Quotes & Sayings


We, and creation itself, actualize the possibilities of the God who sustains the world, towards becoming in the world in a fuller, more deeper way. - R.E. Slater

There is urgency in coming to see the world as a web of interrelated processes of which we are integral parts, so that all of our choices and actions have [consequential effects upon] the world around us. - Process Metaphysician Alfred North Whitehead

Kurt Gödel's Incompleteness Theorem says (i) all closed systems are unprovable within themselves and, that (ii) all open systems are rightly understood as incomplete. - R.E. Slater

The most true thing about you is what God has said to you in Christ, "You are My Beloved." - Tripp Fuller

The God among us is the God who refuses to be God without us, so great is God's Love. - Tripp Fuller

According to some Christian outlooks we were made for another world. Perhaps, rather, we were made for this world to recreate, reclaim, redeem, and renew unto God's future aspiration by the power of His Spirit. - R.E. Slater

Our eschatological ethos is to love. To stand with those who are oppressed. To stand against those who are oppressing. It is that simple. Love is our only calling and Christian Hope. - R.E. Slater

Secularization theory has been massively falsified. We don't live in an age of secularity. We live in an age of explosive, pervasive religiosity... an age of religious pluralism. - Peter L. Berger

Exploring the edge of life and faith in a post-everything world. - Todd Littleton

I don't need another reason to believe, your love is all around for me to see. – Anon

Thou art our need; and in giving us more of thyself thou givest us all. - Khalil Gibran, Prayer XXIII

Be careful what you pretend to be. You become what you pretend to be. - Kurt Vonnegut

Religious beliefs, far from being primary, are often shaped and adjusted by our social goals. - Jim Forest

We become who we are by what we believe and can justify. - R.E. Slater

People, even more than things, need to be restored, renewed, revived, reclaimed, and redeemed; never throw out anyone. – Anon

Certainly, God's love has made fools of us all. - R.E. Slater

An apocalyptic Christian faith doesn't wait for Jesus to come, but for Jesus to become in our midst. - R.E. Slater

Christian belief in God begins with the cross and resurrection of Jesus, not with rational apologetics. - Eberhard Jüngel, Jürgen Moltmann

Our knowledge of God is through the 'I-Thou' encounter, not in finding God at the end of a syllogism or argument. There is a grave danger in any Christian treatment of God as an object. The God of Jesus Christ and Scripture is irreducibly subject and never made as an object, a force, a power, or a principle that can be manipulated. - Emil Brunner

“Ehyeh Asher Ehyeh” means "I will be that who I have yet to become." - God (Ex 3.14) or, conversely, “I AM who I AM Becoming.”

Our job is to love others without stopping to inquire whether or not they are worthy. - Thomas Merton

The church is God's world-changing social experiment of bringing unlikes and differents to the Eucharist/Communion table to share life with one another as a new kind of family. When this happens, we show to the world what love, justice, peace, reconciliation, and life together is designed by God to be. The church is God's show-and-tell for the world to see how God wants us to live as a blended, global, polypluralistic family united with one will, by one Lord, and baptized by one Spirit. – Anon

The cross that is planted at the heart of the history of the world cannot be uprooted. - Jacques Ellul

The Unity in whose loving presence the universe unfolds is inside each person as a call to welcome the stranger, protect animals and the earth, respect the dignity of each person, think new thoughts, and help bring about ecological civilizations. - John Cobb & Farhan A. Shah

If you board the wrong train it is of no use running along the corridors of the train in the other direction. - Dietrich Bonhoeffer

God's justice is restorative rather than punitive; His discipline is merciful rather than punishing; His power is made perfect in weakness; and His grace is sufficient for all. – Anon

Our little [biblical] systems have their day; they have their day and cease to be. They are but broken lights of Thee, and Thou, O God art more than they. - Alfred Lord Tennyson

We can’t control God; God is uncontrollable. God can’t control us; God’s love is uncontrolling! - Thomas Jay Oord

Life in perspective but always in process... as we are relational beings in process to one another, so life events are in process in relation to each event... as God is to Self, is to world, is to us... like Father, like sons and daughters, like events... life in process yet always in perspective. - R.E. Slater

To promote societal transition to sustainable ways of living and a global society founded on a shared ethical framework which includes respect and care for the community of life, ecological integrity, universal human rights, respect for diversity, economic justice, democracy, and a culture of peace. - The Earth Charter Mission Statement

Christian humanism is the belief that human freedom, individual conscience, and unencumbered rational inquiry are compatible with the practice of Christianity or even intrinsic in its doctrine. It represents a philosophical union of Christian faith and classical humanist principles. - Scott Postma

It is never wise to have a self-appointed religious institution determine a nation's moral code. The opportunities for moral compromise and failure are high; the moral codes and creeds assuredly racist, discriminatory, or subjectively and religiously defined; and the pronouncement of inhumanitarian political objectives quite predictable. - R.E. Slater

God's love must both center and define the Christian faith and all religious or human faiths seeking human and ecological balance in worlds of subtraction, harm, tragedy, and evil. - R.E. Slater

In Whitehead’s process ontology, we can think of the experiential ground of reality as an eternal pulse whereby what is objectively public in one moment becomes subjectively prehended in the next, and whereby the subject that emerges from its feelings then perishes into public expression as an object (or “superject”) aiming for novelty. There is a rhythm of Being between object and subject, not an ontological division. This rhythm powers the creative growth of the universe from one occasion of experience to the next. This is the Whiteheadian mantra: “The many become one and are increased by one.” - Matthew Segall

Without Love there is no Truth. And True Truth is always Loving. There is no dichotomy between these terms but only seamless integration. This is the premier centering focus of a Processual Theology of Love. - R.E. Slater

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Note: Generally I do not respond to commentary. I may read the comments but wish to reserve my time to write (or write off the comments I read). Instead, I'd like to see our community help one another and in the helping encourage and exhort each of us towards Christian love in Christ Jesus our Lord and Savior. - re slater

Showing posts with label Charities - Int'l Justice Ministries. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Charities - Int'l Justice Ministries. Show all posts

Saturday, May 19, 2012

Book Review: Kristof and WuDunn, "Half the Sky"


by rjs5
posted on May 8, 2012

I expect this post to be one of my least well-read posts of the year.

That alone is an indictment of our church today – and of its leadership, as most of the people who read Jesus Creed are leaders in some form in the church. It isn’t an indictment because women’s issues should be of prime importance – but because compassion and care should be. We debate heady issues – doctrine and theology and sexuality and evolution and Adam … but I know from experience that issues of compassion and care receive less than 10% the views and reads of such posts.

I post this anyway, knowing it will send my numbers plunging … because some things are that important.

Half the Sky by Nicholas D. Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn is a powerful book that explores the oppression of women worldwide, from rape, sex-trafficking, and maternal mortality to domestic violence, “cutting” and infanticide. They describe the problems in often graphic and heart-wrenching detail. They introduce real people in harsh situations and use their stories to give a face to the problems that exist and an example of hope that can be found. They examine the kinds of efforts for relief and reform that work, don’t work, and sometimes work or partially work to overcome the underlying economic and cultural factors that give rise to the oppression of women. They are honest about the messiness inherent in human societies and motivations. There is no magic bullet to be found in this book. But their book is an unabashed a call for action (as is their organization).
So was it cultural imperialism for Westerners to criticize foot-binding and female infanticide? Perhaps. But it was also the right thing to do. If we believe firmly in certain values, such as the equality of all human beings regardless of color or gender, then we should not be afraid to stand up to them; it would be feckless to defer to slavery, torture, foot-binding, honor killings, or genital cutting just because we believe in respecting other faiths and cultures. (p. 207)
Because the book is intended as a call for action – and designed for persuasion it consists primarily of stories. Stories inspire action in a way that facts, figures, and propositions simply do not. Facts, even accurate and overwhelming statistics, inhibit compassion. According to Kristof and WuDunn:
Social psychologists argue that all this reflects the way our consciences and ethical systems are based on individual stories and are distinct from the part of our brains concerned with logic and rationality. Indeed, when subjects in experiments are first asked to solve math problems, thus putting in play the parts of the brain that govern logic, afterwards they are less generous to the needy. (p. 100)
A point that is rather interesting in light of the article Scot linked last Thursday, Analytical Thinking and Faith (and here are links to the Science write-up and article).

How many who read this blog have heard of Half the Sky? How many have read it?

How many of the men have read it (or intend to)?

Does the power of story motivate?

The book has been having something of an impact in Christian churches (a group in our church has been inspired to take action through the power of the book). The May/June issue of Books and Culture has a review, Hard Truths by Amy E. Black, that considers both Half the Sky and a recent book Half the Church by Carolyn Custis James that claims some inspiration from Kristof and WuDunn. James’s book looks primarily at women in the bible, is directed at an audience of Christian women – but makes connections with some of the issues raised by Kristof and WuDunn, drawing in part on the work of Amy Carmichael in India in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

But this highlights a problem … Half the Sky is, it seems to me, having some impact in the church, but as a “women’s issue” or a women’s ministry project – and that is a crying shame. (You can correct me if I’m wrong here.) But Half the Sky is a book well worth reading (and acting on) for everyone, male and female. It provides a number of important lessons that span a wide variety of issues. The deep need and deep evil that permeates so much of our world. The tyranny of strong over weak … and the ever present temptation to rationalize strength as an intrinsic value. In Half the Sky the tyranny is primarily, but not solely, male over female; but on a much more fundamental level the tyranny is strong or powerful over the weak.

In a tale of Zoya Najabi
“Not only my husband, but his brother, his mother, and his sister – they all beat me,” Zoya recalled indignantly, speaking at a shelter in Kabul. … The worst moment came when Zoya’s mother-in-law was beating her and Zoya unthinkingly kicked back. Resisting a mother-in-law is an outrageous sin. First, Zoya’s husband dug out an electrical cable and flogged his wife until she fell unconscious. (p. 68-69)
But even worse is the deep culture of violence in these hierarchical relationships. Zoya talked about the reasons behind beatings in general – not just her situation.
“But it also happens that the wife is not taking care of her husband or is not obedient. Then it is appropriate to beat the wife....

... Zoya smiled a bit when she saw the shock on our faces. She smiled patiently: “I should not have been beaten, because I was always obedient and did what my husband said. But if the wife is truly disobedient, then of course her husband has to beat her.” (p. 69)
This attitude is not limited to Islamic cultures and does not characterize all Islamic cultures. Similar examples can be found in Christian cultures in Africa and in cultures that are neither Christian nor Muslim. There is a strong cultural element largely separable from religion that justifies continuing violence and oppression.

The God Gulf. Kristof and WuDunn have some rather interesting comments on faith and compassion.
Religious conservatives have fought against condom distribution and battled funding for UNFPA, but they have also saved lives in vast numbers by underwriting and operating clinics in some of the neediest parts of Africa and Asia. When you travel in the poorest countries in Africa, you repeatedly find diplomats, UN staff, and aid organizations in the capitals or big cities. And then you go to the remote villages and towns where Western help is most needed, and the aid workers are suddenly scarce. Doctors Without Borders works heroically in remote areas, and so do some other secular groups. But the people you almost inevitably encounter are the missionary doctors and church-sponsored aid workers.

… Aid workers and diplomats come and go, but missionaries burrow into society, learn the local language, send their children to local schools, sometimes stay for life. True, some missionaries are hypocritical or sanctimonious – just like any group of people – but many others are like Harper McConnell at the hospital in Congo, struggling to act on a gospel of social justice as well as individual morality. (pp. 141-143)
I am not so sure it is a gospel of social justice as much as it is a gospel that embodies the call to love one’s neighbor, even halfway around the world. I fear though that this influence is vanishing from the church. I grew up in an era where missionary week and tales of missionary doctors, nurses, and teachers around the world were highlighted (pastors were there too – but never alone). This simply does not seem a priority emphasis any longer.

I could pick out more pieces from this book, there were a number that moved me or caused me to think. Social insights into western thinking of both conservatives and liberals … and the reasons for the success and failure of various humanitarian efforts – the pieces that capture the interest of my analytical brain (I am, after all, a scientist). More importantly the deep needs that exist and the power of the stories Half the Sky contains.

But I’ll stop here and simply recommend that this book should be required reading – and that as we debate the heady issues of theology and science we should also remember that our faith is shaped and lived out by intuitive thinking as well. Our faith must have a heart.

My challenge to everyone, make and female, and especially to leaders is simple … read the book and think deeply about the issues.

What do you think? What role should faith based compassion have in our church?

Is this the kind of book that should move the church?

If you read the book – what struck you most deeply?


If you wish to contact me directly, you may do so at rjs4mail[at]att.net.
If you have comments please visit Half the Sky and the Power of Story at Jesus Creed.




Tuesday, December 6, 2011

IJM - A Christmas Pledge for Children of Slavery

This Christmas, Counter the Lies of Slave Owners

A message from IJM President Gary Haugen
December 2011


A year after her rescue, Malavika is vibrant and full of life.
A year after her rescue, Malavika is vibrant and full of life.
 
 
 
Give to IJM
Last fall, Malavika was five years old – the age my own daughters started school. But Malavika was spending each day as she had the one before: sitting on the hard dirt next to her mother, helping to crush rocks, as her father carried massive stones out of a deep pit. Though she was young, Malavika knew enough to understand her home – a remote and massive granite quarry – was a terrible place.
 
Malavika’s parents were slaves. The fabric of her childhood was a cycle of abuse, pain, work and need. It was hearing the vulgar shouts of the owner and his henchmen berating the labourers and threatening to sexually assault the women. It was her father’s bloodied face after the owner kicked him in the head over and over again for the ‘crime’ of being too sick to work. It was sleeping in a shack guarded by one of the owner’s thugs. It was never leaving the quarry.
 
Malavika didn’t wish for freedom – because Malavika had no idea what freedom was like. But her parents did. They grieved that their precious daughter and her little brother were growing up in this terrible place. The owner made it clear just how worthless, how expendable they were to him. He had even reserved a plot of land for graves for labourers who died. He often told the two dozen slaves in the quarry that if they didn’t work, he would put them there. At least one man was buried already.
But, try as he might to pretend that little girls like Malavika and men and women like her parents didn’t matter, their owner was wrong. He had enslaved people created in the very image of God. People of infinite value.


More than 20 slaves were held in this granite quarry.  Children like Malavika we
Last year, this was Malavika's entire world: More than 20 slaves were held in this granite quarry. Children like Malavika were forced to work to help their parents.At this time last year, my IJM colleagues in India had just discovered the brutal prison in which Malavika was spending her childhood.

On December 1, 2010, the reality that she and her family were indeed of very great worth became apparent to the man who had enslaved them. In a coordinated operation, IJM and the local government freed the families enslaved in the quarry. The owner who had spent the past five years tormenting these children, women and men was placed under arrest. Gloriously, Malavika’s family left forever the place where they had known so much pain.


On December 1, 2010, everything changed:  The oppression at the quarry came to
On December 1, 2010, everything changed: The oppression at the quarry came to an end through an IJM-supported rescue operation. Malavika and her family were freed.
 
Today, Malavika doesn’t have to see her parents bowed down and assaulted. They are free: Her mother, Sharadha, hopes to become a teacher, and her father, Madesh, works as a guard. Malavika is in school. She loves math, and she says her favorite games are “running and catching.” When you talk to her, it’s impossible not to see how very full of life she is. Her mother hopes that someday, her daughter will grow up to be a teacher; for her part, Malavika wants to be a doctor.

Theirs is now the story of a family leading an ordinary, dignified life together. It is not a complicated story, but it is a good one.

As Christmas approaches, we remember another story – that our Maker placed on each of us such great value that he sent his own son into this world. The slave-owners and thugs and tyrants are wrong – and terribly so. There are no worthless people. And at Christmas, we are reminded of this truth forcefully. In the grand story, you matter. We matter. Little girls like Malavika matter.

But even now, other families like Malavika’s toil in slavery, told in word and deed that they are forgotten, worthless. This Christmas, let’s proclaim the truth that those who wait for rescue matter. Will you help us continue the work of rescue with a year-end financial gift?

With deep gratitude for your partnership and wishes for a joyous Christmas season,


Gary Haugen's signature

Gary A. Haugen
President and CEO, International Justice Mission



The pictures of newspapers covering the rescue The operation made front-page n
Today, instead of helping her parents work in a rock quarry, she's dreaming of a career as a doctor when she grows up.

 

Wednesday, June 29, 2011

More than 500 Free from Slavery in IJM’s Largest Operation Ever


Friday, May 13, 2011

CHENNAI – Today, 514 children, women and men are living in freedom after being rescued from a brick kiln in IJM’s largest anti-slavery operation ever. Sparked by a brother’s desperate plea, the operation brought freedom to nearly 400 forced to work in the kiln – including 23 children, the youngest only 8 years old – and their dependents, either too old and frail or too young and weak to work, but still held captive within the factory’s walls.

A call for help, three states away





Laborers were still at work making bricks when IJM and the local government entered the facility.
The whispered words of a forbidden phone call set in motion the force that would eventually topple the kiln’s brutal slave system. Boola, 27, managed to contact his brother, who listened with increasing horror as Boola described 18-hour forced workdays without enough food or rest, refusals to provide promised payment – and vicious beatings by the owner and his henchmen.

Determined to save Boola, his brother made a report to the government, stating that he believed there could be many more trapped along with him in the massive brick factory. The government referred the case to IJM for support. Together, they prepared for a major operation – but no one imagined the magnitude of the crimes they would find.

'Who wants to come out?'

Asked “who wants to leave?” the laborers raise their hands.
On the afternoon of Wednesday, April 27, 2011, a team of government officials and IJM staff, accompanied by police, entered the brick kiln, intent on liberating any laborers held there by force.

With a local government representative, Kandasamy, leading the way, the rescue team began to gather the surprised laborers from the brick ovens and huts into an open area. As the rescue team explained the reason they had come, excitement built among the laborers, who quickly began to call their loved ones to join the growing crowd.

It soon became apparent that the initial estimate of 200 people fell far short: A sea of people clad in tattered, but colorful, mud-flecked clothing stretched nearly 30 yards from where the team’s rallying point had been established. The sight was overwhelming.

IJM Chennai Director of Aftercare Pranitha Timothy turned to the throng and shouted in Hindi, "Who wants to come out?" Immediately, hundreds of hands shot up into the air.

Accommodating the 500

More than 500 children, women and men were brought out of the brick kiln to freedom.
The IJM team and Kandasamy and his staff began making preparations for the massive group desperate to leave. In a matter of hours, Kandasamy – an incredible advocate for the victims – had secured dinner, lodging and breakfast for all 514 people, a group comparable in size to that of a very large wedding.

He arranged for four trucks to transport the freed laborers to a nearby school, where they would stay for the next several days. When those trucks proved not enough, he used one that belonged to the brick kiln owner; already arrested, he was in no position to refuse. A medical camp was set up to administer check-ups and medication; a water tanker was brought in to provide clean drinking water; police provided 24-hour protection; and classrooms were cleared to accommodate the new arrivals.


Through the night until early the next morning, the freed laborers poured out their stories to local officials in order to be documented as released slaves. Through their recounting of cruel beatings, restricted movement and brutal labor, a common sentiment emerged: "Even if they pay us 10,000 rupees, we would not come back."

A certificate of freedom and a ticket home

As the operation stretched from one day to five, Kandasamy came up with more and more ways to benefit his 514 guests: by day two, a pair of television sets had been brought in to broadcast cricket and Oriya-language programs. At the same time, IJM staff supported the victims and assisted with the government with preparation of the 371 official Release Certificates, which would be presented to each of the adults and children who had been working in bonded labor at the kiln, along with the initial installment of the government rehabilitation funds owed to them. While it often takes months for released laborers to see any of these funds, the money for these laborers had been withdrawn before they had even left the kiln.

By the operation’s third day, a high-ranking government official arrived to hold a special ceremony to celebrate the laborers’ freedom. He assured the laborers that the government would provide not only the required rehabilitation funds, but train transport and accompaniment home. The crowd erupted in cheers and applause; for the first time since they were enslaved, home was truly in sight.

"This is the most impressive display we have seen to date of the government being proactive in combating bonded labor and being sensitive to the needs of the victims," remarked Saju Mathew, IJM South Asia Regional Director. "It is a huge encouragement to work with talented, dedicated officials like these, who clearly demonstrate the potential of the government to lead the charge against bonded labor in India." For the next two days, Kandasamy stood on the platform of the local train station to send off the free children women and men in groups, watching as they boarded train cars that he had ordered to be attached on their behalf. IJM aftercare staff are making plans to ensure the families have the training they need to establish new lives in freedom. They have now returned home – more than 1000 miles from the place where they were enslaved – where they can live in safety.

IJM Rescue Operation featured in the New York Times


Thursday, 26 May 2011

Pulitzer-prize winning journalist Nicholas Kristof accompanied IJM and local authorities on a rescue operation at a Kolkata brothel. After entering the site to locate one girl, Nicholas, law enforcement and the IJM team "emerged from the brothel with five lives that had just been transformed."


What happens next? Answers to readers’ most common questions:
 
Kolkata red-light district
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prostitution_in_Kolkata
What happens to the girls and women now?
 
After girls and trafficked women are rescued, IJM’s in-country social workers partner with local aftercare organizations on the ground to secure shelter, medical care, psychological assistance, and schooling or job training. IJM social workers will continue to provide support to help ensure that these survivors do not become vulnerable to being re-trafficked.

What happens to the perpetrators?

In this case, one pimp has been arrested, and warrants have been issued for two more. Holding perpetrators accountable is absolutely critical to both protect their victims and to create a deterrent will stop others from committing the same crimes. In IJM’s work around the world, we have seen that even a small number of significant arrests and convictions can have a major effect on the behavior of would-be perpetrators.

Currently, there are approximately 100 suspects facing charges for trafficking crimes in Kolkata as a result of IJM-supported operations. In 2009, 9 traffickers and pimps were convicted for their crimes in Kolkata in IJM-supported cases.

Can rescuing individual victims really make a difference?

While the rescue of each survivor obviously makes a difference for her, IJM’s mission is to transform entire communities so that vulnerable people are protected from abuse through their justice systems. We pursue this transformation by using what we learn in each individual operation to partner with local governments, communities, NGOs and other major stakeholders to pursue training, capacity building and other critical changes. We are seeing incredible proof that this strategy is actually working – including a stunning 79% decrease in the number of minors available for commercial sexual exploitation in metro Cebu, the Philippines after four years of IJM work there. Learn more.

What's the role of the local authorities in this kind of operation?

Local governments – including law enforcement – have the only legitimate authority to conduct such an operation. Engagement with law enforcement is the best and only sustainable way to protect victims and apprehend perpetrators of sex trafficking. It is a strategy supported by virtually every credible anti-trafficking organization – including UN agencies, NGOs and responsible governments.

Who actually conducts these operations? Locals? Foreigners?

IJM staff are locals – more than 90% of IJM staff worldwide are nationals of the countries in which they work, including the Kolkata-based staff who conducted this operation. IJM is building the world’s largest indigenous force of justice professionals – sensitive to the needs of their own communities.

Is there a way I can hear about other rescue operations?

Last year alone, more than 800 people were freed from sex trafficking and forced labor slavery in IJM operations. Don’t miss out on breaking news: You can get the latest updates on IJM rescues, convictions and arrests with our free mobile app, available on all smartphones and optimized for Android, iPhone and Windows Phone, or by following us on Twitter @IJMHQ.

Is there a way I can help make more rescues happen -- and support aftercare for girls like these?

Absolutely – your financial support is vital in making the work of rescue and aftercare possible.