Christian publications can’t write “Allah” because Muslims may get confused

DATELINE: Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

Then let Muslims discuss "In the Beginning"... well, maybe not.

[Oh yeah, you know this story has to be interesting.] Apparently, the Malaysian government has been part of Oprah’s book club and all reading the same book because they have unanimously voted to re-impose a ban on Christian publications… from using the word “Allah.”

[See, I told you so.]

Apart from barring the use of Allah, the ban on Christian publications also includes prohibitions on using words like Kaabah, Solat and Baitullah.

So, while Christian reporters can’t talk or write about Muslims going to church, praying or enjoying their Hajj (the pilgrimage) in Malaysia, it’s the people’s feelers the Malaysian government that brought on this drama:

It is just that the government wants to avoid any confusion, [Malaysian Home Minister Syed Hamid] Albar added.

Nice. You know, with government officials like this, who needs enemies?

So, I’m just a bill… a lonely ol’ bill… had to be set on Malaysia’s Capitol Hill because you think Muslims, whom I’ll bet a dozen bean pies ain’t reading those cracked Christian publications, are complete morons and get Jesus and Muhammed confused?!

Seriously, I don’t see Imams teaching hooked on phonics. There isn’t a pressing need to sound out All-ahhhhh before you kneel on a musallah. Wait, that just confused me too. I wonder if this an affect on Muslim agnostics?!

It seems we are all on to something concerning the “Wal Mart” church

It’s almost Six Degrees of Separation to source this riveting article, but I’ll give it a shot before I get rolling:

Thanks to Another Brick on the Wall “Spiritual Pathway Ministries“, by way of the whole article in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram and discusses a Bob Pearle book entitled The Vanishing Church: Searching for Significance in the 21st Century.

All clear? OK, and away we go…

For the past couple weeks, we have plastered on the Wall a few ruminations about “Big Box” megachurches and even its progeny, “minichurches”.

And now this article about Pearle’s Vanishing Church stands in my shadow threatening to whoop up on anyone who talks smack in my direction.

He doesn’t hold that churches are literally “vanishing,” since there are all kinds of churches, often filled to overflowing, in our neck of the woods [North Texas]. “What I’m saying is that the biblical New Testament church is vanishing from society today,” he said. “Anything and everything is acceptable as long as it builds a crowd. Jesus wasn’t as interested in building a crowd as he was in telling the truth.”

Amen! And why all this brouhaha over exponentially growing houses of worship? It’s simple math:

On one hand, we have church overflowing of concert-quality worship, hypersensationalism, a disconnected waltz through the scriptures and a sermon that is more Tony Robbins and less Tony Campolo.

And on the other, we have a warehouse full of crushed velvet, ornate furnishings and lots of bling… and that’s just the “Frozen Chosen” sitting in the pews… er, chairs.

Add the two together and you still get a bunch of folk en route lights and sirens to Luby’s Cafeteria who still can’t tell you what scripture was shared in the pulpit.

From seeker sensitive to televised tabernacle, the missing part of the equation seem to be allegiance to God’s Word. Well, better yet, just God’s Word.

Pearle — who rejects the label of fundamentalist — says declining membership in many mainline Protestant groups results from watering down core biblical teachings. He believes that evangelicals who do that will suffer the same fate. “You have to hear the bad news that we are sinners, before your receive the good news of salvation,” Pearle says.

People, we need a Savior, which is why we should celebrate Jesus Christ daily. We are “saved” and set free to worship God. However, most of us would rather go check out some dude crush expletives in the pulpit for shock value or hear the “Aw shucks the big guy upstairs sure loves you” show.

Now, THIS is the stuff worth shouting about in the sanctuary, regardless what size it is! Anyone?

Ebony… Ivory… and Prosperity

Nice tune, eh?

While I am humming the Stevie Wonder part of that chummy song, I think of an unlikely tandem not often read about in ecumenical circles – Creflo & Gregory Dollar.

OK, HiScrivener. I’ve heard of – and laughed at – one of them, but who’s that other guy? Well, for starters, he is the white adopted son of TBN-evangelist Creflo and skilled TV producer of Dad’s show (no smarmy comment, he’s good at his gig) .

I KNOW?!

Evidently, he has a book coming out, “Love in the Darkness: My Life as Creflo Dollar’s Son” and is making the rounds with the media (I know… insert your jokes here. There’s a few of them that can be applicable).

Dude even has a customized, and albeit morose, MySpace page.

In it, [Greg] Dollar tells of how “a white boy, unusually abused, out of control, and hurting, was rescued by a black man.” It continues, “Gregory Campbell is forced to grow up too fast and too hard,” explains the official synopsis of the book, referring to Dollar by the surname of a former stepfather.

This is a perplexing story.

On one hand, you have a preacher – a talented teacher – who by any conceivable comprehension has traversed down a path where the Gospel serves him instead of the other way around. And then you have a guy with a church of eight who meets this tortured soul and snatches him, despite color, creed or culture, and takes him in from the cold.

To add to the drama, and precarious timing, we have this:

His father’s critics, however, will likely see the book as an attempt to paint a sympathetic view of the prosperity preacher, who is one of the six televangelists under investigation over allegations of opulent spending and possible abuse of their nonprofit status.

Yeah, there’s that. But, call me a sap. I choose to celebrate with the younger Dollar and his Prodigal Son story. He is the epitome of that parable – out and about and still welcomed inside. And that, regardless of the faux exterior of righteousness, warms my heart… if only for a while.

Among megachurches, less is more

“Everything’s bigger in Texas.”

Who hasn’t heard that adage? Evidently, megachurch pastors in the Lone Star state as they have spawned the trend of bigger churches, just in smaller and several locations.

Rather than make their [megachurch pastors] voluminous auditoriums even bigger, they are creating smaller, community-based congregations. These offshoots help relieve crowded sanctuaries, shorten members’ commutes and spread church ministries into untapped territories.

“Offshoots”?! Try more like adorned buildings with a big TV screen. I don’t get the “satellite church,” people. Am I missing something? Going to church… to watch TV? Is TBN so bad that you have to decorate a media room with crushed velvet, high back chairs, offering boxes and the choir?!

But, like the croup and the flu, this stuff is catching.

The trend from mega to mini has gained momentum nationwide. An estimated 22 percent of U.S. megachurches — those with 2,000 or more at weekly services — started or were considering satellites in 2000, according to a megachurch study by the Hartford Institute for Religion Research and Leadership Network. Last year, that percentage grew to 59 percent.

So, here’s a thought: is this being responsible to the needs of the environment or just a clash between vanity run-a-muck and multiple personality disorder?

Sure, these multiple “churches” are saving time on traffic, but it’s still all going to the same trafficker. Listen, if you have a following and the throng just has to see you in the moment, I’m not mad at ya’. Good on ya’. But what happens if pastor isn’t on his game? Or there’s a guest speaker?

What, does the on-location host pastor change the channel? Maybe they plug in the XBOX 360 and play “Halo,” you know, to keep it heavenly minded.

Unfortunately, it seems there is no happy medium with these bustling churches – either they go “big box” and become Wal-Mart’s inner court or they cash in… er, reach out to its multitudes and create more geographically centric “minichurch” locations. What’s a pastor to do?

God is omnipresent and churches are becoming very savvy at marketing, public relations and technology. Praise the Lord for that, but what are they doing that the other churches on the corner not doing?

Maybe instead of holding $400 per ticket conferences to teach monkey-see-monkey-do, these innovative, jean-wearing preachers should leave their plush, tuck-and-roll office chairs once in a while to teach the lesser-thans how to earn enough money to buy a TV, much less broadcast from it. Just a thought.

What else does Utah have more than any other state? Porn!

What? You thought I was going to pen, “Snow,” “Mountains” or perhaps “Mormons”?

Evidently, this is how they roll too

Please, most of the bricks on the Wall are plastered in irony. I couldn’t let you off that easy. You see, according to online buy rates and the Utah Deseret news (and some masonry by the Bible Belt Blogger), someone really needs to “sound the alarm in Zion.”

Ah, I love it when the double entendre works for both Pentecostals and oddball sects. Good times.

Utahns, famous for their wholesomeness and frugality, buy online pornography at higher rates than the rest of America. That’s the conclusion of a Harvard economics professor who tracked subscriptions to online porn sites. Utah ranks No. 1 in subscriptions, according to Benjamin Edelman, who reported his findings in the article “Red Light States: Who Buys Online Adult Entertainment?”

It seems while the LDS Church was debating Proposition 8 in California, they were making online proposals of their own to starlets named Trixie and Delightful Darla. Stay classy, boys.

“Subscriptions are slightly more prevalent in states that have enacted conservative legislation on sexuality,” Edelman writes. In the 27 states where “defense of marriage” amendments have been adopted, there were 11 percent more porn subscribers than in other states, he reports. Use is higher also in states where more people agree with the statement “I never doubt the existence of God.”

So, let me get this right: where people have to create affront of pseudo-spirituality, there are mucho sins in the closet and in the computer. I wonder how much smut is a big player in genealogy, or on the planet Kolob.

I figure with all the getting busy done in space, Utahns are just getting practice for the big day. How’s that for a “Pearl of Great Price“?

I’d bet my autographed Joseph Smith medallion, skivvies from heaven and all my prayers for the dead that some one in the hallowed Temple is cursing Mark Twain. “Lies, damned lies and statistics,” you know.