Embracing and arguing with Peter Rollins...

One of the new theologians that I most enjoy - embracing and arguing with him at the same time - is Peter Rollins. He writes about theology, culture, the imperative for Christians to be heretical and so much more...

In a recent blog - www.peterrollins.net/blog - he shares a post-modern tract that he is working on that deserves the WIDEST circulation. And just below this blog, he reflects on one of the most important new - but disturbing - films to be screened at Cannes: "Antichrist" by Lars von Trier. Now there are two things that I want to celebrate about Rollins:

+First, he doesn't' take himself so seriously as to be a pain in the ass. That is, he is honest, flawed, fun, incomplete and totally human. He is a philosopher and theologian by training, but he is also a full person, too. He's the kind of guy you would want to share a beer with and talk about life and God and other stuff, too. In fact, one of the things his small group - Ikon - does is to hold a monthly dinner called "the last supper" where a leading intellectual is invited to share a meal and conversation with the IKON folk. She/he gets to stay around for another month - and another dinner - until such time as they start talking lame - then... it is the last supper! Freakin' brilliant.

+And second, he takes the upside down nature of Christ's kingdom very seriously. He doesn't give a rat's ass about the institutional church - that will have a life (or not) depending upon whether it is faithful or not - rather he is eager to nourish disciples who will be fed by Christ's spirit. And who just might be a source of light and hope for another. Here's how he puts it in a story from his most recent book, "The Orthodox Heretic."

Believe me, I understand that Rollins isn't for everybody - he can really get under your skin - but I resonate with him on so many levels it makes me rejoice! Let's have fun - and let's change the world - like Jesus did! I say, "Let's hoist a pint for Peter Rollins in the spirit of Jesus!"

Jesu meets AC/DC...

One of my commitments this week (during vacation part two) is to REALLY practice my guitar playing. Last night I found that I wanted to relearn the electric guitar break to a classic rock song, "You Shook Me All Night Long," by AC/DC. I know the opening riffs in my sleep - and love them - but that middle break is pure ecstasy so by week's end I'm gonna nail it...

At the same time - after practicing that thing for about two hours last night on my acoustic guitar (and let me just note that you CAN'T bend notes like you need except on an electric machine) - I found that I was hearing Bach's "Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring" go through my head, too. So this is gonna be another of those Jesus meets AC/DC weeks...

(Doesn't this guy play it sweetly?) That's the essence of my spirituality in a nutshell: bold and ecstatic embodiment married to inner commitment, compassion and beauty. It is a both/and thing for me - never an either/or - both the feasting of Jesus and the fasting of the Baptizer, yes? Listen to how my boys ZZ Top with the Allman Brothers Band put it in "Jesus Just Left Chicago>"

End of vacation - part one...

The first part of my summer vacation came to a close yesterday as we left Montreal and headed back to the USA. We slept in after hanging out at the Francofolies on Saturday and eating GREAT French food (lamb and duck) with LOTS of red wine! In some ways, we were both ready to return to Pittsfield after a week away, but it takes me about a week to really unwind during vacation so I am glad I have another week (and more at the end of August, too.)

Sunday was a day of transitions: after checking out of the hotel we went up Mount Royal to experience the "Tam Tams." Since the early 70s, Montrealers trek to the statue of Jacques Cartier, bring their drums and groove together for about 7 hours. It is part hippie love-fest, part pagan dance groove, part "let's dig the sunlight while it still lasts before six months of darkness" and part "free spirit" community building. It was a sweet groove during the two hours we spent watching people, dancing to the ever-building drum choir and checking in with the various artisans who set up around the periphery.

Saying "a bien tot" to Montreal, we set out - had some "pain au chocolat" - another proof that there is a God - and headed through customs. Ninety minutes later we were in Burlington, VT for what turned out to be their annual "Feast of Fools" day! What timing! More buskers and street acrobats, lots of people in this very cool old town and another noodle bar to die for. Not wanting to leave, but having another four hours to drive, we returned to our "schlep" back home and got here just about 10 pm.

It was good to be back in our own beds... where we both slept like rocks. Part two of my vacation begins today as Di had to return to work this morning. I did a baptism at church for some friends in from California this morning, but now I'm back into the "summer time" mode and living IS easy! I've got hours of guitar practicing to get back into... and some new novels by China Mielville, too. Probably a trip or two to the local art museums, gardening and I promised myself I would start my French cooking assignments as well.

What's more Josh Ritter is going to be at MassMOCA (Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art) on Saturday for an all day festival. And there is a Georgia O'Keefe exhibit happening at the Clark, too.

Blessings to you all... more as this week unfolds.

Rest in peace old friend...

The likelihood of saying anything new or even insightful about the movies of the recently deceased John Hughes is slim. I loved his early movies - so did my children - and we saw them all over and over again. The girls knew the dialogue to "Breakfast Club" in their sleep, we each cherished "Planes, Trains and Automobiles" for its portrayal of radical hospitality and all of us would break into Ducky's lip sync of "Try a Little Tenderness" from time to time when it played in supermarkets or shopping malls.

(NOTE: this is one of those classic Hughes' scenes where one of the outsiders transforms an ordinary moment into something extraordinary by sharing a little humor, style and heart.)

To say that Hughes touched our family would be an understatement: he gave a tender but realistic (and always commercially viable) treatment to teen alienation in America. He helped others - teens and adults - know what it felt like to be shut out and judged. He also showed us how barriers and divisions can be overcome and how healing this is for all involved. He was a master of comedic timing, had a gigantic heart and soul and loved bringing people together. What's more, he did it with real humor and grace.

In a word, he was a missionary dedicated to helping us overcome the alienation of class differences in a country that pretends they don't exist. He was also an ambassador for that upside down kingdom where children and outsiders are often our wisest rabbis. And he used pop music in movies better than anyone else at the time and had spot on taste!

Like J.D. Salinger - but a whole lot more accessible and nice - John Hughes lifted up the feelings and experiences of American young people as authentic. He carefully crafted little windows into the souls of hurting kids while always celebrating the possibility of hope and redemption. The world will be a little darker without his light and I am glad he shared so much with so many. Rest in peace old friend...

Back in the USA...

We arrived home tonight after a GREAT six days in Montreal - and I have a bunch of competing feelings. First, I have totally fallen in love with Montreal - and I am fascinated by the challenge of embracing two languages and at least two cultures so intentionally.

I was speaking with a woman last night - our waitress - who told me her father was Irish and her mother was French. She spoke French at home and eventually learned both French and English in school. She loved both cultures and languages and said: "If you live further north you can get away with just French, but I come from a mixed family - and work in downtown Montreal - where everything is blended. It just come so automatically."

Man, do I wish that was true for many of us in the United States. I know parochialism knows no boundaries, but it is so easy to look the other way in the USA and NOT see how small the world has become. Already, in tiny Berkshire county, there are over 10,000 Latino folk living among us and they are rarely acknowledged - let alone embraced. But the same was true in Tucson, too, with Mexico just 20 miles South. I am not suggesting that Montreal is paradise, but they have certainly learned to flawlessly speak one an other's languages and celebrate one an other's cultures regardless of what the politicians think, say or do.

Second, I read a number of insightful op ed columns in a variety of newspapers speaking about what the US health care debate might mean for Canada. Isn't that interesting? In a host of careful and well reasoned ways, it was noted that as the US tries to figure out the best way to share universal health care in the USA, the folk in Canada might do well to pay attention so that they could fix what isn't working in their system.

What's more, it was suggested that Canadians could even help some ordinary Americans discern what benefits might be gained by making certain that the whole body politic was included in health care rather than giving in to the current fear mongering of the Republican lunatic fringe! What's more, some of the Canadian editorials even urged their people to take American political passion seriously so that the status quo gets shaken up!

And third, this place knows how to promote itself for tourism! Gay Pride Week - Jazz Festivals - Francofolies Music Festival - Film Festival - Blues Festival! And then there is all the winter activities. As my little New England town works to reinvent itself by embracing both the arts and tourism, it is clear we have to do an even BETTER job of promotion. There is a lot to offer in our town: beauty, compassionate citizens, well-educated and competent politicians, an incredible outdoors, local artists, great schools and a real estate situation to die for!

My wife and I get our souls refreshed in Montreal - and we'll be going there often - but we'll also be borrowing some of their wisdom to share right here. Like brother Chuck Berry said...

Random observations...

As we prowled through Montreal, a few things jump out:

+ There are small children and young families EVERYWHERE! Given a French Catholic background that makes some sense but it seems to be true among the Anglophone population as well as the various immigrant groups. What's more, it seems to be a very family friendly city.

+ As we wandered through a variety of neighborhoods - the Hasidic section of town as well as Little Italy, the wealthy French areas, Chinatown, an area of great old homes in an artistic center and the Portuguese region - most everyone is bilingual. What a sift from the parochial habits of New England and most of the United States. People can easily flip between French, English and often another tongue. What's more, they have all been patient and generous with us as we stumble through our very broken attempts at parlez vous Francais!

+ In the on-going battle between the 2 oldest bagelries in North America, I come down easily in the Fairmount camp. St. Viateur's bagels were chewier - and good - but the Fairmount guys had so much flavor AND chewiness that they stole my heart.

+ It is soul-healing for me to walk around such a multi-ethnic city. I understand that when peoples come together from different places and perspectives there will always be problems - and Montreal is no exception - that is clear. At the same time, it is so much fun to share conversations with people from all over creation: Africa, Europe, South America, Asia and the Middle East. And if you walk around the neighborhood of our hotel, you can do this in 10 minutes!

Today, we'll head back to the Old City for some more encounters with buskers and street artists as well as two art museums. We'll probably close the night off with more music at the Franco Foiles - or some other local venue - as we bask in the delight of this rambling vacation.

Friday reflections...

We went to Quebec City on Thursday - a 3 hour trip from Montreal - and it was stunning. One day in the ancient fortified town is clearly not enough, but it was sweet to stroll the grey and white stone streets in the gentle rain. There were buskers and artisans everywhere, open cathedrals filled with tourists and a host of folk who were ready, willing and able to help us with our mangled French.

I realized that one of my apprehensions about this trip was my limited language ability: I began French classes in fourth grade and loved it but by the time high school rolled around, French had become an exercise in passive/aggressive behavior. (Same was true with the sciences as I was clearly an "arts" kinda kid: marginal, smart but lazy and totally opposed to doing anything that would make me become like "one of them!")

By the time I studied Spanish, however, the story was different: I LOVED the Latin American revolutionaries, I worked with Cesar Chavez and the Farmworkers and later I was into liberation theology (and went to study for 6 months in Costa Rica!) And I could speak Spanish on the streets of Nueva York - or Cleveland - and certainly Tucson, AZ.

But the people in Quebec - the MOST intentionally French city in this province - were charming, helpful, willing to endure my butchered syntax and speak English when it was helpful. I guess a lot of my concern was shaped by the early and militant Quebecois days of separatist anger... but we didn't encounter that at all. Which reminded me of the old story about a stranger pulling up to a country general store and asking one of the old men sitting on the porch about the people in his town. "Well, what are they like where you're from," was the local man's reply.

"Well," said the stranger, "they are crabby and cynical and can't be trusted - and they will cheat you just as soon as look at you." To which the old timer said, "The people here will be a lot like that, too, I suspect." But when another guest arrived and the same questions were exchanged, there was a different attitude. "The people in my town? Well, mostly they are kind and willing to help you. They are generous and patient and souls with good hearts." To which the old man said, "Well, then, I bet you mind folks are much like that here, too."

Perspective and patience makes so much of a difference when travelling, yes? I've been in groups where I saw the appellation "Ugly American" reborn, I've seen bureaucrats in Soviet Russia, Costa Rica and Great Britain treat people with all the disdain that George Orwell could imagine and then I've seen strangers go out of the way to share compassion and tenderness. Truly angels in disguise and I've come to believe that... more often than now what you see and get is deeply connected to what you bring into the moment.

Made me think both of the words of Jesus about being careful how we judge and... that crazy Irish rapper, Everlast, and his tune: What Its Like...

Can you say syncronicity...?

Early last week I met with a wise spiritual advisor who shared some suggestions with me about ways to get my writing published. One had to do with exploring why it is that the Dionysian impulse in rock and roll annihilates some while others are able to crawl back from the pit? As I have noted this is a fascinating theme that I will be working on over the next few months.

What makes me smile - and then sit up and pay attention - is that the Sunday NY Times ran a huge story about a new production of "The Bacchae" to be offered in NYC this summer using the music of Philip Glass. Great article - hot combination of theatre and music - better keep my eyes and ears open. (http://www.villagevoice.com/2009-08-04/theater/joanne-akalaitis-the-bacchae-at-the-public/)

Then we were walking down Rue St. Catherine to dinner last night and stopped at a used book store. And what do you think was the first book to jump into my hands - in English - but "The Bacchae and other plays" by Euripides? Ok, ok... I am REALLY starting to pay attention now.

More after some aimless wandering and exploring Montreal...
(credit: moonspiral. "ariade and dionysus" @ http://www.redbubble.com/people/moonspiral/art/2780614-2-ariadne-and-dionysus )

The blessings of Montreal...

One of the realities that I have found over the years of ministry - and I begin my 27th year of ordained ministry in the fall - is that I HAVE to get out of Dodge if I am going to have a real vacation. Last year we did a little "staycation" to acquaint ourselves with the Berkshires - and it was fun - but if church people know the pastor is in town... a vacation doesn't happen. And not because anybody is misbehaving... it is just how all of this works.

So we are 6 hours north of our town in sweet Montreal enjoying Les Quebecois, the beauty of Montreal and the challenge of trying to speak French. Dianne is pretty good after an initial brain freeze. I have a great accent and no vocabulary any more (I am modestly ok in Spanish and now find myself speaking "Sprench" - a mutated combination of languages, numbers and idioms that just makes Dianne laugh... and the locals look puzzled.)

We took a leisurely drive up here on Monday - gorgeous weather and no problems - only to discover that our hotel is just one street away from Rue. St. Catherine: a place LOADED with ethnic food shops, books stores, seedy places and all sorts of weird, fun places! We realized that God had blessed us once again so we wandered the streets like kids in a candy shop and wound up eating Indian food in a GREAT place.

Today we went to L'Oratoire St. Joseph... a basilica started by a modest monk in honor of the father of our Lord which became a HUGE modern, post Vatican II sanctuary. It was gorgeous! It sits at the top of Mont Real - which we walked down - and through the Notre Dame Cemetery until we wound our way (3 hours later) back into the heart of the culture center. So we went to the Muse des Beaux-Arts - a ubiquitous Starbucks (which are turning into a haven of rest and orientation) and then back into the city to look at a mini-replica of St. Peter's basilica (known locally as Mary Queen of Heaven) which was gaudy and filled with excess (both Di and I laughed til we hurt about how Protestant we are!) as well as a trip past the hotel that John and Yoko held their "sleep in for peace" and both St. James United Church of Canada and Christ Church Cathedral (the Anglican show piece here.)

After a rest and dip in the hot tub, it was back out to Rue St. Catherine and a Vietnamese Noodle Shop to DIE for! It looks totally derelict but was heavenly. Then some more wandering and eventually a night of planning for tomorrow. We are off to either the Vieux Ville et Port or a section of the city that has been recently gentrified but with hippies and other malcontents. You see, our ideal vacation is wandering around places we know nothing about and learning what it feels - and tastes - like. We'll hit Quebec City later in the week as well as the Franco Follies song fest down town.

These adventures always do three things for me: 1) they restore my sense of God's grace in real people as folks are always so kind to us; 2) they give me a chance to put in my earrings, stop shaving, put funky clothes back on and wander among people without anyone knowing I am clergy; and 3) it gives me time to laugh and think and love my sweet wife. God, I love that woman! I have even started to pray the Psalm again!

All is grace, dear friends... all is grace. Here is one of my favorite Canadians from Montreal, Leonard Cohen, doing one of my favorite songs: "The Future."

groovin' on a sunday afternoon...

We had a sweet day in worship: our new guest organist - a young player from Oberlin - was rockin' and bold, my wife sat in for our liturgist who has experiencing water damage problem in his basement from all the damn rain and one of my dearest friends and colleagues, Amy, was with us from Illinois. We even got to put together a great little "sacred harp" group for today's special music. It was a sweet way to celebrate God's grace and I was groovin' like the song says...

Last night, Amy and I went out for drinks. We'd worked together for nearly three years back in Tucson and it was one of those magic times that come rarely: great love and respect at church, the ability to bring out the creative best in one another and a drive to spread a radically new sense of Christ's grace and hospitality to people who had been shut out of the church for too long. We laughed and wept and worked harder than I ever worked before. And beyond a doubt, those were among my most cherished times in ministry.

She and her family were in town to visit family - can you believe it but her sister-in-law sings in my church band! Talk about a small world... she's singing the lead in this version of Coldplay's, "Viva La Vida."

After worship - and then a Sabbath nap with the rain returning and our thoughts turning towards Canada - it is clear that vacation time was finally here: a time for rest and renewal, a time for reflection and exploration, a time for fun and love and lots of surprises. Which brought to mind this little treasure that came my way last night from my man, Bobby McFerrin, who documents the universality of the pentatonic scale...

Isn't that incredible? God's presence is everywhere if you have the ears to hear and the eyes to see. Now on to Montreal...\

Can dionysus be tamed with compassion...?

Here is an fascinating question that I am going to explore at length over the next few weeks: why is it that some rock and jazz musicians are able to step back from the abyss that often consumes the rock and roll/jazz experience while others seem to leap into their own destruction? This came about during a recent conversation concerning ways to get my doctoral writing into an accessible written form.

As we talked, two questions emerged about the connection between rock musicians and Dionysus - the Greek god of wine, music, dance and madness - and its implication:

+ Why should people of faith give any positive attention to the Dionysian impulse in rock/jazz that by definition leads to the loss of self and destruction?

+ What literally saves/rescues some in this genre from the inherent madness and death of the Dionysian energies?

A recap of the story of Dionysus - the god of ecstasy who is also known as Bacchus -tells us:

... that he was the son of Zeus and of Semele, daughter of the founder of Thebes. Zeus's jealous wife, Hera, wanted to know the identity of the child's father. She disguised herself as Semele's old nurse and went to see Semele. When Semele told her that Zeus was the father, Hera challenged her to prove her claim by having Zeus appear in all his glory. Semele did so. However, because Zeus was the god of lightning, his power was too much for a human to bear. Semele was turned into ashes.

Before Semele died, Zeus pulled Dionysus out of her womb. Then cutting open his thigh, Zeus placed the unborn child inside. A few months later he opened up his thigh, and Dionysus was born. The infant was left with Semele's sister Ino, who disguised him as a girl to protect him from Hera. As punishment for helping Dionysus, Hera drove Ino and her husband insane.

Some legends say that Hera also drove Dionysus insane. Thereafter, Dionysus wandered the world accompanied by his teacher, Silenus, bands of satyrs, and his women followers, who were known as maenads. When Dionysus traveled to Egypt, he introduced the cultivation of grapes and the art of winemaking. When he went to Libya, he established an oracle in the desert. He also journeyed to India, conquering all who opposed him and bringing laws, cities, and wine to the country On his way back to Greece, he met his grandmother, the earth goddess Cybele. She cured him of his madness and taught him the mysteries of life and resurrection.
(Dionysus -Encyclopedia of Myths: http://www.mythencyclopedia.com/Cr-Dr/Dionysus.html)

The stories also speak of how after participating in the revelries of wine, music and ecstasy the women followers of Dionysus regularly devoured animals - and sometimes the king himself - in a fit of abandon. Now, it doesn't take a genius to note that there are clear parallels here with the life and death of "the king of rock and roll" Elvis Presley - to say nothing of other rock and jazz luminaries from Jimi Hendrix, Michael Jackson and Kurt Cobian to Marvin Gaye and John Coltrane.

+ One hunch that I have about the first question - why people of faith should pay attention to rock music - is that the Dionysian impulse resurfaced in Western popular culture through artists like Elvis and Chuck Berry to bring balance to a sexually repressed culture. The gift rock and roll first shared was an embodied and joyful sexuality. (For more on this see James Nelson, Embodiment: An Approach to Sexuality and Christian Theology, 1978)

+ Another idea about why this Dionysian impulse was necessary has something to do with the way it "incarnated" the social justice ideals of the civil rights movement a generation before their political manifestations. In a conversation that Bono had with Coretta Scott King, she spoke of the way Elvis brought together black and white, male and female, country and gospel and the blues long before the first demonstration. In a Rolling Stone tribute to Elvis, Bono wrote:

Out of Tupelo, Mississippi - out of Memphis, Tennessee, came this green, sharkskin-suited girl chaser, wearing eye shadow - a trucker-dandy white boy who must have risked his hide to act so black and dress so gay... this was punk rock... this was revolt. He was a Fifties-style icon who was what the Sixties were capable of and then suddenly were not.

When I was talking with Coretta Scott King and John Lewis and some of the other leaders of the American civil-rights movement, they reminded me of the cultural apartheid that rock and roll was up against. I think the hill they climbed would have been much steeper were it not for the racial inroads black music was making on white pop culture. The Beatles, the Rolling Stones, Creedence Clearwater Revival all were introduced to the blues through Elvis. He was already doing what the civil-rights movement was demanding: breaking down barriers. You don't think of Elvis as political, but that is politics: changing the way people see the world. (Bono on Elvis, Rolling Stone, March 26, 2004)

+ The second question - why some are devoured while others are not - has something to do with the presence of God's grace. Like those in AA will testify, there is a love at work in the world that literally and figuratively "rescues" some of us with ears to hear from the abyss but not everyone. To be sure, the invitation and possibility is open to all, but not everyone can or will respond. Springsteen did - Bono, Nick Cave and Joni Mitchell, too - but not Coltrane or Charlie Parker.

This song - Love Rescue Me - was written by Bono and Dylan after Bono kept playing it and thinking it was a Dylan song he had heard someplace. The older bard assured him he had never written it so... they finished it together. Ten years later, the children of Omagh, recorded it like... a hymn.

These are the same folk whose families were murdered and blown apart by IRA holdouts on August 15, 1998. These beautiful young people have discovered the healing balance between the wild excess of rock and roll and its deep appeal to God's presence within and among us all. Can I say they are awakened from the numbness by the energy of the music and disciplined to focus it by the spirit of compassion? Is this a healthy unity of body, mind and spirit? Interestingly, it was the Omaugh massacre that rattled the faith of U2 the most - and inspired them to write their most cynical and jarring spirit/justice laments: "Peace on Earth."

Clearly, the young people in the Omaugh chorus feel the potential that the music evokes - a longing for community and trust - and use the music to build bridges on both an ethical and aesthetic level. Clearly U2 believes that music can bring people together in unique ways. I think that there is a playful creativity here that is trying to find a way to embrace a wounded social reality - a tension or paradox that is life giving but complicated - the artistic expression of Psalm 85:

Love and Truth meet in the street,
Right Living and Whole Living embrace and kiss!
Truth sprouts green from the ground,
Right Living pours down from the skies!
Oh yes! God gives Goodness and Beauty;
our land responds with Bounty and Blessing.
Right Living strides out before him,
and clears a path for his passage.

I have more to say about all of this - looking at the Apollonian/Dionysian dialectic as well as the gentle warrior ideas from the men's movement - but that is enough for today. I would love to know what you are thinking and some of the insights that go through your heart and mind, ok? Please be in touch...