Accept the things you cannot change ...

Or not.

• If it needs changing, change it.  
• If it's hard, fight hard.  
• If you fight to the end and die, perhaps your children will finish the fight.  Or your grandchildren.

Some things cannot and should not be accepted as they are.

Injustice, oppression and violence, discrimination, prejudice, abuse, and corrupt power ...

I remember Malala Yousafzai who began blogging about life under the Taliban in Afghanistan.  She was eleven.  Her father supported her.  She was later targeted for assassination, shot and almost killed.  Medically evacuated from the country, she survived, but it was close. 

A Nobel laureate now, she's known around the world as an advocate for education and particularly for girls.  Her father explains with a smile how she used to be known as his daughter, but now he's known as her father.  He's proud of her.   Malala's advocacy has since grown into an international movement.

We're all proud of her.  Except the Taliban; they're sort of embarrassed.

A dear friend in western Africa reminded us, today is International Women's Day.  The issues are much larger than western feminism perhaps recognizes.


Ps 82 - Defend the oppressed, stand up for the poor, the disenfranchised, the abused ... how long will you tolerate the wicked?  God did not call us out to be peacefully passive but to be powerfully influential in our sphere of existence, to change lives. Serenity is not at the top of the list. The peace we're offered is with the Father and within ourselves, not with the ways of this world.