From the Newspaper

[Gravdigr]

A lot of the people who go to church today are not there to worship God, it's become a social occasion, a place to see and be seen.

[xoxoxoBruce]

But it was always that way, the church(s) was the center of social life, and attending Sunday was the dues.

[Gravdigr]

Originally Posted by xoxoxoBruce

But it was always that way, the church(s) was the center of social life, and attending Sunday was the dues.

Not the churches I attended.

[xoxoxoBruce]

Originally Posted by Gravdigr

Not the churches I attended.

You're contemporary, I'm talking about from 1566 to WW II, before Radio, before TV, Before motion pictures reached the sticks. There were two forms of entertainment, bars and churches. Married men could sometimes do both, but usually had to do the bar on the sly. What do you think your folks and grandfolks did in their courting days? Out in the sparsely settled areas the church is still a social center.

[Gravdigr]

Originally Posted by xoxoxoBruce

What do you think your folks and grandfolks did in their courting days?

They attended square dances. That's how mine met.

[Happy Monkey]

Originally Posted by glatt

You need a better spokesperson though to talk to the press and explain that it's a resource issue.

That wouldn't have been better wording, it would have been a completely different reason than the one the pastor gave. I'm all for giving the benefit of the doubt, but in this case you would have to do so by including facts not present in the article.


The pastor herself said:
It was to prevent poor people from hanging out near the church
The congregation didn't like that
Their church is not oriented towards social service

Another "benefit of the doubt" can be applied to the "made the decision ... after receiving an email"; Just because it was "after" doesn't mean "because", and we don't know the context in which the existence of the email was revealed to the reporter.

But the email is a pretty bog-standard "poor people are lazy moochers". Whether it says anything about the Winnipeg church or not, it doesn't reflect well on the one in Victoria.

[xoxoxoBruce]

St Louis news headline...
"St. Louis Zoo voted 'Nation's Best Zoo"

But when you get into the story it was voted in a reader's poll, "The best free attraction"
Yes there's a difference.

[Clodfobble]

The journalist's headline and opening sentence are not at all what the church representatives said. They made a distinction between people they could help, and people who needed more than food. They used the phrase "street people," which was not the greatest euphemism, but to me that says the mentally ill, the drug addicts, the people who start yelling when you don't give them a second sandwich because then someone else won't get one. Poverty comes with social ills, and this little church was naive about that when they started the program. Let's ask UT if he'd like to start a free food stand outside the pawn shop, eh?

[glatt]

I read about an exhibit at some early zoo where they put too many monkeys on an "island" and they killed each other. They are very territorial.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[xoxoxoBruce]

This is Sparta...

[xoxoxoBruce]

Newspapers used to be so much more fun...

[Clodfobble]

Found a cool background article on that case.

[DanaC]

Originally Posted by Clodfobble

Found a cool background article on that case.

Fascinating.

[xoxoxoBruce]

Very bizarre...

[xoxoxoBruce]

Yeah, good move...