John H Armstrong

A Missional Church in Tulare, California

Last weekend, February 20-22, I had the privilege of ministering in several different places in California’s Central Valley. For those who do not know the Central Valley is the most fertile and productive farming country in all of the United States. Both the soil and climate are perfect for growing a large number of crops that feed millions of people. I personally enjoyed a tour of a huge almond growing operation and learned more than I can begin to share in a short blog. It was a lot of fun for me and allowed me to see an agribusiness in a whole new personal light.

My primary purpose for this trip was to serve a new flock led by my dear friend, Rev. David Moorhead. David is a church planter with the Reformed Church in America in Shafter, California, a town about 20 miles north of Bakersfield. New Hope Community Church, this new congregation in Shafter, was begun just a few months ago after several years of planning and dreaming for a new church start in that area. Shafter is a community of around 15,000 people. It is primarily Mexican-American  demographically, with something like 75% of the people of this background. New Hope was begun through the vision of several growers (who are Dutch) who desired to plant a missional congregation in their own local community. David previously pastored in West Michigan for many years. (Many years ago he followed me by becoming the pastor of a church I had planted in suburban Chicago. I have always said, "David picked up the pieces of all my mistakes as a very young man!")

Last year I introduced David to the former pastor of the Tulare Community Church (Tulare, California), who now works in the home office of the Reformed Church in America (RCA) in Grand Rapids, Michigan. This pastor, Rev. Tim Vink, met David and then passed David’s name and resume along to the pastor for new church starts at Tulare Community Church, Rev. Roger Peterson. Roger then sensed God leading him to approach David to lead the new work in Shafter. David and Milinda Moorhead, and their family, then moved to Shafter in the late fall of 2008, believing God was leading them to this small town where the need for a missional church focused on Christ's kingdom was truly needed.

On Friday, February 21, I finally met Roger Peterson. He is one delightful, happy, visionary, man who just exudes warmth and passion for Christ and his kingdom. We were joined by six church planters who had been sent out by the Tulare Community Church. We had a lovely fellowship over lunch. The time was one which encouraged me very deeply. I hope I also gave encouragement to these wonderful brothers as well. Their faithfulness to follow God’s leading in planting new missional churches was quite thrilling to see.

Tulare Community Church (TCC) states that it’s local church mission: “Is to glorify God by producing hundreds of healthy followers of Christ who courageously and unselfishly start dozens of reproducing churches.” That is a truly missional statement of vision and intention.

I wish every church in America had this same vision but the truth is that few really do. Most are content to send some money to others to do their mission and to build bigger and larger local churches if they have the people and money. Few dream about investing so much in new churches. TCC puts money and human sacrifice directly into this statement of vision and actually does what it says it intends to do. Rev. Peterson is called to lead the church in locating places for new congregations and then finding and supporting new pastors to actually plant these new churches. The vision, begun while Tim Vink was the senior pastor in Tulare, is working very well. The classis has seventeen established churches in it so it is not large at all. But it has produced, and only in the last few years, eighteen church plants. That means that there is more than one new church for every existing church in the classis, a concept almost unknown in any denomination I know. (A classis is a group of churches bound together by government and mission, generally in a given region.)

I have no problem with a church growing larger in size. I have a real problem when this growth becomes an end in itself. A major way to avoid the overly satisfied, overly programmatic, and non-reproducing mega-church, is to plant new churches far and wide. TCC has this vision for this and it is working very well. I was truly thrilled to share a small part in this story and hope I can do even more of this if the Lord allows that to come about.

Justice in America? The Failure of Our Prison System

Our prison system is an unmitigated disaster. Very few Christians know the real problems in the system and even less really care. This is positively wrong. We need to become advocates for justice and mercy in the very best sense of both words.

Our system is moving towards a serious collapse and few know the answers. An obvious problem can be seen in the simple, observable fact that those who have money generally avoid prison and those who are poor do not. But even worse is how we treat those who are incarcerated.

California has the largest penal system. This is no surprise since it is our most populous state. It is also one of the worst systems in America. The state has been building new prisons, since 1970, at a rate that is almost beyond belief. The entire system is so overcrowded and inhumane that a federal court recently ordered the state to reduce the prison population by one-third. The system is overcome by internal violence and the prisons are not correctional facilities in any meaningful sense of the word. They are, in reality, breeding grounds for worse behavior once prisoners are released. California even farms out over 20,000 inmates to other states!

But this is not simply a California problem. It is a national nightmare. 2.2 million people are in prison in the United States today and 13.5 million will pass through the prison system in some form this year! The cost to us is in excess of $60 billion. Lest you think this is a problem worldwide you need to know that we have more people in prison than any other Western nation, having passed even Russia in the past few years.

Some of you will think that this is all caused by our illegal immigration problem. Not so. Illegals are deported, at least in most cases. The reasons we have a huge problem range from drug use to tougher sentencing and parole laws, as well as the utterly shameful idea of "three strikes and you are out." (Minor criminals have been sentenced to life in prison under such laws and few people seem to realize it! Or a relatively petty "third" crime puts a person away for life.) This "three strikes" law is the result of harsh, unjust, over-reaction to the rising crime rate!

The Christian tradition has always labored to create humane conditions for prisoners. It has also rightly emphasized that imprisonment should work for rehabilitation in every possible case. Once a just sentence is served people should be given a new opportunity. And visiting and caring for those in prison has always been understood as a work of mercy by ethically minded Christians (cf. Matthew 25:36).

While prisons are clearly needed in every society a system that is cruel and unjust must be reformed. Warehousing inmates is not justice. It violates all sense of decency and mercy. The largest percentage of those who enter our system are not violent criminals, at least not initially. These nonviolent offenders must be corrected and helped. By the system we now have in place they are often raped, brutally mistreated and infected with all kinds of diseases. It has been estimated that 350,000 of our inmates suffer from "serious mental illness." (Only the simplest argue against the idea of mental illness.)

The bottom line here is a broad based lack of respect for human dignity. Christians rightly protest the "culture of death" that is associated with abortion. I wonder why so few of those same Christians do not protest the direct assault upon human dignity that is brought about by our horrible penal system. When man is inhumane to man the results impact us all. This is a "culture of life" issue.

The lack of regard for those who are warehoused in our prison system has a much greater impact on our total well-being than we know. It corrupts us all in ways we have never really thought about. We cannot afford to be ignorant about this any longer. We ought to make our voices heard in the corridors of power.

We need to begin by reforming sentencing guidelines, by developing better programs for helping prisoners re-enter society on the outside, and by providing a decent health care system inside prisons. We also need to make a serious effort to keep prisoners and families engaged with each other. More judges, cells and guards is not the answer! Building more prisons will not make us safer either.

I have studied revivals for almost forty years. In every experience of revival that I know about prisons have been directly impacted. I pray that God will touch your heart and mine to make us more aware of this problem and personally ready to respond as the Lord leads us within our own context. Having preached in prisons, and worked in prison ministry, I can tell you that the need is greater than ever and we are not solving it. Our record is so bad as a nation that we ought to be clamoring for change. And the church ought to care much more about this life issue than it does. What is your church doing about this problem? What are you doing?

The Intersection of Faith, Media and Politics: An Evening with David Brooks

Last week I enjoyed another one of those great lectures that I get to hear now-and-then. (I have made reference to these several times recently.) This time the presentation was an evening hosted by the Center for Applied Christian Ethics (CACE) at Wheaton College. The speaker was New York Times columnist David Brooks, one of my favorite columnists. Brooks spoke about how he began to embrace the conservative philosophy of Edmund Burke while he was a liberal undergraduate student at the University of Chicago (B.A., 1983). As he saw the impact of  socially liberal political philosophy on real people on the south side of Chicago he was forced to question what he had always believed about government and people. In short, Brooks began to embrace a serious view of human sinfulness and depravity and this pushed him away from his liberal assumptions about mankind and how much government can actually serve the betterment of ordinary people. Don't misunderstand, Brooks is not a silly right-winger but a serious, intellectually thoughtful, political and social conservative. He is also a friend to evangelicals, though he remains a non-Christian Jew. This was why he was a guest at Wheaton College.

If you watch "The Newshour with Jim Lehrer" on PBS you will see David Brooks quite often. A few minutes of David Brooks is often better than an hour of most conservatives who fill up our time in the popular media. Brooks appeared, for example, on Tuesday evening's PBS coverage of the President's speech to Congress. As always, he was insightful and fair.

Brooks told us last week that he has interviewed Barack Obama on fifteen different occasions. He once listened, with real surprise, as Obama spent twenty minutes explaining his understanding of Reinhold Niebuhr's view of immoral man and society. For those who think that Obama has no theological traditioning at all this should come as an interesting insight. Brooks spoke very highly of the president's great intellect, his wonderful personality and obvious political skills. His concern is not with the character of the man but with some of the places where his confidence, Brooks argues, is misplaced.

I first heard of David Brooks some years ago by reading his book, Bobos in Paradise: The New Upper Class and How They Got There, an excellent and entertaining book. When he became a New York Times Op-Ed page columnist in September 2003 I was pleased. I try to read him regularly and would thus encourage you to discover this sane and helpful voice for reason and faith. Brooks is one of only two major columnists in the mainstream media to have ever been an editor at the National Review, the magazine begun by the late conservative genius William F. Buckley. If anyone thinks the mainstream media is prone to hire writers from conservative magazines then this fact alone should dispossess such inclinations.

Brooks has the habit of offending populists and right wing media types by his straightforward intellectualism and common sense arguments. Here is a sample from an October 8, 2008, column written during the last election:

[Sarah Palin] represents a fatal cancer to the Republican party. When I first started in journalism, I worked at the National Review for Bill Buckley. And Buckley famously said he'd rather be ruled by the first 2,000 names in the Boston phone book than by the Harvard faculty. But he didn't think those were the only two options. He thought it was important to have people on the conservative side who celebrated ideas, who celebrated learning. And his whole life was based on that, and that was also true for a lot of the other conservatives in the Reagan era. Reagan had an immense faith in the power of ideas. But there has been a counter, more populist tradition, which is not only to scorn liberal ideas but to scorn ideas entirely. And I'm afraid that Sarah Palin has those prejudices. I think President Bush has those prejudices.

Because I agree with Brooks on so much this one caught my eye in October, as it did many others who read it. This kind of thought makes many conservatives, who are not conservatives in the older sense of the word at all, uneasy with me when I write such things. Perhaps this is why I would prefer to hide behind Brooks sometimes. He says it so much better, which is why he writes for the New York Times.

You can understand why I was thrilled to hear Brooks in person for the first time last week. His humility and common sense conservatism impressed me even more now that I have heard him answer questions in an open forum at Wheaton. In many ways David Brooks is a lot closer to the real legacy of the late William F. Buckley than many of those who sincerely think they are following conservative ideas in 2009.

Ash Wednesday: The Beginning of Lent

Many evangelicals believe that Lent, and thus Ash Wednesday, are Roman Catholic celebrations. Nothing could be further from the truth. In this instance the "evangelical sub-culture" has misinformed multitudes of people to embrace a reactionary response against church tradition.

I was pleased to see in the news today that several non-liturgical congregations in my suburban Chicago area were actually holding Ash Wednesday services. So far as I can tell this is further evidence that liturgical celebration is spreading into places where it was once taboo. This, I believe, is a very good thing.

Lent is the season of forty days that comes before Easter. It is generally considered a "fast" time though various traditions deal with the "fasting" part of this celebration quite differently. Originally embraced by some Protestants the Reformed only began to embrace such seasons in the 20th century. Now others are following this pattern as Baptists, and other non-liturgical churches, consider the value of placing more emphasis upon ordinary time and the rhythmical cycles put before us by the church calendar. There is undeniable value in such patterns and practices but many good people still react because they do not find a "proof-text" to defend this. (This "proof-texting" is common to all anti-liturgical traditions and tends to make a hodge-podge of the Bible's bigger, fuller message.)

Today is the first day of Lent in the West, commonly called Ash Wednesday. The ashes are placed upon a person's forehead in the sign of the cross. The statement made is: "Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return." The purpose is to call us to remember that we came from the dust and we will return to it, being mortal creatures. We are thus welcomed to a "Lenten Journey" on this Ash Wednesday.

This is my third consecutive year of participating in Ash Wednesday and Lent. Each year there has been a different work that God has desired to do in my own soul as I have entered into this fast. Because we are all called to struggle against everything that takes us away from the love of God and neighbor repentance, fasting, works of mercy and holy love are all part of the discipline of Lent. These help us to wage spiritual warfare. On this day we recommit ourselves to this struggle and confess our sins, asking the Father to grant us strength to persevere in our Lenten discipline.

God tells his people to rend their hearts, not their garments (Joel 2:13). The gift of this day is one of personal reflection, a time of confession, a time to change and to face our certain death with hope. Today begins a journey of hope that leads to Calvary and Easter. From facade to faith, we sanctify a fast (Joel 2:15) thus seeking to address our voracious consumption by following a new path of self-denial and grace.

The smudge of ashes placed on my forehead in the sign of the cross reminded me that I will die. I belong to Christ and he is my only hope in life and in death. Such symbols of piety can be transformed into masks that hide the real me from the world behind a prideful religious facade. But the sign of the cross, made with ash, can also be a powerful reminder, in my own human flesh, of the grace of God. This is how I sought to receive it at the noon service I attended today.

The Passing of the Peace

One of the most basic traditions of holy worship practiced by Christians down through the ages is called "the passing of the peace." This tradition is rooted in the several passages in the New Testament that refer to giving one another a "holy kiss."

I remember the first time I read those texts and asked the adults of my church why we didn't practice these customs the answer I got was unsatisfactory. I was puzzled at how insistent we were about interpreting the Bible literally but we tended to pick those things out of the Bible that we liked and left the rest. Such was the case here.

Then I discovered the "passing of the peace." This practice usually precedes coming to the Lord's Table. Part of the reason for this is so that we will all come having sought reconciliation with each other. We will also have a proper way to greet each other in the context of congregational worship.

The greeting is simple:

Leader: The peace of the Lord be with you always.
People: And also with you.
Leader: Please share the peace with one another.

My wife always brings along the hand sanitizer to kill the germs but we gladly shake hands all around and happily pass the peace. I have found the practice to be one that fills my heart with joy.

The Season of Epiphany

We come today to the last Sunday in Epiphany. Next week begins Lent and the church's preparation for Easter. Most Christians, at least those who are Protestants, know very little about this celebration. This is actually a sad loss since whole segments of the church do not not use the church calendar. January 6 is the actual day of "The Epiphany of our Lord." Then the Sundays that follow are called: "The First Sunday after Epiphany," and "The Second Sunday after Epiphany," etc.

Two major themes dominate this season. The first is the coming of light into the world and the power of that light to draw us to God. That light is Jesus. The second major theme is revelation. The texts associated with Epiphany are chosen to reveal to us who Jesus is. There is an emphasis in these chosen texts on calling individuals and congregations to teaching and healing ministry.

Epiphany is one of the oldest celebrations in Christian history. Easter and Pentecost are based on Jewish celebrations going back several thousands years before Christ. Early Christians transformed a two-day festival of the Egyptians into a time to honor the new born Christ, thus the "Day of Holy Lights" now commemorates the manifestation of God in the birth and baptism of Jesus.

A friend of mine says that if you could create a symbol for this season it would be one of those big spotlights used for musicals, dramas, speeches or grand openings. During this season the church seeks to hold the spotlight intensely on Jesus. We thus pray to hear what he is saying to us all over again. We hear voices like those of John the Baptist, Samuel and Eli, Philip and Nathaniel, Simon and Andrew, etc.

I have come to appreciate Epiphany deeply. It is a blessed time to prepare us for the next great season to come: Lent. Then comes the greatest time of all, Holy Week and Easter Sunday. The flow and pattern of these seasons helps us to remember our Lord as we ought. I am reminded that the very words of institution used at the Lord's Supper tell us "to do this in remembrance of me." I am prone to forgetfulness thus frequent coming to the Table, and to the various seasons of the church, helps me immensely.

Michael Beschloss on Presidential Courage

One of the privileges I am afford, living in a city like Chicago, is the opportunity to hear various noteworthy scholars, teachers and journalists speak publicly. Elmhurst College, where both my wife and daughter received a B. A. degree, is only about twenty minutes from my home. It is a first-rate liberal arts college that is affiliated with the United Church of Christ (UCC). It is also the host of an endowed annual lecture devoted to history and social science. Past speakers have included names such as Robert Dallek, David Gergen, David Halberstam, Taylor Branch, Richard Norton Smith, David Tracy and Martin Marty. This year's lecture was held last Sunday evening, February 15. The speaker was Michael Beschloss, esteemed historian of American presidents, and a frequent guest on NBC and The NewsHour with Jim Lehrer.

Beschloss has authored several best-sellers and is a good writer. He is also an excellent speaker, or at least a very good story-teller. He did not provide us with a prepared lecture but rather a running series of anecdotes and stories about several presidents. He also answered about five or six good questions from the audience as well. He was easy-going, pleasant and effective. I enjoyed hearing him in person.

Beschloss grew up on Chicago's South Side and the nearby suburb of Flossmoor. After graduating from Williams College he did an M.B.A. at Harvard Business School. But he couldn't get the historical passion out of his system and eventually gave himself to the study of American history. His special interest has been presidential history. He has particularly studied FDR, Truman, JFK and LBJ, thus he told quite a few stories about each of them.

When asked about the worst presidents in U.S. history he cited Warren G. Harding and John Buchanan. Ironically, Harding died in office with extremely high approval ratings from the public and was well liked. Buchanan delayed on dealing with the issues that led to the Civil War and the delay likely made matters a lot worse.

He told two marvelous stories I will never forget about courage in the office. One was about Washington and the other about Lincoln. Washington was nearing the end of his second term. He had been a virtual god to many American and was genuinely "the founding father" of the nation. But at the very end of his term Britain was threatening to attack America and use the Indians to help them destroy the infant nation. Washington knew we could not win. He sent John Jay to negotiate a treaty in London. The infamous Jay Treaty kept us out of war but brought incredible pain into George Washington's life. When he left office many hated him and in his own state of Virginia he was vilified. Many even prayed for his death. But historians can now see that the Jay Treaty protected America at a most vulnerable time and ultimately preserved a fragile, young nation.

The second story was about Abraham Lincoln. His advisers came to him in August of 1864 and told him that he would lose the election in November in a landslide. The Civil War had gone so badly for the North that people wanted to end it. They also wanted to end it and stop the struggle over slavery in the South. The advisers told Lincoln that if he would move away from The Emancipation Proclamation then he had a chance of re-election. Lincoln thought about this for several days and sought counsel about actually doing it. He felt very strongly that he needed to win in order to preserve the Union. But Lincoln, ever wise and open to the counsel of those who opposed him, sought advice. Frederick Douglas took great issue, as you would expect. So did others who advised him in private. After some days Lincoln decided that he would rather lose the election than go back on what he believed was morally right. When Grant began to win military campaigns, and Sherman marched through Georgia, the war efforts turned and by November Lincoln was able to win the election after all. Either way he stood by his tough decision as morally right and history has shown us that he was correct.

I pray we will again be led by men (or women) who have such courage. It is such presidential courage that has often served the nation at its darkest moments.

The Academy Award Goes To . . .

The five nominees for Best Picture are Slumdog Millionaire, Frost/Nixon, The Curious Case of Benjamin Button, Milk, and The Reader. Slumdog Millionaire received ten Academy nominations and thus will, most likely, win the most awards this year. There is some suggestion that Academy voters will create a last-minute backlash against the film since it became popular so long ago and because so many think it will obviously win. Michael Phillips, film critic of The Chicago Tribune, believes it remains the best bet to take home the best picture Academy Award this Sunday evening. I happen to agree with Philiips, though I see two other movies that have a decent chance at winning the award: Frost/Nixon, a truly first-rate film, and The Reader, a film with very provocative adult themes set in a Nazi context, a context that is popular again this year. Why do we remain so fascinated with the Nazi's? Perhaps we need these cultural reminders of the potential for human evil on a macro-scale.

Having seen all five of the nominees for Best Picture, and all the actors and actresses nominated for the Academy Awards, a movie I would have put in the top five, that did not get nominated, is Doubt. One of the five nominees for best supporting actress, Viola Davis (photo at right), appears in Doubt. A stage star this is a break-through film role for her. She plays an African-American mother of a boy who is caught in a political power play between a priest and a nun in a parish school. She is very good and is my "sleeper" choice for best supporting actress! Doubt is a movie that I highly recommend for thoughtful Christians. The greatest line of the year occurs when the priest (Philip Seymour Hoffman) is defending himself against the false charges of the nun (Meryl Streep). He asks her what proof she has for her charges of sexual impropriety. She answers, "Father, I do not have any proof but I have my certitude and that is enough for me." (This might not be the exact words but you get the idea from the statement. Some will understand why I found this so compelling since I have seen this same self-righteous certitude far too often used by religious people I have known.)

Slumdog Millionaire direct Director Danny Boyle describes his film as a "picaresque," part comedy, part thriller and part romance. You will leave the theater feeling like a million bucks after seeing it. Face it, this is part of the movie's real charm. It is an all-too-real look at Mumbai's poorest orphans, living in the streets, while at the same time it is a story with a happy ending. It really is everything that most film goers generally like.

The people who bet on these things believe that The Curious Case of Benjamin Button is the "underdog" that might slip in and win best picture. I did not care for this film that much. It was a bit too fanciful and preposterous for my tastes. I generally like films that create an imaginary world but this one did not work for me. I always find one film people love that I do not like that much and this year this film is my choice. It stars Brad Pitt, who was "dubiously nominated" for best actor according to Michael Phillips. Again, I do agree with Philipps.

Two of the nominees for best picture are political in nature: Frost/Nixon and Milk. Frost/Nixon feels a lot like All the King's Men, which won an Academy Award for best-picture some years ago. It is a superb film for adults and appeals especially to all of us who lied through the Nixon-era. It brought back a lot of memories, not all of them positive for sure. I was surprised at how much I liked it.

Milk is the story of the controversial Harvey Milk, a San Francisco city councilman who became the first openly homosexual man to hold elective office in the United States in the late 1970s. Harvey Milk was later shot, as was the major of San Francisco, by a disgruntled former councilman named Dan White (Josh Brolin was nominated for best supporting actor for his role as Dan White). White served a relatively short sentence in prison. (Anyone remember the "Twinkie defense" used by White's lawyer in this case?) Upon release White hung himself. Sean Penn is truly marvelous in the role of Harvey Milk. Some believe that he will win the award for best actor as a result of his  portrayal of Harvey Milk. I think Mickey Rourke (photo on left) should get the award for his sterling role in The Wrestler. (Warning: If you cannot deal with films that make homosexuality a central issue then do not see Milk. I will do a review of three films on the theme of homosexuality in the next few weeks, including the film Milk as one of my three. Culture shapes movies and movies shape culture. I want to show how by looking at this explosive theme in films.) Milk will most likely not win best picture. The politics of this film could play a role, one way or the other, depending on who you believe. Many thought Brokeback Mountain was a sure-fire winner a few years ago but it did not nab the award as expected. Director Gus Van Sant has been accused of polishing the rough edges from Harvey Milk's character in order to give us a more sanitized version. I find this to often be the case with the way various films present homosexual characters. The rough side, the seamy side, is always downplayed and the characters are presented as victims much of the time. This seems to be a function of social thought much more than hard-core human reality.

Some of my favorites, who will most likely not win awards but I think should, are Richard Jenkins (photo at left) in the fantastic movie, The Visitor. This is a sleeper film that I recommend very highly. I saw it on DVD from my local library. It truly flew under the media radar this year. The best supporting actor should he Heath Ledger, hands down, for his role as the Joker in Batman 2: The Dark Knight. But Philip Seymour Hoffman was truly superb in Doubt. (How is he a supporting actor when he is the star in the film?) Kate Winslet will most likely win the best actress award (I sure wish she could star in a role where she kept her clothes on) but I would give the award to Meryl Streep for her role in Doubt. I have already said that Viola Davis should win for best supporting actress but Marissa Tomei was great in The Wrestler, a tough surprising film that could have been nominated for best picture. The best cinematography award should go to The Dark Knight. Man on a Wire is by far the best documentary and has no political angle at all, a rarity these days. I cannot guess at the best foreign language film since I have not seen any of them. (I watch these on DVD when they come out later since they first appear in small art-house theaters and I have none near me.) The best director award should go to Danny Doyle for Slumdog Millionaire. The oddity is that Slumdog was not nominated for any of the actors/actresses in the film, all of whom are Indians. Is this a Western bias? This film works almost like a great basketball team. Slumdog Millionaire is the sum of its parts and all the players have their unique role to make it a winning movie. It is, quite simply, a very fine movie. In some ways it is not a "great movie for the ages" at all but it still should win the award this year. It has such huge audience appeal in a very refreshing way. See it if you have not done so. Having been to Mumbai I can assure you the conditions you see are real.

24: The Seventh Season

Yes, I really do enjoy 24. I actually think this is a much better season than the last several years in the 24 series. The shift to Washington, D.C., is genuinely great and the recovery of the heart and soul of the old CTU team is unexpected and great fun. The new "Madam President" is both tough and likeable but will her husband survive? Maybe find out next week. I'm not sure what to make of the "first husband." (He is not Bill Clinton, which is a blessing of sorts I guess.) And Jack Bauer is truly back, back saving the nation and hunting down the bad guys by living on the edge. Will he end up in with a significant other with the FBI agent he is now working with? The chemistry is growing. Jack is, well, Jack! I remain a big 24 fan and thus I am also thankful for my DVR, which allows me to cut the commercials and save time by seeing it on Monday night in only forty minutes. For those who love 24 this is great fun, fun for conversation and all those "water-cooler" chats with your peers. For those who don't care at all, well you are missing out on a fun season with our great "mythical" national hero, Jack Bauer. (Though Congress wants him on a platter! Bad, really bad.) I love it. But I have a lot of tastes that are spread very widely, along both serious and pop-culture lines.Surely my love for 24 proves this point.

Sudan Will Not Go Away

Michael Gerson noted this last week "That while a new administration is just getting started, history doesn't stop." He expressed deep concerns about the problems in Sudan and Darfur. There is a very good reason for this concern. President Obama's Africa policy team is already working on these issues and what they will find should open everyone's eyes if the truth on the ground is brought into the light. Everyone familiar with this part of Africa knows that it is a terrible situation that needs a careful and involved contribution from the United States.

The International Criminal Court (ICC), of the United Nations, issued an arrest warrant for President Omar Hassan al-Bashir of the Sudan last week. He is charged with war crimes. Thus the new administration faces a very tough question: "Can a hunted war criminal also be a partner in the Sudan peace process?"

Gerson wrote last week that when he was in the White House he generally felt that ICC war crimes charges pushed a dictator into a corner and then made him more dangerous, not less. But in the case of al-Bashir he believes the traditional forms of diplomacy have plainly failed and he must be brought to justice, not bargained with in a peace process. America has sat out the ICC in the past and Gerson thinks it will continue to do so under Obama. But he now believes the ICC warrant should really mean something in this case. Sudan has broken so many pledges and so many people have died that it is time to take a different approach. A verified cease-fire is called for in Sudan. The international community needs to be involved and America needs to lead. A comprehensive peace plan between the north and south of Sudan is a must. Bashir is an international pariah and we should treat him as such if we are serious.

Concludes Gerson, "Change in Darfur will not arrive with the delivery of an arrest warrant. It will require the construction of a broad coalition to isolate and marginalize Bashir. And if he is offered a negotiated way out, it must be costly and comprehensive." I agree. I pray that the Obama administration will show both courage and moral conviction. We should be watching and praying and letting them know if we believe that they have failed. Too many have already died and more will die if we do nothing. Watch the news over the coming months and let your voice be heard. The man who ran on changing America's role in the world needs to step up and take action in Darfur and Sudan. Darfur is a great place to find out if he will actually address a really tough argument that does not get the attention that the Middle East garners.