just minishorts.

Yes it's true. I'm going to go on a religious rant all over again.

It seems that I've aged to a point in my life where I've only just begun to see the cowardly contents behind that holier-than-thou facade that fundamentalists so proudly wear. I know too many of them, the type who pride themselves in their religious walk with God simply because they go to Church more often, say grace aloud (and in Shakespearean English some more), and that they usher more people into the kingdom of God. The type who choose sermons tinged with messages of hellfire and brimstone, and think it's more regal of them to be divisive about doctrine-related stuff, to cook up stories like three-levels of heavens and making outright snide remarks about Catholics and the Pope, or calling Christians who get baptised as infants 'not-Christian' enough.

You see, the last thing I learnt in languages, told me that the -ian suffix behind the word denotes a person who chooses to believe in the Messiah, hence Christians are 'followers' of Christ.

Then again, I'm also worried about this, because emotional outbursts jotted down anywhere are naked to negative reactions, and it is not to say that I am being entirely kind in this little soliloquy of mine.

The situation: I was locked in a conversation with a Christian who claims to be on fire for the Lord today. I say locked because I felt captured in a cage of self-deception.

Now to me this is sad, because on a personal note I've always admired the character of those who demonstrated fire for God, people like Mother Teresa or Martin Luther King, or even kindred spirits of a different faith, like the monks and nuns who chose to devote their lives to the belief of Buddhism, for example — I've always admired not only for their zeal, but more so the discipline and total surrender to the teachings. Truly it takes character to do such things, but I've also learnt to realize that monks and nuns don't ever go around telling everyone, 'Lookie, lookie, I'm a proud fundamentalist.'

But my Christian friend was telling me just how comforted he was in his life because he had now learn the wonders of 'surrendering' to God, and that things were going really well because he was truly living by faith only. Now of course this wasn't exactly the main focus of the conversation, the focus of the conversation was about making decisions to purchase a particular phone model that we had just saw at a shopping mall counter, and our friend here was at a dilemma as to which model would suit him best.

'Seriously lah I dunno which model to choose lah,' he told me at the end of the day, after asking my opinions on which particular brand I would purchase if I were him.

'Well at the end of the day it's your money, and all it takes from you its a decision. Just choose, buy, and live with it. Or choose not to buy, and live with it. Easy right?'

'Haiyah… but. but…'

'What's there to but. Just decide lah.'

'Aiyoh, I dunno lah. Maybe I will just pray about it, and then see what God says.'

…

SEE LAH SEE LAH YOU GERAM OR NOT? I TELL YOU NO WONDER PEOPLE KENOT TAHAN THOSE BUBBLE-WRAPPED CHRISTIANS LAH, THESE IDIOTS WALK AROUND WITH BLINKING SIGNBOARDS ON THEIR HEADS DECLARING TO THE WHOLE DARN WORLD THAT THEY'RE PURITANS AND TRUE CHRISTIANS BECAUSE THEY GOT DUNKED INTO WATER AND HAVE RECEIVED THE SIGNS OF THE HOLY SPIRIT BECAUSE THEY BABBLE AT WORSHIPPED SESSIONS, AND THEY GO AROUND TELLING PEOPLE YOU YOU YOU GOING TO HELL BECAUSE YOU DON'T BELIEVE JESUS CHRIST DIED AND LIVED AGAIN, blardy hell wanna link me to these people also I malu…

Come on lah, it's just a fucking decision. JUST MAKE UP YOUR MIND and CHOOSE. Wanna go back to pray and see what God says? How God will answer your prayer?

(Foul Rant Over)

So I asked him that. 'Errr… how you pray and how you know God answer your prayer woh?'

'Oh, I will go home, sit in a quiet corner, read the bible, and God is so great, I will know it from the page I turn to.'

'…'

So I got pissed lah. Come on lah. Since when did God give us free will for nothing? If you really had faith in God, then God would permeate your entire life. You would live life in true faith, which is to say that you are able to rest in the comfort that God would make right all things in your life, because He cares for you, and no matter what decision you choose to make, the outcome will always be okay because God allows it.

Or maybe I've got all my concepts of The Higher One wrong and making the right decision really is about going back to a quiet corner and flipping the bible to see which word or verse I spot first.

I've always believed in empowering people through responsible management, and have always been going against the tide of bureaucratic feudalism so obviously apparent in traditional organizational structures. So if anyone would ask of my personal opinion, it's rather obvious that I'd choose flat over layered structures yah?

—

I was also having a chat with dear Bob over the Golden Compass fiasco the other day, and I really quite think it's absolutely ridiculous of Christians to start judging Christians for actually making that choice to go see the movie, especially in these precarious times… come on, surely small talk can be focused on something more relevant to current living in the world (i.e. the talk of town, bla bla… bla bla… OK I can't actually be too specific about that here…)

I don't know, what is your church discussing about recently? In home fellowship meets, do you now talk about how people who have some part to play in the production or consumption of that accursed movie will eventually end up in hell, or about what's happening in the country now? Which topic is being given more airtime?

Or rather, if you guys are (thankfully so) talking about the front page news, How do we discuss these issues, do you talk about 'what you can do?' or how praying can change things? (I'm not a very big believer in praying in tongues, because it makes the whole concept of praying so exclusive… I'm the live in prayer kind of person, prayer through action, you know? Tongues vs action? OMG quite obvious right? Surely there's some way we who call ourselves followers of Christ can actually do rather than hurdling around in weekly meetings sharing testimonies and then hiding into isolated corners prior into bursting out in incoherent babbling right now? I'm sure God gave us the other talents for some other reasons right?)

I know I'm sesat like that lah can? It still annoys me to death that I keep getting spam on 'why you should boycott The Golden Compass' when it ought to really worry us to death that discussions for company financial decisions are beginning to take into factor when the elections are going to happen and some idiots are screaming nonsense like, 'I'm not going to vote because I no longer believe in the system.'

Cis bedebah.

Surely most people (who come from Good Christian families who only watch movies made by good Christian people, read books by good Christian authors, eat food at restaurants owned by good Christian businessmen and work for good Christian employees) have received the mass mailed warnings to warn us of the perils of going to THAT terrible movie written by that terrible man called Phillip Pullman.

Well if you haven't, I have, and although this happens almost all the time in the family I own, I still haven't been able to escape being annoyed by the circumstance.

Or perhaps, it puzzles me to hell why was I encouraged a good education when I am not allowed to make good use of the education. Very much like the banning of The Satanic Verses, or the tirades against that absurd-money-raking bestseller called The Da Vinci Code, or even frightened fundamentalists parents forbidding their poor kids from reading about Harry Potter and his amazing (fictitious spells), here we go again.

Nicole Kidman is going to hell, by the way, for playing a part in what is so obviously a movie that is anti-God.

…

I say my friends, there is a difference between being anti-religion, and being anti-God. But of course, somewhere in between the years, Satan has totally succeeded, and now that God has been so successfully intermeshed between that deceiving concept we obediently claim to be our differentiating religions, we're doing the very thing thats driving human beings apart. Let's judge, let's condemn, it's in the name of God, we say.

If you watched the movies and were you to be even so close to realize what allegorical references actually mean, it's true, the books through the movie indeed is telling us about the problems with organized religions (that inevitably is built up through hierarchy-addicted power-hungry tyrants). But come on, half the population in the world aren't really that bothered, and very quickly, the story's just another rehashed-and-retold one… and if I may risk being labeled heretical to actually say this, much like how much of the stories in the bibles could be considered rehashed and retold stories from various cultures around the world.

So the contents, running a checklist here - you've got the protagonist, some helpers, a kind of systemic ruling system that keeps things under control, the people who're desperately trying to keep the systems intact, and those who believe in a world of pure free-will. OK what, a lot of shows have done that before lah. Lord of the Rings — like that also kan? Star Wars - also like that mah. Narnia like that also. All also like that. What's so special?

Eh you dunno, Phillip Pullman's book got something called a God-Killer you know. And some more the characters named after God based on the Hebrew / Christian faiths. So he must be of some Satanic cult thing… you wanna go Heaven or not? Better not read.

—

Maybe because I go to a Lutheran church, and that the founder of the Lutheran denomination had to go through a lot of literal shit just to break down systemic religious systems that oppressed intellectual thinking that this kind of mass-emailing annoys me to death. Didn't our God, His Son had to go through the same kind of anti-government warfare in order to prove what it meant to conquer the cross?

It's Advent, and instead of telling people to spread the love, love your neighbour (and enemy) as your won, we're busy spreading e-mails of hate, telling each other to boycott movies, if you're a good Christian. 'Act accordingly, read carefully.'

What would Jesus think if he were actually here?

I watched the movie btw, and the ending was really quite bla. Am I converted to Pullman-ism? Not quite. Impressed? No, it's watered down, and quite fortunately so. Will I watch the rest of the trilogy, why not? When the show comes out. Do I think it's Satanic? Who cares?

It's Advent. Time to spread the love.

I recently got to know someone from a Charismatic church lately. She was cool and normal when we said hi, and then when I told her I attend church too, her character somehow transformed into an overwhelmingly loving and adoring sister-in-Christ, saying Amen to everything I said, as if suddenly some veil had been stripped off and Christianese was the common language between the two of us.

I'm not wanting to be provocative by writing that. I have my roots in a Charismatic Church. My dad's Charismatic, his family's very charismatic (there are pastors, counsellors and all). And yet even though her husband's Christian, my mum, well, my mum wouldn't have anything to do with Christianity thanks to the overwhelming emphasis on living the Spirit life, and was driven to the very last end of the backsliders association board room, arms folded with pursed lips. Sort of the reason why my parents are not together anymore.

Anyway before I get tempted to play the blame game, I must admit that I do adore the Charismatics, and by nature I am very charismatic. To put it mildly, had I not have my roots in charismaticism, I probably wouldn't have been able to relate to the figure of God as a real person, the presence of the Holy Spirit as utterly real and that Jesus Christ really lived, died, lived again. All of those stuff just would have been very textbook to me, just information for me to digest… so for me, being Christian requires a good fistful of charismaticism in order to truly embrace and welcome the heavy weight that comes with all that persecution that Christians are required to endure.

But being Charismatic in nature doesn't explicitly mean there is a requirement for me to attend a Church that embraces the Spirit only when it is bursting in flames. This is where I choose to deliberately become provocative, so if you're attending a Church that claims to be 'more spirit-filled' than another, be warned. You can stop reading now.

(more…)

Found here…

1. Many folks want to serve God, but only as advisers.

2. Opportunity may knock once, but temptation bangs on your door for years.

3. Quit griping about your church; if it was perfect, you couldn't belong.

4. The phrase that is guaranteed to wake up an audience: "And in conclusion."

5. If the church wants a better preacher, it only needs to pray for the one it has.

6. Not only are the sins of the fathers visited upon the children, but nowadays the sins of the children are visited upon the fathers.

7. To make a long story short, don't tell it.

8. If your left hand doesn't know what your right one is doing, you should consider running for a job in Washington.

9. Some minds are like concrete, thoroughly mixed up and permanently set.

10. I don't know why some people change churches. What difference does it make which one you stay home from?

11. A lot of church members are singing "Standing on the Promises" while they are just sitting on the premises.

12. We were called to be witnesses, not lawyers.

13. Outside of traffic, there is nothing that holds this country back as much as committees.