In one of my classes, we were asked to write a letter to a congregation that was largely white and middle class concerning the influx of a large group of Hispanic immigrants in the community due to the opening of a meat packing plant.  Here is my response; it is largely devoid of references to [...]

We, as the North-Western Church, must tread carefully as we awaken to the present, past, and future realities of the Eastern and Southern Churches.   This post is a collection of some helpful ideas to that end. In many ways have many things which these other Churches lack. Chief among these are education, history, wealth, and [...]

From Julia Esquivel in Threatened with Resurrection: Prayers and Poems from an Exiled Guatemalan (Elgin: The Brethern Press, 1982), 79-91.  I love how it uses Biblical language and themes to remind us at what price our comfort comes.  I’m thinking hard this holiday season about the intersection between religion, politics, exploitation, and thankfulness.  I pray [...]

The following article contains an interesting take on the issues of polygamy and divorce.  He suggests that while God intends for marriages to be a perpetual arrangement between one man and one woman, God always incarnates his will in the midst of sinful societies.  As such, we see God moving people away from sinful societal [...]

A while back, after reading Rich Christians in an Age of Hunger, some friends and I decided to stop dumping and start investing the in poor.  We (well, I) had (ve) always bemoaned the idea of dumping aid.  I really felt like giving a man a fish every day kept him dependant upon me [...]

The folks over at Wired worked up the following maps purporting to visualize the density of the seven deadly sins among our united states.  Their methodology is… interesting to say the least.  I’ll let you head over there to see how they went about graphing the most slippery of deviations from God’s will.
WIRED :: American [...]

Saw Transformers Revenge of the Fallen last night.  It wasn’t that horrible of a summer-stupid movie.  Well, the 1.5 hour editing down of the 2.5 hour monstrosity on screen wouldn’t have been that bad of a movie.  Excepting therefrom the gratuitous everything, the only thing that really bothered me was the two blackface characters, Skids [...]

From some 1944 Hungarian newspaper.

This sums up 98% of all comic storylines.  From Atomic Robo,volume 1.

Meredith and I stopped using ethanol-laced gas a couple of years ago because we have a hard time burning food for gas.  Came across the following today: The Great Ethanol Scam.  Here are some selected quote to entice you to read the three page article:
First, the primary job of the Environmental Protection Agency is, dare [...]

Book Review: The Patriot’s Bible (part 2)
I find myself utterly confounded as to how Christian commentators can agree that a military combatant is “the noblest development of mankind.” Since Christ is the perfect illustration of what it means to be “in the image of God,” and since he is our Lord and the one we [...]

From The Rise of Christianity: [1] by R. Stark:
Free-rider problems are the Achilles’ heel of collective activities. […] “Truly rational actors will not join a group to pursue common ends when, without participating, they can reap the benefit of other people’s activity in obtaining them.  If every member of the relevant group can [...]

Quote from Timothy Price in Is the Father of Jesus the God of Muhammad? :
Some scholars have argued that monotheism is inherently racist, oppressive and violent – witness the many holy wars waged in the name of the one true god. But it just as well be argued that these tendencies, though real enough historically, [...]

Sometimes I reuse parts of my own writing.  However, nothing like this:

See the post over at Cinematical for more.

From Green Lantern Volume 4, Issue 39.

There is blood, blood, actual human blood,
Spilled in the name of the Lamb.
There is blood, blood, street staining blood,
Spilled in the name of the Lamb.

I am not an expert on Calvin and Geneva.  Hank asked me to supplement the claim about Geneva’s blood stained streets that I made on my April’s Fools post where [...]

[Jesus teaching a young couple on their wedding eve]
And if you have children, for their sakes you will become oppressors and robbers and smiters of orphans and wrongers of widows, and you will be grievously tortured for their injuries.  For the greatest part of children are the cause of many pains; for either the king [...]

Spoken of; Spoken for – Women in the Thomasine community. While women, their needs, and their concerns feature prominently in the narrative, they are almost always written about from the male point of view.