In Praise of the Faith Community

I love churches. Whenever I am traveling through a new town, my eye scans the horizon for steeples. Whenever a wedding, funeral or meeting calls me to some other church, I almost always arrive early enough to walk around and get a feel for the place, its people and mission. I pick up newsletters. I read bulletin boards and posted meeting minutes. I sit in sanctuaries and simply absorb the residual Spirit and atmosphere. The same holds true for the monasteries, synagogues, temples, mosques and shrines I have visited. I am drawn to these places where profound and profane meet... these formal touch points between Creator and creation. Something sacred has been lovingly built in these places. With each new day and each heartfelt prayer, more faith, more holiness is added.

Even now, as I sit in my office typing out this reflection, I can hear the cars and trucks zooming by on Routes 5 & 20, just 100 yards away. I wonder where people are going. I know some take comfort at the sight of our building. Perhaps some would stop in to explore and meditate if they only had time. Someday... Someday...

Practical concerns like weather and potential vandals require us to close and lock down at times. Still, in summer, I like to throw open the doors to the Spirit wind and wandering travelers. I've met a lot of interesting people this way, as the sight of our huge oak doors thrown open to the world tends to attract the curious, the troubled, the seeking and the holy. I remember one day when I found myself playing host to three very-excited-if-slightly-lost black lab puppies that suddenly burst into my office. They seemed to appreciate holiness, but, alas, their little puppy brains (hardwired to their little puppy bladders) could only handle so much loving acceptance.

I've also hosted itinerant evangelists, addicts, genealogy researchers, fresh starters, con artists, a few birds and one very persistent bat, all thanks to this open door policy.

I remember one day about ten years ago when these two women showed up. One appeared to be in her late 30s, the other was in her 50s, easy, and seemed to be having a difficult time with arthritis. They were hitching and camping their way from the Midwest to Vermont. A trucker had dropped them off in Avon at the end of his run. They'd walked as far as our doors when they ran out of steam. We gave them a hot shower and a warm meal on that early autumn evening. They seemed a bit leery of a pastor and his family, and didn't share much. Family in Vermont? Nope. Friends? Nope. Jobs? Nope. It dawned on me that these two were most likely traveling together to a location that had just legalized gay marriage. Not knowing where I stood on the issue, they probably chose not to share too much. They simply wanted to make it to Burlington unmolested and uncontested. I felt it best to respect their privacy and not force them to answer to my conjecture. It wasn't my business.

They had a tent and sleeping bags. The 50ish lady said she preferred sleeping outside, but I also saw her wince when she rose from her chair.

A local gentleman farmer granted permission for them to camp in the short grass up behind his pond, and, after dinner, I helped them lug their packs and set camp. It was about midnight that the thunder, lightning, wind and torrential rains hit. I drove and ran to their camp, where their tent had collapsed and they were drenched. They agreed to spend the rest of the night at the parsonage.

In the morning it became obvious that the older of the two ladies was unable to continue hitch-hiking and camping. She turned to her companion with tears in her eyes and said "I just can't do it." I jumped online, found a sister UCC church in Burlington (checking quietly to make sure it was Open and Affirming), called with advance word of these two sojourners, and then we bought them a couple of bus tickets to carry them the rest of the way in padded, heated comfort. At the bus station we asked them only to send word that they were safe and well, handed over a couple of box lunches, quickly, quietly prayed a blessing over them and sent them on their way.

We did receive a simple, brief thank you note, but no other word ever came.

Jesus once said that merely giving a cup of cold water to a child was a holy task. He also said:

"if anyone wants to sue you and take your coat, give your cloak as well; and if anyone forces you to go one mile, go also the second mile. Give to everyone who begs from you, and do not refuse anyone who wants to borrow from you.
"You have heard that it was said, 'You shall love your neighbor and hate your enemy.' But I say to you, Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be children of your Father in heaven; for he makes his sun rise on
the evil and on the good, and sends rain on the righteous and on the unrighteous. For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Do not even the tax collectors do the same? And if you greet only your brothers and sisters, what more are you doing than others? Do not even the Gentiles do the same? Be perfect, therefore, as your heavenly Father is perfect."


We'll never be perfect. Not even close, in my case. But it seems to me the most efficient way to eliminate an enemy is to love them into friendship. Who is the enemy of Christ, anyway? Someone who wants to pursue a quiet life of love and laughter? One who would insist on separation, castigation and discord? Any way you think on the issue, Jesus is crystal clear in his directives. Greet all. Love all. Help all on their way.

Yesterday our faith community, West Bloomfield Congregational Church UCC, voted overwhelmingly - UNANIMOUSLY - to throw open our doors to the wandering stranger.We are now officially an Open and Affirming church, though most would say we've always been so, we just hadn't made it formally known. This was not a vote to "love the sinner, hate the sin," but simply, firmly a vote to LOVE.

I pray that you are part of a faith community that does likewise, or are seeking the same. If you are a part of this faith community and have absented yourself because you disagree with the rest of us or the UCC on this or some other issue, I pray that you will return to love and be loved, to be affirmed, and to be a part of this incredible, wide-open, life- and love-affirming mission to which Christ has assigned us all.

How Do You Make Love Stay?

Someday, after mastering the winds, the waves, the tides and gravity, we shall harness for God the energies of love; and then, for a second time in the history of the world, humanity will have discovered fire. -- Pierre Teilhard de Chardin

Ah, the power of love. That's what Christ offers to us. All this talk of coming again to judge the living and the dead... OK, fine. But with what shall Christ judge the living and the dead? LOVE. And on what basis will we be judged? How well and completely and actively we LOVE. Whoomp, there it is.

I'm not one to artificially separate romantic love (Eros-ish love) from brotherly love (agape-ish love). Truth is, there is nothing more romantic than having a healthy amount of agape mixed in with your Eros To be smitten and on fire with passion is a marvelous thing. To care deeply and work diligently for the spiritual, emotional and physical well-being of the one for whom you feel passion makes that passion even better. However, I do agree it is best not to be inflamed with passion for anyone besides your intended. That would turn church dinners into Melrose Place or much, much worse. True, it would boost attendance for awhile, but, oy, that couldn't end well! Agape without Eros, yes. Eros without agape, no.

To finish the romantic love tangent, when Dan Fogelberg or some other pop singer croons the question “How do you make love stay?”I believe the answer is simple: pay closer attention to your agape (respect, care, compassion, encouragement), and the missing Eros might still come around from time to time. To borrow another Fogelberg-ism, the fire will, indeed, start to mellow through the years. But it can still flare up from time to time with a bit of stoking, so long as you've kept the hearth aglow. Nuff said on that topic?

So, no matter how you are thinking of love at the moment (agape or Eros) let's see if the following lesson will apply. This is a bit from Paul, from his first love letter to the church in Thessalonica. I believe this is Paul's earliest preserved letter...the freshest after his conversion from persecutor of “the People of the Way,” to “Person of the Way” himself. It is full of brotherly affection and friendly advice. It is obvious he deeply loves these folks, and why wouldn't he? Paul first came to Thessalonica after being roundly abused in Phillipi. They loved and listened to him. A church was formed. Paul healed up spiritually and physically among them, then went on his way and was repeatedly stymied in his attempts to get back to visit the ol' neighborhood. So he sent Timothy in his place. Then he wrote this letter to them. In the fifth chapter he says this about sticking together in the hard times to come...that is, making love stay:

5:16 Rejoice always, 5:17 pray without ceasing, 5:18 give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you. 5:19 Do not quench the Spirit. 5:20 Do not despise the words of prophets, 5:21 but test everything; hold fast to what is good; 5:22 abstain from every form of evil. 5:23 May the God of peace himself sanctify you entirely; and may your spirit and soul and body be kept sound and blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. 5:24 The one who calls you is faithful, and will do this.

This reading is remarkable to me, giving in terse sentences the simple instructions for best following together a path of faith-to-wholeness in spirit, body and mind. Here are Paul's rules for a life of love that STAYS:

1. Stay positive (5:16) be happy when they walk through the door,





2. Stay reverent (5:17) really ask God to bless them,





3. Stay grateful (5:18) sincerely thank God for them,





4. Stay energized (5:19) be wings, not dead weight





5. Stay open-minded (5:20) seek the good and Godly, not strife and controversy
   
   
   


6. Stay grounded (5:21a) don't simply shut down, exchange thinking and ideas fully, honestly





7. Stay close to good (5:21b) keep your good/God bearings





8. Stay far from bad(5:22) don't drift into bitterness, gossip, judgmentalism, anger or fear





9. Stay focused (5:23) keep stoking your soul, continually tend to your own relationship with God





10. Stay faithful (5:24) when God blesses you, you can really, really bless others.

Why should we do these things? So God will love us best? NO! So God will love THROUGH us, that we can love better!!! When we are of generous heart and mind, those around us thrive. Don't be stingy with the true love. Open your heart to the “other” (yes, especially the ones in that other group, over there!), because the truth is, there IS NO OTHER. There's only us and God.

Don't give in to the impulse to separate, complicate, obfuscate. Share the love where you are. How do you make love stay? By making more love where you're staying!

Putting Some Multi- in the Media

Looking through some compatriots' blogs, I see that I have been far too verbose, leaving no breaks for the eye...NO PEEKCHURS!



So here is a break for your entertainment pleasure...
















Isn't it strange how the brain works.


I took an intensive course in the "Seven Intelligences" a few years back. It absolutely revolutionized the way I perceive the way I perceive. We all "click" differently, and most traditional measures of intelligence are hopelessly biased toward a few of those ways of clicking, encountering the world and learning.



Realizing that we are differently gifted is relatively easy. Making allowances for those differences in how we reach, preach and teach is far more challenging, but ultimately liberating. In my church, we try to offer different modes of experiencing the Divine. Not sure how successful we are at it, but it is certainly leading our church to evolve.


Our music program is flourishing under the leadership of a cadre of individuals who reach, teach and preach melodically. We have a wonderful member of our congregation who makes banners and wall hangings that are regularly rotated through the sanctuary. We do occasional dramatic presentations, though not nearly enough... We've also added a brand new digital projection unit which will be used in all kinds of creative ways to help people open their hearts, souls and minds to the Holy Experience. And our occasional guided meditations are quite the rage.

Why? Because traditional church can be a mind-numbing experience, when it should be a mind-BLOWING experience.

Here, have another picture:



This is a duck I met outside the Clifton Springs clinic after I spent the night at the bedside of an acquaintance there on a mental health admission. He was a loner (the duck, that is), standing apart from all the other ducks doing their ducky things. "I'm my own duck, dammit!" he seemed to say to the world. "I will not follow the flock.I will not humiliate myself for a scrap of stale bagel. I am the pinnacle of duckdom. "


We spend a lot of our lives being measured to see if we are smart enough, pretty enough, interesting enough, rich enough, erudite enough. But God has created us as part of an amazing palate of ability, flaw, color, dimension and odor (to name just a few variations). Why do we feel the need to categorize, homogenize, institutionalize and sanitize ourselves and each other? I prefer the collage... the mess... the FUNK. How about you?

When was the first time you acknowledged you were different than everybody else? How'd you feel? I think you're weird. Please don't change unless you want to...

bailing out

Okay, I'm finally stretching my brain around the whole bailout issue. It didn't really hit my personal tripwire until I read of the Citibank bailout this morning. I've done precious little if any business with AIG or any of the other companies rescued so far. As to the big three auto makers, I am a Toyota man. I bought my first Toyota in 1989 (a pickup I finally sold this past year), and have owned three others besides. They are solidly built, comfortable, reliable, economical vehicles. Detroit has yet to offer anything comparable, in my opinion. And judging by the car lots and TV commercials I've seen, Detroit is still marketing gas-guzzling pickups and SUVs to the testosterone-addled mega-hauling crowd. They don't need a bailout so much as some intelligent leadership. But, hey, I get it that a pretty good percentage of our work-force is tied to the auto industry. So, a pretty good percentage of our economy is tied to counter-intuitive thinking and empty suits. They insist on blaming the unions for their lack of competitiveness, but last I checked, Toyotas and Hondas cost MORE than comparable American vehicles. The Japanese aren't eating Detroit's lunch because their products are cheaper. They are eating Detroit's lunch because they are building better products that American drivers want to buy!

But I digress. The reason the Citibank bailout strikes me is because Citi and I have an ongoing relationship. I have a Citibank credit card with a healthy (for them) balance. Times are tight right now, but Citibank will not lift a finger to bail me out. And if I am late on two payments in any twelve month period, my interest rate will more than double overnight. In fact, if I am late on a utility payment, go temporarily delinquent on an auto loan, or fall even a few days behind on some other credit card payment, Citibank reserves the right to turn the screws to me -- check your credit card agreement, they can do it to you, too! (Thank VP-elect Joe Biden for that...he helped make it law.) So the ordinary consumer can't afford to bleed the least little bit in the water, because, legally, that will result in all the sharks attacking!

What this all tells us is that government of the people, for the people, by the people has very nearly perished from this earth. It is all stacked against us. Our representatives on the local, state and federal level don't seem to have a subtract button on their budget calculators, and most have bought into thoroughly debunked "trickle down" theory rather than protecting the engine that drives the economy: the middle class. Duh!

I am not saying "tax the rich." Those reps who come home and gloat over this or that government grant they have landed are playing a shell game, calling themselves heroes for taking an ever-growing portion of our income and then returning an ever-shrinking portion of our money back to us. I don't see this ending well. I believe Jesus was right in saying "Give unto Caeser what is Caeser's," but he wasn't commenting on a representative democracy. We, the governed, now have a say in governance...or so we have been taught.

What's a good Christian citizen to do? Pray first, then raise holy hell?!? Could be. What do you think of the state of our economy and the solutions offered by government on various levels? How does your faith inform your response? Let's discuss...

Open and Affirming

Okay, here goes. The leadership team at West Bloomfield Congregational Church, UCC has arrived at the following statement. We will ask our congregation to pray over it, study it and then vote on adopting it as our own at our annual meeting January 4, 2009. Most who have read this statement see it as a simple formalizing of what we have already practiced for decades.


We know as Christians that we are many members, but are one body in Christ. We are members of one another, and we all have different gifts. With Jesus, we are called to love our neighbors as ourselves. We are called to act as agents of reconciliation and wholeness within the world and within the church itself. We join together as a loving Christian community to celebrate and share our common communion and the reassurance that we are indeed created by God, reconciled by Christ and empowered by the grace of the Holy Spirit. Therefore, we do not discriminate against any person, group or organization in membership, appointment, use of facility, provision of services, funding, hiring, or promotion on the basis of sexual orientation, race, gender, age, nationality, ethnicity, economic status, marital status, or physical disability.

That is all there is to it. Yet, that is not all there is to it. To say we will openly embrace, encourage, and even hire anyone regardless of their sexual orientation is not an uncontroversial thing. I know a few of our church members are deeply troubled by this step. We will be speaking about it over the next few weeks in our church, especially in light of explicit Biblical chapter and verse that seem to contradict our stance. This is a deep issue and must not be approached carelessly.
What's your opinion?

Learning Reading

I love to read. I find it to be the most excellent of all our invented human forms of communication. But how often do we really think about what we are doing when we read? I recently read a brief, Near-Eastern/Western history of reading on www.liveink.com that summed it all up rather nicely. To paraphrase:

Verbal communication is millions of years old, but it was only about 6000 years ago that the Sumerians began drawing pictures in clay to portray ideas and keep track of supplies and events. This is our first evidence of written communication.

About 2000 years later, in 2000 B.C., the Phoenicians came up with the first symbols to represent the sounds of human speech. This first writing was a string of consonants crammed together to represent spoken words (THSFRSTLPHBTWSSTRNGFCNSNTSCRMDTGTHRTRPRSNTSPKNWRDS).

Around 1000 B.C., the Greeks invented vowels(AROUND1000BCTHEGREEKSINVENTEDVOWELS)...

Around 200 B.C., the first punctuation appeared (AROUND200B.C.,THEFIRSTPUNCTUATIONAPPEARED.)...

Around 700 A.D., lowercase letters were developed by Medieval scribes (Around700A.D.,lowercaselettersweredevelopedbyMedievalscribes)...

About 200 years later, in 900 A.D., words were finally separated by spaces, making it possible finally to read silently, rather than sounding out letters out loud. This was a big deal.

Notice that most of the tweaks and advancements in writing and reading were developed concurrently with or even after the writing of the individual books of the Bible, which took place here and there roughly between 1000 B.C. and 150 A.D.

Realizing that we have no original scripture documents – NONE – we can see how remarkable (yes, even miraculous) it is that we have a Bible at all. Our sacred documents come to us from copies of copies of copies of copies of texts written in nearly indecipherable blocks of letters on animal skins, clay or papyrus, each and every letter of which was painstakingly read and rewritten by oil lamp or candlelight by tired monks with aching eyes. A single misplaced, skipped or repeated letter out of millions could change entirely the meaning of a word or passage. In time, these writings would be translated into other languages, and those translations updated as languages evolved. Eventually, scribes would be replaced by movable type, then... you get the idea. The Bibles we read today have passed through countless human hands to get to us. God is God, but writing and reading are uniquely human. It may be God's word, but our mortal fingerprints and thinking are all over, around and through it!

Let us also recognize that we read different materials differently. I suspend disbelief for a good work of fantasy. I read over the same lines repeatedly and open my imagination to complex metaphor for poetry. A text book requires interactive attention, maybe even the taking of notes. I may find myself checking for author bias, or weighing statements against other sources in a work of biography. In short, when I enter the library, how I will read depends on the section in which I am reading.

The Bible – from the Greek Biblios, meaning library – is a collection of books of various sources from various eras in Near-Eastern history: Some of it is the written preservation of stories and rules once memorized and spoken around campfires and communal tents (Torah – The Law or The Teachings). Some of it is a collection of social and political commentaries of various eras (the Prophets). Some of it is the collected wisdom and sacred songs of this or that ruling class (Psalms and Proverbs). Some is the collected accounts of the life, teachings and ministry of our Messiah and his common followers (The Gospels and Acts). Some is the collected letters of itinerant preachers to local churches (the letters of Paul, Peter, John and Jude). Some is political polemic written in veiled terms and thinly disguised code (Revelation). How we read each of these books in our holy library depends on which book we are reading. So, when we read Psalm 137, we should not take it as God's will that we dash the babies of our perceived enemies on the rocks! No, we should read the anger and frustration in the sacred Blues sung by an exiled people toward their captors, the Babylonians. We should feel their sheer desperation for God to rescue them and restore justice. We should, in short, use Psalm 137 as a reminder of what happens to a human soul robbed of its freedom and dignity, and strive to neither oppressed nor oppressor be!

And while we're thinking of it, let's consider the human authors of these books. There is a German term – sitz im leben – which literally means “life setting” of a text. Who was writing this? What was their station in life? What was happening around them when they wrote it? Consider, for example, Paul's admonition from 1st Timothy 2:

Let a woman learn in silence with full submission. I permit no woman to teach or to have authority over a man; she is to keep silent. For Adam was formed first, then Eve; and Adam was not deceived, but the woman was deceived and became a transgressor. Yet she will be saved through childbearing, provided they continue in faith and love and holiness, with modesty.

This is written in our Bibles! Does that mean that we should bar women from preaching and teaching men? Should a man turn off his radio if Joyce Meyer comes on? For the misguided literalist, yes!

But suppose I don't simply read these verses as a timeless command directly from God, but rather, as an excerpt from a letter written by a devout man in 1st century Palestine? In his day, women were almost entirely illiterate and unschooled. In his day, there were only a few men in larger villages who might have access to scripture and theological training. That was this letter's sitz im leben.

Would we remove a female seminary professor or pastor in this day and age solely due to her genitalia and a surface reading of 1st Timothy? Yes, some of us would, despite the vast difference between the era in which this verse was written and our own. This is an example of the damage that can be done when we insist on a childish relationship with scripture. We must not lean on our own understanding, but rather trust in God and the wisdom imparted through the ages. We can dig deeper than our own surface understanding of a text to encounter God's will in scripture. It takes prayerful dedication and hard work, but isn't Godly wisdom worth it?!? If we prayerfully, carefully apply the standards of Paul to our modern reality, we may instead say:

Let those who are unschooled learn in silence with full submission. I permit no ignorant person to teach or have authority over a church. For it was through ignorance and deception that Adam and Eve became transgressors. Yet they will be saved through their life roles, provided they continue in faith and love and holiness, with modesty.

I did not simply pull this interpretation out of thin air, but did my humble best to consider what God may be communicating to me through Paul. I do so humbly, recognizing that I might not have it quite right, and leaning hard on my years of training, research, study of ancient languages and cultures, and my continuing life in Christ and Christian community. If you plan to do the same, I would recommend you do so in community with others, including (as Paul insists above) one or more leaders well-schooled in scripture and tradition. This is very much in the tradition of the rabbis from the first days through today, including Paul and ESPECIALLY Jesus.

Scary? Overwhelming? Darn right it is! But we are called by the God of the Living to no less than our best efforts. In other words, dig in, think, discuss, pray, learn, apply and live!

Happy are those who do not follow the advice of the wicked, or take the path that sinners tread, or sit in the seat of scoffers; but their delight is in the law of the LORD, and on his law they meditate day and night. - Psalm 1:1-2