Don’t tell Glenn Beck — but in the great area of Alberta, Canada, a new breed of superheroes are in town — the Social Justice Superheroes.

My dear friend Sister Simplify (aka Paula Spurr) got a nice write up for her league of superheroes in Geeze Magazine.

We are a team of social justice superheroes who masquerade as teenagers and boring adults most of the time.Our mandate is to fearlessly do good deeds, to educate our peers about social justice issues, and to encourage each other in our efforts to change the world. We meet bi-weekly at League Headquarters (my house), sharing a simple meal, praying for each other, and discussing our next plan of action.

Over our brief history, we have fasted on World Hunger Day, volunteered at the local food bank, gathered excess clothing and blankets to share with the homeless, washed windows for elderly neighbours, bought nothing on Buy Nothing Day, and helped to sort shoeboxes for Operation Christmas Child.

Our members include The Mercy Monkey, Anti-Materialistic Man, and Love Machine. We all have amazing superhero costumes that we made ourselves out of things we already owned. We are hoping to expand our ranks, and are always looking for new ways to serve and educate the public around us.

Their mission :: To fight injustice, to right that which is wrong and to serve all mankind…

So AWESOME! Keep it up Social Justice Superheroes!

Wanna know more about Paula? Follow her on Twitter: @cowpunkmom or as her alter ego: @sistersimplify.

We’ve also shared her story on the podcast and interviewed her on We Live Simply.

Keep up the great work Paula — you continue to be an inspiration!

other posts you may enjoy ::

• #justicefriday – Who said it?
• Church 2.0 forum
• Something every non-Christian should know
• Huckabee on Glenn Beck

I’ve been meaning to do this for a while but haven’t taken the time to do it until now. I want to be sure and let you know about several great projects my friends have recently been a part of.

Least of These

Kevin’s recently published his NaNoWriMo work from 2008 (same month I wrote my novel), Least of These. I read it in a few hours one evening and thought it was great read. Lots of great ideas built around a captivating story.

Kara, Brick and James form a trio of survivors, the last of a now-dead community. They wander a post-apocalyptic world where humanity’s savagery has already ruined civilization and now threatens survival as well. James is always looking to the east and the hope of the promised land, Brick is quiet but strong and Kara yearns for simple hope. This young, world-weary trio encounters a man full of hope and promise—he’s either a wise guru to lead them forward or a foolish old man.

As mentioned on Facebook recently, I love how Kevin spent a lot of time referring back to Isaiah 2:4 and giving a vivid illustration of how this “prophecy” can really play out.

They will beat their swords into plowshares
and their spears into pruning hooks.
Nation will not take up sword against nation,
nor will they train for war anymore.

I’ll be chatting with Kevin a little later on about the book — but don’t wait till then to get your own copy. You can download a free PDF from Kevin’s site or order your copy from Amazon.

Headphonaught’s photography

Thomas, my brother from another country and one of my co-hosts on the podcast, has really been stepping up his photography more and more recently.

His photography has been featured in a local journal as well as on the cover of Cousin Silas’ latest indie album, The Snow Imposed Silence.

Plus one of his photos was chosen for the February wallpaper on We Live Simply .

Be sure and check out Cousin Silas’ album (it’s good indie music as well) along with more of Thomas’ photography on Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/headphonaught.

green church

My good friend Lindsay Cofield has written a new e-book, green church, telling the story of green/organic churches. It’s a brief book (roughly 25 pages in length) that shares some of the practical “how-to’s” of starting a green church, as well as some stories from those who are actively building communities of faith this way.

Christ-followers of ONE who acts in love & power!!!
+ The most life-changing ministry we can humanly provide a group of overlooked friends is a simple Body of Christ, a Church, planted among them, to be His Hands, His Heart, His Voice, His Compassion in their circle of relationships +

I’d love to tell you to buy 5 copies of the book and keep one and give 4 away, but Lindsay won’t let you. He’s giving the book away — for FREE. You can read the entire thing on his website, download the FREE PDF, or if you really want to pay something for it, you can purchase a copy for your Amazon Kindle.

(as a disclaimer, I built the website for Lindsay and helped format the Kindle version)

I’m sure I’m missing some other great projects my friends have been a part of but wanted to be sure and give props to these great projects.

Support what really matters to you.

As Everett Bogue writes:

I’d like to argue that there are artists all around us creating many fine things. An artist is someone who is creating something that they are passionate about.

You vote with every dollar you spend. Do you vote mega-corporation or independant artist?…

I realize this makes the decision to purchase anything infinitely harder, but that’s the decision we need to make if we’re going to support what really matters.

Artists give something that matters. That art might be a muffin that the lady at the coffee shop woke up early that morning to bake. That art might be the blog post that you read this morning that you know the writer put some thought into—so that he was creating art that made a difference.

I hope each of these artists continue on and keep up the great work and create wonderful, passionate art.

other posts you may enjoy ::

• Posterous as a Twitter Client
• What is emergent? A generous orthodoxy
• #justicefriday :: clean water wells
• Give the gift of clean, fresh water for 30 people

Researchers are not able to differentiate the behaviours and values of self-identified Christians from non-Christians with on exception — what they buy. As total sales of religious products reaches $7 billion annually, it appears that God’s people are constructing and expressing their identity through the consumption of Christ-branded products. As Mark Riddle observes, “Conversion in the U.S. seems to mean we’ve exchanged some of our shopping at Wal-Mart, Blockbuster and Borders for the Christian Bookstore down the street. We’ve taken our lack of purchasing control to God’s store, where we buy or office supplies in Jesus’ name.”

- Skye Jethani The Divine Commodity

What do you think?

other posts you may enjoy ::

• Skye Jethani :: Where does our legitimacy come from?
• iPhones and dirty Coltan #justicefriday
• one.love
• Just a heads up…

My friend Russel is working towards his dream of opening his own restaurant that will hopefully have an internship program for at-risk-youths, giving them job and life training. He’s recently completed culinary school and is continuing his education in a variety of places.

In an effort to improve his baker’s chops, he recently had the opportunity to spend some time with baker extraordinare, Peter Reinhart. Reignhart is a baker, teacher at Johnson and Wales, author of several cookbooks and a James Beard and IACP award winner.

Russel said that along the way, he discovered that Reinhart shared his own unique story about bread making at TED a few years back.

As Russel shares, there’s much to be learned from the presentation — including a great insight into why Jesus used the metaphors of bread and wheat so many times in his own story telling.

I love the idea that transformation is not something that’s subtle like hot water to cold or cold water to hot. But transformation is water boiling and becoming steam. There must be a real change that takes place.

What a great picture!

What else stood out to you about this presentation?

In addition, you may be interested to read Russel’s guest post at We Live Simply about outfitting a kitchen for cheap and watch this video with Andrew Jones talking about pizza parties and the yeast that Jesus talks about:

Click here to view the embedded video.

other posts you may enjoy ::

• I am an atheist…
• The Missional Church video
• Saturday’s adventure
• What type are you?

One morning Nate and Marc went outside to play after their breakfast.

Nate decided to go for a ride on his new bicycle.

He rode the bike down the driveway, then down the sidewalk and around the block. He was riding so fast that before he knew it, his training wheels fell off.

He’d never riden without training wheels but this was easy!

His training wheels were gone and he was riding on only two wheels!

As he rode further and further from home, he saw a train travelling down the train tracks. He was so excited he started racing the train, peddling faster and faster.

And before he knew it, he was passing the train!

He was going so fast!

As he passed the train, the train’s engineer gave him a big wave and blew the train’s horn with a long, loud whistle.

Nate was peddling so fast, all the homes and trees were a blur as he passed them by.

Suddenly, up ahead Nate noticed he was approaching a large hill.

He kept peddling and as he neared the top of the hill, his bicycle began to take flight!

He was now soaring over trees and the rooftops of the homes in his neighborhood.

He looked down and saw Marc waving from the ground.

He was enjoying flying above everything but suddenly it occurred to him, “Oh no! How do I get down? How do I stop?”

It was then that he remembered his backpack and his special blanket.

He pulled the blanket out of the backpack and held it above him to make a parachute.

His bike slowly drifted to the ground.

When he landed, it was so soft it was as if he landed in a big pile of marshmallows.

Suddenly he realized, “It is a big pile of marshmallows! We’re in a field full of marshmallows!”

He jumped off his bike as Marc came running up with a hand full of marshmallows.

“Taste these! They’re amazing,” Marc said as he stuffed his mouth full of marshmallows.

Nate refused, picking his nose instead.

“I’d rather eat boogers instead,” he told Marc.

Marc kept urging him to eat the marshmallows.

“They’re so much better than boogers!” Marc insisted.

Finally Nate joined in. He stopped eating his boogers and started eating marshmallows from the giant field of marshmallows.

They ate and ate till they could eat no more.

They were so stuffed and so full that they could barely move.

They both laid down in the giant field of marshmallows and stared into the sky.

As they stared into the blue sky, it started snowing!

They were laying in a field covered by white marshmallows and now they were being covered with wonderful white snowflakes!

But as the snowflakes began to cover them, Nate realized he wasn’t cold. He’d been in snow before and it was cold. But this snow — it wasn’t cold.

Nate took a handful of the snow and put some of it on his tongue.

He quickly realized, “This isn’t snow! It’s sugar!”

“It’s snowing sugar!” he yelled to Marcos who was still to full to move.

As Nate began to run and play in the field of marshmallows and falling sugar from the sky he felt a hand on his back and a familiar voice.

“Good morning Nate. It’s time to rise and shine.”

other posts you may enjoy ::

• Candice’s Laundry Love story
• Tonight’s bike ride – 10 miles
• Abused at the Lehmann house
• Peter Rollins :: No Conviction

I have several friends (and family members) with blogs that get updated somewhat frequently. Others are far more occasional, and still others, I have to wonder if they’ve forgotten their password.

When I ask them about it, their usual response is, “Well I don’t know what to write about.”

I understand, I’ve had writer’s block before.

But there’s one thing I’ve found that gets me over my writer’s block every time — writing.

I know you’re all looking at me funny now but perhaps I can explain.

In my college journalism class we had a practice we’d start each class with — 10 minutes of writing about anything.

It didn’t have to be a lengthy prose, it didn’t have to be publication worthy, it could be fictional, non-fiction, prose, poetry, whatever — it was just the practice of writing that helped get our muse going and get our minds thinking.

While most of what I wrote was usually junk that was trashed as soon as the practice was over, I also ended up with several good columns out of the process as well.

The practice still works today.

In fact, one of the reasons I was able to finish my novel in a month was because I simply wrote. I didn’t focus on re-thinking or editing during the process, I just wrote.

There’s plenty of time for editing once you’re finished.

So for starters — just write.

Not only will it get your creative juices flowing but it may turn out being something worth publishing (or at least a starting point for something in the future).

And if that doesn’t get your blogging juices flowing, I’ve also put together a list of some other great starting points for your next blog post:

• Share a funny story that happened today (kids are great sources of this)
• Something you liked about your favorite TV show
• Something you disliked about your favorite TV show
• Politics (always a hot topic)
• Professional wrestling – you may laugh but I always get a lot of visits from Google when I write new posts about wrestling. Even if you don’t like wrestling do a quick scan of WWE.com or TNAWrestling.com and figure out how to work in the name of a couple of the wrestlers mentioned on the front page, like The Undertaker, Shawn Michaels, AJ Styles or Kurt Angle, and see how many visits you get from it .
• What you love about your favorite restaurant
• A favorite recipe
• Mindmap your past posts. This idea comes from Darren Reeves and his e-book 31 Days to Building a Better Blog. Make a list of your most recent posts and then brainstorm all ways that the post could be extended into other posts. This is your chance to think outside the box.
  • Take the opposite approach to an issue
  • Explore an idea or suggestion someone may have made in the comments of the original post
  • If you shared a story, offer an alternative ending (fictional or not)
  • Offer an alternative “how-to”

  I recently did this with my post, How I found Heaven at What-A-Burger:
  
  Granted, I may not write or publish all of these ideas, but it’s a great resource of ideas.
  See how many posts you can get out of your original one and then start writing as the ideas come flowing in (hint: don’t post the posts all at once — schedule them for several weeks out).

• Pick a topic and write a series of posts on the topic. If you can find a list of something you’re interested in, blog about each point on the list. I’m doing this with the Simple Living Manifesto over on We Live Simply. Simply blogging each point in the manifesto, I have 72 posts (which will last me through the middle of June 2010). And that doesn’t include mind-mapping each of those 72 posts either.

Of course, while these ideas have helped me — but they may not be your cup of tea.

So what about you? Where do you get ideas for your next blog post?

other posts you may enjoy ::

• Posterous or Tumblr?
• What should I blog about?
• Add a Buzz This button to your Wordpress blog
• 11 must have Wordpress plugins

“We need the church.”

“In order for the church to be effective to this ministry and this calling… They’re going to have to be a healing culture. They’re going to have to be a forgiving culture. They’re going to have to a faith that is renewed daily.”

Dr. Karen Purvis spoke at the 2009 Tapestry Conference last year. It was easily the highlight of the day.

She also co-wrote the book The Connected Child — a book I highly recommend for folks preparing to begin the foster, adoption process.

(HT Building the Blocks)

other posts you may enjoy ::

• Texas foster care statistics for 2009
• Thanks.
• How quickly life can change
• The local church and foster care

Of those numbers, there were 5,442 children in Region 3 (North Texas)

In 2009, there were 6,510,210 children between the ages of birth to 18 in the state of Texas and 1,795,971 in the North Texas region.

In FY 2009, what were the confirmed allegations of neglect in the state of Texas?
13,875 because of physical abuse
6,316 because of sexual abuse
648 because of emotional abuse
205 because of abandonment
2,109 because of medical neglect
6,570 because of physical neglect
49,588 because of neglectful supervision
625 because of refusal to accept parental responsibility

Total confirmed allegations of child abuse/neglect: 79,936*

Number of child abuse/neglect investigations in 2009: 283,922

Number of confirmed cases of abuse/neglect in 2009: 68,326 (24.1%)*

How many fatalities were there, in Texas, due to neglect or abuse? 280
Harris County: 67
Dallas County: 29
Tarrant County: 13
Bexar County: 13
Bell County: 10
Hidalgo County: 10
Ellis County: 2

How many children were removed from their families through DFPS?
12,107 in 2009 (down from 14,295 in 2008)
2,362 in Region 3 (North Texas)

Who are Texas children waiting in the foster care system?
3,319 (20.8%) of foster children are between ages of 0 and 2
2,249 (14.1%) of foster children are between ages of 3 and 5
2,679 (16.8%) of foster children are between ages of 6 and 9
2,930 (18.4%) of foster children are between ages of 10 and 13
4,225 (26.5%) of foster children are between ages of 14 and 17
530 (3.3%) of foster children are between ages of 18 and 21

Who are the most common confirmed perpetrators of abuse or neglect?
Relationship: Parent (78.1%)
Gender: Female (56.8%)
Age: Age 26-35 (37.7%)
Marital Status: Married (29.4%)

What are the most common characteristics of confirmed victims?
Age: Age 1 to 3 (25.1%)
Gender: Female (51.7%)

How long do children remain in DFPS care on average?
Those ending in family reunification – 14.6 months
Those ending in relative care – 14.2 months
Those ending in adoption – 29.8 months
Those ending in long term care (Emancipation) – 63.3 months
Those ending in long term care (Other) – 14.3 months

The average number of placements per child in substitute care for all children who attained permanency is 3.4.

6,386 children are waiting to be adopted

What’s the median length of time children wait to be adopted? 12.3 months

Where are the children who remain under the care of the DFPS?
Of the 25,185 children in DFPS substitute care on August 31, 2009…
11,022 children were placed in a Child Placing Agency (CPA) Foster Home (These foster homes are recruited,
trained, verified and managed by private CPAs.)
1,886 children were placed in DFPS Foster Homes
664 children were placed in Basic Child Care (cottage/campus type housing)
1,421 children were placed in Residential Treatment Centers
496 children were placed in Emergency Shelters (intended for 30 days or less)
443 children were placed in other types of foster care (camps, maternity homes, hospitals, juvenile detention, etc.)
7,673 children were placed in Kinship Care (relative)
421 children were placed in pending adoption homes
623 children were placed in other substitute care
536 children were in pending adoptions in CPA Adoptive Homes

What happened to the children who left DFPS Care in 2009?
Family Reunification – 4,423 (30.5%)
Custody Given To Relatives – 3,213 (22.2%)
Adoption Consummated – 4,859 (33.5%)
Children Emancipated – 1,453 (10.0%)
Other – 549 (3.8%)

What do these stats say to you? What are you shocked/astonished by? Do they inspire ideas/actions/reactions in you?

This information is from the Texas Department of Family and Protective Services 2009 annual report.

*Not sure why these numbers don’t match – they’re from different pages in the report (pages 39 & 44)

other posts you may enjoy ::

• Texas foster care statistics
• Texas child deaths increased sharply in 2009
• Creating a culture of adoption in the church
• Thanks.

280 Texas children died as the result of child abuse and neglect in 2009 — up more than 30% from 2008.

The Texas Department of Family and Protective Services is still trying to figure out why.

According to one think tank, the reason is likely due to increased teen pregnancies and increased poverty — which seems very probable. But Texas DFPS isn’t convinced.

Another possible cause is case workers being overworked (the average caseworker in the North Texas region is 20 investigations per day) and a turnover rate of nearly 24%.

Just my uneducated assumption is that Texas DFPS is removing far less number of children from their homes over the past five years — it would seem that if you’re removing less children, either parents are doing a better job — or you’re going to end up with more fatalities.

In 2005, DFPS removed 17,428 children from their homes.

In 2009, they removed 12,107 children from their homes.

There may be other factors to this — but that would be the first place I would look.

Austin’s KUT has a report on the issue.

You can also read the full DFPS study online — or I’ll post some highlights tomorrow.

HT Funky Shapes for the photo

other posts you may enjoy ::

• Texas foster care statistics for 2009
• Texas foster care statistics
• How would you respond?
• Creating a culture of adoption in the church

I am an atheist when it comes to the god of violent jihad.
I am an atheist when it comes to the lord who converts by the sword.
I am an atheist when it comes to the mission of politicians using religion as ammunition.

but

I believe in You – the Artist of trees and galaxies.
I believe in You – the Poet of oceans and rivers and streams.
I believe in You – the God of compassion who calls us to action

I can’t believe what they believe but I believe in You

I believe in You – Majestic Designer of space and time
I believe in You – Composer of beauty and music of life
I believe in You – The Holy Forgiver and Wild Reconciler

I am an atheist to the gods of the greedy ignoring the needy.
I am an atheist to the gods who make others torture and suffer
I am an atheist when it comes to view of the chosen few, who
judge and condemn all who differ them.

I believe in You – Mighty in meekness and gentle in power
I believe in You – The Word who has spoken good news to the broken
I believe in You – Transcending mystery, with us in history

What do you think?

other posts you may enjoy ::

• Incredible stop motion video
• Lessons from the baker
• A call to Ubuntu
• Understanding the fine print