Bent? Then Repent!

we want them to repent and be changed

So says the archwhatever from the Rochester Anglican Boys Club.

people who depart from traditional Biblical teaching "don't share the same faith."

Quite right, but as expected, not getting much support.

Mooning at the Bastardisation of Easter

The recent loss over their reason to exist when MP Anne Tolley pulled the rug over tuck shop food obviously still smarts. So called nutritionists still trying to get me to deviate from meat and two veg with a few chocolate vices thrown in.

was particularly critical of the sale of 1kg Easter eggs, which have 60 teaspoons of fat and 146 teaspoons of sugar

A foodie is getting her nanny state knickers in a twist over largish Easter eggs. Seems she wants to stop all eggs as being it is a 'bastardisation of Easter'.

Our products can be enjoyed as part of a balanced diet and balanced lifestyle, and we recommend all food should be consumed in appropriate amounts related to an individual's ability to balance their intake of calories with their output.

Cadbury's tells her like it is. We pig out one day a year, feel crook for a few more and then are over it.

Christian customs connected with Easter eggs are to some extent adaptations of ancient pagan practices related to spring rites. The egg has long been a symbol of 'fertility', 'rebirth' and 'the beginning'. In Egyptian mythology, the phoenix burns its nest to be reborn later from the egg that is left; Hindu scriptures relate that the world developed from an egg.

With the rise of Christianity in Western Europe, the church adapted many pagan customs and the egg, as a symbol of new life, came to represent the Resurrection. Some Christians regarded the egg as a symbol for the stone being rolled from the sepulchre."

So that's all right then. Because the egg has been part of the Christian culture of Easter since the early days of the church, for many centuries in fact, but it also may be an adaptation of other traditions, it's fine to cash in on the tradition while destroying the special significance of Easter being celebrated at the specified time of year.

She would do well to remember that the eggs are a pagan fertility rite.

An aside, I couldn't find a link, but I did wonder if another King of the same vintage, notorious for howling at the moon about crime, was her sister?

Very apt that the date for Easter is the first Sunday after the the first full moon after the vernal equinox.

Must be in the genes for self-proclaimed foodies to go off around a full moon.

Update:

Snap! Oswald states the case in a more forthright manner.

The other side of religion

Borat's director is taking an irreverential squiz at religion.

America's corrosive culture wars, in which evangelical Christians are never far from the front line, are about to be reignited by a Borat-style take on organised religion.

In ultra-conservative US of A.

using the same hit-and-run techniques - will open in New York next month. Provocatively titled Religulous (think "religious" and "ridiculous"), it will mock the beliefs of the world's major religions, recruiting unwitting assistance from the ranks of the faithful.

Not to satirise religion, but to demolish religion. It's already in the can.

have made clear that, while they were looking for comic potential from their engagements with believers, their ultimate aim was not to poke fun but to demolish."I want to destroy more than debunk," said Charles. "Just destroy the whole system.

That will be worth paying good money to see.

Sham marriages

While those over at No Minister investigate Greek issues and marriages of convenience, after following a link, I found that those in the Golden State are having a golden moment.

proposed constitutional amendment to outlaw same-sex marriage in California said Monday they have gathered enough signatures to qualify the measure for the November ballot.

Like our recently buggered smacking petition, a few in-state voters have arduously collected more than a few signatures and have raised for the next election, what we would call a referendum. I say arduously collected, because even with interfering of gathering of petition signatures being illegal over there, more than a few out-of-state rent-a-gay-mob appear to have just done that whilst signatures were being gathered. Is it the same in NZ, I wonder? Still they got there and a million plus signatures is not to be sniffed at.

the voters in California will have the chance to protect marriage

Yes the Californian electorate is making a further stand (initially done in 2000) on the definition of marriage as being

a California voter initiative defined marriage as a union between a man and a woman.

Even the Pope is in on the act. US bishops have been given the same message.

the sacramental bond of marriage seems scarcely distinguishable from a civil bond, or even a purely informal and open-ended arrangement to live with another person.

The electorate is being forced to take a stand on the matter, even Arnie is getting flak for not supporting the cause.

Not content to wait years to respond to the state Supreme Court, Californians are asserting their constitutional prerogative to settle this fundamental question for themselves. This will be an epic battle to defend not just marriage, but voters’ self-determination.

It would be great if NZ could have made the same commitment to real marriages, the rights of real parents and not sham marriages of convenience.

Religious Tolerance

CR has been looking at the recently released Fitna movie on religious tolerance which has provoked considerable negative reaction and asks why there has not been a similar one examining the Bible. He even submits a possible script for the movie...

But of course! Why did nobody think of that?
Oh yes, it ought to be easy enough to make. Why, all we have to do is send people armed with cameras to all those places where Christians are executing gays, driving schoolgirls into burning buildings, sodomising and shooting schoolchildren, stoning adulterers..
There must be more. Hang on a second--it'll come to me...

Ah yes! The stoning to death of (female) adulterers in St. Peter's square ought to be good for several minute's worth of movie time. And perhaps while we're there it'll be possible to capture some shots of loving Italian Catholic mothers sawing parts off their daughter's genitals.
Did I miss any other fine Christian traditions? Beheadings maybe? Killing Buddhist schoolteachers in Thailand?
Cameras in local churches will be essential--to capture shots of priests as they preach death to the Western pigs and apes and the destruction of Israel.
We could wind up the movie with some interviews with the Pope and the Archbishop of Canterbury, as they call for the killing of any who dare to leave the Christian church. That ought to round it out nicely and end on a fine multicultural, tolerant note.