When I share the story of how I\u2019ve experienced God at work in the Middle East with local congregations or other interested groups in the USA, I often receive this question: \u201cWhat unbiased source can we read in order to better understand what is happening in the Middle East?\u201d What I have learned from my own experience and from asking my Middle Eastern colleagues for their thoughts on this question is that there are no unbiased sources. The best we can do is to develop the discipline of critically reading several sources and understanding what each source\u2019s particular bias may be. To understand the nuances as well as the big picture, I have found it important to read and listen to voices that represent the whole spectrum of religious and political life in this complex part of the world and how it interacts with, responds to, and is impacted by similarly complex dynamics in the Americas, Europe, Africa, and Asia.<\/p>\n
This assignment, to curate sources that help me further develop a geopolitical and global framework, has led me to a similar conclusion. Understanding what is being said about a topic from multiple perspectives helps me to think more deeply about my own assessment and on what I am basing my opinion. Multiple perspectives also help me to interrogate more deeply my own history, theological understandings, scriptural grounding, and anthropological frameworks. To this end I find it helpful to understand as much as I can about a writer\u2019s or source\u2019s worldview assumptions. This helps me to listen with less reactivity and a more generous but also critical ear. Two on-line sources I use help to identify a news source\u2019s assumptions and to see a wide range of perspectives:<\/p>\n
With this in mind, I found our two assigned articles fascinating and thought-provoking. I would personally place both right of center. Both N.S. Lyons and Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn speak from a position that places a high value on tradition and a worldview that arose out of different expressions and movements of Christendom, though from different historical and contextual vantage points. Lyons, from a 21st<\/sup>-Century position, writes in \u201cThe Upheaval,\u201d \u201c\u2026the New Faith\u2026rejects nearly every fundamental principle of liberal modernity\u2026[it] is enthusiastically taking an axe to the decaying pillars holding up liberal democratic civilization just as it enters a potentially existential struggle with a rising authoritarian challenger.\u201d[1]<\/a> Solzhenitsyn, from a much longer view of history given his Orthodox faith, critiques both liberal modernity and the authoritarian\/totalitarian structures of his 20th<\/sup>-Century generation, writing, \u201cIt seems more and more apparent\u2026the noose around the neck of mankind draws tighter and more hopeless with every passing decade, and there seems to be no way out for anyone\u2026the combined vision of all the thinkers of the Enlightenment amounts to nothing.\u201d[2]<\/a><\/p>\n I appreciate the questions posed by Lyons as his article concludes. He outlines in this article the \u201cthree concurrent revolutions\u201d he sees \u201cforcibly\u201d reconfiguring the world today: geopolitical shifts from West (USA) to East (China), ideological shifts from the liberal international order of the past nearly one hundred years to what he calls \u201cthe New Faith,\u201d and technological developments that feed the previous two. He concludes with his desire to further explore these simultaneous revolutions in future writings, guided by these questions: \u201cWhat is happening? Why is it happening? Where are we headed? What, if anything, can and should we do, individually and collectively?\u201d<\/p>\n These questions feel particularly important to pursue in light of this evaluative statement made by Lyons earlier in his post: \u201c\u2026this ideology seemed to emerge so suddenly, and is in its stark irrationality so alien to the modern liberal mind, that surprised observers and hapless opponents so far struggle even to settle on a name for it.\u201d[3]<\/a> As I read this, I was reminded of what the Reverend Ren\u00e9 August from the Desmond and Leah Tutu Legacy Foundation counseled: \u201cStart reading theologians who are not white.\u201d My sense as I listen and learn from my black colleagues and other colleagues of color is that this ideology referenced by Lyons has not suddenly emerged, nor is it without rationality, nor is it monolithic. It has emerged out of several global contexts over multiple decades, and in many respects, it has been fomenting since the advent of colonialism. It is, at least in part, the expression of diverse voices that have always been there, just not in the position of economic, military, and thus cultural power. One blog my black colleagues have referred me to in order to learn more about this history is: https:\/\/lorettajross.com\/dred-feminist-blog<\/a>. Loretta Ross is a professor at Smith College, an activist, and a public intellectual. Her writing would most likely be received as far left of center in the context of this assignment but provides a different and important lens into this conversation about ideological revolution. Michael Frost is an Australian missiological voice I find helpful in this conversation as well. He writes blogs on several themes (Christian faith, Christian ministry, mission, culture & politics, art & popular culture, and Bible\/Jesus), and would likely be received as left of center in the context of this assignment. For example, a recent blog exploring issues related to the ideological revolution described by Lyons is entitled: \u201cPicturing Jesus-Part V: Does it Matter What Color Jesus Is?\u201d https:\/\/mikefrost.net\/category\/art-popular-culture\/<\/a>. I also find that the PBS NewsHour hosts very helpful interviews on this and a wide range of topics. Their website has very informative follow-up articles and podcasts (https:\/\/www.pbs.org\/newshour\/). They are categorized by ranking websites as centrist\/balanced or nonpartisan in their coverage.<\/p>\n I hope to read additional blogs by Lyons to discover how he explored the revolutions he described. I am very interested to see who he draws from in his conversation. I hope he introduces his readers to a wide range of voices so that a truly comprehensive response to his thoughtful questions can be developed.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n [1]<\/a> N. S. Lyons, \u201cThe Upheaval,\u201d Substack newsletter,\u00a0The Upheaval<\/em>, April 7, 2021, accessed April 23, 2022, https:\/\/theupheaval.substack.com\/p\/the-upheaval.<\/p>\n