Below is a sermon I preached at Generation Church in Oceanside, CA. Please listen to it and tell me what you think! The picture below is what I refered to at the beggining of the sermon.
Election years are times of great animosity and fervor. So often in the months approaching an election Christians seem to get more patriotic and "seemingly" more political. We have been taught from a very young age that it is our moral and patriotic responsibility to vote. We have been taught that voting is the means by which we politically engage the world. Although this article is concerned with politics, this article will not try to convince you to vote for any particular presidential candidate. I don't believe this will make us more faithfully Christian.
Rather, this article will merely ask one question: namely, how do we politically engage the world as faithful Christians on November 3rd, 5th, and 6th?
You see brothers and sisters, we are confronted with the temptation to believe that because we vote, we have fulfilled our political duty for the next four years. Forfeiting the political nature of the Kingdom of God through the Church, we have settled for a cheap perversion of politics where the Church is used and co-opted to justify the platform of any political agenda. Although republicans and democrats tend to not cooperate on many issues, bipartisan consumption of the Church happens across the board. Both the left and the right entice the Church to align itself with the next up-and-coming party in power. Enticed by her beauty and power, the politics of our day are an easy solution for an insecure Church.
Jesus experienced such a temptation. The last in a series of four temptations, Jesus is confronted by Satan. "Again, the devil took him to a very high mountain and showed him all the kingdoms of the world and their splendor. 'All this I will give you,' he said, 'if you will bow down and worship me.' Jesus said to him, 'Away from me, Satan! For it is written: Worship the Lord your God, and serve him only'" (Matthew 4:8-10). Jesus here does not reject political power, but rather rejects a particular type of politics that can only be achieved through idolatry.
Although Jesus resisted Satan's temptation, Satan understood the power that the kingdoms of the world utilize to entice people away from worshiping God. The Church in America finds itself in an interesting place. Insecure and stuck in an identity crisis, the Church has been enticed by the power and majesty of the kingdoms of the world. Bowing down to them, we have traded the worship of God for the worship of structures, parties, and people. Mainline denominations in America have been historically failing. Convinced that the Church does have the resources to effectively change the world, we have flocked to the kingdoms of the world for security and change. Because we have not effectively made disciples to live moral and faithful lives, we have decided to legislate morality. You see brothers and sisters, this has nothing to do with choosing between a republican or democratic platform. Rather this has everything to do with the Church. The Church has lost its power.
The Church has been called to be a political body. Living out small pockets of the Kingdom of God, the Church lives by a different set of politics. Politically engaging the world, we do not need to wait for November 4th to make a change. We do not need to wait for legislation to pass to affect the world. Are people hungry, naked, poor, or sick? Why isn't the Church feeding them, clothing them, providing for them, and taking care of them (Matthew 25:40)? Are there wars and rumors of wars? Why isn't the Church practicing peacemaking (Matthew 5:9)? Is there hate, violence, and death in the world? Why isn't the Church practicing love for its enemy? Why isn't the church praying and forgiving its enemy (Romans 12)?
Sadly, we have failed. We have traded in the cross for a sword. But if we live by the sword, we shall die by the sword.
This is by no means a plea for people to stop voting. Rather this is a plea to see voting differently. Voting is important and should be practiced, but it is by no means the primary way that the Church faithfully politically engages the world. We need to re-discover the language of the Kingdom of God. A kingdom is a political body that requires allegiance from its members. The Kingdom of God is a trans-national, trans-historical global Kingdom. That means that God's Kingdom can be found in any county, at any point in history. As citizens of the Kingdom of God (Ephesians 2:19), we are confronted not with the question, "What is best for America?", but rather, we are confronted with the question, "What is best for the world?". "For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish but have eternal life" (John 3:16).
NAFTA, Urbanization, Labor Migration, and the Immigration Crisis or Blessing?
If you were anything like me, then chances are that you did not pay much attention in your senior government and economics classes. The reality of the matter is that I didn't spend much time studying for any class in high school.
Unfortunately, our very laziness and apathy to understand fundamental political and economic principles are the responsible agents in enabling dominant forces to wield unquestioned power. It is our laziness and indulgence of ignorance that enables power to coercively oppress and dominate people. These problems are not simple, but rather complex. Complex problems require a complex solution. But as we have seen throughout history, a number of complex problems have been boiled down to simple scapegoats—a demonized few. People groups such as the Jews, Tutsis, and presently undocumented Latino migrants, have been demonized and marginalized as the sole cause of complex problems.
Rather than continuing to demonize the undocumented Latino migrants among us (repeating the mistakes of the past), allow us to explore the dynamics of the problem before us: the immigration crisis.
The complex problem before us has most immediate roots in January of 1994. That year marked the solidification of what we call today "a globalized world". The North American nations of Mexico, Canada, and the United States entered into a trade-bloc called the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). Naturally, one would ask, "free from what?". Well, NAFTA was implemented in order to eliminate all taxes and tariffs imposed upon products being bought and sold between North American nations. Thus, when one refers to free trade, one is referring to trade that is free from taxes and tariffs. This is called liberalization or deregulation (liberalization: meaning liberating the market from taxes and tariffs, and deregulation: meaning undoing regulations restricting international trade).
Now ideally, this agreement was thought to help poor developing nations. But over the past 14 years the opposite has proven true. In order to discover the destructive dynamics of this agreement, observe what this agreement has done to one particular market of the global economy—agriculture. Within the United States, farmers are subsidized by the federal government to produce a surplus. Meaning, farmers receive free money from the government in order to sell their products cheaper on the global market. According to the America's Program, 40% of the net income for American farmers come from government subsidies. This surmounts to about $248.6 billion that the government is freely giving annually to large multinational corporations. Although this is intended to keep the cost of food down for American consumers, the affects on the world market are disastrous.
For example, although it costs American farmers about $3.41 to produce a bushel of wheat, American farmers sell one bushel on the international market for $2.28. This means they are selling their products cheaper than the cost to produce them. Federally funded subsidies are what enable American farmers to sell their products at such a low cost and still make a profit. When such cheap products flood the international market, competitors are forced to lower their prices. Small independent farmers in Mexico and Central America do not receive federally funded subsidies. Likewise, their production processes are not as efficient and technologically dependent as American farmers. Naturally, it would cost Mexican farmers more to produce their products than American farmers. When trying to compete on the international market, Mexican farmers are forced to drop their prices lower than the cost of production——forcing them into debt.
Before NAFTA, tariffs and taxes were utilized to balance the privileged position of American and Canadian farmers. Enabling smaller independent farmers in Mexico and Central America to compete with products from the United States, tariffs regulated the market for more just conditions. But now that the market has been deregulated and liberalized, "market forces", historic privilege, and economy of scale——not justice or hard work——dictate who will and will not make a profit.
Thus far, the results have been catastrophic. Small family owned farms in Mexico are systematically failing. Unable to provide for their families, farmers are forced to leave the rural agricultural countryside for the seemingly opportunity rich urban centers. This migration of labor is characterized by "push" and "pull" factors. Pushed from the agricultural countryside by market forces imposed by NAFTA, farmers are pulled to cities by the myth of jobs, services, and opportunity.
The pulls of the city are often romanticized. This promise of wealth and security is known as the "urban mystique". Unfortunately the urban mystique is exactly what it claims to be; namely a mystique, not reality. The harsh reality of the city is anything but the assurance of success. Brutal competition for employment, housing, clean water, and health services is the reality that migrant laborers confront upon arriving to these metropolises. Border cities, such as Tijuana and Ciudad Juarez, are experiencing this urban boom. As the population in these cities increase, adequate, affordable, and formal housing becomes increasingly scarce. The majority of these economic refugees are forced to build informal settlements called colonias. Typically, colonias are built on the most undesirable and uninhabitable lands.
In Tijuana for example, "the great majority of the population of 1.5 million live in self-built colonias that cling precariously to the sides of eroding hills or squat on bare mesas" (Davis, 2005). Because the sheer majority of these shacks do not rest on modern concrete foundations, rains can be catastrophic to entire colonias. Entire communities can be swept down a hillside without warning. Every winter countless men, women, and children suffocate under a deluge of rushing mud. Because these people represent the city's most marginalized and disenfranchised, reliable death-toll statistics are not available.
Sadly, the plight of these economic refugees only gets worse. As the competition for employment in these cities rises, the wage one is willing to work for lowers. This is again simple market forces: supply and demand. Many people claim this is natural; "the way things just are". This couldn't be further from the truth. As more people compete for jobs, human lives are not treated with dignity and reverence for their Creator. Rather, people are dehumanized and treated as any other commodity. This is called the "commodification of labor". Denying one's humanity, people become expendable resources that can be bought, sold, and traded. This is exceedingly true within the border city multinational factories called maquiladoras. Within a typical maquiladora, laborers receive on average 81 cents an hour. 42% of Tijuana's population is currently employed by such industries. Two-thirds of these people receive no "social benefits". The term "social benefits" is not narrowly defined as only health care, but includes workers compensation (Canales). Thus, if and when these economic refugees get injured in one of these maquiladoras, they are disposed of as an expendable resource.
Living in informal settlements on the margins of border cities, these economic refugees are pulled again by another type of mystique called "El Otro Lado"—the other side. Finally, after a long series of events fueled by western consumption, the problems we have created are becoming our problems. Pushed by harsh living and working conditions, these economic refugees are pulled to the other side of the border. Promises of health and wealth captivate the imaginations of these economic refugees; only to arrive to racism, bigotry, and harsh working conditions.
The deceptive term "immigration crisis" has been loosely thrown around in reference to this problem. This term narrowly isolates only one aspect of the problem without highlighting the blood on our own hands. We seek to not only discourage use of the term "immigration crisis", but likewise, question whether or not the presence of economic refugees amongst us truly is a "crisis".
Citizens of what?
As followers of a first century homeless political refugee—Jesus the Christ—, we should have a particular affinity towards the poor and displaced. Calling these people "aliens" means that they are foreign to us. But if we take the gospel seriously, we should "…regard no one from a worldly point of view" (2Cor. 5:16). Rather, we recognize all people as children of God. Fellow brothers and sisters, no one is foreign to us, but rather members of our very family. In order to see people from this perspective, we need to question what we consider ourselves citizens of.
The migrant poor amongst us serve as a prophetic indictment to us. Living amongst us as mystical pictures of Christ (Matthew 25:40), their presence forces us to confront the question "What are we citizens of?". We learn from the apostle Paul that when we participate with Jesus in his death and resurrection (baptism), we become citizens of an alternative kingdom.
The age-old saying, "blood is thicker than water" is true for the most part, with the exception of the church. If we take the Scriptures seriously, then the waters of baptism are thicker than blood. The Body we are baptized into literally is God's alternative kingdom: The Body of Christ. Citizens of this kingdom, we are no longer foreign to each other, but rather mutual citizens. Participating in a meal of bread and wine together, we enact and perform the Body of Christ. The one loaf of bread represents Christ's one body. As we break that one loaf, we are reminded that Jesus was broken for us on the cross. We unite Christ's broken body through being in communion with one another. Forming His body, prior divisions do not matter any more. Water is thicker than blood. We form Christ's Body.
During the Christmas season, a group of our friends participate in something called "La Posada Sin Fronteras" (The Inn Without Borders). Gathered at the border of the United States and Mexico, Americans and Mexicans reject their nationally ascribed identity, and perform the Body of Christ. Serving each other bread and wine through the holes in the border fence, these faithful Christians literally perform and enact a subversive version of reality where borders make no sense: The Body of Christ.
We are no longer citizens of Rome, Mexico, or the United States, but rather we become citizens of an alternative kingdom that transcends all borders, languages, and ethnicities. We learn from Paul that "there is no Greek or Jew, circumcised or uncircumcised, barbarian, Scythian, slave or free, but Christ is all, and is in all" (Col. 3:11). As Christians living in a place called the United States of America, we must pause and tell the economic refugees amongst us that they "are no longer foreigners and aliens, but fellow citizens with God's people and members of God's household" (Eph. 2:19). Collectively, our citizenship is in heaven, not within a nation. But what does this mean for us?
Well first of all, the economic refugees amongst us remind us that we are also aliens living in a strange world. As citizens of heaven, we live as resident aliens in a strange world. Living as citizens of the Kingdom of God, we pray the prayer that cries out, "your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven". Living out the kingdom of God on earth today, we must align our politics with the politics of God's kingdom. Such politics do not marginalize anyone on the basis of imaginary lines we call borders. Our citizenship transcends any human construction. This means that in Christ there is not male nor female, Jew nor Gentile, documented nor undocumented, or should we even dare to say American nor Iraqi.
Participating within these alternative politics, we must live as if these economic refugees are our brothers and sisters. Demanding trade reform through only purchasing fair trade products is one way of doing this. But more importantly, practicing hospitality forces us to confront these issues through the lives, faces, smiles, and tears of God's children. So then, "Do not forget to entertain strangers, for by so doing some people have entertained angels without knowing it" (Hebrews 13:2). Such economic refugees are angels to us; reminding us where our true citizenship lies.
Bibliography
Alejandro Canales. "Industrialization, Urbanization, and Population Growth on the Border". August 1999, http://americas.irc-online.org/borderlines/1999/bl58/ bl58dev_body.html
Americas Program Policy Report. "NAFTA Free Trade Myths Lead to Farm Failure in Mexico" Dec. 2007, http://americas.irc-online.org/am/4794
Mike Davis. "A Rainy Day in Tijuana" Feb2005, www.socialistreview.org.uk/article.php?articlenumber=9241
Wow, sooo I’ve been blogging it up lately...Much more so than usual. Well, this next blog is not for the average audience. I know the majority of you (Myspace Friends) don’t study theology or think too critically of political science. Sooo, by no means is the blog entry meant to engage you. I assume a rather large pre-understanding of certain terms and concepts. If you would like to read it, by all means, do so. But rather, the intended audience for this blog are my friends from college, and the few others who are weird that care about this stuff like me. Soo, Shawn, I will spare you the writing time and already affirm the elitist nature of this blog. With that said, read away!
The Salvation of the Playground Pt. I
It’s a common misconception to believe that kindergarteners are the only ones that exercise something we like to call imagination. Vested into a drama of good vs. evil, these young heroes vanquish evil with their flaming swords—i.e. sticks—, only to be interrupted by the sound of a bell and the call of a teacher to return to class.
It is the central thesis of this article that "us" big-kids likewise exercise imaginations; the only difference is that our weapons cause much more damage and turmoil than mere sticks. Utilizing the works of William Cavanaugh, I will attempt to identify the social imagination in which society is vested into by the discipline of the State.
What is a social imagination? The term has historically been associated with concepts such as worldviews, paradigms, and for Hegel, the "spirit of the people". The fundamental assumption behind such terms is that faculties of any institution, society, or social body cannot be reduced to its merely functional meaning. Rather, as Cornelius Castoriadis teaches us, in his The Imaginary Institution of Society,
Everything that is presented to us in this social-historical world is inextribicably tied to the symbolic. Not that it is limited to this. Real acts, whether individual or collective ones…would be impossible outside of a symbolic network"[1]—a social imagination.
Social imaginations impart meaning and significance to seemingly functional objects and actions. For example, Cavanaugh, in his Torture and the Eucharist , comments on the power and role of a social imaginations,
The social imagination is not a mere representation of something which is real, as a flag represents a putatively "real" nation-state; the imagination of a society is involved when the flag becomes what one will kill and die for… The imagination of a society is the condition of possibility for the organization and signification of bodies in a society. The imagination is the drama in which bodies are invested.[2]
Narrated into a particular drama, social bodies—conditioned through the disciplinary power of the State[3]—perform roles consistent with their imagination.
Crime, terrorism, wars, and rumors of wars are all indicative of a drama we are conditioned to believe. Scripted into a particular narrative, we are lead to believe that violence is natural, with its roots in a primitive primordial essential ontology. Describing this ontology, Cavanaugh states
the war of all against all is the natural condition of humankind. It is cold fear and need for security, the foundation of both religion and the social contract, that drives humans from their nasty and brutish circumstances and into the arms of the Leviathan [:The State]. This soteriology of the State as peacemaker demands that its sovereign authority be absolutely alone and without rival.[4]
Thus, in speaking of the acts of "terrorism", Everett Wheeler—a historian of military affairs and theory—characterizes terrorist violence as "primitive". He states, "terror as a strategic/tactical tool has ancient roots, and terrorism like primitive warfare is unconventional in its most literal sense: the parties in conflict lack a shared set of rules"[5]—as if a rational, terror free, or governed violence actually existed. Citing theinevitability of violence, the State narrates such a drama so that we are lead to believe that the only hope for a fragmented people plagued by the brutalities of their primordial nature is the intervention of the State through its monopolization of coercive violence—the State saves through its mighty hand. Through this monpolization, the State assumes the exclusive right to excerise violence. Thus, a particular soteriology is normalized through the rejection of all other soteriologies.
Crowded into packed arenas, the seams of these edifices are bursting with devout worshipers. Offering their sacrifices of praise, song, and eventually votes, the ground literally shakes with their fervor. As the messiah appears on stage to harold the euangelion—good news—to the poor, oppressed, jobless, and taxed, anticipation builds through the congregation. As the messiah opens her/his mouth, different phrases uttered incite tears from the crowd, "Yes we can do…Yes we can together!"[6], or "You can’t convince me that our problems are insurmountable. Americans have never met a challenge we couldn’t overcome"[7]. Claiming to be able to offer salvation from the degradation and violence of the world, the social imagination that idolizes the State is best observed through these recent presidential campaigns. Complete hope is vested in the State and its polity through the faith vested into these candidates. But at the cost of what?—the State’s use of violence.
Legitimating its violence, the bully of the playground wields his mighty stick as if it were rational and evolved. But how is violence, in any form, evolved or free of terror? It is this particular myth—the myth of retributive justice—that the State wields in its affairs on the playground to assume its soteriology. Thus, when
US bombs hit a civilian warehouse in Afghanistan in late 2001, Donald Rumsfeld responded, ’We’re not running out of targets, Afghanistan is.’ Apparently no reporter questioned such lighthearted destruction of Afghanistan’s civilian property. The bombs kept falling…But the first six months of US bombing of Afghanistan killed as many civilians as had been massacred in the WorldTradeCenter.[8]
Through the disciplinary measures the State imposes upon the masses, these atrocities are narrated and normalized as "collateral damage" necessary for our security and freedom from fear. And again, with the countless other horrors of our era, they go by unnoticed and not challenged. If the disciplinary power of the State to script the masses into a particular social imagination is what enables for these atrocities to go by unquestioned and legitimated, true resistance to the State and its imagination can only be forged through a counter discipline into an alternate social imagination—discipleship. In the weeks to come, part two of this mini-series will concentrate on the subversive power of Orthodox Christian discipleship and worship in resistance to the powers and principalities of this dark age[9]. In doing so, the Church rejects the soteriology of the State, and testifies that, "Salvation is found in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given to men by which we must be saved"[10]—Jesus Christ of Nazareth.
[1] Castoriadis, Cornelius. The Imaginary Institution of Society. Translated by Kathleen Blamey. Polity Press, Oxford: 1975 Pg. 117
[2] Cavanaugh, William T., Torture and Eucharist. Blackwell Publishing, MA: 1998. Pg. 57
[3] For information on the disciplinary methodology of the modern nation-state, see Michel Foucault’s renowned work Discipline and Punishment (1975) and William Cavanaugh’s groundbreaking work Torture and the Eucharist Pg. 21-70
[4]Cavanaugh, William T., "’A Fire Strong Enough to Consume the House:’ The Wars of Religion and the Rise of the State". Modern Theology, Oct 1995Pg. 10
[5] Wheeler, Everett L. "Terrorism and Military Theory: An Historical Perspective", Terrorism Research and Public Policy. Edited by McCauley, Clark R. KY: Routledge, 1991
[6] The motto of current presidential candidate Barack Obama.
[7] The concluding remarks of a speech delivered by current presidential candidate John McCain in Livonia, Michigan on January 12, 2008
[8]Kiernan, Ben. Forum on the American Invasion of Iraq: "Collateral Damage" from Cambodia to Iraq, Antipode. MA: Blackwell Publishing, 2003 Pg.1
[9] Where I will be heavily drawing from the work of Katongole Emmanuel M. A Future for Africa: Critical Essays in a Christian Social Imagination. IL: Scranton Press, 2005
Soooo, as many of know, I work at a church in Vista. I have to write a news letter every month to our congregation. I just wrote the news letter for the month of Feb. and I thought that many of you may be interested in reading it. So, you will find it below!
Let me know what ya'll think!
The End of "The Journey" on the Horizon: The Gates to a New Frontier
You may not know, but our church's youth have gone through an intensive discipleship program (The Journey) that consisted of 11 weeks of class teaching, one-on-one mentorship, and finally 16 hours of service. This program was strategically designed in such a way to create disciples of Jesus Christ—embodied in conversion, learning, relationship building, and service. Many of these students will either be welcomed as members of the church, baptized for the first time, or recommit their baptismal vows. To recognize and celebrate our youth, a Youth Sunday is in the works of being planned. Please keep your ears and eyes attentive to further details on this celebration.
Allow us now to turning our eyes to ourselves. Celebrating the accomplishment of our youth is a chance for ourselves to remember our own baptism. The age-old saying, "blood is thicker than water" is true for the most part, with the exception of the church. If we take the Scriptures seriously, the waters of baptism are thicker than blood. The Body we are baptized into literally is God's family. And so, when we are instructed to greet one-another on Sunday mornings, we are reminded that these people—that God has gathered—truly are our fellow brothers and sisters in Christ's Body. When told that his family was waiting outside a crowded home for him, Jesus asked, "'Who are my mother and my brothers?' he asked. Then he looked at those seated in a circle around him and said, 'Here are my mother and my brothers! Whoever does God's will is my brother and sister and mother' (Mark3:33-34). Be reminded that the divisions and barriers the world attempts to erect—language, nationalities, race, culture, or even sex—in attempts to divide Christ's body make no sense in light of baptism.
In 1994 a brutal and devastating war in Rwanda gave way to genocide. The two ethnic groups, Hutu and Tutsis, were at odds with each other. It is estimated that at least 500,000 Tutsis were massacred at the hands of crude weapons such as machetes. Sadly, Christians killed Christians through the horror and despair. But, on one particular day, a local militia entered a Christian secondary school. For the purposes of continuing the carnage, the militia told the students to separate into Hutu and Tutsis. One young girl, Shanta Munjoarajo, exclaimed, "We have been baptized into one Body, and we are friends! We will not separate". The militia went ahead and massacred them all—13 children were killed.
As our youth are moving into the frontier of life in the church, may we be examples of the unity in Christ. May this frontier truly be characterized in love, compassion, forgiveness, and the resurrection; for the waters of baptism truly are thicker than blood!
MLK Day: A Call to Christian Faithfulness
Current mood: determined
In 2005 city developers in Downtown San Diego were threating to prevent the Salvation Army's Bread of Life Ministry from serving God through serving the poor. Since then the threat has subsided on the Bread of Life, but by no means are the voiceless and homeless of our county taken care of. From undocument laborers to dual-diagnosed (substance-abuse and mental health issues) victims living on our streets and hills, these men, women and children continue to be dehumanized and forgoten.
In light of the legacy of the late and great Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., I provide below an article a friend of mine wrote in reaction to what was occuring in 2005. Although the Bread of Life remains, I suspect the critique and call to faithfulness in the article remains important for us today. Please read it and reflect on it. Likewise, please comment on it. Also, I provide below a piece of art by Rose Wells that I believe is very fitting for this topic.
MLK's Prophetic Call to Contemporary Christians By Dr. Jamie Gates Center for Justice and Reconciliation Point Loma Nazarene University
A national holiday with its over-commercialized pomp and circumstance and the endless military marches so inconsistent with his own message of non-violence was probably one of the last things the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. would've wanted to honor his legacy. After all, King was first and foremost a minister, a preacher, a Christian willing to critically examine his contemporary world in light of the demands of the prophetic witness of the Hebrew and Christian scriptures. In his "I have a dream" speech, the hope he expressed in a world where all can be reconciled to one another came from his confidence that God was in Christ reconciling persons to one another and the world to God. His unflinching commitment to confronting injustice in the public square came from living with and preaching the lives of Jesus, Moses, Abraham, Ruth, Isaiah, Amos and Zachariah. His commitment to non-violence came not only through the witness of Gandhi, but through his faith in the Christ who walked like a lamb to the slaughter in the face of the powers and principalities that were threatened by the peaceable reign of God that Jesus announced.
What prompted me to think about King as minister is the recent pressure from the city developers on the Salvation Army on 8th street to close down the Bread of Life ministry. Bread of Life is a Christian worship service and meal that was served every evening to anywhere between 200 and 400 of San Diego's poorest and hungriest people. Organized originally by Norma Rossi, Bread of Life ran for years on the corner of 13th and Broadway, a lot leased for $1 a year from the city. When city developers closed the lot for "redevelopment," city and church leaders agreed on the Salvation Army sight. Now, some of the very decision-makers who agreed on the Salvation Army sight are putting increasing pressure to close down programs that serve the poor and, in the words of the Center City Development Corporation's downtown plan, "disperse" the social services and those served by them from downtown.
Speaking from my own tradition, feeding the hungry and living in solidarity with those who suffer is central to what it means to be Christian, commanded by God as attested by Old and New Testament writers and lived out in many variations throughout the ages. Maybe we're not all called to be Franciscans, as County Supervisor Bill Horn jabbed recently, but we are all called to take care of the widow, the orphan, the immigrant and the poor. Anyone who prevents us from caring for those who suffer stands in the way of God's activity in the world and invites the peaceful resistance of all Christians. This includes resistance against those who prevent care of the poor by "dispersing" the poor to someone else's neighborhood.
Some have recently suggested to me that this type of resistance may take on the form of a legal defense. As a fundamentally religious activity, on Church property, Bread of Life is not only protected by the First Amendment, but by the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act passed by Congress on July 27, 2000 as well.. But ultimately, Christians are not bound by the "legality" of their actions in commitment to the poor. As a fundamental calling of the Christian life, commitment to the poor may require us to feed the hungry whether approved by city leaders or not.
This article is neither a threat nor a warning to city developers and officials. Rather, it is a call for Christians to be faithful to their own traditions. Consistently throughout both Jewish and Christian traditions (amongst others), the faithfulness of God's people is measured by the degree to which the people care for those in need. Of course, not all Christians remain faithful in this way. King often faced intense resistance not just from the political elite, but from some of the most prominent Christian leaders across the nation. While this resistance received the greatest national attention when it came from eight fellow clergymen from Alabama, prompting his Letter from Birmingham Jail, he was as frustrated with the countless clergy who sat idly by while great injustices were inflicted upon powerless people in their parishes.
King's Christianity led him to preach in the public square as a voice for the voiceless. But it also led him, with all the resources of the church that he could muster, to peaceably resist those who stood in the way of caring for those who were on the margins. Rather than waving our advertising banners in parades led by brass bands or eating expensive breakfasts with the city elites, perhaps our greatest tribute to King would be to peaceably and publicly resist those who would prevent us from caring for the homeless.
If after reading this article and seeing the above art and you are curious to see what MLK Jr. really taught and believed please click on the link below to listen to a snip of a sermon by MLK Jr. (because its def. not the King we celebrate in our paradase and festivals)
These are a few quotes that have really shaped the way I praticipate in Christ-Mass. I hope you like them as much as I do...
"It belongs to the nature of fire to shoot upwards; and no one would think it wonderful for a flame to act naturally. But if he saw a flame with a downward motion like that of heavy bodies, he would take it for a marvel, wondering how it could remain a flame and yet contravene its nature by its downward motion.
So it is with the incarnation. God's transcendent power is not somuch displayed in the vastness of the heavens, or the luster of the stars, or the orderly arrangement of the universe or his perpetual oversight of it, as in his condescension to our weak nature. We marvel at the way the sublime entered a state of lowliness and, while actually seen in it, did not leave the heights. We marvel at the way the Godhead was entwined in the human nature and, while becoming man, did not cease to be God."—Gregory of Nyssa, Address on Religious Instruction: 24
"5Your attitude should be the same as that of Christ Jesus: 6Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be grasped, 7but made himself nothing, taking the very natureof a servant, being made in human likeness. 8And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself and became obedient to death— even death on a cross! 9Therefore God exalted him to the highest place and gave him the name that is above every name, 10that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 11and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father."—Philippians 2:5-11
In light of these reflections, here are a few stats of the Christ-Mass season: -The average person in America will spend $859 on gifts the season. -Online US kids, teenagers, and young adults aged 8 to 21 spent $2.4 billion on gifts for others during the 2000 holiday period. -So great is the social pressure to spend that 44 percent of all Americans feel they spend too much on Christmas gifts. -In 1997, Americans cut down 33 million real trees to put up in their homes, enough to cover the state of Rhode Island. In doing so, they spent somewhere between $600 million to $1.1 billion. -Furthermore, each acre of growing Christmas trees provides the daily oxygen requirements of 18 people. What are we really worshiping?
What or who abundantly distributes the rights all "humans" are entitled to? The Nation State. By what means? Citizenship. By what authority are two wedded together? The State. Who or what determines a lawful marriage? The State. Who or what determines what is lawful or "moral"? The State. Who or what is burdened with the responsibility of providing social welfare? The State.
It can be demonstrated that in the formation of what we call the "Nation State", the framers drew from and imitated what the Church --through the authority vested in God--was supposed to be and do...
By doing so, the Nation State takes the place of God...
My professor and dear friend John Wright, has helped very much in processing these issues, and asking the question "What does it mean to be the Church today?"
He states in his blog-reflection to a recent book by Charles Taylor, "As a pastor and theologian, the lack of reference to God in the state does not bother me at all for the God of the state, at least in the United States, is an idol, not the Triune God revealed in Jesus Christ. What is a concern, however, is the totalitarian claims of the state that generates a 'private realm' where faith is relegated to 'value' rather than a commitment to Reality, to what is True, Good, and Beautiful, as revealed by the Father through the Son by the power of the Holy Spirit." By the Nation State doing so, the Church has become irrelevant. It merely serves as a self-help tool or coping mechanism, rather than that which defines reality as revealed in Jesus Christ--our rights as children of God, citizenship into His Kingdom, marriage in His Kingdom, ethics within His Kingdom, and welfare for those in His Kingdom...
How do we, as the Church, reclaim the authority God has vested in it, while remembering that we live in the, "...'saeculum'--the time between the times of Christ's coming when the authority of a coercive 'street gangs', the city of man in Augustinian terms, exists alongside the city of God. One of the key movements in modernist secularity is when this chronological understanding of the secular becomes a 'space' so that a distinction might be drawn between the 'secular' and the 'sacred.' The state becomes responsible for the secular, and grants, in its beneficence, a temporal amnesty over the 'sacred' as long as the 'sacred' capitulates ultimately to the power of the state."?
These excerpters come from Dr. John Wrights Blogs and Reflections. They can be accessed on:
Marriage, Love, and The Cross: The Trinity?
Current mood: confused
Category: Religion and Philosophy
I think that my lowly and alienated mind is beginning to understand love, marriage, the cross, the resurrection, the Church, the Trinity, and the Body of Christ, the sacraments, communion, and reconciliation in regards to what they are pointing to. I am sure that I am capable to articulate the theological and ontological significance of them (through academic writing), but not necessarily experience them. May the grace of God rain down. The following quotes has changed my life in regards to understanding and experience such realiteies that are found in Christ...May God form us into his Body...
"In movies and magazines the 'icon' of marriage is always a youthful couple. But once, in the light and warmth of an autumn afternoon, this writer saw on the bench of a public square, in a poor Parisian suburb, an old and poor couple. They were sitting hand in hand, in silence, enjoying the pale light, the last warmth of the season. In silence: all words had been said, all passion exhausted, all storms at peace. The whole life was behind—yet all of it was now present, in this silence, in this light, in this warmth, in this silent unity of hands. Present—and ready for eternity, ripe for joy. This to me remains the vision of marriage, of its heavenly beauty...But 'by the cross of joy entered the whole world'. Its presence is thus the real joy of marriage. It is the joyful certitude that the marriage vow, in the perspective of the eternal Kingdom, is not taken 'until death parts', but until death unites us completely".—Alexander Schmenann, "For the Life of the World", Pg. 90-91
"Through the cross of Christ we are drawn into the mystery of the Trinity. This is God's work on our behalf. We are made members of a kingdom governed by a politics of forgiveness and redemption. The world is offered an alternative unimaginable by our sin-determined fantasies."--Stanley Hauerwas, Cross Shattered Christ, Pg. 31
Read Galatian 2:20, John 17, Ephesians 4:25, 1Corinthians 11:23-26, and Colosians 3...
May the mysteries of Christ be made manifest through His Church...
I read this today. I liked it sooo much that I thought I would share it with all of you! Enjoy!
An extract from the diary of Lieutenant Colonel Mervin Willett Gonin DSO who was among the first British soldiers to liberate Bergen-Belsen in 1945.
I can give no adequate description of the Horror Camp in which my men and myself were to spend the next month of our lives. It was just a barren wilderness, as bare as a chicken run. Corpses lay everywhere, some in huge piles, sometimes they lay singly or in pairs where they had fallen. It took a little time to get used to seeing men women and children collapse as you walked by them and to restrain oneself from going to their assistance. One had to get used early to the idea that the individual just did not count. One knew that five hundred a day were dying and that five hundred a day were going on dying for weeks before anything we could do would have the slightest effect. It was, however, not easy to watch a child choking to death from diptheria when you knew a tracheotomy and nursing would save it, one saw women drowning in their own vomit because they were too weak to turn over, and men eating worms as they clutched a half loaf of bread purely because they had to eat worms to live and now could scarcely tell the difference. Piles of corpses, naked and obscene, with a woman too weak to stand proping herself against them as she cooked the food we had given her over an open fire; men and women crouching down just anywhere in the open relieving themselves of the dysentary which was scouring their bowels, a woman standing stark naked washing herself with some issue soap in water from a tank in which the remains of a child floated. It was shortly after the British Red Cross arrived, though it may have no connection, that a very large quantity of lipstick arrived. This was not at all what we men wanted, we were screaming for hundreds and thousands of other things and I don't know who asked for lipstick. I wish so much that I could discover who did it, it was the action of genius, sheer unadulterated brilliance. I believe nothing did more for these internees than the lipstick. Women lay in bed with no sheets and no nightie but with scarlet red lips, you saw them wandering about with nothing but a blanket over their shoulders, but with scarlet red lips. I saw a woman dead on the post mortem table and clutched in her hand was a piece of lipstick. At last someone had done something to make them individuals again, they were someone, no longer merely the number tatooed on the arm. At last they could take an interest in their appearance. That lipstick started to give them back their humanity.
"IN PRAISE OF SELF-DEPRECATION" The buzzard has nothing to fault himself with. Scruples are alien to the the black panther. Piranhas do not doubt the rightness of their actions. The rattlesnake approves of himself without reservations.
The self-critical jackal does not exist. The locust, alligator, trichina, horsefly live as they live and are glad of it.
The killer-whale's heart weighs one hundred kilos but in other respects it is light.
There is nothing more animal-like than a clear conscience on the third planet of the Sun. --Wislawa Szymborska
Every year 15 million children die of hunger.
The World Health Organization estimates that one-third of the world is well-fed, one-third is under-fed one-third is starving- Since you've entered this web-site at least 200 people have died of starvation. Over 4 million will die this year.
20% of the population in the developed nations, consume 86% of the world's goods.
For the price of one missile, a school full of hungry children could eat lunch every day for 5 years
Do you have a clear conscience? Are you an animal?
What are we doing with our money? In what ways can you better allocate your funds to help the poor and suffering of the world. Lifestyle changes in individuals can change the world. are you willing to change your life to help others? I know that I have not made the steps I need to make to achieve that. Loving God through loving people is not manifested in onetime handouts that entrench dependency, but rather it is sacrificing one's entire life to the wellbeing and survival of others through empowering them. May we be better stewarts of the talents God has entrusted to us...
14"Again, it will be like a man going on a journey, who called his servants and entrusted his property to them. 15To one he gave five talents[a] of money, to another two talents, and to another one talent, each according to his ability. Then he went on his journey. 16The man who had received the five talents went at once and put his money to work and gained five more. 17So also, the one with the two talents gained two more. 18But the man who had received the one talent went off, dug a hole in the ground and hid his master's money. 19"After a long time the master of those servants returned and settled accounts with them. 20The man who had received the five talents brought the other five. 'Master,' he said, 'you entrusted me with five talents. See, I have gained five more.' 21"His master replied, 'Well done, good and faithful servant! You have been faithful with a few things; I will put you in charge of many things. Come and share your master's happiness!' 22"The man with the two talents also came. 'Master,' he said, 'you entrusted me with two talents; see, I have gained two more.' 23"His master replied, 'Well done, good and faithful servant! You have been faithful with a few things; I will put you in charge of many things. Come and share your master's happiness!' 24"Then the man who had received the one talent came. 'Master,' he said, 'I knew that you are a hard man, harvesting where you have not sown and gathering where you have not scattered seed. 25So I was afraid and went out and hid your talent in the ground. See, here is what belongs to you.' 26"His master replied, 'You wicked, lazy servant! So you knew that I harvest where I have not sown and gather where I have not scattered seed? 27Well then, you should have put my money on deposit with the bankers, so that when I returned I would have received it back with interest. 28" 'Take the talent from him and give it to the one who has the ten talents. 29For everyone who has will be given more, and he will have an abundance. Whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken from him. 30And throw that worthless servant outside, into the darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.' --Matthew 25:14-30
Prayer of St. Francis
Current mood: Filled with the Spirit
Prayer of St. Francis
Lord, make me an instrument of your peace. Where there is Hatred, let me sow Love. Where there is Injury, Pardon. Where there is Doubt, Faith. Where there is Despair, Hope. Where there is Darkness, Light, and Where there is Sadness, Joy.
O Divine Master, Grant that I may not so much seek to be consoled as to console; To be understood, as to understand; To be loved, as to love; For it is in giving that we receive, It is in pardoning that we are pardoned, And it is in dying that we are born to Eternal Life. Amen
May this prayer be answered so that we may be those shinning lights God has called his Church to be...
13"You are the salt of the earth. But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again? It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled by men.14"You are the light of the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden. 15Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl. Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house. 16In the same way, let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven.--Mathew 5:13-16
determined
contemplative
confused
