An End to Calls for Violence

We know violence here in Oklahoma City. Saturday, April 19, will mark the thirteenth anniversary of the bombing of the Alfred P. Murrah Building. Planners of the recent “Denouncing Violence in the Name of God: The Case of Islam” conference noted the location for the event (Oklahoma City University) and the topic discussed. “The topic of this conference is so profound and sobering because of its time and location. We are in Oklahoma City and it is April,” said Loye Ashton, chairman o religious studies department at the Tougaloo College in Jackson, Mississippi.

Various speakers at the conference noted terrorism intends to undermine democracy rather than further a particular religion. Media often makes the connection in such a way readers/listeners come to believe the work of terrorism to be a tool to further a religion, in most cases Islam.

Imagine my own surprise when I read Martin Marty’s piece “Rod Parsley on Islam.”
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Partnerships and Collaboration - Better Public Schools

This evening the first Educators & Clergy Conference sponsored by the Oklahoma Education Association got underway in Norman, OK. The time invested in planning and preparation proved valuable as the evening was both inspiring and challenging. Who could not be excited about getting together with a group of people who share a common dream to invest in students and communities? What’s more, we should discover the realities that churches and schools “can” partner. There is no need for the adversarial role painted by misunderstandings about the “separation of church and state.” The primary challenge will come in overcoming fear by learning appropriate boundaries for a healthy relationship. Educators face the reality of doing more than ever and being blamed for outcomes they really cannot control.

I am excited about the possibilities.

Not just about Killing … Children and Darfur

A couple of quick errands this morning gave me pause to stop by Starbucks. While waiting on my Peppermint White Chocolate Mocha I perused today’s edition of the New York Times on the stand in the coffee shop. This piece caught my eye as we continue to hope the situation in Darfur gets more international traction and the killing ends sooner than later. Now it seems the consequences of the fighting not only leaves many children orphaned, others displaced in refugee camps but now it appears what aid is reaching children is woefully inadequate as malnutrition is on the rise.

Read - Despite Aid, Malnutrition in Darfur Rises

Free Burma

Free Burma 

Keep your eyes on the children

In May I posted on the “Not for Sale Campaign.” Yesterday morning a brief AP story notes to be wary of adoptions in Guatemala. We know of a couple of children adopted from Guatemala who are blessings to their families and to our church. Despite these successful adoptions it appears now Guatemalan women are targets for child trafficking rings. Another story tells of the rescue of these 46 children. It is happening again.

Remaining Diligent … Flip-Flop goes the Dictator

Keeping an eye on children is a full-time job. Take your eyes off an exploring child and soon he will test the limits of the rope you give. On August 1 the AP ran the story, “U.N. seeks misery’s end in Darfur.” (The article may be found here under the title, “Sudan Hails Peacekeepers.”) Many who have followed the tragedy in the Sudan held their collective breath as hints at a breakthrough raised hopes before only to be dashed. Some may have even gone so far as to suggest we could now focus on another world issue.

I wear a green wristband which carries the reminder, “Not On Our Watch.” Just when you let down your guard a leader may change his stance. It appears President Omar al-Bashir would prefer to pick the composition of the force to help end the bloodshed.  Now when you are charged with aiding and possibly funding the janjaweek militias, who would not question the commitment to peace when we now interject the need to “choose” our forces. This in no way questions the commitments being received from other African nations. Instead it appears the child may be looking for a way to move just out of sight so he may continue to stretch the limites. In this case it is not child’s play. It is a matter of life and death.

Great piece on Darfur … What would you be willing to do?

I met Ken sevveral years ago. We reconnected in Norman a couple of years ago while he was in town on business. He owns a business in the Washington D.C. area, works on his master’s degree in philosophy and occasionally writes entries no one should miss. I received an e-mail with this line, “

I’ve struggled with the relation between politics and spiritual growth for awhile, because in my experience political engagement seems to shift our focus from our own growth to others’ failings. However, the existential crisis of my generation that is Darfur forced me to clarify this quite a bit. This blog post is the result.

If there is only one thing you ever read from me, I hope it is this.

Take a moment go over and read Ken’s post. Think not about what you cannot do, but what you will do.

“Caught in the Middle” gets quoted …

Glad to read the ABP piece in which my brother Paul is quoted.

“I’m conflicted because I am part of an American evangelical Christianity that is almost entirely and uncritically in bed with the Republican Party, who will support them as long as they support capitalism and oppose abortion and homosexual marriage. Do that, and we’ll vote for  you, we’ll go to war with you, we’ll let you spend the country into oblivion, and we’ll be silent when you make sexual advances toward minor pages. And I don’t go for any of that stuff.”

Drifting Boats … or, Fear of Losing the Ship …

Word pictures often provide a speaker with the tools to embed an image in the mind of a hearer. We often use this tool of communication to help the hearer understand a point we believe may well be missed. We may augment these pictures with common phrases intended to connect with populist caricatures to move our hearers to a desired action. Preachers who become adept at this practice easily influence the crowd. Sometimes too easily.

Denominational Commentary is a tag I hate to attach to any post. There are many reasons. One of my primary reasons - these kinds of posts are easily misunderstood and then misrepresented. The events of the past couple of days at the Southern Baptist Convention meeting in San Antonio certainly provided occasions for commentary. I may offer a couple of other “minor” asides along the way, but it has been much more fun to “Stetzerize” my blog than spend time and mental energy attempting to give my thoughts on recent developments. Be that as it may I hope to comment not on personalities but on implications; not on motives but rather something of a “hearer response.”

Populist preaching tends to whip the hearer into action by using well worn idioms. During the convention one of our seminary presidents set out to give a report by suggesting a story would help. It seems we may liken the direction of the convention to a boat used by Huckleberry Finn and Tom Sawyer. Certain the speaker did not intend us to investigate every nuance of the “story” we will leave the implications of Huck and Tom leaving their boat for lunch since the Resolutions Committee did not think it necessary to bring the resolution on gluttony to the floor.

Instead we would do well to think an institution to be like a boat left to drift without a motor - something to power it upstream. The imagery of the river in the story proved to be key. Floating downstream, an obvious allusion to being carried away from the truth, sets the stage to whip the crowd into a frenzy when the speaker notes the boat is untethered. The boat may float to the left into liberalism, to the center into neo-orthodoxy, or the right into confessional conservatism/ecumenism. The warning - stay connected to truth; tie a better knot when mooring at the dock. Nothing was noted about which dock we should tie up to. Baptists’ only creed is the bible so are we to tie up to the Scriptures? Is it one of our confessions we should tie our boat to so as to express our confessional understanding of the Scriptures for a given time and place; a given cultural context?

Evidently the river is only bothersome if you drift downstream. But, riding upstream seems to change the context of the river. It is as if riding upstream, going against the flow, is not fraught with peril of its own. We could conclude the truth is found upstream. Sailing upstream would never lead to legalism, moralism or sectarianism.

The problem with this imagery is that the speaker chooses when to sail with or without the image so as to connect with the audience his desire to move them to a specific conclusion and action. Since 1979 warring is the chief image employed by the leaders of the takeover/resurgence, it is odd to use a boat and river. It seems moving from the Gospel of the Kingdom is really where the peril lies. Moving upstream or downstream holds unseen rock formations that may well send the boat in an unwanted direction, capsize the boat or dash it into larger rock formations.

What if the word picture was indeed a good word picture if thought of differently and we looked to our seminaries to help in a different way. Could it be the river portray the journey of life for those giving themselves to vocational service? It is merely a part of the larger story of God - not “the” story of God. That is, how could we help a young woman or man learn to live into the story of God as it is being lived with its winding, sometimes treacherous features. Might it be better to suggest the seminary gives the “sailor” an understanding of the boundaries - the banks within which the Spirit of God appears to be operative?

Our living out the Gospel of the Kingdom will require some leftward movement as we stand for justice and engage our cultural. We will on occasion move right as we emphasize what it means to live by the ethic of Jesus in all human relationships. Other times we will float the center where the two meet on most occasions. The flow of the river is always “toward” the fulfillment of the Kingdom of God. So we teach to participate in the Kingdom. This means we must move beyond the Kingdom as a “future only” reality. Instead we take the words of Jesus, the red-letters as some suggest, and see them as a proper way to order one’s life. This ordering is not a moralizing our way to God but rather an indication we trust not just these words, but “the” Word of Life. Repenting, changing our minds, to live in the flow of the Kingdom of God because it is there we find life and share it with others.

Words mean something. Illustrations and images hold a great deal of power. I like the image one of our seminary presidents used. I simply believe we would be better served by infusing the image with different meaning.

Corn, ethanol and greater pressure on the poor …

Linda works at one of the local convenience stores where I buy fuel. She told me early last week she heard a gallon of gas would rise to $3.75. Fortunately news broke of a better than expected supply of oil and the price actually retreated from $3.29/gallon.

I recall a Wired magazine article suggesting the price per barrel points at which the search for alternate fuel sources would accelerate. The article did not suggest what kind of consumer pressure would be brought to bear if the price per barrel remained low but supply pressures gave cause for increases at the pump.

We all witnessed the variations on alternate sources - wood chips, cooking oils and a greater percentage of ethanol mixed with traditional fuels among others. The matters are certainly complex.

Today I read a brief in The Christian Century. Our attempts to search for alternate fuel sources will invariably affect the poor. For example, in the short piece, "Cornucopia" a piece taken from Foreign Affiars May/June notes the rise in a bushel of corn from $2.80 to $4.20. The impact is felt in Mexico where corn flour is used for tortillas. It seems that in 2006 the price for this flour doubled. Here is the effect,

"Several studies have concluded that the caloric consumption of the world’s poorest people drops by half of 1 percent for every 1 percent increase in the price of major food staples."(Christian Century, May 29, 2007, p.6)

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