Showering Starfish

I've volunteered at a day program for travelers and homeless in town the past couple weeks. For two afternoon I'm at the shower table, giving out baskets of body wash, shampoo and conditioner, deodorant, towels, sometimes socks, and checking for folks' mail. In between guests, I mop and spray down the shower stalls. It's not what I envisioned doing there but it's solid and it's a ministry.

My single fret is, no matter how I try, I can't get everyone in a shower who wants one. When I arrive in early afternoon, there can be as many as twenty names listed. Each person gets fifteen minutes before I begin to ask them to finish up. But the program closes at 3 and the showers end at 230. Even when everyone complies, it still won't work.

My initial impulse is to stay later in order to get the last folks through but I know the downside to that.  If I do so for one I need to do it for all, and it's unfair to the volunteers on the days I'm not there. A couple days ago I caught myself getting frazzled as I tried to get everyone through, so much so one of the staff touched my back and said, "You're all right, you can do this."

I move slowly and purposefully because I want everyone I come into contact with to know they aren't a burden on my time, that I have the time and patience to give them. The stalls are clean and sanitary. I remember the showers on the lower levels of Grand Central Station. There were two, you paid 50¢ for maybe ten minutes and the attendant was very aware of the number of people waiting, telling you to hurry. He sat on an overturned box in e corner of the tiny anteroom you waited in. There was a communal bar of soap, no shampoo, probably a towel. The dim light was a blessing because you couldn't see how grungy it was. But you could still feel the film on the floor and the slime if you touched the walls. But I still felt cleaner on leaving.

This informs my work and I've realized that, like counseling the dying and listening to the mentally ill, I can't do far them all. Like the fellow on the beach told his throwing a star fish back in the ocean makes no difference, it makes a difference for that one.

258 candles-day 51

I've been wracking my brain trying to think of what I can say that will mean anything to anyone about the current dismal, distressing state of politics in this country. And I've come to realize this: There isn't anything I can say. But there is something I can do.

My solution, based on the Chinese proverb that it's better to light a candle than to curse the darkness, is to provide daily candles in the form of links to other people's solutions, simple or complex responses to problems that they see. But as a single candle will hardly provide enough illumination to blot out the darkness that is the pettiness and meanness that characterizes this election cycle, I will light 258 candles, one each day between now and election day. In this way, I will do my part to remind each of us we are better than the baseness of the bases.

Today: Like this essay points out, it's easier to say bullshit to recent survivors rather than to admit you don't know what to say, but often we're better off saying nothing and letting our presence do the talking. As the Book of Job also recognizes, the first part of being a friend is the act of being present with the grieving.

I have come to know my place

I've experienced depression for many years. Like a lot of people, I did a lot of self-medicating with alcohol and drugs, and I kind of liked that. But I discovered that I was a poster boy for the wonders of Prozac and have been on some form of antidepressent for nearly 20 years. I've never felt suicidal (although a good argument could be made that I have been self-destructive) or whatever term there is for the desire just to remain in bed. I have no trouble moving around and getting my day going, although sometimes it's hard to understand to what purpose. My depression leaves me angry more often than not, sometimes with myself but usually with society.

All this is to say that, when it comes to depression, I'm not un-self-cognizant. It took me a long time to recognize a need for help, and even longer to accept it. I'm not proud of my tendency toward do-it-myselfism, but realize it's a battle I fight continuously.

On Wednesday I had a counseling appointment with a new counselor I started with late last year. Before and after I left for the appointment I took out my aggression that had been building for months on the three dogs I love most, hitting one with a book, pushing another down the stairs, and kicking the third. I was devastated by this behavior and am so ashamed of myself that if I was suicidal I might consider it. None of them was hurt, although all three looked surprised, which is of course being hurt, and like an abuser I tried to make up for my behavior immediately. But it didn't do any good for how I felt about what I'd done.

This is not to make too big a thing of it. I know every animal lover has done something in her thoughtless moments that he regrets and I know that this is really no different. But one thing I've prided myself about is the immeasurable love I have for my animals. But my depression makes them fair game, I know, and my wife just a few weeks ago said she was sometimes anxious about leaving me alone with the animals in winter, knowing that I could take my anger out on them. I told myself if that happened I needed to make a serious change.

So here is the change I'm making.

It's really not a big thing, more a recognition of something in front of me all along. For decades I have tried to be something better than I am, socially and economically. I have gotten several degrees and trainings--I hold two masters and a master of fine arts, and I've trained as a chaplain and a minister. I was a college teacher for a decade and a part-time minister for another decade.

But those are middle class ambitions and I didn't come from that. I am a lower-class prole straight out of Orwell who lucked into those positions and now, in the current employment market, cannot find a way to make lightning strike twice. The market may not be right but it is what we live with and I have come to hear it loud and clear: it does not want me to make my way as a professional. I must make it as a minimum-wage employee.

I have gotten above myself and have been suitably punished for it.

As a result, I renounce my desires to be a minister or chaplain, as I more or less gave up my desire to be a teacher any longer, and starting Monday I will look for any full-time job within ten miles I can find. Keep in mind where I live, deep out on the rim: the best I could hope for around here is work as a machinist and I don't have that kind of training.

Is this a reaction to both my depression and my acting in a way I'm ashamed of? Perhaps. Probably. But I feel lighter as a result of making this decision. For the first time in a long while I feel less like a victim of economic forces and more like someone who's accepted his fate.

This doesn't mean I intend to give up ministering, as I haven't really given up teaching. I've just given up the hope anyone will pay me a living wage doing it. I've come to recognize my place, and it's behind a broom or a cash register, not a lectern or an altar.

the pastor of porn

I rarely talk on this site about personal things going on in my life, primarily because I don't think that's the business of or of interest to most readers.  Having said that, it has been a hard two years since my last full time employment, and this past week I've stepped up my applications to places that aren't in my fields.

One of these has been a place closer in on the hub, in the river town Hudson, and around the corner from one of my favorite libraries.  It's called Left of Center, and it's one of those remnants of the looser 70s and early 90s, a store that specializes in sex toys, printed and video porn, pipes and other smoking accessories, lighters, gambling equipment, and lingerie.  I'm secretly hoping, although the guy I spoke with told me they aren't hiring currently, that I'll get a call from them.  This is the sort of place I'm comfortable in and with whose people, secretive and anonymous as they often are, I'm comfortable. 

My role as a minister, albeit part time, is featured prominently on my resume, and in my imagination it's this that would encourage the owner to hire me.  What better argument at contentious zoning and ordinance meetings than that the store is so safe it has a minister working at it?  I've even played around with titles I might use in relation to there:  "Pastor of Porn;" "Preacher of Paraphernalia;" "Hierophant of Hemp;" "Lay Clergy."  (As an interesting aside, I've typed "pastor of porn" into Google Images and much of its returns (NSFW) are mugshots of preachers arrested for child pornography and publicity shots of Ron Jeremy, who famously traveled the country debating Ron Gross of Fireproof Ministries, as well as the usual crotch shots. And yes, I'm aware the image I use uptop is from XXXchurch.com, whose message is diametrically opposed to my own, but the image is too good, and too right, not to use.)

So I recognize, and wouldn't be opposed to, my being used in that way.  But it's also a valuable way to be with the people I see as my primary congregation, the people who aren't covered by most preachers:  lowlifes, addicts, the lonely, the desperate, the fearful.  My wife pointed out to me that by working outside my teaching or ministerial roles I could be ministering to people without their even knowing it, and that's exactly where I hope my road takes me.  So if you're of a mind to, pray or think good thoughts for me to find full time employment at the porn shop.

homily on leadership

In connection with the post I added earlier this weekend this is the order of service I wrote up for an opening worship I conducted last Tuesday for my course in Unitarian Universalist Polity, specifically on leadership and (yes, the need for) meetings.  All numbered references are to the hymnal Singing the Living Tradition.

Welcome
Chalice Lighting (#473--James Vila Blake)
Hymn (#318--"We Would Be One")
Homily:

I always thought of myself as comfortable in chaos.  As most of you are aware, I was homeless for three years and that is often the epitome of becoming comfortable with chaos.  I sympathize with anarchists, understanding the pull for tearing down a corrupt order to be reconfigured by new, more humane means.

But even within my chaos I’ve sought regularity.  While I was homeless I had two fixed acts:  I had to shave every morning and I had to brush my teeth twice a day.  These were unalterable.  I never knew who I might meet.  While protesting the 2008 Republican National Convention with the anarchists I got into a screaming match with a black mask over his upending a newspaper kiosk into the street, insisting, “This is not what we do!”

And I have dogs and cats.  There is little more appealing to allowing chaos to reign than dogs and cats.  Everyone knows the iconic figure of the crazy cat lady.  Less well known perhaps but similar is the dog hoarder.  We read stories about these people—dozens of cats, many of them dead, removed from a house reeking with ammonia; packs of dogs kept in a basement whose floor is inches deep in feces.  Both of these accept or maybe give in to the call of chaos but there is nothing healthy about either them or the animals they presume to help.

I understand the large hearts of people who would let their animals “just be.”  Just be a pack, just be alive, just be animals.  But imagine feeding time, even among animals who have among themselves created their own effective way of governing themselves as a body, because unless they’re free to roam outside at will there must be someone who provides them with food.  Imagine letting them outside, because unless there is a flap allowing them instant access to the outdoors at all times there will be a constant stream of ins and outs and a Three Stooges-like pileup of several trying to get through the door together.  Imagine when one gets sick, because unless there is someone to minister to that animal or take him to the vet it is very likely that the animal will die.  Or if he has standing in the pack torn to pieces by the other members sensing weakness and a chance to move up.

Within chaos there must still be order.  There must be agreement, there must be rationale, there must be a sense that someone is in charge.  While there is great disorder in the universe—we don’t know that anyone is in charge in the larger scheme, and many days it seems that if anyone is she has a nasty streak a mile wide—there are also pockets of certainty.  When we come together as one body we know that someone will greet us with a smile and a kind word.  When we confess our fear or weakness we know we will receive an open ear and a hug.  From the chaos of congregational life a group will come together to make certain the lights come on when we flip the switch, the heat comes on in the winter, the floors get swept, the dishes get washed, the grass cut, children given something to learn, an ad appears in the local paper, sick people are visited,  injustice is addressed.  To make certain that when we come together as one body there will be someone there to stand and lead us and who we will listen to and whether we agree with her or not whose wisdom we consent to.  For the sake of something greater than ourselves we come together.  We would be one, dwelling together, seeking truth, helping one another.  Within the chaos order is struck. 

Silent Meditation

Responsive Reading (#591)

Benediction (#698)  

"Our service together is at an end.  May your individual services continue."

spiritual homelessness 3

Some of you may have read the following portion.  It's appeared, in slightly different form, here.

 

Part II:  What is my vocational calling?

Another story.  This past August I was coming home from seeing my counselor when I drove past an older woman on the opposite side of the road, taking a photograph of the geese who hang out at one of the local restaurants.  She had several knapsacks, so I figured her to be traveling.  I swung around at a gas station and pulled up and rolled down my passenger window. "Sister," I said, "Can I offer you a ride somewhere?"

She was about my age, maybe a little older. She wore glasses that looked small on her big face, braided her long hair streaked with grey in a ponytail down her back.  She wore an ankle-length denim skirt, high-top sneakers, and a flannel shirt rolled up to her elbows.  She giggled when she answered.  She said, "I was just taking pictures of the geese.  You never know when you'll see something like this again."

She asked where I was going.  I said, "Well, I'm heading home, but where are you going?"  She said, “Minneapolis,” and asked how far it was and I told her it was about an hour.  "Oh," she said.  "I guess I'd have a long walk."  She asked again how far I was going and in that moment I could have told the truth and said I was heading about 20 miles further (I did need some dog food there) and then dropped her off at the Minnesota border without an ounce of guilt.  Instead, I said, "Sister, I'll take you to Minneapolis." 

She tossed her things in the back seat and got in and we exchanged names.  Hers was Cora or it might have been "Coral.”  It’s not unusual, when on the road, to name yourself something that reflects how you think of yourself.   I was facing north when I picked her up and she was surprised when I turned around and headed back to the interstate:  "Isn't Minneapolis that direction?" she said, pointing back the way she'd been walking.

"No," I said. "It's west of where we are."  

"Oh, I would have had a very long walk and gotten nowhere!" she said. 

Almost immediately she told me she was a street preacher who ministered to the homeless, and that God had told her to leave her home a year and a half ago and take to the road.  I said I was also a preacher.  We asked what each other was.  She was "just Christian," she said, "Just Jesus out of the book."  She had heard of Unitarian Universalists and had met a few and been impressed by them.  She filled up nearly every second of our drive with talk and questions and confessions. 

She left her abusive husband, she said, about 5 years ago back outside Denver.   She had begun this trip 3 days before at a truck stop in South Dakota.  She was resting between rides and had been approached by a Jamaican woman whose husband was a trucker and who asked if she'd come home with them to help the Jamaican woman get herself together.  But then this woman had stopped taking her meds, Cora told me, and progressively got more and more aggressive, yelling and berating her, finally literally throwing her bags out of the truck when they'd stopped for gas at the station where I turned around.  Cora camped for two nights in the woods nearby, to pray and settle herself, before heading back out.  The night before she attended midweek services at a Lutheran church not far out of town—I know the place, it's a few miles from my house—and she'd heard from people there that there are a lot of homeless people in Minneapolis.  So Cora decided to head there next but apparently hadn't a very good idea of where it was in relation to that part of Wisconsin.  I told her she'd likely traveled through Minneapolis riding with the trucker and his wife. 

She had been born in Alsace-Lorraine, she said, but couldn't speak more than rudimentary French and German, and her mother was long dead.  Her father was ungodly, she said, and dead to her.  She'd grown up somewhere out west, she was very vague about where, and mentioned a daughter who was married.  I tried on occasion to ask about her family but it was like trying to blow into a whirlwind.  She was a talking machine, sometimes punctuating sentences with "Praise God!" and "Lord, that's your way!" and sometimes girlish giggles.  

She was attending an online bible college out of Australia run by an evangelical couple that delivered two types of courses, free and paid for.  She was taking the courses for free so she wouldn't get a degree but she didn't think that was important for the ministry she was doing.  She had no idea where she was going or what she would do when she got there except to preach the word to people as she could and if they'd listen and rely on their goodness.  She said that God and Jesus had kept her safe and healthy all her time on the road.  She didn't care much, she said, of what anyone else's opinion of her was, she would just be as crazy as Jesus wanted her in order to do his work.  I told her she was a fool for Christ.  She allowed she'd never heard that phrase but she thought it suited her perfectly, and she repeated the phrase several times during our ride.

She asked me about Unitarian Universalism and I gave her a short answer about no one knowing about an afterlife but we know we have this one and it's important how we treat each other here.  She thought that was wonderful and wanted to experience a UU service so I told her where the nearest congregation was in the area where I would drop her off.  She mentioned her reliance on libraries several times so I told her the perfect spot I could think of was at one end of Nicollet Mall by the county library.  She said that sounded perfect.  When we got there I pulled off to the side of the street and helped her unload and then shoulder everything, We exchanged hugs and "God bless you”s, and I watched her waddle around the corner before driving off and heading back home.

Later, my wife would ask me "Do you think she was crazy?" and I'd answer, "Yes."  Cora mentioned having refused to take mental health exams in order to receive social services, claiming that Second Timothy says you can't be both crazy and a Christian, and since she was Christian she wasn't crazy.  I failed to find this suggestion in Second Timothy or anywhere else in the Bible. 

But on a larger, communal scale, did I think she was a danger to herself or other people?  Not for a second.  She seemed to have a solid understanding of her life on the road and what it entailed, and if she didn't have it when she started, by this time she had.  She seemed to know how to stay safe—she told me she'd never been physically harmed by anyone and I believe her—and when to recharge her energies.  After all, she'd spent a couple nights alone in order to pray and "get herself together."  She didn't seem too concerned about getting anywhere in particular or about getting something done.  She wasn't upset when she found she'd been heading in the wrong direction.  She seemed content to drift along, going where her God sent her and doing what she thought her God wanted her to do.

From what she told me what her God wanted from her isn't very different from what my God wants from me:  Serve people andhelp them be as human as possible.  She didn't want anyone to stop doing anything he or she wasn't interested in stopping, just maybe to think about doing something else and offering to be with them while they went about their lives.  She seemed extraordinarily happy and she said she wasn't on any medications—since she was not crazy—and didn't do drugs or alcohol or smoke.  She just liked people, she said. 

I have known many preachers in my life, and many of them I would model myself after, but Cora’s way of being with people seems the most satisfying for me.  It was on meeting her I began to have first thoughts about shifting what I have always assumed is my calling—that of a parish minister who spends much time on the streets and opens the church to local homeless and troubled—to a minister whose parish is the streets among the homeless and addicted.  It’s a subtle but informed shift as it moves my perspective from bringing others inside with me to being outside with them. 

a new direction

The vocation of ministry is a holiness and a gift; it is being a voice for justice for those who have no voice; it is a calling to compassion and service; it is directed to the healing of the wounded, the finding of the lost, the binding up of the broken, and the nurturing of all in justice; it is the work of scholarship and proclamation and teaching; it is the constant struggle against the abuse of power, the resistance to the temptation of false ministry, and the surrender of one's life to trust in God; it is a life lived in prayer and the strong word of God; it is a life marked by servanthood.

--from Desert Hearts and Healing Fountains:  Gaining Pastoral Vocational Clarity by Victor Hunter

I've operated the past years in seminary under the assumption that what I was working toward has been parish ministry.  That's been because I'm familiar with it, having already served as the spiritual leader for a congregation and having attended churches and temples and mosques and synagogues for decades (even when there were large stretches between visits).  But recently, probably because I'm nearing graduation and the insistent tug to get serious about how I want to serve people, I've begun to see the way parish work is morphing into something else, and I'm not entirely certain there's a place for me in it as it changes.

I love being a preacher, writing sermons, visiting people, being a leader.  But I'm also realizing that that isn't the only way I can serve people effectively, especially the people I want to serve, and maybe won't have the opportunity to do so anyway.  As a result, I've decided to shift my attention to chaplaincy.  My clinical pastoral experience was not bad by any stretch of the imagination, and while I did it without once thinking it would become what I wanted to do, having come to that decision in the past few days has been very quieting.  I think my service is better when focused directly on one or two people at a time (although I thrill to large crowds and don't think I'll ever give up giving sermons or performing weddings and funerals).  

I've had a difficult time dropping the image of myself primarily as a teacher but as time passes by and I am not in front of classes, I'm finding it--not exactly easy, but less painful, less a sense of loss.  I'm feeling much the same about church work.  I don't think what I'm meant to do is to start a new church or new way of being together, which is what I think needs to be done by pastors in the future.  I'm best at making peoples' lives as solid as possible, to remind them they aren't alone.  This is my ministry.

fool for christ

some days ago I was coming home from seeing my counselor when I drove past an older woman on the opposite side of the road, taking a photograph of the geese who hang out at one of the local restaurants.  I noted she had several knapsacks, so I figured her to be traveling.  I swung around at a gas station and pulled up and rolled down my passenger window. "sister," I said, "can I offer you a ride somewhere?"

she was about my age, maybe a little older. glasses, long hair in a ponytail down her back, streaked with grey.  ankle-length denim skirt, hightop sneaks, a flannel shirt rolled up to her elbows.  she giggled when she answered.  she said, "I was just taking pictures of the geese.  you never know when you'll see something like this again."

she asked where I was going and I said, "well, I'm heading home, but where are you going?"  she asked how far minneapolis was and I told her it was about an hour.  "oh," she said.  "I guess I'd have a long walk."  she asked again how far I was going and in that moment I could have told the truth and said I was heading about 20 miles further (I did need some dog food there) and dropped her off at the border without an ounce of guilt.  but something suggested I go the extra 40 miles and I said, "sister, I'll take you to minneapolis."

so she tossed her things in the back seat and got in and we exchanged names.  hers was kora (it might have been "coral").  I was facing north when I picked her up and she was surprised I turned around and headed back to the interstate:  "isn't minneapolis that direction?" she said, pointing back the way she'd been walking. "no," I said, "it's west of where we are."  "oh, I would have had a very long walk and gotten nowhere!" she said.

almost immediately she told me she was a street preacher who ministered to the homeless, that god had told her to leave her home a year and a half ago and go out on the road.  I said I was also a preacher.  we asked what each was.  she was "just christian," she said, "just jesus out of the book."  she had heard of unitarian universalists and had met a few and been impressed by them.  she filled up nearly every second of our drive with talk and questions and confessions.

she had left her abusive husband, she said, 5 years ago and back outside denver.  she'd started out 3 days before at a truckstop in south dakota and had been approached by a jamaican woman whose husband was a trucker and asked if she'd come home with them to help her get herself together.  but then this woman had stopped taking her meds, she said, and progressively got more and more aggressive, yelling and berating her, finally literally throwing her bags out of the truck when they'd stopped for gas at the station where I turned around.  she'd camped for 2 nights in the woods nearby, to pray and settle herself, before heading back out, and then had attended midweek services at a lutheran church not far out of town--I know the place, it's a few miles from my house--where she'd heard from people there that there are a lot of homeless people in minneapolis.  so she'd decided to head there (but apparently hadn't a very good idea of where it was from the part of the rim she was on).  I told her she'd likely been driven through minneapolis by the trucker and his wife.

she had been born in alsace-lorraine, she said, but couldn't speak more than rudimentary french and german, and her mother was long dead but her father was ungodly and so dead to her.  she'd grown up somewhere out west, she was very vague about it, and mentioned a daughter who was married.  I tried on occasion to ask about her family but it was like trying to blow into a whirlwind.  she was a talking machine, sometimes punctuating sentences with "praise god!" and "lord, that's your way!" and sometimes girlish giggles.  she was attending an online bible college out of australia run by an evangelical couple that gave 2 types of courses, free and paid for.  she was taking all of them free so she wouldn't get a degree but she didn't think that was important for the ministry she was doing.  she had no idea where she was going or what she would do when she got there except to preach the word to people as she could and if they'd listen and rely on their goodness.  she said that god and jesus had kept her safe and healthy all her time on the road.  she didn't care much, she said, of what anyone else's opinion of her was, she would just be as crazy as jesus wanted her in order to do his work.  I said she was being a fool for christ.  she allowed she'd never heard that phrase but she thought it suited her perfectly.  she repeated it several times during our ride.

she asked me about uuism and I gave her a short answer about no one knowing about an afterlife but we know we have this one and it's important how we treat each other here.  she thought that was wonderful and wanted to experience a uu service so I told her where the nearest congregation was in the area where I was dropping her off.  she'd mentioned her reliance on libraries several times so I told her the perfect place I could think of to drop her off at was on one end of nicollet mall by the county library.  she said that sounded perfect.  when we got there I pulled off to the side of the street and helped her unload and then shoulder everything, we exchanged hugs and "god bless you"s, and I watched her waddle around the corner before driving off and heading back out to the rim.

later, my wife would ask me "do you think she was crazy?" and I'd answer, "yes."  she'd mentioned refusing to take mental health exams in order to receive social services, claiming that second timothy says you can't be crazy and a christian, so since she was christian she wasn't crazy.  but did I think she was a danger to herself or other people?  not for a second.  she seemed to have a solid understanding of life on the road, and if she didn't have it when she started, by this time she had.  she seemed to know how to stay safe--she said she'd never been physically harmed by anyone and I believe her--and when to recharge her energies.  after all, she'd spent a couple nights alone in order to pray and "get herself together."  and she didn't seem too concerned about getting anywhere in particular or getting something done.  she wasn't upset when she found she'd been heading in the wrong direction.  she was content to drift along, going where her god sent her and doing what she thought her god wanted her to do, and from what she told me it seemed what her god wanted wasn't very different from what my god wants me to do:  serve people and help them be as human as possible.  she didn't want anyone to stop doing anything he or she wasn't interested in stopping, just maybe to think about doing something else and being with them while they went about their lives.  she seemed extraordinarily happy and she said she wasn't on any meds--not being crazy--and didn't do drugs or alcohol or smoke.  she just liked people, she said.

sunday sermon in willmar

this past weekend I drove to willmar, mn, twice as far on the west side of the hub as we are from the east, directly into lakes and woods and beaver ponds next to the road. I was asked back in november to speak at the uu church there and to sermonize on a uniquely uu subject. I gave my sermon about prayer and somehow it didn't feel right.

by that I don't mean the sermon itself didn't feel right, although I may not have been feeling as good in delivering it as I have in the past. the sermon itself is unaffected but I've heard that the feelings of the sermonizer can affect the way an audience experiences it, and it might be that that's what I felt. I was excited about the sermon--I think it's a good one that I enjoy reading to people--and I felt pretty good about the circumstances of being in willmar where I was surrounded by lakes and trees and the building itself, a century-old former xian science church, was beautiful and old-smelling and comfortable. that day's attendance was smaller than I'd expected, about 25, but that's a larger turnout than I usually got at menomonie and there were several kids and a teen there too. but I was on the younger end of the age spectrum, a couple young families there, and a single woman attendee I'd hoped to have the chance to speak with as she sat forward in the last pew the whole time in that stance of great interest people have when they're surprised.

but something didn't seem right, whatever that might mean, and I'm not certain why. I arrived about 6 the previous evening at a home where a lovely woman named mary lou was kind enough to put me up, and she'd invited several members over to dine with us. the night was spent talking about uu denomination and local congregation matters and birds and gardening and gazing at jupiter and mars and venus in the sky above eagle lake and drinking red wine--I drank red beer--and when I finally crawled into bed at 10 to read and play scrabble by phone with my wife, I was tired in a good, at-rest way and slept the sleep of the just plain tired.


on the drive there I'd stopped to wander at a park in waverly named for local son hubert humphrey and that was fine. I was relaxed into my seat, listening to the radio and watching the sun go down ahead of me so it seemed as if I was heading into it, a sensation I always loved when I lived in my vehicle and retain. in other words, all the very subjective events pointed toward a wonderful sense of peace and oneness as well as a sense of having made an effective appearance. still, I could not help, immediately after the service and on the drive home, feeling as if I'd spoken with my zipper open or unknowingly wearing an offensive t-shirt (and as I'd had to point out to my wife, I'd worn a nice black oxford and black jeans with black sneakers and my colorful robert bly vest at the pulpit and not the raggy baggy pants and hawaiian shirt I arrived home in). nothing was said and no one acted oddly but there was something decidedly off in my appraisal of my appearance. perhaps it is true, that we are our worst critics, even when we don't know of anything to criticize.

I don't have to be wounded to not be xian

an interesting observation from today's clinical pastoral seminar. at 1 point after having, on the advice of my wife--who is pretty keen about these sorts of thing--come out to my seminarmates about not being a xian, 1 of them, in response to 1 of my proposed learning goals about being better able to be with xians in prayer and christlanguage, made a comment suggesting she understood my having been wounded by xianity.

and I don't think she meant it this way but I think the unspoken assumption that lay behind her comment was unless I'd been wounded I would see the truth of xianity. I haven't, as it happens, been wounded by xianity, certainly not as much as some people have and not the way some xians who have decided to remain with it have been. while I should applaud the recognition she had that some people can be harmed by what she sees as the ultimate good thing, what it also suggests is an inability to recognize that someone can be faced with the best aspects of xian practice and thought and still, definitely, refuse to accept them. my take on xianity is that, like mark twain's definition of golf as a good walk spoiled, xianity takes a good teacher, jesus, and adds more bricolage to his shoulders than any human should have to bear. whoever or however many people jesus may have been he or she or they could only be human since other than plant and animal and mineral life that's all we've ever seen and I'm not about to ascribe causation to the invisible ghost someone else sees in the room. I don't have to be wounded by the invisible ghost to decide I don't believe in it.

what bothers me

this has bothered me all afternoon. after church this morning I stopped at a grocery where I knew I could buy a sunday new york times. I'd stepped in and picked up a copy and was in the process of joining the line to pay for it when something happening just a few yards to the left of me caught my attention.

a cashier had apparently caught a young boy of about 10 or 12 shoplifting, or failing at shoplifting, and caught up with him outside and walked him in a few moments behind me. she wasn't berating him badly or being abusive. she was the only one talking loud enough of the 2 of them for me to hear and I caught her saying, "I know you're heading for the register, I'm heading with you to the register," and "do you have enough money to pay for that? so you are going to pay for it?" I couldn't see what the "it" was, but from the way she held it in her hand I figure it was a small can of soda or maybe a candy bar.

I left before the drama played itself out--she was calling for someone to come over to the register as I paid and stepped back out--and there wasn't a reason I needed to see the kid humiliated. as a person who has done his share of theft, including shoplifting, I'm not anyone to have proferred advice in the situation. except perhaps to tell the kid you don't wear a black hoodie with the hood up if you're a tween planning a snatch & grab--you might as well wear a sign around your neck saying, "gonna do something, here."

here's what bothers me. the area around there is a mix of housing projects and typical suburban houses. I was in bloomington, mn, which is 1 of those odd quickly-building suburbs in the hub that was farmland in recent memory--the church where I am finishing my internship was a seed congregation only 30-some years ago made up primarily of commuters from minneapolis. the place is filling in more quickly than a community ought to and so everyone, middle and lower class and a few upper middle class, live cheek by jowl. so the kid could have been shoplifting for 1 of 2 reasons: he was a stereotypical middle class white kid (and he was white) looking for thrills or he was making a grab at something he couldn't afford (I never heard the outcome to whether he had the money to pay for "it").

what bothers me is that my reaction changes depending on which kid he is. if he's able to afford it, I say good on the cashier: he's taking part in a traditional attempt of kids to test their boundaries and he's not getting away with it and the humiliation of being caught and marched back inside and made to pay might be enough to keep him on the straight and narrow later. who knows, had this happened with ken lay decades ago enron might have had a different ending.

but if he's not able to afford it my reaction's different. I've lifted because of inability to pay for the food I wanted to eat--admittedly, with greater finesse--and I ask myself, if I'd known the kid couldn't pay, would I step forward and offer to pay for him? the answer is yes, and that is what bothers me. is it right that my response depends on the kid's situation? shouldn't theft be theft, no matter the circumstances? if I'd been caught, there would not have been anyone to step forward to pay for me, and I'd have been lucky to only have been humiliated. is it different because he's a kid? am I more lenient because I'm not a kid?

this is a hopelessly complicated reaction to an event that took only a few moments time and to which I don't know much more than the middle. but I think it's in entertaining these complications and rounding back on ourselves to try to examine them more closely that we participate in humanity, having a relationship even with cashiers and kids we never meet.

take confidence in gratitude-4

the finale of my day-after-xmas video sermon. it was a good experiment but I learned there are non-technological elements that also need to be considered, such as against what is such a sermon being projected (a white wall that bright sunlight reflects against is not a good choice), as well as how enlarging a video clip can slow it down considerably so dancers look like they have st. vitus.

take confidence in gratitude-3

part 3 of today's day-after-xmas multimedia presentation (that went over very well, thank you: attendance was always down, I was told, on the service after xmas, so there were "only" 50 or so people; but when I preach out on the rim I would kill for an attendance of 50, so I'm not complaining).

take confidence in gratitude-2

part 2 of my day-after-xmas multimedia presentation

take confidence in gratitude-1

I'm in charge of the sunday-after-xmas service at one of the churches where I'm interning, and as I'm told it's a traditionally less-attended service, I decided to try some technological experimentation. in this instance, doing a 20 minute multimedia presentation rather than the traditional sermon. I've been working at it for several weeks and kept running into the same difficulty: too large to keep track of and something somewhere ended up unravelling. finally I've just sliced it into fourths and and publishing them here as 4 separate videos over the next 4 days.

(if I need to mention it: the photograph is not a spiritual comment, but I used it in the course of the work and I really, really like the blissful look on her face.)

the apple from the tree

I've spent much of the past couple days visiting family that I'm unlikely to hear from except when I'm here. it's been really good: I saw my dad's younger brother and his family, including his daughter who I remember as a 4 or 5 year old and who's now celebrating her 17th year in the air force; spent time seeing his elder sister who's 90-something and has dementia and who thought I was her dead brother-in-law; ran into my cousin who works for the post office in vegas; we stopped at the longterm care facility my dad's surviving sister-in-law lives at and spent time with her (when she was still alive my mom visited her every other day and my dad drives up to feed her twice a week); and today we picked up my cousin who lives in wellsville and the 3 of us had thanksgiving dinner at a tiny restaurant in genesee, pa.

I want to talk about that place for a moment. it's called the genesee hometown restaurant and has been there about 3 years, but the woman who owns the place and does the cooking says she has been a restauranteur since she was 6. her name is audrey kio and her place doesn't have a spot on the internet (except this listing) and it's likely that when she dies, which won't be that long since she's in her 90s, the place and her name will disappear, be subsumed by the weight of everyday life of everyday people. the place is staffed mostly by family and they had set up a buffet of turkey and ham and potatoes and salads and pies and such, mostly for her family to come by to eat since she didn't advertise. the food wasn't exceptional but there was plenty of it and the dinner plates were the size of some towns. genesee itself is a little pimple on the raised back of the pa-ny border with a gas station and a post office and a library open 3 days a week. but we were there and in my sweater and black sneaks I was probably the best-dressed. mostly the people there were farmers and hunters in bibs and boots and caps, people who smelled and spend their lives sweating.

audrey sat down and like it was the most natural thing in the world talked to us about her childhood and her upbringing and her family. her husband died some 6 years back and her family is all she has left now (which is true for most people, I guess) and her granddaughter is in jail and her greatgrandchildren want to stay with her but they can't for some reason I never heard. my dad sat there and listened and commisserated. this is what most of our week has been was him sitting on someone's couch or on the edge of a chair and listening to her pour out her life in spurts and fits and I realized this is where I get my sense of ministerial calm. I haven't felt bored and I suspect if he hadn't been a banker my dad would have been a preacher in some postage stamp town. I suppose I'd known that but it was brought more forcefully to me the past few days. my wife made a comment to me earlier today on a different topic that the apple didn't fall far from the tree. I guess not, although I hope I don't end my days in the thick.

love is a rite

I married another couple last night. I'm a sentimentalist when it comes to these things. I'm very proud of the work I do on ceremonies and rituals --weddings, funerals, memorials, child welcomes, coming-of-age rites, community welcomes--and I think a part of the reason I do them well is because I don't feel drawn to the ceremony itself but to the emotion and release people associate with these rites. while I don't cry at weddings, for instance, I love to watch other people, especially the bride or groom, do so, and cater my message and performance to elicit that as honestly as possible. below is the homily I wrote for this most recent ritual and I won't pretend to false modesty--I share it because I think it's a good one.


"The Good Grey Poet, Walt Whitman, has come down to us as a poet of many topics, of self-identity and community, companionship and optimism, equality and even bereavement. But Jon and Sara have, by their inclusion of him, given me a new understanding of Walt’s topicality: as a poet of adventure. Of tenderness. Of marriage.

"We don’t choose our children or our parents. But we do choose our companions. We choose our partner. We choose one another. Jon and Sara, today you look one another in the eye and say, “I love you and I want to be with you, and I want to share my life with you. The good, the bad, the swiftly-moving giddy days when I’m happy just to be with you and the long, never-ending nights when it seems I will never like you again. I want to share my greatest, my least, with you, because only with you do I feel complete.”

"We have to take a lot of “what ifs” in hand when making our choice. “What if I’m not as likeable as I think I am?” “What if she’s not as willing to make concessions as I am?” “What if he just thinks he loves me?” Here is another “what if” most of us never even consider: What if the other person is unwilling to move as often as I’ll need to? What if she or he simply isn’t willing to pack up and go as the opportunity arises? Earlier, Sara’s sister Megan read an excerpt from Walt Whitman’s long poem “Song of the Open Road.” Elsewhere, what he writes sounds almost like a prophecy:

"Listen! I will be honest with you;
I do not offer the old smooth prizes, but offer rough new prizes;
These are the days that must happen to you:

"You shall not heap up what is call’d riches,
You shall scatter with lavish hand all that you earn or achieve,
You but arrive at the city to which you were destin’d—you hardly settle yourself to satisfaction, before you are call’d by an irresistible call to depart,
You shall be treated to the ironical smiles and mockings of those who remain behind you;
What beckonings of love you receive, you shall only answer with passionate kisses of parting,
You shall not allow the hold of those who spread their reach’d hands toward you.

"The solution is compatibility. Jon and Sara, a fear you shared, maybe even a fear you were certain of, was that you would be unhappy all your lives because the person you settled down with wouldn’t have your passion for different cultures and lands, your love for education and your need for it. You were each afraid that what you wanted in your life was yours alone, that there was no one you could love who could share that. You feared, in Walt’s words,

"'The east and the west are mine, and the north and the south are mine.'

"What you feared was the unspoken assumption that they were yours alone. Your focus would remain on the “me,” “I,” “my” alone, so you would end up

"'Scatter[ing] myself among men and women as I go;'

"Fear is a funny thing. It keeps us from doing things—like dating the friend we feel attracted to because to do so would seem unprofessional—and it forces us to do things—like opening ourselves to that friend because the thought of being alone is unbearable. Remember this in the days ahead as you live in the space of a walk-in closet getting in one another’s way. Remember this is the person you love, the person who shares the way the world excites you and wants to be with you as you explore it. “We will sail pathless and wild seas” you promise one another today, and sometimes those seas will be the distance between the two of you. Be as unafraid of crossing those intimate borders as you are of crossing national ones.

"It is traditional that the officient of a marriage service charges the newly married couple with some office, some task they are to keep in the back of their minds to help their marriage succeed. But I can’t improve on Walt’s charge:

"'Here is the test of wisdom;
Wisdom is not finally tested in schools;
Wisdom cannot be pass’d from one having it, to another not having it;
Wisdom is of the Soul, is not susceptible of proof, is its own proof,
Applies to all stages and objects and qualities, and is content…'

"Sara and Jon, your wisdom has come from schools but is not bound by their limits; has been shared with one another but is made greater than the sum of the two of you. The only proof your wisdom requires is that you remember to love, honor, share and be patient with each other. If there is only one certainty, it is that we’re alone in our lives until we accept another person as our companion. Your road will not be smooth or always clear but it will always be the one you travel together."

shaking the gates of hell

"People create institutions for a variety of reasons: to nurture life and serve the common good, to advance their own self-interested goals, sometimes to accomplish both. People create institutions to promote agendas that may either help or harm human beings or the earth. They invest their energy and resources...serve them, become loyal to them, and promote and defend them...When an institution invested with authority assumes this degree of importance in people's lives, the survival and growth of the institution itself may become paramount...

"What many people do not realize is that institutions are not simply groups of individuals working together. Invested by humans with authority, institutions tend to take on a life of their own, to develop their own personality, goals, ethos, culture, milieu. As an institution becomes larger, wealthier, and more powerful, individual human beings within the institution have relatively less control over what it does...

"In other words, an institution is more than the sum of the human beings who make it up. It is an actor, a protagonist, an agent, interacting for better or for worse with human beings, with other institutions, and with the nonhuman parts of creation. It is a Power. In a very real sense, through the people who make it up, it takes on a life of its own.

"In theological terms, one could say that the Powers are primarily concerned with their own survival and growth, even at the expense of mortal human beings. An institution demands loyalty from those who identify themselves as part of the institution and have an interest in furthering its goals...When this happens, people end up serving the institution, instead of the institution serving life..."

--from Shaking the Gates of Hell: Faith-Led Resistance to Corporate Globalization by Sharon Delgado

if this is so--and I submit it is at least partly so--then theargument can be used in at least 2 ways: to further the legal argument that corporations become citizens, with rights and responsibilties, because they act in society's interest (or against it); and to argue that opposition to corporations and institutions is a holy act that religiously-inclined individuals are obligated to be a part of, even if it conflicts with their role as part of the institution.

my 1st half century

I think I had a party at 5. I don't remember 10 at all. at 15 I was resigned to the reality that, like everyone else, I grew older. at 20, already married, I saw in myself a new version of my father. at 25, newly divorced, I was certain I'd never see 50.

when I hit 30, life was starting to get good: I imagined that at 50 I'd be living in the desert, growing a small plot of vegetables, and teaching. by 35, buying our first house in the midwest, I knew that wasn't going to happen. I celebrated 40 with a vasectomy and spent the weekend on the couch in a vicodin and beer-fueled haze. by the time I hit 45, teaching and appreciating the life I had, I'd started reflecting on life differently.

like nearly every male growing up in the late 20th century, I held onto the fantasy of being a boy wonder for a long time, finally even giving in to the fantasy in my 40s of being a late-blooming boy wonder. at 50 you can't convince even yourself you're a boy wonder anymore. why that particular fantasy holds such sway for americans I'm not really certain, except for our youth-transfixed culture and the lure of early and easy fame. I can still evoke the shudders I felt standing in the dark schubert theatre in 1975 listening to this line from bobby in a chorus line: "if troy donahue could be a movie star, then I could be a movie star."

living and writing quietly on the rim now, heading into the heart of what was once a frontier city to teach and be taught, discovering what it means to be trusted by community and appreciated in turn, well-remarried and playing each day with animals who recognize in me the benign nature I sometimes forget myself, I am happy with what I am. I dreamt last night that I was teaching in a crowded school wherein classes were conducted in huge open rooms with students sitting in chairs arrayed around teacher's desks. the lighting had to be better, and I was replacing the lamps with help from former students. we were laughing and telling stories, and I woke with a solid sense of contenment and doing holy work.

this is where I should be, this is what I should be doing. I'm only missing the vegetables.

"we swim together"

I attended my quasi-home church the other morning, expecting to hear a visiting pastor speaking on "the art of listening to yourself"--spiritual stories and memoirs, that sort of thing--and was surprised to listen instead to the candidate for full time minister at the congregation. this was not a problem.

julianne lepp, the candidate, is young and southern and interesting. her sermon was titled "lifeministry: diving deep" and had a water motif--her referent point was the ocean and diving into it. "we swim together," she said in her conclusion; "we might want to swim alone but the lifeguard has a rule: we must swim together."

the congregation seemed taken with her and her partner (their children were not there) and I think she will make a good fit for the eau claire congregation. she is solidly in the mold of the last two ministers, virginia woolf and (interim) wendy jerome. like with them, I found her easy to listen to (not unchallenging but easy to follow and to understand) and essentially optimistic, which is important in fellowship. if she is confirmed, I look forward to good conversations with her.

but while listening to her I came to an interesting epiphany about myself. I enjoyed parish work when I did it--the sermons, visits, the hustle of writing and meetings--but I think I'm coming to realize that this may not be the future for me. I am feeling drawn closer to a new style of ministry devoted to people outside church walls, more like community or service ministry. I've had a hard time articulating what I mean: a ministry of doing and being on the street with people (especially the homeless) and traveling. if I had my druthers, I'd be one of those annoying traveling ministers who set up camp at rainbow gatherings and dead show parking lots and behind carnivals and tent revivals. I'd love to give sermons, but that wouldn't be likely. I'd be more often serving people, getting food together, talking one on one with people, hanging out with kids and old people, sewing up ripped clothes and setting up healthcare appointments. most often, listening to the stories people tell.

this would be wonderful. I'm not aware of any way to make a living at it.