What's up with this...?

What's up in popular culture when it comes to discerning the presence of the Lord?  Clearly there is a yearning for an encounter with life beyond life - however you want to make sense of that - in that three of the top 10 TV shows in 2010 have to do with the supernatural and vampires? (True Blood, Vampire Diaries and Supernatural.)  And let's not forget the 2011 winner: The Walking Dead?  The supernatural is an upside and sometimes immature impulse to know about the spiritual - especially when the traditional world of religion is so vapid and corrupt.

+ And what about "Lost?"  It is a great TV adventure in which linear time as we know it disappears, everyone is sorting out a distant or broken past relationship with a loved one that causes confusion while everyone also encounters a love greater than our wounds that makes sense of life even without answering all our questions.  I see the theme of "grace trumps karma" all over this bad boy.

+ There are also five crime shows that are making the critics' list:  NCIS, Bones, Breaking Bad along with Luther and Law and Order: UK.  Each in their own way reinforces our sense that life, while not fair, is governed by a drive towards justice.  And even when that justice is dispensed by very broken souls - and these are all wounded healers - there is a sense that the force of good is just holding back the tides of chaos.  And what about "Justified?" (my personal favorite...) A 21st century Dirty Harry doing battle with both chaos and history with a sense of humor and a ton of humility.

We're going to start "Treme" tonight - perhaps the cream of the recent crop - that speaks a whole lot about life in post September 11th America, yes?  "Moral habits that originated in religious communities," writes Kelton Cobb, "now travel down two different roads: one still within religion and one in its secular diaspora of cultural spirituality."  He continues:

With respect to doing a theological analysis of culture, it is important to remember that the moral habits that now travel in secular diaspora in the West were originally conceived as responses to theological convictions about the nature of God, the human condition, covenant, grace and salvation.  That raises the possibility that if one digs around in our culture's moral habits - which are found in the non-profit institutions it supports, the mythic stories it tells itself, its founding documents and the exemplary persons it promotes as worthy to emulate... - a theological layer might be uncovered.  (Cobb, Theology and Popular Culture, p. 129)

I see a nation that is deeply alienated from the Christian truths of our collective past but profoundly hungry for a redeeming spiritual experience, too.  We are self-absorbed and addicted, but like "Mad Men" we bored with ourselves and clear that "things" are not the answer at the same time. I sense a people literally "lost" who sense that God's grace is available but are clueless about where to turn for help. To say nothing of a nation yearing for justice in the economic and moral chaos who also know that  it is fleeting. 

Douglas John Hall has observed that now that the old church has been disestablished by secular culture, maybe the true Jesus can be shared with a people groping in the darkness?
 

Thanks be to God...

Today we really stepped out in faith - and had a blast!  Not only did our band kick it up a notch with a LOT of U2 tunes, but we put together a New England gospel choir - 25+ voices - for a shot at "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For" - and it rocked!  A young girl sang lead with a seasoned rocker, two little dudes - also 10 years old - joined me on acoustic guitars and we had a BLAST!  Two important thoughts come to mind at the end of a beautiful day:

+ First, this was inter-generational worship in the best way.  Nothing was dumbed-down for the children and at the same time they were integral to the integrity of the music and the message. This was about being the BODY of Christ together in a new/old way. I was so blessed by the way everyone pulled together and gave shape and form to a vision the Spirit has been encouraging for the past four years.

+ Second, our band is VERY tight and getting better.  It will be fun to move into a new program year with a new music director helping us explore new sounds of hope and compassion.  After worship we met with our new music guy and we'll be doing BIG events once a quarter - finding ways to welcome new musicians into the mix as well as deepen the groove the old timers are creating, too.

And given the fact that we just hired a new Christian Education person...!  Let's just say things are really lining up for a TON of creativity to start shaking after we get back from vacation.  Right before worship I headed to the restroom where I met one of the singer's in the band who asked, "Is this what you had in mind when you came here four years ago?" I paused and replied, "It is something of what I had hoped might happen... given our unique New England spin... and a lot of time and prayer."

With patience and love - with the work of a LOT of people and the grace of God - the renewal work I was called to help shape is really coming to pass.  And while I can't WAIT for my vacation time with Di in Montreal, this year is going to be so wonderful as we really start to go deeper into the spirit of joy and hope and commitment in our new incarnation.  As we sang, it was a beautiful day...

A quick thought to be unpacked later...

During the month of August, as I have been exploring a "spirituality of authentic blended worship," I have dipped back into the work I did five years ago on my doctoral dissertation.  Clearly, my commitment to discerning the presence of the holy in popular culture continues to be as lively a part of my public and personal spiritual life as when I first wrote "While My Guitar Gently Weeps" for San Francisco Theological Seminary. But in the ensuing years I have also come to see a distinct omission from that work:  the role of beauty.

To that end, it seems that much of my blogging has been an exploration of the importance of truth, goodness and beauty in popular culture and art - with a keen eye for that which is beautiful. Theologian, Paul Tillich, has noticed that those of us who seek the holy in art and culture often fall into one of two categories:  "Those with an ontological faith... anticipate God in the beautiful; while those with a moral faith anticipate encountering God in the good." (Kelton Cobb, Theology and Popular Culture.) 

+ Ontological faith is rooted in the sacramentality of life - discovering the holy within the human and the extraordinary within the ordinary - it is a Word made Flesh perspective that "... is enchanted by the fascinating face of the holy in the moments where the numinous shines through existing beings... That plain, finite reality is found adequate to serve as a receptacle for the transcendent beauty of the divine is deeply reassuring... (and celebrates) that ultimate reality may be encountered through concrete things, person and events - this particular jar of water, piece of bread, tree or building." (Cobb, p. 109) I know that I have benefited from the work of Mako Fujimura and the IAM consortium as well as the insights of Gregory Wolfe and IMAGE Journal.

+ Moral faith is more attuned to the "otherness" of the Lord - the perfection of the divine and the sinfulness of humanity - the call for justice and judgment.  "Aware of their shortcomings, those with moral faith occupy themselves with constructing a way of life that is just and compassionate for only then will we be found fit for the presence of the divine. Moral faith gravitates toward law-giving, activist and Utopian expressions of piety." (Cobb, p. 109)

That I came to faith in a moralist context is no surprise:  the Reformed tradition of the Congregational Way is bathed in the quest for  justice and peace, activism and intellectual rigor.  The "Statement of Faith" that founded the United Church of Christ is baptized in this moralist spirituality that from the outset celebrates God's action and our deeds:

We believe in God, the Eternal Spirit,
Father of our Lord Jesus Christ and our Father,
and to his deeds we testify:
He calls the worlds into being,
creates man in his own image
and sets before him the ways of life and death.
He seeks in holy love to save all people from aimlessness and sin.
He judges men and nations by his righteous will
declared through prophets and apostles.
In Jesus Christ, the man of Nazareth, our crucified and risen Lord,
he has come to us
and shared our common lot,
conquering sin and death
and reconciling the world to himself.
He bestows upon us his Holy Spirit,
creating and renewing the church of Jesus Christ,
binding in covenant faithful people of all ages, tongues, and races.
He calls us into his church
to accept the cost and joy of discipleship,
to be his servants in the service of men,
to proclaim the gospel to all the world
and resist the powers of evil,
to share in Christ's baptism and eat at his table,
to join him in his passion and victory.
He promises to all who trust him
forgiveness of sins and fullness of grace,
courage in the struggle for justice and peace,
his presence in trial and rejoicing,
and eternal life in his kingdom which has no end.
Blessing and honor, glory and power be unto him.

And that I have been called for the past 30 years into the ontological way of a sacramental spirituality is no secret either; my soul became sterile in the stern surroundings of a church devoid of deep aesthetics.  And now, after nearly my entire ordained ministry, I am trying to find a way to give space to both - just as Tillich once advocated.  "For religious faith to thrive, it must strike a balance between the moral and the ontological. Because God is both beautiful AND good - at least as evoked in the experience of the holy - the human response of faith must take account of both. But also, in very practical terms, a desire for beauty that is cut free from moral goodness can descend in the worst sorts of cruelty..." (Cobb, p. 110)

Next week - in my worship notes - I will speak more of this balance between beauty and goodness.  We will use Bobby McFerrin's feminist setting of the 23rd Psalm as well as Sarah McLachlan's reworking of "Bring on the Wonder" to highlight this balance.  And I suspect I am going to be taking Tillich's Systematic Theology along with me on vacation.  It seems as if the old man continues to speak to something within that needs more time and consideration.

Let God be God...

The spiritual practice of honoring the Sabbath is a precious (in the best sense of the word) and all too often neglected part of our lives.  For the past 15 years, with verying degrees of success, Dianne and I have been trying to gently embrace a Sabbath keeping rhythm to our shared life. It mostly consists of waking LATE, sitting together in the morning with the NY Times and tea or coffee and visiting.  Later in the day we will likely share an easy walk and a fun meal, too. 

Ours is an incarnational commitment to the Sabbath rather than a ritualized one - although I find myself going to my prayer book at least once on this day.  And this is probably true for a great deal of my prayer life - walking/waking meditation on gratitude, discerning the sacred in the events of the day,  listening for the still-speaking God in the music of the hour - rather than marking the hours with liturgy. Both have value and both have been a part of my journey in faith, too.  It seems, however, that in this second part of living, I am more energized and open to improvisation in all things - including my opening my heart to God - than used to be true.

Joan Chittister, once well-acquainted with a more ordered life in prayer and service, has written:

I do not have unlimited freedom.  Obedience to God's will sets limits...(That is why) the first rung of the ladder to union with God and harmony in life is to let God be God. We make so many things in life god - this job, that person, this thing, that title - that eventually we forget who God really is. We forget what really lasts in life.  We forget that there are responsibilities that come with creaturehood: to gend the garden and to care for it, to take care of the creatures and to be helpmates to one another. We even forget the presence of God and so act as if God were not present:  we belittle one another and make fun of the poor and reject the alien.  We make ourselves god and forget the will of God in others for us.

Keeping Sabbath - and honoring it, too - is a body prayer.  From the inside out and the outside in, it awakens me to the presence of God so that I might act faithfully in the present realities of my life.  One of my mentor's in the contemplative life is Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel who once wrote:

Creating holiness in time requires a different sensibility than building a cathedral in space: “We must conquer space in order to sanctify time... There is a realm of time where the goal is not to have but to be, not to own but to give, not to control but to share, not to subdue but to be in accord. Life goes wrong when the control of space, the acquisition of things of space, becomes our sole concern. (Heschel)

He also has observed that, "Spiritual life begins to decay when we fail to sense the grandeur of what is eternal in time."  For me, honoring the Sabbath involves rest on a variety of levels, for rest and refreshment is an act of trust as well as renewal.  And I know that when I am not at rest I am not able to sense what is eternal in time.  It is also trust in that my rest documents that I am not necessary to God's work.  For 24 hours, the One who is Holy can get along without any of my efforts - without ANY of our efforts - because God is God. Practicing this truth - honoring it - enriches my life as well as my faith.

Another thing that has become a part of Sabbath keeping for me is a quiet reflection on the week that has passed:  what happened last week that knocked me off my center, where were the blessings, the fears, the joys and the sacred surprises?  Fredrick Buechner speaks of this type of prayer as observance:

A religious observance can be a wedding, a christening, a Memorial Day service, a bar mitzvah or anything that you might be apt to think of. There are lots of things going on at them. There are lots of things you can learn from them if you're in a receptive state of mind. The world "observance" itself suggests what is perhaps the most important thing about them.

A man and a woman are getting married. A child is being given a name. A war is being remembered and many deaths.  A boy is coming of age.  It is life that is going on. It is always going on and it is always precious. It is God that is going on. It is you who are there that is going on. As Henry James advised writers, be one on whom nothing is lost.  OBSERVE!! There are few things as important, as religious, as that. (Buechner)

This week I observed a colleague in crisis and a faith community searching for ways to experience redemption. I was present with people with talent and finesse playing music from their hearts.  I shared a meal with loved ones in my family, walked the main street of our town during a festival and greeted new friends and neighbors, spoke about spiritual formation and community building with people who want to help strengthen our Sunday School ministry, visited with friends and talked about where God might be breaking into our lives.  A few times I was rattled by the cruelty people I love can dish out in their pain and fear; it awakened me to the fragility of love and friendship.  But I also encountered a LOT of love and integrity in people as they seek ways to be faithful to God.

As this Sabbath day unfolds, I find myself going back to the poetry of Scott Cairns.

Scattered, petulant, argumentative,
the diverse members generally find
little, nothing of their own, to offer

one another.  Like us all, the saved
need saving mostly from themselves, and so
they make progress, if at all, by dying

to what they can, acquiescing to this
new pressure, new wind, new breath that would fill
them with something better than their own

good intentions.  Or schemes of community.
Or their few articulate innovations
in dogma. What the Ghost expects of them

is a purer than customary will
to speak together, a mere willingness
to hear expressed in the fragmentary

figures of one another's speech the mute
and palpable identity they share,
scoured clear of impediment and glare,

the uncanny evidence that here
in the stillest air between them the One
we call the Ghost insinuates his care

for the unexpected word now fondling
the tongue, now falling here, incredible
confession - that they would be believers,

who startle to suspect among the scraps
of Babel's gritty artifacts one stone,
irreducible fossil, capable

of bearing love's unprovoked inscription
in the locus of its term.
/em>

Shared sacrifice and the common good...

This morning I had the chance to take a short hike by the water with a man from our church. We shared thoughts about the state of our union, life at church and the challenges of being men of faith during this moment in history - and a whole lot more, too.  Later, when returning home, there was an email from the group, Faithful America, waiting for me. My friend hadn't sent it to me, but he might as well have as it deepened our earlier conversation. (check them out @ http://www.faithfulamerica.org/) I was struck by this paragraph:

When Michele Bachmann won, we started hearing a lot more about the "values voters" who propelled her to victory - so we perked up and listened in. We heard a lot from these groups and the candidates about protecting corporate tax breaks and fearing Muslims and LGBT people - but not so much about shared sacrifice and the common good.

That really resonated with me:  when did following the way of Jesus become synonymous with hatred, fear and mean-spirited economic policies?  Given the "end times" theology of some of the current Republican presidential hopefuls - and the ugly mood of the once middle class in many parts of the United States - I sense that the ministry of Faithful America is more important than ever.  Maybe you'll even want to join them?  I did recently - and along with ONE (http://www.one.org/us/)  and Church World Service (http://www.churchworldservice.org/site/PageServer?pagename=homepage ) - I think these folk are on the side of the angels.

These are hard times for many and they are going to get worse before they get better.  Can you help?

credits: Dexter and Blue (Belgium) @ http://blog.vandalog.com/

An authentic blended worship: part three... (creativity and U2)

NOTE:  Here are my worship notes for this coming Sunday, August 21, 2011, in what is Part Three of the "authentically blended worshp" series.  In the previous Sunday's I have spoken about listening for God's still speaking voice in popular music, the prophetic presence of the Lord in contemporary music and now U2's creative use of imagination.  I am deeply grateful, too for Raewynne Whitely and Beth Maynard's work, Get Up Off Your Knees, which I read again for this message as well as Christian Scharen's One Step Closer. This quote says it all for me:  "I see U2 as an icon leading us one step closer to the cross - a place of both suffering because of the world's rejection and violent killing of Jesus, as well as a joyful hope that comes from God's raising him to new life over violence, hatred and even death."  If you are around on Sunday morning at 10:30 am, please join us.

“In a culture where religion belongs to the private world and pop culture to the public,” writes the Anglican scholar, Raewynne Whiteley, “we have tended to think of religion and pop culture as two areas divided by a vast chasm.” The return of the American Culture Wars – just in time for the presidential battles of 2012 I might add – are a case in point pitting the fiercely devoted fans of liberation music, art, style and culture against the overtly pious advocates of the End Times.

Usually this clash between contemporary Puritans like Governor Rick Perry or Representative Michelle Bachmann, who discern the Devil lurking in everything from economics and race to sexuality and art, and the vast majority of us – hip hoppers and soccer moms and dads, rock and rollers and middle of the road business people – who fear an erosion of our hopes and dreams through the threat of a renewed theocracy, is marketed and manipulated by both camps and framed as a collision of essential values.

• “Either you with us… or you’re against us” claimed one of our Presidents. Either you stand for God and Country or you fall for those who want to destroy America.

• Their opponents are equally as divisive and dismissive in their eloquence: If you want to keep Big Brother out of your bedroom… if you want to end the greed of Wall Street and take care of your neighbors on Main Street… if you love Mother Earth and hate those who are raping her with pollution…

Enter the unique public ministry of the rock band, U2, who found a way of making allies with the Religious Right and the so-called Secular Left around feeding the hungry and caring for HIV/AIDS patients in Africa. Not only have they harnessed the genius of capitalism with the sin of conspicuous consumption to serve the Lord’s call to compassion and justice, they have also challenged presidents and prime ministers, religious leaders and movie stars to stand and deliver healing and hope for the wretched of the earth. As front man, Bono says with his usual aplomb: "Eight million people die every year for the price of going out with your friends to the movies and buying an ice cream.”

Literally for about $30 a head per year, you could save 8 million lives. Isn't that extraordinary? Preventable disease – not calamity, not famine, nothing like that -- but preventable disease - just for the lack of medicines. That is cheap, that is a bargain….But we've got to follow through on our ideals or we betray something at the heart of who we are. Outside these gates, and even within them, the culture of idealism is under siege, beset by materialism and narcissism and all the other isms" of indifference. (Bono)

And let me suggest to you two truths that embrace to inform the music, spirituality, commitment and conviction of U2:

• First, they understand themselves to be artists of irony and creativity in a strange and wonderful era where celebrity is currency and can be used for good or ill.

• And second they know that in truth religion and pop culture have not been opponents but have always been connected.

In the medieval period, mystery plays and their accompanying and often bawdy music taught the great themes of Christian theology to the uneducated; in the sixteenth century, (the Protestant Reformer Martin Luther wondered why “the Devil had all the good music” as he listened to the tunes in German beer halls.) Even in the twentieth century, faith has frequently found expression… in the popular music of jazz and blues or even the explicit questioning of Joan Osborne’s song, “What If God Was One of Us?” (Whiteley, Get Up Off Your Knees, p. 158)

So this morning, we’re going to share four key songs from the U2 catalog – four songs that speak to their unique commitment to compassion and justice born of their equally profound calling as Christians of the 21st century – that are simultaneously prayers and a summons to action. In ways that have eluded US politicians and church leaders alike, these guys have found a way through the culture wars.

• They get things done in the name of the Lord and build a true community of former enemies in the process.

• They insist that God’s grace trumps karma – and that this demands a response of gratitude and hope that becomes flesh in our broken world.

And they do it with artistry, humor, finesse and irony: U2 never hides their doubts or their faith – they see them as embracing – nor do they hide their darkness from the light or their fear from their courage. This is part of what it means to know God’s creative invitation with our imagination. If you were here last week, I spoke about meeting God in the prophetic presence: the embrace of the Lord in solidarity, challenge and paradox. Today let me call your attention to the One who is Holy through the creative use of our imagination. Preacher and scholar, Eugene Peterson, puts it like this:

One of the maddeningly enduring habits of the human race is to insist on domesticating God. We are determined to tame God. We figure out ways to harness God to our projects. We try to reduce God to a size that conveniently fits our plans and ambitions and tastes. And we are pleased when we find that there are men and women coming alongside us, offering a rendition of gods and goddesses that give us what we want, when we want it and on our own terms. Publicists and propagandists, joined by a surprising number of leading religious figures, are among this company. They cannily manipulate our hunger for meaning and mystery to sell us their product or enlist us in their cause. They are masters at using some so-called “spirituality” as a ruse for exploiting our anxieties and hormones.

And then a prophet shows up and tells us we can’t do it. We can’t fit God into our plans – rather we must fit into his. We can’t use God… like a tool or an appliance or a credit card. For prophets, you see, confront us with the sovereign presence of God in our lives – and if we won’t face up, they grab us by the scruff of our necks and shake us into attention. (Peterson)

So, rather than explaining this truth with even more words, like John Calvin said about Holy Communion, I would rather experience it. Let’s enter an experiential conversation in four parts by listening to the Creative Imagination of the Lord with U2.

Part One: Hopefully Searching for God in Reality: Genesis 9:8-17 – “Beautiful Day”

I don’t know about you, but I spend a lot of time these days weeping: not because I’m clinically depressed, but when I consider what is taking place to God’s green earth and my sisters and brothers throughout creation, many times I am full to overflowing with grief.

• The famine in the Horn of Africa – and the agony of everyone involved.

• The painful and excruciatingly complex wars for liberation in Libya and Yemen to say nothing of the futility of Afghanistan and Iraq.

• The mean-spirited greed and impotence of our own politicians.

The return of religious fanaticism to national politics – the pollution of our resources – the abuse of our loved ones – the agonizing if existent economic recovery: I’m not alone in my tears and fears as the riots and rage in England, the Tea Party in the US or the war on public employees make clear. This is a sad and bewildering time, yes?

And in a eras like our own “it is easy to imagine that God has abandoned us… not so much as individuals… but abandoned us on an earthly scale… abandoned the human race, left us to our own devices, to the consequences of our own flawed (and sinful) decision making. (Whitely, p. 5)

To which U2 says, “Stop feeling sorry for yourself – or alienated from the love of God – there is something going on that is much bigger than your feelings or social analysis. There is God’s historic commitment to be with us ALWAYS – even unto the end of the ages – born of a time when God’s people were completely clueless.

• Read Genesis 9: 8-17

• We don’t have to believe the historicity of Noah’s tale to know what it feels like to be given a sign that the rain and the flood and all our fears are not the end of the story.

Each of us has experienced something of the rainbow sign in our lives often when we needed it the most. But just so that we don’t miss the point, the Bible concludes by telling us: NEVER again, saith the Lord, will I leave you alone or feeling abandoned. NEVER – and my proof is my sign – the sign of the rainbow.


With creativity and imagination, we are reminded that God has given us a sign and the assurance that earth will never again be destroyed – and this is a promise born of the heart of the Lord. Part one of today’s story involves learning how to search for God with hope in the midst of reality.

Part Two: Creatively Using the Pain of Reality: Psalm 40 –“40”

Now no one – God included – said this search was easy or even simple – and that is clearly the second part of this conversation with U2. That’s why they use the Psalms so often in their music – especially the songs of lament – there is honesty and anger and real humanity in the Psalms.Bono once said, “King David was the first blues singer… a man of faith who believed enough to get angry when it looked like the Lord wasn’t coming through. In fact, David is to the Psalms what Elvis is to rock and roll: authenticity – depth – passion and honesty.”

• Have you ever cried out to the Lord, “How long?!?”

• Have you ever despaired that God wasn’t listening – or didn’t care?

• Have you ever cried yourself to sleep wishing that you might die before the morning arrived so you wouldn’t have to face the aching emptiness?

THAT is part of what the Psalter asks us to pray – pray with the integrity of Job – and with just as much passion. And maybe you will want to join in on when the Lord’s servant cries out: how long?!?


If you have ever seen U2 live – and I know some of you have – you know how powerful it is when 40,000 – or 100,000 other voices join yours in worship in a concert stadium and cry out to the Lord: How long? This quest to use our pain creatively to move into God’s hope is hard work…

Part Three: Honestly Accepting the Cross: John 15: 12 – “When Love Comes to Town”

In the Christian tradition, you cannot escape the Cross of Jesus Christ in the journey of faith: you may want to avoid it, you may think it too horrible or irrelevant for a 21st century faith and you may think you know better than God because YOU would never make the Cross the center of a religion. But the Cross is what gives shape, form and meaning to Christ’s words:

• Read John 15: 12

• Preacher, Julie Bogart, once said that most preachers focus on the first part of this word – YOU love one another – but Christ’s emphasis was on the ending – as I have loved you.

On the Cross – on a trust born of God’s love and presence – not human ethics or discipline: you don’t think Jesus was able to endure the Cross because we was smart or committed do you?
That is only a piece of the story – because the truth is that he could only go to the Cross in love and grace by God’s presence – not his own sense of right and wrong. Jesus looked into his own fears and opened himself to the only power capable of leading him through the wilderness all the way to Golgotha: God. And I am talking about God’s love – God’s grace – God’s strength – God’s presence – and God’s promise.

• How did St. Paul put it? Left to our own we will be okay for a bit but then no matter how hard we try on our own we will end up doing exactly what we hate.

• Romans 7: the power of sin within me keeps sabotaging my best intentions, I obviously need help! I realize that I don't have what it takes. I can will it, but I can't do it. I decide to do good, but I don't really do it; I decide not to do bad, but then I do it anyway. My decisions, such as they are, don't result in actions. Something has gone wrong deep within me and gets the better of me every time. It happens so regularly that it's predictable. The moment I decide to do good, sin is there to trip me up. I truly delight in God's commands, but it's pretty obvious that not all of me joins in that delight. Parts of me covertly rebel, and just when I least expect it, they take charge. I've tried everything and nothing helps. I'm at the end of my rope.

So using a really ROUGH and tumble sound – bringing the premier blues man of the Americas, Mr. B.B. King into the mix, too – U2 gives us an example of what it feels like to face our need and then surrender to God’s love so that we can face even the cross.


Part Four: Openly Facing the Challenge of Grace – Philippians 3:8-16 – “I Still Haven’t Found”

Let me bring this to a close: with creativity and imagination, U2 works at being prophets to pop culture – and through pop culture to the world beyond – even religion. They speak of hope as well as fear, they see both the light and the dark, too. What’s more, they insist that an authentic faith is NEVER private. There is always an inner journey – Jesus was explicit about spending time quietly in prayer – and the 21st century needs a LOT more introspection.

At the same time, without a commitment to challenging injustice with compassion, religion can often be part of the problem. St. Paul understood that as well as anyone and insisted that those who followed Jesus never come to think that they have the quest for faith all figured out.

• Read Philippians 3: 8-16

• If we think that having a private faith is enough who will speak for the forgotten and voiceless? If we trust only in our hearts but do nothing with our lives to give shape and form to Jesus, how will others come to know the Lord?

• And if our faith is built just on words, how does the Word become Flesh in our generation?

This closing song asks all those questions – and I thought it made sense to ask them as a community rather than just a singer or a band – so let’s have the gospel choir come up so that we might bring this home, ok?



Hope in reality – creatively using our pain to move closer to God – embracing the Cross – and wrestling with the challenges of grace are a pop culture catechism that I am down with. Like St. Paul told us:

Let's keep focused on these goals, those of us who want everything God has for us. If any of you have something else in mind, something less than total commitment, God will clear your blurred vision—you'll see it yet! Now that we're on the right track, let's stay on it.

At the start of this week...

This week our worship will use some of the music from U2 to explore God's still speaking voice in our generation.  Over the years, their songs have become prayers for me and I look forward to sharing some of them with our folk during our 10:30 am worship celebration.  I am particularly excited about the gospel choir setting for "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For" that we're doing.  Too much fun and joy - and I am so grateful it is coming together.

Four other developments, however, are energizing me as morning breaks on a rainy Berkshire Monday:

+ Our annual Thanksgiving Eve show:  I am starting to line-up participants for the gig on Wednesday, November 23rd at 7:30 pm and can hardly wait to start practicing. This show tries to accomplish four things simultaneously:  a) reclaim the almost lost art of group singing that was once so important to our culture; b) bring together some top local musicians who want to perform and share their gifts in support of raising funds for emergency fuel in this area; c) create a little beauty with American music and poetry at the start of winter; and d) find ways to involve as many people as possible from children to seniors.  Already, a number of folk have enthusiastically re-upped saying, "This is one of the most valuable things we do together each year.  I can't wait!!"

+ Interviewing and hiring a new Christian Education coordinator:  the time has come in our renewal to take another step and really strengthen this ministry.  We have GREAT volunteers who are talented and loving.  And, they needs support and a fresh blast of creativity to help us move to the next level of equipping our children with the tools of the faith. Already two highly talented - and very different - people have visited with me about this part-time position and now we need to have deeper conversations including members of the CE ministry team.  My hope and prayer is to nail this all down before we head out at the start of September for vacation.

+ Let's not forget the return of the Jazz Ambassadors to Patrick's Pub on Thursday, September 1st @ 6:30 pm:  We haven't played together since Turkey - so this will be a reunion of sorts - as well as a concert for peace-making through music.  Other guys in the band have been playing all around this summer - there is a Dixieland contingent and Bennie and Charlie have had their own gigs - and our church band has been rockin' the house, too.  But now we're going to make some JAZZ together and that will be sweet.

+ And for the final Sunday before we head out to vacation, we'll look at the importance of TRADITION in authentically blended worship:  it is a balancing act, yes?  I want to celebrate and honor not only the new, but the time-tested beauty of some of the great hymns and chants of the historic church.  That will be a gas, too!

Today there are pastoral visits to make, interviews to schedule and my last summer class on "celebrating Eucharist" to lead.  As I wrote last week, "sometimes you're the windshield..." Today I celebrate the blessings in our earthen vessels as I head into the day.

It was a beautiful day...

Today worship REALLY came together:  my band mates sang like ANGELS, the sound guys were spot on, I didn't forget the core of my interpretive message and the Spirit was palpable!  Thanks be to God!  As one young man said, "Sometimes just for a about 30 seconds I can feel something in me lifted into God's presence in the beauty... I am so glad for today."  Me, too, man and I can't wait to post a video of our reworking of the Springsteen's "The Rising."  Very soulful, slow and more gospel chant than rock anthem - and my buddies really cooked on it today - as we saw something of Ezekiel's dry bones story at work in the Boss's homage to the heroes of 9/11. 

Next we're off to rock and soul land with the "creative imagination of God as expressed by U2."  For 4 weeks we've been practicing a gospel version of "I Still Haven't Found" with children, youth, adults, classical choir and rock and rollers making up our 20+ person group. It has been a total blast. We're also going to be doing: Beautiful Day, 40 and When Love Comes to Town.

And just to round things out, we'll be hearing from a daughter of the congregation about this summer's CPE work before she starts her third year in seminary.  We want/need to help raise a few thousand dollars for her, too. Hmmmm.... grace is busting out all over the place these days and I am so grateful.  More on "a spirituality of authentically blended worship - part three" as next week unfolds.

See the world in green and blue
See China right in front of you
See the canyons broken by cloud
See the tuna fleets clearing the sea out
See the Bedouin fires at night
See the oil fields at first light
And see the bird with a leaf in her mouth
After the flood all the colors came out

Strange days...

Ok, it is a strange day when Al Jazeera TV needs to remind us about the importance of the separation of church and state in the USA but... apparently we NEED it! (check it out: http://english.aljazeera.net/indepth/opinion/2011/07/20117413402398376.html)

+ Today, Gov. Rick Perry of Texas declared that he was in the race for President on the Republican ticket just a week after organizing a religious rally invoking God's judgment on a godless, morally bankrupt secular American society.

+ Representative Michelle Bachmann won today's Iowa straw poll with her bizarre mix of Evangelical spirituality, lies and fear-mongering. (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/08/13/michele-bachmann-iowa-straw-poll-results_n_926273.html?igoogle=1)

+ And Southern Baptist minister and Fox News Commentator, Mike Huckabee, advises Tim Pawlenty to stay the course.

Five days ago, Susan Thistlethwaite of the Chicago Theological Seminary, ran an insightful column in the Washington Post that bears further reflection given the return of the Religious Right in the 21st century. (check it out: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/on-faith/post/recession-20-what-can-we-learn-from-faith-during-the-great-depression/2011/08/08/gIQAkfvx2I_blog.html)

Her two key points are clear:

+ Not only are we making all the same economic mistakes today that gave rise to the crash of 1929, and then prolonged it during the Great Depression of the 1930’s, like unregulated boom times and then the failure to sufficiently invest in a recovery, we’re making all the same religious mistakes... In the 1930’s, most people failed to heed the depth of the critique of the economy and of religion by Reinhold Niebuhr, the thundering Protestant theologian who sought a return to “Christian realism” in the 1930’s in order to bring about a new Social Gospel that reckoned with the reality of evil. Instead, in the Great Depression, the only sector of American Protestantism that actually grew was the “sectarian” type that emphasized individual conversion and the imminent return of Jesus in a Rapture.

+ In the 1930’s, most people failed to heed the depth of the critique of the economy and of religion by Reinhold Niebuhr, the thundering Protestant theologian who sought a return to “Christian realism” in the 1930’s in order to bring about a new Social Gospel that reckoned with the reality of evil. Instead, in the Great Depression, the only sector of American Protestantism that actually grew was the “sectarian” type that emphasized individual conversion and the imminent return of Jesus in a Rapture... This is, of course, exactly what is happening now. Harold Camping recently (and incorrectly) predicted the end of the world for May 21, 2011, making him 0-2 for end of the world predictions. Camping, of course, could accurately be described as a sectarian.Even more in the “mainstream” than Camping, however, is the kind of call to repentance and the threat to the nation of the failure to repent that was the main text of Governor Rick Perry’s recent Texas prayer event, “The Response.” Perry’s prayer and bible reading presentation fit into the sectarian framework of individual repentance leading to salvation. This also fits the Niebuhrian critique. While a host of problems from poverty to division in families and nation are decried, very little is actually being done in terms of social justice to correct these conditions.

I have noted before that this strange but troubling hybrid of quasi-spiritual fear mongering - that is obsessed with the End Times - when mixed into a scape-goating political message bears too great a resemblance to the rise of Hitler to remain silent. The economic and social fear in the US is palpable - and President Obama better get off his academic perch and address it head on with prayer AND get-us-back-to-work populism.  Because the alternative of a Bachmann/Perry theocracy is terrifying to consider...

Without a clear, bold and assertive alternative to the fear and scape-goating of the current Religious Right - and without a true moral challenge to indifference - the United States is set to relive the 1930s on many different fronts.

Sabbath notes...

As is often the case on Sabbath mornings, a number of thoughts are running around my head in no particular order. It is a cool day in the Berkshires - the temperature was in the low 50s F here last night - and the sun hasn't quite made it to our back porch.  But The Times was in the driveway - for the last three months I've been grumbling with the delivery people about meeting the 8 AM guarantee closer to 8 AM rather than their preferred 10:45 AM - so we entered they morning quietly, reflectively reading stories to one another as they struck our fancy.

I've been thinking a lot about vacation - we will be leaving for some away time at the start of September - and this is a month later that usual. 

+ We're both a bit churlish about the delay from time to time, but it will be sweet when it arrives.  We had hoped to drive to Thunder Bay, Ontario to see our friends, Peter and Joyce, but Di wasn't able to get the necessary time off from work for such an excursion.  For a few days we were in a quandary about "away time" but quickly found a deal for a break in Montreal - one of my favorite places in the world - so away we go.  It will be shorter - and we are working on another Thunder Bay excursion - but it will be a blessing.

+ One of my MOST favorite things in the world is walking around French speaking Montreal with Dianne just seeing what we encounter (London, too!)  And we are both aching to get on the road.

I've been thinking about what is coming together in our faith community, too.  After four years of intentional - and also totally unexpected - hard work and blessings, a few truly fascinating things are about to take shape and form.

+ First, we've hired a new music director who is equally gifted in both traditional music and jazz.  This opens doors of creativity beyond the imagination on so many levels I can hardly contain my joy.  I can't wait to see how his gifts will meld with ours - and stretch us, too - so that we are finally able to consistently craft what I have been calling "authentically blended worship."

+ Second, our small church band has been attracting a few new top notch players to add to the mix of excellent vocalists and guitar players:  we have a dear friend on acoustic bass - who is also a smokin' guitar player - as well as a killer tenor singer in the "classic rock" vein who really rocks the house on electric guitar, too.  This week's foundation for "The Rising" and "Everything is Broken" kicks up the energy by their presence and creativity.  And let's not forget the upgrade in our sound system:  OMG it is the difference between night and day.

+ Third, a small group of insightful and talented people are now willing to share their gifts by creating three new small groups.  This is a huge leap forward for us.  Others have noted, that while evangelical churches have figured out how to create community and support through small group study, the "side line" churches tend to favor joining a group and then staying with it forever.  These new gatherings, however, are designed to host 4-8 people each, last from October to early December and then evaluate whether to regroup or morph into something new.  Their will be an intentional women's spirituality group, a gathering to reflect on Eucharist and justice, a small group committed to trust building in addition to our Old Testament study group and knitting ministry.  I am truly blessed by this calling to go deeper and excited about where it might lead us all.

+ Fourth, this is the year for our children and families ministry to be strengthened.  There are key parents ready to help us deepen what happens on Sunday morning and I just interviewed a potential new director who knows how to use technology in advance of working with children in creative ways.  While the population in the Berkshires continues to age, many young families who live here sense they have been forgotten - and this is a key group for this year's outreach.

And let's not forget the reconnection of the Sister City Jazz Band who meets for a late summer celebration of our time in Turkey, returns to the bandstand on Thursday, September 1st at Patrick's Pub and who may try to set up a Skype concert with our buddy, Omer Sahin, from Istanbul in support of the Playing for a Change benefit on September 17th.  I am telling you, as I heard a little guy say to his grandmother one afternoon as she held his hand crossing the street:  "I am a lucky, lucky boy!"

All of which made me think of this poem by Anna Kamienska called "Gratitude."

A tempest threw a rainbow in my face
so that I wanted to fall under the rain
to kiss the hands of an old woman to whom I gave my seat
to thank everyone for the fact that they exist
and at times even feel like smiling
I was grateful to young leaves that they were willing
to open up to the sun
to babies that they still

felt like coming into this world
to the old that they heroically
endure until the end
I was full of thanks
like a Sunday alms-box
I would have embrace death
if she'd stopped nearby

Gratitude is a scattered
homeless love.


I have a wedding rehearsal this evening but a lot of time to settle into the beauty of this Sabbath, too.