Just when you think things have gone from bad to worse they get hellish. I have been getting up ealier the past couple of weeks. Making myself get into a routine, eating breakfast, have a cup o' Joe, and being more overall ready for the day. Part of that has been watching the news. Today I wanted to watch The Early Show because I like watching Survivor and they always have the "newest castoff". So I watch that and they show a promo for the next half hour. In the promo they showed they were going to have a report on "faith based vacations". Well, my interest wasn't peeked I should say, it was annoyed, SO I decided to watch. HA
Well, can I just say we have now entered from "Christian Marketing 101" and class you have moved up to "Christian Market 102". I think we have all heard of the theme park in Florida The Holy Land Experience. (if not click on the name)Apparently their numbers are up and looking to get even more popular. Well, what can I say about that. Not whole lot that none of y'all might not be thinking already. I just watched in wide eyed annoyance and then at the end I scramed and threw a pillow at the screen. This brings me to my full on annoyance and to our class. Apparently there is a Christian Organization that is in Isreal and in talks with Isreal to making a theme park by the Sea of Galilee. You know where Jesus walked on water. Now I just did a look up and my heart is now racing, our "fair" Mr. Pat Robertson is behind this. Click here to read about it.Guys, when are we going to get it? This honestly makes me want to pound something. I honestly keep seeing this picture of God and Jesus being raped by Pat Robertson and others. How DARE we!!!! How DARE they!!!! Is God so unholy to us that we now have taken it to this? My God forgive us. I mean the I have so many words on this and right now I can't even bring them all together, but to say this is disgusting. I'm ashamed, I'm embarrassed and I'm angry. I'm angry that we have made this culture, I'm angry that we have made God a joke, I'm angry that Christians these days are trying to find ways to market God and make Him unholy, every day, and so many other things. Demons tremble and what do we do? We tremble at ways to market Him. How DARE we....
5 comments:
Couldn't agree more. The funny (ironic) thing is that my former boss had a hand in this theme park and alot of the artifacts in the Scriptorium came from him. He was a good man, but controversy followed him wherever he went. He also set up a compound of sorts in Michigan for his family and friends really, but because of the religious undertones and his dogmatism it became accused of being a cult and had all kinds of problems.
A case of over zealous Christianity? But I guess at least, tho it wasn't my way of doing things, he followed his passion......
Good to see you posting again Jewels!
How are you doing - really? Things here on my end have changed a lot. Email me sometime.
xoxo
Hey girl! :)
how am I really? loaded question much. ;) LOL
I'm pretty ok right now.
e-mail me, tell me what is UP or down??? ;)
I emailed you Julie - I sent it to you at your @theooze.com email. If you have somewhere else I should send it, let me know!
xoxo
Karen-
there seems to be a problem with the oozemail. :P can you e-mail me at my gmail account? its the same as the ooze one, but @gmail.com :)
Jewels
Ultimately, what Pat Robertson or the others do will not be, at least in final summation, be judged by us.
Having said that, though, a lot of "Christian" endeavour appears to take its parameters from Madison Avenue or from Hollywood rather than from the spirit that Our Lord showed.
This is not to say, and you'd probably agree, that we're not happy when people utilize the arts, drama, whatever gift they have, in making visible the Christian message. So far, so good, eh?
Problem is, as you seem to feel, huge projects that are not manageable, in the sense that they require a great deal of capital and profit and marketing and so on, to survive, are often undertaken by Christians. If they've GOTTA MAKE MONEY, they may take the low road. They sometimes trivialize the message by their commercialization or lite-delite approach. in some cases, you may even get a sense of irreverence.
Often, some Christian projects have proven an embarrassment, since they've gone beyond their own ability to sustain, have put Hollywood pressures on the leaders running them, and so on, and corners have been cut in ethics.
Once it's a cash cow thing, then there's a problem, eh?
Sure, we have to laud the willingness to make Bible stories known, but the commercial aspect galls in a number of efforts, as you rightly state.
Still, the Lord of the Harvest has said [advance warning] that some stuff will be gold and silver, right? Some will be wood, hay and stubble.
Probably, there's a lot of wood, hay and stubble around, wouldn't you say!
Ultimately, the truly BIG news on this earth, I suspect, when accounts are eventually added up may be about some unknowns who have made the biggest difference, somewhere on this earth, eh?
The people building with gold and silver, that is, stuff that'll endure, are often out of sight, and maybe blind or ugly or in a hospital, or starving somewhere, so we may have the impression that all has gone to the dogs.
Trying to be fair: Pat R. has made a few perhaps unwisely-framed public statements, lately, which has led me to wonder whether he's getting a bit beyond things in his aging process and judgments.
On the positive side, I guess I should mention that when I have travelled to South America from time, over the years, with my husband to visit our relatives. His 700 Club interviews were greatly liked by women to whom I talked. Some other shows had riled them, since the preachers had always been running down just about everybody. Pat's had been uplifting, in their view. Now, they might not have understood any more about salvation, but, anyway, at least, they had not been alienated. And they had the idea that some people with real problems in their lives have experienced God's intervention, and so on. There, that was less flashy, a bit every day, and people seemed to profit by it to some degree. So, maybe he had a better judgment in choice of project, there.
There's another problem around a lot of the time: people lauded as IMPORTANT in the Christian world, in Christendom, are mainly lauded because of visibility, I guess. It's a bit crazy, eh?
So, there may be important stuff going on, but not necessarily in the flashy places, eh?
Post a Comment