A line of thought inspired by Invictus

I went to see Invictus a couple days ago, and it was a really good movie. You should go see it. It's about Nelson Mandela and rugby!

The movie portrays South Africa during and immediately after apartheid. I was thinking how South Africa is one of, if not the most, developed country in Africa, and how the white parts of South Africa were (and still are) really developed. It reminded me of how Dr. George would always say in her Social Change and Development class at Gordon that "the Third World is to be found in the First, and the First in the Third."

In the movie, it is painfully obvious that it doesn't matter how developed a country is if that development is limited to a certain portion of the population, i.e. whites in South Africa. Another thing Dr. George always said, along the same lines as the quote above, is that the term "developed nation" is not an accurate term, and it is even misleading. It implies that America has made it, and has no where to go, and is what all nations should strive to be. What Americans have is what they should want.

But, what good is development in America if it is restricted to certain economic classes? What good is it to have good hospitals and medicine if millions can't afford it? Apartheid is a comfortable enough subject for movies because the injustice is obvious. Institutionalized racism is wrong. Everyone agrees. But what about institutionalized classism? [Disclaimer: I'm not saying America is as bad as apartheid SA, don't get carried away...]

Where Invictus causes the right questions, movies like Pursuit of Happyness give the wrong answers. Pursuit tells the story of a statistical outlier, but it pervades the consciousness of American cultural expectations for what the poor "should" be able to achieve if only they "work hard enough." The bad news is, poor people in America work hard and stay poor.

So, should health care be only for those who can afford it? Should the benefits of America's development go only to America's rich?

I don't pretend to know how to "fix" America's health care. I'm just saying that conservatives should understand that health and justice are linked. And justice for the poor matters a whole lot to a certain 1st century rabbi that seems to get people elected a lot...

And remember, its always the children of the poor that suffer anyway. Even if kids get health care, imagine what happens to the kids in a family that is already poor and a parent gets sick and can't work.

To end, some exhortations:
1. Christians in America, think eternally for a second. Christ endures, America dies. Think about the ethical/political implications of that!
2. Think about who really benefits from your political views: the rich or the poor? Then think, between those two groups, who does Jesus want justice for? (Open your Bibles to Luke 6:24-27, underline it like a good evangelical, and just stare at it for a while. If you're a Christian and you're going to defend the rights of an economic class, it has to be the poor.)
3. Figure out what the presuppositions of your political views are! Then, examine your presuppositions!
4. Seek truth in politics, not victory!

"Justice is what love looks like in public." -Dr. Cornell West

Grace and peace (and apologies if I'm not graceful or peaceful enough),
Charles

Things keeping me awake until 5:48 (at least) in the morning.

1. Prednisone (I had an allergic reaction, and they gave me steroids with numerous side effects)
2. My massive complaints about Biblical Studies (I got downgraded on a paper because it wasn't irrelevant enough)
3. An excerpt from Kierkegaard about despair (I really related to it two hours ago, at 3:48 am (and I'll probably relate to it when I'm well rested too...))
4. Wanting to move to Peru (To do/learn/teach sustainable agriculture)
5. Thinking about moving into the community house next week (aka Mat Schnetne's commune)
6. Wondering if I could take down my college's bookstore by getting everyone to give their books to each other (Maybe watch Facebook to see if that materializes into anything once I'm thinking more clearly)
7. Getting excited about almost being done with college and having an idea of what I want/should/need to do next (see number 4)
8. Wondering how I am going to survive finals on Prednisone (and a presentation in a couple hours, and Winter Ball tonight, etc etc etc)
9. Thinking about philosophical absurdities (I don't exactly know what other people mean by that, but I basically mean "things that don't have any worthwhile reason for existing" (that I can think of, or deem worthwhile) i.e. rubber chickens, gourmet dog food, caring about who wrote the Gospel of John, etc etc etc)
10. Wanting to live in a country where people love it for the reasons I love Wisconsin, because it is home and because of its people, culture, food, nature, etc (and not because of a fanatical, uncritical, religious devotion to its history, politics, or economic system!)
11. Writing! (and ranting, see numbers 2, 9, 10)

Goodnight/good morning!

A brief bit of NT Wright's thoughts on truth claims

"It is an interesting observation on today's religious climate that many people now get every bit as steamed up about insisting that 'all religions are just the same' as older dogmaticians did about insisting on particular formulations and interpretations. The dogma that all dogmas are wrong, the monolithic insistence that all monolithic systems are to be rejected, has taken hold of the popular imagination at a level far beyond rational or logical discourse. The 'remote god' view encourages it: if god is, or the gods are, far away and largely unknowable, all human religions must be vague approximations, different paths up the same mountain (and all paths get lost in the mist quite soon anyway). Equally, the pantheism that sees 'god' as the divine or sacred aspect within the present world leads ultimately in the same direction: if all religions are responding the to 'the sacred' in this sense, they are simply different languages expressing the same concept.

Few who embrace one or the other of these beliefs (or in some cases, it seems, both) stop to consider how remarkably arrogant and imperialistic these rejections of the supposedly arrogant and imperialistic religions actually are. They are saying with all the authority of the eighteenth-century Enlightenment behind them that they have discovered the hidden truth that all the great religions (especially Judaism, Christianity, and Islam) had missed: all religions are 'really' variations on the Enlightenment's idea of 'religion.' Well, of course: if you start with that idea, it would look like that, would it not?

But why should we believe the Enlightenment's arrogant claim any more than anyone else's? Some Christians, thinking to be generous-spirited toward those who embrace different faiths, have spoken of such people as 'anonymous Christians'; this is now generally accepted as hopelessly arrogant. Why should a Buddhist want to be an 'anonymous Christian?' But by that same token it is just as arrogant, if not more so, to claim that the adherents of all religions are really 'anonymous Enlightenment religious persons.'

We cannot, obviously, settle this huge debate here..."

-N.T. Wright, The Challenge of Jesus, pages 100-101

Please pray

Hello,

There is a lot of rioting going on right now in Kampala, and even in Mukono town, where UCU is and where a lot of people I love dearly live. Around a dozen protesters/rioters have been shot dead by police, and live bullets have at least been fired in Mukono. I don't have a lot of information right now. It seems that friends of mine there cannot leave their homes, though, and the situation is tense. I have emailed my host family but have not heard back yet. Please keep the people of Uganda in your prayers, and check the news.

Peace,

Chuck

http://www.monitor.co.ug/artman/publish/news/10_feared_dead_in_city_riots12_91137.shtml

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/8251431.stm

http://www.monitor.co.ug/artman/publish/news/Gunfire_rocks_Bulange_as_Besigye_blames_Museveni_91152.shtml

My friend Rose

Hello,

I have a very dear friend named Rose. She was my host family's "house girl" in Uganda. She is probably the sweetest person I have ever met. She lives a good six hour drive away from her four children and sends the money she earns to them. Her youngest kid is around 6 or 7 I think. I love her dearly. I can't imagine how painful her life is, but she has so much grace and love for everyone anyway. Wonderful.

When I left Uganda, I was going to give Rose a picture of me and my family. I let her choose from the small album I had brought with. The pictures didn't really mean anything to me. I could have just printed new ones out on a whim once I returned. She picked out three pictures. She especially wanted a picture of my father.

A while after she had picked out her pictures from my album she brought me a picture from 1999 of her and her family. She told me who they were, and noted the ones who have since passed away.

Rose does not have the option of reprinting this picture. She barely has any pictures of her family, and she gave one to me.

This may seem insignificant to many, but it was extremely significant to me. One, obviously, because of how wonderful Rose is. The second, is that it made me realize something. I gave Rose something that I can easily replace. Rose gave me something she can't replace.

I realized that I have never given anyone anything that I could not replace.

This woman has given more by giving me one photograph than I did by giving her three. She gave me more than the total of what I have ever given anyone. In the kingdom of God, there will be no plaques honoring rich folks who give millions from their millions. There will be no honor or special social standing for the "socially aware" rich folks who take comfort in their "giving." Giving in the kingdom of God does not mean that money changes hands!

I have never given. I might give it a shot one day.

Mark 12:41-44 Jesus sat down opposite the place where the offerings were put and watched the crowd putting their money into the temple treasury. Many rich people threw in large amounts. But a poor widow came and put in two very small copper coins, worth only a fraction of a penny. Calling his disciples to him, Jesus said, "I tell you the truth, this poor widow has put more into the treasury than all the others. They all gave out of their wealth; but she, out of her poverty, put in everything—all she had to live on."

Food

http://fud.smugmug.com/gallery/4665232_qUp2L#275574459_Xs57b

Further reflection on HIV/AIDS

This is my final project for a class I had in Uganda. I couldn't just post the audio, so I added a picture to it and made it into a video. The picture is of the health center. The building on the left is where the AIDS treatment was mostly done, and the building on the right is the main hospital building. The picture zooms to where the conversations in the audio take place. If you're a faithful reader, some of the stories will be reruns, but much of it is new. It is about 15 minutes long. Thanks for listening.