Prayers, Patterns, and Paper

 One of the great things about going to the Create in Me retreat is that I come home with all sorts of ideas. Let me record one of them here. This prayer practice would work well on one's own or in a group; we did it in a group.

 

We sat in groups of three or four around tables, and each table had a plastic bag with supplies: glue sticks, all sorts of papers (plain colors, pages from old hymn books, papers with patterns), and scissors. We also had larger squares of black paper on the table.

 

We were told to think about people, places, and situations in our lives in need of prayer. We were instructed to choose the three or four that most meeting and to pick a paper to represent that prayer. So, for example, If I choose my spouse, I might select a page from a paisley pattern, while the situation in Ukraine might call for a yellow piece of paper.

 



We were to choose a shape, and each prayer had the same shape. So my prayer for my spouse might be triangles, while my prayer for Ukraine might be squares. And then we set to work cutting the paper.

 

With my broken wrist, I could not cut, but I adapted. I tore some shapes, and then I realized they weren't all going to look the same, so I just didn't worry about trying to make them the same.

 

Once we had our shapes cut, we arranged them on the square of black paper and glued them; we were told to keep the center of the page uncovered. While we did the cutting and gluing process, we had music in the background; I believe I recognized George Winston. For me it helped me attain a meditative state, but I could see that working in silence might be good too.

 

When we were done, we put our prayers on the walls. We did this the first night, and it was good to move through the creativity retreat surrounded by prayers.

 

I like this activity because anyone can do it. I like thinking about prayers in a more tactile way. It's adaptable to those who can't cut or those who feel like they don't have an artistic bone in their body. It could lead to group discussion, but it doesn't have to. For those of us you need something to do as we settle into a meditative state, this practice could be a good one.

Meditation on This Sunday's Gospel

The readings for Sunday, May 1, 2022:

First Reading: Acts 9:1-6 [7-20]

Psalm: Psalm 30

Second Reading: Revelation 5:11-14

Gospel: John 21:1-19

Here we have another mystical encounter with the risen Christ. Notice that it's mystical and yet grounded in earthiness. Jesus makes a barbecue breakfast, and Simon Peter gets wet. It's mystical, yet rooted in second chances. It's mystical and yet a bit whimsical too. The men have fished all night and caught nothing. What does Jesus cook for breakfast? Fish.

This Gospel reading also has a lovely symmetry. It ends the ministry of Jesus in the way that it began, on the shore, with Jesus calling his disciples to mission. This Gospel story gives Peter a chance to redeem himself. He declares his love for Jesus three times, just the way he had previously denied Jesus three times.

The Gospel reading for Sunday reminds us of some of the essential messages Jesus gave us. We are to let down our nets, again and again, even when we have fished all night and caught nothing. Our rational brains would protest, "What's the point? We know there are no fish!" But Christ tells us to try again.

Even when we can't see the results, even when our nets are empty, there might be activity going on beneath the surfaces, in the deep depths of creation, where our senses can't perceive any action. We might need to repeat our actions, despite our being sure that it will be useless. We aren't allowed to give up. We aren't allowed to say, "Well, I tried. Nothing going on here. I'm going to return to the solitude of my room and not engage in the world anymore." No, we cast our nets again and again.

What do those nets represent? What do the fish represent? The answers will be different for each of us. For some of us, casting our nets might be our efforts at community building. For some of us, casting our nets might be our efforts to reach the unchurched. For some of us, we cast our nets into the depths of a creative process. We cast again and again, because we can't be sure of what we'll catch. Some days and years, we'll drag empty nets back to the shore. Some days and years, we'll catch more fish than we can handle.

The Gospel also reminds us that we're redeemable. I love the story of Jesus and Peter. Peter would have reason to expect that Jesus would be mad at him. But Jesus doesn't reject him. Jesus gives him an opportunity to affirm what he had denied in the past.

Jesus gives Peter a mission, and this mission is our mission: "Feed my sheep." There are plenty of sheep that need feeding and tending. We have our work cut out for us.

This Gospel shows us the way that it can all be done: we must work together, and we must take time to nourish ourselves. The men work together all night, and in the end, Jesus makes them a meal. Think about how much of Jesus' mission involved a meal. Jesus didn't just tend to the souls of those around him. He fed them, with real food. In doing so, he fed their souls and renewed his own ability to keep healing the world.

We must do the same.

Creativity Retreat with Broken Wrist

Last week I would have already been on the road for a few hours. Last week I thought I had a sprained wrist. I got to my friend’s house, took a quick shower, and we went out to enjoy a lovely meal in the April sunshine.

The next day, when I arrived at camp, I was encouraged to go get my wrist X rayed. Even before the creativity retreat started, I had a right hand splinted, which made it mostly unusable. And yes, I am right handed.

Would I have still gone to the retreat had I known? Yes I would have but I would have packed differently--I ended up with lots of articles of clothing that wouldn't go over the splint, sweaters and things.

 

Over the 15 years that I've been attending this retreat, it's become less of an event for me about trying new things and discovering new art forms. I've made deep friendships that are rekindled each year with this retreat. That's the main reason I go, and I don't need the use of my right hand for that.

Still it was strange to see all the creativity around me and not to do it--so I decided to see what my left hand could do. It's one of those things that many a creativity book tells you to try: use your non-dominant hand and see what happens.

At first I started with watercolors. I had been enjoying the azalea bushes and so I tried to capture them. That went well so I did something more abstract, which turned into a descending dove. 

I then did another piece with watercolor, which I used as the basis of a collage.

 

The next day I tried doing zentangles with my left hand, but as I expected that required a level of precision that I can't do with my left hand yet. But there were colored markers on the table, so I started to sketch with those. Part of me wonders if this sketch that I did with my left hand is so very different from what I might have created with my right hand.

 

I didn't do much writing while I was away, even though I had the computer. I did get some reading done for seminary classes, so that was good. the weather was beautiful, but I didn't feel like going on a walk. It was almost hot by the middle of the day, and my splint makes me feel even warmer and itchier--or maybe that's just an excuse.

I enjoyed being surrounded by creative folks, and I got some ideas for future retreats of my own, which will be a subject for another blog post. At the end of the retreat, we walked the labyrinth created by cloth braids, which I recognized from an earlier retreat. 

In fact, I had provided fabric strips for people to write prayers on, strips which we later braided together. And now, 10 years later, we're still using those braids to create a labyrinth--what a great metaphor for community.

 

I had always assumed that only death would prevent us from having this community, but the last three years have shown me that the world is more fragile then I knew. People can move away, diseases can change the way we gather, institutions which once seemed solid may not be. That realization made the joy of being together even more vivid, and I wouldn't have missed it just because I had a broken wrist.

Driving with a Broken Wrist

 Over the next few days, I will write about the Create in Me retreat. It's the first one we have had since 2019, and it was different:  a bit more low key, a more relaxed pace, but a great retreat. Today, let me write a bit about the trip in the car.

When I left, I thought I just had a sprained wrist. The drive up wasn't too bad, although for about the first hour I wondered if I was making a mistake. I had a soft brace on my hand and wrist, So I could still move my fingers. I couldn't clench the steering wheel, but my right hand could help with the steering and holding steady.

While I was away, I had my wrist splinted, so my right arm was bent, and I had less use of my fingers. I knew the trip back would be different. I had always planned to go back to Columbia to spend some time with a grad school friend on Sunday. I decided to make that trip, and if it turned out to be impossible, I would call my spouse and strategize.

It was not as easy as the trip up the mountain, but I thought that I could probably make the trip back to South Florida. I didn't want my spouse to have to fly up and drive the car back, and I didn't want to fly down and have to go back and get the car at some other point. So yesterday morning, off I went.

I was surprised at the amount of traffic:  lots of traffic between Columbia and Orangeburg and then again, for the first two hours after the Florida line. Happily, those times of heavy traffic were interspersed with times of less traffic. In the heavy traffic I kept my left arm tense and my attention super focused, and it was exhausting.

I finished the trip in South Florida with heavy rush hour traffic, even though it was only three o'clock--sigh. But in a way that was good; as the traffic slowed to 30 and 40 miles an hour, it meant that I didn't have the big trucks trundling by along with the cars that zip in and out of slower traffic. In short, it was easier to keep control of the car.

I got home looking like a drowned river rat. All that intense driving left me sweaty. But I did it! I don't recommend it. At one point during my odyssey last week, I thought about how I had said I needed to start working on my arms, but this is not the upper body workout I had in mind.

Would I do it again? If it meant I got to go on a wonderful retreat, yes I probably would. But hopefully, in the future, I won't have to make these kinds of choices.

Broken Wrist Woes and Gratitude

 It has been a strange week. That is an understatement. A week ago it was Easter. It feels like a million years have passed since then.

On Wednesday, I got in the car and headed north. I knew I had a 10 hour drive in front of me, and for the first hour I wasn't sure I was going to be able to make this drive. But I really wanted to see friends and go on a retreat and get back to the mountains, and so I kept going.

On Thursday, my hand was the first thing that people noticed because my fingers were purple and swollen. I thought I was just in the bruised face of my sprained wrist, but several of my retreat friends are nurses and former PE teachers, and they recognize a break when they see it.  One of my retreat friends lives locally, and she told me about a great orthopedic urgent care that's in the same block as the camp entrance. I went over to have my wrist X-rayed at long last. My purple fingers concerned me too.

I was still hopeful it would just be a strain, a sprain, and that I would have spent money on X-rays for nothing. Why am I spending money on X-rays?  My former employer changed insurances, but didn't tell me, and as a person on COBRA, when they change insurance, I change insurance--long story short, I'm still waiting on insurance cards. Insert heavy sigh here.

Unfortunately, it is a break, and a brick that may require surgery, a metal plate, and pins.  The doctor told me I have some time--no need to go racing back to South Florida. So they splinted my wrist and sent me on my way.  The next day, Friday, I did make an appointment with the South Florida orthopedic hand specialist, and I've been enjoying the Create in Me retreat.

It's been interesting to hear how many people have experience with broken wrists. I met two people during retreat week who broke their wrists in the same way that I did, a simple fall. My mother wrote me an email reminding me of her experience with a broken wrist; she too needed surgery, pins, and a plate. I had been feeling bad about not going to get an X-ray sooner. But I likely would have had to wait on surgery anyway--often there is waiting time because of swelling, and my wrist has been very swollen.

I am still feeling no pain. I realize I'm very lucky. I've been enjoying this retreat even though I can't do a lot of the activities. I've been experimenting with my left hand, and I've been remembering an art book that recommended working with our non-dominant hands.  I've had a few moments where I felt panicky, both about my own wrist and about the larger precariousness, how one minute we're fine and then one little trip over a sidewalk crack--which sometimes results in skinned knees, but can result in broken bones or worse. I'm thinking of Octavia Butler, gone too soon when she slipped and fell.

I'll write more about the retreat later. I am trying to get ahead with both grading and seminary work, since I do have an appointment with a hand surgeon on Thursday, and I don't want to get too far behind. We are at the end of the semester for both my teaching and my seminary student work. When this semester started back in January, I worried about the new Omicron variant, and I worried that my job might keep me from being successful with my classes.  A broken wrist was not on my radar screen of things to worry about. I am aware that I often worry about possible negative developments only to be blindsided by something else. Breaking that habit of worrying about the future may take more years than I have left.

Again I realize I am very lucky. I am grateful for the voice recognition that I have with my version of Word, for example.  I am grateful to be able to be at this retreat, broken wrist and all.

 

Meditation on This Sunday's Gospel

 The readings for Sunday, April 24, 2022:

First Reading: Acts 4:32-35

Psalm: Psalm 133

Second Reading: 1 John 1:1--2:2

Gospel: John 20:19-31

This week's Gospel returns us to the familiar story of Thomas, who will always be known as Doubting Thomas, no matter what else he did or accomplished.  What I love about the Gospels most is that we get to see humans interacting with the Divine, in all of our human weaknesses. Particularly in the last few weeks, we've seen humans betray and deny and doubt--but God can work with us.

If you were choosing a group of people most unlikely to start and spread a lasting worldwide movement, it might be these disciples. They have very little in the way of prestige, connections, wealth, networking skills, marketing smarts, or anything else you might look for if you were calling modern disciples. And yet, Jesus transformed them.

Perhaps it should not surprise us. The whole Bible is full of stories of lackluster humans unlikely to succeed: mumblers and cheats, bumblers and the unwise. God can use anyone, even murderers.

How does this happen? The story of Thomas gives us a vivid metaphor. When we thrust our hands into the wounds of Jesus, we're transformed. Perhaps that metaphor is too gory for your tastes, and yet, it speaks to the truth of our God. We have a God who wants to know us in all our gooey messiness. We have a God who knows all our strengths and all our weaknesses, and still, this God desires closeness with us. And what's more, this God invites us to a similar intimacy. Jesus doesn't say, "Here I am, look at me and believe." No, Jesus offers his wounds and invites Thomas to touch him.

Jesus will spend the next several weeks eating with the disciples, breathing on them, and being with them physically one last time. Then he sends them out to transform the wounded world.

We, too, are called to lay our holy hands on the wounds of the world and to heal those wounds. It's not enough to just declare the Good News of Easter. We are called to participate in the ongoing redemption of creation. We know creation intimately, and we know which wounds we are most capable of healing. Some of us will work on environmental issues, some of us will make sure that the poor are fed and clothed, some of us will work with criminals and the unjustly accused, and more of us will help children.

In the coming weeks, be alert to the recurring theme of the breath of Jesus and the breath of God. You have the breath of the Divine on you too. In our time of a ravaging respiratory virus and staying safe distances away, this imagery seems even more vivid, as we've all learned the power of the breath. 

But God's breath transforms creation in ways that viruses can only dream of.  God's breath can transform us too.

Triduum with Trip and Fall

  Early on Good Friday, I went for my daily walk.  Hours later, I made this Facebook post: Tripped on my morning walk--came down hard on my chin and right hand. Face is OK--landed on grass. Wrist is swollen and sore but responding well to ibuprofen, ice, and a wrist brace. Poet brain wants to make Good Friday connections, and seminary brain is grateful that because of Easter break, no written work is due until later next week. 

And this morning:  On a bright note: taking a lot of ibuprofen yesterday for my strained wrist means no pain this morning in my arthritic feet.

More details later--Typing is tough right now.

Quilt Camp, Eucharist, and Maundy Thursday

 I realize that I haven't talked much about the religious aspect of Quilt Camp.  Even though it's held at Lutheridge, a Lutheran retreat center, it's less overtly religious than some of the adult programming there.  I've spent some time wondering if my friends of other faiths would like the retreat.  I think that all but my friends who are strict atheists (the type annoyed by religious people) would.

The room was set up with this space under the rock climbing wall.  From a distance, it looks like a simple stage, barely elevated, a display platform for quilts and rocking chairs--a way to give the huge room a touch of hominess.  

But it was where we faced for evening devotions, which were optional.  The last night we had communion.  We were able to do this because one of our participants is ordained by the Baptist church--during that brief moment when the Southern Baptists ordained women.

We had a wide variety of Christians in the group; if anyone was of another faith, or atheist, or agnostic, she didn't say.  After communion, one of the younger women made a group announcement.  She said that she had never been to a service where a woman handed her the elements for communion, and then, with her voice cracking into tears, she talked about how meaningful it was. 

Unlike other retreats, there was no Bible study, no group work; we spent most of our time at our individual tables sewing and sewing and sewing.  Occasionally there would be conversations, which occasionally turned to the topic of God.  One woman said to me, "It's in the Bible, right?  So therefore, we know it's true, right?"

Well, she did ask me, and so I gave her the gentle version of why we can't assert that, or at least why I can't assert that if she means true as in factual.  I talked about how I view the Bible as the writer of the text telling us of an experience of God, but not the only experience, and perhaps not even a true experience as we would define it today.  Having spent months studying the letters of Paul, I am not the person to lead your Bible study, if you want a leader who will tell you that God dictated the words to the Bible writer, so of course there's no bias.

She didn't run away in horror; in fact, we had a good conversation.  But I was also relieved that it was a casual conversation.  At the God Spa retreat, I heard some genuinely crummy theology (as in "God never gives us more than we can handle" and "The Lord gives and the Lord takes away"), but as a regular participant, I didn't see my role during group Bible study time to be the one who rips everyone's theological crutches out from under them.

I write this post on Maundy Thursday, a time when I might be writing about foot washing or meal sharing.  But the community I experienced at Quilt Camp seemed just as vivid a witness of the power of love in the world.  We were able to be together, in all of our variations of age, skill, knowledge, and resources.  We were able to cheer each other on.  We had lots of advice, for those who wanted it.  

I would love to see more Christian churches expand the vision of what it means to be a community based in love.  What would Maundy Thursday look like if we celebrated more than Jesus and 12 disciples and a last meal and a footwashing?

Meditation on This Sunday's Gospel, Easter Sunday

The readings for Easter Sunday, April 17, 2022:

First Reading: Acts 10:34-43

First Reading (Alt.): Isaiah 65:17-25

Psalm: Psalm 118:1-2, 14-24

Second Reading: 1 Corinthians 15:19-26

Second Reading (Alt.): Acts 10:34-43

Gospel: Luke 24:1-12

Gospel (Alt.): John 20:1-18

I've talked to many people who seem a bit amazed at how fast this season of Lent has zoomed by us. I've talked to several people who don't feel ready for Easter at all. Are we ever ready for Easter?

Some years feel more difficult than others. Here we are, at the beginning of the third year of a global pandemic.  Some of us have losses that we're still grieving.  Some of us may feel we have been spared.  Some of us may be wondering what's coming next.

If we're lucky enough to have been spared from personal disaster, medical or otherwise, we've likely looked on in horror as other parts of our world have suffered horribly.  Maybe we've been focused on war in Ukraine.  Maybe we're afraid of hurricane season that begins soon. If we're thinking people at all, we have to realize how precarious is our existence on the surface of our planet, that surface which looks stable, but we know that forces are rumbling underneath.

Maybe you say to yourself that you're still in that Ash Wednesday space. Maybe you ask, "How can we celebrate Easter with the taste of ashes still in our mouths?"

Hear that Easter message again. Know that God is working to redeem creation in ways that we can't always see and don't often understand. But we get glimpses of it.

The earth commits to resurrection this time of year. Green sprouts shoot out from hard earth everywhere. Each spring, we are reminded of the cyclical nature of the world, which can bring us hope in the times in which we suffer. This, too, shall pass.

But maybe we see those examples of resurrection as random and capricious. If we've heard the Easter story (and the Holy Week stories) again and again, we tend to forget the miraculous nature of them. Maybe we're tempted to downplay them even. Maybe we're beaten down and tired: tired of praying that the insurance company gets its act together before the next hurricane season starts, tired of praying for health and people getting sicker, tired of praying for peace in the world which never seems to come, too beaten down and tired to believe in miracles anymore.

Resist that pull towards despair, which some have called the deadliest sin, even worse than pride. We have seen miracles with our own eyes: Nelson Mandela walks out of jail to claim his place as president, for example. We're often too shy or scared to run out of our gardens to tell everyone else what we've seen, what we know.

We may worry that the world is sliding backward, but we've always been worried about that possibility. We must remember we are a Resurrection People. Commit yourself to new life. Rinse the ashes out of your mouth with the Eucharist bread and wine. Celebrate the miracles.

Palm Sunday at the Quilt Retreat

How do we respond when we meet the Divine in unexpected places?

How do we react to reminders that of God's humanity?

Can we  worship a God who has been working through time and outside of time to transform this human condition?

Do we believe in the promise that resurrection will break through, even in the most unlikely circumstances?

Rethinking the Quilt Top

 On the first night of Quilt Camp, we had a show and tell session--we were supposed to bring a quilt from home.  I grabbed the one that was easiest to bring, the one that I had quilted during my last Quilt Camp in October of 2020:

As I held it up, one of my Quilt Camp friends said, "And what you don't know is that every part of this was done by hand, the piecing, the sewing, the quilting, all of it by hand."  During the first day here, I have learned that cutting with scissors is also retro.

I look at that quilt, and I think of all the odds and ends of fabrics I collected--fabrics for the wedding quilts of my sister and the fabric I picked up when buying other fabric for the baby blankets of many friends and family.  I see those pieces of fabric and think about the quilting friends who were with me when I shopped for fabric, friends who have moved away or died.

I have spent the last few days surrounded by people who sew on fancy machines that cost more than any computer I've ever owned, and one woman has a machine at home that cost more than my car.

I look at the above quilt, and I wonder about my current approach, which is also using long, wide strips.  At the time I made the autumnal quilt, I was in a hurry to be done with the quilt top and to get some of the fabric that I had out of the way--that led to the long, bland patches on the left of the quilt in the picture above.

At our show and tell on night one, one of my fellow participants told of a class she took where they were supposed to cut apart a quilt top they didn't like and reassemble it.  She didn't have a quilt top that she didn't like, so she took some fabrics that went together, sewed a top out of strips, and cut that apart.  Here's what she ended up with:

I wonder what would happen if I looked at the panels I've been assembling in a different way.

What would happen if I cut those strips into smaller rectangles and mixed and matched them?  I will spend time thinking about this.  

Earlier in the quilt retreat, I was in a hurry to be finished with the top.  But now I'm thinking that maybe I should go a bit more slowly.  I don't make as many quilts as I once did.  I could take an additional day and make this one be a bit more interesting.

Here's my original idea:

And here's what I'm thinking of this morning:

Let's see what the day brings!

First Full Day at Quilt Camp

Yesterday was the first full day of Quilt Camp.  I got here on Wednesday to get a head start, but yesterday had a different feel.  Plus, Wednesday night I had to go to my online seminary classes.  Still, I made this Facebook post:  "Retreat month continues! I am safe at Lutheridge, one of the places on earth where I most love being, ready for retreat #2: Quilt Camp! And thanks to the joy of modern technology, I can do my seminary classes each night. Seminary classes and Quilt Camp--perhaps I have died and gone to Heaven?"

The benefit to getting here on Wednesday was that yesterday morning, my table was set up and ready to go at 7 a.m. on Thursday morning when the building opened.

I spent yesterday cutting strips and sewing them together and occasionally, I'd lay out panels to see how far along I was.  By the end of the day, I had about half the panels that I will eventually need.

I also had to do some seminary work.  Happily, the vibe here is laid back.  I have my computer and books set up on a corner of my sewing station.  I can work the way that I love best:  do a bit of writing, do a bit of creating that's more tactile, go back to writing, 

In the evening, I decided to go ahead and figure out the back of the quilt.  In February, I had got a beautiful piece of fabric for an online store, and if I bought the rest of the bolt, I got it for a $5.00 a yard price, which is unheard of these days.  So I had just enough for the back.  I cut it in half, ironed the clothe, and sewed the halves together.

Last night I made this Facebook post:  "If it's 9:30 at night, and I'm ironing the fabric for the back of my quilt, am I really Kristin anymore? (You may or may not know that I usually go to bed about the time that toddlers do and that I almost never iron)."  It was the second night of staying up late, luxuriating in good conversation and the joy of sewing a long seam.

And today, I get to do it all again--heaven!

The Trip to Quilt Camp

 I am writing this from Lutheridge, the camp in Arden, North Carolina, which is in the mountains near Asheville.  How strange to think that just 48 hours ago, I was at the desk that was once my grandfather's, that I was writing down in South Florida.

On Tuesday, I got up very early, brewed the coffee that I would later pour out on the North Carolina pine needles, put the last batch of stuff in the car, and headed north.  It was a fairly easy trip:  the road construction that I encountered was very early in the morning when the traffic was light, and along the way, all of us drivers managed to avoid accidents.

I got to Columbia, South Carolina just after my grad school friend got home from teaching her morning classes.  During the last few hours of my trip, the public radio station in South Carolina had broadcast messages about various state offices closing early, the message brought to us by the department of emergency preparedness at the governor's office.  How strange, I thought.  I visualized a map of South Carolina, wondering if the counties were near each other, and the answer was yes and no, as the announcement broadened the number of counties.

My friend had had students leave her class early because their children's schools were being let out early because of possible thunderstorms.  We shook our head at this modern life.  I looked at the skies and brought my overnight bag in, along with my computer.  About a half hour later, the skies opened up, and I was glad I did.  There was a crack or 2 of thunder, but we didn't think much about it.  It was cozy to eat soup and sandwiches assembled on sourdough bread while the rain poured down.

Later in the afternoon, the tornado watches were elevated to a warning.  Again we looked at the skies and the maps.  We thought we were out of range, but we made a plan, just in case.  We talked about what would happen if we went to the room below ground, and a tornado came.  Would the house be lifted off of us?  Would it collapse down on us?

Happily, we never had to find out.  I am aware that others were not that lucky.  All the way up I 95 I heard the horrible reports out of Ukraine--so much death and destruction.  And this morning, I'm reading about the destruction wrought by tornados across the very route that I drove on Tuesday.

On Tuesday, I had other thoughts as I drove up I 95.  The last time I drove up I 95 was in January, when I went up to LTSS to finish my certificate in spiritual direction.  Back then, I still owned a house in a flood zone in South Florida, although I was hopeful that we would actually close on selling it the following week (we did).  Back in January, I was still employed in my full-time job, and I was beginning the think about whether or not I should sign up for online seminary classes since it looked like my job would not continue.  Six weeks later, I had been severed from that job and signed up for a mix of online and onground classes, and I've submitted a request for on campus housing.  When I last drove north on I 95 in January, there were rumblings of war in eastern Europe, and as I drove up on Tuesday, there were rumblings of war crimes and news of utter devastation.

On Wednesday, we had a leisurely morning, and then I got back in the car to finish my trip to Lutheridge.  My month of retreats continues!  Here I am at Quilt Camp.  I last attended in October of 2020, the first large-ish gathering I attended since the pandemic started.  Back then, we didn't have vaccines, but I felt safe-ish because there were only 13 of us, we had open windows and high ceilings, and we were able to be as distanced as we wanted.  We were in the dining hall because a local elementary school group was using the Faith Center for school.

And now, here we are; I have had 4 vaccine shots, so I feel fairly safe.  We are in the Faith Center, which has much better lighting.  As I overheard conversations, I am struck by how many of us have gone through life-changing stuff in the past year or two--some of it in a good way, some not.  Would we have gone through the life-changing stuff if there had been no pandemic?  I have no idea.   I can only speak for myself--the pandemic reminded me that I may not have as many decades left on this planet as I want to believe that I do.  But other elements came together too--I found my dream program at Wesley Theological Seminary, and if that hadn't happened, I don't know that I would have decided that now is the time to go to seminary.

It has been wonderful to be able to travel--I was able to do my Tuesday night class, my Wednesday night small group session, and my Wednesday night class from a distance.  Tonight's class has been cancelled.  If my professor had to cancel a class, I'm glad it was this week.

It's strange to think that last week, I joined my Thursday night class saying that I had gotten a 2nd booster shot and was starting to feel chills, so if I shivered, just ignore it.  We had a brief, pre-class, discussion about booster shots and travel, and then my professor headed off to London for a conference.  And now, she's cancelling class.

As I said, I'm happy to have extra time for other pressing tasks--that might be a funnier pun if I ironed.  But it's hard not to wonder what's barreling our way that we are not seeing.  But let me not allow my brain to go down that path.  I am trying to live in this current moment, surrounded by cloth, friends, and the mountains.

Meditation on This Sunday's Gospel

 The readings for Sunday, May 1, 2022:

First Reading: Acts 9:1-6 [7-20]

Psalm: Psalm 30

Second Reading: Revelation 5:11-14

Gospel: John 21:1-19

Here we have another mystical encounter with the risen Christ. Notice that it's mystical and yet grounded in earthiness. Jesus makes a barbecue breakfast, and Simon Peter gets wet. It's mystical, yet rooted in second chances. It's mystical and yet a bit whimsical too. The men have fished all night and caught nothing. What does Jesus cook for breakfast? Fish.

This Gospel reading also has a lovely symmetry. It ends the ministry of Jesus in the way that it began, on the shore, with Jesus calling his disciples to mission. This Gospel story gives Peter a chance to redeem himself. He declares his love for Jesus three times, just the way he had previously denied Jesus three times.

The Gospel reading for Sunday reminds us of some of the essential messages Jesus gave us. We are to let down our nets, again and again, even when we have fished all night and caught nothing. Our rational brains would protest, "What's the point? We know there are no fish!" But Christ tells us to try again.

Even when we can't see the results, even when our nets are empty, there might be activity going on beneath the surfaces, in the deep depths of creation, where our senses can't perceive any action. We might need to repeat our actions, despite our being sure that it will be useless. We aren't allowed to give up. We aren't allowed to say, "Well, I tried. Nothing going on here. I'm going to return to the solitude of my room and not engage in the world anymore." No, we cast our nets again and again.

What do those nets represent? What do the fish represent? The answers will be different for each of us. For some of us, casting our nets might be our efforts at community building. For some of us, casting our nets might be our efforts to reach the unchurched. For some of us, we cast our nets into the depths of a creative process. We cast again and again, because we can't be sure of what we'll catch. Some days and years, we'll drag empty nets back to the shore. Some days and years, we'll catch more fish than we can handle.

The Gospel also reminds us that we're redeemable. I love the story of Jesus and Peter. Peter would have reason to expect that Jesus would be mad at him. But Jesus doesn't reject him. Jesus gives him an opportunity to affirm what he had denied in the past.

Jesus gives Peter a mission, and this mission is our mission: "Feed my sheep." There are plenty of sheep that need feeding and tending. We have our work cut out for us.

This Gospel shows us the way that it can all be done: we must work together, and we must take time to nourish ourselves. The men work together all night, and in the end, Jesus makes them a meal. Think about how much of Jesus' mission involved a meal. Jesus didn't just tend to the souls of those around him. He fed them, with real food. In doing so, he fed their souls and renewed his own ability to keep healing the world.

We must do the same.

Meditation on This Sunday's Gospel

The readings for Palm Sunday, April 10, 2022:

Liturgy of the Palms 

Psalm
Psalm 118:1-2, 19-29
Gospel
Luke 19:28-40

Liturgy of the Passion 
First reading
Isaiah 50:4-9a
Psalm
Psalm 31:9-16
Second reading
Philippians 2:5-11
Gospel
Luke 22:14-23:56 or Luke 23:1-49


Those of us who have been going to church for awhile have heard these stories dozens of times. If we go to many or all of the Holy Week services, we'll hear these stories again and again this week. As we enter Holy Week, how can we hear them differently?

This year, what would happen if we imagined these stories from the perspective of a variety of characters? I imagine that many of us hear these stories and imagine ourselves one of the disciples. But what if we told the story through the view of the palms? What if we thought about the donkey's perspective? The poet Mary Oliver did just that in "The Poet Thinks About the Donkey," a poem that you can find here: https://predmore.blogspot.com/2016/03/poem-poet-thinks-about-donkey-by-mary.html.

The journey that takes us from Palm Sunday to Good Friday offers us some serious reminders. If we put our faith in the world, we're doomed. If we get our glory from the acclaim of the secular world, we'll find ourselves rejected sooner, rather than later.

Right now, we live in a larger culture that prefers crucifixion to redemption. For some of us, we see a brutal world that embraces crucifixion: no second chances, perhaps no first chances.  The world hurls a new disease at us while reminding us of old fears, like nuclear weapons.

The Palm/Passion Sunday readings remind us that the world has always been this way, although the particulars change. Jesus and the disciples lived in an empire far more brutal than the ones that Northern Hemisphere, western culture Christians inhabit. We may find comfort in our smaller communities, but we are called to live in ways that will likely bring us into some sort of conflict with the larger culture.

We may not end up hanging on a cross, but we may be among those weeping at the foot of the cross. We may have seen this ending coming, as we have watched our loved ones headed towards an ending that might have been avoidable. We may find ourselves asking, weeping, lamenting: "Is there no other way?"

We know that the story doesn't end on Good Friday. We know that God will make a way when humans cannot see a way. We know that God promises resurrection, even when we can only see ruin every direction we look.

We worship a God who has been working through time and outside of time to transform this human condition. We don't always see it, but Easter assures us that the process is in place and that resurrection will break through, even in the most unlikely circumstances.

Return from Luther Springs

 In some ways, it seems silly to write yet another blog post about the retreat.  Do I really have that much left to say?  I realize I haven't yet included much in the way of pictures when I've written about the retreat.  This morning, as I looked over my pictures, I wondered if any of them merited this final blog post about the retreat.  Yes, I realize this prewriting period has much to say about the mental space where I spend too much time for my own good:  is it worth it, any of it?

I'm also worried about the washing machine.  I put clothes in awhile ago, and it didn't seem to be moving through the cycles properly.  Now I've moved the dial to the spin cycle, and I'm realizing that I don't know how long the machine usually takes in the spin cycle.  Grr.  Yes--another glimpse of my mental space that seems far too common.

One of my church friends posted her retreat pictures, and I felt bad that I didn't take more walks along the sandy paths, that I didn't explore the grounds more in the one or two hours when it wasn't raining.  Her pictures made me realize that there were some cool places that I didn't even realize were there.  Why didn't I go and find out for myself?  Again, this head space is familiar, and unhelpful.

Let me try to write myself back into a righter frame of mind.  Let me remember that one reason that I didn't want to leave my room was because it was cozy to be there during a rainy day.  Let me remember all the handmade quilts on all the beds in every room.  Here's mine:

Let me remember doing various arts and crafts projects in the room with the windows open so that we could hear the thunder and rain.

Let me remember the sand mandela that I made, and how easy this project would be to do with a bowl of sand and objects found on a walk:

Let me remember that even when it's too rainy for a regular campfire, you can create one with a string of lights and colored paper:

And then you can sing around it:

But most of all let me remember the friends that brought me along with them:

Last Sunday in Lent, First Sunday of Passiontide

This Sunday is the fifth Sunday in Lent.  We could think of it as the last Sunday of Lent, since Holy Week is a different time in the calendar of the church.  An older way of thinking about this day is that this Sunday begins Passiontide, the two weeks before Easter.  Next Sunday is Palm Sunday, which will mark a different season, that time when we travel with Jesus from the praise of Palm Sunday, to the last encounters with disciples before the crucifixion to the crucifixion itself to the tomb to resurrection.

But before we get to Palm Sunday and the increased pace that it portends, there is time to stay with the austerity of Lent a bit longer.  If we have abandoned our Lenten discipline, we could return to it for this first week of Passiontide.

It is also part of an older tradition to mark the 5th Sunday of Lent as Passion Sunday.  These days, many of us will compress much of crucifixion part of the story into one day.  Many churches go directly from palms to passion on Palm Sunday, since so many of us can't get back to church for Good Friday.

We could use this time between the 5th Sunday of Lent and the Saturday before Easter to focus our attention on the passion of Christ.  We could take each day and focus on a station of the cross.  You can find a traditional version here  The Episcopal church has put together a resource that ties the suffering of Jesus to current issues, which you can find here. Or maybe we want to focus on the seven last words of Christ from the cross.

Our Easter will be richer if we spend time thinking about what Jesus suffered--and we might want to think about why he suffered.  Crucifixion was a punishment reserved for those who were seen as an enemy of the state, the highest threat to the governing empire of Rome.  Jesus wasn't stoned or beheaded, other types of capital punishment of the time.  What part of the message of Jesus and his life so threatened Rome?  How does the message of love so upset the established order?

And how can we be that love in the world?  How can our lives be an incarnation of that love?

Is God the GPS or the Friend Who Gets Lost with You?

I am at Luther Springs for a women's retreat.  This month is a feast, if one believes in the feast or famine kind of dichotomy, a feast of retreats.  In terms of programming, we're using some pre-prepared curriculum, but I can't tell you which one because I left my booklet on the table in the group meeting area in the chapel.  It's the kind of curriculum that leaves me a bit tired, but not because it's intellectually demanding.

In past years, I might have decided to skip the group work, but this year I'll stick with it, at least for a bit.  After all, I'm training to be a pastor, so it's good to see this side of church life.  And I do understand why people use this kind of curriculum.  It's similar to those VBS-in-a-box kind of deals, and for those of us who don't have time to create VBS or retreats from scratch, I get it.

For those of you wondering why I'm being circumspectly negative, I'll offer this example.  We had a story last night to go with the "Return to the Lord your God" passage of Joel (Joel 2:  13).  It was a story about people in a car, getting lost, ignoring what the GPS says, the road going from paved to cobblestones and finally almost into the Mississippi River.  If only they had listened to the calls of the GPS that told them turn around!

In our small group, we talked about the language of repenting and returning.  We talked about God as the perfect parent--I added "Or partner."  One of the group leaders joined our small group and talked about how God has the one right way, and when she can align herself to it, things always go better.  We talked more about the ways we fall away from all the ways we should be living, all the actions we should be doing--in other words, all the reasons why we should repent.

I became more and more uneasy with this idea that there's one right way, and it's so hard for us to follow it.  But I wanted to respond pastorally, not combatively.  I thought back to the story.  I asked, "But what if God isn't the GPS system?  What if God is the friend in the car, going with us to the unexpected places, saying 'OK, if you want to head to the Mississippi River, we'll go there together.  Let's explore what that would look like.'"

My small group liked that idea.  The group leader said, "You know, I once went to a spiritual director.  When I asked what God wanted me to do, he said, 'What do you want to do?  I think God would want to know what your heart's desire is."  We talked a bit about that idea, that there are many ways to find God, not just the one path that proves so difficult for so many of us.

I'll be interested to take Church History classes in seminary next year.  So many of us have so many strange ideas about God, and I'd like to know how these ideas evolved.  I know it solved someone's purpose to focus on texts that tell us that humans are sinful creatures with much work to do before we can be pleasing to God.

And I know that most believers are not going to let go of those ideas easily.  We like the idea of a God who tells us that we're going the wrong way.  We like our GPS God.  A God who gets lost with us--that's a tougher sale, and I get that.

But to me, it's a much more compelling metaphor.

Retreat Month Begins

Today begins my month of retreats--no, that's not an April Fool's sentence.  When I was severed from my job in early February, I thought, great, I can go to both the quilt retreat and Create in Me at Lutheridge in April.  I had wanted to do that, but I didn't have enough vacation saved up, and I was strategizing.

A few weeks ago, one of my church friends asked me if I had considered going with them to the women's retreat, God Spa, at a different church camp, Luther Springs.  I asked her when it was--in the past, that retreat date has often conflicted with Create in Me.  But this year, it didn't.  

It will make for heavy travel times.  I get back from God Spa on Sunday, and then on Tuesday I head out again to go to Quilt Camp.  I get back home for Holy Week, and then leave the following week for Create in Me.  I'll need to take my computer with me and do some seminary work, but that's the beauty of my seminary schedule right now.  If I've got an internet connection, I can do it from anywhere.

I want to go to God Spa for several reasons.  The main one is because I got an invitation.  I'm also happy to have some time with church friends.  I am moving to DC in August, so I won't have these opportunities often again.

I also want to see Luther Springs again.  They've done lots of building since I was there last in 2015.  I've donated money.  I want to see what they've done with the place.

And I want to do this because I'm unlikely to have this space of open time again.  I want to take the sorrow of being severed from my job and turn it into good memories.