No Syllabus for God-sightings

July 10. Registration day for fall classes. Oh, wait, that’s right. I won’t be taking classes this fall. One of the new experiences gifted to me because I am going on internship is a semester without coursework.  Most of the time, I recognize it as a gift; sometimes, like this morning, I want to throw a two-year old’s tantrum and scream, “But I need that class now...” I think that, besides interrupting the reassuring, steady march of completing degree requirements, what I fear is missing the structure of having a schedule and a syllabus and some predictability. Instead I’m living in a pretty unstructured environment, for a few weeks anyway; trying to listen and watch what God may be trying to teach me in this time and space; and, watching internship draw closer on the horizon.

The learning doesn’t stop, fortunately. I discovered the local library system has a free online language tutor that lets me refresh my Spanish and bridge its Castilian foundation to the Latin American Spanish we hear more often in the Americas. I visited the stacks of the local used book store where it looks like somebody traded in a library of emergence theology and other interesting books. (so, I obligingly brought a few home)

I was finishing up a library copy of Kenda Creasy Dean’s Almost Christian and hoped to find a used copy to buy but I didn’t have any luck. I’m not surprised; it is a sticky book − one I expect I’ll reread even though I don’t usually read things more than once. In Almost Christian Dean writes about the 2003-2005 National Study of Youth and Religion (NSYR) and talks about teenagers, contrasting popular, cultural faith which reflects a moral therapeutic deism and “consequential faith”, which develops in teenagers in congregations who “portray God as living, present and active, place a high value on Scripture; reflect the life and mission of Jesus Christ in its practices and relationships; and emphasize spiritual growth, discipleship and mission.”

As someone who is more comfortable talking with people born in the ‘20s than people living in their 20s (or teens), a while back, I adopted a mantra for ministry: “break stereotypes, learn flexibility, build relationships and communicate well.” Dean challenges stereotypes of teenagers who aren’t interested in talking with adults and who aren’t capable of conversations that take more than 140 characters.  She includes an important reminder in Almost Christian that can get lost in the tussling about that is parenting a teenager:

[Every teenager is] an amazing child of God. Their humanity is embedded in their souls as well as their DNA. Their family is the church, their vocation is a grateful response for the chance to participate in the divine plan of salvation, their hope lies in the fact that Christ has claimed them and secured their future for them.

In Almost Christian, there’s a challenge to be intentional about living this truth out in our relationships with teenagers. There's also a challenge to Christian adults and to parents, particularly in mainline Protestant traditions, to recognize how we influence the faith of children, whether we know it or not, and to not be as afraid of speaking about God and Jesus, of pointing to the ways that God is moving in our lives. We tell our lives in stories and unless we are talking about our God-sightings and God-stories, how can anyone else recognize themselves in the Christian story?

So one hope I have for this unstructured time I have is to participate in more conversations about God’s active presence in our world, and more readily answer where I saw, heard or experienced God in everyday life. I hope you’ll listen in.

Like a Milkpod Bursting

"Like a milkpod bursting" was how Phyllis Tickle described the communities that grew out of a year-long gathering in Kudzu's, a local bar in Memphis. From her description, I would guess a lot of the participants in "Beer and Bible" might have refuted that it was church. Certainly, it didn't look like church if you imagine church as a building with pews and hymnals and offering plates, but, undoubtedly, it was church, the ekklesia: it was local people gathered around the Word of God. 

(Read a little bit more in this 2008 article on Sojourner's website)

What mattered was the people who came and went on those Tuesday nights had questions they wanted to ask about faith, about truth, about the Bible and about God, and they had a space where they could come and ask them. When they ran out of questions, they stopped meeting. A year later they reunited to mark the anniversary of what they had been doing and sometime after that, the milkpod burst and they began meeting in smaller groups.  

Tickle gave the illustration of this emergence community to give us a picture of how church is happening today outside our mainline congregations.

Explaining a cascade of sociological and historical events that have set the stage for “The Great Emergence”, Tickle was challenging those of us “in the business of religion” to listen for and address the hard questions that people ask. The questions aren't meant to tear down the Church we have known; they are to get at which traditions carry something worthwhile – Living Water (John 4:10) – and which ones are like cracked cisterns that need to be thrown out. 

Encouraging leaders to designate a pastoral allowance that lets pastors go where people are – whether that is a neighborhood bar or a coffee shop – Tickle argued that we need to be reminded that our congregations and churches are not the kingdom of God, but we are called to serve the kingdom of God and that means talking to whoever is looking at us, wherever they find us. 

"Take the kingdom out to the people around us."

No Rising Tide?

In No Rising Tide Joerg Rieger challenges the relevance of President John F. Kennedy’s well-known statement that “A rising tide lifts all boats.” (1)  As the Occupy movements have brought to the headlines in recent months, “the gaps between the very wealthy and the rest of the population keep increasing” and “life-and-death struggles are no longer just a matter for the poorest of the poor.” (3) Even New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman, who Rieger identifies as “a long-time supporter of globalization who [has] great faith in the free market” has said, “We are going to have to learn to live with a lot more uncertainty for a lot longer than our generation has ever experiences.” (2)

Rieger challenges us to evaluate our assumptions about the economy and free markets.  Observing that often we believe “the authority of economics is unquestionable and often even infallible, and in the assumption that the current system is the only one that is viable” he suggests that there are parallels between economics and religion.  He cites theologian and Union Theological Seminary professor Paul Knitter as one who has gone as far as to say that the market is a religion and therefore, should be in conversation with other religions. (6)

What would that discourse look like? What would the questions be? Rieger suggests several: “On which authorities, powers, and energies do we rely? [Are they the right ones?] What is it that gives us ultimate hope, shapes our desires, and provides reasonable levels of stability?” (4)

These questions matter because in this disparate world where we live “power and influence determine who gets to shape the world, who gets recognized, and whose ideas count.”(3)  One example of an explicit theology of economics is pronounced by Michael Novak, an American Enterprise Institute scholar to whom Rieger attributes the idea that “the status quo should not be challenged since this is the way God intends things to be.”(6)  Arguing that often the relationship between economics and theology is more implicit than explicit, Rieger suggests “the principles of mainline economics are mostly taken for granted by religious communities, presupposed as part of the way things are, and virtually never discussed in critical fashion.” (10) Because the principles are embedded, “Hope, even in the midst of the most severe economic crisis, is thus built on the faith that things will eventually get between and that the reign of free-market economics will be reaffirmed.” (7)

Why don’t we talk more about “the alternative approaches to the world of economics”? (11) How can we awaken critical self-reflection of our economic positions, and initiate a movement away from market fundamentalism which promotes adherence without “consideration of changes in context or the real needs and concerns of people?” (14-15) At this point, I am not advocating one position over another; instead what I want to do is to echo Rieger that we have a responsibility to understand more about the world in which we live and the assumptions that are built into the systems and institutions that we live within.

Four Portraits of Poverty

While many of the Jesus stories in the gospels address the poor, few Christian texts provide information about why poverty existed in early Christian communities.  Reading the Revelation of John, the Letter of James, the Acts of the Apostles and the Shepherd of Hermas, Biblical scholar Steve Friesen examines illustrates four unique explanations for the causes of poverty and four distinct responses.  (Friesen, 18)

Importantly, Friesen reminds us that in the early Roman Empire, “most or all of the recipients of a particular text lived near the level of subsistence.” (Friesen, 21)  It is very easy to forget that texts are written in a particular context and to a particular audience.  As I read a text it’s helpful to recognize how my hearing of a text is shaped by my context and experiences, and to reflect on the meaning of the text in the very different context where it was first received.  

(1) In the apocalyptic literature of the Revelation of John, the writer describes a satanic beast who “ conquers the world, defeats the saints, and is worshiped by the whole world.” (Friesen, 22) Friesen suggests the beast is how the writer “portrays the Roman Empire as Satan’s tool, opposed to the God of Israel, and destined for destruction.” (ibid)  The domination and oppression is absolute in that no one is exempt, able to be a bystander.  The system requires participation by everyone, even, or perhaps especially, the exploited. The writer urges people to flee from the Empire’s domination: “Come out of her, my people so that you do not participate in her sins…” (Rev. 18:4)  (Friesen, 23) The suggested response is not only resistance, but anarchy.

(2) The Letter of James moves the emphasis away from the systems of the Empire and emphasizes individual responsibility.  Friesen suggests the writer follows “the prophetic tradition of Israel: one should trust God completely and act accordingly, keeping one’s life pure and taking care of those who suffer.” (Friesen, 24)  The writer contrasts “society’s system of honor and God’s system of honor” calling people to seek God and not the world, and “[advising] the community to share what resources they have….” (Friesen, 25-26)  Here the response is more like nonviolent direct action by refusing to participate in actions that hurt neighbor. 

(3) The Acts of the Apostles neither addresses economic injustice nor does it criticize the Roman Empire.  In fact, in contrast to our other texts, the author of Acts describes the assemblies as people with more resources and existing above subsistence levels. (Friesen, 30-31)  Here the emphasis is on charity; Friesen writes, “the author presents personal gifts and household hospitality (rather than redistribution)” as the way to address the poverty of the neighbor. (Friesen, 28)  

(4) The Shepherd of Hermas presents a fourth and final portrait of poverty.  Suggesting the poor are dependent on the wealthy for survival, “Hermas portrays charity as an individual act that gives material aid to the poor and help the rich survive the final judgment.” (Friesen, 34)  It ignores the causes of poverty and credits wealth to the blessing of God. (Friesen, 35)

The four portraits contradict one another, lending credence to Scroggs’ argument that the Bible is better understood as a foundational document for Christianity than as an authoritative one.   They also spotlight the ambiguity and complexity that are present in religion.  (Friesen, 36)  What is hopeful about this examination is that we find the freedom to live into the questions and work toward understanding.

Friesen, “Injustice or God’s Will” (p. 17 - 36) in Holman, Susan, ed. Wealth and Poverty in Early Church and Society.     Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2008.

So far as it depends on you

“If it is possible, so far as it depends on you, live peaceably with all.”  (Romans 12:18, NRSV)

These straightforward words from Paul to the Romans have been rattling around in my head ever since I read them during worship on Sunday.  In a world where the headlines scream about middle school bullying, high school gangs and armed violence in an endless list of countries throughout the world, including western first-world cities like London, I don’t think that just putting one step in front of the other and staying clear of trouble is adequate.  Living peaceably begins with each one of us living differently. 

So far as it depends on you.

Or me.  Defy the temptation to look out for ourselves first, disprove the cynics who promote ruthless competition and refuse to apply a Darwinian idea of survival of the fittest to our human relationships.  Learn to create communities with accountability and rapport. Learn to trust one another.  Leave preconceptions and labels at the door and discover who “those people” are.  Pretty quickly we’ll discover they are not “those people” at all.

Martin Luther’s words from the Small Catechism help answer, “How?”  Luther encourages us to “come to the defense” of our neighbors, and “interpret everything they do in the best possible light.”  (Eighth Commandment in the Small Catechism, Book of Concord)  How many times do I approach a new situation or relationship with a critical (e.g., negative, not discerning) eye? Am I really listening? How would that interaction change if I change my role, my posture, my stance? How would our dialog change if I remembered that the person I disagree with is just as passionate, educated, thinking as my peers or allies?

So far as it depends on you. 

A beloved and now-retired colleague taught his students about being a ripplemaker.  Our actions connect us to one another; we impact the people around us and we do have responsibility for whether that will be a positive or negative impact.  Thinking about him, I also recalled the quote “no man is an island” which I could not have attributed with any accuracy but I looked it up and learned that it originated in a poem by John Donne, (1572-1631):

"All mankind is of one author, and is one volume; when one man dies, one chapter is not torn out of the book, but translated into a better language; and every chapter must be so translated...As therefore the bell that rings to a sermon, calls not upon the preacher only, but upon the congregation to come: so this bell calls us all: but how much more me, who am brought so near the door by this sickness....No man is an island, entire of itself...any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee."

Living peaceably requires some intentionality and the recognition that you and I are living in this world together and we are connected, even when culture promotes individualism and even anonymity.  Living peaceably depends on you. And me.

Everybody Can Be An Activist

In Here Comes Everybody Clay Shirky examines the ways in which social media have influenced political activism.  He tells the stories of people who have gone far beyond clicking the “Like” button on a political candidates’ Facebook page or even submitting a petition by email to their local representatives.  

Shirky tells the story of one of the first flash mobs with political purpose which happened in September 2003 on behalf of presidential hopeful Howard Dean. (See the September 8, 2003 invitation in the online archive of “Doonesbury” by Garry Trudeau.)

Another story he tells is from May 2006 when protesters in Minsk in Belarus organized themselves to appear in Oktyabrskaya Square and showed up eating ice cream.  (Read more about “turning information into action”.)  By the way here’s a disappointing update from the Christian Science Monitor on the political situation in Belarus now, five years later.

But political protest persists, and just yesterday student protesters in Chile demonstrated against their government over their failed education system. 

Social media is not only changing how we communicate but how we organize and use information to inspire action.

The Front Porch

Practices of listening, attentiveness, connection and engagement are at the heart of Elizabeth Drescher’s Tweet If You ♥ Jesus. Encouraging church leaders to adopt these practices by entering the Twittersphere and being on Facebook, she describes “the Digital Age as “a place” where we can wind our way in and out of communities and engage people we might not encounter face to face. Drescher chides, “What if those who might be seeking spiritual engagement in your community started hanging out right outside the doors of your church. Would you squander that opportunity?” (148)

I appreciate Drescher’s challenges to listen, to be attentive, to connect and to engage. Especially on pages like one might have for a youth group or congregation, it is easy to fall into a pattern of using Twitter and Facebook to broadcast news and events and bury dialog under the headlines.

Reading Tweet If You ♥ Jesus. I still bump up against the tension between how I engage those who might be seeking spiritual engagement in my community who really are hanging out right outside the doors of my church, and those who are on my digital front porch. That is, many of the people in my community – rural western North Carolina – are not online but in line at a soup kitchen or the Salvation Army shelter. They are struggling to find work or they are sinking under oil bills from last winter. While Drescher points to the prevalence of social media, and encourages more vibrant conversations, I appreciated her description of Kirk Smith, the Arizona bishop who engaged people in his immersion at the border, but clearly remained focus on doing the work he was doing rather than crafting a message about it.

Yes! These practices are important, replacing the echo chamber of anonymous and empty spaces with the chatter of a campfire or coffeehouse will change how we engage with one another and how we define community, but we also need to recognize when we have made it too easy to engage from our front porch swings and never actually step foot into the world.

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,

“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?

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."

Mother-Tongue

I am learning my 'mother-tongue'.(Mark Allan Powell, Opening the Book of Faith)

Like a child who hears her mother and father speaking it and then learns the words, I am being immersed in a language I don't know and learning how to listen to it, what the cadence is and what the words mean. I am also listening to stories and learning who the characters and authors are. Like a child growing up on AA Milne, Shel Silverstein and Dr. Seuss, I'm discovering the authors who write about theology. I am also experiencing some wonderful but startling moments where it all overlaps.

New concepts, ideas, practices:

Tenebrae Service - The Service of Tenebrae follows a tradition of the church dating back to the 8th century. From the Latin, the word Tenebrae, means "darkness" and commemorates the final hours of our Lord's life on earth, as he suffered death upon the cross. In the early church, the service of Tenebrae was celebrated on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday of Holy Week.

Mission Developers - this is work happening in different forms in different places, but one place is Netzer Co-op http://www.netzercoop.org/ near Austin, TX

Shema - from Encyclopedia Brittanica: (Hebrew: “Hear”), the Jewish confession of faith made up of three scriptural texts (Deuteronomy 6:4–9, 11:13–21; Numbers 15:37–41), which, together with appropriate prayers, forms an integral part of the evening and morning services in the Jewish faith.

Random vocabulary:
phylacteries held the Shema and were literally bound to one's hand or forehead as a reminder of God's Word

a prolegomenon is an essay

aggiornamento is a 'bringing up-to-date'

abrogate means to 'nullify or abolish'

expiation means to make atonement

exigencies are state of affairs that make urgent demands

People I've learned more about:
Rudolf Bultman
Paul Tillich
David Tracy
James Cone
Sallie McFague
Rosemary Radford Reuther