Phil Vischer one of the creators of Veggie Tales. Veggie Tales started as a children's video series and did not only contain sound Biblical teaching for children. It also was quite hillarious for the whole family.
Vischer has worked on other projects since Veggie Tales such as Jelly Telly and What's In the Bible. He also has a podcast called Holy Post which this video comes from. In the video Vischer gives a 17 minute history lesson about racia inequality in this country. It is both harrowing and fascinating. If you are a big Veggie Tale fan, it may be a little disconcerting as at points it sounds like Bob the Tomato is giving a history lesson. (Vischer provide's Bob's voice for Veggie Tales.) Once you get past that, I hope you are as challenged by this as I was.
In researching a piece for another one of my blogs I came upon this gem of a dialogue between Billy Graham and Woody Allen.
A little background, Woody Allen was for a long time one of my favorite playwrights, actors, writers and directors. I love his intellectual yet self depreacating humor. I still think that Crimes and Misdemeanors is a modern masterpiece telling the story of the power of sin and the need for redemption.
Billy Graham became a hero of mine as my Christian faith emerged and grew. His love for otChrist, his family and others has had adeep impact on my life and ministry.
When I was in college I got this crazy idea of hosting a talk show. It was the late eighties and David Letterman with his viewr mail, stupid pet tricks and other goofiness was my inspiration. I planned the show to be a hybrid between letterman and a faith based talk show like the 700 club. I imagined that my first gueat would be Billy Graham. On my show I planned to intersperse regular questions with unusual ones. So with Billy, I'd be like tell me about your crusades, then I'd follow it up with Do you fish? How often do you fish? That sort of thing. This interview between Allen and Graham has some of that spirit to it that I would have liked to bring to my own talk show.
I really enjoy the good humor they both bring to this conversation without abandoning their own positions. It's hard to think of the late 60's as a simpler time, however I think as far as public discourse goes this is so much better than the soundbites, barbs and gotchas that predominate these days.
I am now in the process of revamping Dave out Loud. The last time I posted here was 1 year 3 months 1 week and 2 days ago. The time before that I was gone 2 years 8 months 3 week and 2 days. So I'm getting better.
I figured I needed a plan if I want this new reboot to work. I think I came up with one. I am going to start a new feature called quick random takes. If you've ever watched Whose Line is it anyway? it will be like scenes from a hat, but instead of scenes it will be me talking. Every week I'll ask my family members and my viewers to give me suggestions on something to talk about for a minute or two. I will then take all those suggestions and put them all in a hat. I will also write random on one of the sheets. If I pick the piece of paper that says random I just have to come up with a topic on the spot. After I pick the topic I'll just speak for 1 -2 minutes and then post the video.
The next time I'll keep the previous suggestions and get some more. Each week I'll make one suggestion of my own and add one more wild card. I may do other types of videos as well and begin sharing other peoples videos as I have in the past. I think one of the reasons I stopped posting here was the coming up with ideas part and then also the filming the idea part. I hope this will jump start the creative process.
So next time I hope to come back with an inaugural video for the segment. Until then
No, I can't handle it. I must include a video. Dave Out Loud without a video is like minor league baseball without kids running the bases at the end. You can do it, it's just not as fun.
With that in mind here's a video of some of my family members running bases after a minor league baseball game.