I've been having little arguments with myself all week: on one hand, like many good Americans, I believe in the idea and potential and creativity and wonder of individuals. I believe that the mind, for example, is a fathomless miracle. I believe that individuals have certain rights to freedom and self-determination.
Yet at the same time, everything that we are has been given us. We carry in our bodies the genes of thousands if not millions of ancestors; we have been brought to this moment — every moment — by people whose care and attention and patience have loved us imperfectly along. And, of course, by the God who has loved us into being.
Those of us who have the gift of being able to read and write often also have the ability to learn and to choose — to choose where to live and with whom, to choose what to think and to believe and to consume. And that, compared to how most people have lived and do live, is an almost unimaginable luxury. We can choose.
“I Am Congo” is a groundbreaking video series featuring five amazing people living their lives amid the deadliest war in the world.
Christians are called upon to tell and retell the story of hope, grace, and change that we see acted out in the scriptures. It is through hearing and responding to this story that our own lives and stories are transformed today. It is through the telling of stories that we learn about the lives and worlds of those who live next door or those who are halfway across the world.
Extreme poverty, famine, war, and disease can seem like overwhelming problems with no hope or solution. But faith can move the largest mountains even in our world today.
These are stories of hope. These are the stories of the people who call the Democratic Republic of Congo home—in their own words.
In eastern Congo, we meet a human rights lawyer who fled a volcanic eruption with just her law book and became an advocate for rape survivors. An artist pulls together a film and music festival every year in a city with few paved roads, let alone a theater. In a national park bigger than Yosemite, a conservationist protects endangered mountain gorillas caught in the middle of decades of conflict.
“I Am Congo”— a series more than a year in the making by the Enough Project’s Raise Hope for Congo campaign—features professional video storytelling on an issue largely ignored by the mainstream media and unknown to many.
The goal is simple: to introduce more people to the Congo and empower them with solutions to help end the conflict there.
Too often, stories from Congo focus on the extremes: either killing, raping, and crushing poverty or “feel-good” stories that ignore the chaos. These extremes not only fail to capture the full picture of Congo; it leads many to turn away.
“I am Congo” tells the full story of the Congo and its juxtapositions: natural beauty collides with decay; humanity struggles against a constant drumbeat of war; brave community leaders overcome personal tragedies to fight the status quo of corruption and conflict.
I Am Congo – Faith Leads to Hope, is intended to highlight the work that God is already doing in a war-torn region of the world and raise awareness among Christians to the conditions and struggles of God’s children around the world.
"From a scientific standpoint, what's legitimate and fair to say is that a woman who is raped has the same chances of getting pregnant as a woman who engaged in consensual intercourse during the same time in her menstrual cycle," said Dr. Barbara Levy, vice president for health policy at the American Congress of Obstetricians and Gynecologists.
One widely accepted study suggests a 5 percent pregnancy rate following rape, resulting in 32,000 pregnancies each year.
The report was from the Medical University of South Carolina and was published in the American Journal of Obstetrics and Gynecology and cited by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
But placing an exact figure on post-rape pregnancy is problematic, primarily because rape is thought to be underreported. Another factor is the availability of over-the-counter emergency contraception, which can prevent fertilization when taken after intercourse.
One study from the journal Human Nature in 2003 suggests pregnancy rates are higher after a rape when compared with consensual sex because of the inconsistency of birth control use.
As international concern about U.S. targeted killings with drones rises, Ben Emmerson, UN Special Rapporteur on Human Rights and Counter-Terrorism, said Sunday that every drone strike should be impartially investigated. According to Common Dreams,
"Emmerson is preparing a report for the next session of the Human Rights Council in March covering the use of drone attacks, which have spiked since Obama's presidency.
He questioned the legality of the drone strikes and noted the growing global outrage over their use. ‘We can't make a decision on whether it is lawful or unlawful if we do not have the data. The recommendation I have made is that users of targeted killing technology should be required to subject themselves, in the case of each and every death, to impartial investigation. If they do not establish a mechanism to do so, it will be my recommendation that the UN should put the mechanisms in place through the Human Rights Council, the General Assembly and the Office of the High Commissioner.’”
This comes as a flurry of drone strikes along the Pakistan-Afghanistan border in the last four days have killed at least 18 people. Reuters reports that six people were killed in an attack on Saturday, five early on Sunday, and two more later on Sunday near the location of the previous strike. These attacks came as celebrations of the Eid al-Fitr festival, marking the end of Ramadan, were occurring. Tuesday, a further strike killed five, according to the Associated Press.
Mr. Emmerson’s call for investigations is an important step, one that will hopefully mark the beginning of the end for drones as killing machines.
Among my must reads are the Sunday New York Times Book Review and other book reviews I come across in various media outlets. There are too many books being published that I would love to read, but just don’t have the time. So, I rely on reading book reviews as one way of keeping in touch with what’s being written.
Here are my picks of this week’s books.
Ever since the global financial cabal drove the world's economies into a ditch, popular movements have been rising up to fight "austerity measures" that exact punishment on the poor and leave the rich untouched. This is a familiar biblical meme for the definition of injustice. The words of the prophet Jeremiah come to mind: "Your clothes are stained with the blood of the poor and innocent" (Jeremiah 2:34).
"When Spanish mayor Juan Manuel Sánchez Gordillo recently led farmers on a supermarket sweep, raiding the local shops for food as part of a campaign against austerity, his political immunity as an elected assembly member protected him from arrest. He now asks other local mayors to ignore central government demands for budget cuts and refuse to implement evictions and lay-offs. In this era of austerity, such flagrant disrespect for the law ought to be encouraged. Sometimes, the greatest strength of popular movements is their capacity to disrupt. So here, for the benefit of imaginative indignados, are five examples of civil disobedience:
Shrill voices, backed by vast ad spending, are trying to turn Americans against each other. And not just in vocal and behavioral disagreement, but to a depth of fear and hatred that could turn violent with little provocation.
Is it working?
To judge by the shrill echoes of shrill voices, the right wing is arming for battle, with God on their side, the flag as their shield, and the future of a white Christian nation at stake. Foolhardy politicians egg them on, and the greedy rich seem to believe that they can turn this hatred on and off to suit their quest for tax breaks.
Do the shrill represent any force larger than their own passions? Will the common-sense middle prove more durable and extensive than zealots want to believe?