~Ron ReedSister Rose Pacatte writes for the National Catholic Reporter. In her recent article Seeds of the Gospel in Cinema she talks about cinema divina - a practice of watching film as a spiritual discipline, derived from lectio divina. She mentions Father Benedict Auer's article "Video Divina: A Benedictine Approach to Spiritual Viewing," in which he writes "Video divina requires a set disposition which says, 'This evening, I wish to get closer to God, so I think I'm going to watch this film, which might give me better insights into myself or why my neighbor acts as she or he ...

Hope and the Great Restoration ~Travis Stewart Fourteen years ago my wife held our newborn child in our arms as his heart stopped beating after on 30 minutes of life. That experience changed everything; how we viewed the preciousness of life, how we expressed grief and even career choices. It also challenged how we understood the meaning of redemption and the core of the Gospel message. What I present here, in this audio presentation preached at Open Door Fellowship in ...

Inception 2010 • Rated PG-13 Directed by Christopher Nolan [SPOILER WARNING: Don't read unless you've seen the movie] Inception has been called "an elegantly cerebral story that is primal, compelling, and as visually disconcerting as it is completely captivating" as well as "a tremendously challenging and tremendously rewarding movie, the type that will have audiences talking -- and debating -- long after the credits roll." After seeing it again last night I'm in ...

Inception 2010 • Rated PG-13 Directed by Christopher Nolan "Avatar was one man's film pushing his vision of the world using amazing technology. Inception is a film exploring the human mind, guilt, regret, forgiveness and the power of beliefs through imagination and creativity. With Avatar I felt preached at; with Inception I felt invited to explore my core beliefs, how guilt drives my behavior and my perception of reality." That's what I wrote on my Facebook status ...

Part Two in a series written by Denis Haack of Ransom Fellowship addressing the problem on how to live faithfully in a culture largely ignorant of God. The following is a portion of his article "A Model for Faithfulness" (originally posted at www.ransomfellowship.org - used by permission). ~Travis Stewart A Model for Faithfulness The Babylon Series, Part 2 ~Denis Haack Where Evangelicals Are Today At the time of the First Great Awakening (1735-1743), ...

In the winter of 2001 I had a choice to make; either I take a one week class in New Testament Greek, continuing my work on a Master's of Divinity degree or switch degree programs and sign up for a class called Movies and Theology taught by Denis Haack. Considering that I didn't feel called to ordained ministry and having parsed my quota of Greek verbs I choose to learn the language of film over the language of the ancients (after all, I figured, I know a lot of guys I ...