Hanukkah, and Stupid Christians

Two links this evening. Two links to places with knowledge, waiting to be had.

Link One: Did you know that Hanukkah is also known as Armed Jews Week? Did you know that those sweet paintings of Judith by Artemisia Gentileschi were inspired by events around the time of the Maccabees? Are you even sure when the time of the Maccabees refers to? To learn more about how some fairly violent times were the impetus for Hanukkah, and how Hanukkah has been a source of inspiration to Jews during other times of trouble, check out this Hanukkah overview by Dave Koppel over at MSNBC.

Link Two: This link comes courtesy of Adam over at mrjonesandmeandmrjones. He emailed me about a recent opinion piece in the Chicago Sun-Times by Cathleen Falsani. It's basically a lament (like a modern day Isaiah or Jeremiah) on the failure of the evangelical church to respond to the AIDS crisis in Africa. A telling statistic: over the past year, the number of evangelicals who would help children orphaned by AIDS given the opportunity has risen from 3% to 17%. Not a bad jump to be honest, but what it also means is that 83% of evangelicals don't see a big enough problem to lend a helping hand. And I don't mean lend a hand to reckless adults who contracted AIDS because of unsafe sex, but to FREAKING ORPHANED CHILDREN (that's me, yelling into cyberspace). Go read it, and care a little more about Christ on other continents.

Fini.