Secrets of Hillsong, pt. 2

Last night I finished watching the FX Vanity Fair four part documentary on Hulu, The Secrets of Hillsong, a Christian (Pentecostal) megachurch in Australia, which spread to the United States. Much of this story was revealed in 2022 on the Discovery Channel. I was unaware of any of this, mainly because Hillsong first became famous through its music, which so many churches were already using. I don’t attend a service that uses that so there were probably discussions I ignored.

The first episode is primarily about Pastor Carl Lentz, the rock star pastor of the New York City Hillsong church who was so charismatic and charming (think Bill Clinton charisma but younger and better looking) that he became an entertainer-preacher who had celebrity guests like Justin Bieber, Kevin Durant and Vanessa Hudgens at the worship services. Lentz even appeared on the View. The footage shown of the services looked like rock concerts, but with more arm waving and jumping up and down. Even OSU Buckeye football fans don’t get that worked up!

Pastor Lentz falls from grace due to marital infidelity in the first episode after the audience has been introduced to his incredible ability to spin the Gospel and sway with the culture, but if that were the point of this documentary, there would be no story. The underlying theme and purpose in my opinion is to tell the audience that Christianity and Christians are a bunch of fakes and charlatans out of step with LGBTQ, BLM and Feminism, plus they are stealing money from their congregants and molesting children as sidelines.

In episode one we are introduced to the journalists and writers who put this story together (obviously with Pastor Lentz’s input). They dead pan pithy explanations yet do not condemn. That is left to the other on camera speakers, mostly from the NYC church who at one time were “volunteers” in responsible positions. (By the end of the 4th episode, they’ve all left the church, and some have left the faith, but you don’t know that in episode one). In the first episode, these are all women, several black, one possibly Hispanic, and one gay man who had been on a reality show with his boyfriend. In the 3rd or 4th (don’t remember) episodes we meet some men who worked with the Australian church, and like Lentz, were dismissed or “cancelled” by Brian Houston, the Australian founder of Hillsong (originally that was the name of the music arm, and the church took the name).

The final episode focuses on the sins of Brian Houston and his father Frank (d. 2004), who had been charged with child sexual abuse, but the church and particularly son Brian took no action even after a lengthy investigation by secular authorities. The trial is coming up in June, so that is yet to be revealed. Maybe there will be a fifth episode.

As I watched the very moving stories about the child abuse, I couldn’t help but think that this looks like nothing compared to what our current “leaders” from entertainment to school boards to medical clinics to churches are accepting-- the mutilation and sterilization of children who cannot give consent, either to attend drag shows, read assigned books or to have their bodies destroyed. Will they ever come to trial?

https://youtu.be/5_aIauL2xKA Shout to the Lord (Hillsong) The composer is at piano, and the lead singer might be Darlene Zschech.

https://news.yahoo.com/where-brian-houston-now-hillsong-203049379.html?guccounter=1

Keep in mind if you watch this, that from start to finish, the whole point appears to be to condemn all Christians, not a particular church or group of sinners. Why would Vanity Fair care? There are other sources for this story which may not have that slant.

Go to Australia to get your updates on Biden

I just watched Sky News Australia and got a fairly complete story on the Biden Family Scandal. Why do they get the news in Australia and we don't? The report even included the Twitter and Google scandal of censoring the story. And it was over 22 minutes!  We might get 2-3 minutes on Fox and the others are mum. . https://youtu.be/_zhWHsfEa0U

Media has ‘never been so untrustworthy as it is now, said another Australian commentator. https://youtu.be/Fa4JwFj4uz4

Springsteen and Youngstown, Ohio

Mike Huckabee reports on Springsteen and his (long forgotten) ties to Youngstown, Ohio): “Bruce Springsteen must be taking career advice from the Dixie Chicks. During a concert on foreign soil (Australia), he implied that he was embarrassed by America’s President, then sang a song suggesting it was because Trump hung up on Australia’s Prime Minister – a dubious story from an unnamed source that both parties to the phone call strongly denied.

This is hardly Bruce’s first jab at Trump. Having campaigned hard for Hillary, he’s also on record as calling Trump incompetent and a “moron,” although he did recently add a caveat that that there are “plenty of good, solid folks that voted for Donald Trump.” I’ve said this before, but if he really wants to be a voice for beleaguered working people, he should do what I do: spend time talking to them instead of celebrities, politicians and Rolling Stone writers.

I’d suggest starting with Joe Marshall Jr. He’s a retired Ohio steelworker who inspired Springsteen’s song “Youngstown,” often hailed by liberals for its sad depiction of the problems of laid-off factory workers in an outsourced-jobs world. In the last election, Marshall was a strong Trump backer. He told the New York Times that the Democrats “failed Youngstown” with overbearing regulations that drove jobs away. Springsteen said he wrote his song after reading about Marshall in a book. Might I suggest talking to Marshall, and other Trump-voting factory workers like him, face-to-face? Judging from the way Bruce fell for one of the countless anti-Trump fake news stories, it appears that he’s not making very good choices of reading material.”

http://occupydemocrats.com/2017/02/03/bruce-springsteen-just-apologized-australia-trumps-behalf-best-way/

http://townhall.com/tipsheet/leahbarkoukis/2017/02/02/even-the-mexican-government-is-calling-out-the-ap-for-inaccurately-reporting-call-with-trump-n2280214

What may be the saddest war song ever

Today my husband played the 3 cd set of "The Dubliners; Ireland's No. 1 Folk Group" in exercise class. Irish songs are minor key and very sad. Our "cool down" song must be the world's saddest war song. It's about the Irish-Australian soldiers who returned from WWI, a war when losing 7-8,000 men in one battle over several days wasn't unusual. And even so, more American soldiers died of the flu than from the war. Here's just part of it:

They collected the wounded, the crippled, the maimed
And they shipped us back home to Australia
The armless, the legless, the blind and the insane
Those proud wounded heroes of Suvla
And when the ship pulled into Circular Quay
I looked at the place where me legs used to be
And thank Christ there was no one there waiting for me
To grieve and to mourn and to pity

And the Band played Waltzing Matilda
When they carried us down the gangway
Oh nobody cheered, they just stood there and stared
Then they turned all their faces away

Now every April I sit on my porch
And I watch the parade pass before me
I see my old comrades, how proudly they march
Renewing their dreams of past glories
I see the old men all tired, stiff and worn
Those weary old heroes of a forgotten war
And the young people ask "What are they marching for?"
And I ask myself the same question.

Australian bush fires

Australia is a continent--it's huge. All of Europe would fit within its borders with room to spare, and it's about the size of the U.S. without Alaska. So it's hard to generalize what's happening, since parts of that country are flooding, others having fires. Our hearts go out to all who've lost family and property in the terrible fires. Americans and Australians share Ireland as, if not our mother, at least a motherly aunt. Possibly 300 have lost their lives and 7,000 have been displaced. But we all know global warming will be blamed for either extreme--fires or flood--because, well, there's never been temperature extremes before right? It's only humans that are the problem. The little greens will blame people for wanting to live away from the city in areas with lots of trees (only movie stars and politicians should be allowed to do this) and the big greens will blame lack of action in capitalist countries to shut down production and let their people all return to 19th century levels of poverty.

I'm guessing that the most fire prone areas of Australia have regulations like ours in the SW U.S., with the best intentions, but aggrevating the fire and loss of life problems. When we were in Arizona and southern California in 2006 our guides were able to show us huge stretches of ugly tender-box forests, where neither the state or private owners were allowed to remove diseased, dead and trash vegetation. Some of the regulations are not even well-intentioned. They are intended to keep people from living there because it would be too dangerous and the "greenies" don't want the habitat desturbed.

Thursday Thirteen--13 Words for sheep

Feminist librarians say naming (cataloging and classification) is a form of power. Yawn. Librarians always say that about information, i.e., knowledge is control, power, etc. That's why they have such fabulous salaries and get government appointments. Ha. But other professions besides librarians and government bureaucrats also name by gender, role, age, economic value, hierarchy, etc., too. Like sheep farmers. One time I saw a list of 50+ English words for sheep (most of New Zealand and Australian origin where sheep are essential to the economy), only a few of which I remember. Here's a few I found on the Internet . . . plus a poem. Just because I'm a formerly powerful librarian.

Photo by JD Lasica
1) buck - uncastrated male sheep
2) dam - sheep mother
3) ewe - female sheep of breeding age

Two tooth ewes (not pregnant)

4) ram - entire male animal that has reached sexual maturity at around six months
5) wether - male sheep castrated at an early age before secondary sexual characters have developed. A bellwether is a sheep with a bell leading the flock (also called a mob).
6) hogg - a sheep up to the age of one year; one yet to be sheared
7) hoggett - castrated male sheep usually 10 to 14 months old.
8) lamb - young sheep still with its dam (mother) or up to five months of age. Qualified as

ewe lamb or
ram lamb or
Cade lamb - regional term for an orphan lamb

9) shearling - regional term for sheep up to first shearing
10) Gimmer - regional term for a young ewe that has not yet born a lamb.
11) Tegs - regional term for fat lamb in second season
12) Theaves - another regional term for a young ewe up to first lambing.
13) Tups or tips - male sheep, usually an entire breeding male ram
-----------------
My sheep poem
by Norma

Buck, dam,
Ewe, lamb,
Wether, hogg,
Hoggett, ram--

Yearling,
Gimmer,
tups, tegs, tips,
Theaves, shearling--

Waltz Matilda, waltz!*
----------------------
*Waltzing Matilda is Australia's unofficial anthem. The spell check says it has never heard of any of these words.