Responsibility

in a Flattening Urban World

I was at a dinner gathering/discussion last night talking about hope, peace and sharing what the gathered folks experience as good news in their lives. It was exciting, encouraging and envigorating...sharing ideas, feeling a connectedness that breathes and nurtures community. I found myself relfecting on some words we meditated upon together last night, and some others that I have written on the first page of my journal.

"For our sake he made him to be sin
who knew no sin, so that in him
we might become the righteousness of God."
- 2 Corinthians 2:21

"You are not obliged to complete the task,
niether are you free to refrain from it."
-Prike Avot 2:21

"Imagination is more important than knowledge."
-Albert Einstein

"Love is just like breathing when it's true."
-The Indigo Girls

This morning as I try to center for the day, reading the paper, with coffee and some reflection... I'm struck by the ideas of these quotes...responsibility, inter-dependence, creativity, a new way of being with oneself and with each other. What does it mean that we aren't obliged to do anything...and yet neither are we free to do nothing. I think I get it...but do I really? What does Paul mean when we says that "we might become the righteousness of God?" What does that mean in terms of responsibility, obligation, freedom, and the way we live, breathe, and move in the world?

In the papers and my internet reading I'm struck by stories of interdependence, how we're Bound Together and making connections in our globalized and ever-flattening world. I'm saddened by the tragic news of a Maxwell Park neighbor shot last night by another too impatient driver because the former took to long to parallel park, the story of the Morrissey family murder/suicide/familicide, and the reality that Baghdad is as unstable as ever, and the tragic death of Michael James Keenan who died from burn suffered in a act of selfless good-samaritan-ism.

In our urban, ever-flattening world we can't live in isolation, withdrawing from the pain, horrors, tragedies, and blight around us....yet on a certain level that's what we long for. How do you respond when your neighbor is robbed by older children looking for a Play Station, or another is shot for driving too slow, or another dies trying to save your dog? How do we understand the concept of neibhorliness in a globalized world...where we might have more in common with folks in Shanghai, Jakarta, Lima, Bangalore, or Frankfurt than with those living next doors to us?

Everywhere I went yesterday I saw the tired face of Bruce Willis staring out at me from the back of AC Transit buses declaring the movie title and motto "Live Free or Die Hard" Catchy title...but what does it mean for those of us seeking to live, not just survive, in freedom - fully human lives in the midst of the oftentimes chaotic cacophony of urban life? If Paul is correct in saying that in and through Christ we are becoming the righteousness of God...what does that say about us - our responsibilities, relationships, and actions? What does it say about God's nature, purpose and passion?