Is Church Like High School?

At annual conference, I called for "The Year of the Nones." You undoubtedly know what a none is, as the fastest growing religious population in the US, it's someone who marks "none" when asked what one's religious affiliation is. I am praying for the nones whose names were given to me at annual conference (2315 names) and I hope that you are praying for the nones in your life, too. I also hope you're using a similar method to encourage your faith community to pray for and learn from the nones in their lives.

My colleague, Bishop John Schol in the Baltimore-Washington Conference, made a video of his conversation with his daughter, Rebecca. Rebecca is a none; not necessarily disbelieving in God, raised in the church, and a wonderful human being (I've spent many hours with her and her twin sister). But she has some issues with the church! You can listen/watch the interview at: http://www.bwcumc.org/ministries/connecting/rebecca?tr=y&auid=8511504

But whether you listen/watch the interview, one of the insights I got from Becca was around the frustration that nones--young people in particular--have with the church. They believe that church people are too judgmental. This has been documented in many well-known books, such as UnChristian (Kinnaman) and They Like Jesus But Not the Church (Kimball). I thought I resonated with their concerns but Becca gave me a new insight, particularly a young adult insight that I hadn't thought about before.

Becca implicitly compares the church's judgmental attitude with high school. "High school follows you," she said, indicating that it has a continuing impact on young adults' lives. I don't know exactly what high school was like for her but my guess is that she and many in her generation have experienced more bullying, judging and negative experiences in high school than many of us who are baby boomers. There are so many ways to bully/judge each other in high school these days, including Facebook, email, and other social media. The pain of judgment, criticism, ostracism, name-calling, etc. is more recent and fresh, and easier to do than taking someone out and beating them up as was the usual means in my day (and not so frequent then at least where I went to school).

Yet almost diametrically opposed, Becca's seemed to have an expectation of a church as a group of "like-minded people." The church community as well as our general society is more and more diverse and not adverse to sharing one's own unique perspective. The church community needs to be a place where we can learn to live with each other in our un-like-mindedness in a way that is accepting of each other and in a way that teaches us to live, love and work with all those other people in our lives with whom we have un-like-mindedness.

WDYT? Is the church like high school, too quick to judge? If so, how do we live together in our un-like-mindedness in a way that helps us all grow more like Christ?

The Ultimate

One Sunday I came home from church when I was the pastor of Church of the Redeemer in Cleveland Heights, Ohio. Ken and I were reporting in on the interesting things that happened that morning as we have for 35 years! I said, "A really interesting woman came to church this morning. Her name is Ann Weatherhead. She's a runner and we talked until everybody had left the building."

Ken said, "Is she related to Leslie Weatherhead?"

I said, "No." But my NO dragged out into about 3 syllables in my cynicism at such a ridiculous question. Weatherhead is a common name in Cleveland. In fact there is a Weatherhead School of Management at Case Western Reserve Univeristy so why would I think this was Leslie Weatherhead's relation?

Leslie Weatherhead was a British theologian from the World War 2 era and beyond. His famous book is The Will of God. In it he describes how basically everything is the will of God; whether it works out the way God originally intended or not, there will be the ultimate will of God. Leslie Weatherhead was a very controversial figure, shaking up the religious establishment of his day. I imagine him a bit like Rob Bell!

His grand-daughter, Ann, had never read him. So of course the first thing I did was hold a study on The Will of God. She was mortified by his dated language and illustrations but I tried to assure her that in fact he was contemporary for his time. Ann has never been quite sure where she stands with all of her grandfather's theology (her parents didn't subscribe to it at all and it was only because she came with a running friend that she even showed up at church that first Sunday) but even as I type, she is in England, checking out some of her ecclesiastical/theological roots.

The will of God is an elusive phenomenon. In Acts 21 Paul is sure that he knows what the will of God is. But then, so do his friends. Paul thinks the will of God is that he goes to Jerusalem; his friends think the will of God is that he doesn't go to Jerusalem. But Paul is a bit like Leslie Weatherhead. He believes that no matter what happens in Jerusalem, ultimately God's will is made known because what's important is that he will faithfully witness to God, no matter what happens. The will of God isn't that Paul is spared imprisonment and even death; the will of God is that God's grace is shared. Paul ultimately (an important word, I think, in describing the will of God) gives witness to God's grace--through his trials in Galilee with the political and religious leaders, through his hardships in getting to Rome (ship-wrecked and all), and through his imprisonment in Rome once he gets there. Ultimately it's all God's will.

In the end, Paul arrives in Rome where they haven't heard much--and what they've heard hasn't been good-about Christianity, but Paul takes it on as his personal mission to share the grace of Jesus with others. Specifically with those who haven't been in the inner circle. Sort of like Ann Weatherhead, to tell you the truth. She's the original none, seeking but unsure, embarrassed by less-than-spot-on Christianity, and yet a person with a heart of gold. Had she known him, she would have gone to Paul's open door. Having known her, run with her (a couple half marathons), hung out with her at the Barking Spider at Case Western Reserve University on their gospel night, I know that God's will is ultimate; far beyond my ability to express or know it, or Ann's.

What about you? How do you know what God's will is?

Be Thou My Version

I was sitting behind a worship leader during a service and I could see her notes about what the praise band would be singing next. On the paper, she had written, "Be Thou My Version." I chuckled but then wondered if this was some new contemporary song that I hadn't heard of yet and frankly couldn't quite imagine where it was going in its message. But then as the service continued, sure enough! The song they sang was an upbeat, modernized version of "Be Thou My Vision."

I've contemplated this Freudian slip of the hand and as I read Acts 16:6-10. Paul and Timothy had a plan to "turn west into Asia province, but the Holy Spirit blocked that route." So they proceeded to go another way, "but the Spirit of Jesus wouldn't let them go there either." They ventured yet on another route until finally Paul had a dream where a Macedonian was beckoning them to "come over to Macedonia and help us!" It says that "the dream gave Paul his map."

While it's important to plan--Paul did it regularly--it's also important to know when what we are doing is our version of God's vision.

I'm impressed by this story that Paul's version wasn't as big as God's vision. By going to Macedonia, Paul's world and therefore the church's witness and outreach was significantly enlarged.

Are our versions small and sometimes even self-centered, asking what we want to do instead of what God is calling us to do?

Are our versions limited to our own and people like us instead of reaching out to God's people everywhere?

Are our versions tight-fisted instead of generous in helping others?

Are our versions reflections of what we've done before and how we've done it instead of rethinking and imagining what God can do through us in new ways?

How has God given you a new song to sing? Changing it from "Be Thou My Version" to "Be Thou My Vision?"

WDYT?

Are We Trying to "Out-God" God?

"So why are you now trying to out-god God, loading these new believers down with rules that crushed our ancestors and crushed us, too? Don't we believe that we are saved because the Master Jesus amazingly and out of sheer generosity moved to save us just as he did those beyond our nations? So what are we arguing about?" (Acts 15:10-11, MSG)

What does it mean to try to "out-god" God?

Out-godding God may be one of the biggest obstacles to our own ability to reach new people with the gospel. We're familiar with the consistent reports that young people think that the church people are hypocritical, judgmental and boring...maybe it was too political rather than boring. But too political, according to the reports, means that one side of things is proposed as the only way to believe if you want to be a Christian, on the right side, with the insiders. I think that's out-godding God.

How easy it is to fall into the trap of out-godding God! Recently a pastor in my home town told his congregation of farmers that unless they farm organically, they're not really Christian. (He's not long for that world...) Not to get engaged in how nearly impossible it is to make a living farming organically in eastern Washington state and how complicated the whole American agricultural system has become, given the US Farm Bill, etc., what was he thinking?


Abraham Joshua Heschel, my favorite prophetic voice of the Hebrew scriptures, warns his readers in The Prophets, that prophets can go beyond God's judgment, destroying instead of disciplining. Heschel calls it a hypertrophy of sympathy for God, or out-godding God in judgment. Jeremiah had a tendency to out-god God in his condemnation, reprimanding without reminding people of God's love; judgment instead of grace, forgetting God's love for the victims caught in the mire of complicated issues. A hypertrophy of sympathy for God is to outweigh love of God for love of neighbor; they're meant to be in balance (a trick if you can do it).

Obviously out-godding God isn't an exclusively early church phenom!

But equating any political, social, religious or economic agenda--or anything for that matter--as the only way to be Christian is to out-god God! It's simplistic and only adds burdens to those who are often the most vulnerable, even the victims, of the injustices that we decry.

Acts 15 demonstrates that the complicated issues of our religious, economic, political, and cultural lives aren't easily discerned, lived out, and finalized. In our present economic struggles, given the federal deficit, states' need to balance budgets, and the pinch on congregations to be in ministry (and federal and state leaders calling on the faith communities to pick up the slack), how do we find our way forward to make wise and faithful decisions based on our biblical and Wesleyan traditions of economic justice? And avoid out-godding God when we do? How do we find a gracious prophetic voice?

WDYT?

There Are Two Kinds of Christians...

In reading Acts 13:1-5, it becomes clear that there are two kinds of Christians: those who are sent and those who commission and support those who are sent. The Holy Spirit chose Barnabas and Saul to be sent (literally called apostles) and that the rest, including Simon, Lucius, and Manaen who were leaders, were to stay behind to build up the body of believers there. They were the supporters of the sent. The sent and the supporters of the sent; two kinds of Christians.

Over the years we've considered missionaries and evangelists to be people who travel to other places to people that we or they don't know in order to share the good news. But what does it mean in our world today where we don't have to go to another country or people in order to be sent to someone else with the gospel? Today to be sent means to go talk to a neighbor, co-worker or someone in our own family.

Aren't we all called to be two different kinds of Christians at the same time or at least at different times in our lives? Sometimes we are the sender and sometimes we're the sent. Unfortunately many of our churches are filled with those who don't believe they are sent to their neighbor or friend or family member or co-worker. Their faith is too "private" for all that.

The most dynamic, growing congregations in my experience are those where there are people who are constantly sharing their faith and their church with others that they know or meet in their daily lives. And then there is the need for those who are providing the support--not just for the senders but the whole congregation to keep growing senders and the sent.

We're all the sent--telling others about Jesus or at least where they can find Jesus (hopefully in our churches!). We're all the supporters of the sent--doing our part in the life of the Christian community so that all experience opportunities for Christian formation--no matter how old or young, Christian community that is open to new people and changed by them, and opportunities to grow toward God and others.


But then, you have to consider the end of this chapter that finds Paul and Barnabas forced out of town because some were afraid that "their precious way of life was about to be destroyed" by this message of Jesus.


What is your "precious way of life" that might be destroyed if you truly shared your faith and your church with others? Might we lose control over what happens there--the style of music/worship, the decisions made about what it means to be church, who comes to church and who gets attention that might be lavished on ourselves?



WDYT?

Stop Living in the Moment!

In Acts 7, Stephen has outraged the religious authorities and he is about to be stoned to death. Yet instead of defending himself, he recalls the story of the salvation of his people. He recounts the ways in which God has been with them through all the twists and turns of their history as a people, implying and trusting that God will be with him as he faces his accusers.

Stephen's story of salvation is an example of how he who is in the midst of a very bad situation--about to be stoned--gives credit and praise to God who has helped his people face adversity. I admire that ability to see and tell his story from the perspective of God's care for them in the midst of difficulty.

The way we tell the story of our lives becomes a lens by which we see life and define ourselves. It becomes a script for us in how we see ourselves, others, the world, and even God. Some people's story is that of how everyone has hurt them and they are victims. Others who may have even more experiences of adversity tell their stories in terms of how they have overcome; if they are people of faith, they give credit and praise to God for helping them overcome. We should be very careful how we tell our stories since we can spiral down into despair or find hope and courage to face the future.

Even how we tell the story of our church can provide a script that can bring despair or hope to us as a people. I would guess that there are no churches in the Minnesota Annual Conference who have not faced adversity in the past and yet they have perserved. How do we tell our story? What did we learn in those times? Do we live so much in the moment that we fail to remember how God has been with us in the past?

How do you tell your story in such a way that empowers you instead of deflates you? Let me give you an example. I was told when I was in the 8th grade that it was "too bad you're a girl, you'd make a great preacher." People often gasp in our 21st century context (although not everyone!!!). Yet I understand that the person who said that and people who believed it (so as not to recommend me to the seminary I wanted to go to because I was a woman) had no imagination for women in ministry. Even I didn't initially have the imagination that it was possible. But now I do. I could be the victim in my own story or I could see it as what continues to happen in our lives, faith, and culture all the time: there's so much we don't have an imagination to understand. See how far our imaginations have gone! How much farther might they go in the future? What is God waiting for me to imagine today?

So how do you tell your story in light of God's salvation history in your life?

How do you tell your church's story in light of God's salvation history?

How might we someday tell the United Methodist Church's story in light of the context of God's salvation history?

WDYT?

Wherever Two or Three Are Gathered...

Wherever there are two or three gathered, there is Christ...and there is conflict!

Prior to the 5th and 6th chapters of Acts, the opposition against the Christian movement was largely from the outside. It's easy for us to idealize the early church, thinking that it was free of significant internal disagreement and conflict. But people are people in the first and the 21st century and not only is Christ present when two or three of us get together, but there's also disagreement! That's what happened when the church began to grow and included a diversity of people. People gathered in Christian community from different ethnic-racial groups, languages and from a lower socio-economic condition and conflict erupted!

While we are aware of the role of decline in a local church that causes conflict, having significantly grown church in my ministry, I'm aware that conflict results when a church grows, too!

"Who are these people and why are they here?"

"I don't know everyone anymore!"

"Things just aren't the same here anymore!"

As a church that was growing, we had problems; we called them "good problems," like not enough parking, seating, coat space, Sunday School rooms, etc. As the church grew, it also attracted a diversity of people with different theological perspectives, racial-ethnic backgrounds, religious traditions, socio-economic conditions. These differences created challenges for the church to include all who needed community and their spiritual needs met. A clear focus on the purpose of the Christian movement as well as the distinct leadership gifts was essential in order to deal with their good problems.

One way or the other, differences and conflict occur when two or three of us get together, even in Christ's name. We need to stop beating each other up for that reality. Keeping our focus, recognizing each other's gifts, and including all into our midst of Christian community transcend time, people and context.

Please don't give us the gory details about the conflict, but what do you see has important in moving a community of faith through the inevitable differences and disagreements that occur when two or three of us get together?

Is Acts 2 Utopian?

One of the favorite passages from the book of Acts is the second chapter, specifically the last verses which describes what the church was.

So what was that early church like? Following the coming of the Holy Spirit, it says that people were amazed and filled with awe at all that was happening in through the followers of Jesus. It says that the believers were in harmony with each other, holding everything in common, even selling what they had so that "each person's need was met." Followers followed a daily discipline of prayer and worship. They came together for common meals and joy was the mark of the church.

Is that a description of the 21st century church? Your church? The church at its best? Have you experienced in this regard?

We'd all like to be a part of a church like Acts 2, but it's a utopia unless we are also living and doing what what those first followers were doing. Did you know that the word utopia means 'no place'? Acts 2 is a utopia unless we are living like those early followers. We all want to go to an Acts 2 church but without us there's no there there! It doesn't exist as an ideal place; it's a place that we're called to create. We need to make Acts 2 incarnational, in and through us. It will be less than perfect and less than fully Acts 2 but it needs to be our simple model of what it means to be church.

Acts 2 is a mirror to hold up to what we are as the church today. At our best, where do we demonstrate this palpable sense of God's presence through awe and wonder in our daily living? Where and how do we seek to live in harmony? Where and how are we willing to give for the good of all, much less even sell what we have to make sure that there is an elimination of poverty in our communities? Where have we become intentional as individuals as well as a congregations to follow a daily discipline of prayer, worship and study?

When you break it down--this description of a seemingly utopian community--there are practices that make an Acts 2 church; a real, flesh-and-blood community of faith in any place and time. So the question is: what are we as individuals--clergy and laity--willing to do and be willing to change in our lives to be an Acts 2 church?

Yes, I want to be a part of an Acts 2 church, but it doesn't just happen; it happens because the Spirit changes me to be an Acts 2 church. Where do we see this Acts 2 church lived out that gives us all inspiration to allow the Spirit to change us?

I look forward to your insights! WDYT?

Like Runners in the Marathon of Salvation History

Welcome back to my blog! Over the next couple of months, I will be blogging on a weekly basis with the Acts of the Apostles as the text for consideration. I invite you to join in the conversation; please espond with your comments on the blog so that others can see what you have to say but keep your comments directed to the discussion at hand!





At annual conference 2010, I invited all United Methodists in Minnesota to read the Acts of the Apostles for themselves and for each church to do some kind of study or sermon series during the conference year. Many individuals (lay and clergy) as well as churches have been studying Acts and others will be in the new year.





My intent is that we look at Acts as inspiration and a comparison between the 1st and 21st centuries. What can we learn from the 1st century that helps us to see ourselve differently in the 21st? I invite you to read the study guide that I posted during the Fall as some background to the scriptures. You can find that at http://minnesotaumc.org/Portals/1199/Bishop%20Corner/acts%20study%20guide%202010-2011.pdf





While I don't intend to go chapter by chapter, I do want to start with the first chapter this week.





When I read the first chapter of Acts, I'm mindful that it's a critical kairos moment, entrusted to ordinary and sometimes uncomprehending human beings like Peter but also empowered by God's Spirit. It's post-Jesus of Nazareth and pre-church. It's a hand-off in the marathon of salvation history that hinges on all that has been with all that will be. What a moment!





I don't want to be overly dramatic here, but sometimes I feel like we're in a critical moment, too. Our transition is from post-Christendom to pre-something else! This kairos moment is entrusted to us ordinary and sometimes uncomprehending human beings but also empowered by God's Spirit. Peter interpreted the moment from scripture and called for +1 in the number of disciples.





It's easy to romanticize or idealize this 1st century moment when in fact the reason that they scattered from Jerusalem to Judea to Samaria and the ends of the world was because there was persecution. It was a hard and disruptive time for Christians but in the midst of the disruption, Christianity spread to new places, new people, and in new ways.





Today people are scattering, too. The next generation has scattered from the church, often because our forms of worship and our failure to live out the faith has made Christianity irrelevant to their lives. As people move or become discouraged with a local church, they scatter and often don't become a part of a faith community as readily as before or if at all. There are lots of reasons--many of them very socially acceptable like the increase of travel by many Americans--that makes a connection with a faith community weaker and weaker. While it breaks my heart that there is such a scattering of the people, instead of just beating ourselves up for it, I wonder what we might learn from Acts about what to do when there is this kind of upheaval in church as we have known it.





Phyllis Tickle in her book, The Great Emergence: How Christianity Is Changing and Why, views Christendom from the perspective of major upheavals and how upsetting it was for many Christians and the church at each disruptive time. During these times of upheaval, people had to rethink what was essential in being a Christian but "because of the reconfiguration of those treasures (of tradition) into new shapes and vessels and accommodations, the faith they testify to was scattered across a far broader geographic and demographic area than it had previous occupied. And...(the church) was freed to develop a praxis, liturgy, and theological richness" (p. 27) than before. The church didn't cease to be but spread wider and deeper than before.



So do you think this is a "disruption" in Christianity that will allow the emergence of a new way of being Christian here in the US? And if so, what treasure do we bring out of our ancient tradition and what do we "bring out" that is new (Matthew 13:52)?

Is this just a discouraging, downward spiraling time as the church or is it actually a kairos moment entrusted to us like those hinge times in the past? Like runners in the marathon of salvation history, are we at the point of a hand-off to an emerging way of being church? If so, what is required of us?



Please share your thoughts with others!

What Song Would You Sing?

Like you, I was following the rescue efforts in Haiti. I know two of the three United Methodist Committee on Relief personnel who were trapped under the Montana Hotel: Sam Dixon and Clint Rabb. They're not close friends, but I've had conversations and dinners on occasion over the years with Sam. Clint Rabb has been here in Minnesota in the last few years. When I heard that they were missing, I had the experience of "praying without ceasing." I thought and prayed for them all the time; they were on my heart and mind.

I was at a meeting with the bishop of the third UMCOR personnel, Jim Gulley, and Thursday evening we stayed up late talking. As we parted company to go to our rooms, we sighed, thinking that these are about the three most resourceful people we know...and they haven't found a way to contact anyone yet. "It makes me lose hope," I said. I couldn't imagine what their families were feeling.

I was getting ready for bed when my hotel phone rang. It was the other bishop, telling me that she had just received word that all three of them were alive. Again, I couldn't imagine the joy their families were feeling!

Gulley who received fewer injuries, according to early reports, said that he and two other Haitian personnel shared a stick of gum and a Tootsie roll pop, prayed and sang hymns together as they waited 55 hours to get rescued.

My thoughts and prayers were with those I knew and now they were rescued even as they yet recover from their physical, emotional and spiritual injuries. Now my thoughts and prayers are centered on the Haitians who have experienced generations of misery and suffering, and now this. Why, God, would this happen to a people who are already in such dire need? We pray and then we respond. I hope you will give to UMCOR through your church or online (http://secure.gbgm-umc.org/donations/umcor/donate.cfm?code=418325&id=3018760).

Have you thought about what you would do if you were trapped like that, waiting for rescue and unsure what any minute could bring? Suffering from lack of food and water and even air? Wondering if people would hear you or look for you? Would you give up hope? Would you pray?

Would you sing? What would you sing? Would you quote scripture? Which scripture?

In addition to the 23rd Psalm, I might turn to: "The Lord is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear?" (Psalm 27:1)

What about you? What would you sing? What would you quote to keep your spirits strong? WDYT?

Have a merry green Christmas!

The signs are out for Black Friday shopping which always sounds a little ominous to me. But obviously it's to announce a day when the stores hope to jump into the black and out of the red ink in their financial pages. It will take some concerted shopping on all our parts for them to go from red to black.

And probably even more to go green!

Maybe you've had a chance to read my column at www.minnesotaumc.org on having a merry green Christmas. A green Christmas usually means that there's no snow but in these days of concern about the environment--God's creation--we need to develop a new holiday greeting: have a green Christmas!

How will you make changes in the ways in which you celebrate Jesus' birthday so that you are kind and caring toward the Earth upon which he walked?

I come from a long history of paperbag wrappings so there's not too much more I can do in that department. I was thinking that maybe I could recycle ALL the gift bags we have, using colors and symbols that aren't necessarily Christmas or even winter! So someone might get a gift bag that looks more like a sunny day in the Caribbean . . . maybe not so bad!

We have an artificial tree although for years we had no tree whatsoever. We would wrap a stool with Christmas lights and put a nativity set on top. I guess you can tell we're not traditionalists.

We look like we're the only Jewish family in the neighborhood. People have been out already on the warmer November days putting up lights. There will be no lights on our house. It's an energy-saving move but the energy-saving that comes from not going out there and putting them up, not the amount of electricity used! At least we'll have a tree and you can see it from the outside. But for those who put up light, the more energy efficient, the better.

We'll probably spend less this year which won't make for a black Friday or December for anyone, except maybe us! We'll be more careful about what we give instead of the shot-gun approach that we sometimes use, hoping we hit the mark for the ones who have everything!

We enjoy giving money away at this time of the year and the rest of the year for that matter. The givingMN.org website and its Give-to-the Max day was wonderful! How can we help our churches, church-related institutions and organizations, and the denomination itself provide for this means of giving?

So tell us, how will you have a merry green(er) Christmas this year? Share your ideas and hopes to care for Earth as you celebrate Jesus' birth and maybe you'll inspire me to do more and others with new ideas!

What in the World Happened?

I'm reading a very disturbing, but powerful--and I'd even say, life changing--book by Nicholas Kristof and Sheryl WuDunn, Half the Sky: Turning Oppression into Opportunity for Women Worldwide. Nicholas writes a regular column for the New York Times and travels the world, usually to developing countries. Often he reports on women's lives and certainly the lives of those who are burdened by abject poverty. I've learned more from him about the world around me than I ever do in church. Yet it was in church as a child that I learned about a wider world, not some of the problems described in book, at least that there is a world in need out there.

Nicholas and Sheryl tell the stories (you have to have a strong stomach for it all) about women throughout the developing countries and the ways in which they suffer and die from means that could be alleviated. They write about the overwhelming statistics (which I won't give you here) on modern slavery in sex trafficking for girls, the high and growing maternal mortality rates in developing countries, the lack of education for girls which influences poverty and even the number of pregnancies that the girl will experience in her lifetime, the violence inflicted upon women and girls in war-torn countries and the list goes on. Millions and millions of women and girls are suffering and dying...and we almost don't hear about it.

The thing is that as the women go, so goes the village. Do we care about all of these precious lives, children of God?

I actually believe that our outreach through the Women's Division and Global Ministries has ministries and missionaries that reach out to many of these women and girls in their villages, but we rarely hear about them in our churches.

What in the world happened? Or maybe I should ask, What in the church happened? When did we stop caring about the world?

If you read my last blog, you saw that 52 times someone posted a comment. Lots of activity, the most I've had on my blog! The topic of homosexuality is of great interest to many people, and as you can read for yourself, it usually invokes great emotion. Certainly it's a reality that we have to deal with in our society as well as church.

But I feel a bit like Nicholas and Sheryl when they describe how they reported on a dissident in China and it made front-page news, but "when 100,000 girls were routinely kidnapped and trafficked into brothels, we didn't even consider it news...we slip at covering events that happen every day--such as the quotidian cruelities inflicted on women and girls." (p. xiv) "Quotidian cruelities" were what the prophets warned the people about and Jesus came to heal.

Do we care? Can be generate as much emotion over the existence of such poverty and neglect of the most vulnerable in our world? Do we care enough to hear about it? Pray about it? Do something about it?

I was cleaning a book shelf this summer and saw an old copy of Walter Rauschenbusch's, A Theology for the Social Gospel (copyrighted 1917). I opened it and came to a story he told about a Mennonite farmer whose milk was flagged because it had contaminates in it due to careless practices on his part. The farmer swore, which is a no-no in the Mennonite community, and was publicly chastised for swearing by the faith community. But they made no mention of his carelessness in potentially causing children who drank milk to get sick from his contaminated milk.

Rauschenbusch suggested that the faith community should tell the farmer to settle his sin of swearing before God but that he be excluded from the voting community until he gets his practices in producing milk back into a healthy and ethical level. The social impact of his milking practices far exceeded his personal problem with swearing and yet the faith community didn't care about the greater problem of children getting sick.

It seems like we become so emotional and focused on certain things without noticing the huge ethical infractions that our own living creates.

Do we care? Why don't we care?

WDYT?

(I'm betting I don't have 52 comments!)

How About Those Lutherans?

In Cleveland no matter how the Indians were playing, a conversation could always be opened by asking, "So, how about those Indians?"





How about those Lutherans (Evangelical Lutheran Church in America)? On Thursday, August 20, 2009, they voted overwhelmingly for full communion with the United Methodist Church! This will provide more opportunities for working together in communities. I'm particularly hopeful about some of our rural communities where we could share clergy (UMC has had ELCA clergy but not the other way around). It was a great and celebratory event!

But you may not have heard about it on the news because on Friday, August 21, 2009, they voted that gay clergy could be placed on the roster for pastoral leadership in churches. The vote passed with the support of 68 percent of about 1,000 delegates at the ELCA's national assembly here in Minneapolis. It makes the group, with about 4.7 million members in the U.S., one of the largest U.S. Christian denominations yet to take a more gay-friendly stance.



While I was in attendance at the ELCA Assembly for their hearings and vote (and ultimately celebration) on being in full communion with the United Methodist Church, I heard some of their debate and marveled at their impassioned but not nasty discourse around homosexuality (at least what I heard). Their manner of being together didn't suggest to me that they will quickly or easily split or leave. They are also far more identified individually as Lutherans than we usually are as United Methodists. I wonder what that will mean for their way forward together as one.

I think that it's significant that the ELCA made this decision because they're the church of the "fly-over states." Lutherans are so mid-America, and not just geographically. What does this say about the American, Christian viewpoint on homosexuality, if anything?

Presiding Bishop Mark Hanson writes, following the vote, that "we meet one another finally--not in our agreements or our disagreements--but at the foot of the cross, where God is faithful, where Christ is present with us, and where, by the power of the Holy Spirit, we are one in Christ." He affirmed the way in which the Assembly made the decision rather than the decision, but asked that those who "lament" and those who "rejoice" at it will continue to be in conversation and relationship with each other "for together we have been called to proclaim the Good News of Jesus Christ and engage in God's mission for the life of the world."

As United Methodist, we state that we will not ordain or appoint self-avowed, practicing homosexuals in our Church. We have people who have left because of this stance and also those who agree with the stance.




I had recently resolved to try to write a new blog entry for peoples' reflections and conversations on a more regular basis and it was time to write one. I wasn't going to write about the Lutherans, but then I read that good leadership doesn't allow an elephant to sit in the room! How could I ask a provoking question for people to reflect on when this decision has just happened?



I'm wondering how this decision should or could shape our own discussions on homosexuality. What can we learn from both their decision and how they made their decision? How does this decision impact us and our churches?



WDYT?

(Please remember the rules of engagement for civil discourse and I urge you to post your thoughts for others as opposed to writing me privately.)

WWJWS?

What would John Wesley say about our present debate about health care (WWJWS)? Our own, Steve Manskar, reminds us on his Facebook page what John Wesley said and did about health care in his own time. If you're on Facebook, you can find his quotes from "A Plain Account of the People Called Methodists" on this subject matter at http://www.facebook.com/n/?note.php&note_id=115822479323&mid=ee6c1bG1ee3e4a1G28f49fcGa.

Suffice it to say, John Wesley spent a good share of his time, personal finances, and Christian commitment in providing health care for the poor in England.

I've heard economists and those knowledgeable about health care remark that there hasn't been enough dialogue about what the changes should be made in health care. The Mayo and Cleveland Clinics have been raised as exemplary places to provide a more wholistic approach to health care; less individual providers with less than 20 minutes to work in their silo of medicine on our complicated and interconnected bodies. Could health care be more wholistic for all of us?

The town hall meetings that we are hearing about in the news with legislators and the President of the United States going out into the country don't exactly sound like a dialogue to me. Why the anger? What are we afraid of?

Why the misinformation? My own mother admits to getting many emails a day (her harddrive crashed so not so many right now!) about "pulling the plug on grandma," etc. Whose fueling that? Could it be the health insurance companies themselves? Could it be those who stand to make a lot of money off of us if we don't make changes?

How's your health insurance working for you now? Even those on Medicare (a government-run health provider). I'm sure it's not perfect, but something must be done in order to reduce costs but also to provide better care.

Do we have to link employment with health insurance? The history of that is that benefits were given instead of salary increases. That appears to be the case again today, at least for clergy! And of course the disaster is that when one is no longer employed, one is also off health insurance. Several members of my own family don't have health insurance right now because they don't have jobs. This isn't about someone else. This is about us and if it's not affecting us directly now, it affects us indirectly. Presently it's causing some local churches to really struggle in providing benefits for clergy. The issue isn't that clergy shouldn't have benefits, but that benefits shouldn't be so exorbitant.

Now you probably think that I'm "playing politics," but let me direct you to the Social Principles in our Book of Discipline which state in part: "Providing the care needed to maintain health, prevent disease, and restore health after injury or illness is a responsibility each person owes others and government owes all, a responsibility government ignores at its peril..health care is best funded through the government's ability to tax each person equitably and directly fund the provider entities...We believe it is a governmental responsiblity to provide all citizens with health care." (Par. 162.V, 2008 Book of Discipline).

So why aren't we more adamant about health care for all as United Methodists? What can we do? WWJWS?

Please feel free to express your opinions but I expect that you will respond differently from "the world," and I hope we can have a conversation based on our faith and not just our politics!

WDYT?

Sally Dyck

Is It a Teachable Moment?

Four characters living out the drama of racism in America in the headlines.



Professor Henry Louis Gates, a prominent Harvard professor, returns home from a long trip and can't get the door of his house open. Enlisting the aid of his cab driver, he tries to push the door open. He identified himself as the owner and yet seems to have lost his temper. Would you if someone was still questioning you in your own house?



A neighbor, Lucia Whalen, responds to the request of an elderly neighbor who saw the men tryiing to get into the house by calling the police. Is she being a good neighbor to the elderly woman or her community when someone sees something unusual?



A well-respected police officer, Sargent James Crowley, responds to a 911 call. He is a trainer for helping prevent racial profiling. What overrode his own training in the heat of the moment?



The President of the United States hears about the incident and comments in such a way that ratchets the conversation. Later he reflects a little on what it's like to be a black man in America and calls it a "teachable moment."



Later today they are all, except the woman who called 911, expected to have a beer together in Washington. I think it's good modeling that they will sit down together and I hope we'll have enough of a window on the conversation to allow it to truly be a "teachable moment" in how to talk about racism.



In a predominantly Euro-American state with our diversity in many different ethnic and racial groups, it's easy for us as Minnesotans to ignore the realities of racism. And yet every day there are incidents in our own state with our neighbors who are Native Americans, Hmong, Hispanic, African, African American and the rest of our emerging diversity of peoples. Our neighbors are literally next door to us in all of our neighborhoods as individuals and as churches. Many of our churches are located in neighborhoods filled with people who don't look like those of us worshiping in the buildings.



How are we making this headline news item a "teachable moment?" What do we have to learn from this incident? And what do we have to teach from it as Christians and in the context of gathering as people of faith for worship, Bible study and prayer? What are we saying? How are we praying?



Is it a teachable moment?



WDYT?

Where's Your Shack?

I'm baaaaaaaack! I just needed a little hiatus there for a bit and now I'm back wanting to hear from you on all sorts of things.



I recently read (on my iPod) the popular fiction entitled, The Shack, by William Paul Young. The reason I read it was because I saw all these people in the airport and on airplanes reading it and I thought I might have an interesting conversation about it if I had actually read it. I didn't expect to like it...



But I did! I was also reading the book of Job at the same time and so I like to say that the story line is really "Job meets the Triune God"! A man suffers a terrible tragedy and then finds himself going to the place where the tragedy occurred: a shack. In many respects the season of Lent is about going to our shack, wherever that is that is hardest for us to believe in the living God.



At the shack, he has an encounter with God that doesn't meet his expectations about just who God is and how God relates to humanity. Finally God says to him, "This weekend is not about reinforcing your religious stereotypes!" There couldn't be better advice about what will help us relate to God differently than to let go of our "religious stereotypes" at time. Isn't that the story of Easter morning? There's nothing in John 20 with Mary Magdalene encountering the living Christ that was reinforcing her religious stereotypes!

However, I know that the way in which God is revealed to the man at the shack is disturbing to some. I found it rather refreshing! I have always believed that our images of God are what draw us closer or farther away. How can we know God's love if the image of God that we have is less than loving to us?



I also find myself adopting a few phrases from the book. I like the way God is forever saying, "I'm especially fond of you" or whoever God is talking about at the time. Remniscent of "you are my beloved child," this phrase reminds us that God is especially fond of us...and everyone else for that matter! (Honestly, it becomes a catchy phrase!)



The images of life after death or heaven--whatever that was with rainbow like auras--didn't do so much for me but I think we're all challenged to think about what life beyond this life is...for the purpose of living this life. The man in the story had to confront his relationships with others who had already died so that he could truly live. It's a story of transformation.



Not bad theology overall but like "Jesus movies" that pop up every now and again, when we read or see our images of God or Jesus or the Holy Spirit a little differently, it makes us think...and rethink just who God is in our lives. Not a bad thing...



So, have you read the book? WDYT?

We, the People

We have elected a new president of the United States of America. With the election of Barack Obama, many place high hopes for change across our land and world.



What are your hopes?



What role does the Church play in providing a prophetic witness to the new Obama administration and to us as nation?



Some did not vote for Barack Obama. What are your hopes (this is an appreciative inquiry)?



As a nation, whether we voted for Obama or not, we are called to be one people. After all it says, "we, the people," not "he, the president." What do you hope "we, the people" will be and do as a nation in these next weeks, months, and years, rooted in our faith and lived out in our nation?



It's a critical time in our nation's history. WDYT?

Has Tuesday Finally Come?

All day that silly saying of Wimpy's from the Popeye cartoons of my childhood keeps coming to mind, "I'll gladly pay you on Tuesday for a hamburger today."

I don't know, but I wonder if it was funny 40-50 years ago because nobody would give anybody a hamburger today if you weren't going to pay them until next Tuesday. Now it seems that we have built our society on the expectation that we can have all the hamburgers we want and don't have to pay for them until the next and then the next and then the next Tuesday.

So has our Tuesday finally come as a nation or at least on Wall Street?

First it was Bear Stearns, then Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, then Lehman Brothers, and then Merrill Lynch (described as Wall Street meeting Main Street, USA). Where will it all lead?

I don't have a business or financial background so I can't fully analyze and extrapolate all that is going on, but it seems like there are some questions to consider and lessons to be learned.

A few of my questions today as Wall Street reels:

Is this as simple as greed?

Where was the leadership in these companies? What were their principles of operation that led them to this place?

What does this suggest to us as a church? Will anyone speak of it in worship this Sunday? Or any Sunday? (Maybe that's why I'm hoping some of you can lend your expertise in analysis, especially how that analysis might impact our faith.)

Clif Christopher is coming to the Minnesota Annual Conference on September 23 at St. Andrew's Church in Eden Prairie and I'll be interested in how he addresses stewardship in light of these economic times; things have changed economically since he was here last fall. How is it impacting your fall stewardship campaign if at all?

Furthermore, what is the unique voice of the Christian faith in these financial times?

WDYT?

The Middle Ages in the Church Today

I've spent some time with family this summer and as a result, I've been immersed in young adult culture and then older adult culture (as in 75+). At first I was thinking these two cultures are on a collision course but I've decided it's more like they are going in opposite directions, never to meet unless something really brings them together.



I found young adults to be more disconnected to the church than I even I had imagined. What we care about as the institutional church is so far off their radar of concern. But it's not that they don't have expectations of the church. In fact, they're deeply disappointed that we talk but we don't walk what they expect the church to be: a community that cares about people other than ourselves. That's kind of the bottom line: we care too much about ourselves and not others, especially those who are different from ourselves, the environment, and the global issues of our day.



My immersion with older was a little disconcerting, too. Change is about the last thing they want--in the church or politics. For instance, my cousin's daughter who is 14 came to a family gathering. No one quite expected her to make the 2 hours trip in the car but she came. Shouldn't we be delighted that she did? Shouldn't we be all over her in terms of making her feel welcome? Instead the girl hennas her hair and later all I heard was that she hennas her hair. Who cares? In my immersion with young adults in San Francisco, I never saw so many tattoos in my entire life in such a short time. I had to get over myself on that one! Yet these older adults can't figure out why younger people won't go to church! But the look on their faces would make any young adult think twice, not to mention my cousin's 14-year-old!



When I got home the other day from the most recent foray into family immersions, I began to wonder, what is the role of people my age? Baby boomers. I'm thinking specifically in terms of the church.



Do we ask the right questions of both groups?

How are we part of the problem? Or the solution?

Do we advocate for one group or the other?

Do we try to bring these totally alien groups together?

Do we align with one or the other?



I was talking to one of my young adult relatives and she said, "You have to just go with the young people...but then I suppose that's hard for the old people." Yes, my dear, that's the dilemma.



So, I'm wondering. How do you experience these two diverse age groups? As one of them or someone like me in the middle.



Frankly, I've never felt so middle aged as I have at the end of this summer after my immersions with the two age groups! And the church is definitely in the grips of middle age--trying to negotiate between these two very diverse age groups.


WDYT?

WDYRead?

As the mid-summer's dream of warmer days and some time away from our usual responsibilities approaches, I note that many periodicals and newspapers begin to publish the "beach reading" or summertime bests. Even Circuit Rider's latest edition, May/June 2008, listed some well-known United Methodists--laity and clergy--and their favorite books.

John Wesley used to read a wide variety of topics and disciplines. He was particularly fond of the sciences in his time as well as theology. He advocated wide reading with clergy. Sometimes I worry that we as clergy don't read widely enough, keeping us from having a diverse perspective on the world, our lives, the culture, and the people entrusted to us. But then, do laity read widely outside of their fields of interest? I'd be interested to know what influences what you read.

I'll begin by listing what I am presently reading, too. I usually have several books going at a time--one on my iPod (audio book) and one or more that I'm reading with my eyes. All are stimulating but quite frankly I'm much less inclined to fall asleep while reading when I'm running plugged into an audio book!

On my iPod I am reading Amazing Grace: William Wilberforce and the Heroic Campaign to End Slavery by Eric Metaxas. This is an excellent history of how social change occurs, motivated by people of faith. I haven't seen the movie but I can't imagine that it represents the social conditions and Methodist influence as pointedly as the book. I am learning things about Methodism in England during the last half of the 18th century (and later years of John Wesley) and the beginning of the next. The social conditions as well as the way in which Methodism is regarded by "outsiders" isn't something that I have as vividly had described. Plus, it's important to read about those who have brought about deep social change against all odds.

With my eyes I am reading The Magic Mountain by Thomas Mann. This came from Bishop Will Willimon's recommendation in the Circuit Rider. His description of this novel caused me to call up my local bookstore and get a copy asap. As Bishop Willimon says, "When the church becomes infatuated with physical illlness, and ministry too easily degenerates into running errands for those who are experiencing physical degeneration, Mann's novel that takes place entirely in a hospital tells the truth. Our therapeutic church is really changed in this classic." I'm only about 100 pages into this 700 page novel so I can't say I have his perspective yet, but I'm intrigued!

And then with my eyes, I am also reading A Spring without Bees: How Colony Collapse Disorder Has Endangered Our Food Supply by Michael Schacker. The bee population is disappearing, bee colonies are collapsing, and the greatest scientific minds can't figure out why. The interconnectedness of the bee with agriculture with world hunger and poverty should give overwhelming concern to us all. We as United Methodist Christians need to do more theological thinking about the ecological changes going on around us.

For me I'm reading history, fiction and science.

WDYRead?