Mid-Life Metanoia

Blah, Blog, Blah, Blog, Blah...

2012-03-15T20:11:00.000-07:00

I have heard a great deal from many sources a similar refrain..."Hey, what about your blog??" Well...the blog was an idea I had before the reality of divinity study hit me! I began a draft of a blog post last October that never got finished...it started something like this...

I remember the opening credits of a western that was on television for maybe a year or two when I was a child. The cavalryman had been accused of a major dereliction of duty, what I don’t remember. But as the theme song typical of 1960s television was sung by a full choir explaining the man’s crime, the soldier’s uniform was being ripped piece by piece of its medals and distinguishing marks until the man was left wearing just a plain blue shirt and the opening credits faded into the story. You didn’t know what was going to become of the man…but you knew he definitely wasn’t a soldier anymore. From the determined look on his face, you kinda thought the story would turn out alright for him…

Yes, this has been a challenging transition, re-entering the academic world after a twenty-five year sabbatical. I have been stripped of all the accoutrements of my former life as a competent professional woman, spiritual director, health policy duffer, helpful friend, regular shopper at Whole Foods...I am indeed wearing a plain blue shirt, marking a life in transition. But, oh what a transition! I am learning to chant this semester (even though I keep telling them in my deepest Texas accent, "Thar ain't no chantin' in the Diocese of Texas!") as well as a class to learn to read scriptures out loud with feeling...but I have definitely decided that I will not emote to the extent I am being taught by a theater professor while reading the Gospel in my future parishes...

Like the soldier from the 1960s Western, I maintain a sense of purpose...although frequently the look on my face is more akin to weariness than determination...but I know that, with God's help, "things will turn out alright"....and I will ride into a sunset like this in another two years, headed back to Texas!

A Pilgrimage Taken and Another Begins...

2011-08-26T19:48:00.000-07:00

We were pulling out of the parking lot as the sun was just beginning to peek over the horizon. It was Saturday morning following our first week of orientation at the School of Theology…and we were heading down off “The Mountain” (Sewanee-speak for leaving the campus…since the campus of the University of the South is literally on the Cumberland Plateau, about 2000 feet above sea level…amazing for this sea level kinda gal) and into the heart of Alabama. We were on a pilgrimage to Hayneville, Alabama to honor Jonathan Myrick Daniels and other martyrs of Alabama who lost their lives during the civil rights struggle. The Episcopal Church has set aside August 14^th in honor of Jonathan, an Episcopal seminarian who took a leave of absence from his studies to support African Americans in their efforts to register to vote in 1965 and lost his life…. http://vimeo.com/14117023.

When we arrived at Hayneville five hours later, we joined a large multi-ethnic crowd in the courthouse square, prayed and then processed to the first site, the jailhouse where Jonathan and his friends had been held.

The inside of the jail seemed like something you would see in a third-world country. After some readings (including Psalm 85, verse 11”Truth shall spring up from the earth and righteousness shall look down from heaven”), we moved to the next stop, Varner’s Cash Store, all the while singing spirituals and hymns prominent in the civil rights movement. I found myself quietly weeping behind my sunglasses as I sang and walked in lock-step with two African Americans who knew the words to those songs by heart…thinking of how impossible what we were doing would have been 46 years ago.

We stood around the steps of Varner’s Store (now Central Alabama Insurance) where Jonathan was shot and killed, heard how the deathly encounter enfolded as read from a biography, and again prayed. We then processed back to the courthouse square to a memorial established in honor of Jonathan by his VMI classmates, read scripture (Galatians 3:22-28) and prayed before entering the courthouse where Jonathan’s killer had been acquitted.

But for this day, the courthouse was turned into a sanctuary…the desk where the law and justice of the land are dispensed now was converted into an altar where the Body and the Blood were about to be dispensed.

There were probably 150+ people squeezed into that oh, so typical Southern courthouse, and instead of Atticus Finch striding in front of the judge’s desk, an Episcopal bishop humbly spoke words of repentance, remembrance and reconciliation. Jonathan and twelve others were eulogized before the bread was broken, blessed and shared. And then out into that muggy Alabama heat…and back on the bus to Tennessee, sobered by the example a fellow seminarian had given us of the cost of the way of the cross.

And so after three weeks, our orientation ended this week. On Wednesday, after a quiet day of retreat at a nearby convent, we participated that evening in a Matriculation Ceremony (http://theology.sewanee.edu/news/new-students-are-welcomed/) in All Saints Chapel where our name was individually called and we signed a book that all students entering the University of the South have signed since the dawn of time…or at least the dawn of the University. We were all given academic gowns (Harry Potter’s Hogwarts style)…and then classes began the next day. And so, my pilgrimage at Sewanee begins…here we go!

Run! Middle-aged woman trying to learn to blog!

2011-07-11T14:00:00.000-07:00

From a simple e-mail with instructions and encouragement from friend Christi, I am attempting to start a blog on my excellent, ecclesiastical adventure. There is a good chance I might not figure this out no matter the level of confidence Christi has in my intellectual capabilities...but I have had so much interest in my mid-life metanoia that I thought it might be worth at least trying....that is until the harsh reality of papers, exams, late-night studying and field work comes crashing in....

You're right, Reese, it makes my head hurt when I think of those challenges that lie ahead...so, it is best to stay in the present and let life begin to unfold as God would will it.

Why did I leave a comfortable life in Houston, Texas to attend seminary in Sewanee, Tennessee leading to the Episcopal priesthood? Well, since this is a blog and not a memoir, the best and briefest explanation can be found in a couple of lines from Mary Oliver's poem, Thirst... "Oh Lord...grant me, in your mercy, a little more time. Love for the earth and love for you are having such a long conversation in my heart. Who knows what will finally happen or where I will be sent, yet already I have given a great many things away, expecting to be told to pack nothing, except the prayers which, with this thirst, I am slowly learning."