Posted by Two reads and one listen that are more than worth your time.
I’ll open with what I think is the best of the three, though it will require a longer time investment.
Episodes 562 and 563 of This American Life delve into a topic people stopped talking about years ago: school integration. “Separate but equal” schools were rejected as a solution by the Supreme Court 60 years ago, yet many inner-city minority students live in a world in which their schools are measurably inferior to the surrounding suburban schools where all the money resides. As rich schools get richer, we must confront the increasing data that supports continued integration of schools across racial lines as a solution to the achievement gap.
Or to be really blunt about it: The Gospel might mean I should love my neighbor enough to send my kid to a worse school so that families with few other options for their kids can benefit from the effects of my (white) privilege.
Controversial enough for you? Good. Give it a listen.
Also, if you aren’t shaking with anger and grief during the audio of the parent meeting in St. Louis in 2013, you have no soul.
This American Life: The Problem We All Live With (#562)
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Second, I commend this dense but readable essay that suggests Christians should stop fighting a PR war and focus attention on the daily, hard work of loving the people around us. It’s not rocket science. But it takes work … when it’s a lot easier just to snap a selfie at a rally or #StandWith on Twitter or complain about how the Church isn’t helping the poor. (That last line is for you, John)
If you Love the Poor for the sake of the Favs and RTs, it will destroy you. Even doing it for the love of others can tear you apart, constantly peeling the onion of intersectionality until you’re a crying mess. Loving the Poor for the praise of Our Father In Heaven, as Jesus told us to do, might involve just as much crying, but it at least gives you something beyond yourself that you can hold on to when you have no idea whether or not you’re actually loving people or loving the thing you’re building for them or loving the way they make you feel.
Loving the Poor: Pics or It Didn’t Happen (from CAPC)
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Finally, this essay about how watching films changes us for the better because it trains our hearts to empathize is well worth a read. Again, a little denser than I’d like for a casual piece, but absolutely worth your time. Brought back lots of great memories from the time I read James K. A. Smith’s excellent book Desiring the Kingdom.
Irrigating Deserts: How Film Transforms and Causes Us to Love Our Neighbors (From CAPC)
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OK, I lied. One more.
All the hoopla over Harper Lee’s Go Set a Watchman hasn’t produced in me any desire to read it. I’m familiar enough with the shape of the tale and the surrounding metanarrative of how a reclusive author at the end of her life suspiciously agreed to release a manuscript she never wanted published.
This is the first article I’ve read which makes me think perhaps GSAW is worth a read after all.
“I am Atticus”: Racism and Vision in Harper Lee’s Go Set a Watchman
Just:Words 