Senior Thesis

By Scott Kleinman

SOCIAL JUSTICE

DEFINITIONS OF SOCIAL JUSTICE• Fair and proper administration of laws conforming to the natural law that all persons,

irrespective of ethnic origin, gender, possessions, race, religion, etc., are to be treated equally and without prejudice

• Injustice- Violation of another's rights or of what is right; lack of justice

• "Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere" (Martin Luther King, Jr.).

A BIBLICAL PERSPECTIVE OF SOCIAL JUSTICE• “Where there is no Justice there is no

fragrance in worship.” – David Ruis

• "A minister cannot preach the glories of heaven while ignoring social conditions in his own community that cause [people] an earthly hell" (Martin Luther King Jr.)

A BIBLICAL PERSPECTIVE OF SOCIAL JUSTICE• Justice has been important to the community

of God from the beginning of it development.(Amos 5)

• greatest self-denial is helping in your community or being involved in people.(Stott)

• Each year, more than 2 million children are exploited in the global commercial sex trade (UNICEF)

• 27 million men, women and children are held as slaves. (Kevin Bales, Disposable People)

• 1 in 5 women is a victim of rape or attempted rape in her lifetime. (U. N. Development Fund for Women)

• More than 1 million children live in detention, the vast majority awaiting trial for minor offenses. (UNICEF)

• Human Trafficking

WHAT INJUSTICES LOOK LIKE TODAY

• When clean water is scarce, all aspects of life are impacted:Health: Contaminated water and poor sanitation are factors in 80 percent of all disease in the developing world.Food production: Without safe water, crops and livestock die and healthy meals cannot be prepared.Economics: Poor health from unclean water means the productivity of the community suffers and family incomes dwindle.Education: Where water is scarce, it is unlikely that schools will even be built or teachers will move to the communities. And because children spend time fetching water, they cannot attend school.

• Every 21 seconds, a child dies from a water-related illness.

• More than 2.7 billion people have inadequate or nonexistent access to proper sanitation.

• When a community gains access to clean water, its child mortality rate drops by half.

• Water and Sanitation.

WHAT INJUSTICES LOOK LIKE TODAY

• Alaska, California, Colorado, Hawaii, Idaho, Nevada, Oregon, Rhode Island, Washington State, and Washington, D.C. have the highest rates of homelessness, according to a study released in 2007 by The National Alliance to End Homelessness.

• Total Homeless people 671,859 in the United states.

• 159,732 Homeless in the state of California.

• Average age of homeless person is 9 years old.. Growing demographic of homeless people are 2 people families.(Harvac)

WHAT INJUSTICES LOOK LIKE TODAY

• Homelessness

THE PREPARATION FROM LPCBible and theology

1. Theo 1I learned how to do theology, and understand the importance of it.

This helped me why I needed to figure out theology in the first place.

1. Theo 2I learned the theology of Christ being an ultimate example and what that example is in the idea of Christology.

This is something that has to be addressed in any ideal theology. If Jesus is doing it we probably should be doing it as well. We had to read the Stott book that’s why this class was able to help.

1. Theo 3Theo 3 gave me a clear understanding of Ecclesiology.

With Social justice this is something that you cannot do anything without. This goes along with the theology of the church.

THE PREPARATION FROM LPCMinor Classes

1. HebrewThis class taught me how hard life could be. This also gave me skills in interpreting what the Bible is saying.

Jim Adams would always say never trust a commentary. That’s what I did, I challenged the commentary to understand what the OT say about Social Justice.

1. GreekThis class gave me skills to read commentaries, and gave me a better understanding of how Greek works.

With the reading of commentaries I was able to see how Jesus as an example did social justice.

6.Hebrew in exegesis of Amos. Hebrew of exegesis just helped me to refine my Hebrew and to understand the book of Amos.

The book of Amos was deliberately helpful in understanding how Justice works. One of the reasons for this prophecy to written is because Israel was perverting justice and the parallel righteousness.

THE PREPARATION FROM LPCGeneral education

7. Math Math taught me how do understand money. It taught me how to compare high numbers to low numbers.

When dealing with the poor I needed to understand how much more money was involve with a wealthy nation like the USA verses an impoverished nation like Haiti.

8 Disciplines of LeadershipThis is a class where we learned that the best leadership is servant leadership.

The best way to get something done within social justice is leading; this taught me by serving the needs of my community I would be leading.

9 Senior Seminar In this seminar we went through different problems that dealt with social needs.

This is what sparked my issues of doing social justice. The ideas of saving tithes and giving to the poor.

THE PREPARATION FROM LPC

19. Social Justice and Ministry of Christ

This class was all about the idea of social justice.

This gave me a clear idea of everything. From the Biblical perspective to the issues that are involved.

THE END!