Holy Crayola! Jesus in crayons

Blurred as the image is, it really could be anything.

Sadly, the Daily Mail’s always seems willing to give face time to people who think they’ve experienced a pareidolia miracle.

A woman who prayed for a sign from Jesus got a little more than she bargained for when his image emerged out of some melted crayons.

Tara Gomez and her son put a few colourful sticks in the oven as part of an arts and crafts project they wanted to try out.

After cooling the mixture in the freezer, Ms Gomez was startled to discover Jesus’s face had emerged out of the swirling pattern at her home in Blue Springs, Missouri.

The young mother told ABC7: ‘I’d been praying and praying about certain things, and I asked God for a sign and I think the crazy thing about this… what better sign to get then right in front of you.’

The thing is, when you really want a sign, a sign can be anything.

Credit to the author of the piece, though, who reminded readers that it’s possible to buy Jesus toasters and give yourself a sign every day with breakfast, lunch or dinner. But probably not in time for Christmas.

Pray out the weigh?

The New York Times reports on churches in the Mississippi Delta where diet instructions are served along side the day’s gospel teachings. Out with the high calorie church lunch traditions, in with the fruit baskets. Several churches are following in the footsteps of Rev. Michael O. Minor, who has used his pulpit to preach the benefits of good eating for more than a decade already. He’d gotten the idea after he moved back to Mississippi in the early 1990s and was shocked by the difference in weights between those he’d known at Harvard and Boston and the folks back home.

When he began preaching his health gospel right from the start, he was met not by outright resistance — that would have been rude — but by a polite disregard. This is the way people have always cooked here, church members said, and they ignored him.

He argued that while the food may be the same, people’s lifestyles had changed, and few put forth the physical effort that life in the Delta once required. Preparing pork chops used to involve raising and slaughtering a pig; now it requires little more than a trip to the grocery store. But he eventually realized he would have to adjust his strategy.

It’s made a difference for his congregation and those who’ll emulate him, but others staunchly ignore the health advantages of teaching believers how to make better food choices, even when “Your sick members can’t tithe,” should be logical enough incentive to provide them with healthy alternatives.

Churches have so much influence on the lives of the people who attend them. They look toward church leaders for all manner of advice and support and, while I’d have no reliable statistics to back it up, most probably follow whatever suggestions they get. But, I suppose getting told their traditions are the problem is problematic all on its own. Change is always a bigger challenge than one might realize when the first decision to change things gets made.

Hopefully he’s getting a lot of support from local doctors and other health professionals. How do they feel about the overall bad health of the people in that state? Sick people can’t always pay hospital bills either, and I’m sure they get bills pretty often. Those that would bother to go to a doctor, that is. No doubt that’s part of the problem, too.

On that note, I went for my first physical in a decade recently and was pleased to come out with a clean bill of health and an A+ on my blood work. heh. Canadian Blood Services is always pleading for more donations and I’m finally set up to give them some pints. I’ll add them into what the Saskatoon Freethinker group has already given. Atheists and humanists saving lives. Can’t get much better than that.

Meanwhile, Hell’s advertising campaign…

got a pass from New Zealand’s Advertising Standards Authority (ASA).

Hell Pizza made headlines around Easter with their unique hot pentagram buns and according to this article, it wasn’t the first time their style of advertising raised a ruckus, apparently. Other ads they ran satirized local news reports and (as far as complainers were concerned) worse.

In 2009 a billboard carried the catch phrase “at least our brownie won’t eat your pet dog” — a reference to Tongan Paea Taufa being found roasting a pitbull terrier-cross in an umu at his Mangere home.

The advertisement was the most complained about ad for that year, with the ASA upholding 62 complaints about it.

The “brownie” ad did not meet a due sense of social responsibility, was distasteful and reasonably likely to cause serious or widespread offence, the ASA said.

In late 2008, Hell began a “$25 Hot as Hell” direct mail ad, which promised a Thai massage with one of its pizzas, if the offer was redeemed in Thailand on the day of purchase.

The ad showed a photo of a young Thai woman in high heels and a bikini, which 16 complainants said invoked prostitution and was a racial slur to Thais.

Their sense of humour appeals to me (who’d actually fly to Thailand on account of that ad?) but I can see why they’re seen to cross lines. Crossing lines on a bun to mock an Easter tradition, though? That’s what generated the most complaints to date: 179. Fortunately the ASA saw it their way and let the billboards stand.

The ASA noted positive views expressed by the public including St Matthews In The City.

“…we can only conclude that the campaign was in fact within ASA guidelines as to acceptable humour and satire allowable within a tolerant and open society such as New Zealand.”

Too bad the complainers weren’t also tolerant and open to joking around. Judge not lest ye be judged and all that. If their beliefs can’t stand up to a little mockery, perhaps their beliefs aren’t very solid in the first place?

Quotable PETA

I applaud the idea of supporting the health and well being of animals and it’s certainly worthwhile to encourage others to rethink how they bring food to tables. PETA has a long history in the fight for this but have they always brought so much religion into it? I first noticed it in regards to wanting to alter the bible (as if changing an “it” to a “she” will make a difference in terms of how a chicken gets treated) but here’s another:

God created humans and other animals out of flesh, blood and bone. We share the same five physiological senses and the ability to feel pain. God designed us this way. God designed pigs to root around in the soil for food and play with one another. God designed chickens to make nests, lay eggs, raise their chicks and establish communities (the “pecking order”).

Yet agribusiness today denies animals the fulfillment of their most fundamental needs. Agricultural scientists “play God” by manipulating animals to grow so quickly that their hearts, lungs and limbs can’t keep up…

with a few more examples of bad health and living arrangements following. Is all this god talk going to guilt these companies into more ethical set-ups? I have my doubts about that. Profits are what they care about and so long as the majority of people are willing to buy what they’re offering, they’ll continue to offer it.

I’m reading a book right now called Stuffed: an insider’s look into who’s (really) making America fat. It’s by Hank Cardello, who was in food business for a lot of years. The idea that food needs to be thought about ethically, organically, or healthy in general is very new concept, really. Attempts to make food better for us have been met with a lot of resistance, either by the companies unwilling to risk changing their product, or the customers themselves. He doesn’t mention much in the way of the animal business, except when writing about the “improved” food pyramid (page 90-94) and the politicking that went on with the Cattlemen’s Beef Assocation and dairy manufacturers. They worried that the new design would stigmatize their products as less healthy in terms of portions thus make people less likely to buy a lot of them.

We can’t all become vegetarians overnight. Even if we did, what would happen to these animals? They’d be rendered unnecessary, beyond medical help, and would have to be wastefully slaughtered. It’s not the fact that these companies are “playing god” with these animals. Humans have practiced specialized breeding for hundreds of years on all kinds of species and will continue to do so. The issue should be with how they do it, not the fact that they are. Until there is a bigger public push for change, from grass roots to big government, all the talk in the world won’t make a difference.

Holey Swiss Cheese, a Jesus pizza!

This slice of hot bubbly goodness from Brisbane, Australia could also be a cheesy John Lennon but people were more likely to bid on a three cheese Jesus so that’s what the owner of Posh Pizza told bidders it is.

The shop, in the city’s Fortitude Valley, has put the slice on eBay, and as of this morning bidding was up to $65.

All proceeds raised will go to a charity to be decided once the pizza is auctioned.

Posh Pizza’s Maree Phelan said her pizza oven was seemingly blessed with the presence of Jesus Christ, who chose a three cheese pizza as his medium.

Phelan isn’t convinced it’s the son of God, but she’s certain it got there on its own.

“I can definitely say this isn’t a fake,” she said.

Apparently her Cheesus has already stopped her from getting a parking ticket, that’s how she knows. One would hope she was joking, but the Herald Sun still went to check on the nature of miracles and quotes somebody official.

Australian Catholic University associate professor and director of the Institute for Catholic Identity and Mission, Patrick McArdle, said the pizza was “almost definitely not a miracle” and would be hard to prove.

”There are a lot of misunderstandings in the making of saints and miracles,” he said.

He said generally only “medical miracles”, such as healings, were accepted by the Catholic Church because those incidents could be tested using scientific means.

“We often rely on medical miracles because there is scientific proof it can’t be explained by conventional science, that’s where the validity comes from,” he said.

“You have to understand we can’t apply that kind of rigour to a piece of cheese,” he said.

And you can’t really prove it tastes heavenly if you’re scared of offending Him by eating it.

The winning bid was $153 and they’re taking suggestions at Facebook for what charity to spend the money on.

–
edit March 31/10: The winning charity was Mummy’s Wish Inc, a “a not-for-profit charity focusing on supporting mothers diagnosed with cancer while either pregnant or with young children in South East Queensland.” Posh Pizza matched the bid, giving the group $306.

Bless this pizza, Mary, Jesus…

You can’t set your watch by them, but stories about seeing religious figures in ordinary things is such a regular occurrence in the field of journalism, I guess they can’t not report on them.

Josh Mather, of Mansfield, couldn’t believe his eyes.

Me neither. Looking at the image provided with the article, it’s clear he’s completely mistaken and this is a sign that George Lucas really wants us to believe in Jawas. What kind of religion did they have? Sign me up! May the force…

Mather is pre-socialized to see religious iconography instead of homages to film, I guess. I saw Gandalf giving the ring to Frodo on a slice of French Toast once, too. I took a picture of it and then I ate it.

Anyway, back to what passes for news in this world:

He closed his bar in Plainville and was sifting through his equipment when he made this discovery. He says he found an image of Jesus and Mary on a diffuser for the pizza oven.

I’m surprised they didn’t throw the name of his bar in here as well. Unless Plainville is so small he has the only one in town?

Josh has walked by that oven for years and says he just happened to notice the image today: Ash Wednesday.

Josh says believe it or not the counter of his bar was actually made out of church pews and today is the first time he’s been to church in 20 years.

Yes, sure. Is he trying to imply that remains of church pews would make the place holy enough for the finger of God to come down personally to trace some imagery in a grease stain? Just noticed this.. in time to make headlines on Ash Wednesday, the first day of Lent. Mentioning it on Fat Tuesday just wouldn’t have had the same effect, eh?

Is Chick-fil-A anti gay?

I’ve heard of the restaurant but know nothing about it. It’s made it into headlines recently, though, after one of them in Pennsylvania planned to supply sandwiches to a marriage workshop put on by people who supported traditional (read: biblical) couples. This raised enough bad press and flak to make them change their minds about that.

The Georgia-based lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) advocacy group and other university groups across the country are asking their schools to quit getting “Jesus chicken” for lunches now that people have been reminded of where the chain stands on this issue. In a Facebook video, CEO Dan Cathy addressed some concerns.

Cathy explains in the video, “Providing sandwiches and brownies for a local seminar is not an endorsement or a political stance.” He also adds that marriage has long been a focus of Chick-fil-A, which his father, S. Truett Cathy, started in 1967.

But would they have agreed to supply sandwiches for a gay pride parade? Now that I know more about the history of this particular chain, I assume they never would have been asked in the first place.

Fortunately for both Chick-fil-A and the gay community, free speech is still alive in the United States. Also, every American still has the freedom to start a business and build it as they see fit. Chick-fil-A has every right to support, promote and encourage Christian values, while individuals, groups and businesses in the GLBT community have the same rights to further their cause.

However, hateful, derogatory actions or speech toward any group (including gays and Christians) should never be tolerated. That said, it would be prudent for organizations and groups like Chick-fil-A and those within the gay community to pick their battles wisely; decide where their time and resources would be best spent.

The author of this piece, Kim Linton, would probably support Chick-fil-A’s side, given she’s a contributor to a Christian themed webzine, but she still makes a good point. Focus on school bullying and education. Focus on legalizing gay marriage. Nobody’s forcing you to eat their chicken. If you disagree with their position, you can still tell others and get lunch somewhere else. It’ll never be the only food option available.

Is cancer man-made?

I won’t deny there’s possibility of that, given the number of chemicals we’re exposed to on a daily basis. Researchers seem to be heading towards that conclusion, although so far it looks like all they have for “proof” that it’s our fault are samples from Egyptian mummies who didn’t die of cancer (possibly because something else killed them first).

That wasn’t going to be the point of this post, though. I found an article claiming God’s love is the only cure we need for cancer. I’m sure most doctors would disagree…

Whether a victim or an activist to breast cancer, the concerns are personal. Everyone should take this deadly disease for what it is really worth, and that is another mechanism to destroy the good that God created.

Is this an argument that the devil gives people cancer? That might be a straw man argument, I suppose. But the phrasing of it does take God out of the equation as the giver of cancer, possibly taking him out of the role of creator of cancer, too, thus making room for “the good that God created” to have created the problem in the first place. Free will and all that. Yay us.

When I was a young child, I did not ever hear of the word cancer, but today, it’s an epidemic that comes in all forms.

That doesn’t mean there wasn’t any cancer back then, though. You might have been sheltered. My folks sheltered me. I wasn’t told directly that my mother had ovarian cancer because they didn’t want to worry me during finals or something. And I was in high school at the time. I forget when I was told or finally realized that’s what was going on but I recall wondering why I wasn’t in on the news from the start. I’m sure I resented being left out of something that serious, even if it would have made it harder to concentrate at school.

When we look at the color pink from the spiritual standpoint, we know that it is nothing but good associated with it.

Pink is a combination of red and white in the color spectrum.

Red represents the blood of Jesus and white represent pureness as God is.

Oh barf.

To me, when I see pink as it is being represented by victims or activists of breast cancer, I know there is a chance no matter what the illness is because we are being reminded that by Jesus’ stripes, we are healed. So although it may attack our bodies, never give up or in to it.

Keep holding on to the hem of Jesus’ garment in hope that all things work toward good to those who love God.

Right, because only the godly deserve to be cured and the rest should just get on with going to hell or something? Yeah, that’s a straw man argument for sure, but I’m sticking to it.

Personally I’m pissed off by the co-opting of pink for breast cancer awareness, but that’s beside the point. Sort of.

I think it says a sad thing about our society when you realize that the whole reason so many companies bring out pink cancer boxes for their products is because people are consumers first and charitable givers second.

People want to support breast cancer research through what they have to/want to buy rather than cutting a cheque and eliminating these middle men. And companies are taking advantage of that because while they market the pink box to “support a good cause,” they make a profit on it. I highly doubt these companies give all the money from the pink boxes to cancer research. Why would they? They have to be able to buy their supplies to meet demand, too, and they probably sell a lot more if there’s pink on the box, which means needing more supplies. I’m sure a lot of people are buying a lot of crap they don’t even need because the boxes are pink and they want to “support a good cause.”

I avoid the pink boxes like a plague, myself. I buy nothing with a pink ribbon on it because I see it as a marketing gimmick, not real give-a-damn. If I gave more of a damn myself, I’d call some of those 1-800 numbers given on the pink boxes and quiz the company people about what percentage of the price is earmarked for donation. I wonder if it’s like McDonald’s saying they’ll give a penny for every Happy Meal sold.

Happy Meals have always played an important role in making family meal time fun and special. Our new fundraising effort gives parents another way to teach their children about the importance of helping others.”

In addition to purchasing a Happy Meal or Mighty Kids Meal, where one penny from each purchase will benefit RMHC…

Here’s a question; how many dollars will McDonald’s receive from the public before McDonald’s will give a thousand dollars to Ronald McDonald House Charity? I’d answer that, but it depends on the local price of the Happy Meal in question, which I don’t know. Bottom line, it would save everyone a shitload of money (and possible child obesity problems) if four thousand people simply dropped one quarter in a charity box. Yes?

Instead of giving via costly consumerism (thereby buying and/or eating the very chemicals that likely give us the cancer in the first place), why don’t we just give more of that money directly to the charities? Wouldn’t that make a lot more sense?

Can we trust Nutrisystem’s “research” here?

MarieClaire points out a problem with the national consumer surveys that weight loss company recently reported on:

studies of this nature reveal how deep our nation’s obsession with “thinness” and the greater issue of body image run. Would we really sooner resign ourselves to an entire season of chastity than tack on some stray pounds? Evidently, yes.

Even more alarming? Twenty-five percent of Americans favored dropping weight over a job promotion. Suddenly obesity trumps not only companionship, but individual successes (and the higher pay that goes with it!).

Americans are obsessed with weight loss. This is nothing new. But what’s worse? This distressing viewpoint, or the fact the Nutrisystem, the source behind the above findings, continues to exploit it.

Here’s the link to the “study”:

Additional findings from the survey include:

* A majority of Americans (66 percent) who say they need to lose weight to feel sexier than they currently do, think it will take an average of 23 pounds of weight loss for this to happen

* More than half (52 percent) of American women would take a summer without sex over gaining 10 pounds; a quarter of American men (25 percent) said they would make the same sacrifice

* More Americans would prefer to shed 10 to 20 pounds this summer (25 percent) than get promoted at work (20 percent)

* Almost three out of four Americans (73 percent) are willing to give up television, their cell phones or their computers for a flat tummy this beach season

* Nearly half (46 percent) of the country chose not to diet, even when they knew they needed to lose weight, because they didn’t want to give up their favorite foods

* Almost all dieters (93 percent) find at least one aspect of their dieting plan to be challenging; the majority said they aren’t able to control cravings (71 percent) and find portion size an obstacle to their success (64 percent)

Nothing in there about how big a pool of people got surveyed, if it was a random survey in any way, or what the statistical variance might be should others wish to attempt to duplicate their findings.

Science it isn’t. Marketing it is.

Nutrisystem wants people to sign up to lose weight and lose money at the same time. Nutrisystem wants people to buy and eat their food, but they preach about how cheap it’ll be, “as little as $11 a day” — which adds up to at least four thousand bucks over a year, for servings designed to feed only one person per meal.

This week I spent $8 on a bag of fresh produce from CHEP – Child Hunger and Education Program. They offer Good Food Boxes for a good price, usually to schools and low-income families in Saskatoon and area, but they aren’t limiting themselves to that. If enough people in an area or business are interested and can get enough orders together, they’ll deliver. They offer locally grown food when they can get it and the rest of the year they probably get a good deal buying in bulk. In my bag this time were bananas, apples, oranges, washed and ready to eat carrots, a zucchini, beets, several new potatoes, and a packet of organic whole whole wheat pancake mix. The last bag two weeks ago had a whole bag of celery in it instead of the zucchini and I just cut the last of that for a salad last night.

All fresh, not prepackaged into chemicalized servings full of sodium. Yeah, it requires knowledge of how to use a knife to cut these vegetables into bite sizes and a few minutes to do that, but otherwise it’s nearly all ready to go. That was eight dollars for more food than I could eat in a day, I know that.

CHEP offers plans and programs for schools and families to teach and train them on making good and healthy food choices from the get-go. Nutrition education is the key and it needs to start early and everyone in the family needs to get in on it. It’s not enough that kids get a health class in school; if their parents are still going to serve them cans of Zoodles for supper every night, being able to recite the number of servings of bread allowed per day isn’t going to make much difference.

Weight loss isn’t where the emphasis should lie but Nutrisystem will never really tell anyone otherwise because, despite their nutritious sounding name, they still know their consumers and their consumers are willing to pay through the nose at the chance to lose one more pound.

So, Folkfest is running in Saskatoon

It’s a yearly city ritual to showcase the food, entertainment and general culture of countries around the world.

Last night I ate food from Hungary and listened to some traditional music from there. Then I popped over to the Asia exhibit to look around and watch what I think was a team from Taiwan manipulate a dragon across the stage. That was kind of cool actually – the lead guy had a ball on a stick and whatever way he duck and dove, the guy operating the dragon’s head would match the move and each guy behind would match and move his piece of the body around so the dragon would fly, twist, twirl, spin and nearly tangle itself up at some points. It was all done to the sound of some large kettle drum thing another guy was hammering on. After that bit of the show I went to the India pavilion to see the daughter of a lady at work do a dance number out of some Bollywood production. She had a really good time doing that, judging by the big smile on her face. One of the other girls looked like she’d been sent on stage under duress and wasn’t really keen to be there.

The night before I went to the Scottish Pavilion so I could get my fill of pipes and country dancing (was kind of dancing to the tunes myself, as I consider myself Scottish by appreciation) and bought myself some smokey bacon crisps and a can of Apple Tango drink. Before that, I sat at the Caribbean for an hour and watched the limbo girls, our local steel drum band and a troupe of Latino dancers (that was a fine show where I was sitting…mmm..mmm… mighty fine butt wiggling going on there…). And prior to that, I was at the Philippines exhibit for supper. I’d gotten there just as the place was opening up so there wasn’t much in the way of a line for the food.

While we waited to be served, we were greeted by somebody on stage who talked a bit about the culture of the Philippines and happened to mention it was the only Asian country that was nearly completely Catholic (she was wrong if Wikipedia is believable) and then she said the other 18% or whatever it was leftover had so far “resisted conversion.” Right there in the dinner line I started cheering. All by myself, cheering, “Resistance! Hooray!” — not loud mind you. I didn’t want to get booted out of line before I got fed. But I know a few people standing around me heard. I didn’t even care. I just liked how she phrased it, considering it wound up sounding like she disapproved of them. But how else could she introduce the traditional dancers from the part of the country that wasn’t chowing down on Jesus every day at Mass? I stayed to watch those dancers while I ate. There was some nice drum work for that, too.

There are more places I could go today but I think I’ve done enough world stuff. Time to focus on the home front and clean up after myself, get groceries and do a bit of other shopping. I realized last night that my best pair of shoes is in dire need of repairs and I want to check what kind of cost I’d be looking at to fix them. They’re so comfortable, I don’t really want to look around for a replacement that I may never like as well. If it’s more than the shoes are worth (as I discovered the day I wanted a new zipper put in a jacket..seriously? That much money to change a zipper? Passaroonie. I’ll use the snaps), I’ll rethink that notion. I’m just glad cobblers still find work. So much stuff these days seems designed to be tossed once busted. No wonder landfills overflow.