Live Generously

I received an e-mail today from Sojourners that I thought I would also share on here. I would encourage you to follow the link at the bottom and urge your congressperson to vote to ensure that hungry people around the world are able to receive rice in the quickest and most cost effective manner. While I understand the need to stimulate our economy, it simply does not make sense morally to pursue economic stimulus in a way that keeps the poorest of the poor hungry. I would encourage you also to pray for our nation’s leaders that they would pursue a policy that would benefit the least of these.

You’ve probably seen the headlines about record food prices, which have led to deadly violence and panic across the globe.

The U.N. Secretary-General said last week that the situation has “become a global crisis,” and the World Food Programme is warning of a “silent tsunami” of hunger. Even here in the U.S., grocery stores are starting to ration sales of rice.

Sadly, this desperate situation is being worsened by our own government’s policies. While we spend billions of dollars on food for the hungry overseas, Congress requires that all of it be purchased from farmers in the U.S. and shipped halfway around the world — wasting money and delaying the food’s arrival.

As Congress finalizes the Farm Bill, tell them to fix this misguided policy and help feed more hungry people.

It seems so obvious: When buying food for hungry people overseas, buy from farmers nearby — it’s simpler, cheaper, and better for the local economy and environment.

But even as children are at risk of starving to death, Congress has shown more interest in increasing profits for big American agribusiness than in ensuring that we feed as many hungry people as possible.

These policies are decided as part of the Farm Bill, a mammoth but little-known piece of legislation that governs our nation’s agricultural policies. So far, it’s been shaped mostly by a narrow group of farm-state legislators and industry lobbyists — and it’s become so laden with pork-barrel spending that President Bush is threatening a veto.

But our lawmakers have one last chance to get it right before the bill goes to the president’s desk. One simple change could make a dramatic difference in addressing the global food crisis.

Click here to tell your senators and representatives to fix our food aid policies.

Thank you for raising your voice, as we seek to follow Christ in feeding the hungry multitude.

Blessings,

Patty, Michael, Elizabeth, and the rest of the team at Sojourners

Please click on one  of the links above and fill out the brief form to write to your representative.  Thanks.

I came across this interesting post today written by a college acquaintance of mine named Brad Greenberg (who has an excellent blog). The post is called, “The president need not be Christian”, and it talks about the role of religion in the presidential race and the plethora of articles written about the place religion has taken in the campaign It then focuses on a new series of articles by Christianity Today, that have explored how Christians ought to behave in a secular society. While I agree with the groaning of the Lutheran gentlemen that Brad quotes at length in his post (Did not Christ tell Pilate: “My kingdom is not of this world” (John 18:36)? Which of these seven words is so hard to understand?), there is something to be said for developing a somewhat nuanced approach to engaging in politics ‘Christianly’ I say ‘nuanced’ only because, as Brad says, we ought to focus more on a candidate’s values than his or her professed faith. This is especially true given the Carter and W. Bush administrations, two of the poorest in recent memory (and in the second case most immoral), which led my men whose public discourse was steeped in religious rhetoric.

At any rate, I wrote this article a few months ago on helium.com answering the question “should one’s faith influence a citizen’s vote?”, and I thought I’d post it here as well.

One’s religious faith, rightly understood, certainly ought to effect one’s behavior in the public square, particularly one’s voting behavior. That being said, religious faith is only rightly understood when it leads to personal conviction about what makes for just and moral private and public behavior. Conviction of this sort must be much more nuanced than merely establishing views on abortion and gay marriage. In reality, religious faith (or a lack there of) is a large part of constructing a world view, which in turn very logically effects voting decisions. A religious faith that is only based on professed belief is hardly faith at all, thus common professed religious faith most certainly ought not to motivate a voter to vote for a particular candidate.

This is a sticky issue given the mass partisan politicization of spirituality that has taken place in this country. It simply must be understood that faith is not partisan, thus while faith ought to inform my voting decisions, it most certainly ought not to make be a Republican, Democrat, Libertarian, or anything else for that matter. Furthermore, one ought to evaluate candidates on the basis of their actions, not on the basis of their words. It is a well known fact that in this country one cannot get elected president without espousing belief in the Christian God. For this reason, I ought not be impressed with a presidential candidate speaks, whether generically or candidly, about their belief in such a God. That, in my view, is where faith-informed voting gets confused. Faith-informed voting is taken to mean “voting for someone who says they have the same religious beliefs that I do, and vocally opposing someone who does not.” As a person of deep spiritual belief and conviction, and as a person weary of the less than flattering caricatures of Christians in the public square (which Christians, sadly, have earned), I find such a shallow understanding of faith-informed voting to be massively troubling. Such an understanding fails to acknowledge the obvious truth that politicians will say whatever will help them get elected.

I’ll admit it…I’m a big fan of the quotes on the sides of Starbucks cups.  You know, the “The Way I See It” quotes?

There, I said it.

As someone who probably has close to half a dozen meetings at Starbucks every week, I always look forward to reading the quote on my cup.

Maybe that means I’m inquisitive.  Maybe that means I’m a raging dork.  I’m not really sure.

At any rate, I liked the quote on my cup this morning. It related to a lot of issues I have been thinking through lately.  I am becoming increasingly annoyed with what I perceive to be a lack of fair-mindedness in our culture.  In other words, I am finding in several different arenas that there is a growing intolerance for differing opinions, and there is a growing tendency of those with one particular perspective to demonize and mischaracterize those who do not share this perspective.  In other words, public dialog has been replaced, in many cases, with intolerant, dogmatic preaching.

This became especially clear to me about two years ago when I briefly subscribed to Sirius Satellite Radio.  The main reason I subscribed was to listen to talk radio in an effort to stay informed about what was going on in the world.

I lasted two weeks.  I couldn’t stand it.  I actually found that I showed up to work angry in the morning after 20 minutes of political talk radio.

On the conservative stations all they could do was talk about how liberals are idiots that are consciously conspiring to destroy America.  On the liberal stations all they could do was talk about how conservatives are idiots that are consciously conspiring to destroy America. There was no dialog.  There was no attempt at mutual understanding. And it was flat out intellectually dishonest.

I find this sort of rhetoric in the “God” debate as well.  Those in the new atheist movement characterize people of faith as deluded and feeble-minded people who are living in denial of plain evidence, and they often use words like “extremist” to describe Christian or other faith-based organizations.  Then again, their Christian counterparts characterize atheists as, well, deluded and feeble-minded people who are living in denial of plain evidence, while using words like “militant” to describe outspoken atheists.  This sort of condescending and disrespectful rhetoric is, again, intellectually dishonest, and it does nothing to encourage understanding between the differing perspectives. Something that I appreciated at Francis Collins’ book The Language of God was that I felt he avoided this sort of argumentation. He certainly had a particular point of view, and he sought to assert that point of view’s superiority, but he did so in a way that clearly was not seeking to belittle those of differing perspectives, be they atheists/agnostics or young earth creationists.

I’ll be the first to admit that I struggle with fair-mindedness when it comes to issues that I am passionate about.  There are numerous political and moral issues where I find the alternate perspective to be badly wanting.  I am learning, however, the importance of listening, and the importance of being teachable.  I certainly am not saying it’s easy, nor am I saying that the answer is to become wishy washy in our beliefs and convictions.  I suppose all I’m trying to say is that there is value in being willing to listen to other perspectives (and respecting the humanity of those with such perspectives), whether the issue is the war in Iraq, abortion, the existence of God, presidential candidates, or the best team in the National League West.

I find it somewhat ironic that while our society is becoming more and more pluralistic, as individuals we are becoming more and more dogmatic. In college ministry I personally am struggling with how to help students and others fully understand and live out their faith while also learning to understand and dialog with other perspectives.  In other words, our goal is that all of us have living and active relationships with God that we can express and live by without appearing dogmatic and judgmental. I should say that, while it is a struggle, I fully believe that it can be done.

All that being said, here’s the quote from the cup that sparked all of these thoughts:

“You can learn a lot more from listening than you can from talking.  Find someone with whom you don’t agree in the slightest and ask them to explain themselves at length.  Then take a seat, shut your mouth, and don’t argue back. It’s physically impossible to listen with your mouth open.”

A few years ago I was told that I absolutely must read this book called The Irresistible Revolution: Living as an Ordinary Radical written by a guy named Shane Claiborne, who at the time I’d never heard of. To be honest, I am frequently told that I absolutely must read such and such book, so I didn’t really think much of it. Eventually, after being given the aforementioned mandate by several people, I went ahead and ordered the book. And it absolutely blew me away. Shane’s ideas are nothing short of radical, and its voices like his that the church desperately needs. Since reading The Irresistible Revolution I’ve tried to read everything by him that I can, I’ve been to see him speak, and I even bought a little button when I saw him speak that said “God Bless Everyone” and had an American and Iraqi flag on it (I attached it to my computer bag, but sadly it eventually fell off). Needless to say when I heard about his new book, Jesus for President I was pretty excited. It just recently came out, and I haven’t had a chance to read it yet, but these quotes (taken from a review of the book posted on Amazon), are certainly intriguing:

“Too often the patriotic values of pride and strength triumph over the spiritual values of humility, gentleness, and sacrificial love.”

“We in the church are schizophrenic: we want to be good Christians, but deep down we trust that only the power of the state and its militaries and markets can really make a difference in the world.”

“Rather than placing our hope in a transitional church that embodies God’s kingdom, we assume America is God’s hope for the world, even when it doesn’t look like Christ.”

I look forward to hopefully sitting down with this book and having it kick my butt in a couple of weeks once finals are over. Publisher’s Weekly has already called the book “the must-read election-year book for Christian Americans.” They’ve got a pretty nifty website for the book that’s worth checking out. If Shane can avoid getting tagged as an ultra-liberal (which some would argue he already has), I believe he has tremendous potential to do a lot of good for the Kingdom of God in a generation that is growing weary of the tired old ways of doing church.

There were two particularly interesting articles in this week’s issue of The Economist. The first was an op-ed piece commenting on Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams’ suggestion that “the symbiosis that existed in practice between the law of the land and Muslim institutions, especially those that regulate marriage, property, and inheritance, should be recognised and formalised.” (British spelling) The op-ed piece then said that Williams’ remarks revived the age old debate about where to draw the line between church and state, and that he got it wrong. The full text of the article can be read here, and the article that reported on his original remarks can be read here. While I’m not really in much of a position to comment on the specific Muslim laws themselves, the article did get me thinking about church/state issues. Being an American, it’s difficult to imagine having a national church like the one that exists in England. Similarly, it’s difficult to imagine having Congress approve church prayer books or having church bishops serve as members of the Senate (although maybe part of why that’s tough to imagine is the fact that my denomination has neither prayer books nor bishops ;-)). The article goes on to say:

“The archbishop proposes to expand the privileges of all religions. It would be better instead to curtail the entitlements of his one. It makes no sense in a pluralistic society to give one church special status. Nor does it make sense, in a largely secular country, to give special status to all faiths. The point of democracies is that the public arena is open to all groups—religious, humanist or football fans. The quality of the argument, not the quality of the access to power, is what matters. And citizens, not theocrats, choose.”

I agree that in a pluralistic society it doesn’t seem right to give one church or religious group formal power. The public arena ought to be open to all ideas, and people of faith should be required to formulate good ideas and effective public policy if they want to be heard in the public square, just like everyone else. Furthermore, as a Christian who is horrified by the way that Christians in power have too often abused that power, I am very uncomfortable with Christian leaders having a presumed “access to power”. I also firmly believe that the Christian faith is practiced most authentically when it is practiced from the margins. Rob Bell at Mars Hill Bible Church in Grand Rapids, MI, gave a brilliant sermon a few weeks ago where he spoke from the perspective of the Apostle Paul and declared that the idea of a Christian state deeply concerns him. It concerns ‘Paul’ because if that happens Christians will become lazy in their faith and they will be vulnerable to getting sucked in to the lust for power that too often accompanies solidarity with the state. History has proved that fear to be valid. In the final paragraph of the article the author writes:

Let religion compete in the marketplace for ideas, not seek shelter behind special privileges.

And my point in all of this is simply that the separation of church and state is a good thing because it requires the church to be more like the church and less like the state. It requires those of us who call ourselves Christians to take seriously texts like the one I’ll be talking about this Sunday where Jesus says, “Whoever would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me,” rather than focusing on power and authority. Similarly, it requires those of us who call ourselves Christians to get creative politically, and think deeply about what the issues are that Christians ought to care about in the public square, and how our approach to these issues can lead to the good of all people regardless of their faith. This is a needed alternative to blind alignment with moral disasters like the Religious Right. A clear separation between church and state will help the church spend less time trying to be heard and more time making sure we actually have something positive and constructive to say.

The other story that caught my attention, that I’ll discuss much more briefly, was the cover story on Barack Obama. The cover simply read, “But could he deliver?” The sub headline goes on to say that America needs to start evaluating Obama the potential president rather than Obama the political phenomenon. I sometimes suspect that I, as much anyone, have been captivated by Obama the phenomenon. I loved his book The Audacity of Hope, his skills as an orator are first class, and the way that he speaks of changing the political game in Washington is inspiring, but the article does point out that in some cases his position on key issues isn’t quite as nuanced as one might like. I agree with the author of the article that perhaps now that Obama is the Democratic front runner it’s time to raise the bar and hold him to a higher standard. Rhetoric is nice, but a plan is better. I remain confident that in the coming weeks and months Obama will be able to rise to the challenge and prove that he can be a competent president, but he certainly needs to start doing that quickly.

While I certainly want to tread lightly when it comes to discussing partisan politics, it bears mentioning that the debate last night between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton was outstanding. (I should note at this point that I’m a registered independent and have no longstanding loyalty to either political party). While they certainly highlighted their differences, I appreciated the relatively common visions expressed in their views on Iraq, immigration, universal health care, and tax reform. I believe these are all issues that ought to be profoundly important for us as a faith community, and frankly it appears to me that Obama and Clinton are offering solutions that our country badly needs. It will be interesting to see if the Christian community as a whole can get behind which ever one of these candidates makes it to the general election, especially given that they differ with the evangelical consensus are issues that evangelicals traditionally manage to distract themselves with. That being said, from watching the Republican debate a few nights ago, it doesn’t appear that any of the remaining candidates have the sort of moral vision that will be able to capture the evangelical vote. It is difficult to imagine evangelicals in general supporting a candidate who wants to keep the United States in Iraq and wants to make the Bush tax cuts permanent. But, it could happen, I suppose It will indeed be interesting to see what happens…I can’t wait for Tuesday. Thoughts, comments, concerns? Am I right? Am I crazy? Should I not even be commenting on politics? I’d love to hear anyone’s thoughts.