Make Your Place

Amy over at Angry Chicken has a book review for Make Your Place: Affordable, Sustainable Nesting Skills by Raleigh Briggs. Looks like an interesting read if you're curious about making your own (non-chemical-laden) cleaners, hygiene products, etc.

Dooce and Natural Birth

Wow.

Heather Armstrong of Dooce gave Your Best Birth by Ricki Lake and Abby Epstein and The Business of Being Born (directed by Epstein and featuring Lake) glowing reviews on her website yesterday. Beyond glowing, actually, but raving, shining, superbly fabulous reviews. This is a woman who ten or fifteen weeks ago was planning to ask for all available drugs in the hospital and hoping to be knocked out cold and not feel a thing when she delivered her second daughter, Marlo. And then, at about 30 weeks pregnant, she read Your Best Birth and she actually changed her mind about the birth process.

You can read her post The labor story, part 1 for yourself. (Or you've already read it because you're a normal American and everyone reads Dooce these days.) Her writing isn't usually to my taste, but this woman is a major influence on all 900 gazillion of her readers (okay, I estimate), and this is what she told those readers:

"I'm not going to get into the specifics and the really convincing and at times jaw-dropping statistics of it here, there are so many other places and people who can write about it better than I can, but I will say this: if you are pregnant or are planning to become pregnant, GO READ THAT BOOK. From now on when someone asks me what is the one piece of advice I would give to a pregnant woman, it will be: GO BUY A COPY OF THAT BOOK. [...] IT CHANGED MY LIFE. I'm not even kidding, I'll say it again: IT CHANGED MY LIFE."

I think books on natural childbirth are about to start flying off the shelves.

Thoughts on Trinitarian Universalism

Oh blog, my little corner of the web, I neglect you badly these days. It's just that I have a house and a husband and lots of little music students to attend to, not to mention theological questions swimming around in my head.

Please forgive the messily-written processing that sometimes takes place here. That is how I learn, absorb, and remember - by having some sounding-board for my thoughts and a place to gather them all together.

If you read my post recommending Nathan Alterton's blog posts regarding hell, you may not be surprised by this: I'm afraid I may be leaning toward a type of Christian universalism; not the Unitarian type we often associate with the word "universalism" but rather a distinctly Christian Trinitarian universalism. I feel like I'm intellectually and spiritually on the brink of this great leap - believing something so opposed to the view of eternal torment most evangelical Christians hold - and it's rather frightening.

Nathan's dad has two posts of his own on the topic: How Broad a Salvation? and Part 2 of the same. He presents additional thoughts and considerations but doesn't necessarily eschew the view of universal reconciliation. He brings up interesting points about the Kingdom of God.

Gregory MacDonald (a pseudonym) has a couple of interesting and relevant blog posts: Reasons People Think Evangelicals Cannot Be Universalists and Responses to Evangelical Objections to the Orthodoxy of Universalism:

"'Evangelical' universalists arguably have a very biblical and robust notion of divine love (or so I argue in my book). They do not need to imagine that God is a soft touch who would not dream of punishing anyone. Their understanding of divine love seeks to be shaped by its revelation in Christ. And they have a strong view of divine justice. Indeed, they think that every divine action is a manifestation of what P.T. Forsythe called, "holy love." It is not that some divine acts are loving (like saving people) whilst others are just (like sending people to hell). Rather all God’s deeds are loving and just. Whatever hell is we must not suppose that it is the action of justice as opposed to love. It is, they think, an act of severe mercy – of 'holy love.'"

I've been thinking about The Great Divorce. It doesn't exactly paint a picture of universal reconciliation, but rather a bus filled with passengers with the option to disembark, leave hell, and be in the presence of God. This 'Great Divorce' of good and evil is voluntary. The interesting part, of course, is that most of the passengers continue to choose separation from God. If one loathes God and all goodness, truth, and beauty, one does not want to be in the presence of Him, after all. But, in this view of heaven and hell, the choice between the two continues beyond our earthly lives.

"There are only two kinds of people in the end: those who say to God, 'Thy will be done,' and those to whom God says, in the end, 'Thy will be done.' All that are in Hell, choose it. Without that self-choice there could be no Hell. No soul that seriously and constantly desires joy will ever miss it. Those who seek find. Those who knock it is opened." - C.S. Lewis, The Great Divorce

George MacDonald said, "Every soul that is ultimately lost is a defeat of the love of God," and "Every attribute of God must be infinite as himself. Mercy, for example, cannot be temporary but eternal." He also wrote in David Elginbrod, "...God loves, yea, is love. Therefore hell itself must be subservient to that love and must be an embodiment of it." According to this article in Christianity Today, he was known to ask, "Which is stronger? The love of God or the will of man?"

Do I believe in universal salvation? I wouldn't go that far right now. But perhaps (and I am simply positing here) the work of universal reconciliation is already accomplished, as the blood of Christ reconciled us to God while we were still sinners and were His enemies. This reconciliation does not require faith because it is already reality and was accomplished through grace. The enmity between God and man was reversed 2,000 years ago, and the sins of the past, present, and future forgiven. Now this does not necessarily mean everyone is saved. Whether one spends eternity with God or apart from Him may still hinge on individual choice, but perhaps physical death is not the final cutoff point in this choice; perhaps there is a possibility of post-mortem repentance and salvation. Given this proposed picture of life after death, will everyone ultimately choose God, accept His mercy, and be saved? I don't know. Maybe.

I'm feel as though I'm seeing for the first time a fuller scope of salvation, one that culminates in a beautiful, beautiful restoration of all things.

I'm surprised now that I didn't see it before, in Gregory of Nyssa, in George MacDonald, and in so many others - particularly early church fathers. But I suppose if you are taught in church and Sunday School to believe that all Christians think this one certain way about damnation and punishment, it can be difficult to see past that and glimpse that in fact, in the early church, a belief in universal reconciliation may have been the prevailing Christian thought.

Is it the truth? I don't know. But as I survey this other option I have the odd sense of being Chesterton's explorer: sailing the whole world and coming back to my starting point thinking I've discovered a new land, viewing home as something new and different, only to find it the same familiar home I left. I remember things my parents said and quoted to me over the years that may have quietly, subversively gone against the traditional evangelical view of hell. So perhaps it's not so odd that I'm considering this now, after all.

In addition to contemplating universal reconciliation, I'm also grappling with salvation (perhaps taking issue with the legally-based concept of justification-sanctification-glorification I was taught in youth group and considering differences between having our sins forgiven and 'being saved'), imputed vs. imparted righteousness, and the efficacy of prayer.

I wish I could say I'm doing this grappling in a methodical, productive way, but the truth is I just feel overwhelmed and confused.

I guess I've been feeling spiritually and mentally adrift lately, and by lately I think I mean for years now. I'm searching for orthodoxy, doctrine, and truth, yet I don't feel grounded in a church body of believers with whom I can grow and learn. I'm praying to be filled with the Holy Spirit, and if God weren't so good I think He'd be tired of my supplication, "Lord, I believe, help Thou my unbelief."

My Dad says, "Humans trying to understand God is like trying to teach an ant quantum physics!" I feel like a little ant, indeed.

Two Book Reviews

Among the books I've been reading lately two stand out in my mind right now, and I've been wanting to write little "reviews" of them - perhaps some of my readers will want to read these books, too. I read a riveting novel over the summer, and a fascinating book on maternity care in the fall, and only now am I getting around to posting about those good reads! Here goes...

1) Quo Vadis by Henryk Sienkiewicz:

I had no idea how much I would enjoy this book, and I could not have predicted that I would be so drawn into the storyline that I would stay up far too late, night after night, reading. The title is Latin for "Where are you going?", drawn from when Peter met Jesus on his way to be crucified. Quo Vadis is set in the very earliest days of Christianity, and tells of a love story between a pagan Roman military officer, Vinitius, and a young Christian girl, Ligia. Once I was a little way into the book and the plot got moving, I was swept up in the story, which culminates in depictions of famous events: the burning of Rome, and the subsequent feeding of Christians to the lions. The book is inspiring without being preachy - something that can't be said of much historical fiction involving Christianity! The characters really come alive, and I found myself sickened by Nero's cruelty, deceit, and wickedness, drawn to Ligia and other Christians like her, and eagerly awaiting each appearance of Peter or Paul (although they are not very developed characters) in the pages of the book.

I found myself thinking of Diotima's ladder as I progressed through Quo Vadis. Diotima's ladder, or "the ascent passage" from Plato's Symposium, describes how love ascends from a base love (love of a particular body) to the highest love, love of Beauty (as a Form; inseparable from Truth and Goodness). While the connection between the two books is not a precise one, the one certainly reminded me of the other. Vinitius, a pagan entrenched in the ways of Nero's corrupt court, initially lusts after Ligia. So that he might possess her, Romans remove the girl from her home by force, and she is essentially to be a concubine to Vinitius. Through the events of the book, his heart is changed, and he grows to love Ligia's soul, and through her eternal soul, to see and love the beauty of Christ.

Through Christ both Ligia and eventually Vinitius learn to live a life free of fear, a life dramatically different from the typical Roman lifestyle in every way. Vinitius's conversion and subsequent growing faith is powerfully and beautifully told.

"His faith had become so strong that eternity seemed to him something incomparably more real and true than the fleeting existence that he had lived up to that time."

The book describes in vivid detail the persecution of the Christians. Even the wicked, godless Romans who come to the arena to see the sights are sickened by the events that follow - and how much more so was I! At this point in the book, I admit that my vision of the page was occasionally blurred... it is a very sad story, indeed - saddest because it is true.

At the moment when Ligia is in the arena with wild animals, Vinitius's only words are, "I believe! I believe! Grant a miracle, O Christ!"

As to what follows, I recommend you read the book!

Peace to the martyrs.


2) Pushed: The Painful Truth About Childbirth and Modern Maternity Care by Jennifer Block:

My friend Story (who is in the final stages of becoming a certified nurse midwife) lent me this book, and I highly recommend it to anyone and everyone. The scientific and medical aspects of the book are made easy to understand, and the statistics on modern American birth are fascinating. The stories in the book - tales of one unnecessary intervention after another, C-sections of convenience, and agenda-oriented hospitals - certainly ring true with the experiences many of my family members and friends have had in their birth experiences. Suffice it to say that when it comes to low-risk pregnancies, I'm a home birth advocate!

One of the things that struck me as most tragically ironic as I read this book was the concept of "reproductive rights." We hear a lot about women's reproductive rights, don't we? As it turns out, the only right that is getting easier and easier for women to obtain is the right not to reproduce! When women want to reproduce, it's increasingly difficult for them to do so in the way they deem safest, healthiest, and best for mother and baby. The book even describes situations in which lawyers were appointed to unborn fetuses in order to assure the baby a "safe" hospital birth. In a time when fetuses are generally granted few if any rights when a mother wishes to terminate a pregnancy, is it only me who finds this a very sad irony? Most "women's rights" groups are interested only in women's rights to abortion, not real reproductive rights.

Whether you're male or female, young or old, expecting or not, you should read this book. In the interest of true women's rights and reproductive rights, all women should have the intellectual power to know what kind of birth experience they want, and to what kind of procedures and interventions they will or will not consent.

Links

There's all sorts of interesting stuff online. Here are a few articles I've read and enjoyed lately...

Gov. Mom provides a factual look at Sarah Palin's life as Governor of Alaska, VP candidate, and mom of five:

"It's quite a compelling image: An accomplished -- even glamorous -- working mother, projecting to the world that she can and does have it all: five children, a successful career and a husband who doesn't mind being Mr. Mom. Oh, and she's going to be a grandmother, and her infant has special needs, and she's running for vice president."

Elizabeth at In the Heart of My Home shares a more personal perspective about Palin:

"Can Sarah Palin appeal to traditional moms at home who are raising their children? Oh, yes, she can! Every home is different and every woman has a different way of expressing the fullness of her femininity. Some of us balance homemaking and childrearing with some kind of work at home, whether that is freelance writing or in-home childcare for children not our own. Some of us take on the formidable task of working alongside our husbands to farm the land and care for livestock. And some dedicated mothers discern to work outside their homes, while Dad takes on a greater share of child care. I know what works for my family and I think Sarah Palin and her husband know what works for hers."

If you don't have time to read whole articles about Palin, and if you missed her speech at the RNC (I hope you didn't), here are a few witty soundbytes:

"The American presidency is not supposed to be a journey of 'personal discovery.' This world of threats and dangers is not just a community, and it doesn’t just need an organizer."

"Before I became governor of the great state of Alaska, I was mayor of my hometown. And since our opponents in this presidential election seem to look down on that experience, let me explain to them what the job involves. I guess a small-town mayor is sort of like a 'community organizer,' except that you have actual responsibilities."

A Speech to the Delegates provides a humorous, if a little corny, laugh at recent political events:

"For this election isn’t about the past or the present, or even the pluperfect conditional. It’s about the future, and Barack Obama loves the future because that’s where all his accomplishments are."

"No, this country cannot afford to elect John Bushmccain. Under Republican rule, locusts have stripped the land, adults wear crocs in public and M&M’s have lost their flavor. We must instead ride to the uplands of hope!"

And on an unrelated note, more links - these to some books I've been wanting to get my hands on:

An Equal Music: A Novel by Vikram Seth

Personal Record: A Love Affair With Running by Rachel Toor

The More-With-Less Cookbook by Doris Janzen Longacre

In Defense of Food: An Eater's Manifesto by Michael Pollan

And one book I did get my hands on, thanks to a kind loan from my friend Story (although currently FavoriteBoy has usurped it, so while he's several chapters into it and declaring it very good, I haven't yet cracked the cover):

Pushed: The Painful Truth About Childbirth and Modern Maternity Care

There are an awful lot of interesting things in life - it's a lot to keep up with.

Two Deaths

Thursday, September 6 saw the loss of two artists: Luciano Pavarotti, tenor, and Madeline L'Engle, author.

I've read most of L'Engle's novels, and many of them more than once. From middle school through college I often revisited the Murrys, the O'Keefes, and the Austins. My family read The 24 Days Before Christmas every year during Advent, and my love for that book led me to read and enjoy many more of L'Engle's works. I loved Vicky and Meg and I believe that most adolescent girls must feel a sense of common ground with these characters. I particularly remember Meg Murry. A member of a quirky scientific family, she felt awkward and unappreciated by her peers. Her parents taught her that her wit and intellect, her care for others and deep-seated feelings of right and wrong - the things that made her unique and sometimes unaccepted - were the very things they valued most about her. What adolescent hasn't felt like Meg? Of course, I was a lucky one, with parents remarkably similar to Meg's. My Dad's frequent response to any mention of insecurity or unacceptance always began the same way: "Nonsense!" My parents were always there to dispel the faintest notions of value for things like popularity or 'coolness' that didn't deserve to be highly valued. A "children's author" who never wrote down to children, L'Engle was among the great Christian writers whose books can grow up with a child. I grew up on L'Engle novels.

The New York Times article quotes L'Engle's beliefs in the power of a story:

But she often said that her real truths were in her fiction.

“Why does anybody tell a story?” she once asked, even though she knew the answer.

“It does indeed have something to do with faith,” she said, “faith that the universe has meaning, that our little human lives are not irrelevant, that what we choose or say or do matters, matters cosmically.”

While I grew up with the writings of Madeline L'Engle, I can't say I was very familiar with Pavarotti until I left home for college. While my parents love instrumental classical music, opera never really made it into their CD collection. When I was a sophomore at Wheaton College I discovered that I actually liked opera! First it was Mozart, then Rossini and Puccini... by the end of the school year I was spending summer evenings in my bedroom listening to opera. My mutinous siblings and parents had to institute a "closed-door policy;" I could listen to those warbling women and golden-throated men only at reasonably low volume behind my closed bedroom door. But while my younger brothers may not have thought much of Nessun Dorma or Una Furtiva Lagrima, I grew to love the great tenor arias, and among many tenors who sang them, Pavarotti.


"Our truest responsibility to the irrationality of the world is to paint or sing or write, for only in such response do we find the truth." ~ Madeleine L'Engle

Harry Potter Etymology

Don't worry; no spoilers here! This is not a review of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. I've finished the book, but the whole series encompasses so much, so many things to think about, that I'm hardly in a place to write a review right now!

I read all seven of the Harry Potter books to myself. Like most people, I don't actually "pronounce" each word in my head; I absorb whole sentences at a time as I read. Perhaps as a result of never reading the books out loud, or perhaps because I'm just dumb, it wasn't until I was reading the final book that I realized what a clever name Kreacher is for a house-elf. Yes, I really didn't realize until the seventh book that Kreacher is a play on the word "creature."

I started thinking about other word plays in the books, and realized that Number 12 Grimmauld Place, pronounced aloud, becomes "Grim Old (Auld) Place." Rather a fitting name for the Black family home, don't you think?

Rowling has also developed the names of several places with a play on "alley" and "-ally." Knockturn Alley, the dark, seedy alley frequented by dark wizards, is, of course, a play on the word "nocturnally." And Diagon Alley (which I've always pronounced to myself as DIE-agon Alley rather than "Die-AGON Alley" - I'm not sure which is correct) is naturally a play on "diagonally" - whether because the street is literally diagonal or because it is in the middle of London but somehow in its own dimension, I'm not quite sure.

From the earliest Harry Potter books I've always enjoyed the Latin references throughout the books: expelliarmus, liberacorpus, levicorpus, imperio, accio, crucio, lumos, confundo, expecto patronum, (possibly my favorite), and so many others.

After discovering many of these Latin references and plays on words for myself, I found MuggleNet.com this morning, whose name origins page revealed to me a word whose origins I never would have guessed on my own. Alohomora (a spell that opens locks), the website claims, is derived from the Hawaiian "Aloha" (hello or goodbye) and the Latin "Mora" (obstacle or barrier): "goodbye, obstacle!" Brilliant.

Of the many, many things I love about Rowling's books, it's the scope and power of her imagination and creativity that has me in awe. From the smallest details (names of characters, streets, spells, and towns; little things considered "normal" in the wizarding world that bring the stories to life) to the biggest themes (good and evil, power and corruption, love, choices, humility, and sacrifice), her books are filled with material to delight and fascinate readers of all ages. As C. S. Lewis's wardrobe has always beckoned me into the imaginative world of Narnia since my childhood, so J. K. Rowling's Platform 9 3/4 sweeps me into Harry's world at Hogwarts - a world, like Narnia, that is much fuller than the physical world we see.


(Did Chapter 34 remind anyone else overwhelmingly of The Chronicles of Narnia? Not surprising, I suppose, since Rowling has been quoted saying Lewis was one of the most influential writers she read as a child.)

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

Bought the book Monday night. Read through page 150 Tuesday evening. Read through page 759 today. Finished!

(I cried all through chapter thirty-four.)

Quotes

"Lightly men talk of saying what they mean. Often when he was teaching me to write in Greek the Fox would say, 'Child, to say the very thing you really mean; that's the whole art and joy of words.' A glib saying. When the time comes to you at which you will be forced at last to utter the speech which has lain at the centre of your soul for years, which you have, all that time, idiot-like, been saying over and over, you'll not talk about joy of words. I saw well why the gods do not speak to us openly, not let us answer. Till that word can be dug out of us, why should they hear the babble that we think we mean? How can they meet us face to face till we have faces?"

Till We Have Faces by C. S. Lewis

"Aslan," said Lucy, "you're bigger."
"That is because you are older, little one," answered he.
"Not because you are?"
"I am not. But every year you grow, you will find me bigger."

Prince Caspian by C. S. Lewis

Indwelling

by T. E. Brown

If thou couldst empty all thyself of self,
Like to a shell dishabited,
Then might He find thee on the Ocean shelf,
And say— "This is not dead," —
And fill thee with Himself instead.

But thou art all replete with very thou,
And hast such shrewd activity,
That, when He comes, He says: — "This is enow
Unto itself — ’Twere better let it be:
It is so small and full, there is no room for Me."

Summer Memories

My cool blog-friend Amir has posted about his summer activities, which include gardening. This has caused much reminiscing from yours truly... I spent a great deal of time as a child planting gardens each summer. Whenever my Mum placed an order from Burpee or a similar catalogue, she would order three or four of the 1 penny packets of mixed seeds, and my brothers and sister and I would plant our little gardens. They would produce a strange variety of things - turnips, coreopsis, daisies, beets, carrots, and much more - but we had a wonderful time.

Another strong memory of childhood summers is reading. Our library did a summer reading program, with prizes for reading a certain number of books. Us Palmer kids always won the biggest prizes. We'd go to the library and check out hundreds of books, and I can remember lying on my parents' bed under the ceiling fan, reading book after book. That's one way to anesthetize the post-novel-reading letdown, you know: start another book immediately. (You know the letdown I'm talking about? "Oh NO... it can't be OVER... oh but I love the characters... there must be a sequel... oh please let there be a sequel...") So I would read series like Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle (fabulous), The Happy Hollisters (not so fabulous, but I guess I thought they were fabulous at the time), Encyclopedia Brown: Boy Detective, Betsy, Tacey, and Tibb, the Shoes books, and many more...

Speaking of the Shoes books... There is a wonderful scene in You've Got Mail about those books. Kathleen's shop has gone out of business, and she ventures into Fox Books one night, near tears. She sits down on a tiny chair in the children's section. Joe is nearby, watching her from the other side of the room. A woman comes in and asks a salesman a question.

Woman: Do you have the Shoe books?

Salesman: Shoe books... Who's the author?

Woman: I don't know. My friend told me my daughter has to read the Shoe books, so here I am.

Kathleen: Noel Streatfeild. Noel Streatfeild wrote Ballet Shoes, and Skating Shoes, and Theater Shoes, and Dancing Shoes, and... I'd start with Ballet Shoes first, it's my favorite. Although Skating Shoes is completely wonderful... *near tears* but it's out of print!

Salesman: (to woman) Streatfield. (to Kathleen) How do you spell that?

Kathleen: S-T-R-E-A-T-F-E-I-L-D.

Woman: Thank you.

I like that movie a lot.

While I am reminiscing, I'd like to invite you all to join me. Post and comment and tell me things, memories you have... how did each of you spend your summers as a kid? What are some of your strongest memories?

"Final Roar"

"Even though there is an element of isolationism inherent in the whole concept of a Christian college, I believe the concept can be justified, both for the church and for the nation. It can be justified if, and it is a very big "if," the graduates of Christian colleges can go out and make very special, very positive, and very measurable impact on our society by being able to offer distinctively Christian solutions at every level of that society.... The bar for Christian college graduates must be set very high because the investment in them is very high....

"When one understands that these colleges [speaking specifically of those in the Coalition of Christian Colleges and Universities] graduate more than thirty thousand seniors each year, one can begin to understand the level of their potential effectiveness and influence. Thirty thousand each year! This amounts to a not-so-small army of some of the best and the brightest minds of the American churches' young people. They are sent out each year to do battle for "truth, justice, and the American way," after four years of what should be the best education, the best training, and the best motivation the churches' schools can give them....

"Really, the only way for these thirty thousand yearly graduates of the Christian colleges not to disappear or concede defeat is for them to become deeply involved in a meaningful cause--to break away from the mundane and the trivial and to venture out into the exhilarating atmosphere of risk. Theodore Roosevelt said it so well almost a hundred years ago: 'Far better it is to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs, even though checkered by failure, than to take rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy much or suffer much, because they live in the gray twilight that knows not victory or defeat.'...

"I believe the current prevailing atmosphere at most Christian colleges is a defensive one. Most parents, churches, and supporting denominations send their students to these campuses in hopes of protecting them from the evils of a society they see as completely alien to their values and beliefs. Their highest aspiration for them seems to be to get them back as unscathed as possible, hopefully with a spouse with a similar belief system. There is nothing really wrong with this, except that it ignores the admonition to be 'salt' in our world and to obey the command of the Great Commission. There is just far too much fortress mentality and not enough 'Onward Christian soldiers marching as to war.' As a result, most graduates are neither inspired nor equipped to go out to do the very tough work of influencing the nation with Christian truth-claims. Our country is poorer as a result.

"The mission statement at my Christian college alma mater says the college exists to produce servant leaders. Some sort of servant-leader language is probably a part of most Christian college mission statements. Finding it much easier to produce servants than leaders, however, Christian institutions of higher education pay only lip service to any authentic leadership emphasis. Producing leaders is very expensive, not only in terms of the investment dollars involved, but also in terms of plain hard work. It takes diligence, attention to detail, intellectual rigor, and an unwavering commitment to excellence. It takes the kind of faculty dedication that was once the Christian college norm, but which is now in increasingly short supply. To produce leaders, Christian faculty cannot 'mail it in,' and academic administrators must recruit professors who understand what this kind of commitment entails and who are dedicated to teaching and mentoring....

"Among the most vital tasks of the Christian college teacher/mentor/discipler is vision casting. Christian students need to know the possibilities of service at every level, including the leadership levels of all the professions. Some students need to be mentored toward becoming the best, most godly, most influential, and most productive kindergarten teachers posible. Some need to be encouraged to understand the possibility of becoming an equally proficient book or newspaper editor, or filmmaker, or corporate executive, or even secretary of state. We are much better at producing kindergarten teachers than we are at producting servant leaders in other areas of the arts, business, and the professions. We need to do so much better. This is not because good kindergarten teachers are not terribly needed, or because they are less valued than others who might be serving in a more prestigious role, but rather because all Americans, at every level, deserve the opportunity to see competent, caring, committed Christians, and the kind of truth and value judgments Christians are supposed to be offering. Unless our Christian families, churches, and educational institutions commit to this, we will continue to be far less than we should be....

"It is important to understand that the service I am discussing here is not the professional ministry--the pastorate, a foreign missions assignment, full-time work with a parachurch organization, the Salvation Army, and so on. Rather, it is the service to which every Christian is called as he or she pursues whatever career in which they might be engaged. The Christian physician, lawyer, politician, scientist, publisher, athlete, teacher, plumber, builder, soldier, housewife, or salesperson must see their career not as an end in itself but as an entry point for service to Christ and ministry to his creation. By being there in a particular job setting, Christians have built-in contact with their peers on the job. As we perform our jobs to the very best of our abilities and demonstrate genuine caring for our coworkers, we win a hearing for the things we believe, the ideas and values that inform our Christian faith and which we believe will benefit our colleagues and our country. We must be certain that no opportunity to offer these values goes unfulfilled. We must be committed and ready... Our country deserves it, and our faith demands it."

- Bob Briner, Final Roar

(excerpts from Chapter 3: Raising the Bar on Christian Higher Education)