Waving or Drowning?

Mere Belief

Those who have walked this transformative journey through death to resurrection (“the Paschal Mystery”) are the ones who have the authority to say” I know God.” They are drawing upon a Life larger than their own. It is not a belief system but an actual “knowing”. Instead of just “I believe there is a God”, God becomes a “well springing up within us” (John 4:14), a lived experience and a constant Presence.

So what if you believe there is a God? Is the Gospel a giant college entrance exam? I believe there is a God myself, but—big deal—that’s just in the head. It asks almost nothing of me. It doesn’t change my life or yours. Mere belief systems largely create defensive and offensive people trying to prove that my God is better than your God, and I am better than you. Is this not evident from our history? Most groups defended their petty image of God and religion, even with war and torture, with little concern for the poor, the outsider, and those who had to suffer because of their beliefs. Jesus went wherever the pain was, and far too often, we have instead been the creators of pain for others. We have been in the wrong place and utterly wrong position to meet the real Jesus.

(Richard Rohr, Adapted from The Authority of Those Who Have Suffered, emphasis mine)

Contrast, or...

...Old Life & New

Nairobi Billboard

We're alive and well in Nairobi, on the run, with little time for blogging. As I tweeted a few minutes ago, this country is crazy about Obama. For that reason this billboard caught my eye as we negotiated the insane city centre traffic this afternoon.

A Wall or a Window?

"To give people answers to questions they have not yet struggled with or suffered for makes those very answers more a wall than a window. The answers are not deeply understood or subtly felt, and they tend to be used to block further experience; or worse, to find real inner experience of God unnecessary. All you need to do is follow outer authorities or texts, and obey laws. This creates the passive, aggressive, and largely un-transformative religion that we have today. The Gospel offers us so much more."

Richard Rohr, Adapted from The Authority of Those Who Have Suffered

Alive and Well...

In Bujumbura, Burundi!

To Africa With Love IV

In just a few hours Pete, Daniel and I will be heading for the airport. After a whirlwind 9 hours in London, we're off to Nairobi, Kenya then connecting right through to Bujumbura, Burundi. We leave Monday afternoon and arrive Wednesday morning!

Thanks for your thoughts and prayers, and a special thank you to those  who have decided to participate in this trip and have contributed to our "grassroots philanthropy" fund. All those who contributed through the ChipIn widget, and those who have sent along cash and cheques. All together we are taking close to $3000 with us to dispense.

We'll be blogging when we can, and when we return we'll be providing details to those of you who have contributed financially. We want you to know exactly what your generosity has done for others.

Peace.

Hear Me Now

No words needed here, except to point you to The Green Children Foundation.

Blessed Are The Peacemakers

Blessed are the peacemakers: they shall be recognized as children of God.
~ Matthew 5:9

A peacemaker is the one who reconciles quarrels and overcomes conflicts, first of all within himself or herself. Clearly you can see Jesus is not on the side of the violent but on the side of the non-violent, yet we did not have the English word “non-violence” until the 1950’s. You do not have a word for something that is not even in your consciousness.

It is almost impossible to believe how most of Christian history was unable to hear Jesus’ rather explicit teaching on non-violence. It seems that we started, encouraged, idealized, and fought in most wars that were ever available to us. The only time—until very recently—that a Pope ever condemned a war was when the Turks invaded the Papal States! But, thank God, there were a few smaller groups like the Mennonites, Quakers, and Amish who always took Jesus’ teaching seriously.

Jesus is saying there must be a clear consistency, a constant unity between our means and the ends we hope to achieve. There is no way to peace other than peacemaking itself. How you get there is always where you finally arrive.

Richard Rohr, Adapted from Jesus’ Plan for a New World, p.139

Just Because

 

The Reading List

Seeing as I've been going on a little lately about books, etc. I thought I'd show you what's going in the bag for this trip to Africa. Of course, there's no guarantee I'll get through all or any, but here they are:

Dead Aid: Why Aid Is Not Working and How There Is a Better Way for Africa
(Dambiso Moyo, @dambisamoyo)

Things Hidden: Scripture As Spirituality
(Richard Rohr, Center for Action and Contemplation)

A Future for Africa: Critical Essays in Christian Social Imagination
(Emmanuel Katongole, Duke Center for Reconciliation)

Empire of Illusion: The End of Literacy and the Triumph of Spectacle
(Chris Hedges, Wikipedia)

And, I always need to have one fiction work on the go:

Three
(Ted Dekker, @dambisamoyo)