outdoor

The boys and I took a walk to the siikakoski rapids to witness for ourselves whether there's any hope of ever getting rid of the snow... it appears there'd be some, although it takes a quite a bit of faith still. It's been exceptionally cold this year, and compared to e.g. last year it's been miserable. Anyway, spring is great whenever it eventually arrives. Summer's even better, but all the way up in here it's better just to forget about still for two months.

Les hommes (tout) puissant

One of the latest fads among the fellows is showing off with might. Confidently Joonatan claimed to himself the title of "the strongest man in the house".

Who would object?

quotation of the month

Teach us to number our days aright,
that we may gain a heart of wisdom.

ps. 90:12

Monster Glamour in EuroVision

Finland takes yet another hop to have success in EuroVision song contest. Finland's history has been rather comical for decades in that contest and we have placed as last and the second last, being drop out of the contest here and there, but there we go again. This time, bad success (if it so comes) won't be due to impersonal show, at least. We are sendind a heavy rock band Lordi, with tons of pyrotech and makeup.

Let's see what comes. Cyprus Broacasting Company (the local public tv) first made a decision not the broadcast the bands preview video, because it appears as anti-Christian, satanistic, and unsuitable for kids. Now they apparently will broadcast it, but do discuss about making the video viewing a late night show.

This is not only in Cyprus, I received a concerned email here in Finland, urging to join in a prayer chain to block the band's participation in the contest... because some don't feel comfortable being represented as Finns by something like that. Well, I think they should rather pray that someone they'll like will be contesting on the national level next year, and especially that they'd remember to vote in the national contest. My guess is that none of the chain members were too active in votes this time.

Anyway, what it comes to the band itself, I'm not sure whether they are that anti-Christian afterall - at least when compared to all the rest of the performers. What worries me in these reactions is that nobody said anything last year when Jari Sillanpää, a famous pop singer, sang "It Takes Two to Tango" and performed the show dressed in angel wings and a halo. The lyrics can be read here, (below in English, first in Finnish) and they don't appear to me as very christian either.

To my personal opinion, the monter aesthetics are part of the heavy rock culture and not more than that. There are lots and lots of openly christian, proclaiming rock bands that are into that stuff too, simply becuse they feel it's an impressive and cool thing to do. (I'm not into it very much, but I do enjoy Lordi's pyrotech... hopefully that'll be in the contest show) What it comes to Lordi's lyrics, they appear to me as romanticized gloom, and sort of horror glamour, or perhaps even anti-satanic as The Devil Is a Loser.

I'm not a great fan of Lordi, one because I don't like that monster stuff, two because their music does not impress me when it's apart from the show, and third i don't think preaching gloom works really well to bring light into the dark lives of many. But, in all of these someone may disagree with me.

But, as for now, I'm really looking forward seeing where they'll place in the contest. They do have a good fan base around europe which is going to be very active in voting, so in fact Lordi is having the best changes ever to broke the Finnish records since the jolly "tipitii, tipitipitipitii" song 20 years ago.

But, besides appreciating the burning hearts of praying Christians, I do hope that the christians either engage into the culture actively in these occasion, representing themselves as they feel comfortable through the artists they like, or then forget about these completely. The contests like this are about sending a text messages to the given numbers, not about praying God to intervene into something that we did not feel like intervening.

god on current affairs

One of the biggest current affair program here in Finland, Ajankohtainen Kakkonen, had set up a discussion panel on god, faith, fundamentalism and tolerance, and it came out on Tuesday. It's in Finnish, of course, but the fortunate ones can watch it here.

The topic was large, but so was the set of representatives. They had people from atheist free thinkers, through Green League of Finland's representative from the parliament, Imam from the muslim community, archbishop of the Lutheran church in Finland, to the leader of the fastest growing charismatic revival movement inside the lutheran church, to name a few - altogether around 20 people, and 2hours to go...

As expected, the debate did not reach any significant depth. It reached one heated climax when the imam got mad at cartoons. (this time it was a finnish satire comic about scared artist in Finland, according to the author, unintended to upset anybody... but it apparently did.)

I can't help but think that the shallowness of the discussion was deliberate to some extent and it did strengthen the standpoint of the mainstream ideology of "religiously neutral" humanism, what would be the standpoint of the program itself. When the religious standpoints were not given a proper time to make their cases, it came out natural to judge them all to share the same fundamentalist spirit - the one that makes folk to blow up themselves in metro station, as well as go distribute food in public parks. (it's quite a remarkable flexibility to the spirit, if it's just one...)

The discussion just got worse when it reached the lutheran schism on blessing the samesex marriages. It's a hard piece because the government in Finland directs a portion of the tax income to the lutheran and orthodox churches, and it would be natural to expect that these communities share the values of the government. However, they don't, especially on this very topic.

I was hoping the discussion to move deeper towards this issue of shared values, and the autonomy of religious communities on the doctrinal issues. There, i would have been really interested to hear where the muslim community would be standing on this topic. But, to my disappointment, they did not talk about these, but the ones representing the active christian groups (Markku Koivisto from the charismatic lutheran movement, and a youth leader couple from Elävä Sana "a living word" church) just stated (and re-stated) their faith in bible, and how they apply it on this issue - and the "neutrals" expressed their dislike.

The outcome was to me as mournful as always. It was obvious that they had not common ground to discuss from, which to me would be the foundation to any significant debate - mournfully more, nobody tried to look for it either. I doubt that anybody watching gained any helpful insight to the Bible-believing-christian reasoning, which I would have set as a goal if I'd been invited to discuss. Now they talked a lot and hot, but on different issues.

To me the show worked to strengthen to points that I've previously belived. First, the society should not be Christian, muslism, or formed after any other faith community, but it should be aimed to provide freedom and peace to all it's incredients. I think church and state should separated, but I would expect that to give freedom for any faith community independently to state their doctrines according to their believes and values as far as they won't threathen the peace of others.

The other point would be, never ever go discuss publicly on tricky issues as homosexuality, unless you make sure you are sharing the terms and the logic with your opponents. Besides making fool of yourselves, you also take hundred steps further from getting your real point across.