So I stepped off the ship on Saturday afternoon, off to explore the new horizon.

Let me tell you something.

It is better than I could have imagined, and classes haven't even started yet.

Here's why:

1. I really, really enjoy chapel. I have so missed it this summer. Thanks to Scott Feather for the inspiration.

2. I have the best breakout group ever. (Hightower, your cookies rock the world!) We will be taking over campus by the end of the semester.

3. My room is in Beta 2 South, undoubtedly the most incredible hall of guys on campus.

4. I now have coffee filters. Thanks.

5. I really get along well with my adviser. Dr. Burkholder, we're going to have four great years!

6. Did I mention Hightower's amazing cookies?

So here I am, by the grace of God, taking Grace College by storm. I hope you are enjoying your early fall as much as I am.

In keeping with my current pattern, it's time for my monthly entry. In keeping with my current habits, it's time for me to make a list, something I've been doing a lot on paper and mentally thanks to graduation.

At Least 5 Stray Thoughts  from the End of All Things aka April/May

1. I think that the conflict between the Urgals and Elves can be chalked up to one key difference between them: the Urgals are complementarian and the Elves are egalitarian.

2. Is a graduation ceremony really necessary at all? Or since we're definitely having one, can we follow it with some sort of Celtic celebration, preferably with fiddles and dancing?

3. I belong to Jesus. Not to America. Not Reagan's America. Not Bush's America. Not Obama's America. Not even Washington's, or Jefferson's, or Lincoln's. In fact, I might be ready to be done with America altogether. This kingdom is tiring me out.

4. Having said that, I implore the U.S. government to stop torturing suspected terrorists. How can violating one's civil liberties in the name of a nation that prides itself on personal freedom possibly make sense? Please. Either stop trying to defend illogic and just admit you don't care about justice at all or resume governing by just laws.

5. Living in Indiana is tiring. Lately the weather has been quite bipolar, and consequently, so have I.

6. Speaking of Indiana, I am tired of hearing about Obama's commencement speech/ honorary J.D. from Notre Dame. I'm more concerned with being in the world with the revolutionary love of Jesus, thank you. No matter who the President is, the message of reconciliation is more important than any politics to me. Also, where were you the past eight years while our government was torturing? (Refer to #4).

7. I may or may not be a dispensationalist, but I am definitely passionate about growing in the knowledge (in the sense of the Spanish verb conocer - to know personally and by experience) of Jesus. My dad hasn't given up yet.

8. I love SpringHill. I love Oakridge. Not working at camp this summer is a weird feeling. Pray that I will find the labor of love that Jesus laid out for me to do right here. I miss all you guys!

9. It is wonderful to have my beautiful sister home for a while. I enjoy our little mutual interruption thing that we've got going on.

10. I am not a potato.

Of making many books there is no end...  

and much study wearies the body. Praise God for summer.

This time next year I will be looking back on my first year at Grace College. Though I don't know what lies ahead, I praise God for placing me in this free-verse poem called life and for gifting me with a purpose.

Thank you for enduring my ramblings and for being fellow-travelers on the road less taken.

'09!  

Unless you are a truly exceptional American/Westerner, you have never truly been hungry. Hungry, that is, to the point of imminent starvation and death. In fact, like me, you have probably never gone more than say, 8-12 hours without food (not counting the time you spend sleeping). And, like me, most of you enjoy beef in some form at least once a week. Meat is as much a part of your routine as any other food.

Unless you are searching for the information I am about to share, it will likely come as a shock to you that the way you eat is literally starving millions:

People go hungry because much of arable land is used to grow feed grain for animals rather than people. In the US, 157 million tons of cereals, legumes and vegetable protein – all suitable for human consumption – is fed to livestock to produce just 28 million tons of animal protein in the form of meat.

In developing countries, using land to create an artificial food chain has resulted in misery for hundreds of millions of people. An acre of cereal produces five times more protein than an acre used for meat production; legumes such as beans, peas and lentils can produce 10 times more protein and, in the case of soya, 30 times more.

Global corporations which supply the seeds, chemicals and cattle and which control the slaughterhouses, marketing and distribution of beef, eagerly promote grain-fed livestock. They equate it with a country’s prestige and climbing the “protein ladder” becomes the mark of success.

Enlarging their meat supply is the first step for all developing countries. They start with chicken and egg production and, as their economies grow, climb the protein ladder to pork, milk, and dairy products, then to grass-fed beef and finally to grain-fed beef. Encouraging this process advances the interests of agribusinesses and two-thirds of the grain exported from the USA goes to feed livestock. The process really got underway when “green revolution” technology produced grain surpluses in the 1970s. The UN’s Food and Agricultural Organisation encouraged it and the USA government linked its food aid programme to the producing of feed grain and gave low-interest loans to establish grain-fed poultry operations. Many nations have attempted to remain high on the protein ladder long after the grain surpluses disappeared.

Human consequences of the shift from food to feed were dramatically illustrated during the Ethiopian famine in 1984. While people starved, Ethiopia was growing linseed cake, cottonseed cake and rapeseed meal for European livestock. Millions of acres of land in the developing world are used for this purpose. Tragically, 80 per cent of the world’s hungry children live in countries with food surpluses which are fed to animals for consumption by the affluent.

...

Drought and other 'natural' disasters are often wrongly blamed for causing famines. Local people have always planned for freak acts of nature and although they may be the trigger that starts a famine, the underlying cause is the system of modern day neo-colonialism.

The land in poor countries is still largely not owned by the people who work on it and rents are high. Huge areas are owned by large companies based in the West. It is common for people to be thrown off the land, often going to the towns where there is little other work. About 160,000 people move from rural areas to cities every day (5). Many migrants are forced to settle in shanty towns and squatter settlements.

Much of this land is used to grow “cash crops” for export - like coffee, tobacco and animal feed  - rather than to grow food for indigenous people. Countries agree to grow cash crops in order to pay off their crippling debts. Fifty-two of the world’s poorest countries owe the rich world in the region of £213 billion. Annual repayments total £14 billion - the majority of this from countries where most people are living on less than one dollar a day (see p7: Why are countries in debt?). (6)

The sad irony is that the world produces more than enough plant food to meet the needs of all its six billion people. If people used land to grow crops to feed themselves, rather than feeding crops to animals, then there would be enough to provide everyone with the average of 2360 Kcal (calories) needed for good health (7).

If everyone were to take 25 per cent of their calories from animal protein then the planet could sustain only three billion people (8). In simple, brutal terms, if we were all to imitate the average North American diet, we would only be able to feed half the world’s population.

From Jeremy Rifkin and Feed the World: Why eating meat is a major cause of world hunger - and going vegetarian is a solution.  [http://www.viva.org.uk/guides/feedtheworld.htm]

And that's just the first page of the article... it gets worse.

For my entire life I have viewed vegetarianism as an ideological outlook that raises the value of animal life at the expense of human life. I have seen Christian vegetarianism as an issue of pride in one's works, an unnecessary legalism. 

However, by reading this article and others like it, I am beginning to be convicted that, as a follower of Christ, I forgoing meat might be an act of mercy rather than arrogance. I can't live with the fact that another person should have to starve when I could survive without meat.

This is not to say that I am going "veg" immediately, but it's a possibility for the future. And it's not to say that I believe eating meat is wrong for all Christians, at all times.

I've just been exposed to the suffering of others, and am wondering what it means for me.

That is all.