Arts: Entertainment: Videogame presents Christian fndmntlism's tragic turn to false doctrine, training religious-hate terrorists of future

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The Christian online journal, Ekklesia and other news sources repoirt the scandal of a videogame put forward as Christian, which actually promotes inter-religious hatred.

US Christians oppose violent fundamentalist video game

A range of Christian organisations in the United States are concerned that a major evangelical publishing house is promoting a video game which they say legitimates a violent and hate-filled world view based on religious fundamentalism.

At a press conference in Phoenix, Arizona, the Christian Alliance for Progress is joining with CrossWalk America, the Beatitudes Society and The Center for Progressive Christianity to protest the release of the Left Behind: Eternal Forces video game, a companion to the best-selling book series of the same name.

Critics say that the ideology of the game corrupts the Christian message and is based on distorted readings of scriptural texts which have been discredited by scholarship and are recent deformations of the Gospel tradition.

Many organisations and individuals are asking Tyndale House to disassociate themselves from the product. CAP’s letter declares:

“The Christian Alliance for Progress deplores the release of the video game Left Behind: Eternal Forces in which the game's object is to convert or kill any who stand in opposition to the ideology that the game and its companion book series seek to promote. We urge the game's sponsor, Tyndale House, a Christian publishing business which used to be concerned with sharing the good news of Jesus Christ, to recall its values and withdraw its support for such an un-Christian enterprise as this.

Videogames, by Owlie Scowlie

“The game, which comes with a copy of one of the books in the series, represents a relatively novel way of interpreting the book of Revelation and the biblical passages that treat the end of history and the coming kingdom of God, whose origin is less than 200 years old. It thus rejects the historic ways of reading Revelation and the coming of God's kingdom that have sustained followers of Christianity for two thousand years. It also rejects the insights of biblical scholarship and deliberately misreads Revelation as a book of prophecy, rather than the kind of literature it actually is, which is apocalyptic.

“Worse, rather than seeking to close the gap between neighbours, as Jesus did in his ministry, the game's purpose is to drive a wedge between people, teaching teenagers that what God intends is for them to slaughter those who do not share their beliefs. Because of the predominance of Christian fundamentalists on television and radio in the past generation, the American people have been left with the false impression that this strange way of interpreting the Bible is what Christians have always believed and taught. We are here today to challenge that view and to name it for the error that it is.”

refWrite urges all readers of goodwill to join in signing the online petition against the Tyndale House videogame Left Behind: Eternal Forces>/b>.

More Info:

Christian groups assail video game
Evangelicals petition against hate-teaching Christian fundamentalist video

Movies: Homosexscandal: See evangelist Ted Haggard at the movies! -- 'Jesus Camp' coming your way

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Fired Evangelist Slams Gays in New Movie

Movies, by Anaximaximum

More later, but in the meantime, check-out refWrite's previous coverage in our occasional Morals, Mores, Manners column by Owlb, on rW page 2

Technics: Internet: Web2.0 is being called a "revolution" of transition in usage from desktop to online applications

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A major new report on the so-called "Web2.0" phenom has been published under the title Web 2.0 Principles and Best Practices. It sells for USA$400, according to email newsletter Read/Write Web. The chief author is John Musser, with help from Tim O'Reilly and the O'Reilly Radar team (publisher is O'Reilly Media).

"These trends manifest themselves under a variety of guises, names, and technologies: social computing, user-generated content, software as a service, podcasting, blogs, and the read–write web. Taken together, they are Web 2.0, the next-generation, userdriven, intelligent web. This report is a guide to understanding the principles of Web 2.0 today, providing you with the information and tools you need to implement Web 2.0 concepts in your own products and organization."

Technotes, by Owlie Scowlie

There's now an annual Web2.0 Conference, but there's now also a differentiated Web2.0 Summit (the difference behind that designation should be obvious even to non-techie consumers of all things internettal).

More Info:

Why Web 2.0 Matters and How You Can Make the Most of It
Web2.0 (Wikipedia article)