chris rouse

Wow, I loved Carman’s music as a kid. I saw him several times in concert and he put on a fantastic show. It’s sad to hear his announcement that he has incurable cancer.

I have delayed writing this but those of you I call friends and supporters, who have prayed for me and this ministry need to know about this new battle that lies ahead. One week ago I was diagnosed with Myeloma Cancer. It is incurable and I’ve been given a 3-4 year window of time.

So, in the spirit of celebrating his awesome musical legacy, I thought I’d share some of his music videos. Continue Reading…

“The Jesus Inquest” is in interesting concept and format for a book. Written by Charles Foster (“Writer, barrister, tutor in medical law and ethics at the University of Oxford, and a Fellow of Green Templeton College. He has written, edited, or contributed to over thirty books…” –back cover author bio), “The Jesus Inquest” immediately establishes that this isn’t going to your typical book about whether Jesus was real or not. This book is about the most popular (absurd, logical, plausible, and religious) views on whether the death, burial and resurrection of Christ happened.

The book is laid out with Foster acting as both “Witness X” and “Witness Y”. “Witness X” aims to essentially discredit the Christian view of the Gospels’ accounts of Jesus’ death and resurrection, and “Witness Y” is essentially an apologist arguing the Christian view and having to bear the burden of proof to the validity of the Christian view. In court, “Witness X” would be the prosecution, simply tasked with casting doubt and “Witness Y” acting as the defense and having to prove “beyond a shadow of a doubt” the facts and arguments laid out.

Continue Reading…

A couple weeks ago I visited a chiropractor for the first time. I had no idea what to expect, and honestly, I’ve always kind of viewed chiropractic medicine as a bit of a “quack” science. I thought “aren’t they just cracking my back and neck? I can do that on my own.”

Well, it turns out it’s a little more complex than that. Yes, they do a lot of back cracking (which is my favorite part so far), but a chiropractor is really targeting ligaments that pull bones–specifically the spine and neck–into place and getting those ligaments to pull with equal force from all directions to keep things lined up. The chiropractor also targets bone positioning to maintain proper spine and neck curves and bone alignment.

The chiropractor that I’m seeing performs an initial review that includes x-rays of the neck and spine as well as an electronic scan of the back that provides better detail about each bone in the neck and spine as well as the ligaments pulling on each vertebra.
Continue Reading…

Originally posted December 22, 2006:

As I promised, here is my blog about why Frosty the Snowman should be banned. It isn’t as extensive as my blog about Rudolph. After saying I would write about Frosty, I actually went to thinking about the song and actually could only come up with a couple of things. So it won’t be as funny (well, I thought the first one was funny, but no one commented so I don’t know if it really was) as the one about Rudolph.

Frosty the Snowman
Was a jolly happy soul
With a corncob pipe and a button nose
And two eyes made out of coal

Why would a major cultural symbol of the Christmas season have coal for eyes? Coal is symbolic of being naughty. Clearly Frosty the Snowman is evil incarnate. Maybe he’s a vampire. Vampires can’t be out in the sun. Frosty can’t be in the sun. Frosty is a vampire. Vampires are evil. From is an evil vampire. Coal is also a fossil fuel which is a non-renewable resource. Every year thousands of snow effigies to Frosty are built (idols are bad too) and coal is used (or charcoal) for his eyes. Since using up fossil fuels isn’t a good thing (ignore the fact I drive an SUV), I’m surprised that Al Gore didn’t indict Frosty in his recent documentary.

Second. Parents put lots of time into teaching children not to talk to strangers. Here we have a stranger that shows up one day and comes to life (or from the un-dead; reference vampire discourse above) talking to children whom he doesn’t know. And we’re encouraging children to talk to strangers if they look like someone fun. “Hey kids, want to see what’s under my ‘magic’ hat?”

Third. As I mentioned in my last blog, Frosty encourages juvenile delinquency.

Down to the village
With a broomstick in his hand
Running here and there all around the square
Saying catch me if you can
He led them down the streets of town
Right to the traffic cop
And he only paused a moment when
He heard him holler stop

Frosty was being a bad example to these kids. He was encouraging them to run up and down the sidewalks of an otherwise quiet little village terrorizing the locals with their rambunctious nature. And we have a mention of a broomstick. Just a few lines before he talked about “melting away”. Maybe Frosty is actually a witch? Frost challenges the authority of the town by calling out “catch me if you can” and carrying on and making all kinds of racket. When they approached the crossroads of the town, there was a traffic cop (such a small town they didn’t even have a stop light). Like a good cop, he asked the snowman and the kids following him along (maybe Frosty is the Pied Piper, who wasn’t a good person either; read that story if you don’t get this reference) to stop momentarily until it was safe. But Frosty, being the hoodlum that he is, ignored the cop, paused briefly, probably flashed a dirty glance, and took off again without a second thought. Now the kids think they don’t have to respect the authority of the traffic cop anymore.

Frosty the Snowman
Had to hurry on his way
But he waved goodbye
Saying don’t you cry
I’ll be back again some day

Read the Pied Piper story, then read that verse again, it will make more sense in that way. The Piper left town quietly, then came back and killed all the kids after the town didn’t give him what he was promised before. Or he may have just held them ransom for a large sum of money, depends on the version. Either way, Pied Piper=Evil=Naughty=Coal=Eyes (plus all the other analogies I made).

So, once again, I have successfully defended my position against a Christmas song. We’re up to two songs that should never be allowed again: Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer and Frosty the Snowman.

I’m out of ideas for future songs to ban. Suggestions welcome.

Originally posted December 20, 2006.

I have decided that I don’t like the song “Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer” anymore. At least not the song. I feel sorry for the poor chap, Rudolph. Let’s break down this statement a little, starting with the song lyrics themselves.

Rudolph, the red-nosed reindeer
had a very shiny nose.
And if you ever saw him,
you would even say it glows.

All of the other reindeer
used to laugh and call him names.
They never let poor Rudolph
join in any reindeer games.

Then one foggy Christmas Eve
Santa came to say:
“Rudolph with your nose so bright,
won’t you guide my sleigh tonight?”

Then all the reindeer loved him
as they shouted out with glee,
Rudolph the red-nosed reindeer,
you’ll go down in history!

Here is where the song breaks down for me. The first verse points out how little Rudolph was different. He had a shiny red nose. Not normal fare for a young reindeer. He should have a black nose. Moving on to the second verse. It talks about how the other reindeer “laughed and called him names”. Sounds like bullying to me. Rudolph was different, and the other kids made fun of him. They picked on his one flaw that he was probably most self-conscious of and ridiculed him. Again, bullying. Wouldn’t you agree?

Now here is where it gets more interesting. Look at verse three again. There is a mixture of bad weather and a lack of fog lights. Today, this wouldn’t be a problem. But back when this song was written, fog lights hadn’t been invented. I digress. Anywho, Santa needed some extra light out front so he could see where he was heading in order to make it to all the houses. And who did Santa pick? None other than our poor little mistreated reindeer, Rudolph.

Verse four. Well, at this point Santa has turned Rudolph into the hero of this little story. He has been chosen to guide the most famous sleigh in history. And remember those jerks, I mean other reindeer, from the beginning of the song? Wouldn’t you know it, now that Rudolph is famous, all the other reindeer want to be his friend. They want to be able to tell their children in a few years that “I knew Rudolph before he was famous.” HA! Those reindeer “knew” Rudolph, but they were his enemies. They picked on him relentlessly and probably made him go home crying more than once. I bet Rudolph’s mom read him the story about the Ugly Duckling and Rudolph probably doubted that it was ever possible for him to be “a beautiful swan”.

Why is is that every year, we sing over and over about how it is acceptable to pick on someone who is different, and then, once they turn out to be someone better than us, or they become famous, we want to be their friends and expect them to forgive us for everything we did and said to them? Honestly, with all the concern over bullying and pointing out when people are different, why is this song allowed to be part of our culture? Isn’t it only instilling these exact problems? This song is about bullying, name calling, and false friendship for our own betterment. I vote that it should be outlawed during all future Christmas seasons.

Stay tuned for my next installment. I may talk about how “Frosty the Snowman” teaches kids a blatant disrespect for the law and turns children into juvenile delinquents.