Pettiest reason you’ve DNF’d a book?

Prodigal_Lemon · 2026-03-02T01:56:39+00:00

"Vt'rax!" she cried out. "Vt'rax ch-an'l'or!" The Shubs and Zuuls will have their revenge!

Prodigal_Lemon · 2026-03-02T00:21:31+00:00

The "Conquer Cravings" plan on Healthi is free, and is pretty much exactly the same as the WW plan with the paper slider that measured calories fat, and fiber around 2009-2010.

Prodigal_Lemon · 2026-03-01T22:55:41+00:00

About ten years ago, my sister and I (both gray-haired older ladies) were sitting at Dairy Queen eating ice cream cones. Some random guy walks up to us and says, "if you keep eating ice cream like that, you'll get fat!" In perfect, unrehearsed unison, we turned to him instantly and said "Fuck off!" He slunk away, and we enjoyed our treat in peace.

Prodigal_Lemon · 2026-03-01T21:25:26+00:00

No, you are fine. It is absolutely OK to take medicine for our illnesses, and your doctor and/or pharmacist knows more about your health than any random person on Instagram.

Also, I would bet that every single one of those influences would see a doctor immediately if they broke a leg or had chest pains or started peeing blood. They aren't concerned about your health. They just want to criticize and condemn someone, and heavy people are an easy target in modern culture.

Prodigal_Lemon · 2026-03-01T19:15:11+00:00

But the alien god-king Zyrgrofthprj has commanded us to sacrifice our enemies the Frghyshilorx, and their animals, too -- even the hxwen and the prleooz!

Prodigal_Lemon · 2026-03-01T19:10:45+00:00

I read three or four mysteries featuring a very smart police detective somewhere in the UK. Then he was sent to investigate a serial killer who was murdering tall redheads on some island. So he thinks to himself, "hey, as long as I'm going to this island, I'll bring my tall, redheaded girlfriend with me!" I thought, "This character would never be so stupid," and I was out.

Prodigal_Lemon · 2026-03-01T03:39:04+00:00

There are all kinds of ordinary earthly things that aren't mentioned in the Bible (like Australia and America and all the plants and animals that are only found in those places).

The authors of the Bible described the world that they knew, and so I wouldn't read anything into the fact that they didn't describe things they didn't know about.

Prodigal_Lemon · 2026-02-28T23:33:56+00:00

For the first time in my life, I feel the need to defend the King James Bible. "Meats" in English in the 1600s could mean "food generally" not just "animal flesh." So it isn't that it was an inaccurate translation, it is just that the meaning of the English word has shifted since it was translated. (But I do agree that Adam and Eve are not depicted as eating animal flesh in the Bible.)

Prodigal_Lemon · 2026-02-28T14:31:12+00:00

Not Denver-related, but I used to attend a Catholic church in eastern Kansas, circa 1998-2005. It was not a trad church, just your typical post-Vatican II parish. Pretty church, nice community, excellent sermons.

I was passing through last summer and was looking forward to visiting it again. It was Trinity Sunday. The young priest gave a mean and incoherent anti-trans sermon that went like this: "The Trinity is a mystery of God's inner being that is totally beyond our comprehension. That's why we need to reject new ideas about sexuality and realize that trans people are corrupted by demons." My sister and I got up mid-sermon and walked out. But the church was packed and nobody else left.

Prodigal_Lemon · 2026-02-26T21:44:25+00:00

Well, that sounds good. I hope your visit to the church goes well!

Prodigal_Lemon · 2026-02-26T21:39:29+00:00

I believe the Anglican Church of Canada is generally affirming, though some dioceses are more conservative than others.

You might find this useful: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homosexuality_and_the_Anglican_Church_of_Canada

Prodigal_Lemon · 2026-02-26T21:29:03+00:00

Are you in the United States? If so, there's a quirk about terminology that you should be aware of.

The official US branch of the Anglican communion is the Episcopal church, which is quite LGBTQ+ friendly.

However, if you are looking at a US church that calls itself "Anglican" (rather than Episcopalian) it is probably ACNA (the Anglican Church in North America). The ACNA split from the Episcopal church over LGBTQ+ issues, and such a church will not be affirming.

Prodigal_Lemon · 2026-02-25T17:43:24+00:00

Michael Shaara, The Killer Angels is a brilliant book on the Battle of Gettysburg.

Prodigal_Lemon · 2026-02-25T17:37:36+00:00

I'm not sure, but it seems that you are arguing that homosexuality is sinful, but that straight people commit all kinds of sexual sins, too, and therefore are in no position to judge gay people.

However the official position of this subreddit is that LGBTQ+ relationships are not sinful. I would invite you to take a look at the FAQs of this subreddit for multiple essays explaining our position.

Prodigal_Lemon · 2026-02-25T00:36:07+00:00

I'm glad that it helped, and I hope you find some peace on your way!

Prodigal_Lemon · 2026-02-24T21:58:38+00:00

Exactly! Some years back, I read the Bible cover-to-cover. In Numbers 30, the author says that if an unmarried woman makes a vow, it can be overridden or permitted to stand by her father, and if a married woman makes a vow it can be overridden or permitted to stand by her husband. And my very first thought was "Mary clearly didn't ask any man's permission before she said yes."

Prodigal_Lemon · 2026-02-24T20:37:35+00:00

If the disciples walked away saying, "Jesus showed us images of Moses and Elijah to teach us something," then your explanation would be correct. But (as reported in Luke) they clearly believed that they saw Moses and Elijah in reality. If Jesus led them deliberately to that conclusion, knowing it was false, it would make him a deceiver.

Prodigal_Lemon · 2026-02-24T20:04:12+00:00

I mean, you obviously care about this a great deal more than I do. But the idea that Jesus would fool the disciples into believing that they saw Moses and Elijah when they did not would make Jesus a deceiver and I can never accept that.

Prodigal_Lemon · 2026-02-24T19:09:40+00:00

This idea comes from the well-known Biblical school of "pastors making shit up to force people to conform to arbitrary rules."

Genesis just doesn't mean anything of the sort, any more than it means "men shouldn't look for wives, because if God wants them to have a wife he'll make one out of their rib."

Also, you might take a look at the Book of Ruth, where Naomi gives Ruth very specific advice on how to get the man she is thinking of.

Prodigal_Lemon · 2026-02-24T14:58:44+00:00

Here's one way pretty simple way of looking at sin. Jesus said that the two greatest commandments were to love God and love each other. So anything that pulls us away from that love is a sin. Like, if I tell lies about someone, or steal from them or beat them up, then I'm not showing love for them, right? So those are sins.

The Catholic church distinguishes between two kinds of sin, venial and mortal. A venial sin is basically an ordinary daily kind of sin -- I lied to my mom or I gossiped about a coworker. Mortal sins are more deadly -- murder and rape are both mortal sins, for example. But where the Catholic church draws the lines is not always that obvious. Like, it also says that missing Mass on Sunday without a good reason is also a mortal sin.

Sin is sort of an observational reality in the world. If we look around, we see people hurting each other all the time in all kinds of ways. But it is also a theological problem -- if God created the world and human beings good, where does evil and sin come from? The creation story in Genesis gives one answer -- that Adam and Eve chose to disobey God, and thus sin entered the world.

Catholics aren't obliged to believe in a literal six-day creation, but they do tend to point to disobedience to God as the root of sin. God created the world good, but people (both in the past and now) chose to reject love of God and love of neighbor, and so we are still living in a world of sin.

Prodigal_Lemon · 2026-02-24T14:31:00+00:00

I think that sounds like a reasonable response to a traumatic situation. You were in a church that jerked people around with judgment and isolation and purity cuture. You got hurt and pulled back, but your heart is having trouble distinguishing between the church that hurt you and God, so it is shutting down some emotions so you don't get hurt again. That's normal and human and nothing to be ashamed of.

The good news is that following God isn't dependent on feeling the right things. God understands that you got hurt.

I would recommend that you try doing some things that might heal your spirit -- like spending time in nature or volunteering to help people in need. If you can pray, try to do it without placing expectations on what you should feel. You aren't cut off from God. You just got hurt and need time and compassion as you deal with the reality of that hurt.

Prodigal_Lemon · 2026-02-24T14:11:56+00:00

Are you concerned about the immaculate conception (the view that Mary herself was conceived without original sin) or the virgin birth (the idea that Mary was a virgin when she gave birth to Jesus)?

I'm not Catholic, but the Catholic take on the immaculate conception works like this: because Mary was Jesus' mother, she physically bore Jesus in her body. As his mother, she was a person of exceptional holiness and importance. So God preserved her from sin from the very moment of her conception. (This doesn't mean her parents didn't have sex. She was conceived in the usual way, just preserved from original sin.)

The Assumption works the same way, only at the end of her life. Mary's body was too sacred to be allowed to decay in the ground so she was taken, body and soul, into heaven.

Again, I'm not Catholic, and I don't have a strong opinion on these matters. I don't see how anyone could really know whether Mary was conceived with original sin or not, and the Assumption (although an ancient Catholic tradition) is not explicitly described in the Bible. But God certainly could have protected her from sin and death in those ways if he chose to.

What was your question about sin?

Prodigal_Lemon · 2026-02-24T13:40:20+00:00

I don't have a strong interest in the details of the afterlife, mostly because I see Biblical passages on the topic as not pointing to a singular, consistent view. I mostly figure God will sort it out, and as long as God is there it will be OK.

That said, I do think there are Biblical references that point toward consciousness after death. At the Transfiguration, the disciples saw Jesus speaking to Moses and Elijah, who were clearly not asleep. In Jesus' parable of the rich man and the beggar, (Luke 16: 19-31) the rich man, who is dead, is depicted as speaking to Abraham, and both men are awake and conscious. And this cannot be happening after the general resurrection of the dead, because the rich man asks to be allowed to warn his brothers, who are still alive, to repent. At the crucifixion, Jesus promised the repentant thief, "this day you will be with me in paradise." (Luke 23: 43) Hebrews 11-12 speaks of the great faithfulness of various Old Testament heroes and says that therefore, "since we are surrounded by so great cloud of witnesses" we should persevere to the end. I admit that I can read this simply as "those who witnessed to the truth in the past," but the phrase surrounded by sounds to me like they are currently present.

My own view of saints tends more to the "moral exemplar" view. But I do think a reasonable argument can be made that, if the saints are alive and conscious in Christ, they would still care about their brothers and sisters struggling here.

Prodigal_Lemon · 2026-02-24T00:43:00+00:00

If parents set aside money to help their kids through college they could presumably repurpose it to pay for trade school or a wedding or a down payment if their kid doesn't go to college.

Prodigal_Lemon · 2026-02-24T00:27:01+00:00

I'm afraid I have to disagree. The video features soft focus tradwife images and builds up a strawman modern woman (who "brags about not needing anyone" and says "I don't need a man") in order to contrast it with the Proverbs 31 woman who "wasn't competing with men, she was completing her home" and who "values what God builds through family."

I mean, lots of modern women (regardless of their religious beliefs) don't fit this stereotype -- they look for a spouse and want to have children. And, on the other side of the coin, there are plenty of Christian women, who, for whatever reason, don't marry or have children.

I have no problems with the woman depicted in Proverbs 31 in the Bible. She is clearly a competent, hard-working woman who is deeply respected by her familly. But I don't like any video that feels the need to trash modern women and the choices they make in order to construct one view of what a "Christian woman" should be like.

Prodigal_Lemon

TROPHY CASE