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Repaso: April 5, 2013

April 5, 2013 — Leave a comment

1. The Latino Reformation
Elizabeth Dias writes this week’s cover story for TIME on “the rise of the evangélicos” and has this to say in an online teaser:

One Sunday late last summer, I saw a sign on the side of the road in Adelphi, Md. It was small, wedged between dozens of presidential campaign signs, and it was in Spanish: Iglesia de Dios del Evangelio Completo. Down the road I found another sign: Primera Iglesia Bautista Hispana de Maryland. Soon I started seeing signs for Protestant Latino churches everywhere. There was even one right behind my apartment in Virginia. And so I decided to visit two of the largest Latino Protestant churches in the area—La Roca de la Eternidad in Adelphi and Iglesia Cuadrangular el Calvario in nearby Silver Spring. What I discovered signaled a Latino Reformation.

2. The food aid debate
An important – if contentious – conversation seems to be happening in political, business, and NGO circles about the U.S. food aid program:

Washington is awash in rumors this week that the White House is planning major changes in the way the U.S. donates food to fight hunger in some of the world’s poorest countries. It has set off an emotional debate. Both sides say they are trying to save lives. America’s policies on food aid are singularly generous — and also unusually selfish. On the generous side, the U.S. spends roughly $1.5 billion every year to send food abroad, far more than any other country. On the other hand, the rules for this program, known as Food for Peace, ensure that much of the money stays in American hands.

3. The “two men” that were Hugo Chávez
The famed Colombian author Gabriel García Márquez remembers a plane ride with Hugo Chávez in 1999 from Cuba to Venezuela:

The airplane touched down in Caracas at three in the morning. I could see now through the window the glow of the lights of that unforgettable city where I had lived during three crucial years of Venezuela’s history, three crucial years of my life. The president bid me farewell with a hug. As he walked away amidst soldiers and supporters, it struck me that I had just traveled and chatted happily with two different men; one to whom luck had given the chance to save his country, and the other, an illusionist who might pass into history as yet another despot.

4. Diversity in conference lineups
Ken Wytsma, founder of the Justice Conference and author of Pursuing Justice, shares one of the most important lessons he learned from his late friend Richard Twiss – the need for minority representation at Christian conferences and events in prominent roles:

Diversity doesn’t trump competency, character or having a message. Leaders and teachers have and should have a high bar of accountability with regard to teaching and influence. It’s just that we need to operate with the theologically confident belief that God can and will surface credible, diverse and dynamic voices to lead us into a fuller, more equitable and more representational picture of the body of Christ.

5. Magnificat
Bruce Herman’s Magnificat exhibit will be at New City Church tonight for First Friday, including a presentation around 8pm. If you’re in Phoenix, here’s the info. To whet our collective appetites, this short film from Laity Lodge introduces us to the painter and his work.

[Image: "Second Adam" – detail of Christ crucified (2007) by Bruce Herman via bruceherman.com]

In Repaso art, Bruce Herman, church, diversity, food aid, Hugo Chavez, Ken Wytsma, Latino

Repaso: August 10, 2012

August 10, 2012 — Leave a comment

1. Vocational and cultural discipleship
Gideon Strauss has a great post at the Redeemer City to City blog about re-envisioning the meaning of work, including a reflection on the first annual Gospel & Culture Conference held late last year in New York:

Listening to Chelsea Chen perform on the organ of beautiful St. Bart’s church, and to Tim Keller and Richard Mouw outline an inspiring theology of culture, redolent with the gospel; hearing Fiona Diefenbacher’s heart break for the fashion industry, and Max Anderson offering a vision of hope for MBA programs; I thought to myself: this is the stuff of a cultural reformation. This is not just another fad, soon to blow over. This is not some utopian vision of heaven dragged down to earth by human hands, no matter the price. These people are committed to the slow, hard, nuanced work of bearing hope into every corner of their world, by living their everyday work out of motives shaped by the gospel.

2. The stewardship of transcendence
David Greusel is an architect specializing in places where people gather, including a couple of MLB stadiums. He’s also a theologically astute wordsmith. Here, he writes about architecture and art in a culture in which the church is “no longer the most important building in town”:

The big question for the church in the West is this: Can its stewardship of transcendence be recovered? To answer this question requires predictive skills that I lack. However, I can predict with confidence that the attitudes of the church toward art of the last 150 years will only drive it further from the mainstream and from the centre of cultural influence. To move back toward the centre of culture will require that we befriend (and become) museum curators, art history professors, critics, journalists, and publishers. This will require a generation of wise, spiritually grounded and theologically nimble missionaries.

3. Crossing borders within our own
In last week’s Repaso I included a post by David Kirkpatrick about seeing life through Latino eyes. Here’s a follow-up:

Few Christians would disagree with Samuel Escobar when he says, “The heart of ‘mission’ is the drive to share the good news with all, to cross every border with the gospel.” But when pressed with the need to cross ethnic borders within our own national borders, many are perplexed. They have a burden without a vision.

4. How fast is Usain Bolt?
Yes, Usain Bolt is fast. Really fast. But this video puts his speed in historical perspective, and it makes him seem even faster.

5. Guatemala wins its first Olympic medal
Guatemala won its first ever Olympic medal last Saturday, thanks to Erick Barrondo’s second place finish in the men’s 20 kilometer walk. As you can imagine, Guatemalans are pretty excited and proud. Honestly, though, I’m not sure which is bigger news — that this is Guatemala’s first medal, or that walking is an actual Olympic sport. Apparently, racewalking is quite popular in Latin America.

6. Comparing the continents
Some creative folks have created a series of infographics using the ubiquitous Olympic rings, which represent each of the world’s continents, to portray inequality of various kinds around the world. Here they are in video form:

Repaso is intended as a thought-provoking compilation of news and commentary from the past week related to the intersections of faith, development, justice and peace. As always, I welcome your thoughts on any of the links and ideas in this roundup!

[Photo credit: Andrew Rodriguez via nytimes.com]

In Repaso architecture, art, church, culture, David Gruesel, David Kirkpatrick, discipleship, Erick Barrondo, Gideon Strauss, Guatemala, Latino, mission, Olympics, Repaso, stewardship, Usain Bolt, vocation

Repaso: August 3, 2012

August 3, 2012 — 1 Comment

1. Seeing life through Latino eyes
David Kirkpatrick, who is pursuing a PhD focused on Latin American evangelicalism, writes about the reality of life for Latinos in the United States, as seen through Latino eyes:

I was recently struck by what a Latino pastor wanted me to see. Before immigration reform and other hot button issues, he said, “I would like Anglo churches to see that Latinos are a suffering community.” When you see a Latino walking down the street or sitting in a local business, what do you really see? The current immigration debate has poisoned the well of compassion and replaced it with the residue of resentment. While multicultural ministry brings an array of challenges, I believe our greatest need is to see rightly.

2. The good and the bad in medieval Christianity
Jake Belder, an assistant minister in the UK and a really thoughtful blogger, reminds us that despite what children of the Reformation tend to believe, “not all medieval church leaders were bad.” Church history is more complex than that:

The point is simply that we need to approach history with graciousness. Yes, the medieval church was in dire need of reformation, and was in many ways thoroughly unbiblical. Yes, men like Wycliffe played a major role in stirring up that reformation and reclaiming biblical and theological perspectives that had been lost. But it is important to remember that men on both sides had good intentions – some in the establishment were genuinely concerned for the preservation of unity and what they understood to be truth. Just as true, men on both sides had bad intentions – not all Protestants were solely motivated by a concern for the authority of Scripture and the glory of God.

3. The wisdom of renewal through rest
Chris Seiple, president of the Institute for Global Engagement (“a think-and-do tank at the forefront of the emerging field of religion and global affairs”), has a pretty demanding job, as do many of us in one way or another. In this piece, he reminds us all of the wisdom found in the biblical command to rest:

Do you believe that if you rest, your Creator will provide for you? Do you acknowledge that He understands you better than you understand yourself, that you need to be physically and spiritually renewed through rest? Although the New Testament never commands us to set aside the seventh day, how do you spend your “Sabbath”? Do you make time for Sunday every day? And when you do, are you truly resting in Him and anxious for nothing? As you vacation this summer, work at rest. Make time to focus on your relationship with God, resting in His gentle but mighty hand, knowing that He will provide for all those things that seem so important, so needing of your time. And commit to extending this habit into the fall and next year. If you can find time to rest in Him, you will, strangely enough, be more productive. For He will return the honor that you have given Him.

4. Introducing Bedford Ideas
Bo White, who serves as Director of Community Care with Word Made Flesh, has launched a new blog called Bedford Ideas, and it looks like it’ll be wonderful:

My plan is to explore the transformative impact of stories and how stories shape us, mold us, and frame so much of our life. I also want to continue to grow in my understanding of grace, which is unique to the Christian faith and truly amazing in its implications and applications. And finally, I want to engage with culture in such a way that we encourage one another to think deeply, but also act creatively. If these things interest you, then you’ll find some items of interest here that may be helpful, useful, and simply thoughtful.

5. Churches and social media
Mashable has published an infographic based on a recent survey about churches and how they’re using social media. Following this piece in the New York Times earlier this year, it’s interesting to see coverage of social media use among Christians. It’s interesting stuff to ponder, especially in light of concerns about how the Internet changes how we discuss things (included in last week’s Repaso).

6. Actor Chris Kipiniak reads a real Yelp review
This has been going around a lot this week, but in case anyone hasn’t seen it, it’s pretty funny. Think before you Yelp, or yours might be next!

[Photo credit: Door of St Saviour’s Cathedral, Goulburn, NSW via redbubble.com]

The elefante in the room

March 12, 2012 — Leave a comment

There’s much to be puzzled by when it comes to U.S. politics, but for me one of the biggest is the underappreciated the Latino vote.

TIME’s cover recently featured a collage of Latino faces (and a Norwegian-Chinese-Irish one; oops), along with the words: Yo Decido. The cover story, written by Michael Scherer, is “Why Latinos will pick the next President.” He looks at national politics, but focuses his writing on things here in Phoenix. Simply put, Latinos are changing not only this state, but also the face of the country, and they will change its politics. Currently about one sixth of the total population, by 2050 one in three in the U.S. will be Latino. That’s a big piece of the pie.

But Obama, who won in 2008 with two-thirds of the Latino vote, failed to deliver on promises to pass immigration reform during his first year in office, and instead stepped up deportations like never before. The Republicans, meanwhile, are going to great lengths to outdo each other in anti-immigrant rhetoric (without much interest in differentiating between those with documents or without) that sees immigration as a simple problem with simple, if costly and/or strange, solutions. The most creative solution proposed by a one-time leading candidate entailed an electric fence at the border, guarded by alligators; he later called it “a joke.”

While Latinos are not a homogeneous voting bloc, they tend to be young and socially conservative. And immigration is far from the only issue on the table. Latinos have suffered disproportionately during the recession, and while the national unemployment rate holds steady at 8.3% — happily a three-year low — unemployment remains above 10% among Latinos. The economy matters a lot to all of us this time around, but even more so to Latinos.

Rev. Samuel Rodriguez, president of the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference, says in the TIME story, “We really look like Republicans on paper, but they don’t want us. The Democrats don’t look like us on paper, but they really want us.”

I blogged about this strange phenomenon last month, quoting Jeb Bush and Marco Rubio as Republicans who seem to get it and are pleading with their party to stop being so irresponsible and foolish. A little respect would go a long way. Sensible policies wouldn’t hurt either.

Though the cover story itself is unfortunately by subscription-only on TIME’s website, they do offer a photo essay with faces and quotes from different Latino voters here, and there’s another photo essay on being Latino in Arizona here. Finally, it’s interesting to note that while Mitt Romney won big in Arizona’s primary, and while he has said he favors “self-deportation” for undocumented immigrants, 63% of Republican voters in this state disagreed (36% thought they should be able to apply for citizenship, and 27% thought they should be allowed to stay as temporary workers). If the numbers are that high in Arizona, they’re certainly higher elsewhere, and if he becomes the nominee he’ll have no choice in the fall but to find a more moderate position. But by then, will he be able to rebuild the bridges he and others in his party have burned?

I’ll have more to say in future posts about civility and citizenship, two themes more timely than ever, but I’ll leave it there for now.

If you’re Latino, what do you plan to do in November? Has any party or candidate won your vote? What do you wish politicians, or any non-Latinos for that matter, understood?

In Culture Arizona, citizenship, civility, Democrat, economics, Hispanic, immigration, Latino, Phoenix, politics, Republican, TIME, US, voting

Repaso: Voting questions; Latinos & the environment; conservatives & immigration; evangelicals overseas; Lancaster, PA

March 2, 2012 — Leave a comment

1. Four important voting questions
Gideon Strauss suggests four questions that gospel-motivated citizens should consider when voting, but that his 11-year-old self wouldn’t have considered: Will this candidate help rehumanize American political life? Will this candidate help Americans of differing convictions to coexist more peaceably? Will this candidate help American communities and institutions toward a more symphonic justice? How does this candidate talk? These are important considerations in an election year.

2. Latinos and environmental stewardship
A Fox News Latino article takes a look at Latino support for legislation related to climate change, indicating that in addition to immigration, education and jobs, Latinos are also very concerned about environmental issues:

A 2010 study by Yale and George Mason universities found 66 percent of Latinos considered climate change a “high” or “very high” priority for the president and Congress to address, compared to 48 percent of non-Latino whites… Latinos viewed several forms of environmental damage, including air pollution and toxic waste, as a more pressing issue than whites did… Quintero said Latinos are less likely to question climate change because they have more contact with countries in Latin America that lie closer to the equator, where the repercussions are more evident. “The reason that Latinos believe and see the reality of climate change is because they live it,” Quintero said. “These impacts are very real and they’re costing lives and they’re costing jobs.”

3. Conservative evangelicals and immigration
Ali Noorani writes for CNN about a recent conference in Alabama focused on immigration from a biblical perspective and changes taking place among ordinary conservatives and evangelicals:

If you think all conservatives support a deportation-only approach to immigration, think again. Last week, hundreds of conservative evangelicals gathered in Alabama to engage in a reasonable, respectful discourse on immigration. You read that right. Less than a year after Alabama enacted the strictest immigration law in the land, evangelical students, pastors and national faith leaders gathered at Samford University in Birmingham for “a Christ-centered conversation on immigration” called the G92 South Immigration Conference… A fundamental shift is occurring among conservatives toward a new consensus on immigrants and America. These are the early steps in a march by Americans of all political stripes fed up with partisan attacks on immigrants and immigration — a groundswell ready and willing to skewer political extremism from either side of the aisle.

4. U.S. evangelicals’ overseas focus
Karl Zinsmeister writes in Philanthropy Magazine about how evangelicals in the U.S. are becoming more and more actively involved in overseas ministry, looking at different denominations and faith-based NGOs. The piece covers a lot of interesting ground, but here’s an interesting blurb:

While smart government agencies and secular NGOs often hire local workers to help them navigate crucial cultural nuances, Christian aid generally takes place in close partnership with indigenous church members. Those partners, who are both local and motivated by religious conviction, are especially good at opening doors, establishing trust, and mobilizing communities. That’s why AIDS care, health clinics, schooling, and similar assistance provided by Christian philanthropists and volunteers is frequently more transformational than aid delivered by other organizations. (Recognizing this advantage, some governments and NGOs seek out partnerships with religious philanthropies—as happened with AIDS assistance during the Bush administration.)

5. Lancaster, PA does it again
Yep, a new study shows that well-being is higher in the Lancaster metro area than in any other metro area in the country. Though I no longer live there, that finding makes me happy. It really is a great little city. Daniel Klotz has good analysis at his Lancaster, PA Blog.

[Photo credit: storiesofusa.com]