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[Woodstock Report, December 1998, No. 56]
Dear Friends of Woodstock,
What our world most needs in its current mood of political cynicism and personal distrust--is a word of hope.
And that is exactly what Woodstock has to offer. Don't take our word for it. This hope is based on the Word of God. Let's go back and trace the history.
When God started to create, the book of Genesis tells us, he looked out and saw chaos. And by his Word he gradually shaped chaos into an ordered and harmonious universe: light divided from but in dialogue with darkness, sea from land, sky from heaven, animals from vegetation. And finally God created the human family of Adam and Eve to continue his creative work of bringing order, harmony, and collaboration to the world.
At each stage of His creative activity, God looked and saw and said, "It is GOOD." Above all, when he looked at us humans, he said to himself, "They are GOOD--very, very GOOD."
We know, of course, that Adam and Eve sinned, and we, their children, still carry the scars of flawed freedom and biased intelligence. But in the wake of sin, God spoke His Word once more. And what Jesus was saying on the Cross with his, "Forgive them, Father," was, "They are VERY GOOD." His forgiveness makes it so.
This is the foundation of Woodstock's hope, a hope that rests on God's assuring word that we are good. With God's grace, we do have the intelligence to discover ways to make our lives together harmonious and collaborative and we do have the free will to do it.
Defeatism, on the other hand, is all too tempting today. We see terrorism and violence, poverty and starvation, political posturing and commercial greed and we are tempted to say, "There is nothing we can do about it. It is all too much for us." There are even elite intellectuals who cast doubt on our human capacity to find truth and choose the genuinely good thing to do. They invite us back to chaos but now without God.
Woodstock begs to differ, as you can see from the variety of projects described in this Annual Report. These projects confidently address urgent issues in the fields of finance and business, government and public policy, Third World development and the globalization of the economy.
By carrying out this work, in collaboration with many others, we believe that we are not only contributing to a more just and peaceful world, but that we are driving out cynicism with hope. We are collaborating creatively with the God who made us, and who says now, as he said then, "IT IS and YOU ARE GOOD, very, very good."
As our principal collaborators we rely on you for good advice, for moral support, and for the financial means to keep our work and word of HOPE alive. And to you we are deeply grateful.
Please complete the reply form below and mail it along with your tax-deductible contribution to me at:
Woodstock Theological Center
Georgetown University
Box 571137
Washington, D.C. 20057-1137
Thanks so much,
James L. Connor, S.J.