ONE

Hi,

I just signed a petition asking the G8 take urgent action against extreme poverty, and I'm hoping that you'll join me.

Sign the petition now at: http://www.one.org/international/g8

There has been a lot of progress against extreme poverty in recent years, but, as recent headlines about the global food crisis and natural disasters like Cyclone Nargis in Burma will tell you, there is still much to be done.

When we unite with one voice and call upon our leaders to take action, we can and will solve these problems.

Thanks

LH

http://www.jamesdobsondoesntspeakforme.com/

http://www.jamesdobsondoesntspeakforme.com/

James Dobson doesn't speak for me.

He doesn't speak for me when he uses religion as a wedge to divide;

He doesn't speak for me when he speaks as the final arbiter on the meaning of the Bible;

James Dobson doesn't speak for me when he uses the beliefs of others as a line of attack;

He doesn't speak for me when he denigrates his neighbor's views when they don't line up with his;

He doesn't speak for me when he seeks to confine the values of my faith to two or three issues alone;

What does speak for me is David's psalm celebrating how good and pleasant it is when we come together in unity;

Micah speaks for me in reminding us that the Lord requires us to act justly, to love mercy and to walk humbly with Him;

The prophet Isaiah speaks for me in his call for all to come and reason together and also to seek justice, encourage the oppressed and to defend the cause of the vulnerable;

The book of Nehemiah speaks for me in its example to work with our neighbors, not against them, to restore what was broken in our communities;

The book of Matthew speaks for me in saying to bless those that curse you and pray for those who persecute you;

The words of the apostle Paul speak for me in saying that words spoken and deeds done without love amount to nothing.

The apostle John speaks for me in reminding us of Jesus' command to love one another. The world will know His disciples by that love.

perhaps you would like to go to the website
http://www.jamesdobsondoesntspeakforme.com/
to sign the document and to let the Right Wing of our faith know that they don't speak for many of us.

Future Wisdom.

The Future always looks impossible when viewed from the present.

George Gilder
Wealth and Poverty

Give Me Christ Or Give Me Hiroshima (hyperbole?, probably?). Love's The Only Engine Of Survival(Straight up? I think?)

Leonard Cohen
The Future (1992)
The Future

"Give Me Back My Broken Night
My Secret Room, My Secret Life
It's Lonely Here
There's No One Left To Torture
Give Me Absolute Control
Over Every Living Soul
And Lie Beside Me, Baby
That's An Order!

Give Me Crack And Anal Sex
Take The Only Tree That's Left
And Stuff It Up The Hole
In Your Culture
Give Back The Berlin Wall
Give Me Stalin And St. Paul
I've Seen The Future, Brother
It Is Murder

CHORUS
Things Are Going To Slide In All Directions
Won't Be Nothing
Nothing You Can Measure Anymore
The Blizzard Of The World
Has Crossed The Threshold
And It Has Overturned
The Order Of The Soul
When They Said Repent
I Wonder What They Meant
When They Said Repent
I Wonder What They Meant
When They Said Repent
I Wonder What They Meant

You Don't Know Me From The Wind
You Never Will, You Never Did
I'm The Little Jew
Who Wrote The Bible
I've Seen Nations Rise And Fall
I've Heard Their Stories, Heard Them All
But Love's The Only Engine Of Survival
Your Servant Here, He Has Been Told
To Say It Clear, To Say It Cold
It's Over, It Ain't Going
Any Further
And Now The Wheels Of Heaven Stop
You Feel The Devil's Riding Crop
Get Ready For The Future
It Is Murder

CHORUS

There'll Be The Breaking Of The Ancient
Western Code
Your Private Life Will Suddenly Explode
There'll Be Phantoms
There'll Be Fires In The Road
And The White Man Dancing
You'll See The Woman
Hanging Upside Down
Her Features Covered By Her Fallen Gown
And All The Lousy Little Poets
Coming Round
Trying To Sound Like Charlie Manson

Give Me Back The Berlin Wall
Give Me Stalin And St. Paul
Give Me Christ
Or Give Me Hiroshima
Destroy Another Fetus Now
We Don't Like Children Anyhow
I've Seen The Future, Baby
It Is Murder"





I love what this guy does.
He is a Jewish Mystic,
a Bhuddist Monk,
a Christ Loving poetic genius
and
a Sensulaist (who aches in the places he used to play)....
which makes it hard for me not to be intrigued by him.

The Future

Our faithfulness will depend on our willingness to go where there is brokenness, loneliness, and human need. If the church has a future it is a future with the poor in whatever form.

- Henri J.M. Nouwen
Sabbatical Journey

Hopeful Healing in Him whose "name" is both Love and Justice

Psalm 72:

7 In his days shall the righteous flourish; and abundance of peace so long as the moon endureth.

8 He shall have dominion also from sea to sea, and from the river unto the ends of the earth.

Malachi 4:2
But for you who revere my name, the sun of righteousness will rise with healing in its wings. And you will go out and leap like calves released from the stall.

Dealing with the past, healing the future.

Some Long Unfinished business is finally addressed.

A shameful legacy in Canadian history is being acknowledged today. Let's hope it leads to reconciliation and new future for Canada and its aboriginal peoples.

From Cape Breton Post

11/06/08

Canada apologizes for trying to ’kill the Indian in the child’
After more than a century of torment that saw the federal government strive to silence their languages and snuff their culture, aboriginal people packed Parliament to hear the prime minister say it for all Canadians: “We are sorry.”
Stephen Harper made the historic apology Wednesday in the House of Commons for generations of racist policy meant to “kill the Indian in the child.”
Eleven aboriginal guests of honour sat before him on chairs arranged in a native restitution circle, some trembling with emotion.
Above them, survivors of unspeakable abuse in federal schools geared to “Christianize” them clasped each other’s hands, bowed their heads, and cried.
“The treatment of children in Indian residential schools is a sad chapter in our history,” Harper told the extraordinary session of the Commons, reading from a text he helped draft with input from native advisers.
“The government of Canada sincerely apologizes and asks the forgiveness of the Aboriginal Peoples of this country for failing them so profoundly. We are sorry.”
Applause repeatedly rained down on aging survivors of the church-run schools as they sat a few steps from Harper.
But the most thunderous ovation was reserved for Assembly of First Nations national chief Phil Fontaine, who endured repeated sexual attacks as a little boy at the Fort Alexander residential school in Manitoba.
Wearing full Ojibway regalia and headdress, Fontaine was belatedly allowed to respond to the apology in the Commons after days of contentious resistance by the Conservatives. He made it one of his finest moments.
“Brave survivors, through telling their stories, have stripped white supremacy of its legitimacy,” he said to jubilant shouts and the rhythm of drumbeats. “Never again will this House consider us the Indian Problem just for being who we are.
“We are, and always have been, an indispensable part of the Canadian identity.”"Finally, we heard Canada say it is sorry," Fontaine said.
Fontaine said. "We heard the government of Canada take full responsibility."
He said the apology will go a long way toward repairing the relationship between aboriginals and the rest of Canada.

"Prime Minister, Chief Justice, members of the House, elders, survivors, Canadians, for our parents, our grandparents, great grandparents, indeed for all of the generations which have preceded us, this day testifies to nothing less than the achievement of the impossible."

The End is Nigh!

One day Sven & Ollie, local pastors, were seen pounding a sign into the ground, that said: "DA END ISS NEAR! TURN YERSELF AROUND NOW BEFORE IT'S TOO LATE"

As a car sped past them, the driver leaned out his window and yelled, "Leave us alone, you religious nuts!"

From the curve we heard screeching tires and a big splash...

Rev. Ole turns to Pastor Sven and asks, "Do ya tink maybe da sign should yust say 'Bridge Out'?"

The yearbook entry for these guys said "Most Unlikely to Succeed."

What a bunch of low draft picks



Henrik Zetterberg#40Left WingDetroit Red Wings Height: 5-11
Weight: 195
Shoots: Left
Born: Oct 9, 1980 - Njurunda, Sweden
Draft: 1999 - 7th round (210th overall) by the Detroit Red Wings


Pavel Datsyuk#13CenterDetroit Red Wings Height: 5-11
Weight: 197
Shoots: Left
Born: Jul 20, 1978 - Sverdlovsk, USSR
Draft: 1998 - 6th round (171st overall) by the Detroit Red Wings


Valtteri Filppula#51CenterDetroit Red Wings Height: 6-0
Weight: 189
Shoots: Left
Born: Mar 20, 1984 - Vantaa, Finland
Draft: 2002 - 3rd round (95th overall) by the Detroit Red Wings



Nicklas Lidstrom#5DefenseDetroit Red Wings Height: 6-1
Weight: 193
Shoots: Left
Born: Apr 28, 1970 - Vasteras, Sweden
Draft: 1989 - 3rd round (53rd overall) by the Detroit Red Wings


Johan Franzen#93CenterDetroit Red Wings Height: 6-3
Weight: 218
Shoots: Left
Born: Dec 23, 1979 - Vetlanda, Sweden
Draft: 2004 - 3rd round (97th overall) by the Detroit Red Wings


Tomas Holmstrom#96Right WingDetroit Red Wings Height: 6-0
Weight: 202
Shoots: Left
Born: Jan 23, 1973 - Pitea, Sweden
Draft: 1994 - 10th round (257th overall) by the Detroit Red Wings





And retreads and prodigal sons who had hit bottom


Darren McCarty#25Right WingDetroit Red Wings Height: 6-1
Weight: 210
Shoots: Right
Born: Apr 1, 1972 - Burnaby, British Columbia
Draft: 1992 - 2nd round (46th overall) by the Detroit Red Wings
(Addicted, Broke and Divorced...he was given a second chance)

Daniel Cleary#11Right WingDetroit Red Wings Height: 6-0
Weight: 210
Shoots: Left
Born: Dec 18, 1978 - Carbonear, Newfoundland
Draft: 1997 - 1st round (13th overall) by the Chicago Blackhawks
(high draft pick that some said was washed up and uncomitted...he was given a second chance)

Kris Draper#33CenterDetroit Red Wings Height: 5-10
Weight: 190
Shoots: Left
Born: May 24, 1971 - Toronto, Ontario
Draft: 1989 - 3rd round (62nd overall) by the Winnipeg Jets
(purchased for the princely sum of $1 from the Winnipeg Jets...how humiliating)


Chris Osgood#30GoaltenderDetroit Red Wings Height: 5-10
Weight: 176
Shoots: Left
Born: Nov 26, 1972 - Peace River, Alberta
Draft: 1991 - 3rd round (54th overall) by the Detroit Red Wings
(underrated, underappreciated, seldom respected...this 3 time Cup Winner may yet be a Hall of Fame Goalie)



Humble beginnings for many and almost humble endings for others
yet they all found a way to make it happen for themselves and their fans.


What a Team.


According to some this is the house that love and humility built (by an unassuming Papa Ken Hollands).

Long may she stand.

THE YEAR'S BEST [actual] HEADLINES OF 2007:

Something Went Wrong in Jet Crash, Expert Says
[No, really?]

Police Begin Campaign to Run Down Jaywalkers
[Now that's taking things a bit far!]



Miners Refuse to Work after Death
[No-good-for-nothing' lazy so-and-so!]


Juvenile Court to Try Shooting Defendant
[See if that works any better than a fair trial!]


War Dims Hope for Peace
[I can see where it might have that effect!]


If Strike Isn't Settled Quickly, It May Last Awhile
[You think ?]


Cold Wave Linked to Temperatures
[Who would have thought!]

Enfield ( London ) Couple Slain; Police Suspect Homicide
[They may be on to something!]


Red Tape Holds Up New Bridges
[You mean there's something stronger than duct tape?]


Man Struck By Lightning: Faces Battery Charge
[he probably IS the battery charge!]


New Study of Obesity Looks for Larger Test Group
[Weren't they fat enough?!]


Astronaut Takes Blame for Gas
in Spacecraft
[That's what he gets for eating those beans!]


Kids Make Nutritious Snacks
[Taste like chicken?]


Local High School Dropouts Cut in Half
[Chainsaw Massacre all over again!]


Hospitals are Sued by 7 Foot Doctors
[Boy, are they tall!]


And the winner is....

Panda Mating Fails; Veterinarian Takes Over
[I wasn't much good in Biology but I think my teacher made it perfectly clear that this just isn't going to work.)]

Young Pens will have their day but today belongs to us Old Birds

Way to Go Redwings....Let's do it again next year.

Victory is reconciliation not destruction

The world is overcome not through destruction, but through reconciliation. Not ideals, nor programs, nor conscience, nor duty, nor responsibility, nor virtue, but only God's perfect love can encounter reality and overcome it. Nor is it some universal idea of love, but rather the love of God in Jesus Christ, a love genuinely lived, that does this.

- Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Meditations on the Cross

This love of God for the world does not withdraw from a reality into noble souls detached from the world, but experiences and suffers the reality of the world in the harshest possible fashion. The world takes out its rage on the body of Jesus Christ. But he, tormented, forgives the world its sins. Thus does reconciliation come about.

- Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Meditations on the Cross

Healing for our time.

I sense that a new spirituality is being born in the church today, flowing from the wounded hearts of the weak and broken who are crying out for friendship. This friendship is also a source of healing for those who answer their cry.

- Jean Vanier
Spiritual Journeys

The Mercy Seat (Lyrics and Music by Nick Cave)

Mercy Seat
It ALL began when they come took me from my home
And put me on Death Row,
a crime for which I am totally innocent, you know.

I began to warm and chill
To objects and their fields,
A ragged cup, a twisted mop
The face of Jesus in my soup
Those sinister dinner deals
The meal trolley's wicked wheels
A hooked bone rising from my food
All things either good or ungood.

And the mercy seat is waiting
And I think my head is burning
And in a way I'm yearning
To be done with all this weighing of the truth.
An eye for an eye
And a tooth for a tooth
And anyway I told the truth
And I'm not afraid to die.

I hear stories from the chamber
Christ was born into a manger
And like some ragged stranger
He died upon the cross
Might I say, it seems so fitting in its way
He was a carpenter by trade
Or at least that's what I'm told

My kill-hand's
tatooed E.V.I.L. across it's brother's fist
That filthy five! They did nothing to challenge or resist.

In Heaven His throne is made of gold
The ark of his Testament is stowed
A throne from which I'm told
All history does unfold.
It's made of wood and wire
And my body is on fire
And God is never far away.

Into the mercy seat I climb
My head is shaved, my head is wired
And like a moth that tries
To enter the bright eye
I go shuffling out of life
Just to hide in death awhile
And anyway I never lied.


And the mercy seat is waiting
And I think my head is burning
And in a way I'm yearning
To be done with all this weighing of the truth.
An eye for an eye
And a tooth for a tooth
And anyway I told the truth
And I'm not afraid to die.

And the mercy seat is burning
And I think my head is glowing
And in a way I'm hoping
To be done with all this twisting of the truth.
An eye for an eye
And a tooth for a tooth
And anyway there was no proof
And I'm not afraid to die.

And the mercy seat is glowing
And I think my head is smoking
And in a way I'm hoping
To be done with all these looks of disbelief.
A life for a life
And a truth for a truth
And I've got nothing left to lose
And I'm not afraid to die.

And the mercy seat is smoking
And I think my head is melting
And in a way that's helping
To be done with all this twisting of the truth
An eye for an eye
And a tooth for a tooth
And anyway I told the truth
But I'm afraid I told a lie.

By Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds






By Nick Cave and the Bad Seeds
sung beyond the grave by Johnny Cash on Solitary Man

God's Report Card (Under-achiever?)

As we take a quick look around the world it is a stretch for us to say that God is all powerful and all loving. 

The question of  why is suffering so common and indiscriminate has no good answer.  Some, like Rabbi Harold Kushner in his book "Why Bad Things Happen to Good People", try to save God by claiming that He is Good but not all Powerful. In this framework God is involved and is caring but is limited and often can do no more than suffer along with His creation. I struggled for a long time with this apparent diminishment of God. I tried writing Theodicies to make God no less than what theologians and preachers have claimed He is, but God can not be saved by any trick of language or sophistry of reason from a hack like me or a genius like (insert name of your favourite theologian or philosopher here)................................................. 

God stands before us as nakedly proud and overbearing as Job's encounter describes Him.  We, like Job, can demand an accounting but we will not get one.
So we are left with a clear choice...we either accept the ambiguity and the confusion of a world at odds with the simple faith of our youth and bow before this mystery...mouths closed...hearts broken, yet still hoping
or we must forfeit our faith and the hope of a redeemer who will stand with us upon the earth and someday give meaning to the trail of absurdity that we have unwillingly walked upon.

I am closed in between these two options and I only slightly favour the way of faith over resignation.
I can never be sure if the thread by which my faith hangs will hold but as it holds I remain in the church and remain a Christian.


Absurdity is so evident that I can not deny it, I can not rationalize it, I can not mitigate it. Therefore I tentatively embrace it and say that the evidence of our lives tells of a God who is unknowable and who favours the unexpected and the unexplainable. The evidence suggests that He is a connoisseur of the bizarre. As such I can even make peace with monumental natural and human disasters because beauty is no longer in the eye of this beholder it is only in the Eye of The Beholder.

And the Beholder apparently loves the deformed, the damaged, the odd and the poor.....after all, He made so many of us.  The ugliness and suffering of this world must have a beauty and a reason far above our ability to perceive it.   So we must simply accept the world we have and continue to love mercy and to live life as if  Love is eternal and powerful.

If what God wants for this world is as simple as we thought it was, then this world is a testimony to an Under-achieving God....but, if we examine it as the art of the creator and curator of curiosities and mysteries whose ways are beyond our finding out it is truly a place of wonderful and bewildering beauty . Such a world is not evidence of an under-achieving God. It is evidence of our under-perceiving.

Lord give us eyes to see and hearts to perceive the beauty in the ugliness around us and faith to embrace this life even when we can not perceive the beauty beneath.

LH

God as underachiever...not if He is Curator and Creator

Gerard Manley Hopkins (1844–89).

Pied Beauty


GLORY be to God for dappled things—
For skies of couple-colour as a brinded cow;
For rose-moles all in stipple upon trout that swim;
Fresh-firecoal chestnut-falls; finches’ wings;
Landscape plotted and pieced—fold, fallow, and plough;
And áll trádes, their gear and tackle and trim.

All things counter, original, spare, strange;
Whatever is fickle, freckled (who knows how?)
With swift, slow; sweet, sour; adazzle, dim;
He fathers-forth whose beauty is past change:
Praise him.

Words of Woodsy Wisdom (God as an Underachiever)

Woody Allen Quotes



I am at two with nature.

It's not that I'm afraid to die, I just don't want to be there
when it happens.












If it turns out that there is a God, I don't think that he's evil. But
the worst that you can say about him is that basically he's an
underachiever.

Not only is there no God, but try getting a plumber on weekends.

More than any other time in history, mankind faces a crossroads. One
path leads to despair and utter hopelessness. The other, to total
extinction. Let us pray we have the wisdom to choose correctly.

My one regret in life is that I am not someone else.

I was thrown out of college for cheating on the metaphysics exam;
I looked into the soul of the boy sitting next to me.

It is impossible to travel faster than the speed of light, and certainly
not desirable, as one's hat keeps blowing off.

It seemed the world was divided into good and bad people. The good ones
slept better... while the bad ones seemed to enjoy the waking hours much
more.

Life is divided into the horrible and the miserable.

What if everything is an illusion and nothing exists? In that case, I
definitely overpaid for my carpet.




What if nothing exists and we're all in somebody's dream? Or what's
worse, what if only that fat guy in the third row exists?

Eternal nothingness is fine if you happen to be dressed for it.

To you I'm an atheist; to God, I'm the Loyal Opposition.



Life is full of misery, loneliness, and suffering - and it's all over
much too soon.

Interestingly, according to modern astronomers, space is
finite. This is a very comforting thought-- particularly for
people who can never remember where they have left things.

Most of the time I don't have much fun. The rest of the time I don't have any fun at all.





(To most of this I can only say an ironic Amen.)

What if God is as much Curator as Creator? (Seeing the World as a Divine Curiosity Shop may save God from Woody's charge)

Pieces taken from MOBA The Museum of Bad Art

"Indeed, it is not an easy thing to struggle against mighty forces like the giant orange cat consuming humankind. The artists here do not stoop to common human endeavors and limitations and only sometimes rise up to them."

from
museumofbadart.org
(Now, that is bad enough to be good.)

Creator or Curator? (Seeing the World as a Divine Curiosity Shop makes Woody's assessment seem slightly misguided.)

Ted Turner takes a turn

"I regret anything I said about religion that was negative. … Religion is one of the bright spots as far as I'm concerned, even though there are some areas, like everything else, where they've gone over the top a little, in my opinion."
Ted Turner, announcing $200 million anti-malaria partnership with Lutherans and Methodist denominations. The media mogul who once called Christianity "a religion for losers" says he now prays for sick friends, explaining, "It doesn't hurt."

Oscar Got It Right

Nothing is so important as human life, as the human person. Above all, the person of the poor and the oppressed... Jesus says that whatever is done to them he takes as done to him. That bloodshed, those deaths are beyond all politics: They touch the very heart of God.

- Oscar Romero
March 16, 1980

Al Queda Dreams My Nightmare

I was depressed last night so I called Lifeline.

Got a call center in Pakistan ...

I told them I was suicidal.

They got all excited and asked if I could drive a truck or fly a plane !!!

Jesus Against the Rapture

To watch is to be prepared for the unexpected. It is to give up the illusions of straight-line extrapolations, the silly assumption that current trends will continue. It is to abandon the calculations of the pundits about the swinging of some invisible pendulum. In this time, particularly, it is to accept the fact that life will not go on as it has. A change is in the offing, but no one knows what direction it will take. History is the realm of contingency, the unexpected. The proper eschatology is watchful expectancy for the Abba's work and will, and a wary guardedness about the rebounding perversity of humankind. The danger is to preempt the future with our own agenda and our own eagerness to be proven right by history.

- Robert Jewett
Jesus Against the Rapture

Happy Re-Birthday Israel

When I was a card carrying member of the evangelical, charismatic, biblical inerrancy crowd I believed that the rebirth of the Jewish nation was a miracle.
I still see it as a type of miraculous event but we can scarcely know what this miracle means especially when we consider that modern Isreal was birthed in the extermination camps of Nazi Germany. The unspeakable atrocities committed there forced the Western (dare we say Christian) World to come to grips with our history of anti-semetism. The guilt we felt was the goad that finally pushed the cause of a Jewish homeland to the top of the world's agenda. In 1948 the miracle of rebirth was realized. Its continued existence takes on almost miraculous aspects when one considers how it has been the object of the military, political and spiritual wrath of nearly all its neighbours and much of the rest of the world.
No doubt this amazing land inhabited by a remarkable people has not lived in perfect righteousness since its founding but they have striven to make a good life, ruled by law, democracy and compassion.
In my simpler days I took comfort in the sign of Israel's rebirth and its miraculous existence. I hoped that the return of Jesus would follow fulfillment of ancient prophecies about regathering God's people from the four corners of the earth. I even calculated that there could be no more than 70 years from the time of the formation of the modern state of Israel till Christ's long awaited Parousia. The prophecy of the 'greening of the fig tree' and Christ's promise that the generation who saw this greening of the nation of Israel would not pass away till He comes in power seemed to point to a soon coming King who would put an end to this present darkness.
I reasoned that a generation could be interpreted as 3 score and 10. '4 score for reason of strength' seemed like an exception and not a definition so I told a few confidants that if Christ did not come back by 2018 then all my literal interpretations of scripture and prophecy would have to be rethought. I guess my rethinking has been a little ahead of schedule. For several years I have not been able to find a reasonable coherence of interpretation that allows a simple literalistic treatment of the scripture to stand and so I no longer cling to my old ways of seeing and believing.
I celebrate the miracle of Israel's existence and pray for peace in Jerusalem and all the nations surrounding her but I do not see the miracle as a portent of the second coming any longer.
I have to trust that Jesus has come in power as prophesied and He did so in the generation of his first followers and that coming in power was a spiritual transforming experience that has always seemed weak and unimportant in natural terms but is like the leaven in the dough of our violent self justifying hearts which will continue to do its job until the kingdom of peace and love preached by Jesus has come in power and glory.

May His Kingdom Come
His will be Done
In earth as In Heaven.
forever and ever
Amen!

LH

Winston Churchill on Our Spiritual Heritage

"There's an extraordinary passage by Churchill in a speech he gave in Jerusalem in 1921, which dumbfounds me every time I read it. He said,
'We owe to the Jews in the Christian revelation a system of ethics, which, even if it were entirely separated from the supernatural, would be incomparably the most precious possession of mankind, worth in fact the fruits of all other wisdom and learning put together. On that system and by that faith there has been built out of the wreck of the Roman Empire the whole of our existing civilization.'

That's an extraordinary thing to say, especially in public."


and it could bear saying again......

Let There Be Light (this guy is on to something)

He Qi, a prominent Chinese painter, believes Christian art should be bright. "I read the first chapter of Genesis, the creation, and God says, 'Let there be light.' So God's creation is a very, very colorful world." This idea goes against the centuries-old tradition in Chinese academic art — minimalist still lifes and landscapes usually done in black ink on white paper.

    

                                                                                                                            

Gideon and the Angel
David and King Saul

Jonah
Solomon's Judgement
Elijah and the Ravens

(Can you tell which biblical story is being represented by these brilliant pictures? I gave you an easy one first.)