Coverage misrepresents group’s purpose
As a member of Grace on Campus, a Christian student group featured in “Christian groups offer sense of community,” (News, March 10), I have two thoughts to offer as a response to what was written.
First of all, thank you so much for taking the time and effort to explore a Christian ministry at UCLA. Though we represent a group numbering over 300 students, we still find it an absolute privilege that the Daily Bruin would choose to cover us.
However, many of us at Grace on Campus are disappointed that the primary focus of the article left readers with an impression that Christian groups were more about social networking, having friends and adjusting to college than about Jesus Christ.
The amazing thing about a Christian group is not that we sing songs together, but who we are singing about; not that we study the Bible together, but who we are studying; and not that we attend church, but who we worship while we are there.
The Christian community is not the primary focus of a Christian group.
If there is one thing that Grace on Campus stands for, it’s that unity is not built around a church potluck ““ unity is built around God’s truth and God’s grace.
If the author had contextualized the quotes that she took, she would have presented to the UCLA student body something even more wonderful than Christians living in community: She could have presented Jesus Christ. His perfect life and death impart to Christian believers the unmerited grace that our fellowship is named after.
Over 300 students join together to worship, not because going to church with your Christian friends is cool, but because Jesus Christ is our Lord and Savior.
Benjamin Du
Urban planning graduate student, Member of Grace on Campus
Shades of gray in political conflict
The authors of “Loaded words inappropriate in describing Gaza Strip conflict” (Viewpoint, March 10), Miranda Bogen and Leeron Morad, bring up a very valid point. Loaded words have indeed been used by both sides of this grievous conflict.
For instance, in February the Israeli Deputy Defense Minister Matan Vilnai warned that if the rocket attacks continued, the Palestinians would a bring upon themselves a “shoah.” This Hebrew word can mean both “disaster” and more often “holocaust.”
However, despite valid points, their article exhibits the same skewed perspective that pervades Israeli-Palestinian discussion in the U.S. We can no longer view Israel as a white knight fighting for survival against evil terrorists. Both sides have done wrong and are doing wrong. And both sides must make sacrifices to reach a stable peace.
Bogen and Morad describe a compelling example, that of an Israeli mother forced to choose which of her children she carries to the bomb shelter. The mother’s situation is horrible, but is the suffering of the Israeli mother worse than the suffering of the Palestinian mothers who have been cut off from supplies needed to care for their families? In truth, the suffering is equally terrible for all victims of this conflict, whether Israeli or Palestinian.
To have a truly healthy discussion, we must eliminate loaded words as Bogen and Morad rightly suggest. We must also realize that Israel’s existence is no longer at stake. The finest American military hardware and several billion dollars annually of American military aid have seen to that. We must also realize that both Palestinians and Israelis are suffering, and both sides continue to harm each other. Both are victims, and both are aggressors. Neither side is morally superior to the other. This conflict is shaded in grays, and we must view it realistically and not moralistically.
William Dawson
Classics graduate student