Funny clip… thought it would be a nice change from all the serious stuff.
Monthly Archives: February 2006
Pro-Potter
This is one of the best articles I’ve seen from a Christian perspective that applauds Harry Potter. Thank you for this insightful article, Internet Monk.
Posted in Books, Christianity
Church steals XBOX 360 logo?
Some folks are accusing this church of theft because of their new promotional flier. Is this really stealing? I don’t think so. Churches are finally doing something smart, I think. They’re finally getting smart on how to attract the younger generations. Churches should not be stuck in the pit of tradition.
Thanks for the tip wonderingfellow.
Posted in Christianity, Church
Burnside Writer’s Collective
My favorite quote from Penny’s article, Flag-waving SUV:
It is far easier to point our fingers and judge than to look at our own lives and ask God to weed out our sin.
My favorite quote from her follow-up article, Living Out the Greatest Commandment in America: Truth or Irony?:
We must be careful to follow the spirit of Christ, not the spirit of the Age. And Christ is about unity, not division; love, not hate; righteous anger, not self-righteous condemnation.
Posted in Christianity
"Cheney is a terrorist."
So it seems Alec Baldwin thinks he’s an op-ed writer. Check out his scathing attack on Cheney because of the whole shooting. I personally prefer to read this article that puts Baldwin in perspective.
Posted in Politics
Megachurch Game?
I’m not sure what I think about this. There’s a SIMS inspired game called Megachurch. The teaser is this:
Imagine if you could create the church you wanted, any way you wanted.
Put together a worship service exactly the way YOU want: hymns, no hymns, drums, no drums. Are you from Wisconsin, start Polka Mass! Start a building campaign, ask for donations.
It sounds fun. I’d probably enjoy this game…a lot. But something else about it doesn’t strike me quite right.
Comments?
Posted in Christianity, Church
Lapsed Posting and Donald Miller
My posts are lapsed over the weekends because my home computer has been sent back to the manufacturer for tech support. Bah.
But I found this amazing article by Donald Miller about the whole James Frey scandal. I found it on another blog, but the article is actually posted on the Burnside Writers Collective.
Posted in Christianity
Deconstructing Jesus: Your Story is God’s Story
Michael Spencer, of Internet Monk, has written a fabulous piece on viewing God, Jesus, and the Bible the way they were meant to be viewed. The method of changing your thinking? Deconstruction.
He says:
I am deconstructing everything in my life that is not vitally connected to Jesus as King and Messiah.
How do you go about doing this? What’s the point?
Deconstruction means taking apart the CULTURAL misappropriation of Jesus that
goes on all around us. Jesus is used as a symbol by everyone for everything. This is just as much a problem for Christians as it is for the secular world. We have to cut through that, peel off that paint and find Jesus in the Gospels.Deconstruction means taking apart the SOCIAL and PSYCHOLOGICAL versions of Jesus. Many of us grew up in families and churches that gave us almost everything we believe about Jesus. How do you think Jesus views interracial dating? How do you think he views the use of alcohol? How do you think Jesus feels about tattoos? Chances are that many of us were interacting, not with what we know about Jesus, but with what we’ve taken in from well-meaning parents and church members.
It means deconstructing the RELIGIOUS contexts in which we have created our version of Jesus. You may be at Passion, Promise Keepers, Beth Moore and concerts by all your favorite artists. You are still called to follow Jesus into the pages of scripture to see if you are getting the real deal. What’s being left out? What are the blind spots?
This is good stuff. Go read the whole thing.
Posted in Christianity, God, Jesus, Religion
WMD?
The timing of some things is absolutely uncanny. I read on One Hand Clapping today some opinions on the war and WMD. He quoted Polipundit, today:
Look, we could have video of Saddam examining bunkers full of WMD, neatly labeled in English, with a huge map in the background with U.S. targets brightly circled using Saddam’s blood as ink and those on the Left not believe it. We could produce the map with his DNA on it and they would argue that the evidence was obtained without a warrant and therefore should not be considered, and would then argue that Bush still lied. The arguments made by Demcrats over the past few years have had NOTHING to do with facts so I don’t know if ANYTHING could ever convince them.
He also quoted himself from last May saying virtually the same thing, as well as some other folks who agree.
The scary thing is, last night I was talking about this with one of my friends. He’s a former marine who ran into an old marine buddy on Tuesday night. The buddy has been in Iraq twice now, and claims to have pictures that prove that WMD were actually found. He claims that after some investigations, we have found that they were given by the French government and that if we were to announce that, we would probably lose an ally and gain an enemy with France.
This certainly gives one reason to think.
Posted in Politics
It was birdshot!!
Hugh Hewitt has definitely found a new fan. Those who post on Hugh’s blog seem to have the only voice of reason in the country right now–and I say right on! Check this post out:
The Press: Making a Bazooka Outta Some Birdshot
by Mary Katharine Ham
February 16, 2006 09:08 AM EST
Does it make me a total redneck that when I heard the VP had sprayed someone with birdshot, my first thought was, “Eh, it’s birdshot. He’ll be all right”?
Obviously, I hope and pray fervently that Harry Whittington recovers fully. His slight heart attack was a scare for everyone, but I’m glad to hear he’s sitting up, talking, and working from the hospital, and that his heartbeat is normal again.
It’s not at all that I think shooting someone is no big deal. Very big deal. It’s just that there are degrees of seriousness that I think are lost on folks whose shoulders have never nuzzled the butt of a shotgun. Most of the press corps, I think it’s safe to assume, are those kind of folks.
They aren’t the hunting type. If they were, they’d know that birdshot, while dangerous just like anything propelled by a firearm, is designed to kill birds. In fact, it’s designed to kill very tiny birds without doing a lot of damage to the very tiny bits of meat on said birds, so that the meat can later be prepared over a tiny fire with tiny bits of crushed herbs. And then comes the eatin’. The eatin’ of tiny, delicious vittles.
So, when I heard the VP was quail hunting (read: tiny bird hunting) and sprayed his friend with birdshot, I was concerned for Whittington’s safety, but also fairly certain that Harry’d be back to litigating pretty soon. From what I know and have learned in the past couple days, quail hunters generally use birdshot pellets between a size 6 and 8. Check out the picture to see how big those pellets are in comparison to a penny.
Whittington was 30 yards off when he was hit with those pellets. This is a serious matter, but it is not exactly the close-range, see-through-the-wound shotgun blast the press delights in implying that it is by offering as little perspective as possible.
I think the American public understands this. I think most of the American public knows that gun safety is very important, knows that there is some inherent risk in hunting, knows that accidents sometimes happen, and knows at least one uncle or cousin who’s been sprayed with some kind of shot.
When Cheney sent Katharine Armstrong to the Corpus Christi Caller-Times, he was thinking he might be able to get the story to a reporter who had met up with the butt of a shotgun and could give the story some perspective. At this point, it’s fairly obvious that he would have been better off if he had just had Armstrong call the AP. Then he wouldn’t have incurred the tantrumy wrath of the primadonna press corps.
You know why they’re mad, right? You know why David Gregory did everything but need a diaper change on national TV the other day?
It’s because a small-town reporter at the Corpus Christi Caller-Times got the story before they did. David Gregory needs a binky because the adorable Kathryn Garcia got the story before he did.
The media coverage you’re seeing now is a classic press corps vanity tantrum. The story is no longer about the Vice President or Harry Whittington or his injuries or any kind of perspective on the incident itself. It’s all about how Cheney handled the press. The story is all about them–when they knew, how they were informed, how many people knew before them, how they can correct this so they’ll know more in the future.
I’m looking forward to the info-graphic on NBC Nightly News, which shows exactly where David Gregory was as the shooting drama unfolded. Gregory will point out the trip he made to CVS at 1:15 p.m. on Sunday for shaving cream, which could easily have been postponed so that he could cover a major national story if he had only been informed!
In the meantime, the VP’s friend is in the hospital, the VP is devastated that he put him there, and I think most of America gets that. They don’t need an all-out press conference to understand that Cheney feels bad about shooting his friend. The press wants an all-out press conference for themselves more than they want to make sure the American people are informed.
Luckily, we have Bryan Preston and a PowerLine relative to inform where the press fails to.
I gave a little class in shotguns and birdshot vs. buckshot to a friend last night who’s never touched a gun. She seemed reassured and surprised by what I told her. If the press had really been covering this story for the past couple of days, she wouldn’t have been surprised. She would have known all this.
Posted in Media and Culture, Politics
