Trivial Pursuits!

Sometimes I feel that the Media is full of trivia (i.e. things that do not interest me) and neglect the issues that really matter. We have methods of communication that enable news to be spread at a speed that would be incomprehensible to most of the people who have lived on this world during the last two thousand years. However, we seem to use it to spread gossip faster!

 We learn too much of some of the activities of two people in the Oval Office and not enough about decisions affecting the peace and prosperity of many that are also supposed to be taken in that room. Earlier this year we saw reports of the same President renewing his acquaintance with British Beer, while in Birmingham for the G8 Summit Meeting. But we seemed to hear nothing of the arguments about the abolition of Third World debt that such serious and knowledgeable non-participants as Christian Aid and The New Economics Foundation were seeking to get on the agenda. We see a senior Japanese Banker making his tearful pleas for forgiveness for his organisation's lending mistakes but this is not related to poverty elsewhere in the same hemisphere. And when did we see or hear our local newspaper or radio encouraging fathers to do something as easy and sensible as reading to their sons? I am sure that each of you could add your own favourite examples of the same apparent bias in reporting. However, we are told that the Media is only letting the public have what it demands and maybe they are right!

 Whenever I am tempted to despair about the damage that other people (but not me, of course) seem to be doing to each other and the environment, I share my fears with God. If I am open enough, I become aware of my own shortcomings (many of them, I'm afraid). I remember that this is God's world, which He creates, sustains and loves. If I allow myself to become aware of His presence, I know that He is in control and that His Son asked us to pray that His Kingdom will come on Earth as in Heaven.  Paul Newman

Prayer

 Dear Lord and Father of mankind,

forgive our foolish ways;

re-clothe us in our rightful mind;

in purer lives Thy service find,

in deeper reverence, praise. Amen

John Greenleaf Whittier (1807-82)

 This prayer is taken from the first verse of a well-loved hymn that can be found in Mission Praise, as number 111.

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