PopTarts:

I am a sad sad creature who just had cake mix for lunch

What, no canned icing?! (You did actually make the mix into batter, right?)

Susan, what kind of films does Dylan like?

Hmm. DH is really anti-Million Dollar Baby, and none of the others grab me.

Maybe we should forget the movie and just go for a really fantabulous dinner.

That reminds me of Educating Rita "A tree landing on a man is not a tragedy.
"It is if you're the poor sod under the tree, isn't it?" (I went to a chandeliers hitting cleavage place, is why)

In addition to that, many believe that people are alive because God wants us to worship him, but he doesn't need us to do so. However, we are taught that it is our duty to Him to go to church and worship Him. How does it benefit God any if I do or do not go to church? Why should I go to church if I don't get anything out of it and He doesn't need it?

I wasn't taught that it was my duty to go to church in worship Him, in quite that way. I was taught and still believe (or believe, again) that I need church (because I need fellowship with other believers for support and growth, much like fandom and Buffistas, if you want a less serious example). Likewise, it is not that God needs my worship, but that I need to worship God (see Augustine, and the God-shaped hole in the soul).

If you don't believe, what reason would you have to go to church. If you do believe, but are not getting anything out of church, there can be many different reasons for that (says the woman who was absent from church from ages 18 to 36, despite the fact that she believed), and that's what you might want to start looking at. Similarly, if you aren't sure what you believe, you might want to investigate what you do and do not believe (which is not always the same as like and dislike) about your current path, and start from there.

Jen, Maria, JZ, thanks, and the post is up here: [link]

JZ, there's a special footnote dedication just to you. *g*

Fwiw, the post is way expanded from what I was going to put here originally, very long, and (all flavors of) Christian church-goer specific. It may not interest any of you, even the principal participants in the conversation which inspired it.

Jen doesn't need God because she's high on life!

Heh. I'd never thought of it that way but you're completely correct.

Off to a coffeeshop for some artificial wakefulness and the hope that I'll be able to get some reading done. I'm so far behind....

Well, mixed, of course.

I'm relieved. I had a horrifying vision of your sitting in the corner with a box and a spoon.

Susan, what kind of films does Dylan like?

Well, aside from the obvious gimmes that we love equally (anything by Pixar, LotR, etc.), he's, for lack of a better word, a bit more lit-ficcy in his tastes than I am. Movies toward his end of the spectrum that we both enjoyed were Lost in Translation and that one whose name I'm forgetting with the guy back in NJ for the funeral and Natalie Portman.

Life is cool but I hear the hangover sucks.