 QUOTE OF THE WEEK |
We in Gaza are 1.5 million people in need of immediate psychotherapy. But the children especially. They have experienced severe trauma. They should cry. They should shout. But the way they are talking about this tragedy, it's not normal.
- Issam Younis, director general of the al-Mezan Center for Human Rights in Gaza. At least 280 children were among the 1,300 Palestinians killed in Gaza. Thirteen Israelis died in the war, including three civilians. (Source: The Washington Post)
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Davos: How Will This Crisis Change Us?
In a plenary session titled “The Values behind Market Capitalism” yesterday at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, I started with this observation:
Every morning when I wake up in Davos, I turn on my television to CNN in my hotel room. And every morning, there is the same reporter interviewing a bundled-up CEO with the snowy “magic mountain” of Davos in the background. The question is always the same: “When will this crisis be over?” They actually have a “white board” where they make the CEO mark his answer: 2009, 2010, 2011, later.
But it’s the wrong question. Of course it’s a question we all want to know the answer to, but there is a much more important one. We should be asking, “How will this crisis change us?” How will it change the way we think, act, and decide things, how we live, and how we do business? Yes, this is a structural crisis, and one that clearly calls for new social regulation. But it is also a spiritual crisis, and one that calls for new self-regulation. We seem to have lost some things and forgotten some things -- such as our values.
We have trusted in “the invisible hand” to make everything turn out all right, believing that it wasn’t necessary for us to bring virtue to bear on our decisions. But things haven’t turned out all right and the invisible hand has let go of some things, such as “the common good.” The common good hasn’t been very common in our economic decision-making for some time now. And things have spun out of control. Gandhi’s seven deadly social sins seem an accurate diagnosis for some of the causes of this crisis: “politics without principle, wealth without work, commerce without morality, pleasure without conscience, education without character, science without humanity, and worship without sacrifice.”
If we learn nothing from this crisis, all the pain and suffering it is causing will be in vain. But we can learn new habits of the heart, perhaps that suffering can even turn out to be redemptive. If we can regain a moral compass and find new metrics by which to evaluate our success, this crisis could become our opportunity to change.
Wednesday I attended an extraordinary session here called “Helping Others in a Post-Crisis World.” It was full of the insights of social entrepreneurs and innovative philanthropists, all discussing new patterns of social enterprise -- where capitalism is again in the service of big ideas and big solutions, not just making money. But the session was held in a small room, not a big hall. And it wasn’t full. New ideas of business with a social purpose have surfaced here at Davos before, but, as in the global economy, social conscience is a sidebar to business. Social purposes have become “extracurricular” to business. It’s time for the sidebar to become mainstream and move to the main hall of discussion and to the center of the way we do business.
If we wait until the economic crisis is over to get back to business as usual, we will have missed the chance we now have for re-evaluation and re-direction. Some of the smartest people in the world are assembled here on the mountain. But are we smart enough not to miss the opportunity this crisis provides to change our ways and return to some of our oldest and best values? Almost half the world’s population, 3 billion people, live on less than $2 a day -- virtually outside of the global economy. Maybe it's time to bring them in.
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How-To Video: Contemplative Prayer
 Sojourners editors Rose Marie Berger and Jeannie Choi demonstrate simple contemplative prayer practices that anyone can adopt into their own worship habits. In part one, Rose and Jeannie talk about contemplative prayer and learn how to do a simple prayer exercise that uses the verse, "Be still and know that I am God," to center one's heart on God. In part two, Rose teaches Jeannie about Lectio Divina, a meditative reading of the Bible that encourages prayerful reflection.
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| ON THE GOD'S POLITICS BLOG |
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Video: Inauguration Eve Interview with Moby
by Matt Hildreth
Last week, the SojoTube team had a chance to sit down with DJ, songwriter, and musician Moby--between all-night DJ sets--to talk about music and politics on the eve of Barack Obama's historic inauguration.
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When Jesus and Justice Kiss
by Shane Claiborne
It seems that much of our conversation as a church is in a perpetual cycle of reaction. We are tempted to exaggerate the neglected truth, and end up making incomplete disciples, either social justice disciples without Jesus or Jesus disciples without social justice. Then there are those special moments where Jesus and Justice kiss. I recently had a moment of that kind of romance, in Australia.
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A Controversial Approach to Healing Northern Ireland's Violent Past
by Gareth Higgins
I can't over-emphasize how important it may be for people to read, whether or not they have any connection with Northern Ireland. We in Northern Ireland were stunned by the ongoing, repeating, and spiraling wounds of our recent past, and it has taken more than a decade to get to the stage of even starting to negotiate our future together.
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Beyond Gaza: An Abrahamic Peace
by Rabbi Arthur Waskow
Beyond anguish, what can we say about the massive death and destruction in Gaza and the traumatic fear of falling rockets in Israel? How do we shape not just the temporary palliative of "cease-fire," but a true alternative? Not just in pretty theory, but in political practicality?
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Bringing Word and Music Together Against Poverty
by Martin Smith
I am very honoured and excited to be invited to the Mobilization to End Poverty in April. This is a time in history when the music and the word have to come together for full impact as God gathers a new army that doesn't just raise its hands in praise but raises them in anger at the injustice of poverty and oppression.
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'Yes, We Did' - But What Will We Do Now?
by Kaitlin Barker
Barack Obama, though an inspiring, courageous, and hard-working man, is still just a man. We must hear not only what we want to, but pay attention to his oft-used pronoun – we. Obama has never said, "Yes, I can." It's always intentionally been "Yes, we can." And now it's become "Yes, we did," a tense change that threatens to leave us patting our backs and sitting back to watch what happens next.
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A 'Just Peace' President?
by Valerie Elverton Dixon
If this Gaza war teaches us anything, if the tragic history of wars in the Middle East teaches us anything, it is that when people are determined to obtain weapons and fight, war goes on and solves nothing. Thankfully, both sides have declared unilateral cease-fires even as sporadic violence continues. However, the first moves by President Obama regarding the Middle East signal a paradigm shift.
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Service Careers Still Valued Less than 'Real Jobs'
by Julie Clawson
Apparently those of us who choose to devote our lives to serving others for little to no pay somehow fail to be full human beings in society's definition of the term. Even within the church, which values mothers and pastors in its own way, we still aren't considered as worthwhile or important as others in more traditional buy/sell/trade/manufacture money-making professions.
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JFK, Resurrection, and Post-Modern Christianity: Books for a New Year
by Molly Marsh
As you've probably surmised over the last few weeks, we asked God's Politics contributors to send us some of their favorite books of 2008. Here are a few more to add to your list....
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God Showing Up in Older Women
by Nadia Bolz-Weber
It's happened twice in as many months: God showing up in an older woman. A stranger offering me her blessing. Not offering it so much as insisting on it, now that I think about it. I had no idea what to do about the first time.
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'The Needs of the Poor Take Priority Over the Desires of the Rich'
by Fernando Laguarda
As a Catholic, I have been taught about the importance of the poor in the gospel and the social teaching of the church. As we contemplate the New Year, the inauguration of a new government into office, and our own plans and challenges, I would like to suggest that we incorporate the poor especially into our own thinking and the decisions we make for ourselves and our public policy.
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Gaza: A War Without Winners
by J. Daryl Byler
I began a fast for peace when Israeli troops entered the Gaza Strip. Last week, I ended the fast, as fighting has stopped and most if not all the troops have left Gaza. This is a fragile cease-fire at best -- and perhaps one of the strangest in the history of human conflict. Each side has declared a unilateral cease-fire on its own terms, while refusing to talk to the other or acknowledge the other's terms.
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Lift Every Voice
by Mary Nelson
I was there at the Lincoln Memorial Opening Inaugural Event, the Inauguration ? tears of past memories and future hopes slid down my cheeks. Memories of marching with King in Chicago, of the riots and destruction in our west side community, and of those in the struggle now long gone filled my mind. The words of "Lift Every Voice and Sing" stayed with me.
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Looking for Allies at the World Economic Forum in Davos
by Jim Wallis
Some have noted that they would expect me to be protesting outside of the WEF and not a participant in it. While it would not be hard to find "enemies" to fight here at Davos, I find my time much better spent looking for allies. Over the past few years, I have seen from at least some business leaders across the world a growing desire to understand morality in the midst of markets.
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Obama: 'Talk is Cheap'
by Seth Naicker
From rhetoric and actions, one can affirm that President Obama is enacting empathy and not just allowing it to be a case of "more was said than done." In a post-Obama inauguration era, Sekunjalo ("now is the time") for leaders and people to get engaged in moving from justice pursuit with their lips, to justice pursuit with their hands and feet.
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President Obama's Call for Common Ground on Abortion Reduction
by Jim Wallis
I am encouraged that President Obama's first action on abortion was to release a statement supporting a common-ground approach to reducing abortion, even as he also reiterated his policy of supporting legal choice.
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When One Suffers, All Suffer
by Mimi Haddad
Have you ever noticed how scripture celebrates our interdependence, our mutuality, and our oneness as the church? To be members of Christ's body gives new meaning, fellowship, and comfort to us in our weaknesses and suffering.
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Hope Replaces Cynicism: Reflections on the Inauguration
by Soong-Chan Rah
Our ecclesiology reflects a church that moves through the despair and destruction of the world like Noah's Ark. Why bother working toward social justice when the world is destined for destruction anyway? Even our theology becomes doom and gloom rather than one of hope and promise. I am a part of that cynical generation.
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Readings on War, Happiness, and Cultural Amnesia
by Bart Campolo
Need a good book? Check out some of these titles....
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The Next Stage in the Fight Against Torture
by David Gushee
The Bush detainee policies had thrown off the moral gyroscopes of many people, perhaps especially evangelicals, with their so-often reflexive Republican and Bush loyalties. If President Bush had ordered or permitted something, it must be right. If anyone was opposed to it, they must be partisans, liberals, irrationalists, or heretics.
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Torture and the Currency of Human Rights
by Chuck Gutenson
Fear is a terrible motivator if the desired outcome is wise and civilized practices. While I am sure some of us will have principled disagreement with President Obama over the next years of his service, we are buoyed by his consistent call to us to be motivated by the better angels of our nature -- by hope, rather than fear.
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Slumdog Millionaire’s India: My Sobering Reality
by Joseph D'souza
The movie Slumdog Millionaire and the Booker Prize-winning novel White Tiger have highlighted the non-shiny part of India. Far from exploiting poverty, these are stories about India that demand a global response -- especially for the sake of the children. This is the India of 80% of the population -- the India of the slums, the outcasts, the exploited, and of abject poverty.
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| SOJOURNERS IN THE NEWS |
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Top Stories:
Q&A With Reverend Jim Wallis
Time Magazine
For more than three decades, liberal evangelical leader Jim Wallis has been stubbornly preaching into the wind, telling fellow evangelicals that they need to do something about poverty and urging fellow liberals to partner with religious communities. Now, after years of being drowned out by the Religious Right, Wallis finds himself a most unusual position: he has the ear of the man in the Oval Office. Wallis was one of a small group of religious leaders who participated in the national prayer service that followed Barack Obama's Inauguration.
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Pro-Lifers In Obamaland
Newsweek
But while the majority of pro-lifers may be preparing for an escalated battle, there is a small group that sees the change in Washington as an opportunity to reshape some of the movement's core principles. "In this context, no matter what your convictions are, we're not going to change the rule of the law," says Jim Wallis, who directs Sojourners, a progressive evangelical group. "Even if Roe is repealed, it just goes back to the states." Wallis, who is pro-life, and other progressive leaders are trying out a strategy that has so far failed to gain much traction on either side of the debate: "Let's look at results. How do you really reduce abortion? You support women's health care, you promote involved fatherhood. I think those programs are significant if you're saving unborn lives."
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Davos Notes: Contrition, Paralysis, and the Embrace of Faith and Philanthropy Take Hold
The Huffington Post
Memorable words from Day 2 of World Economic Forum
The Associated Press
Pro-life leaders criticise Obama for reversing Mexico City policy
Catholic News Service
Funding Restored to Groups That Perform Abortions, Other Care
The Washington Post
Obama reverses abortion aid ban
The Washington Times
A Diverse First Presidential Morning Prayer
The New York Times
The role of religion under Obama
The Christian Science Monitor
"Sojourners in the news" articles are the most recent news clippings that mention Sojourners in any way - whether favorably or unfavorably. Though we provide the text on our site for your convenience, we do not necessarily endorse the views of these articles or their source publications. |
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