Between the Lines.

Going to Cambridge, England.

2012-02-07T23:30:00.001-05:00

This photo, taken a few years ago, has held a reoccurring place in my life.

A symbol of unknown,

A symbol of newness,

A symbol of both life and death.

It now is offering me a bit of an excursion to travel.

Thank you moment, for presenting yourself so readily.

And thank you photo, for breathing all on your own.

Courtesy of the Duke-Cambridge Initiative

The piece will be presented within the context of Holy Week

and to the music of this brilliant composer

Grad School Sucks My Life...

2012-01-21T13:27:00.000-05:00

But what did I expect? A jovial, time-filled walk through a forest?

Truth be told I wouldn't have it any other way. So the low down on the academic experience.

1. The Rose Colored Glasses Came Off
the bad: well, it always sucks when you discover the failings of an institution you've been waiting to attend for so long.
the good: no institution is perfect, all are capable of their own organizational sins. The sooner the glasses come off the sooner one can work critically in the system.

2. Subversive!
the bad: only how much fun it is to be subversive
the good: I have reworked my program to be able to study what I like, to emphasize the research and projects that are important to me.

3. Sweet Professors :)
the bad: now I feel like I've got to be on my A-game. They will call through your illusions. The wider web you spin of elaborate vocabulary the more likely you are to get caught.
the good: when you get the grade it will never be sooo satisfying. Also, it looks like I might have the opportunity to work with one of the professors I came here to work with. A wee bit awesome.

4. MFA!!!
the bad: tuition, another masters, but seriously it's more education..
the good: playing (rather seriously) with the idea of pursuing an MFA in documentary studies. Taking a class right now through that department. At least it's a terminal masters so I can take time off, work, and do like before getting what I am now seeing as inevitable... the PhD.

5. Jane
the bad: she is still nuts, makes messes when I'm not looking, and has figured out how to get into cabinets.
the good: she's developed super powers, is working on a plan to overcome the world, and she likes to cuddle.

Oh semester, how you will slowly suck my life. But, oh semester how I will subvert you, overcome you, succeed in you, and in the end rise from the academic grave.

Here's to another semester.

Here's to an attempt to occasionally think about things outside of my program.

4th Week of Advent: Peace

2011-12-21T21:54:00.001-05:00

Forgetfulness - by Billy Collins.

2011-12-07T13:59:00.001-05:00

The name of the author is the first to go
followed obediently by the title, the plot,
the heartbreaking conclusion, the entire novel
which suddenly becomes one you have never read,
never even heard of,

as if, one by one, the memories you used to harbor
decided to retire to the southern hemisphere of the brain,
to a little fishing village where there are no phones.

Long ago you kissed the names of the nine Muses goodbye
and watched the quadratic equation pack its bag,
and even now as you memorize the order of the planets,

something else is slipping away, a state flower perhaps,
the address of an uncle, the capital of Paraguay.

Whatever it is you are struggling to remember,
it is not poised on the tip of your tongue,
not even lurking in some obscure corner of your spleen.

It has floated away down a dark mythological river
whose name begins with an L as far as you can recall,
well on your own way to oblivion where you will join those
who have even forgotten how to swim and how to ride a bicycle.

No wonder you rise in the middle of the night
to look up the date of a famous battle in a book on war.
No wonder the moon in the window seems to have drifted
out of a love poem that you used to know by heart.

Second Week of Advent: Love

2011-12-03T15:41:00.001-05:00

take this kiss,

that of my body

and take this breathe,

that of my life.

and in this, hope.

for this day, impenitent love

find rest

and for tomorrow, tired marrow

find amity

1st Week of Advent: Hope

2011-11-29T09:19:00.001-05:00

And behind me, a long porch

from which the sky may be viewed,

sometimes stippled with high clouds,

and crossed now and then by a passing bird --

little courier with someplace to go --

A Sense of Place

-Billy Collins

like snow falling in the darkness of the house--

the silence before I wrote a word

and the poorer silence now.

Silence

-Billy Collins

And so Advent is upon us, and with with it the reminder deep longing. If allowed, the tiredness of the soul surfaces, pushing fast the analgesic of the bright and flashy, and want and more. And so, we wait. Quietly or boisterously, we wait.

Is there anything better than fall?

2011-11-14T23:24:00.001-05:00

Phoenix fire of autumnal glory
Gold flitters against holocene
And earth becomes heaven, briefly
From ashes the blaze arose
To ashes the blaze the will carry me.

Ready to Run Away...

2011-10-26T18:29:00.002-04:00

Sacrament

2011-10-24T15:02:00.002-04:00

I sat with about 20 other Episcopal students listening to Bishop Griswold discuss clerical life, specifically that of the Sunday morning rite. Being a tradition Episcopal priest he had plenty to say about cassocks, proper ways of sitting and how to not draw attention to one's self when conducting the service. So when the conversation turned to how one should administer the sacraments, I was mildly surprised. Here was a polite bishop telling me that I am to feel awkward when taking the sacraments, that they the officiator is to feel awkward administering the sacraments. And what he said, how he said it, did not turn my mind off. I did not think to myself "bull shit" like I've done when listening to sermons or spiritual books. Instead, I saw how my activity in faith formed my activity in life.

The Eucharist, the baptism, the sacraments are to be bold and awkward. That was Griswold's premise. The real bread and wine served with confidence for the purpose of consumption, to literally feed body and soul, are apart of the very real sense in which we are hungry, viscerally hungry, for the bread of life. Similarly, when we wash each other's feet we are to realize our own humility, remembering Christ's humiliation, by placing knees on hard ground and touching one of the least noticed parts of a person. So here we realize there are new realities among us and these sacraments are to remind us, strengthen us and to continue in the building process of those realities. (and these are just two examples from the many sacraments) For God to to place himself into the body, to physically dwell with us: eat, sleep, drink, shower; should bring a new awakening to what it means to partake in the body and blood of Christ. Living in my own body I realize how awkward it is to think of Christ existing in a similar manner. And this should inspire my soul to kneel down and maybe get my knees and the floor wet to better serve my friend, or to let the awkwardness of drinking the communion wine from the challace challenge me, while the taste lingers on my tongue to remind me of God's humanity, and in that humanity, God's compassion.

The sacrament at the alter is always to lead to the sacramental life. To learn to live a life that yearns to seek understand what the Word of God means for the People of God today. To be the living hermeneutic of the Scriptures.

Road trip pilgrimage part 1

2011-10-10T23:06:00.002-04:00

I'm technically on a social-technology (FB/texting/email) fast of sorts.. not sure where blogging fits in to this. Technically the fast is for a class, the instructions didn't say anything about blogging. And with the encouragement of cool peeps I've been talking with the past few days here's my hot mess of rambling.

So I'm been a bit lax with posts about pilgrimage, mostly because I have no idea how to experience pilgrimage, nor am I particularly comfortable with the idea. Yay course work throwing me out of my comfort zone.

So I'll break it down: 3 Reason's why pilgrimage makes me squirm (in no particular order).

Illusive spiritual language shrouds the conversation on pilgrimage.
Many formal pilgrimages are made to places where people believed something miraculous happened... modern skepticism seep innnn... NOW
People go on pilgrimages to show how strongly they believe in God. (this isn't so much a bad thing... just a confusing thing when at times I have no idea whom I am praying to)

But I am on this road trip, and I am attempting to formulate it into pilgrimage. There are 5 stations; the drive up, Cedarville, Toledo, Michigan and the drive home. On the drivers seat I have a list of thoughts that I desire to contemplate at each point, mostly associated with the people I will be interacting with.

The drive up was a focus on coming to grips with what I believe. Why do I have to be certain? I don't even agree in the concept of certainty, and yet I bang my head against a wall clamoring for truth. So the drive up I focused on the aspects of my faith that I will hold too, even if they don't make sense sometimes, if ever.

Being in Cedarville is a space of remembrance. Seeing familiar faces and landmarks, running and driving down familiar paths, and talking with professors and people who have left indelible marks upon my life.

So since I have yet to head on phase three I will stop here and reflect briefly upon the conversation within all this that has my mind lost in thoughts elsewhere. I grabbed coffee with my old philosophy prof. Discussing everything from his book to institutional politics narrative ethics and so on we landed on a familiar topic: faith and the language that surrounds it... hence the reflecting above on why pilgrimage language gives me the willies. We verbally maneuvered down the familiar path, what do we do with phrases like "God will provide" or "will" or "answered prayer" or any of the other hundreds of phrases. But this conversation Prof brought referred to a story attributed to Kathleen Norris. She recalls a student aggravated at the idea of stating a creed he does not believe and a priest who responds saying that the creed is not "his" but "ours." Prof then went on to elaborate that through reciting the creeds we push faith outside of the language of first person singular and into first person plural. We invoke the power of community.

I took this train of thought to the old river. Sitting and listening to the water, letting the sound silence my mind. I wonder if faith is like that river. One droplet alone cannot fill the creek-bed, one droplet alone cannot carry the life-giving current, but the droplets together for better or worse corse down the carved path. Likewise, I don't have to believe prayer works every second of every day, the history of the church: saints past and present, do that for me. I believe in God, father almighty, maker of heaven and earth, I believe in Jesus Christ, and I believe he died, rose and will come again. And I believe in the holy spirit who is somehow connected to father and son. But I don't believe these things on my own. I can't, that's too much pressure. So I need in morning prayer, and with my community confess sin. I make the sign of the cross as a reminder of the death and life through Christ, and I recite the Apostle's Creed to affirm the faith. Our faith.

So, I am almost certain that there will be hours, days and months ahead where I will not feel that I believe this. Pretty sure that my stomach is flipping inside of me as I write this, but I will head the words of my wise Prof that as I recite those words I allow myself to be open to what they mean, both ontologically and presently. Allowing what the hell this might all mean presently when nothing else seems to make sense...

Welp, this post is a hot mess of inconsistent ramblings... should have seen that coming when I took a class entitled Intro to Christian Spirituality...

An Alter in the World

2011-10-04T11:46:00.001-04:00

So, I'm a bit behind. Not only did I not post a recipe Friday, but I also posted zero reflection on pilgrimage yesterday. So, I'm will try to remedy that. Friday's post is going to be tasty (butternut squash people!) and today's post is going to combine yesterday's and tomorrow's.

Someone recently reflected that Grad school/Div school is like pilgrimage. It is. As I engage new ideas, remember old ones, and find myself forming into a deeper-thinking being I notice how these changes take place. At each station - whether it be midterms (like this week) - finals, changing of year, passing of papers or whatnot I reflect on the process and it's formation in my life.

So with that I'm also reading Barbara Brown Taylor's An Alter in the World. Barbara Brown Taylor’s anthropology in An Alter and the World presupposes that all humans are spiritual beings. Taylor’s concern is that people recognize their spirituality in themselves, others and creation and then choose to foster that divine grace. Taylor writes from the perspective that many people, herself included feel disembodied, both from the physical institution of the church and their own physical being, unaware of how body and soul interact with each other to inform the practitioner’s perspectives on God, the world and self. Therefore, spiritual practices and disciplines for Taylor are outward visible signs that seek to help the practitioner become more fully human from which she develops an awareness of the inner, divine grace present within herself and present in others and creation. (Totally cheating and lifted this from the paper I have to write on the book)

I am enjoying this book immensely, for I see her challenging certain complacencies in my life that have been far too easy to develop. So the past couple weeks I've been trying to implement some of the practices she writes on - things I never though as spiritual.

Walking - The three mile walk to and from my apartment allows me to encounter life in ways unexpected. When leaving school I walk through the gardens, beautifully manicured and flourishing with life. I then tread on a parking lot. Cemented earth, set aside for purposes of utility. I walk through a neighborhood, nice houses, small houses, falling-apart houses. I walk over an overpass - I try to learn to make eye-contact with the man that panhandles there daily. I then walk across East Campus, an ivory sanctuary, tower, refuge and prison. I walk down the street with the school. The kids play, the elderly sit and listen, the yappy dog barks at me. I am home.

Through walking I am recognizing my body as physical. Through being in the world, I am recognizing the life in others and that which surrounds me. I'm learning to be spiritual.

2011-09-28T23:15:00.001-04:00

Reading:

An Alter in the World -Barbara Brown Taylor :: A poetic book on what it means to view all of life as sacramental, all of life as though there is an alter present in which you taste and see and remember.

This hurts my soul. This hurts my soul as a human being, as a woman, as a created image, as a person with moral convictions. This is an atrocity, and beyond that I have difficulty expressing my grief and anger.

Origen's On First Principles - this is the nerdy entry, but I've spent the past three weeks reading and rereading this text. Originally assigned for a Church History paper, I've found myself digging into what he thinks about Christology and it's centrality in exegesis, how it is through Christ we interpret the text, through Christ that the Old Testament mysteries are being unveiled and through Christ the New Testament mysteries are built. I also appreciate that he expects body, soul, and spirit of a person to delve into the meaning of the text. If you ever have a nerdy moment, go and read.

Dorthy Day's On Pilgrimage - she is viewing the daily life as a pilgrimage, always moving towards redemption

Watching:

Any Human Heart: I love PBS specials, and this is just so beautiful. The story is one of those based in the search for human meaning, and meaning found in the connectedness between people.

Listening to:

Ryan Adam's new album, currently on NPR's first listen. Seriously on repeat. Listening to it now actually. You should too.

Eating:

Brussels Sprouts - whoever said their gross apparently had no idea how to cooke them.

Hoping for:

Today Dr. Elen Davis read this beautiful prayer in class:

Whenwe murmur on the mountains for the old Egyptian plains,

whenwe miss our ancient bondage, and the hope, the promise, wanes,

thenthe rock shall yield its water and the manna fall by night,

andwith visions of a future shall we march toward the light.

(T.Herbert O’Driscoll, United Methodist Hymnal #586)

Today is one of those days where I feel simply blessed to sit and be in this place of learning.

2011-09-26T23:12:00.002-04:00

Pilgrimages take many forms.

There are the meditations of the mind - pilgrimage

There are the retreats away from civilization - pilgrimage

There are the journeys we take hoping to find ourselves, our purpose, clarity, etc. - pilgrimage

There are the journeys we take to find another, to find hope, to find forgiveness - pilgrimage

And there are the daily lives we lead, that when we reflect upon become a pilgrimage of their own.

Usually pilgrimage has a goal a purpose.

So what is my purpose? What do I hope to achieve?

I almost do not want to set an end goal, for I'm unsure if I will meet that goal. Or in the end want to meet that goal.

Why couldn't I contemplate silence, or hermitage, or something else spiritual and less mystic.

But here I am. In Div. School, trying to figure out what pilgrimage means.

But as I think about it a little longer I am uncomfortable with the language that the concept of pilgrimage requires me to use. It requires that I break into a vocabulary that is very Christian, very distinct. I am uncomfortable with a language that for so long has been defined in ways that make my skin crawl. A language that is very indefinite. Indefinite, yet distinct. Such a strange paradox.

I was talking to a co-work at the coffee-shop about this. She, in her own words, is in now way apart of the Christian tradition, but she has a respect for those who stick within their language and use their life to help define that language.

So, I think I will be on a pilgrimage of words. Words I will try to make sense of, wrestle with, and maybe come to terms with and fall in love with. Maybe I will learn to love "sovereignty" as much as I love "restoration" and "God's will" as much as I love "community."

And maybe in the end I'll ditch this and decide to become a silent monk and never have to use words again.

I also think Marlena's post has some interesting insight into this.

Kale

2011-09-23T15:42:00.005-04:00

Kim has inspired me. Last year I felt every time I saw her she was experimenting with the leafy green. Until then most I had experienced Kale was dad churning it in smoothies for himself and feeding the leafy green to my ducks in winter to keep them well nourished. But now I feel a world of green, healthy deliciousness has been opened to me.

Kale Raspberry Salad

This experiment was inspired by the Duke Refectory salad. Except every time I took a bite I was hopping for "something else." So I decided to experiment.

The Needs:
Shredded kale
Raspberry balsamic vinegar
Olive Oil
Honey
Cinnamon
A nut of your choice
dried cranberries

The process
1. in a small skillet stick in a dab of olive oil and raspberry balsamic. Something that will be enough to coat the amount of kale you desire to consume. After heating this up a bit throw the kale into the pan and let it wilt.

2. Once it has wilted add a bit of honey, I probably only stick about 1/4 tsp. (It's just to add a bit of flavor.) If you so desire also sprinkle a bit of cinnamon. (Don't go overboard on this, your salad will taste funny). Toss.

3. Turn heat off and toss in nuts and cranberries. Place in fridge and serve chilled.

It's really a simple salad that can last a couple days.

p.s. so in the overwhelming desire to consume my salad I didn't take a picture, but the picture is from a site that talks about making kale chips. Think of this post as a two-for-one deal :)

Cheers.

Current...

2011-09-21T13:11:00.000-04:00

Currently reading:

1. Hebrew book - my text and I have a sort of committed relationships.
2. On Pilgrimage - Doris Day - Doris Day's journal that reflects on pilgrimage within the daily life.
3. Whispering the Word - feminist readings of the Old Testament - I think I will be writing a review on this book.

Currently listening to:

1. Free the sunbird - Happy fall music
2. The Horrors - New album Skying - oh please stop what you are doing and go listening.

Youtubing:

micro-pig swimming

Pilgrimage

2011-09-19T22:12:00.002-04:00

This semester I am taking Dr. Winner's Intro to Christian Spirituality, and I have been given a spiritual disciple to study, practice and appreciate. For me it is pilgrimage.

To be honest I was hoping to get one about fasting or praying or silence. Pilgrimage is a concept that as a spiritual discipline the protestant church has left largely overlooked. I think part of that is because there is an unknown mystery that is apart of the act of pilgrimage, something intangible.

Though maybe largely forgotten (maybe that is to great a generalization) by the free-church tradition, pilgrimage is a piece that defines many groups within the Christian tradition while also being a vital portion of other religious systems. Catholic and Anglo-Catholic groups hold to the stations of the cross, while Muslims view Mecca as their holy pilgrimage and Jews, Jerusalem respectively. Pilgrimages are also common within the Hindu, Buddhist and many Easter traditions. Simon Coleman wrote an excellent book on the subject.

So with that being said, I myself am on a pilgrimage of sorts. With being in Divinity School there comes a point where I must admit that I am not merely on an academic journey, but a spiritual one - even if I am unsure how to define that. So I've decided to use this space as a place of documenting the concept of pilgrimage that I will be studying and practicing. Not quite sure what that will look like, but I guess we'll see.

So, since I like structure I guess this is the plan.

Monday - reflections on my current status of pilgrimage

Wednesday - current - currently reading, listening to, watching etc. pertaining both to this discipline and life in general.

Friday - RECIPE! Food is such a glorious friend of mine, and being a grad student with little time and money for the delightful wonder I will also be on a food pilgrimage of sorts.

Now the question: I've had little experience with pilgrimage. I've done the Stations of the Cross once. So, have you had experience with it? What are your thoughts (whether you have had experience or not)? Any suggested reading on the topic?

Grace and Peace,
Kate

2011-09-17T00:34:00.003-04:00

Blogging feels superfluous.

The more I study the less I have to say.

I should write about the books I'm reading, or the refugees I'm teaching, or the gardens I'm sitting in.

But I have no significant thoughts.

So here is a picture of a place I inextricably miss.

May its memory prompt me to the be kind of person that develops the community I desire.

-- Maybe I'll have something to say next week --

A Monk-ish life.

2011-09-15T00:12:00.002-04:00

There is this saying of the desert fathers where a young monk goes to his Abbot and asks how he can be a better monk. The Father replies something along the lines of "don't sleep, eat or drink till you are satisfied, so that you might always long for God to satisfy those things."

Well, 3 weeks in I feel as though I am but a meager monk.

So this afternoon I found myself out in the gardens. I read this article once about a women
who did not know where she kept her faith. She sat in a cold cell, with guards and wardens trying to beat her faith out of her. She wonders if her faith is in her graying hair or wrinkled eyes. Or maybe it is in the community of others who do not renounce either. She could not give faith up even if she wanted to, because to give faith up would imply that she knew where it was. (It's a great story in Amnesty International's book Freedom) Though I cannot relate to the setting of the story, the theme is one I am rather familiar with. I wonder where faith has gone and so I search for it, and as I search I find a piece of faith.

I found a piece of faith in ancient text I am now being able to translate.

I found a piece of faith in a solitary garden moment, and another in crowded city walk.

I found a piece reverberating through airwaves and landing in my auditory canal.

I found a piece of faith under the knees of a friend, praying the morning Rite beside me. Their breathe mingling with my own, traveling upward.

I found a piece of faith in chapel bells, humming be now thy vision and thou my true word.

And I reflect back upon that story, where the woman sat for days and years wondering where her faith was. I think she might have discovered that faith is like a treasure. No wise man will bury all his gold in one place, and likewise faith is like that gold buried in a myriad of places, revealing itself in unique ways through the ages, and waiting for us to find it.

I took a nap on my Hebrew homework... osmosis is the key to language learning

9/11

2011-09-10T21:15:00.000-04:00

Tomorrow will be the tenth anniversary of 9/11. I'm sure many of you have already read reflective articles or glanced at People's photojournalism essay on children who lost their parents due to that horrendous day turning 10 this year. (Sorry for that cumbersome sentence... reading Church fathers and mothers does not help your writing)

Early this week I had the opportunity to attend an inter-faith dialogue on September 11. I won't try to expound upon it, but ask that you watch it and consider their comments. The people on the panel represent Judaism, Buddhism, Christianity and Islam. I think what they have to say is pertinent in realizing that healing still needs to take place and what are response should be to future suffering.

On a side note, tomorrow would have also been my great grandmother's 105th birthday. She was an amazing woman and I am thankful that she was apart of the first 17 years of my life.

water

2011-09-07T17:15:00.000-04:00

...when i can't find in the ground, it comes from the sky...

My own Quotidian

2011-08-31T19:24:00.000-04:00

"...I found it remarkable - I still find it remarkable - that in [the] big fancy church, after all the dress up and formalities of of the wedding mass, homage was being paid to the lowly truth that we human beings after we eat and drink must wash the dishes. The chalice, which had held the very blood of Christ was no exception. And I found it comforting that the priest, as a kind of daft housewife, overdressed for the kitchen, in bulky robes, puttering about the alter, washing up after serving so great a meal to so many people."
Kathleen Norris, The Mystery of the Quotidian

I sit and munch on my own personal Eucharist of homemade bread and homemade jelly. As sort of after school moment of respite and peace before heading back to the books for more study. Truth be told I feel as though this entire week has been a kneeling at the communion table, full with emotion of how did I get here, how am I privileged to receive the luxury of education let alone in a place as lovely as this. May this feeling not run dry when midterms find me trembling.

So before I end up posting the inevitable "what I've been learning and mulling and wrestling and rambling about blah, blah, blah" I pause to reflect upon what many of you have reminded me to reflect upon. The journey to get here. The winter of the last 3, 4 (6?) years has led way to a Spring. Though spots of snow, mud and a grey sky splatter the landscape, I find sprigs of grass and blossoms of leaves pushing their way forth.

So with that being said, here is currently my favorite spelt-bread recipe (which, unlike making it in a bread machine does not come out like a rock!)

4 1/2 cups whole-wheat spelt flour, plus more for dusting
2 teaspoons fine sea salt
2 teaspoons active dry yeast
1 3/4 cups cool (70°) water
2 tablespoons honey

In a standing mixer fitted with a dough hook, combine the flour, salt and yeast. Turn the machine to medium low, add the water and honey and mix until the flour is moistened, about 2 minutes, scraping down the side of the bowl with a rubber spatula as needed. Increase the speed to medium and knead until a stiff dough forms, about 2 minutes longer.
Transfer the dough to a lightly floured work surface and shape into a ball. Set the dough in a well-floured bowl, cover with plastic wrap and let rise in a warm place until doubled in bulk, about 1 1/2 hours.
Preheat the oven to 450° and spray a 9-by-5-inch loaf pan with vegetable cooking spray. Invert the dough onto a lightly floured work surface and gently punch it down. Fold the dough into a loaf, tucking in the sides and pinching the seams. Transfer the dough to the loaf pan, seam side down. Cover with plastic wrap and let stand until doubled in bulk, about 1 hour.
Remove the plastic wrap and lightly dust the dough with flour. Using a razor blade or sharp knife, make a shallow lengthwise gash down the center of the loaf. Bake for about 35 minutes, until the loaf is risen, golden on top and an instant-read thermometer inserted into the center of the loaf reads 180°. Let the bread cool in the pan for 10 minutes, then tip it out onto a rack to cool completely before serving.

Well Hello Hurricane

2011-08-27T10:48:00.000-04:00

Staring out my window I see the oncoming storm blowing in. Nothing too severe as of yet, but we will see what Miss Irene has up her sleeve.

This week was Orientation. 3 full days of advice, information, meetings and the whatnot - including a paper due Tuesday. Welcome to Duke Divinity, they say. In the middle of the divine orienting Sam Wells, dean of Duke Chapel, spoke. To be honest I don't remember too much about his homily (which I probably shouldn't publish since I work for his office... sorry :) ). But I mostly don't remember because I found my mind stuck on a phrase he said in the beginning of it. He was speaking on the book Breathing Spaces, A Spiritual Journey Through the South Bronx by Heidi Neumark. He began his speech discussing our love for the church. And that's where my mind stopped.

He talked about the church a place that let's in the home-wreckers, the flaky; the know-it-alls. A place where the destitute, the wealthy, the confused and the confident all come to mingle and be. And then I realized that I don't love the church.

On a Sunday morning I would much rather be in a soup kitchen or grabbing coffee with someone. I love theology, I think it is very important to a person's formation, to the discussion of ethics. But I do not love the church, the physical, congregational entity of the church, in a way where when I see the negatives of a congregation I decide to be apart of the change instead of the person that cops out. I have a hard time speaking openly about my Christian heritage, for I think we all know the blunders that lie there. So why do I, a M.Div. student, a person who supposedly desires to be apart of this ministry dislike the church? In part maybe it is because I feel that the church has let me down personally, maybe it is because I feel that the church has let down their communities, those in need of service, those in need of challenge. And though those reasons are true to one degree, the answer is a bit more specific.

I do not love the church because the church is a place for the home-wreckers, the flaky; the know-it-alls. A place where the destitute, the wealthy, the confused and the confident all come to mingle and be. I do not like the church because it is imperfect, broken, and let's in people like me. I am all too quick to notice failure, to stomp my feet and clap my hands at the failings. The idealist in me has overwhelmed my eyes and feels dissatisfied that the utopian dream I hold can never be on this earth.

So I think I need to learn to love the church.

Midtown helped a bit with this. But loving Midtown was easy(ier). That was my family, the people I did life with. That didn't feel like "church." By that I mean, when talking with Tim he would always speak of his desire to be apart of the guild, his love for taking part in the global aspect of the church. I'm all fine with the local, but bring in that global and that creates a need for a whole lot of loving I don't know if I can do. So Kate (talking to myself here), welcome to Divinity School, where you are going to learn how to love the church. May you learn well.

A Methodist and an Anglican walk into a bar...

2011-08-21T22:30:00.000-04:00

So I tried this beautiful Methodist church today, formerly called Reconciliation United Methodist (now called New Creation). The story of the church is rather intriguing. New Creation UM is the merging of two churches that found themselves unable to carry the financial burden anymore, but still saw the need of their services in the community (food pantry, counseling.. etc.) So they combined. From what I heard from those who have attended for a while is that they really sought to highlight the strengths of each congregation and come together in a form of matrimony, committing themselves to serve each other the way Christ served.

The service was a higher-liturgy UM service. So on the scale of non-denominational churches with little to no formal liturgy and the Catholic/Episcopal church being high liturgy it sat in the middle. New Creation reminded me a bit of Midtown in the relaxed atmosphere all present. Children were coloring in the pews and sang songs loudly. The priest knew everyone in the congregation and made light-hearted quips when talking about texting in church. The church was also very diverse, in every way a church could be diverse. Racially, ethnically, socioeconomically, educationally, gender and age. The singing is lead by a gospel-style choir with Spanish lyrics posted down the side and before the service begins they have mini Spanish lessons. There is a rather large latino community present within the church, which some is due to refugee communities others immigration.

So I feel so odd making pro-con lists when it comes to a church community that I've only visited once, but I've found it to be helpful in the processing-process. So I guess here goes.

1. The diverse nature of the service, both in those who attend and how the service is presented.

2. The reverend being very welcoming (the congregation in general being very welcoming).

3. The relaxed nature of the service.

4. The Eucharist is served every Sunday

Cons.

1. I found myself missing the quieter atmosphere of the Anglican service and think this more has to do with affinity for headaches.

2. It's a bit larger. St. Joseph's is a small parish, and with that they offer many opportunities to get to know others in the parish.

3. I found myself missing bits and pieces of the liturgy. Something I have grown to love about the Episcopal tradition is the congregational interaction throughout the service. The UM service had a bit of that, it was just different. So this is more an unfamiliar con rather than I actual "con-con." (Well that made zero sense)

So what it comes down to is this. I really like both churches, and wish Midtown would magically appear solving my problem. But since that last part won't happen, I now just have to decide to try one out for a time and see how connected I can be in the church. So with that being said, I think for the next month I will attend St. Joseph's Episcopal church. Reason being is that it is less than a mile walk from my apartment. (The other church is just a bit farther, but I would have to cross a rather hectic highway) If after a month I am not connected I will head over to the UM church.

So this month I will commit myself to being involved in St. Joe's. This won't be just a "sit through the service and see what I get month" but a being the kind of person who exudes the kind of community I so deeply desire to be apart of. I will overcome the awkwardness of being the new person showing up at events and service opportunities. I will get over will seek to try and get to know a person or two outside of the church. I will seek to learn what it means to be in community at St. Joe's.

In other news orientation is this week! Woot. I have my Hebrew "aleph bet" down (oh you know you like the quip).

So cheers my dear peeps.

Pilgrims

2011-08-19T10:00:00.002-04:00

I've grown fond of flying. Though I still think the concept absurd (hey guys, let's through a several ton tub of steel into the air and stuff it with people), I always anticipate who I will meet.

I met Sarah, the accountant from Colorado. I asked when she was getting married to which she replied the ring was from a broken-off engagement from 2 years ago. I didn't know if I felt awkward because of the question or the fact she was still wearing the ring. Then there was Tim, a plant biologist. After he and his wife received their PhDs from Cornell (of which he met her because she sat at the bench next to his - how nerdy and cute) they came to Durham to do post-docs at UNC and Duke. And then there was my favorite, Zoar.

Zoar - A cognitive research scientist from Tel Aviv who received his PhD in music theory from U.Penn, has spent semesters guest teaching at OSU, NYU, and UofR. He spends his days teaching music theory and composition while researching the effects music has on a person's affect.

I noticed he was typing in Hebrew and ask where he was from. He had a grandfatherly complexion, with a softspoken, accent-think voice. He told me about his life in Tel Aviv, growing up where the religious turmoil defined the political tumult. Christianity, Judaism, and Islam all using their religious stake to insight bigotry, violence, and oppression. Sure there is a level of religious turmoil in the US, but ours is almost purely philosophical. There the religious roots stem deep into the land, nation and people in a way that I have a hard time understanding. Zoar is no longer religious. Though Tel Aviv has become "more Western" since his childhood and the religious tensions are not as heated within the city, he sees issues with the fundamentalist notions. He speaks of faith as something that should bring about ethical living and be the presupposition for doing good. Having already established my current field of study he asked if I was practicing.

I never like that question. Mostly because the two perceptions of practicing Christian I hear about are either a. the ignorant, rudely dogmatic individual who has very little respect for another person's beliefs and b. the cliche' spreading non-thinker (both those are the phrasing of this guy that comes into my coffee shop a lot - thought they fit). But I swallowed my "worries of assumptions" and just said yes.

Here is the issue I have with evangelism, specifically "street evangelism," as most evangelicals put it. The idea seems to be to "get the person saved in 10 minutes or less." There is this thought that if one lays out the Christian paradigm, use a bit of hell-inspired fear and say a few prayers then this person is going to leap into the Kingdom. Of course that's a bit melodramatic, but even when those persons say "Even if we plant a few seeds" we all know the hope is that there will be a revival. And having both been on the speaker of said script and ending up on the opposite side of that conversation I know that a. that is a very inorganic way of communicating, b. awkward and c. not really founded in Scripture. From my understanding of the Gospel there is a difference between the conversions we see among the disciples and those we see when Christ is speaking. This is a bit tongue and cheek - but come on he was God, and people were coming to realize that, discipleship among us mortals is going to take a bit longer as we see in the Letter of Paul.

But back to Zoar. He and I sat there, and he asked me to explain why I believe in the Christian faith. Another question I squirm at. Faith is inherently an illusive concept and does not have a clear definition - at least in my life where faith is very fluid and changing. But stating that does not answer the man's inquiry, and is a bit of a cop-out (anyone else have a fear of being crazy saying that you believe a man died and rose again and is God?). So once again I bit my tongue and said something to the affect of "I believe that Jesus was a real person and that the Scriptures outline his life, and that because of his life and death I desire to continue that work and follow his teachings and be a person of restoration." {a very awkward phrase if I do say so myself}

From there we continued to have a simple conversation. I wasn't trying to persuade him and he wasn't trying to persuade me. And in the end he thanked for a genuine, non-confrontational discussion about religion.

I wonder if that was apart of redemption too, living a life that emulates (speech included) the grace and love and welcome Christ lived. To be able to have beautiful conversations with strangers that or edifying to both parties involved, where there was no agenda.

{Hannah & Ben}

2011-08-17T10:17:00.001-04:00

This past week I spent my time touring the East Coast and visiting friends.

After a beautiful, leisurely trip I arrived just in time to be apart of Hannah and Ben's wedding.

I felt so blessed and proud to be able to stand along side them as they said their vows.

So of course I had my camera along to take capture some memories. Here is a smattering of photos from the wedding weekend.

{Of course there are none of the actual ceremony, I thought it would be a bit rude to have my camera up there while trying to stand pretty.}

Anglican.. a sort of Part 2

2011-08-03T18:55:00.001-04:00

After a lot of thinking and processing with my distant-dear-friends I realized that going to a local church is really important to me. Modern convenience allows us to be able to pick and choose the various religious communities we join and though I don't think there is anything wrong with find a church that one feels comfortable in, I do think there is a cost that is rarely acknowledged. The 3 main costs I think are the following:

1. It's harder to get to know and serve the community that surrounds the physical location of the church.
2. Sometimes the distance gets in the way of developing deeper relationships within the church
3. You do not get to know the needs of the community you physically live in as well as if you are worshiping with those who are physically around you.

I have really enjoyed All Saints, but it is a 20 minute drive and I know that once the semester begins it will be harder for me to be involved there. I found this issue with Midtown. Because I didn't live in Springfield, Oh (and didn't have access to consistent transportation) I found it difficult to get involved in the lives of people there, and with that I learned that I really desire to "be where I am.")So, with those thoughts in mind I am going against my original intent of staying at All Saints for a couple months, and am trying out some other places of worship that are closer to my place of residence.

This last Sunday I popped over to St. Joseph's a little Episcopal church, St. Joseph's, in my neighborhood being a good 10-15 minute walk from me - or a 2.5 minute drive if I'm lazy. First, the small chapel was beautiful. Though small, the suspended, wooden buttresses framed the alter, where stained-glass window told the story of Joseph's obedience to God. The Eucharist sat center upon the alter table and soft music played in the background. It reminded me a bit of going to Catholic mass as a kid. Everyone sat reverently in their seats, in what appeared to be quiet meditation. There were probably no more than 60ish people present. The service was classically Anglican in that it held to the high liturgy, including hymn usage, collects, and readings. The homily was beautiful and simple. (Note: not simple minded- just refreshing and uncomplicated.. and on a side note apparently Archbishop Desmond Tutu oversees the sister parish in Africa and has connection with this parish as well as the Episcopal Center). Afterwards was a simple coffee social that goes on every week. This is where everyone comes together and enjoyed community, where those who might not be comfortable attending the service are more than welcome to have a cup of coffee and what ever luncheon bits are present.

Things I really liked about this church:
1. Their commitment to those in their neighborhood, including the poor. Homeless are welcome to stay on the church property. As I was walking in the door there were some men in old lawn chairs sitting in a shaded area, the priest before beginning the service went out to them and made sure it was known that they were welcome to join, or at least come to the coffee social.
2. It's about a 10 minute walk from my apartment.
3. They have a community garden where the members of the church take turns caring for and then share the bounty.
4. There is a lot more diversity in the church, both in socio-economy, but also in race and even country of origin... kind of cool.
5. The liturgy is beautiful.

Things I'm unsure about.
1. As much as I love liturgy, I also understand that it can be a form of "educational barrier" to some people.
2. A lot of the people I met (and this could be just the Sunday I went on) were studying for the pastorate. Now I'm not sure where to stick this point. My personal concern is that I will be spending all my days in theologically academic classes and group discussions and writing my papers, etc. I want to be intentional about being in worship with people who are in different fields and have different sets of experiences than I do. Not to say that can't happen there, just something that I have realized is important to me (though reflecting on my dear core friend-circle, who are all sorts of different thinkers, doers and such.. they have seemed to help me grow in unique ways that I could not have done if I stayed in a homogenous circle of influence)

With all that said, I am open to input. There is one more church in my neighborhood I want to visit. A Methodist church who has been talked a lot about in the local news for their "reconciliation themes" from incorporating various worship styles into tradition liturgy to the work they do in the community. They are about a 7 minute walk from my place.

A Poem I found

2011-08-01T20:54:00.001-04:00

First Sunday After Easter

water’s edge bypasses the stone boat landing,

coming to gazebo’s boarder.

bundled in a winter’s vestments

incongruity encroaches

weed whackers heard bustling

across the creak’s shore-bed.

it is38 degrees

it is May.

sun crowning through heavy-set rain does not reveal

spring’s cleansing of winter’s waste,

but instead illuminates.

murky over-filled creak and muddy earth

baptizing waters were not strong enough to purify;

instead they bring suppressed shit to surface.

and a column of light breaks down

as the mourning dove’s song is heard

somewhere in trees above.

Intentional Living makes me a Bolder Person

2011-07-26T22:53:00.000-04:00

Starting new relationships is awkward and messy. It's easy to forget that the long-held relationships I hold might not have been those that clicked or connected instantly. They very might as well have been those relationships were I thought the other person was intimidating, strange, awkward, so on and so forth, and the other person could have held the same sentiments about me. When meeting new people there are uncomfortable silences, misspoken words and the "replay effect" where you sit and think of how you could have spoken/acted/articulated yourself better. But yet, somehow without realizing it those relationships become natural and possibly vital to community.

Maybe it wasn't awkward, I felt akward. Cheesecake plates and wine glasses sitting around the coffee table, Jane-the-awkward-cat being neurotic and I wondering what to say or not to say. I was very aware of the present and felt more in that moment that the people in my midst are still - to some degree - strangers/acquaintances. I try to recall the similarities we have, but I still know so little about their lives. The conversation that lingered was very polite, and I would say warm, full of laughter, antidotes and the like. But it was not personal. And so I felt awkward. I've grown accustom to continually being amidst people where I can ask whatever question that comes to my head, and they either answer or politely decline - but no offense is taken - there is honesty and community. That is being found anew here.

I feel way out of my comfort zone being so forward. I'm not as gregarious as I pretend to be. But this has been good and beautiful. I am getting to know two beautiful couples who are some of the most hospitable people I have met. The wife of one going out of her way to make me feel included and established here. I am getting to know a peer who is going through a major life transition as well - the respectively different (she's getting ready to get married). I have been able to help people here, offer a hand of shared goodness. I helped a coworker move her junk into her apartment to find that she has great taste and music and excellent vintage finds. Sure these things are simple and outward, but trust is a seed that has a long germination period.

Intentionality is a discipline, and through disciplining myself in the small ways I feel like my little soul can be bold in this very new place.

So in the spirit of this intentional-focused city that places a high value on communal intentionality, I am continuing my intentional living.

The intentional-short list plan for Durham:

1. Greet the people I pass on the street (but not annoyingly so) - I'm stealing this one from Naomi.

2. Support local economy as best as possible.

3. Within this year get to know at least one of my neighbors - trust me this is harder than you think in an apartment complex that is mostly young adults.

The Church Hop

2011-07-24T23:08:00.001-04:00

Positives about the new digs:

+ Anglican
+ The sense of community
+ The rotational nature of the pastoral staff and the homily giving
+ Sense of humility

Negatives:

- Music - What can I say I miss John Mortensen and the hoge-podge of musicians that would show up each week. I also just miss some of the songs. something I can get over.
- 20 minute drive - I was hoping to find someplace in my neighborhood.
- I miss the open forum - where congregation and teacher interact

So week 2 of the church-finding activities. I've decided to stay at All Saints for a bit, figure if you really want to know if a church is a good fit and you are a good fit for it you've got to do a bit of life together. But truth of the matter is is that the list of negatives currently outweigh the list of positives, and that is due to one reason alone. All Saints is not Midtown.

Today I sat in my seat listening to one of the most beautiful and humble homilies on Lazarus that I think I've ever heard, and the entire time I was on the brink of tears. This doesn't feel like home. It does not feel familiar. The words seem harder to grasp and believe, the language is distancing - otherizing.

The people who I heard speak from the makeshift pulpits of Midtown I trusted - learned to trust. They could say words like pray, faith, restoration and kingdom and I could believe them for I could believe the person speaking them. Even in the deeps seasons of doubt, there was a simple comfort in being able to trust the person standing before you, speaking from the ancient text, reciting the ancient prayers, something about knowing that person and trusting that person that made the words more believable.

So I sat their today. Hearing about resurrection and hearing about Jesus hearing prayer and mourning with us between funeral and feast day, and I so badly wanted to believe and yet - for now - I sit back and relearn the new relationship forming. I need to learn to trust this community as much as they need to trust me and learn to allow me in. I need to realize that however wonderful Midtown was, this new season of life will be different. I need to ponder and take with me the beautiful lessons learned, but also move forward and apply.

Summer leisure

2011-07-23T10:10:00.000-04:00

So I have not completed my goal of reading the entire harry potter series, I haven't even picked up the first book. However, I have filled my time with other nonsensical things.

Watching: The Kennedys. A miniseries that was produced in Canada, premiered in the UK and never quite made it to the US television stage. I am not sure how accurate the historical portrayal, but it is visually a stunning story. If anything, it's wet my pallet to go digging around in the actual history of this not-forgotten president.

Watching - Part 2: Documentaries on the Cold War, Restrepo, the Pixar Story, and a National Geographic: Solitary Confinement. Sure the conglomeration is rather interesting, however documentaries, to me, are fun ways of learning new things. :)

Reading: Anne Lammont's Blue Shoes, some book on Economics, another book on social contract theory, and Dean and DeLuca's cookbook.

Drinking: A Tanzania Peaberry. This wonderful African coffee smells heavenly as it brews. It contains hints of berry and citrus, and then when it hits those taste buds it has subtle hints of chocolate. Heavenly.

Eating: I've been working through this wonderful recipe set for Tilapia. Mmmm mmm good.

Current events: Aside from the Murdoch scandal, questions of the debt-ceiling (or bull-shit ceiling as John Stewart names it) I've been cheering with the people of South Sudan, keeping up with the Lybia Conflict and just doing my best not to let the summer lazy-haze overcome me.

New Church

2011-07-19T09:44:00.001-04:00

Going to new churches always insights a nervousness in me. I loved/still love midtown. Midtown was informal, small, communal, a place were it was normal and ok to doubt, questions, affirm, wrestle and just be. Though there was liturgy, there was also an understatedness - where we sat around tables in jeans and t-shirts and sang him to whatever conglomeration of musicians showed up that day. It was a place of growing. It was a place of flaws. It was a place where a group of well-intentioned individuals wrestled hard to be redemptive in the desolate city of Springfield. I love Midtown because never once did I doubt the genuineness of those people. The only thing I hate more than going to new churches is going to Women events at new churches.

So here I am in Durham, doing what some have entitled the church hop, or in my case, wait until someone invites you maneuver. This past Sunday I ended up at All Saints Church, a small Anglican church with, as far as I can tell, some of the most genuine people. Last night my new friend Katie, brought me along to a Women's event at All Saints. I didn't have much hope for the event, but I experienced a group of women who just want to be honest with one another and get to know each other better. Women who wrestle with career and family and how to serve others better.

All this to say, you should never judge a church by it's formal structure.

Language Ethics Post 1: Foucault and Said reedings.

2011-07-16T17:43:00.000-04:00

My apologies if this isn't incredible coherent, for I am still thinking through all this, however sometimes you gotta just start somewhere.

From what I can gather the rather obtuse philosopher, Foucault, is saying is that knowledge in and of itself is power. To have the knowledge, to lead the discourse is to have power over the discourse and the other persons taking place in it. From that the meaning of morality and truth is a structure of discourse, and whatever overarching thought-structures that stem from that current discourse seem to carry the most power. An example might be the conflation of ice cream and the polio outbreak in the late 1940s.

Polio is more likely to appear in the summer, as are people more likely to consume ice cream, and so in the 1940s correlation was linked to causation. This notion was advertised on televisions and propagated by doctors. The media holds a special place in people's homes as a way of receiving important information - or being educated about certain social norms. Doctor's are associated with rigorous study and knowledge, and therefore a doctor's words contain a certain weight - a certain power - when interjected into discourse. It was only later, when more research was done that the connection to polio and certain aspects about the season (I tried to research this a bit more, but google fell short as to why it is more common in summer and fall months - the most I could get was temperatures that allow the virus to incubate - I'll hit up the library later).

According to a Foucault reading of the situation, the reason why people did not know that ice cream did not cause, or aggravate, Polio was because said person's previous experience did not allow them to make any other connection. So it is perfectly natural for them to conflate ice cream intake with an increase in Polio infection. The examination of discourse helps delineate why people would jump to what those in the 21st century think is an erroneous decision.

Other examples of this could also be the Communist Red Scare after WW1 or wide-spread paranoia over Sputnik. Now, these example aren't perfect, for at least in the Polio case, there is no ethical dilemma. But I think there is a problem when we view language in terms of how we relate to ourselves and others.

Those in academia - and this includes myself being a person in the higher educational system, hold a certain level of discursive power. Academia, as Said notes in An Ethics of Language (his essay on the treatment of Foucault's language ethics), the academic circle is defined by the discourse, that is the knowledge that leaks down to the public is controlled and monitored by those higher up in the conversation. Therefore, those with more knowledge contain more power. Within this we have defined knowledge in terms of whatever society has marked as economically valuable. Life-experiece, farming experience, social work, jobs in local communities seem to hold less clout in the academy than those with MBAs, PH.ds, MDs and so on and so forth.

What I wonder then is how do we diffuse the power, and subsequently privilege, those with the knowledge hold over those who are unable to access that knowledge? There is this sect of social-contract theory that suggests all language and knowledge that disenfranchises or excludes certain persons must be purged from social interactions. However, that would clearly leave us all to be inarticulate, for ever bit of knowledge will somehow exclude some other person. I think step one is to as those with power, we must be willing to let go of that power. To educate and raise up those who do not have education. An example that I am currently in love with is the Cafe Femenino project throughout South America. The project is helping women become successful coffee growers, educating them in business, trade and international relations. These women are able to take part in their local economies, helping to strengthen their community, while also providing for their families. Here a woman with a background in finance sought to use her "power" to bring others up to her level.

This is on the personal level, as far as socially doing this on a governmental, systemic level, I am unsure how to start that. But maybe it is a individual thing. To be the person who becomes self-aware of her own privilege and willing to humble myself and extend that to another person, and realize that despite my monitory fortitude, the other person contains valuable knowledge that I am in need of as well.

Tastiness from Durham

2011-07-13T16:28:00.002-04:00

Well, Durham is fitting quite well. This is certainly one tasty city, and if the in-restraunt food wasn't good enough, the three farmer's markets certainly have my mouth water. Well, with that said I will attack the easiest of the three goals on my blog-list. Here is my favorite black bean salad recipe.

1 can black beans (or 1 cup soaked black beans overnight)
1 red onion, diced
1 bunch of cilantro
1 avocado
1tbs (or to flavor) chipotle chillies
1 head escarole (or if you can't find that your favorite chard can work - I tried a red chard that was really good)
2 cloves minced garlic
3 tbs white vinegar
3 tbs lemon or lime juice (the lime does add a certain something)
Olive oil
Salt and pepper to taster

1. Mix: Can of black beans, half of diced onion, cilantro, chillies together, salt and pepper to taste.

2. In a skillet heated to medium - low heat drizzled with olive oil saute onions till translucent and wilt the escarole with the garlic and a bit of the white vinegar and lemon juice, pour the rest of the vinegar/juice over the beans and mix.

3. Serve the warm escarole mixture over the black bean mixture with slices of avocado either on the side or over it.

This is an great recipe to experiment with, using other veggies and dressings.

Cheers!

All Things New.

2011-07-11T17:11:00.000-04:00

I've put off any serious contemplation, and hence blogging, due to the move. But now I am officially a resident of Durham, North Carolina. Despite fear, uhaul driving and the neuroses of my cat I am settled and ready to start what is appearing to be a bright new season. I now have a new (relative to the owner ) car (manual transmission!), new apartment, new job, new school, new driver's license, bright red couch, and so on and so forth. So with that I will get cracking on this blog thing and try to keep up with it.

Dearest friends, I have greatly appreciated your support during this time. Your phone calls, emails, and questions as to when I will update on my life have been well received. And now I will put forth an agenda of things that have crossed my mind that I will try to articulate and blog about. Normally I wouldn't list what I hope to think on out of fear of commitment, but with a new season comes new possibilities (become a little less commitment phobic). So, feel free to email, txt, call or comment to give feedback on any of these topics as I engage my mind and try to figure some stuffs out.

Here goes.

1. Overview of language ethics reading and contemplating their actualization in society - I've been reading a lot about language ethics in both the theology and philosophy spheres (as well as from those who merge the two rather pointedly). I am particularly interested in this in terms of the power structures language creates. A friend told me a story once of her being in a courtroom watching the plaintiffs approach the judge. One man obviously had no courtroom experience, did not know the lingo, and sort of tripped over his words the entire time with the judge breathing down her nose correcting him every chance he got. The next man, was suave, well educated and new proper protocol, working linguistic magic. Granted there are probably personalities in these settings, but the first man was not fluent in the courtroom nomenclature. If I was in that room the only reason I would be able to converse would be because of the reruns of Law and Order mom watched, something that a person from a lower socioeconomic status might not be able to do.

2. Food: I've been reading cookbooks lately. (no joke) And therefore, I have been trying out some new recipes, trying to find healthy, quick and super tasty ones to fit into my hectic impending graduate school schedule.

3. Ethics - A few months ago I read this article in Haper's Magazine discussing Ghandi's peace movement in light of the peaceful protests exercised by the Palestinians in the Palestine- Israeli conflict. This past weekend I saw a dear friend, Kate Cella (attending journalism school at NYU) and we discussed social-contract theory in terms of developing and changing personal ethics. The scenario in my head is like this: When Ghandi put forth his peaceful resistance we was speaking to British rulers who hold valuable certain charities that most Middle Eastern countries do not. in Afghanistan children are trained at a young age about honor and how to protect that honor. A lot of this has has to do with how religious systems have manifested there ethical systems in society. So I will try and reflect on that a bit.

Sorry this post is a bit dry, but hopefully I will stick to my goals.

Lakehouse.

2011-07-05T18:16:00.000-04:00

Sometimes when I can't sleep and so I take pictures. This was taken at 3am on Cayuga Lake, one of the finger lakes in NY.

Word

2011-06-28T17:16:00.000-04:00

Language. Words. Speech.

They all prove to be inadequate.

When we speak we ramble our thoughts into hopeful coherent strings of words. I have this image of wet sweaters on a laundry-line, hanging heavy and limp.

Maybe it's culture, or maybe it's my generation, but there is this need for articulation - almost over-articulation - of every thought, carrying with it the academy of knowledge, as to (hopefully) give those thoughts value and meaning. We analyze, we study, we find our emotional fortitude in that we can fortify with academia. The moderns taught us the value of empiricism and the postmoderns the necessity of deconstruction, doubt... put them together and you might get a 20-something conversation.

I wonder how language hinders.

J.A. rambles like a poet. Stringing words like beads on a necklace, placing them like wet sweaters on the laundry line. He forms odd phrasing of adjectives and verbs - the descriptors becoming their own characters making decisions and choices. And he, only the vessel harboring those daemons within him. Containing them as best he can before one, or all, breaks out like they inevitably will.

Language becomes the Warden's gate to him. Speaking and acknowledging his way of fortifying the walls. I take a glance at my friend. It's his birthday, and it is apparent that the tangential forces of the evening have brought about a certain awkwardness. I already knowing the answer that if asked my friend would give: You ok?... I'm fine.. just don't feel like I have anything to offer.

Questions, questions would be good I think. By asking questions you put pressure on the words, adjectives and verbs to reveal themselves, to show their weakness, help J.A. see where he needs to build stronger bars, discipline the rowdy daemons - but I guess that's what therapists are for. But I keep those comments to myself and change the subject.

And in an evening I feel the divide between weighted words and silence.

Language is our primary form of communication and yet so often it hinders us and keeps us in our personal human containers.

Current

2011-06-22T11:33:00.000-04:00

1. Listening: Bon Iver's new album. It's magical!

2. Watching: If I could do anything in the world it would be dance. However, because my own lack of grace hinders that endeavor I enjoy watching it immensely. The ability to converse without words, to speak using the body in such an expressive way is mystical. There is a dialogue that takes place that invites others to watch, interpret and [if so talented] take part in.

I have currently been watching the Matchbox Dances, a series of short films that examines how film captures dance and then how public, private and personal movements intersect with one another. and the more I watch the Canary and the Coal Mine the more I beautiful it becomes.

CANARY AND THE COAL MINE from matchboxarts on Vimeo.

3. Eating: I like fish. It has been a long arduous process to enjoy the taste of tiny sea creatures, but I now like fish. So, the other day I made tilapia with escarole and lemon-pepper oil.

4. Doing: Packing. 7 days and I embark on a new adventure. Durham, NC here I come.

12 steps.

2011-06-17T16:09:00.000-04:00

1. I admit that I am powerless to the change that is about to ensue me.

2. I admit that only Power greater than I can restore my sanity, and that only a Power great than I could have ever brought me to this insanity.

~~3. I make a decision to turn over my will and my life to God as I understand God...~~

wait.. what? I don't understand.. rewrite.

3. I make a decision to turn over my will and my life to God though most days I really don't understand what that implies until about a half decade later. [now find 12 step program for insecurity]

4. I will make a searching and fearless moral inventory of myself.

i will now cower under my sheets out of fear of myself. i will also check myself into therapy. no one should look that closely at oneself without a bit of guidance.

5. I will admit to myself, God and others that I am scared of the smallest bit of change, that I am weak and not very brave. I will also apologize for my insanity leading to their insanity, and then walk with them as they gain back their minds too.

6. I am ready to be a brave person.

but being brave means I will no longer be scared. change. drat.

amendment: I am ready to be ready to be a brave person.

7. I am ready to be ready for God to make me ready to be a brave person.

8. I will make a list of all those I have driven insane by my insanity. I will bake them pies and cakes.

9. I will face my fear directly with the help of those around me, except where it might incur more harm...

...is it too late to renew my current lease... yet my current topography is changing even as i stand still.. is it too late to make a time travel machine and go back to 2 weeks ago?

10. I will continue to examine my moral self [however with a rather broader lens] and realize that change can bring good opportunities. I will admit that change is good.

11. I seek through prayer and meditation to improve my conscious contact with God as I understand God, praying only for knowledge of God's will for me and the power to carry that out..

Oh man... back to the haze.

edit: I refocus my mind and allow it to rest, realizing that change does not equal unknown, and unknown does not equal change. I will allow myself to take life a day at a time. I will allow my mind to focus on God and allow it to rest despite its uncertainty. I will also keep a stash of reeses in the cabinet for the particularly stressful moments.

12. Awaking spiritually as a result of these steps I will not pass out tracks nor attempt to make articulate sense out of this experience right now. I will however take deep breathes, go for a longer run and eat the half of chocolate silk pie in my fridge.

based loosely off the 12 step program.

Change is hard.. and I should know.

2011-06-15T20:29:00.001-04:00

15 days from today I will be moving down to Durham, NC.

8 days from today I will headed up to a cabin in NY with some dear friends.

Tomorrow my apartment will be completely packed up.

As a self-labeled major procrastinator I have been slowly but surely packing my apartment over the last month and tomorrow all but a suitcase for the next 15 days will be packed. [Of course due to my short thinking I also packed all things necessary to cook, so pb&j will have to do].

And in case I or anyone else has forgotten, I hate change. "Even when I choose the change," mom always says. This is why I've been taking so long packing my apartment. By doing so slowly I am allowing myself to get use to the idea of the impending change. I am probably the biggest fan of routine I know. I've gotten better over the past couple years, but even so major changes like moving, job changes, or whatnot throw me for large lugubrious loops.

Change is usually the catalyst for most existential/metaphysical/epistemological (oh let's just throw the whole philosophical boat in there) doubt. And with all these questions and wonderings, anxieties and anticipations I find myself praying a lot and, as with any good crisis, reexamining these tenants to my life - specifically with prayer.

There is this old Hindu proverb I came across a year ago that I love. "Prayer is asking God for something, while meditating is listening." Far too often prayer becomes a list of requests, and subsequently a tattered, mournful, disappointed whimper when many requests turn back void. Prayer, to me, is catastrophic in that by taking part in it I placing my faith in a God, who for the time being, remains shrouded in intangible mystery. I let go of my fear of feeling silly or insane, I set aside my contemporary affluence and fortitude and take part in a tradition that spans thousands of years. I read through prayer books written by the Desert Fathers and utter words that carry means deeper than I understand. It is in that I find my friends words ringing true: prayer is a refocusing and reorienting of one mind and thoughts back to the tasks at hand.

After visiting a Buddhist meditation service a few times I think as a Christian I have a lot to learn from the peaceful monks. That when I take part in prayer I should be letting go my anxieties, realizing those circumstances I cannot change, and accepting the responsibilities for the circumstances that I can be a positive influence in. Buddhist monks spend an hour 2-3 times a day in complete silence and stillness, allowing their minds to relax and let go reorienting themselves to the "rhythm of the earth's change" as one monk put it to me. Stepping beyond that, I specifically bringing in my Christian ethic, I reorient myself to the teleology set forth in Scripture. My days end up much more peaceful when I take an hour or so and just sit in calming silence and stillness and just meditate.

Doubt.

2011-06-13T22:39:00.001-04:00

I cannot escape it.

As much as I would like to grasp onto the fleeting moments where I am comfortable stating that God provides, alas they dissipate and I questions and I wrestle again.

The problem - or rather the conundrum - of going to seminary is that I am not merely getting a master's degree in religion. I am paying large sums of money and dedicating a significant portion of my life to this specific religious tradition. In a sense I am walking down a large foreboding aisle and signing a marriage covenant when after all these years I am not completely sure I know this God.

It feel silly to pray and silly to believe and silly to spend time thinking about this topic.

But then I remember the story of a refugee I've been emailing. She is one of the few Christian refugees I have met and when I asked her why she believed she gave an answer unlike anyone else.

Most of my friends are American born and raised, they have enjoyed the comforts of the West and know very little first hand of genocide and war and the life threatening nature of illness in a third world country. So the answers I commonly here are those in terms of narrative. I don't think they are bad answers. I agree with those answers, for in this context those answers reveal a bit of truth about God. The scriptures do explain why community thrives and fails - despite the suffering it might be going through. The Christian tradition offers an redemption and restoration narrative that though is dependent on the divine, it requires our action and awareness. But this refugee's answer, her simple answer, I find myself fumbling over.

She said something along the lines of: In the camps you pray to a God because you need God. He is your only chance at survival. When someone is sick we pray for healing, for when a person is healed it is only because of God, but we also pray that if the person is not to be healed they will go soon and quickly and pray gladness that they get to escape this hell.

I don't need God.

I am sick - I am doctor's a meds.
I am hungry - I have a job, friends who chip in or invite me over to eat
I am needy - I am never needy.

I live in convenience, and though I want to be carefully not to demonize the fortune I am blessed to be in, I recognize that I doubt because very rarely am I ever truly in need of God.

Farewell Ohio.

2011-06-09T14:43:00.000-04:00

It is no secret that Ohio might be my least favorite state that I have ever had the opportunity to exist in. Though really any state that has a winter ranks pretty low on my list. I could make a list about a mile long about why I dislike this Mid-Western state. First, where I live it is completely flat and the wind is almost maddening (which only worsens in the icy winter). Second, I prefer mountains to flat lands. But My time here is ending. As summer begins to swell with it's record breaking temperatures (15 degree increase over the average this week) and humidity I prepare to say goodbye and head down to balmy North Carolina.

However, not all Ohio-ness is fraught with horribleness. As I view the present moments through the eyes that realize the limited-ness of my time remaining the sun takes on a magical light, comfortable silences with friends feel deeper than spoken conversations and my early morning coffees in the park make me almost wish I was not leaving.... almost.

But mostly I am sad that this season of life is over, never again to be revisited.

But that only means I have new memories and seasons to live elsewhere.

a whole bunch of words.

2011-06-07T18:17:00.002-04:00

Language. Words. Speech.

They all prove to be inadequate.

When we speak we ramble our thoughts into hopeful coherent strings of words. I have this image of wet sweaters on a laundry-line, hanging heavy and limp, the wind blowing giving it life, giving it death. These are my words.

Maybe it's my current cultural situatedness, or maybe it's my generation, but there is this need for articulation - almost over-articulation - of every thought, carrying with it the academy of knowledge, as to (hopefully) give those thoughts value and meaning. We analyze, we study, we find our emotional fortitude in that we can fortify with academia. The moderns taught us the value of empiricism and the postmoderns the necessity of deconstruction, doubt... put them together and you might get 20-something conversation.

So, I wonder how language hinders. How because of my "language situatedness" I keep more hidden than i ought to, I am more careful than I ought to be.

I throw this out to Denise who takes things back to her theater experience. Because of the theater she is allowed to be what philosophers, psychologists and lit theorists would call inarticulate and it is considered to be acceptable. She can convey her emotions insucinctly and yet be heard more clearly and understood more penetrably than I feel I can ever be currently. The in-articulation is thought of as artful, and with it it is understood that the listen can extract whatever emotion rings true to them or, I guess, place upon the speech that same emotion. But when you are sitting in a livingroom and have thoughts you don't understand and emotions that find words annoying you don't have art, you don't poetry, you have frustration.

But then again, this isn't left only for those of us who are "emotionally mute."

I think of the Art academy. We have created glass boxes in which we place art, in which we discuss and theorize about art. We have created a safe room for which the emotion that is expressed is de-emotionalized and theorized about and removed from that which probably inspired the art (the every day, unaware person). So when I visit the museums and I read the art criticism it is no wonder that I feel like I am left unmoved, uniformed, and feel silly for expressing any deep emotions that might have been felt because of the piece in front of me. I view the painting in the sterile room, on the sterile wall, away from and unaware of the experience that moved the artist to create the piece. I view it in an academic rhetoric that I feel as though I barely understand, and yet I try and try in this language Ito articulate my emotions and experiences and the meaning-ness of the the piece. I do not understand. I feel at a loss.

Maybe these are the 20-something emotions. Placed in a glass box, like art, left to be theorized about and discussed over, hopefully producing something that has a clear and weighted value. maybe...

Art informing Spirituality.

2011-05-30T20:39:00.000-04:00

Dan and I sat in James Turrell's Pleiades installation. For the first 5 minutes we wondered if there was a magic button hidden somewhere, needing to be pressed to start the show. The room was completely dark, I guess what is known as "pitch-black." There was no use trying to see my hands, my lap or any other part of my or Dan's personage. I felt the wooden railing in front of me, the seat bellow me, and heard the echo of the room around me.

The lightness and darkness somehow coexisting. The weight of darkness pressing upon my skeletal shell, forcing a sense of claustrophobia - a fear that close proximity or touch would suffocate me. Yet our voices echoed - enough to know that the room was large and could swallow us whole. The way James Turrell uses light cause the line between actual visual perception and perceived visual perception to be blurred, viewing the world with your eyes wide shut. The "outside space" of external existence and the "inside space" of internal awareness begin to merge and with that nothing is illuminated or known, but instead a deep confusion sets in. Doubt of what is actually there and what your mind thinks is there starts to wax and wain.

The longer we sat there our eyes mildly adjusted. There appeared to be a graying light glowing, being projected on the far wall directly in front of us. Dan and I asked questions about our perceptions, trying to distinguish if our eyes were lying to us or not. Eventually we began to see the same thing. This asymmetrical, morphing blob that just continued to glow and emanated on the far wall.

And then we leave.

---

I find art a tool to inform spirituality. The outside stimulus making us aware of the internal thoughts that we were thinking all along - maybe even unaware.

Liturgy

2011-05-25T13:32:00.001-04:00

Liturgy [n] : a service performed following a specific form, usually pertaining to religious worship.

The seasons perform a liturgy unmatched by any person or religious institution.

seasons.

2011-05-24T00:29:00.000-04:00

my church, my home for the past 4 years closed saturday.

i know there are other places that exist like it, i know that i was moving regardless. but my heart is wrenched with sorrow for those who will still be here and must find/figure out/ discover a new home.

midtown made me christian, redefined what christian means to me.

christian is not:

a program.
a building.
a talisman.

christian is:

a community.
a lifestyle.
a bond.

john wrote some beautiful words on what midtown was. in a sense i think it will always be this, for midtown was/is the people and those people still exist and i pray they carry with them the beauty and the pain of the season of midtown.

2011-05-19T20:59:00.000-04:00

I haven't been blogging as frequently. That has been due to a few different reasons. 1. As this season of life has been changing friends have been moving away, and with that I have been spending many of my waking hours soaking in the last bit of their presence before they are whisked off to the next phase of life. 2. A season is ending and I have a hard time admitting it.

My year off is rolling to a close. Come fall I will be walking down the daunting halls of Duke and starting my full-on graduate program. Come July I will be moving to a new place and learning how to operate in a new community. With all these changes I find great joy and sadness. However, this year of intentional living has taught me that though a season ends, that does not mean I leave all behind. Instead, this coming season friendships (though distant), lessons, experiences and wisdom will trail with me.

I've also put off writing because I've embarked on this "tell a more truthful story" shenanigan and now I feel the weight of being honest when I write.... but more on that in another post.

All this too say, this season has been a great one and I have been in a bit of denial as it comes to an end, but as all good things come to an end one has the write to celebrate with a top 10 countdown!!

So top 10 experiences of this past year.

10. Learning to survive - from medical crap, to car accident craziness to financial strain and more, I will now proudly rock out with Gloria Gayner and sing "I will survive!"

9. Dropping everything might bruise your toes, but in the end will strengthen a friendship - I know cheesy.. but I feel a bit more grounded in my values. Though I still might have a lot to learn in consistency I know that I have a foundational groundwork.

8. Jane - she's my cat. She's cute, annoying, a pain and my dearest little creature. I'm excited that she will be making the move with me.

7. Ethnic food - I know grad school won't really afford me as much time as I would like to cook, however I can dream. I have greatly enjoyed experimenting with Thai, Indian, Moravian, and whatever other recipe I can find.

6. Crossing a few things off my bucket-list. Let's say that an addition addendum in the comment section can now be scratched off :)

5. Dropping everything and flying to see a dear friend. So technically that required a bit of fore-sight, however I greatly enjoy just being able to have a flexible schedule. It will be hard to go back to a more solid on, however, I still hope I can on occasionally randomly book a train ticket/plane ticket/road trip and see my dear peoples near and far.

4. Death sucks, but can teach us to live life more fully and challenge us to see the beauty.

3. Surviving part 2. I realize I already stated this one, however, it sometimes amazes me that I am still living.

2. Working to start a non-profit. We are beginning to build the elements of the site www.refugerefugee.org

1. Breathing. Nothing is better than going on a 5 mile run, or riding my bike all over creation, or just laying outside and feeling the wind. I have a deep appreciation for my little pink lungs and the simple enjoyment they find in being outside.

So, nothing spectacularly written here, but hey, it's the mundane that tends to shape us.

Singleness

2011-05-13T16:18:00.001-04:00

[This is an op-ed style piece I wrote for a friend's publication. Thought I would post it here.

Cheers.]

The engagement stories are abounding, couples are pairing off, and you and I are single. Single, the six letter word that for many of us unearths fear, pain and longing that we have spent so long trying to temper. “Ring by spring” is more than a joke: to some it is a desperate goal, a goal I find even myself grasping unrighteously for, viewing singleness as a fallacious life-option – even if for only a season. Many of us grew up in the church surrounded by conferences and sermons on virginity and "saving ourselves" for the husband or wife that one day would be by our side. We were told that college is a magical place where we would find that special someone alongside our book-learning. Now that college is here (and for some of us college will be over shortly), we sit and ask ourselves where that person is--did I some how miss him/her? can that other single person over there make a suitable companion? could they, at least, satisfying this longing to be known and cared for? The purity conferences and sex talks offered by our churches and youth groups (if those churches and youth groups even discuss these topics) have left us short-changed.

St. Augustine famously penned, “Lord make chaste, but not yet.” These words ruminate subliminally through dorm halls as eager freshmen find themselves as graduating seniors without attachment. Though we might be willing to make grandiose statements of contentment and open desire for what the Lord has for us, we are running scared. We are scared wondering if there really is that “one person” for us, scared temptation will overcome us, scared of being alone. And this is where the discussion on purity and virginity falls egregiously short. According to a traditional Christian ethic, sex is meant to be within a marital relationship, saved for that special someone. But by stating that sex and purity is only about saving yourself for that “someone” we lump sex and our personal sexuality as something that is biological and incomplete currently. The irony is that we criticize media’s portrayal of sex as shallow and animalistic. But by claiming that my purity is nothing but a gift for a person I have not met yet and may not exist do I somehow water down sex to be nothing but animalistic passion that must be kept under lock and key? These words, this concept, have weigh heavy on my mind: have I somehow cheapened my current state of chastity, my current state of singleness by merely just pining and waiting for the someday instead of embracing my current station in life? Historically we have spoken about virginity in terms of a physical act, and recently we have been bringing in the emotional side of purity, but we still are not addressing the deeper nuances that living the virginal life holds. In Lauren Winner’s book Real Sex, she quotes a religious community in New Zealand on the matter, “Chastity is the free choice to live one’s sexual life in accord with Christian values – therefore, everyone is called to live chastely” (p.134) Chastity moves beyond just abstinence, but requires us to investigate how we are to live within our sexuality regardless of relationship status.

I remember sitting in my kindergarten Sunday school class hearing metaphorical stories of princesses waiting for their princess. I recall modesty lectures, purity discussions, and “waiting until that day” talks. I was no stranger to the concept of “protecting my purity until the day of marriage.” However, all this was contingent upon there being a Mr. Right. All this was assuming that my future has a definitive spousal relationship. Even if a husband is in my future should singleness be just a means to an end? Is chastity a fiery hoop we jump through and prayerfully not get scorched? Why do we teach our children these things, and how do we demean those who are widowed or life-long celibate or those that face perils of illness and handicap? Why do we hype up marriage to our children to the point where singleness is frowned upon, chastity is grimaced at, and well meaning “one days” are furiously spread around to calm anxious nerves.

Let’s be honest, you and I know the passages of scripture. We can quote them from “though shall not commit adultery” to “even if you think a dirty thought about another person in your heart it is as though you have committed that against them.” But slowly and surely we have decontextualized these passages, severing them from their communal roots within scripture, their roots in the creation story and the churches collective representation of Christ. We no longer find it convincing to hear or say “But God says so, and therefore…” because we long for these passages of scripture to speak to the deepest longings of our souls, to feel that God hears our deep desires for commitment and unity and be able to trust that regardless of what will be one day we are whole and complete as long as we are rooted in Christ. Chastity is not just about saving sex for marriages, it is about placing sex within a context, one that is rooted in the gospel, in ourselves as created beings, in the restoration narrative of scripture and seeing our fullness as something found in Christ from which we share with others, extending beyond a biological act but encompassing our entire sexuality as male and female - both in how we act as single persons or married persons.

The discussion of chastity is more than what I do or not do as an individual, but begs me to look and see how this part of my life functions inside the greater community of the body. With that being said, I believe that we have been failed by the church as well as have failed ourselves in not seeking how to live our lives with the fullest contentment within the communal setting. In other words, to live chastely we must come together – elderly, single, married, or widowed - and inspire and challenge one another to live fully and contentedly in our various placements. When satisfaction in chastity [or maybe just willingness to be chaste] is contingent upon one day being married how much present contentment and joy can we truly experience? Instead of enjoying this season, I find myself anxious for the one day. Instead of viewing chastity as a gift, I view it as squelched desire to which I can honor my future whomever. I have placed my reason for preserving my parochial “greatest treasure” in a person who may or may not exist. Even as I write this I find myself appalled at the fact I am honoring someone that I am uncertain truly exists! Someone who has yet to even earn my respect [let alone I earn his]. What contentment can I ever receive in singleness if I leave myself with such insecurity and unpredictability? If I place my reason for chastity first out of respect for myself as a created being, outflows a respect for myself, and my body. I have respect for a body that is created in the image of Christ; a body that one-day will be resurrected and completely restored. Through this lens I also have a respect for the other bodies and persons I interact with, desiring their body to be holy and a part of the restoration narrative. Perhaps I must redefine 'singleness.' Singleness, a season of great challenge, prosperity, growth, drought, and beauty to which one can be open and unhindered to the service of others. Singleness, a season to be embraced instead of despaired.

Paul speaks directly to the widow and the single persons proclaiming that this season is good, and with it such persons are able to take part in and be beneficial to the community, even more so than those who are wed (I Cor. 7). We need to reteach ourselves, reteach our churches, and teach our children that singleness is a time to be enjoyed and savored. Though this might not alleviate the desire to be in a close, intimate marriage relationship, it might at the very least encourage a more productive season and a deeper satisfaction and “ok-ness” in where we are. There is great godliness in contentment (1 Tim. 6:6), godliness that views our current provision as enough and rooting unavoidable longing in the trust we have in the faithfulness of God. In all things we are to learn to be content (Philippians 4). If I do not learn to be content now, will I be able to be content later – marriage or not? Will intimacy be satisfying then? Though I am unmarried, and relationally unattached, I will glean the wisdom from those around me. “To be content now, is to be content later,” no matter what the later may be.

Charitable Mourning

2011-05-02T19:43:00.000-04:00

"We may have had some victories, but gloating over the deaths of our enemies will only poison our resolve and our principles. We should mourn for them, we should pity them, because they like many were only pawns in a play for world-wide power." -- US Christian Democrat's blog

The quote above is from a blog spot well worth your time reading.

A few months ago I wrote a post on charitable discourse - relating to how we interact with the various views around us (specifically within Christendom). I now want to extend this thought to how we think about the current situation with Bin Laden. Not having internet at my apartment I didn't understand the abrupt cheering that took place outside my apartment until a friend texted me, clearing things up. {Though I didn't realize he was serious until the next morning.} And when the gravity of the situation hit me I felt sad, legitimately mournful.

I want to be careful. This sadness is not to delegitimize the suffering Bin Laden [and those who have worked with] has inflicted on others (on my personal family), this is not to say that justice should not be had (I am not even going to try and argue what appropriate justice should look like in this circumstance), but was not Bin Laden created in the image of God? Isn't he one who was fearfully and wonderfully made?

I am weary of the good guys/bad guys mentality that has inundated our theology - or maybe we have created a hybrid of thought: Theopolitics. As Christians we hold to the belief that every life is sacred, yet in this case we seem to have added a clause - except that of terrorist. I question, wouldn't the beloved Apostle Paul be considered a terrorist by our standards? After ordering the stoning of Stephen Acts 8 informs us that

"On that day a great persecution broke out against the church in Jerusalem, and all except the apostles were scattered throughout Judea and Samaria. Godly men buried Stephen and mourned deeply for him. But Saul began to destroy the church. Going from house to house, he dragged off both men and women and put them in prison."

And later Acts 9 records

"Meanwhile, Saul was still breathing out murderous threats against the Lord’s disciples. He went to the high priest and asked him for letters to the synagogues in Damascus, so that if he found any there who belonged to the Way, whether men or women, he might take them as prisoners to Jerusalem."

This shows that not only was Paul involved, but also the religious leaders of the time. This last passage is right before Paul's conversion, after which he faces the same kind of torturous acts upon himself. He then becomes one who proclaims in Romans 12 a reiteration of Christ's teaching in Matthew 5 - that we are not to repay evil with evil, that we are to try and live peaceably with everyone and furthermore we are to leave room for the wrath of God.

As a contemporary people I think we have done very little to promote that last front. We look to Old Testament passages and claim for ourselves the judgment that God brought upon disobedient nations as our anthem passage for why we should instigate war or promote the death penalty. However, [and this is my own curiosity not a statement upon the text] I wonder if the Pharisees toted these same passages when they took part in the persuasion of first century Christians. God acts in very direct ways in the Old Testament, and many times we see God fighting on behalf of the people. I recall the story of Ai in Joshua 7 where there Israelite decide to go forth upon their own strength - they fail. We see God chastise them and only by his direct order and command do they succeed the second time. And even in these battles it was made very clear that this was not of their doing, but of God fighting on their behalf (Exodus 14:14 : Exodus 14:25; Deut 1:30; 3:22; 20:4; Josh 10:14, 42; 23:3; 2 Chr 20:15, 29; Neh 4:2).
I become extremely nervous when I hear these passages being used as mantras for "pro-war" or "pro-death penalty" - which the death penalty is the form of justice the U.S. took up against Bin Laden. Where is room for God's wrath, God's judgment? I am not stating that we should not act, but I do believe we need to think more carefully about how we act. [I also believe it was not the U.S.'s place to impose this justice. Yes we incurred loss due to Al Qaeda's actions, but the Middle East and the families there have incurred greater injustice from their actions that has spanned not hours or months or years, but generations - the formal beginning was 1988].

So therefore I return to my initial question, should we really be celebrating Bin Laden's death? Though I doubt the possibility of his conversion [I don't want to make Bin Laden a Paulian character], should we celebrate the lack of redemption in this fellow created being? Should we celebrate that on this side of heaven there is no possibility of redemption?

I mourn the terror that Bin Laden and Al Qaeda has inflicted upon thousands of people. But I also mourn the death of a lost soul.

Random Readings

2011-05-01T13:58:00.000-04:00

3 books that deal with maneuvering through change [though the change might be unrelated to my own]
1. House Made of Dawn - Scott Momaday
2. The Great Gatsby - Fitzgerald
3. The Maytrees - Anne Dillard

I a not counting down the weeks until I move: onto another season of life, another location, another community.

Change is my least favorite word in the dictionary.

Yet being stagnant scares hell into me.

So change it will be.

Some Good music
1. The Middle East
2. Tennis - Cape Dory
3. The Shins - Wincing The Night Away [an oldie but a goody]

On the Subject of Easter

2011-04-26T01:42:00.000-04:00

The sunlight breathed around me, with every exhale saffron light stretched out across the damp earth, while the inhale brought back the the clouds and steal blue color that marked the day. Climbing to the top of the steps of the central building of the one-day reopening Antioch College campus I smelling the Japanese Tulip trees and watch a stray puppy gallivant across the straggly lawn. The wind carried with it the sent of the blooming wild flowers the sounds of distant creatures chirping and scurrying above. I spent Easter outside of the pews and buildings, away from rock-anthem music and neon lyric screens.

I really do not have much to say that is that unique or profound from what I have already said. Easter is about the resurrection, and in a world that appears to be overcome by the maniacal forces of death, I find it comforting that resurrection is one day promised.

Yet, on that note I wrestle with the Easter narrative. My experience with Easter is in pageants and rock operas with neon crosses, my experience is this explosion of gospel anthems that take the already contrived words of some worship song about Jesus dieing just for me and appending a new guitar riff to it. So when I go to church and I hear an Easter story and hear that resurrection is awesome I shift in my seat and wonder if this person, this speaker, is making up some mythological story to make us all feel better.

The Easter story really is fantastical; larger-than-life.

I am appreciative for my almost Catholic-protestant up bringing. As a family we walking through let. I don't remember ever not observing lent. We would give up our sweats and tv and Mom would always explain why we let these things go whenever we would complain about not being able to eat Birthday cake (which occasionally my birthday would fall during lent). The Thursday before Good Friday we would place all the flowers in basement and close the blinds and place a black table clothe on the kitchen table to prepare for the solemn day to come. Friday was spent rather quiet. We wouldn't listen to music, and I remember one Friday in particular where we just cleaned all day. I remember cleaning in Becca's room and she and I we getting a bit rowdy and Dad came in and calmly asked us to settle down - explaining why we are solemn this day. Sunday was always a wonderful transformation. Mom would fill the house with flowers and joyous music, she would make a splendid breakfast and we would celebrate the joy of new life.

But yet, despite the familial awareness of the holiday my experience inside the church has always tainted my view of the Easter story, making it sound as contrived as the G/C/D worship anthems we sing all year long.

And this is where I find a new appreciation for the Holiday season this year. Spending Easter outside of a church I enjoyed friends, creation, eating Chinese food, making Indian food, talking with complete strangers, reading scripture, sitting in silence and singing at the top of my lungs while driving down a forgotten back road. I spent Easter allowing my eyes to be opened to both the beauty and the pain of the earth around and praying for the hope that will one day overcome it all.

I wonder if part of my issue with Easter inside the church structure is that we do not take enough time to delve into the liturgical calendar, which allows the juxtaposition of the suffering and present/future hope to live in tension with one another.

So on that note some various readings that may or may not have to do with Easter.
On of my favorite essays on worship - Brueggemann's the Costly Loss of Lament.
N.T. Wright on Resurrection

Completely random: Wasabi Peas are amazing.

Forgiveness, Provision, and Bits in Between

2011-04-20T20:35:00.000-04:00

Today is Wednesday. It's now 3 weeks ago that my car was pulverized. Life has moved on.

Mr. J (the other driver) showed up for his court date last week and he will be going to prison. I'm still not sure when or if I will replace my car. I believe that God provided once and he will provide again. I'm not angry at Mr. J, I sincerely pray that he will find redemption and restoration. If anything, I find myself angry at the jail systems and programs that are implemented to rehabilitate trouble members of society. My gathering from talking to the cop who oversaw my case and from talking to people who work in the ares is that the county jail system does not work (Mr. J was only out for 4 months before the accident). I desire justice, but I desire justice as a means to restore. And though it is right to send Mr. J to prison - for he is a danger to himself and others - I would gladly raise the money and support to send him to a place that would help him work through his issues and possibly be restored back to society.

I have to admit, I am still a bit surprised that this is my first reaction towards Mr. J. Don't get me wrong, I was angry. I was angry when I saw him laying next to my friend in the ambulance. I was angry when I sat in the waiting room by myself waiting for Peter to come, I was angry when they cop told me they couldn't perform a tox-screen due "politics." But driving home I became less angry, the next morning I felt sad, last Wednesday I spent my day praying restoration for him, and this week I'm use to not having a car and kinda don't mind.

This past year I have been trying to learn the practice of forgiveness. And though I could try and articulate those thoughts the truth is that Miroslav Volf says it better. (I know, current favorite theologian...) So here is a video that my prof sent my after the accident.

I think, unbeknown to me, that it has been through learning how to forgive daily on the small scale - and occasional large scale - that forgiving Mr. J. has been so easy. Similarly, I have had the privilege of watching my Mennonite friend exercise forgiveness. Mennonites are known for the gracious spirits, and the way her family and herself has handled this situation just continually humbles me - to say the least.

On a loosely related note, through this I have been able to see restoration in unique ways. Friends have come around me to support me, lending me rides, cars and lifting anything over 5 lbs. One friend offered his car for me to use over the last week since he was going to be out of town, another took all my laundry and washed it for me (since I'm not allowed to lift the basket). I wrote my admissions essay to Duke on the ecclesial nature of suffering and the importance of the community's response to the sufferer. I can speak from experience that learning lessons of forgiveness, lessons of trust and redemption are infinitely more meaningful and significantly easier when the church gathers around supports me in my suffering. Over these past few weeks I find it is through the support of a few dear friends that I find myself open to "whatever the future might hold," to tote the cliche, and willing to just hold so loosely that which has no eternal value. In a similar way, Mr. J is suffering as well and I wonder if the church has failed him. I can't speak definitively, for a. every person has the choice to live their life in a certain manner and Mr. J could simply be choosing to live against the advise around him, and b. I don't know what his religious standing is. But given that statistics say that 80% of people at least profess some knowledge of Christ, I can't help be wonder if the church - whether that be grocer, bar keep, neighbor, mechanic, etc. - has failed him - even if it is a failure to notice him.

Do I need a car? Maybe. But I know that when that day comes God will provide, whether that be through another friend or family member, finances or a friend offering their services. In the mean time, friends, keep praying for Mr. J. I am committed to praying for him during his time in prison, that he will find restoration and hope, that his family will find restoration and hope and that whatever local Christian community is around him will respond to the suffering in a way that brings forth redemption and restoration. We are in the Easter season, the season where we celebrate the first advent of Christ and the sacrifice that he made, and pray and wait for the second. Might we at the very least be open to and experience restoration while we wait for Restoration.

Questions I don't like answering - but willso anyway.

2011-04-16T23:08:00.002-04:00

Between bites of burgers and fries, I enjoyed the new life of a dear friend [hence the pictures of random musicians - of which he is one]. The conversation was sublime, from guessing radio songs to discussing European beers, redemption underpinned the currents of thought. I sat for about 2-3 hours with these new friends, these fellow souls, discussing redemption and restoration and how we live that, how we try and find it in all the brokenness. They had just come from playing a show at an awareness conference on human sex-trafficking, and from that stemmed long conversations on whether a person, a relationship, or a

"So where did this talk on restoration come from?"

I really don't really like answering that question. Makes me uncomfortable. I played around with the possible answers in my head, but decided to land on the truth. The guy I was talking to was leaning back in his chair, fumbling a fry in his hand waiting for an answer. I've met few people as humble and honest as him, so I thought he deserved the honest truth.

"A break-up - and then life being medical hell for a year," I responded. "I saw how when life is working people claim 'this must be of God' and 'how good and Kingdom-building this is,' but when things move south we claim 'well this stuff happens' and 'oh well.'" I shared a bit about how I watch friendships change because of that relational change, and watched people who had once claimed devotion to my life become distant and awkward. The answer is simple. My eyes were made abundantly aware of how broken we really are. I also realized that never once had I heard preached from a pulpit what it meant to live in restoration and redemption with another person. I figured, there's something wrong with this picture of the gospel. Corey joked how he came in the middle of all that - as an almost-beacon of redemption. (Which when I think about it is true for him and Katherine and Mom and Bec and a number of people who while I wrestled with life just came into it and offered a possible narrative for how to live.)

In light of the last post, these are the conversations that I hate and love. The conversations where it's not good enough to just discuss the abstract theology of how I live, but the story that shaped why I live this way. Sometimes I wish the story was simpler - I read the Bible and found this and enacted it and it work. But that's clearly not what happened. A relationship fell apart, a body began to disintegrate faster than I could hold it together and the body of Christ drastically failed me. But then if I am going to be really honest, I failed them, affirming those that left me sitting alone that I neither wanted their help nor needed it.

Theological ethics cannot be developed in a vaccuum. I don't think that a person can rightly sit in a closet with nothing but a Bible and develop a system for how the church should interact with one another and still come-out sounding genuine and honest. I don't like to admit the root of this line of thinking because it feels rather silly - girlish [maybe a little country-songish] But through losing what I thought was so important and so valuable I received a gift far greater, I learned what it means to be apart of the body of Christ, or in other words, how my actions affect those around me. Through unintentionality, I learned why I must be intentional, through ignorance I learned how to listen; through loneliness I learned how to pray. Hebrews says through suffering Christ learned obedience. Through suffering [both cosmic and that which was the consequences of my own actions] I learned what it might mean to embody the gospel.

Even so, I am blown away by the story of the guy I talked with. The life he has come through and the forgiveness he works to extend shapes how he writes, how he interacts with his children and his wife. It has shaped how he thinks about the earth and the poor. By hearing his story I learned more about mine, and by hearing his story I felt as thought I glimpsed a bit of Christ working to redeem the earth.

All that to say, the evening confirmed in me that I need to figure out how to discuss experience, to tell an artful story. That are stories are apart of the redemption narrative of this earth (I hope to get some friends to write out a bit of their story and post it here).

Corey - the friend who's band I met.

The Art of Confession

2011-04-13T21:55:00.001-04:00

...or how I'm not as honest as I would like to think I am...

Easter is almost here, many of us are anticipating this familial holiday - or at least counting down the days till our lenten fasts are over. I've been thinking through the act of confession a lot, even written a few post on it, but as I have been praying and thinking more about it I realize that I really wrestle with being self-disclosing, and how to appropriately self-disclose.

I have a story, a narrative I've lived and am living. There are good parts, bad parts, mediocre parts and parts that end of in the miscellaneous/un-index-able pile. The text of my narrative manifests itself in a variety of different ways - conversations with friends, interactions with baristas and co-workers, writing here on my blog, and so on and so forth. But am I telling a shallow story? Now, I'm not talking about a Donald Miller, A Million Miles in a Thousand Years kind of story, I'm wondering if I'm not being honest with what my story really is. Of course with this conversation questions are raises as to how much is to much, but I think what I am wrestling with is how much is too little? I think there are those people people where we find full disclosure, and then moving outward - like concentric circles - to the rest of the community we allow our stories to unfold.

Talking with Whitney-friend, we wrestled through why this is difficult. Some of the conclusions we came to are the following.

In the church we have developed a habit of "spinning." Everything we write or say about our personal struggles we attempt to "spin" in such a way that we still come out winning in the end. We do this with testimonies and struggles and faults. I think there are times where people truly are genuine, and through honesty we see the glory of redemption. And I cannot speak for anyone else out there, I do not know their motivation, not should I try to hypothesize about it. I can only speak to my own. I tell about my pain - but usually the pain that is cosmically-inflicted. Or in other words, that which is out of my control. Every once and a while I might tell of a short coming, but that is usually hidden under perfunctory text that tries to "spin it" back into something positive.
We don't know how to be honest with our close friends, so how can we be honest with or interactions with other members of the church - or heck, just members of society. I remember reading in Unchristian how a rather significant percentage of people (i know specific...) think Christians are disingenuine and fake - keeping people at arms length. I think I've gotten better at this with those that I trust, but I notice that when it comes to the things I've overcome I'd rather not talk about them. If I am really honest, I think it's because there is shame still lingering on those memories. I almost hope that people will forget, or that if I talk about it then who else will know. What will my parents, family, friends think? (Let alone those that we don't know well, or who hurt us, or who we are unsure of, or who we are interested in - wanting to keep up a polite and clean facade as to not give reason to hate/dislike/reject/disapprove of)
We want to sound profound. Nobody wants to sound like an idiot, but I think when profundity is the point all we end up with are pithy maxims and abstract thoughts that can't seem to make there way down to planet earth.

When I leave the messy parts out of my life, I am not being honest. I'm not exemplifying the process of sanctification that has hopefully been taking place in me, I am hiding the fact that I have needed my community members to be honest and I am still allowing embarrassment to determine who I am. I want to learn how to tell my story, to allow my story to open to genuinely interact with others, to learn how to better admit my faults and weaknesses - not out of psuedo-righteousness, but hopefully out of humility.

So, with the encouragement of my dear friend I am going to try and articulate aspects of my story. I am going to try and be honest.

Of course I realize that I haven't really said anything here. All I have said is the problem I see with myself and how I want to fix it. I have to admit I really don't like the idea of this project, for it's going to take a lot of effort, thought, prayer and vulnerability.

I fear that if I publicly admit I use to have an eating disorder that somehow I won't be taken seriously, or I will be viewed as another female statistic. I fear that if I admit that I drop that ball at times, that I fail friends dramatically, that I will never be trusted to help or be involved. I fear that if people know that as I'm more spiritually inconsistent when it comes to the spiritual disciplines of fasting and waiting and having patience than a 5-yr-old on sugar, that I will somehow be disqualified from entering into seminary. I fear that if I admit that I have days where I just feel lonely, even in a crowd, that the last person I would ever want to know about my lonesomeness will know and be able to gloat it over me. I also fear that by writing all this I will have to actually talk about it... but maybe that isn't so bad. It's one thing to disclose secretly in a counselor's office all your rubbish, it's another to actually take it and lay it out and see how it fits into the narrative of your life, allowing to maybe be something beautiful.

So friends, for you are my original audience, and whomever else might be reading. I hope you enter into the conversation and help me to learn how to be honest.

The Lord is my Shepard.

2011-04-11T17:27:00.001-04:00

Psalm 23 has been a continual point of meditation for me over the past couple years.

The Lord is my shepherd,
I shall not want;
He makes me lie down in green pastures.
He leads me beside still waters;
He restores my soul.
He leads me in paths of righteousness
for His name's sake.

Even though I walk through the valley
of the shadow of death,
I fear no evil;
for You are with me;
Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me.

Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me
all the days of my life;
and I shall dwell in the house of the
Lord forever.

I grew up with reading an illustrated child's book of this Psalm. The first stanza was painted in bright arrays of color, illustrating wistful clouds, crystal waters and a sleepy lamb. The children played carelessly in the field and in my 5-year old mind I thought the imagery was lovely. Turning the pages the second stanza was dark and foreboding, with gray, wiry tree frames arching over the small children like monsters erupting from the shadows. I very rarely looked at those pages.

But just yesterday as I while 'dinnering' with a dear friend I played the Psalm through my head, and taken-aback by the simple phrase 'even though.' This is the present. Currently the the storm is raging, and the dark shadows are lurking. There is an ominous feel in the wind and life feels all to tenuous. The Psalmist isn't sitting reclined in his chair, enjoying a warm scone and tea, but is cold, tired and worn.

The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.. what does that mean? I think of this because my dear friend has watched various avenues of her life crumble. She mourns death, heartache, frustration and brokenness. She is like this Psalmist who finds himself walking in the valley of death and dying. Is the Lord her shepherd, doesn't he see her pain? Where is when her friends are no where to be found, when the questions keep her awake all hours of the night? Is he there?

The contrast of the two stanzas makes me wonder if the Psalmist is able to see a respite in the darkness, that though the path wearisome he is being sustained. The Psalmist is claiming peace, and stillness, rest and restoration. He finds that God is with him, though the pangs of death surround him, making their presence known. He finds that this path leads to righteousness.

I have no words to unfold why suffering is still present, why the resurrection has not come. I sometimes wonder, aren't things bad enough? Does Japan have to sink into the ocean? Do 100,000 more people have to be slaughter by a dictator, does my friend have to lose more and more of her family? The peace does not outweigh the questions, but I think sometimes if we allow ourselves to breathe deeply, and have our eyes opened to the simple ways the Lord provides we can walk through them a little better.

My prayer today is one of sustainment, that wherever you find yourself you might fine a moment or 2 or rest. That though your life might feel overwhelmed by deep shadows, I pray you can see redemption emerging. As we come towards Easter we are reminded that death will not last, the darkness will not conquer, for one day there will be light. So today, I pray you will find that glimpse of light.

A Book Review: Half the Church

2011-04-04T12:13:00.000-04:00

With all the hub-bub this past week I almost forgot to post this! I also get to give away this book. How you might ask: Super powers. Well not really, but post a comment with a link or copy of a great dessert recipe. I'll post the winner at the end of the week and get your info from you. Also if you own a Kindle, Carolyn Custis James' other book The Gospel of Ruth is available as a free download from Amazon Kindle.

When approached to write a book review, I was a bit tentative to crack the spine on Carolyn Custis James’ Half the Church: Recapturing God’s Global Vision For Women. The egalitarian/complementarian debate is nothing new. Every so many years (sometimes as short as months or weeks ) the conversation reemerges with a new gusto, confirming Solomon’s adage that there truly is “nothing new under the sun.” Each camp pulls out verses, doctrines, and theological anthems to prove their legitimacy and persuade the other side to convert. The conversation is a tiresome one, and one where being a woman entering the seminary field I am all to familiar with, and would prefer to distance myself from, but the subtitle “Recapture God’s Global Vision for Women” intrigued me, so I opened the book. I am glad I did.

In Half the Church James tries to transcend the heated debate by raising some very important questions on how we should go about discussing this matter. The women’s roles conversation has been predominantly Western in both thinking and function. Half the church the Western church is controversial, but we’ve forgot about the global portion of that church. James finds that this conversation needs be more than westerners trying to decipher what is correct or incorrect, but instead be looking at the conversation. What do our propositions and stances mean for a woman who has been trafficked through India, and abused for most of her life? What are the implications of arguing a firm submission or a liberalist feminist liberation mean for a young woman in the Middle East? Correspondingly James states this conversation must be much, much more than women advocating for women, but a conglomerate effort by both sexes to seek the Kingdom of God and all that entails. James rightfully states that half the church is at stake here.

James found her inspiration in the book Half the Sky the Pulitzer prize winning book by Nicholas D. Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn, which helped bring modern slavery and sex trafficking into our foresight as an issue that we must deal with. Bringing in examples from Half the Sky, James offers credible evidence that the way we have been discussing gender theology must change if we are to truly be a global Kingdom of God. She writes this statement [p.42]

“The twenty-first century is a time of unprecedented opportunity for the church to be a beacon of hope for women throughout the world. This is a moment for us to put on display before a watching world the greatness and beauty of the gospel of Jesus Christ and the radical difference he makes in relationship between men and women as we serve him together. This is a time for us to value and foster the flourishing of women and girls and to join together in leading in global advocacy and activism on behalf of the widow, the trafficked, the marginalized, and oppressed. Blessings from Go carry responsibility to others”

How does our language on women’s and men’s roles affect our international brothers and sister, what are better ways to empower the church abroad, and what can we learn from these various cultures that we cannot learn if we remain in ethnocentric are all questions the James has raised in my own head.

The discussion is a rather pastoral one. The bit of exegetical work that she enters into might be lacking if you are trying to use this work for academic argumentation. At times I wish she would have delved more into the statements she made about the Hebrew language and stories that exemplify male/female equality as well their Greek counterparts, offering more citations and evidences. However, looking at this work as a pastoral piece I find that her framework asks other to research and explore this issue themselves, not relying on anyone person to tell them “this is how it is or should be,” but to go digging themselves.

The book is also formatted to be used in group settings, with questions at the end of each chapter that I imagine would provoke deep and thoughtful discussion. Though this book is primarily targeted to women, I would not hesitate to hand it to any of my male friends, for I think this is a discussion that must be had by the entire church.

Overall James offers a charitable work that begs both complementarians and egalitarians alike to look at the larger picture of the church and adjust their actions and language accordingly.

2011-04-02T21:40:00.003-04:00

Today was a surreal day.

Today was a wedding.

Today was a celebration of a birth, or a continued life.

Today was a funeral.

The coalescence is confusing and mysterious.

Peter tends to his family as they mourn a death, while I stand next to friends as they commit "till death," meanwhile thanking the father I am alive to see 22.

I normally don't attend chapel, but out of support for my dear friend I sat front and center to see the culminations of her year's work [advocating for and raising support for a local inner-city ministry]. I must say I am glad I did. The passages read where passages I have been praying through for 2 years now. It was a beautiful answer to prayer to hear these passages spoken on and prayed through, an experience I was humbled to be present for.

2 Corinthians 5 - the ministry of reconciliation.
Ephesians 3 - the God who offers abundantly more than we could ask or think.
John 13 - they will know we our Christians by our love for on another.

Simple passages, that when taken seriously change our daily lives. If I had forgotten before this past week reminded me the weight of importance these moments we are sustained in carry. We have the power to be reconcilers, healers, and redeemers, if only we grasp onto this idea that the moments we stand within now matter.

We are not promised tomorrow. I sat with my bride-friend's mother as she told me the funeral she attended on Wednesday [the day of my accident]. A funeral of a young man my age who had the exact same kind of accident I had, but didn't make it. I don't understand why I was sustained and he wasn't, why God's hand was over me while his mother now mourns his death. So friends, my thought is simple and maybe rather cliche'.

Live today as though it matters - for it does. And in each moment might you always be working through the power of the Father to bring about the kingdom "on earth as it is in heaven."

My name is Kate Roberts, born April 2, 1989

2011-03-31T09:30:00.000-04:00

I was hoping to write a blogpost about the amazing refugee women we met with last night. I was hoping it to be full of stories that would challenge me and shape me in the years to come.

Yet, we never got there.

And the story I have from last night is a very different one.

I'm not sure why I snapped the picture to the left, I think it was because I didn't believe all that happened. I kept saying my name, my birthday, wanting people to know who I was, for them to know that I know who I am.

On our way to Columbus last night Amanda and I were hit head on by an intoxicated/half-sleeping driver. He just showed up in our lane. I swerved. He swerved right into us. Amanda is ok and home with her parents. She sustained the most injuries out of the two of us, with a broken nose, broken leg and a whole lot of bruising. I am just covered head to toe with bruises. This is a picture of them cutting her out of the car as I sat in the ambulance.

If you could see the front of the car you would see almost nothing. It's gone. The roof, the roof pealed in the front like a can of sardines. But we are alive. We are ok.

I am thankful for Peter who called in the middle of all this to say he was coming down to the hospital. Thankful for the prayers we received, and Amanda's family who once again displayed the love, affection and grace that defines the Mennonite tradition. And their constant assurance this was not my fault.

Within a years time, for the 2nd of April is fast approaching, I have faced terminal illnesses, more diagnosis-es, and now a car crash that should have killed me. Nothing will teach you more so the value of actively taking part in the acts of reconciliation and restoration, that this life now really does matter, than having your mortality continually dangled before your face.

A Weekend Current

2011-03-27T09:28:00.000-04:00

My kind of happy hour at of my favorite book stores

I have written a current in a while and I have been reading, listening to and experiencing so many wonderful things!

First Books:

Rob Bell's Love Wins: Though I will not give my opinion on the matter, I will say I think he has something we need to hear - no matter what side of the line he eventually falls on.

Katherine Ann Porter's Flowering Judas: What a lovely lovely collection of short stories, as well as the eponymous story Flowering Judas. She carries with her writing a catholic allegory reminiscent of Flannery O'Connor, but without the incredibly abrupt endings.

A Dr. Mill's suggestion: Philip Cary's Good News for Anxious Christians: 10 Practical Things You Don't Have to Do. Smattered with bits of humor, Cary argues against the modernist evangelicalism that underscores a lot of our practices within Christendom today. I am still not sure if I agree with some of his final notions, but I sincerely wonder if that is because of Scriptural evidence or because the overly romanticized ideas of "that being how things work."

For all you poetry lovers, I found the wonderful Poetry Foundation. Have a meandering.

Other than that I've been keeping up with the Lybia Crisis, the Japan Earthquake/Tsunami/Nuclear Crisis and now Thailand and Burma's Earthquake. Really makes you pray, Lord, come quickly.

Music:

The Middle East: A bit late to discover their 2009 release of The Recordings of the Middle East but hey better late than never.

The Tallest Man on Earth: The Wild Hunt. Mmmmm good music.

Mat & Kim. A guy at work introduced me to them, not sure if they are a favorite, but definitely worth listening to.

All things Jonsi, for Jonsi is great non-profit writing music. Segue? I think so.

Experiencing:

It's always nice when you are passionate about something and the more you talk about the more you find that there are people around you who are either passionate about the same thing or desire to help you get it off the ground. With that being said here is our new logo by the wonderful Laura Dreyer:

We have purchased our domain and have a site containing our start up info ready to go as soon as our server is approved by our host. Research is well underway and I have a myriad of friends who have offered to research one of the refugee people groups we are focusing on and write a narrative, so yay there too! Also, I will be meeting with people from World Relief this week to discuss this project.

Prayer would be appreciated :).

dry bones.

2011-03-24T14:40:00.002-04:00

there are dry bones all around us, even in us.

we feel the weight of brokenness, the sorrow, the anger; the confusion.

so you go running around, huffing and puffing looking for life to arrive in the dry bones. you see them twitch here, and dust kick-up around them, but nothing. the bones within you are still dry, worn, tired. you long so deeply for resurrection, restoration. you speak it, yell it, preach it, weep for it as you pray, but yet the bones are still dry. the bones still lay lifeless before you.

but god, you cry, why won't you redeem, why won't you save. i am looking for you, and yet you remain hidden.

but there is a voice, small, almost inaudible, more like a rumbling within you. it confuses you, for it asks you to speak and for you to have faith one more time.

i wonder if more often than not we look for life in the wrong places, the places we were never meant to find it. sure, there is something stirring off over to your left, but it that the life that is to be had? as i spend a great amount of time in ezekiel this year i feel like we are like those little isrealites, looking for life here, trying to find hope there. occasionally we find something, and we cling onto it claiming "god provided this for me" when maybe he never meant for them or us to have it. when the isrealites stop they realize a deep longing within for hope, they feel that god has put in their heart a desire for the impossible. restoration? redemption? salvation? to be whole with god, with creation, with one another? is that possible?

and so the lord comes to ezekiel, tells him to prophesy and speak life to the dry bones. he then tells him to go and tell the people of israel about this, that they are those dry bones and he will bring life to them. but this life is based on obedience, this life is based on them trusting god.

i wonder if those lifeless bones we see in our own lives, those instances where we ask god why he hasn't restored, or redeemed, or worked, are really waiting moments that are waiting for us to turn to him, pray and obey. to have a bit more faith and to act. could it be that grad school choices aren't really that complicated? could it be that maybe that school we got into and feel a deep unspeakable longing to go to and to learn at is right where we need to be? could it be that god will provide when we obey, and that might even be after we pack our bags and go? could it be that person you haven't talked to in 3 or 4 years, whom you use to share deep friendship with is actually in a place where they are ready to receive restoration? that in your own longing to see things restored, god has been working on their heart and you need only to speak 'Dry bones, hear the word of the LORD!' and the dead will become living? could it be that is illness and hardship, when death seems to win the battle, i just need to be on my knees and pray and ask god to show how i can be a perpetuation of redemption with whatever life i have on this earth?

i wonder if maybe god has already worked redemption and is ready to breathe life back into the dry bones if only we obey.

Standing, waiting, praying.

2011-03-22T14:50:00.000-04:00

I am reminded that amidst the encroaching Easter season that we still wait for a final Resurrection, one that will set all things to rights. As I sit with my friend who now endures a second death in her family in a month, I am reminded that death still exists.

So I think about the story of the friends digging the hole in the roof, lowering the paralytic before Jesus.

Sam died when I was in 7th grade. It was in 2nd that he was diagnosed with a brain tumor. One day he didn’t show up at school. The small chair at my reading group table remained empty for the rest of the year. I thought cancer was like having the flu, but worse, and tumors just creeped me out - something growing inside you...sounded gross. I didn’t understand. But then I began to. We prayed as a class. We prayed as a school, a family; a church that Sam would get better, and every once in a while he did.

I remember one story where the doctors were going to begin surgery, but when they cut into his spine they found nothing. The scans showed 3-5 tumors, but they found nothing. In Sammy’s groggy state he said that Jesus had allowed him to be healed for a bit.

He was in and out of school. The chemotherapy drugs took from him a grade level and most of his hearing. I was 4th grade and he was now in 3rd, and I only saw him at recess. He walked with a bit of a limp now, but he smiled and laughed and played with us. I still see the school uniform on him, red nit sweater vest and the crisp white collared shirt underneath, navy blue pants. I never saw him cry. But I was a kid, and probably wouldn’t have noticed if he cried. But Sam always had nice things to say. He always talked about his love for Jesus and books, and his cat that slept on his feet.

It wasn’t sudden when he died. Each time the cancer came back it was worse. The chemo dissolved Sam’s dark brown hair into a peach colored fuzzy covering, while the steroids he took for pain for pain puffed out his face and arms. He looked a bit shriveled in the wheel chair, his arms and legs bunched in around his torso. The disease eventually took away the little hearing he had left, his ability to walk, and made speaking difficult. But he would always ask how I was, always smiled, always tell me that he was excited to see Jesus.

When they laid his body in the ground it was like they dug a hole in the roof of heaven, lowering him down before Jesus to be healed. We were like the friends looking in, wondering if something miraculous was going to happen as we lowered him down. . And there his body rests until the day Jesus will come back and heal. And like that paralytic, Sam will jump and run and dance and be well.

So as my friend goes forth to this funeral, where yet another family member will be lowered before Jesus, I pray that we, the onlooking friends might cling to faith that He will say “arise and be healed.”

Be Healed.

2011-03-18T18:46:00.004-04:00

Suffering is poetic. So often we chant repetitively "this too shall pass, this too shall pass." And this is true in a terminal sense, all this shall pass. The suffering will one day end, the suffering will one day be redeemed. But what about today? In Drops Like Stars Mr. Bell rephrases that old adage into "This too will shape me."


Even in the suffering, I do find life.

Talking with my dear Sarah friend today, I shared with her a bit of my wrestling with Matthew 8-9. Any person who has bore an smidgen of physical illness or walked along side someone with a major illness knows what I am going to say here. Why doesn't God heal? Why am I still sick? Why is my Father/sister/aunt/friend suffering? I feel this not only about myself, but for my friend who was born with one kidney and needs a transplant. I feel this with my Dad who shares with me in illness. I feel this with the kids I work with. Why God? Why do you heal then and not now?

Reflecting upon the healings in Matthew 8-9 I think I must acknowledge the overwhelming theme. The healing was never just about not being sick, but being whole within community. The leper was ostracized from community, left to look on from the outskirts, having to yell "unclean!" if anyone ever approached him. The hemorrhaging woman was in a similar boat. The centurion was a Gentile, unwelcoming in Jewish circles, and those with demons were unwell and spiritually disenfranchised from the religious system. When the paralytic was brought before Jesus the Scriptures say that he was healed because of the faith of those who brought him. When Jesus healed, those he healed were given the opportunity to once again come into the religious/social/spiritual life that define that Jewish culture.

Present within this text there is also the unknown aspect of time. How long have they been living with illness, how long have they been on the fridges of society - only able to see the community they long for? How long did they prayed to be well, for YHWH to heal them? We know with the woman it was 12 years. I've already halved that with my own illness.

"We live with all sort of expectations about how our life is suppose to pan out. And then, we suffer." Bell says in his video. Sometimes, even after 6 years, I find myself sitting on the roof of my car staring up at the stars wondering what my life would be life if healing came tomorrow. I plan where I would go, what I would do; the adventure I would head on. And then a melancholy acceptance comes upon my where I realize that today this is where I am, and today I am sick, and today I am breathing in the small portion God has offered to me.

But still, how do we reconcile ourselves with these legendary stories of healing and wholeness when we are continually confronted with the brokenness of this earth? On a global level I really don't have an answer. But personally, in this Western context I think we need to redefine healing. Outside of physically still being sick, I am deeply connected with my religious community, my family. I am able to partake in the spiritual disciplines, both individually and communally. The Lord has sustained me to graduate high school, to graduate college, to have the opportunity to go to grad school, to have the opportunity to work with others, to serve and be served. In that sense, I consider myself healed, I consider myself whole.

I do say that with a bitter-sweet hope, for I will be meeting the head of the Lupus council in Pittsburgh to discuss hopeful treatments. I say this with a bitter-sweet hope for I know my friends have been praying that I would be without illness, to physically be whole. But dear friends, I am healed. This to shall and has shaped me. Will I ever be without pain? Will I know how long life will be? Does this mean that this is as bad as it will get? I don't know, and I cannot speculate who I would be without these past six years, and neither do I want to. This doesn't mean tears won't flow, and words won't be exchanged with God, nor does it mean that I am joyful and thrilled that this is my life. But, it does mean that wholeness is defined as deeper than my physical being. This means that I am trusting. This is but part of me, and this part of me has allowed me to relate to a whole world of suffering that I would never wish upon another being. It has allowed me to pray with those who suffer, find solidarity and hope and long for the resurrection in profound ways. This too shall shape me.

So I pray for you who are ill, who are suffering and scared, for you who long for Christ to heal family or friend. I pray that you might find hope, that you might find community and feed into and by fed by that community. I pray that you might be healed.

---------

Some wonderful listening - Jonsi live :)

Matthew 8-9

2011-03-17T03:13:00.001-04:00

I’ve been trying to write something profound to say about Matthew 8-9. I have been soaking the commentaries into my small brain, and reading wonderful books like The Voice of Matthew and Matthew for Everyone. But the more I try to make my thoughts flow the more I find they are disjointed. So here is the very unartful, incohesive, outline of why I love Matthew 8:1-9:34 in a cohesive way. Most of us know the stories of the Centurion’s sick slave, the calming of the see and the hemorrhaging woman, but I feel as though these stories offer a larger picture to be grasped.

1. With these passages being squished between the Sermon on the Mount and the coming together of the 12 Disciples, I find it powerful that after Christ gives this speech on how to live, and before he goes and bestows his power upon the 12, he exemplifies it. Jesus is very concerned with the suffering present on this earth, as stated in the Sermon’s rhetoric. And from Jesus’ speech, that declares not only his awareness of suffering but also that this creation is on a restoration trajectory, he begins to enact it by healing and exercising dominion over the earth.

2. Healing was not just a physical thing, it was a spiritual, religious thing. When Jesus healed the leper and the hemorrhaging woman he did not just give them healthier bodies, but allowed these ceremonially unclean people to enter back into social life, back into the religious life of the community. When Jesus cast out the demons he healed their mind, their soul. When Jesus gave those he came in contact with a new wholeness. Jesus is setting up a new order where through his sacrifice we can be clean, even in infirmity.

3. Jesus forgave sins. Previous to Jesus being on the seen the remission of sin was only ever done in the temple, and never once do we see Jesus forgiving sins inside the temple. When Jesus heals the paralytic he says, “Get up, your sins are sent away.” He is now setting up a new paradigm, one where we do not have to travel to the temple to sacrifice animals or live with the overwhelming guilt and shame until we are able to make the long trip.

4. Jesus is aware of our fear, and hold power over them. When he calms the storm he shows his power over the earth, reminding me of the numerous Psalms that declare his power over the oceans and seas.

These passages speak to the healing power within Christ. And though we sit in a world that is not healed, that is falling apart at the seems (literally!), we know that Christ will come and heal. Might we be faithful in the mean time.

Things to pray for:

The continuous upheaval in Libya.
The Japan disaster. This country has really experienced a Job story, with earthquake, tsunami and Nuclear melt down. I really prayer that we see Jesus heal, and that we see the church (ourselves) step up.
The friends that are facing illness.
The friends that have had to bury family members.
For Jesus to come back.

Isomniatic Reading.

2011-03-16T01:55:00.002-04:00

The tolling of the midnight bell is a signal, but what does it mean? Get up, Laura, and follow me: come out of your sleep, out of your bed, out of this strange house. What are you doing in this house? Without a word, without fear she rose and reached for Eugenio's hand, but he eluded her with a sharp, sly smile and drifted away. This is not all, you shall see -Murderer, he said follow me, I will show you a new country, but it is far away and we must hurry. No, said Laura, not unless you take my hand, no; and she clung fist to the stair rail, and then to the topmost branch of the Judas tree that bent down slowly and set her upon the earth, and then to the rocky ledge of a cliff, and then to the jagged wave of a sea that was not water bu a desert crumbling stone. Where are you taking me, she asking in wonder but without fear. To death, and it is a long way off, and we must hurry, said Eugenio. No, said Laura, not unless you take my hand. Then eat these flowers, poor prisoner, said Eugenio in a voice of pity, take and eat: and from the Judas tree he stripped the warm bleeding flowers and held them to her lips. She saw that his hand was fleshless, a cluster of small white petrified branches, and his eye sockets were without light, but she ate the flowers greedily for they satisfied both hunger and thirst. Murderer! said Eugenio, and Cannibal! This is my body and my blood. Laura cried No! and at the sound of her own voice, she awoke trembling, and was afraid to sleep again.

The end of Katherine Anne Porter's Flowering Judas

I wonder if Judas knew what he was doing all along. I wonder who he was. I sometimes think that the paths between follower and deceiver are not that far apart, maybe only a few steps away. I wonder what happened that changed his mind after all he experienced, he witnessed so much. Were his feelings hurt and anger ignited when Jesus claimed that only he would sit at the right hand? Did illness or peril overcome him, where he felt as though the one who could heal did not care to notice, did not care? The story never says. Just that one will betray. The paths between follower and deceiver are awfully close together.

Laura betrays. She betrayed her religion long ago, the political movement she currently follows, the students she teaches, and herself. By never committing, never binding herself to any thought, person or desire, she remains on the fringes of her humanity, for can a person be human and be so apathetic about their life? Was that Judas' problem? Was he apathetic? Did he never truly weave himself into the 'cloth of belief?'

I wonder if Judas felt same fear Laura experienced surge through his frame as he felt the silver pieces for the first time, the "slow chill, a purely physical sense of danger, a warning in her blood that violence, mutilation, a shocking death, wait for her with lessening patience." But we don't talk about Judas much, only at Easter when we mention he betrayed Jesus. "Don't be a betrayer," the pastor once said. Is it because we relate to Judas a little to closely? Because we know his woeful death should be our own. At least in Peter, with all his misplaced zeal, we see his redemption and being called the rock in the end. And Thomas, Thomas bears the burden of skeptic, but he too believes and weeps. But Judas. Poor Judas, he accepted the tainted silver and kissed the cheek.

As a kid I use to pray for Judas. I felt sad when Judas died, he was so close, so very, very close. He even admitted his fault. So I prayed for Judas, that the Lord would have mercy upon the ancient soul, for I wondered, like Laura, what if I'm Judas, or you're Judas, or my friend sleeping upstairs is Judas. So I prayed for Judas. Sometimes, I still pray for Judas.

Lent: Thoughts on Confession.

2011-03-12T22:30:00.002-05:00

Lent is now in full swing, with this being the first Saturday of the lenten season. This is a season of longing, reflection, repentance, and hopeful restoration. Lent is a season in which we deny ourselves of something and where many in turn try to pick up (or renew) a practice of simple living and awareness of community and Spirit. Our reflection turns inward to our souls as we ask ourselves "What are the they ways in which we keep ourselves from understanding, from peace, from relationship with God, from relationships with others? How have our actions denied the restoration anthem of scripture both in turn of our community, our church, our personal family and friend relationships?" Lent is a time where we find ourselves broken and honest, confessing these things to God and each other.

I have a deep respect for my devout Catholic friends who taker seriously the practice of confession. They willingly submit themselves to the accountability and admonishment of the priest and community. They do not hide their sin, but confess it realizing that though the restoration and healing process from the damage of sin might be painful, it leads to life. I think this is a practice in which protestant/evangelicalism has sorely overlooked. Our form of confession is more of an inspiring testimonies of the "once was, but no longer," or the "God brought me out of and I'm healed." This is not to negate those with this testimony, but my reading of history is that humans are continually, daily fallen individuals who will wrestle and battle against the powers at work on this earth until Christ's return. Have we lost the ability to humble ourselves and be honest with those closest with us about where we struggle? Do we tarry to the point in which we might never come at all?

I was in awe and inspired by my Mennonite friend's church last Sunday. During the service a man stood up and acknowledge his struggle with pornography, apologizing for how his actions have affected those closest to him as well as those within the community that were unaware. He was not alone, others stood up beside him acknowledging their own sin. Now I do not want to focus on how the details of such a confession should be discussed in the public sector, nor do I want to focus this discussion on the proper way to go about confession. However, what struck me deeply was what this man's open confession said about the church to whom he confessed. They cultivated an environment in which trust and love where preeminent. This man's strength spoke to the longsuffering of the church, bearing with one another in love and grace, allowing a member to muster his strength and confess the darkness within him, bringing it to light, allowing his community to carry the burden with him, and allowing all to come together and seek Christ and his Kingdom more whole-heatedly. (I also appreciate the acknowledgment in his action that this sin, though hidden, affected his community - whether they realized it or not.)

Even today I found myself challenged in my conversation with Naomi to acknowledge the deep, trusting community that we share within friendship and confess to her my sin, my shortcoming, my darkness. It's awkward and weird. It has left me vulnerable. But it leads me accountable, it leaves me with the opportunity to grow deeper in both my relationship with Christ and my relationship with her as my friend.

Tonight I found my minds wanderings of the week once again firmed by the homily at Midtown. Gombis lead us in a beautiful prayer-filled liturgy on sin and confession. Reading through Genesis 2:15-17; 3:1-7 we prayed for deliverance, for the desires of our heart to be those that seek Christ and reject the evil within us, among us. We prayed to deny the desires of honor, praise, and preference, and to deny the fear of humiliation, rebuke, forgettenness, and of being wronged in order to turn out hearts toward Jesus, in order that he might implant in use the desires to put others first, to love freely, to live a life that speaks of Christ and his glory.

From there we moved to Psalm 32. This psalm is a heavy psalm. "When I kept silent, my bones wasted away through my groaning all day long. For day and night your hand was heavy on me; my strength was sapped as in the heat of summer." I think far to often this is where Christian lie, where I lie. Out of fear of my reputation being tainted, being laughed at, humiliated, rebuked, etc. I keep silent. I remember the journal entry sophomore year where I wrote that my soul felt emaciated within me, as though my lungs were like two paper bags barely able to hold air within them. When we keep quiet about our own sin, institutional sin, communal blindness and the like, we waste away. And so from this passage we confessed areas in which we have been silent; our love of affluence, or selfishness with time; our failure to recognize those in need (or our failure to do something when we recognize those in need), and asked that the Lord will have mercy upon us.

Moving forward, Romans 5:12-19, recognizing that to overcome sin it required the death of Christ. "Just as one trespass resulted in the condemnation for all people, so also one righteous act resulted in justification and life for all people." We turned in prayer to come before God and acknowledge his sacrifice, ask that we might long to love him and serve him more. We opened ourselves to living lives that truly reflect the gospel, to live lives that will be open to the painful scrutiny and the spirit of those in our community when we fail to do so. Our hearts are parched from wandering in the desert of sin.

Matthew 4:1-11. Christ went out into the desert for 40 days to be with God, to find new life. How it saddens my heart that in order to find Eden again we must wander in this desert. But, the hope, the promise of redemption is there. Confession does not leave us wanton while we wait for Christ's return, but instead opens our hearts, minds, souls and body to the redemption act that Christ will one day complete and has asked us to take part in today! And so, I leave with this pray we prayed in response to the passage.

God you are good and upright and you instruct sinners in your ways. Show us how to break down the barriers separating us from each other,
Lead us though the wilderness sin has created to find new life.
Forgive us for the times we have abandoned the poor, the disabled and homeless. Teach us to live by the law of live in unity, peace and concord,
Lead us though the wilderness sin has created to find new life.
Forgive us the ways we exclude people of difference race, culture or gender. Guide us what we may come to mutual understanding and care,
Lead us though the wilderness sin has created to find new life.
Draw us into your community to embrace those with whom we need to be reconciled. Grant that who seek to heal divisions between people may have hope,
Lead us though the wilderness sin has created to find new life.
Show us our ways, O Lord. Teach us your paths and and guide us towards your truth, for you are God our Savior and our hope is in you.

Look down on mercy, Lord, on your people who come before you, and grant that those whom you have nourished by your Word and Spirit may bring forth fruit worthy of repentance, through Christ our Lord Amen.

Charitable discourse, wheat-free cookies, and an all around plesant feeling.

2011-03-11T12:15:00.000-05:00

Such charitable conversation.

It's here, it's here, it's here! What's here you ask? Well dear friends, Jesus, Paul and the People of God: A Theological Dialogue with N. T. Wright of course! I've been waiting and waiting sing the Wheaton Theological conference last year for the essays presented to be published. And what better way to recuperate from pleurisy/chest congestion than to curl up with a bit of theological discourse? I already devoured Vanhoozer's essay! [He might be a favourite theologian. Read Drama of the Doctrine between Summer and Christmas 09... such an artful way of thinking and writing]

Oh the excitement.

In light of my previous post, I truly find the discussion one that exemplifies how to go about conversing, agreeing and disagreeing in such a charitable fashion, exemplifying humility in thought and speech. I still remember sitting in the fold-down chairs listening with wide ears to lecture, the manner in which these reputable scholars conversed with one another and they way Wright responded to both praise and criticism. It was during that conference that I felt my decision to pursue theological study and apply to Duke was confirmed. For I saw that you could come from different spectrum of the theological conversation and wrestle through texts and positions but still walk away brother and sister in Christ. There will probably be posts and such about the essays in the near future.

Apparently my expressions during the conference were so memorable that a few professors still comment on my childish wide-eyes, claiming they knew I was going to head off into theological studies for I lit up like a kid in a candy store.

Other than that my day has been spent making some delicious wheat-free cookies, grading, research and just resting. I am so please that spelt flour makes everything taste remarkably normal, and chocolate chip cookies makes grading and course researching so much more enjoyable.:)

Hard to believe spring break is almost over. Soon the placated town will be full of action and movement, oh how I have enjoyed this peace. To my students: I hope you started thinking about research topics. To my friends: I look forward to your return.

Oh and remember to keep your eyes open for the book give away the first week of April. I have decided that the give away criteria will be the submission of your favourite dessert recipe. It can either be a link to a website with the recipe or just the recipe written out in the comment form. [Note: not a huge cheesecake fan unless the cheesecake is infused with heavenly, heavenly chocolate!]

Cheers!

Developing a Theology of Discourse.

2011-03-09T13:20:00.005-05:00

Some rather appropriate books on Mom's bookshelf.

In light of the recent outrage and ‘discussion’ that has now ensued over the topic of universalism, I am curious as to why we do not hear more sermons on the theology of discussion or ‘How we should treat each other respectfully with the action of speech.’ Staring at the pile of library books holding up the wall over my nightstand I’d like to think that such a piling would be representative of the ability they hold to discuss and converse with one another. From Christopher Wright to N.T. Wright, Wiesel, Boyd, Bauckham, Gadamer, Volf, Keller, Bell, plus the myriad of wonderful fiction (Fitzgerald, Dillard, Katherine Ann Porter, etc.) Yet, this week has made it apparent to me the sad truth that not unlike the rest of our physicality, our speech is quite fallen. And, like the rest of our being, discipline is needed in learning how to speak and converse in a way that is redemptive and Kingdom building.

I do understand the reactiveness in the discussion. These knee-jerk comments are not only the Achilles heal of those within the Judeo-Christian Theology or the church, but we find these same sorts of reactions in other religious systems, politics, philosophy, literature and even pop culture (OMG, did you see what Lady Gaga was wearing/doing/saying). They occur when we feel as though someone is attempting to delegitimize our point of view, or that which we believe passionately. Yet, I find that when such speech occurs in Christian community my heart is greatly dissuaded, for we claim to be seeking the Kingdom, unity and redemption. We claim to be living lives that merge Jew and Gentile. But yet the recent onslaught of speech shows a long set habit within denominational Christianity to count ourselves, our doctrine, our beliefs as the elect and all others as misguided and damned. But, with this past Sunday being Transfiguration Sunday and today being Ash Wednesday, the marking of the Lenten season, I desire to focus on how our speech either advances or hinders this Kingdom.

1 So if there is any encouragement in Christ, any comfort from love, any participation in the Spirit, any affection and sympathy, 2 complete my joy by being of the same mind, having the same love, being in full accord and of one mind. 3 Do nothing from rivalry or conceit, but in humility count others more significant than yourselves. 4 Let each of you look not only to his own interests, but also to the interests of others. 5 Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, 6 who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, 7 but made himself nothing, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. 8 And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. 9 Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, 10 so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, 11 and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

I bring to mind Philippians 2 and the basic observance of Christ’s life throughout the Gospels. Paul exhorts the Church to be of one mind, encouraging one another; being one in spirit for the sake of unity amongst brothers and sisters as exemplified through Christ. It is no small potatoes that the main way through which we communicate is via speech, both written and verbal. Looking merely at how Christ spoke we find that the people he used inflammatory speech with were those who were in the church and should have known better, and even then he mostly condemned discriminatory or exploitative actions (Matthew 21:12-17, Mark 11:15-18; Luke 19:45-47; John 2:14-16; Mark 12:38-40; Luke 20:45-47; Matthew 5-7). Jesus appears very aware of his language and what Jim Belcher refers to as the 1st tier of Orthodoxy, unity that is “‘...nothing more or less than the ancient consensual tradition of Spirit-guided discernment of Scripture,’” from which the 2nd tier is where we hold carefully and humbly our respective denominations and doctrinal statements and partake in conversation that will hopefully challenge and edify our fellow brothers and sisters in Christ (Deep Church p. 59-58). I find it strange that we leave the messages on using “kind words” and “not gossiping” to the children’s and youth ministries, but the ethics of speech is severely lacking from current pastoral conversations.

In Miroslav Volf’s August 2003 presentation at the ICETE International Consultation for Theological Educators High Wycombe, UK, he discusses the importance of language within theological education. He argues that theological study is not the study of language that we use to speak about God, but is direct speech about God, “Indeed, properly understood theology does not only study God. Its goal is to promote love of God—the creator, redeemer, and consummator of the world, the source of all truth, goodness, and beauty” (p.2) Later he reflects that,

“We interpret the world for them in the light of God’s designs; we reflect on how to align our lives and our world with God’s purposes; we seek to motivate them to find fulfillment and be a blessing to the world by trusting and loving God. What we say and how we put it cannot be just a matter of movement “from the inside to the outside,” to use Taymor’s phrase. We are “pastors,” and must be sensitive to specific needs and situations of our “parish,” whether that be the church or the world. Neither in the way nor in the content of our speaking and writing can we abstract from all audiences and just have God on our minds” (p. 7).

As we discuss theology, life, politics, etc., it is necessary to be sensitive to the matter at hand. We are humans, made in the image of God, created to steward this earth, to cultivate peace, and to promote the glory of God to all. We are also fallen beings, needing of and longing for redemption. We experience God’s redemption through the sacrificial act of Christ, and through this should be willing to extend redemption and grace to others. This should be most heavily exemplified within the church. Looking at the story of the unforgiving servant (Matthew 18) we find that the servant was not condemned because of his debt, but because of his lack of grace upon that who owed him. Similarly with our speech, we expect our points to be heard, accepted, and discussed with respect. Likewise, shouldn’t we also listen, discuss, and either encourage or admonish with the same respect?

Belcher argues that even with Orthodoxy comes “‘cognitive modesty,’ the belief that beyond classical consensus there are widespread differences within orthodoxy that need to be respected” (Deep Church, p. 62). Reflecting back onto the work and words of Christ I do not think it is a stretch to say that the teachings we find as anthems for how we are to love one another, serve each other, find unity within the faith, etc. most adamantly include our speech and how we use it. “By this all people will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another” (John 13:35). How important than is the use of our language? With the dawn of internet, social networks, and other such telecommunications one of our most powerful ways to show love and grace is through our language.

This does not imply that we not disagree, nor agree without careful discerning thought. However, given that this season is a time of meditation on God’s love for us through his sacrificial act, I think we might do ourselves a favor by taking the time to be intentional in our speech, allowing Christ’s love to emanate it and build one another up (whether that be in joyful agreeance or humble dissension).

A really long post, a big (maybe crazy) idea, and hopefully a miracle...

2011-03-07T01:30:00.004-05:00

Matthew 7:15-23 Matthew 17:1-13

Since the BCP reading a few days ago, I find my my thoughts meditating on the Matthew 7 passage. Though I’ve never read the book 10 Things I Wish Jesus Never Said, I imagine that if I wrote the book this would be one of them.

“Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep's clothing but inwardly are ravenous wolves. You will recognize them by their fruits. Are grapes gathered from thornbushes, or figs from thistles? So, every healthy tree bears good fruit, but the diseased tree bears bad fruit. 18 A healthy tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a diseased tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Thus you will recognize them by their fruits.

“Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but the one who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. On that day many will say to me, ‘Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and cast out demons in your name, and do many mighty works in your name?’ And then will I declare to them, ‘I never knew you; depart from me, you workers of lawlessness.’”]

The passage is daunting yet appropriately situated at the end of Jesus’ most famous teaching. This passage confirms that faith through grace is not about either faith or works alone, but through both fruit is to be found blooming in our lives.

This passage creates feelings of great angst within me, wondering if I have fruit, if the Spirit is evident in my life. This passage has challenged me to lay my cards on the table, seeing my shortcomings and weakness for what they are. But this passage also challenged me to be honest with what might be a growing awareness within me, but more on that in a bit.

Matthew 17:1-9 and the transfiguration. Here we find Peter, James and John climbing a mountain with Jesus, 6 days after Peter has declared him the Messiah. And to these select few transfigured himself before them, not allowing them to speak of this to anyone, not even the other disciples, until after the resurrection. Their eyes were made aware to the glory of Christ and the power, royalty, bestowed upon him by God himself. Reminiscent to the dove descending and the heavens opening at the baptism, we find another glimpse of the glory of God.

It is from this passage I find a light shed on the previous. I imagine that after peaking at the glory of God these disciples were transfigured. It is through dwelling on the transfiguration that I wondered if the fruit in us and our lives are revealed by Christ being transfigured before us opening our eyes to see his glory, his hope for our lives. The Matt 7 passage as a stand-alone passage sets us up for failure, for how can we overcome ourselves to produce something that requires us to move beyond ourselves? To be something more than just me? Yet recalling the Lord's prayer (which has us requesting that God enable us to be procurers of his redemption plan and to come and fulfill that longing) as well as looking to Matt 17 I find that to live a fruit-bearing life is more than just obeying, but also allowing our eyes to be opened to the present glory of Christ, and through glimpsing that glory being transfigured.

At Midtown this past week we prayed a prayer for Transfiguration.

[Oh God we open our eyes and we see Jesus,
the months of ministry transfigured to a beam of light,
the light of the world, your light.
May your light shine upon us

We open our eyes and we mist,
the cloud of your presence which assures us of all we do not know
and that we do not need to fear that.
Teach us to trust.

We open our eyes and we see Peter’s constructions,
his best plans, our best plans, our missing the point, our missing the way.
Forgive our foolishness and sin.

We open our eyes and we see Jesus, not casting us off,
but leading us, leading us out - to ministry, to people.
Your love endures forever.

We open our ears and we hear your voice,
‘this is my beloved Son, listen to him!’
And we give you thanks. ]

Recently my eyes have been opened. Opened to a world of people that dwell among us and yet for all intensive purposes have been invisible. If you’ve been following along you know what the people I am becoming more and more passionate about serving are refugees. I am genuinely nervous to write this so publicly, for so often I find that people are more full of talk than activity and I fear that in the important things I am those people. However, part of bearing fruit is allowing a branch to be pruned. The branch be being pruned is fear of failure, for there people need love, they need help, they need to be heard.

I have been wrestling with what I do with that information. How do I retain it and just let it sit. So Amanda ad I are heading on a journey beyond just researching, but finding action. We have entitled this project Refuge, for we sincerely pray that we might offer refuge to those who have been without for so long. This project will first stat with a new blog (refugerefugee.blogspot.com) in which we will post interviews with people, telling their stories, and hopefully post updates about how we are coming along with this project.

There will be three phases.

1. Education: Just compiling research, cultural information, population statistics, etc. Interviewee after interviewee has stated that the number one issue is that most people in the US do not know that refugees dwell in the US, and if they do know, most do not understand who a refugee is. We hope to educate people about refugees, who they are, why they are here, how to be sensitive and aware of their presence as well as give them a voice to tell their stories. They want to be heard, but we have to be willing and able to listen.

2. Refugee Resettlement: More times than not refugees are resettled in an urban setting, which can be difficult for those who are from agrarian cultures. Our hope will be to make connections with rural churches and social services to help refugees find resettlement in which they can use the skill set they already possess some knowledge of.

3. Funding: Very little funding is available to refugees, and when they come they are at the bottom of the barrel in everything: jobs, economy, housing, education, etc. Our hope would be to one day be able to provided aid in paying back travel loans as well as maybe offer funds that can be applied into to cover basic expenses when they come across the inevitable hard times.

Obviously this is not going to be a quick project, but will probably take years to get underway. So prayer and support will be appreciated. Hopefully soon we will have a proposal finished and sketch of a business plan underway.

I sincerely pray that the actions by all those involved in this will be a glimpse of the glory of God revealed to those we come in contact with, to love those who have been abandoned and stripped of their basic human identity, and bestow upon them respect and love for they are my fellow human kind.

Some light reading...

2011-03-03T23:35:00.004-05:00

Kim and I are now full of Chipotle and very happy. Can I just say that this buy-one-get-one thing is fantastic? Going with a friend, I've had Chipotle 3 times this week. Dear Chipotle, thank you for sharing your wonderfulness with my belly (though right now I wish I would have foregone the wheat tortilla... but part of eating a burrito is actually having it be a burrito).It's cheaper than grocery shopping.

So, to those heading on Spring Break excursions, might you find some lovely readings. Suggestions you ask? Well how convenient, I just compiled a list.

Annie Dillard makes me regret giving up high school dreams of studying English. Annie Dillard makes me wish I could truly write. If I could write like anyone it would be she. The Maytrees is a beautiful, poetic piece of fiction that allows you to smell the New England rocky beaches and hear the sadness of sullen dunes and ocean tides without sounding perfunctory. I would keep talking, but I just think you should read the book.

Some interesting thoughts on authenticity among pastoral staff. A. and B.

After following for the past few months what George Clooney has been doing in the Sudan, I think what is currently going on in Lybia has been proof of his words. Though in relation to the Sundanese conflict, the Sundanese people need to rise up, not another military force coming in a parenting. I truly do pray that the people of Lybia can find peace again. (Play by play)

Mayor of Casterbidge, or anything by Thomas Hardy, is absolutely wonderful. I appreciate the Victorian novelist who is very unvictorian.

Weird childhood fact: Dad never let us heat anything up in plastic containers and preferred that we stored food long term in glass containers. Part of this was because microwaves distorted the integrity of the plastic and the other part was because he didn't trust the chemical integrity of plastic for food storage. Well Dad, thanks to you I have a fear of keeping my food in plastic containers and turns out you were right. Go Dad!

Speaking of Dad, I have a weird appreciation for vinyl. I think he's explained the process to me over 100 times over the years, and because of that I find a happy nostalgia every time I add a new vinyl to my collection. The latest? I found at this random CD exchange store B.B. King's Midnight Believer for 10 bucks. Seriously under-priced given the excellent quality of the disk. I must say, it sounds so beautiful!

Perusing some of the other blogs I like, I found that one of my fellow bloggers had posted a series of xtranormal videos about going to seminary, church planting, and hipster Christians. Have to say, it's nice to be reminded not to take myself to seriously.

Again, speaking of fellow blogger. He posted a particularly interesting blog about how we talk about hell. I think by now most of us have heard about Rob Bells new video and book, and probably have formulated our opinion one way or the other. But what does our opinion say about our larger views on Christology and Ecclesiology? What about own fears? A friend did his senior research project on this topic, and over the past 2, 3 years that I've perused the information I never thought that such a heated, angry, public debate would take place. I've been impressed with a few rational voices and disappointed with those that have usually been level headed leaders in the field. However, I think these questions have been rumbling underneath. I'm beginning to think that all this outrage is really a knee-jerk reaction (considering most haven't even read the book) out of their own deep-seated unrests. What do I think? Um.. not really qualified to have an opinion one way or another. Orthodox positions are orthodox for a reason, however dogmatism must be held loosely and the Scripture examined. Cop-out? If you say so, but for now I will examine all sides and pray that evangelical inclusivism and universalism are reality. I feel a long road of thinking ahead of me... oh squirrels...

Rachel Held Evans wrote a great article on how this whole discussion is just revealing more of our own insecurities and questions about God, and is more indicative of a conversation that we have want to have for a while, but have been to scared to utter.

Summer 2009 relevant publishes this great article on doubt, and now they have posted an abridgment of that article on their site. This is one of those articles I have clipped out of the magazine and keep in a special folder entitle "If I ever end up as a prof and want to whip out a relevant, culturally engaging article that is now slightly obscure because of the age difference, but not to far gone..." (The abridged name is pipe dream.)

A friend sent me a link to the LOLcats Bible.... um... I don't know if they have foreseen my spinsterhood as a creepy cat lady or what.. but I don't know if I should claim sacrilege or just laugh... a bit of both I guess.

This is just cool. What a neat way to learn about Art History and be apart of the continuing art conversation. Being a person who has bought the Janson Art History books, I appreciate a site that just desires to help people learn art history without the bulky cost (130 bucks!) of the books.

I will always be happy that Dr. Gombis was hanging in a study carrel right when I needed a good book to read for Jesus and Politics by Alan Storky is a phenomenal piece of gospel homiletic (oh yes, the seminarian nerd is coming out in me). The book is a thorough search of what Christ is inciting about the Pax-Romana and how these political views translate today. Being of UK origin he offers an interesting, truly non-partisan perspective on US politics. He argues that we must look at Jesus' teachings as principles, which "are probably not fashionable in postmodern era, where pragmatism, economic power, and what suit particular groups tends to dominate political culture." Through this lens he deconstructs the notion that there is a God-ordained political system and challenges his readers to really internalize the principles that Christ stood for. I found the book challenging and eye opening to my own inconsistencies with how I attempt to live out Jesus' teachings, specifically the Sermon on the Mount. I also devoured the chapter on Resurrection Politics because it dealt with (you guessed it) restoration, for in this chapter he overtly makes claims that Jesus' politics were more than just a view on how humans are ruling the earth, but also the war of Powers that is going on unbeknownst to us. (He also makes these claims throughout other parts of the book, but there seems to be the teleological climax here.) [I also appreciate that he has an entire apendix outlining his use of hermeneutics and another on Jewish chronology] This is certainly a book I will probably have to invest in and mark up. (And probably make pipe-dream future students read if I obtain that crazy dual M.Div/Public Policy masters thing... wow, can i pt. 72 that font on that if?) I will leave my thoughts on this with an excerpt:

"The Resurrection was a simple act of God's power. For the God who has created the universe, and whose "Let there be..." words of power have kept millions of scientists in work, the resurrection was small beer. It was the verdict that the Creator did not and does not accept the dominion of evil. As Peter put it: "But God raised him from the dead, freeing him from the agony of death, because it as impossible for death to keep hold of him" (Acts 2:24). It was a miracle, victory, and verdict, but it was not magic. In no way did the resurrection take over human history or did God assume the control of a dictator. Wars, empires, viciousness, using the work of others, and all the other despicable human actions continue, because this is not God's domination in history. Even the history of Israel continued on its self-chosen, Christ-ignoring path.
"The change is in the hearts and lives of those who willingly submit to God's gently way. Only slowly does the yeast leaven the lump. Only slowly and if we wish, has God's rule come. The kingdom peace can be accepted or rejected, but it is not imposed. " [p.281]

With that said. Happy Day!

Casmir Pulaski Day.

2011-03-02T14:39:00.000-05:00

Daniel 2:22

He reveals deep and hidden things;

He knows what is in the darkness,

and the light dwells with him.

Laying in bed at 1 am I decided enough was enough. I grabbed coat and keys and headed for a drive. Iron and Wine crooned over the speakers as I wielded my way through back roads and allies, out to the country where the pollution of amber incandescence was a dome off in the distance.

The sky was clear. I laid on the roof of the car staring up at the band of the Milky Way. Blue and red stars formed constellations that I remember learning in this sticker-book mom got me as a kid. Each page had a different constellation and gave the history of the name and had these glow-in-the-dark stickers to mark the outline. The one I always remember is Cassiopia because in her story she was tide upside down to a chair and placed among the stars. But as I lay under the expanding sky, heaven comes to earth. There is a beauty to the night that we are remiss to overlook. Laying in the middle of the country with nothing in view but sky reminds me of Daniel 2:22. Daniel is asked to reveal the hidden meaning of the king's dream, and he claims that the only one who can reveal it is YHWH. As I lay in the dark I feel deep and hidden things revealed in myself, inarticulate thoughts.

Even upon driving back I find it difficult to be inside, so I sit on the stoup of my building for an hour. Seeing the sky makes conversing and listening to God feel less hindered. Like walking out of Kroger to find cell-phone reception. Can I hear you now? So I stare upwards and I feel the crisp air and see the frosted due and I realize spring really is a volatile season. We have these Kinkaidian images of babbling brooks and budding flowers, but the majority of March will the battle between frost and sun, with mixed forms of precipitation to lead to the overcast skies of April. In Ohio we feel lucky if we get a few warm days where we can dawn bear legs and shoulders and pretend that summer is here. Staring up at the night sky, the first clear sky in about 2 weeks, on the First of March, Casmir Pulaski Day (at least in Canada).

Something feels rather appropriate that Lent falls amidst the torrenting Spring, leading to the violent Easter holiday that breaks into streams of hope. Restoration is a violent process, finding Eden is a heavy laden road. And today as I sit in the warm sunlight on the Second of March I too will enter into the growing pains of Spring to reveal deep and hidden things, to maybe find a glimpse of the Redemptive Eden, to maybe give a glimpse of the Redemptive Eden.

Jane Stole My Keys...

2011-02-28T18:11:00.002-05:00

So Jane has developed a recent habit of hiding my keys. It's a game to her. I see her grab em and dart into some "cat-sized" crawl space, with my keys jingling behind her as she mouths the lanyard. Trying to be on time, I ended up leaving without keys hoping a roommate would be home to let me in later. But as I was hunting for my keys later I found them in a box of papers that sits under my book shelf, next to an old journal from sophomore year. Intrigued as to how "advanced" my thoughts were then (as I will probably one day think as I read through these ramblings) I perused my 19/20 year-old self. On the last couple pages were written passages, the following being one of them, written over and over and over again. (Eph. 3:14-21)

For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, that according to the riches of his glory he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in your inner being, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith—that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.

Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen.

Once again I feel a little "Marva Dawn-esqu" as though somehow the bookmarks are being moved in my Bible and devotionals (and in the hyperactivity of my cat), for this has been a passage that I've been dwelling upon again [Yay last month's CBP reading, which is a great way to systematically work through Scripture if you don't already have a plan]. It's a passage I prayed through for most of last year, almost as a benediction to hold faith and plea for God to work. These 8 verses fall after a long Christiological, to God be divinus auctoritas, anthem that Paul has laid out. A reminder of sorts of who they are talking about, worshiping, communing with. I sometimes think we would be better off to maybe spend a few moments meditating on these words before entering into any significant theological debate. But, I love Paul's transition here. These 8 verses mark a change of thought moving from God down to creation. Chapter 1 lays out the Christ is the initiator of redemption, offering it to us freely. And if that weren't enough he values us. Chapter 2 elucidates that that we experience grace through Christ's work in us and our reciprocal faith in him bringing to light a new order how we are to act, while chapter 3 speaks of the mystery of Salvation and that the church has now been made minister of this gospel and chapter 4 marks the distinctive shift to what this means as Christians living our daily lives. [I must confess, I am skipping a ton of theology here, so if you are interested in reading more I suggest reading Tim Gombis's or Marva Dawn's books.]

These last 8 verses rest upon the phenomenal theology that Paul just professed. These verses are the culmination of acknowledging that God is the author of salvation, the giver of grace, the foundation of the church and the unifier of the body. And so Paul proclaims that in this power we might come to know God beyond knowledge and understanding.

These have been an interesting few days. This month I will be heading back to the rheumatologist for what looks like a more firm diagnosis [prayers would be appreciated], and I have to admit this does sadden me. Friends have prayed for so long that I would be healed, and talking to Naomi the other day, we both breathed the sigh of feeling as though we are once again at square one. And that brings me to the last couple verses, Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen. Resting on his previous novel of proclamation, Paul claims submission to the one who is at work within us, capable of working beyond even our deepest groaning, and in that he is worthy of our praise. There are very few people I can handle reading that from, but Paul is one of them - since he kinda gets the whole in pain, suffering, was a prison a few times thing.

My thought here is simple. This world is a broken mess, and we serve a God who is currently at work in it and in us to bring about his redemption plan. Even if I never see healing on this side of heaven or reconciliation the way my heart longs so deep, I know that in the mean time there is a love that is deep and wide and all encompassing, that through this love at work in us we will experience glimpses of the glory to come, that we can have hope. Through the truth of who God is I rest in the knowledge that he is at work here and now, and even though the day is dark the clouds will part, the storm will pass, and in all this I can say it is well with my soul.

So I entrust the following (and ask that you my friends remind me of this when I get whiny):
1. That God will sustain me for the work he has for me.
2. That God will provide for grad school. I believe through prayer and wisdom from those older than me (even my grandmother who still questions why I am going into theology) that I am heading in the right direction, and I know God will provide.. even if it is after the fact.
3. I entrust that my obedience to how Scripture says I should live will one day make sense - even if one day is on the other side of paradise.

But in other news: Zondervan Publishing has given me the opportunity to do a give away!! I will be doing a book review for them soon on Carolyn Custis James' new book Half the Church, because of that they are allowing me to give away a copy of her book for free. [I don't know about you, but free books just warms my soul.] So keep your eyes open in April for this, and if you have any ideas about what the criteria should be for this give-away leave a comment or shoot me an email.

Hope.

2011-02-26T23:42:00.016-05:00

Driving home Paper Route came on, and the lyrics capitulated the exact emotion of where I've been these past couple weeks. I'm not going to try and "Christianize" these lyrics, but I think there is an emotional thread that connect these lyrics and the words of a favorite Psalm. [Hannah and I continually have this conversation about how we are allowed to claim these feeling about poetry and literature, but with music's emotional connectedness seems to be "snubbed" or left to high schoolers who still have Myspace and take mirror pictures... But I guess that's another conversation.] I have been experiencing feeling of dissociation as I have been maneuvering the crevices of life these few days, and I feel as though I have lost my voice, my ability to articulate, as I try to decipher "my calling," prayer, theology, the news, education, etc. Especially coming back from a weekend that opened my eyes to a world of suffering only to encounter those I love finding some of the most cruel suffering. It all felt like an enemy attacking my soul. While watching Ohio flatland I mumble the lyricist's words like a childish prayer, In the silence you're the first one I turn to, the first voice that I turn to, in the absence of my own. There's an enemy among us. There is nothing more painfully discouraging to feel the weight of longing for the weight of glory only to find that circumstance have appeared to eviscerate redemption. As if all that listening, praying, etc. is for loss. So again I find myself in the Psalms. Particularly Psalm 131, which found its way into the lectionary tonight.

O Lord, my heart is not lifted up;
my eyes are not raised too high;
I do not occupy myself with things
too great and too marvelous for me.
But I have calmed and quieted my soul,
like a weaned child with its mother;
like a weaned child is my soul within me.

O Israel, hope in the Lord
from this time forth and forevermore.

The words are simple. The Psalmist is humbled. The heart is written throughout ancient texts as the seat of desire, and as Spurgeon puts it, "What the heart desires the eyes look for." The Psalmist does not desire anything loft, and his eyes do not wander for something glorious. The Psalmist is not looking for anything that will glorify himself or bring him status, but instead desires to be in the presence of God, to be made completely content. There is a sense of longing in the background of this Psalm, as though there is a great plea that he desires the Lord to hear, that he has probably placed before the Lord many times before. Like an enemy crouching at the door is that longing, like a double-edged sword. Though it can open his eyes to both the beauty of creation and the redemption-song inspiring awareness of how the brokenness of the world, the longing can also bring waves of incessant mourning that bring the soul down into the depths of despair for the world is not yet redeemed and today brokenness abounds. There is an enemy that has come to steal kill and destroy. But instead, today he chooses to content himself with the portion offered to him, the simple compassion the Lord offers in his very presence, remember that the Lord is the hope of Israel and that redemption will come.

I'm not sure of the Psalmist's situation upon penning these words. Is he sitting at a the mouth of a cave, watching his enemy approach, or glancing down at his dead baby that he spent days praying for, or maybe he is watching the harvest come in more abundantly than expected and feels humbled at the Lord's provision. I don't know. But this passage also reminds my of Philippians where Paul proclaims I know how to be brought low, and I know how to abound. In any and every circumstance, I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and need. I can do all things through him who strengthens me. That simple contentment. That simple trust.

It is so easy to let this enemy of illness, poverty, war, genocide, hatred, awkwardness steal from us the hope of what God will do, what he has promised to do. There is an enemy among us and this enemy will try and steal the contentedness (which is different from complacency) that allows us to rest in God and realize that whatever redemption that does occur as an outworking of our obedience to Scripture, of living a life worthy of the calling to which we have been called, is through the nothing of our own but the power at work within us. And therefore, today, I can find a calmed and quieted soul, because things will not be left this way. God has not pulled an Elivis, and left the building, leaving us wondering what is happening next, but instead asks us to continue to be faithful and exercise trust.

Psalm 131 places the responsibility of contentedness upon my shoulders, for if I am to find peace I must calm and quiet my soul. So today I mimic the Psalmist and find a simple unfettered hope. One that knows the ability God has to redeem and acknowledges that today there is nothing (beyond obedience to the Scriptures) that I can do to speed that process. I guess today, as Cornell West says, "I cannot be an optimist but I am a prisoner of hope."

Lybia

2011-02-25T15:11:00.000-05:00

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-middle-east-12307698

It is hard to realize that if I had stuck with my plans from a year-and-a-half ago I would be in Tunisia right now.

It is hard to realize that I will not be in Iraq this summer.

It is hard to be in my comfortable home and know that all I can do is pray.

But, I am also listening. Listening for what I can do here. Praying that if I meet those who flee to the US I might offer them compassion and serve them.

Almighty and merciful God,
whose Son became a refugee
and had no place to call his own;

look with mercy on those who today
are fleeing from danger,
homeless and hungry.

Bless those who work to bring them relief;
inspire generosity and compassion in all our hearts;
and guide the nations of the world towards that day
when all will rejoice in your Kingdom of justice and of peace;

through Jesus Christ our Lord.

Amen.

A Smattering of Thoughts

2011-02-24T10:23:00.001-05:00

1. Running update: This weekend really wore on my body, but I was able to push out 3 miles yesterday. Despite the less than graceful form and regretting eating that plate of french fries but 20 minutes before, I managed to run it in about 30 minutes.

2. Friend Update: I've decided that hospitals are dumb. My first inclination was to shut them, however that logic means the slew of friends that have needed them these past couple days would... well... So I decided to revamp that idea and place a ban on people getting sick. Again realizing the idiocy of that statement I have now rested on praying more fervently for Christ's quick return and help in these situations. Friend who was in the ICU was sent home because the couldn't figure out what's wrong, despite the fact that not 24 hours before she had another grand mall seizure. So prayer for her safety and recovery, as well as wisdom for those around her and whatever medical professional she encounters, would be greatly appreciated.

3. Lybia: After this weekend that situation does not feel so far away. I'm not sure what the approriate response to the crisis is, for I feel so helpless being here. But, might we pray fervently. Not the fervent prayers we offer between meetings or classes as an after thought, but the prayer that finds herself desperately on the floor calling to God because he is the only source of refuge. Things to pray for: Safety for those fleeing, welcome arms where they end up, a change of power, food, water, resources on the other side, and salvation that they might find hope that this is not all there is.

4. Best Ice Cream: Coldstone's Chocolate Covered Strawberry with Oreo and Brownie. Despite the apparent wheat in the Oreo and brownie, I must say it was worth every bite. And I appreciate the ragamuffin friends who took part in the feasting, even if Dan didn't follow my lead with the chocolate theme.

5. A prayer that has been on my lips for 2 years. (I still cannot believe 2 years have passed) I find myself meditating on the words today.

Psalm 131

1 O Lord, my heart is not lifted up;
my eyes are not raised too high;
I do not occupy myself with things
too great and too marvelous for me.
2 But I have calmed and quieted my soul,
like a weaned child with its mother;
like a weaned child is my soul within me.

3 O Israel, hope in the Lord
from this time forth and forevermore.

Eden.

2011-02-23T00:35:00.005-05:00

One foot always remains in Eden, a piece of our collective ontology always reckoning back to the prelapsarian state. And as we remember how things should be we grieve when we are overcome with injustice, poverty, sickness and death. There is an inherent feeling with all of us that thing were not meant to be as such, and today as I stood over my friend in the ICU I felt the wait of longing overwhelm my soul as I prayed for Eden's return which now lies beyond the sun.

Sorrow is better than laughter for by sadness of face the heart is made glad. Ecclesiastes 7:3.

Part of my soul feels reserved to grieve this time in which I inhabit, where the "day of death is better than the day of birth." I watch her fight against the wires and tubes that are inorganic to her biology, yet in modern eyes seem to be the hem of the cloak, providing healing. And we pray and ask why is she not getting better, why a 25 year old woman who has been so healthy is now so sick. Why a woman who has overcome so much pain is now pummeled with more.

How do we discuss God's sovereignty in this context? How do we speak of God's will? To claim God's ordination over us, over this life is to acknowledge that he sees the pain and brokenness and chooses to keep his glory shrouded in mystery. Holding her hand I feel utterly helpless and completely humbled as she stares up with puffy, tear-spilling eyes and claims that "God is here, and he is in control."

So here I come to Quoheleth's search of portion and profit, only to find that which is profitable is vanity and what we remember and cling to is the portion which God provides to sustain us in this season. It is like the Psalmist breath of relief in the deliverance of the turmoil, breathing in his current placement before being plunged back into the heart of the battle. And though I do not find a miracle as I pray for healing, I do find gracious sustainment in the attitude of my dear friend and a simple provision of laughter in dire circumstances, a look that holds a contented spirit and understands the dark valley and recalls the knowledge that on the other side is the Eden that will one day be again.

This is our prayer today, spoken like the woeful but hope-filled melody of nineteen twenty nine.

Psalm 118:19-24

19 Open to me the gates of righteousness,
that I may enter through them
and give thanks to the Lord.
20 This is the gate of the Lord;
the righteous shall enter through it.
21 I thank you that you have answered me
and have become my salvation.
22 The stone that the builders rejected
has become the cornerstone.
23 This is the Lord's doing;
it is marvelous in our eyes.
24 This is the day that the Lord has made;
let us rejoice and be glad in it.

Listen.

2011-02-20T13:54:00.001-05:00

These past weeks have been a time of much contemplation and wrestling, with this weekend culminating in the synthesis of those thoughts. So first, I apologize for the incoherence. I am operating on very little sleep, but needed to purge these thoughts from my brain.

I had a lot of time to think over the past few days, more than I anticipated to have, more than I knew what to do with. But as I laid beneath the stars, staring up I began to feel God's sovereignty. That is not a word I am comfortable using very often. The idea of conflating this earth, this life, this present darkness with the sovereignty of God produces a volatile fear within my soul. But as I laid there I felt the weight of a very big God being very near. And though I think there is a lot of messed up theology in regards to the Sovereignty of God, I also find that the path I am on, whatever it may be called, has produced something within and beyond myself that is has not been of my doing.

I have mediates on Psalm 23 a lot this week/weekend. A passage that I bashfully admit I cannot read without falling to pieces, for I understand the valley, I understand the pain of discipline, and I know what emptiness when God feels distant. This is a passage I over these 2 years I have repeated to myself over and over again, as statement to my own mind that I will not bow to the evil that is present on this earth, submitting to its rule, but instead I will submit to the Shepherd.

The Lord is my shepherd, and I shall not want.
He makes me rest in the green pastures, and brings me beside still waters.
He restores my soul and brings me to the path of righteousness for his name sake.

Even though I walk/sit/feel stranded in/ the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear (try my hardest to trust as to not) no evil, for you are with me.

Your rod and staff, your direction, discipline; leading comfort me.

You prepare a table in front of those who are my enemies, and you anoint my head with oil, and because you are with me my cup overflows.
Surely, goodness, mercy, provision, daily grace, will fall me all the days of my life and I will dwell in the house of the Lord.

While I laid in the dark, staring up at the night sky I saw the beauty of the stars, recalled to mind what I have seen God do in my life, his profound provision, and I know that whatever life is left within my bones he will be my God, and I will be part of his people. As I wrestle with going to grad school, moving, how to serve my friends, questioning if God sees this fallen world, if he is working, if he answers prayer, I know he is present. I have a hard time trusting the hopes and desires of my heart, but as I pray they grow stronger, as I seek counsel they speak louder into my ears, and I begin to think that they are not my own but what God has placed there.

I trust God will provide for me as I take steps down this road. Being here this year I have already seen him provide finances, transportation, food and I in turn have been able to experience the beauty of service to those I love and call my community.

I trust God will sustain me how he sees fit. These past few months I have been able to rejoice in the act of running, and I will find gratitude and joy in the grace that has been bestowed upon me when others said it could not be done. Even if this season ends tomorrow, I will fight to respond humbly and with gratitude.

I will trust that God will complete his restoration plan, that this hurting and pain and sorrow will not define this planet forever. I will continue to pray and live my life according to the scriptures to hopefully bring glimpses of that glory to this earth.

I found today's reading in the BCP reflecting these thoughts. And as I listen to these words and pray them, I pray that you as well might experience the hope and the goodness present in the text, and that you as well might find see the goodness of the Lord even amidst suffering and confusion.

I am reminded by that odd passage in Hebrews, "and through suffering Christ learned obedience." I think this also reflects that through our trials and honestly wrestling with ourselves we also learn (I am learning) to be quiet and hear God.

Blessed are You, our God, Ruler of the universe, who has kept us alive, sustained us, and enabled us to reach this season.

2011-02-15T14:36:00.001-05:00

Yesterday I wrote on how prayer has been so difficult lately, but today I meditate on how the difficulty has produced an assurance. I think it was Cornell West in an interview with Craig Ferguson who said something along the lines: Though I might not have certainty I do have blessed assurance.

As I read through other religious texts and study the concurrent ethical systems I am reminded why I hold tightly to the Christian faith. This text is not just about waiting for redemption, or doing good works to avoid damnation (and that, I admit is an oversimplification of other religious systems), but this faith has me being apart of the redemption.

What scared me the most about last year was not death, for in and of itself death has lost its eternal power, but instead the most frightening part of last year was not that I might not be able to be apart of redemption, reconciliation, restoration on this earth - themes within scripture that beg for us as created beings to be in process with. Through the power of Christ's act on the cross we too can be used in the redemption of all things. There is an immediacy in the text that I think until then I had forgotten. After the ascension the apostles believed that they were in the end days, everything they did reflected that mindset. So I found myself scrambling to make conversations matter with people, to heal broken friendships, be apart of ministries that help bring God's Kingdom into places where redemption seems to be lacking. Through this I have learned the discipline of seeing how I am apart of the redemptive process today, how I am making my time matter in the present.

So how I find myself in redemption today.

1. This was the year dad was suppose to go on disability. It is a miracle he is walking, talking, thinking, being. Dad taught me what it means to be a self-contained redemptive being. Sure his body still is failing, but he cares for it, he uses it, he views everyday, every movement as worship within it.

2. It has taken two years, but I am now running at the level I was sophomore year. I ran four miles on Sunday, and though my body does not recover like it use to, my soul sings. I spend a lot of time praying while I run, and so while I take part in recognizing how I am created, and my body is able to do this think called running (which if you do not think is cool hit up a physiology text book... the amount of nerve conduction, neurotransmitters, calcium, potassium, sodium balance, etc. is amazing!) I also take part in the redemption of creation, specifically those on this earth with me who long for things to be right. Today I feel the ache in my bones, but I smile for one day I will "run and not grow weary, walk and not faint."

3. I turned 5 lbs of potatoes into 5 lbs of friend fun! I noticed that bag was beginning to turn, so why not turn into a way to bless those I love? Or those that I do not know as well. My small space filled with people who were close and who hopefully will become close.

4. I sat outside with my toes in the chilly grass. I closed my eyes to hear the earth groan to me that it is awakening, that life is coming. Things are growing all around.

5. I am just praying. Though difficult I refuse to give up. I believe God hears me, and I will continue to pray for those around me, pray that the brokenness I experience between neighbor and neighbor, myself and neighbor will be healed, that the brokenness that I read about in Egypt and the Middle East will one day be rectified. I realize how idealistically all this is, but I also know that one day God will redeem and I will fight through prayer that we catch glimpses of that now, and that God might come quickly. And in the mean time I wait for his response and take part in what I know I am commanded to do now.

More on Prayer

2011-02-14T18:30:00.001-05:00

Today I heard the birds for the first time since fall. Walking downtown Yellow Springs (of course everything is sort of downtown) I looked up to see a flock fluttering in and out of the clustered ivy that has nested its way up the side of an old book store. It was a beautiful end to a rather long, prayerful weekend.

Prayer has become an increasingly difficult task lately. Part of that is how Marlena puts it, that prayer some times becomes "watching the clock tick away" instead of it being a time to refocus and revel in the glory that God beholds. The other part is that I sometimes genuinely question if this whole thing works.

Since studying the anthropology of religion over the past couple weeks, I find each religion holds key characteristics (to name a few): an ethical system, a restitution system, some form of sacred text, and a worship practice - a way in which they commune with their deity. And with everyone praying to these gods and finding communion with their saints it can be rather unsettling when you are sitting, clinging to every bit of faith you have to what you believe is the "One True God" and nothing appears to be happening. (And this is where Dan and I sit and count all the different religious systems we are saved in, but seriously.. I think later I might right on how anthropology has strengthened my faith.)

This is why I am thankful for catholic nature of the Christian faith. I read through ancient prayers that span a thousand years and speak those words and pray with those saints of old, while also praying with those who will come later in time. I picture this like me sticking my hand up through the milky way outside of the universes, outside of time. And that picture, though certainly not empirical, and certainly not even in the slightest bit evidentiary, gives me faith that prayer is cosmic, and that prayer can change everything - whether it be God cosmically working on his own, or cosmically working through us.

This year at Midtown we have had a great focus on prayer, specifically communal prayer. I find that even the days when I cannot pray myself I can come together with these people and speak these works with them and find my soul strengthened through the faith present in the room. Here are two excerpts from the prayers we prayed together this past Saturday. I encourage you to read through them slowly.

You brought Salvation through the cross,
Lord Jesus, we offer you our praise and thanks.
You brought a means through which humanity could be made right again with our Creator
Lord Jesus, we offer you our praise and thanks.
Your brought comfort to the sorrowing, liberty to the poor
Lord Jesus, we offer you our praise and thanks.
You accept us as we are, and mold us into the people we were meant to be
Lord Jesus, we offer you our praise and thanks.
You enable broken lives and relationships to be made whole again
Lord Jesus, we offer you our praise and thanks.

Father, we are conscious of our shortcomings
aware of the thoughts, actions and deed s
which have not reflected your love.
Jesus, Lord of Love have mercy on us
Father, our lives are filled with comings and goings
so little time to be still, so little time for others,
for giving instead of receiving
Jesus, Lord of Life have mercy on us
Father, in a world that needs to know your love forgive us those
times when impatience, tiredness, aselfishness or insensitivity have made it difficult for others to see your love through our lives
Jesus, Servant of all have mercy on us
In a moment of silence we bring to our Heabenly Father the needs of our friends and families;
the tensions, the harsh words spoken in hast, the good deed not done, the love not shown.
(silence)
God of family, God of Love, forgive us for those times when we have forgotten how much we are loved by you, and how important a part we play in your family. Forgiev us when we take our church body for granted.

The Intangible God

2011-02-12T02:23:00.001-05:00

So shipping now is my first print article, a sort of pre-seminary debut into the world of publication I guess (It is through Bible Study magazine published through Logos Bible Software). It really was quite a random, unexpected opportunity that literally appeared in my email. Here is an excerpt of sorts from this current issue (March/April).

The Intangible God

Kate Roberts

I lay on the table with wires attached to my arms and legs. Soon, the electrodes taped to my skin would have currents running through them. I was about to experience one of the many medical tests I’ve been subjected to over the past few years.

The uncertain outcomes and pain of these tests have made this season a very lonely one.

It’s times like these that I wish God would be sitting across the table from me—physically present to comfort me. When life was simple, I was almost okay with the intangible God.

First John 4:11–12 seems haunting when you’re looking for comfort: “Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; if we love one another, God abides in us and his love is perfected in us.”

“No one has ever seen God.” It’s an expression that exemplifies loneliness. Why the stark contrast with the surrounding text, which focuses on God’s presence and love?

For you cedarvillians, I know the library has a copy (if you dare find yourself so interested).

Midnight Mochas introduce you to the Locos

2011-02-10T13:36:00.000-05:00

Let alone the fact that caffeine at such an hour just probably isn't wise, I now have yet another reason as to why going on a midnight mocha run is probably not the best idea.

However, I do now have a response for the random horn honks and "Baby, baby"s that seem to come from nowhere.

Creeper: "Hey, Baby girl, why don't you come this?"

Me (in the most ridiculous Southern accent): "Oh my Christiana, looks like we found ourselves some husbands to raise a whole dozen of children with!"

Creeper: "Crazy-ass white girl."

Well crazy might be right, but I do what my tucus has to do with it.

Winter.

2011-02-05T20:19:00.001-05:00

I attempted to find the beauty of winter. Then winter went and kicked my in the butt. Though I might have injured my shoulder trying to get these pictures, I do find the ice lovely.

Please don't judge to harshly, these are raw files.

On this icey day.

2011-02-03T11:14:00.002-05:00

Forgiveness doesn't stand alone, as a punctual act or even as an isolated practice. That would be too passive an understanding of what forgiveness is all about. Rather, it is embedded in a way of life that is committed to overcoming evil by doing good. That's how Luther interpreted "forgetting" in the phrase "forgive and forget." Not to count the offenders guilty and not to press charges against them is important but insufficient. Luther insisted that you should "load" the enemy "with kindness so that, overcome with good, he will be kindled with love for you." pg. 189-190 Free of Charge, Miroslav Volf

Forgiveness then, might be found in the simple acts. It might be committing oneself to prayers or it might be saying hello with a smile as you pass one another.

Lord, may our hearts be open to forgiving those who have wronged us, and willing to receive forgiveness from those we have wrong. Help us as we struggle to embrace the Kingdom community on this earth and learn how to live reconciled to one another again. Deliver us from our arrogance and ignorance and help us to foster peace.
Amen.

Intentional Forgiveness (And Why I Considered Yale)

2011-01-31T16:59:00.002-05:00

Miroslav Volf.

He is an amazing theologian and the Henry B. Wright Professor of Theology at Yale Divinity School. A professor-friend of mine studied under him this past summer and passed on to me the respect for this man's intellect and the passion he holds for redemption and restoration. As I continue to read and research his work I find that he will most likely greatly influence my future endeavors in the study of social ethics.

In Free of Charge: Giving and Forgiving in a Culture Stripped of Grace Volf discusses forgiveness as a social affair. Growing up I always heard in Sunday school we must forgive each other, but never how we are to go about this forgiveness. Forgiveness as an open social encounter, I believe, is essential in both understanding the gospel for ourselves, but also portraying it to those around us. When we openly forgive we are learning to conform ourselves to the kenosis of Christ (as found in Phil 2) and follow in his footsteps of bring God's Kingdom to this earth. When we forgive one another we are acknowledging our own humility and need for God's grace to redeem us, as well as acknowledging that the person before us is as "deserving" as we are. I find it so interesting how Ephesians 2 starts off with how we are saved by grace and flows directly into how we are one in Christ, being built together. I believe that through the social enactment of forgiveness we find that "brick and mortar" are being added to the building of the church.

The relationship between forgiveness and repentance is more complicated than such a conclusion implies. What complicates matters is that forgiveness is a social affair. We forgive in order to take care of wrongdoing, but a wrongdoing always happens between people, not just in the thoughts or actions of an individual. Unless we are wronging ourselves, we don't just do bad things, unrelated to anyone else; we wrong others. That's why it is insufficient if forgiveness happens just in someone's mind and heart. It must happen also between people - between offender and the offended. A person who I've wronged doesn't just forgive; she forgives me. Wrongdoers, and not just those who are wronged, are always involved in forgiveness. A gift is not an object we find in a star... an object becomes a gift when we undertake to give it so someone as a gift. Similarly forgiveness is not just a state of our mind; it is something we give to someone else. Put differently, forgiveness is a social affair. (p. 181)

Volf then articulates that forgiveness is only half the equation, the other half is repentance. "Repentance is important, even indispensable, and its indispensable because forgiveness is an event between people, not just and individuals change of feelings, attitudes or action"(p.183). However, a person who clings to the teachings of Christ will remember Peter's question about forgiveness. How many times? Jewish law required only 3 times, so Peter was thinking he was pretty grand for offering 7. However, Jesus states 70 times 7. Basically, if we are to follow Christ we need to forgive, regardless of the other persons actions, and live humbly with that person for we ourselves are in need of that same forgiveness. But, as stated in forgiveness is a social affair, and in order for true redemption and restoration to breed again in community both side of the coin need to be had. However, it must be made clear that repentance does not imply the rapid change of actions in order to receive forgiveness - some how making oneself better (L. Gregory Jones, Embodying Forgiveness, p 151) - but instead it is the acknowledgment of how personal actions have negatively affected the community and desiring to change.

This still all sounds so clear cut. But truth of the matter is there comes a point where both sides of equally wronged the other, both need to forgive and are in need of forgiveness. I think this is where forgiveness becomes exceedingly hard. It is so easy to sit back and claim the place of the one wronged, the misunderstood, or the saint trying to rectify the situation. But if we, if I, am honest with myself I will see the thousand and one ways I am wrong and have wronged. I see that while I need to extend forgiveness I also need to be forgiven. And from this humility, this gut wrenching, soul bearing humility, I find what Volf says next so simply beautiful.

Forgiveness places us on a boundary between enmity and friendship, between exclusion and embrace. It tears down the wall of hostility that wrongdoing erects, but it doesn't take us inot the territory of friendship. Should those who forgive stay in the neutral zone?

If they did, forgiveness would be the generous act of a person who wishes to stay away from the offender. Often that's all we can muster the strength to do, and all that the offenders will allow us. Yet at its best, forgiveness hopes for more. In general, when we give, we hope that gifts will in some way be reciprocated and the exchange of gifts will birth to friendship, even to mutual delight. Giving creates and strengthens communal bonds.

Forgiveness is born on the wings of a similar hope. A wrongdoing has made a serious den in a relationships, maybe even totaled it. We forgive in hope that it will elicit repentance, and that forgiveness will mend and restore the relationship so that gifts circulating within the community can continue to strengthen the bonds between members. (p. 188-189)

That last line "to strengthen the bonds between members." This is not just about the two (or however many people) involved, but those that surround them. I agree with Volf that as we learn to enact this forgiveness we learn Romans 5:1, we learn what it means to dwell peaceably with our God. For this is not just the diffusion of tension, but the infusion of hope, community, and the beautiful, enchanting passages that Paul writes about in terms of unity.

I think to withhold forgiveness or repentance is to deny God's work in our lives, it is to deny God's work in the other person's life. To withhold forgiveness allows us to foolishly believe that we somehow have the right, the power, to extend or retract grace as we see fit. I have heard so many sermons on the Lord's prayer over the past 2 years, and it continues to astound me that 14ths verse of Matthew 6. Basically, if we choose not to forgive God shuts his ears to us.

I am crazy enough to believe that even the worst off of relationships can be restored if we exercise the grace the God has offered us.

Texture

2011-01-29T14:57:00.001-05:00

Sitting at lunch Kat looked at the clock to realize she had an hour before heading out. Just enough time to grab our junk and head on an adventure.

Open.

2011-01-27T00:00:00.001-05:00

1. Prayer is a cosmic event. God leaves himself open to the prayers and pleas of his people, and by praying I leave myself open to his cosmic work.

I love this video by Rob Bell. I feel like it describes the complexity of prayer in such a beautiful way.

Today is a day where I exercise faith over doubt, where I pray though I don't hear the response.

Today I am open.

2. I ended my run in the park today. The snow has ravaged the joy that was once found on the jungle gym. Maybe prayer is like a park in winter. Though appearing void and pointless, we will see it flourish come the spring.

3. I sat with an old friend today and reminisced with him about where we were a year ago. Maybe prayer is like an old friendship, you don't realize the outcome until you sit and remember them.

4. An email, a dinner. Today I found myself in the middle of "good happening."

5. A burning candle, cup of tea, waiting for morning. Prayer is like this too.