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Family members cry out as Canadian missionaries attacked in Kenya return home
http://www.macleans.ca/article.jsp?content=n072902A
John and Eloise Bergen are back home in Calgary, now. I’m really glad they made it back, because it seemed to be a little difficult getting them back. Apparently, their daughter-in-law Robyn McGough left a comment on my last post – she told us about some of the financial difficulties regarding bringing them back. Anyways, I’m glad they’re back.
So I’m currently at campus training days in Abbotsford, at a place called Summit Bible College or something like that. It’s really great, except that I have to drive back to SFU tomorrow morning and work on my thesis more. But before I get to that…
My day started off busy, with a trip to the dentist’s at Metrotown. I had to pack all my stuff before I left, though, because I knew I would be ending up today in Abbotsford. So I put it all into a big hockey bag, and went off to the bus. Two buses later, I made it to Metrotown and trekked all the way to the dentist’s office. After that (I considered getting take out from Sushi garden for lunch, but it wasn’t open yet), I made my way back to the bus stop but a guy was still by the side of the lane that had a homeless sign or something, so I was able to give him my $1 McDonald’s gift certificate that I got from Winter Conference like 3 years ago (it’s still valid). I didn’t want to give him any cash, because cash in the hands of unknown persons is not a good idea (e.g. it could be used to feed their substance abuse, or what not). Better to actually feed them than feed a (potential) addiction to drugs or alcohol. But I digress.
I made it back to SFU, worked on my thesis some more (I also like working on my laptop while on the bus), and then got a thesis date booked. Yes, that’s right. I now know when my thesis will be defended (i.e. the end is in sight). Then I went with my Mom to get her car, and I drove all the way down to Abbotsford. Listening to AM 730 (all traffic, all the time), I found out that Hwy #1 was backed up from like 122nd to 192nd or something like that, so I took Lougheed Hwy instead and then I heard that there was an accident further down on Lougheed. Who knows if I actually saved any time. Anyhoo, I made it to campus training days (and I managed to catch the last 5-10 min of dinner service).
Campus training days is kind of like Summit (which we have every year at the end of September, as students) – except that it feels more like a family reunion for a really big extended family. The opening session seemed to focus a lot on weddings, engagements, new children, and other personal things. We actually recapped a lot of what we’ve been doing as a ministry across Canada, too, but it felt really integrated and it felt like people were sharing these things as naturally as if it had come up in conversation.
So staff is like family. Kinda. I’d be overly idealistic if i thought being a staff/intern is like being in one big (always) happy family, but it’s still at least nice to see that even personality-wise, I’m guessing it’s easier for people like these to get along with each other. Like Johnson has said, “I think you need to be a certain kind of person to join staff” (or something like that).
Side note: I met a whole bunch of people from Waterloo and Western. Ok, not a whole bunch. But, for example, I met Andrew who grad’d from Waterloo two years ago in Comp Sci I think, and he knows Tabitha and Sarah Also, I got to play hockey with him and Rod Alm. (though he thought you were more involved with IVCF at the time [I told him it was CCF]). Oh yeah, and Tab, Kolten Macher is an amazing MC.
I was really happy to see Josh and Deb Wong. They got to share a bit about how they’re doing and some photos of Abel with the whole group, too. It was also good to see Derek and Amy and all the ex-UBC/SFU students-turned-staff. And the list goes on and on. Silas, too (he’s using my guitar for worship leading)! Ok, I’m going to stop naming names now, because I have to go work on my thesis and/or go to sleep. I have to drive back to SFU tomorrow, the earlier the better (is what I’m now hearing from my prof).
Traffic on the way to Abbotsford
The last-minute dinner I ate once I got there (it’s as good as it looks)
Ha. Muzungu. And there’s a guy named Paul?
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So people are starting to flood in to Vancouver right now. They’re staff friends of mine from our Christian campus ministry. In fact, today in the Church parking lot while Johnson was parking, I spotted Gloria, Leah, and Hannah Lee.
I was really excited to see them! Hannah is here for Campus Days (our campus ministry training days), which I’m hopefully going to be able to attend this week depending on my thesis progress. Basically, the timetable has been rushed and now I need to hand in my thesis to my committee members sometime this week (the earlier the better; or else maybe on Friday, because then I might be able to attend Tues-Thursday of Campus Days. maybe).
Anyhoo, today’s my Sabbath, so I’m going to sleep as early as possible (I hope) since I’m not doing any work today, so that I can wake up super early tomorrow and get cracking on that thesis.
Bye!
P.S. I wanted to take a picture in the parking lot, to document and blog about it, but I was too busy catching up to them and chatting.
*Warning, may contain minor spoilers*
I watched The Dark Knight tonight. In fact, it’s 3:30AM and I just got home from Metrotown, because I managed to catch the 12:00 AM Friday showing with Johnson, Ricky, Alana, and my cousin Sam.
Maybe some day soon I’ll post a real review of it, along with pictures of the line-up, etc. The gist is I thought it was great! Or rather, it’s wonderful. I want to watch it again to catch all the nuances, and then maybe I’ll have a more complete of what I think about the movie and its themes (it’s 2h30min long, after all!). But for now, I hope this post will be enough to give you all an idea of what I think about The Dark Knight.
“The Dark Knight”
If you ever watch the very ending of The Dark Knight, I think you should ponder this quote a bit and think about what it means:
“For our sake…
he made him to be sin…
who knew no sin”
- from 2 Cor 5:11a (ESV)
I’m not sure if you heard about it in the news, but earlier this week a missionary couple from Vernon, BC were attacked in the home they were living in while doing missionary/humanitarian work in Kenya. John, 72, and his wife Eloise, 63, were attacked in their home by 5 men. From what I understand, they were living in a walled compound with guards, but the guards have since been arrested presumably for helping with the crime. Mr. Bergen was beaten just outside their home with machetes and other weapons and left virtually for dead, while his wife Eloise was subsequently attacked inside the home while she was taking a bath, had her hands bound by the attackers, and was sexually assaulted. The couple’s story after that is quite amazing, because Eloise was able to free herself and find her husband, haul him into their vehicle, and drive to their organization’s compound. From what I’ve heard, he may have died from his injuries if his wife wasn’t able to get them to safety, because his cuts were quite deep (although it seems that thankfully no major arteries were severed).
The reason I’m making myself blog about this is because of what I heard and saw in a video interview I caught on TV with John Bergen from his hospital bed. I can’t find that footage anymore, but I will relay as best I can remember it. In the interview, John shared a lot about what happened to them, but a pivotal part came when the interviewer asked him what he would tell his attackers if he got a chance to speak with them. Mr. Bergen’s response moved me a lot, because he said something like – I would tell them that Jesus loves them, and I forgive them, and that God wants to forgive them, if they’d receive it.
As far as I can remember, never have I heard such a specific and accurate message of love from a Christian aid worker on Canadian or American television. Specific, because he was unashamed to mention the name of Jesus and because he knew that those young men needed to “receive” God’s forgiveness. That’s very different from what you might hear from some “Christian” leaders or public figures, who might tell you that your beliefs about God don’t matter as long as you’re a decent person. But Mr. Bergen’s message of love was also accurate, because while those young men could be greatly helped by having the Bergens’ forgiveness, by being rehabilitated and integrated properly into society, and by being lifted from poverty, etc. – that’s not ultimately what they need. What they need the most is peace. Peace with God, because by default, we are enemies of God and are in a state of hostilities towards Him. Which is no big deal if it was your 3-year old cousin, but not so cool when it’s God (who’s right).
It’s like if you met a young teenager, and you found out that he had purposely set fire to his Dad’s house and now he was living in the city, broke and desparate. Sure, you could give him a place to stay and feed him, but that’s just a temporary fix. On the other hand, if you knew that his Dad wanted him to come home beecause he loved him, wouldn’t the most important thing you could tell the guy would be to go home, apologize to his Dad, and trust that his Dad would make things right? That’s pretty much what John Bergen wants to tell his and his wife’s attackers.
What I think is easy to miss in this story is that these are the men who raped his wife. You can tell how precious Eloise is to him when you hear him describe his pride in how his wife managed to save him and haul him into the vehicle. How his “little girl” managed to life his 128lb body after being attacked herself, he’s not too sure. I’ve never been married, but I am a guy, and I would imagine that it would be tearing a lot of guys up to know that their wife was sexually assaulted and tormented by pitiable men such as these. For that reason, and many others, I really respect how John and Eloise Bergen have responded to this incident. From what I’ve observed, John Bergen is an inspiration and a challenge to live as a man of integrity to the praise of God’s glorious Grace.
Note: Here are some links for more this story.
thestar.com – “Missionary won’t leave Kenya despite attack”
“What we’re going to do is go to the prison where the perpetrators are and show them that Jesus loves them and we forgive them,” he said. “So that’s the plan.”
CTV British Columbia – “Missionary describes terrifying ordeal in Kenya”
(features several videos)
CBC.ca – news article, including this 7 minute long audio interview with John Bergen (RealPlayer file)
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Yes, my blog is called “Total Rip-Off” for a reason. Because I haven’t written a blog post for awhile, I will refer you to an interesting discussion I’m having on my friend Ricky’s blog. So if you feel like reading a bit about family and whether “family comes first”, take a visit: Ricky’s post (my comment is down at #6).
Basically, I have a theory that family DOES come first, and there are practical reasons why. And yes, this is a question worth asking, because if you thought about it, why should family come first? All people are valuable because they are human. That’s why people should be treated equally. So why should you give your family priority over others in need? Well, perhaps there are practical or emotional reasons for it. I make up discuss a few of them in my comment.
I’ve never read the book, The Shack, but here’s what seems to be an interesting (though long) review of it:
http://www.boundless.org/2005/articles/a0001788.cfm
(from Boundless Webzine; review written by blogger Tim Challies)
From what I’ve read of the review, The Shack sounds theologically kinda sketchy… 
(This post has lots of photos from the shoot. Scroll down for a link to the album)
Ok, so I heard that Battlestar Galactica was filming this week at my school, Simon Fraser University. Now, this confused me, because the last time BSG was filmed here was for the opening miniseries of the whole TV show, when the AQ gardens & pond served as a location on the planet/colony Caprica. If you’ve ever watched any BSG, you should know that Caprica along with the other 11 colonies got nuked to waste by the Cylon invasion. And the Colonial fleet (i.e. the humans) has spent 3 1/2 seasons travelling away from Caprica/SFU. So WHY might they be fliming at SFU again, in the same location of the AQ pond and gardens? I have no idea. There’s a slight possibility that they’re just going to film tightly on certain parts of the AQ pond, and hope that no one recognizes that it’s the same place as shown on Caprica, but I doubt that.
I Wiki’d Caprica last night while starting this blog post, and I found out that they’re making a spin-off TV series called Caprica set on that planet 50 to 70 years before BSG! So I started getting excited when I found this out, but then I realized that they couldn’t have been filming Caprica. Why? Because President Laura Roslin would have been like, 0 years old in that time period, and Mary McDonnell (the actress who plays President Roslin) isn’t even listed as part of the cast of Caprica on Imdb.com. But WHY am I even mentioning President Roslin of the Twelve Colonies?
BECAUSE I met her yesterday.
Yup, I met Madame President herself, and she even shook my hand and asked my name! I have to confess, I didn’t actually know her real name at the time (Mary McDonnell). But she was very nice and after thinking about it for awhile, I’d have to say my first impression of her is that she seems like she’s really the President who just happened to be asked to act in some Colonial TV series for a bit, and so now she’s pretending to be an actress. In other words, I have a hunch that a lot of her real personality is poured into how she carries herself in her role on BSG, cause it seems a bit like you’re actually talking to the President when you get to talk to her.
Anyways, the whole reason I was up there yesterday was to take photos! And I’m hoping that the real BSG community (not a poser fan like myself who’s only watched like 10% of the show over the last few years) will come in here and help figure out where the last half of this season is headed and why they seem to be filming back on Caprica. So without further ado, let us begin the photo journalism!
Thoughts & notes: If you’d like to link or post my photos elsewhere, please go ahead but I’d appreciate it if you credit me (Paulman C) and link back to this blog or blog post. Also, my friends have called me a paparrazi before, and now I’m afraid I may have literally crossed over into that category. Maybe there’s a handy euphemism, like “embedded photo-spectator” we can use, instead.
Now for the photos:
Here’s a link to the entire album I have up on my Picasa (1600×1200 max resolution, only): FULL ALBUM
If you click on each photo, it will send you to the Picasa photo page and you can click on a small Magnifying Glass button near the top right to zoom in. Here is a selection of the photos I took:
1. At first I heard that the only cast member involved in the shooting would be the woman wearing black, but since I was far away I couldn’t quite tell who she was. I had a hunch it might be the President.
2. This is when they started getting ready to film the scene. Note the strange futuristic baby stroller behind President Roslin.
3. Ok, here we go! The President (Mary McDonnell) starts filming her scene as she steps in the pond (which is usually really, really yucky).
4. Ok, now she’s under the fountains (which were brought in just for the filming). I’m not sure why she’s there, but she may have looked sick or something. At the very least, her acting seemed despondent/desparate, almost. Maybe she’s dying (well, we “know” she’s dying).
(There are a lot more photos in this sequence if you want to check my album)
5. And thus concludes the filming. Ms. McDonnell bowed to the audience in response to the applause for her performance.
6. And to close, some shots of Ms. McDonnell after the shoot.
Anyways, around this point I asked Mary McDonnell if she’d be up for taking a picture with me, but she declined saying “not looking like this!” 
I guess she felt a little disheveled, what just coming out of the water and all. But she felt bad as the group of us were walking towards the trailers (I was walking to another building on campus in the same direction), and she asked if we’d like her to sign an autograph or something. I was a little hesitant as I said, “sure…”, and started taking off my backpack to get something (my backpack is a bit disorganized and I was trying to figure out what I might have that she should sign), but then she sensed my hesitation and told me that I didn’t have to if I didn’t want to. So I felt kind of bad, because she was trying to be nice to me and I was acting all reluctant! Well, Ms. McDonnell, if you’re reading this, I didn’t mean to act reluctant and I really appreciate your niceness! From this encounter, I definitely get the impression that Mary McDonnell puts thought and effort into making sure her fans feel appreciated. So kudos for that 
I’m going to head back up to school, now. Who knows if they’re still filming? But then again I’m not really up at school to take photos… (or am I?)
Note: In the last photo, I think Ms. McDonnell looks like a Dark Jedi/Sith Lord with that hood, heh heh. Perhaps she’s actually Darth Roslin?
Discussion: So, what do you think they’re filming up here at SFU? A flashback to Caprica? Or maybe a recreation/reconstruction of this part of Caprica on the new Earth?
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Ok, quickly before I go to sleep, I wanted to blog about today – Canada Day!
Today was July 1st, 2008 – which makes Canada 141 years old! Anyhoo, I wanted to make a couple points with this post, the first one being that I’m proud to be Canadian, and you should be, too.
Whether you’re a Canadian citizen or you’re just living here, I think it’s good to care about Canada and be happy to be here. As in, if that doesn’t describe you, that’s bad If you think I’m being harsh, well maybe I should explain myself a bit more. I liken patriotism to being part of a family. Sure, your family might not be perfect (or even good) but it’s important that you love your family and the people in it, and that you do what you can to help your family out. Why? Well, because they’re the people closest to you (i.e. they are within your reach and influence) and because you should care about EVERYONE anyways, so why NOT your family?
In the same vein, if you live in Canada and/or you’re Canadian, what happens to our country should matter a great deal to you. So if you’re someone who doesn’t really care about what Canada is like 10 or 20 years from now, I have to ask you to reconsider, because we’re all in this together. You are influencing Canada’s future (our future) whether you like it or not, be it through your action or inaction.
And on the subject of Canadian pride, we as Canadians have a lot to be proud of. Low urban pollution (I live in Vancouver; and I’m pretty sure Hamilton is still pretty well-off compared to a lot of the world), a free and democratic society, and ice hockey are some of the great things going for us. If you’re still down on your view of Canada, then think about my family analogy – even if your family has issues, it’s still your family; surely you can find SOME good things about it to be happy and proud about?
Anyways, in summary, I would like to challenge you to the following, this Canada Day onwards:
1. Take action to make Canada a better society/place/nation.
2. Be happy that you’re a Canadian or that you live in Canada.
In other words, please be a great LOVER of Canada. Care about Canada and take delight in her.
And now for Canadian Idol:
I just wanna say that I think this is by far the best year of talent that we’ve seen on Canadian Idol (not that I’ve watched a whole lot of Canadian Idol over the years). But I think it’s undeniable. Half of the top 20 are contenders to win this thing! And they’re SO GOOD! They’re wonderful musicians and vocalists! The consistency of the quality in this group is better than what I’ve seen in the American Idol groups, ever! I don’t know if the best of this batch are better than the best that’s ever come from American Idol, but hey, maybe they are. In summary, there’s AMAZING Canadian talent on Canadian Idol this year.
Who’s my favorite so far? I dunno. I think I’m a big fan of like 5 of them or something. One sticks out in my memory, though, because:
a) she’s Mennonite (from Alberta, heh heh)
b) she’s one of the 10(?) or so who’ve shown to me that they can really sing
c) she’s a girl, what can I say? (ok, I mean she’s pretty)
d) she seems really nice
Yup, it’s Amberly Thiessen. Ever since I saw her name and city, I was saying to the TV screen, “I bet she’s Mennonite!” Hey, I’m Mennonite (Brethren), too!
Two things I’m wondering, though. #1 Is she just ethnically Mennonite or actually Christian Mennonite? and #2 Was Ben Mulroney playing the Mennonite Game with her right before her last performance? (I missed what they were talking about ’cause I changed the channel a bit too late, I think)
And to end this little blog post…
A random photo from this Canada Day evening:
My little Butterscotch Marble chocolate-milkshake experiment
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