It has felt as if God has forced me into it, again and again. In 2001, from the Four Way Synchronicity, to the Jon Ronson TV series/book generating interest in the Cremation Of Care among four of us in the small group here (the most to have a recent common book/film to compare notes on at any time?), to the sudden advent of Kulisz prolifically filling out our detailed knowledge of the horrific psychosexual side of The Holocaust, to the traumas of all the books of the Holocaust Reading List to try to get a grip of some kind of balance on that post-Kulisz. Obviously, these could all be Frozen Accidents but my strong impression is that the Concrete Picture Of Evil just had to be faced on Why.

Let me give the latest example. I announce Why Is Now Closed and appoint four loving "executors" of the last will and testament of Why, people that I felt it would be most restful to share this reflective time and space with. Then, going into town with a Jewish businessman to meet with, I feel an impulse to stop at a bookshop I don't normally visit. There is nothing of interest anywhere it seems ... until I see A Moral Reckoning. Oh no. I had no idea there was a whole book. I'd only seen a tiny one paragraph about DG being critical of Pius XII. Still, I felt absolutely sure that this was why I'd felt led into that shop.

And once I posted, the much-hoped for gentle, quiet life of deep agreement was to escape me once again on Why. It never happens exactly as you hope. We have again to struggle and strive for unity, for friendship, for clarity, for some reasonably well-shaped and readable pages. And this I now see as most valuable in this period, if somewhat schedule-delaying.

It's the same old god of the poor not letting me off the hook, just as he focused me on Listening To Kabili as the new phase started. But these themes just must meet the goodness of God or else all hope dies.

Firstly, there have been the much appreciated questions from James Crook in Why Hast Thou Forsaken Me and Parabolic Explanations. The first utterance (including its context, of course) absolute embodies this whole Dark Themes Meet The Good idea. In the second James, in pulling me back to the parables of Jesus, is concerned that I've been tangentially digressing. Well, I am concerned about that too. The whole of Why has seemed a big digression a lot of the time. Why Has No Center. What do we do about it? Certainly, talk about the relevance of Jesus is key but even in the story of Jesus and in all the theories of how it came to us there are many dark themes. Daniel Goldhagen's Criticism Of The New Testament says so, as do many other people, including renowned first century scholars like Geza Vermes. But the focus on Jesus is key for us. Agreed on that and thanks very much to James for the prompting.

Then there were two instances during this period where God seems to have pointed me in unexpected ways towards more positive, wholesome themes for the future. One was the time I picked up How Children Learn The Meanings Of Words. The second was more involved. I'd wondered for a long time how to summarize the Beliefs Of Bilderberg, trying to answer succinctly but effectively Keith's original questions. Eventually I settled on just two sources, the second being the enlightening 1930s talk of Arnold Toynbee, head of research at Chatham House. Three days later I feel I should pick up a very old book (one I've owned for around 25 years) from the shelf at home, Cameron Townsend's They Found A Common Language. I feel that I should read from page 47 for about ten pages (strange but true). Townsend is talking in the book about bilingual education in the old Soviet Union, in the Caucasus, where he has travelled extensively. In the chapter I land in he's in Armenia. There is this and that and then, suddenly, he is mentioning a visit from Arnold Toynbee to the Jungle Base of the Summer Institute Of Linguistics in Peru, and Toynbee's warm endorsement of the work Townsend started. Wacky.

Then the next day, I look at the Find Page Example Pages. The linguistics theme isn't going to go away. Summer Institute Of Linguistics and How Children Learn The Meanings Of Words stare me in the face. But this is not just about linguistics but about hope, about very different takes on the same people, their plans and aspirations. The negative side of Toynbee revealed in Beliefs Of Bilderberg, if it is negative to deceive and lie to destroy national sovereignty across the world, needs to be faced. But there is always more than one side to the story. I attended SIL back in 1979 and Townsend, despite some naivety about the Soviets, remains one of my global heros of the Christian world in the 20th century. And he comes up with the contact and mention of Toynbee. It is unsettling and it is meant to be. Find Page Example Pages just rubbed in the point.

This is a mess, as explanations go. Raw events, only partially deciphered. Someone may even help me edit it and understand it better one day. -- Richard Drake