Yes, it's been months since my last blog, but hey, I'm at the mercy of the current of events and the temperature of my inspiration.  Something sufficiently registered on my radar a week ago today so I'm ready to take the plunge with you once more.

Monday, November 2, found me at my alma mater, Fuller Seminary, as a panelist at a symposium on the future of Asian American churches.  As a respondent, I'd been given a draft of Dr. Jonathan Tran's two lectures ahead of time, so I knew going in that a good twenty percent of this first lecture was aimed squarely at our church (Evergreen Baptist Church of LA) and the one Dave Gibbon's planted in Irvine (Newsong) a little more than a decade ago.  Following his lecture, I used my ten minutes to take apart his equating us (an 80+ year-old church compromised of four generations of various Asians, Asian Americans, and all kinds of other groups) with a church that was planted not long ago and that didn't come close to having our diversity in ages and generations.  Dr. Tran was extremely gracious in receiving all of our critiques.  Immediately after he issued his brief response, I was on my way to LAX to catch the last flight to Dallas.  The symposium overlapped with my commitment to mentor nine 30-40ish senior or solo Asian American pastors and they had gathered again from around the country for the final installment in our 18-month-long experience.

All of this is my way of explaining why I woke up in Texas, Tuesday morning, without a clue of what had exploded all over the internet the previous day.

North Park Seminary's Dr. Soong-Chan Rah had been flipping through the new catalogue from Zondervan on Monday when something caught his eye on one of the pages.  The clearly Asian graphics on the cover of one of the promoted books was unexpected.  Even more, though, was the book's title: "Deadly Viper Character Assassins: A Kung Fu Survival Guide for Life and Leadership."  Co-authors Mike Foster and Jud Wilhite had framed an important but rather boilerplate topic (achieving and maintaining Christian character for leaders, executives, etc.) with this sort of "Kill Bill" (Quentin Tarantino's series of movies that revolved around various assassins) gimmick.  I've only read reviews of the book and glimpsed brief snippets of its content, but I believe they came at this topic from the angle of there being these different kinds of martial-arts-related "assassins," e.g. ninjas, who are out to destroy your character if you're not careful.

Okay, so I never studied martial arts but I was a huge Bruce Lee fan (as was EVERY AsiAm male in the '70s) and, to a much lesser degree, I've seen my share of Jackie Chan, Jet Li, Sho Kosugi (ninja superstar), and I've even watched an occasional Chuck Norris and Steven Seagal flick (ok, most of the Seagal flicks).  Oh yeah, even Jason Scott Lee.  And even if the reviews are tepid, I'm probably going to go see the "Ninja Assassin" when it comes out later this month just because, even at the tender age of nearly 55, I still find myself drawn to martial arts movies.

So then, why was I drawn into the firestorm that erupted last week against the authors and the publisher of "Deadly Viper Character Assassins"?  Why wasn't I just drawn to this book on Christian character that is framed within a martial arts, Asian-esque motif?  Why isn't the way the authors chose to use Chinese characters and a strange intermixing of Japanese and Chinese martial arts images a huge boost to my historically beleaguered AsiAm male ego? 

Since I'm already in the mode of truth-telling, my AsiAm male ego honestly hasn't really felt that beleaguered for more than ten years now.  It's partly due to the fact that I'm too old and misshapen to make any non-Asian assume that I am a martial arts expert anymore.  But mainly it's because I've long since made peace with how I look and how others look at me.  Maturing as an apprentice of Jesus has been a sizable part of that inner transformation.

So when I first heard about the building outcry against the co-opting of historically hurtful or demeaning Asian images by the authors and the publisher, my first reaction wasn't pain or outrage.  It was more like "So what's all this fuss about?"  In scanning the blogosphere, I saw where another AsiAm Christian blogger was calling me out, along with Francis Chan, Dave Gibbons, and Peter Cha, to weigh in on this controversy.  Sheesh!  That was the first time I've ever been publicly called out twice in the same week (Tran's lecture @ Fuller, remember?).  I haven't come across anything from those other three yet, but I ended up jumping in head first Thursday, after coming back from Dallas the night before.  By Friday, I was part of a 7 AM conference call with Rah, Pastor Eugene Cho (Quest Church, Seattle), and Kathy Khang,  of InterVarsity Christian Fellowship.

My three brilliant colleagues made the case to these executives from Zondervan exactly why the use of these images was so offensive to so many Asians and Asian Americans.  Rather than me going into all of that here, please check out Soong-Chan's blog at http://profrah.wordpress.com  If you scroll down, you will get a chronological understanding of this issue as well as where everything now stands.  Zondervan has asked us to please be patient as they gather more information, confer with Mike and Jud, and weigh their options.  We told them that a public offense requires a public apology but they never promised that they would eventually issue one. 

They kept saying that the content of the book was solid and wanted to be sure that none of were offended by the content.  My friends and colleagues went out of their way to affirm the lessons on Christian character.  I, on the other hand, quipped that, depending on how the authors and the publishers respond to the growing outcries against the co-opting of these historically limiting images for many Asians and Asian Americans would have everything to do with whether or not I had issues with the book's content.  "The Bible teaches that we're all part of Christ's body and if any part of the body is in pain, the entire body is supposed to feel that same pain.  Whether or not anyone intended to offend or harm any Asians or Asian Americans, we are telling you that that is what you've done.  All of your sincerest apologies mean nothing to us if you continue to sell the books or maintain the "Deadly Vipers" webpage.  To me, how you all handle this issue, now that we've taken the time to explain why these images are offensive to us, is going to speak volumes about all of your character."

What's most disturbing to me about all of this is that this is the second time in three years that Zondervan has put out a book that portrays Asians in a demeaning way.  The first time was when they published Youth Specialties "The Skit Guy," in which one of the characters to portray is an immigrant Chinese restaurant delivery guy.  Rah called them on that and they eventually pulled the material.  Back then, they reassured Rah that they were going to improve their vetting process so that this would never happen again.  The fact that it has means that, despite whatever ways Zondervan believes that they have broadened the scope of their vetting process, it still has major blind spots when it comes to Asians and Asian Americans.  The four of us told them, in no uncertain terms, that their use of these images was entirely inappropriate, insensitive, and offensive to many of their Asian and AsiAm brothers and sisters in Christ.  I said to them, "So what if Mike and Jud had settled on harmfully stereotypical images of people with serious disabilities as the way to frame this book on character?  What if, instead of ninja "character assassins," they chose to portray severely disabled people like the old circus sideshow 'freaks' who are out there wanting to 'disable' our characters.  Are you telling me that you'd green light this project?  Well, it might not sound like the same issue to you, but it's pretty darn close."

I've made the decision to get involved and I hope that you will too.  Get your thoughts together and then send an email to one of the executives that was on that conference call with us.  His name is Jason Vines and his address is Jason.Vines@zondervan.com.  Let Zondervan and the authors know that many of us Asians and AsiAms are proud of coming from cultures that spawned the martial arts and that even more of us have well-developed senses of humor.  So this all this hullabaloo isn't because some of us are a bunch of thin-skinned, humorless party poopers.  Tell them, though, that we're upset because Zondervan supposedly already got the memo three years ago that this kind of stuff is completely unacceptable.  We expect more and better from Christians at a time when America has an African American First Family and there increasing numbers of black and brown faces in all kinds of roles in the media today.  We're just tired that the majority of roles offered to Asian actors and actresses still revolve around martial arts, gangsters, and sex objects.  On second thought, I'd love to see an Asian or AsiAm male portrayed on the big or little screen as a sex object.

When President Clinton had nowhere to hide from his affair with Monica Lewinsky, former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich vociferously condemned the President and demanded that he resign his office.  It was only years later that Gingrich confessed that he himself was entangled in an adulterous affair while he was busy attacking Clinton.  One of the other politicians who led the charge to get Clinton to resign was Senator John Ensign (R-Nevada).  I don't recall Ensign being part of that outcry over ten years ago, but the fact that he was is now clear because just this week, Senator Ensign confessed to having an affair with the wife of one of his staff members.  So the press is having a field day now with his apparent double standard. 

Last year, former Democratic golden boy and presidential candidate John Edwards came out about his illicit activities with a campaign photographer and producer.  Predictably, those on the right side of the aisle had a field day tearing Edwards apart, especially since his wife Elizabeth had garnered sympathy during the primaries with her ongoing battle against breast cancer.  There were calls for his resignation, though, because he no longer was an office holder.  But there were plenty of bold predictions that Edwards' lack of self-discipline and poor judgment had killed his hopes of becoming the Democrats' choice for president someday. 

And then we have the most recent case of Gov. Mark Sanford (R-S. Carolina).  Not long ago, he grabbed headlines with his libertarian-like rejection of federal bailout money for his state's schools, but he was overruled by the courts.  Three days ago, articles began popping up in the papers and on the internet, stating that he had gone missing this past weekend.  His wife said she didn't know where he was but wasn't worried.  His lieutenant governor (and political rival) said it was highly inappropriate for the governor just to disappear like that without letting him or other state officials know of his whereabouts.  His staff at first also said that they had no idea where he was, but then began stating that Gov. Sanford had always been an 'outdoorsy' guy and that he was somewhere on the 2,500 mile Appalachian Trail, where he was hiking to recover from that recent legislative donnybrook.  Like vultures drawn to a decaying carcass, this benign mystery began to attract growing numbers of Democrats and reporters in general as Sanford continued to be missing in action and further evidence seemed to point to a remote airport, not a remote hiking trail.

This latest politician's nightmare came to a head today when Gov. Sanford called a press conference and admitted that he'd been in Argentina trying to wrap up a months-long affair he'd been having with a close friend in that country.  Apparently, his wife was told of his unfaithfulness five months ago and they've been seeking help and counsel.  He announced that he had resigned his position as chair of the Republican Governors Association so that he would have more time to figure out what this all means for his marriage and his family.  Repeatedly, he admitted that he had violated "God's moral law," was now suffering the consequences of that failure, and apologized explicitly and profusely. 

As if on cue, those on the left side of the aisle are not surprisingly screaming "Hypocrite!" and demanding that Senator Ensign follow his oft-declared "Promise Keeper" Christian credentials and resign, but thus far he has said nothing to indicate that he will do this.  Those mainly on the left are also calling for Gov. Sanford to resign since he clearly has failed to live up to his own conservative, Christian standards. 

Sitting here in my study, all of this is like watching some really lame ping pong match, where the spectators are either major 'homers' who would rather drink acid than ever support the other team's player or they are objective observers who are completely turned off by the blatant hypocrisy of both sides.  If someone really believes that cheating on one's spouse or cruising for a sex partner in a public men's room are clear signs that the guilty party  has violated the public trust, disregarded their vows of holy matrimony and shown themselves to be such flawed human beings that have disqualified themselves from ever holding public office, then that standard should be applied to all public leaders, even the 'golden guys/gals' of your favorite team, right?  Or do we each have a hidden well of unconditional mercy and grace for those we see as the standard bearers of our particular party or issues?  Talking heads on the far right side of the radio dial today were dipping deeply into that reservoir of forebearance as they dealt with Sanford's admission of guilt today and with Ensign's the other day.  Pointing a sharper accusing finger at guilty people like Edwards or Clinton is disengenuous at best and hypocritical at worst.  And for talking heads on the other side of the dial to be gleefully going after Ensign and Sanford this week reeks too with the same flawed and biased double-standard.  "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you" seems like a concept from an alien planet rather than a fundamental teaching from the book that both sides, especially the right, like to cite.

Clearly, the history of the world is proof positive that all of our leaders are flawed human beings, some more than others.  Some more obviously than others.  Yet some proved to be solid and needed leaders in spite of their obvious shortcomings.  Others leaders on the public stage apparently had inconsequential flaws, with some even being paragons of virtue, even Christian values.  Yet some of those proved to be horrible leaders.

As this latest pair of scandals plays itself out around the watercoolers and air-waves, I am doing my darndest not to revel in the trevails of Ensign or Sanford in the same way that I didn't revel in the messes that Clinton and Edwards made for themselves.  As fellow flawed human beings who just don't have our sins and shortcomings dragged before the public eye, we should know that we have established an impossible standard for all of our leaders to follow.  Some have gone too far, claiming far more perfection than is humanly possible and Scripturally provable, in an effort to garner votes, worship, and confidence.  They add to their moral resumes by being some of the earliest and loudest voices to condemn those who have been exposed.  How can I show mercy to those who have been merciless?  That's where I struggle.  Or how can I be understanding and forgiving when the adulterous leader isn't repentant, doesn't return to the marriage and family, but instead chooses to be with the other illicit party?  Honestly, that's where I really don't know how to respond or even how to feel.

My hope is that each of us who claim to follow Jesus will never stop struggling to apply God's Golden Rule evenly to everybody, even our worst enemies or our most hated political foes.  Let's not let partisanship ruin our witness for Jesus.

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