A Rich and Full Life

That is what I often say about my life - it is rich and full.
This weekend is certainly a prime example of that. And the richness had more to do with my being present (but not in leadership) in several worship experiences.
I went to a funeral and wedding and at our church, I did not preach.

The funeral was for a young man who was a great buckeye fan. we were encouraged in the obituary to wear buckeye attire (game against Penn State later that day with OSU won). I wore my red Ohio State sweatshirt. The funeral was different and wonderful. It was not necessarily "Christian" but very spiritual in its own way. It included some scripture but many songs (on CD) to reflect his love of music. It started with the OSU fight song and then we heard "Morning has Broken", "On Eagle's Wings" and "Turn, Turn, Turn." At the end his sister did the Ohio Script. you had to be there because it all worked and was meaningful.

The wedding was for a young couple that met in my home a couple of years ago at a Bible study. They are part of the Advance Conference camping program for young adults. I did not officiate but did a reading from "Tuesdays with Morrie." I loved watching the way that Allen Harris does a rehearsal and a wedding. I am still learning (like to tell the bridal party not to drink until after the wedding!) The wedding was at Northwest Christian Church where I was ordained. Lots of memories for me.

Yesterday at church was "Consecration Sunday" when we invite the congregation to make a financial pledge to the life of the church for the coming year. Charles Montgomery, our pastoral associate preached a tremendous sermon. He ended with a "Youtube video" about a runner (can't remember his name even though I saw it twice!)
who got hurt during a race and limped to the finish line with his father coming out of the stands to help him. Both times I found myself in tears.

The one special thing that I did was a baptism at the 5 PM service of Connie who has just joined our church. It was all about new beginnings. What was most powerful to me was that she is afraid of the water, but she went into the baptismal and trusted me enough to put her under for a second. Words can never express what this feels like and what it means.

I write this on my day off. Today I will see my spiritual director and then Chuck and I are driving to Toledo for calling hours for Harv's sister and then to attend the funeral mass tomorrow.

It is good to have a morning to just be - to ponder and reflect on all of this. What I have learned for all of us with our rich and full lives - we have to have some margins to just be and rest and allow our souls to catch up.

Hating Cancer

Today we got word that Harv's sister, Karen, passed away. She discovered that she had cancer right after Easter and now she is gone

And I also got word that a young woman in the church who has stage 4 breast cancer is going back on chemo which is a disappointment because she was hoping to be in a clinical trial. That may yet happen.
She has had cancer for three years - she is 32 years old. She has been in too much pain for too long.

And then I think of my sister - gone now for over a year and a half
and my sister in law Carol
and my mother
and my father

I hate cancer. I hate the pain, the hair loss, the various forms of suffering
I hate way that we move - all of us - between hope and resignation and despair and hope and fear and ......it never stops

I hate cancer

Please pray for Karen's family and they grieve the loss of this woman who died too young
And please pray for Lisa and her family and she suffers and we all hope and pray for miracles
And please pray for whoever in your life has cancer.

Contemplative Living - WW

At the invitation and encouragement of Kim Veatch I started weight watchers about six weeks ago. This is common knowledge because I even used this program as an illustration in a sermon.

What I keep learning about the contemplative life is that it is requires people to be present to themselves. To live mindfully.

Without a doubt I have behind me a lifetime of eating mindlessly. I have a gift for devouring a bag of cheez doodles (my drug of choice) in the shortest time imaginable. The worst times for me are when I get home from work before dinner and after meetings at the end of the evening.

BUT weight watchers has stopped that. I am tracking points and aware of every mouthful. And so, not surprisingly, I have lost weight. (9lbs so far!)

It has been helpful to have companions on this journey and knowing that usually I will see Kim, Lisa, Pat, and Gerrie at the meeting and hear from Marnie immediately after. There is mutual understanding and support. There is also that check that I write every week for $11 that keeps me aware of not wanting to waste my money.

But what strikes me most of all in this process is that it is slow. Sometimes the loss of weight is only 2 oz - and sometimes it is 2 lbs. Slow.The contemplative life is living slower and mindfully and slowly there are changes - not just in weight but in appetite.

I know lots of people who have done weightwatchers and it was successful for them. I also know others who have done this program and 5 years later gained back the weight.

It is all about the daily decision to think long term instead of instant gratification. And to seek to live in the present.

This is not the weight watchers life - this is the spiritual life.

It's not easy - but it is worth it.

Life Review

The other day when I was spending time with my good friend Oprah (my spiritual discipline this fall is to spend an hour with her every day while I can! :) Jane Fonda was on and promoting how important it is to do a life review.

She said that we need to go back and remember what happened and what we did and actually feel the feelings. All of this is so true and what i keep learning through spiritual direction.

It is helpful to have a companion in it. Today I visited one of our shut ins who is 93 years old and got to hear some of her story. What was interesting was that our conversation started - as it often does with people who are 80+ - with real concern about what is happening in their life. And her family has got some brokenness - a brother and sister who don't speak to each other, a granddaughter going through a divorce, a son who is alienated from his son. And then there is the brokenness and divisiveness in the media that is played out all the time. It seems like the first reaction to all of these issues for older people is to say - it wasn't that way in the past.

Until we start talking about herpast. And then remembering the divorce of her parents and the blessing of grandparents who helped to raise her. Remembering the time when her husband was in the war and she was on her own with children for 2 years. Remembering some very lean times financially and probably emotionally.And looking back she remembers that somehow she survived and they survived and even thrived.

I think it is easy to look back generally only at the high points and forget the difficulties and the strength that you found in the struggle. So that, when the next generation goes through their own version of difficulty and burden and struggle, we think it is something new and insurmountable. But of course, the God got us through our storms will get them through theirs.

A life review - maybe a systematic appraisal of where you have been and what you have been through. But often a conversation that touches on some of it and helps us to remember.

G. O. D.

So I am coming into church this morning and there was a man sitting on the step outside of Fellowship Hall. Are you going to the meeting? He asked me.

No, I am the pastor - and I can let you in.

And then he talked about the fact that he used to have a key, but after a friend died, he stopped coming for a while.

We talked about grief and loss and I told him about how people sometimes don't want to come back to church after a death - too much sadness, too many tears.

And then he shared a story about God giving letting him know that the person was there - and he mentioned a butterfly, a fortune cookie and a tract from the watch tower. And he said G O D - Glimpses of Discernment

And, of course, what we see as God - others can so easily see as co incidence.

Then I came to my desk and read the meditation for today from Richard Rohr.

NON-DUAL SEEING


The mystical gaze happens whenever, by some wondrous “coincidence,” our heart space, our mind space, and our body awareness are all simultaneously open and nonresistant. I like to call it presence.

One wonders how far spiritual leaders can genuinely lead us without some degree of mystical seeing and action.
It is hardly an exaggeration to say that “us-and-them” seeing, and the dualistic thinking that results, is the foundation of almost all discontent and violence in the world. It allows heads of religion and state to avoid their own founders, their own national ideals, and their own better instincts.
Lacking the contemplative gaze, such leaders will remain mere functionaries and technicians, without any big picture to guide them for the long term. The world and the churches are filled with such people, often using God language as a cover for their own lack of certainty or depth.

So I start this day with his prayer
When you can be present,
you will know the Real Presence.

Holy Fool - Male Spirituality part 2

At the workshop today we got a diagram of the journey of transformation that men go through.
And it is different from women, although there are some similarities
From Age 1-32 - Men are on the heroic journey - period of idealism as he experiences his own power possibilities. "Necessary egotism; not in love with God, but with the idea of being in love. Duty responsibility, hard work, delayed gratification, black and white worldviews. Exhibits immature and potentially dangerous righteousness."
There is more than this - but you get the picture.

Between 32 and 50 men experience the crises of limitation - a time of inner loss of meaning, sometimes accompanied by failure...confrontation with one's limits, paradox mystery."

50 - 65 - some men go on the wisdom journey - looking to the spiritual because the old rules don't work any more

Some men go on the "embittering journey" - with confrontation but no enlightment (grumpy old men?)

And Later on the Wisdom journey - some men become the holy fool. "The mellow grandfather who can hold the paradoxes together because God has done it in him....Being human is more important than self image, role, power, prestige, or possession. He can lead, partner or follow when necessary. He has it all!"

I write all this because I came home from my workshop to Chuck - the Holy Fool.
He has spent time at church today vaccuming the pews and the sanctuary; he has been to the thrift shop and bought Christmas presents (for only 1$ for John and Jackson!)
He is right now working with six kids from across the street - making them ice cream and giving them pop after they helped him in our yard. He paid them (borrowing the money from me!) These kids are all from Sierra Leone. And Chuck has bought them toys and thinks about what he can do for them all the time.

He won't read this blog, he certainly won't ask me about my workshop on "Male Spirituality" and he probably won't pay attention tomorrow when I preach.
But he is a Holy Fool.

I am a blessed woman.

Male Spirituality -

I have just returned from a workshop on male spirituality and it certainly has me thinking about the men in my life - especially my brothers, husband, sons in law (counting Erik now) and grandson.

This was required for my Wellstreams program and also open up to the community. There were about 16 women in attendance and 6 men. That is par for the course when you "talk" about male spirituality. Because male spirituality is very different from female - and usually involves more action than talk. Which is why churches are so full of women. And it is a problem.

We have been reading a fascinating book called "From Wild Man to Wise Man" by Richard Rohr. He writes this

"In almost all cultures men are not born; they are made......The boy had to be separated from protective feminine energy, led into ritual space where newness and maleness could be experienced as holy."

We had a lot of conversation today about male initiation rites - when does a boy become a man? And for a woman, the initiation rite is often her period. It is so clear. Not so for a man - especially these days.

We learned about the initiation rites of native American - kidnapped from their mother, a vision quest, learning wisdom from the holy men, a blood sacrifice and then they are placed in the world - as hunter or shaman.

And what I have learned over and over again is that so many men don't have mentors or father figures to guide them. We know that the appeal of gangs and even military experience fills that need - that father hunger. But too many men are not being led.

All of which made me think about Jackson and how good it is that he has such a strong bond with his grandfather, Thomas. Thomas is teaching him how to be a man - even though he is only 5 - there is something very good about that relationship.

We also learned about the male archetypes - that first men tend to be warriors, then lovers, then kings, then magicians. Very interesting - all of it. There is balance to each of these archetypes - for example king archetype out of balance is either a tyrant or he abdicates his power. It has helped me to reframe some of my understandings of some men in my life. And it may help me to become more compassionate.

There is much more that I am ruminating about on this subject - like the fact that when Jackson hits puberty he will have 20 Fold increase in testosterone. Wonder what that will look like?

All in all, I know this - men and women may share a common humanity but we are put together in very different ways. And we need each other but we also need to claim our own identities as men and women. In other words, there are times it is good for men to be with men and women to be with women.

Food for thought. All of it.