Movement 112
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the magazine of the student christian movement I issue 1,12 | autumn 2OO2<br />
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movement<br />
issue <strong>112</strong> | autumn 2OO2<br />
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MOVEMENI is the termly maglazine of<br />
the Student Christian <strong>Movement</strong>,<br />
distributd free of chatf,e to memberc<br />
and ddicated to an open-minded<br />
ery t o rati o n of Ch ri sti a n ity.<br />
Editor: David Anderson<br />
e: movementmagazine@hotmail.com<br />
Designer: Liam Purcell<br />
Nert copy date:, 22 November<br />
Editorial board: David Anderson, Liam Purcell,<br />
Elinor Mensingh, Marie Pattison, Kate Powell<br />
SCM staff: Co-ordinator Elinor Mensingh; [,nks<br />
Worker Marie Pattison<br />
SCM office: University of Birmingham, Weoley<br />
Park Road, Selly Oak, Birmingham 829 6LL.<br />
t: (O121) 471,2404<br />
f: (O121) 4L4 2969 mark faxes 'FAO SCM'<br />
e: scm@movement.org.uk<br />
Website: www.movement.org.uk<br />
Printed by: Henry Ling Limited, Dorchester<br />
lndividual membership of SCM (includes<br />
<strong>Movement</strong>) costs f,15 per year (t1O if unwaged).<br />
Subscription to <strong>Movement</strong> only costs E7 per year.<br />
Disclaimer: The views expressed in <strong>Movement</strong><br />
are those of the particular author and should not<br />
be taken to be the policy of the Student Christian<br />
<strong>Movement</strong>.<br />
tssN 0306-980x<br />
Charity No. 241896<br />
@ 2002 scM<br />
Dft '-J '-J<br />
It.-itplatform<br />
Robert Cook 3<br />
newsfile 4<br />
diary 6<br />
worldview: globalising resistance David Lasso 7<br />
disarmin$ actions Helen Steven 8<br />
frustration, humiliation, courage David Anderson 9<br />
celebrity theolo$ian Rachel Muers 70<br />
small ritual Steve Collins 7!<br />
movement what is globalisation? C/FOD !2<br />
feature:<br />
gtobatisation globalisation for the $ood of all<br />
Noreena Hertz 74<br />
globalisation and the $ospel<br />
Andrew Bradstock !6<br />
people not profit Katherine Anderson !8<br />
see also... 20<br />
ties and binds Jim Cotter 2!<br />
ecumenism is like riding a bike... Tim Woodcock 22<br />
first amon$ equals Claire Connor 24<br />
the education of desire Kathryn Powell 25<br />
movement the mysteries David Anderson 29<br />
reviews<br />
sacred century Liam Purcell 27<br />
no ordinary child Ethan Black 28<br />
attack of the ctones Kathryn Allan 26<br />
writin{ in the dust David Anderson 30<br />
the serpent 31<br />
Wanted! Student Editor, no experience necessary<br />
<strong>Movement</strong> is put together by an editorial panel including the designer and editor, SCM staff,<br />
and student representatives. There is a vacancy at the moment for a third student representative<br />
on the panel. lf you would like to be involved in deciding the content and themes of<br />
<strong>Movement</strong>,' and could spare one afternoon a term for meetings, e-mail the editor at<br />
movementmaEazine@hotmail.com<br />
Wanted! Articles, teviews, artwork<br />
We want <strong>Movement</strong> to be as open as possible. All your ideas are welcome. Have you got somethin$<br />
to say? An issue you want explored? Ever fancied yourself as a writer?<br />
Send your articles and ideas, or just your details if you'd like to write for us in the future, to the editor<br />
at movementma{azine@hotmail.com. All submissions will be considered by our editorial board.
platform<br />
anythin€ Soes<br />
do we need creeds?<br />
{<br />
I'll lay my cards on the table. I am<br />
actually a bit of a conformist. I have<br />
grown to be intolerant of those choosing<br />
to be different or radical merely for the<br />
sake of that label: we should have well<br />
thought-out reasons for being different. I<br />
firmly believe that achieving Ghristian<br />
unity is a duty we cannot afford to shirk.<br />
We all need to come to our own conclusions<br />
about the truth of the Christian<br />
message, but we should seek the truth,<br />
not just what we find appealing, and<br />
when we believe we have found the truth,<br />
be able to profess it with others.<br />
My problem is this: all too often in our secular<br />
culture we are encouraged to choose what we<br />
individually want, to be consumers. From a<br />
religious perspective this translates into<br />
exploration of a lonely kind, perhaps selfseeking<br />
and perhaps self-styling, but certainly<br />
looking for what fits with our intellectual and<br />
emotional whims, such as a desire simply to be<br />
different. Satisfying our personal desires and<br />
'doing' religion alone is not what Christianity is<br />
about.<br />
Perhaps the part of my faith most in conflict<br />
with the rise of self-styled religion is the creed.<br />
Creeds proclaim a complete truth, a full<br />
statement of faith, which is inflexible and<br />
potentially exclusive. Who better for me to turn<br />
to then than Cyril of Jerusalem? Writing around<br />
AD350, he said of the creed:<br />
'This synthesis of faith was not made to be<br />
agreeable to human opinions, but to present<br />
the one teaching of the faith in its totality, in<br />
which what is of greatest importance is<br />
gathered together from all the scriptures'.<br />
Harsh words maybe. However, on balance I<br />
am inclined to agree with Cyril's sentiments<br />
and feel I should set out why.<br />
Christianity is at heart an outward-looking,<br />
corporate faith: it believes in worshipping with<br />
others, professing belief in front of others and<br />
extending God's love out to others. There is a<br />
vital role for private reflection and prayer, but<br />
equally something is crucially missing without<br />
the collective aspect to worship. lf you want a<br />
biblical imperative for it, look no further than<br />
'when two or three are gathered in my name'.<br />
However, sitting around in a room with others<br />
who wish to meditate on spirituality can never<br />
amount to collective worship: it does not affirm<br />
the 'we believe'. There is something magnificent<br />
about all confessing the same truth: the total is<br />
greater than the sum of the parts. This cannot be<br />
accomplished by many private worshippers in one<br />
place. Creeds are vital in enabling us to engage in<br />
collective Christian worship. Most obviously, the<br />
creed is never prayed individually: it is our most<br />
important collective statement of unified belief.<br />
More subtly, a creed provides a clear framework<br />
around which we can grow in faith and<br />
understanding.<br />
the creed is never prayed individually:<br />
it is our most important collective<br />
statement of unified belief<br />
I do not deny that formal doctrines such as<br />
creeds have been used to carry out unacceptable<br />
acts of persecution and may still be<br />
unfairly used to exclude some people from<br />
genuine religious searching. This is completely<br />
wrong, but used properly, personal exploration<br />
can be enabled rather than stifled by creeds.<br />
Creeds act as a framework, creating a space<br />
around which personal reflection can take<br />
place. We need some sort of structure to<br />
develop our faith around. Without a reference<br />
point no-one would know where to start<br />
exploring or where to focus discussion.<br />
Religious dialogue would descend into anarchy<br />
and collective worship would be doomed to fail.<br />
It is only realistic to expect that people will have<br />
differing opinions on matters of faith, yet if we<br />
believe it is our duty to work towards Christian<br />
unity, we need to look for and uphold some sort<br />
of 'Christian denominator' which enables fruitful<br />
discussion to take place, working towards<br />
reconcili ng differences.<br />
A creed not only provides a clear reference<br />
point for debate, but since it is backed up by<br />
threefold authority: the Bible; centuries of<br />
theological debate; and the work of the Holy<br />
Spirit, it provides the closest approximation we<br />
can hope for to a common denominator that is<br />
substantial enough to provide the framework we<br />
need.<br />
ln the necessary quest for a personal faith<br />
there is a fine line between satisf,ing a requirement<br />
that we have thought deeply about our<br />
faith and developing a self-styled religion,<br />
pandering to our own whims. Creeds act as a<br />
vital counterbalance to this danger and enable<br />
us to worship together meaningfully, as our<br />
faith requires. I<br />
Robert Gook<br />
. Robert Cook 13 a student<br />
at O)dord Unlversity and<br />
Warwlck Chrbtlan Focu3.<br />
movement l3
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a new face<br />
Hi, I'm Rebecca, and I'm SCM's new office administrator. I started<br />
work on 12 August. For now, here's a quick guide to me so far:<br />
Full name: Rebecca Frances<br />
Hawthorne<br />
Date of birth: 2 January 1981- (mY Mum<br />
swears blind she got me in<br />
the January sales!)<br />
Brutrers & sisters: none, unless you count the<br />
cats!<br />
Height: 5'10'<br />
Eye colour: blue<br />
Hair:<br />
brown and (very) curly<br />
Favourite colour: yellow<br />
Favourite Teletubby: Laa - Laa<br />
Likes: bare feet, Star Trek Voyagler, sleeping, Abba'<br />
kids, Birmingham (call me weird), dinosaurs,<br />
cats, lona music, trains<br />
Dislikes: wearing shoes, fish, long car journeys, Jim Carrey<br />
films (exceplThe Truman Show), clubbing<br />
Education: Three Bridges First School, Dunottar School<br />
(Reigate), Birmingham University (studied maths)<br />
Religion:<br />
Brought up Anglican. St Barnabas Church<br />
(Crawley), Church of the Holy Family (Crawley),<br />
Birmingham UniAngsoc<br />
At university: Many things to Angsoc, including Chair. General<br />
hanger-on and troublemaker to Methsoc. Cause<br />
of confusion to several chaplains. Co-cause of<br />
chaos last Freshers'!<br />
! hope this helps give you an idea of who I am, and I look forward to<br />
meeting some of you in Person!<br />
editorial changies<br />
This issue of <strong>Movement</strong> has been put together by Acting Editor David<br />
Anderson, who has done a marvellous job of pulling together all the<br />
material from a range of contributors before his deadlines.<br />
From issue 113, the new editor of <strong>Movement</strong> will be Liam Purcell' Liam<br />
has been the designer of <strong>Movement</strong> for three issues, which means that<br />
he's been responsible for jobs such as fitting two thousand word articles<br />
onto one and a half pages with pictures, and finding photos for the back<br />
cover. He is an avid fan of Emma Bunton and his favourite television<br />
program is Watercolour Challenge. To find out if some, all or any of this<br />
is true, watch this sPace neK time.<br />
Liam would like to hear from anyone interested in writing articles or<br />
reviews tor <strong>Movement</strong>. See page 2 for contact details'<br />
Quick Questions<br />
What's your favourite Possession?<br />
My jeans with a dinosaur and my name stuck on<br />
What are you reading at the moment?<br />
Just flnished The Most Arnazing Man Who Ever<br />
Lived by Robert Rankin, and about to start<br />
Suddenly he thinks he's a Sunbeam by Adey<br />
Grummet<br />
What is your favourite film?<br />
Ghost<br />
How do you relar€<br />
Sleepl Or flnd the nearest person who'll give me a<br />
hug<br />
What's your favourite journeY?<br />
A long train journey with a gfoup of ftiends -<br />
Birmingham to lona was Pretty good<br />
What do you like most about yourself?<br />
Creativity<br />
What do you dislike about Yourself?<br />
My very bad sense of directionl<br />
What's your fuvourite word?<br />
I could tell you, but then everyone would be able<br />
to access my e-mail!<br />
lf you could be someone else who would it<br />
be?<br />
When I was little I always wanted to be a trapeze<br />
artist, but now I think maybe someone who can<br />
sing really well - Maddy Prtor perhaps<br />
When did you last cry?<br />
Tears of joy when SCM gave me a job!<br />
What are you scared of?<br />
Fish and snakes<br />
What do you never miss on W?<br />
Star Trek Voyager, although I have most of the<br />
videos, so I don't really mind missing it too much!<br />
What music do you listen to most?<br />
At the moment it's folky stuff, Steeleye Span'<br />
Wateson Carthy, Pentangle. Plus the odd musical<br />
- Cats, Godspell, Joseph<br />
What pet hates do you have?<br />
Car drivers who don't respect cyclists<br />
What would your motto for lMng be?<br />
Never grow upl<br />
4lmovement
Created in God's imaSe?<br />
6-13 April, Amsterdam<br />
ln an 'A€ree/Disagree With The<br />
Statement' activity a Nonrve$an<br />
participant rcvealed her sexuality.<br />
She was lesbian, and some of tre<br />
other participants were clearly<br />
intrigued. lt was the WSCF<br />
Eurcpean Gonfiercnce on 'Body and<br />
Crende/ and alrcady on the opening<br />
day itwas clear hordiverce opinion<br />
in the eFoup was goin€lto be.<br />
The group was of diverse nationality:<br />
it consisted of people from Romania,<br />
Hungary, Slovakia, Sweden, Denmark,<br />
Italy, Finland, Norway, Belarus,<br />
Estonia, the UK, and Germany, and a<br />
number from Amsterdam, the host<br />
city of the conference. The conference<br />
itself was a week-long<br />
discussion of a variety of issues<br />
relating to body and gender and<br />
Christianity. There were also more<br />
subtle elements to the conference<br />
which reinforced the topic being<br />
discussed: it was a period of fasting<br />
for the Orthodox Christians so most of<br />
the food was vegan, which added an<br />
interesting element to the seminar on<br />
the body and denial.<br />
The day always started with worship,<br />
which was on a different theme every<br />
morning and every evening (from<br />
Catholic to Queer, Women to<br />
Lutheran). We then generally had<br />
inputs or debates, coffee breaks,<br />
lunch, small group meetings,<br />
workshops, free time, dinner and then<br />
worship again. The evening officially<br />
concluded with a more informal<br />
activity (such as a cultural evening,<br />
Dutch evening or film evening).<br />
Four people from very diverse<br />
backgrounds spoke at the conference.<br />
The first speaker was Trees Versteegen<br />
- a Dutch'theolo$an who described<br />
herself as Catholic and Lesbian. She<br />
proposed an intricate understanding of<br />
gender and body from a biblical<br />
perspective. A large number of the<br />
participants were studying theologr;<br />
the response to the seminar varied<br />
from celebratory to utter refusal to<br />
accept what she had proposed.<br />
The second speaker was an<br />
Orthodox priest. He discussed the<br />
topic of fasting and its relation to the<br />
body. After finishing his talk the<br />
priest was asked some awkward<br />
questions regarding Orthodox denial<br />
of the body, and even the concept of<br />
trade justice somehow emerged.<br />
The third speaker was Luca Negro;<br />
an ltalian representing an<br />
ecumenical movement. We looked at<br />
the use of the body in worship in<br />
various denominations: from gesticulations<br />
to fasting, and from Holy<br />
Communion to waving hands in the<br />
air whilst worshipping.<br />
The fourth and final input from<br />
Katrin Rogge was entitled<br />
'Transformed Bodies'. ln it we<br />
investigated trans-gendering, and<br />
the transformation of the body by<br />
use of artificial implants. By far the<br />
most eye-opening input, by all<br />
meanings of the word.<br />
Workshops were less controversial<br />
and more creative. Perhaps the most<br />
significant workshop was on AIDS in<br />
Africa, led by an AIDS worker from<br />
Uganda. AIDS awareness was central<br />
to the week long conference, and we<br />
were $ven the task of designing the<br />
European part of a global banner which<br />
was going to be displayed at the next<br />
global WSCF conference, July 2003.<br />
Evaluation at the end of the week<br />
exposed a number of interesting<br />
issues: participants, particularly from<br />
NEWS<br />
Eastern Europe, commented that the<br />
liberal stance dominated the<br />
discourse and they felt their more<br />
conservative opinion was instantly<br />
dismissed. The situation might have<br />
been very different if the Orthodox<br />
Christians hadn't been fasting. One<br />
Romanian stated early on in the<br />
conference that he was unhappy with<br />
the opinions being expressed and<br />
questioned their biblical groundings,<br />
but that it was part of Orthodox<br />
fasting to be at peace with those<br />
around you. Even so, concluding<br />
meetings suggested most people felt<br />
they had learned a lot from the<br />
conference, and those I got to know<br />
well during the conference certainly<br />
felt blessed by all the people there. I<br />
know I was grateful for the opportunity<br />
to go to the conference and I<br />
met people from many different<br />
backgrounds, who had some<br />
wonderful understandings of<br />
Christianity and love. So I would<br />
strongly recommend that students<br />
involved in SCM attend WSCF Europe<br />
conferences in the future. British<br />
participants, I was told, have been in<br />
demand at the conferences; do think<br />
about going to the next one. I won't<br />
deny I had a strong feeling of<br />
trepidation about attending, but it<br />
was a wonderful experience - many<br />
thanks again to the British SCM for<br />
the opportunity.<br />
Mark McDonald<br />
SCM is affiliated to WSCF (World Student Christian Federation),<br />
and has money set aside to help students towards the costs of attending WSCF events.<br />
movementl5
NCWS<br />
a hopeful protest<br />
politicians<br />
ftom all<br />
parties had<br />
announced<br />
their support<br />
for the lobby,<br />
while failing<br />
to notice<br />
that the<br />
prutesterc<br />
werc against<br />
unrcgulated<br />
access to<br />
developing<br />
ma*ets by<br />
multinational<br />
companies<br />
Trade Justice <strong>Movement</strong> mass lobby of<br />
Parliament, Wednesday 19 June<br />
You don't often find ecumenical services<br />
turnin$ people away. But there was a<br />
queue of people for the service at the<br />
Emmanuel Gentre at L2.45 to mark the<br />
mass lobby of parliament for Trade<br />
Justice, and the stewards were havin$ to<br />
do just that. Visitors were still allowed<br />
inside the building to look at the stalls<br />
staffed by various aid aelencies, and to<br />
buy fairly traded coffee. The other option<br />
was to travel down the road and wait<br />
outside Methodist Gentral Hall for the<br />
main meetin$.<br />
Nine members of SCM attended, proMding a<br />
small but earnest addition to the 12,000<br />
lobblsts from all over the country. The Lobby<br />
was protesting against the maintenance of<br />
subsidies protecting goods fiom First World<br />
countries, and against measures insisting on<br />
unregulated access by First World companies to<br />
markets in goods and seruices in poorer<br />
countries. We did discover that Methodist<br />
Central Hall still makes things slightly awkward<br />
for wheelchair users; we had to trek round poorly<br />
signposted conidors round the back only to find<br />
that wheelchairc were not allowed in the main<br />
hall due to fire regulations. This sliglttly soured<br />
the occasion. Those of us who were in the main<br />
hall, and not listening ftom the doorway, heard<br />
that politicians ftom all main parties had loudly<br />
announced their support for the lobby, while<br />
failing to notice that the protesters were against<br />
unregulated access to developing markets by<br />
multinational companies.<br />
After the speeches, the SCM party had to<br />
split up as the lobbyists left the hall by region<br />
of the country. Protesters lined the banks of<br />
the Thames in a queue stretching round from<br />
the Houses of Parliament, down Millbank,<br />
over Lambeth Brid$e, and along the Embankment.<br />
The queue was at times wide enough<br />
to nearly block the path. Many MPs did travel<br />
out to meet their constituents; others sent<br />
parliamentary assistants.<br />
Although most of the SCM party had to catch<br />
trains back home, one or two stayed to listen<br />
to the panels after the event, which discussed<br />
ways forward for the reform movements. The<br />
event was $ven a half-minute mention on the<br />
BBC evening news, even though there were no<br />
arrests and no violence.<br />
I've experienced two kinds of protests: some<br />
seem to be mostly a(ainst something (usually<br />
the US), and some are for something (trade<br />
reform, debt cancellation). The latter seem to<br />
me far more hopeful - althouglr this may be an<br />
effect of the free chocolate on offer. I<br />
David Anderson<br />
Actingi Editor ol <strong>Movement</strong><br />
I<br />
N<br />
21Se@nfier<br />
Global Mo Dry<br />
w.' nrvw. oeaceonedav.otq<br />
18-20 Ocbber<br />
GlP (drudr &ilon on Povottuf lhUod<br />
Goniettnoe<br />
Gaderry Tower, near Edinburgfi<br />
Poverty and ProsperiU - includes rvodahops on<br />
globalisation, sustainabiliB and paltterchip<br />
For more info and online booking:<br />
w,' rwrw' ch urch-oovertv.org. uk<br />
210-.27 0c$ber<br />
OneWorld Wedr<br />
For morc info and to order a padc<br />
w; nrYw.onewor{dweek.org<br />
$t fO ilovember<br />
scn rct<br />
Details to be confirmed.<br />
Gheck website for infonnation.<br />
Tue 3 Deeenbcr<br />
lDeDt m qrr lloolttep Ldon rnd lobby Itry<br />
Westminster and Edinburglt<br />
Speaking out against poverty in the UK.<br />
w; wrnu.debt on-our-doorsteo.com<br />
15 Dccenfier<br />
LGGt Gdol Sonlce<br />
St Botolph's, london<br />
w; www.lgcm.org.uk<br />
6lmovement
worldview<br />
€Iobafibin€ reslbtance<br />
the experience of the 'lnternational Gamp' in Ecuador<br />
Murderers! Murderers! The guard had<br />
shot one of the people taking part in<br />
the lnternational Camp for Di€nity and<br />
Social Justice for the People. The<br />
person was writing graffiti - Abajo el<br />
ALCA ('Down with the F[AA') - on one of<br />
the luxurious walls of the World Trade<br />
Gentre building in Quito. This march<br />
was closing an event in which around<br />
400 people took part, from twenty<br />
countries in Europe, North America,<br />
Latin America and Asia.<br />
the struggle for a better world<br />
must be globalised<br />
The Camp worked from 14 to 20 March in<br />
three Ecuadorian cities simultaneously -<br />
Quito, Lago Agrio and Manta - with the<br />
support of several organisations in Europe<br />
and North America. lts goal: to articulate<br />
forces coming from every corner of the<br />
planet, in order to consolidate a platform to<br />
resist and struggle against the Colombia<br />
Plan, the FTM and any other manifestation of<br />
neo-liberal globalisation. The intention is that<br />
this Camp will not end with the physical<br />
gathering of people in one place, but will<br />
continue to exist as long as it is necessary -<br />
it is, therefore, a permanent space.<br />
From the diversity of thoughts it was stated<br />
that: 'the struggle for a better world must be<br />
globalised'. Young Colombians from the<br />
universities in Bogota, in Valle and Neiva,<br />
young people from Peru, farmers from<br />
Bolivia, activists from ltaly and Germany,<br />
United States artists, journalists from<br />
Venezuela and hundreds of other people<br />
shared their local experiences, their alternative<br />
deyelopment proposals, their<br />
perspectives on dialogue, confrontatlon and<br />
resistance. A small Tower of Babel working in<br />
confusion, and at the same time, recognising<br />
themselves in their exclusion.<br />
CEPAJ (the Ecuadorian Co-ordinator for<br />
Youth Action), the Ecuadorian SCM, was one<br />
of the organisers of the Camp. From outside<br />
and within WSCF (the World Student Christian<br />
Federation), as individuals, as Christians, as<br />
young people, as human beings, we would<br />
like to share with you these thoughts:<br />
. We are concerned when we see how little<br />
we know about the economic, social and<br />
politicalstructures in Latin America. We ask<br />
ourselves: how much do we know about<br />
situations like the Water War in Bolivia, the<br />
Dignity Plan or the Panama Puebla Plan?<br />
. We feel motivated when we see that there<br />
are people informed about the current Latin<br />
American problems, when people organise<br />
themselves and resist together and act<br />
together beyond verbal solidarities.<br />
. We see how complicated it is to build a<br />
continent-wide platform to both resist and<br />
make proposals, and to take the first step<br />
to articulate these proposals in a single<br />
project and a single force.<br />
Most of all, we do not want to accept our<br />
passivity as WSCF. We feel scared when we<br />
see that these problems are not even being<br />
debated, that these mega-projects are not<br />
being taken into account when we make our<br />
plans. We feel scared, but above all it<br />
motivates us to go on working.<br />
One of the results of the Camp was the<br />
creation of the lndependent Media Centre<br />
Ecuador - Indymedia - which will be launched<br />
soon. Although support from the majority of<br />
the population, as far as the protest against<br />
the FTM is concerned, is minimal, the Camp<br />
opened doors and brought us together. There<br />
is still much work to be done with the people:<br />
there is a distance between the protest and<br />
proposals coming from the resistance<br />
groups, and the everyday needs of the<br />
people.<br />
we feel scared when we see that these<br />
problems are not eyen being debated,<br />
but it motivates us to go on working<br />
. Davld lasso ls<br />
Co-ordinator of CEPA,<br />
(SCM Ecuador)<br />
Towards the end of this year, the Trade<br />
Ministers of the Latin American countries<br />
(with the exception of Cuba) are planning to<br />
meet in Quito, Ecuador, to follow up the<br />
negotiations to concretise the FTAA.<br />
Garavans of diversity throughout the country,<br />
meetings of young farmers and the Latin<br />
American Farmers Organisations Coordination<br />
(CLOC), Networks Continental meeting,<br />
and a national mobilisation against the FTM<br />
are expected to confront this megaproject.<br />
And in your country, what's going on?<br />
Davld lasso<br />
movement | 7
disarming actions<br />
disarming actions I<br />
helen steven<br />
ls nonviolence neutral?<br />
Nonviolence<br />
requires the<br />
ability to<br />
view the<br />
opponent as<br />
a human<br />
being, and<br />
to reach out<br />
to that<br />
person<br />
. Helen Steven works at<br />
the Scottish Centre fot<br />
Non-Violence.<br />
8lmovement<br />
During the last ten days of June the Scottish<br />
Centre for Nonviolence will have been<br />
involved in providinE training for a group of<br />
seventeen women who will be going to live<br />
with Palestinian families as part of the<br />
lnternational Women's Peace Service. Their<br />
task is to be a nonviolent presence in the<br />
midst of the desperate conflict between<br />
tsrael and Palestine. As yet their remit is<br />
undefined, but some of their tasks will<br />
include accompanyingl people whose lives<br />
are under threat, observing and<br />
documenting human rights violations' simply<br />
beingl alonElside people as their homes are<br />
searched or destroYed as an act of<br />
solidarity, and possibly participating in direct<br />
action to prevent violence'<br />
It is hard to know vvhere to begin the task of<br />
training for such a challen$ng remit. Obviously a<br />
basic understanding of the underlying principles<br />
of nonviolence will be an integlal part of the<br />
course, as will a thorou$h exploration of the<br />
limits of nonviolence and what kind of actions<br />
ftll within the definition of acceptable nonviolent<br />
action. Time will be spent in role-play, acting out<br />
a variety of possible scenarios, and exploring<br />
issues around fear, trauma and stress.<br />
One fundamental question that will have to<br />
be addressed is that of partisanship. ls it the<br />
role of the nonviolent interventionist to remain<br />
strictly neutral at all times, or is the team<br />
going to take up the cause of the oppressed<br />
Palestinian people and take action alongside<br />
and on their behaF.r Undoubtedly part of the<br />
motivation for going to Palestine in the first<br />
place is to show solidarity, to attempt to<br />
understand their desperate pli$ht and to resist<br />
any form of oppression. Nonviolence does<br />
take sides, and is used as an effective tool for<br />
redressing injustice. Palestinians have been<br />
denied their human riShts ever since the<br />
setting up of the State of lsrael: their land has<br />
been occupied, they are subject to inhumane<br />
conditions as second class citizens, their<br />
people have been killed and exploited, and<br />
their young people are indeed without hope.<br />
Which is precisely the kind of talk that created<br />
such an outcrywhen Chede Blairsaid thatyoung<br />
Palestinians were lMng wtthout hope and that<br />
this was what drove them to become suicide<br />
bombers. So by going to stand alongside the<br />
Palestinian people, is the team showing goss<br />
insensitivity to the fears and suffering of the<br />
lsraeli people, and can they be accused of<br />
condoning the violence of tenorism?<br />
ln the articles I have written to date for<br />
<strong>Movement</strong>, I have repeatedly stressed that the<br />
only way to deal wilh tenorism is to be$n to<br />
understand why people become terrorists, and<br />
what drives people to the desperation of suicide<br />
bombing. This is not to condone violence or<br />
agree with such ways of acting, but it is the<br />
be$nning of an attempt to discover the root<br />
causes of viotence in order to remove them. By<br />
living alongside Palestinian families, the Peace<br />
Team will experience at first hand the pain of<br />
their situation, and may be able to convey some<br />
understanding of this to the outside world.<br />
But nonviolence demands more than this. lt<br />
also requires the ability to view the opponent<br />
as a unique human being, and to reach out to<br />
that person in the belief that transformation is<br />
not only possible, but through one's nonviolent<br />
acts of witness, is already taking place. So<br />
there is a challenge to reach out to the lsraeli<br />
people as well, and to reach a deePer<br />
understanding of their fears and hopes. Not<br />
only does the world need to understand the<br />
plight of the Palestinian people, there is a<br />
deep need for the tra$c fears and insecurities<br />
of the lsraeli people to be heard. They are<br />
living in daily insecurity at the very heart of<br />
their everyday lives, as terror does in truth<br />
stalk the streets. Their right to live unmolested<br />
in their own state is also being eroded, and<br />
both sides feel themselves at the mercy of the<br />
fickleness of the international powers.<br />
Any peace team truly committed to nonviolence<br />
will want to work towards an<br />
understanding of both sides in the conflict.<br />
Some of the bravest activists in the whole tra$c<br />
conflict, who are daily risking their lives, are the<br />
members of the lsraeli peace movement.<br />
members of organisations like Gush Shalom'<br />
who recently won the Swedish Right Livelihood<br />
Award, and who confront the lsraeli government<br />
by symbolic actions, such as painting a<br />
demarcation line at the boundary of the<br />
Occupied Territories; the thousands of young<br />
soldiers who are retusing to figltt if they are<br />
ordered into the West Bank; and many' many<br />
more who form the increasin$y vociferous<br />
peace movement within lsrael. These are the<br />
people who can $ve hope to the young people'<br />
not only of Palestine, but of lsrael as well. lt is<br />
with these groups that the task of peacemaking<br />
must be$n, and this is where the role of nonviolent<br />
solidarity is so crucial.<br />
Partisan, yes, fearlessly resisting oppression<br />
in whatever form it takes; but acting out of a<br />
deep love and respect for all sides of an issue'<br />
and creating the bridge over which people may<br />
cross to peace. I
ftustr atio\ humiliation, cour a$e<br />
students express their solidarity with the oppressed in the occupied territories<br />
On 27 March this year, a group of<br />
students from Sussex University went<br />
out to Palestine, also known as the<br />
Occupied Territories. The day after they<br />
arrived, the lsraeli army drove their<br />
tanks in and placed the West Bank<br />
under military curfew. David Anderson<br />
talked to Dan Glazebrook, who was one<br />
of the students. The interuiew took<br />
place at the end of June.<br />
Dan told me that the group spent ten days in<br />
the West Bank town of Ramallah and then a<br />
couple of days in East Jerusalem at the end of<br />
the trip. The trip had been organised by<br />
Grassroots lnternational, an umbrella organisation<br />
including groups such as Trade Unions,<br />
the Union of Palestinian Women, and the<br />
Union of Palestinian Medical Relief Committees,<br />
that hosts international observers in the<br />
Occupied Territories. They had originally<br />
planned to see Palestinian towns, such as<br />
Ramallah, and refugee camps, and to speak to<br />
people in lsraeli peace organisations - such as<br />
soldiers who were refusing to serue in the<br />
occupied territories - but after the lsraeli<br />
curfew this was impossible. Dan and two<br />
others were staying in a flat owned by the<br />
Union of Palestinian Medical Relief Committees<br />
to house workers who lived in the country<br />
around the town (travelling in every day would<br />
take too long, even in peace time, because of<br />
the road blocks), and were woken the first<br />
morning by the 'nasty screeching sound' of a<br />
military convoy going past, a tank, an APC, and<br />
a bulldozer. For two days, they couldn't leave<br />
the house but on the third day the curfew was<br />
lifted, and the UPMRC ambulances were<br />
returned, minus a driver. (Ihe driver was<br />
released after another three days, having<br />
spent the time stripped, handcuffed and<br />
blindfolded.) The students then agreed to ride<br />
in the ambulances to help distribute food and<br />
first aid p'ackages, thinking that foreign<br />
observers would discourage lsraeli soldiers<br />
from possibly beating the drivers or throwing<br />
the food and medicine onto the road. 'The<br />
ambulances couldn't be used for picking up<br />
the injured because no one was allowed to get<br />
into those areas. One of the nastiest things<br />
about the conflict was that, because they<br />
weren't allowed in, most of the deaths were by<br />
blood loss.' ln the ambulances, they were<br />
stopped pretty much every hour; which meant<br />
they had to get out and unload the ambulance,<br />
they were<br />
woken by<br />
the 'nasty<br />
screeching<br />
sound' of<br />
a military<br />
convoy going<br />
past<br />
most<br />
orgAnisations,<br />
whether<br />
linked to the<br />
Palestinian<br />
Authority or<br />
not, were<br />
targeted for<br />
harassment<br />
and attack<br />
pa lestine<br />
and the students had to show their passports<br />
- this took about half an hour each time. Most<br />
organisations, whether linked to the<br />
Palestinian Authority or not, were targeted for<br />
harassment and attack, Dan said. At one stage<br />
during that week, the office of the Medical<br />
Relief Committees that they were working from<br />
was shelled by a tank: Dan told me that the<br />
only reason no one was killed was that the guy<br />
who was working in the office at the time was<br />
in the toilet. 'lt was quite deliberate, because<br />
it was in a block of flats and it was the only<br />
floor that had been shelled'. ln addition, lsraeli<br />
soldiers used to bring dead bodies to the office<br />
and supply depot on the grounds that it was a<br />
medical organisation.<br />
On the final day, Dan and another Sussex<br />
student, an lsraeli girl, were travelling<br />
together when soldiers stopping them took<br />
their passports, told them to follow them to<br />
the central square where the lsraeli tanks<br />
were parked, and then drove off with the<br />
passports as the ambulance was told to park.<br />
Eventually, after a long wait, during which the<br />
ambulance left, they were told to get in a jeep<br />
and were driven off to a nearby Jewish settlement.<br />
They phoned the British Consulate on<br />
their mobile, and discovered that the army<br />
had told the Consulate that they'd been<br />
arrested, but that they would be released.<br />
After 24 hours, they were given back their<br />
passports and driven to East Jerusalem by the<br />
British Consulate. (They had been planning to<br />
return to East Jerusalem that day anyway.)<br />
They spent a couple of days in East<br />
Jerusalem talking to UN agencies and lsraeli<br />
peace groups. On the last day, Dan and the<br />
lsraeli girl in the group went to West<br />
Jerusalem to see her cousin and some of her<br />
friends, who were about to join the army.<br />
I asked Dan what he'd learned from the<br />
Palestinians.<br />
'The atmosphere at the checkpoints is<br />
one of humiliation, and generally as well;<br />
I don't know if I'd say despair, but frustration,<br />
but also they're quite proud people,<br />
quite courageous. They've no intention of<br />
stopping demonstrations even though<br />
they might be shot in the head. So the<br />
three words that sum it up are frustration,<br />
humiliation, and courage.<br />
It was interesting talking to people about<br />
suicide bombers. They don't call them<br />
suicide bombers; one guy said to me that<br />
suicide is associated with someone who )<br />
movementl9
palestine<br />
the more<br />
people are<br />
humiliated<br />
and<br />
oppressed<br />
the more<br />
they want to<br />
strike back<br />
in some way<br />
. Davld Andorson is ActinGl<br />
Edltor of ,ltovement.<br />
Dan Glazebrook as a<br />
Universlty Palestinian<br />
Solldarlty Campalgn.<br />
People<br />
didn't want<br />
or need to<br />
believe in a<br />
powerful<br />
God who<br />
would zap in<br />
to sort<br />
things out<br />
r€search in theolofly at<br />
Glrton Collegle,<br />
Cambrldgle<br />
has lost their will to live. lt's not to do with<br />
depression or self-hatred; they want to live<br />
freely. They callthem "marlyr attacks". They<br />
have mixed feelings, but certainly when the<br />
invasion took place most people supported<br />
them because there's so little they can do<br />
when tanks are coming into their houses.<br />
Except for some highly Orthodox Jews, and<br />
some lsraelis who refuse to join the army,<br />
almost every lsraeli citizen has served in the<br />
army, so for the Palestinians the distinction<br />
between civilians and army is blurred. Men<br />
in lsrael under the age of fofi can be called<br />
up as reseryists, who are mainly used in the<br />
occupied territories. But the more the<br />
Palestinians are humiliated and oppressed<br />
the more they want to strike back in some<br />
way.<br />
Obviously most Palestinians are not too<br />
fond of Zionism, the idea that there<br />
should be a state on their land that they<br />
were kicked out of, which is always and<br />
only for those of a particular reli$ious<br />
group, which is not them. But most<br />
Palestinians have made this historical<br />
compromise to accept that. They want to<br />
see a Palestinian state on the West Bank<br />
and Gaza, and the checkpoints dismantled<br />
and the settlers to be returned.<br />
Celebrity<br />
Theologian<br />
Dietrich<br />
Bonhoeffer<br />
Oh yes, I've heard of him'<br />
And you've probably seen the movie, read the novel,<br />
noticed the statue outside Westminster Abbey?<br />
Wow, a real celebrity! And I thought he was iust<br />
another of those dead German'speaking men who<br />
created modern theology.<br />
Well, that too. Born 1905, did two doctorates by the time he<br />
was 24, lecturer at the University of Berlin from 1931 to '1933'..<br />
Bit of a whiz kid. So, an illustrious career ahead of<br />
him?<br />
He left his university post in 1933, shortly after his radio<br />
broadcast on why Christians should be suspicious of the<br />
concept of a Fuhrer was cut off midway through. Someone<br />
didn't like what he was saying. They liked it even less when<br />
he became a leader in the 'Confessing Church', resisting the<br />
Nazi takeover of the Cerman Protestant churches and<br />
particularly the exclusion of Jews from the churches.<br />
Not a man to keep his theology and his politics<br />
separate, then.<br />
Bonhoeffer argued that the centrality of Jesus Christ for the<br />
whole of human existence, nature and history meant it was<br />
fundamentally wrong to think in terms of two spheres - the<br />
sacred and the secular, the religious and the political. He<br />
called the attempt to keep faith separate from questions<br />
about how lives are lived 'cheap grace'. The question 'Who is<br />
Jesus Christ for us today?' exemplifies his attitude - thinking<br />
theologically in response to the present situation, and getting<br />
an answer in terms of action and life rather than just theory.<br />
There's a lot of frustration about the<br />
international situation; the lsraeli government<br />
tries fairly successfully to keep<br />
them isolated, so they're very encouraged<br />
to see people like us coming over.'<br />
Dan had had a chance to talk to some<br />
lsraelis at the parly, which he said was<br />
interesting. 'One cousin said that Arafat was<br />
a terrorist and should be kicked out; I said'<br />
"isn't Sharon a terrorist?" and she said, "yes,<br />
he should go too." lt's in a crisis, lsraeli<br />
society, because the lsraeli government has<br />
offered the best deal it's going to offer to<br />
Palestine: a state unlike any other with no<br />
control over the borders, no airspace, with<br />
the settlements and roads between the<br />
settlements remaining under lsraeli control.<br />
The Palestinians feel that if that's the best<br />
they're going to be offered, then they haven't<br />
anything to lose now. The lsraelis feel, "come<br />
on, that was a good offer, and if they're not<br />
going to accept that what can we do?" The<br />
main sticking point I think for many semiprogressive<br />
lsraelis is the ri$ht of return for<br />
refugees, because that would endanger the<br />
Jewish identity of the state, and that's an<br />
unfathomable idea even for many people who<br />
oppose the occupation.' I<br />
Davld Anderson<br />
Sounds like SC/tlt's kind of guY.<br />
Well, it's a bit more complicated than that; on various social<br />
questions he was very conservative. Traditional family<br />
structures, woman's place is in the home.<br />
But isn't he the one all the radical 1960s theologians<br />
quoted?<br />
He wrote about the world 'come of age' - people didn't<br />
need or want to believe in a powerful Cod who would zap<br />
in to sort things out. And Bonhoeffer claimed that that<br />
situation actually enabled people better to understand the<br />
Cod revealed in Christ - who isn't powerful, who's weak<br />
and hidden from the world. What Christianity meant, he<br />
said, was learning to live responsibly without the powerful<br />
God to back you up.<br />
Ah, 'Death of God' and all that.<br />
Yes, though again it's more complicated than that;<br />
Bonhoeffer wasn't suggesting that we reduce theology to<br />
politics or ethics. Unfortunately he never wrote at any<br />
length about his more radical-sounding ideas - they're only<br />
mentioned in the letters he wrote from prison to his friend<br />
Eberhard Bethge.<br />
From prison?<br />
Having been a pacifist in the late 1930s he gradually<br />
changed his position and became involved in a plot to<br />
assassinate Hitler, which failed in )uly 1944.<br />
Doesn't sound like a haPPY ending.<br />
He was executed in a concentration camp in 1945'<br />
But won undying glorY?<br />
Hence the statue outside Westminster Abbey on the frieze<br />
honouring 2Oth-century martyrs. Though note that unlike<br />
many of the others on that frieze he wasn't killed for iust<br />
saying he was a Christian; he was killed for doing what he<br />
thought being a Christian required of him, which was<br />
conspiring to assassinate a head of state.<br />
Hmm, it is complicated' isn't it?<br />
At least Bonhoeffer realised that. I<br />
Rachel Muers
small ritual<br />
small ritual I steve collins<br />
Mountains of the Lord<br />
ln Onboard snowboarding magazine a<br />
couple of years back there was an<br />
article called 'Lands of the Gods',<br />
which ran through the place of<br />
mountains in many of the world's<br />
religions. Except, that is, for<br />
Christianity. Which, given Mount Sinai<br />
and Mount Zion, the Mount of the<br />
Transfiguration and the many biblical<br />
references to 'the mountain of the<br />
Lord', seems strange.<br />
Admittedly none of these sound much like<br />
powder heaven. But Christianity has dropped<br />
out of consideration; it is unknown tenitory<br />
for most of today's spiritual seekers.<br />
They seek a spirituality that will connect<br />
them to the mountains they love and ride; a<br />
sense of belonging, of awe and yet protection.<br />
Perhaps even the assurance that<br />
snowboarding can be an act of worship. How<br />
did Christianity lose the ability to articulate<br />
such things, in ways that make sense to our<br />
culture?<br />
We have a hunger for space. The spaces<br />
in our culture are all closed off, boarded up,<br />
privatised. Our ancestors looked across<br />
empty landscapes, sailed across open seas<br />
under huge skies. Such things seep into the<br />
soul. They are the spaces for which we were<br />
made, and all our attempts at control and<br />
shelter have in the end shut us up in a box<br />
of our own making, too small to breathe.<br />
Such space as is allowed to exist is owned<br />
and sold back to us with conditions<br />
attached. lt has already been determined<br />
how we shall behave.<br />
We find our freedoms are illusory. Before<br />
we even think it, play has become Playru,<br />
with someone else's values built in. The toys<br />
we shall buy are already waiting. The posters<br />
on the walls offer fantasies of escape. But<br />
they are consumerist. You will not escape,<br />
because you will take everything wath you.<br />
The very fact of you going there will<br />
contribute to the destruction of the spaces<br />
you crave. This is Escape*. The space is<br />
already rented on your behalf, commodified<br />
and sold back to you. Your experience has<br />
already been designed.<br />
Snowboarding is as compromised as the<br />
rest. You can barely do it without expensive<br />
branded equipment and clothing. lmages of<br />
snowboarding are used to sell cars and soft<br />
drinks, against the complaints of those who<br />
actually do it. And ironically those ads then<br />
sell snowboarding back to us, as part of the<br />
lifestyle package.<br />
But snowboarding illustrates both compromise<br />
and transcendence. Few people think<br />
about their branding while they're riding.<br />
Piste poseurs miss the point. All that stuff is<br />
just means to an end, mere background. The<br />
promise of a good brand is that it will get you<br />
a little closer to that end a little faster. lt will<br />
get you adventure and fun by technical<br />
specification; it will get you community by<br />
displaying where your head is at.<br />
Snowboarding shows how the physical and<br />
spiritual are inescapably combined. lt tells<br />
us a truth about ourselves that Christianity,<br />
so long tempted by dualism, has often<br />
denied. Bodily experience is a means to<br />
taste God. ln heaven, worship and experience<br />
of God will not be separate activities<br />
from every and any activity of living. Even<br />
now physical actions can both give and<br />
receive of God, without words. The purpose<br />
of words - of the words of God - is to lead<br />
us to the brink where actions take over.<br />
ln our unacknowledged hunger for God we<br />
are drawn to places where we cast aside our<br />
mastery for a moment, situations where we<br />
cannot but be humble. We are small and the<br />
mountain or ocean is vast. lt is beautiful,<br />
but can crush us. For those without<br />
conscious religion, this experience of beauty<br />
and danger is the closest they get to<br />
standing before God. And for those who do<br />
have religion, it may still be the closest they<br />
get in this life to standing before God.<br />
lf all nature illustrates some aspect of its<br />
creator's being, and if physical action<br />
expresses spiritual intent, then riding a<br />
board down a mountain is indeed an<br />
enactment of worship, is indeed a touching<br />
of God, even if the rider has no belief<br />
system to make sense of that act in<br />
conscious language. Prayers are written in<br />
powder fields. The rider seeks to be one with<br />
the world and its maker, not as master but<br />
as lover, embracing and embraced, in<br />
intricate involvement not aloof perspective.<br />
The mountain of the Lord is not an ivory<br />
tower but a place to throw yourself off. I<br />
Snolboading<br />
illustrates<br />
both<br />
GOmprcmise<br />
and<br />
hanscendence<br />
. Steve Gollins is a writel<br />
and web desiElnei in<br />
London<br />
movementlll
feature: global isation<br />
Delegates at $r ,t, t/ s rtlllindow on the World' conference in March<br />
explored the meaning of globalisation and Ghristian responses to it.<br />
Here are some of their thoughts.,,<br />
What<br />
concerns you most<br />
about globallsation?<br />
Using the term globalisation makes<br />
the issues seem like a huge evil monster<br />
but many of the problems can be tackled<br />
in bite sized pieces (like eating an elephant)<br />
The issues of fairness related to trade,<br />
'super-companies' taking over the world<br />
Driven by and in the interests of powerful<br />
states<br />
The inequality between rich & poor &<br />
the fact that it's increasing<br />
What<br />
do you understand<br />
least about<br />
globalisation?<br />
How much is it a natural occunence<br />
and how much it can be controlled and if<br />
so who has power over it<br />
Precisely what it is as it is mainly a buzword<br />
used to describe a variety of<br />
Why everyone rants about it without<br />
understanding it...<br />
This trade stuff - it seems to be<br />
very complicated<br />
What do you<br />
understand by the term<br />
'globallsatlon'?<br />
The way the world is coming together in terms<br />
of communication, travel, and so on; also the 'new<br />
wap of trading, that is, free market economy<br />
l Economics and Trade<br />
2 Communication & Social & Political Affairs<br />
3 A philosophy of interconnectedness - not only as we<br />
interact with other people but also wtth the environment<br />
- and this has always been so. There are spiritual<br />
aspects to discuss - to do with Unity and it could be<br />
thought of as being related to the Gaia philosophy<br />
Closer economic interaction > more political<br />
interaction > cultura/social interchange<br />
The new economic & communications<br />
systems that are 'shrinking the<br />
world'<br />
IYhat<br />
would you like to<br />
find out more about ln<br />
relatlon to globalisation?<br />
Ways to tackle the evil parts of<br />
globalisation<br />
wll it last? stabilise? continue<br />
inexorably?<br />
What are the arguments put fon'vard<br />
by the World Bank & TNCs for what<br />
they do?<br />
Ways to change the current<br />
systems, or alternative<br />
systems<br />
Do<br />
you think there are<br />
any beneflts flowln$ from<br />
globalbatlon? lf so, whati?<br />
Chocolate. Pineapples. Ability to share<br />
knowledge around the world - and stories &<br />
cultures<br />
The coming together of the world; it allows a much<br />
greater sense of $obal community<br />
Yes. - Investment in developing countries is essential'<br />
cultural interchange<br />
A collapse in trade would devastate livelihoods<br />
Means we get bananas and poor people in<br />
Ban$adesh get access to (mobile) phones<br />
Communications technoloA/ improvements<br />
but of course these only benefit<br />
those who are richer (at the<br />
moment?)<br />
12 lmovement
feature: global isation<br />
P<br />
,<br />
CAFOD, Gatholic aid agency and prominent member of the Trade<br />
lustice <strong>Movement</strong>, offer this exploration of globalisation, which is<br />
reproduced from their website lrvlw.cafod.org.uk) by kind permission,<br />
Globalisation describes the<br />
process whereby individuals,<br />
groups, companies and<br />
countries become increasingly<br />
interconnected. This interconnectedness<br />
takes place in<br />
several arenas:<br />
Global logo inc<br />
The inexorable rise of giant<br />
transnational corporations (INCs) lies<br />
at the heart of globalisation. Brand<br />
names, from Nike to Coca-Cola, have<br />
become some of the most widely<br />
recognised images on the planet. Of<br />
the world's top 100 economic<br />
players, 49 are countries and 51 are<br />
corporations. General Motors, Wal-<br />
Mart, Exxon Mobil, and Daimler<br />
Chrysler all have revenues greater<br />
than the combined economic output<br />
(GDP) of the 48 least developed<br />
countries.<br />
With economic power has come<br />
political clout. World leaders scramble<br />
for audiences with Bill Gates<br />
(Microsoft) and John T Chambers<br />
(Gisco). Corporate lobbyists are<br />
enormously influential (though often<br />
invisible) in drawing up the laws<br />
governing global trade and investment.<br />
Supporters of globalisation<br />
argue that TNCs bring jobs and new<br />
technologl to developing countries,<br />
while critics worry that their growing<br />
political migfit is undermining national<br />
governments and allowing corporations<br />
to run the global economy to suit<br />
themselves and their shareholders.<br />
The world in your supermarket<br />
Rich and poor countries alike have<br />
bought into the globalisation<br />
message - that you can export your<br />
way out of under-development. From<br />
1980 to 1999, world trade in goods<br />
(not seruices) tripled from 91 trillion<br />
to over f,i! trillion. Poor countries<br />
have concentrated on clothes,<br />
footwear, electronics, and food - a<br />
trip down the aisle of your local<br />
supermarket has become a tour of<br />
the Third World, with asparagus from<br />
Peru, prawns from Bangladesh, and<br />
mangetout from Zambia. China has<br />
become the world's largest exporter<br />
of clothing, toys, electronics, and<br />
shoes. Trade can create jobs and<br />
wealth in poor countries, but the<br />
regular media expos6s of appalling<br />
working conditions in Third World<br />
farms and factories have led to<br />
increasing concern over the social<br />
and environmental conditions under<br />
which the goods are produced.<br />
IT has awakened fears<br />
of a $rowin!,'ditital<br />
divide' betvveen the<br />
haves and have-nots<br />
Globalfuture.com<br />
The accelerating pace of innovation<br />
in information technologr (lT) is driving<br />
$obalisation. The cost of a threeminute<br />
phone call from New York to<br />
London fell from $245 in 1930, to $3<br />
in 1990, to about 35 cents in 1999<br />
(1990 prices). Using 24-hour e-mail,<br />
companies can split up their assembly<br />
lines between countries on different<br />
sides of the globe, sending designs<br />
and orders down the phone line and<br />
shifting components from one country<br />
to another to minimise costs. lT can<br />
cut costs and create a $obal village,<br />
but has awakened fears of a growing<br />
'digital divide' between the haves and<br />
have-nots. Thailand has more cellular<br />
phones than the whole of Africa.<br />
One Disney MacWorld<br />
The doubling of tourism over the last<br />
15 years, and increased international<br />
migrataon, have meant greater cultural<br />
contact between countries and<br />
peoples. The spread of information<br />
and corporate branding has generated<br />
something akin to a single global<br />
culture, especially among the<br />
teenagers of the MW generation.<br />
Those hyping globalisation believe this<br />
will lead to greater international<br />
understanding. Others fear that the<br />
global cultural tapestry could be<br />
replaced by bland corporate imagery<br />
and the platitudes of 'Just do it'<br />
branding. Priests in Latin America<br />
have told CAFOD they have been<br />
asked to baptise children from poor<br />
families with names like Rangerover,<br />
Thissideup and lloveny (think about it).<br />
$2 trillion a day<br />
Capital flows, increasingly disconnected<br />
from any real trade or<br />
investment, have grown enormously in<br />
the last 15 years. They now run at<br />
about $2 trillion a day (that's 12<br />
zeroes), moving around in the Alice-in-<br />
Wonderland world of derivatives,<br />
futures, and currency trading. The<br />
capital crossing the world's borders in<br />
three days exceeds a whole year's<br />
global trade. Globalisation's<br />
supporters argue that capital flows<br />
can provide much-needed investment,<br />
for example via third world stock<br />
markets, and can deter governments<br />
from following unwise economic<br />
policies which endanger 'market<br />
confidence'. However, such massive<br />
capital flows can easily overwhelm<br />
even large economies (as Norman<br />
Lamont found out in 1992), and in the<br />
last three years capital surges have<br />
caused severe social and economic<br />
crises in Thailand, Korea, lndonesia,<br />
Brazil, and Russia. The World Bank has<br />
found that these crises tend to hit the<br />
poor hardest, while subsequent<br />
recoveries benefit the better off,<br />
ratcheting up inequality. I<br />
movementl13
feature: global isation<br />
obalisation<br />
for the Sood of aII<br />
lournalist and author Noreena Hertz writes on embracing the new agenda<br />
live increasingly in a world of haves and have-nots'<br />
gated communities next to €lhettos, of extreme povefi and<br />
ble riches. Some enjoy ri$hts that are com<br />
to others. Vast numbers of people see almost no<br />
benefits from the advances of the past century. Relative<br />
inequalities are explodin$, and the world's poorest, despite<br />
all the advances of globalisation, may even be getting poorer.<br />
Trickle-down, the main rationale of neoliberal<br />
$obalisation, has turned out to be an illusion.<br />
Special interests have gained in power. Some<br />
people have a voice, but many remain<br />
voiceless. lt is a world of extremes, which can<br />
be characterised most clearly in terms of<br />
exclusion: political, economic and social.<br />
in a world like this' few<br />
can gain redress for<br />
the iniustices inflicted upon them<br />
globalisation:<br />
Economic exclusion.<br />
That is self explana-<br />
tory - and can be<br />
christian responses<br />
ideas from scms"---<br />
What do I mean by political exclusion? The<br />
rights of citizens marginalised by the<br />
interests of big business - whether this is<br />
George W's environmental policy, clearly<br />
formulated with the interests of the American<br />
energy companies that bankrolled his<br />
campaign in mind, or the infamous World<br />
Trade Organisation, which puts trade<br />
interests before the environment, labour<br />
standards or human rights. Governments can<br />
no longer be counted on to safeguard the<br />
public interest or protect the public<br />
realm'<br />
'window on the worrd' conference<br />
t""J,"*n"r"<br />
'Christiane need t'o make lhemoelves<br />
aware of globalisai"ion ioeuee, and explain<br />
and inopire within i"he workplace, ohurch,<br />
univeroity, Campaiqning muot be done on a loaal<br />
level and a national level, Campaignlng muot, be<br />
radical, difterent and therefore noticeablel<br />
in growing<br />
inequality and polarisation of wealth, in<br />
countries in the South crippled by debt<br />
repayments and growing income gaps both<br />
within and between countries. ln almost every<br />
developing country in the world, the number<br />
of people living on less than a dollar a day<br />
have increased not fallen over the past 20<br />
years since the 'Washington consensus'<br />
became mainstream.<br />
And social exclusion? ln a world like this,<br />
few can gain redress for the injustices<br />
inflicted upon them. ln the South we often see<br />
a race to the bottom: companies scouring the<br />
globe for the cheapest and easiest place to<br />
manufacture. Regulatory standards, health<br />
and safety standards fall, while rights are<br />
junked, communities displaced, unions<br />
outlawed. Tobacco workers in Brazil are<br />
poisoned by banned pesticides, but there is<br />
no hope of compensation, let alone improvement<br />
in working conditions. These are<br />
Southern workers and Southern communities<br />
excluded from the access to justice that we in<br />
the First World take for granted.<br />
What arises from these patterns of exclusion<br />
is a deep and growing chasm between the<br />
global economy and social justice. lf it is not<br />
bridged, it will result not only in seething<br />
conflicts, but, over time, in a growing<br />
movement of people that will make even our<br />
gated communities impossible to protect.<br />
So for our sakes, as well as those of the<br />
two million-plus children who die each year<br />
from diarrhoea brought on by a lack of clean<br />
water, the issue of exclusion must be<br />
addressed head-on. This is not just a longterm<br />
goal; it is something that has to be done<br />
at once, a project that can and must be part<br />
of a contemporary political process. We need<br />
to realise that what has prevented the pursuit<br />
of this objective has not been an absolute<br />
scarcity of resources; it has been an absence<br />
of moral imperative, responsibility, or will'<br />
We must therefore embrace a new agenda<br />
based on inclusiveness, a commitment to<br />
reconnecting the social and the economic, a<br />
relinking of the latter to a plausible redistributive<br />
system and a determination to ensure<br />
access to justice for all. All these things<br />
are within our reach. >
In practical terms these should be the<br />
immediate first steps:<br />
First, an inclusive political process must be<br />
set up to investigate and consider the impact<br />
of economic globalisation. This should take the<br />
form of an international independent commission,<br />
transparent, open, and involving all major<br />
stakeholders: representatives of the South as<br />
well as the Nofth, members of communities<br />
who are affected as well as those who are<br />
beneficiaries, the poor as well as the rich.<br />
And the issues to address? What is the<br />
impact of trade liberalisation on the poorest<br />
members of the global society? What is the<br />
cost of economic growth to the environment?<br />
What price are we paying for big business<br />
influencing the rules of the game on the<br />
quality of the air we breathe and food we eat?<br />
What is the justification for allowing the North<br />
to continue to protect key industries such as<br />
agriculture and textiles while the South is told<br />
to open up all its markets?<br />
This is not a matter of simply looking at<br />
economic costs. We have to examine the<br />
impact of economic globalisation on human<br />
development, on social capital, and in particular<br />
on the poor. What are the implications<br />
for society of rural communities collapsing<br />
overnight, or for farmers when their indigenous<br />
plants are patented by corporations?<br />
We do not as yet know the answers to all<br />
these questions. Much of the research on<br />
impact is confined to aggregate economic<br />
data which tells us little if anything at all<br />
about impact on particular groups. And there<br />
is at present no forum within which to<br />
rigorously address and examine these issues.<br />
But now more than ever there is a real need<br />
to confront the beliefs of the market<br />
fundamentalists away from the streets and in<br />
a public forum. A real imperative to investigate<br />
the costs of economic globalisation<br />
framed around the issue of exclusion.<br />
Next we must commit to putting in motion<br />
the necessary steps to create a World Social<br />
Organisation, which will seek to reframe market<br />
mechanisms in rules and regulations that<br />
ensure that the costs of externalities such as<br />
pollution and human rights abuses are factored<br />
into all aspects of economic activity. An organisation<br />
which'will provide a real counterweight<br />
to the dominance of the WTO - with as sharp<br />
teeth and powers of enforcement as real.<br />
For if the status quo in which trade<br />
interests have been given primacy is<br />
maintained, if the economic is allowed to<br />
dominate, and if we never reconnect the<br />
social with the economic, we will exacerbate<br />
divides and perpetuate a system in which the<br />
rules of the game all too often serve the<br />
interests of big business before people, and<br />
profit before social or environmentaljustice.<br />
globalisation: christian responses<br />
ideas from scm's<br />
'window on the world' conference<br />
'tMe as Chrisilane need to aome lo a aommon underetandinT of<br />
globallealion ao an umbrella term lo desaribe lhe proceeees lhat<br />
exist in our world today. The churahes need to identify, underetand<br />
and eetablish reeponaee to lhese individual proceoaeo by reaseeseing<br />
tradilional Chrielian teaching in lhe light of an<br />
incrc a eingly gl ob alio e d e o ciet y.<br />
Ae Chrlstians we sland united lhrough lheolo1iaal refleatlon<br />
and lhrough aatrion. The aation enables us lo<br />
ao-o?eraie wilh and affirm ghe aalion of olher non-<br />
Chrielian or1aniealione, Theologiaal reflealion<br />
providee bolh a baeis lor our own action and<br />
helpe ue deliver a Chrietian messa1e aarose<br />
lhe world in a way that,ie appropriate in<br />
various conte*el<br />
Of course<br />
we must be<br />
careful that the North should not use this new<br />
organisation as a form of protectionism.<br />
Assistance must be provided by the developed<br />
world to help its developing partners be able to<br />
bear the costs associated with better global<br />
regulation, and different responsibilities<br />
should be attached to nations of the South in<br />
the short term at least. The South should not<br />
be penalised for joining this organisation from<br />
a singularly disadvantaged starting point.<br />
new resources have to be created<br />
to empower people to gain access<br />
to better lives<br />
But relinking the social to the economic,<br />
though necessary, is not sufficient. There still<br />
remains the problem of seeking to alleviate<br />
the positions of those who are most excluded<br />
and marginalised. At the minimum this means<br />
the cancellation of debt, reversing the outflows<br />
of capital from the South to the North.<br />
Overseas aid, which to the least developed<br />
countries has fallen by 45o/o since 1990, must<br />
be significantly increased, while the ways in<br />
which it is delivered need to be rethought.<br />
It will simply be impossible for countries to<br />
reach the goals agreed upon at the Millennium<br />
Summit if these steps are not taken.<br />
We shall not be able to halve the proportion<br />
of people living in extreme poverty by 2015,<br />
nor halve the proportion of people suffering<br />
from hunger, without an end to the financial<br />
drain and a real financial boost.<br />
But more than this, new resources have to<br />
be created to empower people to gain access<br />
to better lives. And these new forms of<br />
resources can only be raised by new forms of<br />
taxation, global indirect forms of taxation,<br />
that are then redistributed. At the same )<br />
movement | 15
feature: global isation<br />
. Noleena Hertz is the<br />
author of Trre Sirent<br />
Takeover: Globat<br />
Capttatram and the Dealh<br />
of Democfacy (A'lowl<br />
s7.99).<br />
time these taxes must be used to protect our<br />
environment and our resources, so they<br />
would be taxes on the use of enerry and<br />
resources, and on Pollution.<br />
Finally mechanisms must be put into place<br />
to help people fi$ht injustice as part of a<br />
wider political rebuilding of institutions. All<br />
people, wherever they are, must be extended<br />
the rights we take for granted for ourselves.<br />
Workers and communities everywhere must<br />
be able to safe$uard basic rights to minimum<br />
health and safety standards, to minimum<br />
wages, to not be dispossessed without<br />
adequate compensation.<br />
ln the long term this is a matter of strengthening<br />
both local and international regulation of<br />
companies and making enforcement effective.<br />
ln the short term, there are clear steps that<br />
can be taken by governments of countries in<br />
which multinationals are domiciled.<br />
Several test cases are underway in which<br />
companies are being sued in the North for<br />
actions carried out by their subsidiaries in the<br />
South. They include Unocal in the States in<br />
connection with its activities in Burma, and<br />
Shell in connection with its activities in Nigeria.<br />
But this means of redress is usually blocked on<br />
two fronts. First, it is very seldom possible to<br />
lift the corporate veil and make parent<br />
companies accountable for the actions of their<br />
subsidiaries. Second, even when this is done,<br />
there are usually no funds available for<br />
workers or communities to take on multinationals<br />
with relatively unlimited resources.<br />
A world in which people have no access to<br />
justice is a world in which discontent will<br />
continue to fester. So my final recommendation<br />
is to ensure that the perpetrators of<br />
corporate crimes shall be taken to account,<br />
wherever they are, and that their victims will<br />
have redress whomever they are. This means<br />
committing both to legislative reforms that<br />
will ensure that the corporate veil can be<br />
lifted and parent companies can be held<br />
responsible for the actions of their<br />
subsidiaries, and to the establishment of a<br />
global legal aid fund so that workers and<br />
communities everywhere can be allowed<br />
access to justice.<br />
A tall order, perhaps, my plan for the world<br />
- but not inconceivable. For now more than<br />
ever it is clear that this divided world of<br />
injustice, inequity, and power asymmetries is<br />
untenable. The events of September LL<br />
2OOt, have shown us all too clearly that we<br />
do not and cannot live in isolation. We are<br />
inexorably linked, standing as global citizens<br />
side by side. And we allow the exclusion of<br />
groups of people amongst us at our peril. lt<br />
cannot be that the only issues upon which we<br />
as a world unite are terrorism and trade' We<br />
must commit to a global coalition to deal with<br />
the issue of exclusion too. I<br />
Noreena Hertz<br />
obatrbation<br />
and the Cospel<br />
How should we respond as Ghristians to the challenges and questions<br />
posed by a globalised society?<br />
When future historians look back at our era they are<br />
unlikely to i$nore the process we call '$lobalisation'. While<br />
it MAY prove just a 'buzzvord' and disappear as fast as it<br />
emerged, the phenomena it encompasses - the globalising<br />
of trade, investment, communications and so on - appear<br />
to be so profoundly transforming our world it is hard to<br />
believe we are not at a new, definin$, moment in history.<br />
But how do we view $lobalisation as people of faith? Do we<br />
see it as positive or harmful, or have we nothing to say<br />
either way? Gan we bring anything, as Ghristians, to the<br />
debate it has generated?<br />
First I suggest we need some reserue'<br />
realism and humour. Because the expansion in<br />
the mobility of capital we've witnessed in<br />
recent years seems not to have improved the<br />
lot of people living in abject poverly, and if<br />
anything to have widened the gulf between the<br />
richest and poorest nations, we can easily<br />
dismiss globalisation as antithetical to<br />
Christian values. And clearly many aspects of it<br />
should be viewed critically. But we need also to<br />
remember that many aspects of it have greatly<br />
improved our lives, not least the advances in<br />
information technologt: that we know as<br />
much as we do about globalisation's effects ;'<br />
16lmovement
is largely because of what it has given us. The<br />
irony of this has not been lost on protesters<br />
with a sense of humour - witness the<br />
'Globalised <strong>Movement</strong>s Against Globalisation'<br />
banners seen at Seattle, for example - and it<br />
should help us to keep things in a proper<br />
perspective.<br />
We should also be wary about simply being<br />
negative and denunciatory. lt's true that the<br />
TINA ('There ls No Alternative') approach<br />
adopted by many defenders of liberal<br />
capitalism needs taking apart, both for its<br />
lack of openness to the future and for its<br />
feeble understanding of history; but critique<br />
on its own, without pointers to alternatives, is<br />
no better. The frustration of businesspeople<br />
at those critics of capitalism who issue calls<br />
for a 'just and sustainable alternative',<br />
without saying what that alternative might<br />
look like, is easy to understand.<br />
I shall consider'alternatives' in a moment,<br />
but let us first return to our original questions<br />
- and here I suggest we find ourselves in a<br />
genuine tension. On the one hand there are<br />
sound theological reasons why the neoliberal<br />
agenda should worry us as Christians.<br />
lf we believe the gospel calls us to love and<br />
care for one another, especially the weakest<br />
and most marginalised, and to build<br />
community, we may not immediately warm to<br />
a system predicated upon competition and<br />
we Gan become a powerful force for<br />
good in our globalising world<br />
individualism. lf we believe that capitalism, of<br />
its own internal logic, must put profits before<br />
people and the environment, then, again, it<br />
will not be immediately obvious to us how it<br />
fits with Christian values. Yet globalisation is<br />
the only context we have to work in at the<br />
moment, the only arena in which to try to live<br />
out the gospel narrative; and therefore the<br />
choice seems to be, either to try to make it<br />
reflect gospel values, to work in the interests<br />
of poor people, or to ask the poor to wait<br />
while we dismantle it and build a better<br />
alternative (assuming that to be possible).<br />
My preference will be clear from the way I<br />
have phras"ed the alternatives. While it will<br />
hardly be straightforward to achieve, I believe<br />
we have to put our efforts into making the<br />
present system operate more justly, Let us<br />
not forget, before we get too ovenvhelmed,<br />
that it is not an unalterable, divinely-ordained<br />
system, but a humanly-created one, and that<br />
it is not therefore fanciful to envisage how it<br />
might work in ways that are more<br />
transparent, more sensitive to the planet,<br />
more people-centred. Our own government<br />
believes this to be possible, and has signed<br />
feature: global isation<br />
up to the Millennium Development Goals with<br />
their target of halving by 2015 the number of<br />
people living in abject poverty. The Chancellor<br />
has spoken publicly of a role for churches<br />
and faith groups in the struggle to achieve<br />
these goals, and it seems entirely consistent<br />
with our calling to 'seek first the kingdom of<br />
God'to engage in such a project.<br />
we must hold fast to the vision of<br />
God's people as community<br />
Yet our commitment to God's reign cannot<br />
but lead us also to remain open to radically<br />
new ways of being society - and here is the<br />
possible tension. We may have to work within<br />
the present situation as we find it, and even<br />
try to redeem it, but we also anticipate the<br />
coming of that 'kingdom' which radically<br />
transforms us as individuals and communities.<br />
Christian eschatology means that we<br />
cannot buy into the 'end of history' thesis, the<br />
suggestion that the system we find ourselves<br />
in, post the Cold War, represents the logical<br />
'omega point' to which history was inexorably<br />
leading. We cannot believe that what we have<br />
now is as good as it gets, that no other way of<br />
organising ourselves is possible. Rather we<br />
must hold fast to the vision of God's people as<br />
community, indeed, as the 'one body' we<br />
anticipate whenever we break bread together.<br />
It may not be easy to hold that in tension with<br />
a commitment to 'make globalisation work for<br />
the poor', but the two are not inconsistent.<br />
The vision inspires us to work all the harder to<br />
make the commitment work.<br />
Underpinning our whole approach to globalisation,<br />
then, must be our understanding of<br />
God - God as a God of life, the creator and<br />
sustainer of life and the one who, in Jesus,<br />
comes that we might<br />
have life<br />
'more )<br />
globalisation:<br />
christian responses<br />
ideas from scm's<br />
'window on the world' conference<br />
'The Chrislian aommunity ehould<br />
reo?ond with pnyer and action.<br />
Prayen oupporting lhoee who take acliont for<br />
unde?atanding of the issuesl for wisdom about<br />
how to aat,<br />
Aationz to learn morei to aampaigni to educate<br />
olheroi to alert poliliaiano; to be more aware of our<br />
voaationi to have liturgy that reflecls our concern for<br />
lhese issuesito givefrnancial and ?rayer oupporti
globalisation: christian responses<br />
ideas from scm's<br />
'window on the world' conference<br />
'Chrielians ehould ..,<br />
make oureelvee aware of t'hebibllcal groundingwehavefor<br />
hope and aa|,ion| take whalever aclione we aan in our<br />
own lives (for example, Turahase<br />
loaally grown food),<br />
while reaognising i';hat everyone ls aompromieedt<br />
eduaate ahildren aboul lhe world they live in,<br />
eopealally aboul t'he relali.lonship belween the<br />
Northern and goulhern Worldo aaL within<br />
and wit'hout corToratione to subvert<br />
and reeisllheir harmful etfectel<br />
abundantlY'.<br />
lf we understand that to<br />
mean that nothing should be valued more<br />
highly than life, that everything should serve<br />
life, then we have a framework for both<br />
critique and action. We shall not demonise<br />
markets, companies, international finance<br />
institutions, even globalisation per se' but we<br />
want to see them seruing life rather than vice<br />
versa. We shall argue for work as an activity<br />
that gives meaning and value to life rather<br />
than one likely to jeopardise or debase it. We<br />
shall argue for trade and investment to be<br />
means to an end - improving the quality of<br />
life for all - rather than simply ends in<br />
themselves. We shall affirm, as forcefully and<br />
passionately as we can, our planet as a Godgiven<br />
source of life for all, even in the face of<br />
its exploitation and rape in the relentless<br />
pursuit of groMh and profit. And when, in<br />
. Dr Andrew Bradstock is<br />
Secletary for Church and<br />
Soclety at the United<br />
Reformed Church. He ia<br />
author of several books<br />
on falth and polltics' and<br />
has recently edlted (with<br />
Christopher Rowland)<br />
Radlcat Christian<br />
Wrllings: A Reader,<br />
publlshed by Blackwell.<br />
making these affirmations, we find ourselves<br />
sharing ground with people of a different<br />
faith, we must do all that we can to break<br />
down the barriers between us, barriers which,<br />
when founded on mistrust and misinformation,<br />
can have such devastating<br />
consequences.<br />
So we can offer an alternative to the<br />
prevailing system - its reorientation to reflect<br />
and incarnate the values of the reign of God'<br />
to serue the interests of people, life and<br />
planet. And we have already begun to work<br />
towards realising this. Jubilee 2000 proved<br />
that church people, in solidarity with others of<br />
like mind, can be highly effective in securing<br />
significant reforms to the global economic<br />
system; the Trade Justice <strong>Movement</strong>, drawing<br />
on the support of many relief agencies'<br />
churches and other bodies, seems likely to<br />
make this point just as powerfully. The<br />
Fairtrade <strong>Movement</strong>, too, alerts us to ways in<br />
which producers in the developing world are<br />
exploited and challenges us to act justly as<br />
consumers. As Christians make connections<br />
between povertY and debt, trade, aid,<br />
education and other factors' so we can<br />
become a powerful force for good in our<br />
globalising world. And as the movements we<br />
have mentioned remind us, throughout the<br />
scriptures God calls on communities to<br />
practise justice and jubilee in preference to<br />
charity and alms, to organise so that povefty<br />
is eliminated rather than simply 'treated'. This<br />
is a callwhich should spur us allto committed<br />
and prayerful action, for that really is what it's<br />
all about in the end. As Max didn't quite say'<br />
the point is not just to interpret our globalised<br />
world but to change it' I<br />
Andrew Bradstock<br />
t-.i uAraFltq.c<br />
Ie not profit<br />
Fairtr e<br />
Globalised iniustice can be opposed by globalised resistance..'<br />
rhis Piece is about empowerment'<br />
I anout the understanding that<br />
I Eloo"li"ation is a process that we<br />
all are part of, and that we all can<br />
influence. The 'we' that I am referring to<br />
is literally everyone who feels unable to<br />
affect, but feels affected by, the trends<br />
of international business and politics'<br />
According to Christian Aid, the three richest<br />
people in the world control more wealth than<br />
all 600 million people living in the poorest<br />
countries. Their share of world trade is just<br />
:: bittBr d+.1<br />
lEr Th;'d \'/(rl,l<br />
Frl.ldu 3uf g<br />
0.4 per cent. But this doesn't mean that<br />
ordinary people have no power. On 4 May this<br />
yeart over 30OO rural craftswomen in<br />
southern lndia marched proudly through the<br />
streets to celebrate the first ever World Fair<br />
Trade Day, proclaiming their achievements as<br />
artisans and expressing their solidarity with<br />
others around the world, who they see as<br />
their trading partners. On the same day,<br />
supporters in Austria were climbing into mansized<br />
banana suits to spread the word to<br />
other shoppers in the Vienna high streets. ><br />
18 lmovement
feature: global isation<br />
'My first experience of international trading was at a trade<br />
show in Europe. Quite out of my normal comfort zone, I<br />
found the experience daunting, unnerving and at times<br />
quite intimidating. Prices, naturally, were uppermost in<br />
people's minds and I had great difficulty reconcilin$ the<br />
atmosphere of the trade show with the environment in<br />
which the products were produced. There was no way in<br />
this great hall that I could share the stories about the<br />
women who made the products and in no way were their<br />
needs and aspirations taken into account. I am not naiVe<br />
enough to believe that at the end of the day, trade is not<br />
about prices and profits, but somehow there needed to be<br />
another way.'<br />
Karin le Roux from Mud Hut Trading!, a Fair Trading or{,anisation<br />
in Namibia which links rural craftsmen and women<br />
We must develop the confidence to face, and<br />
not accept, the global trading system as it is.<br />
We have the power, if only we will use it.<br />
The Trade Justice <strong>Movement</strong> is a growing<br />
group of organisations in the UK who are all<br />
concerned about the negative impact of<br />
international trade rules on the world's<br />
poorest people, on the environment, and on<br />
We have the power,<br />
if only we will use it<br />
democracy. Their shared vision is that trade<br />
can be made to work for all - if there is<br />
change to the rules and institutions that<br />
govern it. This can be achieved if ordinary<br />
people are inspired to take action and make<br />
their governments listen to their concerns.<br />
On 19 June the mass lobby for Trade Justice<br />
proved its power as 12,000 campaigners<br />
from every corner of the UK converged on<br />
Westminster to deliver their message to their<br />
parliamentary representatives and from there<br />
to the top echelons of government.<br />
We find that we have power and influence in<br />
the various areas of our lives. The Fair Trade<br />
movement is a growing sector of international<br />
business that brings the Trade Justice vision to<br />
life through practical, everyday trading with<br />
communities who have been shunted to the<br />
mar$ns by $obalisation. Those communities are<br />
now selling their products on the same<br />
(botlom left)<br />
rhousands or<br />
plotesters<br />
lobbred thef.<br />
MPS ln<br />
person ro<br />
;:,?::t<br />
;lij:<br />
mass lobby of Parliament this summel<br />
supermarket shelves as the largest multinationals.<br />
When customers in the UK choose Fair<br />
Trade products, they are contributing economically<br />
and politically to an alternative way of doing<br />
business. The growth of Fair Trade sales in the<br />
UK has spearheaded a momentum of initiatives<br />
across the corporate sector that go far beyond<br />
PR and represent genuine efforts to measure<br />
social impacts as part of the bottom line.<br />
That empowerment is mirrored at the other<br />
end of the trading chain, in the lives of our<br />
trading partners in developing countries.<br />
According to Brigitte Kyerematen-Darko from<br />
the organisation<br />
Aid to ><br />
globalisation:<br />
christian responses<br />
ideas from scm's<br />
'window on the world' conference<br />
'?ray lo bring God into the situation, and<br />
live the ?rayen<br />
Listen to the stories and be aware ol the<br />
situation, while epreading awareneol to other<br />
people (that io, beln6 the "aonsaienae of the<br />
people".)<br />
View Nhe planet aa on loan from our grandahildren<br />
and God, and eee all people ao equal.<br />
5ee the Flble as a double-edged eword, read bolh as<br />
o??reeeor and the oppreesed,<br />
Have faith lo aat, knowing lhat God ie wibh usi
feature: global isation<br />
Artisans Ghana, woodcaryers may know that<br />
they are not getting a fair price from intermediary<br />
traders, but need the confidence to<br />
Small communities are now selling their<br />
products on the same supermarket<br />
shelves as the largest multinationals<br />
. Kathorlns Anderson Is<br />
Co-ordinator fol<br />
lnformation and<br />
AdvoGacy for the<br />
lnternatlonal Federatlon<br />
of Alternative frade<br />
negotiate. 'Fair Trade gives them the<br />
confidence.' Aid may provide much needed<br />
assistance - but it doesn't give any of the power<br />
back.<br />
So what can we do to engage positively<br />
with the challenge of globalisation?<br />
we can use our power as voters to engage<br />
with the parliamentary process. We can use<br />
our power as customers to create a demand<br />
for fairly traded goods. Let businesses know<br />
that we have ethical concerns when we buy<br />
their products - send a postcard to the store<br />
manager. lf we have money to invest, think<br />
about where we invest it. The main thing is to<br />
be vocal. We have friends, families'<br />
colleagues, and through those networks of<br />
relationships we can influence many others.<br />
When we realise the interconnections<br />
following globalisation, we realise that<br />
nobody is so easy to i€nore. I<br />
Katherine Anderson<br />
IITEffiIIET#ffiTIET<br />
see also,,,<br />
O The Trade Justice <strong>Movement</strong><br />
campaigns for fundamental<br />
change to the unjust rules and<br />
institutions governing international<br />
trade, so that trade is made<br />
to work for all. lt is a fastexpanding<br />
group of organisations<br />
that include ActionAid, CAFOD.<br />
Christian Aid, The Fairtrade<br />
Foundation, Friends of the Earth,<br />
Methodist Relief & DeveloPment<br />
Fund, National Federation of<br />
Women's lnstitutes, National<br />
Union of Students, Oxfam, Peace<br />
Child lnternational, PeoPle &<br />
Planet, Save the Children, SCIAF,<br />
SPEAK, Tearfund, Traidcraft, VSO,<br />
War on Want, WOMANKIND,<br />
Women's Environmental Network<br />
and the World DeveloPment<br />
<strong>Movement</strong>.<br />
Contact details:<br />
Trade Justice <strong>Movement</strong><br />
c/o The Fairtrade Foundation<br />
Suite 204<br />
16 Baldwin's Gardens<br />
London<br />
EC1N 7RJ<br />
t: 020 7404 0530<br />
e: tim@fairtrade.orE.uk<br />
w: www.tradeiusticemovement.org.uk<br />
O The Fairtrade Foundation was set<br />
up by major UK develoPment<br />
agencies to promote Fair Trade<br />
and to award the Fairtrade Mark.<br />
The Fairtrade Mark is an indePendent<br />
consumer label which<br />
guarantees a better deal for<br />
workers and producers from Poor<br />
countries. Set uP bY major<br />
development agencies, the<br />
Fairtrade Foundation checks that<br />
products meet its standards<br />
before awarding the stamP of<br />
approval. The Fairtrade Foundation<br />
is a point of contact for all UK<br />
individuals interested in<br />
supporting Fair Trade.<br />
Contact details:<br />
The Fairtrade Foundation<br />
Suite 204<br />
16 Baldwin's Gardens<br />
London<br />
EC1N 7RJ<br />
t: O2O 74OS 5942<br />
e: mail@fairtrade.org.uk<br />
w: www.fairtrade.org.uk<br />
O labour Behind the Label is a UK<br />
coalition camPaigning for<br />
improvements in working<br />
conditions in the international<br />
garment industry. lt is Part of<br />
broader international coalition,<br />
the Clean Clothes CamPaign.<br />
Through Labour Behind the Label<br />
you can find out how to influence<br />
UK high street retailers to improve<br />
conditions for their workers.<br />
Contact details:<br />
Labour Behind the Label<br />
38 Exchange Street<br />
Norwich<br />
NR2 1AX<br />
t: 01603 610993<br />
e: lbl@gn.apc.org<br />
20 lmovement
ties and binds<br />
ties and binds I jim cotter<br />
this lookout, this planet earth<br />
Untilfairly recently the calendar of the<br />
Western world was firmly attached,<br />
without controversy, to the approximate<br />
year of the birth of Jesus. We<br />
still refer to years as, for example,<br />
581ec or Before Ghrist, and lo 581, or<br />
Anno Domini, in the year of the Lord<br />
581. (By the way, the ec comes after<br />
the date, the no before it, because you<br />
say it aloud like that when you use the<br />
phrases in full - sorry to point it out,<br />
pedantic I'm sure...) To many people<br />
this division now feels parochial, or at<br />
best regional, not least since the<br />
'millennium' was greeted by every time<br />
zone round the planet, and even Ghina<br />
uses the year 2OO2.<br />
Since more people, of different cultures and<br />
faiths, now use the formerly more exclusive<br />
Christian reckoning of the years, some writers<br />
have altered ac to BCE, Before the Common<br />
Era, and no to CE, Common Era. But there is a<br />
problem here. lf you don't think the birth of<br />
Christ significant your dating system hangs<br />
loose from any event. lt doesn't really work for<br />
a secular world. Of course Christians may think<br />
they hold a trump card. After all, the language<br />
of 'common' and 'universal' has been claimed<br />
totally for Christ. But the change to CE is more<br />
a matter of international convenience and an<br />
accident of history in a world of computers and<br />
travel agents.<br />
Well, I might want to argue that one of the<br />
best titles for Jesus is The Human Being, the<br />
archetype of humanity who lived a decisive<br />
(perhaps I push that word into 'definitive'?)<br />
clue to the character of God, incarnating it,<br />
which I would sum up as Love, expressed as<br />
Justice in public life and Intimacy in private<br />
life. That is the vision I have glimpsed and the<br />
programme I recognise as fitfully enacted.<br />
But I am aware that at least two-thirds of the<br />
world doesft think like that, and in general<br />
human awareness it seems to me that indeed<br />
something new has occurred over the last<br />
generation. We have crossed a threshold,<br />
intimations of which have been gathering pace<br />
ever since the first circumnavigation of the<br />
globe, and which irrevocably changed our<br />
consciousness when human eyes - was it in<br />
1968? - first contemplated our home planet<br />
from far off in space. I would make a tentative<br />
claim that that was the most siginificant event<br />
of the twentieth century.<br />
This suggests to me that the 'Common Era'<br />
or 'Global Era' began in, give or take a few<br />
years, 1968, and that we are now living in,<br />
shall we say, 34 GE - though I am under no<br />
illusion that the United Nations is going to<br />
endorse this prophetic moment. I simply share<br />
the idea for what it's worth, which may be<br />
nothing.<br />
These ruminations could lead into a discussion<br />
of globalisation, the World Cup, climate<br />
change, the internet, international law, or a<br />
host of other issues. But I want to stay with<br />
that picture of the planet, the blue and white<br />
sphere against such a deep black background.<br />
Much poetry and prayer uses the imagery of<br />
sunrise and sunset, and the human eye<br />
delights in the illusion as well as in the natural<br />
beauty. The sun sets, sinks, falls, and so on.<br />
and so on. Body clocks and emotional moods<br />
are often intimately connected with the<br />
changes of daylight and darkness, and the<br />
seasons of the year.<br />
But the new awareness gives us a different<br />
perspective, one not yet woven into poetry and<br />
prayer, not least because we neither feel nor<br />
see (at least with the naked eye) the<br />
movement of the planet in space. One meditation,<br />
derived from information in Edward Hays'<br />
Prayers for a Planetary Pilgrim (Forest of<br />
Peace Publishing lnc., 1989, 1995), gives us a<br />
hint of how we might add a 'morning' 'ptayet'<br />
to our repertoire that honours the new<br />
universe story - though whether it leads to<br />
thoughts of glory or of insignificance remains<br />
an open question:<br />
From this lookout, this planet earth,<br />
remote outpost of the universe,<br />
contemplating the stars at night,<br />
racing with our brother planets<br />
forty thousand miles an hour through<br />
space...<br />
On the surface of our earth,<br />
warmed to life by mother sun,<br />
orbiting around her six hundred million<br />
miles a year,<br />
wakened by our day star that seems so<br />
close...<br />
At morning turn-around of earth,<br />
spinning on her axis at a thousand miles<br />
an hour,<br />
fullness of day beyond the eastern<br />
horizon,<br />
thick night way out beyond the west...<br />
we breathe in quiet exhilaration,<br />
we move into this new day in trust... I<br />
one of the<br />
best titles<br />
for lesus is<br />
The Human<br />
Being, the<br />
archetype of<br />
humanity<br />
. Jim Cotter runs Cailns<br />
Publishing, an<br />
independent Christian<br />
imprint<br />
movementl2l
ecumenrsm<br />
ecumenlbm tb like<br />
ridins, a bike...<br />
what can SGM learn from cycling activists?<br />
solidari$f No, really - put the<br />
away,<br />
history books aside - in your experience what is it?<br />
have you felt, 'l belong. This truly matters'?<br />
Examining my own life, I realise solidarity is<br />
much rarer than I first thought. An evening<br />
spent with close friends in a pub discussing<br />
grand ideas? Once the mist of alcohol or<br />
sentimentality has gone away, I'll admit this is<br />
only camaraderie. Then there are certain stories<br />
I have covered as a journalist for local newspapers<br />
- stories with political bite that have voiced<br />
community concerns and effected change. This<br />
doesn't even take strong editorialising, just<br />
straight reporting of a legitimate issue. Yet, if I'm<br />
honest, the reason editors love such stories is<br />
that they sell papers. lt is not because they<br />
conform to some noble charter of ideals.<br />
I'll try again. The best example of solidarity I<br />
can offer is riding my bike with a bunch of<br />
strangers. By that I mean a Gritical Mass bike<br />
ride, a monthly'happenin$' in numerous cities<br />
worldwide, in which cyclists assert their ri$ht to<br />
be on the roads by riding together, usually at<br />
rush hour on a Friday evening. ln this case I'm<br />
talking about St Louis but the atmosphere, and<br />
the ethos, is more or less the same anywhere.<br />
Gritical Masses are not protests'<br />
not athletic bike rides, but rather<br />
torganised coincidencest<br />
I came to St Louis, Missouri last summer with<br />
my wife. We'd been married for a week at that<br />
point and Katy hadn't lived in St Louis for ten<br />
years, so we were both pretty clueless about<br />
what to expect. We were short of cash'<br />
. unenthused by the idea of runnin$ a car and<br />
determined to see how we'd fare with a travel<br />
pass and a bike. We soon discovered that in the<br />
Midwest, relying on public transport means<br />
something different than in Europe. Put simply,<br />
only pensioners and poor people ride the bus.<br />
Or at least that is the perception. lt's not<br />
uncommon to be standing at a bus stop and<br />
have a passing motorist yell, 'Get a car!' When<br />
people give you directions they'll tell you where<br />
to find a parking spot, even before asking how<br />
you're travelling. Using Metrolink - a light<br />
railway system installed ten years ago - is not<br />
quite so deviant, but it doesn't get you<br />
everywhere.<br />
As for cycling, recreational biking is deemed<br />
acceptable, but anything more purposeful is<br />
just plain eccentric. I have heard a story about<br />
someone who had just taken a job with a<br />
corporation and was told he would not be<br />
allowed to ride his bike to work. Given that<br />
context, it's understandable why biking with a<br />
group of fifty other riders is so affirming. We're<br />
all freaks together.<br />
Critical Masses are not protests, not athletic<br />
bike rides, but rather, as the lingo goes,<br />
'organised coincidences'. There is a route<br />
sketched out, usually about ten miles, and if<br />
someone feels like taking a detour the whole<br />
group follows. One feels safe taking the inside<br />
lane on major roads, something I would be<br />
unlikely to do if travelling on my lonesome.<br />
The idea comes from Beijing, where at<br />
junctions, cyclists gather until they achieve<br />
'critical mass' and then plough into the road<br />
making the other traffic stop for them all.<br />
Similarly, a Critical Mass travels as one unit and<br />
can keep going through traffic lights when they<br />
turn red, in the same manner as a funeral<br />
cortege.<br />
Dan Kliman, a transplant from Chicago where<br />
masses attract up to 500 people, started the St<br />
Louis ride two years ago. He told me: 'l'm a bi$<br />
road rider and every time I ride Critical Mass it<br />
gives that energ/ to get through another month<br />
of being a bike commuter.' lnitiating the ride<br />
was a matter of putting flyers on every parked<br />
bike he saw and getting the news out via<br />
supportive online discussion groups. The first<br />
mass was siginificant for the disparate cycling<br />
community because 'people had the sense that<br />
they could take over the road. We weren't goin$<br />
to be terrorised by cars.'<br />
Numbers fluctuate depending on the weather,<br />
the final destination and, of course, group<br />
chemistry. Participants vary from hardcore<br />
cyclists (professional couriers, competitive<br />
cyclists and daily commuters) to wusses like<br />
myself (far happier on a cycle path than a main<br />
road and with a major aversion to riding at<br />
night) and people who haven't been on a bike in<br />
ten years. I couldn't even begin to identify all<br />
the different kinds of bikes - suffice to say<br />
that the visual effect of a mass (especially the)<br />
22 lmovement
fancy dress one at Halloween) would be enough<br />
in itself to stop traffic. How often do you see a<br />
tandem followed by a rickshaw?<br />
So why have I jimmied these transportorientated<br />
musings into SCM's magazine?<br />
Because, I feel, there is a latent spirituality in<br />
the Critical Mass phenomenon - an appreciation<br />
of what rituals, evangelism (in its best<br />
sense) and community are all about.<br />
RITUAL: after twenty minutes or so of chatting<br />
while people congregate in Keiner Plaza,<br />
downtown St Louis, everyone hops on their bike<br />
and circles round a fountain in the centre of the<br />
plaza several times until someone decides to<br />
embark on the route. lt's street theatre and a<br />
great demonstration of unity-through-diversity<br />
without resorting to shrill slogans. Another<br />
tradition that has evolved with the St Louis mass<br />
(and perhaps other cities, I don't honestly know)<br />
is that at least once per ride at a major intersection<br />
everyone gets off their bikes and defiantly<br />
raises them above their heads. Some drivers are<br />
amused, others are irked and some - believe it<br />
or not - have tried to drive through the mass.<br />
Once the honking of horns becomes too much, or<br />
arms start to sag, we move on.<br />
EVANGELISM: some riders hand out flyers to<br />
puzzled pedestrians and motorists. There is a<br />
fanatical urge to spread the good news about<br />
biking. The leaflets say: 'Once people see how<br />
much fun cycling can be, and how much safer<br />
and more pleasant it makes their streets, the<br />
thinking behind our car-oriented transport<br />
policies will be challenged.' To my tastes the<br />
flyers are rather gushy, but to people who have<br />
never considered a bicycle as a serious form of<br />
transport, it's maybe not a bad idea to be<br />
emphatic. Although it's not 'my thing' (l never<br />
made a good evangelical Christian either), others<br />
will continue to ride-n-proselytise and I<br />
wholeheartedly support them.<br />
COMMUNITY: Critical Mass creates a tangible<br />
sense of community, even if the community exists<br />
in that form for one night only. Some riders are<br />
rabidly anti-car, others drive daily, but there is no<br />
interrogation about how committed anyone is to<br />
alternative forms of transportation. There is no<br />
qualification to being a Critical Mass-er, other than<br />
being there with a bike.<br />
Those empowering evenings remind me of my<br />
time involved with SCM in Glasgow: there's the<br />
grand idea - an intelligent and inclusive vision<br />
of Christianity - which no-one really talked<br />
about because you were so busy doing it;<br />
there's the discovery that I am not alone, there<br />
are other freaks (people who also feel both<br />
sceptical and excited by faith); and we stuck at<br />
it, meeting once a week, with the numbers<br />
fluctuating wildly.<br />
Rather than worrying that SCM has lost its<br />
political edge or its theological rigour - or<br />
whatever the complainl du jour is - perhaps we'd<br />
do well to imagine SCM as an advocacy group<br />
along the lines of Critical Mass. The primary aim<br />
is to allow free thinking about our faith, when,<br />
broadly speaking, churches discourage this.<br />
Meeting together without a leader is a form of<br />
direct action and if we succeed in making a 'safe<br />
space', theological insights and political stances<br />
will come out of that. That was my experience<br />
during six years with Glasgow SCM. We would<br />
draw up termly programs with an obligatory<br />
session on 'Homosexuality and the Bible', as if<br />
the SCM group had to spell out its line to<br />
newcomers, but then it morphed into an attitude<br />
of 'There's so many gay Christians in this group<br />
that's if anyone is uncomfortable with the idea<br />
they will have left by the end of term anyhow.'<br />
Rituals were similarly loose and organic. A<br />
ten-minute slot, jokingly called the 'holy<br />
moment', was prepared by a different person<br />
each week, who of course brought their tastes<br />
and religious heritage to it. But liberal<br />
Christians rarely take Mass together, to use the<br />
Catholic term, because it draws lines and<br />
excludes people. Church history and teaching<br />
has turned the breaking of bread - essentially a<br />
sign of unity between believers - into a highly<br />
divisive issue.<br />
I'm not going to suggest on the basis of a<br />
weak pun on the word 'mass', that a bike ride<br />
offers anything that will heal 2,000 years of<br />
internecine fighting. But there is something very<br />
appealing about Critical Mass's way of making a<br />
community from essentially isolated people who<br />
come together and share a journey, then leave<br />
energised and emboldened for their daily<br />
journeys. Critical Masses are carnivals that<br />
celebrate diversity and unleash pent-up ener6/.<br />
But they are also 'carnivalesque' in the sense<br />
that academics use the term. lt's like the<br />
Roman festival of Saturnalia in which slaves and<br />
masters exchanged places for a day: subversive<br />
thoughts are played out, temporarily<br />
turning the world upside-down, and that vision<br />
sustains us when things return to normal. Bikes<br />
could dominate the streets, not cars.<br />
Likewise a spiritual community energises us<br />
for our daily journeys; and SCM is a carnival<br />
where bright young things imagline what the<br />
church should be.<br />
Let the dreary old<br />
codgers honk their<br />
horns. I<br />
Tim Woodcock<br />
ecumentsm<br />
subversive<br />
thoughts are<br />
played out,<br />
temporarily<br />
turning the<br />
world upsidedown,<br />
and<br />
that vision<br />
sustains us<br />
when things<br />
return to<br />
normal<br />
. Tim Woodcock is a<br />
former editor of<br />
<strong>Movement</strong>
first among equals<br />
.l<br />
first among equals I claire connor<br />
Meet Lucy Symons, co-ordinator of a university SCM group' and her<br />
faithful committee. lt's the beginning of the year, and Freshers' Week<br />
is looming large. Lucy's diary tells all...<br />
The whole<br />
day was a<br />
hideous<br />
pantomime,<br />
with large,<br />
fixed grins<br />
directed at<br />
the crowd<br />
of freshers<br />
stumbling<br />
past with<br />
arms full of<br />
freebies and<br />
eyes too big<br />
for their<br />
faces<br />
. Claire Connor is Catholic<br />
lay Chaplain at GKT<br />
medical schools, King's<br />
College London<br />
September 15th<br />
4pm Well, back to earth with a bang - second<br />
year here I come! Just finished moving into our<br />
new house. lt passed the Parent lnspection,<br />
thank Boodness. Mum stuck her head out of<br />
the car as they drove off and yelled, 'Don't<br />
forget to plan your food shopping, darling! And<br />
change the freshener in the loooooo.." The<br />
neighbours must think they've left an eightyear-old<br />
behind, not a grown adult. Hmph'<br />
Surrounded by all my worldly goods here, so<br />
better shove it all in the bedroom and unpack<br />
later. The SCM committee are due round in<br />
half an hour for the pre-freshers meeting. I'm<br />
the first back, can't believe it. Damn, no fresh<br />
milk! Oh well...<br />
9.3opm Come on!! Meeting went amazingly<br />
well. Am fantastically fantastic co-ordinator (we<br />
decided not to use the term president, too<br />
hierarchical and not very pc, we felt), with v.<br />
committed team. Nearly everyone was there,<br />
Bemadette (social sec), Jane (publicity), Sister<br />
Margaret (Chaplains' rep) Kevin (secretary) - we<br />
were missing my assistant co-ordinator Jeremy,<br />
but he's still on holiday. Pretty much<br />
everything's in place for the fresher's fair on<br />
Wednesday and the opening social on Friday at<br />
Tom's house (HUGE vicarage and his wife's a<br />
great cook).<br />
Slight problem with Kevin, or Krazily Keen<br />
Kevin as I think of him, in that he wanted to<br />
minute the entire meeting word for word. Tried<br />
to say he just needed to put down the main<br />
points but there was no stopping him. A bit<br />
tedious having to repeat things and his pencil<br />
was practically smoking by the time we were<br />
finished, but it's great that he's so conscientious.<br />
Always look for the positive, Dad says.<br />
There were some great ideas for the annual<br />
retreat - Kevin wants to cycle to Santiago di<br />
Compostella but most people seemed to put<br />
Taiz6 as the top option. Have to see what<br />
people think. Just back from the pub with<br />
Bernie and my bed's covered in boxes.<br />
Unrngh, what's positive about that?<br />
September 18th<br />
8.3oam This is inhumane! lt's practically the<br />
middle of the night. Thank goodness Freshers'<br />
Fair is only once a year. Oh Lord, I'm going to<br />
miss the bus. Here goes!<br />
7pm Too - tired -to write. Quite successful -in<br />
spiteof -iz@z..<br />
September 19th<br />
71am I have in front of me a sheet of paper<br />
with 26 freshers'e-mail addresses on it. Yep,<br />
26. ln view of yesterday's performance, this is<br />
miraculous. Jeremy, my mainstay team<br />
member, has had what I can only describe as<br />
an unholy conversion experience over the<br />
summer. New Orleans has clearly weakened<br />
his mind. I don't know what I'm going to do<br />
with him - or at this rate, to him. Grrrrr'<br />
Arrived to find Jane and Robert (Free Church<br />
Chaplain) setting up the stall next to the<br />
Groovers society, who were cheerfully<br />
thumping out music to make your ears bleed<br />
on a mammoth sound system. 'Couldn't get<br />
anywhere else!' screamed Robert - at least, I<br />
think that's what he said. Whole day quickly<br />
became like hideous pantomime, complete<br />
with exaggerated sign-here gestures and<br />
large, fixed grins directed at the crowd of<br />
freshers stumbling past with arms full of<br />
freebies and eyes too big for their faces. Only<br />
Kevin remained undaunted, bouncing around<br />
in an 'l belong to Jesus' t-shirt and matching<br />
WWJD baseball cap, cheerfully bellowing at all<br />
comers and handing out term cards.<br />
Thankfully, there were enough people for us to<br />
do half hour shifts with hearing recuperation<br />
breaks in between, and we were actually doing<br />
okay - untilJeremy made his entrance.<br />
He strolled up at 2pm (four hours late), Mr<br />
strait-laced Marks and Spencer 2002 dressed<br />
in top to toe black, shirt half-unbuttoned to<br />
reveal a large gold chain, wearing a ridiculously<br />
large pair of shades and a cigarette (a<br />
cigarette!) dangling nonchalantly from the<br />
comer of his mouth. There was a collective gasp<br />
from the stall - well, everyone had their mouths<br />
open at any rate. 'Jeremy, what happened?!<br />
You look like something out of the flipping Blues<br />
Brothers!' I shouted. 'lI's Jaz, if you don't<br />
mind,' he replied coolly, 'and that's the whole<br />
point - dotl.'Well, it was damage limitation ftom<br />
there on in. Even Kevin began to lose his<br />
bounce after an hour ofJeremy haranguingthe<br />
Groovers (soulless philistines, apparently)' and<br />
lurching up to fteshers with what was clearly<br />
supposed to be a cool swagger, shouting,<br />
'We're on a mission from God!' and spraying<br />
cigarette ash all over the place. We were luclcy<br />
not to get thrown out, franklY.<br />
Amazin$y, not everyone was scared off and a<br />
good number seemed keen to come to the<br />
social. Wonder if I can dissuade Jeremy/Jan<br />
from coming - no, that's horrible. Maybe he'll<br />
get normal again after the holiday effect wears<br />
off. ln the meantime, it's official - America is<br />
bad for my health. I<br />
1<br />
24 | movement
eviews: books<br />
I<br />
J<br />
fgVJ 9<br />
'V<br />
c)<br />
J<br />
celebratin{, the senses<br />
a new book challenges some accepted orthodoxies about the body<br />
The Education of Desire<br />
T J Gorringe I scm press I f,13.95<br />
I confess I judged this book by its<br />
oover. The colour photograph of a<br />
half-clad Dexter Fletcher posing as<br />
Bacchus in Derek Jarman's film<br />
Canva{gio wastoo much to resist.<br />
As is often the case, it is had to<br />
find justification for the choice of<br />
picture in the contents of the book,<br />
thouglr Gorringe does refer brieffy<br />
to Caravaggio's depictions of<br />
Bacchus in his third chapter, 'Sins<br />
of the Flesh?'. Still, the Dionysiac<br />
and delectable Dexter is what<br />
made me pick the book up and<br />
perhaps what made you read this<br />
review, so here goes.<br />
The first four chapters of lhe<br />
Education of Desire are based on<br />
lectures given at the University of<br />
Victoria, British Columbia in 2000 and<br />
argue for a revised attitude towards<br />
our bodies and senses in our thinking<br />
about God. The final chapter is taken<br />
from a lecture given to the Catholic<br />
Peace and Justice Conference and is<br />
a re-interpretation of the Eucharist as<br />
both a celebration of the body and as<br />
a ritual with.far-reaching implications<br />
for living as bodies in the body of a<br />
global economy.<br />
The problem with turning a series<br />
of lectures into a book is that the<br />
chapters risk appearing disjointed<br />
and may not come together convincingly<br />
enough to form a coherent<br />
overall argument. But Gorringe<br />
overcomes this problem almost<br />
wholly successfully by setting up a<br />
bold case for the centrality in<br />
theology of a celebration of the<br />
senses in the first chapter:<br />
'ln and through bodies, and<br />
through the exercise of our<br />
senses, God moves towards the<br />
creation of a new world, a world<br />
of the celebration and affirmation<br />
of bodies, and therefore of<br />
the creator, as the consummate<br />
sign of the grace of God's<br />
essential nature.'<br />
and then dealing with anticipated<br />
objections to his own argument in the<br />
chapters that follow. What about<br />
when the senses are used for evil as<br />
well as for good? Doesn't a celebration<br />
of the senses affirm our hedonist,<br />
consumerist societlp What about the<br />
tradition of asceticism? And, to my<br />
mind most importantly, if we put so<br />
much weight on the senses, what<br />
about those who are sensually<br />
deprived - blind, deaf or quadriplegic?<br />
Gorringe is refreshing and illuminating<br />
on all these points, but his<br />
treatment of this last one is the most<br />
memorable because it is the most<br />
controversial. He challenges deepseated<br />
ideas on a sensitive subject,<br />
rejecting the definition of disability<br />
as that which is contrary to what is<br />
'normal', but also rejecting the view<br />
held by some of those who are<br />
disabled themselves, that physical or<br />
mental impairment is somehow Godgiven.<br />
What is particularly impressive<br />
about this chapter is its range of<br />
reference. Gorringe never simply<br />
gives his own scholarly view - rather<br />
he illustrates his points with firsthand<br />
accounts of people personally<br />
affected by disability.<br />
lndeed, the whole book is filled with<br />
an incredible array of references. He<br />
refers to Karl Barth and to Britney<br />
Spears, to Augustine's Confessions<br />
and to When Harry Met Sally. This is<br />
engaging and entertaining, though<br />
occasionally he does risk losing his<br />
reader by getting bogged down in<br />
constant allusion to other sources.<br />
Gorringe is at his best when<br />
overturning accepted orthodoxies<br />
and challenging our prejudices and<br />
hang-ups. His points on the real<br />
origin, purpose and reach of the<br />
Eucharist in the final chapter are<br />
certainly food for thought. What,<br />
finally, does he mean by 'the<br />
education of desire'? Nothing to do<br />
with Dexter, I'm afraid, but that<br />
doesn't mean it's not provocative. I<br />
recommend you go between the<br />
covers to find out. I<br />
M enber . r.,"i;j gill,:,"ff:l<br />
movementl25
.l<br />
reviews: theatre<br />
teachin€ God to dance<br />
a modern interpretation of medieval religious drama<br />
Mysteres<br />
London, spring 2002<br />
A South African theatre<br />
company put on a PlaY based on<br />
the Ghester Gycle of MYstery<br />
plays in London during the<br />
spring. The Mysteries were a<br />
series of medieval PlaYs telling<br />
sacred history from the Fall of<br />
Lucifer to DoomsdaY Put on bY<br />
craft guilds in cities across<br />
Europe: each town had its own<br />
set of plays. TheY were a<br />
populist form: the stories were<br />
enlivened by humour from<br />
assorted shepherds, devils,<br />
soldiers, and Noah's wife (who<br />
didn't like the idea of sPending<br />
forty days cooPed uP with a<br />
bunch of smelly animals and<br />
would rather go and visit her<br />
friends), and the anti-authoritarian<br />
potential of the Passion<br />
narratives was PlaYed uP.<br />
planvrights cheerf ullY<br />
imagined the events in<br />
medieval terms,<br />
unencumbered by historical<br />
awareness or any sense of<br />
classical grandeur<br />
The writers of the Plays found that<br />
the biblical narratives are often<br />
somewhat spare and confine<br />
themselves to essentials. To modern<br />
sensibilities, this is part of their<br />
literary power, but medieval sensibilities<br />
were different, and theY found<br />
that the biblical narratives allowed<br />
for, and indeed required, elaboration<br />
to explain and motivate the behaviour<br />
of the characters. Thus, the<br />
playwrights cheerfully imagined the<br />
events in medieval terms, unencumbered<br />
by historical awareness or any<br />
sense of classical grandeur. Medieval<br />
sensibilities enjoyed diversity, digression<br />
and occasional irreverence, and<br />
they found that the grand narrative of<br />
the Old and New Testament allowed<br />
them to fit a lot of this in. The good<br />
characters are surprised at being<br />
caught up in the events of sacred<br />
history, reasonablY Pious, $ven the<br />
number of miracles going on around<br />
them, but not exactlY holy, while the<br />
evil characters are cheerfullY<br />
irreverent or madly tyrannical' Herod<br />
was notorious for allowing the actor<br />
to go over the top - Shakespeare has<br />
Hamlet make reference to him. The<br />
primary sense is of a bustling<br />
humanity who have lives of their own<br />
in the background, who haPPen to be<br />
called up into the Biblical story. As<br />
noted, the villainy of the evil characters<br />
in the New Testament, is<br />
depicted very much in terms of<br />
medieval power structures - wicked<br />
priests and rulers are bY no means<br />
left safely in a distant Past. The<br />
narratives before the lncarnation<br />
show God at his most'Old Testament'<br />
(although the narrative starts with the<br />
Fall of Lucifer, which is a much later<br />
invention). The play cycle traditionally<br />
included Judgement DaY, which is<br />
pretty 'Old Testament' as well,<br />
although in the South African production<br />
it was omitted in favour of a<br />
thoroughly universalist ending: the<br />
cast all did an African dance led bY<br />
Jesus, with Lucifer in the middle of<br />
the company playing the percussion<br />
accompaniment.<br />
wicked priests and rulers<br />
are by no means left<br />
safely in a distant Past<br />
The company in the London Performance<br />
was mixed race, mostlY<br />
black, performing in traditional<br />
African dress for the Old Testament'<br />
and in jeans and shirt for the New<br />
Testament. TheY sPoke in at least<br />
four languages - Afrikaans, English,<br />
Xhosa, and Zulu - with a few extra<br />
Latin chants. Some of the costumes<br />
were pointed: Pontius Pilate was<br />
costumed as a British Admiral' not<br />
wanting to convict a man he thought<br />
innocent, but eventually washin$ his<br />
hands of the native's affairs.<br />
I'm not sure to what extent the<br />
mixed-race casting was used deliberately.<br />
The first white character on<br />
stage was Cain. Other white characters<br />
were Abraham, Mary, sister of<br />
Martha, Pilate (as PreviouslY<br />
mentioned), and Thomas (who didn't<br />
get to express doubt over the<br />
resurrection, but did seem to be<br />
telling Jesus that he couldn't be<br />
expected to learn to dance just like<br />
that). Certainly the casting raised<br />
questions of racial Privilege and<br />
God couldn't dance until<br />
he'd taken off his robes and<br />
jewellery and stripped to a<br />
pair of old ieans<br />
power, and was preferable to the all<br />
too frequent inclusion of a black<br />
actor as a minor villain on the<br />
London stage.<br />
Lucifer always steals the show and<br />
the actor playing Lucifer in this<br />
production was esPeciallY good.<br />
Although he could and did adoPt an<br />
expression of gleeful mischief when<br />
required, he was at his best<br />
wandering through the stage with a<br />
shell-shocked expression as various<br />
humans did awful things to each<br />
other without his prompting. Another<br />
particularly effective scene was the<br />
massacre of the innocents. Herod's<br />
soldiers, in modern uniforms,<br />
swaggered onto the stage and cooed<br />
over the babies before killing them.<br />
Both the mothers and the soldiers<br />
knew that the soldiers had no<br />
benevolent interest in children, but<br />
you could see them both thinking<br />
that the mothers were in no position<br />
to protest.<br />
The most memorable scene: Mary<br />
teaching God[esus how to dance at<br />
the incarnation. God couldn't<br />
manage it until he'd taken off his<br />
robes and jewellery and stripped to a<br />
pair of old jeans. I<br />
David Anderson<br />
ActlnEl Edltor ol <strong>Movement</strong><br />
26lmovement
eviews: art<br />
ll<br />
but tb it arJ?<br />
an exhibition of 20th century art raises a few questions<br />
Sacred Century: Reti$ion in 2oth Century British Art<br />
Exhibition at the Victoria & Albert Museum, London, until 8 June 2OO2<br />
Walking into the room with this<br />
small exhibition felt, at first, like<br />
walking into a modern church.<br />
The dominant centrepiece, taking<br />
up an entire wall, was a tapestry<br />
design produced in the sixties by<br />
John Piper for Ghichester<br />
Cathedral. You'll have seen the<br />
kind of tapestry in many<br />
churches vibrant colours,<br />
abstract symbols of the Spirit,<br />
ioytul flowing patterns. Pretty -<br />
but it didn't excite me or make<br />
me think. This initial impression<br />
was challenged by an exploration<br />
of the other pieces, but it started<br />
me thinkingl about the relationship,<br />
or lack thereof, between<br />
religion and effective art.<br />
'Sacred Century'tried to map out a<br />
progression in religious influences on<br />
art over the last 100 years, with<br />
varying success. I started by looking<br />
at work from the early years of the<br />
century - jingoistic images from the<br />
'Arts and Crafts' movement, of Saint<br />
George and other patriotic subjects.<br />
The horrors of the First World War<br />
only seem to have exaggerated<br />
these conservative tendencies.<br />
Reacting against the chaos they had<br />
suffered through - the artist Stanley<br />
Spencer said that it felt like 'the<br />
divine sequence was gone' - the<br />
Christian artists of the twenties and<br />
thirties sought to reassert notions of<br />
order and tradition, through idyllic<br />
pastoral imagery and styles<br />
influenced by medieval iconography.<br />
World War ll shook artists out of this<br />
unexciting tendency. The pieces from<br />
the forties onwards be$n to use<br />
powerful combinations of traditional<br />
reli$ous imagery with contemporary<br />
elements. Feibusch's 1943 'Pieta'<br />
places a man in modem dress beside<br />
Mary and Christ's body, evoking the<br />
tenible scenes taking place in Europe at<br />
the time. Graham Suthedand's Thom<br />
Cross' contains contorted human<br />
figures and sinister machinery of war.<br />
The overriding impression that<br />
'Sacred Century' gave of the late<br />
twentieth century, thougih, was one of<br />
fragmentation and pluralism. The<br />
earlier works were nearly all intended<br />
for use in Christian publications or<br />
churches; the later pieces ranged from<br />
the tapestry mentioned above to<br />
secular works such as lee Wagstaffs<br />
'Shroud', a modem-day Turin Shroud<br />
imprinted in the artist's own blood. The<br />
tone was one of exploration and<br />
challenge, with artists taking and using<br />
diverse images and references to make<br />
their indMdual statements. Wagstaffs<br />
'Shroud'features the artist's tattoos of<br />
reli$ous symbols, reflecting an interest<br />
in the repetition of patterns and beliefs<br />
across cultures. 'Perils of Faith' by Ana<br />
Maria Pacheco pictures sinister<br />
masked figures digging in the dark, a<br />
far cry ftom the noble Saint George.<br />
And artists have drawn on reli$ous<br />
imagery to create striking and controversial<br />
images which challenge the<br />
comfortable notions of conventional<br />
reli$on and politics. Helen Ghadwick's<br />
'One Flesh' pictures a modern<br />
Madonna, sunounded by the paraphernalia<br />
of modern motherhood and<br />
pointing questionin$y at her female<br />
baby. The artist aimed to reclaim<br />
patriarchal images of women, seeing<br />
the Virgin Mary as 'an extraordinary and<br />
fertile site of the feminine'. Similarly,<br />
Rose Garrard was inspired by a 2,000<br />
year old Gnostic text to depict an<br />
evocative trinity of female figures.<br />
Closing the exhibition was a<br />
special display of Adrian<br />
Wiszniewski's stark Stations of the<br />
Cross. Their simplicity and timeless<br />
design was powerful, but as with the<br />
tapestry, I had to wonder whether<br />
they really had as much to say to us<br />
in a new millennium as their more<br />
'secular' counterparts.<br />
For me, the more imaginative and<br />
challen$ng pieces in this exhibition<br />
were nearly all works from a secular<br />
perspective, which drew on the<br />
powerful imagery of religion and )<br />
movement 127
eviews: books<br />
myth (Christian or otherwise) to inspire<br />
debate or explore the human<br />
condition. Leaving the gallery, I<br />
passed dozens of exquisite medieval<br />
church ornaments, impressing on me<br />
the power of a tradition that reigned<br />
over all the people of Europe for<br />
centuries. But that shared worldview is<br />
now gone, shattered in part by events<br />
in the last century. Art produced in and<br />
for the church now is always at risk of<br />
becoming insular, limited, or merely<br />
self-congratulatory. One really<br />
challenging work is worth any number<br />
of colourful banners proclaiming<br />
'hope', in my book. But at its best, art<br />
can act to make religion's imagery and<br />
messages more relevant to the culture<br />
around it, helping religion to engage<br />
more fully with the world.<br />
Some of the work in 'Sacred<br />
Century' did achieve this, and I know<br />
of other exciting and challenging<br />
work being done by artists within the<br />
church, such as the female<br />
crucifixion piece 'Christa'. But art<br />
commissioned for churches should<br />
not be afraid to confront the same<br />
issues which secular artists tackle.<br />
The language, stories and symbols of<br />
religion will alwaYs have a unique<br />
power to define and exPlore the<br />
things which matter to us most as<br />
people and as communities. I<br />
Liam Purcell<br />
seekin!, outcasts<br />
meditations on homosexuality and the church<br />
Ordinary Child<br />
ueline Ley I Wild Goose<br />
Resource Group | 98.99<br />
No Ordinary Child is a book of<br />
meditations written by a mother<br />
grieving the loss of her one-time<br />
hopes for her son.<br />
When Jacqueline Ley's son told her<br />
that he was gay, she had to undergo<br />
a spiritual journey not unlike the<br />
grieving process, coming to terms<br />
with that inescapable feeling that<br />
God's plans for you are not alwaYs<br />
what you may have had in mind. This<br />
is the key in understanding the<br />
book's universality - it is ultimately<br />
not a book about homosexuality,<br />
rather it uses homosexuality as a<br />
guide, a map of woe.<br />
Although Ley never stoops to look<br />
for sympathy through a sensationalistic<br />
style, there is something deeply<br />
moving in her raw sufferinel. She is<br />
up front and honest with the<br />
questions she asks God, describing<br />
succinctly yet powerfully her<br />
feelings:<br />
'The fact that I am a Christian,<br />
that lmy son] James too is a<br />
committed Christian, only served<br />
to compound my anguish.'<br />
(pa$e 75)<br />
We learn through Jacqueline's<br />
experiences some of the meditations<br />
she has used to surrender her<br />
problem to God, to rely on his love<br />
and, perhaps even more difficult in<br />
times of spiritual crisis, to trust in the<br />
decisions he makes for all of us. Her<br />
N-E<br />
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yet<br />
astute biblical referencing provides<br />
the reader with a very wide range of<br />
passages from the Old and New<br />
Testaments often overlooked in this<br />
field. She makes her points clearly,<br />
reassuring us and encouraging us to<br />
think about our position in the Church<br />
on similar issues with the same<br />
maternal care she shows her son:<br />
'God is in the business of seeking<br />
outcasts. Mercifully, his agenda is<br />
quite different from that element<br />
of the church that bears his name<br />
but continues to ostracise and<br />
demonise gay people'.<br />
(page 44)<br />
Ley thankfully avoids the issue of<br />
homosexual sex in her meditations,<br />
unlike most other literature on the<br />
subject. This absence is significant,<br />
and serves to reinforce the major<br />
point of the book - compassion for<br />
victims of the Church's oppression;<br />
suffering with them in our own way<br />
and not addressing specific issues<br />
that are best left to those victims<br />
themselves.<br />
One of the major failings of the<br />
book, however, is the lack of a<br />
further reading list - the endless<br />
debates and discussions within the<br />
church about homosexuality have<br />
been accompanied by a vast number<br />
of books on the subject, including<br />
the controversial recent worship<br />
anthology Courage To Love,<br />
compiled by Geoffrey Duncan, and<br />
Aliens in the Household of God,<br />
edited by Steve de Gruchy and Paul<br />
Germond. Organisations of relevance<br />
include the Lesbian and Gay<br />
Christian <strong>Movement</strong> (Oxford House,<br />
Derbyshire Street, LONDON E2 6HG<br />
- www.lgcm.orE.uk) and Called to Be<br />
One (for Catholic parents of lesbians<br />
and gay men - PO BOX 24632,<br />
LONDON E9 6XF, tel OL642<br />
465020).<br />
Ley's experiences of trying to<br />
surrender her worship of the graven<br />
image of 'normality' for her family<br />
will strike a chord with many, not just<br />
parents of a child with an alternative<br />
sexuality. She recognises that there<br />
are often no answers - much as she<br />
would like to reassure both herself<br />
and her son, the overwhelming<br />
feeling of the book is that we must<br />
trust in God and his decisions. This<br />
collection of meditations provides an<br />
excellent focus for all in similar<br />
situations. I<br />
Ethan Brack is an Arts<br />
"". .r"tjL:l*"jl:l<br />
28 | movement
eviews: films<br />
is the force strcnS, in thlb one?<br />
a long-awaited prequel - but can it live up to the hype this time?<br />
Star Wars Eprbode II: Attack of the<br />
Clones I dir. George Lucas<br />
Star Wars Episode ll has always<br />
been set to be a unique film. As<br />
viewers we know what has gone<br />
before and what is to come next;<br />
as well as measuring up to the<br />
most popular trilogr ever made<br />
(hopefully with more success<br />
than The Phantom Menace,<br />
almost universally panned by<br />
'reaf' fans), Attack of the Clones<br />
had to be a convincing jigsaw<br />
piece. lt has been billed as the<br />
'turning point' episode, the one<br />
in which Anakin Skywalker<br />
begins his gradual slide towards<br />
the Dark Side and audiences are<br />
given insight into his later<br />
character. The promotional blurb<br />
promises a focus on the tension<br />
between desire and duty, as he<br />
falls in love and wrestles with his<br />
Jedi responsibilities.<br />
The trouble is, in the middle of all<br />
the shoot-outs and lightsabre action,<br />
there's just no time to explore any<br />
themes properly. There has been<br />
some criticism that the performances<br />
are 'wooden', and that may<br />
be justified, but there's so little<br />
dialogue that there's not much<br />
chance for any of<br />
the characters to<br />
develop. lnstead,<br />
the script seems to<br />
rely on the quickest<br />
and most formulaic<br />
route to convey each<br />
message, a sort of<br />
emotion-by-numbers<br />
approach. lndividual<br />
scenes are very<br />
obviously intended<br />
to explain pafticular<br />
developments: for<br />
example, the death<br />
of Anakin's mother<br />
and his reaction<br />
marks the beginning<br />
of his disillusionment with his role as<br />
a Jedi, and his fight with Count<br />
Dooku leads towards his transition to<br />
part-man, part-machine. But these<br />
scenes are strung together with little<br />
obvious progression, and there is<br />
none of the subtle flavour of the<br />
original films (just how many times<br />
does Obi Wan call Anakin young?!).<br />
ln the first half of the film Anakin is<br />
constantly moaning about the way<br />
Obi Wan treats him, but in the<br />
second half this seems to be<br />
completely forgotten. Part of the<br />
problem is that the characters don't<br />
seem to carry their personalities into<br />
the fight scenes as Luke Skywalker<br />
and Han Solo did. Whilst this is<br />
probably a result of the possibilities<br />
of improved technologl - there's no<br />
longer any need to 'fill out' battles<br />
with close-ups and dialogue, since<br />
there are spectacular effects to be<br />
shown off - it means that the film<br />
has a different, less personal feel.<br />
The least subtle moments of all are<br />
the fove scenes. ln lhe Empire Stnkes<br />
Back, there's the brilliant scene<br />
where Han is being lowered into<br />
carbon to be frozen and Leia tells him<br />
she loves him. Apparently Han's reply,<br />
'l know', was improvised by Harrison<br />
Ford, because anything else sounded<br />
too cheesy. George Lucas doesn't<br />
seem to have worried about that this<br />
time, though. Put Anakin and Padm6<br />
on their own together, add a sunset or<br />
a panoramic view, and hey! lnstant<br />
attraction. Apart from a few pained<br />
expressions, there's little sign of any<br />
personal conflict on Anakin's part. He<br />
doesn't seem concerned at all about<br />
the Jedi code of conduct, and simply<br />
comes across as a hormonal<br />
teenager trying to get a girl into bed<br />
(and 'l'm an agony' isn't the most<br />
original chat-up line ever, I'm afraid).<br />
It's not even clear why Padm6's<br />
attracted to him in the first place;<br />
there seems to be little to<br />
recommend him by the time of their<br />
first kiss apart from his creepy-crawlychopping<br />
skills, and they hardly make<br />
up for his brattish behaviour and<br />
needlessly crap hair. Luke Skywalker<br />
may have been a bit wet, but at least<br />
he was nice to his friends; there is no<br />
sense that Anakin has genuine<br />
affection for anyone around him.<br />
Don't get me wrong. lt's an<br />
entertaining film, with impressive<br />
and exciting sequences, and I would<br />
recommend it if only to see Yoda<br />
kick ass. lt's just that it's not a<br />
classic. lt feels a bit like being<br />
invited to a friend's house for dinner<br />
and playing on their Playstation all<br />
night instead: fun, but ultimately<br />
unsatisfying. And I wouldn't want to<br />
do it every night. I<br />
Kathryn Allan<br />
Postgirad student at the Unlvelsity of GlasElow<br />
movementl29
eviews: books<br />
no easy ansrryers<br />
the new Archbishop of Ganterbury questions the 'war on terrorism'<br />
Writing in the Dust; Reflections on 77th September and its aftermath<br />
Williams I Hodder&Stoughton | 93.99<br />
Rowan Williams is the<br />
Archbishop of Wales, and has<br />
been named as a possible<br />
candidate for Archbishop of<br />
Canterbury. This is unlikely to<br />
happen, giiven that he is considered<br />
liberal on the issue of gay<br />
priests, is extremely intelligent,<br />
and has an alarming tendency<br />
to speak prophetically. (This<br />
review was wriften in February.<br />
Predictions are rash. Ed.)<br />
Writing in the Dust is a set of<br />
reflections on the attack on the<br />
World Trade Centre and on the<br />
subsequent attack on Afghanistan.<br />
Williams was a block away from the<br />
World Trade Centre when the attack<br />
occurred, discussing spirituality for a<br />
radio broadcast. The subsequent<br />
book is not an attempt to fit those<br />
events into a Christian theologl. The<br />
first chapter reminds us that trying to<br />
fit events and people into a religious<br />
agenda is perhaps the first step<br />
towards the mindset that acts with<br />
violence.<br />
'Perhaps it's when we try to<br />
make God useful in crises,<br />
though, that we take the first<br />
steps towards the great lie of<br />
religion: the god who fits our<br />
agenda. There is a breathing<br />
space: then just breathe for a<br />
moment. Perhaps the words of<br />
faith will rise again slowly in that<br />
space (perhaps not). But don't<br />
try to tie it up quickly.'<br />
Williams has' little time for the<br />
language of a war on terrorism,<br />
which obscures the issue of just<br />
what we are trying to achieve by<br />
droppings bombs on Af$hanistan:<br />
"'War" against terrorism is as<br />
much a metaphor as war against<br />
drug abuse (not that the<br />
metaphor isn't misleading there<br />
as well), or car theft. lt can mean<br />
only a sustained policy of making<br />
such behaviour less attractive or<br />
tolerable. As we've been<br />
reminded often, this is a long<br />
job; but there is a difference<br />
between saying this, which is<br />
unquestionably true, and<br />
suggesting that there is a case<br />
for an open-ended military<br />
campaign.'<br />
Still, Williams avoids taking sides<br />
in the debates in the newspapers<br />
about whether or not violence is<br />
wrong as such. There is no resort to<br />
any hard-and-fast theological rules.<br />
Rather he asks whether this bombing<br />
campaign is an adequate response<br />
to this atrocity. And he suggests that<br />
There is no resort to any<br />
hard-and-fast theological<br />
rules. Rather, Wlliams asks<br />
whether this bombing<br />
campaign is an adequate<br />
response to this atrocity<br />
it bypasses the difficult and painful<br />
attempt to try to understand what<br />
the causes of the atrocity were and<br />
are. He says this not as a complacent<br />
liberal exaltation of dialogue<br />
and understanding. Dialogue is apt<br />
to be painful:<br />
'Globalisation means that we are<br />
involved in dramas we never<br />
thought of, cast in roles we never<br />
chose. As we protest at how the<br />
West is hated, how we never<br />
meant to oppress or diminish<br />
other cultures, how we never<br />
meant to undermine lslamic<br />
integrity and so on, we must try<br />
not to avoid the pain of grasping<br />
that we are not believed.<br />
Once again: this is not about<br />
Western guilt and non-Western<br />
innocence, not a recommendation<br />
to accept all that we are<br />
accused of. lt is about acknowledging<br />
that it is hard to start any<br />
sort of conversation when your<br />
that your aim is to silence them.'<br />
There is no espousing of any parly<br />
line in this book: that makes it dense<br />
and hard to summarise. lnstead we<br />
have an attempt to avoid all easy<br />
answers and to plead for a chance to<br />
think. Still Williams does argue that<br />
Christian theology has some<br />
resources to offer us in doing so:<br />
'And Christian faith? Can we<br />
think about our own focal<br />
symbol, the cross of Jesus, and<br />
try to rescue it from its frequent<br />
fate as the banner of our own<br />
wounded righteousness? lf<br />
Jesus is indeed what God<br />
communicates to us, God's<br />
language for us, his cross is<br />
always both ours and not ours;<br />
not a magnified sign of our own<br />
suffering, but the mark of God's<br />
work in and through the deepest<br />
vulnerability; not a martyr's<br />
triumphant achievement, but<br />
something that is there for all<br />
human sufferers because it<br />
belongs to no human cause.'<br />
This is a disappointingly short<br />
book: less than 100 small pages of<br />
large type. There must be shelves full<br />
of religaous or political books with<br />
less good sense in them. I<br />
David Anderson<br />
Actlng Editor ol <strong>Movement</strong><br />
3O lmovement
ROYAL JUBILEE<br />
I hope all my readers<br />
enjoyed the recent<br />
celebration of fifty<br />
years of government<br />
based on divine right.<br />
The Queen's<br />
unflinching devotion to<br />
the onerous duty of<br />
opening supermarkets<br />
and waving at the<br />
public has meant that<br />
the United Kingdom<br />
has<br />
remained<br />
blessedly free of<br />
democratically<br />
elected leaders,<br />
like George W Bush.<br />
The cause of republicanism<br />
was struck a<br />
lethal blow when it<br />
became apparent that<br />
the entire nation was<br />
willing to bunk off work<br />
and go to a party<br />
instead. In his sermon<br />
in Westminster Abbey,<br />
Archbishop George<br />
Carey broke my record<br />
England's<br />
for greatest number of<br />
problem has<br />
platitudes uttered in been that all<br />
ten minutes, recent<br />
bettering the Archbishops have<br />
previous record been clean shaven<br />
held by himself. I was and that the next<br />
Archbishop needs to<br />
beard.<br />
particularly impressed<br />
by the way in which<br />
Carey said 'street<br />
parties', in a tone both<br />
amazed at the quaint<br />
customs of the<br />
common folk and<br />
complacent in its<br />
indulgent superiority.<br />
I haven't been so<br />
embarrassed on an<br />
Archbishop's behalf<br />
since I read Richard<br />
Holloway gamely<br />
writing about'shagging'<br />
in Godless Morality.<br />
MEN IN BEARDS<br />
Carey is retiring. By the<br />
time you read this,<br />
you'll know who's been<br />
picked to boldly lead<br />
the Church of England<br />
into further irrelevance.<br />
Hundreds of bishops<br />
have come out of the<br />
woodwork and been<br />
dismissed on the<br />
grounds that they were<br />
too boring even for the<br />
C of E. Commentators<br />
have been learnedly<br />
agreeing that the<br />
Church of<br />
I<br />
t<br />
have a<br />
Apparently this makes<br />
them look like a figure<br />
from the Bible and so<br />
holy, although we<br />
needn't expect any of<br />
them to do something<br />
really exciting like call<br />
down fire and<br />
on<br />
brimstone<br />
Methodist Central Hall.<br />
This emphasis on<br />
beards is blatantly<br />
discriminatory against<br />
snakes. We could be as<br />
holy as any middleclass<br />
.male if we<br />
wanted. At the time of<br />
Rowan<br />
writing,<br />
Williams' fine Welsh<br />
facial fungus has been<br />
tipped as the winner<br />
(correctly - Ed) but I,<br />
for one, regret that we<br />
won't be seeing more<br />
of Bishop Michael<br />
Nazir-Ali's outstanding<br />
sideburns.<br />
THE BRITISH<br />
JOURNALIST<br />
Speaking of calling<br />
down fire and<br />
brimstone, I read in the<br />
newspaper headlines<br />
that the world will be<br />
destroyed by an<br />
asteroid in 2019. Even<br />
jaded reptiles like<br />
myself might<br />
t<br />
be<br />
somewhat<br />
excited by this news.<br />
The prospects for<br />
Methodist Central Hall<br />
were not looking good.<br />
Then I read the article<br />
underneath, which said<br />
that the chance of this<br />
asteroid hitting us is 1<br />
in 60,000. lt seems<br />
Methodist Central Hall<br />
can breathe easy<br />
again.<br />
While on the subject of<br />
the British Press, I<br />
can't resist mentioning<br />
my favourite Private<br />
Eye cover of the<br />
summer: a picture of<br />
Osama Bin Laden, with<br />
the caption 'l'm going<br />
to<br />
become<br />
accountant.'<br />
THE AMERICAN WAY<br />
OF DEATH<br />
Evangelical vicars are<br />
in an awkward position<br />
at funerals. They have<br />
to console the grieving<br />
relatives without<br />
compromising the<br />
Good News that if their<br />
dear departed didn't<br />
have faith in Jesus, he<br />
or she is currently<br />
enjoying the great<br />
steam sauna down<br />
below. But I have now<br />
heard that a Revd<br />
Orlando Bethel in<br />
Alabama has had<br />
enough of these woolly<br />
liberal compromises.<br />
Having got up to sing at<br />
the funeral of his wife's<br />
uncle, he was moved<br />
by the Holy Spirit to<br />
inform the congregation<br />
that the dead man<br />
drunken<br />
was a<br />
fornicator burning in<br />
Hell. Prudently he had<br />
brought along a<br />
loudhailer to use when<br />
his microphone was<br />
cut off by diabolical<br />
agencies at<br />
the sound desk.<br />
The<br />
^-.<br />
Reverend is<br />
obviously a<br />
forgiving soul as he<br />
refrained from<br />
mentioning that the<br />
deceased uncle had<br />
been in a dispute<br />
over inheritance of<br />
land with him and his<br />
wife.<br />
SATAN BANISHED<br />
an<br />
News has come in from<br />
Florida, telling me that<br />
my old boss has been<br />
forbidden entry to the<br />
town of lnglis. A pastor<br />
at the Yankeetown<br />
the serpent<br />
Church of God has<br />
buried a hollow post at<br />
each entrance to the<br />
town, containing a<br />
prayer and a declaration<br />
by the city's Mayor<br />
announcing 'Be it<br />
known from this day<br />
forward that Satan,<br />
ruler of darkness, giver<br />
of evil, destroyer of<br />
what is good and just,<br />
is not now, nor ever<br />
again will be, a part of<br />
this town of lnglis.'<br />
When asked if she had<br />
actually seen Satan,<br />
Mayor Carolyn Risher<br />
said, 'Never. But I have<br />
felt his works. I can't<br />
see the wind blow,<br />
really, but I have felt its<br />
effects.' Spokespersons<br />
for Satan have<br />
said that he feels he is<br />
being made a<br />
scapegoat. I gather<br />
that the declaration is<br />
provoking a constitutional<br />
crisis: it was<br />
printed on official civic<br />
notepaper, and this<br />
may violate religious<br />
freedom under the<br />
constitution. (As<br />
opposed to teaching<br />
Creationism in schools,<br />
which doesn't.) But at<br />
least US citizens don't<br />
have to listen to<br />
George Carey<br />
preaching. lnstead,<br />
they have George W<br />
Bush telling the world<br />
that Evil is Bad, which<br />
is far more<br />
exciting. lf<br />
he thinks<br />
Methodist<br />
Central Hall is<br />
O harbouring Evil<br />
Trade Justice<br />
j Protestors out<br />
to unoermtne<br />
a the American<br />
O- Way of Life, he<br />
really can call down<br />
fire and brimstone from<br />
the sky.<br />
I'll be back next issue,<br />
assuming that there's<br />
any world left to come<br />
back to.
s (<br />
StsdeDt<br />
Name:<br />
q<br />
Cbristian<br />
/rl<br />
l|lovenent<br />
tr Please send me fufther information about joining the Student<br />
Christian <strong>Movement</strong>, and tell me where my local group is.<br />
tr I would like to subscribe to <strong>Movement</strong> magazine. I enclose a cheque,<br />
payable to SCM, to the value of f-7.OO for my first three issues.<br />
Address:<br />
Telephone number:<br />
E-mail address:<br />
University or college (if applicable):<br />
Postcode:<br />
Post to; Student Christian <strong>Movement</strong>, University of Birmingham,<br />
Weoley Park Road, Selly Oak, Birmingham 829 6LL<br />
t: OL21- 471- 2404 | e: scm@movement.org.uk I w.' vwwv.movement'org.uk