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The other day I got a catalog from a Christian book store chain promoting their new Easter products. One of the items you could buy was a “crown of thorns.” For a mere $49.95 you could own a crown for your desk? Your mantle? Where do you properly store/display a crown of thorns? Do you think the Roman soldiers that made it at the time said to each other, “You know, some day this is going to make a really sweet paper weight.” But what can I say, when it comes to Easter and Christmas but shut your mouth not Halloween, we love us some weird memorabilia.

If you ever went to Vacation Bible School then you know exactly what I’m talking about. For some reason, Christians love finding ways to save money on cookies. That’s why instead of Oreos you always had to eat “chocolate sandwiches” or some other cookie with a generic sounding name. And they aren’t the same. I know they told you that “jungle crackers” were the same as “animal crackers” but you knew the difference, you knew.

Read more stuff Christians like.

A few years ago I was asked to create a press release for a CEO of a company. My client wanted me to write something extolling how dedicated to being honest about sales results this particular CEO was. The only problem was that she wasn’t.

She was known for being a bit blurry when it came to the reality of the sales the company was generating. The press, the stockholders, the employees, everyone that knew this lady was going to see right through my press release and instantly think, “No way am I listening to this lady. I know her past.”

What I wanted to do, which was eventually rejected, was come out with the truth. I wanted to disarm the readers by opening up with a statement that said, “In the past, numbers have not been my greatest strength.” If I said that, all the readers would have to pause before throwing a rock at us. In essence I would have removed the biggest objective they had to reading the rest of the press release.

The same thing happens with Christianity.

We do some things really well and we do some things less than really well. But when we pretend we’re perfect, people see right through it and won’t believe anything else we say. And that’s the point of this project. I want to be honest and upfront and hopefully a little funny about the issues the church and Christians struggle with sometimes. I want to say, “Whoa, whoa, please don’t judge me or God by Christian radio.” I want to admit the times we’ve dropped the ball on issues or ideas that people called to love their neighbor should have knocked out of the park. I want to blow up misconceptions and preconceptions about what it means to be a Christian.

And I need your help. For the first time in my blogging experiment, I want to open up the posts to other people. Got an idea about “Stuff Christians Like?” Email me and if it fits the theme of the site I’ll put it up and give you all the credit.

So check out the posts. Laugh a little. Get mad a little and if you finish here, don’t forget to stop by ProdigalJon.com and 97secondswithgod.com .

p.s. this is a direct rip off from a really popular secular site and started on March 21. Instead of cramming the first 40 posts on one day that would never have been scrolled through, I went back and loaded all the content day by day starting with January 1st. That way the days are all evenly laid out and when you click on “March” you don’t just see one thick day trying to carry 40 posts. See post 1 for more details.