The Birds

After 30 years of clunking around this world I finally saw Alfred Hitchcock's "The Birds". I laughed so hard at one point that I almost cried. I am sure that in 1968 this movie was "the bees' knees" as far as suspense films go. The sodium screen process used was tremendously innovative at the time and creates some believable moments. You can also see the influence of Hitchcock in Shalmylan, King, and other suspense/horror films of the day (and I dare say in Lost as well). And that got me thinking...

What Hitch gave us was innovation. He was truly progressive in his use of film, camera angles, score and dialogue (or the lack thereof, The Birds for instance hardly has any music at all), and postmodern in his tendency to have entirely open ended endings. I'm afraid however that he may have opened Pandora's Box in another sense.

Psycho deals with a cross dressing murdered who keeps the corpse of his mother in her bedroom upstairs, Rear Window centers in part around a voyeuristic neighbor, Marnie is about a girl with suppressed memories of killing a man who tried to physically assault her mother (who was a prostitute), North By Northwest was edited to remove steamy dialogue, I wonder at times, did Hitchcock introduce much of what I detest about modern cinema. In Hitch's case, it would appear that most of these subjects were dealt with for the sake of the story, but still in their day, many of these topics were risque' (he was not ashamed to use eye catching cleavage for instance), and still are not entirely kosher today (which in my humble opinion is a good thing).

More Programs to Make Your Life Easier

PC Decrappifier: Yes, that is the real name. WONDERFUL for ridding your computer of all the pre-loaded garbage and trial software. WARNING: you can mess this up if you are not careful. Rule of thumb, don't delete anything that is manufacturer specific, for instance, my Toshiba had several programs for the trackpad and the nifty buttons that let you open Media Player automatically.

Avast! Anti virus: a great alternative to AVG which has been made less effective in its recent release.

Malware Bytes: an extremely thorough spyware/adware/trojan detector. Does what Spy Bot Search and Destroy and Hijack This used to do in a more user friendly way.

CleanUp!: the name says it all. If it's not malware and preloaded bloatware goofing up your machine, it is usually the enourmous cache of files your pc saves everytime you visit a website. This takes care of that, and can even empty your recycle bin for you.

Open Office 3.0 (et. al.): Why spend as much as you did on your computer to write papers? Sure, the early versions were WAY unstable, but now you can even save in Word formats so you can actually print in the computer lab. You'll love the interface if you cut your teeth on Word Perfect.

K-Lite Codecs Pack: Every codecs you could ever want and many that you did not even know existed (because they are from other planets).

D Ban: Completely nukes a hard-drive. Mind you, it really, REALLY, does clear it. As opposed to just scattering data like Windows reformatting, this overwrites all your data with 1's and 0's. We used it on my fossil of an HP (read some of my xanga/myspace posts about that saga) and re-installed XP and it runs like a new computer.

I did not include links, but you can go to Download.com or just use you Googleing skills.

Have fun, and if you break something, blame Brent because he showed me most of these!

WW II Art

You may have heard the blurb today that some of Adolf Hitler's art sold at an auction today. I have to admit that as an armchair historian, this peaked my interest and whilst trolling the search engine I came across a collection of WW II art that was not done by Hitler. Furthermore, I was unaware of the vast amount of work done in response to the war, i.e. not propaganda. Here you will find a link to a blog featuring some of this fascinating work.

Didn't know I was into art did you? :)

Carrie Prejean: the Face of Intolerance

I usually have derogaroty comments for people from Caliofornia (bunch of Birckenstock wearing liberal-commie-tree huggin'-latte' sippin' freaks!... just kidding) but I am impressed by the answer Carrie Prejean, also known as Miss California gave this past week. While not particularly articulate, she gets points for honesty for an answer that is almost certain to sink her chances at being Miss America and will likely lead to pies in the face and other torment from those in more "tolerant" circles. 

You can see the whole thing here.  

(note the abject horror of the crowd! oh wait, they are actually clapping? was this held in like Northern Arkansas?

The whole thing is really a circus though. I mean, of all the people to pop the question. But it was random.

Anyhow, Mr. Hilton has been relentlessly roasting Prejean since her answer was given. I guess that it didn't meet his expectations, but hey, what do you expect from a blonde right ;)




AUTHORS NOTE: The author has a blonde daughter himself sports a pate of strawberry blonde hair, his comments were made in irony. No beauty queens or fundamentalists were harmed in the authoring of this blog.

An Unlikely Friend

I have recently discovered the joys of Wal-Mart.com. We have a set of storage tubs that we use for recycling our kids clothes that went out of circulation in stores, but Wal-Mart still had some left so we were able to order them on-line and have them shipped to a local Wal-Mart for free. Then, this morning I found a $79 Targus laptop backpack for $39 that shipped to my house for 97 cents! 

I am not the biggest fan of Wal-Mart, but that is awesome!

As the Ruin Falls

Some years back, my friend Chris was immersed in C.S. Lewis at OBU and uncovered the little known fact that Lewis was not only a brilliant scholar, theologian, and fiction author, BUT was indeed quite the accomplished poet. One of his more challenging and revealing works is the following work. I know it cuts me to the bone every time I read it.

********************


As the Ruin Falls

All this is flashy rhetoric about loving you.
I never had a selfless thought since I was born.
I am mercenary and self-seeking through and through:
I want God, you, all friends, merely to serve my turn.

Peace, re-assurance, pleasure, are the goals I seek,
I cannot crawl one inch outside my proper skin:
I talk of love --a scholar's parrot may talk Greek--
But, self-imprisoned, always end where I begin.

Only that now you have taught me (but how late) my lack.
I see the chasm. And everything you are was making
My heart into a bridge by which I might get back
From exile, and grow man. And now the bridge is breaking.

For this I bless you as the ruin falls. The pains
You give me are more precious than all other gains.

C S Lewis

Media Spin & Fearmongering Caused Unnecessary Social Damage: CNN.com

Posted by: readysteadys // 1 day ago // viewed 200 times
San Diego, California // embed media

Ten years ago, I was in my senior year of high school. A week before my eighteenth birthday, the Columbine incident happened. I went through a wave of emotions and could not get enough of the news coverage. I was one of the "goth" kids at school and already had gotten enough flack for the way I dressed and my differently colored/styled hair. I felt so terrible for the kids and teacher who had lost their lives and could not believe that anyone could be so callous, but at the same time, based on the reports that they were picked on for listening to a certain type of music and wearing certain clothing, I also felt bad for the perpetrators.

Shortly following Columbine, I was interviewed for Teen People magazine, to provide my outlook as an "outsider" in high school - how I was treated, how I handled it, and my views on how judgmental my peers (and adults) could be. Once I received a proof copy, I realized that my story was drastically edited and words were attributed to me that I did not say. This frustrated me, but there was not much I could do about the situation other than hope that some portions of my original message would be seen by those who needed to see it.

Just before the issue hit newsstands, I was invited to take part in a special program that Dateline NBC & Teen People were putting together. It was a panel of teens from around the country who would give their insight on school security, bullying, parental involvement, internet socialization, cliques, and other issues we faced. I agreed to participate, as I felt that it could be a more real & open outlet to say what I had to say, where it would be more candid and less censored.

To prepare for the show, I started doing research on the Columbine incident itself. Many facts had come to light and had not actually been reported by the major media outlets. The media had blamed rock music and violent video games; claimed that Eric Harris & Dylan Klebold always wore trenchcoats and all-black clothing; that they obsessed over Nazi literature and carried out the attacks on April 20th due to that being Hitler's birthday; that they were regularly picked on; had a list of enemies/targets; and that they shot Cassie Bernall for saying she believed in God.

This is what I found out: Yes, they listened to rock music. They didn't frequently wear trenchcoats. They were not racists, they were sociopaths who disregarded everyone, no matter what their heritage. They were actually the bullies, according to Eric Harris' own journal writings, frequently picking on freshmen and other people who seemed weaker. Their "enemies" list was mostly made up of people who had already graduated from Columbine. And poor Cassie Bernall, who was allegedly killed for professing her faith? She lost her life because she was in the wrong place, at the wrong time - and investigators have since stated that they do not believe that the now-mythical verbal exchange took place. I went to New York, armed with these and many other bits of information that I had collected both from trawling through volumes of both direct and media accounts, as well as from acquaintances who witnessed the incident for themselves or knew people who did.

The special was hosted by Katie Couric, who - in person - seemed rather shocked by a lot of what was said by a few of us. Those of us who knew better denied that video games, music, or being part of a clique had anything to do with what Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold carried out at Columbine. We assured her that there was no real Trenchcoat Mafia, based on what people who attended the school had to say, and that there was nothing to fear from people who chose to dress in all black or people who listened to songs that weren't about puppy love. Much of what we had to say was edited to make it seem like we blamed the jocks for what happened and like we were playing the victims in our own experiences with bullying and being ostracized. This was far from the truth.

My experience of being on the panel mirrored how the media handled the incident as a whole. They were fearmongers that created an even more intolerant environment for teens to deal with, by grabbing onto every senational nuance they could find and pushing their stories as fact. The rumors that were filtered through or created within production offices & newsrooms were almost all based on falsehoods and exaggerations. As a result, the public were afraid of the "goths" and "punks" and "metalheads" at school. Parents - often successfully - lobbied to get trenchcoats and all-black attire banned in their local schools. School administrators started considering these groups to be "gangs" and harassment of students was rampant, with unwarranted backpack searches, detainment in the hallways by security guards, and being called into the administrative offices for questioning. All of this simply because of the students' clothing and/or chosen music preferences. Teens learned that if they didn't like someone, they could simply report to administrators that the person had an "enemies list" and the school would quickly swoop in to rectify the situation - even when it wasn't the truth - and since there was no stopping the local rumor mill, the accused would forever be known as "the kid with the list" and ostracized. This continued for a couple years, until the media and the country, as a whole, had 9/11 on which to shift their focus.

School shootings seemed to have tapered off since then or at least the reporting on them has. I'm not sure if it's because we've created a generation of kids with entitlement issues, due to parents mollycoddling their children in the hopes that they wouldn't flip out, or if it's a variety of factors, potentially including the events surrounding 9/11 and giving the current generation something to focus upon and fight against. Personally, I lean more toward assuming the latter. And look at the things that are prevalent in the preferences with the current youth: "emo" and hard rock music; clothing that is an amalgamation of the goth, punk, and metal styles from the 80s and 90s; tatooos/piercings; wild hair colors and styles - all of the things that were looked down upon around the time of the Columbine incident. It's like the generation following mine has almost done a complete 180 degree turn. They're self-aware and far more likely to embrace creative expression.

Two things definitely remain the same, though. The media is still sensationalizing every story it can dig its talons into and - sadly - teens still tend to shun those who are different than they are, rather than having an eclectic mix of friends from different backgrounds. I doubt either one of these will ever change, as people enjoy the entertainment aspect that the "news" provides and teenagers will always be awkward & unsure of themselves, searching to belong until they realize that life is about pursuing happiness, rather than homogeneity.

Ice Cream

Easter 2009: Doubting Thomas?

John 20:19-29

How would you feel if your name was an epithet, an insult? If people walked around saying, “Oh stop being such a J.P.!” or “You’re such a Vicki!” Some people throughout history have that undistinguished distinction. This is easy since people seem to always recall failures more readily than successes. To name a few: Benedict Arnold, Brutus, Jezebel, Judas… Today I want to go a step beyond the empty tomb and talk about a man who’s name is synonymous with doubt, Thomas.

I don’t think about Thomas all too often. Honestly, what got him back into my head was the only TV program I follow (Lost). During an episode a few characters go to a church (not to pray) and there is a massive canvas of Caravaggio’s “Thomas”.

According to John, after the Resurrection, Jesus makes a few appearances to select almost as if he is giving them one more opportunity to “get it”; another chance to some of those who had not entirely comprehended his mission and ministry. He appears to Mary Magdalene at the Tomb, then to the disciples (except Thomas), then again to the eleven all-together, and finally to Peter, James, John, Thomas, and Nathaniel at the Sea of Galilee (where we have the “do you love me” discussion).

I feel that Thomas’ story is important in our age of exceptional skepticism. Just this morning I was reading a post where someone simply said, “JESUS… who is he…”, the tone echoing “and why should I care about Him since He doesn’t seem to care much about me?” Much of our skepticism may be well deserved. Recent polls suggest that people trust the government less, have little faith in the financial system, feel the world in general is getting worse, and have less interest in the church. Wars and rumors of wars, decaying infrastructure, a general depreciation of life and the quality of life; the lines are being drawn… sounds almost, apocalyptic... It is easy to despair, to doubt.

The decline of Empiricism (five senses, scientific method, etc.) has left a vacuum, filled partially by a strand of post-modernity which refuses to make declarative statements on anything except that it refuses to make declarative statements… So then, it appears that we are left to the mercy of cynics, skeptics, and talking heads.

19 So when it was evening on that day, the first day of the week, and when the doors were shut where the disciples were, for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood in their midst and said* to them, "Peace be with you." 20 And when He had said this, He showed them both His hands and His side. The disciples then rejoiced when they saw the Lord. 21 So Jesus said to them again, "Peace be with you; as the Father has sent Me, I also send you." 22 And when He had said this, He breathed on them and said* to them, "Receive the Holy Spirit. 23 "If you forgive the sins of any, their sins have been forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they have been retained."

So there, Jesus just simply appears. Instantaneously He is among them. Barrett notes that just as he passed through the grave clothes (and perhaps the stone; I mean do you really think the stone was rolled away so that Jesus could get out?) he walks through or materializes right there among them! Hard to believe? Perhaps. Fully awesome to be sure.

While there, he breathes upon them, which should sound familiar. He’s done it once before, when He breathed life into us all. (There is a tradition that I follow where into the breath of every newborn child is whispered 1 Jn 5:12, “He who has the Son has the life; he who does not have the Son of God does not have the life. (NASB)” in hopes that the child will one day come to know the Source of their life (Jn 1:1-14), and of eternal life).

Here, just as He has breathed the breath of life into us all, He breathes power into the lives of the disciples. This power is to accomplish the work He has given them, to go to the world and proclaim forgiveness. It has been said that God is not so much in the business of calling the equipped (the intelligent, lovely, etc) but in the business of equipping those whom He calls. Perhaps that is the case here, He first commissions them, then, conditions them for service through the Holy Spirit. The cryptic statement at the end seems to be similar to the declaration Peter received at the Mount of Transfiguration, that he (and by extension the Church) would hold the keys to the kingdom (Mt 16). We can either open the door with them, or lock them tight through indifference.


24 But Thomas, one of the twelve, called Didymus , was not with them when Jesus came. 25 So the other disciples were saying to him, "We have seen the Lord!" But he said to them, "Unless, I see in His hands the imprint of the nails, and put my finger into the place of the nails, and put my hand into His side, I will not believe."

We don’t know where Thomas was, but we must to be certain that Jesus does. Whatever we may say about the ante-Resurrected Christ, we have to know that by now He is glorified and knows exactly where Thomas was. It caused a stir. Thomas doesn’t buy it. Simply put, he says seeing (and touching) is believing. But before we are too hard on Thomas lets look at his record a bit.

Thomas has some things going for him. First off, he made the cut, Jesus chose him along with eleven others to share three years of ministry with. That is something else. But he’d had doubts in the past. In Jn 11, while Jesus is headed to raise Lazarus from the dead, Thomas quips “Let us go to that we may die with Him…” Now folks have taken this different ways. It may be a matter that Thomas simply thinks it is time for the end, that he misinterpreted Jesus’ words to mean that it was time. But one can’t help but hear the slightest bit of cynicism in his voice. “Fine then… if He wants to go within arms reach of the people who want to kill Him (v.17), we might as well all go along…”

Thomas comes up at almost every funeral. In Jn 14 Jesus has just told the disciples that He will be handed over to the bad guys and killed (and will raise up again). To which Thomas replies, “Lord, we do not know the way where you are going, how can we go with you?” Now, surely Thomas knew the way to Jerusalem, so then, he must be talking about the way to where Jesus will ultimately be going, the Inaugurated Kingdom of God. Jesus’ reply is famous. “[Thomas], I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life”.

Perhaps these two events are what moved Jesus to give Him another chance, a chance to change (has God ever given you another chance?).


26 After eight days His disciples were again inside, and Thomas with them. Jesus came* , the doors having been shut , and stood in their midst and said, "Peace be with you." 27 Then He said* to Thomas, "Reach here with your finger, and see My hands; and reach here your hand and put it into My side; and do not be unbelieving, but believing." 28 Thomas answered and said to Him, "My Lord and my God!" 29 Jesus said* to him, "Because you have seen Me, have you believed? Blessed are they who did not see, and yet believed."

This passage says so much about Jesus. God has more patience with skeptics than we might imagine. He understands our doubts, but expects us to overcome our fear and place our trust in Him. The fact that Christ came at all proves that God is willing to go great lengths for us to come to a saving faith in Him. For instance, when is the last time you stopped to ponder just that fact, that GOD came to Earth? And remember, He came twice for Thomas. Judas had made his choice, but Thomas was not yet a lost. Jesus had heard/known what Thomas asked for, and so, the opportunity was presented to Him.

This is particularly interesting considering that Jesus expressly told Mary to keep her hands off of Him (although for reasons that make little sense to those of us who are not Jesus, cf. 20:17). So then, He appears to be making an exception. This is what we might call an act of extreme grace. Jesus wasn’t very complimentary toward signs (cf. Jn 4:48), yet out of His great grace He would give many, and would give this one, and He still gives many today.

For me, one of the most fascinating things about this story is that we don’t know if Thomas ever actually followed through. Did he touch Jesus? We don’t know. It would appear that simply seeing Him in His resurrected state was enough to cut through the fog of disbelief.

30 Therefore many other signs Jesus also performed in the presence of the disciples, which are not written in this book; 31 but these have been written so that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that believing you may have life in His name.
John 20:19-31 (NASB)


I have a soft spot for skeptics because I have a lot in common with Thomas. Two hours after I was born I stopped breathing, I was resuscitated and spent the first three months of my life in the neo-natal ward of a Detroit hospital. Throughout my life I had many health problems, in my adolescence I had mental health issues, family strife, and came dangerously close to destroying my life.

Even though I had seen God, that is, I grew up in and out of church, and had never fully abandoned the kernel of faith planted in me, I was living a wholly Godless life. At the age of fifteen, I challenged God, I gave Him an ultimatum (or so I thought, it was really a desperate cry for deliverance). I told Him that He had a week to show Himself to me or I would never believe in Him. Well, the next day I was brought to my knees, and then to my face during a worship service, and I have never been the same.

We may not be able to prove the ministry of Jesus. But that is actually a good thing according to Jesus who said, “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet believe.”

You know, I’d hope to one day be an epithet, a byword, but of a different sort. I’d like demons to use my name like a cussword. I’d like to be an Enoch, or an Elijah, a Lazarus or a John the Baptist, A Timothy or a Paul, one known for great faith and trust in God. Not for my glory, but for His.

Jesus has risen. The proof? Billions of changed lives throughout history. People whom Christ has irrevocably changed… including Thomas.

One of the things that the Bible does not do for us is tidy up all the loose ends. However, sources close to the times of Jesus and the Disciples that tell us what happened to most of the disciples. All but two were martyred, including Thomas who after preaching the Gospel in Parthia and India angered the priests of the local sun gods and was ran through with a spear around 70 AD.

So, I guess that encounter really made an impression. Perhaps we should find another name for “Doubting” Thomas.

How about you? Do you doubt? The power of God to raise His Son from the dead, to work in your life in some way? Have you trusted the Risen Christ?

A Little Cash for Easter :)

Testing

1,2,3...

What Would it Be Like

Many moons ago during a student retreat at Glorietta New Mexico a drama team was performing a skit featuring a trapezist and his apprentice. The apprentice; in character, a young girl was trying to comprehend how she was supposed to let go of one rung and await the arrival of the other rung. "So, it will just come?" "Yes," came the reply, to which she shuddered...

What would it be like for the disciples, waiting. Watching the door. John tells is that they were afraid that the Jewish leaders would be breaking it down any moment looking for Jesus-sympathizers. And lying there in the tomb were all their expectations, everything they thought they understood about how God worked. More than once, Jesus had told them this was coming, and there they were, and it had happened. And they wondered. Would the other rung really come?

A (Not-so-)Good Friday Meditation

It has been aptly stated that “Fear is the thief of dreams”.

I would suggest that of all the forces that caused Jesus to be ground up in the gears of history that fear may have been the greatest part of it all.

Now, the most astute among us have already caught me, “It was not the forces of the age, not even of nature that brought Jesus to the Cross, it was God’s divine design from the foundation of the world” or the sentimental might say, “Nails didn’t hold Jesus to the Cross, love did…”

I feel it in my bones, fear nailed Christ to that Cross. Fear of the unknown caused Adam and Eve to crumble. Fear caused the backsliding of the children in the Exodus. Fear brought Israel into alliance with lesser kingdoms. Fear caused the “spiritual” to kill the prophets. Fear plugged the ears of the Pharisees, Scribes, and Sadducees. Fear moved the people to cry out, “CRUCIFY HIM!” Fear moved Pilate to do nothing while a good man was sentenced to death. Fear drove the disciples away.

The Bible exhorts us time and again to not be afraid. Men better than I have reported that the most common commandment in the Bible is “be not afraid”. Perhaps we should take that to heart this Friday.