Travel Journal

Another Newsweek Article. This article is of interest to me because I did really like the movie End of the Spear. But I did find it also very interesting that they chose a politically active homosexual to play the lead. Later as I read the director’s comment on why he chose Chad Allen, I came to understand more about it and started to believe the decision was possibly good. Maybe the movie (or PR of the movie) would have been more effective with non-politically active homosexual lead, but also maybe there is a greater good here. And now after reading this article, perhaps there is.

Film: Gays, God and the Movies
Bruised in one encounter with evangelicals, gay actor Chad Allen gets a different reaction the second time around.

WEB EXCLUSIVE

By Samantha Henig

Feb. 6, 2007 – Normally a child actors biggest professional hurdle is finding roles once his voice breaks and acne hits. But Chad Allen, whose career took off at age 9 as Tommy on St. Elsewhere, had another obstacle to overcome: his sexuality.

When the openly gay Allen was cast as a Christian missionary in End of the Spear, a 2005 movie produced by an evangelical film company, members of the religious right fumed about the choice. But he has received a warmer response from evangelical Christians to his new film, Save Me, in which he plays Mark, a drug-addicted, promiscuous gay man who is sent by his disapproving brother to Genesis House, a live-in therapy program that aims to cure gay men of their brokenness, through Christianity. Mark does find God at Genesis House, but he also finds love. The film, which was recently shown at the Sundance Film Festival but does not yet have a distributor, tackles the controversial practice of ex-gay ministries. It chronicles Marks struggle to reconcile his newfound belief that living in the Lords image means being heterosexual, with his romantic feelings for Scott, a fellow Genesis House resident, played by Robert Gant of Queer as Folk.

Read more!

An interesting article in Newsweek that I read.

God Debate: Sam Harris vs. Rick Warren

At the Summit: On a cloudy California day, the atheist Sam Harris sat down with the Christian pastor Rick Warren to hash out Life’s Biggest QuestionIs God real? A NEWSWEEK exclusive.

April 9, 2007 issue – Rick Warren is as big as a bear, with a booming voice and easygoing charm. Sam Harris is compact, reserved and, despite the polemical tone of his books, friendly and mild. Warren, one of the best-known pastors in the world, started Saddleback in 1980; now 25,000 people attend the church each Sunday. Harris is softer-spoken; paragraphs pour out of him, complex and fact-filledas befits a Ph.D. student in neuroscience. At NEWSWEEK’s invitation, they met in Warren’s office recently and chatted, mostly amiably, for four hours. Jon Meacham moderated. Excerpts follow.

Read more!

The new James Cameron documentary – though it is supposedly an old finding, but with “new evidence”. I guess read for yourself and see.

Discover Channel Article

Other Readings:

Apologetics

Has it been found?

Read more!

My brother sent me this info…sweet:

Highlander: The Source

Also, check out this news page: http://www.highlander-thesource.com/news-updates.html

But I don’t know, I hope it’s not another Highlander II. Sounds like this one will try to explain the origins of the immortals, and we know how that last one turned out. It would be all too ironic if their search lead them to the conclusion that …. they are aliens from another world!

It seems they plan on it being a trilogy. But also sounds like a straight to video thing.

He sent this to me from his cell phone. I’ll send a shout out to him!

Full Story

NEW YORK – The nation solemnly observed the fifth anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks Monday with moments of silence timed to mark the World Trade Center jetliner crashes and quiet remembrances held around the country.

The 16-acre trade center site in lower Manhattan fell quiet at 8:46 a.m., five years after American Airlines Flight 11 crashed into the north tower, and 9:03 a.m., when United Flight 175 slammed into the south tower. A third moment of silence at 9:59 a.m. marked the collapse of the south tower.

“We’ve come back to remember the valor of those we’ve lost, those who innocently went to work that day and the brave souls who went in after them,” former Mayor Rudolph Giuliani said in a ceremony at ground zero.

Family members at ground zero held up signs reading “You will always be with us” and “Never forget,” and quiet sobs could be heard as the moments of silence were observed. Some victims’ relatives crossed themselves and wiped away tears.

“Five years have come, and five years have gone, and still we stand together as one,” Mayor Michael Bloomberg said. “We come back to this place to remember the heartbreaking anniversary and each person who died here those known and unknown to us, whose absence is always with us.”

The sorrowful task of reading the names of the 2,749 victims of the trade center attacks fell to spouses and partners.

“My love for you is eternal,” said Maria Acosta, who began the annual reading of the names, including her lost boyfriend, Paul John Gill. “And we all love you very much.”

President Bush opened the day at a historic New York firehouse, mingling with firefighters and police officers who were among the first to rush to the burning skyscrapers. He was to visit the attack sites in Shanksville, Pa., and the Pentagon later in the day before giving a prime-time address from the Oval Office.

I have been catching this show “Who Wants to be a Superhero” on the Sci-Fi channel. It is corny and cheesy at times, but overall kind of a amusing. A sort of “reality” game show to find the next superhero for Stan Lee. The winner, Feedback, who get his own comic book series, and a Sci-Fi movie special. So that kind of cool. Can’t wait to check it out.

“Okay, lecture’s over – time for some Feedback!”

One day while camping, my brother played some “Eye of a Tiger” to wake me up. It really worked – it got me going and motivated to get out of bed.

So in my many attempts to find the failed-proof method for my wake alarm, I set up mp3’s to play in the morning. I made of list of songs I find motivating that inspires me to “seize the day” that would play for my alarm. I think that worked a couple of days, but then I just slept through them again instead of motivating me. Laziness wins again.

So lately I had an idea. Maybe not a list of songs – but just that one song – Eye of a Tiger. The songs says it all. So now I wake up to that one song. It would probably work more, but the logistics is the problem now. I don’t always have an mp3 player with an alarm in the bedroom. But maybe it would work more, and get me energized to go and conquer the world.

Another thing that I find that works a lot is just to use the radio (loud enough) as an alarm, instead of a buzzer. I would set it up an hour before I would wake. I would not have to get annoyed by getting out of bed to turn off an unwanted alarm. The talk on the radio in the morning would also bring me out of my dream state. The problem with waking up is that I am so deep into my dreams that sometimes I want to finish my dream, or dream a little more. But with the radio, the real world comes to me. I then become more aware that I am waking up to the real world, and the dream I have is fleeting and not real. So though to it does not shake me awake, it does bring out from my sleep, and allow me time to stretch and get out of bed when I am ready.

But now there is something that got me thinking about the way I start my day. A lot of time on the radio, they play Mercy Me “I Can Only Imagine” in the morning. So I wake up to that song often – that and the other “Here With Me”. And everytime I wake up to that song, it’s a different sense of the world – one that I have been trying to capture day to day. Of course, the song is about each one’s personal vision of Heaven. So the song reminds me what I think of Heaven.

So often in the daily activities of “conquering the world”, you get tired out and wonder why bother sometimes. Then you re-focus your life, and focus on the simple joys and rewards of the day. And so I love waking up to this song because it does starts of the day totally opposite. I use to think my focus of the day is to take on the world, face all the challenges, and be a winner in the end of the day. To be successful. That is not bad thing at all. But everytime I do that, I do lose focus, and I come back to this point. And now, starting my day with the correct focus, it has really given me a reason to get out of bed. I get out of bed realizing life is not a bunch of challenges I must overcome and be weary of. Life is simple. You enjoy it. You still make the most of it you can. You do your best. But remember what all this is for. How matters in the end and what does not? What has value that stands the test of time? And to always remember that life does not end here, and these troubles we face everyday will just be a memory. In my Heaven, the thing that counts the most is being surrounded by the beauty of the world, being able to love the ones I love, and walking (physically) alongside with Christ intimately. And that gives me motivation to “seize the day”.

Today I got and a wedding invitation from an old friend. Well, actually he is a friend of my brother, but I grew up with him as well so he is close to me too. I can’t wait to go to his wedding – his wedding will be the wedding of the century. (Other than my own wedding of course). His may not be big or fancy necessarily, and I don’t even know what it will be like. But the reason I’m looking forward to it is because of the reunion we will have. I will be seeing old friends that I have not seen in ten years or more, friends that I have grown up with. At his wedding will be his family, which includes some of my best friends from early child and some of my classmates, because they all related.

It started with Jennifer – I knew her from elementary school, probably around fourth grade. If I get chance to meet with her again, then she will be the person if I’ve have known the longest. (There was also a Susan Gatlin I knew in first-grade and I knew her in high school as well, I was never really that close to her so I don’t consider her someone I’ve known a long time. But technically Susan would be the person that I have known the farthest back and known for more than a few years.) Anyway, Jennifer would be the one that I would consider a close friend and I’ve known the farthest back. But I’ve been out of touch with her for about 10 years now – the last time I saw her was in college.

So then I met her brother Nathan. Nathan and I used to walk home together since we lived roughly in the same neighborhood. So I got to know him, and then met the rest of his family – Alex and Jon (and Jennifer). Nathan became a best friend and we hung out all the time – running around the neighborhood, exploring the forests, and just getting into trouble. (As a side note now that I remember it, I also met Bryan Jamison around this time. He and I – we actually do keep in touch nowadays, so I guess he IS currently the person I’ve known the longest that I still keep in touch with. When I first met him, he was my bully, so it was kind of different and another story. But he is now a good friend and we try to keep in touch as we can.)

So I grew up around Nathan and Alex, and my brother played with Jon back in Nacogdoches. Around middle school, Nathan and Alex left Texas to go live in New Mexico with their real mom. So I did not get to see Nathan and Alex again until late in high school, and by then we come have drifted apart. (Alex actually worked with me for a summer in McDonalds.) I e-mailed to Nathan over the years, but I have not heard from him in three years or more.

So when my brother told me Jon was getting married this year, I told my brother that I had to be invited to that wedding. I missed the wedding for Mindy, and I regretted it. I was not I invited to her wedding though. Mindy’s wedding was the second wedding of the century, again because the whole gang was there, except me. Mindy and Jon were close friends. But I hope to make it to Jon’s wedding this time though – so I can see Jennifer, Nathan, Alex, Jon, and even Mindy. And even little Steve will be there as well, though the last time I saw him – he only three years old. And Helen who is their mother is now a doctor supposedly and I am looking forward to seeing her as well. And of course my brother and possibly my sister will be there, and possibly Jennifer’s new baby. It will be like my second high school reunion.