During the past
month I’ve had two positive experiences in dealing with the local media.
A letter I had
written to the Los Angeles Times in
response to an article on immigration was published on Aug. 11th. To
the credit of the Times editorial staff, they contacted me to make sure I was
the letter writer and to verify what I’d written. Due to space limitations,
they couldn’t run my entire letter, but ran enough of it to get my point across
(to view it, go to www.latimes.com, then type in “Jim
Wallis” in the search box).
A few days
later, I was contacted by the producer of a radio show who had seen my letter.
I was asked to go on the show the following week, which is produced locally but
broadcast to a national audience. After thinking about the possible risks of
doing this, I finally accepted the invitation and appeared on the morning
broadcast.
The show’s host
is Jesse Lee Peterson, who is a pastor and also head of the Tea Party movement
here in Los Angeles
we discussed
contemporary issues that intersect religious faith, political ideology and the
human experience. While he and I represented mostly opposite sides of the same
issues, I found the conversation to be engaging and spirited, and him to be a
very cordial and respectful host. In short, I had fun!
More important
than having fun, however, was the opportunity to engage in meaningful
conversation about faith and life that inform each other. On a recent Sunday I stated that our United
Methodist Christian faith does not exist in a spiritual vacuum, but is a faith
that is lived out by engaging the world, its people and circumstances.
The Christian
faith is to be lived as well as believed, for in our living is when we
really discover what we believe. That means taking advantage of opportunities
to engage people who have perspectives and outlooks that do and don’t jive with
yours.
That is what
makes life so richly interesting, and I appreciate these recent opportunities
to engage the issues of the day with in ways that challenge me to think and
live faithfully!
Grace and Peace,
Reverend Mark M.
Nakagawa
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