Odd Spot

Is there a “war on christmas”

Friday, December 20th, 2013

Nothing in evangelical Christian author Rachel Held Evans’ five years of blogging has gone as viral as her simple little flowchart to determine if one is being persecuted during the Christmas season. At last count, the post had attracted more than 700 comments, the vast majority in agreement with her. The idea that there’s a Read more

Jesus and Santa were white men: Fact

Tuesday, December 17th, 2013

Fox News host Megyn Kelly caused controversy last week when she said that that not only is Santa Claus white but Jesus Christ is too. On her Wednesday programme, while talking with a panel about a piece in Slate, “Santa Claus Should Not Be A White Man Anymore”  (the author suggested Santa should be a penguin). Read more

Christmas miracle at airport

Tuesday, December 17th, 2013

When passengers travelling on a Canadian airline arrived at baggage claim, instead of suitcases was everything they wanted for Christmas. The event was captured on hidden cameras and turned into a video which is quickly going viral. It shows passengers checking in at Toronto and Hamilton International airports, as a virtual Santa Claus asks them Read more

What do Pope Francis and Lorde have in common?

Friday, December 13th, 2013

MTV’s college channel in namined Pope Francis and pop singer Lorde as its man and woman of the year. MTVU says both figures challenged their followers with unexpected stands. Since becoming Pope, Francis has urged the Catholic Church not to become obsessed with “small-minded rules” The New Zealand teenager Lorde released a debut single, “Royals,” Read more

Clerical fashion house aknowlegdes growing female clientele

Tuesday, December 10th, 2013

Clerical designs are bound to tradition and slow to change. But this year for the first time, Stephen Fendler is revamping CM Almy’s women’s line of everyday clothing to keep up with increased demand. In the United States, in 2012, more than 20 percent of clergy were women, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, Read more

Pope Francis once worked as a bouncer

Friday, December 6th, 2013

In addition to having worked sweeping floors and running tests in a chemical laboratory as a teenager, Pope Francis revealed he also used to work as a bouncer. He has told one group that when he was young, he worked as a bouncer, and that his work later in life, teaching literature and psychology, taught Read more

Homeless man runs competition to see which religion give most money

Tuesday, December 3rd, 2013

In April this year a homeless man homeless man may well have the discovered the most innovative plway of collecting small change Holding a sign which asks “Which religion cares the most about the homeless?”, he set out nine receptacles, each assigned to a different faith. A photograph on Huffington Post, showed that to bowls labeled “atheist” and Read more

Are Messianic Jews descendants of original Jewish Christians?

Friday, November 29th, 2013

“Messianic Jews “represent themselves as modern-day counterparts of first-century Jewish-Christian followers of Jesus, who, as it were, went underground for almost two millenia only to resurface recently as today’s Jewish messianics!” says Rabbi Michael J. Cook, the Sol and Arlene Bronstein Professor in Judeo-Christian Studies at Hebrew Union College, writes in his book, Modern Jews Engage the Read more

A “Tango Mass”

Tuesday, November 26th, 2013

An Argentine composer Martin Palmeri introduced the “Tango Mass” a number of years ago, but now we have an argentine Pope, it’s gaining new life and new audiences, “Obviously, I’m very proud. It’s a piece I composed over 15 years ago. And slowly it’s been growing and getting played at bigger venues. For me this Read more

Man tweets Bible in three years

Friday, November 22nd, 2013

It took Chris Juby, the Director of Worship at King’s Church in Durham, England exactly three years and three months to summarise the entire Bible into 1,189 tweets. He, says that he won’t be tweeting from @biblesummary any longer. There were times during Juby’s Twitter journey through the Bible when he didn’t know if he would make Read more