reading

Since finishing school the number of books I’ve been reading each month has decreased by just about 100%. That is to say, I have only completed two books since December. I am really hoping this can be considered a sabbatical from reading and that at the appropriate time my ‘reading burnout’ will fade and be replaced by a passion to work through the seemingly endless books on my list. One book that I have had trouble finishing up is Resident Aliens by Hauerwas and Willimon. The thing about this book is that every time I actually pick it up to read a chapter I thoroughly enjoy almost every page. Tonight I read the second to last chapter (so close!) which is directed mostly to pastors but applicable to the priesthood of believers…right?

Here are some quotes:

“Biblical interpretation is a political, ecclesial problem before it is an intellectual problem.”

“When held up next to our ministry, this episode in Acts 5 reveals our deceit. We say we tolerate Ananias and Sapphira because we love them, because we are called to a ministry of service and compassion, even when people are wealthy liars. In other words, we have more love than Peter had in Acts. In truth, we deceive ourselves. We do not believe Ananias and Sapphira as much as Peter believed in them. For us, possessions are a life sentence of involuntary servitude. We cannot imagine any means of breaking out of our materialism, so we dare not risk truthtelling like that in Acts 5.”

“It is fearful to realize that the church is more than a matter of good-hearted fellowship, that nothing less than life or death is involved here. It is an awesome thing to realize how much God intends to make of us, a terror to know of God’s determination to “make us or break us” rather than leave us as we are.”

“If we live as a colony of resident aliens within a hostile environment, which, in the most subtle but deadly of ways, corrupts and coopts us as Christians, then the pastor is called to help us gather the resources we need to be the colony of God’s righteousness.”

“wow”- chris lewis.

the bulldozer driver.

Taken from a friends blog..

“Many of you have probably seen the latest news of violence in Jerusalem: a Palestinian living in Israel attacked a bus while driving a bulldozer killing several people. What a tragedy. Immediately this was declared the latest act of Palestinian terrorism. This man, however despicable the act, was not a terrorist and did not belong to any terrorist organizations. The Israelis responded with calls to cut off this man’s whole neighborhood from Israel with the infamous wall. This is to affectively isolate and withdraw the citizenship of everyone in his whole town. Furthermore, his home, which houses 22 people (!) is scheduled to be demolished. What a tragedy.

In the US it would be as if a school shooting was done by a black student from a poor inner-city neighborhood and then the US government demolishing this student’s family’s home and then calling for his whole black neighborhood to be punished by removing their citizenship and booting them out of the country. This is collective punishment and this is racism. Inflicting pain on others does not do away with our own pain and it does not provide security. Let us pray for both the victims of this attack as well as for the family of the attacker.

Please read the story at: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/7490212.stm:”

Would it be too much to echo Chris Martin when he says “I don’t want a cycle of recycled revenge”….

the G8

Well the G8 Summit is upon us and wouldn’t you know it, the Hon. Stephen Harper is one of three world leaders that are blocking the setting of targets for climate change. Wow. Thanks Steve. I thank you and my future asthmatic children thank you. I kid. Mostly.

There’s a group called Avaaz who have put the following ad together which will apparently be delivered to the hotel room of every delegate of the G8 Summit. Classic.

the haircut

I’m not exactly sure what it is with me and haircuts but I really just don’t like getting them. Let’s call it… an inconvenience. In January a couple people from the old cohort took me to a place in a mall to get a haircut, claiming that I had to get at least one haircut in my life that cost more than $8. I got that haircut and it was mediocre at best, although that may have had something to do with the fact that i said ‘just cut it… short on the sides… a little longer on top’- ya, that didn’t work out so well.

Fast forward to this past Saturday. I was again in need of a haircut and since Keith and I were out for lunch, opposite of a mall, I decided to venture in after our meal to see if I could get a haircut. Once in the mall I couldn’t actually find a hairdressers, since each place doesn’t actually say that they cut hair in the title of their store.

Now, before we go any further you should know that I was sick last week and while I was on the road to recovery from one illness I acquired a fairly painful sinus infection sometime between Friday midnight and noon Saturday. Yikes. So as I’m going through the mall looking for a place to cut my hair the only thing I’m really thinking is “i want to go home and die…’ or something similar. I come to the first place and ask how much a haircut is (naturally…!) and hear that it will be $21 with a wash. Hot dog. a hair wash. which i actually can do myself. I tell the person at the frontdesk that I might be back and think to myself that there’s got to be something cheaper. Then I remember that I feel like I want to go home and die, and that is enough motivation for me to spend $21 on a haircut. So I return.

Now, I know that since before the dawn of time men have been moving their heads when a hairdresser is trying to cut their hair. I’m confident of this. I also know that my head moves quite a bit, almost all the time… so it’s hard to sit still. However, usually the hairdresser politely asks me to be still. Not last Saturday. Last Saturday I got yelled at, which is not particularly fun when you’re about to collapse due to the piercing behind your eyes. And so, perhaps because of the pain, or perhaps because on somedays I’m only mostly dead to sin… I snapped back a little bit and was maybe a little sarcastic.

To me it’s debatable whether or not this lady actually meant to entirely screw up my haircut. I mean- short on the sides an a tad longer on the top can’t be that hard…can it? Actually this time she really screwed up and I’m confident she did this on purpose because I snapped back at her. I can’t see her being this incompetent and having a job. I had some chunks of hair missing from the side of my head (athankyou buzzer #2) and entire chunks of long strands still on the back of my head. And also, the part of my head where a yarmulke goes (if I wore one) was an entirely different length than everything else. Weird. All of that for what amounted to $26.

I’m pretty sure I received the unprovoked comment “who cut your hair” about 15 times in the 3 days following this episode. Mostly because I looked ridiculous.

Today I went back to this laguna beach salon or whatever it’s called and showed them my haircut and then asked them to both fix it and refund me. Apparently they have a no refunds policy (understandable I suppose) but I requested a coupon for a free hair cut instead + a fix up job, to which they obliged.

The moral of this story is as follows: never pay more than $8 for a haircut.

The end.