by: Jordan Vetro 

Chrismas time: a time to celebrate the birth of Christ and show peace and love on earth towards your fellow men and women, and to give in the true spirit of Christ’s Law. Well, it should be, but it ain’t. No it ain’t. In today’s world, Christmas has been skewed and twisted into some deplorable business too demented for anyone to recognize.

So whose fault is it? Who has taken such a pure and beautiful thing and turned it into such a freakish and frightening thing? Oh, I know I know, its the big businesses right? Coca-Cola and Nike.

They’ve all gotten together and turned a giving holiday into a taking one so that they can manipulate the masses into handing over loads of cash. Yeah right. Who are we kidding?  Business executives can’t do that. Little do we know, they are under the control of a much deeper, more dangerous threat, that if left unmonitored could lead to our total and ultimate OBLIVION!

What I am really trying to say is that Christmas has become vulnerable to the dreaded virus that many of us have come to know as.. . COMMUNISM! That’s right everyone, the red stain. Beware! We are facing the next Cuban Missile Crisis, quietly shrouded. It’s true, friends and neighbors, that we have a true blue conspiracy on our hands. I shall show you now, how it all works.

Did you ever notice how much this guy:            looks like this guy:

                          .

The first guy is the Jolly Red fellow many of us have come to know as Santa Claus, St. Nick or Father Christmas. The second, as I’m sure many of you are aware, is Karl Marx, publisher of the Communist Manifesto and the father of modern Communism. That’s right. Santa Clause is the image of Karl Marx created by the communists to allow them to easily infiltrate our society, and soon, Santa’s going to make his big move.

So where is this all coming from? Well this guy of course,

This is Fidel. The current leader of Communist Cuba. Did we really think that he was gonna sit by and let capitalism take over? That’s where a 126 year old Joseph Stalin, a.k.a. This guy:

He is the previous leader of Communist Russia and is still hiding today, growing his long white beard and eating gourmet, preparing one day to fly in on his rocket powered sleigh shuttle, to bring Communism into your home!

In all truth, we should have seen the signs. I mean, come on. RED? The world’s favorite Christmas colour. Ever seen this berfore?

And honestly, fir trees, do we not see these growing somewhere particular in the world?

That is Siberia, in the Northern parts of what USED to be communist USSR, where all the Russian Gulags (work camps) used to be. They are using our big purchase natures to ship over their fir trees and make billions of dollars off of our capitalist natures!

AND WE NEVER SAW IT COMING.

And how did I figure all of this out? How was I the one who discovered the true and vile nature of everyone’s favorite holiday? Because last year, I got up on Santa’s knee and I asked for a pony for Christmas and all I got was socks and stuff. This could only be the work of Communists!

So please I beg you. This Christmas, forget about the commercialism and the pomp and finery. Because you might just be under the affect of communism.

by: Curtis Healy

It has been very eye opening for me to go through my pains and see that my pain is not as severe as others’.  It’s definitely not something major compared to others, but as I look and as it builds, it more often than not doesn’t change how I feel. Pain is pain and suffering, suffering. Jesus didn’t come to mend the severely broken hearted, or the quasi crippled, or the half way orphaned; he came for us all, not caring about the severity of our suffering but that it was suffering at all. Our major and minor malfunctions unified every single one of his actions from his conception to ascension, and it will motivate his return. His love for us, and his desire to correct pain in whatever form is what unified Christ’s life; that was where God the Father was working – where there was pain and injustice.  The only worthy suffering was the passion of Christ, and in all our places of agony no matter the minute, we are united to Christ in his passion and his work. And he begs us that his mission would unite us all under the banner.

But we use pain as an excuse to separate and to justify ourselves. Pain must only justify compassion and service and a broken heart, or you make your own pain meaningless in the face and to the heart of God. It crucifies Christ a second time, because you say that his suffering on behalf of your pain is not worth your sacrifice for the sake of compassion. It is no different than the parable of the debtors. [I'm not saying that we should in any way flaunt our pain, etc, but we cannot put it on a pedestal and we cannot pretend like ours makes us special or unique, even if the causes are.]

It is ironic, though that because we all struggle we have less ability to band together and change with corrections. But that simply means the need for us to bind together and support each other in all things is more desperate. A community of Christians should be a marriage to each and every one of us – a partnership both emotionally and monetarily – where none are wanting and all pick up the slack everywhere. But that is not the case for our communities – Christian or not – they are poisoned by the ‘necessity’ lie of the business world, where the slack ends up hanging those who encounter it. This is a lie that would disappear if we became more concerned with pooling our resources and becoming communally ’self’ sufficient. In essence, we would pool ourselves and become the perpetual of body and soul, the person and the shell, the body of believers and the identity of its tenants – a functional contemporary monastery. But we fail at this because of the trap to survive and that drives us apart and keeps up from coming together.

The thing is that barriers are manifested unconsciously, based on our need to be ourselves. It is being ourselves at the expense of being Christ, that is the issue. We watch movies like ‘Mean Girls’ and look at the plastics and think we’re not like them in the effort to preserve ourselves and our identities.  We should never wish to lose them or cease to be ourselves. But how many times do we do that to real people? We see someone like in ‘Mean Girls’ (though we’re not as vindictive and conceited and vain as the plastics in that movie) and we put up a barrier.  And then we make it impossible for us to be Christ; we make it impossible for them to see us and Jesus holding hands, because we have closed off the unifier that God has placed inside all of us: Pain. Whatever the reasons or the extent of that pain and suffering, pain is pain and it is the unifier of humanity. 

We take on the attitude that ‘we’re not plastic, we’re real’ when encountering other people.  But we make our hearts a harder stone than any plastic, and we make ourselves more like those who crucified Christ. We forget one very important thing when we do that; that we are struggling through the same battlefield, because we all experience pain.  To whatever degree, pain is pain and struggle is struggle. The difference is, as Christians we need to seek to bring unity with everyone through compassion because sin separates us all.  Whether someone becomes a Christian or not, if you can cast down a barrier between you, them, and others, then you have served in the mission of Christ and thwarted some aspect of sin and upheld the Cross and resurrection. Until we seek to support ourselves in a way such as that then we Christians will be the reigning kings of friendly fire incidents, shooting down our brothers in the fight. I think we need to take up the attitude expressed in a quote from Captain Corelli’s Mandolin.  “If I see a man suffering then that man is my brother.” And guess what, whether shown or not, we all are suffering.

Now that I have been side tracked, and have expressed two ideas, which do link together in some form, how might we learn to be vulnerable and daring, unthreatening and mending, and actually change the world?  As I see it we are all, myself included just making merry with injustices that are not only killing the world but us and our ability to Christ; we just accept this as normal life. I will make no excuses; life is hard and painful, and it always will be.  As for us making it or accepting everything that makes it harder by system, it’s about time that ended and we stopped helping it.

by: Jordan Vetro

Merry Christmas from the Voice on the Street!

Our question of the issue is “When did you stop believing in Santa Claus (if ever)?”

In the spirit of the holidays we had everyone dress up like me. (Don’t try and understand, just accept; it’s better that way.)

I was 16. When I was about 10 I saw a silhouette of Santa and his Reindeer in the moon, and I thought; “Oh, it’s true.” It took me till I was 16 to give that up and realize it was probably an advertisement or an illusion or something.
–Mike Salvatore

About 8 or 9. Later I realized his name was Panty Slaus.
–Dan Cook

I’ve never believed in Santa Claus.
–Matt Cardases

About 2.
–Stephanie Vincent

I have never believed in Santa Claus. My parents strongly felt it was a consciously immoral thing to do; that is to lie to your children from a very early age. The fact that parents all over North America today can so consciously lie to their children is positively deplorable. I completey agree with my parents’ decision to keep me from such a misguided tradition, and I strongly feel that if the world only had more of Jesus in their lives, they would change. “I am the way, the truth and the life” sayeth the Lord, and the key word here is truth.
–Tabitha Rozeluk

I was 14.
–Jason Edgar

I’ve never believed in Santa Claus.
–Steve Kay

I’ve never believed in Santa Claus.
–Julie-Anne Wideman

I was four. I was at the Santa Claus parade and I indignantly asked my mother why all the reindeer were made out of cardboard.
–Janice Anderson

Dear Queen B,
What’s the worst meal you’ve ever eaten in the EBC cafeteria and how much of it did you eat?
Truly Scrumptious

Dear Truly Scrumptious,
I am probably the worst person to ask this question, or possibly the best.
You see I am known by those who work in the EBC cafeteria as an incredibly
picky eater.  So to ask me what meal I have not liked is like to ask a bank
teller how much money he/she has seen in a day.  Well you get the point.
However, this is one meal that always sticks out in my mind, and I know I’m
not alone in this.  Last year there was a dinner in which pot pie (saying it
now even makes my stomach turn) was served.  Each person had the choice of
turkey (which was the good choice) or beef (which I will forever dread).
Needless to say, I chose beef that night-I guess I was feeling brave.  To
say this in the most polite way, from what I understand those of us who
chose the beef potpies were left, well, let’s say you couldn’t forget it.
I’ll just say that there was a lot of stomach groans by many people that
night.  And the groans screamed and begged for mercy, but none was shown
that night.  No there was no mercy by that beef potpie.
Brittany
P.S But I remember dessert was excellent!
 

by: Mike Salvatore

Today we’re going to talk about hamburgers.

Hamburgers are a tough food item to review.  Everyone serves them, and many taste the same.  I have by no means tried all of the hamburgers around, so if you know a good burger that I haven’t mentioned, send your review to voiceofebc@gmail.com

There are 5 hamburgers in the tri-cities that stand out in my mind, and they’re all worth trying.  They are located at:

Wimpy’s Diner – 1470 Weber Street East, Kitchener

Mel’s Diner – 140 University Avenue West, Waterloo

Crabby Joe’s – 296 Fairway Road South, Kitchener

Chill & Grill – 160 University Avenue West, Waterloo

Oscar’s Family Restaurant & Deli – 835 Victoria Street North, Kitchener

Wimpy’s Diner

The “famous” wimpy burger makes the restaurant worth going to, though I don’t always think much of their wait staff…especially the one with long brown hair and glasses: watch out.  If you don’t tip her enough, you’re in trouble.  The burger itself is huge.  It’s so big that I often cut off the meat that hangs outside the bun and eat it separately. 

Mel’s Diner

An assortment of burgers can be found here.  I usually order the Bogart Burger, but only because I can’t finish the Easy Rider Burger.  What sets this one apart is it being served on garlic toast with a choice of seemingly whatever topping I can think of.  I can’t finish it because it has 3 ½ lb patties weighing it down.  Last time I ordered it I saved the leftovers and I still couldn’t finish it.  The Easy Rider ended up being 3 meals for me, but I’ve heard of people who can finish it off in one sitting.  Also to note:  Mel’s is open 24 hours.

Crabby Joe’s

These guys put together a solid burger that no one can complain about.  The meat is good, the bun is good, and it’s topped well.  I wouldn’t go out of my way to eat a crabby burger, but I know it’s there for me when I want it.

Chill & Grill

Picture Harvey’s but with choice of sautéed onions and mushrooms, more sauces and more veggies added to their toppings list.  Chefs at The Grill cook the food in front of you and the burgers taste fantastic when they’re finished.  I find it difficult not to opt for the bacon and cheese every time I go, because they seem to do it just right every time. 

Oscar’s Family Restaurant & Deli

I’ve only eaten at Oscar’s once, and I didn’t even order the hamburger, but Mary did.  I got to finish it off, and I was quite happy at the time.  Oscar’s gets an honorable mention for serving whole mushrooms on their burger when ordered, instead of the wussy sliced mushrooms that I’ve been forced to become accustomed to.  Everything else about the hamburger is good too. 

by: Stephen Weber

“Watch out for people who try to dazzle you with big words and intellectual double-talk. They want to drag you off into endless arguments that never amount to anything. They spread their ideas through the empty traditions of human beings and the empty superstitions of spirit beings. But that’s not the way of Christ. Everything of God gets expressed in him, so you can see and hear him clearly. You don’t need a telescope, a microscope, or a horoscope to realize the fullness of Christ, and the emptiness of the universe without him. When you come to him, that fullness comes together for you, too. His power extends over everything.” (Colossians 2:8 The Message)I love debates, and I love discussions.  I thrive on it.  How far, however, can one go with a discussion?  How long should we persist in “endless arguments that never amount to anything”?

The answer to this all depends on the person.  As I said, I thrive on debate.  When I find another who feels similarly, we can go on for hours.  When we are done, however, we are still okay, still friends.  We don’t allow the discussion to come between us or our faith.

Fundamentalism is the return to the fundamentals, or foundations, of our faith:

“For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God…” (Ephesians 2:8 NKJV)

“…[I]f Christ has not been raised, your faith is worthless; you are still in your sins….  But now Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who are asleep.” (1 Corinthians 15:17,20 NASB)

“For God did not send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be saved. ” (John 3:17 NKJV)

Us who enjoy it–debate.  Those who do not–you do not have to!  Christianity is not founded on a set of complicated and debatable concepts, but on one simple truth.  Christ is raised.  Much is important, and knowledge can surely strengthen our faith in the One who has saved us, but we are saved even in our disagreement.

Cry with the disciples, “Who then can be saved?” (Luke 18:26) and live as though punishment is inevitable.

Believe with Paul that “by grace you have been saved” (Ephesians 2:8) and Christ’s resurrection is enough.

“What I mean is this, that each one of you [either] says, I belong to Paul, or I belong to Apollos, or I belong to Cephas (Peter), or I belong to Christ.  Is Christ (the Messiah) divided into parts? Was Paul crucified on behalf of you? Or were you baptized into the name of Paul?” (1 Corinthians 1:12-13 Amplified Bible)

by: Wesley Hague

Mountains seem so tall and wide
impossible to pass with a single stride.
The quick way around is what we seek
To have it done, in less than a week.

Yet with a rush, or this instance success
we more and more for things begin to press.
More we want on our Golden Plate
Enough for our ravenous appetites to sate.

A challenge is what we so desperately need
for our own lives, that we truly heed.
That hard work done, by our own hand
Is really what that God has planned.

Life, will not always be easy and sweet
It will not go by as easy as some treat.
With sweat and toil, some pain and strife.
Truly will add richness to our life.

by: Rachel Neumeister

I have looked at this picture a lot since I found it two days ago on page 6 of the September 1 issue of Christian Current.  You would never expect to find such a thing in a secular newspaper, as it forces the reader out of the cushioned Western world we live in where personal hygiene and nutrition are second nature.  The flies on this boy reminded me of when I was watching my dog die and he could not keep the flies off his own face.  It hit me that this is a person.  This poor child and the millions of others like him, is just as much of a person as your next door neighbor or the Queen of England.  Why was I fortunate enough to be born into a home with Christian parents, a roof over my head and food on my table?  Why am I me and not this little boy?  Who would even have the nerve to question this photo of being “politically incorrect?” just because it makes us feel uncomfortable about our lack of caring? 
 

Is being aware that this happens enough?  Is feeling sympathy, being heart wrenched or shedding a tear enough? What is?

Full Name: Taryn Shea Wiley

Hometown: Collingwood

Currently Resides: Lower Lehman 8

Home Church: Collingwood Church of God

Family: A daddy and mommy, little sister Mir (my best friend), baby brother Shane (coolest cat I know).

Pets: The three most awesome fish on campus: Pablo, Norm and Sebastian. And I have a stupid dog at home named Chloe. But growing up I had a husky named Tusk and she was the greatest dog ever. She would pull me and my sister around on a sled.

How did you get to EBC: I drove in my Jeep, which should be back in my life very soon.  : )

Educational Background: I went to elementary school with Matt Lockhart, than I went to high school.  After graduating I went to Nipissing University for a year. At Nipissing I was majoring in Math and English. Now I am at EBC for Counseling.

Favorite Book and Why: I cannot think of one right now but I was definitely a Nancy Drew girl growing up.

Favorite Food: It changes depending on my mood, but right now I could really go for some beets.

Favorite Bible Verse: “But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace to me was not without effect.” 1 Corinthians 15:10

Most Influential Person and Why: My Papa, I would say that he has been my spiritual mentor and I love him.

Favorite Cartoon Character: Big Bird – really just the original Sesame Street Crew.

Dream Vacation: I would really love a week to go away to a cottage with a group of friends and just relax.

Course you would love to teach or take at EBC and why: I’m pretty pumped about group dynamics next semester cause Jeffery and Midget and PJ or going to be in my class with me.

If you could change places with anyone on campus who would it be and why? Howie – so that I could live in the Ghetto.

Name you wish you were given: I like my name - my parents did well

Blood type: type O

Favorite TV show(s): Always been a 7th Heaven fan.  Otherwise CSI and House
What are you wearing right now? Black track pants, black trailblazers hoodie, white tank top and runners (plus undergarments). 

How do you want to die? I would personally love the opportunity to be on the mission field.

Most memorable puberty experience: I was a little self-conscious of my ankles; then in grade seven my teacher told me I had fat ankles.

If you could go on a date with anyone at EBC, who would it be and why: Michelle Gosnell; she’s hot!

Biggest library/video store late fee: not applicable

Embarrassing story (50-100 words):  After walking too much for one day, I decided to cut across the expressway on the way back to the school to save time and energy.  We made it across but had to climb a fence.  I made it up okay but on the way down I ended up ripping off a piece of the bum of my pants on the fence.  It was no good; they were Parasuco’s.