Newspaper columns Archives – Page 32 of 64

The paradox of Christmas

1 Comment / Hamilton Spectator, Newspaper columns / December 20, 2014 / 2014, Advent, Christianity, Christmas, Islamic culture, Istanbul, Jesus Christ, Middle East, Middle East culture, Middle East peace / 4 minutes of reading

(The Hamilton Spectator – Saturday, December 20, 2014)

ISTANBUL, TURKEY ✦It was a Sunday, the first day of Advent, en route from Hamilton to my African home, when I toured the Old City here, a place where religions and cultures and empires have collided for centuries. This is when my guide for the day said what he did.

I had asked him about some historic notes and holy relics in the Topkapi Palace Museum, items identified as thousands of years old from ancient Israel, but looking dubiously more modern and Ottoman-like, when he told me as plainly as if he was giving the weather report that, “It’s all mythology anyway. Whatever you believe is true, that’s the truth.”

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Hope in the food court

1 Comment / Christian Week, Newspaper columns / December 15, 2014 / 2014, Christianity, Christmas, food courts, God's love, Handel's 'Messiah', Jesus Christ, spirituality / 3 minutes of reading

(Christian Week – December 2014)

Today in the food court there was a piano. The pianist, wearing a red Santa hat (naturally), finished “Jingle Bells” through the dull roar of shoppers, their winter coats unzipped, hats aside, while they sat and talked and ate KFC or New York Fries or whatever they happened to have.

Then a young woman, scarf thrown loosely over her shoulder, stood and put her cellphone to her ear. Strangely enough, she sang into the phone. And her voice, somehow, melodious and majestic, carried through the entire food court. Brows raised. Heads turned.

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25 years after The Wall fell

1 Comment / Hamilton Spectator, Newspaper columns / November 19, 2014 / 2014, 25th anniversary of end of Berlin Wall, Berlin, Berlin Wall, freedom, Froese biography, human nature, human rights, suffering / 4 minutes of reading

(The Hamilton Spectator – Saturday, November 15, 2014)

KAMPALA, UGANDA — It was still morning in Berlin on this Sunday when candles at the Church of Reconciliation were lit to honour yesteryear’s dead, the brave souls who ran from the uniforms and helmets and strong-armed authorities, who ran for freedom that was torn away, even as their flesh would be torn by barbed-wire and vicious dogs and bullets at that wall.

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Salvation is a mystery that can’t be faked

2 Comments / Newspaper columns, The Standard / November 17, 2014 / 2014, Christianity, eternal life, forgiveness, God's love, God's mystery, Jesus Christ, salvation as mystery, the thief on the cross / 4 minutes of reading

(UCU Standard – Monday, November 17, 2014)

MUKONO, UGANDA ✦ It’s a risky move, of course, to open up your Sunday morning message to questions. You never know who might ask what.

But this is what happened last Sunday. The minister who I listened to had a post-sermon question-and-answer session and a woman stepped forward with what they call a show-stopper.

Her voice quivering, she asked rather plainly and desperately, “So just how do you get saved?”

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Will life ever change for Uganda’s poor?

Leave a Comment / New Vision, Newspaper columns / October 26, 2014 / 2014, global disparities, inequity, minimum wage in Uganda, poverty / 5 minutes of reading

KAMPALA, UGANDA ✦ Some days you hardly know how to keep going, how to take even another step.

The hunger pangs gnaw that much at your stomach. But it’s your children and their lack of good food that worries you more, especially these days since they are so sick.

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The long and mysterious road to sainthood

Leave a Comment / Hamilton Spectator, Newspaper columns / October 18, 2014 / 2014, African plagues, Amurk Corp, Bethany Paquette, Christianity, death, ebola, Graham Greene, humanity, intolerance, Olaf Amundsen, sainthood, spirituality, The Power and the Glory / 4 minutes of reading

(The Hamilton Spectator – Saturday, October 18, 2014)

KAMPALA, UGANDA ✦ It’s hard to know what it means to be human some days, let alone a saint, but there are clues here and there, like in this novel, The Plague, by Albert Camus, where two atheists – one a doctor, one a journalist – have a brief conversation.

They’re in Africa fighting a devastating plague when one says to the other, “It comes down to this. What interests me is learning to become a saint.”

There’s a mystery to the whole thing, a hunger, a longing …

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Learning to be a kid again

Leave a Comment / Christian Week, Newspaper columns / October 14, 2014 / 2014, adoption, African adoption, children, Christianity, Froese biography, God's love, Thanksgiving, Ugandan adoption, Ugandan children / 3 minutes of reading

KAMPALA, UGANDA✦It’s the children who in the end will be given the keys to the Kingdom.

This is what Jesus said on the matter. Be a kid again. The way up is down. If you want even half a shot at eternal life, as if it were somehow possible, go and grow young.

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Your life is much more than your career

Leave a Comment / Newspaper columns, The Standard / October 9, 2014 / 2014, African university life, careerism, careers, Christianity, Jesus Christ, spirituality, the incarnation, work / 3 minutes of reading

(The UCU Standard – Monday, September 29, 2014)

MUKONO, UGANDA ✦ The problem with university life is that it can bypass your heart and feed your mind directly with foolish notions about the work world, namely that some grand career will make you a personally large being.

“Hey, look at me! I have this job now. It’s who I am!”

And maybe you’ll win much of that war that’s so well-known around the world, that is the war to get ahead.

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