The spectacle of poverty- poverty-as-image, poverty-as-a-means-of-shocking-oneself, poverty-as-medium-of-immersion-and-empathetic-experience, poverty-as-object-of-foreigner's-thinking-about-how-life-is-hard-for-others.

Debated here in relation to the film Slumdog Millionaire

And debated in my mind throughout my Jesuit immersion in the Philippines.

I went with my brother, who is involved in a program called Magis - that has been around since World Youth Day. The first time the Jesuits have ever done youth ministry, which is pretty important, considering that Jesuits are the intellectuals, but haven't really seen their role as being with post-secondary school youth.

And I think about the Pastoral Cycle- the process of "See-Judge-Act" or Praxis developed by Joseph Cardign and the Young Christian Worker Movement, and the process advocated by Paulo Friere.

That process is about real solidarity- as in- being with and acting with others- identifying -not so much empathetically- but rather in a sense of common experience and common grievances, and committing to act together. This involves becoming equals, accompaniment, analysing the situation and being active participants in intervening in situations that are not right.

However, in travelling so far away to the Philippines, and in being in a position of short term observer- and even accompanier- it was difficult to establish the kinds of relationships that could lead to true solidarity.

So I found myself grasping for something profound- something that prompts spiritual reflection- some strands I could grab from each day- and I would lean on all the intellectual frameworks in my mind- analysis of imperialism, of factory labour, of oppression of trade unions and livelihood campaigners, of ecology, of geography, of gift economies. I would also try to connect the experience with scripture, but would find it hard- Only the outrage of Old Testament prophets can do justice to such abject poverty. Some other strands I could grasp were about The Gift- the importance of hospitality to the Filipina/os, and the biblical injunction to give, to appreciate God's grace (the providence and fecundity of nature etc).

I would find a lot of contradictions in this. Like the prayer on the wall of the house in Payatas- that place of mountains of rubbish- and the prayer says "God is ever generous in his gifts to us" or something like that. And I just don't know what to say. The courage of the people there in going about daily life, sacrificing for their children and prioritising their families above all else impresses me.

And yet, my position throughout the trip was a little awkward, uncomfortable. I was told by Frs Ed and Pedro that discomfort is part of the experience: that you NEED to feel on edge to go outside your comfort zone, that those ambivalent feelings can be very important for the process.

Exactly getting to the core of my discomfort about the politics of my trip: the poor as icons of religious veneration- In Catholicism sometimes we seek God through the poor and dispossessed. We speak in hushed tones about vulnerability, about people who are small in means but extremely generous.
This attitude of piety-in-being-with-the-poor is resisted through poetry such as this on a train in Manila:



And yet there are other perspectives on the Christian relationship with the dispossessed. Here is a beautiful portrayal of The Last Supper by Joey Velasco, a Filipino artist, portraying street children in downtown Manila and Quezon City:



(source here

What is at stake in all this, is what does all this mean? and does it only have meaning for Christians? What kind of transformation? What place does political and ethical transformation have? What kind of baggage does this image have? What is the Last Supper? Is this solidarity?

Reflections on Christianity and Activism: Reply to Jonathan

Christians and Lions
Jonathan M wrote-

Yesterday at 1:02am
Dear friends,

I want to share with you a story about how easy it is to deeply hurt people we care about without being conscious of it.

This evening I was watching a video of the "No to Pope" rally in Sydney with friends. It was so inspiring to see so many people standing up against irrationality, oppression, abuse and standing up for sexual freedom, safety and free thought.

One of the protestors said something like "So many Christians, so few lions". A friend of mine who was watching with me laughed about how hilarious that line was. On some level, I could see the humour in taking the piss out of a group of people in society who are very defensive and take ourselves very seriously. But despite trying not to, I was hurt deep down inside by what my friend had said. It wasn't the first time.

I tend to keep my religious beliefs to myself, and I am generally pretty opposed to people constantly talking about their faith to people who aren't interested, so my friend might not have known I was a Christian. Of course I knew he didn't mean that he thought I should be fed to lions. But it made me feel absolutely awful.

I genuinely don't believe that religious discrimination is the same as racial discrimination. Why? Because you can choose your faith, but you can't pick your skin colour. If someone had made a joke about feeding Africans to lions, it would have felt even more horrible for an African. This joke wasn't in the same league. Many of my friends dream of a future world, where everybody is free from religion, irrational belief systems, as well as oppression, hierarchy, gender constructs and so on. I have a lot of respect for that dream and share many elements of it. But nevertheless, I am a Christian, and the joke about being fed to lions still hurt me. I wouldn't want my worst enemy to be fed to a lion.

The hurt that I felt is of course not on the same par either as the horrible hurt in reaction to Christian oppression against queer people, women, non-Christians and anybody who doesn't fit into the straight white male fundamentalist Christian worldview, or the hurt felt by the hundreds of millions of people worldwide killed, colonised or robbed in the name of God. That oppression is widespread, both historic and ongoing, and dominates society. In many ways, anti-Christian rhetoric is a defensive reaction to this onslaught by Christians. It throws back in Christians' faces the horrors many Christians hypocritically inflict on the rest of the world, ignoring their own sermons about doing unto others as you would have them do to you.

In the first and second century AD, Christians were indeed killed in fora by lions and Roman gladiators. This happened well before the "Christendom" merger of state and church, and at the time Christians were a small sect, hated by the Romans and many others because their countercultural philosophy challenged Roman ideas of empire and sovereignty. They were killed as subversives, and a historical reading of the early Christian writings shows how directly Christians challenged the authority of both the Roman empire and the religious institutions. The Romans needed to use their legal systems against them in much the same way as indigenous people today are being jailed and killed for not accepting Crown sovereignty.

In the intervening 2000 years, Christians gained political power and with it, much of the rest of the ideas which come with political power, including opposition to minorities and so-called "social deviants". Much of what is currently thought of as Christian sexual morality has been developed in the past 500 years, including opposition to sex before marriage, consensual marriages and non-heterosexuality. Power also brought with it the opportunity for some male clergy to sexually abuse children. In the last hundred years, a new fundamentalist (counter-modernist) reading of Christianity has become loud and popular, so much so that we consider these Christians to represent all Christians. They have successfully reclaimed the Christian faith in the world's eyes. Most of people's assumptions about Christianity are based on this fundamentalist interpretation, including that Christianity hinges on belief in a supreme being, that Christians are opposed to sex outside of marriage and non-heterosexuality, that Christian faith relies on belief rather than reason, that Christians believe in six literal days of creation and a young earth, that the Bible is the Word of God, and so on. Richard Dawkin's "The God Delusion" successfully debunks this kind of faith system.

When we make jokes about Christians, we can't always be sure that there aren't Christians in the room, even if we've known everybody there for years. A lot of the time Christian radicals keep their beliefs quiet, both from Christians and non-Christians, because they are marginalised in both communities, and also because they are opposed to the Bible-bashing which occurs in many Christian communities.

But some of us stand in solidarity with the struggles against church and state, against belief in human illusions, for sexual liberation, sexual consent, an end to the military-industrial complex and solidarity with the dispossessed. Our position is not despite our faith but because of it. If we are to succeed, we need to build a broad-based movement that can include Christian anarchists, Christian socialists and other Christians who read the gospel in its historic and cultural context.

I'm not asking anybody to stop making jokes about Christians, to stop attacking Christianity itself or to stop trying to convince me that my own beliefs are illusory. But next time you make a comment like that, you will know how much it hurts me, despite my understanding why you say it. I would love to live in a world where people try learn about the diversity of the Christian community rather than basing their attitudes towards all Christians on false assumptions and ignorance.

If we can learn more about each other, then we can continue to build a movement that will defeat the church and the love of ignorance. God knows we need it in a world in ecological crisis.


==========================

Yes Jonathan.

Sometimes I think that people mistake us and our Churches for unselfreflective, rigid structures- determined by and shackled by our histories- like blocks of concrete- Rather than creatures that grow by constant renewal and the cleansing of self reflection- like butterflies that lose their chrysalis, or eucalypts that lose their bark each year in order to grow.

Of course many churches are rigid, and are proud of their unchangeable traditions, and may impose their rigid frameworks of belief on you like a cookie cutter that turns you into a clone. But other parts of society also can do that. The Christianity that I seek and that I identify with is not rigid- it is fluid and humble- open to new interpretation in the light of current historical experience and past historical evidence- and seeking to be just, honest, and real.

It is ONLY through self reflection that you can grow, and I think that the STRUCTURES and RITUALS of self reflection embedded in the evolving traditions of Christianity are the best ways I can personally maintain my focus and ethics as an activist and try to be the best person I can be, without appropriating the religious traditions of another place and people that is apparently free of such baggage and (then I guess I could piously say to you that I have truly transcended the Western baggage of YOUR Christian history !!).

denialism...

infuriating, infuriating!!!

ANOTHER global warming denier wastes our time outlining his beliefs at work (they always seem to be male, don't they?).

I look up from my desk in disbelief. I feel like asking "So, do you believe in science? Do you believe in evolution? When was the last time you opened a book?"

How about this... If a doctor diagnosed you with a serious illness, would you believe her or him?


But I have to be tactful. I ask him why he believes that, but unfortunately I legitimise what he's saying by getting him to repeat it.
Even worse, I then go the opposite direction and ignore what he says, instead, saying that Al Gore is calling for us to make urgent change to 100% renewables in ten years (see the We Can Solve It campaign.)
Unfortunately i can't help getting antagonistic and slightly emotional.

What kind of crazy world do we live in - when smart, university educated young men -who happen to influence policy- do not believe in the most important issue of our generation, and instead choose to live in a fantasy world of their own choosing?

We are conflicted as a culture.

Is that voice telling us that DECADENCE is ESSENTIAL?

But wasn't it telling us yesterday that we should save water?

Is decadence the only way to affirm fragile female self-esteems?
Does this woman represent our ideal (feminine) self??? Is she aware of being observed in the photograph (as John Berger, the great art critic, points out)

Canberra

So now it has been two months since I have left that City of my birth- Sydney. The city of jacarandas and incessant, impatient traffic.

I have left many of my friends behind, and started anew, in Canberra, in a wonderful sharehouse with two art students.

I now ride a bike to work, and have much better quality of life. This city - our Capital - is made up of geometrically orientated suburbs, with median strips full of trees and wide enough to have picnics in.

I am reading many books, including one by Barack Obama, and I am hoping to start practising 'The Artists Way' soon.

More updates to follow!

Kevin Annett and Canada's genocide

I just watched the film Unrepentant: Kevin Annett and Canada's Genocide, a very important and harrowing documentary about the dispossession of Native people in Canada.

It adds new dimensions to what I already know about North American indigenous frontier history. [when i first heard lyrics of Ani DiFranco's song tis of thee, i was proud that i knew what the reference to small pox blankets was- the two edged sword of charity:

"Above 96th street
they hand out small pox blankets so people don't freeze
and the old dog's got a new trick,
it's called criminalize the symptoms while you spread the disease
I hold on hard to something
between my teeth when i'm sleeping
i wake up and my jaw aches
and the earth is full of earthquakes"]

What i realised is that it was a quite wide practice by church people- (including the missionaries working for the Catholic Church) to do such things, and to treat the Indigenous people as worthless...

OUTLINE:


In the early 1990's - maybe late 1980's- Kevin Annett, a United Church of Christ Minister, attempted to get to the bottom of why native people did not come to his church.

By inviting these people, who made up 30% of the population of his town, and allowing an 'open pulpit' policy- where anyone could speak after the sermon, the long hidden stories of trauma and suffering emerged.

The shocking revelation that various churches -through the residential school system- had willingly and officially pursued the annihilation of Native American civilisation- emerged. The participation of churches in eugenics policies- in forced sterilization, in deliberate infection of people with smallpox and TB through giving contaminated blankets and failing to isolate TB patients was revealed. The story goes on- and shows the lengths to which church officials would go to cover up, to silence him and to do damage control. There were drastic consequences of all these revelations for Arnett's life. He lost his marriage, his career and his future. You should watch it, and think about what it means for us in Australia.

I actually feel quite emotional listening to all the testimonies and the travesty of the different ways the UCC worked to prevent natural justice.

voting and abstention

I was driving back in my shared car-bubble from a mega shopping centre today, (having been to a beautician, and tried on some clothes- how superficial am I!!??) past the blank stares of so many young people. I was thinking about the way that there is a fine line in wearing clothes between being dignified, and in establishing standards of dress that set you apart from others, and hence distance you from others who can't afford or don't have the taste that you have.

I started to think about the post that my friend Simon Reeves wrote on his blog some time before the election- about voting and abstention. Simon is a guy who just radiates warmth and justice- so he's someone i really respect. Simon does not vote.

But I started to think there was something profound in the fact that he doesn't vote. His justification and his action were both profound. In other cases- several anarchists I know, and the case of the Exclusive Bretheren, their abstention slightly annoys me as a signal of their negativity towards our society in general. But in Simon's case, it is clear that he has a lot of love for society - as it is, in its incomplete and imperfect form.

But his statement in not voting says to me that he is not complacent about society and the way it is today. There is something seriously wrong with our current system of structuring public decisionmaking and participation.

By not voting, Simon is making a statement about the need for democratic participation that goes far deeper than writing numbers in boxes. In my opinion, the public must become Pro-active rather that simply Re-active. Simon is making an 'embodied' statement, making a symbolic and actual sacrifice in his democratic participation, saying 'that's not adequate for us'.

If i did similarly, it would force me out of complacency- to make a serious effort to resuscitate our passive political culture until I see real structural results.

I might consider it next time.