intersections

Training Faith Based Community Organizers

For the past few days I’ve been in Los Altos, California at the PICO National Training.

PICO (People Involved in Community Organizing) is a network of faith-based community organizations. Our local affiliate, or federation, is called LA Voice. It is through our relationship with LA Voice that we, in the Hollywood Seventh-day Adventist Church, are learning to be faith-based community organizers. Through LA Voice our congregation has participated in organizing around affordable housing (as in our recent Town Hall), health care access for children (as in our work to gather signatures to place Proposition 86 on the ballot), and ending homelessness (as in our support for Permanent Supportive Housing). Part of the fight for health care access for children is our current struggle for S-CHIP reauthorization. I will continue to write out our congregation's work for social justice through faith-based community organizing because it has become one of the strongest (if not the strongest) aspect of our church’s ministry.

The training which I have been attending is designed to give an introduction to the basic principles of PICO’s organizing model. What I think I’ll do is write a series of posts in the near future talking about the organizing model, how it relates to our church’s ministry, and how the model is essentially the same as the missional transformation work we are doing (which relates to my doctoral work). It is remarkable when you awaken to find that the various strands of your life and work has intertwined in form one ‘rope.’

If you are pastor and reading this thinking something like, “How can my church do better at following Jesus into the community and embodying the gospel in the neighborhoods where we find ourselves,” I would be happy to talk to you about PICO and helping you get connected to a PICO affiliate near you.

In closing, one story about the training this week…. Each morning we have heard from one of the faith traditions present for the training. So on the first day we hear from a Quaker young man (named Ryan). Another day we heard from three Jews in our group. Today we heard from several Catholics. It has been so beautiful and spiritually enriching to hear how people in different faith traditions are led into working for justice and peace in their communities. Today, in the Catholic presentation, they highlighted ‘foot washing’ as a practice that invites us into service and justice. Most Catholics practice footwashing once a year on the Thursday before Easter (Holy Thursday). How ironic, I thought to myself. “They took one of my favorite Adventist practices, which we experience at least 4 times a year, and taught me something about it.” Amazing!

For more on PICO’s work for children’s health care, click here.

Prior posts about the Hollywood Church’s role in LA Voice…
     •    Where it all got started...
     •    Permanent Supportive Housing for the Homeless in Hollywood
     •    Proposition 86 press conference with Jim Wallis
     •    Affordable Housing March
     •    Housing Crisis Town Hall – part 1
     •    Housing Crisis Town Hall – part 2
     •    Housing Crisis Town Hall – part 3
 

Christopher Hitches In Service of the Gospel

Rodney Clapp discovers that Christopher Hitchens is right!

The God he deplores is not the Living King of the Universe, the God of Israel and Jesus Christ who is the creator and redeemer of the cosmos. The God he is against is the God of the sovereign nationalistic consumer, tailor made for and by affluent individuals who think the Christian faith is one more thing that will help give us what we want, when we want it, and not cost too much in the process. This God is no more than a household idol, the likes of which Rachel hid by sitting on top of it (Gen. 31). In short, this is a God you can cover with your butt, and who will conveniently cover yours too. Household idols or astrological charts—take your pick.

Read the rest here. I am hoping to read Hitchens’ book over the summer, as well, though I am running out of summer.

And the Tour de France falls to pieces...

Well, the Dane is out! That's right...the news just came over the wire (and to my BlackBerry, courtesy of my friend, Jeff Gang). Michael Rasmussen is out of the Tour on a rules violation related to drug/blood doping testing. It appears he missed the last several appointments to have his blood tested. Also, Christian Moreni tested positive for testosterone and he and his entire team, Cofidis, is out of the Tour. The word is that Rasmussen's Rabobank team might also withdraw entirely from the race, so...possibly three entire teams out in two days.

I guess the silver lining for Contador is that he is now the race leader and will start tomorrow in yellow, but this is a terrible way to win a race. This whole thing has become such a disgrace, the sponsors don't want to be associated with it anymore. Now T-Mobile is saying they might end their sponsorship early.

Stay tuned for more drama.

Epic Battle and Embarrasing Defeat

My boy, Levi Leipheimer, came in second in today's unbelievably difficult stage 16 of the Tour de France. What an battle between the yellow jersey of Michael Rasmussen and the Discovery Team riders, Alberto Contador and Leipheimer. I'm so used to watching Lance Armstrong that I was just waiting for Contador to dart up the hill in the final 3 miles to steal the yellow jersey. But it wasn't to be. Rasmussen rode an amazing stage to not only keep the yellow jersey, but win the stage and put more time between himself and his rivals. Kudos to the Danes, several of whom play in our church's worship band. Way to go!

Leipheimer is having his best tour ever and it's good to see him finally getting some attention.

In other news, Alexander Vinokourov is a bonehead. I'll just leave it at that!

Camp Meeting 2. 0 - Bloggin' the 28

The two most recent posts in our series, "Camp Meeting 2.0 - Bloggin' the 28" are now up.

The first comes from Bill Cork, who blogs at Oak Leaves, writing on the topic of The Lord's Supper.

Today's installment is from Jared Wright, blogging at Adventist Environmental Advocacy, writing on (you guessed it) Creation.

Both of these men have written very simulating articles and I hope you will take some time between now and Friday and catch up with both of these articles. As usual, comments are closed here, so that you can add your comments on the respective blogs where these guys are writing.

Poor kids don't vote, so who cares?

In early March I joined a delegation from LA Voice in Washington, DC, to lobby on behalf of a major expansion in the S-CHIP program that would cover all 9 million uninsured children in the United States. As we speak, the debate around this issue is heating up. The president has promised repeatedly to veto this legislation.

Digsby is blogging for Tim Grieve at the Salon War Room while Tim is on break...

It wasn't too long ago that he was more than willing to dramatically expand government healthcare -- as long as the insurance companies got a nice healthy piece of the action and the pharmaceuticals companies got no price controls -- and, of course, the people who benefited were a huge voting bloc. Poor kids don't vote, so why bother?

Let's see if the Senate can get anything done or whether the threat of a vote from Bush will make them run for cover.

Here's how you can TAKE ACTION - sign this petition and ask congress to expand health coverage for all children!

LA gets a quick wash

Something strange happened in Los Angeles this morning...it rained!

The National Weather Service measures the Los Angeles rain season from July 1 to June 30. The rain season that just ended is officially the driest on record (since records began 130 years ago in 1877). From July 1, 2006 to June 30, 2007, downtown Los Angeles received 3.21 inches of rain; only 21% of the usual 15.14 inches.

Indeed...I can't even remember the last time in rained. This morning the air smelled so nice. Naturally, cars were sliding all over the road. Even at that, the NWS website only lists this morning's rain as "trace." As in, immeasurably small amounts.

David Beckham takes the field for the Galaxy

Elysabeth and I were able to enjoy something totally unexpected last night - David Beckham's premier performance for the LA Galaxy. My cousin, Brenda, called me a few days ago and said she and her fiance, Christian, had a couple extra tickets for the game against Chelsea and did we want to go? Of course I wanted to go. What surprised me more than anything was how eager my wife was to go. During the game she called it her new favorite sport. I think we'll be attending more Galaxy games.

We got the timing of the game wrong, so we arrived at halftime, but all the fun stuff happened in the second half. Chelsea scored the one goal just a few minutes into the second half and David Beckham took the field with about 10 minutes to go.

The crowd erupted in shouts and applause every time he moved, literally. He stood up - applause! He took off his warm up jacket - applause! He jogged a little and stretched - more applause! It was the funniest thing. Most Angelenos know that Beckham re-aggrivated his hurt left ankle, so no one was sure if he would play at all. The fans were thrilled just to get a good look at his pretty face. He mostly hung around the back of the action, though he did get a few touches and one corner kick.

Christian played soccer for CalState Northridge, so he is a good soccer player and knows the game inside and out. It was amazing to watch Chelsea pick apart the Galaxy defense. They are an amazing, amazing team. Lots of Chelsea fans in the audience.

One more photo after the jump...

Housing Crisis Town Hall - last post

I promise this will be the last post about our recent Town Hall meeting with Eric Garcetti and company. We finally have all the news media posted for people to see. All the links are below.

TV Coverage
Univision (Spanish)
ABC 7
KTLA 5
Fox 11

Radio Coverage
KFWB

LA Voice - Housing Crisis Town Hall - Ch 7 News