There’s a character in the Taika Waititi’s movie Hunt for the Wilderpeople called Psycho Sam. Sam lives out in the bush, as far away from civilization as possible. He wisely wears a colander to prevent the authorities tracking him. He’s a bit of a ditsy, doomsday prepper who hasn’t quite got around to building the bunker that will protect him from the impending nuclear holocaust and his cooking leaves a lot to be desired.
I guess that’s one way to deal with the anxiety about the end of the world. Dig a bunker. Stockpile food. Wear a colander. Look after number one. But Jesus suggests that when you see the signs – in the sun, the moon, the stars, distress among nations, the roaring of the seas – when you see the signs there’s another way of responding . . . and it doesn’t involve a colander!
Oh, and, if you haven’t seen the movie, I recommend it.
Tachycardia. Bradycardia. Atrial fibrillation. These are all types of arrhythmia. Which is not ideal. It means your heart is out of rhythm. If you have a heart arrhythmia you might experience palpitations, chest pains, fatigue, light-headedness, shortness of breath, anxiety. Probably best to see your doctor. Left untreated arrhythmias can result in stroke, heart failure, cardiac arrest and sudden death. Sounds serious.
I wonder what the diagnosis would be if ‘the world’ were to see a heart specialist?
Benjamin Franklin once wrote that ‘in this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes. If he was alive today he might have added: ‘and scams’. According to the ACCC, Australians lost $2.74 billion to scams last year. Maybe you were one of them?
Last week I received an email from the LCA IT department inviting me to complete a S.C.A.M 1 Fundamentals course. Sounds helpful, right? The trouble is the email asks me to click on the link! I would, but I don’t know if it’s a scam or not!
The effects of scams go way beyond just the financial losses. Yes, the financial losses get the headlines, but it’s the emotional and psychological impacts that can have the greater and longer lasting effects: anxiety, loss of self-esteem, shame, cognitive impairment, powerlessness, loss of identity.
I guess it should be no surprise that Jesus was ahead of his time and he knew what he was talking about when he said: “Beware that no one leads you astray”.
Are you interested in money? Dumb question, right? I haven’t met too many people who aren’t. Whenever I’m in my local library I browse through the magazine rack. There is magazine titled ‘Money’. There’s a section at the end of the magazine where a successful person is interviewed. One of the questions is: How would you spend your last $50? One person said: ‘I would spend my last $50 on a big breakfast – with as many sides as possible – and a few coffees at a gorgeous Bondi café’. Many others respond with similar comments. Sometimes someone will say they would invest the money, or pay for some sort of lessons to upgrade their skills, or even give the money away to charity! The one thing I have never read is for someone to say they’d give the money to scammers! Well, that would be crazy wouldn’t it?
Factoring in inflation, $50 dollars may not be far off the two copper coins the widow in this week’s Gospel reading puts into the temple offering bowl. It’s her last $50. It’s everything she has. But, Jesus does not have very complimentary things to say about the people who are supported by the temple offerings: “They devour widows’ houses”, he says.
So, who is this unnamed woman? Does she know what she’s doing? Is she crazy?
The serpent said to Eve in the garden: “You will not die . . . your eyes will be opened and you will be like God” (Genesis 3:4-5) Half-truths are insidious. The two half-truths told by the serpent continue to lure us and fascinate us and shape us. We (understandably) look to avoid death and anything that goes with death (pain, suffering, heartache, grief) by ignoring death, denying death, minimizing death, celebrating death (just look at the skeletons and tombstones and ghosts plastered all over fences this week), controlling death and by doing so we think we are being like God. Well, perhaps in some ways we are, but there is a price to pay for trying to be like God. It’s a price we may be willing to pay, but it’s a price God is not willing to pay.