“Confessions of a Bad Christian” – Forgive? No, I’m serious…I don’t wanna.

I hit a nerve with a lot of people with the post about forgiveness. I lot of you thought my ideas fit into the philosophy of  “nothing is impossible for the person who doesn’t have to do it.” My thoughts were addressed to a wounded lamb who identified himself as “doormat”. That post brought a return response from doormat who graciously thanked me for the effort to address his situation. Thank you for taking so much time to respond to my post. I don’t expect you to go on and on with me. I know the ultimate answer is “Jesus surrendered His rights so who do you think you are?” First of all, you are welcome. Anyone who knows anything about me knows that I have a heart for wounded lambs. I would be willing to go on and on with you if God could somehow use my words to help you heal and forgive. I think you got it partially right about
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“Confessions of a Bad Christian” – ‘ Post” Mortems

The informal meaning of post mortem is an analysis or review of a finished event. One previous post is ready for a “post” mortem examination and another should soon be there. Let’s take a look at a couple of prior stories and where they stand. Jesus wins round one in Italy I wrote about an atheist who was going to take a former friend and Catholic priest to court to prove the historical existence of Jesus. The Washington Post recently reported that “an Italian judge has dismissed an atheist’s petition that a small-town priest should stand trial for asserting that Jesus Christ existed. Luigi Cascioli, a 72-year-old retired agronomist, had accused the Rev. Enrico Righi of violating two laws with the assertion, which he called a deceptive fable propagated by the Roman Catholic Church. “The Rev. Righi is very satisfied and moved,” Righi’s attorney, Severo Bruno, said. “He is an old, small-town parish priest who never would have thought he’d be in the spotlight
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“Confessions of a Bad Christian” – Coming clean with my Christian “agenda”

I have been outed. Some readers of my books and these daily ramblings have somehow discovered that I am, deep breath, a conservative Evangelical Christian. A blog called Disaster Area reviewed When Bad Christians Happen to Good People. A couple of things he said cracked me up. First of all, he says the book is by “a guy called Dave Burchett.” That also happens to be my name so that may well be the reason I am called Dave Burchett. Secondly, he oddly states that I am “apparently an Emmy winner in sports broadcasting.” Apparently? But the biggest revelation against a guy called Dave Burchett who has apparenlty written this book is this breaking news. (emphasis is his) “However, it becomes clear about halfway through the book that by Christians he means North American Fundamentalist Evangelical Christians.” I guess they are on to me. Feedback to my post about  Richard Dawkins noted the following with this quote which I have reproduced exactly as it appeared. “The article also trys to make Dawkins
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“Confessions of a Bad Christian” – Forgive? I don’t wanna…

One of the things that really struck me from the movie “End of the Spear” was that in the Waodani language, there is no word for forgiveness. The concept was so foreign to that culture that no word had ever been coined. In our Christian culture we have the word but we too often lack the ability to apply it. One of the joys of writing these daily ramblings is hearing from readers who are blessed or challenged by something I have written. Occasionally someone takes time out of their busy schedule to tell me I am an idiot. Isn’t it a waste of time to tell an idiot that he is an idiot? How can an idiot comprehend that? But I digress. The communications that are really hard for me are the ones from people who have been wounded by other people in the church or by church leaders. Those break my heart and such messages arrive far too often. Today was such a day. I wrote
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“Confessions of a Bad Christian” – Evangelicals Miss the Big Picture? Really?

Any article entitled “Evangelicals Miss the Big Picture” will get my attention. So I delved into the piece in USA Today with great interest. The writer is William Romanowski, a film studies professor at Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Romanowski surmised that “evangelicals can influence Hollywood, but their efforts would be more effective and better received if they focused on cultural discourse, not religious conversion.” Hmmm. Discuss.  Here are some excerpts from Professor Romanowski’s essay. My commentary is italicized. The Passion’s numbers were an eye-opener for Hollywood. Now, movies with clear religious themes such as Constantine, The Exorcism of Emily Rose and The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe, and even those without any sort of explicit Christian connection, such as Cinderella Man or The Greatest Game Ever Played, are being pitched by studios to reach the “Christian” market. More specifically, the target is those evangelicals who embraced The Passion with such enthusiasm. Consumers are spending hundreds of millions of dollars
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“Confessions of a Bad Christian” – Boomers get ready…how soon will we be going home?

A simple new test is designed to calculate the odds for me being alive in four years. That’s right. I can tally my score for the twelve predictive categories and decide if that five year bond is really a good idea. So I took the test and the results are in. According to this measuring stick it looks like I will accomplish my goal of living long enough to be a problem for my children. The mortality calculator (that sounds dark) was developed by researchers at the San Francisco Veterans Affairs Medical Center. The researchers developed the scale after studying 12,000 patients and then applying those findings to 8,000 more to chart the reliability of their GRI (Grim Reaper Index – that is my acronym, not theirs). This is a test where you hope for a very low score. A zero to five score for an over fifty respondent will give you a 96% chance of seeing 2010. I scored a
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“Confessions of a Bad Christian” – The Gift of “Regifting”

I suppose that most writers perceive themselves as wordsmiths. But most of us merely arrange previously coined words. What a thrill it must be to actually create a word and see it become a part of the lexicon. The Seinfeld television show was known for inventing new words and phrases that are now in common usage. I was reminded of that this week when I read a survey about the phenomenon of regifting. Regift is a verb and means “to give an unwanted gift to someone else; to give as a gift something one previously received as a gift.” (dictionary.com) That term, as well as the noun regifter, were first used in a Seinfeld episode from 1995 called The Label Maker. Seinfeldians will recall this dialogue… George: The wedding is off.  Now you can go to the Super Bowl.Jerry: I can’t call Tim Whatley and ask for the tickets back.George: You just gave them to him two days ago, he’s gotta give you a grace period.Jerry: Are you
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