<i>it seems like a <i>genuine miracle</i> and a direct response to an unuttered prayer.</i>
Prayers may go unspoken aloud, but God knows what's in our hearts; no prayer is unuttered. So, boys and girls, be careful of what you wish--you might get it.
And a comment on your larger thesis:
<i>At the end of the First Battle of the Marne, it was too soon to tell who would emerge victorious from the Great War, but not too soon to say that no one’s initial objectives— be they to chasten Germany in a jolly war that would be over before Christmas, or to ensure security for the German Reich....</i>
It's not only time that interferes with our ability to say what an outcome will be. Also interfering with the accuracy of those predictions is the falseness of the going-in proposition(s)--here, for instance, that it would be a quick (and fun!--geez) war, or that any war makes any nation secure for all time--rather than just driving the wolves from the door, or even the local part of the forest for a time.
I'd actually written that God, by definition being omniscient, knows full well what I'd like to happen to my Visa card debt. But I took that passage out on the grounds that the newsletter was already too long ... in any event, congratulations: Yours was the First Inevitably Interesting Comment! Welcome!
Ah--no basic HTML tags here. Still, I'll likely screw that up; some blog facilities allow them; others don't, and I don't waste neurons on tracking which is which.
From the Eric Hines school of theology:
<i>it seems like a <i>genuine miracle</i> and a direct response to an unuttered prayer.</i>
Prayers may go unspoken aloud, but God knows what's in our hearts; no prayer is unuttered. So, boys and girls, be careful of what you wish--you might get it.
And a comment on your larger thesis:
<i>At the end of the First Battle of the Marne, it was too soon to tell who would emerge victorious from the Great War, but not too soon to say that no one’s initial objectives— be they to chasten Germany in a jolly war that would be over before Christmas, or to ensure security for the German Reich....</i>
It's not only time that interferes with our ability to say what an outcome will be. Also interfering with the accuracy of those predictions is the falseness of the going-in proposition(s)--here, for instance, that it would be a quick (and fun!--geez) war, or that any war makes any nation secure for all time--rather than just driving the wolves from the door, or even the local part of the forest for a time.
Eric Hines
I'd actually written that God, by definition being omniscient, knows full well what I'd like to happen to my Visa card debt. But I took that passage out on the grounds that the newsletter was already too long ... in any event, congratulations: Yours was the First Inevitably Interesting Comment! Welcome!
So--where's my prize for being first into the breach? A lifetime supply of mint chocolate chip ice cream would be adequate.
Eric Hines
Ah--no basic HTML tags here. Still, I'll likely screw that up; some blog facilities allow them; others don't, and I don't waste neurons on tracking which is which.
Eric Hines