The writing home of David Soliday
It’s been a little more than a year.
I’m now a retired minister.
I’m heading up a creative reuse project, and trying to make the world a better place. I don’t know about the rest of the globe, but signs point to this campus and this small city being a better place because I’m in it.
How about you?
The WordPress mobile app has had several enhancements since the last time I used it.
Here I am.
For me, it’s “Welcome back!” FacilitatingParadox.com was my blog home while I was in seminary from 2003 to 2009. Fortunately, the Internet Archive Wayback Machine has dozens of historic captures of my old site. (When I let the domain registration lapse someone else grabbed it and demanded a lot more money to get it back…)
So, I’m not alone in getting back to blogging. I may still resurrect my EdTech at OWU blog, and there’s definitely one in the works at DUUF.org. But this, and my new Twitter handle, @ParadoxMidwife, are where you’ll find my solid day’s thoughts.
I look forward to the conversations!
This here blog had 1554 unique visitors in March 2004, and out of them 18 added it to their favorites. There was a typo in the February stats—that should have been 1119 unique visitors, not 119. There were 16 posts last month, so my rate of publication is increasing. FP’s top two referrers are sites I’ve never heard of and one is in an oriental language I can’t even read. Across, Beyond, Through is the top referrer that I know is legit. Thank you, Rev. Parker. “Bart Ehrman” continues to be the top search phrase bringing browsers to this site. I hope you find what you’re looking for. It’s still a crawly Amphibian in the TTLB Ecosystem.
For those who missed FP’s April Fools get up, you can still see what you missed here.
Finally, Facilitating Paradox turns a year old on April 12. I’m not sure what I’m going to do for the occasion, but keep an eye out for something special.
While I’ve been busy doing other things, not posting anything to this blog, spammers have been busy posting rude and/or obscene comments to it. I don’t know if they would stop if I posted more often, but they sure are annoying, especially when one spammer posts nearly a dozen comments in one day. If you’re interested in marketing drugs or adult-only web sites, go somewhere else. I have a zero-tolerance policy for offensive comments. Once you post anything not remotely related to my own post, you’re henceforth banned from ever posting comments again. Likewise with email. Any sender that gets marked as ‘junk’ mail will never be seen in my inbox again. The lists of banned IP addresses (prohibited from posting comments to this blog,) and blocked email addresses keep getting longer and longer. I’ve got better things to do with my time.
I thought of a way to advertise my own blog. On the front of a t-shirt this would be printed:
The statement on the back of this t-shirt is true. www.facilitatingparadox.com
On the back, the following:
The statement on the front of this t-shirt is false. www.facilitatingparadox.com
🙂
January traffic was up: 1231 unique visitors, a 21% increase over December. The post of my sermon, “Give Praise!” had the most reads, with “Bart Ehrman on Fresh Air!” coming in second. My papers on YHWH, suicide, UU sacraments, and Sufi Sam were also popular. As in previous months, Google was the top referrer after direct address or bookmark. Oddly enough, the top referring site for January was a Paris Hilton Video blog on Blogspot, but I was unable to find a link, (either hyper or contextual.) “bart ehrman” was the top search keyphrase, and most other search phrases and words had to do with paradox. It’s estimated that 12 visitors added this site to their Favorites last month. Thank you! I also see that FP is now a Flippery Fish in the TTLB Ecosystem. That’s the highest it’s been yet! And now The Truth Laid Bear is offering Java script to automatically keep your own blog updated as to its status in the ecosystem. Watch for that on the FP home page.
Also, stay tuned: I have something special planned for April, to celebrate one year in the blogosphere, and to celebrate another holiday that month.
More features have been added: a blogroll which I’ve just realized that I can use as a portal to all of my favorite blogs, and a “Currently Reading” link with a Powell’s search box below it. Enjoy!
Well, I guess I’ve officially jumped on the bandwagon. I’ve got my own blog…
What turned me on to blogs? Doonesbury has had characters using blogs for some time now. Plus, I like Tom Tomorrow’s web site and keep tabs on the war in Iraq by way of the agonist.org and another blog from a civilian in Kuwait, (which I don’t have handy at the moment.) I’m also familiar with the User Friendly web site, although I really only read the comics there.
I have searched for blogs on Theology in general and Interfaith Theology in particular and have come up empty handed. So I’m going to speak up in the void. I’m a Unitarian Universalist ministerial student attending a Methodist seminary. I spent six years with the Hare Krishna movement, and have practiced Native American spiritual traditions for the last thirteen years or so.
How about some questions to stir things up and test the one thing I’m curious about when it comes to blogs: how much feedback will a little voice like mine generate…
Where and/or when do you most readily experience the presence of God or Divinity or the Majesty of Nature?
If there is a God, is that God compassionate? How/where do you perceive that divine compassion in the world today?
Should religious institutions be involved in politics?
That aught to be enough to stir things up a bit…