Spiritual Consolation

This morning, I am supposed to be packing and then en route to a lovely retreat center three hours away for three days of Presbyterian reflection and planning.  I spent a lot of time preparing two liturgies for today, and was all set to lead the opening worship service and this evening's compline ~ and was so looking forward to this time of getting to know and working with my colleagues.

 

Instead, I will be writing a sermon for the funeral service that I'll be conducting tomorrow for a lifelong church member.  He and his wife, who died just a year ago, were the only ones in their family still members of our church.  His adult children had not, therefore, seen the bulletin announcements the last two weeks indicating that I would be away for three days, and made their scheduling plans before involving me.

 

It's a privilege to preside over tomorrow's Service of Witness to the Resurrection for someone with whom I've spent a great deal of time as he has struggled with his health and the loss of his wife of fifty-eight years.  But it occurs to me that, under the circumstances, I, too, need to hear a portion of what I wrote for today's noon service for the Presbytery retreat, the opening of a day dedicated to exploring The Way of Consolation.

*****

The essence of spiritual consolation is the sense of an inner  movement toward God.  We all experience fluctuations in our relationship with God.  Sometimes we feel that we are moving toward God; sometimes, away.  Sometimes we feel that God is moving toward us; sometimes, that God is pulling away.  At times our relationship with God is one of peaceful confidence that God is present to us and active in our lives -- whether things are going well or not.  At other times we are confounded by turbulence and a sense of distance from God -- again, whether things are going well or not. 

 

These movements, or changes in  feelings and experiences, are not indications of success or failure on our part.  They simply are.  What helps, however, is to learn to recognize them.  Our capacity to see clearly, to make choices, to determine whether to follow new paths or to re-commit ourselves to the old -- to discern -- is grounded in our capacity to appreciate when and where God is at work in our lives, guiding and leading us toward God.

 

Sometimes we experience spiritual consolation as a overwhelming sense of God's presence that seems to come out of nowhere.  An awareness of God's gift of love, a feeling of strength and confidence that God is present and active, may come as pure gift.  Perhaps you wake up to a particularly beautiful sunrise and are flooded with feelings of gratitude for God's goodness and care for all creation.  Or perhaps you look up from your desk in the middle of composing a difficult letter in response to a troubling conflict and are nevertheless overwhelmed by the sure knowledge that God is present and offering love and reassurance to you in the midst of struggle.  The external situation is not the determining factor in an experience of spiritual consolation.  The determining factor is the awareness of God and your own connection with God.

 

More often, we experience spiritual consolation, a movement toward God, as the result of some form of activity that is clearly leading us toward God.  If we are engaged in prayer, or in study or preparation for preaching or teaching; if we are conversing with someone in a pastoral encounter; if we are working on a mission project or even an administrative task; if we are doing, or planning, or preparing for the work to which we are called, we often experience a corresponding sense of spiritual consolation.  That sense of being drawn toward God, of our deepest core self being in accord with God's desires for our lives, of satisfaction in our calling, might come in the feeling of deep affirmation in the context of a sermon that's going really well.  Or it might be the only thing getting you through a meeting that's going really badly.  Again, the external situation is not the decisive standard.  What matters is that sense of movement toward God -- which most often reveals itself when we are alert to who we are as someone being uniquely shaped and molded by God and what we are doing in response to God's individual and loving call to us.

 

 

 

 

Looking Back

A couple of weeks ago I was invited to emcee an event next April: the dinner celebration of the tenth anniversary year of the Ignatian Spirituality Institute, the program in which I studied spiritual direction. I started wondering what I had been up to during the April in which I was making the Exercises, and dug back through my journals to see whether I could uncover something that might help me introduce the event.  (I may have.)  

Then, as long as I had my file boxes of prayer reflection journals out (twenty-some over the past eight years!), I wondered what the October entries would show.  How life has changed  .  .  .   .

October 19, 2005

A few weeks into the Spiritual Exercises, which means that I have made a commitment to an hour or so of prayer time each day (I am nowhere close to meeting that commitment) and a weekly meeting with a spiritual director, who is very gentle and very funny, and takes my beginning efforts very seriously.  Recently returned from visiting Josh at The University of Chicago.  I am an elder in my home Presbyterian church and a teacher in an Orthdox Jewish school, and my life of prayer is in its infancy.

" 'Be still and know that I am God.'

Really, these are words that you could put into use anywhere, any day, in the middle of anything.  Staring with the 'be still.'  Meaning: Create an interior stillness.  Lose all the internal chatter.  That in itself would be a discipline.

Just right now: I can hear the tv in the living room, the dog walking around hopefully in the kitchen, the clatter of these [computer] keys.  But I can try to create an inner stillness.  A hollow place.  Not an empty place, but a warm, hollow, inviting place for God to rest.  How would I do that during the day?"

October 17, 2006

The Exercises are, officially, behind me, and have become the framework for my spiritual life.  I am embarking upon the ordination journey, and have just been endorsed by the Session of my home church as an Inquirer in the official process.  I'm visiting and applying to seminaries, and there's no reason to think that all will not go splendidly.

In my journal: A brief email exchange with my spiritual director on the continual dilemma in my life: Protestant/Catholic; Ignatius/Calvin (both studying in Paris in the 1530s, where I spent time in July imagining them both).  He has some reading suggestions. 

October 20, 2007

I am a brand-new new seminary student, reflecting on the Eucharist, which had been transformed for me the previous year from a boring ritual to a deeply significant sacrament, thanks to a Seder dinner at the home of one of my students, a meal shared in the context of Week 3 of the Exercises with its many imaginative prayers based on Jesus' final days.

"The seminary feels physically bereft to me.  No labyrinth.  No stained glass.  No statues.  No art. Puritan starkness in the extreme  It has its own beauty but it seems, as a day-after-day-after-day experience, on the empty side.  I begin to see how much I depend upon material, substantial reference points for faith."

Mid October, 2008

The entries are not dated, but they are stacked in order in a folder.  Josh has been gone for seven weeks.  My father thinks his cancer had recurred.  (It had not.) Spiritual director emeritus does have cancer.  ( From which he eventually recovered.) How much? I wondered, sitting in my living room late in the afternoon, hair dripping from the shower, looking in despair at the emails on my laptop. 

"What does it mean that people keep speaking and writing to me in this way -- you teach us so much, you will have more wisdom and compassion for others?  Does it mean that even in the midst of such a horrific loss, I am still called to serve?  Even though I am now a person who can barely get out of bed in the morning?  A person who could not be trusted with the life of her own child?"

October 19, 2009

I am back in seminary.  I am taking Worship and Sacraments and Hebrew Exegesis and something else (I have no idea what that might have been).  This is the fall that I spend almost entirely on Psalm 88, which probably helps to save my life.  

In my journal: A long email received this day from SDE, which I carried around, crumpled up in my pocket, for months, because I needed to read and re-read what was, in effect, an extended meditation on the Suscipe,  a prayer at the end of the Spiritual Exercises.  He writes, among other things, about coming to an acceptance of the mystery of faith.   I will get no answers, he tells me.  It is oddly reassuring, to be offered companionship in the articulation of that hard reality. 

Not a bad re-read this week, as I am contending with Job in the pulpit.  Odd, to look back at these entries from this vantage point.  What a terrible and strange and wonderful journey this has become.

Far Voices Calling (Sermon)

My congregation is celebrating an anniversary week-end: the Methodists have been here for 180 years, the Presbyterians for 175, and and we've been together as a merged church for 80 years.  We are an aging congregation, and I am working to maintain our orientation outward at a time when the temptation is to close ranks and take care of ourselves.

*****

Happy Anniversary, Everyone!  

As we began to prepare for this week-end, NY revealed herself to be our researcher extraordinaire. She delved into the cupboards and drawers in which our historical documents are contained -- themselves a testament to MF, our faithful chronicler -- and surfaced periodically with new finds and new information.  Among her findings were news articles describing our 25^th anniversary celebration in 1957, at which the Rev. Dr. Alfred Swan, who had preached at our dedication service in 1932, returned to preach a sermon entitled “Far Voices Calling.”   

Hmmmm, I thought; we could do that again.  “Far Voices Calling”: That’s a great, evocative title for an anniversary sermon.  We didn’t find the sermon itself, or even the bulletin, which might have identified the scriptural text from which Dr. Swan preached, but maybe that’s good.  No temptation to repeat the past when we don’t know what it was!  But a good starting point for our present.

I did find out a bit about Dr. Swan.  His parents lived here; his father was the pastor of the Presbyterian Church from 1916 – 1921. Dr. Swan himself was to become the pastor of the First Congregational Church in Madison, Wisconsin. He was invited to return home to preach the dedication sermon, and then he was invited back twenty-five years later to preach for the anniversary.  I’m thinking that in another 20 years, I can come back and preach from this title again for our 100^th!  

Our text this morning is an example of how profoundly the lectionary passages, set years ago by a committee, sometimes reach out to us in our present circumstances.  It’s from the Epistle to the Ephesians, a letter ascribed to the apostle Paul and ostensibly directed toward the community of Ephesus in ancient Greece.  Interestingly, today’s passage is written in the form of a prayer, the prayer of an evangelist and pastor for a church for which he cares deeply.  Let’s listen to the words of Ephesians 3, verses 14 – 21:

For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth takes its name.  I pray that, according to the riches of his glory, he may grant that you may be strengthened in your inner being with power through his Spirit, and that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith, as you are being rooted and grounded in love. I pray that you may have the power to comprehend, with all the saints, what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, so that you may be filled with all the fullness of God. Now to him who by the power at work within us is able to accomplish abundantly far more than all we can ask or imagine, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen.

Now there’s a far voice calling!  A voice from 2,000 years ago, a voice passionately concerned about the church, a voice that speaks to other far voices.  Who might those others be, and what does Paul say to them?  To us?

I think that some of today’s “far voices calling” might be those of eighty years ago, those voices of the women and men who merged two churches to form the one that we know today.  And those “far voices calling” might be those of the future, those of eighty years hence, to whom we leave our legacy of faith and commitment.  And, perhaps most importantly of all, those “far voices calling” might be some of those that are not so far away, geographically or chronologically, but are perhaps far away in experience – those with whom we are called to share God’s abundance and to whom we are called to proclaim God’s love.

“May God grant that you be strengthened,” Paul prays, “strengthened through God’s Spirit.”  Let’s ponder for a moment those Presbyterians and Methodists of eighty years ago.  Talk about being strengthened through the power of the Spirit!  It was the Depression.  There was no money.  BM told me that his family moved every year or so – every time his parents could find a house where the rent was a dollar less.  And while some of us have talked about how the Depression was a little easier on folks in the country who could produce their own food than on those in the city who had neither the land nor the know-how of what to do with it, not all families out here owned land and farmed.  And money was scarce even when food was available.

And yet, those people, our ancestors in faith, embarked upon a phenomenal project.  A project that required a lot of labor and cost a lot of money.  Men and boys raising and moving the Presbyterian church from across 302 to connect it to the Methodist sanctuary here.  Women cooking up an endless stream of chicken dinners and oyster suppers to raise funds. Families sacrificing to pledge to the building fund.  We should  honor the sense of community that built this church, but we should also remember that the work was God’s, and that the motivation behind it came from the Holy Spirit.  It was through the Spirit that the people were inspired and strengthened to build community and unity, and to address their challenges by working together.  They set an example to which we all might pay attention today.

Those people of the Depression era, those far voices call out to others.  They ring out with today’s words from Paul. Paul prays that Christ may dwell in our hearts as we are being rooted and grounded in love.  Intriguing words for pilgrims, for people on a journey, as we have called ourselves all year.  Images of dwelling, of being rooted and grounded – like  trees which grow in one place for hundreds of years.  What can these words mean to us?

It’s tempting to hear these words and to look backward, to rest in a kind of sentimental remembrance of those voices calling from eighty years ago.  “That Christ may dwell in us” – we can stay right here, in this exquisite and beautifully cared for building.  “That we be rooted and grounded in love” – like trees, we don’t have to move.  We can grow upward and outward right where we are, right as we were planted by those brave and determined church members of eighty years ago. That would be nice, wouldn’t it?

But remember, “far voices” are not just those of the past.  They are also the voices of the distant future, and the voices of the present.  And to what do they call us, we pilgrims on the Christian journey?

“Dwelling” is a beautiful image for Christ’s presence in our lives.  In the Gospel of John, Jesus tells his disciples that he and his Father will dwell, will make their home, with anyone who loves him.  They will come and settle in, curl up before the fireplace, and rest in peace in those who love Jesus.  But what else does Jesus say?  That “the Son of man has to no place in which to rest his head.”  That we are to “go forth and make disciples of all nations.”  If Christ dwells in us, then we are called to dwell in the world.  

And what about being “rooted and grounded?”  Does Paul, that great traveler in the Mediterranean world, mean that in love we are rooted and grounded in one geographical location?  Does he mean that we dig in our heels right here and wait for the world to show up at our door?

I don’t think so.  

I don’t know, and neither do any of us, who those far voices of eighty years hence might be.  But I know that we are called to branch and leaf out in ways that prepare the way for Jesus to dwell in those people of the future.  And we do that not by standing still like trees, but by following the example of the indwelling Christ who roots us in love, and by taking him out into the world beyond these four walls.

If Christ is dwelling in us, if he has made himself at home, set up a kitchen and plumped up the pillows of his bed in our lives, then we are called to carry him as a flame of love into the world.  If we have been given the great grace of roots in the Christian faith and a foundation in Christ in this church, in this wonderfully sacred building, then we are called to fling its doors wide and travel outward.

Where do we go?  Who are the far voices of today?

Some of them really are far away, geographically speaking.  They are the voices of the orphans in Rwanda, about whom D came to speak this spring, and whom we generously support as they become trained in the skills needed for the adult world.  They are the voices of schoolchildren in Liberia, to whose educations we are contributing through the purchase of a truck and the building of classrooms so that their hopes can be realized.

And some of them are close, geographically, but far in experience.

Think about the mission speakers who joined us last May, and what they told us about far voices.  Let’s start with the Food Bank.  Most of us are doing just fine where food is concerned.  In fact, if the trunk of my car when I leave the Bs’ house is any indication, we are more than fine.  Zucchini, anyone?  But there are hungry people in this county.  People whose voices have not been nourished by newly ripened apples and just-harvested potatoes.  If we are rooted and grounded in love, then we are also called to share what comes out of the ground, literally as well as spiritually.

What about ACCESS?  We all live in comfortable homes, homes that are warm in the winter – and perhaps too warm this summer!  Even those of us who live in nursing care or assisted living sleep in comfortable beds, have the use of private bathrooms, and are able to store our belongings where they are immediately accessible to us.  But we have neighbors who share in none of those benefits.  People who live close by in miles, but far away in experience.  The Beatitudes tell us that they may be more blessed than we are.  “Blessed are the poor,” Jesus tells us in the Gospel of Luke.  “Blessed are the poor in spirit,” he says in Matthew.  Well, we may not be poor in the literal, U.S. Census definition of the word.  But if Jesus dwells in us, we are called to be poor in spirit, which means we are to understand that his indwelling in our lives means that we are called to do some out-dwelling ourselves.  

And finally, what about Hospice?  A lot of us don’t like to talk about hospice; it means death and dying; it means decisions and events we don’t care to contemplate.  And yet, Jesus tells us, also in the Beatitudes, “Blessed are those who mourn.”  Hospice, as we learned during our May mission month, is a place of respite and care for both the dying and for those who mourn their loss.  Jesus, who dwells in us, invites us to journey with those at the end of life and those dear to them.  More far voices calling us.  Voices not so far geographically – hospice is about a ten minute drive from here.  But for many of us, voices far from where we prefer to be.   Voices to whom we are asked to carry the love in which we are so firmly rooted and grounded.

Paul’s words, Paul’s prayer for the church of Ephesus, and his prayer for us today, concludes with a phrase he uses frequently: that we may know the love of Christ so that we may be filled with the fullness of God. Filled with the fullness of God.  Fullness that comes from the love of Christ.

When Christ comes to dwell with us, he does not come to cramp our style, to take up the spare bedroom, to clean out the refrigerator.  When he invites us into the church, into his mission in the world, he is not seeking to sap our energy or to deplete our resources.  Not at all! His love calls us to be filled, to be filled with the fullness of God.  To be rooted and grounded in a love that gives us the firmest of foundations from which to move outward and to share God’s abundance.

That fullness, that love of the indwelling Christ, is responsible for the building in which we worship this morning. Those voices calling to us from the past say to us:  Look at the work of the Lord!  And let’s do – let’s look around for a minute.  Look at the beauty of the windows, the sheen of the woodwork, the glow of the cross.  Look at the archway that marks the physical merger of two congregations, two groups of people who chose unity over division.  Look at the building that has housed eighty years of worship, of Sunday school, of fellowship, of joys and of sorrows, all shared as a people of God. Look at what God has given us, through the power of God’s Spirit and the hard work of our church ancestors.

And then listen to the far voices calling from the future and from the present: from Africa and from our own county.  The voices of the poor and the hungry, the homeless and the dying.   The voices that might see this beautiful building as a beacon of hope, as the place from which we are called forth in order to share God’s great love, in both words and action.  

This building was not intended by those long ago voices as a monument to something long past.  It is not intended by God to be a museum for those in the present, or as a historical site for those calling from the future.  This building is a springboard from which we are called to carry the indwelling Christ into the future and into the world. This is a building whose voices, past present, and future, voices wrapped in the loving power of the Holy Spirit, call forth

 Unity, not divisiveness  

 Hope, not despair

 Optimism, not pessimism

 and

 They call forth: joy in the presence of God.

And so:  Let’s enjoy our anniversary today!  Let’s celebrate the far voices it represents, voices from the long ago past who shaped our present, and voices from our community, our world, and the distant future with whom we are called to share the fullness of God.  And let us pray together, as Paul did so long ago, that God use what God has built here to accomplish abundantly far more than all we can ask or imagine.  Amen.

Ignatian Spirituality for Protestants

Ignatius the Pilgrim ~ Jesuit Retreat Centre at Guelph, Ontario

You may have noticed a new link in my sidebar ~ the folks at Loyola Press are offering a second July packed with posts and links celebrating Ignatian spirituality.  I expect that I'll respond to some or several of them here, and you can look for a book giveaway a little later in the month: a new book by Margaret Silf, one of my favorite authors!

For today, though, I thought maybe I'd post a brief introduction to Ignatian spirituality, especially for Protestants.  We Protestants, especially those of us in the Reformed churches, aren't terribly familiar with the term "spirituality" (other than in the context of the ubiquitous phrase "spiritual but not religious") as it refers to for what our sake I'll call various schools of prayer, worship, and general approach to life which have tended to emerge out of the gifts, experiences, and leadership of particular people.

To the extent that we have much knowledge at all, we Protestants are probably most aware of Benedictine spirituality, with its emphasis on daily Scriptural prayer, its historic hospitality, and its role in the preservation of learning in western Europe after the fall of the Roman Empire.  We may not know the historical context (I used to teach high school world history, and Benedictine monasticism was part of our curriculum)(yes, even in an Orthodox Jewish School!), but many of us are familiar with Kathleen Norris's book Cloister Walk, wherein a Presbyterian poet provides an elegant introduction to Benedictine monastic life.  We tend to go blank, however, when names like Teresa of Avila and John of the Cross come up, when someone makes a reference to Augustinian or Franciscan spirituality, or when asked to think about mysticism or contemplation.

My own way into the richness of the church's wealth of spiritualities came, predictably, through the Benedictines; Joan Chittister, O.S.B. was a frequent speaker at The Chautauqua Institution during the years our family vacationed there, and I'm a longtime Kathleen Norris fan.  But I can't claim to have pursued any of what either of them had to say other than via books and lectures and sermons.

Ignatian spirituality came my way, as do most things of great importance to most of us, because someone whom I admired took the time to introduce it to me. He accompanied me through the Spiritual Exercises,  and he and a couple of his fellow Jesuits have generously brought their vast training and great gifts of listening, counsel, and prayer to bear on the rather considerable challenges of my life for the past several years. 

Those of us who are Protestants have been more or less well schooled in the importance of Scripture and its study and proclamation, in the value of community worship, in the history and theology of the Reformation, and in the essential roles played by baptism and communion in our lives.  All good.  

So what has Ignatian spirituality added to my life as a person of faith?

An insistence on God as one who gives, dwells, labors, and embraces us in all things;*

The concept of the "contemplative in action" -- that a person of deep prayer is also naturally a person of prophetic words and action, and that a person of words and action must be grounded in prayer;

The high value placed on the imagination, especially on the use of the imagination in prayer;

The profound importance of listening, of availability, of attentiveness to the God who speaks and acts through all things;

An understanding of the ups and downs and ins and outs and wanderings of the spiritual life through the concepts of spiritual consolation and desolation;

A deeply religious, faith-oriented understanding of what in the last century we came to know as psychology ~

And I wish that I could add to this my understanding and practice of detachment and indifference but, you know . . .  baby steps.

I've had a Jesuit look at me and ponder, "Hmmm. . .  Ignatian and Presbyterian . . .  both prophetic . . .  makes sense."   I've had someone else comment, "I don't see any way that you can combine those two."  What can I say?  It doesn't always make sense and sometimes one gives way to the other, but this particular combination in my own life seems to me to be one of God's great gifts of willingness to be in the midst of all things.

So: This is your invitation to visit 31 Days!  Have a great month!

(And . . .  did I leave out matters of discernment?  Well, yes and no.  Another post!) 




*Credit for that particular formulation goes to Howard Gray, S.J. in A Jesuit Retreat (Now You Know Media).

Observations: Pittsburgh and the PC(USA) General As

The Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) is holding its General Assembly in Pittsburgh this week.  I was privileged to travel to yesterday's opening festivities with a bussed group from a presbytery neighboring mine, thanks to a friend who got the two of us organized.

Herewith, some observations:

My friend and I, walking a bit downtown and enjoying the marvelous river views from the convention center, decried the fact that in our years at Pittsburgh Seminary, we never once made it to downtown Pittsburgh.  I know that my younger seminary colleagues were able to take advantage of that wonderful city, but for those of us constantly commuting between seminary and our homes at a distance elsewhere, the city center only a few miles away was always just out of reach.

Cynthia Bolbach, our just past moderator, preached a terrific sermon.  I  had the pleasure of meeting her when she preached at my home church (a year ago?); since then, she has been diagnosed with and undergone treatment for cancer. I know a little about what it's like to be the recipient of a cancer diagnosis in the middle of what seems like an important episode in your life; I felt a particular affinity with Cynthia due to our mutual challenges of this past year.

It was fun to see old friends and new, some only briefly and some for extended conversations, and to worship with RevGal Marci Auld Glass.  Marci has a beautiful singing voice and, as a commissioner, was in possession of the program booklet, so we were not completely in the dark.

 The Revs. Craig and Glass

I now have copies of the sampler of the upcoming new Presbyterian hymnal, which is the subject of a personal campaign of mine at my church.  If you are PC(USA), and if you know how passionate I am about sacred music (which I cannot sing myself but, whatever), and if I tell you that we have neither the blue nor even the red hymnal, you will understand my hopeful determination with respect to this venture.

I think I purchased only six books.  Had I realized how deeply discounted they were, I would have gone for at least six more.

I have to admit that it was a lot of fun, after I got over the initial shock, to introduce myself to people as the pastor of a church!

Here's a report on what Cynthia had to say in her sermon.  As someone who's had the experience of lively, giving, and prophetic churches, I was delighted with what she had to say.

"After the Old Testament reading (Isaiah 40:28-31, the theme of this Assembly), Mark 2:1-12 was read by the Rev. Landon Whitsitt, vice moderator of the 219th General Assembly. Bolbach then preached on the same text referenced in her platform speech as candidate for moderator two years ago. Her focus from the text in 2010 was on the paralyzed man, suggesting that the PC(USA) was the paralyzed one suffering fatigue over constant battles, uncertainty and fear over the effective proclamation of the gospel in the 21st century.

'Two years later, I have a different focus and a different point of view,' she said. 'I do not believe the PC(USA) is paralyzed … although we are light years removed from the 1950s during which denominationalism and church structure thrived, we are actively engaged and concerned with what God would have us do and be.

'At the heart of the gospel, at the heart of each community of faith that seeks to proclaim the gospel, is not structure or Form of Government. At the heart of the gospel lie disciples like these in Mark who are willing to take risks, willing to do whatever it takes to help others see Jesus. Not just [carry] those whom they like, but maybe even [carrying] those they don’t know, those they don’t like. Willing to go up to the roof, willing to cut a hole in it.'

She continued, 'Over the past two years, I have seen those disciples at work in every nook and cranny in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) … and over the past few months, I have felt those disciples. While struggling with cancer, I have been uplifted and supported by those disciples. Many disagree with me, but they have reached out to help me to the roof, and carried me to see Jesus…. 

'None of [our disagreements] matter without disciples who are willing to take risks for the sake of the gospel. Let’s not worry about process and structure; instead, let’s pray that we will be given the faith that Jesus saw in those disciples. Let’s commit ourselves to be those disciples who will take risks, who will carry others up to the roof….  

'If we commit ourselves to lift someone we don’t know, someone we don’t like, we will soar on wings like eagles, we will run and not grow weary, we will walk and not grow faint because we will be helping people see Jesus. What more could we ask for?' ”

Musings on Ministry

This morning The Questing Parson writes about an encounter with a young almost-pastor and his counsel to her with respect to her first assignment, for which she has grand hopes of growth in numbers.  “Slow the decline and then work on increasing the membership.”

Last Sunday, as occasionally happens, a visitor new to our church made a complimentary remark as to the accuracy of what she had heard about me.  As I thanked her, I looked around wondering, "So where is everyone?"  Word of mouth has not translated into numbers.  Not, I realize, that the numbers are about me.  And I'm trying to focus on depth rather than breadth, something which has been noticed (without prodding from me) by our leadership ~ but, naturally, I am aware of the quantitative element.

Meanwhile, my friend Michelle, who is chemistry professor and contemplative, and a published writer on both, is developing a writer's website.  I've just posted a comment on her FB page, stating that "I love the juxtaposition of the worn and battered composition books with the technology of the site -- reflective of your unique personal blend of contemplative and chemist. It evokes both Marie Curie and Thomas Merton gone contemporary in venue. (And you may recall that my 11th grade writing teacher instructed us that we were forbidden to use the word "unique" unless it applied, which situation was highly unlikely to occur. Here, finally, it does.)"

And now I ponder the connection, a matter which I've begun to process only recently.

Back in my Methodist (Questing Parson's milieu) days, I was a young attorney, struggling to make sense of the demands of my profession  in the context of a new and wobbly Christian faith.   In retrospect, it's clear that I had embarked, determinedly but without guidance, on a path toward a contemplative orientation.  Even when I asked as directly as I could (and I hasten to clarify that I did not know how to articulate the questions I had  or what it was that I was seeking), no assistance was forthcoming from pastors or congregational leaders.

I find myself wondering more and more frequently whether, if someone had been able to point the way, I would still be both a Methodist and a practicing attorney.  If I had been able to integrate both dimensions of my life, would I now be sharing my legal expertise as a leader in the United Methodist Church,  as does a Presbyterian friend with great generosity and care, and offering retreats and spiritual direction to my professional colleagues, as does a Catholic lawyer I know?

And what, exactly, is the connection between depth versus breadth and offering a doorway into the contemplative life in the context of the everyday?  I know; it seems obvious.  But in practice, a good deal more difficult than it looks.

I have been ordained exactly seven months today.  I suppose I am not required to have it all figured out yet.

Churches en Route

These are the churches that I pass en route to and from the Little Lakes:

Presbyterian

Episcopalian

Catholic

Daily Photo 35

 

Good Samaritan Window

Presbyterian Church of Coshocton, Ohio

Daily Photo 34

Presbyterian Church of Coshocton, Ohio

Writer (That's Me) Needs Help!

Some of you have been following my blogs for a long while, some for less ~ and I think that more than a few of you know something about writing for publication.

I'm ready to start seeking some broader outlets for my written work, and wonder whether any of you have some ideas:  agents, editors, publications?  Can you introduce me to anyone?

Here's what I have going on:

My major project involves transforming what was my Desert Year blog ~ and related posts in my other blogs ~ into a book.  As I blogged away during the first couple of years after Josh's death, my topics were varied and I wrote indiscriminately:  the suicide of a child, the grief of parental loss, the absence of God, pastoral care for bereaved parents, attempts to re-group, seminary and ordination in the wake of unfathomable loss.  

I think that I've finally got some focus and direction, a framework for revision of those many pieces of writing ~ but I would be really happy to find someone interested in publishing it!  Perhaps Lauren Winner has just done it better (!), but we all have our stories to tell.  My current version contains so much of  (1) Ignatian spirituality and (2) persistence in ministry despite catastrophe that I think a small religious publisher, Jesuit or Presbyterian (yes, my life is always one in which unusual combinations materialize), would be a likely destination for my work.  Any ideas?

I'm also starting to formulate some articles/essays/small books/whatever in my head on the interface between various Catholic and Protestant spiritualities.  That interface is where I live ~ an Ignatian-trained spiritual director/Presbyterian minister, a pastor of a federated Methodist-Presbyterian church, a Protestant who makes retreats with Jesuits. I know a little about Benedictine, Carmelite, and Ursuline spirituality and nothing much about the Domincans or Franciscans; I know something about Wesleyan and Reformed spiritualities but a lot more about that of Ignatius.  I'm working on broadening my exposure and knowledge, and I would love opportunities to make it all more accessible to others.

So, you published writers out there: Can you help?

Shana Tova!

In a perfectly wonderful confluence of events, the Jewish New Year started Wednesday night and today is the Feast of the Archangels in the Roman Catholic Church.

When I taught in the Jewish school, I had students named Gabe, Gabriella, Michael and Rafi.  

The Lakeview Cemetery images above are of Michael the Archangel (two details) and, I presume, due to the trumpet, Gabriel.

Since this whole cancer thing began, I have had emails and calls from Jesuit friends telling me that they are praying for me when they celebrate Mass, and a FB  message from my friend Carol that she remembered me in her Rosh Hashanah mishebeirach (healing) prayer.  (You should see the photo of her beautiful dinner table.)

Last night I went to the session/council meeting of my new church and came home assured of many Presby-Methodist prayers (and feeling like a pastor!).

And I know that there are other Jewish-Catholic-Protestant-of-all-flavors prayers floating around out there, because people keep writing and telling me so.

There was also Rosh Hashanah chicken soup on my back porch when I got home awhile ago.   And Ignatian tea and jam and chocolate in the mail.

Thank you all so very much. You make cancer a small thing and friendship a great one.