Category Archives: religion

Ms. Marvel, #1: A Comic Book Review

msmarvelreview

There was a lot hinging on this first issue, and that’s putting it in the lightest way possible. Not only is Marvel releasing a book featuring a brand new character [in secret identity, not heroic alter-ego], they’ve chosen to also make her a female, Pakistani, and a Muslim. How well this title ends up doing will strongly affect the publisher’s future decisions on diversity down the, and in their, line. In other words, this had better be incredible.

I picked up a copy this morning and read it cover to cover. I witnessed all that Wilson, Alphona, and Herring had made, and it was very good. Continue reading

Drive-By Evangelism

A couple nights ago I heard something blaring outside my window. My apartment complex is situated next to a high school football field, so I didn’t think anything of it until the sound started getting clearer. I walked over to my window and looked out to see a truck with a flat trailer hitched up behind it, carrying a sound system, floodlights, a microphone, and a guy singing an (awful) Christian rap/altar-call hybrid.

Again.

Yeah, these guys have been through before. I’m not sure if it’s a monthly thing, or if they go for it whenever they can sneak in (I’m pretty sure the management, slum-lords though they are, haven’t signed off on this).

For the most part they just roll up and down the streets in the complex at a couple miles an hour and shout through the loudspeakers that we have got to accept the Jesus into our hearts as lord and savior and…

Well, that’s about it really. And it’s junk like this which is the subject of today’s post. Continue reading

Culture War Correspondence: Evolution, Creation, and Debate

GORDON: Ladies and gentlemen, it has fallen to Kat and I to provide you with today’s topic. Some people would say we arrived at the topic gradually over time, making little changes along the way, others maintain it was created within seven minutes.

It’s evolution and creationism and the place of both in our society.

KAT: Exactly. So Gordon and I were tossing around some ideas for tonight’s CWC and arrived at this one. It was Gordon’s suggestion, so I thought maybe you (Gordon) wouldn’t mind describing why it came to mind.

GORDON: Well, it was posted in my Facebook feed that Bill Nye, acclaimed figure of the scientific community, will very shortly be debating creationist Ken Ham on the subject of creation vs. evolution. What really caught my attention though, and lead to me suggesting the topic, was that the person who had posted it was saying it was a shame that Bill Nye was doing this- that this debate would just legitimate something that had no standing.

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Culture War Correspondence: Atheist Churches

GORDON: Brothers and sisters, we are gathered together today in the eyes of…

well, nothing. Today’s discussion will cover the growing number of atheist churches in the West.

EVAN: That may seem like a ludicrous concept to any and all of you, so I think before the two of us really begin discussing this movement that originated in the UK [of course] I think it would be good for us to share what our first impressions were of that term.

So, Gordon, what did you imagine an atheist church was, or would be like?

GORDON: Well, my immediate reaction to the concept was that it’d all be some kind of satire, like Pastafarianism, though the more I thought about how one would actually function, the more I kept returning to some kind of a cross between a support group and a study group.

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Teaching Your Children About Santa, Noah, and Other Bearded Mythical Men

I’m not a dad. I probably won’t be a dad for a good number of years, seeing as the last “serious” relationship I was in was the latter end of high school. Even still, I find myself thinking about how I’m going to raise people who are 50% me, and one particular area is in imparting my personal beliefs.

Yes, I’m a Christian, and yes, I do believe that Christ is the son of God sent to die for our sins and that scripture is inerrant and so on and so forth, but regardless of how true all of that is for me I still struggle with how I ought to impart, at bare minimum, the knowledge of those beliefs to the kids I don’t have yet. Continue reading

CWR Writers’ Roundtable: No Red Kettles and “Baby It’s Cold Outside”

EVAN: Dearest audience, this week we dedicate our blog posts [more or less] to the holidays, and today’s Writers’ Roundtable is especially festive with not one, but two Christmas-related topics. Seeing as this is the season of giving the first one, website/movement No Red Kettles,  is particularly appropriate.

KAT: Well, I first learned about the debate around the Salvation Army on my Facebook feed where it was causing a pretty big debate. 

The first article I read about it insisted that the Salvation Army “hates gays”, which I immediately thought was pretty fishy. The Sally Ann did release an official response, but the debate has continued, because for many people it has clicked that the Salvation Army is a Christian organization, and they aren’t so sure they want to support it because of that.

This video from No Red Kettles pretty well sums up that argument:

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