#BlackLivesMatter

I’m going to say this a clearly as I can - black lives matter.

And if you’re a Christian you should be doing four things:

First of all, witness to the truth and refuse to believe the lies that live within you, and that come from our prevailing culture.

Secondly, bind up the broken. We have a responsibility to care for one another because we share a common humanity and equally bear the image of God.

Thirdly, live the alternative. Find ways to live the kind of life that expresses the values of goodness and grace and justice and mercy.

And finally, replace evil with good. Whatever you can do to see that good prevails, do that in your life.

#BlackLivesMatter

Deep solidarity with humanity, creation and God

A few years ago, at the height of the HIV and AIDS pandemic in Southern Africa, I wrote that the Church would need to cultivate a deep sense of solidarity with HIV positive persons if it was to uphold the integrity of its witness and work. 

I wrote,

Schillebeeeckx notes that without true solidarity the “gospel becomes impossible to believe and understand”^[i].  The notion of true solidarity cannot be divorced from contextual solidarity.  Our solidarity is not merely some spiritual concept that has no bearing on our real lives.  So, in relation to HIV/AIDS Haight reminds us, “Jesus cannot be Christ and salvation cannot be real without having some bearing on this situation”^[ii]. 

The Southern African context is not unfamiliar with suffering and solidarity.  Albert Nolan wrote during the height of the atrocities of Apartheid in the 1980’s that solidarity with the suffering will be “the new starting point for modern theology and spirituality in most of the Christian world today”^[iii].  

This weekend I came across the quote below as I was reading some ecological theology on the Sunday aftern Earth Day.

If we are to hope to correct our abuses of each other and of other races and of our land, and if our effort to correct these abuses is to be more than a political fad that will in the long run be only another form of abuse, then we are going to have to go far beyond public protest and political action. We are going to have to rebuild the substance and the integrity of private life in this country. We are going to have to gather up the fragments of knowledge and responsibility that we have parceled out to the bureaus and the corporations and the specialists, and we are going to have to put those fragments back together again in our own minds and in our families and households and neighborhoods. We need better government, no doubt about it. But we also need better minds, better friendships, better marriages, better communities. We need persons and households that do not have to wait upon organizations, but can make necessary changes in themselves, on their own.

- Wendell Berry, The Art of the Commonplace

This challenging quote, on the Sunday after 'earth day' reminds me that we need loving solidarity rather than conquering violence. The way of the prince of peace is love not conquest. Christ rules from a cross as a servant rather than a conquering King. I shared some of these thoughts in my recent VLOG on the Cross of Christ and the language of Empire.

I'd love to hear your thoughts, reflections and ideas - leave me a comment, send me a tweet @digitaldion.

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[i] Schillebeeckx, E Jesus: An experiment in Christology.  Translated by Hoskings, H.  New York:  Vintage books 1981:623.

[ii] Haight, R, Jesus symbol of God. Maryknoll, New York: Orbis Books (1999:26).

[iii] Nolan, A, God in South Africa. Cape Town:  David Philiip publishers. (1988:43).