The Iowa State University Extension is offering a workshop in our area entitled “Living with Less,” giving folks advice on coping with the current economic downturn.
I think we needed workshops about ten years ago on “Living with More!” Perhaps if we had, if we had better learned how to use the good times to benefit our communities at large instead of “everybody for him/herself” … we might not be in the situation we are now.
From inward/outward, a quote from G. K. Chesterton:
There are two ways to get enough: One is to continue to accumulate more and more. The other is to desire less.
Dr. Joseph Lowery's benediction for the inauguration of Barack Obama
Click on the link above to hear again this powerful and inspiring prayer …
I enjoyed Elane O’Rourke’s New Year’s Day post: on the premise that whatever one does on New Year’s Day one will do all year. It is fun, reflective, and disarmingly honest … about her reactions to the events of the year and about the status of her relationship with the Big G(al/uy)!
Here’s an excerpt:
Last night, my wonderful husband also asked: so how is your relationship with God these days? And I was able to answer, confidently: peachy. God and I are doing really well, like comfortable old friends who occupy a room together, occasionally chatting, doing things together and apart. When I feel distant, I know it’s just me — that I need to pick up the phone and call.
Wow! Peachy? Wouldn’t it be great to have such a sense of freedom and assurance and trust about your relationship with the living God? I pray that it may be so, that the bonds between God and you in this new year will be just peachy!
And I pray that when you feel distant, as you will, you will recognize it is just you, and you will “pick up the phone …”
As reported today by Reuters:
President-elect Barack Obama has chosen a pastor who opposes gay marriage as a speaker at his inauguration, creating a commotion over what inclusiveness will mean for his administration.
Obama chose Rick Warren, the evangelical pastor of the southern California megachurch Saddleback, to give the invocation when he takes office in January.
The president-elect on Thursday said that he held views “absolutely contrary” to Warren on gay rights and abortion and described himself as “a fierce advocate for equality for gay and lesbian Americans.”
“During the course of the entire inaugural festivities, there are going to be a wide range of viewpoints that are presented. And that’s how it should be, because that’s what America is about. That’s part of the magic of this country is that we are diverse and noisy and opinionated,” he said.
Obama’s choice of Warren has raised an outcry among gay rights activists and progressive religious leaders. Chuck Currie, a UCC colleague, expressed his disappointment in this blog post: Rick Warren Wrong Voice For Inauguration.
I am deeply troubled that President-elect Obama has invited Rick Warren to offer the invocation at the inauguration. Warren stands opposed to the progressive agenda and to many of the core values that Barack Obama campaigned on. The symbolism of offering such as prodigious place in history to a figure such as Warren is upsetting.
I am no fan of Rick Warren. Nor am I very enamored of Barack Obama’s decision to invite him to participate in the inauguration ceremonies. However, I can defend the choice and do understand the reasoning behind it.
In my mind, what makes Obama an unusual, and almost unique, candidate, is his willingness to listen and grant respect to his political opponents. He really does believe at his core that we rise and fall together as a people — black and white, blue and read, conservative and liberal. One “side” does not have a monopoly on truth or virtue, and we are great weakened as a nation when we play up and exploit our differences.
Many certainly have hoped that his election will mean a raising of the “liberal” flag, and a renewed opportunity to promote “progressive”causes. And that may well prove to be the case. But Obama, I think, genuinely wants to do something new, something different, not to represent this constituency or that advocacy group, but to work hard at getting people talking with each other, not just at each other.
Our nation is bitterly divided over so many issues: gay rights and abortion and health care and environmental stewardship. If we simply “play the game” as we always have, holding hard and fast to the “party line,” and demonizing the opposition, we will get the results we always have, namely a lot of heat and not much light … and not much progress in making people’s lives better and safer and more just.
It strikes me that Jesus managed to upset most of the people at least some of the time. It would be hard to pin him down as a classic conservative or liberal, because he was not the advocate of a cause or a constituency or a philosophy, but an advocate of obedience to the will of God. Conservatives and liberals both have found sufficient ammunition in his sayings to support their causes, but if either would listen to him carefully enough, it would surely give them pause …
I applaud Obama, not for the choice of Warren, but for sticking to his vision of a united America, of a new kind of dialogue.
At what point do we move past the description of all that we are against and actually take an active stand for something? When do we stop just talking about religion and wishing others would be more like us and instead start doing the things Jesus asked us to do? If over a thousand women could devote an afternoon to high tea and hearing about how we should resist the culture, how awesome would it be if that many women instead took an afternoon to be the hands and feet of Jesus to this hurting world?
Good questions, Julie! Read the rest of Julie Clawson’s post: Questioning the ‘Survivor’ Mentality of Some Christians.
I agree that sometimes, perhaps most of the time, we get it backwards. We want to defend Jesus (which is to defend ourselves and our faith stance), rather than follow him. We want to prove ourselves right, rather than do what is right. They will know we are Christians by our …
Notice the Wonder was posted today on the inward/outward website. It quotes Abraham Heschel, a theologian and a lover of God whom I have always found most insightful and eloquent.
To pray is to take notice of the wonder, to regain a sense of the mystery that animates all beings, the divine margin in all attainments. Prayer is our humble answer to the inconceivable surprise of living. It is all we can offer in return for the mystery by which we live. Who is worthy to be present at the constant unfolding of time? Amidst the meditation of mountains, the humility of flowers wiser than all alphabets—clouds that die constantly for the sake of god’s glory, we are hating, hunting, hurting. Suddenly we feel ashamed of our clashes and complaints in the face of the tacit glory in nature. It is so embarrassing to live! How strange we are in the world, and how presumptuous our doings! Only one response can maintain us: gratefulness for witnessing the wonder, for the gift of our unearned rights to serve, to adore, and to fulfill. It is gratefulness which makes the soul great.