Kansas report

I returned home Sunday night around 11:30 after having traveled nearly 18 hours from Newton, Kansas, with my nine intrepid traveling companions. Due to my lack of sleep the previous three days (maybe 13 hours total), I collapsed into bed and slept for 11 uninterrupted hours.

The conference was a good experience, particularly the time I spent with my fellow Goshen College students. Being a student who commutes 30 miles to school two days a week means I don't get to establish the kinds of relationships enjoyed by traditional students, so I really value and appreciate these kinds of opportunities to connect with my peers.

Jim Wallis stuck to a script familiar to Sojourners' readers, but offered some challenges directly to his Mennonite audience. "If nonviolence is to be credible," he said, "it must answer questions violence purports to answer in a better way." It isn't credible to merely protest war--particularly while living a comfortable, risk-free middle class life--peacemakers need to provide alternatives. And peacemakers need to be willing to risk as much as those who would espouse violence as a sometimes-necessary means to an end. Christian Peacemaker Teams would be one example of peacemakers willing to risk their lives for the peace. They boldly ask: "What would happen if Christians devoted the same discipline and self-sacrifice to nonviolent peacemaking that armies devote to war?" Yes, what if? The implications seem staggering ...

Mr. Wallis said much more, of course, but I've run out of time for blogging. Perhaps I'll write more later.

I think the highlight of the trip (for me anyway) was playing in a cobbled together bluegrass band in Saturday night's talent show. Several Goshen folk (guitars, mandolin, voices) collaborated with a few Bethel students (fiddle, upright bass, voices) to play a few standards and songs by Gillian Welch and Old Crow Medicine Show. I had so much fun that I decided I need to play more despite my utter lack of time to do so. Oh, and I need to get a mandolin (despite my utter lack of funds to do so).