Thursday, April 17, 2014

Daily Links 4-17-14

In today's edition: Reader's Digest Christianity, revisiting the great Dungeons and Dragons scare, confessions of a Christian film critic, the aggregation of marginal gains, and more.

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Exposing the flaws of Reader's Digest Christianity. Unfortunately this is what too many sermons have started to sound like.

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How do I talk to my teenage daughter? This is a struggle that every father of girls faces.

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The 4 Stages of Writing and 3 Common Mistakes We Make. I can relate to every bit of this article (particularly the mistakes).

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Recalling the great 1980s panic about Dungeons and Dragons. I recently shocked my kids when I confessed to them I had played the game (more than a few times) when I was younger. Somehow I managed to survive. (Hat tip: Challies)

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12 Places in Pixar movies that exist in real life. Some of these are less obvious than others.

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This is an interesting read: Confessions of a Christian Film Reviewer:

If it’s a challenge to write about Christian films as a Christian, it can be just as problematic to review nonreligious films, especially the bad ones: The humility and loving kindness I try so hard to cultivate in my daily life doesn’t hew to the snark and downright cruelty that can be the occupational hazard of the reviewer’s job. Where I’ve become much more unforgiving, however, is in depictions of violence. As a student of film history, I know that violence is a long-standing, even essential element of cinematic grammar and audience catharsis; as a Christian, I find it increasingly difficult to accept portrayals of brutality that are glib, meaningless, played for laughs or cynically nihilistic. As Underhill wrote, “We cannot begin the day by a real act of communion with the Author of peace and Lover of concord, and then go on to read a bloodthirsty newspaper at breakfast.” If a bellicose tabloid is enough to give peace-lovers a case of indigestion, they should try watching a Quentin Tarantino film on an empty stomach.

Hat tip: Breakpoint

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How to keep your marriage strong. These are great tips. #5 is the one I find the hardest.

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This is very interesting: the aggregation of marginal gains. Having the patience to make small changes will result in bigger changes.

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