Title: The Precious Blood of Jesus

Medium: Oil on canvas paper

Size: 12in. x 9in.

Only a Sith deals in absolutes

We love you Ren!

There is absolutely not a shred of dramatic development in The Force Awakens, and to be honest, I actually prefer Lucas's first three episodes (I, II, III) with all of their annoying aspects to this boring bag of hashtags. At least even the boring aspects of the first three episodes were embedded in a story that had substantial things and meaning going on and thus were fluid. But this new thing is pure junk: the insider fanbase event of a totally undeveloped, lukewarm porridge of references; the more stocked up it becomes with fan pleasures the more piddling it gets. Even the key revelations and plot points feel like nothing more than baseless references, and play out as such. This is the first major blockbuster to be entirely built out of a hashtag. Or perhaps the first was Jurassic World. George Lucas is absolutely right when he criticizes this movie for its attempt to be retro.

The Force Awakens #TheForceAwakens commits the same sin of Peter Jackson's continuity schemes in the Hobbit movies, which instead of completing, continuing, developing or adding to what previously occurred (in the LOTR films) rather acted as forms of violence to what previously occurred. For instance, Darth Vader's half melted helmet that Ren keeps as a sort of heirloom centerpiece for his meditating on the dark side of the force. Leaving aside the fact that Luke Skywalker would have seen to it that the helmet along with any other metal articles was destroyed, since that would logically go along with the whole purpose of cremating his father's remains - what stands out from this is the fact that - you know - Darth Vader was redeemed, you idiots. In the villains' parlance, you might say he was a traitor to the dark side of the force. Word would have been spread through the republic how Vader threw Emperor Palpatine over the rails. Which one could say is pretty significant in terms of being a traitor to the dark side. Even if one would argue - argue very poorly I should add - that Ren wasn't made aware of this, which would be impossible, or that still knowing this he claimed the remains to help channel, if only to serve as a soothing trinket, the dark side from when Vader was strong with the dark side of the force, it still doesn't work. Why? Well, because, in a word, the movie is using the visage of Darth Vader as a symbolic emblem for the continuation of the dark side into the present story, when Vader was a distinctive player in the discontinuation of the dark side. It's not only baseless. It's stupid. It feels like some dad whose kids are big Star Wars fans but who himself never watched the films but was acquainted with certain facts about the films - such as Luke Skywalker is a Jedi knight and Darth Vader is the big bad villain and so forth - was called upon to write the script.

Of course, that "dad" is Disney. LOL. Some would call this "fan fiction". Well, I just call it profiteering by huge corporations who gear the projected "event" of the movie into the making of the art (in which case it is very poor art) in order to make money. This is why I say it is entirely built out of a hashtag. Even the title of the movie doesn't make much sense. The force awakens? Huh? But I thought the force is everywhere and in everything. You mean the dark side of force awakens? Or the light side of the force awakens? Both? But it was never really asleep, clearly. The title is baseless, in that it derives entirely from the "event" of the Star Wars movie being released. The new Star Wars Movie Awakens. That's basically what the title means.

This is Star Wars Disnified. It's actually kind of hitting the nail on the head for George Lucas to have made the “I sold them to the white slavers that takes these things, and…” remark, what with Disney's very obvious thumb marks of political correctness all over this film, which is a form of ideological colonization. You might say Disney is the new ideological colonizer, and the release of this movie is a sort of ideological colonization? Is it only me who felt that the "breaking the box office records" was totally fake? By that I don't mean the box office records weren't for real, but that that was the entire point of the making of the film and, moreover, that people kind of knew it? If one could consider the artist-filmmakers of yore, like Lucas, as the "shrinking middle class" of the film world (LOL), the corporations are enslaving us through films that are utterly politically correct, and which are pre-written as film events, before they are actually written, for us to fill in and break that box office record. It gives me the creeps.

I agree with the late Sir Alec Guinness's remark about the Force being "fairytale rubbish", but even then, in the first six episodes there was still this notion of "graduation". It was an entire story arch completed before Luke could even get that light saber out of the snow/ice on Hroth in The Empire Strikes Back, and only then after really having to apply himself. His first significant foray into harnessing the force was a mere deflection of a little laser blast from a hovering mini droid with the eye shield down.

This notion of graduation was only reinforced by the moral danger of getting ahead of oneself and how it can, and will, lead to the dark side; such as we saw with Anakin Skywalker. Here in #TheForceAwakens we have the young girl self-discovering that she has Jedi abilities, on the spot as it were, and in a matter of minutes is doing the same inimitable feats that the wizened Obi-Wan Kenobi does in episode IV, where he tells the storm troopers you don't need to see our identification and we can move along and so forth. She does this after a couple of tries. Not to mention earlier deflecting Ren's psychic interrogations. Uhm, okeedokee then. Watching these scenes I was like, "What is this, freaking Harry Potter or something? Because it's certainly not Star Wars". Absolutely ridiculous.

And the humour: some of it was funny, but not in the spirit of Star Wars. The humour is more in the spirit of Spaceballs.

Something else I did not like was the light sabers. Ren's is more like a "fire saber"?

Some may say, "Paul, you hate CGI; then surely you would love #TheForceAwakens?" Well, I would love to love it, but I didn't. It only goes to show that the essence of any art does not lie in its object end, but in its subject.

People talk way too much about art as an object to be attained, rather than as a subject to be occupied.

This harpsichord concerto is absolutely awesome

Marvelous and brilliant.

I love the violinist's face at 5:07. He's like, "Shit, you have the tough part." LOL.

Or perhaps you need to listen to the finale of The Copernican:




Or just listen to the entire symphony.

Astonishingly beautiful.

As one youtube comment put it for Songs are Sung:

"gorecki s music excellent!!!! the 3rd symphony has been over played this is excellent!!!!"

Exactly.

A Scandal for Justice

Mercy is no fleeting sentiment, but rather the synthesis of the joyful Good News, a choice and decision on the part of all who desire to put on the “Heart of Jesus” and to be serious followers of the Lord who has asked us to “be merciful even as your heavenly Father is merciful” (Mt 5:48; Lk 6:36). In the words of Father Ermes Ronchi, “Mercy is a scandal for justice, a folly for intelligence, a consolation for us who are debtors. The debt for being alive, the debt for being loved is only repayable by mercy”. --Pope Francis' Christmas Greeting to the Roman Curia

By shadows they fed, below the wood's hood,
noses out of eaves, never straying from them.

Aware to the watcher, tranquility arrested;
they fled within, as disclosed fish strike for the depths.

Yet one walked out to watch the watcher.
Saplings from his head upon a raised neck.

The family now ensconced in the dark matter
he levelly stared like one not satisfied

until fully amending his unawares,
by reciprocating your eye for eye.

Mercy before Justice

"By experiencing the tenderness and pardon of the Lord, the penitent is more easily led to acknowledge the gravity of sin, is more resolved to avoid it in order to remain and grow in renewed friendship with him." --Pope Benedict XVI,  To The Confessors Who Serve In The Four Papal Basilicas Of Rome

Mark Mallett writes in a meditation entitled Just Enough:

"The same Jesus whose apologetics could silence the Pharisees suddenly became silent Himself. The Jesus who could pass through angry mobs now stood condemned before Pilate. The Jesus who raised the dead could now barely pick Himself up to carry His Cross. The Jesus whose hands healed the sick were now helplessly fastened to the wood. The Jesus whose tongue cast out demons was now soundly mocked by them. And the Jesus who calmed the roaring waves now lay lifeless in a tomb." ...

..."You, my dear brothers and sisters, are being called into this 'little flock of believers'. But if you are looking to the nostalgia of yesterday, the glorious Church of the past, the strength of yore, then you will not find it, for the glory of tomorrow will be as different as the wounds of Christ’s resurrected body were from His crucified flesh." --Mark Mallett, Just Enough

Sing to the Lord a new song for He has done marvelous things

"...We have to put mercy before judgment, and in any event God’s judgement will always be in the light of his mercy. In passing through the Holy Door, then, may we feel that we ourselves are part of this mystery of love, of tenderness. Let us set aside all fear and dread, for these do not befit men and women who are loved. Instead, let us experience the joy of encountering that grace which transforms all things. ..."

"...as we pass through the Holy Door, we also want to remember another door, which fifty years ago the Fathers of the Second Vatican Council opened to the world. This anniversary cannot be remembered only for the legacy of the Council’s documents, which testify to a great advance in faith. Before all else, the Council was an encounter. A genuine encounter between the Church and the men and women of our time. An encounter marked by the power of the Spirit, who impelled the Church to emerge from the shoals which for years had kept her self-enclosed so as to set out once again, with enthusiasm, on her missionary journey. It was the resumption of a journey of encountering people where they live: in their cities and homes, in their workplaces. Wherever there are people, the Church is called to reach out to them and to bring the joy of the Gospel, and the mercy and forgiveness of God. After these decades, we again take up this missionary drive with the same power and enthusiasm. ..." --From Pope Francis' homily on the inauguration of the Year of Mercy

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