If your only tool is a hammer...

So what's the difference between speaking with passion and conviction and being a bully? How do you differentiate between words that are intellectually or emotionally over the top because a button has been pushed and a shadow exposed, and, a firmly held conviction that challenges the status quo? A moment of self-disclosure, for many of us, discerning these differences is a life-long quest - especially those who have confused anger for passion and getting our own way with advocacy. Add the double-whammy of our culture's insistence upon repressing nuanced emotional health in most men and the challenge becomes even more complex, yes? 

One of my favorite authors, Marilynne Robinson, put it like this in a collection of essays entitled The Death of Adam:

It all comes down to the mystery of the relationship between the mind and the cosmos. Those who would employ reductive definitions of utility or reality credit their own perceptions of truth with fundamentalist simple-heartedness, brooking no allusion to complexities and ambiguities and countervailing experience... It seems to me that there is now the assumption of an intrinsic fraudulence in the old arts of civilization. Religion, politics, philosophy, music are all seen by us as means of consolidating the power of the ruling elite, or something of the kind. 

She goes on to argue that contemporary culture - and our infatuation with the marketplace as the only viable metaphor for reality - nourishes a "terror at complexity (that) has driven us back... (to) a very crude monism. We have reached a point where cosmology permits us to say that everything might in fact be made of nothing, so we cling desperately to the idea that something is real and necessary, and we have chosen, oddly enough, competition and market forces, taking refuge from the wild epic of cosmic otogeny by hiding our head in a ledger."
My experience - personally and professionally - suggests that Ms. Robinson is on to something: not only have we made an idol out of marketplace realities, we have let the most shallow market metaphors feed our fears of complexity. Indeed, as one poet wrote at the turn of the century, "We have become what we have hated." Funny how that works out over and over again. Jesus put it like this in Luke 12:34:  where your treasure is, there will be your heart. Or as the 19th century moral philosopher, Ludwig Fuerbach, said:  "You are what you eat." You become what you do - your habits, culture and material surroundings shape and inform your worldview - and we have chosen to be overfed on a diet of consumerism and fear for so long it even shapes how we speak with those we love. Somebody has to win - and somebody has to lose.

As I was surfing Facebook last night, Diana Butler Bass, posted this quote about life in a post-Twin Towers context that has implications for my opening question.  She wrote:

In the 20th century, there were three events that dramatically changed the global religious landscape: 1) the trenches of WWI; 2) the Holocaust; and 3) the nuclear bomb. After all three, it was exceedingly difficult for conventional religious faith to make meaning in the world (and raised questions engaged by the greatest philosophers and theologians of the last century). Increasingly, it seems to me that the exponential growth of religious disaffiliation in the North America has a lot less to do with individualism than it does with a profound cultural reaction to the "Post-Twin Towers" world. In a very real way, people who have left churches are reacting to a loss of meaning in conventional pre-9/11 religion, spiritually unmoored as they are attempting to remake forms of faith that provide a new way of life from the ashes of religious violence and crusading hatreds. If we blame the "nones" for the problem of religious decline, we've missed the point; for many of the newly unaffiliated feel and see the problems far more clearly than (sadly) many of the church people I know. There is no way around the cultural reality of religion's complicity in global violence and until we get our heads and hearts around that, and until we discover new paths of theology and spirituality and making community, there's not much hope for any of our existing religious structures. (BTW, this "Post-Twin Towers" reality is so much like the years following WWI in Europe that 1914 and 2001 suggest a sort of historical poetry of anguish and post-Christian doubt.) 

Here's the take away for me in three parts:

+ First, in our current culture of competition and fear, it is small wonder that even good-hearted people speak to one another with cruelty. Where is the alternative model? Certainly NOT in most of our churches, synagogues and mosques.  Bass is right (as was Joseph Campbell before her) in noting that religion is so complicit in the global violence of this era that we have been disqualified from any significant public role. People have voted with their feet and taken their hearts and minds with them. To my way of thinking, those of us attempting to live into the call of the Spirit, must recognize that we have to earn the right to be heard. We must saturate our words and actions in compassion so that a track record that is objectively observable in the marketplace can be considered. And we're no where close to having earned the right to be heard again.  Like David Crosby sang:  it's been a long time coming, gonna be a long, long time gone.

+ Second, given this reality in the West, our work also includes showing

contemporary people how life has value and hope before death. No one in our world - that is, the world of Western culture and history - is worrying about life after death. Most of us in the post-Twin Towers realm want to know if there is meaning BEFORE our lives are over. As Bass notes, you can see the confusion, fear and despair in our art just as this was clear in the culture of post WWI and the Holocaust. 

Think what you like of Paul Tillich's sins - and he could be cruel in some ugly ways - he was also brilliant in observing that the Spirit of God was at work in the artists of his day. Indeed, he was so bold as to say that the Spirit of God had vacated the churches of post-WWI Germany because they were obsessed with sentimentality and nationalism. Not so in the music and visual art that gave birth to abstract expressionism. Much of contemporary visual art in this generation is flirting with beauty - a long forgotten virtue - that speaks to our inner emptiness. This is a clue about how to nurture meaning and hope in the 21st century. Beauty evokes awe - an experience that the marketplace has squeezed out of everyday considerations - but which is an essential ingredient in identifying real passion and authentic compassion.

+ And third, this moment in time invites us to reclaim the value of community after three generations of rugged and obsessive individualism. And not phony or forced community that demands membership and rules and dues. No, the simple table fellowship of Jesus will do very nicely. An open table where there is a place for everybody and the whole party is eager to hear your unique and important story. The time has come for religious bodies to practice lots more feasting where story-telling is at the core not doctrinal minutiae. Group singing, too is a lost art in the West, but it can teach us so much about listening as well as trusting and sharing. Just an encounter with creating harmony is a lesson that cuts deeper - with gentle beauty - than almost anything the marketplace currently offers - Disneyland included.

Rilke described our dilemma through the lens of his own generation in this poem that continues to shape and haunt me.

sometimes a man stands up during supper
and walks outdoors, and keeps on walking,
because of a church that stands somewhere in the East.

And his children say blessings on him as if he were dead.

And another man, who remains inside his own house,
stays there, inside the dishes and in the glasses,
so that his children have to go far out into the world
toward that same church, which he forgot.

Last night, after I finally went to bed, I finished Paul Harding's new novel, Enon. Not coincidentally, I had just watched the movie version of The Book Thief (from Markus Zuzak's novel of the same name.) Both books - and the film - explore something of our culture's soul at this moment in history:I see it as a deep and crippling grief writ large that we are confused about embracing. We avoid grief, we self-medicate against it, we scapegoat and distract ourselves with foreign enemies (real and imagined) to avoid paying attention to our own sorrow and shame. Nevertheless, we are still shadow-boxing with the world of our fears rather than spending time grieving and being liberated by the Spirit.

Sadly, most of our churches (I don't know about our synagogues and mosques) stink at mourning. We rush through everything in a sanitized way then expect our people to get back to business three days later. Look, that was ok for Jesus after HIS death, but most of us need years to figure out what has changed. Thomas Lynch, a poet undertaker, has written insightfully and ironically about grief and death.

Yeats said to Olivia Shakespeare that the only subjects that should be compelling to a studious mind are sex and death. Those are the bookends. And think of it, what else do we think of, what else is there besides that? “I think most people drive around all day being vexed by images of mortality and vitality. All they’re wondering about is how they’re going to die and who they’re going to sleep with, or variations on that theme—what job they’re going to have, whether they’re tall enough or skinny enough or short enough or smart enough or fast enough or make enough money, and all of it plays into these two bookends.

There are clues all over the place that we are ungrounded, filled with fear and terrified to grieve. We turn even the slightest disagreement into a contest where someone has to emerge as a winner. To which I suggest the road less traveled - the way of Wendell Berry, Mary Oliver, Parker Palmer and Carrie Newcomer, the way of Robinson, Bass and Lynch, the way of our modern shamans making the music of faith, hope and love - and the way of silence and listening, the way of music and beauty. Because if your only tool is a hammer, everyone will look like a nail - and there are too many people hurting to whack them again.

Trust the Spirit and leave the bullshit behind...

Today an e-letter from my denomination was hawking a new book that they bill as "THE book to help declining churches turn around." Ok, I have to say it: BULLSHIT.  There is NO such thing as a magic bullet for declining churches nor is there any "one size fits all prescription" for helping congregations in decline. All claims to the contrary are... BULLSHIT! What's more, such hyperbole only feeds the anxieties of local congregations and pastors who are reeling and hurting in this time of realignment and discernment. (A HELPFUL book is Jaco Haman's When Steeples Cry - an invitation to grief and trusting the Holy Spirit -or Paul Nixon's I Refuse to Serve a Dying Church - or any of the disestablishment theology being done by Douglas John Hall.)

If 30+ years of practice in the local church means anything, there are going to

be countless pastors and church councils who will try to implement all the suggestions in this new text only to find themselves faltering after 18 months. And when that happens, the pastors will either blame themselves or look for scapegoats, and as is often the case, some frightened and sometimes mean-spirited lay leaders will try to hang their pastor out to dry, too. It is a viscous and degrading cycle filled with dead-end that our congregations have been fumbling with since the 1980s. So let me say to the United Church Press: SHAME ON YOU FOR TRYING TO HAWK MORE BULLSHIT! (Am I being over zealous? Dost thou thinkest the gentleman protesteth too much? Could be... I'll try to own my own shadow stuff after having tried EVERY gimmick from praise bands to worship as craft fair over the years!)

So look, there are really only three, time-tested keys to doing church renewal - and without them things just don't come together - no matter what window dressing you try:

+ First, the pastor and the church leadership MUST trust that God is in charge. They must also believe that the ONLY thing they have to share with the world that our ginned-up consumer culture can't do better than us has to do with sharing Jesus. We can't make better coffee. We can't do better movies. We can sometimes give a few performers a run for their money with our music, but we can't offer better vacations than Disneyland or more diversions than the Internet or Las Vegas. Most of the churches that I know that are in decline share some of these fundamental problems: a) they are more comfortable in their secular humanist values and words than proclaiming loyalty to Jesus crucified, died, risen and ascended; b) they rarely have a core of authentic albeit broken and sinful leaders who trust that God is in charge; for while they are all hard workers, unless the Lord builds the house all of our activity puts US at the center of the universe rather than the Living God and that is backwards; and c) they have become too comfortable being big fish in an ever shrinking pond; these leaders have come to confuse their efforts and preferences with the will of God for their church. They like calling the shots. They cherish being gate keepers. And they enjoy protecting what has become a burial society rather than the Body of Christ.

+ Second, the pastor MUST have a creative and highly skilled music person working in concert with his/her renewal plan.  I remember Jeremiah Wright once telling a small group of Michigan pastors that "after hiring a pastor who loves the Lord and has some fire in her/his belly for church renewal, the next essential hire is a director of music who is on the same page." Without this, there will be passive aggressive sabotage, triangulation rather than problem-solving and too much energy spent on turf wars that might better be used for building up the congregation, teaching the members and visiting people beyond the walls of the Sanctuary. I have been there - I have had to fire a variety of music directors - and plan strategically how to work around others, too. And without this team member - a musician who can do her/his style well and work with you as an ally - worship will remain flat and stuck.  But let's be clear: you don't have to have a rock and roll or jazz artist on staff; if you do traditional music well - and have a plan for making it lively and beautiful - that works, too. What you can't have is someone who always does what she's always done, because then you will always get what you've always got. And after listening to what passes for music in all too many declining congregations, it is amazing that they are still open! I wouldn't worship at many of our declining churches both because the worship is so bad, boring and without beauty, but also because it is clear that the music leadership is fighting the pastor's vision in the heart of public worship.

+ And third, you need allies in Christ on your church council or else those who have turned the status quo into an idol will out-maneuver you every time. You have to break some eggs to make an omelet, yes?  So you need lay leaders who are willing to break them with you - and have your back when the shit hits the fan - so that YOU aren't hung out to dry when people finally realize that you are serious about the work of renewing Christ's church through the power of the Holy Spirit.  Pastors, don't leave your relationship with the leadership to chance. Work it. Nourish it. Make the compromises you can live with early on so that you have a solid core of elected lay leadership that both trust God and support you. How did Jesus put it?  You have to be wise as serpents and gentle as doves. So don't be afraid to consult with those outside of the church re: strategy. I have found over the years that both military people and small business folk - women and men who have been given authority to get hard jobs done - are goldmines when it comes to strategizing. They don't teach that in seminary. (Would that every pastor be required to work a few years in retail before taking on a church!) But do it or else you will remain stuck and discouraged and trapped in the "paralysis of analysis."

There are some great books out there - and the one in question (which I will read) is probably well-intentioned (check it out here: http://act.ucc.org/site /MessageViewer/  ?dlv_id=86702&em_id=62922.0) - but let's get real. If the United Church of Christ (or any other side-lined denomination) really knew how to do church renewal IT WOULD ALREADY BE HAPPENING!  The stats on my tradition are staggering:  in 2014 over 45% of the members who were a part of the United Church of Christ at our founding in 1957 are gone. And another 900,000 have left since 1980.) 

There are NO magic bullets. There IS God's Holy Spirit. I say trust the Spirit and leave the bullshit behind.

A change is gonna come soon...

Yesterday something beautiful happened. Well, actually a few beautiful things in addition to the stunning spring day filled with sunlight and flowers. At our "coming out" party for the emerging Berkshire community organizing justice project, I had the chance to teach the 50+ folk some of the history of singing for social justice. This was a mostly "traditional" church crowd - excellent and loving people - but without much movement experience or awareness of the role singing has played in the freedom movements throughout the world. So I taught them the essential: "Ain't Gonna Let Nobody Turn Me Around." I learned it from Jessica Govea back in the United Farm Workers movement of the early 70s. And I suspect that she and Marshall Ganz and others learned it from their work in the Southern Civil Rights movement starting with Freedom Summer in 1964.

(I LOVE what The Roots do with this and truly LOVE this movie!)

Now here's the thing: nice and gentle church people aren't used to embodied singing - they tend to sing quietly and in a pretty voice in worship - so it is often essential to do some remedial clapping with LOTS of encouragement to "make it LOUD!" And if the whole crowd gets into the groove and trusts you, things can come alive. And after a little work with clapping on the off beat and BELTING out the melody, things started to pop! At the end of the meeting, I was able to lead them in the more gentle but no less important "If Not Now" to close the evening.

After the close of the meeting, one of my colleagues from one of our synagogues told me he wanted to work more closely with me (and our congregation) in learning/discussing/exploring and challenging one another with the complex truths re: justice and peace in Israel and Palestine. I was SO blessed by this conversation.  We are both horrified at the frustrated and unhelpful response to the current stalemate that the US Presbyterians are advancing. We are equally discouraged and confused by the intransigence of almost everyone on the ground who are involved in this struggle for life, death, freedom and dignity. And we weep for the everyday folk on either side of the Wall whose lives are in chaos and tumult. So, he said, he wanted to find a way to have this complex and challenging conversation here with our congregation in ways that maybe can't happen elsewhere! I am soooo down with this it makes me tremble.

Over the years I've tried the path of being a hard ass and ideologue, but the only result was that I pissed off potential allies and came to hate myself. So little by little I have come to trust the "still small and quiet voice" that always encourages me to try a "third way" - a way of gentleness and patience - a way of wrestling with my own shadow and confessing when I project my shit on to another - a way of making certain that lots and lots of listening takes place as an essential ingredient to peace-making. Richard Rohr recently wrote about this like this:

In the second half of life, one has less and less need or interest in eliminating the negative or fearful, making rash judgments, holding on to old hurts, or feeling any need to punish other people. Your superiority complexes have gradually departed in all directions. You do not fight these things anymore; they have just shown themselves too many times to be useless, ego-based, counterproductive, and often entirely wrong. You learn to positively ignore and withdraw your energy from evil or stupid things rather than fight them directly.

Now, you fight things only when you are directly called and equipped to do so. You do not define yourself by opposition or eccentricity as the young often choose to do. We all become a well-disguised mirror image of anything that we fight too long or too directly. That which we oppose determines the energy and frames the questions after a while. We lose all our inner freedom.

By the second half of life, you have learned that most frontal attacks on evil just produce another kind of evil in yourself, along with a very inflated self-image. They also incite a lot of pushback from those you have attacked. Holier-than-thou people usually end up holier than nobody.In the second half, you try to influence events, work for change, quietly persuade, change your own attitude, pray, or forgive instead of attacking things head on.

Over the seven years that we've been here in the Berkshires we've seen how this way has built a little trust in the LGBTQ community. We've taken some small steps with our sisters and brothers in the African American community, too. And now there is the chance to explore and practice trust-building with our cousins in faith in one Jewish synagogue. Like Sam Cooke once sang (and wrote after hearing Bob Dylan's "The Times They Are a'Changin'" saying:  a white boy wrote that? I have to do better!): it's been a long time comin' but a change is comin' soon! I trust that to be true even when it takes twice as long as I think it should.
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And just to add icing to the cake, after all of this another colleague mentioned to me about the possibility of our churches working together on a mission trip this summer with our youth. Oh Lord a'change is gonna come... soon. Thanks be to God.

New/old prayer/songs that open the heart to Jesus...

NOTE:  Here are my worship notes for this coming Sunday, May 25, 2014. We are starting to wrap up a series I've called "Meeting God at Table with Jesus." And this week I try to show how some prayer/songs have helped me stay connected to the mystery of the Eucharist. There will be singing and thinking in a way that is tender and fun.

WORSHIP NOTES OUTLINE

(Begin to play “Father I Adore You” at the close of the Gospel reading from Luke.)

When I first heard this song – and I remember the time and place back at my

first church in Saginaw, MI – it changed my life.  That really isn’t overstating the case; it changed the way I related to church music, it changed the way I connected to songs outside of my tradition and comfort zone and it changed the way I worked in relationship to my friends in the Roman Catholic community.  It really did change my life.

Let me tell you a brief story and then I’d like if you would sing it with me.  I was a newly ordained pastor – a hot shot who thought I was going to both change the world and Christ’s church – as is often the case with young clergy.  It was the second Tuesday in September 1983 and the Saginaw Ecumenical Ministry group was meeting in our church. Most of the gathering was what I had come to expect – and dread – from these gatherings:  a fair amount of blathering and self-congratulations by the more dominant clergy and a lot more nervous shuffling of feet by the rest of us.  But everything changed when Fr. Tim of the cathedral church, St. Mary’s, was asked to offer the closing prayer.  And he asked us to sing this song, “Father, I Adore You.”

He led it – teaching it to us a capella – and then asked us to sing it with him – and when we got to the closing “alleluias” he asked us to do it as a three part round.  Now I had never heard this before – up until this point in time I wasn’t really crazy about the way I had heard folk in Roman Catholic churches sing either – and I had generally shied away from the songs of the charismatics.  We used to call them charismaniacs back at Union Seminary.

But I have to tell you, this song touched me – and who knows why – it just felt like soul food.  So as we sang it without accompaniment in this little meeting room at First Congregational Church, Saginaw I let myself be carried by both the words and the tune. And when we started to sing the alleluias in a round, as the harmonies washed over and through me and the fall sunlight came in through the stained glass, I have to tell you I was lifted up and outside myself.  Man, I was lost in the beauty of the Holy Spirit in the most tender-hearted way as I lost track of all time and space. 

And I know that for some of you this will sound crazy, but I ached when we stopped singing this song; I didn’t want to let that sacred moment pass. There were tears of joy on my face and like a little child hearing her favorite story I wanted to say:  do it again – can we do that again – but mostly kept quiet.

But for more than 30 years this song has been prayer language for me.  Can you try it with me now – and do the alleluias as a round – first all together and then twice in two parts?

(Sing “Father, I Adore You” together)

As you can probably tell, I became one of those charismaniacs that day – not speaking in tongues – but discovering a whole new prayer language in some of the emerging music of the contemporary church.  Not all of it, for sure; there’s a ton of schlock out there, but that’s true with all genres from rock and roll to high art and classical music.  So, as my heart was opened in a new way by this new music, I began to explore my deepest spiritual and theological convictions through music.  As I often say, I have come to pray to the Lord through songs – some people do it in sitting meditation or yoga, some head out into nature or engage in acts of compassion or justice work – but I mostly open my heart to God through songs.  And over the years I’ve discovered some tunes the both express and articulate my deepest spiritual convictions.

You know, in this morning’s gospel lesson Jesus asks his dearest friends to help him prepare for the Feast of Passover. Now Passover is a way of being in prayer around a table – it is literally feasting with God through food – and the heart of the Passover prayer is freedom.  Freedom from fear, freedom from political and religious oppression, freedom to become fully our best and most sacred selves:  freedom, freedom, freedom.

And another song that I discovered about 10 years later evokes that for me – and I still pray and sing it over and over.  It is called:  “Jesus Your Blood.” Now I’m not a big BLOOD song type of Christian – there are people who LOVE the blood songs – but not me.  What REALLY speaks to me is the second verse in this song that says:  “Father, your love has set me free. Father your love lets me… be me.”

That’s what authentic religion is all about – not forcing us into somebody else’s mold of what is holy and good – but empowering and setting us free to become our fullest and best selves. Like St. Paul teaches us in the metaphor of the Body of Christ: there are different, unique and vital parts of every body – and each part is essential – and each part is different. And what makes it all work is when the heart is free to the heart – and the tongue is free to be the tongue – and the hands and legs and eyes.  Are you with me?  So let’s try this one – and if you are game we can do IT as a round, too – on the third verse – Spirit of God, you comfort me…

(Sing “Jesus Your Blood” together)

Now let me ask you something:  how are these songs different from hymns?  Do you have any ideas or thoughts about how they are different from hymns? My hunch is that some of these songs are not as uniform as a hymn.

+  You know the beauty of hymns is that they have been constructed to help groups of people sing them well all together.  Did you know that?  The poetry and movement of a hymn invites group participation. 

+  These songs are a little more uneven – quirky – more like folk music than hymns, do you think?  And people learn to sing folk music, even the most syncopated songs with the weirdest runs, through repetition. That’s why some of these songs have simple melodies and even simpler lyrics that are repeated a variety of times: like folk songs these spiritual tunes take some practice.

The third prayer song that I’d like to try with you articulates some of my deepest theological commitments – and sounds a little bit like something the Beatles wrote combined with an old African American gospel – it is a pop song and a love song and a gospel song all at once. The Beatles used that chord progression twice in two different songs:  the first time was when John Lennon wrote, “If I Fell” for the movie “A Hard Day’s Night” and the second time was when Paul McCartney wrote “Here, There and Everywhere” on the “Revolver” album.  
One of the things the new song prayers played with was borrowing whatever was good, true and beautiful from popular culture even if it originally had nothing to do with God. That’s part of what Paul was talking about in the first reading today when he told his Greek audience that he discerned something of truth in the sculptures he was seeing all around him – and something of the sacred in their poems, too – and because Paul knew the art of his culture, he was able to talk about the heart of God in ways that his audience could comprehend.

That’s another thing these new prayer songs attempted: they borrowed riffs and chord progressions from pop tunes and found ways to make the work for new believers.  Try this one with me – and I’m going to ask my mates to help out at the end – where you will follow me while they lay another track over the top of what we’re singing.

These three songs all speak of God’s abundant grace – the healing and wholeness that is at the heart of Christ’s ministry – and the love sent to us through the Holy Spirit so that we don’t have to rely just upon our own strength, wisdom and ability.  Literally, figuratively, spiritually, theologically and emotionally these new prayer/songs invite us to TRUST in the Lord and REST in God’s goodness.

The closing portion of today’s reading from the gospel of Luke comes after table fellowship with Jesus. The Master has shared Holy Communion with his friends – taught them about how he will nourish and bless them with God’s grace forever – and then stopped them from arguing about who will be the greatest.

It is a fascinating connection that links how Jesus serves US at Eucharist – he is the HOST – and then asks us to go out into the world to do likewise. He asks us to live in the world as servant leaders who take on the burdens of one another as a sign of our commitment and gratitude.

The kings of the Gentiles lord it over them; and those in authority over them are called benefactors. But not so with you; rather the greatest among you must become like the youngest, and the leader like one who serves. For who is greater, the one who is at the table or the one who serves? Is it not the one at the table? But I am among you as one who serves.

Most of the new song/prayers were NOT written by old timers and professionals in the church; rather, they came from the hearts of young believers who were discovering God’s grace afresh.  Often these songs are very emotional – the best ones are not sentimental (although there are enough of those, too – but born of the heart.  And that’s because they are an attempt to express a mystical connection – a living and vibrant intimacy – between God, Christ, Spirit and the community of faith.

The last song I’d like you to sing with me is a Eucharistic hymn – it celebrates the fullness of God’s promise to us whenever we sit down with the Lord at Holy Communion – and it is one of my favorites.  It is joyful and sad at different times, it is simple and complex, too; and always it is grounded in the experience of opening our hearts to God and being filled from the inside out.

(Sing, “Jesus Is Our King” together)

  

That’s the way my heart feels it, beloved, so let me leave you with this prayer that comes from the wisdom of both country singer, Kathy Mattea, and America’s favorite curmudgeon, Mark Twain:

You’ve got to sing like you don’t need the money,

Love like you’ve never been hurt

Dance like nobody’s watching

And live like it’s heaven on earth.

God brings me just what I need at just the right time redux...

Yesterday, as I was wrapping up my Sunday message, I had the thought: where the hell am I going with this? I know that happens to musicians - I was debriefing about the jazz we were playing with my musical honcho at church when he said he experienced something similar in one of the tunes we were doing - but you should know it also happens to preachers. Now, as in jazz, so too preaching: this lapse - diversion - mistake or brain fart CAN become a blessing and open up whole new possibilities. That is a beautiful thing. It can also become a train wreck and then you simply have throw yourself on the mercy of a grace-filled God and try better the next time. Like St. Paul says: ALL have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.

So, as I realized I was adrift in the closing moments of my message, I said a quiet prayer and brought it home. Afterwards, while in conversation with another, a young woman assured me that what I had said was just what she needed.  A few other people told me that today as I met them in different settings. It seems that if I remain as open and awake as possible, God brings me just what I need at just the right time.

For the past week I've been wrestling with what to say to the folk at our organizing meeting tomorrow. For the past year a small sponsoring team has been working with a local community organizer - and a regional organizing consortium - to build a justice movement from the grassroots. There are already traditional, Leftist justice groups that jump around from one band wagon to another trying to be relevant. I have never been interested in their shtick - too well-trained by Cesar Chavez and Fred Ross, Sr. I guess - so I have shied away for their shrill and hollow calls to action. But this group, the Berkshire Organizing Project Sponsoring team is different. It is thoroughly grassroots, boldly inter-faith (Jews, Muslims, Catholics and Protestants are all a part of the sponsoring group) and action oriented based on local issues.

As acting president (a label only until things get off the ground) I was charged

with articulating WHY we are engaged. And after a week of walking around with a few ideas, here is what I've come up with. Again, God brings me just what I need...

WHY WE ARE HERE:  Berkshire Organizing Project Meeting

My name is James Lumsden – I am the pastor of First Church of Christ on Park Square in Pittsfield – and I have been a part of the Berkshire Organizing Sponsor Project since its inception.  That is something that I am both proud and humbled by because while I am grateful that there are now 10 congregations committed to the work of making our values count in a significant and public way in our towns, I know we could just as easily blow it and go back to the divided, suspicious, weak, frustrated and even demoralized status quo that is always just a heartbeat away in the Berkshires.  Still, I sense that this moment is pregnant with possibilities:

+  Roman Catholics are talking and working with Protestants again – Jews and Muslims are also at the table today as equal partners – and we are laying the ground work for an authentic inter-faith justice organization that can change the lives of ordinary people in the Berkshires. 

+  This isn’t the country club at prayer, beloved, or some elite collection of dilettantes who want to dabble among the less fortunate for a season before moving on to the next cause of the month.

No, this is real people – working people, middle class people, clergy and laity and women religious alongside teachers and postal workers, electricians and gardeners, social workers and retirees – who know what life on the ground in the Berkshires looks like and feels like and tastes like from the bottom up.  You are people who LOVE the Berkshires. Amen?

And while we know this to be a beautiful place to live, with fascinating and hope-filled dreams for the future, we also know that the last seven years have been brutal – and the past 40 years have been tragic.  Speaking just about the Christian institutions that are represented in this room let me remind you of some sobering statistics about what has taken place among us since the 1980s: Nationally the United Methodist Church has lost more than 3.3 million members; the Episcopal Church has lost more than 1.1 million.

My tradition, the United Church of Christ, has lost more than 45% of our founding membership with another 900,000 departing since 1980.  And while I can’t speak for my Jewish and Muslim sisters and brothers, I know the trend has been equally grim for the Roman Catholic family because in the same month I arrived in Pittsfield 7 years ago, the Diocese of Springfield closed 22 congregations in our county alone.  These have been hard times, not without hope, but challenging and complex times that demand a new way of operating.

My friends in AA like to put it this way:  If you always do, what you’ve always done, you’ll always get what you’ve always got. And the people of this community do not need another debacle like recently took place at the hospital in North Adams.  Too many are already grieving, too many are already wounded and demoralized; too many already believe that our churches and religious organiza-tions have just given up on them.  Look it isn’t a secret that opiate addiction is on the rise all over the region, right? Our people are broken-hearted.

And that’s why I am here tonight:  As a pastor, my call is not just about comforting people when they are hurting, but joining God’s spirit in pursuit of justice.  That’s what God’s people have always done – Jews, Muslims, Catholics and Protestants – we may us different words, but we’ve always offered shelter from the storm AND a vision and voice of a better way in the struggle against injustice. The Hebrew prophet, Isaiah, put it clearly: THE SPIRIT OF THE LORD MY GOD IS UPON ME BECAUSE THE LORD HAS ANNOINTED ME TO PREACH GOOD NEWS TO THE POOR. GOD HAS SENT ME TO BIND UP THE BROKENHEARTED, PROCLAIM FREEDOM TO THE CAPTIVES AND RELEASE TO THE PRISONERS… TO BESTOW UPON THEM A CROWN OF BEAUTY INSTEAD OF ASHES, THE OIL OF GLADNESS INSTEAD OF MOURNING AND GARLAND OF PRAISE INSTEAD OF A SPIRIT OF DESPAIR.

Now bear with me just one more minute:  this is a call – a sacred invitation –

to both comfort the walking wounded all around us AND restore and repair the conditions that have CAUSED the suffering. Don’t be fooled by that word preach, ok?  Scholars are clear that the Hebrew word, basher, which we have translated into English as PREACH is a rather poor and passive choice. The Hebrew word BASHER, you see, comes from the stem BASHAR that literally means MEAT or FLESH.

So the prophet Isaiah ISN’T telling us to spend more time TALKING about our problems. He’s telling us that we become allies of the Spirit of the Living God when we ENFLESH AND EMBODY some news that is good to the poor and the lame, the broken and the maimed:  THAT”S when we’re anointed, sisters and brothers, when we’re in loving action!

Like most of the rest of the world, I’ve had enough talking and preaching. I believe the time has come for some action – some performance – some holy embodiment that is good news to the poor and comfort for all those who are broken-hearted.  Can I get a witness?  Thanks be to God…

(I'll be singing this for the group, too...)

God gives me what I need just when I need it...

I was blessed over and over today: worship was all about giving thanks to God for grace when we get stuck! We played jazz, taught the congregation

some Israeli folk dances and then DANCED our prayers to the Lord. And the choir sang like angels to a HOT setting of Holy Manna. And as I was debriefing the whole thing with my music man - and wondering if I had wandered off and got lost in the ozone - a young woman I value very much came up and embraced me saying: I just want you to know how grateful I am for this morning's message. I couldn't keep from crying because it was JUST what I needed.

Later in the evening, after a boring but necessary regional church meeting, I got to hoist a few brews with a beloved colleague. He is a total blessing to me, too - a bright, creative and insightful young voice in the church - and I pray that we have the chance to do some work together in the year to come. We laughed and bitched, encouraged one another and affirmed the calling to be real, creative and deep in one another's setting.

It was an unexpected gas today - and I am knocked on my ass with how God gives me just what I need just when I need it. We're starting to plan for our summer rock and soul benefit - with LOTS of local Berkshire artists - and I can't but think that THIS is at the heart of it all - what say ye all?

Awakening our spiritual imaginations...

NOTE:  Two additional thoughts popped-up after an hour of cutting the grass that warrant consider.  They are offered at the end of the original post.
Last week I had to cancel our conversation on the film, "Jesus of Montreal," because during the set-up the LED projector bulb exploded. Being a small church on a budget meant that there was no spare bulb waiting to be used - of course. So, I pulled the plug on everything that evening and we will regroup in 2 weeks. Still I haven't been able to stop thinking about how prophetic this movie was in its day (1989) and continues to be in 2014. 

And this is especially true as I start to read Jaco Haman's reflection, When Steeples Weep, and the new Yale Divinity School's journal, Reflections, which explores "seeking the light of Christ for a new generation." Truth be told, I am in the twilight years of my ministry. I will be active for the foreseeable future and look forward to the journey. But at 62 (in July) with over 35 years on the ground, I am not really a part of what the next generation will embrace in its quest for light. Yes, I can be supportive. Of course I can get out of the way when necessary, too. And I can also listen carefully and offer my perspective when asked (see yesterday's post re: avoiding windbag status with my colleagues.) But I know that I am not - and will not be - on the cutting edge of new transformational communities of faith. That is as it should be, yes?

And this is where "Jesus of Montreal" offers us all a lens through which to consider our current context: the movie was created as a critique of Quebec's rapid descent into consumerism after the disestablishment of the Roman Catholic Church. In an email to my film class, I wrote:

In the 1970s the traditional foundation of Quebec was altered forever by the “disestablishment” of the French Roman Catholic Church by Rene Levesque and the “Quiet Revolution.” In rapid fashion, church and state were separated – within one generation Quebec was a truly secular society – with all the blessings and curses therein.  Theologian Douglas John Hall (who taught at McGill University in Montreal) has written extensively about this rapid social and cultural change and has concluded that without a viable alternative to Christianity, Quebec and much of Canada has embraced and/or descended into naked consumerism. Cultural critic, Thom Stark, has noted that this reality was the inspiration for the film. Jesus of Montreal was produced in Montreal, Quebec in 1989, written and directed by Canadian filmmaker Denys Arcand, as a follow-up to his widely-acclaimed film, The Decline of the American Empire (1986). 

Both films explored themes relating to the demise of traditional and spiritual culture in Quebec, and the rise of a consumer culture in which relationships serve only the end of instant self-gratification and in which human beings, especially artists, are commodities to be exploited and consumed as they are turned into apostles of the gospel of consumption. Arcand had the idea for Jesus of Montreal as he was in production on Decline of the American Empire. An actor of his was playing Jesus in the passion play at night, while auditioning for commercials in the day. This struck Arcand as profoundly ironic, and led to the development of Jesus of Montreal. 

^{(http://religionatthemargins.com/2011/03/jesus-of-montreal/#footnote_0_807}

^{Curiously, Arcand's critique of American consumerist culture in Canada is even more relevant today to the 21st century church in the United States than it was in 1989. In the YDS journal, Reflections, Javier Viera noted that "without exception... (the 20-30 year olds in his congregation) agreed that their work is what gave them identity above all else. Their church attendance, their Christian identity, was a "secret" they guarded closely and shared only on a need-to-know basis...(fundamentally) because work was where they spent the vast majority of their time... Since childhood, most reported, they had been encouraged to aspire to the best job possible. Their work was their raison d'etre, the value that mattered most to parents and family...(And) their spiritual interests would absolutely take a back seat to professional endeavors if necessary. They didn't imply they would compromise themselves ethically. Rather, work matters above all else." P. 18 in YDS Reflections, Spring 2014, p. 18)}

Viera then goes on to conclude: "We have not yet made a compelling case for an alternative way of being in the world, a way in which Christian identity and vocation are paramount. For these younger adults, joining the world of the prevailing economic order, its rhythms and aspirations, seemed like the only real and rational way of living. Yes, there was much to question and change in this world, but they felt powerless to do something about it. This sense of resignation was breathtaking."

In Jesus of Montreal it was the spiritual imagination of the young actors called together to recreate a contemporary Passion Play that was awakened. When they were able to explore - and then embody - an alternative to the degrading rhythm of naked capitalism, they discovered the beauty of the unforced rhythms of grace. And that, perhaps, is what the charism of the contemporary Church is at this moment in time. I see it manifest in the adoration of Pope Francis I. Every where he goes, there is a tidal wave of compassion just behind the social resignation of this era. And he encourages people to express what is most tender in their hearts in small but real ways.

That resonates with what I have experienced over the years: whenever we in the local church can offer people ways of making a difference that are immediate, sensual and relevant - acts of compassion that clearly have a bottom line and make sense in this consumerist culture - people participate. The same is true for worship that is embodied, simple and honest: people respond in profound ways. Unlocking and awkening our spiritual imaginations is likely to be a part of the third reformation in Christianity.

Please know that I have NO idea what the transformational congregations of the next generation will look like. But I have experienced buy-in when people's spiritual imaginations are awakened. I have seen resignation become participation when the action really matters. And I have heard young parents say they want to offer their families new ways of nourishing their Christian identity. 

My hunch is that for whatever years remain in my ministry, everything will be up for grabs: when and how we do worship, the ways we financially support the ministries and even where we create space to honor and celebrate the holy within our ordinary lives. Some will have to grieve this - and others will have to be willing to let their imaginations run wild - but it is all to the glory of God for this moment of time.

(Additional thoughts after cutting the grass...)

When my children were small - when I was in seminary and in my first church - Reaganomics was becoming the lens through which all of life was viewed. With the fall of Russian and Eastern European Communism, some economists spoke of the 80s as the "end of history." With the triumph of aggressive capitalism and the end of competing ideologies, they believed the world as we knew it had come to a close.  And while international competition didn't end, they were right: without a compelling social critique of naked greed, the market place became the only metaphor for a meaningful life. 

To be sure, there were alternative visions at play in this time - I think of Scorsese's "Wall Street," Springsteen's "Born in the USA" or U2's Zooropa/ Pop tours that lampooned and lamented our loss of caring for the common good - but they were the exception to the rule. Dominant culture was celebrated by Madonna's "Material Girl" and President Reagan became an icon for freedom and market values throughout the world. I will never forget speaking with a Polish dissident in the late 80s when his country was under the boot heel of Marshall Law after the rise of Solidarity.  He said, "We really wish that our hero Ronald Reagan WOULD drop the bomb on the Communists. Then things would truly get better!" (No shit...)

As the Hebrew prophets used to say, without a vision the people perish. They also taught us "not to fret... wait upon the Lord." Forty years later most of the excess of consumerism has played itself out. More and more people have grown weary of the emptiness of living only for the bottom line. And we have the lived experience of what it means to re-enter a contemporary gilded age. I am not surprised that Pope Francis is so popular: he offers us a real and attractive alternative. 

The other thought that comes to me is that there is a role for elders in solidarity with the transformational and emerging church - and that is mostly to the members of our existing congregations. We need to help them grieve so that God's new order can come to pass. That's where When Steeples Weep is so helpful. Haman reminds us that when the prophet Isaiah tells the post-exilic community in Israel that "The Spirit of the Lord is upon me to preach good news to the poor, to bind up the wounded..." our word "preach" is too limited. It sounds like words only, when in reality the word in Hebrew means "to embody." Important distinction, yes? Before new life can come to many of our existing churches, they must live through and embody the deep grief of disestablishment. This must be done intentionally and incarnationally. For then, and most likely only then, will we be ready to embody the good news of healing and hope. 

In this regard I think of folk like Eugene Peterson and Richard Rohr and to a different degree Dorothy C. Bass or Phyllis Tickle:  they've been there and done that - they have gotten out of the way for younger leaders to emerge, too - so they stand read to offer their experience when it is requested. And they have some real experience to share. Too often we old folk still want to call the shots. We love to gather and tell war stories that are mostly self-aggrandizing acts of sentimentality. That's not what is needed now; we need to hold young leaders up in prayer, encourage them to step out boldly by faith and give them all the support we can must trusting that God will do the rest. We also need to help our aging and wounded congregatins grieve and come to grips with the new world. Some will die but some will be reborn. And we are called to do this now. Abraham Joshua Heschel used to remind us that Rabbi Hillel used to ask:  If not now, tell me when. The young civil rights activist, John Lewis (himself now and elder), amplified this saying:  If not us, then who? If not now, then when?"
At the close of a recent graduation address, artist and theologian Mako Fujimura told the students that today they stand by the banks of a river named "utilitarian pragmatism."  Utilitarian pragmatism is the type of thinking that constructs the point of education only to be to train us to survive in a materialist universe, as if the future is predetermined by our limited resources.  In other words, you are only valuable as your usefulness to society. When we think like that we can only see grey skies of fear all about us, and it does not reflect the Biblical path of valuing all people as made in the Image of God.  Utilitarian pragmatism can speak even in a graduation day; "well, your dreams, and your art, what you call the beautiful may be nice to think about, but now you are going to face a 'real world.' You are going to have to buckle up and be an adult about it all."

We are at a turning point and the energy is all about creativity and compassion.  If not now, tell me when indeed!

Slow down...

The other day at lunch I was musing with a church friend that at this point in my life there are clearly some things I want and need to explore more deeply. There are also a few others that I don't care about at all and a whole bunch of things that interest me to varying degrees but take more time, energy and zest than I possess. Such is reality for me these days: I don't want MORE, I want DEPTH. That is a distinction I couldn't grasp thirty years ago.

Back in the day, I grew frustrated that life was too busy, too demanding and sometimes too hard for me to focus on my most serious interests. Today I tend to think: guess what? It is ALWAYS too demanding and frenetic - and it will always be so no matter how frazzled I feel. So I have to make some choices, yes? It is up to me to discern where to give my attention and time - my heart and soul and mind - knowing that even without me, the world will carry on very well with all the rest. 

And here's something else I sense is true: this is not something I can share with any of my younger colleagues without coming off like an old fart or some pompous windbag. There are days now when I know I'm becoming a cranky old man, so I want to stay as far away from old fart and pompous windbag as I can! That means that I erase a lot of Facebook posts and delete a variety of emails and try to keep my mouth shut from time to time in public. It is ok to rant a bit later in the car, but there are simply some things that are better kept to myself: not only do they not translate across the years, they can only be experienced when the time is right. 

I rather think Ernest Hemingway was on to something when he said, "No, that is the great fallacy: the wisdom of old men. They do not grow wise. They grow careful.” At least sometimes - and only among some men (and women) because I know all too many who have turned into fools or cynics. But being careful... I like that.  I also think that Mark Twain got it right when he quipped:
Age is an issue of mind over matter: if you don't mind, it doesn't matter!"

As the wise old preacher in Ecclesiastes said: there is a time for every season under heaven - a time to be born and a time to die, a time to plant, and a time to pluck up what is planted; a time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up; a time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance; a time to throw away stones, and a time to gather stones together; a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing; a time to seek, and a time to lose; a time to keep, and a time to throw away; a time to tear, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak; a time to love, and a time to hate; a time for war, and a time for peace.

For those who have the time - and inclination - you might find this link by Sandi Villarreal about "Slow Reading and Slow Responding" of value. I loved it:
http://sojo.net/blogs/2014/05/15/praise-slow-response

Blessed Sabbath...