atheist blogs, davinci codes

amy, thanks for the tip... i'm having fun at nogodblog.com.

i'm halfway through 'the davinci code'. it's pretty good... not the best dialogue in the world, but chock full of action and suspense. great summer reading (listening in my case). they're just getting into all the BS about The Holy Grail and the mystery of who/what it is. Dan Brown is way off on early church history. Constantine invented the Divinity of Christ? Methinks not. The 'Hymn of Christ' in Philippians 2 is perhaps the earliest saying we have about the nature of Christ, and even there we have "[Jesus], being in very nature God". i'm still listening to it.

'beyond belief' by elaine pagels is decidedly less fun. she's basically going through and picking all the best verses out of the Gospel of Thomas, to create the impression that here we have a genuine alternative to the four canonicals. Okay, how about this verse from Thomas:

(114) Simon Peter sais to them, "Let Mary leave us, for women are not worthy of life."
Jesus said, "I myself shall lead her in order to make her male, so that she too may become a living spirit resembling you males. For every woman who will make herself male will enter the kingdom of heaven."

Yikes! and that's just the tip of the iceberg.

All Rock, No Action

Alas...

All Rock, No Action

happy 30th birthday julie!

from Ashland newsletter

hey, i had a cool little write-up in Koinonia, Ashland Seminary's newsletter.

if you're interested, i scanned it here

"cows, constitution, and carlin"

from george carlin:

COWS
Is it just me, or does anyone else find it amazing that our government can track a cow born in Canada almost three years ago, right to the stall where she sleeps in the state of Washington, and they tracked her calves to their stalls. But they are unable to locate 11 million illegal aliens wandering around our country. Maybe we should give them all a cow.

CONSTITUTION
They keep talking about drafting a Constitution for Iraq. Why don't we just give them ours? It was written by a lot of really smart guys, it's worked for over 200 years, and we're not using it anymore.

TEN COMMANDMENTS
The real reason that we can't have the Ten Commandments in a Courthouse? You cannot post "Thou Shalt Not Steal," "Thou Shalt Not Commit Adultery", and "Thou Shall Not Lie" in a building full of lawyers, judges, and politicians! It creates a hostile work environment!

my dissertation notes

if you're interested, i'm keeping a running log of all my dissertation notes and conversations at:

http://aavineyard.annarborvineyard.org/donscorner/dissertation/index.html

sermon

i had a great time preaching this past weekend. if you're interested, the sermon audio and notes are available under "recent sermons" at http://www.annarborvineyard.org/media/sermon_music.htm

julie and i went up to jim & shannon niedzinski's parent's place on Shannon Lake up north near Fenton. truly a blast... swimming, basketball (in the rain), good food, lots of friends... very nice.

i've seen 'war of the worlds' twice now... once with julie, once with jesse. loved it! awesome sound, special effects, constant action. definitely two thumbs up, four stars. only possible complaint (and it's a minor one) is that the ending is somewhat anticlimactic.

the baby is kicking like crazy... can't wait to meet her. i saw a commercial for disposable baby washcloths--how cute!! were babies always this cute, or is it just because i'm expecting my own?!

inspirational