Category: thoughts

Humility, forgiveness and terrorism

Previously, I wrote about terrorism and forgiveness. Perhaps I should have approached that with a little more humility. Let me be clear: I am not yet prepared to forgive the terrorists who attacked New York City and Pentagon and attempted to attack Washington D.C. on September 11, 2001. I was pointing to the cross as the only bastion of hope for stopping the cycle of violence. But I’m not ready to pull the handbrake on this sick carousel yet.When I think about forgiveness, I turn to the Sermon on the Mount. When Jesus said, “Love your enemies,” I wonder who he meant. I’ve always imagined that my enemy is probably a person across town who doesn’t like me. I think I may be able to take a stab (pardon the pun) at forgiving that guy. But Jesus seems to define one’s very neighbor as a person of a different, hated nationality in the parable of the good Samaritan. So I imagine that Jesus would define one’s enemy in even more extreme and uncomfortable terms.

Even though I’m not yet able to respond to the evil of terrorism with love, I aspire to being that kind of person some day. And it helps me greatly to know that even though I’m not supposed to seek out vengeance, our God is a Just God who does. In fact, his vengeance and his wrath are more terrible than anything I can even conceive. I’m sure God’s vengeance would make any payback humans could deliver seem silly and childish. It’s like a toddler toting a wooden sword to go after the man who killed his mother.

I’ve read a good bit of the Old Testament. I know if I can trust my God with anything, I can trust Him to take vengeance on those who truly deserve it. I just need to keep in mind what separates me from those I hate and strive to keep from being one whose actions deserve God’s wrath.

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Terrorism in Munich and New York

I’m reading the 9/11 Commission Report right now. I’ll post a book report when I’m finished, but this is intended to be a meta-report of some of my initial thoughts on reading about the events of September 11 and an effective response to terrorism.

Reading about the details of the hijackings brings home to me how evil those acts were. It arouses my ire and makes me wish for vengance. I briefly fanasized about studying to become an expert in terrorism in order to strike back and make a difference. My initial conception of striking back against terrorism involves surgical strikes and very careful elimination of terrorist cells.

Against a backdrop of these thoughts, I went to see the movie Munich by Steven Spielberg late last night. Munich follows my fantasy of assasination-type surgical strikes against terrorists involved in the terrorist attacks carried out by Palestinians against Israelis at the 1972 Munich Olympics. It follows a young Jewish man recruited to carry out these attacks in what amounts to Israeli state-sponsored terrorism. The movie, though violent, doesn’t glorify violence. It takes a very close look at the very real issues surrounding terrorism. As the main character kills those terrorist and suspected terrorists, he witnesses the rise of harder targets and enemies more vile than those he was killing. He also struggles with many complex moral issues attending to the attempts to serve higher purposes with lower means.

Driving home from the theater, I was forced to reject my previous ideas about striking back at terrorism as an effective means of stopping it. I reflected on the “you-killed-my-brother, I’ll-kill-yours” mentality seen in places like Northern Ireland, the West Bank, and my own heart. I realized that the only solution ever presented to this ultra-hard problem comes in the out-of-the-box teachings of Jesus Christ. Forgiveness, however hard, is demanded as the ultimate solution to the cylce of violence and death.

I don’t pretend to make these statements from a position of understanding, as I haven’t lost loved ones to the pain of violence. But God DID lose his Son to us who declared ourselves His enemies. And the cry from the cross, the one calling for forgiveness of Jesus’s tormentors, echoes today across West Bank and Northern Ireland and through the caverns of my dark heart. It’s the first and last solution to the extreme evils of terrorism. This isn’t a call to weakness or to laying down in the face of evil; it’s a call to carry out one of the hardest acts ever imagined. It’s a call to stand up to evil in the world and in our own hearts; and it’s the only weapon ever shown to stop the cycle. God help us.

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Is it a small world after all?

Book report: The World is Flat byThomas Friedman

I just finished The World is Flat, thenoted New York Times journalist’s enthralling commentary on worldaffairs in every dimension from technology to terrorism. At 455pages, completing it is no mean feat, but well worth the effort.

It’s clear that Friedman is Jewish:besides implying so in the last page before the book’s conclusion,the imprint of the Jewish message of hope for and from humanityemerges strongly.

The entire work takes a fairly simpleform. It first describes the author’s discovery of some facts aboutthe state of the world and where the world’s headed. Then itbacktracks a bit to describe the background behind said facts. Allof this was clarifying and enlightening for me. The end of the bookdiscusses force that threaten to undermine some of the really neattechno-economic progress humanity’s attained. These forces includesickness, poverty, and humiliation (and the terrorism that results). Terrorism and the despair and lack of hope that give rise to it aretreated especially heavily near the end of the book. Sprinkledliberally throughout are recommendations for making the world abetter place. These include personal skills for Americans hoping tocompete in the global job market, solutions for feeding the hungryand saving the environment, ideas for eliminating terrorism andpromoting religious tolerance, and notions related to fosteringcontinued technological innovation. These recommendations were loftybut realistic for about the first three-quarters of the book. By theend, I began to feel that Friedman was offering the answer to everyproblem that plagues humanity. The enormity of this task alone jadesme to the possibility that Friedman may indeed have some goodanswers.

Despite this, the book is well worthreading, both for people who want to seek jobs in this brave new(flat) world or for those who direly need to think about how best toconduct American affairs in it. If you have a stake in either,you’re welcome to borrow my copy of the book and read it.

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On Spiritual Sophisitication, Lack Of

I used to think that God was somehow nearer to those who grew in spiritual sophistication. They sinned less, I reasoned, so He must want to be nearer to them. I’ve been realizing that I’m wrong. God is nearest to those who understand their own depravity and are intimately acquainted with their unworthiness to be anywhere near Him.

Maybe this understanding comes easier to the powerless, to whom unworthiness must be more familiar. This puts me at a distinct disadvantage. I live in the wealthiest nation on earth during history’s most prosperous period thus far. I’m a member of the economically favored class, race, and gender. I’m healthy, capable, and educated. I have an iPod. I’m about as far as anyone could be from weakness or vulnerability. In light of all this, it’s a wonder God lets me draw near at all.

But God hasn’t left me completely without tools for understanding my true place. I have weaknesses. There are things that I cry out for God to take away. But in His wisdom He doesn’t take them away. He understands the danger. The possibility that I, stripped of my weakness, would never again feel my need for Him. That I’d never find occasion to turn to Him in the absence of my pain.

So my failings are God’s gifts, the evidence of his graciousness in my life. They anchor me from turning into a completely self-involved, useless ball of pride.

When I want to draw near to God, it’s to my weaknesses I must turn, not my strengths. I can never approach Him in light of my abilities, impressive though they may be to anyone else. If I claim to be an artist, He responds that he paints the skies each evening. If I claim facility with language, He responds that he created each tongue, even the ones I’ll never learn. Nothing I bring impresses him. But my weakness showcases His glory, and it’s to Him alone that I can turn.

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Transit

The wind in my hair, the salty spray of the sea roughly kisses my lips and face. I haven’t showered or shaved in two days, and I’m in a rigid-hull inflatable boat bouncing through the wind and surf off the coast of a small island nation. I’ve made this trip so many times in the last 24 hours that my skin’s starting to cake with salt. On the wind I can smell the burning of rice patties. It’s a scent that even here, in this faraway place, brings me back to the familiarity of childhood. I can feel the sun scorching the salt-coated skin around my eyes and neck. The boat drops off the face of a wave into a trough, and I tightly grab the rubber pontoon I’m sitting on and my camera bag. There’s a treacherous boarding ahead, and it’s one more thing to anticipate with barely-concealed glee. This is living…

Erasing culture?

I spent this morning working at a school in Malabo, the capital of Equatorial Guinea. A crew of volunteers from the CGC Bear painted and cleaned two classrooms. It was hard, hot, difficult, dirty work. At one point I found myself sweeping feces from beneath a broken desk. Typical of many schools in the developing world, electricity and running water were conspicuously absent. One element, however, was not absent: evidence of the America’s corrupting cultural influence. On a wall, an Equatorial Guinean school child had written in bold letters a list of his/her favorite American rappers: Nelli, P Diddy, Ja Rule, Tu Pac, and the like. I wish children in far away lands would admire and seek to emulate the more noble parts of our culture. I wish they would say, “I want to be hard-working and industrious like Americans,” instead of, “I want to have bitches and ho’s, gold teeth, and a job selling crack like Americans!” I put four coats of paint over that spot. But the list of names kept showing through, despite my best efforts. I fear this situation is sadly symbolic of the nature of America’s culture influence overseas…

All right, enough!

Jon, You’ve done it. You’ve commented enough to make up for everyone else. I love your captions! Tricia, it’s not a metal, but plastic wrap and a gradient map, along with some layer masks, a warming filter, and some other fun stuff. Grandma, do they look like really mean butterflies? My XO saw the picture on the my laptop and said it looks scary. Other people on the boat think the same. I never saw scary, but maybe that’s because it came out of my own head. I saw something completely different.

In other news, I liked doing that so much that I decided to try it again with another photo. I’ll post it above. Here’s your writing prompt for this excersise: “Do you see? This photo is a story for you to tell me.” This picture will look a little bit different depending on the contrast of the calibration on your monitor. Pay attention to details.

I hope y’all are having a great 4th of July!

Looking forward to hearing your responses,
Andrew