great, as expected

Conan wasn't as funny as usual, but that's probably because it's tough sitting next to the most important living band in the universe. What? Does that sound irrationally biased? I had to stay up until 1:30am--a time that I'm all too familiar with these days--but I got to catch the boys rockin' out on NBC. They are in the middle of a 7 day tour stand in NYC. All four band members were interviewed, then there was another time with just Bono. As expected, he talked about the One Campaign and the good it's been able to do. Two million people plus have signed up for the campaign. Hopefully many of those people are wearing their white bracelets. I get asked about my One bracelet about once a week. I know it's going to sound incredibly cheesy, but it's the best opportunity I've ever had to talk about my beliefs--not coincidentally, I would argue, it takes the focus off of one-to-one "conversion" talk and makes the conversation more about entrenched problems, how Christians and the West have contributed to those problems, and the hope that some of those problems can be addressed in this life, in this age. The final victory over all this shit is probably not going to come on this plane of existance. But it doesn't mean we shouldn't unite the whole globe attempting to alleviate the suffering of a major part of it--or at least address it head-on. Speaking of engaging suffering, read John's Cambodia blog.