Devising a Meaning for Coldplay's "Every Tear A Waterfall"

Maybe the troubadour poet inside me hears more to the music and lyrics of Coldplay's latest song than was intended, but vignettes of heaven's world seem to play again and again within this upside-down world of ours to wash across the turbulent landscapes of heaven's earthbound-faithful when hearing Every Tear a Waterfall. And yet, isn't this ofttimes the case as followers of Jesus hear in their heads beats to a different rhythm than the world can hear? Beats that come across as graffiti to outsiders, but are beautiful, strong, vibrant, like that of a mighty, rushing waterfall over the rocks of our broken hearts thundering God's love and majesty against the turmoils of this life? Who hear God's whispered assurances of "Peace, be still" proclaimed in a rebel song of heaven's rushing music through the bursted heart of the Spirit? Whose troubling voice fills with the breath of rushing waters racing darkly across the broken landscapes of our frail being vibrating with an intensity of conflict that would crush our burning tears into the heart of God's assuring spirit speaking love. Speaking peace. Speaking hope into the accumulated teardrops of humanity's broken hearts even as our own hearts burst within like a mighty, rushing waterfall. Carrying us over our own edge of nothingness till hearing the Spirit's song underneath. Flowing from the many streams of God's broken heart into the gathering streams of God's atoning abyss lost forever upon the rocks of God's mercy, grace, and peace. Falling away and purified into cleaner, clearer waters mending all time and eternity into surer worlds remembering a time that was and is no longer. Cathedrals to humanity's templed trove of redeeming waters remaking all new till Monday morning's dazzling sun comes true as "we dance all night with heaven in sight."

And all the kids they dance,

All the kids all night,

Until Monday morning

Feels another life,

I turn the music up,

I'm on a roll this time,

And heaven is in sight...

skinhead

July 2, 2011

**********

Background & Lyrics

http://www.directlyrics.com/coldplay-every-teardrop-is-a-waterfall-lyrics.html

Coldplay's first offering in 2011 is this new song entitled "Every Teardrop Is A Waterfall" which the British band premiered/released online on June 3rd - Coldplay's amazing new tune samples Argentinian band The Sacados' 90's hit "Ritmo de la noche" - It's soo good! Uplifting, catchy and summery. "Every Teardrop Is A Waterfall" will appear on Coldplay's upcoming fifth album which will hit stores in the Fall of 2011.

"Every Teardrop Is A Waterfall" by Coldplay is currently (week 26, 2011) in the HOT100 Billboard charts at position 52. The Every Teardrop Is A Waterfall lyrics by Coldplay are displayed below.

 

  Send "Every Teardrop Is A Waterfall" Ringtone to your Cell

I TURN THE MUSIC UP, I GOT MY RECORDS ON

I SHUT THE WORLD OUTSIDE UNTIL THE LIGHTS COME ON
MAYBE THE STREETS ALIGHT, MAYBE THE TREES ARE GONE
I FEEL MY HEART START BEATING TO MY FAVOURITE SONG

AND ALL THE KIDS THEY DANCE, ALL THE KIDS ALL NIGHT
UNTIL MONDAY MORNING FEELS ANOTHER LIFE
I TURN THE MUSIC UP
I'M ON A ROLL THIS TIME
AND HEAVEN IS IN SIGHT

I TURN THE MUSIC UP, I GOT MY RECORDS ON
FROM UNDERNEATH THE RUBBLE SING A REBEL SONG
DON'T WANT TO SEE ANOTHER GENERATION DROP
I'D RATHER BE A COMMA THAN A FULL STOP

MAYBE I'M IN THE BLACK, MAYBE I'M ON MY KNEES
MAYBE I'M IN THE GAP BETWEEN THE TWO TRAPEZES
BUT MY HEART IS BEATING AND MY PULSES START
CATHEDRALS IN MY HEART













AND WE SAW OH THIS LIGHT I SWEAR YOU,
EMERGE BLINKING INTO TO TELL ME
IT'S ALRIGHT AS WE SOAR WALLS,
EVERY SIREN IS A SYMPHONY
AND EVERY TEAR'S A WATERFALL
IS A WATERFALL
OH
IS A WATERFALL
OH OH OH
IS A IS A WATERFALL
EVERY TEAR
IS A WATERFALL
OH OH OH

SO YOU CAN HURT, HURT ME BAD
BUT STILL I'LL RAISE THE FLAG

OH
IT WAS A WA WA WA WA WA-ATERFALL
A WA WA WA WA WA-ATERFALL

EVERY TEAR
EVERY TEAR
EVERY TEARDROP IS A WATERFALL

EVERY TEAR
EVERY TEAR
EVERY TEARDROP IS A WATERFALL

Send "Every Teardrop Is A Waterfall" Ringtone to your Cell

Wiki Reviews - http://www.wikicoldplay.com/Every_Teardrop_Is_A_Waterfall

Coldplay, 'Every Teardrop Is a Waterfall' - Song Review

http://popcrush.com/coldplay-every-teardrop-is-a-waterfall/

by Amy Sciarretto

June 2011

EMI/Capitol

Coldplay‘s brand new single ‘Every Teardrop Is a Waterfall’ is as big as its title suggests. It is not a ballad, but an uplifting, room-filling Brit pop song laced with the band’s rock ‘n’ roll edge.

While Coldplay have endured plenty of Radiohead comparisons throughout their career, they’ve turned the corner here, going for stadium-sized hooks a la U2 with this bold, bright, guitar-driven new song that is steered by Martin’s inimitable voice. Thanks to its massive size and scope, the four-minute monster more than makes up for all the time fans had to wait for new music from the band.

At about the three-minute mark, ‘Every Teardrop Is a Waterfall’ balloons with layered harmonies and faster guitar work. It’s as though vocalist (and Gwyneth Paltrow baby daddy) Chris Martin wrote the song with the express intent of performing in a stadium or at the Olympics. (Ahem — the 2012 Olympics will be held in London, so…)

When Martin sings, “I turn the music / I got my records on / I shut the world outside until the lights come on / Maybe the streets alright / Maybe the trees are gone / I feel my heart start beating to my favorite song,” he pulls us into his world, where everything around you fades into the background while you focus on what you hear in your headphones. Speaking of which, you will pick up all the nuances of sound via a pair of earbuds.

The song doesn’t fade out, either. It ends on a percussive note. You’ll want to listen to it over and over again. It’s a gorgeous mix of Coldplay’s knack for pretty melodies mixed with some escalating guitar work, despite not being nearly as polished as the band’s previous pop songs.

The song comes in like a lion and goes out like one, too!

Wikipedia

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coldplay

Background

Coldplay are an English alternative rock band formed in 1996 by lead vocalist Chris Martin and lead guitarist Jonny Buckland at University College London.^[1] After forming Pectoralz, Guy Berryman joined the group as a bassist and they changed their name to Starfish.^[2] Will Champion joined as a drummer, backing vocalist, and multi-instrumentalist, completing the lineup. Manager Phil Harvey is often considered an unofficial fifth member.^[3] The band renamed themselves "Coldplay" in 1998,^[4] before recording and releasing three EPs; Safety in 1998, Brothers & Sisters as a single in 1999 and The Blue Room in the same year. The latter was their first release on a major label, after signing to Parlophone.^[5]

They achieved worldwide fame with the release of the single "Yellow" in 2000, followed by their debut album released in the same year, Parachutes, which was nominated for the Mercury Prize. The band's second album, A Rush of Blood to the Head (2002), was released to favourable reviews and won multiple awards, including NME's Album of the Year, and has been widely considered the best of the Nelson-produced Coldplay albums. Their next release, X&Y, was initially met with mixed reviews upon its release in 2005. However, the band's fourth studio album, Viva la Vida or Death and All His Friends (2008), was produced by Brian Eno and released again to largely favourable reviews, earning several Grammy nominations and wins.^[6]

Coldplay have been an active supporter of various social and political causes, such as Oxfam's Make Trade Fair campaign and Amnesty International. The group have also performed at various charity projects such as Band Aid 20, Live 8, Sound Relief, Hope for Haiti Now: A Global Benefit for Earthquake Relief, and the Teenage Cancer Trust.^[7]


Activism and Commercial Endorsements

Make Trade Fair, abbreviated as MTF,

shown on Chris Martin's piano during

a concert

Despite their worldwide popularity, the band has remained protective of how their music is used in the media, refusing its use for product endorsements. In the past, Coldplay turned down multi-million dollar contracts from Gatorade, Diet Coke, and Gap, who wanted to use the songs "Yellow", "Trouble", and "Don't Panic" respectively.^[112] According to frontman, Chris Martin, "We wouldn't be able to live with ourselves if we sold the songs' meanings like that."^[112]iTunes Store, advertising its exclusive availability of the single as a digital download on iTunes.^[113] Additionally, Chris Martin appeared at an Apple Inc. Special Event on 1 September 2010, playing a number of songs, and also thanked Apple for their assistance in marketing "Viva la Vida".^[114] Coldplay supports Amnesty International.^[115] Martin is regarded as one of the most visible celebrity advocates for fair trade, supporting Oxfam's ongoing Make Trade Fair campaign.^[116] He has been on trips with Oxfam to assess conditions, has appeared in its advertising campaign, and is known for wearing a "Make Trade Fair" wristband during public appearances (including at Coldplay concerts).^[117] The band were also filmed for Make Poverty History, clicking their fingers.

During the early years, Coldplay became widely known in the media for giving 10 percent of the band's profits to charity,^[118] which they continue to do.^[119] Bassist Guy Berryman said, "You can make people aware of issues. It isn't very much effort for us at all, but if it can help people, then we want to do it."^[115] The band also asks that any gifts intended for them are donated to charity, according to a response on the FAQ section of Coldplay's website. Martin spoke out against the U.S. invasion of Iraq in 2003, and endorsed the United States Democratic presidential candidates John Kerry^[120] and Barack Obama in 2004 and 2008 respectively.^[121]

In June 2009, Coldplay began supporting Meat Free Monday, a food campaign started by Paul McCartney which attempts to help slow climate change by having at least one meat free day a week.^[122]

From 17 and 31 December 2009, Coldplay auctioned a quantity of significant band memorabilia, including their first guitars. Proceeds went to Kids Company, a charity which helps vulnerable children and young people in London.^[123] A month later in January 2010, Coldplay performed a slightly modified version of "A Message", entitled "A Message 2010", at the Hope For Haiti Now telethon special, raising money for the victims of the Haitian Earthquake.^[124]

In 2011 Coldplay endorsed the song "Freedom for Palestine" by posting a link to the video. In less than a day 12,000 comments were made on that post. Some threatened to boycott the band, and a Facebook group was created that demanded an apology to Israel.^[125] Coldplay eventually removed the link to the song from their Facebook wall.

for Wiki citations see - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coldplay

Ayn Rand Led Me to Christ

http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2011/june/aynrandled.html

How the anti-Christian philosopher prepared me to hear the gospel.

by Bishop Edward S. Little II

posted 6/29/2011 09:40AM

Ayn Rand changed my life. When I embraced her philosophy, Objectivism, the conversion was far more dramatic than my decision, several years later, to follow Jesus Christ—more dramatic, but in the end transitory. Yet Rand, the novelist, philosopher, and uncompromising atheist, inadvertently opened a door for the gospel. I don't believe dead people spin in their graves, but if they did and she could read these words, I imagine Rand would be twirling violently.

As many have noted, Rand's ethic of rational self-interest is incompatible with the gospel, and leads to social as well as spiritual disaster. "Most observers see Rand as a political and economic philosopher," wrote Gary Moore last year in Christianity Today. "I believe that she was first and foremost an anti-Christian philosopher." A six-foot dollar sign wreath towered over her casket, Moore pointed out, an icon of the false gospel she labored to proclaim. I agree entirely that Christianity and Objectivism are utterly incompatible. But my gratitude to Rand remains profound.

My First Conversion

In the spring of 1962, an awkward and philosophically oriented 15-year-old raised in an utterly secular home, I read The Fountainhead and then Atlas Shrugged. Those books triggered a philosophical (and, unknowingly, spiritual) revolution. One evening, immersed in Rand's writings, I listened on the radio to a re-broadcast of a lecture she had delivered a year earlier at the University of Wisconsin, during a symposium called "Ethics in Our Time." Even at a distance of 48 years, I can still hear her heavily accented voice as she quoted from John Galt's speech, the long and detailed summary of Objectivism that appears near the end of Atlas Shrugged: "Yes, this is an age of moral crisis. Yes, you are bearing punishment for your evil …. Your moral code has reached its climax, the blind alley at the end of its course. And if you wish to go on living, what you now need is not to return to morality … but to discover it."

For three years I followed Rand, read every word she published, studied Objectivism and its moral, political, and economic implications, and even tried to imitate the heroes in Rand's novels. Several times, the central character in The Fountainhead, Howard Roark, is accused of staring at people, his piercing eyes making the novel's villains feel judged and found wanting. And so I practiced widening my eyes and keeping them open for extended periods. No one, however, seemed daunted by my gaze.

Because my family lived in New York City, I was able to enroll in a 20-session "Basics of Objectivism" course at the Nathaniel Branden Institute. (Branden, an early Rand associate and a psychologist by training, spent many years teaching Objectivism in partnership with Rand.) The course included sessions on metaphysics, epistemology, ethics, aesthetics, and political and economic theory, with a heavy emphasis on laissez-faire capitalism. When Branden finished his lecture, Rand herself would often answer questions. Among the memorabilia from that period of my life is a scrap of paper with Rand's autograph, the letters sharp and angular. I also enrolled in "Objectivist Economics," taught by a very young Alan Greenspan.

My commitment to Rand and her philosophy, however, did not survive my early years in college. Two figures intervened.

The Unscrupulous God

The first was Plato. In Rand's teaching, Aristotle served as a kind of philosophical hero. Plato, with his tendency toward mysticism, represented philosophical depravity for Rand. So I entered college predisposed to reject Plato, and came armed with Objectivist and Aristotelian weapons for the battle. Then I actually read Plato in a philosophy class. I was shocked to find much to commend his vision of a Reality that is more than the reality we can see. "A young man who wishes to remain an Atheist," C. S. Lewis wrote in Surprised by Joy, "cannot be too careful of his reading. There are traps everywhere—'Bibles laid open, millions of surprises,' as Herbert says, 'fine nets and stratagems.' God is, if I may say it, very unscrupulous."

The Phaedo was particularly disturbing, as Plato's Socrates prepares to die and in the process comforts his friends with an admittedly non-Christian notion of the afterlife. What troubled me most was that it made sense, that the one-dimensional universe of Objectivism did not do justice to the facts. Could Rand be wrong? My certainty began to crumble. Much later I stumbled onto a hymn that points to Plato and Socrates as unwitting precursors of the gospel:

For Socrates who, phrase by phrase,
Talked men to truth, unshrinking,
And left for Plato's mighty grace
To mold our ways of thinking;
For all who wrestled, sane and free,
To win the unseen reality,
To God be thanks and glory.

I still remember my breathlessness as I read the Phaedo for the first time. But Plato merely set the stage for something, Someone, more profound.

The second figure was Jesus. In my sophomore year, I enrolled in a two-semester "Bible as Literature" course. I was majoring in ancient history, and biblical history figured into the wider picture. But the ground softened by Plato presented itself to the plow of the gospel, and I was changed forever.

The process, however, has its own bizarre twists and turns. These courses were taught by a former pastor turned agnostic, a delightful and humorous man who enjoyed introducing conservative Christians to historical-critical methods and shaking their faith. Students often emerged from Bible as Literature predictably unbiblical in their perspective. For reasons known only to the Holy Spirit, the system didn't work in my case. Reading the Bible for the first time, encountering the text and laying aside the professor's debunking attitude, I met a God who laid claim to my life, a Savior who invited (or, more precisely, demanded) my allegiance.

Over the course of two semesters, something happened. I can't precisely date it. But friends tell me that they noticed a change. By the time I was halfway through the New Testament course, I was referring to Jesus in the present rather than the past tense. Later, under the guidance of those same friends, I learned the vocabulary—about committing my life to Jesus, receiving him as Savior, following him as Lord. Paul describes the experience of his Corinthian converts, and my own experience, with overwhelming and almost inarticulate joy: "You were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit of our God" (1 Cor. 6:11, RSV). But the deed was first done surreptitiously, as I read the Bible and met the One who is King of kings and Lord of lords. Lewis was right: God is indeed very unscrupulous.

The Truth of Ayn Rand

And what of Rand? I quickly relegated her to my intellectual and spiritual past. Friends from my Objectivist period drifted out of my life. As a new Christian, I immersed myself in the Bible, Christian literature, and the Christian community. Only occasionally, in the intervening decades, did Rand enter my consciousness—once again with the recent release of the movie Atlas Shrugged. In reflecting on how she inadvertently influenced me, I've seen God's hand work through her in a number of ways.

I - Ayn Rand taught me how to think. "Man cannot survive except through his mind," says Howard Roark in The Fountainhead." He comes on earth unarmed. His brain is his only weapon. Animals obtain food by force. Man has no claws, no fangs, no horns, no great strength of muscle. He must plant his food or hunt it. To plant, he needs a process of thought. To hunt, he needs weapons, and to make weapons—a process of thought. From this simplest necessity to the highest religious abstraction, from the wheel to the skyscraper, everything we are and we have comes from a single attribute of man—the function of his reasoning mind." And so Rand challenged me to reject sloppy thinking, to apply reason meticulously, not least when dealing with culturally mandated assumptions. But that very commitment to reason gave me tools that led, much to my surprise, to a critique of Objectivism itself. The unseen Reality to which Plato pointed made sense not simply as an alternative way of seeing the world, but also under the test of reason.

Indeed, that very test points to God himself. The order and complexity of creation, the fact, as C.S. Lewis notes in Mere Christianity, that there seems to be a moral law with a claim upon human beings ("right and wrong as a clue to the meaning of the universe," he calls it), all stand upon the foundation of the firm application of reason. Rigorous thought can set the stage for faith and demonstrate the reasonableness of the Christian claim that Jesus Christ is King of kings and Lord of lords. While reason cannot, unaided, present the fullness of Christian truth, it can support and undergird it.

II - Ayn Rand taught me that there is such a thing as objective reality. Three Aristotelian axioms—Non-Contradiction, Either-Or, and A is A—mark the three sections of Atlas Shrugged. "Contradictions do not exist," Francisco tells Dagny. "Whenever you think that you are facing a contradiction, check your premises. You will find that one of them is wrong." In other words, a thing is true (or false) regardless of what we think about it. This flies in the face of modernism (which tends to dismiss out of hand the supernatural and the miraculous, with no evidence beyond skepticism) and postmodernism (which doesn't so much reject the supernatural as completely relativize it). When a postmodernist says, "All truth is relative; you have your truth and I have mine," Rand, and I, might answer: Your very statement contains an inherent inner contradiction. You claim as objective truth an assertion that would, in effect, negate itself.

All of this, in the end, led me to the non-sentimental and objective claims of the gospel. The gospel is no mere preference. It is true, or it isn't. Jesus is who he says he is, or he is (again, Lewis) [either] a madman or a fraud. Christian doctrine—Creation, Fall, Incarnation, Redemption, Consummation, and our ultimate and beatific vision of the Trinity—is true, or false. It can't be both. Rand's view of objective reality is admittedly limited. She relies on the senses and goes no further. She dismisses faith as mysticism and its practitioners as witch doctors. But she is right in this: If something is true, it is so because it aligns with reality. Our desires neither confirm nor deny its validity. Our only choice is to say "Yes" to truth, or not. As a Christian, that "Yes" is to Truth incarnate, Jesus Christ.

III - Ayn Rand taught me to believe in moral absolutes. Gary Moore reserved his strongest criticism precisely for this aspect of her thought. Rational self-interest, taken to its logical conclusion, is ultimately destructive: "I am done with the monster of the 'We,' " the hero of Anthem says, "the word of serfdom, of plunder, of misery, falsehood and shame. And now I see the face of god, and I raise this god over the earth, this god whom men have sought since men came into being, this god who will grant them joy and peace and pride. This god, this one word: 'I.' " The golden calf of Exodus 32 hardly receives the adulation that Rand pours upon the individual and his or her moral autonomy.

John Galt's oath in Atlas Shrugged puts it more sharply: "I swear, by my life and my love of it, that I will never live for the sake of another man, nor ask another to live for mine." Rand places each human being at the center of his or her own universe, and makes that human being absolute. This is, from a biblical perspective, monstrous, the very articulation of Adam and Eve's disastrous rebellion.

As destructive as her moral vision may be, however, it is a moral vision—and that is precisely the point. I came to believe, in my Objectivist years, that I would flourish if I lived my life in accordance with a set of clear and unmistakable moral precepts. Later, I realized that those precepts were wrong; they work precisely against the flourishing of human beings as God has designed us and are ultimately self-destructive.

But in rejecting Objectivist ethics, I discovered that the New Testament offers us a "more excellent way" (1 Cor. 12:31, RSV). The New Testament vision of discipleship involves the attempt (aided, empowered) to bring our lives in accord with God's revealed will and purpose. There are moral absolutes with which we must grapple, which we must obey, and about which (when we fail to obey) we must seek absolution. Just as there is objective reality, there is also right and wrong. The twisted moral vision of Rand prepared me, perhaps simply by contrast, for the values of the kingdom of God.

IV - Ayn Rand taught me about humanity's heroic destiny. Her four novels are dominated by great heroes: Kira Argounova, Howard Roark, Hank Reardon, Dagny Taggart, John Galt, and the unnamed narrator of Anthem who finally calls himself Prometheus. Critics dismiss these heroes as plastic, one-dimensional, unbelievable. They are probably right. Gary Cooper's version of Howard Roark in the movie rendition of The Fountainhead demonstrates how difficult it is to portray a hero with no flaws, no inner conflicts. Cooper simply couldn't pull it off, and the role is stilted. But as a young Objectivist, I had people to imitate, an ideal to live up to: "I want to be like that." Rand incarnated her moral precepts, defective as they are, in her heroes.

So, of course, do the Bible and Christian tradition. Unlike the heroes of Rand, the Bible rarely portrays its chief characters as relentlessly good. Abraham tried to pass off Sarah as his sister. David committed adultery and murdered his rival. Peter is [both] a coward and a rock, a thoughtful evangelist and an impulsive motor mouth. Paul's teaching provides for all time the essential infrastructure of our Christology, but his temper (to take one example) bursts out of his writings with disturbing power. Yet in all of these characters, flawed as they are, we see God at work, correcting them, calling them, drawing them to himself, transforming them. "I want to be like that."

Only and finally in Jesus do we see humanity as the Father intends it. And only and finally in Jesus can our humanity ultimately be transfigured. "It does not yet appear what we shall be, but we know that when he appears, we shall be like him, for we shall see him as he is" (1 John 3:2, RSV). Our heroic destiny is fulfilled in Christ, whom we shall gaze upon eternally. Even now, while our transformation is still incomplete, we have "put on the new nature, which is being renewed in knowledge after the image of its creator" (Col. 3:10, RSV).

There is little in Ayn Rand's philosophy or worldview that a Christian can endorse, even in small ways. Moore is right; Rand is "first and foremost an anti-Christian philosopher," and Objectivism stands in painfully stark contrast to the gospel. Yet I wonder if I am alone in offering thanks for Rand and her role, inadvertent as it was, in Christian conversion. God can use a donkey to chastise a prophet. Can he also use Rand as a kind of waystation on the road to Christ?

In my more hopeful moments, I find myself wondering if Rand, in her last moments, perceived her error and turned to the One she had rejected all her life. Or, as she slipped into eternity, if Jesus made a final, undeserved, and awe-full offer of grace. But that is speculation, and well beyond what God intends us to know. It is sufficient for my own purposes simply to say: Thank you, Ayn Rand.

Edward S. Little II is bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Northern Indiana, and author of Joy in Disguise: Meeting Jesus in the Dark Times (Morehouse, 2009).

 

Related Elsewhere

Gary Moore wrote earlier about why Christians should be wary of Ayn Rand and her disciples.

Previous articles on conversion or testimony include:

Testify! | In nightclubs, coffeehouses, and iPods, true first-person storytelling is becoming a cultural force as it borrows from Christian tradition. (January 7, 2011)

Bearing True Witness | Why we are tempted to embellish conversion stories. (June 28, 2010)

What Conversion Is and Is Not | Hint: It's not just about getting people 'saved.

********************

Amazon Books -
http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=ayn+rand&x=0&y=0

The Ayn Rand Institute -
http://www.aynrand.org/site/PageServer?pagename=indexWikipedia Introduction
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ayn_Rand

Ayn Rand ( /ˈaɪn ˈrænd/;^[1] born Alisa Zinov'yevna Rosenbaum, February 2 [O.S. January 20] 1905 – March 6, 1982), was a Russian-American novelist, philosopher,^[2] playwright and screenwriter. She is known for her two best-selling novels and for developing a philosophical system she called Objectivism.

Born and educated in Russia, Rand moved to the United States in 1926. She worked as a screenwriter in Hollywood and had a play produced on Broadway in 1935–1936. After two initially unsuccessful early novels, she achieved fame with her 1943 novel The Fountainhead. In 1957, she published her best-known work, the philosophical novel Atlas Shrugged. Afterward she turned to nonfiction to promote her philosophy, publishing her own magazines and releasing several collections of essays until her death in 1982.

In her philosophy of Objectivism, Rand advocated reason as the only means of acquiring knowledge and rejected all forms of faith and religion. She supported rational egoism and rejected ethical altruism. In politics, she condemned the initiation of force as immoral and opposed all forms of collectivism and statism, instead supporting laissez-faire capitalism, which she believed was the only social system that protected individual rights. She promoted romantic realism in art. She was sharply critical of most other philosophers and philosophical traditions.

The reception for Rand's fiction from literary critics was largely negative, and most academics have ignored or rejected her philosophy. Nonetheless she continues to have a popular following, and her political ideas have been influential among libertarians and some conservatives. The Objectivist movement attempts to spread her ideas, both to the public and in academic settings.

Beyonce Is Wrong: Girls Don't Run the World

http://blog.christianitytoday.com/women/2011/06/youre_wrong_beyonce_girls_dont.html

Why her message of female power is hurting the African American community.

Natasha Robinson, guest blogger

posted June 28, 2011

According to the first single from Beyonce’s highly anticipated album 4, girls indeed run the world. Thanks to her musical contribution to First Lady Michelle Obama’s "Let’s Move" campaign, her recent Billboard Millennium Award, and surprise farewell performance to honor Oprah, all eyes from middle-age school rockers to professional intellectuals are on Beyonce. The 29-year-old is an influencer. From the words of her recent hit, “my persuasion can build a nation,” and she knows it.

Beyonce has built a musical career based on girl empowerment and the seduction of men. In her efforts to empower women, though, she has endorsed a self-absorbed world where a false view of love reigns supreme. Her songs reveal a worldview where men and women indulge in lust, lavish spending, and fantasies of catering, upgrades, and joy rides. I don’t see much responsibility or empowerment of either sex in that kind of behavior.

Yet the lyrics of her recent single acknowledge the men who respect what she does. In her skimpy attire, she seduces them while singing we have "endless power, our love we can devour when you’ll do anything for me."

The question that haunts me and should arise from moral women of influence is: What type of power is Beyonce encouraging women to embrace? Is an average girl’s persuasion enhanced by flaunting her body, vanity, and money more than modesty, character, team building, and leadership that place the needs of others above themselves?

True persuasion and leadership elevates all people without sacrificing others along the way. That’s what alarms me with the “positive” messages in songs like “Run the World (Girls).” By elevating girls in a music video where they stand strong against an all-male army, Beyonce has subtly (or perhaps not so subtly) sent a message that devalues boys and men.

As an African American woman who is heartbroken over the current condition of African American boys, I find Beyonce’s message destructive and damaging to the Black community. The reality is that so many African American boys are being ignored in the classroom and other social arenas. These young men are dropping out of high school at an alarming rate. Many who graduate from high school cannot read with a significant level of comprehension or write a grammatically correct paragraph. Some sources say we now have more Black men in prison than in college. If Jesus' teachings concerning the Good Samaritan resonate at all, we should all share in these concerns. We cannot continue to ignore the plight of these young men while Beyonce is encouraging all the independent women to "throw their hands up."

Does God value women? Certainly! Does he want them to be strong contributors to society? Absolutely!

Yet when considering how God supremely values women, we must remember other fundamental truths: that God is love and wants us to walk in love. We must also acknowledge that we were created for community. God said that it was not good for humankind to walk through life alone. He created women and men for a holy partnership that is not limited to marriage. Whenever one gender of God’s partnership is elevated above the other or is ignored, we all lose.

There is much work and community building for all of us to do. I want to see young girls grow up into God-honoring, intelligent, beautiful, and strong leaders. When they show up in the classroom, corporate boardroom, or sanctuary, I want individual lives touched and the environment changed by their very presence. I do not want these women believing, however, that they don’t need men. Not only do we need them, they need us, and both sexes should seek opportunities to value, honor, and lift up each other.

Just as we must take responsibility for the images that we affirm or reject as women, men must do the same. My brothers must stand strong and hold each other accountable so that they do not fall prey to the fantasies and lies presented by the world. We should hold godly men accountable for breaking the cycle of “no fathers in the home” by consistently fulfilling the roles of teachers and mentors in the lives of children being raised by single mothers. In this way, children can observe a healthy partnership between men and women. They can then affirm who real men are and what real men do.

If we do not commit to these changes, we will continue to raise young men who have no consistent male leaders, teachers, or mentors in their lives. Furthermore, these young men will have very little expectations of themselves, since everyone knows that girls run the world. Therefore, they can transfer residence from their mother's homes to their girlfriend’s, and let her take care of him since she’s the college grad making the paper.

Both genders need to stand firm and confident knowing that the other is there to partner, encourage, and help them carry the load. We do not have to bear our burdens alone. We can be present for each other. Together, we can live the example of God’s truth and love in the lives of others.

We stand to partner because God loves us and wants an army of codependent men and women to glory him by lovingly running this world together.

Natasha Robinson is a graduate of the United States Naval Academy (2002). She served six years active duty as an officer in the U.S. Marine Corps. Currently, she is co-director of the women’s mentoring ministry at Cornerstone Baptist Church in Greensboro, North Carolina, and founder, writer, and speaker for His Glory On Earth Ministries. She is a full-time student at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, and a wife and mother. Check out her blog, A Sista's Journey, where she featured a five-part “Way Up for African-American Boys Series.” Twitter @asistasjourney.

The Lost Girls of China and India

Why so many baby girls are being killed in the world's two largest countries.

http://blog.christianitytoday.com/women/2011/06/the_lost_girls_of_china_and_in_1.html

Amy Julia Becker

June 29, 2011

Across most cultures and throughout time, parents have wanted boys more than they have wanted girls. Recently developed technologies are allowing parents to reject their girl children before they are even born.

In India and China, the world’s two most populated nations, parents have chosen to abort hundreds of millions of baby girls.

According to Samanth Subramanian, writing for The National, “Indians are aborting more female foetuses (sic.) than at any time in their nation's history, with the practice growing fastest in the more affluent states. . . . There are now 914 girls for every 1,000 boys under the age of 6.”

Furthermore, the BBC News reports that in India, “activists fear eight million female foetuses may have been aborted in the past decade.” In addition to a large number of abortions using so-called “sex-selection,” the infant mortality rate is higher for girls than boys in India, probably due to a combination of neglect and infanticide.

This gender disparity has posed social problems for decades. In 1994, India's legislators made it illegal for ultrasound technicians to reveal babies’ sex in India, yet the disparity between births of girls and boys has only increased in recent years. The laws on the books are rarely enforced and pose minimal consequences, but even for doctors who obey the law, the problem remains. World Magazine recently reported on a hospital in Morena, a rural area with 825 girls to every 1,000 boys. The editors wrote, “The hospital insists it strictly obeys the law against using sonograms to reveal the gender of a baby. . . . The sex ratio at birth at [Dr. R.C. Bandil’s] hospital is as high as 940-945.” In other words, even when baby girls aren’t aborted, they die young: “An exhausted mother who faces neglect, poor nutrition, and blame for producing a daughter is likely to pass on that neglect, social workers say. For an infant, that can mean the difference between life and death.”

An even greater gender disparity exists in China, where “the ratio is 837 girls per 1,000 boys.” According to an Economist report last year, “The destruction of baby girls is a product of three forces: the ancient preference for sons; a modern desire for smaller families; and ultrasound scanning and other technologies that identify the sex of a fetus.” Furthermore, at least in India, parents still often pay a dowry when their daughters get married. Girls cost more and produce less. Ultrasound technology and abortion allow them to be treated as commodities, discarded like defective widgets on a production line.

In addition to the obvious and egregious ethical problems posed by widespread abortion and infanticide of baby girls, the Economist spells out pragmatic problems for such an imbalanced society: “the cumulative consequence for societies of such individual actions is catastrophic… In any country rootless young males spell trouble; in Asian societies, where marriage and children are the recognised routes into society, single men are almost like outlaws. Crime rates, bride trafficking, sexual violence, even female suicide rates are all rising and will rise further as the lopsided generations reach their maturity.”

The Economist cites South Korea as the only nation where the rates of sex-selective abortions have decreased dramatically: “In the 1990s South Korea had a sex ratio almost as skewed as China’s. Now, it is heading towards normality. It has achieved this not deliberately, but because the culture changed. Female education, anti-discrimination suits and equal-rights rulings made son preference seem old-fashioned and unnecessary. The forces of modernity first exacerbated prejudice — then overwhelmed it.” In addition to suggesting that China change its one-child policy, The Economist suggests a series of other measures to effect change: “encourage female education; abolish laws and customs that prevent daughters inheriting property; make examples of hospitals and clinics with impossible sex ratios; get women engaged in public life — using everything from television newsreaders to women traffic police.”

 

A fundamental Christian claim is the inherent worth of every human being. In Roman times, Christians contributed significantly to the end of infanticide. Contemporary notions of human rights alone are not the key to cultural change, nor is an appeal to the social necessity of men and women. Christians and non-Christians agree on the importance of changing attitudes toward women so that sex-selective abortions and infanticide cease, and a combination of governmental programs, law enforcement, and other social measures should help such change occur. Yet Christians have a key ethical foundation to offer to effect such cultural change. From Genesis 1:27 — “So God created man in his own image, in the image of God he created him; male and female he created them — ” to Psalm 139:13 — “For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb" — Christians can attest that every human life is a valuable one with inherent dignity and worth regardless, of gender, race, age, or ability. The foundation on which gender equality lies is neither modernity nor pragmatism, but rather the truth about who we are as bearers of the imago Dei.

Succeeding on Schedule

http://www.lauraziesel.com/2011/06/succeeding-on-schedule.html

by Laura Ziesel

posted June 30, 2011

photo © 2010 William Warby | more info (via: Wylio)
Do you ever feel like you're racing the clock to achieve something in life? Marriage, children, tenure, educational degrees, buying a house, or paying off student loans: These are all things I think many of us think need to be "checked off" the list by a certain age.

To be honest, I felt like I was making good progress ticking things off my list: I had a job doing something I was passionate about right out of college; we got married in our mid-20s; Josh and I were paying off his student loans; we decided to pursue his doctorate degree. We were moving in the "right direction." But then, about a year ago, everything started to move in (what felt like) the wrong direction. For a few months, we were both jobless. Not only did we have to dip into emergency savings to live, but we started accumulating more student loans for Josh's grad school. I starting freelancing to pay the bills, putting my own career goals on hold.

I don't know about most of you, but when I hear the word ageism I think first of discrimination against the elderly. There is no doubt in my mind that care of the aging is one of the greatest weaknesses in modern American culture. But recently, I've realized that I've been ageist toward myself, applying the standard of age to judge how far I've come or how many years I have left to contribute to Kingdom work, my 401k, and my family.

At my amazing church's 55th birthday celebration in November 2010, our pastor, Jim Miller, preached a great sermon on Jacob's adoption of Joseph's sons in Genesis 48. In it, he reminds us that retirement is not a biblical doctrine. In talking to the elderly people in the audience, he challenged them to remember that their greatest contributions and experiences in life could still be awaiting them.

Jim gave the example of Peter Drucker. Jim said that he visited a library where Drucker's books are lined up chronologically, with Drucker's first books on the far left and his newest books on the far right. Apparently, if you put your finger on the shelf representing the break between the books Drucker wrote before age 65 and after age 65, two-thirds of his books would be to the right of your finger. That means that he only produced one-third of his written works before the age of 65. Moreover, his most defining and influential books were written after the age of 65.

Jim's intention was to encourage the older people in our congregation with that fact. But surprisingly, when I heard those stats, I felt convicted.

I feel as if I need to figure out how I'm going to contribute to the world and do it soon. (I think a lot of this is driven by the fact that my parents had two kids and a stable income by the time they were 26. In fact, I think they bought their first house at 26.) I see a ticking clock and I think, "Okay, I only have about 40 good years of work in me. I need to figure out what I'm doing soon so that I don't spend 10 of those years doing something wasteful."

But there is so much flawed thinking at work in this.

To begin, perhaps my greatest contribution to the world has already come and gone; perhaps I discipled a student who will go on to be the next Billy Graham, Gary Haugen, or Beth Moore. If that is true and my greatest contribution is over, then I am forced into admitting that I am not the best or final arbiter of why I'm here; because I certainly feel as if I've done very little. But in God's Kingdom, I don't even know how much I've done or not done. And I might not even know the fruit of my past labor until That Day.

Moreover, I am working under the assumption that I have about 80 years of life to work with. I see my clock ticking and I want to make the most with the next 54 years that I have. But, only God knows the length of my days. I could live to be 110 or I could die tomorrow. The reality that I cannot plan the future continues to be a hard lesson to learn.

So here, today, I am repenting of my self-centered, flesh-driven attempts to succeed on schedule. Lord Jesus, help me simply follow You one step at a time. Give me this day my daily bread and save the rest for later. I trust You with it all.