who is hardcore

last Thursday reflection

2006-12-07T22:31:00.000-08:00

The last class was enjoyable, and it was interesting especially to talk about anticipated ways to transform currently emerging subcultures, such as online communities. I think this brings up an important point about not only our job to recognize how to redeem practices and transform culture, but to also be aware enough of how culture functions to antcipate it, not just adapt to it. I will carry this class material with me throughout the remainder of my time at seminary, without doubt. I think the questions and insights it has brought about will permeate the way I holistically view theology and its consequent practice.

Tuesday Reflection, 11/29

2006-11-29T07:14:00.000-08:00

It is difficult to resolve the tension between being against the injustice that McDonald's, WalMart, etc. represent and yet know that there are those who don't get to sit around and ponder the problem all day long and so are thankful for the real ways in which these corporations simplify their lives and leave time for more important things. Granted, there are those who are middle class, happy-to-be-naive sorts of people who purposely turn a blind eye because of the convenience and comfort it provides for their life's habits. I can resolve being unhappy about that. However, I can only think of prayer as a way to ask for direction in what redeeming/transforming the use of these companies' services would look like for everyone. Could it look different for various demographics? Should we work to create a sociological demand for more just business practices that would simply pressure change in WalMart's practices and, therefore, provide better service in our eyes and still remain the good provider for those who don't know or care otherwise? Perhaps. However, I tend to think any successful sociological pressure for change would have to come from such mass audiences that there would need to be solidarity in thought between the academics (with no immediate needs to worry about) who haven't shopped there in years in protest in addition to the actual loyal customer base of these establishments.
In any case, for the first time yesterday, I was thinking about the irony of children in other countries who are slaving away to make cheap products at WalMart so that children who are poor n more developed areas can have those shoes. Neither end of that picture seems just to me. Surely there's a way God could guide us to help redeem both areas.

Tuesday Reflection, 11/21

2006-11-27T22:53:00.000-08:00

Tuesday we discussed the McDonalidization of culture. I recalled reading an article discussing McDonald's latest plan to redo their interior decor to look more like a coffee shop. They are also beginning to offer wireless internet at a cost inside their premises. Just before my recollection of this, Dr. Bolger talked about McDonald's symbolizing cultures of efficiency, of going in and out and quantifying time and productivity instead of measuring days in the quality of time we spend with people. At face value, it would seem that the McDonald's plan to redo the interiors of their establishments to be more friendly to coffee shop culture, which does lend itself more to quality time. However, I really think this is a matter of what I like to call Britney=Avril. To elaborate, Britney Spears became popular not too long before Avril Lavigne. Their images were produced to be totally different. Britney is the pop star, and Avril is the mainstream alternative for those who don't like Britney. But no one's fooled here. Britney and Avril represent different things so that the labels producing these images can cover as much of the market as possible, both pro-Britney and anti-Britney. Therefore, the standardization of their music, their image, their tour locations are all strategized to appeal to mass audiences in such a way that Britney and Avril are really about the same thing. There is a contrived, strategic nature to their existence. In the same way, McDonald's is not changing their values to influence the world to spend more quality time with their families by hanging out at McDonald's. They're instead cashing into the trend Starbucks has set for making money off of people who want to stop being lonely inside their autonomous and thus lonely households (but that's a different soap box). They're strategizing; they're just continuing to standardize so as to profit off the most massive audience possible.
This brings me to the 'suspicion' (perhaps better said as 'conclusion' with few exceptions) that all big corporations, who are out for a profit on planet capitalism, operate under this value-less mindset. However, it also reminds me that the profit game is so saddled on the game of supply and demand that transforming culture might really come from creating sociological demands within the public in such a way that corporations would then respond in supply to people's demands out of profit-interest, but would still be offering more redeemed practices than before. Is it bad that McDonald's might encourage more quality time at their establishments? No. It's their motives that are bad, but we are here to redeem them however we can and to put to work the belief that God uses whatever He chooses to bring glory to Himself, even McDonald's.

Thursday Reflection, 11/16

2006-11-20T19:13:00.000-08:00

Thursday we discussed books Culture Jam and Transforming Powers. It was good to bring these books back up after having read several books since then because it helped me to remember and re-digest more of the application-worthy material in these books. Especially when discussing Jesus practices shared in Transforming Powers, suddenly I felt surprised that I could recall some ideas the author had that I had never heard of previously. For example, it's interesting that the author poses the idea of Jesus as a purposeful agitator or as a person of confrontation so as to make churches see a healthy way to work that into their own practices. I think careful analysis of his ideas would be important in applying his ideas to the specific context of your own church. However, I do think there are several valuable observations like these that would be worth considering.

Tuesday Reflection, 11/14

2006-11-15T19:37:00.000-08:00

I've recently been struggling with the contradiction between the great resources mega-churches have to use for the kingdom and my complete aversion to the consumerism these huge churches represent to me. However, the grassroots house church is devoid of the types of financial resources and manpower that the mega-churches have, although they have a better chance at intimate community in my mind than the huge church. These are the types of questions that begin what seems like a black hole of trying to choose between qualifying the house church or the huge one.

What last class helped me resolve was realizing that perhaps this is not the right way to approach the effectiveness of church size. Instead of even looking at the size of the church, it was so helpful to hear the thought posed that a little church does not necessarily mean it's missional and not attractional. Following Jesus in the culture, perhaps, is the more important question than the size. Imagine that.

Thursday Reflection, 11/9

2006-11-09T10:01:00.001-08:00

I really enjoyed the lectures concerning Children at Risk. I thought Dr. Bryant Myers had some great information to share. He did a great job of breaking down specific problems with children at risk on an international level. Even though he felt he was going on a tangent at the time, his comments on children in the Western world being at risk were sobering as well, through American children's exposure to media, being the target of the marketing world, and receiving thousands of messages about products that claim to also fulfill a deeper need. It is a different kind of risk at which we put our children, as opposed to the different but still desperate need for children to gain basic human rights in other developing countries. The stories from the developing world, however, were utterly compelling and convicting, as I'm sure they were intended to be.

Tuesday Reflection, 11/7

2006-11-09T10:01:00.000-08:00

Dr. Bolger talked a lot about church culture in England last class. It is so eye-opening to what our country is headed for. I have to wonder if part of Dr. Bolger's desire to do research there came, in any part, from a desire to gain an understanding of what's going to happen to our church culture before it actually happens. I think the idea he discussed concerning communities who had strict policies about having a 50% nonChristian presence around them was drastic in a positive way. I think the transfer cycle of church bodies simply moving from one church to another, as opposed to churches actually drawing unchurched people in, may find an answer in exactly these types of policies. I'm curious to see how this may rear its head in America.

Book Review: The Social Movements Reader

2006-11-05T21:29:00.000-08:00

The Social Movements Reader, Cases and Concepts
Edited by: Jeff Goodwin and James M. Jasper, Blackwell, 2003.

Goodwin and Jasper are both authors of various books concerning social movements. Goodwin is also Associate Professor of Sociology at New York University.

The Social Movements Reader contains many articles about different social movement topics, being divided into ten parts that explore different aspects of various social movements. Instead of each part addressing a different movement, the ten parts answer straightforward questions like when and why social movements happen, who joins or supports them, who stays or drops out of them, why movements decline, and what changes they bring about. It is a compelling way to organize a case reader in that it attempts to present case studies from various movements in each part, but the parts are strung together in themes that ultimately analyze the value and effectiveness of social movements in general.

This book was helpful in its analysis to remove any existing myth that social movements are magical phenomenons that erupt wherever justice occurs. Goodwin and Jasper make sure to emphasize in their introductions that there are practical “tricks” to successful movements that are worthy of observation and repetition (5). In discussing when and why movements occur, observations are made that resources must be made available to nourish the emergence of movements, that the psychological optimism that individuals have concerning the potential success of the movement is paramount, and that rhetoric and symbols can contribute positively to achieving healthy group psychology within a movement (13).

Part III discusses “cognitive liberation,” which is when potential participants begin to believe in the success of the movement (52). Belief in a movement’s success is something discussed throughout the book as dire to success and even something that can be manipulated in various ways to keep participants active. However, the Civil Rights movement was not just a group of people directed in the correct way to bring about change, although clever organization was a contributor to success. Rather, the injustice itself truly drove people to be willing to make sacrifices in their time and resources to join a collective purpose. It is exactly this, giving up both time and resources, that the Social Movements Reader claims is why people would otherwise drop out of participation in a movement (91-3). Therefore, it has to be worthwhile to participants to sacrifice parts of their “normal” existence to bring about change. The Reader discusses the consequent importance of encouraging participants to lose their own identity and to instead find their identity as part of the group (160).

The final part’s discussion on the types of changes movements bring is unsurprising because it is unable to pin down many tangible effects of social movements. However, the conclusions it does make point out that because these movements are social in nature, the effects are seen in cultural effects and in the way people perceive their everyday lives, which is almost impossible to objectively measure (349). Suffice to say, however, that social movements have effected great change in the world; in the least, this book is filled with examples of entire culture’s mindsets changing due to determined workers for civil rights, women’s rights, gay rights, and much more. There is clearly a historical consensus that these social movements have happened, and our celebration and analysis of them today contributes to acknowledging social movements’ generally undeniable impacts.

Thursday Reflection, 11/2

2006-11-05T17:15:00.000-08:00

Today we discussed both Claiborne and Klein’s books, which seem to bring a stark contrast to observations concerning the gospel. In Irresistible Revolution, Claiborne shows a sense for love in on the micro-level, where as Klein addresses caring for the world more through macro-change, i.e. by transforming corporations, policies, etc. Claiborne exhibits a desire to be proactive in living out an alternative to what the gospel would be against, whereas Klein focuses a great deal on expressing what she is against without offering explicit alternatives. I think there is probably room for elements of both of their ideas in how we live out the gospel, as even Klein had several ideas about hope in transformation and coming together that fit into (what I think are) Jesus' practices just as well as Claiborne’s loving observations about living among the poor.

Tuesday Reflection, 10/31

2006-11-02T09:09:00.000-08:00

Today we split up into groups and discussed Jesus' practices in different contexts. One interesting point brought up in my group came in discussing how Jesus' life should change the way we practice our friend and family life. Dave pointed out that it's easier for him to rationalize continuously investing in his family, even when they are "dorky," because you can always say, "What can I say? They're my family." For many of us, family is something we pursue without having to qualify the people involved in it. No matter how difficult that may be, life giving situations are brought out of a mutual valuing of one another. However, with friends that come into your life that may be hard to connect with at times, or they may be quirky in some way, it is harder to commit to investing and valuing that person if they have no direct connection or advantage to bring into our lives. Jesus redefined what family is for us, though. Perhaps I should remember that when I am unsure about investing in someone difficult to connect with in my life. This person is family, too. This person is a beloved child of God, a sister or brother with which I can share the abundant life we receive from Christ. This person could be me. This person could be Jesus.

Happy Halloween!

Thursday Reflection, 10/26

2006-10-29T15:10:00.000-08:00

Several interesting points were made on Thursday, one of the most intriguing being Dr. Bolger telling the class Yoder's perspective on being inevitably ostracized from society as part of the daily cost of the cross we take up as Christians. By living differently as the gospel demands of us, we are, of course, set apart. What's funny about this familiar concept is that "transforming contemporary culture" class now seems to be bringing to light a great juggling act that is unsurprisingly also part of Christianity. What I mean by this is that this class is filled with topics dedicated to creating situations in which we can participate in society and be inviting to culture, not giving up our daily cross, but finding what it means to both live separately and, at the same time, precipitate God's message into every crevice possible on earth. I choose to believe this is not so much contradictory as beautifully mysterious. Perhaps this is one of those beliefs that would set me apart!

Book Review: Culture Jam

2006-10-29T15:09:00.000-08:00

Book Review: Culture Jam
by: Kalle Lasn, Quill, 1999.

Lasn is the founder of the Adbuster Media Foundation and Powershift Advertising Agency. He is active in social marketing campaigns and was initially inspired to work in this field through battles dealing with media corporations who don’t allow access to public airwaves (29-35).

Culture Jam explores injustice in the way media uses its power to engender unhealthy standardization, working to convince readers to act against that injustice by using the media’s own influential means to restore authentic living. The book ultimately aims to provide a “perspective-jarring turnabout in…everyday life” (xvii). Perhaps its most engaging point is defining contemporary culture as an experiment on humankind that has no answer yet, wondering what the diagnosis of confusing side effects of mass media and technology will be when we are finally able to recognize what they are (10).

To build his observations compellingly, Lasn divides the book into four distinct parts. The sections are named Autumn, Winter, Spring, and Summer to symbolize the process of beginning as the influenced and gradually “blooming” into victory over those who influence unjustly.

This is not a very academic book and does not claim to be (115). In 215 pages, Lasn touches on his opinions of numerous issues without developing them extensively. He covers topics ranging from mood disorders (3) to intellectuals who retreat to the “left cortex of their brains” when facing injustice instead of responding with action (116). Lasn openly writes with bias, even devoting lines in the dedication to make known that he considers his “mortal enemy” to be Philip Morris, Inc. Lasn often assumes readers will have experienced certain general sentiments while constructing a point and so does not spell out much. For instance, he provides no holistic definition of feminism while using his “We’re Not Feminists” section to relinquish such a label from culture jammers. Instead he simply says he knew “feminism was in trouble about 10 years ago when [he] saw a WOMEN ONLY sign” hanging in front of a doorway at a university (117).

However, this writing style is fitting because Lasn suggests readers “take stock of” their own lives, to consider if one’s own habits, likes, and dislikes are truly compatible with their authentic identity. Readers may then recognize parts of their own assumed identity as something obediently taken from corporations and media’s seducing powers of suggestion (40). Lasn’s use of experiences to draw conclusions works because it serves to create reader reflection. It is a clever strategy for Lasn who clearly does not want readers to put down the book without considering change in their lifestyle.

Lasn creates one especially delightful point in his provision of quotes from corporations who rationalized why they would not air his environment-friendly commercial called “Mystical Forests” (31). CBS Boston public affairs manager Donald Lowery said, “We don’t sell airtime for issue ads because that would allow the people with the financial resources to control public policy” (32). What is so ironic about this reason is that Lasn’s entire book works to show how these wealthy networks’ restriction of what is aired does exactly what Lowery claims to avoid. They restrict messages to only those that come from or support corporations with an interest in profit margins and not the well being of humans.

Tuesday Refelction, 10/24

2006-10-26T10:04:00.000-07:00

Tuesday we were discussing how Jesus participated in practices that went against the social rules. Someone made a comment concerning the societal reaction that must have come from those in Jesus’ surroundings. I think it’s very interesting that the Bible doesn’t dwell on what the verbal reactions were to Jesus’ radical actions. Yes, we know when people were amazed or stunned enough to admit that Jesus is Lord, but how interesting that we don’t have chapters dedicated to the conversations that would’ve explored the mental and emotional process so many were going through in their disbelief, wonder, frustration with Jesus’ audacity, or their brokenness in realizing they had encountered something full of truth and love. In other words, it’s fun to imagine what a late night slumber part -style talk about Jesus would have looked like.

Thursday Reflection, 10/19:

2006-10-22T17:36:00.000-07:00

Today at some point Dr. Bolger said that as practices become redeemed, they begin to flatten out and become more life-giving and give space to people to be more creative within that space. I relate to that in the sense that I am usually quite comfortable in social situations, but there are a few that have always left me perplexed with myself. Perhaps this is due to implicit social rules when not redeemed. For instance, I took dance lessons in the neighboring town growing up, and all the girls went to the neighboring school district's schools instead of mine. I struggled for years with not knowing how to relate to these girls, and often when I thought conversations or connections had been positive, I realized everyone else thought nothing of it, or maybe even saw the conversation as negative. Being intelligent was not seen as positive among these girls, and it was known that I was studious, so this already put me on an uphill "cool" battle. I think my list of "cool" and theirs had opposing qualities on it, so socialy rockiness ensued. It wasn't until much later that I began seeing the situations more clearly, such as now, when I recognize the differing sets of boundaries my dance classmates and I had constructed for one another. Such awareness is helpful for redemption, I would think.

Book Review, Fences and Windows

2006-10-22T17:35:00.000-07:00

Fences and Windows
by Naomi Klein, Picador, 2002

Klein writes for Canadian publication the Globe and Mail and the United Kingdom’s the Guardian. She is also author of international bestseller No Logo.

Fences and Windows is filled with articles by Klein written for various publications, the majority being from the Globe and Mail. Each addresses the dynamics of political activism on various levels, which includes anything from activists’ rights of safe protest to descriptions of mass protests in Seattle or Washington, D.C. Klein is mainly concerned with sending a message that she is not what her critics dub activists like her as people of anti-globalization, but rather people who are trying to show that “there are more than two worlds available” (245). It is not a simple choice between capitalist-driven globalization or none whatsoever, but rather exploring “the invisible worlds between the economic fundamentalism of “McWorld” and the religious fundamentalism of “Jihad” (245). Klein splits her articles into three sections representing this range of issues, including Windows of Dissent, Fencing in Democracy, Fencing in the Movement: Criminalizing Dissent, Capitalizing on Terror, and Windows to Democracy.

Klein begins by critiquing corporations and trade organizations for seeking to represent themselves as helpful to the poor (8). She goes on to bring up the question of whether or not capitalism is a redeemable concept (16). She reflects on how, either way, capitalism has engendered a culture that has created deities of the products and services it creates (30). I believe Klein brings us a good point, which leads me to wonder if we can redeem an institution that creates its own deities as a direct consequence of its existence. If Christians agree that all powers are fallen but retain hope for redemption, Klein addresses her view of what bringing this kind of redemption looks like, even though a specifically Christian perspective is never overtly offered.

Klein goes on to describe true democracy as “always demanded, never granted” (47). Through the Christian audience’s lens, I tend to think that we are not in a position to take such a demanding attitude toward enemies, or rather corrupt institutions. However, Klein also illustrates through other articles that everyone, especially the poor, are more directly affected by the actions of international trade organizations than we may think (51). Her answer is to not to fight against globalization but rather for “deeper and more responsive democracies” (77). Perhaps her view could be described as living within the cultural framework but not yielding to it, and also as showing an alternative for living that general audiences may not know exists. She points out that she uses her “opponent’s symbols” as “levers” or “handles” and calls readers to “move through them” (246). In this light, although Klein argues that demands are necessary, she shows a gospel framework for her activist efforts.

Tuesday Reflection, 10/17

2006-10-19T09:46:00.000-07:00

In class on Tuesday, Dr. Bolger talked about Dieter Zander's view on what church should be. I liked some of the commentary that came from that, especially the notion that church should strip itself of consumeristic availability. In other words, we don't have to fight the war against consumeristic American culture framing itself comfortably in church culture if we give ourselves (the consumers looking to consume) nothing to consume. I would love to know more about how to make that work, as I think it is an excellent but potentially complicated idea, as it challenges us to strip our own selves of consumeristic tendencies we've learned from the cradle. I say that as a good thing, however, because I believe giving up those tendencies bring us richer dependency on Christ.

Thursday Reflection, 10/12:

2006-10-16T06:50:00.000-07:00

Today we discussed our need to worship the victory Jesus has in redeeming the powers. I do believe that this is expressed through our interaction with the powers being comparable to that of Jesus: living within the powers and not yielding to them, just as Bolger explained. This creates a situation in which one does not ask who wins and loses, but rather who is using the same resources to do something altogether different. We live beyond this system, for something beyond domination. We are free from seeking power for ourselves, which is otherwise an enslaving sin keeping us both within the system AND yielding to it.

Book Review Three: Transforming Powers

2006-10-16T06:49:00.000-07:00

Transforming Powers
written by Robert Linthicum, InterVarsity Press, 2003

Linthicum serves as president of Partners in Urban Transformation and has also authored Empowering the Poor and City of God as well as City of God, city of Satan: A Biblical Theology of the Urban Church.

Transforming Powers has two parts, including A Theology of Power and The Practice of Power. The former uses six chapters to explore a general redemptive story of church and societal structures , beginning with answering what God’s original desire for society was and moving on to how the church should be reacting to society’s fall in order to redeem it for God’s kingdom. The second part takes four chapters, beginning with dismantling perspectives on power as corrupt and moving into viewing power as redeemed if we answer relationally to Christ’s call to participate in fallen society. Finally, he uses these definitions to suggest detailed, concrete steps readers may take to apply the use of power in the church.

In Part I, Linthicum discusses the pursuit of shalom as an active process (36) and the recognition that “our” wealth does not belong to us (32), creating a picture of sharing resources and emphasizing relationships. I viewed this as a positive idea but also as a challenging situation in which to have accountability for one another, even though Linthicum addresses accountability as a natural part of this perspective change (52, 61). He sees the church as a body of people who are called to be not only accountable to one another but also to hold society accountable for its actions (52), which reminded me of what is traditionally seen as the media’s responsibility. I thought it was a very interesting idea to assert that it is the church, and thereby no longer the corrupt media, who is in the better place to hold the “powers” to justified actions.

In Part II, Linthicum tediously outlines how we might find shalom in equipping others to permanently exit themselves from oppressive situations (93, 135). I immediately thought of the most recent Nobel Peace Prize winner, Muhammad Yunus, who founded the Grameen Bank. The Grameen Bank alleviates poverty by a micro-loan process that allows the impoverished to get out of their own poverty permanently rather than temporarily easing individuals’ suffering in poverty (www.grameen-info.org).

Overall, it was difficult to swallow the idea of the church not only being okay with co-existing with powerful structures, but also pursuing that power itself. It plagued me to wonder how the church would become involved with power without becoming corrupted by it, but Linthicum’s connections between Jesus’ interaction with power was helpful (55). His explanation that any action is an exercise of power leaves the reader recognizing that it is not a matter of avoiding power or using it but instead a choice of how to use power already within our grasp (160).

Yoder does not emphasize practicality in peacemaking but more so being a beacon of a different lifestyle. However, Linthicum struck me with the new idea (to me) that God did not call us to be weak so corrupt power can be strong and overshadow the church’s meek peacemaking efforts. We are called to be weak in the sense that we can pursue power for God’s kingdom instead of ourselves.

10/10 Tuesday Reflection

2006-10-11T23:35:00.000-07:00

Today someone asked a question about the identity of the Powers as more of simply a collection of individuals rather than just a big happy entity with its own identity. However, I remember Nancey Murphy addressing this in her first chapter in the book, discussing our individualistic culture's reluctance to acknowledge that corporate identities do indeed exist beyond ourselves as a result and not in spite of us coming together. Ironically yet helpfully, Dr. Bolger's stories about relationships among individuals taking on their own identity through implicit social rules helped make this idea Murphy had presented "click" in my head. Much more so would it seem feasible, if even our friendships have their own identity beyond ourselves in their structure, to regard bodies of people or organizations as having an identity beyond the sum of its parts.

10/5 Thursday Reflection

2006-10-08T22:13:00.000-07:00

Today in class Dr. Bolger told us about a book tour he went on with some colleagues in England. He said when questions were taken, many people asked how to use one of the author's successful church models in their own churches. His reply to this question was that they HAD to find their own way, that copying the model was useless and unhelpful for their own community. I thought this was very interesting. The acknowledgement of different contexts needing different scaffolding to be successful makes sense. However, I do see how showing a successful model to others, while not being useful as a carbon copy, can always be useful in sharing universally important common elements that churches probably often forget about in day-to-day business. Even if a successful model for a specific situation reminds another church pastor about the importance of simple aspects of maintaining successful ministry, it could be enormously helpful. It might just be a reminder about the importance of being sincere, or of letting go of emphasis on "programs" just enough to be more "organic," or perhaps a reminder that some institutional traditions should often be checked for reasonable motive or lack thereof. In this way, I think models should be regarded as "transferrable" for their intangible frameworks rather than their specific programs that do in fact only apply to a specific context.

Book Review Two: Transforming the Powers

2006-10-08T22:00:00.000-07:00

Transforming the Powers
Fortress Press, 2006

Transforming the Powers is edited by Ray Gingerich and Ted Grimsrud. Contributing authors include Daniel Liechty, Nancey Murphy, Glen Stassen, Willard M. Swarley, and Walter Wink. Walter Wink’s previous writings are used as the basis for the other authors, who comment on and add to his established thoughts on the Powers.

In three parts, the book breaks down the process of doing what the book title suggests: transform the powers. The sections are Worldviews and the Powers, Understanding the Powers, and finally Engaging the Powers. The book aims to make the reader aware of what entities play into what Wink coins as “the Powers,” clarify the goals and workings of the Powers, and finally explore Jesus’ life in relation to these Powers and the authors’ resulting conclusion on the nature of what a Christian lifestyle should look like in trying to live out the gospel amidst the Powers.

In Worldviews and the Powers, I sought and found a clarification on the identity of the Powers. I was able to work though authors’ assertions that we need to have an “integral” view of reality, seeing “everything as having an outer and an inner aspect” (21). Acknowledging this “integral” view was key for me to be able to move toward the next step of understanding the powers, especially since I often instead tend to polarize Christians’ possibilities in either participating or alienating these Powers.

In Understanding the Powers, I took my view of the Powers as having a holistic identity and then applied the notion that the Powers’ identity overshadows a culture’s framework of presupposed notions of right and wrong. For instance, general acceptance of violence as a means to be productive, especially in international politics, would be a presupposed “right” without thinking of the potential “wrong” in the framework of violent response. Consequently, Gingerich says Christians should gain an understanding of how to begin paradigm shifts.

In Engaging the Powers, Stassen suggests steps Christians can take to work on this paradigm shift in communal models (126). Stassen warns us that it was repetitious confrontation and nonviolence that “got [Jesus] crucified” while he was living outside the paradigm of biblical culture (129). While obviously dangerous, he suggests a similar lifestyle for Christians. I support pacifism and yet still question our role in the connection with the Powers while trying to pursue justice. To elaborate, I interned with the International Justice Mission (IJM/www.ijm.org) in summer 2003. Part of IJM’s success in pursuing justice involves encouraging government officials and criminal justice systems to set legal precedents in the area of crime so as to discourage future offenses. I see this as a wonderful way to pursue justice by nonviolent force, and yet there is direct participation with systems that may or may not use violent practices for punishments. I cannot help but support this organization, and yet I wonder how Stassen or even Yoder would respond to the type of intimate connection IJM plays with the Powers in their pursuit of shifting a paradigm. Thus, while this book served as a clarifying and helpful work in how readers may view what the Powers are and how we might begin reacting to them, I am left with many resulting questions. Perhaps the important aspect of this is that I now know better how to articulate them.

10/3 Tuesday Reflection

2006-10-03T23:04:00.000-07:00

Small groups were interesting today, and I was glad to get started on what I believe will be a quarter full of fun dialogue concerning various issues. The lecture was also helpful today and has left me with some lingering questions dealing with the relationship between the ideas that were being thrown around in England in the last couple of centuries versus what was going on in the United States.

My assumption is that England's ideas, since they were at the forefront of this thought, are to more or less represent western thought concerning culture as it sifted through the industrial revolution and mass media production. However, I think America's sociological view on the working class and mass media must have been different on some meaningful levels.

For instance, Andrew Jackson is known to be the first president who had set a precedent of winning the presidential election on a platform that he could relate to the common man. Suddenly after his election, politicians made their start in convincing the people that they were not as elitist as they might seem, which of course plays into even Abraham Lincoln's well-known modest background and how that helped him win his presidential election as well.

America also made its start as a nation by being filled with immigrants and people who in large part already represented an alternative/minority/resisting culture to the place they left behind. Their perceptions of the value in differing lifestyles in the least, if not in high art, still must have played into a significantly different take on culture within the continental US.

Finally, as England elites became more at ease with the validation of working class culture so as to make room for their aghast state toward American mass media, the United States itself must have had a significantly different reaction simply because it was responsible for that mass production, which must mean that on some sociological level it was a good era, if nothing else as paired with what must have been a happy economic time for those in the media production industry.

These are my thoughts that resulted from class today. I really enjoyed it; the content is very interesting! I hope to have a chance to discuss my questions from this reflection before/during/after class sometime, although I may be jumping the gun on a subject that is to be approached before we finish talking about culture history in class.

Book Review One

2006-10-01T22:44:00.000-07:00

Book Review: The Revolution
edited by Heather Zydeck, Relevant Books, 2006

Heather Zydeck is the Revolution editor for Relevant magazine. The many authors of this book, each contributing a chapter concerning various social justice issues, are professionally involved in pursuing the social justice issue about which they are writing. The twelve chapter topics are clean water, gang violence, women’s rights, fair trade, hunger, HIV/AIDS, capital punishment, war and peace, torture, the environment, human trafficking, and poverty.
The main focus of the book is to donate, educate, activate, and pray for the cause of social justice issues (XVII-XVIII). The Revolution is filled with action-oriented perspectives on the connection between Jesus Christ and the consequent necessity of being compelled to pursue causes that name all people in the world as our neighbor. This is done with hope that we Christians do or will take seriously the call to love our neighbors as ourselves (122-3). Each author and the editor maintain a unified tone of urgency in becoming a participant of solutions by numerous suggested means throughout the book.
Because of this book, not only have I felt a sense of urgency in fighting for social justice, but my perceptions of how to view myself as a servant have changed also. I think of how I often judge those I serve by their sinfulness while forgetting my own. In the chapter on poverty, Coulter offers a quote by Dietrich Bonhoeffer that is consequently meaningful to me: “ ‘We need to relate to people less according to what they do or omit to do, and more according to what they have suffered’” (186). This reminds me of how the 1979 Book of Common Prayer describes sin as both things we have done or left undone (41). On page 202, afterword author Sider reminds us “when we face setbacks, we should remember they are only temporary.” I agree and believe we are our own setbacks in our sinfulness, and that these setbacks are only temporary so long as we look to Christ to free us from our self-righteous perceptions of the role we play in loving our neighbors as ourselves. We are instead free to share in all our suffering as servants and as the served.
Finally, I believe The Revolution’s overall theme relates to what Dr. Bolger has been discussing in class concerning the shift of missiological focus from just overseas to including our own culture. Christians need to recognize both domestic subcultures and foreign ones as having common truth that can be related through various cultural frameworks. In the chapter on trafficking, Hunter discusses the importance of “[celebrating] a culture foreign to ours” although they “may not look like our next-door neighbors” (176). In the same chapter, Hunter uses an Elie Wiesel quote to make an observation about the need for our identities to become less individualistic and more community oriented so we may become pursuers of solidarity (171). To build on those thoughts, I believe the ability to love our global community results in our recognition of the more unifying values among all cultures. While we become more cognizant of global needs instead of individual ones, relating to what could otherwise seem like a foreign culture might become just as easy as relating to our neighboring subculture. This acknowledgment frees us to attempt to reflect Christ’s love toward our neighbors that are defined as neighbors by simply a unifying, universal desire to love and be loved.

Thursday Reflection, 9/28:

2006-10-01T22:43:00.000-07:00

Hearing the history of cultural questions was helpful today in that I realized the United States is not the first country to deal with shifting perspective of church in their own culture to a missional one. I had not heard of Newbegin before today, but I am thankful for his existence and for being corrected in what may have been a common American egocentric assumption that we are the ones with all the ideas about how to view/interact with contemporary culture when evangelizing. I also found refreshing the acknowledgement of subcultures as having valid alternative modes of thought and lifestyles through studies in British working class and other, such as punk, cultures. I think that provides a platform on which to value differences and seek out unifying desires between our own cultures, various subcultures, and other country’s cultures.

Tuesday Reflection, 9/26:

2006-10-01T22:42:00.000-07:00

I am excited about this class and am glad we introduced ourselves and mentioned our interests in the class today. I think this is important namely because I think the class topic itself will be benefited by class dialogue, so even getting to know superficial information about the class members was still important. I have so many questions about, for instance, how to rope down the elusive cloud that hides the definition of emergent church. Today Dr. Bolger discussed the need of a shift from missional focus just being overseas to actually seeing evangelism in our own country as missional, and this was even helpful to recognize the perspective of those who would seek to “do” church differently concerning the framework of contemporary culture. It even reaffirmed some personal conclusions I’ve drawn concerning missional focus since my Anglican church in Nashville decided to break off from the Episcopal church and instead work under a bishop from Rwanda.

We begin here.

2006-09-27T13:00:00.000-07:00

This is my blog for Transforming Contemporary Cultures class at Fuller Theological Seminary. I am excited about this class and will soon be posting all sorts of goodies here in response to readings we are doing in class. Until that time, I will here leave my blog to hibernate while I actually do the reading required to have thoughts to contribute.
Blessings!
Carrie G