… oh, so pretty! I feel pretty, and witty, and … Okay, anyway. Right. A new look to my blog. I couldn’t stand looking at my old one anymore. And this is the best template WordPress has right now, for me. Bottom line: I need to get a real website. Which means paying someone to build me one—or (yikes) taking classes and learning to build one myself. Until then, this is my new one! Read more
Here’s the next bit following Satan’s Ministers Await Satan’s Arrival: (SATAN enters. The MINISTERS immediately fall into a customary posture of subservience.) SATAN: Up. (They rise.) How gratifying to have you all here at once. How integrated I feel, when we are all together this way. I trust each of you is feeling nasty and diabolical today? (The MINISTERS signal they are.) SATAN: Good. Well, before beginning our discussion about the very important reason for which I have... Read more
I got so excited discovering what books were on everyone else’s bed-stands (see My Weird Fixation on What People Read at Night) that I forgot to list what books are on my own. They are, right now: “In the Compny of Cheerful Ladies” (#6 in the awesome “The No. 1 Ladies Detective Agency” series) by Alexander McCall Smith “Tears of the Giraffe” (#2 in the series above) Three issues of “New Yorker” magazine “Until I Find You,” by the incredible... Read more
Are you interested in the subject of Christianity and humor? Me, too! And that’s why at church last Sunday during the celebration of the Eucharist I busted out a can of Cheez Whiz. Turns out people don’t think that’s as funny as you’d think they would. And I have the thurible-shaped bruise on the side of my head to prove it. For four years now I’ve been blogging on the massive Christian website, Crosswalk.com. The other day, Crosswalk’s executive editor... Read more
The two biggest challenges the Bible brings to anyone caring to take it seriously are no mystery: the Good Book is extraordinarily (if not, let’s face it, miraculously) complex, and so vague that one or more of its passages can be used as “proof” for just about any imaginable assertion. I could claim that Bozo was God come to earth to show the world what all men would look like in the future, and find Bible quotes to support it.... Read more
When it comes to people, I’m Joe Extremely Nosey; the only superpower I’ve ever craved is the ability to secretly listen in on people’s conversations. But do I care what anyone has hidden in their sock drawer, or whether they’re having an affair, or anything of that sort? No; that stuff bores me. What I’m basically insane about knowing is what people read in their bed at night before they fall asleep. When I used to babysit people’s kids, or... Read more
Theologians and Christian philosophers have long puzzled over the exact nature of the Holy Trinity. They needn't have to--and you don't either. Read more
In today’s New York Times there’s a huge article about Mark Driscoll, head of the Mars Hill mega-church in Seattle. Mr. Driscoll is a Calvinist. This means he believes that, before they were even born, some people were preordained by God to go to heaven—and that everyone else, when they die, gets shot directly to hell. You’re born either one of God’s “elect” (cue Napoleon Dynamite’s voice: “Lucky!”), or you’re not. Period. And there’s nothing you can do to change... Read more
So lately we’ve been having some fun discovering fellow Christians out there who’ve decided that I’m … well, as in yesterday’s case, an Actual Heretic. Now here’s another guy! (Thanks, You Know Who You Are, for sending me this link. Some friend! You know you bite soggy figgies.) This one, typically, declares right off, “I’m not certain he [being me, doncha know] is a Christian.” There’s that accusation again! What is it with Christians and that accusation?? Also, be... Read more
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John 1:5: The Archer’s Grief
Today we’re considering John 1:5, which reads: “The light shines in the darkness, but the darkness has not understood it.” I think this deceptively simple sentence is way too easy to skip over. People usually do nothing with it beyond equating “darkness” with those who refuse Christ, who reject his divinity, who are either too dense or too given to sinfulness to recognize the light of God when it’s shining right before them. It too readily becomes a dismissive condemnation... Read more