Come to the Table

Sarah is a recent college graduate from Minnesota now living in downtown Los Angeles as a Salesian volunteer working with the children of homeless women. Randy is using his advanced engineering degree to help design community centers, water projects, orphanages, and medical clinics in Afghanistan with Engineering Ministries International. Katie is studying for an advanced degree in Ecology after serving for two years at a homeless shelter with the Jesuit Volunteer Corps. Jay shared his gifts as an urban musician by facilitating a partnership with a local music production company and a Presbyterian church in Tacoma, Washington, to create a music development program for inner city youth.

Each of these young adults shares a commitment to engage the world through service. They have chosen to share in and contribute to the social, economic, and spiritual development of a specific community of people. That they each made such commitments demonstrates that there are likely some shared values between them. Living out such commitments, however, is likely to transform them, pushing them further toward a common set of values or ethic. It is the ethic of service, civic engagement, and global understanding that the Krista Foundation for Global Citizenship believes such commitments can lead. In a word, it is the ethic of the global citizen. While we believe that service commitments are a powerful influence toward this ethic, we recognize that they are not the only things that lead people to develop into global citizens. However, this article attempts to articulate some critical components of this ethic from the angle or perspective of service. I do this recognizing as well that the set of values I have chosen is neither comprehensive nor closed to dispute, even within the community of the Krista Foundation.

In 2005, we published in this journal my essay "Staying for Tea: Five Principles for the Community Service Volunteer." In some ways, this is a companion piece to that article. It is written with much the same audience in mind and the ideas should be complementary. However, one essay deals with principles, the other values. It may be helpful then to differentiate what I mean by these two words. I don't pretend to offer authoritative definitions, but rather to clarify the distinction within these two articles.

A value is something to which we steadfastly assign higher-order worth. By "higher-order" I mean that if you were to group everything that is of worth to you into sets, your values would be in that first set that you'd hang onto even if it meant foregoing something from a lower set. When trade-offs are forced between things that have worth to you, the result is generally clarification about your values. A principle, on the other hand, guides how we express our values in the world. It is a general rule of behavior that, if kept, will by and large keep us aligned with our values. Both are critical to identify and remain aware of as we go about making the myriad choices we face each day, both large and trivial.1

It is not enough to have one without the other. I might say, "I value community," yet have no idea what that means in real life or how it impacts day-to-day decisions. So, we develop principles like "Staying for Tea" that guide our behavior as we attempt to live out our values.2 My hope is that this article engenders better thinking about what values we bring with us and desire to express in the communities we serve. The things of worth we put into that higher order are not part of an immutable set. We choose our values. We think about them and make preferential choices regarding the set of values to which we compose principles.

Before beginning, I should explain the metaphor of invitation to a table. Each value is presented through the metaphor of a type of table: a communion table, a study table, and so forth. The reason is two-fold. First, values are very personal; they can't be imposed, replicated, or transferred. There is no definitive list of values that characterize a global citizen. Just as one may be invited to sit at a table with others, so too you are invited to consider the relevance of each of these five values to you on your journey into global citizenship. Second, using metaphors creates more open space than defining values does. Perhaps you'll find the metaphor of the communion table useful, but prefer that it reference the value of community or reciprocity or sacrifice rather than mutuality. Perhaps you agree that the value of humility is a critical component of an ethic of global citizenship, but find the communion table a better symbol for it than the operating table. The use of metaphor allows the reader to add his or her own meaning, thus personalizing and increasing the worth of this effort.

While the image of breaking bread together is inextricably associated with the Christian sacrament of communion, the meaning of the act is by no means confined to this. It is a near-universal human tradition to imbue meaning to the sharing of bread with another. The linguistic roots of companionship reflect this: com - together with; panis - bread. Companionship is literally derived from the image of being together around the table.4 If you'll excuse the double dose of etymology, the roots of communion are an even more powerful link to the value I want the communion table to symbolize. Communion comes from the Latin communis - mutual participation. And so this table symbolizes the value of mutuality. Some may prefer to think this as companionship, community, or accompaniment.5

The Krista Foundation for Global Citizenship supports young adults in their twenties who are engaged in a sustained period of voluntary or vocational service as an expression of their Christian faith and values. We call these young adults "Krista Colleagues."6 It is during their twenties that most people define the values by which they will lead the rest of their lives. We believe that travel and service are powerful means to shape these values towards those that align with an ethic of global citizenship. Krista Colleagues commit to service assignments through a number of organizations like the Jesuit Volunteer Corps, the Mennonite Central Committee (MCC), AmeriCorps, Peace Corps, and the Presbyterian Church. Many of their service assignments take them into communities in which they are outsiders. Many of these communities are in some way broken - communities of orphans, refugees, widows, homeless, and the dying; communities of neglect, poverty, addiction and violence. It is tempting to think of their arrival as heroic, and in some ways it may truly be, but it is essential to remember that we are all in some way broken.

To sit at the communion table is to realize our share in the human condition. We may be better positioned to have some of our needs met, but our neediness allots us equality to those we serve. We all hunger and thirst. We all need grace, love, hope and meaning. We all bleed red and know what pain and loss feel like. Accepting an invitation to this table means not pretending otherwise. It means dropping our Christ-complex and operating at eye-level with those we serve. I invite you to push beyond the value of charity and toward mutual indebtedness.6 Repositioning our value here recognizes that our own vulnerabilities, weaknesses, and needs may be addressed by those we intend to serve.

Where there is true mutuality, there is also sacrifice. What does it mean to count our own life and needs as no more worthy than those of others? How much are we willing to risk laying down in service to others? When Krista and I left for Bolivia in 1997, we literally had to sign a waiver with MCC that essentially said, "We understand that this may cost us our life, and yet we willingly go." That decision did, in fact, end up costing us her life and nearly mine. While I have deeply regretted and mourned the consequences of our decision, I still assert that it was the right decision to make ex ante.7 I believe that Krista would agree that our decision, regardless of the final outcome, was based on the right set of values or ethic.

You may be going to live among the poor, the marginalized, the voiceless, and the violent; you will share their risks. You may get malaria or chagas disease, you may get caught in the crossfire of gang warfare, you may be another victim of poor roads and machismo behind the wheel, you will learn to know hunger, frustration, rage, and impotence. But you will share these things with those who did not come voluntarily and who cannot escape to a home outside of their conditions. It is a powerful statement of mutuality with echoes of Christ. Jesus emptied himself and learned to know suffering as deep as any of us have ever known, was rejected by his hometown, betrayed and abandoned by his friends, tortured and killed by the people he came to save. May you never have to empty yourself so far or lay down so much, but may you always be willing to. The relationship between you and the community you serve can be powerfully shaped by your willingness to mutually participate - to have communion.

When you break bread together, there is a mutual willingness to sacrifice half of the loaf in recognition of the other's hunger. There is also a mutual appreciation for the half freely given. At the communion table, we participate together as equals in the bread being broken and in the symbol of the act. On the train from Cuzco, Jim Hunt, Krista's father, was once invited to this table. Too wondrous for mere prose, here's his account in verse8

Quechua Dama
Hustled from train to bus
There, next to her, an empty seat.
She nodded approval of my occupying its emptiness.
Her stout frame amply filled the seat's corner.

I, long, white and lank
Appeared as if from a different world,
Brown hat, sunglasses, blue eyes, white skin.
She, dark, short, hair tinged with grey, teeth missing.
Still, she smiled and nodded.

We chatted in Spanish about
Houses, trees, mountains and families.
As the bus lurched along
Our generalities became specifics.

I, a daughter died three years ago.
She, a daughter too in a bus accident.
Both, in magical ways were twenty-five
Our eyes locked, both brimming with tears.

I choked mine back.
But she, lady that she was
Dove deep into her blue plastic shopping bag
And lifted high beautiful Peruvian pan

She broke it and offered me some.

2. The Negotiation Table: Influence

Let me now invite you to a totally different kind of table. The negotiation table: the place where strategies are developed, decisions made, deals brokered, policies written, and resources deployed. What matters at this table is influence. Your service in the world may take you to those without power or influence, but I hope that, for some of you, it also takes you to those with all the power and influence. There is work for Global Citizens committed to principals of stewardship, justice, and peace at this table. There are systems, structures, and laws that need to be changed. There are policies, movements, and nations that need advocates, organizers, and leaders who understand and value the importance of influence. We can look to men and women like former UN Secretary General Dag Hammerskjöld, Nelson Mandela, and Wangari Maathai of the Green Movement in Africa, as models of how it can be done at the highest levels.

The obstacle for most young adults I know is that there is a difference between valuing influence and having it. Most don't have the credentials to take a seat at this table just yet. However, the Krista Foundation, and others believe that by encouraging the commitment to service in young adults, there is a long-term investment being made in their leadership capacity and ethic for the time when they do have the credentials. There is also a growing body of evidence that young adults who travel and engage in service gain such credentials.

Jim Hunt has been doing some research in this area. He has developed a number of case studies of American leaders as diverse as Benjamin Franklin, Abraham Lincoln, Jane Addams, and Martin Luther King Jr., who were transformed by experiences of travel and service as young adults.9 What Jim found in common with their stories is that they gained perspective, adaptability, and credibility that helped launch them into and guided them through vital leadership roles. A longitudinal study of service in AmeriCorps has also found evidence of significant long-term impacts on the type of civic engagement that we associate with social capital and healthy democratic governance. Years after returning from their service assignments, volunteers are acutely aware of their own communities' needs, have a stronger sense of civic obligation, and are more engaged in public activities.10 These studies support our claim that young adults like the ones the Krista Foundation for Global Citizenship support become better citizens and leaders as a result of their engaging the world through service.

Clearly, I'm not just saying that volunteers tend to vote more later in life, although that's probably true; I'm talking about a fundamental shift in attitudes and values that shapes them as citizens and leaders in a way that benefits society as a whole. When young adults commit to a sustained period of service, not only are they more likely to develop a global citizen ethic, their voice is likely to gain the credibility needed for influence. I invite you to this table because I believe it is important to value this kind of influence. Some young adults disparage it as if influence involved "selling out to The Man." A couple of people actually accused me of this when I told them I attended Harvard University and was considering a position at the World Bank because I wished to take a seat at the table on behalf of those marginalized and without voice. Valuing influence is not selling out; it is recognizing that relevance is better than self-righteousness. People's willingness to engage society and to leverage their credibility and influence is at the root of nearly all social change.

Service volunteerism is not a mere holding pattern for young adults unsure of what they want to do next, it is not a one-off activity you do in your idealistic days before you have to live in the "real" world, with "real" responsibilities and with a "real" job. Can you think of work more rooted in reality than accompanying children with AIDS as they pass from life to death? Is there anything not real about helping a rural community establish its first library, about facilitating dialogue between Muslims and Christians in Egypt, about training indigenous nurses in Indonesia, or about helping disabled adults live in community with dignity? These are real examples of real work being done by Krista Colleagues. Their choice to do this work, to engage in service volunteerism, may be the critical inflection point that redirects the long-term trajectory of their lives. This is not a holding pattern; it's a launch pad into a life that engages society's most pressing realities in ways that are critically needed.

We believe that the years committed to voluntary or vocational service are deeply formative for the person these young adults will be if and when the time comes for them to embrace influence and take a seat at this table. They'll be more likely to think of those unable to be at the table and advocate for them. Their perspective will be more global and inclusive. Their values and ethics will be reinforced by practice beyond theory and they will be less likely be co-opted by the power at the table. Their voice will carry more weight backed by the depth of their life experience. Their audience will be broader, their vision deeper, their hearts wider.

3. The Study Table: Competence

Sometimes the best expression of an ethic of service is to remove yourself from the action for a while and invest in your own capacity to serve. We also invite you to the study table to hone your skills, knowledge, and attitudes, and to learn from others who share this table with you. If you wish to take a seat at the negotiation table, one of the surest ways to build the necessary credibility is to be competent in what you do. Now, I'm not saying that you need a Masters degree or even a college education to effectively serve others, but my own experience tells me that I'm less effective when I'm uninformed. When I don't know the relevant theories, what has been tried before by others, what the practical steps are to efficiently accomplish what I want to achieve, or even how to frame the right questions about the matter, I'm less effective. The study table may be at a formal institution, it may be in your hammock. It's just a metaphor for balancing action with contemplation and learning.

Few things are sadder to me than watching the explosion of frustration that results when young adults are passionate about some social issue, yet impotent in their ignorance and lack of credentials. Unable to engage the nexus of conversation in the appropriate language, they instead throw stones and scream slogans, both of which usually miss meaningful targets. Marginalized and inarticulate, they throw ineffectual tantrums that further strip their voice of credibility.

I was recently invited to a dinner with a group of young social activists in Bolivia. A couple of them were militant anti-globalization protesters. I found their passion stimulating and wanted to really engage them on the issue. But as we continued to speak, I got the sense that their emotion was not backed up with any real knowledge. I asked them if they had any training in international finance, economics, or trade policy. They didn't. How about business, international relations, information technology or migration? None. I asked them if they had at least read any books about globalization. One had read an article and another, an excerpt from a chapter in Stiglitz's book.11 I was suddenly and totally uninterested in their opinions about globalization.

Effective passion is not about spikes in blood pressure and raised voices, it's about being concerned enough to sustain your efforts to be a relevant actor. Wakefield Gregg, a Charter Krista Colleague from the class of 1999, once said that "passion is perfected in discipline." It's about caring enough to consider that you might cause harm if you storm in unprepared. It's about strengthening your voice so that you can be an effective advocate, deepening your knowledge so you can be a nontrivial player, and sharpening your skill so you can be a builder of capacity in others.

If you launch into community development, or environmental activism, or peacemaking, or any of the other important activities this foundation supports without investing in your own preparation, you reinforce the subtle condescending view that these activities don't constitute real work that require real skills, professionalism, intelligence, or competence. You tacitly underline the idea that the people you serve don't deserve the best that you or the world has to offer. You reveal your own prejudice that service is more about good intentions than effectiveness. Good intentions aren't worth much if they bring harm to the people you intend to serve. Let me give you an example that I shared at the 2005 annual conference of the Krista Foundation during a panel discussion on engaging the mind.

There are millions of child laborers around the world working in scores of industry and service sectors. The idea that we could we save them by simply boycotting a few of the products manufactured using child labor is a tempting one. In fact, at any given time one can find dozens of ongoing child-labor related boycotts against corporations like Nike, McDonalds, Wal-Mart, Nestle, and Coca-Cola, and specific trade goods like Chinese fireworks, Indian carpets, and Pakistani soccer balls. A quick Google of "child labor boycott" provides ample evidence of how popular the boycott is. Activist teachers turn boycotts into school projects, activist churches turn boycotts into missions, activist politicians turn boycotts into campaign issues and bills.

The intentions are good; the problem is with the outcomes. Few boycotts are ever followed up to see what the actual impact on child welfare was. Most are based on the unexamined assumption that, if they force the closure or relocation of a factory that employs children, child welfare will improve. And so the measures of success are in terms of pain inflicted on the offending companies and changes in their behavior. However, there are some good studies that do follow up on the impact of boycotts on the formerly employed children, and the evidence does not offer much support to these assumptions. The truth is boycotts sometimes result in a decline in child welfare, not an improvement.

When factories close, the underlying preferences and incentives that brought the children into that factory in the first place don't just disappear. Parents don't suddenly decide that they can afford to send young Abul to school now that factory is closed. The children don't suddenly realize the long-term value of pursuing an education. Governments don't suddenly make policies that obviate the needs of these families. Children who end up laid-off as a result of a boycott often end up moving into more dangerous and lower paid work like stone crushing, fireworks manufacturing, street hustling, and prostitution. Boycotts can lead to a decline in wages paid to child laborers and, paradoxically, even an increase in child labor. 12

Clearly I'm not advocating child labor, nor am I saying that boycotts of abusive businesses can never improve child welfare. The point is that assumptions about what will happen when you take an action need to be examined carefully. The world is complex and we can't always predict how economic and social structures will respond to interventions. This shouldn't paralyze us but if we really care about the people we wish to serve, it is good to value competence. Make sure you are actually affecting the intended change without creating unintended counter-directional change. When you come to the study table, you intentionally take time to think before you act, observe as you do, and reflect on what you've done.

Whatever your service assignment or vocation, take it seriously. Just because you are a volunteer or do social work or are employed by a faith-based non-profit organization, you are not excused from being professional and well-informed, from being held accountable for both your process and results, from having more than good intentions expected of you by those whom you serve. Subscribe to the pertinent journals, read the relevant literature, attend a conference, find a mentor, go to graduate school, whatever. Get engaged, value competence, be relevant, and do no harm.

4. The Operating Table: Humility

There are times when we ourselves don't have the power or authority to make the changes needed within us to live a life aligned with our calling. For these times, I invite you to the operating table where the value of humility is embraced. Humility recognizes that we are limited creatures. We aren't enough as we are on our own to fix a broken world. Here, God the surgeon puts us under the knife and cuts away the parts infected with sin. It is only then that God begins healing us, restoring us, and building us into the people God intends us to be.

We can come willingly to this table, dipping back into its bounty again and again. One way we do this is through the spiritual disciplines. Some disciplines engage us in practicing the presence of God: prayer, meditation, celebration, spiritual reading and biblical study. Others disengage us from the things that get in the way of experiencing God: fasting, silence, rest, tithing, and anonymous service. We practice the disciplines as humility in action. It is a way of opening ourselves to God's transformative love and grace, and by "transformative," I mean that change happens. When God works change into our life, its not always comfortable, which is why it typically takes discipline. As one of Linda Hunt's writing students once noted, "You can't sharpen a knife in tapioca."

Sometimes, we don't come willingly to this table, but rather find ourselves placed on it, willing or not. When we fail, when we experience loss, when we burn out, when we break down, we become vulnerable to God's healing touch. I don't mean to imply that God throws us on the table by causing us to experience loss, failure, or pain so that God can operate on us. Our Creator is not a divine terrorist. God's heart is the first to break when catastrophe befalls us.

A few hours after Krista was killed, I was lying on a stainless steel operating table in a darkened room, wondering how I had gotten there. How did a small town boy from Montana end up in on this table in Bolivia with his bride crushed under a bus in a ravine 100 miles away? "What's going to happen now?" I wondered. "God, don't leave me now," I pleaded.

God did not leave me, and it was what happened in the years following that led to a great deal of change in my life. I am undoubtedly a better man today than I was before the accident and a much of the improvement has been a result of God and I working out my response to that catastrophic loss. However, it is inconsistent with my understanding of God's character to think that this situation was created in order to transform me. God did not kill Krista to improve Aaron; I'm simply not worth that much, even transformed.

So while God may not have created the circumstances for the purpose of transforming us, God may certainly work all things for good by staying with us and operating on us in the midst of them. And for this reason, the value of hope might also be represented by this table. Another Krista Colleague, Sarah Wanless uses the metaphor of a compost pile; all of life's experiences go onto the pile and are eventually transformed into fertile soil. 13

Whether through the intentional practice of the spiritual disciplines or by the hard times the befall us, there are opportunities for those that embrace humility to be reshaped. Come, allow yourself to be on the operating table and seek here the healing and transformation that God can bring you. Let go your baggage, strengthen your integrity, shore up your faith, deepen your wells of compassion, and intensify your joy.

5. The ‘Hearthing' Table: Celebration

Finally, I'd like to invite you to the hearthing table. This is a table of celebration, bounty, thanksgiving, hospitality, rest, and wonder. Around it you'll find invigorating conversations, curious sampling of new foods and culture, grateful spirits, and cries of "pull up a chair and make yourself at home - mi casa es tu casa!" The Hearth, a guest center above the Hunt's home, was so named, in part, because Jim liked that the following three words are encapsulated in it: hear, heart, and earth. Let's look at each of these words.

What do we hear at the hearthing table?

We hear each other. That is we recognize and celebrate our friendships both new and old through hospitality. We invite each other to the table we've prepared and provide exuberant hospitality. We take time to dress the table, thinking about the details like candles, wine and food pairings, napkin rings, background music, dessert and coffee. Whether we have a little or a lot, we honor our guests by making the table one of preposterous bounty.

Again, Wakefield Gregg has been an example to me in this area. When he bought his home in the Hilltop neighborhood of Tacoma, it was not exactly a natural house of hospitality. That is to say, there was nothing about the house structurally, or the neighborhood socially, or the property in terms of natural beauty that made it a hospitable house. Yet Wake transformed it into a place of preposterous bounty. Seventeen different people moved in and lived with him in that house during his four years there. And when he moved to Seattle, he brought the same spirit of hospitality with him.

When I returned after five years in Bolivia, Wake moved into the guest bedroom in his own house so that he could invite Gabriela and me into the master bedroom for the first year of our marriage. He lent us his car and when an errant driver totaled it with me in it, he used the insurance money to buy a table that was crazy big for a bachelor, but just right for hosting huge, exuberant dinner parties.

When Gabriela and I went to Boston for a couple of years, we decided to forego the typical American entertainment system and bought the same table that Wake had. In our two-bedroom house, we hosted dozens of dinner parties, two of which grew into crowds of forty to fifty from dozens of different countries.
At the hearthing table, we create space for our guests to feel valued, honored, and heard.

Heart - Many of you are serving in some extremely difficult places, emotionally, physically, and spiritually. Our emotions and identity can get pulled in so deeply to the pain and brokenness in which we daily walk, and the enormity of it all can overwhelm us. We can become despondent, pessimistic, deadened, burnt out. I know several Christian humanitarians who ended up shipwrecked in their faith and without energy or hope to continue in the struggle for Kingdom values in a broken world.

At the hearthing table, we step away momentarily from the pain and violence. We don't forget it, but we recognize that this is not all there is in the world. This is also a place of beauty, kindness, and provision. We step away also to remember not to take ourselves so seriously. We are not the only ones resisting the darkness. And furthermore, we can't resist the darkness if we've forgotten what the light feels like. Forgetting to be grateful and to celebrate is like forgetting that Christ's grace is upon us, that we are created in the image of God, that our blessings outstrip our pain, that God's justice will be the final word spoken in Creation.14

Earth - There is something sacred in the celebration of earthy things. I am personally moved to breathe a prayer of thanksgiving to God when a brilliant mouthful of Pinot Noir follows the perfect mouthful of pork cutlet, prepared by my beautiful wife. I am filled with a sense of wonder and grace when I stand atop Mt. Rainier and look down upon the ice flow of an enormous glacier. I smile and marvel when a Masai grandmother in Tanzania spits in my hand to say thank you or when I am totally incapable of deciphering what the lateral head-bobbing of a boy in India is meant to convey. When the way I am created interacts with the earth and the people God created, I sense something sacred happening. I sense a deep connection between celebration and creativity that connects me to the intention of God's design.

Some would create a false dichotomy between that which is earthy and mundane and that which is spiritual and heavenly. Creation is God's manifold physical expression; when we enjoy it, we enjoy our Creator. Culture is a product of humankind, made in God's image, expressing its variation and richness. When we celebrate these two without unnecessarily separating them our own creativity is engaged in profound ways.

Let me illustrate with a somewhat trivial example. When Jim and Linda wanted to create a logo for the newly created Krista Foundation, they explored ideas with professional graphic designers and artists, but nothing seemed to capture the essence of what they were creating in this foundation. They decided to try a different approach. They invited me over to their house, fed me well, popped open a bottle of red wine, and we relaxed together on their deck beside the waterfall. As we talked about The Krista Foundation and their hopes and dreams for what it might become, they slid a piece of paper and pencil over to me and simply asked, "What is the symbol of what we are celebrating here?" And in about fifteen seconds we had our logo, which is two people dancing and celebrating the richness of a life committed to showing God's love in actions, whose bodies form the letters K and F in front of a background of mountain and sky.

God modeled the pairing of creation and celebration at the very beginning. Each day God created - first light, then water, then earth and all of its creatures, and finally humankind. At the end of each day, God paused, looked out at this new creation and celebrated it, saying, "Ah, this is good. This is very good." We honor God's high opinion of creation and recognize our place in it when we "serve the Lord with gladness," as the Psalmist writes. This is indeed our heritage and our calling.

The Dessert Table:

Amore precise title for this article might have been "The Beginnings of a Christian Ethic of Global Citizenship Rooted in Service," but precision would have come at the cost of both clarity and brevity. The invitation to these five tables is an invitation to define what values framework will empower you to live out a life-long ethic of service, civic engagement, and global understanding. My Christian perspective and focus on service clearly shaped the values that I chose, but I leave the question open for you and the perspectives and focus you bring. Nevertheless, my intention is to promote without apology a concept of global citizenship rooted in values like these. What I define as mutuality, influence, competence, humility and celebration, you may define as community, advocacy, learning, change, and wonder. The five tables presented here are intended to define a values space that is at once capacious and the minimum frame for defining the ethic of global citizenship.

You are invited here with some earnestness. We invite you so that our world might change; so that God's goodness might be expressed in you and through you as you serve the world with gladness. From Camden to Cameroon, the world needs those that would embrace an ethic of global citizenship. Whether you're in the slums or in a boardroom, in the field or taking exams, step forward grounded in the values that make you a global citizen.

*Based on a keynote address given by the author at the annual conference of the Krista Foundation for Global Citizenship, May 28, 2006, titled "Come to the Table: An Invitation to Krista Colleagues, Both New and Returning".

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