Posted in Uncategorized ]]> http://livinginthequestions.wordpress.com/2009/10/31/its-halloween/feed/ 0 Kate http://livinginthequestions.wordpress.com/2009/10/31/its-halloween/ http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/livinginthequestions/~3/yIwkrwi6zgY/ http://livinginthequestions.wordpress.com/2009/10/20/op-ed-guest-columnist-rebranding-america/#comments Tue, 20 Oct 2009 14:56:18 +0000 Pastor Kate http://livinginthequestions.wordpress.com/2009/10/20/op-ed-guest-columnist-rebranding-america/ ]]>

via nytimes.com

Definitely worth the read and it’s not just because I like U2 or Bono…

I’ve begun to notice that my dog’s behavior is directly proportional to the time I spend with him.

In late August, I felt like Gus had really begun to understand what it is to be a well-behaved dog.  I was able to leave the bathroom door open and he wouldn’t go digging through the trash or unroll the toilet paper in the pursuit of paper products.  I could leave him out when I quickly ran to the store, confident I would return to find everything just as I left it.  Most importantly, he was calm and didn’t really go off in search of a book to rip the cover off of or something else he could sink his teeth into.

But by mid-September and early -October, Gus seemed to have relapsed back into a puppy.  Now, he’s only about 16 months old and it really probably takes until a dog is two years old to settle into adult behaviors, but it seems like Gus decided he didn’t want to be an adult and was going to find everything he could to rebel against it.  He’s back to finding hidden treasures in the bathroom trash and chewing on things he shouldn’t.  He goes off to find whatever he can that will not only be interesting to his keen sense of smell but will provide some sense of entertainment.  The only thing he hasn’t regressed back to is tearing the covers off of books (thank goodness).

I just couldn’t figure it out, that is until a friend asked me if October had been a busier month for me.  That’s when it began to dawn on me – Gus misses me and is trying to get my attention.  September and October have been crazy busy months and poor Gus probably thinks I’ve abandoned him.  He doesn’t know what my schedule’s been like – that I have to be at several installations, funerals, and bible studies.  He doesn’t know that I’ve had more meetings than normal and most are at least a 45 minute drive from home.  He doesn’t know life in the parish has picked up a bit and will eventually slow down, but for now I’ve a bit too much on my plate.

All he knows is that I’m not here.  With him.  And he’s alone.

So now I’m trying to find ways of carving out time with him – time to let him know I still love him, that he’s a good dog.

We’ll see if more time spent improves Gus’ behavior.

Gus decided he much preferred it this way and did some rearranging while I was in the shower this morning…

Okay, so change became a buzz word over the past two and a half years.  But before it was a buzz word and still for those happy with the way things are in life, change was a dirty word.  For some, it was almost the equivalent of a four-letter word (even though it has six).

But change, as the cliche often notes, is the only constant in our lives.

And lately I’ve begun to think a bit about the rate of change (or flux for those of us who are geeks).  Much of this comes out of a conversation I had with my brother regarding cell phones.  Mostly how different the phones we have now are from those we had two years ago and how different those phones were from those we had nine years ago (or I had nine years ago).  But also how quickly it’s changing.  Cell phones, in a race for the edge in the market, are bringing out new phone after new phone.  It seems like every month or so companies are releasing newer, slicker, faster, smaller phones.  And that rate is a drastic difference from the rate at which they were released even three years ago.  Not to mention when my mom first got a cell phone fifteen or sixteen years ago (back when they were bricks… almost literally.  But I digress).

So I’ve begun to think about this with relationship to the church (because we always get here right?).  If my generation and especially those who come after me are used to the rate of change in life being at a dizzying speed, if we’re used to a new cell phone every month or having the size of notebooks become so small we change the name to netbooks, then what happens when they/we enter the church and find change happens at a snail’s pace?

And really, I suppose my question is what happens in congregations where the average age is below 35?  Are these congregations more likely to change at a quicker pace?  Or will that become true in the future?  Will change be quicker as our generation ages?  Or will the change always be slow the change?  Or will those used to quick change become so frutstrated with the pace and leave before it ever speeds up?

I’m curious to see what others think…

Photo courtesy of zenera (rights).

Text: Mark 7:1-8, 14-15, 21-23

Now when the Pharisees and some of the scribes who had come from Jerusalem gathered around him,  2 they noticed that some of his disciples were eating with defiled hands, that is, without washing them.  3 (For the Pharisees, and all the Jews, do not eat unless they thoroughly wash their hands, thus observing the tradition of the elders;  4 and they do not eat anything from the market unless they wash it; and there are also many other traditions that they observe, the washing of cups, pots, and bronze kettles.)  5 So the Pharisees and the scribes asked him, "Why do your disciples not live according to the tradition of the elders, but eat with defiled hands?"  6 He said to them, "Isaiah prophesied rightly about you hypocrites, as it is written, 'This people honors me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me;  7 in vain do they worship me, teaching human precepts as doctrines.'  8 You abandon the commandment of God and hold to human tradition."  14 Then he called the crowd again and said to them, "Listen to me, all of you, and understand:  15 there is nothing outside a person that by going in can defile, but the things that come out are what defile."  21 For it is from within, from the human heart, that evil intentions come: fornication, theft, murder,  22 adultery, avarice, wickedness, deceit, licentiousness, envy, slander, pride, folly.  23 All these evil things come from within, and they defile a person." 

I think, sometimes, the church has Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder.

I think we’re a bit OCD.

When I say that, many of you probably think of people who have to lock and unlock the door multiple times before even opening it to leave.

Or those who ritually wash their hands five times before eating.

Some of you may even think of the often comical, yet highly effective private detective, Adrian Monk; a character on the USA Network show, Monk, who suffers from OCD.

For those who suffer from Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder, these rituals are a means of getting through the day, of making order out of their lives, and controlling things so they feel like life is just a bit more manageable.

Instead of simply washing their hands because they’ve just visited the restroom and they want to prevent the spread of germs and disease, those with OCD must do it repeatedly, because otherwise they feel totally out of control.

So when I say the church has the capacity to be a bit OCD, I’m not suggesting that we wash our hands five times before coming to the table, or that we light and extinguish the candles five times before finally lighting them again for worship.

Nor are we OCD in a way that we must receive the same size piece of bread during communion or cross ourselves three times every time we pray.

Instead, I think we’re OCD whenever we perform a ritual simply because it’s what we’ve always done.

Not because the ritual holds meaning for us any longer or connects us with God.

We can be a bit obsessive and compulsive about the rituals we perform – having to do them not because they point beyond themselves to something greater.

But because it is these rituals that have come to define our religious lives; that have come to define our faith.

These rituals bring order to our lives and give us a sense of control.

Sometimes we baptize our kids not because we wish to bring them up in the faith or because we know that in the waters they are claimed as God’s own children – but because it’s what Christian families do.

Or we see it as insurance the child won’t eventually go to hell.

The ritual of liturgy on a Sunday morning can become an OCD ritual of the church. 

We show up and go through the motions of the liturgy because we’re guilted into it by our spouses or our own consciences rather than meeting God in the Word and the Meal as well as to meet each other in a mutually affirming way.

Often, in the life of the church, we find ourselves participating in rituals and programs totally unaware of the meaning they have or once held.

They can be anything from worship to Sunday school.  Confirmation to Celebration Sunday.

Like people suffering from OCD, we look to manage the pain of religious life, of our own lives, through rituals and programs.

And once our rituals have lost their meaning, have lost their ability to challenge, to celebrate, and to connect people with God and one another, if we do them just for the sake of the ritual, this is when the church suffers from Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder.

We live out actions only to tame our faith and make sure God and life are a bit more manageable.

But the problem did not begin with us, it has long been a problem in religious life.  

The early Jews, the Pharisees and the Scribes, thoroughly washed their hands before eating.

Not because they didn’t want to catch the cold virus that was going around town or because they didn’t want to suffer through salmonella poisoning. 

Nor was it even because they thought they would be spiritually contaminated – as if eating with dirty hands would defile a person.

It was to observe the tradition of the elders.

Because they’d always done it that way.

And their fathers had done it that way.

And so had their fathers.

No longer was the ritual cleansing of their hands, as well as cups, pots, and bronze kettles, connecting the people with God.

Instead it was merely a way of coping with the chaos of life…

of putting order to that chaos…

a distraction from the chaos.

And a distraction away from the real problem – their hearts.

“For it is from within, from the human heart, that evil intentions come: fornication, theft, murder,  ²² adultery, avarice, wickedness, deceit, licentiousness, envy, slander, pride, folly. ²³ All these evil things come from within, and they defile a person.” (Mark 7:21-23)

Just as a person suffering from OCD believes they can control the pain they feel through ritual actions, the Jews thought they could control the pain in their hearts by washing their hands at prescribed times.

This way they wouldn’t have to face the pain of acknowledging they wanted more wealth or avarice. 

Or that they envied one another, or that they took pride in themselves way too much.

They thought they could take the easy way out – thinking they could wash the grime off their hearts by washing the grime off their hands.

Over and over again.

And the more often they did it, it eventually lost the meaning behind the ritual and was done only for the sake of the ritual.

By thinking they could control their sin with mere rituals, by ignoring the things in their hearts that really defiled them, they missed all the work God was doing to clean up that grime.

They missed the very gift of Jesus standing right there before them – reminding them that it is not only the ritual that cleanses their hearts.

When we are so focused on our rituals, on our traditions, we not only ignore the real issues that lay deep in our hearts, the dirt and the grime that have built up there.

But we also miss all the work God is doing to restore and cleanse us.

When we only focus on the rituals of our lives, then we miss the deep connection God creates within us that leads to a deeper love for one another. 

We miss a profound love that leads us away from the emptiness of fornication and meaningless sex, but into deeper relationships with people that satisfy our need to be loved.

When we focus on what lies in our hearts, we find that Jesus is hard at work giving us new hearts and drawing our eyes to focus on him, on love.

No longer do we need to see wealth or even pride in ourselves as the thing we need most in order to feel whole and complete.  Instead, we see a loving God who creates new and right spirits.

When we shift our focus away from baptism as a pure ritual just to “get our baby done” or to prevent the soul from burning in hell later, we find that God is there washing and soothing us, opening up the heavens and saying, “This is my daughter,” or, “This is my son, with whom I am well pleased.”

Or when we see worship not just as a Sunday morning obligation but as something that brings us together with other children of God – gathered together despite our differences because our one Father has claimed us all, because we are family for each other;

We find we are able to support each other when a sister dies or when facing the pain of a divorce, able to challenge one another in order to grow, and to find joy in each other, laughing at a joke or celebrating a new start in life.

When we are able to look honestly at a program that is only still in existence because it’s what the church has always done, then we are able to walk away from it, able to go to the new ways and places God is calling us toward.

When we begin to look away from the rituals as the means of purity and salvation, we find we not only can begin to address the real problems that lay in our hearts but that Jesus has already been there working on them.

No longer shall the church be OCD – practicing rituals for the sake of the rituals.

Instead we begin to see rituals as having a deep and profound meaning, as adding to our lives and enriching them in ways we’ll never understand.

Able to meet Jesus again in the rituals and in our hearts.

Text: John 6:56-69

Those who eat my flesh and drink my blood abide in me, and I in them.  57 Just as the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so whoever eats me will live because of me.  58 This is the bread that came down from heaven, not like that which your ancestors ate, and they died. But the one who eats this bread will live forever."  59 He said these things while he was teaching in the synagogue at Capernaum.  60 When many of his disciples heard it, they said, "This teaching is difficult; who can accept it?"  61 But Jesus, being aware that his disciples were complaining about it, said to them, "Does this offend you?  62 Then what if you were to see the Son of Man ascending to where he was before?  63 It is the spirit that gives life; the flesh is useless. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life.  64 But among you there are some who do not believe." For Jesus knew from the first who were the ones that did not believe, and who was the one that would betray him.  65 And he said, "For this reason I have told you that no one can come to me unless it is granted by the Father."  66 Because of this many of his disciples turned back and no longer went about with him.  67 So Jesus asked the twelve, "Do you also wish to go away?"  68 Simon Peter answered him, "Lord, to whom can we go? You have the words of eternal life.  69 We have come to believe and know that you are the Holy One of God." 

Sometimes the cross is not good news.

For some of us, the cross is a difficult encounter – it is far from what we would expect and can offend us.

It challenges our ideas, our conceptions, and our notions of how things ought to be.

It proclaims that the least of us will be lifted up – which leads those of us who are not among the least, the lost, and the forsaken to wonder what that means for us.

The cross challenges our understanding of how to be people of God and what that means in this time and place. 

It challenges the choices we make including how we use money, care for others, and what we eat. 

It challenges our very place in life.

Sometimes, it seems, the cross is not good news – especially when it means giving up what we believe to have been earned or what belongs solely to us. 

It can be perceived as anything but good news when it means changing the way we live.

And the cross is particularly challenging when we don’t understand – when things remain a mystery.

Which is exactly how we encounter Jesus’ disciples in today’s Gospel text.

Some of those who have been following Jesus, listening to his sermons, eating the food he has miraculously provided, watching him heal person after person, still have problems understanding what it is he is talking about.

Jesus is the bread of life – the one sent from heaven so that all may have life.

It doesn’t make much sense and they find it difficult to understand.

Just like the Jews did only moments before, some of the disciples, those who were following Jesus begin to grumble that this teaching is too difficult.

Not just the Jews, but those very people who have followed Jesus around, who have thought there is something more to him than simply being the son of Mary and Joseph or the kid from Nazareth.

But when he hears these disciples are beginning to complain, Jesus does not comfort them.  Instead he pushes them a bit more.

Does this offend you?

“Then what if you were to see the Son of Man ascending to where he was before?” (John 6:62)

What if you were to see him lifted up on a cross?  That’s really the question Jesus is asking them.

If you think the bread of life is a difficult, offensive teaching – then wait until you see the Son of Man lifted up on a cross.

While we’re very much used to the idea of the cross as God’s saving action, these are people who cannot imagine the horror of such an instrument of death to display God’s glory.

They do not understand. 

Because sometimes the cross is difficult, sometimes it is offensive.

So they leave – they walk away.

Because it’s easy to walk away from what we don’t understand, what we don’t like, what we find to be difficult.

And I have to admit that today I stand before you as one who does not understand.

I spent most of this past week in Minneapolis at the ELCA Churchwide Assembly.

If you read the article in yesterday’s Washington Post, have been keeping up with the Assembly on the web, or have heard from others – then you know by now the Assembly adopted a new social statement on human sexuality and voted to open ordination to those in committed same-gender relationships.

These two votes, only two among many this past week, are the cause of many mixed feelings among people in the ELCA right now.

I watched on Wednesday as the social statement was adopted by the narrowest vote possible – 66.67%.

I also watched all the mixed emotions of people following the vote – tears of joy from those who thought they were once far off from the church and now feel included. 

I heard some cry out in pain following the vote, those who cannot understand how such a statement endorsing same-gender relationships could be part of God’s plan. 

And others simply sat there in stunned silence.

Those same emotions carried into the next day and then again into Friday when the ministry policies were changed to allow those in committed, loving, monogamous, same-gender relationships to serve as Rostered leaders by a 55% vote.

And these emotions, all of them, have carried into how we treat the “other.”

I have heard people who endorse the change refer to those who do not as intolerant.

I’ve also heard those against the change say those who want it do not believe in scripture or don’t love God.

And I am certain there will be people in every congregation of the ELCA who hear this morning’s Gospel text and believe it is those they disagree with who are walking away from Jesus.

Some will argue that the decision to allow partnered, gay clergy is the difficult word driving some to consider leaving the ELCA while others will argue the 55% who voted for the change have already left.

But that is simply not the case.

Neither group has left.

And yet in many ways, both groups have already chosen to walk away.

Both groups continue to say to Jesus that they have come to know he is the Holy One of God.

But by refusing to listen, refusing to empathize with the struggle of their brother or sister in Christ, they too have walked away.

Unfortunately, this week a lot of people felt like winners and losers.  Some people felt their faith had been ripped from them, taken away because 55% voted to change the ministry policies of the larger church body, while others found new life given to their faith.

All of this because each of these people very much loves Jesus and wants to do what is right.  It’s just that they, we, are not in agreement as to what the “right” thing is.

But it does not mean that we have to walk away from one another and away from Jesus.

Instead it means we must do exactly the opposite – be together in the midst of this.

The reality is that none of us is God – no matter how much we think we’re right, we need to be able to extend a bit of grace and care to our brothers and sisters who do not agree with us.  Acknowledging that we may not have the right answer.

And we must also acknowledge that all of us, at times, have walked away from Jesus because it was the easy thing to do.

We’ve walked away, choosing instead to follow the god of money and greed.  Or choosing to trust in ourselves more than Jesus.

We’ve walked away from Jesus because of a sense of pride – because the possibility that we may be wrong is too much to accept.

But in the midst of all of this, even when we’ve not remained committed to Jesus, he has remained committed to us.

He called us while we were sinners, no requirements to have it all figured out or to understand everything before we are able to follow him.

In fact it seems to be exactly the opposite – that only by following him do we even begin to understand.

And when we still don’t understand, when we stick our feet in our mouths, he stays in it with us, continuing to love us despite our fears and failings.

Even Simon Peter, the guy who always seems to have his foot in his mouth, realizes this.

“Lord, to whom can we go? You have the words of eternal life.  ⁶⁹ We have come to believe and know that you are the Holy One of God.” (John 6:68-69)

We have come to believe…

We did not believe when you first called us…

Or even after the first couple of days…

It’s only been after waking with you for a while… talking with you… that we realize you have the words of eternal life.

Words that challenge…

Words that love…

Words of life…

It is those same words we hear now – words we need to hear from both Jesus and our fellow brothers and sisters.

Words of love and words of challenge.

Words of life from each other, that we love each other enough not to leave just because something is difficult or we don’t understand.

Words that say we’re committed to figuring this out together – this offensive, often difficult act of understanding why our God would be so committed to a frail creation by being ultimately frail on a cross.

Words that remind us we need to stay in this together because we are the one body of Christ, and can only be together.

While Wednesday evening seemed to bring division among those at the Assembly, Thursday morning was a time of unity as we all worshiped together.

The same people who clapped at the adoption of the social statement and those who cried prayed side-by-side that morning.

We all sang hymns together and came to Christ’s table together. 

At the table on Thursday we ate Christ’s body, broken for each of us, and drank Christ’s blood, shed for us.  Each of us, all of us eating the bread of life together.

One body, one faith – no matter the disagreements between us.

Called there by the head of that body, Jesus Christ who remains committed to us, even to death.

Sometimes the cross doesn’t seem like good news, and in many ways it isn’t.  But this morning it is.

It is a sign of a God who cares enough to get involved with the world, a God who does not walk away, a God who loves us despite our failure to understand, and a God who unifies us despite our disagreements.

Yes, the cross is good news this morning.