Friday in the wild - Mar. 4, 2005

It's Friday! And that means that it's time for the regular Friday roundup of new and interesting stuff I've seen around the blogosphere from last Friday to today, which is Friday. Here goes:

Joe Carter laments - or maybe "laughs at" would be more factually correct - the sad state of modern visual art:

Modern art is in the toilet.

Literally.

Last December, 500 arts specialists in Britain agreed that the single most important work of art in the 20th century was Marcel Duchamp’s "Fountain."

[Read Lifting Art Out of the Toilet: Can Christians Save the Visual Arts?]

Fountain, for you ignorant philistines, is a urinal placed on a pedestal.

I think one of Joe's commenters said it best: "DuChamp has the right to write his name on any piece of plumbing he wants and I have the right to call him a lazy hack-poser for it. It's the circle of life!"

Here's an excellent piece from Challies.com about the contemporary trend toward deprecating the office of pastor:

As the Protestant church has changed and evolved since the time of the Reformation, so has the office of pastor. Where in times past the minister wore a robe, collar or both to differentiate himself from the laity, it seems that today the pastor is often the person wearing shorts and sandals. Where a pastor once wore clothing that conveyed dignity and displayed the uniqueness of the pastoral ministry, today the pastor often tries to be the most unnoticeable person in the church. Where the term "pastor" was once largely reserved for the minister who led his flock, today we have pastors of every type – music pastors, counseling pastors, administrative pastors, and even lay pastors (which seems to be a contradiction in terms). Where pastors and office-bearers once held the keys to the kingdom and had the privilege of administering the sacraments, today the laity is permitted and even encouraged to do this themselves.

[Read An Authoritative Word from God]

Taking his cue from Hollywood Worldviews author Brian Godawa, David at Jollyblogger comments on the self-stultifying assumptions of movies written from an existentialist point of view:

So, the bottom line is that the art of storytelling itself belies an existential worldview. The art of storytelling leaves no room for chance, it operates under a deterministic worldview.

[Read The Paradox of Existentialism in the Movies]

Call me heteronormative. That's the word Parableman suggests for the view that heterosexuality is normal and homosexuality is abnormal, as opposed to "homophobia" which has overtones of bigotry. He frames the discussion in terms of the flap at Harvard over Jada Pinkett Smith made some comments at a recent event that assumed a heterosexual audience.

No interesting searches graced the Crusty Curmudgeon this week. There were an understandable number of hits from people wanting info on Gene Scott, a less understandable run on "God's perfect will," and a last-minute attempt by someone to search for Michael Menkin, a literal tinfoil-hat guru. Googling crusty finds us in 5th place this week, though Google is still ignoring what's between the <title /> tags for some reason. Well, whatever. Enjoy.