The Sustainist

Artist-Leader

I posted the first blog as The Sustainist exactly one year ago.  Fifty-two posts later, I am still writing.  As I revisit the year of sharing with my readers, I realized I was trying to describe something that is not yet fully realized.  I could see the connections here and there and I shared them, but I have not yet able to see the full picture of this “Spirituality for Sustainable Communities in a Networked World.”  

Here are some of the blog posts’ titles from last year: Do More with Less, Waste=Resouce, Network Globally-Connect Locally, Ancient-Future-Now, Facilitate like Water, Darkness Is Not Dark, Fear-Miner, Holy Currencies, GracEconomics. As a writer, sometimes I arrived at ideas that the conventional English language does not have existing words to describe.  So, I create new words by connecting words that had not be coupled or combined before.  The presence of hyphenated words and intentional coupling of previously un-related words are indications of the emergence of something new - new concept, idea, identity, experience, organization, community that is so new that we have to invite new words and phrases to describe.

Matthew Fox in his classic book, A Spirituality Named Compassion: and the Healing of the Global Village, Humpty Dumpty and Us, wrote, “The very heart of being creative is seeing relations between matter and from that no one has ever imagined before or that people deeply want and need to see.” 

Jesus was an artist in that he connected the concept of the messiah with suffering and dying and giving up of himself for others.  When he spoke of these connections, even his friends were not able to accept it until the whole gospel story was lived out. This is the risk an artist-leader takes.

In this sense, I have tried to be an artist-leader this last year by seeing and sharing the relations among people, resources, technologies, money, concepts and ideas that would create sustainable community. In other words, I am trying to describe the sustainist which, in itself, is a vision that is not yet fully described.  And I hope these are things that people want or need to see. I am still still writing weekly because there are many more connections to be made.  

 

Invite members of your community to gather and explore new connections. Invite participants to brainstorm a list of things that they are doing well within their community. Invite them to brainstorm a list of places where people gather in the neighborhood/town/city. Select randomly one item from 1) and one item from 2) and invite participants to create a new vision of how they can share what they do well with others in the neighborhood. Do a few more and invite participants to be as creative a possible without worrying about financial and other constraints. Invite participant to consider the following question: As a result of attempting to make connections today, what am I called to do?

Reflection Questions for 2nd Sunday of Lent (Year B) Genesis 17:1-7, 15-16    How did you learn from this story about covenant with God? Psalm 22:22-30   What are the reasons for us to pray God as expressed in this psalm? Romans 4:13-15   What does it mean to have faith? Mark 8:31-38   How does this story challenge your idea of a savior?

Eric H. F. Law
Kaleidoscope Institute
For competent leadership in a diverse changing world
www.kscopeinstitute.org

Come to Los Angeles in 2012 to study with The Sustainist, the first  two opportunities: February 27–March 2, 2012 Kaleidoscope Winter Institute Holy Currencies Conversations on Money and Sustainable Ministry March 14–18, 2012 Face to Face Seeing and Hearing Each Other . . . Knowing God Creative liturgy & music for a diverse and changing world An ecumenical gathering of church leaders to create worship experiences that are authentic, relational and missional

The Occupy Song – The Video

The television media of the United States of America is occupied with false and misleading attack ads produced and paid for by the so-call Super-PACs that support a certain candidate for election. These are ads that attack the person and not at disagreements of the policies and governing philosophies that the candidates put forth. In fact, in the midst of this media war, we, the people, might not even know what the candidates believe and represent anymore.

The temptation for the people, the voters, is to be lazy and undiscerning, like grass being blown to and fro by the wind of personal attack ads – changing who we will vote for based on which ad speaks the loudest against another candidate. 

I invite you to occupy your mind with skills to discern what is true and right in this election year.  Go to flackcheck.org which is a project of the Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania, to find out how one organization is trying to check the ads and other political assertions against the facts.

Here is my offering:  A music video of The Occupy Song, of which the lyrics was first shared with you in a post in December 2011.  Let this song be a meditation for us to occupy our minds and hearts with the passion for the common good, so that we will take our parts in creating a just and sustainable community.

Invite members of your community to gather and watch several political ads that are currently being aired on TV today. Invite participants to notice what is being presented as facts and truths in these ads as they watch them. Invite participants as a group to make a list of these “facts” or “truth.” Divide participants into smaller groups and give each group one of these “facts” or “truth,” and invite them to research via the internet and other means to check if that “fact” is true. Invite each group to report back. As a large group, invite participants to consider the following question: What am I challenged to do as a result of this dialogue?

Reflection Questions for 1st Sunday of Lent (Year B) Genesis 9:8-17    How do you recognize the sign of your covenant with humanity and/or with God? Psalm 25:1-9   What does it mean to ask God to show us God’s ways? 1 Peter 3:18-22   How can you be alive in the spirit? Mark 9:2-9   What temptation do you have being called a son or daughter of God?

Eric H. F. Law
Kaleidoscope Institute
For competent leadership in a diverse changing world
www.kscopeinstitute.org

Come to Los Angeles in 2012 to study with The Sustainist, the first  two opportunities: February 27–March 2, 2012 Kaleidoscope Winter Institute Holy Currencies Conversations on Money and Sustainable Ministry March 14–18, 2012 Face to Face Seeing and Hearing Each Other . . . Knowing God Creative liturgy & music for a diverse and changing world An ecumenical gathering of church leaders to create worship experiences that are authentic, relational and missional

View from 2040

“View from 2040” was the theme of the activities around the Inauguration and Installation of the Rev. Dr. Frank Yamada as the 10^th President of McCormick Theological Seminary in Chicago.  I was glad I could attend, not only to witness the historic event of the installation of the first Asian American President of a major seminary, but also to learn more about the state of theological education today.  Also, I was excited to engage in these kinds of deep conversations with both my friends from McCormick and the Lutheran School of Theology in Chicago (LSTC) in the same location. 

All the speakers surrounding this event insisted that theological education institutions must change because by 2040, there will no longer be a racial/ethnic majority in the U.S. and technologies will continue to impact how we communicate and form communities. I was particularly inspired by Frank Yamada’s inaugural address in which he invited those present to consider how theological education can be faithful, relevant and sustainable in a diverse and fast changing world.  At one point, he quoted Chris Anderson’s book Free in which he said that digitized “information wants to be free.” Yamada also use Khan Academy as an example through which one can get over 2800 educational video free on the internet. 

So, under such condition, what is the role of an educational institution if it is going to be sustainable?  If we think of an educational institution as the place where information is disseminated to the students, then it will not survive because eventually, no one will pay for information since they can get it all free through the internet. 

Perhaps we can learn from the music industry as they struggled with the reality that digitized music was going free.  In a number of examples from Anderson’s book Free, he described how the creators of new music deliberately offer it free in the form of CDs and on the internet; then they put great efforts in promoting the same artist’s concerts in local communities in which they provide face-to-face, real experiences of the music.  People may not pay for digitized music, but they are willing to pay for a real hi-touch experience, which cannot be replaced by technologies.  Since dissemination of the free music is also free, the distributor can reach millions of people without incurring any cost, and if only a small percentage of the people wanted the hi-touch experience, the concert halls would be full and the music industry becomes sustainable. 

What if a seminary like McCormick or LSTC does a similar thing like the music industry?  A seminary can draw from the resources of its faculty and library and create thousands of videos and other media that cover the foundational material of a theological curriculum and put them on the internet free!  If these free materials, given that they are inspiring, can reach, for example, 10,000 people, and if only 5%  of the people are interested in having a full community experience using these materials for real-life ministries at a location like Chicago, one would have 500 students making their pilgrimage to seminary to experience in-person formation.  They might even be willing to pay for it.

This means the roles of seminary will be very different in at least two major ways.  First, instead of classes that disseminate information, classes will be a place where teachers and students create relevant materials to be put on the internet so that the free curriculum will be continuously updated.  In additional to writing research papers, students will be creating videos and other forms of media to be shared not just with their teachers but with a wider ever expanding global network. 

Second, a seminary might be organized around a number of community-based ministries that are missional and self-sustaining, using a model similar to Social Business as defined by Muhammad Yunus,  Every student and faculty member are involved in at least one of these missional projects. Some examples of these social business-like ministries might be a restaurant modeled after Soul Kitchen, or an after school program to supplement the arts and music education of the local schools, or consulting groups consisting of professors and students to resource local congregations. These missional projects will become places where students and professors do active theological reflection from all the disciplines. A sustainist seminary would become a place where resources flow between the seminary community and the wider neighborhood – these resources are not just financial, they include relationship, truth, wellness and gracious leadership.

Students would join an existing missional project in their first year.  In their second year, they would form a new missional group and incubate a new social business/ministry and then in their third year, they would actually implement the missional project and leave the ministry with the seminary to be continued by future students with the support of faculty.  Since all of these missional projects are self-sustaining, they will not cost the educational institution any money. More importantly, they will actually create jobs and provide services for the local community.  What better way to form church leaders than having them actually create sustainable missional ministries as the foundation of their education!

As you can sense, I am passionate about this, and these are just preliminary ideas that I came up with through conversations with colleagues while I was in Chicago.  I would invite more dialogue with any leaders of theological education institutions who found what I shared here exciting and worthy for further exploration.

Invite members of your community to come together for time of dialogue on technology and change. Invite participants to compare their life experience five years ago and today.  In particular, invite them to review how technologies, such as, computer, hand-held devices, etc. has impacted their lives. Divide participants into small groups to discuss: What were the gifts that these technologies bring? What were the struggles/challenge they present? Invite each group to report back. What am I challenged to do as a result of this dialogue?

Reflection Questions for last Sunday after Epiphany (Year B) 2 Kings 2:1-12     What did you learn from this story about change? Psalm 50:1-6   What does it mean for God to be the judge? 1Corinthians 4:3-6   How do you let the light of the gospel shine in your darkness? Mark 9:2-9   What did you learn from this passage about change?

Eric H. F. Law
Kaleidoscope Institute
For competent leadership in a diverse changing world
www.kscopeinstitute.org

Come to Los Angeles in 2012 to study with The Sustainist, the first  two opportunities: February 27–March 2, 2012 Kaleidoscope Winter Institute Holy Currencies Conversations on Money and Sustainable Ministry March 14–18, 2012 Face to Face Seeing and Hearing Each Other . . . Knowing God Creative liturgy & music for a diverse and changing world An ecumenical gathering of church leaders to create worship experiences that are authentic, relational and missional

What is Normal?

I have lived with constant pain for the last 10 days.  My doctor said I had a classic case of shingles which is a skin rash caused by the same virus that causes chickenpox. After an individual has chickenpox, this virus lives dormant in the nervous system and is never fully cleared from the body.  Under certain circumstances that no one seems to be able to definitely identify, the virus reactivates and causes shingles. Besides the unsightly rash, the pain following the path of the affected nerves was constant and unbearable at times.  There were nights when I wished there could be a magic lotion or a cooling pool of water into which I can immerse myself and heal the rash and stop the pain.

While I was careful not to be around children and pregnant women, I instinctively kept my medical condition from the people with whom I worked.  Perhaps, there is a deep sense of shame or fear of rejection associated with sickness that affected the skin.  I was taking regular doses of painkiller through out the day (and night) and acted as if I was normal.  After about 10 days, my body was beginning to accept the constant pain as normal, as I reached for my pills to relieve the anticipated pain for the next few hours.

In passing conversation with a friend, I jokingly said that I was addicted to pain pills and I stopped myself and asked: Am I?

While I don’t think I will become an addict, this experience has caused me to reflect on how easily we adapt to things that are not normal; how easily we cover up reality to continue our denial that things are not normal.  It is not normal for our young men and women to be fighting a war 7,000 miles away from home.  It is not normal for people who worked and not be able to afford a safe place to live.  It is not normal for a small percentage of people to own and control a large percentage of our money and resources while the majority of the people are struggling.  It is not normal for private groups to spend 16 million dollars on negative TV advertising against a candidate they don’t like while one of the key issues in this election is the economy and job creation.  What pain have these caused us and what painkillers have we been taking to keep up our denial?

I am going off my pain pills today.  I am curious as to how my body will react.  I am also telling my friends about my medication condition and not be ashamed.   I am willing to face whatever may come in order to achieve physical health again.  I want to be well because I remember what health feels like.   I remember what it was like when I was healthy and did not have to take pills every 4 hours to be functional.

What will it take for us, as citizen of the United States, to stop our denial?  Do any of us really remember what it was like when we are not fighting a war?  Do any of us remember what it was like when resources were flowing through every segment of our community?  Do any of us remember what it was like when an election was about who will lead our, town, city, state and nation based on their love and care for the people?  Who will help us recall what a healthy nation looks like?

Invite members of your community to come together to imagine what a healthy nation looks like. Invite participants to read the Preamble to the Constitution of the United States of America: We the People of the United States, in Order to form a more perfect Union, establish Justice, insure domestic Tranquility, provide for the common defence, promote the general Welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America. Divide participants into 6 small groups.  Each group takes one of the following phrases and discuss what it would be like if we have accomplish it for our community: Form a more perfect Union Establish Justice Insure domestic Tranquility Provide for a common Defence Promote the general Welfare Secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity Invite each group to report back. As a large group, invite participants to consider the following question: What am I challenged to do as a result of this dialogue?

Reflection Questions for 6th Sunday after Epiphany (Year B) 2 Kings 5:1-14     Who do you listen to in order to achieve healing? Psalm 30   What did you learn from this Psalm about healing restoration to life? 1Corinthians 9:24-27   What is the imperishable prize of life? Mark 1:21-28   What did you learn from this passage about healing?

Eric H. F. Law
Kaleidoscope Institute
For competent leadership in a diverse changing world
www.kscopeinstitute.org

Come to Los Angeles in 2012 to study with The Sustainist, the first  two opportunities: February 27–March 2, 2012 Kaleidoscope Winter Institute Holy Currencies Conversations on Money and Sustainable Ministry March 14–18, 2012 Face to Face Seeing and Hearing Each Other . . . Knowing God Creative liturgy & music for a diverse and changing world An ecumenical gathering of church leaders to create worship experiences that are authentic, relational and missional