Justice work is good work. It is a high calling. It deserves great effort and exertion. But in today’s world, if our work in the realms of social justice mimics the exhausting routine of the fiercely competitive struggle for wealth and power, we would do well to take a moment to consider the biblical rhythm of Sabbath.
The esteemed rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel wrote in The Sabbath that the holy day serves as a “sanctuary in time.” The invitation of the Sabbath is a summons to dwell in the eternality of time, he wrote, to turn from “the results of creation to the mystery of creation, from the world of creation to the creation of the world.”
“A Muslim mosque cannot be subjected to a different land-use approval process than a Christian church simply because local protesters oppose the mosque,” reads the brief from almost 20 religious and civil rights groups.
The root causes of Islamophobia are intolerance and misinformation, causes that come in all sorts of ugly packages like anti-Semitism, religious bigotry, sexism, and even racism. Islamophobia is just one way that our own insecurities, fueled by bigotry and a lack of information, come back to haunt us in a very real way.
Tracing God’s indomitable shalom throughout Scripture, The Very Good Gospel celebrates the blessed web of creation where the flourishing of one is the flourishing of all. Devoting nearly 20 pages to shalom between the genders, Lisa Sharon Harper considers her own experiences in Christian ministry where too often God’s gifts to women are shamed and marginalized. Harper challenges the theological distortions that rob men and women of that blessed partnership beaming throughout the pages of Scripture.
If I were to share my understanding of the gospel to my ancestors who walked the Cherokee Trail of Tears (according to family oral tradition) and slaved in South Carolina and Virginia (according to Census Slave Schedules), would they receive my simple understanding of Jesus’ “good news” as good news? Would they jump for joy to find out “God has a wonderful plan for their lives, but they are sinful and therefore separated from God, but Jesus died for their sin, so if they pray a simple prayer they get to go to heaven?”
If this news would not lead my oppressed ancestors to shout with joy, then maybe it’s not good news at all — or at least it’s not good enough.
The Association of Baptists for World Evangelism has released a 280-page report revealing how its leaders failed to stop a leading missionary surgeon from sexually abusing 22 women and girls.
It’s a story as familiar to small, neighborhood churches as it is to large megachurches, though those are the ones that grab headlines.
Better dead clean, than alive unclean.
That Mormon mantra apparently was ringing in a young Brigham Young University student’s mind in 1979 as she leapt from a would-be attacker’s car on the freeway.
Hollywood, take notice.
The silver screen has been looking pretty white, and even those films that have more diverse casts haven’t been getting the recognition many think that they deserve, as #OscarsSoWhite can attest.
The White House announced May 10 that President Obama will travel to Hiroshima, Japan, reports The New York Times.
This will be the first time a sitting U.S. president has visited the city where the U.S. dropped an atomic bomb at the end of World War II.