In January of 1964, President Johnson declared "unconditional war on poverty in America." In response, the Census Bureau created a methodology for establishing an "official poverty line," determined the number of people whose incomes fell below the line, and calculated the poverty rate.  The formula for determining poverty was based on the assumption that food costs consume one-third of a family's after-tax income -- an assumption that is still used today, though food now constitutes closer to a seventh of family income. The resulting calculation means that a family of four is considered poor if total income is $21,200 or less. Except for adjustments to reflect inflation, this calculation has remained unchanged for more than 25 years.

At a recent hearing of the House Subcommittee on Income Security and Family Support, experts testified that the food measure fails to consider other necessities of contemporary life, such as housing, transportation, health care, child care, and other expenses that have become essentials of modern life. They called on Congress to modernize its method for calculating poverty. One expert at the hearing stated: "If we want to solve the poverty challenge, step one is to get our heads around the true scope, dimension, and dynamics of the problem."

Both political candidates for president have made poverty part of their political agenda. Sen. McCain promised to make the eradication of poverty a top administration priority in his April 2008 statement. Sen. Obama co-sponsored the Global Poverty Act, which calls on the president to develop a comprehensive agenda to cut extreme global poverty in half by 2015. He has also endorsed the need for a new poverty measure that more accurately reflects the costs of living and the economic pressures on American families.

Whatever your political point of view, a key issue to consider in any election is the issue of poverty. Sojourners is using the '08 election cycle to focus specifically on the issue of poverty.  Poor people play a central role in the parables told by Jesus. As people of faith, we must not forget the poor in our midst.

Rosemary Du Mont is a participant in Sojourners' Windchangers grassroots organizing pilot project in Ohio, which works on the Vote Out Poverty Campaign. She lives in Cleveland.  

[ ...continued from part one]

So how do we help people who have been hurt so much psychologically and emotionally that they don't believe in themselves and don't believe they deserve better? How do we help children who have never heard a parent say, "I love you, you are special, talented, and will do great things one day"? Or those who watched their parents harm themselves through substance abuse or alcoholism? Is there hope for these men, women, and children? If we believe in God and the power of God to give us beauty for ashes, then the answer is yes!

For many people living in poverty, their change will not come through programs and policies, but it will come through personal responsibility. What I mean is that it will come through our personal responsibility to walk alongside them and show them through our actions that we are not going to give up on them. It will require that those of us who no longer live in poverty or have never known poverty develop substantive relationships with people who are poor. We must go out and meet people where they are and show them how we got out, show them through our interaction with them that they are loved. Invite them into our homes so that they can be exposed to a better life, see what healthy relationships look like, and hear us talk to our children using words of empowerment. When people see living, breathing examples of what God can do, that's when they believe God can do it.

And yes, I understand that this notion of stepping out of our comfort zones to have deeper personal relationships with people whom we don't know and perhaps don't understand, is not very appealing or makes us uncomfortable.  But is this not what Jesus did?  Every person he encountered was a stranger before that moment. In fact, we were strangers when he found us.  But as it was when Jesus walked the earth, reaching out to those in need of change, touching people who had never felt a compassionate hand, so it is today.

Yes, in our own power and limited ability we cannot do this, and I would daresay that some may not want to do it, but with God all things are possible.  If we humble ourselves and say, "God, I cannot move this mountain, I need you to move it for me, increase my faith," then and only then can we truly eliminate poverty by liberating the poor from the psychological bondage of their circumstances.

I know this is possible because it is my story.  Had it not been for men and women who believed in me when I didn’t believe in myself, people who refused to leave when I tried to force them out of my life, had it not been for them I  would either still be living in poverty, selling drugs, in a gang, or dead. But thanks be to God for those men and women who refused to give up on me simply because they realized that in their own lives, God refused to give up on them.  Yes, we need better policy, new programs, and personal responsibility, but perhaps what we need most is to stand alongside the people who need us most.

Rev. Romal Tune is the CEO of Clergy Strategic Alliances, a graduate of Howard University and Duke University School of Divinity, and a member of the Red Letter Christians.

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During this election cycle, we have heard candidates talk about ways in which we can work to end poverty. John Edwards has a new initiative to cut poverty in half in 10 years.  These and other initiatives are certainly admirable ideas and much-needed programs that could help millions of men, women, and children.  

In additions to programs and needed policy changes from our elected officials, we are also hearing about personal responsibility.  And yes, inasmuch as we should look to our elected officials to address the needs of a growing “underclass,” those in need must also do something to change their circumstances.  However, as we work to address the needs of the poor through policy, programs, and personal responsibility, we must also take into account that something is missing from this dialogue. 

As someone who grew up poor in a single-parent household, I went without dinner more nights that I can even count. At times having to choose between using my bus fare for lunch and walking home, sometimes the decision to eat forced me to humble myself and stand on the corner asking strangers for change so that I could get home. I know from experience that there is more to the task of eliminating poverty than programs, policy, and personal responsibility. 

For those of us who either grew up poor or work in poor communities, you have likely come to realize that the psychological impact of poverty is just as damaging as the circumstance itself.  Perhaps the most difficult task, when trying to get people to engage in the work of their own liberation, is convincing them to believe that they are worthy of a better life.  Yes, there are those in poor communities who, given a fair chance, will rise above their circumstances and pursue a better life. But we cannot ignore the reality that there are others whose spirits have been broken and feel like the darkness of poverty is their destiny. There are those who have been told so many times that they will never amount to anything, will never achieve anything, and even deserve to be where they are, that they now believe it is true.  These are the men, women, and children for whom it will take more than good policy to get them out of poverty.  These are the men, women, and children who can no longer be inspired by words that seem foreign to them, because it has been words that have done them the most harm.

There is a saying that "hurt people, hurt people." In other words, many living in poverty are simply doing what they were taught by their parents. They are using the skills and words handed down to them by people who were hurting, and they are now instilling the same beliefs in their children.  They have not seen examples of how to do things in a different way, they do not know how to encourage their children because they were not encouraged as a child, and they do not know how to live as a community or family where people meet the needs of others so that everyone can succeed, because from early in their lives they have been left alone and had to fend for themselves.

[to be continued...]

Rev. Romal Tune is the CEO of Clergy Strategic Alliances, a graduate of Howard University and Duke University School of Divinity, and a member of the Red Letter Christians.

[... continued from part one]

And that is my back door into discussing the recent exploits of Rene Marie, an artist based in Denver, Colorado. (I wanted you to understand my presuppositions and how I define my terms.) Rene Marie was invited by the mayor's office in Denver to sing the "Star-Spangled Banner" at the mayor's State of the City address in June. Her artistic offering turned out to be the words of "Lift Ev'ry Voice and Sing" to the melody of "Star-Spangled Banner" (how's that for a good gut check). Her arrangement is the third movement of a broader, evocative, and elaborate "love song to America." She had debuted the arrangement a month prior, in Denver no less, at the statewide Colorado Prayer Luncheon (for which the mayor was an honorary host), with many of Colorado's political elite in attendance. This second time, however, her contribution was met, days later, with venom and vitriol -- including death threats. Denver's mayor is up in arms and many are seeking to characterize the performance as a cheap publicity stunt. Rene has offered this statement and one interview in response.

Rene Marie was invited to sing precisely because she is a talented artist, and I would wager a guess that no one went out of her/his way to specify that only a specific arrangement be sung. Those who requested her participation just got more than they bargained for. Many have recited the words of the anthem as a poem without music -- and called it the "Star-Spangled Banner." At the Olympics, the music of the anthem is played without words -- and we call it the "Star-Spangled Banner." Marvin Gaye crooned the words of the anthem to an R&B groove at a NBA All-Star game (others from different musical genres have done variations of the same) -- and folks applauded it as the "Star-Spangled Banner." Finally someone has dared to complete the artistic set.

Though some may argue that Rene Marie breached her contract or at the very least showed poor manners, I would suggest that this was, even in the way it was structured by the Denver mayor's office, a "contribution" on Rene's part, not a transaction -- and thus should be understood differently. Rene Marie was solicited to offer her talents as a -- albeit public -- gift. No fee for service exchanged hands. There are no acceptable grounds for consternation concerning gifts given in love. This is the home-training we received every time a birthday rolled around (isn't it?). When we are given a gift, the appropriate response my parents taught me is always, "Thank you." Even if we spent time beforehand coming to terms about what the gift was to be and how it was to be presented (like in our Christmas lists), if we got on a stage and I made a monetary contribution to you, a politician, or charitable organization, it would be considered bad form for you to belittle it afterward on the grounds that it was somehow different than you expected. Why is Rene Marie's contribution any different?

One of the challenges of living in a society that is so fiercely market-driven is that we begin to think of every interaction as a "transaction." And we begin to believe that the appropriate response to interactions that fall short of our expectations is to appeal to the legal reasoning we've set in place to protect our transactions. That is one way of going about it, sure. But I don't see society so much the better for having reduced social interactions (i.e., with spouses, friends, teachers, colleagues -- and yes, even with our political representatives) to economic/legal transactions. Divorce is higher than ever, students certainly aren't learning more just because we now consider school a business, and here we have a mayor acting like a spoiled ingrate, and we don't have the collective good sense to chasten him.

Whatever one may think about what she did, Rene Marie did it in honor of America, not in desecration of her. Intent matters. We can't champion freedom of speech as a national virtue, and then crucify someone for exercising it in honor of our nation -- even if her specific expression of honor may not have been our own. In doing so, we miss the opportunity to see our world in new and living ways and to help shape our world into that beauty.

Those are my thoughts, but I'm open to other respectful points of view. What do you think?

Melvin Bray is a devoted husband, committed father, learner, teacher, writer, storyteller, lover of people, connoisseur of creativity, seeker of justice, purveyor of sustainability, and believer in possibilities.  This post is one of a series of essays titled Home-Training.

Following is a continuation of Becky Garrison's e-mail exchange with Tina Beattie, author of The New Atheists: The Twilight of Reason and the War on Religion. Click here for part one. 

Elaborate on what you meant by this statement: "To understand the impact of [Darwin's] The Origin of Species and the ongoing struggle between evolutionary science and religion, we need to situate Darwin in a wider context with regard to the changing relationship between theology and science in Victorian England."

My argument is that the 19th-century conflict between science and theology in England in particular, which is being played out again today by the so-called "new" atheists, has to be understood as much in terms of power as in terms of truth, bearing in mind that, since the Enlightenment, the relationship between knowledge and power have gone hand in hand -- to quote Francis Bacon, "Knowledge is power." Until the mid-19th century, the institutions and values of English public life were to a very considerable extent dominated by the Anglican church, and theologians and clergy were custodians not only of knowledge but of considerable power and influence. When scientists sought autonomy from theology, they had to struggle against the vested interests of a church that wielded considerable power, and not surprisingly the struggle was sometimes expressed in militant and hostile terms. However, just as today militant atheism masks a much more fertile and mutually informative debate between science and religion and often involves scientists who are themselves religious believers, so in the 19th century, the vast majority of those caught up in the debate did not see it in terms of an irreconcilable conflict between science and religion, but as a struggle for meaning that was capable of encompassing both the truths of the Christian religion and the new discoveries of science, even if the latter demanded considerable rethinking of the former. I think that's still very much the tone of the debate today, even if we often don't hear the quiet voices of reason amidst the din of militancy on both sides.

It's also worth pointing out that this is a debate that plays out very differently in Britain and America. A 2006 survey suggested that atheists are more feared and despised in America than Muslims, gays, or lesbians. In Britain, there is no stigma attached to being an atheist, and British thinkers like Dawkins and Hitchens are somewhat dishonest when they present atheists as universally reviled. In fact, until the recent resurgence of religion in British politics during Tony Blair's government, British politicians were very wary about declaring any religious convictions. Certainly, atheism remains every bit as respectable as liberal Christianity in mainstream British society, and a good deal more acceptable than Catholicism, Islam, or any overt display of religious enthusiasm.

How has science been co-opted by intelligent design theorists and militant atheists?

Intelligent design theorists such as Michael Behe and William Dembski seek to challenge the teaching of evolution by natural selection in American schools, by offering a different theory of the origins and evolution of life based on the idea of an intelligent designer. Their argument is that some living organisms (e.g. the bacterial flagellum) are so complex and so finely tuned that their existence cannot be explained by evolution alone. Because this is a theory that ostensibly does not rely on any particular religious understanding of God, intelligent design theorists argue that it should be taught in schools as a scientific alternative to Darwin's theory. Intelligent design theory is not the same as creationism, which challenges Darwin's theory by appealing to a literal interpretation of the creation account in the book of Genesis. Atheists such as Dawkins argue that the theory of natural selection eliminates any need for an intelligent designer, because it suggests that, given enough time and enough cumulative evolutionary modifications, even the most complex life forms can be explained without recourse to the idea of God. However, intelligent design theorists are not the only ones to point to considerable inconsistencies and improbabilities in the Darwinian hypothesis, so that even if the theory of evolution is broadly correct, there is still much work to be done on accounting for the emergence of complex life forms and, most importantly, the evolution of human consciousness as a capacity to reflect on the laws and phenomena of the material world. Of course, if we bring physics as well as biology into the picture, then the vision of the universe that modern science lays before us is far more mysterious and elusive than we once thought. Some would argue that the boundary between philosophy and/or theology and science dissolves in the face of quantum physics.

Why do you think we might be at "the dawning of a near era of plurality, diversity and freedom, but it may also be the beginning of a long night of violence and conflict?"

We live on the brink of environmental disaster and in an era of proliferating threats of war. Our global economy is in crisis, largely thanks to the corruption, greed, and cynicism of those who have profited from the unfettered capitalism of the last 20 years. We know that many people in our world today are willing to resort to violence to achieve their political and ideological goals, whether that is the ruthless violence of the modern nation-state with its high-tech armies and increasingly repressive techniques of government and imprisonment, the anarchic violence of tyrants such as Robert Mugabe, or the chillingly unpredictable and suicidal violence of Islamist extremism. We also have opportunities as never before to communicate across divisions of race, culture, and religion, to use this as a time of opportunity for the transformation of our political and economic structures, and to insist that our politicians, religious leaders, and others in power channel the earth's limited but still abundant resources into the service of human life and dignity. Faith and reason are not enemies. They enable us to cultivate a vision of human dignity and purpose, and to create the social and economic structures that allow humans to flourish in many different cultural, religious, and geographical contexts. Only if we rescue democracy from its alarming decline, in which apathy and tyranny together are turning our modern societies into dystopian nightmares, might we find the collective resources to meet the challenges we face. Only hope can give us the energy we need to change, and whether we find that hope in secular or religious visions of the future, we all need to discover it before it's too late. I think our starting place must be our relationship to violence and our acceptance of war as "politics by other means," and this is a challenge to the modern nation-state as much as it is to the world's religious traditions.

Becky Garrison is the author of The New Atheist Crusaders and Their Unholy Grail.

Then the scribe said to [Jesus], "You are right, Teacher; you have truly said that 'he is one, and besides him there is no other'; and 'to love him with all the heart, and with all the understanding, and with all the strength,' and 'to love one's neighbor as oneself,'--this is much more important than all whole burnt offerings and sacrifices." When Jesus saw that he answered wisely, he said to him, "You are not far from the kingdom of God."

- Mark 12:30-32

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If I accept myself as ordinary, weak, frail, in other words, totally human and totally dependent on God, then I am stripped of any sense of being in some way set apart, different, superior. It is then that the genuine, real self may begin to emerge.

- Esther de Waal
A Life-Giving Way

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I've been on a real art binge of late. Reading, watching, listening to, experiencing, and creating as much as I can. Good art isn't just creative, it's generative -- that is, it inspires creative acts in others. It gives us hands to shape the world in new and living ways. And I've been thinking a lot about how much this world we share needs more of it.

Like any other act of love, I believe art is fundamentally contributive, not transactional. It's not an if-you-do-this-I'll-do-that proposition. By my experience, as soon as it becomes transactional, art more often than not simply becomes entertainment. The difference is the bottom line. The bottom line in entertainment is to perpetuate the transaction. At least they're honest about it, those who transact in performance art. They call it "the biz," show business, business being the operative word. I was chatting with an Atlanta-based artist friend of mine, Patdro Harris, who used to choreograph for Stevie Wonder. He mentioned Stevie once noted that the great thing for him was that when he broke on the scene in the '60s, the industry and the public were transacting for the very art that was stirring inside of him. Sadly, that is not often enough the case. More often, people transact for (give back to) that which affirms and leaves them right where they are, good, bad or indifferent. Art -- love -- says, "Even if you don't give back to me, I'm going to give to you, and it's going to be an attempt to seek your best."

As much as I'm extremely protective of people's right to create and contribute, I'm not one of those anything-for-art's-sake and all-things-are-art kinds of guys. For example, perhaps counterintuitively, I don't find a lot with the marketing label "Christian" to be good art. Don't get me wrong (I can hear some readers' blood pressure rising), brand-Christian has great Jesus-and-me-God-is-awesome-way-to-go inspiration and encouragement (which definitely has its place), but not enough ears-to-hear-tongues-to-taste-new-possibilities for my palate. Like this Christian comedy duo I recently saw on national network television. Fun, campy, entertaining, audience-participation act, but rather than subverting the Christian kitsch that has become the popular caricature of the way of Jesus, they seemed to be promoting it as adorably goofy and secretly cool because ultimately (shhhh!) "We're gonna win." Such triumphalism makes me nauseous. And we also can't overlook how often brand-Christian buys into notions that the Christian narrative totally overthrows. Take, for example, the alternative extreme, tragic hero/ine. Why are there so many tragedies of redemption (one dies a spectacular death so others can live) on brand-Christian shelves, but so few stories of resurrection (one succumbs to death and defeat, to be composted into a new iteration of life)? (I bet there are fewer than you think.) Resurrection (the anti-conclusion that manages to subvert every possible anticipated ending -- triumphant, tragic, cleverly ambivalent -- while being a bit of each and then something more, all at once) is the gift of hope-for-all that those who know the Jesus story have. However, many of the compelling tellings of it are currently coming from outside the brand. While we vacillate between Left Behind and The Passion, some have chosen a more/less _______ path (I couldn't think of a fully accurate word that would be worth the offense).

I don't find degradation very artful either. With art being quintessentially generative as far as I'm concerned, that which is degenerate doesn't do it for me. I can abide the grotesque and dark, but once I heard the story of an exhibit that was closed because of a piece debasing a graphic of The Virgin by placing it in a toilet with feces. I wholeheartedly agree with that decision. On the other hand, I was dismayed when the Secret Service shut down Yazmany Arboleda's installations The Assassination of Hillary Clinton and The Assassination of Barack Obama--which though provocatively titled, are purely symbolic portrayals of the media's treatment of these figures. . Assuming the best until evidence to the contrary surfaces, I think they are brilliant, though undeniably disturbing (á la The New Yorker). Sometimes a good gut punch is the only thing that will blur our vision long enough for us to see.

[to be continued...]

Melvin Bray is a devoted husband, committed father, learner, teacher, writer, storyteller, lover of people, connoisseur of creativity, seeker of justice, purveyor of sustainability, and believer in possibilities.  This post is one of a series of essays titled Home-Training.

Becky Garrison recently e-mailed Tina Beattie, author of The New Atheists: The Twilight of Reason and the War on Religion, to glean her insights on this ongoing debate.

Why is this new atheism primarily a British and American phenomenon?

Although the new atheists are sweeping in their condemnation of religion per se, they are by and large a rather homogenous bunch of disaffected white, male, English-speaking Protestants who seek in evolutionary science the kind of reassurances that perhaps they might once have sought in Christianity.

Sam Harris is Jewish.

Sam Harris is an exception. Not only does he come from a Jewish background, he is also a much more complex and clever philosopher with a smattering of mysticism and a neo-con approach to politics, which allows him to offer a quite terrifying philosophical justification for torture, war, and the inevitability of "collateral damage." Harris apart, most of the new atheists have much in common with their Christian fundamentalist counterparts.

How so?

They think that theirs is the one and only truth to which all other cultures and religions should submit; they interpret the Bible literally (they blindly condemn what religious fundamentalists blindly support); and they have very little insight into the psychological, philosophical, and historical complexities of their fellow human beings outside their own small circle. (Dawkins refers to French critical theorists as 'icons of haute francophonyism.') The new atheism reflects a certain intellectual zeitgeist currently fashionable in Britain and America (which are of course also two quite different cultures), rather than those of European cultures, which have been more deeply influenced by Catholic and Jewish thinkers, and where there is a greater concern for language and symbolism than science and fact in the construction of meaning. Continental atheism has its roots in philosophy and psychoanalysis rather than the material sciences (e.g. Nietzsche, Freud, Lacan), but it also arises out of the trauma of the 20th century and the Holocaust. I think it's fair to say that many Christian thinkers -- myself included -- have little difficulty reconciling Darwin's theory of natural selection with a Christian understanding of the world, but Auschwitz poses a much more fundamental challenge to the history and values of our faith. I would add that the new atheists fail to take seriously enough the challenge posed by the genocides of the 20th century to their own position, with its faith in science, progress, and reason. We should remember that, in the 20th century, a religious person was much more likely to be persecuted by an atheist than vice versa.

Why do you think you have more in common with Richard Dawkins than George W. Bush?

Well, for a start Dawkins has been fairly robust in his condemnation of the Iraq war, but I also agree with many of his criticisms about the dangers of religion -- not the least of those dangers is the alliance between recent American presidents and the Christian Right. (I have a friend who has a bumper sticker that says 'The Christian Right is neither'). My problem with Dawkins is not that he criticizes religious extremism, but that he is so undiscriminating and ill-informed in his criticisms. He blunts the impact of his own critique by spreading it too thinly and too wide. But if I had to choose between spending an evening with Dawkins or with Dubya, I'd choose Dawkins if only because I think the jokes would be better (the intentional ones, anyway).

[to be continued ...]

Becky Garrison is the author of The New Atheist Crusaders and Their Unholy Grail.

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The virtue of discretion lies dormant without the fervor of charity; and intense fervor runs wild without the guidance of discretion.

- Bernard of Clairvaux
On the Song of Songs

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He also said, "With what can we compare the kingdom of God, or what parable will we use for it? It is like a mustard seed, which, when sown upon the ground, is the smallest of all the seeds on earth; yet when it is sown it grows up and becomes the greatest of all shrubs, and puts forth large branches, so that the birds of the air can make nests in its shade."

- Mark 4:30-32

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My great-grandfather was one of the first Christians in a village near Pyongyang.  God's grace was poured over his entire family, but they experienced intense persecution because of their faith. As a result, he "escaped" one night with his entire family from what is now known as North Korea.  My father was 5. Not everyone in his family survived the journey south that one chaotic night.

North Korea, as some may know, is one of the most isolated nations. Subsequently, some of the gravest human rights violations and suffering go unnoticed -- including approximately 200,000 Christians who are in prison labor camps simply because of their faith in Christ. This past weekend, Minhee and I had the privilege of spending some time with friends who left Seattle three years ago to go to Yanbian, China (via Singapore). With their three children, they left the comforts of home, family, and friends to act upon their convictions. The father recently relinquished his well-paying job with full benefits to serve the people of North Korea -- initially at the border of China -- and in a few months, he'll hopefully receive his "resident card," which would allow him to travel to and from North Korea to do community development work. There is no salary to his work as a "tentmaker."

Who in their right mind wants to become a "resident" of North Korea?

It was humbling and inspiring.

When people ask us why we feel so compelled about starting and building the new global poverty organization, it's because of these people and thousands more who are on the ground fighting poverty by serving people, enabling education, building community development projects, digging water wells, distributing medicine, writing letters to governments, giving hope by restoring human dignity -- and so many who do these and so much more -- many who do so in the love of Christ.

Someday, I will return to North Korea.

Someday, I will return to the birthplace of my ancestors, the birthplace of my father and mother. We still have family in North Korea, that is if they are still alive. We do not know. Someday, I will return with my wife and children to not only proclaim and demonstrate the gospel of Jesus Christ but the good news of human dignity that must be afforded to all people because that is the will of God. Thirteen years ago, I climbed Mt. Baekdusan at the border of China and North Korea and prayed for an opportunity someday to return home. I echo that prayer again. Someday, I will return to Korea.

But until then, I hope to be an advocate and activist for many around the world who have no voice. Did you know that about 790 million people in the developing world are still chronically undernourished, almost two-thirds of whom reside in Asia and the Pacific?

Before I submit another entry in the coming days about some of my views about policies with North Korea, I want to draw your attention to an overview of the situation in North Korea via the organization Liberty in North Korea. Would you take three minutes to read this link to hear the story and suffering of my people?

Eugene Cho, a second-generation Korean-American, is the founder and lead pastor of Quest Church in Seattle, and the executive director of Q Cafe, an innovative nonprofit neighborhood café and music venue. He and his wife are also launching a grassroots humanitarian organization to fight global poverty. You can stalk him at his blog eugenecho.wordpress.com.

The prophet Isaiah says that the Lord will be a stumbling block for many, meaning that the majority of us will have difficulties living the way we ought to. Working in the field of social justice only seems to add another dimension to that difficulty. Poverty, economic inequality, and eradicating racism, sexism, and the like are all issues that "progressive Christians" care about, but how much do we really say about how things got this way?

From my experience, the progressive Christian movement has shown that it can advise its constituency on how to assist in uplifting burdened communities, but I've noticed an absence in acknowledging what got us -- a collective "us" -- into places of suffering in the first place. Effective movements all have two key elements: first is a thorough understanding of the root causes of their issues in order to heal whatever the "disease" may be. The other is an unrelenting commitment to be a cure and not a treatment.  Where we are right now in history begs the question: Do we want to be a cure or just a painkiller?

To illustrate my point, let's take an example from sports. The fact that Washington, D.C.'s NBA team is now called the Wizards, rather than the Bullets, is a treatment -- not a cure of the disease of gun violence in our city and society at large. The "progressive" nature of those who eventually voted and officially changed the name acted more like "pressure valves" than healers. What's unfortunate with a lot of progressivism nowadays is that we've lost sight of what's necessary -- the sacrifices and the struggle -- that's called for to break down systems of oppression and exploitation, and for a new order to rise.

What we do instead is become a pressure valve that takes a step in the right direction to relieve some pressure of a situation, but usually stops once that initial victory is achieved. There's nothing inherently progressive about changing a name. What we should be focusing on is changing the culture of violence. Ironically, from where we stand today, perhaps D.C. needs to revert back to its old NBA name, or maybe the "D.C. Militias" would be a good one if the Supreme Court, in all of its infinite wisdom, is the Truth we are satisfied with.

Let's be clear: Walking in love and faith through Christ is hard because it involves the death of things we'd rather hold onto: pride, privilege, our egos, grudges toward certain people, etc. But the Bible tells us many times that those things that make up ourselves are going to have to die in order for us to truly live through him. Hebrews 12 reminds us that we "have not yet resisted to the point of shedding our blood" -- or in other words, we have yet to come to a place in our struggle where we are willing to give up our ways of life, that while they may allow us to live comfortably above others, they help foster the "isms" we protest against.

To read the whole sermon, click here.