Election Fun: Romney

January 14, 2012 By scotmcknight 9 Comments

By Eliot Weinberger, at the London Review of Books, taking aim at good ol’ American candidates:

There are many reasons Mitt Romney will never be elected president. These include, in descending order of importance: 1) He is a Mormon who wears funny underwear. 2) On a family vacation, he drove for many hours with his dog, Seamus, strapped to the roof of his SUV. 3) He is a stuffed shirt, full of ‘pious baloney’, as the incomparable Newt recently put it. 4) He has been on both sides of every issue, while denying that he ever held the opposing view.

But what will sink Romney is his last name. Americans do not find two-syllable names ending with a long e presidential. They are associated with diminutives and baby-talk and lack the requisite gravitas. American history is littered with these losers: Pinckney (1796); another Pinckney (1800, 1804, 1808); Birney (1844); Greeley (1872); Woolley (1900); Hanly (1916); Wilkie (1940); Dewey (1944, 1948); Humphrey (1968); Kerry (2004). The list of those who failed to be even nominated is much longer, including Ed Muskie and Mitt’s dad George. There has never been a baby-trochee president. (Three syllables, however, like Kennedy, evade the curse.)

 

Filed Under: Uncategorized 9 Comments

Santorum for Family Research Council

January 14, 2012 By scotmcknight 9 Comments

The question: How influential is the Family Research Council?

(CNN) – Family Research Council president Tony Perkins announced Saturday that a meeting of Christian conservative leaders resulted in the group backing GOP hopeful Rick Santorum.

The group heard pitches from surrogates for Republican candidates Friday, and voted to support Santorum after three rounds of voting.

 

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Gary Bauer’s Religious Test

January 14, 2012 By scotmcknight 11 Comments

From USAToday:

Gary Bauer, who once sought the Republican presidential nomination, is president of American Values and chairman of the Campaign for Working Families. (Last Sunday, Bauer endorsed Rick Santorum for the GOP presidential nomination.)

A thought experiment: Imagine a presidential candidate. He has spent years in politics,rising to become a trusted leader in his party. He also has spent time in the business world, has an impeccable personal life, a deep understanding of the issues, and is eloquent in speech and moderate in temperament. Sounds like a dream candidate,right?

But imagine that, along with those qualities, the candidate is also a Wiccan, a modern pagan. It’s not an implausible idea. Some estimates put the number o fAmerican Wiccans at more than 100,000. It’s safe to saymost voters would at least have a few questions for our hypothetical candidate. After all, Wicca involves magic,spell-casting and sorcery — not exactly mainstream religious practices.

But would this candidate’s beliefs make you question his fitness for office? Would you oppose him based solely on his faith? [Read more...]

Filed Under: Public Issues, Religions 11 Comments

Saturday Book Review: Len Sweet

January 14, 2012 By scotmcknight 16 Comments

This review is by Andy Holt, who returns again to our blog with another review of Len Sweet’s book, I Am a Follower. Andy is pastor at Ember Church.

The Church has a leadership problem. So argues Leonard Sweet in his new book, I Am a Follower. The problem, however, is not that we don’t have enough leaders, or that our leaders have lost their way.

The problem is that we have become enamored with leadership culture, obsessed with leading, and supremely focused on raising up the next generation of leaders. The trouble is, Jesus never told us to lead. He told us to follow.

The evangelical church has bought into a brand of leadership that, since the economic crisis of 2008, has gone bankrupt. But the lonely, trailblazing, genius-coming-down-from-the-mountain model of leadership is not what Jesus had in mind for his bride. The picture of leadership in Jesus’ mind was himself, and the rest of us are called to follow him. “What the world defines as leadership is not the way God works through his people in the world. …Christians are called to live by faith in a world that lives by fame.” (28-9) [Read more...]

Filed Under: Books, Pastoring and Leading 16 Comments

Weekly Meanderings

January 14, 2012 By scotmcknight 21 Comments

Our town

Falsani and Paul Simon: “A few years back, Paul Simon released an album titled,Surprise. But for many of his listeners, and for me in an exceptionally personal way, the real surprise came with his 2010 album, So Beautiful or So What. After its relase last spring, I wrote about the album, filled with wondrous stories about God and faith, Jesus and the afterlife, and love in “hard times,” calling it one of the most spiritually powerful albums I’d heard in many years. A few months after my review of the album ran, I got a phone call at home in California one afternoon. It was Simon, whom I’d never met or spoken to before, calling to chat. He’d read what I’d written about the new album and was intrigued by the idea that, perhaps, God might have moved through him in the music without his knowing it.” [And I hope you can escape the Chevy Chase/Paul Simon jingle.]

Good line from Chuck Smith: “Never trade what you do know for what you don’t know.”

Australia and pot: “No, mon, it’s not what you think: Jamaica and The Netherlands may be popular with pot smokers, but according to a new study by the British medical journal The Lancet, high honors go to Australia and New Zealand, where up to 15% of residents between the ages of 15 and 64 used marijuana in 2009 – the latest year for which data is available. That compares with 11% of North Americans, 5.5% of Europeans and 2.5% of Asians.”

The Virtual Abbess ponders how original sin and laziness and relationships work together.

Adam McLane: “One reason youth ministry is flatlining is crappy theology. Kara Powell, executive director of the Fuller Youth Institute, was recently interviewed by Relevant Magazine about the present reality that youth ministry presents a faith students easily walk away from in college. She was asked, “Do you think there are any misunderstandings or misconceptions that contribute to young adults leaving the church?” Her response:

The students involved in our research definitely tended to view the Gospel as a list of dos and do-nots, a list of behaviors. We asked our students when they were college juniors, “How would you define what it really means to be a Christian?” and one out of three—and these were all youth group students—didn’t mention Jesus Christ in their answer; they mentioned behaviors.

Alex Murashko: “In a surprise decision by the U.S. Supreme Court, justices ruled in favor of church authority Wednesday, overturning a lower court ruling and concluding that the federal government should not intervene in the hiring and firing practices of churches.  In one of the most important religious cases disputed in years, also having separation of church and state implications, the high court accepted what is known as a “ministerial exception” to the employment discrimination laws. The ministerial exception allows religious entities to give preference in employment to individuals of a particular religion or require that employees confirm the organization’s religious tenants. It also bars the federal government from examining employment decisions by religious groups for employees with religious duties, such as pastors or ministry leaders.”

Jenell Paris responds to Mark Noll.

Here’s a group of Coloradons heading to NPU for classes next Tuesday!

 

Speaking of Colorado, Denver, Broncos, Tim Tebow, here’s a good one. [Read more...]

Filed Under: Weekly Meanderings 21 Comments