Quote of the Day, Love: Oscar Wilde

To love oneself is the beginning of a lifelong romance.

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Tuesday, April 5, 2011

On Second Thought

Many churches have excellent youth groups that volunteer for soup kitchens on days other than Thanksgiving or Christmas, and raise money for good causes. These are good people. However, the Protestant churches over the past twenty years or so have incorporated business speak and demographic research to fill  pews. This kind of thinking leads to church reader boards with mission statements. Even though the methods for reaching out to young people are often hokey or just embarrassingly awkward, many churches, temples, and I imagine mosques, have excellent youth groups. Stuck in a traffic jam today, I noticed a van parked outside a local church which, I assumed is used to transport their youth group members to volunteer and charitable work.The sign looked something like this:
flames,microsoft publisher
I did a double and triple take. It was a United Methodist church and I'm fairly certain that they are not a racist group.
I would have liked to have been at the meeting where the name and logo was decided upon. I bet it went something like this:









Play: The Big Decision by K Margeson
Scene I
A is a younger man with great enthusiasm and B is a middle aged man who is calm. A and B meet in a church basement. They are seated in molded plastic chairs. Secretary is a younger woman and is taking notes on a laptop computer.

(Secretary) Next item: youth group logos and titles. (she types as they speak)
(Middle Aged Man):We need something catchy.
(Man A) Yes, that shows our real passion for helping people and spreading the word. 
(Man B) Yes, flames maybe. We need to include the cross but in a modern way you know for the kids. Maybe hip hop or a cartoon bear?
(Man A) I've got it Crossfire.  But what should we do for a logo, a shooting target, a crossbow?
(Man B) No, those are controversial; we don't want people to think we're advocating violence. The logo will be a cross with flames around it! We'll put it on all of our vans, t-shirts and stationary!
Secretary: (Pauses and looks up) Uh, guys I don't think that is a good idea.
(Man A). :Just take the notes
(Man B). Yeah, let the creative minds do their work .Yeesh!
(Secretary): Fine, go with it. (smirks slightly and continues to type)
(Man B): This is great let's get the youth group to volunteer in the poor urban neighborhoods.
Scene.


Scene II
A and B with the kids in the back drive the newly decorated van down a city street. Offstage,  a barrage of rocks, bricks,rotten food, and jeers whistle past the van. A rotten egg explodes as a sulfurous scent seeps in though  onto the windshield.
B:Why do they hate us so much in this neighborhood?
A: I don't know. I just don't understand. (shakes head)
The End

I think that the ease with which we can create media sometimes keeps us from really thinking about what we write, for example, you will occasionally find typos in my blogs because in my haste, I do not spell check them. They look so pretty that I can't imagine they would have errors.Even someone with little artistic skill like myself can create a simple picture like the one above and as a result, everything begins to look polished and professional. Appearance wins out over quality of content. That concept applies to all kinds of situations really.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

good intentions etc.

Anonymous said...

You should have published the pic. Though your recreations of it are pretty good. I like the revenge sign the best(oh, and I"m also a guy)

Anonymous said...

Ah, hip churches. The worst thing for hipness and the worst thing for church.

Tina McKim said...

wow. talk about a lack of self awareness. was this in woodinville?

Katie said...

@ Tina, yes it was. The nice church over by Albertsons. The people I've known who are members are decent community-minded churchgoers. I think they just didn't make the connection. To readers: be sure to check out Tina's Etsy site listed at the bottom of the blog.