The Nog

Defection

2009-08-04T15:06:00.000-07:00

After a few years of Blogger service, I'm switching over to WordPress. Check out Gershom's Journal (formerly known as The Nog).

See you on the other side.

Slavery No More

2009-08-04T10:02:00.000-07:00

Let me know if you're interested in going.

There's no way I can't post this

2009-08-03T15:02:00.000-07:00

Too freaking cute.

A good weekend

2009-07-30T17:23:00.001-07:00

... might look like this:

[L to R: dinner at Oggi's; home for firepits and s'mores]

[L to R: surfing at HB (Bolsa Chica) with Jeff]

[L to R: brunch with Jeff at Longboard; cycling back along the PCH]

[L to R: getting ready to go; sunset over the mountains; Vegas in the distance]

[L to R: food, food, food; all from the Wynn Buffet]

[L to R: excited to be in Vegas (finally); the Bellagio; view from our hotel room]

[L to R: outlet stores in Primm; back in Orange; sunset over Pasadena]

Human trafficking videos

2009-07-30T10:27:00.000-07:00

Sex trafficking:

Ukraine - US

Nigeria - Italy

Nigeria - Denmark

Russia

Argentina

India

UN Office of Drugs and Crime PSA

MTV PSA, featuring the Killers - "Goodnight, Travel Well"
60-second version

Full-length version

Also: Sex trafficking in Nepal

Human trafficking in the products we buy:

MTV PSA, featuring Radiohead - "All I Need"

"Tony's Chocolonely" - human trafficking in the cocoa trade

My niece is a teenager!

2009-07-29T22:00:00.000-07:00

Happy birthday, Aimee!

Love, Uncle Jus.

[back in 2002, when she wasn't almost as tall as me]

A little bit on human trafficking

2009-07-28T18:18:00.000-07:00

There are an estimated 27 million people in modern day slavery around the world.

Between 600,000 and 800,000 people are trafficked across international borders each year. Approximately 80% are women and girls. Up to 50% are minors.

Around 14,500 to 17,500 people are trafficked into the US from overseas and enslaved every year.

About the same number are murdered in the US every year, but while the national success rate for solving murders is about 70% (11,000), in 2006 only 111 were charged and only 98 were convicted, which is less than 1% of all human trafficking cases nationwide.

An estimated 1.2 million children are trafficked every year.

[All info taken from the US State Department's Trafficking in Persons Report, apart from the last entry, which was from UNICEF UK Child Trafficking Information Sheet, January 2003.]

You're a star

2009-07-28T17:12:00.000-07:00

Close your eyes, take my hand;
no need for words--I understand:
you let him in, he let you down,
and you shattered when you hit the ground.

When all you ever got from love was hurt,
won't you let me show you what you're really worth?
I can see you building up your walls again;
won't you let me hold you close, my friend?

Coz you, you're a star;
yeah, I see all that you really are.
And somehow I think we'll go far;
somehow I think we'll go far.

To turn the page and start anew,
to trust and hope again is the hardest thing to do.
To let the past fall away
and breathe in a brand new day.

When all you ever got from love was hurt,
won't you let me show you what you're really worth?
I can see you building up your walls again;
won't you let me hold you close, my friend?

Coz you, you're a star;
yeah, I see all that you really are.
And somehow I think we'll go far;
somehow I think we'll go far.

And the tears fall coz it feels like you've lost it all ...

But you, you're a star;
oh I see all that you really are.
And somehow I think we'll go far;
somehow I think we'll go far;
somehow I know we'll go far.

written on July 23, 2009

41

2009-07-27T11:46:00.001-07:00

On July 27, 1968, my parents got married.

As one of my models of marriage, I've seen from them what it looks like to choose to love, to choose to sacrifice for the other, and above all, to choose to trust God. I know that they remain firm in the belief that everything good (including a marriage spanning for decades) is only possible by the grace of God, and the testimony of their lives together reminds me that God is good, even through the hard times.

Happy anniversary, Mom and Dad! I love you guys.

Favorite movie of the year?

2009-07-25T14:45:00.000-07:00

It's certainly in the running. Plus, it revealed a side of LA I'd never seen but look forward to discovering a little before I head east.

Go watch it.

P.S. Zooey Deschanel may be my new fave.
P.P.S. It has a rocking soundtrack, too.

Perhaps ...

2009-07-25T13:13:00.000-07:00

Reinhold Niebuhr:

Perhaps the church ought to be more concerned to bring the goodness of Christ as a judgment upon every fragmentary form of human goodness than to find the particular cause which might be identified with Christ. There are many good causes and just claims which turn to into evil at the precise point where absolute validity is ascribed to them. Is not religion, including the Christian religion, a fruitful source of fanaticism and bigotry precisely because men pretend that their good is the ultimate good in the name of religion; and because Christians so easily claim Christ as an ally without ever having experienced his love as a judgment upon the shoddy character of their so-called ‘values’ and upon the fragmentary of even their best causes?

We must, as Christians, constantly make significant moral and political decisions amidst and upon perplexing issues and hazardous ventures. We must even make them ‘with might’ and not halfheartedly. But the Christian faith gives us no warrant to lift ourselves above the world’s perplexities and to seek or to claim absolute validity for the stand we take. It does, however, encourage us to the charity, which is born of humility and contrition.

Essays in Applied Christianity, 91-92

Oasis 3-week update

2009-07-23T23:17:00.000-07:00

Week Three

One of the highlights this week was the trafficking training session put on by the Coalition Against Slavery & Trafficking (CAST) LA, which took place on Wednesday. The focus of the training was ministering to survivors of human trafficking, particularly sex trafficking. As a result, many of the other attendees were workers at shelters, and much of the material that we went through that day wasn’t directly relevant to the work that Oasis is doing as an advocacy organization, and especially as a relatively young organization.

Having said that, it was very helpful to see not just all that is involved ministering to survivors of human trafficking, but also to see all the other people and organizations who are also seeking to combat human trafficking. It seems analogous to the work of the body of Christ (1 Cor. 12)—many parts are necessary to accomplish the goal, and they must be coordinated and working in tandem. In this case, non-governmental organizations and shelters must work with government agencies, police forces and health organizations.

Moreover, starting out at Oasis, a smaller organization (at least here in the US), working with only a few staff and a few interns, it was particularly helpful to get a sense of the movement that is rising. The coalition to combat human trafficking is a movement that is only recently gaining momentum, not just in terms of the legislation that is being enacted in the US and around the world, but also in terms of the awareness that we as anti-trafficking campaigners need to bring to the public view. There is a certain excitement that plays into being at the start of a movement, and a movement which we know is in line with what God is calling us to do: to seek justice for those who do not have it.

Week Four

I finished the first draft of the bible study resource this week (finally!). As a student, I’m used to working non-stop on something until it’s done, a tactic which I didn’t take with this internship; for this project, I worked full-time on it (when I could) Tuesday through Thursday, and then left it alone over the weekend. It’s a different way of doing things, perhaps a healthier way (since I also had plenty of other things to do apart from the internship), but the pace of work was definitely slower than I was used to and I got done later than I would have liked.

Still, it’s done; and it was an interesting exercise for me. I’ve been in higher education for nine years now, the last six of which have been in the field of theology. So I suppose I’m used to operating at a more theoretical and less basic level—I’m certainly engaging at a different level than I was before I started studying theology. The biggest challenge for me was the feeling I had that what was needed was a biblical worldview—a broader perspective—and not simply a bunch of verses that supported what I wanted to see happen. I do believe that God is a God of justice, that he is on the side of the poor and the oppressed, the orphan, the widow and the foreigner, and that if we are to be his people, we are to care for these as much as he does. I could build a case for combating human trafficking on a couple of verses if I chose, but I think that it’s important to remember the broader context, to see the person of Christ as a central figure in the story, and to highlight the consistencies and congruities in the story.

So that’s what I tried to do with this resource. I tried to establish a biblical framework for Christian involvement in human trafficking and in justice in general. In six sessions. I think it turned out okay …

Week Five

This week I went out into the Arcadia and San Gabriel area with Daniel, Oasis’ outreach worker, and Monica, who oversees the coalition of which Oasis is a part. Over about an hour and a half, we stopped by several massage parlors in order to hand out fliers advertising a community health clinic, but also to casually check the places out. It was a fascinating experience, as not one of the locations we stopped into was above reproach: one place had an inordinate number of video cameras (5) on a space which certainly didn’t seem to need it (approx. 30’ by 30’); a couple of other parlors did not advertise full body massages but said that they were available in a backroom upon request. Now, neither of these situations is a surefire sign that trafficking is taking place, but they do make one wonder.

Because of the newness of the field, which I mentioned a couple of weeks ago, there aren’t very many established protocols in terms of how to proceed in this area. While it’s definitely desirable that more people are mobilized to combat human trafficking, one of the things which people must be aware of is the uncertainty and risk involved. The trafficker(s) may well be just one person trafficking another person; or organized crime could be involved; or even larger crime syndicates may be in control. One of the central things for organizations like Oasis is safety—we are not equipped to engage in combating crime (which human trafficking is) in the way that police forces are. Indeed, if a police department is already actively involved in staking out or investigating a site, the involvement of civilians may interfere with an ongoing operation or tip off the traffickers, who will then quickly shift the victims to another location.

On the other hand, because of the newness of the field, many police departments have not yet had training in identifying and targeting human trafficking. Oasis has worked closely with the Arcadia Police Department and created a good, cohesive relationship, by which the police’s work is not interfered with or obstructed, but allows Oasis to do as much as it can. It’s hoped that this cooperation will form a template for other police departments and government agencies to work closely and effectively with non-governmental agencies, non-profits and other organizations to implement and establish a good model for combating trafficking.

What to do and conclusion [part 3]

2009-07-23T09:30:00.000-07:00

When faced with something as vast and complex as the U.S. health care system and with the biblical challenge to do something about it, one inclination can instead be to retreat into despair and inaction; this is obviously not the answer, and the Bible’s numerous exhortations to “Fear not!” are evidence that God does not intend his people to be paralyzed by fear. Change can be effected; change must be worked for if we believe in and serve a God of justice; and change will need a collective effort, requiring the energies of:

Individuals. As much as we’d self-centeredly like to think that we live “in a world described and defined by the necessity of autonomous choice, freely made, most people actually live in the relational, obligatory, and interconnected world, a world far messier and heavily freighted, far more passionately loving and passionately hating than that described in philosophic texts.”[1] This being the case, we cannot simply sit on our hands, ignoring the interconnection that means that loving our neighbor may translate into reforming a health care system that denies him or her adequate health care coverage. As individuals, we can contribute by researching the issues, by paying attention to policy goings-on, by talking with friends about these topics, or by raising awareness of the direness of the health care crisis.
Churches. In the church, we can point beyond what is politically possible or what can be legislated, to what the Spirit can achieve through the distinctive community that is the body of Christ. Lawrence Brown suggests that institutions that mediate between policymakers and the public, such as churches, may serve to “help their members to get acquainted with the complexities of social choice and build trust in the intentions and intelligence of those who press for innovation.”[2] Churches can contribute to health care reform by contributing to the education of its members regarding the issues involved, or by organizing writing campaigns to Congressional representatives—those who are accountable to us as voters—pressing for expansion of Medicaid or more minority doctors and nurses who, studies show, are more likely to return to minority communities. In addition, churches can engage in direct health care services, running faith-based clinics, or programs to inform, enroll and translate for the poor in our neighborhoods. As Ron Sider points out, nations may choose to offer services to its citizens and not to foreigners, but “the biblical concern for the alien and stranger compels Christians and Jews to offer health care to millions of illegal immigrants.”[3] One could easily add that the biblical concern for the poor compels Christians and Jews to campaign for health care for the millions in poverty who are not, for whatever reason, covered by Medicaid.

However, individuals and organizations alone will not be able to effect this change. According to Kaiser State Health Facts, Medicaid alone cost a total of $303.9 billion in 2006.[4] The fiscal force of employers and governments will also need to be brought to bear in order to effectively face the challenge of insufficient health care, and individuals and organizations may play a part in pushing for such employer and government action. After all, “What is politically possible, of course, changes quickly when enough people demand action.”[5]

****

4. Concluding Thoughts

The issue of the U.S. health care system is an imposing malady, imposing enough that it has never been successfully addressed despite significant deterioration in the last few decades. As President Obama pointed out recently, “When times were good, we didn't get it done. When we had mild recessions, we didn't get it done. When we were in peacetime, we did not get it done. When we were at war, we did not get it done. There is always a reason not to do it. And it strikes me that now is exactly the time for us to deal with this problem.”[6] Framed in biblical terms, the call to image God in love, justice, mercy and concern for the poor and oppressed is too important to not do anything about the health care crisis.

Superficial change will not be sufficient. I would join the chorus of voices seeking change that takes root at a deeper level as well, advocating for a more foundational reform, such as Rebecca Todd Peters’ appeal to a new economic model “that is rooted in a moral framework of compassion and the elimination of poverty … that does not focus on growth and trade as its primary indicators of success,” but focuses on biblical priorities such as justice and the affirmation of human dignity.[7] Or Laurie Zoloth-Dorfman’s challenge for “a change in the ideological paradigm of health care itself, along with a change in the process and language of the discourse of public policy. There must be a change in how Americans perceive health and illness, cure and death.”[8] As Christians, our calling is to consider these issues—as well as those of justice and poverty and treatment of the alien—from a biblical perspective and to speak them into society and into being, seeking to see the kingdom of God come on earth. The challenges we face will be great in addressing the reform of the U.S. health care system. But the need is too great to ignore. And we may take heart from the reminder that the God we serve—the God of justice, the God of the poor, the God of healing—is a mighty God, and he can do anything.

[1] Zoloth-Dorfman, “First,” 24.

[2] Lawrence D. Brown, “Health Reform in America: The Mystery of the Missing Moral Momentum,” Conservative Judaism, 51 no. 4 (Summer 1999), 111.

[3] Sider, Generosity, 188.

[4] Kaiser State Health Facts, “Total Medicaid Spending, FY2006”; accessed from http://www.statehealthfacts.org/comparemaptable.jsp?ind=177&cat=4 (March 14, 2009).

[5] Sider, Generosity, 181.

[6] Barack Obama, “Closing Remarks by the President at White House Forum on Health Reform, followed by Q&A, 3/5/09,” The White House; accessed from http://www.whitehouse.gov/the_press_office/Closing-Remarks-by-the-President-at-White-House-Forum-on-Health-Reform/ (March 14, 2009).

[7] Peters, “Economic Justice,” 106-107. She goes on to say, “This new economic model need not eschew profit, or growth, or efficiency, but it should recognize the ways in which it values these goals. And it will balance them with other moral considerations, such as sustainability, justice, and the social well-being of people and communities.”

[8] Zoloth-Dorfman, “First,” 26.

Thinking Christianly about Health Care Reform [part 2]

2009-07-23T09:13:00.000-07:00

In considering the importance of a Christian voice in our culture, and particularly in the field of bioethics, Allen Verhey writes, “To raise a theologically articulate voice in protest or in hope may be a sign of life in the culture, and it may preserve a memory or stir an image that will make a difference to the culture.”[1] The church is intended to be a distinctive community, living out the values of the kingdom of God and proclaiming the gospel with words and actions. The following section is intended to build the framework for a biblical understanding of some of the main issues which may impact on one’s consideration of health care and health care reform in the United States. The gospel is all-encompassing good news, which means that it has something to say about this issue. I will survey one overarching theme which is particularly pertinent—that of justice, recognizing that there is a multiplicity of approaches that can be taken and a long list of such themes that can be investigated.[2]

a. A biblical framework[3]

In Genesis 1:27, we read that humanity is made “in the image of God … male and female he created them.” Most scholars have concluded that “the image of God reflected in human persons is after the manner of a king who establishes statues of himself to assert his sovereign rule where the king himself cannot be present. … The image of God in the human person is a mandate of power and responsibility. But it is power exercised as God exercises power.”[4] And as John Goldingay notes, being made in the image of God means that “humanity not only represents God but also resembles God.”[5] Thus, it is important to understand the character of God in order that we might best represent him, resemble him, and exercise the power he has given us in the way that he exercises power. In considering the theme of this paper, I will focus on justice as central to God’s character: Yahweh is a God of justice. But what does this mean? For this, we turn to the biblical narrative.[6]

In the Exodus story, God had to shape a people who had spent years oppressed in slavery, by the Egyptians, into a people who more ably represented—imaged—their God. Moses reminds the Israelites:

Yahweh your God is God of gods and Lord of lords, the great God, mighty and awesome, who is not partial and takes no bribe, who executes justice for the orphan and the widow, and who loves the strangers, providing them food and clothing. You shall also love the stranger, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt. (Deut. 10:17-19)

God’s justice is revealed in tangible acts; his characteristic qualities are proven only when his saving actions attest to them. And it was God’s justice that became the reason for the Israelites to do justice: “I am Yahweh your God.” This meant:

having honest balances, honest measures, honest practices, because Yahweh their God is an honest God (Lev. 19:36; Deut. 25:15; Ezek. 45:10);
practicing the year of Jubilee, a year of emancipation and restoration, because Yahweh their God had emancipated them from slavery in Egypt and restored them to the land he had promised their ancestors (Lev. 25);
loving their neighbors as themselves because love was central to Yahweh their God’s being (Lev. 19:18);
loving the alien and the stranger among them because Yahweh their God had brought them from a place where they themselves had been aliens and strangers (Lev. 19:33-34).

Similarly in the Psalms, God’s righteousness and justice (two concepts which are virtually interchangeable from an Old Testament perspective) are not intangible characteristics. Instead, they are revealed most often in God’s saving, righteous and just actions (Ps. 71:1-2, 15-19, 21-24a). The psalmists were especially vocal in their affirmation of God’s justice, singing, “Yahweh loves justice; he will not forsake his faithful ones” (Ps. 37:28) and “Yahweh works vindication and justice for all who are oppressed” (Ps. 103:6). He is worshiped as the God:

who helps the victim and the fatherless (Ps. 10:14);
whose throne is built upon righteousness and justice (Ps. 89:14);
who executes justice for the oppressed, sets the prisoners free, opens the eyes of the blind, lifts up those who are bowed down, watches over the strangers, and upholds the orphan and the widow (Ps. 146:5-9).

Yahweh is the God who commands his people, “Give justice to the weak and the orphan; maintain the right of the lowly and the destitute. Rescue the weak and the needy; deliver them from the hand of the wicked” (Ps. 82:3-4).

When his people failed to discharge their responsibilities as representatives of God and ambassadors for his justice, he raised up prophets to point this out to them:

Jeremiah pleaded with King Shallum, “Did not your father eat and drink and do justice and righteousness? Then it was well with him. He judged the cause of the poor and needy; then it was well. Is not this to know me? says Yahweh” (22:16);
Ezekiel spoke out against corruption, where “the alien residing within you suffers extortion; the orphan and the widow are wronged in you … you have forgotten me, says the Lord God” (22:7, 12);
Through Amos, God denounced worship devoid of justice: “Take away from me the noise of your songs; I will not listen to the melody of your harps. But let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an everflowing stream” (5:23-24);
Micah reminded the people, “He has told you, O mortal, what is good; and what does Yahweh require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?” (6:8);
Through Isaiah, God’s words to his people are most revealing:

Is not this the fast that I choose: to loose the bonds of injustice, to undo the thongs of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, and to break every yoke? Is it not to share your bread with the hungry, and bring the homeless poor into your house; when you see the naked, to cover them, and not to hide yourself from your own kin?

Then your light shall break forth like the dawn, and your healing shall spring up quickly; your vindicator shall go before you, the glory of the LORD shall be your rear guard. Then you shall call, and the LORD will answer; you shall cry for help, and he will say, Here I am.

If you remove the yoke from among you, the pointing of the finger, the speaking of evil, if you offer your food to the hungry and satisfy the needs of the afflicted, then your light shall rise in the darkness and your gloom be like the noonday. (58:6-10)

It is in Jesus, though, that we find the fullest expression of God’s image, and consequently, the truest paradigm for us to follow. In Jesus, we find the fullness of God and his justice embodied in a human being (Col. 2:9). Jesus took upon himself the mantle of the Servant about whom Isaiah prophesied, anointed “to bring good news to the poor, to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor” (Luke 4:18-19; cf. Is. 61:8). Yet Jesus was also characterized by love. He commanded his followers:

to love one another as he loved them (John 13:34, 15:12);
to love not only their neighbors but also their enemies (Matt. 5:43);
to feed the hungry, to give drink to the thirsty, to welcome the stranger, to clothe the naked, to take care of the sick, to visit those in prison, for “just as you did it to one of the least of these who are members of my family, you did it to me” (Matt. 25:31-46).

In all of these instructions, Jesus was seeking actions that demonstrated characteristics. Justice, I would suggest, is the effective action that makes the characteristic quality of love tangible. As the Apostle John asked, “How does God’s love abide in anyone who has the world’s goods and sees a brother or sister in need and yet refuses help? Little children, let us love, not in word or speech, but in truth and action” (1 John 3:16-18).

Catholic theologian Walter Burghardt summarizes New Testament justice:

Love as Jesus loved. The kind of love that impelled God’s unique Son to wear our flesh; to be born of a woman as we are born; to thirst and tire as we do; to respond with compassion to a hungry crowd, the bereavement of a mother, the sorrow of a sinful woman; to weep over a dead friend and a hostile city; to spend himself especially for the bedeviled and the bewildered, the poverty-stricken and the marginalized; to die in exquisite agony so that others might come to life.[7]

Jesus is God incarnate, and in him, we see the personification of the justice, compelled by love, that is evidenced throughout Scripture as a central characteristic of God. Consequently, as human beings created in the image of God—created to image and represent God—we are called to be just people and to do justice, motivated by love and by the example of Christ. Just how this works itself out with regard to health care and health care reform, we will see a little later on.

b. A Catholic perspective

The Catholic Church has been a consistent and outspoken voice on matters of justice, particularly in addressing biblical implications for culture with a constancy that the Protestant Church has been sorely lacking. For this reason, it is instructive to look at some of the texts in which the Catholic Church has addressed the issue of health care, applying biblical teaching to a contemporary cultural issue:

Pope Leo XIII in Rerum Novarum, published in 1891, highlighted the importance of social justice to the individual and to a peaceful society by emphasizing the importance of themes such as the centrality of the common good and its promotion.[8]
In 1981, the U.S. Bishops issued a letter addressing the health care problem, which restated the Catholic Church’s position and is worth quoting at length:

Every person has a basic right to adequate health care. This right flows from the sanctity of human life and the dignity that belongs to all human persons, who are made in the image of God. It implies that access to health care which is necessary and suitable for the proper development and maintenance of life must be provided for all people regardless of income, social or legal status. Special attention should be given to meeting the basic health needs of the poor. With increasingly limited resources in the economy, it is the basic rights of the poor that are frequently threatened first. …

The benefits provided in a national health care policy should be sufficient to maintain and promote good health as well as to treat disease and disability. Emphasis should be placed on the promotion of health, the prevention of disease and the protection against environmental and other hazards to physical and mental health. …

Health planning is an essential element in the development of an effective and coordinated health system. Public policy should ensure that uniform standards are part of the health care delivery system. …

Following these principles and on our belief in health care as a basic human right, we call for the development of a national health insurance program.[9]

In 1993, the U.S. Bishops issued a resolution on health care, restating the basic right of every human being “to adequate health care. This right flows from the sanctity of human life and the dignity that belongs to all human persons, who are made in the image of God.” This right is rooted in the sanctity of human life, and “the biblical call to heal the sick and to serve ‘the least of these,’ the priorities of social justice and the common good,” the “virtue of solidarity,” and “the option for the poor and vulnerable.”[10]
In the same resolution, they also laid out the criteria for reform, consistent with the principles the Catholic Church has always sought to champion:[11]

Respect for Life. Whether it preserves and enhances the sanctity and dignity of human life from conception to natural death.

Priority Concern for the Poor. Whether it gives special priority to meeting the most pressing health care needs of the poor and undeserved, ensuring that they receive quality health services.

Universal Access. Whether it provides ready universal access to comprehensive health care for every person living in the United States.

Comprehensive Benefits. Whether it provides comprehensive benefits sufficient to maintain and promote good health, to provide preventive care, to treat disease, injury, and disability appropriately and to care for persons who are chronically ill or dying.

Pluralism. Whether it allows and encourages the involvement of the public and private sectors, including the voluntary, religious, and non-profit sectors, in the delivery of care and services; and whether it ensures respect for religious and ethical values in the delivery of health care for consumers and for individual and institutional providers.

Quality. Whether it promotes the development of processes and standards that will help to achieve quality and equity in health services, in the training of providers, and in the informed participation of consumers in decision making on health care.

Cost Containment and Controls. Whether it creates effective cost containment measures that reduce waste, inefficiency, and unnecessary care; measures that control rising costs of competition, commercialism, and administration; and measures that provide incentives to individuals and providers for effective and economical use of limited resources.

Equitable Financing. Whether it ensures society’s obligation to finance universal access to comprehensive health care in an equitable fashion, based on ability to pay; and whether proposed cost-sharing arrangements are designed to avoid creating barriers to effective care for the poor and vulnerable.

The Catholic approach to applying biblical values to contemporary issues like the one of health care is enormously helpful and instructive, particularly for an introduction such as this project.

c. Health care and the Bible: other things to consider

Building upon the Catholic perspective and drawing upon the biblical framework of justice, we may also consider the following points:

When we consider that all of humankind is created in the image of God, what does it mean that tens of millions people in the United States are uninsured? Ron Sider concludes bluntly, “By tolerating a situation in which over 45 million people lack health insurance, this society stands in blatant defiance of God’s will.”[12]
When we consider that Jesus loved, welcomed, and commended children (Mark 10:13-16; Luke 18:16), what does it mean that 13.3 million American children under 18 live in poverty?
When we consider that God shows favor to the poor, if not holding a preferential option for them, what does it mean that the poverty rate stands at 12.5% of the population, an estimated 37.3 million people, and that most of these are uninsured?
When we consider that “those who oppress the poor insult their Maker” (Prov. 14:31; 17:5), what does it mean that the Medicaid budget, which covers hospitalization, doctors and drugs (in some states) for the poor, and provided for about 52 million people in 2004, was cut significantly by Congress in 2006?
When we consider that Christians defend the family, what does it mean that poor families suffer doubly from being in poverty and being uninsured? When we consider that Christians value life as a gift from God, what does it mean that millions of babies born into poverty lack decent health care? “How can any Christian read what the Bible says about the poor and what Jesus says about the sick without hearing a divine call to demand that every person in this nation, starting with the poor, have access to health insurance?”[13]

In considering our Christian role in addressing health care and health care reform in the U.S., we must be realistic, recognizing that we live in a broken and sin-marred world with broken and sin-marred people and broken and sin-marred systems. But this should not deter is from doing what we must in living up to our calling as images, ambassadors and representatives, of God. As Laurie Zoloth-Dorfman puts it:

Our discussion of health care has a prophetic responsibility. It must move beyond that which is and point to that which ought to be. …

The outcome of the national debate over health care reform will represent a compromise, the result of victories and defeats along the road to justice. But the plan itself must clearly reflect the prophetic “ought,” and it must provide a mechanism for truly democratic participation of all of us in the process of determining its final makeup. It will fail if it does not frame the issues in terms that remind us that we are part of a larger moral community, and that to do justice means to pay careful and sustained attention to the fact that people live among, are responsible for, and are obligated to others.[14]

[1] Allen Verhey, Reading the Bible in the Strange World of Medicine, Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company (2003), 28.

[2] Not least of these might be a study of sickness and healing in the Bible, considering verses such as Matt. 10:1-8; Acts 3:1-10; 5:15; Rom. 5:12-14, 1 Cor. 15:26; James 5:14-15.

[3] Adapted from Justin Fung, “Social Justice and Human Rights,” MD524 Advocating for Social Justice final paper, Pasadena: CA (Summer 2008), 4-7.

[4] Walter Brueggemann, Genesis, Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press (1982), 32.

[5] John Goldingay, Old Testament Theology, Vol. 1: Israel’s Gospel, Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press (2003), 98.

[6] For further examination of this topic, see also Enrique Nardoni, Rise Up, O Judge: A Study of Justice in the Biblical World, Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Publishers, Inc. (2004); translated by Seán Charles Martin from Enrique Nardoni, Los que buscan la justicia: Un studio de al justicia en el mundo biblico, Estella (Navarra), Spain: Editorial Verbo Divino (1997).

[7] Walter J. Burghardt, Justice: A Global Adventure, Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books (2004), 19.

[8] Leo XIII, Rerum Novarum: Encyclical of Pope Leo XIII on Capital and Labor, Vatican City: Libreria Editrice Vaticana; accessed from http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/leo_xiii/encyclicals/documents/hf_l-xiii_enc_15051891_rerum-novarum_en.html (March 16, 2009).

[9] Excerpted from U.S. Bishops, Health and Health Care: A Pastoral Letter of the U.S. Catholic Bishops, Washington, DC: United States Catholic Conference (November 19, 1981).

[10] U.S. Bishops, “Resolution on Health Care Reform,” Origins 23 no. 7 (1993), 99-100.

[11] U.S. Bishops, “Resolution on Health Care Reform,” Origins 23 no. 7 (1993), 99-100.

[12] Sider, Generosity, 178.

[13] Sider, Generosity, 189.

[14] Zoloth-Dorfman, “First,” 25, 89.

So You Think You Can Dance

2009-07-23T09:00:00.000-07:00

I only started watching SYTYCD last season, largely because many of my friends did. I'm not a dancer ... which is perhaps why it's one of the few reality shows that I watch, and while I feel like last season had more characters (Twitch, Joshua, Chelsie, etc.), this season has certainly had its share of amazing dances.

Jason and Jeanine

Ade and Melissa

And from last season:

Mark and Chelsie

Twitch and Katee

Chelsie and Joshua

P.S. For an entertaining and informative write-up of every week's episode, check out Liz's blog.

The state of US health care [part 1]

2009-07-23T08:06:00.000-07:00

[The following is excerpted from the first part of a project I did for my Ethics of Life & Death class in Winter 2009. The project is entitled "Initiating a Christian Conversation About Health Care Reform."]

1. The Current State of U.S. Health Care
We start with an introduction to the current condition of the U.S. health care system, which offers the worst return for highest cost in the developed world. I hesitate to begin with statistics because they tend to be remarkably impersonal, thereby contributing to an already-malignant bent toward depersonalization and distance; additionally, a statistics bombardment can leave one shell-shocked and overwhelmed. However, they also serve a purpose in setting the stage onto which the gospel must make its impression.

a. Overview of the health care system
First, though, an overview: insurance in the U.S. is provided through a “five-part patchwork system that covers most serious problems for most people most of the time, but still allows many people to fall through the cracks.”[1] The five parts are:

Employment-based coverage and private medical plans;
Medicare, which covers 80% of medical expenses for Americans over 65, and also people with disabilities under 65;
Medicaid, which provides coverage for the poor, including people on public assistance, children of poor parents, poor seniors, people with disabilities, and adults with mental illness;
CHAMPUS (Civilian Health and Medical Program of the Uniformed Services), TRICARE (the U.S. government-sponsored health insurance plan for active military members, their families and retirees) and the Veterans Administration Hospital System, provide health care for military personnel, their families and for veterans;
Health care in emergency rooms: the Emergency Medical Treatment and Active Labor Act 1986 forbids emergency rooms from turning away anyone who is medically unstable. As a result, emergency rooms serve as a national safety net for all kinds of medical problems of the uninsured and for illegal immigrants.

Those who fall into this fifth category (or those who obtain health care through private service organizations, including faith-based clinics) are not generally considered to have reliable access to health care since emergency rooms and private service organizations are not designed to function as a safety net and therefore not equipped to deal with the vast amounts of people who turn up for treatment. These include undocumented immigrants; homeless people (who have no fixed address and thus are ineligible for state-based Medicaid); and people with problems including substance addiction which are not recognized as disabilities. As Sondra Ely Wheeler notes, the health care that is provided through overburdened emergency rooms and private service organizations is often “both more costly and less effective than prompt primary care would have been; sometimes, it comes altogether too late. These people suffer and die of treatable or preventable illnesses at a much higher rate than those with stable access to care.”[2]

Clearly, such a patchwork health care system is not conducive to promoting preventive medical services and better control of chronic illnesses such as hypertension and diabetes. Such chronic illnesses, if left unchecked, and even minor problems, if not treated, will deteriorate, leading to bigger health issues and higher costs of treatment, perpetuating a vicious cycle that is seeing health care spending as a percentage of the U.S. budget rise at a much faster rate than all other spending.

b. Health care spending

Nobel Prize-winning economist Paul Krugman writes, “the opposition to universal health care depends on the claim that doing the morally right thing isn’t possible, or at least that the cost—in taxpayer dollars, in reduced quality of care for those doing okay under our current system would be too high.”[3] The facts tell a different story.[4]

On the whole, Americans spend more on health care in order to get the same or worse treatment than the rest of the developed world. Of course this is not to suggest we ought to simply transfer the health care systems of other advanced nations onto the American framework; there are advantages that Americans benefit from over the rest of the world, such as more cancer screening or quicker access to specialists and elective surgery, and these other systems have their own drawbacks. But as things stand, the wealthiest nation in the world has the highest population of uninsured in the developed world.

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, in 2007, forty-six million people were without health insurance in the wealthiest nation in the world, in the nation that spends the most per person on health care; and this number has undoubtedly risen in the last two years of economic recession. (There is the additional issue of the underinsured, who may spend their own income on out-of-pocket health care but will be unprepared and unable to face health catastrophes. Karen Tumulty estimates this number at around 25 million, and these too ought to be factored into what one considers the health care crisis.)[5]

Returning to uninsurance, we can also see that there are glaring disparities when we look at its distribution, both in terms of race and in terms of economic status: the percentages given are percentages of that particular ethnic population and that particular economic bracket. For example, we can see that while only 10% of all non-Hispanic Whites are uninsured, a staggering 32% of Hispanics are uninsured.

From the McKinsey publication alluded to previously, we also learn that 11% of children are uninsured, and this number increases to 17.6% when we consider children living below the federal poverty line. Here too, uninsurance is unevenly distributed across racial and ethnic categories:

Ron Sider summarized the American health care situation thus:

the uninsured are four times as likely as the insured to report that they needed medical care but did not get it;
they are three times more likely to report problems in paying medical bills;
and the uninsured get substantially poorer medical care even when they do see a doctor. Studies show that the uninsured enter hospitals sicker than the insured, receive fewer tests, and leave the hospital sooner. Hospitals receive the greatest number of uninsured patients, and incurred 60 percent of the $40.7 billion uncompensated care costs in 2004.[6]

Bioethicist Laurie Zoloth-Dorfman frames our current condition in stark practical terms:

To travel on the freeway across Los Angeles … is to share in the risk that an accident could bring you to the doors of the nearest emergency rooms, the ones that serve as outpatient clinics to the poorest and the uninsured. They might well be closed, full beyond capacity, or inadequately staffed, no matter how exquisite your car, or provident your health care coverage.[7]

Because emergency rooms are not being used in the capacity for which they were meant—that is, as emergency rooms—they are overtaxed and understaffed and therefore unable to properly treat emergencies.

The picture does not improve when one considers the fact that, foundationally, the system upon which the health care system is built is not a value-free system but “one laden with values that favor profit and economic gain over other priorities—such as sustainability and economic justice.”[8] As such, the system which contributes to almost half of personal bankruptcies, according to a 2005 Harvard study, is allowed and encouraged to perpetuate:[9]

Medical costs are going up rapidly as medical technology improves and doctors are able to treat more (though at higher prices); thus employer-based insurance is in decline as employers seek to maximize profits and cut benefits or declare more employees ineligible for health care coverage or the cost is shifted onto employees through high-deductible health plans.
This has knock-on effects galore, including eventual lack of health care coverage for many workers, particularly low-wage workers, leaving them to seek unaffordable health care treatment or to go without insurance.

It might be interesting to note that the government subsidizes employer-provided health insurance at about $130b for 2006 in tax breaks, which far exceeds the benefits the poor receive through TANF and food stamps combined ($57b); most of these tax breaks end up going to those who make more than $75,000.

c. An insurance-driven system

The United States is perhaps the only developed nation whose health care system is driven by the insurance industry. Paul Krugman explains the process of insurance:

Insurers screen applicants for any indications that they might need expensive care—family history, nature of employment, and, above all, preexisting conditions. Any indication that an applicant is more likely than average to have high medical costs, and any chance of affordable insurance goes out the window.
If someone who makes it through this first process nonetheless needs care, insurers will look for ways not to pay, picking through the patient’s medical history to see if they can claim an undisclosed preexisting condition; this would invalidate the insurance. More important in most cases, they challenge the claims submitted by doctors and hospitals, trying to find reasons why the treatment offered wasn’t their responsibility.[10]

Naturally, all of this lends itself to much bureaucracy and administrative costs. Krugman notes that Medicare, the government-run health care, which does not (need to) haggle, spends only about 2% of its funds on administration, a figure which stands at about 15% for private insurers.[11]

d. Conclusion

Considering the situation now with the economy in recession:

if the economy is struggling, more people are losing jobs;
more people are losing health insurance;
more people are unable to afford to be healthy, and wait until problems become critical before being treated;
more people pay higher prices for treatment, which they cannot afford;
and the vicious cycle continues …

Princeton economist Uwe Reinhardt predicts that if nothing change:

Health-spending per capita in the United States will continue to rise 2 to 2.5 percentage points faster than the rest of per-capita gross domestic product, as it has done for the last four decades. Health care then will absorb about 40 percent of G.D.P. by 2040.
More and more middle- and lower-income American families will ﬁnd themselves priced out of needed health care, as the cost outpaces the growth in the wage base that supports the families. They will experience harsh rationing of health care, not by government, but by price and their ability to pay.
The waste most experts impute to our health system would continue unabated, as it thrives on the opaqueness of a heavily paper-based, fragmented health system that shuns comparative effectiveness analysis.[12]

The current state of the U.S. health care system is decidedly unhealthy, and it's about time something was done about it.

[Part 2 to follow]

[1] Gregory E. Pence, Classic Cases in Medical Ethics: Accounts of the Cases and Issues that Define Medical Ethics, New York, NY: McGraw-Hill (2008, 5^th ed.), 348.

[2] Sondry Ely Wheeler, Stewards of Life: Bioethics and Pastoral Care, Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press (1996), 63.

[3] Paul R. Krugman, The Conscience of a Liberal, New York, NY: W.W. Norton & Company (2007), 215.

[4] McKinsey Global Institute, “Accounting for the cost of U.S. health care: A new look at why Americans spend more,” (November 2008), accessed from http://www.mckinsey.com/mgi/publications/US_healthcare/ (March 14, 2009); and Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, “OECD Health Data 2008, 26 June 2008,” Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development; accessed from http://www.oecd.org/document/27/0,3343,en_2649_34631_40902299_1_1_1_1,00.html (March 16, 2009).

[5] Karen Tumulty, “The Health-Care Crisis Hits Home,” Time Magazine (March 5, 2009); accessed from http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1883149,00.html (March 14, 2009).

[6] Ronald J. Sider, Just Generosity: A New Vision for Overcoming Poverty in America, Grand Rapids, MI: 2007 (2^nd ed.), 175.

[7] Laurie Zoloth-Dorfman, “First, Make Meaning: An Ethics of Encounter for Health Care Reform,” Tikkun, 8 (July-August 1993), 23.

[8] Rebecca Todd Peters, “Economic Justice Requires More than the Kindness of Strangers,” in Douglas A. Hicks & Mark Valeri (eds.), Global Neighbors: Christian Faith and Moral Obligation in Today’s Economy, Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company (2008), 106-107.

[9] David U. Himmelstein, et al, “MarketWatch: Illness and Injury As Contributors to Bankruptcy,” Health Affairs (February 2, 2005); accessed from http://content.healthaffairs.org/cgi/content/full/hlthaff.w5.63/DC1 (March 14, 2009).

[10] Krugman, Conscience, 220-221.

[11] Krugman, Conscience, 223-224.

[12] Uwe E. Reinhardt, “Economic Trends in U.S. Health Care: Implications for Investors,” presented to An Investors’ Health Care Conference (January 2009); accessed from http://blogs.ft.com/maverecon/2009/02/uwe-reinhardt-on-the-health-of-the-economy-and-the-economics-of-health/ (March 14, 2009).

Presidential Press Conference

2009-07-23T07:35:00.001-07:00

In case you missed last night's press conference:

July 17

2009-07-17T23:15:00.000-07:00

Years ago, when times were more simple ...

A boy. A girl.

Butterflies. Hearts skipping beats. Knees weak. Breaths catching.

A kiss.

With a glance of your eyes

2009-07-15T09:12:00.000-07:00

Guess who wrote this:

A glimmer that danced across her round, dark eyes whenever I looked at her, the slightest hint of uncertainty, as if, deep inside, she knew how fragile things really were, and that if she ever let go, even for a moment, all her plans might quickly unravel. That touched me somehow, that trace of vulnerability. I wanted to know that part of her.

Hint: It's a writer whose work I REALLY like.

UPDATED: *sigh* I said "guess," and my friends Googled. It's Barack on Michelle, from The Audacity of Hope.

A word for the hurting

2009-07-14T07:39:00.000-07:00

You’re trying to hold on, you’re trying to be strong;
but you don’t know if you can wait that long
coz sometimes it just seems too far away
when you don’t know if you can last another day.

But don’t lose heart, coz you’ll lose everything;
show your soul, baby, though you don’t feel anything …

Touch the sky
And though the pain, it seems too much to bear,
it means that you’re alive, it means that you still care.
Touch the sky
To forgive and forget but you can’t, oh, not yet
But that’s alright.

Don’t lock yourself in a cage of your own choosing;
don’t shut yourself off from the risk of losing
everything once again, but maybe this time
You’ll find all you were looking for, somewhere down the line.

Taste and see, breathe and be
Take a second just to scream
Let the tears come, let the colors run
There will be a day when you’re never undone.

“Touch the Sky”, Justin Fung, 2006.

Advice from an Archbishop

2009-07-12T23:36:00.000-07:00

I’m reading Desmond Tutu’s God Has A Dream, and while his writing is always pertinent, the book and the chapter I happened to read today were so apposite as to be ironic. I have to say, I laughed out loud when I opened it up.

Anyway, here are some gems of wisdom. Enjoy:

In God’s universe, while we are not free to choose whether we suffer, we are free to choose whether it will ennoble us or embitter us. (72)

You have very little control over your feelings. That’s why God didn’t say, “Like your enemy.” It’s very difficult to like your enemy. But to love your enemies is different. Love is an act of the will, where you act lovingly even if you do not always feel loving. We tend to think love is a feeling, but it is not. Love is an action; love is something we do for others. … Our freedom is based on our ability to rise above our feelings and to act based on our will. (78)

Sometimes the best you can do is to say to God or to yourself, I want to love. Sometimes the best you can do is to say, I want to want to love. But when you do, you are much more likely to act in a loving and compassionate way, regardless of what you are feeling. Certainly it is wonderful when our feelings prompt us to act lovingly, but it is not realistic to expect that we will always want to do what we must do. (78-79)

The extraordinary thing is that when you act lovingly you can begin to feel love. … If you act for long enough in a particular way, you begin to feel the feelings that accompany the actions. We don’t always feel like we are all God’s children. (79)

Practicum with Oasis; first thoughts

2009-07-05T22:25:00.000-07:00

In case you didn't know (or didn't read previous blog entries), I'm interning with Oasis USA this summer, primarily in the area of human trafficking. This week, the rubber hit the road, and we really got rolling. Along with the two other Fuller interns (Brianna and Kelly), I’m working on Oasis’ “Active Communities against Trafficking in the sex industry” (ACT/s) pack. The aim is to pilot it in a community or two in the area, as well as to review it and put forward any suggestions we might have. But the practical application part of that hasn’t quite gotten going yet, and so we’re working on the review side of things, as well as a couple other things. I’ve been working on constructing some sort of bible study and/or church toolkit resource, which is leading me to go over a number of other organizations’ bible study resources as well as my own theological education. I haven’t written a bible study since before I studied theology, and I’m finding a lot of already-existing bible studies like to proof-text! (Which, to be fair, I’m sure I did a fair bit before I knew any better!)

The first thing we did this week was to watch a couple videos on trafficking. I’m a person who has a surprising capacity for unwavering optimism and faith in the basic goodness and decency in human beings. The area of human trafficking poses a serious challenge to that optimism because there are some really bad people out there. Here are situations and circumstances that make me wonder if such people and such things can be redeemed.

But two things tell me that they can. First, Genesis 1, from which we learn that all human beings are made in the image of God—all human beings, including those who make bad decisions and choose not to walk with God. Of course, those who are victims are more in need of people to defend this image, but just as much, we have something to say about the image of God in those who victimize. As easy as it is to demonize them and to portray them as utterly bad—and well they may seem deserving of such framing—it would serve us well to remember that they too are created in the image of God. Our approach to them will undoubtedly be different from our approach to the survivors, just as Jesus’ approach to the Pharisees was very different from his approach to the oppressed and marginalized; but they are no less creatures of God.

Second, the fact that Christ died for all. Which means that he loved the world—not just those who return his love—enough to give his life as a ransom for many. And as his followers, we are called to have his perspective—no one is beyond redemption. Desmond Tutu writes of his experiences in post-apartheid South Africa in his book God Has A Dream:

As we listened to accounts of truly monstrous deeds of torture and cruelty, it would have been easy to dismiss the perpetrators as monsters because their deeds were truly monstrous. But we are reminded that God’s love is not cut off from anyone. However diabolical the act, it does not turn the perpetrator into a demon. When we proclaim that someone is subhuman, we not only remove for them the possibility of change and repentance, we also remove from them moral responsibility

We cannot condemn anyone to being irredeemable, as Jesus reminded us on the Cross, crucified as he was between two thieves. When one repented, Jesus promised him that he would be in paradise with him on that same day. Even the most notorious sinner and evildoer at the eleventh hour may repent and be forgiven, because our God is preeminently a God of grace. Everything that we are, that we have, is a gift from God. He does not give up on you or on anyone for God loves you now and will always love you. Whether we are good or bad, God’s love is unchanging and unchangeable. (Tutu 2004: 10-11)

This may be the biggest challenge I face during this internship and beyond: to keep God’s perspective in the forefront of what I do, think and say.

More than just a trust fall

2009-07-03T20:33:00.000-07:00

Frank Laubach:

For do you not see that God is trying experiments with human lives? That is why there are so many of them. He has [six billion] experiments going around the world at this moment. And his question is "how far will this man and that woman allow me to carry this hour? ... For I who pushed life up through the protozoan and the tiny grass, and the fish and the bird and the dog and the gorilla and the man. ... I have not become satisfied yet. I am not only willing to make this hour marvelous. I am in travail to set you akindle with the Christ-thing which has no name. How fully can you surrender and not be afraid?

quoted in John Ortberg, The Life You've Always Wanted, 207.

...

2009-06-29T22:55:00.000-07:00

I'm not sure what words to use to reflect on Ann Goldingay's passing and on the impact that she and John had, or the example that they were, so I'll just let Liz write.

Here's the first paragraph (clicking here will take you to the full blog entry):

john goldingay, aside from being a world-renowned old testament scholar, is well-known at fuller for being a beautiful human being. his wife ann has been wheelchair-bound for 12 years, and more recently mute and unable to communicate. as she has deteriorated, he has cared for her unfailingly. taken her to concerts. brought her to chapel every week. taught only at night, so he can care for her during the day. and so on. any woman could only hope to marry someone as unfailingly committed as dr. goldingay.

Our thoughts and prayers are with you and yours, John.

"Our God Reigns"

2009-06-26T16:45:00.000-07:00

In the midst of a world that often doesn't make sense ...

Our God Reigns

40 million babies lost to Gods great orphanage,
It’s a modern day genocide and a modern day disgrace
If this is a human right then why aren’t we free?
The only freedom we have is in a man nailed to a tree.

100 million faces, staring at the sky,
Wondering if this HIV will ever pass us by.
The devil stole the rain and hope trickles down the plug,
But still my Chinese take away could pay for someone’s drugs.

Our God reigns, Our God reigns,
Forever your kingdom reigns.

The West has found a gun and it’s loaded with ‘unsure’
Nip and tuck if you have the bucks in a race to find a cure.
Psalm one hundred and thirty nine is the conscience to our selfish crime,
God didn’t screw up when he made you,
He’s a father who loves to parade you.

Yes he reigns, yes you reign, yes you reign,
For there is only one true God,
But we’ve lost the reins on this world,
Forgive us all, forgive us please,
As we fight for this broken world on our knees.

A joyful God

2009-06-22T22:19:00.000-07:00

G.K. Chesterton:

Because children have abounding vitality, because they are in spirit fierce and free, therefore they want things repeated and unchanged. They always say, “Do it again”; and the grown-up person does it again until he is nearly dead. For grown-up people are not strong enough to exult in monotony. But perhaps God is strong enough to exult in monotony. It is possible that God says every morning, “Do it again” to the sun; and every evening, “Do it again” to the moon. It may not be automatic necessity that makes all daisies alike; it may be that God makes every daisy separately, but has never got tired of making them. It may be that He has the eternal appetite of infancy; for we have sinned and grown old, and our Father is younger than we.

quoted in John Ortberg, The Life You’ve Always Wanted, 61.

Happy Father's Day

2009-06-21T01:20:00.000-07:00

A salute to my favorite dad:

My second birthday, 1984.

My eleventh birthday, 1993.

Christmas 2001.

My graduation from Fuller, 2009.

See you soon?

2009-06-19T11:44:00.000-07:00

It's a fairly surreal experience saying goodbye to your parents, and not knowing when you'll see them again.

Love you guys.

Thoughts on success

2009-06-17T23:57:00.001-07:00

My twelve year-old niece Aimee emailed me recently. She has to do a presentation in class on someone who's successful. So I was a little bit surprised and very honored that she chose me! In fact, one of the first questions was, "What is your most successful achievement?" And that had me stumped.

I'm not really sure what my most successful achievement would be. Maybe the fact that I moved half the world away from my family when I was 15, but then lots of people move and adjust to new environments nowadays. Maybe the fact that I'm a musician with his own music video? But then, there are millions of better known and more talented and more published artists. Maybe the fact that I've collected four degrees in nine years of higher education? Then again, I certainly wasn't a child prodigy, and I'm certainly not the smartest person in the world!

Thinking about it more, I think my most successful achievement is figuring out what success really is, realizing that success isn't necessarily about beating everyone in a competition or in a race, or about getting better grades than everyone else.

Success is being a good human being, a good person. Success is loving God, loving your neighbors, and loving your enemies. Success is figuring out who you are, figuring out what you're good at, and being the best that you can be—the best that God created you to be—and knowing that that is enough, and that that is all that God asks of you. Success is helping those in need, speaking up for those who can't speak for themselves, protecting the weak and the marginalized. Success is showing patience, kindness, grace, humility, mercy, joy, faithfulness, and love in all of our relationships. Success is being faithful and hopeful and loving in spite of all the challenges that the world and life throw at us.

In the process of learning, I've had many experiences that have made me question myself, my abilities, my talents, even my worth as a person. I've suffered disappointments in my work, felt unable to produce anything good—both in terms of music and in life in general—and known heartbreak and letdowns in relationships.

We live in a culture that measures success by comparing us to other people, and so one of the big challenges for me was realizing (and continually reminding myself) that I don't need to compare myself to other people. All I need to do is the best that I can do; all I need to be is the best that I can be.

And ultimately … any success I may have is only by the grace of God. I suppose the way that I try to live out this kind of success is to be first grounded in God, to know what he says about me, to know that he loves me no matter what, to know that my family and my friends love me no matter what. There's a freedom that comes with being secure in friendships and relationships, that allows us to be and do all that we can be and do.

So that's been my success: understanding success as I think God sees it, and then living in the light and truth of that.

Speaking at Commencement

2009-06-16T08:06:00.000-07:00

Here's the video and transcript from my little speech at Commencement last Saturday:

Love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind. And love your neighbor as yourself (Luke 10:27). “Give justice to the weak and the orphan; maintain the right of the lowly and the destitute. Rescue the weak and the needy; deliver them from the hand of the wicked” (Ps. 82:3-4). “Let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an everflowing stream” (Amos 5:24). Feed the hungry, give drink to the thirsty, welcome the stranger, clothe the naked, take care of the sick, visit those in prison, for “just as you did it to one of the least of these who are members of my family, you did it to me” (Matt. 25:31-46). For all humanity is made in the image of God—male and female he created them (Gen. 1:27).

These verses have come to mean a lot to me. You see, it was during my time at Fuller that God lit a fire in me—a passion, a vision, a calling to do justice, to see justice done. I began my time at Fuller in Fall 2006 in the Master of Divinity program, thinking that I would follow in the footsteps of my two brothers and go into fulltime pastoral ministry. But in the years since, through the classes I took, through the friends I made, and through the conversations and encounters I had, God tweaked that a little. And so, about a year and a half through, I switched to the dual MA in Theology and Cross-Cultural Studies, realizing that while I maintain a love for and interest in seeing the church impassioned and empowered to do justice, I also have a calling to see this justice done outside the church, to work in conjunction with non-Christians as well as Christians toward seeing the kingdom of God here on earth.

It was at Fuller that I began to ask questions like, what does this justice look like when over 45 million people in the United States alone are without health insurance? What does this justice look like when there are twenty-seven million slaves around the world today in bonded labor or in forced prostitution? What does this justice look like when there are still a billion people in the world living in extreme poverty? What does this justice look like?

This fall, I’ll be moving to Washington, DC to begin a year-long internship with the social justice organization Sojourners. It’s an opportunity rich with potential and promise, and I’m excited to see the things I’ve learned here at Fuller worked out in practice and in policy. To work out what biblical justice—God’s justice—looks like, and to see it done. To work out what it looks like to be our brother’s keeper and our sister’s keeper. To be a voice for the voiceless, an advocate for and a friend to those whom Jesus called the least of these. Because as the prophet Micah reminds us, “What does the Lord require of you, but to do justice, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God?”

I’m sad to leave Fuller, but I’m excited because while the challenges to seeing this justice done are great, God is already at work in our world, doing what he does. And me? I’m with him.

Beautiful

2009-06-15T08:00:00.000-07:00

Being at seminary can tend to lend itself to a certain cynicism, fueled by intellectual detachment from the realities of life, a dispassion built upon having to dissect, critique and deconstruct everything. Combined with an enervation resulting from trying to balance too many hours of school, too many hours of work, and too many other things, this world-weariness can often manifest itself in negativity or pessimism (apologists might prefer to call this “realism”). Living in the West in the 21st century, bombarded as we are with millions of images, words, sounds, and messages, it is similarly easy to develop a tough exterior of ennui in order to protect oneself. Unfortunately, in trying to shut out the bad, the negative, or simply trying to defend against the deluge, we can also shut out appreciation of the good, the joyful, and the uplifting.

The song “Beautiful” was birthed one sunny London day in the summer of 2006. I provide this background since it directly impacted the writing of the song. As you may know, sunny days in England are a dime a dozen, so my appreciation of this meteorological phenomenon was particularly heightened. My aim in beginning to write this song was to respond to this reminder of the grace and beauty of God’s creation. And my aim in choosing to rework it for class (Theology & Culture with Barry Taylor) was to combat both the overwhelming cynicism of the surrounding culture and my own tendency towards disinterestedness and dispassion as a tired, final-year seminarian.

I don’t like to be overly prescriptive with the meaning or interpretation of the words of the songs I write. I like making room in my songs for some ambiguity in order that they may mean different things to different people at different times (though I wouldn’t advocate this approach for congregational worship songs). Even for myself, I have found occasion to appreciate this song at different times and in different contexts. All that I will say about the words of the song is that, in writing them, in using the words I did, I was hoping to encourage the listener to open him- or herself up to the beauty, the grace, the God in life.

For the video itself, I turned for inspiration to other songs and music videos that I had found uplifting and inspiring, in particular, Lifehouse’s “Spin” and U2’s “Beautiful Day”, two songs that similarly extolled the beauty in life. In both, there is a sense of winsomeness, a sense of both holding on to life lightly enough and yet being grounded deeply enough that we can appreciate the good in the face of the hard.

To that end, I settled on filming scenes from life, and especially those moments that remind me that life is beautiful. Obviously, as this is my engagement with and response to culture, the moments which are displayed demonstrate some of the things that I find uplifting: two people in love, a family at play, enjoying the company of friends over coffee and basketball, digging into a good book, and being able to express oneself creatively with the gifts God has bestowed. I interspersed this with shots of landscape, of city, and of beach—all of which are part of my life in California, and in all of which I am particularly able to see God’s fingerprints. Others might (and probably would) frame things differently, or show different moments.

My three years at Fuller were simultaneously the toughest and the best of my twenty-seven years, and one of the reasons for the latter was that I was able to seek and find God in it all. Even in the hardest of times, he was revealing himself and the traces of his grace were evident if I would only look and see. Even though I might not have understood what was going on with my life or my future or whatever I may have been struggling with at the time, even though I might not have been able to comprehend why certain things were happening or not happening, I was fortunate to be able to recognize (or perhaps the Spirit was insistent enough to remind me) that God was still there, that beauty and grace and love were still there. Thus, what began as a simple appreciation of and expression of gratitude for a beautiful day became a metaphor and analogy for life, and for the oftentimes-inexplicable movement and work of God.

Feel the sunlight on your skin
Take a deep breath, take it in
Oh my, what a beautiful day
See the clouds swim in the sky
Close your eyes and let it take you high
What a beautiful day

Though you don’t understand
And this grace you can’t comprehend
You know it’s a beautiful day
It’s a beautiful day

This is beauty, can’t look away
And your tears, they fall and fade away
On this beautiful day
Reach out, darling, heaven’s here
It’s all around, it’s coming near
Oh my, it’s a beautiful day

Though you don’t understand
And this grace you can’t comprehend
You know it’s a beautiful day
It’s a beautiful day

Flood the senses
Overwhelm your defenses
Let love teach you how to love again

A time for life, a time for death
A time to run, a time to catch your breath
On this beautiful day
A time to hurt, a time to heal
A time to hold your tears, a time to feel
On this beautiful day

Though you don’t understand
And this grace you can’t comprehend
You know it’s a beautiful day
It’s a beautiful day
It’s a beautiful day
It’s a beautiful day

I think love is a bit of heaven

2009-06-09T11:05:00.000-07:00

Of all the words I've ever read in all of the books I've ever read, this remains one of my favorite passages:

I think love is a bit of heaven. When I was in love I thought about that girl so much I felt like I was going to die and it was beautiful, and she loved me, too, or at least she said she did, and we were not about ourselves, we were about each other, and that is what I mean when I say being in love is a bit of heaven. When I was in love I hardly thought of myself; I thought of her and how beautiful she looked and whether or not she was cold and how I could make her laugh. It was wonderful because I forgot my problems. I owned her problems instead, and her problems seemed romantic and beautiful. When I was in love there was somebody in the world who was more important than me, and that, given all that happened at the fall of humanity, is a miracle, like something God forgot to curse.

Don Miller, Blue Like Jazz, 151.

Thursday's gig

2009-05-25T15:17:00.000-07:00

Here's the Brehm Center preview of this Thursday's gig, featuring Carrie G. and me.

Heir to the President?

2009-05-19T10:18:00.000-07:00

[from the White House Flickr feed]

I love this pic.

***

On a separate note, here's an interesting article in the Economist, about heightened creativity in those who have lived or are living abroad.

White Man

2009-05-18T17:15:00.000-07:00

"White Man," by The Michael Gungor Band.

U2 - Magnificent

2009-05-17T18:14:00.001-07:00

In my opinion, easily one of U2's greatest songs.

Magnificent
Oh, magnificent

  I was born,
I was born to be with you  
In this space and time
 After that and ever after
I haven't had a clue

 Only to break rhyme
This foolishness can leave a heart
Black and blue  

Only love
Only love can leave such a mark 
But only love
Only love can heal such a scar 

I was born
I was born to sing for you  
I didn’t have a choice
But to lift you up
And sing whatever song you wanted me to
I give you back my voice
From the womb my first cry
It was a joyful noise
Oh, oh

Only love
Only love can leave such a mark
 But only love
Only love can heal such a scar 

Justified till we die
You and I will magnify 
Oh, the magnificent 
Magnificent

Only love
Only love can leave such a mark 
But only love
Only love unites our hearts  

Justified till we die
You and I will magnify
Oh, the magnificent 
Magnificent 
Magnificent

Van Jones @ M2EP

2009-05-08T11:05:00.000-07:00

Van Jones, the Special Advisor for Green Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation at the White House Council on Environmental Quality (CEQ), addresses the Monday morning plenary session at Sojourners' Mobilization to End Poverty 2009 (April 26-29).

Van Jones @ M2EP from Justin Fung on Vimeo.

I love this guy.

The breath before the plunge

2009-05-07T21:29:00.000-07:00

In case you haven't already heard, my plans for the next few months are:

Graduate June 13.
Intern in LA with Oasis USA over the summer.
Move to Washington, DC in the fall to be the Policy and Outreach Intern with Sojourners.

I'm totally excited about all of those things. But very, very, very deep down.

Because before I get to those things, i.e. in the next four weeks, my to-do list is as follows:

Write four one-page journals, two critical responses, and a final project.
Read three heavy (in terms of subject matter) and thick (in terms of size) books, write a 25-page research paper.
Write an 8-10 page paper, write up my part of a group project, and write an in-class essay.
Think up, write up and present my part of a group project (about which we're still not totally sure ...).
Organize and coordinate the Fuller All-Seminary Council elections, and various other ASC responsibilities.

Let me tell you this: if I'm alive at the end of this quarter, it'll only be by the grace of God.

Seriously.

Snapshots from MA

2009-05-06T07:56:00.000-07:00

A few pics from my time in Cape Cod, Boston and Cambridge, Mass.:

[Cape Cod clam chowder; breakfast overlooking the pond; Snake Pond #1 and #2]

[Micah 6:8 from an old Bible in Denton's collection; Plymouth Rock; Quidditch on Boston Common; an antique bookstore]

[Harvard Divinity School; sunset over Snake Pond; with the Lotzes; flying into LAX]

Snapshots from DC

2009-05-05T22:11:00.000-07:00

A few shots from my DC trip last week:

[Escalator at Rosslyn Metro; springtime; the White House; the Jefferson Memorial]

[Cherry blossoms; Washington Monument and the Reflecting Pool; Lincoln Memorial; Rep. John Lewis on opening night]

[Rep. Rosa DeLauro addresses the opening plenary session; recorded messages from the President and Jeff Sachs; Vicky Beeching and Martin Smith lead worship]

[JK, Don Miller, Carrie, and me; the Capitol #1 and #2; meeting Sen. Boxer's staffers]

[After visiting Rep. Schiff; Speaker Pelosi addresses the gathered few; Chinatown; artwork from Tuesday night]

[JK, Joey, Bev, me and Carrie; the ONE reception; Joel Edwards; the Washington Convention Center ballroom]

"It means getting in trouble"

2009-04-28T04:23:00.000-07:00

I'll update more in full from the Sojourners Mobilization to End Poverty Conference (M2EP) when I have more time (and I'm more rested), but for now, here's this awesome little tidbit.

On Sunday night, Rep. John Lewis (D-GA) gave the message at Shiloh Baptist Church, encouraging us to stand up for what we knew was right, namely the fight against poverty. He said, and I paraphrase, "When God tells you to do something, often it means getting in the way, it means getting in trouble."

Well, John Lewis, a veteran of the US civil rights movement, isn't just one for words. He leads by example and on Monday, after speaking at the first plenary session at M2EP, he picketed the Sudanese embassy in DC in non-violent protest, calling for a reversal of Sudanese President al-Beshir's decision to expel international humanitarian groups from Darfur, and he (along with a number of other protesters, including four other congresspeople) was arrested.

You want an example of talking the talk and walking the walk? Look at this 69 year-old congressman, whose faith inspires him to get in trouble.

Happy Earth Day!

2009-04-22T09:55:00.000-07:00

It’s Earth Day!

A couple things of interest:

First, a Wired article by J.J. Abrams (of Felicity, Alias, Lost, Cloverfield and the new Star Trek movie) on the magic of mystery.

And second, check out this short film, Chicken a la Carte. It was a top prize-winner at the Berlin International Film Festival 2006.

View this movie at cultureunplugged.com

Jon Stewart on Torture

2009-04-21T16:16:00.001-07:00

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart

M - Th 11p / 10c

We Don't Torture

thedailyshow.com

Daily Show
Full Episodes

Economic Crisis

Political Humor

Culture, Technology & Theology

2009-04-21T11:31:00.001-07:00

One of the classes I'm in is Theology & Culture with Barry Taylor. I love it. We're looking at the way in which God can be found in various aspects of culture. This week, we looked at media, and we noted how technological advances have revolutionized not just media and media communication, but how technology has also lent itself to a developing theology. Barry made the point that technological advances have laid the groundwork for imagination to play a more central part in shaping our realities; not that imagination (or vision, as someone else phrased it) was not previously involved in the process of seeing and working towards a better or alternate reality, but that it's place is becoming more central and its potential is becoming more wide-ranging. At least, that's how I understood his point.

A year ago, I wrote a paper on spirituality and technology in the 21st century. My basic point was that technology is a boon to us--it allows us to do so much more than we were ever able to--in this specific case, in terms of communication, with email, with social networking, with sites like YouTube and Twitter; but that we need to be aware of how it impacts us and how it influences us. This is a particular challenge since technology is such a part of our lies that it is often difficult to see what influence it has upon us. But we need to be active and proactive in engaging with culture, in seeing how God is working in the culture we inhabit, in the technological advances that we see and the benefits that they bring, as well as being aware of the pitfalls and risks. Media and technology and their benefits for culture and spirituality can only be properly enjoyed and appreciated if its challenges to culture and spirituality are also properly understood and engaged--the best way to engage is with an eye on the whole picture.

I love technology. As a musician, I love the convenience of being able to carry my entire music collection around on my laptop. I have over four thousand songs in my library, and assuming (generously) that a CD can hold fourteen or fifteen songs, that would equal almost three hundred CDs. As someone who lives on a different continent to most of my family and many of my closest friends, I appreciate th ease with which technological advances have allowed me to chat with friends over IM or talk to people long-distance for cheap (or free). As an activist, I love that the internet can be utilized to bring people together for a common goal, to share with and to encourage one another.

But I'm also distinctly aware of the challenges that technology poses: the temptation to avoid silence and contemplation having so much with which to distract myself, the tendency to waste time browsing inane websites (and there are A LOT), the abuse of the internet to spread falsehoods and malice, the multiplicity of creative TV shows that can take up much of one's time (to the point where one doesn't even take time to be creative oneself!).

As a church, as Christians, we need to be engaging with culture; we need to be seeking God in culture and seeing where he's working. I think if we really open our eyes and look for him, we'll be surprised where he shows up.

Speaking of media, there's a new NBC drama that I love. It's called "Kings," and it's based on the biblical story of David, translated to a fictional modern kingdom. Apart from the fact that Chris Egan, who plays David, seems to always have a look on his face as if you've just wounded him (I suppose that's the natural look for a young, righteous hero), it's been interesting to see how the writer Michael Green has brought this story to life for modern times. Here's a teaser video for the premiere episode.

And here's Ian McShane, who plays King Silas, talking about the show:

Also, Jars of Clay released their latest album, "The Long Fall Back to Earth," this week; check it out.

Talking with our enemies? Oh dear.

2009-04-20T09:34:00.001-07:00

In recent weeks, the criticism of President Obama has shifted to his foreign policy, and specifically his stance on talking with our enemies (namely, that we should do it). This weekend, former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich and John Ensign (R-NV) decried Obama's warm handshake with President Hugo Chavez of Venezuela as "irresponsible" and naive.

Venezuelan TV posted some video of Obama and Chavez conversing. As Jake Tapper of ABC notes, the body language isn't quite as warm as it's been cast.

Chavez Obama
by noticias24

Anyway, I suppose it's possible that people might see Obama being open to people like Chavez. the Castros of Cuba, and Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad as going soft on America's 'enemies'. As Gingrich put it, "It does matter to the world if the United States tolerates a vicious anti-American propaganda campaign, and then smiles and greets the person who has systematically been anti-American his entire career."

I'd raise a couple of points in response to this:

What happens when America is acting anti-American, contrary to the ideals that we seek to propagate? What happens when we aren't in favor of freedom, liberty and justice for all, if not in word then in deed, policy and action? What happens when we let tragedies like Hurricane Katrina and New Orleans happen, tragedies that belie a lack of care and even racism, whether conscious or unconscious? What happens when we deny human rights to prisoners, when we torture? Don't these things undercut the foundation we claim to stand upon? Doesn't that make these things un-American or anti-American? [While this isn't what Chavez and Ahmadinejad criticized about the US, I think the point remains.]
Building on the previous point, as Christians, we have even less stake in a "my country, love it or leave it" approach. Jesus tells us love both our neighbors and our enemies. How exactly this translates into a political sphere is tricky and requires nuance, but the point remains, I think. God's heart, as revealed in Scripture, is and always has been for the nations, and not just for a chosen people; our loyalties lie with the kingdom of God, and an ethic of love, life, mercy, grace and justice, before any earthly kingdom. So we extol these qualities wherever we find them, in whatever nation we find them; and we decry their abuse wherever we find that.
Not talking with a country because they don't like us strikes me as rather counter-intuitive. I don't think I've ever really changed my opinion of anyone because they stopped talking to me; isolation only reinforces already-held positions. What disagreements or misunderstandings or differences have been worked out by not talking to each other? I understand that at an international and political level, it's a little more complicated than this, and there are arguments about security, caution, etc. And I'm not saying that we go in blind or ignorant to the dangers--I'm certain President Obama isn't either--but you don't defuse hostile situations by being hostile. Unless you wipe out the other side. Which is (1) a strategy for an antiquated age; (2) even less Christian.

That's my two cents on the topic. Or my tuppence. Depending on which side of the Atlantic you live.

Checking off this weekend

2009-04-19T22:29:00.001-07:00

Play softball: check.

My first proper exercise in five weeks! And I went 6-8 in our pickup games and got a little sunburned to boot. Oh, how I've missed the glorious ache of well-used muscles.

Get homework done: check.

Wrote a journal entry and a book review, and read about 250 pages on Bonhoeffer, including the first half of Letters & Papers from Prison. Expect some quotes, poems, and more things Bonhoeffer on the Nog soon.

Get ASC work done: check.

Attended to various emails, forms, admin stuff. Tiring. But it needed to be done.

Go to church: check.

This morning, Don Miller--author of Blue Like Jazz, To Own a Dragon, and a few other books that adorn my bookshelf, as well as a good friend of Ecclesia--gave the sermon from John 20:19-31; Liz has a good writeup. I like Don and agree (generally) with much of what he has to say (as found in his books), but like Liz, I was a little surprised at the tack he took regarding doubt this morning. I'm not sure whether or not he meant to be as down on doubt as he actually was, or whether it was an unintended corollary of being so assertive about the necessity of having faith in Christ (with which I agree). You can check out the podcast by searching Ecclesia Hollywood on iTunes; or just go here: it's up now.

Watch Arsenal beat Chelsea in the FA Cup Semi-Final and the Mariners sweep the Tigers: ...

I suppose I had been riding high a little bit, sports-wise. Can't have that lasting too long now, can we? *sigh*

Finally, go support the movement to free Iranian-American journalist Roxana Saberi. You can do this on twitter (@freeroxana) and Facebook. And for more information on the story, check out this BBC news article.

Mariners lose

2009-04-16T22:21:00.001-07:00

Yeah, I'm not gonna blog about them for a little while ...

Tax Day

2009-04-16T09:18:00.000-07:00

I love Jon Stewart.

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart

M - Th 11p / 10c

Tempest in a Tea Party

thedailyshow.com

Daily Show
Full Episodes

Economic Crisis

Political Humor

“Taxed Enough Already.” Protesting high taxes and government’s wasteful spending.

Okay, part two first: as Jon Stewart notes, protesting wasteful spending by buying lots and lots and lots of tea bags—and I may be going out on a limb here, but I doubt they’re going to use those afterwards—doesn’t spell anything as much as it does irony.

Second, protesting high taxes against a President who offers a tax decrease for 95% of the population is like biting the hand that just fed you some good food.

Anyway, in other news … the Seattle Mariners stand at 7-2 and are off to their best start since 2001. I’ve been loathe to mention this in case I jinx their run of six straight wins—my superstition is linked only to sports; and if they lose tonight, don’t expect me to blog about them again for awhile. But it’s SO good to have Ichiro and Griffey back.

[Photo by Otto Greule Jr/Getty Images]

And Arsenal beat Villareal comfortably last night to sweep to sweep into the Champions League semi-final, where they’ll face Man U on April 29th (at Old Trafford) and May 5th (at the Emirates). It ought to be a cracking encounter! Meanwhile, enjoy highlights of last night.

Arsenal Vs. Villarreal at FootyTube.com

Have you heard?

2009-04-12T00:05:00.000-07:00

“Why are you looking for the Living One in a cemetery?” they said. “He is not here, but raised up.”

Every person dies.

Only one has been raised from the dead.

What a weekend.

[From The Passion of the Christ. Graphic content. All images belong to MGM and Icon.]

A little splash of music

2009-04-11T21:31:00.000-07:00

With Lifesize

From the Bull & Gate, March 2006:
"Undone"

"Her"

Solo

From Coffee by the Books, December 2006:
"Whispers and Wind"

From Coffee by the Books, February 2007:
"For a Rainy Day (Laura's Song)"

From Coffee by the Books, November 2008:
"Winter is Over"

"All I Want is You" (U2 cover)

The Morning After

2009-04-11T13:24:00.000-07:00

[Frank Bramley. A Hopeless Dawn. 1888. Oil on canvas.]

Daybreak brings cold, harsh sunlight. It’s the day after …

And he’s dead. The rabbi, the teacher, the prophet, the messiah. Dead as dead can be.

It wasn’t supposed to be like this. This wasn’t the glorious end we’d all imagined for the Chosen One. A walk of shame up to a hill of death instead of a procession of victory through the streets of the city. A cross instead of a throne. Jeering instead of cheering. Baying for blood instead of celebrating the grace and goodness of God.

It wasn’t supposed to be like this. My hope, my heart, feel like they’ve been ripped from my chest, torn into a million pieces and stomped into the gravel. Repeatedly.

The air seems somehow less oxygenated, and every breath is a gasp for life, for hope, for light, for anything to keep me going.

But there is nothing. Jesus is dead, and there is no hope.

Do you work wonders for the dead? Do the shades rise up to praise you? Is your steadfast love declared in the grave, or your faithfulness in hell? Are your wonders known in the darkness, or your saving help in the land of forgetfulness? (Ps. 88:10-12).

Good Friday

2009-04-10T09:39:00.000-07:00

How could anything so tragic be good?

[From Mel Gibson's The Passion of the Christ, 2004.]

And the account from Matthew's Gospel (27:27-54):

Matt. 27:27 Then the soldiers of the governor took Jesus into the governor’s headquarters, and they gathered the whole cohort around him. 28 They stripped him and put a scarlet robe on him, 29 and after twisting some thorns into a crown, they put it on his head. They put a reed in his right hand and knelt before him and mocked him, saying, “Hail, King of the Jews!” 30 They spat on him, and took the reed and struck him on the head. 31 After mocking him, they stripped him of the robe and put his own clothes on him. Then they led him away to crucify him.

Matt. 27:32 As they went out, they came upon a man from Cyrene named Simon; they compelled this man to carry his cross. 33 And when they came to a place called Golgotha (which means Place of a Skull), 34 they offered him wine to drink, mixed with gall; but when he tasted it, he would not drink it. 35 And when they had crucified him, they divided his clothes among themselves by casting lots; 36 then they sat down there and kept watch over him. 37 Over his head they put the charge against him, which read, “This is Jesus, the King of the Jews.”

Matt. 27:38 Then two bandits were crucified with him, one on his right and one on his left. 39 Those who passed by derided him, shaking their heads 40 and saying, “You who would destroy the temple and build it in three days, save yourself! If you are the Son of God, come down from the cross.” 41 In the same way the chief priests also, along with the scribes and elders, were mocking him, saying, 42 “He saved others; he cannot save himself. He is the King of Israel; let him come down from the cross now, and we will believe in him. 43 He trusts in God; let God deliver him now, if he wants to; for he said, ‘I am God’s Son.’” 44 The bandits who were crucified with him also taunted him in the same way.

Matt. 27:45 From noon on, darkness came over the whole land until three in the afternoon. 46 And about three o’clock Jesus cried with a loud voice, “Eli, Eli, lema sabachthani?” that is, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” 47 When some of the bystanders heard it, they said, “This man is calling for Elijah.” 48 At once one of them ran and got a sponge, filled it with sour wine, put it on a stick, and gave it to him to drink. 49 But the others said, “Wait, let us see whether Elijah will come to save him.” 50 Then Jesus cried again with a loud voice and breathed his last. 51 At that moment the curtain of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom. The earth shook, and the rocks were split. 52 The tombs also were opened, and many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised. 53 After his resurrection they came out of the tombs and entered the holy city and appeared to many. 54 Now when the centurion and those with him, who were keeping watch over Jesus, saw the earthquake and what took place, they were terrified and said, “Truly this man was God’s Son!”

Maundy Thursday post-op

2009-04-09T11:22:00.000-07:00

Today I had my three week post-op appointment with my surgeon; the next time I see him will be in a month. Everything’s pretty much going according to schedule (or perhaps even ahead); I’m on soft foods for another month, since my jaw is held together by three screws on each side (not one as previously reported) … and little screws at that. In the last week of ‘eating’, I’ve put back on 2lb of the 7lb that I lost the previous two weeks.

As you can see above from the pre-op and post-op cephalometric x-rays, there’s a slight but noticeable difference. (And of course, you can see the little screws.)

In non-surgery news, life is as busy as I expected it to be, and I haven’t yet settled into a routine in terms of when I’m gonna get everything done. But hopefully this Easter weekend, as well as commemorating the momentous events of two thousand years ago, I’ll be able to collect my thoughts in preparation for the remaining eight weeks of the quarter, which’ll undoubtedly be full pelt (apart from the week I’m in DC/MA).

Finally, as I mentioned in the title, today is Maundy Thursday, or the day we remember the Last Supper. Here’s the account from Luke’s Gospel (22:14-27):

Luke 22:14 When the hour came, he took his place at the table, and the apostles with him. 15 He said to them, “I have eagerly desired to eat this Passover with you before I suffer; 16 for I tell you, I will not eat it until it is fulfilled in the kingdom of God.” 17 Then he took a cup, and after giving thanks he said, “Take this and divide it among yourselves; 18 for I tell you that from now on I will not drink of the fruit of the vine until the kingdom of God comes.” 19 Then he took a loaf of bread, and when he had given thanks, he broke it and gave it to them, saying, “This is my body, which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me.” 20 And he did the same with the cup after supper, saying, “This cup that is poured out for you is the new covenant in my blood. 21 But see, the one who betrays me is with me, and his hand is on the table. 22 For the Son of Man is going as it has been determined, but woe to that one by whom he is betrayed!” 23 Then they began to ask one another, which one of them it could be who would do this.

Luke 22:24 A dispute also arose among them as to which one of them was to be regarded as the greatest. 25 But he said to them, “The kings of the Gentiles lord it over them; and those in authority over them are called benefactors. 26 But not so with you; rather the greatest among you must become like the youngest, and the leader like one who serves. 27 For who is greater, the one who is at the table or the one who serves? Is it not the one at the table? But I am among you as one who serves.

[Nicolas Poussin. The Last Supper. 1640s. Oil on canvas. The Trustees of Rutland Trust, Belvoir Castle, Grantham, UK.]

Happy Maundy Thursday!

More on the Wilkins ice-shelf

2009-04-07T22:53:00.000-07:00

From the BBC:

Palm Sunday

2009-04-06T23:24:00.000-07:00

[Alexandre Bida, Triumphal Entry into Jerusalem, engraving, from Christ in Art by Edward Eggleston (1874).]

Yesterday was Palm Sunday, marking the start of Holy Week and commemorating the triumphal entry of Jesus into Jerusalem. Here’s the account from the Message paraphrase of Matthew’s Gospel, chapter 21:

When they neared Jerusalem, having arrived at Bethphage on Mount Olives, Jesus sent two disciples with these instructions: "Go over to the village across from you. You'll find a donkey tethered there, her colt with her. Untie her and bring them to me. If anyone asks what you're doing, say, 'The Master needs them!' He will send them with you."

This is the full story of what was sketched earlier by the prophet:

Tell Zion's daughter, "Look, your king's on his way, poised and ready, mounted on a donkey, on a colt, foal of a pack animal."

The disciples went and did exactly what Jesus told them to do. They led the donkey and colt out, laid some of their clothes on them, and Jesus mounted. Nearly all the people in the crowd threw their garments down on the road, giving him a royal welcome. Others cut branches from the trees and threw them down as a welcome mat. Crowds went ahead and crowds followed, all of them calling out, "Hosanna to David's son!" "Blessed is he who comes in God's name!" "Hosanna in highest heaven!"

As he made his entrance into Jerusalem, the whole city was shaken. Unnerved, people were asking, "What's going on here? Who is this?"

The parade crowd answered, "This is the prophet Jesus, the one from Nazareth in Galilee."

***

In other news, umm, a significant sliver of the Arctic ice-shelf has fractured. I don’t think this is good news. Even if, for some reason, you don’t believe in global warming, rising sea levels are not a particularly good thing.

Say, "Ahh ..."

2009-04-02T14:30:00.000-07:00

Today, two weeks after I had my jaw broken, I had my first post-op visit with the surgeon, and finally had the rubber bands—that have been my bane over the last fortnight—removed. I can open my mouth again, I can eat (soft foods), I can brush my teeth properly; it’s the little things that I’m able to appreciate again. ☺ I lost 7 pounds over the last couple weeks and I’m looking forward to putting it back on!

It’ll take a little while since I’ll be on the soft food diet for a good 6-8 weeks, during which time my jaw (which was fractured on both sides, aligned by the surgeon going inside my mouth, and then reconnected by a screw on each side, and the punctures sewn shut on the outside) will continue to heal, and my jaw muscles (which have been inactive over the last couple weeks) will get used to working again. Right now, I can open my mouth, but nowhere near normal capacity. That’ll take awhile …

… which also means that my singing abilities are limited for a little while. But I’m hoping to be back and ready to go by the end of May, when I’ll hopefully play one more time at Fuller before I graduate.

In other news:

I’m loving my classes so far, and I’ve been to three out of my four: I’m particularly looking forward to reading a bunch for my Theology & Politics in Modern Society seminar (even though it’s all guys—first all-male class in my time at Fuller). And I’m also enjoying starting out with the All-Seminary Council (so far!). ☺ It’s gonna be busy. But it’s gonna be good. I can feel it.

It looks like the G20 summit was actually fairly successful, at least in the sense that something was agreed upon. And what’s more promising is that it includes substantial provisions for combating poverty. Hopefully, something concrete will come out of these proposals.

Thinking about the economic crisis: the markets have been improving somewhat in the last few days, and some economists think that we’re past the worst of the recession, which would be great, right? Now this is just amateur economic theorizing, but if the economy is going well, isn’t there less incentive to change things such as health care and the auto industry and financing regulations and market practices? Of course, if the economy is going badly, this is not good coz people are suffering, losing jobs, losing houses, etc. But I wonder if the momentum for change comes most when people are unhappy with the current situation?

If and when we get through this economic downturn, will we still recognize the need for health care reform, for cutting back on greenhouse gases, for making our cars and transportation greener, for investing in clean, green energy sources, for making sure that free market capitalism isn’t allowed to run amok and the few aren’t allowed to prosper at the expense of the rest? I hope so.

In South Africa, Archbishop Desmond Tutu is accused of “sacrilege” for criticizing the African National Congress, whose leader Jacob Zuma has been embroiled in corruption and an arms scandal. I’m with Bishop T on this one: if he’s innocent, well and good; if not … should he really be running the country?

And back in the US, the House approved legislation that will, for the first time, give the government the powers to regulate tobacco products (in the same way that they regulate food items).

Finally … Opening Day is Monday!! Baseball season is back!

Today's news

2009-04-01T16:55:00.001-07:00

I have tickets to go see U2 when they come to the Rose Bowl here in Pasadena in October 25. Obviously, I’m still not even sure if I’m going to be in Pasadena, but still … I’m so excited!

The G20 summit is going on; let’s hope they can figure something out.

At 9:30am on Tuesday April 7, Antonio Villaraigosa, Mayor of Los Angeles, will hold a press conference on the steps of City Hall to declare by proclamation that Los Angeles is a “ONE City” fully committed to the work ONE members are carrying out every day to end global poverty and preventable disease. Go here to sign up if you want to attend.

Reading, Van Jones and Green For All

2009-03-29T15:18:00.000-07:00

Spring break is almost over—class starts tomorrow, in fact, on what will most likely be the busiest quarter of my three years at Fuller (following closely on the heels of last quarter, which was the busiest quarter of my three years at Fuller). I’ll be taking four classes (Theology & Culture; Theology, Politics & Modern Society; Culture & Transformation; and Teamwork & Leadership) and working part time as the All-Seminary Council (ASC) Vice-President. I’m excited about this coming quarter, but boy, is it gonna be busy!

Anyway, this past week has been a great one. Notwithstanding the whole not-eating thing (four days to go!), I’ve been able to chill out here and recover from the craziness of the last quarter, watching movies, sleeping, hanging out with friends, napping, and probably most importantly, reading.

Reading is sort of an occupational hazard when you’re a grad student, and one can become jaded towards the whole endeavor of reading when you have to read books for school anyway (and on a timetable to boot). I usually try to be reading at least one non-school book so as to keep me sane, but often this gets squeezed out by the sheer volume of pages I have to digest per week.

So it’s been with great pleasure that I’ve dived back into reading these last few days. Currently, I’m reading Tom Wright’s The Challenge of Jesus, Muhammad Yunus’ Creating a World without Poverty: Social Business and the Nature of Capitalism, and Dostoevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov.

And I just finished The Green Collar Economy: How One Solution Can Fix Our Two Biggest Problems, by Van Jones, who’s Barack Obama’s new Green Czar, also known as the Special Advisor for Green Jobs, Enterprise and Innovation at the White House Council for Environmental Quality (CEQ). I highly recommend it—the last time I was so struck by a writer’s honesty and inspired by a writer’s vision was when I read Barack Obama’s The Audacity of Hope, and we all know what happened after that. ☺ Anyway, highlights from the book:

our entire economy was designed to function in a world where fossil fuels are forever abundant and forever cheap. Today, as those fuels—and especially oil—become increasingly scarce, prices are rising to reflect that reality. (2)

The United States is the world’s biggest polluter. To avoid eco-apocalypse [both environmental and economic collapse], Congress will have to do more than pass a cap-and-trade bill. And Americans will have to do more than stick in better lightbulbs. To pull off this ecological U-turn, we will have to fundamentally restructure the U.S. economy. We will need to “green” whole cities. We will have to build thousands of wind farms, install tens of millions of solar panels, and retrofit millions of buildings. We will have to retire our car, truck, and bus fleets, which are based on combustion engines and oil, and replace them with plug-in hybrids and electric vehicles powered by a clean-energy grid. (58)

“History teaches us that it is impossible to guide a complex series of deep changes in culture, economics, and law without first grounding efforts in a set of unchanging ideals,” (65) and Jones puts forward the three principles of
equal protection for all: “there are some dangers that are too big for any individual to overcome, especially the most vulnerable among us. So in an age of floods, we must reject any philosophy that would tempt us to tell people in wheelchairs to ‘sink or swim.’ We must embrace, instead, the principle that says: ‘We are all in this together—come what may’” (70).
equal opportunity for all: “We are one human family. So on a good day, we should not leave anyone out. And on a bad day, we should not leave anyone behind. We should not accept a world where people of color and low-income people are always first in line for everything bad and then are left to benefit last and least when it comes to anything good” (73).
reverence for all creation: “we don’t have any throwaway species or resources. We don’t have any throwaway children, throwaway neighborhoods, or throwaway nations either. Therefore, the green economy must do more than reclaim thrown-away stuff. It must also reclaim thrown-away lives and thrown-away places. And it must reclaim the thrown-away values that insist we are all members of one human family, with sacred obligations to each other” (74).
He advocates what he calls Noah principles (as in Noah from the Bible; but go read the book for more) in creating the kind of politics through which we can get things done:
Fewer “issues,” more solutions; that is, focusing on the things that we are working towards rather than focusing on the things we are against.
Fewer “demands,” more goals: “Goals can be shared—even by people who disagree on many points. Demands can never be shared. One party makes them; the other party must either deny them or capitulate” (107).
Fewer “targets,” more partners: “In this age, our main job is to seek out friends wherever we can, not just to defeat enemies” (109).
Less “accusation,” more confession: “We would be better off confessing our own weaknesses, our fears, our needs. Doing so will let others see the gaps more quickly, find their rightful places around the growing circle—and come to the campfire with fewer pretenses themselves” (111).
Less “cheap patriotism,” more deep patriotism: “Some of us still believe in ‘a more perfect union’—and in making it more perfect every day. Some of us still believe in ‘America the beautiful’—and in defending its beauty from the clear-cutters and despoilers. Some of us still believe in ‘one nation, indivisible’—and in opposing those who profit by keeping us needlessly divided. Some of us still believe in ‘liberty and justice for all,’ and we won’t stop until that classroom pledge is honored from shore to shore” (113).

Van makes the point, well-known by many now, that though the United States makes up only about 4% of the world’s population, we emit 25% of greenhouse gases (not good), and are home to 25% of the world’s incarcerated population (also not good). It is clear that something must be done, and something can be done. Once again, this is not situation where we sit helpless and hopeless as the economy collapses and the environment deteriorates—things can be done to change things, but once again, a grassroots movement made of individual citizens, businesses, organizations, non-profits, and governments will be the driving force for change. It will require change on all levels, from recycling, reusing, and being more environmentally friendly to contributing to green job training, retrofitting and weatherizing buildings, and setting up a clean energy grid that will lay the groundwork for the next generation.

Such a green economy will be as expansive and enveloping (in a good way) as the current economy (in a bad way), comprising all five of the major subsystems of sustainability: energy, food, waste, water, and transportation. And already, the grassroots movement is beginning: people, organizations, businesses, and governments are all getting involved. Moreover, we have a ‘Green President,’ as Jones describes him, in the White House: in Barack Obama’s budget for the current year, there is a clear recognition that the way forward is to invest in the present and the future of renewable clean energies and climate-friendly jobs; see here for the White House fact sheet.

And go check out Green For All, the organization founded by Jones.

Yes, we can. Again.

P.S. Check out this video (that Neville made a while ago) for the Fuller bloggers, of which I am one. (Relax, I write more on here than I do on there).

Justin Fung from Fuller Theological Seminary on Vimeo.

Human Trafficking

2009-03-25T18:43:00.000-07:00

I’ve been meaning to write about this for a while, but with the busyness of the last quarter and the downtime afforded me by this spring break, I’m only getting around to it now. I’m only offering a snapshot, providing some links, hoping you’ll go look up some stuff for yourself and get involved in the fight against the modern day slave trade.

I came across this staggering truth only in recent years, thanks to Kevin Bales’ Disposable People: New Slavery in the Global Economy and David Batstone’s Not for Sale. As Bales writes, slavery is still alive and well, two centuries after the Slave Trade Act was passed in Great Britain and nearly 150 years after the passing of the Thirteenth Amendment in the United States. “Around the world we still face the terrible frozen face of ignorance. The awareness that there are twenty-seven million slaves in the world has not yet fully penetrated the public mind, but the sparks and fires of committed people are beginning to melt that icy apathy” (xii).

Twenty-seven million people are trafficked. Twenty-seven million.

Think about it. It's a justice issue. It's a moral issue. It shouldn't be happening.

Organizations and websites you can check out (nicked from one of the appendices of Gary Haugen’s Just Courage:

Amnesty International
Anti-Slavery International (UK)
Freedom House
HumanTrafficking.org
Human Rights First
Human Rights Watch
International Labour Organization
UNICEF
United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM)
US Department of Justice
US Department of Health & Human Services: Campaign to Rescue & Restore Victims of Human Trafficking
US Department of State: Office to Monitor and Combat Trafficking in Persons
World Health Organization

See also:

The Sold Project
Oasis’s Stop the Traffik
Free the Slaves
Call+Response

Day Five

2009-03-25T13:40:00.000-07:00

Day #5 since my surgery sees me still on a liquid diet (and continuing so until my next appointment with the surgeon next Thursday). I’ve been surviving thanks to a rather unintentional Lenten fast of blended … well, everything: congee, smoothies, shakes, soups. Matt and Sara’s Magic Bullet has come in very, very handy—handy enough for me to get my own! (However, though I’m still alive, I’m getting very sick of drinking all my meals. Having said that, I’m glad that the meals I’m blending/drinking have been made by loving hands.)

The recovery’s proceeding with very few complications, which is great. The initial swelling has almost all gone (I no longer look like a fat-faced chipmunk), leaving just the bruising from the actual break (I now just look like a normal chipmunk), and the bruising around my neck and upper chest area from the breathing tube they stuck down my throat during the surgery.

‘Only’ eight more days …

Spring Break

2009-03-23T13:29:00.000-07:00

Three days ago, I had my jaw broken to correct my underbite.

I’m already sick of drinking my meals. What a glorious way to spend spring break …

****

In the meantime, from the Department of Overdue Links:

Video footage of Hong Kong from the 1930s (hat-tip to Gerry):

And check out:

Kiva, a micro-financing non-profit that allows people to lend money to small businesses in developing countries.
The Sold Project, a non-profit grassroots organization seeking to help people stop child prostitution.

My plan is to blog some more this week … after all, I’m not really doing much else!

U2’s No Line on the Horizon, first impression

2009-02-22T14:19:00.000-08:00

I love it. ☺

Standout tracks for me: “Magnificent” (track 2), “Moment of Surrender” (track 3), “I’ll Go Crazy If I Don’t Go Crazy Tonight” (track 5), “Get On Your Boots” (track 6), “White as Snow” (track 9, sounding eerily like “O Come, O Come Emmanuel”), and “Cedars of Lebanon” (track 11).

Yes, I know I named more than half of the album … what’s your point?

Social Justice & Human Rights (4)

2009-02-20T07:59:00.000-08:00

The following is the fourth and final part of a paper I wrote last summer (2008) for Advocating for Social Justice, adapted for this blog. The paper looks at the biblical mandate for justice and at the particular way this may be worked out with regard to human rights.

Words of Caution

Advocacy for human rights is one way of doing justice in the world, of defending the image of God that abides in every human being. But just like every part of the work that God calls us to on earth, it will not be accomplished without opposition. “In truth,” writes Gary Haugen, “we live in an exceedingly dangerous world in rebellion against its Maker, a world filled with prideful, frightened, willful, violent people who have incrementally chosen to cut themselves off from the Creator’s goodness, love, mercy and justice” (112). There is much injustice in the world, there is much that needs to be done to participate in God’s redeeming story, and there will be many dangers and obstacles that will seek to dissuade us from pursuing God’s agenda. One such danger is to be overwhelmed by the immensity of the task: Gary Haugen names this as the church’s malady over the last century, observing that “somewhere during the twentieth century some of us have simply stopped believing that God actually can use us to answer the prayers of children, women and families who suffer under the hand of abusive power or authority in their communities. We sit in the same paralysis of despair as those who don’t even claim to know a Savior—and in some cases, we manifest even less hope” (14).

Another danger in engaging these issues is to take the messianic mantle which belongs to no person other than Jesus Christ. We are graced with the honor and entrusted with the responsibility of participating in God’s mission, recognizing that though we bear the image of God, we are also afflicted by fallibility: “the tension between what Christians are called to do and what they actually do remains a problem. Therefore, Christians should never claim that their achievements or their aims in politics or in any other arena of life represent God’s will. They should only claim that they are trying to respond obediently to God’s call to love their neighbors and to do justice” (Skillen: 3). All we can do is be faithful.

The third and final danger I will mention is to think that the structures and systems that dominate the world stage need not be addressed. While Christians have traditionally been good at rescuing individuals or helping communities, we have often failed to consider and address the various social, cultural, economic and political frameworks which influence us. Missiologist and theologian David Bosch wrote:

It was a stupendous victory of the evil one to have made us believe that structures and conditions in this world will not or need not really change, to have considered political and societal powers and other vested interests inviolable, to have acquiesced in conditions of injustice and oppression, to have tempered our expectation to the point of compromise, to have given up the hope for a wholesale transformation of the status quo, to have been blind to our own responsibility for and involvement in a world en route to its fulfillment. (quoted in Haugen: 63)

It is a daunting task to change the political, economic and social systems which ensnare people in cycles of poverty, which entrap people in forced prostitution, which allow the abuse of children, which turn a blind eye or give an approving wink to anything that devalues the image of God in any person. But we are called to nothing less.

Words of Encouragement

But we should not let the dangers—though there be many—discourage us. One of the core messages of Gary Haugen’s book Good News About Injustice is that “we can change things. Our despair, cynicism and laziness may insist to us that nothing ever really changes and that we can never really make a difference. But on high we see a great cloud of witnesses stand to their feet with a different testimony” (60). We have the witness of people like Martin Luther King, Jr., of Rosa Parks, of William Wilberforce, of Oscar Romero, of Mother Teresa, to name but a few reminders to us that where God is the propelling and compelling force, change will happen. Moreover, we can take heart in the fact that “God does not call us to a ministry that he will not empower” (Haugen: 104).

Conclusion

Love God; love your neighbor; love your enemy; do justice; love mercy. I have sought to show that advocacy of human rights is a natural extension and implication of these biblical commandments, whether we choose to argue from the creation story—highlighting humanity’s creation in the image of God—or from Jesus’ instruction to love as he loved—a love which defended this very image. I have not promoted an individualistic understanding of human rights, but a perspective of human rights that focuses on “the least of these” (Matt. 25)—a perspective that mirrors Jesus’ own. “Those who read in the biblical text a sheerly personal, individualistic morality have not understood the Torah, have not sung the Psalms, have not been burned by the prophets, have not perceived the implications and the very burden of Jesus’ message, and must inevitably fast and loose with St. Paul” (Burghardt: 12). If we are to read and live Scripture faithfully, we must also work out the gospel’s implications for our lives (and for the lives of others). As I mentioned previously, truly living faithfully to the gospel will have implications for every part of life, and I have understandably not been able to explore all of these. For example, the narrow definition of human rights as found in the UDHR is not focused on non-human creation but environmental and creational issues have an enormous impact on human rights—for instance, it is the poorest who suffer most as a result of the global warming to which the richest contribute most. But I hope in brushing the surface I have begun a conversation about justice and about a broader understanding of human rights that may stimulate more conversations. And more action.

***

References Cited & Further Reading

Bales, Kevin. 2004 (revised ed.). Disposable People: New Slavery in the Global Economy. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
Brueggemann, Walter. 1982. Genesis. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press.
Burghardt, Walter J. 2004. Justice: A Global Adventure. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books.
Claiborne, Shane. 2006. The Irresistible Revolution. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan.
Gempf, Conrad. 2003. Jesus Asked: What He Wanted to Know. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan.
Goldingay, John. 2003. Old Testament Theology, Vol. 1: Israel’s Gospel. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press.
Haugen, Gary M. 1999. Good News About Injustice: A Witness of Courage in a Hurting World. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press.
Hertzke, Allen D. 2004. Freeing God’s Children: The Unlikely Alliance for Global Human Rights. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc.
Hollenbach, David, S.J. 2003. The Global Face of Public Faith: Politics, Human Rights, and Christian Ethics. Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press.
Lewis, C.S. 1978. Mere Christianity. Glasgow, Scotland: William Collins Sons and Co Ltd.
Mahoney, Jack. 2007. The Challenge of Human Rights: Origin, Development, and Significance. Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing.
Newbigin, Lesslie. 1989. The Gospel in a Pluralist Society. Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing.
Romero, Oscar. 1988. The Violence of Love. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books.
Skillen, James W. 2004. In Pursuit of Justice: Christian-Democratic Explorations. Lanham, MD: Rowan & Littlefield Publishers, Inc.
Stassen, Glen H. 1992. Just Peacemaking: Transforming Initiatives for Justice and Peace. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press.
———. 2008. “Human Rights.” Not yet published; obtained and used by permission of the author.
Stassen, Glen H., & David P. Gushee. 2003. Kingdom Ethics: Following Jesus in Contemporary Context. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press.
Storkey, Alan. 2005. Jesus and Politics: Confronting the Powers. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic.
Traer, Robert. 1991. Faith in Human Rights: Support in Religious Traditions for a Global Struggle. Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press.
van der Ven, Johannes A., Jaco S. Dreyer, Hendrik J.C. Pieterse. 2004. Is there a God of Human Rights? The Complex Relationship between Human Rights and Religion: A South African Case. Leiden; Boston: Brill.

Social Justice & Human Rights (3)

2009-02-19T07:58:00.000-08:00

The following is the third part of a paper I wrote last summer (2008) for Advocating for Social Justice, adapted for this blog. The paper looks at the biblical mandate for justice and at the particular way this may be worked out with regard to human rights.

Advocacy for Human Rights: What It Means and What It Might Look Like

Teresa of Avila, the sixteenth century Spanish mystic, wrote the poem “Christ Has No Body,” which tells us that we are the body of Christ, through which his compassion comes to the world: “Yours are the feet with which he walks to do good; yours are the hands, with which he blesses all the world.” This is a theme that has been repeated over the centuries, most recently by Shane Claiborne: “We are the body of Christ, the hands and feet of Jesus to the world. Christ is living inside of you and me, walking the earth” (85). The people of God are the conduits through whom the love and justice of God are conveyed to the world. Gary Haugen puts our call to practice justice in this way:

Unless the work of seeking justice is a category of endeavor that is completely different from every other activity on earth that is important to God, the answer to the how question has something to do with what God’s people do or don’t do. If you think about it, two truths apply to everything that God wants accomplished on earth: (1) he could accomplish it on his own through supernatural power; but instead, (2) he chooses for the most part to limit himself to accomplishing that which he can achieve through the obedience of his people. (96-97)

The just character of God is not revealed in Scripture only for our information; we are not only to be hearers (or readers) of the Word, but doers also (James 1:22-25). It is a biblical mandate to do justice, and advocating human rights—defending the image of God in every person—is one way to do this.

Advocacy for human rights, I would suggest, is more than just speaking up for the basic and individual rights set out in the UDHR, though, as I have argued, this is not a bad place to start. Stassen critiques our culture as having a “definition of human rights [that] is too narrow. In the United States, we emphasize the freedoms of speech and press, religious liberty, and freedom from torture or arbitrary imprisonment but de-emphasize economic rights to health care, housing, food, and jobs” (1992: 138). Though the UDHR has begun to broaden its definition of human rights to include such economic rights, as seen with the ratification of the Right to Development in 1986, the Christian call to justice and human rights should be understood as an even higher calling than the UDHR definition of human dignity since “[f]undamentally, biblical justice is making things right, not simply recognizing or defining individual rights” (Burghardt: 25). If our understanding of human worth is grounded in our understanding of people as created in the image of God, then “[i]nsofar as we see men and women together as the image of God, called to serve God with all that they are and have, we must seek diligently to make it possible for every person, in community to develop and bring to light their gifts and abilities” (Skillen: 40). What practical implications might this cultivating of humanity have? Beginning with the basic rights outlined in the UDHR, I will explore briefly a few such repercussions.

The Right to Liberty (Art. 3): human trafficking and slavery
The right to individual liberty is often derided in Western culture because it is seen as allowing a person to do whatever they want to. However, the right to liberty may be put into context when we realize that in the world today, two centuries after the Slave Trade Act in Great Britain and 150 years after the ratification of the Thirteenth Amendment in the United States, an estimated twenty-seven million slaves still inhabit the earth (Bales: 8). They are sold into bonded labor and into prostitution, among other fates, often trapped in a cycle of poverty or abuse, with no way to break out of their own accord. These are some of those who cannot speak for themselves, who are destitute, who are poor and needy; we are told to speak up for them (Prov. 31:8-9).

Kevin Bales describes slavery as “unquestionably the ultimate human rights violation short of murder” (32). It is, he continues, “exploitation, violence, and injustice all rolled together in their most potent combination. If there is one fundamental violation of our humanity we cannot allow, it is slavery. If there is one basic truth that virtually every human being can agree on, it is that slavery must end” (262). Around the world, organizations such as Anti-Slavery International, Free the Slaves, and International Justice Mission, are working to bring freedom and liberty to the twenty-seven million men, women and children who are trapped in bondage and entangled in the web of economic, social, political and cultural disadvantage. God did not intend those who bore his image to be enslaved by others; we can work to free them.

The Right to Life (Art. 3): abortion, the death penalty, and everything in between
One of the most controversial areas of human rights is the area of abortion; in particular, the conversation has developed to a point where the question of when a fetus acquires human rights has been raised. As Christians, we believe with the psalmist that God knit each one of us together in our mothers’ wombs (Ps. 139:13), and that all life is sacred, even if it is not medically “viable.” But perhaps our methods for advocating for the life of the unborn child may take a more humble approach than picketing family planning centers or condemning those who make such undoubtedly difficult and distressing decisions; Stassen and Gushee suggest seeking “to deliver people from the causes of abortions. See to it that potential mothers will have help raising their children or giving them a family through adoption. Make it possible for people to raise their babies and not to have to drop out of school, not to have to give up on a future. Help them have confidence that they can cope” (227).

At the other end of the life spectrum from birth is death. The death penalty is reserved for those who have committed the most heinous crimes, and it stands as a form of retributive, punitive, and deterrent justice. But Christians believe that every human being is created in the image of God, and that while this image has been tarnished by human sin, it has not been obliterated. For this reason, Pope John Paul II said, “The dignity of human life must never be taken away, even in the case of someone who has done great evil” (quoted in Burghardt: 67). Moreover, Stassen and Gushee observe, “Biblically … while there is a retributive dimension to justice, the focus is given to deliverance of those in bondage and restoration to community. … Jesus consistently emphasized a transforming initiative that could deliver us from the vicious cycle of violence or alienation” (212, 213). Even in the way we view legal justice, we are called to seek life and the methods and practices that affirm it.

Rights for All without Distinction (Art. 2): civil rights, immigrants, children
In the beginning, God created humankind in his image: not only those who were a certain race, color, sex, language or creed, but every human being. So the rights set out in the UDHR and the worth endowed by God belong to all people. This means that prejudice and discrimination of any kind that denigrates the dignity of a human being is not of God. Racism, for example, “violates the integrity of creatures made in the image of God and is wrong everywhere, in every institution and relationship” (Skillen: 87). Xenophobia—and its cousin, mistreatment of immigrants and foreigners—is inexcusable since it maligns the image of God in these people. Jesus treated every human being as created in the image of God, even those who were reviled by his culture. Burghardt describes Jesus’ encounter with the Samaritan woman at the well:

in his eyes she was a person, a woman, human, human as he was. Even more importantly, she had been shaped by God, shaped in the image and likeness of her Creator, gifted with intelligence and freedom, with a mind to know and a heart to love. And, for all her faults and fragility, she was still an image, a reflection of God. Somewhat misshapen, like the rest of us, but still awfully precious in God’s eyes, in Jesus’ eyes. (47)

As well as people of different ethnicities and nationalities, the image of God is found in people of different ages. The youngest and the oldest are often most at risk; they are often the most vulnerable and the ones who suffer the most as a result of human sin. In the halls of power, the children “have no lobby of any consequence, no influence with Congress. Guns have a powerful lobby; so too capital gains; so too tobacco; but not our children” (Burghardt: 35); and the elderly are abandoned in a culture which values self-promotion over care for family. Organizations like the Children’s Defense Fund seek to defend the youngest and most vulnerable, and to ensure that their concerns are not ignored.

***

The few aforementioned examples offer only a glimpse into what it means to actively love our neighbor—that is, to do justice—and to value every person as made in the image of God. There are far more examples that could be provided; the gospel, after all, affects—or at least, ought to affect—every part of life. Christ’s birth, life, death and resurrection—his redemptive work—has implications for every human being and for all of creation; through Christ, “God was pleased to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven” (Col. 1:20).

References Cited

Bales, Kevin. 2004 (revised ed.). Disposable People: New Slavery in the Global Economy. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.
Burghardt, Walter J. 2004. Justice: A Global Adventure. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books.
Claiborne, Shane. 2006. The Irresistible Revolution. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan.
Haugen, Gary M. 1999. Good News About Injustice: A Witness of Courage in a Hurting World. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press.
Skillen, James W. 2004. In Pursuit of Justice: Christian-Democratic Explorations. Lanham, MD: Rowan & Littlefield Publishers, Inc.
Stassen, Glen H. 1992. Just Peacemaking: Transforming Initiatives for Justice and Peace. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press.
Stassen, Glen H., & David P. Gushee. 2003. Kingdom Ethics: Following Jesus in Contemporary Context. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press.

Junior

2009-02-18T22:36:00.000-08:00

Ken Griffey Jr. is a Mariner again.

I am happy.

Social Justice & Human Rights (2)

2009-02-18T07:49:00.000-08:00

The following is the second part of a paper I wrote last summer (2008) for Advocating for Social Justice, adapted for this blog. The paper looks at the biblical mandate for justice and at the particular way this may be worked out with regard to human rights.

A Biblical Understanding of Human Rights

Having established justice as an indispensable element of God’s character, the next task is to build a biblical perspective on human rights. At first glance, this is a thankless task since, as Jack Mahoney notes, “neither the Hebrew Bible nor the Christian New Testament makes any reference to the subject of human rights” (4). However, while there is no specific mention of the phrase ‘human rights,’ this does not necessarily mean that the concept of human rights is unbiblical. Instead, an understanding of human rights can be gleaned from and built upon the biblical corpus regarding justice, just as our understanding of the Trinity has been gleaned from and built upon what is explicit in Scripture.

As mentioned previously, God created humankind “in his image … male and female he created them” (1:26-27); they were the pinnacle of God’s creation, sharing something of the very person of God—even to the point of resembling him (Goldingay: 98). It is upon this foundation that Catholic social tradition built its doctrine of the dignity of the human person, and it is a valid one. It is because every human being, male and female, is made in the image of God that every human being has innate worth. As Rich Nathan notes, “Human sin has not erased the divine image” (242). Translating this to a human rights framework, advocating human rights is a practical and tangible way of recognizing the worth which God has given to people.

When Jesus is asked which of the commandments is the greatest, he responds with two commandments that summed up the law and the prophets: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind” and the second, which is “like” the first, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself” (Matt. 22:34-40). The two commandments to love God and to love neighbor are inextricably connected and related: “If we love God, then we will love all made in God’s image” (Storkey: 138). But who is our neighbor? This was the question posed to Jesus by the lawyer in Luke 10:29-37, seeking to figure out to whom he would bear an obligation, and Jesus turned the question on its head with the parable of the Good Samaritan. The issue was not about who was the priest’s neighbor or the Levite’s neighbor, but who was a neighbor to the man who had been robbed? Who would the victim have considered his neighbor? Conrad Gempf points out the allusion here to Jesus’ so-called Golden Rule: “Do to others as you would have them do to you” (Luke 6:31; Matt. 7:12):

Do not ask, “Who must I see as a neighbor?” Ask instead, “Who would I want to see me as a neighbor if I were in need?” … The problem isn’t that of defining who is our neighbor, it is a problem of changing our attitudes from that of limiting our obligations to that of seeking to be of service. (76-77)

In fact, Jesus goes beyond the realm of ‘neighbor’ and says, “Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you” (Matt. 5:44). ‘Love’ in this context is clearly not the emotional feeling with which we have come to associate it as a result of the influence of Western culture. Jesus went beyond a change of perception—seeing more people as our neighbors—and demanded an active love towards all people, friends and enemies. C.S. Lewis wrote, “This is what is meant in the Bible by loving [your neighbor]: wishing his good, not feeling fond of him nor saying he is nice when he is not” (105), intending the phrase ‘wishing’ to mean more than just a desire unaccompanied by action.

How can Jesus’ radical commands to active love towards our neighbors be manifested within the contemporary landscape? Perhaps love of neighbor can be found in affirming the value of every human being as understood in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights: “born free and equal in dignity and rights” (Art. 1), having “the right to life, liberty and security of person” (Art. 3), being free from the fear of “slavery or servitude … torture or cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment or punishment” (Art. 4, 5), and more. Perhaps we may love our neighbors by defending their rights, “without distinction of any kind, such as race, color, sex, language, religion, political or other opinion, national or social origin, property, birth or other status” (Art. 2). In this way, advocacy for human rights offers a concrete expression of love for neighbors and for enemies.

The sphere of human rights has been decried as overly-individualistic, and this is a genuine danger, especially in more developed countries. But the risks of too much liberty should not deter us from advocating for those who do not have even basic rights: “Speak up for those who cannot speak for themselves, for the rights of all who are destitute. Speak up and judge fairly; defend the rights of the poor and needy” (Prov. 31:8-9). The apostle Paul, in his letter to the Galatians, makes it a point to emphasize that Christians are free—“now that faith has come, we are no longer subject to [the law]” (Gal. 3:26-29); “For freedom Christ has set us free” (5:1)—but he also exhorts them not to use their freedom “as an opportunity for self-indulgence, but through love become slaves to one another. For the whole law is summed up in a single commandment, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself”” (5:13-14). As Glen Stassen comments,

Based on the Christological doctrine of justification, we are freed by Christ, subject to no one’s authoritarian domination. But the “liberated freedom” in which the Christian lives is the freedom to servanthood and love. The release from all servitude to the powers of the world means empowerment to serve the well-being of others—both freedom and responsibility in one. This supports human rights of freedom, not as selfish autonomy but as mutual servanthood. (2008)

As Christians who have been saved by grace and liberated by Christ, we possess a freedom that cannot be taken from us; but it is not a freedom that we have for ourselves. It is a freedom to follow Christ, to do as he did, to love as he loved, and to affirm the dignity of every person as he did. It is a high standard that he calls us to, higher even than defending the basic rights set out in the UDHR; but the fight for human rights is a good place to start, that is, consistent with the Bible’s priorities for humanity.

It must be noted that, while advocating human rights in general is a good expression of upholding the value of every person as created in the image of God, as Christians we must maintain the perspective that love of neighbor is not divisible from love of God, and that the dignity and worth that we affirm as being innate in humankind is innate only because God put it there. “Since humans have their dignity because they have been created in the image of God, their ultimate obligation is to God, not to a state or an enterprise or a clan. Or to put it another way, even in and through their civic responsibility, humans owe that responsibility ultimately to God” (Skillen: 11). Jesus said that loving one’s neighbor was like loving God (Matt. 22:39), but he did not say they were the same thing. We must not lose sight of the centrality of God, not in the sphere of human rights nor in the broader realm of justice: as Archbishop Oscar Romero put it, “be careful not to betray those evangelical, Christian, supernatural convictions in the company of those who seek other liberations that can be merely economic, temporal, political. Even though working for liberation along with those who hold other ideologies, Christians must cling to their original liberation” (2). Stassen summarizes the biblical understanding of human rights thus:

If the greatest commandments are love of God and love of neighbor as oneself, then human rights need to be grounded in love of God who gives humans their rights rather than simply individual possession, and in obligation toward neighbors who have been given these rights rather than simply individual assertion that “I own these rights.” Furthermore, if Jesus teaches that all persons, even enemies, are to be included in the community of neighbors, then our obligation is to all persons created in the image of God and to whom God gives sunshine and rain—which is truly all persons. Human rights, then, are based in God’s universally inclusive love and in our obligation to all persons God cares about. Human rights are obligations to the basic needs of all persons. They are not merely possessive individualism; they are obligatory caring. (2008)

Therefore, defending and advocating for people’s basic human rights need not be understood as a secular glorification of the human person, but can be seen as a logical extension of what it means to be a follower of Christ, whose welcome extended to all people, especially the outcasts and misfits of society, and what it means to love God with all of our heart, mind and strength in loving our neighbors (including our enemies) as ourselves. The next section of the paper will offer some further practical suggestions for what this may look like.

References Cited

Gempf, Conrad. 2003. Jesus Asked: What He Wanted to Know. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan.
Goldingay, John. 2003. Old Testament Theology, Vol. 1: Israel’s Gospel. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press.
Lewis, C.S. 1978. Mere Christianity. Glasgow, Scotland: William Collins Sons and Co Ltd.
Mahoney, Jack. 2007. The Challenge of Human Rights: Origin, Development, and Significance. Malden, MA: Blackwell Publishing.
Romero, Oscar. 1988. The Violence of Love. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books.
Skillen, James W. 2004. In Pursuit of Justice: Christian-Democratic Explorations. Lanham, MD: Rowan & Littlefield Publishers, Inc.
Stassen, Glen H. 1992. Just Peacemaking: Transforming Initiatives for Justice and Peace. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press.
———. 2008. “Human Rights.” Not yet published; obtained and used by permission of the author.

Social Justice & Human Rights (1)

2009-02-17T19:27:00.000-08:00

The following is the first part of a paper I wrote last summer (2008) for Advocating for Social Justice, adapted for this blog. The paper looks at the biblical mandate for justice and at the particular way this may be worked out with regard to human rights.

Introduction

Human rights are important. Whether one agrees with them or not, it is undeniable that they are coming increasingly to the fore, in the spheres of economics, politics, and development. The United Nations adopted the Universal Declaration of Human Rights in 1948, and though it is a technically a non-binding resolution, it is now considered by most to be the foundation of international customary law. On the Christian front, while the Roman Catholic Church has had a consistent tradition of social justice, of upholding the dignity of human person, of championing rights and responsibilities, and of speaking up for the poor, Protestant Christians have been slow to recognize its congruencies with a biblical understanding of justice. For some, the problem is an insufficient understanding of justice as one of the central characteristics of God; for others, it is an insufficient understanding of how human rights can serve as a manifestation of this justice. Some have discounted human rights because the phrase ‘human rights’ does not appear in the Bible; nor does it contain a systematic code of rights. However, I would argue that much of Christian faith is about working out the repercussions of what we find in Scripture, and that a value and respect for human rights is one such implication of the biblical text.

The aim of this paper is not to discuss human rights per se but to try to formulate a theology of human rights. Consequently, I will not look at the common challenges that are leveled against the sphere of human rights. Instead, in this paper, I will argue that advocating for human rights is one necessary consequence of the biblical mandate to do justice, which itself stems from the character of God. It is because God is who he is—a God of love and of justice—that he commands his people to be like him. Advocating for human rights is one way in which Christians can show their love of God in their love of neighbor. Finally, I will end by mentioning a few ways that this impacts some contemporary issues.

A Biblical Mandate to Do Justice

We begin by looking at the creation stories of Genesis, and in particular where God creates humankind “in his image … male and female he created them” (1:27). As well as being central to a biblical understanding of human rights, this verse lays the foundations for a biblical mandate to do justice. Most scholars have concluded that “the image of God reflected in human persons is after the manner of a king who establishes statues of himself to assert his sovereign rule where the king himself cannot be present. … The image of God in the human person is a mandate of power and responsibility. But it is power exercised as God exercises power” (Brueggemann: 32). As John Goldingay notes, being made in the image of God means that “humanity not only represents God but also resembles God” (98). Thus, it is important to understand the character of God in order that we might best represent him, resemble him, and exercise the power he has given us in the way that he exercises power. For the purposes of this paper, I will focus on justice as central to God’s character: Yahweh is a God of justice. But what does this mean? Walter Burghardt writes, “the biblical concept of justice is too rich, too opulent, too complex to be imprisoned in a definition” (7). In order to construct an understanding of Yahweh as a God of justice, therefore, we will look at some passages in the biblical narrative, recognizing that this is only a cross section due to the limits of this paper.

In the Exodus story, God had to shape a people who had spent years in slavery, oppressed by the Egyptians, into a people who more ably represented—imaged—their God. Moses reminds the Israelites, “Yahweh your God is God of gods and Lord of lords, the great God, mighty and awesome, who is not partial and takes no bribe, who executes justice for the orphan and the widow, and who loves the strangers, providing them food and clothing. You shall also love the stranger, for you were strangers in the land of Egypt” (Deut. 10:17-19). Justice is revealed in tangible acts; characteristic qualities exist only because saving actions attest to them. God’s just actions were intertwined with his just character: he rescued the Israelites from slavery not only because they were his chosen people but also because they were oppressed. This became the reason for the Israelites to do justice: “I am Yahweh your God.” And this meant having honest balances, honest measures, honest practices, because Yahweh, their God, is an honest God (Lev. 19:36; Deut. 25:15; Ezek. 45:10). This meant practicing the year of Jubilee, a year of emancipation and restoration, because Yahweh was their God, the one who had emancipated them from slavery in Egypt and restored them to the land he had promised their ancestors (Lev. 25). This meant loving their neighbors as themselves because Yahweh was their God, and love was central to Yahweh’s being (Lev. 19:18).

Similarly in the Psalms, God’s righteousness and justice (two concepts which are virtually interchangeable from an Old Testament perspective) are not intangible characteristics. Rather they are revealed most often in God’s saving actions (Ps. 71:1-2, 15-19, 21-24a). The psalmists were especially vocal in their affirmation of God’s justice, singing, “Yahweh loves justice; he will not forsake his faithful ones” (Ps. 37:28) and “Yahweh works vindication and justice for all who are oppressed” (Ps. 103:6). He is worshiped as the God who helps the victim and the fatherless (Ps. 10:14), whose throne is built upon righteousness and justice (Ps. 89:14), and who executes justice for the oppressed, sets the prisoners free, opens the eyes of the blind, lifts up those who are bowed down, watches over the strangers, and upholds the orphan and the widow (Ps. 146:5-9). Yahweh is the God who commands his people, “Give justice to the weak and the orphan; maintain the right of the lowly and the destitute. Rescue the weak and the needy; deliver them from the hand of the wicked” (Ps. 82:3-4).

When his people failed to discharge their responsibilities as images of God and his justice, he raised up prophets to point this out to them. Jeremiah pleaded with King Shallum, “Did not your father eat and drink and do justice and righteousness? Then it was well with him. He judged the cause of the poor and needy; then it was well. Is not this to know me? says Yahweh” (22:16). Ezekiel also spoke out against corruption, where “the alien residing within you suffers extortion; the orphan and the widow are wronged in you … you have forgotten me, says the Lord God” (22:7, 12). Through Amos, God denounced worship devoid of justice: “Take away from me the noise of your songs; I will not listen to the melody of your harps. But let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an everflowing stream” (5:23-24). And Micah reminded the people, “He has told you, O mortal, what is good; and what does Yahweh require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?” (6:8). Through Isaiah, God’s words to his people are most revealing:

Is not this the fast that I choose: to loose the bonds of injustice, to undo the thongs of the yoke, to let the oppressed go free, and to break every yoke? Is it not to share your bread with the hungry, and bring the homeless poor into your house; when you see the naked, to cover them, and not to hide yourself from your own kin? Then your light shall break forth like the dawn, and your healing shall spring up quickly; your vindicator shall go before you, the glory of the LORD shall be your rear guard. Then you shall call, and the LORD will answer; you shall cry for help, and he will say, Here I am.

If you remove the yoke from among you, the pointing of the finger, the speaking of evil, if you offer your food to the hungry and satisfy the needs of the afflicted, then your light shall rise in the darkness and your gloom be like the noonday. (58:6-10)

In Jesus, we find the fullness of God and his justice embodied in a human being. Jesus took upon himself the mantle of the Servant about whom Isaiah prophesied, anointed to bring good news to the poor, to proclaim release to the captives and recovery of sight to the blind, to let the oppressed go free, to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor” (Luke 4:18-19; cf. Is. 61:8). Yet Jesus, who was justice personified, was also characterized by love. He commanded his followers to love one another as he loved them (John 13:34, 15:12); to love not only their neighbors but also their enemies (Matt. 5:43); to feed the hungry, to give drink to the thirsty, to welcome the stranger, to clothe the naked, to take care of the sick, to visit those in prison, for “just as you did it to one of the least of these who are members of my family, you did it to me” (Matt. 25:31-46). “Jesus is not seeking distant acts of charity” (Claiborne: 158), but concrete expressions of love. Justice is one such concrete expression of love; justice is love made tangible. Love was the motivation for Jesus’ mission and love was the motivation for Jesus’ commission, and justice was demonstrated in the way that he loved. As the Apostle John asked, “How does God’s love abide in anyone who has the world’s goods and sees a brother or sister in need and yet refuses help? Little children, let us love, not in word or speech, but in truth and action” (1 John 3:16-18).

Burghardt summarizes New Testament justice in the statement, “Love as Jesus loved. The kind of love that impelled God’s unique Son to wear our flesh; to be born of a woman as we are born; to thirst and tire as we do; to respond with compassion to a hungry crowd, the bereavement of a mother, the sorrow of a sinful woman; to weep over a dead friend and a hostile city; to spend himself especially for the bedeviled and the bewildered, the poverty-stricken and the marginalized; to die in exquisite agony so that others might come to life” (19). Jesus is God incarnate, and in him, we see the personification of the justice, compelled by love, that is evidenced throughout Scripture as a central characteristic of God. Consequently, as human beings created in the image of God—created to image God—we are called to be just people and to do justice, motivated by love and by the example of Christ.

References Cited

Brueggemann, Walter. 1982. Genesis. Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press.
Burghardt, Walter J. 2004. Justice: A Global Adventure. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books.
Claiborne, Shane. 2006. The Irresistible Revolution. Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan.
Goldingay, John. 2003. Old Testament Theology, Vol. 1: Israel’s Gospel. Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press.

Mélange

2009-02-16T22:36:00.000-08:00

I feel kind of weird blogging again, having been away for so long. It’s been a crazy-busy few weeks since I last posted. And there’s much that I’ve wanted to write, but I’ve either had no time or no energy or no motivation. So, in no particular order:

Started working in the Admissions Office again (+15 hours).

The weekend before the beginning of quarter, my faithful MacBook died on me.

Four days later, I got a great deal on a new MacBook Pro to replace it (thanks, Ivan!).

The MacBook Pro is awesome.

Inauguration Day was awesome.

Celebrated Chinese New Year in style with Christina and family, and friends.

Had a phenomenal Valentine’s Day (we’re now on a roll: five consecutive good V-Days and counting): babysitting Jackson, waffle brunch with the neighbors, dim sum brunch, and then …

Snowboarding for the first time! I only wiped out a couple times (one of which left me with a bruise on the back of my head and minor whiplash), and had a phenomenal time. I’ll post some more pics when Judith gets around to posting them.

The day after Valentine’s Day was crammed with catching up on schoolwork because of all the fun I had the day before; plus, I was pretty hurting, so sitting at a computer working on papers and reading for most of the day did not help that.

Had two dim sum runs and a dumpling run, among a number of other culinary expeditions. Food = so good.

On a more serious note, go visit The Sold Project. My friend Rachel is the executive director of this non-profit. Go get informed about child prostitution in Thailand, just one horrible facet of human trafficking which enslaves 27 million people globally. More on this to come.

Oh, and then there’s future news …

...

It’ll have to wait till next time.

SUNDAY: Call + Response

2009-01-08T23:08:00.000-08:00

You're invited to a special screening of the film "Call + Response: Concert to End Slavery" NEXT SUNDAY, JAN 11th at 6:30pm to honor Human Trafficking Awareness Day.

Call + Response is the first feature rockumentary to expose the world’s 27 million most terrifying secrets. There are more slaves today than ever before in human history. Call + Response goes deep undercover where slavery is thriving while luminaries on the issue such as Cornel West, Madeleine Albright, Daryl Hannah, Julia Ormond, Ashley Judd, Nicholas Kristof, and many other prominent political and cultural figures offer first hand accounts of this 21st century trade. Performances from Grammy-winning and critically acclaimed artists include Moby, Natasha Bedingfield, Cold War Kids, Matisyahu, Imogen Heap, Talib Kweli, Five For Fighting, Switchfoot, members of Nickel Creek and Tom Petty’s Heartbreakers, Rocco Deluca. Music is part of the movement against human slavery. Dr. Cornel West connects the music of the American slave fields to the popular music we listen to today, and offers this connection as a rallying cry for the modern abolitionist movement currently brewing. You will not leave tonight without learning about many different tangible, easy, and effective ways in which you can respond to this issue!

This film deals with human trafficking and is rated PG-13. Admission is only $2 and FREE childcare is provided. Street parking.

DETAILS for CALL + RESPONSE

WHEN: SUNDAY, JAN 11, 6:30pm

WHERE: Ecclesia Hollywood, Pacific Theatre lobby, Hollywood Blvd.

NOTE: Childcare is provided, FREE

For more INFO - churchinhollywood.com and callandresponse.com; or contact me (Justin).

Favorite movies of 2008

2009-01-02T12:34:00.000-08:00

In reverse alphabetical order:

WALL·E: For a movie with not all that much dialogue, where the main characters are two robots that communicate in one-word sentences, this is a keeper. Somehow, Disney make you care, make you think that maybe, just maybe, robots can fall in love. All against the backdrop of an underlying message about the environment, what we’re doing to our world, and the potential of the apocalyptic future.

***

Slumdog Millionaire: I saw this movie in December, and it quickly leapt to the top of my 2008 movie list. Directed by Danny Boyle, showing his versatility after Trainspotting, 28 Days Later, and Millions, and starring two first time actors in Dev Patel and Freida Pinto (with whom I may have fallen in love), this is the touching story of a kid who, having grown up in the slums of Bombay, is on the verge of winning the big prize on India’s version of “Who Wants to be a Millionaire?”. The portrayal of the realities of life in one of the fastest-growing countries in the world is heartbreaking because you know it’s not fictional; and Boyle takes the audience on a rollercoaster ride of emotion from heartbreak to exhilaration. One of my faves, and not just of 2008.

***

Run Fatboy Run: Simon Pegg of Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz fame is back with this gem, directed by David Schwimmer. His comic genius is on display in this movie about a guy who tries to win back his one-time fiancée and mother of his child by running the London marathon. That and London movies often get me.

***

Rambo: Sylvester Stallone isn’t really known for subtlety, and that wasn’t his goal with this, the fourth movie in the Rambo franchise. I saw an interview he gave in which he said that he’d wanted to convey the brutality and harsh reality of war in this movie. He succeeded. It’s a violent movie. A very, very violent movie. But in some ways, I think, it works to show people that war isn’t pretty. Not at all.

***

Iron Man: After a number of angsty superhero movies, which is fine—superheroes do have angst—it was good to have one movie where the superhero was … well, fun. As well as being one of Robert Downey Jr.’s comeback movies of the year, this was an exercise in enjoyment; he really made Tony Stark and his alter ego come alive.

***

The Dark Knight: Heath Ledger’s magnum opus as the Joker, this film was much bigger, more epic, and quite a bit darker than its predecessor, and it was undoubtedly a great movie. However, I actually thought that as a whole, Batman Begins was a better movie. Still, I do love Christian Bale, Michael Caine (as Alfred), Morgan Freeman (as Lucius Fox), and Gary Oldman (as Jim Gordon), and the additions of Heath, Aaron Eckhart (as Harvey Dent/Two Face), and Maggie Gyllenhaal (replacing Katie Holmes as Rachel Dawes) were great moves. Hopefully, director Chris Nolan and the rest of the crew will be back for a third.

***

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button: Brad Pitt and Cate Blanchett do a wonderful job in this touching epic (adapted from a story by F. Scott Fitzgerald) about Benjamin Button, born old and growing young. It’s a fairly long movie, a tad over 2 hours and 45 minutes, but David Fincher brings a touch of fantasy and magic to this story.

***

Bolt: While it won’t win any awards for sophistication or praise for philosophical observations, Bolt makes my list because it’s the one movie that had me laughing the entire time. (In fact, I was laughing so much I choked.) Rhino the hamster totally made my day.

12.25 (or 25.12)

2008-12-25T09:23:00.000-08:00

“Do not be afraid,” said the angel, “for see—I bring you good news of great joy for all the people: to you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is the Messiah, the Lord. This will be a sign for you: you will find a child wrapped in bands of cloth and lying in a manger.” (Luke 2:10-12)

And the Word became flesh and lived among us … (John 1:14)

Happy Birthday, Jesus, and Merry Christmas to all of you!

Joseph Lowery to Deliver Inaugural Benediction

2008-12-19T11:43:00.000-08:00

There are actually two preachers speaking at the Inauguration, though you might not know it. One is Rick Warren, which everyone knows. The other is Joseph Lowery, a Methodist preacher who was a leader in the civil rights movement, who will be giving the benediction at the inauguration. He’s known as a progressive voice that, as Ben Smith of Politico notes, serves in combination with Rick Warren to provide a look at the kind of political coalition that Barack would like to put together, with people from both sides.

Here’s a video of Lowery in action, delivering the eulogy at Coretta Scott King’s funeral in rhyming verse. You’ve got to see it to appreciate it.

Rick Warren to Deliver Inaugural Invocation

2008-12-18T17:05:00.000-08:00

After every quarter, I usually (need to) take a few days off to regroup, recuperate and get out of the school mindset, so that I can relax a little more. It’s been a wonderful few days, chilling out with friends, shopping for Christmas (well, shopping at all, really!), getting more rest, watching great movies (of which there will be some mention over the next few days). I’ll offer some thoughts on Christmas soon. But for today, some news …

In the last few days, in case you weren’t aware, Barack Obama tapped Rick Warren, pastor of Saddleback Church and author of the multimillion-selling Purpose Driven books, to deliver the invocation at the inauguration on January 20. This has raised the ire both of those on the left and those on the right.

On the left, they lambast Barack for picking someone who disagrees most vehemently with them (and him) on issues of same sex marriage (in a recent interview, Rick equates it with incest, pedophilia and polygamy), abortion (Rick calls abortion reduction efforts mostly “a charade”), and the social gospel Protestantism of the 20th century (Rick labels this “just Marxism in Christian clothing”). Rick also comes under fire for not pressing President Bush on matters of torture because, he says, “I never had the opportunity”; some would view such a comment skeptically.

On the right, conservative Christians decry that Rick is associating himself with a man who does not stand for the same values (at least where gay marriage and abortion are concerned). They might also take umbrage at the interview in which he also offers his thoughts that Christian leaders sometimes focus on gay marriage because “we always love to talk about other people’s sins,” or where he says that he nonetheless supports abortion reduction approaches as a sort of Schindler’s list, a way to reduce the harm of overall evil.

But as several commentators have noted, they do share in common a concern for seeing the AIDS crisis resolved and for social justice. Rick Warren has, because of his conservatism, been one of the catalysts in the expansion of the evangelical agenda, from a two-issue platform to one that seeks to bring faith to bear on all of life; and it has been because he is a social conservative on so many staple evangelical issues that he has influence to bring to bear on these other (I would argue, equally important) issues.

I think this is vintage Barack; he is who he says he is. He says he wants to find common ground, he wants to work with those who disagree with him, he wants to get things done. This is symbolic of who he is, as was the appointment of Hillary Clinton as Secretary of State. During the campaign, he said he wanted to expand our politics, to rise above the pettiness and divisiveness of the last few decade. And now he’s showing it: he doesn’t surround himself with yes-men (or women), with those who will agree with every word he says and every opinion he holds. I believe this makes him a better leader. And I think that if this is the tenor for the next four years, this is something I can stay on board with, and not be disappointed about.

P.S. Rich Cizik resigned as vice-president of the National Association of Evangelicals last week because he’d said in a radio interview with NPR that he supported civil unions for gay people. Rich also played an integral part in expanding the agenda to include the genocide in Darfur, global warming, AIDS, malaria, poverty and religious repression. Prominent conservative leaders on the right weren’t too happy with this, and the interview was the trigger. Here’s Nicholas Kristof’s comment on it. As for my comment, I’m disappointed and angry that this happened, and I hope that this doesn’t signal an undoing of Rich’s work.

Adding to the confusion

2008-12-08T22:29:00.000-08:00

One of my non-Christian friends emailed me a couple weeks ago, asking me what the Bible said about killing and murder. He was alluding to the Ten Commandments, and so I told him that the Bible said, no murder (short version), and more generally spoke of a consistent ethic of life and of the value of human life. A few days later, he emailed me back.

“So you should not murder, and therefore the death penalty is abhorrent to all Christians? Sorry if this sounds simplistic.” (My paraphrase.)

I haven’t replied yet, because this could be a paper topic. I could talk about the voice of Scripture that runs throughout the Bible, the witness that says that the value for human life is tantamount, and that any judgment that comes is necessary judgment, and that God does not pleasure in meting out punishment. I could talk about contextualization and how God dealt with the people where they were, culturally and historically. I could talk about the trajectory of history and of the Bible, which reaches its climax in Jesus Christ, the full embodiment of God, and how we look to him to know what God is like and it is through him that we interpret the law.

But I’d also have to be honest with him: the death penalty is not abhorrent to all Christians, just as not all Christians seek to follow Christ with their lives, thoughts, actions, attitudes, and relationships.

My point is …

First, being a “Christian” can mean a wide range of things (and we touched on this in class). Does “Christian” connote someone who is pro-life, pro-death penalty, anti-gay marriage? (Because it does for some people.) Or does “Christian” connote the opposite? (Because I know a good few Christians whose values as gleaned from the pages of Scripture motivate them to fight for the woman’s right to choose, against the death penalty, and for gay marriage.)

Second, how do we navigate this broad swathe of Christianity? Being a Christian, at its narrowest, is to believe that Jesus Christ is the Son of God, that he died for our sins, and that he is the Lord and Savior of our lives (or something similar; I’m sure we could make it even more narrower). But it’s in the working out of what it means for him to be the Lord and Savior of our lives that we can sometimes differ.

Third, should we just be okay with this? I think that Christians who differ do so because they are sincerely and genuinely trying to figure stuff out, not because they’re being disingenuous, ignorant or moronic. (Okay, some do … sometimes.) And we all think our understanding or interpretation of the gospel and the Bible is the best, at least as far as we know (and if we didn’t, we’d have great trouble living out our convictions).

So … what to do?