Launching

15 January 2010.

It's now or never -- if the journey of a thousand miles begins with the first step, a blog kicks off with the first post ... however clear or absurd, insightful or lame.

Now two weeks into the new year, and quite a ride so far: It began with winding up a road trip to the South (S. Carolina, Georgia), then a visit from my good friend Elena from Voronezh (Russia), and now Dad's bypass surgery -- along the way, a transatlantic Skype conference meeting, a plan to engage a consulting firm for the church, and more.

I have just learned that a friend (and former parishioner) is in Haiti to do relief work. Very good news. The outpouring of press on this disaster leaves me with a contradictory welter of personal reactions. On the one hand, I am glad there's an effort to get real help to the Haitian people -- and fast. On the other hand, their country has been a basket case so long -- there seems almost an element of hypocrisy that it takes this horrific disaster to get them on the radar of caring. We respond if they die in large numbers. The news coverage I heard this evening (on ABC) seemed almost to be inviting a desire for revolution ... sickening. We saw lawlessness born of desperation and inadequate policing in New Orleans after Katrina -- why should we not expect to see it in the poorest nation of the hemisphere with a weak government and a background condition of desperation? I hope that the relief materials will not only get there, but do some long-term as well as short-term good, and not wreck the local economy in the process. Meanwhile, prayers for the nation which is grieving their loved ones, and the destruction of many of the tokens of national pride they possessed.