Thursday, August 25, 2011

On thinking I'm Right.

A friend was telling me a while back about a conversation that she had had with her brother in which he had quipped, "the problem with you Christians is that you think you're right!" to which she had shot back, "that's because we are right!" I chuckle recounting that verbal transaction, knowing the individuals and their mutual ability to hold their own in an argument.  But seriously, yes Christians think they/we are right, but so does everyone if you take a moment to think about it. Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, secular atheists, Jews, heck even agnostics think they are right that they cannot possibly know, and if they didn't think that, then the reality is that they would think something else and then they would think they were right about the alternative.  To think we are right about what we believe is the nature of belief itself is it not? The thing that is interesting to me is that it often seems that it is secular minded people that I see accusing Christians of thinking we are right, and of proselytizing, while at the same time insisting that a banner of human rights and "western values" be carried around the world, often at at the end of a gun.  Interesting isn't it?  The question I would have to ask is why does it appear that it is historically Christian, now secular countries proclaiming human rights?  I would go further.  Where does that exclusive belief in human rights come from if not from the belief that human beings are created in the image of God? My point being that while secular folks are accusing Christians of exclusivity and proselytizing that they are doing the same thing without realizing that arguably the foundation of their own belief in the unique value of human beings is historically Judeo-Christian. The only difference as I see it, dare I suggest, is that informed Christians have a broader understanding of the foundations of their own worldview which leads them to proclaim many of the same principles with added depth. In other words, the worth of the individual, human rights and human dignity, which is grounded in a loving personal God.
     Having said all this, I think I understand why people are uncomfortable with exclusive belief systems, because they divide.  Yes they divide, atheism divides from agnosticism, Buddhism divides from Hinduism, and Jesus, well Jesus-divides. And if we think that getting rid of traditional religions would solve the problem, rest assured that innumerable ideological and political divisions would have no problem taking their place. My point being is that we cannot escape ideological division. Difference is part of life, and no one is neutral in all this.  The solution, I believe is a free society that allows people to engage themselves and others in thoughtful respectful dialogue and inquiry,  rather than controlling that discussion with an intellectually limiting political correctness which ultimately asserts it's own exclusive truth claims. I hope for a culture that allows me the freedom to believe and profess that belief, while allowing you the freedom to agree or disagree.  Thanks for listening.

Wednesday, August 17, 2011

Social Justice from the Ground Up

I took part in a social justice course that was offered as a small group through my church a number of months ago.  The thing that I found to be most interesting about this course, was the emphasis that it's creators placed on building relationships between people in communities as a way of enacting social justice.  A key moment in a series of videos that we watched was when the speaker said that often when you look at a difficult situation or poverty in an individual's life, that it's not just a problem of material resources, but that (in my own words) there is often a broken relationship beneath the surface. 

I live in Canada, which by all accounts is further to the socialist end of the spectrum than the United States.  I'm not an economist and I'm still trying to figure out how you balance a capitalist market with caring for the needs of vulnerable people, so I don't want to be seen as making broad statements here, but I will say that this idea of putting all responsibility on government to solve all our problems is ultimately very costly and unsustainable in the long term.  The thing that bothers me, is that I seldom if ever hear people talk about the connection between the breakdown of relationships and the end result that is so often a state price tag.  So often the attitude seems to be, throw money at it via a bureaucrat rather than asking, what could I, what could we do as a society to help my elderly neighbor get her groceries, to volunteer in a soup kitchen, to communicate with my spouse or seek counselling rather than call the divorce lawyer and so forth. 

And so I look around me and I see a tremendous lonliness, I see that lonliness and that disconnect in myself and in others.  I remember someone I respect once saying that we all seem to be made as pieces of a puzzle, needing the other parts for completion. Maybe that sounds corny I don't know, but what if rather than looking at societal issues and lonliness as a problem, that we begin to see an opportunity for relationship in those problems? That maybe that lonliness that may of us feel, is a reminder of a hunger that cannot be filled by a bureaucrat.