congregamus

[congregamus]

I do believe that there is help. Even in spite of the fact that it feels like there is hand around my throat all the time now.

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Current Administration may choose not to communicate the information, but WHO is still providing international and regional updates.

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As awful as everything is, at least I don’t have to put up with my parents gaslighting me. I could have a gun to my head and they would tell me to calm down because it’s not that bad and at the same time encourage me to give thanks that I even got the chance to be alive at all before I get shot.

Fuck that noise, and fuck this situation, too.

[congregamus]

My algorithm is moving me into pr3pp3r stuff, and on the one hand, absolutely. Should have been at least to some degree all along. But also, I get that this is not a good look for one with mental health such as mine. Nonetheless, my completely untreated cptsd is not going to let me rest until I have some basic low-tech shit in case of a large-scale crash-out. Because I have been watching the slow-approach of this tsunami for a long time, and I am not so worried about my optics that it's gonna keep me taking care of myself.

[congregamus]

Pardon my addition, as we don't know each other, but this is very (as we used to say on this site) "relevant to my interests".

First off — totally agree. Christianity in America is fucked beyond repair. But I think your use of the word "America" is an important semantic point, and ought to be the focus of a lot of attention these days. American Mental/Health is fucked. American Economics are fucked. American Democracy is fucked. American Religion is fucked.

Unfortunately, these correspond generally to the categories of life we call the physical, the material, the political, and the spiritual.

That means that there is nothing in the US that has not been stained or even poisoned by the concept of "America", which is, in its current expression, White Supremacy Capitalism-Towards-Technofeudalism.

"America" as a contemporary concept is an echo of the Confederacy and is different from both the physical location of, and the intellectual concept of, "The United States". The concept of "The United States" stands in direct opposition to the concept of "America." Everything "American" is fucked and dying. American Christianity must, too. Christ, however, who has conquered death, will return to us in a Resurrection Body, completely unrecognizable to those without eyes sensitive to such. If we continue to call what we experience in this Resurrection encounter "Christianity" is anyone's guess.

Thank you so much for the original post.

Trumpites are calling the BISHOP who led the prayer service at the inauguration a bunch of nasty things because she was politically neutral, and didn’t fall to her knees and worship their orange deity

Christianity in America is fucked beyond repair I fear

[congregamus]

what's everyone's big three?

mines sag sun, leo moon, aries rising

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[congregamus]

Sometimes it takes me a good 10 minutes after getting home to remember that I don't have to wear my mask anymore. If nothing else, I guess that means that the one I have is pretty comfortable.

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I have returned to my mantra, "What gentleness(es) may I enact today that will destabilize the status quo?"

That's gonna do a lot of heavy lifting for someone who refuses to participate violently.

[congregamus]

I guess I have to round all this ecomonic complaint up with a declaration which is slightly less cryptic than is usually my style: "Ah!" (I said to myself,) "Truly, this is a time ruled by the pentacles."

I think this blog may have existed at the time when I had my deepest reading at a little shop across the Bay in Oakland. I had a good feeling about the reader, so I said, "Start the meter and go as deep as you can. I want to hear what you can tell me."

And when she saw that I was reading along with her, we just started to talk. We had a very good conversation, but I remember so little of it. What I do recall, though, is that she said, "You are not dumb. But you are about the concrete. About material stuff. And that's a choice that, one day, you'll finally stop making when you get tired of banging your head on the concrete."

And so here we are.

[congregamus]

Today was very, very hard. Most days are at least one iteration of hard for me. I won't say it's "how I'm made", but it is "how I tend." I wrote elsewhere,

Sometimes days that start out the worst turn out to be really good. Leaning into that hope. Not gonna blame anyone/anything if it’s just a tough day though.

At the almost-end of it — (I still have an hour-long meeting at 6 PM, and then get to do my long commute home from Evanston after that) — I report that, in spite of not being completely desperate, it was still just a tough day. A good thing, which I acknowledge, happened. That one good thing simply makes the other awful things bearable with a little more humanity. The minute the money hit my account, 1/3 of it got immediately passed along elsewhere, because those payments were already late. And the rest is already called for, too. Practically every penny. Blessedly, it is not called for *exactly at this moment*, but 95% of it's already spent by necessity. After I've attended to that, I have about $50 left with which to "have fun" (read: eat something that tastes better than I can cook for myself) between now and the next time that I stare down this cycle again.

It is disheartening that the only way one is allowed more than subsistence is if one is willing to give so much of oneself away to labor that there's not enough left over to do anything with. (Though it can hardly be called "giving" and ought to be called coersion.) The grace-gift of earth time is apparentlysomething to be exchanged in some way or another on behalf of the body which requires, and this, at least in the system I experience, degrades.

Thank you for reading if you do, and thank you for letting me speak as I need to here. There is, with zero exception, no other place where I feel safe enough to do so than on Tumblr. Not that what I write is necessarily read, but at least it has been articulated semi-publicly instead and isn't transforming into poison within me anymore.

[congregamus]

Big thanks to anyone who read earlier and prayed for me. My direct deposit hit earlier than expected, so I will eat better than “just hummus”tonight lol

[congregamus]

Kind of a perfect metaphorical storm for me at the moment. It is kill-your-ass cold in Chicago, and my place* is so drafty that the Arctic air cannot be fought completely. Add on to that, I have less than $20 in my bank account, and I don’t get paid until tomorrow. Also, I have nothing left in my refrigerator but the hummus** I made this time last week.

*very thankful for that blessing, and yet I have to wear thermals and another layer in my house to keep warm. If I were to try and warm my house in this weather above what the thermostat says is 68° (it’’s not), I will go into real debt with a large bill I *might* get paid off by this time next year.

**very thankful for the hummus too because without it I just wouldn’t eat today.

[congregamus]

I don’t know what to say to the ones (IRL) who are trying to comfort themselves with the mantra “we just have to survive for four years”, because the Nazis aren’t going back in the closet any more than you are, sis. The board is set, and initial moves have been made. We should all act accordingly.

[congregamus]

My neighborhood is made up of a majority of Central American and Asian (Korean) immigrants. This is the mood.

[congregamus]

Yesterday formalized a very difficult collective diagnosis in the US. The Dx does have effective treatment. But the treatment is almost as bad as the status. We may be able to survive, or we may not be able. That is not for us to know. All we can do is drop root into ourselves as much as we can and be nourished from the depths.

I'm sorry, friends. I'm here. I'm not the solution, but I am a part of it, and I will do what I can with what I have as I am able.

[congregamus]

ICE raids are starting on Tuesday in Chicago.

Yell “ICE” and “LA MIGRA” to disrupt them. Notify people and use your privilege as a citizen to make ICE’s job as difficult as possible.

Fascism has been here. It’s just loud now. Time to be loud too.