Random

• Unhappy with the amount of information available to the public, China is trying to crack-down on online-maps. The problem is that once the cat is out of the bag not only can you not put it back in but most people aren't going to accept the bagged-cat approach to life. ~ Link

• Care instructions with your new toilet paper wedding dress: 1. Avoid outdoor activity on rainy days. 2. Use lots of deodorant. ~ Link

• And then there is the prom dress made from Skittles wrappers -- that's hard core ~ Link

• ComedyCentral does Guam, again -- the election. ~ Link

• More than a dozen churches in the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Sydney now use security guards to collect the offering. They must be doing some major giving down there. ~ Link (via)

• At least 22,000 dead! Will Myanmar's reluctance to allow foreign relief workers into the country slow down the generosity of the world? We're trying. Online donations to help with the Myanmar/Burma relief. ~ Link

• Quotable:

Almost all the recent alternatives to the Trinitarian formula undercut the personal significance of God's name by replacing it with words of function. As many have noted, "Creator, Redeemer, and Sanctifier" encourages modalism, the heretical teaching that God's threeness is more about his modes of operation, or our perception of him, rather than something intrinsic to the divine essence. Biblical Christianity teaches that all three persons of the Trinity are involved in creation, redemption, and sanctification... ~ CT editorial

• Major exodus out of the US for medical care ~ Link

• Still trying to save the e-word -- the just released "evangelical manifesto" seems to be less manifesto and more education. That is, it seems to be less about plotting a new direction than defining the old direction in all its fullness. ~ Link

• The system doesn't make it easy for alternative fuel users -- even Gov Arnold Schwarzenegger in California could be in violation. ~ Link

• IKEA, the world's largest "charity"? ~ Link

• The chatter on one of the distance education forums is focusing on the announcement that NationsUniversity, a creative online school "...that offers affordable, accessible higher education to build faith and to develop culturally rooted Christian leaders around the world" is planning to pursue accreditation. Hmmm? Sounds expensive -- especially for an operation that doesn't charge tuition. ~ Link