The question for me is not are we political, but how are we political? We need to be politically engaged, but peculiar in how we engage.

With the early Christians you couldn't have God as your father unless you have the church as your mother. This isn't accepting the church as a perfect thing.

The more I travel, the more I see how important it is to each population to see that their history of the good and the bad is remembered by others.

Maybe we are a little crazy. After all, we believe in things we don't see. The Scriptures say that faith is "being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see" (Heb. 11:1). We believe poverty can end even though it is all around us. We believe in peace even though we hear only rumours of wars. And since we are people of expectation, we are so convinced that another world is coming that we start living as if it were already here.

How can we worship a homeless man on Sunday and ignore one on Monday?

Look through the prayer books. You'll see lots of dates. You'll see names of Native Americans remembered. This was an open-sourcing project among so many people.

We are faithful not to the triumphant golden eagle (ironically, also an imperial symbol of power in Rome) but to the slaughtered Lamb.