eChurch Blog

Inspiring stuff:

“If I have to be plagued with mental illness, then I’m going to be the best mentally ill patient I can be!” proclaimed 60-something Amy.

I half laughed and half choked at the statement but knew that Amy’s declaration was sincere. It seemed quite funny at the time but, let’s face it, mental illness is no laughing matter.

In fact, Amy’s announcement haunted me for many days.

I’ve known Amy for about 10 years and each time I see her, I am overwhelmed by how remarkable she is. She always speaks openly about her love of, and walk with, Jesus. When Amy offhandedly mentions some event where her point is how Jesus was “right there,” you can’t help but be flabbergasted at how easily she recounts something quite unsettling and then you are almost unable to grasp the whole “…but Jesus was with me” point of the story.

I’ve often wanted to say, “Really?! You see Jesus IN THAT experience?!”

Those are the times where I realize how my faith walk is a far cry from Amy’s. I have so much to learn from her.

I am intrigued that she refuses to allow her mental illness to provide an excuse for anything. She cracks me up when she says things like, “Just because I have some mental problems doesn’t mean I can be irresponsible with my money…or eat too many sweets…or watch too much television…or…”

Every day offers a variety of new challenges for her and every day she does her best to rise to those challenges. Let me add that along with her mental illness issues, Amy has a number of health issues.

Amy talks about her mental illness as if it were a lifelong companion—which it has been—debilitating on some days and simply a nuisance on others, making things and tasks that would be simple for most people a real chore for Amy.

Amy has not implored the good Lord to be relieved of her cross (something I tend to do in a heartbeat), she simply asks for ways to handle it. She sees it—and all its consequences in her life—as a gift; and that often boggles my mind. When she could not afford a car, she asked the Lord to provide transportation to Mass. And He did.

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Ironically, it is a prayer life Amy has because of her mental illness. Sure, in a perfect situation these children would have had a mother who was able to care for them when they were young and then that same mother would lovingly cover them in prayers as they grew older. But very few of us experience the perfect situation.

What keeps Amy going—has always kept her going—is the firm belief that Jesus was ever at her side. When she gently reminisces about her one childhood friend and advocate—Jesus—you can’t help but wonder if your own life would be better with a little less mental and physical health and a lot more faith.

He was at her side during the many times that she was hospitalized for ailments ranging from the mental to the physical as well as when she was undergoing numerous electroshock treatments. She makes it clear that He is still at her side today.

She looks at the hurdles she’s had to overcome—and still attempts to overcome on a daily basis—as opportunities to depend on Jesus. And He never lets her down.

Some might find that foolish or naive; but I find it inspiring.

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I was going to include Roger Olson’s exploration of the interplay between evangelicalism and the Roman Catholic Church in my “few good links“.

Upon re-reading the post, I feel it’s worth highlighting in it’s own right:

Over the last 50 years many notable evangelical thinkers have converted to the Roman Catholic Church (or to some independent Catholic church of which there are many; here I’m concerned mainly with those who have converted to the RC Church).  Think of Tom Howard, evangelical professor at Wheaton (and I think Gordon), who converted to RCC and wrote a book about his conversion called Evangelical Is Not Enough (1988).  Think of Peter Kreeft and, most recently, my own colleague Francis Beckwith.  But there are many more than never get noticed.

Last evening I attended the first session of a conference on Catholic-Evangelical dialogue.  I renewed acquaintance with a former colleague (from the university where I used to teach) who has converted from being Baptist to RCC.  (He now teaches at a Catholic university.)

Over the years I’ve had several students convert to RCC.  I wouldn’t call it an avalanche yet.  But it is a noticeable movement–very bright, studious, even scholarly evangelicals turning to the RCC and often attempting to maintain their evangelical identities.

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A few links I found interesting for one reason or another:

Clayboy – Burn Baby, Burn: eavesdropping on Bell’s Hell

The Church Mouse – New poll from BHA – over 50% are Christian, but only half of them believe in a resurrected Christ

Patheos – 36 Hours after Corapi-Stormfall – UPDATED

Lisa Graas – An Atheist Explains a Catholic Explaining Atheism. Huh?

Psychology Today – We’re All Flagellants at Heart

Storied Theology – Prayers of Privilege

Fr. Z – Lutherans becoming Catholics

The following cross-post by Joseph represents a richly deserved achievement for my friends over at the Rosh Pina Project, as well as a very welcome move forward by Evangelicals Now.

From the popular UK Christian magazine Evangelicals Now, April 2011, this article:

Click image to enlarge:

This is a small victory for Rosh Pina Project.

Last year, we complained that Evangelicals Now couldn’t find any Jews in the Old Testament.

Within a few months, EN is finding believing Jews in Israel. Furthermore, EN even recognises that Yad L’Achim are taunting Messianics by trying to dismiss them as “Christians”.

This is a huge step forward, and EN should be congratulated.

Indeed they should be congratulated. The plight of Messianic Jews in Israel at the hands of groups such as Yad L’Achim needs to be more widely reported within the Christian world.

The following is somewhat hypocritical given the recent abuses at the Temple Mount by the Muslim religious authorities.

Not to mention the ancient tombs of the Jewish Patriarchs.

On Wednesday a committee of experts from several Arab countries met in Amman, Jordan, to gather documents that will be brought before the International Court of Justice in an attempt to start legal actions against Israel’s archaeological excavations in Jerusalem. According to the Jordanian representative to UNESCO, Moawiyah Ibrahim, Israeli authorities are using archaeological findings for political gains. “Israel has used Biblical texts to support their national narrative and have disregarded Arab-Islamic heritage,” he said. The committee will also suggest that UNESCO gets an increased role in the old city of Jerusalem which is listed on the organizations endangered heritage sites list.

Source

Hat-tip: Fr. Stephen

So, ICANN have finally approved the top level domain [dot] .xxx for porn sites.

ICANN are entering into an agreement with ICM Registry who proposed the domain name .xxx back in 2004.

With over 30% of Internet activity dedicated to pornography this is hardly a surprising development, especially given the potential for this to generate $1 billion in online transactions a year.

Apparently there have been 234,852 pre-reservations for .xxx domain already. (This figure is accurate at time of posting.)

The justification for this move is that it will be easier to filter out inappropriate content. This is of course bunkum, as pornographers will simply utilise the .xxx domain in addition to traditional domains.

Interestingly, the porn industry is not overwhelmingly supportive of this move as they are concerned their content will be ghettoised. They also fear governments could try to control the domain’s usage, so that pornographic content is more easily blocked.

The ‘ghettoisation’ effect is the same concern levelled against the creation of the .god domain.

Intriguingly, back in 2009 the Pope called on ICANN to keep religion out of the domain name system.

The genie is out of the bottle now for the .xxx domain and the message given by this move is undoubtedly one of legitimisation for the pornography industry.

This is breaking news and I can’t find anything online yet that I don’t have to pay for, except this link to the National Secular Society.

Sorry about that. I’ll update this post as news becomes available from more friendly sources.

UPDATE:

Here’s the full judgement in PDF format

This from the Associated Press:

European court: Crucifix acceptable in classrooms

Cranmer was quick off the mark.

Final link on this, with Vatican statement:

National Catholic Reporter – Big win for the Vatican in European crucifix case

I thought this really quite funny and worth your time.

…….What this means for Western intervention is that we won’t be liberating a country from a universally despised dictator, we will be taking sides in a civil war. Indeed, a civil war in which Gaddaffi is not only the strongest force but quite possibly the most popular one. Nobody wants to believe that, but Gaddafi has not held onto power and so easily rolled up his opposition simply because he has shipped in sub-Saharan mercenaries.

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Absolutely nothing could be better calculated to provoke Islamist retaliation against the West. And the conditions the West will create in Libya promise to be most conducive to al-Qaeda-style militants: dictators like Gaddafi and Saddam Hussein murder their own people, of course, but they also murder any Islamist who threatens them. With the tyrant gone, not only the innocent but militants, too, will enjoy a newfound freedom. And don’t think you can crack down on them without collateral damage to human rights — in our own country we have seen the civil-liberties toll that comes with the Department of Homeland Security’s bogus War on Terror. (It’s a war on Americans’ right not to be strip searched by well-paid government agents.) At least we Americans have to keep up appearances. Arab and Muslim lands are very familiar with pure police-state measures taken in the name of fighting nationalists and Islamists. A Western-backed Libyan dictator will have his excuses ready made. And what kind of influence might such a figure have on neighboring Tunisia and Egypt?

The West is not intervening into a two-way war. Obama, Hillary, and the gang are taking us into a fragmentary nationalist and religious conflict that pits Islamist radicals and supposedly nice Westernizing computer geeks against Gaddafis or Mubaraks — only thereafter to pit the radicals and Westernizers against one another, the remnants of the old regime, and, as often as not, the foreign invader. This intervention will turn a genuine popular revolution — with all the pros and cons that such things entail — into another Iraq or Afghanistan. And we still aren’t done paying the price for those wars. Indeed, the lost lives of American soldiers and foreign civilians, and the trillions of taxpayer dollars poured into the sand, are just the downpayment. The highest cost of all is the strategic price that comes with shoring up client despots and undermining popular movements for reform or revolution. Western interventionists are doing exactly what al-Qaeda wants by enabling the argument that real revolution can only come to the Arab and Muslim worlds only once the meddling West has fallen.

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