That last post was inspired by this article. Leaders, the supposed good guys, lie and spin as they see fit. I don't think I would much care if they would just stop putting their aims in religiously righteouss language. But I guess that is the job of almost any government in history, bar the communists - to convince the people that "God is on our side".

Mr Bush spoke of the tens of thousands of opponents of Saddam Hussein who had been arrested and imprisoned and summarily executed and tortured � "all of these horrors concealed from the world by the apparatus of a totalitarian state".

But there was no mention, unfortunately, that all these beatings and burnings and electric shocks and mutilations and rapes were being merrily perpetrated when America was on very good terms with Iraq before 1990, when the Pentagon was sending intelligence information to Saddam to help him kill more Iranians.

With no other superpower left to oppose it, the U.S. is looking more than ever like the Roman Empire. And I think that is helpful comparison for Christians living in the West, as early Christians had the same challenge of working out allegiances as we do now. The Roman Empire always assumed that its values and its goals were the right ones. Christians within the empire knew this was not true. They didn't see the Roman Empire as intrinsically good or intrinsically evil. In fact, the Roman Empire proved itself to be capable of both extreme good and extreme evil. But the early Christians never melded their "Roman-ness" with their allegiance to Christ.

That is where it gets confusing for us nowadays. The American Empire often uses the name of our Leader, but doesn't pay much attention to his teachings. The teachings of Christ don't mix well with the goals of nation-building (as the Romans seemed to understand), but co-opting his name seems to be useful for giving people a sense that whatever the nation is up to is right.

What a dangerous thing then when the church starts to look more intently on Jesus.

Iggie is talking about what it means to be an apostle, and it doing so, he inspires us with the life of Rich Mullins. Mullins has meant a great deal to me also, and I really identify with what Iggie is saying about Mullins way of marrying moving lyrics with a life that left no doubt about what he believed in.

Here's one of Mullins songs that I can still rarely get through without tearing up. I never heard a song that so perfectly expresses that life of a Christian - torn between two kingdoms.

Land of My Sojourn

And the coal trucks come runnin' with their bellies full of coal
And their big wheels hummin'
Down a road that lies open like the soul of the woman
Who hid the spies who were lookin' for the land of milk and honey
And this road she is a woman, she was made from a rib
Cut from the sides of these mountains
Oh these great sleeping Adams who are
Lonely even here in paradise
Lonely for somebody to kiss them
And I'll sing my song,
I'll sing my song in the land of my sojourn

And the lady in the harbor
Still holds her torch out to those huddled masses
Who are yearning for freedom that still eludes them
The immigrant's children see their brightest dreams shattered
Here on the New Jersey shoreline
In the greed and the glitter of those high-tech casinos
But some mendicants wander off into a cathedral,
They stoop in the silence and there their
Prayers are still whispered
And I'll sing their song,
I'll sing their song in the land of my sojourn

Nobody tells you when you get born here
How much you'll come to love it and how you'll never belong here
So I call you my country, but I'll be lonely for my home
and I wish that I could take you there with me

And down the brown brick spine of some dirty blind alley
All those drainpipes were drippin' out the last Sons of Thunder
While off in the distance the smokestacks were belching back
This city's best answer
And the countryside was pocked with all those Mailpouch posters
Thrown up on the rotting sideboards
Of these rundown stables like the one that Christ was born in
When the old world started dying and
The new world started coming on
And I'll sing His song, and I'll sing His
Song in the land of my sojourn

I heard someone talking about delegating responsibility a while ago. They said that sometimes delegation is giving to someone else what God gave you to do. I think that sort of sentiment lies at the core of my lack of energy for institutional church and contributes to my tendency toward a sort of Christian anarchism (I am being very specific about it being Christian anarchism, as history shows that the kind that doesn't embrace a transcendant divine love gets real ugly real fast).

We must ask God, with all the honesty we can muster, to communicate what he has for us to do. Once he reveals that, true leadership is not to try to get a bunch of other people to do what he told you, but to do it yourself. The anarchist in me says leave the followership up to God. There are others out there who he is speaking the same things to. And you will find your tribe.

And there will be plenty of others who aren't doing it your way. They might be wrong, or they might just be different. In any case, it's not your call. Listen to them, and let their light increase your own, but you are not called to be them. Obedience to God demands that you do what he's given you to do.

I hope I'm not wrong, or else I should be spending a lot more time in church.

And I know this was vague and cryptic. It likely should have been a poem.

Wow. Those are refreshing sentiments coming from a leader in the Western world.

"You cannot exercise your powers to the point of humiliation for the others. That is what the Western world -- not only the Americans, the Western world -- has to realize. Because they are human beings too. There are long-term consequences.

"And I do think that the Western world is getting too rich in relation to the poor world and necessarily will be looked upon as being arrogant and self-satisfied, greedy and with no limits. The 11th of September is an occasion for me to realize it even more."

Now if only he could speak English.

Does anyone have any good advice on how to track down cheap airline tickets to Japan?

"A good pastor keeps you from forgetting what you need to remember in a time of trouble."

If I have ever heard a modern day prophet, it is Tony Campolo. We often joke about him when he comes to Winnipeg that he tells the same stories every time, and every time we leave crying. Well, he's got some new stories in his reflections on "Christianity after September 11th". He says some important stuff that we need to hear right now.

And here's a hook for some of you: Bono and U2 feature prominently....

Archie Bunker: Now, no prejudice intended, but I always check with the Bible on these here things. I think that, I mean if God had meant for us to be together, he'd a put us together. But look what he done. He put you over in Africa, and put the rest of us in all the white countries.

Sammy Davis Jr.: Well, he must've told 'em where we were because somebody came and got us.

I guess I am just going to have to learn the language. I have been experimenting with online translation software, and it has a long way to go. Here is a message my friend sent me. His English is poor and my Japanese is poor, we conversed in the international language of food. So for email he tried out an online translator:

Hello It is HIOKI. It is a long time truly. Does it live on you energy? I congratulate a baby on birth from the heart. The baby who was looking forward to it thinks a very dear thing. My family is very fine. I am doing the car dealer which is not profitable as usual -- but -- He is enjoyed very much. Is he enjoyed although John also thinks that work is busy? Although many things to talk still more occur, since this text is sent with translation software, it is anxious in whether it is an unclear text.

John -- and please live from the heart forever fortunately with a new family's baby. -- Coming out again -- !!!

You too Hioki! I think that is good advice for anyone - live from the heart forever fortunately. I think I'll start signing my letters that way...

Richard Bott posted some stuff that reminded me of a similar discussion we were having about a year ago. He is talking about how uneasy some people get when he prays for God's blessings on Saddam Hussein.

Such prayers were by and large absent in last years response to the tragedy. It seems to reveal our true colors, and how serious we are about Christ when one of his most challenging and specific commands to his followers is to "... Do good to those who hate you. Pray for the happiness of those who curse you. Pray for those who hurt you." The words of Christ aren't compatible with the ideals of anger and revenge.

I wrote this a couple weeks after the disaster last year.

I was awaken by a really vivid dream. I was driving west on the trans-Canada, the terrain looked like BC, with my dad in the passenger seat. We were on the way to Japan. The highway was really busy and we were behind a big, red semi. Suddenly, another big semi comes screaming past us in the left lane and totally cuts off the semi in front of us. He smashes his trailer into the red semi, and then turns and smashes him a few more times, really angry. Dad and I have to drive onto the grass beside the highway to avoid being involved in their collision. Once we get back on the road, we breathe a sigh of relief and continue on. Suddenly we are surrounded by eight or nine people on Japanese racing bikes (Ninjas, and Katanas, etc). I get really tense again because I think it means trouble and I pull over into a roadside stop. They come up beside me and take off their helmets, and they are a bunch of young people. When I say that I am going to Japan, they are totally pumped, saying that they love Japan and it's totally awesome that we are going there. They pledge to drive with us and protect us and do whatever they can to make sure we get there safe and sound.

Hmmmmmm....