The Unclad Soul

I am often a harsh critic of the church. Most of contemporary Christianity endlessly exasperates and offends me. So many churches today represent so little in terms of anything that comes even close to a sacred space or a place where someone might find arms of welcome no questions asked. A place where they are given room to explore their beliefs, to grow, and to remain human and real. Too many are old fashioned places of outdated rules and harsh judgments against people not like them. Or they are huge corporations for greed with their “seed faith” message and lifestyle of the rich and famous promise. Or they are political action committees that shamelessly promote specific political candidates and advocate one party representation. Or they are entertainment centers filled with garish music and an atmosphere disguised as some kind of contemporary Jesus scene with a Bible verse thrown in here and there sprinkled with empty talk of God that is little more than religious pabulum on

Rick Santorum’s surge and second place finish in the Iowa caucus represents one of the most cynical aspects of this already bizarre and empty presidential campaign. And that is the so called “Evangelical” vote. Who are these people? Some of them are good and decent church going folks who think they are supporting Christian values. They simply like anyone like Santorum who says religious and conservative things and so they give him their full trust. They are often fearful people who think the world is evil and hope someone will rescue them from life’s hard realities and get rid of drugs and terrorists and divorce and so forth. They think someone like Santorum can do this by legislating morality. Others are angry, ungenerous, bigoted people who hide behind their religious faith and use it to sanction their rejection and dislike and in some cases hatred for gays, blacks, immigrants, and liberals. They do not follow Jesus. They do not really believe his teachings. Read the Ser

“Happiness, satisfaction, fulfillment, joy, love... All these things work the same way. The more you search for them, the less likely you are to find them.” ~ Patrick Rhone, “Keeping It Straight”

I saw “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo” over the holidays. I had already seen the original Swedish movie. In fact, I’ve seen all three of the Swedish films and they are all terrific. The English version of the first one is equally good. I liked Daniel Craig as Mikael Bloomkvist, the intrepid journalist and owner of Millenium magazine, a magazine that gets at the truth of things and exposes all of those nasty realities that most people don’t want to read about, like corrupt politicians and corporations and how they destroy people. I thought Rooney Mara, who plays Lisbeth Salandar, the genius geek and computer hacker who is not to be messed with, was excellent. I didn’t think there was any way she could be as good as the original Lisbeth played by actress Noomie Rapace who is in the latest Sherlock Holmes movie. But Mara held her own. The story is complicated and filled with endless fascinating details but basically Bloomkvist and Lisbeth eventually team up to try and find out

“There are two mistakes one can make along the road to truth. Not going all the way, and not starting.” ~ The ancient mystics