nooooooooo

I thought I'd heard this before.

Bankrupcy and the Millennium Development Goals

Question: How much is the proposed bail-out by the US government worth and how much has yet to be found to pay for the Millennium Development Goals?

Answer: $700 billion and $25 billion respectively. That's right folks, we need 28 times more money to fix the banking system than to stop 20,000 children dying needlessly every day. And guess which is easier to find. Morally Bankrupt is not too strong a term.

h/t One Hand Clapping

Distributism

Maybe this is the solution to the credit crunch woes.

Post modernism

I have been frustrated for a while and wondering why so many things seem to start and then give up before seeing the thing through. I suspect as Julie Clawson says, it is because we're all far too post-modern for our own good, and travelling is more important than reaching a destination.

church

Yesterday was the best church experience I've had for years.

On Saturday I met up with a group from Servants to hear about their plans for work in Southwark, London. It was a good day, I really appreciated having the opportunity to meet up with them. In the process, I met our friends' son. He is having a difficult time at the moment. Anyway, I found out that he enjoyed juggling, so on Sunday I brought my clubs to church thinking that maybe we could do some practising together.

Anyway, as we arrived, it turned out that there had been some conflict in our friend's house that morning so the son wasn't coming to church. So I asked if I could go and juggle with him at home.

Which I did. I avoided church altogether, spent half an hour juggling and half an hour walking through the Coventry suburbs in silence. And the world felt good for a few minutes.

the economics of Apartheid

One of the interesting things I was reading in Naomi Klein's book Shock Doctrine was about South Africa. One of the main drivers for the anti-Apartheid movement was the massive inequalities that existed within the country, so that a small white elite lived like white Europeans whilst the blacks and coloureds lived as poor Africans in the townships.

Today, despite the routing of Apartheid, the inequalities are even greater. The rich have got richer and the poor have got even poorer.

But what struck me was that the radicalising effect of the inequality. The blacks did not just want a vote, they wanted a more equal society. How much more should be be radicalised with the knowledge that we live in a global Apartheid?

kettle

Some while ago we added a broken kettle to our litany of broken consumer goods (which now lists fridge-freezer, washing machine, microwave and several kettles).

Having researched the most environmentally sound replacement (obviously), we finally chose one from Amazon. We have now had two 'new' kettles from Amazon which we had to send back - one was missing a part and the other didn't work at all.

I'm not sure if this is symptomatic of Amazon or the manufacturer, but surely says something.

kiekegaard does it again

How about this for a powerful quote:

"The matter is quite simple. The Bible is very easy to understand. But we Christians are a bunch of scheming swindlers. We pretend to be unable to understand it because we know very well that the minute we understand we are obliged to act accordingly. Take any words in the New Testament and forget everything except pledging yourself to act accordingly. My God, you will say, if I do that my whole life will be ruined. How would I ever get on in the world?
Herein lies the real place of Christian scholarship. Christian scholarship is the Church's prodigious invention to defend itself against the Bible, to ensure that we can continue to be good Christians without the Bible coming too close. Oh, priceless scholarship, what would we do without you? Dreadful it is to fall into the hands of the living God. Yes, it is even dreadful to be alone with the New Testament."

alpha posters

In church yesterday there was a little presentation table with the latest selection of posters for the Alpha course. The poster says "What am I doing here?" and underneath is asks "If God did exist, what would you ask?"

The former is a question I frequently ask in church. If God exists, I guess I ought to be asking why he lets it all continue.

10 reasons why having a vasectomy is better than the visiting the dentist

1. Treatment for a vasectomy is free on the NHS.

2. You get a free cup of tea after a vasectomy.

3. You have to visit the dentist and have it all done again in six months.

4. When the dentist says 'this might hurt', it really hurts.

5. Your jaw doesn't ache after a vasectomy.

6. Your wife is impressed after you visit the doctor, and a little annoyed when you need to have more treatment at the dentist.

7. At the dentist, you get bored of looking at his/her face. At the doctor, you can pretend you are doing something else entirely.

8. Your daughter doesn't ask to 'see the work' after a visit to the doctor.

9. You have no previous experiences to make you scared at the doctor.

10. There really is nothing more disgusting than having that little vacuum cleaner in your mouth. Nothing.

[By the way, I know it is nothing compared to childbirth. Just in case you were wondering]

Vasectomy

Guess what I've been doing today.

Sarah Palin

What I'd like to know is what any seventeen year old did to deserve a mother like that. If it was me, I'd elope somewhere out of the public eye. Fast. But YMMV.

By the way, I still don't care about the US elections.

[edit] Actually, maybe she was really bad in a past life and was reincarnated as the pregnant daughter of a Republican

Non co-operation

In what cause would you refuse to co-operate with your government even if it led to a fine or imprisonment?

What criteria are you using to come to a decision?