HOT. COOL. YOURS.
Apparently
a lot gets lost in translation.
After
wondering for days about the Sochi Olympic slogan I finally did a little
research and here’s what I discovered.
HOT – In Russian the word
is zharkie and can be translated as “heated.’ The idea is that the competition is heated by
the passion of the athletes (which is what is required to nail a YOLO Flip on
slushy snow in a halfpipe).
COOL – The Russian word is zimniye
which means “wintery.” It’s the winter
Olympics – snow, ice, white mountaintops, visions of Disney’s Frozen….
YOURS. “Yours” means “yours” in every language
except for where the proper word might be ya’lls or yous guys. The word was
chosen as a reminder that the Olympics are for everyone (speactators and
competitors) – no one is excluded from the party (avoiding any reference to
Communist Party exclusions).
HOT. COOL.
YOURS. Makes perfect sense once you
explain it – but nonsense if you don’t – like a lot of church messaging.
I
was in a worship service recently (not at Mountaintop) where the worship leader
encouraged us to celebrate that we were all children of different mothers but
the same father… I knew what he meant (and in writing it I could make it
clearer with “Father” rather than “father”) but it sure sounded weird when he
said it. I spent the next 5 minutes
with the words to the song “Papa Was A
Rolling Stone” stuck in my head.
HOT.
COOL. YOURS. – What’s your church’s “slogan” (we like to call them things like
vision or mission statements – but most people think of them as slogans). How much of what we are trying to say get’s
lost in translation?
And
for those who attend Mountaintop – how would you translate our vision (slogan)
to be:
A community that is learning and sharing a better way to live in Christ?
Changed lives
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