Charles S. Freeman (trying to be thankful, dammit)
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cspencef.bsky.social
Charles S. Freeman (trying to be thankful, dammit)
@cspencef.bsky.social
620 followers 600 following 6.2K posts
PC(USA) interim pastor in the Quad Cities, ex-musicologist. Highly intolerant of BS and willful ignorance. Music, sports, religion, attempted humor, whatevs. AI is unethical at its root. h/h/h hymnsbycharlesfreeman.blogspot.com
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cspencef.bsky.social
My little tree in my little space.
A small and clearly artificial Christmas tree with white lights next to a strip with three things plugged into it (including the tree) on a red surface (a filing cabinet).
December 1, 2025 at 11:45 PM
cspencef.bsky.social
Getting whitecaps on the river. Yes, it’s windy.
A view, through the trees, of the Mississippi River near East Moline, IL. Small “whitecaps” can be seen on the water suggesting windy conditions.
November 26, 2025 at 8:09 PM
cspencef.bsky.social
Sleeping cats are just irresistible.
Daisy, grey/white cat, napping against a pillow in various pastel shades on top of a red/blue plaid-patterned comforter on a bed.
November 22, 2025 at 11:04 PM
cspencef.bsky.social
What perfect album came out the year you turned 16?
Album cover for Ghost in the Machine, by The Police. Band name upper left, album title lower right, in the middle weird glitchy-looking symbols that suggest your machine is not working properly.
November 17, 2025 at 5:08 AM
cspencef.bsky.social
You may have to be a band geek from way back to get why I’m very to have happened upon this concert.
Program for a performance of the Augustana Concert Band; the portion that is geeking me out is that the program includes the Second Suite in F by Gustav Holst. 1. March 2. Song Without Words 3. Song of the Blacksmith 4. Fantasia on the “Dargason”
November 16, 2025 at 10:01 PM
cspencef.bsky.social
Wearing a collar and a t-shirt that identifies me as, at minimum, not Catholic of any kind. (I’m not Episcopal either.) I wouldn’t react so except that this has happened a number of times and you’d think reporters would learn by now…
Me, with glasses and ever more-white beard and thinning hair, wearing both (1) my clergy shirt complete with tab collar, and (2) a t-shirt that reads: putting the PROTEST back in PROTESTANT
November 15, 2025 at 3:49 AM
cspencef.bsky.social
THE HIGHWAYMEN Florida's African-American Landscape Painters GARY MONROE Cover image: painting of a windblown coastal Florida scene with a stormy orange-ish sky. Disney Pixar THE ART OF SOUL FOREWORD BY TINA FEY INTRODUCTION BY PETE DOCTER AND KEMP POWERS Very hazy purple-ish cover image with indistinct bluish-white center
November 14, 2025 at 9:49 PM
cspencef.bsky.social
This church has a labyrinth. I can’t remember the last time I had access to a labyrinth. (I can’t get a good angle to take a picture of the whole thing.) Since this is probably the last warm day of the year I figured I’d better walk it today or I wouldn’t until 2026.
FIRST PRESBYTERIAN LABYRINTH OPEN DAWN TO DUSK ALL ARE WELCOME (Also a diagram of the labyrinth) *If you want to know God better, you should take a walk with God." 4 year old Asa The Labyrinth The labyrinth is an ancient sacred path found in all religious traditions, the most famous being the 11-circuit labyrinth laid in the Cathedral of Chartres, France in the late 12" century. The labyrinth is a winding pattern, not a maze, leading to the center and back out again reminding us of life's journey. It is meant to be walked as a form of meditation and its purpose is to connect us more fully with God, ourselves, one another and all creation. This 11-circuit labyrinth, based on the Chartes labyrinth, was created on the property df First Presbyterian Church in 1998. We welcome the public to walk this sacred path with us. Preparing to Walk to the Labyrinth The key to fully experiencing your walk is to remain open. On this sacred pathway you are moving your body as a means of quieting your mind. There is only one path. Follow it to the center, letting go of cares and stress, control and concerns. Spend a few quiet moments in the center to connect more deeply and fully with God/Your Higher Power/Your "Holy Place." Follow the path back out again to act with greater integrity and hope. There are as many ways of walking the labyrinth as there are walkers. Here are a few suggestions: Gracious Attention: Let all thoughts go. Allow a sense of attention to flow through you . • • • Ask a Question: Focus on a question you have been asking yourself. Walk with a listening heart. Use Repetition: Repeat a mantra, word or phrase over and over. Offer Petitions: Bring to mind persons or issues for which you wish to pray. Honor a Benchmark: A birthday, a life-style change, an anniversary, a memorial can be the focus of your walk. • Body Prayer: Move spontaneously and freely as your body wishes. Find your own rhythm and way of being on this walk. May God's peace be with you always! We hope you will also join us Sundays at 10:00 a.m.! (Gotta plug the church, you know…) Not an effective view of the labyrinth, but it’s there. (Not from the entrance.)
November 14, 2025 at 8:21 PM
cspencef.bsky.social
There’s a nearby place where I can get this on Wednesdays for ten bucks plus drinks (and they do have sweet tea). This native Georgian can certainly live here for a couple of years.
Three pieces of fried chicken (breast, leg, and wing) with mashed potatoes and gravy, with mixed vegetables in the dish to the side.
November 12, 2025 at 8:07 PM
cspencef.bsky.social
Lot more of this coming this year…
A black t-shirt with the words I GOT A ROCK printed in white in Peanuts font on it.
October 31, 2025 at 5:10 PM
cspencef.bsky.social
I can’t express how much I hate developers who do destructive things like this.
Beatrix, polydactyl kitten from Breaking Cat News, reporting: (Above her) And I know "hate" is a very strong word... (Below her) …Which is why I specifically said it.
October 30, 2025 at 3:11 AM
cspencef.bsky.social
1 Samuel 8:10-18, NRSV.
10 So Samuel reported all the words of the LorD to the people who were asking him for a king. 11 He said, "These will be the ways of the king who will reign over you: he will take your sons and appoint them to his chariots and to be his horsemen, and to run before his chariots, 12 and he will appoint for himself commanders of thousands and commanders of fifties and some to plow his ground and to reap his harvest and to make his implements of war and the equipment of his chariots. 13 He will take your daughters to be perfumers and cooks and bakers. 14 He will take the best of your fields and vineyards and olive orchards and give them to his courtiers. 15 He will take one-tenth of your grain and of your vineyards and give it to his officers and his courtiers. 16 He will take your male and female slaves and the best of your cattle and donkeys and put them to his work. 17 He will take one-tenth of your flocks, and you shall be his slaves. 18 And on that day you will cry out because of your king, whom you have chosen for yourselves, but the Lord will not answer you on that day."
October 15, 2025 at 5:06 PM
cspencef.bsky.social
Blue t-shirt with white lettering: CATS ARE THE NEW KIDS, followed by a white silhouette of a kitten.
October 13, 2025 at 9:51 PM
cspencef.bsky.social
For this year I’ll go with this Italian-American:
Album cover image from The Definitive Vince Guaraldi. He is standing with one foot propped on a very small piano, with the Peanuts character Schroeder looking on with concern.
October 13, 2025 at 4:14 PM
cspencef.bsky.social
Got this t-shirt when I did an internship in seminary. Awful lot of Christians (not just eeeeevangelicals) want to ignore that last word, and many aren’t so keen on the first word either.
Back of a t-shirt with the words Learn. Pray. Act.
October 10, 2025 at 3:25 AM
cspencef.bsky.social
Guess nobody told this guy that Washington was an urban hellhole? www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/...
Leaving Boston wasn't easy, particularly with the Red Sox on the ascent. At the same time, the allure of Washington -- "a world-class city," Toboni said -- was obvious, and the Lerner family, which owns the Nationals, sealed his deeision. "Just the food, the culture, the diversity -- the love of sports. It's woven into the fabric of the area." Toboni said.
October 1, 2025 at 7:46 PM
cspencef.bsky.social
On its birthday, share one image from your favorite #TNG episode
Patrick Stewart as Jean-Luc Picard in Star Trek: The Next Generation episode The Inner Light. After the events of the episode (go look it up, I can’t describe it without losing it) Picard is alone in quarters, playing a small recorder-like instrument.
September 29, 2025 at 1:51 AM
cspencef.bsky.social
share your favorite black and white movie
Poster for Laura (1944), featuring Gene Tierney and Dana Andrews. Gene TIERNEY Dana ANDREWS Laura CLIFTON WEBB VINCENT PRICE JUDITH ANDERSON 20TH CENTURY-FOX PICTURE SCREEN PLEY BY JAY BRATLER Produced and directed by OTTO PREMINGER
September 24, 2025 at 9:50 PM
cspencef.bsky.social
My rapture outfit
Steve Martin in a scene from Only Murders in the Building. Dark overcoat over blue sweater and light collared shirt, dark blue bowler hat
September 23, 2025 at 3:28 AM
cspencef.bsky.social
Post a movie you like with a terrible rotten tomatoes score
Screenshot of Rotten Tomatoes page for the movie Amazing Grace and Chuck (PG, 1987), 43% on the Tomatometer (but 70% on the Popcornmeter!) with description starting “Average American boy Chuck Murdock (Joshua Zuehlke) goes on a school outing to a nuclear…” (rest is cut off). Image of mother holding son.
September 17, 2025 at 12:55 AM
cspencef.bsky.social
Things keep happening that provoke the sharing of this image.
Comic strip panel from the strip Breaking Cat News, in which the kitten Ora Zella has climbed up a drape but now finds she can’t climb back down. She exclaims: SOMEONE HELP, I'M EXPERIENCING THE CONSEQUENCES OF MY ACTIONS! Followed by a TINY HISS!
September 15, 2025 at 3:43 PM
cspencef.bsky.social
From Karl Popper, The Open Society and its Enemies (1945):
Unlimited tolerance must lead to the disappearance of tolerance. If we extend unlimited tolerance even to those who are intolerant, if we are not prepared to defend a tolerant society against the onslaught of the intolerant, then the tolerant will be destroyed, and tolerance with them.
September 14, 2025 at 1:29 PM
cspencef.bsky.social
One way to make the point…
September 9, 2025 at 10:36 PM
cspencef.bsky.social
I’m still basically finding my way around here, but I’ve been to all of one minor league game in the last three summers, and I arrived here just in time for the last week of the season, so dadgummit, I’m at the ballpark.
View from seat behind home plate at Modern Woodmen Park in Davenport, IA (I think; so far, unless I’m at the church, I have no idea which Quad City I’m in). I wonder if anybody ever hits a home run into the Ferris wheel?
September 3, 2025 at 11:27 PM
cspencef.bsky.social
Using one photo already in your phone, what is the announcement tomorrow at 2?
Kitten Ora Zella from the strip Breaking Cat News, having climbed too far up a drape, now finds she can’t climb down; she cries out SOMEONE HELP, I'M EXPERIENCING THE CONSEQUENCES OF MY ACTIONS! and lets out a TINY HISS!
September 2, 2025 at 4:19 AM