God in the slums, the silence and the debris…
"…whatever thoughts you have about God, who He is or if He exists, most will agree that if there is a God, He has a special place for the poor. In fact, the poor are where God lives.
Check Judaism. Check Islam. Check pretty much anyone.I mean, God may well be with us in our mansions on the hill. I hope so. He may well be with us as in all manner of controversial stuff. Maybe, maybe not. But the one thing we can all agree, all faiths and ideologies, is that God is with the vulnerable and poor.
God is in the slums, in the cardboard boxes where the poor play house. God is in the silence of a mother who has infected her child with a virus that will end both their lives. God is in the cries heard under the rubble of war. God is in the debris of wasted opportunity and lives, and God is with us if we are with them. "If you remove the yoke from your midst, the pointing of the finger and speaking wickedness, and if you give yourself to the hungry and satisfy the desire of the afflicted, then your light will rise in darkness and your gloom with become like midday and the Lord will continually guide you and satisfy your desire in scorched places."
It’s not a coincidence that in the scriptures, poverty is mentioned more than 2,100 times. It’s not an accident. That’s a lot of air time, 2,100 mentions. (You know, the only time Christ is judgmental is on the subject of the poor.) ‘As you have done it unto the least of these my brethren, you have done it unto me’ (Matthew 25:40). As I say, good news to the poor."
Bono speaks to The National Prayer Breakfast (see more here)
3 Responses to “God in the slums, the silence and the debris…”
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author musician theologian
Maggi has kept a blog since September 2003, writing about theology and faith, the arts and literature, and a little about life and random nonsense...
In an increasingly secularised society few people have a good working knowledge of the Bible. Yet a great deal of our culture is built on stories or ideas that come from the Bible. Literature, art, music, language and even the fabric of our society - such as our justice system - are built on Christian concepts and biblical references. The Writing on the Wall provides a fascinating introduction to the Bible's best-known, and most influential, stories. Each chapter gives some background to the text of the Bible, and shows how the stories have become enmeshed in Western culture. Adam and Eve, the ten plagues of Egypt, The Prodigal Son and Mary Magdalene all feature - along with how the Bible has influenced everyone from Shakespeare to Monty Python, and Caravaggio to Banksy. 
Giving It Up explores the Lenten idea of 'giving up', taking it beyond the traditional idea of simply abstaining from something, and suggesting instead that what we need to give up is our existing ideas about God. With a daily readings for each day of Lent, from Ash Wednesday to Easter Sunday, it follows the heroes of the Bible who had to give up their own too-small ideas about God.
This is Maggi’s bestselling book of daily readings for each day of Advent, Christmas and Epiphany. Advent is the beginning of the Church year, and marks the anticipation of the coming Messiah. These readings explore how beginnings and endings in our own lives are illuminated by the different Gospel narratives of Christ's coming.
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For a wooly agnostic like myself one of the most compelling features of faith is the “prerogative for the poor”. God is where the poor are, and more often than not, so too are Christians. That is I think, the biggest challenge to the “angry atheists” that there is. Faith isn’t a set of creeds to assent to but a way of life that challenges the comfortable.
I have a few poems on-
http://www.gypsyexpressions.org.uk
if you click the writing page
and then-Jimmy Mcphee-thats me.
They are mostly about
spiritual wealth in human poverty
I’m not trying to promote myself or this site only make the comment of these poems.
I’ve just listened to the whole address at: http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/bononationalprayerbreakfast.htm
and it was all pretty special. One idea that struck me forcibly was where Bono was saying “it’s not about charity, it’s about justice” That was a gobsmacker. (Taking his meaning of charity as the current meaning ie. condescension – as opposed to love)
That’ll get used on Sunday – the Wife & I are preaching on passion.