Grotesque Parodies

There is little that we can point to in our lives as deserving anything but God’s wrath.  Our best moments have been mostly grotesque parodies.  Our best loves have been almost always blurred with selfishness and deceit.  But there is something to which we can point.  Not anything that we ever did or were, but something that was done for us by another.  Not our own lives, but the life of one who died in our behalf and yet is still alive.  This is our only glory and our only hope.  And the sound that it makes is the sound of excitement and gladness and laughter that floats through the night air from a great banquet.

– Frederick Buechner from Magnificent Defeat

Christianity in the Movie “Avatar”

Last night was my first experience of the blockbuster movie Avatar.  The epic was a feast for the eyes, the ears, and the nerves as I watched on the edge of my seat.  Even with the obvious comparisons with Pocahontas and Fern Gully, it was a definite delight.

But Avatar is NOT Christian.

Rev. Roy Shaff apparently agrees, but thinks that it is a prime opportunity for “discussion” about “spiritual truths.”  Rather than relying on the Bible (which is supposedly authoritative) to bring its own truth, Rev. Shaff advocates for taking this film as a primary source for discussion.  In a post on his blog, he tries to pull out what he says are excellent discussion points that connect with the message in Scripture.

The Atheist “Non-Agenda”

It has often been said by many an atheist that there is “no such thing as an atheist agenda.”  Oddly enough, one such statement comes from “The Atheist Missionary” (@AtheistMission).  Apparently the name must be an oxymoron, but under casual scrutiny there is much to be said about regular and insipid attacks against Christianity.

Last night I happened to notice the following tweet, and my suspicions were confirmed when I clicked on the link:

Great article in Washington Post by Richard Dawkins on #Haiti & Hypocrisy of #Christian Theology: http://bit.ly/6z6seR #atheist #atheism (Online Source)

Creation Among the Athiests: a Retrospective

It has been more than 6 months since I became an incognito Christian and joined a group of more than 300 atheists as they toured the Creation Museum in Petersburg, Kentucky on August 8, 2009.

The response to my reflections have been overwhelming.  To date there have been more than 14,000 hits on “Scarlet ‘A’ for a Day” alone.  The experience has generated much open dialogue and has challenged me in more ways that I can express.

In case you missed them, here is a comprehensive list of my posts about the experience:

• What Do You Get When You Cross 300 Atheists and the Creation Museum? – A brief introduction to the event with a list of other accounts of the trip and a link to national news coverage.
• Scarlet ‘A’ for a Day – My own reflections on being at the museum, how visitors responded to us, and brief encounters we had there.
• A Skeptic’s Creation Museum Video Tour – A video chronicle of conversations that some of the atheists/agnostics had during the day.
• And This Atheist Was a Walking Christian Tract – Encounter with a skeptic who wore a t-shirt that visitors found offensive, but not for the reasons you may expect.
• Atheism at the Creation Museum – How museum curators mistake moralism for Christianity.

Another trip to the museum is planned for the end of the month.  This time it will be a group of friends and I will be going as a Christian with good critical-thinking skills.  We shall see if anything of interest comes from that perspective.

Doritos Instead of Christ

A Los Angeles church decides to make the big time by producing, writing, and directing a Doritos ad to enter a contest to win loads of cash and tickets to the Superbowl.  The church in question is Mosaic, which (after doing some digging) is a Southern Baptist church which is headed by Erwin McManus. 

The reason that I bring the Doritos ad to this forum is in part because when doing research for the post immediately before this one, it was curious to me why my link to www.erwinmcmanus.com lead me not to a page about none other than Erwin McMaus, but instead brought me to a screen with a single screen shot (above) and the words “We need your vote.”

What has occurred is that the creative powerhouse that is Mosaic teamed up to win a bunch of money.  What better way to “get out the vote” but to replace your website with a forum to collect said votes.