The Cultural Collision... People and culture are two peas in one pod.  You cannot have one without the other.  People are communal.  We cluster together.  Oh sure, there are those outliers who flee humanity and self-isolate in faraway lands.  But the movement of the vast majority of people today is to live in closer proximity to one another.  Cities are growing while the outlying rural areas are rapidly de-populating.  Global urbanization is on the rise and as those people move to the city centers they are bringing with them their cultures. Culture is the unique and identifiable customs, arts, and social structures of an identifiable group of people.  Often times their culture is expressed in their use of language - even when the language is shared by many culture groups, they have their own words, phrases, and accents unique unto themselves.  For example, English is used in United States, England, and Australia.  But, put a pers...

 Christ, Culture, and Cinema.  What does it look like when these three things converge at one point?  In October of 2019, following the urging of my son Jarod, my daughter Madelyn and I went to the movies to see the movie Joker, starring Joaquin Phoenix.  The Joker is rated “R.”  This movie received media criticism, stirred up the law enforcement, frightened theater owners,  and created an air of potential violence that might ensue by those embracing chaos and disorder.  I have to admit that when I sat down in the darkened theater I looked around at my fellow movie-goers - mostly younger people (younger than me), chomping on chips and popcorn waiting for the experience of this duly hyped movie. What unfolded before my eyes was not anything I had expected.  The movie was dark...and it kept getting darker...right up to the very end.  I wasn’t bombarded with violence, bloodshed, and gore (although there was some of that).  Rather, I was c...