I’ve been ruminating over the whole “Occupy Wall Street”  (and similarly themed movements/occupations throughout the world) over the last few months.  When the movement began I was torn between almost fanatical support and discomfort.  It wasn’t the lack of organization (I understand that to be part of the point) or rallying cry (it’s not a protest!) which frustrated me but rather the irony of it all.  Here were my fellow Americans who were responding to a very real dichotomy between the haves and the have-nots in this country – folks who have honestly attempted to follow the rules to the American Dream only to find it a mirage – the statistical 99% who in general, broad-sweeping terms STILL live better than the majority of the world.

Don’t misunderstand me.  These folks are responding to VERY real problems in our society in regards to social inequity – but it is social inequity within a (generally) first-world context.  It would seem to me that the problem needs to be addressed on a MUCH more global scale in order for it to have any integrity.  Therefore, paradoxically, if something needs to occur globally – it also needs to occur on an almost micro-local level.

Such as my seat.  Or yours, while we’re at it. 😉

This is the square-footage that I can control (to some extent), and it begins with self-awareness of what is actually happening with me and with those around me.  I need to fully occupy the space that I am in, mindful of how I am spending my time, talent and material resources.  I need to be more deliberate in how I spend my time – allowing for sabbath, mind you – but also making space for prayer, relationships and all those things which are sustainable.  I need to choose how I use my talents with a bit more deliberation… and finally, I need to work harder at making choices in regards to the material, paying heed to how my wallet intersects with another’s life.

I need to stop with the excuses.  The past can only be the past when it is treated as such.  The future depends on my living fully in the present.  Very Zen, no?

So here’s my challenge to myself and all within earshot.  Occupy YOUR seat.  Be mindful.  Be fully present.  Live sustainably in all areas of life realizing that the world depends upon it.

I’ve disagreed with the position of my denomination on the Ordination of gays and lesbians for over 30 years.  I entered the fray back in 1979, when our Interim Associate pastor, the Rev. Donna Prickett, worked with the Committee of Five in response to charges against the Westminster, Buffalo church for declaring itself to be a “More Light” church.  I was an Elder Commissioner from my home church, Kenmore Presbyterian, to the Presbytery of WNY.  I learned so much from watching folks MUCH older than myself debating and challenging the system.

One of the reasons I remained Presbyterian – in spite of my frustration with the denomination’s stance on this issue – is because what I witnessed in the Elders and Ministers around me was an incredible grace that allowed for significant disagreement on an issue that still allowed for folks who were at odds to eat from the same Table.  It was amazing!  We disagree…. and yet we work together.  THIS is a church that reflected what I believed was possible.

For thirty years I’ve served a church in various capacities – representing three different Presbyteries at Synod, and one at the GA level.  I’ve worked as an Elder and Minister of Word and Sacrament on Presbytery committees – from Chairing the Polity and Review Committee in Genessee Valley to serving six long years on Elizabeth Presbytery’s COM.  I’ve given blood, sweat and tears and have encouraged the congregations I’ve served to support the work of the PCUSA… even though I disagreed with our stance.  Oh, I worked for that stance to change – and prayed and hoped – but I believed I still belonged alongside these brothers and sisters who disagreed with me.

A few weeks ago, that all changed.

A few short weeks ago, a vote was cast from the Twin Cities Presbytery which would ratify the work of July’s General Assembly (to which I was a Commissioner) which will allow individuals in same-sex relationships to be ordained.

My joy is tempered by the understanding that this decision will mean that several clergy (and the churches they’ve served) may work towards dividing the denomination into non-geographical Presbyteries that are aligned theologically.

I don’t understand.  I can’t pretend to understand.  I remained within this imperfect system for over 30 years, and worked hard on behalf of governing bodies for the good of the whole church (progressives, conservatives and all in-between) and the response from those who now find themselves in a place where they will be in a church with which they disagree… is to find ways for us to NOT gather at the same Table?

I realize that this difference has drained our resources and focused many of us from the real work of the Church.  I’m ready for a time when more of my denomination’s energy can be focused on mission and evangelism, but this stings.

I’ve struggled for the last few weeks trying to determine WHY it hurts – and although not a perfect answer, I think it is because it feels as if I have been used. I’ve disagreed, but continued to serve because I believe in that grace that allows for folks to disagree to do so together.  Now that the table has turned…. those who I’ve served with are interested in leaving?  It’s as if what is being said is “I will work alongside you only as long as MY beliefs are the ones being honored.”

I’ve always known that folks interpreted scripture differently – and that part of our Call was to live with that tension and the understanding that “God alone is keeper of the conscience”.  I’ve known about our differences – but I always made the assumption that we agreed on what it meant to be “church”, and specifically, what it meant to be Presbyterian.

Today, I’m not so sure.

We’ve made two payments to Ella’s college – and have made my Fall semester payment for my PhD program.

We’re now officially broke.  😉

We’ve cut back on all categories, and have completely eliminated others.  The days of heading to the Diner for dinner are done.   Although I’ve generally been a “scratch” cook, we’ve moved further towards eliminating processed foods and have increased meal planning.  My usual weekly allowance will now need to stretch for a month…. and gift-giving will focus more on hand-made.  We’ve given up internet at home, as well as a landline – and I’ve put aside my Blackberry for a phone that makes phone calls.  And texts.  And that’s it.

It’s austerity.  And it’s good.

1)  This is self-imposed austerity, for the most part.  We could take out loans.  We may need to in subsequent years, but this year we’re trying to see if we can do this without further debt.

2)  It actually feels good.  I know this choice for our family will eventually pay off in higher dividends.  I’m spending less, and therefore also creating less waste.  Our footprint as a family is becoming smaller.

3) It makes sense.  When Bill and I reviewed our finances and discovered what we were able to do, if we so chose, I immediately realized how much money we’ve ‘blown’ in the last few years.  I had always thought we lived fairly modestly, but working our budget differently has truly opened my eyes. Had we started this sooner, who knows what we might have done with the money we had saved.  Put water in up at our property?  Built a small cabin?  Amazing.

Unlike many in the world who have no choice – we’ve made the choice to live a bit simpler.  That small fact is what continues to motivate me and move me forward.  We’re doing this because we’ve chosen to do so – and yet when I read about the poverty and famine (Somalia, anyone?) that exist throughout the world, the fact that I am able to even make this choice shames me.  I can make this choice because I AM wealthy.  I can choose to send my daughter to a good school, and take up another degree for myself because I AM privileged…. and that sudden self-awareness is what wakes me up in the middle of the night wondering how I could do otherwise.

There are moments when I hold a bit of a pity-party for myself.  Poor Karen.  She can’t update her Facebook status or look at her Starbucks balance while noshing at the local watering hole while reading a magazine and dreaming about future yarn projects.  Thankfully, I’m able to slap myself with the knowledge that I’ve chosen this… and I’m blessed because I *can* choose this.

I embrace the idea that every day is a new day – fresh with possibilities and new challenges.  I don’t always wake up feeling that perky about it, and I don’t often use it as fully as it presents itself, but still…. each day holds incredible potential.

Some days are more equal than others.

This morning I write this from the Best Western in Wooster, Ohio.  The girlchild is sprawled across her bed, oblivious to my typing just a few feet away from her.  She was up until at least 3 a.m., reading “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo”.  Bill is the next bed over, gently sawing wood.  In an hour or so they will both be awake and we will be about our day.  Our day that is more equal than others.

Today, Ella takes her placement tests for college – and spends the day, and night – with a quarter of her fellow Freshmen.  Today, my daughter begins to move from our world, to her own.  Today she begins to take very real steps away from home.

When she was a toddler, we’d often take her to the playground.  (Any playground would do… we’d have to deliberately alter our driving route to avoid playgrounds, for the moment they were in her vision, she would not be deterred from visiting).  After we’d get her out of the car seat, her feet would start moving towards the equipment.  Her arms would extend as if to offer a hug to whomever was near, and she’d say in the sweetest voice:  “Friends!”.  It was uttered as an exclamation and a question:  an expression of hope, that whomever was on the monkeybars or the swings would soon become her friend.

It was often hard to let her go.  To watch as she’d move towards an already established group of children knowing that they might rebuff her – and that the pain from that would be far harder to nurse than a scrape from the slide.  More often than not, she’d find a friend, and those successes helped propel her feet forward the next time.  She never gave up.

This same child now toddles towards campus.  Her anxieties aren’t about books or classes or whether she’ll do well academically.  She wonders (as do I) who will laugh and weep with her over these next few years.  Who will join her on the emotional swings of college?  Who will be her friends?

And now, just as then, we watch her walk away knowing she may very well get banged up from the experience.  Our job, as always, is to let her go, and to watch with amazement her courage and beauty as she moves towards this new playground of possibilities.

 

 

Allow me to preface these remarks with this:  I’m profoundly grateful for the work of our troops and our government in their courageous acts to keep my and mine safe.

I’ve tweeted and have made status-updates on Facebook in regards to what has occurred over the last three days, but felt I needed to put all of it down in one place for my own sanity’s sake.

1)  I love this country and what she stands for.  Therefore, it disturbs me deeply when what we stand for takes a back seat to our safety.  Men and women have died so that we might have the freedoms we cherish – we each need to be willing to make the ultimate sacrifice as well.  This means, at times, we need to do what is right (as opposed to what is comfortable).  Although I do not grieve his death, I do wish that we could have shown the world, especially those areas where there are blossoming democracies, what due process looks like.  Would there have been tremendous backlash, and potential terrorist attacks in attempt to have him freed?  Yes.  (See ultimate sacrifice, above).

2)  These last few days I’ve been appalled at the fist-pumping, “hey, hey… goodbye” actions of others.  This wasn’t a Superbowl victory.  We are not entitled to a Victory lap.  I can understand relief… and satisfaction… and pride in the work of our Armed Forces.  Can we really find joy at the death of anyone?

And this is where I blame the Munchkins.

And yes, I’m serious.

When you consider where we as children of this generation have learned how to respond to the passing of an enemy – what comes to mind?  “Ding dong, the Witch is Dead…”.  

Not the words of Proverbs “Do not gloat when your enemy falls; when he stumbles, do not let your heart rejoice, or the Lord will see and disapprove and turn his wrath away from him.”

Not the words of Jesus “‘Eye for eye, tooth for tooth.’ Is that going to get us anywhere? Here’s what I propose: ‘Don’t hit back at all.’ If someone strikes you, stand there and take it. If someone drags you into court and sues for the shirt off your back, giftwrap your best coat and make a present of it. And if someone takes unfair advantage of you, use the occasion to practice the servant life. No more tit-for-tat stuff. Live generously .”

Not the words of Martin Luther King – and remember, part of that mis-quote of this past week WAS his.

Instead, we respond like Munchkins who in the middle of it all find themselves questioning “Which old witch?  The WICKED witch”, as if we know that this is one in a series of evil that will need to be destroyed and then rejoiced over.  It’s a cycle, and we know it… and one that cannot be stopped if we persist in allowing it to continue.  “Which Witch was this one?” we ask ourselves?

What we learn as the Munchkins’ story unfolds is that this act doesn’t abolish evil.  It can’t.   The witch’s sister arrives to avenge her death… much to the terror of Munchkinland.

In the end, of course, all is well and evil is forever abolished in Oz  (well… unless you read Baum’s 13 sequels in which Evil becomes incarnate again and again).

There is another way. I propose we teach our children – yet another round of munchkins? a way which responds to the death of any individual as a loss of life, and opportunity.  I propose we teach our children to find ways for light to counter darkness with light.   I propose we find new ways of meeting hostility with kindness, persecution with forbearance, and error with truth.

In other words, let us teach from the Wisdom of the Christ… and not the Lollipop Guild.  May this be a time for thought, and prayer.

Throughout Lent, my congregation and I explored many of the biblical stories that surrounded the imagery of rocks or stones.  Considering the landscape of the Holy Land, I suppose it should be a surprise that there were many stories to choose from.  Rocks, stones… and more rocks.

Easter’s story was of the stone that was rolled away.

Mark’s Gospel tells that it was a big stone (really, really big), and Matthew speaks of an earthquake moving it from it’s perch.  Luke, however, simply mentions that it had been moved.

For so many folks, it would be wonderful if it was as simple as that.  A stone moved.  He is Risen!  But so many of us find ourselves with the women not making the connection between the rolling stone, and the risen Christ.  They walk into the tomb and find it empty – and it is not an emptiness that inspires hope, but despair.

Two angels appear.  You’d think at a time like this, the women would have questions – but it is the angels who direct the interrogation.  “Why are you looking for the living among the dead?”  and “Don’t you remember what he said…?”  The women remember – and with the realization they run from the tomb to preach the first sermon (which, by the way, falls flat on most of those who hear it).

They don’t need to see Jesus.  Remembering what He said is enough.  The stone rolled away now makes sense.  The impossible has become possible.

It makes me wonder what other stones have been rolled away – what other things have happened that we’ve not understood simply because we’ve not remembered what He said.  It makes me wonder about all the stones that I carry about with me which could be moved, if I only remembered what He said.  It makes me wonder what other impossible things could become possible…. if only I took the time to remember, and to live into that remembering.

A blessed Eastertide to you and yours.  May it be spent in remembering… and then going forth with joy.

I try my darnedest to not be judgmental of other faith communities.  We all have our flaws, and I’m pretty sure that anyone looking at the PCUSA would be able to find a few as well.  However, lately I’ve found myself growing more and more peeved at a billboard an area church has displayed.

“Worship doesn’t have to be BORING”! it declares in bold letters.

True.

Worship doesn’t  have to be boring… but should it, by definition, be entertaining?

It begs the question of who (or WHO) is being worshiped, doesn’t it?

I know the argument.  Worship needs to be designed in such a way to provide communion with God – and so worship that is meaningful, and perhaps even a bit entertaining, is the stuff that provides the rich fertilizer that enables the relationship to grow.  Therefore, exciting worship kindles a deeper desire for the worshiper to be fully present before the Living God.

I get that.  I do.  And there have been times when the trappings of worship have moved my own soul more towards God.  There have also been times when I’ve gone home feeling that the band gave a great performance, and that the preacher presented a few good jokes that I can use on friends during the week.  (I also got a bit teary during the Children’s sermon… always a good thing, right?)

There’s nothing wrong with the choir singing well, or the preacher finding the right illustrations – there’s nothing wrong about feeling deep emotions during baptism, communion or the passing of the peace.  What becomes a problem is when we attend worship for THOSE things, instead of for WHO those things point to.

In the Reformed tradition, worship is understood to be where God hears our praise and petitions, but also where God speaks through the reading and singing and proclamation of the Word.  Consider this – for an hour on a Sunday morning, you have the opportunity to come before the Author of the Universe and to offer your praise… as well as to hear the Word for you anew. Amazing.  How could that EVER be boring?

C.S. Lewis in Letters to Malcolm writes:  “The perfect church service would be one we were almost unaware of; our attention would have been on God”.

Yes.

I always felt sorry for Dorothy at the end.

She finally finds a way to go home – to the place where she is loved – but in doing so she leaves a place of vibrant color and music, and a place where she was loved and was also able to love.

I know I’m not getting the point here – but there’s always been a part of me that wonders if it is possible to find home in various places.  Kansas and Oz.  NJ and Buffalo.  With my folks and with my spouse.  Had I put on those shoes and whispered “There’s no place like home”, I fear my heart would land in one place and my stomach another.

We’re on vacation from vacation, and have traveled from Camden, NY (where we will eventually retire) and Buffalo, NY.  Bill and I stopped off en route to our hotel to do several things.  First, we ate at Ted’s (anyone who calls Buffalo home knows that Ted’s is like oil for a tin man; then a drive-by the old family house and then we went to the Albright-Knox.  Bill did his field-ed placement there, and I had spent countless hours there while taking graphic arts courses at Buff State (not to mention field trips as a kid!).  Today we’ll lunch at Mighty Taco, with an Anderson’s custard chaser.

Buffalo is a town where a visit is a chance to eat all those things you crave when you’re not at home there – unfortunately, our 24 hours will not allow us to eat at all the places we’d like.

The nostalgia of this trip is wrapped up tightly in the fact that this is my first trip to Buffalo without my parents here.  Indeed, the reason we ended up here was due to mourning the fact that we no longer had an excuse to eat at Ted’s since they had moved to Rochester.  And although my family is no longer here in the Buffalo region, there’s a part of me (my digestive tract apparently!) that will always call this area home.

We leave in a few hours for Camden, NY (via Attica, NY… another place we’ve called home!).  Camden may not have great food – but it does hold our future together.  It has marshmallows and stars and coyotes and owls.  It has a meadow surrounded by trees and a thick dew in the morning.  On Sunday we’ll leave our present and future home for Roselle, NJ – our current home.  All these places hold things and people that I love – and all of them are cast in brilliant color and filled with music and memory.

There’s no place like home(s).

In several different spiritual systems or theologies there is the idea of an “in-between” time – a time when the veil between worlds, as it were, is thin.  Although my own Reformed understanding doesn’t codify such a space or time, for me it resonates with Paul’s “mirror darkly… then face to face”.

I experience that space just as the dawn is breaking and seconds before my alarm clock rings.  It’s an awareness of what IS as well as what may be… the promise of a new morning (and the desire to not greet it just yet).

But I experience it in the lulls between tasks – those rare moments when I’m not moving from here to there or from project to project – when I’m fully present to the present, and in doing so, present to that which is beyond the present.  I know others experience this during prayer,  or yoga, or meditation.  I most often experience it while knitting, or doing laps at the pool.

In the fullness of that space and in the fullness of that time, I understand albeit briefly so much more about myself, my motivations and my dreams.  It is here where my soul speaks.  It is here where I find peace.

One of the mental areas I know I need to stretch is my relationship with food.

No surprise there, eh?

Like many folks who tip the scale in an unhealthy direction, I eat for emotional reasons.  I’m generally able to eat a healthy diet (using the word diet in the classic sense referring to a grouping of food) much of the time.  I’m doing better with the fruits and veggies, thanks in part to the enormous influx of zucchini and squash from the CSA, but we’ve always been a whole-grain family, with limited processed food on the table.  I don’t do “Fill-in-yer-meat” Helper.

I make healthy choices at restaurants and the coffeeshop… with the exception of an occasional dessert.  I’m the chicken and salad girl, and not the one with the nachos loaded with cheese.

It’s when something in my ordered world goes haywire that I find myself reaching for food in a way that doesn’t nourish my body, but instead feeds and soothes the anxiety.  Hormones kick in, and the anxiety subsides and all is right again with the world.

The key here, apparently, is living life anxiety-free.

(Hah.  That was a joke.)

No… the key is learning how to better manage stressful situations proactively.  And, picking up from my previous post and thoughts, that means stretching those muscles prior to working them hard.  This ties so deeply with where I am spiritually as well, that the connection goes deeper than words.  I can’t expect to tap resources I’ve not stored up – and the quick fix, be it physical, mental, emotional or spiritual is what has caused much of what I’m struggling with.

Hence the renewed journaling/blogging… and the attempt to focus on some of the work of the Spirit that needs to happen within.  S – t- r- e- t- c – h!

One friend has asked me why I’m being public about a fairly personal issue.  I’m not fully sure.  Part of is knowing that the greater community has incredible resources that I may be able to tap into; part of it is wanting those in my world to know that this IS something I struggle with.  I’m also pretty certain that much like some who go on shows like the Biggest Loser that part of it is wanting to do this publicly so that there is built-in accountability.  Fortunately, this last rationale is the smallest part.  I give thanks to a good CPE supervisor who helped me to understand that authority and accountability are attributes best developed within.