2008/09/30

Rather wonderful

I rather love this collection of maps: they show the world from a series of novel perspectives. I don't know what we learn from this, really, but they are great to look at.



Example: Tourist destinations


The size of each country indicates the proportion of international tourist trips made there. Western Europe receives 46 per cent of world tourist trips, while just 0.1 per cent of trips are made to Central Africa.

Specks and planks

Here is rather a nice blog post, which made me call to mind Jesus' suggestion that it's much easier to take a speck out of your brother's eye after you've taken the plank out of your own. In short, he says that if we want to suggest that the Muslim community needs to reign in its fundamentalist wing, we had better call a spade a spade with regard to the Christian fundamentalist wing.

A not dissimilar idea comes in this blog from Alan Hirsch.

In the past, I've been reluctant to put clear space between my evangelical perspective and that of the fundamentalists - I so understand where they are coming from. But as I remarked earlier in the year, it seems increasingly necessary. Too often, those of a fundamentalist persuasion appear to speak for all Christians, but their faith isn't the historic faith of the church - or, more importantly for many, the truth revealed in the bible. It's an aberration, the result of reading the bible as a modern text, when manifestly it is not. And it seems to be getting worse (witness the onward march of the Creationists) and ever more legalistic. And it needs to be called out on those grounds.

Ah, but you say, doesn't the line about specks and planks (or motes and beams, if you're that way inclined) apply equally to one Christian tribe criticizing another. Yes, maybe. So should we keep silent?

2008/09/22

Driscoll just won't go away

That man Mark Driscoll seems to be everywhere. He was in London recently, but I didn't go and join the fans. Then I got this link to one of the most bizarre sites I've ever seen. I suppose there's no reason why the Song of Songs shouldn't be a cartoon, but ...

And then today, I got news (thanks Martin) of a talk he gave to the Sydney Anglicans, while he was down under recently. The Sydney Anglicans are not known for their relaxed, easy-going attitude, so I can only guess at the response: I guess the blogosphere would tell me if I searched ... the news reached me from a different (geographical and ideological) corner of Australia, so it is certainly travelling.

I would urge you to take a look, and even to listen, if you have time (it takes about an hour). Why? Well, what he says is by turns prophetic and inspirational, brash to the point of being arrogant, wise but hubristic, factually incorrect but searching, and above all entertaining if you can picture the audience. There's much of what he says that horrifies me (though his references to church leaders as "men" will doubtless go over well in Sydney). In general his reformed theology gives me nightmares, but there's not too much theology here. If you can get past the ranting about entrepreneurs, socialism, and the British, there are some nuggets of wisdom there, and, moreover, some good methodological challenges for us all.

In the background, there is much movement going on over the use of words ("emerging" is nearly gone, I think) -- more on that another time. Whatever words you want to use to describe Driscoll, he is a prophetic voice when it comes to making the news of the kingdom relevant today. And his influence seems to be becoming very great. If you pray about things, please pray for him: it would be too easy for his outspoken ways to come before a big fall. And that would hurt a lot of people as it fell. That would be a bad outcome. Pray that his ministry may continue to grow and thrive, all the while becoming more and more Christ-like.


Edit: I sound like a fan. I'm not (see some earlier blog posts). But we do need to listen to many challenging voices if we are better to grasp the truth.

2008/09/16

Poetry

Wouldn't it be poetic if all those bankers loosing their jobs found themselves unable to keep up their mortgage payments, and had to sell their houses, finding themselves in a situation of negative equity, as the economy crashes around them. Somehow it would just begin to vindicate those folks who, having been sold mortgages they couldn't afford, lost all their quality of life as they defaulted on their loans and became that amorphous mass of "sub-prime" debt.

Shadenfraude is such an ugly emotion, however. But I do hope that the news and business reporters who cover this story - which will, I fear continue to get worse before it gets better - will spare a thought for all the individuals caught up in it.

No one is blameless, I fear. The bankers were either negligent, or knew they were living on a bank of shifting sand. The mortgage brokers are perhaps the true villains of the piece. But the hard-up borrowers should surely have known that something seeming too good to be true probably was. The latter get my sympathy, however: surely our calling is to protect the weak and vulnerable - whether that vulnerability arises from weakness or a simple inability to do arithmetic.

Great strides have been made - though there is much more to be done - in the area of fair trade. If at least we make the processes of global trade transparent, we can decide for ourselves whose blood, sweat, and toil we want to exploit. I wonder if there is room for a similar venture in the area of financial transparency. The whole business of "ethical investments" just means that I don't buy shares in tobacco companies and arms manufacturers, as far as I can see. As financial instruments get more and more complex, I should perhaps care exactly how the banks (and others) that I deal with make their money - and where the scope for collateral damage might be.

Teasing that all apart would be quite a job. It would take an institute full of dedicated ex-bankers, I suspect. As well as informing the end customer, it would have an opportunity to engage in lobbying for improved accountability in the banking sector, too.

There are, of course, some people doing much more creative thinking around this subject. There's micro-finance along the lines of Kiva, for example, or Josh's Indian (former) Taxi Fund [how's that going, I wonder? I Googled around for a more up-to-date blog post, but couldn't find the one I wanted]. And there's probably a lot of other things beside.

I fear there will be a lot more fall-out from the banking sector still to come. And too often, those in high finance will forget the little people. Wouldn't it be great for Christians to be known for charting a course through the mess, and helping people get their lives straightened out (rather than for bickering about creationsim, women bishops, or homosexuality). But I'm dreaming.

2008/09/14

Is Ancient Knowledge worth having?

A colourful postcard just came through my letter-box: "Ancient Knowledge", it says, "The Centre for the Study of Self-Knowledge invites you to a series of open lectures: ... Tibetan Psychology (Buhhhata-Consciousness, Ego, Self-Knowledge) ... Mayan Wisdom (Secrets of a lost civilization, pyramids, cosomology) ... Celtic Mysteries (stone circles, leylines, the Runes).

Who believes in this crap? Of course, I have no problem with people studying this stuff for reasons of history or anthropology, but the clear implication of the leaflet (and much else beside) is that we'd be happier, better people if we would just listen to the message of ancient times, and get more in touch with the lifestyle of our cave- or hut-dwelling ancestors.

Well, I don't buy it. Modern life has its problems, but if you want me to swap 21st century medicince, communications, and manufacturing for that of a few thousand years ago, you'll have a long wait. Why suppose that those people were more in touch with truth and reality, and the things that really matter? What possible reason, other than distant romantic mist, is there to suppose that creators of stone circles were wise folk who can give us insights to help our present situation? Perhaps agrarian iron-age hut-dwellers used to sit around the camp-fire and reflect on how much more in touch with the real world the cave-dwelling hunter-gatherers had been.

Of course, such a rant comes with a barb, doesn't it? I came across someone this week declining to follow the ethical teaching of the church, saying that if some people wanted to follow the mythology of a nomadic bronze-age tribe, that was fine, but he shouldn't be expected to join in.

That stings. But I can see where he's coming from. The truth about God surely transcends our circumstances, and if the bible is one of his principal means of revalation, well it cannot be tossed lightly aside. But I'm increasingly coming to the view that we must work much harder to situate that truth for our present generation.