My Christian Faith

I am a Christian and I take my faith very seriously. Simply put, I love God. And if I both love God and believe that mankind is created in His image, then I must necessarily love people too. All of them. Every single one.

Extra Sour Refrigerator Pickles

Started off making Alton Brown's Bread & Butter Pickles, which are very good.  But if you like your pickles on the sour side, you'll like this modification, which I've developed over the past couple of years.  

2 to 4 cucumbers (depending on size, about 1 1/4 lb.), thinly sliced
1/2 onion, thinly sliced
4 tsp. minced garlic
3 Thai chilies (optional)
1 cup apple cider vinegar
1 1/4 cups distilled white vinegar
1/4 cup sugar
2 tablespoons pickling salt
1 tsp. mustard seeds
1/4 tsp. ground tumeric (or 1 tsp. fresh grated tumeric)
1 tsp. celery seeds
2 tsp. mixed pickling spice

Pickling cucumbers work best  but regular slicers will do as well. Layer the cucumbers, onions, and garlic (and chilies, if used) in a quart canning jar.  (Spring-top jars are ideal.) Pack them in fairly tight, or they'll all float to the top when you add the liquid.

Combine the remaining ingredients in a medium-sized saucepan.  Bring to a boil, and then simmer for 5 minutes.

Pour the hot vinegar mixture into the jar, filling it to the top.   Let the jars cool to room temperature.  Use any leftover vinegar mixture to top off the jar (some liquid will absorb into the cukes -- and that's a good thing.)  Fasten the lid and refrigerate.

The pickles will be ready to eat in about 2 days, but the flavor will be even better if you wait a little longer.  They'll should keep in the frig for 6 weeks, although they've disappeared long before that in my experience.

Other modifications.  You like dill pickles?  Replace 1/2 cup of the white vinegar with water.  Increase the sugar to 1/2 cup. Reduce the pickling spice to 1 tsp and add 1 tsp of dill seed and 1 tsp of dill weed.  It's won't be quite like a fermented kosher dill, but you'll get a hint of that dill flavor.

Hot & Sour Soup

This is a pretty easy recipe. This is just my variation of a fairly standard recipe.  

Hardware:

• 4 qt. saucepan or stockpot
• small mixing bowl
• assorted measuring spoons/cups

Software:

• 2 qts. low sodium chicken broth
• 1/2 c. low sodium soy sauce
• 1/2 c. cooked & shredded chicken breast
• 1 c. brown mushrooms, finely diced
• 1 1/2 Tbsp. garlic chili sauce
• 1/2 tsp. ground pepper (preferably white)
• 1/4 c. white vinegar
• 1/4 c. rice wine vinegar  
• 1 can (8 oz.) bamboo shoots, julienned
• 7 oz. firm tofu, diced in 1/4" chunks
• 1/4 c. cornstarch and 1/4 c. cold water
• 2 eggs, beaten thoroughly
• 4 green onion stalks, diced
• 1 tsp. sesame oil

Algorithm:

1. Bring broth to boil in stockpot.  Reduce heat to simmer.
2. Add mushrooms, soy sauce, chili sauce, and chicken.  Simmer 5 minutes.
3. Add vinegar, bamboo shoots, tofu, and pepper.  Simmer for another 5 minutes.
4. Combine the corn starch and cold water in a sealed container and mix thoroughly.  
5. Add the cornstarch mixture to the soup.  Stir in.  Simmer for another 5 minutes.  Soup will thicken some.
6. Beat eggs in small bowl thoroughly.  Pour egg very slowly into the soup in a fine stream.  Stir for 1 minute.
7. Add green onions and sesame oil and stir in.  Remove from heat and serve.

Output:  Approximately 10 servings.  

Carmel Pecan Pie

 Hardware:

   9 in deep dish pie plate or 9" x 2" fluted tart pan
    food processor
    3 qt. sauce pan
    assorted measuring cups, spoons, spatulas

Software:

• 3 1/2 cups coarsely chopped pecans 
• 2 cups flour 
• 2/3 cup powdered sugar 
• 3/4 cup butter, cubed 
• Floured cooking spray

• 1/2 cup firmly packed brown sugar 
• 1/2 cup honey 
• 2/3 cup butter 
• 3 tablespoons whipping cream 

Algorithm:

1. Arrange pecans in a single layer on a baking sheet. Bake at 350° for 5 to 7 minutes or until lightly toasted. Cool on a wire rack 15 minutes or until completely cool.
2. Pulse flour, powdered sugar, and 3/4 cup butter in a food processor until mixture resembles coarse meal. Pat mixture evenly on bottom and up sides of a lightly greased 9" x 2" tart pan with removable bottom.
3. Bake at 350° for 20 minutes or until edges are lightly browned. Cool on a wire rack 15 minutes or until completely cool.
4. Bring brown sugar, honey, 2/3 cup butter, and whipping cream to a boil in a 3-qt. saucepan over medium-high heat. Stir in toasted pecans, and spoon hot filling into prepared crust.
5. Bake at 350° for 25 to 30 minutes or until golden and bubbly. Cool on a wire rack 30 minutes or until completely cool.

The Blue-Eyed Gal's Secret Peanut Butter Pie Recipe

The Blue-Eyed Gal's Secret Peanut Butter Pie Recipe

(Under cover of darkness, in a commando-style raid, I managed to storm the kitchen, unlock the recipe box, and photograph the recipe on microfilm. Using my training in cryptanalysis, I discerned that a Caesar cipher had been used for encryption.  The decoded recipe follows below):

colate, if you can get it")

Mix until smooth:
1 cup sugar
8 oz cream cheese, softened
1 1/2 cup peanut butter (a handwritten notation adds "I like crunchy")

Blend in 1 large Cool Whip  (notation says 12 oz.)

Pour 1/2 mixture into crust.
Sprinkle broken Reese's Cups  (notation "Have also used Butterfingers, etc.")  then cover with remaining peanut butter mixture.

Chill.  (I presume that means the pie, instead of the just the cook....) 

The Case for Idolatry: Why Evangelical Christians Can Worship Idols image The Case for Idolatry: Why Evangelical Christians Can Worship Idols

By Andrew Wilson 

http://thinktheology.co.uk/blog/article/the_case_for_idolatry_why_evangelical_christians_can_worship_idols

For as long as I can remember, I’ve wanted to worship idols. It’s not that my parents raised me that way, because they didn’t; I was brought up in a loving, secure, Christian home. But from childhood until today, my heart has been drawn to idolatry. In fact, if I’m honest, one of the defining features of my identity has been my desire to put something else – popularity, money, influence, sex, success – in place of God.

That’s just who I am.

For many years, I was taught that idolatry was sinful. As a good Christian, I fought the desire to commit idolatry, and repented when I got it wrong. But the desire to worship idols never went away.

I wanted it to, but it didn’t.

So it has been such a blessing to discover that worshipping one God, and him alone, isn’t for everyone. There are thousands of Christians out there who have found faithful, loving ways of expressing worship both to God and to idols, without compromising either their faith or their view of Scripture. In recent years, I have finally summoned the courage to admit that I am one of them. Let me give you a few reasons why I believe that idolatry and Christianity are compatible.

I start with my own story, and the stories of many others like me. I am an evangelical, and I have a very high view of the Bible – I am currently studying for a PhD in biblical studies at King’s College London, which will be my third theology degree – as well as knowing both the ancient languages and the state of scholarly research. Yet, after much prayerful study, I have discovered the liberating truth that it is possible to be an idolatrous Christian. That, at least, is evidence that you can be an evangelical and an idolater.

Not only that, but a number of evangelical writers have been challenging the monolatrous narrative in a series of scholarly books. A number of these provide a powerful case for listening to the diversity of the ancient witnesses in their original contexts, and call for a Christlike approach of humility, openness and inclusion towards our idolatrous brothers and sisters.

Some, on hearing this, will of course want to rush straight to the “clobber passages” in Paul’s letters (which we will consider in a moment), in a bid to secure the fundamentalist ramparts and shut down future dialogue. But as we consider the scriptural material, two things stand out. Firstly, the vast majority of references to idols and idolatry in the Bible come in the Old Testament – the same Old Testament that tells us we can’t eat shellfish or gather sticks on Saturdays. When advocates of monolatry eat bacon sandwiches and drive cars at the weekend, they indicate that we should move beyond Old Testament commandments in the new covenant, and rightly so.

Secondly, and even more significantly, we need to read the whole Bible with reference to the approach of Jesus. To be a Christian is to be a Jesus-person: one whose life is based on his priorities, not on the priorities of subsequent theologians. And when we look at Jesus, we notice that he welcomed everyone who came to him, including those people that the (one-God worshipping) religious leaders rejected – and that Jesus said absolutely nothing about idols in any of the four Gospels. Conservative theologians, many of whom are friends of mine, often miss this point in the cut-and-thrust of debate, but for those who love Jesus, it should be at the very heart of the discussion.

Jesus had no problem with idolatry.

He included everyone, however many gods they worshipped.

If we want to be like him, then we should adopt the same inclusive approach.

We should also remember that, as we have discovered more about the human brain, we have found out all sorts of things about idolatry that the biblical writers simply did not know. The prophets and apostles knew nothing of cortexes and neurons, and had no idea that some people are pre-wired to commit idolatry, so they never talked about it. But as we have learned more about genetics, neural pathways, hormones and so on, we have come to realise that some tendencies - alcoholism, for example - scientifically result from the way we are made, and therefore cannot be the basis for moral disapproval or condemnation. To disregard the findings of science on this point is like continuing to insist that the world is flat.

With all of these preliminary ideas in place, we can finally turn to Paul, who has sadly been used as a judgmental battering ram by monolaters for centuries. When we do, what immediately strikes us is that in the ultimate “clobber passage”, namely Romans 1, the problem isn’t really idol-worship at all! The problem, as Paul puts it, is not that people worship idols, but that they “exchanged the glory of the immortal God for images” (1:23). Paul isn’t talking about people who are idolatrous by nature. He is talking about people who were naturally worshippers of Israel’s God, and exchanged it for the worship of idols. What else could the word “exchange” here possibly mean?

Not only that, but none of his references apply to idolatry as we know it today: putting something above God in our affections. Paul, as a Hellenistic Roman citizen, simply would not have had a category for that kind of thing. In his world, idolatry meant physically bowing down to tribal or household deities – statues and images made of bronze or wood or stone – and as such, the worship of power or money or sex or popularity had nothing to do with his prohibitions. (Some see an exception in the way he talks about coveting as idolatry in Ephesians 5:5 and Colossians 3:5, but these obviously reflect his desire, as a first century Jew, to honour the Ten Commandments.)

In other words, when Paul talks about idolatry, he is not talking about the worship of idols as we know it today. As a Christ-follower, he would be just as horrified as Jesus if he saw the way his words have been twisted to exclude modern idolaters like me, and like many friends of mine. For centuries, the church has silenced the voice of idolaters (just like it has silenced the voice of slaves, and women), and it is about time we recognised that neither Jesus, nor Paul, had any problem with idolatry.

Obviously this is a contribution to an ongoing conversation, rather than the last word on the subject. But I hope you will all search the scriptures, search your hearts, and consider the evidence afresh - and avoid judging those who disagree in the meantime! Maybe, just maybe, we can make space in the church for those who, like me, have spent a lifetime wrestling with the challenge of idolatry.

So, you think my faith in Christ is a crutch?

So, you think my faith in Christ is a crutch?

Well, is there some reason why I should be interested in the least at what an accidentally animated piece of meat that appeared for no reason, out of a blind, pitiless, indifferent, causeless cosmos, in the form of a random collection of chemicals on its purposeless way to oblivion, "thinks" about my faith in Jesus?