#52 Stephen Colbert: Jesus

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|Corners and Coins

Have you seen Corners, the Nooma that draws its name from the ancient practice of leaving the edges of fields unharvested for others to glean (ex., Lev 19:9-10)? Over Christmas a few of us were talking about what that teaching could look like today in our non-agrarian society.

Today in class a gentleman shared how his church tries to live this. Members collect their spare change and bring it to church whenever there is a 5th weekend in a month. This money is donated to MCC, the Mennonite international development and relief agency.

I liked the sound of it. We save our change and have used it for Christmas and birthday presents for the past couple years, but this takes it to another level. I think this should be in addition to planned giving. What do you think? And what other ways could this ancient teaching be lived today?

|Monday Potpourri

These various items have caught my attention recently:

• The War Abroad and the War at Home (ESA)
• Arrested Development? (ESA)
• The End of Poverty? (documentary)
• Green (48 minute documentary, watch online)
• No Impact Man (C Beavan)
• Heroes of the Environment 2009 (Time article)
• Through the Consuming Fire: Economic Faithfulness in An Age of Consumerism (Conference, Nov 13-14)
• The Myth of a Christian Religion (G Boyd)
• The Year of Living Like Jesus (E Dobson)
• God's Economy (J Wilson-Hartgrove)
• Follow Me to Freedom (S Claiborne & J Perkins)
• "Awesome" photo a hit for Westminster birder (H Pankratz, The Denver Post)
• 20 moves to simplify your finances (M Hunt, Shine/Yahoo!, 21 Sept 2009)
  
• Liberals Aren’t Un-American. Conservatives Aren’t Ignorant. (Tom Jacobs, Utne Reader, Sept-Oct 2009)

BONUS: Okay, two more from Through the Consuming Fire...

• Enough: Contentment In An Age of Excess by Will Samson -- Engaging, readable challenge to consumerism in the church by one of our main speakers.
  (Read a review from The Englewood Review of Books...)

• Being Consumed: Economics and Christian Desire by William Cavanaugh -- Challenges churches to discern distinctively Christian economic practices.
  (Read a review from The Englewood Review of Books...)

|Compassion in Politics -- Bono

Check out this great (and short) post at Compassion in Politics about Bono's reaction to the Wall Street bailout.

|Jesus for President

Shane Claiborne and Chris Haw's book tour for Jesus for President kicks off tonight at 7pm at Mars Hill.




Here are some quotes from the Facebook group:

A different kind of campaign.
A different kind of party.
A different kind of Commander in Chief.

Jesus for President is a radical manifesto to awaken the Christian political imagination, reminding us that our ultimate hope lies not in partisan political options but in Jesus and the incarnation of the peculiar politic of the church as a people “set apart” from this world. In what can be termed lyrical theology, Jesus for President poetically weaves together words and images to sing (rather than dictate) its message. It is a collaboration of Shane Claiborne’s writing and stories, Chris Haw’s reflections and research, and art and design.


This is my little way of joining in the blog tour. And the book tour:

• JUNE 23 - GRAND RAPIDS
• JUNE 24 - INDIANAPOLIS
• JUNE 25 - CINCINNATI
• JUNE 26 - PITTSBURGH
• JUNE 27 - WASHINGTON DC
• JUNE 28 - NEW YORK CITY
• JUNE 29 - HARTFORD
• JUNE 30 - TORONTO, CANADA
• JULY 4 - CORNERSTONE FESTIVAL
• JULY 6 - OMAHA
• JULY 7 - DENVER
• JULY 11 - SAN FRANCISCO
• JULY 12 - FRESNO
• JULY 13 - LOS ANGELES
• JULY 15 - ALBUQUERQUE
• JULY 16 - LUBBOCK
• JULY 17 - DALLAS
• JULY 19 - ATLANTA
• JULY 20 - ORLANDO
• JULY 22 - RALEIGH/DURHAM
• JULY 23 - RICHMOND
• JULY 24 - PHILADELPHIA

|Pride

I was given a copy of Revolution in World Missions (Yohannan) when I started my new job. It's powerful.

Here's a bit from tonight's reading (p. 87-88):

Ask the average Christian why the Lord destroyed Sodom, and he or she will cite the city's gross immorality. Ezekiel, however, reveals the real reason in chapter 16, verses 49 and 50: "Behold, this was the iniquity of thy sister Sodom, pride, fullness of bread, and abundance of idleness was in her and in her daughters, neither did she strengthen the hand of the poor and needy. And they were haughty, and committed abomination before me: therefore I took them away as I saw good."

Sodom refused to aid the needy poor because of pride. We are caught up in a national pride similar to Sodom's. Yes, selfishness and perversion come from that pride, but we need to see that pride is the real root. Deal with that root and you cut off a multitude of sins before they have a chance to grow.

And from last night's section (p. 72):

I had a full-fledged pity party, feeling sorry for myself and the hard life I was leading.

With a start.... I realized that the Spirit of the Lord was speaking.

"I [God] am not in any trouble.... I made no promises that I will not keep. It is not the largeness of the work that matters, but only doing what I command. All I ask of you is that you be a servant. For all who join with you in the work, it will be a privilege--a light burden for them."

The words echoed in my mind. This is His work, I told myself. Why am I making it mine? The burden is light. Why am I making it heavy? The work is a privilege. Why am I making it a chore?

Presidential Nominees

I have not yet commented on this round of electioneering in the U.S. of A. These are the questions I would ask the campaigners if I had the opportunity:

1. Do you feel our current level of military spending is appropriate? Would you work to reduce spending in this area so we can invest in other ways?
2. Do you consider waterboarding torture? Will you call it torture and demand that this tactic and other forms of torture be completely prohibited?
3. Will you close Guantanamo, or will you at least guarantee that the Red Cross will have full access to ensure the Geneva Conventions are being honored there?
4. Will you deal with illegal immigration in a way that supports human rights and our economy? Do you admit that our society benefits from immigrants, both legal and illegal? Would you attempt to send illegal immigrants home, or would you design a legal framework for dealing with these millions of people that would allow them to stay with their families and their jobs? Why did you or did you not support the reforms President Bush attempted to inact?
5. How familiar are you with the Millenium Development Goals? Are you willing to honor our repeated commitment of offering .7% of GDP toward reaching these goals? Would you advocate for these objectives and lead us from .15% of GDP to at least .5%?
6. Do you believe that military intervention is the best way to deal with countries such as Iran or North Korea? What other means of promoting peace and reconciliation do you advocate?
7. Of course you must support business and the economy, but how much money have you received from lobbyists and special interests, specifically the defense (offense) industry, sickcare providers, and the industrial farming sector such as Monsanto? Who owns you?
8. Are you satisfied with our current healthcare system where some 47 million people do not have health insurance? How would you work to improve this?
9. How familiar are you with environmental issues? Who would be your advisor in this area? What is your stance on ecological conservation?
10. Do you plan to continue funding for HIV/AIDS research and care such as President Bush has done?
11. Who would you most want to have in your cabinet, especially in the posts of Attorney General, Secretary of Defense, and Secretary of State? Also leaders of the Department of Energy, Department of Homeland Security, the Environmental Protection Agency?
12. What are your opinions of the Patriot Act and subsequent rulings and enactments?
13. Do you believe unilateral or multilateral actions tend to be more effective at making a better world? In which situations?
14. How would you support investments in clean and renewable energy? Politicians tend to focus on short-term issues, but we need forward-thinking leadership. How can we begin preparing for Peak Oil by moving toward more sustainable ways of life now? What role would your administration play in this area?
15. What is your stance on sanctity of life issues--war, abortion, stem-cell research, poverty, etc.? Are you consistently pro-life? If not, explain your perspective on each issue.

What other questions would you want to ask?

God bless the whole world.

Red Letters (Tom Davis)

Tom Davis, president of Children’s HopeChest and author of Fields of the Fatherless, has written a new book that reads quickly and hurts deeply—Red Letters: Living a Faith that Bleeds (2007).

I’m a slow reader, yet I finished the book in three days. However, processing and living these ideas will take much longer. In the final paragraphs, Davis states, “I don’t want you to think of this as the end of anything at all. Instead, thin[k] of it as the beginning—the beginning of a Red Letters life” (p. 167). A life lived on the truth found in Jesus words, the Red Letters of the gospels.

Davis uses brutal examples of poverty, disease and violence, along with biblical teachings, to exhort readers to live their faith in ways that help those in need, specifically by caring for people in Africa with HIV/AIDS.

This book reminded me of Good News about Injustice by Gary Haugen, both are hopeful yet viscerally sickening. However, Red Letters is much more informal. I’m beginning to observe a common internal response to this type of book, “God, take us home! Finish this mess! Help me make it better while we’re here! Stop this now!!!”

Weakest Chapter: 9—Snapshots of Hope. This chapter is supposed to help the reader believe that he or she can work for change by showing that other “ordinary” people have also done meaningful things. However, as far as I can tell, the supposed ordinary people all live in foreign countries—Swaziland, South Africa, India and Russia. At the minimum, they are working in these countries, something most of us readers can’t do. [this book review sites chapter 9 as the best.]

In Good News about Injustice, Haugen does a better job of accomplishing this goal by telling more detailed stories about three people who made significant change within the U.S.

Strongest Chapter: 10—How to Bleed. This chapter makes up for chapter 9 by offering practical steps that most of us non-practitioners of international development can take.

Most significantly, Davis presents the Five for 50 plan:

Step 1—Give five minutes a day to pray for those suffering from HIV/AIDS.
Step 2—Give five hours a week to fast for those suffering from HIV/AIDS.
Step 3—Give five dollars a month to the Five for 50 Fund to support worthy causes.
Step 4—Give five days a year to travel overseas to help alleviate poverty and suffering.
Step 5—Give five people the opportunity to join you on your journey.

Additionally, he recommends starting a blog, talking to friends, joining an action group like the One Campaign or Acting on AIDS, raising money with a charity badge (see My Profile drop-down menu), going on a mission trip, connecting with Children’s HopeChest or Compassion International, going on a mission adventure, making a gift/donation, changing your shopping habits by consider the Red movement or fair trade items, or adopting a child (a handful of international adoption agencies were listed). The appendix offers a lengthy list and description of change-oriented organizations that could use our time and money.

If the book’s purpose was to convince readers that poverty is horrible and Christians can and should do something about it, then Davis was successful. Writers of such books must play a fine balancing act; they must convince the reader that the problem is serious enough to warrant action, but not so overwhelming as to lead the reader directly to fatalism and depression. Thankfully, we have a God of hope.

For those who would like to follow-up with a deeper analysis of poverty and development, may I suggest The End of Poverty (Jeffrey Sachs), Walking with the Poor (Bryant Myers) and Rich Christians in an Age of Hunger (Ron Sider).

The Gleaners and I

Our latest foray into foreign films was less fulfilling than expected. Doesn’t the following description for The Gleaners and I sound brilliant?

Agnes Varda’s no-holds-barred documentary about scavengers and recyclers is an insouciant treat from beginning to end. Inspired by Jean-Francois Millet’s famous painting “Les Glaneuses,” Varda strikes out with just a hand-held digital camera in search of the modern equivalent of Millet’s grain field gleaners. She finds her quarry at dumpsters, outdoor markets and roadsides across France. A unique film with an unexpectedly obtuse perspective. (Netflix packaging)

This could be accurate as long as insouciant means an elderly woman with no sense of cinematography or story line or character development walking around with a camera doing extreme close-ups of cabbage or heart-shaped potatoes or her hand (sometimes still, sometimes grabbing 18-wheelers like a child pretending to squish a playmate’s head between the thumb and pointer-finger).

Charissa couldn’t finish it. I couldn’t stop; the insanity pulled me along.

Have you seen it? Go ahead, tell me how artistically bankrupt I am. Point out to me that she won awards across Europe, so clearly I have unrefined cultural tastes.

High Point: Meeting a gentleman who sells newspapers, scavenges for food after the city market has closed, spends two hours a night teaching immigrants how to read and write French, and has a master’s degree in biology.

High Point 2: Listening to the same gentleman in the follow-up documentary made two years after the original. He shares his opinion of the film. He did not like her presence—footage of her hands and hair. It was “unnecessary.” Brilliant!

Low Point: The footage of the “dancing” lens cap taken when she forgot to turn off the camera while walking through a field. Unbelievable. Absolutely no relevance to the story. Except that I guess she gleaned a bit of throw-away footage and shared it with curiosity seekers like those who come to see the castle made from trash.

Conclusion: The Gleaners and I was a reminder of our culture of waste and the resourcefulness of those at the edges. It had great potential; the film could have been fabulous. But instead it’s so bad it hurts.

8 in 11

That is, I passed through eight airports in eleven days. The bulk of the time away from home was spent at Oakwood College for a social justice conference. The picture is of a slave cemetery that is on campus. It is believed that Dred Scott's wife and two children are burried here.

I recently learned that Sojourner Truth was SDA. And did you know that the Rwandan played by Don Cheadle in Hotel Rwanda was also Adventist? I had no idea. For a supposed list of other famous (and infamous) Adventists go here.

Ron Sider gave two presentations at the conference. Some of you know him as the President of Evangelicals for Social Action or as the author of Rich Christians in an Age of Hunger and Churches That Make a Difference. I just started reading the former. Please join with me. It was chosen as one of the top 100 books of the century by Christianity Today (now in it's 5th edition, it was first published 30 years ago).

I am also interested in reading Less Than Two Dollars a Day by Kent Van Til.

At the conference, one religious leader described the label Christian in its original context. It was meant as a derogatory term, but the followers of Christ took it and redeemed the epithet.

Just a few days earlier, my grandfather described a similar transformation from his youth when his family became Seventh-day Adventists (1930s or 40s?). The church had African-American church members, so people in town would sometimes sneer at my grandfather, "You go to that nigger church!"

They meant the term as demeaning, but our God is in the business of redeeming hurtful words. I'm glad to be part of a church that welcomed diversity long before the surrounding culture. Now if we could just maintain this social example. To me, separate conferences based on race in the eastern U.S. is just wrong.

The trip also included seeing my parents and attending Nick and Korine's wedding. Good times.

Shane Claiborne - Mars Hill

Click here to hear Shane preaching at Mars Hill. For those who've read The Irresistible Revolution, you'll recognize a lot of these stories. Seriously a spiritual kick in the back side. (More sermons by Shane at Mars Hill)

Where is my Calcutta? May we all do our small things with great love today.

If you're interested in learning more about Christian Community Development Association (CCDA), click here.

World Refugee Day

World Refugee Day - UN

UNHCR - 2007

USA for UNHCR

International Rescue Committee

Tsotsi and the Tick go to Managua

Last night we watched Tsotsi, a redemption movie set in a poor township in South Africa, and then I pulled a tick off my arm. Both were hard to watch. The tick must have found me while we hiked in RMNP on Sabbath afternoon. I say I love nature, but I HATE ticks and they are as natural as the sunset.






Pictures taken in RMNP this weekend:



1. Northern view from Trail Ridge Road. That jet barely cleared the mountains.
2. Southern view from Deer Mountain Trail. Long's Peak is the highest point on the left.
3. Mountain Bluebird perched and singing.
4. Quaking Aspen (below).



Also, Sunday morning I finished reading Meet Me in Managua, by Wendy Murray Zoba. I felt the flow was stalled by unnecessary commentary and trivia, but I did appreciate the final section that highlighted numerous people affected by Rainbow Network, an NGO working to help rebuild Nicaragua one small community at a time. This world needs more Keith Jaspers. I need to be more like Keith. You can read it to see what I mean.

Dolores Huerta

This past Tuesday night, six of us went to UNC to hear Dolores Huerta speak (Link 2, Link 3). I thought she was going to talk about her with with Cesar Chavez on farm workers’ rights, but it was an event for Women’s History Month. She is a firey lady, but she talked about so many different things that it was hard to follow her train of thought.

Here are a few loose quotes, paraphrases, shall we say:

The real “value issue” is poverty, instead of money going to war.

The U.N. convention on Women’s Equality has not been passed by the U.S. [Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women]

“Undocumented workers” should be used instead of “illegal aliens.”

We need to stop U.S. economic colonization.

On Sunday, April 29, we need to march for immigrant children who are left when their parents are deported. We should send postcards and emails to our political leaders’ district offices urging them to vote yes for legalization of undocumented workers.

Education is for service, not so we can exploit others. We need to make the world a better place. There’s nothing wrong with wealth; just use it to make the world a better place.

We are all Africans with different shades of color.

“Wozani” is a Zulu word that means “The people are coming together to fight for justice.”

We should make drug addiction a disease not a crime, like alcohol and nicotine addiction, and empty our prisons.

Politicians work for us. We pay their salaries. We don’t owe them something; they owe us something.

She also commented on the wall between the U.S. and Mexico, the Dream Act, a woman taking sanctuary in a church to avoid being deported, the Equal Rights Ammendment, abortion rights, the environment, self-defense classes, female cultural training, Venezualian health care, James Dobson and Ted Haggard, and I can’t remember what else. It really was all over the social action map.

POVERTY: The Suburbs

Here's an interesting article about poverty problems shifting from the inner-city to suburbia.

ISSUE: Poverty

Each student in my ESL class had to lead a 30 minute discussion based on a topic of their choice. The gentleman who is on leave from Guatemala's central bank presented stats on poverty that he found at www.globalissues.org.

Here are some choice bits of info (emphasis mine):

• 20% of the world’s population consume 86% of the world’s goods while 80% of humanity gets just the remainder 14%.
• “The combined wealth of the world’s 200 richest people hit $1 trillion in 1999; the combined incomes of the 582 million people living in the 43 least developed countries is $146 billion.” ^{source 16}
• The richest 50 million people in Europe and North America have the same income as 2.7 billion poor people. “The slice of the cake taken by 1% is the same size as that handed to the poorest 57%.” ^{source 22}
• In the UK the bottom 50% of the population now owns only 1% of the wealth: in 1976 they owned 12%.
• Half the world — nearly three billion people — live on less than two dollars a day. ^{source 1}
• The GDP (Gross Domestic Product) of the poorest 48 nations (i.e. a quarter of the world’s countries) is less than the wealth of the world’s three richest people combined. ^{source 2}
• Less than one per cent of what the world spent every year on weapons was needed to put every child into school by the year 2000 and yet it didn't happen. ^{source 4}
• Some 1.1 billion people in developing countries have inadequate access to water, and 2.6 billion lack basic sanitation.
• More than 660 million people without sanitation live on less than $2 a day, and more than 385 million on less than $1 a day.
• The world’s 497 billionaires in 2001 registered a combined wealth of $1.54 trillion, well over the combined gross national products of all the nations of sub-Saharan Africa ($929.3 billion) or those of the oil-rich regions of the Middle East and North Africa ($1.34 trillion). It is also greater than the combined incomes of the poorest half of humanity. ^{source 23}
• In 1960, the 20% of the world’s people in the richest countries had 30 times the income of the poorest 20% — in 1997, 74 times as much. ^{source 10}

Consider the global priorities in spending in 1998:

Global Priority	$U.S. Billions
Cosmetics in the United States	8
Ice cream in Europe	11
Perfumes in Europe and the United States	12
Pet foods in Europe and the United States	17
Business entertainment in Japan	35
Cigarettes in Europe	50
Alcoholic drinks in Europe	105
Narcotics drugs in the world	400
Military spending in the world	780

And compare that to what was estimated as additional costs to achieve universal access to basic social services in all developing countries:

Global Priority	$U.S. Billions
Basic education for all	6
Water and sanitation for all	9
Reproductive health for all women	12
Basic health and nutrition	13

^{source 25}