An Allegiance Greater than Patriotism or Family

Photo Credit:
U.S. Embassy Kabul Afghanistan

Taken from The Storm-Tossed Family: How the Cross Reshapes the Home by Russell D. Moore:

"Natural allegiances are strong, and strong for reasons designed by God. The pull of a fallen universe is to make those natural allegiances even stronger, into religions. There’s a parallel here with patriotism, since the word patriotism comes from the root of the word for father. It is natural to love one’s homeland. Patriotism is a good recognition of gratitude to God and to others for the blessings one has inherited as part of a country. Patriotism or nationalism when made ultimate, though, is ugly, violent, and even satanic. 

Those who are the best citizens of any earthly country are those who recognize that their citizenship in that country is not ultimate. There is a higher allegiance over the state. The problem with putting the nation—any nation—first, over the kingdom of God, is not just that such is idolatrous (the most important problem) but also that it is not, in fact, patriotic. Any state or tribe or village must have principles that transcend the body politic, and hold it accountable for its own ideals and aspirations. Where that is lost, one loses patriotism and sees it replaced with a cult. 

The problem with putting family first, over the kingdom of God, is that we, first of all, replace a living God with the worship of ourselves, and, second, we lose the ability to be the kind of people who can love our families. The same is true with family. Love for family is not only good but also biblically mandated. When love of family becomes ultimate, though, it becomes, at best, Darwinist and atheistic."

Moore, Russell D.. The Storm-Tossed Family (Kindle Locations 1079-1091). B&H Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

Weekly Web Roundup (7/1/17)

Photo Credit: Golden_Ribbon

Here is a collection of items from around the web that caught my attention the past couple of weeks:

Watch Your Mouth by Randy Nabors

"The consciousness of racial injustice and its attendant social, economic, psychic, emotional, and physical realities are like a punch in the gut.  We have no alternative but to spell them out, to both the ignorant and the resistant.  Yet, if we allowed hate to fill us, these truths could inflame our hearts and push us to be fiery-eyed zealots and avengers, we instead seek to speak the truth in love; as Ephesians 4:15 teaches us to do.  This is not always easy to do, to speak hard truths in love.  We cannot be flippant about what love means (claiming we love people but producing no demonstrable proof) in our communication, especially not in having read the James passage in how the “wisdom from above” is to be imparted.  In other words people who hear hard truths from us must also hear and feel the love as far as it may depend on us."

Surprise! We Need to Learn from Christians from Other Cultures by Amy Medina

"When we talk about church in America with our Tanzanian friends, it's their turn to be shocked.  Your church services are only an hour and fifteen minutes long?  And that's the only service you attend all week?  And you've never, ever done an all-night prayer vigil? Like, never?  Are there even any Christians in America? In America, your devotion to Christ is measured by the amount of personal time you spend in prayer and Bible study.  Am I right or am I right?  Well, in Tanzania, your devotion to Christ is measured by the amount of time you spend in prayer and worship with others. Of course, you might protest that measuring godliness sounds like legalism.  Which is true--but we still do it, don't we? If you are American, what would you say to a Christian who never did personal devotions, but spent many hours every week in church worship services? Would you even know where to put that person in your spiritual hierarchy?  And would you be able to back up your conclusion with Scripture? It's easy for us, as foreigners, to come to Tanzania and point out what they are doing wrong. Those deficiencies pop up to us broadly and clearly.  But I wonder, what if a Tanzanian Christian came to the States and was given a voice in the white American Church?  What deficiencies would be glaringly obvious to him?"

I preached about a gun rights advocate. He wasn't who I thought. by Amy Butler (USA Today)

"I sat there, startled briefly by the unlikely situation in which we found ourselves. We couldn’t be more different. But Todd and I share at least one fundamental belief: nobody is the stereotype we believe they are. We do ourselves and our world a fundamental disservice when we won’t summon the courage to listen to each other and try as hard as we can to find the things we share, small as they may be."

Poll shows a dramatic generational divide in white evangelical attitudes on gay marriage by Sarah Pulliam Bailey (The Washington Post)

"The question for many evangelicals has been whether LGBT issues are matters where they can agree to disagree and still work together, perhaps like the question of when children should be baptized or whether women can be ordained. When the issue came up for World Vision, one of the largest Christian nonprofits in the country, in 2012, the answer was a sharp no — it lost thousands of donors right away. And InterVarsity Christian Fellowship, a major ministry, announced last fall that its employees must affirm its views that marriage is between a man and a woman. Some evangelicals believe there’s a difference between supporting gay marriage as a public policy matter and gay marriage as sanctioned by churches. A large majority of white evangelicals (including younger generations) continue to see homosexual relations as morally wrong, according to the General Social Survey. The 2016 survey found 75 percent of white evangelicals saying homosexual sexual relations are always or nearly always wrong. That number is down from 82 percent in 1996 and 90 percent in 1987. The survey does not show a large generational gap, however. In 2014-2016 surveys, 70 percent of Generation X/millennial white evangelicals said same-sex sexual relations are nearly always or always wrong, compared to 81 percent of baby boomers/older generations."

7 ways the iPhone has made life worse by Kara Alaimo (CNN)

I'm an iPhone user but I share the concerns listed in this article from Kara Alaimo. Here she lists seven ways that she feels our smartphones have made our lives worse:

1. They're bad for our brains.
2. While we're busy on our phones, we're ignoring the world around us.
3. We're also ignoring one other.
4. They're ruining our relationships.
5. They promote FOMO ("fear of missing out") syndrome.
6. We have come to need constant validation.
7. We're expected to be available for work 24-7.

Smartphones can be useful if we use them and they don't use us. But these concerns are worth considering.

My 3 Big Fears in Parenting Teenagers by Trevin Wax (The Gospel Coalition)

"As fathers and mothers, we model the love of God to our kids in different ways. I know that whenever my children think of their Heavenly Father, they will in some way associate Him with their earthly father. The responsibility of modeling the character of God to my children makes me feel so honored and so inadequate. My fear for the teenage years is that, in the midst of the drama, the mood swings, the debates and disagreements, and the inevitable growth of independence, I will respond in ways that push my kids away from God instead of toward Him. That I will consistently model something untrue about God. For this reason, I pray that God would give me a soft and repentant heart, a willingness to own up to my sins, so that our kids would see that leadership in the home is not opposed to admitting I'm wrong, or that I need forgiveness. I also pray that God will not allow my fear of making mistakes to make me passive and thus forfeit my leadership role through apathy. A good father needs to have a combination of grace and boldness, with strands of love and authority tied so tightly you can't untangle one without the other."

Weekly Web Roundup (6/10/17)

Photo Credit: pennstatenews

Here is a collection of items from around the web that caught my attention the past few weeks:

How "Race Tests" Maintain Evangelical Segregation by Joshua L. Lazard (Religion Dispatches)

"As the Bracey/Moore study alludes to, these evangelical churches are spaces that on paper claim that, to put it colloquially, “race doesn’t matter,” or “It doesn’t matter what color Jesus is.” But obviously it does. Reality shows that ecclesiastical segregation is a sociological trend that exists beyond just white evangelical churches. It also includes congregations and denominations that are decidedly liberal and stand at the opposite end of the theological spectrum. Studies have shown time and time again that this segregation has held true for a multiplicity of reasons. While these reasons range from the difference of praise and worship style and doctrinal differences, to residential segregation or the preference of non-whites creating affirming spaces of their own, white liberal churches aren’t excused from being a part of white institutional spaces as defined by this study."

Being Black, a Woman and an Evangelical by Natasha Sistrunk Robinson (Missio Alliance)

"For those black people who are conscious of this American history and still desire to remain true to the scriptural principles of evangelicalism, it costs us something to present ourselves as evangelical. For the most part, we are able to confidently make this claim because we have been trained in evangelical institutions, we love Jesus and the Good Book, and we believe in the gospel as the ministry of reconciliation. It also means that we often find ourselves leading and ministering in predominately white spaces, churches and institutions. It means that we are often one of a few ethnic minorities within white evangelicalism challenging the thoughts and actions surrounding diversity (or most often the lack thereof), racial reconciliation and biblical justice. We are often on tap to contribute to conversations but rarely on payroll to make decisions."

Considering (and Surviving) Unhealthy Christian Organizations, part 1 by Ed Stetzer (Christianity Today: The Exchange)

"Many times, the leader gets a pass for the fruit of his/her leadership because of some overwhelming characteristic: preaching ability, intelligence, ability to woo others, or more. Yet, the fruit remains below-- a culture toxic to all who swim downstream. The leader is often seen (from the outside) as a great leader, but those inside know him/her as someone who is, well, more concerned about outside appearance than godly leadership."

Sports Spectrum Podcast Interview with Ernie Johnson

The personal story of NBA on TNT studio host Ernie Johnson is powerful. As someone that became a Christian later in life, his family's journey of faith through cancer, adoption and other challenges related to their special needs child is challenging. This interview with Jason Romano is worth a listen.

Are You Married to Your Smartphone? by Dave Boehi (Family Life)

"Adjusting to new forms of technology is nothing new. Just think how telephones and automobiles changed our culture. Or air-conditioning. Radio, television, computers, and many other new inventions sparked significant changes in our culture and in the way we related to our family and friends. But the pace of change since 1995 has been breathtaking. We’ve seen the emergence of the internet and of mobile phones, and then the convergence of the two in 2006 with smartphones. We can now be plugged in wherever we are, 24/7. The technology is evolving so quickly that most of us are barely aware of how our behavior is changing and our relationships are affected. As one reader wrote after I wrote about this issue a few years ago, “These mobile devices can take over your life.” Another said, “I understand technology has its advantages, but we are being ruled by the technology rather than using it as a tool.”

How the Internet is Changing Friendship (The Atlantic)

Weekly Web Roundup (5/20/17)

Photo Credit: sheldon0531

Here is a collection of items from around the web that caught my attention this past week:

A conversation with Andy Crouch about family and technology from Russell Moore

In this episode of the Signposts podcast, Dr. Moore offers an enlightening conversation with author Andy Crouch. They discuss how parents can create healthy boundaries with their children regarding technology use.

Standing Rock changed how I see America by W. Kamau Bell (CNN)

"I can't imagine what it must be like to be one of the indigenous people of the United States of America. I can't imagine watching the news every day -- as people debate whose country this is and who should be in charge of it and how to make it great again -- and hardly ever see your people brought into the discussion. As a black person in this country, I am always frustrated by the lack of attention my people's issues get. But at least the news and politicians are talking about not talking about our issues. Native issues are basically ignored."

Jesus, the Frybread of Life by Deborah Pardo-Kaplan (Christianity Today)

Here's a great profile of the work of InterVarsity Christian Fellowship (IV) as it pertains to Native American college students. Cru's Native ministry -- Nations -- partners closely with IV and is mentioned in the article.

My Family’s Slave by Alex Tizon (The Atlantic)

"She was 18 years old when my grandfather gave her to my mother as a gift, and when my family moved to the United States, we brought her with us. No other word but slave encompassed the life she lived. Her days began before everyone else woke and ended after we went to bed. She prepared three meals a day, cleaned the house, waited on my parents, and took care of my four siblings and me. My parents never paid her, and they scolded her constantly. She wasn’t kept in leg irons, but she might as well have been. So many nights, on my way to the bathroom, I’d spot her sleeping in a corner, slumped against a mound of laundry, her fingers clutching a garment she was in the middle of folding."

Why People Fight Online (The Barna Group)

"“Our most fraught conversations seem to have moved from the dinner table to the screen,” says Roxanne Stone, editor in chief at Barna Group. “However there are very few rules of etiquette in place for the internet yet. Where once family members could put a stop to an argument with a cry of ‘no religion or politics at the table!’ the digital world does everything to encourage such debates. And, of course, it’s a lot easier to be an anonymous jerk to a stranger than it is to yell at your mom. “Yet, there is a real person on the other end of that comment and online bullying has proven to be a truly destructive force,” says Stone. “The number of teen suicides attributed to it is but one extreme and horrifying example of its potency. Our level of civility and straight-up kindness should not be dependent on whether we are physically with a person or whether we know them. It’s easy to disembody the messages we read online and imagine our own posts are simply going out into an indifferent void. But real people are really hurt by the things said about and against them online."

The Blessing of Conflict by Chanequa Walker-Barnes (Collegeville Institute)

"The therapeutic definition of conflict is simple: a difference of opinion between two or more people. In this sense, conflict was not inherently bad; in fact, it was evidence of the family’s capacity to allow and cope with self-differentiation among its members. In a healthy family system, members have both a strong sense of group cohesion as well as clearly developed individual identities. The way in which families managed the dinner exercise told us something about that. On this task, a healthy family was one in which people offered different ideas about what they wanted, and then they worked through it to agree upon a menu that accommodated some, although not necessarily all, of those differences."

This Is All of Us - Mandy, Milo, Sterling and Chrissy Surprise Fans

NBC's "This is Us" became one of my favorite shows this past year. This video shows the stars of the show unexpectedly surprising fans of the show.

Weekly Web Roundup (5/13/17)

Photo Credit: aka Quique

Here is a collection of items from around the web that caught my attention the past couple of weeks:

How to Raise an American Adult by Ben Sasse (The Wall Street Journal)

"We all know the noun adult. But I was perplexed last year to hear the new verb to adult. In social media, especially on Twitter and Instagram, it birthed a new hashtag: #adulting. As in: “Just paid this month’s bills on time #adulting,” or “Decided I couldn’t watch Netflix 8 hours straight and went to the grocery store instead #adulting.” It even got a nomination from the American Dialect Society for the most creative word of 2015. “Adulting” is an ironic way to describe engaging in adult behaviors, like paying taxes or doing chores—the sort of mundane tasks that responsibility demands. To a growing number of Americans, acting like a grown-up seems like a kind of role-playing, a mode of behavior requiring humorous detachment. Let me be clear: This isn’t an old man’s harrumph about “kids these days.” I still remember Doc Anderson standing in the street in 1988, yelling at me to slow down as I drove through his neighborhood in our small Nebraska town. I was 16 and couldn’t stand that guy. Years later, when I had children of my own, I returned to thank him. Maturation."

Teams in Mission: Are They Worth It? by David Sedlacek (The Exchange: Christianity Today)

"Teamwork has been a popular concept in missions theory and practice for decades, but there is a persistent sense among missionaries that teams may be more work than they are worth. Working alongside others, especially those of different cultures, is no easy task. It takes time, effort, and energy to work in a team, and it doesn’t always produce the fruit we look for. We’ve all heard this comment: our younger generation values teamwork, but the older generation doesn’t get it. Twenty-five years ago, as a member of the new generation of missionaries, I nodded my head in agreement. I thought, Yes, we value teamwork and the older generation doesn’t get it. Today, I am a member of the “older” generation. When I hear the familiar refrain, I’m tempted to respond, “Yes, the younger generation values teamwork, and we don’t get it.”"

Don’t Let Facebook Make You Miserable by Seth Stephens-Davidowitz (The New York Times)

"Friends have always showed off to friends. People have always struggled to remind themselves that other people don’t have it as easy as they claim. Think of the aphorism quoted by members of Alcoholics Anonymous: “Don’t compare your insides to other people’s outsides.” Of course, this advice is difficult to follow. We never see other people’s insides. I have actually spent the past five years peeking into people’s insides. I have been studying aggregate Google search data. Alone with a screen and anonymous, people tend to tell Google things they don’t reveal to social media; they even tell Google things they don’t tell to anybody else. Google offers digital truth serum. The words we type there are more honest than the pictures we present on Facebook or Instagram."

Reflections on the Meaning of Home by Scott Sauls

"Recently, our oldest daughter graduated from high school. To commemorate her accomplishment, Patti and I wrote her long Letters from Mom and Dad. In those letters, we walked down memory lane reflecting upon and getting nostalgic about her eighteen years of life. As we reminisced, it dawned on both of us that, while we gave the girl opportunities, we never gave the girl roots…at least not with respect to place. To date, she has lived in seven different homes and attended eight different schools in five different cities. Contemplating the quasi-nomadic upbringing that we imposed on our daughter, Patti wrote in her Letter from Mom, “I am so so so sorry…and you’re welcome.” 

The “I’m sorry” part makes good sense. Moving of any kind is disorienting, especially in childhood. It uproots a child from friends, teachers, neighborhoods and familiar spaces. It digs a hole in the heart, uprooting and re-rooting like that. For better or for worse, our daughter’s story has become the same as mine. It’s a story with no lifelong friends or neighbors or houses from childhood. Instead, it’s the story of a traveler. What good could come from seven homes and eight schools and five cities in eighteen years? Why on earth would my wife feel compelled to say “You’re welcome” right after saying “I’m so so so sorry” to our daughter? I believe it’s because regret and hope don’t have to be mutually exclusive."

A Theology of Race

Here's a helpful video from Jemar Tisby on what the Bible means when it refers to race or, more appropriately, ethnicity.

Weekly Web Roundup (4/29/17)

Photo Credit:
US Department of Education

Here is a collection of items from around the web that caught my attention the past couple of weeks:

Sorry Weber, Durkheim, and Marx: Educated Evangelicals Are More Religious by Sarah Eekhoff Zylstra (Christianity Today)

"Evangelicals who graduated from college are more likely than those who didn’t enroll to attend religious services at least weekly (68% vs. 55%), to pray daily (83% vs. 77%), and to believe in God with absolute certainty (90% vs. 87%). They’re also more likely to say religion is very important to them (81% vs. 79%). Those numbers aren’t a fluke; when Pew broke the categories down further, the trend continued. Evangelicals who earned a graduate degree after college are the most committed to their faith; those who dropped out of high school are the least committed."

The Missing Piece in American International Missions by Courtlandt Perkins (Reformed African American Network)

"In many places, ethnicity and faith are deeply connected to a people group’s identity, so to only see people with white skin representing Christ speaks volumes about what Christians look like. The human heart naturally doesn’t want to receive Christ due to depravity, but what if the dark skin of a missionary helps them be received into an African village, simply because they look familiar? The unreached will physically see that Jesus changes the lives of people who look like them. African American missionaries could inspire a generation of African missionaries to receive Christ, and take His message to places AA’s could never go. In the same way, sending Hispanic-American missionaries to Latin American countries, we could help deconstruct the notions of white superiority, and point to the reality that white Christians do not have the copyright of international missions. It is obvious the issues run deeper than just numbers. The reality is often rooted in inherit racial bias and historical discrimination. But my friend’s words resound deeply with me: “Diversity is a powerful (and much needed) tool for witness.”"

6 Tech Habits Changing the American Home (Barna Group)

"Technology is literally everywhere in our homes—not only the devices in our pockets but the invisible electromagnetic waves that flood our homes,” writes Andy Crouch in his new book The Tech-Wise Family, written in partnership with original Barna research. “This change has come about overnight, in the blink of an eye in terms of human history and culture. When previous generations confronted the perplexing challenges of parenting and family life, they could fall back on wisdom, or at least old wives’ tales, that had been handed down for generations. But the pace of technological change has surpassed anyone’s capacity to develop enough wisdom to handle it. We are stuffing our lives with technology’s new promises, with no clear sense of whether technology will help us keep the promises we’ve already made."

The Legitimacy of Ethnic Churches in Multi-Ethnic Contexts by Andrew Ong (Reformed Margins)

"While pursuing a church demographic that proportionally matches the community’s might be a helpful and wise benchmark for certain churches, to impose any particular vision of unity and diversity upon a local church strikes me as mechanistic. This is especially true since the automobile has fundamentally altered our conception of communities’ bounds. How many of us worship at the closest Christian church to our home? Binding local churches to the norm of multi-ethnicity is mechanistic if our conception of church unity is absolutely bound by spatial-location. Is a church less faithful if it’s attended by more people who live ten minutes away by car than people who live ten minutes away by foot? Didn’t Jesus just say that his sheep would hear his voice?"

One Teenager's (Supremely Brilliant) Perspective on Social Media (Scott Sauls)

"When I finally spent a week “unplugging” from my phone, I realized that the withdrawals I experienced from disengaging from the app were a sign of the control it had over me. This control scared me and made me angry because I had willingly put myself in an unnecessary position to compare my insides to others’ outsides, to be controlled by my appearance and people’s opinions, and to hurt others and myself with my comments, posts, or digital footprint. This unnerved me because it was a dangerous trap that had been disguised by an attractive, socially acceptable, and necessary staple of popularity. After I deleted my social media accounts, I began to notice how other teenagers my age were trapped in the same digital world that I was. I wanted to understand why this was happening. What exactly are we as a society risking with the constant attachment to our screens?"

Why a racially insensitive photo of Southern Baptist seminary professors matters by Jemar Tisby (The Washington Post)

"But the biggest problem doesn’t show up in the picture. The presence of any person of color would have reduced the chances of this photo ever happening. But a photo like this evolves in an environment that lacks meaningful interaction with people from other cultures, especially on the leadership level. The seminary’s website appears to picture all white men in an administration and an entire preaching faculty. Even if a school has diversity in the student body, if the decision-makers all come from a similar racial and cultural background, then they will remain oblivious to their own racial blind spots."

The Guide to Being a Detroit Sports Fan by Dan Holmes (Detroit Athletic Blog)

"What does it mean to be a Detroit sports fan? What should we all know? What do we need to know? Not everyone has the answers to these questions, so I wrote them all down in one place. Enjoy."

Weekly Web Roundup (4/8/17)

Photo Credit: Amaza Design

Here is a collection of items from around the web that caught my attention over this past week:

How to be a Tech-Wise Family & manage kids, technology & family by Andy Crouch (AnnVoskamp.com)

"Some of our happiest times as a family have been spent on this first floor, lit entirely by candlelight and the glow of a wood fire. Why wait for a power outage? The Wi-Fi and cell signals are there, all right—but we can choose to ignore them, turning instead to conversation, music, books, or silence. Indeed, on Sundays that is what we intentionally do, all day long. And all the most beautiful and striking things—everything that would start a conversation or capture a child’s attention—require our active engagement. Children love this, by the way. They thrive in a world stocked with raw materials. Too often, and with the best of intentions, we fill their world with technology instead—devices that ask very little of them. A cheap electronic keyboard makes a few monotonous sounds, while an expensive one promises to make all kinds of sounds. But actually, neither the cheap keyboard nor the expensive one has anything like the depth and range of possibility of an acoustic piano. A single pencil can produce more “colors” of gray and black than the most high-tech screen can reproduce. For a child’s creative development, the inexpensive, deep, organic thing is far better than the expensive, broad, electronic thing."

Faceless of the Game: Where have all the MLB superstars gone? by Jayson Stark (ESPN.com)

"For more than three decades, dating to the arrival of Bird and Magic, the NBA has embraced star power as the secret sauce for How To Sell Your League. And baseball? Not so much. "Baseball has always promoted the game," [Arn] Tellem says. "But it's been more about the game and its history. And it's been less about the individual players." Tellem sees that approach beginning to change. Finally. But in a star-driven society, he said, it can't shift gears fast enough. "Baseball is at a point now where they have to reach the youth of America," he says. "And clearly, [promoting] the game is important. But it's about using stars and developing stars and helping them become bigger names, as a way of reaching the youth. And baseball has to see that convincing [those stars] and having them participate will serve the game."

‘S-Town’ Explores the Maze of the Divine Clockmaker’s Mind by Kaitlyn Schiess (Christianity Today)

"My favorite professor likes to say that a biblical view of humanity “needs to start in Genesis 1, not Genesis 3.” In saying so, he’s arguing for a fuller picture of what Scripture tells us about ourselves—not only that we’re fallen and sinful, but that each and every one of us is made in the image of God. It’s actually the combination of these ideas that most fully explains both the goodness and evil of which humans are capable: We display—albeit brokenly and imperfectly—characteristics that point us to the perfect character of our God. Christians can find signs of this eternal truth in highly unusual places, such as the incredibly successful podcast S-Town."

How Japanese Americans Survived Internment in WW2 by Emily Wilson (The Daily Beast)

"With President Trump having issued executive orders for two travel bans for majority Muslim countries, both blocked by federal judges, the history of rounding up a group of people based on ethnicity or religion seems especially relevant and urgent. A couple weeks before the exhibition’s [Exclusion: The Presidio’s Role in World War II Japanese American Incarceration] opening, Eric Blind, the director of Heritage Programs for the Presidio, showed me the space that would house it. Outside the entrance visitors will see a telephone pole with a replica of the poster telling all Japanese Americans to report to that buses that would take them to the camps. “It’s an ordinary object with an extraordinary pronouncement,” he said. “We want to create this empathy with people seeing the order—not just if you were Japanese Americans, but their friends and neighbors—about how would you feel if you saw this on a telephone pole?”"

Black Eye on America - What Is Black Twitter?: The Daily Show

Roy Wood Jr. explains how the African-American community uses Twitter to discuss social issues and finds out why that communication is unique to black culture.

Weekly Web Roundup (3/25/17)

Photo Credit:
City of Seattle Community Tech

Here is a collection of items from around the web that caught my attention the past couple of weeks:

God Made Me Hispanic. And It Was Good by Rebecca Gonzales Kelsall (Cru.org)

"God opened my eyes to the values I’d grown up with, Latino values, scrawled all over His Word after a conversation about the beautiful differences among cultures. I realized, because Christian Latinos didn’t teach me about Christ, I learned a lot about how majority American culture reflects Christ, and nothing of my own. But we, Hispanics, were His brainchild too. Each of us and each of our cultures, reflects Him in specific, amazing ways. In learning more about our ethnic identity, we learn more about ourselves and more about the great God who created us in His image."

The Key to Raising Kind Kids by Rebecca Randall (Christianity Today)

"Until more recently, parents did not concern themselves with cultivating their child’s happiness and self-esteem. Weissbourd address this dramatic cultural shift in The Parents We Mean To Be. He writes, “It’s important to pause and consider how unique this belief is—that many parents are conveying that happiness or self-esteem leads to morality appears to be unprecedented in American history and may be unprecedented in the history of humankind.” He also points out that “many vital moral qualities… do not spring from happiness or self-esteem.” These “missed values” include fairness, justice, and caring for others. In Huck’s Raft, Mintz makes a similar point. Although historically, children’s contributions to the family provided a type of service beyond self, “young people today have fewer socially valued ways to contribute to their family’s well-being or to participate in community life,” he writes."

Why Leaders Fail to Stop Bad Behavior by Jessica A. Kennedy (TIME)

"Although the failure to stop an unethical practice is often attributed to character problems such as greed, sexism or the relentless pursuit of self-interest, our explanation is subtler. According to our studies, ethical failures like these can also stem from a psychological factor endemic to very successful teams: identification with the group or organization. Identification is a feeling of oneness with the group. When you identify highly with a group or organization, you define yourself in terms of your membership in it. When asked, “Who are you?” your answer will reflect a category (e.g., you might refer to yourself as a man, a Texan, a Yankees fan, an environmentalist, a Christian). You focus on the traits that you and other group members share, rather than on personal traits that distinguish you. 

We found that holding higher rank increases identification. People in high-ranking positions feel more connected to their group or organization and value their membership in it to a greater degree than do lower-ranking people. This trend has benefits for the group, as strong identifiers cooperate more readily and contribute more to the group’s goals. But stronger identification has an ethical cost: It makes it more difficult to perceive ethical problems within the group."

Meet the man who helped transform Michigan's Derrick Walton (and Tom Brady, Desmond Howard and Michael Phelps, too) by Pete Thamel (Sports Illustrated)

"The emergence of Walton as one of the elite players in college basketball can be linked to another success story for Harden, who for three decades has served as a mentor, confidant and advisor for all of the boldfaced names in the Wolverine athletic department. He came to Michigan in 1986 at the request of Bo Schembechler, who valued Harden’s background in social work to address alcohol and drug problems. Since then, Harden has worked with everyone from Desmond Howard to Tom Brady to a volunteer assistant swim coach named Michael Phelps. Harden’s hair is far more salt than pepper, and in his 31 years at Michigan the 67-year old has shared blunt advice and deep bass laughter with everyone from Glen Rice to Mike Hart to Tim Hardaway Jr. “I wouldn’t be the person I am today without having Greg Harden in my life to help me with development,” said Warde Manuel, Michigan’s athletic director who arrived on campus with Harden in 1986. “There’s hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of student athletes—both men and women—who feel that way.”"

That Asian mom is not the nanny. Why do so many people assume she is? by Jessica Roy (Los Angeles Times)

Here are some helpful insights about how a recent viral video uncovered racial stereotypes that often go undetected.

The first time I discovered I was white by John Blake (CNN)

"But the evolution of whiteness is so much more complex. It was invented; not inherited. Some race scholars say it was created around the 17th century as a legal term to confer certain protections and privileges on Americans of European descent. It was also used to reinforce the notion of a superior white race -- and to justify slavery. Dow gives some of this historical context in the "Whiteness Project" in between interviews with his subjects. But I think the most fascinating part of his project is seeing white people grapple with their racial identity. Some people denied their whiteness. Others were apologetic. One young white man said "I'm not happy that I'm white," citing the historic oppression associated with his people. Another guy wondered why black people still get hung up on "the slave thing.""

Body Language Matters – Geno Auriemma on body language and the type of players he recruits

Geno Auriemma, the women's basketball coach at the University of Connecticut, offers a challenging perspective on his values when it comes to his players. Even though Coach Auriemma has been highly successful on the court, there are other qualities beyond winning and losing that he wants to see from his teams.

Weekly Web Roundup (1/14/17)

Photo Credit: misha maslennikov

Here is a collection of items from around the web that caught my attention this past week:

The 5 (Unwritten) Rules of Honor-Shame Cultures  (HonorShame.com)

"In collectivistic societies, identity is defined by the group you belong to. When two people meet, one of the first items of conversation is figuring out which family, clan, or village the other person is from. Since honor is a shared commodity, what one person does brings honor (or shame) upon the entire community. Children are taught from an early age how to bring honor to the family, and people are expected to be loyal to their community, even at personal cost. In Western cultures, family is much more of a voluntary association. At the age of 18 or so, young adults are encouraged to venture out from the home to “find themselves” or “establish their own lives.”"

How to Destroy Your Child Through Sports by Ed Uszynski (Athletes in Action)

"In spite of mini-movements of outcry regarding poor parent and coach behavior at youth events and the intense pressure being put on kids to perform, many of us seem committed to staying on a course that ruins our children’s ability to enjoy games. Instead of sports being experienced as something good, a category called “play” that God created for our good and His glory, too often we use our kids’ playground to exorcise our own demons. 

In more than 25 years of listening to athletes from youth to professional levels process their experience of sports, I’ve learned that these parental behaviors can be counted on not only to ruin their experience of play, but also to create multi-layered psychological and spiritual maladies that stick throughout life."

9 Steps to More Ethical Fundraising (A Life Overseas: The Mission Conversation)

"We were doing all the things we were taught to do—pray, write newsletters, make calls, send letters, schedule meetings—but after two years, we felt stuck. We were at about 50% of our goal and couldn’t seem to make any traction. One day, I just felt I needed to do something to make a statement to our potential supporters that we were as serious about this as we possibly could be and that we held them and their potential donations in the highest esteem. So I decided to write down the ways in which we were committing to respect them and their sacrifice. 

I called this our “Fundraising Code of Ethics.” To me, it was a public covenant we were making to hold ourselves to a standard of maturity, transparency, and responsibility. By making it public, we were welcoming our supporters to hold us to this standard, but we also warned them we would never have a perfect record and asked them to be gracious with us. Like every healthy relationship, trust is absolutely crucial. We are all aware if donors trust you they are more likely to support you. What we learned is that we also need to have enough faith in our supporters to be transparent with them."

Racial Divides in Spiritual Practice (The Barna Group)

"Black communities tend toward communal rhythms of spiritual development while white communities prefer a more individualistic setting. It is unsurprising therefore that white Christians are more likely to view their spiritual life as “entirely private” (42% compared to 32%). Black Christians, on the other hand, are much more likely to believe their personal spiritual life has an impact on others—whether they are relatives, friends, community or society at large. For instance, black Christians are much more likely to believe that their personal spiritual lives have an impact on broader society (46% compared to 27%). 

This was a strong belief of Martin Luther King, and it appears to have had great staying power. He fundamentally believed that one’s personal spiritual life had implications for societal justice, and he called Christians—on both sides of the debate—to bring their faith to bear on the struggle for civil rights, to which he dedicated his life. This impact is also tied to the approach to evangelism: half of black Christians (50% compared to 34%) believe it is their responsibility to tell others about their religious beliefs, further reinforcing the public / private contrast between both groups."

The Longstanding Crisis Facing Tribal Schools by Alia Wong (The Atlantic)

"Children who are disciplined in school are far more likely to end up in prison as adults; it goes without saying that being disciplined as a child via formal law enforcement has similarly deleterious, if not worse, effects. The alleged practices at Havasupai Elementary are, the suit contends, characteristic of those at tribal schools across the country. Indeed, a March 2014 U.S. Department of Education report found that Native Americans across the country are disciplined at disproportionate rates. Unsurprisingly, they’re also incarcerated at a rate 38 percent higher than the national average."

Repealing Obamacare without a Replacement: How It May Hurt Small Church Pastors and Church Planters Near You by Ed Stetzer (Christianity Today)

"I’m not defending Obamacare, it’s success, and certainly not its implementation. And, furthermore, this is not just about pastors—it impacts a whole lot of people in your church (and not in your church). But, I’ve talked to a lot of pastors about this topic, so I’ve made that my focus here. In short, the point here is that big policies aren’t simply big policies. And when they appear (or actually are) broken, there isn’t a simple answer. Big policies impact real people. A plan approved by Congress impacts millions of everyday, hard-working people. And I’ve only focused on one group here, small church pastors and church planters, since I have often heard about this from church planters. Actually, I have spoken in conferences on this very topic: how the ACA has opened the door for many church planters to get insurance."

Twin Sisters Separated at Birth Reunite on Good Morning America

Two sisters, each adopted from China by different American families, meet in person for the first time on ABC's "Good Morning America." Here is their touching story.

Ruining Our Children Through Sports

Photo Credit: USAG-Humphreys

I read the following headline in our local newspaper this morning:

"REFS CALL LEADS TO BRAWL BETWEEN PARENTS AT HIGH SCHOOL BASKETBALL GAME."

Intrigued, I read the article.

It seems that a man who was watching his daughter play made a comment about a disagreeable referee's call. The father of a girl on the opposing team told him to "shut up."

The first man called the second man an "idiot" and the second man dared him to "call him an idiot again." The first man accepted the dare and called the other man an idiot for a second time, and the two started wrestling in the gym and punches were thrown. The men continued to fight until someone in the stands pulled them apart.

As a coach of youth sports for many years and a parent of multiple children that have played a number of sports, I know all too well what can happen when the competitive juices get flowing.

Of course most parents simply want to provide an opportunity for their children to play with friends, learn a sport and have fun while getting a little exercise.

But there are some parents that choose to live out their unfulfilled athletic fantasies through their children and put an unbelievable amount of pressure on kids, coaches and referees in order to try to make things go their way.

This article by Ed Uszynski with Athletes in Action offers 8 behaviors that can destroy our children through sports. Ed says this:

"In more than 25 years of listening to athletes from youth to professional levels process their experience of sports, I’ve learned that these parental behaviors can be counted on not only to ruin their experience of play, but also to create multi-layered psychological and spiritual maladies that stick throughout life."

Athletics can be a wonderful part of the life of a child but it can also be a dreaded experience due to poor parenting and coaching.

As a coach, I realize that most players I coach probably won't go very far in their athletic career. Although I have had a few players that have played at the collegiate Division 1 level, most won't advance past their middle school or high school teams when it comes to competitive athletics.

My hope is as my former players grow into adulthood that they will be able to look back upon their experiences in competitive athletics as children and think to themselves, "That was fun. I'm glad I was able to do that. Those were good times."

For my own children that I've coached, my desire for them is that they will have fond memories of having their dad as a coach. It's not always easy, but keeping the end in mind helps a great deal.

Weekly Web Roundup (9/10/16)

Photo Credit: leonyaakov

Here are some interesting stories from around the web that I've seen during this past week:

Is There Something Dangerous About Focusing On the Family? by Jared Kennedy (Gospel Centered Family)

"When we are strategizing ways to equip parents as the primary disciple-makers in their homes, we must also help them prioritize their own spiritual growth. We should think about slimming down our church programming in order to help families keep the Sabbath. We should think of ways to give burned-out mom's times to study the Bible together away from their children. We must take pains that family discipleship is not another burdensome duty but rather fruit that overflows from the hearts of parents who know and love Jesus."

The Main Thing You Need to Know About Fundraising by Phil Cooke

"Down through the years, as I have lived and taught this approach to major donor fundraising, some of my colleagues in ministry have recoiled. It’s too “pastoral,” they feel, not “systematic” enough. The fact is, I am a very systematic person. I like to make a plan, work the plan, evaluate the plan. But my plans and systems for extracting gifts from major donors did more to wear me down than to build up the work we were doing — and they certainly did nothing for the donors themselves.. But at the heart of this system is a truth that took me years to understand"

A Message from a Warrior About Protecting Our Sacred Lands: Why Standing Rock Matters by Liz Perez Halperin (Indian Country Today Media Network)

"A topic few are being encouraged to discuss is the issue that inspired hundreds of Native American tribes across the USA to unite and take a stand: the building of the Dakota Access Pipeline. This is the first time since the Native American movement of the 70s that tribes have come together for a cause."

White male leadership persists at evangelical ministries by Steve Rabey (Religion News Service)

"Only one of 33 major national organizations contacted for this article is led by a woman — Jane Overstreet at Development Associates International. And only three are led by nonwhite males. “Some groups are talking about greater gender diversity, while others talk about racial diversity,” says Amy Reynolds, an associate professor of sociology at Wheaton College in Illinois, a leading evangelical institution that recently appointed its first female provost in its 156-year history. “The question is, what are they willing to do to get there?”"

How to talk to black people in eight easy lessons by Leonard Pitts, Jr. (Miami Herald)

"The truth is, How to Talk to Black People isn’t all that difficult. The candidate who wants African-American support should pretend black folks are experts on our own issues and experiences — because we are. He should learn those issues, tap that experience, formulate some thoughtful ideas in response."

Companies would benefit from helping introverts to thrive (The Economist)

"And yet, if anything, the corporate approach to introverts has been getting worse. The biggest culprit is the fashion for open-plan offices and so-called “group work”. Companies rightly think that the elixir of growth in a world where computers can do much of the grunt work is innovation. But they wrongly conclude that the best way to encourage creativity is to knock down office walls and to hold incessant meetings. This is ill-judged for a number of reasons. It rests on a trite analogy between intellectual and physical barriers between people. It ignores the fact that noise and interruptions make it harder to concentrate. And companies too often forget that whereas extroverts gain energy from other people, introverts need time on their own to recharge."

Central Michigan vs. Oklahoma State - CMU Football Game Winning Hail Mary

The football team for my alma mater, Central Michigan, had one of the most amazing finishes we'll likely see in college football this season in a win over #22 ranked Oklahoma State. Here's the final play:

Weekly Web Roundup (8/13/16)

Photo Credit: danzden

Here are some interesting stories from around the web that I've seen during this past week:

Don't Let Anyone Tell You Adoptive Parents Aren't Parents by Carrie Goldman

American gold medal gymnast Simon Biles is one of the breakout stars of the 2016 Rio Olympics. But NBC commentator Al Trautwig's initial refusal to refer to Biles' adoptive parents as her parents caused quite a stir. This article addresses the importance of language choice when referring to adoptive families.

Racial History of American Swimming Pools from The Bryant Park Project

Americans everywhere rejoiced when Simon Manuel became the first African American swimmer to earn an individual swimming gold medal in the Olympics. For African Americans, the feat was of particularly significance due to the complicated history that the black community has had with America's swimming pools. This feature explains why.

A Letter From Young Asian-Americans To Their Families About Black Lives Matter by Shereen Marisol Meraji and Kat Chow

NPR offers some quality commentary on how many younger Asian Americans find themselves at odds with their parents over their views and engagement with social justices issues, particularly the Black Lives Matter Movement.

The “Dreaded Glenn”: A Response to Ms. Gaye Clark by Bryan Loritts

A post on The Gospel Coalition website earlier this week ignited a controversy when writer Gaye Clark wrote a piece entitled, "When God Sends Your White Daughter a Black Husband." The post has since been removed but the response from Pastor Loritts is worth the read as he explains why he, along with so many others, were troubled by the article.

When Love Fills Your Heart by Dayle Rogers

A friend and co-worker, Michelle Beckman, went home to be with the Lord this week after a courageous several year battle with cancer. Michelle committed the best years of her life to serving middle school and high school students so that they could know the Savior that she loved so dearly. Dayle Rogers writes of her friendship with Michelle and offers a touching tribute highlighting the influence that Michelle's life had on so many.

Is In Vitro Fertilization A Moral Issue?

Photo Credit: Torsten Mangner

With the increasing availability of reproductive technology, a growing number of Christian families that have struggled with infertility have chosen to utilize in vitro fertilization (IVF) and even surrogacy.

However, according to a recent Pew Forum report, a large number of Americans (46%) do not view IVF as being a moral issue. In comparison, only 23% view abortion as not being a moral issue. In contrast, 49% of Americans view abortion as being morally wrong, whereas only 12% of Americans are opposed to IVF on moral grounds.

In an article on the Hermeneutics blog entitled "The Overlooked Ethics of Reproduction", Jennifer Lahl raises some thought-provoking questions about whether the creation of life should be viewed in moral terms in a similar fashion to how we view the taking of life. In other words, the question at hand is whether God, as the author of life, cares about the circumstances in which life is created?

Lahl offers this:

"While grieving with those who struggle with infertility, Christians still need to look more carefully at today's reproductive technologies such as IVF in light of our beliefs about God, life, our bodies, and our children. 

Since the time of the Old Testament, infertility has been part of the human experience. Many of us know someone who has struggled desperately to have a child or have experienced that difficulty ourselves. In the 21st century, though, infertility is met with "options," "solutions," and countless technologies offering hope to those in our midst struggling with fertility issues. Rather than rushing to embrace any procedure that might bring us a child—IVF, sperm or egg donors, surrogacy—we should consider the appropriate use and limits of technology. 

The fact that so many people fail to consider the moral implications of IVF suggests that in the age of fertility treatments, surrogates, and modern family-building via parenting partnerships, a woman's womb has come to be seen as a somewhat arbitrary location. NBC's The New Normal quips that women are "Easy-Bake Ovens" and children are "cupcakes." 

In Scripture, God affirms that what happens in utero matters and cannot be casually or disrespectfully dismissed. The womb, where God first knits us together (Ps. 139:13-14), is not an arbitrary place for a child to grow and develop. In fact, modern science has proven just how important those 9 months are—for both mother and child. 

Renowned marriage and family therapist Nancy Verrier, in her book The Primal Wound, writes about how mothers are biologically, hormonally, and emotionally programmed to bond with their babies in utero as well as at birth. A baby knows his or her mother at birth, and both the mother and the baby will experience grief at any separation at the time of birth. This primal wound is forever present. 

In other words, it's nowhere as easy as the Easy-Bake metaphor. In the case of surrogacy, we can interrupt the natural rhythm for mother and child and risk negative effects. (It is worth noting that surrogacy differs from adoption in that surrogacy intentionally establishes a situation that demands that a woman not bond with the child she is carrying.)

These are some important issues to consider and each Christian family should prayefully consider the ethics involved in utilizing modern technology in creating new life.

You can read the rest of Lahl's article here.

Current Insights Into The Values Of U.S. Hispanics

Photo Credit: Bread for the World

From Barna:Hispanics:

"After significantly influencing the 2012 presidential election, Hispanics captured the attention of the nation’s leaders and media. Now, as the debate over the future of immigration continues, political liberals and conservatives alike may be surprised to learn about the values and priorities of today’s Hispanics in the U.S. 

Research from Barna: Hispanics, in partnership with the American Bible Society, the National Hispanic Christian Leadership Conference, and OneHope, reveals that the faith and social values of Latinos may be more conservative than many cultural observers realize. As America’s fastest growing demographic segment, Hispanics demonstrate high commitments to the Christian faith and to traditional concepts of family. 

In fact, foreign-born Hispanics who currently reside in the U.S. are often more socially, spiritually, and politically conservative than are those Hispanics who are citizens. The implication is that the longer the Hispanic community experiences U.S. cultural norms, the less socially conservative its members become. In the broadest sense, this creates a fascinating paradox for policymakers and politicians: social conservatives stand to gain more allies by pushing for aggressive immigration reform, while liberals who advocate for reform are likely to find fewer allies on social and moral issues among foreign-born Hispanics who are given a path to citizenship. 

Given their relationship-driven culture, it is perhaps not surprising that Hispanics in the U.S. place high value on the traditional family. Three-quarters of all Latinos in the U.S. say that the traditional family is the main building block of a healthy community (78%). Seven out of 10 believe it is best for children to be raised by parents who are married to each other (69%). In addition, Latinos remain markedly committed to preserving the traditional family structure. Half say they are “very concerned” about the breakdown of Hispanic families. 

When it comes to typically hot-button social issues, homosexuality and abortion, most Hispanics embrace conservative points of view. On the issue of same-sex marriage, considered an important voting issue to many evangelical Christians, two-thirds of Hispanics say marriage should be defined as a relationship between one man and one woman (66%). And the majority of Hispanics in the U.S. (73%) believe that adoption or parenting are better choices than abortion for a woman who is not ready to be a mom."

To read the rest of the Barna report please click here.

How Culture Might Have Influenced The Manti Te'o Hoax

Photo Credit: Matt_Velazquez

There are many questions that still remain about the hoax that led many to believe that Notre Dame football player Manti Te'o had a girlfriend that passed away in September of 2012. As we now know, his girlfriend was not real and it was all just a cruel prank.

The question that is forefront in many of our minds is: How could Te'o have been fooled? He appears to be an intelligent guy, and is well-known. How could this have happened? Remarkably, it seems that other athletes have also fallen victim to the trap of entering into online relationships with "imaginary" individuals.

In Te'o's case it seems that there may have been cultural factors that were at play that contributed to his involvement in this hoax. For many of us in the majority culture, we may be quick to dismiss the suggestion of cultural influences on something such as this. But in an intriguing piece in The Atlantic Monthly, Ilana Gershon offers some insights into Samoan culture that may explain some of the dynamics affecting the Te'o story.

Gershon writes:

"As an ethnographer, I heard a number of stories that sound almost exactly like Te'o's story—naïve Christian golden boys who had been fooled by other Samoans pretending to be dewy-eyed innocents. Leukemia was even a theme—I guess Samoan pranksters keep turning to the same diseases. 

I heard these stories as gossip—women in their late teens or early 20s would tell me about how a much sought-after man in their church had been fooled. I never talked directly to a victim or a hoaxer about this, so I didn't write about this in any of my academic work. I did this fieldwork before Facebook or cell phones, and even before email became widespread outside of college circles. All the stories I heard involved husky voices on telephones, and maybe a letter or two.

What strikes me as particularly Samoan about Te'o's comments to ESPN is that he opens with a very familiar Samoan worry. It is not his own shame he is concerned about; he is worried about the shame this will bring to his whole family, all those who share his last name. Concern about family comes up time and time again in his tale. 

So much of this news story is hauntingly familiar to me from fieldwork with Samoan migrants: the role of family, the half-hearted attempts to verify a person's identity that fail, the strong spiritual connection Te'o thought he felt with Kekua, and the hoax itself. He chooses family reunions over possibly seeing his elusive girlfriend. He understands when she is forced to do the same. In Samoan life, family obligations always triumph, and often seem to keep lovers apart.
Te'o was deeply concerned about how his parents would react to his new girlfriend, with the tacit undercurrent that this was not just about two people falling in love, but about two families entering into a complex alliance that will involve many mutual obligations. 

He tried to find ways to have Kekua enter into his family's circle as a potential Christian daughter-in-law, encouraging her to text passages of scripture to his members of his family.
And I am not surprised that the Samoans playing the hoax felt the need to tell Te'o that his girlfriend died only hours after Te'o texted them that his grandmother had died. His girlfriend's family might have been obligated to send money for the funeral. If they did, the family name would be announced publicly at a large Samoan funeral in thanks. The hoax might have started to cost the hoaxers money and they would risk exposure, unless they took drastic measures, like pretending the girlfriend had died. 

The only part of Te'o's story that I found strange was that, upon hearing that his girlfriend had died, he only sent white roses to her family, and his parents also only sent flowers. The Samoan migrants that I knew would have sent money, and the amount would have signaled how much the family valued the potential alliance. Flowers alone really wouldn't have cut it."

After considering this whole situation through a cultural lens, perhaps this may not seem as odd to many of us as it initially appeared to be. Our cultural background often influences how we behave and also how we respond to the behavior of others. I'm willing to consider that at least some of these cultural factors may be a part of this developing story.

To read the rest of Ilana Gershon's piece on Te'o please click here.

(h/t to friend John Waidley for the link.)

Halloween Fun 2012

My Power Ranger, Ninja, Katniss (Hunger Games) & Hawkeye (The Avengers)

Me dressed as a middle-aged, white dad

Our Pumpkin Creations: The Avengers Logo & Hunger Games Mockingjay

The Chens Tell A Beautiful Story of Adoption

One of the most moving aspects of becoming a Christian is the experience of having been adopted as a child of God. Adoption provides a beautiful example of what it means to demonstrate God's love in a meaningful and lasting way. Our friends, Dennis & Carita Chen, enjoyed the privilege of having aspects of their adoption journey captured on video. The video takes less than nine minutes and I promise you that your eyes won't be dry after seeing them meet their son, Jacob, for the first time. You can watch it below or by clicking here.

Tips From Children On What Makes A Good Dad

h/t to God's Politics

On Black Women & Marriage

Photo Credit: godserv

From The Economist:

"The collapse of marriage among blacks is well documented, but not the sexual, psychological, emotional and social toll this has taken on black women. Seven out of ten are single. Of the others, many are forced into "man-sharing." 

This crisis in the black “relationship market,” as Mr Banks calls it, starts with a “man shortage.” About one in ten black men in their early thirties are in prison. As a group, black men have also fallen behind in education and income, just as black women have surged ahead. Two black women graduate from college for every black man. As these women rise into the middle class, the men stay in the lower class, becoming less compatible. 

Many black women respond by “marrying down, but not out,” as Mr Banks puts it. But that makes bad marriages. Two out of every three black marriages fail, about twice the rate of white marriages. 

The real problem is the behaviour of those few black men who are considered good catches. They often stay unmarried for the opposite reason: they have too many options. As one man told Mr Banks: “If you have four quality women you’re dating and they’re in a rotation, who’s going to rush into a marriage?” Even black men who nominally commit to one woman are five times as likely as their white counterparts to have others on the side."

To read the rest of the article please click here.

In my ministry within the black community, I've seen some of these realities and, unfortunately, with some individuals very close to me. But I've also personally witnessed numerous successful marriages between African Americans.

If you are an African American man or woman, what is your response to this article? What solutions can be offered to reverse these current trends?

Why City Life & Raising a Family Are Not Incompatible

Photo Credit: kaysha

Kathy Keller, longtime resident of New York City and assistant director of communications for Redeemer Presbyterian Church, shares her thoughts in a recent post on The Gospel Coalition site on why she thinks a big city is a wonderful place to raise a family.

Here she comments on the perceived darkness in the city and its effect on children:

"In the city your kids see sin and its consequences while you are still with them and can help them process it. Eventually they're going to encounter it for themselves, usually when they leave the protected environment of home for the big wide world---just when you are no longer around to discuss things. 

I have had parents counter this suggestion by saying that, as valuable as processing the ugliness of this broken world with your children might be, there is such a thing as seeing too much, too soon. Possibly so, but my daughter in law (with degrees in education from Vanderbilt and Harvard in both primary and secondary education, and experience in teaching both) pointed something out to me---if children are really that young, too young for some sights, they simply won't see them, or understand what they're seeing. 

Children find a great deal of the world inexplicable to them, so the very young are not usually in danger of being damaged by fleeting glimpses of the sordid world. By the time they are old enough to notice what they're seeing, it's time for parents to be talking to them about it, anyway. And it's usually way younger than you thought!"

To read the rest of the post please click here.