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February 13, 2007
700
Hm. Read this list then read the deduction:
The Dude is teaching an interim class about pop television (so many kids signed up that he has to teach a morning session and an afternoon session!), specifically the way Christians are treated in the media. I've been thinking about it and discussing it with him quite a bit lately.
- I was up to my elbows in dishes yesterday so I didn't stop to change the channel when the "Colbert Report" came on. His guest was this Christian guy who wrote a book calling Evangelicals the new nazis. They discussed it and while it irritated me, I still had a chance to hear what kinds of things really got this guy's goat: Health and Wealth Gospel* people bother him, as do Legalists** who quibble over hemlines for women while neglecting the poor and needy.
- "Studio 60" last night was interesting. One storyline they are developing is the relationship between the head writer, Matt, who is the epitome of the Hollywood liberal anti-christian mindset (oh, and he's a drug addict), and Harriet, one of the stars of the fictional sketch comedy show and is also a Christian, who sings gospel music (presumably in the same category as Kathie Lee Gifford), makes appearances on the 700 Club, and actually believes in and raises money for (gasp!) abstinence education. Enough backstory...on the the point: Studio 60 had an interesting flashback sequence in last night's episode that showed us how Matt and Harriet met, and Matt went on and on about this sketch idea he had called Crazy Christians, in which he would lambaste these weirdos who actually believe in the Bible, in a binding moral law (though he didn't phrase it that way, I did!), and in Biblical interpretation of scientific fact. Harriet retorted angrily that she was one of those weirdos, and Matt was embarrassed 1) because he insulted her beliefs and 2) because he couldn't believe anyone would actually be a Christian! An interesting note...Harriet is the kind of person who believes in a literal interpretation of Revelation even though the introduction clearly says it's a book of signs and symbols. She's got bad hermeneutics***.
- This morning in the laundromat the TV was set on CBS which was fine for the morning show but then I was trapped in the laundromat with Pat Robertson and the "700 Club!" It was irritating and enlightening. If you are a non Christian in a nearly post Christian society and the only thing you know about Christianity is this show, I have to say it's not the best representation of 'us.' It was very one-sided. The kinds of stories they showed were about poor people who were living in terrible sin and suddenly had a miraculous revelation to follow Jesus. (Seriously.) No mention of God's Word, no mention of why we obey God's law, no mention of the freedom of the redemption. A lot of Christian-y jargon, insider terminology, and some requests for money. I also got the impression that people who watch this news show expect the show to do their thinking for them, instead of becoming educated about world events and the socio-politico-economic context of a culture's history. (Do I sound like a brochure for Global Trends**** or what??)
-If you know next to nothing about economics and stocks and whatnot, and you turn on Bloomburg television, you're going to be bored and confused.
-If you ever go to a dinner party as a friend of a friend and most everyone there engages in shop-talk, discussing their boss and jobs and workplace, you'll feel excluded and slightly hurt.
-If you don't have any context for the gospel and the kind of gift Jesus offers, and you turn to the 700 Club just to hear Pat Robertson call you to repentance for your sin, you'll be offended and confused.
-All 'they' know about Christians and Christianity is that folks like Pat Robertson exist. ('Isn't he that guy that hosts the 700 Club? He made that foolish and foolhardy comment a few months ago (anyone remember what it was? I know it was something bigoted or something).')
--No wonder that we all turn them off if this is all they know about us. We're not all like that, but how will crazy liberals ever know that?
---
* Health and Wealth Gospel: the erroneous, even heretical, belief that Jesus wants us to be wealthy. In reality, that teaching is not found anywhere in the Bible and is thought of to be promoted by black sheep who actually want to mislead people away from the truth of the Gospel.
** Legalists: those who are trapped into false comfort by obeying rules upon rules upon rules. In reality, most of the rules taught by Legalists are actually cultural expectations not Biblical commandments.
*** Hermeneutics: the systematic study of the Bible. One of the rules of hermeneutics is that we should interpret a passage based on its genre. If it's a book of poetry, it's not meant to be literal; if it's history, it's not meant to be a textbook; if it's instructional, it's not meant to be a fable or a parable. The beginning of the book of Revelation (oh, and it's singular, not plural!) says that the description to follow is composed of signs and symbols, and so we shouldn't interpret it literally, but figuratively, like figures of speech aren't meant to be literal (I didn't really eat a horse).
**** Global Trends: a required course at Covenant College, whose goal is that the student will have a basic understanding of the forces of modern economy, politics, foreign policy, and how they interact to cause the current events we hear about (and those we don't hear about) in our news reports.
What's the Worldview? | By The Newest Worker | 01:30 PM
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Comments
Props for explaining all the shop-talk in your post!
Also, I'm fairly sure that last summer, Pat Robertson said we should just assassinate Hugo Chavez, the president of Venezuela. He's fairly Communist-friendly, extremely anti-American, and is very committed to seeing Latin American countries present a more economically and politically unified front to the rest of the world.
(CLEARLY, the best thing for all God's children is for him to die. I mean, we're Americans, so we have this divine right working for us, right? Let's just set up an ayatollah and call it a republic. That worked in Iran, remember?)
Tongue-in-cheek, people.
Posted by: bob at February 16, 2007 05:22 AM