A few words and a song...

This Sunday - after worship has closed - our band (and maybe some of our local musical friends) will sing this in honor of Levon.  We use it to close our Thanksgiving Eve gigs each year and it has become a deep favorite.

Every year this song takes on a new meaning:  different folk take a verse and interpret it their own way.  Some go soulful, some make it playful and my man, Brian, makes it both with just a touch of lament.  (He OWNS the "crazy Chester" verse, yes?) 

So, we'll sing it as part of Levon's legacy in this musical ministry.  We'll sing it to say good bye with respect. And we'll sing it so that some of the young people in the congregation might learn it and keep it alive.  Like "the Boss" in the Seeger Sessions gigs made clear, each generation has a sacred obligation to keep the songs of freedom and hope alive.  And this doesn't happen in books - it happens in community - where you learn by hearing and seeing and doing.

We'll sing also because sometimes a few words and a song are all that's needed. Dear Mary Oliver put it like this in her poem:  It You Say It Right, It Helps the Heart to Bear It...

The comforts
   of language
      are true
         and deep;

in a cemetery,
   in the South,
      so many stones
         and so many

so small.
   Sometimes
      three or four
         in a row.

In this instance:
   Eliza May,
      Oceola,
         Joseph.

Can you imagine
   the condition
      of the heart
         of a mother

or a father
   watching these plantings?
      I cannot.
         But I try.

"God taketh
   his young lambs home"
      is carved there.
         A few words

like water
   on a stone.
      Cool and beautiful
         like water on a stone.

If you are in town, please stop by and sing with us, ok?

The night they drove old dixie down...

I loved Levon's voice - his drumming and mandolin playing, too - but especially his voice.  He kept a SOLID American back beat and sang from the soul with a voice that echoed the country he loved so deeply.

As I understand it, he didn't want to bring The Band to a close - that was Robbie Robertson's idea - and it probably made sense in some karmic way - the good times can't last forever - but I'm so glad Levon kept making music.  He was the real deal in American music.  When he drummed for the Hawks he kicked ass.  He gave Bobby Dylan just what he needed to help the Trickster go electric.  His voice was one of the best ambassadors this country ever had.  And he kept up the fight for fun, integrity, shaking your booty and welcoming everybody into the good times until the very end.  Just listen to what this cat does with "Cripple Creek" it is pure gold...

Some people don't connect deeply to music - I don't get that but I know it is true - so this post won't make much sense to you.  I always wanted to play guitar like the Band's Robbie Robertson and I always wanted to sing like a combination of Levon and Bruce Springsteen. So when one of your heroes does "the last waltz," there is a sadness in your heart because even though we never met, his spirit was always close. Seems that Robbie finally visited Levon last week after decades of alienation - just before his death - to make amends. That is a good thing to do for everyone involved and now both partners in the music can rest a little easier because Levon passed today quietly in his sleep. 

I know how important making amends is for everyone involved... it can heal your soul. So let's just say Levon's death has hit me hard in ways I wasn't expecting:  who can say why?  A few years ago, I wrote to Garth Hudson (of the Band) and invited him to come by our church sometime to play our great pipe organ.  He never replied - and I guess that goes with the territory.  But I still love his playing and wanted him to know that if he was ever in the neighborhood, the church organ would be his for a while.  I still remember him playing before it rained at Watkins Glenn - he played a long, wild and wooly prelude to "Chest Fever" that evoked Celtic tunes from Canada as well as Bach and ice rink music - and then they ripped it up - with Levon's vocal soaring through it all.

"She's stoned" said the Swede, and the moon calf agreed
I'm like a viper in shock with my eyes in the clock
She was just there somewhere and here I am again
And as my mind unweaves, I feel the freeze down in my knees
But just before she leaves, she receives

With Levon just living 60 miles away, I guess I thought that I would likely get another chance to hear his good time music once more before we all moved on.  But I was wrong. Sometimes death sneaks up on us like that, yeah?  It just grabs you by the throat and shakes for a bit in all its unexpected power and truth. That's how I felt today...

So I shed some tears for Levon and I will probably shed some more, too.  Some are for me, I know:  his music touched something in my heart and it hurts to say good bye. Some of my tears are for those who have passed before I got a chance to make amends, too. And some are for the loved ones in my life and church who are hurting right now - some facing death - and others are just bewildered by life and all its pain. My tears are a prayer for them as I lift them up to God's grace in the faith that in time they will be released from their suffering and know a taste of joy.

How many times have I prayed these words... Into your hands, O merciful Savior, we commend your servant.  Acknowledge, we humbly pray, a sheep of your own fold, a lamb of your own flock, a child of your own redeeming. Receive him into the arms of your mercy, into the blessed rest of everlasting peace, and into the glorious company of the saints in light. Amen.

Dick Clark has passed... and brother Levon is close...

I was saddened to hear of the loss of Dick Clark - an icon of American music - but my sad hit a deep level with the news that brother Levon Helm is in the final stages of cancer.  I can remember coming home from first grade and watching American Bandstand with my Aunt Donna.  She taught me ALL the line dances of the day - and later the Mashed Potato and Twist, too.  (It was a little bit of magic when she put on the Isley Brothers "Shout Parts 1 and 2" or Little Eva.)  She was my musical mentor - turned me on to Little Richard (NOT Pat Boone) before I even went to school, too!

Later, when Clark created the hipper "Where the Action Is" I would groove to that show, too: loved corny Paul Revere and the Raiders but also saw some great acts each afternoon before "Dark Shadows."  Don Cornelius (RIP) wanted to do for Black music what Clark did for POP songs - and both were blessings to artists and fans alike.  My life has been enriched by Dick Clark's commitment to sharing the good times (and I STILL remember seeing these cats back in the day... ooh do I love "Talk, Talk!")

And then Levon Helm.  My first written music review ever began with a reflection on the Band's "Music from Big Pink" - and I've been a stone, cold fan ever since.  We close every Thanksgiving Eve with "The Weight," I still get shivers whenever the opening moans of Garth Hudson's electric organ from "Chest Fever" come on (they are the equivalent of Celtic pipe harmonies played on a HUGE pipe organ), saw the Band at Watkins Glenn along with the Dead and Allman Brothers and have LOVED the roots rock brother Levon has been making these past 20 years.

As you know, he and Robbie Robertson were the first electric players to go on tour with Dyaln back in the day.  True, the Trickster of rock first showed off his electric blues with members of the Paul Butterfield Blues Band at Newport - Mike Bloomfield et all - but it was Helm and Robertson that made the rockin' real all over the world.  And after Dylan's motorcycle accident took him to Woodstock for quiet recovery, the Band came into their own.  Not only did "Music from Big Pink" take the world by surprise, but the once "Basement Tapes" between Dylan and the Band reclaimed and refashioned the "old, weird music" of Americana for the 20th century.  His voice and back beat were pure, man cuz he was the real deal.

Like many others, I, too thought he had beaten throat cancer... but apparently that was short lived.  Every year for the past 10 years I've been trying to find a way to do either "Don't Do It" or "Rag Momma Rag" for our Thanksgiving Eve gig and now maybe this will come to pass.  He was one of the best and kept on rockin' in the free world until the very end. Blessings to you both, dear brothers in creativity, you have both earned a well-deserved rest.

Confusion, clarity, beatiful losers and open eyes...

NOTE:  Here are this week's sermon notes for Sunday, April 22, 2012 the second Sunday after Easter.  For a while I am going to be experimenting by just posting here my notes - the working outline (with various quotes) - not a full prose text. From time to time I find I need that freedom - so we'll see where this leads.

Introduction

Two weeks after Easter – and we’re still trying to explain what happened!  We’re just like the first disciples as recorded in this morning’s story from Luke:  wondering, questioning, wandering, worrying, fearing, studying, experiencing, eating and sharing.

·       Biblical scholars are clear: every generation of disciples have to wrestle with the resurrection of Jesus.  “It always eludes human perception and yet is also no human fabrication.” (Charles Cousar)

·       It is mysterious and real – nourishing and paradoxical – challenging and comforting all at the same time.

And so today we get some of the story from Luke – we’ve already heard from Mark and John during the past two weeks – now we have yet another take on the story of Jesus as beautiful loser and why the foolishness of his Cross means wisdom and hope for you and me.  So let me share some thoughts with you about the Scripture and why they might matter for us in something I call:  confusion, clarity, beautiful losers and open eyes.

Insights

As you might have gathered, I sense there are four parts to this story – and its consequences for us as a faith community – that roughly correspond to the words confusion, clarity, beautiful losers and open eyes.  In fact, I think there is a rhythm at work not only in this story but in the way God reveals grace to us in the Cross:

·       At first we’re confused – bewildered, afraid and in the dark; then, in a hundred different ways, some clarity is revealed or experienced.  One writer likes to say that at first we encounter the truth of God in the darkness and then it is explained.

·       And often this explanation is both an experience with the Crucified and Risen Christ – a beautiful loser if there ever was one – and call to change direction:  the Cross opens our eyes and impels us to repent – or change direction – or turn around and move closer to God.

·       Are you with me?  Is that rhythm clear?  Confusion – then clarity; an experience with the beauty of Christ’s cross before our eyes are opened?

Let me go deeper:  our story today is intimately related to another right before it in Luke’s gospel that some of us know as the breaking of bread on the Emmaus Road story.  Remember it?  Let me summarize the Emmaus Road story because it suggests the same unfolding as our text today.

·       Two people are going home in the Emmaus Road story – the disciple Cleopas and someone who isn’t given a name – maybe it is his wife but we don’t know.  They are leaving Jerusalem after the crucifixion on Friday but before Christ has been revealed on Easter.

·       So they are grieving – heart-broken disciples – who know nothing of the beauty of the Cross only its shame:  for them Jesus has become a rejected and discarded loser.

·       What happens next?  They meet a stranger who asks what is going on?  Why are they sad?  Why are they leaving the Passover festivities of the great Temple?

Now here’s something in the Bible that I find fascinating:  the text tells us these two disciples have eyes that have been kept from recognizing the stranger as Jesus – resurrected and raised from the Cross. Did you hear that?  Their eyes have been kept from recognizing Jesus – so what do they start to do but essentially scold him and rebuke him for not knowing all that has taken place.

·       Do you get a sense of the confusion?  Here the disciples – who have betrayed and deserted the Master – are scolding him. 

·       Further it would appear from the Biblical text that both God and their broken emotions in their grief kept them from recognizing the blessing in their midst:  they couldn’t see the risen Christ.

So let’s talk about that for just a moment:  could it be that the Bible is telling us that sometimes our own expectations “of Jesus blind us to the real presence of God in Christ?” (Stoffregen)  Are you with me on this?  Am I being clear?

God may use our inadequate or narrow understandings to blind us so that God can then give us a new vision of the Lord at work in the world.  Think of Saul before he was baptized and became St. Paul:  he was very devout, a totally committed believer in the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, yes?  And what did is religious devotion lead him towards?  Murder and violence in the name of the Lord, right?  Clearly, his expectations about Jesus kept him from seeing the truth about the Lord – and if that is true for Paul it is likely true for me and you. (Stoffregen paraphrase)

I can’t tell you how many times I hear about hatred born of so-called religious commitment: 

·         Pro-life advocates murdering their opponents in the name of the Lord

·         Political jihad rather than true submission

·         Persecution of our GLBTQ sisters and brothers by those who taught us to love our neighbors… as ourselves

·         Other examples…?

It would appear that today’s story suggests that sometimes even our deepest understandings are really more about confusion than clarity – and the consequences of this darkness can be dangerous and ugly.  That’s one of the reasons why we just ran a study/discussion in PLAY-FULLNESS:  slowing down to listen and wait – exploring more than the obvious – embracing the wisdom of our opponents and all the rest is one of the time-tested, God-given paths to peace-making.  But it means not taking ourselves too seriously…

So, in the rhythm of the story, Jesus – the stranger and hidden Lord – let’s them rebuke him for a while – he gives them space for their confusion and grief – but then offers clarity:  he explains to them all that has taken place in the Cross as a part of Israel’s story of redemption and freedom.  How does the Bible put it:  beginning with Moses and the prophets, he explains to them all that had to take place.

·       He explains to them that God’s commitment to Israel is ALL about freedom:  it starts with the Exodus – freedom from slavery – and continues with the creation of the nation of Israel – freedom to live as free and gracious people.

·       And even when Israel gave in to idolatry, fear, greed and pride, God didn’t quit – the Lord sent the prophets to wake them up to the call of freedom and grace – and kept doing that over and over and over again.

·       And Jesus goes one step farther by saying that the Cross that looked like the mark of a loser was actually beautiful – it too was part of God’s liberation and freedom and grace.

Well there is some movement going on now – literally and figuratively – the disciples are moving from confusion to clarity when they come to a fork in the road:  and how cool is that!?!  Jesus is still hidden from them – still a stranger – who says he should be going off in another direction but they beg him to stay for dinner.  And when they sit at table together – and break bread and fish – what happens? 

·        They recognize the Beautiful Loser in their midst and… their eyes were opened

·       Didn’t our hearts burn with understanding as he explained the Scriptures to us they said – didn’t we begin to get it – to give up our confusion – in the presence of this mysterious Beautiful Loser?

Cut to OUR text for this morning – our story in Luke BEGINS where the Emmaus Road story ends – and these same disciples – who had been confused but now knew clarity and open eyes – hurried back to Jerusalem – 20 miles on foot – where they are told:   "It's really happened! The Master has been raised up—Simon saw him!" Then the two went over everything that happened on the road and how they recognized him when he broke the bread. While they were saying all this, Jesus appeared to them and said, "Peace be with you."

And then the whole thing happens again:  confusion before clarity – the appearance and recognition of Christ as the Beautiful Loser of the Cross – and then their eyes are opened.

·       Confusion:  when Jesus showed up and blessed them with peace how does the Bible describe the reaction of the disciples?

·       They thought he was a ghost and were scared half to death!  Even those two cats from the Emmaus Road – they were there, too – they thought he was a ghost and were scared half to death.

So Jesus tries to explain things again – he wants to offer them clarity – and what does he do?  He asks them to look at his feet and his hands – see me as the Beautiful Loser – try to get your head around the Cross as God’s clarity for the world.  Barbara Brown Taylor puts this beautifully in a sermon:

She recalls the ways the hands and feet of Jesus had been important in his ministry, healing people, breaking bread, traveling around with the good news. Now, wounded and bruised, those same hands and feet were offered as proof to the disciples that "he had gone through the danger of the Cross and not around it.  Through the danger, and not around it:  so much of our time and energy is spent finding a way around things, rather than living through them. We don't want to experience pain or danger, or even to come face to face with the suffering of other people or the suffering of the earth. What can we do about all of that? And yet… we bear hope for the world only because of the commission Jesus gave the disciples and the whole church long ago:  you are my Body – the living Image, of the Risen Christ in the world today: "Not our pretty faces, not our sincere eyes but our hands and feet and what we have done with them and where we have gone with them" in the face of suffering and shame.

And still the disciples seem in the dark – they know more confusion than clarity – so the Beautiful Loser asks them for some fish:  do you have anything to eat here?  And he took what was left over – ate it – and once again their eyes were opened.  Now let’s be clear about this:

·       Both the bread of the Emmaus Road story and the fish of the upper room in Jerusalem tells us something about Christ’s bodily presence:  he wasn’t a ghost – he was alive and present albeit very different, too.

·       And this emphasis on being nourished – taking real food into a real and mysterious body – was to help believer know that our bodies are GOOD! 

We are not just spirit beings – abstract and disembodied – waiting to slip from this realm into heaven:  we are spirit, flesh and blood and ALL of this must be nourished.

·        The body needs food – and shelter – and peace – and love:  this is the call to justice and compassion. 

·         We also need spiritual nourishment – worship and awe and wonder – and forgiveness by grace

So Jesus eats something in the presence of his faith community – and after all the teaching and clarity – all the awareness and sensitivity to the confusion – when God’s Beautiful Loser breaks bread in community…. our eyes are opened.  And that suggest two final insights:

·       One – we really need one another to get all of this – we need encouragement and clarity, presence and compassion to grasp how to live as the Body of Christ in this broken world

·       We just can’t do it all by ourselves:  that’s one of the destructive lies that always trips up spiritual folk:  we like to believe that we can do this all by ourselves – and sometimes church people make it very easy to want to affirm this lie

But if the wisdom and rhythm of these stories are true – and I have experienced them as authentic – then we have to confess that we cannot live into the upside down blessings of Christ and his Cross all by ourselves

·       And two – like the first disciples – most of us aren’t going to get the clarity of the Cross right away.  Notice that even after the Emmaus Road supper, Cleopas and his wife were still JUST as scared to death as the other disciples?

·       What’s more, the disciples in Jerusalem, who had first proclaimed their joy and wonder at the Lord’s resurrection were just as frightened and confused as everybody else when Jesus showed up unannounced?

Conclusion

Discipleship, it would seem, “doesn’t have to be – and often is not – something that happens completely and all at once for us or for the disciples of long ago. Instead, for them and for us, it happens by fits and starts, in hours of doubt and moments of exhilaration, with days of numbness and mourning punctuated by small moments of holy presence and powerful certainty. (Cynthia Gano)

The rhythm of disciple-making, dear people of God, seems to be clear:

·       There is confusion – and then some clarity.  There is an experience or encounter with Jesus Christ – God’s beautiful loser – and then our eyes are opened.

·       Your questions – your fears – your doubts are JUST as important and sacred as your insights.  Do you know and trust that?  It is true…

What’s more, God is already at work transforming your confusion into the bounty of clarity and grace... don’t worry – God isn’t finished with you yet – and THAT really has to be the good news for today.

Something's happening here...

As a part of my reflections on being called to this faith community five years ago (yesterday), I started to think about some of what's happening here.  (How did Buffalo Springfield put it:  there's something happening here...?) To my mind I see a fascinating burst of creativity taking place in this faith community on a number of levels. It is often outside the box, to be sure, but always grounded in a high albeit edgy Christology. 

One expression that is starting to make an appearance takes the form of original music created and shared by a variety of people in the congregation.  One the last Sunday of this month ~ a Fifth Sunday experiment in community/inter-generational worship ~ three different songs by church members will be a part of our liturgy.  Each is insightful, vulnerable and musical, too.

+ One, by Brian, was at the core of our Good Friday 2012 gathering:  "Broken World" is a multi-rhythmic lament that  begins with a panorama of a modern crucifixion only to be resolved in a chorus/prayer of hope ~ whose gonna heal this broken world - he's gonna heal us: Jesus!  It is a song that grows out of our worship/study life.  It honors the tension we know between finding Jesus is "the least of these our sisters and brothers" and living into our calling to respond as the body of Christ.

+ Another, by Dick, was his response to our Play-Full Living class:  he shared it a few weeks ago during our poetry segment and calls it"Sometimes I'm Not Sure." It is a gentle folk song that tenderly expresses what it feels like to sometimes be at rest in God's love only to experience uncertainty and confusion later.  To me, it is a beautiful confession about the way faith and doubt weave in and through one another in our ordinary lives.

+ And then there is Don's children's song:  He calls it "Z Y X W V U ..... The Upside Down World of God" in honor of the counter-cultural vision and values of Jesus.  Don is fun, inventive and deeply committed to helping young people connect with God's grace.

Now there are other things happening here, too (and perhaps I'll be able to give shape and word to them as the week unfolds) but for today let me note:  we are currently sharing what it means to practice hospitality within our community.  It begins with safety and trust. It ripens to not only honor and encourage some members to use their gifts creatively, but helps them experience the presence of God by doing so. To be sure, my commitment to doing theology through the arts has also been embraced - hence some of this music and visual arts - but without a culture of appreciation and respect, I sense the fruit of the Spirit would not be so abundant, yes?  The Apostle Paul wrote in Galatians 5:

But what happens when we live God's way? He brings gifts into our lives, much the same way that fruit appears in an orchard—things like affection for others, exuberance about life, serenity. We develop a willingness to stick with things, a sense of compassion in the heart, and a conviction that a basic holiness permeates things and people. We find ourselves involved in loyal commitments, not needing to force our way in life, able to marshal and direct our energies wisely... Since this is the kind of life we have chosen, the life of the Spirit, let us make sure that we do not just hold it as an idea in our heads or a sentiment in our hearts, but work out its implications in every detail of our lives. That means we will not compare ourselves with each other as if one of us were better and another worse. We have far more interesting things to do with our lives. Each of us is an original.

Many people feel that this has become a home for their vision and creativity - it is NOT just for the professionals - so they are willing to work hard at making their offering beautiful. And that is another important factor:  taking time to craft something of integrity and beauty. 

Not every idea - or song concept or work of art - needs to be shared, right?  If we want to give our best to the Lord, that takes work - and practice - and editing and so much more.  Not everyone understands that, of course. 

Last year there was a person who just wanted to show up on Sundays and sing with the choir without any practice.  When I suggested that the creation of beauty needed care and time to ripen, this soul was offended and announced:  "Well, I just don't have the time for practice."  To which I had to say:  "Well, we all have to make choices - because we already have all the time that there is - so while I will respect your choices until you can make the time for practice you won't be able to sing on Sunday with us."  Not a happy camper, but come on!  (Such is another aspect of trying to embrace the counter-cultural commitments of Christ's community: this isn't a spiritual supermarket, it is a faith community.)

And because we're a faith community, we also have to find ways to encourage EVERYONE to join in the creativity.  So, a few times each year we put together an Ad Hoc Gospel choir that meets for practice after worship for about a month: any and every one can join in this:  the young, the old, the talented, the tone-deaf and everybody in between. We often have an open invitation to display the congregation's visual arts at these events, too.  In this, there is space and encouragement to grow in personal creativity and comfort while being a part of the body of Christ.

I am genuinely excited to hear the songs my friends have created.  Their music will accent and bracket the wisdom and experience of others who will be talking about how they have come to experience the presence of God in justice work, mission, education, family life and business, too.  This should be a gas!

Today was the fifth anniversary...

Today was the fifth anniversary of my call to First Church, Pittsfield ~ man, what a long, strange trip it has been!  Today was also the first Sunday after Easter ~ typically a "low" Sunday in our tradition ~ but the congregation (about 75) was roughly the same size as on that very "high" day five years ago.  For me, this is yet another small sign that God's renewal is taking place within and among us. 

Five years ago, it snowed; today it was in the 70s.  Five years ago our church was afraid of closing; today we have a deepening sense of mission and ministry.  Five years ago a very formal style of worship was the order of the day; today we are truly "blended" with jazz and rock, German chorales mixed with songs of praise, spontaneous choruses and LOTS of soul.  Five years ago most people were tentative about trusting me as their pastor; today we have become a community of faith, hope and love.

To be sure, there was a ton of fear and trembling for us all - and some years of wandering together n the wilderness - but today three additional things about our renewal are worth noting:

+ First, we have spent major time, energy, money and effort on making worship a place of joy and awe.  It is very accessible to guests - we explain everything and print clear instructions in the liturgy - because we want even people from outside ANY worship tradition to fully join in the action.  We practice the radically open table of Jesus at communion.  We include secular songs right alongside the traditionally sacred ones. We are finding new ways for the congregation to write some of our prayers and music.  And there is a lot of laughter as we try to practice Christ's hospitality.

+ Second, we have spent a whole lot of time creating small group study and reflection.  We reworked our mission statement, rewrote the church covenant and have dedicated most Monday and Wednesday evenings to Bible study, too.  We crafted a clear and compassionate Open and Affirming statement using small group study and are shaping a spring/summer justice series in the same way.  We have even established a midweek Eucharist each Wednesday at 12:10 pm that serves as an oasis of prayer and reflection in the presence of Jesus.

+ And third, it has been critical for me and the congregation that we develop relationships built on trust and respect - both of which take time and careful attention to being present in the hard times.  No congregation in our tradition simply plays follow the leader - nor should they - so the office of pastor is not one with a lot of built-in authority.  Many young clergy get themselves into trouble because they refuse to own this fact:  we have to earn the right to lead.  That means we have to show up in homes and hospitals not with a sense of duty, but with joy.  How did part of the reading for today in I John put it?  I have come so that your joy shall be full.

Through an emphasis on lively, authentic and honest worship that is theologically solid and edgy; through a deep commitment to study and prayer (and a willingness to organize people for participation); and through a humble sense that showing up with love is 80% of the calling, we have experienced something of God's renewal in our church.  Numbers are not everything, but they do tell a story:  on my first Sunday there were less than 40 people in worship on a regular basis; today we are close to 100.  We are moving towards biblical and liturgical literacy and our commitment to sacrificial stewardship and radical acts of justice and hospitality are part of this year's challenge.  We have rebuilt our staff ~ MAN are they GREAT ~ and constructed two very skilled musical groups, too.

Suffice it to say that I give thanks to God today for this calling.  I had a beautiful and full 10 years in Tucson - and I give thanks to God for that ministry, too.  (For Cleveland and Saginaw, too while I'm at it!)  We have found a spiritual home here in the Berkshires - and a place to use our gifts in new and creative ways - and I rejoice that the Spirit touched us all five years ago today.

More gardening...

I love gardening - I'm not very good at it or even disciplined - but I love it.  Di says I love the "idea" of gardening more than the actual work (and she has a point.) Still, it does my body and soul good to get my hands in the dirt and play with the beauty of nature.  The daffodils are bright - a few tulips, too - so yesterday we spent 3 hours making a first pass at our front yard.  I spent another three hours today and will do likewise tomorrow. (And then there is the back and side to consider over the next few weeks.)

Spring - almost summer - weather has arrived in the Berkshires nearly a month early.  Is this truly part of the climate change we fear or just another fluke that falls into some 50 year cycle? I don't know, but the ground needed tending and it was sweet to get back into that groove. Made me think of Mary Oliver's poem:  With Thanks to the Field Sparrow Whose Voice Is So Delicate and Humble.

I do not live happily or comfortably
with the cleverness of our times.
That talk is all about computers,
the news is all about bombs and blood.
This morning, in the fresh field,
I came upon a hidden nest.
It held four warm, speckled eggs.
I touched them
Then went away softly,
having felt something more wonderful
than all the electricity in New York City. 

As I prepare to return to the rhythm of my commitments in our faith community after a week apart for retreat and renewal,  my time in the earth speaks to me of connections. Norman Wirzba writes about these connections in his excellent book Food and Faith.

Food is about the relationships that join us to the earth, fellow creatures, loved ones and guests and ultimately God. How we eat testifies to whether we value the creates we live with and depend upon. To eat is to savor and struggle with the mystery of creatureliness. When our eating is mindful, we celebrate the goodness of fields, gardens, forests and watershed and the skill of those who can nurture seed and animal life into delicious food. We acknowledge and honor God as the giver of every good and perfect gift.  And we also learn to correct our own arrogance, boredom and ingratitude...

That has certainly been true for me over the past five years in the Berkshires.  Being connected - to the garden and this town, to my loved ones and community of faith, to my new friends in music throughout the region and the world, to the flowers and our polluted but beautiful river - has certainly brought a measure of grace to my natural arrogance and ingratitude (and I trust there is more to come.)  Taking time for quiet and rest - and getting back into the dirt - helps.  Like Jaco Hamman wrote in our Play-Fullness book:  "... grant yourself the freedom to accept that for the majority of life's difficulties, simple solutions are possible... for we seek a quality of life that permeates all of our relationships."

As this day comes to a close, that rings true for me - and now it is time to wash off some of the dirt of this sweet day.  Tomorrow's gospel from John whispers throughout it all:

Jesus breathed on them - giving them new life - saying: Peace be with you.  As the Father has sent me, so I send you... Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; but if you retain the sins of any they are retained.

Sam Spade, Starbucks and Reinhold Niebuhr...

This morning's NT Times featured its regular David Brooks' column ~ a  weekly personal favorite - that is called, "Sam Spade at Starbucks."  It is worth a look (check it out @ http://www.nytimes.com/2012/04/13/opinion/brooks-sam-spade-at-starbucks.html)  At the heart of this article Brooks celebrates the creativity and commitment of the ever growing ranks of young activists who have been called into the "social entrepreneurship" movement of micro loans and discrete projects of compassion  "It is hard not to feel inspired by all these idealists," he writes. "Often they are bursting with enthusiasm for some social entrepreneurship project: making a cheap water-purification system, starting a company that will empower Rwandan women by selling their crafts in boutiques around the world. These people are refreshingly un-cyncial. Their hip service ethos is setting the moral tone for the age. Idealistic and uplifting..."

Simultaneously, he offers a corrective word of caution:  "Unfortunately, many of today's young activists are really good at thinking locally and globally, but not as good about thinking nationally and regionally. The prevailing "service religion" underestimates the problem of disorder. Many of the activists talk as if the world can be healed if we could only insert more care, compassion and resources... History is not kind to this assumption."
So, Brooks tenderly suggests spending some time with Sam Spade the the film noir heroes and heroines of that genre to discover a way to live into a world this always contains "venality, corruption and disorder."

(The) noir hero is a moral realist. He assumes that everybody is dappled with virtue and vice, especially himself. He makes no social-class distinction and only provisional moral distinctions between the private eyes like himself and the criminals he pursues. The assumption in a Hammett book is that the good guy has a spotty past, does spotty things and that the private eye and the criminal are two sides to the same personality.

That's why I've added Reinhold Niebuhr to the mix:  if EVER there was a moral realist who understood the place of sin and grace in the human soul ~ as well as in politics - it was Niebuhr. He made it clear that human sin has to do with our ability to see and name the common good, but the inability to do it consistently.  He articulated an understanding of politics that grasped the difference between how grace works in the individual human heart and the body politic.  And he offered people of good will a way to advance the cause of compassion and justice that was always grounded in humility.

In fact, Niebuhr saw naivete and moral utopianism as an ally of hubris - sometime to be challenged as clearly as possible - knowing, of course, that "now we see as through a glass darkly... only later shall we see face to face." (Serendipitously, as I was catching up on the NY Times I missed while away earlier this week, I came across the obituary of poet, Reed Whittemore, whose words in "Lines Composed Upon Reading an Announcement by Civil Defence Authorities Recommending That I Build a Bomb Shelter in My Backyard," include:

But I'll not, no not do it, not go
     back
And lie there in that dark under
     the weight
Of all that earth on that old
     door for my state.
I know too much to think now
     that if I creep
From the grown-up's house to
     the child's house I'll keep.

Perfect, yes?)

Since the start of the current two wars of aggression in the Middle East - over 10 years - I've been wondering where the voice of Niebuhr might re-emerge in American discourse.  The neo-cons tried to reclaim him for a time, but they were so disingenuous that they quickly got lost by believing in their own press releases - hardly a Niebuhrian practice. And Obama has made reference to the master at times, notably in his speech at West Point, wisely calling us to explore the irony of American history.  But most politicians looked the other way.

In May, my little church will begin a two month study into a Niebuhrian understanding of justice, faith and American politics. We sense that the worn-out liberal commitment to the ethics of Rodney King - why can't we all just get along? - is just as empty as the cynical conservative agenda of exploiting wedge issues.  Personal and public morality must be congruous, to be sure, but understood as different, too.  Maybe part of our study will include watching "The Maltese Falcon" as well wrestling with the blessings and limitations of the social entrepreneurs.