Wednesday, November 25, 2015

15 Movies With "Hidden" Christian Themes


Ask us how many Christian movies topped the box office in the past few years and we’d be tempted to say “none.” But that was before we discovered that these hit movies had hidden Christian themes.


THE CHRONICLES OF NARNIA: THE LION, THE WITCH AND THE WARDROBE

C.S. Lewis, the author of the novel The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe, is famous for using Christian themes in his work. This film adaption is filled with them: Aslan is Jesus Christ, Jadis is Satan, and the plot of the movie follows the resurrection of Christ and the fall of Satan.

But those religious themes didn’t go over so well with everyone. When The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and the Wardrobe came out in 2005, The Guardian’s Polly Toynbee criticized it, saying it was “invad[ing] children’s minds with Christian iconography… heavily laden with guilt, blame, sacrifice and a suffering that is dark with emotional sadism.”


Thursday, November 12, 2015

Japanese-American Actor Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa is Baptized Orthodox Christian


November 12, 2015

The soul of Cary-Hiroyuki Tagawa, best known for the part of evil sorcerer Shang Tsung in the Mortal Kombat movies, has been captured by Russia – he has apparently decided to be baptized into the Orthodox Church.

Tagawa, an American actor of Japanese descent, who took part in a new Russian film called The Priest-San, decided to abandon his faith and become a true follower of Jesus Christ’s Orthodox teachings, Interfax reports.

The news was spread via Facebook by one of his colleagues, Ivan Okhlobystin, an actor and prominent Russian religious figure. He shared a photo of Tagawa taken with a giant cross, probably snapped during filming not far from Moscow.


“I’m happy to say that… after deep and thorough consideration Cary Tagawa, who played the part of the Japanese Orthodox priest in our new film The Priest-San, will take the Sacrament of Holy Baptism,” his post goes.



“I can identify with the spirituality of Ivan (Okhlobystin) and Pyotr (Mamonov), I am deeply religious myself. You cannot just grasp the essence of the Russian Orthodox Church with its centuries of history. Getting to know it takes time, and it's a job for the heart rather than the mind. When I had first come to Russia I had very little time to get into the character. So I visited a number of Russian cathedrals in Yaroslavl and Rostov. Simply being inside had a very powerful effect on me,” Tagawa said in an interview to Kinopoisk.ru in 2013 when the shooting in Russia was done.


Tagawa also expressed his intention to become a Russian citizen at a press conference, according to Orthodox news website pravmir.ru.

“I’m not following the new trend,” he said, most likely alluding to American boxer Roy Jones Jr and French actor Gerard Depardieu. “I follow my heart. There are no easy decisions either in America, or anywhere else in the world. This will be a new challenge for me.”

The film, soon to hit screens in Russia, tells the story of a Japanese priest, who leaves Japan due to Yakuza wars and heads for a small Russian town to help its locals fight rampant corruption. The movie is the latest project from the "Orthodox" producing studio.

(He was baptized by Metropolitan Hilarion in the Cathedral of the Joy of All Who Sorrow. His baptismal name is Panteleimon.)





Wednesday, November 4, 2015

Is Technology Evil? (St. Nikolai Velimirovich)


By St. Nikolai Velimirovich

Many complain against technology.

Many accuse modern technology for all the woes in the world.

Is technology really to blame, or those who create technology and use it?

Is a wooden cross to blame if somebody crucifies someone on it?

Is a hammer to blame if a neighbor breaks his neighbors skull?

Technology does not feel good or evil.

The same pipes can be used for drinking water or the sewer.

Evil does not come from unfeeling, dead technology, but from the dead hearts of people.

From the Complete Works of Bishop Nikolai [in Serbian], Book 12, p. 23.

Monday, November 2, 2015

10 Horrifying Technologies That Threaten Humanity's Existence


Jonathan Benson
December 08, 2014
Natural News

Technology is the archetypal golden calf of the modern age. Everything that naturally exists in a purely analog and resonant state is being artificially mechanized, computerized, digitized and hybridized (think half-human, half-robot on this one). And with this gradual suffocation of the living, breathing fabric of our world comes the ominous threat of eventual human extinction, as the very essence of humanity is systematically uprooted in favor of a wholly synthetic and programmed existence.

Much of what is considered technological advancement these days is inherently evil and has the potential to be used as a collective weapon of mass destruction against life itself. Synthetic biology, for instance, which involves re-engineering genes to manufacture fake organisms, is one such example that threatens to set off an unpredictable chain reaction of devastation and death within the larger ecosystem of life itself.

"The idea that technology is neutral or amoral is a myth that needs to be dispelled," said Patrick Lin, director of the Ethics + Emerging Science Group at California Polytechnic University, as quoted by io9. "The designer can imbue ethics into the creation, even if the artifact has no moral agency itself. This feature may be too subtle to notice in most cases, but some technologies are born from evil and don't have redeeming uses...."

Here are 10 other examples of horrifying technologies that, if fully implemented, could spell the death of humanity (H/T io9):