celebrating the slender strands of synchronicity - part two

The American poet, William Stafford of blessed memory, put it like this:

There’s a thread you follow. It goes among

things that change. But it doesn’t change.

People wonder about what you are pursuing.

You have to explain about the thread.

But it is hard for others to see.

While you hold it you can’t get lost.

Tragedies happen; people get hurt

or die; and you suffer and get old.

Nothing you do can stop time’s unfolding.

You don’t ever let go of the thread.

I am not certain when I began to pay attention to that thread; it has long been a point of reference, but I suppose I consciously started to hold on to it while studying Celtic spirituality. Not only did the ancient Celtic monks practice a unique pilgrimage - they would venture out into the world without a fixed destination, rather than head for an established holy destination - but they would wander until they found a place of personal resurrection. That's a unique distinction that squares well with Maritain's commitment to personalism, yes? A traditional pilgrimage is linear: each sojourner chooses their destination in advance, experiences personal insights into the care of their soul along the way, and then celebrates completing the peregrination at the end of the road. Think of the Camino de Santiago to the church dedicated to the brother of Jesus in Spain. Or the various sacred journeys believers make to Lourdes, Chimayo, or Fatima. I've been on one of those treks and value it profoundly.

Christine Valters Paintner writes, however, that a Celtic pilgrimage was quite different. Sometimes seekers would wander without a clear destination, waiting and trusting that the spirit would reveal herself when the pilgrim was ready. Think of St. Columba who left Ireland in a coracle (a small, simple boat) and eventually founded a monastery on the Isle of Iona. Those seekers waited prayerfully for the wind (or the Spirit) to literally carry them to their resurrection center without much control. (Talk about a counter-cultural spirituality!) Other times, given their deep appreciation of spirals, suppliants would walk three times around a tura - a circular space dedicated to contemplation - resembling a labyrinth. Dr. Valters-Paintner writes:

These Celts had a deep understanding that walking embodies prayer, and walking in a circle has a way of moving our brains out of their desired linear course. When we are discerning our direction in life, we often want the next best step to appear, if not the entire path clearly ahead. But discernment in this tradition is more like a spiraling inward and a deep attentiveness to what is happening in the moment.

She adds that walking these turas was a multifaceted spiritual practice:

Walking helps to slow us down. The poet Wallace Stevens once said “the truth depends upon a walk around the lake.” We allow ourselves to arrive fully in a sacred place, both body and soul, and ask permission to be there and receive the gifts offered. Walking in a circular manner helps to move us out of linear ways of thinking. It allows us to rest into the spiral nature of time and see things from a new perspective. Pilgrimage is never a straight, step-by-step journey, but one of continual unfolding and listening to wisdom arising from dreams and nature. Walking helps us to bless the earth with our feet, so that our whole being becomes a prayer. Instead of walking to “get somewhere” as we might when journeying to a particular place, walking the rounds invites us to continue journeying in place. https://godspacelight.com/pilgrimage-and-walking-the-rounds-by-christine-valters-paintner/

The mystical and serendipitous nature of the Celtic pilgrimage appeals to me and offers a corrective to my illusions of and inclinations toward control. How did St. Paul put it? "Let it be, let it be, let it be, yeah, let it be: whisper words of wisdom, let it be." During our current wanderings this week, yet another slender strand of synchronicity was revealed in the words of Barbara Brown Taylor. Her most recent Substack column describes how once the words of traditional theology opened insights into the meaning of life for her. Esoterica like theophany and eschatology carried her into college, seminary, advanced studies, and in time, the Episcopal priesthood. Incrementally, though, these same sacred words of illumination soon became unsatisfying. They were disembodied - abstract - and she was yearning for incarnation through a life of connection and belonging.

In books and concepts, I not only found names for holy mysteries I had never been able to name before; I also experienced the kind of ecstasy others talked about finding in worship and prayer. The medium of this encounter was the written word. The experience was being known by writers I had never met. The ecstasy came in the process of yielding to minds greater than mine that had no desire to dominate me. They didn’t point me at anything; they pointed me beyond. From them I learned that the yearning to know God might be as close as I ever got, and it was plenty These writers had such an effect on me that I decided to make my living with words as well—some spoken, some written, all in the service of beyond—which was how I learned the difference between words that have bodies and words that do not. Take a look (at what I have just written above) and you may notice there is not a single word in it that has a color, temperature, taste, or smell. This was not on purpose; it just happens when I am thinking theologically. You may have added some bodily details to “ecstasy” or “dominate” based on your own experience, but I didn’t put them there. You did. When I started noticing this, I decided to put more trust in words made flesh.

https://barbarabrowntaylor.substack.com/p/words-made-flesh?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=3382211&post_id=163430122&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&token=eyJ1c2VyX2lkIjo3MTcxMDc5LCJwb3N0X2lkIjoxNjM0MzAxMjIsImlhdCI6MTc0NzE0MTI4NSwiZXhwIjoxNzQ5NzMzMjg1LCJpc3MiOiJwdWItMzM4MjIxMSIsInN1YiI6InBvc3QtcmVhY3Rpb24ifQ.EASwNNFZfmqiZ8G2ocpBXbRcvLnkm0whs6FHDblTm2k&r=49p8n&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email

Like Taylor, Brooks, Martian, the Pope (old and new), those writing from a spiritual but not religious perspective, feminist authors, hundreds of musicians, and their countless popular songs, I, too, began to see that while human angst, confusion, and inner fury are a part of the human condition, they aren't the whole story. It's clear that some of us have been blinded by our culture's obsession with unbridled individualism. Others have endured the starvation of their souls in societies built upon a one-size-fits-all bureaucratic collectivism. Some have been wounded by religion, others have been kept ignorant of or afraid of its blessings, and still others who found their hearts, minds, and flesh set free by the promises of faith. Small wonder that brother Brooks believes that perhaps NOW is the time for a Maritain revival

The first responsibility of personalism is to see each other person in his or
her full depth. This is astonishingly hard to do. As we go through our busy days, it’s normal to want to establish I-It relationships — with the security guard in your building or the office worker down the hall. Life is busy, and sometimes we just need to reduce people to their superficial function." But personalism asks, as much as possible, for I-Thou encounters: that you just don’t regard people as a data point, but as emerging out of the full narrative, and that you try, when you can, to get to know their stories, or at least to realize that everybody is in a struggle you know nothing about.

Jazz critic extraordinaire and public intellectual, Ted Goia, also brings something to the table of synchronicity in his recent explication of the "new romanticism" that is rumbling just below the surface of popular culture. As one often labeled "a total downer," Goia replies that he's more of a truth teller in a culture of denial. He is savvy, sassy, and seriously attuned to the wisdom beyond the obvious in popular culture. (check out his Substack column @ The Honest Broker.) Take a careful look at this reflection on the emerging rebellion against life ruled by algorithms In the 1800s, cultural elites assumed that technology, science, the pursuit of profits, and linear reason would unlock an earthly paradise. 

As that century dawned, the creative class (as we would call it today) increasingly attacked rationalist currents that had somehow morphed into violent, intrusive forces in their lives—an 180 degree shift in the culture. For Blake and others, the name Newton became a term of abuse. Artists, especially poets and musicians, took the lead in this revolt. They celebrated human feeling and emotional attachments — embracing them as more trustworthy, more flexible, more desirable than technology, profits, and cold calculation. The new paradigm shocked Europe when it started to spread. Cultural elites had just assumed that science and reason would control everything in the future. But that wasn’t how it played out. Resemblances with the current moment are not hard to see.

“Imagine a growing sense that algorithmic and mechanistic thinking has become too oppressive. Imagine if people started resisting technology. Imagine a revolt against STEM’s dominance. Imagine people deciding that the good life starts with NOT learning how to code.”

This rings true to me personally, professionally, and politically. It seems to be true on the edges of culture, too. Goia observes that stepping back from the overly optimistic promises of rationalism includes relinquishing our " aesthetics of light" for an "aesthetics of dark." More mysticism than map-making. More trusting the slender strands of synchronicity than the propaganda of Meta and X. He writes:
"When rationalistic and algorithmic tyranny grows too extreme, art returns to the darkness of the unconscious life—and perhaps of the womb." His closing insights speak to my heart as this personal pilgrimage ripens:

Beethoven turned against Napoleon—and this is emblematic of the aesthetic reversal sweeping through Europe (during the first age of romanticism). Not long ago, Beethoven and other artists looked to French rationalism as a harbinger of a new age of freedom and individual flourishing. But this entire progress-obsessed ideology is unraveling. It’s somehow fitting that music takes the lead role in deconstructing a tyrannical rationalism, and proposing a more human alternative.

Could that happen again? Imagine a growing sense that algorithmic and mechanistic thinking has become too oppressive. Imagine if people started resisting technology as a malicious form of control, and not a pathway to liberation, empowerment, and human flourishing—soul-nurturing riches that must come from someplace deeper. Imagine a revolt against STEM’s dominance and dictatorship over all other fields? Imagine people deciding that the good life starts with NOT learning how to code. If that happened now, wouldn’t music stand out as the pathway? What could possibly be more opposed to brutal rationalism running out of control than a song?

https://www.honest-broker.com/p/notes-toward-a-new-romanticism

All of which leads me back to "The Power of Love." I am not suggesting this is the ONLY song that covertly challenges the status quo, but it is one we need to hear again. So, too, the gentle masculine harmonies of Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young. The lyrical wisdom of Joni Mitchell. The way our band, Wednesday's Child, deconstructs old songs like "Runnin' on Empty" or "Paint It Black" to reveal the deeper lament that is aching for expression. This music is tender. Uncluttered. It makes room for improvisation alongside well-rehearsed and complicated vocal harmonies. It is genre-bending rather than squeezed into the confines of "auto-tune." And it celebrates the beautiful particularities of life that tremble with holy wisdom for those with eyes to see and ears to hear. Josh Ritter captures this new romanticism affectionately. Michelle Ndegeocello, too. Brooks closes his essay on personalism with prescient words of caution and promise that speak to me of the music I'm committed to sharing: music that is participatory, music that honors our feelings, music that is saturated in darkness but unafraid of the light, music that celebrates beauty over ideology, and creativity as a key to blessing.

Personalism is all about availability: to be open for this kind of giving and friendship. This is a tough one, too; life is busy, and being available for people takes time and intentionality. Margarita Mooney of Princeton Theological Seminary has written that personalism is a middle way between authoritarian collectivism and radical individualism. The former subsumes the individual within the collective. The latter uses the group to serve the interests of the self. Personalism demands that we change the way we structure our institutions. A company that treats people as units to simply maximize shareholder return is showing contempt for its own workers. Schools that treat students as brains on a stick are not preparing them to lead whole lives. The big point is that today’s social fragmentation didn’t spring from shallow roots. It sprang from worldviews that amputated people from their own depths and divided them into simplistic, flattened identities. That has to change. As Charles Péguy said, “The revolution is moral or not at all.

celebrating the slender strands of synchronicity: part one

As our anniversary vacation/retreat ripens on the shore of Lake Gardner, and Brother Sun has rejoined us for another day of beauty and warmth, a few seemingly random - but most likely related - thoughts keep swimming through my consciousness. These quiet and tender connections - the slender stands of synchronicity, as spiritual director, Christine Valters Paintner says - are neither random nor foreordained. Rather, they are mystical reminders of creation's heart and soul. When observed and honored, synchronicities can bring clarity to our quest for meaning. They can instruct us gently in the sacramental wisdom that saturates all of creation and reminds us that there is a love at work in life that is greater than the obvious chaos of this present darkness. One wisdom-keeper at Being Benedictine writes:

I think of synchronicities as connections seen with the inner eye. They are holy coincidences. Both mysterious and meaningful, these holy surprises open our eyes in new ways. The voice of synchronicity encourages us to be aware, to look and listen deeply... There are so many invisible forces and connections weaving a web that holds us in its grace. The more we look, the more we see. It is only with eyes open to wonder, holy surprises, and synchronicity that we experience the humbling and awesome fall to our knees. There we are uplifted by invisible forces and surrounded by angels who “walk among us in seen and unseen forms.” In these moments, we see new pathways and possibilities. I agree with Brian McLaren who said “The closest thing to God is when we say WOW!” Holding tight to this knowing sustains us when our faith is not as strong or challenges present themselves. 

living from the heart...

Yesterday was saturated in paradox. That's true daily, but I was more keenly aware as Saturday ripened. First, it was cold, grey, and wet. Buckets and buckets of rain poured down upon our small retreat house, so we hunkered down in front of the fireplace and took it slow. Second, despite the outward serenity, my insides hurt: from out of nowhere (or so it seems to me), I had a painful flare-up of diverticulitis. Not the end of the world, and certainly not the worst pain I could experience, but it still hurt. Third, a beloved old friend died. We'd started emailing about a year ago, and two months ago she told me she had an incurable, fatal disease. We made a point to spend some time on the phone earlier this month - and then her oldest daughter reached out to let me mom had crossed over the day before Mother's Day. I rejoiced that for Bettye, all pain and suffering were over, even as I grieved her precious family's loss. We had spent lots of time together at my first church in Saginaw, MI - even travelling to the former Soviet Union with our youth group as part of a people-to-people peace brigade. And then, one of the men I am doing spiritual direction with checked in to let me know his dad was likely close to death now, too.

One of the blessings of pastoral ministry is being connected with others in love. Not co-dependent, but blessed by the ties that bind. I can compartmentalize with the best of them, but sharing the ups and downs of real life always cuts deep for me. I still weep in sadness and celebration whenever I sing verse three of the new/old hymn: Won't You Let Me Be Your Servant? My experience of ministry might best be summarized as:

I will weep when you are weeping, when you laugh, I'll laugh with you;
I will share your joys and sorrows till we've seen this journey through.

This type of ministry is not bound by political ideology or activism of one type or another - and that's why I love it so. My mentor in pastoral ministry, the Rev. Dr. Ray Swartzback, used to tell me that before people are willing to make a change in their lives, they must trust you - and trust is not portable. Every new person and context requires not only showing up with compassion and attention, but also choosing to walk together in solidarity without judgment. Phoning it in is NOT how true ministry takes place. And my experience over 40+ years is that Swartzy was right. Despite my own discomfort yesterday, and the many miles separating us all, we found a way to stay connected, trusting that as human beings we have more in common than we realize. As that same hymn adds:

We are pilgrims on a journey, we are travelers on the road;

We are here to help each other, walk the mile and bear the load.

I will hold the Christ light for you in the nighttime of your fear;

I will hold my hand out to you, speak the peace you long to hear.

Today, the sun is shining on the glorious little lake in front of us. My discomfort is slowly abating. A new Pope shares the promise of solidarity with the world even as he struggles to make peace with his own unique blessings and blind spots. Sorrow shall return, of course. So, too, injustice and fear. I like the way Fr. Richard Rohr puts it:

In our ugly and injurious present political climate, it’s become all too easy to justify fear-filled and hateful thoughts, words, and actions, often in defense against the “other” side. True spiritual action (as opposed to reaction) demands our own ongoing transformation and a voluntary “exile,” choosing to be where the pain is, as Jesus exemplified in his great self-emptying. You and I are placed in this world of hatred, violence, anger, injustice, and oppression to help God transform it, transfigure it, and change it so that there will be compassion, laughter, joy, peace, reconciliation, fellowship, friendship, togetherness, and family. We are here to bring others out of exile.

darkness, light, dancing, mourning, and all the rest...

One of the blessings I reclaim whenever Di and I can take an extended break is the generosity of God's grace. It saturates Mother Earth and fills the hearts and minds of many with awe and gratitude. Sitting in the calming silence and solitude of our current retreat house on the banks of Lake Gardner, the waves gently lap the shore and refresh my soul with hints of Eden. Hiking along the rugged banks of the North Atlantic coastline as the sun breaks through the fog and waves crash against the stones on shore is restorative in a whole other way. There is peace as well as wild energy. Serenity alongside exuberance, too. As I often muse: there really IS a time a time and a season for every purpose 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 silent and a time to speak; a time to love and a time to hate; a time for war and a time for peace. (Ecclesiastes 3)

This passage of Scripture is an old and time-tested friend. It keeps me grounded in the sacred paradox of the holy where celebration and sorrow embrace. I hear the wisdom of Barbara Brown Taylor chanting in my heart:

Here is the testimony of faith: darkness is not dark to God; the night is as bright as the day... I have learned things in the dark that I could never have learned in the light, things that have saved my life over and over again, so that there is really only one logical conclusion. I need darkness as much as I need light.

Being here reminds me that a healthy and holy life involves striking a balance between the light and the dark, the challenges and the comforts, the songs and the silence, as well as the fullness of community and the emptiness of the desert. In the short time that we've been away from home, the lake house has been shrouded in an impenetrable fog and two days later slathered in sunlight. It helps me honor the quest for balance by feeling the depth and breadth of grace. It's all too easy for me to slip into the semi-consciousness of routine. And while stability has its place, walking into the cold, wet mist before arriving on a massive rock by the ocean that's been baking all day in sunlight is an encounter with incarnation. It's a vibrant and embodied prayer that bathes my flesh in the words of faith. I hear the soft voice of Cynthia Bourgeault say:

Find the place where your feet know how to walk and follow your own trail home. The way to your heart begins with your feet on the ground, quietly but intensely present... (this is prelude to the promise of meditation that) rests on the wager that if you can simply break the tyranny of your ordinary awareness, the rest will begin to unfold itself. At first when you begin a practice of meditation, it feels like a place you go to. You may think of it as “my inner sanctuary” or “my place apart with God.” But as the practice becomes more and more established in you so that this inner sanctuary begins to flow out into your life, it becomes more and more a place you come from.

Such sacred solidarity feels woefully absent in popular culture right now. And yet even the cruelties of this era hold an invitation: become grounded in the totality of grace that offers us food for the journey, whether that's loving another being or resisting the repression, kleptocracy, and fear of this present darkness. Living into the grief as well as the joy of this season is an act of cultivating humility, too. It preserves a measure of our sanity as we dance lightly each day without ever knowing what's coming next. I think of the late Elie Wiesel's NY Times op ed for Yom Kippur. After restating his anguish and anger over the apparent absence of the Sacred during the Holocaust - including subsequent decades of grief and despair - Wiesel sings to the Lord (in my paraphrase): ok, I still don't get it - and I am still furious and heartbroken - but what else can I do in this madness except... dance. His final novel, A Mad Desire to Dance, presents this holistic paradox where dance is a "a metaphor for our yearning for joy, connection, and a sense of normalcy in the face of overwhelming despair." Or as Zorba says so simply at the close of the movie: "Dance? Did you say dance, my boy?" During this "down" time, I am reacquainting myself with a prayer book crafted by Fr. Ed Hays: Prayers for the Domestic Church. I was drawn to this one this morning: 

Blessed are You, Lord our God, for you have created a wide and wonderful world in which we can travel We ask Your blessing upon us as we leave for our journey. Be our ever-near companion, O Holy Guide of Travelers, and spread the road before us with beauty and adventure.

May all the highways ahead of us be free of hard and evil. May we be accompanied by Your holy spirits, Your angelic messengers, as were the holy ones of days past. On this trip may we take with us as part of our traveling equipment a heart wrapped in wonder with which to rejoice in all that we shall meet.

Along with the clothing of wonder, may we have room in our luggage for a mystic map by which we can find the invisible meanings of the events of this journey - of possible disappointments and delays, of possible breakdowns and rainy day troubles. Always awake to Your Sacred Presence and to Your divine compassionate love, may we see in all that happens to us, in the beautiful and the bad, the mystery of Your holy plan.

May the blessings of Your name - Creator, Christ, and Holy Spirit - be upon us throughout this trip and bring us home again in safety and peace. Amen.

domestic terrorism and the wisdom of the cross

Well, the absurd cruelties of the current regime are starting to hit home for me personally. Since the election, I've been emotionally and spiritually circumspect about what this cadre will actually accomplish. Not detached or distant, mind you, just cautiously patient before jumping to conclusions given the President's rapidly changing mind and often haphazard engagement with reality. I believe any critique or challenge to the administration must avoid the lies and slander so popular these days. Facts are vital even when they're ignored. So, I've looked to the ups and downs of the first term for one set of clues about what might be coming our way; so, too, with the ugly rhetoric of the 2024 campaign and the weirdly theocratic authoritarian white paper crafted by the Heritage Foundation. 

After one hundred days in office, however, three new factors are currently in play. First, "flooding the zone" with Executive Orders has become a highly effective strategy for confounding and confusing the loyal opposition. It keeps serious critics from focusing on what matters most while distracting and infuriating more casual opponents with sensory overload. Second, articulating a populist agenda in public creatively throws the Republican base the illusion of raw meat without ever having to deliver an authentic egalitarian agenda. Consequently, 47's leadership team of conservative elitists, obsessed with a harsh libertarian ideology, remains relatively free to wreak havoc on the common good while flying under the radar of serious review. (see David Brooks @ https://www.nytimes.com/ 2025/ 02/13/ opinion/trump-populism-elites.html ) And, third, by repeatedly ignoring both the rule of law and due process, an intentional reign of domestic terrorism against its own citizens has come to pass under the guise of law and order. It is as if 1984 embraced A Brave New World while singing "God Bless America!"

+ Consider the wildly incompetent cabinet appointments of reality TV personalities who distract us from the true ideologues like Stephen Millier and Todd Lyons. Or the ramping up of ICE raids, the economic absurdity of tariffs, the Mussolini-like public posturing of the pouting President, or the pardoning of the home-grown traitors of January 6th. 

+ Don't forget the war on foreign aid, the abduction, incarceration, and deportation of innocent people, the demonization of trans sisters and brothers, the overt disdain and ignorance this administration has for the US Constitution, or the rabid loyalty of apparatchiks who know nothing about democratic governance and everything about serving the whims of their boss.

+ Then there's the corruption and weaponization of the Department of Justice, the renewed rape of Mother Nature by the fossil fuel industry, the rejection of our historic foreign allies in favor of cozying up to international thugs and dictators, the polarizing rhetoric and willful demolition of civil society by the unelected, unschooled, and woefully uninformed billionaire, Elon Musk, who believes empathy is sinful, to say nothing of the relentless, self-righteousness of the propaganda and lies spewed ad nauseum every day by the White House press secretary.  

For the past six months, I have operated from a commitment of solidarity - what hurts one, wounds us all - knowing full well that one day those closest to me would fall victim to this present darkness. I knew it was coming. It was only a matter of time for social decay always gets worse before it gets better. Already, my children were facing the uncertainties of what tearing down governmental resources might mean for their work as educators. Former youth group members around the world were furloughed or fired from sharing food or healing with the most vulnerable members of the human family. And a growing number of friends were quoting the prescient wisdom of Pastor Neimöller's confession during the Third Reich: 

First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a socialist. Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a trade unionist. Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—because I was not a Jew. Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.

Yesterday, it all became personal when friends from Canada chose to avoid a trip to the US for fear of being harassed, detained, or disappeared at the US border. Dianne and I chose not to celebrate our 30th anniversary in Canada for much the same reasons. And members of my spiritual community in Iona, Scotland, pulled the plug on a long-planned retreat for US/Canadian members because safety could no longer be assured. Notice that these were "voluntary" cancellations. Self deportation based on personal choice, if you will, where no one was forced to do so.. And that is the insidious danger of domestic, government-sponsored terrorism: it compels us to make fear-based choices that incrementally shut down our contact with the wider world. ICE agents are already bullying their way around our small New England communities in masks, body armor, and drawn automatic weapons. Fear is palpable as dread and anxiety become normative - and that is what the regime wants. Not only will a few undocumented people be taken into cusstody - a well-orchestrated sideshow to keep the base happy - but the wider civilian population will withdraw from community and retreat into silence.

Please understand that I know my sorrow and trepidation is modest in comparison to my nation's most vulnerable. I have no illusions about that. Social scientists used to speak about the "relative deprivation quotient," and clearly mine is low. But that doesn't negate the regime's campaign of domestic terrorism. I don't think it's hyperbolic to say life will get much, much worse here before it gets better. And while I live by faith in the resurrection - and know that most of life goes on well beyond politics - the goal of shock and awe is to shut down dissent, make havoc the new normal, and publicize the pain that awaits those who call attention to injustice. 

This is one of the many truths revealed in the Cross. Rene Girard has noted that Jesus shows the world what happens when institutions seek to quell dissent and purchase social cohesion through violence. Jesus offered up his life to show us what happens to the scapegoat, not the victor. When we manufacture a common enemy to destroy, the vilified scapegoat temporarily unites a society. This shared enemy from outside the majority sets in motion a sense of solidarity that keeps us from looking inward. Think 9/11. The illusion of unity, however, always wears off. When injustice, oppression, or unrest return, power brokers must find a new scapegoat in a vicious cycle. Currently, this is playing out through the carefully orchestrated ICE raids that show the wider population the anguish, fear, and pain of our most vulnerable neighbors. Our leaders know already that their abduction will not significantly change immigration realities - and that's not their point. These raids have been symbolically crafted to show the vast majority what might happen to us if we, too, oppose their agenda. The fear, pain, and distress of those taken into custody is being marketed 24/7 to make certain that WE understand that what is happening to the most marginal among us could very easily become our destiny, too. Better to shut up, keep our heads down, self-censor, and even self-deport! 

Government-sponsored domestic terrorism makes a few examples for the many. It temporarily holds the majority together through fear and confusion, and it always fails to bring true healing to a broken society. The prophets of ancient Israel used to lament: how long, Lord, how long? That's obviously beyond our pay grade. All we can know now is that jailing and killing the messengers of peace and justice never wins. I hold fast to the promises of God - and just to keep me on tract found this prayer last night before heading to bed:

Lord, Divine Keeper of All time, 

   The hours of this day that remain are few; night is upon me.

Touch my memory and make me aware of today's gifts. (silent reflection.)

The redemption of the world, the removal of injustice and the spread of unity among all peoples is beyond my limited abilities. So, help me examine how I have failed to redeem that small part of the world that did touch my life today. (silent reflection)

Beloved, I rejoice in your mystic presence in ten thousand ways.

   You have been present in the ordinary events of this day.

You have waited, in patience, in those persons and times in which

I have failed to be aware of your divine presence.

Tomorrow, Lord, help me to see more and I shall be open-eyed so as not to miss you. You know all my needs, but I am mindful of my poverty and therefore lift up to you the needs that are in my heart tonight. (silent reflection)

I lift up into you sacred heart, all those who at the end of this day are without shelter or food. Be with them and with all the earth this night.

May I sleep in peace and awaken to life.

O Lord of Day and Night, of Life and Death,

   I place myself into your Holy Hands. Amen.

to every thing there is a season...

Interestingly, I haven't posted here since before Christmas! Blogging was once an essential spiritual practice for me - a venue to think and rethink my questions of faith and ministry - but now it's become an afterthought. My hunch is that this has evolved because:

Since my sabbatical in Montreal, I've experienced a dramatic shift in how I think about and do ministry. Having come of age in the '60s; been conscientized by the public theology of Dr. MLK, and the insights and critiques of the feminist movement of the 70s; studied carefully the progenitors of liberation theology in the 80s; and engaged in urban social justice activism as an elected official in the 90s: I used to believe that it was essential for people of faith to challenge the status quo when it was oppressive. This is still a part of the equations for me - and our current context offers a ton of ways to do this. What has changed, however, is the realization that the old affirmation, you can't give what you ain't got, is true! In other words, because I wasn't clear about the necessity of both the inward and the outward journeys of faith, I tended towards either/or analysis rather than the liberating blessings of dancing with paradox.

It wasn't until I completely melted down in the 00s that the sacred link between resting into God's grace, trusting silence more than words, and sharing compassion in acts of social justice was made. The 12 Step movement and L'Arche insisted that "if you always do what you've always done, you'll always get what you've always got," but as my AA told me: I'm just too smart for my own good. Deep within, I believed that I could think my way out of hell rather than learn strategies to make it through. Stepping away as a "civilian" gave me some clues as to how to integrate the way of the heart with the way of the gentle warrior. But it took leaving formal ministry for a few years for this new awareness to bear fruit. The first few years of retirement gave me permission to garden, walk quietly with Mother Nature, savor being a grampa and friend. During this quiet hiatus, I learned a little more about the unforced rhythms of grace from our wacky dog Lucie and went deeper into Celtic spirituality. 

Without belaboring ALL the details, it took stepping away before the Spirit renewed my sense of calling to formal ministry. To everything there truly IS a season: once I was called into the fold, then I was called out only to be surprised by grace when I was invited back after the pandemic. The big difference was that my focus now was NOT (and is not) about advocating for faith-based community organizing, but rather assisting individuals and congregations to cultivate a vibrant inner life as the foundation to any social engagement. St. Paul put it like this in I Corinthians 13:.

If I speak in the tongues of humans and of angels but do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers and understand all mysteries and all knowledge and if I have all faith so as to remove mountains but do not have love, I am nothing. If I give away all my possessions and if I hand over my body so that I may boast but do not have love, I gain nothing.

Fr. Richard Rohr rang true when he wrote the following about the social justice agenda of Jesus.

Jesus does not directly attack the religious and institutional sin systems of his time until his final action against the money changers in the temple (see Matthew 21:12–13; Mark 11:15–17; Luke 19:45–46). Because of this, Jesus’ primary social justice critique and action are often a disappointment to most radicals and social activists. Jesus’ social program, as far as I can see, is a quiet refusal to participate in almost all external power structures or domination systems. His primary action is a very simple lifestyle, which kept him from being constantly co-opted by those very structures, which I (and Paul) would call the “sin system.” Jesus seems to have avoided the monetary system as much as possible by using “a common purse” (John 12:6; 13:29). His three-year ministry, in effect, offers free healing and healthcare for any who want them. He consistently treats women with a dignity and equality that is almost unknown in an entirely patriarchal culture. At the end of his life, he surrenders to the punitive systems of both empire and religion by letting them judge, torture, and murder him. He is finally a full victim of the systems that he refused to worship.

Jesus knew the destructive power of what Walter Wink wisely called the “domination system.” [2] These systems usually wield power over the poor, the defenseless, and the outsider in every culture. When he does take on the temple system directly (Mark 11:15–18), Jesus is killed within a week. Contrary to history’s interpretation of Jesus’ practice, he did not concentrate on personal, “flesh” sins nearly as much as the sins of “the world” and “the devil,” but few of us were taught to see him that way. In fact, Jesus is always forgiving individual sinners, which was a problem for the righteous from the beginning (Luke 7:34). In contrast, I do not once see him “forgiving” the sins of systems and empires. Instead, he just makes them show themselves (Mark 5:8) and name themselves (Mark 5:9)—as did Desmond Tutu in South Africa and Martin Luther King, Jr. in America.

Significantly, Jesus says “Woe to you, Chorazin! Woe to you, Bethsaida!” (Matthew 11:21) and “Alas for you [cultures of the] lawyers, scribes, and Pharisees” (most of Matthew 23 and Luke 11:37‒54). He didn’t warn Bill from Bethsaida, Cathy from Chorazin, or Simon the Pharisee, with whom he engages and eats (Luke 7:36–47). He laments over “Jerusalem, Jerusalem” (Luke 13:34‒35) instead of attacking Jerry from Jerusalem. Today we would call that making an “unfair generalization”; but if what I am saying here has any truth to it, maybe it is a much more truthful and fair diagnosis of the problem. It is Bethsaida and Jerusalem that should fear judgment more than Bill and Jerry! It is “Capernaum” that is to be cast into hell (Matthew 11:23), not necessarily Corey from Capernaum. How did we miss that? It is crucial in our understanding of evil as being, first of all, a social agreement.

My somewhat stumbling attempt to articulate this shift has incrementally taken shape and form in a song I've been working on throughout this metamorphosis:

Thinking big and acting strong – led me into all that’s wrong
Hitting bottom taught me well – strategies to get through hell
Touch the wound in front of you, that’s all you can really do
Keep it close, don’t turn away, make room for what’s real today

SMALL IS ME, SMALL IS YOU, SMALL IS HOLY AND RINGS TRUE
SMALL IS HARD, SMALL REVEALS THE WAY OUR HEARTS CAN BE HEALED

Blame is such a viscous deal, wastes your time and never heals
Pay it forward’s more the way, grace trumps karma every day
Live the questions, wait your turn, take a deep breath, try to learn
Losing is one way to win what once has died might live again (chorus)

Wisdom’s blessing’s upside down - something’s lost when something’s found
Each day brings us something good: carry water, chop the wood

When my life bewilders me – it's time to listen silently
Don’t say too much, don’t push too hard - what helps the most’s in your backyard
Let it lead your soul to rest just like a child on momma’s breast
The arc of love is slow but true and waiting to come home to you (chorus)

So now it's on to an extended retreat of wandering favorite places, visiting bookstores and coffee shops before heading into the rugged beauty of the forest and the ocean. Once we're out in the woods, beyond the hiking and rest, I need to reclaim the prayer rhythms found in Prayers for the Domestic Church by Fr. Ed Hay, the insights of Robin Wall Kimmer's new book, and what New England gardeners have learned about the best way to grow pumpkins!

a blue december offering: sunday, december 22 @ 3 pm

This coming Sunday, 12/22, we reprise our Blue December presentation at Richmond Congregational Church, (515 State Rd, Richmond, MA 01254) at 3:00 pm. Here is a set list with songs and poems:

CENTERING
Only a River/” Kindness” – Naomi Shihab Nye/River
Welcome and Sanctuary
In the Bleak Midwinter/Paint It Black
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REFLECTING
“Peace of Wild Things” – Wendell Berry
Can’t Find My Way Home
Runnin’ on Empty
Missing/Angel
Find the Cost of Freedom/Hold On
Teach Your Children
The Stars Shine in the Sky Tonight
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CANDLELIGHTING
“Darkness” – Jan Richardson/Thinking About You/Prayers and Candles
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RETURNING
Helplessly Hoping
“Last Night I Dreamed” – Auroa Levins Morales
Joy to You, Baby
Wednesday’s Child

The six members of Wednesday's Child are time-tested friends and artistic partners who have been making music together on and off for 17 years. Individually, we have performed professionally throughout New England in a variety of jazz, rock, and folk ensembles. Our shared roots go back to the culture-care ministries of First Church of Christ, Congregational in Pittsfield, MA. Like America itself, we hail from different religious traditions – Congregational, Roman Catholic, Methodist, Baptist, Pentecostal and Episcopal – and we share a commitment to simple acts of compassion in the spirit of sacred and radical hospitality. Our music expresses solidarity by raising funds for local eco-justice projects, regional hunger centers, refugee resettlement, and the quest for common ground. We stand in opposition to hatred. We have hosted concerts celebrating the 50th anniversary of “A Love Supreme” by John Coltrane as well as Paul Winter’s “Missa Gaia,” too.

It is our conviction that beauty invites us into a shared vulnerability that can evoke awe as well as gratitude. The late Leonard Bernstein used to say: “This will be our reply to violence: to make music more intensely, more beautifully, more devotedly than ever before.” This winter we have assembled a meditative gathering based upon the music of Josh Ritter, Joni Mitchell, Carrie Newcomer, Jackson Browne, Sarah McLachlan, Tom Waits, the Eels, the Stones, and the Grateful Dead - as well as the poetry of Naomi Shihab Nye, Wendell Berry, and Jan Richardson – as a tender reprieve from the brutal banality of the blues some of us experience during the so-called “most wonderful time of the year.” There will be song and silence, poetry, and candle lighting, with a few inter-faith seasonal prayers.

For more information, contact The Reverend Dr. James Lumsden

ripening with perspective and contentment...

An extensive study published in the New England Journal of Medicine notes that a person living in the USA experiences his/her/their greatest productivity "between the ages of 60-70... with the second most productive stage of our humanity being those between 70 to 80 years of age." The study added that the third most productive stage is from 50 to 60 years of age. (SOURCE: N.Engl.J .Med. 70,389 (2018) Dare I say that, at least in my case, this rings true? 

I know that the United States is riddled with addiction, alienation, and anxiety. We
are a nation almost equally divided along what appear to be hard ideological political lines; the recent national election offers a clear picture with Ms. Harris securing 48.3% of the popular vote while Mr. Trump garnered 49.8% - a mere 1.5% difference. Claims of a mandate pale when viewed through the lens of hard fact but still authenticate our divisions. Add into our sociological stew the ever morphing but always dehumanizing experiences with racism, sexism, gender wars, and class struggle and the locus of our productivity becomes a murky, complex and challenging reality. And yet despite all of this, it would seem that as we ripen into what was once euphemistically called our "golden years," most experience greater creativity in our public lives and perhaps more inward contentment, too. Journalist Barbara Gonzalez-Ventura summarized the science behind the research in an article noting that:

The director of the George Washington University College of Medicine argues that the brain of an elderly person is much more plastic than is commonly believed. At this age, the interaction of the right and left hemispheres of the brain becomes harmonious, which expands our creative possibilities. That is why among people over 60 you can find many personalities who have just started their creative activities. Of course, the brain is no longer as fast as it was in youth. However, it wins in flexibility. That is why, with age, we are more likely to make the right decisions and are less exposed to negative emotions. The peak of human intellectual activity occurs at about 70 years old, when the brain begins to work at full strength. Over time, the amount of myelin, a substance that facilitates the rapid passage of signals between neurons in the brain, increases. Due to this, intellectual abilities are increased by 300 percent compared to the average. (https://philstarlife.com/self/610935-60-80-old-age?page=3)

There's no reason to believe that my experience is normative; that is to say, I am a white, male, metro-sexual intellectual with too much formal education. I tend toward spiritual contemplation, the arts, and solitude. I read voraciously and am highly selective about the cable television I consume and music I enjoy. I regularly practice or perform music at least three nights a week, am happily married with children and grandchildren, and share life with an old, special needs dog. I am too sedentary but still modestly healthy. We live in a small city, in a modest home with property abutting an expansive wetlands. 

In my early 60's, after engaging in 30+ years of satisfying Christian ministry as well as various musical ensembles, I sensed a call away from doing ministry during a sabbatical. By the time I was 66, I'd fully retired and cherished my new, stress free existence. In retirement, I was free to connect more deeply with my friends at L'Arche Ottawa, play music throughout the region with an old high school buddy, and be a doting grandpa. The pandemic brought our public music-making to a close. Family health issues made it more and more complicated to spend extended time away in Canada, And my online spiritual direction practice began to thrive (in a very modest manner.) 

As covid came to a close, I was invited to re-enter parish ministry for five months as a "bridge" pastor and, surprisingly, I loved it. This led to additional training and now I am serving a congregation as their 3/4 time interim pastor. This, too, has been joy upon joy leading me to personally affirm what the New England Journal of Medicine reported: my 60's and now 70's have been chock full of creativity, productivity, and a renewed commitment to ministry. More and more musical possibilities are coming to life these days as well. 

Science suggests that "after 60 years, a person can use both hemispheres (of the brain) at the same time... allowing us to solve much more complex problems." 

Features of the brain of an elderly person

1. The neurons of the brain do not die off, as everyone around them says. Connections between them simply disappear if a person does not engage in mental work.
2. Absent-mindedness and forgetfulness appear due to an overabundance of information. Therefore, you do not need to focus your whole life on unnecessary trifles.
3. Beginning at the age of 60, a person, when making decisions, uses not one hemisphere like young people, but both hemispheres at the same time.

4. Conclusion: For a person who leads a healthy lifestyle, moves, has feasible physical activity and has full mental activity, intellectual abilities DO NOT decrease with age, but only GROW, reaching a peak by the age of 80 to 90 years.

(credit: Gonzalez-Ventura, ibid)

My all-time favorite Psalm evokes metaphysically and inwardly what the realm of research proves empirically:

LORD, my heart is not haughty nor are my eyes lofty. Neither do I concern myself with matters too great or with things too profound for me. Surely I have calmed and quieted my soul and behave like a weaned child with her head upon her mother's breast.

or me. Surely I have calmed and quieted my soul and behave like a weaned child with her head upon her mother's breast.

My hunch is that rather than carp about what might happen as the new régime comes into power, we old-timers reclaim the mandate of the "elders" and use the creativity, wisdom, experience, and bold compassion we've amassed to bring a measure of outward healing to the brokenness while mentoring younger good hearts in the way of contemplation . Check out the work of Carrie Newcomer and Parker Palmer for living examples of joy in the midst of challenge.

all saints and souls day before the election...

NOTE: It's been said that St. Francis encouraged his monastic partners to preach the gospel at all times - using words only when necessary. That's been a mantra for me of late as I favor incarnating small acts of mercy over extended political harangues. Indeed, as the election polling seems to document, people's opinions re: Ms. Harris or Mr. Trump have long been calcified with almost no change in the status of their stand-off even two days away from November 5th. Most of us who are not ideological stalwarts are exhausted. And afraid. What's more, I believe that no matter what the outcome, people of compassion must steel themselves for the aftermath of this divisive, mean-spirited, and wildly unpredictable campaign. Like Carrie Newcomer asks in song: "Will you be my refuge? My haven in the storm? Will you keep the embers warm when my fire's all but gone? Will you remember? And bring me sprigs of rosemary, be my sanctuary 'til I can carry on?" 

Pundits as well as social scientists have noted that we are in the midst of a massive cultural/political/spiritual shift - and it is not at all clear how it will play out. So, while I never hesitate to carefully delineate the stark differences in perspective, values, and goals between the two candidates with those interested in authentic dialogue, listening carefully to their concerns, I refuse to waste my time or energy picking fights with partisan militants. Period. I do not support condescending liberals who denigrate and dehumanize Trump loyalists any more than the racist, sexist xenophobes who continue to condemn Harris as the anti-Christ. Staying within the comfort of our self-righteous siloes changes nothing and only reinforces the destructive aspects of our shadows. I pray that compassion carries the day on November 5th. I support those who advocate for radical diversity, equity, and inclusion beyond all stereotypes. And recognize, as Niebuhr taught, that even our best intentions carry with them unintended consequences that often create new antagonisms. As he was want to say:

Nothing that is worth doing can be achieved in our lifetime; therefore we must be saved by hope. Nothing which is true or beautiful or good makes complete sense in any immediate context of history; therefore we must be saved by faith. Nothing we do, however virtuous, can be accomplished alone; therefore we must be saved by love. No virtuous act is quite as virtuous from the standpoint of our friend or foe as it is from our standpoint. Therefore we must be saved by the final form of love which is forgiveness. 

As my life has ripened and changed, l believe like St. Paul that there are charisms for our different stages of consciousness: compassion, humility, and solidarity are constants but they can take on different configurations. Once I was an organizer. Now I am not. Some are called to aggressively challenge the injustices - others are called to bind up the wounded and offer consolation - and both are essential. This is what came to my heart during the celebration of All Saints and All Souls Day 2024.

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One of the joys of my trip from Pittsfield to be with you each week in Palmer is the roughly 75 minutes I spend twice a day on either the Mass Pike or Route 9 through Northampton. The trees this autumn have been spectacular in all their phases. Same was true, too, this spring and summer. The beauty of Mother Nature never fails to evoke prayers of gratitude from me; they are organic icons of God’s generous grace. Now, to be sure, there ARE a few downsides to my pilgrimages, too, ok?

I can say I truly HATE getting stuck behind a tractor trailer at night in the rain. I just had the passenger side, rearview mirror replaced after one of those bad boys inadvertently squeezed me into a traffic cone while crossing a bridge in repair that tore it right off. That wasn’t fun. And three weeks ago, while heading home after Sunday worship, no sooner had I entered the Pike than my brakes totally gave up the ghost. Seems a faulty gasket let all the brake fluid leak out over the weekend after just being repaired so that on my ride home – in the rain at twilight – well… I had to give thanks to God for my old school driver’s ed, believe me, and what-ever was left of my emergency brake, too!

But those autumn trees – or once in late February when they were shrouded in ice: when the sun came up over the mountain – totally breath-taking. I can’t help but think of something the late Henri Nouwen wrote about autumn maybe years ago when he noted that our fall foliage was a lesson in the beauty of letting go: Many leaves contain yellow and orange pigments all year round, but in the spring and summer they’re masked by the vivid greens of chlorophyll.

That’s the pigment responsible for the absorption of light to provide energy for photosynthesis. But as the days shorten and the temperature falls, the chlorophyll breaks down and drains away and those yellows and oranges begin to shine through. They were there all along, quiet and un-noticed, but now they emerge as the green curtain fades. If God is a painter of autumn trees, what we see is an art not of addition but of subtraction. It’s an art of revelation, of revealing the hidden beauty of what was already there. So, too, for the reds and purples: as the chlorophyll fades, the remaining sugar in their leaves is transformed into a flavonoid called anthocyanin that protects the leaves from the sun as it starts to fade into winter. Nouwen noted that the Divine Artist not only paints by revelation, but also by transformation, protection, and subtraction.

My soul revels in the wisdom God shares with us in nature: there’s a beauty, stability and awe that helps keep me grounded. And I find a measure of comparable beauty in the rhythms of the church year: our liturgical journey with Jesus that begins with his birth, continues with his death, and then mystically moves us into his resurrection and beyond. Today opens a unique, sacramental mini-season that simultaneously evokes both endings and beginnings. All Hallow’s Eve, All Saints and All Souls Day kick off a four-week sojourn into the close of the church year at the end of this month on Christ the King Sunday, and, the opening of a new cycle as Advent re-turns on the first Sunday of December.

My ancient Celtic ancestors called this month a liminal season, Samhain, where natural and spiritual light is diminished, the mystery of darkness invites us into a deeper trust, and any division between the living and dead shrinks. This holy time is called Caol Ait (culleeth) in Gaelic meaning a “thin place” where the distance between heaven and earth collapses. Like the earth itself which celebrates the cycle of life, the church year in November likewise offers us a sacramental insight into the joy and grief that swirls within us as we re-member our beloved departed. Poet John O’Donohue said:

May you know that absence is alive with hidden presence, that nothing is ever lost or forgotten. May the absences in your life grow full of eternal echo. May you sense around you the secret Elsewhere where the presences that have left you continue to dwell.

I hear this proclaimed obliquely in today’s gospel from St. Mark where Jesus celebrates rather than excoriates one of the Pharisaical scholars of ancient Judaism. Often, he tells us: You have heard it said in tradition THIS… but I say unto you THAT. But today, Jesus praises this elder saying: Today you are not far from the kingdom. This isn’t an act of abstract ideology or a solidarity of race, class, gen-der, culture or religion. Rather, it’s Jesus showing us that God’s grace can and does break through to us in the most unexpected places: it could appear among the Pharisees who regularly oppose him, another time in a Gentile woman at the well or even a Roman centurion from the occupation army with a dying child. In each of these – and a host of other examples – Jesus makes allies among ALL types of people who willingly open their hearts and minds to God’s unconditional mercy. And I suspect that many of us have experienced something of this, too from a whole HOST of people who have made God’s love real for us even when we’re at our worst.

They might be elderly wisdom-keepers or young holy fools, old souls regardless of age incarnating the insights of the seasons or wee’uns filled with an exuberance and innocent zest for all that is noble, true, beautiful, good, and loving. In a moment I am going to invite you to share the name of one such saint who has touched your life but now no longer tarries with us physically. That’s part of the charism of All Saints and All Souls Day: we can call into consciousness that great cloud of witnesses who have crossed over into glory yet continue to pray and bless us beyond our awareness.

· And ONE of those all too human but holy salty saints in my life was Michael Daniels of blessed memory. Sadly, he passed from this life into life eternal alone – without a blood family or church home – he was laid to rest in a pauper’s grave in Cleveland about 15 years ago. I met Mike one October night maybe 30 years ago night when his wife, Cheryl, called our church to tell us that her father (an in-active member) had recently died. She requested a pastoral visit to plan his memorial service, and I agreed to go than night with NO idea what I was getting myself into.

· I arrived at their modest home and found it pitch black – no welcome lights on outside – and precious few lit on the inside. I knocked, rang the bell, and eventually Michael opened the door looking whacked out, wild-eyed, and distraught. He was about THIS tall and the blackest man I have ever met. Without a word, he motioned me inside while Cheryl got herself presentable, silently directing me to take a seat on the sofa that he proceeded to clear off. Empty pizza boxes were tossed on the floor, a few crumpled newspapers, too. And in the process, he nonchalantly uncovered a pistol buried under the trash. I didn’t know if it was loaded or not but for a moment, I sensed I was about to meet my maker.

· Thank GOD Mike eventually picked the revolver up, put safety on, and placed it into a desk drawer. To say that an unexpected relationship began with Mike would be an understatement: after we got Cheryl’s dad buried, Mike and Cheryl started attending worship. Now, both he and she, beloved children of our Living God, were hard core alcoholics with a host of mental health is-sues. To make a LONG story a bit shorter, after about two years, Cheryl went off her meds, as so often happens, disappeared into the streets of Cleveland, and was consumed for a few sad months by the worst of her untreated schizophrenia.

I regularly helped Michael search for her over the course of two months and eventually, finding her sleeping rough in a bus stop, we got Cheryl to the hospital and back on her meds. After they were reunited and settled again, one Saturday morning when Mike went out for cigarettes, Cheryl’s demons got the best of her again and in her agony swallowed a bullet from that same pistol. When Mike got home 15 minutes later, and she was dead, a hurricane of tragedy unfolded as the police arrived and arrested him on suspicion of murder, the landlord threw all of his belonging out of their second story apartment onto the street where the neighborhood junkies had a field day gathering up all that might be valuable. By the time I got him bailed out of jail everything he’d owned had been stolen, his wife was dead, and he was now homeless.

In those days I was a young, earnest, quasi-evangelical pastor committed to the spirit of Jesus, so I naively brought him home with me to camp out on our living room floor – which, as you might imagine – simply thrilled my wife and two daughters. It was not a permanent solution, of course, and a few days later I got him into a halfway house. The only condition for remaining in their shelter was that Mike get and stay clean – which he did in a dry drunk for two days. He got busted, received his one and only warning, but couldn’t keep it together for long – and three days later was tossed out on the streets again because of his drinking.

After I picked him up, we sat in my car – and wept – both of us. I eventually said: Michael, I love you like a brother, and I want the best for you. But I can’t put you up in my house again and we’ve run out of options… except for this: I could, right now, drive you to the county hospital and get you into their rehab unit. Or, you can open that door and walk away from me forever til you get clean. For what seemed like a month, but was probably only a minute, we sat in my car with our tears and the silence until he said quote: Brother James, let’s give it a go. I done lost everything already; what more can I lose? We drove in silence to Cuyahoga County General Hospital where I dropped him off with NO sense he would make it – but after 28 days he came out clean and sober.

And Michael maintained his sobriety for another 25 years, praise God! Little by little, he mov-ed BACK into the land of the living and we grew closer. He often spent holidays with my family. Often he taught me about how to live a 12 Step spiritually in his new life of sobriety. And loved to tell me that I was too damn smart for my own good because, and this is crucial, be-cause I believed I could think my way out of all my fears, shame, and wounds. He was right, of course, and because I am a slow learner, stubborn, and sometimes too full of myself it took another 15 years before, I too began to work the 12 Steps.

When ministry took me away to Arizona and then to Massachusetts, on the anniversary of his sobriety, Michael Daniels would call me. Until… he didn’t. At a conference in Cleveland, I was told by a mutual friend that my old buddy had passed. Our old church home had merged with another, and Mike didn’t fit into their prissy piety so quit attending and with no blood family or spiritual home… Michael died alone. All that I had left of our friendship was one squirrely picture taken of Mike at a church picnic and the love and wisdom we once shared now experienced only in absentia. 

That’s when All Saints Day began to matter to me – the sacred invitation to remember our loved ones who’ve crossed over in-to God’s eternal love – so every year I raise a smile, a candle, and a prayer for Michael Daniels. He became one of my mentors – a gritty little wisdom-keeper of sorts – who kept challenging me with love and humor to deal with my brokenness, my addiction to work, my fears and angst. His inner peace was hard won, but like the wisdom-keeper in today’s gospel, it was clear that God’s kingdom had come close. And I’ll bet there are people YOU would like to remember and honor this day, too. People who have loved you, touched your heart, and brought you shelter from the storm. The artist and author, Jan Richardson, said it best: "It’s HARD but HOLY to honor our beloved dead."

They make different claims, offer comforts that do not feel comfortable at the first. They do not let you remain numb. Neither do they allow you to languish forever in your grief. They will safe-guard your sorrow but will not permit that it should become your new country, your home, They knew you first in joy, in delight, and though they will be patient when you travel by other roads, it is here that they will wait for you, here they can best be found here the river runs deep with gladness, the water over each stone singing your unforgotten name.

So, let’s share some of those names – not all the stories – let’s simply say aloud ONE name, which we’ll hold for a moment together in sacred silence, At the close, we’ll lift up a prayer of gratitude for all we’ve named as well as those still silently alive in our hearts…

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Let us pray:  Gracious and Tender, Loving and Faithful God,
when we hear the word "saint" we often associate it with those who no longer walk this earth, who are dwelling in eternal rest. We can think of many people in our own lives who had an impact with us, whom we cannot wait to see them again. Lord, we have named some today, those we dearly miss who are no longer here on earth. But we rejoice that they no longer experience pain or shed any tears of sadness. They have shaped us to be more like you, and for this we will forever return thanks. (And from Jan Richardson)

For those who walked with us, this is our prayer.

For those who have gone ahead, this is our blessing.

For those who touched and tended us, who lingered with us

while they lived, this is our thanksgiving.

For those who journey still with us n the shadows of awareness,

in the crevices of memory, in the landscape of our dreams,

this is a benediction offered in the presence of Christ Jesus our Lord. Amen.