Farewelling Adam Goodes, during his lap of honour at the SCG.

What it feels like to be in a minority: Sitting in the Crowd at this weekend’s Sydney Swans v GWS Giants AFL game which was held at the Swan’s home ground, the Sydney Cricket Ground, Obadiah was wearing his orange and grey Giants cap. The crowd of 37,000 was a sea of red and white, the Swans colours. There might have been a couple of hundred in the Giants’ orange and grey. It felt a little lonely. Once upon time Obadiah wore red and white too, but when the new team, GWS (greater Western Sydney), was set up, Obadiah felt he should swap teams, because we live in Western Sydney. In reflective moment he found himself thinking, that Christianity used to feel rather like being a Swans fan (popular, well-regarded by most) but now feels like following the Giants (people wonder why you bother). As Christians, we all sit in the away fans part of the crowd.

No one booed: Adam Goodes did a lap of honour. Just about everyone stood up. Nobody booed.

Headline in a Christian website: “The perils of blind dating”. Obadiah thought it seemed a too contemporary or even a tad racy for a very conservative website. Turned out that I was right. The article was about carbon dating and creation.

Reacting to embarrassing news: A famous Christian got the embarrassing news that the man he thought was his father all his life is not his real father. And in the most awkward way possible – from a media report.How do you respond in a way that is actually uplifting? Justin Welby who has the job of leading the world’s Anglicans as Archbishop of Canterbury managed it. “I know that I find who I am in Jesus Christ, not in genetics, and my identity in him never changes.” He tells his story here

Quote of the week: “Our boys are in heaven, and we pray the defendant will be one day too – and we can all hold hands together” Testimony at a inquest reveals what South Carolina Pastor Gentry and wife Hadley Eddings (who lost two sons, one who was delivered in the emergency room but also died, after a traffic accident caused by another driver on drugs) said to the prosecutor.

Quote of the week 2: Mark Coleridge is one of Australia’s most influential Christian bloggers, either because or despite being Catholic Archbishop of Brisbane. The world’s Catholic media found this Aussie’s blogging from inside last year’s Vatican Synod (congress) on the Family gave by far the best insider view. Here’s a key par of his report on the Pope’s latest statement of the family from The Australian: “Of course he says the church must speak the truth. But that isn’t enough. If that’s all we do, then we run the risk of turning the great truths of Christianity into stones that we hurl at those we want to condemn. We also need to walk with people, all kinds of people, especially those who are struggling in their marriage or family life. It’s what Christianity has to offer in an often merciless world.”