Oscars 2011

It's that time of year again... Red carpet, A-list actors and actresses followed by the ceremony awarding gold statuettes to the top movies of the year: The Oscars! So tonight, the long, drawn-out ceremony begins. Anyway, If I have time after homework I hope to catch a bit of the show because I've actually seen quite a few of the movies that are up for awards tonight which makes it about 10X more exciting.

Here are some predictions for the winners by the famous film critic Roger Ebert (who is also a columnist for the Chicago Sun-Time): http://rogerebert.suntimes.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20110210/OSCARS/110219999">

The top 3 possible winners for Best Picture seem to be The King's Speech, The Social Network or True Grit, with The King's Speech seeming to have the edge. I got the chance to watch all three this year and can say that they are all definitely movies worth seeing. Although The King's Speech has great acting and a feel-good story, I'm hoping that The Social Network has an underdog victory tonight.

When I think about it, I really enjoyed watching a lot of this year's movies. Inception, Black Swan, Toy Story 3 anyone?? Feel free to post your prediction for Best Picture and/or your favorite flick from this past year. Here's to hoping that 2012 has just as many great films.

PS- I do believe that the lower lounge of Hoyme will be showing the ceremony.

DIA

Recently, our class has been learning DeTocqueville's perspective on American Democracy. As Jake pointed out, yes, it does seem a bit like a love letter to America, but I think that the insight we've gained into America during that time period is very beneficial to our class and not all that much of an exaggeration. I enjoyed talking about Democracy being built from the "ground-up", as DeToqueville said in DIA, and I think that it is absolutely true. A country must start small and grow into a governmental change so huge as Democracy is. As it takes a seed to grow a flower, it takes people to form a government. In my mind, this means Ideas > People > Actions > Government > Change...

Overall, I think that reading DIA has helped me understand the complex process of forming a true Democracy in any country in the world whether it is taking place today, or over 200 years ago.

The man of the hour!

Democracy: A 25-word Definition

On Monday, we ended our class time by writing our own 25-word definition of the word Democracy. Since we have begun the 2nd semester of AmCon, our focus is once again on Democracy in America. This time, we work on a long-sentence structure.

My definition:
Democracy is the political idea of equality and equal representations throughout all peoples that promotes the freedoms of those peoples as individuals.

My Sentence

From Friday's class period assignment:

Take a sentence from McLoughlin's work and re-write it using the same sentence structure with a different subject of your choosing...

Original Sentence: During the Second Great Awakening the conservative pietists of the East gradually merged with the more radical pietists of the efforts to get all the unwashed masses washed in the Blood of the Lamb before deism, Unitarianism and Jacobinical mob rule put an end to the concept of a Christian commonwealth.

Revised Sentence: During her final year of high school Liza chose to attend St. Olaf College in Northfield, Minnesota in order to obtain a degree in Economics instead of attending school for journalism, fashion design or mass media at larger state universities closer to home.

Not sure if I completely got the gist of this assignment but, I understand the idea of utilizing a longer sentence structure...

What Would You Do With an Extra Hour?

I came across a photo-submission contest this past week that is entitled, "25 hours in a day." The site asked for people to submit doodles of what they would do with that extra hour and submit their photos in order to be voted on by the public. Then, one winner would receive a free T-shirt and a free magazine subscription to "GOOD".

"...Imagine that an hour has been added to each day, 30 hours to each month, 360 to each year. Sure you could always add an hour to your day by cutting back on something. But what if you didn't have to? What if tomorrow all of a sudden you had an extra hour to play with? What would you do?"

You can look through the top 25 submissions here: www.good.is/post/submissions-doodle-submissions-for-25-hours-in-a-day/

I enjoyed looking at the pictures, and although a significant number were the typical answer of "sleep", the website left me asking myself the same question: What would I do with an extra hour in a day? So, I've come up with a few ideas below... but ultimately I'd like to learn

what would you do with an extra hour?

Everyone's Story is Important

Last night I went to a Chris Tomlin concert in Minneapolis with some friends (including 3 fellow AmCon members!). Chris Tomlin is a Christian rock singer who was accompanied by Christian speaker Louie Giglio for his concert tour. Of course, the concert was full of Christian messages that led to me reflect even more on our past AmCon class period. As our speaker Mr. Giglio spoke about Christianity and worshipping God, I thought about how present the idea of equality in Protestantism has become. The fact that Louie Giglio spoke to thousands of people about his own experiences with God is proof that Christianity has become democratized in America. So whether I have the seen signs of democratization in Christianity through a Christian rock concert, or just chatting openly at lunch about my own personal experiences with faith, I remind myself that this is a result of The Second Great Awakening in America.

Church Attendance in America: Doomed or Just a Slump?

On Monday, our AmCon guest-speaker Amy Fryholm began her discussion about Protestantism in America with a graph of church attendance from the year 1790 to today. Her graph indicated that the attendance steadily rose from 1790-1965, where it was at its peak, and since has slightly declined to where it is today. She spoke of both the idea of "Pre-Millennialism" and "Post-Millennialism" and the decline of church attendance since 1965. The social change that is demonstrated through Post-Millennialism may have led people to believe that they do not "need" the church.

I think the most fascinating aspect about Pre and Post Millennialism is that the formation of Protestantism in America is really fairly young and new. The fact that it took nearly 200 years until the church had a significant decline is amazing, and although America has seen a decline within the past 50 years, there very much still remains a future for the church. The question is, will Protestantism continue to decline or rise back to the top? Will Post-Millennialism become more or less prevalent according to that change? Only time will tell...