Andrew Knot

"You owe it to all of us to get on with what you're good at." -Auden

[60 Minutes @60Minutes]

"There are no maverick molecules in the universe," says Ben Sasse. https://t.co/Tem7ihHlik

[Wes Huff @WesleyLHuff]

This Easter, I invite you to look at Jesus, consider what he said and did, and ask for yourself what I believe is the most important question you will ever answer: Did he really leave behind an empty tomb? And if he did, what does that mean for you?

This video was made possible and in collaboration with my friends at @ChildlikeMedia.

[@jason @Jason]

Vail resorts $mtn destroyed skiing in America so badly that its cheaper to fly your family to the Alps or Japan

Disgraziad!

[Andrew Côté @Andercot]

It just seems implausible this is what we are made of, essentially, nanotechnology about a billion years beyond anything we can design or make ourselves.

[Andrew Knot @acknot]

“The people walking in darkness have seen a great light; on those living in the land of deep darkness a light has dawned.”

[Ben Sasse @BenSasse]

Friends-

This is a tough note to write, but since a bunch of you have started to suspect something, I’ll cut to the chase: Last week I was diagnosed with metastasized, stage-four pancreatic cancer, and am gonna die.

Advanced pancreatic is nasty stuff; it’s a death sentence. But I already had a death sentence before last week too — we all do.

I’m blessed with amazing siblings and half-a-dozen buddies that are genuinely brothers. As one of them put it, “Sure, you’re on the clock, but we’re all on the clock.” Death is a wicked thief, and the bastard pursues us all.

Still, I’ve got less time than I’d prefer. This is hard for someone wired to work and build, but harder still as a husband and a dad. I can’t begin to describe how great my people are. During the past year, as we’d temporarily stepped back from public life and built new family rhythms, Melissa and I have grown even closer — and that on top of three decades of the best friend a man could ever have. Seven months ago, Corrie was commissioned into the Air Force and she’s off at instrument and multi-engine rounds of flight school. Last week, Alex kicked butt graduating from college a semester early even while teaching gen chem, organic, and physics (she’s a freak). This summer, 14-year-old Breck started learning to drive. (Okay, we’ve been driving off-book for six years — but now we’ve got paper to make it street-legal.) I couldn’t be more grateful to constantly get to bear-hug this motley crew of sinners and saints.

There’s not a good time to tell your peeps you’re now marching to the beat of a faster drummer — but the season of advent isn’t the worst. As a Christian, the weeks running up to Christmas are a time to orient our hearts toward the hope of what’s to come.

Not an abstract hope in fanciful human goodness; not hope in vague hallmark-sappy spirituality; not a bootstrapped hope in our own strength (what foolishness is the evaporating-muscle I once prided myself in). Nope — often we lazily say “hope” when what we mean is “optimism.” To be clear, optimism is great, and it’s absolutely necessary, but it’s insufficient. It’s not the kinda thing that holds up when you tell your daughters you’re not going to walk them down the aisle. Nor telling your mom and pops they’re gonna bury their son.

A well-lived life demands more reality — stiffer stuff. That’s why, during advent, even while still walking in darkness, we shout our hope — often properly with a gravelly voice soldiering through tears.

Such is the calling of the pilgrim. Those who know ourselves to need a Physician should dang well look forward to enduring beauty and eventual fulfillment. That is, we hope in a real Deliverer — a rescuing God, born at a real time, in a real place. But the eternal city — with foundations and without cancer — is not yet.

Remembering Isaiah’s prophecies of what’s to come doesn’t dull the pain of current sufferings. But it does put it in eternity’s perspective:
“When we've been there 10,000 years…We've no less days to sing God's praise.”

I’ll have more to say. I’m not going down without a fight. One sub-part of God’s grace is found in the jawdropping advances science has made the past few years in immunotherapy and more. Death and dying aren’t the same — the process of dying is still something to be lived. We’re zealously embracing a lot of gallows humor in our house, and I’ve pledged to do my part to run through the irreverent tape.

But for now, as our family faces the reality of treatments, but more importantly as we celebrate Christmas, we wish you peace: “The people walking in darkness have seen a great light; on those living in the land of deep darkness a light has dawned….For to us a son is given” (Isaiah 9).

With great gratitude, and with gravelly-but-hopeful voices,
Ben — and the Sasses

[Andrew Knot @acknot]

@viewsoff_ @grok Where is this?

[Andrew Knot @acknot]

The world: "What goes around comes around"

The Gospel: 👇

[CSPAN @cspan]

Erika Kirk: "My husband Charlie he wanted to save young men, just like the one who took his life...On the cross, our savior said, 'Father, forgive them, for they not know what they do.' That young man. I forgive him."

[homo duplex @_homoduplex]

Treffer, versenkt.

„Yet here in Germany, the response of the media class was even more disturbing. They seemed to revel in it. Instead of uniting in condemnation, major outlets reached immediately for the smear. … The result? Millions of ordinary Germans, who take prime-time anchors at their word, are invited to conclude that while murder is technically bad, this particular victim was barely human in the first place. … This is a sign of how far the political mainstream in Germany has drifted Leftwards. It is no longer enough to oppose your adversaries. They must be delegitimised, dehumanised, treated not as mistaken citizens but as moral outcasts. … A society that cannot even pause to mourn the death of a man who dedicated himself to free speech has lost its moral bearings. … If this is the moral standard of the German mainstream, then its democratic future is far darker than its leaders dare to admit.“

https://t.co/cIsaX1LdU4

[Andrew Knot @acknot]

To all life Thou givest, to both great and small;
In all life Thou livest, the true life of all;
We blossom and flourish as leaves on the tree,
And wither and perish, but nought changeth Thee.

[C. S. Lewis @CSLewis]

“In grief nothing ‘stays put.’ One keeps on emerging from a phase, but it always recurs. Round and round. Everything repeats. Am I going in circles, or dare I hope I am on a spiral? But if a spiral, am I going up or down it?” - A Grief Observed, C.S. Lewis.

© 1961 CS Lewis Pte Ltd.

[Ross Douthat @DouthatNYT]

My opening statement in the great @TheFP religion debate:

[Bayer AG @Bayer]

Earlier today, we published our Full Year 2024 results. CEO Bill Anderson provides a 90-second overview of the figures from 2024 and a look ahead to 2025:

[Andrew Knot @acknot]

Abolish Ohio

[Pardon My Take @PardonMyTake]

Michigan players got Maced to break up the skirmish after Beating Ohio state on their home field

[Andrew Knot @acknot]

The bureaucracy assures you that your final breath will be risk-managed.

[The New Atlantis @tnajournal]

“We know that angry family members are our greatest risk (laughter).”

–Dr. Ellen Wiebe, who has personally euthanized over 400 patients in Canada.

[Andrew Knot @acknot]

@ebels10 Otto will sleep easy tonight.

[Stadt Wien @Stadt_Wien]

Zürich ist doppelt so groß wie der Wiener Zentralfriedhof, aber nur halb so lustig.

[Matthew Yglesias @mattyglesias]

I wonder if the headlong rush toward ubiquitous sports betting has any downsides

[Noah Toly @noahtoly]

Dietrich Bonhoeffer

[Andrew Knot @acknot]

There are a lot of good, well-intentioned people who work at @DB_Bahn, but, wow, the the way the German rail service consistently outdoes its own incompetence is truly remarkable.

[Yuan Yi Zhu @yuanyi_z]

“Involuntary euthanasia for children”.