June 22, 2006
Filed under: News — admin @ 8:06 am
After several weeks of controversy surrounding the Parental Guidance (PG) rating of the film “Facing the Giants”, the MPAA has stated that the furor was caused by nothing more than a misunderstanding.
On June 7th, Kris Fuhr, vice president for marketing at Provident Films (owned by Sony), was quoted by Scripps Howard saying that she was told by someone at the Motion Picture Association of American (MPAA) that “Facing the Giants” was awarded a PG Rating because the film “was heavily laden with messages from one religion and that this might offend people from other religions.”
Conservative news sources, organizations and politicians across the United States, puzzled by the report, expressed their concern with the MPAA’s reasons and called on the Association to explain why the movie merited the PG rating.
“This incident raises the disquieting possibility that MPAA considers exposure to Christian themes more dangerous for children than exposure to gratuitous sex and mindless violence,” House Majority Whip Roy Blunt wrote in a letter to MPAA Chairman and CEO Dan Glickman.
On June 13th, Catholic League president Bill Donohue wrote to Dan Glickman, chairman and CEO of the MPAA, requesting that he investigate why an “overtly” Christian film like “Facing the Giants” merited the PG red flag.
Joan Graves, chairman of the MPAA ratings board, contacted the Catholic League, admitting that she was the MPAA official who originally spoke to Fuhr. According to Graves, she told Fuhr that the PG rating was given to the movie, not for being overtly religious, but because of mature issues such as: depression, matters relating to pregnancy and sports-related violence. So there you have it, a lot of fuss over nothing.
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June 21, 2006
June 19, 2006
Filed under: News — admin @ 6:52 am
Marian Conning is pastor of Amistad United Church of Christ in Vacaville, USA, and is a great example of a progressive Christian. To quote:
“We believe that it is our responsibility to use our God-given intelligence to take the Bible seriously through study and interpretation, but not necessarily to take it literally. (And let me note that as we study and interpret, we notice that the Bible says much more about what we should do with our money than it does about what we should do with our sexuality.)
We believe that the ongoing presence of Jesus among us calls us to work for justice within families, communities, nations, social structures and the environment.
We believe that the Holy Spirit enlivens our work for justice and peace. Most of us believe that eternal life has more to do with a dimension of life, rather than with its duration.
As for Christians living as gays, we believe that a godly sexual ethic has more to do with how one treats one’s partner than with the gender of the partner.And finally, we believe that God is still speaking. “
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June 16, 2006
June 15, 2006
Filed under: News — admin @ 5:57 am
In the gospel of Matthew, Jesus tells his disciples: “Where two or three of you are gathered in my name, there I am in the midst of them.”
A fledgling North Loop congregation takes that verse to heart every Monday night at 7 p.m., when they worship at Montana Coffeehouse, 514 N. 3rd St.
Scott Woller and his wife Amber started Corner Church in January. It has a modest congregation of about two dozen people, mostly students and young parents, but Woller has been spreading the word with an outreach campaign that includes e-mail, fliers throughout the neighborhood and open invitations at public neighborhood meetings.
He hopes to attract members for not just one, but several Corner Church locations in the burgeoning community that, until the small church was born, was without a place of worship.
A Corner Church service is not your traditional, average, liturgical worship. On a recent Monday, Woller presided in tennis shoes, jeans and a T-shirt bearing the church’s logo, with a guitar hanging from his shoulders.
(more…)
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June 14, 2006
Filed under: News — admin @ 4:11 am
The day before his mother’s funeral, Donald Rockson had a last-minute change of heart about her bible-shaped coffin.
He had wanted the coffin to reflect his mother’s position as a devout churchgoer in this suburb of Accra, Ghana’s capital. “She is a church elder so it should be a bible in which she is buried,” he explained. “But the coffin was not nice, it was not presentable.”
Ditching the bible idea, his search for the perfect coffin brought him to Daniel Mensah’s coffin shop.
Rockson, who has saved a video of his mother lying in state on his mobile phone, comments with approval as Mensah and his apprentices pin silk and fix crosses and roses to an ornate white coffin, just minutes before the funeral is due to start.
Funerals are important social occasions in this West African country and elaborate, brightly colored coffins have become an art form. Most customers give Mensah more time than Rockson but all want to give their loved ones a fitting send-off in a coffin that honors who they were and what they did.
Fantasy coffins shaped like Coca-Cola bottles, chickens, cars, cameras, birds and bibles are all on sale in Teshie.
First popularized in the 1950s, the coffins cost between $300 and $800 in a country where many live on barely $2 a day. Some say the coffin represents an aspiration, or pride in the achievements of a short earthly stay in a poor country.
“If you can’t acquire it, you can at least be buried in it,” said Kwame Labi, a research fellow at the University of Ghana’s Institute of African Studies. “It is born out of economic crisis, out of trying to build confidence and pride in what life you have.”
Buying a good coffin also offers a chance, some believe, to calm an angry spirit, who could wreak havoc from the next world. In many African communities, Christian faith often co-exists with traditional beliefs in a world of spirits.
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June 13, 2006
June 12, 2006
Filed under: News — admin @ 3:18 am
A conservative advocacy group is angry over the Parental Guidance (PG) rating given to a new family film with a “pro-God theme.” The theme of Facing the Giants is, “Never give up, never back down, never lose faith.” But the movie poster also says parental guidance is suggested “for some thematic elements.”
The American Family Association is outraged. It accuses the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA), the movie raters, of putting Christianity on the same level as sex, violence, and profanity because it might offend non-believers.
“The MPAA is controlled by Hollywood moguls known for their bitter opposition to Christianity,” the American Family Association said in an email to supporters.
According to its website, Facing the Giants tells the story of a Christian high school football coach who uses his faith to battle the giants of fear and failure. The plot includes waves of answered prayers, a medical miracle, a mysterious silver-haired mystic who delivers a message from God and a bench-warmer who kicks a 51-yard field goal to win the big game when his handicapped father pulls himself out of a wheelchair and stands under the goal post to inspire his son’s faith.
In one scene, the coach tells a student to change his ways with God’s help. The boy tells the coach that not everybody believes “in all that honoring God and following Jesus stuff.”
The coach tells the boy that no one’s forcing anything on him: “Following Jesus Christ is the decision that you’re going to have to make for yourself. You may not want to accept it, because it will change your life. You will never be the same.” The American Family Association believes that’s the exchange of words that earned the movie its PG rating.
Personally I’m fine with them objecting, what bothers me is that the only comparison for a movie not getting a PG rating, and at the same time serving as an example of why this movie should be rated for all ages, is:
(more…)
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June 9, 2006
Filed under: News — admin @ 4:03 am
The controversy began Friday when the agents visited the Great News Network in Denton, Texas, and threatened to arrest staffer Tim Crawford for hiding evidence in a counterfeiting investigation. The agents took 8,300 tracts and left their business cards and a receipt.
The Christian group argues, however, that “million-dollar” bills can’t be counterfeited because they don’t exist, and the tracts which include a “not legal tender” disclaimer on the front – present the Christian salvation message on the opposite side.
The gospel tracts are produced by evangelist Ray Comfort, and his Living Waters Ministry in Southern California has no plans to stop selling them.
In fact, he said, since news of the seizure, his office has been inundated with requests, 500,000 were sold yesterday, nearly exhausting the supply.
Comfort said if the Secret Service issues a “cease and desist order,” he will comply by creating a new tract, one-and-a-half times the size of a regular bill and emblazoned with “Secret Service Version”
The New Zealand-born evangelist said his ministry (known for its television program, “The Way of the Master,” and an association with actor Kirk Cameron) has sold 5.7 million million-dollar tracts since March 2002.
Agents explained to the Great News Network’s Crawford that someone in North Carolina had attempted to deposit one of the million-dollar bills in a bank account. The address of the Texas group was on the back, and the Secret Service went into action.
The tract includes this message: (more…)
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June 8, 2006
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