Newspaper columns Archives – Page 34 of 62

And now onsreen in Uganda, it’s Rob Ford

(The Hamilton Spectator – November 23, 2013)

KAMPALA, UGANDA – When Rob Ford first appeared onscreen in Africa I was sitting in front of some public televisions, a place where I often work, reading about Ghandi.

It was strange because Gandhi, the great Indian leader, led a fifth of the world’s people to democracy in his bare-feet, boney and malnourished and wrapped in just a sort of bed-sheet, while the burly mayor of Toronto has become a small man even while, in heavy shoes, he’s fallen with such a thud that it somehow has to be heard around the world.

The last time I recall Ontario news making it this far was six years ago when the Shedden massacre involving the infamous Banditos gang got a couple of paragraphs in a Ugandan daily.

And now onsreen in Uganda, it’s Rob Ford Read More »

What suicide can teach us about fear and living freely

Leave a Comment / Newspaper columns, The Standard / November 1, 2013 / 2013, African university life, Christianity, family, family life, Jesus Christ, relationships, spirituality, suffering, suicide, theology / 4 minutes of reading

(The UCU Standard – Friday, November 1, 2013)

MUKONO, UGANDA ✦ Suicide is a shabby and shameful business, something that nice people don’t get mixed up in, yet here they are, two suicides in our university family, two young people who in separate incidents have left us with nothing but a disturbing ‘good-bye.’

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War may be hell, but it’s strange too

Leave a Comment / Hamilton Spectator, Newspaper columns / October 24, 2013 / 2013, cold war, Korean tourism, Korean unity, Korean War, North Korea, Panmunjeom, personhood, pseudo war, South Korea / 4 minutes of reading

(The Hamilton Spectator – Thursday, October 24, 2013)

PANMUNJEOM, SOUTH KOREA ✦ We’re at the border of North and South Korea, at the planet’s hottest line in the sand, and the guard – a youth in military garb and dark sunglasses – tells my wife to change her footwear. She has open sandals and the North Koreans, even from a distance, might see her feet.

Which shows that while war may be hell, it’s strange too, certainly this pseudo-war at Panmunjeom, the UN’s demilitarized zone, the so-called DMZ separating these two Koreas, countries that stopped formal shooting 60 years ago but still without any treaty.

War may be hell, but it’s strange too Read More »

When the poor come knocking

Leave a Comment / Hamilton Spectator, Newspaper columns / October 21, 2013 / 2013, African culture, deception, ethics, Mzungus, poverty, rich and poor, suffering / 4 minutes of reading

(The Hamilton Spectator – Friday, September 20, 2013)

KAMPALA, UGANDA ✦ It was late and dark and unusual because the visitor lives hours away and I didn’t expect him. But he came anyway and sat at my front door and cried and told me all about it, how thieves had come the night before.

He had been at church, he explained, at one of those all-night prayer services common in this part of Africa, when the rats did it, when they broke in and cleaned out his house. Clothing, furniture, cash I had recently given for his kids’ schooling, everything gone by sunrise.

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A matter of the heart

Leave a Comment / Christian Week, Newspaper columns / October 1, 2013 / 2013, appearances, holiness, legalization of marijuana, legalization of pot, pot / 3 minutes of reading

(Christian Week – October 2013)

KAMPALA, UGANDA ✦ The thing about marijuana is that it stinks up the joint and brings images of barefoot hippies and stoner movies and general rebellion, none of which is very attractive to the clean-cut religious crowd. The sorry thief on the cross? A pot smoker no doubt. Probably a dealer.

But the times, they are a changin’.

A matter of the heart Read More »

Attracting partnerships and fresh thinking in Africa

2 Comments / Newspaper columns, The Standard / September 23, 2013 / 2013, African university life, Jean Chamberlain Froese, partnerships, relationships, Save the Mothers, Uganda Christian University / 3 minutes of reading

(The UCU Standard – Monday, September 23, 2013)

MUKONO, UGANDA ✦ The old Yiddish joke goes like this. ‘Do you know what makes God laugh? People making plans.’

This is the mystery of it, of the Gospel itself, really. Even our lives, fragile and short as they are, are not ours to over-script. No, we need to open them to possibilities outside ourselves, and when we do, surely good surprises will come along the way.

It’s as true for any person as it is for an institution like UCU. I was reminded of this while around the dinner table – twice – during my family’s recent season back in North America.

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On prayer, danger and flying into it all

4 Comments / Hamilton Spectator, Newspaper columns / August 17, 2013 / 2013, Christianity, danger, Froese biography, malaria, prayer, spirituality, suffering, travel / 4 minutes of reading

(The Hamilton Spectator – Saturday, August 17, 2013)

HAMILTON, CANADA ✦ It’s a strange world, especially here on what is, for all I know, my deathbed. It’s malaria and I’m dreaming. Or maybe in the fight of it I’m actually hallucinating.

I see a friend, a writing mentor, a bear of a man, the sort you can disappear into when he hugs you. He’s an American who’s never been to Africa, no not once. But he’s somehow made it over the ocean and through the walls to kneel at my Ugandan bedside.

“What are you doing here?” I ask.

“I’m praying for you.”

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Losing yourself and moments of true intimacy

1 Comment / Christian Week, Newspaper columns / August 14, 2013 / 2013, global marriage rates, intimacy, marriage / 3 minutes of reading

(Christian Week – August 2013)

HAMILTON, CANADA ✦ It was a summer Sunday and communion was finished and so was the sermon and they stood, both of them, old and gray and a little stooped. And we all clapped for some time to say ‘congratulations’ and ‘thank you,’ too.

This, in a Hamilton church, a moment to show that even after 60 years of marriage you can still stand as man and wife and smile at the world, and smile with the sort of lines that show old things like truth all over your face.

It’s something to think about as marriage hits hard times.

Losing yourself and moments of true intimacy Read More »