Christianity

The Fast for a Moral Budget Goes Viral

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From the listserve at a Unitarian Universalist congregation today, a classic Tikkunish rumination, a discovery by a humanist that religious progressives (in this case our good friends at Sojourners) can be inspiring allies:
I find myself connecting to an evangelical Christian organization, Sojourners, even though I’m a died-in-the-wool humanist… because of their message and action around social justice. I subscribe to their magazine as well as their e-newsletter, SojoMail. This group has turned me around from feeling uncomfortable about their theological positions to very appreciative of their social justice positions. Right now they are in the midst of a fast so that they can focus in on what’s really important with our national “budget debate” and that we can turn towards a moral budget.

Christianity

Christian Right calls Christian Left "A Rising Power"

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According to a recent post by the Family Research Council, “the Christian Left is a rising power in American politics, finding allies at all levels of government. Arguably, the movement played an important role in electing Barack Obama to the presidency in 2008.” In the following video, Dr. Mark Smith of Cedarville University gives a very interesting and informative (albeit long) lecture on the differences between the Christian Right and the Christian Left. At the end of the talk, Smith offers his own critique of the Christian Left’s call for government intervention to create a more socially just society:

1) Government-imposed social justice is unjust because plans for redistribution cannot distinguish between those who are rich or poor through oppression and those who deserve their status. According to Smith many poor people “deserve to be poor through their behavior” — as Proverbs puts it, through their “laziness,” “love of sleep,” “love of pleasure,” “love of food,” and “love of wine.”

Christianity

‘Of Gods and Men’: A film of enormous spiritual power

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A little-noted outgrowth of the current wave of popular upheaval sweeping the Arab world is that Algeria’s nearly 20 year rein of martial law has been lifted. Most of the 1990s were marked by a savage civil war that pitted a variety of Islamist insurgent groups against Algeria’s military regime and against each other. By the time it petered out early in the 2000’s, the massacre of whole villages, urban bombings, shootouts and assassinations had claimed 150,000 to 200,000 lives. Eventually, this conflict engulfed the French Cistercian Trappist monastery situated in a remote village, where its monks were much loved by their Muslim-Arab neighbors. They incorporated them into their everyday lives, even inviting them to family weddings and other life-cycle events.

Christianity

Values at Davos? Jim Wallis' Moral Economics

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Jim Wallis, at Sojourners, walks a tightrope that gains him many critics. He is probably the best known “left” evangelical Christian in America, and yet he eschews the term “left.” He prefers to use the word “moral” and wants to see a moral politics, a moral federal budget, moral business, etc. And when he says “moral” he means primarily following the Bible’s injunctions to help the poor, the prisoner, the sick. What’s not to like about that?

Christianity

The Prince of Peace is not the God of War

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For those who follow the Christian tradition, Christmas is a time of hope and promise in the unlikely person of a child. It is a time of celebrating the birth of the one spoken of by the prophet Isaiah and heralded by Handel as the “Prince of Peace.” Yet religion and war have become so grotesquely interconnected that we can scarcely tell them apart. Indeed, to suggest that war is antithetical to the message of Jesus is to risk accusations of treason, heresy or both. Most people are unaware that for the first few hundred years of the Church, Christians were total pacifists.

Christianity

From a Jew on Christmas Eve

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At the last Tikkun gathering that I attended back in February one of the speakers talked about how Jews and Christians are united in their discomfort about the fact that Jesus was Jewish. So I laughed with everyone else, and have shared this insight with many others since, and still see that I personally love it that he was Jewish, because I feel a sense of connection with him that is rendered more meaningful this way. Which almost begs the question: how would a Jewish woman born and raised in Israel develop a sense of connection with Jesus? Loving No Matter What
The year was 1991. I was having a fight with a friend during and after a back-packing trip.

Christianity

Requiem for a Holy Tree

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The veneration of trees pre-dates Christianity and no doubt all organized world religions. The tree is a source of life, offering shelter, food, habitat, fuel, soil preservation and enrichment—not to mention breathable air.