Links to Your World, Tuesday August 4

If you’re in your twenties, have kids in their twenties, or lead church programs for those in their twenties, read “The Case for Early Marriage” in Christianity Today, written by Mark Regnerus, an associate professor of sociology at the University of Texas.

 

“Hollywood movies about vibrant marriages are rare. There is “The Thin Man” (whose main characters, it should be noted, are Nick and Nora). But most often film unions are dreary and painful, a chore that must be slogged through en route to the real story line: divorce or an affair. Enter “marriage” as a keyword on the Internet Movie Database (imdb.com) and the results are almost uniformly negative: “unhappy-marriage” (150 titles), “forced-marriage” (140 titles), “marriage-as-hell” (37 titles).” (From a NYT article about the good buzz that early showings of Julia and Julie are generating over the positive portrayal of Julia Childs’ marriage. One critic said it will be why “Julie & Julia” goes down in the cinematic history books.)

 

“Where race is concerned, I sometimes think of the president as the Peter Sellers character in ‘Dr. Strangelove.’ Sellers plays a closet Nazi whose left arm—quite involuntarily—keeps springing up into the Heil Hitler salute. We see him in his wheelchair, his right arm—the good and decent arm—struggling to keep the Nazi arm down so that no one will know the truth of his inner life. These wrestling matches between the good and bad arms were hysterically funny. When I saw Mr. Obama—with every escape route available to him—wade right into the Gates affair at the end of his health-care news conference, I knew that his demon arm had momentarily won out over his good arm. It broke completely free—into full salute—in the “acted stupidly” comment that he made in reference to the Cambridge police’s handling of the matter. Here was the implication that whites were such clumsy and incorrigible racists that even the most highly achieved blacks lived in constant peril of racial humiliation. This was a cultural narrative, a politics, and in the end it was a bigotry. It let white Americans see a president who doubted them.” (Shelby Steele)

 

. . . And they disapprove.

 

Regardless of where you land on his politics, you gotta admire the President as a husband and father. Now comes “The White House Fatherhood Tour.”

 

Plastic takes thousands of years to decompose — but 16-year-old science fair contestant Daniel Burd made it happen in just three months. (Wired)

 

The NY Times has a heartbreaking story on a Pakistani Christian family killed by a mob that was provoked by clerics of the religion of peace.

 

“Let me flee the temptation to debase myself before youth, thinking to ingratiate myself with them….Lord, since I have to get old anyway, please begin preparing me now, so that I will not be like ‘fruitless trees in late autumn, twice dead, uprooted’ (Jude 1:12).” (Andree Seu)

 

The “50/30/20 Budget” is a good one. We just have to remember that biblically the tithe falls in that “50” category of “needs.” That’s the conviction Diane and I have followed in our family budget.

 

Related: In order to live within the 50/30/20 plan, Liz Pulliam Weston suggests 5 places most people can tweak:

* Food. You've got to eat, but most of us could trim our grocery bills, often substantially, without too much effort. Plan your meals, cook from scratch, use up leftovers, clip coupons -- you know the drill.

* Utilities. You want the lights to stay on, but the air conditioner doesn't have to blast 24/7.

* Transportation. More carpooling and public transportation, less time alone in your car.

* Insurance. Higher deductibles can help reduce your premiums, as can shopping around and taking advantage of all available discounts. Ditch insurance you don't need, such as life insurance if you don't have financial dependents, or collision and comprehensive coverage on a clunker.

* Ditch the contracts. Early termination fees might make canceling your cell service too expensive, for example, but once your contract is up, consider switching to prepaid or pay-as-you-go service. Unless you're a real gym rat, gym contracts are another expense to shed as soon as you can. Consider paying by the visit or signing up at the local Y, which offers monthly billing without long-term contracts.