In all this Lenten discussion of ashes, my brain has finally made the connection that the Church is going through a phoenixing. What I mean is that the church seems to be dying... and a new birth is on the horizon.
It is dying to its old ways - moralistic preaching and moral absolutes. I see the new church preaching the story of Jesus Christ and letting the people decide for themselves what to do about abortion, political debates, and whether or not women and gay and lesbian people can be leaders in the church. Then again, if it is a lesbian person preaching that gospel good news, people may not be able to hear it. I struggle with that.
The Church is dying in a physical sense if we think about whom the members of the Church are. Most of my congregation is made up of elderly people. Though many amazing things happen in my congregation and being older is by no means a limitation... the fact is that this older generation is dying. This causes some tension in my opinion. There's the practical problem of differing tastes: the older generation wants the Creed, the classic and familiar hymns, and a more traditional worship service; the younger generation is somewhat okay with the traditional worship style (typically if they grew up with it) but are more interested in inclusive language, social justice issues, newer hymns, and different forms of spirituality (and religion). But if the congregation is made up of older members, how do you form a church that will meet their needs and yet still welcome in another generation?
And I do recognize that this tension is the very task of being a pastor. How to minister to one group and at the same time open the doors to another who has different tastes. The comfort is that at the most basic level, we're all human and we all need to know we are loved and a part of something bigger than ourselves.
But the Church is dying. In ways that I couldn't even begin to articulate. But this means that the next generation of church will be a different looking place once it arises from the ashes of what is now.
Perhaps the new church will not be easily recognized within church walls and on rosters of church membership. Perhaps the new church will be so busy working for justice that Sunday mornings no longer look like they always have. Communion will happen around tables at youth hostiles or homeless shelters where it doesn't matter what clothes you wear or how well you can read the bible. Preaching will happen with our very lives as we live out the gospel in our various vocations. Baptism will be celebrated in rivers and streams and creeks and oceans - and we'll be surrounded by all of creation, not just us humans. Sharing the gospel will happen in online chat rooms reaching people who cannot leave their homes because of depression, anxiety, illness, or disability. The gospel will reach places it never could before as it is spoken by pastors and people with dyed hair and tattoos and piercings (*cough cough* Like me!).
The Church is phoenixing. Are we ready for the flames?
Monday, March 21, 2011
Wednesday, March 09, 2011
It's My Party and I'll Cry If I Want To
What does one do when one plans a (Shrove Tuesday pancake) party to which no one shows? Take it as a personal insult? Chock it up to busy lives where people forget or get busy?
More specifically, how does one not take it is a personal insult and instead accept that lives get crazy and people forget?
No, seriously. How?
I'm trying to think of how I could have invited people differently, made more explicit invites, sent confirmation e-mails or texts, etc. Is it my fault that no one showed up to my little party? Bad party idea? Bad party night? Bad host?!@*#
...that might make me feel worse.
I want my TN and Chicago friends back.
More specifically, how does one not take it is a personal insult and instead accept that lives get crazy and people forget?
No, seriously. How?
I'm trying to think of how I could have invited people differently, made more explicit invites, sent confirmation e-mails or texts, etc. Is it my fault that no one showed up to my little party? Bad party idea? Bad party night? Bad host?!@*#
...that might make me feel worse.
I want my TN and Chicago friends back.
Ash Wednesday Sermon
Ash Wednesday -
For months, our stories have surrounded us in light. Not only the bright star announcing the birth of Christ but the brilliance of Christ himself, transfigured on a high mountain.
So when we turn to focus on our inner being, on the work of our hands, we seem to step away from the brilliance of the holy and into the shadow of our selves. To be sure, we are coming down that mountain into the mundane. And for anyone who knows anything about walking up and down large mountains, it is just as difficult to hike down as it is to hike up. It's just a different kind of difficult.
So this is Lent. The descent. The difficult walk down. The shadowy time when we look in upon our very souls and take inventory on what we find there. When we see with new eyes the ugliness of sin. It is the darkness of the tomb after the black afternoon of Good Friday. It is the acknowledgment of that darkness within our own bodies.
To say this journey inward, towards God, is easy would be a lie. It is always difficult to encounter the darkness. Think for just a minute about the absurdity of putting ashes on our bodies to remember our mortality. This morning, as I was distributing ashes to several elders with severe dementia, they looked at me like I was asking them to eat mud. They shooed me away with grand looks of confusion and even anger. Who was this woman offering to put some kind of muddy ash on their face? Why in the world would anyone want that?
It is abnormal to choose to encounter our mortality. Society leaves this task to those people with terminal illnesses or their family members. In general, we try to stay far away from the mess of death and dying. And in truth, we all try to resist death. Store shelves are lined with products for looking younger, feeling younger, and staying younger. It is clear, in our society, that death and darkness and are bad things. Reflecting on our mortality is, then, not only a bad thing but an absurd thing.
Perhaps that is why this tradition is not wide spread. Why so few know what it means to put ash on foreheads. Why so few choose to remember that they are dust and to dust they shall return.
Because it is never easy to encounter our mortality, to explore the darkness within us. Perhaps we all believe that to encounter the darkness means to give up. Or perhaps you think like I used to. I believed that the darkness would swallow me whole should I choose to explore it. By simply acknowledging the darkness of the world and the darkness within me, all light would cease to shine and I'd be left alone, consumed by the darkness.
This could not be farther from the truth. Because, if we learned anything during Epiphany, we know that when we delve into the depth of our deepest self, we will find God there. The one that breathed life into our dust still remains. We will discover that in the muck and mire of our souls, God appears. It should not surprise us to find God there - the light refusing to be consumed by the dark.
After all, this is where God DELIGHTS to be. Jesus is the light of the world after all. It is God that illumines us from within, still surrounded by our darkness. It is God that illumines the world, despite its darkness.
So tonight, we remember our mortality. We remember our beginning as dust. We remember the power and light of the One who breathed life into us, a light that covers all the broken, murky, ugly, sinful, or shameful parts of our souls.
So as we come down the mountain contemplating the darkness of sin and the cross, we descend into our souls, confessing our darkness and acknowledging the darkness we see in the world and in each other.
Lent is a time to explore the darkness. To search for the light of Christ that was not left behind on the mountain top but is still alive in each of us. Lent is the season to discover that death and darkness never have the final word, whether within each of us or throughout the world.
Amen.
For months, our stories have surrounded us in light. Not only the bright star announcing the birth of Christ but the brilliance of Christ himself, transfigured on a high mountain.
So when we turn to focus on our inner being, on the work of our hands, we seem to step away from the brilliance of the holy and into the shadow of our selves. To be sure, we are coming down that mountain into the mundane. And for anyone who knows anything about walking up and down large mountains, it is just as difficult to hike down as it is to hike up. It's just a different kind of difficult.
So this is Lent. The descent. The difficult walk down. The shadowy time when we look in upon our very souls and take inventory on what we find there. When we see with new eyes the ugliness of sin. It is the darkness of the tomb after the black afternoon of Good Friday. It is the acknowledgment of that darkness within our own bodies.
To say this journey inward, towards God, is easy would be a lie. It is always difficult to encounter the darkness. Think for just a minute about the absurdity of putting ashes on our bodies to remember our mortality. This morning, as I was distributing ashes to several elders with severe dementia, they looked at me like I was asking them to eat mud. They shooed me away with grand looks of confusion and even anger. Who was this woman offering to put some kind of muddy ash on their face? Why in the world would anyone want that?
It is abnormal to choose to encounter our mortality. Society leaves this task to those people with terminal illnesses or their family members. In general, we try to stay far away from the mess of death and dying. And in truth, we all try to resist death. Store shelves are lined with products for looking younger, feeling younger, and staying younger. It is clear, in our society, that death and darkness and are bad things. Reflecting on our mortality is, then, not only a bad thing but an absurd thing.
Perhaps that is why this tradition is not wide spread. Why so few know what it means to put ash on foreheads. Why so few choose to remember that they are dust and to dust they shall return.
Because it is never easy to encounter our mortality, to explore the darkness within us. Perhaps we all believe that to encounter the darkness means to give up. Or perhaps you think like I used to. I believed that the darkness would swallow me whole should I choose to explore it. By simply acknowledging the darkness of the world and the darkness within me, all light would cease to shine and I'd be left alone, consumed by the darkness.
This could not be farther from the truth. Because, if we learned anything during Epiphany, we know that when we delve into the depth of our deepest self, we will find God there. The one that breathed life into our dust still remains. We will discover that in the muck and mire of our souls, God appears. It should not surprise us to find God there - the light refusing to be consumed by the dark.
After all, this is where God DELIGHTS to be. Jesus is the light of the world after all. It is God that illumines us from within, still surrounded by our darkness. It is God that illumines the world, despite its darkness.
So tonight, we remember our mortality. We remember our beginning as dust. We remember the power and light of the One who breathed life into us, a light that covers all the broken, murky, ugly, sinful, or shameful parts of our souls.
So as we come down the mountain contemplating the darkness of sin and the cross, we descend into our souls, confessing our darkness and acknowledging the darkness we see in the world and in each other.
Lent is a time to explore the darkness. To search for the light of Christ that was not left behind on the mountain top but is still alive in each of us. Lent is the season to discover that death and darkness never have the final word, whether within each of us or throughout the world.
Amen.
Ashes
Distributing ashes to seniors with severe dementia has given me a whole new perspective on Ash Wednesday. When I asked if they'd like ashes for Ash Wednesday, several of the elders looked at me like I was asking them to eat cardboard.
From the woman and her daughter patiently waiting with grateful hearts for me to come to her room and read Psalm 51 and do the imposition of ashes to another woman who very nearly lashed out at me in confused anger when I offered to put ashes on her forehead...
It begs the question, why in the world would any of us want ash on our bodies? Beyond the fact that it is unusual to play in the mud and dirt and earth past the age of, oh, seven or eight, is the fact that for those of us who are quite aware of the meaning of Ash Wednesday, we are reminding ourselves of our mortality.
And that's something we NEVER do in our world today. It is impolite to ask someone's age. The shelves are stocked with ways to look younger, feel younger, and stay younger. Our society doesn't seem very comfortable with aging and dying. And yet...
We are dust. And that's where we shall return.
So why on earth would we want to remember that?! Why on earth would we put oily ash on our foreheads that looks like mud? Why begin 40 days of repentance and fasting and prayer?
I don't have the answer but it is worth reflecting on - the power of humility. The recognition of our mortality. A time to truly reflect on our heart and soul's life of faith. In these few short years that we have on earth, what's the point?
God bless you all this Ash Wednesday.
From the woman and her daughter patiently waiting with grateful hearts for me to come to her room and read Psalm 51 and do the imposition of ashes to another woman who very nearly lashed out at me in confused anger when I offered to put ashes on her forehead...
It begs the question, why in the world would any of us want ash on our bodies? Beyond the fact that it is unusual to play in the mud and dirt and earth past the age of, oh, seven or eight, is the fact that for those of us who are quite aware of the meaning of Ash Wednesday, we are reminding ourselves of our mortality.
And that's something we NEVER do in our world today. It is impolite to ask someone's age. The shelves are stocked with ways to look younger, feel younger, and stay younger. Our society doesn't seem very comfortable with aging and dying. And yet...
We are dust. And that's where we shall return.
So why on earth would we want to remember that?! Why on earth would we put oily ash on our foreheads that looks like mud? Why begin 40 days of repentance and fasting and prayer?
I don't have the answer but it is worth reflecting on - the power of humility. The recognition of our mortality. A time to truly reflect on our heart and soul's life of faith. In these few short years that we have on earth, what's the point?
God bless you all this Ash Wednesday.
Tuesday, March 08, 2011
Monday, March 07, 2011
I am a story holder
I think it has to be one of my gifts that people will just open up to me and pour their story into the space between us. An hour later they say, "Wow, I guess I needed to say that." Or, "I didn't mean to talk your ear off!!" Or "Thanks for listening." I nod, usually grateful that they trusted me enough to share their story in the first place. Grateful that I could be the person to hold their story for that hour.
I say this not to boast, for in truth, sometimes I get really frustrated. I'm trying to walk out the door, people!! Or to the girl giving me a pedicure two summers ago before my friend's wedding who told me about her best friend's death when I asked about her tattoo, I'll admit that I wanted the short story. The simple story. The story that wouldn't engage my heart. The story that would allow me to sit back in the chair that massaged my neck and just get some pretty polish on my toes and relax.
Storytelling happens often when I least expect it or desire it. When I go in to check on a resident and share a simple hello and end up talking to the grieving daughter for thirty minutes. After a prayer, she has tears in her eyes, unaware of how much she simply needed to share her grief.
It's an amazing gift God's given me. I'm just wishing I also had the gift of patience to endure the gift of story holding. Perhaps it is just out of practice and is buried in me somewhere?
Storytelling happens often when I least expect it or desire it. When I go in to check on a resident and share a simple hello and end up talking to the grieving daughter for thirty minutes. After a prayer, she has tears in her eyes, unaware of how much she simply needed to share her grief.
It's an amazing gift God's given me. I'm just wishing I also had the gift of patience to endure the gift of story holding. Perhaps it is just out of practice and is buried in me somewhere?
Kindness
Before you know what kindness really is
you must lose things,
feel the future dissolve in a moment
like salt in a weakened broth.
What you held in your hand,
what you counted and carefully saved,
all this must go so you know
how desolate the landscape can be
between the regions of kindness.
How you ride and ride
thinking the bus will never stop,
the passengers eating maize and chicken
will stare out the window forever.
Before you learn the tender gravity of kindness,
you must travel where the Indian in a white poncho
lies dead by the side of the road.
You must see how this could be you,
how he too was someone
who journeyed through the night with plans
and the simple breath that kept him alive.
Before you know kindness as the deepest thing inside,
you must know sorrow as the other deepest thing.
You must wake up with sorrow.
You must speak to it till your voice
catches the thread of all sorrows
and you see the size of the cloth.
Then it is only kindness that makes sense anymore,
only kindness that ties your shoes
and sends you out into the day to mail letters and purchase bread,
only kindness that raises its head
from the crowd of the world to say
it is I you have been looking for,
and then goes with you everywhere
like a shadow or a friend.
Poem: "Kindness" by Naomi Shihab Nye, from The Words Under the Words: Selected Poems. © Eighth Mountain Press, 1995.
you must lose things,
feel the future dissolve in a moment
like salt in a weakened broth.
What you held in your hand,
what you counted and carefully saved,
all this must go so you know
how desolate the landscape can be
between the regions of kindness.
How you ride and ride
thinking the bus will never stop,
the passengers eating maize and chicken
will stare out the window forever.
Before you learn the tender gravity of kindness,
you must travel where the Indian in a white poncho
lies dead by the side of the road.
You must see how this could be you,
how he too was someone
who journeyed through the night with plans
and the simple breath that kept him alive.
Before you know kindness as the deepest thing inside,
you must know sorrow as the other deepest thing.
You must wake up with sorrow.
You must speak to it till your voice
catches the thread of all sorrows
and you see the size of the cloth.
Then it is only kindness that makes sense anymore,
only kindness that ties your shoes
and sends you out into the day to mail letters and purchase bread,
only kindness that raises its head
from the crowd of the world to say
it is I you have been looking for,
and then goes with you everywhere
like a shadow or a friend.
Poem: "Kindness" by Naomi Shihab Nye, from The Words Under the Words: Selected Poems. © Eighth Mountain Press, 1995.
Saturday, March 05, 2011
Living the Gray
Last Saturday, I spent much of the day sobbing, pouring out my sorrows to my counselor and my mother and lamenting the depression that was sitting on my shoulders like an unshakable heavy blanket.
This Saturday, I feel like I'm in a whole different world. While on one level this makes me feel a tad bi-polar or manic, I also recognize that in some of those dark days, I faced some realities. And since then, those realities have been confirmed and balanced. So instead of feeling unnaturally happy and bubbly, I feel content. Like I am at the end of a long battle in which I neither won nor lost. It just ended.
My CPE supervisor told me that I thought too much in zero sum terms. If I win, someone else loses. If I lose, someone else wins. And despite believing I was someone who didn't think in extremes, I've found that many of my thoughts and beliefs about life betrayed me. Dualism - boo.
For instance, as soon as I knew I got my first choice for internship, I knew someone else who had put Montana first didn't get their first choice. I immediately saw my gain in terms of another person's loss.
Additionally, I often see my "single" status as a deficiency. I either have worth because I am with someone or I do not because I am single. This kind of flawed thinking is slowly being corrected (in part thanks to my two amazing supervisors, my mother, and Brene Brown's words around shame and imperfection) but the fact that it existed shows you that I think in extremes.
It also explains the way I self sabotage. I'm either great at something or I don't do it. I'm either a fantastically skilled and loving pastor the first day of internship or I'm not going to be a pastor. (Yes, this sounds ridiculous. I see that now.)
All or nothing doesn't work in life. VERY few things are black and white. For instance, I tried to tell myself for years that the world was good. It was good. It is good. It's grand. It's all good.
And then I saw the ugliness. Saw the flaws. Saw the brokenness. Saw divorce and betrayal and death and wondered what to do with it given that the world was supposed to be good. The struggle was that if I allowed any of this bad stuff to exist, the world would be bad, evil, and ugly. The good would be gone and I couldn't live in that kind of world.
And yet, the darkness hounded. I frequently fell into depression trying to figure out how to live in a world and a body that was EITHER completely black or completely white. Like Jacob, I wrestled.
I was told once and have been reminded repeatedly that to be Lutheran you must love paradoxes. Must love embracing both/and. I'm thinking now that to be Christian you must love paradoxes. To be ALIVE, you must love paradoxes.
So I'm trying to embrace the gray. Embrace that I will never be one to exercise every single morning at 6am. This allows me to work out once or twice a week and go to yoga and feel damn good about it. It doesn't have to be all or nothing. Likewise with healthy meals. Prayer. Pastoral visits. Ministry.
To give the best of myself does not mean that the end goal is perfection. And not reaching perfection does not mean that I did not give the best of myself nor that I am incomplete. Rather, it's life. Nothing is black or white. We bounce around in shades of gray, embracing the dark with the light.
I received a card from a good friend this week. She closes with saying, "You are beautiful my dear - light, dark, and all the shades of grey in between." My heart wept with joy. I will now do my best to continue living the gray.
This Saturday, I feel like I'm in a whole different world. While on one level this makes me feel a tad bi-polar or manic, I also recognize that in some of those dark days, I faced some realities. And since then, those realities have been confirmed and balanced. So instead of feeling unnaturally happy and bubbly, I feel content. Like I am at the end of a long battle in which I neither won nor lost. It just ended.
My CPE supervisor told me that I thought too much in zero sum terms. If I win, someone else loses. If I lose, someone else wins. And despite believing I was someone who didn't think in extremes, I've found that many of my thoughts and beliefs about life betrayed me. Dualism - boo.
For instance, as soon as I knew I got my first choice for internship, I knew someone else who had put Montana first didn't get their first choice. I immediately saw my gain in terms of another person's loss.
Additionally, I often see my "single" status as a deficiency. I either have worth because I am with someone or I do not because I am single. This kind of flawed thinking is slowly being corrected (in part thanks to my two amazing supervisors, my mother, and Brene Brown's words around shame and imperfection) but the fact that it existed shows you that I think in extremes.
It also explains the way I self sabotage. I'm either great at something or I don't do it. I'm either a fantastically skilled and loving pastor the first day of internship or I'm not going to be a pastor. (Yes, this sounds ridiculous. I see that now.)
All or nothing doesn't work in life. VERY few things are black and white. For instance, I tried to tell myself for years that the world was good. It was good. It is good. It's grand. It's all good.
And yet, the darkness hounded. I frequently fell into depression trying to figure out how to live in a world and a body that was EITHER completely black or completely white. Like Jacob, I wrestled.
I was told once and have been reminded repeatedly that to be Lutheran you must love paradoxes. Must love embracing both/and. I'm thinking now that to be Christian you must love paradoxes. To be ALIVE, you must love paradoxes.
So I'm trying to embrace the gray. Embrace that I will never be one to exercise every single morning at 6am. This allows me to work out once or twice a week and go to yoga and feel damn good about it. It doesn't have to be all or nothing. Likewise with healthy meals. Prayer. Pastoral visits. Ministry.
To give the best of myself does not mean that the end goal is perfection. And not reaching perfection does not mean that I did not give the best of myself nor that I am incomplete. Rather, it's life. Nothing is black or white. We bounce around in shades of gray, embracing the dark with the light.
I received a card from a good friend this week. She closes with saying, "You are beautiful my dear - light, dark, and all the shades of grey in between." My heart wept with joy. I will now do my best to continue living the gray.
Wednesday, March 02, 2011
A Taste and See Saturday Preview
I wrote this for the other blog I contribute to, Taste and See. This is a sneak peak on my Saturday post....
As I send out prayers for the Middlers awaiting internship assignment and the Seniors awaiting synodical assignments, I am noting the flux in my own community here in Montana and the transient nature of internship. There are interim pastors coming and going from four ELCA churches and the staff is changing around at the care facility I work for.
I have the illusion that once I am on first call, life will calm down and I will, at last, have a consistent community. But this is merely a myth I tell myself to deal with all the change in my own life. I've moved every year for the past 7 years and sometimes twice a year if summer happened to be happening elsewhere! I long to have a community that stays put around me and I with it instead of this ongoing change.
I know many other interns and I anxiously await the time when we can hug one another again and walk down to Jimmy's for a pitcher of Linney's. Skype and phone calls just aren't the same. And then I start to think how quickly this year has gone by and how quickly our final senior year will go by and my breath catches. That's barely any time at all before we all begin to depart for our first calls and lives outside of the seminary.
What do we do with all this change?
Perhaps the key is to begin looking at life moment by moment and enjoying those who are around you in that moment. There is no guarantee that any of us will be around tomorrow or next month or next year.
And if Vitor were here, he'd offer an eschatological remark about bringing about the kingdom. It's us. It's now. Seize the day. The day is all we've got.
As I send out prayers for the Middlers awaiting internship assignment and the Seniors awaiting synodical assignments, I am noting the flux in my own community here in Montana and the transient nature of internship. There are interim pastors coming and going from four ELCA churches and the staff is changing around at the care facility I work for.
I have the illusion that once I am on first call, life will calm down and I will, at last, have a consistent community. But this is merely a myth I tell myself to deal with all the change in my own life. I've moved every year for the past 7 years and sometimes twice a year if summer happened to be happening elsewhere! I long to have a community that stays put around me and I with it instead of this ongoing change.
I know many other interns and I anxiously await the time when we can hug one another again and walk down to Jimmy's for a pitcher of Linney's. Skype and phone calls just aren't the same. And then I start to think how quickly this year has gone by and how quickly our final senior year will go by and my breath catches. That's barely any time at all before we all begin to depart for our first calls and lives outside of the seminary.
What do we do with all this change?
Perhaps the key is to begin looking at life moment by moment and enjoying those who are around you in that moment. There is no guarantee that any of us will be around tomorrow or next month or next year.
And if Vitor were here, he'd offer an eschatological remark about bringing about the kingdom. It's us. It's now. Seize the day. The day is all we've got.
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