Skip to main content

Where is the love ?

The year 2003.
Started on a wednesday, was the year of freshwater.

January 25th - 34 people are injured on the tube.
January 30th - support is releasedfrom the UK in support of Disarming Iraq

February 9th - BBC three takes over what was BBC Choice

March 3rd - capture of suspected mastermind behind 9/11
March 18th - British sign langage becomes an officail British language
March 20th - USA, UK, Poland and Australia invade Iraq

April 9th - Saddam Hussein's regime is over in Baghdad through the force of U.S Forces

May 2nd - Monkey man superhero hoax of tunbridge wells
May 24th - Turkey win the Eurovision song contest

June 1st - 29th G8 summit opens
June 22nd - largest hailstone ever recorded in Nebraska

July 5th - double suicide bombing at a moscow rock concert kills attackers and 15 others
July 7th - the first possible Gay bishop decides against it after talking to church leaders
July 8th Sudan airways flight 39 crashes in Sudan, killing 116 of 117 passengers, the only survivor was two years old

August 1st - A suicide bomber rams a truck filled with explosives into a military hospital near Chechnya, killing 50 people, including Russian troops wounded in Chechnya
August 28th - An electricity blackout cuts off power to around 500,000 people living in southeast England and brings 60% of London's underground rail network to a halt

September 10th - Estonia approves the refuerendum to join the EU
September 14th - Sweden rejects the Euro

October 24th - Concorde takes last commercial flight.

November 5h - The "Green River Killer", confesses to murdering 48 women
November 22nd - England wins rugby world cup

December 1st - using a mobile became illegal whilst driving
December 13th - Saddam Hussein is captured
December 18th - Soham Murder trial ends, Ian Huntly found guilty of two murders

In 2003 popular internet searches where Britney Spears, Iraq and earthquakes. For images it was eminem, britney again, and the Simpsons.

Now does anyone remember that 2003 song that reached 16 number one places and 22 top twenty spots in the charts around the globe? That was the top UK selling single of 2003?
Where is the love?
I was listening to this song and the words in which had so many people agreeing with it and saying yes where is the love, what have we got to six years later?
Can we really say we've taken that song to heart...

"I feel the weight of the world on my shoulder
As I'm gettin' older, y'all, people gets colder
Most of us only care about money makin'
Selfishness got us followin' our wrong direction
Wrong information always shown by the media
Negative images is the main criteria
Infecting the young minds faster than bacteria
Kids wanna act like what they see in the cinema
Yo', whatever happened to the values of humanity
Whatever happened to the fairness in equality
Instead of spreading love we're spreading animosity
Lack of understanding, leading lives away from unity
That's the reason why sometimes I'm feelin' under
That's the reason why sometimes I'm feelin' down
There's no wonder why sometimes I'm feelin' under
Gotta keep my faith alive till love is found
Now ask yourself

People killin',
people dyin'
Children hurt and you hear them cryin'
Can you practice what you preach
And would you turn the other cheek
Father, Father, Father help us
Send some guidance from above'
Cause people got me, got me questionin'
Where is the love"

Well what is our world coming too

2009 started on a Thursday, the last years of the 2000's, national year of astonomy and natural fibres.

January saw Obama as the first black president of America, and the continued bombing in the east.

February Jóhanna Sigurðardóttir is appointed as the new Prime Minister of Iceland, becoming the world's first openly gay head of government and Members of the Bangladesh Rifles paramilitary force begin mutinying. Over 80 are killed.

In March Guinea-Bissau's president is assinated, gunman attack a srilanken cricket bus killing 8 and injurying 7, josef Fritzl is found guilty for enslaving and raping his daughter for 24 years and killing there infant and flash flooding and the Situ Gintung dam's failure kill at least 99 people in Tangerang, Banten, Indonesia

April is the month that earthquakes strike Italy killing 293 and injuring over 1500, the former peruvian president is sentenced to prison for using the security forces to kill and kidnap people and the first awareness of influenza "swine flu" is broadcast

May brings nuclear testing, rebelling and revolting across areas of the globe.

Halfway through June, 228 people are presumed dead from the missing from Air France Flight 447 and Swine flu is announced a pandemic. This is all that made wikipedia.

Headlines for EDP today....
Escaped prisoner accused of murdering Yarmouth pensioner
Fruit farm workers jailed for Norfolk rape
Norwich man denies murdering paedophile

Where is the love

Our Love can be the revolution
So here I stand
Outstreched arm and outsteched heart
Crying for the things I've seen
The destinations and outcome that could have been
And as I try to make sense of it all
Words try fail and escape me
I don't have all the answers to all of the questions
I don't understand the reason
But I trust Jesus and I know
Our love can be the revolution!

How about the rest of 2009.... maybe it's time for us to remember the love!

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Questions

I mentioned in my previous group about one of my lovely youth groups. Its reasonably small and all the young people come from a church orientated background or have been going to church for a while. We  started back in January and as a leader theres that post Christmas panic when you realise you havent planned a session let alone the rest of the term. So I used a cop out, I used my first session back to help get the young people to plan the sessions - brilliant, right! Over the last five months in post here in Conwy, theres been a real theme emerging from my work and my visits and my volunteering/volunteered(ness) at things like Faith and Order and 3Gen. This is the idea of questions and having a safe space to ask questions discuss them and not necessarily come out with a definitive answer, but having explored deeply the topic at hand. At Uni I hated the big questions discussed late at night, when one should have been writing assignments because then it felt like wor...

The Arrival

While they were there, the time came for the baby to be born,   and she gave birth to her firstborn, a son. She wrapped him in cloths and placed him in a manger, because there was no guest room available for them. Luke 2:6-7

Reflection on #fando

My university degree assignments were largely theological reflections, and I largely hated writing them. But as I reflect I have or I have a responsibility as I get back on the train. What do I have to do now. My response to these two and a  bit days. I have had a strong renewal in my passion for theology, and I don't want to keep this to myself. This has an impact with my ministry with families and young people. To help the, engage with theology, the communion of saints the richness in grappling with the big questions. Moving to not have a shallow ministry but a deep ministry allowing God to reach deeply in my life and of those around me. Being aware of the Wesleyan quadrilateral in the work I do not just as a a useful tool for graduating from a college with Methodist tendencies. There needs to be an investment in theology in the local church and I have a chance to facilitate this. Theology is integral to our faith and walk as Christians, I think people do want to engage wit...