Thanks, NPR

It's so easy to be absorbed in the tiny scope of the world I know.

There is an Iraqi man who occasionally reports for NPR from his community in Iraq. Over the last few months he has given details on the personal challenges and fears he faces on a daily basis. I first heard him giving the account of his wife birthing their first child, a son, into a culture of hostility. The last report was sometime last week when he described a trip to the community market, where he witnessed 9 small children, playing soccer in a nearby park, killed. Several men drove up and opened fire on the group of children, no life was spared. Hearing the chaos, the families of the children came out of their homes and started firing on each other. The voice of the reporter was so quietly numb. He had fear and sadness in his voice, but not shock, not surprise.
There is also a segment on NPR called "This I Believe". People send in their essays describing, usually rather adamantly, what they believe. I've heard anything from "I believe in baking" to "I believe in kindness" to "I believe that God does not know the future". The latter I heard this past week. The physicist described growing up "religious", blindly believing that God knew everything about him, every step he took, all of his future. But after several years of higher education he began to form his own beliefs, including but not limited to, "Creator is only one mask that God wears" and "When I get life right, I think God is pleasantly surprised". In the end I was led to conclude that the man both thought that God was big enough and powerful enough to create the universe, but that He had no power (or didn't want any part in it) post-creation.
I especially enjoyed the 5-part series following a reporter travelling down the Ganges River in India. The roughly 1500 mile river is sacred to Hindus and supports life for millions of Indians. He reported on the toxins in the river. He reported on the economics of the river. He visited with various people, most memorably (to me) two small girls selling goods in a market along the river. They claimed to be 9 and 10 years old, but the reporter believed them to be half that. Child labor is a punishable offense here. It's a way of life for those two girls, and I'm sure millions of others. I know of at least 50 kids who spent the afternoon eating snacks, hunting for easter eggs, napping, running around their backyards.

I am challenged by NPR. It keeps my eyes open to life outside of the culture of northern Colorado and of my church community. It also keeps me deeply rooted in the truth that God is my only hope. Keeps me so thankful that this huge, scary, cynical world is not all there is.