AFL Chipz

a Biblical thought...
When Elisha reached the house, there was the boy lying dead on his couch. He went in, shut the door on the two of them and prayed to the LORD. Then he got on the bed and lay upon the boy, mouth to mouth, eyes to eyes, hands to hands. As he stretched himself out upon him, the boy's body grew warm. Elisha turned away and walked back and forth in the room and then got on the bed and stretched out upon him once more. The boy sneezed seven times and opened his eyes. (2 Kings 4:32-35)

a Book thought...
The church desperately needs more people who facilitate a deeper, more authentic vision of the Christian faith in our pluralistic, sophisticated culture. (p17)

a Dave thought...
On Thursday night I ventured into the MCG to see Judd v Cousins with my soon to be 7 year old son. As Noah is very keen on football he asked me to buy a footy Record which I did for $4. As we exchanged money with the seller he then reached into the box and handed over ten packets of what looked like footy cards and handed them to Noah. We put them in our bag and proceeded to the gates amidst the 86,000 people present for the season's opener. After finding our seats Noah was keen to open the packets in which we discovered were two Chipz in each packet, and we now were the owners of 20 imitation gambling tokens! I have since discovered that this had already reached the Age newspaper this week...

Reverend Tim Costello said this week: "The power of sporting heroes introducing kids to an industry that destroys many lives is unacceptable. What is the AFL thinking?"
Mr Costello said the gaming industry relied on problem gamblers for 53 cents in every dollar. "To remain sustainable it has to always cultivate a new generation of problem gamblers, obviously children. To have their work done by the AFL is both unethical and completely unacceptable."

So I have run into this dilemma first hand and have an opportunity to respond on two fronts. Firstly as a parent having a child who has had this put into his hands is just wrong, and secondly I work for an organisation that fights against injustice and having met and helped problem gamblers personally I believe this is something that's worth fighting. I'll keep you posted on how I go.

Just a thought.