Ink Smudges

Tony Dungy's book

2010-02-02T17:19:00.001-06:00

This was my monthly article for the parish newsletter in September of '08. Forgot to post it here, and it seems timely given the Colts are playing this Sunday.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

As we head back into the school year and the beginning of football season, this month’s margin smudges are in the pages of some light reading appropriate for this time of year: Quiet Faith: The Principles, Practices, and Priorities of a Winning Life by Tony Dungy and Nathan Whitaker.

As you football fans know, Tony Dungy is the head coach of the Indianapolis Colts and the winning coach in Super Bowl XLI. It’s also well known that he is a Christian; he is not bashful about talking about his faith and is willing to use the publicity that an NFL coach receives to do that in all manner of venues. The book was a big hit when it was published last year, and many of you may have read it already.

The book is the memoir of a football coach, so there is a certain amount of football involved, but it’s not a book about football. Instead, it is a book about faith. He talks with frank honesty about his struggles early on in the league, his questioning whether he is doing God’s will in his life, and his struggles about whether or not to continue coaching. His son James committed suicide toward the end of the season in 2005; he spends a whole chapter talking about the grieving process, even including the things he said when he spoke at his son’s funeral.

Here are just a couple of quotations:

“I had always said that trusting in the Lord was the answer. Now, facing my own tragedy, I knew I needed to accept the truth that God’s love and power were sufficient. If I really believed it, I needed to use this personal and painful time to validate that belief. God would work for the good of those who love Him, even if we didn’t understand how He was going to do it.”

“I didn’t want to be an icon. I wanted to provide hope. I wanted my experience to open people’s eyes to the opportunities available to all of us. Not necessarily just opportunities in football…but any opportunity to knock down the walls that divide us. That’s how God wants it to be.”

There’s a reason this book was a #1 bestseller, and it’s not because a bunch of football fans bought it. It’s worth your time to read, and your faith will be strengthened by it. As always, you can borrow my copy—it’s on the shelf in my study.

More thoughts on college football

2009-12-11T15:07:00.006-06:00

I wondered out loud at this time last year if this would be the year I quit caring about college football.

Turns out I was right.

It's funny, now that Texas is scheduled to play for the (deliberate quotes here) "national championship," and Colt McCoy is once again a finalist for the Heisman, and I should theoretically be on the edge of my seat with anticipation, or on top of the world, I just find it hard to work up the emotional energy.

Several things contribute to this for me. At least one part is that I've moved to a small town in deep south Texas, where they root enthusiastically for the local college team, but it's a division II school, without all of the hype and media coverage that follows most major-college programs.

And I got to know some of the players, and the coach. They came to church together this year, during "fall camp" before the start of the season. So I got a chance to preach to them, and later lead pre-game devotions for the Fellowship of Christian Athletes, which was most of the team. When they came to worship, many came up to the altar rail during communion to ask for a blessing, so I literally laid hands on... oh, I didn't count, but I'm guessing about two-thirds of the team, and asked for God's blessing and protection on each one.

Watching them play this year reminded me of my freshman year in college, when I shared a suite with four guys on the team. Made watching the game a completely different experience. I'd frequently watch a play and ask the guy next to me what happened--I might not even notice the tackle at the end, because the whole time I was watching my friend Richard, who played center, pancake-block his man... or I was focused in on Joey, or Jason, or Joel.

Watching the Javelinas was like that this year. Okay, maybe we didn't make the first down and we have to punt, but Markeith made his block, did you see that?

But a big part was that last season's ending soured me on major-college football. So let's just be honest about some things.

First, major college football is an entertainment industry. The players are, depending on how you define it, professional entertainers. They might not get paid directly, but the players get scholarships and make connections which will help them financially in their future careers, even if they don't play professional ball in any future league. They're compensated. The pricing of tickets and licensing of apparel and broadcasting rights is not driven by what you need to break even, like in small programs, it's driven by what the market will bear.

Second, let's just call it what it is. The BCS is not a playoff. It's a cartel.

(go look up the definition, and then tell me you disagree with me. Go on, look it up. I'll wait.)

Last year was a mess. Nine teams with a reasonable argument that they should be playing for the crystal football. This year was almost worse. Six teams finished the regular season undefeated. (Alabama, Florida, Texas, Boise State, Cincinnati, and TCU).

I think my poster child for why the BCS is broken is Boise State. They have the most legitimate gripe, in my opinion. The Broncos have run the table, gone undefeated in the regular season, three out of the last four years. I don't care what conference you play in, that's ridiculously hard to do. They got into the BCS once before, and beat Oklahoma in the Fiesta Bowl. Remember the Statue of Liberty play and the guy who scored the winning points proposing to his cheerleader girlfriend?

And after all that, there was not any serious conversation about having the Broncos play for the crystal football this year. (Why the hell not?) Instead, the BCS cartel made the cowardly move of having the "outsiders" play each other. What's that about....?

Greed.

Boise State is in a "non-BCS conference," i.e., not a part of the cartel, which is not driven by trying to create a champion, or athletic success, or fair competition. It's driven by making money. The rules are that #1 and #2 (according to a bizarre and arcane ranking system) play each other, and then each bowl chooses teams from those available (with certain limitations) that make the most sense (i.e., most money) for each one. Boise Sate and TCU are outsiders. Small-market outsiders. How many people live in Boise, Idaho?

And since I included the Heisman in this ranting last year, I might as well include it this year.

As long as we're calling things what they are, we have to quit calling the Heisman the award for "the best player in college football." You might, at best, call it the award for "the best quarterback or running back who plays for a team that finishes in the top 5 in the AP poll."

What made me give up on the Heisman this year was the end-of-year reporting. Sure, I know writers gotta write and talking heads gotta talk, and part of their job is to stir up controversy. And since it's been clear for about a month now that (barring any major upset) it was probably going to be Florida or Alabama vs. Texas on January 7th, the pot-stirring has been more about the funny statue than the "championship game." (again, deliberate quotes)

I will admit to a little bias, but I also honestly think Colt McCoy is the best player in college football. Just one stat: 45 career victories, an NCAA record. Oh, the others are outstanding players too.

After thanksgiving night, the overwhelming consensus in the media was that he had it sewn up. But there was still one game to play. If Colt does not win because in the last game before the voting deadline, he had a rough night against one of the ten best defenses in the country... then let's rename it to the award for "the best quarterback or running back who plays for a team that finishes in the top 5 in the AP poll and has a good game the last week of the season."

* * * * *

For the record, the TAMUK Javelinas made the playoffs. You know, playoffs? With college-student players, who manage to find a way to do it every year in division II and also take finals? Yeah, they lost in the first round. An amazing game, lost because the opposing team made a 64-yard field goal as time expired. (I saw it with my own two eyes and still didn't believe it.) I'm still proud of them for a good season.

Lost fair and square. The way Boise State should have a chance to do.

out of hibernation?

2009-12-11T11:22:00.003-06:00

A recent request by our diocesan communications department to link to various bloggers in the diocese made me realize that it's been almost a year since I wrote anything.

I started this blog in September, 2005, just two months after I began a new phase of life, employed as clergy and working as a congregational pastor. The first line of the first post was "hello, world," ironic when you consider the recent frenzy surrounding Tiger's life.

The thing that pushed me over into the blogisphere was that I was already publishing things on the internet. I was required, at my former parish, to write a monthly column for the printed newsletter. It was already published (deep down in the church's horrible web page, but out there nonetheless). And people started asking for copies of my sermons, and I learned as an airport consultant that once something leaves your hand, it should be treated as public knowledge.

So I figured, if I'm already publishing, I might as well write a blog. My rule was that I would post any newsletter article that might vaguely be interesting outside the parish, and any sermon that someone asked for a copy of. And to those entries I would add various other essays.
[side moment of true confession--there were a couple of people who asked for copies of sermons, and I thought it was not because they wanted to read it again for their own spiritual growth, but because I had said something controversial that had upset them... and I was afraid of them trying to use my words against me, so I lied (just a couple of times) and said that I hadn't written out a full manuscript.]

Over the last four years, several things have happened.
* My old friend Meeegan and new friend Tripp got me writing about the book Sabbath, which was a whole series in itself.
* My friend Gordon, aka Real Live Preacher, encouraged me to write and got me in on the ground floor of a network of bloggers for the Christian Century.
* We had a child, which completely sucked my brain clean of the ability to sit and write coherently for several months.
http://schereschewsky.blogspot.com/2007/11/new-daddy-brain-no-blog-posts.html
* I started thinking about who was reading, which led me to shut up where others were speaking up. You can read about that here:
http://schereschewsky.blogspot.com/2008/09/long-blog-silence.html
* I finally got on Facebook, which changed the way I stay in touch with some friends. I still check my regular list of blogs, and wider church news, as has been my habit every Monday morning for 15 years. I'm not the only one who has slowed or ceased blogging when they found a new way to connect... the list of blogs I read regularly gets smaller and smaller as people quit writing.

But the biggest reason is that I'm at a new parish now, and they are not exactly technologically sophisticated. Note: that doesn't mean stupid, or ignorant. I have at least seven university professors and a dean in my congregation, and I'm working on the president. We just communicate differently. The patriarch of the congregation, a man universally loved in this little town, told me once he checks his email once a month, whether it needs it or not.
Yes, we have a parish newsletter, but (and there's layers of meaning in this) it is physically cut-and-pasted together by our editor. My articles for it tend to be announcements of upcoming events, giving detail, rather than meditations, or something else useful or interesting outside of Kingsville. (side note: Peter Gomes said once in my hearing "sermon-ettes make Christian-ettes," and I agree wholeheartedly. I absolutely despise trite little front-page newsletter offerings. I've tried for five years to learn to say something spiritually meaningful in three hundred words or less, and I can't do it. Maybe I need to take up poetry like my friend Gil...)

And not one time in a year have I been asked for a copy of a sermon. Either my sermons suck now, or people just don't ask. Not sure I want to know which is true.

In eleven months of living in Kingsville, I think I have six facebook friends in town--only four from the congregation, and they never contact me or post anything on their own facebook accounts.

(plus it's been a hectic year in a lot of ways.)

At the end of the day (one of my favorite phrases), I'm not sure who's reading this any more, and the original reason for writing the blog has gone away.

I still publish, and occasionally it's something useful outside of Kingsville. So there will be more posts to come--maybe as soon as later today. But if you're still reading... don't hold your breath in between.

non-spiritual ranting: and the Oscar goes to...

2008-12-17T14:05:00.002-06:00

When I was a kid, I used to enjoy watching the Oscars. The Academy Awards show, I guess it’s actually called. I liked seeing all the people from the movies dressed up in street clothes, and trying to remember which movie I had seen them in. I remember Johnny Carson was the host a few times, and he was so classy about his presentation, and I loved getting to see him because normally I didn’t get to stay up late enough to watch his show.

Then there was the presentation of the awards themselves. Just like today, there would be little clips from the movies that had been nominated, and then that moment of tension while the envelope was opened: “and the winner is…”

Somewhere along the way, the presenters were instructed to say something different. Instead of announcing a winner, they were told to say “and the Oscar goes to…” I didn’t notice at first, until one actor brought it up in his acceptance speech, acknowledging all the other nominees and saying that he couldn’t believe he had won if they were also nominated.

* * * * * * * * * *

Do you want to know the best movie of 2005? Hands down? Absolutely no contest?

Serenity.

I’ll just say this: if you’ve never seen it, go rent it. Better yet, go buy it, because you’re going to want to keep it. And then get the DVDs of Firefly, which was its TV predecessor. Or come borrow mine. But you have to give it back, because it’s easily on my top 10 list of movies I’ve ever seen.

It may even be the best science fiction movie ever made.

It crosses genres (western meets science fiction), it tells a story of deep and meaningful relationships between people, and what they do and sacrifice for each other. It’s a story about society, and about the nature of the self. Every single one of the characters (okay, maybe not Jayne) is deeply written enough that you could spend hours talking about just that character. The acting is superb. It’s funny, not as in staged gags and humor, but as in the way that people really laugh with each other. It’s sexy in parts, but there is no blatant why-is-this-in-here sex scene. There are tears for the cast and probably for the audience. There are moments of shocking revelation. There’s action and violence, but not the kind of action that takes over the plot of the story.

Okay, enough waxing rhapsodic.

I’ll bet you a nickel you can’t name the “best picture” Oscar winner that year, even though it was just a couple of years ago. [short interlude while the music plays and gives you time to think]

It was a film called Crash, which was a heavy-handed, slap-you-in-the-face-with-the-point movie about racism and the ‘gritty reality’ of urban life. The other nominees included… Munich, a violent, nasty film about terrorism and the horror surrounding it on all sides, Capote, a film about a tortured homosexual writer falling in love with a man who is on death row for the murder of an entire family, and, please God let me forget this movie, Brokeback Mountain, which I’m not going to dignify with any further comment. (you all who are mortally offended at this point because I’ve criticized your favorite movie ever, take a deep breath. The point is that they’re all dark, depressing, twisted films)

It was a growing-up moment for me when I realized that the Oscar didn’t go to the best actor, film, or song, it went to the one that got the most votes from the members of the academy. And there’s sometimes a vast difference between the two. But we shouldn't really blame the Academy. Every community rewards those who affirm their image of themselves, and the Oscars exist for the purpose of self-congratulation.

And you know what? I hardly watch the Oscars any more. We record it every year, and I sometimes fast-forward to see the acceptance speeches for the big awards, but at the end of the day I really just don’t care what “the academy” thinks.

* * * * * * * *

Well, I’ve had another one of those who’s-the-best growing-up moments this year, in an entirely different arena: college football.

I frankly think there’s something seriously wrong with the inflation of college sports into a farm system for professional sports. I’ve already ranted on that elsewhere.

But if you’re going to play a competitive game, and have a ranking system, then you should have a champion at the end of the season. That’s just logical. Every other sport at every other level does this—except Division I football. I’ve never liked the BCS, not since the beginning. But this year is worse than usual.

There are nine teams (twelve, if you count the teams with two losses) whose players, coaches, and fans have a legitimate, reasonable argument to say that their team is the best in college football. Nine. Boise State, Penn State, Texas Tech, Utah, USC, Florida, Alabama, Oklahoma, and Texas all could play in the last game of the season and say they deserved to be there. On January 8th, some announcer will hand the coach (probably Bob Stoops) the crystal football, and seven other teams will watch and say, “nice game, but we could have beaten those guys.” (Texas players will say, “we DID beat those guys.”)

And for me, it’s going to be one of those moments like when they hand out the Oscars. “and the crystal football goes to…” Well, that’s nice and all, but they’re not the best team. They’re one of the teams that got enough votes to get into the last game of the year.

And who are the voters? Sportswriters, who are supposed to be neutral, but everyone knows are biased toward the teams they cover and the teams that make news. Boise State doesn’t get any love from this crowd, not even after a couple of spectacular seasons. How many readers are in Boise? And then there’s the coaches’ poll. Does anybody seriously think that coaches of major college football programs are actually watching a whole lot of other teams play and making unbiased, informed votes? I bet Mike Leach probably watches a whole lot of game film, but not a whole lot of Florida Gators game film, seeing as how Texas Tech doesn’t play them very often. So they have to listen to the news same as the rest of us, and see the highlights and the scoreboard.

Which leads to another abomination in this process. Thanksgiving weekend, there were three big games played. Florida-Alabama, Texas-Texas A&M, and Oklahoma-Oklahoma State. All with big implications for the last game of the year. And the announcers and commentators were talking about not just wins, but “style points.”

Style points? Excuse me? What is this, figure skating?

* * * * * * *

To put another face on this, let’s go to the perspective of an almost unknown person, a woman named Debra, who lives in a tiny, one-stop-sign-no-Dairy-Queen town in the Texas panhandle, which means, in case you’ve never been there, that this woman lives in the middle of nowhere. Her husband is the local football coach, which, let’s just acknowledge, can’t be an easy life. Her kids, of course, are football players. They’re also good students, and attend church regularly, and volunteer in the community.

So one of her kids (Daniel) grows up and gets ready to move away, and he’s recruited to play football at a big school that’s hours and hours away from her home by car. A school that plays big-time college football, where the defensive linemen weigh well over three hundred pounds and can bench-press the team bus and rip phone books in half. Her son plays quarterback, but this school already has one—maybe the most gifted athlete the school has ever had at the position in a hundred years.

So your son sits on the sidelines for a year, and never gets in the game, and that’s okay, because you don’t want him to get killed. But then the amazing athlete leaves school to go play football on Sundays and your kid gets to play, and sure enough, he gets hurt. Hurt bad enough that they take him to the hospital in an ambulance while the game is still going on.

But your kid is tough, and he does his rehab and lift weights and drinks milkshakes and gains weight and goes back out there for another season. And gets hurt again, this time bad enough that for a while the doctors are afraid he might not be able to walk again. Would you let your son go back for a third season?

Well, unbelieveably, she does, and the third year the kid has finally started to really fill out, and he has a good season. A really good season. In fact, people start talking about giving him that funny-looking famous trophy for being the best football player in the country. How would that feel? From wondering if your son is going to walk again to winning the prize for best player in the country in one year?

Well, I’m sorry, dear readers. Daniel “Colt” McCoy did not win the Heisman this year. Why? Because the award is granted by voters, and his team will not be playing in the last game of the season.

Earlier this year, Texas Tech beat Texas, by one play. Michael Crabtree made a great athletic catch and struggled into the end zone. Two guys had a shot at him, and neither one made the tackle. If either one of those guys makes the tackle, we’re not even having this conversation. (if any one of five different plays gets made over the course of the game, the same is true) Instead, Texas is undefeated, all the press coverage is on them, and the debate is about who gets to play them in the last game… and Colt McCoy probably wins the Heisman easily. You know it’s true.

You could make a similar argument for the other two finalists, or for Graham Harrell. If their team had gone undefeated, they get far more attention, they get to wear the mantle of “quarterback of the undisputed #1 team in the country,” and they probably win the Heisman. But it’s more bitter for Colt McCoy, because they lost by one play. One defensive play. One defensive play in October is the difference maker in deciding who is the best quarterback in the country? And how on earth to you explain this rationally to Daniel’s mother? Good luck.

* * * * * * *

Okay, I know, I’m ranting.

What I’m wondering is, will I look back on this as the year I quit liking college football?

Spam and Eggs

2008-10-14T16:29:00.006-05:00

Happy Schereschewsky day, everyone!

It's the feast day of this blog's patron saint, Samuel Isaac Joseph Schereschewsky. I intended to write something commemorating the day. You know, use a few words to honor the man of many words.

And then, instead, I sent a LOT of words. Spam happened. And it's my fault. I clicked the wrong button.

As far as I can tell, an email has been sent to every person in my address book telling them to check out my facebook page and asking them to sign up for an account. (yes, I do have a facebook page. I'm late to the whole facebook party, but finally got there. That's another story for another day.)

Then I tried to send a "sorry, please disregard earlier email" message, but my email program wouldn't let me, saying that I had exceeded the maximum number of messages in an hour. As if I was a spammer... oh, wait, I guess I am.

My whole freakin' address book. It includes three quarters of the active members of my current congregation, about a hundred core leaders from other congregations I've served in and still keep in touch with, at least three ex-girlfriends (don't ask), all of the clergy of West Texas, three judges, fifteen or twenty bishops (one of them a primate), my Senators and Congressman... Ah, crap.

Right. I'm a spammer. And I have egg on my face. (Spam and eggs, get it?)

I'm going home to hide in the closet.

two thousand feet of rock--finished!!!

2008-09-26T17:11:00.000-05:00

(This post has been overdue since March. Better late than never)

It took a lot of work, but... we have a labyrinth!

Here's how it started: with an empty field.

We staked out the widths of the paths with string and flags, and asked the congregation to come put a rock next to one of the flags. People of all ages helped, with rocks big and small.

Eventually, we called a couple of work days. People brought pickup trucks, and we were able to place several loads each day.

At the beginning of the process, the rector placed the initial stone on the altar in our worship space. When we finished the labyrinth, it went in the center.

It's a big labyrinth...

Come walk with us!

The Mathematics of Inevitability

2008-09-25T17:30:00.004-05:00

Sometimes, it really sucks being trained as an engineer.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Two weeks ago Tuesday afternoon, I was packing to go to a conference in Corpus Christi, Texas. Then we got the word that the conference was postponed because of in impending hurricane. By Wednesday evening, the projections said that Ike would be directly overhead of us here in San Antonio on Sunday morning, as a category 1 or 2 hurricane.

I sent an email to my congregation, warning them of the possibility of a hurricane (just in case someone wasn't listening to the news), and telling them to use their common sense on whether or not they should try to get here for worship on Sunday. I planned out a couple of alternate routes for myself for Sunday morning (the two most obvious ways to get from my house to the church campus have streets that flood).

We weren't alone--events got cancelled all over San Antonio. Kids' activities, high school football... and the Texas Longhorns rescheduled a football game in Austin. Now there's a sign that the world just might be coming to an end.

On Sunday morning, Ike was... over five hundred miles away. In Missouri, for crying out loud.

The very best minds we have, using the most sophisticated computer modeling we have, missed their guess by five hundred miles. Some things we still don't know how to predict, or else are inherently unpredictable.

And then there are other things, whose behavior we know very well how to predict. And that's why it sucks sometimes to be an engineer.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Engineers, you see, are trained to understand the way the world works, and to make it a better place. I studied with Phil Bedient, and I know that hydrology is a fascinating and complicated discipline, but if you over-over-simplify, this is true:

V=R*I*T*A

where
V=Volume of water
and
R=rate of rainfall
I is a coefficient for the percentage of the impervious surface of the land, from 0 to 100%
T=time of rainfall
A=area on which the rain falls

Just for fun, I've used this basic formula (yes, I'm a nerd) to calculate the rate of rainfall, based on the amount of time it takes to fill up a trash can with the runoff from the roof of my house.

Applying to the impending hurricane:

Houston, my friends, is a great big place. It's flat as a pancake, with a huge portion of it paved over or developed. By late Thursday evening, our best guess had changed, and a storm five hundred miles wide was heading for the city, where it was about to rain very, very hard.

And the engineer part of my brain said: It's going to flood, and at least a few people are going to die. The only question is where, and how much.

I've also studied roadway design and traffic flow, and even if there's not such an overly simple equation to show you, I know that if you made every highway single-direction flow out of town, and somehow got the residents of the city to move with military precision, with no breakdowns or accidents, you still couldn't evacuate four million people in less than two days, even if you wanted to.

Which meant that when the mayor of Houston (or the disaster response people) said that they were "taking a calculated risk" when they only ordered the evacuation of certain portions of the city, that's true, but it's only partially true. The other side of it is that they know that they can't evacuate the city that fast, and people with pretty good models for runoff and floods (like the aforementioned professor) know where it's going to flood first, so they move those people first.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Seven years ago this September, I remember having a similar moment about an impending disaster. I didn't see the first plane hit the world trade center, and I was hoping it was a particularly horrible accident. But when the second plane hit, I was sitting on my friend Brian's couch watching it on TV, and it was clear that this was deliberate.

I was stunned for a few minutes, wondering how on earth, and who... and then I started thinking about what was going on. Suddenly, the part of my brain that studied high-rise building design jumped over and overlaid itself on the part of my brain that had been an airport consultant for a few years, and I knew--I knew--that the towers were coming down.

I stared at the wall, and saw in my imagination the curves from the steel construction handbook that describe the strength of steel as a function of temperature. I saw, dancing before my eyes, the homework I had done in high-rise design and in structural stability class. And I turned to Brian and said, "Oh, God, they're gonna collapse."

It's just the mathematics of inevitability.

(by the way, it's not that I'm a particularly good or smart engineer. I'm certain that every one of my classmates came to the same conclusion, wherever they were scattered around the country, only they got there faster than I did)

I got up to call my only friend who worked in the World Trade Center, and got as far as picking up the phone, before realizing that he's pretty smart guy, and was (if he was even in the office that day) already on his way out of the building. I put the phone back down, and went and sat back down on the couch, and waited for the horrible scene I knew was coming.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

When a city floods, whose fault is it?

You can't blame the hurricane. It didn't decide to turn North, it just happened.

You can't really blame the city engineers, either. They designed a bayou system for Houston that will handle some tremendous storms. If I remember right, Braes Bayou is designed for the five-hundred year storm. (That means a storm of such intensity that it occurs, on average, once every five hundred years) But it was designed for a five-hundred-year storm in the city in which it was built... and Houston kept growing. Several years later, the runoff from all that extra pavement still flows downhill (such as that is in Houston), and it gets to the creeks and ditches and bayous as intended, but there's more of it than there used to be.

So who's to blame now? Should we tell Mrs. Martinez on the west side of the city that she is not allowed, after all, to realize her dream of owning a house in America? Should we forbid St. Martin's from constructing their enormous new worship space? Make the members of Second Baptist Church park on the grass rather than paving over a parking lot the size of Massachusetts?

Even if maybe we should say some of those kinds of things, we probably won't..because this is basically a free country, and people are going to do what they're going to do. There are laws in place in many inhabited areas that require new construction to be offset by the creation of retention ponds, which makes me feel a little better. But there are plenty of good people who find ways around those laws, or who ignore them because constructing the water retention areas are sometimes expensive.

It's old news by now, but I guess we have to keep saying it. We must recognize that our lives are interconnected. What I do matters.

We breathe the same air, we share the same water supply. When I cut down a tree, we all have a tiny bit less oxygen to breathe. And when I pave over the land, there are people (literally) downstream who are affected.

Death of another classmate

2008-09-18T19:24:00.029-05:00

I was the youngest member of my seminary class. Every last one of us are second-career clergy, and some of my classmates had already retired once, before pursuing a different vocation.

I remember the day that I realized that being the youngest meant I stood a good chance of grieving every one of their deaths, one by one. I just didn't expect that one of them would die at 42.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

D. Brent Russell was technically the graduating class behind me, rather than my class year. He was an interesting fellow...Strongly held opinions. High ecclesiology. And, unfortunately, intolerant of bullshit. It got him thrown out of a rather heavy-handed cultural immersion course that he was required to attend, and he had to go back for a second helping the next year.

We got to be friends over a series of loooong afternoons in the back workroom of the library. See, almost every student at the seminary in Austin is on a work-study program for financial aid. It becomes a kind of monastic service to the community. In between classes, you see people sweeping, cleaning, running video, shelving books, working for professors. My second year, I had the great privilege of being the student assistant to the Dean. That was way cool. Third year, though, I said that I was willing to let somebody else have that honor, and I moved to the library.

And so it was that, many afternoons, Brent and I sat in the workroom and talked about life, and classes, and the state of the church, and theology, and human sexuality, and liturgics, and... life. I was unhurriedly checking in and shelving periodicals, and he was unhurriedly fixing up old books, repairing spines, carefully gluing end panels back together. I asked him once where he got so good at that kind of thing, and he laughed.

Turns out he was a funeral director before coming to seminary. Didn't really surprise me, once I thought about it. That, of course, gave us material to talk about for at least a month. He never betrayed personal information, but he had stories that would make you laugh and weep, sometimes both in the same story.

He gave me a great gift one afternoon. I went out to his house, waved to his wife, sat down with him at his kitchen table, and for three or four hours talked about the nuts and bolts of the funeral industry from the funeral director's perspective. He had documents, tricks of the trade, perspectives on things I'd never thought about. It was advice I took to heart, and it's come in handy several times already.

* * * * * * * * * * * * *

The thing I'll remember most is what we called each other. Not sure how it started... probably, it was because I said something to him in the middle of an argument like "okay, in twenty years when you're the Bishop of Texas, we can do it your way," and he responded with something not generally printable.

(Note to the non-clergy:Seminarians love to tease each other about things like that. Nobody in their right mind wants to be the bishop.)

The next day, I walked into the workroom, and called out, "Good afternoon, Your Grace!" Without missing a beat or even turning around, Brent responded, "Good afternoon, Your Eminence!" (which is the honorific for a Roman Catholic Cardinal, or an Archbishop, depending on your religious tradition.) I cracked up laughing, and somehow it stuck.

It became our ritual greeting:

Good afternoon, Your Grace.
Good afternoon, Your Eminence.

* * * * * * * * * * * * *

Life moved on. I was ordained and hired and brought to San Antonio. Brent dropped out of the ordination process, finished his seminary degree anyway, and made some difficult and painful decisions about his family and his future. Then he decided to try his hand at being a chaplain, which is extremely difficult duty. I think he would have made a great priest, or a great chaplian, in the right circumstances.

And then came the brain aneurysm, a 'successful' repair surgery, the beginnings of rehab, and a sudden (and probably merciful) death. By the time I got the news, he was already gone.

Goodbye, Your Grace.

*

A long blog silence

2008-09-12T09:58:00.005-05:00

I think I've finally figured out why I haven't written in quite a while.

Most of you who have had face-to-face conversations with me know that I'm not exactly naturally shy or reserved. ("In love with the sound of my own voice" is more accurate.) In small groups, I have to be careful not to dominate the conversation. I have to constantly remind myself to stop and listen, really listen, to my wife and children, rather than jumping in before they even finish their sentences, and I'm not always successful at that.

But in a large group, I'm different. I want to choose my words carefully. I don't want to waste the time of a large group of people with an incomplete or rambling thought.

I've been a delegate to diocesan council in three different dioceses, covering at least twelve years. In all that time, I've never stood up to address the council, not even once. I've gone to clergy conference for three years, and I have yet to speak up at clergy conference. (sotto voce jokes not withstanding) I've attended city council meetings, meetings of concerned citizens about airport noise, and public forums, and only rarely, rarely, will I say anything.

The funny thing is that I tend to be one of those people who have to start talking about something complicated before I get it straight in my head. I almost always have a step in the sermon writing process where I go for a long walk, or take advantage of a long drive, or shut the door and pace around and around and talk to myself. If we have to make a decision quickly, I'll sometimes ask my wife "let me think out loud for a minute, okay?" and she knows that the first thing out of my mouth might not be the same as the last thing.

* * * * * * * * *

A while ago, my friend Gordon Atkinson asked me to be a part of the network of bloggers for the Christian Century. (you've almost certainly noticed the link in the upper right corner of this page.) I had to think about it for a while to see if I wanted to be included, but finally accepted. I suddenly found myself in distinguished company, people who were faithful and far more articulate than I am and insightful and smart and funny. I read everything that anyone in the network wrote, for a while. Then the network grew and grew, and more and more voices were added, all of them worth reading. I kept reading. And the more I did that, the less I wrote.

Took me a while to recognize the same dynamic that happens when I'm in a room full of people. I realized that I was unconsciously weighing everything that was going on in my head to say against the wonderful stuff that was already being said, and deciding not to waste everyone's time on it. And then I got out of the habit of regular writing. And then life events happened, and I had a few crazy-busy weeks, and then all of a sudden it's been three months since I posted. And if it's been three months, then it's really no big deal if I let it stretch to four...

Take, for example, the subject of my most recent post. It was the middle of Lent, and we were building a labyrinth. Yes, we finished it. Yes, I started writing about it. I even have pictures. But the urgency wasn't there to post it. The people at my congregation already knew it was finished, and my friends who read this blog from several states (or countries) away couldn't come and walk it with us, and all those wonderful people in the bloggers network probably wouldn't care less... Same goes for my monthly articles for the parish newsletter, and sermon manuscripts.

This is silly, I know, but I haven't been consciously thinking about it. It took a day like today, when I was going to be doing something that got cancelled and then I was going to be really busy doing another important thing that's probably not going to happen either and I unexpectedly have a free day to sit back and take few deep breaths and look around to see what I've been neglecting that I shouldn't be.

I never promised to be prolific, but I won't be living in a cave again.

two thousand feet of rock

2008-02-05T08:36:00.000-06:00

The rector of my parish has, literally, laid out a challenge for the congregation during this season. He has asked us to build a labyrinth.

My congregation's worship space, offices, and school sit on twelve acres on the north side of San Antonio. Four of those acres are completely undeveloped, mostly grassy field with a few trees. There are "long-term master plan" sorts of plans for the land, but those plans are years away from fruition.

In the meantime, Chuck wants us to turn the field into a place for prayer.

So, last weekend, three of the ministers of the church went out and staked out the outline of an 11-circuit labyrinth, and placed survey flags in the ground to mark the width of each path. The idea is that the members of the church will bring rocks to line the paths.

The more I think about it, the more I think it's a great idea. For those of you unfamiliar with San Antonio, it's dry, rocky country. There are stones everywhere. You can pick them up off the side of a highway. You can dig down in your front yard about three inches and hit one. When we were placing the survey flags, it was a 50-50 proposition whether there would be enough soil in the right place you wanted to plant the flag for it to stick. Half the time you would go to put the flag in the ground and would hit (you guessed it) rock.

The point is, everybody can participate. Maybe you don't have extra money for world missions or extra time to volunteer, but everybody can find a rock or two... or five, or ten.

My rough estimate of how much we'll need: a little over two thousand feet of rock.

If you're in San Antonio, come particiapte. Bring us a rock, 12 inches long (roughly the size of an american football), head out to the field on the southwest corner of our church grounds, and place your rock next to one of the survey flags.

Current count: 39 rocks.

stay tuned.

The Golden Compass review

2008-01-28T19:42:00.000-06:00

I've been asked to renew my series (called "margin smudges" in our parish newsletter) in which I review and comment on books I'm reading, and specifically to start with Philip Pullman's The Golden Compass. At the time of the request, I had neither seen the recently-released movie nor, more importantly, read the book on which it's based. Having now done so (thanks to a loaner copy from Betsy Rupe to get me started), I can with a little more integrity add my two cents to the reviews that have already been published.

The Golden Compass is the first of a three-volume work entitled His Dark Materials, and as such is only the opening to a longer story. It is remarkably well written and makes an enjoyable read. The characters are believable and real, and Pullman has great storytelling skill. The movie is also well done, and actually does the first novel some justice. The acting is superb, the CGI and special effects are seamless, and other than what I thought were a few poor casting decisions (Sir Ian McKellen as Iorek? Really?), it's a thoroughly enjoyable film.

As you've probably heard already, though, it's not the first book of the trilogy that's the problem; it's books two and three. Philip Pullman is an avowed atheist, and, as he told The Sydney Morning Herald point-blank in an interview, "My books are about killing God.” At the end of book three, his protagonists do just that (sort of).

The god that gets killed in Pullman's novel, though, bears almost no resemblance to the Living God we worship and serve. It's more the medieval concept of an old man with a long beard living in the sky who is out of touch with the world. He's described with weak limbs and rheumy eyes, a rather pathetic and almost pitiable figure.

Pullman's real target isn't God, exactly, but rather "the church." The overarching point he makes is that the church wants to control behavior, and thus robs humanity of our freedom and robs life of all beauty. Pullman is particularly savage in his criticism of the church's desire to control human sexuality. The exercise of sexual expression, for Pullman and his characters, is something to be celebrated, a way to grow and mature, to expand human consciousness. Thus puberty is the beginning of self-knowledge and intellectual curiosity. To quote Hanna Rosen's review in Atlantic Monthly, "To [Pullman], the loss of sexual innocence is not a tragedy; it’s the springboard to a productive and virtuous adulthood."

While many Christian writers have condemned the books and the movie, it may be surprising to note that Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury (and a formidable theologian), is an admirer of Pullman’s and a supporter of his books. Williams even spoke in favor of using the books as a text for religious education in England, for he contends that Pullman's negative portrayal of the church amounts to an attack on dogmatism and the oppressive abuse of religion, not on Christianity itself. (It’s interesting to note that the person and teaching of Jesus are not a part of Pullman’s construct called “The Authority.”)

It’s unfortunately true that there’s been plenty of oppression in the history of the church, and plenty of attempts to control human behavior, even going so far as abuse and violence, so Pullman’s argument finds an easy mark.

Where the rubber meets the road on this kind of review is: will I take my son to see the movie, and will I read the book to him (or let him read it himself)? And a close corollary is: do I think the children of the parish should read it?

My answer is entirely dependent on the maturity of the child. I’m all for engaging children with deep and meaningful questions about life, spirituality, and morality. But the main point of the book requires a certain level of maturity to grasp. Any child able to read with comprehension will understand that the books are firmly against “God” and “The Church.” I’d want to wait until the reader has sufficient maturity to be able to question how Pullman’s world and ours differ before tackling these stories.

To pre-pubescent children, much of the subtext about sexual expression may also be missed, which may be an argument for letting them read the books early, depending on how you look at it. The whole "heroine loses her virginity and thereby saves the whole multi-world universe from impending doom" ending seemed... pointedly overdone, and fairly ridiculous. I saw it coming from at least three hundred pages away and kinda hoped that particular train wreck wasn't going to happen. Alas.

I will, eventually, encourage my boys to read these books. But I’ll wait until I think they’re ready, and until I judge that I can engage them in the important conversations that the book begins.

$6000 per pound

2007-12-20T14:38:00.000-06:00

The baby bills are starting to come in. Some of them are enormous. I'm keeping a running tally, and the current cost of bringing Zachary home from the hospital: approximately six thousand dollars a pound. That's just the hospital cost... individual bills for the physicians will arrive separately, or so they told me.

Several thoughts come to mind.

First, it really doesn't matter what the bill is; a child is priceless.

Second, it's odd to incur such a huge bill for services that I didn't deliberately choose to pay. Sure, you sign a waiver and agreement for treatment and all that legalese when you check in to the hospital. Then your wife is in labor and they want to give her IV drips of drugs you've never heard of, and then she eventually requires an emergency c-section (read: major abdominal surgery), and then they whisk the baby off to the NICU because he's not breathing properly and keep him there for four days, and meanwhile, your beloved's life is saved, not once, but twice, by an attentive nurse, OB, and anesthesiologist. Nowhere in this process do you say, or even think, "hey, wait a second, what's this going to cost?"

Third, I'm thankful we are insured. It's actually rather good insurance. There are a few ways that the church takes care of our clergy, and the insurance coverage is one of them. So my out of pocket cost will be a fraction of that. A surprisingly small fraction.

But what if I wasn't insured? I guess we might have tried to deliver the baby somewhere cheaper. (But if we hadn't been at a first-class medical facility, my wife and son would have died. No kidding.) Or we would have sucked it up and paid it ourselves, which would have exhausted all our savings, and we're people who are living privileged lives. There are plenty of people in America who don't have health insurance, can't afford it, or don't qualify. Gordon wrote about this recently, with more eloquence than I have at my disposal at the moment.

No matter how you look at it, the health care system in this country needs fixing. And what irks me is that this is an election year coming up. Which means we're going to hear a lot of hot air about health care and prescription drugs for seniors (because seniors vote in large numbers), and not a whole heck of lot about addressing the difficult issues of who's going to pay for it and overhauling the system. And then the new administration will take a while to settle in, and...

New Daddy Brain = no blog posts

2007-11-09T14:13:00.000-06:00

There are some things in life that affect you whether or not you see them coming. The syndrome I cheerfully call "New Daddy Brain" falls into that category.

You know the symptoms: heavy-lidded eyes, rumpled clothing, coffee mug permanently attached to left hand (regardless of how hot or how empty the mug is), a tendency to wander into rooms and then look around in bemusement, wondering why you're there...

I pitched up to Bible study a couple of days ago without my Bible, which is usually considered an essential piece of equipment if you're the one leading the study. Hey, at least I've managed to remember to wear pants every day this week.

And it's not like there hasn't been material worthy of reflection in my life. Declining numbers in the church, comic strips, hospital experiences (mine and those of others), reflections on new babies, letters from loved ones... all of them flit past, then go get trapped somewhere in the cobwebs of my mind, possibly never to return. I'm aware that I've promised you, dear readers, a wrap-up to the Sabbath set of posts, and also some reflections on the trip to Tanzania. Stay tuned. I'm giving myself another half a week to climb far enough out of the fog to function without a coffee IV drip, and then I'll get to some of this backlog.

Here he is....

2007-11-02T10:56:00.000-05:00

Home from the hospital!

It's a boy!

2007-10-31T12:29:00.000-05:00

Rejoice with us! The Lord has given us a son.

We're going to call him Zachary Alexander.

Mom and baby are still in the hospital. Pictures to follow when I get a chance. And a cool story or two.

Death of a preacher man

2007-10-18T17:13:00.000-05:00

One of my seminary classmates died yesterday. That's one of those things you know is going happen eventually, but it's never welcome news when it gets to you.

His name was Bill Wiseman.

Hard to know where to start describing him, really. Bill kinda defied categorization. I knew him best, not as a classmate, but as a prayer partner. We were part of a small group that met together on a weekly-ish basis, prayed together, shared lives and stories, read scripture and discussed it, that sort of thing. The rules of the group made our discussions confidential, and there are some stories about him, or stories that he told, that I'd love to share--but I never got his permission to do so.

Those of you in small groups know what kind of special relationship forms between people who regularly pray for each other. We didn't always hang out together, but I always knew he was there. Some corner of my mind paid attention to where he was in chapel (along with the rest of the members of the small group), and at the prayers of the people it was a kind of anchor in reality to know that I was praying for Bill, that wise-cracking dude right over there, rather than some random name off the list of alumni and donors. He'd occasionally come down to my study desk in the basement of the library and keep me company.

Bill got to seminary by a roundabout route. Somewhere around age 30 he got himself elected to the Oklahoma state legislature, served a couple of terms, and then switched parties and lost his next election. Never really left politics altogether, in the sense of politics being the realm of people trying to make a difference in the world and make the world a better place. After he left office, he did a number of things. Worked in advertising for a while, if I remember right, and then was a consultant of some kind. Learned to fly somewhere along the way. He earned at least four academic degrees, including a doctorate (jurisprudence, I think), read Hebrew fluently and enthusiastically, and had a depth of connection to literature that astounded me.

He was in his late 50s at seminary, and you always knew that he was working from a slightly different paradigm than everybody else. Thought he was smarter than the professors (and was in some cases), concentrated on things differently than the rest of us, and was driven by different motivations. I remember him as a passionate reader and scholar of Hebrew and the old testament.

The thing many of my classmates are going to remember was one of his signature moments... his senior sermon. Now, you gotta have a little background on this to understand it. At the seminary in Austin, you get one chance, exactly one, to preach to the community in chapel. Usually it was Thursday, which was the weekly Eucharist, and was your garden-variety Episcopalian sermon: 10 to 12 minutes (maybe 15 at the outside), a few Biblical references, a carefully politically correct joke or two...

Well, old Bill preached on a Wednesday, if I remember right. Wednesday's service (Choral morning prayer, at least a couple of years ago) was usually about 25-30 minutes long, followed by lunch, followed by committee meetings. There's not usually a sermon. Well, that day we had a sermon. Boy did we. Bill preached for, I kid you not, I timed it, forty-seven minutes.

Bless his heart, it was the worst sermon I ever heard in the chapel. It had about four false endings, where people started to pull out their prayer books and shift in their seats, ready to move on... and then he kept talking. At one point, he pulled out a prayer shawl and a zucchetto (skullcap), put them on, and began to chant from the Torah. He rambled, he gushed, he told stories from the prophets, he told stories about his own life. And I'm sitting there the whole time, rear end long ago fallen asleep from the uncomfortable chairs, loving him because he's my prayer partner and wanting to wave the white surrender flag and tell him to shut up at the same time.

My feedback to him was this: in the end, it was basically an eight-word sermon with 46 minutes of commentary. Somewhere in the middle of that rambling and gushing over the beauty and richness of Hebrew scripture and tradition, he said:

I beg of you, drink from this well.

I actually agreed with him on that, and I envied his depth in the scriptures and his knowledge of Hebrew. At one point, he had me convinced that I should wear a zucchetto as part of my normal Sunday clerical attire. (okay, most of you, quit laughing.) I talked myself out of that, mostly because I didn't want to have to explain it a thousand times. (Also because I landed in San Antonio, and the combination of cowboy boots, a clerical collar, and a zucchetto is bizarre.) But hey, I just might go get one and wear it in Bill's honor one of these days.

He died, along with four other people, when the plane he was flying crashed. he was heading from Tulsa to my old home town of Sugar Land, but never got out of town. The funeral is next week, but I'll be at clergy conference. I'll have to let my friends Ron and Stephanie and Reid be my tears for me.

Give rest, O Christ, to your servant with your saints,
where sorrow and pain are no more,
neither sighing, but life everlasting

the other side of the world

2007-09-08T09:21:00.000-05:00

So, here I am in Zanzibar. And here's a quick blog post, just because it's cool to post from the other side of God's world.

We saw the sites today of some caves where slaves were kept before being sold at the markets, and the cathedral built on the site of the slave market. I was invited to preside at worship and preach there--talk about intimidating! I'll get through somehow. God is good.

This afternoon, I'm engaging in a little sabbath time with my host and friend Masalakulangwa.

Can't download pictures, unfortunately, but I'll post a couple when I get home.

blogslacking: guilty as charged

2007-09-03T23:10:00.000-05:00

Yes, I've been blogslacking.

I've been busy, really.

First, the sabbath chapter for three weeks ago was right down the middle of what I planned to preach about, so I put off posting till the sermon was over. Then Sunday was crazy and I didn't post it and put it off till later. Then the next chapter was what I thought was the last one of the book, so I got ready to do some kind of wrap-up...but Megan and Tripp read it differently, and the good news is we have a few more weeks to go. Their posts are good ones, and reflect well on the material. I may or not catch up. (Megan and Tripp, I've been reading along, and reflecting, just not posting.)

Then our senior pastor went on vacation for two weeks, and I tried to hold down the fort in his absence. That's not normally so busy a job, but this time it was.

And now I'm leaving tomorrow, for a short (weeklong) trip to see a seminary buddy--in Dar Es Salaam. I'll post about that when I get back.

Five shiny things

2007-07-31T12:54:00.000-05:00

There are days I love living in San Antonio.

Yesterday was one of those days.

Sabbath 28: The Way Of Enough

2007-07-23T21:33:00.000-05:00

Sabbath 28: Tripp's post, Meeegan's post

In this chapter, Muller returns to a familiar theme. He wants to draw a distinction between sufficiency (having enough) and abundance (having more than enough). Sabbath is about recognizing that enough is enough; a time to focus on what we have, rather than what we lack. "When we are trapped in seeking, nothing is enough. Everything we have mocks us; we see only what is missing, and all that is already here seems pale and unsatisfying."

This is another verse to a familiar tune of Muller's: simplicity. He devoted what I think is an entire section to it earlier in the book. (chapters 17-20, if you want to search back and look at them again) And he's right on target, for me at least, and probably for the vast majority of his intended audience--people who live in the developed world, probably America--who are, by the global standards of the world, incredibly, ridiculously rich.

But for the vast majority of the world, the story is different.

One billion people in the world live on less than a dollar a day--or try to.

Two billion more live on just slightly more than that, two or three dollars a day.

There are people on this Earth right now who will never in their lives have as much food in their home at one time as I have in my refrigerator and pantry right now--and we were just thinking that we needed to make a run to the supermarket, because we're out of a few things.

Yes, I'm ridiculously rich. Yes, I have literally half a garage full of stuff my family never uses. And yes, I am trying to do my part to do something about it. Those of you at St. Thomas heard me mention this in the sermon last week.

I guess that Muller's chapter served not to remind me of the abundance of God's creation (which is true--there is enough food in the world to feed the world) but to remind me of the unequal distribution of wealth. Much of the world doesn't have enough, even as Muller tries to remind me that I do.

PLEASE DO NOT TELL ME THE ENDING

2007-07-20T20:07:00.000-05:00

We've had something of a family tradition--I read the first six books out loud to my beloved, in way-over-the-top pythonesque accents, thankyouverymuch.

She has asked me to do the same with the last one, which means that it will take us at least a week to ten days to get to the end.

Don't tell me what happens, or I ain't gonna be your friend no more.

* * * * * * * * *

Post script--
Until we are finished with the book, I will not be reading anonymous comments posted to the blog, opening emails from unknown addresses, answering blocked phone calls, or reading billboards on the side of the highway.

Constant Vigilance!!!

Millennium Development Goals follow-up

2007-07-16T21:40:00.001-05:00

For the readers at St. Thomas, here are a couple of links to things I referenced in Sunday's sermon.

ONE Campaign

ONE Episcopalian

(and here)

Sababth 27: Mindfulness and Holiness

2007-06-29T11:06:00.000-05:00

Sabbath 27: Meeegan's post, Tripp's post

Okay, we're back in the blog saddle after a few weeks of travel and other craziness.

This week's chapter begins a new section, one called "Consecration." In the chapter, Wayne makes the point that Sabbath is time for re-creation, for restoration, and that restoration involves taking stock of where you are, and acknowledging the reality of that.

His suggested exercise for this chapter is confession. It reads like a natural progression from where he's been going all chapter, in that seeing the reality of life often means seeing your faults and failures, and wanting to make those better. He tells stories of couples he knows who take time to deliberately talk on the Sabbath about the times they have wronged one another in the last week, and asking forgiveness.

The health of honesty in relationships is something that happens more often, these days, in the psychologist's office rather than the confessional booth. Either way, Muller's treading on ground that's going to be sensitive for many people. Once again, he's is playing in deep water for my faith tradition, and it's the practice of confession that I want to spend my time on this week.

* * * * * * * * *

Last week, I visited one of my parishioners, and she started telling me stories (unprompted) about going to confession as a child.

"We used to make things up," she said with a giggle. "Well, you had to go to mass, because if you didn't your soul was in danger, and you couldn't go to mass without going to confession, and you couldn't go into the booth without having something to confess! So we'd make things up!"

I have about a hundred confessional-booth jokes in my back pocket. You've probably heard a few yourself. I think the problem has nothing to do with what Muller is reaching for--the reconciliation of people to each other and to God--and everything to do with the institutional logistics of the system. When you start making rules around the grace of God, strange things start happening. And the have-to-do-it-this-way mentality that is all too often the product of institutional church (the Roman Catholic church is only the biggest example) can actually become the hindrance to God's action in the world that it was trying to avoid by making the guidelines in the first place.

Viewed the wrong way, the system seems to put a requirement for human participation (the priest) in the way of God's forgiveness. You need a priest to pronounce you clean, or you'[re going to hell, because that's what the rules say.

And that same system is the one that can lead to great abuse. Today's legal decision to settle with victims of sexual abuse by priests in the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Los Angeles to the tune of some $60 million casts a long, dark shadow over this discussion.

Every week, my community says a prayer of confession as a part of our regular worship.

Most merciful God,
we confess that we have sinned against you
in thought, word, and deed,
by what we have done,
and by what we have left undone.
We have not loved you with our whole heart;
we have not loved our neighbors as ourselves.
We are truly sorry and we humbly repent.
For the sake of your Son Jesus Christ,
have mercy on us and forgive us;
that we may delight in your will,
and walk in your ways,
to the glory of your Name. Amen.

This prayer is usually sufficient for most people. But some sins are just too heavy, and too hard to let go of. The Episcopal church does still retain the one-on-one sacrament of "reconciliation of a penitent," although it surprises most people to know that there's a rite in the prayer book. We tend not to do it with the old-school confessional booth, instead meeting privately in an otherwise empty church building, or in the priest's study. This is the formal prayer used in confession:

I confess to Almighty God, to his Church, and to you, that I have sinned by my own fault in thought, word, and deed, in things done and left undone; especially__________. For these and all other sins which I cannot now remember, I am truly sorry. I pray God to have mercy on me. I firmly intend amendment of life, and I humbly beg forgiveness of God and his Church, and ask you for counsel, direction, and absolution.

When I hear a confession, whether from an individual or from a congregation of Christians, I think of myself as a witness. I witness the penitent(s) confessing their sins to God, and I in turn remind them of God's forgiveness. (or, in the language of the ordination liturgy, 'declare God's forgiveness to penitent sinners') It's not that God won't extend God's grace without my participation--that's ridiculous--but I can sometimes be the needed catalyst on the receiving end.

Sacraments are just patterns; material, tangible reminders of the countless ways God reaches out to us. We are material beings, and we need some way to be touched (literally) by God. The water of baptism, or oil of anointing, or bread of communion, are ways for us to experience the presence of the living God.

For some people, they need to hear someone look them in the eyes and audibly tell them that God's grace is sufficient to cover even their sin. (As in: Yes, even you are forgiven. Yes, even for THAT. No, really, God still loves you.) To get to be that person, occasionally, by virtue of the function assigned to me by God's people, is one of the great joys of my vocation. (and one of the frightening things).

sabbath sabbath: off to camp

2007-06-05T16:30:00.000-05:00

I really have no idea how many readers I have, because I took the hit counter off the blog a long time ago. (though I did install one of those cool world maps to see where the visitors come from. It's a small planet, friends, and we need each other.)

Anyway, for those of you waiting with bated breath for each new installment of Sabbath reflection (yeah, right) we're taking the next three weeks off. I'm off to camp!

Sabbath 26: Beginner's Mind

2007-06-05T16:27:00.001-05:00

Sabbath 26 (finally!): Tripp's post, Megan's post

This chapter was a bit scattered for me, and I had to read it several times over before it made sense at all. I ended up understanding it best as a part of a longer section of thought entitled "wisdom."

It seems to me that Muller is trying to explore what the Sabbath teaches us about wisdom from several angles, but instead of accomplishing that he ends up saying the same thing in five different ways. My summary of the section: you're not in control. You don't know what's going to happen in the future.

He tells a few stories in this chapter, some legendary, some real-life anecdotes, about people who struggle for control of their lives, and are swept away by unforeseen and uncontrollable forces. This whole section is steeped in eastern thought; he quotes the Tao Te Ching and references the Buddhas several times.

I struggled with this chapter as I did with the others in the section. After five chapters of the same argument, the same things are true: Wayne seems to think that things will solve themselves if you leave them alone, and I don't. There's a difference between allowing yourself a break from working and worrying at something and deciding that it's going to fix itself.

also, if you go down the track of "we don't know what's going to happen in the future and we can't control it," you eventually stop at a station called "why should I work at anything at all?" Here I will admit that I'm not well schooled in Eastern philosophy, so maybe I'm being too critical. Maybe my friend Brendan over at Off the Beaten Path can help me understand where Wayne is trying to go.

When Muller says that each Sabbath is an opportunity for a new beginning, my response is to think that he's missing his own point. If you're not in control of events, then what's the use of new beginnings?

Wayne's suggested exercise for this chapter is "sabbath bathing." Wash as if you're taking a ritual bath, cleansing all your parts and starting anew. If I could disconnect it from the chapter, I might feel better about it. I like the idea, even if I had to clean the tub before I could do the exercise.