I’m scheduled to visit Greece in a few weeks.  My guess is that this trip could coincide with a total meltdown in Greece.  If not, we will be dodging the inevitable bullet.  Things are going to get a whole lot more chaotic in Europe (and thus the rest of the world), before they get better. This is a pretty great summary of the situation as it stands.  Europe needs between 2 trillion and 6 trillion Euros to avoid some kind of major disaster.  That kind of money is just too much to pull out of thin air.  Who knows what awaits us. 

Interesting article on the growth of Evangelicalism in Britain.  Interestingly, the article goes beyond immigrant Christianity. Money quote:

“Evangelical Christianity might be heavily African-influenced but it’s also spreading among the natives as well. Yesterday I attended an Evangelical service for a friend’s baby’s naming ceremony (not a baptism, as we papists call it – this group don’t believe in infant baptisms).

The happy clappy thing is not my scene – I’d need at least four Stellas before I could get up and dance in a church without dying of a cringe-related stroke – but it’s easy to see why Evangelical Christianity is rapidly spreading in the UK. The median age of this church was about 20; in most Catholic parishes in London you’re considered an energetic young go-getter if you’re under 75; the Evangelicals have many working-class members, while very, very few

The Evangelicals also aggressively court people of other faiths, including Muslims – while the Catholics would rather meet other religious leaders at (preferably tax-payer funded) interfaith meetings where they can spout platitudes about faith communities, as if religious identity is fixed, not a choice.

And in three decades of living in London I have also never seen so many people of different racial backgrounds united in a feeling of brotherhood – Londoners generally tolerate each other, and muddle on, but whether it’s the NHS surgery or the Notting Hill Carnival, the theme is begrudging tolerance, not affection. A small church can do far more for race relations than all the state-subsidised quangos and anti-racism campaigners in Christendom.

Many Catholic and Anglican churches are packed on Sunday mornings with young parents trying to get their kids into the best schools, and it shows – the air is thick with hypocrisy. In contrast the Evangelicals, whether anyone likes it or not, believe, and it shows. Doubt and scepticism are fine things but a religious community that does not believe in its own message will wither and die, and be replaced by others. I’m not remotely surprised Evangelical Christianity is on the march in England.”

MTV is retooling for the millennials:

“Life amplified,” is MTV’s current slogan. The network is in pursuit of stories that reveal and explore characters’ vulnerabilities. Authenticity, Shore and others say, is a critical component.

“About the biggest put-down in the millennial world is to call someone fake,” said Carol Phillips, president of Brand Amplitude, a Michigan consulting firm. “They want to see experiences that feel real.”

Snarkiness, the currency of Generation X, doesn’t carry the same appeal, partly, the researchers said, because millennials experienced a less hierarchical upbringing than did Gen Xers. Parents of millennials assumed the role of life coach or friend, a phenomenon called “peerenting.”

“Millennials come from families that are more democratic and worlds spin around the kids,” Shore said. “This has created kids who have a sense of power, a sense of voice and kids who need to be listened to.”

MTV already was overhauling its programming in 2009 when Shore came on board. That summer it had launched “16 and Pregnant” and in December it added “Teen Mom” and “Jersey Shore,” two gritty reality shows that were a dramatic pivot from the sun-drenched escapism of “The Hills.” The series reversed MTV’s ratings slide and landed the network back on the cultural map.

“Jersey Shore,” with its over-the-top partying and fighting, is partly a story about the search for love and acceptance — eternal themes for youth. And the show even gives an occasional shout-out to the unit most important to millennials: their families.

“The characters themselves have become something of a family, and their moms and dads have been part of the show,” said Van Toffler, president of the MTV Networks Music and Logo Group. “Before our evolution you would not have seen parents on MTV.”

Now MTV is rolling out a new slate of shows, both scripted and reality, that hopes to speak to millennials in their own language. While it fell short with “Skins” and “The Hard Times of R.J. Berger,” MTV scored with “Awkward,” which debuted in July. MTV’s millennial mantra that “smart and funny is the new rock and roll” applies to the irreverent comedy. “Awkward” centers on 15-year-old Jenna Hamilton (Ashley Rickards), a witty nerd who is invisible at school until a freak accident, which everyone assumes is a suicide attempt (it wasn’t), makes her suddenly notorious.

While writing the show, “Awkward” creator Lauren Iungerich, a member of Generation X, put together her own focus group at her former high school in Palos Verdes. She and her writing staff spent a day interviewing students.

“We asked them everything, about sex and relationships, and we picked up their slang,” Iungerich said. “What fascinated me was the kids spent an hour-and-a-half talking about their mothers. They often feel they are competing with them. Their mothers are trying to stay youthful and even wear the same size of clothes.”

In the show, two mean girls snap a cellphone photo of Jenna getting undressed in the locker room. They text a shot of Jenna and her exposed breast to the entire school. Her youthful mother tries to help by suggesting Jenna get a boob job, which she doesn’t want.

“I wanted the show to be true to the kids and what they are going through,” Iungerich said.

The quest for genuine voices is seeping into new reality offerings too. On Oct. 11, MTV launches a documentary-styled program, “Chelsea Settles.” The show’s 23-year-old heroine, Chelsea Settles, struggles with a tough decision: stay in small-town Pennsylvania with her seriously ill mother or move to Los Angeles to work in the fashion industry.

Unlike the rail-thin blonds who populated MTV three years ago, Settles is black and weighs 324 pounds.

Two scripted shows scheduled for next year revolve around millennial themes. The Doug Liman-produced “I Just Want My Pants Back” is about a group of 20-somethings in Brooklyn navigating relationships, based on a novel by David J. Rosen. And MTV will introduce “Underemployed,” a comedic stab at one of the biggest challenges facing young adults: overcoming the weak economy.

Along with helping MTV find a new pop-cultural relevancy, the focus on what Shore calls “radical audience intimacy” is paying dividends. The network just ended its seventh consecutive quarter of year-to-year ratings growth. According to the Nielsen Co., nearly 1.2-million people on average watched MTV during prime time in 2011. “Awkward” has had an average of 1.9 million viewers its first season, and the network says it is watched online (in full or clips) 1.4 million times a week.

“We want the audience to be our muse,” said Shore. “When we get that right and become a reflection of our audience, then that’s when MTV is at its best.”

Good summary from Ezra Klein in the Washington Post:

Europe is caught in a long bout of something that we’re very used to seeing after financial crises: extend and pretend. The underlying reality of their dilemma is that there are hundreds of billions — or maybe more — in losses for someone to take. If Greece and Ireland and Portugal take them, that means default and likely exit from the Euro. If they default, that means defaulting, in large part, on loans owed to German and French banks, which could cause a banking crisis in those countries. For them not to default, however, means that taxpayers in other European countries have to take those losses.

The solutions to this crisis that are economically plausible are not politically plausible, and vice-versa. As economist Carmen Reinhart told me, “If the policymakers were to be proactive, they would restructure Greek debt alongside bank recapitalization and at the same time, restructure both Portugal and Ireland as well.” That is to say, they would do it all at once. But the sticker shock to that strategy would be enormous.

What is proving politically plausible is to do just enough to survive the week, and do it in the nick of time. We’ve seen that over and over again in this crisis. But the irony of this strategy is that it’s likely making a resolution harder. The longer Europe spends under this cloud, the harder it is for them to grow. The harder it is for them to grow, the worse these debts become. And the worse these debts become, the harder they are to pay off. The cost of denying the problem is to make the problem worse. But for Europe’s leaders, that is, at least for now, an easier price to pay. Actually fixing the problem might ultimately be cheaper, but it requires a wealth of political capital and continental unity that they simply don’t have.

Thank you to Park Place Church of God for contributing $1,500 to send us their very talented youth pastor Josh Wieger.  Josh will be joining me in doing two 3W Seminars:  Liverpool and Paris in December.  The goal of these seminars is to discuss ways for reaching young people and the challenges that most churches face in this area.  Josh is an emerging leader who is doing a great job at Park Place and has a lot to teach all of us.

The rest of the costs for the Seminars will be picked up by our Next Gen Fund which helps train and prepare the next generation, as well as give emerging young leaders a global platform to share their gifts.  This will be a great experience for the churches, for the youth, and for Josh himself.  We try as much as possible to create these kind of synergistic win-win moments at 3W.  We’re grateful to Park Place for supporting us as we try to engage the younger generation. 

Ken and Keli Oldham and their daughter Grace went with Jamie last week to visit Egypt for the first time.  They are our newest Three Worlds team members.  Get to know them a little better and read about their adventures at their blog here.

The Oldhams are still needing financial support to make the move to Egypt.  So please contact us if you or your church can help us.

This morning we learned that Jamie’s grandmother, Evelyn Skaggs passed away in Seattle, Washington.  Evelyn served as a missionary to Egypt in the late 40′s and early 1950′s before Jamie and her family moved there in the 1980′s.  She was a much beloved person in the Church of God had a large influence on many people who went on to become leaders.  This is a big loss for many people.

Evelyn was obviously very special to us.  Trips to the Pacific Northwest always involved visits to see Grandma.  She was like a grandmother to me, and was a GREAT great-grandmother to Marco.  She was extremely sharp, was very well-read, and was a total joy to converse with for long periods of time.  Even when I was without Marco or Jamie after we moved to Asia and Europe, I would often make the drive up to Seattle from Portland just to visit her.  We could talk politics, religion, or baseball.  I liked to write for her and she was one of the three people I always picture in my head when I write this diary.

She traveled all over the world and touched many people.  But as kind as she was, she was absolutely impossible to beat at Scrabble.  She loved the game and knew how to clean everyone’s clock.  On our last couple of visits as she closed in on 90 years of age, she had sympathy for me and intentionally tried to lose at Scrabble to me.  But she couldn’t.  Even her half-hearted efforts at beating me ended up scoring too many points.

As we travel around the world, people often ask about Evelyn.  Nowhere more so than in Egypt where she is a much beloved saint who blessed so many people.

In the past few months, she took a turn for the worst.  First in June, and then she struggled through the next few weeks. We were able to tell her that we loved her in a recent phone conversation and we last were able to visit for Easter of 2010.  We had hoped it would not be the last time we could be together.  But she passed away peacefully at 10:30PM–fittingly on a Sunday.  We will miss her greatly.

Last weekend, I attended the annual conference of the Church of God in Germany.  The events location rotates between Fritzlar in the center of the country every other year, and then to the north and south on the other years.  This year, it was in the North at a campground south of Hamburg.

As usual, the Germans put on a great conference.  The campground was beautiful, and the events well-organized.  In General, I remain so impressed with the German Church of God.  The pastors are wonderful, there is real unity amongst the leaders, multiple generations attend their annual conference, young people in ministry are tracked, and they reach out to Europe and the world.  They are a well-functioning Church of God in comparison to many other places.  We are so thankful to them for allowing us to base ourselves here in Germany.

The leaves are starting to fall on the trees and the weather is now consistently in the 60′s.  We’re about to go into my favorite time of the year–Autumn.  It’s so great to live in a four season location again.  Best of all, I have quite a bit of time at home now with Jamie and Marco before my next overnight trip.  This is on purpose, as we are trying to slow our schedule down for Marco’s sake.  Jamie just got back from Egypt yesterday and the Oldhams and the Langfords are still with us for one more day.  On Sunday begins a “long stretch” of being home and sleeping in the same bed, and not having to put things in a suitcase for more than 30 days.  I’m really looking forward to it.

I plan to spend these next few weeks focusing on Jamie and Marco first.  Then I will be catching up on a lot of work as well as preparing for the numerous 3W events coming up in the Fall and Winter.  And perhaps I’ll finally get to see some of Berlin.  I still know so very little about Berlin since I am never here.  There are more museums per capita in Berlin than anywhere in the world.  Perhaps we’ll get to get out some and see some new things.

Fascinating facts about the languages we speak from Time Magazine:

English, with a high information density of .91, was spoken at an average rate of 6.19 syllables per second. Mandarin, which topped the density list at .94, was the spoken slowpoke at 5.18 syllables per second. Spanish, with a low-density .63, ripped along at a syllable-per-second velocity of 7.82. The true speed demon of the group, however, was Japanese, which edged past Spanish at 7.84, thanks to its low density of .49. Despite those differences, at the end of, say, a minute of speech, all of the languages would have conveyed more or less identical amounts of information.

Of the many things that we covered at our Three Worlds Staff Meeting this past week was the use of media.  Unfortunately and fortunately, new media platforms are available to all of us in this new age of the internet.  Communications via the internet has become a very important part of missionary work.  It’s a great way to keep supporters updated, to post prayer requests, to get rapid responses regarding things on the field, to keep in touch with missionaries and for missionaries to keep in touch with their families.  It’s a blessing.

It’s also a curse in that it is very time consuming.  I spent a couple of hours today just making a dent in all the business emails that accumulated while I was attending the German conference this weekend.  The diary needs an entry, and then photos need to be taken and posted.

This diary is going on its ninth year now.  The average for a blog is 5 years and they disappear.  Nine years is A LOT!  Especially as i try to write on average every 3 days.  If you were to go back to the beginning you would probably find that, yes indeed, this diary averages one entry per 3 days over 9 years.  Hundreds of thousands of words have been posted here over this past decade.  That’s a good thing, but it takes time.  A lot of time, yet it is how people communicate and pay attention these days.  That’s just fact.

But now “BookFace” has entered the picture.  And everyone BookFaces each other.  Many people don’t read blogs anymore.  They prefer the short entries on BookFace.  Worse yet, now there is a whole generation of people who prefer Twittle.  They twit each other to death–little sentences telling people that they are getting their haircut or cut their toenails while watching the Jets game.

All kidding aside—it seems like the older generations really do tend to swing toward websites and blogs.  While younger people go for BookFace and then the super young love their Twittle.  In other words, you have to communicate in different ways for the different generations.  That’s a good metaphor for how it works in the church as well.

We briefly toyed with the idea of closing down the Diary.  But I know that quite a few of you (we only have 3 readers) really prefer the diary and have followed it since the very beginning.  You might not appreciate having to switch over to Bookface or Twittle.  So we have decided to keep the diary alive.  Let us know your thoughts on this.

So what does this mean for 3W? That was one of our questions at our Staff Meeting.  3W is already on BookFace and Twittle.  But it looks like it’s time for me (Patrick) to start contributing a lot at both places.  Furthermore, there will be more super exciting episodes of GBR (Gateway Berlin Radio) in the future.  And there is our e-newsletter which I hope you all subscribe to.

So that’s it….I’m gearing up.  In the second half of October I am going to start BookFacing on 3W and Twittling at 3W’s twittle account.  So there will be 3 places to find us.  Personally I much prefer the diary where all thoughts can be elaborated on.  BookFace will drive me nuts.  And Twittle even nutser, if that’s possible.

I’ll have to re-calibrate my mind and writing for these very different formats.

Oh, Marco has just informed me that it’s actually “Facebook” and “Twitter.”  Thanks, Marco.  For those that are interested, you will be able to follow me shortly at Facebook and Twitter.   We’ll see you there the 3rd week of October. The Three Worlds media presence will grow…as I watch my time disappear into a giant black hole of media involvement.

Three Worlds can be found at:

Facebook:  Three Worlds

Twitter:  http://twitter.com/#!/3WCHOG

We’ll go full-power in late October!!!

It’s Friday September 16th and I just dropped off Jamie and our newest 3W team members the Oldhams at the airport.  Ken, Keli, and their daughter Grace are going to Egypt for the first time today to see their future home.  This is a very big deal!  We need to pray about this–that all goes well, that they all stay safe, and that it is a great experience.  Their two smallest children remain back in the USA.  As for Audrey, she is an American working at our church in Liverpool alongside her husband Zach.  They’re a great young couple that I wrote about in my last post.  Audrey grew up in Egypt, just like Jamie and they both went to the same school at different times.

Imagine moving your whole family to a different city.  Now imagine moving them to a different country.  Now imagine moving them to a country that is in great transition where there was just a revolution.  That’s what is happening with the Oldhams, so we need to keep them in mind this week and after this week as well.

They continue to need some serious financial support to make all of this happen.  So spread the word that there is a need and an urgency about all of this.

Our 3W Staff Meetings finished yesterday with an emotional time of prayer for the Oldhams.  It such a big deal to have a whole family move to the Middle East.  But this is what they feel called to do and we are going to support them in all they do.

Thanks to the 3W crew for being great workers, for helping out in the kitchen, and for the amazing time of interaction.  Everyone is an important part of the effort.  And thanks for all the laughter.

In a few minutes, Marco, Zach and I will head out to the annual conference for the Church of God here in Germany.  We will be joined by our 3W teammates, the Simpsons from Bulgaria who are on their way to the USA for home-assignment.  Jamie and the gang will be back almost exactly 7 days later.  Once again, stop and say a prayer.

It’s been busy lately (it’s always busy in case you haven’t noticed), because we have been preparing for our annual 3W Staff Meeting.  All of our Three Worlds team comes to Berlin in September to discuss our team strategy, ethos, and vision for our region.  It’s always a fun time.  The Simpsons are here from Bulgaria, the Oldhams flew in from the USA (and will be going to Egypt for the first time with Jamie on Friday to see their future home), and The Philips and Varners are here too.  We’ve also invited special guest stars-Zach and Audrey from America via Liverpool where they work with the church in Birkenhead.  It’s a full-house.

Jamie and I lead the meetings which cover a number of very important issues ranging from strategy, 3W ethos, future recruitment, changes in policies, mental health issues, finances, media communication, and much more.  We start at 9AM and go until 5pm for two days with 1 hour for lunch and two 10 minute breaks.

We have a very united, peaceful team that works very well together.  This doesn’t happen by accident. It has to be intentional and structure, direction, accountability, and regular communication and engagement with each other is a necessary part of making that happen.  One year into this, and we are very glad that our region is in a team approach.  On a number of levels, we all help in each other to do our jobs better.  It’s not just a cliche–we are able to do so much more together than apart.  That is played out constantly here at 3W.

The Varners and the Philips worked at the German teen camp which helped raise money for the Bulgarian youth to have their own camp.

The Simpsons helped us put on our Paris 3W Seminar.  The women of the team joined together to put on a conference in Istanbul.  The Philips helped host our 3W intern Gina.  The Varners helped to host our Emerging Leaders the Adwalpalkers.  The list goes on and on and on.  In many ways, in many different geographical locations, this team is doing a great job of supporting each other and adding value to each others work.

In the future the team will grow.  At times, the team will shrink.  But we hope to continue going forward with this team approach regardless of who is on the team at any particular time.  That means we look for team players that are consistent and dependable–ready to put team above themselves.

At the “top” of this are Jamie and I as team leaders and Regional Coordinators, but by creating a team approach (with real team processing) we make ourselves accountable to our home bosses and our team here on the field.  So no one, not even us, operates on their own.  We are even more accountable, and with the creation of our 3W Roundtable later this year consisting of donors, we will have even more people watching what we as leaders do.  This is how we prefer to operate.

Too often in Christian organizations there is a lack of organization and a blind trust that it will all work out.  But teamwork, unity, and transparency are not easy to come by.  It takes effort. So we thank your team for doing such a fantastic job this past year.  They’ve accomplished so much–I think even they are surprised.  It’s an honor to work with them.

Photo by Aaron who wisely knew I would forget to get a photo for the website.  See that’s what I mean.  It just all works better this way.

3W Intern Gina Shaner in Oberammergau, Germany.

Our 3W Summer Intern Gina Shaner did an exit-interview for us and discussed her feelings and experiences with Three Worlds.  We would like to thank her for the fantastic job that she did.

3W: Gina, you had 3 very different settings that you worked in during your internship: on the streets of Berlin, at a German youth camp, and traveling to Italy and Spain with the RC’s.  Let’s start with your Berlin experience.  What were your impressions of the city of Berlin?

My first impression of Berlin was of the vast beauty of the diversity of persons, cultures and expressions of self that walked down the street. The city itself functioned in a very organized, German way and was very easy to get around on public transit. The variety of ethnic food was amazing. One could eat a different ethnic food for every meal and not have a repeat for a week! However walking down the street there was a definite awareness of persons looking for a place to belong, it seemed that people were very detached from others, very caught up in their own world, very in need of hope.

3W:     What was your ministry in Berlin like this summer?

The ministry that I did in Berlin was serving daily as a part of the ministry of not only the XZ Berlin team but also working with abused women on the street. This was an every weekday ministry. It was incredibly difficult, but such a practical place to serve those who live in lives of chaos. Though it was difficult to see the women knowing the difficulty and the abuses they live with, it was interesting to hear the women talk of the peace they experienced when they were with us.  The work was also an experience of learning to care for women where they are, not for where we hope for them to be, but to be a friend to them right where they are. Offering them love in spite of the life they find themselves in.

3W:    You also worked in the Church of God youth camp in Germany.  What were your impressions of German teens in comparison to young people in the U.S.A.?

German teenagers have experienced so much more of life and have a more difficult environment in which to live out their faith than do most teenagers in the USA.  The family environments of German teenagers are similar to US teenagers, but the school and church environments, from talking to the teenagers, seem to be the more challenging for the Church of God teenagers that I met. Many attend churches where they struggle to understand what is preached on Sunday mornings, with much of what is preached being over there heads. Also the teenagers in Germany live out their faith in a much more secular environments with fewer of their peers and classmates sharing a similar faith expression. I was impressed with the maturity of the German teenagers in comparison to many American teens that I have worked with, their understanding of what it meant for them to live as a follower of Jesus Christ was very encouraging.

3W:     You also worked in the Church of God youth camp in Germany.  What were your impressions of German teens in comparison to young people in the U.S.A.?

German teenagers have experienced so much more of life and have a more difficult environment in which to live out their faith than do most teenagers in the USA.  The family environments of German teenagers are similar to US teenagers, but the school and church environments, from talking to the teenagers, seem to be the more challenging for the Church of God teenagers that I met. The teenagers in Germany live out their faith in a much more secular environments with fewer of their peers and classmates sharing a similar faith expression. I was impressed with the maturity of the German teenagers in comparison to many American teens that I have worked with, their understanding of what it meant for them to live as a follower of Jesus Christ was very encouraging.

3W:  Do you have any special memories of the 3W Team in Germany (the Philips and the Varners)?

There were many special memories with the 3W Team. I really enjoyed driving down the highway hearing the history of Ludwig II and the history of Taco Bell’s International presence with Patrick and Jamie. The memories with the Philips were the many conversations we had driving, riding the bus and over meals.  I really enjoyed the times preparing meals with Rhonda and running errands with Kelley. I also really enjoyed spending time observing and participating with Rhonda working in ministry on the streets of Berlin.  The memoires I hold dear with the Varners are eating breakfast at TFZ and the many conversations shared on the trip to and while in Spain. Especially all the time we spent laughing and the many hours (it seemed) we spent looking for dining establishments.

3W:  You also traveled with the Regional Coordinators to Italy and Spain.  What were your impressions of the organizational and strategic side of ministry?

From the very beginning of my time with the Regional Coordinators I was curious to see how the organization and strategy side of the ministry of Three Worlds would look. The region of Europe and the Middle East are vast and incorporate cultures that are vastly diverse in their operation and personalities, so to think how to strategically direct a ministry that reaches the vastness of it I knew would have to be creative, but extremely specific.  As I first read over the (Three Worlds Strategy Paper) and then continued the conversations while driving, eating dinner and exploring, I was amazed at how specific and thorough the strategy is. At first there were a few aspects that I was unsure of, but after conversations, visiting with leaders on the field and hearing of the issues that were being dealt with, I understood the need for each dynamic, spelled out in a specific plan. While it was helpful to read about the strategy and organization, the dots were even more connected for me, as I observed first hand how it played out on the field.

3W:  Do you feel that you got to experience the Three Worlds?  And how will that affect you in the future?

After spending my summer in three very different ministry contexts in Europe, I feel as if I was able to see the textbook case studies of my courses come to life. The three worlds’ and the challenges at play for missions in Europe were such a present part of the every day of my experience, that my eyes were able to focus more clearly to see the realities at play. The moment where I saw the cultures displayed most starkly was in the church in Vera. To see a church of Bolivian’s, expressing their faith and community in a Non-Western way, but in Post-Christendom context, was incredible. I was especially intrigued how the kids responded when we pulled out cameras. It was as if we were in a Bolivian village and we were entertaining the kids. This first hand experience of seeing how the three worlds’ exist in one context has transformed my way of thinking about ministry not only in Europe but even observing how the three worlds also exist in the North American context. The creativity and diverse range, requires thinking ahead and a strategic vision, it is very challenging but also exciting to see how God chooses to use his servants in these contexts.

3W:  What did you learn about yourself this summer? Was the 3W internship helpful?

I discovered about myself this summer that I still have so much to learn. Living with the Philips and the Nachtigalls was an amazing opportunity, to learn what it looks like to be a missionary family in the day in and day out. How important it is for every member of the family to be willing to help and be flexible not only in ministry but also for each other, to whatever situations happen in that day. I learned from this that I am able to adjust more quickly in a culture when I can become a part of the family/team and serve in the ways that are presented.

Living as a missionary/missionary family, as I observed, means living on a sort of roller coaster. One day could be a quiet day with not much to do but rest, and the next three may be days that require you to literally fly at the speed of light. I learned that when there are quiet days it is a gift from God and to take that time to rest and rejuvenate for whatever may come next.

I also learned what it means for me to live and engage difficult people in the day to day. Difficult people can very easily turn ones attitude and journey into a negative attitude for the day or even week, but instead I had to learn to look at it as an opportunity to be the hands and feet of Jesus. It was an opportunity to offer love and grace when what was given was disrespect and disregard for any other opinion. Jesus handled these people with love and humility and at times strong words and I learned what this looked like fleshed out in more than one way this summer.

I learned that I work extremely well in a team environment. It was confirmed for me this summer working with the XZ team, working on the street ministry, and the Three Worlds team of the potential that a well-connected, and smoothly functioning team can have. The 3W’s internship was an incredible learning experience and a time of growth for me. I learned not only about living in the European context but what it means to live out of a suitcase and be flexible wherever I may be.

3W:  What do you think about the situation of Christianity in Europe overall?

I think that Christianity in Europe is on the decline, as I was aware of before I came. However I think that the potential for God to do some amazing work through missionaries and leaders who are willing to think creatively and strategically is exciting. The field of Christianity is as diverse as the Three World’s but has the potential to be a place where the gospel explodes a new and afresh.

3W:  After all of your hard work the first few weeks, you also got to do some sightseeing in Germany, Italy, Austria, and Spain.  What were your favorite places or highlights?

Every place that we saw and visited in Germany, Austria and Italy was a top highlight. Neuschwanstein and Linderhof were incredible and the views were breathtaking. I enjoyed hearing the history of such an eccentric, interesting dude as Ludwig II. I loved Oberammergau, and looking at the various cemetery plots and the beautiful church. Also hearing the history of that part of Bavaria was very interesting especially in the context of some of their reasoning’s for hosting the passion play. The lake villages and cities that we visited, around Arco were stunning. One of my favorites parts of traveling was the meal times, when we set out to find a restaurant and ended up exploring quaint, charming little German, Austrian and Italian cities. To think that though these small streets reminded me of a walk through Walt’s Disney World, these were legit buildings that have seen decades of history.  The day that we spent in Verona was a highlight, the opportunity to visit the famously depicted balcony of Juliette and the coliseum. To think of the events that have taken place within the walls of the coliseum and what connections and similarities it held to many of the narratives and places that Paul journeyed is incredible.  The highlights of our time in Spain was to be able to visit the Sagrada Familia, to see the hundreds of hours and many years that have been spent working on the majesty of one building. Though its beauty is incredible it seemed almost as a picture into the heart of Europe; beautiful buildings that stand empty, except for the throngs of tourists that come to enjoy its museum like qualities.  I also enjoyed the day that we spent at the beach. Though it was similar to other beaches around the globe, the time to relax and process was a special time.

I went to Spain with 3W teammates Aaron & Nicole as well as our summer intern Gina.  We wanted to connect with people from the Bolivian Church of God that have emigrated to Spain in search of work in Andalusia.  Along the way, we met some wonderful Latin American missionaries, visited another church in the city of Almeria, and also got to see the XZ winter Intern Deni at her home in Barcelona.  We saw many beautiful things along the way and made some new friends.  It looks like we will be doing a 3W Seminar in Almeria, for college students which will explain the Three Worlds of Christianity.  It will be in 2012.  This will be our first 3W Seminar outside of the Church of God and the first one in Spanish.  I can’t wait!

Here are some photos:

The beaches just south of Barcelona.

Deni (the XZ Berlin winter intern) on the bottom left and Judith of the Bible school in Germany (bottom right) and Aaron, Gina and Nicole in Castalldefels (Barcelona).

La Sagrada Familia--Gaudi's unfinished masterpiece.

La Sagrada Famiila

(L to R) Gina, Nicole, Judith, and Aaron.

Just off La Rambla in Barcelona.

"Bartha: Platha de Ethpania"

Gina, Judith and me on the Barcelona seafront. They need a Bubba Gumps Restaurant badly! That's my all-time favorite restaurant.

Polish Catholic youth singing in Barcelona as they head to the Pope's Youth Day in Madrid. Over 8,000 youth made commitments. Over 6,500 decided to become priests and 2,000 decided to become nuns.

Wearing baggy clothes since Barcelona is the pickpocket capital of Europe.

Is this Kyoto or Barcelona?

Our rental car went 1,100km on one tank of diesel fuel for only 65Euro. Pretty amazing. It was an Audi (German).

Driving into the desert of Andalusia looked a lot like driving through southern Arizona near the Mexican border.

Almeria, Andalusia.

Gina and Nicole put their feet in the Mediterranean Sea. On the other side (not far way) is Africa (Morocco).

Driving along the Andalusian coast in Southern Spain.

Beautiful.

A house-church in Andalusia.

The kids gravitate toward Aaron.

Visiting a church in Almeria.

A & N. I like this picture of them.

Japan is a country that has an aging population.  Actually, they are just plain old.  The Japanese live long because of their healthy diets, and their modern economic miracle (post-World War II) has led to a society that doesn’t produce enough children.  Economically, it has a rough road ahead with too few young people in the work force.  But there’s also the problem that Japan’s younger generations are not experiencing economic prosperity, but rather economic decline.

Is this Europe’s future?  Russia, Italy, and Germany are just three countries that are facing a similar trend.  There are many old people, few children, and not enough people other than the old with financial security.

I’ve often wondered if both in Japan and Europe, whether Christian churches have done enough to reach the elderly.  It is something I have wanted to explore for a long time.  Three Worlds hopes to utilize senior citizens in a variety of ways in the future.  My mind is still in the planning stages on these things, but my wheels are turning.

In both Italy and Spain last month, I learned of ministry opportunities involving the aged.  The challenge of older people is that their minds are often made up.  But they are also far closer to having to face the reality of mortality.

Even advertising in Japan is having to change with such an old society:

Fascinating information from a recent Economist article.

Ueshima never explicitly describes itself as a coffee shop for the elderly. But it targets them relentlessly—and stealthily. Stealthily, because the last thing septuagenarians want to hear is that their favourite coffee shop is a nursing home in disguise.

Japan is greying fast: already a fifth of its people are over 65. And the “silver generation” has gold to spare. The incomes of middle-class working folk have declined in the past decade, but seniors are sitting on a vast pile of savings. Almost a third of the nation’s household wealth, some ¥450 trillion ($5.8 trillion), is in the hands of those aged 70 and older (see chart). In the West, the elderly pinch pennies, but Japan’s seniors pay extra . . .

Many firms tailor their services to silver shoppers without letting on, explains a marketing specialist .  . . But inside there are chairs for weary shoppers. Signs are in large fonts. Many salespeople are in their 50s and 60s, since elderly customers trust such people more than whippersnappers. The food hall promotes good old-fashioned Japanese noodles more than newfangled foreign muck.

The shelves are lower, so older people can reach them. (Because of wartime food shortages, the elderly are much shorter than their juniors in Japan.) Loyalty cards at Keio award points not according to what you buy, but according to how often you visit. “Seniors have a lot of time on their hands,” the marketer explains.

Marketing to the elderly is tricky. The direct approach—say, calling your product “the soap for the over-70s”—does not work. And traditional advertising fails. “You can’t use TV adverts: they forget them,” groans the 30-something executive. “We show it again and again and again—and they still can’t recall it,” he sighs. Word-of-mouth is the only way.

Please say a little prayer for Marco this week as he starts 3rd grade at a new school.  This is his 5th school.  Despite all of our efforts to create stability, for reasons out of our control, he has had to be moved in and out of schools far more than we had ever planned.  We are MK’s/TCK’s and we know how hard it is to be moved around and have to change schools.  Marco is particularly tired of it since he had to start school at an earlier age than most kids because we lived in Hong Kong in the Chinese school system.

He’s tired of having to say “goodbye,” and tired of having to be the new kid yet again.  And we’re tired of it too.  It’s been a hard first week.  At first we thought it was going okay, but it turns out he was just trying to put on a brave face.  It’s been hard.  So say a little prayer for Marco in the coming weeks as he tries to make friends and adjust to school being in German and English.

Our 3W Intern Gina Shaner taking in the view in Bayern, Germany.

It has been a busy three weeks for us since we got back to Germany.  On Sunday August 7th, our 3W Intern Gina moved in with us after having spent the first half of her internship under the care of The Philips.  She arrived exhausted from German Teen Camp and we arrived exhausted from our summer in the USA and Costa Rica.  After a couple of days, we headed down to visit the new Church of God in Arco, Italy.

We had a wonderful time encouraging this little church that has just started in the past year.  And the pastors, the Lovaglios continue to report that there are other communities wanting to have a pastor.  So the potential for growth is great, but we will need to mobilize for this is the future.  The Lovaglios are working hard, still commuting 2 hours every week to go back and forth to the church in Arco–and sleeping on the floor of the little church.  I think it was a great opportunity for Gina to see how challenging the European context is for churches, but also how there is great potential, but it always starts with small communities.  We had a wonderful time not only sharing with the people, but listening to the Lovaglios share about their dreams, struggles, and burdens.  They are doing an important work and Pastor Lovaglio is one of those guys who has a gift for finding open doors to begin new works.  He has that St. Paul quality.

Gina with the Lovaglios in front of the new church in Arco, Italy.

We then went to Andalusia, Spain to meet some of the Bolivians from the Bolivian Church of God who have immigrated to Spain and are now living in Vera.  In 2009, I was in Bolivia and attended their annual Easter service.  Now we were meeting people from the same community (and other Bolivian immigrants) who are continuing to worship in a house church.  We met the Fernandez family who are Latin American missionaries in Europe.  They are from Bolivia and Honduras and have been ministering in Spain for quite a long time.  They are phenomenal leaders and Nicole, Aaron, Gina, and I were all enchanted by them.  Like the Lovaglios in Italy, they are working very hard to minister to a number of communities that need a pastor and need assistance in a variety of ways.

Aaron and Gina getting loved on by the Bolivian's kids at the house-church in Vera, Spain.

Moises (on the Left) is from the CHOG in Bolivia.

Part of the purpose of this trip (and internship) was to expose Gina fully to the Three Worlds of Christianity.  The Bolivians very much practice a faith that is non-Western.  It is experiential, it is communal, they are not necessarily educated in Western systematic theology, and their Christianity is infused with many indigenous Bolivian traditions.  This is quite different from the context Gina witnessed here in post-modern Berlin, or in the more traditional settings in Germany or Italy or Almeria, Spain.

For missionaries like the Fernandez in Almeria, they are having to engage all Three Worlds in order to do ministry in Europe.  There are large, communities of elderly, retired German Evangelicals (and snowbirds) living on the coast of Andalusia are very traditional.  But the university students that attend the church in Almeria are more post-modern, and of course the Bolivians are non-Western.

Our 3W Internship is designed to not only expose our interns to these Three Worlds, but to give them an opportunity to engage the Three Worlds, because they call for very different responses and methods of interaction.  Our 2011 3W Intern, Gina, did a fantastic job navigating the Three Worlds.  In every setting we put her in:  working in ministry on the streets of post-Christendom Berlin, working with youth and the traditional church, or visiting with the non-Western Bolivians; in every setting, she did a fantastic job of not only appreciating the Three Worlds, but integrating into them.

We are so thankful to Gina for doing such a great job, being so flexible, and giving everything and everyone a chance.  She gets an A+ from us, as she heads back to Asbury Theological Seminary in Wilmore, Kentucky.

I’ll comment more later on the trip and add some more photos.  Gina got to see some gorgeous things here in Europe.  This continent is the most beautiful in the world—period.

Gina and Marco at Lago di Garda near Arco, Italy.

Gina in front of the ancient Roman Coliseum in Verona, Italy.

Marco and Gina in the mountains outside of Arco, Italy.

A surprising quote from Albert Camus:

Albert Camus wondered long ago, what it would be like to film someone’s life from beginning to end–like the Truman Show–or like what we see on a smaller scale in reality TV.  It’s a deep thought.

“The result would be a film, the screening of which would last a lifetime and that could be seen only by viewers resigned to losing their life in the exclusive interest of the details of someone else’s. Even then, this unimaginable film wouldn’t be realistic—for the simple reason that the reality of a man’s life isn’t found only where he is. It’s also found in the other lives that shape his—first of all, the lives of those he loves, who would, in turn, have to be filmed; but also the lives of unknown others—powerful or downtrodden—fellow citizens, policemen, professors, invisible companions in mines and factories, diplomats and dictators, religious reformers, artists who create myths that govern our behavior—all told, humble representatives of the sovereign accidents that reign over even the most orderly existence. Thus there’s only one realistic film possible, the one that is endlessly projected for us by an invisible apparatus on the screen of the world. The only realistic artist would be God, if he exists.”

Hi folks.  Sorry for the lack of diary entries lately.  You may be wondering how our intern Gina is doing, how’s Italy, and how’s is Spain.  Well, all is wonderful, but the days have been very long and internet has been real spotty from place to place.  And then there’s just the exhaustion factor.

At the moment I am on the Southeast Coast of Spain in a gorgeous town called Aguadulce (Sweet Water), close to Almeria in Andalusia, Spain.  I know Gina had a wonderful time in Italy and I will write about it later and post pictures.  And then there’s the wonderful people we are visiting Spain.  More about that later with lots of photos.  There’s Italy, Austria, Barcelona, and Andalusia all coming up.  And it’s been a great trip for learning and experiencing the Three Worlds of Christianity we write so much about.  It’s been very encouraging.   Three Worlds is fitting a need and the time is right.

Thanks for hanging in there.  And thanks for supporting us.

Events in the Middle East continue to unfold in ways that will have a tremendous impact on all of our futures.  Most Westerners are still very skeptical that democracy can ever flourish in the Middle East or in Islamic countries.  But this is ignorant.  Democracy already exists in the largest Islamic Nation–Indonesia.  It exists in Malaysia also.  Morocco and Tunisia are moving quickly in that direction and Lebanon, which is a pluralistic society, has democracy.

“Ah..” you say, “But those Democracies are all dysfunctional, run by cronies, big business, or not really Western.”

Yes, you are right.  But Western Democracies are not exactly doing so well either.  Hardly any of the democracies in Eastern Europe are as politically open and free of corruption as we would like.  Western Europe has an international structure called the “E.U.” which is many ways limits democracy.  And in 2000, the United States was not sure which president it had elected, and in 2008, it’s financial system was revealed to be beyond corrupt.  Democracy is always messy and the future of 21st Century democracy (as I have argued before) is not necessarily going to belong to “Western-style Democracy.”  Whatever that is.

For the countries of the Middle East, North Africa, and Islamic Asia, democracy may never arrive or it may arrive very slowly.  It’s very possible that democracy will come to the Middle East, slowly–over 3 generations, bit by bit.  In a way, this is what is happening to China.  Until the fall of the Qing Dynasty in 1912, China was a monarchy.  It went into a period of Civil War (which began the process of new ideas for governance taking hold), the Communists took over (which brought many problems, but also liberated women), and then entered into it’s hyper-capitalist phase (which is creating a Middle-Class that is demanding more democracy and transparency from the government).  It didn’t happen with the first revolution in 1912, but bit by bit, many of the ideals of Democracy are spreading into China.  This is how it may be for countries like Egypt, Tunisia, Libya, U.A.E., and all the rest.  We may be at that Qing Dynasty Collapse moment.

Instead of being negative about Arab Democracy (and Democracy in Islamic countries), let’s look at 9 things that we can already celebrate about the changes in the Middle East in 2011.

1. Not everything is Israel’s Fault.

Up until a year or so ago, the blame for the regions ills, it’s lack of employment opportunities, its disconnection from the world, it’s lack of innovation was based on the Israel-Palestine issue.  Not anymore.  Now, from Tunisia, to Libya, to Egypt, the people are taking a deep look into their own cultures and their own government’s problems.  This is a huge change and it should be celebrated.  It’s not that the Israel-Palestine issue still doesn’t cause problems, but it is no longer defining the entire discussion.  This should be celebrated.

2. Facebook is more fun than Being a Suicide Bomber

It’s looking like the large number of Arab youths (part of the so-called “youth bulge”) has been spending a lot of time on Facebook and on the internet in general, instead of joining terrorist camps.  Yes, playing Angry Birds on your i-phone can be more fun when you are young, then blowing yourself up.  As Arab and Muslim youth listen and now make rap music, connect globally, and play angry birds instead of being angry terrorists, we see that the pull of a free world is much stronger than one that is dictated to you by someone like Osama bin Laden or the Angry Mullah’s of Iran.  Most kids don’t like taking orders from old bearded men in their 60′s and 70′s.  We are being reminded that this is a cross-cultural truth; youth long for freedom and resemble James Dean more than they do Ayman Al-Zawahiri. This should be celebrated.

3. The Old Regime Does Not Always Win

Many of these countries have been under the impression (and rightly so), that the old systems of government cannot be replaced.  The entrenched powers—the Royal Family or the Autocrat like Saddam or Mubarak–can never be dislodged.  This is now obviously untrue, and for once, the government is afraid of the people instead of the other way around. This should be celebrated.

4. Islamic Nations cannot just pass leadership from Father to Son.

There has also been the belief, in this part of the world, that authoritarian rulers can just pass from Father to Son, as Saddam Hussein wanted to do, and Hosni Mubarak, and many others.  But in the age of twitter and facebook, these kind of undemocratic successions don’t work as well.  Who wants to be the son of one of these guys now?  Being Uday Hussein is just not that great, you know?  This should be celebrated.

5. Women Matter.

At the heart of many of these revolutions have been women.  Nada, the martyr in Iran, the articulate Egyptian women being interviewed by global media in Tahrir Square, and women demanding more rights in the Gulf States.  The President of Islamic Indonesia is a woman.  The empowerment of women is a revolution in itself and one that will pay great dividends in the future. This should be celebrated.

6. The Celebrated Martyrs are No Longer Terrorists.

Mohamed Bouazizi, Hamza al-Khatib, Neda.  Are these names familiar to you?  Probably not, but they are becoming household names in the Middle East.  They are celebrated martyrs, but not because they blow people up for Islam.  But because they were killed by their governments for simply protesting or committed suicide to make a point about internal problems.  These are not killers of infidels in the name of Islam, they are people asking for internal political reform.  This is a new thing. This should be celebrated.

7. Birth Rates are Slowing Down Fast

One of the biggest problems in the Middle East (that has lead to the rise of Fundamentalism but also to the chronic unemployment problems which are causing counter-reactions) is the population explosion in Arab countries.  While this region of the world still has a large amount of angry, disillusioned, unemployed youth; population rates are decreasing at a very fast rate.  From Europe to Pakistan, Islamic women are having less children, and the generation that is growing up on Facebook and Twitter will probably aim to have one or two kids at the most.  Lower birth rates for this region of the world will eventually lead to greater stability.  This should be celebrated.

8. The Dubai Factor

Despite issues of corruption, bad investments, oil money, and a myriad of other problems, the standards of living in the Middle East are getting better–at least in the capital cities.  It may be from oil (the Gulf States), Chinese investment (Syria) or the creation of business parks (Egypt), but there is a middle class growing.  And that Middle Class is becoming more visible and is finding ways to plug into the global economy.  I call this The Dubai Factor.  Dubai is not a democracy, or free of corruption, or free from dependence on oil revenues.  Not by a long-shot.  Neither is it a place constructed by Dubai people (third world laborers do the grunt work).  But Dubai, is trying to move away from being a one-trick pony.  It has become a hub for air traffic, it has invested in tourism infrastructure, and slowly but surely, it is becoming more than just rich sheiks with oil money.  But best of all, it is a gleaming example of modernity in the Middle East.  It is not the image of a chaotic Iran or a dirt poor Gaza, but it conveys to the whole Middle East, what a progressive, modern metropolis can look like in the heart of Arab country.  Dubai may be surpassed by Qatar or Abu Dhabi, or a Saudi city–but it has projected an image that is an important counter-image to what we have seen previously.

9. Al-Jazeera

I’ve long been a fan of Al-Jazeera.  Why?  Aside from providing the best, most global news (just try getting good pieces on Latin America from CNN, BBC, or FOX), Al Jazeera is showing images of the Islamic, modernizing, middle class and beaming them into every part of the Islamic world.  It is also exposing corruption, and it’s reporting during the Egypt crisis was amazing.  Al-Jazeera is Al-Qaeda’s worst nightmare.  (And as a sidenote:  They produce some absolutely fantastic documentaries).  This should be celebrated.

So the road to democracy may be long for places like Egypt, Iraq, or U.A.E.  And it may never look like our democracies, although ours probably won’t look like our 20th century versions anymore either.  But it is possible that as with the Collapse of the Qing Dynasty, we are witnessing some seismic changes in the Islamic/Arab landscape that will lead toward a better future for all of us.  There’s no reason for complete pessimism.

In the past few years, I’ve wandered around country after country that I never thought would be open to foreigners in my lifetime.  And now I live in a city (Berlin) where a wall once stood and we thought it would be there our whole lives.  But it’s gone.

As Marco would say:  ”That’s epic!”

We are so happy to have Gina Shaner with our Germany 3W crew this summer.  Gina is finishing up her Master’s Degree at Asbury Theological Seminary in Wilmore, Kentucky and is doing her internship with us.

Our goal with this internship is to not only expose Gina to hands-on ministry (which is what internships typically do), but to expose her to the Three Worlds of Christianity in different settings and countries.

In addition to all of that, she will also be learning about the behind-the-scenes organizational, management, and member care issues that we deal with as Regional Coordinators (the care for the missionaries spiritual and emotional health).

The combination of practical experience, broad exposure to a variety of fields, and exposure to the administrative/organizational side of missionary work is very unique.  We think the 3W Internship is a very comprehensive program which will return Gina to Asbury with a wealth of practical knowledge.

*Gina has already spend time doing ministry on the streets of Berlin in a challenging environment and neighborhood.

*She also helped the XZ Berlin team run the German teen camp.

*Now, she is moving into our home and joining us as we visit our new church in Arco, Italy.  She will join us as we make strategic decisions for the future.  This is a very post-Christendom setting.  Then she will join Aaron and Nicole and I in Spain as we meet with believers from the Bolivian Church of God who are migrant workers.  They come from a non-Western culture and perspective and are now integrating into a post-modern European society.

So her internship is taking her from the streets of Berlin, to the German Countryside, to the Italian Alps, and the South of Spain.  In each place, a very different context.

We’re thrilled to have her with us for a few more weeks and we are proud of what she has already accomplished this summer.  You will be hearing and seeing more of Gina soon.

We arrived back in Berlin, Germany on Friday. It’s great to be back!  I’m looking forward to seeing members of our 3W team tomorrow.  There will be lots of hugs, laughs, and cuddles all around.  They just got back from running the German youth camp and it was great, I hear.  They raised nearly 600 Euros for Bulgarian youth to have their own camp!

Three Worlds connects the region baby!

I spoke in Columbus this past Wednesday at Meadow Park Church of God.  Thank you so much to those of you that attended.  It was a very encouraging time for me personally and I am thrilled at the reception that 3W has received in Phoenix, California, and Ohio this summer.  It was a great trip back to the USA.  And I didn’t gain weight!!!!  Applaud me!!! Love me!!!!

Time for more of my lousy photos.  Since we were on vacation, I really felt unmotivated to even take photos so….I didn’t bother really getting any scenic stuff.  The time down there was great.  It was great to re-connect with old friends, take naps occasionally and observe the country continue to change.

Costa Rica has changed so much in many ways.  In others it is exactly the same.  It is still beautiful, the weather is the same (mostly), San Jose’s downtown hardly changes at all compared to other globalized, plugged in countries.  The government remains peaceful and completely ineffective–in a permanent state of gridlock. We now have our first female President, however.  Most of the roads are terrible, but not as bad as when we had to cross more than 50 rivers to get to the beach.

Some of the big changes though have to do with new wealth, religion, and development.

Like so many countries that start to ride the globalization wave, living standards are higher than ever in Costa Rica.  The middle class truly looks like a global middle class now.  Some of my “cousins” who were running around in diapers back in 1990 and from poor or modest homes, now have great jobs, very nice cars, and all the techno gadgetry you can imagine.  Even in the 90′s, when I would go back, I stood out for my clothes and First World appearance.  Today, there is no such obvious disparity.

There were a lot of young people with money.  Today, 99% of all chips made by Intel are made in Costa Rica.

At the same time, there is a pretty startling increase in obesity.  I wrote about this in the diary on one of my previous Costa Rica trips.  It used to be only Americans had obesity issues and they were made fun of for that, but now it is common down there and in much of the underdeveloped and developing world.

The suburbs have become a lot more posh.  Some of the new malls in Escazu are shockingly beautiful as are the homes.

But the biggest change is the rate at which Costa Rica is secularizing.  Catholics are becoming more nominal, the Evangelical church is peaking (or peaked) and there is a great increase in non-religious people.  The youth increasingly see religion as irrelevant.  Thus we see the birth of the Post-Modern in Costa Rica.  From two worlds: 1) Traditional and 2) Non-Western to three with Post-Christendom establishing a strong imprint on the nation.

This happens as the influx of wealth and living standards increases.  As I experienced on the Mosaic journey, even in the under-developed and developing nations, large pockets of post-moderns are emerging–particularly amongst the new, young, globally plugged in youth.  The church’s response will have to be more out-0f-the-box than before.  Not relying on old approaches, and trying to attract youth into an institution.  It will require big change.

Marco loves going to Costa Rica and playing in my father's backyard.

The View of San Jose from Ram Luna

There are more species of animals in Costa Rica than in any other country in the world.

Marco likes to go to the children's museum in San Jose and simulate the picking, cleaning and packing of bananas.

Marco's best friend in Costa Rica--Cajeta the dog.

More trumpet lessons from Grandpa

The beach at Tamarindo

You think this is beautiful, you should see me in my swimsuit!

Dad playing the trumpet at the Centro Cristiano on Sunday. He's playing a song by Lady Ga-Ga.

Flying over one of Costa Rica's many volcanoes on our way back to the USA for 3 days.

Democracy can be dangerous (allowing radical parties, such as Islamic ones to take office), but the process of being political often tempers what is religiously possible because once you win, you have to…uhm…actually do something other than say “Islam is great.”  Reza Alsan of the Washington Post looks at recent reports of the weakness of radical Islamic groups in Egypt.  The soil is not as fertile as is sometimes being made out.  Aslan’s comments on this are worth quoting at length:

It is true that Islamists comprised the largest and most vocal of the more than 25 different Egyptian organizations, most of them labor and youth groups, who organized last week’s mass show of unity against the country’s military rulers. But that is a reflection of their superior organizational skills and their ability to mobilize their members, and not of their political clout or their national support.

Polls show the Muslim Brotherhood doing poorly in parliamentary elections, with only 15 percent support. They are not even bothering to field a presidential candidate. There are more than 40 million voters in Egypt. Rallying tens of thousands of people to Tahrir Square is impressive, no doubt. But it is far from an indication of electoral prowess.

Yet what if this were an “Islamist rally,” as the press reported? What could be more crucial for a country trying to define its democratic future than allowing religious organizations who have spent the last 50 years huddled in mosques and hiding in back alleys to air their views to the voting public? Egypt desperately needs an open debate about the role of religion in society, the reconciliation of Islamic and democratic values. Six months ago, such talk would have landed these protesters in one of Mubarak’s sadistic prisons. Today they are part of the vibrant political debate that is taking place all over the country.

By competing openly with other political factions for votes, the Islamists are playing precisely the role one would hope for them in a free and democratic society. Because like it or not, Islam is going to be a force in post-Mubarak Egypt, where Muslims make up 96 percent of the population.  Just as Christianity, the faith of some 70 percent of the U.S. population, influences American norms, values and laws (think gay marriage, abortion, etc.), so will Islam influence the norms, values and laws of Egypt. As long as the rights and freedoms of minorities are preserved and protected, and the rule of law made sacrosanct, Egypt will likely move along the same secularizing trajectory as all democratic societies, including America, that have created space for religious conservatives to compete with secular liberals in the marketplace of ideas.

Indeed, that process is already underway in Egypt. Suddenly forced to provide practical solutions to the social and economic problems facing Egyptians, the Islamist organizations have fractured. Younger, more liberal members are increasingly challenging the older and more conservative leaders. As a young member of a Salafist party put it , “We actually have more trouble connecting [with] people inside the movement than we do connecting with liberals.”

This generation of young Islamists has no interest in simply shouting, “Islam is the answer,” and then retreating back into the mosque. They know that if they are going to take part in the political process – an opportunity they have never been given – they must come up with real solutions to peoples needs. Otherwise, they’ll be tossed out of office.

[Patrick's note: Or you can become Iran and nobody will care about Islam ever again after 30 years of lousy "Islamic" rule].

That’s how democracy works. And despite its many obstacles, despite the cacophony of voices vying to decide the country’s future, and the fact that six months ago it was an oppressive dictatorship, last Friday’s rally in Tahrir Square is proof that democracy is working out just fine in Egypt.

Will Europe be taken over by Muslims?  Is Europe in danger of Islamic terrorism.  The attacks in Norway this week (which most assumed would be attributed to Al-Qaeda) turned out to be an attack by an ultra nationalist-Christianist. On this week’s episode of GPS, Fareed Zakaria pointed out that in Europe over the past two years, only .3 (yes, that’s .3), and 1% of terrorist attacks were done by Muslims.  The rest have been done by separatist groups and nationalists, having nothing to do with Islam.

As I’ve written before, the trouble with Osama Bin Laden’s vision for an Islamic theocratic government ruling Europe and the World is that it is difficult to get people to submit to anything–especially religion–and more so when it is done by force.  Christians teach in original sin and rebellion (separation) from God.  Therefore it should be no surpise that even in the Islamic world, attempts to force Islam down everyone’s throats is not working.

Drug usage ( a way to escape confining societies) drugs, and atheism, are at all-time highs in the Middle East.  And birth rates by Muslims in the Middle East and Europe are declining now).  And then, as I’ve mentioned before.  There’s porn which has become endemic throughout Islamic lands.  Even Osama had his little porn stash.

Western media makes it sound like it is so easy to indoctrinate people into becoming Islamic terrorists.  When in fact, people abhor having religion (any religion including Christianity) shoved down their throat.  Increasingly there is secularization and atheism throughout the Islamic world.

And Western Europe which has secularized Christianity can easily do the same to Islam and very well might.

And Muslim-born activist explains why she is now an atheist:

“I suppose people can go through an entire lifetime without questioning God and a religion that they were born into (out of no choice of their own), especially if it doesn’t have much of a say in their lives. If you live in France or Britain, there may never be a need to renounce God actively or come out as an atheist. But when the state sends a “Hezbollah” (the generic term for Islamist) to your school to ensure that you don’t mix with your friends who are boys, stops you from swimming, forces you to be veiled, deems males and females separate and unequal, prescribes different books for you and your girlfriends from those read by boys, denies certain fields of study to you because you are female, and starts killing in­discriminately, then you have no choice but to question, discredit and confront it – all of it. And that is what I did.”

Once this Norway attack blows over, there will be more straight-line projections about the future of the Middle East and Islam.  But let’s not forget that thus far, in this very volatile era where Fundamentalist Islam is very much hostile and under threat, the number of attacks was .3%

Something to think about on occasion.

Anti-globalization movements (of which Al-Qaeda is just an Islamic version) may be the bigger threat, particularly as the divide between rich and poor increases dramatically in the coming days (although–as pointed out a few weeks ago on this diary–the poor will be wealthier than the poor of any previous era).

I am giving a talk on Wednesday. See details here:  The talk is from 11AM to 3:30PM with a lunch break. The presentation will revolve around findings “Mosaic” as they pertain to the Church of God internationally.  It will also discuss the creation of Three Worlds as a response to the international challenges.

Greetings from San Jose, Costa Rica.  We are down here visiting my father.  It’s been great to be down here.  We try to come back every 2 years so that Marco can see his Grandpa–and we usually stay 7 days.

This time we are here for 14 days which is nice.  We took my Dad and his wife Julia to the beach this past weekend.  We usually go to the same beach every year, but this time we tried a new place.  I think we all agree that the old place is better, but it was nice to have a change of scenery–literally.  We headed out to Tamarindo far out on the Northwest “arm” that extends out into the Pacific Ocean.  It was not far from here that I used to go to the beach with my parents as a kid Marco’s age.  We often went to Playa Hermosa and we had to cross 52 rivers to get there.  Oh, no bridges either.

Many of these rivers were very deep and had strong currents.  I remember a few rivers nearly covered our entire car.  The water would be at about the window level and we’d be pulling a Mazda van behind our Land Rover.  It was truly wild.  But it also seemed normal.

Now, there are nice paved roads that go to these beaches and the drive is anywhere between 90 minutes and 6 hours.  Costa Rica has always done a poor job when it comes to infrastructure, so compared to Thailand (another tourist, tropical paradise) it has very bad, slow roads.  But the roads that are here now are far better than what we had in my childhood.

Jamie always enjoys her time down here, and Marco really loves it as well. SInce he is 1/2 “Tico,” (Costa Rican)  I’m always thrilled that he feels so comfortable down here and feels like it is one of his homes.

Not many great photos to choose from.  I’ll post some soon.  My Dad says “hi’ to all those that ask about him.  Of course my Dad was famous for being in the Anderson Trumpet Trio—The Beatles of the Church of God.  People still always stop me wherever I go and ask me how my Dad is and if he still plays the trumpet.  Yes, he lives down here in Costa Rica and still plays his trumpet–and gives Marco free lessons.

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