WHY THIS CHRISTIAN BELIEVES IN SAME SEX MARRIAGE

May 16th, 2012

I am Bronco fan. I have a good friend who is a Raider fan. If I take him to a Bronco game and put a Bronco jersey on him, have I made him a Bronco fan? Not likely.

I am also a Christian. As a believer, my definition of marriage is based on Christ’s words. That marriage is a union between a man and a woman. So some of my Christian friends wonder how I can support same-sex marriage. Here’s why.

I don’t kid myself; I know that the majority of people do not believe what I believe about Christ. The non-believer is not living their life by the same set of morals that I am. We understand this, but when it comes to marriage we want them to adopt our definition of marriage. As if this will somehow make them more Christ-like. My favorite theologian, C.S. Lewis understood this; he states that:

“A great many people seem to think that if you are a Christian yourself you should try to make divorce difficult for everyone. I do not think that. At least I know I should be very angry if the Mahommedans tried to prevent the rest of us from drinking wine. My own view is that the Churches should frankly recognize that the majority of people are not Christians and, therefore, cannot be expected to live Christian lives. There ought to be two distinct kinds of marriage: one governed by the State with rules enforced on all citizens, the other governed by the Church with rules enforced by her on her own members. The distinction ought to be quite sharp, so that a man knows which couples are married in a Christian sense and which are not.”

I don’t want to put words in Lewis’s mouth. I realize he’s talking about divorce and not same sex marriage, but the point is clear. He understands that forcing the Christian definition of marriage on the non-believer is about as useful as making a Raider fan wear a Bronco jersey in hopes of making them a Bronco fan.

C.S. Lewis also warns, “— how far Christians, if they are voters or Members of Parliament, ought to try to force their views of marriage on the rest of the community by embodying them in the divorce laws.”

Again, while Lewis is talking about divorce his point is clear, we should not “force our views of marriage on the rest of the community.” It really serves no one. You aren’t making them Christian. You are simply stopping them from what I personally feel is one of the greatest things this side of Heaven.

I know some will argue that the laws have been this way for so long so why should we change them now. This “tradition” point of view really holds no value. We have changed many laws over the years to be fairer to all people. Remember slavery and not allowing women to vote? Still think that was a good thing?

In closing, I will admit that I am no theologian. I am simply a guy trying to live my life as best as I can to please Jesus. I know that Jesus said, “Love your neighbor as yourself.” In fact he said there was only one commandment greater than this.

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WERE YOU “PANDALIZED”?

May 17th, 2011

In the past few weeks, I have started seeing the SEO community start using the term "Pandalized."

Pandalized is the term used for SEOs to say their web sites have been penalized by Google specifically through the Google Panda update.

Personally, I am not sure how I like to use words like this, but it does make for a quicker way to say - "I was penalized by Google after the Google Panda update." Instead you can just say I was "Pandalized."

In fact, there is a domain at pandalized.com. The site has graphs showing some of the sites that were Pandalized. The domain was purchased about a month ago by an unnamed individual.

Our ongoing coverage and stories on the Content Farmer/Panda update:

Have you been Pandalized?

Forum discussion at WebmasterWorld.


Posted in Google Search Engine Optimization | Comments Off

TEST QUESTIONS FOR 70-519 – PRO: DESIGNING AND DEVELOPING WEB APPLICATIONS USING MICROSOFT .NET FRAMEWORK 4

January 26th, 2011

So last week I passed the Microsoft test 70-519 and thought I would share a sample of the test questions with you. It’s quite daunting the range of skills the test pulls from. I have been a software developer for over twelve years and this test seems to have found a way to span almost my entire arsenal of skills. Or at least my Microsoft skills. Here are some of the skills measured:

- ASP.NET (both Web Forms and MVC)
- C#
- Ajax
- jQuery
- Windows Communications Foundation (WCF)
- ADO.NET
- ASP.NET Web Services
- LINQ and Entity Framework
- IIS
- Unit Testing, debugging and deployment
- Application state, session state, and request state (for example, ViewState, ControlState, Cache object, cookies, and client-side persistence)
- Globalization – designing to support local, regional, language, or cultural preferences

There’s probably more that I’m forgetting. Bottom line is wow, it’s a good thing that I have played with [most] of this stuff at one time or another because you aren’t just going to get lucky when it comes to passing this test.

Some questions include:

You need to recommend appropriate technologies for designing Web forms for entry and retrieval of news items.
Which technologies should you recommend? (Each correct answer presents a complete solution. Choose two.)

A. ASMX and SOAP
B. WCF Data Services and jQuery
C. ASP.NET MVC 2 and Microsoft AJAX
D. Entity Framework and Microsoft Silverlight

Answer: B and C

You are designing an ASP.NET MVC 2 Web application. You have the following requirements:
“Type safety must be validated at compile time.
“Code must not require explicit run-time type casting.
You need to pass data between the controllers and the views within the Web application. Which approach should you recommend?

A. Use the View Data Dictionary class.
B. Use the Temp Data Dictionary class.
C. Use strongly typed view model classes.
D. Use dynamic object view model classes.

Answer: C

You are designing a deployment process for a new ASP.NET Web application.
The company requires the application to be compiled to a single DLL for deployment.
You need to design a deployment process that meets the requirement.
Which approach should you recommend?

A. Use MSDeploy.
B. Use the Web Deployment tool.
C. Use a Web Deployment project.
D. Use the ASP.NET Compilation tool.

Answer: C

You are designing an ASP.NET MVC 2 application.
You need to centralize the logic for handling and logging unhandled exceptions.
Which approach should you recommend?

A. Use try and catch on every method.
B. Override the One Exception method of each controller.
C. Decorate all controllers with a custom Handle Error attribute
D. Decorate all controllers with the default Handle Error attribute

Answer: C

You need to design a solution for incorporating NTFS permissions in the Web application.
Which two approaches should you recommend? (Each correct answer presents part of the solution. Choose two.)

A. Grant the Network Service account only Read permission to the root directory.
B. Grant Read permission and Write permission to the root directory.
C. Grant the Network Service account Full Control permission to the Upload folder.
D. Grant the Network Service account Read permission and Write permission to the Upload folder.

Answer: A and D

You need to design a solution for capturing an exception. Which approach should you recommend?

A. Use a Page_Error method.
B. Use a HandleError attribute.
C. Use a CustomErrors element.
D. Use an Application_Error method.

Answer: B

Good luck to all, you’re gonna need it…

Posted in .NET, Ajax, C#, Microsoft | Comments Off

DAILY SEARCH FORUM RECAP: DECEMBER 3, 2010

December 3rd, 2010

Here is a recap of what happened in the search forums today, through the eyes of the Search Engine Roundtable and other search forums on the web.

Search Engine Roundtable Stories:

Here is a recap of what happened in the search forums today, through the eyes of the Search Engine Roundtable and other search forums on the web.

Search Engine Roundtable Stories:

Other Great Search Forum Threads:


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VIDEO RECAP OF WEEKLY SEARCH BUZZ :: DECEMBER 3, 2010

December 3rd, 2010

itunes-subscribe-video.pngI am doing this video recap remotely today via St. Louis, so please excuse any issues. This week we covered how some SEOs claimed they were treating their customers poorly in order to get publicity, because any publicity, even bad, helps with Google rankings. Google then combatted them and others by degrading really bad customer service merchants. Google and Bing confirmed they use social factors, such as Twitter and Facebook in ranking the web results. Google promised to improve their DMCA and copyright handling. We ran a poll asking if Google should remove Q&A sites form the search results. Google Places now asks owners to verify edits made on Google Maps. Google is testing "searches related to" above the AdWords Map. You can't remove access to others from your Google AdSense console. Google added the report offensive images back to the image search. Google had a nice logo for Rosa Parks and Yahoo did Worlds AIDS day logo. Google has a special Chanukah easter egg, it's cool. SphinnCon Israel's agenda is now live, so sign up. We launched a brand new look and system this week. And yesterday was our seventh birthday, I've been covering search for seven years! That was this past week at the Search Engine Roundtable.

Make sure to subscribe to our video feed or subscribe directly on iTunes to be notified of these updates and download the video in the background. You can also watch this live and ask questions during the show, typically Friday mornings around 9:30 (EST) at seroundtable.com/live, follow @rustybrick to be notified when we air. Here is the YouTube version of the feed:

For the original iTunes version, click here.

Search Topics of Discussion:

Please do subscribe via iTunes or on your favorite RSS reader. Don't forget to comment below with the right answer and good luck!


Posted in Search Buzz Video Round Recap | Comments Off

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