An ITN reporter on last night's news made the poignant comment that the only thing Israel and Hamas seem to agree on is that the violence should continue.
Watching the tragic footage of bleeding, torn and dismembered human beings makes you wonder if any 'just cause' exists that could possibly justify such appalling suffering.
It seems that people of every nation and belief are capable of turning this 'holy land' - the planet that all humans being share custody of, and nobody really owns – into an unholy mess. And in the process, doing the same kind of damage to their own integrity.
The only highlights were those people risking their own safety to pull wounded children and adults out of the bombed wreckage of their homes, the medical staff who carried on operating way past their point of exhaustion, and the orphaned children trying to shelter and care for even younger ones.
For love to survive amid that grim and relentless carnage is a testimony that human nature is capable of real heroism – not the kind that calls itself heroic while bombing the life out of fellow enemies.
Tuesday, 6 January 2009
Tuesday, 9 December 2008
Bugging me
Do you ever get bugged by a phrase that just sticks in your mind and won't let go?
Can't think where it came from or why it's clogging up your brain space, but can't get any peace till you find out?
I knew it was from somewhere in the Old Testament so that narrows down the search a bit - to needle-in-the-haystack proportions!
And I thought it was something to do with Jacob (or was it Joseph?)
But it wasn't the bit about Jacob wrestling with the angel, because I checked that out, in the book of Genesis.
So I asked Warren at church on Sunday morning. He's training to be assistant pastor so he'll have to get used to people expecting him to know all the answers!
Jacob, he said. (Umm, I think. Yes, definitely Jacob.) But not the bit where he wrestles with the angel. Because the quote wouldn't make sense then, because Jacob definitely knew that God had been with him then. So it was some time before then. Definitely in Genesis. Somewhere near the front.
Getting warmer, then.
He grabbed a bible and started flipping pages. Now I'd got somebody else bugged.
(Aagh! I know it! I'll find it!
Nope. Can't get it.)
Joan overheard. Definitely the book of Genesis, she said. Definitely Jacob.
She took a large-print bible out of the cupboard and started flipping pages back and forth.
I'll get it, she said. Hang on a bit.
I have to go, I said. Husband, lunch, sorry and all that.
I'm halfway out of the door and Joan calls me.
Got it, she says. Jacob's ladder. Genesis 28.
The part where Jacob, on a journey to an unknown land far from home, has been overtaken by darkness and lies down and sleeps and in a dream sees a ladder reaching from earth to heaven. Angels are going up and down between heaven and earth, and God promises Jacob he will give him the territory where he's lying and will extend his influence far and wide, will take care of him wherever he goes and bring him back safely to this very spot.
And Jacob wakes up and says .... (and YES! this is the quote that's been bugging me all this week and last .... ) ...."Truly, God is in this place and I never knew it!"
Fantastic, huh? It fits every circumstance, but especially when you're far from home and out of your comfort zone, and doesn't wait till you're perfect (Jacob was, at that time, very much a work in progress.)
Truly, God is in this place.
And I never knew it.
But now I've got it firmly fixed in my head.
Still don't know where it's taking me, but at least I now know where it's come from!
Can't think where it came from or why it's clogging up your brain space, but can't get any peace till you find out?
I knew it was from somewhere in the Old Testament so that narrows down the search a bit - to needle-in-the-haystack proportions!
And I thought it was something to do with Jacob (or was it Joseph?)
But it wasn't the bit about Jacob wrestling with the angel, because I checked that out, in the book of Genesis.
So I asked Warren at church on Sunday morning. He's training to be assistant pastor so he'll have to get used to people expecting him to know all the answers!
Jacob, he said. (Umm, I think. Yes, definitely Jacob.) But not the bit where he wrestles with the angel. Because the quote wouldn't make sense then, because Jacob definitely knew that God had been with him then. So it was some time before then. Definitely in Genesis. Somewhere near the front.
Getting warmer, then.
He grabbed a bible and started flipping pages. Now I'd got somebody else bugged.
(Aagh! I know it! I'll find it!
Nope. Can't get it.)
Joan overheard. Definitely the book of Genesis, she said. Definitely Jacob.
She took a large-print bible out of the cupboard and started flipping pages back and forth.
I'll get it, she said. Hang on a bit.
I have to go, I said. Husband, lunch, sorry and all that.
I'm halfway out of the door and Joan calls me.
Got it, she says. Jacob's ladder. Genesis 28.
The part where Jacob, on a journey to an unknown land far from home, has been overtaken by darkness and lies down and sleeps and in a dream sees a ladder reaching from earth to heaven. Angels are going up and down between heaven and earth, and God promises Jacob he will give him the territory where he's lying and will extend his influence far and wide, will take care of him wherever he goes and bring him back safely to this very spot.
And Jacob wakes up and says .... (and YES! this is the quote that's been bugging me all this week and last .... ) ...."Truly, God is in this place and I never knew it!"
Fantastic, huh? It fits every circumstance, but especially when you're far from home and out of your comfort zone, and doesn't wait till you're perfect (Jacob was, at that time, very much a work in progress.)
Truly, God is in this place.
And I never knew it.
But now I've got it firmly fixed in my head.
Still don't know where it's taking me, but at least I now know where it's come from!
Friday, 28 November 2008
Britain at war
Britain could be described as a nation at peace, as there is no war going on within its shores.
But it could hardly be described as a peaceful nation.
The UK is one of the most aggressive arms-traders in the world, supplying lethal weapons to countries with deplorable histories of corruption and victimisation of the poor by official and rogue militias.
In the circumstances, any involvement by the UK in global peace initiatives can only lack credibility, till it puts its money where its mouth is and stops equipping the rest of the world for terrorism and war.
But it could hardly be described as a peaceful nation.
The UK is one of the most aggressive arms-traders in the world, supplying lethal weapons to countries with deplorable histories of corruption and victimisation of the poor by official and rogue militias.
In the circumstances, any involvement by the UK in global peace initiatives can only lack credibility, till it puts its money where its mouth is and stops equipping the rest of the world for terrorism and war.
Thursday, 27 November 2008
In the eye of the beholder
I was interviewing a man with learning difficulties and he told me he had to have help with some things because he was mentally handicapped.
I asked him to tell me what that meant.
He said, ‘It means people stare at you in the street and say horrible things in shops.’
It made me wonder how other groups might be defined, in terms of how they get treated by other people.
There was a blind man in the street collecting for a blind welfare charity. I guess his definition of being blind might be something along the lines of: ‘It means people think you won’t notice them walking past pretending they haven't seen you.’
Foreign visitor? ‘Means people raise their voices as though you’re deaf and think you’re stupid if you don’t understand the first time.’
Deaf? ‘Means people think you’re stupid if you don’t understand the first time.’
Christian?
Sadly, in many countries: ‘Means you get arrested on false pretexts, thrown in prison, lose your job or are evicted from your home and no lawyer will represent you.’
I asked him to tell me what that meant.
He said, ‘It means people stare at you in the street and say horrible things in shops.’
It made me wonder how other groups might be defined, in terms of how they get treated by other people.
There was a blind man in the street collecting for a blind welfare charity. I guess his definition of being blind might be something along the lines of: ‘It means people think you won’t notice them walking past pretending they haven't seen you.’
Foreign visitor? ‘Means people raise their voices as though you’re deaf and think you’re stupid if you don’t understand the first time.’
Deaf? ‘Means people think you’re stupid if you don’t understand the first time.’
Christian?
Sadly, in many countries: ‘Means you get arrested on false pretexts, thrown in prison, lose your job or are evicted from your home and no lawyer will represent you.’
Monday, 17 November 2008
Criminal
Once in a while someone says something that sticks in your mind and won’t go away.
I was talking to a committed Christian whose brother is involved in petty – or actually, not so petty – crime.
I commented that it must be hard, seeing your brother go down that path.
He said it was no harder than seeing him in a nine-to-five job and living in a three-bed semi, if he didn’t know God.
And that keeps niggling away at me: why assume that outward respectability makes a person any closer to God than outward criminality?
After all, if I’m not living God’s will for my life, then he is not my God – even if I believe I believe he is!
Even if I was doing lots of stuff that looked good, felt good and even did people good –apparently – if it wasn’t what God was asking me to do, I’d be no closer to him than if I was selling drugs or stolen goods or cheating defenceless people.
I’d be cheating on a God who chooses to be defenceless against my free choice.
And that surely would be a terrible waste of life.
Criminal, even.
I was talking to a committed Christian whose brother is involved in petty – or actually, not so petty – crime.
I commented that it must be hard, seeing your brother go down that path.
He said it was no harder than seeing him in a nine-to-five job and living in a three-bed semi, if he didn’t know God.
And that keeps niggling away at me: why assume that outward respectability makes a person any closer to God than outward criminality?
After all, if I’m not living God’s will for my life, then he is not my God – even if I believe I believe he is!
Even if I was doing lots of stuff that looked good, felt good and even did people good –apparently – if it wasn’t what God was asking me to do, I’d be no closer to him than if I was selling drugs or stolen goods or cheating defenceless people.
I’d be cheating on a God who chooses to be defenceless against my free choice.
And that surely would be a terrible waste of life.
Criminal, even.
Thursday, 13 November 2008
Secular God
Following yesterday's blog about Christmas stamps (Embarrassed by God) I received the following comment from a blog-reader:
You've got this story back to front.
Royal Mail have many years issued secular and religious Christmas stamps on alternate years. This year was due to be a secular year. (2006 stamps featured Santa Claus in the snow, 2007 featured the Madonna stamps etc). For 2008 last year's religious stamps are being re-issued as an optional choice.
So rather than asking why they're only available "under the counter" (which is a bit of an exaggeration given the media attention), you should be asking if secular stamps will also be available in parallel next year for the non-religious.
So, in reply, I'd like to add:
On the other hand …. Christmas is an annual festival to commemorate the birth of Christ.
Not just on alternate years, or taking turns with Peter Pan, or just as long as it doesn't offend anyone.
If people want to celebrate December 25 as a bank holiday with pantomime stamps (or inflatable Santas, luminous reindeer, binge-eating, credit card debt or any other form of jollity) no one's stopping them
But insisting that Jesus Christ has nothing to do with Christmas for the 'non-religious' is odd.
As is stopping shopkeepers (including our local Hindus) from displaying nativity scenes in their shop window.
And insisting on rebranding Christmas as 'Winterfest' or some other title that omits the word 'Christ'.
And allowing schoolchildren to perform plays about fairies and witches, or dances commemorating goddesses, but not plays and songs retelling the birth of Jesus.
Jesus Christ never came for the religious (including the secular humanists) who had their belief systems all sorted out. They didn't like him or his followers, and still don't.
He came for people who were sick to death of superficiality and hypocrisy, especially in themselves, and wanted a different way to live life. He was born a homeless baby and was tortured and executed for offending both religious and secular establishments.
That truth can't be summed up in Madonna and Child stamps or Bethlehem-stable Christmas cards, but for me it comes nearer than Mother Goose or Frosty the Snowman, and I'd like the option of a Christmas image including Christ to be available, openly, publicly, on show, over the counter, in the windows, on the streets, once a year at Christmas – every year – regardless of whether it's considered to be politically correct or internationally inoffensive.
You've got this story back to front.
Royal Mail have many years issued secular and religious Christmas stamps on alternate years. This year was due to be a secular year. (2006 stamps featured Santa Claus in the snow, 2007 featured the Madonna stamps etc). For 2008 last year's religious stamps are being re-issued as an optional choice.
So rather than asking why they're only available "under the counter" (which is a bit of an exaggeration given the media attention), you should be asking if secular stamps will also be available in parallel next year for the non-religious.
So, in reply, I'd like to add:
On the other hand …. Christmas is an annual festival to commemorate the birth of Christ.
Not just on alternate years, or taking turns with Peter Pan, or just as long as it doesn't offend anyone.
If people want to celebrate December 25 as a bank holiday with pantomime stamps (or inflatable Santas, luminous reindeer, binge-eating, credit card debt or any other form of jollity) no one's stopping them
But insisting that Jesus Christ has nothing to do with Christmas for the 'non-religious' is odd.
As is stopping shopkeepers (including our local Hindus) from displaying nativity scenes in their shop window.
And insisting on rebranding Christmas as 'Winterfest' or some other title that omits the word 'Christ'.
And allowing schoolchildren to perform plays about fairies and witches, or dances commemorating goddesses, but not plays and songs retelling the birth of Jesus.
Jesus Christ never came for the religious (including the secular humanists) who had their belief systems all sorted out. They didn't like him or his followers, and still don't.
He came for people who were sick to death of superficiality and hypocrisy, especially in themselves, and wanted a different way to live life. He was born a homeless baby and was tortured and executed for offending both religious and secular establishments.
That truth can't be summed up in Madonna and Child stamps or Bethlehem-stable Christmas cards, but for me it comes nearer than Mother Goose or Frosty the Snowman, and I'd like the option of a Christmas image including Christ to be available, openly, publicly, on show, over the counter, in the windows, on the streets, once a year at Christmas – every year – regardless of whether it's considered to be politically correct or internationally inoffensive.
Wednesday, 12 November 2008
Embarrassed by God?
It seems to be only in the 'sophisticated' West that people regard belief in God as an embarrassing social solecism – tolerated in people from other cultures and religions but seen as an under-the-counter commodity in home-grown Christians.
Literally.
The latest eccentricity is the Christmas stamps. Apparently there are two sets of designs: one featuring more or less grotesque pantomime figures, and one featuring the Madonna and child – the Virgin Mary and her son, Jesus Christ.
One set is offered for sale by post office and shop staff. The other is kept under the counter and only produced (if the outlet stocks it at all) on request. Guess which one is the poor relation? Yup, you got it: the one featuring the child whose arrival into the world is the whole point of the Christmas celebration.
The irony is, of course, that you have to know about the 'alternative' stamps in order to request them. Why are they not offered openly for sale, along with the pantomime crowd? Because 'there is no demand'!
I live in an area which is richly multicultural, multiethnic, multilingual, multi-accepting, and I love the local shopkeepers for their happy display of Hindu icons, Christian images, Muslim symbols, and cards for every festival – Eid, Diwali, Christmas, Rosh Hashanah ….
Our neighbours from the East don't have a problem with belief in God. They don't find it embarrassing to admit to their own beliefs and they don't expect Westerners to apologise because some of them are Christian.
They accept that not everyone has the same beliefs but on the whole our neighbours seem relieved to find that we're Christian – that we believe in a God beyond our own human limitations – rather than atheist. Especially our neighbours from Eastern countries find secularism cold, alien and self-seeking.
The UK government, on national and local levels, is – rightly – careful not to offend anyone of any religion.
Except, it seems, Christians.
No one apologises for Eid being a Muslim feast, or insists that Diwali be devoid of lights and images in case the worship of Hindu gods offends people who don't accept them as divine.
So why does Christmas have to be sanitised and desanctified, stripped of every connotation and hint of Jesus, just in case it offends someone to be reminded that Christmas commemorates the birth of Christ?
We don't believe in an under-the-counter God but one who claimed to be the light of the world, making himself freely available to anyone overwhelmed by this dark and inhuman world.
Christmas is coming.
Shine on, Jesus Christ.
Literally.
The latest eccentricity is the Christmas stamps. Apparently there are two sets of designs: one featuring more or less grotesque pantomime figures, and one featuring the Madonna and child – the Virgin Mary and her son, Jesus Christ.
One set is offered for sale by post office and shop staff. The other is kept under the counter and only produced (if the outlet stocks it at all) on request. Guess which one is the poor relation? Yup, you got it: the one featuring the child whose arrival into the world is the whole point of the Christmas celebration.
The irony is, of course, that you have to know about the 'alternative' stamps in order to request them. Why are they not offered openly for sale, along with the pantomime crowd? Because 'there is no demand'!
I live in an area which is richly multicultural, multiethnic, multilingual, multi-accepting, and I love the local shopkeepers for their happy display of Hindu icons, Christian images, Muslim symbols, and cards for every festival – Eid, Diwali, Christmas, Rosh Hashanah ….
Our neighbours from the East don't have a problem with belief in God. They don't find it embarrassing to admit to their own beliefs and they don't expect Westerners to apologise because some of them are Christian.
They accept that not everyone has the same beliefs but on the whole our neighbours seem relieved to find that we're Christian – that we believe in a God beyond our own human limitations – rather than atheist. Especially our neighbours from Eastern countries find secularism cold, alien and self-seeking.
The UK government, on national and local levels, is – rightly – careful not to offend anyone of any religion.
Except, it seems, Christians.
No one apologises for Eid being a Muslim feast, or insists that Diwali be devoid of lights and images in case the worship of Hindu gods offends people who don't accept them as divine.
So why does Christmas have to be sanitised and desanctified, stripped of every connotation and hint of Jesus, just in case it offends someone to be reminded that Christmas commemorates the birth of Christ?
We don't believe in an under-the-counter God but one who claimed to be the light of the world, making himself freely available to anyone overwhelmed by this dark and inhuman world.
Christmas is coming.
Shine on, Jesus Christ.
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