During Louisville’s Elite Eight win over Duke, on their way to a National Championship, Kevin Ware experienced what is probably the most gruesome injury ever broadcast on live television. If you were watching, you’ll know what I’m talking about, and if you weren’t…there’s really no way to describe it. It will suffice to say that broken bone was visible through skin, and men young and old were immediately moved to tears at the sight. Everyone, coaches, players, and referees, instinctively moved away from Ware, horrified by his injury. Only one person, Ware’s Louisville teammate Luke Hancock, went the other way.…
Can You Boo a Player to Greatness?
The Toronto Raptors’ Andrea Bargnani, the number 1 overall pick in the 2006 NBA Draft, is having a terrible season. So terrible, in fact, that he’s being loudly booed by his home fans. Check out this quote from Zach Lowe of Grantland.com: “Bargnani has been obscenely horrible on both ends since his return from injury, to the point that [head coach] Dwane Casey is sneaking him into home games after timeouts so that fans don’t have a chance to boo the Italian big man at the scorer’s table.” Bargnani’s case is certainly not unique; under-performing players…
Royce White on the Human Condition
Royce White is a great basketball player. He led his Iowa State team in every major statistical category as a sophomore and was a lottery pick in last year’s NBA Draft, all while suffering from a serious anxiety disorder. He’s currently in the throes of trying to work out a mental health protocol with the Houston Rockets (the team that drafted him) so that he can feel comfortable playing. White was recently interviewed by Chuck Klosterman for Grantland.com, and had some very revealing things to say.
CK: Well, then what’s the lowest level of mental illness? What is the least problematic…
A New Jeremy Lin Already?
There’s a Chinese player at Virginia’s Oak Hill Academy (a school famous for producing NBA talent such as Kevin Durant, Carmelo Anthony, Rajon Rondo and Josh Smith) named Chris Tang. He toiled in total obscurity until those magical nights last winter when “Linsanity” struck New York. Now, good luck finding his name anywhere on the internet without an attendant mention of Jeremy Lin. Tang has been labelled, for better and worse, “the next Jeremy Lin.”
It’s better for Tang now because his profile is exponentially higher. He has a much greater chance of attracting the attention of major college recruiters and NBA…
America / Everyday / Film / Identity / Music / News / Politics / Psychology / Relationships / Sports / Technology / Theology / TV
Five Golden…Themes! What We Just Couldn’t Get Enough of in 2012
One of Mockingbird’s most distinctive features is the repetition. Like Christmas itself, we’re trying to point that one “old, old story,” that ancient theme, as we see it dug up time and again. It’s dug up in all sorts of places, of course, from 18th century poetry archives to slasher films, from church basements to top-tier corporate office towers. But it’s still resonating a singular focus–the Gospel–from these unforeseen, albeit obscure, sources.
Despite the wide-spanning scopes and intentions of some of our favorite “news” sources, the same thing unwittingly tends to happen. After all, reporting the news means telling and retelling…
Books / Film / Humor / Poetry / Politics / Psychology / Relationships / Religion / Social Science / Week In Review
Another Week Ends: Post-Election Meekness and Melodrama, Googlepoetics, Psychopathic Stories, DFW Exists, The Testament of Mary, Episode VII, and Skyfall
1. Definitely not the easiest week to write this column. The Interwebs, as one might have predicted, have been consumed by I-Told-You-So’s and The-End-Is-Nigh’s, neither of which are a whole lot of fun–at least not from the standpoint of grace. Who knows, maybe you found yourself staying away from screens altogether this week, biding your time until the sanctimony and self-pity dissipated a little…. Maybe you took the opportunity to read the new DFW collection, catch up on Bob’s Burgers, change an ungodly number of diapers, and possibly delve a bit deeper into the unreleased work of The Rolling Stones.…
America / Forgiveness / Identity / Interviews / Music / News / Politics / Psychology / Science / Sports / Technology / Week In Review
Another Week Ends: F. Scott FitzDylan, Dormroom Surrender, Self-Fulfilling Paranoia, Caveman Vulnerability, Campaign Boredom, More Olympics and Air Conditioning
1) The New Yorker recently released a very good (and very short) story from none other than F. Scott Fitzgerald, called “Thank You for the Light.” A “pretty, somewhat faded woman of forty,” a midwestern corset saleswoman, she cannot find a place to smoke a cigarette away from judgmental eyes. She is becoming desperate and in her desperation she finds, yes, a church. A small sampling here, but be sure to take the extra five minutes and read the whole thing here.
And to herself she was thinking, If I could just get three puffs I could sell old-fashioned whalebone.
She had…
America / Books / Everyday / Identity / Law / Money / Psychology / Science / Sports / Technology / TV
Another Week Ends: Fans and Debtors, Reverse Psychology, Brooks on Merit Power, Batman and Walter White, Spousal Surveillance and Christian Technology
1. From The Atlantic comes “Why Being an Obsessed Soccer Fan Can Make You Really, Really Happy,” a look into the camaraderie of fandom–which seems simple enough–but not only does fandom give purpose and an unusual chance to breach the confines of self-interest, it also provokes inclusion by way of exclusivity. People have the opportunity, despite their level of fandom, to be fans, together—to identify with something that’s not themselves, together.
The Penn State Nittany Lions Paternoville “White Out”
Trying to rationalize fandom can be a complicated, even futile process. But studies by psychologists have shown that identifying yourself with a…
Church / Fashion / Film / Identity / Interviews / Music / Psychology / Religion / Social Science / Theology / Week In Review
Another Week Ends: Moral Dieting, Self Illusions, Craig Sager’s Suits, Superhero Saints, LIBERATE, Prometheus, Drive-In Church, and MJ’s Bad
1. We’ve given him a rest for a few months, but the break is over! David Brooks wrote an another incisive column for The NY Times this week, “The Moral Diet,” reflecting on Dan Ariely’s new book on dishonesty. Brooks isn’t afraid to cast the research in historical-religious terms; indeed, the shift in Western self-perception, from fundamentally bad to fundamentally good, is one of his favorite subjects. But in this column he also touches on our proclivity for self-justification, questioning the unquestioned assumption that a good life is simply one where the good outweighs the bad, i.e. where the moral/political/achievement…
I’m Just Like Pele… Except I’m Terrible at Soccer
Brian Phillips is a writer for Bill Simmons’ sports and pop-culture website Grantland.com. His writing is gorgeous. Last year, he wrote several articles about Roger Federer that include some of the most lyrical sports writing I’ve read in a long time. The other day, he wrote an article about Pele (likely the greatest soccer player of all time) on the occasion of Pele’s critical comments about Lionel Messi (likely the greatest soccer player playing today).
But then part of Pele’s post-career shtick is that any high praise given to another player in his presence is a boorish deviation from the continuous…
America / Film / Grace in Practice / Law / Music / Psychology / Relationships / Religion / Social Science / Theology / TV / Week In Review
Another Week Ends: Indie Law, The New Marriage Killer, Futurizing Fear, Apatheism, Damsels in Distress, George Lucas and Downton Abbey
1. In his short article “The Pitfalls of Indie Fame” on Grantland, Chuck Klosterman captures something we have been trying to say on here forever. Don’t be put off by all the music jargon; he is using the critical success of the tUnE-yArDs debut record as an opportunity to reflect on the cruelty of the Law. Which may be particularly pronounced in the indie world (or any rarified/snobby setting for that matter), but the phenomenon is universal. The human relationship to righteousness is a troubled one, love/hate at best, and it finds expression in every possible arena. And while non-religious…
America / Books / Christmas / Forgiveness / Humor / Literature / Psychology / Relationships / Social Science / Sports / TV / Week In Review
Another Week Ends: Generous Marriages, Creative Cheaters, Converted Grinches, Tebow Haters, Twilight Zone Xmases, Gracious Police and Walter
1. Some new research on the importance of generosity in marriage and relationships has been making the rounds this week, and the soundbites are amusing in their captain-obvious-ness. Generosity here being very close to what we would call grace, and the relational dynamic it characterizes being one that by and large does away with scorekeeping, exposing egalitarian notions of the 50-50 split as the recipe for resentment that they often are (100-100 being the happier and, ironically, less legalistic ideal). The research also implicitly condemns models of relating based on self-fulfillment rather than self-sacrifice. Go figure! Of course, knowing what’s…
Another Week Ends: Zombied Church, The Hill and Wood, Full Eyes, Soda Bans, (The Paradox of) Dysfunctional Families, Joe Pa and Scandal Love
1) Something’s in the water at The Atlantic lately, because inspired after inspired article seems to be finding its way into the proverbial stream, including an intriguing article about tv show The Walking Dead‘s “Come-to-Jesus Moment.” As the review is aware (and mind you, if you’re not caught up on the show, spoilers), it’s certainly a dissatisfying presentation of faith’s power in crisis, but it has a lot to say about the human compulsions to lean on something in hard times, and the ease of and inevitable infidelity of that leaning becoming a leaning on one’s self. In a hellish…
Addiction / Film / Law / Music / News / Religion / Social Science / Sports / Theology / TV / Week In Review
Another Week Ends: Horton on Legalism, Atheist AAs, Oprah, Irene Relief, Star Wars, Beach Boys, John Luther & Teenage Wastelands
1. Hopefully you got a chance to read our recent e-newslettter. We made a number of announcements about upcoming events and projects, including our next Spring Conference in NYC, which will happen from April 19-21, 2012, and at which none other than Michael Horton has agreed to be our keynote speaker! Needless to say, we are super excited. For those of you unfamiliar with Dr. Horton, our friend Tullian Tchividjian has posted a superb four-part interview with him over at The Gospel Coalition, in which the distinction between the Law and the Gospel is hashed out at considerable length, among…
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