Blog - Page 202 of 318 - John H Armstrong

The Dollars and Cents of Sports in Chicago

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:20:53-05:00February 6th, 2009|Categories: Baseball|

As I read the Chicago Tribune today I asked myself: "What on earth are the owners of professional sports teams thinking in this very bad economy?" Today's Tribune notes that every Chicago professional sports franchise is raising their ticket prices this season except for the Chicago Bears, the football team. But while the Bears hold the line on prices the baseball White Sox are raising prices modestly, by $2.00 per game. The lone exception is the upper deck box seats, which are going up only $1.00 per game. This is tolerable, but not a very good strategy in this economy. The Blackhawks, feeling good about having a much better hockey team this year, are raising their prices an average of 16%. The Bulls, struggling right now to be consistent as an NBA basketball team, are raising season-ticket prices 33% and court side seats by anywhere from $100 to $950 each. Utterly amazing!

Worst of all, as is typical in this city, the Chicago […]

President Obama: "I Screwed Up"

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:20:53-05:00February 5th, 2009|Categories: Current Affairs|

I couldn't believe what I was hearing. I sat down to watch a brief portion of the evening news and there, on CBS no less, was an interview with Katie Couric and the president. The words that I heard stunned me. "I screwed up. I take responsibility for this mistake." President Obama was referring, of course, to the problems several of his choices have faced in the U. S. Senate in seeking confirmation.

First, there was Governor Bill Richardson, then former-senator Tom Daschle, and now Nancy Killefer, his choice for chief performance office for the federal government. (Obama's choice of Republican Senator Judd Gregg (photo at right), of New Hampshire, for Secretary of Commerce seems to be a solid one and an evidence, again, of non-partisanship in style and effort.)
Even Timothy Geithner, the new Treasury secretary, faced challenges about $34,000 of self-employment taxes that he had not […]

Prayer: Conversation with God

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:20:53-05:00February 4th, 2009|Categories: Prayer|

St. John Chrysostom said, "Prayer is conversation with God." Clement of Alexandria and Gregory of Nyssa said much the same thing. Origen distinguished different kinds of prayer and thus wrote:

Supplication is "a petition offered with entreaty by one who needs something; prayer "is offered in a dignified manner with praise concerning matters of importance"; intercession "is a request to God . . . made by one who possesses more than usual confidence"; and thanksgiving "is an acknowledgment that blessings have been obtained from God." That's pretty good.

Greek and Roman prayers were "tit-for-tat" offerings to vague impersonal deities; i.e., I have sacrificed this for you so you should give this back to me. Christian prayer was, and is, radically different. We must understand this essential point if we would make any progress in Christian faith at all. […]

The Jesus Prayer

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:20:53-05:00February 3rd, 2009|Categories: Prayer|

The apostle Paul instructed the Thessalonian Christians that they should they should: "Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, in everything give thanks; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you" (1 Thess. 5:16-18). I ponder this text a great deal. I am sure I fail the first more than once a day, more likely a few times every day. I also fail the last more times than I care to admit. But the middle imperative is even more difficult, or so it seems to me. How do I "pray without ceasing?"

Most Christians I know try something like this to explain this injunction: "God knows we cannot pray all the time since we must do many things throughout a day that are not prayer so this has to mean something else than what it appears to mean." I cannot agree. Nor did the ancient fathers of the Christian Church. They believed that all three of these Pauline injunctions were to be literally obeyed every single day, all day long, and even in the night when […]

The Gift of the Spirit & Mission

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:20:53-05:00February 2nd, 2009|Categories: Missional Church|

The late David Jacobus Bosch (1932-1991) was a major voice for mission in the post-colonial world. His most famous work, Transforming Mission: Paradigm Shifts in the Theology of Mission (1991),
was a ground-breaking book that still impacts all who read it. If you do not know David Bosch, or this particular book, you are missing out on learning deeply from one of the truly great voices of our time. Bosch, a member of the Dutch Reformed Church, was originally a supporter of apartheid but his involvement in mission transformed both his thinking and his heart. Tragically, he was killed in a car accident on April 15 1992, at the still productive age of 62. Those who have profited by his work have always wished there had been many years for him to write so much more.

Bosch studied under the famous Oscar Cullman at the University of Basel. There he was encourage to embrace a more open view toward ecumenism. In 1957 he began […]

Rush Limbaugh: There's No Business Like Show Business

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:20:53-05:00February 1st, 2009|Categories: Current Affairs|

Ultra conservative talk-show host Rush Limbaugh got his own stimulus package recently, signing an eight-year radio deal worth a reported $400 million. That is pretty good for a syndicated talker who attracts millions of listeners five days a week. I admit I once listened to Rush, even found him humorous at times. Once in awhile he even made sense. You knew he was being funny, but you also knew he believed his basic points and made an occasionally decent argument.

Well Limbaugh should be happy that he has President Obama in the White House because now he has exactly what he needs to keep his show lively for another eight years, assuming Obama is re-elected in 2012. And President Obama gave Rush just what he needed, if the New York Post got it right, when he said to Republican leaders, "You can't just listen to Rush Limbaugh." If he really said this one wonders why.

Limbaugh has already declared […]

Being the Family of God

By John Armstrong|2009-01-31T05:00:00-06:00January 31st, 2009|Categories: Unity of the Church|

Last week the Roman Catholic Church celebrated ecumenism and Christian unity. I listened to a number of Catholics reflect on this vital theme on Catholic radio as I drove to speak last Sunday, January 25th. I then read a number of things on the Vatican Website as well. I reflected on how unlikely, or humanly impossible, this all would have been before Vatican II. There can never be too much emphasis placed upon how fundamentally Vatican II changed this whole context. In many ways it is now up to Protestants to respond in the right way. And that response is improving with every passing year.

One priest I heard last Sunday noted that we are in the same family. He served a small parish in Kentucky, in and among a predominantly Southern Baptist context for decades. He observed that you can't be the family of God and remain isolated from one another. But how can this happen, given our real and serious differences that still […]

The Illinois Senate Gets It Right, Now What?

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:20:53-05:00January 30th, 2009|Categories: Politics|

The Illinois Senate did the obvious yesterday in unanimously voting to remove Governor Rod Blagojevich, our 40th governor. His impeachment and quick conviction was almost unprecedented in modern political history. There was no party partisanship in the matter and no one to defend the governor but himself. His helpless effort to go to the people of the nation via television, earlier this week, was truly one of the most pitiful and amazing acts of hubris in recent political history. He will now face a court trial that will send him to prison, thus making him the fourth Illinois governor to go to prison in my lifetime. No wonder this state has a bad reputation politically!

Like many of you I asked myself again and again: "Does this man believe what he is saying?" My honest guess is that he is so out of touch with reality that there is a sense in which he does. President Clinton believed his lies until he was forced […]

A Bold Decision Regarding the Mac

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:20:54-05:00January 29th, 2009|Categories: Personal|

My cell phone contract was up on Tuesday. (I had used T Mobile for two years and found out it did not give me the coverage and service I wanted.) I knew I wanted a new provider, and chose AT & T, so it was time to consider the two really superior Smart-phones that are on the market: The Blackberry Bold and the Apple iPhone. I have to tell you I have never put much time into making a rather simple decision like this. I generally seek a little advice, check a few phones at the store and buy one. This time I did about four hours of online research (alone) and then about two hours of conversations with sales people at three different retail stores.

First, both of these products are excellent phones. If you really like to have a load of applications, a truly neat screen and some very cool Internet stuff then the iPhone is what you want. If you […]

The Wrestler

By John Armstrong|2021-07-02T06:20:54-05:00January 28th, 2009|Categories: Film|

David Aronofsky's much heralded movie, The Wrestler, is a true gem. Understand though, the point of the film is not about wrestling, not at all. Randy "The Ram" Robinson (Mickey Rourke) is a washed-up professional wrestler whose personal life is now truly in the tank. He is searching for some way to find love and to be loved. His girl friend is a stripper played by Marisa Tomei, who has her own issues and trials in dealing with her child as a single parent. Then there is Randy's homosexual daughter, a child he never loved and now wants to connect with in his dark moments. There is a stark sense in which what you see in The Wrestler is human life in the hard track, life in the give-and-take of America, life where faith is missing and hope is all but gone. The ending of the movie is appropriately chilling and powerful. (I will not give it away.)

The realism of this movie is […]