Rogue Reverend

I Love a Man in Uniform

I love books. I have two favorite female writers from this century. Pam Houston and Lily Burana. My favorite Pam Houston quote, from the short story collection, Cowboys Are My Weakness, is “I was addicted to him like cough syrup, and I didn’t respect his mind.” I read that book in the early 1990′s, and I still think of that quote at least once a week.

Lily Burana wrote my all-time favorite book, Strip City. Obviously, if you know me, you understand why. Burana combines all the things I love: strippers, memoir, psychological understanding, and just a little bit of religion. I’ve recommended Strip City to every Star Light volunteer, to all the women I’ve talked to about starting their own stripper ministry, and to every dancer I’ve ever met. I loved that book so much, at one point, I had 30 copies about my house, to give out to folks I loved. Now I have only my original two copies around, both of which are marked up with underlining, folded pages, and exclamation points. I’ve given all the others away.

So it was with great joy and anticipation that I started Burana’s new book, I Love a Man in Uniform. There was some trepidation, too. Strip City is a pair of big stilettos to fill. (That really didn’t work, did it? But you know what I mean).

And before I get too much into I Love a Man in Uniform, you should know a bit of my own bias: I am a pacifist, I have protested our current wars, and yet, some of my dear friends are service people. My father served in Vietnam, I served a church in Metro DC with several service people (and got in trouble for a sermon about Abu Ghraib), and I’ve worked with sex workers and former sex workers for 8 years.

On with the review:

I loved it. Loved it, loved it, loved it. Burana has a way of saying things that makes me lean back, smile, and say, “Yep. That’s it.” I literally cried when I read this passage:

The stripping. The arrest. None of it fazed Mike. In fact, he had reservations about whether he was good for me. He worried that I’d see him as helplessly boring and square, illustrating his point by making an “L7″ with his hands. But if I needed something, he was there, and by the end of September, I found myself wanting to see him more and more. It became impossible to get him off my mind.

When Mike came up to visit me in New York in October, he walked around my little cottage in the woods, checking out the furniture and the books. “Wow, you’re pretty squared away.” At the time, I didn’t fully realize what a compliment that was. “Squared away” is high praise from a soldier. From there, it’s a short trip to “I love you.” Squared away means You have your shit together; I think I can rely on you—and to a soldier, that is everything. At first, I had my doubts that we’d make it past the superficial stunt-dating stage, but by now, I was feeling quite different.

I left Mike at my house during a quick trip to Chicago for a writing assignment, and when I came home, I found him outside in the sunshine, carefully cleaning out brushes and rollers. While I was gone, he’d painted my chipped and peeling front porch. My heart soared. I love the traditional niceties of romance—dinners, cards, a pretty bouquet—but nothing compares to the gift of sweat equity, which I view as the he-man’s true statement of intent. Far better than spending money on me, he’d spent some of his precious free time. Bring me flowers and I’m charmed; swing a hammer and I’m yours.

I’ve never experienced exactly what Burana is talking about, but DAMN! I want to!

The story of their romance gets real later in the book. Burana deals honestly and, sometimes brutally, with her own depression, her own demonette, who seeks perfection from her at every turn, and both her and Mike’s Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. She writes:

It occurred to me that stripping, for me, and the whole adventure of those years may have been the ultimate game of Survivor: Trauma Edition. Already dissociated and cynical about humanity, I undertook stripping as the female equivalent of a kind of Special Forces training—the physical discipline, the focus on en pointe performance, the thrill-seeking, the playing with fire and going into dark or taboo places most “civilians” don’t go. The exaggerated gender typing, the special outfits or uniforms that mark, again, a defined break from civilian life, the pervasive sense of danger or limit crossing.

The book was surprising to me, because, having been a fan girl of Burana’s, I really expected a “happily-ever-after” memoir. I wanted that for Burana. She is an amazingly fierce woman and a wonderful writer and I’d like for her to be happy. I wanted a happy book. I Love a Man in Uniform is not a happy book. Near the end of the book, Burana expresses her gratitude for Mike, “Thank you for your commitment to serving our country. Thank you for picking me to be your wife. Thank you for being man enough to get help when you needed it. Thank you for fighting for our marriage as valiantly as you fought any war. Thank you for being both my husband and my hero.”

But the book reminded me. Life isn’t always happy. But it can be good.

My Gay Deli

I went to seminary at a very conservative, Baptist divinity school at Samford University, called Beeson Divinity School. There were a lot of great things about the school, not the least of which was the amazing faculty, who were (for the most part) very supportive of women in ministry.

BUT… there were students who were very conservative on the issue of women in ministry, and many times I was told, “You can’t be a minister! You’re a girl!”

So while I was in school, I worked as a short-order cook in a local deli. A gay deli. Every day I would go to work and a handsome, funny, gay man would say, “You’re gonna make a fabulous minister!”

It balanced things out for me, because the work you do in seminary is lonely. You do spend a lot of time thinking about your relationship with God, but you also spend a lot of time recognizing your faults. And while you can make some wonderful friendships, you also begin to get a taste of the criticism that the church holds for its servants.

I was telling a church member about my gay deli the other day. He’s in a PhD program at a local school. He grinned and said, “Richmond Mennonite Fellowship is my gay deli!”

If you’re looking for a church in Richmond, Virginia, I recommend Richmond Mennonite Fellowship. It’s welcoming, affirming, loving, peaceful, and thoughtful. Come visit. Drop me a message though this site, and I’ll give you directions.

Best Thing About Facebook

I know lots of people think facebook is a waste of time. They’re right. It’s a major huge suck of time, although the newest layout changes are helping me stay off there, and all the problems with their server are helping, too.

But there is one amazing thing about facebook. It really connects people, whether they have lost touch or whether they were never really in touch.

Meet my friend Steve Huff, one of my favorite facebook finds. Here’s a picture of him from about the time I met him:

Awesome!

And I’ve just found a friend from the 7th and 8th grade, a woman I think of every time I think of Rick Springfield.

Her name is Missy, and we used to go over to her house in the afternoon and watch General Hospital. Missy lives in Texas now. We talked on the phone for over an hour last night.

So, thank you facebook. Suck of time? Perhaps. But adding much joy to my life.

Yes! Yes! and Yes!

My friend, Malcolm Marler, is the chaplain at the 1917 Clinic in Birmingham, Alabama. The 1917 Clinic is an HIV/AIDS clinic, and Malcolm has been working to provide compassionate care for folks with HIV/AIDS before treating them with compassion was cool. Malcolm pretty much rocks.

He wrote this in his blog today:

One day I was asked by one of our nurses if I would talk with a single mom in her 30′s in one of our exam rooms who was recently diagnosed with advanced HIV disease and “was crying a lot.” I seemed to get called for a lot of these situations.

I walked in, introduced myself, and sat down.

She could hardly talk through her tears. After a few minutes she stopped her tears and blurted out, “I just want to know the answer to three questions:

1. Does God still love me?

2. Will anybody ever love me again?

3. Will I ever get another hug?”

I think Malcolm is on to something here, when he goes on to say that these are the questions that we all ask every day. Does God still love me? Will anyone ever love me again? Will I ever get another hug?

I know it’s what I wonder when I look at pieces of my life…

Those are the questions that I ask when I really look deeply into who I have been, who I want to be, and how I have been. They are the questions I ask when I start thinking about my history and sharing it with people. And they are the questions I ask when I put myself out there in a new way, whether in a new relationship or a new job search or a new position.

I want to believe that the answers are Yes! Yes! and Yes! But even more than believing with my head that the answers are Yes! Yes! and Yes!, I want to feel in my heart that the answers are Yes! Yes! and Yes!

That is my prayer today.

MLK and the “Irrelevant Social Club,” a.k.a. Church

Every Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, I take some time to read Dr. King’s Letter from a Birmingham Jail. Although I was raised all over the southeast, Birmingham is home for me.

Nine years ago, I was leading a mission trip to El Salvador, and had arranged for our team to visit the final home of Monsignor Romero, and the chapel where he was killed. We also went to the UCA, spoke with Jon Sobrino, the Jesuit priest who narrowly escaped death during the Salvadoran civil war. It was a day filled with martyrs, being thankful for the sacrifice they had given, for the example they gave, for the love they showed.

I went home to my hotel room that night, sat in front of the Spanish television, and watched all of Spike Lee’s movie, Four Little Girls, recounting the story of the young martyrs of Birmingham, Alabama. People I knew were filmed talking about their relationships with the little girls. And I’d had no idea.

This is one of the most significant moments of my life. I’m not sure if I didn’t pay enough attention to my hometown, or if I willingly disregarded  the pain in my own neighborhood, or if I was just ignorant about the fight in Birmingham, but I vowed to change that. One way is by reading MLK’s Letter from a Birmingham Jail. And every time I read it, I glean something else from it.

Tonight, it was this:

But the judgment of God is upon the church as never before. If today’s church does not recapture the sacrificial spirit of the early church, it will lose its authenticity, forfeit the loyalty of millions, and be dismissed as an irrelevant social club with no meaning for the twentieth century. Every day I meet young people whose disappointment with the church has turned into outright disgust.

I wonder if that’s why the church feels so disconnected for me. It feels like an “irrelevant social club with no meaning for the twentieth century.” In fact, so much of the church marketing of the 80′s, 90′s, and 00′s has been about making sure that your congregation is a “social club,” although the marketing materials call them “affinity groups.” They told us that they way to success as a church was by putting like-minded people together.

The most REAL relationships I have are with people who I don’t agree with. They are people that I cannot fully understand, because our worldviews are different. We try to understand, but we bump up against differences, and have to decide, over and over again, “I may not understand, but I love.”

MLK continues about the Church:

Perhaps I have once again been too optimistic. Is organized religion too inextricably bound to the status quo to save our nation and the world? Perhaps I must turn my faith to the inner spiritual church, the church within the church, as the true ekklesia and the hope of the world. But again I am thankful to God that some noble souls from the ranks of organized religion have broken loose from the paralyzing chains of conformity and joined us as active partners in the struggle for freedom. They have left their secure congregations and walked the streets of Albany, Georgia, with us. They have gone down the highways of the South on tortuous rides for freedom. Yes, they have gone to jail with us. Some have been dismissed from their churches, have lost the support of their bishops and fellow ministers. But they have acted in the faith that right defeated is stronger than evil triumphant. Their witness has been the spiritual salt that has preserved the true meaning of the gospel in these troubled times. They have carved a tunnel of hope through the dark mountain of disappointment.

I think Dr. King answers his rhetorical question, ” Is organized religion too inextricably bound to the status quo to save our nation and the world?” with the answer, “No.” Every time it stands up for something right, every time it refuses to limit God, every time it opens the doors of the church wider, every time it expands it’s understanding to include all people, every time we try to understand, but we bump up against differences and say, “I may not understand, but I love.”

That church? I want to belong to that church.