China: The New White Man

America is often seen as the arrogant international police, selectively enforcing its views of human rights, waging its Just Wars over oil fields, and ridding the world of its Axis of Evil, one dictator at a time. The Muslim world hates us, our immodesty, and our Zionism. Latin America grudgingly acknowledges its powerful big brother. Africa takes our handouts and confounds our understanding of development. Europe can't understand our strange marriage of religion and politics. And Asia eyes us jealously, waiting for the day the aces shift from the West to the East.

I mentioned China becoming the new World Superpower in the upcoming years, and a friend mentioned that he was excited for America to lose its spot on top.

I questioned whether or not having China on top would be much better.

Now, I'm no IR major or Sinologist, but I am a general pessimist when it comes to the prospects of China becoming an intrinsically motivated positive player on the world stage.

Numerous reasons for this exist. China's power comes from its enormous and exponentially growing economic clout. Since China opened up in the '80s, its tentacles have made significant inroads not only in Western countries, but developing countries and nations with unstable governments as well. Culturally, the accumulation of pelf is of enormous importance to the Chinese. How one attains that wealth, as those familiar with "Chinese Characteristics" will attest, is not subject to a moral standard of integrity. Politically, China's past isolationist attitude and current non-interventionist policies do nothing to abet peace (ex. Sudan and Burma). China has no intentions of leveraging economic clout to bring about stability. In line with stereotypical Chinese business practices, little concern is given to the "lao bai xing," the normal Joes who are affected by cutthroat competition. Much like colonialism and imperialism raped Africa of its resources, China is systematically taking advantage of Africa by what would be equivalent to economic extraterritoriality in African natural resources.

As an example, much of the Chinese mentality of doing business is already heavily ingrained in South East Asia. In Africa, it is the Mzungu (white man) who is viewed as the privileged and powerful minority. In South East Asia, the ethnic Chinese are powerful minorities who live a high life in walled compounds, hire indigenous servants, quite reminiscent of the despised wealth of Mzungus in Africa (which led to purges in places like the Belgian Congo). As terrible as it was for the Chinese, it's no wonder that Indonesia erupted with anti-Chinese riots in the 90's. (Interestingly, the ethnic Chinese are also oftentimes associated with Christianity in these countries.)

For those who know the Chinese perspective of the world, it is hardly a secret that the Chinese are a very proud people. The Chinese have not forgotten their humiliation in the early 1900s by the foreign powers. In many ways, China's show for the world via the Olympics is not about world peace or brotherhood. "One world, One dream" is lip service. The real Olympic tagline should be, "One China, One Power, biotch." It's about Chinese face, and proving to the world that China has finally come of age. Some might point to China's investment in nuclear talks with North Korea, or its previous (but few) deployments of PLA soldiers for humanitarian work, or its changes towards human rights as encouraging. One must notice, however, that in most cases, China either has vested interest in a positive outcome (e.g. North Korea), must deal with an issue because it's causing internal discontent, or is pressured and shamed by foreign powers (in regards to human rights). I wonder what positive international change can come when China becomes top dog and other countries have little leverage over it, since China in its current state seems to lack most parts of the humanitarian/peace/justice engine on cultural, moral, philosophical, theological, and political levels. Democracy and human rights are hardly their worries.

China will certainly play an increasingly enormous role in the world. But I have very little hope that much positive change will come with China's ascent.

Jesus, my Opiate.

“We may even discover that much of our image of God, and even our reasons for coming to religious faith, have psychological roots. To discover such things creates a great deal of anxiety and can even shake one’s faith. A faith unexamined, however, always runs the risk of being a faith in idols rather than a faith in God.” –Dr. Michael Mangis

We have lived under auspices of modernity and Fundamentalism for so long that most of us have grown up with this need to be “objective” and absolute with our faith. Our churches, the tracts we hand out, the apologetic books we read exist to solidify certainty in our minds, that our faith is logical and worth believing apart from our own needs, able to stand empirically against the “demons” of post-modernity, evolution, and moral decay. We defend our faith against statements like, “Religion is the opiate of the masses,” because it paints us as needy people, and we sure as hell don’t want to be viewed as weak by the world.

The more honest I am with myself, the more I realize I am not objective. Everything I think, say, and do is affected by my experiences, culture, and upbringing. It’s about time that the myth of objectivity lies down to die.

We are so fond of saying, “There’s a God-shaped hole inside of everyone.” Is it so scary to admit that the God-shaped hole might be partly psychological in nature? Is it so wrong to admit that we are indeed weak, and that God is simultaneously our Lord and opiate? Why does it offend our sense of competency to confess that we could not breath without Him? (After all, don’t all things hold together in Christ?) Does our brokenness and need for love and community necessarily make God any less real? The more I know about myself, the more I must confess that I am not strong, but that it is only His grace that is sufficient. It is His strength in my weakness. Actually, I believe that we are all weak. Some of us merely choose to acknowledge it.

In attempting to reconcile the “hermeneutic of suspicion” (recognizing that we are not capable of objectivity) with some Christian absolute truth, Dr. Mangis says the following: “A Christian hermeneutic of humility and confidence, therefore, will answer yes to the first question- there is an authoritative heart of truth- but will answer no to the second- we cannot know that truth with objectivity.” We then, as Christians, are in the pursuit of that truth, but cannot know it absolutely until we see Him face to face, since, “Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.” (1 Cor 13:12). We live in the process of coming to know the truth.

In the end, the person and work of Jesus Christ is whom we hang onto. It is the one thing that I know. As Paul said, “I resolved to know nothing while I was with you except Jesus Christ and him crucified.”

A quote from my journal:

“I’m so glad for Jesus. He keeps my feet grounded and my heart floating. He calls me to stay away from dwelling long in self-pity or anger. He calls me to lift my eyes beyond myself and shows me that there is more to this world than me. His love anchors me when my emotions throw me about. He is unchanging, yet our dynamic relationship is never stale. He is my Lord, for whom I am thankful.”

An Open Apology to My Sisters

There is guilt that comes along with being a guy. The guilt exists because of the recognition of what so many of my sisters go through... the burdens they carry in trying to achieve attractiveness according to society’s impossible standards, all because that’s what they think they need to be in order to be liked by people, including us “men,” who also agree with what we see on TV and magazines and pornography.

I feel guilty because I know what these images do to women... I can only imagine the feelings of inadequacy and personal dissatisfaction when they compare themselves against the 5’10” model that weighs 115 pounds. And yet, this is what we are trained to be attracted to. I feel guilty because as much as I desire to honor women, there is this dark part of me that has imbibed in objectifying them and dehumanizing them.

And we men... we so actively participate in it, with our words, who we give attention to, who we look at and smile at... how we cold shoulder those we consider to be unattractive.

We see the results of our sin, in women trying to win our approval with their bodies, in the process selling themselves as less than they are. My friends compliment each other on their thinness, or we in our naitivite, try to affirm women with, “On you look nice today!” all the while not knowing that those compliments are reinforcing destructive behaviors among themselves. We talk about personal worth apart from weight and attractiveness, yet that is how so many women, view themselves... that’s how we men view women.

All the while, we men... we sad excuses of brothers, are guilty as hell. I don’t even need to mention the rape, abuse or other sins we commit. It simply saddens me to watch modesty give way to skin, though it undeniably catches my eye. It’s hard to accept that the reason we find a girl physically attractive is because she cares so much about what other people think that she would throw up her last meal (or not eat it at all) to retain her size and shape. I feel as if my attraction silently condones and approves the ways in which women hurt themselves and are hurt by the world. I feel as if in recognizing the sin that runs in me, I cannot vehemently condemn it as it deserves because it crouches at my own door.

I want so badly to be a real blessing to women... to fight against the structures that chip away at their Imago Dei. Yet I participate so deeply in spoken and unspoken ways that oppress them.

I’m sorry sisters, for being such shitty brothers to you. Please show us grace. Please don’t give up on us. Christ is in the business of making us new, is He not?

I'm sorry that this is the most I can offer.

Colbert Gets Psychologically Theological

Oh, and Happy Valentine's day. I'm going to try to fight my cynicism.

I Can't Stop Thinking About Sex

Actually, I can't stop thinking about sexuality, who we are as men and women, what intimacy and love mean, identity and security, partly because I'm taking Psychology of Sexuality, but partly because these topics have always interested me. I mean, how can they not? Each of those affect us deeply. It would certainly be in our best interest to better understand the relationships between all those complex subjects, if only for our own sake.

No small thanks to my time in China working with a sexual education curriculum, I seem to have acquired a high degree of tolerance when speaking about issues of sexuality. So, I don't intend to mince words. You have been warned.

I try to avoid pornography. I don't need to go into details about how it seriously messes with men's minds and contemptuously degrades women. (For the former, take Dr. Struthers' Men and Addictions class, or read his book on that topic, almost in print). Though concerning the latter, I am a strict affirmer of aesthetic beauty. There are those of us who are slightly more sensitive to the color of a note or the sound of snowfall. We are winded by nature and can be stopped cold with a painting. I affirm physical beauty in creation as God given, and I echo His statement that "It is good." Asceticism? Hell no.

However, in my bittorrent client (don't worry, if you don't know what that is, it doesn't matter) which I frequently use, the most popular and highest rated files are often those of a soft-core pornographic nature. At best, someone can try to legitimize it by saying, "But I'm simply admiring beauty!" At worst, obviously, there is no excuse except lust. Now, I affirm the physical beauty in women. But lest an analogy goes awry, women are not simply a painting to be gawked at. Our physical selves are simply an aspect of who we are. (I have much more to say about the affirmation of physical beauty in relation to who we are as holistic people, but I'll save that for another day). Perhaps I've been primed to be more keen towards issues of gender, relationships and sexuality since taking the class, but here are a few of my recent thoughts and observations.

Scenario one. I recently watched the French movie "Amelie," which, by the way, was incredible. However, despite its beauty, its view towards sexuality rubbed me the wrong way. Aside from a rather blasé and irreverent view towards sex during most of the movie, a relationship between two strangers is symbolically and literally epitomized using sex as the culmination of intimacy. (If you haven't noticed, that's pretty much the norm in the media's understanding of sex).

Scenario two. I watched the movie "Once," also an unforgettable movie with an intense soundtrack. In this case, the lead character asks to sleep with the girl he just met because he was lonely, causing tension between them for the rest of the movie.

Scenario three. I watched "Juno," a witty and enjoyable movie as well. However, the sex was so out of place and immature, there was no beauty in it, just awkwardness.

Those scenarios all suffer from a common malady, namely a truncated view of sexual intimacy. First, our view towards sexuality suffers from the same disease that plagues the rest of our lives, namely, compartmentalization. We talk about sex as an isolated act. In an attempt to affirm its sanctity, we Christians have elevated it so high on this pedestal that it has become detached from the realities of every day life. It is recognized as pertinent to our nitty gritty existence only so far as to prevent it from happening before marriage. We fail to realize that our sexuality and desires for intimacy go beyond simply the reproductive act of sex, but is rooted in the very core of who we are as men and women, created to live in relationship.

Secondly, sex, I think, has become a sort of idol in Christian circles. "Christian locker room talk" would have me believe that the wedding night will be the most ecstatic and satisfying night of my life. This distorted ideation fails to recognize the complexity of intimacy. I don't believe that sex is the end-all-be-all of intimacy. It is (or rather, should be) a deep manifestation of it, yet the depth of our sexuality and relationships are not limited to sex. Though I am surrounded by gender stereotypes, I find it hard to believe that men are only sex-driven automatons guided by their unwavering desire for phallic satisfaction. In fact, I believe it is this truncated view of sexuality that has deprived us of the opportunity to express and experience intimacy in ways that don't require us to take off our pants.

Pornography, sex without commitment, mechanistic views of sex, all those things bother me because they lack the true intimacy between a man and a woman that makes for a healthy view of sex. In regards to pornography, it elevates, de-contexualizes, and adulterates one aspect of femininity, as if there is nothing more to a woman than her body. It is an ugly excuse for a cheap and broken version of something that is extremely costly but deeply beautiful. However, on the Christian side, idolization of sex, a lack of acknowledgment concerning sexuality, compartmentalization and over-simplification of sexuality might almost be just as harmful. Instead of providing a forum in which men and women can safely explore and discover their identities and relationships with one another as amazingly complex creations, our Christian culture seems content in expounding the dangers of premarital sex. Wouldn't relationships be richer and our lives fuller if the church spent more time encouraging a healthy holistic sexuality? Wouldn't our families be more whole if we went into marriage without fears caused by distorted views and unspoken expectations? Wouldn't it be beautiful to embrace and be at home in the bodies and minds the Lord has given us?

In the end, sex and sexuality cannot be spoken of outside of "the other," as no relational aspect of our lives can. I'll end my rambling with a little note I sent a recently engaged friend who grew up in a broken family:

"There's a hope that the relationships we get ourselves into will turn out better than the ones we grew up in. There's a hope that our marriages will make a family that brings joy, not frustration and pain.

"Here's to hoping eh? Here's to the grace of God and the power of the Holy Spirit that breaks the power of environment, our past, and ourselves. Here's to him who makes all things new."