A few years ago my friend and creative director for The Other Journal, in what seemed almost an accident, contacted Human Rights Watch and asked if anyone was hosting their traveling film festival for Seattle.  Before we knew it, we had reserved the rights to host the Human Rights Watch Traveling Film Festival in Seattle, a film festival which features award-winning films looking at current issues of human rights and social justice.

Because we are a theology and culture publication, we began to wonder about what we could do with the films. What, we asked, connections between these films and theology could be and should be made? 

After deliberations with the editors and creative team at The Other Journal, we landed on the concept which is now Film, Faith, and Justice.  These films, we hypothesized, would present an excellent opportunity to engage the theology of social justice, through the powerful medium of film and keynote lectures and discussion panels, we hoped this would prove a fertile nexus for debate and education around religion and social justice.

The first year we hosted the event (Spring of 2006), we held it at a local Christian liberal arts school, Seattle Pacific University.  At this event we heard from speakers Dan Bell, Steve Long, and Pam Cochran, and dialogued about topics such as Capitalism and Christianity, Womenist Theology and Justice, and what would a Theology of Democracy look like.

Our second year (Spring of 2007) we moved the event to the University of Washington and hosted speakers Shane Claiborne, Dwight Hopkins, William Cavanaugh, and young theologian and activist Rachel McGuire.  We discussed issues of Race, Economics, Religion and Violence, Immigration, and what acitivism looks like for young radicals.

Film, Faith, and Justice 2008

This year we have moved the event to the fall, we have an excellent line-up of speakers and films, and our time calls for deep engagement in issues that we will address such as poverty, patriotism and faith, the myth of redemptive violence, and violent constructions of race.  Our excellent speakers for this year are: Chris Heuertz of Word Made Flesh, Eugene McCarraher of Villanova University, Rita Brock who is the Co-Director of Faith Voices for the Common Good, and J. Kameron Carter of Duke Divinity School.

Our venue this year, Mars Hill Graduate School, will be a bit more intimate but should be an excellent place for film buffs, activists, members of Seattle's faith communities, and those in the academy can gather to witness impactful films and challenging speakers.  We shifted a bit more toward a conference setting this year.

All this to say, in my biased and unashamed way, I think FFJ08 will be an excellent conference for the Seattle community.  Conferences, I admit, are hit or miss, but where I think FFJ does a good job is to invite attendees to practical engagements with these issues, whether it is signing up to help host a refugee family, committing to better buying practices, or donating time to local efforts to raise money for relief efforts accross the globe.

These films and excellent speakers will bring a challenge to move more fully into praxis--faith and theology in action.

I've listed the films below, but to read more about the films and the schedule of the event, go to www.filmfaithandjustice.com

We hope you will join us for this event this year, tickets are available online and student discounts are available.

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This year's films are:

A Promise to the Dead - Filmmaker Peter Raymont travels to Chile with Dorfman in late 2006, at the time when Augusto Pinochet, Allende’s overthrower and Dorfman’s long-time nemesis, is dying. Raymont follows Dorfman through emotional reunions with his friends and fellow resistors, to personal landmarks that are powerful both emotionally and historically. During the journey they explore exile, memory and the search for justice.


The Greatest Silence: Rape in the Congo - Shot in the war zones of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), this extraordinary film sensitively yet unflinchingly brings to light the plight of women and girls caught in that country’s intractable conflicts. A survivor of rape herself, Emmy Award-winning filmmaker Lisa Jackson travels through the DRC to understand what is happening and why.

Letter to Anna - Anna Politkovskaya was a brave and tenacious journalist for one of Russia’s only independent journals, Novaya Gazeta. Anna used her journalist platform to strongly criticize Russian military actions in Chechnya. On October 7, 2006, she was shot dead in the stairwell of her Moscow apartment building. A few years before her untimely death, filmmaker Eric Bergkraut met Politkovskaya while making his documentary Coca: The Dove From Chechnya. Bergkraut filmed some powerful, frank interviews with the late reporter. In Letter to Anna these are interwoven with a tantalizing search for her likely killers and insightful contributions from colleagues and loved ones who discuss her work while celebrating the life of an extraordinary woman and mother, a fearless defender of the people, “the conscience of Russia.”


The Sari Soldiers - Filmed over three years during the most historic and pivotal time in Nepal’s modern history, The Sari Soldiers is an extraordinary story of six women’s courageous efforts to shape Nepal’s future in the midst of an escalating civil war against Maoist insurgents, and the King’s crackdown on civil liberties.


To See if I’m Smiling - Israel is the only country in the world where 18-year-old girls are drafted for compulsory military service. To See If I’m Smiling is a disturbing look at the actions and behavior of women soldiers in the Israeli army who, stationed in the Gaza Strip and the West Bank, help maintain the 40-year-old occupation of Palestinian territories.

USA vs. Al-Arian - A passionate, outspoken pro-Palestinian activist, university professor Sami Al-Arian was charged in 2003 with funding and supporting a Palestinian terrorist group and held in prison awaiting a trial for two-and-a-half years. USA vs Al-Arian is an intimate family portrait that documents the strain brought on by Al-Arian’s trial, a battle waged both in court and in the media.

Project Kashmir - Two American friends, one Hindu and one Muslim, enter the war zone of Kashmir to investigate the 60-year rivalry between their homelands India and Pakistan. How does a young generation remain hopeful in this endless war? Beautifully lensed by award-winning cinematographer Ross Kauffman, the film captures the physical splendor of Kashmir, while expertly interweaving deeply moving personal stories of Kashmiris with those of the two American women, who strive to reconcile their ethnic and religious heritage with the violence that haunts their homeland.


Up the Yangtze - A symbol of China’s economic prowess, the Three Gorges Dam on the Yangtze River is the world’s largest, and China’s biggest engineering feat since the Great Wall. It also represents the end to a way of life and livelihood for two million people along the Yangtze. Among those being forced to relocate are the Yu family. Poor, illiterate farmers with few options available to them, they decide to send their oldest daughter Yu Shui to work on a cruise ship. Working for the same cruise line is Chen Bo Yu, the only son from a middle class family. Good looking and proficient in English, Jerry (as he is renamed by the cruise line), sees this as an opportunity — a stepping stone to bigger and better things, while Yu Shui (renamed Cindy) would prefer to continue her education. Both struggle with the demands of their jobs, especially the expectation to understand Western social cues and to operate comfortably in a Western social environment. Chinese-Canadian filmmaker Yung Chang crafts a beautifully photographed and moving metaphor for life in contemporary China, as well as a disquieting glimpse into a future that awaits us all.