Welcome back! Our twitter roundup has now become Godbytes, ideally encompassing all the religious bits (or bytes) that were picked up in the social media/blogsphere this week.
As this is a work in progress, please let us know if you have any good ideas for features we might include.
So it turns out everyone is pretty excited about this Harry Potter thing. Some religious conservatives still think the fiction franchise is diabolic, but Danielle Tumminio over at Huffington Post Religion thinks it’s a good way to talk about faith. Others think conservatives have a right to be spooked.
But for fans of the series, all you really need to know is this: Jesus would be a Hufflepuff.
In scandal news, the big buzz in techie Christian circles this week surrounded controversial Seattle-based pastor Mark Driscoll after he posted a predictably controversial question on his Facebook page asking:
“So, what story do you have about the most effeminate anatomically male worship leader you’ve ever personally witnessed?”
The internet did not approve: progressive bloggers like Rachel Held Evans jumped on Driscoll for the comment, and blogger Tony Jones even used it as a way to talk about “homoerotic churches.” The hubbub eventual eventually prompted Driscoll to offer a response of sorts. Check Religion Dispatches for a good synopsis of the controversy.
Speaking of Driscoll, he and others are all about family this week: Driscoll is defending the nuclear family while Joanna Brooks (aka @askmormongirl) offers a take on the attempt to legalize polygamy in Utah and Gawker is flabbergasted by the fact the Real Housewives of the Bible is a real thing.
Over in the twitterverse, the Tweet of the Week goes to Huffpost Religion for a headline that falls under the “Wait, what?!” category:
@HuffPostRelig Is Oprah the Antichrist? http://t.co/WAy8FrS
Also, while this is a tad late, Pastor Rob Bell makes some interesting observations about the anatomical corrrectness of some Christian art.
@realrobbell His heart is on the outside…http://t.co/kQFKEU4âÂ?¨
Meanwhile, Mega Pastor Rick Warren (he’s been active this week!) is soliciting his twitter followers for stories of how his book, the Purpose Driven Life, changed people’s lives so he can write another book presumably about how good his first book was.
That’s all for now folks, but we do have a request: this column is an ongoing experiment to catch religion news in the social media sphere. Are there other places we should be looking? Let us know!
And, as always, make sure to follow us @religionnewsnow!
–Jack Jenkins
