I met with Patrick last night at Perkins' (a local chain of restaurants similar to Coco's or Denny's back in California) to discuss the prospect of putting together a weekly Bible study group. Amidst discussions of such important issues as which of the Superman movies were the best (it's #2, of course - "Kneeeeel before Zod!") and the merits of Vincent Price's features (his face and voice, not his movies - though that, too), Patrick and I discussed whether or not it was a realistic idea to try to make a living in the comics industry (his answer: "I usually tell people 'no', but your art is such that you could probably do it so long as you continue to improve; it's hard work, and it's a risk, just like opening your own business, but it can be done."). He also mentioned that he spoke to Pastor Matt at church about our putting this small group together, and Matt said that one of the women at the church was trying to organize more men's groups, and thus may have other guys who might be interested in joining us. We were both a bit hesitant on this. Don't get me wrong, neither of us are opposed to having other guys from the church join us, but my feeling was that - and I'm trying really hard not to sound like an elitist - I don't know to what degree the other guys in church "get" our little world of geekery. I think that one of the things that would make our meetings special would be that we both have certain things that we deal with and need encouragement with that I don't think guys outside of the comics-and-games world would necessarily understand. While every guy struggles with lust and coarse behavior, and understand the significance of behavioral standards amongst non-Christians (not that we let it all hang out amongst our church brothers), you need to know what it's like to attend a comics convention (especially like San Diego) to fully appreciate the challenge before us. Discussions of how best to represent Christ to an entire demographic of people who, in my experience, have turned away from Christ and the Church because of erroneous judgementalism ("Those funny-books and D&D games are of the Devil!"), will be commonplace. We talk a lot about how to use our art in a way that's glorifying to God, but also our concern about what would happen if we just started churning out Jack Chick tracts and asking people to pay for it as entertainment. Also, Patrick mentioned trying to invite a soft-spoken friend of his who is a borderline Christian - a believer, but one who has a great deal of questions and is surrounded in his daily life by, erm, borderline personalities (he works at the Post Office, is all I'm saying). He could use some encouragement, and I'm not sure to what degree the huntin' and fishin' crowd at church is really up for such a task.

Okay, that sounds terribly elitist, and it probably is. The guys at church are very nice and open people; I'm stereotyping them based on their interest in football and boats and an entire spectrum of life that is completely uninteresting to me. But at the same time, I think that if I'm left feeling a bit out of the loop when 50-75% of conversational subject matter is foreign to me, I can only imagine what it would feel like for a guy who doesn't attend church regularly and may have even less interest in such things than I do, which is saying something. That's my impression at this point.

I'd prefer it just to be Patrick and me and our wives and another fellow or two with some connection to the geek world, is what I'm saying. It may be selfish, but then, a great deal of the reason why we're trying to organize this is because we know that *we* need it.

In other news, I added a link to Doug Ten Napel's website. He's the creator of the graphic novel "Creature Tech", which I've been wanting to read, and the cartoon "Earthworm Jim," amongst numerous other things. He's a brother in Christ and a political conservative to boot - two characteristics not equal in importance, certainly, but both things that warm my heart.

Doug's blog pointed me toward probably the best response I've seen to Cindy Sheehan's demands for a second meeting with President Bush to "demand answers" about her son's death in Iraq. (I don't know if mainstream media has mentioned the fact that she already met with him last year and came away from that meeting sounding fine and dandy, calling him a sincere Christian and truly sympathetic. Are they?) The response comes from Mohammed at Iraq the Model. Worth reading, I think, as it puts things back into a grand perspective, written by someone who knows a lot more about the things Cindy has experienced than I hope I ever will.