“It’s light that makes me uncomfortable” and other Googlisms

April 6, 2004

I think it’s fair to say that inter­net search engines have changed how many of us explore social and reli­gious move­ments. There is now easy access to infor­ma­tion on won­der­ful­ly quirky sub­jects. Let the Super­bowl view­ers have their over­pro­duced com­mer­cials and cal­cu­lat­ed con­tro­ver­sy: the net gen­er­a­tion does­n’t need them. TV view­er­ship among young adults is drop­ping rapid­ly. Peo­ple with web­sites and blogs are shar­ing their sto­ries and the search engines are find­ing them. Here is a taste of the search phras­es peo­ple are using to find Mar­tin Kel­ley Quak­er Ranter.

Con­tin­ue read­ing

The Passion of Uncomfortable Orthodoxies: Mel Gibson’s “Passion of the Christ”

February 24, 2004

Mel Gib­son’s movie _The Pas­sion of Christ_ is a chal­lenge for many mod­ern Quak­ers. Most of the rich metaphors of co-mingled joy and suf­fer­ing of the ear­ly Friends have been dumbed-down to feel-good clich­es. Can the debate on this movie help us return to that uncom­fort­able place where we can acknowl­edge the com­plex­i­ties of being fer­vent­ly reli­gious in a world haunt­ed by past sins and still in need of con­vic­tion and comfort?

Con­tin­ue read­ing