intersections

Al Gore named hypocrite by conservative group

I thought this was funny...

Al Gore, a leading voice in the fight against global warming, is being called a hypocrite by a conservative group that claims his Nashville mansion uses too much electricity. (Read the whole AP article here)

So, let me get this straight. Al Gore builds a compelling case that global warming is an alarming problem that we are creating and we can solve (though now it's questionable whether we can solve it very quickly, if at all). Then, the Academy of Motion Picture Arts & Sciences honors him with an Oscar (unpresidented in US Presidental political history? I think so). So, the best the conservative groups can do is call him a hypocrite?

The article goes on to say...

Gore participates in a utility program that sells blocks of "green power" for an extra $4 a month. Gore purchases 108 such blocks every month, covering 16,200 kilowatt-hours and helping subsidize renewable energy sources.... Gore has been purchasing the "green power" for $432 a month since November. The Gore home is also under renovation to add solar panels.

Sounds like sour grapes to me!

Hollywood Prayer Network

The Hollywood Prayer Network (HPN), a non-denominational Christian prayer ministry, was established in 2001 to pray for those in entertainment. Possibly one of their biggest events yet was planned this month: a call for a mass prayer meeting in Hollywood during Oscar weekend.

I somehow ran across this story on the Christian Broadcasting Network's website. The story goes on to say, "Churches and parachurch organizations were invited to the event held at the Mears Center of Hollywood Presbyterian Church." This apparently happened today. I heard nothing about it. Does this strike anyone else as a little weird? Maybe it's just me but I would not be that interested in such an event. It just strikes me as conservative Christians trying to "fix" Hollywood.

You can find out more about the Hollywood Prayer Network at their website.

Urban Art and Community Action

Yesterday, thanks to Marcel, I had the privilege of touring the CINCO facility in Highland Park and meeting their amazing Executive Director, Martha Rivera. If you've never heard of CINCO please visit their website here and check out the amazing work their doing. This isn't exactly Hollywood, but there are a lot of things we could learn from this community program that could be implemented in Hollywood.

The urban art above has nothing to do with CINCO, but it was in the parking lot next to the building and I just loved it. We're considering something like this on our ugly freeway wall. What do you think?

Afterwards we had some amazing Salvadorian food down the road.

Thank you!

I want to say a very big, THANK YOU, to everyone who supported my little Heifer International fund raising drive during Advent & Christmas. I realize, now that Valentine's Day has passed, that Christmas is long gone. I also realize that I set my goal way too low. As soon as we passed $250 the giving stopped!

So, I'm going to take down the button on the right but if you want to donate to my campaign just click here and you can still support this amazing charity. If you visit the Heifer website you will also see dozens of ways for you, your family, your church or your school to engage with people of all ages in this amazing ministry to overcome poverty in the world.

In addition, I'm going to post a few new buttons in this area from time to time, so you can have an idea of the things I and my community are involved in.

Next up: Christian Peace Witness.

CAST 8th Anniversary Celebration

Yesterday Elysabeth and I had the privilege of attending the 8th Anniversary celebration of an amazing organization called CAST - The Coalition to Abolish Slavery and Trafficking. I've blogged about CAST before, here and here. The event was amazing. It was held in the home of Stanley & Betty Sheinbaum. In their home we observed one orginal Piccaso and photos of Stanley with Bill Clinton, Jesse Jackson, Jimmy Carter and many other famous people.

We saw clips from the upcoming films Amazing Grace and Trade. CAST honored a number of truly remarkable people including Eric Garcetti and Amy Wakeland and Mira Sorvino. Everyone was seated and the program had begun when Mira slipped in quietly and sat down in the open seat...next to me! See the picture above (click to enlarge). I've never been so star struck in my life! She literally took my breath away. Not only is she a great actress but she is an amazing scholar and activist. She graduated magna cum laude from Harvard where her thesis on Human Right in China won an award. Oh, did I mention she speaks Mandarin?

She was being honored by CAST for her work in fighting human trafficking and slavery. In 2005 she stared in a Lifetime made-for-TV moved called Human Trafficking, with Donald Sutherland. She was nominated for a Golden Globe for that role. During her research for her role as an ICE agent in Human Trafficking she contacted CAST and learned from their expertise. Since then, she has done amazing work in Sacramento and Washington, DC in fighting for rights for the survivors of human trafficking.

Elysabeth said on the drive home, "Who knew when we were watching that show on TV that we would be sitting next to Mira Sorvino as she is being honored for her work on that movie?" Hollywood is truly an amazing place. I've been talking about this for 24 hours straight now. Tonight my wife asked me if I had a crush! I'll never tell....

A Day Apart

I discovered this wonderful new book "by accident." One of my favorite things to do is browse the "New Arrivals" at Fuller Seminary Bookstore. They are a very comprehensive bookstore...the best theological bookstore in Southern California (Archives, also in Pasadena, is right up there, too). Anyway, there was this book, A Day Apart: How Jews, Christians and Muslims Find Faith, Freedom and Joy on the Sabbath, by Christopher D. Ringwald (Oxford).

As a Seventh-day Adventist Christian I am fascinated by a book like this. There are numerous references to Seventh-day Adventists in the book and while I'm only a quarter of the way through, this is by far my favorite statement related to Adventism. At least it gives me hope and encouragement for what an Adventism that blesses the world might look like:

A similar realization must have startled the first disciples, who were stumbling into a new religion as they broke away from the old. But then that business of separation and distinction immediately plunges us back into the profane world of doctrine and dogma. We are us by being not you. Yuck! Maybe the Seventh-day Adventists are right to say that all children of Abraham can be unifed in the seventh-day Sabbath, instead of Muslims meeting on Fridays, and the Christians on Sundays, which promotes their distinction from the Jews and division among God's many children (79-80).

I've actually never heard an Adventist say that Sabbath can unify Muslims, Jews and Christians, except myself and my friend, Samir. This gives me hope that others must be saying similar things, even if in hiding!

(For those of you who are not a part of the Adventist story, please forgive my excitement over finding a reference from an respected author, published by Oxford Press, giving props to Seventh-day Adventists for their Sabbath observance. We are so rarely complimented, even back-handedly, that some of us get a little overwrought at the slightest congratulation. I'm better now!)

OneVoicetoEndSlavery.com

My family and I will be attending this event (One Voice to End Slavery) in Costa Mesa in a few weeks. Several others from the Hollywood Adventist Church will also be attending. Thanks to Dr. Siroj Sorajjakool (professor of religion at Loma Linda University) for the heads up on this event. Siroj runs a small ministry called Child Prostitution Prevention Project which provides modest living expenses to young adult women in Thailand so they can attend school without having to work in the bars and other extremely risky jobs. Often girls that start off dancing in bars end up in brothels, prostitution and sex slavery. The Hollywood Church took up an offering at our Mission Convocation back in October and raised nearly $1200 for this project.

Yesterday I met with Kathryn McMahon, the founder of CAST (Coalition to Abolish Slavery and Trafficking) to discuss the new Interfaith Counsel of CAST and how the Hollywood Church can become part of this effort. Kathryn is now a board member and chair of the Interfaith Counsel. I also met Kay Buck, the Executive Director.

On Sunday, Elysabeth and I will be attending the 8th Annual Anniversary Celebration at which CAST will be honoring Mira Sorvino, among others. A while back Mira stared in the two-part, made-for-TV drama about human trafficking.

Good For Him!

      Senate Chaplain Barry C. Black has canceled his scheduled appearance at a Christian evangelical conference after he was pictured with columnist Ann Coulter and other prominent conservatives in a brochure promoting the event.
    Black told Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) that he wouldn't be addressing next month's Reclaiming America for Christ Conference because his appearance wouldn't uphold the Senate chaplain's "historic tradition of being nonpolitical, nonpartisan, nonsectarian," a spokeswoman for the chaplain said Thursday.
    Spokeswoman Meg Saunders said Black, a Seventh-day Adventist and a former Navy chaplain, had received "a very generic invitation" in fall 2005 to speak at the March conference and had agreed because there was room on his schedule.

Read the rest of today's LA Times article here.

Another proud day. Thank you, Pastor Black, for following your convictions and removing yourself, and our church, from this divisive, right-wing, group.