You are NOT in control...

Sunday morning worship regularly reminds me that I am NOT in control - which is a good but not always an easy truth to affirm - and it happens in so many ways. Sometimes someone will make a bone-headed announcement full of dreadful theology and unhelpful ideas, other times I will spontaneously find myself going down a side road in my message only to discover too late that I shouldn't have made the turn. From time to time a person will hear something that was never intended - and most likely never said - and then there are the outright interruptions that throw everything in worship up in the air.

+ For example, early in ministry I shared some socio-economic observations about shepherds one Christmas Eve - something about how they were often ritually unclean and considered less than socially desirable because they worked "the third shift" - only to be scolded for picking on people who have to work swing shift to keep their families fed. I thought I was being in solidarity but...

+ Same thing happened in Arizona when talking about Christ's radical inclusion of women: I referenced three women who would be considered outsiders in traditional society but who were celebrated in the ministry of Jesus only to be told that I needed to get over my sexism and honor the important contributions that women make in the church. "Men aren't the ONLY important ones, you know?"

+ And then there was the time one of my early bands was leading a gospel tune and one of the local street people came in - he was about 6'4" and looked (and smelled) like John the Baptist - as he marched down the center aisle before parking himself on the floor in front of the band. We finished the song and he said: "Do you KNOW when Christ is coming again?" Good question, I thought, although I wasn't prepared to talk about it then so I said, "Karl, how about we talk about this after worship?" At which point he jumped up straight up into the air - from the floor -shook his fist at me and screamed: "Sinner, sinner" before storming away. I thought he was going to hit me with one of his huge, ham hock fists... but he just shouted and fled out the back door.

Today was a gift - my friend Bert was a spirit-filled preacher - and together with my musician friends and liturgist they brought great skill and verve to the mix. It was a feast. And when I asked one of the children what she thought a worship stole was all about she paused, smiled and said, "It is a scarf." And when asked how you would wear it, she said, "Like this..." and tossed it jauntily over her shoulder making a true liturgical fashion statement.

So, as another Sabbath comes to a close, and I recall ALL the times I have been reminded that I am not in control, I give thanks to God. Ever so slowly I am learning that my job is to invite folks towards the grace of God's feast. I can do some training and offer lots of prayer, but the rest is not up to me. Like the movie, "Babette's Feast," teaches: we are here to prepare and invite and then trust that God will do the rest. Lord, I believe... help my disbelief, too.

Sharing faith, music and friendship...

Tomorrow my friend and colleague, the Reverend Bert Marshall, will be our guest preacher. I am still in town - my vacation time will come later in August with a trip to Halifax for the International Busker's Festival (can you imagine?) - but wanted the faith community to hear from Bert. He is the regional director of Church World Service,(www.churchworldservice.org/site/PageServer) one of the best and most faithful ecumenical ministries committed to caring for the broken of the world. He has just recently returned from South America with stories of hope and challenge. I can't wait.

Last fall, Bert joined our Thanksgiving Eve ensemble on guitar and vocals - and his loving spirit is infectious. He also shared some of his own tunes, too.

And in addition to his work with CWS, he has put together a ministry of sharing the power of Christ's love through a dramatic presentation of "The Gospel of Mark Alive." (Check it out at: www.gospelofmarkalive.com/reviews.html) It is always a treat to work and hang-out with this man for we share a common faith, a love of God's presence in music and a friendship. How providential is that the lectionary text set for tomorrow is the Good Samaritan?

Just then a religion scholar stood up with a question to test Jesus. "Teacher, what do I need to do to get eternal life?" Jesus answered, "What's written in God's Law? How do you interpret it?" He said, "That you love the Lord your God with all your passion and prayer and muscle and intelligence—and that you love your neighbor as well as you do yourself." "Good answer!" said Jesus. "Do it and you'll live."

Looking for a loophole, he asked, "And just how would you define 'neighbor'?" So Jesus answered by telling a story. "There was once a man traveling from Jerusalem to Jericho. On the way he was attacked by robbers. They took his clothes, beat him up, and went off leaving him half-dead. Luckily, a priest was on his way down the same road, but when he saw him he angled across to the other side. Then a Levite religious man showed up; he also avoided the injured man.

"A Samaritan traveling the road came on him. When he saw the man's condition, his heart went out to him. He gave him first aid, disinfecting and bandaging his wounds. Then he lifted him onto his donkey, led him to an inn, and made him comfortable. In the morning he took out two silver coins and gave them to the innkeeper, saying, 'Take good care of him. If it costs any more, put it on my bill—I'll pay you on my way back.'

"What do you think? Which of the three became a neighbor to the man attacked by robbers?" "The one who treated him kindly," the religion scholar responded. Jesus said, "Go and do the same."

Join us for the feast if you are around...

Nourishing the heart at Christ's feast...

This has been an intense week: the heat wave has been oppressive, the challenge of this ministry demanding and, on a personal level, the attempted suicide of a loved one in Dianne's wider family has been unsettling. (Thanks be to God this young man was found and is now receiving care and treatment.) And still my heart looks towards the feast... A story from the gospel of Matthew is clarifying in which those following Jesus are reprimanded for picking grain on the Sabbath and eating it, too.

One Sabbath, Jesus was strolling with his disciples through a field of ripe grain. Hungry, the disciples were pulling off the heads of grain and munching on them. Some Pharisees reported them to Jesus: "Your disciples are breaking the Sabbath rules!" Jesus said, "Really? Didn't you ever read what David and his companions did when they were hungry, how they entered the sanctuary and ate fresh bread off the altar, bread that no one but priests were allowed to eat? And didn't you ever read in God's Law that priests carrying out their Temple duties break Sabbath rules all the time and it's not held against them? Look: "There is far more at stake here than religion. If you had any idea what this Scripture meant—'I prefer a flexible heart to an inflexible ritual'—you wouldn't be nitpicking like this. The Son of Man is no lackey to the Sabbath; he's in charge."

A few ideas emerge for a "spirituality of the feast" from this text:

+ First, the way of Christ's feast is a path of the heart - lebab in Hebrew and kardia in Greek - rather than merely a collection of rituals. It is neither a rejection of intellectual thinking nor is it opposed to ritual celebrations for in the roughly 854 times "heart" is used in the Old Testament the meaning points to the emotional, rational and ethical core of a person. Both Jesus and his predecessors summarize the way of the heart like this: Listen, O Israel, the Lord is our God and the Lord is One. Blessed be the God's kingdom forever and ever. You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all soul and with all your might. These are the words I have commanded you today to be in your heart. http://www.jewfaq.org/prayer/shema.htm

As a charismatic, mystical son of Israel, Jesus taught that the core of his tradition is always about turning our mind, our feelings and our will towards God in faith. He also emphasized that the best way to practice the turning of our core towards the Lord is by embodying compassion for our neighbors. Luke's gospel articulates this most clearly in Luke 19 where Jesus connects Deuteronomy 6:5 with Leviticus 19: 18 and 34:

And one day an authority on the law stood up to put Jesus to the test. “Teacher,” he asked, “what must I do to receive eternal life?” What is written in the Law?” Jesus replied. “How do you understand it?” He answered, “ ‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul. Love him with all your strength and with all your mind.’(Deuteronomy 6:5) And, ‘Love your neighbor as you love yourself.’ (Leviticus 19)” Jesus replied,“You have answered correctly, so go and do that and your life will have meaning.

Those who know the Christian tradition will recall that immediately following these words, Jesus defines our neighbor in the parable of the Good Samaritan: a despised outsider - the Samaritan - not only shares compassion and healing with a wounded Jew, but arranges for his well-being through gifts of food and lodging. Here is the embodiment of a flexible heart in opposition to the prison of inflexible ritual or habit - and curiously it is expressed through radical hospitality - in which compassion, food and shelter become God for the wounded.

St. Paul said something similar in Romans 12: I urge you, sisters and brothers, by the mercy of God to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice - THIS is your spiritual worship - and THIS is what is holy and pleasing to the Lord. Do not be conformed to the ways and habits of this world, but rather be transformed by the renewal of your mind, for then your bodies will show the world God's will in all its beauty and power.

+ Second, the spirituality of the feast trusts that it is our encounter with radical hospitality - the bread of life and cup of compassion - that is the best way to nurture acts of deeper commitment. Intellectual assent, catechises and all the rest have their place, but they are not primary. How does the old saying put it: "When the student is ready, the Buddha appears?" An encounter with grace that is experiential, honest, earthy and embodied - like a feast - is the best way to train disciples and cultivate a company of the committed.

Think of all the stories where Jesus teaches and molds his crew into a counter-cultural community through table fellowship: from the wedding banquet in Cana of Galilee to the post-resurrection supper along the Emmaus Road, it was the breaking and sharing of bread that "opened their eyes." I think the invitation to the Eucharist gets it right - but not just for the ritual act of feasting - but as a guideline for turning the core of our hearts towards the wisdom and spirituality of embodying Christ's feast in all things:

This is the joyful feast of the people of God: Men and women, youth and children come from the East and the West, from the North and the South to gather about Christ's table (or dare I say to make Christ's table visible and embodied) so that the presence of the Lord is made flesh and shared in community.

As the old words say, "Go and learn what this means: I seek compassion not ritual sacrifice says the Lord. Do likewise and you shall have the essence of life." (check out "Peaches en Regalia" by my man Frank Zappa.)

And so the feast goes on...

As you may have noticed, I've been on another jag - one exploring how a grace-driven commitment shapes what I am starting to call a spirituality of the feast - it is a metaphor for how I am learning to "do" church. I've noted earlier that there is still a lot of tension in this model: it is all about the invitation and not so much about what happens after the feast is over. It is rooted in the present moment and a deep trust in God rather than striving after results or numbers.

And it is a whole lot more fun than other ways of "doing" church, although it is also highly misunderstood. My friend Steve and I were talking about this today at lunch. He reminded me of something he wrote a while back (check it out here: http://thenightseajourney.blogspot.com/2009/07/what-and-who-is-god.html) that contains this insight from Thomas Moore:

The name of God can be used to freeze our wonder, to make a comforting and useful idol, or it can be the opposite: a name that opens into continuing mystery. I learn from Islam to use the name carefully, from Judaism to use it rarely, and from my own experience to use it almost not at all. It makes sense to light a candle every time I call on God, just to remember that the name is holy and never means what I think it means.

For those reasons I use it much more in the privacy of my thoughts and devotions that in public. My reluctance to speak of God apparently leads some people to question my religiousness and my faith. Maybe that is a good thing because when people see your piety, it has probably already passed too far into form.

It is better to be on the cusp between religion and secularity than to fall into either category. For there is another paradox at work: the appearance of religiosity is often in inverse proportion to the quality of religious practice.

I think this is part of what I am discovering about a "spirituality of the feast" - this movement towards the holy in community - is always hovering somewhere in-between secularity and religion. What's more, to put this spiritual discipline into practice, takes both care and creativity so that it is gentle and able to move with the breeze. It is subtle and tender and fluid rather than overt, aggressive and didactic. Tomorrow I hope to post the four broad elements that I am thinking are a part of a "spirituality of the feast," including:

+ First there is inspiration: prior to creating a feast or even inviting your guests, there is an awareness - a calling into celebration and joy - that is always the guide, yes? "In the beginning, was the Word... and the Spirit blows where it will."

+ Second is the invitation: a discernment must take place about who to invite and why - to say nothing of how to share the invitation - and when. "Come unto me all ye who are tired and heavy laden and I will give you... rest."

+ Third is the preparation: buying and baking, roasting and basting - cleaning, decorating, savoring, watching and waiting - all before the first guest arrives. "And so he went into the desert for 40 days of fasting and prayer as prelude to announcing the kingdom of God..."

+ Fourth is the actual feast itself: from the music and initial welcome to the serving of the food and comfort of the guests: everything matters including the farewells and clean-up. "But when did we see thee, Lord, hungry and give thee bread... or naked and clothe thee... or lonely and visit thee? Whenever you did so unto one of the least of these my sisters and brothers you did so unto me..."

Well, my break for reflection today is over, there are more people to visit and a meeting to get ready for this evening. "So they committed themselves to the teaching of the apostles, the life together, the common meal and the prayers. Everyone around was in awe—all those wonders and signs done through the apostles! And all the believers lived in a wonderful harmony, holding everything in common. They sold whatever they owned and pooled their resources so that each person's need was met. They followed a daily discipline of worship in the Temple followed by meals at home, every meal a celebration, exuberant and joyful, as they praised God. People in general liked what they saw. Every day their number grew as God added those who were saved."

Additional thoughts on feasting, grace and faith communities...

Today is a scorcher in the Berkshires and Gershwin got it so right: summertime... and the living is easy. People are moving slowly, folks are heading home early (if they can) and fans and air conditioners are humming through these pretty hills.

Well I've had two inter-related summertime thoughts about my last post re: doing church in a new way. Maybe they make some sense and maybe I am just too damn hot...

+ First, the grace-based model - which some call generous orthodoxy while others speak about Christ's radically open table - begins with a feast. It doesn't not begin with a set of rules, expectations or conditions, simply an invitation: come. Come as you are, come broken or whole, come because you know you need something or come just because it feels like it might be right. In this, Kurt Cobain was more prophetic and holy - in spite of his wounds - than many within the Body of Christ. "Come... as you are... and KNOW that I DON'T have a gun" (or anything else that will hurt either!)

Curiously, it is often the most wounded and alienated from our churches - and most of straight, white middle class living, too - who understand the importance of living as in invitation to the feast. They may not be much of a witness - Cobian was about as fucked-up as a person could get - but at the same time he was an evangelist for God's grace, right? That's why the new/old paradigm of the feast makes so little sense to those shaped by other ecclesiologies: to paraphrase John Lennon, the feast is NOT instant karma (or fast food and anything cheap.) It is a huge, always maturing and every creative seven course banquet - and it takes time and presence to both savor the feast and be nourished by it, too. It isn't a coincidence that Jesus' first miracle takes place at a WEDDING FEAST in Cana of Galilee. Remember how does Isaiah put it?

Ho, every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters, and he that hath no money; come ye, buy, and eat; yea, come, buy wine and milk without money and without price. Wherefore do ye spend money for that which is not bread? and your labour for that which satisfieth not? hearken diligently unto me, and eat ye that which is good, and let your soul delight itself in fatness.

+ Second, preparing the table as well as the banquet is just as important as the actual event. I know that at least HALF the fun of a party is decorating - and baking - and setting the table. I LOVE doing this in anticipation of a feast! And the same is true with our faith communities: we have to make certain that we offer signs and symbols of authentic hospitality and take the time - and spend the money - necessary to welcome our guests and friends.

For example, when we were candidating at our current church, we walked into the Narthex - a word NOBODY knows anymore - and it looked like a mausoleum: all marble panels honoring this or that dead former saint. It was scary, man, and this was the entry way to the church: OMG! (It still needs some serious reworking - which will happen this summer - but at least now we have some children's art work and a ton of colorful things to tell people about our mission, our worship, what to expect, etc. This summer, however, the RAINBOW BANNERS!)

And here's the challenge of "doing' church as a feast: it takes LOTS of time. It ain't McDonald's. It takes time to prepare, it takes time to set the table and cook, it takes time to welcome and greet and it takes time to feast. Eventually the meal is consumed and the guests are nurtured, but not quickly. And sometimes it takes a number of feasts before folks feel like they can trust that the other shoe is not going to fall.


Yesterday I spent most of the holiday preparing a feast for my honey: it was blistering hot and I shouldn't have ROASTED a chicken but... it was for Dianne. So I sauteed onions and carrots, basted that sweet little bird with butter over and over and poured red wine into the mix with abandon. And yes, it was damn hot by the time she got home and we sat down... but it was worth ALL the sweat, too. Preparing for the feast is part of the blessing, yes?



Oh yes, there is one other benefit to doing church as a feast: the other guests have a role to play. It isn't all about the host - or the pastor - or the elected leadership. Often guests find they have something in common with someone they never knew before and before you know it they are off having their own feasts because of the invitation. I LOVE when that happens, too.

To say that I am still learning about feasting in church is a given - but I love doing church this way even if it takes a long, long time. Bon appetit!

Differing thoughts about authority in our faith communities...

Summertime in the Berkshires implies a shift in both the weather and participation at church: as James Taylor said last night at Tanglewood, "Some of you may be missing the rain because we've been blessed with an uncommonly beautiful day... but this will soon pass." That said, most folk take full advantage of the sunshine and head for the even greater outdoors of Cape Cod or Maine or even just hiking the woods and mountains of the region. It is a stunning season and I don't begrudge anyone the diminished worship attendance the beauty of the Berkshires breeds at this time of year. In fact, it gives me time to pause and reflect...

And what I've been thinking about - in attention to all that stuff about the Beats and Dylan - might be summarized like this: in our Reformed tradition there are differing thoughts about where authority is to be found in our faith communities. I know, I know: I am the master of the obvious. Nevertheless, one of the truths I have gleaned in my 28 years of ordained ministry - and one of the perennial problems in our way of being the Body of Christ - is found precisely in these competing notions of authority. For brevity's sake, let me summarize the challenge like this:

+ Some folk assign authority to the Scriptures (and only sometimes to tradition.) This differs significantly from the perspective of our Roman/Anglican cousins in that they fully embrace the authority of tradition, scripture and the office of ordination. Not so in our wing of the Reformation: clergy here are "teaching elders" - nothing more - but certainly nothing less. Some people, therefore, listen carefully to the ordained teachers, but not everyone because given our commitment to the "priesthood of ALL believers," we have insisted that scripture (and tradition) can be - and should be - interpreted by individuals as inspired by the Holy Spirit.

What this means, of course, is that fundamentalists and biblicists can insist that their opinions are equal to those who have studied context, language and history. Our radical theological democracy is often a stumbling block. I know that other traditions have their own problems - especially with clericism - but this is our wonderful and complicated reality. And while I continue to work at what we call biblical and liturgical literacy, critical and engaged interpretation is essential lest scripture become yet another idol.

+ Another setting for authority is found in the formal and informal power structures in a congregation. This is true throughout Christianity, but has a unique manifestation in the Reformed tradition where popular election to a church office is sometimes unrelated to either spiritual maturity or even participation. "Let's elect/appoint X to this roll on church council and maybe he/she will start to come back to worship again!" (I can't tell you how many times I have heard such absurdities in the mistaken notion that giving somebody an office or job will bring them back into the fold. NOTE: this is ALWAYS a failure and often a tragedy waiting to happen, too.)

When it works best, authority given to the power structures of a congregation are best based on commitment, spiritual wisdom and gifts as well as a proven record of building up - not tearing down - the Body of Christ. This goes south when random people are either assigned a task/slot that they have no interest in filling, or, when a total contrarian is put into a position of power without being tested. There is a reason why tradition and scripture speaks of deacons and elders: deacons are those who have been called to serve and build up the Body of Christ; and elders are the wise ones who have developed gravitas and compassion through a life of service. You may call these time-tested spiritual offices by other name, but awarding then without a track record is always a mistake.

+ Another locus of authority is sometimes called "the church" - or the Body of Christ - and here, too, there is healthy and destructive power depending on how you define "the body." If the church/body means merely the membership list, this is authority based upon the lowest common denominator. If the body means the company of the committed, it is prudent to ask: who is defining what commitment looks like? Do you see the challenge?

Some Reformed paths have worked to blend these polarities - like the Church of the Savior in Washington, DC - so that there is a rigorous 2-3 year "orientation/candidating" period before church membership can occur. During this time, a person not only documents his/her skills, discipline and interests but also commits to full participation in a study/training course. Here the company of the committed has a clearly defined and objective standard of measurement.

Other branches of our Reformed tradition, notably the United Church of Christ, have gone in the opposite direction and professed: whoever you are and wherever you are on life's journey, there is a place for you here. This path celebrates a radical sense of grace in the hope that in time a person can be trained in the more demanding ways of Christian discipleship. It, too, warrants caution and care but can help people who have been wounded by religion find a way of trusting God - and the church - again.

I understand and honor BOTH extremes - discipleship and grace - and tend towards the grace side of the equation. Where this becomes problematic, however, is when the body is not patient about nourishing spiritual commitments. To be a congregation of radical grace means that we don't all move at the same speed. It means that the "church" doesn't speak together with one voice in public - people do what the Spirit calls individually or in small groups - because not everyone is in the same place.

What's more, you can't force another into your commitment: you can only invite because anything else is a guilt-trip. Such is the complication of this path and not everyone likes it. I suspect that one of the reasons we don't like giving the body maximum time and space has to do with control:

+ If our spirituality of authority genuinely embraces grace - and gives people the time and freedom to ripen and mature in the Spirit - then we will not make others conform to our mold of social action, piety or institutional participation. the model is walking the Labyrinth, yes?

+ We will give up pushing people into our pet projects. Rather, we offer the invitation and trust that the Spirit will do the rest. We give people time to make their way on their own journey even as we walk together.

Sure, for potlucks or work days you have to RECRUIT - phone calls and organizing are essential - but not so with bigger projects: if somebody doesn't want to be a part of the Afghanistan project, if another doesn't get why we are doing a river clean up, if the whole movement towards radical hospitality is frightening...

... in a body born of grace, time and space must be shared with generosity and patience. There really are no SHOULDs in this model - no bullying or fear-mongering either - just Christ's invitation and the trust that God really is in control. It is like Christ's call to the feast... For most of my life, I have wanted to live into this way of celebrating and honoring authority in the body of Christ, but haven't always let myself trust God fully. Now it really is time to let go so that I live as if God is God.

Context is everything, man...

This morning, before worship, I had an interesting beginning of a conversation about my recent postings re: the Spirit, the Beats and their value. My friend, a bright and very creative soul, said, "I might have to argue with you about the Beats... who really celebrated the culture of narcissism... I mean, how can that be healthy?" Good point, yes?

I wanted to explore, however, the Beat's value in unlocking our culture's fear of the body and their antidote in the politics of ecstasy. I wanted to consider how the early rock and rollers - and jazz artists, too - were the champions of incarnation who helped America and the West break out of our buttoned-down fears and repressions. And, I wanted to note that while many of the Beats and their successors often went crazy with pleasure - or encouraged those who were vulnerable to become crazy by living in a realm without limits - they also opened important doors of perception and possibility, too. NOTE TO SELF: right before the Sunday prelude is NOT the time for such a conversation... so such observation will have to wait for another time.

Robert Pirsig wrote a sequel to ZEN AND THE ART OF MOTORCYCLE MAINTENANCE: An Inquiry into Values called LILA: An Inquiry into Morals and it is every bit as valuable as the best selling book. One insight is particularly important to me in giving the Beats a context - especially for contemporary people of faith. Pirsig observes that prior to WWI, social class and social norms dominated culture; that is to say, Victorian social morality held the world in place and everyone acted accordingly.

+ After the so-called "war to end all wars," however, not only did the role of science come to dominate the intellectual realm, but an acquiescence to the bottom-line values of the marketplace came to drive morality.

+ For some in the generation breaking away from Victorian morality, this was liberating: intellectuals like Bertrand Russell, those of the Harlem Renaissance as well as Sartre, Camus, Freud, Jung, Auden and Tillich advocated a freedom that sought to combing responsibility with creativity and freedom. They were still shaped by the Victorian limits of their youth and thus rarely ventured into dangerous or anarchic behavior. They lived creatively in the age of anxiety and the artists of this generation gave new shape and form to the interior life.

+ Others, however, were either terrified by this new freedom or completely lost in abandon, and sought a return to the safety of the old morality. Fascism is one popular consequence of a world cut free from the confines of a moral social order. Pirsig notes that the Beat/hippie movement was another experiment that tried to find a path that was neither rigidly fearful and fascist nor defined by an immoral, market-drive science. Sadly, it degenerated quickly into little more than a quest for "biological freedom" that was base, selfish and hedonistic. Writer Joan Didion makes this clear in her brilliant and terrifying collection of short stories: The White Album (that uses both the song "Helter Skelter" and its impact on the Manson clan - as well as the entire brilliant selfish core of this Beatles' album - as a metaphor for the collapse of the Beat and hippie experiment.)

What's more, there is so much to say about how all of this plays into a contemporary Christian spirituality, yes? Some, like Athanasius of Alexandria (293-373) argue that NOTHING of the "world" can be embraced by those who follow God's light in Christ for it corrupts; therefore, people of faith can have nothing to do with culture except as formed and created by the Church. Others, like Augustine of Hippo (354-430) seem to side with St. Paul who saw everything that was good, noble, pure and beautiful as coming from God. And so the battle still rages...

My sense is closer to the Augustinian side of this and look for God's still speaking voice in all of culture - no wonder I hear the prophets of Israel in Ginsberg and Kerouac and Dylan and all the rest. Not that they weren't wounded - or flawed - or sometimes full of shit. They were... same goes for me, too. And at the same time, given a BIG context - and LOTS of grace - I still sense the loving voice of the holy within a great deal of their human music - and poetry.

A working day...

Most of today was spent updating and refining our new church website. It isn't perfect and there are still some links to work out, but... I am pretty grateful with the work Michael Durwin did for us. And really happy that this project is almost finished.

Check it out @ www.firstchurchpittsfield.org/

Now for a restful evening - joyful worship tomorrow - and a James Taylor/Carole King show at Tanglewood in the evening. Thanks be to God!

Assorted birthday ramblings...

In a little while, Di and I are heading to south county to listen to some sweet jazz a la Miles Davis in 1950. We will connect with a few friends, get some good eats and red wine and take in the ultra cool weather on this my 58th birthday. It has been a gentle and rest-filled day and I've been thinking about a few assorting thoughts:

+ First, it seems that one of the reasons I have become so captured by the Beat poets of late - and their on-going influence in the music I love - has something to do with the chaos of the contemporary world. More and more I find the ugly and shrill politics of this era not only offensive and mean-spirited, but soul destroying, too. And when I look at the historic alternatives to the status quo, only the counter-cultural spirituality of Jesus and the Beats make sense to me. In the time that remains, I want to be a living part of that alternative to the greed and hatred that embodies joy within the sorrow, peace within the violence, grace within the judgments and faith within the despair.


+ Second, although Allen Ginsberg has been gone for 13 years, his testimony lives on in my heart in ways I would never have imagined. And while sorting through the sludge of some of his poetry is daunting, there are precious nuggets of wisdom and blessing amidst the mire. What's more, both HOWL and KADDISH have only ripened. Like the opening line in his Wikipedia listing says:

Irwin Allen Ginsberg (June 3, 1926 – April 5, 1997) was an American poet who vigorously opposed militarism, materialism and sexual repression. In the 1950s, Ginsberg was a leading figure of the Beat Generation, an anarchic group of young men and women who combined poetry, song, sex, wine and illicit drugs with passionate political ideas that championed personal freedoms... he celebrates his fellow "angelheaded hipsters" and excoriates what he saw as the destructive forces of capitalism and conformity in the United States.

I saw the best minds of my generation destroyed by
madness, starving hysterical naked,
dragging themselves through the negro streets at dawn
looking for an angry fix...

As Timothy Leary says in one of the best documentaries of Ginsberg, this was a man committed to the "politics of ecstasy." To be sure, there were times of stupidity and selfishness in his life, but that is probably true of us all. And when Ginsberg passed, he was still a tender, gentle and compassionate Bodhisattva who made the world a better place for having lived. We could do a whole lot worse...

+ And third, life is too freakin' short for anything but the politics of ecstasy - and I mean that personally, spiritually, professionally and publically. I know this will sound like a broken record, but as America's two wars wind on into even greater tragedy and complexity and the Gulf of Mexico bleeds like an open sore upon the earth, the creative soul of both the Beat poets' laments and celebrations ring true for me.

ps: bummer update - at the very last minute Di got sick - so she's sleeping and feeling like shit while I watch old mysteries and soak up the cool breezes. Like Peter Green said: oh well...
(painting by Jaclyn Stiles @ http://ucsdnews.ucsd.edu/thisweek/2008/01/28_thisweekphotos.asp)

Dylan and the Beats: Part Five

When I started this on-going consideration of the influence of the Beat poets on rock and roll, I had no real idea how deeply they touched the work of Bob Dylan. There was a clear intuitive reaction based upon "Subterranean Homesick Blues" - and Ginsberg's part in the video - but it was always just a hunch. Well, a month later after lots of reflection, study and listening - to say nothing of a week spent hanging out in North Beach - two truths have become clear: Dylan is the heir of the Beat mantle - even in his current incarnation as perpetual troubadour, AND, through him the Beat spirit has taken up residence in almost every serious rock and roll artist since the Beatles embraced the blessings of Dylan.

As I've noted before, this would include artists like Beck and Springsteen as well as the following list (which keeps expanding and would benefit from your suggests, too):

+ Joni Mitchell
+ Nico and Velvet Underground
+ Lou Reed
+ Jefferson Airplane
+ Grateful Dead
+ The Doors
+ Pearls Before Swine
+ Marvin Gaye
+ Paul Simon
+ Gil Scott-Herron
+ Television
+ Voidoids
+ Laurie Anderson
+ REM
+ U2
+ Talking Heads
+ The Clash
+ Natalie Merchant
+ NWA
+ Eminem
+ Tom Waits
+ Patti Smith
+ Bruce Cockburn

What I find true within the music of each of these artists/groups is a deep commitment to the "politics of ecstasy," a poetry that embraces the joys and sorrows of real life, an ability to expose and embrace the wounds of our culture, a comfort with both form and improvisation and an almost organic sense of genre bending. These are not rip-off entrepreneurs, rather they are people who can hear what is part of the common experience of a discrete moment in time and give it shape and form. What's more, they aren't afraid to borrow and blend the sounds/insights of others so that the wisdom not only goes deeper but touches more lives.

From my perspective, Howl is the prototype for all of these artists - and those I can't recall - along with something of Kerouac's On the Road groove, too. And I sense that it was Dylan's insistence upon living into his version of these sensibilities that pushed the Beat aesthetic into the sphere of other artists. From 1963, he was a man on fire:

+ His electric troika - Bringing It All Back Home (a reference to bringing the energy and spirit of rock and roll back to the US after the British invasion), Highway 61 Revisited (a way of reworking the blues of the rural South amidst the industrial revolution and psychedelic poetry) and Blonde on Blonde (whose album cover was going to include Dylan with Ginsberg and Ferlinghetti in the alleyway behind the City Lights Bookstore - now renamed "Jack Kerouac Avenue" - during a meeting dubbed, 'the end of the Beat generation') unlocked Dylan's influence beyond the folk music world and showed other artists how to weave a new creativity into the back beat of rock and roll.

+ He returned to both the Beat aesthetic and the politics of ecstasy after recovering from his motorcycle accident with the Rolling Thunder Revue. This ever-evolving rock and roll/Beat circus on wheels brought together Ginsberg and Sam Shepherd along with Baez, Roger McQuinn and others to live into the joy and social critique of his new music. Both Desire and Blood on the Tracks pick up where the electric troika ended. What's more, the Rolling Thunder tour kicked off their wildness in Plymouth, MA - part of Dylan's NEW 'on the road' commitment - and then headed off to Lowell, MA and Kerouac's graveside.

+ A few years later, Dylan regroups with The Band - the very rockers who propelled his electric visions in 1965 upon the public to the horror and booing of the crowd - only to be treated like a conquering hero in this renewed quest.

There are a few excellent resources for teasing out the further implications of the Dylan/Beat connection and its impact upon the art of rock and roll. My favorites include:

+ Greil Marcus -Invisible Republic: Bob Dylan's Basement Tapes
+ Bob Dylan - Chronicles
+ Down the Highway - Howard Sounes
+ Highway 61 Revisited - Colin Irwin
+ The Rolling Thunder Log Book - Sam Shepard

And don't forget the web resource - Bob Links - at: http://www.boblinks.com/. And so it goes - even the current incarnation keeps the spirit alive - and I am grateful.

From a colleague...

This may be the funniest - and most true - thing I have read about being in ministry in decades. It comes from a colleague - my predecessor in fact - and I cherish his wisdom, humor, clarity and big, big heart. Thank you for sharing this. Please: check it out...

http://richardlfloyd.blogspot.com/2010/07/ten-highly-effective-strategies-for.html