Our Holodeck Heaven

Our emerging reality is truly wonderful.

Shadow of Heaven: Dark Matters #3 An imbalance of dark matter has placed two realities in jeopardy, causing the separate universes to merge and threatening the stability of both realms. To preserve reality as it is known, the crew of the U.S.S. Voyager must defy a cosmic conspiracy and wrestle with shadows of the darkest degree! "Rescued" by strangers who may prove to be more dangerous than his original captors, Chakotay struggles to convince his new hosts of the danger posed by the mutated dark matter -- and the killer, or killers, still hunting the villages where Tom Paris has been left behind. In their own reality, as Harry Kim loses his heart to an enigmatic visitor from the shadow universe, Captain Janeway and the rest of her crew continue their search for the hidden dark matter that could cause the entire cosmos to contract in a fatal convulsion. But whose side are the Romulans really on? And what surprising Þgure from Voyager's past holds the ultimate key to the fate of both universes?

"What if earth be but the shadow of heaven, and therein things each to other like more than on earth is thought?" - John Milton, Paradise Lost Matter from the shadow universe is appearing in our own: matter from our universe is appearing there. The universes are unravelling, and to halt the process of destruction the crew of the USS Voyager - minus their First Officer and their pilot - must gather ever piece of the deadly material they've been unwittingly trailing in their wake. In the shadow universe where they are stranded, Chakotay and Paris must do the same. Harry Kim has become entranced by a girl from the shadow reality, but she will have to return there - when they've completed their quest. The Romulans realise the threat they have unleashed and join forces with Voyager to repel it, enabling popular "guest character" Telek R'Mor to lay a crucial role. At the eleventh hour one final piece remains...but Voyager cannot find it. Someone from their past is the only one who can help them. And fortunately Kes, who left the ship when she evolved into a higher lifeform, has always been the helpful sort...

• Popular author and HuffPost blogger • Good for use by individuals or groups Whether we realize it or not, how we respond to life’s opportunities and challenges, to other people, and to ourselves depends upon the stories we tell about ourselves. Too often, we tell distorted stories drawn from painful experiences or internalized from others’ critical voices. These fake stories diminish our dreams, damage our relationships, and fill us with fear and self-blame. Research shows that people yearn for personal experiences of the holy, and Jake Owensby begins by inviting readers to re-imagine Jesus as friend and lover. He then turns to encouraging readers to hear and tell how Jesus would express their story and the stories of others. Jesus’ story about us is our true story: the gospel, the story of the beloved. It helps us experience the richness of life, see the stranger as friend, and make a difference in the world. Useful for both personal spiritual practice and group studies, Your Untold Story will help expand the soul by engaging imagination and deepening relationships among group members. It is a discipleship tool that will aid any individual or group of spiritually minded people. The missional church requires well-formed disciples; here is a resource to help in that process.

On March 26, 1997, the bodies of 39 men and women were found in an opulent mansion outside San Diego, all victims of a mass suicide. Messages left by the Heaven's Gate group indicate that they believed they were stepping out of their 'physical containers' in order to ascend to a UFO that was arriving in the wake of the Hale-Bopp comet. The Heaven's Gate suicides were part of a series of major incidents involving New Religions in the 1990s, as the new millennium approached. Despite the major attention that Heaven's Gate attracted at the time of the suicides, there have been relatively few scholarly studies. This anthology on Heaven's Gate includes a combination of articles previously published in academic journals, some new writings from experts in the field, and some original Heaven's Gate documents. All the material is expertly brought together under the editorship of George D. Chryssides.

An updated edition of the classic book on digital storytelling, with a new introduction and expansive chapter commentaries. I want to say to all the hacker-bards from every field—gamers, researchers, journalists, artists, programmers, scriptwriters, creators of authoring systems... please know that I wrote this book for you.” —Hamlet on the Holodeck, from the author's introduction to the updated edition Janet Murray's Hamlet on the Holodeck was instantly influential and controversial when it was first published in 1997. Ahead of its time, it accurately predicted the rise of new genres of storytelling from the convergence of traditional media forms and computing. Taking the long view of artistic innovation over decades and even centuries, it remains forward-looking in its description of the development of new artistic traditions of practice, the growth of participatory audiences, and the realization of still-emerging technologies as consumer products. This updated edition of a book the New Yorker calls a “cult classic” offers a new introduction by Murray and chapter-by-chapter commentary relating Murray's predictions and enduring design insights to the most significant storytelling innovations of the past twenty years, from long-form television to artificial intelligence to virtual reality. Murray identifies the powerful new set of expressive affordances that computing offers for the ancient human activity of storytelling and considers what would be necessary for interactive narrative to become a mature and compelling art form. Her argument met with some resistance from print loyalists and postmodern hypertext enthusiasts, and it provoked a foundational debate in the emerging field of game studies on the relationship between narrative and videogames. But since Hamlet on the Holodeck's publication, a practice that was largely speculative has been validated by academia, artistic practice, and the marketplace. In this substantially updated edition, Murray provides fresh examples of expressive digital storytelling and identifies new directions for narrative innovation.

One of the greatest spiritual battles right now is over perspective—the way you see possibilities, limitations, and what God is doing. This book will help you encounter God in such a way that you are able to walk in His original design for you, which is to not only commune with Him through conversation but to be aligned with His mind. When you share His thoughts and perceptions, you will be able to live the abundant, supernatural, super-empowered life God desires for you. Humans are unique in that we were not just made in the image of God; we reflect His very nature. If we understood our spiritual, neurological, psychological, and even physical connection to God, we could bring solutions to every problem humanity faces—and many would be practical, even scientific, solutions. In this book, Shawn Bolz shares a series of rich, divine encounters that have defined his spiritual perspective so others can be released into new ways of thinking and experience an expansion of their spiritual intelligence. To walk with God, you need to know not only His heart but also His mind. As believers, we were designed to commune with God, sharing not only conversation with Him but also His thoughts and perceptions—to know His mind through His Spirit. When Adam and Eve walked with God in the cool of the day, they didn’t always need the verbal communication that so limits humanity today. They had inner communication from their connectedness. This is the kind of connectedness Solomon, Joseph, Daniel, Esther, and the apostle Paul experienced, and this is what God wants to restore to His people today. This book will help readers gain a fresh vision of their faith so they can walk out their spirituality exactly as God intended and take their place in the coming move of God.