Archive for November, 2009
Buy Nothing Day: Via Pacis Article
In this December’s Via Pacis, I wrote a followup article to the one I penned about homeless youth a couple of months ago. This article has a different focus, but the concern for the poor remains this same. While my last article focused on the positives of identifying with the poor, this article takes a look at some of the negatives of excess during the holiday season. The full text of the article is reprinted below.
It’s that time of year again – the time when our ears begin to flood with cliché reminders about the “real meaning” of Christmas. “Jesus is the reason for the season,” countless churches will proclaim in what appears to be an attempt to trigger a different approach to Christmas.
About five years ago, these sorts of slogans became particularly bothersome to me, because despite Advent traditions at church, or scripture readings with my family, Christmas looked pretty much the same in the end. Since the days when I was a slobbering tyke I was routinely told, “Christmas is not about gifts,” yet there was always a hefty pile of shiny stuff for me to consume under the elaborately decorated tree.
As I grew older, my frostbitten mind sought for some way to bridge the gap between the birth of the impoverished Christ and my family’s lights-clad, sparkling suburban home. Yet I felt odd for even thinking about this when those around me seemed to accept this strange pairing without question as if the connection was obvious: God gave us Christ, so I should buy my family gifts, right?
As I parked in a lot dotted with Lexuses and Hummers for a Christmas church service, that once-convincing premise fell apart in more obvious ways than before. Inside, tens of thousands of dollars worth of equipment worked to put on the best Christmas service in Las Vegas: dramatic lighting and giant screens projecting Christmas carol lyrics.
It wasn’t difficult to see that not only were the usual corporations capitalizing on literally everything they possibly could during the holiday season, but the church was also functioning this way, even if genuinely oblivious to it. Christmas is the time of year when more people than usual attend church services, and what better way to reel in new customers than by attracting them with a flashy show that ostensibly has God’s stamp of approval on it?
Indeed, Christ – the gift – has ironically become a profitable commodity. This is the “real meaning” of Christmas our local Christian bookstores successfully sell to many each year. Why buy that new Xbox at Best Buy when you can purchase Noah’s Ark brand jewelry, Jesus-covered t-shirts, ‘Christian’ music, and even the now-jewel-encrusted instrument of torture on which Christ died right across the street at Barnes & Moses? (Answer: the Xbox is way more fun, but you can still buy Guitar Praise for your console if you want some God-approved entertainment.)
This predatory profiting seems rather obvious to me now, but when I was younger I completely bought into it, filling my shelves with loads of ‘Christian’ rock CDs. I think this was at least partially due to the fact that this sort of ‘Christian’ consumerism went hand in hand with a popular interpretation I was repeatedly given of Jesus’ interaction with the rich young ruler: Jesus told him to give all of his stuff away not for the benefit of the poor, but because the rich young ruler had turned his possessions into a god. Moral of the story: buy as much stuff as you want, just don’t bow down and worship it. Easy enough, I thought. Until I figured out that buying a ton of excess stuff in and of itself is an act of worship to the god of overconsumption.
Drawing a line to denote where “enough” crosses into “excess” is tricky, but I’ve often found it useful to think about it in the same way that one might think about drawing a line between drinking alcohol safely, and becoming mind-numbingly drunk. Pinning down the exact point someone crosses into the land of “too much” is difficult…until you see a naked guy plowing his moped into a lamp post at 60 mph. Then it is clear: he has had too much to drink. This is the same clarity I gained amongst all those Lexuses and Hummers at church: they have consumed too much in a world where people are starving to death.
It seemed that many, including myself, had been in the habit of subconsciously asking the question, “How much can I consume before crossing the line into excess?” I realized this, and began to move toward asking the question, “How much can I live without so that I can give more to others?”
Thankfully, I was not alone in asking this question. Eventually, my dad decided to alter years of Christmas tradition by opting out of the madness himself. “From now on,” he told my brothers and I, “I don’t want you to buy me gifts for my birthday or for Christmas. I have everything I need.” Instead, he suggested that we give the money we would have spent on him to people who are impoverished and starving across the globe.
So we did. Then we asked him to do the same for us. And suddenly, the gap between the impoverished Christ and our Christmas celebration seemed to shrink a little bit. Sure, we missed the excitement of unwrapping mysterious boxes each year, but eventually that was offset by the knowledge that someone in greater need than us was able to eat.
Last year, some friends and I decided we would share this idea of an altered Christmas with the rabid shoppers at our local malls on Black Friday – the biggest shopping day of the year. I suppose you could say it was a protest, but it was a different kind of protest than the ones to which I’d been accustomed. Instead of the usual justified anger, it was almost gleeful. We dressed in Santa and elf suits and handed out “Buy Nothing Day”* flyers to people, offering them an alternative: instead of piling up more stuff for yourself and your family, give to Action Against Hunger, and provide help to people who are starving.
Of course, I didn’t expect an immediate about-face. I simply hoped to plant a seed that would gradually grow. It is not easy to make such a drastic transition, as many of us have had it ingrained in us through years of repetition that buying purchased gifts is the primary way of showing love to family members at Christmas time. Gathering around the tree creates a sense of family community that rarely comes elsewhere in the year. But this sense of community doesn’t have to go away in an altered Christmas – we just have to shift the focus from communing around the Christmas tree to communing around those in greater need than ourselves.
This will take time. But I’ve found a few great ways to start moving that direction. One is by making sure that the companies I do buy from are not contributing to the misery of impoverished people. For instance, with a bit of research I found that Coca-Cola has hired paramilitary troops to kill union workers in Colombia (amongst other atrocities), so I no longer purchase anything from that company. A little book called The Better World Shopping Guide has been particularly helpful in sorting out purchase decisions as it gives companies a letter grade based on their treatment of humans and the environment.
Another way I have been able to shift the focus of Christmas throughout the year is by living in a house with nine other people, similar to the tenant-to-room ratio at the Catholic Worker houses. While this is not an option for many, for those with large houses, it may be a feasible way to move in the right direction. Through my experience at this house, I’ve discovered that the less space I have, the less stuff I’m likely to buy. The more people I have living around me, the less likely I am to think I need material goods. The less rent I pay, the less money I have to make, the more time I have available to spend serving others at places like the Catholic Worker.
This Christmas, the Catholic Worker will serve a meal to the homeless on Christmas day, joyfully celebrating the birth of the impoverished Christ with the sharing of a meal with impoverished people. “I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, I needed clothes and you clothed me…”
Not all of those lines we’ve heard a million times about the “real meaning” of Christmas are worthless. Many of them have simply been misinterpreted or ignored. Jesus truly can be the “reason for the season” if we shift our focus to Him. After all, Christ really does offer the ultimate gift – the gift to experience a transforming life lived for the transcendent good of loving God through loving our neighbors as ourselves.
* Buy Nothing Day is an international campaign initiated by Adbusters Media Foundation.
* Justin spoke at “The Economics of Christ the King” – an event featuring a screening of the film, What Would Jesus Buy? and a discussion about resisting the forces of overconsumption at First Christian Church, November 22nd, 6:00pm. This event was sponsored by Christ Community Church and Two Rivers Church, partnering with The Best Place Ever, who donated the film.
5 commentsHomeless Youth Book: North Liberty Leader Article
Check out this article for a new book review, and have a happy Thanksgiving everyone! Here’s an excerpt from the beginning: “Nine lives, each unique. They are from isolated rural towns and thriving inner cities; some lived with two parents, some have only known foster parents, and some were single parents themselves, before they were of legal age. Some have suffered unthinkable abuse, while others only watched episodes of family violence as regular as the evening news. They have been straight-A students, drug addicts, thieves and scared little girls.
Nine stories – each unique. What brought them together are the commonalities they share: they are all Iowa’s children, and they have all been homeless, or nearly so, for much of their young lives. “
Article by Lori Linder.
No commentsHomeless Youth Book: WHO 1040 Interview
Last week, Danny and I were interviewed on WHO 1040 about homeless youth, and what other people can do to help as the holiday season draws near. Have a listen below, while also noting our cheese-tastic new press photo (it’s for the kids!).
Danny Heggen and Justin Norman interviewed by Steve Deace.
No commentsVideo: “Stick Around, Mama Earth”
I recently co-directed, edited, and acted in a music video for Repower America, a clean energy advocate. My friends Ryan Stier, Tyler Reedy, and Eric Hungerford came up with the amazing song. The results are highly disturbing. Not for young children, unless you enjoy observing young children vomiting. Facebook is really the best place to watch it, as it seems to have thrown YouTube into seizures. But alas, YouTube is likely more popular so I’ve embedded that version here.
“Stick Around, Mama Earth”
No comments“No Torture” T-Shirt Giveaway
Amongst other topics I am heavily involved in that have not been previously discussed on this blog, one of the most prominent is torture awareness and opposition. I’ll go into that in further depth later, but for now I would like to offer one medium-sized “No Torture” shirt from Alterni-tees for free to the first person who comments here and would like to wear it. They are 100% cotton and made in the USA. Despite the rather crappy looking image below (due to JPEG compression artifacts from the person who saved it) the shirt looks very nice. If you don’t get the freebie, you can also order one from me at the same cost I buy them for in bulk for: $9 each plus shipping.
The giveaway is now over. Jessica won the shirt!
T-shirt designed by Alterni-tees.
No commentsMake-Believe Machines & Homeless Youth: 106.3 Interview
Amidst all the book promotion, I got the opportunity to talk about Make-Believe Machines as well recently. I was interviewed on 106.3 FM in Des Moines, where I got to talk about various musical projects, and the homeless youth book, as well as play a few songs off Moral Calculus.
Justin Norman interviewed on 106.3 FM by Daniel Bosman.
1 comment