Children we love and abuse

I landed in Bangalore India this weekend in the midst of a festival weekend. As well as the local Hindu festival, Muslims were celebrating the end of Ramadan and Christians were using the long holiday weekend as an opportunity to celebrate 'Children's Day' in many of their churches. Within hours of landing I found myself in an impressive, growing, independent church preaching on the place of the child in mission.

India is full of people, and even more so full of children - literally hundreds of millions of them. The children who sat in front of me in church had adoring parents who, in good Indian fashion, are prepared to sacrifice much to see their children well educated and prepared for life, but as I spoke I was just as conscious of the children we had passed on the road side begging for food and those I had not seen whose bodies are abused for the gratification of adult lust. Children are vulnerable but they are also strong and have much to teach us about discipleship - open, trusting, humble and deep. I look forward to being inspired by the lives of other Indian children this coming week as I spend more time in this challenging but hopful country.

Child, Credo, Camp

It's August, its cold and raining, the kids are on holiday - so let's go camping - or better still let's send the kids off to camp while we have a quiet time back home. Each summer, especially in the US, but also across Europe and elsewhere thousands of children are given a great holiday, lots of adventure, fun and teaching about faith, often by Christian volunteers who give up weeks of their anual leave to look after other people's offspring.

This last week has been the week for banning camps. In Britain several Christian groups have raises the alarm about the country's first Atheist summer camp for children between 8 and 17 whilst in Uzbekistan the government have suceeded in closing a camp run by the Baptist Association of Uzbekistan, leaving the leaders of the Association facing massive fines. So if Athiest can teach their 'faith' to children as young as eight in Britain why cannot Baptists do the same in Uzbekistan? Or to ask the question more provactively, if Christians in Britain (a minority religious group) can object to an Atheist camp why cannot Muslims in Uzbekistan (a majority religious group) object to a Christian camp in their country? The real question of course is much deeper. To my mind the issue is to what degree children - at eight or eighteen - should be exposed to the competing truth claims and religious convictions of adults. We rightly protect children from pornography - should be also protect them from atheism - and theism? Perhaps to focus on 'protection' is to begin in the wrong place. Would these difficult questions be more easily addressed if we focused rather on 'nourishment' and 'healthy development' rather than 'protection'? As Christians work with children we need to constantly ask ourselves, is my 'faith sharing' enabling this child to be nourished and grow in healthy ways, to explore and discover their own place in God's world, in His love?

Looking out of windows

Windows are great for focusing attention on what lies directly in view but they also block out a lot more. I once heard about an airforce base where half a wall was painted - the half the queen might see if she were to look out of the window during a visit she was making, the other half remained unpainted and unseen for years. For those of us engaged in Christian mission the "10-40 window" has, for some time now, focused our attention on that part of the world where most people have yet to gain any real exposure to the gospel of God's love in Jesus. Running from Morocco to China and Japan, and Turkey down to Sri Lanka, this window frames a particular approach to mission which is geographical, 'people group' focused, and strategic. Useful as this is, the danger however is that the longer we view the world out of this particular window the more likely we are to forget what we cannot see - the unpainted wall.

Recently I have been introduced to another window - totally non-geographic - the "4-14 nwindow" which frames our mission focus on the 40% of the world's population who are often unseen and unheard because they are children and young people. In a year which is focusing on the rights of the child , Christians do well to view our world through this child-view window. This window does not face the future ("children are our future") but rather gives us a unique view of the real world in which we live today, a world in which children take decisions, share faith, and shape our environment.

Windows can also look into each other. For an intersting "4-14" look into the "10-40" window see Windowkids.