10 ’Av 5768: Even more H. P. Lovecraft stuff

Greetings.

Note: The fast on the 9th of ’Av used to last two whole days, but it was reduced to just one for health reasons. Still, some of the sadness of the Three Weeks and the Nine Days lingers today. And I would like to urge people, again, to consider doing something to confront real-life horrors that still haunt our world rather than merely cease moping as if everything bad that has happened to the Jewish people in particular and humanity in general were over. One person may only be able to do so much to change the World, but lots of people trying to change the World can have a huge impact. That is why, for instance, I have worthy causes of the day. One signature on a petition means very little, but many signatures are something that politicians ignore at their own peril.

Worthy cause of the day: “Bring Justice to Victims of Rape in California”.

Relevant to Divine Misconceptions:

1. “Border guards turn away church group aiming to picket bus victim's funeral”: To review: The Westboro Baptist Church is a group which is infamous for picketing funerals of soldiers (until now only American), claiming “the deaths are… God's punishment for the country's tolerance for homosexuality”, a connection for which they have no solid theological proof. In this case, the Westboro Baptist Church intended “to picket the funeral of 22-year-old Tim McLean to tell Canadians his slaying on July 30 was God's response to Canadian policies enabling abortion, homosexuality and adultery.” This is also theologically unproven and is likely wrong. Now, I am all for freedom of speech, but keep in mind that freedom of speech is not the freedom to make others listen or force others to accept one’s views, nor is it the freedom to force others to aid and abet one’s speech. I applaud Canada for refusing to aid and abet such theologically dubious hate speech, and I applaud everyone who planned to take part in a counter-protest and exercise their own freedom of speech to decry attacking the innocent.
   
2. “W.Va. offers licenses for those who fear 'beast'”: If anyone has any information on how digital photographs are supposed to be “the mark of the Beast”, please let me know. I really hate it that news articles usually skip actual scriptural proofs that might be enlightening.

Today’s news and commentary:

• “Weak Dollar”
  
• “Palestinians Get Off Scot Free”
  
• “Do they really think the earth is flat?”
  
• “Researchers Crack Medeco High-Security Locks With Plastic Keys”
  

Due to the nature of today, I will conclude my Lovecraft series with two sites where one can find plenty of other stories of his which I have not covered:  “An H. P. Lovecraft Anthology” and the more complete “The Works of Howard Phillips Lovecraft”. If you seek horror, forget Lovecraft; horror movies have desensitized many of us to his work. However, his work is cited in some of the core literature of LaVeyan Satanism (The Satanic Bible and The Satanic Ritual), there is a Lovecraftian occultism movement which sees these stories as not mere fiction, and there is some evidence of influence on the theology of the Buffyverse; as such, these stories may be of some interest to students of religious history and epistemology.

Up for tomorrow: Something non-Lovecraftian.

Aaron