some thoughts about the Gospel. [why i am really going to haiti.]

[ over the years, people i've met have often asked
me what i'm working on, and i've usually replied that
the main thing was a book about dresden.
i said that to harrison starr, the movie-maker, one
time, and he raised his eyebrows and inquired, "is it
an anti-war book?"
"yes," i said. "i guess."
"you know what i say to people when i hear they're
writing anti-war books?"
"no. what do you say, harrison starr?"
"i say, 'why don't you write an anti-glacier book
instead?"
what he meant, of course, was that there would
always be wars, that they were as easy to stop as
glaciers.
i believe that too. ]

-kurt vonnegut, jr. [slaughterhouse five]

i refer to this excerpt because i think that it brings up a relevant point. it is pretty apparent that war is not easy to stop. there may be an end to some wars, but war will not cease. likewise, there may be some things that we can do to address issues such as poverty, disease, sickness, illiteracy and homelessness (all of which are probably related more than we realize, all of which, along with war, are symptoms of something else), and we may even see conditions improve from time to time, but overall we cannot eliminate them. i do not believe that we can change the world, that we can save the world, that we can bring peace to earth.

i know how hopeless that sounds. and if that is it, it is entirely hopeless. whatever it may be attributed to, the world is pretty screwed-up. it doesn't seem like that is going to change.

my good friend jordan suggested that i not try to tell my story, but rather tell the story of haiti, of the haitian people, and specifically those haitian people that i will be living with. and i like that suggestion, because i am not particularly fond of telling my own story (as if talking about myself were anything like telling a story). and after all, i am not moving to haiti because of myself (i don't think) but because of the haitian people. i would probably get along just fine if i were to stay put. the problem is that i don't actually know the story of haiti or of the haitian people, and i know very little about those i will be living with.

i know that the people of haiti originally came from africa as slaves brought over by the french. it seems that the french got carried away and brought over too many slaves. the slaves eventually revolted, successfully, and gained independence from france in 1800. haiti has endured tremendous political strife during the last 200 years, being influenced externally by nations that wanted to see haiti become a democratic nation. haiti has endured tremendous internal political corruption. i have heard that haiti is the poorest nation in the western hemisphere, and has been called the second hungriest nation in the world, with 80% of haitians living in poverty and more than 50% living in abject poverty. i know that children go hungry and are scarcely educated. there are roughly 10 million people in haiti, and roughly 1 million homeless orphans.

the united nations has been in haiti for five years. their is a neighborhood on the outskirts of port au prince that was said to be the most dangerous place in the world. the UN pretty much went in and shot the place up, to drive out the gangs that controlled the streets and kept the people living in fear. there is now some stability, which could be gone in a moment.

i have to go back a bit because this story of haiti isn't really a story that i can tell. and honestly, the specifics about haiti i think are pretty insignificant to the story that i am trying to tell, the story that is moving me, the only story that any of us can really tell. that is the story of creation and the fall and redemption.

i know that i may have just turned a lot of people off, and that's okay. keep reading anyways. and keep in mind that i am trying to condense a whole lot of thinking and reading and experience into a few paragraphs, and that i am no theologian or otherwise scholarly fellow.

but really, some folks seem to have this idea that they can go to this place or that, this country or that village, and live among some people, and take all of the things that they have learned in america or elsewhere, in the classroom or from books or the internet, and go change a place and a people. and that is really what matters. and i think that i disagree. i think that the wars will continue, that hurricanes will still come, famine will still come, disease will still come. poverty will still exist, i think as much now as it has and as it will. and we will still use all of those things to measure the condition of the world, the condition of humanity. but it doesn't matter, because regardless of what it looks like, humanity is broken. it is fallen. and in reality, the rich are just as poor as the poorest, and the healthy will die. and i agree with some pretty extreme ideas about the nature and the extent of fallen-ness and how everything is ultimately bent on death, which i will mostly not share (but i do suggest reading 'an ethic for Christians and other aliens in a strange land' by william stringfellow). but i do want to say a few things.

i do believe that all things are moving towards death. that is the fall. i do believe that humanity is helpless to stop it. and i do believe that Jesus Christ, the resurrected Son of God, will return and redeem all things. i believe that there will be a new Jerusalem, a new heaven and a new earth. and there are a lot of different perspectives out there. some believe that we can save things (something, anything), that if we work hard enough and convince enough people, we can stop the madness, end the chaos, restore peace. some have resigned themselves to the hopelessness a bit too much and think that those who are saved (by Christ, by grace, through faith) just have to wait around and make do, that Christ will come and fix everything, that the only thing that matters is telling people about Jesus so that they too can be saved when He returns in judgment.

i don't know exactly what i believe. i cannot be quick to say that i understand the Gospel of Jesus Christ. i am a fairly unconfident reader of the Gospels, a fairly unconfident follower of Christ (would i lay down my life? would i give up everything? ). Christ asks why i worry, and yet i worry. He says to forgive, and yet i hold grievances. i do believe, however, that the Gospel is Hope. if it is nothing else, it is Hope. Christ will return. Christ will save. Christ will forgive. Christ will free. and if He will, He has. if His Kingdom will exist, it does exist. i believe that the Church of Jesus Christ has become that Hope, present in this broken world. we, Christ's followers, His body, are to become the source of that Hope for the world, the image of Christ in this world, the model of his Kingdom come. we are not to be as the world, but as Christ. i wish that i could explain that better.

i don't have much reason to go to haiti. truthfully, i believe that God has led me there. i don't know why. and i don't have much purpose for going to haiti. i have little confidence that i can accomplish much. i can't help haiti. i can't help the 1.2 million orphans there. i can't end the poverty or the violence or the hunger. but i can be a light. i can be a source of Hope. i can hold a few orphans and play with a few orphans, i can build a few things and plant a few seeds and pull a few weeds. i can give up my life for the sake of Christ because i have Hope in redemption. and i can say that. and i can show that.