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Intellectual History of Human Rights

I'm beginning my final term at Regent College this coming Monday. It's quite shocking to realize that I've nearly completed my Masters degree in Christian Studies. It was two years ago now, in January of 2009, that Danae and I uprooted our life in Sisters, OR, and moved up north to Vancouver, B.C. to begin our studies. The time has been rich and full, and has passed quite quickly.

Part of the graduation requirements in my degree program at Regent include something called a Comprehensive (Comps) paper in which the student defines an area of study and then works under the guidance of one or two professors to read widely and produce a 30-50 page paper. I've elected to do my Comps on the Intellectual History of Human Rights. I've decided to break the area up into "core samples" in various time periods in order to try and understand how the idea of human rights came into existence. It's a massive undertaking, and I'm quite intimidated by the size of the project that I've bitten off. Nevertheless, I feel it's an area of incredible importance, especially as Western culture shifts more and more into a postmodern mindset, and the basis for clearly defined "rights and wrongs" erodes.

Here is my reading list for my Comps paper:

General Reading on Justice, Rights and Selfhood
     -Justice: Rights and Wrongs by Nicholas Wolterstorff
     -Until Justice & Peace Embrace by Nicholas Wolterstorff
     -After Virtue by Alisdair McEntyre
     -Whose Justice, Which Rationality? By Alisdair McEntyre
     -After you Believe by N.T. Wright
     -Sources of the Self by Charles Taylor


Old Testament
     -Journey to the Common Good by Walter Brueggemann
     -Old Testament Ethics for the People of God by Christopher Wright


New Testament
     -The Moral Vision of the New Testament by Richard B. Hays

Church Fathers
     -On Wealth and Poverty by John Chrysostom

Early Medieval Period
     -The idea of natural rights: studies on natural rights, natural law, and church law, 1150-1625
     by Brian Tierney

An Alternative Perspective
     -Various Essays by Stanley Hauerwass & William Cavanaugh
     -The One, The Three, And the Many by Colin Gunton
     -Culture of Narcissism by Christopher Nash


If anybody else has been reading these books, please post here and let me know your thoughts on them!

Grace and Peace.

-Mike

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National Hunger and Homelessness Awareness Month

November is "National Hunger and Homelessness Awareness Month," and the week before Thanksgiving (November 14-20) has been officially christened "National Hunger and Homelessness Awareness Week." I find it especially poignant that the National Coalition for the Homeless has chosen to raise awareness regarding some of our nation's poorest people the week before most American will stuff themselves senseless with turkey or ham, mashed potatoes, pumpkin pie and whatever else constitutes the typical Thanksgiving Day meal. Don't get me wrong: I'm in full support of celebratory feasts shared between close family and friends, especially those that foster true gratitude. But may the reality that some 700,000 men, women and children will be categorized as "homeless" while the rest of us are celebrating with our loved ones not only make us all the more thankful if we don't find ourselves in that situation but also motivate us to begin working with and on behalf of those who might spend this Thanksgiving sleeping in a car.

We all know that the past few years have been very hard for many people financially. National unemployment continues to hover just above 9%, not much lower than it was in November, 2009. This reality is playing itself out in the homeless community. As I work with various organizations across the country I continue to hear similar stories: a growing number of people are homeless for the very first time (mainly because of a loss of job and an inability to pay rent / mortgage), there is an increasing number of homeless children and youth (when a single mother of three gets evicted from her apartment the adult homeless population rises by one while the youth homeless population rises by three), and it is becoming harder for people to transition out of rehabilitation programs because the job market is becoming more competitive. The situation cries out for those of us who are not homeless to respond in a compassionate, sustained, and mindful manner.

Thus calling attention to the plight of the three million people (1% of the United States' population) who will be homeless in the next calendar year through the National Hunger and Homelessness Awareness Month is a worthwhile thing to do. And yet my hope is that people will do more than just read some statistics and offer some lip service to our Nation's poorest citizens. A more compassionate, sustained and mindful response might include developing a long term relationship with the people who utilize the services of your local AGRM shelter, advocating for increased alignment between "minimum wage" and "living wage" within your local municipality, encouraging local business owners to consider employing recent rehabilitation program graduates in their workforce, and encouraging your local church to provide overnight housing at least one night per week during the winter months.

So enjoy your Thanksgiving feast this year (I certainly will!). But let me encourage you to pause between the courses to not only whisper a prayer of thanks to the giver of all good things (, followed soon thereafter by a prayerful plea for guidance regarding how you might be used of God to help someone who is on the streets this year celebrate next Thanksgiving in a home of their own.

-Mike

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