everyday earth-shakers

Last week, my nine-year old cousin convinced me to start reading the first Percy Jackson book series. She said the books were great and impossible to put down (which I took with a grain of salt, as she is only nine, after all). 

Considering I read them at the pace of a book per day over the first four days, I'd say her assessment was spot-on.

For those of you who are woefully unfamiliar with the series, it centers around Percy, a teenage boy who discovers he's a demigod (half human, half god). Life had always been hard for him - he was raised by a single mother, since Poseidon doesn't stick around with his baby mommas, apparently - and Percy struggled with ADHD, dyslexia, and being a general misfit in every school he attended (and was inevitably expelled from). Learning of his identity as Poseidon's son only makes life harder, as he is compelled to become a hero and take on quests to save both the mortal world and Mt. Olympus.

Cue the remarkable feats and unbelievable exploits Percy and his friends must perform to survive and succeed. The story line around our hero really does draw you in, as its plot is patterned on the same (yet perennially compelling) structure nearly every other adventure story you've read follows.

After reading an excessive amount of Percy Jackson one evening, I forced myself to drop the book and get outside for a walk before the sun sank below the horizon. It's not the dark I fear in San Antonio, as I'm living smack dab in suburbia, but the bugs here in Texas are quite fierce. (My unofficial job, outside of nannying, has been to provide nourishment for all the mosquitoes within a 2-mile radius of my aunt and uncle's ranch. Consider this accomplished.)

Anyways, on this lovely evening's walk, I was musing to myself about how much our culture loves the hero, the celebrity, the exceptional one who rises to the top. As much as we in the US trumpet our allegiance to democracy and equality, we think the person who is the most successful, most powerful, or most influential is inherently better than the rest of us mere mortals. This especially resounds when they overcome challenges and adversity. 

In the heroes we love from books and stories, they are often forced to step up on doomsday and rescue everyone from the brink of disaster, from an evil tide that is perilously close to taking down everything good, noble, and just.

As these thoughts tumble through my brain, I see a small visual aid confirming my train of thought: A tiny boy of no more than four years old, with jet black hair and a disarmingly sweet, shy smile, waves at me from his driveway wearing...a Batman t-shirt.

We love heroes. We don't require their character to be flawless or their conduct perfect - in fact, perhaps we prefer when they have weaknesses akin to ours - but we love them for their courage and abilities. Among the sharp contrasts in the comic-book world of good vs. evil, light vs. dark, just vs. unjust, we revel in their daring exploits that save the day.

Our world's a bit muddled in comparison, isn't it? Sharp contrasts between "good" and "evil" are not so simple, even to the discerning eye. With such polarized politics, a media that can spin a story multiple ways, a constant stream of leaders - political, entrepreneurial, and faith leaders, to mention a few - who let us down with their soft spines, opportunistic posturing, and pointed, exaggerated rhetoric that demonizes their opponents, it's not easy to sift through the muck to determine who is on the side of good, truth, or justice.

Our systems of government, economy, and society are so complex that it's incredibly difficult to sort out just policies from the unjust, right from wrong, truth from lies. Consider this moment in time: 
   -Our "open and democratic" government is aggressively attempting to hunt down a man for revealing a national security program whose monitoring of U.S. citizens appears to be highly unconstitutional. 
   -One of the core elements of our economy - the military-industrial complex - ensures that the U.S. rakes in huge profits from the sale of weapons and military technology to other nations (including some rather sketchy regimes), yet we claim to be a nation that values peace and abhors violence. 
   -Our country's prison-industrial complex is becoming increasingly privatized, meaning that corporations and individuals directly profit from the incarceration of an ever-growing percentage of the U.S. population (which is already vastly higher than any other first world country, and this includes a disproportionately high percentage of minorities in our prisons).

And this is only a few of the twisted realities that exist in our nation today. Pardon my cynicism. The more I learn about how the world operates, the more possibility I find for frustration and cynicism. 

Yet.

Cynicism solves nothing. It's a bitter, pessimistic reaction to a heavy flood of bad news that batters us down daily. If this reaction becomes permanent instead of merely temporary, it poisons and immobilizes us.

There must be something better I can do with my time. If I'm tired of the influx of bad news, injustice, and the apathy that chokes most people from acting to change things, then I need a different remedy.

Starting this fall, I'm going to make an effort to interview people in my life who are doing small but faithful, disciplined acts to make the world a more loving, hopeful, just, and compassionate place. I'm not talking about the generic and overused "make the world a better place" kind of act - "better" is too relative, isn't it? - but those who make it their life's practice and purpose to follow God's vision for the world he had, and has, in mind.

From these interviews, I will write a post that shares what they're doing in their communities, just to remind us all that there's still a reason to hope, to act, and to reject the apathy that's more contagious than we care to admit.

These people won't be much like the superheroes our culture adores. They'll be so much more than that. They are the everyday earth-shakers, the ones who see the world for what it is, yet work to shape a world they know is better, higher, and far greater than what we can imagine.

I'm sure I'll still post on other topics and things that come up in the fall, but every few weeks, you can come here to be introduced to another everyday earth-shaker who's refused to give up on God and the world he created to be good.

Take that, cynicism. Try not to let the door hit you on your way out.