learning to embrace the darkness and the light...

Like so many others learning to live beyond our culture's destructive dualism and obsession with binary yes/no thinking, it's always a work in progress. St. Paul grasped this when he told us: Now we see as through a glass darkly; later we shall see face to face... When I was a child I spoke like a child, thought like a child, and acted like a child. But ripening into God's grace I see that it is time to put childish things away and trust that faith, hope, and love endure. (I Corinthians 13 paraphrase) 

Jesus taught this, too taking his cue from what Cynthia Bourgeault and others call the perennial wisdom tradition. The closing words of chapter five in St. Matthew's rendering of the Sermon on the Mount are illustrative. After teaching his disciples that God's call is to love our neighbors, our friends, AND our enemies, Jesus says: The time has come, therefore, to be mature, complete, and fully developed for this is what God intends for you. 

English Bibles translate the Greek of Matthew 5:48, telios, as perfect - meaning to be fulfilled, grown up, or complete - but perfect in our culture connotes the absence of fault, living without sin, or being ethically and morally consistent. And if you've been around the block or two you know that this is humanly impossible. By design God created us incomplete so that we might grow into a humble albeit ripening holiness incrementally. Learning from our mistakes and failures is part of the sacred maturation God intended. That's why I say that incarnating the non-binary heart of Jesus is always a work in progress. It takes time, practice, failure, forgiveness, and perseverance. How did St. Paul put it in Romans 5: 

We embrace our afflictions knowing that affliction produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because hope is God’s love being poured into our hearts by the Holy Spirit.

One of the ways I practice this shift is by noticing and honoring the small strands of synchronicity that pop up every day. Yesterday, for example, I was watching the PBS Newshour (something that wasn't happening while we were with our family for Christmas in Brooklyn) and saw the graveyards of Gaza: they were full. I saw thousands of refugees clinging to a UN Relief vehicle in Southern Gaza hoping to secure a morsel of food during the deluge of bombs. And I read the NY Times report on the revolting violent desecration Hamas unleashed against the bodies of Israeli women during their terrorist attack on October 7th. To be sure, the vicious violation of women has long been part of warfare. Our Bible records Jews committing genocide during the conquest of Canaan: they, too castrated their male opponents while enslaving and violating women as the booty of war. In our era, the Russians were notorious for raping and mutilating the women of the Third Reich. The Japanese did so to Korean Women. And some American GIs followed suit during Vietnam and Iraq. (For those with the strength, here's the link:https://www. 

nytimes.com/2023/12/28/world/middleeast/oct-7-attacks-hamas-israel-sexual-violence.html?smid=url-share) 

Part of forsaking the simplicity of binary thinking is taking in the totality of reality - not just the parts that bring us joy, security, or self-affirmation nor only the truths that evoke despair, grief, and uncertainty - but the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. Terry Tempest Williams put it like this: 

“I want to feel both the beauty and the pain of the age we are living in. I want to survive my life without becoming numb. I want to speak and comprehend words of wounding without having these words become the landscape where I dwell. I want to possess a light touch that can elevate darkness to the realm of stars.”

The late Madeliene L'Engle said much the same poetically in "First Coming." 

God did not wait till the world was ready,

till nations were at peace.

He came when the Heavens were unsteady,

and prisoners cried out for release.

He did not wait for the perfect time.

He came when the need was deep and great.

He dined with sinners in all their grime,

turned water into wine. He did not wait

till hearts were pure. In joy he came

to a tarnished world of sin and doubt.

To a world like ours, of anguished shame

he came, and his Light would not go out.

He came to a world which did not mesh,

to heal its tangles, shield its scorn.

In the mystery of the Word made Flesh

the Maker of the stars was born.

We cannot wait till the world is sane

to raise our songs with joyful voice,

for to share our grief, to touch our pain,

He came with Love: Rejoice! Rejoice!

So, starting THIS Sunday, December 31, there will be a slightly different way of doing our modest weekly contemplative online gathering: Small is Holy. For 2024 we'll follow a simple Vespers liturgy and conclude with an inclusive Eucharist. You may know that I'll be starting to serve a new congregation in February and need to streamline my preparation time for these contemplative reflections. Making this commitment is another part of learning to live into a nonbinary heart: for me it is once again time to reconnect beyond my solitude. We'll see how this unfolds knowing that we may need to shift away from Sunday to a midweek time. I'll keep you posted. Using a new/old liturgy that will change according to the liturgical seasons, the renewal of old texts, and the rhythms of Mother Earth: Small is Holy will take another step into the unitive grace of Jesus. (Here's the liturgical template that you may want to print out if you join us over the next seven weeks leading up to Lent.)

+

SMALL IS HOLY VESPERS/EUCHARIST

We begin by offering a sacred body prayer or sign of the Cross before praying:

O Lord, open my lips, and my mouth shall proclaim your praise.

Glory be to the Creator, the Christ, and the Holy Spirit: as it was in the beginning, is now and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.

Hymn: Psalm 134

Come and bless the Lord all you who love God

Who stands night after night in the house of the Lord

Lift up your hands in the Sanctuary and bless the Lord

The Lord, the maker of heaven and earth, bless you from Zion (2x)

Evening Psalm and Alleluia

Quiet Prayer

Gospel Canticle of Mary: Lue 1: 46-55

RESPONSE: My spirit rejoices in God my Savior.

My soul magnifies the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior, for God has looked with favor on the lowliness of the Almighty’s servant. Surely, from now on all generations will call me blessed; for the Mighty One has done great things for me and holy is God’s name. R

God’s mercy is for those who fear God from generation to generation. God has shown strength with God’s arm; God has scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts. God has brought down the powerful from their thrones and lifted-up the lowly; God has filled the hungry with good things and sent the rich away empty. R

God has helped servant Israel, in remembrance of God’s mercy,

according to the promise God made to our ancestors,

to Abraham and Sarah and to their descendants forever. R

Quiet Reflection

Hymn

Seek ye first the kingdom of God and all its righteousness;

And all these things shall be added unto you: allelu, alleluia.

Ask and it shall be given unto you, seek and ye shall find,

Knock and the door will be opened unto you: allelu, alleluia.

Great Thanksgiving/Eucharistic Prayer

The Lord is with you – And also with you.

Lift up your hearts – We lift them up to God.

Let us give thanks to the Lord our God – 

It is right to give God thanks and praise.

It is right…

Holy, holy, holy God Ruler All-Loving: heaven and earth are full of your glory. Glory be to you, O God. Blessed is the One who comes, who comes in the name of God. Hosanna, hosanna, hosanna in the highest.

The Prayer continue closes with the Lord’s Prayer. 

Please pray this in whatever form resonates with your heart…

Our Father in heaven, hallowed by your name: your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us today our daily bread; and forgive us our sins as we forgive those who sin against us. Save us from the time of trial and deliver us from evil; for the kingdom, the power, and the glory are yours, now and forever. Amen.

The bread and wine are blessed and prepared for sharing.

The bread which we bless and share + 

is our participation in the brokenness of the world. 

And the cup which we bless and share + 

is our participation in the celebration of joy. 

These are the gifts of God for the whole people of God: 

come for all things are ready.

Lamb of God, you take away the sins of the world:

have mercy on us.

Lamb of God, you take away the sins of the world:

have mercy on us.

Lamb of God, you take away the sins of the world:

grant us peace.

We share the cup of blessing and the bread of life.

Sing amen: Amen we praise your name, O God.

Sing amen: Amen, we praise your name, O God.

Sing amen: amen, amen, amen, amen.

Amen we praise your name, O God.

honoring the darkness AND the light of this season...

As Advent inched towards Christmas this year I found myself keenly aware of the loss all around and within me: dear friends whose parents passed in 2023, the on-going war between Israel and Hamas and the incomprehensible innocent deaths that Israel has caused in Gaza, the as yet unstoppable pain my sweetheart still endures, the seemingly never ending slaughter in Ukraine, financial challenges, political polarization, Mother Earth on fire, the ugly realization that my once prosperous and modestly egalitarian country looks more and more like a failed nation that stuffs the wealthy while punishing everyone else, the epidemic of anti-Semitism and anti-Muslim violence, my own aging aches and pains, the avalanche of death that consumed musicians I've long cherished (including Denny Laine, Jimmy Buffett, Robbie Robertson, Sinead O'Connor, Randy Meisner, Tony Bennett, Astrud Gilberto, George Winston, Cynthia Weil, Bill Lee, Tina Turner, Gordon Lightfoot, Tim Bachman, Harry Belafonte, Ahmad Jamal, Jim Gordon, Gary Rosington, David Lynley, Wayne Shorter, Huey "Piano" Smith, Burt Bacharach, Tom Verlaine, Barrett Strong, David Crosby, Robbie Bachman, and Jeff Beck), and the overwhelming sense that what's broken politically/economically/and spiritually can't be fixed until it's fully broken. That's a TON of loss born of time, reality, dysfunction, fear, greed, and inevitability.

Simultaneously, beauty and compassion saturates our lives, too. We can't always see or feel this given our own wounds and/or grief, but that doesn't stop the light from shinning in the darkness. Artist, Nick Cave, put it like this:

I am awed at the audacity of the world to continue to be beautiful and good even in times of deep suffering and grief. Some are furious with me for celebrating the systematically gorgeous aspects of life given all the brokenness and wounds – how dare you some ask – but look: life goes on. The sun still rises, the birds still sit in the trees and all the rest of it. Yes, people are suffering deeply – and the temptation is to either ignore this or cling to the absence of beauty that becomes like a hardening of the soul - so I rejoice in searching out the beauty even in the destruction.

This paradox kept creeping into my consciousness this season - the joy and the sorrow - both at once. When our Brooklyn family arrived at worship on Christmas Eve, the Sanctuary was packed. It was the children's pageant with over 50 little ones sharing a tableaux of the birth of Jesus so five hundred of us were on hand to sing our favorite carols accompanied by organ, choir, and brass. The descants were ecstatic and I found myself weeping during verse three of "Hark! The Herald Angels Sing" as the descants and brass just ripped away my defenses:

Hail the heaven-born Prince of Peace! Hail the Sun of Righteousness!

Light and life to all he brings, risen with healing in his wings.

Mild he lays his glory by, born that we no more may die,

born to raise us from the earth, born to give us second birth.

Hark, the herald angels sing, glory to the newborn King.

I had the same sense of being overwhelmed by grace as we feasted in Brooklyn over Christmas: we laughed and savored incredible food prepared by our son-in-law. And after the first course of paper thin fried eggplant and freshly baked focaccia, our 10 year old grandson proclaimed with surprising delight: "Let's all give a cheer for my dad the incredible chef!" The stunned and graciously humble look on his poppa's face was an unexpected blessing. The adult conversations after our morning gift-giving was centered on our concerns about aging and death, the state of our politics, and everything in-between. And just when despair was about to creep into the conversation... it was time for "Mary Poppins" and the joy returned. There were aching backs and full stomachs, tons of laughter mixed with a few tears, sweet and sensitive gifts next to Big Mouth Billy Bass singing "Take Me to the River" (the surprise hit of the feast day.)

Driving home, we listened to NPR's "All Songs Considered" and the paradox continued. It was an episode devoted to the songs that touched our hearts - and it was a tear jerker combing profound loss with gentle solace. The mood in the Sideline Saloon was a bit subdued last night, too before we got things hopping and then the joy was overwhelming. And while going to pick up Lucie from the kennel this morning, what did I see but our once glorious pumpkins caving in on themselves. They had performed their job of bringing bounty and beauty to us since the beginning of October; and now they were done and tossed upon the garden to nourish the squirrels and chipmunks. The circle of life in action, yes?

Carrie Newcomer captured this both/and wisdom last week in her substack column - a message the Christmas Eve preacher echoed - in a call to keep searching for the light in the darkness. Newcomer wrote:

I remember a conversation with two pastors serving two different congregations in Denver. Christmas is a very busy season for pastors, usually non-stop from Advent all the way through to the new year. They described how every year, when they both finished their respective Christmas Eve midnight services, they went to a favorite local restaurant/bar located near their home. When the bar closed at 2am they would hold Christmas Eve service for anyone still in the bar. The owner and these two wonderful women would put a cloth on the pool table and light candles. They would hold hands around the table, tell a story of weary travelers on a weary night far from home, they would sing a few songs and say a prayer of blessing. I asked them both why they decided to do this each year, when they were probably totally exhausted from all the responsibilities of the season. Instead of giving me an answer, they asked me a question, “Who needs a little hope and care more than the folks who are alone and closing down a bar on Christmas eve?” They went on to tell me of how last Christmas Eve there had been a somewhat intimidating looking young man seated at the end of the counter covered in tattoos and piercings. He ended up staying after hours and stood in the circle with the other Christmas Eve refugees. After the gathering ended with a quiet Silent Night, the young man turned to one of the pastors and with soft eyes said, “you know, my mom would have loved this.” Most nativity crèches feature an immaculate barn, with a doting father with a well trimmed hipster beard, a beautiful woman dressed impeccably in blue. Outside, happy shepherds are looking up at the North Star and a gossamer angel oversees the arrival of three very wealthy travelers on camels. The baby is never cold or shivering in the open barn or shed, but laying quietly on the softest looking blanket. But the story actually takes place in a country under the control of a Roman military superpower. The “perfect” parents were most likely quite young and newly married, but the new bride was already nine months pregnant. You can do the math - as the gossips in their little rural town probably did. So close to her due date, there’s no way they wanted to go on this trip. But the powers that be decided taxes are taxes, people had to be counted, and so they were forced to travel to a place where they had no friends or family. People just had to take time off, which was especially hard for those living pay check to pay check. The roads would have been full of migrants, refugees and travelers, all the hotels were full and expensive. When they reached the little town where they would be counted, they had to have been tired and dusty, the young woman was probably very uncomfortable, her bones must have ached, her feet swollen and balance off. Just when things seemed pretty darn hard, it would turn out that all hotels, hostels, motels and air b&bs were booked up. There was not a single room available in town and they only had a donkey, and so no car to sleep in. They were homeless for the night and that would have been then the labor pains started. Then the first miracle arrived in an act of kindness. Simple acts of kindness ARE miracles. So is holding reality tenderly in all its paradoxical pain and beauty. May the unfolding 12 days of Christmas afford you the chance to hold it all together with humble tenderness.

returning to the church in a new way...

                

Over this past month I have been a part of a fascinating new process - at least it's new for me: interviewing for a transitional ministry position in this general area. Previously in four separate searches, my goal was to discern where my heart, soul, gut, and research might meet God's Holy Spirit in pursuit of a full time position. That took our small family all over the country from Saginaw, MI and Tucson, AZ to two Cleveland, OH and Pittsfield, MA. Exploring a church assignment in that incarnation was all about logistical considerations including schools for our daughters, demographics, local/denominational politics, collegiality, affordability, finances, and so much more.

This time around, however, most of those externals are irrelevant: we already have a sweet home, we're rooted within a constellation of friends, we're close to our children and grandchildren, have a satisfying relationship with both our doctors and many of the local movers and shakers, and know the artistic community reasonably well. The four variables to this quest are: 

1) what relatively short-term tasks need to be accomplished in each congregation?

2) what financial package is on the table?

3) how far away am I willing to drive on a regular basis?

4) how much conflict needs to be addressed in each of these very different faith communities?

That's a whole other kettle of fish, yes? As many know, I never anticipated finding myself in a situation where my retired self still has marketable skills in the ever changing landscape of churches in transition. After an intensive, ecumenical training course in ways to collaborate and support these congregations, however, I am learning that this old dog still has a few years to share creativity and compassionate. Given the fact that fewer and fewer young people are entering ministry, more and more people have abandoned religion, and a batch of churches have lost their long term pastor to retirement it feels like a good time to reconnect. This is the season for a casually contemplative focus alongside skill in managing conflict, and a tender sense of humor.

This return seems an organic way of participating in culture change and political resistance to the cruel and divisive agenda of the MAGA era as well. Since before the Covid lockdown, we've been making music as part of our small scale cultural revolution: playing for free in a variety of settings not only nourishes good vibes but gets different folk singing with one another. Physicians have learned that when a crowd of people starts to sing together, it doesn't take long before their hearts are beating together as one in a shared rhythm. A recent article in The Atlantic put it like this: in this era of anger and anxiety, are we ripe for small alternatives grounded in solidarity and tenderness? I think so - and I'm going back into the fray to see what solace I might share. I'll keep you posted as the New Year unfolds.

advent soup as prayer...

One of the Advent commitments we have been practicing this year involves soup: simple, earthy, and savory soups born of a batch of recipes from The Twelve Months of Monastery Soups cookbook. It has been a wonderful Advent spiritual practice for a few reasons. First, making fresh soup has put me back in touch with root vegetables - a connection to the season I have long avoided. This year, however, I am discovering something very satisfying about physically slicing leeks and onions, chopping potatoes, carrots and rutabagas, reconnecting with the mystical magic of herbs, and all the rest. It's way more fun than shoveling snow (which has its own unique charism, but gets old very fast.) 

Second, unlike so much of the work I've done in my life, cooking offers an almost immediate pay off: we get to eat it as well as smell and savor it. So much of what I have done in ministry and organizing is about delayed gratification: seeds are planted that someone else will harvest. And while that is a faith commitment for the long haul that I celebrate, there's NOTHING like slicing freshly baked bread, slathering it with real butter, and taking that first ecstatic taste! Same goes for my encounter with winter vegetables. Once again, the kitchen and our cutting counters have become portable prayer altars overflowing with the bounty of Mother Earth. What a treat!

Third, making monastic soups has helped me stay in touch with sister faith communities all over the world. Tonight I'll prepare a pot of St. Nicholas Soup that claims a Turkish origin; last week I worked on soups from France and Italy. It's a small thing, to be sure, but even in these semi post-Covid days we still spend most of our time in solitude. To eat with monastic sisters and brothers across the globe is a gentle way of staying connected to the international community of Christ.

And fourth, my kitchen prayers have made me curious about poems about soup. I don't know many but enjoyed this one from Daniel Nyikos. I am just beginning to look for others and will keep you posted.

I set up my computer and webcam in the kitchen
so I can ask my mother’s and aunt’s advice
as I cook soup for the first time alone.

My mother is in Utah. My aunt is in Hungary.
I show the onions to my mother with the webcam.
“Cut them smaller,” she advises.
“You only need a taste.”
I chop potatoes as the onions fry in my pan.

When I say I have no paprika to add to the broth,
they argue whether it can be called potato soup.
My mother says it will be white potato soup,
my aunt says potato soup must be red.

When I add sliced peppers, I ask many times
if I should put the water in now,
but they both say to wait until I add the potatoes.
I add Polish sausage because I can’t find Hungarian,
and I cook it so long the potatoes fall apart.

“You’ve made stew,” my mother says
when I hold up the whole pot to the camera.
They laugh and say I must get married soon.
I turn off the computer and eat alone.

nick cave, mary's magnificat, and the wisdom of our wounds: advent III

Advent III arrives this coming Sunday, December 17: to date our Small is Holy contemplative reflections have considered Advent as a "second coming" where our yearnings are recognized as communion with the holy (Advent !); and, where the practice of inner quiet is a prerequisite for authentic peace-making (Advent II). This season we're linking the insights of musician Nick Cave with the appointed texts from the Advent gospels. Two quotes from Cave are guiding these reflections:

• Our search for spiritual intimacy and assurance – our yearning – IS the heart of the religious experience… the desire to believe and the longing for meaning, the moving towards the ineffable – THIS is what is essential, important, and authentic despite the outward absurdity of it – or even because of the absurdity of it. When it comes right down to it, maybe faith is just a decision and God is the search. (Faith, Hope and Carnage)

• For me, vulnerability is essential to spiritual and creative growth whereas being invulnerable means being shut down and rigid. (On Being interview with Krista Tippett.)

This week there's a few gospel possibilities: many will go with St. John's insights re: John the Baptist in John 1: 6-8/19-28. My heart, however, calls me to St. Luke's words and Mary's Magnificat in Luke 1: 39-56. And here's the Nick Cave quote that will serve as our guide:

We've talked about this a lot: the idea that suffering is, by its nature, the primary mechanism of change, and that it somehow presents us with the opportunity to transform into something else - something different - hopefully something better. That God bestows upon us these terrible, devasting opportunities that bring amelioration and transformation. This change is not something we necessarily seek out; rather, change is often brought be bear upon us through a shattering or annihilation of our former selves. (Faith, Hope, and Carnage)

In starting Advent III with these texts, let me offer two preliminary qualifications:

+ First, I do not believe the Sacred causes or demands our wounds. Not only would that be cruel, but it bears no resemblance to Jesus who, in our tradition, incarnates and reveals the deepest nature of the holy we can grasp this side of the grave. Rather, as the Magnificat and countless other poems and songs make clear, as those created in the image of the Creator, we have been imbued with the ability to creatively respond to life's challenges rather than passively endure them. For most of us, we can learn the wisdom of our wounds so that our mistakes become yet one more source of mystical insight. Instead of repeating them ad nauseum, like the Magi, we can "return home by another way." Or as my AA buddies put it: If you always do what you've always done, you'll always get what you've always got. 

+ Second, discovering the wisdom of our challenges and suffering is an honored spiritual practice in the East. Divination in the Eastern Orthodox tradition stands in opposition to the doctrine of original sin that dominates Western Christianity. As celebrated by St. Irenaeus and others, this practice recognizes that human being are born incomplete; that is, we are physically, emotionally, and spiritually infants who must learn to grow and mature. One way this happens is by owning our failures instead of denying or ignoring them. The more we patiently discern what the sacred is asking of us in our suffering - and change direction or alter our thinking (the true meaning of repent) - the more we will start to resemble Jesus. I believe this is part of what Jesus teaches in chapter five of St. Matthew's version of the Sermon on the Mountain: "In a word, what I’m saying is: Grow up. You’re kingdom subjects. Now live like it. Live out your God-created identity. Live generously and graciously toward others, the way God lives toward you.”

Cave suggests that because we are unschooled - and too often unwilling - to listen to the wisdom of our wounds we "blew" the charisms of the pandemic. "I think the pandemic" he said, "offered us an opportunity to improve the world and we blew it. We squandered it."

Early on, many of us felt that a chance was presented to us, as a civilization, to put aside our vanities, grievances, and divisions, our hubris, our callous disregard for each other and come together around a common enemy. Our shared predicament was a gift that could potentially have transformed the world into something extraordinary. To our shame this didn't happen. The Right got scarier, the Left got crazier, and our already fractured civilization atomized into something that resembled a collected lunacy. For many, this has been followed by a weariness, an ebbing of our strength and resolve and a dwindling belief in the common good. (Faith, Hope, and Carnage)

We will also draw sustenance from Maya Angelou's poem: Why the Caged Bird Sings.

A free bird leaps

on the back of the wind

and floats downstream

till the current ends

and dips his wing

in the orange sun rays

and dares to claim the sky.

But a bird that stalks
down his narrow cage
can seldom see through
his bars of rage
his wings are clipped and
his feet are tied
so he opens his throat to sing.

The caged bird sings
with a fearful trill
of things unknown
but longed for still
and his tune is heard
on the distant hill
for the caged bird
sings of freedom.

The free bird thinks of another breeze
and the trade winds soft through the sighing trees
and the fat worms waiting on a dawn bright lawn
and he names the sky his own.

But a caged bird stands on the grave of dreams
his shadow shouts on a nightmare scream
his wings are clipped and his feet are tied
so he opens his throat to sing.

The caged bird sings
with a fearful trill
of things unknown
but longed for still
and his tune is heard
on the distant hill
for the caged bird

sings of freedom.

I hope you will join us this Sunday, December 17th @ 4 pm for Small is Holy on Advent III. We close with a simple, inclusive Eucharist for those who celebrate. @ https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100039658634068

song, silence, solidarity, and celebration...

NOTE: This Advent Di and I are cooking our way through two extraordinary cook books: Monastery Soups and A Monastery's Kitchen. We both tends towards life as solitaries - she even more than me - so we wanted to take another step into this charism. Throughout Advent I'm making a few monastic soups each night for our evening meal. Here's tonight's blessing supposedly born of St. Anthony's life in the desert as the first monastic.

We'll do the same from Epiphany to Lent with both the Gaza and Jerusalem cookbooks. And we're exploring a way to give our days even more form with a personal "rule of life." What follows is part of my reflection on what this might mean as it ripens.

                                                             +

One of the blessings I experience during the "gratitude getaway" retreats we've been taking during the Thanksgiving holidays in the USA is an extended encounter with silence. Except for the rushing river across the road - and the CDs we might play during dinner - the only other sounds are the ones we create with music or conversation. Not that our ordinary days are all that noisy, mind you. We are, as you know, introverted monastic wannabes with a commitment to simplicity and solitude. Still, the traffic, phone, TV, dog, various musical rehearsals, and periodic guests all add a layer of sound that's noticeably missing right now. This poem by the incomparable Billy Collins evokes what this sojourn into silence feels like to me.

I pick an orange from a wicker basket

and place it on the table

to represent the sun.

Then down at the other end

a blue and white marble

becomes the earth

and nearby I lay the little moon of an aspirin.

I get a glass from a cabinet,

open a bottle of wine,

then I sit in a ladder-back chair,

a benevolent god presiding

over a miniature creation myth,

and I begin to sing

a homemade canticle of thanks

for this perfect little arrangement,

for not making the earth too hot or cold

not making it spin too fast or slow

so that the grove of orange trees

and the owl become possible,

not to mention the rolling wave,

the play of clouds, geese in flight,

and the Z of lightning on a dark lake.

Then I fill my glass again

and give thanks for the trout,

the oak, and the yellow feather,

singing the room full of shadows,

as sun and earth and moon

circle one another in their impeccable orbits

and I get more and more cockeyed with gratitude.

Some may know that after a more or less five year hiatus from active local church ministry, I'm currently exploring a NEW call: not a BACKWARDS into what once was- which was a satisfying, complicated, challenging, rewarding, blessed, and often frustrating 40 year run - but rather FORWARDS into serving, sharing, and celebrating the counter-cultural love of Jesus as a "transitional" pastor. I'm discerning what it might mean for me to journey with a faith community more as a partner and spiritual friend than a top-down "leader" for congregations trying discern their own purpose for being in this semi-post-pandemic world. Small parishes often find themselves bewildered and/or perishing once their formally clear mission either changes or collapses. 

In a way that is both prescient and practical, ecumenical judicatories are now striving to equip congregations with pastoral care specifically designed for a mutual search into what the Spirit may be saying about what takes place next. The current wisdom is no longer hierarchical, but horizontal: a partnership of prayer and practice crafted to empower churches in creative ways to be the Body of Christ for the 21st century. I, too have been exploring such horizontal commitments over the past 20+ years - a way of doing ministry NOT as Rev. Fixit - but more like a contemplative partner walking and listening for the still small voice of the sacred within the tempest with a congregation. I like how Carrie Newcomer wrote about this recently:

Practicing care and the protective nurture of the heart is to lean into what is still beautiful as I find it each day. Living well with gratitude and joy is an act of resistance, a claiming and affirmation of all that is still good and still true. Remembering what we love and what still shines is a counter-balance to a culture of endless doom scrolling. Gratitude lifts up what inspires and sustains us even in troubled times. Time with trusted community is a sanctuary of rest that rebuilds and renews our courage and hope. Laughter is a balm that soothes what hurts and heals what is aching. So, in this season of Thanksgiving I am leaning into beauty, holding close what I love. I am sensing the threads of Mercy that still hold the world together, grateful for the golden woods, for the song I started this morning, for a walk with a good friend, for an afternoon planting garlic at Marcia’s farm. I am grateful to be gathering with family, for the good health of many I love and for hopeful medical treatment for those navigating illness. I am grateful for every soft and tender thing, for the god of small birds who watches over them as they fly and takes them into it’s endless heart when they fall.

Over the past fifty years, my commitment to loving the Body of Christ has shifted: once, I was all about theology and an anthropocentric sense of Scripture. I am, after all, a metro-sexual, white, bourgeois intellectual of the Western Reformed tradition where religion has fundamentally been about right doctrine. Abstract ideas and complex creeds constructed in and for the mind. And while I continue to ponder life with intellectual curiosity, my faith is now more about right practice and testimonies of faith rather than tests and creeds. Some call this orthopraxis not orthodoxy. It's a way of trusting and loving God grounded in relationships with all living beings and matter. A spirituality of tenderness, compassion, incarnation, and mystery rather than doctrine, exclusivity, hierarchy, and dogmatic certainties. This path yearns to make peace with the ambiguities of life and love and befriend both enigma and paradox. To that end, my renewed encounter with so-called organized religion (there's a misnomer if there ever was one) is an open-hearted spirituality where three polarities embrace, dance, and whisper clues to any paying attention about some of the places that the divine is now beckoning to us.

Song and Silence: music cuts through so many divisions to communicate directly

with the heart and soul; silence as a partner to song evokes not only space to "be" but also to notice the songs within as well as the songs all around. Nearly every day I discover songs of joy. But more often than not, they are at least as many laments rising up, too. I find that praying with song and silence is part of my practice of leaving behind binary thinking and moving towards holistic wisdom.

Celebration and Solace: St. Paul, mostly likely imprisoned, wrote: Rejoice, rejoice, and again I say rejoice. My organic disposition is towards the light: I may inwardly feel anxiety, but outwardly I am an ally of possibilities. Indeed, I was once a loving monastic associate of the Community of Celebration! As one drawn to the peripheries of life by my conscience, however, I've learned to love and sing the blues, too. There's some of my historic Celtic roots showing up as those songs of sorrow are saturated in a drone note that tears my heart to shreds. To live a life of celebration that holds solace close at hand is, again, a commitment to both paradox and non-binary prayer. 

Solidarity and Solitude: I can STILL sing "Solidarity Forever" (at least most of it) in both Spanish and English. Same with "We Shall Overcome." I learned them - and countless other union and organizing songs - while sojourning with Cesar Chavez and the farm workers movement of the 60s and 70s. In fact, I learned the Wobblies' (International Workers of the Word) words to songs that once were part of the Methodist religious revival in the USA like "Hallelujah, I'm a Bum" was really, "Hallelujah Thine the Glory." As a young, democratic socialist doing union organizing, how was I to know?. Singing together, struggling for equity and compassion together in the company of strangers who soon become sisters and brother, walking, talking, listening to and learning from others is soul food for me. And then, with regularity, I must step away from the fray to let the richness, the grief, the love, insights, and questions sink into my soul through intentional solitude. Solitude and silence are restorative.

Now: how to frame this in a gentle "rule" is still to be discovered. For now, I am making soup, creating a welcome basket for our new neighbors, playing more and more songs I love with Dave and "Double Dropped D" and seeing if the Spirit IS leading me back int a transitional ministry. 

when the holy spirit shows up... hold on to the music

One of the MANY things I cherish about playing in our band, revolution, is the trust, skill, and creative vulnerability each person brings to the table. That most of us have been making music together in one form or another for almost 20 years is one of the reasons this band works. Another has to do with skill and trust: each member brings a unique skill set to the music with trust - and that trust includes feeling safe with one another, trusting that the Holy Spirit will show up when we need her, a commitment to the songs we bring for consideration, and an awareness that no one holds a monopoly upon wisdom. This is especially true when we're on a bandstand where we have to stand and deliver; but also whenever we gather for practice, too.

No where is this trust, skill, and creative vulnerability more evident than when we take an old favorite, deconstruct it in various ways, and then slowly reconstruct it to fit this moment in time so that our collective heart's commitment takes on shape, form, sound, and soul. Playing serious and spontaneous jazz with one another over the years has helped us let go of form so that we might playfully experiment with improvisation. Winton Marsalis wrote that playing live demands vigorous listening as well as a deep willingness to help one another out of the pit should a song start to go south. These three musical practices are a form of embodied spirituality and are grounded in faith: we believe that the sacred is every bit a member of the band as the rest of us. And the more we strive to honor this holy presence the more risks we're willing to take in pursuit of the pay-off.

About a year ago, while working on a benefit show for recently resettled Afghan refugees, we recognized that a beloved song, Jackson Browne's "Running on Empty," wasn't working for us when we tried to replicate it like the record. Our drummer, the wise and extremely tender-hearted Jon Haddad, suggested we try: 1) stripping the song down to just one acoustic guitar played in a finger picking style; and 2) emphasizing the haunting call and response nature of the tune's chorus: "running on - running on empty; running on - running blind; running on - running into the sun but I'm running behind." It took a few takes to find the right tempo - we finally settled on one about half as fast as the recording - then went to work experimenting with additional instrumental endings. In our rendering, this song highlights the spiritual quest that was always latent but hidden under the instrumentation. We can hear aspects of the dark night of the soul in the song - it is fundamentally a lament about feeling empty in the land of plenty - as well as an awareness that everyday life is a combination of trust and sacrifice: Gotta do what you can just to keep your love alive; trying not to confuse it, with what you do to survive. I will be forever indebted to Jon for his vision in helping us take this song apart and reframe it, and bring it back to life. It is still melodically recognizable, but now with added gravitas and grace.

Consequently, we're now playing with a few others: by applying the same insights to the Foo Fighters, "Times Like These," we've come up with almost a Latin driven call to compassion that's world's apart from the kickass rock'n'roll of the original. On a fluke, we discovered that "Groovin'" by the Rascals worked as an ultra-laid back invitation to sensual mindfulness. And that "Gimme Shelter" by the Stones can be an agonizing call to solidarity. We start off acoustically with women's voices ascending and descending in spontaneous chant; the first verse is offered in a hushed tone; adding drums and percussion builds the intensity so that the extended instrumental break into the middle with a searing electric guitar that kicks things into high rock'n'roll gear. We tried it that way last night after discussing these possibilities. Without having played it this way, we could've had a train wreck. But when trust, skill, and creative vulnerability are  embraced by the Holy Spirit: it was a bit like Pentecost when that presence greater than ourselves lifted both the band and our gathered friends into another zone state of consciousness, Debriefing afterwards, confirmed that we all felt the buzz of being lifted beyond ourselves for about 8 sacred minutes.

Two other factors are worth noting, too. First, our lead guitarist, Dave McDermott, follows the flow of the Spirit in all his playing. If it doesn't FEEL real, he lays out, preferring silence to noise. Often he's said to me something like: when our music taps into the vibrations of life that are eternal but not often acknowledged, we are guided by a love greater than consciousness. David doesn't waste time playing random notes. Rather, he shares flourishes and fills as a song ripens and the offers up solos that come from some deep place within and beyond. When this happens, our songs become soul food. Second, each member of this ensemble carries with them a musical legacy that honors rock, soul, gospel, jazz, folk, and chant. I've rarely experienced such an eclectic mix before where we're just as much at home with Nora Jones, the Grateful Dead, and the Beatles as with Miles, Joni Mitchell, Hendrix or traditional country. Jazz poet, Jayne Cortez, put it perfectly when she crafted this:

I crisscrossed with Monk

Wailed with Bud

Counted every star with Stitt

Sang "Don’t Blame Me" with Sarah

Wore a flower like Billie

Screamed in the range of Dinah

& scatted "How High the Moon" with Ella Fitzgerald as she blew roof off the Shrine AuditoriumJazz at the Philharmonic

Add in the stunning natural beauty of taking in the music while contemplating the wetlands... and you get something that feels salvific. Jimi Hendrix once said: I used to live in a room full of mirrors; all I could see was me. I take my spirit and I crash my mirrors, now the whole world is here for me to see. Ain't THAT the truth? Dave and I will join the soiree as "Two of Us" tomorrow at the Sideline Saloon under the able guidance of host Elaine Morel @ 7 pm. Be there or be square! 

joy, sorrow, rhythm, and sound pulsating like the seasons...

As late summer slowly shifts into early autumn, and the multiple greens of the wetland morph into reds and browns, my heart returns to music-making. The next 90 days in these hills are my personal favorites: the luscious corn of Lamas passes the season's mantle to the wheat harvest, sumac and grape vines shimmer with their unique crimsons, the nights demand blankets on our beds again, and the autumnal equinox points us all towards Samhain and the liminal space of All Saints Day. David Cole writes in The Celtic Year that "the autumn season is the time when we lose all that has once been."

It is the season of harvest, when the crops get chopped down and the fields become empty. It is the season when deciduous trees drop their leaves and the ground becomes filled with yellow and brown... and it is the season which teaches us to let go: it carries with it the life-giving aspect of detachment.

Small wonder that our ancient Celtic mothers and fathers sensed that this was the transition that marked the start of a new year: November was the ancient beginning, not January, where darkness and death invite us into the primal womb of waiting in anticipation of new life. The Christian season of Advent is shaped by these truths where the days in-between show us how to slow down, focus, rest, discern, and return thanks for all that has been. We're not there yet, of course, but already the burning bushes are starting to look like fire and a few of the older trees are settling back in repose: a perfect setting for this year's Play Music on the Porch gathering.

The late Jerry Garcia of Grateful Dead fame hit the nail squarely on the head when he told us:

People need celebration in their life. It's part of what it means to be human. We need magic and bliss, power, myth, and celebration in our lives - and music is a good way to encapsulate a lot of it.

Another wise old soul, Nick Cave, put it like this in a book-length conversation entitled: Faith, Hope, and Carnage. In response to Sean O"Hagan's query about the meaning of music, Cave replies:

Music can draw people out of their suffering - even if it is just temporary respite... That's because music has the ability to penetrate all the fucked up way we have learned to cope with this world - all the prejudices and affiliations, agendas and defenses that basically amount to a kind of layered suffering - and get at the thing that lies below and is essential to us all, that is pure, that is good: the sacred essence. I think that music, out of all that we can do artistically, is the great indicator that something else is going on, something unexplained , because it allows us to experience genuine moments of transcendence.

As these two souls dance together while existing in completely different spheres - death and life; the folk/rock/jug band vibe of the Dead next to the T.S. Elliot punk verve of Cave and the Bad Seeds - a unique song is given voice where celebration is practiced in the presence of suffering while magical bliss accompanies the enigmas of our existence. Lou Reed called it magic and loss. I encounter it as trusting the mystery of the journey that carries both blessing and tumult. Cave speaks to my heart when he says:

As I've gotten holder, I have come to see that maybe the search IS the religious experience - the desire to believe and the longing for meaning - moving us towards the ineffable. Maybe THAT is what is essentially important, despite the absurdity of it - or, indeed, because of the absurdity of it.

That's the paradox of music-making as I experience it, yes? It's the absurd AND the ecstatic. The restorative AND ephemeral. Joy, sorrow, rhythm, sound, movement, discipline, and abandon resting within a trust that pulsates like the seasons both in and out of time. When asked how he chose to engage the world after surviving the Holocaust, the late Elie Wiesel said: "I dance." The dance of life is resistance and surrender - it is embodied spirit on a journey of faith that not only acknowledges but accepts grief and healing, assurance and doubt, sound and silence simultaneously as well as the power of vulnerability. Cave wisely says:

To be truly vulnerable is to exist adjacent to collapse and obliteration. In that place we can feel extraordinarily alive and receptive to all sorts of things, creatively and spiritually. It can be perversely a point of advantage, not disadvantage... a nuanced place that feels both dangerous and teeming with potential and the more time you spend there, the less worried you become of how you will be perceived or judged and that is ultimately where the freedom comes from.

And so, at this point in the journey, I choose to link myself to my music-making mates who bring with them their own wounds and wisdom to share in an aesthetic stone soup of sound. That's what the songs we've crafted for this year's Play Music on the Porch feels like to me: nourishment from within shared in community as respite and rebellion. Or prayer and party. Or maybe simply dancing in defiance of all that defiles us. Poet farmer, Scott Chaskey, wrote:

The challenges that confront us daily in the twenty-first century - familial, social, economic, political, environmental - can be overwhelming. As we encounter what is reported as the greatest challenge humanity has collectively face - climate disruption - it is timely to revisit an ancient theme, an interspecies them: our kinship with nature. (Soil and Spirit)

Many of the songs we've selected are chill this year. There are a few kickass rockers but those are the exception to the flow. As we've been practicing over the past month, I've wondered why the vibe keeps coming out subdued and introspective. And now I have a few clues: that is what the season is singing to us. Be still - and know. Be grounded - and trust. Be awake to one another during the insanity of this era and bless be the ties that bind. When we sit upon our deck facing the wetlands each morning, not only is the foliage changing, but so too the birds and four-legged critters. They dance, to be sure, and sing some, too but all in preparation for a deeper change.

An agitation of the air, A perturbation of the light
Admonished me the unloved year
Would turn on its hinge that night.

I stood in the disenchanted field

Amid the stubble and the stones,
Amazed, while a small worm lisped to me
The song of my marrow-bones.

Blue poured into summer blue,
A hawk broke from his cloudless tower,
The roof of the silo blazed, and I knew
That part of my life was over.

Already the iron door of the north
Clangs open: birds, leaves, snows
Order their populations forth,
And a cruel wind blows.

(Stanly Kunitz, The End of Summer)

No wonder it felt like we needed "Ripple" as well as "Gimme Shelter."