Category Archives: Humour

Lausanne Congress computer network hacked

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As someone who has been lurking at the fringes of the Lausanne III Congress, and responsible for the Globalink site at Cornerstone Institute, I was aware that the network both within the Cape Town Convention Centre and that was supposed to send videos and resources around the world, was down for the first two days of the Congress, but had no idea that there was something sinister behind it.

Until I received the following Press release by email a moment ago. So when it appears in the next Dan Brown movie as central to the plot of how the Chinese, cyborg illumanati are taking over the world, remember you read it here first…

Cyber Attack Hits Global Church Gathering

Malicious hits from multiple locations crash system

SOUTH AFRICA 20 OCTOBER 2010 Organizers of Cape Town 2010, the widest gathering of Christians in the history of the Church, today announced that their internet communication to the outside world had been hacked. ‘We have 700 GlobaLink sites in 95 countries extending the Congress to 100,000 people’, said Victor Nakah, GlobaLink Chair for the Congress. ‘Finally, after two rough days, they are being served as planned.’

The sophisticated computer network developed for sharing Congress content with the world was compromised for the first two days of the Congress. ‘We have tracked malicious attacks by millions of external hits coming from several locations’, said Joseph Vijayam, IT Chair of The Lausanne Movement, sponsor of the gathering. ‘Added to this was a virus brought into the centre on a mobile phone.’

Asked if he could confirm where the hacking came from, he replied, ‘We have a pretty strong indication, but one can never be absolutely certain, so we prefer not to share our suspicions.’

The Congress has drawn carefully-selected participants from 198 nations representing many of the best minds and the most courageous practitioners in the Church. Joseph Vijayam explained that two cousins from Bangalore had largely been responsible for solving the difficulties, due to their unique expertise in the exact problems the Congress was experiencing. Vijay Kumar, an employee of Unisys Global Services, and Daniel Singh, a pastor with a doctorate in computational biology, came forward to help when they learned of the situation. They had come to the Congress as volunteers to help hook up printers and other basic IT tasks. ‘I believe God in his sovereignty brought them to us,’ Mr Vijayam said.

[P.S. Has anyone at the Congress seen a really pale, white-haired fellow with a pained expression carrying a suspicious looking cell phone?]

The history of South Africa in 1 paragraph

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Forgive me father, for I have sinned. It has been 60 days since my last blog post.

So this morning I was with my 7 year old son, Jack, on the way to drop him off at school, and he regaled me with his version of the history of South Africa, starting from prehistoric times to the present. You will notice between the lines my attempts at explaining Genesis, evolution, geography and recent history to him:

“In the beginning all people lived in Africa and had small brains and then when God pulled the land apart and made different continents they started living apart and forgot they were all family. Then they started hating each other and fighting wars. The biggest war was between the white people and the black people and the white policeman killed the black people. But then Nelson Mandela came and had an idea to end the fighting, but the white people put him in jail. After thinking about it for 27 years, they let him out and tried out his idea and he became president and brought all the white and black people together and they remembered they were family.”

Mitch, a priest and the horse races

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One day while he was at the track playing the ponies and all but losing his shirt, Mitch noticed a priest who stepped out onto the track and blessed the forehead of one of the horses lining up for the 4th race.

Lo and behold, that horse – a very long shot – won the race.

Before the next race, as the horses began lining up, Mitch watched with interest the old priest step onto the track. Sure enough, as the 5th race horses came to the starting gate the priest made a blessing on the forehead of one of the horses.

Mitch made a beeline for a betting window and placed a small bet on the horse. Again, even though it was another long shot, the horse the priest had blessed won the race. Mitch collected his winnings, and anxiously waited to see which horse the priest would bless for the 6th race. The priest again blessed a horse. Mitch bet big on it, and it won. Mitch was elated.

As the races continued the priest kept blessing long shot horses, and each one ended up coming in first. By and by, Mitch was pulling in some serious money. By the last race, he knew his wildest dreams were going to come
true. He made a quick dash to the ATM, withdrew all his savings, and awaited the priest’s blessing that would tell him which horse to bet on…

True to his pattern, the priest stepped onto the track for the last race and blessed the forehead of an old nag that was the longest shot of the day. Mitch also observed the priest blessing the eyes, ears, and hooves of the old nag.

Mitch knew he had a winner and bet every cent he owned on the old nag. He then watched dumbfounded as the old nag come in dead last. Mitch, in a state of shock, made his way down to the track area where the priest was. Confronting the old priest he demanded, ‘Father! What happened? All day long you blessed horses and they all won. Then in the last race, the horse you blessed lost by a Kentucky mile, then dropped dead. Now, thanks to you I’ve lost every cent of my savings — all of it!’.

The priest nodded wisely and with sympathy. ‘Son,’ he said, ‘that’s the problem with you Protestants, you can’t tell the difference between a simple blessing and the last rites.’

(Thanks for sending me this one, Jan.)

Exam howlers

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One of the courses I teach includes an introductory module on the world religions, and over the years I have collected some beauties from the exam papers I have marked. Read and weep…

Judaism is believed to be the oldest form of religion, established before the common error.

God exposed himself in the Torah.

The Prophet (peace be upon him) must never be described with a face.

The Jews have the same Bible as the Christians but only the Old Testament.

When Hindu children are born they are put onto a bed of banana leaves and rice.

The great ancestor of the Jews was Siddhartha Guatama (white elephant).

Mohammad started a political movement in Meridian.

Ubuntu means hospitality, indestructibility and incompatibility.

Mohammad was the final profit of Allah.

The Hindu religion is open all.

At 80, Buddha died and legend shows that when he entered Nevada, an earthquake shook the land.