At (A) Crossroads

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Ty and I, after five years, have decided it's time to move on from Nexus Church, the progressive start up/experiment we helped launch in Southwest, OH.  It was a difficult decision that took us well over a year to finally face.  I have been out of love with church for over 20 years but decided to go back first for Ty, then for the girls and finally, at Nexus, for the community at large.  Unfortunately, Nexus wasn't working for any of us.  Ty didn't really feel connected with the people there as we had so much churn and, after five years, still only a hand full of families attending. We started taking Shayna and Kayla there when Kayla was 10 and Shayna was 7.  From the very beginning, Kayla was pretty much alone when it came to children her age.  Shayna had a couple of friends who were attending part time which stopped in the last couple of months. So, the girls were bored to tears there. Kayla joined a youth group with another church a couple of years ago and Shayna started attending that church's youth group in the fall.

So, with a heavy heart, we made the decision to move on.  But, Ty has this vision of us all going to church together. So, she and Shayna have been seeking out another church.  A couple of weeks ago I went with them to the satellite "campus" of Crossroads Church- in Mason.  Crossroads is one of those megachurches with the fancy coffee bar, auditorium seating, video productions, slick bands and all the trimmings one needs to be fully entertained on a Sunday morning.  I've been twice now.  Here are my impressions:

The Pros:

• Coffee bar- if you've visited one of the mega churches, you've probably come to expect the coffee bar and the way you immediately feel welcome in the building.  The Mason Middle School, where the satellite services are held, is transformed on Sunday mornings into a place you would think is a church full times.  There's a countdown until when the doors open, then a countdown until when the service starts.  I felt like I was at Disney World waiting to get into the next showing of one of their "attractions".
• The Band- the band at Nexus has dwindled to a keyboard and a guitarist.  Crossroads has a full band and they rock out on Sunday mornings.  I wasn't a big fan of their selections.  But, it is nice to have a full band.
• Children's Services- this is major for Shayna especially.  The junior high and senior high school kids are together at first and they are given the same message (theme) that is being taught in the adult service.  They don't watch the same video (the sermon at the satellite location is taped).  But, they cover the same points. So, we can discuss the lesson of the day on the way home and we know what our kids are being taught.  The kids get the chance to interact with kids their own age.  Shayna already has a good friend who goes there.
• Anonymity- if you want to get lost in a church, this is the place to go.  First of all, so many people are there that no one knows if you're a visitor or just someone they've never met.  So, you can easily blend in. The auditorium is kept dark during the service.  So you're pretty much a faceless body in a seat during the service.  
• The Sermon- I was pleasantly surprised by Brian Tome's first sermon about money.  It was practical, entertaining and made me think of money from a perspective I might not have before. I thought it might be a fluke. But, his second sermon I heard was actually even better.  One of the problems I have had with Nexus is we have had two pastors who follow the "lectionary" and try to fit their sermons to a pre-assigned Bible verse.  For me, that leads to a very hit or miss sermon (mostly miss).  I'd rather hear what is on their heart than them being forced to fit a sermon around a verse some committee somewhere chose.
• Entertainment Value- the production is impeccable.  There are videos, the band is playing.  There's never a dull moment.  Church in the 2010s is playing to our ADHD tendencies.  It's quick, snappy, bright and shiny and in constant motion.

The Cons:

• Anonymity- it's really easy to just slip in and slip out of one of these churches.  You never have to get involved.  You really wouldn't have to even give any money.  You can just come every week, be entertained and then go about your day.  There are calls to get involved by volunteering (it takes a LOT to run one of these places) and by joining small groups.  But, having attended one for years and been behind the scenes, experience shows that only about 20% of people really get involved.
• No real "mission"- I wonder what the real mission is of churches like this.  We were always being called to bring people in (at the Vineyard) and I've seen the same thing at Crossroads.  The idea seems to be to introduce our friends to God.  But, what then?  The churches stay full.  But, what I saw at the Vineyard was that as people matured spiritually and wanted more, they tended to drift away from the "seeker sensitive" Sunday morning message and wanted something more substantial.  
• Videotaped sermon- the Head Pastor of Crossroads runs the services at the main campus.  The video that is show at the satellite campus is taped Saturday evening at the main campus. The rest of the production is live.  There is a "Campus Pastor" who comes on stage to welcome people, make announcements, etc.  When it's time for the sermon, they "roll the tape"
• Massive effort for what return?- there is a lot of money and time that goes into putting on these productions.  My friend Scott Phillips is where I first heard the idea of having a pastor broadcast his sermon to multiple locations to maximize the utility of the time spent putting together the message and to allow the best speakers to reach the most people and allow people who weren't gifted in that area to run a "campus" and not have to deal with doing the sermon.  It's a great business model.  But, there is still a lot of money and time being spent on these productions and I often wonder if it couldn't be better spent.
• Zero interactivity- One of the great things about attending a small church is the ability for people to ask for prayer.  It's not something I often took advantage of at Nexus.  But, I know a lot of people really like that.  There are signs up at Crossroads and you can stay after and have someone pray for you.  But, with several hundred people in there for each service there is no raising your hand and asking the congregation (who doesn't even know you) to pray for your situation.  Another thing that I did really enjoy at Nexus was our "talk back" time which was a time where we could comment on the sermon and share thoughts with the other people who had heard it.  You can do that with 50 people in a room.  You can't do it so well with 500 or 1,000.

So, that's my experience with Crossroads. Not unbearable by any stretch.  But, it's definitely not what I envision church should look like. Will we keep attending?  Only time will tell.

Proud Papa

I am so proud of my two girls.  I always am.  But, lately I've been especially proud of the way they are growing up and the things they are accomplishing.  It's so gratifying to see them facing challenges and overcoming them.

Kayla started public school last year as a freshman.  Her first year was at the freshman building.  Being there with only freshmen was a nice way to get started in public school.  This year she was thrown into the big pond.  She was a little concerned about how she would do at this massive high school for her first public school experience after homeschooling for 8 years. She hit the ground running and has not missed a stride. She's on honor roll.  She's fitting in great socially. She's doing the homework (a heavy load with her honors classes) and she's on the swim team.  Her days are longer and harder than most adults. She's up just after 6:00AM to get a ride to school which starts at 7:30.  She gets out of school around 3, takes a bus to swim practice and gets home between 5:30 and 6:30.  By the time she's had dinner there's usually enough time for about an hour with the family before she's up to do it all again.  We were a little concerned, because Kayla is so extremely laid back, that she wouldn't do her best academically.  When she started school and we encouraged her to do all of the extra credit work and complete all of her homework assignments, she told us she didn't want to be a "point grabber".  We, of course, told her to grab every point she could and we were looking over her shoulder to make sure she was doing it.  Now, she's doing it all on her own.

Kayla loves to swim and she has been on the neighborhood swim team for a few years now. Last year she went out for the high school team and had to make a time to qualify.  Frankly, watching Kayla swim her first couple of years on the neighborhood team, you would wonder if Kayla understood she was in a race. She swims for the enjoyment.  Kayla is a very sensual girl and would talk about swimming in terms of feeling the water flowing over her skin and the silence of being underwater.  We were like "That's all fine and good Kayla. But, you're on the swim team to beat the other swimmers."  Kayla is also someone who is extremely concerned about other people's feelings and felt bad about beating other kids.  But, this year on the swim team her competitive juices have started to flow.  The swim practices are ridiculously long and hard.  She has to swim five days a week after school for 2 hours to 2-1/2 hours at a time. That's in addition to the meets. The swim practices over Christmas break have been optional.  The first one was at 8 AM the first day of break. That meant Kayla had to roll out of bed just after 7 AM to get to practice.  They had a practice at noon the Monday after Christmas.  My family was in town celebrating with us.  But, Kayla chose to go. As I type this on New Year's Eve, she's at an 8 AM Saturday morning practice.  The swimmers are ranked by "lanes" for their practices.  The faster you swim, the higher the lane you can practice in.  In the past, Kayla would have been content to stay in the slow lane, just as long as she was on the team.  But, a few weeks ago she moved herself up to the next highest lane. She was struggling to stay in it and got bumped back down. But, she is determined to move back up.  So, she has committed to making every practice over the break in hopes of getting back into that lane.  This is a side of Kayla I hadn't seen before and I'm really glad to see it.

Shayna is doing great also.  This was a tough year as she was diagnosed with rheumatoid arthritis earlier this year.  She had been in a lot of pain for several months before we finally figured out what was going on.  She's so stoic and has such a high tolerance for pain that we had no idea what she was going through.  She's endured the medications and the weekly injections (which are painful), like the warrior that Shayna is.  I can't recall her complaining about the shots, heat packs, the medical procedures or anything at all. The only complaint is she doesn't like doing the stretching exercises because they're "boring".   Shayna is one of the top players on her basketball team and is a monster on the backboards.  She is a great defensive player and a coach's dream, as she tries so hard to please.  In fact, she tries too hard as we found out lately that she's not enjoying basketball because of the "pressure".  She is so worried about letting us and the coach down that it's taken the joy out of the game for her, at least for now.  We have told her this is something she needs to work through and she's doing it.  She's still playing extremely well, in fact better than ever.  And she accepts that even though she's not loving it right now it's what we think is best for her.  And, as long as she's doing it, she's going to give it 100%.  She's on two teams now. One is a tournament only team that is just wrapping up their season.  I think they came in second in two of their five tournaments, won two and the other tournament that they didn't do well in, they won the game Shayna played in and lost the ones when she wasn't there.

This has been a rough year for Ty, too.  In addition to the stuff with Shayna, we lost her father earlier this year. She's constantly taxiing Kayla and Shayna to 7 or more practices a week and keeping Treasured Locks up and running. This in addition to putting up with me and maintaining the house.  People often don't give "housewives" enough credit for the hard work they do.  But, Ty's schedule is full just with household stuff and the girls, let alone helping me run Treasured Locks.  This November, we were married 21 years, soon to be 25 years that we've been together. I have seen her grow and mature in ways I never dreamed of when I met her all those years ago.

The Adjustment Bureau- Movie Review

I don't often post movie reviews. When I do it's because a movie is a real stinker or really great.  The Adjustment Bureau I found to be one of the most fascinating movies I've ever seen. The more I think about the movie, the more I like it.

Over the Christmas break, the family had a chance to catch up on some movies.  We watched The Help (really good), Happy Feet (again), the Chronicles of Narnia Voyage of the Dawn Treader and the final installment of Harry Potter.  The last two movies are known for their Christ figures and both were really good.  But, The Adjustment Bureau, surprised me with its theological implications and I thought did a great job of addressing the age-old arguments of free will versus predetermination and theodicy (how could a loving God allow bad things to happen to good people).

The movie starts out slowly and you might mistake it for one of those stupid romantic comedies. The female love interest (Emily Blunt) is "quirky" (annoyingly so IMO) making me wonder why Matt Damon is so smitten with her. Her antics at the beginning of the movie (crashing a wedding, hanging out in a men's room, etc.) are charming to Matt. But, hang in there, it gets explained and it gets better.  We find out that the world is not exactly as it appears when Matt Damon begins to fall for her and it's not in the plan of "The Chairman" (God).  Men from the Adjustment Bureau are accidentally discovered by Damon and they have no choice but to reveal to him that they appear in the lives of humans to make corrections where our free will has things going "off plan". It's not in Damon's destiny to be with the woman that he feels this irresistible attraction to.  He is running for the senate and the plans for him (and for her) are much bigger than this.  

I won't ruin any more of the plot for you by telling you what happens to our two star-crossed lovers.  But, the thing I found fascinating about the movie was it's addressing how God can be both good and powerful and still things happen that are bad.  Coincidentally, I am reading a book right now that talks about open theology or process theology which involves the idea that God is very powerful (not necessarily all powerful) and very good.  But, God has either limited his power or has limited power that allows for free will.  He has an overall plan that he's constantly working toward and he redeems bad circumstances for the better.  But, free will and even random chance can "surprise" even God and He has to come up with a new plan or make adjustments.  This idea of a less than omnipotent, omniscient God will be upsetting to many Christians. But, it's the only model that makes sense to me now and I think The Adjustment Bureau did a great job of exploring that, in a light hearted, kind of romantic comedy kind of way.  I give it the very rare 5/5 stars.

Insurrection- To Believe is Human- To Doubt, Divine- Review

I read a lot of books on theology. I generally only review the ones I like.  For example, I read (most of) The End of Religion: Encountering the Subversive Spirituality of Jesus and found it not nearly subversive enough- along with a few other books I haven't even bothered to finish. Rob Bell's Love Wins (reviewed here) was supposed to be so controversial (snore).  So, when I got Peter Rollins' book with a quote from Rob Bell on the cover as to how it was supposed to push me off the edge of a cliff I wasn't exactly shaking in my boots.  This, though is probably one of the three most dangerous books I have ever read, ranking right up there with Pagan Christianity and How to Quit Church Without Quitting God.  Right there in the introduction Peter introduces us to the idea of pyro-theology, burning away the rot to reveal that which cannot be destroyed. Peter immediately sets the place on fire by saying that having faith in the god of religion is not a divine characteristic but a human one.  We all naturally desire someone to love us unconditionally, someone to watch over us and make sure that everything is all right and that we make ourselves believe in this god.  This claim may sound familiar- as atheists have been saying it for decades. What is surprising is hearing this come from a Christian author- in his opening chapter.  The first thing he challenges us to do is to unplug from this God of religion and open ourselves up to doubt and unknowing.  The central theme of the first part of the book is that the crucifixion is a (the?) defining moment in the life of Jesus. Taking part in Jesus' crucifixion is not the abandoning of everything for religion or for God. Taking part in the crucifixion is the abandoning of everything, including God and the certainty and comfort that provides us.  After all, when Jesus (God) was hanging there on the cross His last cry was "My God, my God why have you forsake me?"  If God was not there at the moment when God needed Him most, why should we not expect the same? Rollins says the "dark night of the soul" which we all fear so much and look at as an exception that some Christians must pass through is not an exception at all. Nor it is something we pass through.  It's part and parcel of Christianity.  It's not something to be avoided but something to be embraced.  We cannot participate in the crucifixion of Jesus (something all Christians claim) without experiencing this doubt and absence of God.

We all know people who say "I'm not religious, I'm spiritual." But, many people who say that still believe in the old Sunday school sky-god in their hearts.  They still participate in church services that re-affirm this God of religion.  They talk about the fact that they've moved on and no longer embrace this view of God.  But, the Church service every week gives them that nice security blanket- singing songs, performing rituals and saying prayers out this God.  So, they never fully embrace the emotional reality of this intellectual assent.  This struck me very personally as I have given up on the idea of God as another object or as a big old man in the sky a long time ago. But, I have said things to the effect of "My pastor believes for me.".  Peter takes away all of those security blankets exposing the coping mechanisms we put into place to keep from truly facing up to this "crucifixion" addressing the believer who has left church and even the "atheist" who continues to benefit psychologically from the believers he still hangs out with- the faith of a parent, child or friends. He ends the third chapter with this line:

It is only as we are cut loose from religion in the very depth of our being- experiencing an existential loss of God, rather than some mere intellectual rejection- that we are free to discover a properly Christian expression of faith.  

So, now Peter has told us that we have to give up any thought of God as a psychological crutch to be a true Christian. This is not a crisis of faith.  This is not something that just the most holy of saints must endure, this is something we all have to face to truly take part in Jesus' suffering.  This is totally antithetical to the teaching most of us receive.  The whole point of the church is to affirm our faith in a God who is there for us to avoid anxiety and fear.  

The second part of the book is called "Resurrection"  But, this isn't the part where, like in the traditional sermon, God swoops in to save us from our unbelief or is there in spite of our unbelief. Frankly, at this point I got kind of bogged down in the book after it got off to a very fast start.  But, when I started to get interested again was when he began talking about the life that comes after we have gone through the crucifixion.  I mean the crucifixion would be pointless without a resurrection.  But, we are not resurrected back to the self-assured life of believing in the sky-god. We are resurrected to know that life is not about escaping this world and going off to live with God.  We are resurrected to accept this world and our limits and fully embrace the beauty and the ugliness of the world.  When we are caught up in the religious worldview, we are encouraged to give up the world to find God.  While we may say God is both immanent and transcendant, we really live as though God is out there. So, either we deal with the fact that we will not experience God in this world or we live for those glimpses when God breaks through. During our normal day-to-day life, God, (the object of our desire) is elsewhere.  Thus, we can never have any sustainable satisfaction and are condemned to a "type of half life".  When we are resurrected, we no longer approach God as an object, a separate "person" or a thing.  We no longer talk about "loving God".  We realize that God is loved through the act of love itself.  It is literally true that we cannot love God and hate our brother.  We love God by loving our brother.  God is no longer something "out there". We become immersed in God by being fully immersed in the world.

The book is full of short stories/parables. My favorite comes at the beginning of Chapter 7.  God is watching the Earth go through its final trials and tribulations, as has been prophesied.  But, then after the rapture instead of God staying in residence with those in heaven, descends to Earth to be with his people who have forsaken the promise of heaven for being deeply rooted in the Earth.  

Another term, other than pyro-theology, that I liked in the book was A/theistic Christianity.  As my view of God has evolved, I find myself asking myself the question "Do I believe in God anymore?"  Peter says "What we discover here is that the question, Does God exist? is not a straightforward one for the believer".   For you that may be an unambiguous question.  For me, and for Rollins, it's not (anymore). 

Buy it here:

Keeping the Christ in Christmas

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One of the things about getting old, and I don't know if it's a good thing or a bad thing, is you realize Ecclesiastes is right.  There is nothing new under the sun.  

What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again there is nothing new under the sun.

Every year at this time Christians start up the talk of being persecuted and their holiday being stolen.  The heathen are taking the "Christ" out of Christmas.  Just a few days ago I saw one of the creators of Veggie Tales on TV saying that people trying to use a Christmas tree without calling it a Christmas tree was just as insulting to Christians as if we tried to use a menorah (Jewish candle holder for Hanukkah) and call it something other than a menorah.  Maybe he doesn't know this. But, the candle holder people use for Kwanzaa looks a LOT like a menorah and I don't think anyone asked the Jews' permission to knock off their menorah.  

Back to putting the Christ back in Christmas.  As per my usual, I can see both sides of the issue of whether Christmas is a secular or a Christian holiday.  For me, it's not either/or.  It's both. There's a thing in trademark law that if you don't protect your trademark, you could eventually lose it.  If people commonly come to refer to something other than the trademarked item as that item, the trademark is said to be genericized- it becomes a generic trademark examples are "Band-aids" which we use to mean something other than a bandage named Band-Aid and Kleenex which many us use instead of saying "facial tissue".  I think that is what has happened to Christmas.  The specific meaning has been lost because the word has been used generically so much.  Christmas, strictly speaking, is the celebration of the birth of Christ.  But, it's come to mean a lot more than that.  Some good and some not so good.  Christmas is also the time of the year when we engage in shopping and eating til we drop.  And, we usually don't make the distinction.  Nor do we distinguish it from the time of year when we wish for Peace on Earth and good will to men.  Two out of three of these meanings of Christmas can apply to anyone, Christian or not Christian.  I argued once to a Jewish friend who refused to let his children celebrate Christmas that Christmas has sufficiently been capitalized (as in made into a capitalist holiday) and secularized that it has at least two meanings and there would be no harm in allowing his Jewish children to take part in the secular aspect of Christmas- giving and receiving gifts. 

Once again we have the dust-up over whether we should call it a Christmas tree or not.  The non-Christians are offended if we do call it a Christmas tree.  So, we pretend it's not and call it a "holiday tree".  The Christians are offended if we don't call it a Christmas tree.  C'mon!  Who cares?  We all know it's a Christmas tree, even if you want to be PC and call it a "holiday tree".  A rose is a rose by any other name.  Oh, and Christians if you wanted to keep the birth of your savior "pure" maybe you shouldn't have stolen the ritual of bringing an evergreen into your home from the pagans.  And maybe you shouldn't have chosen the day the pagans celebrated the birth of the Sun God as the day for Jesus' birth.  

So, to you non-Christians who want to share in Christmas.  I say, go right ahead.  But, no matter what you call it, it's  still a Christmas tree, a Christmas party and it's Christmas break.  And to Christians who are worried about others taking the Christ out of Christmas, no one can stop you from celebrating the birth of your savior.  Who cares if they say "Happy Holidays" or want to put up a "holiday tree"?  Anything that causes people to reflect on being better to each other and wishing for the end to hostilities between all men is a good thing. If them dropping the "Christ" out of it makes it more palatable to them, I don't think Jesus would be offended and you shouldn't be either.  

The Breath of God- Book Review

This is one case where one of those ads that Facebook serves up to me everyday got it right.  I saw an ad for this book one day when I was on Facebook and after reading the reviews on Amazon decided to give it a chance.  I'm glad I did as I found The Breath of God by Jeffrey Small to be quite refreshing.

The book is a novel by a first time author who is really into comparative religion and gives credit for his inspiration to people like Marcus Borg, John Spong and Thich Nhat Hanh- some of my favorite writers.  The book is reminiscent of The Da Vinci Code as it a thriller with the hero- Grant, a graduate student is taken on a trip around the world trying to find texts that reveal something about the "lost" years of Jesus's life.  The story is based on true events.  There was a claim made by a Russian- Nicholas Notovitch in the late 1800s.  He said he discovered texts in a monastery in India that documented the legend that Jesus traveled to India and studied Hinduism and Buddhism during the years the Bible is silent about His life.  He wrote a book about those texts. But, they could never be located and his book was largely declared a fraud. What is true though is in the gospels, we have baby Jesus, teenage Jesus (one scene where He stays behind in the Temple while His parents take a couple of days to notice He's missing) and then suddenly Jesus is 30 years old.  The gospels say nothing about 90% of Jesus' life.  There are legends in India about an Issa (very similar to the Muslim name for Jesus- Isa) who traveled there as a teen to learn meditation techniques.  The book quotes passages from the Buddha's writings (The Dhammapada) and parallels them with things Jesus said. It also draws many parallels between the lives and legends of Jesus, The Buddha and Muhammad.

“I am the source of all things, and all things emerge from me ... Infinite are the forms in which I appear. I am the self, seated in the heart of all beings; I am the beginning and the life span of beings, and their end as well . . . I am the source of all things to come.”   The Bhagavad Gita, 5th century BC

“I am the Alpha and the Omega who is and who was and who is to come.”   The Book of Revelation, AD 1st  

While Grant is working to find the lost texts, he is, of course, dogged at every opportunity by a fundamentalist pastor and his church who insist that it's sheer heresy to think that Jesus might have been influenced by any faith other than Christianity and that the discovery of these texts would destroy the faith of millions.

The book is very well written and suspenseful.  It's set mostly in India and Bhutan where Grant is on his quest for the texts.  Grant is taught by an Bhutanese Buddhist monk, Kinley who was educated in the West. For me, being interested in the similarities between religions rather than focusing on the differences, I enjoyed the way Jeffrey Small pointed out not only how similar the faiths of Christianity, Islam, Buddhism and Hinduism are but how similar the stories about our "prophets" are and how the faiths themselves (and the prophets) are- using a Buddhist saying are like the finger pointing at the moon.  The faiths all point to the same underlying eternal universal truths. None of the comparative religion material was really new to me. But, I think it would be new to a lot of Christians who haven't read about the lives of Muhammad, Siddhartha Gautama (the Buddha) and studied about their faiths.  The educational material is slipped into the book in such a way that you don't feel you are being lectured, but you are educated while being entertained.

Grant, like many is caught up in whether the events recorded in the Bible are historically true or not.  One of the many lessons he learns on his quest is summed up in the following quote.

Jigme shook his head. “Why must religion be a history lesson? How the Buddha, Jesus, or Muhammad learned these techniques is irrelevant. Why not focus on what their common experiences teach us about our own lives?”

Whether Jesus actually traveled to India or not is largely not important- except that so many Christians are caught up in constantly pointing out just how different Christianity is from any other faith and ignoring the fact that many of Jesus' teachings are the same as the teachings of the Buddha or Muhammad or the teachings of Hinduism.  This book could give many a new found appreciation for the beauty and truth found in all of the major faiths of the world, if they're open to the possibility that Jesus Himself might have learned from them.

Related articles

• Founders of Faith: The Parallel Lives of God's Messengers (prweb.com)

Steve Jobs- Gone at 56

I think Apple should seriously consider this new logo someone posted on Twitter after the passing of Steve Jobs. The man was a true visionary and changed all of our lives in ways we can hardly even realize today because the innovations he made have become so pervasive and common that we take them for granted.  Even if you don't own a single Apple product (and I own about 20), Steve's creations and innovations have impacted your life.  It's hard to believe he was only 56 years old. He accomplished so much in his short time.  As I think about his life, I'm reminded that we only have a limited time here.  To not try to be someone else.  Do what you do best.  And, that in spite of having billions of dollars we cannot buy health or extra time.  R.I.P. Steve.  Thanks for all you did.

Related articles

• Obama+world pays tribute to Steve Jobs (go.theregister.com)
• Apple Co-Founder Steve Jobs Has Passed Away At Age 56 (q104.radio.com)
• Steve Jobs's Accomplishments In His Final Years (huffingtonpost.com)
• Steve Jobs: Goodbye to an Icon (mashable.com)