Here is a montage of songs from Hairspray, we saw last night in Phoenix. The singers and dancers in this youtube piece are the same we saw last night. Brooklynn Pulver is an absolutely powerful singer!

Enjoy!

The message of Hairspray - about racial integration is appropriate for this Martin Luther King, Jr. weekend as well.

Jim Wallis has just released a new book for this presidential election cycle. Just as his last book, God's Politics, took the country by storm at its publication during the last presidential election cycle, I predict this book will do the same. Read on...

Why I Wrote The Great Awakening - Jim Wallis

(My book) 'God’s Politics' called on people to take back their faith after it had been "hijacked" by the Religious Right. Millions of Christ­ians have done just that, and now the question is what are we going to do with our faith, now that we have it back? My new book, 'The Great Awakening: Reviving Faith and Politics in a Post-Religious Right America', addresses that question.

My friend E.J. Dionne Jr., a Washington Post syndicated columnist, has read the new book and describes how it is different from the last one. "The Great Awakening is the perfect successor to God’s Politics," Dionne says. "If the earlier book helped open our eyes to what had gone wrong, The Great Awakening ... provides an historical and theological foundation for a transformative public religion."

When I am asked what has changed since God’s Politics, I reply, "Everything." The subtitle of God’s Politics was "Why the Right Gets It Wrong and the Left Doesn’t Get It." Well, the hard Right continues to get it wrong, but evangelicals are leaving the Religious Right in droves. Meanwhile the Left is starting to get the idea that politics should be about values and that religion has much to contribute to progressive politics.

Two things in particular have changed. First, we now see the "leveling of the praying field" as many Democrats are rediscovering their own reli­gious roots, with many coming out of the closet as people of faith. And their candidates are actively reaching out to the faith community. In recent years perceived as the "secular party," hostile to religion and values, Democrats are becoming a much more faith-friendly party—that’s a real sea change.

Second, and more important, the agenda of the faith community—especially the evangelical community—is changing dramatically to include issues such as poverty and pandemic diseases, environmental care and climate change, trafficking and human rights, genocide, war and peace.

That change could significantly impact politics in the 2008 election. The Great Awakening explores the new broader and deeper faith agenda and shows how a new spiritual "revival" could spark real social and political change. Already, in the early primaries the clear victor is "change," revealing the deep hunger in America for a new direction in politics, which many on both sides of the spectrum believe to be badly broken. All the candidates are now competing to convince voters that they are the best change agents. Hopefully, The Great Awakening will be the spiritual and movement companion book to that political hunger.

Bill Hybels, senior pastor of Willow Creek Community Church, says that many evangelicals are ready for just such a "justice revival." He says, "We are interested in the poor, in racial reconciliation, in global poverty and AIDS, in the plight of women in the developing world."

And Rich Nathan, senior pastor of the Vineyard Church of Columbus, Ohio, says that "there is a spiritual awakening across America ... on behalf of the poor and the most marginalized."

Adam Hamilton, pastor of the United Methodist Church of the Resurrection, wants to "fan the flames of the 21st-century revival within Ameri­can Christ­ianity. This revival is a reclaiming of the fullness of the gospel—a gospel that invites people into relationship with God through Jesus Christ, transforms them from the inside out, and then calls them to pursue justice, to practice radical compassion, and to both pray and work for God’s kingdom to come on earth as it is in heaven."

The new book traces the history of "great awakenings" of the past, in the U.S. and world history, and then points to what is occurring now. I wrote the book because I believe it’s "movement time" again.

U2’s Bono, in one of the book’s endorsements, says, "I had always been a skeptic of the church of personal peace and prosperity ... of righteous people standing in a holy huddle while the world rages outside the stained glass. But I’ve learned that there are many people of the cloth who are also in the world—and, from debt cancellation to the fight against AIDS and for human rights, they are on the march."

The Great Awakening speaks of two great hungers in our world today—the hunger for spirituality and the hunger for social justice. I believe that the connection between the two is one the world, and especially a new generation, is waiting for. The Great Awakening makes that vital connection and shows how spiritual renewal will likely be a necessary part of social change, and how perhaps only genuine spiritual revival can spark social and political transformation.

As a longtime social activist, I am now convinced that we will not get to social justice without spiritual revival. The book lays out seven key commitments that—if made on the personal, communal, and public policy level—could provide the "tipping point" on many of the key moral issues that we confront today.

I am not just saying that another Great Awakening may be coming. I’m convinced that it has already begun, and the book begins to tell its stories. As I’ve often said, this could be a revival that calls us to find common ground by moving to higher ground. It could transcend traditional divisions and bring people together across the theological and political spectrum on the major moral issues of our time. It asserts that religion should not be a wedge to divide us, but a bridge to bring us together.

As a teenager, I went to the black churches of Detroit after being kicked out of my white evangelical church. It was in the black churches that I first encountered the explosive combination of spiritual power and social change, and I have adopted that vision as my own.

In the months of working on this book my writing, praying, and vocational discernment got nicely tangled together. So I didn’t just finish a book; I also got a clearer sense than ever before of what the next steps might be and what I am supposed to be doing. We decided to organize "Justice Revivals" in cities across the country, beginning this spring in Columbus, Ohio, where I recently met with a wide variety of pastors and leaders to prepare for this three-day gathering of preaching, praise, and a call to do justice.

It’s the vision of the book, and a vision we are beginning to put into practice—a Justice Revival may be coming soon to a city near you.

"We are so indigent we even need words. (Consequence: the more words we need, the greater our poverty.) We need them not only to communicate with others, but also to communicate with ourselves. We are divided, exiled from ourselves. We have to talk to the self from which we are separated."

Thomas Merton, The Sign of Jonas, p. 271.

I was at an immigration workshop on January 12, 2008 in Glendale, AZ.

One of the presenters was a young attorney who is working with the Florence Immigration Project. It is her job to educate detainees awaiting deportation about their legal rights. She reported that when she came to AZ three years ago to work on this project, she worked with persons who were here without papers. These persons were routinely sent back to their countries of origin (detainees represent about 75 plus countries) unless they could prove that they were fleeing persecution and could prove continued persecution if they returned to their homeland.

This was her bombshell: in the first two years, she never met anyone who had US citizenship among the detainees. Now she is frequently seeing people with US citizenship who are being detained and processed for deportation to the country from which their parents came from. Yes, you read correctly. These people were born in the US; their parents were naturalized citizens. They are also seeing people who came into the US under the age of 17 and were naturalized under their parents' citizenship. I don't know what you think - but isn't it terrifying to think that holding a US citizenship paper no longer protects you from deportation? (My sons come under the latter category.)

I went to a faith-based discussion on immigration today.

We were encouraged to look at three Biblical texts which talk about how we deal with the stranger among us:

Deuteronomy 10:14-22

14 The Lord owns the world and everything in it—the heavens, even the highest heavens, are his.15 But the Lord cared for and loved your ancestors, and he chose you, their descendants, over all the other nations, just as it is today.16 Give yourselves completely to serving him, and do not be stubborn any longer.17 The Lord your God is God of all gods and Lord of all lords. He is the great God, who is strong and wonderful. He does not take sides, and he will not be talked into doing evil.18 He helps orphans and widows, and he loves foreigners and gives them food and clothes.19 You also must love foreigners, because you were foreigners in Egypt.20 Respect the Lord your God and serve him. Be loyal to him and make your promises in his name.21 He is the one you should praise; he is your God, who has done great and wonderful things for you, which you have seen with your own eyes.22 There were only seventy of your ancestors when they went down to Egypt, and now the Lord your God has made you as many as the stars in the sky.

Leviticus 10:33-34

33 " 'Do not mistreat foreigners living in your country,34 but treat them just as you treat your own citizens. Love foreigners as you love yourselves, because you were foreigners one time in Egypt. I am the Lord your God.

Matthew 25:34-40

34 "Then the King will say to the people on his right, 'Come, my Father has given you his blessing. Receive the kingdom God has prepared for you since the world was made. 35 I was hungry, and you gave me food. I was thirsty, and you gave me something to drink. I was alone and away from home, and you invited me into your house. 36 I was without clothes, and you gave me something to wear. I was sick, and you cared for me. I was in prison, and you visited me.'

37 "Then the good people will answer, 'Lord, when did we see you hungry and give you food, or thirsty and give you something to drink? 38 When did we see you alone and away from home and invite you into our house? When did we see you without clothes and give you something to wear? 39 When did we see you sick or in prison and care for you?'

40 "Then the King will answer, 'I tell you the truth, anything you did for even the least of my people here, you also did for me.

(All quotes from New Century Version)

As I am sure you are aware, the immigration issue is a hot-button issue for many people in this election cycle. Living in Arizona it is a major issue.

I think people who take following Jesus seriously have to grapple with these teachings.

We concluded the following:

1. The issue is not simple. It is complex and multi-faceted in its face. There are no easy answers.

2. As followers of Jesus, we are called to compassion for the stranger among us, however, they came to among us.

3. We need to educate ourselves about the issue. We need to dialogue with those who hold differing postions with us about how to deal with this issue.

4. We need to realize that this issue will be with us for along time.

5. We need to have a better solution than 'round them up and send them back.' The issue is too complciated for such a 'simple' answer'.

6. The country doesn't have enough workers. We need to develop some form of guest worker program which allows people to work here.

What do think?

ron