GROWING EDGES

At the start of a new year it is good to reflect on the social responsibility that a vital Christian faith engenders. Following Christ is necessarily tied to a concern for the poor and defenseless. Love of God and love of neighbor are two sides to the same door—we must do both to get through the door. And like the Samaritan we soon discover that our path often leads us to the broken and bleeding of humanity.

Anger and Abuse
This issue of the Perspective focuses on the Social Justice tradition, or the Compassionate Life. The issues in this aspect of life are always multi-layered and never easy, so we need the best thinking we can get to help us find our way. Donn Thomas, one of our RENOVARÉ team members, shares with us very personally about the problems of anger and abuse among African-American males. Donn, who is African-American himself, grew up in inner-city Cleveland. It is important for us all to enter the unique context of African-American males in this country and feel their pain with them. And as we do so, we will garner many insights for contexts that are other than African-American and male.

Chicago Declaration II
Twenty years ago a group of Evangelical leaders gathered in Chicago to draft a statement on social justice that came to be known as "Chicago Declaration". Over the past two decades this has been a vigorous and influential document in heightening the social awareness of many Christian groups. On the twentieth anniversary of that declaration a call went out for Evangelical leaders to gather, to take stock of where we have come, and to issue a second statement—"Chicago Declaration II: A Call for Evangelical Renewal." Donn Thomas and I were asked to be delegates to this important effort whose number included such well-known Christian leaders as Ron Sider, Roberta Hestenes, John Perkins, Gretchen Gaebelein Hull, Tony Campolo, and Samuel Escobar. Others gathered for a variety of workshops on social issues while the delegates—about eighty in number—struggled for two days to draft the declaration.

The process we went through to draft CDII was almost as important as the declaration itself. With complex issues and deeply-felt concerns it would have been easy for the whole process to have broken down and each leader to go his/her own way. However we stayed with each other and finally, after an all night drafting session, we joyfully and tearfully echoed the early Christian affirmation, "it seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us" (Acts 15:28).

The document that came from those days of intensive, prayer-filled effort—Chicago Declaration II—is, I believe, of immense significance, and we are printing the entire text in this Perspective. I would encourage you to use it for ongoing study and reflection in your spiritual formation group and other settings.

Peace and joy,

Richard J. Foster