letting go of the organizational chaff so that the body of Christ might rise again...

2019 is coming to a close - and I find myself ruminating over two recent articles on the eve of a new decade. Earlier today day I caught up over hot chocolate with a colleague in ministry. My friend is a gifted clergy person who continues to wrestle with the bureaucrats of the church over how best to live into a calling as pastor for the 21st century. As we spoke and prayed together - lamenting, laughing, and lamenting over the ironies and absurdities of this ordeal - my heart drifted back to how Richard Rohr opened this morning's post: "Up to now, top-down religion has pretty much spoiled the show." Exactly my conclusion! And then he added: 

We need trained experts, scholars, leaders, and teachers, but the truths of Christianity must be made much more accessible, available, localized, and pastoral... While Christian churches do much good, we have one huge pastoral problem that is making Christianity largely ineffective—and largely decorative. Solid orthodox theology is sorely needed... yet we clearly need good and compassionate pastoral and healing practices ten times more!y vision of any future church is much flatter and much more inclusive. Either we see Christ in everyone, or we hardly see Christ in anyone. Frankly, my hope for Christianity is that it becomes less “churchy"... any notion of a future church must be a fully practical church that is concerned about getting the job of love done—and done better and better. Centuries emphasizing art and architecture, music, liturgy, and prescribed roles have their place, but their overemphasis has made us a very top-heavy and decorative church that is constantly concerned with its own in-house salvation. (https://cac.org/the-work-of-healing-2019-12-31/)

For ethical reasons that respect and honor the boundaries required of retired clergy, I have rarely commented on the byzantine particularities of regional church happenings. When I left, I left. It was liberating to become a civilian once again. Whenever local friends would ask my opinion on some of the issues facing our region, I deflected their questions saying, "I hold all the people of our congregations in my prayers - and their leaders, too. It is, however, no longer my place to be engaged or offer commentary. So let's just trust the Lord and leave it at that, ok?" A few times I have been invited back by the leadership to assist with the ministries of music-making for social justice and I have loved that connection: we played some great songs, raised important issues for our area, and generated some funds for the common good. Not long ago the retiring interim pastor asked me back to Sunday worship for his final day to rock the house one more time - and that will be a delight. But that's been it. 

That doesn't mean I haven't thought about what a stream-lined church beyond the grasp of bureaucracy might look like for our region. I have. It would be saturated in simple music with LOTS of singing. It would be family friendly, filled with light and color, Eucharistic and absolutely free of theological jargon. There would be one simple collection to cover modest expenses, ample time for real prayer requests, and a phone/text tree to keep people up to date. It would be held in one of the empty offices or local restaurants that are vacant on Sunday mornings. Mission and acts of compassion would be fundamentally local - living into the 10 foot rule - and owned and implemented by the gathered community.

And, of course, there would be almost no distinctions between leaders and laity. Rohr hit a home run today when he wrote:

It seems to me that we must begin to validate Paul’s original teaching on “many gifts and many ministries” (1 Corinthians 12:4-11). Together, these diverse gifts “make a unity in the work of service” (Ephesians 4:12-13)... (what) we need  (are)Christian people trained in, validated for, and encouraged to make home and hospital visits; do hospice work and jail ministry; support immigrants and refugees; help with soup kitchens or food pantries; counsel couples before, during, and after marriage; share child development resources with families; offer ministries of emotional, sexual, and relational healing; help with financial counseling; build low-cost housing; take care of the elderly; run thrift centers—all of which put Christian people in immediate touch with other people and for which no ordination is needed. Ordination would probably even get in the way. Remember, healing was most of the work Jesus did. This fact is almost too obvious.

If I were organizing such a venture - and let's be crystal clear that I am NOT - there would be NO denominational affiliation. NONE. And here's why (besides cutting out all the ego/territorial bullshit that takes up so much time, space, and energy): in the next decade the once mainline denominations, but now sideline Protestant churches, will shrink to less that 5% of the American worshiping population. Like St. Lou Reed quipped about the mythology of a truly free America: stick a fork in it - its done! So is the way of doing church that I have known all my life. The second article that captured my attention comes from the Religion News Service who "asked scholars, faith leaders, activists, and other experts to reflect on some of the biggest shifts in religious landscapes they have seen over the last 10 years — as well as the biggest themes in the world of religion that they expect to emerge in the 2020s." It is a brilliant compendium of insights and projections about the ever-changing face of religion in the USA.

Each offering is useful and wisely considered. For my world I was particularly engaged by what Ryan Burge, assistant professor of political science at Eastern Illinois University, wrote about the intersection between religiosity and political behavior in the USA. He noted that:

If the so-called 'nones' (adults with no denominational or religious affiliation but  who still self-identify as 'spiritual but not religious' continue to) grow at the slowest rate, they will still be larger than any other group, regardless of the margin of error. At the same time, the two other large religious groups in the United States (evangelicals and Catholics) will each make up about 22% of the U.S. population. The only religious tradition that will sustain serious losses is mainline Protestants. These are the moderate forms of American Protestantism typified by United Methodists and Episcopalians. Today, they make up about 10% of Americans, but in 2030 that will be cut to just under 5%. That result is stunning considering that this group made up 30% of the population in 1976. (Read the whole collection @ https://religion

news.com/2019/12/27/religion-2020-decade-predictions-reflections/?fbclid

=IwAR3YSRJJhK7poKIm5IxhgeTCyICBtI4nHjy5phPqB_VimMLrvaJzylXn5Us

There are a few trans-denominational experiments taking place in our region and I hold them in prayer. We shall see how they fair. One of the things I believe that will make or break them is whether they can become self-sustaining. An insight I learned back in the late 80's from the mommas and poppas of the urban church movement is that so often new projects start with grant money. Things get moving and a buzz is created but it cannot be sustained. Because when the grants end - and they always do - without a viable local funding stream the project dies. Another mistake is creating programs for children under the illusion that "our little ones are the future of the church." Not so. Trained, committed and engaged elders, parents, aunts, uncles and grandparents are the future of the Body of Christ - not children. Kids are users. It is not a blame, just a fact. And once the thrill or novelty wears off, unless there are committed adults involved, the young ones will organically flit to the next thrill.

As I look towards the new decade it is clear that my way of doing church will perish. It is already dying on the vine. I once felt sad about this, but now see it as simply the ebb and flow of creation sorting out what works and what doesn't. I wasn't able to get pumpkins to grow in my garden this year because they were planted in the wrong type of soil without adequate irrigation. Next year I will try again with greater wisdom. The same will take place with the Body of Christ. As it is able to shed the constraints of hundreds of years of habit and fear to say nothing of the current obsession with corporate organizational models, it will be resurrected. In the meantime I will go to Eucharist with my family and deepen my engagement as a spiritual director. It is going to be a wild ride - and I am glad to still be around.

revolutionary love, patience and the beloved community in 2020...

Almost every morning I am greeted by two online poems. Yesterday this one by W.S. Merwin showed up: "Remembering Summer."

Being too warm the old lady said to me
is better than being too cold I think now
in between is the best because you never
give it a thought but it goes by too fast
I remember the winter how cold it got
I could never get warm wherever I was
but I don’t remember the summer heat like that
only the long days the breathing of the trees
the evenings with the hens still talking in the lane
and the light getting longer in the valley
the sound of a bell from down there somewhere
I can sit here now still listening to it

It is both fun and fitting to read this poem this morning as a wintry mix of snow, sleet, and freezing rain starts to coat this part of creation in a stunning and slick blanket of dangerous slop. There are a few vehicles out on the road, notably the sand and salt trucks, but most folk have chosen to play it safe and stay inside. I like getting poetic reminders like this that reconnect me to the true rhythm of life. It is so easy to be seduced by the buzz and rush of popular culture and politics that I forget how slowly everything - myself included - really changes. Before going to bed last night I read this from Fr. Richard Rohr:

We are bookended in a personal love - coming from love and moving toward and ever more inclusive love. Why do I think this is so important? Frankly, because without (this perspective) we become very impatient with ourselves and others. Humans and history both grow slowly and often move three steps forwards, two steps back. We expect people to show up at our doors fully transformed and holy before they can be welcomed in. But growth language says it is appropriate to wait, trust that change of consciousness, what the Bible calls in Greek,  metanoeite, can only come with time. This patience ends up being the very shape of love. Without an evolutionary worldview, Christianity does not really understand, much less foster, growth or change. Nor does it know how to respect and support where history is heading. (Center for Contemplation and Action)

I draw sustenance from trusting the presence of God in nature. I am nourished and strengthened by the counter-cultural wisdom of revolutionary love. But only if I practice resting into the flow of reality's slow moving heart; otherwise, I forget, become frantic, and violate the rhythm of change at the core of creation with my thoughts, words, and deeds. And in a time such as our own, when people of compassion are compelled to resist the fear, hatred, and violence, it is so easy to become lost. To live re-actively, unmoored and overwhelmed, rather than grounded in the guidance of God. That is clearly why today's weather and yesterday's poem point me toward a sacred alternative - one in which God is ever present, albeit moving slowly - with a love that saturates life, death, and life beyond death with grace. St. Paul asks us to remember that God's presence never gives up:

It cares more for others than for self, doesn’t want what it doesn’t have, doesn't strut, doesn’t have a swelled head, doesn’t force itself on others, isn’t always “me first,” doesn’t fly off the handle, doesn’t keep score of the sins of others, doesn’t revel when others grovel, takes pleasure in the flowering of truth, puts up with anything, trusts the rhythm of creation always, looks for the best, never looks back, and keeps on going to the end - and beyond. (I Corinthians 13, The Message)

Yesterday and today the cycle of news in the USA has been filled with reactions to the new epidemic of antisemitic violence. Some of us have expressed shock that such evil still lurks just below the surface in our country. How this this be? Aren't we better than this in 2019? I suspect that those who feel this were among the millions stunned by the current regime's victory in 2016: incredulous and grief-stricken as our optimistic worldview crumbled. Today many of us are angry and afraid. Some are even so cynical to claim that nothing has really changed. But that's not entirely true. Of course there is nothing new under the sun. The wise old preacher of Ecclesiastes back in 935 BCE understood nature and human nature better than many of us on the cusp of 2020 CE. 

One generation goes its way, the next one arrives, but nothing changes—it’s business as usual for old planet earth.
The sun comes up and the sun goes down,
then does it again, and again—the same old round.
The wind blows south, the wind blows north.
Around and around and around it blows,
blowing this way, then that—the whirling, erratic wind.
All the rivers flow into the sea,
but the sea never fills up.
The rivers keep flowing to the same old place,
and then start all over and do it again.
Everything’s boring, utterly boring—
no one can find any meaning in it.
Boring to the eye,
boring to the ear.
What was, will be again,
what happened will happen again.
There’s nothing new on this earth.
Year after year it’s the same old thing.

What has changed, and will continue to change incrementally but authentically and in God's own time, is our commitment to incarnational solidarity. Radical love beyond theological distinctions. What Dr. King called the Beloved Community. We know that we are all in this together. We know that whatever happens to one part of the human community effects us all.

Yes, violence remains. Yes, some Christians continue to fear and hate Jews. Yes, the wounds of the mothers and fathers are still being passed on to the children of the third and fourth generations. And, at the same time, some Christians and Muslims are putting their bodies on the line to protect their Jewish cousins. We are speaking out in public. We are reaching out in private to share solace and sustenance. And we are living into the sacred change of direction - what the Bible calls in Greek, metanoeite - that is the antidote to the poison we inherited from the shadow side of our European Christianity. Even 50 years ago such solidarity would have been outside the Christian imagination. It wasn't until November 1963 that Vatican II clearly changed course by insisting in the treatise on ecumenism that Jews were NOT responsible for the death of Jesus.

Part of the fourth chapter that stirred most attention deals with the issue of the responsibility of the Jews in the crucifixion of Christ. Newspapers, in their desire to convey the point as strikingly as possible, were not always felicitous in their brevity. The schema states that "the responsibility for Christ's death falls upon sinful mankind." In other words, the blame falls on both Jew and Christian. The part the Jewish leaders of Christs time played in bringing about the crucifixion does not exclude the guilt of all mankind. In addition, the personal guilt of these leaders cannot be charged to the whole Jewish people either of Christs time or today. There is a practical conclusion to this. According to the November 8 release: "It is therefore unjust to call this people deicide or to consider it cursed by God."

The Jesuit magazine, America, summarizes this momentous act of theological clarity. Noting that Vatican II did not "enunciate any new doctrine" in this text. Rather, it removed "the source of a ghastly ambiguity. Down the centuries, this ambiguity has allowed the popular mind to associate Christianity with some of the most lamentable episodes in human annals."

How many Christian fanatics, surely not moved by the spirit of Christ, fed upon the legend of the "Christ-killer" in the belief they were doing the will of God. How many were there who, caring little for Holy Writ or the liturgy, were all too ready to quote it sanctimoniously to justify their passion, their hate or their greed! The most despicable kind of anti-Semitism is that which invokes the sacred Passion of Christ. The time had already come, even before the Nazi excesses, for the Christian world to banish this scandal. The expression "Christ-killer" or "deicide" is heard less in some parts of the Christian world than in others. But wherever it is used, the draft declares: "The sacred events of the Bible and, in particular, its account of the crucifixion, cannot give rise to disdain or hatred or persecution of the Jews." We think that the president of the American Jewish Committee was right, along with others who made the same commentary, when he concluded: "Acceptance of this decree will make it impossible for anyone to instigate hatred for Jews and claim sanction or support in Christian teaching or dogma." (https://www.americamagazine.org/ issue/100/jews-and-vatican-ii)

Patience is the shape of God's love in time, in history, and in our hearts. Most of the time we are grateful for this when it applies to our own hearts. It is much harder to be sanguine when wrestling with the wounds of our culture. But I submit to you that patient love is ripening and spreading throughout the human community. Our small family here in the Berkshires has made a commitment to become allies with Valerie Kaur and others in the Revolutionary Love Project. They know that it is not just Christians, Jews and Muslims who are turning the words of radical love into flesh: there is a ripening cadre of Sikhs, Buddhists, Taoists, atheists, artists, and those who trust that love greater than themselves yet practice their compassion from outside any of the traditional religions that are banding together. 

Fifty years ago Dr. King and Rabbi Heschel marched together arm in arm in solidarity. They proclaimed that while human nature doesn't change, it can be healed. It can be nourished and directed towards that which is holy, true, noble, beautiful, and of peace, or, it can foment fear, violence, hatred and division. Ms. Kaur's commitment renews and deepens the old blessing:

We want to stage a cultural intervention in 2020 — Imagine a critical mass of artists, activists, faith leaders, and thought leaders using their voice, art, music, stories, and platforms to call people to action with love. We can shift consciousness from what we are fighting against to what we are laboring for. We can equip people to make love the ethic in more of our homes, schools, and movements.

I am learning that while the weather is keeping us inside today, it would be so foolish and dangerous to do otherwise, this is part of the sacred rhythm of God's love. I trust that there is a place for rest and action. A place for trust as well as silence and even dancing. A place for grace to grow within and patiently nourish the Beloved Community beyond. Please check out the Revolutionary Love Project here: https://revolutionarylove.net.

the work of christmas has just begun...

Since August most of the fiction I have read has been set in either the Germany of the 30's and 40's, or, Paris during the Occupation by Nazi Germany. While browsing our favorite used book store in Montreal, the Mile End store of S.W. Welch, I found the Berlin Noir trilogy (March Violets, Pale Criminal, German Requiem) and have been hooked ever since. (This overview in The New Yorker is spot on @ https://www.newyorker.com/books/page-turner/nazi-comb-overs-philip-kerr-berlin-noir) Last night I finished Haunting Paris by Mamta Chaudhry. It is part lament, part love story, part personal reflection re: what French collaboration with antisemitic fascism meant to one family in Paris, and part parable of the human condition in these trying times. The website GoodReads summarizes this elegiac novel with precision:

In the summer of 1989, while all of Paris is poised to celebrate the bicentennial of the French Revolution, Sylvie mourns the loss of her lover, Julien, and is unable to find solace in the music that has always been her refuge. But when she accidentally dislodges an envelope hidden in Julien's desk, she finds an enigmatic note from a stranger and feels compelled to meet this woman who might hold the key to Julien's past and to the story of the missing child he could not find in his lifetime. Julien's sister and one of her daughters perished in the Holocaust; but Julien held out hope that the other daughter managed to escape... Sylvie's journey leads her deep into the secrets of Julien's past as she finally learns the devastating reason for his reticence about a tragedy both personal and historic, shedding new light on the dark days of Nazi-held Paris and on the man Sylvie loved.

What, pray tell, keeps calling me back to the core of these stories of women and men trying to make sense of a staggering evil that devoured both human bodies and spirit in WWII? Specifically, what am I struggling to grasp about the systematic murder of European Jews and others by people infused with the values, culture, and wisdom of the Enlightenment and Christianity? What does this mean for my moment in history? What parallels are appropriate to comprehend and then challenge now that we are fully enmeshed in the age of Trump's regime? Or Europe's nativism? Or the violent Islamophobia of India or Myanmar? Or even Israel's descent into the current destruction of Palestine?  

The former President of Chicago Theological Seminary, Susan Thistlethwaite, hit upon one truth when she wrote: "Nine antisemitic attacks in a week. There are poisoned aspects of European Christianity at the heart of this, and the poison is being spread by this administration. As a Christian I feel I must be exceptionally clear about this." So let's be clear: it is not coincidental that these acts of domestic terrorism took place during Chanukah! (For more information, please go to: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/dec/29/synagoguestabbings-three-hurt-in-monsey-attack-say-reports) 

James Carroll has written extensively about moment's such as these, times when history shows us,"Christianity becoming violent." In Constantine's Cross, both the book and documentary film, Carroll traces the trajectory of what has taken place in real time when political leaders marry the military with religion. Carroll calls it our "terrible legacy of genocidal Antisemitism... and conflicts sparked by religious extremism." The producers of the documentary describe it like this:

At its heart, Constantine's Sword is a detective story, as Carroll journeys both into his own past - where he comes to terms with his father's role as a three-star General in the U.S. Air Force preparing for nuclear war - and into the wider world, where he uncovers evidence of church-sanctioned violence against Jews, Muslims, and others. Visiting the U.S. Air Force Academy, he and Jacoby expose how some evangelical Christians are proselytizing inside our country's armed forces and reveal the dangerous consequences of religious influence on American foreign policy. Warning of what happens when military power and religious fervor are joined, Constantine's Sword asks the timely question: Is the fanaticism that threatens the world today fueled by our own deeply held beliefs?

This is one truth that I must acknowledge and own as a contemporary Christian: the ethics of Jesus the peace-maker have often been manipulated into a death machine by our darkest fears and prejudices. Carroll's agonizing survey of the Church since the fourth century CE makes this clear. And if the 2016 election taught us anything it is that those same terrifying and dangerous fears and prejudices continue to live just below the surface in the United States. They are real throughout the wider world as well. And it does not take much pressure to exploit our anxieties, convincing many ordinary Christians to scapegoat people who appear to be different from us. Those we don't know well. The vulnerable. The outsider. The Jew. The Muslim. The gay. The racial minority or person of color. Segregation and cultural isolation is not an accident of history, but a strategy to divide, conquer and humiliate us: it is always easier to violate or kill people we do not know - those we have been trained to fear - those who are not our neighbors.

Another insight from these novels (and Carroll's history) is that antisemitic violence, and our surrender and acquiescence to fascism, never happens over night. It is always incremental. Planned. As our better angels are worn down over time, we begin to accept the unacceptable as inevitable. Our anxiety is exploited. Our consciences are exhausted. And with careful precision our civil liberties are eroded until the law of the land sanctifies oppression. Often the slow elimination of freedom and responsibility is disguised within extraordinary acts of diversion. In 1933, the Nazis paid an unstable opponent, Marinus van der Lubbe, to set fire to the Reichstag. Claiming that the arson was the beginning of a plot by the Communists to take over the government, Hitler rushed through parliament an emergency powers act that solidified his power base. It is vital to recall that in February 1933 the Nazis had passed a temporary law restricting freedom of the press and authorizing the police to ban political meetings and demonstrations. With a monopoly upon the interpretation of news in Germany, distraction and manipulation became normative. Arson gave Hitler the cover he needed to solidify ever more restrictive laws as average citizens were conned into believing that apocalyptic Bolshevik violence lay just around the corner. The diversions created confusion as well as emotional debilitation. (For additional information: https://www.history.com/topics/germany/reichstag-fire)

The poisoned aspects of European Christianity; the exploitation of our economic, racial, and religious fears; carefully designed acts of diversion that mask the regime's authentic political agenda; and the manipulation of the media to deepen the emotional exhaustion of all but the most strident among us have now become facts of life in the United States. We rail and fume over stupid and crude presidential Tweets, but fail to note when the Senate confirms narrowly ideological judges who oppose a woman's right to maintain control over her own reproductive organs. We wind up working three jobs to pay for our family's health care so we have no energy left to cry out on behalf of the 5,000 children currently being held in concentration camps along our southern border: https://www.pbs.org/newshour/nation/tally-of-children-splitat-border-tops-5400-in-new-count?fbclid=IwAR3aM3nMw2aEhWgEnlK57mksW4Nzugdg8PvifFA42vL7bozhmBUE_OqXf-I) We hear the Commander in Chief lie in public so often that we are not offended or even surprised that our still free press can print over five pages of fact checks that document the President's deliberate manipulation of the truth - and no one seems shocked. We scratch our heads in bewilderment that after three years of confusion; slander; political sabotage; voter repression; Muslim bans; scapegoating people of color, women, and political opponents; impeachment; eliminating health care for over 2 million citizens; and the abandonment of our long-standing international allies for short-term political grandstanding: still 40% of the electorate supports the current occupant of the White House.

So let me call your attention once again to the Polish journalist and activist Martin Mycielski's 15 point guide to surviving authoritarianism. I submit to you it is essential reading as we head into a new year - and an election year. (go to: https://billmoyers.com/story/increasingly-necessity-15-point-guide-surviving-authoritarianism/) The introduction to the article states:

Mycielski’s “survival guide” has only become more disturbingly relevant with time, its predictions proved frighteningly accurate. Like Umberto Eco’s guide to fascism, it presciently notes the actions and attitudes that now unquestionably define this presidency; the lies and obfuscation of truth, racist fear-mongering, historical revisionism, purposeful chaos and anti-First Amendment agenda. Manipulation and malice are the Trump regime’s forte. (To see how quickly a country can be remade by a charlatan and his abettors, go back and review some of the earliest entries from Amy Siskind’s weekly list tracking changes under Trump. It’s all pretty scary, especially seeing it unfold in real time.)

Earlier this week I sat with my grand-daughter, Anna, in my lap in front of the Christmas tree in Brooklyn. We were warm and safe. The day before I took-in the Christmas pageant at Trinity/St. Paul's in Manhattan where my grandson, Louie, was part of the children's choir. We all took Eucharist together. I gave thanks to God that I could be with loved ones for this feast. I rejoiced in the love we shared. My heart was full to overflowing when Louie's momma said that when she put her baby to bed he told her, "Momma I feel so much love in my heart right now." That is soul food for me. Honest to God holy ground. A bit of sacred love come down at Christmas so that we might be fortified to stand with others who are not safe or warm or loved right now. The late African American theologian and poet, Howard Thurman, got it right:

When the song of the angels is stilled,
when the star in the sky is gone,
when the kings and princes are home,
when the shepherds are back with their flocks,
the work of Christmas begins:
to find the lost,
to heal the broken,
to feed the hungry,
to release the prisoner,
to rebuild the nations,
to bring peace among the people,
to make music in the heart.

choosing real life instead of power in 2020...

For a few years after seminary, I tried living into a radical evangelical theology.  To me, evangelicals had a lot going for them back in the day. After growing up in an overly intellectual and emotionally restrained tradition, the evangelicals had: passion, certainty, moral righteousness, the assurance of salvation, a prophetic social justice witness, and a culture that was changing the face of American religion. CCM (Christian Contemporary Music) or worship and praise songs were becoming the soft-rock standard for churches as savvy promoters, writers, and artists linked Boomer aesthetics with my broken generation's yearning for grace. John Wimber, a talented jazz pianist who once managed the Righteous Brothers, was instrumental in fusing the emotional catharsis of rock and soul music with simple, mantra-like phrases of assurance from the Bible. In short order, songs like "Spirit in the Sky" and "Put Your Hand in the Hand" ruled the airwaves while "Seek Ye First" and "Spirit Song" dominated most Sunday mornings. 

It was an exciting experience to encounter bold emotions in worship. Feeling the Holy Spirit sweep through a congregation in song and prayer was ecstatic. So was speaking in tongues. I will never forget being at a conference with the Community of Celebration outside of Aliquippa, PA when a prayer request for healing went up in the hall. At first there was absolute silence among the 300 participants. Slowly a strange humming of sorts filled the air before morphing into an a capella song in four part harmony: "Jesus How Lovely You Are." I was forever changed as we were all lifted into another realm beyond time and pain. In so many ways, the charismatic evangelical movement of the 70's and 80's fit the era: it linked the disillusionment of once idealistic white, middle class hippies with an inward spiritual grace that was palpable. It raced through Roman Catholic and Reformed churches alike. By the time Bob Dylan released the born again "Long Train Comin'" and "Saved" albums, religion in America had a new lease on life. I insisted we play "You Gotta Serve Somebody" at my ordination with all the gospel funk we could muster.

I loved the groove. I felt liberated by the prayers. But two problems increasingly became impossible to ignore: the movement's fear and loathing of the LGBTQ community, and, their violent opposition to a woman's right to choose. God knows I tried to get my head around these obstacles ethically and theologically. I could, for example, proof text Judeo-Christianity's aversion to homosexuality. And while I couldn't reconcile the hatred with the people I loved, there was the Word to wrestle with. The late Walter Wink's powerful articulation of at least three different, competing, and opposing traditions within the Bible re: homosexuality gave me a path out of this darkness. His wise counsel was clear: Christians are called by the life, death, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus to advance the cause of compassion. (An excellent summary can be found @ http://www.stpetersloganville.org/ images/ Homosexuality _and_the
_Bible.pdf) The Roman Catholic "seamless garment" argument against all acts of violence also held some intellectual and ethical resonance for me as I was a Conscientious Objector to the Vietnam War and a practicing vegetarian. (A useful summary of a consistent ethic of life can be found @ https://www.
americamagazine.org/faith/2017/11/17/can-seamless-garment-approach-pro-life-issues-make-comeback-catholic-church) I continue to be ethically wary of most acts of euthanasia, war, and the death penalty as part of the slippery slope of moral relativism.

But it became impossible to tolerate the human carnage caused by evangelical hatred of the LGBTQ community to say nothing of the violence enacted by anti-choice warriors. Demonizing responsible, loving human relationships; denying the changing wisdom of science in the realm of human sexuality; and denigrating women and men of integrity as immoral was incongruous with an ethic of love. The evangelical anathema against the gay, lesbian, bi and transgendered people I had come to love was irreconcilable with the Jesus I had come to cherish. And the so-called right to life movement's obsession with abortion while ignoring the violence and terrorism within their own ranks was increasingly bankrupt. For a few years I tried to live as a bridge-builder between my evangelical sisters and brothers and a faith that was open and affirming, but in short order I was rejected as reprobate. 

In the 80's and 90's as my ministry matured, the culture wars in the USA raged. The once mainline faith traditions found themselves pitted against a new conservative Catholic/ Evangelical alliance hellbent on denying a woman the right to choose control over her own body. The rise of the Religious Right, the political clout of the Moral Majority and the Christian Coalition, as well as the wealth of TV evangelists like Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell, Jim Baker, Jimmy Swaggert, and Ted Haggard ginned up the stakes. George W. Bush and his strategists enlisted the help of evangelicals to boost voter turn-out in several close elections: pandering to homophobia and the other conservative obsessions made certain they held on to power. (See https://www.nytimes.com/ 2000/02/21/us/the-2000-campaign-the-christian-right-evangelicals-found-a-believer-in-bush.html or go to https://www. washingtonpost.com/religion/2018/12/01/george-hw-bush-helped-push-gop-towards-evangelicalism/)

Evangelical fear-mongering briefly took a backseat during the economic free fall that helped catapult Barrack Obama into the presidency in 2008. But it was revived with renewed and racist vigor as the Tea Party exploded onto the scene in 2009. Funded by right wing money and guided by Ralph Reed and the former denizens of the Moral Majority, the new/old movement became the deciding factor in the Clinton/Trump election of 2016. In key rust-belt states with an active white evangelical population, these so-called "issue" voters turned the tide in favor of Trump. (NOTE: It should also be stated that Mrs. Clinton's missteps and the strategic arrogance of her advisers didn't help.) Donald Trump's assurance that he would appoint Supreme Court justices who would dismantle Roe v. Wade turned voters out in decisive numbers. 

This strategy has been renewed after the recent conservative magazine, Christianity Today, called for the President's removal from office (See https://www.christianitytoday.
com/ct/2019/december-web-only/trump-should-be-removed-from-office.html)  Small wonder that in anticipation of the 2020 election, the president who never feels the need for confession, rarely attends worship except for show, and has no legacy of personal prayer or knowledge of the Bible, announced he and the First Lady would attend Christmas Eve worship at an evangelical stronghold in West Palm Beach, FLA: The Family Church. He has also scheduled a rally at a massive evangelical megachurch for January 3, 2020. (https://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/politics/fl-ne-trump-christian-rally-20191221-avvcye736beyvj7zh4vjdzea3a-story.html)

For two years before his election - and regularly throughout his first year in office - I raised ethical and strategic questions about Trump's manipulation of the evangelical Christian vote. Then, as well as today, it is nothing but a craven bid for political power. The evangelical leaders who have allied themselves with the president, notably Franklyn Graham, Paula White, and Jerry Falwell, Jr., have betrayed the Cross and bowdlerized the witness of the thousands of women and men who have given their lives to safeguard the Lord's most vulnerable. Sadly there is nothing new under the sun: the Church has often collaborated with the powers of darkness. And while the historic evidence is too vast to list, please recall the American Church's historic support of slavery or the ambiguous relationship Pope Pius XI had with the fascists of his day: (https://www.vanity fair. com/style/1999/10/pope-pius-xii-199910)

We are entering a time of great testing. My heart suggests that Trump will likely win again in 2020 - and this will bring greater suffering to God's beloved as the poor and powerless are cast away. In the days ahead, I pray that we stop the name calling and cheap jokes. This is not resistance. Nor will it stem the tide of hatred and fear. Rather, let us find clear and credible ways to publicly and privately build safe spaces with and for people of every faith, race, gender and class who will feel the wrath of this regime. Let us open our own homes that they become sanctuaries for the persecuted. And let us shine the light of love in the growing darkness in ways that do not degrade our opponents, but rather strengthen all people of good will. My soul today looks to Frère Roger, founder of the Taize community, who:

In 1940, at the start of World War II, felt called to serve those suffering from the conflict, as his maternal grandmother had done during World War I. He rode a bicycle from Geneva to Taizé, a small town near Mâcon, about 390 kilometres (240 mi) southeast of Paris. The town was then located within unoccupied France, just beyond the line of demarcation from the zone occupied by German troops. He bought an empty house, where for two years he and his sister, Genevieve, hid refugees, both Christian and Jewish, before being forced to leave Taizé, after being tipped off that the Gestapo had become aware of their activities. In 1944, he returned to Taizé to found the Community, initially a small quasi-monastic community of men living together in poverty and obedience, open to all Christians. (Wikipedia)

We know that speeches must be made. And letters to the editor written. And periodic rallies organized and attended. We know that we must not only register to vote and get out the vote, but oppose all voter intimidation. But let us also praise God by using our hearts, souls, homes, voices, flesh, and resources to quietly go beyond the obvious and become living sanctuaries of safety. Let us start by bringing strangers together to feast. And sing. And tell one another our stories. And poems. In our homes. And churches. And mosques. And synagogues. And temples. Jean Vanier once said, "People cannot own their own evil if they do not at the same time feel loved, respected and trusted." 

There is so little trust in the public square today that change feels impossible. Vanier went on to say, "So do not put your sights too high. We do not have to be saviors of the world. We are simply human beings, enfolded in weakness and hope, who have been called together to change our world one heart at a time." Let this poem by the Russian Jewish refugee poet, who was awarded the Nobel Prize, Joseph Brodksy, serve as a catalyst. (Thank you, Laura Everett, for sharing it.)

"Herod reigns but the stronger he is,
the more sure, the more certain the wonder.
In the constancy of this relation
is the basic mechanics of Christmas."

"December 24, 1971" BY JOSEPH BRODSKY
For V.S.

When it’s Christmas we’re all of us magi.
At the grocers’ all slipping and pushing.
Where a tin of halvah, coffee-flavored,
is the cause of a human assault-wave
by a crowd heavy-laden with parcels:
each one his own king, his own camel.

Nylon bags, carrier bags, paper cones,
caps and neckties all twisted up sideways.
Reek of vodka and resin and cod,
orange mandarins, cinnamon, apples.
Floods of faces, no sign of a pathway
toward Bethlehem, shut off by blizzard.

And the bearers of moderate gifts
leap on buses and jam all the doorways,
disappear into courtyards that gape,
though they know that there’s nothing inside there:
not a beast, not a crib, nor yet her,
round whose head gleams a nimbus of gold.

Emptiness. But the mere thought of that
brings forth lights as if out of nowhere.
Herod reigns but the stronger he is,
the more sure, the more certain the wonder.
In the constancy of this relation
is the basic mechanics of Christmas.

That’s what they celebrate everywhere,
for its coming push tables together.
No demand for a star for a while,
but a sort of good will touched with grace
can be seen in all men from afar,
and the shepherds have kindled their fires.

Snow is falling: not smoking but sounding
chimney pots on the roof, every face like a stain.
Herod drinks. Every wife hides her child.
He who comes is a mystery: features
are not known beforehand, men’s hearts may
not be quick to distinguish the stranger.

But when drafts through the doorway disperse
the thick mist of the hours of darkness
and a shape in a shawl stands revealed,
both a newborn and Spirit that’s Holy
in your self you discover; you stare
skyward, and it’s right there:
a star.

Merry Christmas/Joyeux Noël

We're heading out to celebrate Christmas with loved ones and won't be posting much until later. Thanks for staying in touch, for reading my ramblings, and for sharing your thoughts with me, too. Here's our annual Christmas letter.

Merry Christmas/Joyeux Noël

What a full, complicated, and blessed year this has been! It is always revealing to take stock of what has happened over the past year in our small part of creation, in the lives of those we love, and in the greater world. At this time in 2018 we were preparing to head north for the Winter Solstice, to visit our friends at L’Arche Ottawa for the Christmas Pageant, and then to feast with the Brooklyn family for Christmas Eve and Day. Shortly after Epiphany, we spent time with our loved ones in Plainfield before flying out to Tucson at O-God-Hundred in the morning for ten sun-filled days with Linda and Larry Schloss. Other highlights included:

v Being with our friends in L’Arche Ottawa throughout the year, celebrating the marriage of Ross and Jennifer in Northern California – and spending time with Phil and Julie in North Beach – before joining Henrietta and Robin for their wedding in Ottawa. A late summer vacation took us to Montreal, too.

v Making music and poetry all over the region with precious friends from First Church, Famous before We’re Dead and the poets of Word X Word in Pittsfield. We built a terraced garden in the backyard, planted Louie’s Milkweed and Butterfly Garden and rebuilt our deck with Jon. Finding ways to help our land become a small Sanctuary of safety and peace will be next year’s priority.

v Dianne continues to deepen her teaching and editing work with the English Farm as she participates in growing this innovative enterprise; James launched a new website to strengthen his small spiritual direction practice. (Check it out @ https://northernjames66.wixsite.com/website.)

Watching our grandchildren grow has been a thrill: Louie turned 6 and headed off to first grade; Anna celebrated birthday number two with her infectious gusto, charm, 

fullness, and verve.        

Like many of you, we grieve the fear-mongering and hatred that the current regime foments in the US and all across the world. More and more, the wisdom of the late Jean Vanier resonates: we can only change what we can touch. So we join with others in practicing the 10 Foot Rule – sharing loving concern in tangible ways with those close to home – and entrusting the rest to God’s care. The late Henri Nouwen put it like this:

The small child of Bethlehem, unknown young man of Nazareth, the rejected preacher, the naked man on the cross, he asks for my full attention. The work of our salvation takes place in the midst of a world that continues to shout, scream, and overwhelm us with its claims and promises. But the promise is hidden in the shout that sprouts from the stump, a shoot that hardly anyone notices. I remember seeing a film on the human misery and devastation brought by the bomb of Hiroshima. Among the scenes of terror and despair emerged one image of a man quietly writing a word in calligraphy. All his attention was directed to writing that one word. That image made this gruesome film a hopeful film (for me.) Isn’t that what God is doing: writing a divine word of hope in the midst of our dark world?

You are one of the signs of hope and light in these dark times – the presence of the holy in your humanity – and we both return thanks to God for you. May your holiday be filled with gentle peace and your New Year with strength for the journey. With gratitude and love,

James and Di

pondering all these things in my heart...

This has been a sobering Advent: without travel or engagements, there has been time to let feelings, memories, habits good and bad, and insights bubble up from deep within. It has been shaped by a time much like the spirituality of the Virgin Mary who Scripture says, "held all these things and pondered them in her heart." (Luke 2: 19) Call it a contemplative season - and I have long turned to Gertrud Mueller-Nelson's wisdom about Advent as an encounter with feminine spirituality in these words from To Dance with God:

The season of Advent invites us to underscore and understand with a new patience the very feminine state of being: waiting. Our masculine world wants to blast away waiting from our lives. Instant gratification has become our constitutional right and delay an aberration. We equate waiting with wasting. So we build Concorde airplanes, drink instant coffee, roll out green plastic and call it turf, and reach for the phone before we reach for the pen. The more life asks us to wait, the more we anxiously hurry. The tempo of haste in which we live has less to do with being on time or the efficiency of a busy life - it has more to do with our being unable to wait. But waiting is unpractical time, good for nothing, but mysteriously necessary to all that is becoming. As in pregnancy, nothing of value comes into being without a period of quiet incubation: not a healthy baby, not a loving relationship, not a reconciliation, a new
understanding, a work of art, never a transformation. Rather, a shortened period of incubation brings forth what is not whole or strong or even alive. Brewing, baking, simmering, fermenting, ripening, germinating, gestating are the feminine processes of becoming and they are the symbolic states of being which belong in a live of value, necessary to transformation. (p. 62)

One of the ways I have come to discern the still, small voice of the sacred that calls to us from out of the barking cacophony of culture involves symmetry. Or synchronicity. It is never coincidence, but rather "the simultaneous occurrence of events which appear significantly related but have no discernible causal connection." (Oxford On-line Dictionary) So when I find that all the writings of Richard Rohr, Thomas Keating, Jean Vanier, Henri Nouwen, and Cynthia Bourgeault this month have been about the linkage between humility and humiliation... I start to pay attention. Consciously - and otherwise - I have been giving space in my Advent quiet time - and dreams - to ways I have  wounded, disappointed, betrayed, denied, and ignored those I cherish. Not as an act of self-pity or the inverted grandiosity of victimhood. Rather, as an invitation into God's grace. God's guidance. God's mercy and cleansing. Talk about humiliation! Looking backwards over 50+ years reveals a lot. As Richard Rohr wrote this in his recent series on the spirituality of the 12 Steps of AA:

Step Eight: Made a list of all persons we had harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all. Step Nine: Made direct amends to such people wherever possible, except when to do so would injure them or others. Making a list of the persons we have harmed is a reversal of what our ego prefers to do—make lists of what others have done to us. We are only able to do this because of the housecleaning we’ve done in the previous steps. When we’ve experienced higher states of love and transformation, we must go back and rectify earlier wrongs in appropriate ways to support the healing of those we have hurt. God forgives us, but the consequences of our mistakes remain. We must repair what has been broken, or we stay stuck in a wounded world.

Last night I awoke to a series of laments. And as much as I despise being awakened from a sound sleep by anyone - God included - this 3:00 AM visitation was insistent. Demanding. Clarifying. As I paid attention, a series of memories washed through me, pulling into awareness some of the disappointments, shame, anguish, and confusion I have caused in my past. It was a wildly embodied meditation that exposed to me some of the consequences of my sins. It made clear some of the amends still to be realized. And, after a time I can't really quantify, when there was no room for ambiguity or excuses in my heart, there came a quiet sense of release. Call it an absolution awakened in humiliation. This is not wallowing in the mire, mind you, just owning reality on the road to acceptance and serenity. God never leads us into experiences of self-abasement. No, the sorrow plants seeds of gratitude that can grow into a shared compassion. That was the other gift that arrived in the middle of the night: an awareness of some of the ways I have learned from my wounds to pursue a path of tenderness. Feeling myself relax and drift back towards sleep, I couldn't help but give thanks for such a liberating irony.

In their book, The Spirituality of Imperfection, Ernest Kurtz and Katherine Ketcham put it like this: "Humility... begins with the rejection of the demand to be 'all-or-nothing." Human be-ing - existing and carrying out our lives in the middle - is to be neither all or nothing." We are always a combination of light and darkness, trust and fear, compassion and selfishness. Paradoxically, we mature into humility only by owning the hurt and cruelty we have caused .

Humility involves learning how to live with (and even rejoice in) that reality, the reality of our mixed-up-ed-ness, our being both saint and sinner, both beast and angel... When we come face to face with the reality of our own imperfection, which IS the reality of our very being, we can either laugh or cry; comedy and tragedy, as the masks we see in theaters suggest, intertwine. At certain moments in our lives, it seems that the most fundamental choice each of us has is between fighting ourselves and laughing at ourselves... When confronting our own incongruities, humor is usually the healthier choice, as the wisdom of word origins hints. For the words human, humor and humility all have the same root - the ancient Indo-European ghom, best translated by the English humus.... which the dictionary describes as a brown or black substance resulting from the partial decay of plant and animal matter.' 

Holding these things - the shame, the hurt, the wisdom, the humility, humor and humiliation - in my heart like Mary requires time. Waiting. That is what this Advent has become: moving slowly and quietly so that what is deep might bubble up and simmer into a deeper grace. Nouwen put it like this in the book I am reading for Advent: "Jesus leads us away from all our useless wandering as well" as the lethargy of self-pity. It takes time - and a willingness to let time infused with grace work on us in the darkness - but then "your light shall break forth like the morning, your healing shall spring forth speedily, and your compassion shall go before you." (Isiah 58:8) When circumstances beyond my control, mostly illness and other family demands, turned this year's Advent into a season of slowness, I had no idea that the feminine "processes of becoming" would be at work within, "brewing, baking, simmering, fermenting, ripening, germinating, and gestating" my way towards transformation. And so the journey to Bethlehem continues...

credits:
+ https://www.holycross.org/blogs/sermons-homilies/a-sermon-for-the-feast-of-the-protection-of-the-theotokos-2018
+ https://www.pinterest.com/pin/806074033279510708/
+ https://aleteia.org/2016/02/06/lesson-in-humility
+ https://www.pinterest.com/pin/397653842080615506/?lp=true