Christian-ese that I wonder about

I am sure all of you know that there are TONS of different labels for Christians. Recently there are some terms that I've been wondering about - things like 'evangelical', 'emergent', 'missional', 'righteous', etc.

How did these terms become common? What do they mean, exactly (I vaguely know)?

What words mean the same thing - like 'calvinist' and 'reformed'. Are they the same ideas? Because if yes, I  think 'reformed' is a better name because it takes away the focus on John Calvin, which is good cause we shouldn't focus on him. And if they're different, then how? If they're different, then I need to wonder about another label in my life.

lots of labels, lots of terms, lots of things you could focus on that make you different.

One Jesus.

Gnomeo and Juliet - Movie Review

Gnomeo and Juliet is absolutely amazing. It is fairly faithful to the Bard's plot, with the exception of a positive, chipper, happy ending. At which point, if you are like me, you start scratching your head and thinking "now how does that work?".

I won't spoil the plot, but I can tell you that it is a really clever little interpretation of the play. It's simple enough for children to understand, with the pure, sweet kind of animation they enjoy, with some sly jokes slipped in for the adults to enjoy (for example, Rosencratz and Guildenstern movers? Hilarious!).

Yes, the die hard Bard fans are probably a bit upset by the film...but if you can enjoy things like "The Complete Works of Shakespeare Abridged" you can enjoy Gnomeo and Juliet. Re-imagining fair Verona in terms of garden gnomes is extremely amusing.

"Love and Debate" - Movie Review

Dear Blogosphere -
Because I am not that interesting, you may not have noticed that I went an entire month without blogging. That was entirely intentional, as I had just forced you to listen to a month's worth of my random thoughts and figured you deserved a break.

But now it is June and honestly my fingers have been itching to get back to rambling here. So, I thought I'd treat you to a movie review. Love and Debate is a 2006 independent film that addresses exactly what it's titled to address - Love and Debate.

Jordan, the protagonist, is a skilled high school debater in her senior year. Given the opportunity to go to Harvard for debate, she must learn how to share her life between her parents desires, her own passions, and her skills.

The reasons I would recommend this film:
- great depiction of competitive debate.
- also great Latin music/dancing
- also Sean Austin
- believable (albeit stereotypical) characters

The reasons I did not like this film:
- washed-out colors of Miami are not my favorite
- predictable plot, and it's a narrative movie (when the character starts and ends by narrating)
- the middle part, when there's no debate, is kind of boring

Basically, I watched it for the debate. They really hit it spot on, the evidence, the prep, the fast reading, the judges and the tiny classrooms where it's only you, the other team, the judge, and maybe your coach. I really enjoyed the flood of memories that the film provided. Sometimes I forget the part of me that is designed for competitive debate. The part of me that loves the thrill of arguing and fallacies and thinking on my feet, the part of me that wanted to be caught up on foreign policy in order to find good evidence cards. (I know, all of you who know me are thinking, 'that argumentative girl didn't go that far away').