Apologetics, Christian, Christianity, Faith, History, Islam, Jesus, Religion, Theology

Do Muslims Worship the same God as Christians?

February 9, 2016 Vicki 14 Comments

Abraham and Isaac. Laurent de La Hire, 1650.

That question, “Do Muslims worship the same God as Christians?” is not a new one, but has been in the Christian news (at least) recently over the controversial suspension of a black female professor at Wheaton College. I haven’t written specifically on this topic, though I touched upon it in Does DA: Inquisition’s Imshael have anything to do with Ishmael and Islam? In that article I point out how Islam rejects God’s plan for humanity, as provided by God in the Old Testament through Isaac, and openly celebrates this rejection through their holiday of Eid Al-Adha. How can it be claimed that Muslims worship the same God when they reject biblical scriptures and even God’s plan for humanity? As any bible student knows, God’s plan is interspersed throughout all of the Old and New Testaments, so to reject it and then claim you worship the same God makes no sense. Yet the Wheaton professor, besides showing solidarity with the repression of women (which is not biblical), claims that Muslims worship the same God as Christians.

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Christian, current events, Islam, Middle East, politics, Religion

Raping of Women and Children Now Allowed in the West; Why Not, Eh?

January 28, 2016 Vicki 3 Comments

CS Lewis sun quote — Through God can we see good and beauty, as well as contrasting evil and malignancy, and seek to keep victims from the latter.

“Amnesty International reports that Sweden has the highest number of rapes in Europe and the lowest conviction rate. According to Swedish Public Radio, in Stockholm alone, over 1,000 Swedish women reported that a Muslim immigrant raped them; 300 were under age 15.” “What the EU fails to acknowledge and each country is realizing is that Muslim immigrants have no intention of integrating. Eighty percent are on welfare, following Islamic teaching to take money from the non-Muslim “Kuffar.” Both Sharia4Belgium and Sharia4Holland advocate complete extinction of Jews.” As Christianity Exits Europe, ‘Criminal Muslims’ Fill Void with Rabid Violence (Dec 2014).

A chronology of the violence (including honor killings – or are those just “misunderstandings”?) and non-integration Muslim immigrant issues, via linked news articles.

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Entertainment, Funny, Games, gaming, Humor, parenting, Video Game Review, Video games

Epic Gnome Battle during GW2 Beta! Goats for the Win!

January 17, 2016 Vicki Leave a comment

The Garden Warfare 2 Beta is still on, and in this 5 minute video my son catches the end of a super long battle for the gnome–where he’s able to win it for his zombie team while being a . . . goat! The session was the longest he’s ever experienced playing Garden Warfare, and perhaps that’s a tribute to plants and zombies being more balanced in the newer plants vs zombies game. Here’s the video, but we also have a post that goes over the changes we see, and our impressions of them, from Garden Warfare to Garden Warfare 2. We hope you enjoy both!

Christian, Entertainment, Funny, Games, gaming, Humor, Video Game Review, Video games

Garden Warfare 2 Beta, Changes and Impressions

January 17, 2016 Vicki 2 Comments

GW2, command area for plants — At the central command center for plants.

The Garden Warfare 2 Beta, or more like a pre-release frenzy fest, is happening from January 14th to 18th, 2016. The game’s release is scheduled for February 23rd. I’ve written positively about the original Garden Warfare here, since it’s a “clean” fun game that Christians might enjoy. But what of Garden Warfare 2? Well, we’re playing it and these are some of our impressions; they are necessarily limited to the parts of the game included with the BETA, which are the multi-player mode and small amount of backyard play only.

A note on the categories below. Good, Neutral, and Sad/Questionable relate to changes to the new game from the original game. And, since there seem to be lots of changes, not all are written about here.

The Good

Zombie changes. Not all zombie changes are good, in our opinions here. But there are good ones (the Yeti Chomper is sooo cute!). Captain Deadbeard is funny and has a parrot that he can use for distance attacks, just like the Cactus does with vegetle drones in the original Garden Warfare. The scientist has some fun and detailed variants, the mathematician and the zoologist. The zoologist, especially, is crazy-funny and detailed, with its porcupine gun, living Koala riding piggyback, and prairie dog coif. The scientist, according to my son, is now easier to use/control, too. Another new zombie is the Imp with his Z7 Mech, which together are a fun wink at Titanfall. The imp is a really fun addition to the zombie team.

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current events, News, politics

Frustration Defined: Trump, Donald

January 15, 2016 Vicki 4 Comments

Anyone can verbalize some much needed and tougher foreign policy ideas. And, other Republican candidates have. But for Trump to go on and on and on at the January 14th debate about the false issue of Cruz not being a naturally born citizen . . . he’s willing to promote false issues, look stupid, name call . . . and whatever to get ahead.

Angry frustration (google search image).

False, childish, and rude . . . Trump. We will suffer greatly from such a person as the head of our country. Obama has not handled foreign or domestic policy at all well, but Trump would be the opposite. He would cause problems just the same, only from a different direction. As Ben Carson asked at the debate, where has the attitude come from in this country where everyone is at everyone else’s throats? Why is there the rudeness, the wars, all against all? Trump represents this awful attitude, and the people in the pit are cheering him on.

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Christian, Entertainment, Games, gaming, Video Game Review, Video games

Fallout 4. Sometimes Bigger Isn’t Better (Story)

January 11, 2016 Vicki 3 Comments

Fallout 4. Nick likes me. — “I got you as a friend. There’s nothing more an old bot could ask for.” This is one of the more satisfying aspects of the game, or is that a social outcast sort-of-thing to think? Here, Nick Valentine, a synthetic human with the memories of a 21st century detective (who’s fiance had been murdered by a crime boss), professes warm friendship.

This is the second part of my Fallout 4 review, Fallout 4. Sometimes Bigger Isn’t Better. For the first part, with the introduction and description of what’s similar and what’s different in this newest edition to the Fallout series, please go to Fallout 4. Sometimes Bigger Isn’t Better (Overview).

The Story, or, an Outline of a Story

I don’t know if it was bad directing or bad choices that made the story so shallow in Fallout 4. This game has a huge map, voice acting, cut-scenes that accompany all the dialogues, all kinds of crafting and building, and many followers that have a lot more comments and quips than in previous games, and all of those things take up memory and developing them would have used up the game’s budget. Those are things that either weren’t in the previous games, or they were but to a much lesser degree. So choices were made, and the newest story suffered; it is much more of an outline than an actual story.

The main stories in Fallout New Vegas DLCs, like Old World Blues and Honest Hearts, for example, have more to them than this new whole game does. Characters in those DLCs talk a lot more about what they’ve done and what they’re doing than in Fallout 4, which has a story where all the missing explanation is an irreconcilable, glaring annoyance. Your own character doesn’t have the ability to question much of anything, like any normal person would, nor do they have anywhere near the normal level of frustration, sadness, anger, etc., expressed in all things related to your son and your quest for him.

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Christian, Entertainment, Games, gaming, Video Game Review, Video games

Fallout 4. Sometimes Bigger Isn’t Better (Overview)

January 9, 2016 Vicki 11 Comments

Fallout 4 Older Model Synth — An old model synth found in an abandoned part of The Institute (with a “posterize” filter).

Fallout 4. What can one say? After years of anticipation, the 2015 sequel to Fallout 3 (2008) and Fallout New Vegas (2010) is found to be bigger and . . . different. It should be different, at least in some ways, of course. Fallout 4 (Bethesda Softworks, Rated M) is a BIG game, as so many new ones are today, but it tries to be too much in this reviewer’s view. How can a video game have too much? Well, Fallout 4 isn’t just any video game. It is one in a series, one in a franchise (Fallout New Vegas technically isn’t part of the franchise, but that makes no difference to player perception or lore) with a certain style and lore.

While there is a lot to be happy about with Fallout 4, the new gargantuan level of building and crafting (together with the related radiant quests) is not integrated well with the actual story of the game. It’s almost as if they’re two different things, two different games held together by thin threads. The story comes off as being really minimal compared to both the other in-game activities and the last two Fallout game stories. The ultra-tragic story sets the mood of the game, and when that mood is betrayed (finds no outlet), the resulting annoyance (anger and dismay, more like) spoils the game. But more on that later. Since this Fallout review would be really (really) long for one blog post, it was divided into two. This first part goes over things that are the same and things that are different in this newest Fallout (the lists here are not exhaustive), with the second part presenting the story, with commentary, and giving a final overall analysis and rating.

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Christian, Entertainment, popular culture, Religion, show review, Video games

2015 in review

January 9, 2016 Vicki Leave a comment

The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2015 annual report for this blog.

Here’s an excerpt:

The concert hall at the Sydney Opera House holds 2,700 people. This blog was viewed about 41,000 times in 2015. If it were a concert at Sydney Opera House, it would take about 15 sold-out performances for that many people to see it.

Click here to see the complete report.

Christian, Christianity, Entertainment, Faith, show review, Theology

Person of Interest’s God/Anti-God Allegory in Season 4 (Part 2 of 2)

January 2, 2016 Vicki 2 Comments

Person of Interest, Ep 21, a demand — The Machine gives in to a demand made by its proxy. Similarly, God cares for each one of us and hears our fervent prayers. “Samaritan” only values its agents for what they can do for it and is only concerned with unquestioning humans (others are killed, not saved).

Part 1 of “Person of Interest’s God/Anti-God Allegory in Season 4” covers some show background, a description of the series, and an overview of the God and Anti-God allegory found in this latest season (and developed in season 3). Please see that part for those topics. This part includes an answer to the questionable name given to the antagonist, “Samaritan.” It also includes a section on the biblical verses related to the show’s allegory.

Why “Samaritan”?

It seems really odd that the metaphor for God is “The Machine” and the anti-God is “Samaritan.” We normally think of “the machine,” when the expression is used, as something cold, mechanical, and all that is opposite of human concern and empathy; as such, the result of its machinations tend to be against our best interests. I don’t fully know why the creator of this series chose name The Machine for this role, but there are two considerations I can immediately think of. One, the AI’s creator, Finch, has doubts about his creation and chooses not to give it any other name. Two, since the metaphor grows to allegory in seasons 3 and 4, perhaps the show’s creator and writers didn’t have the it all fully conceived earlier on. The first two seasons were much more about solving crimes before they happened, and corruption in law enforcement and government, than about massive dueling AIs.

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Christian, Christianity, Entertainment, Faith, show review, Theology

Person of Interest’s God/Anti-God Allegory in Season 4 (Part 1 of 2)

December 31, 2015 Vicki Leave a comment

As usual–for anyone that reads my media reviews, that is–I’m writing about something that is not new. We don’t have cable or satellite, but in the case of the show Person of Interest, we couldn’t even get the channel in on our TV that ran it (CBS). So, I finally was able to watch the latest season, the 4th, on DVD (it’s now available on Netflix, too), and will share my “God is working in the world” observations with you.

After not expecting much, really, from a show in its 4th season (the writing tends to go south in aging shows), I was pleasantly surprised by this season’s quality and freshness. That basic laud can be considered a recommendation, if you will, but I’m not here to write a review.^[1] I’m here to discuss the show’s underlying God/Anti-God story, which seems more obvious than ever this 4th season. I’m just happy to see that there are still stories being presented in the US that don’t altogether ignore the Judeo-Christian God. Of course, the concepts brought up in Person of Interest (PoL)may be too subtle or esoteric for most of the population to understand in any other sense than a generalized “good vs evil.”

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