Bible Emoji: Scripture 4 Millennials

Bible Emoji translates the holy text into a language millennials can understand. Photograph: Bible Emoji/Twitter/Twitter

Bible Emoji translates the holy text into a language millennials can understand. Photograph: Bible Emoji/Twitter/Twitter

emoji

It’s a holy book, it’s $2.99 and it might just save religion among young people.

“Bible Emoji: Scripture 4 Millennials” was released Sunday in the iBooks store. It’s exactly what it sounds like: an adaptation of the King James Version of the Bible using internet slang and emoji, the adorable emoticons frequently used in text messages and tweets. Translated over the past six months by a person who identifies himself or herself only as the sunglasses-guy emoji, the objective of the emoji Bible is to make the text more appealing to people of various backgrounds and age groups.

I already hate this thing. I am not a fan of emojis.

The 3,282-page emoji Bible includes interpretations of all 66 books in the Bible and advertises itself as a “fun way to share the gospel.” But it’s already causing controversy, pointing to a larger challenge facing modern Christians: How do you engage millennials without being cheesy?

[…]

The millennial generation, which includes people between the ages of 18 and 34, is famous for bucking trends, and religion is no exception. … “It’s not as if young people today are being raised in a way completely different from Christianity,” Pew researcher Greg Smith told CNN last year. “But as adults they are simply dropping that part of their identity.”

Theories vary as to why this is happening  — millennials distrust institutions, or they’re getting married later, or they think the church is too antiquated — but the trend is a near-universal concern for Christians. So they’re frantically searching for a remedy.

Case in point: Though the emoji Bible appears to be the first of its kind to be published, it’s not the first to crop up on the internet. In 2014, artist Kamran Kastle launched a $25,000 Kickstarter campaign to make an emoticon Bible, according to the Inquisitr. It raised only $105.

IBT Story. Inquisitr Story.

I now pronounce you: Jack Daniels.

From left; Dan Mathews kisses his husband Jack Ryan on stage in Raleigh as Alex Ebert looks on; Photo courtesy of Pawel Malyszko.

From left; Dan Mathews kisses his husband Jack Ryan on stage in Raleigh as Alex Ebert looks on; Photo courtesy of Pawel Malyszko.

Edward Sharpe & the Magnetic Zeros show how to do a concert in NC without compromising your principles.

Edward Sharpe & the Magnetic Zeros considered canceling a concert scheduled in Raleigh, N.C. on Friday, but ultimately decided the show must go on — to make a statement.

The indie band was torn over whether to play in North Carolina in light of the state’s sweeping anti-LGBT law known as House Bill 2, which requires trans people to use bathrooms that do not correspond with their gender identity, rescinds all LGBT-inclusive nondiscrimination ordinances, and bars residents for suing for discrimination in state court.

“HB 2 was passed by an immoral minority – North Carolina has many thriving, creative, modern communities,” lead singer Alex Ebert said in a statement reported by Rolling Stone. “We were tempted to cancel the show, but decided at the last minute to rally the crowd instead by renewing the vows of our good friends onstage.”

[…]

“Then Jack, and Daniel,” continued Ebert. “I now pronounce you: Jack Daniels.”

Full Story at The Advocate.

The Libertarian Presidential Nominee is…

Gary Johnson.

Gary Johnson.

ORLANDO, FLA. — Former New Mexico Gov. Gary Johnson won the Libertarian presidential nomination on second ballot at the Libertarian National Convention today, and while he expects socially liberal voters will gravitate toward his candidacy, particular constituencies like LGBT activists will need to come to him rather than the other way around.

“It’s never been my tactic to reach out to anybody,” Johnson told The Advocate after securing his party’s nomination. “The message that I have is the same message no matter whom I’m addressing, and the most effective reach-out is just saying the things that should be said. In that context, the LBGT [sic] community should embrace what it is that we’re saying.”

Late in the afternoon, the party also nominated former Massachusetts Gov. Bill Weld, Johnson’s hand-picked running mate, as the vice presidential nominee. That came a day after Weld made a direct appeal to LGBT voters, noting his history of nominating the first state Supreme Court justice to hold marriage equality as a constitutional right.

Normally, I’d say doesn’t have a snowball’s chance, but with Trump splitting voters all over the place, nothing is certain anymore.

The Advocate has the full story.

Nearly Winter at 35 Degrees South.

From Lofty, garden pics. There’s a good number of them, so I’ll be posting them over several days. All photos are 1500 x 996, click for full size.

Around here autumn and winter are important parts of the growing season, the European exotics drop their leaves while the rest of the plants get busy. I put the old manual 80-200 macro zoom lens back on the Pentax Kx to get some close ups.

carpet

Carpet of Leaves. © Lofty.

elderbushnakednest

Elder Bush and Naked Nest. © Lofty.

lemon

Lemon. (Seriously delicious looking!) © Lofty.

Stay tuned for more.

Renaissance Technologies

youtube screencap.

youtube screencap.

If the public library was the proto-internet, then the book was both a trusty storage device and an early website. This is essentially how MIT’s School of Humanities, Arts & Social Sciences approaches books in the course “Making Books: The Renaissance and Today,” in which students learn about bookmaking technology.

The course, led by MIT historian Anne McCants and Jeffrey Ravel, sees students making paper and building a handset printing press. The idea is to illustrate that people in the distant past were also clever technologists, while also reconnecting students to the notion of making instead of merely consuming.

[…]

This semester past, MIT Hobby Shop director Ken Stone led the students in the building of the printing press. First, students milled a huge reclaimed wooden beam from an old building, then they worked the wood in various ways until they had assembled a screw-type letterpress printer commonly used throughout the early modern period. During the build, students toured a Colonial-style print shop in Boston called Edes & Gill, paying particular attention to an early handset press like the one they were building. There they picked the brains of printmaster Gary Gregory.

The full article is at The Creators Project. Very, very, very cool, this. I’d love to learn how to do this.

Persecute Me! C’mon, Please Persecuuuute Me!

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Oh my, Matt Barber has a post up at Town Hall, flogging his recent book on the Liberal Agenda of Hating Jesus, and begging to be seen as terribly oppressed and persecuted.

The answer had to be yes. The Holy Spirit made it crystal clear. When Tristan Emmanuel, managing publisher and CFO of BarbWire Books, called me and said it was time for me to put pen to paper and write a book on the anti-Christian left’s demonic war on religious liberty (and all things godly and good), I immediately agreed.

I suppose it’s good policy to say yes to your own publishing company.

Why did I write the book? Because it had to be written. God’s natural created order, His immutable, scientific and transcendent moral precepts, as well as the very lives and livelihoods of Christian Americans, are under vicious attack today at a level unprecedented in American history.

Just once, I’d like for this supposed ‘God’ to speak for itself. I mean, take away all the rainbows or something. Anything. Holler from the mountaintops, whisper from the depths, something that isn’t yet another paranoid bigot pretending to speak for the Big, Bad, All Knowing God. (And then I wouldn’t have to dig through stacks of these books when I’m looking for the good stuff at thrift stores. You wouldn’t believe how many copies of A Purpose Driven Life are languishing on dusty thrift store shelves.)

There are evil blasphemies beyond imagination being foisted upon the American people today by our own godless government in the name of “progress.” Things like presidential edicts that open up little girls’ showers to grown men; the sin-centric and oxymoronic notion of “gay marriage”; forced taxpayer funding of child sacrifice; and forced participation by Christ’s followers in all the above sins, under penalty of law, to name but a few.

Oy, there’s no end to the ooze of melodrama. Most of this is old hat, the same old they’ve been moaning about, but I have to ask, how in the hell did transgender rights morph into little girls’ showers? I’m not interested in invading a little girls’ shower, wherever that might be found, outside a school. Those aren’t public lavs, and why the fuck would grown men be getting in to them? If you aren’t a teacher, I expect most grown men have other places to be. I expect most adult teachers have no particular desire to invade a little girls’ shower, either. It’s telling that the only ones consistently bringing up this little girls’ shower business are white, male, Christians.

Indeed, it is not just within the church’s purview, but it is the church’s duty to insert itself into state matters relating to morality, public policy and culture at large.

The push back has begun. Christian governors, lawmakers, business owners, lawyers, parents, judges, county clerks, organizations, universities, hospitals, adoption agencies and other individuals and groups have been given an ultimatum by the anti-Christian left: “Keep your Christianity at church and away from our culture!”

To which we say, “Not on your life.”

“Or our own.”

Oh, for Crispy Christ Onna Stick’s Sake. Like Ms. Garbo, I just want to be left alone.

The full screed be here.

Santa Fe: Native Treasures.

Beaded high heel sneakers by Teri Greeves.

Beaded high heel sneakers by Teri Greeves.

In the Hopi creation myth, and most Native American creation myths, we are allowed to be here on this earth but only provided we care for it and treat it with respect.”  – Dan Namingha.

Each year, the Native Treasures Indian Arts Festival brings over 200 Native American artists from 40 tribes and pueblos – each of whom is specially invited by the Museum of Indian Arts and Culture – to Santa Fe, New Mexico to display their artistic pottery, jewelry, paintings, glass, stone, bronze, baskets and textiles.

This year the theme is “Mother Earth” and is oftentimes depicted as a turtle in Native American mythology and art which signifies water, good health, long life, patience, determination and peace.

This year’s featured artist at the 12th annual Native Treasures Indian Arts Festival is Dan Namingha. A prolific painter for over 40 years, Namingha, who has been producing earth-friendly, pro-environmental messages for decades, was also awarded the Museum of Indian Arts and Culture Living Treasure award for his overall body of work as well as for recognition of artistic excellence and community service.

Full Story Here.

HIV+ Organ Transplants Okayed in California.

Credit: Shutterstock.

Credit: Shutterstock.

Organ donation and transplantation between HIV-positive people is now legal in the state of California.

On May 27, Governor Jerry Brown signed Senate Bill 1408, a new piece of legislation that protects surgeons who transplant organs from HIV-positive donors into HIV-positive patients from being penalized by the state’s medical board. President Barack Obama’s HOPE Act technically reversed the federal ban on this procedure back in 2013, but as Medical Daily previously reported, there’s been a delay in uptake. Apparently the National Institutes of Health needed time to “properly iron out the act’s guidelines,” so up until now in California, doctors were criminals and even faced jail time if they condoned HIV transplantation and donation, Tech Times­ reported.

[…]

The surgeons at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine in Baltimore had a similar feeling in March when they were approved to conduct the first HIV-positive organ transplant in the U.S. Dr. Dorry Segev, an associate professor of surgery at Johns Hopkins, told NPR that both HIV-positive and negative patients would benefit from the ban reversal when it comes to the organ transplant waiting list.

“Imagine now we take hundreds or maybe thousands of people off of the list, then everybody behind them moves forward,” he said. “So people with HIV are benefited directly and everybody else on the list is benefitted indirectly. And we’re all very excited to get started.”

Full Story Here.