A Power Ranking of Various Kinds of Powers

Image by John

by Ben Howard

Sports writers have to fill a lot of column inches every week and there's only so many original ideas that you can come up with before you just start making lists of things. This gives rise to a weekly tradition of “Power Rankings” wherein people rank things subjectively even when they've already been ranked by objective measurements. We here at On Pop Theology wanted to take our own shot at totally subjective list-making, so we present you with a Power Ranking of Various Kinds of Powers.

20) Hour of Power – We have a policy at On Pop Theology that the last spot on every list must be occupied by a televangelist just for the fun of reminding you that televangelism was totally a thing. We introduced this policy today because we can, and reserve the right to revoke it in any situation where we wouldn't get to mock televangelism.

19) Power Rankings – You're reading this list so you can understand how useless these things are.

18) Powerball

17) Nintendo Power – Press Up Up Down Down Left Right Left Right B A B A Start to unlock commentary on this classically useless magazine.

Image by Lambdachialpha

16) Power Tower – I'm including this on the list solely to brag about how Cedar Point was close to where I grew up and how we went all the time when I was a kid. #EndBragging

15) Powerpuff Girls

14) Powers Boothe – Who do you call when you need an actor to growl menacing lines in a southern drawl? Well, probably a lot of people, but if they're all busy call Powers Boothe.

13) Austin Powers

12) Bear Power – Have you ever seen a bear? Have you ever contemplated their powers? Think about it.

11) J.D. Power and Associates – This rating is seriously buoyed by the mysterious nature of these “associates” teamed with my very active imagination.

10) Power Rangers

T-8) Executive Powers/Power of the Purse – These two are stronger in theory. The theory being that government is incredibly powerful, while the fact is that no one particularly cares or trusts any of the people involved. Hooray America!

7) PowerPoint – This isn't Huffington Post so this Power Ranking isn't a slide show. You're welcome.

Image by Patrik Theander

6) Electrical Power

5) Horsepower – Somewhere, in a vast underground bunker deep in the heart of Wyoming, there is a lab full of scientists in crisp white coats whose research consists entirely of measuring the pulling power of various combinations and numbers of horses for the benefit of the human race. Without their tireless efforts how could we know that my microwave has seven horsepower. Thank you scientists!

4) Superpowers

3) The Powers That Be – None of powers on the list so far have the ability to topple these purveyors of oppression and...umm...powerfulness? But there is hope...

2) Our Powers Combined – Yes, kids Captain Planet was right and one of the most powerful forces in the universe, even greater than Power Rangers and PowerPoint, is the might of all our powers combined. But what's the key ingredient of all our powers combined...

1) (That's) The Power of Love – Who knows even more about power than Captain Planet? That's right, Huey Lewis and his culpable sidekicks, The News. These servicable 80's rockers knew that our only chance against The Powers That Be was the potent combination of Our Powers Combined and The Power of Love. Because it don't take money, it don't take fame, don't take no credit cards to ride this train. Heart!

Ben Howard is an accidental iconoclast and generally curious individual living in Nashville, Tennessee. He is also the editor-in-chief of On Pop Theology and an avid fan of waving at strangers for no reason. You can follow him on Twitter @BenHoward87.  

You can follow On Pop Theology on Twitter @OnPopTheology or like us on Facebook at www.facebook.com/OnPopTheology. If you'd like to support what we do, you can donate via the button on the right of the screen.
  
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Let the Games Begin: The Finale of the Denominational Dominion Tournament of Championships

by Ben Howard

Two weeks ago I set the stage for the Denominational Dominion Tournament of Championships by announcing the rosters for the four teams. Now, on the eve of the Final Four, I bring you the conclusion of the Tournament. Click here for a breakdown of the teams.

Semifinal #1: Anglican Avengers vs. Evangelical Evolutionaries

PG          Queen Elizabeth II                Rachel Held Evans

SG          Desmond Tutu                       Rob Bell

SF           George Washington              Francis Chan

PF           N.T. Wright                            Mark Driscoll

C             Henry VIII                              John Piper

The Avengers start off the game slow, though that should probably be expected when the youngest player, Wright, is 64, and two of his teammates, Washington and Henry VIII, are long deceased. After shaking off the rust commensurate with being an octogenarian, a series of three’s from the excitable Tutu and the crafty ball-handling of Elizabeth 2.0 eventually spark some life in the ancient legs of the Anglicans.

In stark contrast to the slow and creaky Avengers, the Evolutionaries came out firing on all-cylinders. Bell led the team in scoring with a series of impressive drives to the basket reasserting his role as the team’s creative force. Chan tried his best to match Bell’s production point for point, while Evans ran the point with grace and style, though perhaps giving too much deference to Queen Elizabeth when playing defense.

Driscoll provided a bit of controversy near the end of the first half after he threw down a powerful dunk over the top of Henry VIII. Immediately after the play, Driscoll got in Henry’s face and began screaming, “Henry VIII, you are, you are what?!?” earning himself a technical foul for taunting.

The second half marked a stark contrast to the first. The enthusiasm of the Evangelicals began to wane after an inner-squad altercation between Evans and Driscoll about whether or not Evans was allowed to shoot. The discord continued when Piper loudly proclaimed that he no longer believed that Evans and Bell were part of his team and refused to pass the ball to them for the rest of the half. 

Piper’s play descended even more as he stopped playing offense entirely and simply stood under the opposing team’s basket waiting to block their shots while repeating gibberish phrases about protecting “authority”.

In addition to the team-wide meltdown, Driscoll was ejected after he earned his second technical by viciously throwing a basketball at George Washington’s face while screaming, “Dodgeball is a man’s sport!”

The composed maturity of the Anglican team allowed them to simply stick to their game plan and take advantage of the brutal unraveling of the Evangelicals. Tutu and Wright eventually offered Bell and Evans refuge on the Anglican team, thus leaving the Evangelical team with only a terrified Chan and a rabid Piper. This dramatic advantage lead the Anglican team to score the final 45 points of the game, including a series of inspired dunks from N.T. Wright.

Henry VIII sparked a bit of controversy after the game when he immediately wed three of the cheerleaders. However, the next morning two of the three were annulled when Henry found out that modern customs do not allow you to behead or imprison your wives when they don’t give you children.

Semifinal #2: Mainline Marauders vs. Catholic Crushers

PG          John Wesley                     Pope Francis I

SG          Hillary Clinton                   Dorothy Day

SF           Barack Obama                 Thomas Aquinas

PF           Martin Luther                    Augustine of Hippo

C             John Calvin                      Gregory the Great

The battle between the Catholic Crushers and the Mainline Marauders was a tense and touchy contest between two historic rivals. The Crushers played well in the first half, but had a difficult time finding enough offense to counter the relentless firepower of the Marauders. Pope Francis I (aka Air Pope) showcased a versatile, crowd-inspiring style of play that vividly showed the differences between he and his more seasoned teammates.

The DDTC Trophy: An Angel Fish

The frontline of Aquinas, Augustine, and Gregory the Great provided consistent production, but very little flair with the exception of one rim-rattling dunk from Augustine. Interviewed at halftime, Augustine proclaimed, “That was for my mom! Thanks Monica!” Dorothy Day also provided a bit of revolutionary spark for the tradition-minded Crushers, yet they still trailed at the half.

The Marauders, on the other hand, formed an interesting blend, with the fiery, explosive temperament of Martin Luther, who received a technical in the first half for the yelling at Francis and Gregory that they were incarnations of the antichrist. Luther’s rhetoric eventually settled down a bit after Calvin took him aside to say that the Marauders were “predestined for victory.”

In addition, there was a small scuffle between Clinton and Obama about who was really the most qualified to be team captain, with Clinton arguing that the team would much rather call her at 3 in the morning than Obama. Obama responded to this criticism by hitting three straight long threes and then ferociously dunking over Thomas Aquinas. Clinton eventually conceded the point.

The second half continued much the like the first. While the Crushers were comprised by a litany of great defenses, they were eventually overrun by the forces of Mainline Protestantism primarily lead by Luther and Calvin, assisted by the irascible John Wesley.

After the game, Barack Obama was named the MVP of the game which drew a chorus of boos from the Evangelical fans remaining in the arena who thought that Obama should have been ineligible since they don’t believe he’s actually a Christian. The booing led to a small confrontation in which Luther called the fans every insult that he’d ever thought of and destroyed their very souls from the inside out dooming them to an eternity in hell. Calvin said this was also predestined.

The Championship: Anglican Avengers vs. Mainline Marauders

In one of the strangest twists in the history of fictional religious basketball, these two teams spent the first 10 minutes of the game staring at each other in confusion as they tried to decide whether or not they were on the same team. John Wesley awkwardly attempted to score a basket at one point in the game, but was unsure who he was trying to score the basket for and began to cry at mid-court.

The awkwardness and confusion of the game ended when Desmond Tutu gave Wesley a big bear hug and told him that everything would be okay. This led to Tutu hugging everyone on the court and eventually everyone in the entire building. 

Finally, Luther rolled in a keg and the whole thing just became one big party highlighted by a stirring duet of Let It Be with N.T. Wright and Queen Elizabeth II. At one point after many beers, Luther challenged Henry VIII to a fist fight during which Henry knocked Luther unconscious. When he came to, Luther hugged Henry and declared him to be a “good friend.”

Thanks for joining us at the Denominational Dominion Tournament of Championships!

Peace,

Ben

Ben Howard is an accidental iconoclast (see!) and generally curious individual living in Nashville, Tennessee. He is also the editor-in-chief of On Pop Theology and an avid fan of waving at strangers for no reason. You can follow him on Twitter @BenHoward87.

You can follow On Pop Theology on Twitter @OnPopTheology or like us on Facebook at www.facebook.com/OnPopTheology.

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Bad Music Video Theology: "Radioactive" by Imagine Dragons

by Sebastian Faust

First, watch the video. I’ll see you back here in 4 minutes, 4 seconds.

Right… well then, let the commentary begin:

00:00 – The scene opens on an overcast autumn day, dead leaves catch in the wind, a crow caws plaintively in the trees that line an ancient footpath. A figure walks toward the camera, dressed in a blue hoodie, carrying a cage at her side. She is God (patently), portrayed here, of course, in the Divine Feminine. (Also, portrayed here by Alexandra Daddario.)

00:14 – Close-up of God; beautiful music fades in over the sound of the wind, guitars ringing bright, singers intone a simple melody beneath them. Yet when we see the band, these makers of the music, they are trapped, held in a darkened cell. Certainly the song they sing is a lament. “Let the groaning of the prisoner come before you, O God, according to your great power, rescue those who are doomed to die” (Psalm 79:11).

 00:17 – As God moves through this autumnal landscape, new life springs up. Note especially the Cirsium altissimum, the purple Roadside Thistle, swaying in the breeze of God’s passing. Obviously this wind is metaphor: pneuma hagion or ruach elohim.

00:28 – God comes upon a run-down shack in a field beside a forest. But this isn’t The Shack from William Paul Young fame… this is more like the Anti-Shack.

00:38–00:55 – God enters the shack. Meanwhile, imprisoned beneath it in darkness, held captive behind bars, the band begins to sing, “I’m waking up to ash and dust.”  This is lament; “this is a people plundered and despoiled; all of them are trapped in caves, or are hidden away in prisons; they have become prey with none to deliver them, and have become spoil, with none to say, “Give them back!” (Isaiah 42:22). 



00:58 – And now we begin to see just who is inside the shack. First, we see the ringleader, the big man, the head honcho, Lou Diamond Phillips. Around his neck he wears a key; it gleams as it catches the light. It can be none other than the Key to the Abyss from Revelation. He obviously is Satan, the god of this world (2 Cor. 4:4), into whose power have been given the kingdoms of the earth (Luke 4:6). We know this because he is the only one smoking a cigar and blowing smoke rings, and maybe also because, at that moment, the band sings, “This is it, the Apocalypse” (and, almost without question because it’s Lou Diamond Phillips). He is surrounded by gods and demi-gods and demons – they are placing bets on something (maybe it’s Job?).

01:12 – Oh. It’s not Job. No, now we see why the gods are gathered together in horrific, gleeful celebration. It’s the Beast. Admittedly, you think it looks like a muppet. But it’s not a muppet. It’s the Beast. And this is the Apocalypse. “Who is like the Beast?  And who is able to wage war against him?” (Rev. 13:4). Apparently no one, because when we see the tally of the previous fights he’s been in, it’s Beast: 117 – Challenger: nil.



 

01:28 – Scratch that… Beast: 118. This guy’s frightening; he just killed another muppet. Definitely a reference to Revelation 13:7 – “It was also given to him to make war on the saints and to overcome them.”  Meanwhile, below, Imagine Dragons begins to sing, “I’m waking up . . . welcome to the new age.”  Though the night is dark, they live proleptically, looking forward, by faith, to a brighter future.

01:38-2:03 – Again and again, the Beast destroys those who stand against him; muppet-stuffing litters the Battle Pit of Doom. And as each of the saints is eviscerated, Lou Diamond Satan pulls a lever, opening the Abyss beneath their feet and dropping them down into eternal darkness (where there is weeping and gnashing of teeth).

02:05 – But now, God is doing something new. She wades into the midst of the gods; you can see in her eyes the anger at oppression. “God takes [her] stand in the Divine Assembly; [she] judges in the midst of the gods: ‘How long will you all judge unjustly, and show partiality to the wicked?’ . . . But they don’t get it; they don’t understand. They walk paths of darkness . . . [God said] ‘Yes, formerly I declared you gods, all of you sons of the Most High. But now you will die just like humans; now you will fall in battle’” (Psalm 82). God opens the pet carrier she brought with her.

02:11 – Enter Jesus, from above. And yes, Jesus is a pink Care Bear. “And I saw the Beast and the kings of the earth and their armies assembled to make war against Him who sat on the horse and against his army” (Rev. 17:19).

02:19-02:30 – Showdown!  Jesus Bear and the Beast begin mortal kombat (sic). Or, on further review, maybe Jesus Bear just gets the stuffing drubbed out of him.

02:32 – Mayday… Mayday. Jesus Bear down. I repeat, Jesus Bear down! Holy… the Beast just totally crucified that guy.

02:37 – But wait!  Jesus Bear rose up again?

02:43 – Jesus Bear is infused by the Spirit of God, this time manifesting itself as a pink, glowing energy, while the band sings a victory hymn, “I’m radioactive, radioactive.” What they mean is not, “I’ve been bombarded with radiation, and soon my hair will fall out, and I shall waste away,” but rather, “I’m glowing, man. I’ve got the Spirit in me! I’m on fire!”

02:48 – Bye bye, Beastie. Jesus Bear and the Holy Pink Spirit just won this fight. “He treads the winepress of the fierce wrath of God” (Rev. 17:15).

02:55 – The gods are speechless. If they weren’t, they’d probably be saying, “Jesus Christ… is that a Care Bear?”

03:03 – Lou Satan Phillips sends his minions to seize Jesus Bear, but Jesus Bear isn’t having any of it. This Care Bear stare isn’t like I remember it. “And the rest were killed with the sword which came from the mouth of Him who sat on the horse” (Rev. 17:21).

03:19 – With the gods destroyed and scattered, God removes the key from Satan’s neck. Satan then is thrown into the Abyss of his own devising. “Then I saw an angel coming down . . . holding the key to the Abyss and a great chain in his hand . . . and he laid hold of Satan . . . and he threw him into the Abyss, and shut it, and sealed it over him” (Rev. 20:1-2).

03:26-04:04 – There, Satan Diamond Phillips faces torment. Meanwhile, God sets the band free from their ash and their dust, their bondage and their chains:

                                           “The Lord keeps faith forever;

                                           [She] delivers justice to the oppressed;

                               [She] gives food to the hungry;

                               The Lord sets the prisoners free.”

                                                                        - Psalm 146:6-7

Sebastian Faust is an avowed heretic, armchair theologian, and a self-styled canary in the coal mine of pop culture. He lives in Nashville with his dog Watson and what sounds like a family of squirrels that have squatters rights to his attic. If you'd like to follow Sebastian on Twitter, you can't, because he doesn't understand technology.

You can, however, follow On Pop Theology on Twitter @OnPopTheology or like us on Facebook at www.facebook.com/OnPopTheology.

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Community and Why the Church Needs to Be Weird

by Ben Howard

Community is the best show on television that you aren't watching. Except neither part of that sentence is entirely true. First, if you've found your way to this particular corner of the internet you probably are watching Community (in French with English subtitles off a Vietnamese website). Second, it's not currently on TV (except maybe the TV in your heart which is the only TV that counts).

Season Four of Community was supposed to debut about two weeks ago on October 19^th, but due to some weirdness in the schedule NBC decided to delay the show's debut until February 7^th. Four months is a long time in the world of obsessive sitcom compulsives. Its painful, like being forced to watch an episode of Whitney.

Thankfully the cast and crew of Community came to the rescue with a short video explaining to all of their fans that October the 19th wasn't a date after all, it was a state of mind. Any and every day can be October 19th in your heart, especially February 7th. February 7th is October 19th.

This may all sound totally ridiculous and weird, which is good because it is. It's also one of the reasons I love Community. The creative minds at Community have always understood their place in the world. They're a weird, niche sitcom on a network that has no idea what to do with them. This is a show that owns the fact that they've both killed a supporting character in a meth lab explosion and dedicated an entire episode to the obscure 80's film "My Dinner With Andre."

When Community posts a video saying that October 19th is a state of mind, they understand that they're the misunderstood black sheep of the network. When they introduce season three with an over the top dance montage that promises that the show is "gonna get more calm and normal" and be "less crazy", they understand that everyone gets the winking joke and that they don't plan on changing anything.

This kind of self-awareness is vitally important in all aspects of life, but it's especially important in churches. I think churches need to understand how their perceived, but I also think they need a sense of humor about how they're perceived.

I've hinted at this a lot, but I don't know if I've ever said it explicitly. Churches need to laugh more. I don't mean we need preachers who tell more jokes or give more "funny" illustrations straight out of the 1950s. I mean that churches need to embrace the insanity and the tragedy of life and turn it into comedy. They need to redeem some of the brokenness we're a part of, some of the bizarre things we've done, with humor.

Embrace the fact that church is weird and counter-cultural because it is. It is weird that a bunch of strangers would come together to worship a deity and try to become family even though they aren't. Praying is weird and counter-cultural. So are hymns. So is the Eucharist. Embrace it.

Churches have gone out of their way to make everything comfortable for seekers and for the unchurched. Why? It leaves nothing to the imagination and dilutes the power of the message the church wants to convey. If you're weird, then be weird. Own what you are.

Of course you want others to be a part of your developing family, but you don't want to rob them of the experience of becoming part of that family. When we act like Christianity is totally normal we miss out on the beauty of the Christian story. We miss out on what makes Christianity different from the dominant forms of culture.

Like Community, the church doesn't need to apologize for being weird and crazy. That's why we're there in the first place.

Peace,
Ben

You can follow Ben on Twitter @BenHoward87 or email him at benjamin.howard87 [at] gmail.com.

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