An Obadiah Slope Column
Let the little Children go free: Five-year-old Liam Conejo Ramos, who was arrested and placed in detention by ICE agents in Minnesota last month, has been freed by a federal district court judge.
The image of the five-year-old wearing a knitted blue bunny hat went viral. The photo shows the child being detained as he came home from preschool.
But what makes this an Obadiah story is what Judge Fred Biery put at the foot of his judgment.
Matthew 19:14 “But Jesus said, ‘Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them; for the kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these’” (NIV)
John 11:35 “Jesus wept.”
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The pilot who wasn’t there: a great video, but you need to watch it to the end.
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A murder mystery twist: A murder in the church, and a classic whodunnit cast of characters, all of whom are in the congregation. Sounds like a regular putdown of Christianity by the film industry, only it isn’t. Wake Up Dead Man: A Knives Out Mystery, currently on Netflix, has Daniel Craig as detective Benoit Blanc, Glenn Close and Mila Kunis, and a host of other famous actors that Obadiah is too thick to recognise, and a plot full of twists.
But the movie is totally respectful of Christianity. While there are plenty of characters who are really bad Christians, the movie pivots around a good priest and a bad priest. It is an Agatha-Christie-style mystery, only set in a church, and the small congregation and two priests are the suspects.
The director, Rian Johnson, breaks the fourth wall on this one in an interview with CBC, the Canadian version of our ABC. He grew up evangelical, but has moved away – how far Obadiah can’t pin down.
“Father Judd who’s played by Josh O’Connor is kind of, he’s, for lack of a better term, the protagonist of the movie,” Rian tells CBC’s Tom Power. “And he’s a very good-hearted priest, and I kind of put everything that I genuinely love about Christianity and about what it’s all about to me and to him. Blanc [the dective] is, he’s not the antithesis of that…”
“There’s another character, [the controlling priest, Monsignor Jefferson Wicks played by] Josh Berlin, who’s kind of the, where I put all the stuff that I don’t feel so great about in Christianity. Judgement. Judgement. And us against them and sort of the notion of fighting the world for the church and all that.”
This movie takes Christianity seriously, and Obadiah found that refreshing.
To Obadiah, seeing the good side of Christianity on the screen outweighed the other stuff.
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Readers in Australia, like Obadiah, until today, likely won’t have heard of Al Carns, the UK’s Minister for the Armed Forces, who has served in the special forces and has a Military Cross for gallantry in action. But his response to Donald Trump’s suggestion that allied troops stayed away from the front lines in Afghanistan will be a finalist for speech of the year.
“Well, in Afghanistan, frankly, this is utterly ridiculous. Many courageous and honourable service personnel from many nations fought in the front line, many fought way beyond that. I’d served five tours in Afghanistan, many alongside my American colleagues. We shed blood, sweat, and tears together, and not everybody came home. These are bonds, I think, forged in fire, protecting us or shared interests, but actually protecting democracy overall. Now, I’d suggest whoever believes these comments come have a whiskey with me, my colleagues, their families, and importantly the families of those that have made the ultimate sacrifice for both of our nations. It’s also worth reminding everyone here in World War ii, more British troops landed on D-Day than any other nation. It was an allied response, and United, we conquer.”