Hey all, hope that your Thanksgiving went well. But now its back to Work.

Jesse, thank you for the affirmation concerning my post. As we progressed in our research over the topics it became more and more difficult to piece all of it together into a coherent whole. In doing the readings for this class and for my others concerning Globalization, Culture, Post-Modernism, etc. I began to see the world a little differently. I was asked last Tuesday how our presentation was going to be. My response was...its going to suck. I say this not because I think that we have not accurately covered the topic, we all have worked really hard on this project, and battled through some issues. I say this because of our conclusion, or lack there of. it sucks not being able to come up with an answer, for me at least. As much as I like to be mysterious, I don't want to be stumped by a question that I am supposed to have an answer to. But what other alternatives do we have... anyone? I guess I feel for the people who havent done as much research as us, and they listen to our conclusion online and say, "well, great, I could have said I dont know". But you dont know what it took us to get here...is what our conclusion is, there are a lot of factors. There is a myriad of explanation and counters. I guess what we all agree on is that War sucks. So I was right...our presentation is War sucks :)

Jessi, hope you had a good time in NY. I too liked the book Inventing Popular Culture...and I think there are a lot of things that we can draw from this book concerning our responses to our issues, and maybe how we can move towards a coherent view of the near incoherence of the new wars that are going to be fought. Ill discuss this more in my blog.

Blessings,

Hey, guys. Just an update. I added a bit to the case study on Iraq. Most of it came from a reflection I did earlier in the course. Take a look and change whatever you find necessary. The wiki is looking great. My hope is to add some more images this afternoon. Somebody put a couple of images up. The graph looks great, but for some reason, the other image never would load on my computer. Anyone else having that problem? We may need to work on that. Peace, my friends.

Hey folks,
I am sick!!!! And in New York!!!! I didn't realize we were presenting our topic tomorrow until Thursday night when I talked with Dave. I apologize for not being there.

Great input on the group blog. I agree with Josh and Jesse that we should be focusing on the final product of the wiki. I would be willing to do whatever needs to be done. I have been making little organizational changes and a couple of major changes to the wiki along the way, but I would be happy to do whatever is left.

We had discussed putting some images on our wiki. I would be happy to start searching for some good visuals to go along with what we have verbally posted. I will plan on that being some of my major contribution this week, unless I hear otherwise from anyone.

Again, I apologize for my absence tomorrow, but I know you guys will do a great job, and the ideas that I have contributed are already on the wiki.

Good luck, buena suerte. Have a Happy Thanksgiving and I'll see you guys in a week!

Jessi

As we begin to wind down our talks and discussion via the internet and blogging, I find it interesting the evolution or the continual expansion and contraction of my middle ground. Jesse and I have talked a bit at lunch about the conclusion of our topic. What is the conclusion? Are we supposed to have a conclusion? Is there a Kantian Morally Universalized right answer to our discussion? Are there winners with the right answer and losers who obviously don't see the strict call of Christ? Maybe. Maybe not. In response to this question we are obviously dealing with a power structure in itself, the power of rationality, the force of logic... to the victor goes the spoils!

With either side, there lies the ideal and there lies the reality. There lies the spiritual aspect of the Sermon on the Mount/and the reality of acting the Sermon on the Mount. We are asking questions like "does God change" in history? Do we irradicate the Old with the New? Is there condemnation of those who profess faith in Christ and still serve a violent regime? Or is there grace? Are there opportunities for those who profess the strict standards of pacifism and yet fail to be active? or is there grace?

There, lies the situation, that we are faced with in the present ie. Hitler is in front of you...you have a gun.... you can...what? or you could have stopped the regime from happening before it got rolling. But you didn't. You are faced with now.

Therefore can there be a conclusion to our story. In telling the story we are retelling the past and looking towards thre future, not knowing what to do in the present.

If we embrace a Theology of Weakness do we also give up our right to be right. To form a conclusive answer. How far do we take our Theology of Weakness?

Well... it is not hopeless. I pray that we continue to have the strength (in our weakness) to move forward and encourage those to ask these questions and come up with their own answers...but also allow grace for those who do not. Peace.

David your take on this topic is interesting, like I said before I read your blog I will get back to you later with scripture. I do have a few comments, and I am still in the process of refining what I am going to put on the wiki. First we must remember that in order to take care of those who are being oppressed we do not need to fight (Christ did not fight the Roman solders in order to feed the five thousand). Secondly our fight is not with flesh and bones it is with the spirit world. In loving those people who are our enemies and those who oppress others we plant seeds to the witness of Christ, thus fighting the real battle. In other words we take care of both the oppressed and the oppressor because they are both lost, both are people who need the forgiving love of Christ. To say that if we do not act when people are being oppressed is not an act of love is true, the way in which we choose to act is the key difference between Christians and non-Christians. I truly believe that if Christians throughout the world lived a life for Christ and His kingdom, the question of whether or not we go to war over oppression would not even be at hand. The Ethic that Christ set before us in the sermon on the mount was not one which would allow for an American way of life, (I take care of me and mine, and you take care of you and yours). If we lived out the words spoken by Christ our circumstance would be different, but because we do not we have the question of should we go to war looming. The answer in scripture I believe was then, and is now a resounding no. (I do differentiate between nations at war and whether or not we as Christians should be in the military - if the leadership of a nation is professing to be Christian they should make the desision to follow Christ's words and not go to war or not be in government. God will use the governments that He has set up for His purposes, and that is His vengeance, but our duty as Christ's followers is to do what He has said as God.) We should talk later about the Old Testament wars, I have a little bit different perspective than most I think.

David a quick response to your comments. I totally understand where you are coming from, it is very difficult to think about something bad happening to someone you love, I am much more apt to stand up for another person who is being persecuted or put down. The point is to do it in a non-violent way. Something to think about really fast, are we first for the kingdom of God or first for our families? It is my belief that the kingdom comes first, and I think that this is testified to in Jesus remarks about His mom, at this moment I can not remember what the referent is sorry. I will try to add scripture that may help you with this problem to our wiki tomorrow.

Jessi- I think that we are both asking the same questions when it comes to Global Finance and Trade. The topics that we read do not directly talk about our issue of War etc. but it does talk a little about the push towards pure capitalism and the dissolving of the welfare state. When nation states become so emersed within the global trade aspect of their country I think they tend to forget about the microstructures of their own peoples. People become marginalized and overlooked which leads to resentment and contempt by the people. When they rise up we can have war-like symptoms and agression coming from the marginalized. The govenments want to be idealistic that with the gain of finances there will be a gain of welfare, however the exact opposite has occured.

Reed- Great work in summarizing your point on Pacifism. I will add it to the Wiki this week and if you want to go back and edit it, feel free. I will try to put it in the section dealing with your and David's specific stances in "What is the task of Jesus-followers in response to this problem? And some examples of Jesus-followers in response to this problem.. " Also, I recently heard a lecture on Jesus finding his strength in weakness. The Western form of Christianity is based around might and strength. But Christ's message was never proclaiming his strength over people, or his might, that is a Western invention. Christ proclaimed through his actions that his strength was in his weakness, even Paul says that he finds the most happiness and strength in his weakness... so this might also be a point that you make.

Wow, Lea!!! That is a ton of information. I appreciated your own personal testimony too. It would be helpful to have a little description of the websites you cited- I think those could be a great addition to some of the resources we have already posted on our wiki. Great work.

Side note- Josh, I hadn’t heard about the action taken against the Episcopal Church here in Pasadena. That is UNBELIEVABLE!!!!! I would love to hear from some of the members of their community.

Reed- that was incredibly insightful and helpful. I basically just want to cut and paste it right onto our wiki! You did a great job of articulating your position, I don’t know that it needs much tweaking! I think it would be good to hear someone that holds a different perspective from you reply to the things that you wrote. Great work. Thanks for putting the time into that.

And for the rest of you folks, I didn’t see stuff on your blogs. You may be yet to post them tonight, but I am off to bed now. I would be interested to see how you took the reading for this week to apply to our topic. I took a shot and would love to hear if you think I’m off-base for making a connection like that.

Also, I wasn’t clear from your last posting, Jesse, what you wanted me to articulate for the wiki. Did it have to do with what shape I see the Kingdom of God taking? I would be happy to write something, I just wasn’t quite sure what you were after. Let me know.

Peace, my friends. See you on Tuesday. I may be a little late to class, so it would be great if someone could catch me up if something happens.

The question that Jessi asks about whether or not our economic prosperity, and the subsequent deepening of other nations poverty is an important question. I think that it would be a good thing for one of us to look at. It would seem to me that there is a connection, it would be interesting to know if our consumeristic society is part of what leads other people to have an inroad when recruiting people to commit acts of terrorism, or maybe even war.

To Lea I enjoyed reading your blog tonight it seems as though you really want us Christians to do something in this world. It may sound odd, and this is just a question, but do we need to respond to the hurts of the world by doing what the world thinks is best or by what Christ already says is best (example in the case of war the world says that at times it is needed, but Christ seems to be saying no not in my Kingdom). Just a thought, disregard if you have already answered the question.

I too, apologize. I just got a new computer so for the last few days I have been consumed by trying to understand it… it has been to no avail.
I really enjoyed reading everyone’s posts. The content of our conversation has really begun to express deep concern. What this means to me is the more we read about these issues and discuss them with one another, we begin to let go of some of our starting prejudices. Not all, but some, and that is a start. Hopefully what people will get out of reading our wiki is that we struggle in light of these issues. We have wrestled with the angel of information and demanded a blessing. Well some might consider it a blessing, others, well, a curse.
I think that this overall project has just shown us what the world is vastly becoming. We have experienced various viewpoints, great and not so great arguments, and tools for people who are committed to the ways of Christ. The culture that we are immersed in is morphing. The nation-state is having to redefine itself. The global structures of power are having to redefine themselves. We are having to redefine ourselves. What shall we stand upon? Jesse is right in recognizing the need for God to be at work in these situations, and the need for Christ followers to be present and engaged.
My belief is we need to look at the positive and negative of military globalization. We can think of innovative ways to combat the negative while molding the positive side of peacekeeping. The interrelationship between the micro and macro levels of our society are at stake, but as the book points out, so are that of other nations as well. The U.S. as the military elite is at the top, yes, but we share the frustrations that come from an ever globalized world. Violence is raging more in the micro-structures of society around the world and this affects us here, not only as Christians who hate to see injustice, but as a world whose interconnection is real.

Reed, it was interesting to hear what you had to say on your blog. I'm thankful for your perspective. I know you think you are worried about getting carried away in group discussions, but I really find your insight helpful. I would love to hear more of your story and how you came to your understanding. I think I'm headed right down the same path, so I would appreciate your perspective.

I didn't see much else on other people's blogs this week about the reading, although there are still a few hours before it is due. Sorry if I missed something someone said this week.