#stoticluxury

[digitalmp3]

Hey can I request Women who look like you by JP saxe?

here you go!!

#ask #request #stoticluxury

[apenitentialprayer]

@stoticluxury asked: what is the purpose of [Fools for Christ]? Well, there are two ways of answering, I think. The first, from the perspective of the individual fool; and second, by looking at what this phenomenon as a whole can teach believers. Individually, the Fool for Christ is engaging in one particular form of the larger Christian tradition of asceticism. The practice of self-denial and the mortification of the ego has been an essential part of Christian practice pretty much since the beginning; some practices are more extreme than others, though. This seems to be a way to ensure that the Fool does not have a great standing in the eyes of their contemporaries, so that what they do can be said to be purely for God, without the desire of fame and admiration that can come from more traditional forms of pietistic life. If prostitutes are more likely to enter into the Kingdom of Heaven than smug religious leaders, this is one way (albeit a bizarre way) of ensuring they are more like those prostitutes than those religious who are clouded by pride; it’s easier to remember your littleness in the world when everyone is ruthlessly considering you to be of little worth. From the larger perspective, Fools for Christ are uncomfortable reminders of two truths. First, wisdom and success in the eyes of God do not always appear as they do to the eyes of the world. God’s revelation has caused a transvaluation, a reordering of priorities and values to those who accept His call. Worldly success takes a back seat in our goals in life, and might even need to be reviled as a failure. Second, they remind us that holiness can and will be found in the lowly, in the grotesque, in the unrespectable; that the image and spirit of God can be alive and well in figures that society rejects, because God does not reject as society rejects. An encounter with any person is an encounter with God, even those who we perhaps would consider scandalous. Is Foolery for Christ extreme? Yes, absolutely. Are Fools for Christ kind of embarrassing? Yes, that’s the point. But maybe in a society that’s divided into people who see Christianity as absurd superstition and people who seek to prove Christianity is totally compatible with what the world values, we might need some absurdly holy clowns to point us towards their Divine Ringmaster.

#Christianity #asceticism #Fools for Christ