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Archives For March 2011
Question: When is a row not a row?
Answer: When the Daily Mail says there is one.
Check this out. The headline reads: “Church of England row as cathedral opens doors to tarot card readers and crystal healers in ‘new age’ festival”. The first line of the article says “The Church of England was braced for a fresh row today after a cathedral announced plans to host a ‘new age’ festival.”
“Braced for”. Thats it. No row. No negative comment about the plans from anyone. Just an expectation that there will be one. Its simply doom and gloom reporting from the Daily Mail. I cant help but wonder if they’re trying to push a row into starting?
Read About The Spirit of Life at Manchester Cathedral
Here’s this weeks round up:
- Richard Littledale wonders if its ok to use Twitter in Church.
- Its a little old, but as part of the above; Time Magazine has looked at Churches which use Twitter.
- Keeping on the techie theme, Phil Ritchie looks at using the Bible on his blackberry.
- The Rob Bell book: “Love Wins” still has people talking. The Funeral Director wonders why alot of pastors are so keen to judge, while they may well also be preaching the same message.
- And finally… Pole Dancing for Jesus????
About 6 years ago, I left uni, got a full time job, married my best friend, and started getting properly involved in Church again… It was around that time… I started… to put a little bit more weight on…
I always used to put this down to the double whammy of getting married and starting to eat proper food at the same time… This study suggests that church* may well have had something to do with it as well:
Young, religiously active people are more likely than their non-religious counterparts to become obese in middle age, according to new research. In fact, frequent religious involvement appears to almost double the risk of obesity compared with little or no involvement.
What is unclear from the new research is why religion might be associated with overeating.
“Churches pay more attention to obvious vices like smoking or drinking,” said Matthew Feinstein, lead author of the research and fourth-year medical student atNorthwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine. “Our best guess about why is that…more frequent participation in church is associated with good works and people may be rewarding themselves with large meals that are more caloric in nature than we would like.”
MSN are also covering the story as well.
So can the Church do anything to help people mind their… stomach width..?
*May be looking for an excuse
According to the BBC:
A study using census data from nine countries shows that religion there is set for extinction, say researchers.
The study found a steady rise in those claiming no religious affiliation.
The team’s mathematical model attempts to account for the interplay between the number of religious respondents and the social motives behind being one.
The result, reported at the American Physical Society meeting in Dallas, US, indicates that religion will all but die out altogether in those countries.
The team took census data stretching back as far as a century from countries in which the census queried religious affiliation: Australia, Austria, Canada, the Czech Republic, Finland, Ireland, the Netherlands, New Zealand and Switzerland.
Nonlinear dynamics is invoked to explain a wide range of physical phenomena in which a number of factors play a part.
One of the team, Daniel Abrams of Northwestern University, put forth a similar model in 2003 to put a numerical basis behind the decline of lesser-spoken world languages.
I cant help but wonder about the lack of time frame mentioned in this article.
Heres this weeks random roundup:
- If you’ve not seen it, here’s the Martin Bashir interview with Rob Bell. Cant make up my mind if he’s putting up a good argument or squirming?
- The Urban Pastor wonders if he can be bothered to read it… On that note can anyone recommend a good cheap way of getting hold of Love Wins?
- Richard Littledale highlights the little voice of Aria.
- Small plug for the scribbledfish project – which is being given a fresh look. Basically its about me and the camera…
- And finally… Church Mouse questions why no one has pointed out how fashionable John Calvins beard is. Personally I think its amazing…
