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author musician theologian
Maggi has kept a blog since September 2003, writing about theology and faith, the arts and literature, and a little about life and random nonsense...
In an increasingly secularised society few people have a good working knowledge of the Bible. Yet a great deal of our culture is built on stories or ideas that come from the Bible. Literature, art, music, language and even the fabric of our society - such as our justice system - are built on Christian concepts and biblical references. The Writing on the Wall provides a fascinating introduction to the Bible's best-known, and most influential, stories. Each chapter gives some background to the text of the Bible, and shows how the stories have become enmeshed in Western culture. Adam and Eve, the ten plagues of Egypt, The Prodigal Son and Mary Magdalene all feature - along with how the Bible has influenced everyone from Shakespeare to Monty Python, and Caravaggio to Banksy. 
Giving It Up explores the Lenten idea of 'giving up', taking it beyond the traditional idea of simply abstaining from something, and suggesting instead that what we need to give up is our existing ideas about God. With a daily readings for each day of Lent, from Ash Wednesday to Easter Sunday, it follows the heroes of the Bible who had to give up their own too-small ideas about God.
This is Maggi’s bestselling book of daily readings for each day of Advent, Christmas and Epiphany. Advent is the beginning of the Church year, and marks the anticipation of the coming Messiah. These readings explore how beginnings and endings in our own lives are illuminated by the different Gospel narratives of Christ's coming.
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I would say that most things having to do with Christian Culture actually _do_ have to do with Christ…but certainly not in the way one would hope.
Look at the standard attributes of such things:
Classism
Judging by easy external cues
Political power
Focus on division (defining what it means to be a Christian to separate those you don’t want to share power with)
Nationalism/Patriotism
These all are very much linked to Christ…linked to what He detested in the Pharisees.
The Pharisees thought they were the chosen people, America likes to think it is doing God’s will. Pharisees spent a great deal of effort determining exactly what you can and cannot do on the Sabbath, Christians fret over exactly what you can and cannot do on/with a date. Jesus’ attacks on the Pharisees political power and economic exploitation led to His assassination, and our politicians say “God Bless America” and say the GOP stands for “God’s Own Party.”
The Jews tried to define what it meant to follow God just a the modern church puts 13 different doctrines in front of its congregation-goers and says that refusal to believe in any one of them makes you a second-class citizen [or a persona non grata] in Christendom.