Articles & Essays

Not long ago my family and I stumbled into the Sunday morning worship service of a moderate mainline congregation. We soon found ourselves perched in front of a jazz-handed youth choir singing “God Brings Down the House” as the grand finale of a musical about the story of Samson. Listening to the choreographed Samson ditties, my husband leaned over and whispered, “Is this really how we want to package the acts of an ancient equivalent of a suicide bomber?”

What does ecumenism look like in our coffee shops, in our intentional communities, and on our city streets? With latté in hand, a new generation of ecumenists carries on.

What would compel someone to devise and implement a coordinated attack on innocent people, such as that which we witnessed in Boston? How can we feel safe when random acts of terror strike within our shores? What can prevent a seemingly endless string of tragedies from desensitizing us to evil?