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Smartphones Receive Holy Blessing 154

Posted by samzenpus from the blessed-are-the-phone-makers dept.
jeffmeden writes "Plow Monday is normally for blessing laborers and their tools; as the name suggests it is aimed at those who work the land. A church service in London, England Monday decided to go after a more modern audience: office workers and their modern communication gadgets. From the Times article: 'The congregation at St Lawrence Jewry in the City of London raised their mobiles and iPods above their heads and Canon Parrott raised his voice to the heavens to address the Lord God of all Creation. "May our tongues be gentle, our e-mails be simple and our websites be accessible," he said.'"

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Smartphones Receive Holy Blessing More

Smartphones Receive Holy Blessing

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  • Has anyone noticed... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 12, 2010 @01:51PM (#30740946)

    Has anyone noticed that sampenzus is a worse editor than even Jon Katz could ever hope to be?

  • Absurd? (Score:2, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Is this any more absurd than waving other tools in the air and praying for assistance from the divine?

    • Re: (Score:3, Insightful)

      by fastest fascist ( 1086001 )
      No, it does, however, raise the possibility of holy tech support. Prayer circles praying for your tech problems to be solved, for a small fee, of course.

      I have a terrible feeling that already exists somewhere.
      • For a long time my standard line when any one complained abut their computer was to ask them if they sacrificed a chicken on the copier to the Computer Gods. Depending on my mood I would tell them to try KFC or McNugits.

        • Re: (Score:1)

          by Theodore ( 13524 )

          SNORK!!!

          I had a similar joke this last office Christmas party...
          "Way back when the senior VP of accounting was on this floor, every three months we'd have to sacrifice two chickens an a goat...
          But with all the new technology we've installed, it's now down to once a year with a gyros sandwich and a 10 piece mcnugget."

      • Re: (Score:1)

        by jhoegl ( 638955 )
        What are you talking about? Every time I call tech support I hope that the problem resolves itself while I wait.
        Otherwise I would have to fucking decipher their broken English.

        • Every time I call tech support I hope that the problem resolves itself while I wait.

          That's fine, as long as you don't start giving 10% of your income to the Lord God of Magical Tech Support.

          Also, as long as you don't start saying that those of us who do NOT pray to the God of Magical Tech Support are doomed to suffer all eternity with broken equipment and should be banned, shunned or killed.

      • No, it does, however, raise the possibility of holy tech support. Prayer circles praying for your tech problems to be solved, for a small fee, of course. I have a terrible feeling that already exists somewhere.

        I'm certain the Christian Scientists are already advocating a belief that calling hardware tech support at your job is not necessary.
        Scientologists probably advocate a similar stance but only for software glitches, the worst of which must be purged of thetans by use of a 45 caliber handgun. And Spammers are fair game.

        • "I'm certain the Christian Scientists are already advocating a belief that calling hardware tech support at your job is not necessary."

          I have found it to be rather ineffective. My coworker has been waiting to get her cd burner replaced for over a month. In the meantime she emails me the file path of the files she want's to burn and I do it for her.

          As for software, I've been asking for Acrobat for over a year, and they still won't give it to me, even though I need to edit PDFs all the time. I doubt prayin

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by tsm_sf ( 545316 )
        No, it does, however, raise the possibility of holy tech support. Prayer circles praying for your tech problems to be solved, for a small fee, of course.

        And this is different than most tech support plans how, exactly?

      • No, it does, however, raise the possibility of holy tech support. Prayer circles praying for your tech problems to be solved, for a small fee, of course.

        I have a terrible feeling that already exists somewhere.

        It does, in a way. In Russia, there are some organizations advertising "prayer by SMS" - you send them an SMS (charged extra, naturally) identifying what you'd like to pray them for, and they (supposedly) will do so. I don't think they would particularly mind "praying" for a solution to your tech problem.

      • Comment removed based on user account deletion

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by mwvdlee ( 775178 )

      I regularly wave my tool in the air and pray for divine assistance. Alas, I'm still wielding it on my own.

    • Depends. Apple users will first pray to Jobs, and only then resort to an alternative deity. The reason for this is of course that Jobs introduced the iPhone by raising it above his head. So at the very least, the reason for waving the object in the air may vary.

      • Re:Absurd? (Score:5, Insightful)

        by mosb1000 ( 710161 ) <mosb1000@mac.com> on Tuesday January 12, 2010 @05:50PM (#30744012)
        "Apple users will first pray to Jobs, and only then resort to an alternative deity."

        Are you crazy?! A true believer would never pray to another deity. If Steve doesn't fix your problem, it's because it doesn't need to be fixed.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by Korin43 ( 881732 )
          What? No one can fix problems with the iPhone because it doesn't have any. The iPhone was created perfect, if you think there's a problem, the problem is with you!

    • Re:Absurd? (Score:4, Insightful)

      by McNihil ( 612243 ) on Tuesday January 12, 2010 @03:09PM (#30742044)

      It's not assistance they ask for, it is that the tool doesn't break/crash or become otherwise inoperable and IMHO that approach is less absurd and hints at the users humility.

      How much did a plow cost back in the day? If it broke? Without it you and the rest of the family would have a hard time to live.

      Now the absurd is that iPod's and the like should not be included. A persons main computer or server farm that pays the families bill... hell yes.

      But then again most modern people may be Atheists and could care less.

      • How is that not an assistance? They try to control their chosen deity to perform tricks for them, after all (there's no humility in that BTW)

      • Actually blessing of inanimate objects are prayers asking God that the objects will aid us in His service, not that they won't break.

        • Re: (Score:2)

          by McNihil ( 612243 )

          "...objects will aid us in *HIS* service..." emphasis mine... this is why there are different religions, it is all a matter of interpretation. :-D

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by akpoff ( 683177 )
      It really started with Saint Attila:

      And Saint Attila raised the hand grenade up on high, saying, "O Lord, bless this Thy hand grenade that with it Thou mayest blow Thine enemies to tiny bits, in Thy mercy."

      Book of Armaments, Chapter 2, verses 9-21 [wikipedia.org]

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by mjwx ( 966435 )

      Is this any more absurd than waving other tools in the air and praying for assistance from the divine?

      After tech support couldn't figure out their problem this was their next best idea.

      Personally I prefer GOOG to God, as GOOG usually answers me when I ask it a question.

  • "May our tongues be gentle, our e-mails be simple and our websites be accessible"

    Maybe they could start with TFA..

  • How is this (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday January 12, 2010 @01:56PM (#30741050)
    How is this not Idle material? Or better yet trash can material. Who cares what some inane irrelevant church is doing in whatever part of the world.

    • Re: (Score:1, Flamebait)

      by aristotle-dude ( 626586 )

      How is this not Idle material? Or better yet trash can material. Who cares what some inane irrelevant church is doing in whatever part of the world.

      If you don't care, why did you post? Take your hateful bullshit elsewhere.

    • It's idle material for sure. The problem is that sampenzus has a bad habit of posting his crap outside of idle because he knows that 99.9% of slashdotters blocks that section.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by tsm_sf ( 545316 )
        It's not idle material if you're interested in anthropology. Maybe you could just scroll past articles you don't want to read?
        • If you're interested in anthropology you'd know that this kind of thing is already quite common in Japan. I stayed close to a car shrine, where you could drive in and have your car blessed. You may think America has a drive-through culture, but I don't think you have drive-through religion over there yet...

    • Redundant (Score:3, Insightful)

      by mosb1000 ( 710161 )
      The content of your post is implied in all Slashdot stories, since there inevitably is someone who will find anything irrelevant.

    • Thou shalt not worship false idles.

  • ""May our tongues be gentle, our e-mails be simple and our websites be accessible," he said." Not sure all that will happen without an Act of God...

    • Re: (Score:1, Troll)

      by sznupi ( 719324 )

      Same God accepting ethnics cleansing, masochism as a way of salvation and supposedly communicating in extremely obscure ways? Yeah, I can see that...

    • Sorry, forgot the line breaks. Work needs to stop mandating IE6 so I can see my previews ;p

      Edited Post:
      ""May our tongues be gentle, our e-mails be simple and our websites be accessible," he said."
      Not sure all that will happen without an Act of God...

  • Slashdotting (Score:2, Offtopic)

    by 0racle ( 667029 )
    Does that make Slashdotting a site a Satanic ritual now?
    • Simply posting to /. is enough for eternal damnation unless you have a paid subscription, of course.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by plopez ( 54068 )

        unless you have a paid subscription, of course.

        The first 144,000 were the chosen ones....

  • The funny bit... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Sponge Bath ( 413667 ) on Tuesday January 12, 2010 @02:00PM (#30741104)

    ...raised their mobiles and iPods above their heads

    Taking your iPod to church? Why? So you can play games and listen to music instead of the sermon?

    Religion sure is a weird business.

    • Re: (Score:1, Funny)

      by Anonymous Coward

      ...raised their mobiles and iPods above their heads

      Taking your iPod to church? Why?

      Religion sure is a weird business.

      To check if your neighbour had a model worth coveting?

    • Its worth points so long as you show up or something. I can understand faith but religion is strange sometimes.

      • It's like being a Fireman. You just kind of show up in case something happens that needs your attention.

        You look at Thomas, he gets this bad rap, essentially because he didn't show up to church on Sunday and missed the second coming (first? I don't know how the crazies are marking these things.)

        Obviously, you aren't likely to miss the second(third) coming by not showing up at church, but you are going to miss more everyday revelations.

      • Faith is incompatible with being a nerd.

        • Re: (Score:2, Offtopic)

          by Chicken_Kickers ( 1062164 )
          What the hell are you talking about? People with religious beliefs are one of the original nerds. For example, there are many Muslims who have memorised the entire Quran, word for word and could recite to you any verse on command, the same way some nerds can memorise the entire script of Star Wars Episode IV. Medieval Christian monks can spend years on end, nerdily copying and decorating manuscripts by hand. The word "canon" came from the Catholic faith and has been adopted by geeky Wookiepedia, Memory Alph

    • Re: (Score:2, Informative)

      by musichead ( 800784 )
      It's not terribly odd - the church has been in the practice of blessing man's vices for some time. The church has a hostory of blessing pipes, why not tech gadgets? http://theophiliacs.com/2009/01/24/theology-and-pipe-smoking-part-ii/ [theophiliacs.com]

    • Well, you can clearly see that he is a total Apple fanboi. Else he would have said “MP3 players“, and not iPods.

      • Re: (Score:3, Funny)

        by sznupi ( 719324 )

        Just the iPods need exorcisms.

      • No, the rest of us are using iPod as a generic term so that Apple will lose its trademark protection and we can watch the Apple fanboys squirm at Sony iPods.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by Malc ( 1751 )

      Why would you make an assumption and assertion like that? Most people use their iPods to create their own little bubble on the Tube (e.g. going to the Church) and elsewhere in this crowded city and island.

    • "Because then I couldn't listen to the commentary..." -Dilbert episode on Dogbert Day

    • Re: (Score:1, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward

      Believe it or not, we church goers don't teleport from home to church & back again. We might walk there, or possibly drive, and then maybe be crazy and go somewhere else after wards. What are we supposed to do, leave the things at the door?

      They do have off buttons you know :o)

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by eln ( 21727 )
      As long as you're paying enough attention to drop the money into the collection plate when it comes along, you can do whatever you want. Folding money only, cheapskate.

    • So you can say a short prayer, something like this:
      "Hail Steve, full of grace, the turtleneck is with thee. Blessed art thou among fanboys, and blessed is the fruit of thy twisted mind, for thou hast borne the savior of our social lives."

  • Canon Parrott raised his voice to the heavens to address the Lord God of all Creation. "May our tongues be gentle, our e-mails be simple and our websites be accessible," he said.

    I hope I don't go to hell for this, but Canon Parrott sounds a bit like a parrot.
    May redundancy be gone.

  • Read as: (Score:2, Interesting)

    by d34dluk3 ( 1659991 )
    Someone is trying to hard to be 'relevant'.

  • Not to be left out... (Score:2, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward
    Something similar was tried recently at a Synagogue - the laptops got paraded around on chairs, the iPods were wrapped in a handkerchief and stepped on and the cell phones got the end of their antennas cut off.

  • Technical support (Score:3, Funny)

    by ilsaloving ( 1534307 ) on Tuesday January 12, 2010 @02:20PM (#30741392)

    After examining many badly managed and virus ridden machines, I've often declared that nothing short of a reformat and an exorcism is going to get it working again.

    It's nice to know that *someone* is finally following through with my recommendations.

  • So, would the sound of a 300 baud modem connecting be equivalent to Gregorian chant now?
    Is renewing DHCP equivalent to confession and absolution?
    Is SMTP prayer? What does God do when you spam him?
    Does your firewall have an angel with a flaming sword? Ours does.
    And should they really be using wireless if Lucifer is the Lord of the Air?

    • > And should they really be using wireless if Lucifer is the Lord of the Air?

      Isn't Lucifer also known as the "bringer of light" which would imply lord of fibre-optic communications?
      On reflection, perhaps he is the lord of all high-speed communications technologies.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by vlm ( 69642 )

        Isn't Lucifer also known as the "bringer of light" which would imply lord of

        screensavers? e-ink displays?

      • Lucifer is also known as the "Father of Lies".
        Oddly enough, Genesis 2:17 has "God" telling the first lie.

        Imagine a whole religion dedicated to worshiping the wrong deity because someone buggered the paperwork.

      • Lucifer is the Latin for 'light-bearer'. In the bible it's a name applied to a king, and only in certain translations. The appellation Lucifer for the devil only appears in the apocrypha (which is all of the stuff that the Council of Nicea thought had too much Hollywood potential to be part of a serious religion).

    • READY
      ATDT 1888RINGGOD ...
      CONNECTED
      LOGIN: Are you there God, it's me M--$Y%#NO CARRIER

      READY
      AT
      ATDT 1888RINGGOD ...
      CONNECTED

      Welcome to the 4Chan BBS.
      What? You thought you were going to talk to Sky God Crankypants? LOLZ.
      Commandments:
      1. Do as thou wilt.
      2. For the lulz.

  • Ooookaaaayyy... (Score:4, Funny)

    by frank_adrian314159 ( 469671 ) on Tuesday January 12, 2010 @02:42PM (#30741714) Homepage

    May our tongues be gentle, our e-mails be simple and our websites be accessible...

    And the congregation responds: And may porn flow freely without fear of spam and malware.

  • Are they serious? (Score:2, Interesting)

    by piojo ( 995934 )

    This church is called "St Lawrence Jewry"? What a confusing and possibly offensive (to Jews) name for a church. Unless there's something I'm missing about British English.

    • Re: (Score:2, Informative)

      by Anonymous Coward

      They didn't just call it that, you know. Buildings in Europe can be centuries old, back when attitudes or conventions were different. Enlighten thyself. [wikipedia.org]

    • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

      by Jonathunder ( 105885 )

      The name is a reference to its location.

      From its website [btik.com]:

      "St. Lawrence was first built in 1136 in the east end of London in the old Jewish quarter..."

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by ceoyoyo ( 59147 )

      Why would the word jewry be offensive?

      As for confusing, well, the relationships between religions are confusing. The various Christian sects and their relationship to Judaism particularly so.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by piojo ( 995934 )

        Why would the word jewry be offensive?

        The word isn't offensive--it would only be offensive if the church was claiming to be Jewish. (I had before never heard "Jewry" used as a location--only things like the "Jewish Quarter".)

        To understand why it's offensive when Christians say they're Jews, imagine you're a Catholic. Some guy (born Catholic) takes your Bible and starts a cult around it, decrying old tenets, adding new and incompatible beliefs, and worshipping another god (alongside your old God). The cult becomes very big, many times more numer

    • Re:Are they serious? (Score:4, Insightful)

      by AthanasiusKircher ( 1333179 ) on Tuesday January 12, 2010 @03:58PM (#30742600)

      This church is called "St Lawrence Jewry"? What a confusing and possibly offensive (to Jews) name for a church. Unless there's something I'm missing about British English.

      It's not something you're missing about "British English." It's something you're missing about history.

      With just one search, you could have clarified the historical reasons for this. The name dates back to a time when Jews were welcomed into England [wikipedia.org] (even as they were being persecuted elsewhere) after William the Conqueror arrived. The old Jewish quarter in London includes prominent streets like Old Jewry [wikipedia.org] and nearby old landmarks like St Lawrence Jewry [wikipedia.org].

      "Confusing"? Potentially. But it's a reference to an address whose name is almost a millennium old. "Offensive"? Only if you don't know anything about history. It sort of reminds me of the idiots who want to remove the term "Providence Plantations" from the name of the state Rhode Island (whose official name is "The State of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations" [slashdot.org]), because they somehow think that "plantation" only refers to places where there were slaves. That's not what it meant in the 17th century, when the colony was founded.

      Historical ignorance offends me. In the name of reason, try to educate yourself before assuming that a term or name from centuries ago must be intended to offend people.

      • Sorry -- the last link to Rhode Island was screwed up -- for anyone curious, it's here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhode_Island [wikipedia.org]

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Obyron ( 615547 )
        Not to mention that referring to the whole state as Rhode Island would make about as much sense as referring to the the whole of New York state as "Manhattan Island," or renaming Virginia to "Chincoteague Island." The state literally is Providence Plantation on land, as well as Rhode Island. For a similar concept see "Newfoundland and Labrador." These people don't just fail history, they fail geography.

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Rufty ( 37223 )
        And another old name that should not be forgot: here [wikipedia.org].

  • Exorcism for Windows viruses (Score:3, Funny)

    by Jon_Hanson ( 779123 ) <jon@the-hansons-az.net> on Tuesday January 12, 2010 @03:16PM (#30742130)
    They need an exorcism ritual for Windows viruses as well.

  • So how much more does a BLESSED jailbroken unlocked iPhone 3GS sell for on ebay?

    Sheldon

  • "May our tongues be gentle, our e-mails be simple and our websites be accessible."

    "Three shall be the number thou shalt count, and the number of the counting shall be three."

  • Wow, talk about progress! It used to be that if you wanted to see whether someone was a vampire you would have force them into holding a Bible to see if it burns their hands, but now all that you have to do is to bless your cell phone and then use it to send them a holy text!

  • ... now I want to see someone volunteer theirs to be thrown into the water for everyone to dive in and be the first to grab it. I hear that the winner is blessed with good luck for the rest of the year. Except if it was your phone thrown into the water, in which case it's probably off to a bad start.

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