The origins of Easter

April 4, 2007
by Rodney Olsen
4 Comments

Why do we eat hot cross buns at Easter?

What are the chocolate eggs all about?

Is it true that Easter originated as a pagan celebration?

My regular Wednesday morning guest on 98.5 Sonshine FM is Ross Clifford who is the Principal of Morling College in New South Wales and current President of the Baptist Union of Australia. Each week we chat about a range of issues relating to spirituality and belief.

Today we talked about Easter and asked whether it’s a time of religious significance or just a great excuse for a four day holiday.

One of the interesting things that came out of our conversation was the idea that we can celebrate not only the sacrifice that bought our freedom 2000 years ago but that we can live it out by demanding freedom for all. Ross talked about the modern slavery and human trafficking. There are more people in slavery today than at any other time in history.

If you want to do something about ensuring the freedom of all humanity you can visit the Stop the Traffik to learn more and find out how you can do your bit.

Will the Easter eggs you buy for your children be made with cocoa beans grown and harvested with West African slave labour? Your choices can make a difference.

This Easter will you be celebrating only what Jesus did for you or will you be doing your best to extend that forgiveness and freedom to ‘the least of these’?

You can hear our conversation by left clicking here or you could right click here to save the mp3 and listen later.

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Simple, Relevant, Unexpected

April 3, 2007
by Rodney Olsen
8 Comments


Good advertising should be simple, relevant and unexpected.

I caught this over at Memoir and just had to share it with you.

Brilliant.

If only every advertisement was this entertaining.

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It's over for another year

April 2, 2007
by Rodney Olsen
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Last Tuesday, the 27th of March, 40 men and women started riding more than 700 kilometres from Albany to Perth, raising money to help fund the excellent work that Youth Focus does. They arrived back in Perth on Saturday morning.

It was the fifth annual Ride for Youth and this year alone the event has raised over $500 000. When all the money is in for the ride the 2007 total is expected to be around $550 000.

Did you know that here in Australia, around 600 more people commit suicide each year than are killed in car accidents? We hear a lot about the tragic loss of life on our roads, and so we should, but we don’t often hear about the tragic loss of life through people who simply decide that they no longer wish to keep living.

Youth Focus is one organisation trying to do something to turn these horrific figures around. Youth Focus is a West Australian, non-profit community based organisation working with young people who are showing early signs associated with suicide, depression and self-harm. Youth Focus can also provide services to their families. Youth Focus values young lives by ensuring the emotional well-being of young people, developing their self worth and offering them the opportunity to reach their full potential. The Youth and Family Services Team comprises of professionally qualified youth and family counsellors with extensive experience working in this specialised area.

It’s not too late to support the riders. You can click here if you’d like to donate.

Over the past few weeks I’ve kept up to date with training and preparations for the ride by chatting to a couple of the riders during my morning radio programme on 98.5 Sonshine FM.

I talked to James Sutherland, who has been on each of the five rides so far, and Sue Johnston, who was a rider for the first time this year. We had our final chat this morning and it was very encouraging to hear about how well the event went. Despite some tough conditions, there were no accidents and the team worked together very well.

You can listen to our final conversation by clicking here.

I’m wondering whether instead of interviewing the riders for next year’s event, I might even join them.

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Tipping Update Round One

April 2, 2007
by Rodney Olsen
4 Comments

Footy’s back.

If you follow AFL I hope your team did OK.

I was very pleased to see the Eagles get across the line. They managed to still be one point ahead when the siren sounded.

I wonder how well all the footy tippers are doing. I picked 5 out of 8 and thought I wasn’t doing too well but it seems that a lot of people ended up with similar results. I reckon I’ve got a whole season to catch up.

It’s not too late to join The Journey Footy Tipping Competition. Just click the link then scroll down to the button to join the competition. Three out of the seven that are in the comp so far got 5 correct for round one. Scott Sladden is on top of the tipping ladder thanks to his choice of margin.

I’m now third out of seven in The Journey Footy Tipping Competition but as far as the whole footytips.com.au site goes, I am ranked 48,223 out of 190,080 tippers in the 2007 AFL home and away season. Certainly a lot of ropom for improvement but not too bad.

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