We first wrote about GodTube, a YouTube ripoff for Christians, back in April (note the banana video in that post – “the athiest’s nightmare”). Today they launched a really excellent virtual prayer wall to complement the main service.
Users can go to the site and pray for those who’ve left previous messages, or leave their own prayer. Pictures and audio can also be uploaded (although I couldn’t get either to work). Soothing music plays in the background, and readers can leave their comments on any prayer.
In the spirit of athletes who often pray to God to help them win the big game, I’ve left my own prayer request on GodTube. If it works, I’m behind this 100%.
In all seriousness, though, a lot of people have left touching prayers on the wall. This may give them a little (or a lot) of strength to go on fighting crushing illnesses, family losses, etc. If you are a believer, the GodTube virtual prayer wall may be something that helps you through a bad time.
Please God, help me convince Arrington that a Crunch Network comedy blog is in order, albeit let it be separate and equal to the behemoth we see here today.
CrunchGear will break out to more than 1 million visitors, one day. If only it wasn’t so slow and stingy with the content…
“If it works, I’m behind this 100%”
Haha. Me too my brother, me too.
hah praying – what a waste of time. this fits in nicely, then, with youtube and digg and all the other waste of time stuff on the internet.
He doesn’t like it when you lie about your age in your profile. He knows.
Since you brought up Religion – Arrington are you in the Believer or Non-believer category?
I won’t push my beliefs on anyone, I believe in God.
This is unfortunately a blatant rip off of a prayer site http://www.prayabout.com that has been around for about 6 months.
I guess religion even attracts copy cats.
Would you do the same on Islam tube? or would you only do this on religious sites for religions that do not issue Fatwas?
Arrington, that was kind of tasteless.
When they go deadpool will they go to heaven??
I hope so!
You prayed for peace on earth – saw it on the wall!
Joe – that was my non snarky prayer. I’m as superstitious as the next person.
Michael-
If you are not a ‘praying man’ I can understand how you would see the humor and/or the cheese in this. even I as a Christian have a hard time with the whole Christian subculture thing -and the unoriginal ideas that usually arise from it. But thanks for showing some respect in the end. They do mean well.
keef – “The road to hell is paved with good intentions”
I’ve been a big fan of Techcrunch until this post. Maybe the most classless post you have put up Arrington..and that is saying alot. Perhaps you are just naive and fail to recognize that some people value their faith and don’t like to have it mocked. I have no idea why you would even post this. It is obvious your only purpose was to mock the faith of many. It is funny that one of the few stories you actually write now would be to degrade peoples faith. Seems beneath you. Here is a Proverb for you Arrington:
“A fool does not delight in understanding, but only in revealing his own mind.”
Proverbs 18:2
“Please God, help me make TechCrunch the biggest blog…”
Amen.
Thank you God for this delicious bit of humor. And thank you for people like Michael Powell who can’t take a moment to laugh at their own beliefs – which are obviously worthy of ridicule. Comments like his are so satisfying to read – especially when the word “fool” is used without irony.
Belief only exists in the mind anyway.
Believer here. Well said, Sean.
I’m waiting for someone to launch SacrificeAChicken.com – it’ll be just as effective as praying to Yahweh (or any other of the thousands of gods available), but I’ll get some tasty chicken in addition.
Copying prayabout.com, do these people have no shame?
fakesteveballmer.blogspot.com
When will people stop following imaginary figures for motivation? Are human beings lacking that much faith in themselves that they need to uphold stories about some “man in the sky” they’ve never seen?
This is what sickens me about social conditioning. People would rather continue passing along stories they’ve heard all their lives than educate themselves about the origins of most of things which make our society slaves to the very things they believe in.
A virtual prayer wall? Silly.
@21
As long as there are people willing to use this – this is a good business model. Who cares what people prefer, even if it looks silly to you…
If they want it – give it to them and develop your venture – that’s it.
Making too much philoshophy about it will not get you anywhere
In the end, the one who makes stuff that attracts people will win – not the ones who just sit on sidelines, criticize him/her and “neither know victory, nor defeat”.
Just go build something that will make you money, as I do, and you’ll not waste your time, Ronald; cause I don’t think you make a killing with your site. Even if it doesn’t work – you’ll know it and will try something else, and again and again, till you find the stuff that works…
And a huge Good Luck to GodTube!
I’m a believer. I will pray for TC because TC is better than the other two.
Sean O’Brien…Enjoy hell.
Oh Michael,
I thought you were a little sarcastic on this one, I’m alittle disappointed in your point of view. Thought you were a little deeper than that.
The great thing with being threatened with hell is that it’s as imaginary as heaven. No problemo!
It is wrong that they get to call it godtube and yet they exclude all religions except christianity. This site is the definition of segregation and bigotry and I don’t understand why Techcrunch gives it any sort of notice. There are other sites like beliefnet that are open to all beliefs (and non-beliefs) – what are you encouraging segregation and bigotry?
#27 raises a valid point. There are many Christians with the belief that their religion is “supreme.”
Religion is pointless. It’s just another institution to enslave and segregate human beings. Same is true for money (which, today, is made from thin air), class, race, etc. Why do we continue to value these baseless concepts?
It’s okay to believe in something, but why believe in something that’s phony and made up? That’s exactly what religion is. I’m not sure why it’s so hard to understand. Oh, I know why, because the status quo has been brainwashed with this BULLSHIT for centuries.
Hmm, best reply i could come up with was;
…
Please God, if You exist, send more sanctimonious religious nuts to this blessed blog. For mocking them is truly a divine pleasure and we’ve only had a couple so far.
Dear God: If Heaven is full of hypersensitive puritans whose faith is so weak that the slightest joke or criticism sends them into a tizzy, then please can I go to Hell instead.
Hmm, I think it might be time for a noodley appendage version…
Michael,
You went too far with this post.
You may have offended one of the largest religions in the world, including myself.
I find what you wrote here very offensive and as a personal attack. Christianity is not something to be made fun of.
This blog is in need of a little love and understanding. So, in all sincerity, here goes…
I am a Christian:
- not because I’m a conformist; on the contrary I rebel against our culture daily
- not because it makes me a better person than I would be otherwise (note, I’m not comparing myself to anyone else here – I just know what I would be without my reliance on Christ, and it wouldn’t be pretty); though this is a good secondary reason
- primarily because I believe it to be TRUE! Plain and simple. There is evidence for it’s truth, and after weighing this evidence with that of other religions and with the non-belief alternative, I have come to the conclusion that it is simply true.
I have a deep respect for all who are sincerely in search for truth. And my heart goes out to all who are in pain and have suffered at the hands of misguided and hateful people – whether they be believers or non-believers. I just want to let you know that there is a real peace and pure joy that can be found in this life.
Peace.
Amen to that! “But I tell you: Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be sons of your Father in heaven.” Matthew 5:44 Praying for you all, seriously. God bless!
I have to say, I think this post is better than this one: http://www.tech...ome-dating-site
I don’t think Michael was trying to hurt anyone with this, on the other hand, I think he was acknowledging that pray is usefull (even if he think only for some). I commend him on trying another Christian focused post, and in the end he is helping to spread God’s word. I wonder how much GodTube’s traffic went up with this post.
Anyway, keep the dialog up with God Michael, and you just might see what you really want come true.
God Bless
btw, I don’t mean to arrogantly suggest that I’ve found all truth and am now just basking in it. The beauty of truth is that it’s infinitely deep – our journey in gaining understanding of it is never-ending. But once we come to accept the source of truth, and realize that He accompanies us on the journey, it becomes full of joy and love like never before.
Peace.
As a Christian, I’m not sure what’s worse…the need of some Christians here to pass judgement on the non-Christians (John 3:17 says that Jesus came into the world to save it, not condemn it) or the need of non-Christians to pass judgement on the Christians (which is the same thing they accuse us of doing).
WRT the original post, I personally enjoyed the humor in it and thought that overall it was respectful.
Actually, the need of some Christians to pass judgement on the non-Christians is definitely worse…they should know better.
I am not a Christian. Personally I think it is all a bunch of crap. But…
At the same time your joke post on their prayer wall was very tasteless. And your offering it up to the entire TechCrunch community as a joke, inviting other non-believers to perhaps go to the site and leave other tasteless ridicule – was also in very poor judgment.
Pretty disappointing post. You can do better than this Michael. Really.
We are all entitled to our viewpoints – we need to remember and respect that.
The thing the religious need to get their heads around is that, for (many of) the non-religious, we feel no need to respect your *belief*, any more than we respect your choice of politician or football team.
I do my best to not disrespect the person, but the belief is not deserving of respect.
I, like many atheists, find religious belief laughable and offensive in equal measure. It’s a Bronze Age fairy story that makes ugly promises of eternal bliss or ever-lasting torture, depending on getting lucky and choosing the right version of the fairy tale to believe in. It’s divisive. It shuts down, for many, critical thinking, rational discourse and scientific enquiry. It’s a delusional belief that causes many to really lose a grip on reality (e.g. belief that a magical being waved his magic wand to create the universe in 7 days about 6000 years ago, that a man built a wooden boat and stuffed every one of the ~1,700,000 species on board for 150 days – including ~2800 species of termite (lol)).
I think the tide is turning towards a new Enlightenment, and those who believe in superstitious nonsense had better get used to the ridicule, or turn off the internet, turn off the TV and only read the one book.
@Larry (#27) – good point. It demonstrates the arrogance and ignorance of many religious that their god is the one, true god. If only they realised that the god they believe in is a pure accident of time and geography … if they’d been born in another part of the planet and / or at another time, they’d be certain that Odin or Zeus or Anubis or Thor or Jupiter or Morrigan or Quetzalcoatl or [endless list of gods] were The Real Deal. And this is one of The Big Clues – they can’t all be true … so it takes very little rational thought to recognise *none* of them are true.
@MonoApe (#40) I’m a critical thinker with an IQ of 160 and a B.A. from an Ivy League school. And I’m a Christian, based not on blind faith suspension of reality but rather on my own research and rational discourse with other intelligent people.
I find it ironic that you claim not to disrespect the person but then accuse people like me of having shut down critical thinking, rational discourse, and scientific inquiry (I see no conflict between scientific inquiry and Christianity); of entertaining a delusional belief; of having no grip on reality; of being arrogant and ignorant; and of having no rational thought. You may want to look up the meaning of “respect.”
@40
there are of course great minds (current and throughout time) on both sides of the debate – so to suggest that belief in God is not deserving of respect and invites ridicule is to not fully appreciate the depth of the debate. If you read both “The God Delusion” and “God Is No Delusion” (or some other worthy response) I contend you’ll find good reason to at least respect our belief.
Believers as well as non-believers are equally capable of being close minded and only listening to half of the debate. If you’re serious about finding truth, give each side their time.
Peace.
Excellent… I’m sending it around to Episcopalian technologists…
Tech will liberate religion…
I’m waiting for the Raphaels and Michalangalos of the web to emerge…
Peace to you all…
@33
So are you saying that had he poked fun at a smaller religion than yours or one that you are not a member of that would be perfectly ok in your opinion? So apparently to you the validity of a religion is based on it’s size then?
Dan,
Despite your impressive IQ / Ivy League claims, your reading ability leaves a little to be desired. I wrote:
“It shuts down, for many, critical thinking, … ”
Note the ‘many’. In other words, not ‘all’. Of course there are intelligent, decent people who have been suckered in to religion – that still doesn’t mean I need to respect their delusional *belief*.
I note you chose to ignore my observation that your choice of god “is a pure accident of time and geography”. If you focus your intellect on this issue, and you are honest to yourself, there is no other conclusion to reach – it’s all one big wish-fulfilment, fairy story.
Gene,
I can have no respect for a belief that offers no evidence whatsoever, and is based on the error-strewn scribblings of ignorant, superstitious Bronze Age men. In the same way, I can have no respect for a belief that ‘Chief Chimp’ has been a great president. I try to avoid name-calling these people, but both are delusional by the strict definition of that word and many are simply dishonest and dumb as dirt.
Ask yourself why you (presumably) reject Muhammad, Joseph Smith, Jim Jones, David Koresh, L. Ron Hubbard and Michael Travesser. Once you’ve got that worked out, you’ll understand why I reject Jesus and Yahweh.
Mono Ape,
here’s a quote from CS Lewis which addresses your question:
“If you are a Christian, you do not have to believe that all the other religions are simply wrong all through. If you are an atheist, you do have to believe that the main point in all the religions of the whole world is simply one huge mistake. If you are a Christian, you are free to think that all these religions, even the queerest ones, contain at least some hint of the truth. When I was an atheist, I had to try to persuade myself that most of the human race have always been wrong about the question that mattered to them most; when I became Christian, I was able to take a more liberal view. But, of course, being a Christian does mean thinking that where Christianity differs from other religions, Christianity is right and they are wrong. As in arithmetic – there is only one right answer to a sum, and all other answers are wrong: but some of the wrong answers are much nearer being right than others.”
Here’s another excerpt from CS Lewis (from “The Joyful Christian”) with some great insight on the efficacy of prayer.
“…you need not, unless you choose, believe in a causal connection between the prayers and the recovery. The question then arises, ‘What sort of evidence would prove the efficacy of prayer?’ The thing we pray for may happen, but how can you ever know it was not going to happen anyway? Even if the thing were indisputably miraculous, it would not follow that the miracle had occurred because of your prayers. The answer surely is that a compulsive empirical proof such as we have in the sciences can never be attained.
Some things are proved by the unbroken uniformity of our experiences. The law of gravitation is established by the fact that, in our experience, all bodies without exception obey it. Now even if all the things that people prayed for happened, which they do not, this would not prove what Christians mean by the efficacy of prayer. For prayer is request. The essence of request, as distinct from compulsion, is that it may or may not be granted. And if an infinitely wise Being listens to the requests of finite and foolish creatures, of course He will sometimes grant and sometimes refuse them. Invariable ’success’ in prayer would not prove the Christian doctrine at all. It would prove something much more like magic – a power in certain human beings to control, or compel, the course of nature.
…We make requests of our fellow creatures as well as of God: …we ask for a raise in pay, we ask a friend to feed the cat… Sometimes we get what we ask for and sometimes not. But when we do, it is not nearly so easy as one might suppose to prove with scientific certainty a causal connection between the asking and the getting… Your employer is never so likely to grant your request for a raise as when he is aware that you could get better money from a rival firm and is quite possibly intending to secure you by a raise in any case…Thus in some measure the same doubt that hangs about the causal efficacy of our prayers to God hangs also about our prayers to man. Whatever we get we might have been going to get anyway. But only, as I say, in some measure. Our friend, boss, and wife may tell us that they acted because we asked and we may know them so well as to feel sure, first that they are saying what they believe to be true, and secondly that they understand their own motives well enough to be right. But notice that when this happens our assurance has not been gained by the methods of science… It is born out of our personal relation to the other parties; not from knowing things about them but from knowing *them*.
Our assurance – if we reach an assurance – that God always hears and sometimes grants our prayers, and that apparent grantings are not merely fortuitous, can only come in the same sort of way. There can be no question of tabulating successes and failures and trying to decide whether the successes are too numerous to be accounted for by chance. Those who best know a man best know whether when he did what they asked, he did it because they asked. I think those who best know God will best know whether He sent me to the barber’s shop [a reference to a previous story about a troubled friend] because the barber prayed.”
Gene,
C.S. Lewis answers neither of the questions I posed. His wordy, muddled and fallacious arguments hold no sway. His ‘Trilemma’ argument for the validity of Jesus is a great example of his confused thinking.
While we’re on C.S. Lewis, the celebrated ‘atheist’ who converted to Christianity – he was raised as a Christian, claimed to have become an atheist at age 13 and yet he later said that during his atheist years he was “very angry with God for not existing”. That is not an ‘atheist’. He also replaced his supposed loss of Christianity with fantasy and mythology. Again, that’s not an atheist, just someone who has a gap in their personality that needs to be filled with some non-reality.
The Efficacy of Prayer,
Drivel.
I wasn’t trying (And I doubt Michael wasn’t either) to start a theological debate – for that there are plenty of other sites better suited – my favorite is opensourcethelogy.com (which ironically is geared towards christianity but is very open and not defensive). I was simply pointing out that calling your site godtube.com and only allowing christian material is wrong and that techcrunch was wrong to promote it. Peace.
GodTube is interesting and useful, even if a rip off of YouTube. It wouldn’t need to exist if YouTube wasn’t so horrible at categorizing. I can never find anything on that site.