Choices: 50 Years of Women's Ordination in the Lutheran Church

Yesterday was the 50th anniversary of ordination of women in the Lutheran church.  I loved watching Facebook explode with pictures of those 50 years of women's ordained ministry.  It reminds me of how radical change is possible.

People who have grown up surrounded by female clergy may be surprised to hear how once it was assumed that women shouldn't be ordained.  People who have grown up surrounded by female clergy may be surprised to hear their stories about the obstacles faced by those pioneering women who were the first to be allowed to answer their call into rostered ministry.

Yesterday was also a day that the Supreme Court struck down a Louisiana law that made abortions all but impossible.  I wrote this comment on a friend's Facebook comment:   "I am as unable to predict Supreme Court rulings as I am the results of U.S. elections. This time, I'm happy to be wrong in my predictions."

The idea of abortion still makes me feel queasy, but that's partly about the cheapening of life that I see all around me.  It's partly about medical procedures in general.  It's partly about how invasive it all feels. 

I do believe that if a woman can't take care of a child, an abortion may be the less bad choice of a lot of bad choices.  I do wonder what future scholars will make of these choices that we claimed for ourselves, to the exception of all the other types of choices we might have demanded.

It won't just be in the area of abortion and reproductive care, of course.  We will think about all the women pastors who never could become senior pastor because of entrenched ideas about gender and jobs.  I suspect a hard time is coming for parents, and that the burden will fall disproportionately on women as we try to figure out how to provide care for children when we can't send them to public schools the ways we have for the past 2 centuries.

It will likely be interesting to see how we frame these questions of choice in this current century.

Drive Through Communion

Yesterday, I was the person in charge of drive through communion, so that my pastor could get a brief vacation.  My pastor left pre-consecrated wafers in individual plastic bags, along with plastic cups of wine.  I followed his approach.  Here's how it worked:

A car pulled up, and with the driver watching, I put hand sanitizer on my hands.  I handed the person a wafer and asked if they preferred wine or grape juice.  I went back and got the cup for them, instead of bringing the tray of cups to the car.  The empty wine cup could go into the empty wafer bag.

I then said a form of this blessing:  "May the Lord bless you and keep you.  May the Lord's face smile on you and be gracious to you.  May the Lord look upon you with favor and grant you peace."

We had about 20 people during the 2 hours.  My spouse practiced his violin and took care of the money counting duties.  I had plenty of time to read the next book on my reading list for my spiritual direction certificate program.  It was a pleasant way to spend the time.

I was surprised by how happy I was to see everyone, even when I didn't recognize them; many of them wore masks, which made it hard for me to tell who they were.  Each car of people seemed profoundly happy to receive the sacrament and the blessing.

And I was profoundly happy to be doing it, even though it was a bit odd.  By the end of the day, I couldn't get the smell of hand sanitizer off of my hands, but even that was O.K. (I do not like the smell of any hand sanitizer that I've tried).

I've always thought that one of the things I would like best about being a pastor would be the weekly communion duties.  Even with drive through communion, I still think so.

Fifth Visit to the Spiritual Director

On Friday, I went to my fifth appointment with my spiritual director.  We began, as we always do, with some prayer.  On Friday, she used a prayer out of one of her prayer books, and then we launched into discussion.

We talked about our general anxiety about the time we're living in:  pandemic, politics, economics, such an uncertain future.  We talked about our different churches' approaches.  Her is opening slowly with people spaced far apart and not singing.  Mine is staying virtual until at least Labor Day.

We then talked about my specific anxieties about keeping people safe, even as I realize I can't keep people safe.  We talked about ways to return to a centered space, a grounded consciousness, throughout the day, even if I can't take specific prayer breaks a la the liturgy of the hours.  Perhaps I could take a word from my morning watch to meditate on through the day.  Perhaps I could do something specific during breaks when I try to get away from my computer screen and get some steps in.  We talked about having a short mantra and having each step correspond to a specific word--a slow, meditative approach to walking.

We also tried to get to the root of my feeling responsible for everyone's safety.  Was that rooted in childhood?  Not that I could see.  Some specific trauma?  None that seems a particular triggering episode.

We talked about how it's important to give grown people their agency in their responsibility to keep themselves safe--and we acknowledged how hard this is.

Now these ideas are not new to me--not at all.  I feel it may be my life's task to try to reign in my anxiety, to try to be more Zen Kristin and not Control Freak Kristin.  I make a bit of progress, have a bit of set back, zig, zag, zig.

We did some talking about safe spaces and about creating more spaces that feel comforting.  I didn't talk about my underlying weariness of years of home repair that still aren't finished, but I did want to record that idea here too.  My spouse and I had been talking about my parents being here in December and how we'd like the house to look more finished.

Because it's spiritual direction, not psychotherapy, we talked about where we see God in it all, what God would say to us.  I don't believe in a God that comes in with a magic wand or a magic word to get rid of all of the consequences of our bad decisions and bad behaviors.  But I do believe in a God who is walking beside us, sharing ideas for better living, rooting for us, and cheering us on.

We closed with prayer, and I was on my way.  So far, I feel refreshed after each session, but it's more than that.  After each session, I feel like I do after a great yoga session--realigned in important ways.  Each session gives me important reminders and spiritual tools to try.

It's important work we're doing.  I hope we can continue to do it.

A Weird, Warm Sky

This morning, I finished a sketch I'd been working on since Tuesday:

I wasn't sure that I was going to color in the sky at all.  In fact, yesterday morning, I thought I might be done, that I might leave the sketch this way:

But last night, I was trying to stay awake past 7:30, so I decided to start filling in the sky with color.  I started to lose the stars, so I tried accentuating them with some thin lines of cranberry color.

Here's the haiku-like piece that I wrote on the second day of sketching:

Stars in a cold sky
Mend the torn butterfly wings
Underground railroad

In the finished piece, I'm no longer sure that the sky looks cold.  It's got a weird, warmer energy--but I like it.

I really enjoyed working on this sketch, seeing what colors emerged and submerged as I added more layers of color.

Subconscious at Work and at Dreaming

I've been working on this sketch all week:

Here's the haiku-like piece that I wrote on the second day of sketching:

Stars in a cold sky
Mend the torn butterfly wings
Underground railroad

At first these 3 lines don't seem to go together at all.  But as I've been thinking about them, I've been sensing connections.

Clearly, my subconscious is working on various connections that I don't readily see as I move from task to task.

This morning, I made this Facebook post:  "I had my first dream that had me worrying about close proximity and COVID-19 transmission. In my dream, we were packed in a Lutheran church for a high festival day. I was admiring the fabrics in everyone's stoles and the banners and light streamed through stunning stained glass. And then I realized we were packed into the pews and had been for hours and no one was wearing a mask. It doesn't take a trained psychologist to analyze the anxiety aspect of the dream--but in a church on a high festival day with beautiful fabrics all around me? Really, dreaming brain, really?"

I've spent the morning thinking about this dream, thinking about the reasons why I'm having a COVID-19 anxiety dream set in a church, especially when my local church will not be gathering in person until after Labor Day, if then.

We know that churches packed with people do pose a unique danger with this virus.  But it seems that maybe this dream is doing more.  Maybe it's a dream of mourning and lament, for all that has been lost.  Or maybe it's a dream about possible futures that seem out of reach right now.

My subconscious is at work--I'm not sure I can handle what it's realizing.

Meditation on this Week's Gospel

The readings for Sunday, June 28, 2020:

First Reading (Semi-cont.): Genesis 22:1-14


Psalm: Psalm 89:1-4, 15-18


Psalm (Semi-cont.): Psalm 13


Second Reading: Romans 6:12-23


Gospel: Matthew 10:40-42


This week's Gospel reading has the flavor of the theme that Jesus develops more thoroughly in the 25th chapter of Matthew--that reading where Jesus reminds us that as we treat the least of our fellow humans, that is how we treat Jesus. This tiny Gospel reading reminds us of some of the themes Jesus returns to again and again: stay alert and watchful. Treat everyone as if they're God in disguise. Keep our Christian priorities always in the front of our vision, so that we know what's important.

If I wrote a modern paraphrase, I might say something like this: Why do you swoon over supermodels and superathletes? What good do they bring into the troubled world? Why are you not searching out the words of the wise ones among you? Why do you neglect your duties to the next generation?

When I was younger and not surrounded by multiple types of media, it seemed easier to ignore the siren calls of the larger world. I remember a world before cable TV: we had four channels, and when we lived in Montgomery, Alabama, we could sometimes see a snowy version of one of Ted Turner's superchannels out of Atlanta. Little did we know that we were seeing what would become one of the cornerstones of the cable world. Even in the early days of cable, one's viewing options only expanded to 10-40 channels, and then, as now, half of those were just dreadful creations formed to take advantage of cheap airwaves.

At graduation a few years ago, I listened in shock as our graduation speaker told the graduates that there was no Internet 15 years ago. Of course there was. But there wasn't a widespread World Wide Web, so the medium was text based and not as user friendly. Unless we were at a university dedicated to the technology, it was slow and clunky. Therefore, we weren't as prone to let it suck away our lives.

Now we're surrounded by electronic information, media, and gadgets. Of course, in some ways, it's invaluable. It's much easier to research any subject from the comfort of my computer--unlike the old days, when I'd have to go to a library. It's easier to keep in touch and communicate, at least for those of us plugged in. I've often wondered if Christian communities online can be as valuable--even more valuable--in terms of keeping each other centered, grounded and on track. Are we headed towards virtual communion? Is that possible? What would it look like?

But of course, I wouldn't be the first to point out all the ways the technology can lead us astray. We spend our days dealing with e-mail instead of doing real work. In our quest to be connected, we often let our connections in the real, human world slide.

The Gospel for today reminds us that there are rewards for righteous living. Traditionally, Christian communities (at least in the last 300 years) have translated those rewards as coming in the afterlife. But we shouldn't overlook that righteous, connected living has rewards for us in our lives right here and now. We will be able to recognize the prophets and disciples that Jesus promises to send. We will be able to discern the presence of the Holy Spirit. We will not neglect our duties to the young and disadvantaged. We will drink from the streams of living water and be able to know what nourishes us and what saps our strength.

The Feast Day of John the Baptist

Some months, I’m in the mood for John the Baptist. I’m ready to go into the wilderness. I’ve got a file of recipes for locusts and wild honey. I’m in a daring mood—I’ll speak truth to the King Herods of the world, even if it means my head on a platter.

But much of the time, when John the Baptist shows up in the lectionary or when we celebrate his feast day on June 24 or when we talk about prophets in general, I’m weary. Most of the time, I'm tired of having prophets like John the Baptist call me part of a brood of vipers or comparing me to shrubbery that refuses to behave.

I know, I know, I have all these faults. Don't threaten me with that ax. I try so hard to bear good fruit, but I'm afraid it isn't enough. I'm surrounded by people who are clearly in a more crabby mood than I am, and I'm trying to be sympathetic, but it's hard. This attempt of mine to transform myself into a compassionate person is taking longer than I thought it would. I see people at work having meltdowns, and my response is to hide under my desk, metaphorically, although there are days that the thought of literally curling up under my desk is almost irresistible. I don't go to them to say, "What can I do to help you through this painful time?"

But let me return to the mission of the prophets. God does not send prophets because we’re all already damned. God sends prophets to call us back to the path we should be travelling.

On this day in June when we celebrate John the Baptist, it’s good to be reminded that I'm not my final, improved version of myself. I still have work to do. And I need to hear that message that the prophets bring us. I'm lazy and inclined to coast, and it's good to know that God has a vision for me that is vaster than any I could dream myself.

It’s also good to remind ourselves of who we are. I like the passages when John the Baptist is questioned about his identity. He says, “I am not the Messiah” (John 1:20). He could have hoodwinked people who were willing to believe he was the Messiah. He could have made a power grab. He could have gotten great wealth and women and audiences with powerful rulers.

Those temptations have led more than one religious leader astray.

But John knows who he is. He is not the Messiah. He has been sent to point the way to salvation, not to provide it.

Likewise, we are not called to be the Messiah, That doesn't mean we’re off the hook in terms of behavior. We can't say, "I am not the Messiah," and stay home on our sofas. We can’t decide to watch reruns of The Simpsons and do nothing about injustice in the world.

No, John the Baptist reminds us that we are called to emulate Jesus. Some days, though, I’d rather emulate somebody else. I’m so tired of working so hard to be a light to this fallen world.

When I feel that way, I need to listen to the words of John the Baptist again. I need to listen to God, who often calls to us from the wilderness. Most of us need to be reminded to listen to that call that God makes. Let the words fill our hearts with hope: "The crooked shall be made straight, and the rough ways shall be made smooth; and all flesh shall see the salvation of God." (Luke 3: 5-6). Our salvation is at hand: our grieving hearts will be comforted, our anger and irritation will lift, the planet will heal itself as it always does, God will take care of us and everything we need is on its way, even if we’re not ready for deserts and locusts in our dedication.

The Big Decision: When to Assemble Non-Virtually

Our synod has just released guidelines for re-opening.  Just reading the 2 page letter exhausted me a bit.

It talks about keeping the AC running, but propping doors open.  It talks about all the materials that need to be removed from sanctuaries:  hymnbooks, bibles, bulletins.  It talks about the sanitizing that should be done, and the need for ushers to remind people to stay spaced apart.  It talks about what not to do, like singing and speaking loudly and passing the peace.  It even talks about plastic partitions to keep the minister and congregation safe from each other.

We won't need to worry about any of it any time soon.  We are not in phase 3 of re-opening.  I'm not even sure we're in phase 2 down here at the southeast tip of the state.  The Synod also recommends not re-opening until we've had 14 consecutive days of decreasing caseload.  Right now, we have just the opposite--each day sets a new record of cases.

As we drove home from church yesterday, the church where 8 of us gathered to assist with the livestream, I noticed a church with a full parking lot.  I wondered why they decided to start meeting in person again.  I wondered if they're spaced out inside the sanctuary--the parking lot looked fairly full for a church that looked somewhat small.

My church has decided that we don't see any benefits to assembling in person:  we can't sing, we can't have coffee hour, we can't pass the peace, we'd have to stay spaced out.  Staying with our virtual, livestreamed service might be a better worship experience, especially since we're not deciding between virtual and the way church used to be.  We can't do it that way right now, although I am sure some churches will ignore prudent advice.

Happily, from what I can see, our pastor, the larger synod leadership, our local leadership, and our parishioners are all in agreement.  I know that not every church is so lucky.

God and Father's Day

It's Father's Day, and I have parenting, metaphors, and God on the brain. I come from a religious tradition that emphasizes God as Father more than any other metaphor I've encountered, although that situation has been changing during the last 40 years. I've often found it irritating, even though my own experiences with fathers have been overwhelmingly positive.

I know how lucky I am to have emerged from an intact family, to have a mom and a dad who continue to love each other, and continue to love my sister and me. I grew up in the 1970's and saw plenty of wrecked families. I've always wondered how people who come out of those wrecked families, especially those with absent or abusive fathers, react to the idea of God as a Father.

I would argue that much of the damaged theology that we see comes from this idea of God as Father, in all the negative ways that metaphor can include. God as the Judge Father, God as the Punishing Father, God as the Distant Father--I am lucky to have found a church that doesn't talk about God as a withholding father who always evaluates us and always finds us wanting, but that theology is never very far from many of us. It's what keeps many people away from church, I suspect.

Even though I have a good relationship with both of my parents, I'm not crazy about the idea of God as Parent of either gender. I think that God as Parent is an infantilizing metaphor. If God is a Dad--or so much more rarely, a Mom--then it follows that we're children, and too often, we see that as a reason for inactivity. But God needs us to be active in the world. I'd go further and say that God is counting on us. I much prefer the idea of God as partner. God can be the Senior partner; I'm cool with that.

How would our relationship with God change if we saw God not as a parent, but as a wise elder? I know that even at my current age of almost 55, I need more people in my life who can keep sight of the larger perspective. I need a God of a grander vision, a God who can remind me of what's important, a God who directs my eyes to the larger horizon.

Today I shall pray for that God to come to us. We live in a landscape more increasingly wrecked by poisonous models of caretaking; I'm thinking primarily of the fractured political world we inhabit, whether we want to or not. On this day, during weeks of hearing about horrific police brutality, it's clear to me that we need a different model of how to be male in the world.

Happily, most fathers I know these days are different. They're much more involved in their children's lives, regardless of the age. They change diapers, they braid hair, they fix lunches, they teach children the skills they will need, and they help older children find their way in the world. God, too, cares for us that way. And we are called to care for each other similarly too.

Let us do so today--and every day.

Liberation Narratives: Juneteenth

Before today, Juneteenth may have been a holiday that flew under the radar of most of us.  It may seem fairly obscure, to celebrate a day when the last U.S. slaves heard that they were emancipated (June 19, 1865).  Why not celebrate the day that the Emancipation Proclamation was signed (Jan. 1, 1863)?  Why not some other day?

Or maybe we should have lots of days to celebrate freedom.  If so, yesterday might become one of them--when I saw the news of the Supreme Court's DACA decision come across my Twitter feed, I doublechecked with various news sources, just to be sure.  I couldn't believe it would be true.

Now I realize that it's not a final protection.  I realize that the Supreme Court didn't say that DACA recipients can stay forever; it didn't grant them citizenship.  The ruling said that the Trump administration didn't approach the case properly.  As Linda Holmes tweeted:  "Another big day for Administrative Law, aka That Class That Sounds Very Boring But Moves The Earth."

But this week has been a great week for Supreme Court decisions, for those of us who want to see more protections for people who have been in the margins, for people who have been oppressed.  And now, another chance to celebrate:  Juneteenth today!

Of course, the issues of slavery haven't gone away.  In many ways, we have more slavery now than we did during the pre-Civil War time.  I think of sex trafficking when I say that, and all sorts of people working in agricultural industries.

And of course, there are all the institutions which enslave us, prisons who hold so many, some of them legally and some of them held illegally.  And so many addictions hold us in shackles. 

If I think about patterns of thought, I could quickly make the assertion that all of us are held in some sort of slavery.

So on this Juneteenth, let us think about the captives who need our help to be set free.  Let us also think about all the captivity narratives that hold us enslaved.  Let us embrace liberation narratives.  Let us envision what life would look like if all were truly free.

A Blessing for Your Thursday: Softening Our Hard Hearts towards a Place of Compassion

When I close the broadcast of Morning Watch each day, I give a sort of benediction.  Some days it's more like words of encouragement.  Some days, it's more like prayer.  Some days, I repeat what I often say ("God is with us, cheering us on, walking beside us, going up ahead to clear a way for us, etc.).  Some days, something new breaks through.

I often wish later that I had written down what I said, because as the days go by and the recordings mount, it's hard to remember which days were the ones that felt profound.  There's only been a time or two where I turned the last words of Morning Watch into a post of any kind, but I know that there have been more times that felt more profound.

This morning was one of those days.  I talked about our hard hearts cracking open, and I heard that language which feels so violent, in these days of so much violence.

I said, "Let us pray that God who has said even the hardest heart can be melted, can be split open.  Let us pray in these days, that all of our hard heart places are cracked open just a little bit, or a lot.  Let us pray that the cracking open of these hardened hearts is not too painful a process, but instead a softening process."

I then went on to talk about hard hearts softening towards a place of compassion where we can all make better decisions.

Here was my final blessing:

"Move your hard heart places towards softening; see what you can approach from a spirit of compassion.  This the only way, or at least one of a few ways to make the world truly better.  That's what I wish for us all, a better world.  Let's begin to create it today!"

Meditation on This Sunday's Gospel

The readings for Sunday, June 21, 2020:

Genesis 21:8-21

Psalm 86:1-10, 16-17

 
Romans 6:1b-11

Matthew 10:24-39

As we look at the teachings of Christ, a central theme emerges. Fear is at the root of all that keeps us from God.  In this teaching, Jesus again gives us both warnings of what is coming and reminders to be of good cheer.

Again and again, Jesus yokes his teachings of what will be required with the admonition to have no fear. Here, Jesus tells us that God knows about the least little sparrow--and we're worth more than sparrows. The wisdom of the Holy Spirit invites us to new life, not to paralyzing fear. Jesus tells us that even sparrows are nurtured in God's economy. God will take care of us too.

I love this vision of God who knows me from the individual hairs of my head to the rough soles of my feet. I love this vision of God who helps me travel through the dangerous parts of the world. I want to believe that I am worth more than sparrows, and I want to believe that in God's economy, sparrows are worth more than two pennies.

But again, Jesus warns us that we can't stop with that vision. This is a God who keeps watch so that we can do the transformational work that must be done. It is work that is likely to take us to threatening places where we may have to oppose the dominant power structure. We may find ourselves crucified, in every sense of that word.

As I write this meditation, I'm thinking of our current time, which seems like a hinge point of history in so many ways.  We have more people marching for justice than we've had in years if not decades.  We have a pandemic sweeping across the planet.  In so many ways, so many of us are asking the important questions about what society we currently have and how to make the changes to have the society where we want to live. 

Again and again, Jesus asks if we're willing to pay the price. Again and again, Jesus offers the promise that we find at the end of this Sunday's Gospel: if we quit our obsessive clinging to those elements that we think give us life, we may indeed find true life.

We find ourselves in a time period where many of us have stopped clinging to those parts of society that diminish and demean us.  May we have the courage to move towards what will nourish us and to demand that nourishment for all of us.

June, the Month of Unexpected Supreme Court Decisions

Ah, the month of June, the month when the Supreme Court releases the last decisions for the season, decisions which are bound to surprise someone.  Yesterday we got two of those decisions.

The one that captured the national conversation yesterday and likely today is the one that rules that LGBTQ workers are protected by federal law.  Wow.  I predict that when historians look back on the great Civil Rights decisions, this one will be much higher on the list than the marriage decision from a different June in this decade (2015 to be precise).

As many people have pointed out, the ruling yesterday will have much further reaching impact than the marriage ruling.  Very few of us make it through a whole lifetime without working; marriage rates, on the other hand, are declining.

And it may have further reaching impacts, in terms of how other laws are likely to be interpreted.  If we can't discriminate based on this broader definition of gender in employment, the court is likely to also find that we can't discriminate in housing or health care or other issues that quickly become ones of life or death.

A less heralded decision yesterday also caught my attention:  the Supreme Court declined to revisit a lower court decision that upheld a law that the Trump administration sought to overturn: a California sanctuary law that limits local police cooperation with federal immigration authorities.  Most news stories have covered the law enforcement aspect, which means that police departments don't have to comply with federal authorities in immigration issues unless there's a serious crime involved.

I immediately wondered what this means for churches.  Granted, very few of them are sheltering immigrants who may not have their immigration papers.  But I suspect this ruling gives those churches additional protection.

I know that there are Christians across the nation who will get some air time as they comment on these decisions.  I hope the depictions are balanced, but I'm fairly sure they won't be.  Most of my pastor friends are in favor of the decision that protects the rights of workers, regardless of gender, sexual identity, race, age, and other qualifiers.

Sadly, those are not the pastors who are likely to get air time in these divisive days.

Sketching to Mimic Mosaic

It's been a good season for sketching.  In part, it's because I took 2 online classes that featured journaling.  In part, it's because I've incorporated it into my morning watch practice.  This past week, I've really enjoyed working with more color; for my 2 online classes, we worked in grays, blacks, and one color that brought us joy.

I've really liked this sketch that I worked on for several days:

I tried to make it look a bit like mosaics as I colored in the areas between the dark blue lines.  I like the contrast between the tiny block shapes and the swirling lines.

I also really loved the richness of the colors and the way they worked together.  And I liked that it could be a descending dove or tongues of fire or a womb.

I also like remembering the state of calm that the sketching brought to me.  I'm really glad that I've incorporated it into my morning liturgy of the hours.

Transplants in a Time of Transmission

My Hindu writer friend lies in a hospital bed in Miami, but it's for a good reason.  On Friday, she got the call that a kidney was available.  Yesterday, doctors transplanted that kidney into her body.

She's been in desperate need of a kidney for many years now.  She's benefiting from a new rule that lets her get a kidney from someone who had Hepatitis C.  She'll be treated for that disease, and she'll have a kidney.  The payoffs are clear to me, and even clearer to her.

I hope that she's restored to full health, but I also know she'll need to be extra careful in these days of a new corona virus that's still ravaging the planet.  Almost all of my close friends down here in South Florida are self-isolating, and I am in full support.

I also realize that I am a potential vector, so even if they were open to being together, I'd have doubts about the wisdom of a gathering.  I'm out and about in the world, so I'd be the one bringing the disease to them.  I don't need that on my conscience; I already have quite enough that pierces me with agonizing guilt, thank you very much.

In a different time, I might be going down to Miami to see my friend, to bring her some books or flowers to brighten her hospital room.  I might be going down to keep her company, and I might be feeling guilt about not being able to go to see her each day, what with having to work and Miami traffic and all the things that keep me from being the stellar human I wish I could be.

So now I feel guilt about being glad that I don't have to feel that guilt.  The new world of COVID-19 means that I can't go see her as visitors are prohibited.  I know that she'll be fine in the hospital without visitors.  She's got electronic ways to connect, and she's lucid enough to be able to do that.

I'm glad that I don't have any non-lucid loved ones to worry about.  I know that these difficult times are even worse when loved ones can't understand what's going on.

Today I will add my friend to the prayer list at my Lutheran church.  Yes, I know she's Hindu, but I also know that she's happy to have us pray for her.  As she says, "The gods network."

I love her ecumenical approach.  I wish that more of us could be accepting in that way.

Measurement Metrics and the Morning Watch Broadcast on My Church's Facebook Page

I have been doing a morning watch devotional/meditative time for over two months now.  I did my first broadcast on March 30, and the format hasn't changed much.  I use Phyllis Tickle's The Divine Hours, and I read most of the morning selections out loud.  I do change the gendered references to God as much as I can.  I sketch for 5-7 minutes in silence.  I read the closing prayer which Tickle labels The Concluding Prayer of the Church.  I then give various benedictions, reminding people that God is with us and rooting for us and hoping that we'll help in the creation of the new/better world that God envisions for us.

Most days, no one tunes in as I broadcast live at 5:30 a.m. on my church's Facebook page.  I go back later in the day to see how many people tune in later.  Usually there are around 100 people reached, with 4-20 engagements.  I'm not exactly sure what those numbers mean, but I'm guessing that engagement means that people did more than scroll by it on their feed.

Yesterday I noticed that one of our church members was doing a watch party a few hours after the original broadcast.  As far as I know, that member had never viewed morning watch before, at least not as measured by a "like."  There are 4-6 regulars who hit "like" on a regular basis, 3-5 times a week.

Yesterday's morning watch had 78 views, 66 people reached, and 83 engagements--83 engagements!  It had more views and more engagements than any other one I've done.  It will be interesting to see if future broadcasts get the same kinds of numbers.

And here's another interesting aspect:  I usually link to the video on my own Facebook page, but yesterday I didn't.  I meant to link it, and I thought I did.  So the numbers are all from people who found the video on my church's Facebook page.

In a time that seems so long ago (2010 or so), it seemed like many people were monetizing all sorts of activities with just a bit of social media activity.  At the same time, I saw all sorts of articles that promised to show us how to interpret the metrics of effectiveness, how to improve, how to decide which activities to continue and which ones to abandon.

Those analytics would have had me abandon my morning watch weeks ago.  Those analytics would have told me that no one was watching and that there were no statistics to give me hope that anyone ever would.

I thought of that yesterday as I watched the parishioner's watch party.  If I had quit broadcasting in mid-April, she wouldn't have had the chance to discover it and invite her friends, some of them non-members, to watch.

I've been thinking of church metrics for a long time.  How do we measure membership?  How do we measure effectiveness?  Even as I've been thinking about these measurements, some part of me thinks that it's ridiculous.  We know that part of this can't ever be measured in the way that would make statisticians and people in charge happy.

If I had the job of director of distance programming, would my little morning watch program have been cut?  Would my boss have told me to do something that reached more people?

I'm happy to keep broadcasting.  It keeps me doing this practice.  And if a few people find it meaningful along with me, that's a bonus.  And if a lot of people eventually find their way to it, even better.

And if PBS starts a channel devoted to theological programming and asks me to be part, I'm game.  I'd love to be the Bob Ross of morning devotions.  I'd love to be the Oprah show on the channel devoted to theological programming.

What Would Love Do?: an Interview with Bishop Budde

If you want to listen to a nuanced and nourishing conversation about race, politics, and religion, I highly recommend this episode of Diane Rehm's podcast.  Diane Rehm, a practicing Episcopalian, has a wide reaching discussion with the Right Reverend Mariann Budde, who is the bishop of Washington, D.C.

She came into the consciousness of many of us when she took a stand against Donald Trump's publicity stunt at the Espiscopal church in Lafayette Square, where peaceful protestors were violently cleared out so that Trump could stand with a Bible in his hand.  I'm still not sure of the purpose of that Monday evening.

If you don't want the full conversation, the last 5.5 minutes are well worth your time.  I went back to look for a transcript, but finding none, I listened over and over so that I could capture some of her words:

She talks about resisting evil, as she calls it, The Evil One, who wants to keep us frozen in the knowledge that the problems are too big for one individual.  "I can't do everything.  That's not an excuse to do nothing."

She talks about following the model of Jesus who needed to feed thousands, which seemed impossible.  Jesus says, "What do you have?  You have some fish, you have some bread?  I can work with that."

She talks about the work of changing society for the better sometimes feels overwhelming, but we do the tasks that are ours to do.  "Will I show up for the moment?  And draw strength from the sources that are given to me, the wells of strength both spiritually and in community?"

It's important to show up, in whatever way we can, knowing that we can't all show up in the same way.  And we can't show up everywhere--we have to ask ourselves where we are being called to be.

Her last words made me weep at the hope it conveys, the comfort that we can indeed be good enough for our time.  She references Bishop Michael Curry who recommends that we  "ask ourselves, in this situation, What would love do?  What would the sacrificial love of God, that we as Christians see in Jesus, what would that love look like?  And then, go and do that.  Because if we ask that question, and we try to be faithful to it, we will, even if we stumble and fall, we'll be falling in the right direction, and the Spirit can pick us up and take our offering and help that offering strengthen what is good."

I love the idea that our mistakes aren't going to poison the well, that the Spirit can use our mistakes as well as our triumphs.  I say that all the time, but some part of my brain clearly doesn't believe it, if I weep when I hear a bishop affirm it.

Meditation on This Sunday's Gospel

The readings for Sunday, June 14, 2020:


First reading and Psalm

Genesis 18:1-15, (21:1-7)
Psalm 116:1-2, 12-19


Second reading

Romans 5:1-8

Gospel

Matthew 9:35-10:8, (9-23)


In many modern churches, especially in the time around Pentecost, we spend a lot of time talking about mission, even if we're not realizing we're talking about it. Does the church exist to serve the members? Does the church exist to serve the community? And what do we mean when we talk about the church anyway?

In this Sunday's Gospel, we get a very different vision of the early church than we'll get in parts of Acts. In Acts, we often see the early believers arguing about doctrine, like who gets to belong and who doesn't--and once we've decided who gets to participate, there are debates about how to participate.

In this Sunday's Gospel, we see a vision of the early church in the way that Paul will practice it. Jesus gives instructions to his disciples to go out taking very little with them: no food, no money, not even a change of clothes. Their mission: "Cure the sick, raise the dead, cleanse the lepers, cast out demons."

And what will they get for their troubles? They will be flogged in the synagogues and drug before rulers, where we assume a gruesome death will follow. Their message will divide families, but they are to persevere, to endure.

It's not a grow-the-church kind of message. Who would sign up for this mission? I'd much rather create a stewardship campaign or figure out how to pay for a new roof for the building--activities that are not on my list of tasks I enjoy.

I think about those early disciples and our current time.  The early disciples lived in a time of upheaval, and Jesus had fomented even more unrest.  We, too, inhabit a time of social unrest with threats both familiar and new.  We, too, sense we are at a hinge moment in history, when the time before us will be completely different to the time we lived in not too long ago.

In these days when we can't budget in the ways we once did, how can we possibly plan for our mission in the coming months and years?  We have spent years and decades learning to make plans and budgets, skills which seem useless now.

Yet our mission remains the same:  to care for the outcast of society, to speak truth to the ones who rule, to cast out the demons that oppress society.  Jesus sends his disciples out into the world without a plan, without a budget, without supplies, without a script.  He trusts them to be able to think on their feet, to react to the circumstances that they actually encounter, instead of planning for encounters that may never happen.

This passage leapt out at me this morning: "See, I am sending you out like sheep into the midst of wolves; so be wise as serpents and innocent as doves" (Matthew 10: 16). This passage never feels dated to me.  The wolves may change, but Jesus offers a useful way of dealing with the wolves.

Let us all be wise as serpents and innocent as doves.

Breaking Our Eucharistic Fast

On Sunday, those of us who gather to help with the livestream of our church communed together before our pastor went out front to do drive through communion.  I hadn't had communion since March 20, when I decided to pop by the last time our pastor did drive through communion; I had been out buying sketchbooks before everything closed down, and it was on the way.  I didn't think it would be my last time having communion for several months.

There have been months of arguing, at least in some circles, about the best approach to communion.  Can we have Zoom communion?  Do we need to be assembled as a people of faith to make the consecration of the elements possible?  Do we need to have a pastor there?

Books have been written to answer these questions.  Indeed, wars have been fought over these questions--literal wars, if we go back far enough.  So I won't wade into these waters.

Have I missed communion?  Yes.  But I try to have a larger sacramental view.  Where can we see God in the every day elements of our lives?  How can God be revealed in every day ways?

But I am a Lutheran, so it's been strange not to have one of the two sacraments of my church.  We also have not had baptism, but that's never been a weekly sacrament, so I haven't noticed its absence as much.

I wish I could say that I felt infused with grace and that I radiated love since breaking our eucharistic fast on Sunday, but no I didn't experience the sacrament that way.  I usually don't experience the sacrament that way.

Some might say, "Why bother?"  I would say, "Why close off a pathway to be reminded of God's grace?"  Or perhaps I would say, "I don't understand how electricity works or the internal combustion engine works, but I don't want to reject them just because I can't explain them."

I also don't want to close myself off to mystery.  Let me always remain open to mystery.

Protest in Pictures

In these past weeks of protest, here's my favorite picture:

That's Sue Tyler, my friend from the Create in Me retreat.  Last week-end, she held this sign at a silent protest in east Tennessee.

The artwork was created by a different Create in Me friend, Vonda Drees.  Sue and I met her at the 2016 Create in Me retreat, where Vonda introduced us to Copic markers.  Vonda left the retreat and went to her new job and the Grunewald Guild.  Through that organization, I've taken several online journaling classes with Vonda, and they've always been astonishing, in terms of what I've accomplished on a daily basis.

This picture is one of my favorites because Vonda created it in Washington state, posted it, and it inspired her son's sermon in Minnesota.  Then it went on to inspire Sue in Tennessee, and later in the day, me in Florida, across the continent from where it was first created and posted earlier in the day.

It's also one of my favorites because it was posted on Pentecost.  I love that we see the Holy Spirit speaking to us through art, moving across the continent through image.  I love this modern twist on Pentecost, that the Holy Spirit can move through Facebook posts and Instagram and other types of social media.

Trinity Sunday

If I had more time, I would look up the roots of Trinity Sunday.  Why does it come so soon after Pentecost?  Are we that threatened by the events of Pentecost that we need to insert a holiday that reminds that the Holy Spirit is part of a Triune God?

Still, here we are at Trinity Sunday.  This week, I started work on a sketch. 

Over 3 days, it became a meditation on Trinity.  I think of it as a Pentecost image too--what if tongues of flame didn't look like what we expected?  What if the tongues of flame were feathered?

This morning, I thought I didn't like the paleness of the colors, but I decided to leave it alone.  Let me sit with it a bit longer before I go rushing madly back in.

Marching and Writing Checks for Justice

This morning is the kind of morning where I feel drained and empty, where I can't imagine having a whole blog post in me.  Let me capture a few odds and ends and see what might emerge.

--Yesterday, my niece, who goes to grad school in South Florida,asked if any of us had any information about protests or marches.  I was a bit abashed to realize that I didn't.  In grad school, I was connected to all sorts of peace and justice groups, both local and national.  I was much more plugged in, even though we didn't have e-mail or social media, or we had a different kind of social media.

But I did know some folks who knew some information, so that's a plus.

--I have become the kind of person I despised when I was 19, the middle aged person who does support work of social justice by writing out a check.  But let me remember the pastor of the inner city Lutheran church in Washington D.C. who educated me by telling me that suburban people and their checkbooks were what made the inner city ministry possible.  He did it in the kindest way possible, and I will be forever grateful to know that the work of social justice takes many forms.

--I have always assumed that I was the kind of person who would be the first shipped to the radioactive Colonies in an Atwood dystopia.  But I'm thinking I may have flattered myself.

--My spouse talked about seeing a car driving slowly through the neighborhood with masked young guys inside.  With the events of the past few weeks, he was aware of how he found them threatening, and he questioned himself about whether it was because the car was driving slowly, because he couldn't read the faces of the people inside, because they were dark skinned, because they were young.

I noticed that he left something out--they were male.  I always find males threatening.  I have been practicing social distancing for decades now.  When I'm out walking or running, I always move away when approached.  My goal is always to be out of arm's reach.

The males that my spouse saw were very polite and asked him if he'd like a phone book.  He took note of how polite they were, and he wondered whether he was being racist or ageist. 

I pointed out that we live in a time where people are scathingly impolite, so politeness registers with me these days.

--And now, it is time for me to get dressed for work.  There are temperatures to take, health inventory questions to ask, reminder after reminder for people to wear their masks properly.

Nonviolence: the Power of Protest Squared

Today is the anniversary of the violent end to the weeks of peaceful protest at Tiannamen Square back in 1989.  I remember driving to my grad school class and listening in shock.  It was an interesting time, as we watched the unraveling of the Communist bloc (but it was before the events of the German border that would bring down the wall), so I was hopeful that the peaceful protest would prevail.  I felt like weeping when the tanks rolled in.

It feels like we're at a similar crossroads today.  We see a mix of peaceful protest which sometimes stays peaceful and sometimes explodes into violence.   I have written many times about the power of nonviolent protest (for example, here and here).  In these days of protest, many of us are considering the best way to respond.

Bill McKibben has written a wonderful article in The New Yorker about planning for not just what's happening now, but what might be about to happen:  "Events are now moving at high speed in this country—every day, President Trump and his crew gallop past new lines, so that the morning’s flagrant usurpation is legitimized by the evening’s even more outrageous improvisation. (Firing tear gas at a crowd in order to be able to stand menacingly in front of a church holding a Bible is hard to top, but I wouldn’t bet against it.) A danger of this is that we’re always reacting to what came before. So perhaps it’s worth skipping a few steps ahead, to places where we haven’t gone yet but very well may."

He reminds us of the power of nonviolence, while noting that most of our 20th century experiences with nonviolence might not be wise in a time of highly contagious global pandemic.  And boycotts may not be possible in a time when big events aren't happening.

McKibben points to these encouraging statistics:  "As the Harvard researcher Erica Chenoweth has shown, less than five per cent of a population engaged in resistance is often enough to cause huge shifts in the zeitgeist and make it much harder for illegitimate authority to rule."

Mckibben also mentions the work of Gene Sharp, who spent a lifetime cataloging methods of nonviolent action.  What a wonderful list of possibilities!  It's a good reminder that we don't have to be in the streets with the protesters.  We can pray.  We can have sit-ins and other methods of teaching.  We can "communicate with a wider audience"--and he wrote this list before we had so many opportunities that social media gives us.

These dark days, where the president threatens to use the military to hurt its own citizens, have me reaching for Timothy Snyder's On Tyranny.  It's an important book.  But Gene Sharp's list is also important.  We need to resist, while we prepare for what might be coming next.  One way that tyrants solidify their power is by wearing down resistance.  These days, we must not let that happen.

Meditation on This Sunday's Gospel

The readings for Sunday, June 7, 2020:

First Reading: Genesis 1:1--2:4a

Psalm: Psalm 8

Second Reading: 2 Corinthians 13:11-13

Gospel: Matthew 28:16-20


This Sunday is Holy Trinity Sunday, one of those festival Sundays that seem a bit baffling, at first (like Christ the King Sunday, which comes at the end of the liturgical year). We understand the significance of Christmas, Easter, and Pentecost. But what exactly do we celebrate on Holy Trinity Sunday?

At first reading, the Gospel doesn't seem to help. And Jesus certainly didn't spend any time indoctrinating his disciples on these matters which would later split the church. He alludes to the Triune God: we see him pray to God and he tells the disciples that he will send a Comforter. But he spends far more time instructing the disciples on how they should treat the poor and destitute, about their relationship to the larger culture, about their role in creating the Kingdom in the here and now.

You get a much better understanding of the Trinity by reading all the lessons together (thanks to my campus pastor from days of old, Jan Setzler, who pointed this out in his church's newsletter over a decade ago). These aren't unfamiliar aspects: God as creator of the world, God as lover of humans, Christ who came to create community, the Holy Spirit who moves and breathes within us and enables us to create community.

Notice that we have a God who lives in community, both with the various aspects of God (Creator, Savior, Spirit) and with us. It's an image that baffles our rational minds. It's akin to contemplating the infinity of space. Our brains aren't large enough or we don't know how to use them in that way.

But maybe it's not helpful to spend time trying to understand these matters with our intellects.  Maybe we should focus on what the Triune God does, not what the Triune God is.

The God that we see in our Scriptures is a God of action. We see God creating in any number of arenas. We are called to do the same. This is not a God who saves us so that we can flip through TV channels. Our God is a God who became incarnate to show us how to be people of action: Go. Make disciples. Teach. Baptize. Keep the commandments. We do this by loving each other and God. We love not just by experiencing an emotion. Love moves us to action.

We see God acting in a number of ways:  rescuing captives out of bondage, teaching, eating meals together in a variety of ways, fishing, healing, going on retreat, praying, having conversations with both the popular people and the outcast, sharing resources, cleaning up messes, telling truth to power, on and on I could go.

We live in a time when the world offers us so many opportunities to act in the way that God acts.  How can we love our neighbor?  There are so many ways to do that.  Theologian Frederick Buechner reminds us in his book Wishful Thinking: "The place God calls you to is where your deep gladness and the world's deep hunger meet." Jesus promises to meet us there.

When Leaders Use Churches and Bibles as Photo Op Props

Like most of us across the nation, I've been watching events unfold over the past week, events that seem designed to break our collective hearts, events that move some of us to demonstrating in the streets, events that move some of us to writing a variety of responses, events that move some of us to prayer vigils and/or lamentations.

Will we look back on this time as a period that catapulted us to a new age?  The videos of the officer's knee on the neck of a handcuffed black man for 9 minutes as the life drained out of him, will we come to see that as iconography that moved us all to demand justice and kept our demands front and center until we saw a new world forged from the ruins of the old?

It's too soon to tell.  Some of us feel we've been here before, and change wasn't lasting.  I've come to view change as a spiral or a labyrinth.  We may feel we're right back at the same place, but it's different.

One of my friends made this Facebook post:  "Today I'm remembering a book written by Keith Watkins, Liturgies in a Time When Cities Burn, published in 1969. At the end of his 2017 blog post looking back on the book Keith writes: 'As frontispiece, I used a statement from Philosophical Sketches by Susanne K. Langer. We are living, she wrote in 1964, in a new Middle Ages, 'a time of transition from one social order to another. . .We feel ourselves swept along in a violent passage, from a world we cannot salvage to one we cannot see; and most people are afraid.' Half a century later, we seem to be living in that same world.'"

And then, there's the photo of the president of the U.S. in front of the historic Episcopal church, the peaceful protesters violently cleared out of the way so that the president could go to the church and pose with a Bible.  This event, after the president spent the day fuming and spewing about the need to deal with protesters with as much force as possible, perhaps even using our own military against the citizens of the nation.

In a Facebook post my pastor Keith Spencer said it better than I could:

"Maybe the president should have opened that Bible and turned to Galatians 6:7:
'Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows.'

Or Isaiah 5:20-21
'Woe to those who call evil good
and good evil,
who put darkness for light
and light for darkness,
who put bitter for sweet
and sweet for bitter.
21Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes
and clever in their own sight.'

I was struck by the sign behind the president that gave the online worship schedule.  In years to come, will historians look at that sign and remember why the church had online worship?  Will online worship be so common that we won't think anything about it?

I am fairly sure that the historic Episcopal church hadn't been offering online worship just 3 months before yesterday.  I realize that most historians will focus on other parts of our history that were happening in June of 2020, but that bit leapt out at me.

This morning, the words of Matthew 24 came back to me:  "Jesus said, 'Watch out for doomsday deceivers. Many leaders are going to show up with forged identities, claiming, ‘I am Christ, the Messiah.’ They will deceive a lot of people. When reports come in of wars and rumored wars, keep your head and don’t panic. This is routine history; this is no sign of the end. Nation will fight nation and ruler fight ruler, over and over. Famines and earthquakes will occur in various places. This is nothing compared to what is coming." (verses 4-8, in Eugene Peterson's translation, The Message)

My whole life, I've gotten reminders that the world will judge us in many ways, but many of the judgments come back to hypocrisy:  do our words match our actions?  When President Trump acted the way that he has always acted, appealing to the worst parts of our nature, I was saddened, but soon no longer shocked.  When he acts that way while trying to co-opt the better parts of our nature, I am both saddened and shocked--and angry.

I've lived through many administrations now, and some of them I've liked better than others.  I'd take any of them now in exchange for this chaos and madness.  There was some kernel of human goodness in all of them, and in some, those seeds bloomed under the stress of current events.  I continue to believe in narratives of grace and resurrection, but these days . . .  these days test my tendency towards optimism.

After a Week-end of Protests: "Dona Nobis Pacem"

I am tired this morning.  I had a mostly good week-end:  more time in the pool than usual, some reading time, getting grading done, getting errands run quickly and efficiently.  When I look back on this week-end, I hope I remember it as the start of the time when I began to focus on my mandolin. 

I played on both Saturday and Sunday--ah, the return of evenings on the front porch.  On Saturday, my spouse showed me how to pick out the notes of "May the Circle Be Unbroken" and reminded me of how to play each note of the scale that starts with middle C.  We ended by playing "Taps."  On Sunday, we continued to work on those songs, along with "Dona Nobis Pacem."  I have loved that Canon for many years, although for the longest time, I associated it with Christmas music.

I was feeling peaceful when I turned on the TV.  I was all set to watch The Simpsons, even though it was a repeat of a show that was on just a few weeks ago.  Instead, I saw footage of gatherings in Miami and Ft. Lauderdale.  I saw various groups and lines of police in riot gear in Ft. Lauderdale.  In Miami, people seemed to be walking by the Adrienne Arsch center; my spouse said, "Why are they going to the American Airlines Arena?"  I speculated that they had probably parked there.

In Ft. Lauderdale, I saw that there were protesters trying to pick a fight with police, so I wasn't too surprised when a curfew was declared.  I was not prepared for the phone calls, one from the county and one from the city.  The county one came at 9:30, just as I was drifting off  to sleep.  And then, the city of Hollywood called at 10:15.

I feel conflicted about these protests taking place across the nation.  On the one hand, I am glad that horrific images of police brutality can still inflame us and make us take to the streets.  On the other hand, I'm not sure that they do much good anymore--and they don't seem to be very specific, some of these assemblies.  Are we protesting that one incident?  Are we seeing problems in our own local communities?  Are we protesting larger policies of policing and incarceration?  Are we looking at even larger societal structures? 

And why rush the police, the way that some did in Ft. Lauderdale?  The 3 hour protest was over.  Some people stayed behind to look for a fight, and some stayed behind hoping to de-escalate and to keep the violence at bay.

It could have been worse.  From what I can tell, there was some tear gas and people dispersed.  There were some arrests, but I'm not seeing reports of deaths or buildings on fire or all the ways the situation could have been escalated.

I am glad that I spent an hour with "Dona Nobis Pacem."  I will continue to sing it; it will be a constant prayer today, and throughout the rest of the year.

I have resolved to spend the month of June picking up my mandolin each and every day.  I am now adding to that resolution--I will learn "Dona Nobis Pacem."  I will pray for peace each day as I learn the song and memorize it.