It has been said that the biggest problem on earth is not too little democracy, or too much poverty, or too few anti-viral AIDS medicines, but the fact that two-thirds of the world’s population live outside the protection of the law. A lack of justice has a terrible effect on many of the world’s poor. […]
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Soften Your Heart And Harden Your Feet
A twenty-one-year-old music college student took the cheapest ship she could find, calling at the greatest number of countries, and prayed to know where to disembark. She arrived in Hong Kong in 1966 and came to a place called the Walled City. It was a small, densely populated, lawless area controlled neither by China nor […]
Perspective
In his book, The Vision and The Vow, Pete Greig tells of how a distinguished art critic was studying an exquisite painting by the Italian Renaissance master Filippino Lippi. He stood in London’s National Gallery gazing at the fifteenth-century depiction of Mary holding the infant Jesus on her lap, with saints Dominic and Jerome kneeling nearby. […]
Restoring Relationships
Hans worked his way up from being a miner to owning a number of mines. His eldest son, Martin, was very intelligent and went to university at the age of seventeen. A respectable career as a lawyer lay ahead of him. Suddenly, to his father’s dismay, he cancelled his registration for the law course and […]
Your Words Are Powerful
‘The Battle of Britain is about to begin. Upon this battle depends the survival of Christian civilisation.’ These words were in a speech given by Sir Winston Churchill to the House of Commons in 1940. Facing defeat, he inspired the nation to fight from the corner, urging them to brace themselves to do their duty […]
Challenges
President John F. Kennedy said, ‘We stand today on the edge of a new frontier… but the new frontier of which I speak is not a set of promises – it is a set of challenges. It sums up not what I intend to offer the American people, but what I intend to ask of them.’ […]
Just in Time
Corrie ten Boom and her sister Betsie were middle-aged Christian women in Holland when World War II erupted. They resolved to conceal fleeing Jews from the Nazis. They rescued many. But they were eventually arrested and taken to Ravensbrück concentration camp. Betsie died there. Corrie miraculously survived to bear witness to the way in which […]
Prayer Makes A Difference
Saint John Chrysostom (349–407) wrote, ‘Prayer… is the root, the fountain, the mother of a thousand blessings… The potency of prayer has subdued the strength of fire, it has bridled the rage of lions… extinguished wars, appeased the elements, expelled demons, burst the chains of death, expanded the gates of heaven, assuaged diseases… rescued cities […]
On Justice Continued: Who Is Unjust?
Justice and righteousness are about a radical, selfless way of life. Like in the book of Proverbs, what does it mean to “bring about just righteousness?” “Open your mouth for those who can’t speak for themselves.” And what do these words mean for the prophets, like Jeremiah? “Rescue the disadvantaged, and don’t tolerate oppression or […]
Why Do We Care About Justice?
If you were a praying mantis, it would be socially acceptable to devour your mate. And if you’re a honey badger, you have no regard for other animals, you don’t care. If you’re a Panda with twins, it’s normal to abandon one to take care of the other.But if humans do any of these things, […]
