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Alpha and Omega

I heard a great voice out of heaven saying
Behold the tabernacle of God is with men
He shall dwell with them and they shall be His people
And almighty God will be with them

He shall wipe away all tears from their eyes
There shall be no more death
Neither sorrow, nor crying, and no more pain
The former things are all passed away

He that sat upon the throne said,
“Behold, I make all things new”
He said unto me, “Write these words
For they are faithful and true”

It is done (4 Times)

He is the Alpha and Omega
The Beginning and the End
The Son of God, the King of Kings
Lord of lords, He’s Everything
Messiah, Jehovah
The Prince of Peace is He
The Son of Man, Seed of Abraham
Second Person in the Trinity

Meritocracy and Nazism

"There are three responses to this. Firstly, who decides what counts as ‘success’? I don’t remember having had any say, for example, in the designation of the position of CEO at BAE Systems as being ‘successful’. It seems an odd sort of system that regards the chief of a global murder machine as offering anything valuable whatsoever. But then meritocracy is not democratic, and so what we may class as socially desirable is ignored.

Secondly, and less dramatically, meritocracy simply doesn’t do what it says on the tin. The assumption is that it avoids the inequalities which wealth and Old Boy contacts bring about, but this simply isn’t so. A child born into a middle-class family has infinitely more chances of ‘getting on’ in this world than a child born into a working class family. (As may now be clear, however, this in itself is not saying much). Middle-class families tend to have lots of books around, they teach their children to read before they go to school, they take them to museums, they teach them how to ‘talk properly’, they know how to play the system if their child is in trouble: they equip their child, that is to say, with the cultural equivalent of money because they have the money to do so in the first place.

Finally, and most importantly, meritocracy is a form of fascism. Its logic is as follows: the natural inequalities of body, race, ability, and so on are equated with what an individual deserves to receive from life in general. If you’re intelligent, white and ruthless, it’s likely you’ll go far in the world; if you’re black, disabled and have a low IQ, you deserve, the system tells us, to live a life of poverty. There is only one logical step between this and the Nazi approach to the Jews: meritocracy merely condemns to wretchedness people who fail to meet bureaucratic standards; the Nazis killed them." -- Daniel Hartley

Allah-free Bible

"We want to make the Muslims our friends. We are not there to defeat them in a battle or an argument. We want them to come to Christ," he said. "This is the practical reality we have to bow down to, although theologically it may be unnecessary."

Should Christians in Malaysia stop calling God Allah? If so, Fernando said, it would be for reasons other than accurate translation. "The only advantage is to avoid outrage," he said. "I can't see any other advantage." -- Ajith Fernando

Inclusivism Frenzy

A Church of England book published this week says bald and overweight people should be regarded as worshippers with "special needs" alongside the blind, the deaf and worshippers in wheelchairs. The advice is an attempt to make churches more friendly to newcomers and therefore increase attendance at services.

The book, Everybody Welcome, warns that bald people could be "in trouble from those overhead radiant heaters some churches have unwittingly installed" and that special arrangements may need to be made for people who are overweight. "Some pew spaces and chairs are embarrassingly inadequate for what is known in church circles as 'the wider community'," the book says.

Also, consideration should be given to recovering alcoholics who want to receive communion wine, it suggests, and for those who "find loud noises from organs or music groups distressing".

The Church's drive also includes ideas such as encouraging worshippers to make eye contact, to smile and to remember people's names. - The Telegraph

...........

"[the church], for example, is more concerned with being inclusive than being the church. We do not have the slightest idea what we mean by being inclusive other than some vague idea that inclusivity has something to do with being accepting and loving. Inclusivity is, of course, a necessary strategy for survival in what is religiously a buyers' market." - Stanley Hauerwas

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