Here it is. I am taking the dive into the deep, jumping off the cliff clinging to the rope, not sure where this will take me, but convinced I need to start writing. I have written Leaders Briefs for our Breakthrough email newsletter and a few little magazine articles, but this is different. I am going to write from my heart about what I think and feel, without editing and refinement. I admit it is a bit frightening.

I am afraid that what I write will be trite, pedantic musing that will be boring to everyone. Or that, worse yet, no one will read it or even care about the things I write about. But really, isn’t that a common fear, the fear of being overlooked, ignored, not taken seriously?

That is why I must write. In my work in the inner city of Chicago I rub shoulders daily with people who are ignored and overlooked, not just by the internet, but by a society obsessed with success, with a fast-paced culture that doesn’t have time for the illiterate, the dispossessed, the disparate, the impoverished.

I am going to try to raise consciousness, starting with my own. I believe that the discipline of writing will be good for me. It will force me to put my thoughts into words and the words to paper, or in this case, the world wide matrix, the biosphere, the stratosphere, well, at least, out there somewhere for others to see.

I hope to write just a few paragraphs and try to pump this blog full of helpful links to audio files and articles that will give voice to inner city strugglers who carry the disproportional brunt of poverty on their backs. I hope others will join in bringing resources of knowledge and understanding so that we all can move forward in opening our eyes to the realities of social injustice and experience the joy of God’s work in the midst of the pain.

So, that’s it for today. I leave with a quote I heard on a podcast interview of William P. Quigley from an aboriginal woman. It confronts the patronizing attitudes of people who want to “help” the poor.

"If you have come to help me, you are wasting your time. If you have come because your liberation is bound up with mine then let us struggle together."