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i’d like to think that i’m not a violent man. but the one hot button that provokes me to thoughts of violence is automotive theft. perhaps i wouldn’t feel this way if i hadn’t been a victim so many times, but it’s been a repeatedly frequent occurrence of late. granted, it has been a whole eight months since the last time this happened, and this time they only got my stereo and sunglasses instead of the entire car, but still… i wonder if i was simply meant to just utilize public transportation.

why do people keep stealing and breaking into my cars? it’s not a honda, i park in a well-lit carport surrounded by many nicer|newer cars, i have an alarm, i keep nothing in my car, there is nothing aftermarket on my car, and yet somehow thieves still feel compelled to jack my bottom-of-the-line cd player. i swear it’s a conspiracy.

in the end, i’m struck with the difficult counter-cultural ethics of the sermon on the mount- and i wonder what it would look like to embody an ethic of automotive pacifism. maybe i should hide in my trunk waiting to give loads of cash to potential car theives.

today was an interesting day. chris and i went on a brief excursion to vancouver so i could sign some paperwork for the binding/copyrighting/etc of my thesis- that stupid thing just won’t leave me alone (but i think it’s now officially done). afterwards, we went looking for afternoon sushi, but found most good places on robson/denman closed between 3-5pm. how strange it is to be in vancouver and unable to find a sushi place to eat. i thought to myself- could this be a twisted alternate universe where delicious sushi is cruelly just out of reach?

mostly we were just trying to keep ourselves occupied while we waited to hear back from our realtor about whether or not our offer was accepted. in a flurry of signatures and paperwork last night at 11pm, we made our very first offer on a place in columbia city. but like the ill-fated pistons recently demonstrated, sometimes you just can’t beat the odds- and nobody gets the first place they make an offer on in urban seattle, especially in this hot real estate market. even with an escalator clause offering $12k over the list price, we were still outbid.

oh well- easy come, easy go. i found the place on thursday, and as of today, it’s gone. 4 days on the market. and now i’m back to the search. who knew the ghetto* was such a popular place to live?

*ghetto in the most friendly, colorful, appealing, positive way possible.

when i first visited china about 5 years ago, even then the people there were talking about the ridiculous rate of urban construction and expansion. and this was way out in the northwestern xinjiang province, a region most chinese consider the undeveloped ‘wild west’ of china. what’s currently happening on china’s east coast makes urumqi (a ’small’ city of only 1.6 million) look like a tiny podunk village.

the latest time cover story is focused on the recent and remarkable economic growth in china. half the world’s construction cranes are in china. half of the concrete used on earth last year was in china. their new freeways would circle the entire planet four times. and their biggest US trading partner? wal-mart. scary stuff.

napoleon, who called china a sleeping giant, is supposed to have said ‘let china sleep, for when she wakes, the world will tremble.’ the world is taking notice (with plenty of help from horrendous US foreign policy). the spiritual landscape of china will also likely shape the globe. because much of the christian church is underground, numbers of adherents are difficult to pin down, but regardless of size, the openness of china is staggering. and some say india is just around the corner.

i’m excited at the thought of our unipolar superpower world gaining some much needed balance.

robert horry’s game 5 performance was indeed pretty remarkable, but i am way more impressed with (or inspired by, rather) another bob: bob ekblad.

ekblad is about as hardcore as they come. he has spent much of his life as an advocate for the marginalized- immigrants, the poor, the addicted, the jailed. compelled by the struggle of latin american liberation theology, ekblad founded tierra nueva & the people’s seminary, a combination of social justice & advocacy for hispanic migrant workers, graduate theological education, sustainable farming, and bilingual ministry.

bob says, “i was told that if i submerged myself in poverty i would read the scriptures and hear the gospel differently. it’s true.” as a sessional/adjunct instructor at regent, bob has had his fair share of critics- too liberal, too marxist, not evangelical enough. some have said he’s depressing. but for all these reasons, and especially because he’s been truly committed to gaining a perspective on life from the margins, he deserves to be heard as a voice of the voiceless.

want to know more? register for the faith & race conference starting up soon at quest. bob will be there.

it’s been a week since terry schiavo’s comprehensive autopsy was released to the media. given the level of international frenzy around her controversial ‘right to die’ case just a few months ago, i was expecting a bit more coverage of the results. the lengthy report basically confirmed what her husband, michael schiavo, had been saying all along- that she was irreversibly brain damaged beyond hope of recovery. but even as i type that phrase ‘beyond hope,’ i think of the nature of hope- and its often irrational, unscientific tie to faith.

nevertheless, this case from the very beginning was not about persistent vegetative states as much as it was about legal precedent and federal jurisprudence overstepping its appropriate bounds. but i find it interesting that in the light of this autopsy’s authoritative scientific findings, no one in the bush camp or terry’s family is saying much different than before. dubya’s standing firm on the ‘culture of life’ tagline (whatever that means), jeb is (amazingly) asking for an investigation of terry’s original collapse over 15 years ago (can’t he just leave it alone?), and terry’s parents are somehow still convinced that she was not in a persistent vegetative state despite the autopsy’s findings.

only senator (and dr.) bill frist has changed his tune and is now denying that he testified on the senate floor that after an entire hour (yes, a full 60 minutes!) of reviewing video footage of terry, she was ‘clearly not in a persistent vegetative state.’ he seems to have forgotten that his testimony was videotaped- good one, bill. regardless of the standard political maneuvering, i’m struck with the challenge of holding life as precious. as people of faith, when do we hold onto hope, however unreasonable or unlikely, and at what point are we honoring life by letting go?

i really dislike robert horry. but i’m probably just bitter. he definitely had an incredible game last night- a clutch performance when the pressure was on. he did what champions do, and he proved that his five championship rings are more than just bling. that game-winning trey hit like a dagger.

the finals are pretty much over now- the chances of detroit winning 2 straight games in san antonio are pretty slim. even larry brown must be worried. but if any team can do it, it’s the pistons. so we’ll see…

so the intentional community discussion continues… and the hot topic on the docket is the ever-controversial issue of gentrification. i have to admit that until recently, my cursory reading on the topic has been pretty thin. only now that chris and i are seriously considering buying a home between central and SE seattle has this become a more pressing issue to consider. we’re meeting with our realtor tonight… a scary first step in what will be the largest financial purchase of my life thus far.

chris acted surprised when i told her that often artists are one of the primary catalytic factors initiating the process of gentrification. bohemians, hipsters, and artisans move into an urban area and soon convert abandoned retail space into studios or galleries. homes and storefronts get restored and renovated. small independent cafes, swanky restaurants, and gourmet organic grocers open and attract an upper middle class (and often mostly white) clientele. locally run mom-n-pop shops go out of business. property values soar, taxes and rent go up accordingly, and the poor residents who used to be able to afford the area are pushed out by the rising cost of living. gentrification complete. this is simply an urban reality- look at what happened to fremont and ballard, and look at what is happening in columbia city right now.

in defense of this process of ‘urban revitalization,’ not everyone views gentrification as bad. in fact, this study says it’s good for everybody. as always, there is a plurality of voices and arguments on both sides of the fence. nevertheless, the questions we are faced with are difficult: how can we be a humble, listening presence in urban areas where the poorest demographic has no voice? how can we advocate for those whose educational and socio-economic status sets them up for failure and hardship in a system where race, money, and privilege provide unfair advantages? how can we partner with, enable, and empower without an agenda to rescue with charity? even, and perhaps especially, amidst the inevitable gentrification taking place in our city, chris and i want to be bridge-builders. our prayer is to embody micah 6:8 as we embark on a ‘radical’ mission: simply getting to know our neighbors.