At the same time a women not so different from the previous cowers in a corner, covered in a blanket with her young child
praying to God she won’t be heard, and subsequently found. As the rebels raid her village for the third time this month she hears the screams of mothers, the cries of fathers, and the weeping of children as crudely fashioned machetes cut through their flesh. Bullets wiz through her home seeking someone to kill and nearly miss her. She fights back the screams of rage and fear with everything she has in hopes of keeping her life one more day in Darfur Sudan.Two separate worlds on the same day.
Those of you who know me, or have been following this blog through its different stages know that I don’t care to get involved in politics. Although I follow politics very closely and continually educate myself I feel it necessary in my position to refrain from expressing my political views in a public forum, or from the pulpit. With that said, I’m going to approach this subject carefully.
Today in Sudan, and several other countries, genocide is claiming the lives of innocent people. Thousands upon thousands of people are dying for nothing more than being born into the wrong family, in the wrong part of town, in the wrong religion. Governments, including ours, are doing nothing, because world politics take precedent over human life. The price of oil is revered over the sanctity of life. The political ramifications of intervention out weigh the cost of providing aid. As you read this blog someone is dying for nothing.
I don’t want to this message to be received as being cryptic, or depressing, but the realities of our world are in many cases not pretty. On CNN, Fox, MSNBC, ABC, and NBC we see pictures of pain that no longer affect our souls. Children are strapping bombs to their chests, one tribe is killing another tribe, poverty is ravaging a nation, children are dying of malnutrition, and we continue to change the channel, or simply ignore the bigger picture of humanity. When are we going to care? If we care is there anything we can do?
The answers to these questions are simple. We are going to care when we ask God to give us His heart for people, and we can help by praying, giving and serving. I believe with every cell in my body that Jesus is moved to tears over the harsh reality of human suffering, and I know that if He chose to walk the earth today, like he did so long ago, he would be in the middle of the hurt, the pain, and the suffering. Remember, Jesus is not a right winged, Caucasian American, with an S.U.V.
If nothing else, stop and take a minute to inform yourself on the issues. Click on some of the links I’ve provided and allow your mind to take you to these places. In my opinion, these are the places Jesus would be and that means these are the people we should care about.
Although my mind is on fire at the moment, and I am dieing to dive into the political issues at hand, I’m going to leave this subject for tonight and trust that you will at least stop and look at some of the subjects I’ve provided.
FYI…tomorrow at Elliot Bay Book Co. on 1st Ave. in Seattle there will be a book reading from the author of “Darfur Diaries” at 4PM. I’m going to be there, Look for the fat guy with a shaved head and a cross tattooed on his right forearm. I love you guys….goodnight.
1 comment:
Josh, we go way back, so I thought I would throw in my 2 cents on this subject.....
There is particular irony in the fact that christians have taken the "darfur" region under their wing as of late. This is a complicated issue, and it will not be solved overnight.
A stocked fish pond is about as close of a parallel as you can get to Darfur. If you have ever maintained one for any length of time, you will know that alot of the same attrocities occur within other animal species as well. When you have EXTREME OVERPOPULATION in the fish pond, the larger fish will eventually end up eating the smaller ones, and battling for superiority. This is not an attrocity, it is natural selection.
So now lets apply this example to Darfur. Women over there have on average 10-12 babies . IF everyone in the region does this, you get a OVERPOPULATION. Remeber the "baby boomers"? That population spurt might very well kill the US economy..
NOW MIX IN UNICEF AND RELIGION:
Now here is where it all goes wrong..
Unicef is providing about 12.5 million meals a month to that region. Not once teaching the people to plant their fields, or teaching them BIRTH CONTROL, but just feeding them.... THats like giving people welfare. Giving them a handout not a hand up...
Then, in a region that has been devastated by HIV/AIDS, you have christians teaching that birth control is "a sin"... Teaching uneducated people that birth control is a sin should be punishable by jail time in my opinion.... LEAVE RELIGION AT THE DOOR.
In My Opionion:
The cure for Darfur, is not food, and it is CERTAINLY NOT RELIGION, it is EDUCATION.
These people will never be able to provide for themselves unless we teach them to control their population, and in turn, build an infrastructure that can support their citizens. What is happening over there is tough to watch, but it happens more than you think. Look at what is happening to the Asian Carp and the Illinois river and Mississippi river... They have destroyed the fishing in the region, because of the carps overbreeding and aggressive nature. We have set up manmade barriers to keep them contained in these rivers, now they are eating themselves, and killing one another... Hmmmmm sound familiar?
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