I cooked eggnog (the cooking is, apparently, optional).

Re-appropriated glass milk bottles from my two favorite dairies!

At last week's Pasadena Farmers' Market I bought a pallet of eggs from a local guy (not as good as my mother-in-law's friends' eggs, but definitely tastier than any store bought eggs I've tried!). This week, I had not baked enough pies or cookies calling for so many eggs to consume them before our trip out of town to the folks. Another food-oriented dilemma we had was an abundance of milk and half & half in the fridge only days before the journey.

Oh what to do?

MAKE EGGNOG, OBVIOUSLY!

Creative cooking is something we call "Christenson-ing" in our circle of comrades, after our ingeniously creative beer-brewing, recipe-discovering, you-tubing gourmet friends. Instead of planning on discarding our invevibly expiring dairy products, I intended to Christenson some eggnog to take with us on our journey.

I started with this recipe, deemed the "Amazingly Good Eggnog Recipe" which called for cooking the eggs sightly instead of the traditional raw egg yolk ingredient. I made some adjustments having learned a few tricks recently regarding dairy (i.e. light cream can be replaced with half & half and good old fashioned vanilla ice cream can be used for heavy cream) and used mostly half & half instead of milk and cream. Having sampled the awesomeness of this eggnog, I can definitely say that the half & half replacement was successful - particularly for those who add milk to their thick 'n heavy store bought nog like myself - but I can see why the milk is parted into cream portions and milk portions; that is that the two seem to deal with the spices and eggs flavors differently, the milk giving you the smooth start and the cream giving you the lingering sweetness. In any event, here is how I made the recipe which turned out GLORIOUS and absolutely perfect to my taste buds!
(also, I tend to like a little more spice, so you can reduce all the spices by 1/2 a tsp)

(imagine that the palett on the left is FULL of eggs from the Pasadena Farmer's market ;) )

ingredients:
.5 g. of half & half
(or 1 qt milk & 1 qt light
cream)
1.2 c. or sugar
5 whole
cloves
1 tsp of nutmeg
1.5 tsp cinnamon
2 tsp of
vanilla
12 egg COLD
yolks
(*optional: rum)



quick instructions:
1) whisk together the yolks and sugar
2) combine 1 tsp of vanilla, nutmeg, &
half the half&half (or milk) over heat until it boils
3) reduce heat to medium and add the egg yolk mixture slowly
4) stir vigorously for 3 minutes, remove from heat and let cool for 1 hour
5) Finally, add remaining unused ingredients, stir, and refrigerate overnight



extended instructions:
1) Begin by separating the yolks from the egg whites. This is most easily done when the eggs are cold as room temp eggs may have more delicate yolks (you can use the egg whites for whipped topping or meringues later - just
make sure they stay away from ANY moisture).
2) On the lowest setting in a large sauce pan or broad stock pot, combine half of the half & half (or 1 qt of milk) on the stove with the cloves, 1 tsp of vanilla, and the cinnamon for several minutes (5-10 min).
3) Slowly bring to a boil over the course of another 5-10 minutes and let it boil for 5 min. BE VERY CAREFUL NOT TO SCALD!
4) While you are GRADUALLY heating the milk, combine the egg yolks and sugar and whisk thoroughly.
5) Reduce the boiling milk to medium heat and the yolk mixture gradually. Continue to stir it for 3 minutes, keeping it from thickening.
6) Remove from heat and let stand for an hour.
*7) Add the nutmeg, remaining vanilla, the rest of the half & half (or the light cream) stir together.
8) Bottle and let sit overnight. (It can be chilled in freezer and served an hour later, but if you let it sit for at least 6 hours in the fridge, it gets so much more creamy and flavorful!)
9) Serve directly from the refrdigerator!


*1-2 shots of Sailor Jerry's per 12 oz can be added after the chilling stage (1 shot = rummy overtones, 2 shots = grandpa's favorite eggnog) OR
you can add 1-2.5 c of a light rum in the 7th step. I don't like the rum to overwhelm the flavor of the eggnog (which is delicious without it) so I recommend only 1 cup for the whole recipe.

Dumpster Diving

I wish I had written yesterday – when the event was still fresh in my mind but I had yet to relate the experience to anyone and I was still delusional from sleep deprivation. I wouldn’t go so far as to say that I participated because we had run out of funds for the month (although, this is true) or because I had some moral convictions that were satisfied by it (although, this is true, too). The heaviest weighing factor was simply curiosity. I had seen the fruits (literally) of the previous week’s scavenging and I wanted to understand just how much edible waste was actually found in these excursions.

The night began with only two of us who left at midnight for the nearest Trader Joe’s. Initially, I was disappointed by what I saw. The dumpster smelled foul and it looked like most things had yogurt or orange juice dumped on them. It was only about a quarter of the way full which lead me to my 2-minute assessment that there was nothing to be salvaged. My more experienced partner had an eye for this thing, however, and over 15 minutes of poking around, she managed to spot us several dozen unopened bags of bagels, a pair of zucchinis, 4 perfect Fuji apples (and 2 bruised ones), 2 cartons of blueberries and a basket of fresh basil. I was particularly surprised about the apples as they were the only unpackaged treasure we pulled. My friend explained that if the skin wasn’t broken we could wash them with water and a little bit of bleach and they would be sanitized enough to eat safely.
As I was climbing out, we were joined by several other dumpster divers who we spent the rest of the night with. Since it was my first time, they climbed in and double-checked for goods I may have missed. They found a bag of lemons with only one moldy piece of fruit, two unbroken eggs, and a sad looking sweet basil potted herb that they determined could be brought back to life.

We stopped at a few other stores along the way to the site most frequented by my Freegan friends. The ones with management and night crews still out and about we avoided. I have yet to confirm this, but I learned that dumpster diving is not illegal as long as it not on private property (which, apparently, means it is an enclosed dumpster). All the same, we did not want to call attention to ourselves or create an awkward confrontation over this grey-area activity.
We were not the first to get to the prized dumpster, a couple had loaded up nearly two trunks of food before we got there. I got a glimpse before they awkwardly left us to get the last pickings – they had several bags of breaded goods with expiration dates for that day, boxes of produce looking a bit less than pretty but still totally edible, and good deal of shelf-/dry-goods. Apparently, the night of the week we went followed regular shipments at this particular store, so the dumpsters area always full of product that was replaced during that day.
At this site, I, alone, brought home over $70 in grocery foods. This was what was left after we removed all moldy, dairy, warm, or questionable products from our findings. Anything that had not been pierced and could be washed in bleach was fair game. Understanding that I came only from a two-person home, this was a meager portion compared to the amount the other two intentional communities with me took. One of the girls with us even commented that it was far less than normal and they would have to come back the next night; but I was pleased.
The people who beat us to our bounty were a true Freegan couple (eating only free, organic, non-meat products) and so what was left for us to pick from in the dumpster was a large variety of packaged meats. I was extremely skeptical of taking any, particularly the poultry, but the community members assured me that they had never experienced any ill effects from eating the packaged meats they pulled. To accommodate my skepticism, they gave me the meats that were still frozen in their sealed packaging. I hit the jack-pot when I stumbled upon a garbage bag of eggs still in their cartons. I pulled out about ten dozen eggs in perfect condition! This was what the two houses were hoping for as eggs are a main staple, easily prepared, possessing a long un-refrigerated shelf life, and numerous.

At the end of the night, we took out all the goods from our cars (even the ones that had been scavenged by smaller groups in locations I had not been to) and laid everything out. Item by item we asked out loud who wanted what. The divvying was facilitated by questions of amount and preference and gifting all at once; and there was an air of joy and effortlessness to process. In the kind of conversation where it is reasonable to expect conflict, there was openhandedness and an absence of entitlement. Things were not allotted based on what was fair, or even on who needed what, but exchanged in generosity. I am not exactly sure how such an “exchange” of any kind happened because, without sounding communistic, the food belonged to all of us at once. I suppose a contributing factor was that the dumpster would be there the next night and the next and the next…
When I got home, I was nervous that the food I received would go bad or make us sick and so I prayed. The words I heard myself saying were not at all unique, but they had more implication than ever before – I asked that the food I received would nourish us (despite being pulled from a dumpster), that God would protect us (from dumpster bugs), that God would continue to provide for us… The attitude that my friends from the communities had during the distribution suddenly made sense to me. It wasn’t that the food belonged to all of us, it was that the food belonged to none of us.

What do you want to read next?
	The Irony of Dumpster Diving
	Revenge of the Hidden Temple (Danica's version of the childhood game show)
	Pictures Transformers in places they shouldn't be (as edited by Danica for invisiblepeople.tv tour)

E.D.A.R.

This video features Union Rescue Mission's CEO Andy Bales and a family at URM showing how the E.D.A.R.s work.¹

EDAR stands for Everyone Deserves A Roof - the cross between a shopping cart and single-person tent was inspired by President and founder of EDAR, Peter Samuelson, when he sought to provide the self-described needs the homeless he interviewed on his bicycle route.

Eric Lindeman and Jason Zasa are the creators of the current model of the EDAR having won a design competition Samuelson sponsored at Pasadena Art Center College of Design.

EDAR's are given free of charge to homeless individuals who are best able to benefit from their recycling and shelter capabilities. EDAR units also provide a sense of ownership and pride to those largely deprived of both. And as Peter Samuelson asks, "Well into the twenty-first century, if the best our advanced society can do for the hundreds of thousands of homeless human beings... men, women and children... who live among us is the cast-off box our refrigerator came in, what exactly does that say about us?"

Visit www.EDAR.org for more information

The shelters were particularly important to Union Rescue Mission and the other LA missions this winter season with the overwhelming increase in shelter needs. ABC Los Angeles reported last month:

Officials at a winter shelter in Burbank say they have seen a 1,000 percent increase in demand since their doors opened on Dec. 1.

In this video from urm.org, you can see how the regular living quarters at URM were altered to incorporate EDARs and provide more space for families this winter.

(Also... I did a vlog for CP a while back... you can watch me stumble over myself in the URM archive room here, if you like.)

¹Video first reviewed on The Hobo Soul

Christian Pacifism

I will be adding to this post. I don't know what to make of this, it does not seem to justify a pacifism, but it does provide perspective of an impossible hope... but still, how dangerous the line between the means and the ends. I only say confidently, I do no know the answer.
I will be adding to this post over the weekend:

Christian pacifism rests not on a naïve belief that if we would only lay down our arms, the other side would do the same. It does not deny that sin has distorted the world; it does not presume that the enemy will be moved by our gestures of peace. It does not suppose that we can always reach a peaceful solution through diplomatic channels. It doesn't deny that in the face of genocide peaceful diplomacy may only provide time for the aggressors to carry out their evil plan. Christians do not become pacifists because they believe it will "work" better. In fact, it will likely make the world more violent, because in some instances it is only the threat of violence that holds violence in check.
The only reason for a Christian to be a pacifist is that one truly believes that God has made peace with the world in Christ and that God is making peace in the world through our faithful nonviolence. Only if God is actively guiding the world to its harmonious end can Christians risk imitating the nonviolence of Jesus. The point of renouncing violence, then, is not as a strategy for peace but as a witness to the world of the peace that is coming.

From Following Jesus in a Culture of Fear

One of the books recommended by my professor and Melanie deals with the spiritual and pragmatic responsibilities of Christians in their social settings, particularly those of privilege. There is, of course, a lot of justification for violence across all classes; and it seems to follow that when pacifistic, or at least the nonviolent, argument ensues in scholastic (and by nature privileged) circles, it often comes from a young group of idealistic, educated men and women who never have, and probably never will, face a situation where violence seems a reasonable or even urgent as a course of action. We are just simply too well insulated to engage.
I want to be careful that I am finding my answers to the question of Christian action in the Word - NOT (exclusively) in extra Biblical sources, NOT in my limited & privileged experiences, and certainly NOT in pragmatism - however, these books examining Christian hospitality (the topic of my thesis) expound on the themes of violence across the OT & NT by virtue of addressing human and societal interaction and, in context to Scripture, provide an picture of the relationship between God to humanity and humanity to humanity.

What killed was not irreligion, but religion itself; not lawlessness, but precisely the Law; not anarchy, but the upholders of order. It was not the bestial but those considered best who crucified the one in whom divine Wisdom was visibly incarnate. And because he was not only innocent, but the very embodiment of true religion, true law, and true order, this victim exposed their sacrificial violence for what it was: not the defense of society, but an attack against God... His arraignment, trial, crucifixion, and death also stripped the scapegoating mechanism of its sacred aura and exposed it for what it was: legalized murder...
...The God whom Jesus reveals refrains from all forms of reprisal. God does not endorse holy wars or just wars. God does not sanction religions of violence. Only by being driven out by violence could God signal to humanity that the divine is nonviolent and is opposed to the kingdom of violence. As twentieth-century mystic Simone Weil put it, the false God changes suffering into violence, the true God changes violence into suffering. To be the true God's offspring requires the unconditional renunciation of violence. The reign of God means the elimination of every form of violence between individuals and nations. This is a realm and a possibility of which those imprisoned by their trust in violence cannot even conceive.

From "Breaking the Spiral of Violence" in The Powers That Be

This, like the previous quote is just some food for thought. The following chapter in book addresses some more solid answers.

Matt & I have often had a hypothetical discussion that begins like this, "What would you do if a person with a gun was trying to kick in the door of your neighbor's house?" The premise tries to set up the person being questioned to face the dilemma of resorting to violence to save their neighbor. It creates and equation that assumes that violent action against one saves another and asks, is this worth it? What does a Christian say to this? Are we having to choose which person is more deserving of life? Could we go so far as to even question the eternal state of the perpetrator with a gun and desire to extend the invitation to Christ to them? Is that still important in this very moment? Is it even our place to interfere? Does the potential victim have a specific place in the Kingdom that calls us to action? Do these Christian "obligations" (although they are not, they are choices) conflict?
The agony I allow myself to feel over this situation I can only hope might prepare to act in wisdom should I ever face it. But the only rest that I can find in any answer is that of martyrdom - but should that fail to stop the oppressor from pursuing his or her victim then I choose action NOW, in prayer and in light of and in spite of whatever outcome I could hypothetically foresee. Matt and I have resolved to call on God in such cases, call for intervention now and for the future. We call this "the third option" and it is the topic of Wink's next chapter.

Quotes and Sources from my paper

These are just some quotes I will be using through out my paper. Some food for thought on economics and hospitality for you. =D

THE CREDIT CRISIS points to the inadequacy of any ultimate credo whose object is anything but God. God is our refuge and strength. And God’s sustaining power is not tied to the Dow. - Adam Hamilton, Article from Sojourners "Faith, Hope & the Credit Crisis"

He black power base, political base, is not based on activism, is not supported by commerce, not supported by other Black millionaires, we don’t have that many Black millionaires. So what we have is this dynamic where this Black powerbase is based on the White powerbase. So when you have someone, like Jeff who comes along, who is not tight to the political structure, not tied to the dynasties, that kind of creates a problem for the Black political power base. Because they’re like, “uh oh, I like this guy, this guy is speaking to my issues, he’s exciting my people, but he’s not my bread and butter.” And it’s a shame, but that really is the dynamic that the Black powerbase is really dealing with. We didn't get our own so we have to depend on this other, artificial, but yet real base. - Sylvester Brown, from "Can Mr. Smith Still Get to Washington?"

“Capitalism is wrong because even if it succeeds in delivering the goods, it nevertheless works against Good, corrupting (and perpetuating the corruption of) human sociality in competitive and confliction modalities.” -Daniel Bell

"Justification of ungodly behavior comes from the sanctification of cultural wisdom." - Matt

“… I think the statistics about happiness and satisfaction indicate that, deeper down, we know we’ve been over liberated. There are communitarians and social conservatives and progressives for whose “community” has become a magic word, a mystic goal. But it is our economic lines, even more than our moral choices, that play the crucial role in wrecking or rebuilding our communities. We need to once again depend on those around us for something real. If we o, then the bonds that make for human satisfaction, as opposed to endless growth, will begin to reemerge.” McKibbon, Deep Economy

Concern with getting uor needs met keeps us bound to ourselves – our deceptions, our distortions, and our autonomy. - Newman, Untamed Hospitality

(I did not pick the best quote from this book, but it's one I thought that was good offhand.. I highly recommend read)

“It is the task of economic policy to grow the economy as rapidly, sustainable, and inclusive as possible.” Bill Clinton

"[When] money means grace – it means one has grace; it is an indication of one’s graced state. And [when] grace means money – it means one has money; the grace one has, one’s religious standing, is an indication of one’s economic status.” Kathryn Tanner, Economy of Grace

“You can’t ignore people when God is looking out their eyes at you.” Homan & Pratt, Radical Hospitality

"Sometimes intellectual conversations boil down to the capacity to quote the right authority at the right time." - Henri Nouwen, Reaching Out

“From the beginning to the end, the people of the Bible are people of hope. All of them saw the star of promise in the long night of this world, and glimpsed the first streaks of daybreak colours heralding God’s new day.” - Moltmonn, Jesus Christ for Today's World

"How often is your guest room occupied by a stranger? Isn’t it usually prepared for grandmother or aunt Sue or your college roommate? …
Who knows what rich experiences the next guest at your door may have to share with you. Think how your life has been broadened and enriched by the personalities of your friends. …" - Ahleen Heynen, "Given to Hospitality" published in The Banner

“Everything about me is recessive” – my dad to my grandmother

I was sitting in my living room, people watching at about 8:00 this morning. Matt was making breakfast and I was watching a man with a shopping cart go through his morning routine. It looked like it was a routine... maybe it was the first time he'd done it, but he was very deliberate about everything - first he finished his cigarette, and in between drags he would spit carefully in the street and not on the sidewalk. Then he took a swig of water and washed his hands. There was a certain meticulousness about it that struck me. He was careful to dispose of his garbage in an extra plastic bag in his cart. He took out a jar with some powder and added it to the remaining water in his jug and mixed it. He emptied the jar of its contents, double checked for any left overs and then frustratedly disposed of the jar in his garbage bag.

As he drank, I couldn't help but compare his method I was witnessing to the sounds of Matt's own breakfast methods in the kitchen. They both went through their morning routines.

Our breakfast smelled good and, as my exploration and study on hospitality has encouraged, I thought it would be awesome to invite him over for whatever Matt was making. I went to check with Matt about my idea and he agreed.

But on our way out the front door we saw an older woman with a cane scooting past him. For whatever reason he turned and shoved her in the back so hard she screamed and fell forward, disappearing behind a tree.

We were shocked. For a full second neither of us moved, not believing we had just witnessed. Matt said later he thought his eyes had played a trick on him because the woman had seemed to disappear. We realized in retrospect that had we not been standing there at that moment no one would have seen her from the street.

We dashed across the road, one eye on the quickly departing man, as we approached the woman who was nearly sobbing and struggling to get up. To put it candidly, it would have taken her a while without our help.

"God bless you, thank you" she said, "I just said 'excuse me' as I walked by because his cart was sprawled over the side walk. I don't know why he would have gotten mad. The irony is, I've worked for five years with the homeless; in aid and what not."

Matt walked her to work as it was only a block away and she refused a ride.

How odd, I had to think to myself, that after watching this man and deliberating, I came to rest at a decision to invite him in. A co-worker pointed out the obvious "what ifs" to me later ("what if you HAD invited him in"), but what I had to marvel at was the fact that we were at our front door at just the right time because of those very same intentions. One set of hospitable intentions yielded an entirely unexpected good. The "what ifs" I consider now are "what if I had decided against inviting him in?" and "what if Matt had said 'let's not' and we'd simply sat down right there?" There would have been no one to help that woman to her feet.

Because of this, perhaps idealistic, conclusion I've come to, I do no think I will hesitate again to invite someone in.

Dare I say?

I'm not a very good sociologist, I decided.

Yesterday in class I had one of the most intimidating and downright scary experiences I've ever had in my life. I mean, I've said stupid things, but this class just sets you up to face stupidity in the the flesh... via your classmates.

To recap, our course is essentially on "Christian" hospitality and ethics - in accordance with the rubric outlining our senior thesis are questions that begin like this: who are you? where do you come from? where are you going? how does your privilege justify the lack of privilege others have? and so on and so forth. One of the best and toughest self examinations I have ever gone through.
The second part consists of questions about faith, politics, and economics: If those of us who are “advantaged beyond all decent proportions” and so have the power to change U.S. economic policies, do nothing, will we further disadvantage those without privilege? If those who are rich take on ownership of the lives of the poor, will this alleviate poverty? Is this an act of grace as well as an act of hospitality? How are grace and hospitality connected? Yea. A bit harder.
The third section is about "our stranger," the one we have a hard time embracing, the one we actually reject hospitality toward. I haven't even begun the first scribbled note on this section... I'm still wrestling with the first and second parts.

My frustration is currently wrapped up in the processing of my identity. It seems cliche to be asking the question of who am I? After all, I like to think I'm pretty introspective. But in the context of Standpoint theory, I'm not really sure what my stand-point is.
I took a course on the Asian-American Experience last semester. I vainly thought that it would be a simple course because I, by definition, am Asian-American. I even did the final paper on myself and my family. In truth, I learned a great amount about my own heritage; I also learned to pinpoint some inconsistencies in the identity I had constructed for myself. A part of me has always understood that I am "mostly" White. I was raised by a White father, I went to a predominantly White school, and I have certainly acted White (just about everything here applies to me.) The reality is, I am half Filipino and half White and, by default, I cannot belong to either. Sometimes I can pass for White because of, well, to be a little frank, the ignorance and lack of exposure most of the White community exhibits; but in the end, I am exotic, sometimes downright confusing, to that community.

In class, we talked about the American White community's responsibility for the oppression and abuse of the American Black community - even to this day, the numbers and news show Blacks suffering from social injustices based on race. Our professor was trying to facilitate a discussion revolving around what she felt was the necessary apology one community owed to the other.
I must admit, I had a very difficult time with this. An apology in its most sincere sense is very personal and requires repentance. It is a plea for forgiveness that is not expected. I couldn't understand how an entire community could ask for forgiveness - there would ppl who would not believe it necessary, many who simply would not wish to repent, and still others who genuinely had nothing to apologize for. Forgiveness seemed like such a complicated exchange that it could only be interpersonal.
I did a silly thing by citing an example from counseling. I told the class that in learning how to healthily deal with and overcome a bad relationship I had in high school I had to understand and practice forgiveness in a very deeply engaging way. I could not blame the trauma, as result of that relationship, completely on myself (after all, I was a victim) but I also could not blame everything that happened on my ex-boyfriend. This is not to say that I deserved or justified any abusive action he took, but it was important, in order to properly address and forgive myself for what I truly needed forgiveness from - not what I hadn't done. (Without going into details, this ex-boyfriend was coercive and abusive, but I was also curious and wanted desperately look like I was in a stable relationship) Anyway, I felt like I had somehow justified the responsibility girls' have in abusive relationship to get themselves out of it and suddenly my head was swimming with imaginary comments people would be making about how that kind of attitude perpetuates chauvinism and abuse and... well, my point was to illustrate the two-sided nature of most cases requiring forgiveness.
And dare I say that perhaps the Black community has some apologizing to do, too, so that reconciliation might happen. Undoubtedly there has been racism within the community, abuse, and apathy. I could only think of how I, Danica, had been apathetic, insensitive, ignorant, pressured, and racist in some of my actions and thoughts. At best, I could only imagine how such individual reponses, like mine, added up to a great racisism in the society. But how was I, Danica, supposed to apologize on behalf of the White community I came from to the Black community? Who would agree with me? The trouble is, my professor told me, that's not a very sociological position to hold. Sociology suggests that there is an evil in the system, and that the powers that be have the most ability to eradicate it. You have to understand if you are a member of those powers.

A week later, though, I heard a sermon in church where the Pastor recounted an experience a fellow clergy member had while in Kenya. He was there to teach Kenyan pastors about administrating churchwa - he was White. Before he began, he felt compelled to apologize the Kenyan assembly before him for all the misdeeds of the White clergy that had come before him, for the abuse of the Gospel, its use to enslave the nation, for the blasphemy and racism. He did not know what kind of response to expect, but he knew that he had nothing to offer if he did not repent. A very old matriarch amongst some of the elders approached him at the pulpit and simply said, "In all my life I've never heard a White man apologize for anything. I know, for myself, that I forgive you. Now let's get on with what you are here for."
I questioned for days why God had been present in this response. This was all I knew, that the offering the White minister had for the Kenyan assembly could not have been given without his apology. I ask Matt why he would do that? It was clear that he had never participated in enslavement, probably not blasphemy. And I had to wonder... who was he to represent all White ministers? All White men?
Matt said many wise things, I'm sure, but none of which I would here, none of which reconciled my understanding of this man's obedience to a divine hospitality and the pragmatic (and, of course right!) interaction of forgiveness I had in my head. Finally Matt asked me, who is the Church? Us, I said, it is all of us who seek after Christ, and wish to be Christ in this world. And then he pointed out a particularly embarrassing moment when I had succumbed to peer pressure to behave very, unarguably, badly. Were you a member of the Church then? Did you represent Christ in those actions?
And something clicked. Suddenly the weight of my actions bore down in a way that I had never, ever, ever before felt. The pressure of the community was suddenly on my shoulders and I had to admit that those who knew me, knew I was a Christian; those who had seen me behave badly also knew I was a Christian. My actions contributed to the community image - an image the strove for something better and very different than my bad behavior.
The White clergyman's apology was made not so that what he had to offer could be given, but so that whatever he had to give could be received. The color of his skin, his gender, the authority he carried as clergy - his the stand point - allocated him to a group of people that reaped the benefits and also suffered the responsibility for this "bad behavior". His plea for forgiveness was not a relinquishing of his community identity, as my version of forgiveness would allow, it was an acknowledgment; he relinquished the power to oppress that his forefathers had exercised. And he received a forgiveness on behalf of a community that had, up until him, not yet asked for it.

Fish & Loaves

A letter from a brother abroad:

"Dear Brothers and Sisters,
I want to write to each one of you personally and I hope I will get to do that over time but it's been two months since I've arrived in Thailand and so many months since I left the U.S.A – so I thought some news was due.
Well, above all I want to share about Burundi. It was AMAZING. I wish I had the time and space to tell you of each day's events but I will just share some highlights. I got to see my first large scale practical – physical miracle. There are some pictures on Facebook and our team is putting a film together too that we might be able to put on our Facebook accounts. For the time being it will be on youtube.com under teamburundi. God provided for our safety even as we heard grenades in the distance. While we were there, the final peace treaty was signed and hostilities between the warring tribes of Btutsis and Bhutus were ceased. Please do pray for this poor and severely wounded country.
...
As I attempt to conclude on Burundi news for the time being, I want to tell you of the miracle I got to witness. We wanted to do a week-end of Bible club or VBS for the children of the neighbourhood, one of the poorest in this city of one of the poorest nations in the world. We wanted to serve them at least one or two hot meals but by the end of our month there, our budget was limited, we had ended up contributing more than expected on some items for the building and so we decided to do one day and a half and expected about 60-80 children. We made announcements and rounded up children on the first afternoon. We handed out coloured pencils and asked them to draw beautiful things for which they were grateful to God. We led them in songs and games and then invited them to come the next day. We counted about 85 children and expecting more the following day, we asked the cooks to make food for about 150 children of all ages. We thought that would be more than enough. There was going to be singing, a programme with sketches (skits) and a short message. We sat the children down, and started passing full plates around of rice, beans and a thin meat sauce. We could not really calculate portions and then we ran out of plates. We picked up empty ones and quickly rinsed them, filled them up again and gave them to the other children. In the end we started counting how many had been fed, when we got to THREE HUNDRED, we stopped counting. There was even enough rice and beans left for the 5 cooks to grab something to eat. We had NOT made extra. There was a large pot of rice, a large pot of beans and half a large pot of meat. I could wrap my arms around each pot and they were each about 18 inches deep. We FILLED each plate; the children were of all ages, shapes and sizes but ate everything that was on their plate. We were all so very moved and the Pastor said that God's miracle in such a small thing of providence was prophetic of things to come and confirmation that He had not forgotten about them. All were very encouraged. Thank you for praying for us and helping us go.
We are now starting to pray about next year. We are excited that many others want to join us and come to see, to learn and to help. We don't believe in short term but in long term eternal relationships as created between us and Christ and with His body all over the world. He has placed Burundi and this little church at the centre of our concerns. The apostle Paul had some churches that were his special concern and our team has this one in Burundi. We want to continue to invest of our time, efforts, money and all that is precious to us that God calls us to give up on, to give away, and to surrender for the good of His body and the extension of His kingdom on earth as it is in heaven. Will you join us again and tell others? Thank you."

teamburundi08.blogspot.com

Mark 6

Heart & Lungs

I have a sneaking suspicion that there is a more curious than obvious reason for the automated nature of our heart-beat and breath.

NPR woke me up about 6:30 a few days ago with a story on a university experiment that debunked traditional attitudes toward multitasking. It caught my attention right away because I have generally considered myself a decent multitask-er and have prided myself in the past on identifying those who are and those who aren't. (i.e. my artist-husband). But as I listened, I learned that human brain cannot actually multi-task. Rather, it very quickly jumps from one task to another - so quickly, in fact, that we do not notice. This causes us to divide our attention among the number of tasks we involve ourselves with.( 1 )
Tangent 1 | Tangent 2 |

Can you imagine what it would be like to need to consider the air that we take in while driving a car? What if we had to make sure our heart kept beating in rhythm while we carried on a conversation with our significant other?

I know that I cannot read through my inbox and have a conversation with my friend over the phone. I can pretend to "actively listen" by repeating main points my brain caught during the tug-of-war between email and cell - but in the end, I am desperately trying to force my friend and her conversation into the framework of my agenda. To "kill two birds with one stone" does not speak of an advantageous opportunity, but rather a lifestyle I am desperately trying to practice.
Sometimes it has nothing to do with busyness. When my husband is telling me about a new piece he is beginning while I am taking care of our finances, I sometimes feel entitled to lump him into the category of "Obligation I Must Fulfill" by effectively allocating my attention. In these cases, I treat my companionship as a scarce commodity that I distribute to pre-prioritized demands. I let a "competitive individualism" slip in, one that "tries to reconcile itself with a culture that speaks about togetherness, unity and community…” ( 4 ) My relationships become part of a to-do list, rather than the context by which I operate.
By the practice of this attitude, I might respond to a frantic friend's tears by deciding her needs are urgent and take precedence over my planned priorities. While this may seem like a compassionate response, it comes as a knee-jerk reaction that demands my "scarce" attention at the cost of the status my social charity. Elizabeth Newman writes, “In a market society, all human relations are reduced to contract, destroying the longer-term bonds needed to sustain human society.” ( 5 ) I still play by laws of supply and demand and, in truth, I superficially respond to fulfill a duty in my friendship.
But I wonder if, perhaps, I had truly and fully, without distraction, devoted myself to her in a few days sooner, if I would have been aware of her deteriorating state before her collapse.

“Living a life that places higher value on relationships and community than it does on commerce and productivity – this is counter to how much o us have been taught.”( 6 )







(I also heard somewhere that women do this far better than men because they have more connections in their brain. This is also why they are much more social.( 2 ))
Return to reading.

(holy cow, I just told Matt that according to this study (3), man and women are equally capable of multitasking but women make fewer mistakes than men. I said this is for many reason reasons and one being that woman have a higher blood flow to their brain; his response to this "I can't help if it I wield the wand of power.")
Return to reading.

1: How Multitasking Affects Human Learning (NPR)
2: Why Men Never Remember and Women Never Forget (Science Blogs)
3: Gender Differences in Multitasking (MWSU)
4: Nouwen, Henri J., and Gerard W. Hughes. Reaching Out : A Special Edition of the Spiritual Classic Including Beyond the Mirror. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1997.
5: Newman, Elizabeth. Untamed Hospitality : Welcoming God and Other Strangers. New York: Brazos P, 2007.
6: Pratt, Lonni Collins, and Daniel Homan. Radical Hospitality : Benedict's Way of Love. New York: Paraclete P, Incorporated, 2005.

Reflecting on Nouwen

These are notes from my paper on hospitality. I'm not exactly "unpacking" this quote, but the whole topic got me thinking...

“Lonliness is one of the most universal sources of suffering today.”
(Nouwen, Reaching Out)
We recently took a walk around downtown Pasadena and went into the famous Cliff’s Bookstore. Cliff is usually at the counter talking conspiracy with someone and that particular night, about halfway through our visit, he was joined by a man who parked his shopping cart outside. I’m not sure if they were friends or even acquaintances, but talk of politics and government corruption provided common conversational ground. They talked about taxes and parties and eventually soup cans – the man who had come in was carrying bags and bags of soup cans. The next day, Matt told me the man in the bookstore had been hanging around a gas station he’d stopped at a week earlier. He’d approached Matt and begun a conversation on baseball, a topic my husband knew nothing about. The man told Matt that he looked like a famous player and pressed his memory, hoping that they could relate on at least that much. But Matt still did know and they parted ways.
In both our encounters we found sufficient reason to assume the man was homeless. After all, he fit the profile: middle aged, rugged in appearance, black and traveling on foot. It is an unfair assumption, we admit, but gap between the affluent and impoverished in Pasadena is large enough to make the middle-of-the-road folk a rarity. (Ironically we fall into this category). Matt mentioned being nervous when the man had approached him and then embarrassed when he realized all he wanted was a conversation.
This prompted me to give the following remark to Matt:

“I don’t think that the homeless I’ve encountered often begin a conversation so that they might ask for money. It happens, sure, but ultimately it’s not very economic… I’ll bet that when someone does that, first begins a conversation and finally asks for money, that they are actually trying to fill two needs: first the satisfaction of human company, and then the need or want for money for whatever purposes. It’s not a wonder that the issues are addressed in that order – first, we tend to our loneliness.”

It's amazing what an intercessory to community outreach money can become. It's the basis of all our transactions and it, increasingly more, is the limiting, outlining catalyst to so many superficial relationships.

A girl said something that really hit me hard in class. The professor was asking us to consider who our "stranger" is. What she meant was who do we show hostility towards? who do we show the opposite of hospitality to?She said something more or less like, "To be honest... I am considering those who are homeless. I want to say that I don't actually have any 'hostility' toward them... I don't hate them... but the fact is, when I see someone sitting on the street with a cup or even just nothing, I find myself calculating a path around them. It's funny, because I know very well that, as a Christian, I probably ought to be looking for a path toward; in my love as a Christian and for God I ought to be looking for ways to I can provide, way I can meet their obvious needs."

Homelessness

"...I don’t find it surprising when the issue of homelessness gets momentary attention in the media and then fades in the public mind. While the big players in the economy get sustained attention, the vulnerable folks, often children, aren’t given quite the same care" says Howard Linsoff via a publication by West Raven.

There is a history to homelessness. I think Mr.Linsoff explains some of the more policy-based reasons for it that are worth considering. Take a look.

(I'll be adding more links and what not to this blog over the course of the day.)

An interesting conversation preluded by an interesting read

So, THE FINAL class of my undergraduate career revolves around an interesting topic: Hospitality. My professor brought asked us in our last session where we were with our understand in light of our readings* and I had to address my status as one at the bottom wrung... I am not getting this. Because you know what is conjured up in my mind when I think of "hospitality"? The Cafeteria. And all the green shirts running around last year, setting out food in large quantities, bearing identical baseball caps labeling them as "Hospitality Services", i.e. the department that provides the campus with banquets and snacks and meals and Dinner Rally. When I think of hospitality, I think of being served and catered to.
This is not the hospitality that we are speaking of in class. In fact, our senior thesis is designed to revolve around the discovery and practice of our personal ethic of hospitality to our "stranger."
I can tell this is going to be interesting, but I have no idea what such an exploration will yield- I still have no idea what hospitality means. But I have begun to make some connections...

*-The Three Movements of the Spiritual Life
-Economy of Grace
-Disruptive Christian Ethics: When Racism And Women's Lives Matter
-Radical Hospitality: Benedict's Way Of Love
-Deep Economy: The Wealth of Communities and the Durable Future

Oh! I published, but then I returned to edit because I didn't post anything about the conversation!

I was explaining to a friend the sort of tongue-in-cheek blog I posted earlier this month referencing the narcissistic nature of blogging (hey hey now! don't get huffy, I'm blogging, too!) when I realized, in the context of my process of redefining "hospitality" that immersion of blogs is, perhaps, a response to the lack of understanding of a concept of hospitality. It probably goes without saying that this is because of an underdeveloped or lack of encouragement in the practice of community- the root of hospitality.
I came to this conclusion in a funny way. Recently my aunt & uncle and some friends of mine were going to BlogWorld where these very topics were explored; conversations borne out of this trip gave me some language and context in which to express my own, personally felt violations of internet/blog community. After all, who doesn't hate flippin' spam. I mean, yea, these social networks are an obvious way to quantify and reach specified demographics but... I mean come on, I do NOT have a facebook account because I want to know how I can drop 20 lbs. And I actually got RID of my myspace account because I was tired of seeing my boyfriend's log-in page first direct him to a scantily clad lady shaking it for a mortgage company. Ugh.
Being targeted is hardly the issue, though. The fact of the matter is that I don't like uninvited guests. And I might make the argument that these are not event guests, but intruders who leave their ads all over my page or send me ridiculous messages for products and what not. And it is this idea, that was discussed at BlogWorld and amidst my facebook friends (who.. I really do see and call in real life) that inspired a hope in me for hospitality in the modern world. Because in these pseudo-social contexts, these very real values are obviously shared. The community, regardless of the fact that it is the greater Internet which hosts my blogs as opposed to, say my youth group or classmates, is being defended, protected from predictors. It is an indignation for others (as well as ourselves) that is being rebuked- if it was about us only, we wouldn't participate in such networks, and when spam hit, I might argue we'd simply change our identities/profiles or delete it over and over. But instead, we are finding a common ground to resist such violations and abuses to our community!

I think we are beginning to miss each other.