We're all carnies, though some people are in denial. They want to be above it all, above the mayhem of laughter and people and lights and animals and the dark sadness that lurks in the coners and beneath the rides and in the trailers after hours. So they ride teh Ferris wheel, and at the top, they think they've left it all behind They've ascended to a place where they can take things seriously. Where they can be taken seriously.

Plato, the first true pope of philosophy (sorry, Socrates), argued for a World of Forms above the reality-a transcendent plane of perfect essences, pure and lovely, where nothing ever gets muddy (including the essence of mud.)

In the Darwinian world, self-preservation is the ultimate shiny good.

May my living be grace to those behind me.

In Bright Shadow: C.S. Lewis on the Imagination for Theology and Discipleship

Narrative living is the beginning of rhetoric.

Do not fear the shadowy places. You will never be the first one there. Another went ahead and down until He came out the other side.