"Do you not know that in a race all the runners run, but only one gets the prize? Run in such a way as to get the prize. Everyone who competes in the games goes into strict training. They do it to get a crown that will not last; but we do it to get a crown that will last forever. Therefore I do not run like a man running aimlessly; I do not fight like a man beating the air. No, I discipline my body and keep it under control so that after I have preached to others, I myself will not be disqualified for the prize."

...it never ceases to amaze me that all the richness of our mental life - all our feeling, our emotions, our thoughts, our ambition, our love life, our religious sentiments and even what each of us regards as his own intimate private self - is simply the activity of the[..] little specks of jelly in your head, in your brain. There is nothing else.

I remember when I was a girl
Our house caught on fire
And I'll never forget the look on my father's face
As he gathered me in his arms
And raced to the burning building out on the pavement
And I stood there shivering
And watched the whole world go up in flames
And when it was all over
I said to myself
"Is that all there is to a fire?"
Is that all there is?

Is that all there is?
If that's all there is, my friends, then let's keep dancing
Let's break out the booze and have a ball
If that's all there is

And when I was twelve years old
My daddy took me to the circus
The greatest show on earth
And there were clowns
And elephants
Dancing bears,
And a beautiful lady in pink tights flew high above our heads

And as I sat there watching
I had the feeling that something was missing
I don't know what
But when it was all over
I said to myself
"Is that all there is to the circus?"

Is that all there is?
If that's all there is, my friends, then let's keep dancing
Let's break out the booze and have a ball
If that's all there is

And then I fell in love
With the most wonderful boy in the world
We'd take long walks down by the river
Or just sit for hours gazing into each other's eyes
We were so very much in love

And then one day
He went away
And I thought I'd die
But I didn't
And when I didn't
I said to myself
"Is that all there is to love?"

Is that all there is?
If that's all there is, my friends, then let's keep dancing
Let's break out the booze and have a ball

I know what you must be saying to yourselves
If that's the way she feels about it
Then why doesn't she just end it all
Oh no. not me. I'm not ready for the final disappointment
'Cause I know just as well as i'm standing here talking to you
That when that final moment comes
And I'm breathing my last breath
I know what I'll be saying to myself
"Is that all there is?"

Is that all there is?
If that's all there is, my friends, then let's keep dancing
Let's break out the booze and have a ball
If that's all there is

This life is much too much trouble, far too strange, to arrive at the end of it and then be asked what you make of it and have to answer, "scientific humanism." That won’t do. A poor show. Life is a mystery, love a delight. Therefore, I take it as axiomatic that one should settle for nothing less than the infinite mystery and the infinite delight; i.e. God. In fact, I demand it. I refuse to settle for anything less. I don’t see why anyone should settle for less than Jacob, who actually grabbed ahold of God and wouldn’t let go until God identified himself and blessed him.


Beware any science or philosophy, any art or religion, that denies the mystery of being human. All our works of discovery and creativity will avail little unless they wrestle with the fundamental question: What does it mean to be a human being who lives and suffers and dies?

Real historical writers probe factual uncertainties, but they do not invent convenient facts and they do not ignore inconvenient facts. People are entitled to their own opinions, but not to their own facts.
William Kelleher Storey, Writing History

Shout shout don't leave a doubt
Smash up the place or throw things about
You won't change a thing by doing that
Rant rave pull out your hair
Turn on the tears, I still won't care
You don't move me an inch when you do that.

Atheism, then, can be understood as a sort of psychological crutch for those who are unable to face up to the reality of God's sovereign rule of the creation. Not being able to deal with the implications of such rule, the atheist fabricates a universe more amenable to his tastes. All the while, he convinces himself that he is being rational, objective, just following the evidence, etc., making his wish projection an elaborate self-deception. The atheist is sincere in his unbelief, but he is wish projecting, just the same.

The question is, can such a person be reasoned with? Owen seems to imply that rational proofs of God are ineffective in dealing with atheists in general and I would have to say that much of my own experience corroborates this.

Aggressive 15 year olds who attended religious services, felt attached to their schools or were exposed to good family management were much less likely to have engaged in violent behavior by the time they turned 18, according to a new multi-ethnic study of urban youth by University of Washington researchers.

The study also showed that the likelihood of violence at 18 among aggressive youth was reduced when they had been exposed to several of what are called protective factors, even when they also were exposed to risk factors, according to lead author Todd Herrenkohl, University of Washington assistant professor of social work.

The research, conducted by the UW's Social Development Research Group, assessed the impact of what social scientists describe as protective and risk factors. Protective factors, such as feeling attached to your community and family and high academic achievement, can foster pro-social and healthy behaviors, said Herrenkohl. Risk factors, such as living in a run-down and crime-ridden neighborhood or associating with antisocial peers, can encourage antisocial or unhealthy behaviors.

"What’s it like in the big house, Micky?

Ahh, it’s not so bad. You get to lift weights, watch TV, write up appeals, take long showers, lift weight. You get used to it."

" I know you are, but what am I?"
Pee-wee's Big Adventure 1985

For What it's Worth

There's something happening here
What it is ain't exactly clear...
I think it's time we stop, children, what's that sound
Everybody look what's going down...
Stephen Stills

Judging by most of what you read, Mel Gibson's The Passion of the Christ is the most dangerous, disgusting movie of all time. Even if you haven't seen it, you know that it's a gore-filled splatterfest with anti-Semitic overtones, that Mel Gibson's father is a flat-out Holocaust-denier, and that Mel himself is a sinister marketing genius.

The movie has been condemned by most reviewers... Rick Groen said it "comes perilously close to the pornography of violence." Frank Rich, The New York Times cultural writer, has been flaying Mr. Gibson's movie for weeks. "A joy ride for sadomasochists" was among his kinder remarks. The brilliant Christopher Hitchens called it both homoerotic (in a Nazified kind of way) and sadomasochistic. The Toronto Star's Linda McQuaig called it a "torture flick" that will "fan the flames" of anti-Semitism. Commentators of every faith have deplored it as a religious travesty.

So why is The Passion doing such boffo box office?

Because for millions of people across North America, The Passion is a deeply meaningful devotional experience.

"I was profoundly moved," says Ken Godon , who is pastor of Snowdon Baptist Church in Montreal. "It was a very, very emotional experience for me. I saw it twice, and I wept both times. I'm a devout follower of Jesus, and I love him."

The real rift over The Passion is not between the Christians and the Jews. It's between certain devout Christians and all the rest of us, especially those of little or no faith. Virtually everyone who mongers opinions in the mainstream media, including me, belongs to the latter category.

Rev. Godon is a fine and thoughtful man who counts several rabbis among his friends. His flourishing urban congregation includes Iranians, Filipinos, Africans, West Indians, Chinese and Koreans. Some are converts to Christianity. They feel as he does about the movie. "In the Hebrew scriptures (the Old Testament), there is a chapter which describes what will happen in the future. The Messiah, or the suffering servant, will be marred beyond recognition," he told me. In other words, the gore is precisely the point. "Mel doesn't want people to see a sanitized version of how horrific this was."

In this rendering of Christianity, the suffering is at the very heart of the faith. God allowed His Son to be crushed in our stead. What was done to Jesus is a metaphor for sin. "This is what sin does," says Rev. Godon. "It destroys, it disfigures, it mars. So when you put it all together it becomes a very, very deep reflection. It's a meditation on Jesus and also on my own personal soul."

In the movie, both Jews and Romans howl for Jesus's blood. But Rev. Godon says no Baptist would take a message of anti-Semitism from this. The real message is that we all bear responsibility for Christ's death, and we are all with sin.

In fact, there's no sign that the movie has provoked any upwelling of anti-Semitism. (Some argue that it might be used as a propaganda tool in the Muslim world, but that's another story.) And ironically, the evangelical community is among the staunchest supporters of Jews and Israel. "I have a deep respect for Jewish people," says Rev. Gordon. "I look up to them. I honour them. My faith is connected to their traditions and their scriptures. Everything started with the Jewish people."

He's distressed that some Jewish groups are officially upset by the movie (others are not). "When I look at the film, there is nothing but a profound love for Jesus and a deep respect for the culture from which he came," he says...

Christian evangelism [sic] -- which accepts the literal truth of the Bible -- is the fastest-growing brand of religion in North America today. As the grand old edifices of the Anglican and United Churches empty out, the new fundamentalist congregations are booming. It's not hard to guess why. The churches of the Protestant upper classes have neutered Jesus of his terrifying power. They got rid of all the militancy and gore, which were seen as hopelessly primitive. The suffering of Jesus is Christianity's greatest calling card, and they threw it away.

The Jesus I grew up with was a California hippie with a peace symbol. He was gentle, meek, and it never occurred to me that he was Jewish. The revolutionary Jesus condemning sinners to hellfire was nowhere to be seen. Even as I marched up the aisle on the day I was confirmed, it had begun to dawn on me that Jesus was just a metaphor. You weren't expected to take any of this hocus-pocus literally. In which case, why bother?

The up-market liberal churches have pushed God to the sidelines in favour of ecumenism and social justice. He has all but vanished. For evangelicals, God is real. The blood is not a metaphor. The suffering of Jesus is holy, and to contemplate it is to bear witness. "To me, as horrific as it was, the movie was hauntingly beautiful," says Rev. Godon.

You won't see this view articulated in the mainstream media. Most media folks are proudly secular types who regard openly religious people as distinctly odd. If you're gay, bi, or transgendered, we embrace you. But if your orientation is toward Jesus, you'd better keep it to yourself. We are fairly certain that born-again Christians are bigoted, not very intelligent, and possibly dangerous. This stereotype is easy to sustain because we've never actually met one.

After I talked with Ken Godon, I finally went off to see The Passion. To me, the movie was alternately riveting and revolting, moving and unwatchable. Once or twice it almost touched a chord of rapture in me, the sort of rapture that I vaguely remember feeling as a girl.

The Passion is on its way to being the biggest hit in movie history. Something's happening here, and we ought to find out what it is.

The message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God. For it is written:

"I will destroy the wisdom of the wise;
the intelligence of the intelligent I will frustrate."

Where is the wise man? Where is the scholar? Where is the philosopher of this age? Has not God made foolish the wisdom of the world? For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not know him, God was pleased through the foolishness of what was preached to save those who believe. Jews demand miraculous signs and Greeks look for wisdom, but we preach Christ crucified: a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those whom God has called, both Jews and Greeks, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God. For the foolishness of God is wiser than man's wisdom, and the weakness of God is stronger than man's strength.

...God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise; God chose the weak things of the world to shame the strong. He chose the lowly things of this world and the despised things -- and the things that are not -- to nullify the things that are, so that no one may boast before him.
The Apostle Paul writing to the Corinthians

Mel Gibson, the actor and director, has done Christians a favor with his movie "The Passion of the Christ"... remind[ing] Christians of the malevolence many secularists feel toward them and their religion. I have never seen the level of personal attacks directed against Gibson launched against any other director, plenty of whom have produced bloody garbage and soft porn. Even when the Disney people hired a convicted pedophile to direct a movie that had pedophile overtones, the critics were all "ho-hum" and "so what."

What you've seen spewed out against Gibson is pure venom, a hatred that goes far beyond any critical disagreement as to the merits of the movie. The attacks have been vicious and personal. He's been called an anti-Semite, a sadomasochist, a wacko and Lord knows what else. It is far more revealing of the nature of his critics than it is of him. Gibson is a Christian and a near genius as a moviemaker. He is not an anti-Semite, unless you accept the definition that an anti-Semite is anyone Jews hate...

All of this malevolence directed at Gibson is also directed at ...Christians. Don't kid yourself.

If the world hates you, keep in mind that it hated me first. If you belonged to the world, it would love you as its own. As it is, you do not belong to the world, but I have chosen you out of the world. That is why the world hates you.
Jesus