Հաղորդագրութիւն
Bashde Newsletter Volume 2 - October 2011
Harvest Day in the Armenian Evangelical Church of Anjar
On Sunday, October 9, it was “Harvest Day”, in Anjar, in the Armenian Evangelical Church.
Badveli Sebouh Terzian, gave the sermon, about sharing with those less fortunate and needy.
Afterwards “KAHL” senior citizens had lunch in the Chanitz Room.
Source: mousaleranjar.com
Badveli Sebouh Terzian, gave the sermon, about sharing with those less fortunate and needy.
Afterwards “KAHL” senior citizens had lunch in the Chanitz Room.
Source: mousaleranjar.com
A Matchmaker's Cajoling Words by Shushan Artinian
UAECNE Lebanese Educational Council Committee - Workshop on "Work Etiquette"
On Friday, 16 September 2011, in Haigazian University, in the media center, the Lebanese Education Council of the Armenian Evangelical Schools organized a workshop about work etiquette led by Ms. Sonia Sabbah.
Conflict Resolution
Learning to become MEN - Experiencing David’s Challenges
1 Samuel 20:35-43
An Archery lesson: David becomes a man (35-43)
David and Jonathan agreed previously about a secret sign for communication. The sign had to do with archery. The narrator describes it best:
“I will shoot three arrows to the side, as though I shot at a target. And behold, I will send the youth, saying, 'Go, find the arrows.' If I specifically say to the youth, 'Behold, the arrows are on this side of you, get them,' then come; for there is safety for you and no harm, as the LORD lives. But if I say to the youth, 'Behold, the arrows are beyond you,' go, for the LORD has sent you away…” (18-23)
In Hebrew the verb to shoot and the verb to teach are the same (yara). The noun form of it is the famous word Torah, (the first five books of the bible). For the Hebrews, teaching is not just a random act; it is “shooting” the arrows to the target, penetrating deep inside. Teaching should have direction. Jonathan plays a major role to help David to learn and grow and become a man.
Jonathan did exactly what it was agreed upon (35-43)
Jonathan shot the arrows as David was hiding and listening. Then Jonathan talked to the youth (in reality to David) and said,
“Is not the arrow beyond you?” And Jonathan called after the boy, “Hurry! Be quick! Do not stay!” (37b-38)
How difficult was it for Jonathan to say to his best friend “Hurry up, go, go quickly. Do not come back. Go to the wilderness. Go and hide. I am shooting the arrows, I am teaching you, telling you, guiding you…go, go do not look back.”
He appeared to be shouting to the young boy, but he is actually talking to David. He is saying farewell to David and welcoming the arrival of maturity, of manhood.(both are maturing)
Let the Lord be with both of us. They cried and kissed each other. And they departed from each other in God’s peace and presence.
What can we learn?
1. Maturity demands loyalty
Both David and Jonathan did not compromise their faith in God and their commitment to each other. This is maturity.
• Christ taught us to be loyal to the Christ who was crucified for our sins.
• Each of us should carry the cross and follow Him.
• Our faith is tested daily. Temptations are surrounding us. Only when we have faith in Christ we can face them. Only when Christ is our Lord and King we can learn to be loyal to each other and to God.
-This last week I found in you maturity in facing crises. Yes we went through the crisis of fighting against cancer. Some of you were prayer warriors. Some of you reached out to the practical needs of the family. Some of you called me and said they were available. This is loyalty to Christ and to each other. Some think that our church is not spiritual enough. They leave us and go to other churches. I hope they make a commitment to Christ and also show loyalty to the “church family” wherever they are.
Attending church is not just receiving teachings, it is becoming part of the body of Christ. I believe in loyalty in our relationships. Jonathan and David taught us that.
2. Maturity means truth before peace.
Jonathan stood up for the truth even against his own father.
David stood up for the truth and did not compromise in choosing the easy way out. He did quit nor became a slave of Saul.
Of course peaceful relationships are commendable. Yet, when truth is sacrificed and not revealed, the “peaceful” relationships are not reliable; they are fake.
James says: “But the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable.” (James 3:17)
In Armenian it says: Holy, Honest, true, pure…..
First truth then peace; we like the other way around.
Even Jesus said:
“Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I have not come to bring peace, but a sword….Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me,” (Matthew 10:34)
Your relationships will not always be smooth. Jonathan’s relationship with his father did not go in peace. Truth was more important than unreliable peace.
Watch out here, we should be careful how we speak truth:
Paul says:
“speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in all aspects into Him …” (Eph 4:15)
Let me add here, for me the ultimate truth is Jesus Christ, when we have him in our lives, peace that God can give only through Him will be in us.
Both David and Jonathan learned to be mature and they faced truth with courage.
3. Maturity means you allow the “beloved” to go
How tough was it for Jonathan to allow his best friend to go.
How tough was it for David to say good bye to his friend. He wept.
I have been in the ministry for 25 years. I have many pictures of brothers and sisters from different places of the world. It was very difficult to say good bye to them. We learned to be men when we allowed each other go to different ministries.
4. Maturity means finding God in our lives
What were their final words to each other?
“Go in peace, because we have sworn both of us in the name of the LORD, saying, ‘The LORD shall be between me and you, and between my offspring and your offspring, forever.’”(42)
“Finding God, seeking His face, seeking His presence, dwelling in His house” those were the words David learned and wrote. He went to the wilderness. What is in wilderness?
Nothing, it is desert. But right there the Lord was with him.
Amen
Rev. Nerses Balabanian,
Calvary Armenian Congregational Church, San Francisco
An Archery lesson: David becomes a man (35-43)
David and Jonathan agreed previously about a secret sign for communication. The sign had to do with archery. The narrator describes it best:
“I will shoot three arrows to the side, as though I shot at a target. And behold, I will send the youth, saying, 'Go, find the arrows.' If I specifically say to the youth, 'Behold, the arrows are on this side of you, get them,' then come; for there is safety for you and no harm, as the LORD lives. But if I say to the youth, 'Behold, the arrows are beyond you,' go, for the LORD has sent you away…” (18-23)
In Hebrew the verb to shoot and the verb to teach are the same (yara). The noun form of it is the famous word Torah, (the first five books of the bible). For the Hebrews, teaching is not just a random act; it is “shooting” the arrows to the target, penetrating deep inside. Teaching should have direction. Jonathan plays a major role to help David to learn and grow and become a man.
Jonathan did exactly what it was agreed upon (35-43)
Jonathan shot the arrows as David was hiding and listening. Then Jonathan talked to the youth (in reality to David) and said,
“Is not the arrow beyond you?” And Jonathan called after the boy, “Hurry! Be quick! Do not stay!” (37b-38)
How difficult was it for Jonathan to say to his best friend “Hurry up, go, go quickly. Do not come back. Go to the wilderness. Go and hide. I am shooting the arrows, I am teaching you, telling you, guiding you…go, go do not look back.”
He appeared to be shouting to the young boy, but he is actually talking to David. He is saying farewell to David and welcoming the arrival of maturity, of manhood.(both are maturing)
Let the Lord be with both of us. They cried and kissed each other. And they departed from each other in God’s peace and presence.
What can we learn?
1. Maturity demands loyalty
Both David and Jonathan did not compromise their faith in God and their commitment to each other. This is maturity.
• Christ taught us to be loyal to the Christ who was crucified for our sins.
• Each of us should carry the cross and follow Him.
• Our faith is tested daily. Temptations are surrounding us. Only when we have faith in Christ we can face them. Only when Christ is our Lord and King we can learn to be loyal to each other and to God.
-This last week I found in you maturity in facing crises. Yes we went through the crisis of fighting against cancer. Some of you were prayer warriors. Some of you reached out to the practical needs of the family. Some of you called me and said they were available. This is loyalty to Christ and to each other. Some think that our church is not spiritual enough. They leave us and go to other churches. I hope they make a commitment to Christ and also show loyalty to the “church family” wherever they are.
Attending church is not just receiving teachings, it is becoming part of the body of Christ. I believe in loyalty in our relationships. Jonathan and David taught us that.
2. Maturity means truth before peace.
Jonathan stood up for the truth even against his own father.
David stood up for the truth and did not compromise in choosing the easy way out. He did quit nor became a slave of Saul.
Of course peaceful relationships are commendable. Yet, when truth is sacrificed and not revealed, the “peaceful” relationships are not reliable; they are fake.
James says: “But the wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable.” (James 3:17)
In Armenian it says: Holy, Honest, true, pure…..
First truth then peace; we like the other way around.
Even Jesus said:
“Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I have not come to bring peace, but a sword….Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me,” (Matthew 10:34)
Your relationships will not always be smooth. Jonathan’s relationship with his father did not go in peace. Truth was more important than unreliable peace.
Watch out here, we should be careful how we speak truth:
Paul says:
“speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in all aspects into Him …” (Eph 4:15)
Let me add here, for me the ultimate truth is Jesus Christ, when we have him in our lives, peace that God can give only through Him will be in us.
Both David and Jonathan learned to be mature and they faced truth with courage.
3. Maturity means you allow the “beloved” to go
How tough was it for Jonathan to allow his best friend to go.
How tough was it for David to say good bye to his friend. He wept.
I have been in the ministry for 25 years. I have many pictures of brothers and sisters from different places of the world. It was very difficult to say good bye to them. We learned to be men when we allowed each other go to different ministries.
4. Maturity means finding God in our lives
What were their final words to each other?
“Go in peace, because we have sworn both of us in the name of the LORD, saying, ‘The LORD shall be between me and you, and between my offspring and your offspring, forever.’”(42)
“Finding God, seeking His face, seeking His presence, dwelling in His house” those were the words David learned and wrote. He went to the wilderness. What is in wilderness?
Nothing, it is desert. But right there the Lord was with him.
Amen
Rev. Nerses Balabanian,
Calvary Armenian Congregational Church, San Francisco
Human Capabilities and Development Conference
Human Development can be measured in economic terms but this raises important questions – who provided the data and what is being measured? More significantly, what is not being measured?
Dean Fadi Asrawi of Haigazian University’s Faculty of Business Administration and Cyra and Donald Goertzen of HU’s Center for Economic Justice (formal launching set for later this academic year) attended the annual conference of the Human Development and Capabilities Association in the Hague, the Netherland, September 5-9.
One of the characteristics of the Capabilities Approach (CA) to human development is that it measures the “freedoms” that people may exercise in any given society while recognizing that the freedoms that might be valued will vary from one individual to another.
“Considered radical or even eccentric a few decades ago, CA has become one of the dominant approaches to measuring human development,” says Donald Goertzen of the Center for Economic Justice. “It is favored by most development nongovernmental organizations and is one of the categories that even very powerful institutions such as the World Bank will use to determine the impact of the projects it funds. There is a general consensus that Gross Domestic Product and other more traditional indices simply don’t provide a very accurate picture of what is going on in a particular community or society.”
Two of the recognized pioneers of the CA approach are Martha Nussbaum and Nobel Laureate Amartya Sen. The latter received the Nobel Prize Nobel Prize in Economics in 1998 for his contributions to Welfare Economics and Social Choice Theory. Nussbaum was one of the conference speakers and Sen was the official respondent to keynote speaker Tony Atkinson who spoke at the conference opening the evening of September 5.
The trio from Haigazian attended numerous presentations and panel discussions during the three-day event, taking in some together and some separately, depending on individual interest.
Notable presentations included one by a panel from the United Nations Development Program on the occasion of the release of its annual Human Development Report. A respondent noted from the report that there continues to be widespread lack of awareness about the challenges posed by climate change and governments – which generally are aware of the climate change threat – are painfully slow to act.
Somewhat unusual was a report at the end of the conference by a panel of World Bank researchers on the “middle class.” While “the poor” have been the subjects of millions of reports since the U.N.’s founding sixty years ago, the middle class has rarely been the subjects of research. It was suggested that the push for democratization and social change most typically comes from the middle class.
Most of the presentations were given by graduate students in development studies and other fields, while some were made by development practitioners and representatives of multilateral agencies.
“This was a unique opportunity to meet people who are really giants in their fields,” Dean Asrawi noted. “We should consider presenting at next year’s meeting.” The conference meets annually and next year it is set for Jakarta, Indonesia.
Another aspect of Capabilities Approach is that it is not a justice theory and it eschews any grand theory of justice. Rather, it emphasizes incremental approaches to increasing human freedom. Sen noted in his response to Atkinson that if a person is assured by his or her government of basic health care, he or she will be free to make a different set of life choices.
In this respect, a CA approach might be particularly appropriate to a discussion of economic justice in a country such as Lebanon where people’s expectation of government is not high, Goertzen suggests. Rather than fretting too much about what government fails to do, we can consider the smaller approaches that might make government and other stakeholders more responsive.
Funding for Asrawi and the Goertzens to attend the conference was provided by the Mennonite Central Committee’s small grant facility. The MCC is a partner with Haigazian University in the development of the Center for Economic Justice.
Dean Fadi Asrawi of Haigazian University’s Faculty of Business Administration and Cyra and Donald Goertzen of HU’s Center for Economic Justice (formal launching set for later this academic year) attended the annual conference of the Human Development and Capabilities Association in the Hague, the Netherland, September 5-9.
One of the characteristics of the Capabilities Approach (CA) to human development is that it measures the “freedoms” that people may exercise in any given society while recognizing that the freedoms that might be valued will vary from one individual to another.
“Considered radical or even eccentric a few decades ago, CA has become one of the dominant approaches to measuring human development,” says Donald Goertzen of the Center for Economic Justice. “It is favored by most development nongovernmental organizations and is one of the categories that even very powerful institutions such as the World Bank will use to determine the impact of the projects it funds. There is a general consensus that Gross Domestic Product and other more traditional indices simply don’t provide a very accurate picture of what is going on in a particular community or society.”
Two of the recognized pioneers of the CA approach are Martha Nussbaum and Nobel Laureate Amartya Sen. The latter received the Nobel Prize Nobel Prize in Economics in 1998 for his contributions to Welfare Economics and Social Choice Theory. Nussbaum was one of the conference speakers and Sen was the official respondent to keynote speaker Tony Atkinson who spoke at the conference opening the evening of September 5.
The trio from Haigazian attended numerous presentations and panel discussions during the three-day event, taking in some together and some separately, depending on individual interest.
Notable presentations included one by a panel from the United Nations Development Program on the occasion of the release of its annual Human Development Report. A respondent noted from the report that there continues to be widespread lack of awareness about the challenges posed by climate change and governments – which generally are aware of the climate change threat – are painfully slow to act.
Somewhat unusual was a report at the end of the conference by a panel of World Bank researchers on the “middle class.” While “the poor” have been the subjects of millions of reports since the U.N.’s founding sixty years ago, the middle class has rarely been the subjects of research. It was suggested that the push for democratization and social change most typically comes from the middle class.
Most of the presentations were given by graduate students in development studies and other fields, while some were made by development practitioners and representatives of multilateral agencies.
“This was a unique opportunity to meet people who are really giants in their fields,” Dean Asrawi noted. “We should consider presenting at next year’s meeting.” The conference meets annually and next year it is set for Jakarta, Indonesia.
Another aspect of Capabilities Approach is that it is not a justice theory and it eschews any grand theory of justice. Rather, it emphasizes incremental approaches to increasing human freedom. Sen noted in his response to Atkinson that if a person is assured by his or her government of basic health care, he or she will be free to make a different set of life choices.
In this respect, a CA approach might be particularly appropriate to a discussion of economic justice in a country such as Lebanon where people’s expectation of government is not high, Goertzen suggests. Rather than fretting too much about what government fails to do, we can consider the smaller approaches that might make government and other stakeholders more responsive.
Funding for Asrawi and the Goertzens to attend the conference was provided by the Mennonite Central Committee’s small grant facility. The MCC is a partner with Haigazian University in the development of the Center for Economic Justice.
