Wednesday, February 15, 2006

My Good Friend Bono...

I don't think I can really do justice here to how much this speech has already impacted me. About a week ago, my proffesor asked us if we would like to watch Bono at the national prayer breakfast (for my ethics class). So I said "no - I hate that guy". No - you guessed it, I was the biggest keener around.

After my prof said that maybe - although this is potentially kinda crazy - that Bono represents a new "face" of Christianity which is striving for social change without hiding behind the cloak of evangelicalism. He said "if Bono had a church, I'd go to it, and not because he is a rock star". And my answer would probably be the same. I guess for me, it would be partly because he was a rockstar. But man - if you get a chance - try and find the video. If not, here is the printed transcript (and audio is on this page too)..

Check it out.

Some highlights for me:

"Even though I was a believer.Perhaps because I was a believer. I was cynical… not about God, but about God’s politics"

"It’s annoying but justice and equality are mates. Aren’t they? Justice always wants to hang out with equality. And equality is a real pain in the ass. Seriously"

"But justice is a higher standard. Africa makes a fool of our idea of justice; it makes a farce of our idea of equality. It mocks our pieties; it doubts our concern, and it questions our commitment. Six and a half thousand Africans are still dying every day of preventable, treatable disease, for lack of drugs we can buy at any drug store. This is not about charity: This is about Justice and Equality."


I guess the true question is: will I do anything about it?
I plan to.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Hey Sharelle,

funny you watched it in your class, as last Thursday my Ethical Reasoning prof read out to us parts of his speech. Which blew my mind & caused me to print the whole thing off the internet to read & think about. It's pretty crazy how spot on Bono is on some things, I liked the quote "where you live should not determine whether you live." & "It's not about charity, it's about justice". Thanks for posting about that speech, I think more people need to read it.

Ben S. said...

what teacher is this? those TWU profs...

Kathryn Dechant said...

So my brother's friend Alex works for Bioware (they make video games) and apparently Bono is one of the new owners of the company. So Bono is coming to Edmonton to tour the place and meet some staff, so Alex gets to meet him. I am so jealous. I knew you of all people would appreciate this.

Spiro said...

i juuuuuuuuuuuust got around to listening to this. good show.