Jesus Vs. Religion Video

      Today I noticed a video that kept popping up on my Facebook feed so I finally decided to watch it. Basically it is a man who wrote a poem to express his views on religion and jesus. The poem itself contains a very beautiful and strong message. Although there are a lot of aspects of religion I don't understand, I do think that this man has a point. I would suggest you watch the video linked below before reading on.

"See the problem with religion is that it never gets to the core. It's just behavior modification, like a long list of chores. Like let's dress up the outside, make it look nice and neat, but its funny, thats what they used to do to mummies while the corpse rots underneath."

      His message is basically that Jesus is better to follow than religion itself. In his description under the video he writes that "Religion either ends in pride or despair." He means that either you accomplish the "behavior modifications" and standards of how you should live as dictated by the church, or you fail to follow them. Even when you succeed you are filled with pride, which is a sin. And if you fail you feel as if you are not worthy enough for God. Either way you are like the mummies, you look "nice" because you are trying but you are "rot underneath" because you are still unhappy.

      However, Jesus makes people happy because "He represents you...and His sacrifice is perfect putting us in perfect standing with god!" I think what he means by this is that we don't have to worry about getting into God's good graces because Jesus made the ultimate sacrifice for us and released us from that duty. As he says in the video "Because when Jesus said IT IS FINISHED, I believe he meant it." The "it" is the struggle for trying to live a sin-free life and win God's graces. He made the ultimate sacrifice so that we could live our lives however we chose. The struggles was finished, but today with religion we still act as if it is not.

What do you think of the idea that Jesus is greater than religion? Are people freed from their responsibilities because of Jesus's actions? Do you agree with the way he portrays religion as a "list of chores"? Feel free to comment on any part of the video that strikes you.

Is the Glass Half Empty or Half Full?

      Over winter break I visited the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago with my family. I was skeptical of the artwork at first. I don't tend to understand how a painting of a green square can be considered a high value piece of art. Even though I don't quite understand or like contemporary art all the time, there was one painting that caught my attention.

      The painting is by an american artist Jo Baer. It was painted in 1967 and simply called Untitled. The painting is of two boxes outlined with two borders, one black one red, and a white center.

      At first, I didn't understand the painting and was about to ignore it write it off as just another "green square" painting with no meaning. However, when I read the description the painting made much more sense. The painter is basically asking the question: Is the white part of this painting EMPTY or FULL? The center does have white paint covering it, but white is often connected with emptiness. When I first observed the painting I thought of it as having a blank, empty middle. Upon further reflection I realized that the border almost is signifying that the middle area is important or else there wouldn't be a frame, making me think that the center is full.

What do you think of this painting? Is the center full or empty? What do you think the artist thought of the center? Would you consider this a "good" piece of artwork?

Pizza Is A Vegetable?

     Recently around the internet I've been seeing a lot of jokes and comment about Congress making pizza count as a vegetable. At first I dismissed it because I didn't think it could possibly be true. However as the joke came up again on Saturday Night Live I decided to check it out. It turns out there is some legitimacy to the joke. You can read about it in the article attached HERE.

      Basically, Congress wants to keep pizza and french fries on school lunch menus in order to help schools regulate costs. The Obama administration is trying to take "unhealthy" foods out of schools and by doing so they would need to place more restrictions on the types of foods allowed in schools. Some people argue that the government shouldn't be able to tell them what foods they can't serve and that since money in schools is so tight, demanding schools to pay more for "healthier" foods is unreasonable. The idea is that if pizza and french fries count as vegetables, schools can cut costs for foods.

     According to the article Pizza As A Vegetable? Congress Proposes New School Lunch Bill (as attached above), "School meals that are subsidized by the federal government must include a certain amount of vegetables, and USDA's proposal could have pushed pizza-makers and potato growers out of the school lunch business." Food companies have lobbied congress to not allow these restrictions to pass.

      I understand that the government is trying to find a balance between schools budgets and healthy food choices for kids, but I don't think that that is necessarily their job. I think that this is a responsibility for each state to figure out a solution for within their own boundaries. Every state has a different economical and health situation, so I think it is impossible to find regulations on food in schools that will benefit every situation.

How much power do you think the government should have over food in schools? Should pizza and french fries be counted as vegetables? Should the of the students health be sacrificed because of lack of money?


     
     

Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind

     This blog post was inspired by the movie Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind that I watched a few weekends ago. I would highly recommend the movie. It is beautifully filmed and stars Jim Carrey and Kate Winslet as Joel and Clementine, a couple in love. However the main idea of the movie and what I want to focus on in this post is the importance of memories. The movie has two quotes in it that address this topic and that I wanted to figure what they meant exactly. 

The first was a quote by Friedrich Nietzsche:

"Blessed are the forgetful: for they get the better even of their blunders."

The second was a quote from Alexander Pope:

"How happy is the blameless vestal's lot

The world forgetting by the world forgot

Eternal sunshine of the spotless mind

Each pray'r accepted, and each wish resign'd."

     The quotes both express the idea that "ignorance is bliss." In the first quote, forgetful people are lucky because they don't remember the bad things they've done. They only remember the good parts even of their "blunders", or mistakes.
     The second quote is longer and a bit more complicated to understand. In the first line, a "vestal" means a chaste or pure woman and "blameless" means innocent since the woman hasn't done anything. She is happy in her innocence and purity. The second line refers to the fact that the woman does not have wordly concerns. She doesn't worry about the world and it doesn't worry about her because they have forgotten about each other. The third line is probably my favorite because I think it is just beautifully worded and it is the title of the movie. It basicaly says that the mind that is clear of bad memories, "spotless", is the happiest since it is in "eternal sunshine." The last line is saying that the woman's prayers for forgetting her problems have been answered and now she has no more wishes. She is completely happy now since she has forgotten her sins.
     Although both quotes seem to express that forgetting the bad in your life makes you happy, the movie overall disagreed with this message. The characters seek to forget certain bad relationships in their past and are able to undergo a procedure that completely wipes away their memory of that relationship. In the end, they fall in love with the same people again and slowly uncover that this is the second time that they've been in a relationship. Some characters find that they didn't want to forget their past completely because then they would lose their good memories as well. Others learned that they didn't want to forget their past because they hated the fact that they made the same mistake twice.
     From this movie I have come to believe that though ignorance may be bliss, we are better in the end if we remember our mistakes and learn from them. 
Do you think that ignorance is bliss? How do you interpret the above quotes? Would people be better if we could forget the bad in our lives?