What’s your theological worldview? created with QuizFarm.com

You scored as Roman Catholic You are Roman Catholic. Church tradition and ecclesial authority are hugely important, and the most important part of worship for you is mass. As the Mother of God, Mary is important in your theology, and as the communion of saints includes the living and the dead, you can also ask the saints to intercede for you. Roman Catholic 82% Evangelical Holiness/Wesleyan 79% Neo orthodox 79% Emergent/Postmodern 64% Classical Liberal 64% Charismatic/Pentecostal 39% Modern Liberal 32% Fundamentalist 25% Reformed Evangelical 21%

I really thought this quiz was one of the best ones ever written. It covers so many bases and comes to a believable, if not accurate, conclusion about your theological worldview. I believe with the threat of relativism today, there is a need to first know exactly what your theological beliefs say about YOU and then to take steps towards the kind of religion you desire. To you I ask: do you share the same tenets of faith that your church professes?

Sometimes I wonder whether I’ll ever stop being cynical. Stardust (the movie, anyway) is filled with a truly idealised sense of romance that, for me, ended up dragging the movie down somewhat. But anyway, I get ahead of myself.

In one of the best movies ever made in the adventure/fantasy genre, Neil Gaiman’s novella comes to life in a wonderful fairytale with an extremely British sense of humour. Starring a wonderfully talented cast including the brilliant Michelle Pfeiffer, an exciting Charlie Cox, the underrated Mark Strong and featuring perfectly cast cameos by Peter O’Toole, Robert De Niro and Ricky Gervais. And of course, the controversially cast Claire Danes who for some reason really appealed to me as the fallen star Yvaine.

It is without a doubt that when a lovingly written screenplay is brought to life by such a distinguished cast, the result can be no less than spectacular and Stardust is all that. Despite its two hour length, the story is still able to comfortably straddle the line between a romantic fairy tale and a hilarious parody of itself throughout. The only times I felt the story failed was during the romantic scenes which, while believable, were simply too wordy or too dry in comparison to the rest of the film. Director Matthew Vaughn himself is reported to have admitted that he was much more in his element with the adventure-fantasy, while romance was something he left to his co-writer Jane Goldman.

I think what ultimately brought the show to life was the wonderful character of Tristan Thorn who, embodied by actor Charlie Cox, really portrays the ultimate geek fantasy. Tristan is the boy who adores the village beauty and is somehow able to win her attention long enough to promise her the ultimate romantic gift – a fallen star. He then goes on this crazy adventure, where he finds someone even better – the star herself. Charlie Cox’s sheer idealism and genuine likeability shines through (pun intended) to the point where the plot “twist” near the end isn’t quite as shocking as the director would have liked.

And oh, I’m so so glad I’m going to catch it again… because I totally missed Sarah Alexander (of Coupling fame) in her role as one of the evil witches.

Stardust is a perfect 10. You’ve got to watch it.

POSTNOTE: It’s hard to believe we waited a year and a half for this… direcow has blogged about it since April last year. Makes me wonder if I’ll actually “forget” about Star Trek coming out next year in all the hype about Iron Man et al.

Naaaaaaah.

I’ve been silent for two weeks, mainly because I’ve never really seen the need to voice my opinion on certain events/topics that have been dominating local news. But something I read today just got me so riled up that I thought it imperative that I make my stand clear.

The Canon Photo Marathon that ended two weekends ago had several of my friends signing up for the task. Participants had to interpret three themes: Playtime, Challenge, Passion. That’s fine. I thought they were lovely themes that really brought out a lot of ingenuinity in those striving to win big. I really liked the picture that won for “Passion” for the Youth category (above), since anyone that equates faith and belief (superstitious or otherwise) with Passion is cool in my book. What I SERIOUSLY didn’t like, however, was the overall winner’s interpretation of “Playtime” (below).

What kind of a message is that? Catholic point of view notwithstanding, anyone that equates what looks like an anti-AIDS commercial with “PLAYTIME” is seriously barking up the wrong tree. I don’t want this to sound like a religious debate, so I’ll leave out the Catholic Church’s views on contraception (which I’m sure is common knowledge anyway). But ultimately, this is about SEX.

Yes, sex is enjoyable. Yes, sex is fun. Yes, sex gives the people involved a intense rush of pleasure. No one questions these, especially not the Church. But to consider sex (or even the hint of sex, in this case) to be simply PLAYTIME is sending a distinctly discomforting message to the rest of Singaporean society.

I do not doubt for a second that there is a good number of Singaporeans (probably a majority?) who consider sex to be little more than casual entertainment. But having a majority feel that way does NOT make it fact.

Like it or not, sex IS the highest form of communication two people can share. Logically, it goes WAY beyond the ideal of two people just being together silently and yet having the best ‘conversation’ ever. Yet so many people today consider the latter to be more romantic than the former. And decisions like these do NOT help.