Tomb Raiders

By this time most of you have probably heard about the international kafuffle around "the family tomb of Jesus." It's interesting that the overall reaction to the documentary has been a collective rolling of the eyes from both the scholarly and Christian communties. Although it's been more hype than anything else, the major news outlets have already seemed to have dropped it two days after the story originally broke. This isn't a good thing for the networks who plan to carry the documentary in a few weeks. The hype has come and gone. On a quick look around the internet, any links to the story have been quietly dropped from all the major news servers... the only ones that are still up are from the original story when it broke on Monday morning. I've seen flash-bulbs that have lasted longer than this did.

What I found interesting was the near universality amongst voices from the Church (expected), and scholars (not-so-expected) in casually dismissing the claims that the upcoming documentary makes. It's based on speculation and probability around names, but ignores dating, as well as the political realities of the day that would make such a link unlikely. I think the most telling part was the documentary apparently makes a direct link to the James Ossuary which got a lot more attention a few years ago. The trouble is, it's since been proven to be a fraud.

Yet things like this do attract our attention. They get mileage from news media because the general public is increasingly un-aware of the Christian story. There is a collective lack of understanding of religious history, both in the public sphere, but also within churches themselves. I remember once speaking to a baptist who firmly believed that their tradition was founded by John the Baptist. At the time, I didn't know any better, but it sounded a bit odd to me.

Maybe we need to a bit more digging ourselves...

Edit: Well. not quite off the radar... Seems it's being denounced further as a publicity stunt. Here's the link to the Washington Post Article.

Sabbath Moment?

I'm looking at a copy of the Annual Report in front of me on my desk. The title on the front cover is "Sabbath Moments". It's from the national offices as an encouragement to rediscover Sabbath. It's been a busy weekend, Bill Stager's Funeral service, Scott Woods and the Dancing Fiddles, Sunday morning worship, the Annual Congregational Meeting, all the while being a single parent for the weekend. I'm thinking that I may take part of the afternoon off just to catch my breath.

That having been said... watch out for the April Issue of The Presbyterian Record, looks like my article for their "Pop Christianity" column is a go! I must admit it was fun to write. I just hope it's not boring to read...

Getting caught up

I have a bit more time than I expected this morning. I had Megan down at SickKids for a blood test that I expected to take all morning... Yet we were all done before 9am, so I was able to come into the office well ahead of schedule. It means I've managed to get caught up on a few things that was running behind on.

I don't really have anything overly profound to reflect upon, aside from enjoying those moments of extra time that I periodically get. It seems as if the most valued commodity that we have these days is time. Money is one thing, but time is something that we never have enough of, and it literally is impossible to hoard... It goes by whether we want it to or not. We do often use money metaphors when it comes to time... how do we spend our time, how do we budget or manage our time... Yet as much as wrinkle cream companies try to say that we can, we can never stop or reverse time. I guess my vote is to enjoy the ride, and don't let too many moments slip by without noticing them.