Clarion: Journal of Spirituality and Justice

Elderly Woman "overpowers" would be mugger

Message of Hope for 2008 from Partners Relief and Development

“When the righteous are in authority, the people rejoice; but when the wicked beareth rule, the people mourn…Where there is no vision, the people perish”. Proverbs 29:2 &18(KJV)

Dear all,

As I look towards 2008, along with many others I am sure; I cannot help but look back over the past year and reflect.

Three months after the violent crackdown on peaceful demonstrators the international media attention on Burma has abated. The SPDC has made a claim that “normalcy” has returned. I agree that this is true. For many years the suppression of freedom and the systematic and widespread human rights violations undertaken by the hands of the Burma Army has been normal, everyday behaviour for this wicked and despotic regime.

Why I Said, "YET" by Brad Jersak

Amazing the firestorm that one word creates. Hence, the Apostle James’ exhortation to tame the tongue which, though small, can be the spark that ignites a forest fire. And again his warning that not many should be teachers for the greater judgment they will incur. Take my last outing on the television talk show, “It’s a New Day.” We were just winding down a final segment on exclusion versus embrace within the church.

Atheists and "Echthrosists"

I live in a world of functional atheists and operative “echthrosists.”

What is the latter you ask? In a moment.

The secular world has no functional place for God. Not even a “god of the gaps” is needed any longer in our superabundantly technologized world, though before technology set in with a vengeance the late eighteenth century French Philosophes were already celebrating God’s absence.

The Western secular world however, thankfully, imbibed deeply from the Gospels that every human has an inherent right and dignity, and consequently there must be no more victims. True, there is significant distortion of this profoundly biblically rooted doctrine. As has been pointed out by some, the new Western cogito (metonymy for Descartes’ famous formula) is: “I am a victim, therefore I am,” and political correctness runs at times amok in our culture. All cultural truths have their ineluctable detracting corollaries.

So the Western secular world thinks it can somehow embrace neighbour and victim without reference to God. This is unsustainable philosophically as has been pointed out repeatedly. (In the end, why bother, without God?) And the bank from which otherwise is drawn in the West such wonderful capital of “love thy neighbour” and “do unto others” is of course God-soaked Scripture. (A classic statement of this is The Atlantic Monthly article (December, 1989, Volume 264, Number 6; pages 69-85), “Can We Be Good Without God?”[1])

But Western Christians cannot remotely be smug about secularists’ impossible functional atheism. For we are largely operative echthrosists. What’s that, you say?

An atheist is one who denies [the existence of] God, from the Greek meaning literally “without God.” In my linguistic word play, an echthrosist is one who denies [right of existence to] enemies, from the Greek meaning “without enemy.”

The enemy in the New Testament is extreme test case of neighbour: what assesses the pluck of our vaunted neighbour love, which Jesus said, in turn, assays the mettle of our exalted God-talk. When asked for the Greatest Command, he gave two for the price of one, implying the first is predicated upon, and nonexistent without, the second (Matt. 22:40). And in case we missed the implication of Jesus, the rest of the New Testament telescopes The Two Greatest into One, “Love your neighbour as yourself (Rom. 13:9; Gal. 5:14; James 2:8).” Though Christians for two millennia have hidden behind the “God-of-violence” escape theory of the Old Testament, Jesus says God’s entire revelation to the ancient Hebrews is ethically summed up in two simple dictums: Love God, Love neighbour. Not much room for a God of violence in either!

For Christians, the heat is on. Since not only have Christians for two thousand years endlessly tried to dodge this “two-for-the-price-of-one” deal from Jesus, and the “one-law-for-all” metonymy of the New Testament, they categorically toss out the window any reference to love of enemies. (C.S. Lewis’ essay, “Why I Am Not a Pacifist,” The Weight of Glory and Other Addresses, edited by Walter Hooper, (Macmillan Publishing Co., Inc., New York, 1949, pp. 33 – 53), is representative example of excising “love of enemies” from “dominical sayings” to consider.) Like their secular counterparts, functional atheists (whatever their protested belief in God), the vast majority of Christians are operative echthrosists (whatever their protested belief in God, Christ and Scripture) when push comes to shove, as it invariably does, in response to domestic and international enemies. (Lewis wrote his infamous essay in support of Britain at war.)

Put differently, while John 3:16 for two thousand years by Christians has been the most loved and quoted text of the Bible, it has also been the most heavily footnoted with exception clauses. After “world,” “whosoever,” “perish,” and “everlasting life” (in the beloved King James Version), the vast majority of Christians from Augustine (and before!) to Billy Graham, and in turn the huge preponderance of modern-day self-designated “Keepers of the Book” – “Evangelicals,” have inserted “except our enemies,” and even further, “and they must die,” and “and they can go to hell!” after “perish” and “everlasting life.” Additionally, they have tended to relegate this verse and all biblical revelation to an ethereal other-worldly, spiritual, no-earthly-good application that denies legitimacy to politics or universal application to “neighbour/enemy” as surely as it does substance to Incarnation.

When I consider “secular humanists” (to use the popular vilifying expression of Evangelicals), or “fundamentalist Christians” (to use the popular vilifying expression of secular humanists) I see a mirror-image phenomenon that denies frontally New Testament witness: they assert, together, no God, no enemies; both of which in the end merge into one and the same.

Hence my claim: I live in the secular world amongst functional atheists. I live in the Christian world amongst operative echthrosists.

And I? Too much of the Pharisee in me for my own good! So I will leave my observations at that before I hear again Jesus’ words, “Woe to you! (Matthew 23).”

---

[1] http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/religion/goodgod.htm

The Cancer Conspiracy by Wayne Northey

I received this by e-mail yesterday.

The connections made between cancer and our modern addictions, in particular oil, are very disturbing.

Please read on, and pursue the links at the bottom. One is a very interesting web page by the doctor behind the article posted below.

*************

Cancer: The Price of Progress
Posted by: joan.Russow on http://PEJ.org Wednesday, June 29, 2005 - 10:47 PM

PEJ News - F.H. Knelman, Ph.D.: The above is the title of a book I began
writing some fifty years ago. My thesis was that the majority of cancers
had environmental causes. These were mostly exposure to carcinogens in the
workplace and in the general environment, the latter by far the waste
products of industrial operations. According to the World Health
Organization, some 80% of all cancer is environmentally-induced and is
therefore preventable.

CANCER: THE PRICE OF PROGRESS
F.H. Knelman, Ph.D.

The progressive meaning of Progress is a multidimensional mix of social and
personal development, coupled to peace on Earth and peace with Earth. The
current meaning is unidimensional economic growth blind to all other
considerations. Among these other considerations is a high correlation with
cancer. The medical-pharmaceutical-chemical establishment reduces all the
human environmental and social dimensions to the imperative of the bottom
line. They therefore focus on cure rather than prevention. Cancer, after
all, is a growth industry. Economic growth is the ultimate measure of
progress. During the second half of the twentieth century some 75,000 new
chemical compounds have been introduced to the living environment, among
them several potent carcinogens.

Governments and even regulatory organizations have accommodated progress as
equated with economic growth, with nothing less than worship of the GNP.
And the resource which logically dominates the compulsion to grow is oil.
The automotive, chemical and pharmaceutical industries are all
oil-dependent. The U.S. economy, more than any other, runs on oil. Oil has
become the feed stock of progress. And of all the countries in the world,
the U.S. is the most dependent on oil. The geopolitical consequence is the
war in Iraq, the accommodation of Saudi Arabia and the series of political
moves to gain control of the oil and gas-rich Caspian Sea region and the
former Eastern Republics of the Soviet Union. The relationship with Canada
and, of course, Venezuela, are also determined to a large degree by the
need to access their oil. Alberta is the focus point of interest,
particularly with the huge potential reserves of the tar sands. The U.S.
woos Alberta and Alberta is highly responsive. They share the neoCon
political agenda. The pressure will only increase if the war in Iraq bogs
down and the oil supply system is interrupted by pipeline attacks.

The terrible cost of this extreme use of and dependence on oil is not only
social and military but oil is also the basis of a huge chemical and
pharmaceutical complex. We have now come full circle. Hundreds of
byproducts from these industries are carcinogenic or suspected to be
carcinogens. Petrochemicals include pharmaceuticals, fertilizers, fuels,
plastics, insecticides and synthetics of all kinds, as well as the
automobile industry. Combined, they are a source of a multiplicity of
cancers. At the same time, oil is the major source of economic growth,
narrowly defined as progress. The circle is completed, cancer is the price
of progress. But even beyond this, environmental degradation generally and
its major threat, global warming, are also the price of progress. The
United States is the world leader in economic growth and industrial
degradation. To defend their self-appointed category of Number One, they
have invoked Pax Americana, a program to rule the world.

There are many excellent books on cancer. In terms of cost and value, I
would recommend “The Cancer Conspiracy” by John Moelaert, a superior
booklet on the subject. It can be ordered directly by email at:
http://members.shaw.ca/cancerconspiracy , for $20.00, including postage and
handling for mailing in Canada. For other countries same web site and click
the Order link. For all interested parties, I would strongly recommend you
order it. 

[May also be downloaded on line at: http://cancertruth.org/images/The%20Cancer%20Conspiracy.pdf]

Al Rycroft, Senior Editor
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
PEJ News - Peace, Earth & Justice News

Read the daily news at http://PEJ.org
A project of the non-profit Prometheus Institute

info@PEJ.ca
250.592.8307 Canada
Box 8307, Victoria, British Columbia, V8W 3R9
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Make Poverty History: Campaign Platform

At the start of the 21st century 1.2 billion people live in abject poverty, most of them women. More than 800 million people go to bed hungry and 50,000 people die every day from poverty-related causes. It doesn't have to be this way. If we choose - if we have the will to act - we can make poverty history.

A Blanket Solution

Sometimes God calls us to do big things for him. But most times, it’s the little things that matter most.

      Take Elma Voth of Abbotsford, BC and her friend Diane Pohl from Chilliwack, BC, for example. Here are two women—grandmothers even—who didn’t really know how to sew. (If you can imagine that!) But when their children started having babies, they decided it was time they learned.

      It all started with their desire to find some nice, soft, double-sided flannelette blankets for their new grandbabies. But although they searched high and low, they could find nothing like the warm, cuddly blankets they remembered from when they were young mothers.

      “The best we could find was some thin, flannel thing that looked like a dish rag the first time it was washed,” says Diane with a laugh.

      Realizing there was no way they were going to be able to buy such a blanket in a store, the women took matters into their own hands—literally—and decided it was time they learned how to sew their own.

      “My husband doesn’t surprise me very often,” says Diane. “But when he heard what I wanted to do, he went out and got me a whiz-bang sewing machine with all the bells and whistles. You know, real idiot-proof.”

      The two women started experimenting with different fabrics and designs, and before long, they had started their own little cottage industry.

      “Some women get excited shopping for antiques,” says Diane. “We get excited shopping for fabrics!”

      Soon the women had made more than enough blankets for their own grandchildren. But they continued sewing, giving blankets away to friends and family and even selling them to a few interested individuals. Diane has even become known as the “blanket fairy” in her church, because every time a baby is born, it is sure to receive one of her blankets. Diane’s handiwork has also traveled as far away as Africa, Ireland, and Germany.

      “I love making these things, it’s like an obsession,” she says. “At any given time, I have about fifty of them on hand.”

      Not long after Diane and Elma had perfected their product, Elma heard through her sister-in-law that there was a dire need at Evergreen, a ministry of Yonge Street Mission in Toronto, for some baby blankets to be given to new mothers who came in off the street. It turns out many of the mothers were so destitute that they were stealing towels from the hospital where their babies were born, because they had nothing else in which to wrap their babies. Delighted to find such a meaningful outlet for their creative handiwork, the two women immediately set to work sewing even more blankets.

      “It gave us something positive to do with the one thing we knew how to sew,” says Diane.

      But Elma and Diane didn’t stop there. In addition to each blanket, they also included a sleeper, an undershirt, a toque, and a face cloth—everything a new baby needs to get started in the world. To cap things off, Elma and Diane also prayed over each package, or layette, and inserted a personal note of encouragement for the girls. By the time they were all finished last year, Elma and Diane had sent 75 layettes to Toronto.

      This past summer, Elma had the opportunity to visit Evergreen. “It was quite an emotional moment to see the other end of our work there,” Elma says. “They told me that word has now spread on the street that if you’re pregnant and you go to Evergreen, there will be a package there for you.”

      While at Evergreen, Elma also noticed that blanket stocks were getting low, so when she got back home, her and Diane were at it again. They now have a new batch ready to send out this fall.

      “It’s our little way of making sure these babies are taken care of when they come home from the hospital,” says Elma.

      Diane agrees. “We didn’t think what we were doing was a big deal. We love making blankets, and to think that someone can use something we love to make is a thrill to me. I also enjoy the mystery: You send the blankets out there, and you have no idea who will be wrapped up in them.”

      Anyone interested in purchasing or sponsoring a blanket or complete layette may contact Diane at 604-824-8669. All proceeds go to the making of new layettes for the Evergreen centre.

Making a Difference in Vietnam by Kevin Miller

When retired dairy farmer Tony Vanderwal of Abbotsford, BC boards a plane for Vietnam this fall—yet again—no doubt many of his friends will tell him the same thing they’ve said many times before: “You’re crazy. Why don’t you just go to the beach or buy an RV?”

      But to Tony, his work in Vietnam is worth much more than a vacation in some tropical paradise or a gas-guzzling retirement home on wheels. After working hard to establish his family and business, Tony is determined to invest whatever time he has left helping those less fortunate than himself.

      “When I was a kid, I was awful poor. I only got a grade six education,” he says, and laughs. When Tony first arrived in Canada in 1951, all he and his new bride Nicki had was thirty-eight dollars. But the Lord blessed them richly over the years. “Today, to be honest, I’m well off. But who gave it to me? I always prayed like Solomon for God to give me wisdom, and God blessed me as such. So I think it’s more than responsible to use what he has given me to do his work.”

      For Tony and Nicki, that work has involved everything from helping Vietnamese farmers learn better agricultural practices to, more recently, providing help for handicapped and orphaned children, who receive little or no help from the Vietnamese government. Right now, they are working in conjunction with Global Aid Network (GAiN) and the Abbotsford Rotary Club to provide school supplies for a school that will be built in Vietnam by the Lever Company.

      The Vanderwals feel a particular call to help the handicapped, because, in Vietnam, they are often treated as second-class citizens. Says Tony: “When you’re handicapped, your wages are handicapped, too.”

      But Tony has more in mind than simply helping to provide for people’s physical needs. He also sees his work with handicapped children as an ideal way to reach out with the gospel to their families, who are the children’s primary caregivers. As he helps minister to the children, their families are often drawn in, giving them a chance to hear the gospel as well. This is particularly important in a country like Vietnam, where 80% of the population are Buddhist. Trying to convert the older people is nigh impossible, says Tony. They’re too set in their ways. But with children, there’s still hope.

      Working in a communist country that is antagonistic to Christians also presents some challenges. For one thing, Tony is constantly faced with crooked government officials looking for bribes. And when he doesn’t comply, things can get a little difficult, like when an official “lost” Tony’s visa at the airport recently, forcing Tony to pay a large sum of money to get it back. Tony also runs a risk whenever he hands out Christian literature, which he says he does “right, left, and centre.” But he’s not too worried about potential retributions.

      “When they see an old guy like me, they don’t worry too much about him.”

      But for the most part, Tony finds people in Vietnam are very friendly and thankful for the help, and he has no problem finding volunteers for the projects he is involved in. Some women will teach all day at their regular jobs and then teach for free in the evenings at a special school for handicapped children and orphans.

      Prior to his first trip to Vietnam in 1994 (which was made at the invitation of a Vietnamese-Canadian friend) Tony was very active in his local church. He even served on the church board, where he took part in decisions to send money overseas, but he never got personally involved in missions. Since going to Vietnam, however, Tony has found tremendous fulfillment working hand-in-hand with the people he is helping. Over the past seven years, he’s been over to Vietnam twice a year, on average, and he’s not finished yet.

            “You can only do so much in your life,” Tony says. Realizing this, he and Nicki have decided to focus his remaining years on Vietnam, where he knows plenty of work still needs to be done.

"Wind of the Spirit" Brings Volunteers to SOOP

Verena Hoffman of Rose Bay, Nova Scotia keeps a lot of "stuff" in her car, because she doesn't always know where the Holy Spirit will lead. And for the past fifteen years, the Spirit had kept her pretty busy.

      Since her immigration to Canada from Switzerland in 1985 and retirement from teaching in 1992, Hoffman has been the caretaker of a ranch in northern British Columbia, a caregiver to the mother-in-law of a pastor in California, and the manager of a restaurant in Ireland.

      This past winter, she spent two months working at New Hope House in the state of Georgia under the auspices of Service Opportunities for Older People (SOOP), a joint program of Mennonite Central Committee (MCC) Canada, Mennonite Mission Network, and the Mennonite Association of Retired Persons.

      "To people who don't know, it sounds strange to talk about how the Holy Spirit moves people to action," Hoffman says. But it’s become a fairly normal occurrence for her.

      Hoffman heard about SOOP in 1999 through friends and wrote MCC for more information. The envelope she received sat in her car for nearly three years before she felt compelled to reply.

      "I didn't feel the slightest doubt when I dropped the application form into the mailbox," she says. "I was filled with a deep joy, and that's when you know it's the right thing."

      Within a few weeks, the application process was complete and Hoffman, in her 1995 Ford Escort, was on her way to Georgia for a two-month SOOP assignment at New Hope House. Located near the city of Griffin, approximately 90 kilometres south of Atlanta, New Hope House is a not-for-profit organization that provides lodging, along with social and spiritual support, for families of inmates on death row. Volunteers, many of whom come to New Hope House through the SOOP program, spend their time maintaining the organization's facilities or attending trials with the families.

      Hoffman chose to spend her time in the courtroom, where she witnessed the trials of two young men. The first man was convicted and sentenced to life in prison with no chance of parole. The second was convicted and sentenced to death. "I think it is terrible thing to cage and confine any of God's creatures, especially people," says Hoffman. "How is it possible that we can kill each other?"

      This experience led Hoffman to question the ways in which people in North America define freedom. "Freedom is not about doing whatever we please. Real freedom has all the ingredients of caring, respect and responsibility—for others as well as ourselves. Real freedom liberates us into a joyful sense of belonging and unity."

      Hoffman says she felt the dark nature of what was taking place when she first entered the courtroom. She compares her emotion to a ton of bricks suffocating her spirit. That’s why, initially, she fled the courtroom. "I had to go out. There in the sun, in the fresh air, I asked God what he wanted me to do. The answer was clear. LIGHT. So I went back and settled myself behind the defendant for the rest of the trial, calling on Christ and His Word. I was willing to be his channel."

      When the verdicts were read, Hoffman says her world stood still. But in the following days, she says it slowly dawned on her that God's ways are not our ways. "God's values, and God's working cannot be comprehended and measured by any human mind," she says.

      When Hoffman's SOOP assignment ended, she was back in her car and on the way back to her winter home in Rose Bay. She knows her presence in the courtroom didn't change the verdict of the jury, but that doesn't mean her efforts were in vain. On the contrary, she believes her contribution may have done something greater. "I don't think we should always expect direct results. I think there's a bigger impact and that there is more taking place than we see or realize. I don't know what goes on in the hearts of other people, but there's not the slightest doubt in my mind that God's presence was in that courtroom."

            If you would like to know more about how you might become involved with SOOP, please visit http://www.mcc.org/getinv/soop/index.html.

Feeding the Hungry: One Soup Bowl at a Time by Kevin Miller

Looking for a meaningful volunteer opportunity that will allow you to make new friends while earning a great return on your time? Then check out the Fraser Valley Gleaners Society (FVG), an Abbotsford-based, non-profit organization dedicated to sharing God’s compassion for the poor by addressing their need for food.

      God has blessed Canadians with an abundant food supply. However, much of this food is either thrown away or left unharvested because it is unfit for today’s discriminating consumers. Rather than allow the excess food to go to waste, FVG takes the produce off the growers’ hands, dries it, and packages it as a soup mix. This soup mix is then packed into barrels and made available to various international aid organizations, such as the Mennonite Central Committee (MCC), that distribute it to the needy overseas. Through this process, FVG helps to alleviate both waste and need, making them one of the most financially responsible and environmentally sensitive organizations around.

      Since FVG opened their new, 7,600 square foot facility in September 2001, the organization has produced over one million servings of soup. Their goal is to produce over three million servings of soup in 2002.

      FVG survives solely on donations and volunteer help. Their facility contains a commercial food dehydrator that can dry up to 1,200 kilograms of produce a day. However, everything else in the process is done by hand—volunteer hands. This includes harvesting the produce, washing and preparing it for drying, and packaging it into bags and barrels. The work is not difficult, and it does not require specialized skills: only able hands and willing hearts. That’s where people like you come in.

      According to FVG Treasurer Jack Friesen, 95 percent of FVG’s volunteers are seniors. Seniors make ideal volunteers, he says, because they have time on their hands, and they’re looking for opportunities to socialize while doing something meaningful to help the poor.       Friesen, who is a retired BC Hydro employee, was drawn to the organization for precisely these reasons.

      “If you’re retired and you don’t have a hobby, what do you do?” He says.

      Apart from the fun working environment, Friesen says the best part about helping out at FVG is the sense of satisfaction you get that what you’re doing is really making a difference. FVG calculates that one hour of volunteer time generates the equivalent of 120 servings of food. Not a bad return on the time you invest!

      As Friesen says, “We know we can’t feed everyone, but we can feed one person at a time—or one hundred and twenty an hour!”

            If you’re interested in learning more about how you can get involved with the Fraser Valley Gleaners Society, visit their web site at www.fvgleaners.org or call them at 1-866-772-7070. You may also want to contact their sister organization, Okanagan Gleaners Society at 250-498-8859 or john_martens@telus.net.