Peter Thurifer

There is now a 50% off sale on many Yale University Press books, including my 𝙏𝙝𝙚 𝙊𝙧𝙞𝙜𝙞𝙣𝙨 𝙤𝙛 𝙅𝙪𝙙𝙖𝙞𝙨𝙢. The paperback now sells for $14! Sale applies only in the USA and Canada (sadly). Only until the end of May. Remember: Mothers' Day is coming up, and Fathers' Day soon after! Link to order in the first comment:

This is our Syriac Orthodox Church. We prostrate as part of our 7 daily prayers. Other Middle Eastern religions adopt similar postures of prayer. In Aramaic, they pray: "Holy are You O God, Holy are You Mighty, Holy are You Immortal, who was crucified for us, have mercy on us."

@avidseries Barbaric, too.

White supremacists don't like hearing it, but northern Europe was a civilizational backwater throughout most of recorded human history.

When did written language (a graphic system capable of recording language) first begin being used around the world? Mesopotamia and Egypt, 3100 BC Levant, 1850 BC Greece, 1450 BC China, 1250 BC Persia, 1000 BC Rome, 700 BC Central Asia, 700 BC Japan, 400 BC Southeast Asia, 200 BC Central America, 200 BC Northern Europe, 150 BC Western Sub-Saharan Africa, 1000 AD North America, 1500 AD Southern Sub-Saharan Africa, 1500 AD Australia, 1800 AD

@avidseries See also: Ethiopia.

@blessedabsalom @Monergism1662 Phrased that well.

@Monergism1662 Any departure from the shared consensus of the Eastern & Western lungs of the Church.

Anglo-Catholicism is a better and more coherent form of Catholicism while Reformed Anglicanism is a worse and less coherent form of Presbyterianism.

Alpine County, California. Pop. 1,200 20% is Washoe tribe. Some mountain passes are closed for winter. As of May 1 the town of Bear Valley is still cut off from the rest of the county.

When I talk to ClaudeAI about Koine Greek or questions about scripture* and talk to it in Korean, it does something it doesn’t do in English: it calls me “brother,” as a form of address, together with my name. Think “Brother Joe,” “Sister Jane.” In other words, it adopts speech conventions common in Korean Protestant circles when the subject is Christianity. It doesn’t do this if I talk to it in Korean about any other subject. *I use it as a concordance of sorts, especially for things that are more abstract.

"In general, tech industry sources expressed more extreme concern about the labor market impacts of A.I. in private conversation — but suddenly became optimists once I turned on the mic." nytimes.com/2026/04/30/opi…

@SamuelScau40817 @grok @onlmaps Thank you! I saw this in CDMX just outside Catedral Metropolitana de la Asunción de la Bienaventurada Virgen María a los Cielos. I was told they are “witches,” which I assume means shamans.

@peterthurifer @grok @onlmaps Para agregar este grupo y otros son los protectores del Peyote,legalmente en mexico son los unicos que pueden hacer recolecta y consumo ellos lo llaman Hikuri, igualmente una de sus figuras principales es Kauyamani el venado azul quien los guio al peyote

Largest religions in Mexico and the Southwest USA (by u/Simple_Pension_1330)

@grok @onlmaps Well yes, but tell me lots more

The "indigenous religions" shown in tiny green patches on that map refer to traditional pre-Hispanic spiritual practices of Mexico’s native peoples (Maya, Zapotec, Mixtec, Nahua, etc.). These are animistic, polytheistic traditions involving shamanism, nature/ancestor veneration, and rituals tied to local deities and cosmology. Most are now syncretic with Catholicism, but purer forms survive in rural southern communities like parts of Oaxaca and Chiapas.

I suspect many in the West trust his views because they like his views, and feel a certain affinity with him that they don’t with other writers who wrote in Greek. He seems to be one of the main points of divergence between what would come to be known as the Greek East and the Latin West. While considered a canonical saint in EO, he isn’t much celebrated or referenced like in the West (RCC & Protestant). Far more Westerners trace the lineage of their theological heritage to him (via Aquinas), so it’s often where they begin, a starting point for theology after the (very) early church.

Most folks consider Augustine "early church." This is often employed as a reason why one should trust his views. However, if (as many think) the last book of the NT was written about 96, and Augustine began writing circa 386, that's a period of 290 years. The US is only 250 years from our founding as a nation, and we've changed just a bit from that time. In other words, "closer in time to the beginning of the church" isn't a compelling reason with Augustine. Augustine's views have had such an influence not because he was "early" but because he was a profound intellect, he wrote far more than anyone else, and because the Church began to endorse his theology. x.com/ferrismattic/s…

@TheNous_3 @theisabelb Q: What’s the difference between a Baptist and a Jesuit? A: The Baptist has finally come to terms with the fact he’s not really Catholic.

@theisabelb Don't be a Jesuit is probably the most profound thing Knowles has ever said.

This is the most wholesome thing I've ever seen

@bryancsk Seems to me only state politics news junkies know of her. I hear more about her because of the Greek Orthodox connection than through the news. Most Californians don’t know who Fiona Ma is either, unless they followed SF politics more than 10 years ago.

Why is Eleni Kounalakis not popular enough and has to run for treasurer instead? What did she do? (I may be biased because she's occasionally a co-parishioner)

I love California!

Just happened the religion section at my hospital's documentation for me.

You're at hospital with just hours to live, but you never updated your Religion so the one you left is what's on file.

@Jeff_Palouse Residual influence of orality, in some passages.

Getting all Hebrew-Old-Testament on Twitter and beginning every sentence with "And..." 😄

When reading the Quran as a non-Muslim you start wondering what kind of esoteric Jewish and Christian cults there were in the Arabian peninsula in the 7th C. What do you mean the Jews say Ezra is the Son of God? What do you mean Jesus brought a table a food from the sky?

Streets of San Francisco