Lenten Reflection 3/22

Chicago Teachers Union President Karen Lewis speaks outside Mahalia Jackson Elementary School in Chicago about the planned closing of 54 public schools. Opponents say the plan will disproportionately affect minority students in the nation's third-largest school district.  (photo from NPR.org)

Chicago public schools will have a one billion dollar deficit next year.  Because many of the city's school buildings are half empty, Mayor Rahm Emmanuel has proposed closing 54-60 schools to consolidate resources.  "There's no question about the economics here. Maintaining half-empty, century-old buildings doesn't make sense for cash-strapped cities and states," says Timothy Knowles, the head of the University of Chicago's Urban Education Institute.

But a lot of people are not happy with this suggestion.  A number of teachers and school workers will lose jobs.  And parents fear that consolidating schools means that their children will have to travel further to get to school, sometimes through dangerous neighborhoods.  This was a very difficult stand for the mayor to take because anyone can see it would create a ton of push back.  And the push back has been strong.  NPR aired a clip of a Rev. Paul Jaques proclaiming, "If any child's life is lost, the blood of that child in on the hands of Mayor Rahm Emmanuel!"  

And I thought, "Man, I would not want to be the mayor."  Or the president.  Or a CEO.  Imagine having to make big and tough decisions that you know people are going to hate.  But then again, anyone in any kind of leadership position puts themselves in the cross hairs in one way or another.

But being called to be a disciple of Jesus is also a call into leadership.  We're called to go out and be active in sharing God's healing love.  We're not passive consumers of God's love, but active leaders in the Gospel, going out as active sharers of God's love.  We're called to take stands and stand up for them.  We're called to proclaim things like Jeremiah did - things that people might rather not hear sometimes.  We're called to do things others might avoid doing, whether that's reaching out to the poor, making ourselves last, or even following Jesus to Jerusalem and the cross.  Maybe that's why people are so often content just to show up on Sunday morning every now and then, sit in the pew for an hour and say they're Christians.  Actually going out into the world to build the Kingdom of God is a whole lot more responsibility and opens us up to all kinds of opposition and push back, just as it did for Jesus.

In his letter to the Romans, Paul says, "Make sure you stay alert to these qualities of gentle kindness and ruthless severity that exist side by side in God."  I'll admit that I really want God to be a gentle gardener in my life.  I don't want to be pruned!  I don't want to be stretched and refined and molded, necessarily.  I'd just rather do my own thing and have God be delighted with me.

God does tend me like a gentle gardener, but God also prunes me to within an inch of my life sometimes to encourage better growth in me.  I go through plenty of challenging and painful experiences that make me into a better, more mature Christian.  We used to call those experiences "AFGE's" in seminary ("oh, yeah, it's just another f..ing growth experience, we'd say.")  God knows best when its time to leave me be and when it's time to challenge, prune and grow me.  God is the one who knows best when the time is right to draw lines, make strong boundaries and take a stand.  That's much harder for you and me - and for CEO's and mayors and human leaders of every kind.  It's really hard to discern where to draw lines and boundaries in life and take stands.  But that is what leaders are called to do.

Some fundamentalist or conservative leaders draw their faith lines in very different places that I draw mine.  One mayor might draw the line in a different spot than another mayor would.  Sometimes leaders make the wrong call.  Sometimes maybe we get it right.  I take heart that God can redeem whatever we do in the long run.  We don't have the big picture and can only do our best.

But I guess today I'd say, after sitting with Paul's words this morning, that doing my best means staying very close to God.  Paul points out that we need to always remember that God is the taproot of our lives.  Whenever we are called to express leadership, it needs to be done out of the root in which we are most deeply grounded - remembering that "we aren't feeding the root; the root is feeding us."  God is the root out of which all positive, healthy and truly fruitful growth comes.  As Paul says, "Don't get cocky and strut your branch.  Be humbly mindful of the root that keeps you lithe and green."

The years of experience I have in the ministry give me increasing confidence to create boundaries and take stands as a leader.  But the more confidence I get, the more I need to remember that my confidence is not in myself, but in God.  God is the one who has given me all my life experiences and has nurtured and pruned me into who I am becoming - who I am called to be.  If I begin to believe it's my own call, it won't be long until I find myself pruned deadwood.

As I complete this practice of daily Lenten blogging for 2013, (which by the way has been a wonderful and prayerful experience for me) I think Paul's words to the Romans tomorrow are a really good place to conclude:

Everything comes from him;
Everything happens through him;
Everything ends up in him.
Always glory! Always praise!
Yes. Yes. Yes. 

Today's readings:  Jer. 29:1,4-13; Rom. 11:13-24; John 11:1-27
Saturday's readings:   Jer. 31:27-34; Rom. 11:25-36; John 11:28-44

Elsa has been praying the news and the daily readings and blogging her thoughts on each of the weekdays of Lent.  This is her last in this series.  She has been using The Message translation this year.

You're invited to come walk the walk of Holy Week at Grace Church this year.  It begins this Sunday, which is Palm Sunday.  Visit www.gracetrumbull.org for details and service times.

Lenten Reflection 3/21

 

MSNBC's website has a story today about a straight A student in Los Angeles - a girl only 14 years old and in the 8th grade - died of inhaling computer dusting spray.  She'd taped her nostrils shut and was huffing the spray in her bed after school.  The story reports that there has been an increase in inhalant abuse among teens lately.  This girl's parents say they believe this was the first time the girl had tried it, but it is clear that they had very little knowledge of inhalant use, and seem unaware of how kids her daughter's age know all about it - including details about which inhalants leave a better aftertaste, which give the best high, etc.  "I am positive my daughter did not realize that this had the potential to kill her," the mother said.  My stomach lurched reading this story.  Finding your daughter dead in bed with a can in her mouth would be probably my worst nightmare.  I cannot imagine how those parents feel.

The story says that 1 in 4 teens report having tried inhaling something before the 8th grade.  This statistic stuns me.  I think about the headache I get and how ill I feel around paint fumes and the idea of intentionally inhaling a lot of fumes literally doesn't compute for me.   I have a hard time believing that any kid is unaware that huffing chemicals is really, really dangerous, poisonous and potentially lethal.  I wonder if perhaps the danger of the activity actually has something to do with its appeal.  These parents, according to the report, did "all the right things."  They had no guns in the house.  Prescriptions medicines were under lock and key.  There was no alcohol in their home.  Clearly these parents understood that substance abuse is epidemic among kids and they felt they needed to take precautions against it.  It sounds to me like substance abuse had been talked about in that home.  It is certainly talked about in the schools.  There are public announcements on TV and computer.  Everyone who's ever heard of it knows that huffing can be deadly.  But someone who wants to get high will find a way to get high, whether that's with vodka or drugs, cough medicine or computer cleaner. 

The gospel today explores actions and words.  Jesus was a congruent figure whose words and actions matched.  None of us can claim that kind of congruency in our lives.  We do things that are not in line with what we say.  We say things that are not in line with what we do.  We go ahead and do things we say we don't or wouldn't do.  Jesus' message to the Pharisees is that his life is congruent with God.  All his words and all his actions are only what he receives from God, who he calls his Papa.  "He is in me; I am in him."

There are so many things in this world that are not congruent.  Finding your honor student daughter dead in bed from substance abuse is not congruent.  Choosing to huff computer cleaner even though you know it's dangerous is not congruent.   Judging that family or that child for this simply horrible incident is also not congruent, because there but by the grace of God, go I.

In all things, this is what we most need.  The grace of God.  The grace to hear the shepherd's voice and not to reject it, but follow it.


Today's readings: Jer. 26:1-16; Rom. 11:1-12; John 10:19-42
Elsa is praying the daily readings and praying the news and blogging about it on the weekdays of Lent.

She is reading The Message translation this year.

Lenten Reflection 3/20

 

The New York Times online has short videos on top stories, and today there's a story about a subway worker on the large 2nd Avenue subway line project who got caught 100 feet under the streets of New York in some freezing cold muck that drew him down like quicksand with such a powerful suction that simply pulling him out would seriously injure him.  Rescue teams went to great lengths, some of whom became stuck themselves, to get the man free.  The video shows pictures of him emerging from the deep, dark hole, limp and dirty, in the arms of his rescuers. 

The words of John Newton's well known hymn come to mind: "Amazing Grace, how sweet the sound, to save a wretch like me."  There are so many stories in life about being lost and then found.  Being trapped and then freed.  Of going wrong and then turning around right.  Of dying and then discovering new life.  There are many ways to illustrate God's deliverance.  Even today - the first day of spring - is a wonderful yearly illustration of how new life always comes around again.

I can tell you, if I were sucked into dirty, deadly, freezing muck 100 feet below ground, further trapped, as that man was, by a piece of plywood that had fallen in the muck with me, I know I would been screaming out, "Help, God!"  If the ordeal were to go on for hours and hours, as it did for him, I would be crying, wimpering, sobbing "Help, God!" over and over.  Thank God that on this first day of spring the rescue workers were able to bring him back above ground alive.  The story could have had a much different ending if the man had gone face under instead of being kept above water by his rescuers for all that time.  Sometimes stories like this don't have such a happy ending.

But Paul assures his readers in Rome, "Everyone who calls, 'Help, God!' gets help."

I had a discussion with a young Pentecostal man recently who is going through a very challenging time in life.  Believe me when I say that his is not a happy ending story, not in near sight, anyway.  Yet, despite this, he is trusting God, heart and soul as he takes it one day at a time.  And I was really moved when he told me that he feels Jesus helping him through all this, even though progress seems painfully slow.  He said, "I just keep praying for help all the time.  Because, you know, I haven't seen one story anywhere in the Bible in which someone asks Jesus for help and he turns them away and says no, I can't help you buddy.  I know that if I'm asking for help, I'm already getting help.  I've got to trust that I'm saved."

"No one who trusts God like this - heart and soul - will ever regret it," Paul writes.  "Everyone who calls, 'Help, God!' gets help."


Today's readings: Jer. 24:1-10; Rom. 9:19-33; John 9:1-17
Elsa is praying the daily readings and praying the news and blogging about it on the weekdays of Lent.

She is reading The Message translation this year.

Lenten Reflection 3/19

So today I'm reading through the news and I think to myself, "Well, there's nothing that grabs me to write about today."  That's funny, because there are things in the news today that affect other people around this planet deeply and personally.  Car bombing on the 10th anniversary of Saddam Hussein's death.  A small national economy on the verge of collapse.  A new Bishop of Rome officially beginning his work.  Our president preparing for a diplomatic trip to Israel.  Negotiations on allowing American citizenship to immigrants.  Even a very intriguing top article in the NY Times about the city attorney's office in San Francisco and how this top team of ace lawyers has gone about changing the expectations for government officials when it comes to defending laws.  I could find something great to write about in any or all of these things.  But in my mind none of them fit the thing I was hoping to talk about in the Scripture readings.  In other words, none of them fit my own agenda.

And I wondered,: how often do I miss good, juicy things in life because they don't fit what I was expecting to see?  How often do my own self inflicted blinders keep me from seeing what God wants to show me?

Paul describes the core of his teaching to the Romans this morning.  It has to do with knowing that God is not in some far, distant place, but right here in and between and among us.  It has to do with welcoming God's reality into our hearts on God's terms instead of trying to set up our own deals in life.  And it has to do with deeply trusting your whole being to God and God's will.

So even though I was hoping to make some wonderful comparison between the news and my own personal favorite gospel reading, John 9, a reading that makes me literally weep every time I read it, Paul called me to the mat this morning.  Life is ever and always on God's terms in things both small and great.



Today's readings: Jer. 24:1-10; Rom. 9:19-33; John 9:1-17
Elsa is praying the daily readings and praying the news and blogging about it on the weekdays of Lent.

She is reading The Message translation this year.

Lenten Reflection 3/18

 

So last week I didn't pray the news because I didn't hear or see much news while on silent retreat at the monastery.  And this morning as I sit down once again with the headlines, I feel rather assaulted.  The top story on the online NY Times this morning is about the question of whether men who have been put under a restraining order due to their violent threats against their wives or girlfriends should automatically have their guns confiscated.  Most states do not allow the police to take away the guns, and the article tells many sad stories of women (and men) killed by a gun at the hand of their intimate partners (often a murder/suicide) even after they had reported that the man had guns and pleaded with police to take them away.  There was a story on NPR about a gang rape by members of an Ohio high school football team that occurred on a night of wild drinking.  I read reports on violence in Syria, Pakistan and Mali, about a car bomb killed at least 7 people and wounded 10 others in Mogadishu, Somalia, and about hundreds of students at the University of Florida who were evacuated from the school early this morning after authorities found explosives while investigating the death of someone found on campus dead of a gunshot wound.

Without the news, life in the monastery was very quiet.  But even there violence was never far away.  Echoes of war from generations past could still be heard in the psalms we prayed every day.  And during the prayers of the people, at which people are free to share intercessions silently or aloud, the issues of the news were always on people's lips.  Syria.  Afghanistan.  Korea.  All kinds of people in peril.  The earth suffers violence. And you can't get away from it even in a monastery.

Today we begin reading John 9 about the man born blind.  It's a story of a man who gains new sight on every level.  When we first meet him, Jesus and his disciples are walking down the street and see him, probably begging by the side of the road.  He was a man blind from birth and the disciples ask, "Rabbi, who sinned: this man or his parents, causing him to be born blind?"  Jesus tells them that they're asking the wrong question.  It's not a matter of finding someone to blame or trying to understand cause/effect.  Jesus tells them to look first for what God can do in any situation.

And I find that very helpful this morning.  Sitting here and taking in one horrible news story after another, I can so easily find myself wondering what we've done wrong to live in a violent world like this.  What caused it?  What can we do to effect change?  What do we need to do to fix it?  I'm wondering why it seems that a peaceful life seems to have so many enemies and stumbling blocks.  I find myself judgementally clucking - what is wrong with those people and placing blame in various places in my mind.

Paul says in his letter to the Romans that we are so absorbed in what we ourselves are doing and in our own projects that we don't see God right in front of us - like a huge rock in the road. So we stumble into God and go sprawling.  I don't want to let the reality of the world stumble me up today, so this morning, as I take all this difficult news into myself, I am also taking Jesus' advice and looking first at what God can do. 

Paul quotes Isaiah: "Careful!  I've put a huge stone on the road to Mount Zion, a stone you can't get around.  But the stone is me!  If you're looking for me, you'll find me on the way, not in the way."  So today I am focusing not on how I judge our whole society to be stumbling - going to hell in a hand basket - but on how God might be transforming me - and the world - through the many giant stumbling blocks to peace I'm reading about today.  After all, this is the season of crucifixion leading to new life.  How might praying the ever bad news change me or others?  How might God be in all this?

As I transition back into my day to day life from my week of retreat, I share this lovely short video from my Brother Curtis that speaks very eloquently to these questions.   Thank you SSJE brothers, for your warm and gracious hospitality and for the spiritual nourishment your faith provides.


Today's readings: Jer. 24:1-10; Rom. 9:19-33; John 9:1-17
Elsa is praying the daily readings and praying the news and blogging about it on the weekdays of Lent.

She is reading The Message translation this year.

Lenten Reflection 3/12

 

A judge decided yesterday that Mayor Bloomberg's proposed law to outlaw sugary drinks over 16 ounces was both "arbitrary and capricious."  I don't think anyone can question that the mayor proposed this law for the good of the public health, but it did seem a bit haphazard.  The rule applied differently to restaurants than to stores, to clear drinks than to milk based drinks.  Alcoholic drinks were exempted.  And although restaurants could not sell coffee drinks over 16 ounces that were sweetened, they could sell them unsweetened and have plenty of sugar available for customers to sweeten the drinks themselves.

Mayor Bloomberg has been well known for his efforts to promote the public health.  He has enacted indoor smoking bans and required restaurants to post calorie counts.  This latest effort was meant to be a revolutionary approach to obesity, which has been proven to be caused by over-consumption of sugary drinks, especially in kids.   But the soft drink industry didn't like this proposal one bit, and mounted a huge campaign.  There are signs and ads all over the city telling New Yorkers that the mayor is trying to restrict their freedom.  (and of course, making something a question of personal freedom is always a good way to get Americans up out of our recliners).   They also filed a court case against the law, and the decision yesterday clearly came as a surprise to the mayor, as well as to the many restaurants that had already adjusted their menus and retrained their staff to deal with the new regulations that were set to take effect today.  During their campaign against the mayor's proposal, soft drink industry used phrases like, "We don't need the government trying to invade our personal choices on matters of health."

Well, it seems to me that one of the most important roles of the government is to protect the public health.  We certainly wouldn't want to get the majority of our health information from corporations who can afford lots of attractive advertising and who produce foods that alter our appetites and make us hungry for more.  The 'government' is not trying to 'invade' when leaders or governmental health agencies advocate for our health.  We all know soda is unhealthy.  It rots your teeth.  It makes you fat.  It throws off your sugar levels which can lead to diabetes.  It's full of colorings and high fructose corn syrup.  Everyone knows it's unhealthy, but we drink it anyway.   Just like we eat stuff that's bad for us, smoke, sit on the couch too much and make all kinds of risky and harmful personal life choices.  As Paul so correctly puts it, "I decide to do good, but I don't really do it; I decide not to do bad, but then I do it anyway.  My decisions, such as they are, don't result in actions.  Something has gone wrong deep within me and gets the better of me every time."

I admire Mayor Bloomberg's intentions.  He runs a really major city and he wants to promote good health among its citizens and be a model of healthy choices for other cities.   Got to say, he's got guts to try this and to stick with it - especially when the personal freedom advocates got their hackles all up, depicting him with a Hitler mustache and all, as such people are prone to do.  He was boldly advocating for the common good.  Leaders need to have the courage to do that a lot more often.  No matter how much they say they care about personal freedom, the beverage industry really just wants to make profits.  "Sin simply does what sin is so famous for doing: using the good  as a cover to tempt me to do what would finally destroy me."  Personal freedom is a good cover for all kinds of sin.

I know as well as anyone that a law outlawing large sugary drinks will not do away with the over-consumption of soda.  Where there's a rule, there's a way to get around it, and when something is banned, it becomes forbidden fruit, as Paul wrote yesterday.  But I think there is something good about putting public restrictions on things everyone knows is bad.  After all, God put the ten commandments in stone, even though God knew we'd break them in a million ways.  I think what is lacking is a balance in our nation between profits, sound regulation and plain old common sense. 


Today's readings: Jer. 17:19-27; Rom. 7:13-25; John 6:16-27
Elsa is praying the daily readings and praying the news and blogging about it on the weekdays of Lent.

She is reading The Message translation this year.


Note: Elsa is headed off for her yearly Lenten retreat at SSJE.  She will return to this blog on Monday, March 18.

Lenten Reflection 3/11

So last night my family completed our week long "Solidarity Fast".  We limited our food budget for the week to only $4 per person per day, which is what most people on food stamps have to work with.  So last Sunday night we headed off to the grocery store with $112 in hand to buy all our food for the week.  We cleared out the top shelf of the fridge and one corner of the counter top and put all the food we got in those two places.  The rest of the fridge and the pantry were off limits for the week.

I've got to say that we ended up eating plenty of food.  It just was very different food than we normally eat.  I can't say any of us felt hungry, but we didn't always feel satisfied - especially on an emotional level.  As the week went on, we worried a bit that maybe our supplies would run out but this ended up being a groundless fear.  There were plenty of  apples, potatoes and peanut butter - therefore, plenty of calories -  left after Sunday supper.


I read an article last week that advocated that Lenten disciplines should be quite challenging in order to really stir and wake you up.  This fast was challenging.  It was challenging to sit down last Sunday and plan out a list of meals we thought might fit our budget.  It was challenging to shop and match our plans with the reality of how much money we actually had.  It was challenging to be creative with our few ingredients and combine them into unified meals.  It was challenging not having our usual favorite foods and food treats around.  It was most challenging to really feel just a taste of what those who rely on food stamps feel all the time - and to realize that while we experienced it as a challenging fast for a week, for millions of Americans it's not a fast - it's just the day to day reality.

I used to run a restaurant.  I'm good at making a meal out of next to nothing.  I know how to cook wholesome beans and grains from scratch.  As a former holistic health practitioner, I know a lot about nutrition.  I was well equipped to make the most out of this week.  Though the prices were a bit higher, we opted to do all our shopping at the grocery store that is 1/4 mile from our house even though there are cheaper grocery stores further down the road, because having to get supplies locally is part of many people's reality.  We made it work.  But all week I kept thinking about those people who have only some little convenience store nearby where the food is more expensive and less nutritious.  I thought about the people who are working 2 or 3 jobs and don't have time to cook or don't know how to cook or just don't know all that much about nutrition.  What on earth do they end up eating for only $4 a day? 

It was interesting to note that I found myself far more interested in free food opportunities last week than I usually am.  For example, someone brought clementines to my al-anon meeting and I ate 5 of them.  (fresh fruit!) At our vestry retreat, where we were supposed to bring our own lunch, I brought some rice and frozen cauliflower with me (with some of our precious cheese on it - the most costly item we had purchased ) but I was really happy that someone had brought veggie and fruit trays, as well as my favorite kind of potato chips.  There was a potluck lunch at church on Sunday as our unified meals were running out.  I realized how finding free food opportunities is an important part of many people's calculus in making it through the week.

Last night at supper, we talked together about how the experience had been.  The boys claimed that it was really no different than usual except that they got to eat more of what they like - tons of spaghetti.  They got to have the "treat" of having ramen noodles for after school snacks.  They got to have school lunches all week because we figured people on food stamps can get free lunches for their kids.  No healthy bagged lunches, no stupid green smoothies in the morning, no half the plate covered with steamed vegetables in the evening.  From their perspective, they had plenty of food, which is as usual. 

But since they were included in the week's menu planning and shopping they remained well aware of the tally we were keeping on the counter as we used up our last dollars as the week drew to a close.  The boys were the ones most often asking whether I thought we might run out of food.  They did recognize that something was different and it had something to do with feeling confident in your food supply.  They may have said they'd like to eat this way every week, but they missed their meat.  And they missed having pizza at choir rehearsal because we didn't have the $5 per boy to chip in.  We had no desserts in the house.  The food was filling but it was boring, and I'm sure week after week even these pasta hounds would get sick of so much  plain spaghetti with sauce. 

Neither my husband nor I had what we wanted to eat.  As a meat and potato man, Steve didn't get what he most enjoys, nor did he get the portion sizes he usually eats.  He lost weight.  As a gluten free vegetarian, I got plenty of foods I enjoy - split pea soup, bean chili, brown rice, peanut butter.  But this is much heavier fare than I'm used to eating three times a day.  No salads, no healthy smoothies for breakfast, no fresh veggies at all - only frozen, and only apples and a few bananas for fruit (usually slathered in peanut butter!)  I gained weight even though I couldn't afford any gluten free bread or pasta alternatives. 

I think I can speak for both of us when I say we felt our gratitude deepen for our food.  Yes, our calorie levels were definitely affected by this fast, but we were affected most of all by the disruptions we noticed in our emotional and mental attachments to food.  We recognized with stark clarity that we normally simply feel entitled to eat whatever we want whenever we want it.  I normally eat for pleasure, nutrition and taste, and I shop accordingly.  Last week, nutrition took the clear top billing and I had to consider first which items contained the most nutrition per dollar.  Taste came only second and pleasure was hardly an issue.  I made simple, nutritious food.  And we ate when we were hungry - not whenever we felt like enjoying a little something.  And during the fast we felt - literally in the gut - the sad and disturbing fact that thousands of people, even within a small radius of our own home, don't have access to such entitlement. 

When Jesus is in our midst, there is enough food for everyone with plenty left over.  Food is a gift from God and as Jesus' disciples, we are called to feed those who are hungry.  I go back to eating as I usually do today, while people just down the road - or even just around the corner - are eating a bowl of rice or instant oatmeal just to fill their bellies or going to a soup kitchen tonight to eat pasta and day old pastries.  Like the Israelites Jeremiah was warning about the wrath to come - when we make our own bellies into Gods, we're not doing what God is calling us to do.


Today's readings: Jer. 16:10-21; Rom. 7:1-12; John 6:1-15
Elsa is praying the daily readings and praying the news and blogging about it on the weekdays of Lent.
She is reading The Message translation this year.





 

Lenten Reflection 3/8

 

This morning, as I do on Friday mornings, I read the local paper.  This is the only paper I subscribe to - I get most of my news from NPR and online sources.  But I like to keep up with what's going on in my town.  (and I like to have a weekly crossword puzzle to do on my day off...)  Our paper has lots of calendar events, human interest stories, obituaries, classifieds and other local ads and a few local news items that help keep me in the know.  But what the paper is most full of is arguments between town leaders on various issues that are waged as battles through letters to the editor.  The bulk of political news about our town is conveyed in this way.  One week a politician declares he's right about something.  The next week an opponent blows holes in his argument and insults him.  The next week, the politician fires back, questioning the opponent's integrity.  There is no shortage of strong opinions in Trumbull, it seems, on topics ranging from from campaign signs to political endorsements to the budget.  Lately, the hot topic is the management, or in some people's opinion, the mismanagement of a senior housing development here in town.

I don't know.  After living here over three and a half years now, I still really have very little understanding of what's really going on politically here in Trumbull.  I've gotten to know a number of town leaders personally, and find them all likable.  However, the way they work (or don't work) together and how decisions are made here is still a great mystery to me.  I think that like in many small towns, you really need to be around for a long time before you understand how things actually get done.  

While as a relative newcomer, I find myself wondering how to figure out what's really going on, I'm beginning to realize that people's opinions and arguments are the big news around here.  There are lots of people who've lived here all their lives, and they care who says what.  People care who and what their trusted friends endorse.  People take sides because of personal friendships.  Small towns like Trumbull tend to put personalities before the issues.  I see this played out in the paper every single week.

What really happened  at that senior housing development that has caused months of public argument?  I'm still not really sure and I read this paper cover to cover each week.  What I do know is that some people felt insulted, hurt and offended by how something was handled during the hurricane last fall.  People are still mad at each other about this and want everyone to know who made the most outrageous insinuations and who insulted whose mother.  Really.  It goes on and on.  I've often commented while reading this paper that if I were considering Trumbull as a place to live and I got the paper to check the place out, I'd be pretty turned off by the many mean spirited letters sent to the paper by our various leaders and prominent citizens week after week.

Paul tells the Romans in chapter 6 that being a slave to self is sin.  Freedom only comes when you come out of yourself and listen to God, to the world, to others.  And Jesus says "If I turned the spotlight on myself, it wouldn't amount to anything."  There's something bigger in this world than our own opinions, our own view of things, our own arguments, our own reputations.  Many of the combative letters to the editor in our local paper are like self-focused spotlights and they really don't amount to anything.  They don't give readers any clarity at all about the real issues facing our town.  They haven't informed residents of the direction we need to move together to grow and thrive and care for our citizens.  And they certainly don't inspire anyone to want to get involved in leadership on a town level.

I would urge everyone in a leadership position in our town, whether they have been elected, appointed - or just known by name or reputation - to begin thinking more about how they can publicly come together around the common good of our community rather than just trying to top each other in appearing to be either the most righteous or most martyred in their very public letters to the editor.


Today's readings:  Jer. 11:1-8,14-20; Rom. 6:1-11; John 8:33-47
Saturday's readings: Jer. 13:1-11; Rom. 6:12-23; John 8:47-59
Sunday's readings: Jer. 14:1-9,17-22; Gal. 4:21-5:1; Mark 8:11-21
Elsa is praying the daily readings and praying the news and blogging about it on the weekdays of Lent.
She is reading The Message translation this year.

Lenten Reflection 3/7

A lot of aggressive rhetoric is used in international politics.  This rhetoric is kind of like the insults and threats that get thrown around on a playground before the fists start flying. 

For example, the United Nations Security Council is currently considering enforcing further sanctions against North Korea over its nuclear program, and a few hours before the council was scheduled to meet, North Korea proclaimed such sanctions "an act of war," and declared its right to commit preemptive strikes against both South Korea and the U.S.  Apparently North Korea has often said before that it has the right to use preemptive military strikes against the U.S., which it claims is preparing to start a war on the Korean Peninsula.  But today, they increased the hostility of their rhetoric by saying that they have a right to  make preemptive nuclear strikes, and that they would turn Washington and Seoul into "a sea in flames" with "lighter and smaller nukes."  The New York Times quotes a spokesman from the North Korean Foreign Ministry as saying, "Now that the U.S. is set to light a fuse for a nuclear war, the revolutionary armed forces of the DPRK will exercise the right to a preemptive nuclear attack to destroy the strongholds of the aggressors and to defend the supreme interests of the country."

The article goes to say that while few analysts believe that North Korea will launch a nuclear attack on the U.S., believing it would be a suicidal move for the regime, many are concerned that this increase in rhetoric indicates that "North Korea might attempt an armed skirmish to test the military resolve of Park Geun-hye, South Korea's first female president, who took office less than two weeks ago."  The article suggests that Kim Jon-un, North Korea's new leader, is eager to build his reputation as leader of a strong and aggressive 'military first' country.  South Korea, too, has been more blunt in its own rhetoric back to North Korea.  Tensions there are building.  Will the fists start flying soon?

In Paul's letter to the Romans, I was immediately struck today by the sentence that said, "Sin didn't, and doesn't, have a chance in competition with the aggressive forgiveness we call grace."  You don't often see the word aggressive used to describe forgiveness.

There seems to be no limit on how aggressive we human beings can be toward one another, so I like the idea of God's grace and forgiveness somehow having even more power than any aggression I can produce or imagine.  I know what an aggressive threat looks like. North Korea made one just today.  What would aggressive forgiveness look like?  

"All sin can do is threaten us with death, and that's the end of it," Paul says.  "When it's sin versus grace, grace wins hands down."  Grace always wins.  So whatever aggressive forgiveness looks like, it must be far more powerful than aggressive political rhetoric or playground bullying or domestic violence or gun violence or war - or even nuclear weapons.  More powerful than any of the most aggressive things I can think of.  Praying the news can be very upsetting.  You take in a lot of the world's aggression.  So it's very good and comforting news to me today that there is a power greater than any earthly power I could fear.  I think I'll find some rest in that power today.


Today's readings:  Jer. 10:11-24; Rom. 5:12-21; John 8:21-32
Elsa is praying the daily readings and praying the news and blogging about it on the weekdays of Lent.
She is reading The Message translation this year. 

Lenten Reflection 3/6

 

So I was down at Starbucks today, and there were some guys at the next table.  And one of them makes a comment about Hugo Chavez, and another one - well - just goes off.  "THAT guy - don't even mention THAT guy.  What a loser - I'm glad he's dead!"  His friend asked him, "Hey, what did he ever do to you?"  The guy shoots back, louder this time,  "Didn't you hear him at the U.N.?  What right do they have to let him talk about the US the way he did at the U.N.?  Where does he get off?  He should  be dead.  And they never should have let him speak."  Another guy said to him, "I don't like the guy either, but he's a person.  His mother loved him probably, right?  And besides, he was legally elected by his own people in that country."  That did it.  The other guy said, (even louder this time)  "Elected?  ELECTED?  It's a whole different world down there.  They don't have elections the same as we do.  It's all rigged!  He was a crook.  He was a deadbeat.  He was a loser.  I'm thrilled that he's dead."

Whew!  I didn't expect to get a dose of that kind of rage today.  But there it was.  The anger that sometimes simmers in the dark.  The public image of Hugo Chavez obviously struck a deep nerve with this guy - offended him in some deep and clearly personal way.  I don't think any of us admired Chavez's blunt criticisms of our country and his insults toward our leaders, but this guy took it very, very personally.  Chavez clearly represented something very painful for this man.  His friends realized it was a good idea to change the subject.  One of them said, "Let's just not talk about this now," and turning to another one of the guys, he asked, "So how's your friend Joe?"  And the conversation turned.

Jesus said to the Pharisees, "You're looking right at me and you don't see me.  How do you expect to see the Father?  If you knew me, you would at the same time know the Father."

When I was a kid, I used to think that what Jesus was saying here was that he's like the one special envoy sent to earth by God  - and that in order to see God, you had to look at the Jesus of history - the Jesus of the Bible.  Well, although I still would say that Jesus is the image of the invisible God, my view has become more complicated.  What I hear in Jesus' words today to the Pharisees is that whenever we look at any person and don't see him or her - but look at them like an object or a possession or a symbol or anything other than the whole, full, beloved child of God that they are - that's  when we are not seeing God.  We don't see God when we don't see what God has created.  And we are all created in the image of God.  And all of us together are the body of Christ.  We learn who God is through the stories of Jesus in the bible, yes, but also through the body of Christ that is all around us today.  Through our interactions with one another.

So this man's rant about Hugo Chavez, a person he never met, felt to me like Chavez, to him, was some kind of object or symbol - a target that represented everything he hates.  And he wished him dead.  He strongly wished him dead.  And he would spit on his coffin if he could.  I'm sure if I had turned and suggested to him that he could perhaps see something new about God if he were to look more compassionately at Hugo Chavez, he would turn and look at me like I had three heads - or maybe even punch me in the mouth.

The thing is, though, there are alot of people in this world I have my issues with, too.  Those people in Kansas that picket funerals with "God Hates Fags" signs.  Clergy people who do unethical or hurtful things.  People I don't agree with about theology in my own church.  Hey - I even have issues with my husband and kids when they leave a mess in the bathroom.  I guess there's a continuum of issues.  I guess you could put Hitler on one end, and it lines up from there all the way to my own family members.  But we're all sinners and tax collectors to some degree because we're all broken and fallen people. And we're also all children of God.

Nonetheless, my faith tells me that sometimes I learn the most about God by being open to the "other" in my life - the very person that brings up the most stuff inside me.  The things that I hide away in the dark - those things that are hateful and prejudiced and wounded and sore - are brought into the light when I really see someone I consider "other."  Jesus tells us that there is nothing that is hidden that will not be exposed.  And, he says, "No one who follows me stumbles around in the darkness.  I provide plenty of light to live in."  We are called to live in that light - not in our darkness.

If I look right at someone - even someone I don't know personally - and all I can see is my own hate, well, I'm not seeing them. And if I can't see them, how can I expect to see God?
   If I strive to know the other as a child of God,
      if I strive to know myself as a child of God,
         if I strive to know Jesus as the child of God,
            I will at the same time be striving to know God.


Today's readings:  Jer. 8:18-9:6; Rom. 5:1-11; John 8:12-20
Elsa is praying the daily readings and praying the news and blogging about it on the weekdays of Lent.
She is reading The Message translation this year.

Lenten Reflection 3/5

 

There's a top story in the NY Times this morning about a recent drone strike in Pakistan.  The U.S. is denying that this strike, which occurred in February, was carried out by the U.S. military.  The suggestion is that Pakistan itself committed the strike, which killed up to 9 people including two senior commanders of Al Qaeda.  American officials conjecture that the Pakistanis are blaming the CIA to avoid criticism from the Pakistani public.  Either way, when it comes to drone strikes, there's something shady going on that involves secrecy, power and killing.

I'm going to admit that secret drone strikes are something in the news that I simply don't like to think about.  This kind of targeted assassination seems unreal and, to me, unbelievable.  It just doesn't compute in my mind that our country participates in such things.  So I admit that I put reports about drone strikes into their own untouched folder in a back corner of my mind.  Such things just don't seem congruent with the world and the society I think I live in.  But whenever I hear news about this "new kind of war" it is always a reminder to me that there is a dark underbelly to our world and to our nation.  And I know there's also a dark underbelly in each of us.  This stark reality is hard to face.

Jeremiah wanted his listeners to start listening to stark reality.  Jeremiah recounts long lists of examples of the people's refusal to listen to God's decrees and to live in God's righteousness.  He repeatedly points out that the people are not living a life congruent with their covenant with God and that while they continued to declare that they were God's chosen people they were not acting like God's chosen people.  He warns them that this will not end up well.  He wants them to face their own dark underbellies.

This morning I'm realizing that I hear quite regularly about our acts of targeted attack with drones and special forces in the news.  But I realize how few voices like Jeremiah's I hear.  Few seem to be speaking out about it.  Do we all really think this kind of government sponsored killing is ok?  Do others, like me, just shove this news into the dark recesses of our underbellies and ignore it?  All's fair in war, I've heard, and I've also got to admit that I know practically nothing about the realities of war.  But I've got to wonder - is this really a war?  Or is it some other kind of policing?  My gut tells me something is amiss and it makes me wonder: Are we living a life congruent with our most basic beliefs when we participate in and condone such things?


Today's readings:  Jer. 7:21-34; Rom. 4:13-25; John 7:37-52
Elsa is praying the daily readings and praying the news and blogging about it on the weekdays of Lent.
She is reading The Message translation this year.

Lenten Reflection 3/4

 This morning I heard a commentator on NPR news introduce a story about the process of choosing the new pope.  He said that cardinals are holding their first official meeting today to decide who the best person will be to address all the current problems of the church.  Hmmm.  Is that the real job of a pope?  (or a bishop or a priest?) To address the church's problems?  I wonder if that is really how the cardinals themselves are framing the task before them.   But this reporter's words illustrate how many people think that the role of the clergy is to "fix" the church.

This made me think of our visitation yesterday with our bishop, Ian Douglas, at Grace Church.  Ian told our congregation during our coffee hour visit yesterday that when we find ourselves worrying about "fixing the church" we are not actually being the church.   Our work as church is not to fill our pews, get more pledge units and try to restore our churches back to the thriving neighborhood family churches they were the 50's and 60's.  Our work is to go out into the world and share God's healing, reconciling love.

We live in a completely different world than the one that built those churches.  The church can't expect to remain the same as the whole world changes around it. As Ian often says that the only things that don't change are things that are dead.  Our work as the church is, and always has been, to join in with God's mission in the world, however that ends up looking.  Entering into God's mission of healing and reconciling the world is our real work, and these days, that seems to have less and less to do with full pews, traditional Sunday schools and harvest fairs.  "The church doesn't have a mission," Ian said, "It's the other way around.  God's mission has a church."

My church (and I know we are not alone) feels a bit overwhelmed lately by all the changes facing us.  We don't know the way and there seems to be no road map.  Like Jesus says to the people in the temple in John today, "You will look for me, but you won't find me.  Where I am, you can't come."  It's a lot easier to think that Jesus is sitting right there on the altar in the temple (local parish) and all we need to do is show up on Sunday to find him.  But maybe what we need to explore is the idea that building the church has less to do with the church building than we think. 

These days, Jesus seems to have left the building, and is out wandering around the world, and we're called to follow him out there into the unknown, just like the early disciples were asked to leave everything behind and follow him.  Don't get me wrong, I don't think we're being called to just abandon all our buildings, but we're definitely being called to re-frame and re-vision their purpose, use and role in the context of God's mission.  There is no formula for what the church needs to become or how it will look in the future.  There are no easy step-by-step directions for transformation.

Paul writes to the Romans, "If you see that the job is too big for you, that it's something only God can do, and you trust him to do it -  if it's something you could never do for yourself no matter how hard and long you worked - well, trusting in God to do it is what gets you set right with God, by God.  Sheer gift."   It's hard to trust God sometimes, especially in times of huge transition, but that's what we disciples are called to do.  We're called to leave our safety and our own desires behind and to follow.  And we need to somehow trust that God will give us the ability to trust when even that seems impossible.  Lord, I trust you - help me with my mistrust!

We can't "fix" our little church.  I can't "fix" it as the priest, and our bishop can't come in on his yearly visit and "fix" it either.  Not even a pope can't "fix" all the current issues facing the church.  But yet we trust that God's got it all in hand and is working things out in God's time.  As people of the way, we need to let go of our own lives to find them - let go of the church in the way we've grown accustomed to it - and allow God to do a whole new thing with us - so that we can become a good and helpful resource for God in God's mission in the world as it is today.  We may be a bit mixed up these days about our own mission, but we can trust that we belong to God's mission.

Years and years and years ago the prophet Jeremiah warned us not to do what the people of Judah were doing.  They kept insisting that, "This is GOD's Temple, GOD's Temple, GOD'S Temple!" when actually it was just a human construct.   Are we ready to listen to the prophets - and Paul - and Jesus - yet?  It's God's church, not ours.

Today's readings:  Jer. 7:1-15; Rom. 4:1-12; John 7:14-36
For Lent, Elsa is praying both the daily readings and the news and then blogging about it on weekdays.
She is reading The Message translation this year.

Lenten Reflection 3/1

Well, I just don't have the heart to blog about the sequester anymore.  I feel like our leaders have literally gone over the cliff with all their justifications and accusations and political posturing.  Economic stress will do that to people.  I can see the stress produced by just our own little church budget, so when you're talking about our whole country's multi-billion dollar budget, well.  It's beyond my scope.

It just seems that Washington is full of people trying to lead the parade.  The world is full of people trying to lead the parade.  Heck, I try to lead my own parade multiple times a day.  I like to think that I make my life go the way it goes and that I can make things happen the way I want them to happen all on my own.  However, I'm with Paul who says to the Romans that he's figured out that "God does not respond to what we do; we respond to what God does...  Our lives get in step with God and all others by letting God set the pace, not by proudly or anxiously trying to run the parade."

In John's Gospel, Jesus says, "I can't do a solitary thing on my own: I listen, then I decide."  I know my life gets so much less stressful when I start my day listening instead of proudly and anxiously charging out into my own agenda.  And I suspect the crazy stress in Washington would be lessened by less charging forward and lots more listening - and, as my brother Curtis suggests, looking for ways to collaborate.  

Today's Readings:    Jer. 5:1-9; Rom. 2:25-3:18; John 5:30-47
Saturday's Readings:     Jer. 5:20-31; Rom. 3:19-31; John 7:1-13
Sunday's Readings:     Jer. 6:9-15; 1 Cor. 6:12-20; Mark 5:1-20
Elsa is using The Message translation this year.