Our Troubled Waters

A faith-based partnership between global entrepreneurs and indigenous leaders offers a promising model for Haiti's long-term economic development.

Ten American missionaries are jailed in Haiti for attempting to rescue needy children whose lives were uprooted by the earthquake. The missionaries' plight underscores the potential costs of discipleship, but also the consequences of good intentions gone awry.

According to early reports from the International Red Cross, up to 3 million people may have been affected by Tuesday's catastrophic earthquake in Haiti, and tens of thousands are feared dead.

I can't read the guy's mind, of course, but after the initial, natural response of "Yeah, I got it goin' on," I'm thinking this is what President Obama must've really been thinking upon hearing that he'd won the Nobel Peace Prize:

In this third and final installment of Todd Burkes's series on the thorny political, racial, and cultural issues surrounding the health-care debate, the author dives headlong into his most controversial question yet:

Why is "socialism" such a dirty word in America? Is it really that evil?

One might find it strange that a guy who spends his time writing and speaking about reconciliation is sticking his neck out on the volatile issue of health-care reform. The attitude of a reconciler, a peacemaker, would seem to be at odds with that of someone who is outspoken about political issues. But the more I understand reconciliation, especially the biblical principles behind the idea, the more I find myself unable to keep my opinions to myself.

In the end, I am not as concerned about whether health-care reform passes or fails as I am with how people who represent Christ to the world are thinking through and communicating what they believe.

The protests rocking Iran are of great significance for the politics and society of a Middle East regional superpower, yet one relies in vain on Western media coverage for a decent understanding of developments. Once again, the mainstream press seem incapable of analyzing crucial events in the Middle East without recourse to cliché, condescension, simplification, and decontextualization.

Usually it's the book that inspires the movie, but in the case of author Catherine Claire Larson's As We Forgive: Stories of Reconciliation from Rwanda, it was the other way around. The book, a gripping exploration of the aftermath of the 1994 Rwandan genocide and the miracle of forgiveness, is a literary extension of Laura Waters Hinson's award-winning 2008 documentary of the same name.

As the pastor of a church with a deep desire to love others as Christ would, I've recently been telling folks, "If you only read one book this year, then you must read The Hole in Our Gospel by Richard Stearns." And that's saying a lot, given that my own book just came out! I feel that strongly about Stearns's message.

Most of my life I have been thinking about race and religion--as a child when my family left my native Costa Rica to move to inner-city New Jersey, as a teenager struggling to develop my faith and learning to navigate race relations, then as a young adult serving internationally with a missions organization. The issues were always boldly present. Now, as I live my "ever after" as the wife of a South African man, we are trying to raise a family that is intimately committed to God and, as an overflow, passionately committed to social justice. Last year we followed the election closely, and dinnertime was lively with talk of politics, race, and religion.