Put Down the Fork and Pick Up Your Feet - Part 1

I continue to reflect on the food system issues presented in “Food Inc,” and the fight for food that is both healthy and affordable. It is unfortunate that these two ideals are often placed at opposite ends of the spectrum for our low-income neighbors, and it’s become an even greater issue in our worsening economy. More than ever, it’s time for the church to stand up for these brothers and sisters and fight for food justice.

But an article I recently read by Tom Philpott convicted me about the means to winning that fight. The battle cry for many trying to raise awareness about access to healthy, natural food has been to “vote with our forks” or “vote with our shopping carts.” For me, it was comforting to feel like shopping at the farmer’s market and buying organic produce at Sprouts was making a difference in the fight for a better food system. However, Philpott points out that this cannot be our only strategy if we want to actually work towards a new food paradigm.

He writes, “We can’t simply consume our way to a just national dinner table. To try to do so risks creating two food systems - an artisanal one for people with the resources to care about what’s one on their plates and a low-quality, industrial one for everybody else.

“’Vote with your fork’ neglects the vast role of government and corporate power, decades in the making, in setting up the current system. To really challenge the slop being served by Big Food, we’ll have to vote with our feet as well. We’ll have to take seriously what Wendell Berry has called the ‘agrarian responsibility’ borne by all eaters. That means community - and municipal - level organizing.”

Okay - so what do we do? Grocery shopping is one thing; legislative action is another. Serving a meal to the homeless is a wonderful one-time project, but advocating on their behalf is our lifelong calling. But though it seems daunting, I think we’re up for the challenge, one step at a time.

Read on in Philpott’s article and you will find several suggestions to start picking up your feet and moving towards long-term, deep change in our food system at both local and national levels. Let me share a few ways I’ve discovered to plug in locally:

Fullerton Farmer’s Market. You have two options to buy some great food and enjoy the environment of Fullerton in its hustle and bustle. The Certified Farmer’s Market takes place year-round on Wednesday mornings from 8 a.m. - 2 p.m. in Independence Park of Valencia Drive. From April to the end of October, the Fullerton Market also meets in the plaza across from Epic every Thursday from 4 - 8 p.m.

Hunger Action Los Angeles. Philpott encourages us to participate in a local food council. Orange County does not currently have an official food council, but Hunger Action LA acts as an advocacy organization for food policy issues throughout Southern California. Frequent their website for weekly updates and project opportunities, as well as information for attending their monthly council meetings.  http://www.hungeractionla.org/#

California Food Policy Advocates. For more information about food policy actions on the state level, get updated news and resources from CFPA. http://www.cfpa.net/

Center for Food and Justice. Occidental College’s Urban & Environmental Policy Institute promotes a variety of projects and programs working to promote healthy eating and equal access to health education for communities throughout LA and Southern California. http://departments.oxy.edu/uepi/cfj/index.htm

Now it’s your turn! Do some research, and find a program you click with. It’s a reality that we are all busy, so taking on more volunteer work may be more than you can currently handle. You can still sign up to receive news about current food policy issues through any of these websites or the several Philpott recommends. These are just the first steps, but they are important to better understanding how we can directly make an impact for health and food justice in our community.

Review: Food Inc.

Anyone that goes to Epic for even a short period of time will find out pretty quickly that we are quite the "foodie" conglomerate. Some of our most intimate interactions happen over lunch, house church potlucks, or a weekend dinner. We all enjoy a good meal, but more often than not don't really think about its origin, nor do we often prefer to.

Looking into the faults of our food system can seem like opening up a bottomless can of worms that is ultimately hopeless. Just about everything is wrong with it, so why even bother trying to fix it? Robert Kenner's documentary Food Inc. presents a wealth of starting points without overwhelming its audience with the multiple problems we can face when we walk into a grocery store or restaurant just trying to find a decent, affordable meal.

While I could attempt to rehash the film, I'd like to share a review written by one of my long-time journalism icons, Mary F. Pols, who can identify with those folks that may be a little sick and tired of hearing that doom is lurking around the corner if they eat a hamburger: Find Review Here.

I promise I am not pushing you all to go see this film just because I am "one of those vegetarians." It's really important to evaluate how our food choices affect the environment, our health, and the access our impoverished neighbors have to healthy choices. You shouldn't have to be middle class to be able to buy organic or get decent health education. One of the most heartbreaking scenes in the film was the story of a low-income immigrant family that faces the harsh reality that a fast-food hamburger is cheaper than a couple of apples. Guys, we need to take better care of each other, especially with something as simple as food. This movie is an easy place to start doing some research and learning how we can vote with the contents of our shopping carts for a more transparent food system that provides greater, healthier resources to Americans of every ethnicity, age and socioeconomic level.

- And if you want to watch a film that hits this point home right in our Los Angeles backyard, check out the documentary "The Garden." Just ask me if you want to borrow it sometime. :)

The Sound of Music

This weekend I had the pleasure of attending not one but two concerts with some of Epic’s fellow music aficionados. Upon retrospect, I would probably never recommend doing this, as it drives your energy level into seemingly irreversible low zones (but when two of your favorite bands are playing the same weekend, what is one to do?). However, this auditory overload allowed me to remember why it is that I love the musical experience so much.

I use the word “experience” because it goes far beyond just listening. Music is a deeply spiritual art for me; random combinations of sounds can make me feel close to God. Most people lean one of two ways in relation to how they enjoy music: listening for good lyrics or listening for good sound. I am definitely the latter, and can honestly listen to an album a dozen times without ever really paying attention to the lyrics. This is not to diminish the power of a well-written song; it’s just how I’m wired.

While they may seem confusing or even unnecessary to some, there can be such freedom in experiencing abstract, diverse sounds. Music takes me many directions either in memory, my current doings, or dreams of places I have never been. They can mean any million things to any one person; a song can make someone burst into tears while making someone else want to jump up and down in joy. Everyone has their own musical experience and their own musical tastes - no judging here! :) 

Most of the time, good music makes me want to move. When I was a kid and my mom played piano in our living room, my brother and I would run and jump and dance all around the room. When I learned how to drive, I discovered the joy of just travelling nowhere in particular, with a favorite CD turned up as loud as I wanted, until I’d gotten out whatever restless bug was in my system (I still love doing this now). It’s no secret that I have a passion for dance. It brings to life everything that I love both physically and emotionally, providing a rich spiritual experience for me. It's almost impossible for me to sit still when a rhythm really gets going. I may not understand what a series of sounds means, and certainly can’t explain that meaning in words, but I can communicate them through movement.

I think it is important for everyone to have some cathartic, creative experience they can use to communicate the incommunicable. For me, this is dance; for others, it may be painting, construction, a sport, or music itself. I cannot wait to experience community in heaven because I think our ability to create will only be opened up a thousand-fold. The better we understand who we are and what we love, the better we can express ourselves and encourage others to foster their own means of expression.

I love seeing creativity blossom at Epic, and I honestly wish we saw more of it. I totally understand the fear to share one’s own art; I am one of the worst with this. It’s easier to let things stay in your head than put them out there for someone to judge or re-define. But for me, keeping my creative output bottled up for too long makes me feel isolated and unfulfilled. I feel like no one really knows the true me, that there is no one that would be able to hear what I actually think a song means or read one of my essays without thinking I’m weird or incompetent or untalented. But the point of art is not to be perfect or the best; it’s to share our deepest experiences honestly, in love. I hope that we can learn to feel safe in this community to express what may be difficult but necessary.

As for me, I hope to have the time someday to bring dance to Epic, especially for our kids. I get such a kick out of seeing kids move to their own rhythm and make up all kinds of random stuff, just as I got to do to my mom’s piano at home. But for now I just want to get better at sharing my experiences with art and how I find God’s beauty in them, and I would love to hear about those of others.

St. Joseph Ballet's 2009 Annual Concert

From Here...

Saint Joseph Ballet's 2009 Annual Concert

Irvine Barclay Theatre, May 28-31

Internationally celebrated choreographers Jeff Slayton and Nami Yamamoto present World Premiere works and the legendary Mark Haim returns to reprise his acclaimed piece What Is Too Strong For Breaking. Show times are 8pm Thursday through Saturday, with a 2:30pm matinee added on Saturday and Sunday.

Buy tickets here! http://www.thebarclay.org/custom/events/event10.asp?eventID=1195

For more information about Saint Joseph Ballet, click here to learn about the fantastic work it is doing to prepare at-risk youth to face the obstacles of life, embracing the hope and opportunity modeled by the intensive art-making process of dance.

Review: The Soloist

Even before the hyperemotional “August Rush” graced theaters, my threshold for sentimental musician films had been extremely low. Seeing the trailer for “The Soloist” did not really help my preconceptions of the film with its enthusiastic swells of Beethoven, a teary-eyed Jamie Foxx obviously pretending to play the cello, and twirling pigeons flying into a big blue sky. However, this cynic was pleasantly surprised, as the film never travels too far into the cheap sentimentality zone and attempts to shed an honest light on the story of an artist who has been devastated by mental illness.

It’s based on the story of Steve Lopez (Robert Downey, Jr.), a columnist for the Los Angeles Times who meets a homeless schizophrenic named Nathaniel Anthony Ayers (Jamie Foxx), who just so happens to be a former Julliard student. His mental illness has taken everything away from him except for his love of music, and Ayers now haunts the tunnels and street corners of LA struggling to express this love on a two-string violin. The visible talent of this man sparks curiosity in Steve, and what starts out as another good idea for a column unintentionally ends becomes a crusade to bring justice to Nathaniel’s broken life.

The film explores how our devotion to the things we love can be inhibited by the struggles of life and, in turn, how that devotion can inhibit our ability to recognize and deal with those struggles. Nathaniel lives music, but his illness stops him throughout his life from pursuing what he loves most. As a child, he experiences a hazy, delicate world interrupted by hallucinations; after entering Julliard, these hallucinations become extreme and terrifying, forcing him out of school and into a life of desperation he can never escape.

Nathaniel lands in Skid Row, surrounded by those like him that live each day hanging by a thread. There are an estimated 90,000 homeless living in Los Angeles, and their existence is anything but sugar-coated in the film. Skid Row looks like hell on earth, and as Steve follows his new friend into his backyard, his face reveals the fear, discomfort and astonishment that arises when one realizes that right next door are those living in constant pain. While some of these scenes are soured by their political tone, the honest faces on the screen make a compelling case for activism within our own community.

Steve lives with a different kind of hopelessness in the midst of a dying newspaper industry. His cool, cynical demeanor only acts as a cover for a man that really needs to rediscover passion for what he does, rather than continuing to live in the routine of a job that’s pretty thankless. While Nathaniel provides a source for a much needed story, he also demonstrates a joy that creates an itch in Steve he cannot ignore. The visual indulgences of the film show the beauty to be found alongside the terror of Nathaniel’s mind, including a “Fantasia”-esque clip that represents his interpretations of music in fantastic bursts of color.

However, the reality of Nathaniel’s situation grounds their relationship. Compassion can often be a one-way street, and Steve feels the weight of helping a friend that cannot help himself. He is simply a writer that sought out a good story and never wanted to be held responsible for the wellbeing of his subject. His guilt prevents him from leaving, yet it only leads to resentment and distrust from Nathaniel and those around him. The truth is that Steve cannot cure Nathaniel’s illness, and Nathaniel cannot cure Steve’s aimlessness. What they can offer each other is accountability and encouragement to make the most of what they’ve got.

If any of the film’s many subject points was made its focus, it might have been wonderful; unfortunately, it spreads itself too thin by trying to tackle them all. Their exploration is only partial, leaving the viewer wondering what this story was actually supposed to be about. Is it a documentary on homelessness? Is it an extravagant newspaper subscription solicitation? Is it a story about Ayers? Or is it a story about Lopez? The answer is all of the above, and yet not really any of the above. My advice is to choose what you will take away from it, just as Steve chooses simply to try helping a friend in need. Like the mind of Nathaniel, the story is a bit chaotic, but its moments of honesty are beautiful.