Paschal Mystery

When I was little girl growing up in the Pine Barrens of New Jersey (yes, Virginia there is more to NJ than a Turnpike and Newark!) there was a horrible fire that decimated the pine forests. It is a common occurrence really… the barrens being decimated by fire. I later learned in my middle school earth science that there are even pine cones that only pop open and give off seed when fires begin and reaches the cone.

This fire swept through town after town and mile after mile. The earth was desolate in those lonely stretches of Jersey barrens—miles and miles of forest were blackened and gone. Empty.

I had a really good cry the other night. Betsy tells me that I don’t cry a great deal. In my mind, I am a weeping willow, but by her estimation, not so much. She can count on her hand the number of times she has seen me really break down and cry hard. I mean really cry, not just whimper a little or shed a tear or two, but sob and weep until everything inside is all gone and I am spent from the emotional exertion of such an event.

I woke up today after such a cry the night before. I was hollow like the bunnies that came in baskets on Easter Sunday. As I drove to the church, I thought of those desolate blackened miles of my childhood. In my state of feeling hollowed out, I dragged myself into church and said the noonday office. I was a miserable offender: I said Psalm 22 instead of the recommended options. My heart was melting wax in my breast. As I prayed, I heard my mind tell God, “There is no grace present here today; please help.”

But the strangest thing happened.

What felt like only days after the fire, I began to notice signs of life. Birds in the trees, green coming forth from blackened earth. Slow growth came but some 30 years later, (at least at last visit) there is hardly a sign of desolation left.

Signs of life came again today for me. Grace happened like song birds returning or green springing forth. Today, of all days, grace happened.

This is how it is. In the midst of tears and sobbing, in places of blackened earth and hollowed out souls, hearts melting like wax, God forsaken places, grace comes and appears. And new life comes forth.
Maybe it is different life, but it is life nonetheless and why is it that grace is always sweeter after desolation-- like good dark chocolate that melts as you savor it, there is bitterness in this grace but somehow it is all the better than anything I’ve ever known.

God... She???

“Can God be a girl?” The third grader asked me. Errol was a wonderful artist of eight. Like many of her female classmates, she was thoughtful and liked sitting to draw pictures. She was usually the first one out of the gate eagerly drawing an art response to the story or the question asked in Sunday school class. That day, she sat still looking at her blank piece of paper. I had asked what dinner with God would look like for the second and third grade class. Errol looked worried and twice I had asked her if she was okay. Finally, she asked, with reticence and barely audible, “Can God be a girl?”
“Of course!” I responded.
She was so pleased with my response—eagerly she set out to draw a picture of a wonderful tea party that she’d fix for God: there was fancy china, and a beautiful table cloth and God was a large breasted big girl that sat the table with a little girl eagerly enjoying the tea party supper of the Errol’s imagination. “God is my Mother” she wrote across the bottom of the page.
But not everyone appreciates such an image of God.

My Rector noticed the picture on the bulletin board. He was not comfortable with Errol’s art being on our bulletin board. I had labeled the bulletin board, “How our Children Imagine Supper with God”. He asked me to take down the picture, while he believed deeply in the idea of God who was beyond father or mother, he didn’t want to cause problems in our parish—we had enough to deal with already. Every students’ picture came down before Sunday—I wasn’t about to single out Errol. The disaster of a mothering God was averted for now. He was right—there were many things happening in our parish at the time—God knows there’s no fight better than a church fight-- but of all things, a picture of God as a woman was problematic.

Are we brave enough to expand to God to include all of us? Can God be Creator Father and Mother?
Maybe you’re chuckling or doubtful of such things being an issue—or maybe you’re wholly offended by such an idea as Mothering God. Not too long ago, after my national church, the Episcopal Church in the U.S.A., elected its first woman as Presiding Bishop, all kinds of anxious action and reaction took place—there was definitely heat. There were the conservative corners of the church that don’t ordain women that were deeply disenfranchised. There were horrendous comments about Catherine's “looks” and dress that were passed round chat rooms and church coffee hours. I remember reading an online thread of conversation about how ugly her vestments were and how frumpy she is. I never heard such things about Edmond Browning or Frank Griswold—we never discussed their looks or frumpiness as older men. An evangelical preacher actually had the nerve to say something to the effect of, “A woman Presiding Bishop: what’s next—a fluffy bunny?”
And then came the coup de gras: our Presiding Bishop made reference in a sermon to God our Mother. The whole church seemingly came unhinged overnight. Not only were we now out of step with our Catholic and Orthodox brothers by having women priests and now a woman presiding bishop, what’s worse, she was throwing around untraditional languaged images about God that belonged to Pagans, not to Christians.
How sad for us. My heart grieves that the church has abandoned the rich heritage of Julian and Anselm who called God and Jesus, Mother. The medieval church, which was far less body squeamish and less phobic about metaphors than we often depicted Christ as having breasts on the cross from which the church is nourished.
In the early church, we hear of Holy Wisdom, Hagio Sophia the Holy Spirit that is often talked of in the feminine. Jesus talking of Jerusalem says that he longs to take the holy city to himself like a mother hen with her chicks. So what is our problem? Why can’t God be Father/Mother God? Why must we struggle over something that seems fairly logical—both man and woman are made in the image of God and therefore God is both male and female and neither all at the same time—why is God the Father only in the church and why does so many corners of the church raise such a fuss when God She or Mother God is invoked as an image—can’t we realize that the very religious life and self imaging of our children might depend upon our imaging God bigger?
Again the old adage rings in my ears: praying shapes believing. Believing shapes our living and that living requires confidence faithfulness and reliance.

Metaphori

"Give me any word in English and I will tell you how it came from the Greek." My Popou is a proud Greek man and he loved to play this game with me. Metaphor he told me came from the Greek-- Metaphori-- wheelbarrow.

Wheelbarrow: a device that takes you from one place to another. That is purpose of a metaphor as well.

Americans are very poor at understanding this-- probably because the only time we learn about it is 7th grade English when we are at our worst: all pimples and hormones, why should we give a damn about devices that take us from one place to another-- our bodies and minds and collective psyche are doing enough of that already by moving us from childhood to adulthood.

Is it any wonder that here we are as a nation struggling with Religious Right who can't see the Metaphor through the JESUS salvation trees and the Spiritual who are frightened to death of the church because so much mystery, the apophatic and the understanding of the Cosmic Christ have been sacrificed for the sake of certainty and dogmatics.

And then there are the believers themselves. As one bumper sticker put it, "Jesus, Save Me From Your Followers." Yup. Sometimes I'm there too. How Christianity and Bigotry ever got into bed together is beyond me.

a fav vlog ger of mine had this awesome theology around the very loaded word, Sin. Rather than separation or pride or missing the mark, the vlogger said it was a spiritual blockage. Wow... I thought... cool, I could go there... there's a good metaphor that takes me from one place to another. It worked for me-- I've been stuck and blocked a lot in my life.

Could hardly believe the comments that people made-- once again, I say it: it amazes me what people say in Cyber-space to each other-- damn we're mean-- no wonder people are scared of Christians-- I'm a little scared myself! People railing on and on: that's NOT the traditional answer!!! Yadayada... burn in hell, heresy... yadayada...

I sometimes wonder why we just can't see theology as wheelbarrow. And no-- it doesn't make God or Spirit or Higher Power any less "real". Why do we need such rigid boxes for God? No wonder why atheists are so strident-- its because Christians can be so ridiculous.

Who wants an image of God & a religion that hasn't changed one iota since the 1oth Century? Anyone? Anyone? Anyone? Bueller? Bueller? Ah, but I am a product of my generation.

The importance of religion is that is a tool-- a wheelbarrow in our soul that is takes us from one place to another.

I suppose that there are those that would cleaverly retort, "Yes and your wheelbarrow will take you to hell." Well, all right... just be sure to save me a seat at the bar if you end up there first.

Everyone deserves someone to share the popcorn with...

She was 38 and dying. It was cancer that was claiming her life. I was a hospital chaplain in Chicago when we met. By my fourth visit, I had the sense there was something she wasn’t telling me. I don’t remember how it came out; if I asked her or if she just told me, but we came to the heart of the matter. She was gay. She had been with her partner for almost a decade and they had a child. Her family was Christian and estranged. The missing component of her story was the fear she lived with: the fear her biological family would not honor her wishes and allow her partner to come hold her hand and be with her as she died. The fear that there would be legal battles over her biological son, their grandson who was “no one” to her partner—even though the boy called her partner mom.

Recently, in Washington state, laws were past that gave gay couples some of the same rights that married couples afford. Of course, prop 8 in California is still fresh in our minds... People from faith communities registered all kinds of responses everything from dismay to joy. Mostly though, dismay. As believers, we often fall back on faith traditions to justify why we believe the way we do about a particular issue. As Americans, we also look to our laws and constitution. It can become complex to navigate between religion and state as our American tradition has a separation of church and state to allow for religious freedoms for all kinds of believers. While for some, this separation is troubling, it has been one of the things that makes our nation great.

From the beginning, religious freedom allowed for a diversity of believers to live along side each other with relative harmony unlike other parts of the world where believers with different ideas were persecuted. Many of us who are here from several generations back are here because our families were seeking freedoms to practice and live the way we wished to live: Life liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

What about this woman in the hospital? Oh yes, believers might say that she’s unnatural or against their holy scriptures. But doesn’t even a sinner deserve to have her last wishes honored on her death bed? Aren’t all of us as Americans afforded the rights to choose how we choose to pursue our lives as consenting adults?

I have heard many people say that a family made up of two mothers or two fathers is somehow hurtful to marriage everywhere and perhaps I am just not tracking, but I can’t figure how. As studies continue to show kids who grow up with gay parents tend to be well adjusted, productive children who are as capable as their counter-parts. So how is it that gay families wreck other families? How is it that rights such as a same sex partner being in a hospital room would wreak havoc on a family with a man, woman & a child?

I know that has been a tough issue for many people but I can’t help thinking about that woman in the hospital. I think everyone regardless of our personal religious beliefs deserves the ability to be with the person they love the most in the world. These two adults had shared a decade together and struggled and laughed and cried and dreamed together—come on, even the worst unrepentant sinners get to have their loved ones—I watched as gang members died with mothers and girl friends and gang members there—and somehow that didn’t test the metal of family—I wonder why one woman grieving alongside another would.

Back to the Basics...

The bumper sticker had a big cross on it and read, “Back to basics: Feed the hungry, House the poor, Cloth the naked.

Those are the basic values of being a Christian, aren’t they?

Personally, I'd never guess that by the behavior of so many Christians in our country. Christian has become such a loaded term that folks I know actually call it the C word... man oh man...

So what do people say about those that call themselves the C word? Here are some responses I got from random folks on the street:

"Whenever I think of Christians, I can't help but think of dead babies."

"What?"

"Yea, you know those people who stand with signs outside abortion clinics..."

"People who say they follow Jesus but don't act anything like him."

"People who hate gay people and any else that's different."

Does the Gospel say to do that???

In looking at the Gospels, Jesus is constantly healing people and eating with people. Very rarely, do I find Jesus, as he is healing or feeding people asking, “Wait, what do you believe, or who do you live with?” He simply feeds or eats with outcasts and heals people—even people who are of a different religious background than his!

This is the litmus test for being a Christian--Following a Jesus who says love is the only commandment and commands us to feed and heal and eat with outcasts. So, I wonder, how are we doing as a Christian nation with the basics? Maybe thinking about our nation begins by looking at our own corner of the world.

So how are we doing in Thurston County? The last time I checked, there was a two year waiting list for public housing, the food bank in Thurston County was in high demand, there were over 700 children homeless in our county with places at the local shelters not even able to house half that number, the local tent city, Camp Quixote was still wondering where it will go next after St. John’s, and the Cold weather emergency shelter was scrambling to find a enough churches to host overflow for those that are cold and in need of a place to stay.

What I hear from Christian people grieves me; people who are spending more time arguing about who gets into heaven, who can come to church rather than tending to those that the Gospel requires us to tend to. We don’t have time to bicker about how scripture is supposed to be understood or if you are of the right kind of faith.

I wonder what would happen if all the churches of Thurston County decided to set aside their differences and declared their desire to make sure that people in our community have enough to eat, a place to sleep and clothing on their back, what kind of change would we unleash in our community?

In light of all the need that there is in our immediate community right now, I invite all Christians to roll up their sleeves and to be part of the answer to prayer. What prayer, you might wonder—the Lord’s Prayer! Perhaps the Lord’s Prayer maybe the one thing we all hold in common. Part of praying is that we open ourselves up to be part of the answer to prayer. As one Christian once wrote, “Christ has no hands in the world but yours, no heart in the world but yours… now you are the hands of Christ.”

We ask for our daily bread—maybe we can help be the answer to someone else’s prayer by making sandwiches and give them away to people who need them most.

Lamb of God

I went fishing. While on board this little bobbing in the water boat, I felt a tug to try something different, the tug was not on my line, but somehow in the wind-- cast my net to the other side. I decided to get out, to take a walk on the water. So setting aside my fishing pole and leaving my net on the other side, I took my first step out and plunged deep into the cold gray waters and sunk in deep. Once I was down there, and not struggling, I found I could breathe just fine—all I had to do was stop panicking and drown.

Taking a look around, I noticed a little Greek girl with a grandmother. It was Holy Week, you know that time when Christian folk celebrate the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ their teacher. The little Greek girl was maybe eleven and she was fasting with her Ya-ya. The rest of the family thought they were crazy to fast while also preparing for the feast called Easter that come early on Sunday morning. No one else in the house fasted and prepared but them.

The Ya-ya was strange. She had eyes with bulky lids that slid down her face and looked clear on into the other side and a thick accent, with broken English. Sometimes words came rushing but not too often. She said to the child, “You are not old enough to receive the lamb.” She had said this before but the child never questioned it. Today, while kneading the bread dough, the girl found courage. “When, Ya-ya?” she asked. “I will know,” Ya-ya responded. The girl had no idea and didn’t dare ask any further question. The grand-mother after all was strange and had those penetrating eyes that were clear and saw to the other side. The girl knew better than to ask too much.

For two years the girl waited and wondered about this lamb. What was it to receive the lamb? There were always surprises at her grandmother’s house and she had found that waiting was the best way to prove her worth. She knew pressing her grandmother would only cause further delay. Ya-ya was seldom open to negotiation. So, the child had learned that waiting quietly proved best. She was almost 14 when holy week came late that year. Spring was every where budding with pink promises of fragrant offerings and pretty colored eggs. Rabbits and robins were back in the yard again feasting while Ya-ya and grand-daughter fasted and prepared quietly in the kitchen. Working the dough that would later become Easter Bread, Ya-ya proudly watched her grand-daughter work without much instruction. She knew how to make the bread and the soup. “You are old enough now.” She said. The grand-daughter smiled and felt ready for her reward. She hugged her Ya-ya tight. “Come, it is time; the bread can wait. You will come with me.” Grand-daughter cleaned off her hands and took off her apron. Off they went to the church of all places. Just before Easter, the Greek Church became like a market place in early holy week. St Simeon always smelled of incense even outside in the courtyard. There were other smells today— sweet garlic and pungent fish and olives mixed together with the incense of the church. The outdoor area was alive was bustling people speaking and trading and haggling—some were yelling. Grand daughter had never seen this before. There were all kinds of delicacies for sale that were traditional for Easter supper. There were breads and oils and grape-leaves, some imported from Greece. They wandered the market picking up this and that, saying hello to their neighbors also preparing for the feast to come.

At last they came to a pen of cute little lambs. The lambs danced around the pen making their sweet noises, pungent barn smells were in the air. Grand-daughter loved the smell of the barn—manure and straw and wood all mixed together. It was pungent and earthy sweet. “Go ahead, pick!” Ya-ya told her. Smiling the teenaged grand-daughter found the cutest of lambs. It frolicked and danced. “That one,” she said, pointing. Ya-ya gave the farmer a look and nodding the farmer put on a bib, picked up the lamb then disappeared. The two waited but for what? Moments went by still the girl knew better than to say anything. Ya-ya was staring off far, her lined brow was deep and crumbled like a paper in a waste can. She was talking again—whenever she stared off into nothing, the grand daughter knew that she was talking to someone or something not seen. God or Angels or ancestors gone, she didn’t know—she was afraid to ask but someone was talking and grand daughter knew better than to interrupt.

The farmer returned. The white clean bib looked spattered and dipped like someone had taken a can of red paint and splashed him. But somehow the child knew better—the red paint was not a gag gone awry. The man had brown paper packages tied up neatly and he was presenting them to her—Ya-ya’s hands were full so she had to carry it. It was heavy and some of the packages were in a big shopping bag. Grand daughter accepted the packages. She cradled them in her arms knowing that they were the lamb. “Come,” Ya-ya summoned, turning quickly to leave the market. The child followed behind shocked at first then crying. “Some surprise,” she whispered behind her grand mother’s back. There was silence and they continued walking. “Some surprise!” Grand daughter yelled crying harder now. “It was awful. I can’t believe you did that to me. Some surprise. I don’t want to be old enough to receive the lamb!” Ya- ya had heard enough. She turned quickly on the child and looking her direct in the eye as the young woman was now almost taller than her grand mother, “What did you expect?” She asked—“that the lamb would become your pet to run round our house? Where does that food we have on our table every night for supper come from? Is it sent from heaven already dead and wrapped and all the animals on the farm live happy? NO! You see, you do not know and others are too dumb to know—all of life is sacrifice. The lamb died so you can live. It is sacrifice. The olives and the wheat and all that we eat on our table is sacrificed for us. This is why we pray because to not would be to forget the lamb. It is sacrifice do not forget this ever.” The grand-daughter still cried but said nothing more. Ya-ya turned and went on. They went home to prepare the feast and wait for Easter to come when they would shout “Christos Anesti! Alethos Anesti!”

I had seen enough under water. I had lost my breath and maybe drowning wasn’t all that it was cracked up to be. I swam to the surface again, to the bobbing little boat where my net dangled on the side and my fishing pole was dormant.

The net was full and it was sacrifice.
It was never the same after that.

I remember a different story.

“The government of the United States of America is not in any sense founded on the Christian Religion.”

I imagine this quote is libel to raise a few eyebrows and perhaps maybe a few readers’ blood pressure. Many Christians these days are talking about a concept called Christian Theocracy, that is, Christians must dominate our American political landscape in order for our country to be that shining city on the hill that was intended by our Founding Fathers. We are one nation under God and In God we trust -- these are core American ideas. We are a Christian Nation and that’s part of our history and legacy.

So what infidel could have uttered such Anti-American words?

It was George Washington who first wrote these words on November 4, 1796 for the Treaty of Tripoli. At the time, this treaty was of great importance to our foreign policy and was later ratified by John Adams; neither of these men blinked an eye over signing this treaty. Was good old George, the man who could never tell a lie, fibbing?

The United States, was founded on a principle of religious tolerance for all peoples. While we were indeed founded by Christian men, they understood the important value of religious freedom and tolerance having fled governments that held with a state religion and persecuted those with dissenting voices.

The idea of a Christian Theocracy is not only ahistorical but clearly different from what was originally intended by the founders of our nation. Our Constitution is clear in the very first amendment of our Bill of Rights—we are free to practice any religion we so choose. While we are one nation under God, it is very clear that this God is far bigger than any one religion.

The real question is this: Are Christian Values the only values? It seems that our founding fathers and Christian Theocrats have two distinctly different answers to that question. Religious freedom and Christian Theocracy are definitely two very distinctly different ideas.

So how is that we have gone so far a field from religious freedom to Christian theocracy?

In a word, fear. In a country that seems more and more governed by the anxious need for safety and security, rather than rights and freedoms, the vision of Christian Theocracy is safe. Religious freedom means allowing Muslims and Jews and Atheists to practice their different beliefs. Christian Theocracy feels safer and after all, we know what Christianity stands for.

Feeding the hungry and clothing the poor, loving our neighbor and our enemies—aren’t those Christian values? I rarely hear those values espoused from Christian theocratic visionaries. What I have heard is fear. Fear of people who are of different beliefs from us.


It is ironic that fear and anxiety have taken such a deep hold over so many Christians that say they value scripture—perhaps they should go back to their Bibles and do a little research—the most popular phrase that Jesus utters more than any other phrase is, “Be not afraid.”

Is Safety and Security worth sacrificing rights and freedoms? I believe that all too many Christians these days would say yes without thinking twice.

Is this kind of fear really a Christian value or even an American value?

One American I know summed it up this way, “those that choose security over freedom deserve neither.” What American would utter such blistering words? Benjamin Franklin.