News from the Pews

The third Sunday in January is Sanctity of Human Life Sunday, and the Office of Social Justice (OSJ) is pleased to offer resources for your church to honor the day. Synod has encouraged Christian Reformed churches to commemorate the day’s significance (Synod 1981 and Synod 1995). OSJ would like to help churches commemorate the sanctity of human life in ways that are sensitive and mindful of the impact abortion has on society, our churches, and members of our congregations.

Blessed are you* who hunger and thirst for justice

*You who weep at the tears that flood the nightly newscast

you whose tears prompt you to action

You who are willing to practice joy in the fierce furnaces of this world 

you whose joy cultivates the courage 

September 30th 2021 marks the first National Day of Truth and Reconciliation in Canada.  It coincides with Orange Shirt Day, a grassroots commemoration marked by the wearing of Orange Shirts for children forced to leave their families and attend residential schools.  In honour of this day here are five ways that you can engage in working for reconciliation.  

Disability is a theological topic, because people of every kind of ability are created in God’s Image; moreover, through both our limitations and our gifts, people with disabilities indicate the uniqueness and breadth of God’s Image. Disability is a political issue too, because people with disabilities long for equity—freedom and human flourishing—for people of all body types. In this short post, I’m going to do two things. First, I’m going to briefly define disability, ableism, accessibility, and justice.

A few years ago, my friend organized a protest at the shelter he was staying at. His protest concerned the use of sermons to wake up shelter participants. While he is a follower of Jesus, he is also a victim of the residential school system which had used sermons to destroy his people. The protest was peaceful and I joined the round dance he had organized during a community meal. 

I grew up in a faith-based family with an aunt and uncle who spent most of their career as missionaries overseas. They spent many years in Japan and the Philippines establishing Christian churches. I heard enough stories from them when they visited on furlough to know that I was not equipped for their somewhat nomadic lifestyle. I love to set up roots in a community and have a large network of family and friends close by. Listening to their conversations about distant lands always brought me back to the question of how I can invest in my own community. 

On May 20th, the Climate Witness Project had the privilege of hosting a book talk with professor and author Finis Dunaway. His new book, Defending the Arctic Refuge: A Photographer, an Indigenous Nation, and a Fight for Environmental Justice, takes a look at how photographer Lenny Kohm’s grassroots advocacy alongside the Gwich’in people helped protect the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.

Mohammad El Kurd and the Settler Takeover in the East Jerusalem Neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah

How do you grow vegetables when the soil is dry, space for farming is extremely limited and there is no water available? The answer lies in an innovative combination of fish, plant tubs, pumps and pipes! In southern Honduras, World Renew partners with Diaconia Nacional of Honduras for an agricultural project that’s having a big impact using aquaponics. 

In day to day life, I experience what I call “extreme empathy,” meaning that at times I feel the pain of others very deeply—almost as if it’s my own. Because of this extreme empathy, often when I look at the world around me, I am overwhelmed by the pain and sorrow that is seemingly everywhere. I want to fix it all and feel completely insufficient to make even the slightest difference or improvement. The ironic reality is that if I allowed myself to stay in those moments of despair, I would neglect to do the very thing I long to do: seek justice.