Most magic is essentially the same as religion: it is a human attempt to contact the supernatural and, perhaps, manipulate it. Most magic seeks to achieve ends by getting supernatural beings to bypass the normal workings of nature. Religion also seeks supernatural aid, although the purpose is usually more lofty (to do with the afterlife or basic sustenance, not overt power) and the means involves more veneration. Also, generally, the being involved in religion is on a broader scale than those involved in magic: gods are generally conceived as being bigger, more universal, and more powerful than the demons, ghosts or spirits called upon in magic. But these are differences of degree or emphasis, not of fundamentals. (more…)
Author Archives: The Briefing
Podcast: A hitchhiker’s guide to the underworld
Audio
Tony Payne interviews Peter Bolt, author of ‘Living with the Underworld’, about demons, death, the devil and the difference Jesus makes (MP3).
Magic
Download the MP3 of Kirsten Birkett’s seminar on magic at the 2005 EQUIP conference (18.9 MB; 55:06).
(This talk has been reproduced with kind permission from EQUIP. For more information about EQUIP, visit http://www.equip.org.au/.
Pornography as art?
A great controversy has broken out over a photography exhibition featuring a series of naked and semi-naked adolescents—some in sexually suggestive poses—photographed by artist Bill Henson. As Wikipedia summarizes:
Nodding off
There is a famous Australian television commercial which features a man in a nightclub. The punchline of the ad is “I’m so cool, I dance on the inside”. In the weeks and months following, this saying was adopted for all kinds of situations—for example, “I’m so cool, I hug on the inside”.
It’s hard and easy to have faith when life is hard and easy
Faith in Christ isn’t easy for human beings. We can’t win. When times are good, our trust in Christ can fall away, for, after all, who needs it? When times are bad, we can rage at Christ. Our faith is numbed under the sharp pang or the dull ache of our pain.
It’s hard to have faith when life’s hard
It’s when all the serious hurt-mouthing of God begins. Why me? What have I ever done to him? Where was he when I really needed him? After all I have done for him, what happened? How about a break? Isn’t this enough now? Just stop!
It’s easy to have faith when life’s easy
Sometimes a person seems to have a ‘charmed existence’. Everything (at least from the outside) seems to be just right. No real worries. Healthy, happy, wholesome. Perhaps even healthy, wealthy and wise. It seems that life, for them, is effortless and easy. It just comes their way and when it arrives, it is good.
Prayers of the dead
It’s a commonplace of the Roman Catholic tradition that those Christians who have died are now in heaven interceding for us. So the authoritative (for Roman Catholics) Roman Catholic Catechism asserts,
Christ alone
When we say ‘Christ alone’, we mean two things: Christ’s work on the cross is both sufficient and unique.
To a church that was obsessed with worldly power, Paul insisted in 1 Corinthians 1 that he was not interested in what seemed wise or impressive. He was simply interested in the message of the cross, which is “folly to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God” (1:18). Despite its apparent foolishness, in the weakness of the cross, we see Christ’s power to reconcile people to God. Christ’s work on the cross is sufficient to accomplish all of that.
Open up the doors: Music in the Modern Church by Mark Evans
Mark Evans is a Christian who is also part of the Department of Contemporary Music Studies at Macquarie University in Sydney. (He’s also written articles for The Briefing on subjects relating to his area—see Briefing #236 and #263). His book Open up the Doors: Music in the Modern Church (Equinox, London, 2006) is useful, but be warned: it is not for the musically faint-hearted. Having had piano lessons in my child- and teenager-hood, I didn’t mind too much the occasional sentence like this one:
Preaching hell to depressed teens
I’ve been thinking about hell quite a bit recently—not because I enjoy it, or because I’m obsessed with morbid subjects, and not even because I’ve been reading Peter Bolt’s excellent new book Living with the Underworld (which, perhaps surprisingly, given the title, looks away from hell rather than towards it).
Wreck-conciliation or reconciliation?
Reconciliation is a hot topic. It always has been and it always will be. In the first century AD, Paul wrote about reconciling Jews and Gentiles (Eph 2:11-22). In the 20th-century, the nation of South Africa created the ‘Truth and Reconciliation Commission’ to deal with the atrocities of apartheid. The Australian Government is only now ‘reconciling’ with the indigenous population.
Can Western Christians even think ethically any more?
To escape from drowning, you have to swim in what you are swallowing. Churches in the West are drowning in Western values, drinking deeply without being able to swim in the muck they are drinking, let alone being able to escape.
Comment moderation and other housekeeping
Sharp-eyed Sola Panel readers will have noticed that the evil spam monster has, just once or twice, crept through our defences and left us inadvertently advertising the latest—well, less sharp eyed readers don’t need to know. We’ve also had a rash of posts (from just a couple of people) that we had to delete, according to our ‘be godly’ and ‘stay on topic’ guidelines.