So comes the end of the day...

This was a beautiful and full day and I am grateful to God as it comes to a close. It began with "community worship" Sunday - an on-going experiment in liturgy planned and developed by our worship ministry team - and today was a rich and creative time.  At the heart of our celebration of God's love was the notion that the Body of Christ must become flesh.  Barbara Brown Taylor put it like this

What is saving my life now is the conviction that there is no spiritual treasure to be found apart from the bodily experiences of human life on earth.  My life depends on engaging the most ordinary physical activities with the most exquisite attention I can give them.  My life depends on ignoring all touted distinctions between the secular and the sacred, the physical and the spiritual, the body and the soul.  What is saving my life now is becoming more fully human and trusting that there is no way to God apart from real life in the real world.

So five different members of the congregation shared their sense of how they live as part of Christ's body by doing justice, sharing compassion, teaching children, making music, organizing worship, encouraging the forgotten and unleashing beauty.  There were a number of highlights including:  a revitalized children's choir, our band's combination of a Sacred Harp song - Ecstasy - with a Paul Simon tune - Slip Slidin' Away, the choir's contemporary rendition of the 23rd psalm and two killer version's of Isn't It a Pity (a Good Friday reprise!)  One old salt told me afterwards:  "It just felt like everything came together today in celebration of the Body of Christ becoming flesh." I couldn't have asked for more.

The day didn't start out great, however, because when we attempted to head to church the battery in our car was dead.  (Apparently, while cleaning the interior of the car yesterday I tripped a "hidden" switch that keeps the parking lights on - a problem that is notorious for Subaru owners - and caused us some frustration, too.) Eventually, a band mate picked us up and we got through our morning rehearsals - and worship - with joy.  But I had to borrow a car to immediately head out to the funeral of a colleague who died unexpectedly just last Sunday night. (Thank God for generous friends.)

I think I have been in a daze about her death. I wept profoundly upon hearing the sad news but have been somewhat stunned ever since. Looking clearly at my own mortality is very sobering.  Most of the clergy from our Association were present; after all, our friend had only been serving here for a year. In fact, she had been installed just a year and 2 weeks ago ,so our sense of loss was palpable.  It did my heart good to see sisters and brothers gathered together in solidarity as we all were seated together.

I had to leave during the last hymn because our confirmation group was meeting this afternoon, too. And what a treasure that turned out to be:  all the parents and mentors were there (except Di who had to work) and everyone agreed that we needed to extend the confirmation conversation so that it could go deeper.  The opening conversation was about how many contemporary families have not found the support or encouragement they need to help their children cultivate an inner life. Clearly the emphasis in Protestant spiritual formation has changed over the past 40 years. Good things have happened in the emphasis on God's grace.  But something has been lost, too because few people know how to pray anymore - and families almost never pray together.

What's more, time continues to be squeezed out of each young family's day by a variety of competing interests:  school, sports, peer pressure, parents extended work schedules, etc. So without reinforcement and training, it is easy to see why the primary care of young souls has now shifted to Sunday School.  But we agreed that 45 minutes every week - or every other week - really wasn't enough time to build meaningful rituals or spiritual habits. Most young parents exercise more than their children practice spiritual rituals.

So, we agreed on three changes:  First, each family will get a copy of Gertrud Mueller-Nelson's book, To Dance with God, and start to find ways to use it with their children.  This is an excellent resource for the "domestic church" that will give parents a healthy grounding in the wisdom of the liturgical year as well as prayer rituals that make sense in a family context.  We also agreed that from time to time, parents and mentors will meet with me to see how we can help one another make this new commitment work.

+ Second, we decided that we needed to expand the time we spend together:  instead of concluding our conversations on June 3rd, we'll take a summer break and then return in the fall and continue to All Saints Day.  This will give us all another 3 months on Sunday afternoons.  And it will give everyone another six months to actually practice some of Mueller-Nelson's ideas. 

+ And third each mentor will concentrate most of his/her time on reading the gospel of Luke with their confirmand and building a relationship. We realized that the time originally set aside wasn't enough: if we're going to honor God and embody our commitment to Christ's body, we're going to have to work at it, yes?

It did my heart good to hear from our youth - as well as their parents and mentors - that everyone wants this time to be significant.  As another wise soul said, "Nobody needs MORE to do. But if we're going to do this - confirmation - let's do it right!"  So today was a real celebration of God's love in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus. The Body of Christ became flesh in a variety of new/old ways that are intimately connected to the rhythm of our ordinary lives.