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Smartphones Receive Holy Blessing
jeffmeden writes "Plow Monday is normally for blessing laborers and their tools; as the name suggests it is aimed at those who work the land. A church service in London, England Monday decided to go after a more modern audience: office workers and their modern communication gadgets. From the Times article: 'The congregation at St Lawrence Jewry in the City of London raised their mobiles and iPods above their heads and Canon Parrott raised his voice to the heavens to address the Lord God of all Creation. "May our tongues be gentle, our e-mails be simple and our websites be accessible," he said.'"
Has anyone noticed that sampenzus is a worse editor than even Jon Katz could ever hope to be?
Is this any more absurd than waving other tools in the air and praying for assistance from the divine?
How is this not Idle material? Or better yet trash can material. Who cares what some inane irrelevant church is doing in whatever part of the world.
Taking your iPod to church? Why? So you can play games and listen to music instead of the sermon?
Religion sure is a weird business.
Someone is trying to hard to be 'relevant'.
Something similar was tried recently at a Synagogue - the laptops got paraded around on chairs, the iPods were wrapped in a handkerchief and stepped on and the cell phones got the end of their antennas cut off.
After examining many badly managed and virus ridden machines, I've often declared that nothing short of a reformat and an exorcism is going to get it working again.
It's nice to know that *someone* is finally following through with my recommendations.
So, would the sound of a 300 baud modem connecting be equivalent to Gregorian chant now?
Is renewing DHCP equivalent to confession and absolution?
Is SMTP prayer? What does God do when you spam him?
Does your firewall have an angel with a flaming sword? Ours does.
And should they really be using wireless if Lucifer is the Lord of the Air?
May our tongues be gentle, our e-mails be simple and our websites be accessible...
And the congregation responds: And may porn flow freely without fear of spam and malware.
That is all.
Faith is incompatible with being a nerd.
They didn't just call it that, you know. Buildings in Europe can be centuries old, back when attitudes or conventions were different. Enlighten thyself.
They need an exorcism ritual for Windows viruses as well.
The name is a reference to its location.
From its website:
"St. Lawrence was first built in 1136 in the east end of London in the old Jewish quarter..."
This church is called "St Lawrence Jewry"? What a confusing and possibly offensive (to Jews) name for a church. Unless there's something I'm missing about British English.
It's not something you're missing about "British English." It's something you're missing about history.
With just one search, you could have clarified the historical reasons for this. The name dates back to a time when Jews were welcomed into England (even as they were being persecuted elsewhere) after William the Conqueror arrived. The old Jewish quarter in London includes prominent streets like Old Jewry and nearby old landmarks like St Lawrence Jewry.
"Confusing"? Potentially. But it's a reference to an address whose name is almost a millennium old. "Offensive"? Only if you don't know anything about history. It sort of reminds me of the idiots who want to remove the term "Providence Plantations" from the name of the state Rhode Island (whose official name is "The State of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations"), because they somehow think that "plantation" only refers to places where there were slaves. That's not what it meant in the 17th century, when the colony was founded.
Historical ignorance offends me. In the name of reason, try to educate yourself before assuming that a term or name from centuries ago must be intended to offend people.
The content of your post is implied in all Slashdot stories, since there inevitably is someone who will find anything irrelevant.