Bishop Prompts All Orthodox to Stop Watching TV!

[尼古拉前执事]

Turn-Off TV Week is next week for me!

That is a good use for a TV How did turn-off TV week go for you?

[George]

As for me, I unplugged mine last Nativity fast, and the next thing i knew it was Great Lent, so it has stayed unplugged gathering dust with the one exception of a few weeks back when we had some appalling weather and I wanted to see the news reports. There is a documentary I want to watch next week, but really it is just gathering dust. I ought to put it out when they next have an inorganic rubbish collection and have it taken away. Even before I switched off I hardly ever watched it as the content is so puerile. The strange thing is if one is on at someone's house your eyes naturally get drawn to it. In many ways TV seems to me to be mass-hypnotism. (As well as being a great waste of time.)

[Seraphim Reeves]

I'm at a loss as to why holy-weird is upset with a device that would work in this fashion. The fact of the matter is, if I knew an objectionable scene was coming up in a film, I might be inclined to fast-foward/skip anyway - so what if someone wants to do that for me?

Frankly, I think some holy-weird folks are conceited about the crappola they put out every year - very little of it is "art" by any stretch of the imagination, but more akin to the games and circuses of the old world, including all that can be disedifying about such spectacles.

Seraphim

[Daniel]

That is a good use for a TV How did turn-off TV week go for you?

Oh, fine I suppose. It was only off for Holy Week. It wasn't so bad for me because I'm at work. It's was a little harder for my wife who stays at home with our two daughters (though it was only one at the time).

Given that most of the stuff broadcast is worthless, there are still some good programing (PBS) and there plus you need the TV for video/DVDs.

[Sean]

There are many who detest television, even among liberal circles, as none can doubt that it is the porpaganda tool par excellence. I have some non-Orthodox friends who threw a "Kill Your TV" theme party a couple months ago, which featured live entertainment. It costed a cover charge to get in, unless you arrived with a TV. The highlight of the evening was at the end when all the TV's were destroyed. This might be a good theme for a get-together with Orthodox Christians.

--Sean

[TomS]

Personally, I think you can find more damaging things on th internet than on TV. At least on TV there are still SOME limits -- on the computer you get the stuff "pushed" at you via emails and pop-ups.

[尼古拉前执事]

St. Cosmas of Aitolia said in the 18th century that there would be a
box in people's homes having two horns which would make people
stupid.

+++++++++++++
 
Elder Lavrenty said: "The abomination of desolation will stand in
the holy place and will show forth the foul seducers of the world
who, working false miracles, will deceive all such men as have
fallen way from God. And, after them, antichrist will appear! The
entire world will see him at one and the same time."

To the question: "Where is the holy place -- in church?"

Venerable Lavrenty said: "Not in church, but in the home!
Beforetimes, a table used to stand in the corner where the holy
icons were. Then, however, that space will be occupied by seductive
instruments for the deception of men. Many who have departed away
from the Truth will say: We need to watch and hear the news. And it
is in the news that antichrist will appear; and they will accept
him."
 
+++++++++++++

There are also some protestant writers who prophesised in the 60's
and 70's that the TV will have mind control over the masses and will
be the par excellence medium to spread the antichristian agenda.
Grant it that Elder Lavrenty wrote about the TV a few decades
earlier, earthly truths can be accuratley described by those outside
the Church. The Church however possesses the true faith about the
Triune God Himself and His mysteries, but she does not have all the
earthly truths, which we can learn from those not in the Church and
filter them through the orthodox patristic mind of Christ, as St.
Bssil the Great says.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

The "Daily Telegraph" report, "TV is corroding society, says
Humphrys"

After not watching British television for five years, John Humphrys
has
switched his set back on and discovered how much of it is rubbish.
Hence his excoriation of "junk TV" at the Edinburgh Television
Festival
last night. It's hard to disagree.

TV is corroding society, says Humphrys
August 28, 2004
Daily Telegraph (Great Britain)
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jh ... 004/08/28/
nhump28.xml

Much of modern television is not only bad but socially corrosive,
coarsening and brutalising viewers through its obsessions with sex,
aggression and voyeurism, John Humphrys, the broadcaster, said
yesterday.

Delivering the MacTaggart lecture at the Edinburgh Television
Festival,
Humphrys suggested that the first principle of the Hippocratic oath -

first do no harm - should be observed by broadcasters. The presenter
of
Radio 4's Today programme was particularly scathing about "reality"
shows such as Channel 4's Big Brother.

Although there were relatively few of them, he said, they
had "infected
the mainstream of the medium", damaging even serious areas of
television such as history and documentary.

Humphrys, who also hosts Mastermind, said the BBC "produces its
share
of rubbish and its share of quality programming" but had "avoided
the
worst excesses of reality television". However, he said that Greg
Dyke,
the former director general, was wrong to say that politics was
inherently boring and the BBC needed to make it more entertaining.

He said: "It is a serious business and it is our job to report it
seriously. If people don't want it, that is their business, not
ours."