Catholicism reverts (again)

[Avatar]

Read Illusions. One of the best books ever.

--A

[Menolly]

Oh!

*checking tottering TBR pile*

...that one's already scheduled from an earlier discussion with you I think...

[rusmeister]

Read Illusions. One of the best books ever.

--A

I'll nominate "The Everlasting Man" for that title.

[rusmeister]

Someone correct me if I'm wrong, but I seem to recall reading that the word in the Bible that is translated as 'Sin,' in the original Hebrew, means something more along the lines of 'Missing the Mark,' or 'Falling Short.'

Menolly got there first.

[rusmeister]

All well and good. But GBS inherited an intellectual tradition from Nietzsche, for example, but postmodernism (which Chesterton was indeed "predicting") did not really become a European phenomenon until after the Second World War.

I found this interesting little comment on that 'intellectual tradition'. Not to prove anything, but just to give a little thought to how much we honor that intellectual position without really understanding it:

This clearing off of his last critical plays we may classify as the first
of the three facts which lead up to _Man and Superman._ The second of
the three facts may be found, I think, in Shaw's discovery of Nietzsche.
This eloquent sophist has an influence upon Shaw and his school
which it would require a separate book adequately to study.
By descent Nietzsche was a Pole, and probably a Polish noble;
and to say that he was a Polish noble is to say that he was a frail,
fastidious, and entirely useless anarchist. He had a wonderful
poetic wit; and is one of the best rhetoricians of the modern world.
He had a remarkable power of saying things that master
the reason for a moment by their gigantic unreasonableness;
as, for instance, "Your life is intolerable without immortality;
but why should not your life be intolerable?" His whole work
is shot through with the pangs and fevers of his physical life,
which was one of extreme bad health; and in early middle age
his brilliant brain broke down into impotence and darkness.
All that was true in his teaching was this: that if a man looks
fine on a horse it is so far irrelevant to tell him that he would
be more economical on a donkey or more humane on a tricycle.
In other words, the mere achievement of dignity, beauty, or triumph
is strictly to be called a good thing. I do not know if Nietzsche
ever used the illustration; but it seems to me that all that is
creditable or sound in Nietzsche could be stated in the derivation
of one word, the word "valour." Valour means _valeur;_ it means
a value; courage is itself a solid good; it is an ultimate virtue;
valour is in itself _valid._ In so far as he maintained this Nietzsche
was only taking part in that great Protestant game of see-saw which has
been the amusement of northern Europe since the sixteenth century.
Nietzsche imagined he was rebelling against ancient morality;
as a matter of fact he was only rebelling against recent morality,
against the half-baked impudence of the utilitarians and
the materialists. He thought he was rebelling against Christianity;
curiously enough he was rebelling solely against the special enemies
of Christianity, against Herbert Spencer and Mr. Edward Clodd.
Historic Christianity has always believed in the valour of St. Michael
riding in front of the Church Militant; and in an ultimate and
absolute pleasure, not indirect or utilitarian, the intoxication
of the spirit, the wine of the blood of God.

There are indeed doctrines of Nietzsche that are not Christian,
but then, by an entertaining coincidence, they are also not true.
His hatred of pity is not Christian, but that was not his
doctrine but his disease. Invalids are often hard on invalids.
And there is another doctrine of his that is not Christianity,
and also (by the same laughable accident) not common-sense;
and it is a most pathetic circumstance that this was the one
doctrine which caught the eye of Shaw and captured him.
He was not influenced at all by the morbid attack on mercy.
It would require more than ten thousand mad Polish professors to make
Bernard Shaw anything but a generous and compassionate man. But it
is certainly a nuisance that the one Nietzsche doctrine which attracted
him was not the one Nietzsche doctrine that is human and rectifying.
Nietzsche might really have done some good if he had taught
Bernard Shaw to draw the sword, to drink wine, or even to dance.
But he only succeeded in putting into his head a new superstition,
which bids fair to be the chief superstition of the dark ages
which are possibly in front of us--I mean the superstition of what
is called the Superman.

In one of his least convincing phrases, Nietzsche had
said that just as the ape ultimately produced the man,
so should we ultimately produce something higher than the man.
The immediate answer, of course, is sufficiently obvious:
the ape did not worry about the man, so why should we worry about
the Superman? If the Superman will come by natural selection,
may we leave it to natural selection? If the Superman will come
by human selection, what sort of Superman are we to select?
If he is simply to be more just, more brave, or more merciful,
then Zarathustra sinks into a Sunday-school teacher; the only way we
can work for it is to be more just, more brave, and more merciful;
sensible advice, but hardly startling. If he is to be anything else
than this, why should we desire him, or what else are we to desire?
These questions have been many times asked of the Nietzscheites,
and none of the Nietzscheites have even attempted to answer them.

The keen intellect of Bernard Shaw would, I think, certainly have
seen through this fallacy and verbiage had it not been
that another important event about this time came to the help
of Nietzsche and established the Superman on his pedestal.
It is the third of the things which I have called stepping-stones
to _Man and Superman,_ and it is very important. It is nothing less
than the break-down of one of the three intellectual supports upon
which Bernard Shaw had reposed through all his confident career.
At the beginning of this book I have described the three ultimate
supports of Shaw as the Irishman, the Puritan, and the Progressive.
They are the three legs of the tripod upon which the prophet sat to give
the oracle; and one of them broke. Just about this time suddenly,
by a mere shaft of illumination, Bernard Shaw ceased to believe
in progress altogether.

www.cse.dmu.ac.uk/~mward/gkc/books/Geor ... d_Shaw.txt

[rusmeister]

I think rus, or we, needs to start a seperate topic because all this argueing is not only confusing but it deviates from this topic. OK so it doesn't deviate at all. It's just too big a ball of wax and will probably get lost here.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but it appears that rus adheres to orthodox Christianity, as opposed to mainsteam Christianity as opposed to Fundamental Christianity as opposed to Catholicism. What are the differences? Is it wrong to heap this all together? Seems like many people do. This heaping has something to do with Christ right? Orthodoxy is like the Hinayana vs the Mahayana right? The little wheel that thinks it upholds the true teachings of the movement and practices direct experience with God(s).

See if we read as much Chesterton as we can, and the authors Mhoram suggested, we can get confused unless we really break down the terms. Now I know what Manchinean means, but I had to look up postmodernism. As a sociology major I should never forget what it means, but after being brunt out by all these arguements earlier in my life it's easy to purposefully forget.

Obviously you have to go over and over Chesterton to fully understand him...it's the same with many religious thinkers and philosophers. I think the first time I ever tried to figure out what a priori meant I realized these guys were all spouting a bunch of hot air and wasting a bunch of pages to elucidate fairly simple concepts. That's, sorta, the way my first reading of Chesterton's stuff goes-he seems to be contradicting the hell out of himself, on purpose, but I see what he's getting at.

Postmodernism can use some tweaking too...it's a grand idea on paper, but like socialism can be liked to communism by fundamental forces. Now we have to define fundamentalism...see this goes on and on. I truly believe in progess and postmodernism has truly made some great strides, but let's face it fundamentalism (at least in America) has invoked the horrible head of fear over the past 20 years or so and set postmodernism back on it's ass.

See how dangerously close this is getting to politics? (one subject I'm lacking in is Christianity's effects on Nazism, or maybe it's too complex). I'm like Furls, as she stated in the beginning of "What is it you believe", I can believe in science on one hand, and "God" on the other, and can see where quantum physics and intellegent design can eventually merge. It's the semantics and fear that keep everyone at each others throats.

I don't have a Manchinean veiwpoint and I don't believe in black and white. The again I don't believe in "classical" hell either-I believe it's a state of mind right here on earth invoked by ignorance, fear and social factors (population growth and power struggle, for instance). So in proffessing 'progess' I may not be a turnip afterall. And in some sense Chesterton agrees with me. To me the enemy is fear, ignorance and ennui the solution, as Christ the teacher and Fist might agree, is love and cooperation.

Emo is right, as well, just hang out in a neonatal nursery or practice true alturism, for small examples, and keep yourself open and miracles will and do happen.

Hi Danlo! As promised, I’m getting back to you. Sorry about the delay!

My thoughts here are general responses to overarching concepts, and a few random observations on your post. Again, Lewis and Chesterton say all of this so much better than me; but since I guess people just aren’t going to read them unless somebody else demonstrates a little rationality, I’ll pit my relatively feeble abilities to that task. (No false humility intended - please remember that I am only a layman and not the best source for Orthodoxy!) But since I seem to be the only person here to defend Christianity...

You’re right that there are differences within Christianity and it does make a difference.
What you call Hinayana we would refer to as Universalism; the idea that everyone will be saved. (For this, again you are right on breaking down the terms.) One of the key problems for Christianity in the Western world is that, unlike Eastern religions, people who reject it believe that they already understand it – that they are familiar with it – when in fact they are not, and the multiplicity of denominations has only deepened this problem. So people think they understand what ‘salvation’ means in Christianity, when in fact they only have a limited understanding of Protestant Christianity. The most effective thing to do is to back away from Christianity and examine it as an alien would, and see the Apostles, as Chesterton said, as we would see a dozen Chinamen worshipping in a pagoda. You would have to start examining Church history – see how it developed in the first centuries, where the Bible came from and how it developed, what happened in the 4th-6th centuries, learn about the development and causes of the Great Schism and finally what led to the Reformation – and most importantly, where a Reformation never took place. Then you could understand the origins of Protestantism more clearly and begin to be able to understand doctrinal differences. (This is why I will now limit myself on some questions to Orthodoxy.)

It’s hard to talk about Universalism vs Orthodoxy (or any of these topics) without having a good idea as to what terms like ‘salvation’ mean. For sake of brevity, I’ll say here that Orthodoxy views salvation as only a process in this life. We are basically like computer programs that are being run. If, in the course of our lives, we really manage to turn towards God (as He defines it, not we) and hold our course to the end, the Programmer will hit the ‘save’ button. If not, we may be deleted, through our own choices and refusal of God. This decision is not final, however, until the program has been completely run, and we have reason to believe that even then, there still may be hope, but it rapidly moves into areas where we have to say “We don’t know, because we only know what has been revealed.

On the question of revelation, I’ll put forth the image of us as characters in a play (with a curious power of free will). How could we learn about the existence of an Author? The characters are all arguing back and forth – yes there is an Author; no there isn’t, we can’t possibly know, etc etc... The only way we could learn about the existence and nature of the Author would be through revelation from the Author Himself – He would have to somehow insert himself into the play, as a voice from heaven, or a Character. Christianity says that is exactly what HE did do.

As to Universalism, we are not wrong to hope that everyone will be saved (desire for mercy), but we do have assurances from the Christ Himself that there is real danger of eternal destruction. It is wrong to see this as ‘punishment’, as is popular in the West, but rather, the logical outcome of our own choices; choosing to be without God and being cut off from the very Source that ever gave us life in the first place. THAT is what happened to Adam and Eve (choosing self over God) and that is how death came into the world – the unnatural separation of our bodies and souls. In the end, it is through our own free will granted to us that we choose to set ourselves up as gods rather than acknowledge the God Who gave us life.

Manichaeism was denounced as a Christian heresy, very close to dualism. It is NOT something I would defend. It is opposed to Orthodoxy. I would just say that while yes, there are dogmatic areas of black-and-white in Orthodoxy, there are also many shades of grey on things that are not defined by Church dogma. This is more noticeable than in the Catholic Church, where the tendency is to define and rationalize all theological questions (see Thomas Aquinas, for example). In Orthodoxy there’s a lot more of the right kind of ‘agnosticism’ about things that haven’t been revealed.

Emo is right, as well, just hang out in a neonatal nursery or practice true alturism, for small examples, and keep yourself open and miracles will and do happen.

I like this thought!

Fundamentalism (of the kind you were referring to) also has an opposite extreme – that of saying that beliefs do not matter (relativism). Lewis speaks of the devil loving to have us running to opposite extremes… But then, 'the devil' is a term people think they understand and swiftly reject as backward superstition, while they might embrace the idea of spirits and higher forms of being that might be interested in our lives for some reason.

I have not seen a more outstanding indictment of neo-paganism (while acknowledging that which was good and true in paganism) than Chesterton’s “The Everlasting Man”. Paganism really did die, and there was a good reason for it. Neo-paganism is merely an outgrowth of the perception of the failure of materialist thinking that rejected the Faith that had defeated paganism.
www.cse.dmu.ac.uk/~mward/gkc/books/everlasting_man.pdf

I hope this has helped you with a few questions, at least (or maybe given birth to 50 more )

[danlo]

Well, if the delete button is pressed, where do these souls go? Do they cease to be? What if they're good people who made a belief mistake. I don't go around telling people I believe in God, if they ask me I say yes, but not in stereotypical ways many people do. I guess if the deal is strictly between God and I, I don't have anything to worry about. Take my Dad for instance, I've never heard him utter one word about God and he believes when you die it's all over (even tho he was a staunch McCarthyist in the past, ironic, I know...). He's a very good man who I believe is very spiritual, in his own way. I somehow think deep down that he believes in God. I don't know, if he doesn't will he simply get his wish? Or do these type of people get lumped with selfish-evil just turn their backs on God-ers? Are they cast into a non-believer realm where the path is still open but it just gets harder and harder to find it? Do they form their own universe which is simply different?

Is there some kind of Hindu-like caste sytem of the comsos? This would assume that everlasting life and the soul's immortality exist. But if it's a caste system it almost makes the case for reincarnation. I'm not trying to be at odds with anything but I tend to believe in spiritual reincarnation, albiet on other planes of awarness, not necessarily on Earth. I tend to believe that the "soul" is like electricity which can be changed, but not destroyed. So something must happen after we die. I wonder who are we, if we attain everlasting life, if we advocate the delete button and just write the rest of the souls off. Sounds a little Manchinean and smug to me. peace

[rusmeister]

Well, if the delete button is pressed, where do these souls go? Do they cease to be?. What if they're good people who made a belief mistake. I don't go around telling people I believe in God, if they ask me I say yes, but not in stereotypical ways many people do. I guess if the deal is strictly between God and I, I don't have anything to worry about. Take my Dad for instance, I've never heard him utter one word about God and he believes when you die it's all over (even tho he was a staunch McCartyist in the past, ironic, I know...). He's a very good man who I believe is very spiritual, in his own way. I somehow think deep down that he believes in God. I don't know, if he doesn't will he simply get his wish? Or do these type of people get lumped with selfish-evil just turn their backs on God-ers? Are they cast into a non-believer realm where the path is still open but it just gets harder and harder to find it? Do they form their own universe which is simply different?

Is there some kind of Hindu-like caste sytem of the comsos? This would assume that everlasting life and the soul's immortality exist. But if it's a caste system it almost makes the case for reincarnation. I'm not trying to be at odds with anything but it tend to believe in spiritual reincarnation, albiet on other planes of awarness, not necessarily on Earth. I tend to believe that the "soul" is like electricity which can be changed, but not destroyed. So something must happen after we die. I wonder who are we, if we attain everlasting life, if we advocate the delete button and just write the rest of the souls off. Sounds a little Manchinean and smug to me. peace

I think your questions arereally good ones. Hmm. Looks like less than 50. (Phew! )

Remember, I'm only explaining Christianity. If you go off on another angle, I won't be able to follow (and the real issue we would differ on is whether you are going off in the right direction).

On deleting: Do people cease to be? Is individuality lost?
We have clear indications in Christianity that this is possible. Lewis describes it as a log that is burned, leaving only ash, and finding itself in the state of having been a log. But even this deleting, or destruction, is not merely a matter of making a little mistake. It is a definite choice, in the end, to turn away from self and towards God. Lewis's short book (novellette?) "The Great Divorce" deals with a speculative view on fate after death based on orthodox (small 'o') Christianity - it, like pretty much everything else he wrote, is compatible with Orthodoxy (big 'o').
I'd really recommend reading that.

Belief (what you are likely defining as intellectual acceptance) is not enough. "The demons also believe, and tremble." (James 2:19) So the consequence is not due to mere intellectual rejection. Ultimately, only God knows what is really in a man's heart, and therefore, the saving depends on Him. For this reason, Orthodox do not claim to be (already) saved or to know anyone's 'salvation status'. However, we do know that salvation can be found in the Church (doing and living as the Church teaches us through Scripture and the rest of Church tradition. (It's no guarantee - a lot of Orthodox Christians may be found to have never really sought God or turned towards Him - and away from the self, and many non-Orthodox will be found to have done that necessary turn. To cop a line from "Spiderman",
I'd say, "With great knowledge comes great responsibility."

It's a side note, but I would like to add that a huge difference between Church authority and temporal secular authority is that Church leaders have no freedom to change the rules or act in any way contrary to Church Tradition - the idea that Church leaders can arbitrarily control believers who submit to their authority is false. You get to keep your own mind, and even use it! We acknowledge superior authority and rationally submit to it. Not "blindly following".

After death, we don't know. We don't believe in Purgatory, unlike Catholics, and unlike Protestants, we do not believe that death is the final end with no hope or comfort beyond that; thus, we have what I consider to be a great privilege of Orthodoxy (and Catholicism), that of being able to pray for the dead, our Dead (to go Covenant-y). They are just passed on, to the other side, after all! Final deletion has not happened, for when it does, that will be the end of the world (and the final awakening of the Wurm at the World's End, if you like). (Lewis's "The Last Battle" (of the Chronicles of Narnia) has a wonderful fantasy image of that Day.

One way of understanding it is to think of a bad habit you have, say snapping back angrily at people and that it is almost imperceptibly worsening. Imagine what it would be like in a million years. You would be in the very essence of hell, and it wouldn't be something 'administered as a punishment for making the wrong choice', but something you did to yourself. The doors of hell are locked on the inside. Again, "The Great Divorce" would help a lot, I think and answer your questions on death - and it would only take 90 minutes to read!

There's an awful lot out there and I'd encourage you to go mucking around on the OCA website, and if you really want to have a sense of Orthodoxy, visit at least one Orthodox service in your life and talk to a priest. To anyone who actually tries that I would tack on two caveats:

1) Ensure the church is canonical - ie, part of a jurisdiction that is in communion with the Orthodox Church worldwide. There are those that have cut themselves off from Church history and Tradition - they are called 'schismatics'. Fortunately, they are a serious minority.

2) Read this little brochure to understand somethings before you walk in 'cold turkey': www.frederica.com/12-things/

PS - hope this is obvious from my insistence that I am only a layman, but if you are getting information from an authoritative canonical source that contradicts anything I am saying, they are right and I am wrong. Simple!

[Avatar]

If individuality (identity / consciousness) are lost, then we cease to be. Simple as that. Even if danlo is right and the "soul energy" is converted/transformed to some other state, if we don't have a consiousness that can be aware of it, we no longer exist in any meaningful way.

--A

[rusmeister]

If individuality (identity / consciousness) are lost, then we cease to be. Simple as that. Even if danlo is right and the "soul energy" is converted/transformed to some other state, if we don't have a consiousness that can be aware of it, we no longer exist in any meaningful way.

--A

That is logical. That leads inevitably to a lack of any real meaning of the individual at all. It's telling that that is something that we find unacceptable and intolerable. Such a philosophy would likely lead to suicide if taken to its logical extreme (but wouldn't explain what we are doing here and why we have this inexplicable thirst for meaning...).

[danlo]

I've really got to fix my 'snapping back at' fault!

[rusmeister]

I've really got to fix my 'snapping back at' fault!

Yep!

In Christianity, the part of the fixing that depends on us is called "repentance".

If you just had an emotional kneejerk at that word, think of all the Hollywood and media depictions of Christian terms like repentance, sin and salvation as words used by ignorant fanatics, and condition us to hear certain words in a certain light (or color). (I know this could go into a discussion on how we are conditioned to react emotionally to certain words in general (and thus are largely unaware of it), but just wanted to point that out. (Edit - See 'open mind' and 'prejudice', below)

This makes listening to or understanding concepts in Christianity more difficult than, say, Buddhism, Islam or even Shinto. With the latter, Western people readily admit that they are ignorant of them and so listen with an open mind. With Christianity, the very closeness, the seeming familiarity make it more difficult for most to examine it with an open mind. People are already biased against it. By open mind I mean one that is not prejudiced. It is possible to come to a definite conclusion and close your mind (this would be 'postjudice'). The question remaining would be whether the conclusion was correct/based on sound reasoning and information.

I just got this from a fellow on another forum:

Yes, it is indeed arrogant to argue fundamental truths about the nature of human cultures and societies based solely on ancient superstitions and beliefs.

A closed mind. (See question remaining, above)

[Avatar]

If individuality (identity / consciousness) are lost, then we cease to be. Simple as that. Even if danlo is right and the "soul energy" is converted/transformed to some other state, if we don't have a consiousness that can be aware of it, we no longer exist in any meaningful way.

--A

That is logical. That leads inevitably to a lack of any real meaning of the individual at all. It's telling that that is something that we find unacceptable and intolerable. Such a philosophy would likely lead to suicide if taken to its logical extreme (but wouldn't explain what we are doing here and why we have this inexplicable thirst for meaning...).

Since I believe that the only real meaning is the one we create for ourselves, it doesn't bother me in the slightest.

What we're doing here is pretty simple I think...living...surviving...evolving...striving. That's what all life does. Our personal awareness of cause and effect is oneof the things that drives us to assume / hope / long for some greater meaning beyond what we know. Some reason.

Me, I'm of the opinion that there is not reason.

--A

[[Syl]]

Vatican book on Templars' demise

The Vatican is to publish a book which is expected to shed light on the demise of the Knights Templar, a Christian military order from the Middle Ages.

The book is based on a document known as the Chinon parchment, found in the Vatican Secret Archives six years ago after years of being incorrectly filed.

The document is a record of the heresy hearings of the Templars before Pope Clement V in the 14th Century.

The official who found the paper says it exonerates the knights entirely.

Prof Barbara Frale, who stumbled across the parchment by mistake, says that it lays bare the rituals and ceremonies over which the Templars were accused of heresy.

In the hearings before Clement V, the knights reportedly admitted spitting on the cross, denying Jesus and kissing the lower back of the man proposing them during initiation ceremonies.

However, many of the confessions were obtained under torture and knights later recanted or tried to claim that their initiation ceremony merely mimicked the humiliation the knights would suffer if they fell into the hands of the Muslim leader Saladin.

The leader of the order, Jacques de Moley, was one of those who confessed to heresy, but later recanted.

He was burned at the stake in Paris in 1314, the same year that the Pope dissolved the order.

However, according to Prof Frale, study of the document shows that the knights were not heretics as had been believed for 700 years.

In fact she says "the Pope was obliged to ask for pardons from the knights... the document we have found absolves them".

Details of the parchment will be published as part of Processus contra Templarios, a book that will be released by the Vatican's Secret Archive on 25 October.

[Hyperception]

Details of the parchment will be published as part of Processus contra Templarios, a book that will be released by the Vatican's Secret Archive on 25 October.

Great...

So it's going to be in Latin?

Menolly's going to just love me asking her to go find my Latin books for a refresher.

I wonder if this book will detail the belief held by many scholars that the dissolution was basically a land grab by the Pope and the King of France due to the Knights becoming too powerful via their invention of banking.

[emotional leper]

Details of the parchment will be published as part of Processus contra Templarios, a book that will be released by the Vatican's Secret Archive on 25 October.

Great...

So it's going to be in Latin?

Menolly's going to just love me asking her to go find my Latin books for a refresher.

I wonder if this book will detail the belief held by many scholars that the dissolution was basically a land grab by the Pope and the King of France due to the Knights becoming too powerful via their invention of banking.

[Menolly]

...grumble...

Hyperception knows perfectly well where his Latin books are.

[The Laughing Man]

If individuality (identity / consciousness) are lost, then we cease to be. Simple as that. Even if danlo is right and the "soul energy" is converted/transformed to some other state, if we don't have a consiousness that can be aware of it, we no longer exist in any meaningful way.

--A

I would define indentity as "who is being aware that they are aware" and consciousness as being "aware that you are aware", but I don't think you need to be an identity who is conscious to be aware. And meaningful how? If there is no memory of it, or no tacit individual recognition that something meaningful is occurring at any given moment, does that mean nothing meaningful occurred? Why do we have to be aware that we are aware in order for awareness to be legitimate? Why cannot the experience alone be adequate?

[rusmeister]

In C.S. Lewis's last Narnia book, "The Last Battle", there is a moment when some of the talking beasts cease to be talking beasts. They lose their ability to metacognate about their identity - in essence, they lose their identity.
That can happen to us, too.

It is the one thing given to us - to be aware that we are aware, and that we are mortal and must die - peculiar suffering in advance of the suffering. The 'now' of wolf thought (to cop the line from Elfquest) does not do this. And it is something that can be lost. See GKC's references to turnips in my post above.

[Avatar]

Why do we have to be aware that we are aware in order for awareness to be legitimate? Why cannot the experience alone be adequate?

Because without the awareness the creates a point of reference, we will never know that we experienced anything.

--A