THE TROUBLE with scheduled blog posts is that they don't reflect what's currently happening. After watching the flames in Hackney, Croydon and elsewhere yesterday, today has been a constant checking on news updates. If you're an overseas reader (and I know there are many of you), and you've not picked up on what's going on here in the UK, Laura Anne has a summary of events over at her blog. What started in London has spread to other cities.
Rumours fly everywhere, so it's important to establish the reliability of the sources. There have been claims of disorder where there are none. But some are indisputably true, and as ever I feel wordless. Distressed, outraged, and utterly perplexed - but...but we don't do this sort of thing! Well, apparently some do. The rest of us twitch with helplessness and indignation.
Not all entirely helpless - many have been out cleaning up after the riots - what one Twitter user described as a 'riot of goodness'. There seems to be a determination that we will not let ourselves be tarnished by the actions of the few, and we ourselves are prepared to clean up the mess in sheer defiance. Get your broom and go.
General advice seems to be don't panic, and stay out of the way at scenes of disorder. A sea of spectators will not help get things under control.
So we sit and wait from a distance, praying in our frustration and our disappointment that there will be an end to the senselessness, to the disregard, to the pain that is being inflicted in so many ways.
Woman leaps from burning building in Croydon last night
"Please pray. The violence is spilling out onto the streets."
This was a text I received last week from a friend of mine who lives in Uganda.
As the headlines have largely been concerned with other things, I emailed her to ask for more details of the situation. She has given permission for me to post a summary here - although it's quite difficult to summarise all of it, I will pick out some of the main points.
The current Ugandan president has been in office for the past twenty five years. A great plan for development and getting rid of corruption and violence has ended up with more of the same.
Fuel prices are really high - tripling in the space of about 2 months, and this leads to higher food prices because the food needs transporting from rural areas. Inflation is at about 14%.
Those in rural areas are starving as they were unprepared by the relevant government departments for drought followed by flash floods. Some families of eight or ten are eating a small sparrow sized bird for dinner - if they can catch it. Pregnant women may only have a meal of termites to last a whole day (about enough to fill a small yoghurt pot).
The global fund corruption and scandal has meant that the next round of support has been cancelled. Hospitals are having to cut down on employees and recruiting patients. Only one quarter of people needing ARVs (Antiretroviral drugs )are getting them. Drugs supplies for those already on ARVs has reduced - those who can't afford them have to go without or try and change medication which entails resistance to the drugs or side effects.
At the government hospital there are two generators working, hardly any doctors and all medicine has to be paid for. They won't treat you if you don't bring your own gloves - they don't have any.
Mothers give birth on the floor because there aren't enough beds on the maternity wards.
Donated drugs that are supposed to be free are taken by health officers and sold at private clinics.
Despite a 'free for all' education at primary level, because of corruption they have no desks, chairs, reading materials and even meals in most cases. They have gone to introduce 'free' secondary education without dealing with these issues.
Roads are terrible - full of pot holes. Every time an election nears they put a thin layer on top for the canvassers to get through - then it wears off again.
Corrupt government ministers responsible for some of these issues have been in power for many years.
An inaugural party is being planned by the president as well as the purchase of fighter jets. He claims not to be able to do anything about the food and fuel prices due to the global economic crisis. Opposition leaders claim otherwise.
A pressure group was started, supposed to be a peaceful protest, where people walked to work in protest of high fuel and food prices. But the government sent in police and militia (not always easily identifiable) who would get into scuffles with opposition leaders and bundle them off in vans. Rousing the people's anger, riots have broken out, with tear gas and pepper sprays being used and also shootings - a two year old baby was shot dead and another man shot in the head and the thigh - both in their homes trying to avoid the riots.
A few days ago Besigye, a leading opposition figure was in his car, which was attacked and he was doused in pepper spray (BBC report here). Spontaneous rioting broke out all over Kampala.
My friend says "it seems like the rule of the law is dying if not all ready dead".
Please pray for the government to make a concerted effort to improve the situation and bring costs down, diverting money away from unnecessary expenditure and into areas of need. Pray against the corruption - "I don't know how it can stop if the big fish won't get caught," says my friend, "but also the biting poverty has meant that everywhere someone is trying to make an extra buck which is terrible." There is a real feeling of hopelessness about this.
My friend has also expressed concern that there is a lot of censoring in the media, the Internet and even on phones. She says: "We are worried that we may one day not to be able to speak freely about what is happening...we need wisdom about what to say and how to say it."
Video of aftermath of riots here. In pictures here and here.
Disclosure: I am aware that I cannot back up many of these facts 'officially' as I am using a personal source. I do not claim any authority of my own on the subject.
I'm always cautious about wading into to some 'hot topics' on this blog, because it's not part of its purpose. Having said that, sometimes I do feel the need to float ideas and more importantly to pose questions that arise out of an issue.
Hence, I am going to pose a question on the topic surrounding the recent B&B ruling, although it is not in reference to this case specifically (I did appreciate the gentle manner of Mrs Bull's response, however). In my readings of the many opinions on this topic, I frequently come across the suggestion that because B&B owners are offering a public service, it should therefore be open to all members of the public and their practices, regardless of the personal religious belief of the owners of said public service. Please correct me if that's a bad summary. In some cases people have said that if they do not accept homosexual or pre-marital sex in general under their roof, they should not be in the business of offering hospitality (and by that I mean literal business, not just a general welcoming-ness).
My question is this: for those B&B owners who do hold these deep beliefs which mean they are incredibly uncomfortable with the practice of certain things in their own home, are we then saying they should give up their business? For those who have long-standing businesses, a sense of calling to this kind of hospitality wherein it is important to offer a lovely holiday to others, but cannot in all personal conscience accept, for example, homosexual practice in their homes? Do we suggest that someone cannot start such a business unless they do so?
Where do we draw the line here? It's a bad analogy, but I'll use it briefly - prior to the smoking ban, there were B&B owners who did not allow the practice of smoking in their establishment. Now, you may quite rightly say - well, that's to do with health factors, the air quality, and how it affects other guests. I did say it was a bad analogy, but surely for some owners it was a personal preference. Likewise some B&Bs did not personally want people bringing their pets into their establishment, not just for the sake of other guests but because it was their home.
My point, however badly made, is that decisions are made on personal principles all the time, including in the hospitality business. My question, I suppose, is are we to consider that personal beliefs and preferences are unimportant in these areas and even unacceptable? That we can no longer officially do things on moral principle? That the private should never influence the public? Because frankly, we do not all hold the same principles and no group, religion or government will ever be able to force us to do so. And I wonder if deliberate discrimination and personal principle are occasionally getting mixed up, when I don't think they are necessarily the same thing.
These are my current ponderings and I am not submitting an argument or an answer. Neither am I commenting on legality and law. But I can't get rid of the questions - hence I'm throwing them out here out of genuine interest in peoples' response. I'm interested by the relationship of the private and the public, of belief and practice, of how we deal with personal principle - these things are abstract, but they impact our thinking on such issues. Again, these questions are not particularly specific to the most recent case, but neither would I necessarily apply them to other areas.
Feel free to disagree - but please be respectful and remember I am asking a genuine question, rather than delivering an argument.
The earth rumbles, and an unprecedented moment in aviation history. The skies here are blue, if hazy, but no silver aeroplane trails litter the sky, there is both quietness and blankness. In our part of the country, there's no real sign of volcanic 'talcum powder', but still we analyse dust motes with interest: how far have you travelled? For those of us not directly affected, there's a strange unreality about it, the oddness and awe of something out of our control, nature plotting her next move, while we wait on test flights and weather reports.
But we carry on as normal - a normal which is different for those living around the main airports, experiencing an aggressive contrast: the stillness, the soundlessness. But bigger still the difference between those of us merely experiencing an absence above, and those desperate to find a way home.
"Mark's done, Luke's begun, and Numbers is, well, just indescribable!" Such is the subject heading of my email from Community of Readers this week, which sums things up quite nicely. Still keeping up to date, amazingly. Not fazed by Leviticus, handling Numbers - although it does get somewhat repetitive when it lists the exact same thing for each of the twelve tribes (or their representatives!).
While looking at Leviticus 20 some days back, I was particularly struck by verse 4, where it talks from verse 2-5 about those who sacrifice their children to Molech, and the penalty for it (death). But verse 4 for me stood out as it said 'and if the people of the land should ever close their eyes to them, when they give of their offspring to Molech...' (NRSV, italics mine), and do not deliver the penalty for it, they will be cut off from their people and the LORD will 'set his face against them'.
For some reason as I was reading the phrase 'close their eyes' really struck home. Turning a blind eye to such appalling acts results in their God 'setting his face against them' (NIV) and banishment from the chosen people. It is, in essence, a sin of omission. Ignoring the terrible act of others has its own consequences.
Of course, this is Old Covenant law and a specific situation and we need to place it all in context - but the principle stands, and should not be ignored. What do we 'close our eyes' to in today's world? When do we fail to act? What appalling situations do we hear of and yet make no attempt at response? What right do we have to profess ourselves Christ-followers and yet walk by on the other side?
It's not that we don't hear about these things. In our contradictory world we hear of the horrors one moment and are persuaded to buy the latest model-of-whatever the next. We inhabit a society gagged and bound by confusion and mixed messages, mass abuse and mass consumption.
Well might Lily Allen sing in The Fear : 'I don’t know what’s right and what’s real anymore I don’t know how I’m meant to feel anymore...'
How many of God’s people today close their eyes to horrors going on around them? How many, intentionally or accidentally, ignore the horrific abuse of human by human? How often do we even really think about it, let alone take any action? Do we sigh, shake our heads, and then feel peckish and go get something out of the fridge to satisfy our appetites?
A kind of paralysis sets in as we cannot imagine how to make any effect, so we lose all movement. And meanwhile the horrors go on: people trafficking – (the modern slavery which is far more widespread than the institutional slavery in the time of Wilberforce), child pornography and abuse, torture, persecution, neglect, violence, rape. The list continues and wraps its blackened ribbon around a hurting world.
What will it take for paralysed people to open their eyes?
Do you know, it's only just sunk in properly that Obama is actually the US President? I listened to the inauguration speech on the radio while doing the washing up, in the dark of evening over here, and then progressed into the lounge to watch it on TV (having to close the door because the digital signal of the television digi-box was slightly behind the analog radio that sits on top of the fridge, to which Andy was still listening). I liked it when he said: '...to all other peoples and governments who are watching today, from the grandest capitals to the small village where my father was born: know that America is a friend of each nation...'
As the citizen of a different nation, I appreciated the feeling behind the statement. I have to confess sometimes it feels like America ohand the rest of the world but this speech did not make it feel that way. Even when talking about the leadership of America it was not put across in a condescending fashion.
Here in Britain the headlines dwell on recession; not being very economically minded I feel ill equipped to offer much comment except to do what I always do: quietly observe events and wait to see what happens next. I find my not-very-economically-minded brain* trying to get to grips with the whole idea of economy in the larger sense - asking such stupid questions as - where does the money come from- I mean, where does it start? Who are we borrowing from? I feel like a child at the back of the classroom who has somehow missed the first lesson and doesn't know how to catch up, worries about looking stupid if she asks - and probably wouldn't understand the answer anyway.
I glaze over with the comebacks and criticisms of opposing parties: I honestly do not know who is right, and frankly it has come to the point where it appears that whatever one does, the other will burst a blood vessel over it. To me, and perhaps others of us 'little people' trying to make sense of things, the parties and leaders strip each other down for the sake of stripping each other down - so right and wrong seems to recede in the face of simply shouting each other down. The many people who are jaded with politics are fed up either with hypocrisy and suchlike or simply the amount of labels being bandied back and forth - like arrows aiming for weak spots in armour, so any real governing is either disguised or delayed or disrupted by a constant battle.
To me, me who would never make any kind of politician, I am simply reminded that we are all so terribly human, with all our weaknesses. No matter the label or the party. But we are, still, wonderfully human, with all our strengths, and thus I try to take an interest and not become jaded. But so often the media is swamped by minutiae and the bigger, more important issues lie untouched, or unseen.
Perhaps it is just me.
* As in, not good at understanding economics. Not 'ooooh I want to spend loads of money!'
Ah, so Obama did it. I wasn't particularly surprised, although I experienced a sudden surge of trepidation a moment before I found out, and prayed desperately 'let it be the right person'. I'm afraid I didn't watch the election coverage - which for us GMT-ers meant staying up between midnight and 6am - not something that is wise for me to do these days!
In a disjointed way, this reminds me of something I was challenged with several months back, and need to be reminded of again - the need to pray for our leaders and those in government. Here in the UK there is quite a lot of disillusionment about politics and many are choosing not to engage with it at all. But I think of the immense responsibility and pressure our leaders are under. I could never do that, cope with that, be that. But somehow I neglect, so easily, to simply pray - for wisdom, strength, sensitivity, diplomacy...I think I need to zap up my intercessionary praying overall, in fact. So often I pray for others when I am moved to do so - but what about all those times when I sink into apathy? - so many times. If I'm honest, the majority of them. Here's a thought: compare how often we criticise our leaders, with how often we pray for them. That thought makes me stare at the floor and shuffle my feet...
I think I shall try and write down all these things / people in a notebook and discipline myself to go through it regularly. I have such good intentions, but I am so easily distracted. Such good intentions...so easily distracted. (Remind me, please!!!)
Do you ever have moments when you realise you are still very near the beginning of journeying to maturity in lots of ways - simple ways and yet you so easily neglect them?
Lord don't let me forget to pray for others those with needs, responsibilities, those with power, or powerlessness.
THE TROUBLE with scheduled blog posts is that they don't reflect what's currently happening. After watching the flames in Hackney, Croydon and elsewhere yesterday, today has been a constant checking on news updates. If you're an overseas reader (and I know there are many of you), and you've not picked up on what's going on here in the UK, Laura Anne has a summary of events over at her blog. What started in London has spread to other cities.
