The Journey

Congregations and Beyond

2012-01-31T07:41:00.000-06:00

Friends have asked me my thoughts on Peter Morales’ whitepaper and after finding out that I’m going to Orlando to brainstorm about it with others, have generously shared their thoughts with me.

I’ve noticed some interesting things in their thoughts (and for the record, I think all are valid). Now, these are rough approximations … there certainly are people in each category who do not agree with the others in the group. But for the most part:

My Social Media peeps: after years of shouting from the rooftops about the very real community and relationship that happens via blogs, FB, Twitter, etc., they’re excited to see others are realizing it.

My Boots on the Ground Parish Ministers: wonder if any of this is relevant to their churches and have concern that this will take away from the help they desperately need.

Theology Wonks: want more emphasis on the “there, there.” What is the root of what connects us? What are those “core values”?

Polity Wonks: want to know if this is a step toward being an association of members rather than an association of congregations, and if so, will this dilute/change our congregational polity?

One question I’ve heard from almost all groups is a desire for clarification, to know what the end goal is.

One thing I feel quite certain about: if we want to make a significant change in the world, if we want to extend our saving message beyond those who manage to figure out that they’re “Unitarian Universalists without knowing it,” it is going to require change and an “all hands on deck” mentality. No more protecting our own little square of real estate or working from models crafted 50 (or 200) years ago.

Are we willing to? Are we going to be an association that protects the walls, or knocks them down? An association that throws gasoline on burning bushes, or ice water?

Significant change will occur when all the entities – UUA, UUMA, MFC, local clusters, local congregations – look for possibilities. That minister holding 3 third-time jobs? Do we want to encourage someone who is helping 3 struggling congregations, or say, “Meh, doesn’t count”? That minister who spends time out in the community each week, feeding the hungry and being a visible representative for UUism? Do we want to say, “Well, do it on your own time”? That excited person who says, “I know a whole group of people who we should reach out to,” – do we say, “Nah, they don’t fit our profile”? To the person establishing and nurturing relationships online, do we say, “Those aren’t ‘real’”?

And along with the logic about needing to have both wings and roots, we must talk boldly about our saving message, our history, our theology. We are not a giant “non-denominational” movement. We are not the “none of the above” choice. This is not the Grand Church of Tabula Rasa.

We are Unitarian Universalism. We are missionaries into a hurt, broken world.

Love Beyond

2012-01-16T11:04:00.000-06:00

"My grandmother used to tell me stories about how they would put straw under the eyelids of slaves so they couldn't fall asleep," he confided to me.

JT and I took many classes together in seminary, and are good friends. He is one of those encouraging sorts of people who always have a smile and a "How you doing, darlin'?" for everyone.

In my last semester, one of the classes we were in examines the life and ministry of Martin Luther King, Jr.

For me, this is a rich history course. For JT, it is memories. He is a retired funeral director, getting his M. Div. for his own spiritual growth, and to strengthen his existing ministry. He is African-American, and he grew up in the South. He drank from labeled water fountains. He is a big man, tall and broad-shouldered, with dark skin. This dignified gentleman, a successful, generous businessman, lived, and lives, in a world that sees him as the bogeyman.

He and I both have deep beliefs about the power of love. For me, life has made this root of my theology easy. For him, it has made it a just-shy-of-impossible struggle.

The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. preached over and over about justice. But even more, he preached on love. He exhorted others to even love those who wanted to hurt you, wanted to bomb your house, wanted to kill your babies. Over and over, through his sermons, through his speeches, he counseled love. He knew that to cede the power of love was to lose part of yourself.

JT shows me how very hard this is. That to forgive others, others who have never even realized how wrong they were, is a herculean task. The stories of what was done to ancestors are passed down, generation to generation, in his family. There are no such stories in mine. We do not pass down what we are ashamed of.

Our professor, slightly younger than JT, grew up in the North and remembers being yanked away from a "white" water fountain when visiting family in the South. But he is more positive. We read the laws that were on the books in every state in the late 1950's. "Look at how things have changed!" Part of our grade is based on analyzing the success or failure of MLK's ministry.

After class, JT shakes his head. "Right is right, and wrong is wrong," he says. There are certain things, certain hurts, that are unforgivable.

Today, we will probably hear "I have a dream" and "mountaintop" and maybe even "arc of the universe." But to me, Rev. King is still speaking. Part of my spiritual practice lies in reading and studying his words. Words he wrote 50 years ago challenge, indict, and inspire me today. Every day for 2012, will be MLK day for me.

His ministry continues.

I do not do enough. I do not give enough.

2012-01-05T09:34:00.000-06:00

But I want to.

This is not false humility, it is truth. I am not yet the person I want to be. But I feel that I can be.

Jesus, John Lennon, and probably your mama have all talked about my problem. The spirit is willing, but the body is weak. Life is what happens while you're busy making other plans. The road to hell is paved with good intentions.

I have good intentions, and soon as I have more time, more money, I'll do something with them.

I waste. I waste time, I waste money.

Time that could be spent making a real difference in the world is frittered away. I never have time to be bored. From the moment I wake til I fall asleep, there is a steady stream of information available to me. Computer, television, email, books. Boredom spurs creativity, for good or for bad. Grownups often go to great lengths to "keep kids busy" because they know that boredom can lead to mischief. Ya gotta keep kids out of trouble.

We are being constantly entertained, too. And we are kept out of trouble. And we are kept out of good.

I waste money. Another book here, another coffee there. Click, swipe, it is mine, to be abandoned on a shelf, or quickly consumed. Both, 24 hours later, wholly forgotten. Waste.

I know that who I am is not what I do, but I also know that what I do shapes and creates who I am.

I want to be better than this.

I want to be around people who encourage me to do so. Who teach me how to. Who motivate me to set aside my smartphone and join them in transforming our little corner of the world into a better place. Which will help transform me into a better person. I want to change my life in a big way, I want to give myself to something big. But I need help. I need tools so that I can manage my money, my time, my ideas. I need to feel I'm not doing it alone, that I'm a part of something important.

Sunday, I will walk in the doors of your church.

What will you have for me?

Proud to Be a Level Four Santa

2011-12-15T09:20:00.002-06:00

I believe in Santa Claus. I believe in people.

Believe means different things, doesn’t it? And sometimes, we instantly know it. Like saying, “I believe in people.” Well, obviously, I’m not talking about existence, that seems to be a foregone conclusion. People exist.

“I believe in people” means something more, something positive. The writers of the Bible would use a figure of speech called ellipsis, in which they would omit certain words for effect. It’s an unfinished circle, that we tend to automatically fill in with meaning.

So part of what I would fill in is that I believe in people, that they can be generous beyond your imagination, loving to complete strangers, extenders of awesome grace.

Santa Claus embodies this instinct we have toward compassion.

Children, if they are being raised by someone who loves them, assume this. If you tell a 3 year old “People are good and often want to help,” they will look at you blankly. Of course they are! In the same way they will always say that the bigger glass has more liquid in it than the short cup, no matter the opposing evidence, it is part of their logic that grownups are good people.

To tell a 45 year old the same thing is to invite debate, a debate that has raged for the ages, through the Christian scriptures, Lord of the Flies, A Separate Peace, and all those other “original sin” themed books they made us read in High School.

I am here to tell you – people are good. And they will overwhelm you with their willingness to make things better for others.

We share our belief in Santa Claus with our children. There are different levels to this, and so we divide it up into what we feel is developmentally appropriate for them to understand.

It astounds me that so many people stop at the first level. And at a certain point, they learn that it’s “wrong,” and that’s that. It’s done.

Don’t they know, it’s only the introduction!

Level One Santa is the symbolic embodiment into one person: he lives at the North Pole, says “Ho Ho Ho,” and comes down the chimney. He gives without ever expecting anything in return. He brings presents to children simply because he loves them. Oh sure, there are rumors of coal in stockings … but no one actually knows anyone who got that.

Myths grow and become more personal in each family; ours is no exception. With our first, it was decided that it was appropriate to ask Santa for three things (which you may or may not get). Rather early on, our son decided that the things Santa brought that he didn’t ask for were always way better than the things he did. Thus began the tradition he passed down to his sisters. “Ask for two things, but leave it up to him for the third thing – he always knows better!” As the children get older, they tend to even go farther, only asking Santa for one thing, or even nothing. They are learning about trust – trust that if you are open, and willing, you may receive gifts beyond what you know to ask for.

It is an exciting time, with our Level One Santa kids. They go outside to find chewed up carrot tops left by the reindeer, they receive personal letters from Santa a couple of days before Christmas. All of we Level Twos or above are on alert – to listen to the conversations, the casual remarks, the longing looks. And somehow, that Santa inspiration comes through, when suddenly we know what to pull out of the magic bag. Christmas morning arrives and “How did he know I wanted this???”

A personal letter from Santa – all our children receive them, regardless of age. Santa talks about their past year, what he’s noticed, what to work on, how much he loves them.

And then, one year, when they’ve had a lot of questions, and it is right … they receive a letter telling them that on the day after Christmas, they are to reach under their pillow, and there will be a special letter there that answers all their questions.

They are ready to become Level Twos.

Level Two is where you become privy to the giant mystery, the fabulous conspiracy that is Santa. You are entrusted with the secret, that Santa is SO much bigger than you imagined, that you, in fact, get to be Santa, too. The entire framework is laid out and you can see how far-reaching it is, how much more profound it is than a man coming down a chimney. People are so wonderful, that all over the world, they will go to great lengths to ensure that others have a magical Christmas. NORAD … the North American Aerospace Defense Command! – puts up video and a website so that families all over the world can track Santa’s progress. People go to the post office to pick up letters from children who have written to Santa, to actually fill some of those requests, out of their own wallet! Movies made, books written, collections taken up, all to make magic for the most powerless among us. Children.

To become a Level Two is not automatic. It is a choice. You may decide to just close the door, believe that “there is no Santa Claus.” Or you can make the choice to join in, to become a Level Two Santa.

A Level Two is someone who supports the Santa Claus efforts, promoting the wonder, keeping the mystery. Level Twos learn to listen intently, while looking casual; they pay attention to such things as what kind of thing a child plays with, what characters they like, their favorite colors. They themselves make magic, helping to put out the gifts on Christmas Eve, eating a cookie (but leaving crumbs on a plate).

Level Three is when you become Santa for the child in your life – your daughter, your nephew, your grandchild. You give, and receive no credit. No thank-you’s. It’s worth it, to be part of this magic.

Level Four is when you become Santa for someone not as close – an elderly neighbor, a friend, a stranger, a name on a tree. The recipient can’t know who you are, of course. If they did, you wouldn't be Santa. So there is much whispering and giggling; it is an appropriate time for secrets and ringing doorbells and running away. And yes, you can become a Level Four before becoming a Level Three!

Level Five is the top. This is the person who becomes the embodiment of Santa (or Mrs. Claus) themselves. They put on, or grow, the beard, put on the red hat, perfect their Ho-Ho-Ho. They wave from parades, hold squirming babies on their laps for pictures.

Too old for Santa Claus? Ah, no. For us, the question is, “Is Jane old enough for Santa Claus?” As a Level One, she only knows the door. It’s a beautiful, magical door … but beyond it lies grandeur and awe she can’t even imagine.

And she is a part of it all.

Lizard Eater, Master of Divinity

2011-12-10T00:06:00.001-06:00

I am graduating from seminary tomorrow, friends. Saturday morning.

In August 2004, two things began. My seminary experience, and Little Wren, growing in my belly.

To say I had no idea what would happen with those two things is quite the understatement. Such changes in both, such changes in me. But we survived. My seminary, my daughter, and me. We all survived.

I have attended an evangelical seminary. My first semester, I resigned myself to "flying under the radar." I told friends, and myself, that it was like learning a foreign language. "I don't have to believe Monsieur Thibaux est un ingénieur," I explained, "I just have to learn to say he is."

I stopped seminary, temporarily, I thought, to have Little Wren. I prepared to go back, and shortly before it was time, my world cracked in two. My little baby girl was diagnosed with cancer.

"I will never go back," I told a friend, flatly. I had nothing to say. Why would I be a minister?

But Spirit wants what it wants. Little Wren healed, and I healed. I went back to school.

And then ... it was back. Cancer.

I stopped seminary again. We did cancer again. She healed, I healed. I went back to school.

Okay, that's not exactly the timeline. She healed. I went back to school. I healed. Yes, that's a more accurate representation.

I found my voice. And I found nurturing professors who encouraged me to use that voice. No, I did not have to believe Monsieur Thibaux was an engineer. Explain to them why it was not so, give sources, make educated statements.

They learned more about what a Unitarian Universalist is. And I learned that "evangelical" is most definitely not synonymous with "fundamentalist." I have been surrounded by people who are not homophobic, nor judgmental. I have been surrounded by professors who genuinely live their faith in a way that is awe-inspiring to me.

Along the way, through this blog, I became friends with people, people who reached out to me, wept with me, encouraged me, mentored me. Friends who saw my heart be broken, read words that said I would never go into the ministry, never return to seminary. Friends who were there when I said, "I'm going back to seminary."

You shared your stories with me. Your own stories of cancer, of seminary, of family, of hard times, of good times. In the same way that seminary shaped me, you shaped me. Your stories have become a part of me.

They call it "ministerial formation." It's seminary, and preaching, and life, and CPE, and internship, and all the other things that help you find your identity as a religious professional.

So many of you have formed me. Fussed at me, argued with me, laughed with me, made me feel loved.

I love you, too.

On love and tamales

2011-12-02T15:28:00.000-06:00

There are certain things that transcend the sense of "the stranger." One is fishing. Anywhere I've ever gone, meeting a fellow fan of bait and tackle means that immediate conversation is possible. It usually starts with "Any luck today?" followed by discussions of what they're biting on, what spots are dry, and such. Now, there are certain protocols that are followed. One would never drop line right next to that person, poaching on their territory. Unless invited to, of course. A large cooler of beer you're willing to share makes that incident more probable.

The other arena in which strictures against talking to strangers, and especially someone who is "not like you," are dropped is cooking. Age, culture, even language, are no barriers to two cooks talking.

We are having a tamalada tomorrow, making lots of tamales for the holidays. I went to the Mexican mega-mart today to load up on heavy bags of wet masa, manteca de puerco, and corn husks. An older Mexican woman peeked at my cart and said, "Oh, you're making tamales!" We wound up talking for about 15 minutes, exchanging recipes and ideas. I, of course, came out much the richer for it. Cooks do not mind being bossy with each other. I told her that I was going to cut a few corners this year -- using ground chile rather than roasting my own peppers, that sort of thing. She directed me over to an unfamiliar can of sauce, used for enchiladas, and told me how to doctor it up for my pork filling. We parted, each giving advice -- she telling me that I can make spinach tamales without having to cook the filling first (use frozen spinach), and me encouraging her to tell her adult son that if he wants tamales, well, he better get over to her house and start spreading masa. "Have good holidays!" she called after me.

The BFF-DRE is coming over, after a church meeting. Not that she had much of a choice. Her boys are tamale-making fiends, and I think they were coming with or without her. Making tamales together has now become one of our holiday traditions. One year, we convinced our church cooking group to make tamales as a fundraiser. We took orders for traditional pork tamales, turkey mole tamales, vegetarian black bean and cotija cheese tamales, vegan chipotle bean tamales, sweet potato tamales.

We had orders for over a 100 dozen.

Late Saturday night of that tamalada, we were all near tears. "I just can't make anymore," our friend T cried, throwing up her hands. Sometimes you have to know when to throw in the towel. Nonetheless, I think we'd made about 98 dozen. We gave apologies to a few people who didn't get their full orders. Everyone was very nice about it.

But we never did that again.

Certain things you do for love, not money, even if the money is going to go to something you love. Tamales are one. Fishing, too.

Gasoline on the Burning Bush

2011-10-22T15:00:00.001-05:00

To have a passion is a one thing. It can be a source of soul-satisfying vision, or it can be a crazy-making force.

Sometimes, both at the same time.

But when you have others … others who share your passion, who can see your vision and they get it, they cheer it on, just as you cheer theirs … really, there’s not much better, is there?

The Hysteric Cleric, Rev. Sunflower, Rev. Soulful and SpongeBobbi, and I, all flew from our different cities across the country to a missional church conference. Poppa Bear couldn’t join us, but he was following our trek, commenting on various things we posted.

The conference was great. Rev Sunflower and I tweeted and facebooked like mad, all the great “YEAH!” quotes we were hearing. (Apologies to our friends. You may have your facebook page back now. Please don’t unfriend us.)

But for me, equally important were the times when we broke bread afterwards, discussing what we heard at our different workshops, compared notes, tested theories, discussed how they’d look in our context.

One message that is stressed amongst those seeking to do missional work is the need to have a supportive network. Because there’s no paradigm. The missional movement is a new movement, and there are but a few working examples. We’re learning, experimenting, sometimes failing, and sometimes succeeding, all as we go.

One of those great things I heard about was the need for leaders, when they learn of a member’s “burning bush,” to pour gasoline on it. Pour gasoline on the source of their passion.

As we wrestled with different ideas, the flame of my vision expanded. Thank you friends, for the gasoline.

A little revision to the old joke

2011-10-12T13:55:00.000-05:00

During a worship service a man began to be moved by the Spirit.
~~Out loud he said “Amen!”~~ He tweeted to his friends "This service is rocking! #FirstUU = awesome!” People around him were a little disturbed.
~~Then louder he said, “Hallelujah!”~~ On Facebook, he tapped out, “Hallelujah! Great message today!” A few more people were becoming disturbed.
~~During the prayer, he shouted “Praise Jesus!”~~ During the meditation, he texted his mother. "Rev D talked about anger. I'm sorry re: this a.m. Please forgive me. I <3 U."
An usher moved quickly down the aisle. He bent over and whispered to the man, “Sir! ~~Control yourself!~~ Put that away! We are having church here!”
The man exclaimed, “I can’t help it. I got religion!!!”
To which the usher responded, “Well you didn’t get it here!”

Happy Birthday, David. Were you glad you were born?

2011-09-23T16:32:00.000-05:00

More memories. We just passed the 40th anniversary of when David Vetter was born.

Known in the press as David the Bubble Boy.

He and I lived in the same area. I didn't know him, but several of my friends did. For a while, he "took" classes at our school. And some of the kids "played" at his house.

A lot of quotation marks there. I guess it means he "lived" to be 12 years old.

In that "your friends are my friends" way of understanding community that kids have, all of us felt connected to David. We followed the stories, we were protective of David (even if some felt he was kind of a pill) and his sister. We didn't understand the big picture, we just knew that he was trapped. We thought it was a pretty bum deal.

I won't get into the whole story. You can read it here. I will sum it up by saying it tells what happens when you put science first, and ethics second. It's a damn heartbreaking story.

I remember when he died. I was a freshman in High School, at home by myself. This being a local story, they broke in on the tv and gave the news. I remember they said he died of a heart attack, I don't know why -- I guess because they didn't actually know the cause of death yet. I turned off the tv. I turned on the radio. Total Eclipse of the Heart was playing. Crying, I danced, giant leaps around the living room. I was 14, but I knew that David had never been able to have even that little freedom. I remember thinking I was dancing for David.

His doctors are celebrating. They say his life and death meant life for many others. They say profound scientific knowledge came from the science experiment that was his life.

David, was it worth it?

I am Troy Davis

2011-09-22T08:13:00.000-05:00

Andy asks, "Do you remember the day you were able to really comprehend what the death penalty meant?"

I don't remember that, but I do remember when I realized that an innocent person could be put to death. I remember the dawning horror of realizing that the government, my government, the police and all the "good guys" could, not accidentally, but deliberately and with malice, make it happen, even when they knew the person was innocent.

I was in high school, and Clarence Brandley, who lived in my town, was on death row.

My brother was a young lawyer following the case. He told us about all the details that were coming to light -- the racism, the destroying evidence, how those in power conspired to bring this about.

I think it was the first time for me to really understand systemic evil.

Do you think the "collateral loss" of some innocent people being put to death is worth it? I mean, we know it happens.

Some think that's an acceptable loss.

I don't. I can't.

Clarence Brandley, no thanks to the system, yes thanks to many civil rights activists, was eventually exonerated and set free.

Troy Davis was not.

For further information, see The Innocence Project

My Pond is Gone

2011-09-06T11:35:00.001-05:00

I haven't been to my pond since May, partially because of CPE, but mainly because it's been so beastly hot. Hottest August on record, they say.

We got a cool front. It will be gone by this afternoon, so I pulled on my shoes and as soon as the children were out the door, I slipped out. Ah. Sweet coolness.

I got there, walked down the hill ...

My pond is gone.

I know they say this is one of the worst droughts we've had in decades, but it still hit me like the cliched ton of bricks. Where I used to watch minnows swim and see the occasional splash of a larger fish, is a field. Only a puddle remains.

I walked around the far edge, toward where the water was deeper.

Splat! A bird pooped on my head.

"In some cultures, this is considered good luck," I muttered grimly, wiping it off.

I walked farther. A bit of the pond remains and it was filled, filled with cranes and ... pelicans? Not pelicans, but some type of pink bird. Which means it has come from some place else.

My phone rang. It was the husband. His best friend and his family just had to evacuate their house from the wildfires to the north of us. More wildfires are burning through the state park where I went to so many family reunions. The small town where my mother grew up during WWII.

One of the top search strings that leads people to this blog is "The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away." For a panentheistic, process-theology, Jesus-inspired UU, that works just fine. We are interwoven in all of that, and yet there is also a power far beyond our control.

I continue walking ... it's possible to do that, with a broken heart.

I walk down to my favorite little part, where the turtles used to poke up their heads, then furiously splash away if I blinked. My turtles ... Now, it is just dry, cracked earth.

I turn the corner and a giant bunny, as big as my fat old cat at home, bounces across the path and into the woods. I've never seen a rabbit here, and though I know it speaks to the dry conditions, still, I am thrilled by the gift.

I go home. I take a shower with clean water. I go to my refrigerator and cold, filtered water fills my glass.

I drink it, reverently.

Religion Should Be Delicious

2011-09-02T10:13:00.003-05:00

First, I read the short version of Lillian Daniel's essay about "Spiritual But Not Religious? Please Stop Boring Me," that is making the rounds.

Part of me, I must confess, had that triumphant, "Yeah, what SHE said!" feeling. And then, rather quickly, I felt ... quite uncomfortable. Was sneering at someone else's sneering the way to go?

And it kept sitting with me.

Then, I read the longer version. And felt heart-achingly sad.

A man sits next to her. He tells her his story. Of going to a church where he's not supposed to ask questions. Then going to a church that defines God in such a rigid way, he can't make it fit with his reasoning about the divine.

Then, he finds a church that is like a big warm hug. He fits. But when he goes through the pain of divorce, backs turn. It is his wife's church, he discovers.

Disillusioned, hurt, he begins sleeping in, reading the NY Times, taking long walks. He finds God in the trees and the cicadas. He describes himself as deeply spiritual, but not religious.

Me, I would call that healing. Daniels does not.

After having his intellect, his sense of God's love, and trust in human relationships all abused, we should say, Sorry, Bucko, you should have gone to another church? Tried harder?

Are you kidding?

Yes, I know there are plenty of folks out there, shallowly tralalaing about being spiritual but not religious. They fit with "self-centered American culture, right smack in the bland majority of people who find ancient religions dull but find themselves uniquely fascinating."

Don't you understand that these are the people who most need us?

I can't judge them because I recognize my own demon in it. The demon that tells me that if I buy these storage bins or watch this documentary or read this book, my life will be better. I struggle with this demon, over and over, but I sure do like my toys...

We are needed. But here's the deal: we haven't shown that our way -- the religious life -- is better. In fact, as in the case of the man on the airplane, we've often shown the opposite.

I don't spank my kids, for many reasons. But I'm also pragmatic. I've watched the families where the parents do spank their kids, and if their children were better behaved, heck, I would have considered it. But they weren't.

By your fruits you will know them.

I have a minister friend who is a runner. He talks about the difference it makes in his life. And his life backs him up -- he is physically healthy, and it obviously helps him, spiritually and mentally. Because of this, I'm trying out running as a spiritual practice.

In A Treatise on Atonement, Hosea Ballou writes about loving God:

I am asked if I love an orange; I answer I never tasted of one; but then I am told I must love the orange for what it is! Now I ask, is it possible for me either to like or dislike the orange, in reality, until I taste it? Well, I taste of it and I like it. Do you like it? says my friend. Yes I reply, its flavor is exquisitely agreeable. But that will not do, says my friend; you must not like it because its taste is agreeable, but you must like it because it is an orange. If there be any propriety in what my friend says, it is out of my sight.

We have not made our case. First, we have to let people know: If you come to this church, your life and the world you affect, will be better.

And if we can't say that ... then close up shop. Take a walk in the woods.

Going to church should transform you. Going to church should make your life better, and because of your transformation, should make the world you impact better.

I understand the complaints about a consumer-driven culture that affects our attitude about church. But goshdarnitall, we have to give people a reason to go to church.

I have a friend, a local missional pastor here in my town. His little church is Christian, so they have communion. Every so often, they do it with cake. Why? Because they believe religion should be delicious.

Religion should be delicious. No, not like "deep-fried appetizers," but deeply, soul-satisfyingly delicious. Which means struggling with hard questions, fighting and panting, but knowing the next day, for our struggles, we will be renamed Israel. Delicious, like the pride a parent feels for their child who ventures out, making their first theological pronouncement. Delicious, like sunsets and beaches and walks through the woods.

Is your church delicious? Does it provide opportunities for spiritual transformation? Does it encourage you to transform the world? If it does all that, you should be out there, letting everyone know. You should light the way so that others, caught in the grip of the demon culture that says we can buy meaning, purchase fulfillment, may find their salvation. And if your church is not delicious, you should damn well either make it delicious or find another one. Because we are needed. Desperately needed.

You say you're spiritual but not religious?

Come sit by me. I want to hear your story.

Take Me to the Water

2011-08-15T09:59:00.001-05:00

"Take me to the water ... to be baptized."

I could not go to the waters I normally travel to each summer. For one thing, I was working full time plus, as a hospital chaplain. For another, it has been sold. Some other family goes there now.

I reached the end of my CPE summer and felt the call to come to the waters. There will always be water to refresh you. And I was hot, hot to the very core of my being. I'd drive to the park and ride, and it was already hot. Board the bus, walk a couple of blocks to the rail. Hot, steamy, even in an air-conditioned train car. A block to the hospital. Walking around, one end of the hospital to the other, clothed in a suit, because it's a formal type of place. Sweating through my blouses. Time to go, out to the even hotter day now, the rail, the bus, the car that has baked all day in the sun. Home, but the a/c couldn't keep up with this insane summer. Ice water on the inside, cold showers on my skin, it didn't matter. I couldn't get cool.

I knew where to go.

About 2 1/2 hours from my house, there is a giant pool, fed by natural cold springs. As a child, we would take trips and I would swim there. When my mother was a child, so did she. So did her parents, and her grandparents. Perhaps even those before them. I feel that the very molecules of my body, the genetic material I have inherited, somehow carried those experiences and cried out for me to come to the water. To the cold, cold waters, to be refreshed and replenished.

We didn't tell the children where we were going. Friday, as I left for my last day at the hospital, I left them a scavenger hunt of things to find ... sunblock, swim suits, goggles ... They were madly curious. The coast? The place where I often preach, or their grandmother's home? Nope, we told them. And that was all.

We played tantalizing music on the way, as they cudgeled their brains. Take Me to the Water, Take Me to the River, Old Black Water ...

And then we were there. We slipped on the algae-covered bottom, took deep intakes of breath as the cold hit us, quickly going the very center of our being. So hot all summer long, now we looked up at the small clouds that made it overcast and asked them to part so the sun could come through.

We swam together, somersaulting under the water, showing off strokes, floating and looking up at the clouds. I left them in the shallow for a bit, their father smiling knowingly at me as I took off for the deeper waters. I swam, I dove underneath, I was refreshed, revived, replenished, recovered. Out of the corner of my eye, I could see my parents, grandparents, great-grandparents, and more, as they swam here, in this same place, at a different time. They came together in me and we were held in the healing waters.

Loved Into Being

2011-08-14T21:33:00.001-05:00

I'm tired. I'm tired the way you are at the end of your CPE summer. Ministers, can I get an 'amen'?

But RevTony's post about his wonderful experiences with DBLE and HeartPaths Spirituality Centre prompt me to write. He blogs that those places were "an environment that made me feel appreciated, loved and cared for as a child of God" and that "what enables people to achieve any type of emotional and spiritual healing is that first and foremost they feel accepted, welcomed and loved...Learning can happen at anytime, but perhaps deep, internalized insight can only happen when we are loved."

Jim, who also did CPE this year, wrote about his CPE center, and his appreciation that they used a "collegial educational model, rather than believing that CPE students should be treated rather like soup ingredients that must be thoroughly chopped into small pieces before they can be of any use."

Amen, my brother.

I wound up at a center that was, from the top down, a nurturing, strengthening, affirming culture. Which didn't mean they held our hands ... no, we were thrown out into the big scary ocean straight away. But they cheered us on, answered our questions, and treated us with the respect of being full chaplains. It truly was a loving culture.

I learned, oh, how I learned. I received formation. Lots and lots of formation. I am a different, stronger minister than I was at the start of summer.

But along with that ... I did a lot of healing this summer. From those who have followed along since the cancer years, yes, a lot of healing from that time. The fact that I journeyed with my daughter through two bouts of cancer did affect my pastoral care, and many times, it was a help in connecting with patients. I am no longer resentful that the universe may, in some way, benefit from her illness. Was it worth it? No, of course not, but what does that matter? When sitting with someone hurting, needing my pastoral presence, I will use all the tools I have been given.

One of my heroes is the Rev. Fred McFeely Rogers. Also known as Mr. Rogers.

When receiving a lifetime achievement award at the Daytime Emmys, he used his time to ask everyone to take a moment and remember "those that loved you into being."

I feel that I had the amazing fortune to wind up in a hospital with people that helped love me into being. Come to think of it, my life has almost always had that fortune.

I hope I may do the same for others. Because I am one to whom much has been given. With love, anyway. Undeserved, unasked for. In a word, grace.

Could Your Church Support a Mission?

2011-08-08T10:00:00.000-05:00

So, let me tell you my fantasy.

My fantasy is that we come up with a sustainable model for minister-planted Unitarian Universalist churches.

Right now, our main model is for a minister, capable of living very frugally, and with a supportive spouse, to plant churches on his or her own dime, right? Commendable, but not a sustainable model if we want to have churches popping up around the country.

Which I do.

Christian churches support “missions.” They put money, people, and resources toward sending out missionaries to areas of need. This is part of the Great Commission, they believe. The missionaries return home and give exciting reports about what they’re accomplishing, church members go on mission trips to dig wells, build schools, and meet the members of the local mission. The members are spiritually fed by this, and they make that little pocket of the world better.

Here’s my fantasy.

A UU church – probably one of the larger ones in town – decides to support a Mission. They hire a missionary, a person trained in ministry and missional church planting, and call him or her “Associate Minister.” They allocate funds so that the minister can start a church on a shoestring budget. This missionary/minister goes into a community and plants a church, a church that will do missional work, because we say that we are a religion of deeds not creeds.

The missionary/minister doesn’t go to Uganda or Honduras. This m/m goes … across town. Across town, not to a wealthy area, not to an educated area, not to any of the areas bearing demographics of “People Like Us.” Because this is Mission. The m/m goes to the area of the greatest need because – and this is key – because the sponsoring church truly believes that Unitarian Universalism has a lifesaving message and the members of the church truly believe that they are charged with realizing The Beloved Community and accepting their role in creating it.

The minister/missionary sets up a Satellite Church, returning “home” occasionally, being an associate minister. The senior minister (and other ministers, if the church has more) occasionally comes out to the Satellite Mission, preaching and lending support. Members of the Home Church go out to do things in the neighborhood of the Satellite Mission … planting flowers, helping an area school, helping. Caring.

I’ve written before about shalom, about the fullness of the word. Wholeness. Wholeness of body, mind, economics, spirit. I believe in working toward shalom – wholeness – for all. I can see a church that devotes resources to helping “the least of these” get closer to wholeness … feeding the hungry, offering tutoring, teaching English, making a neighborhood safer, extending friendship to the lonely and giving inclusive, love-based food for the spirit. And finding that in doing so, they themselves were being made more whole.

That’s my fantasy.

Never What You Think

2011-07-27T00:48:00.000-05:00

It’s a half hour past midnight here.

I went to bed at 10 pm and enjoyed two blissful hours of sleep before being awakened by the phone. There was the initial disorientation – where am I? What time is it? Why is my husband not in bed? Followed by slightly less disorientation (emphasis on ‘slightly’) as my muddled brain tried to understand why the phone rang. It was midnight. Therefore, my brain came up with the most logical answers it could, operating on CPE sleep-deprivation:

a) Something has happened to my parents.
b) Something has happened to my son (off at debate camp).
c) My husband has become another person, one who not only is having an affair, but is having one with someone so ditzy she called his house at midnight.

I grudgingly decided to face reality, whichever horrible one it was, and got up. I could hear the husband’s voice, still talking on the phone, coming from upstairs. Odd. Then I noticed a tennis racket lying on the living room floor.

“Husssband?” I called, fearfully.

He came to the railing. “I’m talking to my sister.”

My brain instantly leapt to worrying that something had happened to his mom, for a very tense second, until I remembered that she was sound asleep on the futon in our gameroom and wouldn’t it be really weird if his sister knew something happened to her before we did?

As I stood there, my brain creakily turning, my eyes landed again on the tennis racket.

The Husband was leaning on the railing again. “There’s a bat in the house.”

NEVER what you think!

As my husband stayed up late working on the computer, he became aware of a black thingy flying around the living room. Not hobbled by 2 hours of blissful sleep, it didn’t take long for him to determine what it was. He called his sister, the wildlife biologist, who then called him back to tell him the best thing to do was kill it with a tennis racket, then carefully place it in a garbage bag and take it to be tested for rabies.

In the meantime, it disappeared.

After checking the girls’ rooms, he stuffed towels under the doors so Mr. Bat couldn’t crawl into their rooms (stuffed them under Mother-In-Love’s door, too). He’s tucked me away in our room. Just get some sleep, he generously told me.

Sure, babe.

So, I’m googling about whether you can get a preventative rabies shot (yes) and wondering if I can get one at my hospital workplace tomorrow.

Never what you think.

"No one laughs at God in a hospital ..."

2011-07-17T13:27:00.000-05:00

I've been praying a lot lately. Holding the hands of young and old, strong, weak, even paralyzed. "Know your audience, know your purpose," my CPE supervisor/teacher/role model, Rev. Dr. Strong Love, instructs.

Audience: Catholic? Then I will pray Father-Son-Holy-Spirit. Baptist? Thank you, my evangelical seminary, for giving me my Baptist trinity, "Our Creator, Our Redeemer, and Our Sustainer." Jewish? Y'varekh'kha ADONAI v'yishmerekha, I offer.

Purpose ... it is not mine to decide the purpose. I have learned to ask the person who wants the prayer, what is most on your heart right now? Upon what do you want me to focus this prayer? Sometimes, what they say aligns with what I assumed -- Please let the surgery go well and let me be healed. Often, though, it's different. No matter what happens, let my family be okay with it.

Together, we pray for peace. I ask that doctors and nurses be given wisdom and skill. I pray that the person feel God's presence.

Occasionally when I am guest-preaching somewhere, a person will come up and introduce themselves and reference this blog. (And thank you for that -- I love meeting you in "real life.") Last year, this stunning young woman did that, then left me with a remarkable gift, telling me that something I had written about prayer affected her, and helped her.

We share our journeys, rarely knowing how, or if, our struggles will affect someone else's journey. We just never can know ... you know? I have a CPE classmate who is normally rather quiet, but when he speaks, his words often offer wisdom I can use. I am greedy, which I have told him, and I want more. Even if it's not profound, even if it's 'stupid' ... because the Spirit uses all sorts of things, significant and trivial, to take root in the psyche of another.

I only pray when the patient or family requests it. I have no interest in a perfunctory "this is what a chaplain does" sort of thing. You allow me into your room, I give you a prayer (whether you want it or not). Be sure and tip your nurse on the way out.

But they do request it. A nurse starts to come into the room. "Please give us just a moment," I tell her. The family, or I and just the patient, bow our heads and attempt to connect with each other, and with something outside ourselves.

I went to follow up with a patient I'd had a good talk with the day before. The transformation in her, this day, was stark and heartbreaking. Like a child, she was curled up on her side, her head flat, no pillow, in the dark. I crouched down so our faces were just a few inches apart. "They opened me up. There is cancer. I don't want to talk. I don't want to talk. Just, please, pray."

I prayed. My two hands around the one that she extended to me, I prayed with everything I had that she feel Spirit, that she receive comfort, and peace. Yes Jesus, she murmured at certain parts, please God, at others. Amen, we said together, our voices faint whispers floating off like the smoke of an extinguished candle in that dark institutional room.

Related Posts:
Power of Prayer? Or Not ...
Power of Prayer ... Three Years Later
Praying Out Loud

Yes. Intense.

2011-06-25T17:15:00.000-05:00

If I don't blog about something, does it really happen?

I have been neck-deep in summer CPE, while writing a research paper for a May Intensive class. I overdid it this past Spring, I will confess. 16 hrs, plus the Intensive, so, 19 hrs. But it's lightened my load for the Fall and made some other things possible. Like graduating in December.

So, this is my first truly free weekend. All the other weekends have been taken over by either working on the paper or doing a hospital on-call, or both. Free, free!

CPE, "Clinical Pastoral Education" is intense. 9 hours a day at the hospital + 3 1/2 hours of travel time. I devoutly wish I were one of those people who can get by on 6 hours of sleep a night, but I need 7 minimum. So, not a lot of margin. But better now. I have time to eat dinner with my family, play a little guitar, do whatever CPE reading is required that week. I travel to and from work via park-n-ride, bus, and rail. ("Trains, buses, and automobiles.") On the bus, I can also do a little reading.

I have a great family, so it works. No, really. They've pretty much astounded me. The Husband and I come home to a clean house, happy children all working together to put dinner on the table. We're not sure we're letting the 15 year old go back to school in the Fall.

CPE ... touching, hard, amazing. I wish I could tell you all the specifics, but to protect everyone's privacy, I'll just give you some vague, shadowy pictures. I've had some incredibly touching experiences, like the about-to-be-widowed wife who said, "Oh, I'm so glad you're here," when I walked into the room. And who later, after everything had been turned off, turned to me and said, "You just don't know how good you are at this."

You know what I had done? Stood in the corner, silent.

Holy moments.

The Muslim man, grieving his own situation, who taught me "Hamdu Lillah!"

The older woman whom I asked if I could hug, and who sagged in my embrace.

Heartbreaking moments, too. Coming face to face with what I already know, that life is not fair, but knowing it doesn't make it easier.

A big part of CPE is learning about yourself. I am still in the process, so I can't draw any real conclusions yet, but one thing that did surprise me is how I have the person I was, when I was about 20, and the person I am now, at 42. I have grown up, which hopefully is no surprise, but I realized that in my head, I still think I'm my fluffy-headed younger self.

As my CPE supervisor says, what we tell ourselves about ourself does not always match reality.

I am following along, as best I can, all my friends who are at GA. OH HOW I WISH I were there. Thank you, blogging peeps on the ground, letting me know your experiences there. It means a lot.

I'm with you in Spirit.

Into the Boiling Acid

2011-05-30T20:37:00.000-05:00

I am starting CPE tomorrow, my peeps. Clinical Pastoral Education. For 400+ hours, I will learn about pastoral care, examine what and why I do things, and minister. Minister. Walk with a family down to the morgue. Sit with someone who is dying. Or her father is. Or her child.

I am scared to death.

I am looking forward to it.

I am dreading it.

And yet ... I asked myself how I would feel if I got a phone call that it had been canceled? That I had all summer free to just laze around, read books, sway in a hammock?

I'd be dreadfully disappointed.

My minister friends call it "pastor boot camp." They say it is formative. Transformative. At the end of this summer, I will be better able to walk into a situation and minister, be there for someone who needs me.

I acknowledge all that. I'm sure that it the end of the summer, I will be grateful for the experience. But on this end of the equation ...

Well, it's kinda like someone says to you they're going to drop you in a vat of boiling acid. For 400 hours. But at the end of it, when they pull you out, you'll have the body and appearance of a supermodel!

Okay.

Bring it.

Nobody Puts Internet in a Corner

2011-05-25T09:32:00.001-05:00

I’m not sure we get it. How utterly the Internet has changed life. Maybe we can’t, because we’re right in the middle of it.

It has been compared to the invention of the printing press, and that’s fair, but I think it’s something that has affected so much, we still aren’t quite getting it. We can chase back all the creeping tendrils … how it has transformed commerce, communication, education … but we still can’t fully grasp the big picture. Perhaps, 50 years from now, sociologists can explain it. Maybe they’ll be able to sum up how small it has made the world, and yet how large in possibility. Many of the people getting married, at least the weddings I’m officiating, met via Internet. They said that the revolution would be televised, but television didn’t cause the revolution, didn’t enable it. Internet is.

Mothers are sharing breastmilk because of the internet, you can help a shopkeeper in Guatemala get a loan because of the internet. When your heart is breaking, and you feel you are weeping alone, you can tweet or Facebook or blog and a whole community weeps with you.

I remember when the Internet had been created, but the World Wide Web had not. I had a geeky boyfriend in college, and he’d show me his computer and these message boards where he connected with other geeky types. His bulky computer was in a dark corner of his apartment, and he’d check it, oh, maybe once a day. Maybe.

How many of our churches are still acting as if that is the Internet? Something people keep in a corner and maybe check once a day. So you should have a church website, with your address and service times, you know.

My kids have a book on the human body with thick, transparent pages so you can see all the different “layers” of the body. The circulatory system. The nervous system.

The Internet has added another layer, another dimension, if you will, to life. It’s not something separate. We pull out our smartphones without a thought, sharing where we are with others who might want to join us, checking email, popping on Twitter or Facebook to see what other friends are doing. And that’s just in the two minutes we’re standing in line to pick up movie tickets. We don’t even think anything about it. It’s simply how we are, now.

The night of that day when Gabby Giffords was shot, many of us who would be preaching the next morning posted to each other on Facebook. “Are you changing your sermon? What are you going to say?” Peacebang opened up a chatroom and we mingled there, to share both our emotions, and the ideas and materials we would use the next day. I wrote about Holly Near’s I am Willing; someone else found a youtube of it; the next day, several ministers either quoted it, or, if they had good voices, sang it. That’s just one example of the inspiration that came out of that “room” that night. Perhaps what was more powerful, though, was not the readings, or quotations, or songs that shared, but our very humanness. We gathered in community. When we left that room, we were strengthened to minister.

Oh, I could go on and on with my examples of how the Internet has changed life. But they are my experiences. Internet, like most things, is a conversion experience. Until you’ve been a part of a blogging community, or found your Tweeps, or become the person who just automatically checks Facebook several times a day, you don’t understand.

Some say that we have Internet fatigue, and our churches need to be a sanctuary from that. No electronic devices, please. I think there will be a niche for that, just as there are people who respond to the unprogrammed Quaker meetings.

For many others, who have grown up texting and tweeting, that will hold no appeal. It will be as if you said, “Come inside, but don’t use your sense of smell.”

But oh what opportunity. There was a time when ministers wondered how church could stay connected past Sunday, how it could continue to impact their lives throughout the week. Were we to point blank ask God to create a vehicle to assist in that, I am not sure she could have done better than this labyrinth of wires and metal.

Psalmic Response

2011-05-03T09:52:00.003-05:00

It seems that the last 24 hours has been taken up with processing the death of Osama bin Laden. With that, has come critique on all sides about that process. Or as one mom says to Michael Keaton in Mr. Mom, "You're doing it wrong."

I'm not opposed to critique, I hope that it allows us to adjust back and forth until we find what is the right way for us, as individuals, and as a nation. I am concerned about the shaming I've seen.

But as I've always said on this blog, I'm a fan of the real. What do you really feel? And I think most people are like that. I think that when we've felt offended, it was because we thought someone wasn't showing their deep feelings. The person chanting, as though at a football game -- was that their deep, introspective response, or were they caught up in group aspect? The person saying they grieved the death of any person -- was that genuine, or were they expressing what they thought they should feel?

Someone posted on twitter the John Donne quote about how "each man's death diminishes me." I must admit, I turned to The Husband and said, "I don't feel diminished by the death of Osama bin Laden."

Psalm 137
By the rivers of Babylon,
         There we sat down and wept,
         When we remembered Zion.
Upon the willows in the midst of it
         We hung our harps.

That sock in the gut of watching the planes fly into the towers. That instant fear from those of us who had loved ones up in the air right then. The overwhelming panic trying to locate New York and Washington friends. I remember, after hours and hours of watching frantic friends and family members walking around New York with pictures of their missing ones, "Have you seen him? Have you seen her?" they implored on CNN, I remember turning the tv off and, exhausted, heart broken into dust, saying, "I just can't watch any more. I just can't cry any more."

We hung our harps on trees. We could not imagine singing ever again.

We had been in a fairy tale land where acts of terrorism didn't really affect us, and when they did, it was often terrorism that came from within. That was shattered. When we went to bed, we didn't know what would happen the next day. We were terrorized. We stocked up on duct tape and thick plastic for the vents in our homes, we were afraid to open any envelope.

Psalm 74
The enemy has damaged everything within the sanctuary.
Your adversaries have roared in the midst of Your meeting place...
They said in their heart, "Let us completely subdue them."...
We do not see our signs;
There is no longer any prophet,
Nor is there any among us who knows how long.
How long, O God, will the adversary revile,
And the enemy spurn Your name forever?
Why do You withdraw Your hand, even Your right hand?
From within Your bosom, destroy them!

We wanted justice, we wanted revenge. We began doing the math, adding up the situation, realizing our part in it, realizing our actions had a hand in creating our destruction. It became complicated.

And the videos. Just when we began to relax, a bit, bin Laden would release another video, taunting us, the murderer letting us know he could still find us, still get us.

Years pass.

On Sunday night, when the news came, I was glad. Not for the death, but because he had been stopped. I think that most people who admit to being glad feel this. It's not the death, it's that he has been found and stopped. Certainly, there are others behind him who may continue in the terror. But not he.

I posted on Facebook "Psalm 18:37-40." I did this in no triumphant way. I thought it expressed something very human, and something some of us were feeling. The relief that we do have some measure of control. That we are not just fearful things that can be terrorized and refuse to respond.

I pursued my enemies and overtook them,
         And I did not turn backuntil they were consumed.
I shattered them, so that they were not able to rise;
         They fell under my feet.
For You have girded me with strength for battle;
         You have subdued under me those who rose up against me.
You have also made my enemies turn their backs to me,
     And I destroyed those who hated me.

I understand the love of humanity behind saying that an eye for an eye will leave the world blind. But I am not a pacifist. I believe that evil exists and if it is within our power to do so, I believe in subduing evil.

It gets complicated. What about the evil within, what about what our government does? I believe the easy answer is to say, "It's too complicated, it's too much to try and parse, therefore, I'm just going to err on the side of loving everyone." Or we say, "It's not complicated, what we do is right, period."

Ours is not the easy way. Ours is the painful, complicated, messy way. A weakness in liberal religion is when we don't address evil, when we just explain it all away, and act as if we can just love it out of existence. I am a profound believer in the power of love. But I believe that one way we love is by standing up to evil, whether it be a multi-national corporation or a terrorist leader.

We have seen some crass examples of mob mentality in the last 24 hours, as people find their own catharsis of the last decade. But I saw one moment, right after the announcement, that spoke to me. They had begun gathering outside the White House, and were singing:

And the rockets' red glare, the bombs bursting in air,
Gave proof through the night that our flag was still there.

Triumphant nationalism? Maybe. But in that moment, in the dark, it seemed more a cry of relief. Our flag was still there. We still have the right to defend our country. If you attack our country, kill our people, we will respond. We are not powerless against those who would destroy us.

We will go through our period of catharsis, and then it is time to get to the real work, of examining how what we do affects the entire web of existence. How we create terrorists and dictators by seemingly small actions.

Psalm 122
or the sake of my brothers and my friends,
         I will now say, "May peace be within you."
    For the sake of the house of the LORD our God,
         I will seek your good.

Spent the day at the hospital

2011-05-02T16:57:00.000-05:00

For those who have been on the journey with us -- Little Wren had scans today. I won't lie ... I was scared. This was the first time for her to go 6 months between scans.

No Evidence of Disease.

She also had an echocardiogram, because one of her chemos can damage the heart.

Completely normal.

Her next scans are in November. On a selfish note, I am scheduled to graduate in December. This scan, today, obviously could have changed that. But the November scans won't.

It might actually happen! I might actually grow up and be a real minister someday!

Hugs to all of you, and thank you for the prayers, white light, and kind thoughts.

Spiritual Friendship

2011-04-19T09:21:00.000-05:00

Once a month, I get in my car and drive to a religious retreat in another town that is exactly equidistant between my house and the Hysteric Cleric's. We meet to discuss spiritual things (right now, we're in the middle of Nouwen's Spiritual Direction: Wisdom for the Long Walk of Faith).

There are paths winding through the woods of the retreat. We have one path we usually take, but this time, we decided to go a different way. First we wound up at at a disc golf course, then we went another way and wound up blocked by a giant cobweb across the path. We didn't want to disturb Ms. Spider, so we went back to our old faithful path. Talking, talking, talking ... we looked up -- where were we? Where was the bench we usually come to?

We eventually turned around and went back. Never could figure out where we missed a turn. It's like we landed on a different path than had ever been there.

I'm sure there's a metaphor in there.

We encourage each other, and we push each other to go deeper, to connect with our understandings of the Divine, and to ask ourselves important questions about being.

(And frankly, we give our loving spouses a break from all the "How is your soul" stuff that they tolerate, but must grow weary of.)

I have another spiritual friend, the DRE-BFF. Among other aspects of our relationship, she holds steady in her unwavering ethics and has high expectations of me. (And I, of her.)

Last year, Oprah interviewed Martha Stewart and they talked about how the woman Martha Stewart thought was her best friend testified against her.

I retold this story to the DRE-BFF. She didn't pause a second. "You commit insider trading, I'll testify against you, too!"

If you don't have a friend who holds you to the highest standards, who would testify against you if you broke the law... I'm sorry. And I hope you can find one.

The Hysteric Cleric and I were talking about being "The Beloved" this time, and I asked him when he felt beloved. I won't go into the details, but it will suffice to say that he feels deeply, profoundly loved by his spouse.

It is a tremendous gift and one I wholeheartedly relate to. People often talk about how our understandings of God come from our relationship with our parents. Yet religious texts also often speak of God in the terms of a lover. It seems only logical, to me, that romantic or eros love can give us insight into what we know of the Divine.

The Husband is a spiritual friend. He knows the depth and breadth of what I envision for my call; he cheers it on, makes my steps toward it possible. He calls me back to it when I feel a little lost.

Enlarged in his vision, I feel beloved and I feel I am The Beloved.

"...How do we know that we are not deluding ourselves...that we are not just listening to the voice of our own imagination? Who can judge their own heart? Who can determine if their feelings and insights are leading them in the right direction? ... We need someone who helps us to distinguish between the voice of God and all the other voices coming from our own confusion...We need someone who encourages us when we are tempted to give it all up, to forget it all, and to just walk away in despair. We need someone who cautions us when we move too rashly in unclear directions or hurry proudly toward a nebulous goal...we explore in the presence of another wise companion or two God's claim upon our lives, what has been and what may now be." -- Henri Nouwen

I am blessed with spiritual friends. I hope you are, too.

The Illimitable Mind

2011-04-15T09:34:00.000-05:00

What do you get when you cross The Three Little Pigs with Forrest Church’s Cathedral of the World?

Three very different theological houses.

That first thrill of Unitarian Universalism lies in discovering your own power … having a church affirm that you have the right to discard whatever doesn’t fit your worldview and you are free to explore that vast cathedral of thought about ultimate reality. I have heard Unitarian Universalism described as a religion where “you take what you like, and leave the rest.” This is freedom, but it is freedom without responsibility.

It is important work that we do, systematically building an examined faith. Because in all of our lives, the Big Bad Wolf is going to come calling.

If you have a house of straw or even sticks – and this is something I can personally confess to – when the big bad wolf comes, your entire theological house can be swept away. And you’re left with nothing.

I think this is something that happened to John Lennon. The Beatles had gone through a hateful breakup, he had numerous personal losses, he was bitter and disillusioned. On his first solo album, he wrote the song God:

God is a concept,
By which we can measure,
Our pain,
I don't believe in magic,
I don't believe in I-ching,
I don't believe in bible,
I don't believe in tarot,

He goes on and on, all the things he no longer believes in, both secular and spiritual. I don’t believe in Jesus … Kennedy … Buddha … yoga … Beatles. He sings, “I just believe in me, Yoko and me. The dream is over.”

It’s a complete stripping away of everything.

Well, some of us have to do that. We have constructed houses of straw, taking the things that sound good, ignoring the things we’re not interested in or don’t like. The Big Bad Wolf comes to the door and everything we believe is all blown away. And we have to start all over again, from scratch.

But there is another way.

Unitarian theologian James Luther Adams said, "An unexamined faith is not worth having, for it can be true only by accident. A faith worth having is a faith worth discussing and testing."

An examined faith does not just mean ignoring the things we don’t like. An examined faith is not only characterized by what we reject, but by what we embrace, and what we put into practice.

To go and feed the hungry is a good thing. To know and understand what is the greater meaning deep in your soul that drives you to feed the hungry or march for the rights of the immigrant will give you the strength to continue when you face setbacks and failures. And unless you’re playing it too safe, you’ll face both of those. But your theology will feed your actions and vice-versa.

Systematically engaging with the deep issues helps you form a fully-examined faith. And you’ll discover not only what you believe, but who you are.

Michael E. Duffy wrote a book called the Skeptical, Practical Christian. Frankly, I don’t recommend it for UUs, not because of the Christianity, but because the majority of the book is spent saying, “It’s okay to be skeptical!”

Already there, guy.

But his 4th chapter is good, because he lays out a process for “being able to claim a personal faith conviction on a given issue.”

You identify your issue, examine why you care about it, what you currently believe, you explore other beliefs about it, and then you discover what happens when you live it.

So, first, identify your issue. This can be something that you’re curious about or something that is affecting you at this point in your life.

If something doesn’t immediately come to mind, try this. When was the last time you responded emotionally to something you heard? If you catch yourself feeling defensive when someone questions something you believe, or you just find yourself instinctively rejecting an idea … this might be an opportunity. I’ve come to see those kneejerks, or intense feelings, as a big neon light lighting up a door, “GO HERE!” If I strongly believe or reject something, going deeper, beyond my surface reaction, always leads me somewhere I needed to go.

Second step: we need to examine why we care about this issue. Why do we have a horse in this race? If our identity might be wrapped up in it – why? What it is about this issue that we need to reflect on it now?

When you are doing a deep search for meaning, it may take you to some scary places. That means you’re doing it right. There may be things in your life that you don’t want to revisit. Things you don’t want to think about. But make no mistake – just because you don’t revisit it, doesn’t mean it’s not shaping how you view the world. It’s kind of like having one of those malware programs running on your computer – you ever have that? It’s a program that you don’t even see, but suddenly, your computer is running slower. Occasionally doing weird things. We can have shadow beliefs running in our background that are affecting us – and we don’t even realize it.

Third step: you articulate your current convictions about the issue. And forming the words to explain what we believe is crucial. We can have fuzzy concepts in our mind, but articulating them – either by writing about them or talking about them to others – helps to process and produce an explanation about what we believe. This is the raw material that you have to work with. The scientific method parallel is to construct a working hypothesis. You’re finding your starting point.

Now it’s time for the real work. 4th step. Take your starting point and enter into conversation about it with ‘conversation partners.’

A conversation partner need not be another person. Conversation partners are religious texts, world religions, the theologians and philosophers, your experiences, reason, ethics. And we need to look at a combination of these.

If we limit our conversation partners to only one religious text and doctrinal writings, we’re headed toward closed fundamentalism. And limiting our conversation partners to only our own experiences and reason leads to theological narcissism. And to leave out ethics means that we will not connect our deeply held beliefs with our part in healing the world.

Let me be blunt about why conversation partners are a necessary, required part of examining our faith. We must have the humility to understand that no human possesses absolute truth. Including us. For a religious fundamentalist, the tendency is to make the Bible the sole authority on truth. God said it, I believe it, that settles it. Not a whole lot of room for growth there.

But we are just as dangerous if we decide that our sole authority on truth is us. “This just feels right to me,” means that we are limiting wisdom to our individual experience. And it means that we have no spiritual accountability.

We have to be willing to consider other ideas and philosophies, not just those that support our starting contention on an issue.

Now along with books and writings, conversation partners can and should be other people. We joke about “what do you get when you cross a Unitarian Universalist with a Jehovah’s Witness?” “Someone who knocks on your door and asks, ‘What do you believe?’”

Well, before we knock on doors, why don’t we start with the people we know – including each other. Rather than just asking, “So, Joe … how’s your job?” try something more meaningful – “So, the anniversary of Sept. 11 has me thinking about the nature of evil – what do you think about it? Do you think it’s a force or a result?”

It’s not necessarily appropriate water cooler talk … unless it’s the water cooler at your church. This is why we are here. To grapple with these big questions.

Then, the last step. Application. “Discover what kind of world is created when you live out your new commitments.”

We have to test our new belief and see if it works. Will we be better persons for having this belief? Will it serve us well, or will it hold us back?

What kind of world will we help create when we live out this new faith conviction?

If you are not currently living by that belief, do you need to change that belief or your life?

We have to test our accountability. Even though these are our own personal beliefs, we have to ask, “Will believing this contribute to a life-well lived for all people?”

If everyone believed this, what would that mean for the world?

We’re not just building a theological house for our own sake. We are building what will house our soul, so that we are spiritually empowered to engage with the world we live in.

Gathered and Sent

2011-04-04T10:16:00.000-05:00

Gathered and Sent

A Sermon Given by Lizard Eater

at half a dozen churches in South Texas

Okay, so there were three blind people and … (Congregation: “An elephant.”) Elephant? No, no, man, that’d just be weird. Three blind people and a Unitarian Universalist church. They’d taken a quiz on beliefnet.com that said they were all UUs so they wanted to see what a Unitarian Universalist church was.

The first came in and heard the choir practicing. “Oh,” he said. “Music. A Unitarian Universalist church is where you make music and celebrate.”

The next stumbled over a toolbox. Picking up a hammer, she said, “No, church is where we find purpose.”

The third reached out to her so he could examine the toolbox, but as he did, he also stumbled. She caught him and he reached up and touched her cheek. “Ah,” he said. “A Unitarian Universalist church is where you make community.”

They then walked down to the corner coffeeshop to continue arguing about it, because that is what we blind Unitarian Universalists do!

Of course, they were all right. A Unitarian Universalist church is where we celebrate, find purpose, and make community. And learn. And connect. And find meaning.

But at its core, church is where we are gathered, before being sent back out. We are a gathered and sent people. We are gathered together to strengthen our souls … and we are sent out to strengthen the world.

When we gather together, we worship. Worship, from the Old English weorthscipe, means to shape what is of worth. It’s where we take time to focus on what we value. And when we do this, when we gather together to worship, we give praise, we receive inspiration and we are fortified.

Now, praise is one of those challenging terms for Unitarian Universalists, because we’ve heard it used as a requirement – that there’s a God that created us just to praise him … for most of us, that just seems awfully human for the Divine.

But praise is about pausing and paying attention to what we value. And celebrating it. Because it’s so easy to take things for granted. We just get busy with our lives. When we praise, we pause.

I’m yet again trying to get on a regular exercise regimen. I went down to my YMCA and since the weather was nice, rather than exercising inside, I went down to a path they have around a pond. I had my mp3 player with good music and just walking along, looking at the lilypads, and the water, and the trees, I just felt so close that process of life that I call God. And I was going along, and there’s a bench down by the water. I didn’t stop, though, because, I had my groove on. Next time around though, (pants) …. I'd lost my groove. So I sat down on the bench. And then I took out my earbuds. And I could hear birds and the sounds of the trees. And I noticed all the details … a pillbug trotting along, a fish down in the water … here, fishy fishy fishy. I paused.. And then this great, cool, burst of honeysuckle scented air just hit me full in the face. You can’t buy gifts like that. You can only receive them. I paused. And I praised.

And when we gather together, one of the gifts we receive is inspiration. Whether it’s in the pulpit, or the coffee hour, or during RE, or the corner forum … we get to hear the ideas of others. And that’s one of the great, precious gifts that we inherited in this liberal faith. That we have so many places to look to find our own answers. Our answers may be found in Hinduism, Buddhism, humanism, process theology … for many of us, they’re found in our rich theological heritage of Unitarianism and Universalism. We read Hosea Ballou, Margaret Fuller or James Luther Adams, we take the What Moves Us classes and learn about Forrest Church and the Cathedral of the World … we find, as did one of our fine youth, an epiphany. We gather and we are inspired.

The Rev. Forrest Church, who gave us much inspiration, died last year. At the first service at his church after his funeral, the Rev. Galen Guengerich told of a conversation he had had with Forrest. See, Forrest always ended his sermons with, “Amen. I love you. And may God bless us all.” He explained to his friend why he did so.

He said, “I think people understand what I’m trying to communicate when I say “I love you” from the pulpit.” He listed the three kinds of love that are described in the New Testament: romantic love, friendship, and divine love—agape. “People know I’m not saying “I love you” in the romantic sense,” he explained, “or even in the sense that friends would say “I love you” to each other.” He went on to say, in a typically self-deprecating observation, that he thought some people found him rather reserved in person. “But when I say, “I love you” from the pulpit,” he said, “something connects—I get connected to the congregation and they get connected to each other. It’s almost like, for a moment at least, we all part of each other—of something larger than ourselves. It’s the human form of love divine, as Blake put it.” “And besides,” he added, “someone once told me that I’m the only person in her life who ever says “I love you.” She comes to church to hear someone say that she matters.”

She comes to church to hear someone say that she matters.

Everyone turn to someone right now and say, “I love you and there’s nothing you can do about it!” (congregation does so)

We gather to feel that love. We gather to remember that we matter, and that our values matter. And we are fortified.

And so, having given praise, and received inspiration, and been fortified, our souls have been strengthened.

And so we are sent out to strengthen the world.

Unitarian Horace Mann said “Be ashamed to die until you have won a victory for humanity.” What will your victory be?

Sometimes, I think we – and by “we,” I mean, “I” … sometimes we hold ourselves back because we think that “victory” must mean something huge, dramatic, and life changing. But something can also be small, quiet, and life changing. Because you just can’t know what will change a life. As Mother Theresa said, “we can do no great things, only small things with great love.” Small things with great love. We need to gives ourselves permission to bless others, without feeling we must know that the final outcome is, or that we must be judge and jury for whether someone truly deserves our small blessing.

Often, we make simple things so complicated, either because we can see the big, final masterpiece … and don’t realize that we need to first, just start with “what is the minimum I need to do to get this up and running?” … or because we are so attached to a desired outcome that we’re afraid to begin. We can’t see the entire path, so we’re afraid to take that first step.

I heard the Rev. Marlin Lavanhar talk about this when he was about to take the dramatic step of going to Uganda to help support those fighting the evil proposed laws against homosexuals there. He talked about the difference between when the Israelites crossed the Red Sea and when they crossed the Jordan, like in our ancient readings today.

Sometimes, that path is clear and obvious. We’re like Moses. The enemy is at our back, the waters have been parted, “I know what to do, I can see my path.” Now, even when our path is clearly laid out for us, that doesn’t mean it’s easy. We may feel we’re not ready. We may feel we’re stepping into shoes five times too big. We may look at that water to the right, water to the left, and be afraid of drowning. But the path is laid out. We need only to step out on it.

Sometimes, though, the path isn’t so clear, like in the book of Joshua. We’re carrying that ark, it’s pretty heavy. And we don’t see a path. We have to wade in first, trusting that a path will appear. Step out in faith. So we do. And after we have waded in, after our ankles are wet, then the path opens. Sometimes, we just have to wade in, and hope that the path appears.

I was talking about this with a friend of mine, he’s the pastor of a Missionary Baptist church in Sugar Land, and he said, Yeah, but what about Elisha.

Oh man.

See with Elisha, he has just watched his mentor be swept away to heaven in a chariot of fire pulled by horses of fire.

What to do now? Well, first, he needs to cross back over the Jordan River.

And sometimes we’re like Elisha. Our souls have been strengthened. And we are being sent out to strengthen the world. But there’s no path there. And we can wade out in the middle of it, but there’s still no path that we can see. So Elisha he picks up the robe that Elijah left behind. He had seen him roll it up and strike the waters, so he gives it a try. And they part. Sometimes we have to take what we’ve learned from others, and the tools we are given, and strike the waters. Sometimes, we have to make our own path.

A wise man said, “Faith is taking the first step, even when you don't see the whole staircase.” Anyone know you said that? Martin Luther King, Jr. said that, a man who knew both about gathering together in church to strengthen your soul, and then being sent out to strengthen the world.

This whole gathered and sent thing … this is the core of the missional church. What does that mean, to be a missional church?

It means that every time you leave here, every Sunday, you go out into the world and you actively live as a Unitarian Universalist, you incarnate the values of Unitarian Universalism. It means seeing people as beings who are meant to be loved and acting accordingly. Feeding someone who is hungry. Being in relationship with someone who needs a friend. And doing these things, not because your church tells you to, but because you are Unitarian Universalism. You are the hands and feet of this religion, these values, you are the hands and feet of the divine mystery.

I'm willing to bed that there are people here who feel like when they go through those front doors and leave this church, they are going out into a foreign world, a world that does not reflect their values. A world that says buy this and you “need” that, a world where people ridicule the weak and promote hatred and intolerance, a crass world that values celebrity over decency, flash over substance. And you know what? They’re right! We are in a culture that often does not reflect our values.

But the answer is not to hide here, to seek sanctuary here, not even to provide sanctuary here. We are not a cave to hide out in. We are missionaries. We are missionaries. And our job is to go out into that world out there, and spread kindness. Love. Tolerance.

But kindness. Love. Tolerance. Those things by themselves, those forces, have no hands, have no feet. Love is the most amazing power in the world, but love cannot literally hold open a door for someone burdened. Love has no hands and no feet.

But we do.

We have hands and we have feet and we can walk out there, walk into that world, and be missionaries for what we hold to be true. We can be the hands and feet of love. And we can strengthen the world.

Every time we leave our church and go out to work for justice, we are strengthening the world. Every time we leave our church and go out to extend kindness, we are strengthening the world. And then we are gathered back together, to talk about the work we have done, to share how we have been walking humbly with our God and to worship together. And so it becomes this wonderful cycle of strengthening our souls and strengthening the world and the wheel just gets more and more momentum.

We can build a land where we bind up the broken, restoring ruins of generations, we can build a land of people so bold. Gathered and Sent, we’ll build a land.

Amen, I love you. And May God bless us all.

Why I am a Universalist

2011-03-15T11:31:00.000-05:00

The Rev. Naomi King organized today as "Speak Up for Universalism Day" and I have been tweeting a small portion of the Bible verses that support the idea of universalism.

But they are not why I am a Universalist.

I am deep into Universalism on a scholarly level. Much of last semester was spent rummaging all through the Reformation for information about what was happening with universalism during that time. (Seminarian tip: if you're writing a paper that you already know is going to be called "Hidden Heresy," it should probably occur to you that since it was often hidden, it is going to be quite a challenge to research. You are so warned.)

This semester, I am taking a class exclusively on Universalism, soaking up its history and controversies. And loving it.

But that is not why I am a Universalist.

I am, at heart, a Universalist, because it would be impossible for me to not be. I am a Universalist both because I have been profoundly loved, and because I profoundly love.

I have been demonstratably loved by family, friends, and even complete strangers. When LW completed chemo the last time, we prepared for her Wish Trip. I studied for that trip like I was being graded on it, and one way that I educated myself was through some "fan" boards online. There, I received an email from some women who wanted to know if I would allow them to sew clothes for our family to take on our trip.

When we left for Orlando, our suitcases were stuffed with dresses and outfits, custom-made for us, painstakingly sewn, the ingredients purchased by the sewers themselves. They wouldn't take a dime, not even for shipping. They did not know us. They did not know our religion, our politics, what kind of people we were. All they knew was that our family qualified for a Wish trip. And they wanted to make it even better.

You're going to tell me God has less generosity?

I love. I love family, friends, church members, blogging buddies ... and I love my kids. Wow, do I love my kids. It is scary, when you're holding your first baby, and you realize that you would die for that little handful. And as they get older, and often not quite as cute, you love them even more. To a certain extent, I am powerless under this love I have for them. No matter what, I will still love them. I can be disappointed in them, sad about them, so angry I want to pinch them right between the eyes ... but I still love them. I can't stop.

You're going to tell me God has less love?

In the video promoting Love Wins, Rob Bell talks about Gandhi and how it's inconceivable to him that Gandhi is in hell.

Well, to all of those who tweeted furiously that that proved Rob Bell is a universalist, I say Pshaw. Believing Gandhi isn't in hell doesn't make you a universalist, it makes you a reasonable person.

As much as I say that I couldn't not be a Universalist, it is damn hard work. Because not only do I not believe that Gandhi isn't in hell, I don't believe Saddam Hussein is in hell.

Whatever God is -- and nowadays, my understanding is more of God as a seductive process -- I believe that ultimately, Love does win. I believe that this process of God pulls us towards more compassion, more kindness, more generosity, more love. And eternal punishment just doesn't fit in to that.

Ultimately, God wins.

"I love you Lord, but I am mad at you!"

2011-03-11T09:33:00.000-06:00

Or "Why You Should Be Reading the Lament Psalms."

Walter Brueggemann calls them the psalms of disorientation. They're for when we have lost the privilege of believing that life is fair, that it'll all be okay, that a benevolent force for good is in our lives. They shriek of pain, of despair, of desperation.

For a long time, the Christian church has avoided these psalms, feeling that they indicated a lack of belief, of faith. Ironically, many UU churches avoided them because they address God, which is too much faith for us.

God, I'm hurt, and I'm feeling broken inside. And I am mad at you. And I don't even believe that it's your fault, I don't believe that you cause bad things to happen nor provide miracles. But there's a young woman who is fighting for her life, has been going to nursing school even with cancer, has just poured her young life into helping others and now that cancer just seems to be winning, seems to taking over her whole body and it is hurting her, God. And I know that I don't believe you intervene, that you choose who gets miracles but even with that, God, just this once? Just this once? And now I hear that my friend, my friend, God, the one in class with me with the beautiful long braids, so full of vim and vigor, the one whom I looked at with awe and said "You have the gift of preaching," even though she's in tradition that doesn't recognize your call to women ... now I find out that she has had a massive stroke. She's barely older than me, God! They had to cut into her skull, God, do you realize that? She is lying in the ICU and we don't know if she'll still be she. And now, Good God, an earthquake? More devastation to come? Really, God? REALLY? I am mad, God! And I don't know who to be mad to, so I am mad at you. I love you but I am MAD at YOU.

Psalms like 13, that take the Priestly Blessing, shove it in God's face and say, "You're not doing your part of the bargain!" You're not turning your face toward me and being gracious to me, you're hiding your face! You're pretending I don't exist! How Long, Lord???

Psalms like 137, where we all grieve, broken-hearted together. We weep together, remembering the beautiful life we had, now ruthlessly stripped away. We are so devastated, so victimized, we have so lost who we are, we even fantasize about the children of our enemies having their heads dashed in, so that our enemies can know this pain.

These psalms are brutal, and sad, and heartrending. And utterly honest. Especially psalm 88, the only one that can't crawl its way back to faith in God. Darkness is my closest friend.

We need a way to mourn, grieve, and rail at the forces of life and death. We need a way to join in communal lament, to recognize and acknowledge the pain as well as the beauty.

As for me, I'm keeping the psalms close at hand. I wish I'd known of them as I sat alone in the hospital, a sleeping bald child next to me.

My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?

Behind the Curtain

2011-03-01T08:21:00.000-06:00

When I first began seminary, I spoke of "peeking behind the curtain" -- those times when I would get glimpses into the world of being a minister, not from the audience side, but from the minister side.

As I've progressed, I have been nurtured by several ministers, UU and otherwise, who have allowed me greater access behind the curtain, in order to further my formation.

I still have a toe outside the curtain, so there's a few things I want to whisper with all of us non-ministers, about that secret world of clergy.

My brother recently brought my otherwise calm father to absolute apoplexy by remarking that he thinks people pretty much turn out the way they will, no matter what the parent does. (My brother is child-free.)

My father sat listening to him, fury no doubt rising, until finally he couldn't stand it anymore. "REALLY? Well, that's just great. All those nights I couldn't sleep, tossing and turning, trying to figure out what the right thing to do was, how I was going to afford things you needed, how to reach you and teach you, all that heartache and stress ... and none of it mattered. You would have turned out the same had I just shrugged and let you be."

Well, there's a whole lot of that in ministry. A lot of sleepless nights, a lot of praying and soul-searching. Am I fulfilling my call? God, am I doing what you entrusted me to do? Am I providing opportunities for transformation, for healing, for nurturing? Are my people stronger now, or just tireder and poorer? What am I missing? Who am I missing?

They make mistakes. And it rips them apart. And they can't lean on us. Because they are there to minister, not to be ministered to. They live knowing how very expendable they are. And that it must be that way.

We hear the stories of arrogant ministers, confident in all that they do. But I have seen ministers, so very aware of their human fraility. When no one else is around, tears fall.

The stole is not so much a distinction of honor as it is a yoke of responsibility, sometimes even a heavy chain of commitment and requirement. Heavy hangs the stole.

Perhaps you feel I am aggrandizing a world that I seek to join. I don't think so.

I'm just reporting what I saw when I peeked behind the curtain.

Choosing Bold Over Mild

2011-02-25T14:47:00.000-06:00

... together we want to change the world for the better, and the best strategies for doing this are constantly evolving. We want to shake the foundations of social systems in order to make the world a fairer, kinder place where all people can enjoy their share of life's blessings and hopes. The end sounds mild enough, but getting there requires us to boldly confront the powers and the power brokers of the current world order.

The bolder a church's vision is with regard to the preceding, the more engaging and winsome that church becomes to the general public. The milder the vision expressed, the more that energy is diverted to fellowship, childcare, and building renovation, to entertainment activities, parties, and trips. The mild church is a religious Elk's Lodge except for about an hour a week, when we sit quietly in a room decorated to my grandmother's tastes and try to think (and even sing) nice thoughts about ... loving others. ... But the bold church is quite serious in its intent to change the world, within its range of influence...

I, personally, do not have much time for the Elk's Lodge or much time for a church whose primary purpose is camaraderie ... If I do belong to an organization with mild aspirations, I will be casual and sporadic in my attendance, volunteering, and giving. My energy will drift elsewhere. ...

Bold visions for changing the world will always win us partners who are ready to roll up their sleeves, and in such endeavors they and we together open up ourselves to the serendipitous discoveries and life changes that happen when we are sharing life with the poor and giving to make life better for others.

Rock my world in worship...Challenge me to join with you in changing the world. Be bold and you will win my undivided attention.

-- I Refuse to Lead a Dying Church, Paul Nixon

Sunday is Bring Your Gay Teen to Church Day

2011-02-21T09:10:00.011-06:00

Open doors await them

Homosexuality and religion have a complicated past, but some area churches hope to bridge that gap this Sunday

By JEANNIE KEVER HOUSTON CHRONICLE

Feb. 19, 2011, 7:29AM

Ebie Hussey's first reaction when her son announced that he is gay was to offer unconditional love.

Finding a new church was a close second.

"His first question was, 'Am I going to hell?' " Hussey said of that conversation with her son, Jaxn. "Mainstream Christianity and fundamental Christianity really pushes that homosexuality is a sin, and he had caught on to that."

Jaxn, now 15, knew his parents didn't think that. "But I had always heard people saying that kind of thing," he said.

In an effort to counter the message, almost two dozen Houston-area churches have designated Sunday as Bring Your Gay Teen to Church Day. ... (continued)

The Lay Leaders Guide to Getting the Most from Your Guest Speakers

2011-02-15T11:29:00.001-06:00

One of the things I get to do, and really love doing, is to preach at churches around my state. I adore it. I get to meet some of the coolest people you'll ever meet -- people in little pockets of the world, trying to make their little pocket a more loving, just, place.

My home church is one of those little pockets and has been mostly lay-led over my years there. I held the post of Worship Chair twice and between that and actually being the guest speaker, I've learned some things.

So, here, I offer you HOW TO GET THE MOST OUT OF YOUR GUEST SPEAKER. (Especially if your guest speaker is a UU seminarian, minister, religious professional or consultant.)

Before Sunday:

Tell them everything that will happen that Sunday, from what time someone opens to the church, to the meetings before church, to the circle afterwards, to lunch, etc.
In great detail, tell them everything that you would like them to do:

Do you want them to lead the entire service, or just do the readings/sermon?
Do you want them to do the chalice lighting ... offertory ... lead joys/sorrows?

If you have something after the service you would like them to join, let them know ahead of time. Especially if you have a discussion of the sermon afterwards. In at least two churches, I've mingled, chatted wth people, gathered my stuff, and been walking out the door before someone says, "Oh, are you leaving? We're going to gather to talk about your sermon." Or, "Oh, we were hoping you'd join us for lunch." Well, if I've already pulled together my kids and my husband, it is at best awkward to then come back in, get everyone settled, etc. We often just say thanks, and continue on our way. I'd love to join you. Just let me know ahead of time.
If your speaker is a minister or seminarian, let them know a little bit about your congregation, and any major things that are going on. We want to make our message more meaningful to you. Doing a project you're proud of? Let us know so we can reference it and cheer you on. Is your congregation laid back about religious language or do they bristle at the word "God"? Let us know. We might not change anything, but we'll know what to expect.
Have an established "normal" order of service but be willing to deviate from it. First, let me know what is normal for your church. If they're accustomed to 2 hymns every Sunday, I'd rather do that than add in a third. However, be flexible. If I really think that this particular service needs all three hymns, let's do it if it's feasible.

But again, do have a normal order of service. Don't give me a completely blank slate. Let me know what your "normal" is.

Sunday:

Meet your speaker a little before the service, and first give them a tour of your building. Ah, there's the bathrooms.
Have a fresh cup of water for them in the podium and let them know it's fresh.
Go over the order of service, especially if you're doing it together. Who'll introduce this hymn? Who'll light the chalice?
Show them where they can leave their coat, briefcase, etc.
Have a plan for afterwards -- do you walk them to the back so they can shake hands with parishioners? What about after that? Have someone who can escort them to coffee, introduce them to people, etc. Get the most out of them!

Afterwards:

Let them know any feedback you've heard. (Especially seminarians.) Now, if the cranky person who never likes anyone criticizes them, there's probably not a useful purpose in passing that on. But if 5+ people say "Oh, I liked him!" or "I couldn't really hear her," or even "They found you too ... (Christian, Atheist, Activist, Intellectual, etc.)" let us know.
If they are someone who knows their way around worship, ask them for their feedback. What could you, as a church, do better? They probably visit quite a few other churches, which gives them a unique outsider's perspective.

Edit: The BFF-DRE pointed out that these are good tips for all religious professionals. She's right. Mea Culpa.

"What do you know about Cancer?" Part II

2011-02-11T22:59:00.000-06:00

So, The Husband is watching the Katy Perry video we talked about (see below) and is getting a little teary because of the cancer patient in the video. Little Wren doesn't know why.

"Oh yeah," she says. "He visited."

As ChaliceChick would say ...

*headdesk*

"What do you know about Cancer?"

2011-02-11T21:51:00.000-06:00

Okay, right after talking about cancer, this conversation happens:

I'm in the car with LW and Bo Peep (5 and 8). We're listening to Katy Perry's Firework. Peep says that she's seen the video. Oh yeah, sez I, and it has a girl with cancer in it.

"Don't say that word!" commands LW, from the back seat.

"What word?" I ask, innocently.

"Cancer!" says LW.

"Why?"

"I HATE cancer," says LW.

"Me, too," I say.

"What do YOU know about cancer?" asks LW.

(Those who have been with me on this journey ... we'll now take 5 minutes to alternate laughing, crying, and being silent in gratitude that this moment could occur.)

"Excuse me?" I say. Not defensively ... because I want to see what she has to say. She does have a different perspective than I.

She begins laughing, in that way that I love, where deep chuckles begin burbling out of her chest.

"Oh yeah," she says. "Your were with me the whole time," she says.

There are some moments that defy description. They are just there to be experienced. Take from it what you will.

(But ... those who have been there from the times she can't even remember ... iMinister, Philocrites, and all the rest ... I am, virtually, hugging you, and we are laughing together. So many of us were with her the whole time. What do WE know about cancer?)

And on a personal note ...

2011-02-11T12:41:00.000-06:00

LW, working in the garden

Elizabeth asked how everyone's doing.

Pretty fabulous, thanks for asking. All the kids, including Little Wren, are growing like weeds.

The kids stay busy with school, orchestra, band, etc. and are completely normal, in that they fuss, whine, love pizza, fight, love Glee, and hate cleaning their rooms. Okay, they all have an overwhelming love for steamed broccoli which I think is passing strange, but other than that, normal.

Sometimes, though, things will happen to remind me that they have been affected in their journeys through Cancer World. Like The Boy writing an amazingly insightful paper about Threnody, which Emerson wrote about his faith, lost and refound, after his son died.

For LW, it was just her reality. She told some boy friends (not boyfriends, she will hasten to tell you) that she was bald two years ago. Boys are quite impressed with that kind of thing.

I'm trying to get all my schoolin' done, and will have CPE this summer. The only advice anyone is willing to give me about that is, "Get sleep now."

Yikes.

And The Husband keeps on keeping on, occasionally doing something completely insane like getting up early on a freezing morning to fill my car tank with gas.

And that, my children, is what Real Love looks like.

Bring Your Gay Teen to Church

2011-02-07T10:00:00.000-06:00

Back in October, I blogged about wanting to get the message out to parents to take their gay teen to a church where they would be welcomed and affirmed. A month later, some of us talked about that in our church. About what it could mean to be an LGBTQ teen in loving faith community. One where not only could they be themselves, but they could also be around all kinds of adults. One where they could see healthy, happy, LGBTQ adults. Videos are nice, but being able to witness that It Gets Better? Better.

In Houston, it's happening. February 20.

Yes, Houston. So far, we've got 20 churches signed up, representing 8 different denominations + non-denominational.

I'm tickled purple.

Click on the logo. See the website. "Like" the Facebook page. Tell your friends. This year, Houston. Next year, the world.

Being Missionaries, or "What if ..."

2011-01-31T08:38:00.001-06:00

I know exactly when I took the red pill.

I was in preaching class with one of my favorite professors and just chatting, he brought up the missional church movement. He explained that what they wanted to do was be missionaries, but rather than being missionaries in Africa or Central Europe, they wanted to be missionaries right in their own town.

And reality, as I had known it, crackled into a million pieces; my vision unfocused and I held on to the table for fear of falling off my chair and into a wormhole. He explained further and reality came back into focus, but a different reality than had been there before.

What if?

I profoundly believe in liberal religion in general, and Unitarian Universalism specifically. I believe the world would be a better place if we added a hundred, two hundred UU churches, all working on creating the Beloved Community. And creating the Beloved Community not within their church walls, but outside it, in their greater community. Doing guerrilla gardening and mentoring at the local elementary school, serving up a meal on Sunday for church members and the neighborhood. Focusing not on how many members in the church, but how many they serve.

What if?

Being a missionary, starting up a new church in the poorer part of town ... how is that more impossible than going to another country where you don't even speak the language, and learning a new culture, in order to better the people and save their souls?

I have a different opinion about saving souls. Mine is found in "Shalom," a word translated to mean "peace," but which is so much more. It is peace, rightness, and wholeness; it is both personal and communal.

What if?

What if you had a new church who knew from the get-go, that this would be their focus? That "church" was not where you met, "church" was who you are?

And what if these people were all willing to be missionaries? All week long, in their own spheres of influence, they would pursue mission. At work, at the pub, on the softball field or Mommy and me group, they would actively try to spread their values, seeing themselves as missionaries. And would come together to work the mission field where their church was located.

And what if you had a large, established church, who decided that "missions" was not just something for fundamentalist Christians, but was instead a vital part of their mission, who supported sending a mission ... but rather than to Guatemala, to the other side of the railroad tracks?

And what if you focused on the indigenous culture in which you planted the mission, rather than trying to turn the "savages" into what goes for "UU Culture" these days?

What if.

God, Doubt, Authenticity, and Foolishness

2011-01-25T10:34:00.001-06:00

There is a saying about "It is better to be thought a fool, than to open your mouth and remove all doubt."

We nod sagely at that, not stopping to think ... Oh, then that means no one would talk. Or share ideas. And really, isn't that rooted in fear?

So I say, tish tosh to that, and prefer Emerson's words, "Speak what you think now in hard words, and to-morrow speak what to-morrow thinks in hard words again, though it contradict every thing you said to-day."

In one of my seminary classes, the professor talked about the ambiguity in the Bible, and the fact that we must have humility in understanding that there is so much we can't understand. He was questioned by a student, wanting to know how this plays out in the life of a pastor. "Well," the professor conceded, "There are some things that you'll learn in seminary that you won't share with your parishioners. They can't handle it."

If you are now envisioning Jack Nicholson, red-faced, "You can't handle the TRUTH!" ... well, you are not the only one.

But it made me think of some I know -- even ministers -- in UU churches, who hide parts of their spiritual lives -- daily prayer, communing with God, and what not. Would we say, "They're mostly Stage Fours. They can't handle it."? When, of course, what we mean is, "I don't want someone to look at me and think my beliefs are ridiculous."

I think one problem that can arise, whether we are absolute doubters, absolute believers, or something in between or somewhere else, is when we hold any such belief toooo tightly. Doubt or belief, either can be squeezed so hard that to loosen our fingers would mean painful, crampy digits. We become more attached to protecting what we hold, rather than being authentic with our doubts, questions, and feelings we can't fully rationalize.

For several years now, I have been exploring my understandings of God, Spirit, and the like. I have had numinous experiences. These are cherished moments in my life.

But I remind myself to hold them loosely. Don't get too attached. And even those special moments, where I felt connected to something larger than myself, something I call God ... if you were to ask me, I would, with all humility and authenticity, say, "Yeah, but it also might just be my imagination."

And I don't feel it takes anything away by leaving that as one of the options for finding meaning. In the last Harry Potter book, he asks about an experience he had. "Was it real, or was it all in my mind?" The answer is that it can be both.

Unitarian Universalism is an agnostic religion. That doesn't mean "a polite way to say atheist." One may give heartfelt prayers every day to God and equally be an agnostic. We are the religion that has the humility to say, "I don't know."

To me, the model Unitarian Universalist humanist/Christian/pagan/etc. all say the same thing. They say, "I believe X. But I don't know that for sure." What "X" means doesn't matter as much as, "But I don't know that for sure." But I don't know leaves room for discussion with others. But I don't know leaves room for what the person personally considers ridiculous. But I don't know leaves room for growth and revelation.

We loosen our grip, stretch our fingers. It hurts, at first. But the blood begins pumping, and soon, our fingers feel just fine. Better, even. If we want, we can reach out to other things now.

The Sabbath That Comes Once a Day

2011-01-17T10:00:00.002-06:00

My Jewish friends taught me about Shabbat as being the holiday that comes once a week. Lately, I've been thinking about sleep as the sabbath that comes once a day.

What would it mean, to think of our nightly (or daily, depending on work hours) as holy?

I don't know if I appreciated it as much until the hospital days. The hospital days ... or more precisely, the hospital nights ... were broken into 1 and a half hour increments. Because of the chemo my daughter received, she had to be pumped full of liquids to protect her kidneys. One and a half hours. That's how long she could go without the bathroom. She was only 3, but she refused a diaper. So every one and a half hours, she'd stir, and I'd leap from my cot beside her, and somehow maneuver her and her IV pole into the bathroom.

But I digress.

I still sleep very lightly. Whether it is because of those 6 months or entering my forties, I can't say.

Sleep ... oh, blessed sleep. We cuddle down into our blankets, and hopefully, are able to take just a second to feel grateful. We are safe, we are warm. Best of all is when we are in our own homes.

Perhaps a spouse or a mate rustles next to us. A hound dog or a kitty yawns, stretches, and curls closer, feeling utterly safe next to the heat of our body.

A nursing baby sighs, sliding off our breast and nestling close. Or a young child crawls next to us in the middle of night, "I had a nightmare," she mumbles, before weaving herself under your chin, her knees pressed against your belly, an expanded version of herself as she used to curl in the womb.

Sleep.

If we truly considered it to be holy, a gift from God that comes once a day, how would we treat it? Would we still push ourselves, doing laundry, watching tv, checking Facebook until, exhausted, we finally succumbed and poured ourselves into bed?

Or would we, instead, treat it as part of the divine hours. A specific time -- 10:00, 11:00? Where we began our nighttime discipline: wash the face, brush the teeth, visit the toilet, say a prayer, close our eyes, join in our nighttime Sabbath?

I have known a time when sleep was a much needed vacation from reality. Where I could, for a period of time, rest. Body, mind. and soul. Rest.

Isn't that what Sabbath means?

Being Missional, or, It's the End of the World as We Know It and I Feel Fine.

2011-01-13T10:14:00.000-06:00

I am passionate about the missional church movement and am often asked to explain exactly what "being missional" means.

IT MEANS THE END TO LIFE AS YOU KNOW IT.

Okay, that's a bit dramatic.

But in a way, that might be accurate. The Rev. Ron Robinson and I have agreed that it's like taking the Matrix's Red Pill. Once you have your "red pill" moment, you can no longer see church in the same way. No matter how much you want to go back to the way you used to conceive of church, you can't. "After this, there is no turning back ..."

I'm not getting less dramatic, am I?

Well, maybe because I can't. Because once you start seeing church in this different way, it causes you to do crazy things like move across the country and start holding church in a bar. Or move to a run-down, dangerous area and start doing church by feeding and clothing the poor. Or become the kind of minister who says, "It's not how many people come to our church services, but how many people our churches serve!,"regularly sending out requests to borrow a pickup, so you can deliver donated furniture to a program for the homeless.

Being missional is a wholly other way of conceiving and doing church. Missional is not about having a pretty mission statement up on your wall.

In terms of what it looks like, forget mission statement and think missionaries. Think of a part of town you know -- and it could be your own -- that needs help. Real help, not just being supportive of their spiritual journeys.

Now imagine that you have been sent there to change their lives. By arranging for the hungry to get nutritious food, for the lonely to have someone who feels they matter. So, you find some other people who feel similarly called. Every week, in your own spheres of influence, you and these people go out into the world and try to make your little corner of it into the Beloved Community, where your mission is nothing less than helping each person in the community to find wholeness. You, this group of Called people, are the Church.

The Church is part of the Beloved Community, but it is not, in itself, the Beloved Community. The Beloved Community is what you are making. Members of the Beloved Community may never attend a worship service, but they are served by the Church.

Once a week, you and the Church gather, to strengthen your souls. You sing, you hear an empowering message, you share how you are each doing justice, extending kindness, and walking humbly with your God, however you understand it be.

Fortified, then, you say goodbye to each other, and each of you goes forth for the week ... to strengthen the world.

And as much as you love your fellow Church members, your relationship is not the mission. The Church members themselves are not the mission. Each of you knows that. The only item not expendable is The Mission.

And yet, you discover that as you help bring your little corner of the earth to wholeness, that you yourself are becoming more whole. More the person you were meant to be.

A missionary.

Group Discernment and Superheroes

2011-01-03T11:12:00.001-06:00

One of the advantages of my seminary is that it is interdenominational. My professor for Spirituality was an evangelical Friend, or Quaker.

I learned so many things from her, both from the class syllabus and from how she lives her life. One of the big things came at the end of the semester. It was one of those unplanned things. Being a Friend, she has great respect for the Spirit moving in amongst our days, and so she is flexible in letting it guide our discussions.

On this particular day, it led to her telling us the story of how she wound up at our seminary. Or specifically, the discernment process involved.

Friends place great value on communal discernment and there is a tremendous amount of trust and respect in these discernment meetings. Cutting and pasting from my notes:

The Role of Leadership
•    The leader finds a responsible place within the process, as part of the group
•    Leadership is one of the gifts given to the community
•    The community takes seriously the perspective, skills, and gifts of the leader
•    The leader listens to the community and to the voice of the Spirit through the community

The Voices of the Community
•    Each member plays a significant role
•    Communal discernment seeks to affirm the appropriate voice and contribution of each person, corresponding to each person’s giftedness and role within the community

Gift of discernment
•    Individual contributions that enable the group to discern well
•    Varieties of expression
     --- Seeing beyond the immediate (vision)
     --- Understanding the issues and facts (critical analysis but beyond rational analysis)
     --- Identifying the emotional dimension
     --- Sharing of wisdom and insight (sage)

Conditions for Communal Discernment
•    Common Purpose
•    Resolve to Decide Together
•    Mutual Regard and Acceptance
•    Clearly Framed Matter for Discernment
•    Good information and good research

Now. getting back to my professor's story:

She and her husband were pastors in another state. She received the invitation to teach at our seminary. What to do?

She called for a "Meeting to Discern," with her Board and church leaders. They went through the Friends' process:

* Open Discussion (Threshing): The person calling the meeting explains just the facts. Then, all individuals in the meeting may express any and all concerns. Issues, concerns, fears of the members, perspectives, etc. It's all open -- no need to pretend to have no selfish interest, we all do. Here is where it is honestly exposed, rather than being hidden away.

* Prayer and Silent Reflection (Meeting for Clearness): an extended time of listening prayer. This can be done in different ways. They broke into small groups.

* Discussion toward Resolution ("Sense of the Meeting"): Moderator asks for comments and observations that have arisen out of prayer. A “sense” may emerge that there is more agreement among the group than originally thought possible.

Describing the meeting, my professor explained that the whole purpose was to discern whether the move to the seminary was a genuine God-directed call. After the threshing part of the meeting, selfish concerns (including hers and her husband's) were put to the side. It wasn't even about "what is the best thing to do," it was all on "Is this a call from God?"

They discerned that yes, it was. She said she can't imagine making the decision without that meeting. Even when things haven't been perfect since then, she and her husband can look back on the meeting and say with confidence, "We believe this was a genuine call." The process worked.

I was touched, bewildered, and quite a bit in awe at the process. "That must take a tremendous amount of trust, to put your life in the hands of others," I said. She looked me right in the eye and said, "Absolutely."

I have thought of this often since then, wondering how, and if it's possible, for this to be played out in a UU community. Are the differences between UUs and Friends such that the process would be impossible?

UUs do not necessarily believe in "God," and those who do usually have different definitions of the term. Of those who believe in a force outside themselves, there is a smaller group that believe this force intervenes or can be accessed in any way. So, how could you discern a "call from God" in such a group? How would it need to be reframed?

And then there's the independence thing. We are often so fiercely independent. Is it possible to be that independent and still have such a high degree of trust in others?

Doug Muder writes about a generational difference in UU churches between those who are fiercely independent, and those looking for a mentor, a community, to support their superhero activities. Will younger UUs be more open to group discernment?

If we feel it is of value, it seems we have a great deal of work ahead. I don't know about you, but certain things in my notes jumped out at me, red underlined sentences that shout with disbelief, "Really???"

The community takes seriously the perspective, skills, and gifts of the leader.
Resolve to Decide Together
Mutual Regard and Acceptance

Part of me says, "No, that just wouldn't work in a UU setting. We're too different. Too independent. Too focused on self-sufficiency."

But it just won't leave me alone, this idea. I heard a story filled with humility, interdependence, and love. A story that said, "We don't have to each go it alone."

I guess I am one of those that Muder writes about. I don't want to be an orphan. I want my Scooby gang.

Great Holiday Songs You May Not Know - Day 25

2010-12-25T10:00:00.000-06:00

Okay, so you know this song, but maybe not in this langugage and this version.

The Bruce Cockburn Christmas album is just so, so, terrific. If I could, I'd buy copies and mail them to every one of you. Merry Christmas.

Great Holiday Songs You May Not Know - Day 24

2010-12-24T10:00:00.000-06:00

Children sleeping, snow is softly falling
Dreams are calling like bells in the distance
We were dreamers not so long ago
But one by one we all had to grow up
When it seems the magic's slipped away
We find it all again on Christmas day

Tonight, at midnight, after everyone else in my house has gone to bed, I'll sneak outside in the dark and the cold. Bare feet, probably. In one hand, a leather strap with sleigh bells. 1, 2, 3, I'll shake them with a flourish, like the bells on Santa's sleigh.

Perhaps someone will hear them -- half asleep? -- and decide it was a dream.

I believe in Christmas magic.

And I believe in my power to make Christmas magic.

A very happy Christmas Eve to you.

Believe
Josh Groban

Great Holiday Songs You May Not Know - Day 23

2010-12-23T10:00:00.001-06:00

Okay. You totally know this song. In fact, you're probably sick of it, it's so overplayed on the radio.

But overplayed doesn't mean bad.

Last December 23, The Husband and I looked at each other and faced something potentially devastating. Little Wren's eyes were crossing. The cancer might be back, and in her brain. We made the decision to not say anything to anyone until after Christmas.

Privately, we couldn't help the thought ... what if this is the last one with all of us?

I know that there are others out there, carrying fear through Christmas. Sometimes, it's just unavoidable. That's life.

If you must have fear this Christmas, I pray that it may turn out to be nothing significant, as ours did.

If it is significant, I pray that you may have people to support you and give you their strength when yours wearies.

But most of all, I hope you have a good one, without any fear.

And please God, may war be over.

Great Holiday Songs You May Not Know - Day 22

2010-12-22T10:00:00.000-06:00

Today's is for A. L., S. B., and others who are hurting.

Sometimes all you want for Christmas ... is for it to be over. It magnifies every hurt. Can I just sleep through it, this year? you muse.

I love those churches that do a "Blue Christmas" service a few days before Christmas. Sometimes, misery does love company.

Even when we're not having a sad Christmas, even when things are happy, sometimes we need to shed a few tears. A few tears for sad memories, a few tears acknowledging that there will be other Christmases that are not so merry.

Joni Mitchell wrote this song. There are lots of great versions (I really like the Robert Downey version, too), and I just found this one. It's simple, clean, sad, and lovely.

River
Allison Crowe

Great Holiday Songs You May Not Know - Day 21

2010-12-21T10:00:00.001-06:00

Most remakes of A Christmas Carol are pretty bad. The latest, Christmas Cupid, completely stripped away any message of interdependence and responsibility to fellow man, making it a shallow show all about how a woman shouldn't just have a career, she should also love a hunky guy. O the humanity.

But Mr. Magoo's Christmas Carol. Ahhh. A classic in its own right.

How can you not love the Cratchits? Though poor, they “are cheerful because they cannot help it, and because they all love one another.”

I don't know what razzleberry dressing is. I probably wouldn't like it. But this song makes me giggle and feel happy inside.

May you have a Christmas more glorious than grand.

Great Holiday Songs You May Not Know - Day 20

2010-12-20T10:00:00.001-06:00

I like the real.

Even though my parents don't get drunk. Well, Mama might get a wee bit tipsy with champagne, but only on Christmas Eve. And she still maintains her dignity.

But I'm pretty sure I have kinfolk in Harlingen, though I'm not exactly sure how we're related.

And football is often on during the holidays, except this year, since my 'Horns didn't make a bowl.

And someone always has to run to the convenience store for this or that. And then at least 5 voices add something to his list.

And I like margaritas.

And if you don't have some of these characters in your family ... well, your family just can't be very big.

Merry Christmas from the Family

Great Holiday Songs You May Not Know - Day 19

2010-12-19T10:00:00.000-06:00

I believe in Santa Claus, I know he exists, and I absolutely love it when I get to be Santa Claus. It is a big rite of passage when our children are able to become "Level Two" Santas. Deep crinkles appear between their eyebrows as they work their brains, trying to decide who they'll Santa and how.

You can, too. Consider it a gift to yourself. Be like my hero, Larry Stewart, and be someone's really secret Santa. Take a bill -- a little more than you can afford -- and look for the right person. Perhaps it's someone in the dollar store, trying to stretch their paycheck. Or someone at the bus station. Pretend to pick up something by them. Hand them the bill and say, "I think you dropped something." Give them a wink and a smile. And disappear quickly.

Or something less dramatic. An outrageously large tip to someone. We usually stop by Sonic and pick up drinks for our trip driving around looking at Christmas lights. A teenager working Dec. 23rd will be really happy for a $20 tip. Or more.

You don't have to judge whether the person "deserves" it. This is a gift for you. You get to be Santa Claus.

Shake Hands with Santa Claus
Louis Prima

Great Holiday Songs You May Not Know - Day 18

2010-12-18T10:00:00.000-06:00

Do you allow room for magic in your Christmas?

I believe in Christmas magic and can't be talked out of it. I've seen too much evidence for it -- impossible snowfalls, things falling into place "just so" that long-for dreams can come true.

I love acapella music, especially at the holidays, and I think this is a wonderful combination of two songs.

Pure Imagination/White Christmas
The Blenders

Great Holiday Songs You May Not Know - Day 17

2010-12-17T10:00:00.000-06:00

Baby, It's Cold Outside
Ray Charles & Betty Carter

Best Version Ever.

Smooth. Rich. Sometimes being tempted to naughtiness is sooo delicious. sigh.

Ray Charles & Betty Carter - Baby It's Cold Outside - Click here for funny video clips

Great Holiday Songs You May Not Know - Day 16

2010-12-16T10:00:00.000-06:00

This was on one of those Very Special Christmas albums. I remember people saying, "Why the heck is that song on a Christmas album?"

I understood. That guiding star they say the Magi followed ... what is your guiding star? What would you believe in, even if it meant your friends forsaking you, getting ridiculed, meeting failure again and again?

What sustains you?

I Believe in You
Sinead O'Connor

I believe in you even though I be outnumbered.
Oh, though the earth may shake me
Oh, though my friends forsake me
Oh, even that couldn't make me go back.

Don't let me change my heart,
Keep me set apart
From all the plans they do pursue.
And I, I don't mind the pain
Don't mind the driving rain
I know I will sustain
'Cause I believe in you.

Great Holiday Songs You May Not Know - Day 15

2010-12-15T10:00:00.001-06:00

Merry Christmas (I Don't Want to Fight Tonight)
The Ramones

Hey, I gotta put some classics on here. And I'm really, really hoping someone will do a mashup of this song + The Carpenters "Merry Christmas, Darling."

That would be awesome.

Great Holiday Songs You May Not Know - Day 14

2010-12-14T10:00:00.004-06:00

Driving Home for Christmas
Chris Rea

I don't drive home for Christmas anymore, and haven't for years. For one thing, my childhood home was sold years ago. And once we began having kids, it got more and more challenging. We're the only ones on either side of the family with kids, so we just let everyone know that they're welcome to come to our house. Family in all its forms land on our front porch.

But I remember that feeling ... stuffing the car with suitcases and presents, playing Christmas songs on the car stereo. Passing drivers on the interstate, their cars similarly loaded. Knowing that we're all driving home for Christmas.

I take look at the driver next to me
He's just the same
Just the same

And that moment of getting there -- walking into the warm house, seeing the tree, smelling good food, and the crush of hugs and greetings. Now, we're the ones with the warm house, tree, food, and hugs. Both sides of that equation are good.

Great Holiday Songs You May Not Know - Day 13

2010-12-13T10:00:00.003-06:00

The year is ... um, 1980-something. My family has saved up their pennies all year so that we could take a trip together for Christmas. No gifts this year, other than the gift of being with each other.

My siblings are grown, and I'm on my way, almost college age. My brother is going through a painful divorce.

We arrive on a small island in the Bahamas. Nothing touristy here. There are two places to eat, plus the kitchenette in my parents room. Groceries are expensive here, so my mother packed a baggie full of flour in her suitcase for frying the fish she was confident we'd catch. Yes, customs saw it. Yes, they pulled her aside. Yes, we teased her unmercilessly, and still do, to this day.

The island is so small, we walk everywhere, no cars. Because of that, and the general holiday spirit, and the tastiness of Rum Punch, the adults are imbibing a little more freely than normal.

Christmas Eve, a boat full of Haitian refugees is docked at the island because of a storm. They aren't allowed off the boat. My brother, who has had some of that Rum Punch, or perhaps a couple of Bahama Mamas, feels sorry for them. I can still see him -- out in the balmy air, he stretches his arms out and serenades them with our family favorite, "Children Go Where I Send Thee," all 12 verses.

Children Go Where I Send Thee
various

We always listened to the version by Odetta, and sang it with those verses, but as the years went by, different versions crawled in, changing this verse or that one.

Great Holiday Songs You May Not Know - Day 12

2010-12-12T10:00:00.001-06:00

I Pray on Christmas
Harry Connick Jr and Kim Burrell

CPE and Full Circle moments

2010-12-11T14:31:00.000-06:00

We interrupt your holiday music schedule to share this "Full Circle Moment" with you.

I'll be doing my CPE -- Clinical Pastoral Education -- this summer. Originally, under the advice of a mentor, I'd looked for one in mental health, but the certified CPEs are all hospital-connected here. I wanted a place that treated both kids and adults. Under advice of other seminarians and new ministers, I wanted a supportive CPE program.

When Little Wren was being treated, we had to go to another hospital for her outpatient radiation. The people at this place touched me, impressed me, both with their medical expertise and their spiritual care.

I really hoped I could CPE there.

Got my letter today. This is where I'll be this summer. A spiral moment.

Great Holiday Songs You May Not Know - Day 11

2010-12-11T10:00:00.001-06:00

Il est Né le Divin Enfant

I had a French professor in college who taught me this traditional carol. He was from France, and quite laid-back. He would roll his eyes at conjugating and such, and declare that if the school really wanted us to learn French, they would simply let him take us all to Paris for 6 months, where he would make sure we weren't hanging out with any other americaines, and at the end of it, we'd be fluent. He was a kick.

The song reflects the joy and celebration about the birth of the Christ child. Combined with our belief that "Every night a child is born is a holy night," it bring to my mind a gorgeous picture -- Now is born a divine child! Play the musette, play the tuneful oboe!

I couldn't resist putting in two versions. One by the great Edith Piaf, and then I happened to find one -- and a fine one! -- by Siouxie and the Banshees. C'est bon.

Great Holiday Songs You May Not Know - Day 10

2010-12-10T10:00:00.000-06:00

What is it about toy trains that just says "Christmas" to so many of us? For some, it was a train 'round the Christmas tree. Or the memory of putting one together Christmas Eve night. Or coming downstairs to find one Christmas morning.

My little boy is a big ole high schooler now. But every time I hear this, I blink and am back to the Christmases when he was a roly-poly little scamp, his eyes lit up with the magic at it all, gleefully bouncing up and down at seeing a new wooden train set.

Old Toy Trains
Roger Miller

Great Holiday Songs You May Not Know - Day 9

2010-12-09T10:00:00.001-06:00

1) Because Punk fans like Christmas, too.
2) Because I'm a mom, and I can understand Santa finally reaching the point where he loses his mind.
3) Because how can you not love a song that screeches "Oatmeal Cookies??? Oatmeal Cookies???"

Oh No It's Santa
Jingle Punx

Great Holiday Songs You May Not Know - Day 8

2010-12-08T10:00:00.002-06:00

Hey, I'm a Unitarian Universalist, and some stereotypes are stereotypes for a reason. It just wouldn't be a UU holiday song list without a Peter, Paul, and Mary song.

But as far as I'm concerned, this song transcends it's PPM origin. It even transcends the fact that it's in our hymnal. And I didn't just choose it because it's a Chanukah song.

Light One Candle
Peter, Paul, and Mary

For the rest of my life, this song will take me back to the holiday season of 2001. 3 months after 9/11, we were already seeing Fear turning us into what we didn't want to be.

I'm not comfortable singing in front of people. But for this, I was willing. My Canadian friend "Buzz" and I did a duet, singing with full hearts and teary eyes.

Light one candle for the strength that we need
To never become our own foe;
Light one candle for those who are suff'ring
The pain that we learned long ago;
Light one candle for all we believe in,
That anger not tear us apart;
And light one candle to bind us together
With peace as the song in our heart!

What is the memory that's valued so highly
That we keep it alive in that flame?
What's the commitment to those who have died?
We cry out "they've not died in vain,"
We have come this far, always believing
That justice will somehow prevail;
This is the burden and This is the promise,
This is why we will not fail!

Great Holiday Songs You May Not Know - Day 7

2010-12-07T10:00:00.001-06:00

Thank God It's Christmas
Queen

There are some people who just hold on through all kinds of garbage and pain the rest of the year, because something inside them wants to get to Christmas. And Christmas can be magic, and it can be love, and right after that it's a brand new year, and this year, please God, it will be better.

I know. Because I've been one of those people. Twice.

Oh my love we've had our share of tears
Oh my friend we've had our hopes and fears
Oh my friends it's been a long hard year
But now it's Christmas
Yes it's Christmas
Thank God it's Christmas

Great Holiday Songs You May Not Know - Day 6

2010-12-06T10:00:00.004-06:00

Christine Lavin and the Mistletones
A Christmas/Kwanzaa/Solstice/Chanukah/Ramadan/Boxing Day Song

It's an acapella round that gets in all the holidays. It's cute, fun, and my church has replicated it. For a deliberately pluralist faith, it's perfect.

Edit: I had a link up to a "free download" that makes me nervous - sends you to an .exe file.

So, here's the link to it on Amazon. You can play the sample for free and if you like it, download it for .99.

Great Holiday Songs You May Not Know - Day 5

2010-12-05T10:00:00.001-06:00

I Heard the Bells on Christmas Day is one of those songs that most people know exists, but they've never really listened to it. It's the filler song on the Christmas album, just wasting space between Chestnuts Roasting On an Open Fire and Silent Night.

I think it fair to say that its writer, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, was broken. He had lost his first wife and the baby she was carrying. His second wife had died from a tragic accident with fire. His son had been wounded in battle. The Civil War raged.

Christmas comes, and when we have been hurt, ripped up, all those sweet songs are like salt in our wounds. So false. So artificial. "Give me a freakin' break," we mutter. The first Christmas after his second wife's death, Longfellow wrote, "How inexpressibly sad are all holidays."

That discord between our pain and the joy around us ... it's like a magnifying glass for our pain.

I heard the bells on Christmas day
Their old familiar carols play,
And wild and sweet the words repeat
Of peace on earth, good will to men.

It doesn't compute. It doesn't make sense. Reality intrudes and we reject the pretty words, melodies, ideas.

And in despair I bow'd my head;
"There is no peace on earth," I said,
"For hate is strong, and mocks the song
Of peace on earth, good will to men."

But if we are lucky, if we have just the teeniest little opening, we may find that hope manages to squeeze in there. Hope that we'll survive. Hope that there is a greater meaning. Hope that the world will get better.

Then pealed the bells more loud and deep:
“God is not dead, nor doth He sleep;
The wrong shall fail, the right prevail
With peace on earth, good will to men.”

There's many versions of this song, but I think my favorite is that of Johnny Cash. His voice, gravelly, a little flat in places, seems more attune to the story than other versions. Now if I could just find a naked version that strips "the Nashville sound" out of the background. A pox on Chet Atkins.

Great Holiday Songs You May Not Know - Day 4

2010-12-04T10:00:00.002-06:00

Today is Mama Lizard Eater's 80th birthday. Don't let her know I told you -- a lady is supposed to only get press on her birth, marriage, and death, you know.

Her favorite Christmas song is O Holy Night, which I kinda assume you've heard. But this is one of the other top contenders. Being the wife and mother of a bunch of Christmas-grinches kinda wore down her enthusiasm over the years, but a few days before Christmas -- especially if family was coming in -- she'd play this and even sing along with it. And Mama doesn't sing. But she couldn't resist and when she thought no one was around, her voice would peal out, "Cantcha hear them bells, ringin', ringin', joy, joy, hear them singin' ..."

Every time I hear this song, I hear her voice on that chorus. I hope I always do.

Holiday Music Bonus

2010-12-03T10:56:00.000-06:00

Before you start your weekend ...

Lots of indie holiday music -- FREE. I've downloaded all three albums and can confirm there's some good stuff here. A few faves:

THe BAcksliders - "That's How We Do Christmas"

Here Comes Everybody - "Snow" (Nice kind of Elvis-Costello -y vibe.)

Master Slash Slave- "All I Want For Christmas" (How can you not like a song that says "All I want for Christmas is to get the band back together ...?)

Jessie Torrisi - "Christmas Don't Be Late" (for we Gen-Xers who grew up on that know-it-all mouse in "Twas the Night Before Christmas." Don't you just know he's a UU?)

Piney Gir - "Snow Snow, Beautiful Snow"

Other good stuff, too. There's a couple of dogs, but for the most part, good originals and covers.

Great Holiday Songs You May Not Know - Day 3

2010-12-03T10:05:00.001-06:00

Sometimes, you just need FUN. If you don't have a bit of just silly fun mixed in your holidays, I humbly contend that you're missing a crucial ingredient. Like salt.

And it's a Gen X thing. For a generation of us, it's just not the holidays til we hear this. Memories of parachute pants, skinny headbands, giant earrings, and gargantuan shoulder pads. Ahh. Good times.

Christmas Wrapping
The Waitresses

Great Holiday Songs You May Not Know - Day 2

2010-12-02T10:00:00.002-06:00

I love Christmas. I love the idea of transformation. Scrooge, George Bailey, Grinch -- they ring true in my heart. Hope triumphing over cynicism.

That's why one of my favorite Christmas songs is a little known one -- Christmas, by Blues Traveler. It's honest and it's real, and I can see it laid out and performed as a one-song opera. Do you ever do that? Do you ever hear a song and you can just see it performed, stage musical style?

If I had a church of my own and a corral of talented, willing folks, here's what I'd do:

Characters:
Singer 1: cynical, disillusioned
Singer 2: the teacher
Choir

Christmas
Blues Traveler
Words by J. Popper Music by T. Anastasio and J. Popper

Singer 1:
Comes the time for Christmas
And I really have to ask
If this is feeling merry
How much longer must it last

I wish a one horse open sleigh
Would come carry me away
But I've been waiting here all day
And one just hasn't come my way

Now excuse me if I'm not being reverent
But I was hoping for a miracle to hold me, wash me
Save me from my righteous doubt as I watch helpless
And everybody sings

Choir (with joy):
If it's Chanukah or Kwanza
Solstice, harvest or December twenty-fifth
Peace on earth to everyone
And abundance to everyone you're with
Laha da da da da da
Da da da da da da da da da da da
La da da da da da da da
La da da da da da da da da
Laha da da da da
Laha da da da da

Singer 2 detaches herself from choir and crosses to Singer 1, singing:

Comes the time for Christmas
And as you raise your Yuletide flask
There's like this feeling that you carry
As if from every Christmas past

It's as if each year it grows
It's like you feel it in your toes
And on and on your carol goes
Harvesting love among your woes

Singer 1, singing to Singer 2:
I want to buy into the benevolent
And I was hoping for a miracle to hold me, wash me
Make me know what it's about
As the longing in me makes me want to sing

Singer 2 and Choir:
Noel or Navidad
Season celebration or just the end of the year
Christmas can mean anything
And I mean to keep its hope forever near
Laha da da da da da
Da da da da da da da da da da da
La da da da da da da da da
La da da da da da da da da da
Laha da da da da
Laha da da da da

Singer 1:
As if a cold and frozen soul is warm to love
By love's own hand

Singer 2:
So goes the prayer if for a day peace on earth
And good will to man

Singer 1:
At twenty below the winter storm it billows

Singer 2:
But the fire is so warm inside
And the children while nestled in their pillows
Dream of St. Nicholas's ride

And how the next day they'll get up and they will play
In the still falling Christmas snow
And together we'll celebrate forever

Singer 1, interrupting:
In defiance of the winds that blow

My god in heaven now I feel like I'm seven
And spirit calls to me as well
As if Christmas had made the winter warmer
Made a paradise from what was hell

Both Singers:
As if a cold and frozen soul is warm to love
By love's own hand

Choir Crosses to Singers, singing with them:
So goes the prayer if for a day peace on earth
And good will to man.......

(Rounds of the song, sung over each other by all)

Singer 1, (all by himself, smiling)
I wish a one horse open sleigh would come carry me away
And I'll keep waiting through next May
Until Christmas comes my way

Great Holiday Songs You May Not Know - Day 1

2010-12-01T10:00:00.002-06:00

Latke Clan - the Lee Vees

It's funny but not mocking, it manages to pull together the homey feeling without having that manufactured sound. It's sweet.

Thanksgiving and The Real

2010-11-18T10:31:00.000-06:00

Little Wren gets it.

When a Christmas commercial comes on the TV, she begins yelling urgently, "Change it, change it, change it!" Then she puts her hands on her hips, all righteous indignation, and demands of the TV, "What about Thanksgiving??? Let us have Thanksgiving!"

Yeah!

I love Thanksgiving. It's just so much more real than Christmas, you know? It's forgetting the rolls, and fretting about the frozen turkey, and balancing the holiness of pausing with family and friends to express gratitude and celebrate abundance ... with The Big Football game.

Well, that's how I grew up.

You can see this mix of reality and nostalgia in some Christmas songs, some Christmas movies ... but it's part and parcel of every Thanksgiving movie. "Home for the Holidays," "Pieces of April," and the ultimate Thanksgiving show, A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving.

There's no magical handwaving that results in a puny tree being transformed to a lush one here. Instead, it's someone who doesn't know how to cook making a feast of toast, pretzels, popcorn, jelly beans, and ice cream sundaes, and serving it on a ping-pong table for a bunch of ingrates who weren't invited in the first place.

Thanksgiving is about all our great intentions. That sometimes go terribly wrong.

Thanksgiving isn't about miracles. Thanksgiving is about the real. And being thankful for it, in all it's broken messy glory. And loving each other, in all our broken messy glory.

Mr. Larson: Dear Lord, we realize that lately everything’s changing too fast. And all sorts of things are always the same — even things we hated, like shoveling the turkey and stuffing the snow and going through the same crap year in and year out ...

Mrs. Larson: The food is getting cold.

Mr. Larson: As I was saying, dear Lord, before my wife interrupted me. Give me those old-fashioned pain-in-the-ass traditions like Thanksgiving, which really mean something to us, even though goddamit, we couldn’t tell you what it is ...

What is a Unitarian Universalist?

2010-11-15T09:16:00.002-06:00

Edit: This post is in response to the UU Salon's November Question: What is a Unitarian Universalist?

Boy, this is something I've given a lot of thought to, gone back and forth on.

To recognize anyone who self-identifies as a UU, as a UU, is too broad for me.
To refuse to recognize anyone who is not currently a member of a UU congregation, as a UU, is too restrictive for me.

To explain:

The Potential UU

I met someone recently who self-identified as a Unitarian Universalist. How exciting! We got to talking, and although I found her a fabulous person, who has the potential for being a UU, I would not describe her as being one currently. Why?
* she had never joined a UU church
* she had only visited a UU church once; found that congregation disorganized, and never visited another
* she had never read anything substantive about Unitarian Universalism
* knew nothing of our history or theology

All that she knew was that we were not Christian and had freedom of belief. She also likes New Thought, Unity, etc. I suggested she take that beliefnet test, not because it's a significant arbiter of religious belief, but just as a starting point. Her top was UUism, followed by some of the usual suspects.

So, I believe she has great potential to be a Unitarian Universalist. However, I do not believe she is a Unitarian Universalist.

And on the other side: Unitarian Universalist as Identity

I was born into this religion. Its values are so deeply ingrained in me, they are a part of my identity. Isn't that something we want with our children? Not to raise them in a way that Unitarian Universalism is not merely a choice of churches in the area, but something that becomes part of their DNA, that affects how they see the world, a way of being? Progressive, missional Christianity struggles with this; I think we should, too. What is Unitarian Universalism itself? Is it a system of beliefs/non-beliefs, the club we belong to at the moment, a history, or a way of life?

For my children, for myself, I want it to be a way of life. The Way of Unitarian Universalism.

Then, too, there is this:

Ordination vs. Membership

At some point in the foreseeable future, I hope to be fellowshipped, then ordained a Unitarian Universalist minister. Once I am, unless de-fellowshipped, I am forever an ordained Unitarian Universalist minister. Even if I do not have a church, I will be recognized as a UU minister, by other churches, by my colleagues, by our association.

So how can we say that once a UU minister, always a UU minister, but once a Unitarian Universalist ... "well, only so long as you maintain membership in a UU church." ?

Now, balancing back the other way ... there sure is a lot more involved in becoming that UU minister. An M. Div. degree, CPE, internship, numerous gatekeeping functions throughout the fellowshipping process and you're still not an ordained UU minister until a congregation makes you one.

Contrast that with: come forward in a service (perhaps you didn't even have to attend a new member class), sign your name in a book, hear some pretty words (but you probably don't have to state any words of commitment), receive a carnation. Back to your seat, now. You're a member of our congregation and hence, a Unitarian Universalist.

So, do we just leave it like that? Easy in, easy out? No real commitment required from you to become a UU, but your identity as such is just as ephemeral?

I do not attempt to answer here what a Unitarian Universalist is. I will answer what I would like a UU to be. For this, I've thought about other religions -- to be recognized a Catholic, you've gone through rigorous religious education, baptism. To be recognized a conservative Jew, you've gone through rigorous religious education, a test that you must pass, a ritual bath, a ritual circumcision or symbolic blood-letting.

I'm not proposing we embrace the latter.

What I would like to see --

A Unitarian Universalist has:

* Taken classes in Unitarian Universalism: history, theology, polity
* Been encouraged to journal/pray/meditate/study how this fits with their personal journey
* Taken classes that specifically deal with their local church: its history, mission, what will be expected of them, and what they should expect in return.
* Had a one-on-one conversation with the church minister or the membership person (who takes their position seriously) about why they want to join the church, why they want to be a Unitarian Universalist, and how they will live under the church's covenant.
* Joined a Unitarian Universalist church -- both receiving and giving words of covenant and commitment.

Just as when a church ordains me, that ordination will be recognized by other churches, even after I leave the ordaining church, so should the identity of one as a Unitarian Universalist be honored even if one leaves their "conversion" church.

(They still fall under the rules governing membership in joining a different UU church -- still need to learn about that church, its covenant, have the conversation, and go through a joining ritual -- but their identity as a Unitarian Universalist remains in effect until they say, "Nay.")

Good news

2010-11-01T22:33:00.000-05:00

Little Warrior had scans today. Big scans. 2 year scans.

And we got those three letters we hold so dear. N.E.D. No Evidence of Disease.

On one hand, this is not a huge deal. It gives no promise against relapse. But on the other hand, it's a pretty big deal. 2 years off-treatment is a milestone. She doesn't have to go back for 6 months. Since she was 7 months old and first diagnosed, this will be the longest stretch she has ever gone without seeing her oncologist, with two months to spare.

Back when she was an infant and we had never heard of Wilms' Tumor, I referred to her on this blog as The Wren.

LW: Little Wren. I think we'll transition to that, now.

"Nice haircut"

2010-10-29T11:28:00.000-05:00

Even cock-eyed optimists get hit with reality some days.

Over on the chip aisle, I passed a couple of store employees loading tortilla chips on the shelf. "Nice haircut," one muttered snidely* under his breath.

Now, my children could have told him that not only do I have excellent hearing, but when it comes to snide remarks muttered under one's breath, my bionic bat sonar ear clicks on.

I didn't turn back, I just said clearly, "I shaved it for charity."

Immediate backpedaling. "Oh, I, uh, think it's really a great look." I turned back (because I needed tortilla chips) and he gave me an ingratiating smile. My glance went over him and I perused the chips, expressionless. "I can help you with anything you need," he said weakly.

I went back to my shopping.

What sort of meaning do I draw from this, I wondered. Well, on one hand, maybe I'll make him think twice before muttering in public again. Hey, I can take it, it's no hair off my ... elbow. If it means that when he runs into a cancer survivor whose hair is growing in, he holds his tongue, or better yet, smiles at her ... terrific.

All in all, though, I would handle it differently next time. Let's not be disingenuous. My hair has grown out enough that, as a friend of mine remarked, it looks like a choice now. Out here in the burbs, a buzz-cut woman in jeans and a tshirt is probably seen as lesbian. So my explaining that I shaved my head for charity put me in the "acceptable" box. Straight woman do-gooder. Wrong message.

Next time? Well, if it happens again, I'll turn around and turn on that big megawatt smile that all we Southern women are endowed with and just sweet as sugar, I'll say, "Really? Do you like it? You think it's a good look?"

And when he stammers out "Yes," I'll say, "Aww, bless your heart.** Thank yew."

--
*It was snide. And no, I wasn't walking around with a chip on my shoulder. Between all the kindness and love from my seminary, church, and friends, I'm walking around thinking I'm the bees-knees. This startled me.

**Which all Southern women, lesbian, straight, bi, and questioning, know to mean, "Screw you and the horse you rode in on." What can I say. I'm a work in progress.

Universal Love

2010-10-27T16:16:00.000-05:00

First, I have to explain that I feel loved by God. Profoundly.

For me, God is a process, yet one that I can connect with personally, in the same way oxygen is available for all, but I can draw it in to my own body, have it become part of me. God is a process, and I am part of that process, and I can draw God in, and feel the love of the universe. I personalize God, some could say anthropomorphize God, but that's the best way my puny brain can make sense of this deep, powerful, sense of love that I feel.

Last week, my Spirituality professor schooled me on Universalism. Not that that was her intention.

"What would it be like," she posed the question, "To fully realize that everyone around you is deeply loved by God? How would you treat them?"

And, my friends, as the evangelicals say, I was convicted.

As I said, I feel powerfully, overwhelmingly, loved by God. To look at someone else, maybe someone who I find kinda annoying, who I treat coolly, and realize that he also is loved that overwhelmingly by God ... and I'm going to be politely cool to him? For no good reason?

I realize that others don't necessarily believe in this love from God -- heck, I got it right here at home. The Husband, who tends toward deism, says frankly that he doesn't think God gives a rats-ass about him. And that's okay. Ultimately, it's just a feeling, and if I translate it into a personal belief, it is one I hold very loosely.

But I hope that everyone has some experience of this kind of love, however they make meaning of it. From other people, from the agape love of humanity as a whole.

I think this is a beautiful song, and a beautiful video. To me, it speaks of Universalism. The Universalism that says You Are Loved.

And there's nothing you can do about it.

You Are Loved (Don't Give Up)

Don't give up
It's just the hurt that you hide
When you're lost inside
I...I will be there to find you

Don't give up
Because you want to burn bright
If darkness blinds you
I...I will shine to guide you

Everybody wants to be understood
Well I can hear you
Everybody wants to be loved
Don't give up
Because you are loved

You are loved
Don't give up
It's just the weight of the world
Don't give up
Every one needs to be heard
You are loved

The Love Experiment

2010-10-26T09:03:00.000-05:00

So if we acknowledge that love is a privilege, but a privilege that we have the power to extend to others, where do we start? What do we do?

This year, I did an experiment.

I didn't mean it so much as an experiment. I had a sermon where I talked about Forrest Church and why he ended his sermons with "Amen. I love you. And may God bless us all."

According to Rev. Galen Guengerich:

“... when I say, “I love you” from the pulpit,” (Forrest) said, “something connects—I get connected to the congregation and they get connected to each other. It’s almost like, for a moment at least, we all part of each other—of something larger than ourselves. It’s the human form of love divine, as Blake put it.” “And besides,” he added, “someone once told me that I’m the only person in her life who ever says “I love you.” She comes to church to hear someone say that she matters.”

That last part kills me. Every time I read it. Each time we walk into church, we must realize that there is someone who is there because they need to hear that they matter.

I knew what I wanted to do when I got to that part of my sermon. I'd heard Rudy Rasmus do it in a sermon, and it fit. It felt, to me, necessary. A way of taking a sermon concept and immediately putting it into practice.

Did I dare?

I was going to ask the congregation to do something. Something uncomfortable. In our independence, in our belief that each person is responsible for their own beliefs and actions, this could be seen as blasphemy.

To make the stakes even higher, the first time I did this, I was preaching at a Fellowship famous for their no-nonsense approach to life and worship. "Give us the intellectual sermons and save that
belly-button-gazing touchy-feely stuff for someone else." A fellowship where one member literally walks out of the service as soon as he hears the word, "I," because he doesn't think first-person should be used in a sermon.

"She comes to church to hear someone say that she matters," I repeated. I took a deep breath then said:

"Turn to someone right now and say 'I love you and there's nothing you can do about it!'"

There was an intake of breath. There was a half a second of silence that stretched on for about an hour, it seemed to me. All the nightmares I'd envisioned ran through my head -- people walking out, sitting stone-faced, throwing tomatoes ...

Half a second of silence. And then ... total BEDLAM.

People said it, left and right. Little old ladies hugged each other. A tall gentleman crossed the aisle to say it to another. Men said it to men. Men and women turned front and back, saying it to those in front, in back, to the side, patting each other's arms ...

Three times I tried to start my sermon again. But love had been let loose and it needed its time, first.

Since then, I have done that Love Experiment at four other churches. So, five churches total. Intellectual churches, family churches, dignified, casual. The result is always the same. Oh, I'm sure there's an occasional person who could do without it, but for that experiment, I get the best seat in the house. I'm up in the pulpit and there, I'm the audience. And I have seen some amazing, beautiful expressions of agape and friendship. Things that are in my heart, still. The young woman walking over to the frail man in the wheelchair, kneeling next to him, taking his hand in hers, looking straight into his eyes and telling him she loves him. And there's nothing he can do about it. And the light in his eyes as he slowly, tentatively, pats her hand.

A few months after I'd given the sermon at one of my favorite little churches, I was at an area UU workshop. There was a woman sitting across a large table from me, peering at me intently. Suddenly, she burst out, "I love you and there's nothing you can do about it!!!"

Okay, that was a Truly Great Moment in my life.

My friend, Good Ole Boy, was sitting next to me. He'd never heard that sermon. He looked at her a little curiously, then said, "Wow, that is just wonderful. We need to all be more willing to say that." She and I grinned at each other.

Our Unitarian side emphasizes free will. Our Universalist side emphasizes divine, unlimited, extravagant love. Balance is important, but if I have to err on one side, I'll take the latter. Because I've seen what happens when you give people permission to say, "I love you."

But preachers, be prepared. It'll be a few minutes before you can start talking again. And you may be a little choked up by what you witness.

The Greatest Privilege

2010-10-25T07:32:00.001-05:00

I think that we don't talk about what may be the greatest Privilege.

We talk about male, white, heterosexual, American, affluent, middle-class .... but I think those are usurped by something even more basic. By a Privilege not everyone gets.

Love.

This is a profound, profound privilege. Pick up any book on human development -- love affects who we become. One of the understandings about this is called "mirroring." Baby cries because she's hungry. Mom picks her up and feeds her. Baby cries because he's wet. Daddy picks him up and changes his diaper. We cuddle babies. We talk to them in high pitched voices that their ears can better hear. They are programmed to be loved, and we are programmed to love them.

And sometimes that doesn't happen. Most theorists -- Piaget, Erikson, and the gang -- say that when that doesn't happen, when children miss out on learning things like "trust," they can never go back and relearn it.

There can be what computer geeks like The Husband call "Work-arounds." That means that the best solution doesn't happen, so you make a work-around. It can get the job done, but it's not as easy as having it right to begin with.

I have had much Privilege in my life, from the color of my skin, to the education that was simply expected of me. But Love, I believe, was by far the biggest and most powerful.

I have never known a time in my life when I wasn't loved. Wow.

I mean, certainly there were times when I didn't feel loved. Start with my teenage years. And I'm certainly not above having my "I'm gonna eat worms" days now.

But in my life, there has never been a time when I was not loved. I have had parents, relatives, family friends, siblings, friends of my own, the gift of a Life Mate, who have loved me beyond anything I deserved. My cup runneth over, onto the floor, and out the door.

Not everyone gets that.

And this is one of the things where I believe we can make a profound difference, as a church, and as a religion. No, we cannot go back to when a person was a baby, but we can help strengthen that "work around." We can teach people what love really is. We can love them. Profoundly. Extravagantly. Wastefully.

With our children, we can do this. Drop to your knees, this Sunday, so that you are face to face with a 4 year old. Call him by his name. That's one way to love, too. Calling children by their names values them. Ask about the picture he drew.

And do the same for the adults. Look her in the eye. Call her by name. Touch her shoulder and say, "I'm so glad to see you today." Listen to her speak.

When we love others, we are teaching them something about themselves. Something you cannot learn in a vacuum. When we love others, whether they are 6 months old or 60, we teach them that They Are Lovable.

What a message of liberation, of empowerment.

We are strengthening their souls.

REVIVAL!

2010-10-21T22:33:00.000-05:00

No, I'm not going to become one of those blogs that does nothing but post videos. But great stuff is happening at Pathways. One night, they had the great Chuck Freeman, one of the great preachers we've got here in Texas that we're so proud of. This is another one of those "must see" videos.

Tip: If you've got a Roku, you are lucky! You can watch Vimeo videos like this one on your tv. There's other religious channels ... I'm pantingly eager for someone to set up a UU channel.

Pathways UU Revival - 10-20-2010 - Two Ditches and a Vision from Pathways Church on Vimeo.

Watch This. Now.

2010-10-19T16:50:00.000-05:00

I know you're busy. I know this is 34:21 long. It is worth it. This is Pastor David Owen O'Quill of Micah's Porch preaching about how we do church. Thank you to Rev. Tony Lorenzen of Pathways Church for making it available.

What is the reason for your church's existence?

Pathways Church - Sermon from 10-17-2010 - Standing For Grace from Pathways Church on Vimeo.

Candidate Lizard Eater

2010-10-15T17:31:00.000-05:00

Since so many of you have been on this journey with me, patting me on the back, (kicking me in the butt when I needed it, too) ...

I am in San Francisco where I had my meeting with the Regional Subcommittee on Candidacy.

Candidate status granted.

When I talked about my "support network," I was including you in that -- because it's true.

So thank you.

And now, it's a gorgeous day, so I'm off to go play in Golden Gate Park.

Praying Out Loud

2010-10-08T11:00:00.000-05:00

My children are all in school now. For the first time in 14 years, it is possible for me to be at home all by myself. So what am I doing?

Praying. Out loud.

As I've mentioned before, I attend an evangelical (not fundamentalist) seminary, where the majority of my fellow students are African-American and come from traditionally black churches, such as African Methodist Episcopal or National Baptist.

And man, can they pray.

In many of the southern evangelical traditions, this is something you do. You pray, out loud. Often. As the spirit moves you. We often begin and end our classes with prayer. The prayers are rarely perfunctory. Frequently long. Heartfelt.

These are not prayers carefully lined out ahead of time, words carefully chosen. No. These come from the heart and with enthusiasm. With confidence. With spirit. With, I dare say, soul.

And with sincerity.

There is a skill and a passion involved. I am occasionally called upon to give the prayer, and I wanted to feel more comfortable in amongst these Prayer Rock Stars.

So I have begun praying at home. Out loud. Not scripted out beforehand.

When we pray silently, we have the use of a mental backspace key. We go back and rephrase things in our mind. Praying out loud, there is no backspace key.

I have heard the joke/statement of fact that introverts need to think before they speak; extroverts need to speak to know what they think. Occasionally guilty, your honor.

Praying out loud, extemporaneously, I have discovered concerns and gratitude spilling from my mouth that I hadn't even been thinking about. After I said "Amen," I thought ... Oh. So that's what I was carrying around.

I felt the Spirit.

Hallelujah and Sympathy for Garrison Keillor

2010-10-07T10:55:00.006-05:00

Well, I didn't anticipate saying this.

I have sympathy for Garrison Keillor.

I was sitting in my Spirituality class and right now, we're all doing creative presentations. One student made a slide show of photos that are important to her, and in the background she played, "Hallelujah."

No, not Leonard Cohen's Hallelujah. An anemic mutant version, an unholy alliance. As the student said, "You may have heard this song before, because it's 'the song from Shrek.' But this is a version where a Christian singer rewrote it to make it more godly."

Tepid, bland, nothing substantive added, but much taken away.

My hands were clenched in fists of rage.
No angel born in hell
Could break that satan’s spell.

As the slideshow played pictures of beaches and mountains the student had visited, I sat there in the dark, seething, malevolent. "Blasphemy!" I cried internally. I railed inside, explaining why, and on how many levels this was so wrong, wrong, wrong. "Spiritual piracy and cultural elitism!" I ranted.

Oh.

So, given the sudden inconsistency in my beliefs about changing song lyrics, I grumpily cogitated.

I acknowledged that yes, we do take ownership of songs that are not ours.

And, we can feel murderous rage when someone alters "our" song.

And our changes can reduce a song rich in meaning to a puddle of corn mush.

And just who is the other person to think they can make the song "better" anyway?

You can split hairs -- not exactly the same thing, Silent Night had already been changed, it was old, it was public domain, yada yada.

For me, I had to decide -- if the new person has the legal right (and apparently the Christian singer did receive permission from Cohen) to change the song, is it morally/ethically/philosophically/artistically wrong to do so?

Too many questions. In any case, I decided that I had to come down on the side of the song being a living object, allowed to mutate. Sometimes, the mutation will be good. Lobster enchiladas. Sometimes it will be bad. The Grapple.

It is my choice to never ever ever buy or willingly listen to a chicken mcnugget version of Hallelujah. It is not my choice to say it shouldn't be made.

Sorry, Mr. Keillor. Hey, I have sympathy. I just went past my initial fury and sentimentality and, you know, thought about it. Examined my beliefs.

Because I'm a Unitarian Universalist. And that's what we do.

---
* However, if the songwriter does not give permission, that's a whole 'nuther ball of wax. Those of you still singing Go Now In Peace with "love" subbed in for "god" ... you don't have permission.

Parents, Take Your Gay Teen to Church

2010-10-02T17:54:00.000-05:00

What should you do with your gay teen? Take them to church. Wait now, I need to be a little more specific.

Take them to a Unitarian Universalist church. Or a United Church of Christ church. Or a Metropolitan Community church.

Take them to a church that uses words like “Acceptance.” “Affirming.” “Welcoming.”

Let them be around kids and adults who will love them for who they are. Who won’t think their homosexuality is “wrong.” Who will see them as a normal kid.

Because they are.

Right now, there’s a lot of videos out there of gay celebrities urging teens to hang on, because it gets better.

It will. But it can also get better right now. This Sunday.

Take your gay teen to church.

Because you are welcome here.

Evil

2010-10-02T08:53:00.001-05:00

Unitarianism, "in its 400-plus-year history, has claimed that humans begin in good shape with the prospect of getting better. We have been perennially soft on sin and evasive with evil." (from Freethinking Mystics With Hands, Tom Owen-Towle)

Sure, September is a busy month. Things to do.

But as my blog-lleauge the Rev. Earthbound Spirit, pointed out, there was a very light response to the UU Salon question, "What is the nature of evil?"

And here I am, the writer of the question, and it took me until October to answer the question.

This reluctance to engage the question isn't isolated to the blogosphere. When I took a class on systematic UU Theology, the week we wrestled with evil was the week when most everyone began their responses with, "This is a difficult topic for me."

Even with the fact that I have written about it before, in that class context, it's still not a topic I jump to. Writing about evil doesn't motivate me, doesn't fill my heart. And don't we shy away from it, because of the judgmental aspect? Who am I to say who/what is evil?

Do I believe in evil?

I do.

I don't believe that evil is a source. I believe it is a result. I'll use an analogy to cancer simply because I think it works well for explaining from whence it comes.

We don't always know the cause of cancer. We often can draw correlations, so we can make assumptions about the cause. He smoked 2 packs a day for 20 years. Her mother, grandmother, and aunt all had breast cancer. And some times we can't. It's idiopathic.

Sometimes, we can look at evil and see a correlation. She was mentally ill. He was abused as a child. She felt desperate. He thought God wanted him to.

And sometimes it's idiopathic. Was he just born that way?

Ah, but now, I have been talking about individuals. Group evil, systems evil, those exist on another level. And yet, the systems, the group, are made up of individuals. How do you look at a report on a design flaw and say, "It'll be cheaper to pay off the victims' families than to fix this"?

And evil is so very hard, because it doesn't arrive in a black coat, twirling a mustache. Sometimes, it is the child of ignorance. Fear. Seeing other humans as "the other."

This week, we saw evil.

The Summary of our Gay Teen Bodycount couldn't even keep up. It doesn't include Raymond Chase.

And it doesn't include all the teens quietly put to rest with no media coverage.

Were the children who bullied these other children "evil"? Where do we put the dividing line? The person who put the video up? The kid who threatened another? The child who looked away?

I don't believe these children and teens were evil. I do believe that they did evil. And it's real easy to do.

In a sermon, I talk about how we can be the "hands and feet of love." I believe in that passionately.

But as this week showed us, we -- normal, non-Hitler, people -- can do evil. We can be the hands and feet of hate. And it ain't even hard.

The Bald Woman's Penseive

2010-09-28T21:44:00.009-05:00

Random thoughts on it all

* I wondered if I would get emotional when my head was shaved. Not at all. I was the first to go and it was so hot, I couldn't wait to get that mop off. Plus, all eyes were on me, so my inner master-of-ceremonies took over, keeping a running commentary.

* Afterwards, someone handed me a mirror. My first thought was, "Oh! That's still my familiar face!" I think that I anticipated the change being so dramatic, I would no longer look like myself. Well, of course I looked exactly like myself, just with no hair.

* Every shavee had a reason to be there. Some of those reasons would break your heart.

* ...Like the cancer survivor who is currently on treatment, but who wasn't experiencing any hair loss. He was one of our firefighters. Weak from treatment, had to get out of the heat -- but still came to be a shavee and raise money for childhood cancer research.

* Way more people came out just to be there and support us than I imagined. They cheered, gave more money, took pictures, and told us we were heroes. What I neglected to say then, that I regret -- that they are heroes, too. Reaching in to your pocketbook can be just as much of a challenge to some as getting your head shaved is for others.

* UU ministers are insanely generous. And the IRS has the proof.

* Ditto some of you layfolks and seminarians.

* I have not experienced one single second of regret about shaving my head.

* You really do lose 90% of your body heat through your head ... unless it's sunny. Then your head becomes a solar panel.

* Counting all the checks and cash, the event raised over $14,000. I expect it to hit $15K by final tally. (Not too late to contribute.)

An interesting juxtaposition:

* An amazing amount of people who know me have taken the time to give me very sweet compliments.

* But in the grocery store, strangers won't meet your eye. They see the bald head then quickly look away. To think of a sister with cancer pulling up her energy to go to the store, then getting that ... I'm so sorry.

* Speaking of that ... I'm wearing a pin that says, "Ask me why I'm bald." No one has. (I'm not surprised.)

* Out on the trail around "my" pond, a fisherman smiled and held my gaze. Yep. That's how we are. Bald woman? Whatevv. But are they biting and what kind of bait are you using?

* The one thing I really didn't expect ... shavees coming up to me and emotionally thanking me for the chance to do this. They thanked me for the chance to shave their heads and nag their friends for money. That, friends, is pretty high on the "I'm not worthy" experience list. Beyond humbling.

Losing Hair, Gaining Much

2010-09-24T10:38:00.002-05:00

Supposedly Luther once wrote, "I have so much to do (today) that I should spend the first three hours in prayer." Well, I have so much to do today that I should spend ... well, a bit of time ... in blogging.

Tomorrow is our St. Baldrick's event. At this point, sitting down to be shaved sounds like bliss. At that point, everything will be underway, the work will be done. All done but the shaving and sweeping.

This has been quite the experience for me, and frankly, one that took more "bravery" than agreeing to shave my head. I organized this event.

The tests they make you take, if you're pursuing ministry, all show me to be an extravert, and most people who know me would probably agree with that assessment. Certainly The very introverted Husband would.

But being extraverted doesn't necessarily mean that one feels comfortable contacting strangers, asking for favors. Come those days, and I was a bunny wabbit in the headlights.

I've done it now. It's not huge, but we will surpass our goals. I asked, and got a bunch of firefighters and a venue and some people willing to shave their heads.

Actually, scratch that last part. Other than Father Mac and the firefighters, I didn't ask anyone to shave their heads.

And there's a pretty good lesson there.

People talk about leadership. If you're going into ministry, they want to know, "Will people follow you?"

No. I don't believe so.

I don't believe people follow a person. I believe people follow a mission, an idea, a goal. If they believe in the idea, and they trust the person, they will walk together toward that goal.

No one would shave their heads just because I was. No one.

But they believe in the cause. Many of them have heard a story. For some of them, they heard Little Warrior's story. And so they said, of their own volition, "I will shave my head." Each one of them has their own story, and their own reason to do this. They dared to think, "I can make a difference."

Every one of them is a hero.

---
I have gained so much in this. The next time, I will feel comfortable -- well, more comfortable -- going and asking for help. Because the world taught me that I can. I was not slapped down. I was not made to feel like a fool. The world -- you -- said, "Great idea." Here's a venue. Here's some money. Here's some publicity. Here's my head - shave away.

I have been "emboldened by faith."

Will I do this particular event again? Mmm, I don't know. I picked this time to stand for a cause dear to my heart, childhood cancer research, because it might be the last time I can. I do CPE next summer -- my hair will be grown out. Next, if all goes well, comes graduation, internship ... I have no wish for this to become my identity, "Cancer Mom." I am grateful to those who take up the mantle, and I will always carry my membership card in my wallet, but I don't believe it is my calling to always wear the tshirt.

I have another mission and another ministry. Very bluntly and with total humility to the task, I feel called to love the hell out of the world.

This was just one step.

On Hair

2010-09-18T12:40:00.000-05:00

One week from right-now-this-second, I will be bald.

It would be disingenuous to act like this hasn't affected me at all. Okay ... it would be a big fat whopping lie. I would love to be one of those cool-as-a-cucumber types, "Eh, it's just hair," giving no more thought to it, and instead focusing my brain energy on the best way to provide nutritional supplementation to starving children or how to build vertical gardens to save land.

But it's taken up a sizable beanbag in my brain, popping up every now and then to say, "You do know you won't be able to wear pigtails, if you got a yen." And then I remind myself that in the last 15 years of having long hair, I've never once had a yen to wear pigtails.

I have a seminary friend -- male -- who cut off his waist-length dreads last year. He did so because he felt he needed to look more conservative. Kind of funny, we agreed, that me doing the same thing will mean that I look more liberal.

Being a mom-in-tennis-shoes with long hair, usually clamped up in a bun, has given me a fair amount of anonymity. I'm a mom. I look like a mom. A conservative one, at that.

But now ...

SKINHEAD PUNK EVANGELICAL UNITARIAN UNIVERSALIST FOR PEACE!

It will be interesting seeing the reactions to a bald woman. Already, the reactions to my impending shave have been quite interesting. One woman from my church said she thinks I'm the bravest woman she's ever met. She said it with sincerity. And she was talking exclusively about me shaving my head.

Okay, so at that point, I do become the "It's just hair!" person. I mean, really. It's not like I'm removing something that won't regenerate. Bravest? No. Not even a little. I know people who are brave. Volunteer firefighters and people who do work in the inner city and my sister-in-law, who travels by herself into Mexico for her environmental work. And trains as a mountain guide in Ecuador. That's brave.

Hair? Not so much.

I'm a little scared, but not so much about not having hair. My life has so much going on right now, 4 kids, three schools, 1 seminary, traveling husband ... a little simplicity, even if it's just in the shower, sounds great.

I'm a little scared ... oh, I hate to admit this ...

I'm a little scared of what I don't know. My head. I have no idea what my head looks like -- do you, yours? I blame Shel Silverstein and reading Where the Sidewalk Ends at an impressionable age.

I thought that I had wavy hair
Until I shaved. Instead,
I find that I have straight hair
And a very wavy head.

So, a week from now, I'll know. Bumpy head, birthmarks, moles, all will be revealed.

Still taking donations, and thank you! DONATE TO ST. BALDRICKS

but the flesh is weak

2010-09-09T08:53:00.000-05:00

At my seminary, classes are done in complete blocks. So, rather than a 3 hour class meeting for one hour MWF, it meets for 3 hours, once a week.

I live about an hour away, depending on traffic, and have 4 kids in 3 different schools, so fitting these blocks around their comings and goings is a challenge. The Husband and I decided I'd have one monster day, plus one morning that fits into when they're in school. He makes it home by the time our Elementaries are getting out. Have I mentioned how great it is to have a supportive partner who has a somewhat flexible schedule?

Anyway, Wednesdays are a long day. I love the individual parts, but ...

I begin with a 4 hour class, that's broken up in the middle for Chapel, making for a 4 1/2 hour block. Christian Spirituality. Love, love, love the class, highly participatory, love the professor.

Lunch. Then History of Christianity, 3 hours. Really love the professor -- he's the one who first introduced me to missional ecclesiology. He's one of the reasons why the seminary I attend today is very different than the seminary I started with. (But still the same seminary.) He'll point out (in this evangelical school) that "Various heresies forced the early church to articulate the truth more precisely. Sometimes too precisely – they were articulating things they didn't have the biblical basis to make."

But it's a straight lecture class. Type, type, type, faster faster faster!

Then Research Methods, 3 hours. Team taught, and I'm geeky enough that I enjoy it. Love picking up new tips.

When doing a critical book review, make notes on your inside cover as you go along, with page numbers, e.g. "Unclear writing, pgs 24, 87, 123 ..." That way, when you're done reading the book, you should be able to write your entire paper in about two hours.

I am, I must admit, a bit loopy by that class. The iced Vietnamese coffee that I pack in a big mason jar probably doesn't help.

I get home about 8:30 pm. Now the point of all this is not to complain ... hells-bells, I feel darn lucky for all of it. But it has made me realize how much my physical situation affects my brain and spirit.

I get home ... I've loved all my classes. And yet ... I don't want to be a minister anymore. I don't want to be a wife or a mother anymore. I'm usually starving, but don't want to eat. Nothing is good, nothing is happy. I'm irrational. "What, I'm going to shave my head???" "My living room is a wreck and will never be clean again!" Little things are overwhelming. Overwhelmed, depressed, exhausted, but my mind is spinning and won't settle down.

Stressing may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the morning.

I wake up in the morning, even without a good night's sleep ... and it's all okay again. It's now happened three weeks in a row, enough that I can draw a correlation.

We are animals. Our physical state has great power over our minds and emotions. Hormonal changes, being tired, not eating right ... we are, effectively, not in our right minds.

As for me, I'm going to make a few changes. Limiting myself to one afternoon coffee. Making it a top priority to pack nutritious meals. Drinking lots of water.

And realizing that just as I don't take my 5 year old seriously when she's tired, I need to not take myself seriously, either. "Go to bed and sleep it off," I tell myself. "Things'll look better in the morning."

Because they probably will.

Saints and Poets and Friday Night Lights

2010-09-03T20:52:00.000-05:00

Emily: ... Do any human beings ever realize life while they live it -- every, every minute?
Stage Manager: No -- Saints and poets maybe -- they do some.

It is Friday night.

You'll have to excuse me if I am particularly pre-nostalgic over the life I'm living right now. It's just that it's the start of the school year, the fall, a little crazy, a little stressful, and utterly, utterly normal.

God, normal tastes delicious.

But as I was saying ... It is Friday night.

The Boy is across town, playing sax in the high school marching band at a football game.

The Husband came home from work and the girls and I piled into his car. Went to a local Tex-Mex hangout. Husband has said he'll go pick The Boy up (probably about 11 pm) when they get back from the game, so I was free to have a happy hour margarita. Whoo-hoo! It comes in a glass so heavy I'm afraid to pick it up and happily, tastes of fresh lime juice rather than the pickled taste of mixer. Thank you, Jesus, for good margaritas. And by Jesus, I mean the man behind the bar, Hay-zeus.

Chili con queso and chips and crispy beef tacos (with potato) and cheese enchiladas with chili gravy. And a short Mexican man with a keyboard, playing -- I do not lie -- The Macarena, followed by "You Sang to Me." LW gives her daddy Big Huge Eyes behind her glasses and cons him into going over and dancing with her. He's a sucker for all of his kids. His wife, too.

Friday night. The restaurant is crowded and it seems like there are high chairs at just about every table. The Princess and The Husband are teasing each other now, and for the millionth time, I threaten to separate them. "You're a bad influence on your father," I tell my eldest daughter. She smiles proudly.

She and Bo Peep have both cleaned their plates. I give them each a bite of my cheese enchiladas, off my fork. "Hope none of us are sick," I mutter to The Husband.

Well, if they get a bite, then LW wants a bite, even though she hasn't finished her own dinner. I sigh, and give her the last piece.

I'm certainly not a saint, and not much of a poet. And I disagree with Thornton Wilder. I think most of us realize life. Oh, okay, maybe not every, every minute. But a whole lot of the time.

Give us a good margarita, some gooey yellow cheese spilling across brown chili gravy, and those Friday night lights, and we realize how good we have it.

Welcoming Raised UUs

2010-08-31T09:00:00.004-05:00

The Rev. Christana Wille McKnight wrote a guest post on the uugrowth blog and presented a workshop on the subject at GA 2010. I wasn't there, but I saw the slideshow from the presentation. It included a recommendation that we "Educate clergy, membership professionals and lay leaders about appropriate methods of integrating and welcoming raised UUs as adult members."

YAY!

I vented recently on this subject and received some comments wanting to know more about being a raised UU. I've written before about all the great things about being reared UU, so, okay. Time to give a little of the other side.

First, a little bit about some of the negative that I've seen or heard about we "Cradle UUs" as adults. Let me preface this by saying that though this is irritating when it surfaces, it's thankfully not a widespread issue, certainly nothing that I would consider to be a prejudice. But it's popped up enough to prompt me to stand up and say, "Please do not continue."

What does it look like? It looks like the people on the UU discussion lists (and even in a UU seminary class!) who say that they just don't have as much respect for those born UU -- they didn't have to work as hard to get here.

It looks like the curricula and surveys that assume anyone taking them came from another religion.

It looks like a minister who begins a sermon at a UU function with, "Everyone who was raised UU, please raise your hand." Several of us do so. Minister scans room and then says, "Me neither."

Ha, ha. Yes, I get the joke. But the message is, "I don't see you. You are not one of us. You are not a significant part of this religion."

The sermon continues, talking about how brave one must be to find this religion. And I completely agree.

But.

What is also brave is the kindergartener who is continually told that they are going to hell by their classmates.

The middle schooler who continues to patiently try and explain their religion to their friends.

We are called a chosen faith. Here's the dill, pickles. Even if you are raised Unitarian Universalist, this is a chosen faith. Because we have been raised to go out into the world, explore it, explore our theological beliefs, and make a choice. With my generation, frankly, I think our parents went a little too far with that. "She can choose her religion when she grows up," was a statement heard far too often. Well, of course your child can choose a religion as an adult. Everyone can. But sometimes our religious education was a little too heavy on preparing us to make this choice and a little too light on Unitarian Universalism as a way of life.

I'm thrilled that our modern religious education is rectifying that error.

So you've been raised in this religion. I heard Gini Courter (raised UU) talk about how the one aspect of coming out as a lesbian that was no big deal was the "you're going to hell" part, because she'd already been hearing that one since kindergarten anyway!

In your own way, you've been fighting for religious freedom your whole life. Explaining it, to kids, teachers, scout leaders, who asked you "What the heck is that?" Trying to understand why Susie's mom won't let you come over anymore or the Smith family won't let you babysit. Watching your friends have bar mitzvah parties, receive special Confirmation gifts from grandpa, birthday money from godparents.

You're a young adult, and you go to a UU church ... but you were always in the basement with the youth group, so the service is unfamiliar to you.

You visit other churches as you were trained to do. Try different religions on for size.

You realize that being a Unitarian Universalist is not just a system of belief. Not just a covenant. It is part of your identity.

You come to church. And the religious authority in the front says, "Who was raised UU?" Excited, you raise your hand.

"Me neither," he says.

In my neighborhood

2010-08-30T09:21:00.001-05:00

Oh, who are the people in your neighborhood?
In your neighborhood?
In your neighborhood?
Say, who are the people in your neighborhood?
The people that you meet each day

We are very fortunate. We live in a neighborhood.

My son got on his bus this morning. High school is the first opportunity the kids have to ride a bus, though after one week, my son would scoff at the word "opportunity." Builds character, Son.

After that, I hopped on my bike, with bike trailer, and rode LW to school. It's just over half a mile away, plenty close enough to walk, but it's insanely hot right now. In a couple of weeks, I'll have them out pushing the pavement. Said Hello to Mr. G, the Crossing God, who asked about 'Peep. He's the grandpa to one of the girl's friends, and has been there on the corner for about three years. LW has been chatting with him during all that time. If he hadn't been on the corner that first day, I'm afraid she would have just refused to begin kindergarten.

We go in to the cafeteria and LW goes up to Miss Lindy, the cafeteria monitor, who is grandma to one of The Boy's friends. We see her at every band concert, and she comes to our Halloween party. This morning, when LW was nervous about going to school without Bo Peep, her sisters reminded her that Miss Lindy would be there. And that made it all okay.

Bo Peep is sick, so she stayed home. After I got back, it was time for The Princess to hop on her bike and go around the corner to the middle school. She'll wave at Mr. G as she goes past and he'll tell her to have a good day. He means it, too.

I call the elementary school to tell them that Peep is sick and won't be in. The lady at the desk, who lives two streets over, asks me to please tell Peep that she hopes she gets better soon. I hear the school nurse in the background, who, because she kept up with LW's progress, knows us all so well that when one of mine winds up in her office, she'll call and say, "She says she's sick, but she seems okay to me. Want me to just let her lie down for a few minutes?" or "She's got that dull look in her eyes, I think she really is sick."

And then there's the man around the corner who runs the ice cream shop where we'll be having our St. Baldrick's event, and who gives afterschool jobs to 24 high-schoolers, and the mechanic who we actually trust, and all the neighbors in my cul-de-sac who we rode out Hurricane Ike with.

It is a privilege to live somewhere like this. Where I know the people in my neighborhood.
--

Sacred Cow -- Karma

2010-08-24T09:27:00.001-05:00

We have sacred cows in Unitarian Universalism, and right now, I believe the one treated with the most reverence is the concept of "karma."

We have youth programs that revolve around karma, it is regularly dropped into sermons and casual conversations. From my experience, questioning people about their reverence for it is considered out of bounds. In fact, when I have discussed my own feelings about it -- not in response to someone else's tenderly-held belief, but just speaking from my own experience -- the reaction has often ranged from "you just don't get it" to outright hostility.

It's a sacred cow, folks.

Hey, I was quite fond of it, too ... until I discussed it with someone who actually is a practicing Hindu. And that made me confront the other side of the equation.

We're human. We want to make sense of things. We are all Job's friends, sitting around with him as he scrapes his sores with broken pottery, trying to figure out what he did to cause himself such misery.

Karma makes us feel good. Because it takes an ounce of natural consequences, and expands it into a full-blown philosophy that allows us to feel that we have control over the events of our lives.

Look, if I walk around being nice to people, the natural consequence is that I have greater odds of people being nice to me. That's not karma, it's predictable consequence.

Karma expands that into the metaphysical. You do good, good things will happen to you. You do bad, you will be punished by bad things.

Sound fine, right?

But if 1+1=2, we must be willing to accept that 2-1=1. You can't just accept the first equation.

So ... if bad things happen to you, it's because of something you did. Either in this life, or a previous.

Soum Bunnarith, 41, (is) a former salesman whose wife blinded him with acid five years ago in a rage of jealousy. “I ask myself, ‘Why me?’ ” he said. “But then I think maybe I did terrible things in a past life, and that thought helps me to accept this.”

I was at a multi-faith dialogue dinner, and we were discussing "why bad things happen." The example of a disabled, disfigured baby was brought up. The Hindu at the table explained that they believe that is karma, that the baby was a terrible person in a previous life and now is receiving the consequences.

It's his fault.

Now, obviously, as a mother of a baby diagnosed with cancer at 7 months, I can't pretend this isn't personal for me. But this is part of karma. We can't dismiss substitutionary atonement with disdain and then turn around and only see karma as sunshine and rainbows.

Do I think you need to just reject karma? No. I think that living as if there will be consequences for all your actions/inactions, whether it's through karma, the three-fold law, judgement day, etc, can produce positive results.

But go deep. Examine your belief. Educate yourself about how it is applied in reality. Look at not just the sunshine and rainbows, but also the acid burns and Down syndrome. Poverty. Abuse. Caste.

Examine the differences in understanding about karma. Buddhist karma is not that same as Hindu karma. And "American karma" is a whole other concept.

No sacred cows. Check the teeth. Sometimes they bite.

Kindergarten

2010-08-22T22:19:00.001-05:00

Tomorrow, Little Warrior starts kindergarten.

I am indulging in some weeping, and watching old videos, in the perhaps vain hope that I will not be a weepy pile of goo tomorrow. Or at least, not at the school.

When she had Cancer The First Chapter, diagnosed at 7 months old, the vision I held on to was very simple. There is a hall with a railing upstairs that overlooks our living room. In my imagination, I could see her, perhaps 2 years old, a barbie in each hand, trotting down that hall, following her older sisters. In real life, she was just a baby. Couldn't walk yet, and because of the expanding tumors, could no longer crawl. I held to that vision. Hoping for that.

I got that. I have looked up from my living room chair to see her, grin on face, skipping across. Some visions come true.

And now, 4 and a half years, and one more bout of cancer later, she is about to start kindergarten. Until July, when her scans came back NED, I could never just say, "She'll be starting kindergarten in the fall." It was always, "She'll be starting kindergarten in the fall ... we hope." Or "knock wood." Or "PLEASE."

My kid is a two-time cancer survivor. As many times as I've said that, you'd think that I'd be able to wrap my head around it. But I still can't.

The Husband has the same inability. We look at pictures of LW during treatment -- that bald, eyelash/eyebrow-less little girl -- and can't completely integrate her with the bouncy, occasionally bratty, 5 year old in front of us. "Whatever happened to that little bald child who used to live here?"

Conflicted is a good word, isn't it? Because events and people are so rarely all one thing or another. It makes sense that our feelings would follow suit.

Make no mistake, I am not at all conflicted about LW starting kindergarten. Hey, she's also my 4th of 4. This day has been a long one in coming. Nothing but good on that.

But looking back at the hard times, it's not all bad. Though the good about cancer doesn't even remotely outweigh the bad. And as much as many people would like for there to be a "greater good" reason for it, I don't believe that.

But the truth is, because we were in the hospital, just us, Little Warrior and I spent a lot of "quality time" together. One on one time, talking, reading books, playing, having tea. We would make a tent in her hospital room, where no one else was allowed. Just Mama and LW.

Tomorrow, she'll start kindergarten. That was, at one time, a dream too far-off, too wonderful, too scary to hope for. I did not envision it, because some part of me didn't believe it would happen. Even in June, I wouldn't fully let my heart embrace it.

Tomorrow, it happens. New shoes have been bought, pencils sharpened, clothes laid out.

Tomorrow, she starts kindergarten.

Monday Morning Update: Yup. I cried. Luckily, she is used to Mom crying. Didn't phase her. "Bye!"

I SO am not doing officiating at any of my kids' weddings. In fact, I even think I'll hire a stand-in for mother-of-the-bride/groom.

Did I mention that my oldest baby started high school today? And The Princess started middle school? The BFF-DRE is taking me out for coffee this morning. Or a margarita, she said. Whichever I need.

Join the Fun -- Virtually

2010-08-17T09:33:00.000-05:00

For Ogre and anyone else who might be interested in Shaving the Way to a Cure, from afar:

http://www.stbaldricks.org/about-us/faq/#virtual

And as I tell everyone (even Father Mac) -- Ye Gods, don't feel like you have to do this. I'm crazy, that doesn't mean you have to be, too. Make a donation and spread the word -- you're part of the team.

Shave My Head!

2010-08-16T09:47:00.009-05:00

I'm going bald.

Not slowly. What I mean is, on September 25, I am going to have my head shaved to raise money for the St. Baldrick's Foundation.

Volunteers shave their heads in solidarity with kids fighting cancer, and family and friends give generously - worldwide. The St. Baldrick's Foundation uses the donations to fund more in childhood cancer research grants than any organization except the United States Government.

I found a great place to host the event, a little ice cream shop around the corner with an awesome owner. Come to find out, this isn't his first time to be involved in saving lives. A few years ago, he did something far more dramatic -- he donated a kidney to a guy he knew. Angels are everywhere.

Several of my friends are shaving their heads, too. The Hysteric Cleric has two pots going at his church -- one for "shave" and one for "don't." (I might have to tip the scales into the "shave" category. Shhh, don't tell him.) Blowing my mind, several of my female friends are shaving their heads.

Are they crazy???

Being a female with long hair, I've gotten more than a few questions about why I'm willing to shave off my mane.

Well, three reasons. First, I look at Little Warrior, my little two-time survivor. This second treatment regimen she got, it's a new development, just from the past few years. And I can't help but think, you know, she might be here today because yesterday someone else was willing to shave their head.

And the second reason is completely self-serving. I'm not very brave -- I'm just not. And I'm self-conscious. But I'd like to be the kind of person who'd be willing to shave my head for charity. The quickest way I know to become that person ... is to shave my head. And really ... it's just hair.

And the third reason ... because I'm tired of crying as yet another child "earns their angel wings." We need more success stories.

So, there you go.

Father Mac is getting his head shaved, too. Good grief, he already has a buzz cut. In one week, he'll be back to normal. But he had to rib me some. He emailed me:

OK, let me get this gay, er straight. You want a gay man to cut all his hair off. You might as well ask me to cut off another part of my anatomy that I am extremely fond of. What would my stylist Jose do??????? Do you even realize how much I spend in hair products every month? Sure, go ahead and send me a picture of your daughter when she was having chemo-I know how you operate.

Well, heck. If you're going to throw down a challenge like that ... here's what I sent him:

Hey. He started it!

(He'll be there.)

There are a lot of reasons to donate and get your friends to donate:

* Like Peacebang, you share a horror of hennaed hair. (It's all coming off, baby!)
* You have a fetish for Demi Moore in GI Jane or Sigourney Weaver in Alien 3 or ... um, Jane Curtin in Coneheads.
* You know I'll be blogging about the adventures in being a bald woman without hair privilege.
* One blog sharing the blood and guts about childhood cancer is enough. Prevent "cancer-mom blogging" by preventing childhood cancer.
* Because childhood cancer is different than adult cancer. (Both suck, though.)
* Because you have a kid.
* Because you know a kid.
* Because you were a kid.

And kids shouldn't get cancer. All these years in cancer world, I haven't shaken that gut feeling. It never became acceptable. It never stopped seeming completely bizarre. Kids shouldn't get cancer. Period.

Oooh, now I'm going to have a great excuse to buy lots of hats.

CLICK HERE TO DONATE

(Just to be absolutely clear ... all donations go to the St. Baldrick's foundation, which gives grants for childhood cancer research. No monies go to Lizard Eater, Little Warrior, nor their real-life alter-egos.)

Blogger Survey Questions

2010-08-13T10:41:00.019-05:00

So the Blogger Survey questions are going around again, and I don't think I answered them the first time ...

Why do you blog? What goals do you have for your blog?

I have been blogging since 2004. My "why" has changed, and continues to change. I began blogging because I wanted to write about what seminary was like. I really got into blogging when my baby daughter was diagnosed with cancer and it was better to scream into the blogosphere than my backyard. Now I blog ... hmm, why do I blog now? Sanity. Both my own and my husband's, who would have to deal with me following him around the house verbally posting my thoughts to his ears otherwise.
Who is your intended audience?

Depends on the moment. Mostly, Unitarian Universalists. Sometimes, parents. Other times, cancer parents. A lot of time, the whole wide world. But they don't seem to be listening. Da noive.
Who owns your blog? Does it belong to you as individual or to your congregation or other organization?

Lizard Eater owns my blog.
How frequently do you post?

Way too much or not enough, depending on who you are. If I have 3 papers and a sermon due, probably about 10 times in one day.
What is the tone of your blog?

Indignant. Navel-gazing. Weepy. Excited. Naive. Snarky. Confused.
What steps do you take to make sure that your blog is a safe space, both for you and for other participants? Do you have a code of conduct?

I monitor comments. But my parents know where it is now, so I'm not sure I can maintain that it is a safe space. For me, anyway.
What kinds of boundaries do you observe around confidentiality?

I blog under a pseudonym. It is also the worst kept secret within Unitarian Universalism. And I'm okay with that.
How do you respond to comments and email from readers?

Sporadically at best.
What are the most challenging aspects of blogging in your experience?

Not to allow myself to begin writing "for" my audience. e.g. If I know that you, whom I know in real life, are reading, it will affect how I write. Hence, I maintain the facade of a pseudonym. It is purely to try and trick me. I'm quite gullible.
What are the most rewarding aspects of blogging in your experience?

a) Getting to know other people through their blogs
b) Getting to share my thoughts and my story -- knowing that if it bores my readers, that's okay, they don't have to pay attention
c) Meeting the people that I've gotten to know through blogging
d) Feeling that I'm not alone with my "crazy" thoughts about this crazy religion
e) Learning from others' journeys
f) Being in relationship with other bloggers.

You know, none of these things adequately express the most rewarding aspect. The most rewarding aspect is love, plain and simple. I've gone into hell and back and I have readers/friends who voluntarily walked with me. As Auspicious Jots once said, "Don't ever let them say you can't find true love through the internet." You can. I have.
What advice would you give to Unitarian Universalists who are new to blogging and want to get started?

First, read the uu blogs. Get on uupdates.net and follow the links for a few weeks. You'll see a myriad of ways it's done. Leave thoughtful responses on their blogs. Then start yours. Be authentic. Don't worry so much about the responses you'll get, worry about being true to you. If you start feeling the need to impress others, walk away from the computer.

Keep reading other blogs and commenting. A blog without relationship isn't a blog -- it's a public journal. The relationship is what transforms your writing, your blog, and (testify, Sister!) you.
How do you evaluate the success of your blog? What have been your most successful blog posts or series?

My blog is successful because I keep wanting to write it. Period. I mean, ultimately, I'm not blogging because I think I have some great insight that will change the world, you know? I'm blogging for me. Blogging still feeds me. Ergo, it's successful. My most successful blog posts are those that kept me from sitting in a corner, sucking my thumb and beating my head against the wall. Sometimes it's because of what I have written. Sometimes it's because of the comments people leave. "Salvation is not a solo act." (Thandeka)
What do you wish you had done differently in your blogging?

Never titled a post "How to kill your daddy." I get hits off that every week, which is deeply disturbing and makes me wonder if I should contact the police.
What other online tools do you use to promote your blog? (i.e. social networking sites, Twitter, social bookmarking tools, etc.)

None.
Do you use an Really Simple Syndication (RSS) feed? How many subscribers do you have?

Huh?
Do you track site traffic? How many unique visitors do you have per day (on average)?

Occasionally. And then I see how many people have found me through googling "how to kill your dad" and I go sit in a corner rocking back and forth with my thumb in my mouth.
Do you find Unitarian Universalist Association resources helpful to you as a blogger? What additional resources could we provide to Unitarian Universalist bloggers?

I like the stuff through UU World. They're good about tracking the conversations that go from blog to blog.
Please write any additional comments or suggestions.

Consider giving blogger a red dot to put on their name tags at UU events so we can identify each other.

Hey, that's not a bad idea.

Japanese Bowl

2010-08-12T11:42:00.001-05:00

MonkeyMind and Celestial Lands have shared their favorite Peter Mayer songs, the ones that have affected them deeply.

I love both songs -- Holy Now and God is a River. But my favorite is so personal, I can't hear it without tearing up. Had I heard him sing it with no warning, he would have been killing me softly with his song, telling my whole life with his words.

Of course, remembering how I first heard of it also makes my eyes wet.

The BFF-DRE was at a Peter Mayer concert. She called me, weeping.

The BFF-DRE doesn't weep. Oh, privately, sure. But she's made of sterner stuff, good midwest steel stock.

"He's singing your song," she sniffled. And then something about Japanese bowls and scars.

The song hadn't been released yet, but he was playing it, and explaining it, at this concert.

When his last album came out, I could hear it. And I weeped. For me, for everyone, because we all have our scars. We worry that these scars make us "less than." Not whole. Broken.

Readers of this blog know I have wrestled with how open I could be, in my non-blog life, about our time in cancer land. This song helped ease that struggle. I do not want my identity to be "cancer mom," but neither do I have to deny or whitewash the experience.

So now every old scar shows
From every time I broke
And anyone’s eyes can see
I’m not what I used to be

But in a collector’s mind
All of these jagged lines
Make me more beautiful
And worth a much higher price

I’m like one of those Japanese bowls
I was made long ago
I have some cracks you can see
See how they shine ... of gold.

Why I Live, or "The Time of My Life"

2010-08-10T23:49:00.001-05:00

Why do I live?

Last week, I was at a UU summer conference with a few hundred of my bestest friends. Gentle Giant, a member of my home church, proposed that we have an impromptu “Deep Listening” covenant group while there. We did, and it was wonderful. Want one every time, from now on. Such a smart guy.

Anyway, I was the de facto facilitator of the group, and charged with coming up with each day’s question. I unapologetically cribbed from my uusalon partner, Earthbound Spirit, and presented this month’s question – Why Do You Live?

For a while, the group answered in fairly predictable ways – for our kids, because existence is what we do, etc.

At some point, however, the conversation changed. We put it more in the context of the movie clip – life and death. If you were in that situation, where someone kept trying to kill you, would you live? Why?

We realized that right now, each of us in the group is in a position to simply live because living itself is so wonderful, so delicious. Of course we live.

We veered into more serious avenues, such as being in a Jewish concentration camp. One person admitted he would grab the electrified fence and not live. (This is why it’s good to be in a Deep Listening group. In a regular discussion group, I would have interrupted, “No, I don’t think you would.” Because I know him. But what hubris to say I know him better than he does himself.)

Why do I live?

I know what it is like to hurt so bad you would prefer death. I know that feeling.

Part of why I live is duty. Because of those in my life now, because of those who went before me, I believe I have a duty, a duty to make the most of my life, a responsibility because “much is expected.” Life has given me so many gifts, I owe it my life and labor. I owe it to both to those whom I love and those whom I’ve never met.

Another part is that I love to be surprised, and am continually reminded that each day unfolds more surprises. What will my life be like in a year? I can only guess.

At its most basic, though, I feel that by being alive, I have already won the lottery. Biologically, such a small chance that I, exactly the way I am, would be here.

As happens so often, my thoughts lapse into the poetry of others. I live because “I have promises to keep, And miles to go before I sleep.” (R. Frost)

I live because “some of it’s magic, some of it’s tragic, but I had a good life all the way.” (J. Buffett)

Because “even (if) it all went wrong, I’ll stand before the Lord of Song, with nothing on my tongue but Halleluia.” (L. Cohen)

And “For what it's worth it was worth all the while. It's something unpredictable, but in the end it's right. I hope you had the time of your life.” (B.J. Armstrong)

I live because I’ve had the time of my life.

And I keep having it.

Miracle Among Ruins

2010-08-09T21:54:00.001-05:00

A week ago, I visited one of the abandoned places of the empire, Turley, Oklahoma.

In the heart of Turley, literally and figuratively, is Unitarian Universalist minister, the Rev. Ron Robinson. ("Oh, don't mention me," he said when I told him I was going to blog about A Third Place. Sorry, Ron. It is impossible to write about Turley without writing about this humble visionary.)

Peoria Avenue is lined with abandoned businesses and trash-littered lots. And smack dab in the middle of that is A Third Place.

Some community centers, Ron explained, are set up very rigidly, with sign in sheets and other intimidating prerequisites. Not A Third Place. You walk in, and first find some information about the place, some pamplets and information sheets about community events. You are welcome here.

Move past the entry and you're in a big multipurpose room. The first thing you run into is the food pantry.

For quite a while, they ran it just on their own food donations. But a couple of months ago, they became an official USDA food distribution center.

Past that, you'll find an area to sign up for volunteer opportunities, and a computer lab that stays pretty busy.

If you arrive on a Sunday, as I did, you might also find a table with the remnants of Sunday's communal meal.

Over on the other side of the big room is a library. They people of Turley kept begging the county for a library. And the answer was no. Okay, said the people of A Third Place. They gathered book donations and set up one in their community center. As Ron says, "We decided 'we' could do it ourselves; a big change we have worked on and are slowly planting is the change from a scarcity 'they' model to the abundant 'we' model."

Close to the library are the two small rooms, equipped with modest but professional medical equipment and running water, that make up the clinic, staffed by medical professionals from the University of Oklahoma.

They do well-woman checkups and basic medical care. Unfortunately, much of the grant money for this program has dried up and they are down to only one visit per week.

All of these bits -- library, computer lab, food pantry, clinic -- ring the central common area. There, people read books, watch movies, converse, and worship.

There is another room to the side, with a small kitchen, restroom, and a play area for children.

The bulk of the room has two purposes: it is the clothing donation center and it is the meeting room.

Imagine, just for a moment, that there are no rooms in your church used only once a week. Imagine that every single room has at least two purposes. A meeting room lined with canned goods, an RE room with donated coats along one wall.

Wouldn't that be great?

When I walked into A Third Place, I was met with a surprise -- the face of Rabbi Shaman. Great minds and all that.

The tour of A Third Place was only the beginning. The Rev. Robinson led us on a tour of Turley, showing us what A Third Place has done in the community, and hopes to do. The elementary school where they've been serving lunches, the additional elementary school they will soon begin helping. Their community garden. The abandoned lots they are oh so close to getting, so they can build a community park and garden. (Just a little more help and they'll be there. Go here, watch the videos, and drop off a little money in the paypal plate, wouldja?)

We saw the heartbreak, too. The unlit paths through the brush where people walk to get their groceries. The trash, the boarded up homes.

And we saw hope. A small, neat home, with boarded up neighbors, a shiny new coat of paint on a picket fence. We saw pride returning.

I am very hopeful that we saw the future. It looks like a giant old church:

When the Rev. Ron Robinson was a little boy, he went by the name Ronnie and he attended this church with his Mama and Daddy and numerous relatives who all lived in a bustling community named Turley. Then people moved away. And this church was effectively abandoned. One of the ruins of the empire.

Now Ronnie is all grown up and he has a great vision. To gain this church for the community of Turley, to clean out all the mold and fix the rot. Not to restore it to its former incarnation but to make it something even better. As you stand out in the 106 degree heat and humidity of Turley in August, there seems to be a cool breeze as he explains how this part of the church will be a community center, and this part will be for communal meals, and over here we'll have worship, and over there, we'll ...

But wait. I have neglected to tell you the most exciting, the most unbelievable part of all of this.

This grand project, all the things they've done so far ... were done with 12 core people. They began with 5. No staff. And yet, every month, they average about 250 people benefitting and participating in their various programs.

This is the missional life. To not hide in our churches, seeing them as sanctuaries in the midst of an alien culture. But to go out into that culture, those ruins, and be missionaries. Feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, providing community, health, relationship.

I urge your church to become a partner church with A Third Place. Yes, they need our help.

But that's not why I urge you to partner with them. I urge you to partner with them because it will benefit your church. It will benefit you. I can see mission trips to Turley as so many other religions take mission trips across the globe.

It will help grow the soul of your church. It will change your life.

It has mine.

A Week in the Desert

2010-08-07T17:49:00.001-05:00

Three weeks away from home. One week in the mountains, one in the desert, and one in a sea of Unitarian Universalists.

The Husband was with us for the first week of this journey, then returned home to support this family in our 4 child, 1 seminary lifestyle. Can we get a quick round of applause for those partners who willingly accept the job of breadwinning?

This will probably the last opportunity we have for such a trek. Next summer, good Lord willin', I will be doing my CPE. Summer after that, the boy will be 16, and ready for a summer job. Our three weeks was four for him, as we put him on a plane the week previous, to spend a week alone with his grandparents. A gift to all of them.

After our trip to the mountains, we returned to my parents' home in the desert. The Husband and I got up early Sunday morning so he could get a good New Mexican breakfast in his tummy before hopping a plane home.

A few tears later (hey, we've never been apart for two whole weeks before), I returned home. Pops was in the kitchen, as he would be every morning of our week there, cutting up fresh fruit and flipping hotcakes for his grandchillen. He undershot on the hotcakes. He is used to cooking for two 80 year olds (79 1/2, Mama Lizard Eater would hasten to correct), whom I contend only eat on Tuesdays and Thursdays if left to their own devices.

He decided that next time, he needs to quadruple whatever he thinks he needs.

Each day of the week we were there began the same way -- Pops in the kitchen, and four children tumbling out of bed: "What do we get for breakfast today?" Dinner was Bubbe in the kitchen, fresh vegetables and tasty nutritious meals. My children began eyeing me with suspicion. I don't think they'll continue to believe that the president has called for all home kitchens to be closed this summer.

We had a fun, fairly relaxing week. Enjoying the cool dry air, reading, relaxing, talking politics, religion, family, life. The kids and I visited a wildlife refuge and did some touristy stuff in Old Town Albuquerque. And I got the supreme pleasure of lunch with one of my heroes, the Rev. iMinister, whom I've now known for ... wow, 4 years. She's been a friend, long-distance mentor, and endless source of inspiration. I unabashedly podcast-stalk her. (By the way, if you want to hear/read an excellent, nuanced, educated, sermon on this whole immigration thing, go here.) And it all began with blogging, when she reached out to a terrified cancer mama. Don't tell me what we do online isn't important. I will testify with passion for the opposition.

The week had its surprises, too. My parents have one cactus that only blooms one day, once a year. But what a blooming.

And one surprise, that for me, was not so pleasant. I opened the front door and nearly stepped on this:

Being a mature seminarian and mother of four, I exemplified Non-Anxious Presence. If, by non-anxious presence, you mean slamming the front door, screaming, and jumping up and down as if I'd been attacked.

(Try that the next time you're in a contentious congregational meeting.)

The children, Pops, and I went around the other direction to view Snakey in such a way that he didn't have the opportunity to enter the house. Yes, he looks like a rattlesnake, Pops explained, but you can tell that he's a helpful Bullsnake by the shape of his head and the point of his tail.

Yes, next time I will hold open the front door and calmly examine those two ends to ascertain snake-type.

Part of the reason Snakey was at the front door is because it's so dry this year, snakes are constantly trying to get inside. And part of the reason is because my mother leaves a bowl of water near the front door.

Okay, Mom. A tree frog I can kind of understand. But leaving water for the snakes? Really. It's time to get a dog.

Mama Lizard Eater, or "Bubbe." You may note a family resemblance.

The Last Day

2010-08-07T10:41:00.000-05:00

"You need to post about the last day," both Mama Lizard Eater and The Husband have told me.

God had a swag bag for me, some lovely parting gifts. But I'll get to those in moment.

I woke up early, knowing it was the last time, knowing I needed to get up and get moving. Brother and his wife were about to swing by, leaving earlier than we. But for a few moments, I just stretched, and lay there, giving thanks for what had been for several years, our temporary home in the mountains.

I told Brother and Bitty goodbye, then proceeded to tell My Place goodbye, feeling a bit like Emily from Our Town. Goodbye to the stone fireplace, and the giant wooden dining table. Goodbye to the porch swing and the hummingbirds. Goodbye to the special place by the river, underneath the cool dark trees, where the fairies danced.

Goodbye to the camp fire.

Goodbye to the deck over the river.

Goodbye to the cabin.

And goodbye to my river.

All packed up, we headed up up up the steep winding road for one last bit of fishing at the ponds. Suddenly, The Husband stopped. Another doe in the middle of the road. She leisurely ambled across then stood there, waiting. The Husband gently eased the car up. She examined us. She posed. She told me, "All shall be well, and all shall be well and all manner of thing shall be well."

And then she was gone.

Once again touched by grace, we drove on. Did a little fishing, and a lot of looking. Not looking. Gazing.

Mrs. Jemima Puddle Duck stopped by to say hello with a friend of hers.

They swam on, Bo Peep caught a fish to add to the pile, and it was time for us to swim on. Down, down the mountain.

... climbed a mountain and I turned around
and I saw my reflection in the snow covered hills
'til the landslide brought it down
oh, mirror in the sky, what is love?
Can the child within my heart rise above?
Can I sail thru the changin' ocean tides?
Can I handle the seasons of my life? I don't know.....

Oh, those Born-and-Raised Unitarian Universalists

2010-08-04T00:12:00.000-05:00

Lizard Eater is on vacay right now, but just wanted to put out a request into the universe:

Please stop the meme of "only people who chose Unitarian Universalism" (and weren't raised UU) are brave, smart individuals. Being dismissed because I was born into this religion makes me all stabby.

Thank you.