have a coffee

Jason Clark has written a nice article over at "the church and postmodern culture" -- conversation: Superficial Church: The Loss of Real Church. Clark neatly summarizes the writing of Jean Baudrillard and calls to our attention the importance of being the church over just discussing nice concepts of what the church could be. Definitely worth reading.

Talk about the postmodern blending of different beliefs into your very own ecclectic kind of faith: "Sara Miles, a left-wing, secular journalist and former cook, found herself an unlikely convert to Christianity." Read here about how she came to like the Bible, judge other Christians and make up her own faith mix. At any rate, it's interesting what makes it onto Salon these days.

Richard Dawkins has been at it again. This time, in a Guardian blog article, he uses controversy on the age of the Earth and on the evolution theory's compliance to the second law of thermodynamics as a reference to point out, how large the supposed error of the evolutionists is, from a creationist perspective. But, Mr. Dawkins, what's really new about that? There's no need to resort to lengthy explanations about isotope age measurements and entropy. We always knew it: One side postulates the existence of an almighty God, the creator of the universe, who, on top of it all, is interested in our lives and will one day judge us based on how we were living. The other side claims such a being doesn't exist. One of the two is obviously wrong. How could there possibly be a greater discrepancy between the two?
In fact, thinking about it, in light of the magnitude of difference created by believing (or not believing) in the existence of God, Dawkin's magnitude of error of merely factor 460,000 pales and turns out to be completely trivial.
But, what if you're the one who is wrong, and there is actually a God? Think about the magnitude of difference that really makes -- not just in theory, but for you, personally.

The major hallmark of Pentecostalism is -- tada! -- the prosperity gospel. Who'da thunk? Well, Ted Olson certainly does think so:

While I agree on the importance of discernment, I'm kind of missing it in this article. First of all, it seems hard to generalize the Pentecostal movement on a global scale. The article does admit that, but then, in conclusion, comes back to such a generalization. Second, I find it kind of hard to focus on one single aspect and declare this "the thing that really unites Pentecostals" -- especially when this is just the aspect that would exclude a lot of folks (including me) from the Pentecostal fold.
No, Mr. Olsen, I do not agree.

Peter Lumpkins has an interesting article on Pentecostals being the "ideal conservatives.