Multicultural Worship

It’s good to hear someone else in support of what I’ve been recommending for a while now. That is, being flexible with worship styles, having a variety, not being afraid to do something drastically different from one week to the next. I haven’t been a big fan of the attitude that “contemporary” churches have taken, being basically let’s serve the majority. I admit here that I’m not into “contemporary” churches’ attitude of let’s just serve the majority. I admit here that I don’t like “contemporary praise” music. However the church usually says that I’m supposed to just like it because of the lyrics, and that I can worship God through it even if I don’t like it. I think that it’s sad that probably by many criticizing this music is Continue reading →

Multiracial Church Quotes

Here are links to the articles along with excerpts that I thought were good:

http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2000/011/2.36.html
“The white evangelicals we interviewed do not want a race problem.”

http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2000/011/1.34.html
“Most white evangelicals deny the existence of any ongoing racial problem in the U.S., and many blame the media and African Americans who refuse to forget the past for any lingering racial conflict.”

http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2005/004/22.33.html
“The nation’s religious congregations have long been highly racially segregated. If we define a racially mixed congregation as one in which no one racial group is 80 percent or more of the congregation, just 7.5 percent of the Continue reading →

Multiracial Church

Here recently Christianity Today did a number of articles on striving for racial integration in the community of Christ followers. I know I’m posting a lot here to read, but I feel this issue is a very important one. I would identify one thing as one of if not the biggest problem in christianity as it stands today, that is division. Race is one of the biggest dividing lines, along with theology and different cultures in general.

I used to have the typical white conservative American christian view that racism isn’t really a big problem anymore, outside of a few occasional incidents here and there. After all, the type of blatant public segregation, such as having different drinking fountains for different races, was overcome years Continue reading →

Loss of Freedom

“We have to abridge individual rights, change the societal conditions, and act in ways that heretofore were not in accordance with our values and traditions, like giving a police officer or security official the right to search you without a judicial finding of probable cause.” U.S. Army Lt. Gen. (Retired) Patrick M. Hughes — the top intelligence official of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). (Source: Congressional Quarterly, quoted in Reason magazine:
http://www.cq.com/corp/show.do?page=crawford/20041027_homeland

“The means of defense against foreign danger historically have become the instruments of tyranny at home.” — James Madison, fourth President of the U.S., co-author of the Federalist Papers, sometimes called “The Continue reading →

Government Spending

Just so you know what the government is planning on doing with your money…

To hear liberals and conservatives alike, President Bush’s newly announced fiscal 2006 federal budget is nothing less than a meat-axe poised to slash the federal budget to the very bone. However, the numbers tell a somewhat different story.

* Tiny cuts: Much ink has been spilled over Bush’s pledge to cut or terminate 150 federal programs. Yet even if Congress passed each and every one of those 150 cuts, they would reduce 2006 spending by… less than 1%.

* Spending will still rise: The budget raises overall spending by 3.6% in 2006, even if it is passed without change. And that follows Bush’s incredible 33% increase in spending during the past four years. Continue reading →

Christian Band Sues Rossford Schools

Christian band sues Rossford schools
This to me is another example of how christians seem to be off track. While I think it’s ironic, and perhaps deserving that the school’s is getting sued because they were afraid of getting sued, but at the same time I don’t really know if this should be the christian response. After all, Jesus didn’t seem to concerned with making a show of power in the political realm. However it seems the basic christian idea now days is that we have to fight for our rights and make everyone know we’re a political force. I realize I may not be explaining this well, but something in this story just doesn’t sit right with me.

I guess maybe it’s like this: by simply fighting back by suing the school, the band is Continue reading →

High School Students Don’t Believe in Freedom of Press?

According to a just-released major survey of American high school students:

* Only a bare majority, 51 percent, say the press should be able to publish freely.

* 36 percent of U.S. high school students believe newspapers should get “government approval” of stories before publishing;

* 17 percent disagree with even this modest statement: “People should be allowed to express unpopular opinions.”

These and more shocking results are from a just-released survey of 112,003 high school students across America. The survey was commissioned by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation and conducted last spring by the University of Connecticut.

Hodding Carter, president of the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, which sponsored Continue reading →

British Crime Wave Coming to United States

Look out, America! Two British men are planning to criss-cross the entire United States and engage in a massive, weeks-long crime wave.

They plan to break literally dozens of U.S. laws. And the brazen pair is even bragging openly about their plans to the media.

Of course, there’s more to the story. The laws they intend to break are of the “so stupid you can’t believe it” variety. And the U.S. has zillions of these — local, state, and federal — just begging to be broken.

“There are thousands of stupid laws in the United States, but we are limiting ourselves to breaking about 45 of them,” Richard Smith told the UK Guardian newspaper.

Among the laws that Smith and his partner-in-crime Luke Bateman are planning to Continue reading →

FairTax

Some info on a proposed tax reform known as FairTax. Apparently, it is considered by many to be the best option, and has economic benefits. FairTax will not only help the savings rate which has tremendous implications for the US economy but a few of the benefits of the FairTax also include:

  • The FairTax ends federal paycheck deductions of all kinds; the workingman or woman gets a full paycheck. The plan is a total replacement for all federal income and Social Security taxes: Personal, gift, estate, capital gains, alternative minimum, earned income tax credit, Social Security, Medicare, self-employment, and corporate taxes.
  • The FairTax plan is revenue neutral; it neither raises nor lowers taxes. The rate is set to raise the same Continue reading →