A Silly Poor Gospel

Today's Doses of Cute and Hope

2012-01-25T11:19:00.000-08:00

We are watching my granddaughter Nia Grace. Like every family watches with anticipation to see who their little ones are and will become. Nia joined us here on Earth in spite of some pretty long odds. She has been in many ways a healthy, delightful, and typical baby/ toddler. And then every once in a while she throws us a curve. On her 3rd birthday she received a Radio Flyer wagon. It was her favorite present. When they got it home, and stories were read and jams put on she declared that she would sleep in her wagon. She has a beautiful bed, but has sometimes forsaken it to sleep curled up in her rocking chair - because it rocks. Her parents indulged the wagon sleep. She has not slept in her bed since then, and it has been several months. When she stretches out, she is already longer than the wagon. You just have to wonder where she goes in her dreams, that a bed with wheels is so superior. So Cute.

Part 2 - Hope.

Nia was invited to a birthday party for another three year old. It was billed as a Princess and Knight party. Mind you, Nia is a girly girl in many ways. She LOVES the pink tut and sparkle tights. Jewelry, and headbands and butterfly wings. She has cars and trucks, but they don't get used as much as her toy kitchen. Her parents have so far kept her Disney free, but princess is a concept she knows and likes. But she immediately told her mom that she wanted to go as a Knight to the party. Her rationale was "Knights get to fight dragons" Her mother found her a knight costume, mit sword. Then through further consultation, she decided that she would be a girl Knight, or maybe a princess who fights dragons, which would allow you to have a tutu, sparkle tights, and a sword. She doesn't think binary, She doesn't think she has to choose. She doesn't want to be a boy, she just wants to fight dragons. And no one is going to contradict her thinking. And by the time she runs into someone who tries, she will be solid enough to laugh, and proceed. She is already pretty solid. We are as pleased as punch. She is my hope of the future.

Hero of the Faith - Dolores Huerta

2012-01-21T16:42:00.000-08:00

Alivia, Daughter #2, and I had the honor of hearing Dolores Huerta speak last evening. At 80 years young, She spoke for two hours without sitting. She is still a force of nature to be reckoned with. She started as the co-founder of the United Farm Workers Union, but has consistently broadened that civil rights work to work on behalf of the full range of human rights.

They say that Ginger Rogers did everything Fred Astair did, backwards and in high heels. Dolores did everything Ceasar Chavez did while bearing ELEVEN children!

Highlights:

The mother of eleven is Pro-choice. Her daughter was present and thanked her mother for using her name and not just referring to her as Choice Number Eight!

She said that Ceasar (whom she gave all his due) wanted to boycott Potatoes in '65. She talked him into grapes instead.

She admonished the young women in the audience to be bold in proclaming their own ideas. "Who came up with the slogan - Si Se Puede - That would be Dolores Huerta!" And she reveled in the applause. She admitted scolding Mr Obama a bit for stealing it, but it was clear she like the man, yet thinks we need to stay on him.

She added to our knowledge of The death of Matthew Shepherd. "Do you know that his killers went right back into town and tried to beat a couple of Mexicans?" "You can't say that you are for rights for Latinos and not be for rights for GLBT folk. The people who are coming after those folks are coming after you. It is all the same fight."

She talked about economics and Supports Occupy. She thinks that the title of "consumer" is a dehumanizing insult.

If there was some class of human rights she failed to talk about, I missed it.

She took Questions for long time after speaking. When pressed on African Amercan rights, she spoke about the genocide of African Americans. And noted that if you lock a man in prison he can't procreate which decimates a population.

From a young man: How do you talk to people who disagree violently without and don't seem to want to listen?

DH : Keep at it. It takes time. At least seven times. And tell Stories. Your own and other peoples stories. This is the only thing that works.

She several time referenced her own Catholicism.

When a young woman asked her what she should do when she is working for equality and seems to keep on bumping into opposition from people of faith.

DH: "Pray for them, and keep working"

Never underestimate the prayers of a mother - Part 2

2012-01-16T16:10:00.000-08:00

Bernice and Orville were very happy and in time brought forth the boom-requisite three kids. Boy, girl, boy. My parents started every day together, early, in the kitchen praying for us by name. I remember it as the edge of my dreamworld. Their hopes, dreams and prayers for us were that we would know Jesus and serve Him.

Here we are on Easter Sunday 1964. Note my brother's Bible and my purse. We are both sporting "perfect attendance pins" given out by the Sunday school. I cannot read the number on my brother's pin, but I guarantee you it is a number within a year of his age. We did not miss church, and when on vacation we went to Sunday School and brought a note from that teacher.

I always knew what my mother hoped for me - Pastor's wife. She hoped to send me off to the Wesleyan Methodist School, Marion College in Marion Indiana. I remember her comparing and contrasting for me the lives of missionaries and pastors. And while she would have surrendered me to the mission field if that was God's will, she trained me for the parsonage. Potlucks, music, Sunday School teacher. She had me by her side in Women's Missionary Society meetings when they met in our living room. I was still in grade school, but she had me practice taking minutes. I was teaching Sunday School as soon as I was in high school. When the Men's Quartet from Marion College came round doing recruitment she talked to me about the relative merits of the young men - she was partial to curly haired tenors. I am quite sure, that thinking it or no, she was offering me up to God as the sacrifice for her disappointment she had given her own mother.

The kindest thing my older brother ever did for me was to be way too smart to go to Marion. Off to Purdue and the sciences for him, and my chance to look asunder as well. My mother didn't know it but I was apostate at the time and had no intention of getting any where near a pastor, parsonage or church if they could be avoided. I was planning a career in law or politics. I ran as far and as fast as I could. I married a rather wild young man right out of the Navy. I made sure he was not a believer of any sort before I took up with him. I went to St John's and studied the classics. I thought I was safe from my destiny. My mother was seriously disappointed in me. Then through odd circumstances I ran smack dab into the Living Christ. How He got me is a whole nother story, but got I was.

And I kept trying to go to law school. And I was thwarted twice. But I ended up taking my two daughters to church, and my mother was appeased.

Then I started preaching, at first, mostly against my will. I fought. But I eventually surrendered to a call to the ministry of my own. I went off to Seminary. My mother could not have been more surprised. My Grandpa Hubbell was 90, but was pleased as punch. Named for me some female preachers that he had always admired. Willed to me his pulpit Bible over all his children and grandchildren.

My mother died only a few years after her aged father. She did not live to see me called pastor. But she did hear me preach once. She was encouraging. She said she hoped I would still sing some times, but that I should not let them know I could sing before they heard me preach.

I have pastor'd four churches, and preached in many dozens of them and in several countries. I have occasionally called down fire. I have kicked the Devil's butt. With others, we built a church from scratch.

My marriage lasted 30 years, but it's foundation was never really all that solid. But it made two beautiful daughters for whom I tried not to have agendas.

Then I found love again. Christ-centered love. A foundation of ministry at the core. And I have been very happy. But after seven years as pastor of Freedom Friends Church, I needed a break. I was given permission by God and community to step back. And lo and behold, my beloved stepped forward. And she is the pastor now. And I know she will be an excellent one, because she is called, and equipped and readyand way less rebellious than I.

And... I am the pastor's wife. I surrender.

And somewhere out there in the universe I can hear my mother chuckling. And I can hear her say "Orville, I told you so."

.

And now for some relevent family history

2012-01-15T19:49:00.000-08:00

subtitle: NEVER discount the prayers of a mother! - PART ONE

That's my mom. On the the left. Walking away. I think this picture is from the summer 1950. My mom is about 23 and seven years from becoming my mom. I have no idea who took this picture. I do not know the young man on the right, but I have a pretty good idea. (doesn't look like he's doing too well does it?) He is a fellow student at CEI - that is the Chicago Evangelistic Institute. It was the premier training school for ministers in the Holiness tradition. My mom was sent their by her parents. Here they are - about ten years later.

Formidable people. Gentle but strong. Grandpa Hubbell was a WWI vet and a preacher when he wasn't delivering the mail. Took the churches that could not afford a full time pastor. Preached revivals. Grandma, a preacher's daughter, supported him. People of one Story and one Book - The Book. People with only one plan. Serve, and raise children to Serve. If they had any doubts no one knew it. My mother was their second daughter, and the most promising in some ways. She was bright, did well in school. She could sing like a bird and played piano and any other instrument she set her hands to. She had an early and sincere desire to serve the Lord. She was modest but not shy. So they sacrificed to send her upstate to study at CEI. With one real purpose. Become equipped to teach, and sing and pray at the highest level and find herself the best young preacher and marry him.

She studied. She excelled. She went on a mission to the third world country called Appalachia (which terrified her mother). She had piano recitals. And she dated (such as was allowed) every handsome young preacher they had - and rejected them all. And then refused to come back down to Southern Illinois. She got a job in the secretarial pool of a large hospital. She got an apartment. She learned to take dictation in shorthand. She could type 100 words minute without error. Trolling that pool was a handsome young shark of an x-ray tech. A roller-skate dance champion. A mostly heathen. My dad. And she went out on a date with him, and he was smart enough to go to church with her, and she saw through him, and married him anyway. And her parents were appalled, and confused and disappointed in the extreme.

But mom and dad were happy. Real happy.

To be continued.

My Dear Evangelical Friends

2012-01-10T13:51:00.000-08:00

And you are my dear Evangelical Friends...
And my Alma Mater, GFU

You mailed me a beautiful, expensive, multi-page, card stock brochure for your Selah Women's seminar this week. I can see how hard you are trying to appeal to a broad spectrum of women - I am a fan of ecumenism. I see you talk about women in ministry - women like me. Thank you. I see you are trying to nurture and edify women. Important work.

But when you try and do that, and you include language that talks about "Real women in pain" and links "domestic abuse, eating disorders and same sex attractions" you fail at your goals.

Yes, I am attracted to Alivia, but its more than an attraction, it is Love.
It is not "painful," it is delightful.
I am not stuck, I am free.
Our love is not abusive.
Our love is not an addiction.
Our Love is not a disorder.
Our relationship is dedicated to Christ and the building of his kingdom, just like yours.

So with my warm regards, I send my regrets.

Sincerely,

Psp

http://www.georgefox.edu/selah/breakout-sessions.html

The Eighth State of the Church Report

2012-01-08T16:16:00.000-08:00

The State of the Church Report

Freedom Friends Church, Salem Oregon

For 2011

To Friends Everywhere:

Our Life is love, and peace, and tenderness; and bearing with one another, and forgiving one another, and not laying accusations one against another; but praying one for another, and helping one another up with a tender hand.

Isaac Pennington

In the spring of this year we took these words by Isaac Pennington as our Shared understanding of our ministry. This understanding is both aspirational and accurate. We are attempting to live into this. There will always be room for greater depth, but, by the grace of God, it is a good description of the actual culture of our group. For this we are extremely grateful. It is our prayer that we make this our first, foremost and possibly only measure of success.

We represent 22 households. If all of us were together on the same Sunday, (a thing that has not yet happened) there would be 38 of us. 20 of those 38 are full members. We range in age from 3 months to 84 years. Our only gap is school aged children, with which we have not yet been blessed. This year is the first year that we have not added a new member, but we have several new attenders and hope for next year. We have great diversity in culture, theology, class, education, food preferences and politics.

We have large “webbed feet” meaning our footprint on the World Wide Web is significantly larger that our physical footprint. We continue to meet on 13^th street in Salem, and we enjoy our rented space. We have one standing committee, and this year, one task force. We meet once a week and host one lively inclusive AA group that is almost the same size as the church. On the Web we have a very active website with 2673 page visit this year mostly not by us (freedomfriends.org). We keep track of each other on Facebook and through a Google group e-mail list. Our Forum is mostly used as an archive at this point. There are 3600 references to us on Google. We feel very attended to by the wider world.

We made a third printing of our Faith and Practice this year, and they continue to go forth. Ten of them went to Europe this spring.

Our worship is full of grace and liberty. New comers, even first time attenders, often feel free to speak. We worship through spoken gratitude, prayer, and expectant listening. We have good long stretches of deep listening, but it is a rare Sunday when no message rises out of the silence. This year we did an experiment with the 5^th Sundays. Two of them were completely unprogrammed, and two of them were fully programmed including prepared preaching. Derek Lamson and sometimes with Ruba Byrd of West Hills Friends in Portland were regular musical visitors. This experiment reminded us of how much we like our regular semi-programmed style of worship, but it also was refreshing and educational, and helped us keep our worship fresh. When we attend to our monthly business, we do it straight out of the waiting worship on Sunday morning. Our business continues to be brisk, lively, peaceful, and to the point. We had a sweet but sparsely attended Good Friday Service. Many of us take up the cross every day, we are a people perhaps more in need of a resurrection theology than an atonement theology.

We take seriously the witness that all are ministers. Almost everyone speaks to the things we hold dear, in and out of meeting. Everyone has the opportunity to love, bear, forgive and pray. Many of our folks do very serious Kingdom building work in the world. We have an unusual number of public Gospel ministers for a meeting our size. Sarah Hoggatt traveled in the ministry to Europe in the spring, attending the Europe and Middle East Young Friend Conference. Ashley Wilcox did some eldering and visited Capitol Hill Friends in Washington DC. Vail Palmer spoke at Reedwood Friends and continues his work on writing on Friends and their use of the Bible. Peggy Parsons presented the 2011 Weed Lecture at Beacon Hill Friends House in Boston, and the topic was “Freedom Friends Church and the remixing of Quakerism” (published and available).

We also are learning how to rest our ministers. Alivia Biko took a sabbatical from being an officer of the Meeting in 2011, and will lay down her weekly music ministry at FFC in 2012. Peggy Parsons will be on sabbatical from Pastoral ministry in 2012. Ashley Wilcox took up presiding clerk in 2011. She has brought sensitivity and an attention to good order to the meeting and we appreciate her ministry. We do not have a deep bench for officers, and have to trade hats sometimes, but we are committed to loving those who serve by making sure that we do not burn them out. For instance, Sarah presided over the business meeting once and the pastor took minutes once - we are versatile, flexible and willing. We took a month off from business in the summer to rest everyone. We have appreciated Tim Magee and Deb Lamp for their care of the meetinghouse in 2011, others will take that up in the new year. We have been grateful to the Margaret Fell Fund and others for helping our ministers travel.

Our finances are stable. Despite hard times we are just almost making our expenses from within our own group. We continue to be grateful to the Friends of Freedom Friends who are making up the small difference. About 82% of our budget goes to pay the rent. But we do have savings, and for another year we have not needed to deplete them. We sent a donation off for relief after the Joplin Tornado last spring. God and God’s Friends are good.

Highlights of the year were our 7^th Birthday in March, and our very first BABY! Evelyn Ayla Malmsten was born in October and dedicated to the Lord by her mother in meeting for worship in December. That was joyful!

In our traditional candle light Christmas Eve service, Evelyn “spoke” to us and reminded us that Christ came as a babe, and that as much as we desire to be like Him, He also wanted to be like us, in all our weakness and frailty.

We accept this and live into it as best we can.

January 8, 2011

Peggy Senger Parsons for Freedom Friends Church

Nor Thorns Infest the Ground!

2011-12-24T13:03:00.000-08:00

A Christmas STIW

So there I was...

Yelling for help.

One of the things that I like best about being old, is getting to be on the other side of conversations. There are some family scenes that get passed through the generations. If you are lucky enough you get to eventually play all the parts. You are the child, then the parent then the wise ancient one. It is especially poignant when you get to take up the words of those who have left the planet. Christmas brings out many of these conversations.

Our family has one scene that may be a bit unusual. My father would walk in from the greenhouse...

“Peg, could you come, and bring your tweezers?” (later - get your glasses and tweezers)

“Coming!” I knew precisely what this meant.

My father harbored cacti. Despite all precautions they occasionally bit. He had one in particular that looked velvety, its spines deceptively small, but especially wicked. When it bit, there was nothing you could do for yourself. You needed a magnifying glass, tweezers, patience and a friend.

As I worked he always said the same thing.

“I don’t know why any human in their right mind would harbor such vicious creatures.”

My part was “You do it for the rare but spectacular bloom”

He would smile.

When he left the planet to pursue other opportunities I had decisions to make in the greenhouse. I am not as fond of cacti as he was. Some found new homes, but there were two, known for their regular blooming habits that when it came to it, I just couldn’t get rid of. They stayed by forbearance and I told them that if they bit - they were gone. I was bluffing.

So the other day when I walked into the house from the greenhouse, I used my special voice and called “Liv, could you get your glasses and some tweezers?” She replied “Coming!” and knew what had happened, and as she worked, I smiled and said “I don’t know why any human in their right mind would harbor such vicious creatures!” And she reminded me of their blooms.

And then I was sitting in waiting worship, and we sang

“No more let sins and sorrows grow,
Nor thorns infest the ground;
He comes to make His blessings flow
Far as the curse is found.”

And I knew then why we harbor the vicious. Not for the occasional blessing amid the pain but in expectant hope of the day when there will be no viciousness to be found.

As a Quaker I believe that this is both incremental and apocalyptic. I believe that we can live in the Kingdom here and now. In my house there is no human viciousness. Nor in my church. Nor in my classrooms. There is pain amidst blessings, but the blessings are ridiculously abundant. I believe that in the world there are more people working for good than evil. The tipping point can come, it will come.

And I also believe, call me old or naïve, I care not, that God has promised a restored world, a second Eden, beyond the metaphorical.

And in that hope I harbor, nurture, treasure, even the wicked and vicious. Someday I may walk out to the greenhouse and find blooms without spines.

Merry Christmas, Daddy, where ever you are.

The spiritual discipline of Enough -a seasonal repeat

2011-12-22T22:23:00.001-08:00

A corollary to Christmas Rehab

(A post which is not for everyone - but if it is for you - you will know it)

Well, we are almost there. You are doing fine. The house isn’t perfect but it looks very inviting and comfortable. You sent a few cards and there is still time to bake a few cookies. You are charged with the duty of creating a feeling of faith, joy and abundance. I know how seriously you take that charge. You want to balance the spiritual and the cultural. You want them to be able to enjoy both. You want Light in the darkness. You want home and hearth. You want a connection to the past, participation in the present and hope of the future. You want Peace.

But there is a familiar but unwanted visitor in your heart. It always shows up about now. It doesn’t usually stay long. The actual celebration has a way of melting it away. But while it is here it is quite uncomfortable. It is itchy. Anxious. Fidgety. It asks annoying questions.

“Have you done enough?”

“Have you done the right things?”

“Are you sure?”

It makes you do things; like count presents - many times. It seems to care a great deal about equality - at least economic and physical equality. Will the children understand that fewer things of greater quality equal more things of lesser monetary value?

It can turn an unexpected gift into a quandary. If reciprocation was not in your budget, what do you do? It is hard to even enjoy the gift if the paper it is wrapped in is emotional obligation.

It causes you to feel uneasy about the progression of time as it is represented physically. When it is time to send small family gift to your friends who are doing so well, and whose children are not children anymore, you feel as if the natural transition is somehow a shrinking of your care or attention.

If you have the means it tempts you to just keep shopping, using the scatter shot approach. If you put many things before your loved ones your chances of have a “hit” on the joy meter increases.

If you have not such means, then it surrounds your choices with fear. The stakes seem high and you dread making a poor choice.

You even worry about this worry. You wonder if this concern in your breast is evidence of the encroachment of consumerism and a materialistic outlook.

If you let this feeling rule you, by the Day after Christmas you will be emotionally exhausted, and depression will follow.

So what is to be done?

The first thing to do is to name it. I call it Giver’s Doubt.

The next thing to do is to remember that this is an old acquaintance.
But its dire warnings and insidious doubts have rarely proven to be trustworthy. You have been happy when the cattle were fat, and when they were lean, you did ok. No one who loves you thinks of you as one who is neglectful or thoughtless. Your track record is solid. There is no reason to believe that you will fail now.

This feeling is not your enemy. It is not evidence of corruption or failing. This feeling is the evidence that you have taken up your charge with sincerity. People who are truly careless, truly neglectful never feel this feeling. Some people do get beyond this feeling, they get to a place where it doesn’t come around much anymore.

But you need to respond to this feeling. You must speak to your doubt.

Start by reminding yourself of the priorities.

Abundance. Faith. Joy.

Look about you. Is there a sense of abundance? There are so many ways to make plenty. For a week or so (and only that) feed yourself and everyone else better. Make the time to share memories, and hopes, and kindnesses - to those you love and strangers you meet. Bring out all the pretty things. Hang up all the cards. Lots of color. Plenty of light. Be bold. Be generous.

Is there a sense of Faith. Have you built in time for worship? Music that feeds you? Do you have physical reminders of the story around you? The spirit of the Christmas holiday is about being present. God is with us. We spend a lot of spiritual time trying to live up to being Image Bearers - we want to be more like Christ - of course we do. But on Christmas it is good to remember that He wanted to be like us. He didn’t need us to be better before He joined our team. Share that message wherever you can by being really present to people.

And where is the Joy? What makes you laugh? Do some of that. You cannot give what you do not have. If you do not enjoy yourself, you won’t be able to create a place for joy in your home.

Remember that Christmas was about accepting limits. The Infinite climbed inside the finite and accepted its limitations. The Baby Jesus didn’t get much done on that first Christmas except suckle and wet His swaddling clothes. I don’t suppose his momma did much either.

You have limits: emotional limits, physical limits, financial limits. Find out where they are and live inside them, not just beyond them. It is the Spiritual Discipline of Enough.

The reason for mastering this Discipline is that this feeling is not confined to Christmas, nor celebrations in general. It will come around when your children leave home. Do you do enough? Did you do too much? Did you do the right things? Will it be OK for them? And it will come around when you finish caring for your parents, and at the end of your own days if you are blessed to have time for reflection.

So make yourself a cup of tea. Take a deep breath and say: “It is enough.” Say that as many times as you need to. “I have remembered and honored abundance, faith and joy. I accept as He did, and does, my limitations. It is enough.”

A Christian View of Halloween (repeat)

2011-10-31T08:45:00.000-07:00

So There I was...

...in the kitchen with daughter #1. She was four years old. It was a few days before Halloween. I had finished making her a blue gingham dress and found the required red sparkly shoes. She had a hand basket, and one of her stuffed dogs had volunteered to play Toto. I thought we were all set. But this was the child who from birth had done things all or nothing. She had one more request.

"Mommy, could you make me a cyclone?"

"Uh... no baby, I don't know how to make a cyclone."

"Why not? It shouldn't be hard - cyclones are made of air.
Stop laughing Mommy - cyclones are not funny!"

I never really have stopped laughing about that one. She was right, of course, cyclones are not funny - but four-year-olds are.

I have always loved Halloween, and not just for the candy. I love the imagination, the limitless possibilities. I had a very imaginative mother who was good with the sewing machine, and she worked hard to make our dreams come true. You went to school in costume, and the teachers didn't bother trying to teach - it was an all-day party.

Back in the day (pre-maternal paranoia) once you were old enough to walk to school alone, you were old enough to trick-or-treat alone, especially if your older brother was supposed to watch you. Of course, your older brother and his friends always ditched you because you couldn't keep up with their door-to-door capacity, but that was fine.

We were members, and multiple-times-a-week attenders, of a pretty conservative Christian church, but I don't remember anyone saying a word against the holiday. We dreaded that seven-year occurrence of Halloween on a Sunday, but those years most people would trick-or-treat on Saturday night, so we didn't suffer.

Which is why I have trouble with the segment of American Christendom that feels that they have to turn Halloween into a "biblical costume only - Harvest Party" event. It looks as if they are afraid of Halloween - which misses the whole point! Halloween is the day where WE laugh at darkness, death, and all things spooky. Halloween is a celebration of anti-fear.

As the year wanes, as darkness and leaves fall, we send our little children out to mock the unknown. They can be fairies or witches, ghosts or pirates and take no harm at all from it. We reward them with sweets for knocking on strange doors.

I love it when there is a three foot tall Darth Vader on my doorstep. Christendom should be proud of the fact that we send our most vulnerable out to deal with the dark side of the force. I do not for a minute fear that this will lead to a life of galaxy-wide domination.

I am not always thrilled with the levels of homicidal violence being portrayed. I do not like to see little girls being uber-sexy. Good parents can and do moderate these things well into adolescence. But these things reflect our greatest fears, and we conquer them by reducing them to manageable size.

I love the implication that fear, and the conquering of it, is child's work. The mature members of our spiritual community are busy turning the actual non-metaphorical Hell into a skating rink. We may not live up to this ideal, not often even close, but the model of it is there if we wish to participate in it.

The other despicable thing that is still in vogue in some parts of Christendom is turning the traditional haunted house into a "Hell House," where you attempt to scare teenagers straight by depicting hell in all it's torment. Intentionally scaring people into faith has been tried since the third century. The Spanish inquisition (while never expected) had a real specialty in it. It didn't work then and it doesn't work now. What these folks are doing is using the tools of darkness - fear, terror, revulsion - to try to control. Using the tools of the devil to attempt God's work, backfires every time. When, oh when, will we learn this lesson?

Hell Houses encourage the adolescent carnage fascination that adults should be moderating. Also encouraged is judgmentalism in all its forms. They only depict certain sins; usually the ones they think they themselves do not commit. Always the gory ones.

An honest Christian Hell House would have one room dedicated to gluttony; a portrayal of a typical American potluck would do. In another room would be the gossips and backstabbers. I suppose you could get some gore mileage about a beam protruding from the eyeball of the person calling others sinners. Unlike tiny witches, who only very rarely actually ride broomsticks as adults, youthful training in judgmentalism does often lead to a lifetime of sin.

Tomorrow is All Saints Day. Same deal — part two. Not only are we not afraid of darkness, but we know where our dead loved ones have gone - and they are not lost. They are right here with us, cheering for us from the stands. We know we will join them one day. Death where is thy sting? The Mexican people take Thursday to have Day of the Dead - not a scary zombie flick - but a day to take a picnic lunch out to the graveyard to visit with the old folks.

This is our week to celebrate our lack of fear in the face of death, sin and all its fellows. Pass the sugar!

A Perfect Summer

2011-08-13T10:33:00.000-07:00

I am having a really great summer.

As you know, I believe deeply in the spiritual and emotional benefits of seasonality. I believe humans are hard-wired to need renewable predictable change. You should eat, wear, and do different things in each season. When fruits are fresh and abundant you should eat them until you are sick of them. Then you should not eat them until you crave them and have to wait for them again.

I have a recipe for a perfect summer.
It includes:

A bowl of cereal, eaten in the backyard with my own strawberries, blueberries and raspberries

A day at the beach

A visit with a large group of Quakers

A motorcycle ride with friends

Fireworks

Going out late in the evening for ice cream

Fireflies

extra reading; 1-mystery, 1-Scify or fantasy, 1-true crime, 1-chick lit

a home grown tomato

a long solo bike ride without a map or destination

an extended road trip

an outdoor concert

enough free time to be bored at least once

The right combination of these things creates the sense of time stretching. This summer I have almost re-created that childhood feeling of the endless summer. I am deeply grateful.

I won't see fireflies this summer, and the tomatoes are in doubt, but I am knocking off everything else on the list.

We are about to embark on the road trip. We will be gone 21 days. We will see five states. We are not taking a computer, nor even a cell phone. If I want news (and I may not) I will buy a newspaper (while I can) and we will mail a few postcards (while we can). We will eat when we are hungry and stop when we are tired. We have not filed a flight plan. Sound like heaven to me.

And when we get back, there will still be three weeks until school starts.
Life is good.

What is on your summer list?
.

Getting your Glinda on.

2011-08-02T15:26:00.000-07:00

I’ve been lead to give someone the Glinda talk several times in the last few weeks. I thought I would blog about it. You know how I love me my archetypes.

So, you seem to have a problem. It appeared to come out of nowhere. Poof! All fire and green smoke. You didn’t see it coming and you didn’t ask for it. Any causal relationship you have with this problem is strictly accidental. But it’s getting real personal - threatening actually. It’s not only going after you but your little dog too. And other people are running for cover and hiding behind their lollipops. But you’ve tried running before and that hasn’t seemed to do anything but put you in ever increasingly weirder circumstances. And at the moment you wouldn’t know where to run, life has gotten just that weird. What’s a good kid from down home supposed to do?

Listen to the fluffy lady behind you (in you). Sure, she seems as weird as the problem, but she does seem to know what to do. It’s time to get your Glinda on.

Glinda is an attitude. Glinda isn’t useful in every situation, but she comes in handy more often than you’d think. There is some deep situational wisdom here. She has that light laugh. She is queen of the eye roll. She owns the dismissive wave. And you all know her lines “You have no power here! Be Gone before someone drops a house on you!” and to the girl “Hang on to those shoes - they must be very powerful if she wants them so badly!” She is the archon for being relaxed in the face of a threatening situation. Here are her secrets:

1- Know where you are. Know the ground upon which you stand. The great Ancient Warrior Sun Tzu talked a great deal about grounds. He knew it was always unwise to take the fight to someone else’s ground. The transport alone will bankrupt you! The locals are likely to be hostile. Your resources will be limited to what you can carry and your supply lines will be in danger. Better to be patient, and if the threat is real, make them fight it on your ground, on your terms. The Apostle Paul said that after you were armed to the teeth with things like truth and peace, and integrity that all you had to do was stand still. You will not be moved. What ground are you on? Is it stable? Do you have deep enough resources? Are the inhabitants your friends? If so, then take a deep breath and smile when trouble shows up. It is not likely to have much depth or staying power. (Signs that you are not on your own ground - flying monkeys!)

2- Know that the showy and bilious are often more afraid than you are. Don’t be impressed by the noises and smokes. They are just that - noises and smokes. Those that threaten others are always looking up for that falling house. And boy, do those houses fall. Might be a good idea to step back a bit.

3 - And then there are those sparkly shoes! Wow, red glitter becomes you! You didn’t even know you had them, did you? It may take you a while to figure it out, but you have some personal power going on. Someone equipped you with everything you were going to need in this land. (Spoiler Alert!) You can rescue yourself, any time you want to. All you have to do is remember who you are and where you came from, and what you were created to be, and believe in that, and act on that. You don’t need no wizards or balloons. The Kingdom of Heaven is your rightful home and you can live in it anytime you want to. You can live by its rules, you can reap its benefits. Yeah, sure, some days you are going to have to leave your ground and take it to the threat. Work in places that don’t acknowledge your rules, work around people who don’t know who they are and what they were created to be. Swat a few monkeys. But you get to wear your shoes. Your personal power is portable. If you lose it, it is because you surrendered it - they can’t take it from you.

So take heart, little one. Most days you can laugh at the bluster. Tell it to go away and it will. You have plenty of time to walk your road and figure things out. You are being watched. Help will come when you need it. Your friends may be goofy, but they are faithful. Home is here, home is now, all you have to do is own it.

Caption This!

2011-07-16T12:45:00.000-07:00

Mr. Rembrandt

2011-07-16T12:37:00.000-07:00

Wishes he had caught this one.

My brilliant , beautiful niece, journaling with he stuffed cat, during a June blackout.

The Best

2011-07-16T12:33:00.000-07:00

breakfast of the year, the very last of the strawberries, the first of the blueberries and lots of raspberries - all in the yard.

Naturally redundant

2011-06-26T14:49:00.000-07:00

You couldn't house this program in the "Easier House", could you?

Blue Shoes and Happiness

2011-06-25T22:15:00.000-07:00

Well, it was Alivia's Birthday, and I wasn't supposed to be looking, but what are you going to do when these babies call your name?

There's Friends on my phone!

2011-06-24T21:24:00.000-07:00

And now for today's dose of cute.

Nia is talking on a calculator phone. This is a game I started with her on skype. We both talk into calculators and have many funny conversations.

This is what happened on a day when she could not reach me.

She says Hello, but doesn't connect. She declares her phone broken. She tries again.

She discovers Zeros! on the phone.

She connects with Livi and Gramma. She wonders what is happening with her phone. She tries again.

She says she might have to talk to Livi tomorrow.

She connects with Gramma, identifies herself as Nia and asks to speak to Livi. Then she says Goodbye to everyone, and see ya later to everyone including mommy, daddy, Omi, Poppy, her cousins and aunts and then her friends. Then she tells her mom that she talked to friends, Friends! There's friends on my phone! and then she wants to go, go see her friends.

She is 2.5

Hangin with Sister Mary

2011-06-20T11:08:00.000-07:00

In Boston...

A Glossary for the Weed Lecture

2011-06-08T16:08:00.000-07:00

Remix: (noun or verb) An Alternative version which references an original source. Often a piece of music or music video or video which is composed of a sample of an earlier work and original work. Primarily artistic in nature, remix also contextualizes material for a new era, or setting.

Sample: (noun or verb) To take a bit of an original source for use in a different setting, or that bit itself. Sampling is as old as borrowing a bit of Biblical language, or poetry and placing it in a different setting, or as new as hip-hop. The digital age has made sampling both audio and visual much easier to do, and harder to control.

Participatory Culture: A pervasive attitude that muddies the line between performer and audience, producer and consumer. An active rather than passive exchange of ideas. A fast-forward evolutionary approach to everything. Participatory culture is a feature of post-modernism.

Proprietary Culture: A culture that places great importance on ownership in all matters. Copywriting ideas, logos, and even sounds and smells are evidence of a proprietary culture. Intellectual rights are guarded and permissions sought for use of any material.

Faithful Betrayal: A departure from received tradition that occurs when you so engage with the tradition, know it in and out, apply it to fresh situations, use it so fully and deeply that it has to change.

Holy Revolution: When you love something so much that you are willing to destroy it to save it.

Spiritual Chemotherapy: When you apply a medicine so powerful that you risk the health of the tradition, in order to save the tradition. But the goal is to save the tradition in its form.

Theological remix: Applying remix and sampling to the Godly things. Creating a fresh expression with intentional referencing but not complete preservation of the traditional source.

Joyful Subversion: Taking the received tradition and building upon it, often in radical surprising ways.

Godly Play for Grown-ups: Taking a received tradition and empathetically engaging with the story for enlightenment, message and provocation. Name sampled from “Godly Play” a copywrited Montessori like Sunday School Curriculum.

Orthodoxy: a received tradition, and a right way of thinking about and interpreting said tradition.

Open Source: A way of producing and developing material with the intent that others will have access to the end product’s source material. Inviting the participatory culture. A philosophy. This way of thinking presumes differing needs and contexts and agendas, anticipating that others will change the source for the best functionality in their environment. Another feature of post-modernism. A trust based approach.

Embodiment: Putting flesh and blood and tears and work to an idea. Making something real. Running the program in an actual human-based environment. Intentional engagement with all its messiness. Embodiment requires commitment and good humor.

Sanctification: The process of being God-touched and God-changed. Perfection through the process of engagement. A long-term goal rather than an event.

Neuro-diversity: The idea that not all our brains are wired the same way. A non-pathological way of looking at the differences in perception, interpretation and interaction with the world.

A Reading list for the 2011 Weed Lecture

2011-06-07T13:20:00.000-07:00

Freedom Friends Church and the Remixing of Quakerism

Beacon Hills Friends House, Boston

June 12, 2011

Peggy Senger Parsons

This reading list is a substitute for a bibliography and end notes. It may be useful as preparation or follow-up. All references are web links.

The lecture will directly sample from these sources:

The New Quakers: A Faithful Betrayal? (Quaker Life Article) ; C. Wess Daniels, http://gatheringinlight.com/2010/03/04/the-new-quakers-a-faithful-betrayal-quaker-life-article/

À La Carte Spirituality and Embodied Tradition; Micah Bales,

http://lambswar.blogspot.com/2011/04/la-carte-spirituality-and-embodied.html

Remix Culture and the Church, C. Wess Daniels
http://gatheringinlight.com/2011/03/04/remix-culture-and-the-church/

The lecture is built upon this foundation:

The Acts of the Apostles, Chapter 5

The Faith and Practice of Freedom Friends Church, 2005 FFC,
http://www.freedomfriends.org/FF-What.htm

Examples of Remix and Participatory culture:

Jay Z’s remix of It’s a Hard Knock Life from Annie,
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zxtn6-XQupM

The Johnny Cash Project, video remix and participatory fan culture, http://www.thejohnnycashproject.com/#/explore/TopRated

Peggy Senger Parsons blog: http://sillypoorgospel.blogspot.com/

Apostola Apostolorum

2011-04-24T09:13:00.000-07:00

That's what the early Church called her. The Apostle to the Apostles.

He spoke to her first.

Magdalen
Not Mary of Bethany, the good student
Not Lazarus, who you would have expected to expect the empty tomb.
Not His mother, not one of the three.

Magdalen
She of the seven demons.
She who needed him more than the others,
Because if he wasn't real, what had she to go back to?

He said that if you cleaned a house
you had better fill it
or it will be refilled by hell times ten.

He had more than filled her mind and heart and soul
And then He was gone.

Blinded by grief
she did not see Him.

She hadn't seen Him the first time either.
Cowering in a deep hidden corner of her soul.

But she had heard His approach
Demons screaming as they fled
or were bested in battle.

And He had found her then with His voice
He had called her by her name
And pulled her back up to herself.

Where have you taken Him?
That's where I have to be.
I don't care if it is death.

And He spoke
And she knew Him
And she was full
and sane
and whole.

Her house so in order
that she was ready for company.

And she went forth the First Witness.
Truth Teller.

And they believed her.
Eventually.

.

The Harrowing of Hell

2011-04-23T11:23:00.000-07:00

Jesus Fire Dancer

So There I was...

…Enjoying the fire dancing. I am the pastor of a post-modern church, so my pastoral duties occasionally include things like fire dancing.

One of my folks invited me to come down to the riverfront park in our town and watch her spin about her head small flaming objects attached to chains. Some of her friends were dancing with sticks aflame at both ends, and the dancers were accompanied by a group of people banging on drums. All this was done after dark, of course, on this cool, early April, Easter Vigil.

It was all very tribal, very pre-Christian, or maybe post-Christian. The dancers moved to the beat we all heard, but also to melodies heard only by their spiritual ears. The fires made great “whooshy” sounds as they whizzed about, describing circles in the dark air as if some wizard was teaching geometry to an unseen class. The circles got big, the circles got small, ellipsis and figure eights appeared around the dancers heads, feet and sometimes between their legs. The attitude of the dancers seemed serene, reflective, in control. Occasionally flames from one dancer would interact with the flames of another. I saw flames lick at clothing and hair but no one ignited themselves.

All in all it was a great Holy Saturday activity. I am a Quaker and one of our testimonies is that every day is a holy day and that all activities can be sacramental, but we are free to participate an all that leads us towards God, and the Easter Story certainly does that. I have always had a fascination with the Saturday piece of the story, called by some the Harrowing of Hell. To harrow means to plow, or deeply disturb the earth; to disrupt the status quo.

It is clear that both the Apostles Peter and Paul believed that Christ was not inactive during the time between Friday afternoon and Sunday morning. Sometimes He is pictured as a preacher, speaking the truth to the souls in Sheol.

Talk about a captive audience!

Sometimes he is pictured as a liberator bursting the gates of Hell open from the inside. Eastern Orthodox icons depict Hell as cold and empty with one or two chained demons and Jesus resurrected surrounded by former inmates. That’s a great picture.

Hell exists. A place separate from God must exist for free will to mean anything, but the door is open and the exit sign is clearly marked. It is the church that has rebuilt the gates of Hell and found useful the scare tactic of inescapable torment.

While sitting in the dark and cold, contemplating Holy Saturday and watching neo-pagan fire dancers, I received a new image of Jesus - Fire dancer. In my vision He shows up in the dark and cold of Hell and converses with the Adversary:

A: Welcome, Always knew you’d end up here.

JC: Thanks, I make it everywhere eventually, you know.

A: Really? I think your traveling days are over bud. Like the flames?

JC: Actually I do like the flames. Mind if I play a little?

He reaches down and picks up two handfuls of combustion and starts drawing circles in the air. A crowd appears. A drumbeat starts from somewhere deep. He steps lightly and playfully, showing his mastery, his serenity, His cool. The crowd starts dancing.

A: Cute tricks, been done before, but it’s going to get old.

JC: Anybody ever done this?

The circle of flame above his head expands explosively, and He hurls it towards the gates. Those evil old doors crack and fly outward, and Jesus the fire dancer leads a parade out, up and away.

No More Scapegoat Jesus

2011-04-22T09:40:00.000-07:00

Update: Daughter #1 no longer works for the Lutherans, she still planning to teach but has taken time for an intensive internship in mothering my grandchild.

2.26.2008

Today's UPI column

So There I was...

Facing the righteous indignation of an eight year old.

She stormed into the house, dramatically dropper her school bag and then slammed the door. My normally well-behaved and ebullient second grade daughter turned on me with eyes full of rage, nothing less than rage.

“What’s the matter hon? You’re a few minutes late.”

“SHE HELD US AFTER THE BELL! ALL OF US!”
“Who? Did what?”
“THE TEACHER. Ian and John were talking, but she punished us all! She made us stay after. SHE MADE US PUT OUR HEADS ON OUR DESKS!
I WASN’T TALKING! I LISTEN! SHE HAD NO RIGHT TO PUNISH ME! THE TEACHER WAS WRONG!”

I started as brief explanation of classroom management and why a teacher might try the admittedly lame tactic of using group pressure to control the few bad apples. Then I stopped. She was having none of it. She wasn’t mad at the bad boys. She was furious with the misadministration of justice. I asked her if she wanted me to talk to the teacher. She wanted me to talk to the principal. She wanted me to get the teacher fired. She knew to her marrow that punishing the innocent for the sins of the guilty was injustice of cosmic proportions. She couldn’t believe that they would let someone with such an obviously faulty moral compass teach children.

I knew right then that transmitting any semblance of Christianity to this child was going to be a challenge. Because sometime, someplace some Sunday School teacher was going to tell this kid that the core of the Christian message was that she, along with everyone else, was guilty, that God needed to punish somebody, because that was just how it was, somebody had to be punished, but that it didn’t really matter that you got the right person, so the good news was that somebody really good, could step up and get punished in your place and then you would get off Scott free. I knew this kid would be buying none of that.

Unfortunately I could not put the kid in stasis until I figured this one out. I started then to try and find different ways to talk about God, Jesus, and why death and resurrection are an important part of the story. It has taken me a couple of decades. The child is grown and gone. I am still working on it, but I have some handles.
The break for me started to come when I began to look seriously at the metaphors used for Christ. The most important one was this “Behold, the Lamb that takes away the sins of the world.” This phrase comes from the earliest explainers of the Christ story, the Apostles, those who knew Him, or those who sat at the feet of the first witnesses. They were all Jews. They were using a Jewish metaphor. The temple sacrifice, which was especially poignant for those who had witnessed the destruction of the temple in 70 AD and the end of the animal sacrifice system. Jesus, they explained, was God’s Lamb. Which brings us right back to he was punished for your sins. Unless you really go back and look at the instructions for that temple rituals.

So I spent some time in the Pentateuch, looking at the instructions. The sacrifices are all about community and restoring community. Bad behavior negatively affects community. Bad enough behavior breaks community. There is an element of justice, and even in the last resort, banishment from community. There is also a way to restore community. I discovered this when I found out the difference between the scapegoat and the lamb. Nobody talked much about the scapegoat in the church I grew up in. Once a year the priest was to do a ritual, in which all the sins of all the people are symbolically place upon the back of a goat (unclean – not kosher – not part of the community) and the goat is pushed out the gates into the wilderness, presumable to meet a bad fate. What happens to the goat doesn’t really matter. The punishment is being sent away from the community. The sins get sent away, not the people.

The lamb is a whole different deal. The lamb is clean, kosher, spotless, good, and the lamb is not punished, the lamb is consumed. The lamb is fit to be eaten, fit to be taken in. The lamb is giving your best stuff to the community to show that your intention is to be restored. The lamb is making amends not escaping judgment. The lamb is taking responsibility. The lamb is investing in community.

Then the lightbulb went on. I had been taught a scapegoat Jesus theology mislabeled as lamb theology. Jesus was the best God had, invested in us, not punished for us. Jesus was fit to be consumed, taken in, this was the message He himself taught at the last chance dinner. The Romans thought death was a punishment. God is not just a bigger badder Caesar. God understands that death is the universal human experience, and that joining us in even death is a connection of cosmic order. The ultimate community building experience.

But just wait one heretical minute! Did not Paul talk about “propitiation for our sins”? Yes, he did. I think Paul was spending way too much time hanging around with the Romans, I think it was starting to wear off on him.

So I don’t believe in scapegoat Jesus anymore. I don’t believe He was punished for my sins. I believe He taught me what to do about my sins, recognize them, send them away (i.e. stop) and then re-invest in community with my best stuff. Make my own amends wherever possible, and trust in the eternal resources that He made possible by joining my community to cover what I cannot. Come back, it works. Come as often as necessary.

So what happened to the indignant little girl? She doesn’t sit much under the teachers of orthodox Christendom. I think she is a Quaker in her heart, I know she is a friend of Jesus, she is earning her bread as a church secretary for the Lutherans, probably printing up those Lenten materials as we speak. But most tellingly she is training to be a teacher.

I think she has the right temperament for it.

// posted by Peggy Senger Parsons @ Tuesday, February 26, 2008

Comments:

Right on, sister! This is an issue that I have been doing a lot of thinking & reading about lately. I argued in my 1999 QRT article on 19th century Quakerism that the "substitutionary" or "satisfaction" theory (i.e., "scapegoat theology"!) was already opposed by George Fox and Robert Barclay! For long I suspected in the back of my mind that the big problem with that theory was its assumption that punishment was the "proper" response to sin or crime; my recent reading for an essay on restorative justice clarified for me the alternative -- that repair of the harm and restoration of the broken community (just what you are suggesting) is the proper response to sin/crime! -- and also pointed me to several recent books that confirmed my own suspicions re the basic assumptions involved in atonement theories. Expect lots more from me on this when I get to chapter 6 of "Friends, God, & the Bible" -- I've just completed chapter 4 --

Vail

# posted by Vail Palmer : February 26, 2008 9:34 PM

What a teaser from Vail. I can hardly wait. I wonder if we could get him to leak a few points to muse about. I have been doing some thinking along those lines myself (in spite of the pain thinking causes me). "Atonement" is one of those interesting issues that does not seem to have a settled and universal perception (check http://www.quakerinfo.com/atonement.shtml for a quick review) I recently made the following comment:
"I think that it is self-evident that people do stuff that hurts others and causes uh, bumps in the functioning of society. Throughout history, and anthropologists will tell us pre-history, society has had to deal with such "bumps" and or the individuals that cause them. Somewhere else, we or I talked about "guilt" as a social mechanism for helping such dealings. It is effective when not over used (how does a Jewish mother change a light bulb? "don't worry about me, go out and have fun, I'll just sit here in the dark.") When we do feel guilt for actions that cause harm, there has to be a mechanism for replacing or destroying that guilt. Often, repenting and making whatever amends are possible is enough, but sometimes not, and often there is no possibility of making amends, and a load of guilt can build up. How do we deal with it? Sometimes there is a catharsis if we receive punishment appropriate to the guilt. Sometimes we may feel that there is no punishment that could do the job. There are a number of theories about "atonement," but I think that it is less a requirement of God than it is a requirement of man; to feel that a price has been paid (most often with a feeling of gratitude and love for the one who paid it) and that we are free from that accumulated burden."
NOW I'm gonna hafta look into that "Paschal Lamb" thing and THIS time it's YOUR fault.

In His Love,
Nate

# posted by Anonymous : February 27, 2008 1:13 AM

I do not mean to be inappropriate, but I have to be brutally candid. If what I say sounds offensive, please disregard it.

You are actually saying that Christ died in vain or that your sins are not that bad or even that you find it impossible that He should love you so much that He should lay down His life for you and yes, suffer injustice.

On the road to Emmaus He explained, using the whole Hebrew Scriptures, that He must die for many. There is massive evidence throughout the Bible. This is not some guy's interpretation.

Yes, I do believe the Spirit speaks. But are we being led by His Spirit or by our own minds or, worse, feelings? Jesus once said in Luke 18 that "God will grant justice to his chosen ones who cry to Him day and night." Because He IS just AND good, He punished Jesus in our place. That is called love. Do you love your children? Would you give your life for them? Would you suffer injustice for them? I'm sure you would. Why then should it be preposterous that Jesus should love us like that and suffer the supreme injustice for our sake and as an example?

What you call silly gospel is His gospel, the only gospel there is. Much as I admire George Fox, he was just a man. And he did not die for me.

# posted by spock : February 27, 2008 8:31 AM

Nate -- since you ask, I can't resist thinking out loud a bit on the issue! This may take more than one "comment"-- I'll make the first comment a bibliographical one. My jumping off point is my article, "Some Issues from 19th-Century Quakerism" in Quaker Religious Thought # 92 (Jan. 199)--I deal with atonement on pages 12 to 18 and 27 to 29. My jumping-off point there is Gustav Aulen's book CHRISTUS VICTOR.
My recent reading: Timothy Gorringe, GOD'S JUST VENGEANCE, clearly unveils the interconnection between Anselm's "satisfaction" theory and feudal ideas of justice, and also between Calvin's "substitution" theory and 16th-century concepts of law. All of these involve the underlying assumption that if you hurt someone, you deserve to be hurt in response ("an eye for an eye" etc.). J. Denny Weaver, THE NONVIOLENT ATONEMENT, unpacks in satisfying detail Aulen's "Christus Victor" type of atonement theory, and emphasizes that the victory which God in Christ won over the forces of evil was won by nonviolent means. S. Mark Heim, SAVED FROM SACRIFICE: A THEOLOGY OF THE CROSS, emphasizes the scapegoating motif -- sees this motif as underlying many biblical writings -- and sees the cross as turning scapegoating inside out or upside down -- pretty murky, with some sharp insights; recommended only if the scapegoating issue is significant for you. I am now reading R. Larry Shelton, CROSS & COVENANT -- at first glance a completely new take on atonement theory, tying in the cross and the atonement with the covenant theme (a major theme in biblical theology). More in my next comment.
Vail

# posted by Vail Palmer : February 27, 2008 1:27 PM

Vail - Thank-you so much for the lucid comments. It helps so much to have an actual theologian on the team!I consider myself to be a sort of intuitive theologian and a narrative theologian, but as you know I always feel more confident when I have your affirmation.

Nate - Thanks for dropping in so often. I wish you would write me an e-mail on the back line. I have a couple of questions to ask you.

Friend Spock - just in case you check back.

I never choose to feel offense in response to honest, respectful, disagreement. You are welcome.

I use my blog for self-expression and hopefully inspiration, and not debate. I have never found debate to be effective or edifying.

But I have a few responses for you.

1 - about the blog title "silly poor gospel" I am not referring to the Gospel of Jesus Christ. It is a reference to a quote from Margaret Fell. I refer you to the very first post in the first section of the archives which explains the title of the blog. It is a Quaker in-reference. When I strated this thing I never imagined so many non-quaker readers.

2- I am not saying that Christ died in vain. I think the cross was important and effective, I just do not believe that the purpose was punishment.

3-I sin as much as most people. - more than many. But I do not believe that I have ever committed a sin worthy of capital punishment. Neither have my children.

4-I have no trouble believing that Christ loves me. none at all. He was there when I went to sleep last night and there when I woke up this morning.

5-I think a good parent let's their children have the consequences of their own behavior.

# posted by Peggy Senger Parsons : February 27, 2008 8:17 PM

I checked out the site that Nate referenced -- it turned out to be a summary of 5 types of atonement theory, by our dear Friend Arthur Roberts! These relate to Aulen's 3 types, as follows. Roberts' 2. (Christ satisfies Divine honor - Anselm) and 3. (Christ substitutes for us) are 2 varieties of Aulen's "Latin" type. Roberts' 4. (Moral influence - Peter Abelard)is the same as Aulen's "subjective/moral influence" type. Roberts' 1.(Christ ransoms us from the devil)is what Aulen calls an early (Church fathers) form of the "Classic" or "Christus Victor" type --"Its central theme is Atonement as a Divine conflice & victory; Christ -- Christus Victor -- fights against and triumphs over the evil powers of the world, the 'tyrants' under which mankind is in bondage and suffering, & in Him God reconciles the world to Himself" (Aulen, p. 4) Roberts' 5 (Jesus the Peacemaker - Phil Smith) sounds so much like Denny Weaver's "Narrative Christus Victor" that I wonder of Phil had read Weaver's book and adapted/adopted it for himself -- I'll have to email Phil & ask him!).
In any case, I have for long preferred Aulen's Christus Victor theology -- now I know much better why, and am delighted with how Denny Weaver (a Mennonite, teaching at a Church of the Brethren college!) fleshes this approach out -- it even ties in with the "Mighty Acts of God" interpretation of Biblical Theology which I have long subscribed to. An important aspect of that theology is that it brings in the Covenant theme -- the Mighty Acts of God are covenant-creating and covenant-renewing acts -- and that is where I think Larry Shelton's views might combine well with Weaver's to make a richer, fresher atonement theology -- that's what I want to keep working on. "God was in Christ, reconciling the world to himself, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation" (2 Cor. 5:19).
Everyone who has studied the issue in the past 60 years agrees that early Friends rejected the satisfaction/substitution view of the Atonement. I think I was the first to recognize clear elements of Christus Victor in George Fox's writings -- and of course the whole Lamb's War theme in early Quaker thought is a marvelous extension of Christus Victor. This also fits wonderfully in with Denny Weaver's "narrative Christus Victor" approach" -- like Fox & James Nayler, Weaver clearly sees that in the book of Revelation, "The slain lamb indicates a nonviolent confrontation between the reign of God and reign of evil, and a nonviolent victory via death and resurrection for the reign of God."

(I owe a debt of thanks to Sarah Hoggatt for clueing me in to Larry Shelton's book, which adds such a good dimension to "narrative Christus Victor.")

Evangelical Friends in the early 1800's -- especially Joseph John Gurney -- all strongly believed in the substitution theory, and believed it was the ONLY valid theory (I suspect Spock in his/her comment may be in the same situation?). And so (failing to recognize that early Friends had a different view!) they accused Elias Hicks & his friends (who may have held to the Moral Influence view) of "denying the atonement" -- with disastrous results, splitting Quakerism into two hostile camps.

Anything you want me to clarify or expand on, Nate?

Vail

# posted by Vail Palmer : February 27, 2008 9:52 PM

Peggy --

You are a narrative theologian! Of course! Biblical theology IS narrative theology -- the narrative of the Mighty Acts of God!

I think that is what G. Fox and his friends intuitively recognized, and why, therefore, they refused to ossify their insights into a creed.
Through the 19th century, Hicksite Friends gradually moved away from the original Christ-centered commitment of Quakerism; Gurneyite Friends forgot the original anti-credal stance, changed narrative theology into propositional theology, and eventually came up with that humongous "Richmond Declaration of Faith" in 1887.
That's why we need to be Convergent!!!
Vail

# posted by Vail Palmer : February 27, 2008 10:05 PM

So as a final note here.
This morning I followed a visitor back to the google search 'jesus scapegoat' and was amazed to find many many site specifically touting how wonderful it was to recognize Jesus as scapegoat. (go ahead and try it)

I am not aware of any Biblical reference to Christ as God's goat - only "the Lamb."

this sort of amazes me - I suppose it should not.

# posted by Peggy Senger Parsons : February 28, 2008 9:29 AM

Vail, thank you much for your comments and concern. I think I will wait for your full exposition, though I am interested in that idea of "the cross turning scapegoating inside out," and "murky" fairly well describes my mind.
This is one of those areas of interest that are not essential to my faith that Peggy described as something to check into as opportunity allows in her previous blog post. I surely agree with her that restoration of community is the primary concern.

In His Love,
Nate

# posted by Anonymous : February 28, 2008 5:08 PM

Peggy,
I would like to tell you how much this week's article touched me. This is a theological point I have been grapplig with for several years now and this is one of the most meaningful ways I have heard the subject addressed. More and more, as much as I deeply appreciate my years in Sunday school, I believe there is far more than the Western Protestant perspective I have been taught and this article helped give me a good piece of what I needed to turn the next corner and grapple with it some more. Thank you.

Sarah

P.S. Vail - I have Dr. Shelton's book too and will be reading it shortly. We should sit down and talk about it sometime. That would be fun. :o)

# posted by Sarah Katreen Hoggatt : February 28, 2008 7:16 PM

Peggy,

I'm not a Quaker (though my grandfather was!), but as a humble Episcopalian, I have never been able to make sense of the loving God/atonement paradox. It has always seemed to me that the crucifixion was an extravagant act of love, the proof of God's endless love for us, and that the Resurrection offers the assurance that this love will save us, flawed and broken as we are.

But what do I know? I'm hardly a theologian!

Judy

# posted by Judith : March 03, 2008 6:28 PM

WOW. This resonates with me better than any explanation I have ever read on the subject.

# posted by Jami Hart : March 17, 2008 12:27 PM

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And now for some Seasonal Favorites

2011-04-21T19:42:00.000-07:00

The Next three posts will be Seasonal Repeats - Happy Holy Days

3.04.2008

Geek Squad Jesus

Today's UPI column

So There I was…

Inside an organ. The church organ was old even during my childhood. It had fallen upon hard times, having been sold with the building by the Lutherans. It was as big as a small house, from the motor in the basement that filled its mighty bellows to the 16 foot pipes soaring above the sanctuary. My mother played it every Sunday. Trained on piano she taught herself how to play the two keyboards and the extra keyboard of pedals that she played with her feet. She had nearly perfect pitch and the organ that hadn’t had proper maintenance in a decade must have driven her to distraction.

This is how my father came to be the organ’s repairman.

He claimed it started with a toaster. She wanted to throw it out. He told her it was perfectly good, it just needed a little work. He was kinda cheap. She handed it to him. “Fine, Fix it.” So he took it apart and figured out what was wrong and fixed it on the spot. He was proud. She was cautiously impressed. She said “You think you can fix anything, don’t you?” He allowed as this might be close to the truth. She said “Fine – fix my organ.” And his career as a repairer of fine wooden tracker pipe organs began.

He climbed around inside that thing for years. And when there was occasionally something he wanted to reach in a space too small for an adult, he sent in one of us children. We learned obedience – touch this not that. Put your feet here not there. He was good with machines, and good with children. He was bold. And he knew that you couldn’t fix the organ from the keyboard you had to get inside it to do the job.

I cannot help that fact that he shaped my theological impressions. I wouldn’t want to.

I have previously stated that I think that the death of Christ had nothing to do with punishment. Even Pilate knew that this was a farce. So what did happen on that day outside of Jerusalem almost 2000 years ago?

I think something broken got fixed. I see Jesus the redeemer, as Jesus the repairman, tech support if you will. See, there was this system called ‘time and space’ and running on this system was a program called ‘humanity.’ And it got all buggy. And the code called ‘the law’ just wasn’t working. So the system designer had to crack it all open. Get inside, wipe some stuff, patch other stuff, write some whole new stuff.

It’s a frustrating job, but somebody’s got to do it. It helps if the somebody doing the fixing knows what they are doing. It also helps to have patience. Sometimes, people are just dumb, they do not interface well with the program, and you have to very patiently explain to them, again and again, how the thing is supposed to work. But if the code is all glitchy, you have to get your hands dirty. And you can’t fix the code from the desktop.

So for me the incarnation, life, teaching, death and resurrection of Christ is all part of the same repair job. He got in, bringing with Him tools, skills, and a supremely solid connection to the designer. He ran the program, personally. Diagnostics were completed. One of the buggiest parts of the program was death, so he ran that too. But death was not the end, Resurrection - the reboot to end all reboots was needed. Emptied the recycle bin called Hell while He was at it.

The Law was rewritten, and the concept of clean and unclean pretty much wiped. Do you know what a time saver that was? Efficiency upgrade deluxe. Religious practice within the confines of tribal groups was made obsolete. Limitless grace was written in.

Then the lovely fixed program had to be turned over to the users. So a help desk was established. Some people call it the Holy Spirit, some people call it the Present Christ, some people call it The Inner Light – there are lots of names for it. But it is there 24/7.

So we run the program. Seek the Kingdom. Pursue peace. Get Serenity. Achieve enlightenment. War and hate are options under the free will part of the program. So are glory, sacrifice, and love. Calamity is just part of the set up. Calamity makes room for altruism and compassion. The whole thing works imperfectly, very imperfectly, but that is because of the human interface, not the program. The program works just fine. The human learning curve is steep but it is also part of the design.

Everybody in the program has a task. Finding it and performing it is the work of being human.

I am a minister of the Gospel of Jesus Christ. I work for tech support. I run tutorials. I coach new users. I scan for viruses. I help people with their upgrades. I try and keep a very solid connection. Occasionally I help people bust out of dead end spots they get themselves into. It is a good gig.

Frustrating at times, but very satisfying at others.

I come by it naturally.

Dad would understand.

Nothing Says Easter quite like Compost

2011-04-03T17:08:00.000-07:00

All my Theology lives in my garden.
Any dogma not displayed there is suspect to me.
My Father taught me this.
Early.

Compost is the visible lesson of life coming out of death.
Compost teaches me that nothing and no one is ever really lost.
Compost teaches me to work WITH God and God's processes.
Compost tells me that if I work with God, miracles are easy.

Hauling that miracle out to the right spot, can still be a bit of work.
Work is good for me.

.

"Precious in the sight of the Lord"

2011-03-29T12:53:00.000-07:00

is the death of his saints

Charlotte Macy (left, above) and Dorothy Barratt (R) were recorded and released ministers. Charlotte died in January 1977. Dorothy was reunited with her on Sunday night this week. They pastored churches in Oregon and Iowa individually and together. They literally built Silverton Friends Church. They lived in Rockaway Beach and were instrumental in the building of Twin Rocks Camp. Dorothy had a life long dedication to Christian Education. Dorothy was a member of Newberg Friends Church, and her memorial will be there on April 9.

This reporter did a series of interviews with Dorothy in 2001 and 2002. I was impressed with Dorothy's single minded devotion to her understanding of building God's Kingdom. She had holy boldness and the stamina to back it up.

I wonder if we are making young ministers at the rate we are losing them. I wonder if any of us have the strength of these early pioneers.

.

And Fit Us For Heaven...

2011-03-21T11:25:00.000-07:00

A Review of “Love Wins” by Rob Bell.

He told CNN the other day that he wasn’t a universalist. He was quibbling.

He probably meant that he believes that Jesus Christ is the only way to Eternal Life, which makes him a Christian. He also believes that Jesus will grant/has granted eternal life to all who want it, now or at any time in the ages to come, without conditions, and that all eventually will. That makes him a Christian Universalist. Quibbler. Fortunately there is no quibbling in his new book. No hairs are split, no pin-angels counted. It is a straight forward, compelling exposition of a generous, optimistic, realistic, sane view of God and God’s people.

It is not going to convince anyone who is already opposed to it. If you like the idea of eternal conscious torment, it won’t do. If you like the door to Grace being slammed shut with your last breath, don’t bother. If you need Jesus to save you from His pissed off Father who happens to be His alter ego, then don’t waste your money on this book.

What this book will do is embolden many who have already rejected those ideas but have not had the nerve to say so. And it will open doors and windows to others who “Like your Jesus but can’t stand Christians, thank you very much.”

This message and this messenger have the potential to divide the evangelicals from the fundamentalists. It may be a tipping point.

If you can’t tell an evangelical from a fundamentalist you might want to read this book. He is the first, he is not the latter. He continually makes room for people who see it differently from him. He acknowledges all the other metaphors even when he has a favorite. He knows what a metaphor is. My favorite sentence in the book is, speaking of the book of Revelation, “... it’s important that we don’t get too hung up on details and specific images because it’s possible to treat something so literally that it becomes less true in the process.” (pg 114)

If you have never met an evangelical Christian that you liked, and don’t intend to start liking them now, move along. He’s accessible and likable and he probably will not win you over.

If you liked his videos, you will love the book. If the videos annoyed you with their slick hipsterness, you can read the book without seeing the glasses and hearing the background music. If you are a font geek or a book design geek, you may want to have someone read it to you. Serious academics may not be impressed - I wouldn’t know.

Don’t really wanna give you the Cliff Notes, I want you to read it, but

· His Jesus is divine
· His eschatology is realizing
· Here and now is more important than the sweet by and by
· The purpose of being good in this life is goodness
· Heaven is a restoration
Hell is an optional way station that is not about punishment
· Good Friday and Easter morning matter
· He doesn’t mollycoddle or ignore the reality of sin
· He’s done his Bible homework
· He reads his Bible like T. Vail Palmer reads his Bible

But my personal favorite thing about his book is something that he ignores.

With intention - I believe.

He is an evangelical preacher talking about Life and Death and Heaven and Hell and he never once even alludes to any “End Times.” He completely ignores John Darby and all his made-up dispensationalist nonsense. He talks about getting people clean water, not preparing for a rapture. He talks about the hell of sex-trafficking not when a great tribulation will happen. It’s like he doesn’t even care. Hallelujah. If he doesn’t care then maybe his multitudes of church goers won’t care. Maybe the younger generation of evangelicals will stop caring. Maybe they will fund clean water not Christian Zionist schemes. Maybe if they stop expecting Armageddons they won’t make one. Maybe they will see that the only Antichrists are the oppressors of the poor. Maybe we can leave the end of the world malarkey to Harold Camping and Fred Phelps and the other loonies and haters. Where it belongs.

Bell’s view of God is supernatural and optimistic. His view of humanity is realistic and optimistic.

I like it.

All of it.

.

WOW - Rob Bell actually is a heretic!

2011-03-19T20:18:00.000-07:00

I have his book right here in my hands.

It is completely set in a non-serif font.

Which I was told you could NEVER do in the body of the text.

And he doesn't write in paragraph form.

Not even sentences.

And HarperOne let him do it.

So they are probably going to book design Hell too.

And me.

I'm ruined.

Never gonna touch a serif again.

Irradiated!

2011-03-17T21:11:00.000-07:00

So There I Was ...

Being irradiated. It was pretty impressive. I entered the room with the yellow triangle warning signs. I waited for the tech. When he entered he was wearing a lead apron and carrying a lead box. I asked “How come I don’t get a lead apron?” “Wouldn’t do much good since we are injecting the stuff into you.” He put on lead lined gloves and opened the box. He took out a syringe. I was wondering how good of an idea this was as he injected me with radio isotopes. “Okay, sit a while and I will come back and check you.” He said as he put the syringe carefully back into the lead box and walked carefully out of the room.

He came back after a while with a Geiger-counter. A regular old Geiger-counter. He held it up to my chest - nothing. He held it up to my neck. Man, don’t we all know that fast ticka-ticka-ticka sound from old sci-fi movies. He wrote down his readings.

“Okay you can go now; the doctor will call you in a day or so.”

“Um, how long am I going to be radioactive?”

“Ah, you’ll pee it out in a day or two.”

“So I’m not a danger to my babies or anything, right?”

“Oh, heck, no”

“Then why did you need a lead apron?”

“Cause I handle this stuff all day long every day, and hope to do so for a long career - over caution - don’t sweat it - ok?”

Oooo - kay.

See, I have thyroid disease. They were checking me for Thyroid cancer. Ironically with exactly the thing that most likely causes Thyroid cancer. Radiation.

Hair of the Dog. If dogs glow in the dark.

Although no one can prove it in the specific, I probably came to need that test due to the fact that I was female, born in 1957 and lived through my childhood in the US Midwest consuming copious quantities of cow’s milk. Cow’s milk that came from cows that ate grass contaminated by a series of open air Nuke tests in Nevada. My mother would not have approved, but she didn’t know. The cases of thyroid disease among my peers is dose-correlated to childhood milk consumption. Thanks.

It turned out that I did not have cancer, just hypothyroidism, and I take a little blue pill of synthetic thyroid hormone every day for the rest of my life.

And you know what. I am ok with that.

I could be pissed off, paranoid, radicalized. But I’m not. I want them to do better for my kids than they did for me, and I think they mostly do. I want them to do better for my grand kids, and I think they will. Because in my experience, people learn. It is our Charism. We screw up, and run ahead of ourselves and our Guide, and we cut corners, and we cover up, and we suffer for all that. Sometimes we suffer terribly. But we learn. And we do better.

And I trust scientists, and engineers, and nuke plant workers with kids. Greed trumps conscience sometimes, maybe often. But sometimes it doesn’t. I trust whistler-blowers. I trust activists, even though I am not one. Some people have a call.

Yesterday, in Portland, when they got a Federal Official and a State Official and a City Official and the local Sheriff all up for the TV’s and they all said “Chill, people - we’re ok for now - and if that changes we will tell you.” I believed them. Because I don’t think you could get them all to lie at the same time in the same way. And if something so God-awful happened that they couldn’t save any of us, and they decided not to scare us, then I would be OK with that too. Cause in that case, I would not want to know.

There are things that I do want to know. Like how much radiation was in that Thyroid test. It was certainly the scariest test I ever had. But I looked it up - .03 millisieverts. Turns out the four years I lived in Santa Fe at 7,000 feet gave me 6 milliseiverts per year. The other 47 years of my life I have gotten at least 3 mSv per year. My yearly Mammogram .7 mSv. I have had two CAT scans at 2 mSv each - much higher than the injection. It takes 400 mSv per hour to acutely affect your health and acute radiation sickness starts at a 1,000 mSv burst. The people of Japan aren’t getting anything like that - yet - God save them. The workers volunteering to go into that plant might be, God bless them.

I want to know about these things because some of them I can control, and some I can’t. But as much as possible, I want to be an informed volunteer of my own life.

I also want to know what they learned from Chernobyl and Three-mile Island, and what they will learn from Fukushima. And I want them to apply it right now, and into the future to Diablo Canyon, and all the others. But I don’t need them to shut them all down. ‘Cause radiation in itself does not scare me. Radiation happens. I’ve also had a small skin cancer removed. Probably from those sunny days in Santa Fe - perfectly natural and organic. Risks happen. We are all going to die of something, and I may die of cancer, but I may not. And the scientists me save me from my natural or unnatural radiation-caused cancer with a dose of Hair of the Dog radiation therapy. Or I might not let them. And I am ok with that too.

Because my life today is good. And Love is a strong power, and cannot be stopped by lead shields or pools of water. And I am not my body. And God is over all. And people are glorious. And when our old scary plate-tectonic Earth shakes us all to heck, we help each other. And when our science trips us up, we learn. And some of us risk all to try and save others. And I believe in that. I choose to trust.

Annual Clivia Report

2011-03-12T16:09:00.000-08:00

Father's Clivia bloomed for Ash Wednesday, or maybe it was Mardi Gras - they do look like a party!

These are the first three blooms, I say that because both the mother plant and the twin pups have a second bloom stalk coming along. That is SIX blooms.

The earliest they have ever bloomed was Valentines Day in 07 - I was in Africa at the time.

Three years they have bloomed for holy week 06, 08, 09. The last two years they have bloomed for Ash Wednesday.

The blooms are fairly long lasting, so I am wondering how long during Lent they will bloom this year. The entire Holy Season?

.

Visitors

2011-03-06T13:59:00.000-08:00

One of the things that is true about Freedom Friends, and most Quaker meetings is that Visitors always change a meeting for Worship. In a MegaChurch or even the Catholic Mass, what happens up front is not much changed by who is sitting int he pews on any Sunday. This is not true with us. This morning we were rich in visitors. Vail and Izzy welcomed friends Jim and Marilyn from the Portland area. And Joe Synder and Pepper attended.

Pepper is a Canine Friend. She is not our first Canine visitor nor likely to be our last. Her Friend and Master Joe is a animal caretaker and healer. Pepper is a working dog. She helps Joe.

She is a fine Quaker. She parked herself under a bench, just under my feet, actually. She rested attentively. She was more able to be physically still than most of the human Friends in the room. Joe says she usually sleeps when she is not working but that she always has one ear cocked to hear her name called. She is always ready and excited to work. She is, I believe as God made her to be. She is also the genetic product of a few millenia of cooperation with humanity. She is a very healthy and centered pup. There seems to be nothing neurotic about her.

She is not the shepherd, but she knows his voice. She knows her work. She is happiest when she is about her work, although she is pretty content just to hang with the Shepherd. She had to be trained to her work, although it agrees with her nature.

She has a lot to teach us.

.

The Weirdest Thing I Have Ever Been To

2011-02-26T11:38:00.000-08:00

This is a rare treat. A candid report on a Quaker worship service by an complete outsider.

I teach Psychology at the local college. The class before mine is American Religions. Quakerism is featured quite largely in their text. When their teacher found out that I was a Quaker pastor, he invited me to speak to his class. Since then I have become a favorite interview and research subject.

Below is the "Field Report" of a young woman named Kelli. I have her permission to share. She spent time on Quaker info.org and with the F and P of Freedom Friends. She interviewed me and attended our worship service. She was raised Catholic and occasionally attends a non-denominational Evangelical church. She is about 20 and married. I have not edited her report. The pictures are the ones she included. (note - her pictures have not transferred - I have added notes where she had pictures)

I am not interested in having us correct her small factual errors. I am very interested in what you think of this very fresh view.

.............................

Quakers

by Kelli X

Quakers or religious Society of friends started in the 1640’s. They were a group of people who were dissatisfied with the established church who believed one could get the direct experience of Jesus Christ without mediation of clergy or like minded people. The founder of the Quakers was George Fox and he found other people who thought like him and they began to spread their message. As they expanded they faced opposition and persecution. Many were imprisoned or beaten especially in the British Colonies. The Massachusetts Bay Colony would banish the circle of friend’s members or punish them by death and hanging. They were most welcomed in Rhode Island and made up most of the population. They also came to be in Pennsylvania. They made peace treaties with the Indians have good relations with them after that. In 1947 the friends accepted the Nobel Peace Prize for 300 years of working for peace. There are approximately 160,000 friends in North America but occupy many parts of the world including Africa, Australia, New Zealand and Canada. The religious circle of friends also helped or contributed to found current states such as NJ, Delaware, Penn and RI.

(picture of Quakers protesting war and a picture of George Fox)

For my field assignment I ventured to the land of Quakers. At first to be quite honest I thought that the Quaker religion was very much like Amish and expected it and the people to be very strict; wearing bonnets, having long facial hair and such. I am very surprised to learn that not only are Quaker people everyday people but they actually believe in a lot of what I believe in its just that they have made it a religion.

(picture of Presence in the Midst)

For my research on this paper I attended a church in Salem called Freedom Friends Church and interviewed Peggy Senger who is the pastor at this church. I went on a Sunday to a “meeting” there at 10:30 am. Nothing seemed out of the ordinary they hold meetings on Sunday just like a lot of others, the building didn’t really look like a church, but it’s the address I was given so I went inside.

(picture of Freedom Friends Church and our banner)

The first thing I noticed that was different was it was very small just like a regular room. There were a few pews but instead of all facing to the front they faced each other with half on one side of the room and half on the other. There were no podiums or places where anyone stood up front. I watched as the people came in and they all sat wherever they wanted some not even sitting in the pews but in back at a table or in some chairs against the wall. A lady pulled up a music stand and pulled out her guitar and everyone picked up these binders that had hymns in them. I assume that these are the same hymns they always sing because they go in alphabetical order and it doesn’t look like any ever get added or taken out. We sung about 4 songs. I then expected the pastor to get up and stand at the front and start a sermon or something but it was just the opposite. She sat down right across in the pew and drank a beverage and just talked to everyone. She said it was time for gratitude’s and whoever wanted to could say anything they would like about what they were thankful for in that day or week or whatever. Almost everyone said something they were grateful for but not in any order just whoever felt like speaking. Next she said if anyone had concerns or cares or had something on their mind they could say that at that time, again some people spoke up about whatever was on their mind. The next thing was she said we were going to take some time and talk to god and you can do whatever is necessary to do that but it’s a time for you to talk to god and for you to listen to what he is telling you. You can do this by reading scriptures, coloring, or maybe saying something out loud if necessary. But in this time everyone was silent, I had no idea what was going on no one spoke. After about what seemed like a long while (to me) she prayed. It wasn’t a prayer I ever heard before, most churches I have been to, the prayer was organized almost written down? This pastor just talked… like she was just having a conversation with god but so everyone could hear. After that it was over. I didn’t know what to think it was pretty much the weirdest thing I have ever been to. I couldn’t get over how there was no sermon and basically the entire thing was silent for you to just sit there and think. I really enjoyed it though for the fact that it was welcoming. I didn’t feel really like an outsider and I didn’t feel stiff after I had sat down but I felt that this was kinda like a place to just hang out with fellow people and talk to god.

The church I went to is a semi programmed and socially progressive Quaker church. It has been around for about five years and as Peggy Sengerson (the pastor) told me they are an “experiment” taking on all sorts of the different beliefs that many Quakers have with a few basic key ones. They believe in a few key things I think are important to share. They believe in God, Jesus and spirit. They believe god is our creator and loves every single person no matter what and that he is creator. They believe Jesus died for our sins and was resurrected conquering sin, death and hell once for everyone. They do not believe that communion or baptizing is something that you need other people for but is between you and god. One of the big things they believe in is peace. They don’t agree with war, violence of any kind, or anything else that corrupts holy living. They are one of the few religions that do not have to participate in war but as Peggy was telling me you have to go thru a lot to prove that you’re a true Quaker to get out of this. They don’t believe in capital punishment, abortion, domestic violence and child abuse. They believe in simple living meaning that greed, envy, and security based on wealth are not examples of holy living. They have these meetings to conduct business. In bigger societies they have yearly meetings but not at hers. Conducting business in their place is a big deal because there is no boss. Everyone has the right to think what they want but basically if not everyone agrees no one agrees. If they do have a problem that comes up and can’t decide on an answer they leave it and come back later.

Three things that the Freedom Friends Church opposes greatly are Slavery, Fundamentalism and Evil. Slavery, not just of person to person but of yourself and your addictions to anything. Fundamentalism as they think that what they believe is on the correct path to what god wants but they in no way saying their way is the only or right way to go. They are truly against trying to be evil or anything that has to do with it. I asked Peggy how you don’t do that and she said like for example when everything is going wrong and you want to hate something or someone you think instead of all those bad things what can I do to make this better or make the situation better?

I could go on and on for days about all the interesting things I learned from her or how most of it actually makes sense to me. I really am glad I chose this religion and think I have learned a lot about it and also about being open minded to other types of religion because I think we are all getting the same message from god just in different ways.

(picture of Hold On - Let Go quilt at FFC)

Either Hold On - to God, to each other, to the truth - or Let Go, of your expectations, fears or anything that keeps your from proximity to God and to freedom. Sometimes the answer is do both.

The Call to Boston

2011-02-16T12:52:00.000-08:00

(notes to obscure Quaker references will be in the comments)

I have internal signposts.

Small spiritual prompts that my Guide uses to give me a "heads-up." One of these is "Bristol City Limits." This indicates the dangers of acclaim, and causes me to check my grandiosity quotient. It will rise up in me like a clear, cheery voice of a cosmic conductor, "Bristol City Limits, darlin', time to get off!" I usually do.

Another that gets less use is "The Call to Boston." This call is a reference to the actual dangers of following spiritual leadings. Most of the dangers in my life are the consequences of my own foolish risk taking, not like the Sacrifice of Mary Dyer. But once in a while I have heard "Careful, this has the potential to be the Call to Boston." I take this quite seriously.

But this week I got an Actual Call to Boston! I am going to be this year's Weed Lecturer at Beacon Hill Friends. We are looking at a June date. I am very excited about this.

I am hoping that it does not involve any of this:

When Tyrants Tremble

2011-02-12T12:43:00.000-08:00

When Tyrants tremble sick with fear

And hear their death knells ringing

When friends rejoice both far and near

How can I keep from singing!

There are some despots shaking in their boots today. It is not unusual for them. Those who dish out fear have the most of it to spare, but today especially they fear that they may really lose their grip. They are calling their slimy advisors and making plans. They are right now stacking bribes and threats to make sure that they do not lose control of THEIR militaries.

Tunisia threw out Ben Ali, and then Egypt ridded themselves of Mubarik in half the time and with considerable less violence. The North African revolution may not be over.

From way down South, The Rev Doctor Desmond Tutu has this to say.

“Brothers & sisters of Egypt, you have given the world the most precious gift: the belief that ultimately right will prevail.”

What a consistently humble man he is. Because much of the world would say that the South African revolution of the last decade of the 20^th century was an earlier example of the same thing. I sincerely hope that Madiba is well enough to watch what is going on up North. He set the ultimate example by leading a mostly peaceful revolution, taking the reins of power when elected and then laying them down in due time and walking away. A stunning example. One not followed very often in Africa.

This is one of our deep blessings in the USA that we take for granted. Love them or hate them, you can vote them out. They will actually leave the White house when they lose. They will shake the hand of their successor and wish them luck. Anyone who thinks that our government is kind of despotic needs to take a vacation in the neighborhood of an actual despot. I would suggest Harare. I would also suggest that the new democracies put into their constitutions protections and pensions for retiring presidents. Some African despots hang on simply because there would be nothing else for them to go on to. We are a country rich in ex-presidents. Some of them are better ex-presidents than they were presidents. Obama is young, he is going to make a great ex-president in two years or in six. He isn’t thinking about this yet, but I bet his wife is.

Even a non-violent revolution is not without bloodshed. They say that there are 300 martyrs in the Egyptian protest. But poverty and disenfranchisement kill more in nearly every country in Africa on a daily basis. If this transition is accomplished with even some level of transparency and results in some kind of free elections, the heroes of this revolution will be the Egyptian Military. Somewhere high up there is a general or generals who decided to try neutrality, and maybe more. They saved their nation. Now they must follow Mandela’s example and hold their ground, facilitate change, put out fires, and then step away. Really, it’s an awful lot to expect from an Army. May they be up to it.

If they are, I believe that the continent will change. One way or another.

The villains of this revolution will be the phone companies. Vodaphone is everywhere in Africa, they make their bread from the masses, and they knuckled under. The next job of the Egyptian protestors should be to make Vodaphone et al pay economically. The people are only beginning to taste their power.

I am glad that the Obama administration and the rest of the world mostly stayed out of it, at least on the public side. The worst sin of colonialism is to think that you know better for them than they know for them. The Egyptian people did this themselves. They own the glory.

Kenya almost tipped over into Chaos in 08. But the revolution was not completed there. Its leaders need to pay attention.

Maybe Bashir has been watching and reading the signs, and so he will actually let Juba go. Then he needs to go.

The people of Ethiopia are watching, Chad is watching, Ertitrea is watching. All of Africa now had satellite dishes and cell phones. There are at least a dozen despots who need replacing, and a dozen more potential despots.

Mr Mugabe, you have just been served!

Mr. Museveni in Kampala, when you took power you said that no African leader should be in power any longer than 10 years. That was 24 years ago. You have been given notice.

Mr. Kagame. You have turned into what you once said you hated. It is time to let go and model the elder statesman.

And Pierre Nkuruziza, in my dear Burundi. WATCH! You say you want a prosperous Burundi as a part of an East African Union. Prosperity is best built on peace and freedom. I drove around your barricaded office last summer, as you holed up, fearful of Al Shabab. When bold risk takers become old men barricaded behind their fear, they are of no use to their people. They often become a curse to their people. It is not too late to change!

So enjoy your fear old men! You earned it.

SoThere I was - Grail Quest Edition

2011-02-07T22:05:00.000-08:00

So there I Was ...

Shopping. Again. My friend was here for a few hours. Well, he was here for a couple of days, but I got a few hours of his time. I tend to take up the airport run because we can usually get in a meal and some good conversation. But this duty always come with the insertion of his “Last Minute Tasks.”

These are always entertaining.

He always has a shopping list and counts on me for shopping expertise for the things that are not easy for him to find. There is almost always at least one impossible thing on the list. One year is was “Peggy, we need to stop at a pharmacy and get a thousand tablets of Haldol.” In Africa, if you had the money, and they had the haldol, this would work - like it might work in Tijuana. No doctors need be involved. This does not work in Portland. He was mightily disappointed, African crazy people were depending on him. He does not like to let people down. He’s reliable that way.

This time he had two requests. The first was for a dear Friend of his, a Catholic priest.

“My friend needs a communion cup for his church. Silver. You know, they look like a soccer trophy with two handles. Bigger than a regular cup.”

“Has the Vatican run out of silver that they are not supplying their priests these days?”

“He is building his own little chapel at his retreat center, and needs this thing. It is important to Catholics you know. He is like a brother to me, and I want to give it to him as an honor. I have told him that I would look for one. I have a hundred dollars set aside for this and I am told that such things can be easily found at Good Will in America.”

A grail quest. You don’t get that everyday. And it is not that I do not believe that this man might not just have the purity of heart to pull off such a feat - he might. And it is not that I do not believe that this man might have a God who would get kicks from supplying such a request - he does. And if there was going to be a grail quest I most certainly wanted to be there. But I felt I needed to explain to him the odds. That Good Will was a chancy thing, and that the quality was not usually that good, and that there was the time factor to make the plane.

“Ah, I see, you are saying that it is unlikely, difficult and time consuming.”

“Indeed - But I know of two such places between here and the airport and if you want to try, I will take you.”

“ Thank you - you are always willing, my friend, but it is not the only thing I need.”

“What else is on your list?”

“There is a little boy at Kamenge. He is about 2. His family is very poor. He loves me very much. He likes to sit on my lap on the elder’s bench. I asked his mother if there was something he might need or want from America. She said he was airplane crazy and wondered if a toy plane could be had. I wanted to look for that also.”

“That I think we can find. What do you want to do?”

“The child will not know if I bring something or not, only the mother. And I had such hopes for the cup... But I think I will bring the toy. I would rather please the child than the man.”

And so we looked at the toys. We found a nice shiny jetliner, but he would not have it because the engines looked like bombs to him and he was afraid the child would play war with it. Finally we found a little red Cesna, with a propeller. And he smiled broadly and bought it.

In the car he held his prize.

“I am happy. The boy will be happy. I am content, Let us head for the airport.”

And I knew we had found the grail.

And I was happy.

Wee Bairn Biker

2011-02-06T21:44:00.000-08:00

Our clan's youngest daughter was here recently.
Naturally she wanted to sit on Gran's bike.

She declared it to be "My Bike"

She was quite comfortable. Gran, of course has a rule about babies and bikes. But thought that she might be impressed with a little engine sound. She was handed off to Mom and she batted not an eye when the motor went vroom. So Gran thought to demonstrate and put on a hat and roared just up the lane. The Bairn let out a banshee howl. We weren't sure if for fear for Gran or for the shame of being left behind. So Gran invested in a bit of vintage Radio Flyer to get the babe some chrome bars of her own. She declared it to be "Baby Motorbike!" and was content.

Vengeance is Mine saith the Lord

2011-02-04T16:52:00.000-08:00

A Movie review of True Grit

Especially for my Friend Duncan

(Spoiler Alert - but you probably won’t be interested unless you’ve seen it)

It is not often that I go to see a movie twice in three days. Not often like maybe never. But this movie rattled so many of my doors that I had to go back and pay closer attention to why. Sure it had cowboys and I like cowboys. And horses, I like them even better. And a spunky gal - that’s always good, but that didn’t explain the fascination. Those Coen boys can’t seem to stay away from old timey Gospel stuff and Biblical references, I knew that. They Gospelled up Odysseus just fine. But that didn’t explain it either. I never saw the John Wayne version of the thing, so I had no dog in that fight. I watched it at the Saturday afternoon matinee expecting a good time, mind and heart. I did not expect that my soul would jump up, sit on the edge of the seat and steal all the popcorn.

The movie starts with silent opening credits and I counted it off at about 30 Quaker seconds. This of course made the audience uncomfortable and at one showing some wisenheimer had to break it. But it sets up a sub-theme of who speaks, who is silent, and who publishes truth.

After the silence you get a black screen with the scripture quote - the text for today’s message. Proverbs 28:1 “The wicked flee when no man pursueth. One of the things I presume about a Coen Brothers movie is that you may mid-rash to your heart’s content. Go as deep as you wish. The layers are there, they are intentional. So I feel perfectly safe in interpreting not just what they put up there, but what they left out - the second half of the verse - but the righteous are bold as a lion.” This movie is an exploration of who is wicked and who is righteous. It is also about the vengeance of God, the “B” side to God’s grace. God’s pure vengeance is played by 14 year old spunky gal Mattie Ross. She is on the path of her father’s murderer, and she will not be denied. It is she who sheds the light on the quick and the dead, showing their goodness or depravity. She herself is unstoppable. It is she who lays out the eternal paradox as narrator when she says that while the killer may have thought he got off scott free that there is “Nothing free in life except God’s grace.” Mattie’s theme music is the 1887 hymn “Everlasting Arms”

What have I to dread, what have I to fear,
Leaning on the everlasting arms?
I have blessed peace with my Lord so near,
Leaning on the everlasting arms.

Leaning, leaning, safe and secure from all alarms;
Leaning, leaning, leaning on the everlasting arms.

Mattie is pure of heart, unaffected by the proximity of death, knows no fear, and is bold as a lion.

The speaking truth about judgment theme continues as Mattie arrives in town just in time for a triple hanging. The three condemned men each have their say. The first tearfully blames his wickedness on others, lack of good training and drink. The second does not deny his sin but claims relative goodness, saying that he is no greater a sinner than many he sees before him. The third, an Indian, is hooded mid-sentence. He is allowed no voice. The three conditions of human kind it seems. Through poverty she ends up sleeping in the undertakers workshop in the presence of these three and says that she felt like Ezekiel in the valley of dry bone. The bones Ezekiel sees were resurrected. Prophet Mattie must produce a resurrection of her own.

The vengeance of God picks an unlikely handmaiden in Rooster Cogburn. She raises him from a drunken death. She says she picked him for his “true grit” but he is described to her as “pitiless, fear does not enter into his equation.” He is an irreverent drunk who states that he does not believe in “sermons, fairytales or tales about money.” Yet Cogburn is prone to long bouts of moral self-examination on the trail. Even he isn’t sure whether he belongs on Team Righteousness or Team wickedness. The two of them take up with a Texas Ranger who is bit of a dandy. Debauchery, Vanity and Wrath going out looking for Justice. The three of them fall into discussion of the finer points of law such as the difference between “malum prohibitum and malum in se,” things that are wrong because they are forbidden and things that are just Wrong. This is a very important point for Wrath to take up with Debauchery and Vanity. Would killing the killer be malum, or simply prohibitum?

The Bad guys are not all bad. One unlucky criminal is stabbed to death by his own partner, who is then dispatched by Cogburn. They dying man gets to be the voice of Grace. He asks Mattie to send word of his death to his brother, a Methodist circuit rider. Cogburn asks him if they should tell him that he took up thievery. “It does not matter, I will meet him later, walking in the streets of Glory.” And so the dying thief presumes paradise - it is an optimistic Gospel.

But things do not go according to plan. The trackers fail. The trail goes cold. Ambushes fall through, and eventually both Cogburn and the Ranger Le Beouf are ready to quit. Mattie tries to encourage them, shame them and beg them to no avail. When all is lost she finds the man by pure chance, or the hand of God, which ever you like. She is captured and rescued and takes a mortal wound, but not before she, herself, takes vengeance on her father’s killer. Her last word to him are “Stand up, Tom Cheney.” She calls his name to judgment and, as the Gospel says, his life was required of him that day. She makes several passes through the Valley of the Shadow of death, but shows no fear of Evil. She is eventually saved by deep sacrifice. Cogburn and LeBeouf are proven to be righteous.

Some people knock re-makes. But every good story is a re-make. Joel and Ethan Coen know this. There are only so many stories. The best of them are hard-wired into our souls. We could not stop telling them if we tried. Love trumps death. Truth will out. Sacrifice saves. Mercy and Justice are two sides of a coin. Redemption happens. Sin causes fear. Righteousness is unstoppable. Etc. etc. etc.

I believe in wrestling a blessing out every Biblical topic. True Grit rustled me a blessing out of Vengeance.

I am grateful for the excellence of our great storytellers. I heard the Coens on NPR. They state that they are non-observant and non-believing Jews. Couldn’t prove it by their work. Their name is Hebrew for Priest. Their name claims a genetic descendance from the Temple. Apparently you can take the Coen out of the temple but not the temple out of the Coen. Holiness persists unto many generations.

Now a request: Please, Ethan and Joel. I have been waiting for another famous supposed non-believer, Joss Whedon to do this, but you could do as well, maybe better. What you have done for fourteen year old girls and sixty year old drunks - this empowerment and redemption. Could you please do this for a menopausal woman? Please? If you need a story line, call me, we can talk.

.

State of the Church Report 2010

2011-01-09T17:46:00.000-08:00

The State of the Church Report

Freedom Friends Church

For the Year 2010

To Friends Everywhere:

Freedom Friends Church is heading towards a seventh year of ministry in Salem, Oregon. In some faith traditions, seven is called the age of accountability. The Apostle Peter wrote that we should always be ready to give an account of our hope. This is the hope and testimony of Freedom Friends. God is with us, God loves every one of us without measure and without judgment. God calls us to life and to growth. The present Christ teaches us and this same Spirit guides and nurtures us. We see and hear God in each other and in the world around us. We are grateful.

If we were all to gather on the same Sunday, a thing that has never happened yet, there would be 37 of us, five more than last year. We range in age from 6-83. We gained a member and lost a member this year and have 21 Friends who have taken official membership.

Our worship continues to be lively. Most Friends speak in meeting, whether worshiping through gratitude or petition, or by trying to catch a sense of what God is saying to the gathered people. Ministry often centers on a Biblical passage. First time visitors often feel comfortable enough to speak in meeting.

We are all ministers. Our people teach and work in schools, in the mental health field, and in the justice system. We facilitate good order in hospitals and care giving situations. We are students, parents, grandparents. We are artists, machinists, writers and volunteers. We understand and affirm that ministry is done in all these places.

We have remained in our rented meetinghouse on 13^th street. It suits us in many ways, though at times we long for more space or more control over our space. Our monthly giving by our regular attenders does not always meet our monthly expenses. But some who were unemployed have gone back to work, and for this we are grateful. By the grace of God and the generosity of Friends from beyond our meeting we have ended the year in the black. We took in just over $34,000 dollars last year and our expenses were just about $24,000, $16,800 of that was rent. Just when it seems like we are in financial peril, gifts arrive. Friends in the UK, Canada, Washington and California as well as Oregon have encouraged us with giving. One anonymous Friend gave the church a gift of stock that was sold for the benefit of the meeting; this brought in about $7600 and put us into the black for the year. Words cannot express our amazement at such consistent blessings.

Some of our members do sustained and public ministry. Ashley Wilcox completed service as co-clerk to the Pacific North West Quaker Women’s Theology conference that was held in June. Sarah Hoggatt completed service on the Editorial Board of the Quaker Youth Book Project, which published its work with great joy in the Spring. Ashley and Sarah each did a good deal of intervisitation this year. T. Vail Palmer continues to work on his book entitled “Friends, God, and the Bible” making good progress on what we believe will be a significant contribution to the Quaker world. Pastor Peggy Parsons published a third book, a collection of Gospel messages and then spent the summer in Africa teaching and working as a trauma healer. We do not hold these ministries to be more important than any others, but we are pleased to be able to contribute to the wider Quaker world. We have big feet, and like Quakers in general, we have a greater footprint in the world than our numbers would indicate.

We contributed to efforts beyond our own. After the earthquake in Haiti we contributed to the medical work of Partners in Health, and we contributed with money, body and voice to our local Habitat for Humanity Chapter.

We continue to have an active Web presence. Our web page (freedomfriends.org) is our virtual street sign, and has had 2,660 web page views this year. Our “members” on Facebook outnumber our actual members by several orders of magnitude. Facebook has continued to be our best way to keep tabs on each other. We experimented with a Facebook Ad in December and wonder if other Quaker meetings have tried this. Our Faith and Practice book continues to be a good seller.

The greatest sorrow of the year was the loss of Jaye Kizmet. Jaye took her own life in late February. It was unexpected, unnecessary and blow to the meeting. As we grieved we tried to affirm Jaye’s life, without affirming her choice to end her life. We believe she had much to offer the world and that the world is less colorful without her.

The greatest joy of the year was the April wedding of Alivia Biko and Peggy Parsons. The meetinghouse was packed with Friends and friends of Friends. Peggy and Alivia exchanged simple traditional Quaker vows out of the gathered silence. This joyous union necessitated a look at the leadership responsibilities in the church and with the guidance of Ministry and Oversight and the blessing of the meeting Alivia started to make plans for releasing her ministry as presiding clerk.

In the spring we received Stacey Foose of Corvallis Oregon into membership by convincement. Stacey is an enthusiastic and committed member of the meeting.

We sent five women to the PNW Quaker Women’s Theology Conference in June and it was a time of stretching and support. Such convergent events are exceedingly harmonious with our faith and practice.

While the Pastor was ministering in Central and East Africa for the summer, the meeting took up the slack in several ways. Many Friends took turns facilitating worship, opening and closing the meetinghouse and keeping the meetinghouse clean. Alivia attempted, with help, to be both pastor and clerk for two months and we can say that we do not recommend this to others, but she persevered. Friends watched out for each other.

The Quaker Youth Pilgrimage rolled through during the summer, and they spent some time with a few of our members, a good time was had by all.

In August, Ashley Wilcox moved back from Seattle to Salem. She did this as a spiritual leading with the intent to contribute to the life of the meeting. University Friends Meeting released her sojourning membership to us. We received her with joy.

Two members are finishing significant terms of Service. Sarah Hoggatt is releasing her role as recording clerk and Alivia Biko is stepping back into a semi-sabbatical after six and a half years of being presiding clerk.

We look into the future with hope. We have found our voice and stood our ground and we are ready to do what the Spirit asks us to do. Please hold us in the Light as we so hold you.

A Christmas - So There I was ...

2010-12-22T22:40:00.000-08:00

So There I was ...

In the cosmetics department in Target on December 22.

There was a disturbance in the force. I was first aware of it as a matron rushed around the corner clucking her tongue. I rounded the end of the aisle and a Hispanic mother backed into me. She didn’t notice as she was staring at a man halfway up the aisle. He was interesting. Well over six feet, bald, agitated, rocking and muttering, with some sort of a palsy thing going on with his left arm. And Tattoos, lots of them, the homemade variety. If your home was Folsom Prison. Not just arms but neck throat and head. Some recognizable symbols that bode no good towards no one. And completely fixated on the display of Cover Girl makeup.

I watched him for a minute. His cussing was definitely directed towards the product. He was clearly in the throws of a dilemma and in need of assistance.

“How the %(*^#ing $%#@ am I supposed to figure this out?”

“Sir? Do you need a little help?

“Do you work in this #^*)ing %$&()#^&*( ?”

“Not precisely, but maybe I can help anyway.”

“My daughter wants some of this eyelashes goop. But apparently it has to be exactly the same as her old goop.”

“Girls do tend to be loyal to their goop. Do you know what kind of goop she had?”

“It’s THIS #%&(ing %)#@ here!”

And he showed me a well used tube of Mascara. Pink and Green - He had the Cover Girl part right - I was impressed.

“Well, excellent, so you want one of these ones right here.”

I ain’t stupid, but if you use your eyes you will see that there are about two dozen #%&(*ing types of this pink and green goop.”

“Yes, you’re right. There are shades of goop.”

“No #&$( !”

“There are browns and blacks”

“THERE ARE SIX @%&*ing KINDS OF BLACK.”

“May I see her goop?” He handed it to me. All the outer markings had been worn off. Now I understood his problem. I opened the tube and withdrew the brush. “Very Black - the darkest one here - This one.” And I pulled one off the rack for him.

“You sure?”

“Quite”

“You actually telling me that you all can tell the difference between six kinds of black?”

“No, Of course not, But we THINK we can and that’s all that matters.”

“HA! I thought so.” He looked at the two tubes. “This is right?”

“She’ll be very impressed that you found it. You don’t have to tell her that you had help.”

“I just want her to be happy.”

“Of course you do. Is that all you need?”

“Yeah, I’m done. Thanks. You saved my life.”

“I’m just here to serve. Merry Christmas”

He sighed deeply and walked up the aisle towards the checkout lanes. Then her turned.

“It is waterproof? She said it had to be waterproof.”

“Got you covered. - Your girl a bit of a crier?”

“Oh. My. God. Don’t get me started!”

RIP #10

2010-12-09T16:28:00.000-08:00

The Wake is tonight.

It's snowing, that won't stop the fans from Lining up outside Holy Name Cathedral. And I don't care how much it snows tonight. After the mass in the morning the procession will roll past WGN and then up LSD to Clark and then to Addison. They plan to circle Wrigley with the casket. I wish I could be there. Pete you should keep J out of school for this. I wish it was April and they could have the wake at the park. But in anycase we can all turn our caps to the rally position and let Steve Goodman sing him out of here.

.

My Daniella

2010-11-26T15:15:00.000-08:00

Jesus said "I will make you fishers of men."
Daniella takes her master very seriously.

Household scenes

2010-11-26T11:24:00.000-08:00

Some random scenes from our household life.

This is our outside kitchen - we were roasting bananas in their coats.

The fabled "three-inch" hissing cockroach. They fly - slowly - making a racket. They can hover. And they like to die in my tub.

This is the charcoal delivery service. I tried to move a full bundle of charcoal once - well better than a hundred pounds. I have seen a Bicycle carry three. The bicycles of Burundi SUFFER.

Miracle Motors

2010-11-23T18:42:00.000-08:00

Note the street name!
,

Bristol City Limits

2010-11-20T12:50:00.000-08:00

The last in my series of 2010 Africa posts.

For about six weeks I was a celebrity. Being a white woman walking around downtown Buja still makes you unusual, but it is no longer a rarity. If you are a white woman driving her own car you are a bit more rarefied, because all the white women working for the NGO’s have drivers. But middle class Burundian women now drive, so you don’t get too many looks. But a white woman, riding a moto, with a beautiful Burundian girl sidekick, in matching green fluorescent vests on a shiny new red bike equipped with strobe lights, well, you are officially a spectacle. You not only get looked at and pointed at, you get cheers from the sidewalks, and you become the answer to the dinner table question,

“Well, what did you see in town today?”

But as with all celebrity, the reaction wasn’t completely unmixed. It was about 85% Hosannas and the other 15% considered us to be an abomination to God and an insult to African manhood. Especially the part of man that would never own a moto. There is always a part of the crowd that wants to see you fall. I couldn’t always tell the difference.

On one of my regular shortcuts there was a beer hall on the street and the men there always greeted me with a distinctive call. I always smiled and waved.

Kama Kawaide, it was up to Dani to educate me.

“Peggy, those men are not cheering for you.”

“Really, they seem very friendly.”

“They are very drunk. And they are ex-rebels.”

“How do you know that?”

“Because that noise they are making is their battle cry, it is what you hear coming from the bush before they come and kill you.”

“Ah, do you think they plan to kill me?”

“Probably not, they want to scare you, and make you crash the bike, then they would laugh, and maybe steal the bike, and maybe...”

Better informed, I developed my own version of a rebel yell to give back to them; they threw a few pebbles, but eyes on the road, Milagro never faltered.

The cadre of fellow moto riders, almost entirely taxi-motos, was much more supportive. They understand solidarity. On about my third day they accepted me, and I rode as one of their own until the end. They called me “Madam Moto-Mazungu.”

One day, on one of the terrifyingly complex roundabouts, at the height of morning rush hour, a moto stalled mid-stream. Death. The swarm that I was a part of surrounded our comrade and stopped en masse, raised our throttle hands, and shouted in Kirundi. Can’t kill us all (probably). Traffic stopped, and we escorted the man and moto safely to the side of the road. An Ad Hoc repair committee was formed and the rest of us rode on our way. Hakuna Matata - it’s just what we do.

By the end of the six weeks I was well known, and I recognized many of them as individuals. Be-beeps of greeting in the morning and at night. They work 12 hour shifts 6 days a week. I was more irregular, but always welcomed.

Then my time ran out. I wanted to arrange an escort to accompany Milgro back to Miracle Motors, but with little functional Kirundi, I did not know how to arrange it. So with an escort of Angels we quietly surrendered our steed. We did sing the doxology at the top of our lungs for the final three blocks. Mr. Muni Raju was out to lunch so I wrote a thank-you note and gave the key and helmets to the secretary, and walked away - Lone Ranger Style. I did leave the deepest blessing I knew how to give, on the bike and the man who would become her new master, though I knew him not. I adjusted my African explorer hat and became a foot soldier again.

I took a regular taxi home. The car taxi men are a union all their own, and also very tight. They pride themselves with a "knowledge" of the town and its goings on that would make a London cabbie blush. This man kept sneaking hard looks at me. Finally he said “Why are you in my cab, Madam? Where is your moto? You are the one? No? Madam Moto Mazungu?” I explained that I was on my way to America and that the moto would stay. “Ay, this is a sad day for the moto boys.”

The next day I was downtown with Eli and Dani. We walked past the biggest motostand in the core. I smiled and bonjoured the boys but not a one of the acknowledged me. They did not recognize me without the helmet and bike and vest. I was once again just some old white woman. Sigh. Fame is so fleeting.

I understood in a new way, “He came into His own country - to his own people - and they did not recognize Him.”