“I love ordinary time because that’s where I live.” This is a quote that is attributed to Matt Skinner, a Luther Seminary professor, on Working Preacher, and it echoes in my thoughts as I read and study. I think most of us live in “ordinary time”. So, how do we recognize the extraordinary in our everyday lives?
I found a starting place in another idea spoken by another professor at Luther. That is the idea that we are called to “concrete, fruitful ministry to a cross-section of people”. These are words that I scribbled on a sticky note and hung from my bookshelves more than a year ago after a conversation about vocation and discernment. For me, these words define full-time ordained ministry.
“Concrete” evokes images of plain, hard day to day work and a willingness to get my hands dirty. “A cross-section of people” demands some risk – to be in ministry with people who may not be like me, who are more representative of the world at large, whose stories reflect different ages, genders, ethnicities, socio-economic and religious backgrounds. “Fruitful” represents hope and the promises we find in Scripture, that lives lived following Jesus ‘bear good fruit’. It is in this kind of work that I think we uncover the extraordinary lives around us.
Searching for a way to practice "concrete, fruitful ministry to a cross-section of people", I discovered a day center for the homeless where I can volunteer a couple of hours a week. It’s open every day, year round, for five hours each morning. There, people can find showers, soap, shampoo, razors, washcloths and towels; laundry services; hot food and coffee; telephones; mailboxes; containers or lockers for valuables; over-the counter medicine and vitamins; secure storage for checks and prescription medications. Staff help clients address needs like obtaining identification and educate people about housing, employment and transportation resources. At night, staff reopen to distribute blankets and sleeping bags.
No one is invisible there. Everyone checks in and we learn their names and ages and where they slept last night. This morning the youngest I met was 22 and the oldest was 60-something and there were whites, blacks, Latinos, men and women. The temperatures were in the 50s last night, and most of the people had slept on the street. There, I discovered the extraordinary - extraordinary people facing extraordinary times with extraordinary courage and poise.
Saturday, September 4, 2010
Friday, July 16, 2010
Invisible People
Barbara Ehrenreich is a journalist who wrote about the lives of working class poor in Nickel and Dimed. More recently, she published a collection of satire exposing divisions and inequalities that Americans, particularly the working class poor, experience in the workplace, home ownership, healthcare and religion. Sharply critical of both red and blue, right and left, Republican and Democrat, her essays are biting assessments of modern American culture and society.
Sometimes, her assessments read more like rants and I wonder if she doesn’t stray into hyperbole some of the time. What kept me reading were the poignant stories she provided from everyday life:
• an unemployed man, three years too young to collect Social Security but vulnerable to age discrimination in hiring practices, who chose to commit a non-violent robbery so that he could find a bed and food in prison
• enlisted personnel in the Unites States Armed Services who were enrolled into food stamp programs at enlistment because their entry-level pay grade does not provide a living wage
• the uninsured patient whose routine procedure was billed at a cost nearly five times that of an insured patient, driving that uninsured person even further out of reach of financial stability, let alone security
While I appreciate satire’s role is to hold up human behavior for exposure, ridicule or scorn, I think it acts as a megaphone and, by itself, is an inadequate way to motivate anyone to take action and actually pursue or implement changes that will help us better meet the needs around us. How do we work with people who are experiencing poverty here in our neighborhoods and communities? How do we create opportunities or provide services that help span the gaps that exist, so people don’t have a reason to find incarceration more livable than freedom and others don’t die of treatable illnesses because going to a doctor costs too much? How do we make the plight of “invisible” people more visible, without sacrificing integrity?
Sometimes, her assessments read more like rants and I wonder if she doesn’t stray into hyperbole some of the time. What kept me reading were the poignant stories she provided from everyday life:
• an unemployed man, three years too young to collect Social Security but vulnerable to age discrimination in hiring practices, who chose to commit a non-violent robbery so that he could find a bed and food in prison
• enlisted personnel in the Unites States Armed Services who were enrolled into food stamp programs at enlistment because their entry-level pay grade does not provide a living wage
• the uninsured patient whose routine procedure was billed at a cost nearly five times that of an insured patient, driving that uninsured person even further out of reach of financial stability, let alone security
While I appreciate satire’s role is to hold up human behavior for exposure, ridicule or scorn, I think it acts as a megaphone and, by itself, is an inadequate way to motivate anyone to take action and actually pursue or implement changes that will help us better meet the needs around us. How do we work with people who are experiencing poverty here in our neighborhoods and communities? How do we create opportunities or provide services that help span the gaps that exist, so people don’t have a reason to find incarceration more livable than freedom and others don’t die of treatable illnesses because going to a doctor costs too much? How do we make the plight of “invisible” people more visible, without sacrificing integrity?
Tuesday, July 6, 2010
This Land is My Land, This Land is Your Land
While I resisted the allure of the local AAUW’s book sale last week, I succumbed when I received the list of books required for my daughters’ summer reading and my own fall coursework.
One of the books my oldest daughter is reading in Maya Angelou’s I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings. Ms. Angelou grew up in Arkansas in the 1930s and tells the story of growing up there amid blatant racism, discrimination and abuse. I am reading her book alongside my daughter.
Living in the south, with memories of being bused across Norfolk when schools were being desegregated in the 1970s, I am not naïve about our region’s history and I know it would be foolish to say that racism and segregation have been obliterated. Racial bias has become more subtle, but our communities are still segregated. What I admit I don’t yet understand is how that changes us.
This fall, I will be taking a seminary class titled “Dismantling Racism”. In our faith communities, it commonly is recognized that Sunday morning remains the most segregated day of the week in many parts of our country. Tied into the question of how we worship with one another, or don’t, is how we live and work with one another, or don’t, and the related issues of race, segregation, discrimination and immigration. While I don’t hear or see people mistreated the way the blacks were in Arkansas eighty years ago, I know people are hurting anew now, and I hope to understand how we can care more deeply about each other as God’s children.
The first assigned book I am reading is Searching for Whitopia – An Improbable Journey to the Heart of White America. The author, scholar and commentator Rich Benjamin recounts his experiences as he lived and worked in three “whitopias” - thriving communities “that have posted at least six percent population growth since 2000 [and] the majority of the growth …is from white migrants.” (Benjamin, 5) Sharing his experiences, Benjamin is careful to describe the people he encounters as three-dimensional characters. He presents stories that reflect people’s fear, hurt and anger and as the reader, you may agree or disagree, but there is no doubt that the people he meets are real living, breathing human beings, not three-eyed monsters that media headlines and soundbites create.
Benjamin’s observations echo my own: “The majority of whites in predominantly white communities across our heartland are endearing and kind….Direct interpersonal racism is no longer acceptable.” However, he tackles what goes unsaid in too many of our communities: “Discrimination and segregation do not require animus. They thrive even in the absence of prejudice or ill will. It’s common to have racism without “racists.” (emphasis mine, Benjamin 184-185)
And recognizing that actions can also contribute to deeper division, Benjamin is candid about the consequences of some of immigration policies and stances taken in the U.S. He acknowledges how numbers about population shifts have stoked fears. He writes about the vicious cycle that was set into motion when we stigmatized all Latino immigrants, both legal and illegal, though, reflecting that the indiscriminate writing off Latino youth led to indignation which in turn produced greater scorn by whites. Benjamin writes, “Whether or not our country treats these youth like its bastard stepchildren, someday they will become its full-blooded heirs.” (Benjamin, 83)
Dr. Benjamin’s statements ring in my ears, and I reflect on how his and Ms. Angelou’s words speak to our lives today. I wonder what it means for how we live together in creation, when we acknowledge that we are all God’s beloved children, and, celebrating the 4th of July and the freedom Americans have, what we mean when we sing, “This land is my land, this land is your land”.
One of the books my oldest daughter is reading in Maya Angelou’s I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings. Ms. Angelou grew up in Arkansas in the 1930s and tells the story of growing up there amid blatant racism, discrimination and abuse. I am reading her book alongside my daughter.
Living in the south, with memories of being bused across Norfolk when schools were being desegregated in the 1970s, I am not naïve about our region’s history and I know it would be foolish to say that racism and segregation have been obliterated. Racial bias has become more subtle, but our communities are still segregated. What I admit I don’t yet understand is how that changes us.
This fall, I will be taking a seminary class titled “Dismantling Racism”. In our faith communities, it commonly is recognized that Sunday morning remains the most segregated day of the week in many parts of our country. Tied into the question of how we worship with one another, or don’t, is how we live and work with one another, or don’t, and the related issues of race, segregation, discrimination and immigration. While I don’t hear or see people mistreated the way the blacks were in Arkansas eighty years ago, I know people are hurting anew now, and I hope to understand how we can care more deeply about each other as God’s children.
The first assigned book I am reading is Searching for Whitopia – An Improbable Journey to the Heart of White America. The author, scholar and commentator Rich Benjamin recounts his experiences as he lived and worked in three “whitopias” - thriving communities “that have posted at least six percent population growth since 2000 [and] the majority of the growth …is from white migrants.” (Benjamin, 5) Sharing his experiences, Benjamin is careful to describe the people he encounters as three-dimensional characters. He presents stories that reflect people’s fear, hurt and anger and as the reader, you may agree or disagree, but there is no doubt that the people he meets are real living, breathing human beings, not three-eyed monsters that media headlines and soundbites create.
Benjamin’s observations echo my own: “The majority of whites in predominantly white communities across our heartland are endearing and kind….Direct interpersonal racism is no longer acceptable.” However, he tackles what goes unsaid in too many of our communities: “Discrimination and segregation do not require animus. They thrive even in the absence of prejudice or ill will. It’s common to have racism without “racists.” (emphasis mine, Benjamin 184-185)
And recognizing that actions can also contribute to deeper division, Benjamin is candid about the consequences of some of immigration policies and stances taken in the U.S. He acknowledges how numbers about population shifts have stoked fears. He writes about the vicious cycle that was set into motion when we stigmatized all Latino immigrants, both legal and illegal, though, reflecting that the indiscriminate writing off Latino youth led to indignation which in turn produced greater scorn by whites. Benjamin writes, “Whether or not our country treats these youth like its bastard stepchildren, someday they will become its full-blooded heirs.” (Benjamin, 83)
Dr. Benjamin’s statements ring in my ears, and I reflect on how his and Ms. Angelou’s words speak to our lives today. I wonder what it means for how we live together in creation, when we acknowledge that we are all God’s beloved children, and, celebrating the 4th of July and the freedom Americans have, what we mean when we sing, “This land is my land, this land is your land”.
Friday, May 21, 2010
Summer Reading
For the first time in more than two years, I'm not enrolled in any coursework this summer. The respite is welcome and I hope it will be restorative. I have completed the first-third of seminary, clinical pastoral education and three semesters of fieldwork. During the summer, I want to read some theology unrelated to any particular course, but for May, I really am on a hiatus and enjoying reading far less provocative books.
To meet my fiber cravings, I read Jennifer Chiaverini's A Quilter's Holiday only to discover I've missed a few books in the series since Greek and Hebrew replaced novels on my bookshelves. I also read Maggie Sefton's Dropped Dead Stitch.
Avoiding tuning out academics entirely, I read Paganini's Ghost by Paul Adam. Like Iain Pears' treatment of art history in his mysteries, Adam threads classical music references through this novel.
The plan for the rest of the month includes reading more of both Chiaverini and Sefton as I continue to knit up a prayer shawl, finishing Dan Brown's Lost Symbol, reading Adam's Unholy Trinity and Hilary Mantel's Wolf Hall.
Delightfully, the other reading I'm indulging in is measures of tab as I recover some long-neglected old-time picking skills on my Morgan Monroe banjo.
For now, happiness is a dog-eared book and the twang of bluegrass.
To meet my fiber cravings, I read Jennifer Chiaverini's A Quilter's Holiday only to discover I've missed a few books in the series since Greek and Hebrew replaced novels on my bookshelves. I also read Maggie Sefton's Dropped Dead Stitch.
Avoiding tuning out academics entirely, I read Paganini's Ghost by Paul Adam. Like Iain Pears' treatment of art history in his mysteries, Adam threads classical music references through this novel.
The plan for the rest of the month includes reading more of both Chiaverini and Sefton as I continue to knit up a prayer shawl, finishing Dan Brown's Lost Symbol, reading Adam's Unholy Trinity and Hilary Mantel's Wolf Hall.
Delightfully, the other reading I'm indulging in is measures of tab as I recover some long-neglected old-time picking skills on my Morgan Monroe banjo.
For now, happiness is a dog-eared book and the twang of bluegrass.
Monday, January 18, 2010
Sound and Silence
In silence, there is fullness. In the retreat center, silence in the hallways was an extension of hospitality. In Buddhist monasteries, meals are shared in silence with the intention that you are fully attentive to the people with whom you are sharing the meal. In the Quaker tradition, there is freedom given to speak or not speak, but silence is room-giving, creating space for people to recognize the Holy Spirit.
In studying “church and music”, I recognize the irony of focusing on silence, the absence of music, but the practice of silence in worship intrigues me. Paul Westermeyer explains the analogy of Eastern liturgy (the form of public worship) being “seen as related to the regal court in which time is unhurried.” He writes in Te Deum,
In contrast, “Western liturgy can be seen as related to the legal court where time and juridical action are of the essence.” The West has a preoccupation with brevity that is not just a phenomenon of modernity.
Wrapped up in this reflection are more questions:
In studying “church and music”, I recognize the irony of focusing on silence, the absence of music, but the practice of silence in worship intrigues me. Paul Westermeyer explains the analogy of Eastern liturgy (the form of public worship) being “seen as related to the regal court in which time is unhurried.” He writes in Te Deum,
“One does not rush into the presence of the ruler of the universe….”
In contrast, “Western liturgy can be seen as related to the legal court where time and juridical action are of the essence.” The West has a preoccupation with brevity that is not just a phenomenon of modernity.
Wrapped up in this reflection are more questions:
- What are we losing when we fill our environment constantly with sound?
- What does being present with others mean if silence reflects attentiveness?
- How is silence welcoming?
- In worship, how do we balance the gift of silence with the Word and music?
Monday, January 11, 2010
Blessing of the Shawls
I spent the weekend in retreat with twenty others who knit and crochet prayer shawls. In retreat, not in workshops or seminars. Wisdom was shared but not in guided discussions of assigned topics. Instead, we gathered in the chapel of the retreat house to knit and pray together, we celebrated Holy Communion together, we ate together. But the rest of the time was spent in whatever ways feed your soul. For some, that meant gathering together to knit communally. For me, that meant sleep and time to be quiet, physically and mentally.
Coincidentally, while I was at the Franciscan retreat house, I discovered a legend about Saint Francis that I had not known. The legend says that in the barren mid-winter, Francis approached an almond tree and said, “Speak to me of God!” and the almond tree broke forth into bloom.
The only way to witness to God was in its aliveness.
The second image that I carried with me as I left the retreat was one of ‘meeting Jesus’. It is in the encounter that we are changed. It is in the encounter with other members of the body of Christ that we can enter into dialogue and learn; it is in the encounter with others whose needs we can meet that we can learn to be servants and to be served.
We closed the retreat with a blessing of the shawls and the needles, yarns and hands that would be used to make more shawls in the weeks and months to come.
To you, O Divine One, from whose hands
comes the work of creation, so artfully designed,
We pray that our work may be done in companionship with you.
May our work sing your praise as songbirds do.
May our work add to the light of your presence
because it is done with great love.
May our work speak like a prophet of old
of your dream of beauty and unity.
May our work be a shimmering mirror of your handiwork
in the excellence of its execution,
in the joy of doing it for others,
in our invitation to others to share in it
and in its bearing fruit for the world.
we come to you, our Beloved, with ready hands.
comes the work of creation, so artfully designed,
We pray that our work may be done in companionship with you.
May our work sing your praise as songbirds do.
May our work add to the light of your presence
because it is done with great love.
May our work speak like a prophet of old
of your dream of beauty and unity.
May our work be a shimmering mirror of your handiwork
in the excellence of its execution,
in the joy of doing it for others,
in our invitation to others to share in it
and in its bearing fruit for the world.
we come to you, our Beloved, with ready hands.
Friday, January 8, 2010
Priorities
For the next two weeks I'll be on campus at Luther Sem for the January 'intensive. Ten days, two classes, not a lot of sleep.
However, my last minute run for supplies wasn't for toothpaste or highlighters. I went to the store early this morning to pick up a few extra skeins of yarn. I know I can find toothpaste and office supplies in Minnesota.
It crossed my mind that this intensive, having been to campus twice now, my suitcase, or rather what's not in it, reveals a lot. Besides yarn and knitting needles:
However, my last minute run for supplies wasn't for toothpaste or highlighters. I went to the store early this morning to pick up a few extra skeins of yarn. I know I can find toothpaste and office supplies in Minnesota.
It crossed my mind that this intensive, having been to campus twice now, my suitcase, or rather what's not in it, reveals a lot. Besides yarn and knitting needles:
- No food. The dorm has a regular kitchen and the cafeteria is open for most weekday meals. The corner market has anything I need on a whim, and there are enough people with cars that we can get real groceries if wanted. This time of year, I don't even have to worry about the refrigerator being overstocked - the dorm windowsills provide instant refrigeration!
- Hot pot, one cup coffee filter gadget and cup. Fresh ground hazelnut creme coffee and bags for hot tea. Some things should not be taken for granted. I will have to find honey.
- No running shoes. There is a gym, but I'd rather take a regular walk around campus and for that, I need my boots. Besides, it's not like I exercise at home - why would I expect to change that routine at school?
- Pictures of my family. I didn't bring these on my first trip and it helps to have them, even if I can access files on my laptop, too.
Friday, January 1, 2010
Ending Ten Months of Silence
Wow. My last post is February 2009 and now it's January 2010. Happy New Year!
It isn't that I didn't learn anything interesting in that time. But it must have been more like drinking from a firehose than I realized because I didn't share any of that learning here.
In the spring semester I encountered systematic theology and was fortunate to be study with Dr. Paul Sponheim at Luther Seminary. We explored what statements we will make about God and volumes of what others have said including Carl Braaten, Robert Jensen, Elizabeth Johnson, and Ted Peters. I found my voice and the words to express what I understand about God, and a far-deeper appreciation for the mystery of God and all I do not, cannot, and may not ever, understand.
Alongside that coursework, I studied the Pentateuch. I confess: I spend more time in the Scripture when I have a class that digs into it. Beyond the commitment to the Shema that I posted about, I was also inspired by a new understanding that the Law was given as a gift to God's people, not as oppressive rules and regs. Reading the detail with which the Levites undertook their worship, I realized I had not appreciated the richness or intricacies of the traditions in Judaism.
The summer brought new studies that revealed a wholly new understanding of catholicity and mission in the church, and a long, slow swim through centuries of church history and the Reformation. I discovered the basis for many of the Episcopal traditions I experienced as a child, and then got to see their origins first-hand, visiting Oxford and Westminster in England in the late summer.
Before the fall semester intensified, I had the chance to meet and listen to Marcus Borg who was speaking at a local congregation. Heart of Christianity was one of the first books that helped me find expression for the encompassing love of God and I really enjoyed hearing him in person.
The months since then have been consumed with completing four months of clinical pastoral education (CPE). It was a transformative experience but one that I began very much feeling like a child playing dressup in a white labcoat. I was surprised at the void I felt from the absence of Lutheran traditions, enriched by sharing the experiences with colleagues, grateful for the blessing of being with families who celebrated their loved ones' lives, and yet heartbroken by some of the losses we experienced together.
As intense as CPE was, it was balanced against the foil of continuing coursework that dove deeply into the New Testament, exploring Matthew and Jesus' parables. It made me wish for more classes on the individual books of the Bible because the focused study creates an understanding of the book as a whole work, instead of the piecemeal glances we get in Sunday services, and the discussions allow more reflection and more opportunities to really soak in the texts.
With the new year dawning, I am headed into a new intensive at the seminary, new coursework and new discoveries. One of the classes - the Church and Music - has already put into words something I could only feel: "...the faith of a community comes to life in its music-making. In music, the faith and life of a people take flesh.”(Westermeyer, Te Deum, 5)
With each step, my awe and adoration for God deepens, as does my gratitude for his love for all his creation.
I'll close with a G.K. Chesterton quote that was shared with me in the New Year:
"The object of a new year is not that we should have a new year. It is that we should have a new soul."
It isn't that I didn't learn anything interesting in that time. But it must have been more like drinking from a firehose than I realized because I didn't share any of that learning here.
In the spring semester I encountered systematic theology and was fortunate to be study with Dr. Paul Sponheim at Luther Seminary. We explored what statements we will make about God and volumes of what others have said including Carl Braaten, Robert Jensen, Elizabeth Johnson, and Ted Peters. I found my voice and the words to express what I understand about God, and a far-deeper appreciation for the mystery of God and all I do not, cannot, and may not ever, understand.
Alongside that coursework, I studied the Pentateuch. I confess: I spend more time in the Scripture when I have a class that digs into it. Beyond the commitment to the Shema that I posted about, I was also inspired by a new understanding that the Law was given as a gift to God's people, not as oppressive rules and regs. Reading the detail with which the Levites undertook their worship, I realized I had not appreciated the richness or intricacies of the traditions in Judaism.
The summer brought new studies that revealed a wholly new understanding of catholicity and mission in the church, and a long, slow swim through centuries of church history and the Reformation. I discovered the basis for many of the Episcopal traditions I experienced as a child, and then got to see their origins first-hand, visiting Oxford and Westminster in England in the late summer.
Before the fall semester intensified, I had the chance to meet and listen to Marcus Borg who was speaking at a local congregation. Heart of Christianity was one of the first books that helped me find expression for the encompassing love of God and I really enjoyed hearing him in person.
The months since then have been consumed with completing four months of clinical pastoral education (CPE). It was a transformative experience but one that I began very much feeling like a child playing dressup in a white labcoat. I was surprised at the void I felt from the absence of Lutheran traditions, enriched by sharing the experiences with colleagues, grateful for the blessing of being with families who celebrated their loved ones' lives, and yet heartbroken by some of the losses we experienced together.
As intense as CPE was, it was balanced against the foil of continuing coursework that dove deeply into the New Testament, exploring Matthew and Jesus' parables. It made me wish for more classes on the individual books of the Bible because the focused study creates an understanding of the book as a whole work, instead of the piecemeal glances we get in Sunday services, and the discussions allow more reflection and more opportunities to really soak in the texts.
With the new year dawning, I am headed into a new intensive at the seminary, new coursework and new discoveries. One of the classes - the Church and Music - has already put into words something I could only feel: "...the faith of a community comes to life in its music-making. In music, the faith and life of a people take flesh.”(Westermeyer, Te Deum, 5)
With each step, my awe and adoration for God deepens, as does my gratitude for his love for all his creation.
I'll close with a G.K. Chesterton quote that was shared with me in the New Year:
"The object of a new year is not that we should have a new year. It is that we should have a new soul."
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