Giving Credit Where Credit is DueWritten by Joyce C. Lock
Have you ever attended a church service and thought, "Yuck! This church is dead," then attended elsewhere and thought, "Wow! God is there," as you felt personally touched by His presence? You may have noticed one bragging about how their wonderful schemes got them through difficult situations, and thought them a jerk. Though, you might have been reminded of God's love when someone spoke, with a quiver in their voice, of how God helped them to make it through. Maybe someone made a list of everything they've ever done for you, as if you owed them. But, when someone said, "You can thank me by loving others in need," it became a pleasure to both give and receive. Perhaps, you've experienced someone pointing at your imperfections in anger or rattling of 25 Bible verses so loud you didn't hear a word they said. Yet, when someone came off their pedestal to meet you where you were (and taught you how to overcome your weakness, fear, and insecurity), you were set free.
| | How the Christian Right is Blowing It.Written by Paul Griffitts
I am not a particularly pious person and I certainly don’t go for religious ceremony of things like Inaugurations and Graduations. It has always been my belief that we should do our alms in a closet. Whatever you give, keep that info to yourself, is pretty much my policy. In past few years Christians have taken a lot of heat from liberals and moderates as a result of Bush administration and mostly because of John Ashcroft and what has been labeled as “The Christian Right”. That being said and believe me citations are overwhelming and need not to be mentioned here for sake of space, I have come wonder if old saying, “What you do speaks louder than what you say”, should be in play here. The newest attack on Christian Right is something about how they have accused SpongeBob Squarepants and his buddy Patrick of being homosexual partners and are pushing gay agenda down throats of children. Remember Teletubbies sounds pretty similar. Here is an example of liberal critics taken from a letter I received in my email, “I see that once again, "religious right wing" has found a monster in animated clothing, to wit, "SpongeBob." This has happened before. I remember comical furor over "Teletubbies" and aspersions that one of them was "gay." Now target for this same claim is "SpongeBob Squarepants." I don't know their supposed grounds for their claims, but to say that I find this ludicrous is an understatement. This has become an obsession with this part of populace, and obsessions are a fixation on something that one deeply wants but cannot have. I would suggest to "religious right" that they look within themselves for their monsters and grapple with their own secret desires, rather than attacking animated figures that do nothing more than amuse children.” Now let’s put this into perspective. Most of my readers have opinion that homosexual behavior is wrong because God’s Word says it is wrong. No debate on that one at least not from me. If you are one who sees nothing wrong with homosexual behavior, than you would say that my statement is homophobic or in current debate of SpongeBob you would call me Christian Right Wing so I pose question “Should Christian Right Wing shut up and teach Bible?”
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