The dust of both the election and inauguration of President Obama has now settled and he has inherited a economic situation that few would wish upon their worst enemy. While the economic situation is important, most Christians are more concerned, and correctly I add, with matters of moral significance.
Now we stand at the crossroads of opportunity and challenge. With Obama’s promise to help and aid the poor, Christians may finally take part in economic reorganization that does not continually ground the faces of the poor among us into the dust. However, with his positions on abortion, stem-cell research, and homosexuality, Christians also face a challenge on the sanctity of human life and the sanctity of marriage. This is the unique situation we now find ourselves in and many of our old categories will simply not help us now.
You see, as Christians who care about and work for God’s restorative justice, we can neither fully embrace all of Obama’s plan nor disregard his efforts entirely. We will have to agree where we can, and resist his plans were they violate the clear teachings of the faith. The old approaches of “liberal” and “conservative” will not help us at this time. The last thing we need is four or eight years of us vs. them mentality chocking up the efforts of socially active Christians.
What we need now are Christian categories like justice, peace, love, charity, and life. These are the categories that we need to guide our thinking about how to work with the Obama administration. Thus, we can celebrate that our nation will no longer attempt to baptize torture and that the poor will no longer be ignored, but we must never forget the slaughter of the unborn or the biblical boundaries of human sexuality.
In the coming years we work to reduce the number of abortions, while still not giving up on stopping it all together. We can work on and evaluate our positions on homosexuality and make sure we speak the truth in love, but we can also work together with others to better this world. But we need one more bit of caution. As Christians, we must disagree with one thing Obama has said. America is not the last best hope for the world, that is a false eschatology, Jesus was and is the only hope for the world, and it is the church’s job to make this hope known in both our opportunities and challenges.
Our Vision
To ignite students and equip leaders to join in God's passion for the broken and the oppressed.
Our Mission
IJM Southeastern exists to glorify Jesus Christ by bringing light to the injustices in the world around us and by calling students to action.
International Justice Mission is a human rights agency that secures justice for victims of slavery, sexual exploitation and other forms of violent oppression. IJM lawyers, investigators and aftercare professionals work with local governments to ensure victim rescue, to prosecute perpetrators and to strengthen the community and civic factors that promote functioning public justice systems. IJM's justice professionals work in their communities in 12 countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America to secure tangible and sustainable protection of national laws through local court systems.
An IJM Campus Chapter is a group of students concerned about issues of injustice who desire to work together as advocates for the oppressed in a world of suffering. They partner with IJM in 3 ways:
1. Raising their voices on behalf of victims of injustice through prayer and advocacy.
2. Raising awareness on their campus and in their community of the reality of oppression in our world.
3. Raising support to enable IJM to rescue more victims of oppression.
International Justice Mission is a human rights agency that secures justice for victims of slavery, sexual exploitation and other forms of violent oppression. IJM lawyers, investigators and aftercare professionals work with local governments to ensure victim rescue, to prosecute perpetrators and to strengthen the community and civic factors that promote functioning public justice systems. IJM's justice professionals work in their communities in 12 countries in Asia, Africa and Latin America to secure tangible and sustainable protection of national laws through local court systems.
An IJM Campus Chapter is a group of students concerned about issues of injustice who desire to work together as advocates for the oppressed in a world of suffering. They partner with IJM in 3 ways:
1. Raising their voices on behalf of victims of injustice through prayer and advocacy.
2. Raising awareness on their campus and in their community of the reality of oppression in our world.
3. Raising support to enable IJM to rescue more victims of oppression.
Our Response
International Justice Mission’s first priority in its anti-trafficking casework is to secure the protection of the law for trafficked women and children forced into commercial sexual activity. IJM investigators spend hundreds of hours gathering and documenting undercover evidence of trafficking and sexual exploitation. Using this evidence, IJM staff members then work with local authorities to remove victims from forced prostitution and ensure that they have access to aftercare services to meet their vital needs. IJM lawyers work to secure the conviction and sentencing of traffickers and other perpetrators in an effort to deter future crimes. Sex trafficking will endure as long as it remains a profitable criminal enterprise. By freeing victims and prosecuting their perpetrators, IJM operations increase the risk and decrease the profitability of trafficking. IJM works to combat sex trafficking in India, Cambodia, Thailand and the Philippines. In the 10 years since the organization’s founding, IJM investigations have resulted in freedom for hundreds of girls and women held by force in the commercial sex trade.
Thursday, January 29, 2009
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