Anger And Hostility Speed Up Decline In Lung Power

It's true; and this just adds to previous studies.

The authors point out that hostility and anger have been associated with cardiovascular disease, death, and asthma, and that previous research has suggested that changes in mood can have short term effects on the lungs.
Anger and hostility will alter neurological and hormonal processes, which in turn may disturb immune system activity, producing chronic inflammation, suggest the authors. An accompanying editorial comments that the physiological components of anger and stress overlap, and stress is well known to affect the immune system. "Indeed it is hard to find a disease for which emotion or stress plays absolutely no part in symptom severity, frequency, or intensity of flare-ups," writes Dr Paul Lehrer of the University of Medicine and Dentistry in New Jersey, USA. Chronic anger may permanently alter the normal body responses to and physical and psychological stressors, he suggests, and add to "wear and tear."

It seems that practising what you preach could help to a longer and healthier life. I would have thought that there's a 'spiritualty of forgiveness for health' just waiting there ... hmmm that's a useful idea ... a short course on forgiving and letting go which makes non-cringey connections to the teaching of Christ. Could be a goer, don't you think?
ScienceDaily: Anger And Hostility Speed Up Decline In Lung Power:
Filed in: forgiveness, anger, health, hostility, holistic

ID card fears as staff hack into Home Office database | News | This is London

While admittedly the system that would run the NIR in the UK would be different, one can't help thinking that, nevertheless, this is correct...

Phil Booth, of the NO2ID campaign, said government databases would always be vulnerable to unscrupulous staff. 'That these breaches have taken place in the very agency that is supposed to be protecting the identities of every citizen in this country is a damning indictment of the current system,' he said. 'But when you consider that this agency will be running the ID card scheme, it's truly terrifying.'
John Tullett, the technology editor of Secure Computing magazine, said the Home Office would be 'naive' to assume that the total of recorded breaches reflects the real number of security violations at the department. He said: 'The trend in IT crime is towards "silent" breaches where very competent criminals get into a system and cover their tracks so they can get in again in future, all without the victim ever knowing.'

ID card fears as staff hack into Home Office database | News | This is London:
Filed in: ID_cards, UK, home_office, IT, hacking, privacy, security

On Prayer and how it 'works'

A posting on prayer and whether it 'works' only not as simplistic as that. To get a flavour of the thing by Jonathan Jong in Aotearoa:

Does prayer "work?" I don't know. But probably not the way we think it does. The causal pathways are certainly more complex than the oversimplifications that float around Christendom today. "Prayer moves the hands of God" is almost definitely a gross oversimplification of the matter.
May we say that "prayer doesn't work"? I don't think so. God is God who has chosen to love and therefore to be affected by the ones He loves. The possibility of being affected by our prayers must at least be kept open.... What does prayer change? In terms of certainty, I think prayer changes us, the world and (maybe) God. That is, prayer certainly changes us. And if it does more, it changes the world. i.e. our prayers are variables in what occurs in the world. And if it does more than that, then in some unimaginable way, prayer changes God. Secondly, these questions about prayer rest (partly) on certain assumptions that might be fallacious.

He's right to put his finger on, as he goes on to do, the quasi-gnostic dualisms we tend to erect when we think about God and the so-called supernatural.
up, up and away: On Prayer.
Filed in: prayer, spirituality, Christian, nondualist, causality

New icon? Bonfire of the brands

An interesting report on a radical action.

I am going to burn every branded thing in my possession. Gucci shoes, Habitat chairs, even Simple soap. I have reached the point in my life where I can no longer be around these things, no matter how special they make me feel. Yes, it is going to be a terrible waste, yes I'll no doubt feel lost when they're gone, but at this moment in time, it seems the only thing I can do.

Wish he'd consider giving it away to charity, though.
The reflections he writes on branding, upbringing and self-esteem are worth noting for the effects on the soul.

Once I had nagged my parents to the point of buying me the shoes I was duly accepted at school, and I became much happier as a result. As long as my parents continued to buy me the brands, life was more fun. Now, at the age of 31, I still behave according to playground law ... gullible fool that I am, I believed in the promises that these brands made to me; that I would be more attractive, more successful, more happy for buying their stuff. However, the highs of consumerism have been accompanied by a continual, dull ache, growing slowly as the years have gone by; a melancholy that until recently I could not understand. ... for every new extension to my identity that I buy, I lose a piece of myself to the brands.

Doesn't that sound like an echo of 'For those who want to save their lives will lose them ...'?
And I can't help but think that there's a hint towards '... and those who lose their lives ... will save them.' when he writes,

So, this is why I am burning all my stuff. To find real happiness, to find the real me, I must get rid of it all and start again, a brand-free life, if that is indeed possible

BBC NEWS | Magazine | Bonfire of the brands:
Filed in: consumerism, branding, counterculture, culturejamming

Struggle, church, image and generation Y

I'm wondering how this translates to Britain.

the next generation has concluded that "everything is image," and therefore nothing can be trusted. Church is too slick, too good, too polished to be real. And the twenty-something hunger for raw authenticity just doesn’t fit in.

Although there has been a lot of image reform, it has not really been able to take hold in many British churches; too poor to be able to jump on that bandwagon and too many leaders have been archly suspicious of the enterprise of image building and of accusations of style without substance. And yet something of this rings true:

twenty-somethings simply want permission to struggle. Most fear that they are not good enough for God's family. Each week they are told about the standards they are expected to keep, and each week they are led to believe that the rest of the church is somehow keeping up. This "silence about the struggle" quietly drives young adults away from churches all over the country.

Except I think that this is more than twenty-somethings in Britain. Perhaps it's our post imperial hermeneutic of suspicion, but I find many forty and fifty somethings who face this. Maybe this is why the whole emerging/ alternative church thing was about 15 years out of the box before it really got going in the USA?
What do you think?
Leadership Blog: Out of Ur: Scum of the Church: How the drive for “excellence” is driving young adults from the church:
Filed in: genY, genX, church, image, acceptance, standards

Greenbelt picture

All I can say is 'nice one, Jonny'. This is my all time favourite photo of Greenbelt. Nicely done.

jonnybaker: summer is over
Filed in: Greenbelt, 2006, pictures, photo, jonnybaker

No Quick Fix -not even a smelly one?

George Monbiot's response to the idea I blogged a week or so back to counter global warning by adding sulphur to the upper atmosphere.

By re-engineering the planet’s systems we could risk invoking as great a catastrophe as the one we are trying to prevent.

The main basis for this seems to be this research:

In 2002, the Journal of Climate published an astonishing proposition: that the great droughts which had devastated the Sahel region of Africa had been caused in part by sulphate pollution in Europe and North America. Our smoke, the paper suggested, was partly responsible for the famines which killed hundreds of thousands of people in the 1970s and 1980s(6).

The underlying analysis of why this came about offers little comfort, though need not fatally flaw the plan provided that there are mechanisms to attempt to redress the losses of the losers in any such global plan.
Monbiot.com � No Quick Fix
Filed in: climate, CO2, emissions, Monbiot, sulphur

Can't We Just Sing Some Stuff To God?

Here's the output of a potentially useful little resource which produces cartoons in a variety of styles and topics. Worth bookmarking. jesus deciples last supper comic (make your own by clicking through here.)

38% Basques would back country’s independence in a referendum

If you have joined me in the prayer project of praying for the Basque region, this may be of interest to you.

according to Basque government’s sociometer that was carried out last May, after armed group ETA had declared a permanent truce. 53% of the citizenship considers that the present political situation is good or very good, a figure that doubles last year’s results.

It's worth recalling that historically the Basques have not had their own government and seem to have thrived under the rule of others provided they have a high degree of autonomy, so this result may fit their national character.
38% Basques would back country’s independence in a referendum:
Filed in: Euskadi, ETA, peace, process

How to turn your boss green

This article sets up the question;

at work it's a different story. All that wasted paper, the unfairly traded tea and coffee, the lights left on over night, the computers blazing out heat all day long. It's not your fault - although many businesses are getting serious about sustainability, some still fail to provide recycling bins or to consider the environmental impacts of their products and services. If your employer is one of those who hasn't yet gone green, how can you make them change their ways?

And answers it with some good distilled wisdom.

Talk to your boss. Tell him or her about an article you read on John Browne - the chief executive of BP who turned it round from being an oil company to being an energy company....
Talk about the risks your company faces. Climate change ... Rising oil prices ... Limits on the emissions of CO2... managing these risks can save the business money.
The next thing for business is to be the biggest and best at meeting the growing demand for solutions to these problems ... You and your boss could come up with the next great idea.
In almost every sector there's someone making a bid to be seen as the sustainability king. ...
many of the issues we're facing are too big to squeeze into a board meeting agenda - you need to cut them down into bitesized chunks that relate to your core activities. ...
Get your colleagues interested in your cause by organising lunchtime talks, expeditions, nights out to an organic restaurant - anything that's fun or novel...
Make sure you keep all your messages positive and friendly. Don't go on at people about all the things they're doing wrong because they won't like you much. Instead, tell them what they're doing right, and how good changes will be for the organisation in general and their job in particular. Talk about increased job satisfaction, publicity and customers - make people feel excited about doing things differently.

There's an interesting link too to the Futerra Website that's worth a look.Their focus is on corporate communications for sustainability.
Environment Unlimited | What can I do? | How to turn your boss green
Filed in: environment, green, workplace, advocacy, practicalities

Aramaic Lord's Prayer on Squidoo

Well, I'm really interested to note how this lens seems to be gaining readership. I'd like to make an appeal though. Please someone, visit and give it a star rating, that'd help enormously...
Aramaic Lord's Prayer on Squidoo
Filed in: Lord's_prayer, Aramaic, paternoster

Muslim Leader Argues For Tolerance For Apostates From Islam - Barnabas Fund

Dr Louay Safi ... is the executive director of the Islamic Society of North America’s Leadership Development Centre. His article, “The Politics and Morality of Apostasy”, attacks those scholars who argue that leaving Islam should be punishable by death. Dr Safi argues that “at the heart of the apparent conflict between Islamic traditions is a static and stagnant approach to understanding Islamic law. The conflict stems mainly from a literalist understanding of the revelatory sources, that is the Qur’an and the Sunnah (the Prophet tradition), and the body of Islamic jurispendence derived from them through exercise of juristic reasoning”. Thus, scholars with literalist interpretations continue to argue that the punishment for apostasy and the role of Islamic shari’a law should be the same as it was during the classical period of early Islamic history. It is an essentially static model which cannot be changed to meet the demands of the modern world. ... Safi claims that this interpretation has taken hold across the Islamic world because autocratic rulers often align themselves to literalist scholars to “perpetuate a rigid and anti-reform agenda in Muslim societies... the Qur’an does not support the death penalty for apostasy. Rather, it is based upon two hadiths (statements attributed to Muhammad) and the precedent of Muslims fighting against Arab apostates in early Islamic history. Dr Safi feels that the hadith statements “cannot stand as credible evidence” because he thinks they contradict the Qur’an, which he interprets as arguing for individual religious freedom.

It is fervently to be hoped that this kind of perspective gains more and more active support among Muslims. But we should recall how 'progressive' reform often has proceeded -or not- in Christian-influenced societies. But at least there are probably many many Muslims who would dearly like this interpretive approach to gain ground and that is hopeful.

It's not a matter of indifference either as the recent story of the forced conversion of journalists captured by Islamist militants brings to mind. If they now revert from Islam [and yes, I am using that term ironically] technically for some Muslims they are apostates, even thought their conversion was coerced and probably insincere. Muslim jurisprudence does require that religious activities are sincerely done, but I'm not sure that this is something that would overconcern the kind of people who would do or applaud this kind of action. Similarly, I would expect no announcement of their 'reversion' as that may endanger them to the extremists who may feel that they should execute the proper sentence on apostates.

For those who don't 'get' the reversion thing. Some Muslims argue that since every soul is naturally Muslim at birth and falls away from Islam by socialisation, someone who 'converts' to Islam is actually returning to their original state, so 'reversion' is a more appropriate label. Of course, in a sense, that makes apostates of us all. Isn't that nice?

� 25/08/2006 - Muslim Leader Argues For Tolerance For Apostates From Islam - Barnabas Fund:
Filed in: Islam, apostasy, punishment, sharia, hadith, sunnah, hermeneutics, reform

Eugene Peterson's Satanic "Lord's Prayer"!

Just occasionally we come across something where, as Marge Simpson once said, "There's so many things wrong with that, I don't know where to start" And yet I think that I need to have a go at starting. Here's the 'offending' passage.

Eugene Peterson has the abysmal brazenness to desecrate the Scripture in this manner. What is shocking is that seminary professors are actually endorsing this guy! Look at what he does to the precious Lord's Prayer:
"as above, so below" (The Message, Peterson, Matt. 6)
That is Satanism! The witches pray the same prayer.

Going from the more general to the more particular: the original Greek is hardly the rather polite and middle class that readers of many English translations might think. Well, except perhaps Luke, though even there we don't really have classical Greek. And as for John's Greek, and Paul has his rather impolite moments too ... The problem here is reading the scriptures as if they were written to be high culture. They were written to communicate largely to ordinary people in ordinary language. In fact, Paul even tends to make free with non-religious or even other-religious vocab to convey spiritual ideas. So I can quite imagine him being somewhat envious of Petersen's translation which seems to me to capture the idea quite well. And for the record, in any case, Wiccans have borrowed the term from medieval Christian mysticism, as far as I knew. And, more importantly, Wicca is not Satanism, that kind of equation is dead-set to prevent us helping people in Wicca to understand the gospel because they get so worked up that they do not want to know what those who are so ignorant and arrogant have to say.
I'd go one further; 'Amen' might be well translated as 'so mote it be', if I wanted to put it in the 'Merrie England' vocab that certain Wiccans seem to be over fond of.
Lighting The Way International: Eugene Peterson's Satanic "Lord's Prayer"!:
Filed in: Lord's-prayer, paternoster, The_Message

The great catch-up; what's beengoing on while I've been at Greenbelt?

Well, all kinds of interesting stuff. Just because we've had a public holiday in Britain, doesn't mean the rest of the world stopped. I thought that this revelation was disturbing.
Disaster capitalism: how to make money out of misery And here's why according to Noami Klein, and I fear she may have a point;

One year ago, New Orleans's working-class and poor citizens were stranded on their rooftops waiting for help that never came, while those who could pay their way escaped to safety. The country's political leaders claim it was all some terrible mistake, a breakdown in communication that is being fixed. Their solution is to go even further down the catastrophic road of "private-sector solutions."
Unless a radical change of course is demanded, New Orleans will prove to be a glimpse of a dystopian future, a future of disaster apartheid in which the wealthy are saved and everyone else is left behind.

And the relatively benign side of global capitalism seems to be Google's making the classics available for free download. Of course these are books whose copyright has expired or never existed. There's no other way to make money from them really -except perhaps by translating them into Mandarin.

On another tack, there are rumours that the Pope is considering endorsing Intelligent Design. Part of the evidence is

The Pope also raised the issue in the inaugural sermon of his pontificate, saying: "We are not the accidental product, without meaning, of evolution."

. Of course it will all depend on what is meant by intelligent design and how that is construed in relation to evolution. I would agree with Ratzinger on the quote but would want to say that I do not see a problem with evolution as a mechanism or that it excludes meaning. I await the outcome with interest.

And a further report on the 'free energy' thing with Steorn that I blogged last week.

ask Martin Fleischmann, the cold-fusion scientist, now 79 and retired, what he thought of the Steorn project. "I am actually a conventional scientist," he says, "but I do accept that the existing [quantum electro-dynamic] paradigm is not adequate. If what these men are saying turns out to be true, that would be proof that the paradigm was inadequate and we would have to come up with some new theory. But I don't think their claims are credible. No, I cannot see how the position of magnetic fields allows one to create energy."

I feel the same, I suspect that if there is something in it, it involves stripping the magnets of energy, somehow. Though that would be interesting enough.

And finally the 'battle of the planets' has changed our solar system taxonomically,

The new classification means that the science textbooks will have to be ripped up, as the solar system is now made up of the eight "classical planets", plus a number of dwarf planets. The classical planets are: Mercury, Venus, Earth, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune... two of the objects that at one point were cruising toward possible full-fledged planet status will join Pluto as dwarfs: the asteroid Ceres, which was a planet in the 1800s before it got demoted, and 2003 UB313, an icy object slightly larger than Pluto nicknamed Xena by its discoverer, Michael Brown ... The new rules for a planet state: "a celestial body that is in orbit around the sun, has sufficient mass for its self-gravity to overcome rigid body forces so that it assumes a ... nearly round shape, and cleared the neighbourhood around its orbit".

Filed in: capitalism, aid, privatisation, tsunami

And God will delight ...

When we are creators of justice and joy
Yes God will delight
When we are creators of justice
Justice and joy.

So went the chorus in one of the songs we sang this morning in the communion service at Greenbelt. The song was writtn by Shirley Erena Murray in 1998 and it was my first exposure to it. It really spoke to me in a mini-epiphany moment as the bit of my theology that sees God's creativity imaged in artistic endeavour met and kissed that bit that recognises the love of God is expresesed [among other things] in a deep longing and hard push towards justice. For me it is really meaningful, resonant, helpful, to think about working towards justice as reflecting the redemptive creativity of God. And more, that God takes pleasure in that work as we might take pleasure in a work of art.

Thanks Shirley Elena Murray for broadening and deepening my appreciation of God by connecting up two metaphors I had been finding fruitful in my devotional and theological life. Of course, it all looks so obvious now I smile in wonder at how I could have missed it and how obvious it must seem to at least some other people.

But I like that imag of justice work as artistry; it helps me to appreciate too the potential justice work in artistry.

The verses were pretty good too. Verse one grabbed me right as we began:
"For everyone born, a place at the table
For everyone born, clean water and bread.
For everyone born, a safe place for growing.
For everyone born, a star overhead."

I want to say more broadly, though, and this gives some context. In the last few years, for me, some of the most moving worship I experience has been at Grenbelt and particularly the communion service. I have found at various times that I have been unable to sing because when I try a lump comes to my htroat and tears to my eyes. The common factor seems to be, as I now reflect on it, the heart of God for a hurting world. Perhaps this is why some of the songs I used to find so inspiring seem so trite and trivail to me now that I find it hard to engage with them at all ...

And yet songs like A Place at the Table are not comfortable to sing; verse three says "For just and unjust, a place at the table / abuser, abused, with need to forgive, / in anger and hurt a mindset of mercy / For just and unjust, a new way to live.

Take a deep breath, eh?

Greebelting happily

So here I am; I've paid me two quid for a coffee and half an hour online at the Tank [sponsored bt SureFish -geddit?]. So far I've done a bit of goforing for a speaker been told that anosther has his own minder and helped move some furnitire for the contributors' patio. I have also puntered in a session on justice spirituality and learned a few more things about podcasting -enough I hope now to do it just as soon as I can set things up which may not be for a few months, I suspect.

The weather's been fine but for a couple of light showers overnight and a heavy one that's just started. I'm hoping that this may turn out to be the last of it but I suspect we've a shower or two more to face. Thursday night was clear but really cold but we all slept better in the relative warmth of last night.

One of the joys of Greenbelt is meeting up with old friends and acquaintances and I have had my share of that so far. And then there's the meeting of people that I can't believe I haven't already run into given where we've lived and our interests.

Anyway, this is just really about keeping you up to date so I'll sign off now.

PS it's Weds 30th and alerted by Boy in the Bands I have corrected some of the more obvious typos ... Caused not by Blackberrying but by typing against the constraint of time in an internet cafe using a QWERTY keyboard when I normally use a Dvorak layout.

Hexham

A couple of days back we made a visit to Hexham, market town, ancient abbey centre and tourist trap. Actually, a really nice little town. Lots of coffee shops and new agey places as well as a nice abbey church -above. Below is a view towards the river Tyne. And below that a blow up of the centre, which is why I took the picture; the steelworks is an interesting contrast.

War of the Worlds

It seems that the debate about Pluto is still stumbling on, although the likelihood of redefinitions is still there. It looks like we're likely to be officially a solar system of 8 planets plus three or four ... somethings ... but not 'Plutons' as originally reported and proposed.

Among the scientists who torpedoed "pluton" were geologists, who pointed out — somewhat embarrassingly to astronomers — that it's already a prominent term in volcano science for deep igneous rock formations.

Of the alternatives I can't help feeling that 'dwarf planet' is most likely to get the popular vote.
Wired News: War of the Worlds:
Filed in: Pluto, planets, definition

Lead us not into the temptation to be Terrorised

A few days ago I commented on the recent mutiny by some airline passengers resulting in the removal of two passengers. Well, this article from Wired news makes me feel vindicated. A telling and helpful phrase puts it thus;

The real targets of terrorism are the rest of us: the billions of us who are not killed but are terrorized because of the killing. The real point of terrorism is not the act itself, but our reaction to the act.

And we're doing exactly what the terrorists want.

And in fact, even though this plot was foiled, they've actually succeeded because 'we' have let them jerk our chains. The public really needs to be educated about this, not pandered to. So I repeat that what should have happened in the passenger 'hijacking' recently is that the complainants should have been told that the complained-abouts had gone through security and that if that wasn't enough, they could leave the aircraft and take a later flight themselves.

The Wired article has some helpful advice to close which I want to underline.

It's time we calm down and fight terror with antiterror. This does not mean that we simply roll over and accept terrorism. ... But our job is to remain steadfast in the face of terror, to refuse to be terrorized. Our job is to not panic every time two Muslims stand together checking their watches. ... Our job is to think critically and rationally, and to ignore the cacophony of other interests trying to use terrorism to advance political careers or increase a television show's viewership. ... Our job is to recognize that terrorism is just one of the risks we face, and not a particularly common one at that. And our job is to fight those politicians who use fear as an excuse to take away our liberties and promote security theater that wastes money and doesn't make us any safer.

God save us from our complicity in terrorism by allowing our dark sides to be hooked by news reporting and mimetic panic. God give us the wisdom and courage to refuse to be terrorised.
Wired News: Refuse to be Terrorized
Filed in: terrorism, aircraft, mob-rule, lynching

Kelly calls for 'honest debate' on extremism

And would this be the kind of debate which would involve the expressions of opinions that her government's bill on religious tolerance would have made illegal. I do think that it may be...

Examining the issues that raise tensions between different groups in different areas, and that lead to segregation and conflict
...
· Looking at how local communities can be empowered to tackle extremist ideologies

Not allowing people to express honest perceptions and real disagreements would not have been the right way forward, now, would it?
Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | Kelly calls for 'honest debate' on extremism
Filed in: extremism debate terrorism UK multiculturalism

Smoking ban has driven away regulars. But ...

Of course there may be all sorts of other things to be considered here. First there has been an increasing trend for people to drink at home, perhaps this has accelerated that and things may level off. It is also true that some people like me and my wife are more likely to visit a pub if it's non-smoking. But frankly, we've got used to not going because I hate the smell on my clothes and hair and my wife also has asthma which is exacerbated by cigarette smoke. It would take a while for people like us to re-jig our habits to consider pubbing again.

This is the difficulty with anything that is about restructuring cultural habits; if you look at the figures too early, you get misleading impressions. We will need to be wary of this with things like green taxes; figures suggest that you need at least two years to see the results properly as that kind of time-frame is needed for people to assess impacts in their own life and to turn around habits and to make decisions which often involve significant outlays or other people. So good to read also,

pub companies and industry analysts expressed scepticism ... Mr Patton said it was too early to say what the effect of the ban had been on its pubs in Scotland.

and thinking about the impact when a similar ban hits England,

JD Wetherspoon, which has 650 pubs in Britain, said it was not worried about the impact it would have. "It will hit profits for the first year and a half but you have to think long-term,"

That sounds more sensible.

Guardian Unlimited Business | | Scottish publicans say smoking ban has driven away regulars
Filed in: smoking pubs trade

Lina Joy and Religious Freedom in Malaysia

I'd always thought that Malaysia was relatively liberal as Islamic states went. But ...

Formerly called Azlina Jailani, she is an ethnic Malay who converted from Islam to Christianity in 1990, but since then has been unable to have the word Islam deleted from her identity card. As a result of her conversion she has already suffered imprisonment in a drug rehabilitation centre for men, where on one occasion she was caned on her back, in an effort to force her to return to Islam. Lina Joy began her legal battle to change her official status in 2001 in a civil court. She tried to avoid having the matter handled by a Syariah court, arguing that Article 11 of the constitution guarantees the right of all citizens of Malaysia to choose their own religion. Islamic law (Syariah law) specifies the death sentence and other punishments for apostasy from Islam. However, a lower court ruled that civil law cannot have precedence over Syariah law in this case. A Syariah court would prohibit her from officially leaving Islam. Now she is waiting for the ruling of the Federal Court, which is the highest court in Malaysia.

PS update on this story at this posting.
� 23/08/2006 - The Lina Joy Case and Religious Freedom in Malaysia - Barnabas Fund:
Filed in: Islam, shariah, Malaysia, religion, freedom, conversion, Christian

Ozone hole has stabilised, say scientists

Here's some encouraging news.

We can say the patient isn't getting any sicker because the ozone hole isn't getting any deeper, any broader

However, we're not out of the woods yet as the referenced article points out.
Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | Ozone hole has stabilised, say scientists:
Filed in: ozone, progress, Antarctica

Million Solar Roofs Bill Signed into Law

After a long roller-coaster ride in the California legislature, the Million Solar Roofs Bill, SB1, is now law. Governor Schwarzenegger, who campaigned on a pledge to create a major solar program, signed the bill Monday.

RenewableEnergyAccess.com | Million Solar Roofs Bill Signed into Law:
Filed in: solar, energy, California

A Rest and Reflection Action Plan

I thought that this brief checklist about 'time out for/with God' was worth noting.

Diverting Daily
In my attempt to take a daily quiet time for the purposes of gaining perspective and growing in my relationship with God, I am:
__ Doing well __Needing improvement __Doing poorly
My action plan is to:_______________________________

Withdrawing Weekly
In my attempt to take a weekly Sabbath day for the purposes of gaining perspective, physical refreshment, family health and growing in my relationship with God, I am:
__ Doing well __Needing improvement __Doing poorly
My action plan is to:_______________________________

Maintaining Monthly
In my attempt to take a monthly retreat day for the purposes of gaining perspective, concentrated prayer and listening and growing in my relationship with God, I am:
__ Doing well __Needing improvement __Doing poorly
My action plan is to:_______________________________
Abandoning Annually
In my attempt to take a yearly retreat of at least three days for the purposes of gaining perspective and concentrating deeply on my relationship with God, I am:
__ Doing well __Needing improvement __Doing poorly
My action plan is to:_______________________________

from A Natural Church Development Resource Kit for Pastors and Church Leaders - Guidebook
Robert E. Logan & Thomas T. Clegg with Jeanette Buller. Permission to post from http://www.ChurchSmart.com

Praying Pastor Blog: A Rest and Reflection Action Plan:
Filed in: church, leadership, spiritual, rule_of_life

I'll be at Greenbelt

This is just to warn more regular readers that I'll be going to Greenbelt tomorrow. I'll be working part time as a speakers' escort but this year I have not asked to accompany any particular speakers, I'm looking forward to the adventure of pot luck. If I get the chance I'll have a go at a bit of blogging while I'm there... we'll see how it goes.
Greenbelt - Talks Section
Filed in: greenbelt

Scholars to end Muslim confusion over start of Ramadan

I was encouraged to read this, as it shows the capacity of fiqh to respond to evidence and new developments. Now we just hav to hope that there are ways for this process to be rolled out over things like the status of women, the status of converts from Islam ...

the Fiqh Council contends that the prophet used direct sightings only because no other method was reliable in his lifetime. "Now, we know scientifically whether the moon is there, even if it is not sightable because of the weather conditions," said Muzammil Siddiqi, the council chairman.

I find lots of evidence that normal educated Muslims tend to do this, but I'm less sure that the ulema tend to inhabit the same world.
Islam :: Scholars to end Muslim confusion over start of Ramadan:
Filed in: Islam, fiqh, Eid, dating, interpretation, hadith

In praise of Tyndale and perspectivising the KJV

This is an interesting article to have handy for when you run into KJV fundies, going through the history of the English translation and so setting the matter in a wider context which somehow makes the issue fall into perspective. I especially chuckled over this:

James had a passionate dislike of the Geneva Bible because its marginal notes did not support the notion that the Bible upholds the divine right of kings, a doctrine James was passionate about

; it amused me because the home of KJV fundamentalism seems to be the USA, and I find it amusing that all those republicans defend a translation that in its origins functioned to attempt to outlaw the forces that gave rise to the the American republic. What a hoot! Doubly so as

various Puritans when they moved to America, did not bring a KJV with them. Their Bible of choice was the Geneva Bible.

Anyway, the producers

were not trying to be innovators, but nor were they mere copiers of earlier versions, particularly in spots where there had been advances in original language study. And they were only as good as the original language manuscripts they had would allow them to be.

In other words, they were updating in a conservative way using the best manuscripts then available. There's no sense of the divine providence of the Textus Receptus, it just happened to be the best they had at the time, and the process by which it might be regarded as the best is, in essence, the one which helps us to assess more recent MS discoveries. And one of the comments on the article has a nice addendum:

Ken Schenck said...
One of the most interesting (and most deconstructive) tidbits about the King James only debate is the fact that the KJV in current use is actually the fifth revision to update the language and dates from the late 1700's. So by using this fifth update of the 1611 version, a person implicitly acknowledges the validity of updating the language over time... which of course deconstructs the KJV only argument in its most virulent form.

Interestingly to the dialectician in me,

considering where the universities were in England, and taking into account Tyndale’s own Oxford pedigree, the English that we find in the King James is basically the English of southeastern England,

This is why all those '-eth' endings for third person singular verbs; if they'd used a northern dialect we'd have had the form that won the dialectal battle: '-[e]s'.

It also had some unexpected pleasures for me. I focused more on Wycliffe when we studied the English reformation, so I didn't really recall this info about William Tyndale. I had forgotten how influential he was on English language.

It was Tyndale who came up with the hybrid term Jehovah which combines two different Hebrew names for God. He invented the English word Passover for the Hebrew pesah. It is also to Tyndale that we owe the use of terms like scapegoat and atonement to translate Hebrew terms that had no good direct English equivalents.

I'm amused slightly to realise that I know live in Tynedale -which is presumably where Tyndale's family is named after.
Ben Witherington: The Origins of the English Bible:
Filed in: Bible English Latin Greek, Hebrew, Aramaic, translation, language, Reformation

All great truths begin as blasphemies

If you are interested in getting the results of the Steorn 'perpectual motion' device which I blogged about the other day, when they are tested independently, this page will allow you to sign up and find out as and when ...
They seem to be fairly upfront about this: they aren't asking for money, they seem as perplexed as the rest of us and they seem to be happy for a transparent process of independent testing.
I was intrigued by one of the comments in response to the Wired article which seemed to offer a potential explanation.

There are some aspects of physics that are never taught and therefore never considered. If you add the magnetic field (B) from a bar magnet to one from a current carrying coil wound on that bar (deltaB) the field everywhere is a the sum of two terms, B+deltaB. Energy density goes with the square of the field, so expanding the square of the sum we get B^2 +2BdeltaB + deltaB^2. B^2 is the original energy from the magnet. deltaB^2 is the energy from the coil. 2BdeltaB is excess energy gained from where? That is not a trivial amount of energy, and it can be shown that it comes from the quantum domain. It is ignored because over a full cycle it is generally not available to us.

I think that comes down to saying that the magnetic force is potentially harnessable as energy, but it's not been done yet. Of course if that were what was happening, what would the ecology of it be?
But then there's always the claim on Steorn's own discussion pages, "In the past six years they have given the impression of offering various goods and services, even something about detecting counterfeit CDs and stuff. They seem to have got investors for their products but never sold anything. Needles to say the money was 'lost' into the expenses of developing the fictitious product and the investeors never got a cent back. DOnt take my word for it, just dig around a little especially in a web archive and decide for your self. I'm not stating anything here just pointing out what one might want to look for." So if you sign up to hear more, don't part with any money until and unless you see the proof reported in reputable fora.
Steorn
Filed in: energy, magnet, generation

Smelly Global Warming Fix

Our entire energy economy is dependent on burning fossil fuel, and that's not going to stop anytime soon. We need a stopgap solution.

And the one being proposed is to shoot sulphur into the atmosphere. The idea came from observing the effects of recent volcanic eruptions, one of which lowered global temperatures for a time by one degree celsius. This is not a long-term solution, but maybe could help. However, it is not, either, without its own risks to ecologies ...

Wired News: This Global Warming Fix Stinks:
Filed in: energy, CO2, climate_change, sulphur

Tackling the causes of terrorism

Sensible, constructive and even wise words from Huga Young in the Guardian. Following my earlier comment about mob rule in an aircraft, this makes interesting reading.

There is no point being in denial ... Muslims will be more likely to organise around and identify with their religious identity, both at home and abroad, so long as they feel attacked as a result of their religious identity. There is no sensible conversation you can have about Islamic identity that does not address what is happening to Muslims locally and globally.... The war on terror did not create Islamic fundamentalism but it has exacerbated it. The government should not change its foreign policy because it makes Muslims angry (it should change it because it is immoral, ineffective and makes virtually the entire world angry). But nor should it treat this anger as though it were the unpredictable response of fanatics who don't watch the news and operate in isolation to world events.

It does seem to me that the problem with neocon type responses that are about the iron fist, is that they only ramp up the problem.

Fundamentalists only thrive at times of crisis. At certain moments for certain identities they offer not just the easy way out but what can seem like the only way out. To be serious about combating them one must first be serious about tackling the crisis that gives them leverage. Only when you offer an alternative and more attractive route out of that crisis can you isolate the leaders and win over the followers. To do so is not indulgent but intelligent.

Yes, indeed. Hope is a powerful motivator. Destroy it and you create desperados who become the monsters we project them to be, but morally, we will share the blame. Jesus warned us that those who were the cause of others stumbling had to face up to their responsibilities.

Guardian Unlimited | Comment is free | To fight these reactionaries we must tackle the crisis that they feed off:
Filed in: terrorism, Islam, UK, identity

A Yogi walked into a pizza place ...

What did the Yogi say when he walked into the Zen Pizza Parlor?
"Make me one with everything."
When the Yogi got the pizza, he gave the proprietor a $20 bill. The proprietor pocketed the bill. The Yogi said "Don't I get change?"
The proprietor said, "Change must come from within."

There you have it; an example of why my children despair of my [so called] sense of humour.
Jokes:
Filed in: humour, religion, Buddhism

100 questions at the heart of the UK's environmental future<

British scientists have set a research agenda to try to give info on the top 100 ecological issues facing planners in the UK.

How long does the seabed take to recover from dredging, wind farm construction and oil and gas extraction?
How does the ecological impact of UK farming compare internationally?
What are the ecological impacts of airports?
What are the ecological impacts of faecal matter, pesticides and undigested food flows from aquaculture?
How can we better understand diseases within wildlife reservoirs to protect humans and livestock?
What impact does plastic litter have on the marine environment?
How can we measure natural capital (renewable and non renewable resources) and integrate such a measure into GDP?
What are the effects of light pollution on wildlife?
Which habitats and species might we lose completely in the UK because of climate change?
What hedgerow structure and management produce the greatest wildlife benefits?
How can flood control be assisted by habitat management and what are the impacts on biodiversity?

Filed in: ecology, UK, impacts, research
Guardian Unlimited | Science | The 100 questions at the heart of the UK's environmental future:

Mob rules: how terrorism fuels new witch hunts

I couldn't believe my ears when I heard this nor my eyes when I read it.

a passenger mutiny in which several British families refused to travel on a plane with two Asian men. The men were forced to leave the flight after fellow passengers wrongly suspected them of being terrorists. Several people on board flight ZB 613 from Malaga to Manchester demanded their removal.

These guys had been through security. The passengers making the complaints should have been evicted. This sounds to be little more than mob-rule and should not be pandered to. The men concerned, in my view should be entitled to seek compensation from the Airline and the passengers making the complaints.
The terrorists have won a victory here of further alienating muslims and mainstream non-muslim society from one another. We should not give them the satisfaction.
Independent Online Edition > Transport: Filed in: terrorism, aircraft, mob-rule, lynching

Iran cartoon-show mocks Holocaust

This is interesting in raising a probably valid point but also in the way a point is missed.

'Why is it acceptable in western countries to draw any caricature of the Prophet Mohammed, yet as soon as there are any questions or doubts raised about the Holocaust, fines and jail sentences are handed down?' Tabatabai told The Observer.

If it'd been about making jokes about the holocaust, the point would be made and perhaps some of us would have an insight into the insensitivity and unpleasantness that Muslims felt was expressed in the Danish cartoons. But I think harnessing it to promote holocaust denialism is a mistake. And then it elides some other important differences. Holocaust denial may earn a prison sentence in some countries, but not a death penalty. And, as far as I'm aware, holocaust jokes [and I have heard some] may be considered bad taste and offensive but they don't get judicial notice unless they are tied to other offenses...
So this is assymetrical memefare?
The Observer | World | Iran cartoon show mocks Holocaust:
Filed in: Iran, cartoon, holocaust, humour, Mohammed, Islam

Scientists flock to test 'free energy' discovery

I can understand the skepticism. I tend to have an inner voice which is only too quick to pipe up 'if it sounds too good to be true, it is too good to be true'. And this sounds a bit like the invention of a perpetual motion machine. And yet, the hopeful voice in me says, 'what if it is right?'

Sean McCarthy says that no one was more sceptical than he when Steorn, his small hi-tech firm in Dublin, hit upon a way of generating clean, free and constant energy from the interaction of magnetic fields. 'It wasn't so much a Eureka moment as a get-back-in-there-and-check-your-instruments moment, although in far more colourful language,' said McCarthy. But when he attempted to share his findings, he says, scientists either put the phone down on him or refused to endorse him publicly in case they damaged their academic reputations. So last week he took out a full-page advert in the Economist magazine, challenging the scientific community to examine his technology. McCarthy claims it provides five times the amount of energy a mobile phone battery generates for the same size, and does not have to be recharged.

Is this cold fusion or hot new discovery. I will be on the look out for the results of the peer reviews.
See also an initial article at Wired news. And the company's website making the call for falsification.
The Observer | UK News | Scientists flock to test 'free energy' discovery:
Filed in: energy, renemable, magnetic, science, free

Archbishop of York's fast for peace

I have to say when I heard of this, I thought 'brilliant', 'what a good and positive image to present' and 'probably the only bishop in the CofE who has the imagination, determination and courage to do this; good on him.

the Archbishop of York, Dr Sentamu, is camped out in a purple tent, as part of a week-long vigil of prayer and fasting for peace in the Middle East, and community relations in Britain... He is sleeping rough on the floor in his one-man tent before the altar, as an act of solidarity with those forced to take refuge in churches, bunkers, and shelters. He has urged people to forgo a meal, and donate the money to charities working in the conflict zone.

I think that it seems to be having a positive effect more broadly,

The imam from the local mosque is here today, with other Muslims. The Archbishop has had many encounters already: a diabetic who had exchanged beer for tea and donated the money; a man whose marriage had broken up and who had gone to pieces, but who had seen the Archbishop on television and thought: "He'll do for me." Dr Sentamu says with joy: "God is giving me work."

It reminded me of accounts of how people used to seek out the anchorites attached to churches in the medieval period [Dame Julian is a famous exemplar]. The good thing about this is the positive image of a senior cleric being positively spiritual in a way that a lot of spiritual seekers can identify with and commend.
Church Times - York's hermit fasts for peace:
Filed in: archbishop, Sentamu, York, fast, peace

Shi'a Islam, the Mahdi and the Twelvers

For background on the Mahdi see this article in which we learn

Traditional Islamic eschatology predicts a period of great conflict at the end of time preceding the final resurrection and judgement. This tribulation period is characterized by natural catastrophes and terrible wars. An Antichrist figure (the Dajjal) appears, allied to Jews and Christians, who causes corruption and oppression all over the world, deceiving many by his miracles and false teachings. A heaven-sent saviour, the Mahdi (the rightly guided one) appears to fight the forces of Satan, restore Islam to its original perfection and glory, and set up God’s (Islamic) kingdom on earth

.
Sounds familiar in several ways, does it not? But note how easy it is for contemporary Shi'as to read today's world through that lens especially if feeling humiliated, or excluded, or the victim of unjust systems. The current Iranian administration is heavily into the 'Twelver' version of mahdism;

For Twelver Shi‘a, the expected Mahdi is their Twelfth Imam, Muhammad al-Mahdi, who was born in 869 and disappeared in 873 in Samarra when still a child. He is called the Hidden Imam, as it is firmly believed that he did not die, but lives on in a spiritual invisible mode (occultation) and will return as the Mahdi at the end of days

And it is an activist version -making preparations to hasten the day rather than passively waiting.

Christians are acquainted with similar kinds of mentality and so it should not be hard for us to follow the logics. It's interesting, of course, because it also can have the effect of helping us to enter imaginatively into how some versions of Christianity may look to others ... that's nearly always one of the fascinating things about this kind of interfaith encounter.
� 17/08/2006 - TWELVER SHI‘A MAHDISM AND PRESIDENT AHMADINEJAD OF IRAN - Barnabas Fund
Filed in: Shi'a, Mahdi, twelvers, Islam, Iran, Hizbollah

Diverse Perspective on Jesus

http://poorinspirit.blogspot.com/2006/08/more-diverse-perspective-on-jesus.html>
This is a fabulous collection of imagery in one picture. On the one side it's great to see a visual representation how Jesus, and by implication his meaning and teaching, has been inculturated in such a diversity of cultures. Of course we should recall the inherant danger of it; that we domesticate Christ and indulge in cheap grace.
Blessed Are the Poor in Spirit: A More Diverse Perspective on Jesus
Filed in: Jesus, image, art, mosaic

A More Diverse Perspective on Jesus

http://poorinspirit.blogspot.com/2006/08/more-diverse-perspective-on-jesus.html
This is a fabulous collection of imagery in one picture. On the one side it's great to see a visual representation how Jesus, and by implication his meaning and teaching, has been inculturated in such a diversity of cultures. Of course we should recall the inherant danger of it; that we domesticate Christ and indulge in cheap grace.
Blessed Are the Poor in Spirit: A More Diverse Perspective on Jesus
Filed in: Jesus, image, art, mosaic

Tagged -the book meme

Chris Monroe tagged me for the book meme thingy. So here's my attempt to come up with something like coherant answers!

1. One book that changed your life: Actually that really ought to be the Gospels; that's not because it's the right 'Sunday school' answer; it's because it's true. There is no other book I can think of that really deserves the epithet 'changed my life'. There've been lots that have had a big effect but the Gospels are way ahead. However, if we took out biblical stuff, I guess I might plump for 'The Dust of Death' by Os Guinness. It opened my eyes to cultural analysis, issues of radical discipleship and laid the groundwork for me to understand postmodernity. In its way it set me up for a lifetime's interest in cultural dialogue with the gospel.

2. One book that you’ve read more than once: I really think I have to draw a line under scripture here and offer other books! So from here on in it's 'Desert Island Disks' rules; we assume the Bible and Shakespeare ... That means that probably I could mention Lord of the Rings here.

3. One book you’d want on a desert island: I'd want something that could be read time and time again ... hmmm ... perhaps the Poetry of TS Eliot as long as I had a commentary! But, as linguist I'm quite attracted by the idea of something to learn another language by, I suspect that 'Teach Yourself Chinese' might be a good idea being as statistically its the most likely language of potential rescuers and I know the other two statistically likely languages...

4. One book that made you laugh: The Sacred Diary of Adrian Plass. One of the few books that had me laughing out loud AND then I commended as a Lent book to a congregation I thought needed not to take religion so seriously.

5. One book that made you cry: "Matthew" by Bob Jackson. The story of the death of the son of the vicar I trained with and how their family coped with it. I guess the personal connection helps -my wife gets a mention.

6. One book you wish had been written: Christ the Fulfilment of the New Spiritualities of the West -a constructive engagement with the spiritual search of many who were labelled 'new age', should have been published in the early 80's and countered the scaremongery stuff which stopped Christians engaging missionally with the most significant spiritual movement in the west in the latter half of the 20th century.

7. One book you wish had never been written: This Present Darkness by Frank Peretti. The popularisation of unbiblical ideas of spiritual warfare has arguably and probably set back the cause of Christ. It's the Pentecostal equivalent of the Da Vinci Code: fiction purporting to offer a factual background and which is harmful to Christian apologetics.

8. One book you’re currently reading: Colossians Re:mixed and very good it is too.

9. One book you’ve been meaning to read: Walter Brueggeman on Genesis.

10. One book you’d like to write: Culture Jamming Liturgy [as a matter of fact, I have a few bits and bobs towards this, about three part-chapters.]


Right, that's it. So the next question is, who do I tag in turn?

Study Shows multimedia helps adults learn more rapidly

I had thought that this was already established but now neuroscience seems to be demonstrating it too.

using stimuli that involve both vision and hearing can be combined to produce speedier learning of visual information and suggest that multi-sensory training programs may be more effective for adults learning new skills -- such as discriminating differences between highly similar objects, or finding an item in cluttered scene.
According to Aaron Seitz, a research assistant professor of psychology at BU and lead investigator of the study, the traditional belief among neuroscientists is that the five senses operate largely as independent systems. However, mounting data suggests that interactions between vision, hearing, smell, touch and taste are the rule rather than the exception when it comes to how the human brain processes sensory information and thus perceives things.

Caveat, while it may turn out that these results are more generalisable. It should be pointe out that this only really demonstrates learning in a fairly constrained set of circumstances. But, assuming on the basis of the kinds of research that gives us those training nostrums about hearing and seeing and how much learning gets done, this is a shot in the arm for those of us who say that liturgy should be multi-sensory if we want to maximise the impact...
ScienceDaily: Study Shows Combination Of Sight And Sound Helps Adults Learn Basic Visual Tasks More Rapidly:
Filed in: learning, adult, multi-media

Solving The Da Vinci Code

I know it's a bit passe now, but this is such a good catalogue of the factual errors in DVC that I simply had to give it a mention. Enjoy.
The Silver Tongue: Solving The Da Vinci Code
Filed in: Da_Vinci_Code, Christian, apologia

Cost of water shortage: civil unrest, mass migration and economic collapse

We're not talking of a UK summer drought; that's just a warning of a possible [read "likely"] future for the planet, and here are some of the potential outcomes.

Cholera may return to London, the mass migration of Africans could cause civil unrest in Europe and China's economy could crash by 2015 as the supply of fresh water becomes critical to the global economy. That was the bleak assessment yesterday by forecasters from some of the world's leading corporate users of fresh water, 200 of the largest food, oil, water and chemical companies.

I take little pleasure in noting that I have already highlighted some of these on these very pages. These drive me to prayer, and have me considering how to plan for the next 20 years of my life so I can be part of the solution and get away from being part of the problem.

The annoying thing is that we've essentially known the problems since the mid 70's. For many of us it is hard to do otherwise because we are embedded in systems that direct our patterns of life and co-opt our imagination. The principalities and powers, the corporisations of human activity, have us by the short and curlies. While some of us have the means and freedom to do something ourselves [and should do so], others of us have to act within our means constrained as we are by lack of resources, commitments to others who are not so sympathetic, lack of skills or access to vital resources and so on. We need to act in terms of pressure, voting, voluntary self-restraint, questionning others, setting what example we can, talking to others, praying so that systems get changed and ordinary people can find it increasingly easy to make good choices and then increasingly hard to make bad ones.
Guardian Unlimited | Special reports | Cost of water shortage: civil unrest, mass migration and economic collapse
Filed in: water, climate_change, geopolitics, migration, economics, unrest

Aramaic Lord's Prayer -a further reprise

It's interesting to note that the squidoo site I built as a more centralised repository for information about the alleged translation from the Aramaic of the Lord's prayer has been getting steadily more hits and seems to be working its way up the rankings of search engines when terms such as 'Aramaic' and 'Lord's prayer' are used. As I've been alert to and so following up Aramaic Lord's prayer items myself, I've realised that it's a modestly important theme in DIY spirituality matters. So I commend it to you if you are interested in such matters and you haven't already checked it out.

It's an interest that has begun to take hold of me a bit more too. I've researched the Aramaic myself somewhat and am continuing to do so -I've even learnt the prayer in Aramaic [and had lots of linguistic fun with the pharyngeals and trying to distinguish the sibilants and the vowels]. It's got to the point where I can have a rough go at parsing odds and ends of Aramaic.
Aramaic Lord's Prayer on Squidoo
Filed in: Lord's_prayer, paternoster, Aramaic, abwun, translation, midrash, qaddish

The ethics of forgiveness

Regular visitors will no doubt have already recognise my fascination with the issues of forgiveness. So in that vein, let me recommend this article which explores the real amibiguities and why it is that forgiveness is not necessarily seen a a virtue.

Consider, for example, two particular inflections of the question: Who needs
forgiveness? and Who needs forgiveness? Those versions of the question contain suspicion. The first implies suspicion about the universalizing view that all of us need forgiveness. True though that claim may be, the fact of human history is that some people inflict much more harm than others and it is important to measure responsibility accurately and to place accountability where it belongs. The second inflection questions the virtue of forgiveness. It suspects that forgiveness can become the partner of forgetting, condoning, relativizing and trivializing, all of which sacrifice justice for indifference, what Dietrich Bonhoeffer called “cheap grace” or self-serving rationalization.

It's that thing about sacrificing justice that lies at the heart of the matter, I think. It also surfaces in questions about the atonement. I don't think that we can talk about atonement in Christ without doing some important thinking about forgiveness and what it involves.
Science & Theology News - The ethics of forgiveness: Filed in: forgiveness, ethics, grace, condoning

There are 12 planets in our solar system

I take an inordinate delight in the overturning of orthodoxies of science. So I'm hoping that this proposal will get through. Basically the back story is that Pluto's status as a planet is either anomolous or it creates anomolies; its size and orbit mean that either there are objects that are better qualified to be planets or that it should not be classified as one. So a tidying up exercise has been attempted by the International Astronomy Union (IAU) which has been naming celestial bodies since 1919. The whole affair has meant that the issue of what constitutes a planet must be addressed.

The IAU ... agreed to come up with a scientific definition for planets. ... two conditions must be met: it must orbit a star without being a star itself, and it has to be big enough for its gravity to pull it into a spherical shape.

And this, in turn, means that they can then face the issue of what our solar system is made up of planetwise, and it means that

"Although Pluto remains a planet by the proposed definition, it will generally be preferable to call it a pluton to emphasise its role as the prototype for a physically distinct category of planetary bodies. Plutons are defined as having orbits around the sun that take more than 200 years to complete and are tilted with respect to those of the classical planets. These differing characteristics suggest that plutons have a different origin to the classical planets.

It also 'adds' three planets to the solar system [strictly, upgrades the status of three objects]. So celebrate the coming of age of Charon, Ceres and Xena. It may be that there could be more,

The IAU is already monitoring 12 more candidate planets, any of which could be upgraded in future. These include Varuna, Quaor and Sedna, all Pluto-like objects that reside in a region on the fringe of the solar system known as the Kuiper Belt.

Perhaps we might prefer to think of the solar system as having 8 planets and between 4 and 16 plutons ...
Taxonomy is an interesting subject, eh? After all, our naming and categorising makes little difference to the existence of these objects. Its purely for our own purposes.
Adam gave names to all the animals, and still it continues, only now we're on to celestial objects.
Guardian Unlimited | Science | Pluto survives as solar system acquires three more planets: Filed in: planets, solar_system, definition

How did we get here?

I have to admit I was really surprised by this UK figures about belief in creationism or intelligent design among university students indicating quite a turnaround from the 70's when I would have guessed that a fraction of the numbers would believe in creationism.

Opinionpanel Research's survey of more than 1,000 students found a third of those who said they were Muslims and more than a quarter of those who said they were Christians supported creationism. Nearly a third of Christians and 10% of those with no particular religion favoured intelligent design. Women were more likely to choose spiritual explanations: less than half chose evolution, with 14% preferring creationism and 22% intelligent design.

Now, there are further questions to be asked of this as presented. One of those is what is meant by intelligent design. I suspect, unless there was more detail in the questionning, that many respondants might well have thought intelligent design is evolution guided by God. In which case it's not such a big deal.

I think too that the 400kg gorrilla in the corner may be a cultural one, however to do with distrust in the agendas of 'authorities' like scientists and a disposition to give credence to marginalised narratives and to give notional alliegence to 'surpressed' beliefs which otherwise have no real impact on lives except to vaguely reinforce commitments already made [for the most part the kind of dynamic we see at work in things like the 'Da Vinci Code']. It is a way of resisting the totalising narrative of some science as presented in popular culture; give a place to the marginalised discourse. 'Science' after all has given us the Bomb, the threat of ABC weapons, global warming and very scary visions of the future not to mention its easy take-up by the proponents of eugenics and Nietzchean ethics ... take it down a peg or two.
That's just a set of hypotheses, but worth stating in case they help answer the title-question.

And then of course, the ever growing voice of the creationist perspective among the growing edge of western Christianity has had its effect by riding on the back of the oversimplistic reading of scripture ironically produced by the modernist mindset that it is deployed against in other areas, like this one. This is allied with the shrewd deployment of rhetorical power by creationist leaders to marginalise 'accommodationist' perspectives on the matter of origins so that it takes some energy and commitment to swim against the tide in some congregations, especially when you have articulate and 'cool' figures promoting the view too.

And, of course, another thing is, how come such a high figure among people who mostly don't go to church? That has to be worth chewing on, assuming that I have interpreted the stats right. It is noteworthy how many people from a Muslim background are creationist too. I think that petrodollars are probably backing that up. Another irony, given that petroleum is part of the evidence for evolution and the geophys for finding the stuff is based on evolutionistically-informed geology, if I'm not mistaken.

EducationGuardian.co.uk | higher news | How did we get here?:
Filed in: evolution, religion, creationism, students, research, UK, intelligent_design, Islam,

Archaeologists Challenge Link Between Dead Sea Scrolls and Essenes

For those of us concerned with apologetics to alternative spiritualities, this is potentially a big deal. So in a nutshell, here's the nub of it:

For years, Dr. Golb has argued that the multiplicity of Jewish religious ideas and practices recorded in the scrolls made it unlikely that they were the work of a single sect like the Essenes. He noted that few of the texts dealt with specific Essene traditions. Not one, he said, espoused celibacy, which the sect practiced.
The scrolls in the caves were probably written by many different groups, Dr. Golb surmised, and were removed from Jerusalem libraries by refugees in the Roman war. Fleeing to the east, the refugees may well have deposited the scrolls for safekeeping in the many caves near Qumran.

I'm aware of the pottery factory hypothesis, but I had thought that it had been seen as unlikely because of the placing of the latrines on the Qumran site which indicated a religious community's concerns. So I also issue a 'health warning' that there may be a lot more argument going on about this than the press picks up, especially when it is involved in a book promotion. Nevertheless, a 'watch this space' item. And, of course, if any reader has more intel on the matter, comment it.
Archeology :: Archaeologists Challenge Link Between Dead Sea Scrolls and Ancient Sect:
Filed in: Qumran, Essenes, Dead_Sea_scrolls, archaeology

Forging holidays and vacations

You know, having listened over the years to people recounting their holidays, it does seem that for a number of people the point is to earn bragging rights. Now it appears that someone has created a business out of selling holiday bragging rights without you having to go on holiday; basically by selling you forged 'evidence' of the purported holiday.

Russian travel agency Persey Tours specializes in forged vacations. And making it believable is the whole point.
- Without ever having to pack a bag, clients get full documentation – ticket stubs, fake photos, receipts – all for a trip they never took.
- According to Persey's founder and prevaricator-in-chief, Dmitry Popov, the company even faked a Russian space shuttle trip to the moon for a Siberian gas station owner

Ingenious; and probably much better for ones carbon footprint! [Wait, that's another advertising angle!]
However, it is interesting to stop and reflect about what it says about our culture. That going on holiday is something that is quite a bit about managing the perception those around us in everyday life have of us. In other words, it's about things like status and respect rather than rest, recuperation or personal growth. Perhaps, as Christians we should examine our own 'vacationing habits' with the question about why we do it. One of the purposes of doing so is to be able to develop new habits that don't cost the earth by contributing to the degradation of our planet. What do we really need from a holiday? What do we want? How far is what we want driven by 'unworthy' motives like gaining the respect or envy of others?

I would suggest that holidays should be in a Christian perspective about rest, recuperation of body, mind, soul relationships and Godwardness. For the most part, I have to question how far most of those aims, most of the time, require large amounts of fossil fuels to be burnt ...
But it's possible that there are other factors that I have not considered, and I want to invite further comments before we send the jury out to consider the verdict.
Iconoculture - Consumer Research Service: Trend Observation: Boomers/Matures:
Filed in: holidays, forging, travel, fakery, boomers

Israel as an Extension of American Empire

I'd always tended to feel that Muslim talk of Israel as a crusader state was a piece of hyperbole driven by a historical allusion. After reading Jeff Halpern's article in Adbusters adapted from this article from Counterpunch, I'm not so sure that there is so much room for hyperbole.

Israel is able to pursue its Occupation only because of its willingness to serve Western (mainly US) imperial interests including acting as a galvanizing center for global neo-con forces.

There follows a lot of analysis including a good bit on Christian dispensationalism and Zionism.
The extent of the Israel's being the USA's Outremer is illustrated by this.

Israel provided key support for the US in Iraq, including the construction of mock Iraqi neighborhoods and villages in the Negev where American troops could train. The American military government in Iraq, the "Civil Administration," was patterned after the Israeli Civil Administration that rules the Occupied Territories. Israeli involvement in the defense-related economies in the districts of most members of Congress explains to a great degree why Israel enjoys the uncritical support it does. The Israeli astronaut who died in the Challenger accident testifies to the intimate involvement of Israel in the most guarded parts of the American military, where even European countries are excluded. In fact, Israel has just taken delivery of advanced F-16s and helicopter gunships that have been denied Europe.

I myself used to be pretty pro Isreal, I'm not certain that it is what I thought it was.
The tragedy of it all is that it maybe could have been otherwise and the otherwise tells you why I used to be pro-Israeli.

Israel always talked of democracy, even extending citizenship to its Arab population in 1948, even though the underlying concept of a "Jewish democracy," coupled with a deep-based fear of demographics only exacerbated by the Occupation, has emptied that of much of its content. It constituted itself as a welfare state, only to see that largely dismantled as the Israel-Palestine conflict gave dominance to the right whose agenda, together with expansion, was anti-socialist and pro-privatization. Israel became a member of the Socialist International and engaged in constructive development work in Africa, Asia and Latin America,

But what went wrong? It's a familiar story:

but its need for military strength, coupled with a self-serving "alliance" with the US, has led to become a major arms dealer on a global scale, a subverter of progressive civil society elements throughout the developing world.

Power corrupts, or rather power accelerates temptations to which we eventually and inevitably fall.
The article is worth reading.
Jeff Halper: Israel as an Extension of American Empire:
Filed in: Israel, Palestine, Crusader, USA, geopolitics, neocons

Forecast puts Earth's future under a cloud

More prognostics of climate change, including, to bring it home to Brits, how it would affect England.

Global sea levels would rise by between 0.09 and 0.88 metres as a result. Scientists at the UK Climate Impacts Programme predict that a 3C rise or above would reduce rain on the south coast to half of current levels, by more than 40% across the rest of England and 30% in Scotland. Sea levels could be 70cm higher in the south and there would be a 17-fold increase in flooding on the east coast. London could face a £25bn clean-up bill after a storm surge that would overwhelm the Thames barrier.

Lot's of other more global forecast stuff too.
Guardian Unlimited | Science | Forecast puts Earth's future under a cloud
Filed in: climate_change, effects, forecast, food, forests

Terra Preta: Black is the New Green

This is fascinating and could promise a real virtuous cycle if only we could work out how the ancient Amazonians did it ...

Amazonian Dark Earth, or terra preta do indio, has mystified science for the last hundred years. Three times richer in nitrogen and phosphorous, and twenty times the carbon of normal soils, terra preta is the legacy of ancient Amazonians who predate Western civilization. Scientists who long debated the capacity of 'savages' to transform the virgin rainforest now agree that indigenous people transformed large regions of the Amazon into amazingly fertile black earth. The Amazonians' techniques remain an enigma but are believed to have used slash-and-smolder to lock half of the carbon in burnt vegetation into a stable form of biochar instead of releasing the bulk of it into the atmosphere like typical slash-and-burn practices.

WorldChanging: Tools, Models and Ideas for Building a Bright Green Future: Terra Preta: Black is the New Green:
Filed in: terra_preta, Amazon, CO2, sequestration