God bless us, with material things

This much should be obvious to anyone attending most big American churches:  on Sunday mornings, those lots are covered with expensive vehicles.  If you doubt me, just go out and check them; most American churches, any Sunday.  Do we need expensive vehicles to get from here to there?  Absolutely not. 

Is there hypocrisy in the air?  Most churches are “country clubs with steeples,” according to a friend of mine who believes deeply in God but deals with his God privately, not as part of an organized religion. 

Hey, why am I picking on churches?  Well, maybe it’s because church-goers repeatedly claim to me that they are morally superior to me because they are church-goers.  They also tell me that it’s the teachings of Jesus that make them morally superior.  Now I am quite aware that a teaching often attributed to Jesus is that one needs to first sell all his possessions and give the money to the poor before following Him.  This passage makes me think:  “Hey, church-goers, if you are all so morally superior, show it.”  That’s what I think when I see all those unnecessarily fancy vehicles on the church parking lot.

Where do all those church-goers park those vehicles?  Here’s where: in their big garages attached to their expensive houses.   Here’s the issue then:  these holders of substantial wealth are often the same people who profess to believe literally in Biblical scripture. Yet the New Testament isn’t known for encouraging people to acquire wealth.  Or is …

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You May Have It Cockeyed If…

Science cannot disprove the existence of god. I have heard this claim made so often and by such a broad spectrum of people that I rarely really think about it. But is that the end of it? Science is concerned with materialism ( in a philosophic sense) and does best…

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Who leaves better clues, God or the Devil?

Here's a Question I Like To Ask when arguing biblical accuracy versus scientific discovery: Postulating an omnipotent God and his potent yet subordinate nemesis: Which has the power to influence the minds of a few men to compose a persuasive text and create a regional following, and which to deposit…

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Moral Bias

I’ve been thinking about this since the initial post on our biases and all the responses.  In the course of trying to come up with an “appropriate” response to the world, we often find ourselves caught up in endless exception-making, fudging, attempts to shoehorn certain proclivities and habits into convenient moulds so we don’t go through our days constantly flinching at our inadvertant insensitivities. 

Does it do any good?  The flinching?  I mean, after the Sixties, one had to have been living on Mars for half a century not to be aware that there had been a Big Shift away from what might be called Gross Cultural Reliance to a more nuanced approach which has been (often derisively) termed Political Correctness.  The former is a condition wherein one “borrows” wholesale from the culture to make associational choices.  It doesn’t occur in this instance to question the wisdom of the culture–it’s what it is, and we are part of it, ergo…

But we realized that the Culture At Large was in many ways an Idiot.  It stepped on people.  It made too little room for variation.  It tried to be all things to all people, but it was necessary that all people somehow be The Same in order for that to work.  Those with a vested interest in keeping everything the same mightily resisted movement to change the rules.

We never did come up with a solid formulation that allows for prejudice.

You have to, you know.  What we ended up …

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“Faith-based” homeless shelter gets into debt collection.

Providing jobs for homeless people.  We’d pretty much all agree that it is a fine thing to do. It hadn’t occurred to me before to complain about the jobs that might be offered, although I have complained that pay and benefits for many jobs are inadequate.  A recent “news story” made me take notice.  The story is here but you have to register to look at it.  I’ve reprinted it below so you won’t need to: 

Homeless Shelter Residents get Jobs at Collection Agency

August 28, 2006 – by Mike Bevel, CollectionIndustry.com

A Washington state-based collection agency owner is pairing up with a faith-based homeless shelter to provide jobs for homeless people in the area.

Wayne Garlington is the owner of Accounts Receivable Inc., and sits on the board of Open House Ministries – both based in Vancouver, WA. He is currently employing five women to work as collection agents.

Garlington said he has been pleased with their performance. “They’re not being handed something,” he told the the Columbian News. “They really want to work.”

The jobs not only give the women benefits, they also allow for them to increase their income through bonuses. The company collects on overdue accounts for the city of Vancouver and Clark Public Utilities, among others.

Garlington decided to try out the idea after hearing about a similar plan being carried out by a collection agency on the East Coast.

A ‘faith-based’ homeless shelter, why isn’t that an oxymoron?  If you really had faith, would …

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