Prayer and Praise
What would you say?This semester I am doing a subject called 'Censorship and Responsibility in the Media'. It has proven to be quite interesting. And also quite challenging, as the ground covered will often relate back to morals, and Christianity, in some way. In one tutorial we ended up discussing whether drawing an image of God or Jesus is blasphemous for Christians according to the Ten Commandments. In that tutorial it became evident that i am the only Christain in the class and that amongst that group we also have jewish and muslim people, and an atheist tutor. Interesting mix i promise you, but thats the good thing about uni, right?!
This week the lecture topic was Free Speech and Australia Today. As our guest lecturer proceeded to talk about the censorship of desire in todays society, he said that to understand why we are the way we are with regard to censorship we must "begin as we always must, and thats with Christ"...hm interesting!..
So, he then attempted to explain history of the Christian church (with focus mostly on Catholic church actually) as well as the morals of the Roman empire. His main point seemed to be that Christians measured morality on sexual purity. And that the rules established then are what set the world onto the path it is on now, in terms of how we respond to certain behaviours etc.
He assumed that everyone in the lecture theatre would no longer follow 'rules' about sex before marriage. He also mentioned that in Australia we live in such a secular society, with less than 10% attending church each week. He said that "few of us worship but we respect those who do" (which I thought was somewhat hypocrytical considering some of the things he'd said that i thought were not so respectful). And he said that because we do live in such a secular society we have censorship as a consolation prize for those concerned with the morals etc set up in the time of Christ. A consolation prize! Fair call in some ways, but also sad to see it that way!
Ok, now I dont know if my brief explanation here was very clear, and i dont know what you may think about censorhip in general. I would however be interested in what your responses to these comments would be!?! (please share!)
I sat in that lecture feeling somewhat offended by the way he spoke about Christians. While I could see where he was coming from with the comment that todays morals and opinions on censorhip are greatly shaped by the time of Christ, i was saddened to hear his view was somewhat misled, and biased, which was in itself frustrating cos he spoke in such a convincing way to so many people in this lecture, and does so for a living (he is a journalist). He seemed to miss some of the main points of Christianity, and like many others, seemed to associate it with rule following. And then just use this to make his point. Now my aim here is not to simply criticise the man, that doesnt get anyone anywhere. As I said, his words and attitude saddened me. And I think it was probably because it was representative of the attitude of so many today. There is so much more to say about this topic - if you are interested in hearing more bout it let me know!
Birthday Jazz...
Thursday night I headed into the city to enjoy some jazzy tunes at The Basement and celebrate JT's birthday! I gotta say, I love a bit of live music, and definately think jazz is best experienced live. Steve Morrison and the gang were great, and it was fun times meeting a bunch of cool Moore College people! I had a good night, I hope they did too.
Cheers to Josh - Happy Birthday dude!!
Friday night bible study with my lovely (but psycho) year 9 girls was again good times. We are still working our way through Colossians - such a great book with so much to learn, and had some quality discussion and questions arising. What was most exciting about the evening though was the return of a girl who has not been in at least a year and the fact she brought a friend too! Praise God! I just hope they felt welcome and will want to return!
Sunny Spring Saturday
This afternoon I was blessed to enjoy a tastey lunch out with my family - my brother up from melbourne again and my parents celebrating their wedding anniversary, it was lovely to spend this time with them. There are a few pics from the afternoon here and on flicker.
Prayer and Praise:If you are the praying kind, please take a moment to pray for the following in light of the things I have just shared, it would be greatly appreciated
- pray for David Marr (the lecturer who spoke on thursday re:censorhip) and those in my class. And I'd especially appreciate prayer for myself, as these issues are more than likely to come up again in my tutorial on tuesday afternoon - I hope and pray God will help me to be a good witness in those discussions.
- pray for the two girls (Elise and Alice) who came to B/s friday too please!
-Finally, praise God for these girls, for good friends, and for time spent with family.
Thank you!
6 Comments:
You've got a real opportunity and challenge there, Chels. i just prayed for you and the people in your class tomo, just stand tall and love them and you'll speak volumes no matter what it seems like.
Hope it goes well!
JT
Hey Chelsea, It's tough studying media sometimes - I know. Will have a think about it. Do you know what the reading was for the lecture? Would read more about this topic and think more if you wrote some more!
jt - thank you for your prayer!
sadly there wasnt really much of a chance to discuss this stuff further in the tut today, but these are issues which are likely to continually arise in this class...such a challenging topic though...
Sam - thanks for the interest! we actually didnt have any reading for this weeks topic.
Censorship is such a subjective and difficult area, im interested to know what others think about it generally...
anyway, here is more of what was said in the lecture.
Marr was speaking specifically on the censorhip of desire. In his opinion, the response of media and censorship boards etc is actually a "grotesque exaggeration of what is exactly at stake."
But he said this response and attitude towrad censorship which we hold today all spring from a Christian perspective established at the time of Christ, to flee from desire.
He proceeded to therefore describe Christianity's central importance to be measuring morality on sexual purity, and that is why a system of rules exist, such as no sex before marriage, because have the attitude that 'abandoning sex will make you holy' and that it is only allowed for procreation.
And thus from this attitude comes one that places things as nudity as material that must be censored in order to keep christians from temptation and to fight desire.
What troubled me with the lecture is the way he spoke of Christianity's 'rules for life', his assumption that no one in the lecture theatre would actually follow these 'rules' today, and his attitude that Christians primarily concerd with fighting desire in order to be holy.
Now, I am completely aware that these views are coming from a non-believer and that therefore i cannot expect him to think any different.
However what is sad is to think that misunderstandings such as the view of Christianity as a set of laws are actually very common, and will only continue to be so if we are given more lectures like this and no one helps people understand what it really means to have a relationship with God.
So i am not making a judgement on this man, but an concerned with the way he and others have been misled.
I'd disagree with his assumption that the primary concern of christians is to avoid desire, for a number of reasons. He was however referring to it in temrs of both the catholic church and in church history, two areas i actually dont have a great deal of knowledge of. So, in terms of that context, he may be justified, i dont know, i hope i am wrong, but would appreciate clarification there.
hmm anyway, there is more to be said about this, but it is late and i am tired and likely to make little sense. Thank you for reading this far though!
Looking forward to hearing your thoughts, both on this particular context of censorship of desire, how Christianity has impacted censorship, and whatperhaps our views on censorship should be as christians....
a lot to think about...
Whoa - that's a lot to read! Will have a think and get back to you.
hm yeah sorry about that hehe...oops!
Sounds like you are in a tough class there Chelsea. I didn't have such a subject when I was studying media and it's a shame.
Let me know what you think about 2:37
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