skyangel saved my soul!

(warning: Extremely sarcastic posting ahead)

It took twenty four years of my life before a life changing piece of mail found it’s way into my mailbox. It’s wasn’t a bird, it wasn’t a plane, it was Skyangel!

I’ll be honest, I was a little skeptical at first, a Christian TV and Radio satellite service? But then I read the testimonies and I was won over. I kid you not, this is what one of the “viewers” wrote:

“If you want to become a better Christ-follower, more disciplined, if you want to be the best you can be for Christ, this [Skyangel] is what you should get for your family…”

After all how could you go wrong with Sky Angel’s programming? They offer, “programs that re-energize your faith and connect you with things that truly matter.” And according to Sky Angel there are a lot of things that truly matter: sports, HGTV, and Fox News to name just a few.

There is a lot of worthless stuff out there on the airwaves and I think it makes sense to be proactive in avoiding that stuff in your home. Sky Angel goes one step further (and many steps too far) and pitches it’s stations as the definitive answer on what “Christ-Centered” is. According to Sky Angel the most Christ-centered new is Fox News. According to Sky Angel HGTV and TV in general is an opportunity to “re-energize your faith.”

I started to call them and found my self getting terribly ill and the thought of talking to a sales person trying to sell me faith through television. They are selling Television in the name of Jesus! My guess is Jesus would be stomping through and smashing a few satellite dishes on his way these days.

The Product is You

Is that really part of the President’s job?

I was watching the news on TV on Friday morning (the Today Show to be exact). I always come away with stuff to talk about after watching any TV, and yesterday was no exception. The clip that peeked my curiousity was about the President traveling around the country on Air Force One doing last minute campaign stops for close Republican senate races. This news bothered me a little bit (and this is not a rant against Bush, this goes for any president). Here are a couple of reasons:

  • I understand the President has some political party ties before he is actually elected as President. But once you are President, my understanding is that you represent ALL the people, not just those from your political party. It seems to me that if your going to be using your clout as President to endorse political candidates, then you should probably be doing it during your time off.
  • That being said, do President’s get time off? It does seem like one of those “always on” types of jobs.
  • For example, does the president have his own personal car or plane? If he does, I’d much rather he use his own plane, then Air Force One, which I helped pay for and all the fuel our tax dollars are going to go to, if he’s going to fly around the country promoting politicians. Personally, it sort of seems like stealing paper clips from the office or writing off a meal out as a “business meeting.” Using Air Force One as a backdrop for someone else’s campaign sort of seems like cheating.
  • Finally, and this is direct to our current president. The polls seem to indicate a lot of people don’t think President Bush is doing a very good job in office right now. That being said, you would think he might consider spending a little more time there, rather then flying around the country preparing campaign speeches to help ensure his Republican chums win their states.

Am I the only one who think’s it’s a little wrong, unfair, disappointing, waste of money, unethical and terribly misrepresentative for Bush to be wasting his time on this?

Thoughts on the Journey Compilation

With the daily podcast, Thoughts on the Journey, moving full steam ahead, I figured I should compile a show for all the current Trying to Follow podcast listeners. Basically this is a compilation of 6 of the daily podcasts I’ve been doing through the month of October. This is being posted in the podcast section so it will show up on the itunes podcast page for all my Trying to Follow listeners.

or Download Here.