Sunday, February 28, 2010

Jesus-Followers Are the "New Internationalists"

In yesterday's nytimes.com columnist Nicholas Kristof applauds Richard Stearns and World Vision for "doing superb work on issues from human trafficking in India to mass rape in Congo." World Vision is "the largest U.S.-based international relief and development organization." Kristof, who is no special fan of conservative Christianity, applauds the work and visionary writing of Stearns. Evangelicals, thanks to Stearns and World Vision and groups like it, have become "the new internationalists," replacing "Democrats and liberals."

Stearns is the author of the phenomenal The Hole In Our Gospel. Read it to have your world rocked.

Kristof has written a follow-up to his essay, clarifying some things. He has already received (as I write) 223 comments on the original essay.

Here in Monroe we're part of Godworks, a Soup Kitchen and coming Food Pantry that provides meals every day in our community. Plus in my church we're doing a lot of things like helping girls get out of sex-trafficking to assisting unwed mothers. So when I hear Richard Dawkins and Sam Harris tell me that religion is intrinsically evil I wonder what planet they are living on. Kristof's essay does some more debunking of the Dawkins-Harris myth.