Political Honesty About Iraq

Thoughts from an Activist

Here are some thought from the famous Christian activist and intellectual William Sloan Coffin, who died last year:
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God is not to hard to believe in, he is too good to believe in, we being such strangers to such goodness.

Almost every square inch of the earth's surface is soaked with the tears and blood of the innocent. It's not God's doing, its our doing. That's human malpractice. Don't chalk it up to God.

If you back off from every little controversy in your life, you're not alive, and once more, your boring.

You can be more alive in pain then in complacency.

Only God has the right to destroy all life on the planet. All we have is the power. We haven't the authority. Therefore to make, to threaten to use nuclear weapons must be an abomination in the sight of God.

To say 'grant us peace' in a time of war, God must say 'Come off it!" What are you going to do for peace for heaven sake? Its not enough to pray for it, you have to think for it, you have to suffer for it and you have endure a lot for it. So don't just pray about it.

The Sad State of Christian Protest

This week marks the 4th Anniversary of America's invasion of Iraq. 4 years with
an evangelical Christian president, backed by his faithful who believe in the apocalyptic dimensions of this battle of civilizations.

But where are the followers of the Prince of Peace? Where are the adherents of nonviolent civil disobedience against the injustice of this war? The solitary prophets that are taking a stand must feel like Jeremiah standing alone against the imperial powers.

Tonight I went to the ONLY city-wide Christian prayer vigil this week in one of the largest cities in California. There were no more than 30 people that showed up, and only 3 of them, including myself were under 40.

Where are the nonviolent Christian youth? Are they all on college campuses? Are they busy playing Grand Theft Auto? Are they busy sitting around the local Starbucks with their friends talking about how cool the Emergent Church is?

An Evangelical on Evangelicals

‘The cries of suffering humanity today are many. No evangelicalism which ignores the totality of man's condition dares respond in the name of Christianity.’
Evangelical Theologian Carl F.H. Henry (1913-2003)

Parable on Greed and Servanthood

"You can tell the true character of a man by the way he treats someone who can do absolutely nothing for him"

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A holy man was having a conversation with the Lord one day and said, "Lord, I would like to know what Heaven and Hell are like." The Lord led the holy man to two doors. He opened one of the doors and the holy man looked in. In the middle of the room was a large round table. In the middle of the table was a large pot of stew which smelled delicious and made the holy man's mouth water.

The people sitting around the table were thin and sickly. They appeared to be famished. They were holding spoons with very long handles and each found it possible to reach into the pot of stew and take a spoonful, but because the handle was longer than their arms, they could not get the spoons back into their mouths. The holy man shuddered at the sight of their misery and suffering.

The Lord said, "You have seen Hell."

They went to the next room and opened the door. It was exactly the same as the first one. There was the large round table with the large pot of stew which made the holy man's mouth water. The people were equipped with the same long-handled spoons, but here the people were well nourished and plump, laughing and talking. The holy man said,

"I don't understand."

It is simple" said the Lord, "it requires but one skill. You see, they have learned to feed each other, while the greedy think only of themselves.

Lent and Lockheed Martin

Each Friday during Lent, the SF Bay Area's Pacific Life Community is sponsoring a silent prayer vigil outside the gates of Lockheed Martin, the country's leading weapons manufacturer and the world's most prolific arms exporter. The intent is to bring the community's attention to the activities of a firm that hasn't produced a civilian aircraft since the early 1980's.

This seems to be a beautiful act of solidarity against an American WMD manufacturer. Why isn't there more of this type of social action from among the Church? Why are these types of nonviolent activism only seen as acts for the fringe (of society and of the Church)?

How are communities of faith formed in a way where there are large and genuine acts of nonviolence action against instruments of war? I think there are numerous reasons. But central to all of the reasons I believe is that the Church is the State's prostitute. The State provides the Church national security, freedom of speech and assembly, and tax-exemption. What more could a religious movement ask for? All the state requires are taxes and an unspoken promise not to question its war machine.

Unfortunately, we are not just talking about the institutional Church organizations. We are also talking about the members of those churches. How can you boycott the war businesses when you work there? For many years I lived in San Diego, and on any freeway you drove on during rush hour, 1 out of every 3 cars had military parking stickers in their windshields. These are the people that sit besides us on Sunday mornings. How can we expect these Christians to join us at candlelight vigils outside the offices where they just spent the day working on a tracking microchip for a new missile system?

A beautiful act of solidarity against the military industrial complex. I guess its too complicated for the Church to get involved in. We might hurt the feelings of so many in the pews. And that might cause our offering plates to get a little lighter. We wouldn't want that. Let's just leave these kind of act of social activism to those people on the fringe.

Buddhist Thought to Ponder

Victory breeds hatred, for the defeated live in pain.

Happily live the peaceful, giving up victory and defeat.

Do you have a funny feeling?

This week Iranian President and Saudi Crown Prince met and agreed to work toward stemming the end of Shia-Sunni tension in the Muslim world. Also this week, the King of Jordon renewed his efforts to get the U.S. involved in a Middle-East peace settlement. What do these have in common? What would make someone feel so uncomfortable about these steps toward peace?

If a two-state solution can be agreed upon in Israel, and the Sunnis & Shias lay aside their differences, the continued economic rise of the Middle East could create the onset of a new Golden Age for Islam. With their differences behind them, and a Palestinian state, the Arab League could turn its attention toward creating first world economies in their countries, and expanding their financial and cultural influence around the world.

This would be tantamount to the changes that would have taken place in The Middle Ages if Kings of England and France agreed to become allies and the Pope and the Bishop of Constantanople agreed to put aside their historical differences. In that situation, a gigantic superpower united by a common faith would have arose with the idea to expand their sphere of influence around the world.

I'm not afraid of what may be coming. But it gives me a funny feeling in my stomach when I think that the Saudi's may be at the center of this new superpower. Their fascist ologarchy, founded on oppressive piety, and built on the wheels of a gas-guzzling west, is primed to expand its dangerous interpretation of Islam. This will result in more free speech silenced, women abused, religious minorities persecuted and killed, and countless other brainwashed by a fundamentalist theology filled with spite and disdain for outsiders.

Can you guess where I stand on the Iraq war?

Amazing Sacred Places to Visit Before I Die #1

Tiger's Nest Buddist Monastary

Taktshang Goemba is the most famous of Bhutan's monasteries, perched on the side of a cliff about 3000ft above Paro. The name means 'tiger's nest'; Guru Rinpoche is said to have flown to the site of the monastery on the back of a tigress.

For Your Consideration...An Emergent Order

Members of Emergent Village hold in common four values and several practices that flow from them. In the language of a religious order, we call these four values our “order and rule”:

1. Commitment to God in the Way of Jesus:

We are committed to doing justice, loving kindness, and walking humbly with God. In the words of Jesus, we seek to live by the Great Commandment: loving God and loving our neighbors – including those who might be considered “the least of these” or enemies. We understand the gospel to be centered in Jesus and his message of the Kingdom of God, a message offering reconciliation with God, humanity, creation, and self.

We are committed to a “generous orthodoxy” in faith and practice – affirming the historic Christian faith and the biblical injunction to love one another even when we disagree. We embrace many historic spiritual practices, including prayer, meditation, contemplation, study, solitude, silence, service, and fellowship, believing that healthy theology cannot be separated from healthy spirituality.

PRACTICES:

• As Christ-centered people, to understand the gospel in terms of Jesus’ radical, profound, and expansive message of the kingdom of God.
• As people seeking to be formed spiritually in the way of Christ, to learn historic Christian spiritual practices (disciplines), and to use them for the development of character, integrity, and virtue which flow from true communion with God.
• As participants in the historic Christian faith, to be humble learners, to stimulate learning in others, and to give priority to love over knowledge, while still valuing knowledge.
• As lovers of God and God’s truth, to seek wisdom and understanding, which are the true goal of theology, and to engage in respectful, thoughtful, sacred conversation about God, world, and church.

2. Commitment to the Church in all its Forms:

We are committed to honor and serve the church in all its forms – Orthodox, Roman Catholic, Protestant, Pentecostal, Anabaptist. We practice “deep ecclesiology” – rather than favoring some forms of the church and critiquing or rejecting others, we see that every form of the church has both weaknesses and strengths, both liabilities and potential.

We believe the rampant injustice and sin in our world requires the sincere, collaborative, and whole-hearted response of all Christians in all denominations, from the most historic and hierarchical, through the mid-range of local and congregational churches, to the most spontaneous and informal expressions. We affirm both the value of strengthening, renewing, and transitioning existing churches and organizations, and the need for planting, resourcing, and coaching new ones of many kinds.

We seek to be irenic and inclusive of all our Christian sisters and brothers, rather than elitist and critical. We own the many failures of the church as our failures, which humbles us and calls us to repentance, and we also celebrate the many heroes and virtues of the church, which inspires us and gives us hope.

PRACTICES:

• To be actively and positively involved in a local congregation, while maintaining open definitions of “church” and “congregation.” We work in and with churches, seeking to live out authentic Christian faith in authentic Christian community.
• To seek peace among followers of Christ, and to offer critique only prayerfully and when necessary, with grace, and without judgment, avoiding rash statements, and repenting when harsh statements are made. To speak positively of fellow Christians whenever possible, especially those with whom we may disagree.
• To build sincere friendship with Christians from other traditions.

3. Commitment to God’s World:

We practice our faith missionally – that is, we do not isolate ourselves from this world, but rather, we follow Christ into the world.

We seek to fulfill the mission of God in our generations, and then to pass the baton faithfully to the next generations as well.

We believe the church exists for the benefit and blessing of the world at large; we seek therefore not to be blessed to the exclusion of everyone else, but rather for the benefit of everyone else.

We see the earth and all it contains as God’s beloved creation, and so we join God in seeking its good, its healing, and its blessing.

PRACTICES:

• To build relationships with neighbors and to seek the good of our neighborhoods and cities.
• To seek reconciliation with enemies and make peace.
• To encourage and cherish younger people and to honor and learn from older people.
• To honor creation and to cherish and heal it.
• To build friendships across gender, racial, ethnic, economic and other boundaries.
• To be involved at all times in at least one issue or cause of peace and justice.

4. Commitment to One Another

In order to strengthen our shared faith and resolve, and in order to encourage and learn from one another in our diversity through respectful, sacred conversation, we value time and interaction with other friends who share this rule and its practices.

We identify ourselves as members of this growing, global, generative, and non-exclusive friendship.

We welcome others into this friendship as well.

We bring whatever resources we can to enrich this shared faith and resolve.

PRACTICES:

• To make an annual pilgrimage to an Emergent Village gathering; to give one another the gift of our presence at annual gatherings whenever possible.
• To publicly self-identify with Emergent Village where appropriate and to represent Emergent Village well whenever we can; to exemplify the best of what Emergent Village strives to be and do.
• To invite others to participate and welcome new participants.
• To seek to be positive and constructive in caring for the Emergent Village friendship. To find some specific ways we can help the circle of friends in Emergent Village.
• To stay reconciled to one another. To give one another the gift of commitment not to give up on, betray, or reject one another, but instead, to encourage, honor, and care for one another.
• To stay informed about emergent locally and globally via the website and email updates.

ACTION

We live out the four values of our rule through four lines of action:

• We explore and develop ideas, theology, practices, and connections … through conversations, conferences, think-tanks, gatherings, retreats, publications, learning cohorts, online resources, and other means.
• We resource individuals, leaders, and organizations – funding their imagination, stimulating their thinking, providing examples, events, literature and other resources to assist them in their lives and mission.
• We communicate our calling, vision, learning, and activities to the growing Emergent Village community, and to other interested people around the world.
• We provide ways for people to belong, identify with, and participate in this community, conversation, and mission at varying levels. We encourage the development of generative friendships, collaborations, and partnerships.

http://www.emergentvillage.com/about-information/values-and-practices