thank god for the poets, misfits, writers, artists and musicians...

I love poetry. For years I didn't know that I did. I was knocked over, moved to tears and consumed with an inexplicable joy from time to time by certain songs. The combination of sound, rhythm and lyrics often lifted me into a state of awe. Or grief. Or pure, giddy delight. But it wasn't until one cold, rainy late spring night at a Borders Bookstore in Westlake, Ohio that I grasped how much poetry mattered to me. In an anthology used by Robert Bly in his retreats for men, The Rag and Bone Shop of the Heart, I stood weeping while reading "Sometimes a Man Stands Up During Supper" by Rainer Maria Rilke:

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

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

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

After 15 years of marriage I had separated from the mother of my beloved daughters. It was a frightening and lonely journey of trust to say good-bye. I knew it was a matter of life or death for me, but hated leaving my children behind. (In a very short time they came to live with me.) I was wracked with guilt and shame. And, at the same time, I was convinced that I had to move through the anguish towards something resembling new life. Reading Rilke in that store felt like someone had stripped me naked and left me to fend for myself alone. There was the hint of healing in his words - walking in the dark towards a church in the East - but no guarantees. All that was certain was that the alternative was death within the dishes of familiarity. So I stood by myself and wept in that now defunct Borders - giving thanks to God that someone else grasped my anguish -  even a dead German poet I knew nothing about.

In that same volume, Bly wrote in the introduction: "How does the work of men connect to poetry? To this day in Kazakhstan roomfuls of men sit listening to a poet chant long narratives. We recall the importance of poetry in the lives of Norse farmers, Icelandic shepherds, Greek olive growers and fishermen... the question becomes how do the life of men and the life of a culture connect to poetry?" 

While our European-American tradition questions and argues, and has to teach poetry to sullen students in English classes, other cultures - speaking Spanish, Russian, Arabic to say nothing of the many tongues of African and the Indian subcontinent - grow up inside poems, drenched through with poetic metaphors and rhythms. As we learn to criticize, to take a poem apart, to get its meaning, they learn to listen and to recite. By drawing this sharp distinction with other cultures, we are pointing to a defect in ours. We live in a poetically underdeveloped
nation. Men blame their own lives for a deficiency in the culture. For, without the fanciful delicacy and the powerful truths that poems convey, emotions and imagination flatten out. There's a lack of spirit, of vision. The loss in the heart appears as a loss of heart to take up the great cultural challenges that are a part of every man's citizenship. It is in this sense that we have come to think that working in poetry and myth with men is a therapy of the culture at its psychic roots.

Some ten years before my meltdown in Borders, I was walking in the sunshine down Nevsky Prospekt in what was then Soviet Leningrad. It was in the heady early days of "glasnost" when a young man approached me outside of a hard currency bookstore. Once he had determined I was a tourist, he asked if I might purchase for him a volume of poems by Anna Ahkmatova, a small book that was available to everyone except Soviet citizens. He was forbidden to shop in this store. I was moved by his intensity and willingness to approach me, even in this more open culture, for a book of poems. I was cautious, but glad to oblige, and bought two copies. Both in Russian. One for him and one for me - even though I had no knowledge at the time of why Ahkmatova mattered. 

In time I learned that Anna Ahkmatova was one of Russia's brilliant poets who kept writing through the reign of Soviet terror. Every night she was compelled by Soviet secret police to sit in her well lit apartment window while her son was held in a gulag so the commissars of culture could be certain she had not committed suicide. Stalin and his devils were afraid that should she give into despair and take her life, the common people would revolt. An excerpt from her "Requiem" cuts to the chase.

…I spent seventeen months waiting in line outside the prison in Leningrad. One day somebody in the crowd identified me. Standing behind me was a woman, with lips blue from the cold, who had, of course, never heard me called by name before. Now she started out of the torpor common to us all and asked me in a whisper (everyone whispered there):

“Can you describe this?”

And I said: “I can.”

Then something like a smile passed fleetingly over what had once been her face.”

There are other stories of poems to tell, too: meeting Bly in Tucson at a reading where he shared without a break for 90 minutes yet it only felt like five, hearing Billy Collins read "Lanyard" for the first time one night in NYC, being enthralled by a volume of my lover's poems - new and old - that spoke to me of a burden I could never have imagined, falling in love with the poems of ancient Israel's King David, stumbling upon Mary Oliver, hearing Jane Hirshfield, rediscovering Leonard Cohen, Tom Waits, Scot Cairns and Lou Reed. And I must be clear not to forget Carrie Newcomer. Just yesterday, while prayerfully exploring ways to celebrate the wedding of my oldest friend in creation who will marry a beloved friend from our time in high school next month in California, I came upon "Why We Are Here" in Newcomer's little book, A Permeable Life.

She stood looking out the doorway
Poised to step out into whatever comes next.
Although I knew that I could not go with her
I could keep her company while waiting,
Bear witness to the preparing,
And maybe rub her tired shoulders
Which I know is absolutely nothing
And absolutely everything.

Maybe that is why we are here:
To rub shoulders and play cards,
To be a place to launch,
And a place to land,
To murmur on the pone late at night,
And to say,
"This I love"
And
"This I saw."

For years I have cherished this "poem" by Paul of Tarsus although for most of my life I never knew it as poetry. But now I do - and it rings true. 

If I speak in the tongues of mortals 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.

Love is patient; love is kind; love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice in wrongdoing, but rejoices in the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends. 

But as for prophecies, they will come to an end; as for tongues, they will cease; as for knowledge, it will come to an end. For we know only in part, and we prophesy only in part; but when the complete comes, the partial will come to an end. When I was a child, I spoke like a child, I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child; when I became an adult, I put an end to childish ways. For now we see in a mirror, dimly, but then we will see face to face. Now I know only in part; then I will know fully, even as I have been fully known.  And now faith, hope, and love abide, these three; and the greatest of these is love.

Thank God for the poets and the way through the darkness they have offered to me. Maybe to you, too?

St. Paul by Gracie Morbitzer @ https://www.etsy.com/sg-en/listing/551279935/st-paul-modern-icon-5x7-print

a very small lent...

As I take stock of my Lenten journey with Jesus on the way to the Cross and the Resurrection, I must confess that it has been an uneven sojourn for me so far. I keep returning to the invitation, but seem to have little passion for the traditional practices this year. I very much like the way the Taize community set the stage for this season:

The season of Lent is a time of retreat for the whole community. In the spirit of Jesus in the desert, we take 40 days to practice the essentials of our spiritual lives. 

Sadly, while my spirit is willing, both my flesh and imagination are weak. Usually the three Lenten disciplines -  quiet time for contemplation; letting go of selfish thoughts, words and actions; and sharing simple acts of kindness with those in need - resonate with me. Traditionally we speak of them as prayer, fasting and alms giving. But I can't use the old words any more nor can I muster much juice for practicing them. It is my hunch that people inside the community of faith are too worn out by the old expectations to care about Lent this year, and those beyond our sanctuaries are clueless about why it might matter. Not ignorant, mind you, for God has placed within each of us something of the divine image that we all yearn to strengthen. In this, I fully renounce my Reformed heritage that teaches we are miserable sinners cut off forever from grace without Christ. If Jesus means anything it is that we are all God's beloved - often wounded, to be sure - and regularly confused, but still souls filled with a sacred capacity to live our lives with integrity as the beloved of the Lord.

Imagine my surprise at feeling energized upon reading the gospel text for the Fifth Sunday of Lent: John 12: 1-8.

Six days before the Passover Jesus came to Bethany, the home of Lazarus, whom he had raised from the dead. There they gave a dinner for him. Martha served, and Lazarus was one of those at the table with him. Mary took a pound of costly perfume made of pure nard, anointed Jesus' feet, and wiped them with her hair. The house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume. But Judas Iscariot, one of his disciples (the one who was about to betray him), said, "Why was this perfume not sold for three hundred denarii and the money given to the poor?" Jesus said, "Leave her alone. She bought it so that she might keep it for the day of my burial. You always have the poor with you, but you do not always have me."

It is an invitation - and encouragement - to do something beautiful. For God. For another. For creation. For ourself. "Doing something beautiful for God is one of the ways we show the world gratitude," I once wrote. And that still makes sense. Some of us may do it with visual art. Others with music. Some with poetry. Or movies. Or cooking. Still others will feed the hungry or visit the lonely. Some will patiently care for their children. Or their parents. Or even a stranger. Whatever our calling we can each do something beautiful for the Lord. Usually this will be small. It may not change the world in obvious ways. But it will bring refreshment to at least one other being. And Jesus was explicit that whenever we help one person, we are helping him. I think this is how I have come to live into Lent this year.

learning the 21st century language of awe and reverence...

One of the reasons I continue to tell time according to the Christian calendar has to do with its circular nature: the liturgical year, like the celebration of the Eucharist itself, is not linear. The liturgical year never rushes towards the bottom line. Nor does it demand traditional progress or results. Rather, it asks us to go deeper over a life time, offering each of us the chance to practice living into the life, death and resurrection again and again. It is a counter-cultural alternative to the status quo of business productivity.

In this there is an assumption of failure. Wisdom is born of experience. Holiness ripens slowly. Necessity is the mother of invention. For the way of the Lord requires time to fall down (sin), take stock (confession), make changes (repentance) and get back up again and again (resurrection). Sometimes our rising is of our own volition; more often than not, however, it is of the Lord. Each year that we are conscious of God's grace carefully leads us into a time of feasting and fasting, celebration and solitude, traveling through the light as well as the darkness, understanding and mystery, knowing and unknowing all within the eternal embrace of God's love. St. Paul got it right when he wrote in Romans 8:

All things work for good with those who love the Lord..that is why I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.

I intentionally absented myself from the rigors of public worship for a full year, however, in order to deconstruct and perhaps reclaim the sacred rhythm of living according to God's time. We returned to worship on Christmas Eve 2018, joining our family in Brooklyn at a puppet pageant at St. Paul's Chapel in NYC. It was a beautiful home-coming. But I wouldn't have been able to celebrate this return without those 12 months outside my tradition. They were like an extended silent retreat for me: no pressure, no expectations, and no formal structures to shape my journey. It was a pilgrimage of discovery that first led me out of my comfort zone only to lead me into a deeper reverence. 

After observing the liturgical calendar faithfully for 40 years, you see, too much of it felt like mechanical. And given the gravitas of the number 40 - so pregnant with scriptural significance - I wanted to claim this as an opportunity. Think of the forty days and nights on the ark after the flood, the forty years in the wilderness after the Exodus, and the forty days and nights Jesus fasted in the desert before moving into his public ministry. My forty years of pastoral ministry demanded a comparable season of stillness. So trusting a grace greater than my anxiety, I stepped into a quietude that would lead me towards a renewed rhythm of fidelity. Psalm 46 was my clue: Be still and know... 

One year later, two inner truths have risen to the top: 

+ First, there can be no doubt that my organic spirituality is saturated in sacramental vision: I sense the holy in all things and feel God's presence everywhere.

+ Second, my spiritual vocabulary had become woefully limited. I was mystically experiencing the radical unity of heaven and earth in my ordinary world, but my old school religious words were no longer able to describe this blessing. I might as well be talking to myself as nobody uses such words any more. 

Stepping outside of my comfort bubble taught me that I needed new words to celebrate the healing presence of the holy so often present in the midst of our brokenness. In my old school tongue, I needed another personal Pentecost. My first Pentecostal experience came when the Beatles took the stage on Ed Sullivan's show in February 1964. When John Lennon sang "Twist and Shout," everything changed: the spirit of love washed over me and I was convinced that the gospel of rock and roll (and later jazz) could build bridges between very different people. For 50 years that was my frame of reference, but in 2018 I needed more than just a reissue of the White Album. Now I needed up to date and inclusive images, sounds, visions and experiences from poets like Naomi Shihab Nye and Mary Oliver, Billy Collins and Margret Atwood, Geraldine Connolly and Gary Whitehead, Tupac, Grace R, Carrie Newcomer, Pam McAlister and so many others. This poem by Grace at one of my last official church events made it all clear...


You see, while I knew the poems of the Scriptures reasonably well - and they still rang true to me - to connect beyond a small circle of friends required learning to speak beyond my tradition. The Canadian theologian, Ralph Heinzman, was insightful in Rediscovering Reverence:

Reverence conveys a human attitude of respect and deference for something larger or higher in priority than our own individual selves; something that commands our admiration and our loyalty, and may imply obligations and duties on our part. In a gesture of reverence, either physical on mental, we acknowledge superior worth, our relationship with it, and our potential obligations towards it. Reverence results from humility as a Jewish text puts it... (It seems to me that reverence) flows from awe - the emotion we feel when we encounter someone or something that transcends our normal life, and embodies qualities of excellence or beauty... it is a natural component or source of reverence... and provides the drive that causes people to act: to devote themselves to something, to stand up for something, or to take a stand against something - even to just go on living. Awe can overwhelm us, but it also motivates and empowers us. (pp. 18-19)

So was the work of Bill Yehele and his promotion of local poetry slams and readings throughout our region. Bringing together young poets as well as senior citizens and everyone in-between, he creates 21st century "happenings." Last night I played upright bass in between the poems of 17 local artists. About 30 of us gathered in the local library to see what might happen - and it was engaging, sometimes raw and very real. Check them out @ https://www.facebook.com/wordx wordfestival/. My experience last night brought to mind this poem by Geraldine Connoly called, "The Right Words."

I need to find them,
certain words,
particular syllables.
But everywhere I look,
in yellowed newspapers

and the blue-black dictionary,
under the glossy magazine photos
and tattered envelopes,
they evade me.
I peek under my old stove
and inside my new gloves.

I want to twirl them, swallow them,
send them on errands.
I want to get as close
as I can to the right words,

I want to gulp their wisdom
and eat their sadness,
want to forget the thorny bushes
and dreary blizzards,
to escape
from the mute times.

In this era of Trumpian 1984isms - where the Google and Facebook thought police monitor and manipulate our words and preferences to say nothing of our elections - small gatherings of poets and musicians offer an alternative that is immediate, honest, creative and earthy. These mini-communities give us a chance to cut through the lies, noise and confusion with intimacy and respect. When I got home last night, Laura Grace Weldon's poem, "How to Soothe," came to mind. She evokes what has been lost in this age even as she offers a tender corrective.

When babies cried
my father picked them up,
politely, as if to apologize
for their locomotion issues,
then stepped outside.
He named trees, birds, rain.
"This is grass," he'd say.
"In no time at all
you'll be running on it."
Babies calmed at once,
eyes wide, awake
to the planet's glories.

I learned from my father
it's a matter of walking
inside to out
with someone capable
of truly seeing.

The poet/theologian Christine Valters Paintner of Abbey of the Arts recently has been exploring this theme too: 

When we rush from thing to thing, never pausing, never allowing space, we see only what we expect to find. We see to grasp at the information we need. We see the stereotypes embedded in our minds. We miss the opportunity to see beyond what we want. We walk by a thousand ordinary revelations every day in our busyness and preoccupation. We move through our lives, often at such speed, that our perception of time becomes contorted. We begin to believe that life is about rushing as fast as we can, about getting as much done as possible. We are essentially skating across life’s surface, exhausted, and disoriented.

(Abbey of the Arts: dancingmonk@abbeyofthearts.co)

We were created in the image of a loving God, not an assembly line horror show or a computer bot. We know this deep within. We yearn for something more beyond filling in the slots, buying more trinkets, and punching the time clock. Religious language rarely communicates this longing in 2019. For a time, the institutional church has disqualified itself as a place of trust, too. What seems to cut through the din, however, is the meeting of beautiful words and music shared in small settings by those with open hearts and minds. This is where the calendar of the holy is being revealed in my experience. This is where Pentecost is happening again. This is where kairos time is encountered and treated with reverence.


credits:
+ https://www.aquinasandmore.com/buy/year-grace-liturgical-calendar-20858/

what can i affirm: credos for the halfway mark of lent...

One of my favorite contemporary performing artists is Carrie Newcomer. On this fourth Sunday in Lent - when some of us have paid NO attention at all to the pilgrimage Jesus makes to Jerusalem and Golgotha; and others have tried to join the journey but become distracted, ashamed or overwhelmed; and some don't care at all while a few have made incremental steps by grace towards the practice of prayer, fasting, compassion and sharing - my heart turns to Ms. Carrie's song "I Believe." For me, it rings truer than many of the creeds I have been asked to affirm along the way - and sounds a lot like Jesus, too. 

James Carroll, the Irish Vatican II priest from Boston who left his ordination to go deeper into his calling as a truth teller by becoming newspaper person and author, crafted another credo at the close of his book Christ Actually - and it works pretty well for me at the half way mark of Lent, too:

Jesus, the Jew from Nazareth, is a living expression of the inexpressible God. He is the Christ, Son of Man, according to the Scriptures. He is present to the world the way meaning is present in the word. Just as a word points not to itself, but to its meaning, so Jesus Christ, Son of God, points to One whom he calls Father. In that way, as one of us, he is the Word of God, whose Meaning comes clear. The Unknowable One, therefore, can be known. Because God is not an enemy, but a friend, we need not be afraid. Because God completes what God begins, death is not the end, but a beginning, wholly undefined. Because God is faithful creation has a purpose, and its name is history. Imitators of Jesus Christ, we want mainly to be kind and true, taking heart from our dear companions on the way. And we say with those who go before, and who come after. Amen. So may it be.

Then there is Donna Hilbert's poem called "Credo." I like it a lot. Within its small embrace there is room for me. It is humble and honest. It is open to all that is hearty and nourishing without pretense. It reminds me of Psalm 131: 

MY heart is not lifted up, nor are my eyes raised too high.
I do not occupy myself with things too great or too marvelous for me.
But I have calmed and quieted my soul, like a child on her mother's breast.

This "Credo" sounds like my sou feels at this time in Lent: I start off trying to be simple but have grand illusions about what I can accomplish on the journey to the Cross. Four weeks in, however, I realize that I've barely been able to consistently light a candle and sit with quiet intentions over the past month. The four week marker is like an oasis to regroup and make the most of whatever remains. Like Ms. Hilbert, I'm pretty sure I can be awake for Tuesdays and Wednesdays - and even enjoy the time after supper, too. Tonight, alongside these your saints, I pray: Lord, in your mercy, hear our prayers. 

I believe in the Tuesdays
and Wednesdays of life,
the tuna sandwich lunches
and TV after dinner.
I believe in coffee with hot milk
and peanut butter toast,
Rosé wine in summer
and Burgundy in winter.

I am not in love with holidays,
Birthdays––nothing special––
and weekends are just days
numbered six and seven,
though my love
dozing over TV golf
while I work the Sunday puzzle
might be all I need of life
and all I ask of heaven.

imagine my surprise...

The insightful, tender-hearted and talented, Carrie Newcomer, has written a host of soul healing songs. Spending time with her in concert or with her recordings is both an act of culture care and spiritual renewal. She evokes a sense of solidarity with all that is holy for me as well as an invitation into sacred solitude. She is earthy, honest, reflective, playful and compassionate. I am always enriched by Newcomer's contemplative creativity. 

While digging in the dirt earlier this week - and baking bread yesterday - I started to sense a quiet congruency to my days. There is an order and rhythm to my world now that seeks to strengthen our deep yearning for sanctuary. Some may know that for the past four years it was evident that my calling to be a pastor was over. St. Lou Reed liked to say, "Stick a fork in it cuz its done!" And in my heart I knew this to be true.  There was a finality to bringing this part of my vocation to a close - a clear emotional and professional dividing line between now and then - that was definitive. Sometimes, too, it was harsh and jagged.

Shedding my public role as a pastor had been liberating while on sabbatical and I had no desire to go backwards. In Montreal no one new me as clergy. I was simply "the old guy who spoke bad French and loved jazz." For the first time in decades I could meet people in the moment and be real with them without expectations or pressure. I was in heaven - and had no energy to return to the confines of traditional parish ministry. It was clearly time to stick a fork in it. 

What I didn't know then was that God wasn't finished with me yet. Leaving a Taize liturgy on our last night in Montreal, Di said, "You're not done with ministry yet. It may be time to get out of the local church, but you're too energized by what we just experienced (quiet, contemplative worship in candle light) for all of this to be over. You may think you finished, but something new will arise out of all of this that will take you into a whole new way of being." It was yet another encounter with one of my favorite verses from Christian scripture - St. John 21: 18 - where the resurrected Jesus tells the broken hearted Peter: 

Very truly, I tell you, when you were younger, you used to fasten your own belt and to go wherever you wished. But when you grow old, you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will fasten a belt around you and take you where you do not wish to go.

As is often the case, she was right. And what I recognized in the dirt and the dough of this past week was that now I am living into the contemplative ministry I have ached to embody for over 25 years. One of my favorite David Crosby songs confesses: "It's been a long time coming..."
When I entered into retirement, I drew an emotional line separating what had been from what might become. I knew I was finished with the realm of church and open to a season of solitude. What happened, however, was something very different. We went on retreat about this time last year to the Eastern Townships of Quebec. In the stillness, in the Abbaye de Sant Benoit-du-Lac, in conversation and in quiet prayer we discerned that the next twelve months were to be a "year of beholding." A time to look for what God was already doing in our lives rather than searching for something new. 

This took me deeper into my connection with L'Arche Ottawa. And family. And gardening and baking and writing. This beholding also took me deeper into the work of spiritual direction. Eventually, moving slowly with lots of silence, I grasped that the Spirit of God continued to lure me deeper into a new/old ministry of presence. A ministry not ruled by the obsessions and fears of institutional churchianity, yet still wildly shaped by the living presence of Jesus. A ministry that encourages a counter cultural resistance to that which is cruel, cynical, and cold through cultivating compassion, creativity and contemplation. A ministry that is small. Like Holly Near once proclaimed about herself: "Imagine my surprise!" Fr. Richard Rohr put it like this:

It seems we all begin in naiveté and eventually return to a “second naiveté” or simplicity, whether willingly or on our deathbed. This blessed simplicity is calm, knowing, patient, inclusive, and self-forgetful. In the second half of life you are strong enough to hold together contradictions in yourself and others with compassion, forgiveness, and patience. You realize that your chosenness is for the sake of letting others know they are also chosen. As we grow in this wisdom, we realize that everything belongs and everything can be received. We see that life and death are not opposites. They do not cancel one another out; neither do goodness and badness.

Given this blessing, it feels prudent to extend our year of beholding much like the Blessed Virgin Mary who looked at the birth of the holy with awe and held all these things in her heart. We are not going to try to sell the house this year. Again. We are going to create a small terraced garden for flowers and assorted vegetables and herbs. We are not going to make any big, new plans. We are going to deepen our time with L'Arche Ottawa. We are not planning any big adventures; rather more time to grow closer to children and grandchildren. And do a little more listening in spiritual direction. And perhaps write a few more songs. Life, ministry, vocation, calling and time now feels a bit like this poem by David Mason called "Fathers and Sons."

Some things, they say,
one should not write about. I tried
to help my father comprehend
the toilet, how one needs
to undo one's belt, to slide
one's trousers down and sit,
but he stubbornly stood
and would not bend his knees.
I tried again
to bend him toward the seat,

and then I laughed
at the absurdity. Fathers and sons.
How he had wiped my bottom
half a century ago, and how
I would repay the favor
if he would only sit.

        Don’t you-

he gripped me, trembling, searching for my eyes.
Don’t you––but the word
was lost to him. Somewhere
a man of dignity would not be laughed at.
He could not see
it was the crazy dance
that made me laugh,
trying to make him sit
when he wanted to stand.

where the hours do not oust one another...

Today is rainy and cold. This entire week has been cold but the sun was out, too. Doing yard work - even hard pruning and raking - was satisfying as the sun heated everything up. My bread baking, therefore, was postponed for today. It is a new recipe for an unbleached white sandwich loaf. Already the first rising looks good - so we'll have fresh bread for tonight's meal.

I cherish quiet, cold days of solitude like this. They bring a measure of healing to my soul. Bread baking days are uniquely satisfying, too because through my failures I have learned that I can't do anything else but pay attention to the bread. It is time set aside and outside of normal time. It feels a little like this morning's column by David Brooks who spoke of both Abraham Joshua Heschel and Makoto Fujimura:

In “The Sabbath,” (Heschel) points out that the first sacred thing in the Bible is not a thing, it is a time period, the seventh day. Judaism, he argues, is primarily a religion of time, not space. “The seventh day,” he writes, “is a palace in time which we build. It is made of soul, of joy and reticence. In its atmosphere, a discipline is a reminder of adjacency to eternity. Indeed, the splendor of the day is expressed in terms of abstentions.”

The Sabbath, he continues, is not a rest from the other six days. It is the peak experience the other six days point toward. On this day the Orthodox do less and in slowness can glimpse the seeds of eternity. Sabbath, Heschel concludes, “is endowed with a felicity which enraptures the soul, which glides into our thoughts with a healing sympathy. It is a day on which hours do not oust one another. It is a day that can soothe all sadness away. No one, even the unlearned, crude man, can remain insensitive to its beauty.”

Bread baking days for me are ones where "the hours do not oust one another." It is a day saturated with stillness. Gunilla Norris speaks of the rising of a loaf in ways that are wonderfully comparable. In Becoming Bread she writes:

Here in the bowl

is a warmth and time to rest.

The dough is set apart and covered.

Here in the bowl

the rising starts

and creeps up the sides

reaching into time,

into space... into possibility.

Dreams are like this,

full of air,

going ahead of us,

wanting to take us

beyond the rim 

of our horizon,

wanting to lift us out

of where we are.

Dreams are like this... unfolding

a moment at a time,

expanding us, breathing us,

demanding something new,

wanting to take shape.

This is also dangerous

for there are dark dreams, terrible

dreams. And the ones where

love asks the impossible from us. 

Can this be the restlessness 

of God? Are we being dreamed?

The time for has come to shape the dough into loaves: time to stand and deliver and see if I have paid enough attention to the recipe and the stillness that nourishment is possible. What a beautiful gift on this cold, rainy day.

nourishing joy...

Back in my days of charismania, my inner life was re-vitalized by a single line of scripture. In the gospel according to St. John Jesus tells his friends: "I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you and your joy may be complete." (John 15:11) There are complementary passages to this insight throughout the apostle's writing:

+ John 3: 29: He who has the bride is the bridegroom. The friend of the bridegroom, who stands and hears him, rejoices greatly at the bridegroom’s voice. For this reason my joy has been fulfilled.

+ John 16: 21: When a woman is in labor, she has pain, because her hour has come. But when her child is born, she no longer remembers the anguish because of the joy of having brought a human being into the world.

+ John 16: 24: Until now you have not asked for anything in my name. Ask and you will receive, so that your joy may be complete.

+ John 17:13: But now I am coming to you, and I speak these things in the world so that they may have my joy made complete in themselves.

+ I John 1:4: We are writing these things so that our joy may be complete

+ II John 1: 12: Although I have much to write to you, I would rather not use paper and ink; instead I hope to come to you and talk with you face to face, so that our joy may be complete.

Growing up in Protestant New England, I never heard much about joy. Or grace. I was taught that Jesus came to die for our sins. The doctrine of substitutionary atonement was never sufficiently explained to me as a child or confirmand, but I trusted that at some point the veil would be lifted and I would understand. That day never came. But when I learned - and experienced within - that grace was at the heart of Christ's ministry so that my joy might be full, I was energized. 

This joy, you see, is a living encounter with grace (charis - χάρις). Both joy in this text (chara - χαρά) and rejoice in others (chairó - χαίρω) are cognates of charis. What the core of St. John's gospel teaches about the life, death and resurrection of Jesus is much more about encountering and trusting an God's loving heart in an intimate manner much more than punishment for abstract sin. It is about a way of being in the world that is saturated and nourished by joy. Grace. Delight. Small wonder the early church called the breaking of bread and the sharing of wine eucharista: communion with the essence of gratitude and grace. 

Over time, this renewal born of joy became flesh for me in two important ways: how I experienced Jesus in our celebrations of Holy Communion; and, how I looked for the presence of Jesus in my ordinary life. Fr. Richard Rohr notes that putting on the mind of Jesus is not about being brain washed by abstract dogma
but rather learning to look for signs of the holy in our ordinary experiences.

For me, that makes every day an adventure in joy and compassion. It also helps me know when I am out of balance, too. If I cannot delight in the sounds of children laughing with loved ones, then something's wrong. If my heart is not opened in tenderness when the old woman in a wheel chair asks me to reach for a jar on a shelf at Wal-Mart that she can't quite grasp, I need to regroup. If my soul is not assaulted in solidarity when sisters or brothers are attacked because of who they love, I am not allied with Jesus. If my creative mind cannot search out the hidden clues of the sacred in TV programs like "Breaking Bad" or "The Sopranos" then I need more quiet prayer. And if my ears are unable to hear the words of the prophets in songs by Springsteen, Carrie Newcomer or Pharrell, then I am a drag and too full of myself.

I think the wild man, St. Francis, got it right: "Always look for signs of Christ's cross as you walk about each day. They are everywhere for those with eyes to see." Here's one of my favorites...

"I have come so that my joy may be in you, and your joy may be full." Full in this text might better be translated from Greek as complete (pléroó /ληρόω). My experience is that Jesus embraces us so that we might ripen and mature in God's grace and become complete people of joy in the world. In this, a poem I just read by Mary Howe sounds like a word of encouragement from the heart of creation:  My Dead Friends.

I have begun,when I'm weary and can't decide an answer to a bewildering question

to ask my dead friends for their opinion
and the answer is often immediate and clear.

Should I take the job? Move to the city? Should I try to conceive a child
in my middle age?

They stand in unison shaking their heads and smiling—whatever leads
to joy, they always answer,

to more life and less worry. I look into the vase where Billy's ashes were —
it's green in there, a green vase,

and I ask Billy if I should return the difficult phone call, and he says, yes.
Billy's already gone through the frightening door,

whatever he says I'll do.

what a long, strange trip its been...

One of the deep joys of the past four years has been living more deeply into a new ministry that is shaped by the "road less traveled." I thought it was going to be retirement, but it is really a ministry of presence and tenderness. Professionally this called for a narrowing of my focus: outwardly I had to (mostly) give up needing public recognition, opt out of the soul-draining struggles for institutional survival, quit the relentless internal squabbles over how to share limited resources, unplug from the official and public manifestations of being clergy and simply try to "love the folk." And by the folk I mean whoever shows up: in worship, in community, beyond community, member, stranger as well as those who are sometimes against community. 

I can see now that what I thought began four years ago was really the clarifying of a decades long conversation with God calling me into a ministry of presence. For years too often I feared that I was too insecure to fully follow this invitation. Personally, you see, I had not yet come to honor the holiness of being small. And because there are so few incentives within either the traditional local congregation or the wider church for embracing a radical spiritual solidarity, I spent 25 years questioning the authenticity of my call. Upon reading these words from Henri Nouwen, however, I realized that I am just a very slow learner and God was simply taking her time until I was ready:

I don’t think you’ll ever be able to penetrate the mystery of God’s revelation in Jesus until it strikes you that the major part of Jesus’ life was hidden and that even the “public” years remained invisible as far as most people were concerned. Whereas the way of the world is to insist on publicity, celebrity, popularity, and getting maximum exposure, God prefers to work in secret. You must let that mystery of God’s secrecy, God’s anonymity, sink deeply into your consciousness because otherwise you’re continually looking at it from the wrong point of view. In God’s sight the things that really matter seldom take place in public ... maybe, while we focus our whole attention on the VIPs and their movements, on peace conferences and protest demonstrations, it’s the totally unknown people, praying and working in silence, who make God save us yet again from destruction.

Fr. Richard Rohr often says: "Before the truth sets you free, it tends to make you miserable." That was true in spades for me. There were times of deep joy, too but also profound anxiety. So pay attention to those feelings: pay attention to your grief, your fears. your shame and your suffering. Don't self-medicate with alcohol, food, sex or drugs. Don't distract yourself with work or acts of public busyness either. Fr. Thomas Merton used to say that many of us "will spend our whole life climbing up the ladder of success only to find that when we get to the top our ladder is leaning against the wrong wall." 

Back in my Cleveland days, when I began to sense a change of direction within, I buried a beloved public school teacher, musician and athlete. He was a well known public servant with a tireless compassion for his students. His public life was exemplary - and our sanctuary was packed full with students of every race, creed and color on the day of his funeral. A few weeks after his funeral, I took a call from a woman who was unknown to me. She confessed that she had been my friend's long time on again/off again lover. After thanking me for the liturgy, the tears and the kind words, she said something I will never forget: "You know, he was never satisfied. He kept doing things for kids and the wider community, spending thousands of dollars and hours every year, and people loved him for it. But when each act was over he would come home in a rage saying, 'Nobody  truly appreciates me! They don't know half of what I am doing for them! And how much it costs me!' After fuming for a few hours, he would then resolve to try something bigger and better in the expectation that THEN others might finally give him the love and propers he duly deserved." It was a chilling confession.

Very few people knew that this beloved servant ached inside with an unquenchable private loneliness. He had no real family and few trusted friends. When an operation to reverse a previous surgery was required, there was no one to clean his wounds after he returned home. Casually I told him that, "If we can't come up with somebody from church to help, I will do it." I had no idea that I would have deliver on that promise. But I did - and every morning and evening for the next six weeks I showed up to pull out of his abdomen the bloody gauze, clean out his two inch deep wound, repack it, redressing it and then empty his commode. It was an education beyond anything I had learned in seminary. Truth be told, for the first week I fought back nausea and fear every time I visited. Over time, with lots of conversation and a mutual movement from a stifling embarrassment to something more like humility and trust, we got the job done and I kept my cookies down.

Two years later, something went drastically wrong and he was hospitalized yet again. I had no hesitation spending hours alone with him as he fought a fever or recovered from yet another surgery. And then, suddenly, he died with blood seeping out of his pores. It was just we two in a cold hospital room. Alone. Afraid. And, as I later learned, resentful as well. Talk about finding out that your ladder was up against the wrong wall! 

In the aftermath of her confession, I started to sense that God's call for my life in ministry was changing. Over the next 24 years I incrementally came to trust that God knows more about ministry than me - and I was ready to step out in faith in new ways. I still get it wrong at least as many times as I get it right, but as Richard Rohr writes in Falling Upward:

One of the great surprises is that humans come to full consciousness precisely by shadowboxing, facing their own contradictions, and making friends with their own mistakes and failings. People who have had no inner struggles are invariably both superficial and uninteresting. We tend to endure them more than communicate with them, because they have little to communicate... There must be, and, if we are honest, there always will be at least one situation in our lives that we cannot fix, control, explain, change, or even understand. For Jesus and his followers, the crucifixion became the dramatic symbol of that necessary and absurd stumbling stone.

This morning, after waking up our sleepy dog, Lucie, with her morning ear rubs and time on my lap - and sitting silently for a spell with my tea - the words of Jean Vanier of L'Arche bubbled up within: "The second call comes later, when we accept that we cannot do big or heroic things for Jesus; it is a time of renunciation, humiliation and humility. We feel useless; we are no longer appreciated. If the first passage is made at high noon, under a shining sun, the second call is often made at night. We feel alone and are afraid because we are in a world of confusion." (Community and Growth) I tried to say much the same thing in different groove with a song I call, "Small is Holy," It is my attempt to clarify the core of this second call. 

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

Hold it close don't turn away make room for what is 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.

I been bullied, I been screwed, lost a lot and won a few

Paid it forward, took it back, made good money, got the sack

Hurt those who are dear to me, broke their hearts most thoroughly

Been forgiven, don't know why, grace trumps karma every time.

the spirituality of early spring is grand but never pretty...

This week will be given to small tasks: grocery shopping, bread baking, clearing  the land of a hard winter's detritus, putting books away in my study, walking the dog, breaking bread with old friends, and reading. Lots and lots of reading. After a full week of stomach flu, this place is a wreck. Yesterday was given fully to cleaning bathrooms and then vacuuming and scouring the kitchen. The rest of March must now go towards: a front yard still saturated from the ice of January; the wide flat land in the back that is littered with twigs and branches; and the bramble and grape leaves in the wetlands that must be cut back lest they devour us all. I can make a real dent on this mess if the weather cooperates. Sun is in the forecast till Friday, so we'll see.

Over the past year, I have been "beholding" what God is already doing in my life. I have also been reacquainting myself with the spirituality of the seasons. A trusted guide in this process has been the written reflections of Parker Palmer who writes:

Before spring becomes beautiful, it is plug ugly, nothing but mud and muck. I have walked in the early spring through fields that will suck your boots off, a world so wet and woeful it makes you yearn for the return of ice. But in that muddy mess, the conditions for rebirth are being created. bI love the fact that the word “humus”–the decayed vegetable matter that feeds the roots of plants–comes from the same word root that gives rise to the word “humility.” It is a blessed etymology. It helps me understand that the humiliating events of life, the events that leave “mud on my face” or that “make my name mud,” may create the fertile soil in which something new can grow. (See

https://fetzer.org/blog/enter-spring-parker-palmer-muses-season)

Walking through the fields yesterday with Lucie reminded me of the wisdom of Palmer's words. It was on full display. Besides a massive crop of mud arising all around me, it was full of garbage, dog shit and all manner of unrecognizable debris. Part of the work of this season in these parts, you see, is making peace with the mess. Not ignoring it, not letting it overwhelm me, but never being shocked that it is real. Good boots, old clothes, tick repellent, and strong work gloves make a huge difference when added to time on task and quiet patience. Tending to the humus can be gratifying - in a humble way - if it is honored with a commitment to incremental transformation. 

A lot can be accomplished in a few hours every day out in the muck, but you have to be prepared for slow change. Early spring can be grand, but around here, it never starts out pretty. Some 25 years ago I told a friend, "This Lent I want to fast and study. I want to be open to the bold grace of Jesus." He smiled and then said: "How about you just light a candle every morning and share a quiet prayer? That is something you can accomplish. Why set yourself up for disappointment." He was so wise.

So without stretching the connection too far, I think that the wisdom of the land in early spring yearns to inform how I move through Lent. There is truly not a lot I can do about most things whether that's the current assault on Gaza by Israel, the devastation in Zimbabwe after the storms, or the weaponization of the news by the current regime. Yes, I can make a few changes: I can publicize the atrocities while calling for accountability, make modest contributions from time to time, and be in contact with my legislators. I can be prayerful as well. 

Of equal importance, however, is tending to the muck that is closest to me. Jean Vanier of L'Arche wisely tells us:

We need each other. We need places of belonging. Hidden in our hearts is the God of compassion, the God of forgiveness, the God of peace. In Calcutta we have communities where Muslims, Hindus and Christians live together. In other areas of Calcutta, on one side there is a Muslim community, on the other a Christian community, with all the tensions you can imagine. We cannot resolve the problems of Northern Ireland, Calcutta, between Israel and Palestine. We cannot resolve the problems of Haiti and the problems in some parts of South America. But what we can do is change the world - one heart at a time.

The work of early spring teaches me to go slow: be prepared for lots of muss and fuss. At the same time, practice savoring the incremental new life that is gradually arising from the mire. A crocus is peeking out here. A daffodil is trying to stand up under a pile of leaves. Small acts of tenderness or a kind word shared with the old woman at Wal-Mart opens both of our hearts to the taste of trust right here and right now. Henri Nouwen puts the life of Jesus into the context of Lent like this:

Again and again you see how Jesus opts for what is small, hidden, and poor, and accordingly declines to wield influence. His many miracles always serve to express his profound compassion with suffering humanity; never are they attempts to call attention to himself. As a rule, he even forbids those he has cured to talk to others about it. And as Jesus’ life continues to unfold, he becomes increasingly aware that he has been called to fulfill his vocation in suffering and death. In all of this, it becomes plain to us that God has willed to show his love for the world by descending more and more deeply into human frailty.

So, let's see: there's a ton of work to be done today. And all week. There's some bread to be baked, too.

greater love has no one than this: mister rogers and lent

There is one more Fred Rogers story I want to reflect upon during Lent: the unique and transformative relationship between Rogers and Francois Clemmons. Clemmons became the first African American "to appear in a recurring role on a children's TV series" after Rogers recruited him for the Neighborhood in 1968. The story goes that after Rogers heard Clemmons sing in worship shortly after the assassination of Dr. MLK, he asked if Clemmons might be willing to join his ensemble as a police officer. 

Clemmons told Story Corp interviewer Karl Lindholm in 2016 that... at first (he) was reluctant to take the role of a police officer: 'I grew up in the ghetto. I did not have a positive opinion of police officers. Police- men were siccing police dogs and water hoses on people. And I had a really hard time putting myself in that role..." But in due course, this accomplished artist with music degrees from Oberlin and Carnegie Mellon changed his mind. (Maxwell King, The Good Neighbor, pp. 205-6)

On the first anniversary of Dr. King's assassination Mr. Rogers invited Officer Clemmons to take a break from keeping the neighborhood safe: won't you come and sit with me and rest your feet with mine in my wading pool? "The icon Fred Rogers not only was showing my brown skin in the tub with his white skin," Clemmons said, "but as I was getting out of that tub, he was helping me dry my feet." (pl 206) 

When I read this all I could see was the foot washing ceremonies of Holy/ Maundy Thursday. "A new commandment I give to you," Jesus told his disciples before supper, "love one another as I have loved you." And there could be no ambiguity about what Jesus-love looked like as the Master had just knelt at the feet of his students and friends and washed away the filth of the road. He had taken on the role of servant - an embodied great reversal - saying when he was done: Do this in remembrance of me. Being the faithful, creative and prayerful man that he was, Rogers had to have had the foot washing ceremony of Jesus in mind as he commemorated the legacy and love of MLK. What better gift to the world than to see two men of different races being tender and vulnerable with one another?

But the story isn't over. In time, Clemmons came out as a gay man. Rogers was his advocate. Not only did he encourage Clemmons to advance his career in music, but also served as a confidant when the singer/actor needed to end his marriage.  At first, Rogers urged discretion. He was certain that coming out would hurt his public life. Later, however, "he revised his counsel to his younger friend... and after Stonewall Rogers urged Clemmons" to be true to himself and "enter into a long-term, stable gay relationship. (Mr. Rogers) always welcomed Clemmons's gay friends whenever they visited the television set in Pittsburgh." (p. 207)

This underscored the significance of another element of the (second) 'wading pool' episode in 1993, which reprised the 1969 original. At the end of the episode, when Mister Rogers takes his sneakers off and hangs up his sweater, as usual, he says: "You make every day a special day just by being you - and I like you just the way you are." Clemmons looked over at Rogers as he said it... As Rogers walked over, Clemmons asked: "Fred were you talking to me?" And Mr. Rogers replied: "Yes, I have been talking to you for years. But you heard me today." (p. 207)

Softly and tenderly Rogers embraced and affirmed his friend. He was not flashy nor obtrusive. There was nothing in this sharing that was self-serving. Rather, it was a small act of compassionate solidarity - and it helped strengthen both men. In a lecture Rogers once said, "When I was a boy I used to think that strong meant having big muscles, great physical power, but the longer I live, the more I realize that real strength has much more to do with what is not seen. Real strength has to do with helping others." (p. 323) I cannot help but think of how Jesus put it in St. John's gospel:

As the Father has loved me, so I have loved you; abide in my love. If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commandments and abide in his love. I have said these things to you so that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be complete. This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. No one has greater love than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends. (John 15: 9-13)

I cherish the quiet, small and often unassuming way Fred Rogers shared the love of God with those who were closest to him - and went on to model this love for a broken nation, too. It is my Lenten prayer that I might draw a little closer to this love today.

credits:

+ Copyright:© FixedGearNYC - http://www.redbubble.com/people/fixedgearny
+ https://vitabrevis.americanancestors.org/2018/03/skipped-out/