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Now Available! The Mockingbird Devotional: Good News for Today (and Every Day)!
Finally, it is here! Five years and over sixty contributors in the making, The Mockingbird Devotional is now available for purchase! While it will be available for purchase on Amazon in the next few days or so, it is currently available directly from Createspace for $20, which is where we’d encourage you to buy them anyways (being as more royalty comes our way). What is The Mockingbird Devotional all about, you ask? Besides getting a sense of it via our year’s worth of Hopelessly Devoted previews, here’s the back blurb:
“As long as it has been available, people have turned to the Bible to address the problems and anxieties of everyday life. We look to it for comfort in the midst of suffering, clarity in times of confusion, or simply to learn about God. Thankfully, what we find in its pages is not a collection of rules or demands but a message of unbending honesty and unspeakable compassion: the gospel of Jesus Christ. With humor and heart (and a surprising number of disco and B-movie references) the 365 short devotions in The Mockingbird Devotional carry the good news of God’s mercy and forgiveness to the inner-rooms of human reality.”
Order your copy today! Also, for a limited time, a complimentary copy will be sent to anyone who signs up for any amount of monthly giving! Visit our support page for more information. Feed up time, come get it…
P.S. Check the comments for a full contributor list.
Dying to Be Loved: Lana del Rey’s Tragic Bleeding Heart
Intern Thursday continues! This one comes to us courtesy of our other esteemed mockingintern this summer, Emily Hornsby, writing from all the way in Rio:
In her new song for The Great Gatsby soundtrack called “Young and Beautiful,” Lana del Rey sings about her two favorite topics—love and death. In the music video, the ever-glamorous, ever-pouty del Rey asks the hypothetical guy she is singing to, “Will you still love me when I’m no longer young and beautiful?” These lyrics are classic Lana, but in the third verse things get interesting:
Dear Lord, when I get to heaven
Please let me bring my…
The Many Jesus Complexes of Star Trek
Let Intern Thursday commence! This one comes from newest Mockingfledgling, Win Jordan. For those who haven’t seen Into Darkness yet, spoiler alert!
The second installment of the reinvigorated Star Trek franchise hit screens on May 16th, raking in an impressive $86.7 million dollars in the domestic box office over its premiere weekend. Director J.J. Abrams and his crew kept the film shrouded in mystery which made for eager internet speculation amongst the members of the rabid Trekie fanbase. The special effects and the performances, mostly notably Benedict Cumberbatch as the villain, Khan, alone made it a must-see summer movie, even…
Kierkegaard and Young Adult Anxiety – Will McDavid
Believe it or not, we’re down to the penultimate video from last month’s conference in NYC. This one comes to us courtesy of a true expert in the field (zing!):
You may download the recording of this talk by clicking here.
PZ’s Podcast: Girl Can’t Help It and Old Man River
Episode 142: Girl Can’t Help It
I’d like this one to be considered avant-garde. Like Journey.
It’s a pastoral meditation on realism and hope, geared a little from Eric Rohmer’s “political” movie of 1993, “The Tree, The Mayor, and The Mediatheque”.
This cast also gives me a chance to introduce ‘George’ to my listeners. He’s been with me since the 2nd of April. I christened him ‘George’ on the basis of a “Way Out” episode from long ago, entitled “Dissolve to Black”. My friend George, however, is nicer than the original ‘George’.
Anyway, I hope you like the music, hope you like the movie,…
Death and Life in the Artist’s Studio – Dan Siedell
Nearing the finish line, we are thrilled to present Dan Siedell’s session from our recent NYC conference, complete with an integrated slideshow. Do yourself a favor:
You may download the audio recording by clicking here. Interested parties should also be sure to check out Dan’s “Who’s Afraid of Modern Art?” lecture.
Walter White vs Raylan Givens: The Two Hats of American Law
Alright TV fans, the moment of truth (and consequence) has arrived:
You may download the recording of this session by clicking here. Also, by way of update, The Mockingbird Devotional, from which Ethan reads in his session, will be out next week! Watch this space for an announcement.
Hopelessly Devoted: One Thing Needful, I Can Stay All Night, Baby Beluga, and How I Ended Up At The Bottom Of A Dumpster On Christmas Eve
The hits just keep on coming! In lieu of our usual bi-weekly Monday devotion, here’s four for the price of one, all of Drew Rollins’ wise, funny, and deeply pastoral words from the NYC Conference in one video. They are far less conference-specific than they may initially appear–each one is about 10 minutes long:
Beck Brings Paper to Life (and Life to Paper)
This one comes to us from Win Bassett:
Beck Hansen, better known as “Beck,” will forever be linked to the decade when MTV actually played music videos, kids lived for TGIF programming, and pogs were worth their weight in gold. Who in Generation Y doesn’t count Beck’s “Loser” as one of the first pieces of art to leave a permanent watermark on our young minds? Who isn’t brought back to afternoons of rollerblading and feeding our Tamagotchis every time we hear the low, throaty rumblings of what may have been our first introduction to the Spanish language? (“Soy un perdedor. I’m…
Ministering to Winners: The Blind, Poor, Broken, Oppressed (and Other People Like You and Me)
In which our hero falls into a pile of excrement and discovers the theology of the cross… Must watch for ministers–and human beings–of all persuasions:
You may download the recording of this session by clicking here.
Thou Art My Beloved Child: Parenthood for Prodigals
Changing things up a little, here’s one of the breakout sessions from the NYC conference, Matthew Schneider’s discussion of grace as it relates parenting and adoption in the fourth season of NBC’s Parenthood. Highly recommended, regardless of whether or not you’re a fan of the show. Just be sure to have some tissues handy. Quick note: the first three clips can be heard but not seen. All the others should be fine. You can view the missing footage in episode two of the fourth season, “Left Field” (22:51-24:40, 27:20-18:05, 34:40-36:25).
You may download the audio of this recording by clicking here.
Rooting for Affairs: The Blurry Lines of Pop Culture Romance
This one comes from our friend Liz Riggs, a writer for The Wise Guise.
Don’t most of us fundamentally agree that cheating, no matter what the circumstance, is wrong? That it’s dishonest and treacherous and infinitely disloyal? That it is the sort of indelible unfaithfulness that, simply put, changes everything?
So, if that’s how most of the world thinks, then where does all the black and white turn grey? Where do the lines blur, and how do we make sense of them?
—
Infidelity has always permeated culture. From the dawn of time to modern television, “stepping out” has become a ubiquitous plot point…
I Can’t Fight This Feeling: The Problem of Emotion in Protestant Christianity – Simeon Zahl
Slightly re-titled but no less, er, plausible (or awesome):
You may download the recording of this talk by clicking here.
Big Foot Called My Unicorn an Antinomian: The Double-Bind of the Law – Jady Koch
Week two of conference video begins! This time with the inimitable Dr. Koch:
You may download the recording of this talk by clicking here. To read the post upon which this talk was partly based, go here. He also references this one at some length.
It Came From The (Church) Basement: Addiction, Grace, and Alcoholics Anonymous
Here comes another video from our NYC conference, this time from John Zahl. In addition to some deep wisdom, it features what was hands-down the best joke of the conference.
You may download the recording of this talk by clicking here. And you may order a copy of the book that the talk is based on by clicking here.
Paul Walker: Amazing post! Thank you....
David Morton: Thanks! Ummm... yeah... that was probably the most dead-on, jam p...
Mark Salomon: How am I only discovering this... today? Best to you and your future e...
David Zahl: Fixed! Sorry about that......
Jim McNeely: It's my favorite nightstand reading these days! An awesome tome!...