submitted by new contributor Rev. David T.Don't mind us, folks. We'll just be over here lighting the witches on fire and watching the sun revolve around the earth.
And we wonder why Rolling Stone writes articles like this.
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seen on Nicholas Casey's blog. Originally posted on the Church Sign Generator's collection of church signs.Do it, by all means. Just don't let Him catch you.
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submitted by frequent contributor Julie S.Someone there is that doesn't like a church sign.
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800+ church signs, 3-and-a-half years of blogging, one book published...and I still get three church signs of this epically low quality submitted within days of each other.
Excuse me for a moment whilst I go and slam my head repeatedly on my desk for a while.
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OK, I'm back.
Remember you have until Thursday to get your votes in on the commentary contest.
The race is tightening up. Who's it going to be?!?
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This post cross-posted on:
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Well, God isn't bound by the physical laws of the universe . . . and that's a fact.
ReplyDelete"Move the wall I will." -- St. Yoda
Sure, there's a difference between the laws of the universe and "facts", however.
ReplyDeleteGod is holy. He's bound to that fact. He can't do anything against His nature.
To me, that first sign is clearly implying "What we believe isn't bound to the facts", which reminds me of Copernicus and Galileo in the 1500-1600's and Salem in 1692.
First on the facts: remember that Galileo was under house arrest (in an episcopal palace, with frequent, nearly daily, visits from his daughter, and the ability to come and go) because his theories had not been tested enough yet, and the Church didn't want him to teach it until it had been tested further. He agreed, renegged, taught it anyway, and got in trouble for not keeping his word. (The Church had, at the time, some of the leading scientists of the world within Her clergy. It's not mentioned much, but - for instance - Gregor Mendel was a Jesuit.) But the sign is still crummy.
ReplyDeleteAnd on the wall sign: it only makes me think "All your churches are belong to us."
And the Scripture doesn't help at all.
Acts 10:23:
So he invited them in and showed them hospitality.
The next day he got up and went with them, and some of the brothers from Joppa went with him.
(He and him are referring to Saint Peter.)
Acts 11:18:
When they heard this, they stopped objecting and glorified God, saying, "God has then granted life-giving repentence to the Gentiles too."
(This is referring to Saint Peter's account of why the Gentiles were Baptized into the Church; he was explaining it to the circumcised believers.)
Totally didn't make any sense, and makes less sense with the references.
I'll have to take a picture of another one that was just strange and get it to you. It was too weird to just send in the text.
The first one is way too misleading. It's like the church is saying, Hey Richard Dawkins! You're right! We're just a-living our delusional world here! Woohoo!
ReplyDeleteI'd love to try to explain the second to my children. or my parents.
The third is ... strangely reminiscent of an angsty middle schooler influenced by Robert Frost.
Sigh.
IC: That's what I was trying to say about the first one. Thanks for saying it for me.
ReplyDeleteChristine: I also couldn't figure out what the Scriptures had to do with walls.
In reference to the "facts" sign (which I submitted), what happened to "I am the truth..."? A truer statement might have been, "God defines the facts."
ReplyDeleteActually, the "wall" sign does make sense - but only if you know the context. The sentiment is good (the gospel strikes down all barriers of race, culture, etc.), but the sign itself is too cryptic to make the point.
Wow, those are some bad signs.
ReplyDeleteAnother handy response to the first one is, "Is that a fact?"
Are you anti-Robert Frost, or just anti-obscure misquotations of Frost? The last sign is odd, but unlike so many of the signs you post, its message hardly seems counter to the Gospel. I'd agree it's a crummy sign just because it is rather, well, confusing. But one of the three crummiest? Hardly. The spirit is willing, but the wording is weak.
ReplyDeleteP.S. The "word verification" box asked me to type "xxanh". Am I supposed to be verifying that this is a word? Because it isn't.
OK...I don't know Robert Frost quotations by heart, nor do I know how they relate to church signs.
ReplyDeleteI actually like him as a poet, but that doesn't mean I can pick his quotes out of a police line-up :)
So this is a misquotation of Frost also? Someone please enlighten us.
Oh....Robert Frost. Now that I googled it, I realize that I've actually read this poem ("Mending Wall"), but using it like that, with Scripture references, seems not only cryptic, but (now that I know they're referencing Robert Frost), a bit hoity-toity.
ReplyDelete"Hey, look at us, reading poetry!"
Seriously, you'd think that they might want to quote poetry related to religion...like, um...the Psalms?
I'll get that picture today on the way to soccer, Joel.
Oh, and you'll be pleased to know that my nine-year-old will now read a church sign aloud in the car and follow it with, "Crummy?" Every. Sign. We. See. And we live in the South, where everyone and his cousin seems to have his own church. ;) (Heck, some of the names of the mini-churches are worthy of this blog. I'll have to make a list next time we have snow closings and they cancel services all over the area.)
But, anyway, Crummy Church Sign Spotting is now a family activity for us.
Crummy Church Signs: Bringing Families Together Since 2004 (c)
ReplyDelete"Crummy Church Sign Spotting"
ReplyDeleteIf they can call geocaching a sport, I certainly think this should qualify as well. Our family has been playing for well over a year now.
And, if anyone has a tip on how to get my wife to quit rolling her eyes every time I turn the car around while fishing for my phone so I can photograph a sign, please let me know...
:)
To be fair, the "riding dirty" sign is a reference to the lyrics of the song, which go "trying to catch me riding dirty."
ReplyDeleteIt's still crummy, though. As a general rule, references to popular lyrics on church signs are not good news.
So that's what happened to Yoda, in the church office he works. I guess he needed a break from all those young Jedi.
ReplyDeleteSo...am I the only one who doesn't know what "riding dirty" is?
ReplyDeleteAccording to Urban Dictionary, it's "driving in an automobile while having at least a felony charge worth of illegal drugs and or unregistered firearms with you."
ReplyDeleteI see. Probably don't want Jesus to catch you doing that, then.
ReplyDeleteMending Wall
ReplyDeleteSOMETHING there is that doesn’t love a wall,
That sends the frozen-ground-swell under it,
And spills the upper boulders in the sun;
And makes gaps even two can pass abreast.
The work of hunters is another thing: 5
I have come after them and made repair
Where they have left not one stone on a stone,
But they would have the rabbit out of hiding,
To please the yelping dogs. The gaps I mean,
No one has seen them made or heard them made, 10
But at spring mending-time we find them there.
I let my neighbour know beyond the hill;
And on a day we meet to walk the line
And set the wall between us once again.
We keep the wall between us as we go. 15
To each the boulders that have fallen to each.
And some are loaves and some so nearly balls
We have to use a spell to make them balance:
“Stay where you are until our backs are turned!”
We wear our fingers rough with handling them. 20
Oh, just another kind of out-door game,
One on a side. It comes to little more:
There where it is we do not need the wall:
He is all pine and I am apple orchard.
My apple trees will never get across 25
And eat the cones under his pines, I tell him.
He only says, “Good fences make good neighbours.”
Spring is the mischief in me, and I wonder
If I could put a notion in his head:
“Why do they make good neighbours? Isn’t it 30
Where there are cows? But here there are no cows.
Before I built a wall I’d ask to know
What I was walling in or walling out,
And to whom I was like to give offence.
Something there is that doesn’t love a wall, 35
That wants it down.” I could say “Elves” to him,
But it’s not elves exactly, and I’d rather
He said it for himself. I see him there
Bringing a stone grasped firmly by the top
In each hand, like an old-stone savage armed. 40
He moves in darkness as it seems to me,
Not of woods only and the shade of trees.
He will not go behind his father’s saying,
And he likes having thought of it so well
He says again, “Good fences make good neighbours.”
A great poem, but a little oblique for a church sign. (I see someone driving...huh...I like walls....) Plus, it's misquoted.
Line 31 of the Frost poem seems to say that fences are necessary if there are cows. So Christians shouldn't put up barriers unless there are cows involved somehow. Hmmmm... Anyway, requires way too much though for a sign you have to drive by.
ReplyDeleteAnd I agree with Nick Casey's blog on the riding dirty sign. If you are riding dirty, Jesus doesn't have to catch you--He already knows. (and loves you anyway!)
Hi again
ReplyDeleteSorry my previous comment came off so negative -- I love your blog. I guess I just live in my own little universe... the "riding dirty" sign meant absolutely nothing to me, but it didn't even occur to me that someone might not recognize the misquotation from Mending Wall instantly. Go figure. I guess I read more Robert Frost than I listen to whatever music the other sign references. *shrug* "To each one, his cat," as the French say.
Peace,
Daniel