Economic Giving

This Christmas season has been a very interesting case of good will and charity in the midst of an economic crisis that has come to affect not only the poor and middle class, but also the rich. The story that I am about to tell gives me hope that we as a race, that is as humans, are not as bad as I thought that we were, especially here in the United States.

My story begins about six months ago when the economy began to fall very rapidly, not that it was ever in a great state, but it seems as if it all of a sudden took a nose dive causing a massive case of anxiety and fear to sweep over this land. People now began to realize that their actions in the past had future consequences and that we as a nation could no longer be a hedonistic society. We all began to look at money in a different way and instead of spending what we wanted when we wanted to, we began to make conscious decisions to only spend what was necessary for survival, with only the occasional splurge.

Pretty soon we began to see gas prices fall, but with that blessing came a curse. People were loosing their jobs, industries were shutting down, houses were being foreclosed on, and our way of life had become something that none of us would have ever believed it would have become. This story, however, is not as depressing at it would appear, because the end chapter is one that surprised me about how this Holiday season would actually play out.

Even though people were not buying as much for themselves, which is what capitalism has taught us to do, people were instead giving. People were looking at strangers with a warm feeling of love, and instead of not using their money to buy some product that will only be used possibly only a few times, people began to give to those that were in need. As a Sociologist and a follow of YHWH this brought a smile to my face, because a great majority of people who would normally think of themselves began to see that we are all part of a larger community.

Working at Starbucks I see many people who think only of themselves, they buy their coffee for themselves and do not wish to think of the person behind them. However this season, I saw people ask the person or people behind them if they could buy their drink. This season I also saw the usual Salvation Army bell ringers infront of businesses, and almost every time I saw people either enter or leave a store, they would drop coins and dollar bills into the bucket, and although I do not know the exact amounts that they collect this year opposed to last year, it brought me joy to see people, young and old, take what they have and use it to impact people they do not even know.

Out of all of these stories and more that I have either heard about or witnessed first hand, the one that touched me the most and held the most influence in the writing of this note was one in which one person helped about 200 strangers. On Monday December 22, 2008, instead of finishing up any last minute gifts and errands for Christmas, residents of an apartment complex in Burnsville, MN (I know, ironic, but true) where forced to flee from their home when their building caught on fire. The people were left with only the clothes on their back. Christmas 2008 would be remembered as the time that nearly 200 people lost their homes, but this tale has a happy ending as well. People within the community brought clothes and other items together as donations to the survivors. That, however is not the end, an anonymous donor gave 1 million dollars to the victums which broke down into about $17,500 per apartment. Instead of only thinking of him/herself this Holiday season, this person decided to bless others. (http://www.twincities.com/ci_11290559?source=most_viewed, http://www.startribune.com/local/south/36692839.html)

The amazing part of this whole note is that people chose to do something spectactular and bring the true meaning of this season to light. I truely hope that people will continue to impact this world and change what is ment by being human back to what was originally ment to be human. I hope that this note inspires and brings the same hope that I have been filled with about how we are not really as bad as we think that we are, there is good out there, people just need to be couragous and act!

A Choice of Freedom

For anyone that does not know me all that well, I enjoy watching movies, and because of the way my mind works, I cannot just look at movies simply for the joy of the movie itself. When I watch a movie I see parts that talk about Karl Marx's Conflict Theory, or Emile Durkheim's Functionalist Theory. I see how theology can be applied in a real world application, I know, I am a nerd!

Anyway, on to what I wanted to write about before I delved into my weird movie watching habits. A few days ago I watched The Matrix, which for anyone who has not seen it I would recommend watching. There is some sweet action and even if you are not into the action, there is a deep theological sub plot that the directors may or may not have intended to have in their film. It is that sub plot that I wish to discuss today, however, as usual, I am sure that there will be some people who will disagree with me, and that is fine! I must first begin with saying that this is my interpritation, and as such I am not trying to force others to believe what I believe, I am simply trying, in the words of The Matrix, to "free minds" but the choice is there's to believe and discover for themselves or to reject it and be pissed that I should even say such a terrible thing and then go on to believe that I need prayer for being "misguided". To be honest if I cared what people thought of my writings I would not write the way I do, but because I do not, lets get this wagon train moving!

Anyone who has seen The Matrix can see that the entire movie is based on choices and our ability to choose which path to take. I believe that each of us has a desire to be more knowlegable about different aspects of life, wheather or not we think that we do. For some people that desire is obvious, pastors, teachers, business professionals, etc. are all reading new books to learn more about a specific topic of interest. However for some people, that desire is less obvious, but it is still there. Everywhere people go they are looking for ways to learn more information, they may not believe that they are, but in reality they are like a sponge, soaking up information left and right. We hear people talking and we "tune in" or we see a bilboard that gives a web address and when we get home we check it out.

At the begining of the movie Neo (Keano Reeves) is searching for an answer to the question "What is the Matrix?" and he as been searching for that answer for a long time. He knows that there is more to what he knows to be true, yet he does not know how extensive the rabbit hole actually goes. Through his quest, he contacted by others who are "free" and can help him find the answers to his question. He eventually comes to one of my favorite sceenes, in which Neo finds himself sitting infront of Morpheus (Laurence Fishburne) with a choice to make: either he can take the blue pill and go back to life as normal, or he can take to red pill and discover that what he has come to know as real is much different than he thinks that it would be.

I believe that this is great example of what seeking truth is like. For those of us who are willing to search for what Truth is, and not be afraid of what we might find, will turn out to be like Neo, I know because I was once as Neo was when he first discovered the Truth. It made me throw up, just as Neo, and caused me to have more questions than I began with. Why could I not see? Why was I not able to move? Why did life look so much more different than I thought it would? It is hard to grasp that what I had come to know about the Bible and Christianity was a different concept that was not easy to swallow at first. I had decided to take the red pill and free my mind.

The Matix, not the movie but what is in the movie, a sense of reality, was a comfort, a framing story to keep people happy, all the while unsuspecting that the mechines where harvesting us for energy. That idea is a type of framing story, which is a term used in Sociology to describe how the world that we know is shaped by past decisions, ideologies, and usually described to us by elitist people who do not want us to be freed and question what they have told us, because then they lose their hold on us. (Conflict Theory at its best!)

Once people have their minds freed, it is initially shocking, and those people might wish that they had taken the blue pill and gone back to the way life used to be. This is not easy to do, and for the majority of people, once they have seen what the Truth is, it is hard to go back to complacency. However, when people begin to discover for themselves and not be spoon feed answers, the desire to go back is no longer as strong as it was originally.

The problem is that the majority of people who are in the Matrix are fine with being where they are and many of them are not ready to be freed because they would reject that freedom. The same is true of people who "search" for truth, they are happy where they are, they are not being challenged, and so it is easier to follow instead of lead. There is nothing explicitly wrong with that except that they are not thinking for themselves, so in a sense they are not themselves or who they were created to be, because if they were created to be robots then they are going a good job, however we were not, and so we should not be afraid to go against the grain and think about things afresh. The great thing is that we can choose to take either the red or blue pill, to free our mind or not, and to see how far the rabbit hole goes or fill it in with dirt, but whether or not you choose to do that does not mean that the Truth is not out there! Personally I am glad that I took the red pill!

Thoughts About Family

Last week was Thanksgiving, a time when friends and family members come together to celebrate how thankful they are for what they have and who is a part of their life. I am thankful for the people in my life, friends and family, who have journeyed with me through thick and thin and will continue down the road of life with me, for the memories that we have created, and for the laughs that we have shared, and if you know me I share many laughs with those around me even if they do not laugh too. Recently, actually for a few weeks now, I have been thinking a lot about family and community and although there are strong distinctions between the two, at least for many, the two are interchangeable to me. I am in a class at school (Urban and Community Sociology) where we have been trying to define exactly what community is, and I have found that the term is a very fluid term that has a different meaning for each person. I define community as people who share common interests and depend on each other for survival. That is actually a very simplified version of my definition, but hopefully you will get the point, and it is that definition that causes me to think of community in terms of a family.

My whole concept finally came into existence when I interacted with a couple that comes into the Starbucks where I work regularly did not look to be doing so well on that particular day. I could tell that the woman who came was not doing well because she was not her usual self, instead of looking at me and smiling when I talked to her, she looked at me with tear filled eyes and a semi-smile that told me something had happened. I got them their drinks and pastries and they sat down, it was then that I decided to clean the lobby and talk with them to make sure that they where alright. In doing so I found out that they had had some family issues earlier that day, but they did not wish to divulge the full details of what was going on, so I left the issue with a hug and told them that we would do what we could to help with whatever was going on.

I walked away and continued to sweep and wipe off tables with a huge question resounding in my brain, "Why would they come to Starbucks with these problems going on?" And then it hit me, we all were a part of their family. They wanted to be some place to get their mind off of the subject, some place where they felt comfortable, and where they know people would understand. For those of us that work at that Starbucks, we know their drinks and their names, but more importantly we know more about their lives than many other people do. They have disclosed information about themselves to us because they trust us; they know that our store is more than just serving coffee to people, we are there to brighten their day. They associate our faces and our store as being within their community; to them we are more than just people who make coffee, we are members of their family.

During this holiday season, I challenge all of you to look at the places and the people that you interact with daily and see if you would be willing to make them members of your family or if they are just people that you meet who, in my case, make you coffee. Happy holidays and I hope that when we look at the people around us that we see how connected we are to one another and that our community, our family, is more than just the people around us, it is the connection that we feel with one another.