Ooh. Heaven just denounced me.

[Head Mutant]

My knickers are fine. But it gave me a bit of a flashback to back in college when I was applying to churches for a youth internship, and one pastor wrote to me after discovering MRFH and basically told me I was horrible and shouldn't ever consider the ministry, considering that I supported movies and had bad words on the site. It made me feel bad, sure, but more that someone didn't take the time to understand before pronouncing me evil.

Most of the people at my church know about MRFH, and I don't keep it a secret from them. And no one's ever said anything bad about it. That's why I love these guys, they're real Christians who have beliefs but are also are real people too. My pastor thinks we're a hoot.

[PoolMan]

I think your Pastor's a hoot, too. Very nice man, and good with a Canadian-repelling cross, too.

[Vorlina]

Yup yup yup - my Evil Bosses (TM) decided about four months ago to block all forums from our work internet. Which admittedly has quadrupled my efficiency, but wiped out my post counter. And before everyone says post from home - computer managed to bu**er itself, so now we have a nice new fresh one, out of the wrapper.

However, I now have an eye on the counter and am racking them up fast. Anyone want to start a "what you listening to" thread to assist? ;D

And what an absolutely incredibly funny clip you have managed to incorporate, Druidgirl! My brother came in to see why I was laughing so loudly.

[PoolMan]

Hahaha... did you just censor out the word "bugger"? Man, there aren't a lot of people in here who'd be offended by that word... doesn't have the same connotation in North America.

There IS a "What are you listening to" thread. Look under Books and Music.

[Head Mutant]

Vorlina said:

computer managed to bu**er itself

Your computer butters itself? That sounds high in cholesterol.

[Head Mutant]

Although "buffer" might be more apt in computer lingo.

[PoolMan]

"Bummer"?

[Deleted]

Woah, I actually thought it said "buffer" and that the asteriks were some sort of odd typo. I would never have guessed that it was "bugger." Craziness....

[PoolMan]

She's not crazy.

She's British.

[Magill]

I just checked out CAP and found it rather amusing (in a slightly scary way).

[off topic]Can someone please answer this question--why do some Christian denominations find alcohol to be such an immoral thing? Wasn't Christ's first miracle at the wedding of Cana, where He turned water into wine? Didn't the Last Supper involve wine? If it was good enough for Christ, can't it be good enough for His followers?[/ot]

In cruising other movie review sites (via IMDB), I've found that Christian Spotlight on the Movies (www.christiananswers.net/spotlight/movies) is in a similar vein. Then again, their sites have all sorts of ads for Creationism texts and Harry-Potter-turns-kids-into-Satanists propaganda, so I'm not surprised.

Thought it's not from a Christian Point of view, I've found that Screen It! (www.screenit.com/movies) seems to be a good one for families. They rate the moviemaking quality separately from objectionable content

The "Our Take" review of this title examines the film's artistic merits and does not take into account any of the possibly objectionable material listed below.

Finally, they suggest topics for families to discuss with their children. For example, again from The Return of the King, their suggestions include "the adaptation of the novel into movie form, the battle of good vs. evil, and perseverance in accomplishing a goal no matter the complications and setbacks."

It seems to me that one could take that format, adapt it slightly, and have a Christian movie review website that does more than just dismiss films for having bad words. You could discuss both the artistic merit and the Christian viewpoint and possibly present motivations for why the characters act that way (without condoning the behavior, should it not be compatible with Christ's teachings).

[Head Mutant]

I think Screen It (and to a lesser extent, Decent Films) are excellent parent/Christian resources for deciding on films and being able to talk about them with their children.

CAP and the guy behind it are obvious extreme fundamentalists, and that kind of belief stems from not actually wanting to use the brain God gave you and look into the scriptures intelligently, looking for the truth behind a complex world. Instead, people like that tend to want to know that they're right about everything, and to have a huge list of Do's and Don'ts that pertain to every facet of life. This is nothing new. Jesus had to deal with similar people -- the Pharisees -- in his ministry. People who tried to follow the letter of the law without understanding the spirit behind it and following that instead.

As for drinking, it's not a sin according to the Bible. In moderation. Drunkeness is, as are many things done to hedonistic excess. But see, isn't it far easier to say "All drinking is wrong" instead of looking deeper and understanding that the true sin lies in the loss of your control, being influenced by something else... and having to make that distinction in your life where the line is between okay drinking and not-okay? Yeah. That's the appeal of fundamentalism. All movies are wrong, because some contain elements of bad things. All rock music is wrong, because it has roots in wanton rebellion or whatever.

It's like that Pharoah episode of Futurama, where the Egyptian-aliens were bowing and reciting, "Free us of all independent thought". Honestly, that's how some people of many faiths approach religion. They don't want to question, to examine it deeply, they just want to be told what to think and do so that they know 100% that they're on the right side. As I'm fond of telling my church kids, if God didn't want you to use your brain or see that the world is complex and ugly or see that God isn't some shallow ideal summed up in a two-sentence paragraph, then the Bible would've been about 10 pages long for that purpose.

[PoolMan]

Head said:

if God didn't want you to use your brain or see that the world is complex and ugly or see that God isn't some shallow ideal summed up in a two-sentence paragraph, then the Bible would've been about 10 pages long for that purpose.

The Bible: The Best Pamphlet You'll Ever Read

I spent a little time on CAP yesterday, and immediately regretted it. You weren't kidding, J! That thing is unreadable! It took me two solid minutes of looking (and finally, some cut and paste with the URL tag) to figure out where the actual reviews were!

I especially like the WISDOM meter. Man, is that thing convoluted and confusing. I'm enrolling in a local college next summer so I can build up the skills to understand it.

[Hucklebubba]

PoolMan said:

I especially like the WISDOM meter. Man, is that thing convoluted and confusing.

And yet, in the one review I actually read, the CAP guy felt somehow compelled to blow sunshine up his own crack about how awesome it is approximately every other sentence.

[Head Mutant]

Yeah, I definitely point out the rating mirror in my article. And I'll include a graphic, because I don't think people can appreciate it until they see it.

Also, I'm never one to force an acronym. I think that's a very wrong thing to do.

[Magill]

Oh, another thing that annoyed me was the view of other religions. For instance, they didn't even get the correct religion of Jes's family in Bend it LIke Beckham (they were Sikhs, not Hindus). But in that one, and Brother Bear, the fact that people were off different religions was in the "offenses to God" category. I understand that many people view that their religion is the only one. But I don't think we should mock people by saying they worship false Gods. Especially in the case of Brother Bear (which I did not see, it looked lame), because how were Native Americans supposed to know about Christ, anyway? In the review for The Messenger, the first objection the reviewer states, of all things, is the phrase "holy mother Church." He admits he doesn't know Catholic dogma, so then he goes on to guess at what it means. Because it's so hard to do research. Anyways, he twists it into the same tired ravings of "Catholics are Marianists!" Nevermind that the phrase is actually an analogy to represent the relationship between the Church and its members.

In Bend it Like Beckham, the fact that Your parents don't always know what's best for you" was listed in the Impudence category. I know we're supposed to honor our fathers and mothers, but isn't that true? Parents aren't perfect.

Finally, for someone who is so adamant about religious truth, he doesn't seem to care for historical truth. In the review for Spirit: Stallion of the Cimarron (yes, I was looking specifically at the reviews of children's movies, especially if they involve other cultures), he notes "but there is an instance of brief clothing by one and *only* one of the American Indians. The rest were responsibly clothed. Maybe that is the way the true Americans dressed but that does not excuse display of it in and as entertainment." So, even if that's how Native Americans dressed, we shouldn't show it in movies? How does that make any sense? Should The Passion have shown a fully clothed Jesus on the cross?

But then, given Justin's opinion that the author can't stand shades of grey, it all makes sense.