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archives | newquaker.comWednesday, October 15, 2003
Ripped from the headlines. John Finders was outraged when he learned that his 18-year-old son, a special education student in the "Work Experience Program" of the Evergreen School District in southwest Washington state, has been performing janitorial tasks (often in front of other students) at Vancouver's Heritage High School. The father called this "rather demeaning." Another outraged parent, whose daughter was also enrolled in the program at Heritage High School, said his daughter was called "Stinky" by other students when she picked up trash as part of the Work Experience Program there. Although the case has been dismissed, both parents were part of a federal lawsuit seeking further information about the complaints. [See CNN.com/Education, October 10, 2003]
This is a double-sided form of discrimination and parents who commiserate with this are doing Americans—and so, too, the world—a terrible disfavor. Here's the double side: There is nothing intrinsically wrong with custodial work. We need janitors. We need trash men, garbage collectors, waste management technicians—they are an important part of our social system. We need cooks, and bakers, and auto mechanics. We need clerks, secretaries, administrative assistants, and receptionists. We need telephone repair personnel, delivery truck drivers, route salesmen, mass transit personnel, and—well, the list goes on. These are positions that people fill now because there is a genuine business demand for those skills. The skills and the position-names may change, but such is the nature of our economic system in the West that we require personnel to perform these job functions. There may be a pay differential with other positions, but that is, and ought to be, tied to education and training levels: issues of social standing spring instead from the pride and prejudice of those without respect for the undisguised reality of employment.
I am reminded of a true story. A college president, tired of the pressure of his job, actually sent out his résumé seeking a job as a janitor. The janitor's job required no management responsibilities, no accountability for enrollment, spending, or budget constraints, no liability for staff and faculty satisfaction, etc. It was the perfect job for a talented man who was willing to work hard, complete his duties, satisfy his employer, and to do this all without also having to assume the tremendous responsibilities that rested on a college president's shoulders. For this man especially, a janitor's job was superior to a college president's job.
As Christians, we have a new station and new duties—class distinctions should no longer figure into our relations with other people. We are "God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do" [Eph 2:10]. As a result of our new birth in Christ, the usual barriers are gone. Says Paul: "There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus" [Gal 3:28] Our professions do not have to change: "Each one should remain in the situation which he was in when God called him" [1 Cor 7:20]. Status and profession are altogether irrelevant to the Christian life. Was he circumcised or uncircumcised? A slave or freed? A painter or a tent maker? It is irrelevant to the Christian life. "Keeping God's commands is what counts," says Paul [1 Cor 7:19]. So the truly important issue is neither vocation nor social position, but rather the ability to achieve maturity in the Christian life.
posted by Merle Harton, Jr. 11:16 PM
Sunday, October 12, 2003
Chavez reads Zinn's A People's History of the United States. Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez has weighed in on this Columbus Day observance by calling on Latin Americans not to celebrate the day, asking them to remember it instead as the "Day of Indian Resistance." [CNN, October 11, 2003] The "Discovery Day" debate got heated during the 500th anniversary of the (in)famous 1492 European contact, but either our memories are getting shorter and shorter or we just don't have a clue as to how to undo propaganda so widespread that it sticks to high school textbooks like a factory paint job. After all, how do you celebrate a mistake? One would have thought that Howard Zinn had laid the issue to rest, burying Christopher Columbus' reputation in a deep landfill of well-documented racism, slavery, torture, and murder. The greatest of Columbus's crimes must be the hypocrisy of this conquering Christian evangelist who brought, instead of Christ's love, a tidal wave of genocide and crusading exploitation. It's not surprising that Chavez likens Hernán Cortés and Francisco Pizarro to Hitler and condemns the Spanish, the Portuguese, and the other foreign conquerors who came to the new world hungering for treasure and bearing Western Civilization's worst values.
Although (in his 1421: The Year China Discovered America) Gavin Menzies may well have taken away Columbus' history prize, we can certainly remember and applaud the Italian's nautical feat without also extolling the consequences of his new-world landing, just as we admire discoveries such as the gun, the hydrogen bomb, and the internal combustion engine. We can't undo history, but as Christians we can separate ourselves from the motives that have led to the continuous exploitation of America's peoples, land, and natural resources. As American Christians, this must of course force us to a deep re-evaluation of our priorities and allegiances. But in this let us remember our Lord's words: "For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also" [Matt 6:21].
Dear Heavenly Father, help us to understand how it is possible for us, as aliens and strangers in the world, to balance our need for place and culture with our need for a closer walk with you. Keep our hearts away from the many hollow treasures of this world. In this let your Spirit always light our way. We pray this in Jesus' name. Amen.
posted by Merle Harton, Jr. 12:41 AM
© Merle Harton, Jr. All rights reserved. Biblical references are NIV® unless otherwise noted.
