Aren't We All Immigrants?

edited to add:  I've already gotten good feedback/pushback from a friend at church, challenging me on this notion that we are all immigrants.  That's what I'm looking for!  Help me think this through -- please feel free to leave respectful comments, even (especially) if you I'm headed in a wrong direction!

This coming Sunday is the twentieth anniversary of the death of my mother, who was an immigrant, and whose story I have been feeling compelled to tell lately (it's a great story!).  This coming Sunday is also the first of two Sundays for which there is no plan for adult Sunday school, due to a cancellation of the class that had originally been scheduled (I serve as the Director of Christian Education at my church, Old First Reformed, so filling this void falls to me, lucky me...)  These two facts have me thinking about how I could both tell my mother's story and have something to offer at Adult Forum ....

So I have an idea that keeps swirling around in my brain, but won't quite cohere.  I'm thinking about how much more likely it is for us to care deeply about an issue if it touches us personally.  And as I think about my mom, and her immigration story -- which is also my immigration story -- I keep thinking about the ways that we are all immigrants.  Right?  Every one of us has a story about how our families came to this land.  Some of them are stories of men and women seeking opportunity and hope.  Others are stories of people fleeing persecution.  Still others are stories of ancestors brought here forcibly as slaves.  Some of us know more about our stories than others of us, but every family story ultimately takes on mythic proportions, every family story is both real and imagined.  Indeed, it seems to me that if this land has a creation myth, that myth is an immigration story!  Even Native Americans have immigration stories, albeit ones that likely must be mostly imagined because they are so ancient.  Still, doesn't it highlight even more how much immigration is this land's creation myth, if we think of even Native Americans as having come from some other place?   If we see that even peoples who have been here for millennia are immigrants too?  Well, this is where it's still sort of vague in my mind, but somehow, it seems to me that by telling our immigrant stories -- all of our immigrant stories -- we highlight the absurdity of singling out the most recent immigrants among us as "illegal."

I even want to say -- and this is where it's still really fuzzy -- that somehow, if we all document our status as immigrants, doing so somehow compels us in a way that is more immediate and urgent to stand in solidarity with those who are supposedly "undocumented."  I say supposedly, because of course, every immigrant has a story that should be heard, that we should care about, that should be -- and can be -- documented.  I keep playing in my mind with the word "document"...

As I said, I'm not sure where I'm going with this.  But for starters, I was thinking about telling my mom's story -- that is, my story -- at church on Sunday in the Adult Forum, and then trying to figure out ways for everyone else to tell their stories too.  And because I'm a writer, I was thinking of trying to get folks to write them down.  And because I'm a blogger, I was thinking maybe I would find a way to share them  more widely ... I haven't figured it all out yet, but stay tuned.

And let me know what you think....

Guest Post: Julie's Director of Music Report for the Annual Meeting at Church (in its entirety)

Reflections on a Benign Dictatorship:

A Music Director’s Sonnet of Thanksgiving

I’ve been music dictator 13 years—

How lucky am I to have all of you?

To sing and play and do those things you do

So well and to God’s glory, festive cheers!

In thanking you, I might be in arrears.

Allow a shout out, first and foremost, to

The choir, week in and out, rehearsing, who

Up front, (LOOK UP!), sing as our Christ comes near.

Hey band!  You rock the sanctuary space,

True testament to multi-age: Believe!

When soloists enrich our worship’s verve

And pianists say “yes,” it seems like grace.

For Tim’s dual keyboard skills (please, never leave):

This congregation’s thanks you all deserve.

Respectfully submitted way past the deadline,

Julie Steiner

February 7, 2010

A Guest Sonnet and Sermon for a Belated Conclusion to My Advent Blogging

The Christ-child has arrived again, and so ends my Advent daily blogging challenge to myself. I count this Advent discipline to write (almost) every day a perfect success in that it really got me writing again; and while I most certainly won't be writing every day through Christmas and Epiphany, I do plan to be focusing more on my writing this winter. So stay tuned. And thanks to all of you who are my faithful readers (and an especial welcome to any of you who became faithful readers during my Advent blogging!) It still feels like a bit of a paradox to offer one's writing with humility, on the one hand, yet to be so eager to be read on the other. All of you smart, kind folks out there who read me and say thoughtful, generous things make it somehow feel like less of a paradox.

But enough of my sappy reflections. I know I punted several days in Advent, and failed entirely to post on Christmas Eve, so I offer a couple beautiful things as penance.

First, you may have noticed on the right a link to my Facebook profile (I have SO drunk the Facebook cool-aid; if you are inclined, please send me a friend request letting me know you're a blog reader, and it would be my pleasure to "befriend" you!). There is also a link to Old First's Facebook fan page (go ahead, become a fan -- you'll find a delightful mix of silliness and seriousness! But please note you can read the page even if you're not officially a fan.) Here I offer you a link to Michael's wonderful Christmas Eve sermon called Isn't It Ironic? about the dynamic tension between tradition and change at Christmas time. I loved it; I hope you will too. So, I hope that makes up for my absence on Christmas Eve.

And, for those two or three (four or five?) lame days in Advent when I technically posted but not really anything worth reading, here is a sonnet more worth reading than any that I've noodled around with this Advent (though I have to say thanks to Shannon for getting me hooked on writing sonnets; it's been super fun, and I doubt I'm done!) This is written by a friend at Old First, highlighting once again what an insanely talented and thoughtful bunch we are. Marjorie and I are are not, as far as we know, related, though we do share a last name and a Michigan birthright (among other things), so who knows? I hope you enjoy her Advent Sonnet as much as I do:

Advent Sonnet

The hurried mind is kin to Advent dreams

And darkness does to ghost’s what angels hope

Would be their mission; crafting fear, it seems.

Ghouls hearken now and meld their lifeline rope

To spirals, hoping errant sheep might wind

Along its tendrils; some might lose their way.

Preoccupied is Gabriel; her find

Is pure, while others’ load is apt to sway

Beneath the burdens of this season’s press

Archangels’ work is frantic in the stars

And shepherd’s crook is gentle herd’s redress

The infant’s cry is fertile balm for wars

If lamb were general and ghost be pawn

Then angels’ charge is nothing more; ‘tis dawn!

Marjorie Rose

December 24, 2009

Church

I’m sitting on Michael’s red leather sofa, in the lime green room of the parsonage that I painted for him before I really even knew him, back in the heady days of summer when we were fast Facebook friends but had only ever spoken in person for twenty minutes, about paint colors. The first time I really spent any time at all with Michael was the day shortly after he moved in when I drove him to Ikea in the mini-van to pick up this red sofa. I hadn’t eaten all day, and we had lunch – meatballs for me and a Philly cheese steak for Michael, and across the table there in the Ikea cafeteria, he told me stories about his ex-boyfriend and was perfectly charming but also perfectly scandalous and I couldn’t quite believe our luck to have called him as our pastor.

Tonight I’m sitting on Michael’s red sofa, waiting for the apple pie to finish baking, watching a snow storm rage outside. Julie just excused herself to Michael’s bedroom (pale yellow – too pale, in my estimation, but it’s not my bedroom, except for tonight); Micah is upstairs, finally fast asleep, in one of the two twin beds in Michael’s guest room. Michael will sleep in the other one, once his sermon is done. Trixie is a few blocks away at Aunt Beth’s.

Tomorrow church will happen, just like every Sunday. But really? This is it, right here.

Why Not Come to Church Tomorrow? You Might Be Surprised!

If you live in Philadelphia, think about coming to church tomorrow at Old First Reformed, United Church of Christ! Here's what Michael says on Old First's Facebook fan page:

I am preaching on Mary (the mother of Jesus) this Sunday, and I wonder why the tradition has so stripped her sexuality; it seems we'd almost deny her gender if the church didn't need her womb... maybe as redemption of this inhumane bias, we need to bear Christ to the world, yes, with humility and in service, but also in our whole bodies and with the solace of great physical pleasure... Come Light the Third Advent Candle... for Mary who so graciously bore the Child. And see where I end up on this sermon.

4th and Race Streets. Sunday School at 10:00, service at 11:00. Street parking with a parking placard that you can get inside. Communion with bread baked by yours truly.

The Welfare of the City: Sister Margaret (or: The First Time I Walked Away from Poverty)

I recently told you I want to start writing about poverty and race, two topics I care deeply about, but find incredibly difficult to write about with honesty and integrity. The more I experience and learn about racism and poverty, the less sure I am about solutions to these tragedies, until I find myself positively paralyzed. I’m pretty sure, right now anyway, that all I have is my own story. Unlike everything you have been taught about good stories, this one doesn’t have a clear beginning and middle and end. I’m sure some sort of structure or theme will emerge in this series, which I am calling “The Welfare of the City” (from Jeremiah 29), but I sure don’t know what it is. Still, Sr. Margaret McKenna seems like as good a place to begin as any.

I’m pretty sure the first time I met Sr. Margaret was in a program at my church called Urban Disciples. This was way, way back, in the late 90’s or early aughts, shortly after I joined Old First, having gotten involved there through volunteering with Julie at our homeless shelter. A group of us decided to get together once a week and explore what it meant to be urban disciples. To be Christians called to serve those living on the margins in the city, and in turn to be served by them. Few know about this better than Sr. Margaret, and so we had her come talk to us, and we went to visit her at New Jerusalem, the recovery community she helped found in North Philly.

But my first really clear memory of Sr. Margaret is on a Sunday morning, when she joined us at Old First for worship once. I believe we were recognizing our partners in service, the sites where we send rural and suburban youth groups who come through our work camp program to learn about and do service in the city. At any rate, what I remember so clearly is that it was Reformation Sunday, and I thought it was such a hoot that Sr. Margaret sang A Mighty Fortress Is Our God -- by Martin Luther himself -- with such pleasure and gusto!

Sr. Margaret is a Medical Mission Sister and the founder and passionate spiritual leader of New Jerusalem Laura, a beloved community of men and women seeking recovery for themselves and for the world. To hear Sr. Margaret tell it, she never meant to start anything at all when she moved to an abandoned house in one of the most brutal ghettos in Philly. She just wanted to get away, to be a hermit, to live a simple and prayerful life like the desert mothers and fathers she hoped to emulate. But the thing about Sr. Margaret is that she just loves people. She loves to touch them and laugh with them and hear their stories. And she’s got this infectious zest for life, and this totally disarming charm. It’s probably a cliché to describe an elderly nun as having twinkling eyes, but she does, really – twinkling and mischievous!

She also has a searing intellect (B.A., English, Chestnut Hill College; M.A., Liturgy, Notre Dame; Ph.D., Christian Origins and Religious Thought, University of Pennsylvania); wide-ranging experience (she has been a director of novices, university professor, writer, art director, and peace activist); and broad, broad vision. It’s a compelling combination, let me tell you. So it’s no surprise that the whole hermit thing didn’t really work out for her.

Instead, Sr. Margaret took a look around her new neighborhood in North Philly and said, “Hmm, it seems that addiction is at the heart of a lot of the problems I see facing this community.” She got to know the Reverend Henry Wells, who was working with addicts through his program One Day at a Time (ODAAT), and out of their work together, organically, New Jerusalem was born.

Among the founding principles of New Jerusalem is that people are sick with addiction and the violence it spawns because our world is sick with addiction and the violence it spawns. So to heal ourselves we also have to heal the world, and likewise, to heal the world, we also have to heal ourselves. New Jerusalem is not just a place that serves addicts who want to get clean, but a place where addicts can serve the world to help it get clean as well. As Sister Margaret describes the mission of New Jerusalem:

The program of New Jerusalem Laura is one of holistic recovery: we seek to integrate the physical, psychological, spiritual, political, and social dimensions of recovery in our daily lives. We are committed to work toward healing and justice for and with the impoverished people of North Philadelphia, with whom we live and work in community and reciprocity. We are not so much a service institution, as a community of people helping ourselves and our neighborhood to recover. Recovery is about the radical change from death to life, from darkness to light, from self-will to God’s will. It involves the mystery of conversion and the aspiration to fullness of life in God. It requires risk and mutual support and the sharing of practical spirituality and wisdom. God must be the sole principle of this new way of life, this reordering of chaos. (from the website)

Spiritual formation is at the heart of recovery work at New Jerusalem, and one of the requirements, at least in the first year of residence in the community, is to attend daily Bible study with Sr. Margaret.

***

A couple of years ago at my twentieth college reunion, a classmate whom I hadn’t seen since graduation looked at me and said, “typewriters and babies!” I stared back, blankly. “That’s what you used to say you were going to have on your commune,” said Robert, “typewriters and babies, remember?” I didn’t really, but I was thrilled to be reminded. I guess it’s been a long time that I’ve been fascinated with living intentionally and in community. Though I bet Sr. Margaret would say she is living unintentionally in community, or rather, organically in community -- unintentionally enough that good intention doesn’t get in the way of community happening, organically. That’s one of the most important things I’ve learned from Sr. Margaret, that community will happen if we let it. And it’s kind of true that my life now does feel a little bit like living in a commune – with typewriters and babies no less! But when Micah was little, I wanted something more. I wanted very intentionally to be part of a community like New Jerusalem, which I found so powerfully compelling. But with a first grade daughter and a new baby son, it was hard to imagine how I could really get involved. Bible study seemed like a good place to start.

New Jerusalem is now a pretty wide-ranging community of residences that have been reclaimed and renovated from the abandoned rubble of North Philly. But the heart of New Jerusalem is a pair of small, modest row houses. One is the abandoned house Sr. Margaret originally bought for her hermitage, and the second is the one they bought next door. Along the way, the interior wall was torn down between, so the community house is a funny sort of mish-mash of two kitchens, two staircases, and one big living space. Upstairs is a maze of small offices, bedrooms, two bathrooms, and a small prayer room. Every thing has a scrappy, handy-man-special sort of look to it, with pergo floors and a mish-mash of used furniture; found art of the religious-inspirational variety; political posters of the peace-and-welfare-rights variety; bookcases made of boards and bricks and full of dusty, wide-ranging titles that almost certainly include Ghandi, King, Merton and Day; two kitchens full of mis-matched dishes and cheap, processed food; and doors and windows that are totally out of plumb. There are lots of plants, many hanging from macramé plant holders right out of the seventies; crucifixes hang on several walls; the old piano is never in tune; and a communal, avacado-green phone is attached to its base with a long cord. It might strike you a lot like a college group house at first, except that the plants are all alive, and there are no empty beer cans anywhere, and no ash trays. There is, however, almost always a pot of strong coffee brewing. And if you can look past the lack of attention to any real aesthetic sensibility, you will notice that everything is very clean, as cleaning the community spaces is part of the mandatory community service at New Jerusalem.

Bible study starts every morning at 8:00, in the community living and dining space, where all chairs can be turned to face Sr. Margaret’s plaid recliner by the wood stove. It was a bit of a trick to get there by 8:00, but Trixie was a sport about being dropped off at school early, and with luck, I could usually get there in about ten minutes. Finding the right place to sit among the crowd of forty or fifty residents was more difficult, given the vicissitudes of life with a small baby – Micah was not quite six months, and probably only twice as many pounds, when I first started attending Bible study in October of 2003. I finally figured out that sitting on the steps in the first house afforded me both a good view of Sr. Margaret, and an easy escape route upstairs if Micah got fussy. But mostly in the early months, Micah was content to snooze and nurse in our blue batik sling, and I could sit entranced by Sr. Margaret.

And really? “Bible study” was probably a misnomer, because it was really more like the “Sr. Margaret Variety Hour.” She would pick a theme for a few weeks or months – while I was there, we did the Beatitudes, the “Gospel According to Martin Luther King,” the passion story from Luke – and for an hour each morning, Sr. Margaret would talk. Always with a steaming hot cup of black coffee held between both hands, stopping only very occasionally to let someone else say something or ask a question, Sr. Margaret would interpret and narrate. It was really The Gospel According to Sr. Margaret, truth be told, and not everyone was happy about it all the time. Especially if they dared to challenge the good Sister, or disagree with her interpretation. Oh dear. And if you haven’t spent much time with middle-aged African American addicts and homeless men, you may not know this, but many of them are serious theologians. They know their Bible, chapter and verse. And very occasionally, some of them didn’t agree with Sr. Margaret’s interpretation of things. There wasn’t a lot of room for that, though, so the grumblings stayed pretty low in the back of the room, mostly unnoticed by the rest of us, who sat contentedly, heads nodding, letting loose an occasional “Amen” in response to Sr. Margaret’s compelling meandering through scripture.

Lots of people visit New Jerusalem, and quite a few visit the Bible study occasionally, so nobody paid me much mind at first. As weeks turned into months, though, I slowly and quietly became part of the community. People generally knew who I was, and I started learning names and noticing who was gone, recognizing when folks were new. As Micah grew bigger and more active, I missed more and more of the Bible study, straining to hear as I bounced him and hummed at the top of the stairs. But Micah became quite the center of attention upon our arrival and departure, as I pulled him out of, and then bundled him back into, his purple snow suit. He was quite beloved of the community, and got passed around a lot to men and women hungry for something sweet and fresh and new. (When I took Micah to his one-year old appointment, I got on automatic pilot at the checklist of questions our thorough pediatrician always asked: Any smokers in the house? No. Any guns in the house? No. Do you always use a car seat? Yes. Any reason we should do a TB test? No. …Oh wait, yes, now that I think of it, maybe we should...)

***

Early that winter, Sr. Margaret asked if I would help some of the residents get ready for the GRE, a program she had long wanted to start, but had never been able to get off the ground. I was eager to do something that would give back, eager to get to know folks in the community in a more intimate way, and I eagerly said yes. I put out a call to anyone interested, and soon had about ten residents signed up. I did a thorough intake with each one, assessing their needs and goals. I got hooked up with some city bureaucracy that gave us books. I found a course at Temple and took a van full of residents to the campus to sign up for study help. I scheduled regular study times in the community house, and tried to make myself available to help whenever I could. I found locations and dates for taking the test, and tried to help folks register.

But here’s the thing – the thing I was already learning, in fact, as I watched the faces at Bible study change over time. New Jerusalem is one of the most successful long-term recovery programs around, with a relatively high success rate, and a relatively low rate of relapse. The emphasis, though, is on “relatively.” In fact, even at New Jerusalem, one of the few sure things is relapse and turnover. I guess that’s what I learned, in concrete and heartbreaking ways, about poverty in general: one thing you can count on is that you can’t count on much. Things change all the time: you grow close to someone, come to love someone, and suddenly they’re gone – because they’re using again, or they got in a fight, or they lost their public assistance. Maybe a mother or a child needs them, or their boyfriend took them back, or they ran into some of their boys from back in the ‘hood. New Jerusalem is full of hope, but it is the hope of a flower that blooms in the midst of the weeds and the trash and the used condoms and the crack vials and the hypodermic needles that riddle most every vacant lot in the ghetto. New Jerusalem is a beacon in the midst of the swirling, ugly chaos of poverty and addiction, but it is not immune from the chaos. The chaos swirls through on a regular basis, and wreaks havoc on the community. And the folks who stay, year in and year out – all of them, Sr. Margaret, and the other nuns, and the volunteers, and the long-term residents, all of them working their programs to heal themselves and heal the world – they are all saints. Saints, really, there is no other word for it.

I, on the other hand, am not a saint. It was just too much for me. By the time the test date we’d been working toward came around, almost every one of my promising pupils had left the community. Often I wouldn’t even find out for days or a week. New folks would sign up, but they too would eventually leave altogether, or simply fade away. It was confusing and disheartening and just plain hard.

By the time Easter rolled around, Bible study was becoming less and less satisfying too. Micah was more and more active, and less content to nap or play quietly in the sling. I spent a lot of time upstairs feeling frustrated. I was also finding myself a little uncomfortable with Sr. Margaret’s Easter theology, much as I wanted to revere every word that came out of her mouth.

And so, after spring break, I just didn’t go back. I meant to, I surely thought I would, but as it turns out, I didn’t. I didn’t say good-bye. I didn’t offer any explanation. I just let myself fade away, as so many folks do at New Jerusalem. I told myself it just didn’t make sense to keep going: Micah was too big and fussy, summer was coming, I was starting to tire a bit of the Gospel According to Sr. Margaret. But in truth, none of that was the real reason. The real reason was that I just needed to get away from the chaos of poverty. And so I did. That was the first time I just walked away.

To be continued.

Epilogue: I should note that have been back, a couple of times over the last few years, and I have always been wildly and warmly received with cries of “Oh we have missed you! It’s so good to see you!” Saints, I tell you. No other word for it. If you're looking for a worthwhile cause to give some money to in this season of thanksgiving, I can't think of a more worthy one than New Jerusalem!

Coming Attractions

Last Sunday Michael preached a sermon on James and John, two of Jesus’ disciples who, with a stunning lack of humility, conspired to reserve for themselves the seats of honor on Jesus’ right and on his left in his coming glory. Can you imagine? Wanting to be special like that? Sheesh.

Of course, as Michael suggested in his sermon, we probably all have a bit of that – ambition, a drive to be successful, to be great even – or at the very least, a need to be recognized, affirmed. In its most basic form, it seems to me, this is really just another way of saying that we all need to be loved.

Of course, our need to be loved can play itself out in many ways, some of them not so humble. Often, our need to be loved plays itself out as a need to be loved over and above everyone else, to be greater, better, more special. I mean really, James and John were already Jesus’ disciples for crying out loud! What more could you want?

I doubt Jesus’ response was all that satisfying to James and John, and it can be hard medicine for most of us still today: “…whoever wishes to become great among you must be your servant, and whoever wishes to be first among you must be slave of all. For the Son of Man came not to be served, but to serve…” (Mark 10: 43-45) Jesus doesn’t say that we can’t be special, that we can’t be great, but he redefines greatness. As Michael put it, Jesus asks not that we give up our drive to be first, but rather that we turn our drive to be “first in love … first in service.” Michael suggested that Jesus “democratizes ‘greatness’ if you will. Everyone can be great, because everyone can serve…. Beloved," Michael continued, "Service is the rent we pay for the room we take up in this world. Not something we do in our spare time, with what’s left over. But our purpose in life. Everyone can be great. And it’s one of the most beautiful compensations in life that no one can sincerely try and help another without helping himself. The best way to become yourself is to lose yourself in the service of others. Everyone can be great. ‘We cannot truly live for ourselves alone. Our lives are connected by a 1000 invisible threads, and along these sympathetic fibers, our actions run first as causes and then return as results’ (Herman Melville). Everyone can be great. We can’t foresee our lives’ twists and turns, but one thing we can know: the ones who live best will be those who’ve sought and found how to serve. Everyone can be great. Children of God, Disciples of Christ, find your real job, and do it. Understand real success and go for it. Everyone can be great. Amen.” (Michael Ward Caine, sermon to Old First Reformed United Church of Christ, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania on October 18, 2009)

I agree with Michael that everyone can be great. I agree that Jesus calls us to a different standard of greatness than the world calls us to, and that Jesus’ standard is how well we love and serve one another.

I agree, wholeheartedly, indeed this is at the heart of my faith as a Christian … and yet, and yet … that doesn’t feel like the whole story to me. Or rather, I should say, that’s not my whole story. And I want to tell you my whole story about service and greatness and my need to be loved. I want to tell you because I think it is sort of easy to be a little polly-anna about how nice and good and right it is to serve others, but I am here to tell you it can be pretty fucking hard too. And our actions, that “run first as causes and then return as results”? Sometimes the results aren’t what you’d expect. And you still find yourself yearning for a pat on the back, to be special, to be loved.

A couple of years ago I stopped blogging at the wide tent for several reasons. One was that I found myself starting to feel ambitious as a writer, wanting to be read, and recognized, to be one of the important and successful bloggers – but I didn’t like the writer I became when I was motivated by ambition. I felt that my words, in my mouth, on my fingertips, that they were often righteous, and lacked humility, that I was trying to bring craft to my work not so that it would serve others but so that it would reflect well on me. And when I did try to approach my writing with humility, I would just be left wondering, “Who the hell am I anyway? Why do I think I have anything so special to say?” Either way, it was sort of paralyzing.

Another reason I stopped blogging was that I had hit a wall when it came to writing about race and poverty. I was and still am pretty in awe of Dawn’s writing about adoption, and as I have said before, I felt, and still feel, like I don’t have a whole lot to add. But poverty and racism – I felt like I actually did have something to say, and I was tired of the same old predictable white liberal script -- I wanted to break out, and talk about these things in new ways … but again, I just felt paralyzed.

Most importantly, though, I stopped blogging because I took a job, and I just really didn’t have any time. For almost two years, from early in 2007 until late fall of 2008, I became very involved in directing my church’s summer and after school programs for children and youth living in poverty in a neighborhood of Philadelphia called Kensington. By the end of 2008, I had burned through just about everything I thought I knew about myself, and I just collapsed.

Writing again here at my goodly heritage has been wildly theraputic, and while I don’t have all the answers about why I write, and how I write, and what it all means, I do know that I don’t feel so paralyzed any more. I feel like I have emerged with a new voice, and I will admit I like it. I also will admit that I like getting nice comments from all of you. I don’t know if I have more ambition than that right now, but I’m also pretty sure that if I do, it’s okay. And, I think, maybe I’m ready to tell you my story, my complicated story about service and greatness and needing to be loved.

This story is long, and it will most likely unfold over many months. So stay tuned. If you feel so moved, drop me a comment now and again and let me know what you think. I’m not too proud to tell you that it really does make my day!

The Cost and Joy of Discipleship: My Resurrection "Problem"

Is it just me, or do you have conversations in your head too? I do this all the time, “talk” to people in my head about all sorts of things. When I’m thinking something through, I guess I need an audience, even if it’s just an imaginary one. That’s the reason I started this blog, really: I love to write, I need to write, but I could never make myself do it just for me, in a journal. But I also have never felt that fire in my belly to get published. Oh, it would be nice, I’m sure, and if someone out of the blue asked me to submit something to a magazine, or offered me a book contract, I would surely say “Yes!” and be thrilled. But that’s not how it happens, and I have never had the stomach for the sort of self-promotion and marketing it takes to be a successful writer. Still, I need to write, and a blog seemed like a way to gather around me a little bit of an audience to make me actually get words on a page now and then. (And as it turns out you, my dear little group of readers, are everything I need and I totally adore you, by the way!)

My friend Gordon says that reading, like writing, is communal, that we always read with someone, even if they don’t know that we are reading with them. I never thought about it that way, but instantly I knew what he meant – I’m always reading with someone or other, a friend who loves this author, or someone who reminds me of a character in the book I’m reading, or a loved one who has sewn themes into my life related to the themes in the book I’m reading. Since I joined Gordon’s book review group, affectionately know as the “Booksters,” I now read just about everything with Gordon, in addition to the other folks I’m reading “with,” because I know at the end of my book I will write a review for him. I love that, having him and all those other folks with me as I read.

My solitude is much like that, very much animated by souls who don’t even know they are with me. As an introvert, I need solitude to stay healthy and whole, but I’m also really a relationship-hound. I love people. I just adore them. I treasure relationships and crave intimacy and am promiscuously affectionate. And though I need to be alone a lot, I find that even in my solitude, I gather my dear ones around me in the form of imaginary conversations. I carry on conversations in my head with just about anybody, whether I’ve met them or not. I can “talk” to my loved ones, of course, but also to authors of books I’m reading, famous people I admire, “friends” on Facebook whom I’ve never even met – it’s how I flesh out ideas, ideas that often make their way here in written form, ideas that are influenced along the way by books I’m reading – it’s all very dynamic, my reading, talking, and writing. (Of course in my imaginary conversations, I’m always incredibly articulate and wise and quite attractively clever and witty, so maybe they also serve a therapeutic purpose, to perk me up when I’m down!)

At any rate, what I realized recently is that I don’t “talk” to people who aren’t alive. My imaginary conversations are really rehearsals, fantasy conversations that I’m imagining, at least theoretically, could really happen. I realized this recently when I was thinking (having a conversation, actually, in my head with someone I don’t even really know) about why prayer is so hard for me. The prayer that works best for me is liturgical, praying the Psalms, even praying the Rosary (though I pray it in a very modified way that would probably horrify orthodox Catholics … though just the thought of me praying the Rosary in any way would probably horrify orthodox Catholics, now that I think about it, so what are you going to do?) But I’m terribly undisciplined about any of that, which, combined with my complete inability to pray meaningful in a “talking to God” sort of way, leaves me without the rich prayer life that I really crave. Okay, so yes, I could just get some discipline about the sort of prayer life that actually does work for me (why is it so hard to just pray the Psalms every freakin day, when I love them so much? Go figure.). But still, this “talking to God” sort of prayer is fascinating to me, but ultimately elusive. Entirely elusive. Which doesn’t really make sense, right, if I’m all about imaginary conversations with folks.

Yesterday after church a small group of us gathered over lunch (broccoli and cheddar quiche made by yours truly and a lovely fall salad from Jane) in the parsonage to brainstorm topics for the adult Sunday school series, and George suggested a series called something like, “What’s Jesus Got to Do With It?” He speculated that there are some folks outside the church who are maybe craving something we have, but can’t quite get themselves to join us because while they sort of get God, they’re just not sure what Jesus adds. What’s he got to do with it anyway? I thought that was interesting, because for me, it’s just the opposite: I’m all about Jesus. Truth be told, I’m kind of crazy about Jesus. But God? I really, honestly can’t wrap my mind around God. No, that’s not right -- I can wrap my mind around God, and I really do believe in and experience God, all the time. But the problem is, I can’t wrap my arms around God – I can’t animate God enough to give God personality and the sort of presence that I can be in relationship with, that I can talk to. So when people try to reassure me that really, prayer is easy! It’s just talking to God! That doesn’t help. Not even a little.

But if you have been reading me even for a little while, you know that Incarnation is central to my faith. I just really love the notion that in Jesus, God shares God’s Godness (I was going to say Self, but like I said, I can’t really imagine God as having a Self) with us all in such a physical, earthy, intimate, bodily way. If you’re a relationship-hound like me, who loves the way we can touch one another not just with our heads and our hearts but literally by touching each other, holding hands, kissing and laughing and laying our hands on one another in gestures of love and healing – if you love all that, well then, Jesus is your boy, right? And eating! Have you ever noticed how central eating is to our Incarnational faith? That’s because bodies need to eat, and it is sacred and good to eat together. It’s no accident that Jesus left us with a meal to recreate himself among us. It’s no accident that Jesus revealed himself in Emmaus through the breaking of bread. So, yeah, I’m all about the Incarnation. (I should note here that none of this about the centrality of bodies and food to faith – not one single bit of it – is unique to Christianity; I just happen to be Christian so that’s the tradition out of which I write.)

So the other day, as I was driving past the Art Museum on my way home from a meeting at church, I was thinking about prayer and why it is so hard for me (okay, again, I was actually having a conversation with one of you! In my head…. all the time, I’m telling you, these conversations are going on in my head). I thought, okay, it makes sense that I can’t “talk” to God, but why can’t I “talk” to Jesus? If Incarnation is really so central to my faith, and I’ve got this man, Jesus, whom I adore, and he’s perfectly embodying God, then why can’t I “talk” to him? At first I worried that I had an Incarnation problem, which would be a real crisis of faith, let me tell you. And then I realized what it was: I don’t talk to dead people. I don’t “talk” to my mom, much as I wish I could, and I don’t “talk” to Thomas Merton, even though I call him my patron saint. I don’t talk to historical figures, and, as I realized winding my way past boat house row, I don’t talk to Jesus. At least not unselfconsciously, not in the way that I can lose myself in imaginary conversations with people who are alive.

I realized then, on Kelly Drive, that my problem with prayer is not an Incarnation problem, but a Resurrection problem. And I will admit that I realized this with some relief. Not because Resurrection is not central to my faith: it is, actually. But, I will confess, I don’t “believe in the resurrection of the body,” much as I love to say the Apostles Creed, and I don’t “look for the resurrection of the dead” even though I love saying the Nicene Creed. I believe in, and experience, the Resurrection of Christ all the time, every day, but not in a way that manifests one body, in the person of Jesus, who is alive in a way that I can “talk” to.

Last night another group of folks from church met for dinner at Bob and Joanna’s house. (I brought salad this time, and there was also chili and baked lentils and awesome chocolate chip-raisin muffins for dessert; and always, with that bunch, good wine and beer). We were there as part of our covenant ministry with Michael, with whom we are embarking on a period of revitalization during which we hope to share our good news with others who need it and are seeking it, but aren’t sure where to find it. Michael asked us a series of questions and we shared around the living room, a wacky diverse group of folks. Among the questions Michael asked us was, What is a central way that we as a church experience Jesus? The discussion was thoughtful and moving and just lovely. Dorothy told the story of coming to the United States as a refugee from Liberia, and against all odds finding a church home with us. Laura told of how difficult for her is Jesus’ challenge that we must become like children to enter the Kingdom, yet when a pack of kids, led by Micah and Meg, randomly and very noisily flew through our discussion, there he was for her. Joe, a long-time UCC pastor, spoke of meeting Jesus in Buddhist practices such as meditation, and Bob spoke of meeting Jesus in the homeless men he works with at our food and clothing cupboard. Bobbie noted that because of her work in the HIV/AIDS community, she could only join her husband’s church after we became Open and Affirming, because acceptance of gay and lesbian people was so central to her experience of Christ. And on and on, one gorgeous story after another.

I was sitting in a chair, with Michael on the floor next to me on one side, and Dorothy in a chair on the other, and for a brief moment I had one of those “movie” experiences – you know, when there’s a sequence in a film where the music rises over the dialogue, and usually the camera does something clever, like zooms out or spins round the circle, and you are meant to experience with the character a transcendent moment? That’s what it was for a moment: pure transcendence. I resisted an urge to reach down and take Michael’s hand, to reach over and put my other hand on Dorothy’s back. And I looked around, as the camera would, not really hearing the sounds of voices for a moment, but seeing these faces of all these people that I just love so very much. And they were shining, I’m telling you. Transfigured. And I actually thought right then about all the petty ways that we can be annoying to one another, and let each other down, and be, well, human, you know? I was acutely aware of that, that these were human people, with very real human foibles, many of which I am well aware, having loved them and struggled in community with them now for over a decade. But in that moment they were all shining and perfect and utterly beautiful. And I thought this! This is it, this is the Body of Christ, this is the Resurrection: all these people I’m talking to all the time in my head.

And I realized then that maybe I don’t have a Resurrection problem at all. And maybe, just maybe, all those conversations I have in my head with all of you, my dearest ones, maybe those conversations are my prayer?

The Cost and Joy of Discipleship: Renewing My Lesbian Card

On my “ketchup” list in my last post was the fact that I have been thinking more about being a lesbian in the past ten weeks than I have in the past ten years. That might be a bit of an exaggeration (I’m a little prone to hyperbole), but not too much. Julie used to joke that they were going to take away our lesbian cards soon, if we didn’t get some pride … but then we didn’t, and then we were pretty sure the cards had, in fact, expired. Aside from in fact being lesbians, our lives aren’t very, well, lesbian. We don’t go to gay pride events, we’re not part of any gay and lesbian organizations, we don’t have a rainbow flag outside our house. We have plenty of gay friends, but they’re mostly not our friends because they’re gay, but because they go to our church, or they live on our block, or our kids are playmates.

So my newfound enthusiasm – giddiness even – for thinking and talking about being gay is especially startling to me, like someone renewed my card and forgot to tell me! And it’s not as though I haven’t given any thought to being a lesbian in the last decade, but honestly, it’s just occurring to me that for the most part, what brings gayness to the center of my attention has almost always been the ugly stuff: DOMA and the federal marriage amendment and the whole toxic political climate of the Bush years. But suddenly, we’re married! And we have a gay pastor! And hey, it feels sort of fun to be gay again!

I know that I owe you all an essay or two to conclude my marriage series, but it’s still percolating. I really thought getting married in Iowa was sort of a formality, something kind of cool we never thought we could do. I never imagined that it would be so profoundly generative, in such lovely and unexpected ways. I look forward to sharing all that with you soon (ish; no promises). But I’m finding that I sort of need to write and share my way around it for awhile. The meaning in it, which is gorgeous and unexpected and feels over and over like grace – it’s just too big right now to get my arms all the way around.

So in the meantime, I thought I would share a couple of scenes from a lesbian life, as they are happening to me, or coming back to me these days.

I.

Last Sunday at the adult Sunday school series called Sharing our Faith Stories, our pastor Michael led us in an exercise intended to help us feel more comfortable sharing with one another. It was sort of like “speed dating,” except it was “speed faith sharing.” The chairs in the social hall were set in two concentric circles, facing each other, so folks sitting in each circle were paired with someone sitting in the other circle, knee to knee. Michael would ask us a question, and we each had a minute to share, and then one circle would move one space to the right, so you had a new partner for each question. One of the questions was to tell about an embarrassing moment, and this is the story I told, as it turns out, to my dear friend Suzanne:

When we left Indiana to move to Philadelphia, it was largely because we couldn’t be out there and still be teachers, and Julie, at least, was really sure that she was called to teach (and she was right). As I have written before, it was painful to be closeted in our small, rural classrooms, and the city felt so fresh, so wide-open, so safe, ironically enough. And we were definitely loving being out again, like the BDOC’s (big dykes on campus) that we had been in college. That was definitely way before our lesbian cards expired, back in the day when we loved nothing more than a march on Washington, and if it was a dyke march, all the better.

So there we were, marching with tens of thousands of lesbians right past the White House, and there was a whole contingent who had stripped to the waist. And if you know me, you know that in general I like to have as little clothing on as possible, so OF COURSE I took my shirt off. I mean, right? What else would I do? And we’re marching right past the White House, and we’re chanting something like “Hey hey, ho ho, homophobia has got to go,” or singing “A you’re an Amazon, B coming Brave and strong, Clearly and Confidently you C! D you’re so dykey, oh how you Excite me, how Fortunate for the Female Faculty!” Or some such, you get the picture.

And then, quietly at first, and then a little louder, and more insistent, I hear a voice from behind: “Miss Rose? Miss Rose? Is that YOU?”

And sure enough, I turned around to see a somewhat flushed (and fully clothed, but quite clearly marching in the dyke march) former student. And by former, I mean like she was my student LAST YEAR!

Again, those of you who know me in person know that I’m no prude, and I would probably be quite comfortable being naked in front of most of you – certainly if we were marching together in a dyke march past the White House – but this was too much. Even for me. I smiled, and said, “Well hello! Just let me put my shirt on and then I can talk to you!” But I’m pretty sure I was blushing.

II.

It’s lovely to feel so celebrated and safe these days as a lesbian woman, wife and mother. It’s so lovely that I almost forgot how recently it felt so very different. I think it’s important to remember. This is a link to something I shared with my congregation one Sunday in worship just three short years ago, when Pennsylvania was considering an amendment excluding gays and lesbians from marriage.

III.

A couple of weeks ago in church, we sang a new response at some point in the liturgy, that went like this:

Open my eyes, that I may see

glimpses of truth, Thou hast for me.

Open my eyes ...

Well, actually, I can’t remember exactly how the song we sang in church went, but most of you who grew up in church probably recognized this, right? That never happens to me, because I didn’t grow up in church. All those hymns that you’re pissed off about because some earnest PC music committee changed the lyrics? Doesn’t bother me in the least, because I never knew the old lyrics to begin with. So I was pretty startled that I recognized this song, though I couldn’t quite put my finger on it until about the third verse, and then I remembered: Cris Williamson, Song of the Soul, from The Changer and the Changed (go listen!) – the song that opens with that same refrain:

Open my eyes, that I may see

glimpses of truth Thou hast for me

Open my eyes illumine me,

Spirit Divine ….

And if you were an earnest lesbian (or even just an earnest feminist) in the 1980’s, you probably know exactly what I’m talking about. Remember how we used to sit up in the Womyn’s Center on the fourth floor of Carpenter Hall, that gorgeous space where men were not allowed, and where the sun streamed through that big semi-circular window? There were great big couches and pillows on the floor and that lavender mural called “Weaving Webs of Women’s Lives,” remember? (And of course, if you didn’t go to Earlham College in the 1980’s, but you were an earnest feminist somewhere else in those years, you can probably at least imagine what I’m talking about). There was a record player in the corner and a slender stack of “women’s music” albums – or “wimmin’s music,” or “womyn’s music” – oh my, but we were earnest then! And I loved it all – Cris Williamson and Meg Christian [edited to get her name right] and their triumphant concert at Carnegie Hall, singing about loving women; and Holly Near, who was maybe even a lesbian for a minute or two, wasn’t she? But at the very least she was bringing all us gentle, angry people together in harmony. And Ferrin, remember her? Oh good Lord, she was not only earnest, but earnest and bleak. And Deirdre McCalla [edited to fix her name] and Theresa Trull and Toshi Reagan … they were all like the sound track of my life back then. And I loved it all.

So when we sang that song in church the other day, a song that I not only knew from before I became a regular church-goer, but knew from those sun-filled days in the lavender womb of the Womyn’s Center, it all came flooding back – how much I loved being a lesbian, how full of hope and pride and joy we were, such young women loving each other, and how much those women’s music singers – Cris and Meg and Holly and Deirdre and Theresa and Toshi and all the rest – how easy it is to remember them with sentimentality, or to poke fun (as I often do) at their earnestness, and to forget that they really were pioneers. That it was fucking brave back then to get up on a stage and sing about loving another woman. I’m glad I got to be reminded of that in the midst of my loving, open and affirming congregation, being led by an openly gay pastor – those women were among the many folks who paved the way for there to be such a church, and such a pastor, and such a giddy lesbian as me -- and I am ever grateful to all of them.