Virtual Methodist

Today President Obama takes his second inaugural oath for the second time, due to the vagaries of the 20th January falling on a Sunday. This is an event of immense importance for me, even though I am an insignificant blogger bashing away on his keyboard in the backwoods of Belfast, Northern Ireland, and could have no part in the election of this man. But there is no doubt that his decisions ultimately make as much, if not more, difference to my life as do those of the politicians I am able to elect who sit in the big white house on the hill little over a mile from where I am writing, or the contentious clowns we have managed to elect to the council that sits in Belfast City Hall down the road... There has been some controversy over who will lead in public prayer during the inauguration, but I was encouraged this morning by this prayer by Scot McKnight for the President, and perhaps I could do with using a variation on it as I pray for my political representatives at a loc...

Has there ever been an inauguration like it? Stupid question - answer no! Forgetting all the shattering of the "color-bar" stuff (as if you could) and the palpable sense of hope and expectation invested in him and the event itself, the sheer multi-platform coverage of the whole thing was mind-blowing... My poor little RSS feed couldn't keep up with everyone blogging about it (some more constructively than others)... Even the West Wing (the real one, not the comforting televisual one) has entered the blogosphere immendiately after the inauguration. Also my email inbox was suddenly filled with emails from American friends who seemingly felt that they could emerge out of hiding and re-engage with the world now that their nation had regained a sense of pride in itself and vision for where it should be going. "I found myself singing the words of the National Anthem no longer embarrassed to be known as an American" wrote one... While more than one echoed MLK Jnr in s...

Yesterday was a travel agent's dream, indeed it could well have been dreamed up by travel agents in the first place in order to encourage people to book a holiday in the sun), because, we are told that it was statistically proven to be the most depressing day of the year, although we should always remember Mark Twain's dictum casting doubt on the veracity of statistics. "Blue Monday" it was dubbed by copywriters who had clearly lived through the most depressing decade in living memory (ie the 80s) with New Order as the backing track... It prompted a lot of lazy vox-pops on TV and radio news programmes. One particularly inane piece on UTV had a "Life Coach" suggesting that in order to escape the gloom and doom of yesterday (which the accompanying roving mike piece in the centre of Belfast did not support as everyone said they felt fine) we should think about all the good thinigs in our lives... Is there not a little children's chorus about "counting ...