The Emperor Has No Clothes

The Time: Friday Night.
The Situation: Mom's on a retreat, it's Dad's weekend on the job - alone.
The Problem: Jammies that don't have a top snap.

That little whippersnapper took his pajamas off! You can see them, right there, bundled up in the bottom right of the picture...yaknow, next to his blanket? He completely undressed himself...except for his diaper. And that, I am sure, is only because he fell asleep before he could get it off. What a nut.

Peter had his 18 month checkup today. He's doing pretty well. He's a bit tiny in weight, still got a stinker of a big head, and has some sort of rash on his back that will take 3 weeks to 3 years to go away. Woohoo. That's the part I'm excited about. No, really. I mean, who doesn't like a good rash that, like a bad penny, never goes away? He still hasn't really started talking yet, although tonight he did say 'bah tie' after his dad said 'Bath Time'. I think that counts. 

"My" Church

The purpose of Christian formation is not developing a better self-image, achieving self-fulfillment or finding self-affirmation; nor is it the development of individualistic qualities that make singularly outstanding saints. Rather, it is developing certain qualities that enable us to live responsibly within the community that we have been baptized into. Virtues are ecclesially based. The theological virutes of faith, hope and charity make the best sense (if not the only sense) for Christians when they are lived out in the Christian community as the "peaceable kingdom." Spiritual Theology, pg 103.

I guess that pretty much shoots the idea that church is for and about me in the foot. This quote seems to imply that the more we grow and mature, the greater our focus is on the community as a whole rather than me as an individual.

Isn't it amazing how so many seeming pillars of the church miss that?

The Truth Hurts...

Huh?: 7.7 <-- Be sure you read this!

Tony Campolo often begins his speeches this way: "I have three things I'd like to say today. First, while you were sleeping last night, 30,000 kids died of starvation or diseases related to malnutrition. Second, most of you don't give a shit. What's worse is that you're more upset with the fact that I said shit than the fact that 30,000 kids died last night." The world crisis changes, but the point doesn't.

We, in our anglo-saxon, middle class, white-picket-fence lives, have our priorities so incredibly messed up. It is far more upsetting to me that it is costing nearly $30 to fill the tank in our Geo Prism then that people in the villages in Alaska probably won't be able to afford the heating oil they'll need next year. I am far more passionate about a computer that won't work right than I am about the thousands of students at the high school down the street who don't know Jesus. I'll spend hours and days on things that are ultimately meaningless and then claim I don't have time to do anything eternally meaningful.

And then I'll read things like Sean's post, Tony's comment, and this blog. Nod my head in a dour, serious, as-if-I'm-cut-to-the-core way, agree fully, and then go watch the TV.

C'mon, you know you're doing the same thing.

By the way, did you happen to notice the cover of People Magazine for the week of September 12, 2005? It was a double issue - pictures of the horrors and devestation of Hurricane Katrina and their best and worst dressed. How's that for ironic?