So, you know when people talk about "kids these days" texting all the time. It is really true.
Ever since I started my job at New Church, I've been trying to figure out the best way to let the youth (and leaders) know about upcoming events, or to get feedback about things or whatever. I tried the "group" thing on facebook (there was already a group set up, so I didn't even have to get it going). And I tried the email thing. But not every kid, evidently, checks their email. What? This does not compute . . .
Then one Sunday I was discussing with some parents how I would communicate something with their daughter and her mother said, "Just get her cell phone number and text her. She'll get right back to you."
She wasn't kidding.
I now have most of the cell numbers of the kids who at least usually come to youth group. This afternoon I found out that the church would like us to help out with some "Lenten suppers" they offer on Wednesday nights during Lent, apparently. I sent everybody an email about it. Then I decided to text them and see what happened. So far (and school isn't even out yet as far as I know), I have received 14 text messages in response to mine. There aren't even 14 kids in the group. I think over the course of the last six months, I've only received a total of 3 emails in response to about 10 of those I've sent.
I'm just happy to have been clued into this phenomenon. But I might have to up my texting capabilities on my cell phone plan . . .
Showing posts with label pop culture. Show all posts
Showing posts with label pop culture. Show all posts
Wednesday, February 04, 2009
Friday, November 14, 2008
Good for Goodness' Sake
Earlier this week, a friend of mine, who more or less espouses this view, alerted me to this ad campaign.The thought of it does weird things to my stomach. It kind of awakens my inner reactionary and makes me want to stamp up and down on a poster while wearing stilettos and rant or something. This would probably not go very well, partly because I never wear heels and a first attempt at stilettos while trying to destroy something would likely end up destroying me more quickly than the poster. Also I don't think reactionary reactions are usually very effective.
Having said that, I've got to say I agree with Wildmon on this one. I just don't see where the basis of goodness comes from without a God. We have sort of discussed this here before. Doing unto others as you would have them do unto you, while coming from the mouth of Jesus, might work as a basic manifesto for all people with or without a belief in God. But I've discovered that, just because I love to be given books for my birthday, not everybody does, so if I literally did unto others as I would have them do unto me, some people might not consider I had given them a good birthday present. On a larger scale, somebody might say that assisted suicide is good because it prevents suffering, and I might say it's bad because it short-circuits personal development and denies God's sovereignty over that life.
Although I think there are really solid reasons for believing in the Christian God, for the sake of argument let's say I could be wrong. Or the assisted-suicide-advocate could be wrong. Or somebody that believes in a totally different kind of God could be wrong. But we can't all be right about what good is. And without a God, who decides? I suspect even atheists have different ideas about what constitutes "good" in any given scenario. So do Christians, if it comes to that. But atheists, as far as I can tell, don't have any external basis for deciding what goodness is; it's entirely arbitrary. Christians may not always get our goodness right, but at least we have a basis for it. I think, frankly, that an atheist's basis is the same one--it's just not acknowledged.
On the other hand, I do think there's a reason to "be good for goodness' sake," particularly for Christians. We have a God who loves, who didn't want robots, who doesn't add up points for us to get into His good graces. He wants to relate to us, and He wants our goodness to come out of relating to His goodness--He is goodness. I'd rather be good for His sake than because Santa Claus was coming to town . . .
Friday, November 30, 2007
Name-Dropping
I think name-dropping is irritating. Unless, of course, I'm doing it. That doesn't irritate me at all. (Actually, maybe it does a little, come to think of it. Whatever. I'm still going to.)
On Tuesday I went with Rebecca to hear Rob Bell speak. I . . . don't actually know Rob Bell. But he was two years ahead of me at Wheaton, and he used to be in a college band called __ton bundle. College-Roommate-Jenne and I had a crush on everybody in the band. I was a little belated with mine--those guys kind of scared me freshman year, with their peroxide-blonde hair and their overalls. Sophomore year I got me a couple of artsy skateboarder friends and then I realised how cool they were.
At the end of that year, they did a concert over the road from my dorm. Jenne and I went and swooned. That might, however, just have been 'cause they were dancing on the stage. Dancing was not allowed at Wheaton at the time. I would just like to say that "Velvet Elvis" was the name of a song before it was the name of a book. I could probably sing it to you without having to refresh my memory. (I should also probably say, though, that I have yet to read the book.) Jenne and I both wanted a copy of their album "Taking My Donkey to Town," but we hated spending money on ourselves, so we each bought one and gave it to each other, which somehow seemed more justifiable.
The next year I wrote Rob and asked him how I could get a hold of more of their albums. He actually sent me a postcard back, saying he didn't know. I can still visualise his handwriting, but I didn't save the postcard, because I was a little freaked out he had written me at all. Apparently I have some trouble hanging onto the very evidence that would prove my right to drop names . . .
I didn't find out Rob was famous in Christian circles until my brief stint at seminary, when I was researching something and discovered an article of his in Leadership magazine. I thought it was pretty cool--not so much that I used to serve a now-famous person lasagna at the dining hall, but that the rather edgy college kid had become a rather edgy pastor.
I still think it's cool, but the talk I went to on Tuesday seemed a little like it was missing something. The edge, maybe. I felt as if everything he had said was true, but not the whole truth. I thought the missing bits were probably important--to the extent, maybe, that the Good News he was presenting was less Good because it seemed to take little account of our own sin. I think that grace would be less gracious if the only thing we had got wrong was our perception of God. Also, there were all these people in the audience going on and on about Rob Bell and how great he is, and all that. I'm no longer a college sophomore with a crush on him, and cult-of-personality makes me skittish. Or just kind of grumpy. Rebel that I think I am.
Cult-of-personality is something that can happen with Rob Bell, I guess. I mean, as far as I can tell, he's always been that kind of person. He's still an entertainer. On the other hand, I also think he's genuine. He did have some good things to say. He did have grace to offer, even though, as I say, I think it was missing something. I get the feeling that he is truly a pastor, in the sense of compassion and his desire for people to relate to God. I think he loves Him. I think he loves the Bible, too. I think he loves teaching. So yeah. I guess mostly I still think it's pretty cool that Rob Bell is getting up on stage and people are listening.
On Tuesday I went with Rebecca to hear Rob Bell speak. I . . . don't actually know Rob Bell. But he was two years ahead of me at Wheaton, and he used to be in a college band called __ton bundle. College-Roommate-Jenne and I had a crush on everybody in the band. I was a little belated with mine--those guys kind of scared me freshman year, with their peroxide-blonde hair and their overalls. Sophomore year I got me a couple of artsy skateboarder friends and then I realised how cool they were.
At the end of that year, they did a concert over the road from my dorm. Jenne and I went and swooned. That might, however, just have been 'cause they were dancing on the stage. Dancing was not allowed at Wheaton at the time. I would just like to say that "Velvet Elvis" was the name of a song before it was the name of a book. I could probably sing it to you without having to refresh my memory. (I should also probably say, though, that I have yet to read the book.) Jenne and I both wanted a copy of their album "Taking My Donkey to Town," but we hated spending money on ourselves, so we each bought one and gave it to each other, which somehow seemed more justifiable.
The next year I wrote Rob and asked him how I could get a hold of more of their albums. He actually sent me a postcard back, saying he didn't know. I can still visualise his handwriting, but I didn't save the postcard, because I was a little freaked out he had written me at all. Apparently I have some trouble hanging onto the very evidence that would prove my right to drop names . . .
I didn't find out Rob was famous in Christian circles until my brief stint at seminary, when I was researching something and discovered an article of his in Leadership magazine. I thought it was pretty cool--not so much that I used to serve a now-famous person lasagna at the dining hall, but that the rather edgy college kid had become a rather edgy pastor.
I still think it's cool, but the talk I went to on Tuesday seemed a little like it was missing something. The edge, maybe. I felt as if everything he had said was true, but not the whole truth. I thought the missing bits were probably important--to the extent, maybe, that the Good News he was presenting was less Good because it seemed to take little account of our own sin. I think that grace would be less gracious if the only thing we had got wrong was our perception of God. Also, there were all these people in the audience going on and on about Rob Bell and how great he is, and all that. I'm no longer a college sophomore with a crush on him, and cult-of-personality makes me skittish. Or just kind of grumpy. Rebel that I think I am.
Cult-of-personality is something that can happen with Rob Bell, I guess. I mean, as far as I can tell, he's always been that kind of person. He's still an entertainer. On the other hand, I also think he's genuine. He did have some good things to say. He did have grace to offer, even though, as I say, I think it was missing something. I get the feeling that he is truly a pastor, in the sense of compassion and his desire for people to relate to God. I think he loves Him. I think he loves the Bible, too. I think he loves teaching. So yeah. I guess mostly I still think it's pretty cool that Rob Bell is getting up on stage and people are listening.
Monday, November 19, 2007
Classy
Every so often I go through a phase where I feel like being cultured. These never last very long. But when such humours strike, they make me do wild and crazy things like go to art museums or listen to National Public Radio. (Apparently they also make me say, "National Public Radio," instead of just "NPR." But that might have had something to do with sentence cadence, too.)
I am currently in one of these phases, and what it's making me do this time is listen to classical music stations and practice my flute. (My mother is now weeping with joy. Aren't you, Mom?) It started about two weeks ago when it hit me for the millionth time how I used to be able to play fairly complex classical pieces on my flute and now I can scarcely read music. This time I decided I was fed up with the idea. So I've pulled out some more or less simple things that I used to play and am working my way up. (We'll see how long this lasts. It helps that Former-Roommate-Sarah is now giving me voice lessons, too, which means that I have to practice something anyway.)
At about the time I made this decision in self-discipline, I was listening to one of the insipid pop-stations-which-claim-to-be-alternative that I usually listen to because they don't actually require listening, and I realised that James Blunt was singing, but that I had spent the whole first half of the song thinking it was a woman. And then I switched the station to another of the same ilk . . . and he was still singing. It was really dreadful.
When I first started practicing my flute again (instead of dragging it out every couple of weeks for church and irresponsibly winging it), I thought, "The problem with this whole thing is that I don't actually like the flute." It's not really very cool, you know. Also, when my brother was in junior high and learning the trombone, if he got mad at someone in the family, he could go in his room and let out a long and satisfying blat on it. Whereas, if I attempt something similar with the flute, all I get is "shrill," and there is nothing satisfying about shrill at all.
I was thinking this, somewhat discontentedly, when the classical station I had just started listening to played something by Faure. Gabriel Faure single-handedly makes flute cool, I decided. I think he might have been the only person who really got it. Well, and maybe Poulenc. Anyway. I'm thankful for Gabriel Faure. I'm also grateful that this radio station seems to like him, too.
Saturday, September 29, 2007
Surprise and Delight
If I told you how I am now the owner of the new Annie Lennox CD before its release date, I might have to kill you, but all the same, I feel somewhat smug about this and just wanted you to know that I am.
Starbucks likes to encourage its employees to "surprise and delight" the customers, and I'm afraid that's a little hard to do when you're working with a skeleton crew, all of whom have coughs and fevers, as I was yesterday. And I also feel that "surprising and delighting" might be overstating things a little here, but I still have to say that I usually am most enthusiastic about things I wasn't expecting or hadn't heard of before. This happened when I saw the Matrix (the FIRST one. I only mean the FIRST one!) and Pirates of the Caribbean (again, let me emphasise that I am referring to the FIRST movie in these trilogies). I felt this way about Blue Like Jazz. It happened with the latest OtR release. And, when I unexpectedly received Songs of Mass Destruction before the release date, I was, at least on some level, surprised and delighted.
The problem with this is that I enthuse about these things for a while and then I get embarrassed and think everyone will wonder what kind of pathetic sense of style and taste I have--and then after that the things become blockbuster hits or whatever and it's disappointing because there's nothing edgy about my liking them.
But anyway, I'm just going to put out there, before the release date, that I'm really enthusiastic about the new Annie Lennox CD. It's not like I've been an Annie Lennox fan before this, although based on the songs of hers I've heard before now, I had a hunch I might could be. ("Might could," incidentally, is a verb form I picked up from College-Roommmate-Jenne, who's originally from Alabama.) But it's nice to hear music sung by people who can actually sing. And I just like Gospel- and soul-influenced music. Even if the person singing it is kind of missing something when it comes to the Gospel. Which I think it might be accurate to say Annie Lennox is (though I'm not sure I really "get" the Gospel, either, exactly, when I think about it).
Actually, the CD is a real downer, but it's a heck of a fun downer to listen to. Wikipedia says, "The album addresses global warming, Iraq, Aids, religious conflict, global poverty and inequality." I'm afraid I'm not perceptive enough to get all that, although I do get some of it. I think mostly she just sounds really lonely and sad and sometimes angry about it, and she would like the world to be fixed.
As would I. I find the whole thing a little conflicting, because as I listen to her words I want to say, "I get what you're saying, but if you just knew Jesus . . . " And I really mean it, and I really believe it, but the fact is that I have raged with the same sentiment and almost the same words, sometimes, against that very Jesus. And I can't say that I usually feel Jesus any more than Mother Theresa did, probably. (I'm just less brave about it.) So I can't truly say why, exactly, I feel that it would make a difference to Annie Lennox in this life for her to, say, "put her faith in Him." But there is something bedrock and comforting and "nevertheless" about trusting Him anyway, or trying to. And there's something about her lyrics that remind me of Him, almost as if she were wishing He were true, but not quite willing to believe it.
Anyway. I found myself praying for her on the way home from dinner with the Molly Llama last night. And I really do like the CD.
Starbucks likes to encourage its employees to "surprise and delight" the customers, and I'm afraid that's a little hard to do when you're working with a skeleton crew, all of whom have coughs and fevers, as I was yesterday. And I also feel that "surprising and delighting" might be overstating things a little here, but I still have to say that I usually am most enthusiastic about things I wasn't expecting or hadn't heard of before. This happened when I saw the Matrix (the FIRST one. I only mean the FIRST one!) and Pirates of the Caribbean (again, let me emphasise that I am referring to the FIRST movie in these trilogies). I felt this way about Blue Like Jazz. It happened with the latest OtR release. And, when I unexpectedly received Songs of Mass Destruction before the release date, I was, at least on some level, surprised and delighted.
The problem with this is that I enthuse about these things for a while and then I get embarrassed and think everyone will wonder what kind of pathetic sense of style and taste I have--and then after that the things become blockbuster hits or whatever and it's disappointing because there's nothing edgy about my liking them.
But anyway, I'm just going to put out there, before the release date, that I'm really enthusiastic about the new Annie Lennox CD. It's not like I've been an Annie Lennox fan before this, although based on the songs of hers I've heard before now, I had a hunch I might could be. ("Might could," incidentally, is a verb form I picked up from College-Roommmate-Jenne, who's originally from Alabama.) But it's nice to hear music sung by people who can actually sing. And I just like Gospel- and soul-influenced music. Even if the person singing it is kind of missing something when it comes to the Gospel. Which I think it might be accurate to say Annie Lennox is (though I'm not sure I really "get" the Gospel, either, exactly, when I think about it).
Actually, the CD is a real downer, but it's a heck of a fun downer to listen to. Wikipedia says, "The album addresses global warming, Iraq, Aids, religious conflict, global poverty and inequality." I'm afraid I'm not perceptive enough to get all that, although I do get some of it. I think mostly she just sounds really lonely and sad and sometimes angry about it, and she would like the world to be fixed.
As would I. I find the whole thing a little conflicting, because as I listen to her words I want to say, "I get what you're saying, but if you just knew Jesus . . . " And I really mean it, and I really believe it, but the fact is that I have raged with the same sentiment and almost the same words, sometimes, against that very Jesus. And I can't say that I usually feel Jesus any more than Mother Theresa did, probably. (I'm just less brave about it.) So I can't truly say why, exactly, I feel that it would make a difference to Annie Lennox in this life for her to, say, "put her faith in Him." But there is something bedrock and comforting and "nevertheless" about trusting Him anyway, or trying to. And there's something about her lyrics that remind me of Him, almost as if she were wishing He were true, but not quite willing to believe it.
Anyway. I found myself praying for her on the way home from dinner with the Molly Llama last night. And I really do like the CD.
Thursday, September 20, 2007
Arrgghh!
I missed Talk-Like-a-Pirate Day! I put me in mind of it out on the docks, but as soon as I put into safe harbour to tell of it, I clean forgot. (Well, I would, wouldn't I?)
Belatedly, I discovered this about my pirate self (gender issues notwithstanding):
Now you take the quiz. Or walk the plank.
Belatedly, I discovered this about my pirate self (gender issues notwithstanding):
| You scored as Sinbad. You are gifted with gab and can talk your way out of just about any situation. Very charming, but sometimes the charm gets you into trouble. The gods look on you fondly and sometimes throw obstacles at you just to see how creative your solution is.
What kind of Pirate are you? created with QuizFarm.com |
Now you take the quiz. Or walk the plank.
Tuesday, July 31, 2007
Switching Gears
It's going to be a little tricky to take seriously anything I say with that Simpsons-Jenn up in the sidebar, isn't it? So I'm changing it already. Well, I mean, as soon as Blogger lets me. What if I'm stuck with a Simpsons avatar in my blog for the rest of my life? Ack!
Mom says she's "definitely not an improvement," and I say, "Did we think it would be?" Dave says, "You look better than that," and I say, "I should hope so!" I mean, I really do hope so. It would be tremendously demoralising to find out that my Simpson alter-ego was more attractive than I am. But maybe some of you think differently.
Anyway, I have other stuff to say, so Simpsons-Jenn was a (hopefully) one-day wonder. But I'm dying to know whether any of you succumbed to the desire to find out what you'd look like if you lived in TV-Springfield . . .
Mom says she's "definitely not an improvement," and I say, "Did we think it would be?" Dave says, "You look better than that," and I say, "I should hope so!" I mean, I really do hope so. It would be tremendously demoralising to find out that my Simpson alter-ego was more attractive than I am. But maybe some of you think differently.
Anyway, I have other stuff to say, so Simpsons-Jenn was a (hopefully) one-day wonder. But I'm dying to know whether any of you succumbed to the desire to find out what you'd look like if you lived in TV-Springfield . . .
Monday, July 30, 2007
Simpson Mania
Everybody I know who blogs is clearly more intellectual than I am, because they're all talking about Harry Potter. I have only ever read the first book and seen the second movie. But I have seen the Simpsons. A lot.
I'm pretty sure I won't spend upwards of $11 to watch the antics of mustard-yellow people for over an hour. But you know, your brother tells you about a website where you can find out what you'd look like if you were a Simpson character, and how can you resist?
You can't. You know you can't. Here's the link, just to prove it.
I'm pretty sure I won't spend upwards of $11 to watch the antics of mustard-yellow people for over an hour. But you know, your brother tells you about a website where you can find out what you'd look like if you were a Simpson character, and how can you resist?
You can't. You know you can't. Here's the link, just to prove it.
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