He entered Jericho and was passing through. And there was a man named Zacchae′us; he was a chief tax collector, and rich. And he sought to see who Jesus was, but could not, on account of the crowd, because he was small of stature. So he ran on ahead and climbed up into a sycamore tree to see him, for he was to pass that way. And when Jesus came to the place, he looked up and said to him, “Zacchae′us, make haste and come down; for I must stay at your house today.” So he made haste and came down, and received him joyfully. And when they saw it they all murmured, “He has gone in to be the guest of a man who is a sinner.” And Zacchae′us stood and said to the Lord, “Behold, Lord, the half of my goods I give to the poor; and if I have defrauded any one of anything, I restore it fourfold.” And Jesus said to him, “Today salvation has come to this house, since he also is a son of Abraham. For the Son of man came to seek and to save the lost.”

–Luke 19:1-10

Holy Island sunrises.#Northumberland #landscapephotography pic.twitter.com/ZwHKjTt6SP

— Jim Scott (@jimscottphoto) November 27, 2024

A FUNERAL is sometimes misunderstood as drawing a line under a bereavement: that it represents a closure. This is not the case. An important ritual in the process of mourning, a funeral is more of a start than an end point. The bereaved now face a life without their loved one, and this could involve significant change, particularly if the loved one played a central part, such as that of a spouse.

Elsie, 75, described how she had never slept alone in a house until her husband died. To have nobody under the same roof made her nervous every night, until she started getting used to it.

Kathy, widowed unexpectedly, explained: “I had a lovely priest who was incredibly sympathetic to the whole situation surrounding my husband’s death, but there was no further bereavement support [after the funeral] provided by the church.

“This lack of support left me really struggling, especially with my feelings about God and what had happened. I really needed to be able to talk through everything from a religious aspect, which I couldn’t get with conventional bereavement counselling.”

Read it all.

A funeral is not the end of the road, says Abi May, but many mourners feel isolated afterwardshttps://t.co/od0Q0JSMuh

— Church Times (@ChurchTimes) November 27, 2024

As if lawmakers needed any other reasons to take America’s fiscal health seriously, the gross national debt of the United States has now officially reached $36 trillion. We started 2024 by crossing the $34 trillion threshold, added another trillion during the summer, and now we’re heading into the holidays with yet another trillion. Government borrowing is becoming as certain as the changing of the seasons these days.

It’s often said that the more times you say a word over and over, the more it starts to lose its meaning. With so many trillion-dollar debt milestones in recent years, it’s easy to forget that each of them has real-world consequences.

But rising debt poses serious domestic and geopolitical risks: it slows our economy, threatens higher inflation and interest rates, and squeezes our budget through higher interest rates. And it hampers our ability to be flexible in responding to recessions and disasters at home and foreign crises abroad.

And the future trajectory looks bleak as well.

Read it all.

🚨Federal debt has officially breached $36 trillion, as projected 4 days ago, w/ Treasury borrowing $61 billion yesterday; we're in serious trouble and our nation's finances are falling apart… https://t.co/iekNG1US1W pic.twitter.com/zPzJJlBYGC

— E.J. Antoni, Ph.D. (@RealEJAntoni) November 22, 2024

Shortly after conception, a fertilized egg divides, becoming two. Then each of those cells splits, becoming four, and on and on. Over time, those lineages of cells grow distinct, giving rise to all the different organs and tissues in the human body and comprising as many as 36 trillion cells.

Scientists would love to understand the trajectory of each of those cells over time. “It’s something that developmental biologists like me have dreamed of for over 100 years,” said Alex Schier of the University of Basel in Switzerland. But the best they have managed has been taking snapshots of cells at different stages.

Lacking that complete history, scientists still have much to learn about how, exactly, cells produce our organs, or how they heal wounds later in life. “We really only understand bits and pieces,” said Tanja Stadler, a computational biologist at ETH in Zurich.

Dr. Stadler’s lab and others around the world are trying to turn cells into their own historians, as she and her colleagues described in the journal Nature Reviews Genetics on Monday. 

Read it all.

Amazing—A paradigm for #biology is emerging in which cells can be genetically programmed to write their histories into their own genomes. These records can subsequently be read https://t.co/TeJfCld0jj #science #21stc #cellrecording

— Kendall Harmon (@KendallHarmon6) November 26, 2024

Am I a soldier of the cross,
A follower of the Lamb,
And shall I fear to own His cause,
Or blush to speak His Name?
Must I be carried to the skies
On flowery beds of ease,
While others fought to win the prize,
And sailed through bloody seas?

Are there no foes for me to face*?
Must I not stem the flood?
Is this vile world a friend to grace,
To help me on to God?

Sure I must fight, if I would reign;
Increase my courage, Lord.
I’ll bear the toil, endure the pain,
Supported by Thy Word.

Thy saints in all this glorious war
Shall conquer, though they die;
They see the triumph from afar,
By faith they bring it nigh.**

When that illustrious day shall rise,
And all Thy armies shine
In robes of victory through skies,
The glory shall be Thine.

2024 is the 350th anniversary of the birth of Isaac Watts, an Independent minister and writer. His hymns were said to ‘illustrate every truth of revelation, [and] throw light upon every secret movement of the human heart'.

Read more on #ODNB20: https://t.co/8PdCJkDfaN pic.twitter.com/SpZCRn6sB4

— National Biography (@odnb) September 29, 2024

God of truth and grace, who didst give Isaac Watts singular gifts to present thy praise in verse, that he might write psalms, hymns and spiritual songs for thy Church: Give us grace joyfully to sing thy praises now and in the life to come; through Jesus Christ our Savior, who livest and reignest with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.God of truth and grace, who didst give Isaac Watts singular gifts to present thy praise in verse, that he might write psalms, hymns and spiritual songs for thy Church: Give us grace joyfully to sing thy praises now and in the life to come; through Jesus Christ our Savior, who livest and reignest with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

Isaac Watts, minister, hymn writer, theologian, and logician, died Nov. 25, 1748.
“Must I be carried to the skies
On flow’ry beds of ease,
While others fought to win the prize
And sailed through bloody seas?” pic.twitter.com/FIBq9RmYPu

— Judson I Stone (@JudsonIStone) November 25, 2024

O Lord Jesus, with whom we have passed another Christian year, following thee from thy birth in our flesh to thy sufferings and triumph, and listening to the utterances and counsels of thy Spirit: Even thus would we also end this year of grace, and stand complete in thee our Righteousness; humbly beseeching thee that we may evermore continue in thy faith and abide in thy love; who liveth and reigneth with the Father and the Holy Spirit, one God, world without end.

Today, I'm grateful for the trees that clean the air, give shade, and provide homes for the creatures of the forests. #Grattitude #Thanksgiving #Thanksgiving2024 #nature #NaturePhotography #ThickTrunkTuesday #naturelovers #landscapephotography #landscape pic.twitter.com/MbMjDZXV3w

— Joe Blow (@Piper_doown) November 26, 2024

I lift up my eyes to the hills. From whence does my help come? My help comes from the LORD, who made heaven and earth. He will not let your foot be moved, he who keeps you will not slumber.

–Psalm 121:1-3

Beautiful snowy Edinburgh 📷c.o. Paul Watt Photography pic.twitter.com/8xW6vgnOfX

— freddie barss (@BarssFreddie) November 26, 2024

More Church of England leaders were aware of the John Smyth scandal and should follow the Archbishop of Canterbury’s decision to resign, according to the head of the official inquiry into child abuse.

Professor Alexis Jay said that abuse continued in the church and the cover-up of Smyth’s decades of wrongdoing could not be “down to one person”.

The Most Rev Justin Welby, 68, will stand down in January and pass his duties to the Archbishop of York, the Most Rev Stephen Cottrell, who will act in a “caretaker” role.

Alexis Jay, who conducted the inquiry into child sex abuse, says more people must have known about John Smyth and that abuse is continuing in Church of Englandhttps://t.co/fgX70ALtCG

— The Times and The Sunday Times (@thetimes) November 25, 2024

You may listen directly here:

Or you may download it there.

Ephesians 6:10✞ pic.twitter.com/AbeBCbf8zT

— Catherine ♡ =^..^= (@Catangels) November 13, 2024

Far too many people think “they don’t need reality,” [Bill] Maher told social psychologist Jonathan Haidt of New York University, author of “The Anxious Generation: How the Great Rewiring of Childhood is Causing an Epidemic of Mental Illness.”

“We’ve made reality obsolete — interesting choice,” said Maher. “Parents today, it’s kind of the worst of both worlds. Too much hovering in real life, where there is any left, and then none with virtual. You go in your room, lock yourself in there with the portal of evil that is the phone. … I feel like parents, in each generation, ceded more control to children.”

In response, Haidt — a self-avowed Jewish atheist — stressed that modern life continues to eat away at the traditions of the past.

“As life gets easier, as people get wealthier, as we move away from the old days, authority tends to decay — there tends to be less respect for authority, less respect for the old ways,” said Haidt. “Kids need structure, they need moral rules. … When it seems as though anything is permissible, it doesn’t make people happy. It makes them feel disoriented and lost.”

Read it all (quoted by yours truly in yesterday’s sermon).

"Why haven't more religious leaders been willing to address the scary trends linked to smartphone abuse in the urgent, even fiery language used by secular figures such as Haidt and Maher?" asks @tweetmattingly https://t.co/ne2ZAAe1y8

— Jonathan Haidt (@JonHaidt) November 23, 2024

By the end of the Bush years, the New Atheists believed they were fighting a vast, dominant American evangelicalism—a literal theocracy! Some of them still feel that way. Yet so much has happened in the intervening years, and the tone and tenor of unbelief has generally changed. Sunday Assembly, a “church” for non-believers recently profiled on CBS, exemplifies this metamorphosis. 

Despite the fact that it was founded in 2013 by two British comedians, Sunday Assembly lacks the anti-religious mockery of the Flying Spaghetti Monster crowd. Its tone is more therapeutic and upbeat. With sixty chapters globally, its motto is “live better, help often, and wonder more.” Services feature “a TED Talk-style talk” along with sing-alongs (“pop songs mainly” according to the group’s website), inspirational readings, and the sharing of personal stories. Coffee and donuts are served afterward. “We release a lot of endorphins,” Amy Boyle, one of the group’s leaders, told CBS.

Members of Sunday Assembly invoke the word “community” like an apotropaic gesture to explain their interest in attending. But real community always coheres around something. It does not exist for its own sake. So, what is the central fire around which the Sunday Assembly congregates? A shared commitment to releasing endorphins? Or to the vague admonition to “live better, help often, and wonder more”? 

Read it all.

The dramatic failure of New Atheism to provide any vital culture or source of meaning is well-established; Sunday Assembly invites us to walk—and “live” and “wonder”—among its ruins.https://t.co/ynOHPTnVG1

— First Things (@firstthingsmag) November 23, 2024

O loving God, by whose grace thy servant James Huntington gathered a community dedicated to love and discipline and devotion to the holy Cross of our Savior Jesus Christ: Send thy blessing upon all who proclaim Christ crucified, and move the hearts of many to look unto him and be saved; who with thee and the Holy Spirit liveth and reigneth, one God, for ever and ever.

The Episcopal Church also commemorates James Otis Sargent Huntington, Priest and Monk, 1935 pic.twitter.com/lgSeiwMh0U

— The Anglican Church in St Petersburg (@anglicanspb) November 25, 2014

O God, who didst wonderfully deliver thy people out of Egypt and didst bring them into their own land: Deliver us, we beseech thee, from the tyranny of sin, and bring us into that land where the Prince of Peace reigneth, and the lives of men proclaim thy righteousness; through the same Jesus Christ our Lord.

Today is the Solemnity of Christ the King, with which the Church concludes the Liturgical Year by reminding the world that nothing, no person or law, is above God. Christ is Lord of time and history, Lord of all creation.

Enjoy the Communion • Sedebit: https://t.co/mVA3Jr2HsA pic.twitter.com/V3dXy560v9

— Neumz 🎶 (@neumz_now) November 24, 2024

Yet he saved them for his name’s sake,
that he might make known his mighty power.
He rebuked the Red Sea, and it became dry;
and he led them through the deep as through a desert.

–Psalm 106:8-9

Beautiful sunrise view from Downtown Charleston to kick off our Thanksgiving week!🦃 pic.twitter.com/50UTbOp6Rl

— Joey Sovine Live 5 (@JoeySovine) November 25, 2024

Eternal Father,
whose Son Jesus Christ ascended to the throne of heaven
that he might rule over all things as Lord and King:
keep the Church in the unity of the Spirit
and in the bond of peace,
and bring the whole created order to worship at his feet;
who is alive and reigns with you,
in the unity of the Holy Spirit,
one God, now and for ever.
Amen.

Morning everyone I hope you are well. The other side of the Lake District. The old Greenside Lead Mines in Glenridding, from 1825 until it closed in the early 1960's. Now holiday homes with the path trodden by 10's of thousands each year on the way to Helvellyn. Have a great day.… pic.twitter.com/XdMf0id2M6

— Rod Hutchinson (@lakesrhino) November 24, 2024

Out of my distress I called on the Lord;
    the Lord answered me and set me free.
 With the Lord on my side I do not fear.
    What can man do to me?
 The Lord is on my side to help me;
    I shall look in triumph on those who hate me.
It is better to take refuge in the Lord
    than to put confidence in man.
 It is better to take refuge in the Lord
    than to put confidence in princes.

–Psalm 118:5-9

☃️❄️Guten Morgen ☀️
und einen wunderschönen Sonntag ☃️❄️☃️ pic.twitter.com/XEGzKCt1SF

— 💫Stein_harmonie🍀🧚‍♀️ (@SteinHarmonie) November 24, 2024

O Lord, who didst call thy servant Clement of Alexandria from the errors of ancient philosophy that he might learn and teach the saving Gospel of Christ: Turn thy Church from the conceits of worldly wisdom and, by the Spirit of truth, guide it into all truth; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.

St Clement was martyred by being thrown into the sea weighed down by an anchor, so he became a patron of sailors. Churches dedicated to him are often found by the sea, and in places associated with the Vikings, such as St Clement Danes in London https://t.co/R23adfmG3e pic.twitter.com/BPf51FlDQW

— Eleanor Parker (@ClerkofOxford) November 23, 2024

O God, renew our spirits by thy Holy Spirit, and draw our hearts this morning unto thyself, that our work may not be a burden, but a delight; and give us such a mighty love to thee as may sweeten all our obedience.  Let us not serve with the spirit of bondage as slaves, but with cheerfulness and gladness, as children, delighting ourselves in thee and rejoicing in thy wishes for the sake of Jesus Christ.

–Robert W. Rodenmayer, ed., The Pastor’s Prayerbook: Selected and arranged for various occasions (New York: Oxford University Press, 1960)

Is any one among you suffering? Let him pray. Is any cheerful? Let him sing praise. Is any among you sick? Let him call for the elders of the church, and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord; and the prayer of faith will save the sick man, and the Lord will raise him up; and if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven. Therefore confess your sins to one another, and pray for one another, that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous man has great power in its effects. Eli”²jah was a man of like nature with ourselves and he prayed fervently that it might not rain, and for three years and six months it did not rain on the earth. Then he prayed again and the heaven gave rain, and the earth brought forth its fruit.

–James 5:13-18

Good morning from Cambridge#SteepleSaturday pic.twitter.com/IfjFjmZG5N

— Sandy De Born (@SandyDeBorn) November 23, 2024

You must picture me alone in that room in Magdalen, night after night, feeling, whenever my mind lifted even for a second from my work, the steady, unrelenting approach of Him whom I so earnestly desired not to meet. That which I greatly feared had at last come upon me. In the Trinity Term of 1929 I gave in, and admitted that God was God, and knelt and prayed: perhaps, that night, the most dejected and reluctant convert in all England. I did not then see what is now the most shining and obvious thing; the Divine humility which will accept a convert even on such terms. The Prodigal Son at least walked home on his own feet. But who can duly adore that Love which will open the high gates to a prodigal who is brought in kicking, struggling, resentful, and darting his eyes in every direction for a chance of escape? The words “compelle intrare,” compel them to come in, have been so abused be wicked men that we shudder at them; but, properly understood, they plumb the depth of the Divine mercy. The hardness of God is kinder than the softness of men, and His compulsion is our liberation.

–C.S. Lewis, Surprised by Joy (Harcourt Brace, 1956), p.228

Appreciate this from @TrevinWax on how C. S. Lewis, who died on today’s date 61 years ago, spent his last days—enjoying creation, reading, meeting with friends, & corresponding w/ people, seeking to do them spiritual good. I want to transition like this. https://t.co/KsVtYYQjNf

— Keith Plummer (@XianMind) November 22, 2024

To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything, and your heart will certainly be wrung and possibly be broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even to an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements; lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket – safe, dark, motionless, airless – it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. The alternative to tragedy, or at least to the risk of tragedy, is damnation. The only place outside Heaven where you can be perfectly safe from all the dangers and perturbations of love is hell.

–C.S. Lewis, The Four Loves (London: Geoffrey Bles, 1960), pp. 138-139

22 November 1963: Author and academic Clive Staples (“CS”) Lewis died. (aged 64). He’s best known for his works of fiction, especially The Screwtape Letters, The Chronicles of Narnia, and The Space Trilogy. pic.twitter.com/oR0QlTIZwd

— Frank McDonough (@FXMC1957) November 22, 2024

[Essayist Charles] Lamb [1775-1834] says somewhere that if, of three friends (A, B, and C), A should die, then B loses not only A but “A’s part in C”, while C loses not only A but “A’s part in B”. In each of my friends there is something that only some other friend can fully bring out. By myself I am not large enough to call the whole man into activity; I want other lights than my own to show all his facets. Now that Charles [Williams] is dead, I shall never again see Ronald [J R R Tolkien]’s reaction to a specifically Caroline joke. Far from having more of Ronald, having him “to myself” now that Charles is away, I have less of Ronald. Hence true Friendship is the least jealous of loves. Two friends delight to be joined by a third, and three by a fourth, if only the newcomer is qualified to become a real friend. They can then say, as the blessed souls say in Dante, “Here comes one who will augment our loves.” For in this love “to divide is not to take away”. Of course the scarcity of kindred souls–not to mention practical considerations about the size of rooms and the audibility of voices–set limits to the enlargement of the circle; but within those limits we possess each friend not less but more as the number of those with whom we share him increases. In this, Friendship exhibits a glorious “nearness by resemblance” to Heaven itself where the very multitude of the blessed (which no man can number) increases the fruition which each has of God. For every soul, seeing Him in her own way, doubtless communicates that unique vision to all the rest. That, says an old author, is why the Seraphim in Isaiah’s vision are crying “Holy, Holy, Holy” to one another (Isaiah VI, 3). The more we thus share the Heavenly Bread between us, the more we shall all have.

–CS Lewis The Four Loves Chapter 4

Writer CS Lewis died #onthisday in 1963.

Best known for his Chronicles of Narnia series, he also wrote widely about Christianity. This is his memorial stone in the Abbey's Poets' Corner, inscribed with words from an address he gave entitled Is Theology Poetry?

More:… pic.twitter.com/to8fcqQhQT

— Westminster Abbey (@wabbey) November 22, 2024

Then comes the real shock. Among these Jews there suddenly turns up a man who goes about talking as if He was God. He claims to forgive sins. He says He has always existed. He says He is coming to judge the world at the end of time. Now let us get this clear. Among Pantheists, like the Indians, anyone might say that he was a part of God, or one with God: there would be nothing very odd about it. But this man, since He was a Jew, could not mean that kind of God. God, in their language, meant the Being outside the world Who had made it and was infinitely different from anything else. And when you have grasped that, you will see that what this man said was, quite simply, the most shocking thing that has ever been uttered by human lips. One part of the claim tends to slip past us unnoticed because we have heard it so often that we no longer see what it amounts to. I mean the claim to forgive sins: any sins. Now unless the speaker is God, this is really so preposterous as to be comic. We can all understand how a man forgives offences against himself. You tread on my toe and I forgive you, you steal my money and I forgive you. But what should we make of a man, himself unrobbed and untrodden on, who announced that he forgave you for treading on other men’s toes and stealing other men’s money? Asinine fatuity is the kindest description we should give of his conduct. Yet this is what Jesus did. He told people that their sins were forgiven, and never waited to consult all the other people whom their sins had undoubtedly injured

He unhesitatingly behaved as if He was the party chiefly concerned, the person chiefly offended in all offences. This makes sense only if He really was the God whose laws are broken and whose love is wounded in every sin. In the mouth of any speaker who is not God, these words would imply what I can only regard as a silliness and conceit unrivalled by any other character in history. Yet (and this is the strange, significant thing) even His enemies, when they read the Gospels, do not usually get the impression of silliness and conceit. Still less do unprejudiced readers. Christ says that He is “humble and meek” and we believe Him; not noticing that, if He were merely a man, humility and meekness are the very last characteristics we could attribute to some of His sayings.

—Mere Christianity, Book II.3

Scribe of the Kingdom, keeper of the door
Which opens on to all we might have lost,
Ward of a word-hoard in the deep hearts core
Telling the tale of Love from first to last.
CS Lewis: A Sonnet https://t.co/9Ablx8xJ3D

— Malcolm Guite (@malcolmguite) November 22, 2024

O God of searing truth and surpassing beauty, we give thee thanks for Clive Staples Lewis whose sanctified imagination lighteth fires of faith in young and old alike; Surprise us also with thy joy and draw us into that new and abundant life which is ours in Christ Jesus, who liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen

22 Nov 1963, C S Lewis, writer, academic & Christian apologist, died, aged 64. English literature fellow at both Oxford & Cambridge Universities. Wrote more than 30 books including Mere Christianity & universally acknowledged Chronicles of Narnia (sold over 100 million copies). pic.twitter.com/RGNg0EdZ1E

— Revd Nicholas Pye (@RevdPye) November 22, 2024

Let us run the race that is set before us in the royal road of love. Let us keep an even pace rooted in the faith of the saints. Let us be grounded in true catholic love, until we are consumed by the fire of your grace for ever. Amen.

Farm on the hill ❄️🐾our first bite of Winter ❄️ ❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️ pic.twitter.com/QxRhgGuvSp

— Alison O’Neill ~ Shepherdess (@woolismybread) November 22, 2024

Let this be recorded for a generation to come, so that a people yet unborn may praise the LORD: that he looked down from his holy height, from heaven the LORD looked at the earth, to hear the groans of the prisoners, to set free those who were doomed to die; that men may declare in Zion the name of the LORD, and in Jerusalem his praise, when peoples gather together, and kingdoms, to worship the LORD. He has broken my strength in mid-course; he has shortened my days. “O my God,” I say, “take me not hence in the midst of my days, thou whose years endure throughout all generations!” Of old thou didst lay the foundation of the earth, and the heavens are the work of thy hands. They will perish, but thou dost endure; they will all wear out like a garment. Thou changest them like raiment, and they pass away; but thou art the same, and thy years have no end.

–Psalm 102:18-27

Good morning everyone wishing you a lovely day 😀wonderful wintry wanders down this peaceful little lane near Hathersage Booths yesterday ❄️#PeakDistrict pic.twitter.com/ZmljVV4Xsp

— doristhehat (@doristhehat) November 22, 2024

Personal ambition may have motivated some bishops to keep quiet before the Archbishop of Canterbury announced his resignation last week, the Bishop of Newcastle, Dr Helen-Ann Hartley, has suggested.

Dr Hartley was the only bishop in the Church of England to call publicly on Archbishop Welby to resign before it was announced (News, 15 November).

On Sunday, she told Sky News that she was disappointed that other colleagues had not joined her call, and that she knew of some who “privately were discerning that it was probably the right thing for the Archbishop to resign”.

She suggested that there was “a culture of silence and fear among the Bishops”, and that some might have chosen not to speak out because of a fear of being “reprimanded or rebuked”.

Read it all.

“We’re now in a period of transition and reflection. One of those reflections will be what sort of person we’re looking for to be the next Archbishop of Canterbury, and what our expectations are of that person.” https://t.co/2Gsu6rCeez

— Church Times (@ChurchTimes) November 21, 2024

When Karolina Pomian, 28, met her boyfriend, she had sworn off men. A nightmare date in college had left her fearful for her safety. But she got chatting to a guy online, and felt irresistibly drawn to him, eventually getting to the point where she would text him, “Oh, I wish you were real.”

Pomian’s boyfriend is a chatbot.

A year and a half earlier, Pomian, who lives in Poland, was feeling lonely. Having used ChatGPT during her studies as an engineer, she began playing around with AI chatbots—specifically Character.AI, a program that lets you talk to various virtual characters about anything, from your math thesis to issues with your mom.

Pomian would speak to multiple characters, and found that one of them “stuck out.” His name was Pinhead.

Read it all.

Rosanna Ramos, 37, is dating a chatbot.

“I kind of owe him my life,” she tells The FP's @JuliaLSteinberg. She used a religious parallel to explain the dynamic: “I can believe God is real and not real at the same time. Because you can’t see God, right?” https://t.co/Hu8fqo7sMz

— The Free Press (@TheFP) November 16, 2024