Bono in the Pulpit

“God, my friends, is with the poor and God is with us if we are with them.”

Bono, NAACP acceptance speech [Youtube].

We are staying at home today and doing alternative worship, alternative fellowship kinda stuff. A few young people stayed over last night. For our special meal later today [i like the word “love feast”] i will probably play Bono’s acceptance speech at the NAACP. Bono gives a superb word on loving our neighbour and God being with the poor.Dan Wilt’s blog tipped me off to this.

Andrew

Andrew Jones launched his first internet space in 1997 and has been teaching on related issues for the past 20 years. He travels all the time but lives between Wellington, San Francisco and a hobbit home in Prague.

15 Comments

  • Beth says:

    A fuller version of more or less this same speech was given at the USA National Prayer Breakfast last year, and is about to be published in book form as “On The Move” by Thomas Nelson. It has a lot more scripture and more narrative of Bono’s spiritual journey.
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gUdrYDk8rVA

  • Bono in the Pulpit

    Andrew Jones (aka TallSkinnyKiwi) points out this great “preaching” from Bono’s acceptance speech at the NAACP. “God, my friends, is with the poor and God is with us if we are with them.” Bono, NAACP acceptance speech LINK: TallSkinnyKiwi: Bono…

  • Bono in the Pulpit

    Andrew Jones (aka TallSkinnyKiwi) points out this great “preaching” from Bono’s acceptance speech at the NAACP. “God, my friends, is with the poor and God is with us if we are with them.” –Bono, NAACP acceptance speech LINK: TallSkinnyKiwi: Bono…

  • Cathryn Thomas says:

    hey dude!
    We were just about to have our “love feast”- when i hit your link…. Carl is here from the UK- Tamzin sent him over.. cool stuff going on…. feels like God is upping things on speed and intensity. So we’re about to sit down and nosh… well stick you and Bono on the table and have a listen. our home is feeling like grand central station!
    xok8

  • Mike Anderson says:

    Mother Teresa as rock star! Cool.
    We question where God is in all of human suffering … not knowing it is often His tenderest caress.

  • joe says:

    I like Bono. Hes a good guy.
    But he has also been taken for a ride by others. The RED thing is a complete disaster – raising far less from sales than it cost in publicity.

  • Dan Wilt says:

    Justice vs. charity.
    A good friend, Nathan Reiger (Winnipeg Centre Vineyard Community), likens this to someone walking by a river, and seeing a baby floating by in a basket.
    He rescues the baby.
    Then he sees another, and another. He rescues them, too.
    Then, hundreds of babies come floating by, and the person gets some others to help, trying to rescue all the babies they can.
    Charity and mercy. Good and right.
    But then someone asks “Who is putting all these babies in the water?”
    Some should stay and rescue the little ones, but someone else should go confront the person doing this.
    Justice enters the room.

  • Johnny Laird says:

    Yeah, I picked up on this Bono vid from another source this week as well.
    He can preach!
    Peace & Blessings
    J

  • Truth Seeker says:

    Bono is a good guy, great singer, but I have to go with Joe on this one. The thing I could not stand about his speech was the reference to the Red Campaign. It is a huge disaster! That money could have been better spent on other things. Bono means well, but good intentions doesn’t mean justice.
    I know a lot of Christians who are getting down and dirty with the poor and do it with little to no help from celebrities and have been doing it for years, far longer than Bono and others have. Many I have talked have said that guys like Bono may mean well, but do more to hurt their work than anything else. Throwing a bunch of money at Africa, Asia, and wearing a red shirt does nothing unless you are changing the moral compass of those who need help. A lot of the poverty can be erradicated when we work on the moral issue in these poor area, just as we need to work on the moral issues plaguing our own countries.
    Blessings,

  • Truth Seeker – do you really believe that its just people’s morality that makes them poor??? Are you ignoring the rape of the world by the West, ill advised loans that put whole countries in debt so that they pay more in debt repayment than they do an education and health care, trade laws that screw people and don’t allow them to earn a living wage, patriarchical system supported by Christians that don’t allow women to have control over their lives, “moral laws” that ban sex education, …. It is not those that need help that need moral instruction – they need aid, and money, and eduucation, and healthcare. It is the oppressors – often the rich westerners that need moral instruction.

  • Megan says:

    Actually, I don’t remember RED being mentioned in the speech. RED was mentioned when the speaker introduced Bono, but not during the speech.

  • Truth Seeker says:

    Julie,
    Re-read my posting…I said that both the West and the rest of the world need to be instructed about morality:
    “A lot of the poverty can be erradicated when we work on the moral issue in these poor area, just as we need to work on the moral issues plaguing our own countries.”
    I am not denying that there are immoral people in the west who do those things, not at all. But what I am saying is that simply throwing money at it will not solve the problem. If my kid is acting like a demon child I just don’t simply throw money at him hoping to solve all the problems. No, I sit him down and explain why he needs to change. We need to do that with the West.
    In the poor countries, we need to educate them and help them stand on their own two feet, not just throw a bunch of money at the fat cats getting rich over there, which there are a lot of in the poor countries in the governments and such. Corruption, greed, and swindling is not just a western capitalistic thing, its everywhere.

  • Truth Seeker says:

    Immorality sees no color, culture, sex, economic, ethnic differences. It affects everyone, from the rich to poor, both male and female, in all countries and in all ethnic groups. Immorality is not a western thing or eastern thing, it’s a universal fallen human thing!

  • Megan says:

    Truth…I’m sorry, but your “we” just sounds Very patronizing to me. We are just as guilty as the non developed world in Many moral quandries…..

  • Truth Seeker says:

    Megan,
    Why the hang-up one one word? It is not patronizing. I have admitted that their are guilty people in the Western world, but I also realize that there are guilty people in the non-western world. I am not blind to it. I am not suggesting that “we” are any better because I know we are not. But let’s be truthful here. As Christians we have a moral and spiritual message to tell. If we don’t tell them, or if someone else from a non-western world does not tell them, they will be morally bankrupt, just as if the shoe were on the other foot. We have non-western missionaries coming to the west because of our moral and spiritual voidness.
    The whole human world is morally bankrupt and in need of help. That’s where the Gospel comes in. It is not wrong whether it comes from the west or not. Someone needs to go. I will go and tell them if I have to. Noone is going to stop me by saying that the west is corrupt. I know that, but we have Christians here, they don’t in many cases. So I go!
    Blessings,

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