Month: April 2010

66 comments

A second reason, however, was that I am indebted to the British welfare state; the very one that Mr Cameron would like to replace with charity handouts. When my life hit rock bottom, that safety net, threadbare though it had become under John Major’s Government, was there to break the fall. I cannot help feeling, therefore, that it would have been contemptible to scarper for the West Indies at the first sniff of a seven-figure royalty cheque. This, if you like, is my notion of patriotism. On the available evidence, I suspect that it is Lord Ashcroft’s idea of being a mug.

“Ah hate ICELAND!!!”  – More http://www.metafilter.com/91057/Iceland-takes-its-revenge

“Downloading’s the same as what I used to do – I used to tape the charts of the songs I liked [off the radio]. I don’t mind it,” Gallagher said about his past as a copyright infringer.

“I hate all these big, silly rock stars who moan – at least they’re fuckin’ downloading your music, you cunt, and paying attention, know what I mean? You should fuckin’ appreciate that – what are you moaning about? You’ve got fuckin’ five big houses, so shut up,” he added.

I know what you’re thinking, the steel worker from that Mill in Springfield, right? Me too. They Work Hard, they Play HARD.

It only gets creepier

Nothing says “we’re not racist” like depicting Pres. Obama as a 70s-era pimp and Nancy Pelosi as his Number one Lady

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No, I think the pastor might be more than a bit off in his reading.

Psalm 1 is, first off, from the Old Testament, the Torah to the Jewish people. It’s a fairly core bit of the Torah as well, as it serves, to many scholars, as a sort of guidepost for how one should comport one’s life in relation to God. Study and prayer, day and night, a devotion to the righteous path. All this in the knowledge that God knows the righteous from the wicked, and in some respect the righteous does as well. Judaism embraces this concept of avoiding and shunning the wicked, the unclean. Even extending to dietary laws like keeping kosher.

In the Christian faith the idea of avoiding the wicked is actually something Jesus speaks almost directly against. He speaks highly of the Samaritan (a group who were despised at the time by many Jews for their role in the Babylonian captivity) his relationships with people of ill-repute (prostitutes, tax collectors). Jesus message was far less one of keeping good company and more one of reaching out to those who would be rejected by religion of the day.

Now that’s classical Christianity. What you experienced is more of the “Great Revival” modern Protestant branch. The “by faith alone” and “Christ as personal savior” breed of Christianity. This is where you find your literal readings of the Bible, you’re lack of theological muscle and some very off interpretations of scripture.

So no, I’d say that, if anything, your friend should be inviting you in, not casting you out.

My Bona Fides? I’m a former Catholic seminarian and current Unitarian Universalist with an MA in Islamic history who grew up as a Shabbos Goy in my largely Jewish neighborhood. So yeah, I get around.

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– Some Dude