Apple picking for mid-Missouri

Recently, a group from the Campus Lutheran Church, 304 South College Ave., piled up and drive out to the Huffstutter Orchards in New Franklin, Mo. for a morning of volunteerism. They spent a few hours picking Jonathan apples to help the Central Missouri Food Bank. By the time they finished, the group of children, college students and adults collected 20-25 boxes of apples for the food bank to distribute. Lori Group, one of the participants, provided photos from the trip, and called the experience “really fun and such a great opportunity to be able to help the hungry in mid-Missouri.”

The group of apple pickers from Campus Lutheran Church were all ages, from children to seniors.

Read Full Post »

Left Behind on a Holiday

The New York Times posted a story on September 27th that caught my attention. It was called “Nannies Get a Holiday. Rich Families Get a Suite.” The story summary mentioned Ramadan, and since it has been in the news a lot recently, I wanted to see what angle they would choose.

The story talks about how rich families in Indonesia deal with the temporary loss of their maids, nannies and chauffeurs every year at the end of Ramadan. Many of these Muslim employees take an annual pilgrimage to their hometowns to celebrate Id al-Fitr, which is a holiday at the end of Ramadan. The story said many families either hire temporary help at high rates or check into hotels for the week.

Somehow this struck me as a little ridiculous. I’m not sure why, but it annoyed me a little bit. Some of the people interviewed seemed so inconvenienced that their employees were taking time to celebrate their religion and visit their families. To be fair, not all of them viewed it this way. It just struck me as selfish, though, that they couldn’t just allow their employees to take a religious holiday without complaining. I’m sure it is hard to suddenly be without extra help when you’ve grown accustomed to it, but it just seems a little too spoiled. One woman in the story did say how it was a good chance to discipline her children a little more so they don’t get too spoiled. That seems like a reasonable attitude to have.

I know there is a huge cultural difference between my world and the one I am reading about, so I guess that’s why I’m having a hard time seeing their point of view. I commend these people for allowing their employees to celebrate their religion and their holidays, but it just seems like they could do it with a little less complaining.

This story led me to wonder about other faiths that have to take time off for religious holidays. I bet it would difficult for both parties involved: the people leaving and the people being left. It’s never something I’ve had to experience being from a Baptist background. I would have liked to have heard from some of the Muslim employees in this story to see their opinions on their vacation and its effects on their employers.

Does anyone have any insight to the situation? Is it hard to leave your routine for a religious holiday? Or is it harder to be left behind, having to fill in the gaps?

Read Full Post »

Upcoming fall events

The first days of fall have arrived – can you feel the weather changing? – and with the changing of the seasons comes numerous community events over the next few weekends. Here’s a list of just a few events and activities that will be happening in the Columbia area:

Mission Fair: On Sunday, Sept. 27 a mission fair will be held at the Missouri United Methodist Church in the Connector. The event will last from 8:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. The fair will provide an opportunity to learn more about current and upcoming mission trips. Activities will include information about all the mission trips that was occurred in the past year. There will also be a discussion about two upcoming mission trips in 2010. There will be a presentation on the youth mission trip to Belize in the summer of 2010. Adults will also present information about a medical mission trip scheduled for Guatemala in February 2010. Discussions will include where the trips will be, the types of work that mission groups will conduct and planning for the trips.

Blessing of the Animals: Pet blessings have been covered extensively by the Missourian in the past. In our article “Blessed are the animals,” pet minister Barbara Michael says, “It’s a way to honor animals.” Missouri United Methodist will continue their tradition of animal blessings (they held an event in 2008) on Sunday, Sept. 27 in a special service. The event will take place at 2 p.m. in the courtyard facing Ninth Street, and will include a service, snacks for pets and their owners, and a blessing offered by Senior Pastor Jim Bryan. Bring leashes and pooper scoopers for those pets who require them.

Friend Fest ’09 & Great Communion: On October 3-4, Blue Ridge Christian Church will be holding a two-day event combining Friend Fest and the worldwide event Great Communion. Friend Fest will include activities such as a hog roast, carnival and square dance. The weekend will culminate in the Great Communion Service on Sunday evening. Great Communion is the 200th anniversary of Thomas Campbell’s “Declaration and Address” in 1809, a huge part of the Restoration Movement. According to www.greatcommunion.org, Campbell’s thesis “the church of Christ upon earth is essentially, intentionally, and constitutionally one.” Blue Ridge Christian Church will be hosting the Great Communion and inviting all other Restoration Movement churches in the area to attend, as well as any family, friends or other community members interested. More information about the event is available at the church’s website, www.blueridgechristiancolumbia.org. Kevin Herd, a Blue Ridge Christian Chruch member and one of the event’s organizers, called the Great Communion a “unity event” meant to “say we are one.”

Celebration of Christian Music: On Sunday, Oct. 11 at 6 p.m., the people of all the churches in downtown Columbia will be joining together in an ecumenical service Missouri United Methodist Church to celebrate Christian music. The event is meant for Christians of all denominations to unite and celebrate their faith and their music instead of focusing on their differences. The service will include the singing of hymns from the different the denominations’ traditions. The event was organized by all of the churches in downtown Columbia. All members of the community are welcome to the event. Brochures with more information are available at the Missouri United Methodist Church on Ninth Street in Columbia.

Read Full Post »

Sharing the Muslim experience for a day

Last night I had the opportunity to attend a breaking of the fast sponsored by the MU Muslim Student Organization. I was fascinated by the event. It was a simple, relaxed event that helped promote understanding during the holy month of Ramadan. Many of the non-Muslim students were friends of MSO members, but many said they still learned something and enjoyed the experience. Several people I talked to said they would fast again next year.

I was impressed with the number of people in attendance. I hadn’t heard much publicity about the event around campus, but there were around 100 people crammed into a relatively small room in Memorial Union. Everyone was cheerful and friendly though, despite the cramped quarters. While a majority of the people there were MSO members, everyone was talking and mixing well. I was very impressed with how open members of both groups were. All the non-Muslims were very eager to learn about Islam and to share the experience. They had lots of questions for MSO members and both parties talked about their experiences fasting.

Then, at 7:22 pm, the sun set and the call to prayer was made. People began to break their fast by drinking water and eating dates, which are a traditional meal. Muslim students left for a minute to pray, and when they returned everyone began to go through the buffet of homemade food prepared by members of the MSO. People ate and talked about their days and their shared experiences. Many non-Muslim students in attendance admitted to almost forgetting during the day. Numerous students agreed that the hardest part was not drinking water.

A few students had more individual stories to share.

“The hardest part was trying to study for an exam with no food,” said Brooke Aden, a non-Muslim participant.

There was a genuine sense of gratitude from the Muslim students toward the people who had come to participate. They thanked them numerous times and were very hospitable to everyone who came.

“It’s a lot more than we expected,” said Nuzhat Chowdhury. “The turnout is great.”

The MSO isn’t sure yet how much money was raised from the event. They are hoping to know by the end of the weekend.

I’m not sure I would have heard about this event or attended if it hadn’t been for my story assignment. I feel really rude saying that, but I guess I don’t have enough of a sense of events going on around me. I think that people who didn’t know about this missed out. It was a fun, educational event and I was able to meet some really interesting people. And there was free food. Who doesn’t like free food?

What do you think of the event? Is it a creative way to inform peers as well as help people in our community who don’t have enough to eat? I think it’s a very symbolic gesture. Does your faith group host any events like this? How would you feel about participating in the “Fast-a-thon” next year?

Read Full Post »

Patriotic no matter your religion

Last night when I attended the Muslim Student Organization event, I was able to talk to a few members about their thoughts on Sept. 11. Nuzhat Chowdhury said that she felt like Columbia was a very open community, so she wasn’t worried about any problems associated with the anniversary of the attacks. Another student I spoke with, Mahir Khan, agreed.

Khan felt that as an American society as a whole we had lost our respect for the day. I tend to agree with him. Besides on Sept. 11, we don’t really discuss anything about it. A couple of movies came out a few years ago, but other than that it is rarely mentioned. At the same time, it’s not something that needs to come up in daily conversation. However, I think there is a balance for the amount it is talked about.

I would consider myself a patriotic person. I vote. I follow current events. I am proud to be an American. I’m appreciative of everything the members of our armed services are doing for us. But I think sometimes, as a nation, we are only patriotic on specific days. Rather, we are MORE patriotic on certain days. Why is that? Why do we ignore our patriotism on other days? Is it conscious? Or are we caught up in other aspects of our life.

I don’t think patriotism really goes away. It’s just not as central on the ordinary days. On holidays and anniversaries of tragedies like Sept. 11, it is just more at the center of our minds.

After talking to Muslim students about their religious beliefs and then about the anniversary, I realized their views weren’t that different from my own. Sadly, they occasionally have to deal with discrimination or prejudices because of what they believe, even if they are as patriotic as anyone else. It is my hope and sincere wish that this Sept. 11, no one, no matter their religion suffered any difficulties due to their differences. I hope no one faces mean looks or hateful words like some in the story in the paper today. I hope that on the anniversary of this terrible event, we truly are one nation under God.

Have you ever experienced these prejudices? Do you have to alter your life on this day to avoid it? Maybe you saw someone today on the receiving end of these prejudices and poor treatment. Hopefully you saw someone and gave them a smile. This is a tough day for all of us, but we need to be sensitive of people who are blamed for the actions of others that are out of their control. I hope everyone had a good, patriotic day.

Read Full Post »

What’s in a box?

There was an article in the Washington Post online last week called “Soul-Searching on Facebook.” In case you didn’t know, Facebook is an online social networking website used by over 250 million people worldwide. On your Facebook profile page, there is a little box where you can write down, in 10 words or less, your religious belief. That is all you get: 10 words, 100 characters. An entire lifetime of religious experience and sentiment cut into just a few short words.

According to the article, the most popular answer on Facebook is simply “Christian,” but it gets more interesting than that. A compilation of the top 10 answers to the question revealed that “Jedi” is the number 10 answer … not exactly a traditional choice by any means. In the entire world, of all the people with Facebook pages, “Jedi” was the number 10 religion. But it doesn’t stop there. A little investigation of my own friends’ Facebook pages revealed that people tend to get creative, be it silly or serious, about how they answer the ever-complicated question of identifying their faith. President Obama’s Facebook reads that his religion is “Christian,” the simple yet dominant answer to a question posed by one of the biggest social networks on the planet.

So here’s the challenge: can you define your religious belief in 10 words or less? Does it come with an asterisk? Is it better said with a quote, or with a joke? Is it simply a question mark, left to be defined on another day, or in a different time?

Comment below with your answer to Facebook’s question. Let’s see what our own community has to say about what faith means to us.

Read Full Post »

Financial Peace University coming back to Columbia

“What could the people of God do for the kingdom of God if they were debt free?” That’s the question asked online at the Financial Peace University, a 13-week program on how to better budget your money. The program, which has been around for more than 10 years, is returning to Columbia. Below, I’ve posted a list of the churches involved and whom to contact for more information.

•    Memorial Baptist Church: 1634 Paris Road. Classes begin at 6 a.m. Sept. 9. Contact Larry Wayland at 881-6521 or larry@larrywayland.com for more information.
•    First Christian Church: 101 N. Tenth St. Classes begin at 6 p.m. Sept. 9. Contact Joe Reardon at 449-7265 or reardonj@stifel.com for more information.
•    New Horizons United Methodist Church: 1020 El Chaparral Ave. S. Classes begin at 6:30 p.m. Sept. 10. Contact LaShonda Boone at 884-3104 or boone@tranquility.net for more information.

This program raises an interesting question — how do finance and religion mix?

Dave Ramsey, a personal money management expert and author, created the program by putting together a DVD with 13 different lessons followed by a group discussion on how to alleviate the stress of debt and numerous bills. It’s touted as a “biblically based accountability curriculum” and cites specific scriptures from the Bible in the course description. In theory, by the end of the program, you should have learned how to make all the right decisions on how to spend and save money. According to the Web site, the average family will pay off $5,300 in debt and save $2,700 after 13 weeks, “resulting in an increased ability to give” to churches.

The program is supposed to branch out into other parts of your life, including relationships, marriages and evangelistic outreach.

Ramsey said families improve their finances, and churches do, too.

If anyone plans on going, or has gone through the program, comment below. What types of results did you see? Does religion play a significant role in your financial decisions?

Read Full Post »

Faith groups and the flu

With MU Chancellor Brady Deaton’s e-mail Monday night confirming an H1N1 flu outbreak on campus, the Missourian’s budget meeting Tuesday was abuzz with ideas on how to cover the many angles of this health concern. On the faith beat, since we specialize in covering issues related to large communal gatherings of people who tend to shake hands and sometimes even drink from the same cup (yes, I say that with tongue firmly planted in cheek), we had some questions about how H1N1’s presence might impact Columbia’s faith communities.

As it turns out, the majority of groups I contacted aren’t responding to the flu at this point with any special precautionary measures. With 48 confirmed cases on campus out of 40,000 students and 100,000 residents, it’s not quite an epidemic yet, after all.

The Rev. Dave Benson, pastor at Campus Lutheran Church, and the Rev. Jim Bryan, senior pastor at Missouri United Methodist Church, both said their respective congregations’ main response revolves around encouraging vigilance in hand washing. Bryan said the church’s preschool teachers also would teach students proper hand washing.

What about communion? That was our main concern on the beat when news broke that H1N1 was present in our community. Only Bryan said they would definitely alter their distribution of communion this weekend, asking one member (“who has gone through the hand washing and sterilization process”) to handle the communal loaf of bread the congregation normally passes around and to serve each person a piece rather than having congregants tear off a piece themselves. Benson, who described his congregation’s mindset as “just kind of on the alert at this point,” said that if the outbreak worsens, “We may caution people about the use of the common chalice and encourage people to take the individual cups for communion. We’re still in the discussion phases of that.”

What about handshake, whether a sign of peace or just a greeting? Benson said Campus Lutheran might encourage its members to refrain from handshakes if the outbreak worsens.

As for attendance, it’s too soon to tell. With Labor Day weekend ahead, many churches expect their attendance to be down for that reason — not necessarily because of the flu.

The overall attitude I gleaned is one of “wait-and-see” sensibility. Leela Jashnani, external relations chair at the Shanthi Mandir Hindu Temple & Community Center — where members wash their hands before worship anyway as a part of Hindu custom — pointed out that temple officials caution sick people to avoid worship if they aren’t feeling well. So too, it seems, do many churches. I noted in my reporting that many churches do not take specific cautions for the regular seasonal flu season, perhaps for this reason.

As the Missourian continues to monitor the H1N1 outbreak, so too will the Faith beat continue to watch its impact on faith communities. If you know something about your church’s response, I urge you to comment on this blog or call the newsroom at 882-5720. In the meantime, I’ll be sipping echinacea tea and washing my hands obsessively.

Read Full Post »

Faith and health care: a starting point

If you drove down Green Meadows Road on Saturday night, you might have seen a small circle of people standing on the lawn of the serenely lit Rock Bridge Christian Church, holding candles whose flames danced in the breeze of the unseasonably cool evening. If you stood on that lawn with them, you might have seen a few cars drive by with their windows rolled down, and you certainly would have heard the drivers of those cars honk their horns and shout their disagreement with the signs a few people in that circle held: “Health care is a Moral Issue,” “Love Your Neighbor: Health care for All,” “No Patient Left Behind.”

As a congregation, Rock Bridge stands firmly in support of health care reform. The small, progressive congregation, which also publicly opposes the Iraq war, registered their candlelight vigil with Faithful Reform in Health Care, an organization dedicated to building a coalition of faith communities that support health care reform. Faithful Reform urged faith groups in favor of health care reform to hold some kind of visible event this weekend, the last weekend of the congressional recess. I learned about the event from a letter its organizers, the Rev. Maureen Dickmann and moderator Roger Carter, sent to the Missourian last week.

The group that gathered at Rock Bridge was small — no more than a dozen. The event was short — no more than half an hour. It was grounded in their Christian faith — they prayed, read letters and testimonials, sang hymns and songs with the words “health care” cleverly inserted. For example, the refrain of John Lennon’s “Give Peace a Chance” was altered to say, “All we are saying is health reform now.” They also offered each other a sign of peace at the end of the gathering. It was peaceful, apart from some shouts from passing drivers.

The passion these people showed for health-care reform and that passion’s deep roots in their faith was particularly striking to me. After the vigil, I spoke briefly with the woman who held the “Health care is a Moral Issue” sign, and she said: “We stand together as a church in this belief that caring for each other is our moral obligation … We felt so strongly about this that we needed to make a statement. More people should speak out. So many people feel for others’ misfortune but don’t speak or do anything.”

She also told me Saturday’s event was particularly timely, given the death of Sen. Ted Kennedy, a staunch universal health care advocate, whom she called “our leader,” saying, “Because we have lost him, who was such a marvelous speaker, we all need to step up and speak for him and speak for everyone.”

Later, I sat down with Dickmann and Carter in the church’s worship space. Both tied the need for health care reform to Biblical teachings about caring for the less fortunate, both in the New Testament (“Jesus told us to care for all of God’s children, ‘the least of these'”) and in the Old Testament (“It was about taking care of the widow, the orphan, the stranger, the alien”). Carter, a Social Security disability lawyer, spoke from his experiences with clients desperate to secure adequate health care, and Dickmann told of the “vitriolic,” fear-based anti-reform rhetoric she said she encountered while attending Sen. Claire McCaskill’s town hall meeting in Moberly. Both were passionate about providing health care for all Americans and said they believed the church was morally compelled to make a visible statement to that effect. The conversation — and it felt like just that, a conversation, rather than an interview — was interesting, and I didn’t want it to end.

I attended the event as a starting point for a longer story on Columbia faith communities’ role in the health-care debate, and I am particularly interested in these communities’ faith-based justification for supporting or opposing health-care reform. When I asked Dickmann and Carter what they might say to faith groups that oppose reform, Dickmann appeared taken aback.

“I’d really like to know what kind of argument there would be for being against health care reform based on faith,” she said.

However, I know the arguments are out there, on both sides; as I report this story, I am searching for communities that have spoken on both sides.

So I enlist your help again, dear readers. Has your faith community taken a stance on health-care reform? What stance does your church take, if it has one? Why does your church hold that position? (In the event that this provokes discussion and debate in our comments section, as I sincerely hope it will, I ask that you stay on topic and be respectful.)

Read Full Post »