Month: Jan 2025

The Planets

An actual clear sky for a few hours last night. For reasons I won’t go into for the moment, I could only go out for a few minutes. But I still managed to take a few pics of the planets with my trusty Lumix GF7. I’ve stitched a couple together to try and see the four main ones at once. Not sure how well this will come out on a small screen though.

https://mega.nz/file/A4QmWaaa#ZOBzeOisUxoN_p7JbxjGXdqcOD5-45YTYfusiuhFdq8

Sorry to cut across Mona’s excellent TFTD this morning.

Mona Siddiqui, professor of Islamic studies, New College, University of Edinburgh

UK universities are cutting jobs. Humanities tend to suffer most. The universities are increasingly training colleges rather than centers of learning. But now, more than ever, we need to learn how to think.

https://mega.nz/file/130imbBR#nRWMFC6tIzI6XADwYxJi4otmIyJWqmxbMHvrKaCQPdA

Rev Dr Michael Banner, Dean and Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge

We’re getting a new Silicon Valley between Oxford and Cambridge. This is EXACTLY the same as the feeding of the 5,000. Don’t worry if this is true, although it’s told in all four gospels, and if that isn’t good enough for you then I don’t know what is. All the food is collected and distributed fairly according to Marxist principals, except it’s run be religious people. Communism run by clerics, heaven on earth.

https://mega.nz/file/ovFnxLJA#XLoNAEJDdctbVNW2n8VchW6pCUcyRfcjSEfPlpg-qe4

Ex-Rev Canon Angela Tilby, Christ Church Cathedral Oxford

Gen Z are less likely to be atheists and more positive about the rule of dictators. And what better dictator than the Invisible Magic Friend. He doesn’t instigate endless inquiries, reports and investigations into the consequences. He just orders people to do things, and then threatens them with eternal damnation in everlasting fire if they refuse. Simples.

Gen Z are clearly wise, virtuous and, what is the word, spiritual.

https://mega.nz/file/gqVxxAxY#1k4zBNYqVOWN_skj3YuBhZ4X2waXDkRBBMm4JhgmNeo

Rev Dr Giles Fraser, Vicar of St. Anne’s church Kew

And in the Big News today from a Faith Perspective, Happy St Thomas Aquinas’ Feast Day everybody! Aquinas showed that the Invisible Magic Friend is not a thing. Instead of being a thing, the Invisible Magic Friend is a mystical, metaphysical, indescribable, not thing.

Isn’t theology just brilliant.

I leave you wiser.

https://mega.nz/file/p6cxUTxC#M1BHazFOwovgMmjGddUlB9Wt6yZ17HVt3osXM9Ma5LE