There are still faint glimmers of civilization left in this barbaric slaughterhouse that was once known as humanity.

The fourth season of Stranger Things, but instead of “Running Up That Hill,” it’s “Like A Surgeon” by Weird Al.

“It’s my hope that A Parley with Youth will give parents a new perspective on the role that teachers can and should play for students, and that teachers also see this role as an agreeable possibility. Of all my accomplishments as a teacher, the one I’m most proud of is the significant number of former students with whom I remain in contact, some from the very beginning of my career. Students rightly determine that teachers who flatter them aren’t worth staying in touch with—it’s not the teachers who say, “So, I think there’s some interesting things going on in Drake’s ‘Hotline Bling,’ but tell me what you like about this song,” that students come back to see after they head off to college. When the temptations of the world fall heavy on nineteen-year-olds, and their own moral failures begin to accrue interest, it’s the teachers who told them, “Drake sucks, man,” that students return to for advice.”

-my latest for CiRCE is about A Parley with Youth, my latest book

“While the lines of competition are drawn between nations, watching the Olympic Games tends to produce a remarkable balance between love of one’s own people and love of others. The first sort of love seems to easily segue into the second. When watching, I intuitively pull for the United States, but I find myself easily won over to charismatic athletes from other countries. In distinguishing athletes by nation, the Games ask us to humbly marvel at the fact that people unlike ourselves are capable of besting us. What is more (what is wonderful), the Games often invite us to relish the fact others can best us. The athletes themselves lead viewers in this. When competition is properly framed, even losers feel they have contributed to the revelation of something transcendent, profitable; this revelation helps calm the tumult which attends loss.”

-read more here

Last year’s corporate slogan:

This year’s corporate slogan (for the Olympics):

Just something about “winning.” Go back and forth between the generous and the selfish at will. It’s all the same.

This is just how corporate virtues work, though. LinkedIn word salad. Diversity then excellence, teamwork then individualism, sophistication then agrarianism, Dionysus then Apollo…

Most classical Christian schools have never entirely sorted out whether they want Bible classes or theology classes.

“Bible class” has become a bit of a catch-all term, much like “Bible study.” I regularly hear students say they go to a “Bible study” where they are reading some lately published memoir about overcoming trauma. It is understandable they refer to such events as “Bible studies”, though, because even “Bible studies” which feature open Bibles rarely include Bible study. Instead, a brief passage from one of St. Paul’s letters is read—it might take sixty seconds or so—and then students share what they think the passage means for about half an hour. In this way, a study of Galatians, a study of a Lauren Daigle song, and the study of an Ann Voskamp book all basically turn into the same thing.

At the Minneapolis airport.

I was supposed to be home three days ago, but I’m smack dab in the middle of the Delta meltdown. On Saturday night, my flight from Minneapolis to Boise was delayed from 10pm to 12:30am, then to 2:00am, then to 3:00am, then it was cancelled. I would estimate that a thousand people slept on the airport floor that night–surreal. I was put on standby for a 10am flight to Spokane, but that flight was cancelled, as well. Since Sunday morning, I’ve been at the Radisson Blu in the Mall of America.

I’m scheduled for a 10:30pm flight tonight, but I’m not hopeful. There are three Delta flights from Minneapolis into Spokane today. The first has been delayed three times, the second has been cancelled, and the last one is the one I’m scheduled for. Not an auspicious start to the day.

I’ve never seen corporate incompetence on this level before.

If you’ve read any of the news stories about the meltdown, you know the problem isn’t lack of planes, but lack of staff.

The reason my flight on Saturday was cancelled was because Delta was one flight attendant short of the legal minimum to board. The plane was there, we could all see it, and we all watched two pilots and two flight attendants check in at the gate then head to the lounge to wait. The departure time kept getting delayed in the hope that another flight attendant could be found.

Four days later, this same problem persists.  Delta simply can’t find it’s own employees.

I’ve read a few early think pieces on the matter, and it looks like this will cost Delta at least a billion dollars, although it could be substantially higher depending on what fines the Transportation Department imposes. The federal government stuck Southwest with a $140m penalty for a similar disruption in service years ago.

What if grade inflation is actually a pretty serious sin? What if grade inflation is the defrauding of the public–like counterfeiting or pimping, which Dante consigned to the eighth circle of hell?