A Poem for Thanksgiving

Here's a fun fact: The word "eucharist" means "thanksgiving." So, in a sense, giving thanks is a sacramental act; it makes one aware of the ways in which grace emerges in everyday, common life. Lately I haven't been very grateful, especially toward friends and family. I've been so consumed with work and the immediate goings on of this community in Minnesota that I've neglected them, and in so doing have not mirrored back to them their love and commitment. I haven't "broken bread", so to speak, with a lot of them in a long time. So, besides my renewed efforts to maintain relationships, this poem is for them.

Eucharist

So, this is what it feels like to have eaten one's fill and to be aching in hunger
For the bread of life? Broken open and shared across miles and months.
A hand stretched from eternity, offering a loaf of dark, Jewish rye, even.

God help me, so that I might just gather up small crumbs of grace
Holding them on my tongue, pungent and present.

Community

The other day, I blogged for the first time since I've started my year of service with Lutheran Volunteer Corps. To give an overview of some of my experiences so far, I thought I'd use LVC's core values as a framework: intentional community, social justice, and simplicity and sustainability. This post is about the first of those core values.

Those who take refuge in community while fleeing from themselves are misusing it to indulge in empty talk and distraction, no matter how spiritual this idle talk and distraction may appear. In reality, they are not seeking community at all, but only a thrill that will allow them to forget their isolation for a short time. It is precisely this misuse of community that creates the deadly isolation of human beings. Such attempts to find healing result in the undermining of speech and all genuine experience and, finally, resignation and spiritual death. "Whoever cannot be alone should beware of community." Such people will only do harm to themselves and to the community.... But the reverse is also true. "Whoever cannot stand being in community should beware of being alone." --Dietrich Bonhoeffer, "Life Together"

I live with five amazing people and a rescued stray cat in a 99-year-old house. The past two weeks have been idyllic: together we've eaten dinner, made raspberry jam, explored the city, planted a garden, played board games. Recently we celebrated our housemate's birthday by putting silly signs all over the house for her to find (The toilet flushes, "Happy Birthday, Michelle!"). Since this is the first year an LVC group has lived in the Powderhorn Park neighborhood, we have been given the charge to name our house for future generations. We've narrowed it down to five potential names, and while we won't make a decision for at least another week or two I' can tell you that "Wellstone Ho use" is looking like a pretty good possibility (named after the late Senator Paul Wellstone and his wife Sheila, who championed progressive change in Minnesota and were very connected to the communities they served). All in all, these people are marvelous; they are sources of joy.

The Bonhoeffer quote above is in good, if dislocating, conversation with this experience. With such creative, nice people, I should not be surprised to find myself taking refuge in community and fleeing from myself. When I first heard these words from "Life Together" during orientation, they echoed loudly around the barren space that I've been carrying inside of me for a while. That part of me where vitality has a difficult time taking root, a part of me that is in dire need of greening by the Spirit. I've written about this barrenness in previous posts, and recently it's been emerging in similar fashions. I've been harboring resentment-- sometimes without realizing, even-- which has been making me tired, distracted, and feeling as though I am less-than. I still have yet to unpack my room; something seems to be holding me back. But I need to: in this one, tiny instance I need to stir up some creative love in my life-- or invite some in-- and transform the imposing brown wallpaper of my attic room, or else I will suffocate in the place where I am supposed to be able to be alone and in peace. I look at some of my housemates' rooms, and they are bursting with personality, memory, meaning. I hear Bonhoeffer's words and fear the entropy that will leek into this community like radiation, and the need to resist becomes more pressing.

I also need to reach out-- not necessarily to these people whom I have only known for three weeks, but to friends from the East Coast. I'm in love with Minnesota, home of the "All the Milk You Can Drink for a Dollar" deal at the State Fair and of coffee-flavored beer from Surly Brewing Company. But this past week has been peppered with missing folks something awful. Last night I had a dream in which I went to a big party and saw a whole host of people from college, and when I woke up I wondered whether I will ever see some of those people again. It was surreal and sad. All this week I've had similar experiences, and I'll think of the person in Virginia or Pennsylvania who would relate. Frankly at this point in time I don't feel comfortable unloading to my housemates, in spite of their being creative and compassion people. Thus, to sustain my spirit and to hold up my end of the friendship deal, I need to make some phone calls and write some letters.

Because she's been providing some wisdom and solace lately, I'll leave you with some Mary Oliver. A couple of my housemates have a real passion for Mary Oliver's poetry, which I can appreciate. This is poem is "Wild Geese."

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting--
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.

Amen.

Reporting from Minnesota

Has it really been three weeks since I've been living and breathing and sleeping in the rhythms of Lutheran Volunteer Corps? Have I really been living in Minnesota for only two weeks?

Holy crap. But "Holy crap" in the best possible sense.

For folks who might be confused or in need of an update, I've recently begun a year of service with Lutheran Volunteer Corps, working at an agency that prepares and deliverse meals to people living with chronic illnesses, most of which are people living with HIV/AIDS. After a marvelous, life-giving week of orientation in Washington, D.C., I hopped on a train for the Twin Cities and arrived late on a Sunday night two weeks ago. Because our house doesn't have reliable Internet access, I haven't invested the effort into updating this blog. That changes today.

To give you all a decent overview of my life in the heartland of Lutheranism so far, I'll be writing the next few installments along the lines of LVC's core values: intentional community, social justice, and simplicity and sustainability.

Thousand Red Birds

While sorting through all of the crap I have in boxes, I found this poem-prayer, Thousand red birds, by Phil Porter written on the back of a notebook from last semester. I thought I would share.

Thousand Red Birds

We clutch our tiny bits of faith in tight fists.

Shoved firmly in our pockets.

We clutch it suspiciously, so unwilling to let it go—

we don't want to lose it.

We clutch it fearing that once it is spent,

we will be without hope,

cast adrift, out of luck.

Help us loosen our grip.

Help us to pull our hands out of our pockets.

Help us to uncurl fingers stiffened over time.

to grow,

to shimmer,

to pulse,

to explode into the air

like a thousand red birds.

The crazy

Over the last week I've become more aware of something that I've simply been calling "the crazy." I know that it's an indelicate way to talk about mental health, my own or others'. But in conversations with friends lately, "the crazy" seems an apt label for those compulsive, irrational, anxious, even destructive thoughts. I don't know how to use it in a sentence, exactly. Do I catch the crazy? Does it latch onto me? Is it more about the crazy within speaking up and drowning out those better parts of me that want to see the good others and myself? Or is it merely the product of being in a messed up situation/a broken world? I don't know.

What I do know is that lately I've stumbled into periods in which I'm gripped by a terrible blinding resentment, when I fixate on the inevitably dismissive/contemptuous/resentful/spiteful conversation about to take place or event about to occur. Like in Union station, coming back from a fantastic visit with friends in Philadelphia, wondering whether the folks with whom I'm staying would be angry that I missed the regional train that goes right by their house. And, of course, this wouldn't be the case-- they even said that they wouldn't mind picking me up from the metro station before I left. But the crazy had grapped ahold of me and I had to sit in a stall in the men's restroom to calm down enough to think through what was going on inside of my brain and my heart.

And then, when I was sitting on the Metro, having called and confirmed that I would be at the Springfield/Franconia metro station, I got this terrible tightness in my chest and the waves of self-resentment started. That's how it seems to go with me: All of the pent-up anger towards others flows out first, and then like the tide it rushes back over me so that I'm angry at myself for letting myself get so goddamn crazy. And then I start analyzing all of my mistakes, all of the ways in which I miss the mark. Sitting on the train, slumped in the seat, my heart was aching and I realized that I wasn't breathing.

These days I try to ride out the waves of crazy, knowing (having faith, perhaps) that they will eventually subside-- either my episodes or those of the people around me. Part of the riding out means changing my situation in the ways that I can, and so I pulled out the book I was reading by Anne Lamott and flipped through to find the story about stumbling our way towards grace. I mean, all of them are like that, but I found that one that I was thinking about in particular ("The Muddling Glory of God"). "That's me, trying to make any progress at all with family, in work, relationships, self-image: scootch, scootch, stall; scootch, stall, catastrophic reversal; bog, bog, scootch." I would read some Anne Lamott, and then take big, gulping breaths of air-- enough air to remind me that I wasn't drowning (physically, at least) and enough air to undo some of the tightness in my chest. Breathing out was accompanied by this relieved chuckle-- "ha ha ha, isn't this ridiculous? But I'm soooo glad that I'm breathing again, so I might as well laugh a little."

I'm trying to eat healthier and got more rest (uh huh...), and I know that I should be making time for exercise and prayer. Maybe that would create some room for the Spirit to enter and sweep some of the crazy out of my head and my heart. Or maybe Spirit would come in with some all-purpose cleaner and clean up the shit that is stinking up the corners of my brain, along with the craziness that might be festering in that shit.

So that is what is on my mind. Only a couple weeks left before my Lutheran Volunteer Corps housemates will meet me and we'll determine how each of us is doing with that wrestling match between our selves and our craziness. Hopefully they won't mind my brokenness. Maybe good vegetarian cooking will make up for it. Oh, and grace. Somehow, grace will probably arrive on the scene, even if it's less than spectacular and more bog, bog, scootch.

[Creative commons photograph from coincoyote]

Context Matters, Part 1

In the last week I've had two experiences that re-affirm my commitment to paying attention to how social systems influence my understandings and assumptions. They were unsettling and thought-provoking, and I am curious if others can locate themselves in similar situations.

The first experience happened within a conversation I was having with a self-described "radical non-denominational Christian" friend on our way home from visiting her church. Emerging out our (admittedly uncomfortable) conversation about race and access to the Abrahamic covenant, I had a startling realization. My friend, who is mostly Malay, was sharing with me her perception of being racially excluded from the covenantal grace extended to the biblical/mythic figure Abraham and his descendants (à la Genesis 17-- a perception that seems to me to flow out of Christian discourse than to be a view held by the vast majority religious Jews). As I was responding with what it meant to me-- someone of Anglo-European descent-- to identify Abraham as my spiritual ancestor I suddenly wondered how much this identification had to do with me being white.

And by invoking my whiteness what I am really invoking is white privilege.

White privilege means that “white” is defined as “normal.” Being white in the U.S. means that I don't have to think about my race or my ethnicity. Some white people even experience a sense of not having a race or ethnicity due to the way that whiteness is portrayed as normative. (See this intriguing article by Ashley Doane for a deeper exploration of this.) Because I come from this context in which whiteness is the racial standard against which all other people are held I wonder if that extends to the way that I easily see myself connected to the Abrahamic covenant. I wonder if this connection has less to do with some rationale provided by the Apostle Paul regarding heritage-through-faith (see Galatians 3:6-9), but because I assume that my race-less-ness allows me to transcend the racial boundaries that my Malay-American friend sees.

Additionally, I realized that the Sunday school image of Abraham and Sarah as an elderly white couple is still present in my mind, even though there is little chance that these two Middle Eastern nomads look much like my Northern European-heritage grandparents. This rocked me, since of late I have been getting antsy with idea of reading our modern assumptions about religion and race into Jesus, who was not a Christian and who certainly was not white. I find that by emphasizing Jesus’ Palestinian ethnicity and Jewish religious identity I can resist falling into the trap that I “know” Jesus—i.e. his cultural and religious sensibilities are like mine. In the same way, the conversation I had with my friend makes me think about the ways I kid myself by thinking that I “know” Abraham.

What are other folks’ experiences? How else does white privilege blind us? What are the ways that we’ve suddenly become aware of how racism affects the texts and issues we care about?

Good times at Orientation

I'm sitting at my desk in Thompson Hall 233, with a new student on her laptop listening to her iPod sitting across from me. She's waiting for her friend, also a new student, who is taking the French placement test on a computer across the hall. I'm glad for the quiet, since there have already been six other students taking placement tests today, some with anxious, over-involved parents in tow.

Yep, it's that time of year: Orientation.

And I have to admit it: as tired as I am by the end of my shift, and as cheesy as this probably sounds, I love this season.

I love beginnings. There is openness, promise, possibility. I love being a part of that for people.

Yes, helicopter parents are annoying. Some even piss me off when they answer for their student, incorporating their student's success into their own self-image. But even in the midst of that I love how I get to look their student in the eye and talk to them like an adult. Like they're able to make their own decisions. Because that’s part of what college is about: for better, or sometimes for worse, we learn how to make our own decisions. Let me tell you: interrupting parental control dynamics can feel great.

A lot of memories from my freshman orientation are coming up, stories that I can tell the anxious parents in the office waiting for their daughter or son. Stories about how hectic my orientation was and how in hindsight it's better to take care of ourselves than to stress out ourselves and our loved ones. Stories about how my parents were baffled by the notion of a Parent and Family Orientation, that when they were my age they just showed up on the first day of classes and winged it.

And a lot of memories from my summer as an Orientation Leader (as in, old-school Patriot Leader, circa 2006) wash over me, too. I remember helping people register for classes, especially that one girl who was the last person left in the room, who just needed to hear that it wasn’t the end of the world that so many sections were closed and that she could change things later at home. I remember proctoring the math placement test and telling students once they had finished the exam, "Go do something fun.” Because I sit at a desk in an academic department—and because I give people the time of day—I’m answering a lot of the same questions that people directed at me when I wore the green polo, and it feels good to be helpful in such a rudimentary way.

(Also, who could forget the interpretive dance about drugs and alcohol set to Bonnie Tyler's "Total Ecplipse of the Heart"? That right there is orientation gold.)

It also feels a little weird. I’m the guy at the desk. I’m not there to project my experiences on people; I’m there to explain the Spanish placement test for the billionth time. I’m not there to comfort parents; I’m there to make sure that they don’t walk into the freaking testing area (“Sir? SIR! CAN I HELP YOU???”). And I’m well aware that I’m on my way out, and that my job is to get myself to Minnesota in one piece, and that these folks are going to have their own experiences and make their own choices. So maybe it helps if I’m not a total jerk. But no one is going to remember me fondly (hell, the people in my small group probably don’t remember me). (Tangentially, I ended up living with my OL for the summer, years after my freshman orientation. Weird…)

At least these folks are taking the placement test now, when they’ve retained a little more French, than in the summer before their senior year. Really, if you need to take the test, just do it. Call me or one of my good looking co-workers at 703-993-1220. Peace.

OFPS 2006! I can't believe I found this picture! From left to right there are: me, Scott Picone, Byron Edwards, Javon Thompson (even though you can't see his face, I'm pretty sure it's him), Marc Moore, and Matt Berlejung. HT to Monica Block for taking the photo, and to the Mason Gazette for keeping it floating around the Internet.

It matters so very much

[Creative commons image courtesy of freefotouk. Communion elements from this year's Baptist Assembly in the UK.]

Last night I read Nadia Bolz-Weber's (aka The Sarcastic Lutheran) blog post about "taking the Eucharist to Denver International Airport at 10pm on a Wednesday" and felt an urgent need to respond. Here i s what came from that.

So, here's the gist of the story: One of the fabulous folks from House for All Sinners and Saints, an emerging Lutheran church in Denver, was denied the sacrament of communion in her parents' church, so other HFASS-ers met her at the airport with the bread and cup. For them, it was of utmost importance to be at the Denver International Airport late on a Wednesday night and offer the gifts of God to their sister, reminding her of the wideness of God's welcome, of the depths of God's love, and of the presence of God as close as food on her tongue.

"This is how they will know that you are my disciples: that you take my body and bloody to their airport," Nadia wrote. "Amen?"

Amen! I thought. Because for me and for so many people communion matters so very much.

Why? Because for almost every Wednesday for a semester, the experience of receiving communion brought a good friend to tears, having been denied the sacrament her entire life. Since she refused to participate in the political games around baptism, which too many times designates "insiders" and "outsiders," she had never been welcomed to the table.* And now here in a small gathering of students were people offering her the body and blood of Christ, the bread of life and cup of salvation. Just like that. No games. Just gifts.

Communion matters because, through text and tradition and mystery, these common elements are gifts to all people to share the reality of God's love for all people.

ALL people. The REALITY of God's love for ALL people.

Now, I'm not talking about some hippy-dippy fantasy where God is the dispenser of saccharine smiles and pats on the head. And I am so not talking about the fantasy where God "loves" people on the condition that they change who they are to behave and look like, say, White Anglo-Saxon Protestants. Or, those who believe in "family values." Or, heterosexuals folks. Oh, hell no!

No, I'm talking about the wild, crazy, grace-filled REALITY of God feeding broken, imperfect, beautiful people who are made in the image of God. I'm talking about the vibrant imagery through which text and tradition and mystery portray God's promises of new life and freedom from oppression: imagery like a table weighed down with a banquet set for the entire human family; a table of friends celebrating the feast of liberation, even as betrayal and state-sanctioned murder are immanent; of a body broken like bread, in need of healing.

ALL people, not just the ones with a "stamp of approval," either from me or the Church or even God-- because the immeasurable favor of God that is present in the death and life of Christ is so much deeper and better, assuring us of God's love and demanding us to be accountable to our participation in ways of injustice and violence. When the Ethiopian Eunuch in Acts says to Philip "Look, here is water! What is to prevent me from being baptized?" the intent is to joyfully make known the reality of God's loving action--God's allying with humanity-- through Jesus, not to seek approval or sanctioning or "fire insurance."

And how much more grace-filled could this image be: broken and beautiful people offering God's gifts to their sisters and brothers, siblings of every racial make-up and ethnicity, of every language and immigration status, of every gender identity and expression, of every sexual orientation (or asexual orientation!), of every physical size and shape and ability, of every degree of faith-- faith in Christ or faith in something else that brings them to the table hungry. How grace-filled, that broken people can be part of the giving of God's love, in an airport or in a college cafeteria, or in a rented multipurpose room-turned-sanctuary, or in a coffee house.

Thanks be to God.

For another response to Nadia's blog post, check out the poem another HFASS-er wrote.

[A creative commons image courtesy of six million dollar dan. I wish I saw peanut butter portraits of Jesus more often.]

*A note: Just because communion is out-of-this-world-yet-totally-IN-this world beautiful doesn't mean that there aren't hang-ups. My same friend who cried still chooses not to take communion in churches where the only fruit of the vine is alcoholic wine (we use non-alcoholic wine in our worship services on campus) or when only "the baptized" are invited to partake. I realize that these two things are very precious for many people living as faithfully as possible to their experiences of God in text and tradition and mystery. But I don't pretend to understand why. If anyone would like to articulate why this is true for them, please do. Grace and peace and thanks.

Something gracious

[creative commons image from Ottoman42]

Alternative title: Oh shit... (grace)

(I accidentally hit "publish" before changing the title, but both apply, really.)

A week ago I helped out with worship at a conference that the Metro DC Synod of the ELCA was putting on for ministry among young adults (check out their website here-- it looks pretty good). Once again, my anxieties about "church people" were eased by really engaged, thoughtful, nice people (what a concept... I probably need to start making that my expectation). The worship was shaped around the Pentecost experience of the Spirit breaking in on the scene and messing us up in all of the good ways: joining our perfectly comfortable (if complacent) dry bones into one crazy, beautiful, living body; breathing in new ideas about worship and leadership; and "renewing the face of creation"-- always creating, re-creating, making sure that apathy and entropy don't have the last word.

A lot of really great things happened, some very beautiful. A pastor who has been without a job for a while read the story of Ezekiel prophesying new life to dry bones with such magnificent weight to her voice. During prayer, a man gave thanks for the diversity of the church, and for a few moments I was sure that I would start crying. As we received communion there wasn't any music; instead, the walls resounded with the soft, holy murmur of "The body of Christ, broken for you" and "The blood of Christ, shed for you." At one point we even re-wrote Psalm 104:24-35b and volunteers came up for each verse so that our re-reading was a crazy-quilt of folks striving to keep the faith. (Mine is below.)

I still have a lot of doubts about whether or not I belong in the Lutheran Church-- whether I could ever get used to conservative worship, whether I would need to throw out the insights from my Presbyterian Book of Confessions and claim to believe a single word of the Athanasian Creed. And, of course, I shouldn't kid myself-- the ELCA is most likely going to split over human sexuality soon, and it has the same problems of the other mainline churches: decreasing financial security, traditionalism, and trouble reaching out to young adults. But then again, last Saturday I brushed shoulders with people that have a yearning to follow the leadings of the Spirit, wild and free and wise-- the same Spirit who, as Peter in Acts quotes from the prophet Joel, is poured out on both old and young alike.

If anyone's interested, DC Young Adults is having a Happy Hour on Monday discussing one of Luther's favorite pickles: Law and Gospel. Some folks from Mason and I are going, and if you're in the area it would great to see you there, too. Details and such can be found at the facebook event.

Here's my re-write of psalm 104:24-35b. You can find another version, as well as another reflection of the conference, at Ben Buss' blog: A Musing Revolutheran.

²⁴ Looking around me, God, the world is full of wonders that you have made, and the crazy thing is that all of these people around me and all of the geological features and the animals and the oceans—All of them—are in tune to your deep Wisdom. Every one of them belongs.

²⁵ Wherever “over there” is, I’m blown away by the incredible diversity of life. In the ocean, in the rain forest, on a college campus—innumerable ways of living your Wisdom.

²⁶ Ships and cars travel water and road, and beyond them people run, walk, bicycle, dance, skip, and swim.

²⁷ All of this is dependent on you, your grace (whether we know it or not) preserves us and pervades us.

²⁸ And what a grace it is! Whenever I see it, your gift freely offered in laughter, in vulnerability, in courage, in celebration, I am filled to the brim with joy.

²⁹ And yet too many times your face is hidden, God. Where are you? I am dismayed at your absence in injustice, in destruction, in disease that withers the ones I love.

³⁰ Send forth your Spirit, God! Renew the whole of creation, give us all—people and animals, forests and oceans—new vitality.

³¹ So may your love and power echo throughout the universe, Oh God, you who rejoice in this festivity of wonder!

³² You, Oh God, are the One who can shift our lives as the earth shifts; our lives are not placid, but on the edge of volcanic possibilities.

³³ So, with all of this ringing in my heart and mind, I will sing to you, O God, as long as I have breath in my lungs

³⁴ May this rambling reflection please, God, for it is in the Eternal One whom I rejoice.

^35b Shout the good news of God’s covenanting love, O my soul, now and forever!

Mourning George Tiller

[Creative Commons photo from graciepoo]

I'm coming to realize more and more how central food is connected to ritual. Beyond birthday cakes and insisting on ham for Christmas (back when I still ate ham), food is necessary for healing (soup, chocolate, tea), celebrating change (french toast for Obama's inauguration) and mourning. People just keep dying, you know? When I found out that my friend Brittney committed suicide I felt compelled to do something life-affirming, and nourishing my friends and and myself with pancakes fit the bill. And today, when the murder of Dr. George Tiller took on a new weight for me, I went to work whisking up hot cocoa on the stove.

The horror of Dr. Tiller's death grew throughout the day. When I first read about it here (CNN report), I was struck by the vulnerability of being shot while serving as an usher in a church. Then the anger started to simmer, anger towards people who turn to violence in word and deed instead of dialogue-- because shooting someone is somehow better than civil discourse, individuals conversations, and arguing in a court of law. A classmate commented on my facebook status that there were protesters outside of that church every Sunday. What? Did they ever attempt dialogue? And I was reminded of a shooting last summer in which two people were killed at the Tennessee Valley Unitarian Universalist congregation, which had just put up a sign inviting LGBTQ people to worship. This is not a good trend...

Following a link that a friend had posted deepened my anger and sadness. Both the language of some of the commenters and of Dr. Leroy Carhart, a friend and colleague of Dr. Tiller, echoed with violence and extremism. For instance, one commenter wrote:

"When he stood before God at his death, he soon learned that he had made the wrong choice with his life. Now [he] is in the lake of fire for eternity with the devil and his demons. Tortured for all of eternity for the murders of innocent babies."

And, according to the article, Dr. Carhart

"calls the murder of his beloved colleague a 'terrorist' saying his friend's death is 'a declaration of war' on the part of radical anti-abortion activists whom he calls 'fundamentalist terrorists... no different from al-Qaida, the Taliban or any of them.'"

It isn't that I can't understand that there are very strong emotions attached to losing a dear friend or to those who perform partial birth abortions [correction: late term abortions]. But what rocks me is the implicit violence in their words, and how they don't seem to realize that this violence is the same. I mean, when I read their words, both say basically the same thing: that this Other person is evil, beyond any sort of redemption.

What drove me to hot cocoa, though, was when I looked at the website for Reformation Lutherans Church. I clicked around and when I wound up on the staff page, I saw that their senior pastor, Lowell Michelson, had been a student intern at the Lutheran Campus Ministry at the Ohio State University. Both of the Busses were active in LCM at OSU, so not really thinking I turned to Kriss Buss and asked her if she knew him. And then it sank in. "Lowell? Lowell Michelson?" She not only knew him from campus ministry, but she had met his family, she had held his kids. B-Buss had five of his CDs from his days with the band Echelon. Yeah, they knew him.

I'm re-reading Sara Miles' book Take This Bread, and last night--after sharing hot cocoa with Kriss, discussing a whole range of topics around violence and justice and sin and grace, and a couple rounds of MarioKart--I stumbled on one of many sparks of insight while reading before bed. Relaying the words of a bishop, Miles wrote:

"There's a hunger beyond food that's expressed in food, and that's why feeding
is always a kind of miracle."

So, I hope that the Tiller family and Lowell Michelson and the people of Reformation Lutheran Church have been surrounded by food full of love; maybe they've even been feeding each other. And I hope that the suspect, Scott Roeder, also has something to eat, maybe even offered in more parts grace than resentment or obligation. Because in lieu of everything being better, in lieu of a world where people aren't shot and where people's passion and anger can be channelled constructively and nonviolently, food is first thing I can think of that might begin to be a symbol, or even a sacrament, of healing. At least, that's what hot cocoa was for me.

If you're a person who prays, with words or meditations or cooking utensils, etc., please pray for all those caught up in this violence-- Dr. Tiller's family, the church, Scott Roeder, and anyone else who comes to mind.

I think I might be...

This is... something. Guess what Google suggests if you type "I think I might be" as your search...

Some of them make sense to me-- pregnancy, bisexuality, depression, even crazy. But, "I think I might be psychic"? Or, "I think I might be a sociopath"? Best one, though, is #9. "I don't sleep at night... pretty pale... Angel is my favorite character from Buffy... and I can't see my reflection. Good folks at Google, please help. I think I might be a vampire."

Someone has been obsessing over Twilight a little too much...

P.S. I was typing in "I think I might be Lutheran." I'm not exactly sure what that means or would mean, but I seem to be the biggest non-Lutheran fan of the ELCA around. Sure, a lot of non-Lutherans sign up with Lutheran Volunteer Corps, but how many apply to volunteer at the ELCA Youth Gathering? More thoughts on this later...

P.P.S. I don't think I blogged about my LVC placement yet. I'm going to work for Open Arms Minnesota, and it's going to be fantastic. More information from LVC is in the mail, so I'll be sure to report back with further developments (e.g. When I'm moving to Minneapolis!).

Dispatches from the end of the semester

[Photo from 2-Dog-Farm; this is what came up when I searched for "Ahhh!"]


This is the last week of classes, and I am afraid. I'm not nearly finished with everything. Even though I'm banking on somehow passing and graduating, I'm not really sure of what will happen.

So, to keep myself from despairing, here are some good things in life...

I've been accepted to the placement process for Lutheran Volunteer Corps!!! Yay!!! This is the phase of the process in which I interview
with three social justice/social service agencies and then LVC determines if I'll be placed with one of them. Here's the break-down, with blurbs from their websites (in no particular order):

• Open Arms Minnesota (Minneapolis, MN)-- "Open Arms of Minnesota offers a unique model of care for people in our community who are sick, need nutritious food, and have no where else to turn for assistance. We are the only nonprofit organization in the state that prepares and delivers free meals specifically tailored to meet the nutrition needs of individuals living with serious and life-threatening diseases. "
  
• Nativity House (Tacoma, WA)-- "Nativity House is Tacoma's only daytime drop-in shelter for the homeless. We offer a refuge from the dangers of the streets to all who come to our doors. Whether our guests need a meal, clothing, referrals to social services, or just a smile, the staff at Nativity House is there to provide it. Our mission is to create trusting relationships with our guests, so that they may be challenged to greater life."
  
• Our Savior's Housing (Minneapolis, MN)-- "Our Saviour’s Housing began as a program of Our Saviour’s Lutheran Church in south Minneapolis in the winter of 1982. The basement of the church was opened to provide a warm space for people seeking shelter from harsh weather. Today, Our Saviour’s Housing is a program of Our Saviour’s Outreach Ministries and operates two forms of housing, overnight emergency shelter and transitional housing."

I'll be finished with the interviews by May 4th, but I won't hear back from LVC until the 14th.

Here's some other random goodness that I've stumbled up recently:

I met this really neat guy on the Interwebs whom I would really like to meet in the Outerwebs (has anyone coined this yet? this could be my claim to fame!), but he isn't going to be in DC this summer because he is biking across the U.S. spreading support for Alzheimer's research. Really! He and some friends are going to be travelling to nursing homes and elderly care centers and signing for the folks with dementia there, collecting memories and wisdom in return. They're calling it The Unforgettable Journey (do you see the play on words? isn't he/aren't they brilliant?), and you can check out their website here. Seriously consider donating something to their cause; it's beautiful, but also a little crazy, and they could use all the help they can get.

Check out this post that Philip Clayton wrote for the Plurality 2.0 series that Adam Walker Cleaveland has running over at Pomomusings. Among many insightful essays, his stuck out to me. Maybe it was his grasp on how we have "interwoven identities."

I've re-discovered what a mind-blowingly fabulous cover of Jai Ho the Pussycat Dolls have done. Apparently someone else has, too, since embedding be disabled for their video on YouTube. Look at it here and dance. Seriously, dance.

I'm looking forward to the upcoming first episode of The God Complex: where fully divine runs smack dab into fully human, the internet radio show hosted by Presby rock stars/geeks Carol Howard Merritt and Bruce Reyes-Chow. Listen for it at 12 noon on May 4th. I'm a little bummed that I won't be able to listen live since I'll be in an LVC interview, but I'm looking forward to some really insightful and silly conversation about what's happening in church and society. It looks like Decently and in Order has gone fallow, so God Complex is filling a void in my life (yes, that's "a" void-- no scintillating words about faith and practice could fill the other void in my life for good Mexican food. Or the void reserved for graduating. I'm very void-ful, apparently).

Right, 4:50am. Let's spell check this and hit publish. Grace and peace and good morning, y'all!

He is going ahead of you

⁵As they entered the tomb, they saw a young man, dressed in a white robe, sitting on the right side; and they were alarmed. ⁶But he said to them, ‘Do not be alarmed; you are looking for Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has been raised; he is not here. Look, there is the place they laid him. ⁷But go, tell his disciples and Peter that he is going ahead of you to Galilee; there you will see him, just as he told you.’

Mark 16:1-7

I have good news! Which is desparately important right now, because honestly  this really hasn't been a good news semester. Acknowledging that there has been some pretty amazing opportunities to proclaim and hear good news this semster (e.g. working in Costa Rica, travelling to the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia, planning and leading worship for Pride Week, and giving hip-gyrating thanks for the drag show), I've been feeling a growing sense of ennui, even despair. It's affecting my work, my grades, my relationships, as well as my sense of wellbeing. I've felt stuck, confined in a tomb, slowly fading out from depression. And last Sunday's reminder of the glory and promise of the resurrection of Christ and of all creation wasn't a magic fix. While moments of resurrection and new life still roll away the stone, exiting the tomb is a much harder process. 

In two of the three Easter sermons I heard last Sunday (yes, it was a triathlon of worship services), the preachers used Mark's text to comment that Christ is not in the tomb, but is ahead of us in the future. "He is going ahead of you to Galilee" is Mark's way of affirming the same the truth that Matthew later made famous: "I am with you always, to the end of the age" (Matthew 17:20b). But there is a sense of urgency and motion in Mark: don't stay here, in the place of death, because Christ is alive and waiting in Galilee for us to meet him. I appreciate the kick in the butt-- that's the kind of good news that wakes me up and gives me something to hold onto, hope that isn't based on some kind of heaven but rather on doing the faithful work of Christ as God bring heaven down to earth.

So here's the really concrete good news: Today I received an email congratulating me on my acceptance to the Lutheran Volunteer Corps placement process! LVC is a national service program that works with social justice organizations by supplying them with on-year volunteers. Volunteers live simply and sustainably in community, and spend time working for peace with justice and reflecting on the intersections of ethics and spirituality and their work. They are marvelous people. For example, when I applied last month they asked me to write answers to questions such as: "What is the relationship between racism and social justice?"; "What actions will you take to build an atmosphere that is open, supportive, safe, and affirming specifically for people who are GLBT?"; and "Why does poverty exist in the United States?" I swear, I did a double take. This program could not be that awesome. Oh, but it was. And even though the application process was loooong and the phone interview an hour and a half, I had a lot of good energy around it. And now I have more.

It's simultaneously odd and comforting to feel certainty about what I will do over the next year and not about how the next month will proceed (even the next week...). I don't want to live in the future in a negative way that denies the potential of the present, of course, and I owe it to myself to do what I can to finish the semester healthy in body, mind, and spirit. Still, though, I feel as though someone has just assured me that I am not going to stay "stuck" forever, but will continue on eventually to wherever Christ has gone ahead and is doing the work of resurrection, inviting me to join.

P.S. Here's a really neat piece that Greg Carey, a New Testament professor at Lancaster Theological Seminary, posted on his excellent blog NT Geeks. I wouldn't be surprised if he wrote it himself, since he's pretty fantastic:

A hole, hewn from rock.
A hole in the heart of the world.
One empty.
The other bursting forth with life.

Amen.

You are in I-OH-WAY

[image from haanm2, from Council Bluffs, where my parents live]

"Our liberties we prize and our rights we will maintain"

~Iowa State Motto

Did you hear the news? Today, Friday, the Iowa Supreme Court ruled unanimously in favor of legalizing civil marriage for same-sex couples!

I'm a little shocked. Technically, since I'm still a dependent of my parents until I file my taxes next year, I am resident of the Hawkeye State. What does this mean? I've never thought of myself as an Iowan, but does this mean I have access to legal protection that my friends in Virginia don't have? Of course, I suppose it would only count in Iowa, Connecticut, and Massachusetts.

The thing to do now is to not let a constitutional amendment dash these new-born rights against the rocks of heterosexism (why, yes, that was a biblical allusion). Keep your eyes peeled for mention of anything like this entering the state legislature.

For more information, check out these articles on Feministing and the New York Times.

P.S. Y'all got the reference to "The Music Man," right? I can't find a video of it, or else I would post it.

Presbterian Bloggers: Why I Love (Lutheran) Campus Ministy

This post is a part of Presbyterian Bloggers Unite, a project initiated by Moderator Bruce Reyes-Chow. This month's topic is campus ministry. Next month's topic is poverty. I figure that as a Presby-in-exile I can throw in my two cents.

"Y'all see this bandana?" I hold up a rainbow, tye-dye bandana, covered in smiley-faces and peace symbols, and waive it in the direction of Ben Buss, the Lutheran Campus Minister at George Mason University. "That man over there in the green shirt gave it to me. If y'all haven't met him yet, you really should. He's a force to be reckoned with."

The reason I was embarrassing Ben in front of fifty or so people last Tuesday was that he had shown up to our Pride Week celebration of allies, and I couldn't let the opportunity to thank him (and embarrass him) pass me up. Ben Buss is the person responsible for convincing me to give campus ministry at Mason a second chance, and so he deserves a lot more thanks than that. Maybe I'll bake him a cake.

So, how did I, a cradle Presbyterian and someone for whom my Reformed identity is an important piece of my story, end up participating Lutheran Campus Ministry? I'm sure someone out there is wondering why I didn't connect with a Presbyterian church's ministry (incidentally, I frequent the pews of the Metropolitan Community Church of Northern Virginia) or even with the ecumenical Protestant ministry at Mason, for which the National Capitol Presbytery is one of its biggest sponsors. The answer is, in some ways, lies in my complicated relationship with the institutional church. In other ways, the answer is that it was incidental: I didn't connect, for whatever reasons of scheduling, interest, and experience. The fact that the PC(USA) hasn't figured out how to honor the baptisms of its LGBTQ members probably contributed, although I recognize that isn't a particularly grace-filled thing to say. That lack of recognition certainly turned me away from Campus Crusade for Christ, an organization with which I was involved for a couple of years.

I left Cru my junior year, and didn't intend to return to campus ministry. I was heavily involved in my local church, and I had made peace with the fact that seeking out Christian community at Mason was a lost cause. Besides, I found enough "beloved community" with Pride Alliance, Mason's student org that celebrates and connects with people of all genders, sexualities, orientations and expressions. I experienced-- and still do see-- my leadership and participation in Pride as my way to minister to people, creating a safe space where people can experience life abundant. As Ben Buss says, God is loose in the world, and from my vantage point the Spirit was definitely stirring up love and justice among the folks at Pride.

I met Ben almost serendipitously. We have a mutual friend, Rachael Dickson, who gave my name to Ben's wife, Kriss, so that she could contact me about a project on LGBTQ college students for one of her social work classes. In my answers to her questions, I mentioned that we didn't have any LGBTQ-affirming ministry on campus besides the witness of the good people at Hillel, and she had me meet Ben. At that time, January 2008, Ben was leading a discussion group on Fridays using "The Gospel according to the Simpsons," and even though I went once or twice I didn't really think of Lutheran Campus Ministry as part of my life. Then, in March, Ben sent me a message that went something like this: "We're registering to be a Reconciling In Christ organization [which in the Lutheran church family is their LGBTQ-affirming program], and I was wondering if you could give me some feedback about this affirmation of welcome I wrote."

After that it wasn't hard for Ben to convince me to join the planning team for a weekly creative worship service. All he had to do was ask.

The creative Christian worship services-- dubbed 747 because of their time slot, 7:47pm on Wednesdays-- are a collaboration between Lutheran Campus Ministry and United College Ministries, the ecumenical Protestant group, which sometimes makes me shake my head in bemusement. Here I am: a Presby-in-exile, who attends an MCC and is working with and loving Lutherans, in contact with Presbyterians again. Sometimes this odd amalgamation of religious identities that I carry around seems freakish to me. But then, the more stories I hear, I've begun to suspect that this is how most college students operate: we've come to this place via a multitude of traditions, and we either claim non-denominational or multi-traditional identities. In some ways, emergent is the best way to describe where I am and what we're doing in 747-- something creative and life-giving is coming out the collaboration of pilgrims and the Spirit loose in the world.

More than two

Today in Pride Alliance, when we were talking about the differences between sex and gender, I remembered this quotation that a family friend passed on to me. The piece comes from the philosophical text "The Interpretation of Utterances" by Giles Deleuze and Félix Guattari.

"There are not two sexes, there are *n* sexes; there are as many sexes as there are assemblages. And since each of us enters into several assemblages, each of us has *n* sexes. When children discover they are reduced to one sex, male or female, they discover their powerlessness: they lose the machinic sense and are left only with the signification of a tool. And then a child really does fall into depression. They have been damaged; their countless sexes have been stolen!"

Isn't the multiplicity that this passage evokes amazing? Also, I love the sense of play it implies-- the adventure of coming into our various sexes, the multitude of ways that we related to our bodies. The psalmist is totally spot on: we are fearfully and wonderfully made.

==========================

So, speaking of being fearfully and wonderfully made, I wrote another devotion for that crazy guy from Lutheran Campus Ministry... what's his name? Oh yeah: Ben Buss, who rocks my world and blogged for the first time the other day for the first time since Christmas. Yeah, that guy. ;-) The devotion is about Pride Week, and if you're curious about how the psalmist helps me celebrate this week then you should check it out here. The whole series, of course, is at http://lentendevotions.blogspot.com.

Witness

Folks who follow me on Twitter will have already heard this, but I want to say it again: I am so proud, this morning, of the collective witness that George Masons students and staff and local community members gave against the message of hate proclaimed by the protesters from Westboro Baptist Chuch.

Yep, Fred Phelps' gang came to protest Mason for being the denizen of "fag enablers"
as we began our week long celebration of Pride Week. Maybe they decided to stop by because of our homecoming (drag) queen, or maybe they were feeling the love and joy radiating from our campus as we prepared the honor the experiences and voices of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, questioning, queer and ally people. We got wind of the protest a few weeks ago, and a counter protest emerged from the student body instantaneously.

So, here's what I am proud of, at the beginning of this holy week before Holy Week. I am proud that so many people from the Mason community got up at seven in the morning and came to support their LGBTQ friends and fellow students. I am proud of the Mason police for keeping the peace. I am proud of the people who made signs and t-shirts and dressed in drag. I am proud of my friends, who stood at the front lines of WBC's abuse. And I am proud of and truly touched by all of the Christians who were there witnessing to the love of God that embraces all people, that calls us to care for and be responsible to all people. I wish I could remember all of the loving words on signs and shirts that my Christian friends displayed in solidarity with a community that many of the Christian groups on campus, frankly, do not support (the glowing exceptions, as far as I can see, at Lutheran Campus Ministry and United College Ministries, who will be having a Pride Week worship service on Wednesday). I was proud of all of the area churches who came to support GMU, especially proud of the wonderful folks from the Metropolitan Community Church of Northern Virginia, who preach good news and with whom I made signs yesterday after worship.

Happy Pride Week, everybody! May it be a week of blessings and peace for all people, at Mason and in all places, for those who can see the grace of God around them and for those who have different names for the gratuitous love of the One who is in covenant with all creation. AMEN.

And for a full listing of Pride Week events, check out http://pride.gmu.edu and http://lgbtq.gmu.edu.

Wait

I wrote another devotion for Ben Buss' Lenten Devotions series yesterday. Good times. You can check it out here, and subscribe the series via RSS or email at http://lentendevotions.blogspot.com.

Just in case you were hoping for a "real" post, here are a couple of previews to tantalize your imagination...

• I've registered this blog with Presbyterian Bloggers United and on April 1st will post about campus ministry. Seeing as how I'm immersed in ecumenical ministry up to my ears, and there are some really awesome folks on campus immersed with me (see above), I'm looking forward to participating in that. Who knows, maybe my experiences will be different enough to give some hard-core Presbys something to think about. Or maybe I won't be so different, and I'll get some insight about what other folks are doing.
• I have a follow up post to "Dissonance" in the works. This week offered some continuing conversation about my relationship with different denominations, which included a good conversation with my MCC minister and a somewhat random role in co-leading worship for the National Capital Presbytery with other college students. Plus, some awesome folks left comments on "Dissonance" that hit my brain like the hammer of Thor... except in a good way.

So there's lots to think about... stay tuned.

Undercover

Ben Buss, my awesome friend and Lutheran campus minister at George Mason, asked me to write something for his series of Lenten devotions. I did, and you can check it out here. If you're interested in subscribing to the series via RSS or email, check it out: http://lentendevotions.blogspot.com.

Dissonance

I’m listening to “the Divine Liturgy of the Wretched Exiles” by Psalters right now , which is good for contemplating cognitive dissonance. I’m so glad I plugged in this CD instead of listening to Marty Haugen, who is way too serene to be really useful right now. If you haven’t heard Psalters before, check out their website. I really don’t know how to describe it, except maybe as Christian dada, except not really absurdist.

[Image: The Psalters, photo by meltingearth]

I spent two hours tonight walking around vacant parking lots on campus, wrestling with how to explain why I want to be a minister to my capstone class on Wednesday. We have to give an elevator speech (although everyone knows that you never explain your career goals while on a 30 second elevator ride), and I’m struggling to quilt together disparate pieces of insight about conflict resolution and ministry. I get close, but then my doubts burst the seams. How do I stand up in front of an intelligent, fairly liberal group of my peers and tell them that I want to administer the sacraments, dwell in ancient texts, and help people celebrate the presence of the One who binds Herself to humanity—and that this is how I plan to lead people in being more accountable to our neighbors, meeting people’s needs and doing justice? It’s absurd, really.

Which makes me question my desires to be ordained in the first place. If I want to lead Christian communities in social justice ministries (which seems to be what I want to do), then why not get my MSW and get to work as a lay member of a congregation? Why bother with the rest? And the more I think about it, the more I wonder how much of my desire comes from God (whose ways, if He exists at all, are not mine) and how much of it has been colonized by the forces of empire that provide a space for “progressive Christians” like me to do social “justice”—as long as I don’t interrupt the exploitative economic and social processes that allow privileged folks like me to live as I do. I don’t know… I just don’t know.

I wish I was less anxious about these things, like some people. Or maybe everyone’s a little anxious about these things.