intersections

Needed: Prophetic Voices for a Just Economy

Last week I spent three days in Washington, D.C. with clergy from the PICO National Network. PICO is a congregation-based community organization that is working for justice in our communities. The clergy work toether, locally and nationally, to give a prophetic tone to our voice as we speak and act for justice. Yesterday I posted some reflections at The Huffington Post about my time spent with these faith leaders as we think about where we're at as a nation. You can read a portion below or click here to read the whole thing at the Huffington Post.

"How do you respond when you see this chart?"

That was the question Scott Reed, Executive Director of the PICO National Network, asked a room of about 25 pastors and rabbis who had gathered in Washington, D.C. for the first meeting of the new National Clergy Leadership Council.

"How does it feel to be faith leaders during such a time?" he asked.

A few people had seen this already during a presentation by Josh Bivens, an economist at the Economic Policy Institute and author of the recent book, Failure by Design: The Story Behind America's Broken Economy, but it was brand new to me. It took me, and others, a few minutes to digest what we were seeing here. One by one we commented about what we thought caused this. We tried to explain it, justify it, and rationalize it. Then Scott said something that stopped me cold in my tracks. <keep reading>

 

Also, if you haven't checked The Hillhurst Review in a while (or ever) I have posted several reviews there in the past couple of months. Stay tuned for new reviews in the coming days including a new book by Miroslav Volf called Allah and a helpful book for faith leaders in multicultural settings, Churches, Cultures and Leadership, by Mark Lau Branson and Juan Martinez.

The Hillhurst Review launches

This week my friend, Syd Shook, and I launched a new website called The Hillhurst Review. From our About page:

The Hillhurst Review is a space where peoples of faith can be challenged and inspired. A multimedia, journalistic combination of reviews, interviews, opinion and creative pieces from across the globe provides a platform that breeds new insights and new friendships. We seek to give readers the opportunity to encounter extraordinary thought and stories and the people whose life and faith incite them.

We begin with an interview with an extraordinary doctor, sometime known simply as The Gaza Doctor. Syd and I sat down with Dr. Izzeldin Abuelaish just over a week ago and spoke to him about his new book, I Shall Not Hate. I first met Dr. Abuelaish in July 2010 at a small gathering of interfaith leaders who are concerned about the way people of faith can affect peace in the Middle East, and specifically Israeli-Palestine. I was struck by his humility and grace. Later that evening I listened as he briefly told the heart breaking story of losing three of his daughters and a neice in the Israeli offensive in the Gaza Strip in December 2008. That night I pre-ordered his book which was published in the US until January 4, 2011.

During our interview last week we learned that he has again been recommended for the Nobel Peace Prize in 2011. I highly recommend his book to you, no matter what your position on the conflict in Israel and Palestine has been, or whether it is a completely new topic for you.

Our complete interivew with Dr. Abuelaish is available at The Hillhurst Review. I also wrote a piece for The Huffington Post about this interview and his book. You can find that piece here. An excerpt can be found here, below the fold.

Baloney's not the answer

From time to time I write book reviews for Molossus - an online broadside of world literature. I recently reviewed the new book, Tunnel People, by Teun Voeten (PM Press).

Teun Voeten is not the first to document the lives of the people living in the tunnel systems of New York City. His newly updated account, Tunnel People, is unique, however, because of Voeten’s commitment not only to his craft, but also to the people. Articles and books have been written about the tunnel people and Mark Singer’s award winning documentary, Dark Days, introduced the world to this underground society in what Voeten himself calls a “shockingly honest portrayal.” But Voeten went a step further, living in the Amtrak tunnel on Manhattan’s west side for five months over two years, digging beneath the surface of the tunnel people’s lives as well as their complex and diverse social environment. “To add something new to the earlier studies,” Voeten writes in the introduction to his book, “I decided to take the anthropological approach, using its favorite research method of participant observation” (3).

Read the rest here.

VIDEO - Viral Hope

Earlier this year a book that I contributed to was published by my friend, JR Woodward. This book was an Easter project in 2009. During the 50 days of Easter 50 authors wrote approximately 500 words each explaining what the Christian good news is about. The audience was our local city newspaper. In my case, I wrote for the LA Times. The results is a book called ViralHope: Good News from the Urbs to the Burbs (and Everything in Between). This book would be ideal for a devotional book or for a discussion group.

Above is a video that was recently created to promote the book, which you can buy on Amazon.com by clicking here. I also have some copies in my office to sell. Contact me directly if you're interested.

Summer Reading Group: Deep Church

Spectrum and the re-church network will together be hosting a summer reading group. We will be blogging our way through Deep Church by Jim Belcher. In this book, Belcher maps out, in a very accessible way, the critiques made of the traditional church by those in the emergent movement and the criticisms of the emergent movement that has ensued from the traditionalists in response. He attempts to articulate a third alternative between the two approaches to being and doing church. We are hoping that reading this book together will be a good way to come to a better understanding of the emergent movement, but also to thoughtfully discuss the important issues that are raised in it in the context of the Adventist community.

It's Really All About God

My dear friend, Samir Selmanovic, has just published his first book entitled, It's Really All About God (buy on Amazon) and what a way to start. This is not a review...that will be coming soon. But I will tell you that this is a radical, peaceful vision of the force for good that religion can and should be in the world, told through the intimate, personal lenses of someone who hase expereinced so much of the good and bad of religion.

There is a review at the Spectrum website by my friend, Brenton Reading. You can read that here.

The blurb I wrote for inside the front cover says this:

“Samir has written a book that reads like an extended poem; an ode to life. Where others see only the darkness and destructiveness of religion, Samir sees beauty and hope. Where others see only competition and violence, Samir sees synergy and life. And his vision is no simple syncretism; a blending of all religions into one inoffensive ‘smoothie’ of goodness and light. This book is a celebration of postmodern ‘otherness’ of the first order. It will inspire you, frustrate you, maybe even anger you. Samir will not answer all your questions or tell you exactly what to do next. But if you’ve ever felt that nagging deep in your soul that God is lurking just beneath the surface in places you have least expected, you need to read this book!”

I will write a review here after I get a chance to read it again.

Please go buy this book and read it. In the meantime, check out this short video of Samir talking about his book.

A Felicitous Journey

Part two of our 6-part blog series over at the re-church blog has been up for a couple of days and the conversation has begun. This week's essay is written by Samir Selmanovic, founder of Faith House Manhattan and the author of the forthcoming Jossey-Bass book, It's Really All About God.

I'd love to have you head over there and check it out. Especially those of you who have been reading along with us and know the subject of the chapter, your comments are especially helpful. I think Samir has posed some vitally important questions for us to consider, especially as pastors and Christian leaders in our world today. Here is an excerpt to whet your appetite.

I ask myself, why would I then take up this journey of deconstruction? Why not turn the tools of deconstruction against itself (deconstruct the deconstruction) and settle for something of substance? Life is short. I want to die in one piece, constructed and whole, with my family and friends around me, also constructed and whole. And my hope within me, also constructed and whole.

Think of it. He describes people on this journey as “people who crash-landed,” “frightened by the mysterious” and always partially “lost.” We are supposed to live under “hauntological principle?” We are invited to embrace “contingency” on a journey that has “teeth” and “bite,” a path seeded with “interrupted passages and missteps,” maps with “multiple tracks” and “counterpaths” on every turn. And to live in the world where other people are “shores we will never reach!” He calls this place, our very own lives (yes Christian lives too) “very spooky.” He brings ghost back into the Holy Ghost. He summarizes the situation we find ourselves in as the “postmodern condition.” It does not sound like a journey or a path to me. It sounds like a chronic disease.

Read the whole thing here.

Advent rather than future

As I'm reading back through Lesslie Newbigin's classic, The Gospel in a Pluralist Society, I am a struck by how my own ideas have been shaped by Newbigin to such a degree that I forget where I originally learned these things. For this reason (and many others) I highly recommend reading again the most important books in your life. Here's a sample for today:

Hopeful action means having something to which one can confidently look forward. It means having a horizon. As I said earlier, apart from what has been done in the ministry, death, and resurrection of Jesus, we are shut up to only two possibilities. One possible horizon for our action is a vision for the future of the human race, a future in which we shall have no part. The other possible horizon is a personal future for me beyond death. From that future the world in which I now seek to serve God is absent. Its future is not part of my future. The one possibility gives meaning to my participation in the public life of neighborhood, nation, and world at the cost of marginalizing the human person. The other provides meaning for the individual human person at the cost of marginalizing our shared public life. What is made possible through the gospel is a life looking toward a horizon which is different from either of these. That horizon is defined in the words "He shall come again." For a Christian the horizon for all action is this. It is advent rather than future. He is coming to meet us, and whatever we do -- whether it is our most private prayers or our most public political action -- is simply offered to him for whatever place it may have in his blessed kingdom. Here is the clue to meaningful action in a meaningful history: it is the translation into action of the prayer: "Your kingdom come, your will be done, as in heaven so on earth" (101-102, emphasis mine).

Can We Handle the Truth?

A few weeks ago I announced a Summer Reading Group though the re-church network, a collective of emerging, missional Adventist leaders that I co-founded back in 2000. The book I chose is What Would Jesus Deconstruct? The Good News of Postmodernism for the Church, by John D. Caputo. Caputo is Thomas J. Watson Professor of Humanities at Syracuse University and is known for his work on Derrida and deconstruction (a quick look at his faculty page at the Syracuse website makes we want to drop everything and enroll to study with him).

What Would Jesus Deconstruct? is the winner of the ForeWord Magazine Best Philosophy Book of 2007 award.

The book discussion is taking place at the re-church blog and starts today with a post by me on the first chapter.

Here is an excerpt from the first post which went up today.

Summer Reading Group :: What Would Jesus Deconstruct?

It’s hard to believe…but, summer is here. And with summer comes time spent with great books. So, re-church is announcing a Summer Reading Group. We will be blogging through What Would Jesus Deconstruct?, by John D. Caputo. This is an enjoyable and challenge jaunt into postmodernism, Derridian deconstruction and the gospel. Caputo has a playful, sharp and ironic style that is sure to rub us the wrong way and spark some great conversation.
There are 6 chapters and we will blog one chapter a week for six weeks, starting July 13, so you have time to get the book and start reading. Our bloggers will be:

::Ryan Bell, Senior Pastor of the Hollywood Adventist Church
::Samir Selmanovic, founder of Faith House Manhattan and Pastor of City Lights
::Zane Yi, Ph.D. candidate in Philosophy at Fordham University in New York City.

Please drop a comment at the re-church blog if you plan to read along with us. The blogs will be posted there and we invite your comments, questions, challenges and insights. This will be a much more enjoyable experience if you participate in the comments.

Please invite anyone you know that might be interested in this group and lets have some fun this summer reading together.