Critical Child Rearing Mistake No. 3 - John Pilger

I've started reading John Pilger to my daughter. She seemed to loose interest after just a few pages. Have I introduced Pilger to early?


Reading "the new rulers of the world" whilst on holiday was great. It reminded that we live in the media age and not the information age. Information like the fact that indigenous Australians receive 75c for every dollar spent on non indigenous Australians of federal health care funding and 25c for every dollar spent on non indigenous pharmaceutical benefits is just not readily available. Instead, media stories about indigenous people squandering millions of health dollars is ussually what I get to hear. I'm not sure if my daughter quite understood this important distinction though.

Yawning at Hillsong

Right now I'm visiting my parents in Sydney and so is my uncle. A friend of my uncle's regularly visits Hillsong church when he is in Sydney and recommended that he did the same. I thought it would be nice to accompany him to what is undoubtedly Australia's most famous church. It would also be a good excuse to check out what Hillsong is really like. I've heard raving endorsements as well as scathing critiscims including tales of prosperity gospel preaching. Putting these things aside I decided to try and go in with an open mind, at least to find out why this kind of church is so popular.

Like a football game we were ushered in to a parking bay, then like concert we walked passed all the merchandising and take away foods and were ushered into the auditorium and church began.

There were lots of points I could talk about like...

1. How the music was so incredibly polished it seemed to lack any soul at all.
   
2. How the mini sermon before the offertory slowly morphed from Jesus saying to a rich young ruler "give your money to the poor" to why don't you put some money in the offertory buckets (yes they were buckets but they are a big church so I didn't mind).
   
3. How Darlene Zschechs's sermon not only didn't really seem to say anything but also didn't even seem to have it's own internal logic or any structure.

As much as I could write about these things I'm sure they are probably all old ground for many people.

What struck me the most about Hillsong was how bored I was. Hillsong is about as professional looking and slick as you can get, but like a big blockbuster movie with loads of special effects and no story line, it was boring. This, I wasn't expecting. Once you get over the idea that the church has a decent enough band to back any professional middle of the road artist, the images and film are high quality enough to be used by a home renovation TV show and there are actually lots of people there, there is so little to be impressed about. I was bored out of my brain and completely unmoved for better or worse. My uncle was both thoroughly disappointed in the experience an glad that I didn't bring my wife along and waste her time (as he saw it).

So why is this church popular? I'm not sure but I wonder if it's popular because it's really easy. Turning up every Sunday to watch a big TV show for one and half hours is really easy. You just turn up walk in, sit down, watch and leave. There are no awkward lonely people to meet afterwards, there are no people who need extra help next Friday night for the church bread run and there is no need to help pack up at the end of church. What is more there is also no guilt about not doing this because during the service you can give money to fund outreaches to lonely awkward people, outreaches to hungry people and money to keep a venue that doesn't need to be packed up for other purposed during the week.

So, this got me thinking what should we expect from Church? This will be a future post.

Over Engineering

I am constantly amazed at the over engineering of products which have pretty much reached the pinnacle of their design. The shaving razor and tooth brush are two great examples. I can't imagine anyone wishing either of these two things had a few extra features. Alas, that doesn't sell new products or switch brand loyalty. Once razors came as a single blade but now you can buy them with double, triple or even quadruple blades. With it being highly unlikely that five blades will get people changing brands designers have to come up with other selling points, the most recent ridiculous one I have seen is the battery powered razor. This is not an electric shaver but manual razor with a battery in it. What the battery does I have no idea and the advertising doesn't tell you either. Similarly the latest toothbrush advert I have seen advertises a tooth brush with an on board computer. Again the advertising does not say what the computer does and again I cannot imagine what it could possibly do.

That someone could think of these ideas is one thing. That someone could think of them, someone else could make them and profit from them and that we buy them is another thing. Whilst so many around the world and in our own country suffer from lack of even basic health care it is a poor reflection on our society that we would consider a battery powered razor or tooth brush with an on board computer as a worth while item.

Can games affect change?

About a year ago I was sent a little flash based game where as a player you tried to bomb out the terrorist's in a village. It was a great little game each time you killed a terrorist some civilians would walk by start crying at the persons death and then turn into terrorists themselves. A step up from this is the Dafur is dying game where you can experience what it is like to live in the country, fetching water and avoiding bombs and guns.

I wonder how effective these kind of games will be. Like television before it, I suspect that it will expose us to how horrible war and suffering is, but will it help us to make a change? Personally I think the biggest problem to affecting change is not knowing that there is a problem but knowing what we as just individuals (surrounded by many different problems) can do to meaningfully affect any change.

Futher Rudd Reflections

I'm interested to see what Australian's will think of Kevin Rudd. I noticed the Make Poverty History wrist band he was wearing from this picture in the Australian as well as his promise to meet the Make Poverty History aid targets.

What has perhaps confused me the most has been some of the criticism Kevin Rudd has received.

Paul Comrie-Thomson on Counterpoint said...

As British author Patrick West argued in his book 'Conspicuous Compassion' "If the Good Samaritan had been raised in a culture like ours...he would have walked on by and made a long-winded speech in the temple calling upon the Romans to tackle the root causes of social exclusion in Judea". This sounds like what Kevin Rudd is up to.

He goes on to quote Luke 18:9-14 Suggesting that if Kevin Rudd wants to do good he should go out do good things quietly Good Samaritan style one person at a time rather than try to change the social environment in which people live, this is a comment that I have heard before about issues other than the ones Rudd has addressed and usually aimed at Xns or social activists agitating for some kind of political change that will assist the less fortunate. It reminds me of the famous Dom Helder Camera quote.

"When I feed the poor, they call me a Saint. When I ask why are they poor, they call me a Communist."

I think there are a few different spheres that we can show compassion.

1. Immediate relief or giving someone a fish. This is the more coalface good Samaritan work where you are literally feeding the poor, finding a bed for the homeless or perhaps supporting agencies who do this elsewhere (like emergency relief in the third world).
2. Capactity building or teaching someone to fish. This is longer term work with people so that they can avoid the repeating getting into a situation that saw them needing the immediate relief.
3. System Change or making sure the lake isn't over fished by others. This is agitating for political and structural change, to make sure that as much as possible people will not need immediate relief.

All three spheres are equally important and we ignore either one at our peril. The first two are hard as they involve getting our hands dirty but are often considered where the "real" help happens. I'd argue that the third sphere is equally important. As far as I can see a politician has far greater effectiveness then most in the 3rd sphere. I certainly wouldn't be happy with a politician who was part of a bread run feeding families who don't have enough money to feed themselves but doesn't then try to address the systemic problems that may have got them in this position in the first place.

I'm certainly not going to say Kevin Rudd is the greatest thing on the Australian political landscape but he's certainly saying some good things and I'm willing to see if he can convert the saying into doing.

A new Trinity theory

Recently on Background briefing I was listening to a Richard Dawkin's lecture. No matter what you think of him I as struck by the following section about the trinity...

Do we have one God in three parts, or three gods in one? The Catholic Encyclopedia clears up the matter for us in a masterpiece of theological close reasoning. 'In the unity of the godhead there are three persons, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit; these three persons being truly distinct, one from another. Thus in the words of the Athanasian Creed, the Father is God, the Son is God, and the Holy Spirit is God, and yet there are not three gods but one god.

As if that were not clear enough, the Encyclopedia quotes the 3rd century theologian, St Gregory, the Miracle Worker. 'There is therefore nothing created, nothing subject to another in the Trinity, nor is there anything that has been added as though it once had not existed, but had entered afterwards. Therefore the Father has never been without the Son, nor the Son without the Spirit, and this same Trinity is immutable and unalterable forever.'

Traditionally the teaching of the trinity is has been one of the messiest most confusing aspects of Xy. One being (God) in three beings (persons) just doesn't sit right for many people and analogies about ice, steam and water or one atom made up of three electrons (or is it the other way round?) are often even more confusing.

So I thought I'd explain how I'm thinking about the trinity. This is very much a work in progress littered with ideas that I would have been burnt at the stake or excommunicated for if I was born in a different century. None the less I enjoy posting ideas in progress and I'm not sure if I know anyone else who has a similar ideas.

Here goes...

First forget about trinity. Firstly I think of God and the spirit of God. I tend not to think of the spirit as a second person rather I think of the spirit of God a little bit more like (but not exactly like) the way someone might think of spirit when they say "That act was done in the spirit of Mother Teresa". When we say that someone does something in the spirit of someone else we may not know exactly what has been done but we have an idea of what that act will be like.

Now try to imagine some kind of spirit concept that is somewhere between that and your classic another person / being idea and what I have just described. I often think of the spirit of God as the essence of God. The Hebrew concept of talking about the breath of God, which is translated as spirit in our Old testament, sits well with me. Also interestingly in Revelation 19:10 the spirit tells people not to worship the spirit, this has stuck with me for some reason.

Now that I've explained that nice and vaguely, second you've got Jesus. I tend to think of Jesus as a human with the spirit of God or essence of God. A human infused with the spirit of God or God in the form of a human.

So in essence I kind of believe in just one God perhaps a binity at a pinch but probably not a trinity. This is something that I'd like to resolve reasonably satisfactorily in the next ten years or so. I thought I'd post my incomplete thoughts as a kind of motivation to start working on them.

Critical Child Rearing Mistake No. 2 - Billy Joel

I accidentally let my daughter catch me listening to Billy Joel. The Achilles heal in my "I only listen to cool music" armour.

Now, at 7 months, she has a new favourite toy and she'll only smile at me when I say "Give us a smile your the piano man".

Five Years for David Hicks

Last Saturday I went to a vigil to commemorate the 5th anniversary of David Hicks being held in detention uncharged and untried. With many impassioned speakers I was struck by the simplicity of clarity of Anglican Arch Bishop Roger Herft. This is what he said...

The court case in Iraq with all its weaknesses, was seen as a fledgling democracy bringing the rule of law to bear on a tyrant who ruled with great brutality.

At the time of the court decision our Prime Minister John Howard rightly acknowledged that nature of democracy within this system and noted that ‘a monster like Sadam Hussein was bought to justice by due process.’

It is a matter of real regret that the same logic does not apply to David Hicks- he obviously must be more of a monster than Sadam.

However, it is highly unlikely that David Hicks is as culpable as Sadam Hussein was in terms of the brutality he meted out on people.

Surely vibrant democracies found in Australia and the United States should enable David Hicks to be tried with the due process of law.

The issue for me is not whether David Hicks is guilty or innocent. It is that five years is far too long to be held in such extreme conditions of detention being both uncharged and untried. Surely if evidence of someones guilt is not available after even one year it is not going to be available after five or five and a half years. Guilt or innocence aside It has been painful and embarrassing to see our government acquiescent in letting an ally treating one of our citizens like this. We certainly wouldn't have let the Indonesian government hold Schappelle Corby for five years without charging her or putting her on trial.

Companies v's Countries

I have been a letter for a Amnesty International and while I still believe that is a great thing to do. I'm wondering if that is really only addressing half of the world's injustices. Often when I buy a product I wonder under what conditions the product was made. I cannot help but think that my power as a consumer maybe far stronger than my power as a citizen of a relatively unimportant foreign country. In 2007 I am planning to start writing letters like this.

Dear -company-

I am writing to ask that you please tell me about the conditions under which your -product- is made. I realise that much of the manufacturing process maybe outsourced to other companies but as it is -company- who I am buying the product from I believe it is your responsibility to know how your product is made.

I would like to purchase all my products from companies that pay it's producers a fair price and helps them gains the necessary skills and knowledge to develop their businesses and work their way out of poverty. Also I would like to buy from companies that have a neutral affect on the environment. If these things are not achievable I would at least like to purchase products from the industry leader in these matters.

If you can please write to me and let me know about these matters, including endorsements from any a well recognised NGOs. That would be much appreciated.

I realise that implementing some of these things may result in an increase in the final cost of the item. I am more than happy to pay this.

Yours Sincerely

Chris

Do you think they would have any impact?

Author writes rebuttal to review on obscure blog that hardly anyone reads

A few months ago I wrote a review / reflection on Brad Jersak's book Can you hear me? This week I got a comment from someone called Brad Jersak. At first when I read the name I assumed it was a prank but then he's not exactly the sort of high profile person that others would try and impersonate, so I'm assuming that it's actually him. Seeing that I have quite a small blog audience (see tips for keeping your bog audience small) I'm pretty sure his agent didn't call him up and say "Hey Brad, have you heard what is being said about your book on the a churchless faith blog, You better reply quick!" I'm guessing he or a friend might have googled himself. In a bizarre Google anomaly when I tried searching for "Brad Jersak" "Can you hear me" review my blog comes up fifth! just behind amazon. Sadly for Brad his own site comes in at ten.

My reply to him is here.

Vommit Catching Report

I'm now back and recovered from a week of helping look after year 12 leavers. It's probably not hard to imagine that recruiting people to volunteer to clean up the vomit of Year 12 School Leavers who are drinking to excess is not the easiest task in the world.

What's more surprising perhaps, is how incredibly rewarding the experience always is not just for poor deranged me but all the volunteers who are involved. There is something great about the mix of people who are in a state that they are aware they have brought upon themselves and us, a group of people volunteering to be out in the middle of night helping in ways that many couldn't stomach. Often as people get better we are met with a barrage of thanks, praise and amazement.

Conclusion: Love is messy.

New Church service tested and ready to go

On Sunday night a group of five of us tested a new worship service which is pretty much based on an idea I posted over a year ago (initial idea here). And it worked!

Here is the basic structure for the night...

1) Move into the Space (with journal)
2) Light Candle (signifying God's presence) and say opening prayer
3) Someone reads the reading for the night. We decided to work through Luke's gospel starting with Jesus temptation in the desert (4:1-13). This was projected on a screen.
4) Reflect on the reading (people are given wondering questions to get them thinking). In this case they were... 1. I wonder what was Jesus doing for 40 days, 2. I wonder what it was like when Jesus was being tempted, 3. I wonder why Jesus let the devil tempt him, 4. I wonder what the devil would say today. These questions weren't read just projected on a screen below the reading.
5) Connect using journals and stations. For this session the stations were... A wooden cross to give things to God, stones to write confessions on and drop into water, pictures of Jesus to reflect on, a nature station, a soaking couch, a drawing station, play dough, prayer candles, books to read, sand box to write and doodle in and a place to write questions. Ambient Taize music played in the background.
6) We then got back together to offer our thoughts and work (artwork or journal work) to God
7) Close - using prayer of St Francis (the laptop battery died so we didn't do this as planned)
8) Discuss the experience with each other (optional - people have option to leave if they wish)

The "Service" took about an hour and could have gone for much longer. I felt like I had the time and the tools to wrestle with the text with no pressure. It would have to be the most relaxing thing I've done in a long time. It was a great space to connect with God with no sense of pressure to be some where else or thinking about something else.

I'm still excited about how easy this should be to do each time. With the set up each time just being a new reading, new wondering questions and adding stations as we are inspired to do so. The aim will be to meet every fortnight.

The big thing I'm dying to find out is, is this something that people on the edge of faith/church would be interested in participating in? I'll let you know sometime in 2007.

Kevin Rudd and Faith

Kevin Rudd has just been elected Australia's new opposition leader just as i have finished reading the article he wrote for The Monthly magazine called Faith in Politics.

Reading his article four things stood out for me...

1) How articulate he is and how badly sound bites represent politicians (I assume he's not the only articulate politician)
2) His well laid out explanation of what arguments Xn politicians usually use to convince Xns to vote for them, why these reasons are weak and an alternative vision for a Xn political agenda.
3) His vision of a muscular and meaningful social responsibility inspired by his hero Dietrich Bonhoeffer.
4) Now that he gas been elected leader I'm excited to see what happens and if nothing happens it will be my totally disillusioned with politics.

I've deliberately not quoted or turned the arguments into sound bites. You can read the article for yourself. Faith in Politics by Kevin Rudd.

I'm off to catch vomit for a week

Well there will be no blogging for a week as I make my annual pilgrimage to School Leavers week, for work, where I will coordinate volunteers looking after school leavers in trouble. Mainly those too drunk to hang around on the street but not drunk enough to need to go to hospital which in short adds up to 6 long nights of catching vomit for others. You may find it hard to believe but, it's been a bit tricky getting volunteers this year. None the less those who do go find that the leavers are always really surprised and thankful to see people who will to stay up to all hours just to look after them. As St Francis said "Preach the Gospel to all and use words if necessary". Nursing a drunk school leaver back to health is still one of the most gracious activities I have ever had the privilege of taking part in.

Tom Lyberg, Nirvana and U2

In Tom Lyberg's excellent last podcast he muses over “Why post moderns don’t seem to be coming to church anymore. He suggests that the classic evangelism formula is based on the question “if you were to die tonight do you know where you would spend eternity?” and that concern for eternity made sense to modern people but post moderns really just don’t care or would say “that’s a really stupid question”. Which is perhaps why the Bill Hybels summary of the Xn message as substitutional atonement (SA) got to me so badly. At it's core substitutional atonement is all about making sure you're going to the right place when you die.

Lyberg suggests a more pressing question for post moderns is “If God is real does he (she) give a crap about me?” Where as SA is about making sure we're ok Lyberg suggests post moderns would think “none of us are ok, we’re all screwed up” or “we do know we’re not ok and that’s the way it is”. So why is it that some Xns get this and others don't. I'm wondering if we can make the distinction as simple as this: Those who get this way of thinking liked the band Nirvana those who don't didn't.

Whilst many Xns are wetting themselves with excitement that U2 are touring Australia I am reminded that while I still like U2. It'd seemed that most of the Xns I knew were still raving about U2's Joshua Tree while me and a select few thought we had found a new kind of art in Nirvana. But too my U2 worhsiping friends Nirvana were just noise.

To me Nirvana was about knowing that you're not ok and not trying to fix it but to understand it. To me U2 were about polished perfection but Nirvana was about brokeness. Rather than wanting a God to rescue them I ssuspect post moderns are looking for a God to join with them, even in the brokness.

Rather than banging on about SA Tom suggests that “There is a God who really cares about living among broken people and giving them hope right now heaven and hell business, not on the radar. This world that’s busted up that’s where God lives”.

8 of 101 things to do as a churchless Xn - Get involved in a Parachurch organistaion

Matt Stone's recent parachurch as church post got me thinking. Parachurch organisations are really one of the things that has kept me sane as Xn over the years and makes a really obviois thing to do as a churchless Xn. If your the kind of person who thinks churches spend too much time doing stuff that isn't really important then getting involved in a parachurch organisation could be just the tonic. Personally I've been involved with Drug ARM WA, Scripture Union and Tear at different times. Feel free to post parachurch organisations you've had good experiences with.

Name: Join a parachurch organisation
Category: Serve
Size: Large
Description: Join a Xn group that's not a church.

Alpha and Evil

I've lost count which video this one was but it's the Alpha talk about evil. As regular readers might be suspecting I struggle to believe in the "the devil" (see this post for some background). Particularly "the Devil" as many Xns present him and Nicky Gumbel's starting explanation that God is behind good and therefore there must be someone or something behind evil wasn't a convincing start for me either.

Some of the notes I took during the video were...

• Spiritual Forces of evil can be an excuse for human evil.
• The existence of evil doesn't necessarily equate to the existence of demons or a devil. (NG suggested other wise)
• Inner battles and temptations can exist without a devil. (NG suggested other wise)
• A couple of times (John 10:10 being one example) Nicky to quotes about evil and read the devil into them making it sound like the devil is mentioned way more in the NT than it actually is.
• I'm not sure if I've heard an adequate explanation for how Satan came into being.
  

So what do I think? I don't know I'm trying to work this one out. I'm stuck on the idea that the devil is the personification of evil rather than an actual thing. In Dear Kim this is what I believe Bill Loader says...

For me, to say Jesus is human means I believe that he was not a walking encyclopedia, knowing everything from his birth onwards. He was a human being of his time, living under usual human limitations of knowledge and education. He doubtless believed in a world populated by demons like his contemporaries and probably believed the world was more or less flat, with the sky as a dome in which the stars and moon shone by night and the sun by day, the common Old Testament picture. His expectations about history were those of his time. He lived in a community which thought history was soon coming to an end. His healing practices reflect the methods of his world.

At the moment this is a summary of what I'm thinking, a work in progress if you will...

I don't think that Satan really exists in the OT certainly not the kind of Satan most Xns think of. I think most of the OT is about worshiping the one God Yahweh rather than chasing after other gods like Baal for example. Like Bill Loader, I don't have a problem with devil's and demons being mentioned in the NT. Some of them take up the OT motif of other gods like Beelzebub (or Baalzebub) from the god Baal, others are not. Often when when Paul talks about powers and principalities or when Jesus talks about "the thief" in John 10:10 we tend to read devils and demons into this when it is not necessarily there in the first place. This is not to say that the world is all sweetness and light. To the contrary the world is full of evil and I think it is humans and not some supernatural force that is the cause of that. To me (at the moment) Satan I think is a personification of that evil, rather than a character.

Again, during the discussion part of the night I didn't have the courage to stick up my hand and say "errr... I'm not sure I believe in the devil" especially when everyone else was happy with what Nicky had said. Maybe I'm a wuss or maybe Alpha makes it harder for boat rockers to have a say, not sure. Both could be true.

Alphalpha weekend

The Alpha weekend was a bit of an aha moment for me. Although, I have tried not to be too skeptical about the whole course the "holy Spirit" weekend was were I was most skeptical. I Knowing that a whole page of the manual was dedicated to speaking in tongues (and most Bibles dedicate less than a page to the phenomenon) didn't help. Well, with all that as a forerunner I was pleasantly surprised that the weekend was far more about connecting with God than speaking in tongues, and probably a key reason why alpha is more popular than other evangelism courses like Christianity Explained, which is even more dry and modernistic than alpha. Not only was the weekend about connecting with God (through the holy spirit) but it was some serious connecting with each other with a weekend away. Unfortunately I left the weekend early and was sick during the weekend so I didn't get to do enough of this.

A few alpha advocates had said to me things like "I don't know why this works, it just does". I think I might have started to work out why this alppha thing works. For many of the people in my group I would guess that really they had made some kind of in principal decision to become a Xn. What the Alpha course has done has acted as an introduction to Xy to make sure they're happy with what, in principal, they've already decided. Rather than like what Mark had suggested in my last alpha post.

So am I an alpha convert? Not quite, but I'm certainly starting refine what I don't like about it.

Firstly, I don't think Alpha is a very good as an evangelistic tool (so to speak). Although Nicky Gumbell often talks about people who seem to be invited almost off the cuff to an Alpha course, I doubt that really happens too often. I certainly wouldn't sign up to ten weeks of anything unless I really trusted the person I was going with. Most people are going because of someone they know so in a sense the evangelism has already been done, what alpha really is is an overview for people who are thinking about joining up.

Secondly, since it's really an introduction to Xy rather than evangelism I wonder if there are better ways to introduce people to a faith other than 8 hrs of watching a video of some guy talking.

Thirdly, I feel like Alpha often oversimplifies Xy. I understand that any kind of summary of the Xn faith will involve some kind of simplification, but I think Alpha goes further than this by not really opening the door to the depth and variety found in the Xn faith.

I'll post a fuller review at the end of the course.

I think you should know...

...My little girl gets cuter every day.

Such a small smile and so much joy. I have yet to meet anyone else who kicks their legs in excitement when I walk into their room first thing in the morning. She is such a blessing.

7 of 101 things to do as a churchless Xn - Read a Xn book

The first thing to say about this "thing to do" is that the book doesn't have to be great. Getting inspiration from a good Xn is pretty easy. More often than not a lot of the Xn books I end up reading I find less than satisfactory and certainly not inspirational. That doesn't mean you can't grow from them. Hear are some examples of books I've read recently and what I've got out of them...

Brad Jersak's "Can you hear me?" was one example and I blogged about that here.

In Oswald Guinness's "Unspeakable Evil" I didn't find what I considered a very satisfactory answer for the question "why does undeserved suffering happen?" With an impending sermon on the way I had no choice but to work it out for myself. But with the arguments presented by Guinness I really started to get some clarity on the issue. I was able to say you cover X but not Y which then fairly quickly morphed into my first Sunday Sermon for a long time.

John Spong's "the Sins of Scripture" was a Xmas present I was looking forward to reading. But, with what I considered some really unsatisfactory dealings with some pretty tough passages I worked out that whilst I had rejected much of my evangelical upbringing I was still not a liberal. Although I usually avoid classifications, for the sake of simplicity, I decided that if I was to have a category then I was definitely more of a Liberal Evangelical than an Evangelical Liberal. Which is why I'm now happy as the liberal winger in a more evangelical leaning church rather than the evangelical whinger in a more liberal church. Furthermore, since also I'm very much a postmodern kind of Xn that would make me a "post liberal evangelical" and since anyone who calls themselves a "post liberal evangelical" looks like a wanker I refrain always from doing so.

Name: Read a Xn Book
Category: Grow
Size: Small
Description: Read the book. Work out what you agree with and why and what you disagree with and why. What counter position(s) would you take and why. Reflect on how this might change or reaffirm your faith. This is not an easy activity, it takes a while and can be quite an academic and theological wrestle but in my experience it has been worth it.

God Hates Figs!

www.godhatesfigs.com is is fun little website I particularly loved the "Rooted in Misery" tract you can hand out to your friends. It does a great job of showing how important context can be and why a literalistic reading of the Bible can be very unhelpful (no matter what you think of the particular issue in question).

They're almost all leaving, even in America.

Stephen Crittenden from the ABC's the Religion Report said this on a show a couple of weeks a go.

In the last couple of weeks, The New York Times ran a very interesting article, in which it claimed that evangelical leaders in the united States were warning each other that their teenagers are abandoning the Protestant faith in droves. And I'll give you some figures that compared with 35% of their baby boomer parents, and 65% of their grandparents, only four percent of this current American teenage generation will be Bible believers.

This paints a pretty bleak picture and one that I assume is somewhat similar in Australia. So what's the problem? I think it's more than just how we do church. I think it's rooted in what we believe and how we present our faith to others and how they perceive our faith, which is why I tend to carry on so much about that rather than how we do church - although I think the "how" is important too. None the less, is the way I put Xy any more appealing than say an alpha course or something else? I'm guessing it might sit a little better with non-Xn people but will they be more likely to consider the faith or just say "that's nice I'm glad it works for you"? Or, am I just describing Xy in a way that might relate well just to non-Xn people that I know who might only be a small percentage of the overall population? Perhaps am I just making something simple ridiculously complicated? Am I adding to the problem of people becoming increasingly less interested in Xy or am I doing the opposite?

Am I becoming my metal work teacher?

When I was in high school I can remember finding out that one of our metal work teachers thought he was the only true Xn in the whole world. That is pretty weird now and even weirder if your 16 years old. Sometimes I wonder if I am slowly turning into that person, convinced that everyone else has there theology screwed up except for me, happily walking along in a drum line thinking that everyone is out of time with me rather, rather than me being out of time with them. Well, I don't think that I'm that bad I still believe I have plenty to learn off others and that I will change my mind many more times about different issues. What I am feeling is the isolation of my ideas, especially the ideas as a whole package. I can find evangelical friends to agree with me on some bits and liberal friends to agree with on other bits but no one (not with out needing to change their mind - which isn't outside of the realms of possibility) who would agree with my whole package (so to speak).

Substitutional Atonement back to haunt me

Well I thought after my second last post I'd put the substitutional atonement thing behind me. So, you can imagine my sup rise when I rocked up to a church meeting to find out that we were going to be watching Bill Hybells speak on "the power of clarity". Seemed ok until he came to about one third of the way through the talk where he was about to summarise the entire Xn message in just two words. I was wondering what could that be... "Love God and Love others" perhaps? (the summary that Jesus used) You might be able to squeeze that into three words but not two. Then Bill did his big reveal to show the two words he had written on a big piece of paper "Substitutional Atonement". Needless to say I had some issues with what Bill had to say and whilst many people watching thought it was all great I voiced some concern and have written a quick out line of what my concerns are here for my own peace of mind.

The first difficulty was the issue of clarity and his idea that “Leaders owe people clarity”. I’m not sure that this is true. I’d like to ask clarity about what exactly? Having clarity about absolutely everything is fundamentalism at it’s worst, on the other hand having clarity about nothing is liberalism at it’s worst. Two extremes I’m sure we’re keen to avoid. If parishioners “cry out for clarity” (as Hybels suggests) is it the leaders roles to say “do this” or is it the leaders role to give the skills for the parishioners work it out for themselves?

Hybel’s seemed to be suggesting adopting a business model to church and there is certainly a lot that church can learn from the business model way of doing things. But, since business are not always the most ethical things in and of themselves there maybe things worth avoiding as well. So, my question is what parts of the business model do we adapt to church? Does the average business model give room for the spirit to speak through least qualified person and least likely person?

My quick thought is that we need to have a clarity of values and culture as a church but need to be fluid about our strategies and programs as they need to respond to the needs of the church and community.

The second brief difficulty I had was when Hybels described society as “pluralistic and confused”. I’m not sure if these two things necessarily go together. A divergent set of opinions about spirituality amongst a group of people may in fact indicate that people may have an increasing clarity about what they believe rather than a confusion.

The third difficulty is that “Substitutionary Atonement” (SA) is the key Xn message. Certainly SA is one key thread that runs through the biblical story but it isn’t all there is to Xy. SA is far more narrow than the new testament idea of grace or the Hebrew idea of hesed. By focusing on the SA thread I think we are in danger of missing out on the rich tapestry of the story of God interacting with humanity.

Furthermore, I wonder if in a similar way we reduce sin to just personal immorality. I fear that when we do this any evangelism needs to begin with convincing someone that they are sinner who deserves to die before moving onto the love of God bit.

That SA is only one thread in the overall Biblical story is illustrated in Hybel’s idea that the one question people will be asked when they die is “who will atone for your sin?” This does not sit at all well with the sheep and goats story that Jesus tells in Matthew 25.

I think an over emphasis on SA is one reason why as a church we are missing people under 30. Certainly Jesus disciples did not follow Jesus based on an understanding about SA. Since so many people seem to like Jesus but not church I wonder if we need to build on communicating Jesus rather than communicating the church doctrine of SA no matter how well it encapsulates much of what we believe.

Another problem with the “what will happen to you when you die?” approach to evangelism is that for some it can reduce Xy to an insurance policy against an angry God. All of us would still be Xns now even if we had a way of becoming a Xn 10 minutes before we die. What makes us choose to do this, I think, is far more appealing many to non-Xns than the “what will you say to God when you die?” approach.

Let me reiterate that I do not think we should get rid of SA and that I think it is an important thread in the Biblical story. However it is not the only thread in the Biblical tapestry.

My Fourth and final difficulty was that as a church “we are message centric”. We certainly have a message but are we message centric? If we are then why do we run a play group or give bread to people in need? Is it merely as a carrot to get people in to hear the message or does it have an intrinsic value of it’s own. Again to quote Matthew 25 the people who are in with God in this passage are not in because of the message but because of how they loved or served others. I’d say that as Xns we are love centric which means we serve out of love and it also means that we tell our message out of love.

Ok, that’s it. Maybe there's some deeper psychological reason why my brain seems to be obbsessed with this at the moment.

Social Dysfunction

Tonight was a big work dinner full of sports people and business people eating food I could never afford and generously bidding on auction items I could never afford. I've realised that I'm actually getting worse at social situations. I find small talk so hard. Talking about TV, sport (world cup excluded), work, and hobbies or interests we don't share is all very polite but terribly unrewarding. I'm sure that I can see a glazed disinterest in the eyes of people I talk to when I talk about these things and I certainly feel that myself, as I try with all my strength to hide it. I can feel the slow turn into a grumpy old man fourty years early. It's not that I don't like people in fact quite the opposite. I love them and I am desperate to connect with them in some meaningful way. But small talk is all they offer me and more relevantly all I offer them. It's like there is some social barrier designed to protect me that is actually killing me.

Therefore I propose a secret handshake. The two squeeze hand shake. Rather than the traditional one squeeze and shake, you will squeeze and then squeeze again and shake. A little odd but not too odd that you can't write it off as a nervous twitch. Once one you have received the secret handshake the small talk barrier is down and its meaningful conversation for all.

Doing Alpha and don't think you're a horrible sinner?

The Alpha course I'm doing is having a two week break right now but in the last session I found myself writing notes to my wife, kind of like two naughty kids in high school. Although not particularly respectful it is just a video and the video does take up a huge chunk of time in the Alpha format and I was bored. While alpha is not my cup of tea many people in the group seem to love it. None the less I have recently heard of someone who struggled with the underlying "your a really horrible sinner who needs to ask for forgiveness" message that she got from the course. As much as I know that advocates of the course would say there is more than just that. I think this is still the basic starting point of the Alpha message.

My guess is that for many people who just don't feel like they are horrible sinners, it's not that they are arrogant and would not claim to be perfect. If they were to be put on a scale with Mother Teresa at one end and Hitler at the other even if they put themselves in the middle they would definitely want to be more like Mother Teressa than Hitler. Further more to the best of their ability they are trying to do that. Sometimes Xns have responded by saying things like perfection is like jumping off the Sydney harbor bridge to reach New Zealand no matter how hard you try your always going to fail. Leaving many people feeling like God makes us failures and then damns us for being so and expects us to come crawling back to him grovelling for forgiveness. And, they find it hard to square that with a loving God.

Perhaps it's time to start reframing things. I feel like I'm sounding like a broken record having posted about this a lot before (It's time to Substitute Substitution,A New Analogy for Atonement?, Why did Jesus die? Part 1, Why did Jesus die? Part 2, Relooking at Sin and God is just like the Gestapo?) I feel there is something about the way that Xns often communicate the brokenness of our world and our broken relationship with God that stops people from becoming Xns and it is far more than people's ability to realise their own imperfections and brokenness (sinfulness). Maybe it's as simple as we are asking people to consider themselves as "filthy rags" when they see themselves merely as "flawed creations of God".

The pod is back and so might some more posts

Well it's now been at least 14 days since my iPod went down and despite being told by Apple that it's probably stuffed I've managed to get it back with thanks to way too much stuffing around. Hooray for me. Work has also been ridiculously busy, I've done freelance music and my ISP cut off my internet connection without telling me. So that's why I've been quiet. Now that the music is done and the net is back hopefully I'll be able to get back to posting with my spare time.

Sending "Hell" (Old Testament) to Hell in a Hand Basket

The "to Hell in a hand basket" series continues. With Original Sin done and Satan half done I'm now going to look at Hell. Once again like with with Satan Post I'm ignoring the New Testament and just looking at the Old Testament.

Firstly the word "Hell" does not appear in the OT. If your Bible does have the word hell it is translating the Hebrew word Sheol. Sheol is not the fiery pit that we usually think hell to be instead Sheol is a place of the dead, what we might describe today as "the grave". It is certainly a horrible place and one to be avoided but it is not the lake of fire and demons torturing for eternity that we often think of.

In Genesis the result of leaving the garden was not the eternal torment of hell but rather plain death. I wonder if we have forgotten how bad it is simply to die. I can remember hearing an atheist being quoted as describing death as "a cold wind then nothing". As much as Dante's levels of hell sound terrible the simple "a cold wind then nothing" sounds even worse to me, at least hell is existence nothing to me would be more horrible than non existence.

iCrash7 error 1418

I have fallen victim to the dreaded Error 1418 on my iPod. So i now on a very expensive bit of metal and plastic usefull for play solitare on and that's about it. Apart from my obvious anger at having an expensive piece of equipment being rendered usesless by the software of the company that made the product, I am amazed at how often I use the thing, about 8 hrs a week mostly in the car, listening to podcasts, music and the bible. Tommorrow is my wife's Birthday and today I was going to buy her an iShuffle today, which I'm not going do now.

Grr Apple.

So do I (a) try and think of an alternative 30th Birthday present? Or (b) give my wife the whole apple stole your present but they might fix it up later story?

Darth Vader makes me cry

It's pretty rare that I laugh out loud at anything on the net. This was different. Having clicked on it at work where bursting out laughing is not very appropriate I started to cry instead and had to watch the rest at home. It is Darth Vadar as you have never seen him before. Visit www.akjak.com/vader-sessions or right click here here to download it.

More Blog Delays

Well looks like this blog might be a bit quiet for the next couple of weeks, having just got over the hump of doing a Talk on Suffering I've just been commissioned to write and record four songs for a play. So I'll be quietly buried in that for a while.

Sending "Satan" (Old Testament) to Hell in a Hand Basket

Last month I looked at Sending "Original Sin" to Hell in a Hand Basket as part of my Original Sin, Satan & Hell rethink. This post is part two of what will probably now be a four part post as I am conveniently (for me) looking at Satan in the old and new testaments as two separate posts.

As I start this post I'm thinking of an interview with Peter Cundal of Gardening Australia fame where he told a story of how once he asked in Sunday School "If Satan tempted Eve and Satan used to be an angel them who tempted Satan?" he was thrown out of Sunday school for the question and promptly gave up any further thought about Xy.

There's a lot of varied thought about Satan, I wonder if one of the reasons is because there is not too much said about this character. This is true particularly in the Old Testament where the Hebrew word for Satan appears only a handful of times. For the most it part the word is translated as "accuser" (Num 22:22, 1Sa 29:4, 2Sa 19:22, 1Ki 5:4, 1Ki 11:14, 1Ki 11:23, 1Ki 11:25, Psa 109:6) and once as "adversary" Num 22:32.

In Job the character doing the accusing (often called Satan) appears quite a bit in the first two chapters. (Job 1:6, 7,8,9,12, 2:1, 2,3,4,6,7). Job is wisdom literature and I think written to teach us how God views suffering, rather than a historical account of Job's life and as such the writer takes some licence including the possibility of the creation of the accuser character, who unlike how most people would think of Satan, is part of heaven 1:6. The accuser's role is simply to say "Hey, I think Job only likes God when everything is going well for him". Similarly in the only other two places (yes only two) in the Old Testament where "Satan" is mentioned (1Ch 21:1 and Zec 3:1,2). The role of the character is only to accuse and nothing more. This character does not have all the characteristics that we would normally associate with Satan.

If you're thinking "what about Isaiah 14:12-17 where Satan is described as a fallen angel?" That's pretty widely considered a bad interpretation of that passage. See Dennis Bratcher's essay on Isaiah 14:12-17 for more info.

In case you're wondering the "Devil" or "Lucifer" are not mentioned in the Old Testament.

Next month... either sending "Satan" (New Testament) to Hell in a Hand Basket or sending "Hell" to Hell in a Hand Basket or if that gets tricky sending "Hell" (New Testament) to Hell in a Hand Basket.

Star Wars Birthday Continues...

The presents keep coming. It started with a glorious Yoda back pack. Then my most excellent sister in law got me a Darth Vader t-shirt from threadless.

Then, to top it all off my friends Gary and Tania gave me a Christmas decoration. Yes that's right I am now the proud owner of an official Hallmark Keepsake Luke and Yoda Christmas decoration.

Ahhh... turning 34 doesn't feel so bad after all.

Sunday Sermon

It's all over and yes, I am nuts. It took a couple of weeks but I finally got an answer to the question "Why is there suffering in the world?" and I managed to put it into bite size Sunday morning sermon size. If you want to hear what it sounds like the mp3 is here. The talk started with a slide show of pictures of people suffering with Nirvana singing "Jesus don't want me for a sunbeam" beneath it. The slide show ends with a quote from the book Fight Club, then I start talking. The sound quality isn't great but it's not painful.

God is just like the Gestapo?

Night 3 of Alpha I found kind of disturbing. It was probably the first time during Alpha where I found myself thinking "do I really want to identify with this?", "Do I really want to be implicitly saying I'm a Xn just like the way the video says".

My thoughts started when Nicky Gumbel told a story of a Nazi death camp where a priest steps in and offers to be killed instead of a family man which the Gestapo agree to. Nicky then went on to explain that we are like the family man and Jesus is like the priest, which is all fine and dandy until you realise that God is therefore the Gestapo and that the priest died so that the family man can be friends with the Gestapo. To be fair Nicky later explains that The Gestapo and the priest are really the same person (not using this analogy) but none the less you end up with a sadomasochist God rather a Gestapo God. Both I find pretty unsatisfactory.

I've wrestled with this before in my new analogy for atonement post. My thoughts about Jesus death at the moment go something along these lines.

1. We start life outside the Garden of Eden and dislocated from God
2. The only way for that connection to renewed is for God to become human
3. As a human (Jesus) God shows us a new way of life, a life where we choose love the result of which is suffering and for Jesus is suffering on a cross.
4. The cross is where we get a new perspective on life it's the point on the journey where we think everything will end but instead in the resurrection we see a new reality. A reality where love and justice prevail and sin does not.

Of course with no one else in the group bringing up the issue of God being equated with the gestapo and the speed of my brain it meant I didn't say anything. Maybe I will next week, but maybe I won't. The whole Alpha thing seems to be working for most of the group, just not for me.

World's Best In Laws

It is quite possible that I have the world's best in laws. They've built a shed for me, made a driveway for me, put in reticulation, let us stay at their beach holiday house and produced a beautiful daughter. But here is the final undeniable proof...

My boyhood fantasy

My new manhood reality

The Yoda backpack is a truly great birthday present.

Am I Nuts? The dangers of getting involved with a church

Well flirting with a church leads to getting involved with a church and that's exactly what I've done. At first it was some innocent rocking up to an alpha course (I'll do pretty much anything for a free feed) and the occasional bit of bass playing. Now, with two weeks notice I've committed to doing a talk at the church in just 13 days time. The topic: "Undeserved Suffering" – Facing the fact of evils inflicted on innocent people by natural disaster, sickness, or accident." Am I nuts? I'll let you know in two weeks. Oh, and let me know if you have any tips for the talk. Ta.

Relooking at Sin

Tonight was week 2 of the Alpha course I'm doing and as one person shared how they felt it was difficult to get over the idea that if they had done one thing wrong that they were just as bad as a mass murderer, I started thinking that's actually not only a hard thing to believe but perhaps a pretty silly thing to ask Xns to believe. This attitude we project onto God that, a small sin of someone trying to be good is as bad as all the sins of the world’s worst mass murderer is an attitude we wouldn't accept from our friends or our legal system. So it would be understandable why many wouldn’t accept it from God. I wondered if this might be a better way of looking at it...

Sin is evidence of separation (or disconnection) from God.

This definition would mean that the average try to be nice to everyone kind of person isn't "just as bad" as a mass murderer. It just means that perhaps they've got less evidence that they are not connected with God.

Just a thought.

Confused about how to raise your teenager?

Confused about how to raise your teenagers? Mrs. Walter E. Handford can help with this handy booklet. Just put it on your child's bedside cabinet, they're sure to read it!

If these pictures are too small for you to read click here.

Brad Jersak: Can You Hear Me? (part 1) - Review / Reflection

I was asked by my wife to read this as some friends of hers had read it and got a lot out of it. At the moment I've got through Part 1 (of 3) but thought I'd post some initial thoughts here.

Firstly, I'm not one adverse to the idea of listening to God. I try to do 3 sessions of silent meditation each week in order to listen to God.

My first overwhelming impression is that his theological exposition in the book is woeful. This starts with Jersak’s interpretation of John 10 which kind of underpins the book. Basically takes what the gospel writer even describes as a “figure of speech” (John 10:6) to mean that the follower of Christ can literally hear Jesus voice. The book (so far) is full of similar ways of reading scripture like confusing "The word" as expressed by Jesus in the gospels with the charismatic understanding of "a word". I found this is very frustrating.

None the less I put this behind me. Just because someone has a bad biblical exposition doesn't necessarily mean what they have to say is bad. This is something I honestly believe. Besides, the little blurb on his "Kissing the Leper" book looks pretty good.

The book is not all bad by any means I thought his section on the ways of hearing God (Invitation, Scripture, Teachers, Worship, Conviction of Right & Wrong, A Burden for Others and Prompting) was quite helpful. My problem is not the idea that people hear God but rather exactly how that happens and how we should expect that too happen.

Let me start by explaining how I think we hear God. I‘ve have alluded to this a little in my previous “Me and God like a Jazz Band” post. My thought is that God is playing a jazz rhythm track and we are playing a solo. So like a jazz musician we can play in harmony with that track or in dissonance, but even when we are playing in harmony there is a huge amount of freedom in what we play. So for me hearing God is really about hearing that rhythm track and responding in harmony to that in a me kind of way.

The difference between what me and what I think Jersak is saying is that I have a backing track to which I improvise where Jersak is looking for a particular set of notes that God wants him (us) to play. Hence he gives examples of being told by God to talk to a particular stranger sitting in a coffee shop or get off a road just before a truck is coming. Now I don’t deny that this is possible my worry is when people expect this to be the norm, because my experience is that for most Xns this is not the norm. Nor should it be. To me this is like the difference between having God's Spirit and having God's instruction. If you think of someone doing something in say the spirit of Martin Luther King (MLK) you could imagine what that might be like (and there would be endless possibilities of what that might look like). They would not necessarily use words by MLK. It would be a combination of the essence of MLK and the person doing the thing. To receive instruction is just to do what someone says. To me to have God’s spirit and to listen to God is not about getting direct words from God (although at times this can happen) it’s about hearing that rhythm track and playing something appropriate. In fact as we grow as Xns you might expect to hear even less direct instruction from God, just like a music student might.

When Jersak asks “Is that God or just your imagination?”. My thought is that it's both. To me our imagination in prayer is like listening to a complete jazz song and asking is that the solo or is that the rhythm track? They cannot be separated. I fear that Jersak does that and belittles humans in the process. One example is when he describes Nicola Telsa’s vision of Alternating Current as a vision from God. I’d argue that in fact that was Tesla’s idea, an idea discovered because of the way God had created him but none the less his idea and his imagination. Imagination is great and important for Xns. Imagination is the conduit between what we know about God and how we apply it in our context. Imagination is how we ask what would Jesus do in this situation? Otherwise Xns would be turning up to weddings and trying to turn water into wine or sitting at home waiting for a vision about which tie to wear.

As you can see this has been a hard book as it’s made me do lots of thinking. It’s a book with many things in it that I agree with just not from the angle that those things are being presented. None the less I will keep listening to God but I won’t be expecting any specific instructions, I won’t deny that it’s possible, all I won’t to do is be in harmony with my creator.

10 Weeks of Alphalpha Coming Up

This week I started an Alpha course and it's the first time I have ever done alpha or anything like it. I've always been a little bit sceptical of them but I'm going in with an open mind. My first three initial reactions to the introduction session are

1. Nicky Gumbell is a complete dag. That's not a bad thing as he does not try to be otherwise, in fact it makes him kind of pretty ordinary or normal which is probably quite a good thing seeing this alpha is appealing to such a mainstream audience.
2. The first presentation was really similar to the "Burn Your Plastic Jesus" seminar a friend and I used to do in high schools. Our presentation has video, live music and discussion groups half way through but none the less I think both presentations looked at the question of wether Xy is irrelevant, boring and untrue. Nicky had his anecdotes and we had the video and music and compared quotes of Kurt Cobain & Marilyn Manson favourably with Jesus and quotes by Fred Nile favourably with the Pharisees. So kind of different but kind of similar.
3. The whole gist of the presentation was very much like the "God Shaped Hole" talk that one of my youth group leaders used to do when I was young. The message was that like the famous toy (see below) he had a God shaped hole in his life and no matter how he tried to fill it with cars, work, sport or girl friends none of them would fit and he needed God to be complete. I realise this is how a lot of suburban people probably think so I might learn something about reaching out to people in my new suburb, but most of the non An people I've known are already aware of the God shaped hole in their life and are trying to fill it with other spiritual things. So, I hope these kind of people get addressed eventually.

My other initial reaction is that Nikki Gumbell says "Jesus Christ" in exactly the same way as the boyfriend of Mr Garrison, Mr Slave (below) from South Park.

Anyway, more reflections in the future I'm sure.

The Bible in Two Pages

Ok, here is the Bible in two pages. Well actually it's all the section headings from the NRSV bible at www.anova.org/sev. I find it kind of usefull to get a feel for how the whole Bible fits together without having to read the whole thing a few times.

Sending "Original Sin" to Hell in a Hand Basket

I think I might no longer believe in Original Sin, Satan or Hell, or at least not in the way many Xns believe in these things. This is part one of a what will be a three part post exploring these ideas.

Original Sin seems the most easy and obvious one so I'll start with it. I've been mulling over this for a few days (which I know is not very blog like) and my initial thoughts were...

---

Original Sin is mentioned no where in the Bible and is to me some what of a cop out way of explaining why we humans do bad things. I disagree with the notion that we are all born sinful. I think we are all born with the ability to choose to sin or not and we will eventually be given a choice where we choose badly. My 3 month old daughter who is not yet capable of those kind of decisions is therefore sinless at the moment. Like Adam and Eve we are born with the possibility of a sinless life. What is different is that post garden we are born with somewhat more of a disconnection from God than Adam and Eve. We are not walking around in a garden with God, we are walking around with humans, learning from humans and with the same capability to choose sin as Adam and Eve. Therefore it is certain that as long as we live long enough we will sin at some stage. It is possible to be human and not sin, and Jesus is the example of this. I think to say otherwise would be to deny Jesus humanity.

---

I was not 100% happy with this paragraph having written it. The thing I don't think I was happy with was the word sin. So often I think sin gets boiled down to just wrong moral or ethical choices and to me it's just so much more than that. Lately I've started to think more in the musical terms of dissonance and harmony. It is like God is play a rhythm track to life and that we can either play in harmony with that or not. This analogy acknowledges that there is a great freedom being Xn, a freedom that transcends a list of do's and don’ts. The gift of the spirit can be seen as the gift of being able to hear that rhythm track. Further more, I think people can probably relate to the idea of being out of tune with God more so than being inherently evil. None the less there's still bits about my first paragraph I like. Original sin is not in the Bible, it denies our ability to chose to sin (if we're made to be that way by something other than ourselves) and is pretty much not helpful in any way as far as I can see.

World's Best Ever Budget Music Video

Chuck Palahniuk on Big Brother

With Big Brother over for another year and reality TV hitting the new lows of "Dancing with the Starts on Ice" and "Celebrity Survivor" (and celebrity really needs to be taken with a grain of salt) I am reminded about what Chuck Paulanick said about Big Brother in his novel Lullaby.

Old George Orwell got it backward. Big Brother isn't watching. He's singing and dancing. He's pulling rabbits out of a hat. Big brother's busy holding your attention every moment you're awake. He's making sure you're always distracted. He's making sure you're fully absorbed. He's making sure you're imagination withers. Until it's as useful as your appendix. He's making sure your attention is always filled. And this being fed it's worse than being watched with the world always filling you, no one has to worry about what's in your mind. With everyone's imagination atrophied, no one will ever be a threat to the world.

Blue Like Jazz - Review / Reflection

Like Donald Miller I used to not like Jazz, mainly due to an early introduction to Dixieland jazz which I still loath. Also like Donald I was once mesmerised (after my school formal) by a guy playing Jazz on a saxophone on the street. It looked like he was busking but there wasn't any one around for miles. However not until I borrowed "A Kind of Blue" from my local library did I fall in love with jazz and John Coltrane in particular.

"Blue Like Jazz" is very easy reading, it kind of reminded me of the Da Vinci Code the way it could be digested so quickly. Miller is honest and reflective and will be someone who I can imagine can relate to people from many parts of the Xn faith. My problem with Blue like Jazz is that like Jazz Miller has taken a standard chart (jazz speak) or formula and plays a good solo over the top, but none the less he has stuck to the formula. That formula being:

1. Realise you are a sinner and need forgiveness
2. Turn to God become a Xn

There is nothing wrong with this formula but it's not the way that everyone makes their initial connection with God. As a ten year old I had been a Xn for over a year before someone told me that I should prayer the "sinners prayer". It wasn't that I didn't think that I was a sinner, it's just that not how I initially connected with God, and it was the same for my wife. Unfortunately all of the characters in "Blue like Jazz" connectr with God via this same formula.

A smaller issue for me was that I'm not sure if Miller really gives enough respect or understanding of other belief systems. For example at one point in the book he presents Xy as unprovable and illogical but says it works but, he disses Buddhism for being the same (I guess as it didn't work for him).

I still have this strange tension about this book in my mind, that can be best explained by saying I'd give the book to my more conservative Xn friends but not my liberal Xn friends and not my non Xn friends. But don't hear me say the books bad, it was an autobiography that was enjoyable in the same way that a good airport novel is but also unsatisfying in the same way they are. It was really nice to near someone play the standard evangelical Xn chart or formula the way he does and his self deprecating attitude certainly is an asset. I think being a little more self deprecating about what he believes and a bit more research into and respect of what others believe will help him flourish into an interesting Xn author.

Dreaming of a New Flag

This morning I woke up having dreamt that we got a new Australian flag. The Union Jack was gone and the Aboriginal flag had taken it's place, well sort of. I reckon it looks kind of cool.

Addition made on 10:53pm August 23rd 2006

In a comment on this post Unordered suggested something like this...

and since photos can't be put in comment I've added it to the original post.