Discerning an Interfaith Eremitic World Federalist Blogging Vocation with a Psychiatric Disability

6:15 AM Friday. I've been digging into Islam since Wednesday night. I've also been concerned about the continued government shutdown, Judge Talwani's upcoming decision on a SNAP injunction, the Hurricane Melissa damage assessment, a potential breakdown in the Gaza Ceasefire, and the escalation of nuclear tensions between Putin and Trump, including the resumption of US nuclear testing. I kept a 1-hour Zoom appointment for the fourth and final October class with Rabbi Paul Saal from the Messianic Jewish Theological Institute at 7 PM yesterday, but otherwise I was preoccupied with Islamic studies and didn't pray, plan, blog, exercise, eat properly, or attend to my hygiene very well. Today I will do my best to get back on track. Here is my schedule for 2025 Day 304: Prayer, Daily Planning, and Religious Reading in Islamic Studies from 5 AM to 6:15 AM. Blog Work from 6:15 to 7 AM. Hygiene, Breakfast and Grocery List Preparation from 7 to 8:15 AM. Bring Mom to Her MRI Appoint...

4:28 PM Wednesday. I have decided to spend the next twelve months or so with a deep dive into Islamic studies. But I am a little worried that my current set of Islamic studies authors may be too apologetic with respect to Islam and not critical enough to help me understand what the American and European right is truly thinking about clash and dialogue between Islamic, Jewish, and Christian civilizations.  The current flashpoint of my consideration is Robert Spencer's Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam (And the Crusades) . Is it Islamophobic hate speech, or protected right-wing political speech? It doesn't look like the book is banned as hate speech in Norway, but would be welcomed as a text in a critical Norwegian university seminar along the following lines: Source:  https://share.google/aimode/sKomoGeLYlqh6jlf1   I am thinking Spencer's Guide could be a helpful right-wing polemical counterpoint to Polk's  Crusade and Jihad: The Thousand-Year War between the Musl...

7:00 AM Tuesday. I've been digging into the root causes of the looming November 2025 SNAP freeze since Monday night. I've also been keeping an eye on Hurricane Melissa, the Gaza Ceasefire, and Putin's nuclear-powered missile test. I kept a 2-hour Zoom appointment with Craig Wescoe and the Vegan Christian Discipleship School at 2 PM yesterday (see  Was God Pleased by the Aroma of Burnt Offerings? Swords to Plowshares ), but I was so preoccupied with my SNAP research I didn't pray, plan, blog, exercise, eat properly, or attend to my hygiene very well. Fortunately, I got to sleep early and woke up early this morning feeling back on track. Here is my schedule for 2025 Day 302. Prayer, Daily Planning, and Religious Reading in Küng's Islam: Past, Present and Future and The Study Quran from 3:15 AM to 6 AM. Therapy from 6 to 7 AM. Blog Work from 7 to 9:30 AM. Walk and Flu Vaccination from 9:30 to 11 AM. Lunch, Office Work, and Nap from 11 AM to 2 PM. Blog Work from 2 to ...

4:35 PM Monday.  I should be doing my strength training right now, but I noticed a text from the New York State Office of Temporary and Disability Assistance about an impending November 2025 SNAP freeze as I was shuttling my mom out the door for her eye surgery. I spent all of my time in the eye clinic waiting room researching the issue, and when I finally got my mom home, I wasn't able to focus on my strength training because of my emotions. I went for a short walk to try and warm-up, but I couldn't stop thinking about the SNAP freeze. Here is my Google Gemini research thread from the waiting room: https://share.google/aimode/VotNoYDatglawrDbE   I depend on SNAP for my food expenses, and I don't have enough of a reserve in my SNAP account to make it all the way through November. I've been doing so well with my diet lately - actually eating some fresh produce every day, with help from the Honest Weight Food Coop's participation in the NYS Double Up Bucks program - a...

10:11 AM Monday. Over this past weekend, I made the conceptual change from Christian Zionism - including the minimalist Catholic version pioneered by Gavin D'Costa - to Abrahamic Two-State Zionism. Now I need to make some additional Q4 2025 course corrections. First and most importantly, I will no longer attempt to focus my Two-State Zionism project on a Monday morning time slot. That degree of productivity theme-day specificity has not been working well for me, despite repeated attempts to structure my time into theme days since January 2022. I have learned that there are some weeks when I spend several days diving deep into the two-state crisis, and there are other weeks when I give it much less attention. God rarely seems to restrict my concern for two-state research to a Monday morning. Procedurally, then, what I will attempt to do moving forward is write a Two-State Zionism blog entry whenever I have enough time and feel a strong enough need to add something to the global conv...

6:00 AM Monday. Here is my plan for 2025 Day 300. Prayer from 4:15 AM to 6 AM. Blog Work (with Breakfast) from 6 AM to 11 AM. Lunch, Nap, Bring Mom to Eye Surgeon, and Strength Training from 11 AM to 5 PM. Supper and Personal Hygiene from 5 PM to 6 PM. Kindle Reading in  Crusade and Jihad: The Thousand-Year War between the Muslim World and the Global North by William R. Polk from 6 PM to 8 PM. Sleep from 8 PM until 5 AM Tomorrow. And here is a summary of key blog changes I have made over the past few days. A. Mission I've changed the title of this blog to "Discerning an Abrahamic Eremitic Blogging Vocation with a Psychiatric Disability." I still believe in the saving power and transformational global significance of Jesus's ministry, but I am no longer discerning a specifically Christian denominational identity. I believe it is more accurate to say that I am now discerning an Abrahamic eremitic blogging vocation that is informed by Judaism, Christianity, and Islam wi...

4:03 PM Friday. I spend a fair amount of time keeping up with geopolitics, primarily but not exclusively as it relates to Israel. It is too much time on current affairs for me to become a diocesan Catholic hermit, to be sure, but maybe not too much time for me to become an independent Abrahamic hermit with a call to intellectual work in political theology: https://share.google/aimode/iyCBJfTtELUKtVeS1     Without digging deep into the roots of my sinful political curiosity - though I suppose this is eventually inevitable - I can at least double down on a smartphone-free hermitage zone. I have had this thought before, and I have written briefly about it, and I have even put it into practice with some success, but the success was only temporary. The rule is simple: don't take the smartphone into the sleeping area, the religious reading area, or the meditation space. Alright, there, I published the rule on my weblog and created an additional layer of accountability. Now I need to...

1 Cheshvan 5786 Anno Mundi.  1 Jumada I 1447 Anno Hegirae. 0 Scorpio 40 Tropical Sun in Albany, New York.  4:15 PM Thursday. Day 296.  "Teach us to number our days, that we may gain a heart of wisdom." Psalm 90:12 (NIV) It has been eleven days since my last post  and twelve days since my last weekly plan .  Monday, 13 October 2025 (the release of the remaining living hostages from Gaza; Columbus Day; Indigenous Peoples' Day; and my mom's 82nd birthday) ended up being such a watershed moment in my spiritual development that I couldn't bring myself to write from 5-7 PM as intended  and haven't been able to write until now.  Taking into account all that has happened during this period, on top of all that has come before, I am revising my life mission (the title of my blog) from "Discerning a Christian Vegan Eremitic Vocation with a Psychiatric Disability" to "Discerning an Abrahamic Eremitic Blogging Vocation with a Psychiatric Disability." I ...

1:00 PM Sunday. I've taken my mom to the Five Rivers Environmental Education Center two Sunday mornings in a row. This week we were planning to go for a walk in Washington Park on Monday for her 82nd birthday, but there is a high likelihood of rain all Monday morning, so we bumped our outing up by a day, had breakfast at the Iron Gate on Washington Avenue, and then headed out to Five Rivers for an extended nature walk. We talked about many things during our relaxed ramble together, including the universal human perception of "God" in the awesome majesty of nature. My mom, one of two percent of Republicans who are atheist, is not ready to call the object of her reverence more than a mysterious "something," let alone call it the Hashem of the Torah or the Jesus of the Nicene Creed. I am not trying to force her or even gently persuade her to see it otherwise. "This is my church," she said as we took in the sights, sounds, and smells of the heavenly Octobe...

6:07 AM Sunday. Earlier this morning at about 5:10 AM, building on last Sunday morning's entry , I tried making my bed while silently reciting the prayer recommended by Google Gemini: "Lord, thank you for this new day. Guide my thoughts, words, and actions, and help me to live a life that pleases you."  The combination of making my bed and reciting this prayer had a powerful effect. It was like dropping a stone into a still pond. Moved by the ripples, I found myself meditating upon the words of the prayer until it was time to get up from my zafu and change out of my pajamas at 5:55 AM. As I explored the subtlety of my response to each word in the prayer, I couldn't help but introduce some customizations. "Lord," for example, felt too ambiguous. Was I addressing myself to God, to my personal lord and savior Jesus Christ, to a member of the British nobility, or to something heretically syncretic, like "Lord Buddha Christ Mind"?  This is the customiza...

7:02 PM Saturday. I am running late with today's 6-7 PM Christian Earth Science session. Picking up from last week's entry, this is as far as I can take it tonight: https://share.google/aimode/9H2qDjDQjnb9EfrOK Proposition: that the Garden of Eden refers to a literal time and place on Earth in human prehistory. My current score: -5, Unlikely. Proposition: that the Garden of Eden refers to an archetypal home-world from which humanity originates and toward which it is returning through its eco-spiritual development of Spaceship Earth. My current score: 2.5, Possible-Probable. End 7:38 PM.

3:57 PM Saturday. Here are the seven steps of my weekly planning process as they stand today: Step 1: Reflect on the Past Seven Days Step 2: Review Mission (Blog Title) and Vision (Blog Description) Step 3: Review Areas of Responsibility (Blog Pages) Step 4: Review Project List and Add or Retire Active Projects (Blog Labels) Step 5: Confirm Assignment of Quadrant II Work on Each Project to Productivity Theme Days (Blog Pages) Step 6: Confirm Hard Appointments for the Week, Month and Quarter Underway (Microsoft Outlook Calendar) Step 7: Update Recurring Actions List as Time Allows (Microsoft Outlook To Do)     I have worked through all of these steps for Week 42, and everything is reasonably on track, but I am having a high-level question about my mission that needs some attention, and I also see that I have been neglecting my Blogger profile. When I get right down to it, the most accurate way for to me describe myself right now is not as a Christian. I am an Inquirer with...

11:20 AM Saturday. I set up my Oxford Index Card Storage Box this morning. My system is very simple: 12 manila dividers labeled for each month of the year; 52 manila dividers labeled for each week of the year; and 5 manila dividers for recipes labeled Autumn, Winter, Spring, Summer, and All. You can see the box on my back desktop in the photo above. This photo shows how much work I still have to do in my quest for a minimalist footprint. Here is what the rest of my U-shaped office looks like: End 12:00 PM.   

3:28 PM Friday. Well, here I am on Friday afternoon, and I am supposed to be writing and reflecting exclusively in my new weekly Quadrant II Family Support block from 3-5 PM, but I haven't written anything since Monday, and there has been so much going on, that I really need to open this into a free-writing session, take it all the way until 7 PM, and allow myself to cover as much ground as I can. I will begin by pointing out that I am getting due for a telephone call with my sister Kara in Florida and might as well use this opportunity to call her to mind, send her some love, and make her my first audience for this entry. I helped Mom prepare for the delivery of a new refrigerator on Wednesday. It's a side-by-side stainless-steel behemoth.  She is much happier with it than the old one, which was getting too hard for her to access. This coming Monday morning, on Columbus and Indigenous Peoples' Day, I am taking Mom out for breakfast to celebrate her 82nd birthday. That make...

4:28 PM Monday. I read the homepage and solutions page of The Overpopulation Project (TOP) website today, and I also watched the first 20 minutes of  An Integrated Climate Change Response: The Role of Population . The lecture is brilliant, and I highly recommend it to any Christian inquirers who share my appreciation for modern environmental science. I find myself in robust agreement with many of the solutions listed by TOP on its solutions page. But some TOP recommendations incline me to caution, and a few to outright concern. Is TOP on the right track with its analysis of the problem and its comprehensive framework of solutions? Or is TOP an unconscious exercise in white privilege and racist population control by the Global North? Here is a quick quote from Google Gemini in response to a question I asked about how, if at all, reproductive justice scholars have interacted with the work of TOP: "Reproductive justice scholars largely reject and critically dismantle the work o...

1:31 PM Monday. As I proposed last week , I am now reading through section IV of A/HRC/60/CRP.3. Section IV is titled " Dolus Specialis of Genocide."  A bit earlier in my reading, I paused at paragraph 163 and conducted the following Gemini inquiry: https://share.google/aimode/LrIvK35DuChyZs85B Now I am proceeding from the subsection titled "Statements of Israeli Actors" (alleged direct evidence of dolus specialis ) to the subsection titled "Pattern of Conduct" (circumstantial evidence of dolus specialis ). As I do so, I want to say that some of the facts presented in paragraphs 162-176 do seem to indicate genocidal intent, and I am sure their interpretation will be the subject of much legal argument. For example, whether Netanyahu invoked Amalek to incite the IDF to commit genocide in violation of international law, or whether his intent was to boost IDF morale in defense of civilized norms, depends on a nuanced understanding of contemporary Jewish (and ...

3:55 PM Sunday. I want to start writing at least once a quarter about the important role that Zen mentors have played in my spiritual formation. And I need to say something about the role of Krishnamurti in all of this. I was first introduced to Zen in 1988 by an amazing mentor at the Albany Academy. Then I started reading in Krishnamurti and learning the rudiments of sitting meditation at a Zen center in Bar Harbor in 1989. But it was not until study of these two streams led me to the home of Enrico and Nadia Natali in Ojai, California, for a pivotal six-month apprenticeship in 1992 that I really began to put Krishnamurti and Zen together in earnest. I was twenty years old at the time. The zendo in the photo above is where I learned to sit daily with Enrico. It is also where I participated in my first week-long sesshin.   Enrico and Nadia had a tremendously positive influence on my development. Some 24 years later, in 2016, I found myself homeless and in crisis in southern Ca...

6:05 AM Sunday. Last week, I wrote that "In terms of a Q4 2025 daily prayer goal, I'd like to do a slightly better job of integrating formal apophatic and cataphatic prayer back into my 5-6 AM and 8-9 PM time blocks." I was also thinking about making every Sunday evening from 6-8 PM a dedicated time for review and reflection on my daily prayer life. Well, here we are at the beginning of the second week of Q4, and I am already making two significant changes to this plan. I am advancing my evening prayer block from 7-8 PM so that I get to bed an hour earlier, and I am focusing weekly reflection on my prayer life from 6-8 AM on Sunday mornings. This said, I'd like to spend the rest of my reflection block this morning taking an inventory of my opening prayer habits. My smartphone alarm went off at 5 AM as usual today. I had it right next to my bed, which is a no-no. I prefer to leave it across the room so that I have to get up promptly to turn the alarm off. Today I turne...