Phillip Jensen explains the difference between Cultural Christians and Christian Christians

Phillip Jensen writes...Christmas is the high point of Cultural Christianity. It creates joy and confusion; joy to our culture and confusion to Christians...


Indeed, Cultural Christianity lies at the basis of Australian civil life. .
However, there is such a thing as Christian Christianity – it’s not just a matter of interpretation. Christianity is based in the reality of the Son of God: his incarnation, words and works, crucifixion and resurrection, and promise to return to judge. All this may be false or it may be true – but either way Christian Christianity is committed to the belief and propagation of these ideas.
Cultural Christians don’t have to believe in Jesus to sing carols any more than they have to believe in Santa Clause to sing Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer. Christian Christianity is quite different. Christians do believe in Jesus and do know the difference between the historical reality of Jesus and the mythical nonsense of Santa and the reindeer.
Christian Christians can appeal to Cultural Christians to put Christ back into Christmas but it will not make any real difference, they will still be Cultural Christians. However, Christian Christians cannot put Christ back into Christmas because without him they have no Christmas.

Did you get that Bill... Phillip says Christianity is really about being a believer in something that could be false...yet he'll denigrate those who call themselves Christians for believing in the humanity and compassion displayed by Jesus'...you know...his tolerance and love of mankind...and his elevation of women and (what some branded as) sinners ...in the eyes of God. 

Uggghhhh....I just had an ugly thought....what if Jesus Christ had been someone like Phillip Jensen...stripped of love and compassion for women and gays... only valuing women who behaved the way he wanted them to... allowing them a voice only amongst their own gender....always subservient to a male no matter how mean and nasty and stupid he is...imagine if Jesus had called same-sex attracted people shameful  and had remained silent when members of his faith supported a death penalty to be imposed...someone who promoted discrimination and  segregation...someone who ended, and encouraged others to end fellowship with a same-sex attracted person because he chose love and companionship and God... Calam the concept makes you recoil with repulsion....a mean spirited, rule driven, spiritual Jesus (that in itself is bizarre)... who to this day ...uses his word ....to protect the economic and cultural collateral of  angry straight males...and those who gain secondary benefits...  And maybe ....that's why many people... do choose to be Cultural Christians.

Sydney Anglicans explain how tolerance works when dealing with Keith Mascord and same-sex marriage

Rev. Dr Keith Mascord appears to be the first Anglican casualty of the same-sex marriage debate.
The Anglican Archbishop of Sydney Dr Glenn Davies has decided not to renew Rev. Mascord's ministry licence.
Dr Mascord - an outspoken advocate for reform in the Anglican Diocese of Sydney - has told Noel Debien that churches need to give people the freedom to say what they think and believe in the debate about marriage.

You know something Bill...at least you didn't gag me like them Sydney Anglcans do...but they never let you down...you can always rely on their tunnel vision and self serving hypocrisy...Did you read the article by Raj Gupta titled the Intolerance of Tolerance....ya know when he says...
All I am doing is upholding and defending marriage as it has been understood and embraced for thousands of years. And for that, apparently, I am labelled as a bigot! Really? This is the intolerance of so-called tolerance. And it has progressed – even to the degree of seeking to silence the national debate.
Whether or not Australia has a plebiscite remains to be seen. It would be a chance for the views of the people of multicultural Australia to be expressed.


 

Noble Wolf alerts his readers to the apology given by the NSW Parliament and SMH ...when 500 activists took to Taylor Square in Darlinghurst in support and celebration of New York's Stonewall movement and to call for an end to criminalisation of homosexual acts and discrimination against homosexuals. The 1978 peaceful movement ended in violence, mass arrests and public shaming at the hands of the police, government and media.

Noble Wolf has written a very personal and  informative post. Well worth reading. Thank you Noble Wolf .

Seriously...I don't know what the fuss is about? We Sydney Anglicans support countries that expose and criminalise LGBTI people... and anyone who helps them. GAFCON was built on homophobia. Long live bigotry and GAFCON because without both we'd be extinct!

"Hey Calamity. I've missed you. Sadly your services here are still required!"

Dear Anonymous. It's flattering that you missed the posts on this blog... but I really believe that Sydney Anglicans are not worth the effort. They have used a literal interpretation of the Bible to push themselves into oblivion. Their only appeal belongs with right wing extremists, and  those from  countries, who  treat women as second class citizens, and gays, as criminals.

Anon, as you point out...even the teachers and girls being taught at Anglican Colleges find their doctrine on male headship offensive... How stupid to charge massive school fees to educate women to metaphorically walk behind, and never question their man...no matter how wrong, incompetent or dumb he is!!!!!!

Students and teachers from some of Sydney's Anglican high schools say they are shocked and angered by remarks made by one of the church's most senior clerics.

Before delivering a speech to year 12 prefects during the Annual Service for Anglican School Leaders on Thursday, Archbishop of Sydney Glenn Davies faced a series of robust questions from male and female students about the place of women.

In explaining his view that the Bible says men and women have different roles in society and that God intended men to be the "heads" of women, many present believed he was saying women should not aspire to the same career heights as men.

In my opinion...the diocese is a waste of space. As far as I'm concerned the diocese has been built on faulty prejudicial doctrine, which has failed to stand up over time, so the diocese's only way of coping, to use litigation practices, and name calling, to maintain it's prejudicial stance.

And to the other Anon....David Ould gets off on bashing gays. Seriously...he's a man with a big mouth and a massive ego, who has an opinion on everything. He loves gaining notoriety from being divisive, and he cannot understand that his manner is offensive. He  causes anger in those who have been victims of, or witnesses to, prejudicial abuse, and those who have been coerced into silence, through threats of litigation.
From the words of Peter Jensen said ...in the 1980s the culture in the church was a legal one and not a moral one.

Meet the Jensens

Peter Jensen ...a man who didn't know that sexual assault, let alone that threatening a victim with litigation for disclosing the abuse,  held long term damage for the victim 

Mrs Christine Jensen awarded Medal (OAM) of the Order of Australia, “For service to the Anglican Church community in Sydney”, including her many years of encouragement to women of the Moore College family and through Mothers’ Union.... This is a woman who help develop a strategy to sustain gender inequality within the church. She began the Equal but Different group that promoted male headship within the church. This woman was appointed as the head of woman's ministry, by her husband Peter Jensen.








Phillip Jensen, the former Dean who was also appointed during the time of his brother's  reign as Archbishop.. and Phillip's request below...says it all!

Me a Jensen!!!!! ...I may be a self serving right wing extremist...but I'm not financially incompetent!





Former Sydney Anglican Archbishop Jensen says that sexual assault victims have taught him so much!!! He never knew that sexual assault has lasting psychological effects on the victim...especially when the victim discloses and is threatened with litigation...Speaking of litigation...did David Ould post something about this on his blog?

THE former Anglican Archbishop of Sydney has apologised to a victim of sexual abuse and admitted the response of the church to his allegations was wrong.
A witness, given the pseudonym BYC, has told a hearing of the Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Abuse in Hobart he was abused on multiple occasions by a member of the Church of England Boys’ Society when he was a teenager in Sydney during the late 1970s and 1980s.
Bishop Jensen told the commission the church had failed to deal with the allegations of abuse victims and their aftermath.
“It has been so overwhelming to hear their testimony and to recognise how frequently we failed them,” he said.
“I head what BYC has said about the continued failure and about the way we speak and do not act.
“Again I wish to say to them they have taught me so much.

Say Dan...I wonder if he'd been so reluctant to act if it had been one of his children?

Bishop Jensen said that in the 1980s the culture in the church was a legal one and not a moral one.
“I believe it was under advice, but I believe it was quite wrong,” he said.

So is that why Robert Tong was given an Order of Australia

BYC’s mother also gave evidence this morning, saying the abuse had ruined her son’s life.
“I had no idea about the abuse while it was occurring,” she said.
She told the commission she met with Archbishop Peter Jensen in 2002 to tell him about her son’s case. The archbishop subsequently apologised to BYC in person.
But she said a church lawyer later warned her that if BYC pursued compensation “the church’s barristers will come out guns blazing and tear strips off you”.
She said the damage caused to her son by the abuse had been compounded by the unsympathetic response and inaction of the church.
Richard Kells worked with CEBS from 1976 and told the commission he made multiple attempts to raise the alarm about Jacobs but was repeatedly rebuffed by church officials.
He said he was ostracised by some members of the St Ives congregation because of his concerns and left the congregation in 1982.

Them parishioners are such nice fine upstanding people Roseanne.
I don't know Dan...it all sounds pretty abusive to me....It seems like there was a real systemic approach to the abuse of young people, women and gays... all victims of the church's abuse, blacklisting and threats of litigation. ...But how else do you implement God's word!

Loonpond readers discover Claire Smith and her Sydney Anglican Complementarian views on feminism

 And will Sydney Anglican Complementarian men write to Dorothy and demand an apology?

Dorothy quotes Claire Smith at the Loonpond...If, however, you mean, ‘Is it sexist in that women are inferior to men?’ then it’s not sexist. This is not a statement about worth. It’s a statement about our participation in the congregation and in one limited aspect of what happens in our congregation involving teaching and authority. In fact, not even all teaching, but a particular sort of teaching: the ongoing, authoritative, formal instruction of the congregation. So, it’s saying, ‘Women are to be submissive in that they are not to have a formal teaching role with respect to men in the congregation.’ They are not to engage in that sort of teaching.

...and the readers' responses

7 comments:

1. 
   AnonymousSep 6, 2015, 7:18:00 AM

   Fucking patriachs - all of the one God religions are anti-women. It was when they wrote Lilith - hunter gatherer woman - out of history and replaced her with the gormless Eve - agricultural woman - that the 'original sin' was perpetrated on both men and women.
   
   From wiki:
   
   "The idea in the text that Adam had a wife prior to Eve may have developed from an interpretation of the Book of Genesis and its dual creation accounts; while Genesis 2:22 describes God's creation of Eve from Adam's rib, an earlier passage, 1:27, already indicates that a woman had been made: "So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them."
   
   "The Alphabet text places Lilith's creation after God's words in Genesis 2:18 that "it is not good for man to be alone"; in this text God forms Lilith out of the clay from which he made Adam but she and Adam bicker. Lilith claims that since she and Adam were created in the same way they were equal and she refuses to submit to him:[57]
   
   "The background and purpose of The Alphabet of Ben-Sira is unclear. It is a collection of stories about heroes of the Bible and Talmud, it may have been a collection of folk-tales, a refutation of Christian, Karaite, or other separatist movements; its content seems so offensive to contemporary Jews that it was even suggested that it could be an anti-Jewish satire,[58] although, in any case, the text was accepted by the Jewish mystics of medieval Germany."

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   AnonymousSep 6, 2015, 9:20:00 AM
   Lilith was most probably a Lesbian, Anon. Explains it all.
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   AnonymousSep 6, 2015, 10:42:00 AM
   Crap anon, Lilith would have eaten the snake, made sauce from the apple and given Adam a good time and then she could be a lezzie in her spare time if she felt like it. Only the power of property relations explains the conservative women like Eve who survive the patriarchy by sucking up the blame for everything the alpha Adam man chooses to do, like eating the apple she offered him. What a little boy, dog ate my homework type excuse for making the wrong choice? My mother would have said "and if Adam jumped off the cliff would you follow?".
   
   But here you go; a real life running dog collaborator Eve on RN this morning - of course on the Tom Switzer program - a dinosaur woman who must be Miranda Divines' heroine and source of her wisdom.
   
   Christina Hoff Sommers says, "But some commentators warn that today’s modern feminism is a corruption of what feminism should be; that feminism is no longer about freedom, it’s just a lobby group for pet grievances. That it's not so much about emancipation; it’s now reactionary."
   
   But she is in favour of lezzies, listen and weep.
   
   http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/betweenthelines/fainting-coach-feminists/6746530
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2. 
   AnonymousSep 6, 2015, 7:51:00 AM

   Hi Dorothy,
   
   It would appear that nowadays the Liberals have two Saviours in their pantheon, God and Coal.
   
   The question however is how do the creationists among them explain the formation of coal. Thanks to the intertubes we can wonder no longer;
   
   https://answersingenesis.org/geology/catastrophism/coal-beds-and-noahs-flood/
   
   A delightful piece of tosh evidently written by a real geologist.
   
   DiddyWrote

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   dorothy parkerSep 6, 2015, 8:02:00 AM
   A classic DW, and the pond is eternally grateful, at least until the twelfth of never, for the link.
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3. 
   AnonymousSep 6, 2015, 9:14:00 AM

   Thanks Claire Smith. Now I know why Xians don't support SSM: they can't tell who the submissive partner is. And now I know why that is so critical to their whole existence.
   Maybe if we offered to wear labels that would resolve the issue? A dress? HIgh heels? I'd do almost anything to marry my partner of 20 years; I'd even be prepared to identify as the submissive one - at least in public.

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   AnonymousSep 6, 2015, 9:53:00 AM
   I think a Venn diagram might help sort out some of those tricky areas of responsibility between man and woman in Smith's argument.
    
   
   
    

    

   
   

   
   

    

 

David Ould is in a flap again...over the comments of yet another Anglican from Victoria.

David Ould is in a flap!  God forbid...the bishop of Wangaratta (not Sydney!!!)... Bishop John Parkes...  a former barrister... has told the Chronicle that he believes the country has “grown up” and that the federal government will be bound within a relatively short time to change the Marriage Act to enable people of the same gender to marry.

David Ould being a true religious fundamentalist...  believes that no one is allowed to have an opinion or speak publicly,  especially if the views expressed,  differ to his views.

It seems that David is the only Anglican who has the right to publish articles, write blogs, make radio and TV appearances, and endorse these with the acknowledgement of his status as a Sydney Anglican minister.

Of course...the endorsement of Sydney Anglicanism immediately reminds  the listener, viewer and reader that homophobic and misogynist comments will follow.

However Bishop John Parks is not a Sydney Anglican so why does David Ould expect Bishop Parks to be stupid and bigoted in his comments?

Now David ...hard line fundamentalists don't like double standards you know...I'm not sure that the Bishop of Wangaratta was doing anything other than showing some common sense and respect. Just like you...you know when you were on TV ...and Living with the Enemy ... you know ...when you walked in the Mardi Gras ...to show mutual respect for those two gay men ...who you took to your church ...and got them to sit through your sermon ...about the evils of homosexuality.

You know ...I'm an Anglican who lives in Sydney...and I get  traumatised  when I see David Ould  representing the face of Sydney Anglicanism. .. Muriel Potrter is right when she is quoted in the Wangaratta Chronical as saying... I hope that many more bishops speak out as Bishop Parkes has done because I know that there are a number of bishops and leading clergy in this country who wish to see faithful, loving, monogamous same-sex relationships honoured with marriage,” Dr Porter said yesterday. “If they keep silent nothing will happen.“Silence will just allow hard-line fundamentalists  to dominate the debate.“But if our leading clergy speak up like this, as Bishop Parkes has done, then I would see the church coming in a much more friendly way – and more quickly – to a resolution on this question.”

Why does the Diocese of Gippsland have to respond to David Ould? Why does David Ould think he's so important?

 

David Ould is again whinging about the appointment of Rev Head to another parish. Rev Head is reported to be in a same sex relationship. David criticised and called for the sacking of Rev Head and hounded Bishop McIntyre until he passed away. Now David Ould is turning his attention to Bishop McIntyre's replacement...shock...horror...a woman...Bishop Kay Goldsworthy. He'll be able to blame her decision making on her gender...because David doesn't believe that God created women to preach his word to males.
David claims that the Diocese of Gippsland has broken rule 7.4  from Faithfulness in Service...You are to be chaste and not engage in sex outside of marriage.

Well David ...if you and your cronies supported marriage equality and weren't so divisive...then Rev Head would fulfil 7.4. At present marriage is not available to him ...well unless he joins Sydney Anglican Liberty Christian Ministries...so they can cure him by getting him to marry a woman!

The Sydney Anglican Church League reports that Archbishop Okoh was a member of the National Peace Committee for this year's general elections in Nigeria.

Sydney Anglicans ...just like their GAFCON African counterparts ...don't consider violence against GLBTI  people as  violence. This is apparent when they promote their GAFCON buddy Nicholas Okoh.

As reported at Erasing 76 Crimes...Nicholas Okoh, primate of the Church of Nigeria, “commended President Goodluck Jonathan for his courage in signing the anti-gay bill into law which has continued to generate reactions in some quarters in Nigeria and beyond. According to him, those not in support of the bill are like the biblical duo Adam and Eve, who questioned God for asking them not to eat the fruits from the Garden of Eden,” Channels Television in Nigeria reported. Okoh said that disobeying God’s instruction to allow marriage only between men and women would bring disaster.

The Anglican Church League reports that the ... Now, the deputy chairman of GAFCON, the Primate of the Church of Nigeria, Anglican Communion, Archbishop Nicholas Okoh, has called on churches to give priority to the (GAFCON) President's  anti-corruption drive....
Archbishop Okoh told Nigerian TV that the behaviour of some public office holders was 'a huge disappointment' to Nigeria

Geezzze Bill...Some Sydney Anglicans just make you sick to the stomach...And these people see themselves as the keeper and propagator of God's word...so GAFCON is saying God's a hypocrit then? .....You not wrong there Calam...I wonder if GAFCON's Secretary Peter Jensen manages GAFCON's finances?

 

Has a background in religious fundamentism aka right wing Catholicism deprived Tony Abbott of the ability to negotiate ...or is bullying the act of a desperate man who is inept in his job and just trying to hang onto power?

 

I'm reading the riot act... shut down
1. Freedom of Speech and just let me keep making stupid statements
2. Freedom of Thought and let me manipulate politics and the law ...because I don't give a ***k about anyone but my rich mates
3. any opposition to my governance by using my cromies ...because then I can't be exposed for being bloody incompetent

You know something Dan...I worked for a boss who managed a business just like Tony...and the business didn't implode...no Dan it damn well exploded!

Yeah Rosie...I reckon we're on course for something really big...and I hope those Murdoch and 2GB self - serving people realise how much they have contributed to this farce. For Christ's sake...why can't Alan Jones accept that the electorate didn't want him years ago...and stop trying to govern by proxy!

I'm just waiting..... oh ...and watching ... just watching Tony shoot himself in the foot...and let's not forget the mouth ...oh ...and I'm laughing with Dorothy...over at  the Loonpond

The Sydney Anglican Church League posts yet another right wing US Baptist post about discernment leading to disaster...which is probably why Sydney Anglicans were totally stupid and greedy when it came to investment

Sydney Anglicans...this video is for you.

 

 

Yes the Sydney Anglican Church League is once again posting right wing US Baptist material on their website.

Well the ACL is a Baptist organisation ...isn't it ? Albert Mohler's stupid title called ...  "When Discernment leads to Disaster" is on a par with Phillip Jensen's writing titled... "The Limits of Fellowship"... but isn't it stupid and irresponsible to use a position of  power to promote discrimination and bigotry?  

The Anglican Church League  rarely posts anything Anglican, yet prolofic self promoter and ACL member, David Ould has the hide to declare that the consecration cermony of a woman bishop in Perth as un-Anglican!

Alan Jones said (on 2GB 3.8.15) that unlike Julia Gillard...Bronwyn Bishop didn't call the misogyny card when she was criticized for the Choppergate Affair

Oh Sophie...I can't call the misogyny card because everyone knows that I support the concept of misogyny...and as Alan Jones says about Goodes...It's not about racism...the people just don't like me

You know Ennis...Alan Jones is right... I don't like mean nasty self indulgent hypocrits like  Abbott, Jones and Bishop.

Yeah Jake...what about when Sophie was repulsed by Simon Sheikh's collapse ?

 

Courtesy of Loonpond

 

Alan Jones can find a cause...but it's not addressing racism

As I said...People just don't like Adam Goodes....they don't like him standing up for his heritage...they don't like him taking offence when a teenage girl ...continually calls him an ape...they don't like him for addressing racism when other aboriginal players don't...Adam should be like me ...He should laugh in the face of bigots and gain power...by over looking their prejudices...He should give up standing up for indigenous rights and become cause driven like me...but he's got to pick a mainstream cause like Coal Seam Gas exploration...to name one safe cause...because if I continued to push a cause that addresses prejudices...then I could be treated  like Adam Goodes... Adam it's OK to have a spine...but you've got to have more than a spine...you need a good legal team...and years of practice ...at knowing which part of yourself  to display to the bogans...It's a shame I have chosen to display my ulgy side.

Of course we are all Alan Jones listeners...Alan doesn't flaunt homosexual rights in our face...He respects our prejudices. He the loveable artful dodger...who knows which cause to pick ...and which one to leave alone.

Say Alan...would your 2GB listeners be of this type... if you were a gay man ...who was open  and  proud of your sexuality...Would your current 2GB listeners boo you... if you took on the prejudice directed at  LGBTI people ...with the same passion you applied to the banning the carbon tax? 

 Alan...I just want to say that I'm an avid listener .... but I don't think that all your listeners come from Struggle Street...A lot sound like they've moved to Right- of - Centre... Well bugger human rights, Alan...we all know the best human rights are associated with power and wealth.

The political arm of the Sydney Anglican Diocese, known as the Anglican Church League, held it's AGM... It's underlying purpose...to make sure that elitism and bigotry remains strong within the diocese...and that it continues to align itself with right wing Baptist mentality...because it sure isn't Anglican!

Anglican Church League AGM President, Gav Poole writes ...

March this year, the ACL hosted its own conference, ‘Is there a future for confessional Anglicanism?’ (a closed question with an obvious answer). I believe it was significant in restating that gospel confession is not just Christian but a rich part of our Anglican heritage. The gospel is the foundation of our denomination and a challenge for all Anglicans is to ensure that we are not moved from our foundations

HMMMMMM  Do you remember....

This year the ACL was the proud sponsor of the FCA Australian launch. There was a theological side to the conference (known as bigotry...ie how to keep the gays and feminists out of the church...here and world wide...and not to mention...how to excommunicate ex-cons... ) and a practical side ( political strategizing...because everyone knows Christ can't tolerate inclusiveness). 




HMMMMMMM do you remember the 1st GAFCON convention...

 

• The membership taskforce continues to promote and recruit membership applicants. They have proved that the ol’ ACL can get with the technical times. A new state of the art database has been commissioned, which will be jointly managed by the members themselves, ensuring accurate and up-to-date information. (God loves technology more than people ...and let's not forget money!)
• The communications taskforce has communicated the ACL’s activities with you. Their job is to ensure that you are not kept in the dark. (Keep the propaganda raging...Oh and let's not forget the indignance!)
• The training taskforce ensures that we are not only recommending people for diocesan roles but supporting them. We can look forward to upcoming events. (Let's keep the status quo...new ideas may bring about compassion within the diocese....and let's not forget we need to ex-communicate those who don't repent by ACL standards)

During last year’s triennium elections three of our five contested elections were won, including all candidates for General Synod. At least ten vacancies were filled by new people but were uncontested. Four of these were on Standing Committee. The ACL was involved in all their nominations...(so the ACL can control the diocese )

And don't you love Gav's comments HERE ....
The Anglican Church League president, the Reverend Gav Poole, said that while he disagrees with the ''inevitable'' Church of England decision (to ordain women bishops), he admires its approach, which has made allowances for minorities who do not support the ordination of women.
England's decision came two years after a similar vote failed on grounds that it did not include provisions for those who in good conscience could not accept the leadership of a woman.
Echoing both sides of the ordination divide, any shift in local attitudes was likely to be a long way off, Mr Poole said.
''Sydney is known around the world for its evangelical character and its holding to the authority of the scriptures,'' he said. ''That's a long tradition here in Sydney and something we have always appreciated.''

Dah!....Well all's I can say to Gav is... what a shame Sydney Anglicans don't make allowances for minorities who in good conscience cannot accept bigotry and discrimination...and ...just who...has appreciated the long evangelical character of the Sydney Anglican diocese? Those who have benefited the most...or those who have gained notority from being a minister in the diocese, when in other walks of life they may be seen as attention seeking...or those masterminds who looked after the diocese's financial interests so well, that they took it upon themselves to be  leaders of the world ...or those expert theologians who know more than those who rely on scientific research  ...next Sydney Anglicans will be publishing books on Climate Change..We live in hope...anything  for a buck...I suppose!