You might remember that last week I posted about Fairtrade Man. Well, it turns out there is now a Fairtrade woman as well. Good heavens! Where will it end? If anyone knows of any more Fairtrade Folks of any sort do let us know.

Fairtrade woman’s aims are to promote Fairtrade products and to meet Fairtrade man. She is connected with the Oxfam ‘Generation Why’ I think - oh yes - she works for Oxfam’s Make Trade Fair.

Thanks to all the people who posted in the comments on the Fairtrade Man post by the way. I appreciate people who know about a subject sharing their wisdom, and I mean that sincerely. Not that I don’t mean everything I write sincerely of course.

Oh, by the way, I should have mentioned, I have some Fairtrade cartoons. I did them last year - nothing new I’m afraid.

See here for the high resolution version, and, to a lesser extent, here. See the information there for if you are interested in republishing or anything.

Posted by Dave at 7:25 pm on February 28, 2007 and filed under Religion.

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…there’s no need for the church of Jesus Christ to be wasting its time gullibly falling for all of this global warming hocus-pocus. We need to give our total focus to the business of reaching this world with the Gospel of Jesus Christ and stop running down meaningless rabbit trails that get our focus off of our heavenly purpose.

So says Jerry Falwell, the ‘nationally recognized Christian minister and television show host’. Some of you are sceptical, I can tell. But it is OK, he has been ‘intently studying this subject’ and has amassed evidence and ‘has proof to back up his claim’. Take for example the fact that ‘in November, for the second consecutive month, temperatures across the continental U.S. were cooler than average’. Sounds convincing to me.

Apparently ‘the Bible teaches that God will maintain the Earth until Jesus returns’, so we don’t need to worry. There is a TV news report about this here, but you might have to watch a 15 second TV advert about SUVs first. Another of the quotes above was from this brief report.

This is, I think, quite good news for those who care about environmental things. Falwell saying these things will hopefully help convince people that the opposite is true. Perhaps.

Posted by Dave at 6:53 pm on February 28, 2007 and filed under Environment, Religion.

16 Comments

Here are some blogs that made me smile over the last 24 hours. You probably read them already, but perhaps some of you don’t.

Little Red Boat (link)
Today’s entry: Colour me blindd
Anna arranges her books in colour order.

This book next to that book, poetry cheek by jowl with travel writing, etiquette rubbing up hard against po-faced textbook. This was exciting! And revolutionary! And new! How incredible an idea!

Tales of Variable Yayness (link)
Today’s entry: Staircam
Yay analyses a hospital stairwell.

“Hey! That guy just walked from the third floor to the 9th floor and then back down to the 4th and back up to the 10th! What is he thinking??”

Diamond Geezer (link)
Today’s entry: The Count (2007)
DG takes his yearly look at his statistics.

At one point earlier in the month I thought that the legendary diamond geezer Mystery Count was most definitely going to reach 2 by the end of February.

All of these blogs are favourites in this household and would be good choices for someone seeking some feeds to populate their feed reader.

Posted by Dave at 10:09 am on February 28, 2007 and filed under Links: bloggers, Blogging.

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This one can be used on your own blog too. Simply go to We Blog Cartoons and find the secret code. The code will be one of the first things you see, so it is not really that secret.

Posted by Dave at 10:47 am on February 27, 2007 and filed under Cartoons, Household hints, New Weblogcartoons cartoons.

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Special message to Sarah from Australia
Thanks for sending the special map and using your left over $1.50 stamp to do so. It makes me happy when I get unexpected post of that sort.

Explanatory note to everyone else about the special message to Sarah from Australia
I was thanking Sarah for sending a special map, which she did using a left over $1.50 stamp. It makes me happy when I get unexpected post of that sort.

Posted by Dave at 10:45 am on February 27, 2007 and filed under Sundry posts.

4 Comments

The General Synod of the Church of England is meeting this week to discuss the pressing issues that face us:

The Revd Canon Simon Bessant (Blackburn) to ask the Secretary General:

Q38. The Church of England Yearbook 2007 has a changed order of contents from previous editions, whereby the dioceses now precede the national structures. Who made this decision and what ecclesiological issues lie behind it?

I’m only larking around of course. They will be talking about lots of important and in-depth things. Archbishop Rowan has done his introductory talk and you can read that here. You can find all of the latest Synodical goings-on here. There is a feed so you can get things up to the minute as they happen.

[The cartoon, above, of a very small Synod, is here. You can reuse it freely on your blog by pasting the code found via that link. Lots more too.]

Posted by Dave at 3:50 pm on February 26, 2007 and filed under Church, Current events, Anglican goings-on, Religion.

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I was sent a nice e-mail by the people at the Amnesty International telling me about their irrepressible.info website and also some videos they have made. I know I was not the only person to be sent the e-mail, but I am not going to let that affect me.

In summary irrepressible.info is all about standing up for the rights of bloggers in places like Egypt and China where you can be imprisoned for blogging the wrong thing. In fact I read in the newspaper today about one blogger being jailed. As someone who has been known to blog the wrong thing this is an issue I take an interest in.

In my old life as a youthworker I used to organise Amnesty breakfasts for young people where we would write letters to campaign on behalf of those improisoned (typo - but I thought I’d leave it) imprisoned for their beliefs in different parts of the world. We’d also have a cooked breakfast consisting of egg, bacon, sausage, toast and sometimes baked beans. I can’t remember whether we had mushrooms. I think perhaps that sometimes we did and sometimes we didn’t.

Anyway, it is a good campaign to support I think. There is a pledge you can sign or you can ask to have infomation sent to you so you can blog about it and various things like that.

Sorry that I have done 3d lettering instead of a cartoon. On some days I do not have the wherewithall to do a cartoon, whereas the wherewithall to do 3d lettering is more freely available.

Posted by Dave at 3:42 pm on February 25, 2007 and filed under Blogging, Justice.

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I found this cartoon of mine on the following rather splendid page:

How to survive while listening to a sermon

These notes are set down in sympathetic recognition of the fact that most congregations suffer through the Sunday sermons with heroic fortitude. There must be a great number of Christians with extraordinary faith or else preachers would long ago have emptied the churches permanently! I say this as one who both preaches in pulpits and listens in pews. I can testify that it is much more fun to preach than to listen.

I quite enjoyed:

Strategy #3.
Let your mind wander. The art of mind-wandering is sadly neglected in these busy times. If the preacher announces a subject and clearly has nothing to say about it except plantitudes, let your imagination create the sermon that is eluding the preacher.

(Link to larger version of my sermon cartoon)

Posted by Dave at 3:44 am on February 25, 2007 and filed under Church, Religion.

5 Comments

Posted by Dave at 11:07 am on February 24, 2007 and filed under Cartoons, Mundane, Household hints.

3 Comments

These are all things with a Christian slant of one sort or another.

Slave Britain
A photography exhibition about modern day slavery at St Pauls cathedral until 29 March 2007. Ben Bell went and thought it was good.

On a related note, see The Truth isn’t Sexy. Thanks to Kester for the reminder.

The Art of Persecution
This is an art competition organised by Open Doors. The competition is long since closed I’m afraid, but you can now see the Shortlist gallery if your computer has the right gizmo. The exhibition is in Walsall this weekend and then in Oxford.

New Religion
I’ve mentioned this before, but I will again as it is a Greenbelt-related thing and Greenbelt are good. New Religion by Damien Hurst will be at Wallspace at All Hallows on the Wall, London from Wednesday 7 March to Wednesday 4 April 2007. You can see some images here.

“The content of artwork shown at Wallspace does not necessarily represent the views of the gallery’s directors, of All Hallows on the Wall or the Church of England.“

Posted by Dave at 8:55 am on February 23, 2007 and filed under Art, Religion.

4 Comments

It has been quite a week for the Anglican church. I am sorry that I have not drawn about it but I have not had a very good few days with one thing and another, so it has not happened. If you want a summary read something like this BBC report.

I have learnt today, among other things, that the middle ground is not the place to be. Let this be a warning to the following, who look to me to be dangerously close to seeing both sides of the argument:

Elizaphanian: Trying to think straight

Raspberry Rabbit: Time to quit the Jiggery-Pokery

Disaster Area: Let The Whining Begin - Oh, Wait, It Has…

Last but not least…

Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori: A Season of Fasting - Reflections on the Primates Meeting

Update: Rowan Williams: Why the Anglican Communion matters
Our Archbishop is a very wise man.

Posted by Dave at 2:14 pm on February 22, 2007 and filed under Anglican goings-on, Religion.

10 Comments

Fairtrade fortnight starts next week. One man (we’ll call him Ben) is going to be Fairtrade man for the fortnight by only eating Fairtrade food and only wearing fairtrade bananas on his head. He has a Myspace page and accompanying blog.

It seems to me that Fairtrade rice is the product that will make this possible as there are not, as far as I am aware, Fairtrade breads or other complex carbohydrates (phrase from my days as a sportsperson). He will do quite well for snacks though.

Various people have interviewed him about it, including New Consumer and Soul Survivor. This is the Tear Fund press release page about what he is doing.

Ben recognises, wisely, that ethical shopping on its own is not the answer to all the world’s problems. But it is a good start and by doing what he is doing awareness will be raised and the issues discussed.

Posted by Dave at 9:15 am on February 22, 2007 and filed under Fair Trade.

33 Comments