San Diego Zoo and Animals

While we were in San Diego, we stayed with our good friends Marlo and Josh and baby Owen. We also had to make the trip out to visit the famous San Diego Zoo. Me and Tim went there with Marlo and baby Owen who is now about five months old. It was baby's Owen's first time to the zoo and it was such a treat for him and for all of us. It was a gorgeous day, the weather was warm and we were eager to see all the animals.




I think my favorite animals that I enjoyed looking at had to be the pandas. But we were all pretty intrigued with the animals when it came time to feed them, or if they were napping, or hitting things in order to get their food.

Sundance Film Festival and Nanking the Documentary

“Nanking” at Sundance Film Festival

In January I had the opportunity to attend the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah. Sundance is considered the premier US showcase for American and independent films. There was only one movie that I was really intent on supporting, the highly anticipated world premiere screening of the documentary Nanking. Fortunately I was able to get tickets to one of the six sold out screenings. This film has significant meaning to me since I had a small part on the crew, but also because it was close to my heart, being a Chinese-American woman who heard similar tales about World War II in China through the eyes of my own grandmother.

“A powerful, emotional and relevant reminder of the heartbreaking toll war takes on the innocent, Nanking tells the story of the Japanese invasion of Nanking, China, in the early days of World War II. As part of a campaign to conquer all of China, the Japanese subjected Nanking – which was then China’s capital – to months of aerial bombardment, and when the city fell, the Japanese army unleashed murder and rape on a horrifying scale. In the midst of the rampage, a small group of Westerners banded together to establish a Safety Zone where over 200,000 Chinese found refuge. Unarmed, these missionaries, university professors, doctors and businessmen – including a Nazi named John Rabe – bored witness to the events, while risking their own lives to protect civilians from slaughter.” (www.nankingthefilm.com)

The film interweaves archival images, interviews of Chinese survivors, testimonies from former Japanese soldiers, and readings of first hand accounts, bringing the forgotten past to startling life. Nanking is directed by the Academy Award winning director/producer team of Bill Guttentag and Dan Sturman and features Woody Harrelson and Mariel Hemingway. Nanking exposes the horrors of war but also affirms the extraordinary impact that individuals can do to help others. The film was dedicated to Iris Chang, late author of the New York Times bestseller, The Rape of Nanking. Her book inspired the producer, AOL executive Ted Leonsis, to make a movie about these tragic aspects of history as it had both haunted and inspired him after reading her book.

For more information about Nanking, visit the website at www.nankingthefilm.com

It is showing at the Tribeca Film Festival coming up next week in NYC, and I hope that we'lll be able to do a local screeninig of it in the Hampton Roads Virginia Beach area.

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Also spotted a person dresssed in a Pacman suit

Worship and Justice

This past week I had an opportunity to attend the National Pastors Convention in sunny San Diego. It was a most inspiring and encouraging time to hear about the state of the church and the hearts of people who love the Lord and want to see more of God work in the lives of people worldwide.

One message that I heard really struck the chord of some things that I had been reflecting on for some time. The message was on Worship and Justice.

For starters, when I think of what the word worship entails, it brings me to a state of mind, an opening of the heart, an approach to have an encounter with the God of the universe and give God the well deserved attention and adoration that He so desires because of the idea that God is after all God. The pastor who gave the message preached on the idea that the love that God has for us, and the love that God commands for us to demonstrate to others is one and the same. In the Bible, one of the greatest commands is to love the Lord your God.... and love your neighbor as yourself. Expressing our love to God is part of our worship.

Mark Labberton writes in his book, The Dangerous Act of Worship, " Jesus, if anything, was and is awake. That's the shock for those who encounter him in the Gospels. He came to make a world of those who are awake - awake to God, to each other and to the world. Waking up is the dangerous act of worship. It's dangerous because worship is meant to produce lives fully attentive to reality as God sees it, and that's more than most of us want to deal with."

Furthermore he discusses how sometimes there is a disconnect between worship anad justice, and how a more vigorous encompassing theology of worship can help us understand - who God is on our lives and then truly practicing that life in the world, especially for the sake of the poor, the oppressed and the forgotten.

In Micah 6:8 it says

What does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God ?

I'm really challenged by that thought... How to live out our worship and what that means for DOING JUSTICE in the world....
I'll have to ponder that some more and I'd like to create some more ways to live that out more in my own life.