June 2026

• O Flying Butterfly… by Stanton MacDonald-Wright at LACMA
• Flowers at Wilshire Blvd and Westwood Blvd in Westwood
• Grand Park sign
• Detail from Female Figure by Roy Lichtenstein at the Broad


• Here's a chronicle of mostly Tuesdays, one Thursday, and a single solitary Sunday.

• Tuesday June 2nd was California voting with a very long ballot.

• Tuesday June 2nd at the Skirball Cultural Center, I missed the Comic Book Exhibit they included with admission, so I'll enjoy it next time and also spring for a ticket to Noah's Ark.

• On Sunday June 7th I preached for Pentecost 2A; Matthew's lectionary year continues.

• Tuesday June 9th was LACMA again because it's always a great way to enjoy second Tuesdays.

• No museum or other cultural outing for Tuesday June 16th, but I got a couple of necessities plus a few other things at the Inglewood Century Shopping Sprawl after a Butterscotch Frosty Sundae at Wendy's.

• Because the World Cup partly happened in LA, my Five Minute Friday on Thursday June 18th had to be about Korea and Mexico.

• June 23rd, the month's 4th Tuesday, featured lunch in Santa Monica followed by a short trip to the Westfield Culver City Mall.

• On the 5th Tuesday, June 30th, I visited The Broad Museum and Gloria Molina Grand Park.

• Tuesday June 30th was the release date for Brian Drinkwine's book, Kingdom Over Empire: Recovering the Gospel from Political Captivity. Due to serendipitously noticing Brian's launch team invitation on Facebook, I received an ARC. My amazon review is forthcoming and will have about two-thirds of my blog content.

Brian Drinkwine :: Kingdom Over Empire

• The release date for Kingdom Over Empire is Tuesday 30 June. If this overview entices you to get the book, it would be best if you wait until the morning of June 30th.

• Kingdom Over Empire: Recovering the Gospel from Political Captivity by Brian Drinkwine on Amazon

• Brian's Website

Page numbers are from the ARC PDF and are not the same in the print copy.


Poetic, pastoral, and probing, Kingdom Over Empire provides scripture and history to help you sort out your allegiances. Pastor Brian Drinkwine doesn't advise is. He trusts us. I need this book! Whether you live in a Western-style democracy or elsewhere, you need this book!

Kingdom Over Empire. Particularly in politically blue circles in the USA, one major reaction to goings-on in the current presidential administration has been an active, vocal No Kings movement. The general idea is American colonials broke away from royal rule and chose elected leadership rather than hereditary monarchies, and we continue on that path.

Related to not having kings, in protestant mainline churches, especially some individuals in so-called professional leadership in local churches or judicatories have come close to conflating deep blue politics and progressive Christianity. Though I've hovered on the edge, I haven't quite gone there. Brian's book shows us what a Yes Kings affirmation is when the King is Lord of the Universe, Lord of Life Jesus Christ.

I plan to take seriously assessing how outside forces and influences have affected our (my) perspectives and our (my) fears. That's called formation as in the shape, the traits, instincts, love, convictions, assumptions that intrinsically are part of us—that motivate us, too.

And what we are willing to excuse! Brian offers us "companionship from nearby" because according to one of his blockquotes, You do not need a movement. You need companions.

Two critical definitions:

page 33: "Patriotism is love of place without allegiance to place." It's "grateful stewardship of the land, people, and institutions where God has planted us … At its best, it seeks the welfare of the city."

page 34: "Nationalism happens when love of country becomes something it was never meant to be. Nationalism is what happens when patriotism crosses the line from stewardship to identity."

In the church we casually talk about belief, which too many equate with intellectual assent. But first century pistis belief is allegiance, loyalty, trust; it's a whole body-essence of your being posture. [page 44]

Although it's political, social, and economic, in its essence empire is a way of organizing power over time. You likely can list biblical empires such as Egypt, Babylon, Persia, Rome; you can add in more recent Spanish, British and others. But educational, ecclesiastical, consumer, and other entities also operate in an imperial manner because Babylon/empire is pattern rather than place. It is out there. It is in here. Think about it!

Brian provides a short list of lifestyles and religions you could call Christian Pretenders because they're not the good news Mark, the earliest gospel announces to open his proclamation. They aren't Theology of the Cross; many are theology of glory that humans find appealing and humanly doable.

For the Apostle Paul, the gospel is death and resurrection. In Kingdom Over Empire, the author traces the subversive power of the cross and God's faithful actions that paradoxically create new life out of death.

Brian beautifully reminds us Jesus came announcing, "Not a kingdom built on dominance, but on restoration. Not a kingdom advanced by force, but by faithfulness. Not a kingdom that secures itself through control, but one that grows through surrender."

"In this kingdom, blessing begins with the honest recognition of need. The poor are lifted up. The imprisoned are set free. Those far from God are not threats to be managed but treasures hidden in a field. …This kingdom promises not control, but resurrection." [page 84]

"Writing to a church confused about what faithfulness meant, Paul does not appeal to their influence or their success. He appeals to the resurrection."

“But Christ has indeed been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep” (1 Corinthians 15:20).

"Firstfruits. The first sign of a harvest that is coming, proof that more is on the way. If Jesus has been raised, then death does not have the final word. And if death does not have the final word, then neither does empire. Neither does failure. Neither does obscurity." [page 162]

Short summary:

"The call is not to disengage from society but to disentangle from idolatry. You can vote without making the vote your hope. You can advocate without making advocacy your salvation. You can be present in the public square without giving the public square the allegiance that belongs to Christ.

"The call is an echo of the Exodus. It is a summons to live as exiles—in the empire but not of it.

"This does not mean we abandon society. It means we refuse to be seduced by its idols. We resist its economy, its nationalism, its violence, its counterfeit hopes.

"We live as if Jesus is King, because he is. And we hold loosely to everything Babylon promises, knowing that it will not last." [page 178]

Kingdom Over Empire is a workbook. It's devotional. It's heavy-duty theology. It offers a direction for us to travel together in order to restore life and hope to a world dominated by empires. Throughout the book, Pastor Brian offers his own testimony. Will your life testify of a King who reigns from a cross?

Disclaimer: As a member of the launch team I received an Advance Reader Copy with no expectation or obligation to write a positive review. As always, my opinions are my own (and you know I wouldn't have it any other way).

An Extraordinary Egg

• An Extraordinary Egg by Leo Lionni on Powells

• Website for the book's author and Caldecott Winner Leo Lionni, 1910-1999

Assumptions, mistaken identity, and what else? Through whimsical painterly illustrations and a more than credible narrative, three frog friends adventure together and get to know a creature from another species. Marilyn thinks she knows everything, even if it's only the words and she's not sure what a word refers to. August frog goes along for the adventure, while Jessica loves to reach out and discover what's new and trending.

If someone (Marilyn) calls the big pebble a chicken egg, whatever hatches from the egg must be a chicken and once a chicken, always a chicken, even if someone (like the parent who laid the egg that hatched) calls it an alligator. That's how life works.

Does it matter? The name usually matters to the critter, the human, to the group that first imagined and then created whatever it was. Is "a rose by any other name" still a rose? If you call an alligator a chicken does it become a chicken? No, it doesn't become a chicken. However, the egg starts out being called a chicken and for the three frog friends, it ends as a chicken, even after the alligator's mother calls it her "sweet little alligator." I did call this story "a more than credible narrative."

My cultural anthropology instructor told us about three baseball umpires. The rookie umpire announced, "I call them as I see them." The umpire with more experience said, "I call them as they are." The long-time veteran umpire insisted, "They are what I call them."

Do you remember "define your terms" when you were – or still are – writing a certain kind of paper? It's about everyone being on the same page so each person knows what the other is referring to. Chicken or alligator or…?


Dragonfly Books

It took a long search, but after I visited the rhc books dot com I found on the back cover in tiny print, I discovered this particular Dragonfly Books series is a Random House imprint.

Inside the back cover tells us:

Dragonfly Books introduce children to the pleasures of caring about and sharing books. With Dragonfly Books, children will discover talented artists and writers and the worlds they have created, ranging from first concept books to read-together stories to books for newly independent readers.

# # #

Jenny Han :: Summer Trilogy

• Summer trilogy 01: The Summer I Turned Pretty on Powell's

From Jenny Han, author of To All the Boys I've Loved Before

"First in a series of three" with the disclaimer I read them all before writing this.

Plot, settings, and characters in The Summer I ["I" is Belly or Isabel] Turned Pretty are atmospheric and suggestive rather than grounded and concrete. This intro to bestselling author Jenny Han's Summer trilogy acquaints us with the Fisher and Conklin families who are every summer denizens of a New England down Maine beach house. We observe typical vacation activities, relationships, and misunderstandings—nothing out of the ordinary, even to a predictable degree.

You might enjoy this as a standalone novel, but experiencing kids and grownups getting older and gaining wisdom as their lives expand is the intention of any coming of age book, so I suggest you keep on reading into It's Not Summer Without You. By the conclusion of We'll Always Have Summer (volume 3), you'll discover Fisher brother Conrad has turned into the central character – an ultra-protagonist – ready to launch a decades-long dynasty that deserves at least a half-dozen more books and a classic TV or film series.

• Summer trilogy 02: It's Not Summer Without You on Powell's

Volume 2, It's Not Summer Without You, continues the Fisher-Conklin narrative. Even after dying from cancer, Fisher matriarch Susannah continues her powerful and loving influence over the intertwined families. Author Jenny Han writes realistic dialogue within relatable human messiness of misunderstanding, betrayal, reunion, divorce, romance, and not-so-romantic situations. A reader can feel the teenagers grow in every dimension!

Even if I hadn't known most of the action happened along the East Coast, I'd still compliment how clearly Han elicits its overall style and sensibility. Really! Could the Summer Trilogy have been set anywhere else? No! Geography is destiny.

• Summer trilogy 03: We'll Always Have Summer

Teens love these coming of age novels; some of us who have achieved a level of chronological maturity enjoy them, too.

What person anywhere doesn't enjoy a beach read that's even mostly set in a beach town? This is the third and final volume of Jenny Han's Fisher-Conklin Summer series that unfolds like a dynasty in progress. My research revealed The Summer I Turned Pretty was a Netflix movie during August 2013; rumors suggesting it might become a TV series circulated for a while, but that still hasn't happened. Han does well with character development, particularly as ultra-protagonist Conrad grows in years, wisdom, and influence; even more, she creates dense layers of action and meaning that never quite resolve. However, in this volume 3, we get the happy resolution of Conrad's and Isabel's long-anticipated marriage. Now the countless readers who've loved this series can create their own multipart sequel, and/or wait for Jenny Han to do so.

Holy Holy Holy

Talk about synchronicity! Yesterday I just happened to watch and listen to a Trinity Sunday sermon I'd bookmarked a couple months ago. The Old Testament reading for this coming Sunday, Epiphany 5, also is the Trinity Sunday passage of Isaiah's call from Isaiah 6.

Although this is one of the scripture texts for Trinity Sunday (and relates to that favorite majestic Trinitarian hymn, "Holy, Holy, Holy") Holy, holy, holy in this passage is not a trinitarian proclamation—it's an artifact of Hebrew and other semitic languages that unlike English, don't have comparative and superlative adjectives, so you repeat the word once or twice. Instead of good, better, best, you'd say good, good, good.

Ligonier Ministries name came from its original location in Ligonier, Pennsylvania. The organization is an independent ministry and broadly Reformed; everything I've seen from them is on the conservative side. Scripture quotations in this book come from KJV, NKJV, NIV, ESV, and NASB. Their website explains:

Ligonier Ministries adheres to the ancient statements of faith (the Apostles' Creed, the Nicene Creed, and the Creed of Chalcedon) and affirms the historic Christian faith as expressed in the five solas of the Reformation and the consensus of the historic Reformed confessions (Westminster Standards, Three Forms of Unity, and 1689 London Baptist Confession of Faith).

For comparison, regarding the Three Forms of Unity, the PCUSA's Book of Confessions includes the Belgic Confession and Heidelberg Catechism but omits Canons of Dort. For another comparison, of the four church bodies / denominations (ELCA, PC(USA), RCA, UCC) that covenanted together in A Formula of Agreement, Canons of Dort are constitutive for only one—the Reformed Church in America.

You can find Proclaiming the Perfections of God on Powell's:

• Holy Holy Holy…

on Amazon:

• Holy Holy Holy…

The ten chapters originated as lectures at the 2009 Ligonier Ministries National Conference in Orlando, with "The Holiness of God" the conference theme. Chapter titles and subtitles are helpful for any Christian from any tradition to consider (I know, all the authors just happened to be guys), and make reasonable categories for a systematic theology class:

1. "I Am the Lord": The Only God by R. C. Sproul

2. "Hallowed Be Your Name": The Holiness of the Father by Sinclair B. Ferguson

3. "The Holy One of God": The Holiness of Jesus by Steven J. Lawson

4. "The Breath of the Almighty": The Holiness of the Spirit by Alistair Begg

5. "Cosmic Treason": Sin and the Holiness of God by Thabiti Anyabwile

6. "A Holy Nation": The Church’s High Calling by D. A. Carson

7. "Wounded for Our Transgressions": The Holiness of God and the Cross by W. Robert Godfrey

8. "You Shall Be Holy": The Necessity of Sanctification by Derek W. H. Thomas

9. "Train Up a Child": Walking Together with the Holy God by R. C. Sproul Jr.

10. "A Consuming Fire": Holiness, Wrath, and Justice by R. C. Sproul

The articles are well-written and very very serious. With many quotes and references from John Calvin's Institutes of the Christian Religion, the authors feel stuck in a different era. Chapter 10, Holiness, Wrath, and Justice?

But if there is a God (and there is), and if He is holy (and He is), and if He is just (and He is), He could not possibly be without wrath. If you have not been reconciled to Him through the blood of His Son, the only thing you have to look forward to is His wrath, which is a divine wrath, a furious wrath, and an eternal wrath.

That quote is just plain sad. God is a holy God who calls a holy people (see chapter 6, "A Holy Nation," and chapter 8, "You Shall Be Holy"), but wrath of god is a human construct that Jesus Christ obliterates. The mainline world in which I live is welcoming and grace-filled, but I'm glad I glanced through this book to view a different perspective. There's a helpful index of scripture references at the end.

• My Amazon Review :: Trinitarian and Incarnate Holiness

It's a dog's life

• It's a dog's life by Mark Stern on Amazon

Quite a while ago I picked up this socialist dog's book and decided it needed a review and a blog. Mark Stern's illustrations are fresh and fabulous! Author Stern follows and narrates the experiences of Patch, a dog whose days progress from true happiness with his simple life in the hood to the production and marketing by someone else of a great idea he has dreamt of.

The "someone else" overdog then co-ops Patch's entire existence, along the way setting up himself and his expansively growing company in superfluous luxury—no surprise?! Eventually Patch escapes from being an enslaved cog – and worse – in the means of production. He happily returns to "the true joys of life: fresh air, grass and trees," alongside his sweetheart Honey.

Call it a cautionary tale, a cogent example of "I told you so," or a vision of a more just society that features "what's really important," It's a dog's life is enough to make a human think, think again, and reconsider their own dreams and priorities.

my amazon review: from happiness, to utility, to happiness...

Partners

Partners on amazon, with eight chapters, each in two parts: Part One: Neighborhood Revitalization through Partnership; Part Two: Whittier Neighborhood, a Minneapolis Case Study.

More than ten years after its publication in 1982, at one of the annual Salt Lake City Neighborhood Conferences I received a copy of this soft-cover, 11.7"x9.1"x0.8" explorative report on revitalization of the Whittier section of Minneapolis. It's printed on heavy, coated paper, and it's packed with narrative, with Black and White and color photographs, diagrams, charts, and general inspirations. I'm reading myself and my current situation into some words about the USA from the Prologue that could apply to many individuals:

"This book is about the end of an era and the beginning of a new possibility. The era it leaves behind was 'on the road,' mobile, going anywhere, celebrating space. The possibility it welcomes is 'coming home,' rooting, creating a stake, celebrating place."

"Neighborhood is about place. It declares that one special place is the foundation for life's living. America 'on the move' was hard on places, whether prairies or forests or older cities. This is the story of a new generation that came home and found a way to recover a place that had been misused by old-fashioned Americans. It is about a beginning, a possibility, a way people act when place really matters." [iv]

In the wake of famously misguided attempts by government and by private investors to remedy real problems of inner city decay, neighborhood decline, and infrastructure deterioration, Dayton-Hudson (now Target Corporation) partnered with residents, businesses, local government and other entities to help the actual people of Whittier revitalize and reclaim the community for themselves by creating a home, a place to be, during the 1970s.

Partners is a fascinating study about people power, grass roots action, and the resurgence of hope and life. Three decades later, this book is hardly dated at all, and still would be useful and instructive for any urban studies, American studies, sociology, or cultural anthropology course.

my amazon review: creating home

Summer of Salt

• Summer of Salt by Katrina Leno on Powell's


In this page-turner YA fantasy, older twin Georgina narrates the summer leading to her eighteenth birthday. It's close to equal parts mystery, magic, friendship, sisterhood, witchcraft, and coming of age into a world of possibilities humans might dream of.

Summer of Salt happens along the east coast of the USA on the previously safe and crime-free island By-the-Sea where uncounted generations of the Fernweh family have lived. Aside from improbable magical powers, the fact of many family members never even briefly leaving for another locale feels unwise to the point of destructively insular, but this is fiction, this is imaginative, and it's supposed to expand the reader's perspective.

Annabella the eastern seaborn flicker, the other central character – or possibly the main one – has held the interest of non-island birding communities for centuries. Annual summer visits from birders long has helped By-the-Sea and the Fernweh family stay financially afloat. I'd suggest those outsiders also have brought a needed taste of worlds outside By-the-Sea.

Summer of Salt is well-written without the annoying stylistic quirks I love to hate. It's strongly feminist yet balanced; none of the characters would denigrate a person who identifies as male or "other." With references to sexuality, orientation, and preferences of Georgina and her classmates more or less in passing, this isn't exactly a sapphic ode.

As a [chronologically] mature adult whose favorite fiction genre is YA, I found Summer of Salt an engaging summer read. And look at the brilliant cover!

Detroit City Is the Place to Be

• Detroit City is the Place to Be by Mark Binelli on Powells

• Mark Binelli's website


Is "afterlife" death? Is it a variety of living modified by the adjective after—meaning in the wake of something else? You've probably heard of urban prairies and renatured yards.

Like all great cities, Le Détroit du Lac Érie began and then flourished along a river—the Detroit River is both a river and a strait between Lakes St Clair and Erie.

This book chronicles the place that became the Motor City from its founding in 1701, follows with its growth in population, economic importance, and global impact. Binelli describes Detroit's decline and outlines some of the reasons. And no, Detroit doesn't resemble any postcolonial African state.

I've previously blogged about how Detroit draws me. Family of origin on the side I know something about hailed from Detroit. As a seventh grader I took my first solo flight (as a passenger) to Detroit. Attended my first MLB game at Tiger Stadium, RIP 2009. Those facts relate to my lifelong passion for cities in general, my lifelong resolve to beautify the inner city, and my adult sense of call to serve the urban church.

Binelli's bona fides include growing up in a Detroit suburb and becoming acquainted with the city proper when he worked for his family business as a teen. His reasonably objective perspective as a mainstream journalist is another asset. He moved there to get firsthand experience of Detroit's afterlife; the resulting field reports clarify the human cost of the past and illuminate hope for the future

Detroit City is the Place to Be is copyright 2012. It's now 2023. The prose and characters engaged me, but without an updated sequel the book left me hanging. Not in terms of wanting more of what I'd already read, but because I need to know about now. I've read about the city exiting bankruptcy. I know a little about neighborhood farms and river restoration projects. I rejoice that wildlife again is at home along the river, but I can't feel what's going on. I often tell people I'd relocate to Detroit if it weren't for the weather. Is living there the best way to discover what's transpired during the past decade? "Imported from Detroit" became an American auto industry buzz-phrase. How about if I expatriate myself to Detroit?

On page 95 the author quotes Corine Vermeulen: "the birthplace of modernity and the graveyard of modernity." I fully trust "…hope literally growing from the fallow soil of the post-industrial necropolis." [page 56] Renatured yards and urban prairies because… nature has a way of stripping away the past and opening doors to newness.

• My Amazon Review: Urban Prairies, Renatured Yards, Revitalized City

Downtown Detroit skyline from Windsor, Ontario
by Ken Lund on Flickr

Sleeping with Bread

Sleeping with Bread: Holding What Gives You Life by Sheila Fabricant Linn, Matthew Linn, and Dennis Linn on Powell's

Sleeping with bread—tucking yourself in at the end of the day with whatever's basic to your survival and overall health. With graceful pastel watercolor illustrations by Francisco Miranda, this giftable paperback provides simple instructions and compelling rationales for anyone of any age doing an Ignatian examen on a regular basis. Can you name your greatest consolation, your most stinging desolation from today? Oh, those Jesuits and their reputation for being so good with discernment! Because they are!

I especially appreciate the authors' counsel that making an examen can be wise and helpful not only at the end of a day, week, month, or year (I'm so ready for 31 December 2020 and 01 January 2021) but also after a meeting at work or anywhere, a conversation, a class as student or instructor, a meal. Can you name the best part? The worst part? What brought life? What caused death? Making an examen as an individual or with other(s) each day over as short a period as a calendar month may help confidently guide you into that critical "what now-what's next" in your own vocational or recreational pursuits, or as a family. You probably remember Howard Thurman, the late and great preacher to Boston University telling us: Don't ask what the world needs. Ask what makes you alive, because the world needs people who are fully alive.

My Good Reads review: Discovering Life

The Church: Towards a Common Vision

The Church: Towards a Common Vision on Amazon

We frequently refer to God's Providence—an aspect of God's merciful loving care that involves vision and foresight. The Church: Towards a Common Vision, the ecumenical World Council of Churches Faith and Order Paper Number 214, includes in its title "vision," a word about seeing and perceiving that humans share with the Divine.

Published in 2013, Towards a Common Vision is a convergence text that pairs with Baptism, Eucharist, and Ministry. "BEM," from three decades earlier (1982). The book radically condenses conversations related to the nature and practice of faith, sacraments, and ministry in church bodies that confess the triune God. Orthodox, Anglican, Protestant, Evangelical, Pentecostal, and Roman Catholic participants seeking to articulate a "global and multicultural ecumenical vision" [viii] came from all over the globe.

Convergence implies moving together in some directions, yet it is not full consensus, nor is it necessarily an "agreed statement." Maybe surprisingly, the churches agreed more fully on faith and sacraments than they did on ministry. All interlocutors affirmed both scripture and tradition as authoritative, along with the need to proclaim the gospel in languages, symbols, and images related to the time and place at hand—contextualizing within the listeners' overall cultural heritage. Incorporating diversity, an aspect of catholicity, is essential to incarnational presence and embodied ministry.

Towards a Common Vision views Church in biblical terms as both eschatological community and historical reality. The writing in this technical document is easy to understand; the wide format printed throughout in double columns makes it pleasant to hold and to read. And what's the purpose of all these ecumenical discussions? Because… God so loves the world, and calls the church to be in the world and for the world, enabling the church to embody and reflect God's loving trinitarian communion.

• My Amazon Review: Ecumenical Convergence Text that Pairs with BEM

Give Work :: Leila Janah

• Give Work: Reversing Poverty One Job at a Time by Leila Janah on Powell's

• Intro: We all realize at least for the human years between 20 and 90 "age is only a number," yet I'll mention entrepreneur and paradigm-changer Leila Janah died of epithelioid sarcoma at the much too young age of 37 in January 2020. RIP and thanks for writing about the inspirational possibilities of a digitally and humanly connected world.

Review

We can give work…

• Because life first must be gift before it becomes task.

• Because the world is even flatter than Thomas Friedman told us.

For close to a millennium, goods, materials, and money have moved with little regard for national borders, but historically, humans have not been able to go very far. The fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 broke enough boundaries to create a single global market; six years later, netscape went public and brought internet access to regular people, eventually leading to individuals being able to virtually be and virtually work in places other than their actual physical locations.

Leila Janah's autobiographical account of her lifelong adventures in Give Work is copyright 2017, meaning it was written, edited, and ready for press some time before that year, and almost four years later, interconnections have expanded even more than when the author finished the book. 2021 is about a week away, and we're almost ready for a sequel!

Janah cites topographical barriers of forests and deserts that prevented earlier, pre-internet era connectivity between many African countries, as well as death-dealing mostly European colonialism that extracted natural resources, used them elsewhere, and left the population bereft. Maybe paradoxically, countries with land not so richly endowed sometimes were able to develop human potential much more readily. In terms of reversing poverty, although at times limited direct infusions of cash, services, or supplies from government or non-profits can be helpful and sometimes will be necessary, the giving work concept means people do easy to learn computerized work that companies worldwide need, and it happens in a fair and verifiable work-for-pay exchange. Those wages then stay in the community and lead to more income for others as the money circulates.

It's never easy to find an appropriate name for a product or entity that will span cultures and geographies. In Sanskrit sama is equal or fair. In Arabic sama means sky; it's the root of the Hindi word for same. Leila Janah hoped her company would give everyone an equal opportunity by sourcing in ways that enhanced the value of "sama," thus becoming Samasource. Janah imagined, developed, and planted Samasource on an astonishingly tiny budget—even for a startup. Samasource has grown into an excellent option for companies of any size anywhere to access digital workers who produce quality and get paid fairly.

Although Samasource first sought to employ persons stuck in poverty because of almost zero work options in countries like India and Kenya, Leila chronicles later experiences and challenges she had training people in rural California and rural Arkansas. Maybe surprisingly, big cities in developing countries had literally countless, increasingly affordable internet cafés; underpopulated, depressed American towns lacked all kinds of viable infrastructure. (A few years later, I need to research if or how that has changed by now.)

What was Give Work's best counsel? Keep following your dreams and if your initial product rollout doesn't have glitches and inconsistencies, you have waited too long to launch!


Reflections

An interconnected world is a flat earth, a planet that keeps shrinking, finally down to the size and weight of a smart phone. Leila was able to develop and leave legacies of companies Samasource and LXMI* because of the imagination, energy, and resilience she'd been born with, because of the education she was able to get as a result of where she'd been born, and equally as much, because of her connections with other people. It's not what you know, it's not who you know: it's all about who knows you.

Needless to say, despite beginning the Samasource enterprise somewhat on her own with her own pocket change, all along the way Leila Janah found emotional and intellectual support in friends, acquaintances, classmates, and coworkers. They got who she was, trusted what she felt called to do. Oprah reminded the teenager, "You know you can't do life on your own." I've spent too long developing more skills and further expertise—even including more academic credentials. Objectively, it doesn't matter how splendidly someone does something if there's no place to do it.

It can sound vulgar, but "human capital" is essential for success. Success? Contributing in a manner and to a degree related to the person's gifts and preparation and sense of call. And though virtually no creative anywhere ever imagined they'd get an immense financially windfall, one truly expects working hard and spending time eventually will result in a livable income.

Reminding myself: amidst the overall isolation and urgent "what's next" of the current global pandemic, what was Give Work's best counsel for everyone? Keep following your dreams and if your initial product rollout doesn't have glitches and inconsistencies, you have waited too long to launch! I am so reaching out a few more times and expecting opportunities good to go as soon as the surrounding world starts to open up again… really!


Notice of material connection: I received a copy of this book from publicist, author, publisher, or distributor, with no requirement or expectation I'd write a positive review. As always, opinions are my own.

my goodreads review: Life as a Gift in a Flat World

*Though it's not the main topic, Give Work interestingly details development and marketing the ethically sourced for-profit complexion care line LXMI.

Searching for Sunday :: Rachel Held Evans

• Searching for Sunday: Loving, Leaving, and Finding the Church on Powells

Rachel Held Evans died on May 4, 2019. More than a year and a half after RHE's much too early death, I'm reviewing Searching for Sunday, although it doesn't rate 4 stars, 5 stars, or even 3.

The book's title refers to leaving conservative American evangelicalism because Rachel loved the church too much to stay where she was; her search led to the typically inclusive Episcopal Church. Anglicanism is not a sola scriptura tradition, yet along with its distinctive polity, the two (yes, only two) dominical sacraments of baptism and the Lord's Supper, the ecumenical creeds, Anglicanism claims scripture as foundational, but RHE interprets it according to her own imagination without regard for literary forms or reference to centuries of theological and biblical scholarship. I strongly suspect much of the content of this best-seller went down the way it did simply because the author didn't have anything approaching a formal theological education.

RHE transitioned from her evangelical upbringing into TEC, yet she nominally organized Searching for Sunday around the seven sacraments the Roman branch of the church recognizes, rather than the two sacraments or ordinances most protestants practice.

Despite acknowledging the death and resurrection paradigm that pervades the biblical witness, RHE seems to have little sense of the reality of death and its countless manifestations. The law reveals the demands of a holy God; the law also shows us how to live together in ways that defy death and generate life. The good news of the gospel includes the reality of sin and death, the ultimate reign of grace and life. Baptism initiates us into the church, but biblical theology says God enacts an ontological change and issues an subversive call in baptism.

Baptism initiates us into the church, obliterating all past human loyalties, while Rachel seems to view the church as a social organization, akin to a club whose charter says it welcomes everyone, which happens—except when it doesn't. She doesn't view – or hadn't experienced? – the church as the exhibition of the reign of God to the world.

The best part? Rachel Held Evans writes VERY well and comes alive on the printed page in a manner that's probably similar to the in-person style her audiences loved.

• My Amazon Review: beautiful writing, disappointing content

week of grace 08

After a few week's sabbatical for this topic, here's Week of Grace 08, I backtracked a bit to account for missing last week

1. A wonderful time along with many welcome compliments for leading hymns on the piano for the monthly meeting of Presbyterian Women at the church I used to attend.

2. Lunch and conversation afterwards in the social hall gets a line of its own: Chicken Divan; tossed green salad with southern California special ranch dressing, rolls and butter, yellow cake with white frosting.

3. Finally got highlights, haircut, etc. done.

4. Yummy super-fresh Bánh Mi at the salon—aka "Linda's Garage".

5. Box of frozen waffles turned out to be blueberry instead of buttermilk per outside package label! how fun!

6. Speakeasy blogger/reader bureau (underground discussion community of off-the-beaten path faith, spirituality, & culture books) sent me an actual physical copy of Resurrection City, one of my fave books I reviewed for them that at the time they only had digital copies to distribute!

7. Wednesday evening Brief Eucharist for St Michael & All Angels (Gabriel, Raphael) followed by monthly first Wednesday Healing Rite

8. Several comment exchanges with another amazon vine reviewer who likes my reviews!

9. Excellent post-liturgy Sunday brunch to welcome new and old students at Town-and-Gown. Like most (all?) UC schools, they're on a quarter system so didn't start the current school year until now.