Rogue Reverend

In Honor of Tom, on the occasion of World AIDS Day

No worst, there is none. Pitched past pitch of grief,
More pangs will, schooled at forepangs, wilder wring.
Comforter, where, where is your comforting?
Mary, mother of us, where is your relief?
My cries heave, herds-long; huddle in a main, a chief
Woe, world-sorrow; on an age-old anvil wince and sing—
Then lull, then leave off. Fury had shrieked ‘No ling-
ering! Let me be fell: force I must be brief’.

O the mind, mind has mountains; cliffs of fall
Frightful, sheer, no-man-fathomed. Hold them cheap
May who ne’er hung there. Nor does long our small
Durance deal with that steep or deep. Here! creep,
Wretch, under a comfort serves in a whirlwind: all
Life death does end and each day dies with sleep.

~Gerard Manley Hopkins

It Was All Saints’ Day

Yesterday, November 1, was All Saints’ Day. We celebrated at Richmond Mennonite Fellowship by bringing a memento of one of our Saints to the service.

The sermon was rather different (surprise, surprise!), and I quoted from one Ted talk by Sir Ken Robinson, starting at minute 15.09. Robinson tells the story of Gillian Lynne, a choreographer whose grade school teachers (in the 1930’s) thought that she had a learning disorder. Gillian’s mother took her to a doctor, who listened to the symptoms, and asked Mrs. Lynne to talk with him privately. Instead of talking, they turned to watch Gillian, who got up to dance to a radio that was on in the room.

“Gillian isn’t sick,” the doctor said, “she’s a dancer.” Gillian’s mother took her to dance class, where Gillian proclaims, “We walked into this room and it was full of people like me. People who couldn’t sit still. People who had to move to think.”

I believe the church should be like the doctor: noticing. And like the mother: fostering passion.

Then we listened to 5 minutes of another Ted talk. Eve Ensler spoke on happiness. Go to minute 15:41. Really. Go listen. I’ll wait.

Eve says that the Vagina Monologues “has taught me this really simple thing, which is that happiness exists in action, it exists in telling the truth and saying what your truth is, and it exists in giving away what you want the most.”

We have to work to identify our passion, the thing we want the most, that we have to give away.

We then talked about our saints. sharing our mementos, and thinking about them, “What was the thing they gave away?”

I talked about my saint, Barbara Watts, during this time. The memento I shared was a hymnal from Southside Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama, and hymn number 398, “In the Garden.” Barbara sang this favorite hymn at my ordination.

The refrain is, “And he walks with me, and he talks with me, and he tells me I am his own; and the joy we share, as we tary there, none other have ever known.” Sure, it’s bad theology, but it’s one of my favorites.

Barbara’s gift, her passion, was attention. She paid attention to all the people she loved in such a complete way: cards, letters, calls. Remembrances, birthday wishes, gifts, Barbara paid attention. I’m so grateful for her model in my love, and for being the object of some of that love.

After sharing our saints, without a dry eye in sight, we shared communion. We communed with our saints who are gone, but also with those who will someday consider us saints. What would be the passion they would see?

Jesus took the wine and the bread, very common elements, and made them holy. The saints in our lives, who were very human, shed the light of sacredness in our lives. How would we do the same in others’ lives?

Best. Newsletter. For Homeless Ministry. Ever.

My friend, Hugh Hollowell, of Love Wins writes:

Dear Friends,

Several weeks ago I sat in a room full of pastors from downtown churches in a forum called by the Raleigh Police Department. Ostensibly, it was to talk about how faith communities can properly secure their premises, especially in light of Martha’s murder a few months ago. The gist of the presentation was about church security - having your facilities well lit, etc. And then, they started talking about the homeless.

We saw pictures of dangerous criminals (their words), all but one of whom were black, as examples of the sort of people we should be watching out for. (Of course, most of the folks in the audience were white, so this played with their stereotypes perfectly.) Then they presented us all with trespass letters, which, if signed and placed on file with the police, would give them permission to arrest folks found on their property after hours. The entire presentation built to this, and you got the feeling this was the whole reason for the meeting.

There aren’t near enough shelter beds. If you are unhoused and needed a safe place, you might think about going to sit out of the rain under the awning at the corner church. Especially since the church is closed so you won’t scare any of the rich white people who attend there. If you thought this way you wouldn’t be alone. There are several churches downtown where friends of mine sleep - behind their dumpsters, in the shrubs, under the awning. Because it is well lit, clean and generally safe.

The police work for the city, which makes revenue from developers, who sell houses to rich people who do not like seeing homeless people. So the police are under a lot of pressure to “clean up” the homeless problem. The police are frustrated by the churches that have allowed people to sleep on their grounds. So, the police scare the daylights out of the church leaders, throw Martha’s death in the mix, show some scary pictures of black men and convince a goodly number of the downtown churches to put up no tresspassing signs, enabeling the police to act on those tresspass letters they wanted us to sign.

The presenters assured us they did not want to interfere with our mission - they just wanted us to help them keep us ’safe’.

I was the only one who stood up and said that our mission does not call for us to be safe - it calls for us to show extreme love and radical hospitality. I asked the people, preachers and police alike, the following question: If you are tired and hungry and alone and have no home and no hope - if you cannot go to the church, where should you go?

No one had any answers to that. The police officer told me he understood, but that was not his job.

But it is my job. It is our job. To extend grace and love to the other. Not to put up signs to keep people who don’t look like us away.

So I have spent the last few weeks telling my friends who sleep outside that churches are not safe places anymore. That the No Tresspassing signs mean they will be arrested. And when they ask me where they are supposed to go if they can’t go to church, I tell them I don’t know. And when they leave, I cry.

Love Wins. Always.

If I Were the Architect of the Church. A sermon.

This sermon was inspired by a spoken word poem at Ted.com, called Rives Controls the Internet. The sermon, which was done at a rapid pace like spoken word, was followed by communion where the communicants took the phrase, “If I were the architect of the Church” and said how they would make it theirs.

If I were the architect of the new Church, not the old church, we’d have no tired old Sunday school and Training Union and Wednesday night suppers and Stewardship Sundays and Deacons meetings and church councils and capital campaigns and mission trips,

But it’s new church, with love and care and hope and more love and care and hope and then a little more love and care and hope mixed in. The only thing I’d take from the old model is worship and a lot of fried chicken.

If I were the architect of the new Church, no one would get God wrong. In fact, Church wouldn’t tell about God. You would instead tell the Church about the kind of God you serve. And your God would overlap with my God, in some very lovely ways, but it would be okay if your God was different from my God.

If I were the architect of the new Church, the Pastor would no longer be the holder of secrets. You’d never keep to yourself that you’re going to lose your house, that you’d had an abortion, that you’re going through a rough patch in your marriage, that you’re gay, that you’ve lost your job, that you’re waiting on test results, that you’re sad, or lonely. The pastor’s job would be to help you share your secrets. Because the pastor knows that you’re not the only person going through what you’re going through.

If I were the architect of the church, you would know that the balance in your checking account doesn’t determine your worth as a human being.

If I were the architect of the new Church, the budget would read so differently. We’d pay for salaries and space, then we’d have a budget line where everybody wrote about all the wonderful things they were doing with their money so that we would know that our church was making a difference in the world. One person would be feeding the hungry, one person would be digging water wells, one person would be buying cows, and another fixing the ozone layer. Our missions budget would be through the roof, but it would be through your roof, not ours, because it would come out of your budget, not ours, and we’d be changing the world through our actions.

If I were the architect of the church, we wouldn’t mess up our children. We would understand that our kids are going to grow up with some gaps, but as a community, we would help fill those gaps. And when our children became different than us, we’d get to see how great they are, through the eyes of the community, because communities see better than individuals. And when our children grew up and turned back to us, saying, “You messed me up!” we’d smile, know that they needed to say it, apologize, because they need to hear it, and offer ourselves compassion. And we’d extend compassion to our kids.

If I were the architect of the church, we wouldn’t have marketing campaigns, we wouldn’t target people, we wouldn’t need to pay for advertising. There’d be no us and them.

If I were the architect of the new Church, you’d be the expert on theology, on life, and on God.

Oh! Wait!

You already are! But that’s just it, isn’t it? I’m not the architect of the church. You are!

Passion with Compassion. A Sermon

Mark 10:2-16

78.
Nothing is softer
or more yielding
than water.
Yet, given time,
it can erode even the hardest stone.
That’s how the weak
can defeat the strong,
and the supple
can win out over the stiff.
Everybody knows it.
So why don’t we apply it to our own lives?

Lao Tzu used to say:
“Take on people’s problems,
and you can be their leader.
Deal with the world’s problems,
and you’ll be a Master.”
Sometimes the truth makes no sense.

~Tao Te Ching, translated by Ron Hogan

As you’ll (no doubt) remember, we started a few weeks ago with the idea that the job of the church is to ONLY NOTICE, to notice pain, sorrow and joy in people and to be WITNESSES to that. Then last week, we talked about the radical restructuring of many aspects of our culture, all based in this concept of open source, and the implications of open source on religion is just stunning. First, it’s a move towards decentralization and away from hierarchies. Second, it is open for anyone to create and innovate and share, if they want to which means it’s more inclusive, less dogmatic. Third, we share in the capitalization of it, but we don’t gain monetarily like we would if we capitalize it, we probably let go of property. Fourth, we have no control over it, and we give up the illusion of control, too. And fifth, we do our part and let the spirit go from there.

I’ve been mostly struck with the role of the church in society, if church is indeed open source, and if indeed, these changes are on the horizon. And, truth be told, I’ve been thinking about the role of clergy, too. If there is this radical decentralization, and this real sense of inclusion, what do pastors do? And if we let go of property, do we really need pastors, if they’re not going to be the executive directors of non-profit organizations?

So let me just tell you. I have come upon the reason for the church this week, and it’s two-fold. The first reason for the church? To foster passion. And what’s our church’s theological word for passion? It’s calling.

I tweeted a question, “What would it mean if the church’s job was to foster passion. One minister friend texted back, “we’d better become a lot more tolerant of mistakes!” And in this new vision of church, we’ve covered that! We are more tolerant, even celebrating our differences. More »