Ending Summer on Violence and Despair

Elon Musk just started tweeting about the Iliad. But our guest,

Twitter’s Audrey Horne

, has been talking about Homer with

Samuel Kimbriel

and

Damir Marusic

for at least two weeks now — well before Elon turned his attention to these kinds of things. We figured this was an excuse to share some of the offline chatter with the Crowd. If Elon’s interested in it, it has to be relevant, right?

Christians and Greeks both agree that the world is cruel: one must not look away from the despair we all face. And yet the Greeks face it with “no consoling prospect of immortality,” as Simone Weil puts it. Leaving aside whether it’s true, is the Christian approach better?

This is a classic Wisdom of Crowds rambler: a free-wheeling conversation about faith, meaning, purpose and the very nature of reality. What better way to wrap up the dog days?

Required Reading:

• Twitter’s Audrey Horne
  tweeting about butter (X).

• “Talk to Me Nicely,” by

  Twitter’s Audrey Horne
  (WoC).

• “How to Think About Fallenness,” by

  Damir Marusic
  (WoC).

• “Why Give a Damn,” by

  Samuel Kimbriel
  (WoC).

• “What Are Children For?” with Anastasia Berg and Rachel Wiseman (WoC).