Ben Wood /|\🥭🌿✝️
@cosmichope.bsky.social
Husband, Quaker, theologian, Hedge Druid, "Aristotelian Liberal" in @greenparty.org.uk. Woodbrooke Programme Coordinator for Applied Theology and Biblical Studies. Lover of dogs, Guild Socialism, Dutch beer, old musty books, and slow autumn afternoons.
'Concern is indivisible and so is selfishness. A society which says 'to hell with famine and disease in Bangladesh, it's all their own fault, isn't it?' is extremely unlikely to balance this with compassion and justice for its own pensioners and its own low-paid' (Roy Jenkins, 11 March 1972).
November 11, 2025 at 3:52 PM
'Concern is indivisible and so is selfishness. A society which says 'to hell with famine and disease in Bangladesh, it's all their own fault, isn't it?' is extremely unlikely to balance this with compassion and justice for its own pensioners and its own low-paid' (Roy Jenkins, 11 March 1972).
On immigration, Roy Jenkins observed: 'Where in the world is there a university which could preserve its fame, or a cultural centre which would keep its eminence...if it were to turn inward...? To live apart, for a person, a city or a country, is to lead a life of declining intellectual stimulation'
November 11, 2025 at 3:17 PM
On immigration, Roy Jenkins observed: 'Where in the world is there a university which could preserve its fame, or a cultural centre which would keep its eminence...if it were to turn inward...? To live apart, for a person, a city or a country, is to lead a life of declining intellectual stimulation'
'[That] is what I feel about force & violence. It is, alas ! the ultimate reality on this earth, but it does not always get to the front. Some people call its absences "decadence"; I call them "civilization" & find in such interludes the chief justification for the human experiment' (E.M. Forster) 🔶️
November 11, 2025 at 10:25 AM
'[That] is what I feel about force & violence. It is, alas ! the ultimate reality on this earth, but it does not always get to the front. Some people call its absences "decadence"; I call them "civilization" & find in such interludes the chief justification for the human experiment' (E.M. Forster) 🔶️
2/2 We often miss this subtle aspect in more popular presentations of the Buddha & his teachings. The self is not 'the enemy" of selflessness (that is itself an egotistical framing, assuming self & other). Rather the self is a door to the wide open sky. It is a boat which helps us reach the shore.
November 11, 2025 at 9:44 AM
2/2 We often miss this subtle aspect in more popular presentations of the Buddha & his teachings. The self is not 'the enemy" of selflessness (that is itself an egotistical framing, assuming self & other). Rather the self is a door to the wide open sky. It is a boat which helps us reach the shore.
1/2 There's a glorious paradox in the life of the Buddha. He spends a great deal of energy building up his sense of self. He journeys, he searches, he wills & meditates. Only after he knows what he really wants can he live without wanting. Only after self-discovery does the self cease to matter.
November 11, 2025 at 9:44 AM
1/2 There's a glorious paradox in the life of the Buddha. He spends a great deal of energy building up his sense of self. He journeys, he searches, he wills & meditates. Only after he knows what he really wants can he live without wanting. Only after self-discovery does the self cease to matter.
'I have no dogmatic certainties which tell me where I came from, where I'm going or why, but like a stream which doesn't know the source from which it sprang, or the sea to which it flows, I trust the current in my being & believe if I am true to it, I shall not lose my way.' (Violet Bonham Carter)🌻
November 11, 2025 at 9:14 AM
'I have no dogmatic certainties which tell me where I came from, where I'm going or why, but like a stream which doesn't know the source from which it sprang, or the sea to which it flows, I trust the current in my being & believe if I am true to it, I shall not lose my way.' (Violet Bonham Carter)🌻
'Freedom’ is the natural term by which...man…describes to himself the state in which he shall have realised his ideal of himself...[He] shall have become all that he has it in him to be, and so fulfil the law of his being or "live according to his nature"' (Thomas Hill Green) 🔶️🌻
November 11, 2025 at 9:08 AM
'Freedom’ is the natural term by which...man…describes to himself the state in which he shall have realised his ideal of himself...[He] shall have become all that he has it in him to be, and so fulfil the law of his being or "live according to his nature"' (Thomas Hill Green) 🔶️🌻
'...Labour’s economic vision is based on the presumption that there are no limits. Both conservative and social democratic parties see the world as a magic pudding that can never be exhausted. They build their economic programmes on a fairytale' @georgemonbiot.bsky.social
November 11, 2025 at 8:54 AM
'...Labour’s economic vision is based on the presumption that there are no limits. Both conservative and social democratic parties see the world as a magic pudding that can never be exhausted. They build their economic programmes on a fairytale' @georgemonbiot.bsky.social
For T.H Green, the free person is 'that self-realising subject which is his self'. Free action belongs to the Perfect Idea of the Self. (the actuality of all potentialities). This being 'exists in God as eternally self-realised'. The truly free act puts us in harmony with God & ourselves.
November 10, 2025 at 10:32 PM
For T.H Green, the free person is 'that self-realising subject which is his self'. Free action belongs to the Perfect Idea of the Self. (the actuality of all potentialities). This being 'exists in God as eternally self-realised'. The truly free act puts us in harmony with God & ourselves.
'[New Liberals] served to break down the idea that freedom is something that individuals have as a ready-made possession, & to instill the idea that it is something to be achieved, while the possibility of the achievement was shown to be [socially] conditioned' (John Dewey) 🔶️
November 10, 2025 at 9:51 PM
'[New Liberals] served to break down the idea that freedom is something that individuals have as a ready-made possession, & to instill the idea that it is something to be achieved, while the possibility of the achievement was shown to be [socially] conditioned' (John Dewey) 🔶️
'Only by participating in the...common good can individual human beings realize their true individualities & become truly free. The state is but one organ among many of the Spirit...that holds all things together & that makes human beings members of one another' (John Dewey on Thomas Hill Green) 🔶️
November 10, 2025 at 9:39 PM
'Only by participating in the...common good can individual human beings realize their true individualities & become truly free. The state is but one organ among many of the Spirit...that holds all things together & that makes human beings members of one another' (John Dewey on Thomas Hill Green) 🔶️
'In love man has found himself again in another...The more variegated the manifold in which life is alive, the more the places in which it can be reunified; the more the places in which it can sense itself, the deeper does love become' (G.W.F. Hegel) 💗
November 10, 2025 at 8:12 AM
'In love man has found himself again in another...The more variegated the manifold in which life is alive, the more the places in which it can be reunified; the more the places in which it can sense itself, the deeper does love become' (G.W.F. Hegel) 💗
'Religion, right, ethics, and everything spiritual in human beings, is merely aroused. We are implicitly spirit, for the truth lies within us and the spiritual content within us must be brought into consciousness.' (G.W.F. Hegel)
November 10, 2025 at 8:03 AM
'Religion, right, ethics, and everything spiritual in human beings, is merely aroused. We are implicitly spirit, for the truth lies within us and the spiritual content within us must be brought into consciousness.' (G.W.F. Hegel)
The 3rd Series of Star Trek: TOS has the deserved reputation for being the worst. But despite that, there are still gems to be found. Two of my favourites are "The Empath" (a ghostly tale of alien manipulation) and "In Truth There is no Beauty" (an episode about the pitfalls of pride & jealousy).
November 9, 2025 at 8:51 PM
The 3rd Series of Star Trek: TOS has the deserved reputation for being the worst. But despite that, there are still gems to be found. Two of my favourites are "The Empath" (a ghostly tale of alien manipulation) and "In Truth There is no Beauty" (an episode about the pitfalls of pride & jealousy).
"I am more of a Quaker than anything else. I believe in the 'still, small voice', and that voice is Christ within us" (Ralph Waldo Emerson).
November 9, 2025 at 11:10 AM
"I am more of a Quaker than anything else. I believe in the 'still, small voice', and that voice is Christ within us" (Ralph Waldo Emerson).
'I am never very forward in offering spiritual consolation to any one in distress or disease. I believe that such resources, to be of any service, must be self-evolved in the first instance. I am something of the Quaker's mind in this, & am inclined to wait for the spirit' (Samuel Taylor Coleridge)
November 9, 2025 at 10:23 AM
'I am never very forward in offering spiritual consolation to any one in distress or disease. I believe that such resources, to be of any service, must be self-evolved in the first instance. I am something of the Quaker's mind in this, & am inclined to wait for the spirit' (Samuel Taylor Coleridge)
On my birthday I get to be a bit egotistical. Who am I presently? A Christ-centred Quaker in religion, a tentative Platonist in metaphysics, a Left Aristotelian in politics & Pre-Raphaelite Cottagecore in my aesthetics. Cider over wine, Muse over Radiohead, love over money, winter over summer. 💜
November 9, 2025 at 9:35 AM
On my birthday I get to be a bit egotistical. Who am I presently? A Christ-centred Quaker in religion, a tentative Platonist in metaphysics, a Left Aristotelian in politics & Pre-Raphaelite Cottagecore in my aesthetics. Cider over wine, Muse over Radiohead, love over money, winter over summer. 💜
I'm of an age now when I can remember another energetic New York (New Paltz) Mayor; the Green Party's Jason West, who (against norms at the time) married same-sex couples. West was a signatory of the US Mayors' Climate Protection Agreement & a member of the international network Mayors for Peace. ☮️♻️
November 9, 2025 at 9:00 AM
I'm of an age now when I can remember another energetic New York (New Paltz) Mayor; the Green Party's Jason West, who (against norms at the time) married same-sex couples. West was a signatory of the US Mayors' Climate Protection Agreement & a member of the international network Mayors for Peace. ☮️♻️
'Christianity is not a theory, or a speculation; but a life. Not a philosophy of life, but a life and a living process. It is not therefore so properly a species of knowledge, as a form of being' (Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Aids to Reflection, 1839)
November 8, 2025 at 8:40 PM
'Christianity is not a theory, or a speculation; but a life. Not a philosophy of life, but a life and a living process. It is not therefore so properly a species of knowledge, as a form of being' (Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Aids to Reflection, 1839)
'Public ownership represents half of socialism. The other half is industrial democracy—participation by the workers, the staff, in running industry, not only with a voice controlling working conditions but in every aspect of its administration & development' (Fenner Brockway, House of Lords, 1973).
November 8, 2025 at 8:23 PM
'Public ownership represents half of socialism. The other half is industrial democracy—participation by the workers, the staff, in running industry, not only with a voice controlling working conditions but in every aspect of its administration & development' (Fenner Brockway, House of Lords, 1973).
November 8, 2025 at 5:51 PM
'We cannot live in a world interpreted for us by others. An interpreted world is not a hope. Part of the terror is to take back our listening, to use our own voice, to see our own light' (quoted in Hildegard of Bingen Essential Writings and Chants of a Christian Mystic, p. xv.)
November 8, 2025 at 3:22 PM
'We cannot live in a world interpreted for us by others. An interpreted world is not a hope. Part of the terror is to take back our listening, to use our own voice, to see our own light' (quoted in Hildegard of Bingen Essential Writings and Chants of a Christian Mystic, p. xv.)
'There is another plane of thought...It holds up a vision of a society redeemed by true democracy...when monopoly shall be no more, & labor & capital, no longer at war, shall cooperate to the wiping out of involuntary & undeserved poverty in an era of...equality & social peace' (R. M. La Follette)
November 8, 2025 at 2:32 PM
'There is another plane of thought...It holds up a vision of a society redeemed by true democracy...when monopoly shall be no more, & labor & capital, no longer at war, shall cooperate to the wiping out of involuntary & undeserved poverty in an era of...equality & social peace' (R. M. La Follette)
While Plotinus sometimes sound like he wants to get away from the world (he is suspicious of the manifold snares of the senses) he does not argue that we should hate the world. Instead, we should see the world in & through its Origin. We should love the world because it reflects the Good.
November 8, 2025 at 1:03 PM
While Plotinus sometimes sound like he wants to get away from the world (he is suspicious of the manifold snares of the senses) he does not argue that we should hate the world. Instead, we should see the world in & through its Origin. We should love the world because it reflects the Good.
'What therefore is this flight, and how shall we escape, like Odysseus in the story, from the enchantments of Circe and Calypso? There it tells symbolically how he remained unsatisfied...Our Fatherland is that country whence we came, and there our Father dwells' (Plotinus).
November 8, 2025 at 11:16 AM
'What therefore is this flight, and how shall we escape, like Odysseus in the story, from the enchantments of Circe and Calypso? There it tells symbolically how he remained unsatisfied...Our Fatherland is that country whence we came, and there our Father dwells' (Plotinus).