The G7 nations (UK, Italy, Germany, France, Japan, USA, Canada) met this last weekend in Cornwall, England and there are some nice pics of them all nicely distancing, regardless of vaccination status. Key themes for discussion we are told were Climate Crisis, the Pandemic and China, amongst others.
I have friends who live half a mile / a kilometre from all this and I could not resist the temptation to ask … here’s a tiny bit of the lengthy reply that came – “someone filmed his motorcade – 20 vehicles long… so much for climate change”
What springs to mind is ‘actions speak louder than words’ – but who am I ?!!
What has caught my imagination is that, in my current reading, there is an extensive study on the use and misuse of the concept of ‘choseness’ in our scriptures. A juxtaposition of these two things gives me what ?
- Are the G7 nations the new chosen people and if so what has determined that status?
- What of the randomness (or otherwise) of the number 7 in that also.
- All except Japan have a history based on Judeo-Christian scriptures and values as interpreted and misinterpreted by earlier leaders.
- Though if any of them read history (or theology) they will see that empires – military or economic – have a limited life-span.
- Who are the ‘chosen’ these days and on what basis?
I set myself a personal challenge last weekend and this week invite you to do so too ?
What makes me a chosen person? – and I too will select the number 7.
- I am entitled to a vaccine
- I eat more than once a day every day
- I have a roof over my head every day
- I am entitled to access to healthcare
- I am entitled to access to education
- I have access to any amount of clean water any time of day every day
- I am able to live in peace without fearing for my life
Your list may look very different.
Please note – that I have not worked for, nor by some other means ‘merited’ any of these.
I was simply born in a particular place, at a particular point in history.
My list would look different if I were born in the cotton mill town of Manchester at the height of the industrial revolution and had started working endless hours in dangerous conditions aged 9. I use this as an example because we also read this week that for the first time in 20 years, the number of children in work, rather than in school, (more than 160 million of them) is on the rise once again.
The list would look different if… – you fill this bit in…
As a Christian who seeks to live by the scriptures:
- what am I to make of all that I have written?
- how am to pray for the G7 conference and the G7 declaration that is the working document that emerged from it?
- how am I to be a good steward of all my unearned entitlements?
It’s a wonder I can sleep at night.
