Bournagain

Since news the calamity in Port au Prince began filtering in nearly a week ago I have had times where it has been difficult to keep focused on things demanding my attention. It’s not the first time an earthquake has wrought destruction in a part of the world already woefully ill-equipped to deal with catastrophes. It probably won’t be the quake that produced the most fatalities in my lifetime either. However, this one is affecting me more than most.

For one thing I think it is the first time I have been aware of my children really understanding the extent of the disaster. Previous catastrophes haven’t affected them the way this one has – our 8-year old frequently talks about Haiti; without being prompted prayers for the Haitian people are offered up at mealtimes. It helps that Haiti already had a place in their consciousness. We have a Haitian friend in our church, and had (coincidentally?) begun supporting a work amongst Haitian orphans living in the Dominican Republic not long ago. It’s not that we had any particular concern for the Haitian people more than any other, but simply a belief in our Haitian friend who has taken up this cause, and wanting to support him. We agreed as a family that we would eat just rice for dinner on Mondays (when we remember), and give the money we save for this project.

So when the earthquake hit the children already had that connection. Not having TV they have been spared from a lot of the images – not that I am against children being exposed to the suffering of their fellow human beings per se. But images of suffering are so ubiquitous that it is easy to become blasé about them, and I haven’t noticed our children needing the reinforcement of pictures to understand the seriousness of what has happened. I can’t get over the extent of the damage though. It is so difficult to envisage an entire city leveled, and I keep imagining what it would be like to live there, and the overwhelming sense of not having any idea where to even begin putting life back together again.

And then you start thinking, why Haiti? I don’t mean in the sense “how could God let this happen”, because this is a question that doesn’t usually occur to me. I don’t blame God for natural disasters. I ask the question in the sense, why Haiti instead of, say, France? Are we more deserving than Haitians, that we live in such relative comfort, in secure homes, with reliable incomes? How do we get off scot free? And what if disaster did strike? Would we know what to do? Not just in terms of having enough tins of food stashed away to ride out a disaster, but would we have the emotional and psychological framework in place to be able to not only to get ourselves through it, but to be a beacon hope to those around us in the midst of it. If my house fell down, would I blame God? Would I shake my fist at him? Would I dissolve into a puddle of anxiety and hopelessness? Or would I have the necessary insight to realise that it’s only a house, and that life is more than the sum of my possessions, and get on with the job of helping my neighbour dig out his relatives?

If nothing else, the images of Port au Prince put many of my petty concerns in perspective, and is a great reminder of how ephemeral are our days.

Okay, so I know I’ve been silent for months. This blog has been suffering from a terrible lack of attention. But I just had to share this with you, from one of my favourite authors at the moment.

Faith enables us to be at the same time realistic and hopeful. We can be realistic, knowing that no human project can eliminate the powers of darkness as they operate in human life. This realism delivers us from the utopian fanaticisms which have condemned millions of people to misery and death in the cause of an imagined future. But at the same time we can be hopeful, acting hopefully in apparently hopeless situations, not dreaming of an absolute perfection on this side of death, but doing resolutely that relative good which is possible now, doing it as an offering to the Lord who is able to take it and keep it for the perfect kingdom which is promised. In this sense [...] our actions in the public life of the world are acted prayers for the kingdom. They do not themselves lead directly to the kingdom. They are acted prayers for its coming and as such they act as signs of its reality and so enable others to act in hope.

Lesslie Newbigin, The Gospel in a Pluralist Society

It’s such a shame this guy isn’t better known. What I love here is the refusal to escape into a pessimism which sees the world “going to hell in a handcart”, which leads some to retreat into a kind of “lifeboat” Christianity which refuses to engage with the world other than trying to pull a few drowning people into the boat. But at the same time there is no room for living in denial, as if heaven was already here. Yes the world is profoundly sick, and yes at this point in time we can’t actually bring ultimate positive change through our actions. But, we can rest assured that our actions are not wasted. Change is coming! It is not our actions that will bring it about, but our acts do have an important prophetic role in pointing people toward the glorious reality that is coming. I also really like the idea of viewing our actions as a form of prayer. No room for passivity here.

Hope for Europe has recently launched a new publication called Hope Magazine. It’s got some excellent articles which give a biblical perspective on Europe’s past, present and future. Sign up and you’ll be sent a .pdf of the Autumn 2006 edition which has an interesting article by Sir Fred Catherwood (former Vice President of the European parliament) on the way 2,000 years of Christian influence has formed the Europe of today. While you’re there take a look at the wider Hope for Europe site.

It’s edited by Jeff Fountain, European director for YWAM – definitely a commentator worth reading. He has a regular email newsletter entitled Weekly Word. I have enjoyed reading a positive perspective on what’s going down in Europe today, and what it means as a Christian to live as a person of hope. He also talks a lot about this in his book Living as People of Hope.