Japan

Last night, I planned to spend my evening catching up on some reading before going to bed early and getting up early for class. I casually flipped on CNN around 10:30pm, and was glued until almost 1:00am.   I watched as a recorded AC360 report on Libya switched to CNN International to footage of the quake, mere minutes after it had happened, followed by live footage of the aftershocks, and eventually the tsunami.

I had no idea how terrifying live footage of devastation like that could be. Yeah, I've watched live footage of San Diego wildfires. And I've watched live footage of tornadoes. And I watched people gunned down in Bahrain last month. In fact, I watched, live, as the second plane hit the World Trade Center. I have seen devastation live on television.  But that doesn't diminish the intensity of how it felt to watch that water pull houses and cars across the countryside, enveloping lives and livelihoods as it went.

[EDIT 3/12: In talking with Kelsey about this feeling yesterday afternoon, I was able to articulate much better why watching tsunami, in particular, is so painful. I've probably mentioned before that my love for the ocean is as vast as, well, the ocean. For me, the beach is a spiritual place, a peaceful place, and even a sort of refuge. To watch the entity for which I have deep love, awe, and emotional connection play a significant role in such devastation just...hurts. Kelsey is Coloradan, and has a parallel love for the mountains. Recently, a friend of hers was killed in an avalanche. It's this same principle. The natural world we know and love has the capacity to take as much as it gives.]

The most awful thing I saw was a video of some people in a department store, I think. The footage showed racks of clothing shaking, mannequins toppling over, nothing particularly devastating. But what struck me was the two people standing next to the escalator, embracing. They knew. They knew that this big of an earthquake meant major damage. They knew it meant tsunami. They knew.

The aftermath of this catastrophe is not even over. It's the middle of the night, still, in Japan -- about 4:00am as I'm writing this -- and we've yet to see just how much damage has been done. Japan is underwater, and on fire, and broken. All at once.

Do what you need to do. Text REDCROSS to 90999 to donate $10. Pick your favorite aid organization and volunteer your time or energy. If you have family or friends in the affected regions, make sure they're safe. If you're the praying kind, pray. Pray hard. This is only the beginning.

How did it come to this?

I know I'm really late to this game, but I just watched the video of anti-Muslim hatred in Orange County. I was in tears within 30 seconds.

How long until everyone looks back on this period of history with disgust? How long until this senseless persecution is publicly aligned with that of the Red Scare or of Japanese internment camps? This is absolutely ludicrous. People are screaming at the top of their lungs that which they believe to be truth about people they don't know anything about. People they've never even stopped to consider as fellow human beings.

How much hate has to be spread across this country before the Tea Party is stopped? There were elected officials at this event, there to support these protestors. There to support this disfigurement of what it is to be a patriot.

"I don't even care if you think I'm crazy anymore," Councilwoman Deborah Pauly says. And the fact that her son is a Marine, and that he and his Marine friends would be happy to kill some innocent people, is proof that we should take her seriously. And the audience laughs. Did you notice? They laugh out loud at her death threats.

And have you noticed that Tea Partiers are the only ones claiming that Sharia is taking over the constitution? Tea Partiers are the ones spreading the messages of hate. Where does the constitution that they hold so dear, where does the scripture that they cling to so irrationally, where do those things tell them to go out and hate those whom they fear?

I want to criticize this video point by point, sentence by sentence, but I just can't even express how wrong it all is. I feel like I need to spend every day of my life saying, "Muslims are people. They are not terrorists. Their God is your God. They are Americans, just like you." until everyone understands.

I am so disgusted. I am so angry. I am so afraid. We are hurtling toward the 2012 elections at a frightening speed. How did it come to this?

Keeping the Faith

I write about my dear alma mater, California Lutheran University, with regularity. It's a wonderful place of higher learning, and I give it as many stars as your scale includes. I did work in Admission, so I'm inherently biased to talk about how great it is. Of course, there are moments in the life of any institution that call for change. CLU is in a period of change and conflict right now. The basic facts of the matter are that a member of the ASCLUG student senate (my friend, Evan Sandlin '12) proposed a bill that would alter the wording of the ASCLUG constitution's preamble. The preamble is, currently, as follows, with the phrase in question in bold:

"We, the Associated Students of California Lutheran University, in order to provide for student organization, to encourage academic and social development, to provide a forum for student expression, and to further Christian growth, do establish this constitution."

Evan's proposed change would have the preamble read thus:

"We, the Associated Students of California Lutheran University, in order to provide for student organization, to encourage academic and social development, to provide a forum for student expression, and to inspire the maturity of faith and reason in an environment of Lutheran tradition, do establish this constitution." 

As a Lutheran Christian, I am very much in favor of this change. It should be noted that this is the ASCLUG constitution, not the University's mission or vision statement, though the new language is similar to the language present in those official statements. The ASCLUG constitution pertains to the work of student government. It does not affect the everyday life of the student body in any drastic way.

So why are a few students up in arms about the change? I'm not sure. Their argument is that removing "Christian" from the preamble and replacing it with "Lutheran" excludes non-Lutheran Christian students from the conversation. But what the word "Christian" does, currently, is exclude non-Christian students from the conversation. And while something like 50% of the student body identifies as a Christian denomination other than Lutheran, another 30% of the student body identifies as non-Christian. As students at California Lutheran University, it would seem that we have functioned, for the most part, as comfortable with the "Lutheran" middle name of our school. We are not California Christian University.

There's a difference.

This change does not remove Christian growth from the students of CLU. If the way you are inspired to be mature in your faith and your reason is to continue your Christianity (of any denomination), no one is stopping you. Interestingly enough, the Christian growth you are trying to "protect" is not lost in this changing of words. Does putting "faith and reason" in the constitution scare you? Does the fact that a non-Christian student proposed it scare you? Are you so insecure in your Christianity that the thought of someone pursuing something other than your brand of your faith at the University you both call your home scares you? Does it scare you so much that you are fighting your student government's choice of language, to scare non-Christian students into the corner in which you've already put them? That is not furthering your Christian growth. And it's certainly not mature.

As a Lutheran seminarian, I can assure you that the conversations we are having here look as much if not more like "maturity of faith and reason" than they do like "furthering Christian growth." Every day, we are breaking down old paradigms and building new ways of being Lutheran. We are one-ninth or one-twentieth, depending on how and who you count, of the Graduate Theological Union, a group of religious institutions working together -- maybe even in maturity of faith and reason -- through our commonalities and our differences. That members of 20+ different religious traditions and systems of belief are able to coexist here in harmony is a testament to our commitment to growth, Christian and otherwise. Half of the GTU's Member Schools and Centers of Distinction are Christian, which, in case you're not getting it, means that half are not. PLTS' participation in the GTU is exactly how "maturity of faith and reason in an environment of Lutheran tradition" can manifest.

I'm getting away from the part where this is about CLU. As a Lutheran university, it is imperative that CLU uphold its Lutheran identity in all of the ways that that manifests. Keeping our Lutheran campus ministry alive and well is a good way to go about that. Having a faculty and staff of Lutherans, Presbyterians, Jews, Catholics, Sikhs, Daoists, Atheists, Muslims, Mormons (all I can think of off the top of my head) is a good way to go about that. Having a student body that understands that Luther was about education, conversation, thoughtfulness, doubt, reason, scripture, tradition, and experience is a good way to go about that. Having a governing body committed to conversation with all students, ideology notwithstanding, is a good way to go about that.

It is my hope that when this change goes to a vote among the entire student body (as is the plan) that CLU students will understand what the motivation is behind this change, and that they will understand that it is in the best interest of ALL Kingsmen and Regals to make this change.

I support this change not because my friends proposed it. Not because my friends support it. In fact, I'm positive that some of my friends are in protest of the change. I support this change because it is time that the student government (and maybe someday the student body) acted on its Lutheran Christian identity, rather than bickered about how best to stifle it.