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October 27, 2006
America's Enduring Injustice
It's always weird coming back to the US. I'm not sure why, but I always see and experience the place differently upon returning. Sometimes its good, and others its bad.
Just yesterday I had one of those good experiences. While seeing students and leaders at the campus of Seattle Pacific University I was gifted the opportunity to join up with the on-campus Mosaic club. It happens to be the intercultural studies club and it was quite a treat. During the meeting three people from SPU shared about a trip that they had gone on that was coordinated by their church. On trip, entitled the Sankofa journey, each traveler is paired with another of a different race — on this trip, mostly whites and blacks — to room together, share meals and talk about their experiences. Movies are shown on the bus, such as "4 Little Girls," Spike Lee's documentary about the church bombing. It's a trip to highlight the ongoing need in America for Racial reconciliation.
As a person from the South who graduated (though many do not know this) with a minor to my degree from the University of Alabama in African American studies, listening to the stories of these three women (two of Caucasian descent and one of African America/Chinese descent) talk about the difficulties they experienced emotionally, mentally, and spiritually as they visited the South and explored its history was quite amazing. It really is amazing how far America has not come as nation. Sometimes i see it and I want to weep. Other times others see it, and they choose to weep.
All in all, the need to racial reconciliation in America lives on. The continued need for justice and grace and reconciliatory systems in America which represent true justice, true mercy, and true equality is as necessary as ever. And be not mistaken oh friends, this will not come by finding the next crisis to engage or the next war to fight. No, now as ever is time for the Church in America to engage in authentic racial reconciliation which disrupts the tragedy of segregation which happens every Sunday in America. It is sad that it is the most divided day in the America. It is sad.
I hadn't realized how the experiences of my college lay dormant in my heart and passion until this Mosaic gathering. Now that I have experienced it a fresh, I know i too must act. From Switzerland...or India...or England....or Denver!
To the people who presented about their Sankofa, I say thanks. To those who experience the reality of racial injustice in America daily I say you are not alone. To those who believe Jesus truly provides good news to the downcast and the oppressed, I say now is an opportunity in America to move on these issues a fresh. They will not go away. They will not change. They will only endure until we who follow the master of true reconciliation join in living the freedom of this great story! Its time to act and this november to vote for those who will and can create change in a system that has too long endured.
Joshua Case
Denver, Colorado
October 2006
Posted by joshuacase at 10:48 PM | Comments (11)
October 26, 2006
Human Version 2.0
Alan Mann has posted an interesting conversation piece on Jason Clark's blog. Jason does a great job of inviting others to participate on his site. Alan, along with Paul Mayers generally host pretty good conversations. If you don't know them, you should!
Be sure to check out these thoughts on Human version 2.0. Wierd....but interesting theological, political, economic implications if they do happen. Better start getting ready i guess...
jc
Posted by joshuacase at 07:57 AM
October 25, 2006
Brian McLaren: We Need a New National Mission Statement (Meditations on the Apartheid Museum Part 2)
Here is part two of a few meditations Brian McLaren has done lately. You can find part one here. The links out of the document are mine, not Brian's.
What if some of us began a constructive national dialogue, post-political in the sense that it occurs on a level higher and deeper than the mid-range of partisan maneuvering, geared toward a rather simple but grand project: to articulate a national mission statement for the United States. This statement would tell us – and the world – what we’re about. It would serve as a rudder to guide us, and perhaps as a sail to energize us, and perhaps as a keel to stabilize us as well. It would help us make wise decisions, and to admit when we’ve made unwise ones. It would – perhaps this is too optimistic? – give us something above and beyond partisan politics to guide us, a common values fulcrum upon which to leverage our national debates, a shared vision and dream to which all parties and people could be called.
“Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” had a nice ring in the Declaration of Independence, but frankly, it has a bit of an individualistic and self-centered ring today. Consider, for example, what it would mean, for example, if our nation were more dedicated to the pursuit of peace and justice than to the pursuit of personal happiness, or to a sustainable life for all creatures instead of simply unlimited prosperity for ourselves.
Perhaps a project like this could invite the participation of every family, every elementary and secondary school child, every university, every church, synagogue, and mosque, every community organization, every state. Perhaps, if we made it a five-to-ten year project, the process could be even more important than the final product.
Perhaps there could be websites where people proposed and crafted elements of the mission statement, and grass-roots gatherings in coffee shops and community centers where various proposals were evaluated. Perhaps at the right time, maybe in 2010 or 2012, such a mission statement could be incorporated in some way alongside the essential documents of our nation.
It’s wonderful to have a history to give us a sense of heritage. It’s essential to have laws and institutions to give us stability. But sometimes I think that our nation, like any adolescent, now needs something more: a sense of mission that is clearly and consciously considered, articulated, debated, affirmed, and celebrated – to give us a noble future. Perhaps, in terms of Native American culture, it is time for our national vision quest, or in Christian or Jewish terms, it is time for our confirmation or bar or bat mitzvah – time for our spiritual coming of age.
Perhaps our current national struggles will, like the struggle of South Africa, bring us to a moment of new possibility and new beginning in the not-too-distant future. That is my hope, even if it sounds naive.
Brian McLaren (brianmclaren.net) is an author, speaker and board member of Sojourners/Call to Renewal.
Posted by joshuacase at 07:55 AM
A few banners and links while i'm at it...
Here are a couple of interesting things going on....Finding these conversations fun to follow!
Posted by joshuacase at 07:47 AM
A reason for the silence
Sorry to have fallen off the earth...i haven't, but i have been traveling. I've just arrived in Seattle, Washington for the next three days from California where I've been visiting with some new friends, and potential future team members for Geneva. I'll leave here friday for Denver. Will hope to be back online more soon! Lots going on!
jc
Posted by joshuacase at 07:40 AM | Comments (0)
October 12, 2006
Introducing Mike Todd
Mike Todd has been posting several things on his blog of which i have found of great interest as of late. His blog, entitled Waving or Drowning? frequently keeps me up to speed on issues of social justice, Christian community, and recently, the ways in which Newsweek magazine changes it communication priorities for each region. This isn't the first time Mike has pointed it out. Just the most recent.
The image below says it all. Thanks Mike, for your increased sensitivity and awareness of these things! They do make you wonder!
Posted by joshuacase at 03:41 PM
October 11, 2006
Thinking about things to come...and plotting goodness
Last night Laura and I went to a Geneva pre-screening of the movie An Inconvenient Truth. It was quite compelling. Over the course of an hour and forty-five minutes, sitting in a packed movie theatre, we watched as the story of climate change was unveiled before our eyes. Sure, I've been in conversations with others all over the world about how the myth of climate change really is a myth. And, well, i guess at times i've thought that it was ok to think about it, and to act if an opportunity was given. But this movie...this movie was good; especially if you are looking for a reason to get involved in making a difference in the world.
The facts themselves are compelling. And possibly, for many, the most difficult part of the movie and of the whole issue of climate change is that people will have to experience that this is a moral and scientic issue; not just as a scientific issue. That the numbers do add up. That we do, as Dr. Mark Smith suggests, have just one planet is critical to our efforts and actions on earth.
The other side of this story is that we can make a difference. Even if we do not buy the climate change "myth", people of every religion (Christianity especially in my case) must make sure that their worship of God includes an deep understanding of how the actions of our lives make us good stewards of the good creation. It's no longer just about whether we grew the right crop in the right field. It's no longer about whether we ought to spray for misquitos in our neighborhoods. Yes, these issues do matter; however, we live in a global village and local actions can have global consequences. We can make changes in our homes, in our neighborhoods, in our parishes, in our cities, in our countries which will have lasting effects on the environment, and thus, every living creature. The decisions that we take, the actions that we choose, reflect our desire to be about the plotting of goodness (or of evil) for the next generation.
And this my friends, is the true challenge of plotting goodness: that we recognize that the smallest of decisions in our faith-centered lives give opportunity for greater goodness to come into being for the age to come. And, that we recognize we must begin to make changes in our personal lives which greater reflect the Good News of a good people, compelled by our deepest of convictions, to look after a Good Creation.
Again, the movie was quite compelling. If you haven't seen it, i recommend it. But don't go see it alone! Take one, two, five or fifteen of your friends with you and talk about it afterwards. Ask each other: "how is this information going to effect our daily and community lives? How might we as friends, reflect to our community, our city, our world, that we feel we need to be looking after our world in a more radical, and sustainable way?"
Let me know what you come up with....plotting goodness....
jc
Posted by joshuacase at 09:37 AM | Comments (0)
October 10, 2006
Christianity and the "Pride of Power"
By Brian McLaren as posted on Jim Wallis' blog.
I recently came across this quote from Dietrich Bonhoeffer, from his sermon on 2 Corinthians 12:9:
"Christianity stands or falls with its revolutionary protest against violence, arbitrariness and pride of power and with its plea for the weak. Christians are doing too little to make these points clear rather than too much. Christendom adjusts itself far too easily to the worship of power. Christians should give more offense, shock the world far more, than they are doing now. Christians should take a stronger stand in favor of the weak rather than considering first the possible right of the strong."
These words struck me all the more because I just returned from a five-week, seven-country speaking tour of Latin America. This follows tours of Europe, Africa, Australia, and New Zealand earlier this year - twenty countries in all.
In each country, I heard Christian leaders - Evangelicals, Pentecostals, Traditional Protestants, and Roman Catholics - express amazement and dismay at the relative silence of the church in the USA. They see us, by and large, as a prime example of Bonhoeffer's lament about Christendom "adjusting itself far too easily to the worship of power." We are giving offense, but sadly, the wrong kind. For example, they hear frequent defenses by Christians in the USA - not of the weak and poor, but of the strong and powerful. About torture and violence, about "pride of power," they hear too little protest from too few of us. They know we are against terrorism, but they don't know if we are against American empire and domination.
I tried to tell our fellow Christians in Latin America that many of us are speaking out against these things, but I had to admit that doing so feels like an exercise in going against the current, not only in the culture at large, but in the Christian community as well.
The degree to which Christianity in the USA has capitulated to a neo-Constantinian compromise with empire is disturbing to our Christian brothers and sisters around the world ... and it should be to all of us in the church in the USA. Perhaps these powerful words of Dietrich Bonhoeffer will catch fire among more and more of us in the US, and perhaps we will see afresh that we can not, indeed, serve two masters - whether those masters are Greed and God, Caesar and Christ, or the Sword and Spear of violence and the Basin and Towel of service.
Brian is posting letters to Christians in America from their counterparts in Africa, Europe, Latin America, and Asia. You'll find them on his site, brianmclaren.net.
Posted by joshuacase at 06:37 PM | Comments (30)
October 06, 2006
Bono and (RED) Keep on Giving
UPDATE From the Kaiser Network
Product RED, a project created by Irish musician Bono and Bobby Shriver that aims to raise money for the Global Fund To Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria by donating a portion of profits from a range of branded products, plans to partner with five additional corporations in the next few weeks, Global Fund Executive Director Richard Feachem said on Thursday, Reuters UK reports (Hirschler, Reuters UK, 10/5). American Express, Converse, Giorgio Armani and Gap were the initial partners in the program -- which was launched in January -- and are distributing credit cards and selling tennis shoes, sunglasses and T-shirts, respectively, carrying the Product RED label. The four partner companies have committed to the brand for five years and have pledged to give an average of 40% of profits from the products to the Global Fund. London's Independent in May announced that it would become the first media outlet to sign on as a partner in the project. In addition, Motorola in May announced that it will partner with Product RED. According to Feachem, Product RED has raised more than $10 million in the United Kingdom from February through September. The funds generated from U.K. sales will be allocated to HIV testing and treatment services for HIV-positive women and children living in Rwanda and to supporting AIDS orphans in Swaziland, Feachem said (Kaiser Daily HIV/AIDS Report, 10/4). "There are five major corporations today -- I'm guessing there will be eight or nine by the end of the year" that will partner with Product RED, Feachem said. According to Reuters UK, Feachem declined to name the corporations, but said the list includes "iconic" consumer electronic businesses. Product RED products will be launched in U.S. stores and other markets this month and in November, Reuters UK reports (Reuters UK, 10/5).
Posted by joshuacase at 11:01 PM | Comments (1)
October 04, 2006
Generations collide, love is experienced!
Just yesterday I was having a conversation with a group of youth leaders and parents here in Geneva. During the conversation, we had an interesting discussion on the internet, their children's obsession with it, the way parent's can "control" or understand better their young people's connection-centered existence. It was an interesting conversation which led me again to recommend Shane Hipps book, The Hidden Power of Electronic Media. It's brilliant.
But then today, I discovered this video. It comes to you via YouTube from a 79-year old British widower whose moniker is geriatric1927. He began uploading videos about life onto Youtube back in August. His first video was viewed over 600,000 times!
He seems to be gentle man who is venturing where few of his generation seem to venture...the internet. In the video below, geriatric1927 states that he has received over 4,700 emails from the Youtube and that Youtube has changed his life. He seems to be a man who, recognizing the changes of the world around him, took a step of faith into the blogosphere in order to share his story to those who would listen. Generations collide, love is experienced!
If you are anything like me...sit down, and listen to an old man ramble. It's not the end of the story, but it is part of his-story. And sorry if this is old news to any of you!
Posted by joshuacase at 12:30 PM | Comments (0)
Monastics like me...
Monastics like me read.
Papers and books,
"Joyce" and "Faulkner" and "Shakespeare",
Men and Women and Others,
Landscapes and faces and communities.
Monastics like me read.
Monastics like me learn.
From each other and for each other,
Via books and friendships and blogs,
Via nature and experience and failure,
From our parents and our friends and our enemies.
Monastics like me learn.
Monastics like me feel.
A better way is coming,
That can be found through Christ,
That will be found in community,
That unity brings to taste.
Monastics like me feel.
Monastics like me create.
Songs and blogs and images,
Because its what we are,
Because its how we live,
Because it reminds us we are alive.
Monastics like me create.
Monastics like me live.
With normal people,
In normal jobs,
With an abnormal pace,
In an transnormal environment.
Monastics like me live.
Monastics like me care.
Care for others.
Care for enemies.
Care for creation.
Care for ourselves.
Monastics like me care.
Monastics like me fear.
That the "life well-lived" is a lie.
That people in need are rarely heard.
That people with plenty are shallow.
That we can not be loved.
Monastics like me fear.
Monastics like me give.
Give our hearts,
Give our money,
Give back,
Give God.
Monastics like me give.
Monastics like me love.
Love God,
Love Art,
Love Creation,
Love Dreaming.
Monastics like me love.
Monastics like me read, learn, feel, create, live, care, fear, and love; not as ones who have the mere-luxury to do them, but as ones who hope in our doing of them, the world is different for all.
That through Christ, and community, and friendship, and laughter, and art, and dreaming, and loving, and living, and being, and giving, normal things become exceptional things...and exceptional things give way to tangible grace that is with all, for all, and true.
Posted by joshuacase at 11:03 AM
October 03, 2006
Brian McLaren's tribute to the Crocodile Hunter
Here is Brian McLaren's tribute to the Steve Irwin (as first posted on Jim Wallis' blog. Brian makes some very interesting points about Irwin's missionary-esque love and care of God's creation. Very interesting to think about indeed.
Within hours of the Crocodile Hunter’s death on September 4, 2006, I started receiving sympathy emails from friends who knew that I was a big fan of Steve Irwin. They knew that I am one of those strange Irwinesque people who use words like habitat and riparian and substrate, who think rattlesnakes can be beautiful, who are intrigued by spiders, who find it as interesting (though in a different way) to watch a tortoise plodding along as to watch a football game, who can’t hear a bird singing or notice a leaf in the sunlight without needing to know its name – including its scientific name if possible. They think I’m a little strange, and they think Steve was a little weird, but they wanted to express their sympathy anyway. I have nice friends.
I confess, I’ve shed a few tears thinking about Steve’s stingray-induced death at 44, about his classy wife Terry and their beautiful kids Bindi and Rob; about what they’ll miss, and what we’ll all miss.
I know this might sound strange, but I think the man was a kind of missionary. He knew why he was put here on this planet; he knew his mission, and he knew it was more than a job. It was a vocation, a truly spiritual calling, an invitation and solemn duty to join in the care of God’s sacred creation.
What characterized Steve’s mission? Saving love – and especially for the creatures that are often misunderstood, despised and hated - crocs, sharks, snakes, spiders, and their kin.
Saving love, I’ve noticed, is at the heart of most good things in the world – musicians with a saving love for an almost forgotten genre of music, archeologists with a saving love for the artifacts of ancient civilizations, citizens with a saving love for their city, doctors with saving love for at-risk patients, teachers with saving love for at-risk students, social workers with saving love for at-risk families, pastors with saving love for at-risk sinners.
There seems to be a clue there, perhaps even a revelation, that saving love is in the heart of everything. Steve’s saving love was for wildlife, and based on the words of Jesus – about God’s care for sparrow and wildflower – in Steve’s consuming passion his heart was resonating with God’s own.
He had a zealot’s passion for saving wildlife, and he had a childlike freedom to let his passion show. Somehow, he managed to grow up without ever outgrowing the unabashed wonder and unedited enthusiasm that all of us probably had at one time.
I couldn’t stop thinking about Steve as missionary tonight (a re-run was on TV, and I couldn’t help but watch it, even though I’ve seen it about four or five times before). I was struck in a new way by how Steve took the high road, the positive road. He didn’t spend a lot of time attacking multinational corporations and the way they plunder the environment (as I do). You didn’t hear him fuming about clueless governments with whacked-out priorities (as I do), or ranting against complacent publics (ditto), or whining about what’s gone wrong with modern western culture (repeat ditto). Maybe in private he vented sometimes, but not in public.
Instead of damning the sinful ugliness of humans who lack saving love, he chose a different strategy, a better one, I think: he simply, consistently, passionately, and naively demonstrated saving love by praising the beauty of God’s creatures – confident that he could inspire that saving love in others if they could just see the beauty too. He called himself “a wildlife warrior,” but his only weapons were enthusiasm and love. I think all of us – whatever our mission – could learn a lot from him. (The previous point was understated, but you probably already noticed that.)
In our saving love for children (unborn and born), in our saving love for cities and farmland, in our saving love for justice and peace and the oppressed and the war-ravaged, we have to remember the irreplaceable value of celebrating their beauty with Irwinesque wide eyes and face-breaking smiles.
I don’t recall Steve speaking of God much. But every time he said, “Isn’t that a little beauty!” I think he was speaking for God, the One who notices and loves the smallest goodness of every created thing. The look on his face when he sat with an orangutan or swam with a green sea turtle or let a lizard perch on his finger – that look in itself was a sign and a wonder. Sure, some people think he was over the top, but with millions of other fans, I miss him, and with them, I’m inspired to live life a little – no, a lot - louder and freer because of him … playing my own unique part in the sacred mission of saving love. Rest in peace, Steve-o. Well done.
Brian McLaren is an author (brianmclaren.net), most recently of The Secret Message of Jesus, and leader in emergent (emergentvillage.com). He is also board chair for Sojourners/Call to Renewal.
Posted by joshuacase at 06:44 PM | Comments (1)
October 02, 2006
Yep, you guessed it....
Despite a disappointing team performance during the Ryder muck, Tiger wins 6th in a row. He just keeps winning. What a golfer....!
Posted by joshuacase at 12:07 AM | Comments (1)
October 01, 2006
The Christianity and Islam Debate
Well, with all the debate about Christianity and Islam going on these days (as it has for centuries) I was pointed to this video by Paul Mayers. I am not sure if you will laugh, as I did, or cry...but at least it adds a little child-like humor and outside perspective to the conversation.
Enjoy....i hope...
Posted by joshuacase at 05:23 PM
Rain, Shema, and Geneva
It's another raining day in Geneva. It just keeps coming. Yesterday showed a little glimmer of hope with a break in the clouds. Alas, such is the entry into the autumn for us.
We will be having our first Shema gathering of the Autumn tonight. We're starting a three part series (i heard that) on the shema. This one is entitled, "shema to the sound". We'll be exploring shema in oral culture; specifically, the evolution of Christianity through oral culture. We'll also be reflecting on the loss of our own oral culture(s) and the effects of this on the way we choose to be formed by the community around us. Is the loss of a true "oral culture" hurting us in the electronic age? Did we lose something of authentic humanity with the print age? Can we regain what was lost in the electronic age? Just a few thoughts.
Yes, should be an interesting evening; especially in light of meeting as if in oral culture (no electronic media or sound, no electronic lighting (we think), nothing which has been mass prodiced through print). Of course, meeting in the Auditiore de Calvin should make it interesting, as it is the ancient space where Jean Calvin and John Knox taught. Quite a bit of oral-towards-print history about this place!
In our next two meetings in October (15, 29), we'll exploring shema in print (letter) and electronic (image) cultures.
I will let you know how it goes....
jc
Posted by joshuacase at 10:04 AM