Eli Manning Turns Water Into Wine

My father and I spent ten minutes today discussing Eli Manning’s performance in the Super Bowl.

“Even you can’t deny it,” my father said. “That last play of the game was divine intervention.”

“No, it wasn’t. It was –"

“DIVINE INTERVENTION!” he repeated. “That play was a miracle!”

“It was not miraculous,” I said. “It was good, but it wasn’t a miracle.”

“It was the work of God!” my father insisted.

If you think my father’s commentary was ridiculous, just wait until you hear what Dr. Joanne G. Sujansky, CSP, CEO and Founder of Pittsburgh-based KEYGroup, said in their recent press release “Hey, Corporate America!”

“When the New York Giants' 28-year-old quarterback led his team to a Super Bowl victory, he showed 97 million viewers that Gen Ys are the do-it-and-prove-it generation,” reads the release.

"If this Gen Y quarterback could do it with the best team in the NFL, what's to stop Gen Ys from moving our country's corporate teams to their Super Bowls?" Dr. Sujansky asks.

Gen Ys doing-it and proving-it for a corporate team in a Super Bowl equivalent?

It’ll take a miracle to figure that mess out.

"I've been praying for a way out of here for three days!"

When I was a junior in high school, my theology teacher recommended that I attend a leadership camp.

Michelle, my partner-in-crime in high school, was nominated too and we were shipped off to Clark Summit, Pa. for the first week in July.

Our first clue that something was amiss was that we were staying in a convent.

Our second clue was that there were about fifty kids in groups of five or six standing on the convent lawn and they appeared to be coordinating some sort of dance routine.

This was not a leadership camp. It was a religious leadership camp. And, presumably, it was for boys and girls with bad attitudes.

“You’re going to leave me here?!” I hissed at my parents as they got back in their car. “With these freaks!”

They didn’t listen to me.

“No, really,” I said to my parents. “Do you see these people?! They’re freaks!”

But my parents left Michelle and me with the camp supervisor in the gravel parking lot that afternoon and all three of us knew it was going to be a long week.

“Put your things inside and then join us on the lawn for a game of Red Rover,” she told us.

Prior to that weekend, I don’t think I played Red Rover since grade school - something not uncommon for the normal population.

Reluctantly, Michelle and I joined hands with some scummy kid and swung our arms half-heartedly.

“Red Rover, Red Rover - Let Jesus Come Over!” we chanted.

And kids on both teams looked at us, confused.

“That’s right!” we said, scanning the playing field. “Not coming, is he? That’s because he’s not real!”

It was a little ditty we worked up five minutes before when we were hiding inside with everyone’s suitcases.

While certainly entertaining now, that unwittingly made our Jesus camp experience exponentially more uncomfortable because we became the souls everyone wanted to save most.

Michelle ended up doing OK, but try as they may, they could not break my spirit of spite and angst.

From discussing the religious undertones of Phil Collins songs, to the rebirth party we had at 8 p.m. the second night to the prayer bonfire – I just did not give in.

But in case I have a change of heart, there’s still a chance for me – I could attend Ave Maria University’s “Picnic at the Prep.”

Not to be outdone, the Next Level Church of Matthews commemorated the launch of a new campus with a shot glass give-away.

"The glasses, which feature the church logo, an invitation card, and the words "Give Us A Shot", are designed to encourage attendance at the new campus," reads the release.

Now that's a church event I could "come over" for.

Word Processing Y2K

When I got my first writing assignment in college, I sat in front of my computer for at least five minutes before I turned to my roommate and said, “Do I just type this up in WordPad, or what?”

In case you were wondering, this event took place in September 2000 – and the ridiculousness of it can be directly attributed to my Catholic high school, which did not have a computer lab equipped with the Internet, Microsoft Word, or color-display monitors.

Apparently, the Computer Club was concerned with more important things – such as organizing their annual Valentine Gram program, where the entire student body filled out a questionnaire – on paper – the answers of which were manually entered by the Club into a computer program that matched respondents with like answers.

From a pool of at least 500 people, I was compatible with a total of three - one of whom, I kid you not, is now serving a life sentence for murdering his boyfriend.

But I’ve been lead to believe that things are improving technologically at Catholic schools around the country because GodTube.com, “the World's First Virtual Video Bible and Virtual Video Prayer Wall” is apparently the “#1 fastest growing website in the U.S.” according to a Dec. 18 news release.

“GodTube.com…today brought the Bible into the digital age with the launch of the first Virtual Video Bible and the world's first Virtual Video Prayer Wall, offering the 2.1 billion Christians around the world a whole new way to experience their faith this Christmas season.”

Might I recommend the video “Baby Got Book.”

SOURCE: GodTube.com