Happy Easter! He is risen!
I hope everyone had a blessed Easter. Here in Hong Kong, even though we are part of China and ruled by a Communist Party that professes atheism, we still enjoy public holidays on Good Friday, Easter, the First Monday after Easter and—a first this year!—the first Tuesday after Easter.
I am sharing a short story of mine that was just published in Everyday Fiction. Based on a true story. Enjoy!
A friend of mine is dying from Parkinson’s disease. He was diagnosed 15 years ago, when he was at the peak of his career. At that time he was the president of a big company, had a house overlooking the Pacific Ocean and lots of money. As his body succumbed to the disease, my friend became reflective, humble and thoughtful–considerably different than he had been during his rise to the top. He accepted his fate with minimal anger or self-pity, although he was occasionally prone to moments of despair.
Recently I reflected on what my friend would have done if he were offered this choice: he could experience the great personal and professional accomplishments of his life, but with the knowledge that his body and mind would slowly waste away before he turned 65–or he could accept a simpler, less ‘successful’ life, but one in which he would remain healthy and content until he died in his sleep at the age of 80.
I never got the chance to propose this hypothetical question to my friend. He is no longer capable of conversation and has advanced dementia. What do you think? Do we expect that athletes who win gold in the Olympics would choose the consequences of a sudden, early death instead of a life of mediocrity and anonymity? What would James Dean’s answer have been before he was killed in a terrible accident at the age of 24? Would he have chosen to die young but exist forever as an American icon instead of living a long, healthy life as a happy but insignificant citizen?
But is the only variable in this fictional equation the choice of long life or success? Many people don’t wish to be famous or succeed on the world’s terms. A percentage of those people will also die prematurely from Parkinson’s or some other fate. It is a truism that the most important thing is not how long you live but how well you live. Does the expectation (or hope) that they will live a long time allow a person to indulge their impulses and ignore their imperfections? In my friend’s case, he was often vain and insensitive when his career was ascending. In the years after he left his job to receive treatment he became reflective and gentle.
I am presently focused on achieving things: publishing a book, writing articles. Of course I try to be a good person, etc etc. Jesus said “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” Treasures can come in many types and sizes. I wouldn’t have wanted my friend’s job in a big company, but I want other things. Am I ignoring what really counts because I’m acting as if I will live forever? What if my choice was to ignore the passions that motivate me and focus more on serving God and my fellow brothers and sisters? I hear you say ‘why not do both?’ Perhaps I could. It’s a question of treasure.
I write freelance articles for Christianity Today. My ‘beat’ is Hong Kong, where I have lived for more than 35 years. As you can imagine, things have changed a lot over that time. Two of the news organisations I worked for are now closed. Activities and speech that used to be commonplace are now prohibited. This makes for a lot of interesting potential stories. One of the articles I wrote for Christianity Today explored how different churches were responding to the recent political and societal changes. Here’s the story.
Pastors and church leaders I interviewed were very careful in their comments, although many expressed optimism that nothing would change in the coming years and religious freedom would remain intact. The common phrase was “we’re not political. Our purpose is to share the Gospel.” Things got a bit more complicated when I tried to do a story on churches and Christian organisations that were evangelising newcomers from Mainland China. Hundreds of thousands of Mainland Chinese have moved to Hong Kong in recent years, and many are curious about Christianity. Most had no religious affiliation in China, where the government regulates the five official religions. Hong Kong has complete religious freedom, and yet, when I tried to interview church leaders and Christian organisations about their outreach to the newcomers, the most common response was a polite refusal to discuss the issue. No one wanted to go on the record with details about their glowing success in bringing Mainland Chinese to Christ.
This is the current atmosphere in Hong Kong, where most people play it safe, refrain from doing or saying anything that they think the government wouldn’t like or that might “poke the panda.” None of these churches and organisations are doing anything illegal. Unlike in China, it is lawful in Hong Kong to evangelise in any setting, and to share the Gospel with children. Christian organisations were willing to talk about their outreach to newcomers in the context of teaching them Cantonese or helping them find a school for their children, but wouldn’t go on the record about their success in sharing the Good News with those same families.
I can tell you that many people who have migrated across the border from Hong Kong are exploring the Christian faith and responding positively to Christian outreach. I just couldn’t get anyone to talk about it for attribution. Several organisations actively involved in evangelising Mainlanders simply refused to discuss it. Too sensitive. Not worth the risk. So that’s one story that won’t be appearing in Christianity Today.
(The names of people in this post have been changed)
In a small room in a care centre in Changsha, China, a young girl is struggling to swallow her food. Jiajia has cerebral palsy, which has twisted her limbs and made it impossible for her to speak. Intellectually, she can understand language but finds it difficult to learn basic concepts. The woman who is patiently feeding Jiajia is a paid caregiver. It costs several thousand dollars a year to meet the costs associated with Jiajia’s care, and many times that to care for the other girls in the building where she lives.
None of them will ever be able to hold a job, contribute to society or live on their own. Jiajia’s caregiver, Mrs. Chen, loves the girls in her care, and during the pandemic chose to be locked down with them for weeks on end, separated from her family.
Not far away, a single mother is caring for a child who was born with multiple disabilities, including an intellectual disability. Her husband left the family and the child’s grandparents are unable to help out. Living on the fourth floor of a building with no elevator, the young mother struggles to care for her son and pay her bills. She could have abandoned the boy when he was a baby—it was common back then—but she chose not to. Now, she relies on support from an international charity.
The money to support these children comes from donors scattered around the world. Their compassion is prompted by the stories of struggle, hardship and perseverance that the non-governmental organizations (NGOs) send to them on a regular basis.
Are these donors wasting their money?
Perhaps they should direct their donations to organizations whose efforts are based on effective altruism. Effective altruism, simply put, aims to provide the most effective solutions to humanitarian situations, by undertaking projects that benefit the most people while providing quantifiable results. “Most effective” is generally assumed to mean “bang for the buck”: achieving the most impact cost-effectively.
Examples of this approach include widespread de-worming projects and the provision of malaria nets. Many thousands of people can be helped through the donation of just a few thousand dollars.
So why spend that amount of money on Jiajia when the same amount could benefit many more children? Isn’t it more effective to direct your money where it can benefit the most people?
I believe this approach ignores the value of the individual and replaces it with a simplistic mentality that focuses on statistics and generalizations.
I have known people in the Philippines who went blind because they couldn’t afford the few dollars required to pay for the necessary medicine, and men who succumbed to tuberculosis for the same reason. These are individuals facing heart-rending challenges. They are not part of a grand calculation.
A study in 2015 calculated that the “best buys” in development aid could be expected to save a life for around $3,400. Viewed in this light, Jiajia is not a “best buy.”
There is no doubt that the provision of anti-malarial bed nets and deworming medicine are valuable programs. But when it comes to assessing the effectiveness of these programs, advocates of effective altruism often throw in concepts like future productivity—as if the mere fact that lives were being saved wasn’t quite enough, and some kind of economic or productivity metric was necessary to show how valid the programs are.
This approach demeans the essential value of what these programs are doing: they are saving lives. Additionally, it ignores the complex realities that most aid recipients confront daily. In most regions where these programs are in place, families face many more challenges than just mosquitos or worms: they face intractable problems like entrenched poverty, discrimination and broken governments. Those are problems that are not so easily solved by a simple program that dispenses a product or drills a well.
But that’s not part of the effective altruism sales pitch. When making recommendations on where donors should effectively allocate their donations, there is the ‘feel good’ factor that a donor is not only helping solve a crisis, but also being smart with their money. They can be satisfied that their donations were used where they were most effective, and therefore they have done the right/best thing with their money.
Then what happens to Jiajia when donors decide that helping her isn’t cost effective? Advocates of effective altruism must answer the question of what they would do if a family member or loved one was stricken with an incapacitating malady and they didn’t have the money to provide for them. What if they lived in a country with insufficient health care? This person has immense value to them, but under the dictates of effective altruism, asking donors to direct funds to their care doesn’t make sense.
Advocates of effective altruism like to say that their approach prioritizes the use of evidence and reason in search of the best ways of doing good.I suggest that donors should contribute to projects that have widespread, measurable impacts. That’s great. But they should also remember that Jiajia has value, and assisting her is true altruism. Those who prioritize statistics over individual lives—and call it “the best approach”— are disregarding this important reality.
There are few places in the world where traditional ways of life still continue as they have for centuries. I’ve been to a few, and wonder how much longer they will remain immune to the encroachment of modern civilisation. Indeed, as you will read below, even some of the most unique traditional groups find modern technology useful: nomads with solar panels!
But it’s the adherence to a worldview that distinguishes cultures, and the eagle hunters of western Mongolia adhere to a worldview that honours nature, their place in it and the bond between humans and animals.
https://www.thrillist.com/travel/nation/eagle-hunter-festivals-western-mongolia
This is an article I published in the magazine Thrillist a couple of years ago. The Kazakh eagle hunters gather every autumn to display their skills (more correctly, the tandem skills of eagle and human). It is well worth a visit!
You don’t hear much about the Sermon on the Mount these days, and Jesus’ admonitions not to resist an evil person, pray for your enemies, etc. aren’t at the front of Conservative Christian thought, at least not in America. There is a fair amount of attention paid to gender issues and “traditional” morals.
But when it comes to the teaching of Jesus–the stuff he actually stressed while he was on Earth–most of it is treated as idealistic and frankly, not something anyone is actually supposed to go and do. Are you worried that it really is more likely that a camel could make it through the eye of a needle than a rich person could make it into heaven? I don’t think you are. And I don’t think that you and I feel we need to give to anyone who asks, or let our opponents hit us twice (the ‘turn the other cheek’ thing). Many times it seems smarter to hit the opponent first, and certainly we would be fools to deliberately let him take another shot.
The Sermon on the Mount and the verses that follow it are clear, but they are radical and against our basic natures. They aren’t practical. We treat them the same way we treat Jesus’ comment that you should cut off your hand if it causes you to sin. It’s hyperbole, a metaphor.
Okay, throwing away your eyeball/cutting off your hand is deliberately extreme, in order to make a point, but the message of Chapter 5 in the Gospel according to Matthew is not. It is a prescription for the way God’s people should live on Earth. And it is achievable–but only when we acknowledge that the Kingdom of God is “at hand”–it is here and readily available.
Jesus comes across as a weakling because he has all the power in the world–power that is available to those who enter this Kingdom. If he was some random itinerant preacher making these statements, he is a fool. If he is God, then he can back them up. That’s why he can instruct us to be overly generous, submissive and non-confrontational. That’s what life in the Kingdom is like when an all-powerful ruler is in charge and his people can feel free to be kind, generous and accepting.
A certain brand of Christianity ignores these words. Many people want a muscular brand of religion and a warrior messiah. Maybe they like the imagery of Revelation–but that book doesn’t pertain to how we are supposed to live our lives in the here-and-now. Jesus gave us the prescription, and we can trust him that if we actually behave as he instructed us to behave, not only do we have a place in heaven, but he will be with us as we live our lives as he clearly told us to.
I still don’t know why I did it.
A day at the beach with family. Frantic calls from people on the rocks. A young girl floundering in the waves. Without hesitation I run into the sea to rescue her.
That’s not like me. I’m not the hero type. I like to think I have high ideals and a good sense of morality; that I would be willing to sacrifice for a cause. But on a hero/coward spectrum, I would place myself in the middle. Besides, I’m 67 years old, and although I’m in good shape, I am not a strong swimmer.
This all happened last month, on a beach in Hong Kong that is remote, beautiful and expansive. If you go there during the week, you’re likely to find a handful of beachgoers, lots of seashells and pleasant, warm surf. Even on weekends, it’s not overcrowded. Tourists from Mainland China like to go there, primarily to snap photos of themselves on the large outcropping of rocks that juts into the ocean. My wife, our two children and their fiancees had hiked to the beach and were playing a game of Spike Ball badly on the sand, when we heard the commotion. People shouting. My wife thought maybe they were making a video. But we could discern a single voice repeatedly, frantically crying “Help!”
Out in the waves, not too far from shore, a girl was bobbing in the surf, waving her arms and disappearing under consecutive waves, only to bob back up. Without thinking, I started running. I hadn’t planned to go swimming that day, so I was wearing cargo shorts. Made slow progress as I waded through waves at the shoreline, then began to swim slowly toward the girl. My son had followed right behind me, and I was relieved to see that this young, strong rugby player was passing me and cutting through the waves while I laboriously made incremental progress. I felt the undertow that was keeping the girl from making it to shore, and began to wonder whether I was in trouble. My son reached the girl and brought her safely to dry land while I struggled to get myself to the beach. The girl was still clinging onto him, long after they had stepped away from the water’s edge. My son looked back to make sure he didn’t have to undertake another rescue, but as I slowly waded to shore, I gave him a thumbs-up.
I won’t write further about the grateful mother, the stunned girl or the indifference of the multitude that wandered the shore. My son was impressively humble about the rescue. The incident seemed to pass with a minimum of review or excitement. We got back home and had dinner. I didn’t share my thoughts and feelings, but I was confounded by what I’d done and perplexed about why I’d done it. Over the next couple of weeks, my wife enjoyed recounting the episode to friends, focusing as much on the apathy of other beachgoers as the heroics of her son (my role, although mentioned, understandably got less attention than the successful rescue). I have not brought the subject up with anyone, and my son and I have yet to do a debriefing on what prompted us to respond as we did.
When my wife tells the story, often the listeners point out the danger involved in attempting to rescue a drowning swimmer. They mention that the conditions that put the swimmer in danger would also confront the rescuer, along with the danger of the panicked swimmer dragging the rescuer down with them–that sort of thing. There seems to be a practical assessment of the situation that indicates that it is dangerous–or even foolhardy–to try to rescue a drowning swimmer. Leave it to the professionals, or accept that nothing could be done.
I get it. And there was a moment there where I thought I might be in trouble as the “elderly” would-be rescuer realised he also was in danger of drowning. Perhaps it was unwise to rush into the water without understanding the conditions involved and recognising my limited ability to rescue someone. I have never attempted anything like this before and although I would like to think I’m someone who would put his life on the line to aid a person in danger, until last month I had never done so.
Why did I? I began running without analysing the situation or thinking about what I was doing. As I reflect on this incident, I have no answers. I am astonished that this late in my life I can still surprise myself. I am left with the feeling that something profound happened. I don’t share this incident to bolster my image: after all, not only did I not rescue the girl, I didn’t come close and who knows if I would have been able to if I had reached her. But I have drawn a few conclusions. One is based on a tragic story that a friend mentioned after my wife finished sharing about the incident at the beach. The friend recounted a time many years ago when a man rescued a drowning mother and daughter after heavy waves had swept them out to sea on the south side of Hong Kong Island. He was able to get them safely to shore, but then drowned himself, unable to climb out of the pounding surf before he became exhausted from the effort. His wife and children looked on in horror as he died. I remember the incident–it happened shortly after we arrived in Hong Kong 35 years ago. But while our friends agreed that sometimes “there’s nothing you can do” and tacitly implied that the man should not have attempted to rescue the pair, I disagreed. I can’t say that I would run into the waves again if I saw a drowning girl–I didn’t know that I would do it when it happened last month. But sometimes these circumstances demand a response that doesn’t involve calculation. This is a deep mystery to me, because I didn’t think I was someone who would reflexively spring into action to (attempt) to save someone in danger.
I don’t know if I would do it again. But I’m glad I did it.
I went to an AA meeting last night, and the turnout was quite good: more than 40 people showed up on a Monday night. There were a number of old-timers, and I guessed that between all of us–counting the guy with 4 days and the folks who number their sobriety in decades–altogether we had far more than 200 years of sobriety.
Now, I know this is a “one day at a time” program, and what really counts is maintaining healthy sobriety. Alcoholics Anonymous has a lot of cliches, and one of them is “the person in the room with the most sobriety is the person who got up earliest this morning.” But I was struck by two things. First, despite the hardships and challenges and disappointments that inevitably occur in sobriety ( our lives didn’t suddenly become perfect once we stopped drinking), everyone in that room could say that their lives had gotten better. The troubles and anguish and self-loathing that we’d all experienced had been replaced by hope and self-respect and usually much better circumstances. 200 hundred years of changed lives is quite an impressive feat.
Then I thought about the alternative: if those 200 years had instead been filled with the continued obsession, insanity and despair of rampant alcoholism. If we had all continued walking down the dead end path of drinking and drugs and denying that we had a problem. It is not hard for me to imagine the cumulative chaos that would have ensued. Of course, we wouldn’t have made it 200 years.
It seems quaint now, but there used to be something called the Fairness Doctrine, which obligated broadcasters to present all sides of issues that were of importance to the public. “Doctrine” is a suspicious-sounding word, but it was a rule that ensured that broadcasters didn’t use the power of the airwaves to limit the viewpoints that listeners and viewers had access to.
The Fairness Doctrine was established in 1949 and was essentially abolished in 1987. Along the way it found critics and supporters on both sides of the political divide. I started my journalism career when the Fairness Doctrine was still in force. There were only 3 major television networks and the Internet was a vague dream. Back then, the concept was that broadcasters shouldn’t be allowed to promote just one side of a story: for example, if there was a local bond issue coming up for a vote, radio stations couldn’t run ads and produce news stories that only reflected the station owner’s preference. As a reporter, I was expected to produce fair and balanced stories. My personal standard for determining whether I had achieved my goal was simple: 1) after viewing the story, would audience members be able to discern my personal position on the issue, and 2) if viewers had access to all of the information I gathered in preparing the story, would they agree that I had presented the issue fairly–providing a balance between conflicting arguments.
In the chaotic, partisan media environment of 2025, this approach seems archaic and naive. But honest, folks, it wasn’t difficult to present a fair and unbiased news story. Some reporters and some TV stations crossed the line, but the mandate to be accurate and impartial was real back then. The “mainstream media” was trusted, whether it was Walter Cronkite or intrepid investigative reporters or just the local news team in your city. The change started in the 1980’s when entertainment creeped into TV news. The result was more sensationalism (“if it bleeds, it leads”) and fluff. A news director at my former station in Oklahoma was contemptuous of the “journalists” who wanted to produce stories on topics of importance to the public. He didn’t think that was necessary, and certainly didn’t think it would sell as well as stories on celebrities or sex crimes or talking fish.
The Fairness Doctrine was done away with during the Reagan administration, but there were efforts to bring it back, sponsored by both Republicans and Democrats. The regulation only applied to broadcasters, and by the 90’s an entirely new structure would have been necessary in order to regulate cable channels. By the 21st century, the online flood of content and opinion had created the environment we have today: virtually no news provider is considered impartial. People choose their information based on their preferences. It would be impossible to require Joe Rogan or John Oliver or Tucker Carlson to present opposing views on their shows. For one thing, it would be a violation of their First Amendment Rights. But we could use a new version of the Fairness Doctrine to ensure that the major corporations that control our media don’t prevent Americans from getting a full picture of what is going on in their world. Remember: the Fairness Doctrine required broadcasters to devote some of their airtime to discussing controversial matters of public interest, and to air contrasting views regarding those issues. TV and radio stations could choose how to meet those requirements: maybe a public affairs show or an editorial. This approach not only informed citizens, but avoided the polarisation that plagues America today.
What would a new Fairness Doctrine look like the in the Internet Age? These days, anyone can have their own podcast or website or social media platform. It would be unworkable–and unconstitutional–to require each influencer or podcaster to present opposing views or provide time to anyone who challenged their claims. The Fairness Doctrine of 1949 was valid because in 1949 there were a finite number of channels and frequencies for TV and radio stations. That’s not the case today. So the focus must turn to ensuring that accurate information is shared; that outright lies, false reports and intentionally misleading content is identified and prohibited. The Constitution has never protected lies. It protects free speech and opinions, but anyone who knowingly presents falsehoods should be held accountable. It is society’s only form of protection when AI can now be employed to mislead Americans in myriad ways.
It wasn’t that difficult back in the 80’s to tell the truth on a TV newscast. And back then, different views were given space on the same platform. In the 2020’s, when the number of platforms is diverse and many are controlled by powerful people with specific agendas, the requirement for truth, accuracy and fairness has never been more crucial.
It’s only fair.
My mother attended a small church in South Carolina, where the Sunday service began promptly at 11 a.m. and ended precisely an hour later. If the pastor was overwhelmed by the Spirit and his sermon began to run long, parishioners would fidget in their seats and glance at their watches. They joked that they loved the Lord, but they loved NASCAR, too, and they needed to get home, have lunch and get settled in front of the tube to watch the races.
NASCAR races are typically run on Sundays, and are most often held in states that contain a large proportion of Bible-believing folks. Texas, for example, hosts a stop on the NASCAR circuit and recently passed a law requiring that every public school classroom must display the Ten Commandments. The law is set to take effect in the coming school year.
The Ten Commandments are viewed as the bedrock of Judeo-Christian values. It’s easy even for non-Christians to get behind most of the commands: don’t murder, don’t steal. Even “honour your father and mother” seems like a healthy concept. No doubt legislators in Texas, Louisiana and other states that are preparing similar laws are committed to ensuring that the precepts contained in the Commandments are impressed on the youth of the nation. As Moses, who brought the Commandments down from Mt. Sinai, told the Israelites, “These commandments that I give you today are to be on your hearts. Impress them on your children.”
Christians believe that their salvation comes from grace, not from the Law. The Jews had 613 clear commandments in the Old Testament that prescribed correct behavior and clearly defined unacceptable acts. Jesus didn’t abolish all those laws or say that they no longer mattered. But modern Christians don’t feel obligated to follow ancient laws regarding unclean food, how to deal with mildew or the correct way to sacrifice a goat. Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross and New Testament teaching show that belief in Christ’s atoning death is essential–not a series of laws.
So what do we do with those Ten Commandments? They are a prescription for ideal moral behavior, except for maybe a couple of items that seem a bit out of place in the 21st century. One is the prohibition on making graven images. This was important to the Israelites 3,000 years ago, when they were surrounded by other religions that fashioned their gods out of wood and stone. The other confounding commandment pertains to the Sabbath. That’s the 7th day of the week, a day of rest. The Lord was very clear on its importance. Indeed, in Exodus 35:2 Moses says “Whoever does any work on it is to be put to death.” Serious stuff.
So what are the children in Texas or Louisiana or Arkansas to make of this? Stores everywhere are open on Sundays, millions of Americans work on the seventh day of the week. Moses told his people that they couldn’t even light a fire in their homes on the Sabbath. And yet, in May the Texas House of Representatives passed the Ten Commandments bill on the Jewish Sabbath. Maybe that didn’t count, since most of them were Christians and honor the Lord on Sundays. Sunday is also the day that the Texas Motor Speedway held the NASCAR cup series. But nowhere in America is it described as a mandatory day of rest. It might be the day when most Christians go to church, but a lot of them go to work on that day.
Do we get to choose which of the Commandments we follow? Just the most obvious ones, like not murdering someone? How exactly do we honor our parents? And what about “misusing the name of the Lord?”–or what the King James Version of the Bible referred to as ‘taking the Lord’s name in vain’. In recent decades that commandment has primarily been interpreted merely as a ban on swearing, as opposed to a to a mandate to respect and revere the Lord. If the Ten Commandments are so important that they should be placed in a fourth grade classroom, shouldn’t the people who advocate this also abide by them? At the very least, they might want to go a little beyond the pious action of posting a Biblical treatise on the wall and devote time to exploring what is really meant when the Lord says “you should have no other gods before me.”
Jesus reserved his most pointed criticism for the Pharisees, who were the religious leaders of his day, the people who told others how to act and judged their behavior. The Pharisees believed that laws equalled piety. They were all about the rules. They were wrong.
petermaize 