Today I find myself thinking about a story in Genesis 47:13 – 26. It is the story of a famine in Egypt. I’ll share the text from the Bible, and then I’ll write my commentary underneath it. 13There was no food, however, in the whole region because the famine was
Continue readingAuthor: Christy Knockleby
politics – Christy's Houseful of Chaos: Actions Matter
I am fascinated by this short poem by Piet Hein: CONSOLATION GROOK Losing one gloveis certainly painful,but nothingcompared to the painof losing one,throwing away the other,and findingthe first one again. Apparently the poem was written as part of the Danish resistance during WWII, encouraging people not to throw away their
Continue readingpolitics – Christy's Houseful of Chaos: Donald Trump, corrupt CEO of America
What Trump says reveals so much about him. In the last presidential debate of 2020 Trump said that only those of low IQ would show up for their immigration hearings if not imprisoned. A study says that actually, 99% do. What Trump said doesn’t reflect the reality of migrants to
Continue readingpolitics – Christy's Houseful of Chaos: Little House on the Prairie Books and the Problem of Messy History.
It is a perennial questions in homeschool circles, whether one should read the Little House on the Prairie books with one’s kids or whether the racism in it makes those books ones that should be put aside. The books have the heroine’s mother saying “The only good Indian is a
Continue readingpolitics – Christy's Houseful of Chaos: A Secular Bible Study
My book A Secular Bible Study is now available. I based this book off of classes that I have been teaching online to homeschooling students. My classes are for students who wanted to learn about the Bible, but without being preached at. I take the academic approach I learned at
Continue readingpolitics – Christy's Houseful of Chaos: Thoughts about justice inspired by a town council meeting
I’m going over a town council meeting video to write a news story about it as a favor to my dad, the editor of a weekly newspaper. Every time I do this I am in awe again of all the ethical implications that get dealt with on a regular basis
Continue readingpolitics – Christy's Houseful of Chaos: Cancel Culture and the Need to not Define Acceptable Speech to Narrowly
There has been a lot of discussion on Cancel Culture recently as a result of an open letter by a group of writers and academics. This post is based on a number of comments I made in Facebook groups where this topic came up. What is Cancel Culture? Cancel culture
Continue readingpolitics – Christy's Houseful of Chaos: Political Studies through Minecraft
I have reopened my Minecraft server in light of the Covid-19 restrictions and the need to have extra online social activities for children. I host events a couple of times a week on Minecraft and Zoom, and the children play on the server whenever they want in between those events.
Continue readingpolitics – Christy's Houseful of Chaos: American Political Studies Resources for Highschool Student
I am a Canadian homeschooling my children, but we can’t help hearing about American politics. So, my husband and I are insisting that our children learn to understand the American political system as well as the Canadian system. Here is what we are using: The Frozen Republic: How the Constitution
Continue readingpolitics – Christy's Houseful of Chaos: Jinx! and Political Studies Goofiness
The following conversation is being shared with the permission of my children. My teenager jinxed the eleven-year-old. This rules of jinxing is that two people attempted to say the same thing at the same time, and the one doing the jinxing calls out that the other is jinxed. This means
Continue readingpolitics – Christy's Houseful of Chaos: Where does political authority come from?
One of the books I’ve been reading recently is called Piety and Politics: The Dynamics of Royal Authority in Homeric Greece, Biblical Israel, and Old Babylonian Mesopotamia. One of the things it points out very early is that the divine authority of kings in ancient times is not necessarily the
Continue readingpolitics – Christy's Houseful of Chaos: Sophists And Today?
Aaron Sorkin’s television show Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip aired in 2006. Already, the show feels somewhat dated and when watching it with our children my husband and I found ourselves trying to explain how the public debate was different at that time. (Just as one example, these days
Continue readingpolitics – Christy's Houseful of Chaos: The true reason I haven’t been involved in political activism for a while: not time shortage but fear of being wrong.
Life is complicated. I look back at so many things I used to believe and I don’t hold those beliefs anymore. The knowledge of how my beliefs have changed makes me a bit more hesitant to express my beliefs. What if I say something now, and then look back at
Continue readingpolitics – Christy's Houseful of Chaos: Conversations with Leigh Robertson and some reflections about making change in the world.
I had a great talk with Leigh Robertson the other day. Our conversation wandered from talking about child labour as a focus for teaching children about the history of the labour movement to talking about the gig economy. Then we moved onto talking about the Danish resistence movement during WWII.
Continue readingpolitics – Christy's Houseful of Chaos: Making a difference
Sometimes I feel helpless in the face of all the problems of the world. Then I remind myself there’s lots I can do to make a difference. I can: write a letter to the editor to try to change others thoughts on an issue and to let those who share
Continue readingpolitics – Christy's Houseful of Chaos: teaching civics with reflections on a small town council meeting
It is Saturday morning and I’m watching a video recording of a town council meeting that took place several provinces away. I’m taking notes to write the story up for my dad’s newspaper. The strange thing is, I actually find counsel meetings kind of interesting. I love the little details
Continue readingpolitics – Christy's Houseful of Chaos: “500 climate change denying scientists” – yeah, no.
I’ve been bothering to engage with some of the climate change deniers on the Sudbury Star’s Facebook page. They link to a Brietbart article saying that there’s over 500 scientists that are petitioning the UN to say there’s no climate crisis. I start looking up the scientists who signed the
Continue readingpolitics – Christy's Houseful of Chaos: Biblical history and Israel
Did you know there’s a political component to the question of the literal truth of the Bible? There are people who argue for it being true not just because they want it for a spiritual guide, but also because they want justification for the nation of Israel to be a
Continue readingpolitics – Christy's Houseful of Chaos: On the Trail of Ella McLean
As a child growing up in Smoky Lake, I remember my dad, newspaper editor Lorne Taylor, taking me up to the graveyard off Victoria Trail. We pushed through the bushes to find a big pink granite stone, the text of which read: “Ella A. McLean Devoted Missionary. Born June 24,
Continue readingpolitics – Christy's Houseful of Chaos: Independant Media and the Canadian Budget
Today on Facebook I noticed a story about how the Trudeau government is creating “newspapers and websites deemed reliable.” That makes it sound like the government’s creating a serious official list of which papers are trustworthy or not. Except that isn’t what is really happening. The article in question was
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