Gestures Matter!

Spiritual leaders must learn that there is a difference between spirituality and spiritual influence. Spirituality is internal, spiritual influence is external.

It is not enough to develop internal spirituality, spiritual leaders must also learn how to express their spirituality externally in order to gain spiritual authority.

Tom Peters has a great example from the current auto industry crisis.

Violence Against Christians in India

Condensed from a longer, detailed and disturbing report:

For the last 11 months, Christians in India's Orissa state and elsewhere have been the objects of hateful persecution. A report by internationnal human-rights investigators, lays out the mistreatment and abuse in unsettling detail.
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In Orissa State, 65 identified people have been killed and 85 are still unaccounted for.
Among those killed were one man buried alive near the village of Rudangla; several
people burnt to death and others cut into pieces.
- 117 churches of all Christian denominations destroyed. Not a single Hindu temple has
been destroyed – despite allegations of retaliation by Christians.
- Approximately 5,000 homes destroyed.
- An unspecified number of Christian businesses destroyed, with the loss of livelihood for
their owners.
- 54,000 people displaced from their homes, forced to take shelter in 14 State-sponsored
Relief Camps in Kandhamal District; together with many hundreds living in non-State
camps, including 2 ‘camps’ in densely overcrowded buildings in Cuttsack town.
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- It is estimated that about 20,000 are still living in the jungle or have fled to big cities.
Some may be living with relatives elsewhere.
- In addition to the violence in Kandhamal District, 2 other Districts, Japati and Baragras
District, have also experienced similar atrocities, including killings, looting and burning
of churches and homes. 2 Relief camps have been established for approximately 2,700
people who have had to flee their homes.

Faith-based Counseling in China

Following the Sichuan earthquake, there is more openness to spirituality in helping people recover from trauma. This article has a couple of interesting observations:

But on December 28, 2007, President Jintao relieved some of China's cultural schizophrenia: He signaled a move from atheism to secularism—from "no God" to "a non-political role for God." He called an unprecedented Politburo session on religion, telling his top 25 leaders, "The knowledge and strength of religious people must be mustered to build a prosperous society."

"People in power realize the [success of] economic systems of the West. Intellectuals in China are aware of ties between religious prosperity and economic prosperity. … But while Buddhism and Confucianism [China's dominating schemas] are fatalistic and passive, Christians have a sense of justice and social action."

World War I

Tuesday marked the 90th anniversary of the end of World War I, with the handful of surviving veterans at the vanguard of commemorations for the fallen of "The War to End All Wars."

Leaders from the powers that fought the war, now allies, gathered at the site of the 1916 Battle of Verdun, where 300,000 men were slaughtered over 11 months of bloody trench warfare.

French President Nicolas Sarkozy paid homage to the sacrifice and suffering of the war's "eight and a half million dead, 21 million wounded, four million widows and eight million orphans."