NOTE: This article was originally published on theOOZE.com

I dropped my kids off at school this morning and as I was walking back to my car, I overheard a mother sharing with another her worries about Christmas. With lay-offs and pay cuts abounding many families are growing anxious as the holidays approach. Rather than the sense of excitement and anticipation, the change of decor in storefront windows only reminds many of us of how little there is to go around this year.

The idea of gift-giving doesn’t seem to be central to Christmas any longer. Instead, it’s all about buying stuff and getting stuff. But during a time when so many of us are biting our nails with anxiety over the economic recession, buying and getting adds even more stress than usual. This is problematic for the Christian. We are called to be hospitable, generous people. Yet, these ideals don’t stem from economic security. They come from our story as God’s people. In the book of Exodus we read the story of manna falling from heaven, providing the sustenance that everyone needed to survive in the wilderness. There was one problem: no preservatives. It didn’t keep. You couldn’t save it for tomorrow or the next day. God provided just enough for everyone, every day. In the New Testament, when Jesus teaches his friends to pray he draws upon this story when he tells them to ask God to give them their daily bread. The concept is that God provides enough for everyone. Not enough for some to hoard, or have more than others, but enough for all of us to have what we need… not necessarily what we want, but what we need. This concept runs all the way through Scripture.

But here in our twenty first century Western culture, this is not a concept we are familiar with. We are taught to take all we can; to satiate all of our desires, never concerning ourselves with whether or not everyone else has their basic needs met. But maybe as many of us concern ourselves with how we will pay the bills this Christmas season, it’s a perfect time to step back and ask God if we can take this “enough for all” idea seriously.

I’m hopelessly practical. When I began to see this as a thread throughout Scripture, my wife and I decided to test it. We began to really watch and see if there was enough when so many don’t have their basic needs met. One evening, we walked out of the grocery store to see two store employees dumping boxes full of fruits and vegetables into the dumpster. “What’s wrong with that stuff?” I asked. They looked at me, a little perturbed–I was interrupting their chance to get a smoke before going back into the store. “Uh,” one of them grunted, “It’s not pretty anymore?”

Surprised, I responded, “Really, that’s it? You’re tossing it just ’cause it’s bruised fruit?” In his best Beavis and Butt-head impersonation, the other chuckled and said, “Yeah, dude. Pretty much.” “Well, can I have it then,” I asked as patiently as I could. With a devious grin and a quick wink he replied, “Not while we’re looking.” At which point they both turned their heads, taking long drags off their cigarettes. I couldn’t take it all. I could only fit about a third of what they had on their cart in my trunk, which ended up amounting to about 50 pounds of apples. The next day, we cleaned all of the apples and along with our friends made countless jars of apple sauce and apple butter. One big box of apples that would’ve been hauled off to the city dump became gifts for friends of ours all over the country–and for folks we don’t know as we supplied our friends with jars to give away.

The day after Thanksgiving, thousands of Americans head for the shopping malls for a ritual known as Black Friday, called such as it’s a day when many retailers move from the red (losses) into the black (gains).Who knows if this year will be like most others for retailers. But I’d challenge you to take this year off from Black Friday. Instead, celebrate Make Something Day. Inspired by Buy Nothing Day–which was pioneered by the creators of Adbusters magazine, more and more of us celebrate Make Something Day the day after Thanksgiving attempting re-use and recycle what we can to make our gifts rather than purchase them.

It’s not an earth-shattering idea. It won’t feed the world’s hungry. But maybe you’ll learn, like we did, that we are more than consumers. Rather, we are the creation of God, and we carry the same creative spirit within each of us. Maybe you’ll discover, like we did, that if we get creative there is more to go around than we thought.

I invite you to de-commodify your soul and join us on November 27 to buy nothing and make something.

Many others were not though. We often found Christians to find our music appalling and people in the underground music scene thought our Christian convictions were silly. I still remember playing a show in a cellar converted into concert hall, pipes running just above our heads, walls covered with graffiti and stickers, drenched in sweat and watching a Coke can fly through the air towards our bass player as he shared our convictions with the audience.

We were proud of who we were and what we saw as our mission. But it was awful lonely–never feeling that we quite fit in with anyone; Christians or scenesters.

The rejection and loneliness haunted us until we met Kurt Love. Kurt was a middle-aged man with tattoos, long hair and a big heart. He was a Christian and a punk. He held a Bible study for kids like us through a local Calvary Chapel. He also played drums in a local band. And Kurt started helping us get shows.

Eventually, we did experience some marginal success locally. And once we did, we instinctively started doing our best to help out other bands. We put out their tapes (yes, I’m that old), booked shows, printed t-shirts and stickers and hung out late into the night at cafes sipping coffee and sharing stories. We wanted to make sure that other young people–that were doing their best to follow Jesus in the midst of a culture that made just as much sense to them as Sunday church services–did not feel as alone as we had. Just like Kurt had done for us.

That ideal is something that I’ve sought to live by ever since then. Having been committed to doing grassroots, missional stuff on the margins I still know what it feels like to be “alone.” So, when Brooke and I established the Ecclesia Collective several years ago, we adopted a motto of “nurturing grassroots expressions of the Kingdom of God.” Our hope has never been to prop up our own project, but find ways to link up with others and say, “You’re not alone, we’re in this together.” In other words, through the Collective, we’ve tried to bring together those doing meaningful and important work that embodies God’s dream for this world here in San Diego, but just might not be valued by others in their congregations, denominations and other institutions they’re committed to.

The Hawthorn House may have been the faith community/intentional community to be the primary host and contributor to the Collective for several years. But the Collective has always been something else. And today, more than ever, it has an identity outside of those that comprise Hawthorn House. Today, the Collective is a network of individual Christians and Christian communities ranging from evangelical to mainline backgrounds and affiliation trying to work together in San Diego the way God called the Israelites to in Jeremiah 29–to pray and work for the shalom of our city. The Collective has simply been a conduit for all of us to work and learn together through. Not all of us are employed by churches, but some of us are. Some of us are considered clergy and some of us aren’t. We’ve become much like an artists collective (hence our name), bringing our different mediums and attempting to make something beautiful together.

We’re doing our best to hold forms and methods lightly, realizing this often just allows the few to control the agenda. So, we’re changing things up once again. Starting this month, we’re holding monthly gatherings that will be hosted by the different people that consider themselves part of the Collective. Tomorrow night we’re meeting at Lestat’s on Adams and will be hosted by Adams Ave. Crossing, a new missional community getting started in the Normal Heights neighborhood. The agenda? Mostly conversation. We want to hear what’s going in your community, in your neighborhood and in your work. We’ll talk about how the Collective can be owned by and serve each of us better. And we’ll see where that takes us. These gatherings will look a little different each time I assume. And we have yet to see what will come out of them. Check out the event info on Facebook and watch the video that our friend Geoff Hsu posted that explains the value of networks such as ours.

So, if you’re feeling alone, come join us.

Photo Credit: CCBImages

Shiley Theater, University of San Diego campus

Friday, October 30^th, 2009, 7:30pm

A committed Christian, Dr. Miller has coauthored four high school and college biology textbooks and published numerous articles in leading scientific journals. In 2007, he received the Exploratorium’s Outstanding Educator Award and was named a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. Reminiscent of the Scopes Monkey Trial, he was called to the witness stand in 2005 in Dover, PA where one of his textbooks had become the center of controversy when the local school board reacted against teaching the theory of evolution in favor of Intelligent Design. He is the best-selling author of Finding Darwin’s God: A Scientist’s Search for Common Ground Between God and Evolution and Only a Theory: Evolution and the Battle for America’s Soul.

Dr. Miller will address the theory of evolution, creationism, and intelligent design, and how the theory of evolution does not contradict religious faith.

Following the lecture, both of Dr. Miller’s books will be available for purchase at a discount rate for Dr. Miller to autograph.

$10 for general public, $5 for non-USD students with school ID. Tickets available online at www.sandiego.edu/cctc . For more info, please call 619-260-7936 or email cctc@sandiego.edu.

HATE CRIMES SUMMIT
“Even One is Too Many”

• Thursday, October 1st, 2009
• 5:00 – 6:00p.m.  Check-In
• 6:00 – 8:00p.m.  Program

RONALD REAGAN COMMUNITY CENTER
195 EAST DOUGLAS AVENUE
EL CAJON, CA 92020

Keynote Speaker James McElroy
Southern Poverty Law Center

There is no cost to attend this event or for parking.
Advanced registration is required.

For more information or to RSVP, please contact Crystal with the Center for
Social Advocacy at 619-444-5700 x310. Or email us at
UnitedForAHateFreeSanDiego@gmail.com

For more information about United for a Hate Free San Diego, please visit
the following website:http://www.hatefreesandiego.org/

• Tuesday, September 29, 2009 @ 7:00 pm (coffee at 6:30 pm)
  

Colt Forum: A collaborative effort with the Faculty Research Talks series of PLNU’s Margaret Stevenson Women’s Studies Center and the Brewed Awakening series of the Center for Justice and Reconciliation.

.  .  .  .  .

For more information, contact cjr@pointloma.edu .

Learn more about the Center for Justice and Reconciliation at www.pointloma.edu/cjr

For directions to the university, call 619.849.2200 or go to http://www.pointloma.edu/Directions

John will speak about “crossing borders” as a practice that promotes both spiritual growth and social justice. He will also give an update on the work he has been doing as part of an interfaith coalition working to restore public access to Friendship Park, where generations of San Diegans and Tijuanenses have met to visit across the border fence John was detained and forcibly ejected from Friendship Park by the Border Patrol this spring.

Time: July 26, 2009 from 10am to 11am
Location: UU Fellowship of San Dieguito

Date: June 17, 2009

Time: 6pm-8pm

Location: Malcolm X Library (5148 Market St. Dan Diego, CA 92114)

Featured Panelists Include:
Estela De Los Rios, Center for Social Advocacy; Jose Preciado, South Bay Forum; David Schmidt, Si Se Puede; and Heather Boxeth, San Diego Immigration Rights Consortium

For More Information contact the Malcolm X Library at (619) 527-3405.

I sat up the other night and watched the preview for Google Wave. Like many people, I’m looking forward to trying it out. But as I watched, it dawned on me that the biggest attraction is it’s convenience. We love convenience. Convenience can be a good thing. But there are times when it clearly distorts our perception. This last week, San Diego County officials ruffled a lot of folks feathers. A county representative visited a local pastor’s home and informed his wife that they could not continue having bible studies in their home without a permit. Supposedly, these bible studies had only 15 to 20 people in attendance. My friend Aaron Klinefelter brought it to my attention first. Here’s a clip of local news reporting on it. And it also showed up on Fox News.

It seems clear from the conversation online that this has raised concern in the hearts of many. “What if they shut down my home meeting?” “What about the separation of church and state?!” To say that the county of San Diego is taking away the religious rights of Christians is a bit of an exageration. This particular incident has brought such a public “black eye” to the county that I would think that it will back off of this practice of shutting down bible studies. That said, the reaction amongst some Christians about “religious rights” concerns me much more than this particular incident. This incident in our county should spark conversation amongst Christians, however, I don’t think that it should be a conversation about our rights.

Throughout history and around the globe, Christians have not had permission from the state to practice their faith. Many governments have had trouble with religion in general and Christianity in particular. All that to say, that this is nothing new. While we can debate the intent of Jesus’ words about Caesar’s coin and Paul’s words about respect for the government, no Scripture comes to mind that implies that the church should receive it’s authority from the state, or be an authority over the state. The church–nor any other religious institution–is to be above or under the state (though, our general posture is to be “power under” as Greg Boyd puts it or “domination-free” as Walter Wink puts it). The church is simply something other. Because of that, we can respect the law but the law does not have authority over God and what God asks of us.

In this particular situation in San Diego, the county is saying that religious practices must be limited to buildings designated for that. Residential homes do not typically have this designation. I can not speak for other religions, but for Christianity this is not feasible. Every act of Jesus, whom we consider our Lord and King (or “president” as Shane Claiborn and Chris Haw have put it), leads towards a faith that is found and practiced in the most ordinary of places by all people who choose to. When Jesus was crucified, the temple veil was torn–a symbol of the presence of God moving beyond the confinement of a building designated for religious practices. All I am intending to say is that if we were to follow the letter of law, we would need to file for permits to meet for almost everything and everywhere. We believe that the presence of God is everywhere. We believe that anytime two or more followers of Jesus meet to confess their sin, share a burden, pray for each other, discuss a Scripture passage, or just have coffee that God’s Spirit is their with them.

When it comes to rights, it does not seem evident to me that Jesus or the NT church was concerned about their own rights. In fact, there is an appreciation of being punished for practicing their faith and getting caught (the lack of rights) evident in the New Testament. Rather than a concern for their own rights, it does seem that the early church intended to love and care for others that did not have rights (immigrants, widows, poor, terminally ill, prostitutes, etc.). Not only did Jesus model this, but it follows the God-given values of Israel in the OT.

This bible study incident has been a situation in which many Christians are holding up their separation of church and state card. While when it comes to the issue of Proposition 8 here in California, they quietly tuck the same card back in their pocket. I do not understand why many Christians would applaud the upholding of Proposition 8 here in California. Proposition 8 upholds that marriage is between a man and woman only. Quite frankly, I don’t understand why Christians would care how or why or for whom the state sanctions marriage. It has historically been our conviction that marriage is a bond made before God. It doesn’t matter what the state says about marriage. It matters what God says about it. What seems to be the issue, is what some Christians believe the Bible to say about homosexuality. I agree with Walter Wink’s analysis of Scripture and homosexuality.

“… The issue is precisely whether that biblical judgment is correct. The whole tenor of the Bible sanctions slavery as well, and nowhere attacks it as unjust. Are we prepared to argue that slavery today is biblically justified? The overwhelming burden of the biblical message is that women are inferior to men. Are we willing to perpetuate that status? Jesus himself explicitly forbids divorce for any case (Matthew has added “except adultery” to an unqualified statement). Are we willing to forbid divorce, and certainly remarriage, for everyone whose marriage has become intolerable?

The fact is that there is, behind the legal tenor of Scripture, an even deeper tenor, articulated by Israel out of the experience of the Exodus and brought to sublime embodiment in Jesus’ identification with harlots, tax collectors, the diseased and maimed and outcast and poor. It is that God sides with the powerless, God liberates the oppressed, God suffers with the suffering and groans toward the reconciliation of all things. In the light of that supernal compassion, whatever our position on gays, the gospel’s imperative to love, care for, and be identified with their sufferings is unmistakably clear.” (link)

I agree that there are specific passages that can be read to condemn homosexuality. And if a church decides that because of that, they will not marry people of the same gender, so be it. But as is historically clear, the Church has never agreed universally on issues such as this. I agree with Wink and think that coming to the conclusion to exclude gay and lesbian couples goes against one of the over-arching values of Scripture; that we are to–as I said above–love and care for others who do not have rights. With that in mind, whether or not we think a church can marry people of the same gender, we should still expect that they are treated fairly and decently within the culture we participate in. To use another example, while we may not serve communion to a Muslim, we don’t think the state should deny food stamps to a Muslim (and if it did I would hope that Christians would stand against such treatment).

There is something new about the sexual orientation civil rights movement. Historically, the fight for rights of the marginalized has been for those with limited economic opportunity and power. The gay and lesbian community has not had the same economic restraints. This does not take away from the importance of this, it simply makes it unique. I applaud my friends Rich, Jay and Alex with MissionGathering for their work on this effort. The Our Hearts Are With You campaign that they have initiated has had a huge impact and bridged the gap for many who love Jesus yet have felt hated by his followers. Christians have given millions of dollars to a campaign that has largely been interpreted by others as hatred. Think about how many hungry mouths could have been fed with those resources! As long as we are known by our hate, rather than our love we are missing the point. Shane Claiborne says it most succinctly in this short video clip:

The bottom line is that the Church in the U.S. needs to fess up to it’s approach to separation of church and state. We use it when it’s convenient to our convictions and we hide it when it isn’t convenient. If we are separate (or other as I said) than let’s leave it at that. Either way you interpret that, we’ve commonly got wrong what our involvement with the larger culture should be: we look out for our rights and ignore and deny those of others. It seems to me, that instead we are to count our rights as worthless and look out for others who do not have rights.

Photo Credit:
Ben McLeod
“the intersection of church and state”
Uploaded on June 4, 2005

I paced back and forth in front of shops on the corner of University and 30th last night. Tears on the edges of my eyes. I have had too many conversations like this over the last month or two. In the receiver of my cell phone, I hear the sober and trembling voice of a dear friend. He is unsure where his family will come up with the money to pay their bills in the next few weeks. He has applied to near a hundred jobs. One interview came out of that.

ONE interview.

ONE.

I was as frightened as he is just a few months ago. Fundraising wasn’t working out. Except for one, the organizations we tried to work with just didn’t have enough foresight to make it work with us. Our faith community and family were making amazing sacrifices to help us get by. Now we’re doing okay–I have a little time left working with that one organization, along with the new job my wife has. It does something to you though. Even when you’re not some machismo, patriarchal dude, it still feels like your identity, your ego, your self-worth is crumpled into a ball and thrown into a waste basket… just as you imagine your resume has been countless times.

But then, there is a moment when you feel even worse. When you remember how many people have it worse off than you. In that moment when it feels like someone backhands your soul, you see in your mind’s eye starving kids in Africa, or some sweatshop in Asia or just the homeless people in your own city.

Three of those homeless people I have come to know by name over the last four years. By his sheer will and tenacity, I think one of them is going to make it out of the pit of displacement. I have no idea what is going to happen to the other two. It kills me inside. Temporarily, they both have housing. But what happens this summer? Or, God forbid, next winter? Yeah, I know, “It’s San Diego!?” Go for it then. You sleep outside in December here.

Our little community has tried. Lord knows, we’ve tried. We’ve gathered up goods and money. We’ve offered temporary places to sleep, showers and conversation. We’ve asked other churches to help out. That didn’t get very far. Only one church has really stepped up to help where we couldn’t financially. None of us have a lot, so we’ve just done our best to try and help them hang on to their dignity, their humanity. But it just doesn’t seem like enough for the displaced.

As I pace on the phone, I realize how hard it is for people like my friend on the phone–educated, articulate… young… white… male–to find jobs. Simultaneously, I know that for the mentally disabled and aging friends of mine that know which alleys are safe to sleep in have a better chance of seeing pigs fly than land a burger flipping job in this market.

I am at a loss.

Displaced. This word is stuck in my head. It is as though the number of people I know whom I can apply the word to multiplies. There are, as I have said, those displaced from housing and income. This says nothing of the many spiritually displaced; those whose faith no longer seems to find a home in Christian institutions. But I am also thinking of those that have been displaced from their homeland because of generations of economic hardship. They build for themselves a life here in San Diego, only to again be displaced: sent back to place that has now become completely foreign to them. This last week in particular, I spent countless hours on the phone with more than one family that is separated from each other. In an economic crisis such as this, it only adds insult to injury for this to happen. Mothers separated from children. Husbands separated from wives. Then I receive another call… and some emails about this. One of the three minors deported did not have family on the other side of the San Ysidro border crossing–where they all were deported at.

I am at a loss.

I wish I had the money to fix these problems. Although, maybe that is part of the problem: we still think money is the answer. Unfortunately, money does play into this; I wish I could find enough money to rent a house for my displaced friends and begin another community house with those most need of housing. But a homeless friend of mine recently reminded me that it isn’t about the resources primarily. It’s about relationships and humanity. Relationships, community are a big part of what makes us human; what make us feel human. Without that things fall a part.

Maybe in this moment this is one of our great lessons, that the economics of love can go a great distance. Rather than avoid the burdensome conversation of those hard hit within our midst, we invite those needs to be shared and all of us sacrifice in order that all may have enough. In doing so, we might learn to find happiness with less. Rather than avoid the homeless because we can’t put a roof over their head, we share a cup of coffee and just listen. In doing so, we might find that there are things we can help with. Rather than blame economic hardship on and dehumanize those different than us, we walk next to those individuals to ensure that their human dignity remains intact no matter where they end up. In doing so, we might gain a new imagination for what it means to be citizens of another kingdom.

If instead we depend upon the system, the powers to pull us out of these hardships, I presume we will all be at a loss.

Photo Credit:
RAFAEL ENRIQUEZ
Foreign Debt /IMF (International Monetary Fund)
1983 OSPAAAL