@This Point - Columbia Theological Seminary
Check out this new site. Should be a good source of thought and conversation.
Thursday, November 29, 2007
response to Scott
Comments have been appreciated tho I continue to get your thoughts by e-mail.
WRBC is doing a great job in making faith exploration pertinent for all. 2 separate services each Sunday. Many projects that should and do catch the interest for work or exploration are growing in number. The information is spreading tho slowly that "we are the church" and open our arms and minds to those searching, hoping they will feel comfortable in joining in.
WRBC is doing a great job in making faith exploration pertinent for all. 2 separate services each Sunday. Many projects that should and do catch the interest for work or exploration are growing in number. The information is spreading tho slowly that "we are the church" and open our arms and minds to those searching, hoping they will feel comfortable in joining in.
Sustainable Eating
Over at the Atlanta Emergent Cohort, we have been exploring the interplay between eating and ethics. Check out the speaking of faith podcasts regarding sustainable consumption practices. Pretty interesting stuff.
Abby and I participate in a group called Mellowbellies out at Grant Park. We pay into this group and we get fresh produce from local farmers delivered every week. To be honest, however, we have done this more for the desire to eat healthier. I had never thought of this as a living out of my faith. Peace.
Abby and I participate in a group called Mellowbellies out at Grant Park. We pay into this group and we get fresh produce from local farmers delivered every week. To be honest, however, we have done this more for the desire to eat healthier. I had never thought of this as a living out of my faith. Peace.
Wednesday, November 28, 2007
Psalm 104 is a major Creation Psalm. Verses 14-13 cover the point that God’s Creation is a home for all creatures. See, also Eccl. 3:18-20.
Passages which deal with God as Creator include: Genesis 1-2; Psalm 19; Psalm 24:1-2; Psalm 65; Psalm 74; Psalm 146:7-9; Psalm 148:3-4; Proverbs 17:5; Isaiah 42:5-6; Isaiah 45:18; Isaiah 51:9-10; and Isaiah 65: 17-25.
Passages that describe how Creation suffers because of what mankind does include: Hosea 4:1-3 and Jeremiah 4:23-26.
A major element of Old Testament theology is God’s work as Creator. Because He the Creator, mankind is responsible to live in ways that show care for the Creation. This is a means of worshipping God. His Creation is meant to provide for all, especially those who have no power or voice in world affairs.
New Testament Passages that relate to Creation and mankind’s place to care for it: Mark 4:35-41; Luke 4:18-19; and Revelation 21:1-5 and 22:1-3.
George Hunsinger succinctly summarizes the ecological situation: "Whether the human race will survive the next century is not clear. What is clear is that the means and mechanisms of self-extinction already exist. Ecological destruction is the slow version, while the quick version is nuclear war and its military analogues, and the intermediate version is overpopulation and the gross maldistribution of resources." ("Doctrine as guide to social witness," The Christian Century, April 19-26, 2000, p. 456)
Passages which deal with God as Creator include: Genesis 1-2; Psalm 19; Psalm 24:1-2; Psalm 65; Psalm 74; Psalm 146:7-9; Psalm 148:3-4; Proverbs 17:5; Isaiah 42:5-6; Isaiah 45:18; Isaiah 51:9-10; and Isaiah 65: 17-25.
Passages that describe how Creation suffers because of what mankind does include: Hosea 4:1-3 and Jeremiah 4:23-26.
A major element of Old Testament theology is God’s work as Creator. Because He the Creator, mankind is responsible to live in ways that show care for the Creation. This is a means of worshipping God. His Creation is meant to provide for all, especially those who have no power or voice in world affairs.
New Testament Passages that relate to Creation and mankind’s place to care for it: Mark 4:35-41; Luke 4:18-19; and Revelation 21:1-5 and 22:1-3.
George Hunsinger succinctly summarizes the ecological situation: "Whether the human race will survive the next century is not clear. What is clear is that the means and mechanisms of self-extinction already exist. Ecological destruction is the slow version, while the quick version is nuclear war and its military analogues, and the intermediate version is overpopulation and the gross maldistribution of resources." ("Doctrine as guide to social witness," The Christian Century, April 19-26, 2000, p. 456)
Tuesday, November 27, 2007
Faith and the Environment at a sister church in town
Check out
www.peachtreebaptist.net
for a discussion on faith and the environment going on within their faith community. You'll notice a blog on their website within which folks are having discussion as well. They've been on a 2 or 3 month long exploration of these issues.
Matt
www.peachtreebaptist.net
for a discussion on faith and the environment going on within their faith community. You'll notice a blog on their website within which folks are having discussion as well. They've been on a 2 or 3 month long exploration of these issues.
Matt
Sunday, November 25, 2007
Cynic, tempted to test
Since there are few postings from JEPR group, which group assembles wonderfully probing and well-read minds, one wonders why. One aspect is that common for us all; we are overwhelmed and just too busy.
Another possibility may be a problem I have. In stuff involving passwords, access and process, if I do not use them with some frequency they are forgotten and a barrier arises to their use.
So... for education or testing, would each of you please make a Post to the Around the Bend blog site. It can be just, "Hey, I am here and can do it," or can be a posting of some article, essay, website, or one of your past writings. Developing a habit of often commenting on posts of others would be an added plus.
My tendency is to want something to come from both spouses of JEPR couples ( including you, Debra) to demonstrate involvement and capability, but I will try to repress greed in this regard.
If you find that you do not know (forgotten or never knew) the process, please contact Matt for instructions.
Please laugh and forgive me for being pushy, but an old teacher's instincts sometime will out. BUT..... please pass the test, even if you have to cheat.
Scott
Another possibility may be a problem I have. In stuff involving passwords, access and process, if I do not use them with some frequency they are forgotten and a barrier arises to their use.
So... for education or testing, would each of you please make a Post to the Around the Bend blog site. It can be just, "Hey, I am here and can do it," or can be a posting of some article, essay, website, or one of your past writings. Developing a habit of often commenting on posts of others would be an added plus.
My tendency is to want something to come from both spouses of JEPR couples ( including you, Debra) to demonstrate involvement and capability, but I will try to repress greed in this regard.
If you find that you do not know (forgotten or never knew) the process, please contact Matt for instructions.
Please laugh and forgive me for being pushy, but an old teacher's instincts sometime will out. BUT..... please pass the test, even if you have to cheat.
Scott
Conservatives and liberal and societal needs
The extract copied below is from a recent blog, seen at a Sojourners site. The phenomenon he notes is probably typical and his perspective should be a prod for us, whichever side of the contribution equation we normally lean.
Also, from consideration of poverty ( and DC in part) I strongly suggest that you check out http://speakingoffaith.publicradio.org/programs/seeingpoverty/index.shtml. Either listen, or download and read the transcript. Now that I think about it, a JEPR group discussion on this program would be useful and possibly inspiring.
Scott
I Got Mugged (by Ryan Rodrick Beiler) ( an extract of the longer article)
Why can't we - both as a society and as a church - do better at providing positive choices for our youth? And for me it is a both/and. I've seen more small-government conservatives willing roll up their sleeves and volunteer as tutors. Meanwhile, it's mostly the justice-minded liberals who march and lobby to end poverty and violence. How can we get more liberals to show up at UFD and more conservatives to advocate? (I know these categories are unfair and far from universal, but I've seen this dynamic over and over in my own church experience.)
Government at every level must do better at making the needed resources available, if for no other reason that the churches simply don't have the resources to do it all on their own. But the church must also be the conscience of the state - challenging not only with words, but by example in serving and caring for those at the margins of society. Conversely, the words of the prophet Jeremiah may inspire the church, but they were originally spoken to a king: "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 the Lord." (Jeremiah 22:15b-16)Consider this as the onslaught of opportunities for "Canned Compassion" wash over us with the holiday season, and look for opportunities to do both justice and mercy, not with band-aids of a march here or a meal there, but with sustained service and activism that seeks real healing for our communities.
Ryan Rodrick Beiler is web editor for Sojourners.
Also, from consideration of poverty ( and DC in part) I strongly suggest that you check out http://speakingoffaith.publicradio.org/programs/seeingpoverty/index.shtml. Either listen, or download and read the transcript. Now that I think about it, a JEPR group discussion on this program would be useful and possibly inspiring.
Scott
I Got Mugged (by Ryan Rodrick Beiler) ( an extract of the longer article)
Why can't we - both as a society and as a church - do better at providing positive choices for our youth? And for me it is a both/and. I've seen more small-government conservatives willing roll up their sleeves and volunteer as tutors. Meanwhile, it's mostly the justice-minded liberals who march and lobby to end poverty and violence. How can we get more liberals to show up at UFD and more conservatives to advocate? (I know these categories are unfair and far from universal, but I've seen this dynamic over and over in my own church experience.)
Government at every level must do better at making the needed resources available, if for no other reason that the churches simply don't have the resources to do it all on their own. But the church must also be the conscience of the state - challenging not only with words, but by example in serving and caring for those at the margins of society. Conversely, the words of the prophet Jeremiah may inspire the church, but they were originally spoken to a king: "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 the Lord." (Jeremiah 22:15b-16)Consider this as the onslaught of opportunities for "Canned Compassion" wash over us with the holiday season, and look for opportunities to do both justice and mercy, not with band-aids of a march here or a meal there, but with sustained service and activism that seeks real healing for our communities.
Ryan Rodrick Beiler is web editor for Sojourners.
Monday, November 12, 2007
U.S. Funded Child Soldiers
http://www.christiancentury.org/article.lasso?id=3763
Kids in combat
U.S.-funded child soldiers
by Dean Peerman
In the decade 1995-2005, 2 million child soldiers were killed and 6 million permanently disabled or injured in armed conflict, according to a United Nations report. Of the estimated 300,000 children (younger than 18) currently serving as soldiers in various parts of the world, some have joined voluntarily, out of economic desperation or for their own safety. Others have been forcibly recruited, trained and deployed by rebel forces. But many are conscripted and used in combat by recognized sovereign governments—at present the governments of nine countries, and eight of the nine receive military assistance from the United States. The eight: Burundi, Chad, Colombia, Côte d'Ivoire, Democratic Republic of Congo, Sri Lanka, Sudan and Uganda.
Some of these exploited children are as young as eight. Sometimes girls as well as boys are recruited—and often the girls are raped or otherwise sexually abused. In addition to being compelled to engage in combat—wielding AK-47 assault rifles and the like, often while hopped-up on drugs—the children may serve in support roles as porters, cooks, guards, medics, messengers, spies, human mine detectors or sex slaves. Children are often targeted as recruits because they are viewed as more malleable and easier to manipulate than adults.
On occasion child soldiers are forced by their commanders to commit grisly ritual killings or engage in torture and mutilation, and sometimes other children are the victims. The child warriors are at great risk not only of physical harm but of severe psychological trauma as well. That trauma is likely to be heightened when the shooting is over and they return home, where they tend to be stigmatized and ostracized and may be disowned by their own families. Since they are without suitable skills and often without means of rehabilitation, the transition to a comparatively normal and productive life is extremely difficult. Generally branded as terrorists by U.S. immigration law, former child soldiers are denied asylum or refugee status.
That U.S. taxpayers' money would be dispensed to finance state-run armies using children is an atrocity in itself. Such funding is also in violation of treaties and agreements to which the U.S. is a signatory, such as the Optional Protocol to the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict—a protocol approved and ratified by the U.S. Senate in 2002. About 125 countries have ratified the protocol, but not all of them enforce it; five of the above-named eight nations are signatories. People who recruit and use child soldiers run little risk of being prosecuted.
Last spring liberal Democrat Dick Durbin of Illinois and conservative Republican Sam Brownback of Kansas introduced the Child Soldiers Prevention Act of 2007 in the Senate. Designed to end the use of children in hostilities around the world, the measure encourages governments to "disarm, demobilize and rehabilitate child soldiers from government forces and government-supported militias." While putting restrictions on U.S. assistance to child-using militaries, the bill would not immediately cut off such aid but would allow for a phase-out period of up to two years, during which the U.S. would help the affected countries to professionalize their armed forces and to provide therapy and reeducation for former child soldiers and restore them to society.
A coalition of NGOs—headed by Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International USA, the Center for Defense Information and the Christian humanitarian organization World Vision—is strongly backing the bill. One of the arguments advanced by this coalition: "It is . . . in our own national interest to reduce the incidence of child soldiers in the world: our commanders do not want U.S. troops to confront the spectacle of an armed child in a combat situation."
Speaking about the child-soldiers bill to fellow senators, Durbin quoted Cicero's dictum that "in times of war, the law falls silent," then went on to say: "We must prove Cicero wrong. Even during times of war, the law should never fall silent for the most vulnerable among us—our children."
The bill is still in committee and has yet to come up for debate, much less for a vote. A similar bill is pending in the House.
On October 1 the United Nations held a meeting to reaffirm political support for the Paris Principles—a multination pledge not to use children to wage war that was signed in Paris last February. The U.S. participated in neither the Paris conference nor the October meeting at the UN.
Kids in combat
U.S.-funded child soldiers
by Dean Peerman
In the decade 1995-2005, 2 million child soldiers were killed and 6 million permanently disabled or injured in armed conflict, according to a United Nations report. Of the estimated 300,000 children (younger than 18) currently serving as soldiers in various parts of the world, some have joined voluntarily, out of economic desperation or for their own safety. Others have been forcibly recruited, trained and deployed by rebel forces. But many are conscripted and used in combat by recognized sovereign governments—at present the governments of nine countries, and eight of the nine receive military assistance from the United States. The eight: Burundi, Chad, Colombia, Côte d'Ivoire, Democratic Republic of Congo, Sri Lanka, Sudan and Uganda.
Some of these exploited children are as young as eight. Sometimes girls as well as boys are recruited—and often the girls are raped or otherwise sexually abused. In addition to being compelled to engage in combat—wielding AK-47 assault rifles and the like, often while hopped-up on drugs—the children may serve in support roles as porters, cooks, guards, medics, messengers, spies, human mine detectors or sex slaves. Children are often targeted as recruits because they are viewed as more malleable and easier to manipulate than adults.
On occasion child soldiers are forced by their commanders to commit grisly ritual killings or engage in torture and mutilation, and sometimes other children are the victims. The child warriors are at great risk not only of physical harm but of severe psychological trauma as well. That trauma is likely to be heightened when the shooting is over and they return home, where they tend to be stigmatized and ostracized and may be disowned by their own families. Since they are without suitable skills and often without means of rehabilitation, the transition to a comparatively normal and productive life is extremely difficult. Generally branded as terrorists by U.S. immigration law, former child soldiers are denied asylum or refugee status.
That U.S. taxpayers' money would be dispensed to finance state-run armies using children is an atrocity in itself. Such funding is also in violation of treaties and agreements to which the U.S. is a signatory, such as the Optional Protocol to the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child on the Involvement of Children in Armed Conflict—a protocol approved and ratified by the U.S. Senate in 2002. About 125 countries have ratified the protocol, but not all of them enforce it; five of the above-named eight nations are signatories. People who recruit and use child soldiers run little risk of being prosecuted.
Last spring liberal Democrat Dick Durbin of Illinois and conservative Republican Sam Brownback of Kansas introduced the Child Soldiers Prevention Act of 2007 in the Senate. Designed to end the use of children in hostilities around the world, the measure encourages governments to "disarm, demobilize and rehabilitate child soldiers from government forces and government-supported militias." While putting restrictions on U.S. assistance to child-using militaries, the bill would not immediately cut off such aid but would allow for a phase-out period of up to two years, during which the U.S. would help the affected countries to professionalize their armed forces and to provide therapy and reeducation for former child soldiers and restore them to society.
A coalition of NGOs—headed by Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International USA, the Center for Defense Information and the Christian humanitarian organization World Vision—is strongly backing the bill. One of the arguments advanced by this coalition: "It is . . . in our own national interest to reduce the incidence of child soldiers in the world: our commanders do not want U.S. troops to confront the spectacle of an armed child in a combat situation."
Speaking about the child-soldiers bill to fellow senators, Durbin quoted Cicero's dictum that "in times of war, the law falls silent," then went on to say: "We must prove Cicero wrong. Even during times of war, the law should never fall silent for the most vulnerable among us—our children."
The bill is still in committee and has yet to come up for debate, much less for a vote. A similar bill is pending in the House.
On October 1 the United Nations held a meeting to reaffirm political support for the Paris Principles—a multination pledge not to use children to wage war that was signed in Paris last February. The U.S. participated in neither the Paris conference nor the October meeting at the UN.
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