Book Review for Christian Century: An Elegantly Design Underlies Sollereder’s Theological Survey of Theodicy

In his book Transdisciplinary Systems Engineering, Azad M. Madni defines elegant design as that which “focuses on the total [user] experience and exploits systems thinking, probing and questioning.” Elegant design “encourages exploration” while using “appropriate analogies and metaphors to simplify system architecture.” Madni could just as well have been describing the ingenious architecture of this book by Bethany Sollereder, a theological exploration that follows the structure of a Choose Your Own Adventure book.

Why Is There Suffering? is less a theological discourse than a thought exercise in which the reader is the object of their own experiment. Using the format of the famous 1980s children’s books (and more recent Netflix shows), Sollereder guides the reader in traveling down various theological pathways that explore theodicy, the question of why suffering and evil exist. Different paths lead to different conclusions: God cocreates the world with us (chapters 9, 11, 17, 23, 26, 28), there is no God and/or God is impersonal (chapters 13–22), there is an afterlife (chapters 30, 34, 40, 41), and so on. Sollereder intends the book to be a “lighthearted adventure” through a “heavy topic,” one in which the reader has an opportunity to resonate with different views in unexpected ways.

READ AT CHRISTIAN CENTURY MAGAZINE

Christian Century Q&A: Filmmaker Releases Biopic Series on Twentieth-Century Theological Activists

Over the last 30 years, Martin Doblmeier has directed more than 25 documentary films on religion and spiri­tuality. He won Emmys for two films, one on the Washington National Cathedral and another on Howard Thurman. In 2012 he received the Daniel J. Kane Religious Communications Award. His five-part series Prophetic Voices—films on Thur­man, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Dorothy Day, Abraham Joshua Heschel, and Reinhold Niebuhr—is now available as a digital box set.

Why should people watch the Prophetic Voices series of documentaries?

The subjects of these films are genu­inely remarkable figures, whose lives and spiritual journeys intersected with some of the most dramatic moments in the 20th century. Their lives offer a window into how people of faith confronted the issues of their day and, in so doing, offer us inspiration as we confront our own struggles.

These people are from a very different time than our own. In the 1940s and ’50s, 76 percent of Americans attended religious services. Recently that number fell below 50 percent for the first time. How are these leaders relevant to us?

Too many of us find it easier to keep our heads down and avoid harsh realities. ​​Rather than looking for the expedient, political solution, these people asked themselves: What is the moral response? What all five of these figures have in common is a refusal to be indifferent to the challenges around them. To a person, they armed themselves with their traditions, called upon God to reveal to them his will, and then went forth to do what they felt needed to be done.

READ AT CHRISTIAN CENTURY

2015-2019: Journalism Shift to Video and Podcast

In 2015, I began working on the documentary film Priced Out: 15 Years of Gentrification in Portland, Ore. One of the goals in doing so was to produce both a feature-length documentary and a stream of collateral online reporting parallel to the production. My time in the daily newsrooms of Portland had me believing I could do both while producing a feature film in record time. While the production did move quickly (two years from pre-production to premiere), I didn’t manage to produce much short-form journalism until we began marketing Priced Out in 2018. The Priced Out Podcast, produced by Andru Morgan, ran for two seasons (40 episodes). The production ranged from discussions with Morgan, myself, and various guests, to coverage of screenings around the country, to in-depth reporting on issues like the fight to get California’s first relocation fee passed in the city of Long Beach. The podcasts were available across all platforms, including our YouTube Channel, and were featured on the Priced Out blog.

See all the PricedOutPodcast on the film’s website or on our YouTube Channel.

Check out our three-part series on Long Beach, Calif.

Ep 16: The Battle for Rent Control in Long Beach, Calif

Ep 34: The Tough Latina and the Racist Landlord

Ep 39: Gentrification, a Rebel Alliance, and a Tale of Two Cities

Oregon Affordable Housing Bill Might Not Help Portland’s Gentrifying Neighborhoods

Portland Gentrification Documentary

Construction this Spring along North Williams Avenue at Mason, where three new multifamily building are in various phases of development.

An affordable housing bill in the Oregon legislature might not have much immediate impact in Portland’s gentrifying neighborhoods, according to one housing expert.

Even if it passed tomorrow, a new bill that would allow the city to create affordable housing units in new multi-family developments would have little impact in fast-gentrifying communities. That’s because it the bill doesn’t impact rental housing developments, according to Jessica Larson, director of the Welcome Home Coalition.

LINK: Monday April 27- Inclusionary Zoning Workshop in SE Portland

House Bill 2564 would allow cities in Oregon to create “inclusionary zoning” laws. Cities could get affordable housing built in new developments by waiving certain fees, permits and building restrictions in exchange for the inclusion of below-market units.

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North Portland Party House Goes Down, 105 Apartments to Go Up

A once legendary party house was demolished Wednesday to make way for the latest apartment complex on the booming  North Vancouver/Williams Corridor.

I saw the demolition while shooting the Portland gentrification documentary I am producing.

The little blue house at 100 North Cook Street hosted the very first house party I went to after I arrived in Portland in 1995. I distinctly remember holding a plastic cup of beer in my hand and looking down from the porch at the vacant expanse of lots and abandoned buildings that was the neighborhood.

Almost 20 years later, the house is being pulled down as part of a multi-building demolition project. Soon, the Cook Street Lofts will rise on the block, according to the Daily Journal of Commerce.

The five-story, 105-unit apartment building will have on-grade parking and ground floor retail, according to the blog NextPortland.

New Film to Update 2002 Documentary on Gentrification in Portland, Ore.

Work has begun on a follow-up to the 2002 documentary on gentrification and affordable housing in the black neighborhoods of Portland, Ore., Northeast Passage: The Inner City and the American Dream, which was released at a time when gentrification was only a marginal issue. Since then, Portland has propelled itself in the national imagination as a place that attracts hordes of creative young people. It’s also become the whitest major city in the country, according to The Oregonian.

WATCH: Original Documentary Available on Amazon Streaming

Portland’s African American community, once centered in North and Northeast Portland, has been dispersed to the fringes of the metro area as new, wealthier whites have moved into the area. Nikki Williams, an African American woman and focus of the original documentary, has thrown up her hands. She is selling her home in North Portland and moving to Texas in hopes of connecting with black community there.

GoLocalPDX: Firm Reaps Over $200M, Gets Large Portland Public Housing Contracts 81% of the Time

Bud Clark Commons: $30 Million public housing construction project awarded Walsh Construction in 2008. Photo credit: Home Forward

A local construction firm has been awarded large Portland public housing contracts 81 percent of the time that it bids on them.

A GoLocalPDX investigation has found that Portland-based Walsh Construction and its affiliates have been awarded 9 of the 11 public housing construction contracts, valued at $5 million or more, that they have competed for since 2003, according to data released from public records.

Home Forward, formerly known as The Housing Authority of Portland, has awarded Walsh and affiliates over $240 million from these contracts, according to data released to GoLocalPDX.  Two of Walsh’s nine contracts had no other bidders.  Another two went to a partnership Walsh created with another company, called O’Neil/Walsh Community Builders.

“Walsh is shrewd,” said James Posey, owner of Work Horse Construction Metro Inc. “It’s about who you know in this game.“

Read the rest GoLocalPDX

GoLocalPDX: Local Company Pockets Worker’s Wages, Tax Dollars, Whistleblowers say

Jose Tandy and workers claim Cornerstone Janitorial hired undocumented immigrants and then pocketed their wages.

A local janitorial company that has worked on publicly-funded projects has been shortchanging its workers and pocketing their wages, according to the claims of whistleblowers.

Wage theft complaints against Cornerstone Janitorial Service of Hillsboro have been filed in Oregon and Washington and whistleblowers allege that the company hires undocumented immigrants and takes taxpayer-funded wages that rightfully belong to workers.

In response, Cornerstone tells GoLocalPDX it only hires legal residents and pays the proper wages.

But an investigation by GoLocalPDX has found that in some cases workers are only paid $12 an hour on jobs that should have been compensated at an hourly rate of $36.

“This is discrimination and racism,” Jose Tandy told GoLocalPDX in Spanish. “I’m being robbed.”

Read the rest GoLocalPDX

Importing BuzzFeed Style Listicles (tapping the psyche of the community)

Photo credit: Pedro Ribeiro Simões on Flickr. Creative Commons licence. Image cropped.

While at GoLocalPDX, I encouraged the team to do BuzzFeed-esque posts about “Why this is great…” and “What that is bad..” etc.  The idea, of course, was to take some of BuzzFeed’s ability to tap into the gestalt of a given demographic and condense it into a listicle that really resonated with people.  Because it was GoLocalPDX, we did these listicles in slideshow form. The schtick was to tap into Portland’s personality, both it’s traditional working-class-Pacific-Northwest personality and its new-chic-mecca-for-young-people-and-their-trivial-pursuits personality.   When these post worked, they really drove pageviews.  I think the most successful ones were those we came up with as a team and that really touched a nerve in terms of the community’s collective psyche.

Here is one of my favorites:

10 Reasons it Stinks to be a Straight Single Woman in Portland

Portand: You’re a wonderful city, full of hipsterish, handsome men. You’ve got a great nightlife, a fantastic cultural offering, and a million awesome places for a date.

But finding a boyfriend in this town is harder than finding a brunch venue without a line.

Sure, if you’re a single woman and happy to remain so, this city is probably as good as it gets. But if you’re hoping to become un-single at any future stage, you’ve got a problem in PDX.

Below are our 10 reasons why it stinks to be a single straight woman in Portland.

 

GoLocalPDX: Court Case Argues Portland Parking Tickets Are Not Valid

The result of an obscure traffic court hearing this year has raised questions about whether or not Portland parking tickets conform to state law.

Some legal experts say it’s a good question.

In 2013, over 260,000 parking citations were issued in Portland, generating $18 million for enforcement agencies and the state general fund, according to the Multnomah County court administrator.

But are they valid?

In January Michael Selvaggio took a parking ticket to trial in Multnomah County Circuit Court after he claimed his ticket failed to display the time and place of his court appearance, according to court documents.

Read the rest of my story at GoLocalPDX