A few months ago I began listening closely to the lyrics of the Laura Mvula song “Diamonds.” “Sometimes the grass ain’t greener on the other side,” Mvula sings. “But you’ve got diamonds under your feet.” These lyrics remind me of a saying sometimes attributed to James Oppenheim: “The foolish seeks happiness in the distance. The […]
Using people, loving things
Love people, not things; use things, not people.” Last night I watched a short Argentinian animation called “El Empleo” or “The Employment” (2011). Directed by Santiago ‘Bou’ Grasso, the 6-minute no-dialogue short follows a man through the first few hours of his day. The saying about loving people rather than things and using things rather than people […]
Revolution’s Invisible Costs
“If violence is wrong in America, it is wrong abroad.” —Malcolm X In November 1963, Malcolm X gave one of his last public speeches to a mostly Black audience in Detroit, MI. In one segment of “the Message to the Grassroots,” he highlights the hypocrisy of advocating nonviolent action within the US but promoting violent […]
Don’t wait too long to do the right thing
“THE BIBLE IS CLEAR: Moabites are bad. They were not to be allowed to dwell among God’s people (Dt. 23). BUT THEN comes the story of “Ruth the Moabite,” which challenges the prejudice against Moabites. THE BIBLE IS CLEAR: People from Uz are evil (Jer. 25). BUT THEN comes the story of Job, a man […]
When Popular Analogies Steer Us Off-course
On Friday morning I eavesdropped on the Seventh-day Adventist Church’s Annual Council meeting at the denomination’s headquarters in central Maryland. Several voices will live-report on the 8-day meetings via the Twitter hashtag #GCAC14: follow along over the next week. Mark Finley is an Adventist statesman, an internationally known Adventist speaker and elder. For most of the 1990s […]
Transcript: Toni Morrison at Portland State, 1975
Educating the conqueror is not our business. —Toni Morrison Last week some of us heard for the first time a presentation that Prof. Toni Morrison made in May 1975 during a public lecture series on the theme of the American Dream. “A Humanist View” begins by surveying technically objective shipping records. Comparing the records’ descriptions of rice, tar, […]