resource: http://www.bbc.co.uk/china/learningenglish/story/2008/05/080514_wenchuan_earthquake.shtml

Like many people in the UK, the team at BBC Learning English have been shocked and saddened by news of the earthquake in Sichuan province. We would like to extend our condolences to those affected by this terrible natural disaster. Below is a special report on the earthquake and the rescue operations taking place.

和在英国的很多人一样，BBC 英语教学组的全体成员对五月十二号发生在四川省的地震消息感到震惊和悲痛。在这里我们对受害者表示最深切的哀悼，向那些受地震影响的人们深表同情。下面是对这次地震和地震营救行动的一篇特别报道。

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Rescue efforts are underway in China’s Sichuan province following Monday’s devastating earthquake 灾难性的地震, which measured 7.9 on the Richter Scale 里氏震级.

According to Xinhua news agency, nearly 15,000 people have died in the disaster, with as many as 24,000 more trapped under rubble 碎石，碎砖 from collapsing buildings and another 14,000 declared missing 申报失踪.

Prime Minister Wen Jiabao has visited the area to personally oversee relief work （抗震）救灾工作, and is flying to the epicentre 震中 of the earthquake today.

Chinese troops have been mobilised 调动 to carry out rescue operations and emergency aid 紧急救护 has been air-dropped 空降 into areas that have been cut off by the disaster.

Bad weather has hampered 阻碍 relief efforts and in some cases rescuers have had to trek into the disaster area 受灾地区 by foot and search for trapped survivors 生还者 by hand as roads have been blocked by debris 瓦砾碎片.

Some residents of the provincial capital 首府 Chengdu have chosen to sleep in tents and government shelters for fear of aftershocks 余震 causing more damage.

One witness in Chengdu told the BBC the city’s population is helping the relief work by donating 捐献 food and water for those affected in the surrounding countryside.

Financial aid 经济救助 has been pouring in 大量涌进 from all over China, with the Chinese government pledging hundreds of millions of dollars. Substantial donations from other countries and humanitarian organisations have also been pledged 承诺，给予（援助）.

Although full casualty figures 伤亡数字 are not yet certain, it is clear that Monday’s earthquake is the worst to strike China since the Tangshan earthquake of 1976.

Prime Minister Wen Jiabao is visiting the area

 

清明时节雨纷纷，
路上行人欲断魂，
……

清明时节，想到的人自然是阿爷，上周末全家人去上坟，我还是没能参加，即便我去了，也是个alien，上香拜拜烧纸贡祭都与我无干。我倒愿意哪一天自己一个人去，只带一束雏菊，坐在阿爷坟前和他说话，不受礼式辖制、世俗侵扰。

天上人间，阿爷，我真的好想再见你一面

关于阿爷的去世，从来都不让自己去想，因为知道自己胜不过：直到现在都是自我麻醉，感觉好像他在上海，只因为年迈耳聋，所以不和我通电话；眼花手颤，所以不给我写信…好好的，安详的，平静的，满足的……

06年底回家奔丧，自我麻醉和克制，把自己的魂魄游离在丧事之外，克制自己只可以不出声地流泪……葬礼上有人失控如表演，有人表演如失控……我只听到哀乐声声，生生敲碎我的心。教会那首歌是这样唱的：再相会，再相会……我什么都想不动，头脑停止运作，只机械回放着这三个字，反反复复……

回到北京，把一切包袱都留在上海，觉得那个失去亲人的家不是我的家，去世的那个人，也不是我的亲人……我只是不能高兴起来，感觉漂浮在一种不知名的介质里，慢慢等待失丧的阴影离我远去……

葬礼之后的第10天，我站在海淀医院手术室门口等待一个很青春的女孩子，手术室门口的拥挤让我吃了一惊！说不清楚在哪一个时刻，顿时感觉心如刀割，我多么愿意我最爱的阿爷永远不要离开人世，而她们、他们、她、他、这些人！却活活地要除却已经在子宫中孕育的骨肉！那一刻在我心中的恨，可以把人间一切美好焚烧成灰烬。

我是胜不过，阿爷的逝世我真的没有勇气去面对，对谁也没说，小心地藏起来，自己也不去碰，最好哪一天自己就忘记藏在了那个角落。可总有那么一些时刻，不经意的就触痛，疼到弯下腰来依然强忍不住——

——那天暮色已深，我经过华堂边上的“中石化”，ipod里面突然响起Jacqueline Du Pre演奏的Cello Concerto in E minor, Op.85 (composed by Sir Edward Elgar)，心里的突然被拉开一条口子，伤痛就想潮水一样突然卷涌起来，将我埋葬，不留一丝气息地，甚至都不容我回过神来地，我已经泪流满面……那个时候，距离阿爷去世，已经整整一年。

我不敢让自己回忆，有阿爷呵护的日子，我的童年，很安心很严谨，好像天色常蓝，高薄云天，鸟语花香，很自得很骄傲的公主，不用在意外面的一切。我从来都没有仔细去总结过阿爷的为人，究竟是可贵于何处，直到去年年末的时候，《人物周刊》里一篇缅怀刚刚逝世的老艺术家孙道临先生的文章，让我逐字读着，胸口压抑，就哭起来，忍不住还要再看一遍，再看一遍……阿爷身上的品质，在他这一代人身上共有的那种特质，字字句句都描述得真实，这种熟悉感、共鸣感，找了朋友分享，也是不能明白。

以下是原文的一些摘抄——
“他们那一辈人，从来不（向公家）伸手的。”
“都市的、儒雅的、知识阶层的”
“谈到电影《家》时，孙道临说，‘觉新生活在那个年代，我很熟悉。’黄蜀芹说‘他就像那个年代的人。这样的男演员，现在再也找不到了。’”
“52年后，90岁的张瑞芳不忍回忆。就在2007年10月，孙道临身体稍好一点，曾经走到她的公寓，爬楼梯，进门，跟张瑞芳说，他想拍戏……”
“那一辈人，做事做人极其认真：孙道临当年，哪怕是一个小朋友要求合影，也要把扣子一粒一粒整齐了再照……”
“看得出，他想努力追上这个时代、小心地、顽强地想做事情。但他是忠厚老实的人，那样一个恶性竞争的环境，他肯定不会如鱼得水。”
“对于这样一个骨子里‘很贵气’地人，身体上的病痛或力不从心是另一种负担。年纪大了，洗澡需要别人帮扶，但是他不想给别人添麻烦，……”
“难道现在人民全变了吗？”
“一代人有一代人的‘信’与‘执’……”

那一期《人物周刊》的封面是帅得不得了的蒋介石曾孙……现在的媒体，关注贵族家庭的轶事多过对时代社会的思考和揭露，环视周围，有多少人依然有“家国心”和“使命感”？省视自己，又是走着怎样虚浮的道路！什么狗屁接受高等教育，阿爷那个时代的知识分子才真正能够算是有学养——

 

 

 

It’s drawing near to the year end. Again. Inevitably.

I’ve been thinking about write something to review. It took me one week to look back, and reflect upon myself. The old (although not very much) stories flashed across my mind. And I found them ever clear and simple. 2007 is the best year I’ve ever had, so far.

 

Records,

 

1.       About university study,

    I was thinking cancel the item for the humiliation of my being deprived of scholarship this year. Due to the change of officer in charge of scholarship management, the game rules are changed this year. I with other several candidates lost our scholarship. Administrators’ game in power or whatever, it’s a totally bad news for me. However, when I think it over after 2 days, I can see myself haven’t made enough efforts to the studies. Suppose I was on the top of the award list, by no means I could lose the scholarship. If I have to find someone to take responsibility for the loss, it could only be myself.

    Anyway, shool studies are basically going well. I picked up a little French and forgot them all after exams. Besides all the rest courses are concerning with English. English essay reading might be the most challenging one. However, it’s worthy. Essays are carefully selected, through which I get to know the ideas in the world’s biggest brains. The course broadens my horrizon in terms of literature, philosophy, linguistics and subjects in the sphere of culture. And it reminds me that I should…think, and… reflect from time to time, to form a perspective of my own, in the end. Some of the articles are really wonderful, that give me pretty much enlightenment. I feel being led along a mysterious path, the further I go, the clearer a picture I have. Now I open the textbook, and on the first page I can see a sentence I’ve put down the other day: My understanding towards the essays in this book is based on a Christian’s perspective. Believe it or not, I found theories to serve as the doctrines of my faith, or, my Christianity belief is solidified through my study into the texts which seem to be with no connection of Christianity. It’s God’s guiding.

    Other courses include public speech, business translation, science article translation, pragmatics, literature traslation and even law documents translation. They are delievered by great professors. I am deeply impressed by them. I feel sorry because I have never been a disciple-type student.

 

 

2. Family

    2007 wouldn’t be not too much different with 2006 or 2005 if grandpa still lived. Grandpa passed away in the end of 2006. Till now I haven’t let myself accept the fact, or I can say, I dare not leave myself truly feel the loss. Fortunately, I live basically in Beijing, far away from home. I regard grandpa still living, in Shanghai. But sometimes, the self-deception doesn’t work. I remember the other evening, when I was walking alone in the streets, iPod started to play Adagio-Moderato by Jaqueline Du Pre, I was drowned in sadness. And tears kept going out of my eyes.

    To grandma and auntie, they suffer too much in the past year. I cannot inmagine how they get through the hard time.

    As to my relationship with parents, I should say it keeps going in a unique way. Sweet and torturing, love with pressure. It caused too much agony to both sides. And we have been wasting too much tears. I guess they love me too much and want to protect me from any possible hurt. Like all the parents in the world, they try to steer my to a secure future which I found inconvenient with my dream. But it is obviously unrealistic. In a word, traditional parents vs. post-80 daughter, typical conflicts.

 

3. L’amour

    Falling in and out of love, either records once.

 

4. Health Condition

    At Christmas Eve, I tried hard to recall what I was doing the same time last year. I found out in the end that I spent a high-fever night. 3 o’clock in the morning, vomitting at the hospital emergency…What a special Christmas for 2006. And for 2007, almost the same time, I was ill. So Christmas Eve was a sleeping night. Truly peaceful.

    As a vision for the whole year. Health condition is fine. Compared to the first one or two years of university life, more or less I have some progress. Maybe it’s because of the good mental condition.

    There’s problem with my right knee. It has to be fixed in the coming year. Operation is an option. I escaped it 5 years ago. But as I can see from the recent condition, it’s only problem of time. Sooner or later, I have to. God! It’s terrible!

 

5. Faith/Spiritual Life

    I think I know Christ more in this year. Through good and bad experience, I learned lessons of love, share, and forgiveness. I might not be a religious one, but God preserves me and guides me along the way. Praise the Lord.

     I understand in 2007 that the realities are hard to face, while the truth is hard to figure out. Life is full of ups and downs, turns and twists. When I look back to what I’ve been through for the years, I thank the Lord. Without those hard time or wrong paths, I wouldn’t have known what is of Christ. Chasing the wind is seeking in vain. Jesus is of my faith as the truth and the path.

     Besides, I am very happy to see what happened around me in this year. I witness God’s almighty and God’s love. Miracles as the outsiders may think, it’s the proof of “Jesus, he lives.”

     I changed place for Sunday worship in deep autumn. The new place is composed of basically university students who are from various universities in Beijing. I witness the work God is doing among the young generation in China. Large number of Chinese Christians’ prayer I heard before for the nation peace and prosper, for the young generation’s faith now became a real picture in front of my eyes. Praise the Lord. At Easter and Christmas Celebration, I saw it by my own eyes that Christ the Savior makes his plan realized at his pace. The girl I took there first knew what Christians are. She was surprised at our songs for praising the Lord. She said, “hey, you guys are so rock!” Yes, knowing Jesus Christ does rock!

     The last Sunday, Emmanuel Church’s UIBE students sperated from students of other universities delivered Sunday worship for the first time. It marks the establishment of UIBE LC. Due to the number of  UIBE students Chiristians getting larger, the development realized God’s schedule.

     I want to mention George, who teaches Graduation Thesis Composing. Although many classmates might think he is giving too much preachments, I admire his courage and confidence to give spiritual wisdom to the students. As a scholor specializing in enterprise management training, his knowledge, business sense and thoughs in his mind are…crazy, only this word gives the closest description. In US, he had opportunities to work for White House as Chinese expert. For Christ’s good news’ sake, he teaches in our university as a guest lecturer. Power and faith from God being inside, he shows how a real Christian keeps in line with God’s will, following God’s guide, and undertaking God’s mission.

     My neighbour dormmate as well as classmate got baptized in 2007. I never realized from which exact moment, she started to speaking of God’s good news. I just thank God in heart that Jesus the Christ makes more and more people know Him, which is the Way, the Truth, the Life.

     Xin my highschool classmate. Once upon a time I regarded him as the last one who could accept Christianity belief. Now he is almost my closest friend in Christ. We have lots of same understanding of God. Now when we looked back to our dark time, which we’ve been through together or respectively, we can truly take it easy. I thank God in my prayer for my dear friend. When he knows God’s words, God’s love, and especially His mission on him, he becomes a person live with full energy and kindness inside giving off frangrance to people around him. And whoever is in Christ will know, it’s true. Because, we all do. I pray to God that he becomes a very fine Christian for God’s use.

     This year’s headline of faith is from Kenda. She is the forever lengend for SIS female football team. 2006 is her last year of university. We fought to the final play, although we failed to get the championship, SIS football girls carried forward the glorious history of female football. That was the beginning of story between Kenda and I. When Kenda talked about Christianity with me on QQ, I never realized she would be what she is today. Even when I took her to the church I belonged to, I had no idea what’s God’s plan on her. That was her last 3 or 4 weeks in Beijing, she was about to graduate. When she told me after her first prayer (for years) to God, she received the offering letter from her dreaming university in HK to have graduate study, I took it for granted. How could I know that is the turning point of her spiritual life? I have no idea what God has done to her in that past year, but when she left message to me on QQ the other day and told me that she had devoted to God’s work for full-time service, it was really a surprise. I cannot tell the appreciation and praise I have to God. If someone asks me why. I’ll tell him/her, Kenda used to be the last-could-believe type, from men’s eyes but not eyes of God.

     At the concert held by Emmanuel church, when the music started, when thousands of young people sang in the same faith, “One Way, Jesus. Lord you’re the only reason for my life.” I said in heart, Lord, I wish I can know you more, I wish I could love you more.

 

 

6. C’est La Vie

    I’ve said at the very beginning that 2007 has been the best year I’ve ever had so far. It doesn’t mean it’s a tranquil year without difficulties. To the contrary, it’s a stormy year. Good and bad things happened one after another, as a friend judged— dramatic.

    In Spring, SIS female football team got into year’s Final Play, once again. And struke the second rank in the end. We made too much efforts for the whole season. The stories happened along the whole process I don’t want to look back. That’s the best time. And the peak of triumph. Things changed right after the game, inevitably and doomed. My friends know it is my hardest time for the year. Desperation fights with expectation day and night. Sister said, pray, Julie, pray to the Lord. At those days, I was completely caught by dark power. I was hardly able to speak. Only the Holy Spirit signed for me in front of Lord. To a lesser or greater extent, I am so lucky to put everything behind and start all over again.

    On the one hand, because of I had experienced the tortures, I could understand others in sufferings more than before. On the other hand, when I was in depression, I got the support from sisters and friends. I learned how precious love is. It is the greatest power to better the world.

     My stay in Turkey should be a strong stroke for 2007. I’ve been thinking of recording the heavenly days in a well-composed article. Those people I met in Turkey show the great hospitality to me. They make me believe however different we might be with each other, love and understanding lying inside are the common treasure we have, which is given by God the Creator, the One, and the Only. I’ll keep the memory of Marmara, Aegean and Mediteranean for good. In the last days of my stay, the melody of La Isla Bonita lingered in my mind, that is because I found myself in it. I love Turkey, and Turkish people. Hope one day I can go back to the great land.

 

 

 

Ending

    When it came to the exciting moment of cross-year point, sisters had a toast in the dormitory. The fourth new year we’ve had since we knew each other. And the next year, we just don’t know where or with whom we might be. Like the past 2004, 2005 and 2006, 2007 is another year of victory. Cheers for what? Maybe, for another year of survival. Only the friends of heart know how it tastes for each other. A Farewell to Year 2007, with joy with tears.

 

 

 

Passage 1.

With the sixteenth century the movement in Europe which we call the Renaissance, the “rebirth,” was developing rapidly in England. “Rebirth” is not a very exact word, not nearly so exact as it was supposed to have been when it became attached to the period. The Middle Ages were anything but dead; even philosophy and the arts were not dead; even the classics were not dead. Nothing was dead, although for a time our understanding of the Middle Ages was closer to being moribund than was the Middle Ages itself. The knowledge of Mediterranean culture, however, the knowledge especially of Latin and Greek, classical though, art, and study— all of which had been filtering west and north for centuries—was now greatly augmented. In a growing degree, classical rhetoric became rhetoric, classical grammar became grammar, classical vocabulary became an ideal, at least with the more learned individuals. Of course there were sensible folk who scoffed at “inkhorn terms,” and other sensible people who just ignored them, but the acceleration of learning and study during the Renaissance meant in part an acceleration in the borrowing of and influence from Latin.

Our debts to Latin in this way are incalculable. Many terms we borrowed; they can be traced. Other classical influences can only be guessed at. Latin was the core of the growing school system, and it was the ideal of cultured people. If a man knew Latin, everyone knew that he must be a man of parts. If a man of pretensions did not know Latin, he took pains at least to be well ticketed and branded with Latin tags from the choice authors. Thus, Latin seeped into the language in all sorts of invisible ways.

 

Passage 2.

To the man who appreciates clear thinking and well-constructed argument, Hobbes’ account of sovereignty and his apology for it appear more admirable even than Bodin’s . Hobbes will always be a favourite among intellectuals. He is a robust, bold, resourceful, and at times close reasoner; he used his arguments with the assurance of an all-seeing general winning a complete victory in a large and intricate battle; he is the most pungent of political philosophers, and has a sharp wit, though he is not bitter or waspish. He is a remedy for dullness; to read him is to be put in a better humour. From a certain point of view, he made the best of all cases for absolute authority. But he did not make a case likely to attract the unsophisticated. He has had, no doubt, a great and a long influence; he has had a distinguished intellectual posterity. Many have borrowed from him, including the two most famous among the champions of absolute monarchy by divine right, Filmer and Bossuet. Yet he has been more admired thean persuasive; those best able to appreciate his merits, the intellectuals, have also been the best equipped to take from him what they needed without swallowing his arguments whole.

 

 Passage 3.

What Will I Live For

 

Three passions, from and toward one Governor Jesus Christ will be my life engine: the pursuit of truth, the seeking for love, and the undeniable burden of proclaiming the good news. These passions will become a spring of water encouraging me to march on in the path that God has ordered to me.

 

I will pursue truth, first because it reveals all the nature facts and scientific regulations that were created by God. Among 100 most outstanding scientists of 20^th century, 8 are Christians. They hold the same view that the Creator game men the dominion over the world, for what reason men should research the secrets of natural world so as to be better controllers. I will pursue it, next, because it covers the facts from the very inner emotions to the unlimited out space. Those very facts will bring ecstasy, ecstasy so great that I would excitedly get down on my knees to the Creator of all these elegant and marvelous beauty. I will pursue it, finally because Jesus once said “I am the truth.” To pursue the truth is to pursue God Himself. I press on toward the goal to get close to my Lord in response to the heavenly call. This is what I will pursue, and though it is sure to be a tough journey, this is what—I will take trough.

 

With equal passion I will seek love. “Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth, it always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails.” (1 Corinthian 13:4-8) Love contains all. Its amazing nature worth a life-long seeking. “God is love, and those who abide in love abide in God, and God abides in them.” (1 John 4:16) And because Jesus loves the world and He requires those who are willing to follow Him love others as He does. Love makes me lay aside sins, it encourages me to consider for people’s need, and it ensures me dwelling in the house of the Lord for my life long.

 

Truth and love, so far as they are God Himself, are leading me to be the salt and light on earth for his name’s sake. But always the peace and joy in Jesus Christ urge me to proclaim the good news. That is “For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.” (John 3:16) Echoes of cries of sinners tortured by Satan reverberate in my heart. Children in wars find no dwelling for body and soul, desperate youngsters haunted by addiction, exhausted people chasing fame and fortune but thirsty in spirit, all need to come to the Christ. Yet few I have achieved, and I do suffer.

 

God is truth, God is love, and Jesus Christ is that very good news. This will be my life, be it ever so weird and different from others, whoever asks me about what I will live for will surely get my answer of “whom” I am living for. From the moment I embraced the faith of Christianity, I’ve already determined to live for Jesus Christ.

By Garry Wills

Our Endangered Values: America's Moral Crisis

by Jimmy Carter

Simon and Schuster, 212 pp., $25.00

In 1972, I was asked by New York magazine to survey Southern reactions to the attempted assassination of George Wallace. On my list of people to call was Georgia governor Jimmy Carter. When I called his press secretary, Jody Powell (a name I had never heard before), I was told it would be better for me to come to Atlanta than to talk on the phone. (Powell was drumming up attention for his man, with a view to his running for president.) When I arrived there, Powell had arranged for me to fly with Carter in his little state prop plane to Tifton, a small South Georgia town where there was a meeting with local sheriffs. The sheriffs were unhappy with Carter's liberal racial policies, and Powell obviously thought it would be good for his reputation nationally to be seen as standing up against regional prejudice.

Carter used all his local ties to defang the critics—the sheriffs did not openly turn against him—and I was impressed. On the flight back, he said he wanted to drop off in the town of Plains and see how his peanut business was doing—a homey touch the press would be treated to ad nauseam over the next two years. I do not remember any mention of his local church while we were in Plains. In fact, I cannot recall that religion was brought up in all our hours together. Perhaps he thought that was not something New York magazine readers would respond to. At any rate, I was surprised when, four years later, so much was made of his religion as he ran for president. It began when he was asked, while visiting Baptist friends, if he thought of himself as "born again." He answered yes—not surprisingly, since the Gospel of John (3:5) says that one must be born again to enter the kingdom of heaven, and Saint Paul says that baptism is being reborn into Christ (Romans 6:4). Reporters did not know this as a basic belief of Christians—they treated it as an odd cult claim.

That led to his second-most-famous remark of the 1976 campaign. Carter was asked in a Playboy interview if he thought he was a holier-than-thou person because he was born again. He answered that, no, in fact he had committed lust in his heart—again quoting the New Testament (Matthew 5:28). That did it. For much of the Carter presidency, the line of some in the press (and, as I know well, in the academy) was that he was a religious nut. I followed him in the 1976 race and heard a reporter ask Carter why he constantly brought up religion. He replied that he had made a determination never to bring up religion in the campaign. But the reporters kept asking him about it, and he had to answer them or be criticized for dodging the issue.

His attendance at church was not announced; we reporters had to ferret that out by ourselves. Carter is an old-fashioned Baptist, the kind that follows the lead of the great Baptist Roger Williams—that is, he is the firmest of believers in the separation of church and state. Unlike most if not all modern presidents, he never had a prayer service in the White House. His problem, back then, was not that he paraded his belief but that he believed. All this can seem quaint now when professing religion is practically a political necessity, whether one believes or not. There is now an inverse proportion between religiosity and sincerity.

Carter rightly says in Our Endangered Values that the norms of religion and politics are different. His religion, at any rate, places its greatest priority on love, of God and one's neighbor, even to the point of self-sacrifice. But a president cannot make his nation sacrifice itself—that would be dereliction of duty. The priority of politics is justice, and love goes beyond that. But love can help one find out what is just, without equating the two. That is why none of us, even those who believe in the separation of church and state, professes a separation of morality and politics. Insofar as believers—the great majority of Americans—derive many if not most of their moral insights from their beliefs, they must mingle religion and politics, again without equating the two.

In his new book, Carter addresses religion and politics together in a way that he has not done before, because he thinks that some Americans, and especially his fellow Baptists, have equated the two in a way that contradicts traditional Baptist beliefs in the autonomy of local churches, in the opposition to domination by religious leaders, and in the fellowship of love without reliance on compulsion, political or otherwise. In 2000, these tenets were expressly renounced by the largest Baptist body, the Southern Baptist Convention, which removed a former commitment to belief that "the sole authority for faith and practice among Baptists is Jesus Christ, whose will is revealed in the Holy Scriptures." What was being substituted, Carter writes, was "domination by all-male pastors." As a leading spokesman, W.A. Criswell, put it: "Lay leadership of the church is unbiblical when it weakens the pastor's authority as ruler of the church." The Southern Baptists, Carter laments, have become as authoritarian as their former antitype, the Roman Catholic hierarchy. The Southern Baptist Convention has severed its ancient ties with the Baptist World Alliance.

The marks of this new fundamentalism, according to Carter, are rigidity, self-righteousness, and an eagerness to use compulsion (including political compulsion). Its spokesmen are contemptuous of all who do not agree with them one hundred percent. Pat Robertson, on his 700 Club, typified the new "popes" when he proclaimed: "You say you're supposed to be nice to the Episcopalians and the Presbyterians and the Methodists and this, that, and the other thing. Nonsense. I don't have to be nice to the spirit of the Antichrist." Carter got a firsthand taste of such intolerance when the president of the Southern Baptist Convention visited him in the White House to tell him, "We are praying, Mr. President, that you will abandon secular humanism as your religion."

Such attitudes are far from the ones recommended by Jesus in the gospels as Carter has studied and taught them through the decades, and their proponents have brought similar attitudes into the political world, where a matching political fundamentalism has taken over much of the electoral process. Such dictatorial attitudes defeat the stated goals of the fundamentalists themselves. On abortion, for instance, Carter argues that a "pro-life" dogmatism defeats human life and values at many turns. Carter is opposed to abortion, as what he calls a tragedy "brought about by a combination of human errors." But the "pro-life" forces compound rather than reduce the errors. The most common abortions, and the most common reasons cited for undergoing them, are caused by economic pressure compounded by ignorance.

Yet the anti-life movement that calls itself pro-life protects ignorance by opposing family planning, sex education, and informed use of contraceptives, tactics that not only increase the likelihood of abortion but tragedies like AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases. The rigid system of the "pro-life" movement makes poverty harsher as well, with low minimum wages, opposition to maternity leaves, and lack of health services and insurance. In combination, these policies make ideal conditions for promoting abortion, as one can see from the contrast with countries that do have sex education and medical insurance. Carter writes:

Canadian and European young people are about equally active sexually, but, deprived of proper sex education, American girls are five times as likely to have a baby as French girls, seven times as likely to have an abortion, and seventy times as likely to have gonorrhea as girls in the Netherlands. Also, the incidence of HIV/ AIDS among American teenagers is five times that of the same age group in Germany.... It has long been known that there are fewer abortions in nations where prospective mothers have access to contraceptives, the assurance that they and their babies will have good health care, and at least enough income to meet their basic needs.

The result of a rigid fundamentalism combined with poverty and ignorance can be seen where the law forbids abortion:

In some predominantly Roman Catholic countries where all abortions are illegal and few social services are available, such as Peru, Brazil, Chile, and Colombia, the abortion rate is fifty per thousand. According to the World Health Organization, this is the highest ratio of unsafe abortions [in the world].

A New York Times article that came out after Carter's book appeared further confirms what he is saying: "Four million abortions, most of them illegal, take place in Latin America annually, the United Nations reports, and up to 5,000 women are believed to die each year from complications from abortions."^[*] This takes place in countries where churches and schools teach abstinence as the only form of contraception—demonstrating conclusively the ineffectiveness of that kind of program.

By contrast, in the United States, where abortion is legal and sex education is broader, the abortion rate reached a twenty-four-year low during the 1990s. Yet the ironically named "pro-life" movement would return the United States to the condition of Chile or Colombia. And not only that, the fundamentalists try to impose the anti-life program in other countries by refusing foreign aid to programs that teach family planning, safe sex, and contraceptive knowledge. They also oppose life-saving advances through the use of stem cell research. With friends like these, "life" is in thrall to death. Carter finds these results neither loving (in religious terms) nor just (in political terms).

Carter finds the same rigid and self-righteous—and self-defeating—policies at work across the current political spectrum. The pro-life forces have no problem with a gun industry and capital punishment legislation that are, in fact, provably pro-death. Carter, a lifelong hunter, does not want to outlaw guns and he knows that Americans would never do that. But timorous politicians, cowering before the NRA, defeat even the most sensible limitations on weapons useful neither for hunting nor for personal self-defense (AK-47s, AR-15s, Uzis), even though, as Carter shows, more than 1,100 police chiefs and sheriffs told Congress that these weapons are obstacles to law enforcement. The NRA opposed background checks to keep guns out of the hands of criminals and terrorists and illegals, and then insisted that background checks, if they were imposed, had to be destroyed within twenty-four hours. The result of such pro-death measures, Carter writes, is grimly evident: "American children are sixteen times more likely than children in other industrialized nations to be murdered with a gun, eleven times more likely to commit suicide with a gun, and nine times more likely to die from firearms accidents." Where are the friends of the fetus when children are dying in such numbers?

Carter observes that "the Johns Hopkins Center for Gun Policy and Research reports that the rate of firearms homicide in the United States is nineteen times higher than that of 35 other high-income countries combined" (emphasis added). In the most recent year for which figures are available, these are the numbers for firearms homicides:

 Ireland 54
 Japan  83
 Sweden  183
 Great Britain  197
 Australia 334
 Canada 1,034
 United States 30,419
  [emphasis added]

Once again, Carter finds no support for the policies that make such a result possible in the US, in terms of either a loving religion or a just society.

Capital punishment is also a pro-death program. It does not protect life. It aligns us with authoritarian regimes: "Ninety percent of all known executions are carried out in just four countries: China, Iran, Saudi Arabia—and the United States" (emphasis added). Execution does not deter, as many studies have proved. In states that abolished it, Carter writes, capital crimes did not increase:

The homicide rate is at least five times greater in the United States than in any European country, none of which authorizes the death penalty. The Southern states carry out over 80 percent of the executions but have a higher murder rate than any other region. Texas has by far the most executions, but its homicide rate is twice that of Wisconsin, the first state to abolish the death penalty. It is not a matter of geography or ethnicity, as is indicated by similar and adjacent states: the number of capital crimes is higher, respectively, in South Dakota, Connecticut, and Virginia (all with the death sentence) than in the adjacent states of North Dakota, Massachusetts, and West Virginia (without the death penalty).

How can a loving religion or a just state support such a culture of death? Only a self-righteous and punitive fundamentalism, not an ethos of the gospels, can explain this.

It is in foreign affairs that Carter finds the most self-righteous, rigid, and self-defeating effects of a religio-political fundamentalism. It is the gap between rich and poor in the world that presents the main threat to our future, yet American policies increase that gap, at home and abroad. We give proportionally less money in foreign aid than do other developed countries, and our ability to give is being decreased by our growing deficit, incurred to reward our own wealthy families with disproportionate tax cuts. Carter points out that much of the aid announced or authorized never reaches its targets. This reflects a general smugness about America's privileged position. We are dismissive of other countries' concern with the world environment, with nuclear containment, and with international law. Carter gives specifics gathered from his world travels and from the experts' forums he regularly assembles at the Carter Center in Atlanta.

We have, for example, declared our right to first use of nuclear weapons. We have used aid money to bribe people against holding us accountable to international law. We have run secret detention centers where hundreds of people are held without formal charges or legal representation. We have rewarded with high office men who, like Alberto Gonzales, say that the Geneva Conventions on treatment of prisoners are "obsolete" or even "quaint," or who, like John Bolton, say that it is "a big mistake for us to grant any validity to international law even when it may seem in our short-term interest to do so."

The result, as Carter writes, has been to turn a vast fund of international good will accruing to us after September 11 into fear of and contempt for America unparalleled in modern times. We undermine the inspection teams of the UN and the IAEA with the result that we blunder into Iraq on bad information gathered from self-serving hacks buttering up our officialdom. On the eve of our attack on Iraq, Carter published an Op-Ed piece in The New York Times arguing in terms of the just war tradition that a preemptive and unilateral invasion was unjustified. Going to war was not a last resort (inspections could have continued to contain Saddam until the proof of WMDs, or the lack of them, could be established). War was not authorized by international authorities for eliminating nuclear weapons, but was an opportunity seized in order "to achieve regime change and to establish a Pax Americana in the region." It did not promise proportional violence with a clear hope of providing better conditions than the ones it was remedying. Carter's was a calm and moral judgment about the war, which most Americans now believe was the right one. In retrospect, a majority think the war was a mistake. We should have listened to Carter.

We pretend we are against nuclear proliferation, yet we spur it on when others see our disregard for the very international agreements that promote it:

The end of America's "no first use" nuclear weapons policy has aroused a somewhat predictable response in other nations. Chinese major general Zhu Chenghu announced in July 2005 that China's government was under internal pressure to change its "no first use" policy: "If the Americans draw their missiles and position-guided ammunition on to the target zone on China's territory, I think we will have to respond with nuclear weapons."

We attack terrorism not by cooperation with other countries' security teams, which often have better information on worldwide terrorist activities than we do, but with unilateral and preemptive uses of force that just increase terrorism. This is a new culture of death: "The US National Counterterrorism Center," Carter writes, "reported that the number of serious international terrorist incidents more than tripled in 2004. 'Significant' attacks grew to more than 650, up from the previous record of 175 in 2003."

We claim to be spreading democracy in the Middle East, but a Zogby international poll in 2005 showed that an overwhelming majority of Arabs did not believe that US policy in Iraq was motivated by the spread of democracy in the region, and believed that the Middle East had become less democratic after the Iraq war. The approval rating of America plummeted at the very time we were supposedly bringing the blessings of freedom there—it stood, Carter notes, at "2 percent in Egypt, 4 percent in Saudi Arabia, 11 percent in Morocco, 14 percent in the United Arab Emirates, 15 percent in Jordan, with a high of only 20 percent in [our friend] Lebanon." These developments have taken place as America enacted a retreat from earlier commitments, under both Republican and Democratic presidents, that parallels what Carter describes as the retreat of evangelicals from earlier fidelity to gospel values such as life, compassion, tolerance, and inclusiveness.

Carter is a patriot. He lists all the things that Americans have to be proud of. That is why he is so concerned that we are squandering our treasures, moral even more than economic. He has come to the defense of our national values, which he finds endangered. He proves that a devout Christian does not need to be a fundamentalist or fanatic, any more than a patriotic American has to be punitive, narrow, and self-righteous. He defends the separation of church and state because he sees with nuanced precision the interactions of faith, morality, politics, and pragmatism. That is a combination that once was not rare, but is becoming more so. We need a voice from the not-so-distant past, and this quiet voice strikes just the right notes.

Notes

^[*] Juan Forero, "Latin American Women Mount Campaign to Legalize Abortion," The New York Times, December 3, 2005, page A8.

 

Our great Gatsby “lost the old warm world, paid a high price for living too long with a single dream.” His single dream is Daisy, a rich, worldly woman. After reading this great novel, I felt a bit of familiar with her voice, which is full of money.

Daisy was born in a “nice” family, around by many “nice” people; consequently, she is such a “nice” girl with “excitingly desirable” character to the poor Gatsby. How deeply Gatsby is in love with her. How deeply he believes the only barrier lying between was his poverty. So in the latter years, he struggles to seek fortune. He believes one day, when he has got enough money, his “perfect” Daisy shall come back to him. He feels “married to her, while she vanishes into her rich house, into her rich, full life, leaving him—nothing.” Daisy marries to Tom, so naturally, and smoothly. They lead a rich, “nice” life. The peace is not only on the surface, though Tom has girls outside marriage and Daisy feels “cynical about everything”, neither of them have ever think of changes. Daisy leaves her old dream behind at her marriage, yet her dream is recalled by Gatsby, who comes back with fortune, and fame, and his let-gone single dream. Gatsby is quite sure that Daisy, who shows her still-deep love to him, will leave her husband to marry him. But he is just too naïve. Love could be little excitement in Daisy’s life, but it could never be important enough to let her make any change to her “nice”, and “peaceful” life. So after that terrible accident, in which dies Tom’s girl, she could easily with her husband put all the vital consequences on Gatsby and could vanishes after Gatsby’s death, without a single word. How cruel! Gatsby dies, lonely, leaving that green light on, and his unrealized dream.

Daisy doesn’t ever love Gatsby? Maybe once she does. If not she may not tangle at her marriage. But people in her class are used to be “rational” and easy to let old dreams go. She is one among them. Gatsby to her is just a passer-by. She could easily leave him behind and to look forward. She is used to the “full” life, full of money. She has got used to thinking of life in that “nice” way but could not imagine life of other shape. She married Tom, has a daughter. She knows her husband’s affairs out of marriage. She just appears cool. She feels cynical; she is, in her logic, in her life pattern. At least, she has a secure life. Does she love Tom? She certainly does. Only this sort of love is not from heart, but is from reasoning. In another word, she could do this to anyone, only when this man could meet her requirement for a secure and nice life. Tom, as a man, is with the same theory. What a perfect the couple.

Everyone is Daisy, once used to the secure and stable life, we’re not likely to change. In today’s society, our life is full, even over-full. We could easily persuade ourselves to love something or someone, someone/something that meets our needs. Everyone has several choices and more substitutes. When we talk about life, or dream, or future, our voices are full of money. A secure future and a stable life is all what we want. To prevent the security, killing some old dreams (which is totally from the bottom of our heart), ignoring some loving ones are all of common, and worth. We are all getting cooler and meanwhile crueler. Even there’s someone like Gatsby appears in our dream, he will just be a sweet cookie to life, and we could easily throw him away; the possible tangle is getting shorter and less painful. Is there a green light in our heart? Is there a single one still standing there? Is there anyone among us who still believe in the green light? “The orgiastic future that year by year recedes before us. It eluded us then, but that’s no matter—tomorrow we will run faster, stretch out our arms farther… And one fine morning—

So we beat on, boats against the current, borne back ceaselessly into the past.”

      1.她由严厉而又慈爱的父亲带大，说任何话、做任何事都不可能不考虑到他的批评或赞许。2.即使现在，他已三十岁，离开了家，发表了不少诗歌，而且其中有几首获得过全国性的奖项，她却仍然毫不迟疑的承认父亲是自己的第一位也是最重要的一位师长。3.她说，她无时无刻不意识到他的存在。4.即使他听上去很平静，态度很超脱时，她仍经常在他说话的口吻和通信的字里行间感觉到他对自己的未来所抱的莫大希望。5.事实上，她父亲对她的期望始终萦绕在她的脑际。

 

   1. Brought up by her sever yet loving father, she never says or does anything without his critisism and praise as a consideration. 2.Even now when she is already in her thirties, away from home, and has published a great number of poems, a few of which have won national prizes/ awards, she still doesn't haste to acknowledge her father as her first and most important master/ mentor. 3.At no moment is she not aware/ conscious of his presence, she says. 4.even when he sounds calm and detached, she frequently senses/ hears his greats hopes for herfuture in the tone of his voice and of his letters. 5.She has in fact in haunted by her father's expectation for her.

 

 

 

  by James Tuite

 

New York is a city of sounds; muted sounds and shrill sounds; shattering sounds and soothing sounds; urgent sounds and aimless sounds. The cliff dwellers of Manhattan--who would be racked by the silence of the lonely woods--do not hear these sounds because they are constant and eternally urban.

 

The visitor to the city can hear them, though, just as some animals can hear a high-pitched whistle inaudible to humans. To the casual caller to Manhattan, lying restive and sleepless in a hotel twenty or thirty floors above the street, they tell a story as fascinating as life itself. And back of the sounds broods the silence.

 

Night in midtown is the noise of tinseled honky-tonk and violence. Thin strains of music, usually the firm beat of rock 'n 'roll or the frenzied outbursts of the discotheque, rise from ground level. This is the cacophony, the discordance of youth, and it comes on strongest when nights are hot and young blood restless.

 

Somewhere in the canyons below there is shrill laughter or raucous shouting. A bottle shatters against concrete. The whine of a police siren slices through the night, moving ever closer, until an eerie Doppler effect~ brings it to a guttural halt.

 

There are few sounds so exciting in Manhattan as those of fire apparatus dashing through the night. At the outset there is the tentative hint of the first-due company bullying his way through mid-town traffic. Now a fire whistle from the opposite direction affirms that trouble is, indeed, afoot. In seconds, other sirens converging from other streets help the skytop listener focus on the scene of excitement.

 

But he can only hear and not see, and imagination takes flight. Are the flames and smoke gushing from windows not far away? Are victims trapped there, crying out for help? Is it a conflagration, or only a trash-basket fire? Or, perhaps, it is merely a false alarm.

 

The questions go unanswered and the urgency of the moment dissolves. Now the mind and the ear detect the snarling, arrogant bickering of automobile horns. People in a hurry. Taxicabs blaring, insisting on their checkered priority.

 

Even the taxi horns dwindle down to a precocious few in the gray and pink moments of dawn. Suddenly there is another sound, a morning sound that taunts the memory for recognition, The growl of a predatory monster? No, just garbage trucks that have begun a day of scavenging.                              

 

Trash cans rattle outside restaurants. Metallic jaws on sanitation trucks gulp and masticate the residue of daily living, then digest it with a satisfied groan of gears.

 

The sounds of the new day are businesslike. The growl of buses, so scattered and distant at night, becomes a demanding part of the traffic bedlam. An occasional jet or helicopter injects an exclamation point from an unexpected quarter. When the wind is right, the vibrant bellow of an ocean liner can be heard.

 

The sounds of the day are as jarring as the glare of a sun that outlines the canyons of midtown in drab relief.' A pneumatic drill frays countless nerves with its rat-a-,tat-tat, for dig: they must to perpetuate the city's dizzy motion. After each screech: of l brakes there is a moment of suspension, of waiting for the thud or: crash that never seems to follow. 

 

The whistles of traffic policemen and hotel doormen chirp from all sides, like birds calling for their mates across a frenzied aviary. And all of these sounds are adult sounds, for childish laughter has no place in these canyons.

 

Night falls again, the cycle is complete, but there is no surcease from sound. For the beautiful dreamers,, perhaps, the "sounds of the rude world heard in the day, lulled by the moonlight have all passed away, "but this is not so in the city.

 

Too many New Yorkers accept the sounds about them as bland parts of everyday existence. They seldom stop to listen to the sounds, to think about them, to be appalled or enchanted by them. In the big city, sounds are life.

 

My first job was to tutor a 14-year-old schoolgirl in English. It was a few months after my entering UIBE; and I myself was only 19. On the night I got the offer, my roommates cheered, “Congratulations, finally realized your teacher dream!”

 

The girl was about my cousin’s age. I liked her the first time I saw her. She was bright, active, but meanwhile, she was not hard-working. Every time she would leak on back of her revolving chair, watching out of the window or on her watch now and then. She didn’t know her mother paid 30 yuan per hour to me on her course, or she just didn’t know the value of these 30 yuan.

 

We studied in her south-faced living-room, which is next-door to her bedroom with a bath. She owned that middle floor of their house. The house is in a townhouse neighborhood; its location is in such a remote area that not by cars the transportation is totally inconvenient. And the neighborhood was guarded by many well uniformed-dressing guards, who would question me every time before I was let in. It made me uncomfortable.

 

One day, I got there on time and knocked the door. But no one answered. I waited outside the house on steps of the garden. Downstairs, there was a bicycle, and beside the bicycle, there was a woman; I noticed she threw a look on her watch time to time, obviously was waiting for someone. I suddenly realized she was the pay-by-hour maid of the family. At that time, I felt a little disgraced; a sour sound occurred in my mind, “you’re no nobler than a pay-by-hour maid; you’re just a commodity; they buy your value by hour.” I called the girl’s mobile, she apologized to me and said they would be back in half an hour; she asked me to take a rest in the club house of their neighborhood and they would pick me up when they were back. I controlled my temper and said, “Okay I’ll do that.” Before I cut the line, her mother took over the phone and apologized again, added she would pay the lost hour to me. I didn’t know what to say. I didn’t teach for money. So finally, when she forgot her words I didn’t feel angry.

 

That day, when I left for club, the maid rode passing me. I felt sorry for her. I thought she might not have their mobile number or she might not have a mobile. The only choice for her was just leave, but not for the club house I was going to. And later on I got news from my student that the maid was paid 20 yuan an hour.

 

That was the first time in my life that I thought for a maid. I was brought up in a respectable family in Shanghai. Our house is in downtown Shanghai; and it is colony heritage townhouse. I am the only daughter of my parents who cherished me so much that were against me taking this job from the very beginning. And I was the only granddaughter in the family. So when I wrote to my 87-year-old grandfather, who used to be a lawyer, graduated from Fudan University in 1942, to tell him I felt myself like Jane Eyre, a poor disgraced family teacher in old English times, I expected his loving words. But those loving words could only come from my kind grandma, she told me my father had read the letter and he wanted me to quit the job, and if I wanted money, he would give me enough. Words in my grandfather’s letter are “You’re certainly distinguished from the maid paid by hour. They earn money by physical labor, and you on your knowledge; you’re an intellectual worker. This is the first step you get to know the society and you should take responsibility to the girl; you should try your best to help your student get better in her school work, all because they put trust in you.”

 

After 5 months, a friend of the girl’s mother’s called my mobile; she wanted me to tutor her daughter. And she is my second student whom I helped till now. And from this girl, I got my third job—tutoring her cousin, a boy of the same age. Just at the last weekend, I received the boy’s call, he said, “Sister, have you finished your driving lessons? I don’t like the brother you introduced. I only want you to teach me. I  wish you have time.”

 

My first job has taught me a lot. It removed my pride and arrogance. It let me know job is hard and sacred. It let me how Love is the greatest and abiding. From the first day, my three students have always been in my prayer. I know God will lead them in the right path as He does to me.

今日删除空间中所有中文日志，

以后这里就特别留给英文日志以及阅读中看到的英文好文

 

请Julie的各位好朋友继续关注

 

 

 

We are all like little kids,

walking under God's blue sky.

(An excerpt from Joseph Wood Crutch's "Honor and Morality", in Readings from Left to Right, ed. Victor E.Amend and Leo T.Handpick (New York: The Free Press, 1970) 130-137)

 

 

    Sympathetic interpreters of the beatniks (垮掉的一代) have described them as "taking a revenge on society". The hero of a recent novel "undertakes an alcoholic strike against humanity". But the phrase "an alcoholic strike", like "a  revenge on society", seems to me merely comic. It suggests the opular saying about "biting off your nose to spite your face", that being precisely what some intellectuals (including many somewhat above the beatnik level) are doing—— as though turning into a dope addict does not hurt oneself even more than it hurts anyone else. It seems only slightly less obvious that the more respectable intellectuals who devote themselves exclusively to exploring and exploiting their "alienation" are doing much the same thing. Surely it is more productive of personal happiness and even "more useful to society" to be a candle throwing its beams into a naughty world than a beatnik crying "revenge, revenge" from the gutter. We hear a great deal about the responsibility of society toward the individual. The individual also has a responsibility toward society. And if things are as bad as the alienated say, the only way one can discharge that responsibility is by being an honorable man.

    ...

    I am not preaching universal indifference to society and social action as the highest wisdom. I am saying simply that if and when one individual feels (as so many articulate people do seem to feel) that the world is hopeless, then it is wiser to see what one can do about oneself than to give up all hope of that also.... I will go so far as to suggest the possibility that society may be in a bad wway partly because we have laid so much stress on public education and so little upon self-education.

    Perhaps the most curious and shocking result of the exclusive stress upon social rather than upon private ethics is the disappearance of the concept of honor as distinct from that of morality. One of the differences between the two is simply that honor is relevant to the individual only. True, society may be more affected than some social scientists seem to think by the prevalence or scarcity of honor in the code of the individuals who make it up. But the man of honor always asks first whether or not an action would dishonor him personally, and he is not influenced by an argument that his dishonorable act would have no bad (perhaps even some good) effect upon society and iss therefore "moral" even if dishonorable.

    The world would not now be profoundly shocked as it was a generation ago by the phrase "a scrap of paper". We are used to having promises so treated, as if there was nothing immoral in a broken oath.

    Many college students see nothing wrong about cheating on examinations. "Everybody does it and it doesn't really hurt anyone."

    In such statements it is easy to see a reasonable application of the two leading principles of ethics-without-absolutes-and-without-honor, which is sometimes called "socialized morality". These two leading principles are: (1) What everybody does must be permissible since the mores determine morality; and (2) "Wrong" can only mean socially harmful.

    When some scandal breaks in government or journalism or business or broadcasting, the usual reaction of even that part of the public which is shocked by it is to say that it could not have happened if there had been adequate laws supervising this or that activity. But usually, is it not equally true that it could not have happened if a whole group of men, often including the supposed guardians of public morality, had not been devoid of any sense of the meaning and importance of individual integrity? May one not go further and ask whether any amount of "social consciousness" and government control can make decent a society composed of people who have no conception of personal dignity and honor? It was a favorite and no doubt sound argument among early twentieth-century reformers that "playing the game" as the gentleman was supposed to play it was not enough. But has the time not come to add that it is, nevertheless, indispensable?

 

Seven years ago, I knew about the Lord our God. After that, for a long time, I stayed away from the Church, though during that period of time, I didn’t realize my divergence.

I was filled with Holy Spirit the other day and was called back by the church (in fact, it was Jesus who kept me inside Him). Looking back at the past few years, I found I kept my eyes shut, doing all that I thought was right or those would bring me happiness. Just as what is in Holy Bible:

For the wicked boast of the desires of their heart,

those greedy for gain curse and renounce the Lord.

In the pride of their countenance the wicked say, “God will not seek it out”;

all their thoughts are, “There is no God.”

(PSALMS 10:3-4)

I supposed to get more freedom and excitement; but at last, I found I was in both anxiety and exhaustion, and I was enslaved to the pressure of the sins. Was I innocent? I didn’t expect to offend God, on contrary, I had meant to get close to Him. Then what was the barrier?

My vanity, my arrogance, my desire… Where did they come from? They come nowhere but the flesh, which had already been sold into slavery under sin. Nothing good dwells within flesh since Adam and Eve took committed the First Sin. Body is a word, which is in contrast to spirit. In a Christian’s eyes, this word is plain and neutral, carrying no meaning of sins. “The wages of sin is death” in contrast to “the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord” (ROMANS 6:23)

When we are in sins, we never realized where we are. We are fixing our eyes on tangible things. Money and Reputation is the widely accepted conductor of the current society. We are gradually accustomed to the life of cheating and being cheated. Because of the hardness of the heart, we never confess our fault our weakness, not mention to quit.

We used to claim that we were okay and everything with us was going well. But God the Lord as well as ourselves knew what we actually were. People in sins could never save themselves from the sins but only follow their fleshes. “Indeed, what can they give in return for their life? ” (MARK 8:37) Only the Holy Spirit could do the work. Fortunately, there becomes more and more people accept Jesus as their Lord. Because Jesus has said, “Come to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.” (MATTHEW 11:28-30) Jesus is the Messiah. He was crucified for the redemption of us, saving us from sins. He is the only one who has the authority to do this, for He is the Son of Father. Every time I thought about this, my eyes were filled with tears and I prayed in heart for the Love of God.

God has given me all that I need. He loves me and watches me along the way. The only thing I am thinking about is to pray for our country and to pray for the people around me. Wishes more and more Chinese young people could know the sins and repent, and at last respectfully seek God.

My father used to write to me to remind me of keeping the faith. He said, “We are all the lost sheep and Jesus is our shepherd. May God always be with you, my dear daughter!” Yes, any time, you can make a U turn to God, who loves you and has prepared the way of eternal life for you, who watches as well as punishes all the way and will never leave you alone.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

October 2004 Issue

You Are the Salt of the Earth[1]

by Kenneth S. Hemphill

 

 

We often read this descriptive statement from Jesus with little real emotion. We have become so familiar with it that it has become almost a colloquial expression. We refer to a good person by noting that "He's the salt of the earth." Usually we mean little more than "He's a good ole boy." I seriously doubt that is what Jesus had in mind when Jesus affirmed that Kingdom citizens would be the salt of the earth.

 

First, we should note that the statements "You are the salt of the earth" and "You are the light of the world" are simple statements of fact. This is not an option, it is an observation. Kingdom citizens have this role in God's Kingdom agenda. Further, we should note that these two statements are presented in a context where Jesus has just warned of insults, persecution, and false accusation (Matthew 5:11). "Good ole boys" do not generally generate such intense reaction. Thus when someone lives a salty lifestyle it cannot be ignored. It will not always be appreciated, but it will never be ignored!

 

In my role as National Strategist for Empowering Kingdom Growth, I spend a lot of time in my car driving from one state to the next. I try to use the time productively by listening to books on tape. Recently the mayor of Hendersonville loaned me a book on salt. I was amazed to discover that the book was lengthy enough to require thirteen compact disks. Surely there couldn't be that much to say about salt! To my great surprise the book was both entertaining and informative, and yes, there was that much to say about salt. Little did I suspect that a study of the history of salt would take me on a journey through the history of the civilized world. I had no idea that salt was such a precious commodity that it defined trade routes, caused international conflict, and could be used as a means of barter. We are precious to the Father and essential to His Kingdom purpose.

 

When Jesus declared us to be the salt of the earth He paid a high compliment and gave us tremendous responsibility. Now we must pose the question that naturally follows Jesus' comments: "Have we lost our saltiness?" Jesus indicates that if salt looses its flavor it no longer has any value. Strictly speaking, pure salt cannot lose its salinity, but the impure salt dug from the shores of the Dead Sea could gradually lose its flavor as the sodium chloride dissolved (J.R.W. Stott, Christian Counter-Culture, 1978, p. 60). Jesus has called us to be pure salt. If we are going to make an impact for Christ, we must allow the Holy Spirit to create and preserve the character of our Father in us. Let's think together about being salt.

 

Salt enhances flavor.

For most of us, salt is a rather simple and often overlooked commodity that is contained in a salt shaker on our table. We pay little attention to it until we discover that it is missing. It is not unimportant that salt draws little attention to itself. It is virtually invisible, but it gives flavor to the food item on which it is placed.

 

Here is the question that every Kingdom citizen should ask: "Do I provide flavor to the situations and circumstances on which God sprinkles me?" Unfortunately, many Christians go with the flow when they find themselves in a setting where abusive speech or coarse jesting is the "soup du jour." What is your response when you are placed in a setting where gossip is the "blue plate special?" Do you join the crowd or do you bring flavor? Paul gives us good advice: Your speech should always be gracious, seasoned with salt. So that you may know how you should answer each person (Colossians 4:6). Do we enhance the flavor of life for those around us?

 

Salt preserves from decay.

Before the days of refrigerators, people used salt to preserve meat and vegetables. Salt was essential to people who made their living fishing. Without salt, the fish could not be preserved long enough to transport it to the marketplace. One of the well-known towns in ancient eastern Galilee was named Taricheae, which actually meant "saltings." The book of Numbers speaks of a covenant of salt which symbolizes its perpetual nature.

When Jesus called His disciples to be salt, He was challenging them to act like a preservative in the midst of a decaying world. Evangelicals have been quick to point to the cultural decay indicated by the moral depravity that is flaunted in primetime every evening on our televisions. We have pointed an accusing finger at Hollywood. The question remains-have we sprinkled enough salt on our schools, neighborhoods, places of business, and halls of government to act as a preservative against decay? Our culture needs for us to both maintain and preserve our salinity.

 

To be a preservative we must get involved and stay involved. We need Christians in the public arena-whether it is the school house, the board room, or the halls of government. We need to affirm to every believer that each is called to be a Kingdom agent where they live and work-serving as salt and light.

 

We cannot overlook one of the ways that we can act as a preservative in terms of our culture. We can exercise the right to vote and to do so with the understanding that we are the salt of the earth. This means that we should look at moral values and issues and vote based on conviction. We must be informed and involved. In our form of government the ballot box is one clear-cut opportunity we have to sprinkle salt by voting based on values and not political parties.

 

My colleague John Revell has co-authored a stimulating book entitled, Sinful Silence: When Christians Neglect Their Civic Duty. You will find it both timely and challenging. John and his co-author Ken Conner call us to apply salt and light in the civil arena. They argue that failure to become involved is actually sinful silence. Read the book, study the issues at stake, and vote your convictions. We are called to be a preservative.

 

Salt serves as an antiseptic.

You may have discovered this function of salt by wading into the ocean with an open cut. You may also recall that salt in an open wound can be painful. People will not always understand or applaud our desires to help cleanse them from the effects of sin through the salt of the gospel. They may actually accuse us of being intolerant or judgmental. If we are called to disinfect a dying world, we cannot compromise with sin. A word of caution! If you remember our quotation from Colossians, Paul reminded us to be gracious when we administer salt to a wound. To serve as an antiseptic we do not need to be abrasive or abusive, the salt will do its own work. I can still remember my mom applying antiseptic and immediately blowing the cool air of her breath to make the pain endurable.

 

Salt can serve as a catalyst for fire.

This function is certainly less well known to us today but would have been apparent to the first century disciples. In Palestine, an outdoor oven was called "earth," and one of the common fuels used for firing it was dried dung. To make the ovens burn better, the bottom was lined with salt plates, and salt was sprinkled on the dried dung. The first followers of Jesus may well have thought about this use of salt. He was calling them to ignite spiritual fires. We are called to be a catalyst for spiritual revival. When it begins, we should serve like salt, enabling it to burn with greater intensity. It is tragic to see many Christians who continually douse the enthusiasm of new believers rather than helping them to burn brighter.

 

Salt creates thirst.

All of us have experienced firsthand the incredible thirst salt creates. When we have salt-cured ham for breakfast, we discover that we are thirsty throughout the day. We sit down with a bowl of nuts or a bag of chips to watch a ballgame and find that we can consume large volumes of soft drinks.

 

As Kingdom citizens we should live in such a manner that the world is made thirsty for the gospel. The church today has a tendency to brag about the size of our saltshakers (seating capacity) or the amount of salt we had in our shaker last Sunday (attendance), rather than asking about how much salt we sprinkled on the community during the week. We will know when our lifestyles produce salt by the thirst we create in our friends and neighbors for the truth we have discovered.

 

I have been challenged by Zechariah 8:23 which says, In those days, ten men from nations of every language will grab the robe of a Jewish man tightly, urging: Let us go with you, for we have heard that God is with you. This passage looks forward to the days of Messianic fulfillment. I am praying that EKG will produce in us a lifestyle that is so distinctive that people will grab our garments and seek to go with us because God is among us. Pray that God will use EKG: The Heartbeat of God to bring revival and its accompanying salty lifestyle.

Kenneth S. Hemphill is the SBC national EKG strategist.