If in doubt, always check your language settings

On a scale from one to awesome

Check out these bboys. Freakin' amazing.

This oughtta make Simone happy... :s



What do you think about engagement with the occult in popular culture? Especially in relation to children? Have you had to take a position in it yet?

The thing that annoys me here is that Mark doesn't actually take the time to make any reasoned argument from Scripture. He harps on about being discerning, but then doesn't take any time to carefully discuss what discernment might mean.

In the words of a funny man, "That's not an argument! That's just contradiction!".

Strictly speaking

Check this out. The third (current at time of posting) episode is really interesting. The two brothers are quite erudite, thoughtful, nuanced and intelligent. And, so it would seem, Christians.

I found myself wishing that I had the freedom of the younger brother (Joe) where it seemed persuading you was more important than his hang-ups. But I found myself, a tad saddeningly, feeling more similar to the older brother (Nat) who was more stilted by his own self awareness.

Implications for preaching anyone?

This blog has become a noose around my neck. A crowd to please. An expectation to live up to.

If I write a blog which contains only that which I really want to write, at the rate which I want to write it, who would read it? Would it create the type of hub that I'd hoped for, with people gathering to offer helpful thoughts on my posts and help me to learn and think more? Or would it mean that those few things I did post were simply words for the wind? Letters being delivered so rarely that no-one bothers to check the mailbox.

Thus the noose is of my own making. Desiring to create something which I have not the desire nor ability to maintain. Deciding to win a gold medal in synchronised swimming routine that never ends.

I choose to take my head from the noose. I can stand without.

I now own a piece of rope. There's just enough of it. But I don't have to use it if I don't want to.

Ill-incepted

I went to see Inception last night (I know, I'm behind the times) and only then because a 2 for 1 ticket that I had expired yesterday. I really enjoyed it.

***Spoiler warning!***

My brother told me that he thought I'd pick the twist. By half an hour in I thought I had, got annoyed at how boring that twist was and then settled in to enjoy the rest of the movie. With 20 minutes (or so) left I realised that my proposed twist wasn't right, and then watched as their really was no twist, just a slow revealing of secrets.

The tension that had to be resolved to make things right was Cobb (DiCaprio) needed to finally deal with his grief, let go of his residual-memory version of his wife and allow himself to be forgiven of the guilt of his role in his wife's suicide. It was one heck of a therapy session though, mixed up in industrial espionage, matrix-like alternate reality combat and storming a snowy stronghold. Better than a couch, any day.

On the way out, my wife remarked that it wasn't what she'd expected after having read a review of the movie in Eternity. The review slated the Cobb character as preferring the dream to reality. It further attacked him as promoting the idea of seeking happiness in whatever virtual realm you can find it and avoiding the truth.

Which is a tad strange, given that the whole point of the movie is Cobb moving towards the final moment where he DOES embrace the truth, deal with reality and face his fears, thus returning to reality. The whole point of the tension in the final scene of the movie was the exact opposite of what the reviewer claimed.

Did anyone else read that review and get really ticked off?

We had an agreement!

Apparently, at his wife’s behest, in 1954 vice president Richard Nixon wrote down on paper:

“I promise to Patricia Ryan Nixon that I will not again seek public office.”

He wrote the date on the slip, folded it up, and stored it in his wallet.

Six years later he ran for president.

Sucker love is heaven sent

On the joys of sugar:

A placebo has no pharmaceutical properties; if it works, it works only because of my own belief in its efficacy.

If I know that I’m taking a placebo, it will be ineffective.

So while the placebo cures me only because I believe it will, I can’t believe that it will cure me only because I believe it will.

Peter Cave

Local sports clubs the new local church?

This was an interesting article. Firstly because of the requests being made, but secondly for the social analysis made towards the end of the article.

Cam Butler (Chaplain of the AFL Melbourne Football Club in the AFL and National Director of SCA) is claiming not only that the role of church has been usurped by sport (a tension long felt by those dealing with Kids' sport on Sundays), but also that spiritual guidance has shifted from the cathedral to the locker room.

"May I suggest that the closest thing to a pastor for most young Australians is their local club coach. The closest thing to a church, or refuge from life’s ills, for most Australians, is not the church, but rather their local sports club."

An area of struggle for many local churches is to be able to meaningfully engage with their community as a church entity. Perhaps the local sporting club is an avenue which could bear fruit for the gospel.

Our generation

Cool guys aren't passionate fighters anymore. The more bored you look when blocking the enemy's roundhouse kick while sweeping his standing leg, the cooler you are.

See?



Ok, so this could just as easily be Keanu acting very excited. Bad example.

Still, Joseph Gordon-Levitt has taken bored-fighting to an entirely new level. Even this image can't capture it. You have to watch the movie to feel his sheer boredom during the fight.

What would you answer? pt 1

I was a subject for a documentary being done by an old friend from uni. He's putting together a mini-doco on 'Devotion' and I'm one of three participants who answered a few of his questions about devotion. I was chosen for my alleged devotion to Christianity, another guy for his devotion to his child and a third for his devotion to Stargate.

I thought I'd post some of the questions Pat asked me, to see what you guys would say under the same circumstances. Just a few at a time.

1 . What were you doing five years ago?

2 . What are you doing with your life at the moment?

3 . What are the five great loves of your life? What are you passionate about?

4 . When did your devotion to God begin?

5 . How would you describe your relationship with God?

6 . How long did it take you to form this relationship?

Ecclesiastes: what some other people reckon

These aren't the perspectives that I promised would be analysed in detail, but just some summaries from commentators.

St Jerome (c. 347 – 420)

Saw the book as a call to embrace the ascetic life in order to escape the vanities of this world. Strangely, he also says "the Hebrews says that ... this book ought to be obliterated, because it asserts that all the creatures of God are vain, and regards the whole thing as nothing, and prefers eating and drinking and transient pleasures before all things." Weird

Crenshaw (1987)

"life is profitless; totally absurd. The world is meaningless. Virtue doesn't bring reward. The deity stands distant, abandoning humanity to chance and death."

Ogden (1987)

"The book's thesis ... is that life under God must be taken and enjoyed in all its mystery."

Like any of these? Why not?

Inappropriate

My wife yesterday:

(Excitedly) 'Apt' is such a fitting word!