This Week In Cool Stuff: 05/12/12

Wow, what a week! Where to begin?

-This Tuesday Amendment One passed in North Carolina, which bans gay marriage, civil unions, and domestic partnerships. In its wake, Rachel Held Evans writes how today's Christians are sick and tired of the culture war. Excerpt:

We are tired of fighting, tired of vain efforts to advance the Kingdom through politics and power, tired of drawing lines in the sand, tired of being known for what we are against, not what we are for.

And when it comes to homosexuality, we no longer think in the black-at-white categories of the generations before ours. We know too many wonderful people from the LGBT community to consider homosexuality a mere “issue.” These are people, and they are our friends. When they tell us that something hurts them, we listen. And Amendment One hurts like hell.

-Also in the wake of Amendment One, President Obama finally gets off the fence and endorses gay marriage.

-Sarah Moon says goodbye to her home church.

-Over at Homebrewed Christianity, Bo Sanders says North American churches will never change as long as the communal Bible is read through the eyes of individualism. Excerpt:

Let’s not pretend that we can think another way. We are heirs of the enlightenment – this is our operating system. We can download a new program like ‘christianity’ but it is operating within the individualist code. Talking with my friends who are from non-European descent (Native American, Pacific Islands or certain Asian communities)  it is clear that there is no simple conversion that an individual can undergo and simply start thinking in communal terms. We are cultural creatures and this is our culture.

-And sadly, we lost another one of my childhood icons. Maurice Sendak, author of such classic children's books as "Where the Wild Things Are" and "In the Night Kitchen," died this week at the age of 83. "Where the Wild Things Are" holds a special place in my heart, so as tribute here's Christopher Walken reading it.