front porch

What kind of country?

2008-11-04T07:42:00.000-08:00

My son just called from the University of Missouri this morning, November 4, to inform me that he had voted for the first time in his life. He was excited to participate in our democracy. It only took me 10 minutes to vote he said. And my imagination took me to polling places all over the country where voters face long lines that could delay their voting for at least an hour or two, sometimes more. That in itself is a disgrace and a discouragement to voting, but I believe the commitment to democracy this year will outweigh all of that.

It was just last Thursday night that my son called late at night to tell me he had attended a rally out on the main quad at Mizzou for Barack Obama. He had volunteered to help with the rally.
"Guess whose hand I shook," my son asked with high energy in his voice. "Who," I asked.
"I shook Barack Obama's hand as he entered the gate I was staffing, and he shook my hand on the way out too." "Awesome", I said, as he told me that the crowd might approach 40,000.
What an experience for a young man!

This election year has been remarkable. I never would have imagined a black man being elected
in my lifetime. As a native of the South, North Carolina to be specific, I grew up with obvious barriers to black Americans all around me. I remember separate water fountains, separate eating sections, blacks expected to sit in the back of the bus, and blacks limited to balcony seating in theaters. And yet I also remember my home church holding a joint worship service with the members of the African American First Baptist Church, and how some of our own church members walked out. Incredible! I remember entering high school and sitting next to Jewell Edwards, the daughter of the pastor of that same African American church. Remarkable!

Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863, but for the next 100 years blacks in the South were denied full citizenship in our country. I saw that first hand growing up.
Lyndon Johnson signed the Voting Rights Act into law, and in the process ceded the South to those who rejected full participation by black citizens in our democracy.

What a remarkable year this has been. It has reminded us that democracy is never a finished project; it must always continue expanding. Democracy is an ongoing effort to liberate and empower all citizens, for ours is a participatory government.

On his election as President, Abraham Lincoln said to all of our nation's citizens: "We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies." Some 150 years later, that same hope and declaration holds true. We are not red state or blue state Americans, we are the United States of America. That is an audacious hope and dream!

Charting a Course for the Next Generation

2008-10-29T09:21:00.000-07:00

What kind of values and wisdom do we hope to pass on to the next generation? It's an age old question, but I'm hard pressed to say what it is that our culture and often our churches have to say in response to that question. With three young adult sons of my own who've challenged me to find some answers to what I hope the world will become with their involvement, I keep looking for answers myself.

Marian Wright Edelman's new book The Sea is so Wide and my Boat is so Small offers up another marvelous book of "Letters" to a wide audience of leaders, citizens, and groups who bear responsibility for the shaping of the next generations. Marian Wright Edelman is a national treasure for her advocacy and leadership of the Children's Defense Fund, an organization based in Washington, D.C. that speaks for the poorest of our nation's children. She's also a parent who has tried to pass on wisdom and faith to her own children through books like "The Measure of Our Success: A Letter to My Children and Yours", a book I highly recommend.

Here's the issue, as Marian Wright Edelman describes it:
"While thirteen million privileged children in the richest nation on earth are growing up in indefensible poverty without the most basic necessities of life and a fair chance to envisage a better future, millions of overprivileged children are growing up infected with the affluenza virus- the spiritual poverty of having too much that is worth too little.
Given every material thing they desire- cell phones, iPods, fancy cars, and the latest trendy fashions-while living in big houses in well-to-do neighborhoods, many lack sufficient parental and community attention, limit-setting, spiritual guidance, and moral example...These lost, out of control children are desperately crying out for attention, direction, and protection from parents and other responsible adults."

Marian Wright Edelman wrights letters the old-fashioned way. They are meant to be read and re-read and savored for the long term. They aren't digitized emails that are quickly read and moved to the deleted file. Her letters bear up to the challenges of real life and authentic moral struggle. Here are a few distilled principles for living a rich and rewarding life that Edelman wrote for her grandchildren. Edelman writes, "I wish you..."

An optimistic and determined spirit. Edelman quotes Helen Keller, who became blind and deaf shortly after her birth, and wrote, "No pessimist ever discovered the secret of the stars or sailed to an uncharted land, or opened a new doorway for the human spirit."
A courageous and just spirit willing to speak up for right and against wrong. Being courageous is not being unafraid. It is being able to do what you have to do even when you are afraid.
A forgiving spirit. "Hate is a very heavy burden to carry," is an understanding that Edelman gained from the great singer Marian Anderson during the Civil Rights struggle.
A passionate and persevering spirit. Find and pursue your passions. .. Don't let closed doors deter you. Keep knocking on them.
A can-do spirit devoted to making a positive difference in the lives of others.
A generous spirit. How difficult that can be in our society, when we are told that our value is measured by what we get and not by what we give.
A resilient spirit. Don't dwell on your failures, Edelman writes to her grandchildren. Learn from them and move on. Don't dwell on your weaknesses or on what you wish you could do but can't. Do what you can do. Build on your strengths.
A calm spirit. Try to take time to be silent and to listen to your inner self, where God lives. Be able to be alone without being lonely.

These are just a few of the nuggets of wisdom that Marian Wright Edelman seeks to pass on to future generations. I'm wondering, what do we as parents and as people of faith and as members of the larger human family plan to do in "charting a course for the next generations." What do you plan to offer? Each of us can do something.

Some Sunshine for Your Day

2008-10-10T07:28:00.000-07:00

"Fly"
from the Steve Winwood new album "Nine Lives"

On a brave new morning, smiling at the sky
Every shadow of the past whispers goodbye
There is hope, if you can see
I give it all to you, you give it all to me
Every winter has the sun within its heart
And everything we think we knew we can forget
Maybe far but not apart
I know it's getting better and it will be better yet

So fly
'Cause I know what you're feeling
When it turns out that way
And that emotion is healing
And we can fly

****************

The great Steve Winwood has returned with a magnificent new album titled "Nine Lives".
Get it and you'll find some sun-drenched hope in the midst of this awful calamity we are experiencing in our economy. "Nine Lives" says it all. Life is stronger than death.
Hope is more powerful than Fear! If we people of faith don't believe that, what do we have to offer the world ?

The Dismal Science

2008-10-09T13:25:00.000-07:00

Out on the bike trail this afternoon, I pulled up to the top of a hill overlooking a lake, where I met a man on a recumbent bike who had cycled up from the opposite side of the hill. "Nice bike," I said as we both stopped to admire the view and catch our breath. We struck up a conversation about the advantages of different styles of bikes, one thing led to another, and we exchanged first names and a little personal information.

What do you do? he asked. Well, I'm a Presbyterian pastor, I responded. Interesting my new friend remarked. "Are you finding more people coming back to church during this awful economic crisis?" he asked. Not in large numbers, I responded.

It was an interesting conversation up there on top of the dam, as we looked out over the lake.
How often do people speak about faith and the economy in the same breath? In my experience, not very often. Yet Jesus spoke about the stewardship of wealth in his parables and teaching frequently. In fact, "wealth and its stewardship" was one of Jesus' favorite topics. Someone once said that it's safer in our society to talk about sex, than it is to discuss one's personal finances. I don't know about that, but it looks like we are headed toward a social and economic crisis that may press us all to open up about personal stewardship and the fate of our collective economic condition.

One suggestion. Over at Sojourner's Magazine, in its online version sojo.net, editor Jim Wallis has addressed the economy and faith on his personal blog "God's Politics" today. Wallis intends to open up an ongoing conversation on faith and the economy. It should be thought provoking.

My new friend asked, "Are people coming back to church to help deal with their fear and anxiety over the economy?" It's really too soon to tell, I think. But I wonder about this. What would people find if they did return to church. Would they find pastors and congregations willing to address this topic of our shared economic crisis in open forums and in sermons? Can you envision churches planning a learning series about the justice of our economy? I think that would be intriguing. Imagine planning a series with some local professors from nearby colleges.
And how about an ecumenical cluster of churches together sponsoring a forum in which local congressional leaders would be invited to address this topic. Finding a trained theologian/ethicist to speak about the topic from a faith perspective could add depth and breadth to an ongoing conversation.

"The dismal science"; that's what we have called economics. I wonder if we can afford not to learn more about the key elements of the ways in which nations and communities create, distribute, and conserve all the facets of wealth production and consumption. It is a justice issue. It is a crucial issue for human betterment that can no longer be ignored and left in the hands of Wall St. "masters of the universe."

For spiritual and theological reflection on our current crisis, consider the comments of
St. Augustine of Hippo (AD 354-430 from the City of God (Book I, Chapter 20).
Here Augustine speaks about the crisis of the great city of Rome, in a parallel to our own times of anxiety. This is what Augustine wrote:

They lost all they had [in the sack of Rome]. Their faith?
Their godliness? The possessions of the hidden man of the heart,
which in the sight of God are of great price? Did they lose
these? For these are the wealth of Christians, to whom the wealthy
apostle said, "Godliness with contentment is great gain. For we
brought nothing into this world, find it is certain we can carry
nothing out. And having food and raiment, let us be therewith
content. But they that will be rich fall into temptation and a
snare, and into many foolish and hurtful lusts, which drown men in
destruction and perdition. For the love of money is the root of all
evil; which, while some coveted after, they have erred from the
faith, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows."

Perhaps this could be a start in inviting people of faith to engage in conversation about our current spiritual and economic challenges.

Three Cups of Tea.. a journey toward peace and spiritual encounter

2008-10-07T07:30:00.000-07:00

If you've seen the Brad Pitt movie Seven Years in Tibet you will recall the story of one man's spiritual odyssey in the high himalayan mountains, in the land of the Dalai Lama and in the culture of Tibetan Buddhism. It's a stirring adventure story among a peace loving people who will face the militant challenge of China in our own day. Everyone loves a Buddhist goes the saying. Who loves the Muslim?

That's really the story of the book Three Cups of Tea, which begins in 1993 when high up in the Himalayan mountains American mountain climber Greg Mortenson stumbles lost and near death into a remote village after a failed attempt to climb K2, the world's most dangerous peak. The people of a desperately poor village in Pakistan's Karakoram Himalaya took in Greg Mortenson and nursed him back to health over the course of 6 weeks. These were simple Muslims in a land that is now considered among the most violent and dangerous places in the world for Americans to venture. It's the epicenter in some views of world-wide terrorism and the cultivation of militant Islam. But Mortenson was extended a life-saving hospitality that would transform his life and send him on a grand adventure more challenging and worthwhile than any climb he had made into the Himalayan mountains. Hospitality can be just that life changing!

As Mortenson came to appreciate the villagers of Korphe who rescued him, he came to an understanding of them as a people who had hopes and dreams for their children like people all over the world. They hungered for a better life for their sons and daughters, after seeing that the government of Pakistan failed repeatedly in its promises to build schools. No books, no supplies, no school building, no teachers. Mortenson surveyed the situation and made a rash promise. He would return from America and build a school for the children of Korphe. One school only! From that small step a movement developed that led to the foundation of an organization known as the Central Asia Institute (CAI), with Mortenson as its executive. But from that day in 1993 to today's unfolding mission by CAI there's an adventure story worth telling that rivals and exceed Pitt's Tibetan movie.

Along the way, Greg Mortenson came to love the people of Pakistan and Afghanistan and the children of those countries. The subtitle of the book Three Cups of Tea spells out the mission of CAI: "One Man's Mission to Fight Terrorism and Build Nations...One School at a Time".

Along this voyage of discovery, Mortenson found surprising and often unlikely allies and supporters both in the United States and in Pakistan and Afghanistan. His central learning was this: "If you really want to change a culture, to empower women, improve basic hygiene and health care, and fight high rates of infant mortality, the answer is to educate girls."
Mortenson has pursued his vision and the growing strategy of CAI in a land that most Amerians fear. It isn't the land of gentle Buddhism. It's the land of Islam, which many Americans unfairly caricature as largely centered on violence.

Mortenson doesn't downplay the intent of terrorist organizations, but he offers us this perspective. "'I've learned," observes Mortenson, "that terror doesn't happen because some group of people somewhere like Pakistan or Afghanistan simply decide to hate us. It happens because children aren't being offered a bright enough future that they have a reason to choose life over death." That's a difficult principle for many Americans to embrace during this long struggle with terrorism, when most of our responses as a nation have been fear based. Mortenson's mission is clear and I find compelling, when he argues that the war on terrorism will be won with books, not bombs. The real enemy is ignorance.

My favorite passage in Three Cups of Tea occurs after Mortenson has returned to the village of Korphe, after an amazing and most unlikely success in raising the funds to build a school. That is a remarkable achievement in itself. But when Mortenson returns to head up the building effort you learn his spiritual journey has just begun. In his obsessive goal to build the school, Mortenson drives the village members so hard, that he loses sight of the larger need they have to celebrate this achievement in a land where life unfolds slowly and at a different pace than he is accustomed to. After all, these people measure time in years and centuries, not just in hours and minutes.

Haji Ali, the villager chief and elder, who has played such a significant role in Mortenson's life from the day he stumbled into Korphe, takes this American aside after the frustration of the villagers has grown unbearable. "If you want to thrive in Baltistan (their region)," says Haji Ali to Mortenso, "you must respect our ways."

"The first time you share tea with a Balti; you are a stranger. The second time you take tea, you are an honored guest. The third time you share a cup of tea, you become family, and for our family, we are prepared to do anything, even die," Haji Ali says to his young American friend.

"Dr. Greg, you must take time to share three cups of tea. We may be uneducated. But we are not stupid. We have lived and survived here for a long time," said Haji Ali

What does it mean for Religious Leaders to Coooperate?

2008-09-17T08:34:00.000-07:00

Blog Comment: Today an important announcement and press release points to a vital interfaith partnership to address the enormous crisis affecting the states and people of the Gulf Coast following the recent hurricane disasters. I point this out because one of the signatories to this call for a partnership between government and faith groups is Rev. Richard Cizik. Rev. Cizik is Vice President for Government Affairs for the National Association of Evangelicals. He will be speaking this Thursday, September 18 at Countryside Community Church (UCC) about "Evangelicals and the Interfaith Movement". I'll be attending that lecture and I hope to ask Cizik about this advocacy effort by a broad coalition of religious groups calling for a moral response to the Gulf Coast Crisis. Having traveled to the Gulf Coast three times in the last couple of years on mission trips and to attend a national church mission conference there, I've developed a passion for the suffering of our brothers and sisters in this region of our nation. This is a crisis of government and of the faith communities in our nation. I'll post after Thursday night's lecture.... See the press release below...
**********************************************************************************

Leading religious officials today (September 16) signed an interfaith statement calling for not just a charitable response but for justice through long-term human rights-based recovery policy to help Gulf Coast families.

The statement urges national leaders to make enacting bi-partisan resident-led federal solutions, including the Gulf Coast Civic Works Act, helping families return and participate in rebuilding their communities, creating living wage jobs, restoring the coastal wetland and ensuring human rights along the Gulf Coast a national moral priority.

The Gulf Coast Civic Works Campaign is a nonpartisan partnership of community, faith, environmental, student, and human rights organizations in Alabama, Louisiana, and Mississippi and their national allies advocating for federal legislation based on HR 4048, the Gulf Coast Civic Works Act and urging national leaders to make creating jobs, rebuilding infrastructure and affordable housing, and restoring natural flood protection along the Gulf Coast a national priority.

The 108 signers include Richard Cizik of National Association of Evangelicals; Richard Stearns, president of World Vision; Rabbi Steve Gutow, Jewish Council for Public Affairs; Michael Kinnamon, National Council of Churches; Ingrid Matterson, Islamic Society of North America; Larry Snyder, Catholic Charities USA; David Beckmann, Bread for the World; and Jim Wallis, Sojourners.

Interested persons can support this effort by contacting their member of Congress at: http://www.colorofchange.org/gulfcoast/message.html

The text of their statement:

Gulf Coast Civic Works Campaign Interfaith Statement

Supporting Human Rights in Gulf Coast Recovery Is a Moral Priority

As Hurricanes Ike and Gustav hit the Gulf Coast, internally displacing over one million people, we as a nation were reawakened to the needs of the Gulf Coast. Three years after Hurricanes Katrina and Rita struck and the levees breached, the slow pace of recovery and the new needs caused by Ike and Gustav's destruction have created a moral crisis along the Gulf Coast that demands a powerful response from people of faith.

While the nation has learned to better prepare for this latest hurricane, whether by inaction or injustice, we have still failed to protect the wellbeing of Gulf Coast survivors, new residents and their families, especially the children, the poor, the sick, and the vulnerable through just long term rebuilding policies which fully support human rights. The collapse of local institutions, homelessness, internal displacement, poverty, abusive labor practices and environmental degradation mean they continue to suffer and struggle unduly. A spiritual wound remains open across the region, one felt in God's creation and every community across this country.

Our God is a God of justice, of humanity and of healing, and this moral injustice calls each of us to bold action in support of the common good. We must act to justly rebuild communities, restore the Gulf Coast, and empower families to overcome the devastation they suffered in our nation's worst natural disasters.

Part 2: 21st Century Church-the Vital Mainline Church

2008-09-16T08:32:00.000-07:00

"Thawing God's frozen chosen, one at a time!"

(poster in the youth room of a Presbyterian church, seen on a mission
trip to New Orleans post-Katrina)

In my last post, I wrote about a 10 week adventure of worship and learning about the 10 spiritual practices that Dorothy Butler Bass reports about in her important book "Christianity for the Rest of Us." I heard Bass in a lecture series not long ago, as she spoke about the 3 year Lilly Endowment research project that allowed her to study in depth some 50 mainline churches all across America. By way of introduction, Bass commented to us that "When I told people of my quest to study the practices of vital mainline churches across America they would often respond." "Vital mainline churches? Must have been a short journey!" People sometimes commented to Bass about the mainline: "Aren't they the frozen chosen?" And then another remark often made by people in her audiences: "Only conservative churches can grow." Bass then shared with us that some critics consider the old mainline denominations "culturally irrelevant and hopelessly confused."

How would you respond to the above comments?

There's something bubbling under the surface of many mainline churches that is now beginning to receive attention from students of church transformation and renewal like Bass. In Bass' study of 50 mainline congregations all across America, some new and exciting things are happening, and people are growing deeper in their faith and are experiencing a new sense of identity as people of faith.

For many people in churches, there seem to be only two current options that are receiving attention: You either try to join the Purpose Driven Movement of churches or you attempt to become a better Program Driven Church. Those are not the only options according to Diana Butler Bass.

How would you introduce change? a group of church leaders asked me recently.

Bass does not argue that mainline churches should change. Rather, she maintains that mainline churches are changing and have already changed. Many are moving beyond the Purpose Driven and Program Model Churches to embrace something different. Here's how Bass describes the change already taking place:

"... a new kind of mainline congregation--the practicing congregation--- has been born because of these changes. Practicing congregations weave together Christian practices---activities drawn from the long Christian tradition---into a pattern of being church that forms a intentional way of life in community."

Bass argues that these vital mainline churches are taking ancient and fundamental practice of faith "Out of the Historical Deep Freeze" and putting them back into the shared life of congregations. This movement of the Spirit goes far beyond the limited way many church folk describe their congregations, when they limit their comments to "We're a friendly church."

If discipleship means following the "Way of Christ" surely there's more to be said than calling ourselves a friendly, nice group of people. As Dorothy Butler Bass observes, "Jesus asks everyone to change. It is the heart of his message." Our is a not a faith frozen in some historical deep freeze, it is a living, breathing relationship with a God who claims us for purposes grander than we can imagine. We can no longer assume that people, even in our churches, understand what it means to live a vital faith. That's why we are called to teach and model the practices of faith that are a part of the ancient tradition of faith, come alive in a new day!

21st Century Church: the Vital Mainline Church

2008-09-10T11:56:00.000-07:00

Key questions:

Why are some mainline churches succeeding?
How are those churches finding new life in a time of religious change?
What can those of us seeking a meaningful Christianity learn from them?
What does their vitality mean for the rest of us?

Over the course of 10 weeks this past summer, we explored those questions at our church using Diana Butler Bass' paradigm challenging book "Christianity for the Rest of Us."
Bass's achievement is to debunk the myth that only conservative, evangelical, or mega-churches are growing!

Early on in her book, Bass comments that "the religious right seems to have hijacked American Christianity by creating a kind of 'one-party' Christianity for this country." Give that some thought and ask yourself this question: When people hear the word Christianity, what image comes to mind first in the public media?

So, this summer I designed with our church's worship planning committee a 10 week adventure in "Back to the Future" Christian spirituality and worship. This was our approach. I would plan a 10 week sermon series on 10 vital faith practices that Diana Butler Bass describes in growing and vital mainline churches all across America. Each week on Wednesday evenings, I would also lead small group book discussions of Bass' book as preparation for the coming Sunday.

Over the course of these 10 weeks, a creative team assisted me in designing some visual settings to illustrate each of the spiritual practices portrayed by Bass. That was especially fun to do.
Week by week, a new visual setting was added to the sanctuary to match the faith practice that I would preach about. As the weeks unfolded, the worship space began to come alive with these creative elements. "What will they do next?" was a comment I often heard. Take just one example. For hospitality, we placed a table in the chancel area across from the pulpit, covered by a cloth and on the table a beautiful pitcher with two earthen cups. Imagine weary travelers who are thirsty for a cup of cold water, and the image of Christian hospitality was vividly conveyed.

An added dimension proved especially exciting. With each of the 10 practices of faith, we would also offer opportunities for our small group and for the worshipping congregation to engage the practice, and not just read or talk about it. This was the "praxis" or practice side of our learning.
What a grand adventure we had!

Here are the 10 practices that Bass writes about and describes in churches she has involved in her Lilly Endowment Research Project about Vital Mainline Churches:

Hospitality
Discernment- discovering the will and intention of God for our personal and shared life in community
Healing
Contemplation- It's a rare word for Protestants, but one growing in appeal as congregations are re-learning the ancient spiritual practice of being invited into the presence of God through guided meditation, silence, and use of bible reading known as "lectio divina"
Testimony- learning to speak about our personal faith in confident and engaging ways
Diversity- welcoming people of varied racial/ethnic/socio-economic backgrounds into our faith communities. During the course of our 10 week experiment we helped launch a Sudanese fellowship in the church and invited our Sudanese brothers and sisters to sing with us and for us in joint worship. Awesome!
Justice- reflecting on God's compassion and passion for the poor and mistreated among us and asking us to consider what our call might be as justice lovers
Worship- How can our worship reflect God's invitation to worship with joy and creativity and with a call to transformed lives?
Reflection- learning how to use our minds in growing spiritually so that we become more "thoughtful Christians
Beauty- Finding ways to appreciate beauty as a gift from God in all aspects of our faith and living

I'll follow up this post with a couple of more entries on how all of this progressed over the course of 10 weeks. One key learning along the way. We began to ask how each spiritual practice was related to the others. An example: When you think about hospitality, which is more than mere friendliness, how does that impact our view of becoming a more diverse congregation, because Diversity is one of the spiritual practices. That's just the first example of how we began to gain energy and insight into how the varied spiritual practices were inter-connected not just in our understanding and reading, but also in our practice.

Food for thought

2008-09-08T08:59:00.000-07:00

~Presbyterian Pilgrimage Banner~

GOD DOES NOT WORK-- ALONE!

WHY SHOULD YOU?

Prayer for the Day

2008-09-07T08:30:00.000-07:00

"My Lord God, I have no idea where I am going.
I do not see the road ahead of me.
I cannot know for certain where it will end.
Nor do I really know myself, and the fact that I think I am following
Your will does not mean that I am actually doing so.
But I believe that the desire to please You does in fact please You.
And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing.
I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire.
And I know that if I do this You will lead me by the right road,
thought I may know nothing about it.
Therefore I will trust You always though I may seem to be lost
and in the shadow of death.
I will not fear, for You are ever with me,
and You will never leave me to face my perils alone."

~Thomas Merton "Contemplative Listening"~

"The Great Awakening" by Jim Wallis of Sojourner's Magazine

2008-09-06T10:22:00.000-07:00

In the last big election cycle of 2006, I heard Jim Wallis, editor of Sojourner's Magazine and at the time the recent author of "God's Politics", speak at a lecture hosted by a large area church in Omaha. The sanctuary was filled to overflowing and my son who was a junior in high school was with me. It was a dynamic presentation by Wallis that night. "What did you think?" I asked my son that night. " Awesome" he said. Afterward, we met Wallis in a book signing and I'll never forget how Jim Wallis engaged my son in conversation while a long line of adults were waiting to get their own books signed. "What do you want to do when you go to college?" he asked my high school son. And Wallis listened with genuine interest. He did that because he knows the emerging generation of new Christians matters deeply to the future of the church. My son was impressed also.

Now, Wallis has followed up with another vital book titled "The Great Awakening" with the subtitle: "Reviving Faith and Politics in a Post-Religious Right America".
This is an important book for Christians, for churches and their leaders, for the national conversation on how faith and politics intersect in our personal and corporate lives.

Early in his new book "The Great Awakening", Jim Wallis tells the story of his own high school experience in struggling to relate faith to politics and issues of social justice while growing up in Detroit, MI. At the time, Wallis was struggling with the troubling issue of racial segregation and related conflicts in Detroit, while trying to see how all of that related to his faith as a young Christian.

While at church one Sunday, a church leader sensed Wallis' agitation and impatience with the church's avoidance of coming to grips with racism and segration. Wallis recalls the advice he received. "You have to understand, Jim, that racism has nothing to do with Christianity. That's political, and our faith is personal." Not long after, Wallis left the life of the church, refusing to be part of such a faith, only to return some years later with the deeply held belief that "while faith is deeply personal, it is never private." Christian faith calls us to love the world and to become engaged in redeeming public life, for the sake of the "reconciling love of Jesus Christ."

I heartily recommend Jim Wallis' new book for church discussion books in preparation for the coming political season, where this discussion of what constitutes substantive moral/ethical/political commitments and values will play out with enormous consequences for our nation.

A few words about the substance of the book and its title. The phrase "Great Awakening" refers to periods in our national history when faith tangibly changed things for the better, not just in personal faith, but also in matters of national justice. Students of American religious history are familiar with the first two great awakenings, the first from the 1730s and 1740s, which many argued helped to spark American Independence. The Second Great Awakening occurred between 1800 and the 1830s and called for the abolition of slavery.

Faith changes things! But how? In the course of his new book, Wallis identifies "7 rules for engagement", what he argues are spiritual and theological guidelines for relating faith and politics. The first rule is that "God hates injustice" as revealed in the lives of the Old Testament prophets. Jesus continues that prophetic critique argues Wallis. Another guideline, Wallis maintains, is that the church is "an alternative community" that witnesses to the compassionate and just relationships that God calls us to practice.

Along with those "7 rules for engagement", Wallis identifies "7 commitments" for the intersection of "faith and politics". It is here, that Wallis challenges the narrow agenda of the Christian Right, that restricted morality to only two concerns: abortion and gay marriage. Wallis enlarges the agenda of Christian moral concern and justice to include matters of "poverty and economic fairness", environmental concerns such as global warming, issues of race and immigration and diversity in our rapidly changing nation, a broader view of the issue of pro-choice/anti-choice debates about abortion and life, and the inescapable issues of war, peace, terrorism and the war in Iraq.

Church leaders might be tempted to say: "All of that is too controversial!" I believe we ignore these pressing issues at our peril. If the church cannot serve as a community of moral discourse, what does our faith have to offer a conflicted world?

Wallis ends his book with stories about how young people are responding to his presentations and to his work all across America. Younger generations are hungry for a faith that engages matters of substance. Wallis captures that feeling well, in his comment that "the big struggle of our times, is the fundamental choice between cynicism and hope...The choice between cynicism and hope is ultimately a spiritual choice, but one that has enormous political consequences."

As Jim Wallis travels across our country, he has come to believe that the two great hungers of our time are a hunger for spirituality and a hunger for justice, the belief that God is on the side of what is right for all people. And in Wallis' faith, these two hungers are deeply connected.

For all of us who share these two hungers, Wallis further offers a word of encouragement to our spirituality when it seems at times that injustice will carry the day:

"Majorities normally don't change things; creative minorities do, and the majority just goes along for the ride."

An old proverb: "You're so heavenly minded, you're no earthly good"

2008-09-06T09:33:00.000-07:00

~A meditation for the day~

"What is wanted now is not simply the Christian who takes an inner complacency in the words and example of Christ, but who seeks to follow Christ perfectly, not only in his own personal life, not only in prayer and penance, but also in his political commitments and in all social responsibilities."

We have certainly no need for a pseudo-contemplative spirituality that claims to ignore the world and its problems entirely, and devotes itself supposedly to the things of God, without concern for human society. All true Christian spirituality, even that of the Christian contemplative, is and must always be deeply concerned with man, since "God became man in order that man might become God." (St. Irenaeus). The Christian spirit is one of compassion, of responsibility and of commitment. It cannot be indifferent to suffering, to injustice, error, and untruth."
~Thomas Merton "Choosing to Love the World"~

"American Savior"

2008-09-06T07:05:00.000-07:00

(Check out the description of the new novel below that speaks to our times. I can't wait to get a copy. The publisher calls it a novel of "Divine Politics". But don't be put off; it isn't one of those far right novels meant to scare the pants off of you. It blends high comedy with serious reflection on the state of our politics. Come to think about it, that's about right, because our politics does in reality blend high and low comedy with very serious drama about the future of our nation.)

In a country divided by partisan politics, into a world torn by hatred and war, at a time when it seems that everyone and no one has a solution to the problems that plague humankind, there suddenly appears someone who can rise above the madness, someone with knowledge and power, someone with a finely tuned sense of the ridiculous—someone, in short, who can make it right.

And thus we finally have an answer to the long-simmering question, "What would Jesus do?"

Roland Merullo's novel American Savior posits an inspired "what if" scenario: What if Jesus, alarmed at how the earth's most powerful nation has lost its spiritual footing and dismayed at how His own teachings have been distorted—used by politicians and religious zealots to turn love into hatred and faith into call to arms—returns and announces that he is running for President of the United States? What if He becomes a third-party candidate, is heralded as the Son of God, and not only threatens to disrupt the status quo but poses a serious threat to the already established Democratic and Republican candidates? What would happen? How would the media react? And, more important, how would we react?

What word do I speak?

2008-09-03T08:54:00.000-07:00

~A meditation for this day~

"What am I? I am myself a word spoken by God. Can God speak a word that does not have any meaning?

Yet am I sure that the meaning of my life is the meaning God intends for it?
Does God impose a meaning on my life from the "outside", through event, custom, routine, law, system, impact with others in society? Or am I called to create from "within", with Him, with His grace, a meaning which reflects His truth and makes me His "word" spoken freely in my personal situation?

My true identity lies hidden in God's call to my freedom and my response to Him. This means I must use my freedom in order to love, with full responsibility and authenticity, not merely receiving a form imposed on me by external forces, or forming my own life according to an approved social pattern, but directing my love to the personal reality of my neighbor, and embracing God's will in its naked, often impenetrable mystery (Romans 11: 33-36). I cannot discover my "meaning" if I try to evade the dread which comes from first experiencing my meaninglessness."

Thomas Merton "Choosing to Love the World"

"The Wisdom of Donkeys: Finding Tranquility in a Chaotic Age"

2008-09-01T12:43:00.000-07:00

Here's a meditation for Labor Day from the new book by Andy Merrifield, titled "The Wisdom of Donkeys."

Merrifield mentions the observation by Milan Kundera, who says in his novel Slowness that speed, the demon of speed, is often associated with forgetting, with avoidance, and slowness with memory, with confronting.

We move slowly when we want to listen to ourselves, to others, and to the world around us. We move more slowly when we want to confront ourselves.

If only we could slow down!

The rush of contemporary life overwhelms our ability to observe, to hear, to step back and wonder, and to meditate."

Merrifield took this wisdom to heart and stepped away from a frantic, overwhelming life that seemed successful by every measure. He journeyed to France and there borrowed a friend's donkey by the name of Gribouille to walk at a slower pace and to reflect on the deeper dimensions of life and fulfillment. At a slower pace, some things become clearer.

Happy Labor Day! Take a rest!

Church for the 21st Century

2008-08-30T12:07:00.000-07:00

Early in his new book, "The American Church in Crisis", author and consultant David T. Olson quotes from the poem "The Rock," by T.S. Eliot, who wrote incisively about the church's challenges and potential:

And the Church must be forever building,
And always decaying,
And always being restored.

Consider those three phrases to capture the ebb and flow of the life of Christ's church, writes Olson as he examines T.S. Eliot's poem.

"Always decaying" indicates that every organic entity diminishes and decays over time. Call it the law of entropy. Things wind down. Then, Olson reminds us that, in the biological world, decay is often necessary for new growth to appear.
"Forever building" depicts the pattern of creative initiatives that promote life and vitality. Building may be unplanned or strategic, and that choice will usually determine the level of its influence and its longevity.
"Always being restored" describes a spiritual and miraculous act of God's grace in the life of faith. Restoration takes place when God acts through the power of the gospel story and the movement of the Spirit, breathing new life into the church. The combined process of building and restoration unite human and divine efforts to fashion the household of God, argues Olson. "For we are God's co-workers; you are God's field, God's building." (I Cor. 3: 9)

Despite Gallup polling that reports that more than 40% of Americans say they attended church in the last week, Olson argues that "In reality the church in America is not booming." It is in crisis. On any given Sunday, the vast majority of Amerians are absent from church."

As many now observe, the fastest growing group in America is "spiritual, but not religious."

Delving deeper into actual church attendance patterns, and citing Gallup's own reservations about the accuracy of self-reported church attendance, David Olson offers some different perspectives. A simple definition by the American Church Research Project defines a "regular participant" in church life as someone who attends church at least 3 out of every 8 Sundays- or more than once a month. By using statistical modeling to calculate frequency of attendance, the results show that 23% of Americans are "regular participants."

The converse truth is that 77% of Americans do not meet the above definition.

The question is then raised: Is an authentic connection to the life of a church an integral part of Christianity?"

By way of response, Henri Nouwen is quoted:

"Listen to the Church. I know that isn't a popular bit of advice at a time and in a country where the Church is frequently seen more as an 'obstacle' in the way rather than as the 'way' to Jesus.
Nevertheless, I'm profoundly convinced that the greatest spiritual danger for our times is the separation of Jesus from the Church. The Church is the body of the Lord. Without Jesus, there can be no Church; and without the Church, we cannot stay united with Jesus. I"ve yet to meet anyone who has come closer to Jesus by forsaking the Church. To listen to the Church is to listen to the Lord of the Church."

I recommend David Olson's book for its challenge to church leaders and members alike who love their church, but also remain unwilling to examine the cultural and spiritual changes and challenges to the healthy life of congregations. Too often, we refuse to ask: "What will the church in the 21st century look like and demand of us to live out an authentic and missional faith and discipleship?"

Here, Olson points the way: The Church Needs to Discover Which Century It is Living In. Too many of our churches act as if they are still operating in the 1950s; others act as if they are still living in the 1980s or 1990s.

The American church, argues Olson, must engage with these 3 critical transitions:

Our world used to be Christian, but it is now becoming post-Christian. How does this call us to a more faithful practice of discipleship?
Our world used to be modern, but it is now becoming postmodern. People are not asking so much if our faith is true, but is it relevant and can it actually be practiced.
Our world used to be mono-ethnic, but it is now becoming multiethnic. How will this new reality shape the homogeneous worshipping communities most of us grew up in?

These are huge transitions and the church can respond with anxiety, paralysis and fear, or embrace with confidence that the gospel and our faith is ultimately "translateable' into any new culture and time.

Choosing to Love the World

2008-08-27T14:58:00.001-07:00

Catholic monk and mystic Thomas Merton continues to offer remarkable guidance for the times in which we live. I've long admired Merton and have sampled his writings at different times in my life. A wonderful new compilation of selections from Merton's key writings is titled "Choosing to Love the World". What a fit and striking reminder of the essence of spirituality in so many ways, in a day and time in which we are more tempted to fear the world, than love it.
"For God so loved the world..." the Gospel of John reminds us.

Here's a passage from Merton's writings in this wonderful book...

"He who attempts to act and do things for others or for the world without deepening his own self-understanding, freedom, integrity and capacity to love, will not have anything to give others. He will communicate to them nothing but the contagion of his own obsessions, his aggressiveness, his ego-centered ambitions, his delusions about ends and means, his doctrinaire prejudices and ideas.

There is nothing more tragic in the modern world than the misuse of power and action to which we are driven by our own Faustian misunderstandings and misapprehensions. We have more power at our disposal today than we have ever had, and yet we are more alienated and estranged from the inner ground of meaning and of love than we have ever been. The result of this is evident. We are living through the greatest crisis in the history of man; and this crisis is centered precisely in the country that has made a fetish out of action and has lost (or perhaps never had) the sense of contemplation. Far from being irrelevant, prayer, meditation and contemplation are of utmost importance in American today."

Food for thought

2008-08-25T07:31:00.000-07:00

"Life is about passion; the intense and undeniable emotion that fills the body with overwhelming energy and strength. It allows good people to become great people, their passion so contagious that their words and deeds inspire others to follow and rise to do great things." by Windland Smith Rice

(In a recent visit to the Natural History Museum in Washington, D.C. I saw this quote in a National Geographic Photography exhibit. Some of the most striking photographs of nature and wildlife I've ever seen were exhibited there. Life is about the creative process and all around us God has provided the canvass and the materials to get in touch with a passion for living.)

Martin Luther King, Jr. did not say, "I have a very good plan." Instead he cried out, 'I have a dream."

As I seek to provide leadership with churches and their leaders, I often find people hungering for a fool proof plan that will take them from step 1 all the way through step 7 in renewing and growing their faith communities. But churches are birthed out of a dream. Jesus had a dream of the Kingdom of God, and he called to disciples to pursue that dream. People are energized by dreams, not so much by plans. What passionate dream do we Christians have to share with people around us?

"Life is a process of becoming, a combination of states we have to go through. Where people fail is that they wish to elect a state and remain in it. This is a kind of death." Anais Nin (Cuban-French author)

Quite often church leaders ask about change. You often sense a great ambivalence about the subject. Can't things remain the same? That's a common wish. Deep down we all know that's impossible. It wouldn't even be satisfying in the long run. Remaining the same spells an end to hope and our growth as individuals and as communities. The Spirit of Christ is the "giver and renewer of life" according to one statement of faith that Presbyterians often profess. I like what one politician once said, "The status quo is Latin for the mess we're in..." When you think about it, faith is always about change, and presents us with the courage to deal with the mess we're in.
Or as the Apostle Paul writes in Romans 12, "be transformed by the renewing of your minds."

Converting the church for the 21st century: Mapping the Way

2008-08-22T11:16:00.000-07:00

Below you will find a Select Bibliography for “Out of the Box” Discipleship and Ministry
that I recommend as a starting place for re-envisioning the church for the 21st century.

The North American church is suffering from severe mission amnesia.

It has forgotten why it exists.” Reggie McNeal

The Present Future: Six Tough Questions for the Church Reggie McNeal

McNeal addresses the collapse of the church culture. As he notes, “In North America the invitation to become a Christian has become largely an invitation to convert to the church..” In a day of anti-institutionalism, people run from this. As McNeal observes,

“people outside the church think church is for church people not for them.” How do we Deconvert from churchianity to Christianity? is only one of six tough questions raised in this book. McNeal’s aim is to help us think, pray, live and witness outside this church bubble we’ve created, that’s separate from the world where we live.

>Emerging Hope : “A Strategy for Reaching Postmodern Generations Jimmy Long

Long is the editor of the “Emerging Culture Curriculum” (IVP) and a veteran of 25 years of campus ministry. This is an excellent resource for understanding and responding to the changing cultural context of ministry, with GenX and Millenials. Long is a bit hard on blaming Boomer parents for the struggles of younger adults! Very helpful in discussing how younger generations view the church, their differences from previous generations, and implications for ministry. Summarizes material helpfully.

>ChurchNext: Quantum Changes in How We Do Ministry Eddie Gibbs

Another outstanding and hard-hitting survey of how the church needs to reposition itself vis-à-vis the culture we are seeking to address. Are we even seeking to address the culture?

Gibbs challenges us to move from living in the past to engaging the present.

Great discussion questions at the end of each chapter for your leadership team.

Nice quote: Gibbs describes much boomer religion as “religion-as-accessory, resulting in Gen X children taking the next step to religion as unnecessary.”

>The Essence of the Church Craig Van Gelder

Van Gelder is a leader in the Gospel and Culture Network. If you think there’s a simple method or technique to renew the church, you need to read this very stimulating book. The shelf-life of methods is shorter and shorter: from Seeker Sensitive to 7 Day A Week to User Friendly to Purpose Driven, to you name it. Dig deeper with Van Gelder

>Missional Church Darrell Guder ed.; The Gospel in a Pluralist Society by Lesslie Newbigin Substantive and challenging examinations that are foundational! Transforming Mission David Bosch is the most comprehensive missional theology of all! It is biblical, cultural in its analysis of obstacles to mission, deeply ecumenical, and practical in its strategic directions. Bosch reminds us that we in the church sometimes think crisis is abnormal for the life of faith. We would be far better off, argues Bosch, to realize that crisis has always been the church's context for ministry.

>The Emerging Church and Emerging Worship by Dan Kimball

Kimball is known as one of the leaders in the movement known as the Emerging Church. He’s in his early forties. In the first book listed, you’ll get a marvelous overview of what is happening in this movement of young leaders, with very helpful summaries of what this whole “postmodern” thing is about. Kimball’s book on worship shows how the seeker-sensitive movement addressed many baby boomers, but fails to connect with many of the rest of us, including younger generations drawn to an Ancient/Modern faith.

>Ancient-Future Worship and Ancient-Future Faith by Robert Webber

Webber is describing worship that has depth, is participatory, and is passionate. Webber is a well-known worship scholar and leader with a maturity in understanding the emerging church movement and challenges. Not to be missed. Sadly, Webber died about a year ago. But his legacy remains.

>A New Kind of Christian and More Ready Than You Realize by Brian McLaren. Mclaren until a year or so ago was pastor of Cedar Ridge Community Church in suburban Maryland near D.C. He is a well-respected pastor, author, conference speaker and mentor to many in the Emerging Church movement. He is very imaginative! The first book comes in the form of a story dialogue between a near burned out pastor and a high school science teacher.

If you, like many of us, suspect that something radically different is happening in culture and church, this book is essential reading. Check out the discussion guide. The second book listed is one of the best books on faith-sharing with younger generations, or any other for that matter. This book takes the form of an extended conversation between McLaren and a young woman, a musician, via the use of e-mail. What if we thought of evangelism as a passionate conversation about things that matter? Things like beauty, purpose, love, life, faith, values, hurt and hope. Get this book!!!!!!!!!

<Why Christian? Douglas John Hall

Highly esteemed theologian here shows what it’s like to do imaginative theology and faith-sharing in the form of an ongoing series of tough conversations and patient listening between a college student and a professor (Hall is the professor). You’ll be drawn into this one!

>Life on the Vine Philip D. Kenneson IVP

What’s the point of church and the Christian life? If we aren’t being transformed, why bother? Kenneson’s book is terrific in examining how the fruits of the Spirit challenge the consumer culture and emptiness of much of contemporary life inside and outside the church.

Your Church Is You

2008-08-18T11:22:00.000-07:00

What final comments will I make as Interim Senior Pastor?, I asked myself recently. For 14 months I have been serving a mid-sized congregation in western Nebraska, and I discovered over the course of that time that I was coming to care for and love a group of people I knew I would be leaving at the end of this summer. I didn't plan on feeling this way. But it happened.

And along the way I also have come to believe that all ministry is "interim ministry." None of us stays forever! You could say that about life as well.

So, I shared the following charge to this congregation of Christians I came to love. I've had this statement "Your Church Is You" with me for several years now, and I don't remember where it came from. So here goes....

"You are a walking advertisement of your church and the Christ whom it proclaims. You take the church out of its four walls, and make it live in the everyday affairs of life. In fact, what people think of your church, they think of you.

Some have the idea that the pastor is the church. It is true that the pastor often speaks for the church, declares what it stands for, and invites people into its fellowship. It is the pastor's job to know the church's business and to act on its behalf. The pastor is your representative, but certainly not your substitute.

The preaching in the pulpit is fruitless unless it is reflected in the lives of members of the congregation. Classroom teaching is ineffective unless it comes to life in the attitude and behavior of people. Your church is measured not so much by what its leaders say as by what you do. You are the means by which the good life advocated by the church is communicated to people.

Your church professes a concern for people; you express that concern in the way you act toward others. Your church tries to build up a Christian world; you validate these attempts by your community. Your church claims to have a gospel that will make people new, opening to them a fuller life; you are the demonstration of that claim.

Your daily acts as a Christian preach more sermons, teach more people, and save more lives that the words that are spoken inside the four walls of your church building. You are a cell of the living church. Without you, the church has no life."

What's authenticity got to do with it?

2008-07-18T11:05:00.000-07:00

authenticity- The modern ideal of being true to oneself.

Last night I was leading our ongoing book discussion of "Christianity for the Rest of Us" by Diana Butler Bass, in which she examines spiritual practices among vital mainline churches. Now there's a concept for you- "vital mainline churches". It's an engaging book and our conversations this summer have been fun, often thought provoking, and sometimes deeply challenging of how we currently experience church together. You could say a sub-theme of our
conversations has been, seeking a church for the "21st century."

Out of the blue, in the course of our time together, someone piped up: "We're looking for the perfect worship experience." Now I couldn't figure out where that comment came from, because we were discussing the search for "diversity" as an image of God's dream for the church.
Right back out of the blue I said, "I gave up on looking for the perfect worship service a long time ago." I'm hungry for what's real and authentic, both in worship and in the preaching I'm called to share with a community of faith. Most of all I'm drawn to living an authentic faith as a human being. Perfection just isn't in the equation for me.

As someone who serves the church, with a call to ministry as a pastor, that means being perfect can't ever be the ideal. Once you get trapped in that mind-set, what level of grace do you have to offer others. At the same time, I care about how I lead worship and how I preach. So what does that mean? For me, it comes down to whether I'm passionately engaged with worship and preaching. The way I see it, if I'm not moved and shaken and energized by what I'm preaching about, why should I expect anyone else to be.

A new book on preaching speaks about what I'm seeking and trying to offer in preaching and what I hope to find with others in a genuine practice of faith. That search comes down to authenticity. A recent book about the preaching life examines what that means.

The book is "Preaching Words" by John McClure. McLure writes that "authenticity is often used to describe preachers who seem to be openly human, searching, and accessible in the pulpit. Authentic preachers do not represent themselves as removed, perfect, or on a pedestal, but through various forms of self-disclosure and identification, attempt to communicate a genuine desire for self-awareness and self-knowledge. The goal is to achieve the relational authority of one who with listeners is on a search for their real humanity."

Now, I resonate deeply with what McClure is saying. In fact, I just don't see any other way to be.
Gone are the days, in my experience, where a preacher can pontificate from some remote celestial platform about the struggles to love, believe, and have hope. Too much hypocrisy and phoniness has been exposed in the church and among preachers to pretend otherwise. And younger generations, just on principle, don't buy any ideal of perfection. They haven't seen it in their own families, in churches, or anywhere else in society. And they just don't trust preachers who claim perfection! Like I said to our book discussion group, I gave up on the ideal of a perfect worship service quite some time again. After all, life is messy and far from perfect. What I do respect is passion and an effort to offer the best we have, with what we've got.

So, I say we in the church are invited to search for authenticity in our experience with each other and in our faith. Think how freeing and grace-filled that journey could be! We might have some meaningful words to share with one another about that kind of pilgrimage.

It ain't no sin to be glad you're alive- The promise of Bruce Springsteen

2008-07-14T11:51:00.001-07:00

Long car trips are often times for me to enjoy a good book and listen to some good music.
Doing both is great, but only when I'm not driving! My wife and I drove to Milwaukee, WI a few days ago to see our son, who has started his internship year in medicine. I got to read and listen to music; my wife got to drive. And we were both happy.

No one has sung better songs about the road as a journey of exploration and search for identity than Bruce Springsteen. Seeing him in concert this past May in Omaha with my son was one of life's great thrills. I had introduced my son to the "Boss" years ago, and then we heard him live.
Awesome!

While on my car trip to Milwaukee, I read Eric Alterman's book on Springsteen: "It ain't no sin to be alive: the promise of Bruce Springsteen." The book was written in 1998, just as the E Street Band was coming back on the road with Springsteen after a 10 year hiatus, after Springsteen got married and had 3 children and had taken time to explore new musical possibilities. It was a time when Springsteen, according to Alterman, was growing deeply as a human being, and not just as an artist. Becoming a parent can do that to you.

In a November 2007 interview with Rolling Stone Magazine, Springsteen speaks about the meaning of his songs:

"they're all about the American identity and your own identity and the masks
behind the masks behind the masks, both for the country and for yourself. And trying to hold onto what's worthwhile, what makes it a place that's special, because I still believe it is. The American idea still has enormous power in its best manifestation. And ten George Bushes cannot bring that idea down--a hundred cannot bring that idea down."

"What's the social side" of the identity question has inspired some of Springsteen's most powerful song writing. He isn't afraid to address political questions in his music and art; in fact, he's been fearless in that regard. The "Boss" has united the prophetic side of faith with the priestly and pastoral/healing side of faith in his spirituality. That's what I find so compelling about him.

I think no one offered a more compelling pastoral/healing contribution to the American psyche than Bruce Springsteen did post 9/11 in "The Rising". In "The Rising", Springsteen imagines one of those courageous fire/rescue workers entering the World Trade Tower buildings: "May your faith give us faith. May your love give us love. May your hope give us hope." That was healing song at its best. The sadness of the past years has been the political calculus that turned the American people away from that affirmation, and traded it in for a politics of fear. Since when did that define the American spirit, Springsteen asks.

'Is there anybody alive out there?" Springsteen keeps asking in this society that seeks to anesthetize us and render us passive to the massive forces of consumerism, redemptive violence, and narcissistic individualism. And yet Springsteen also knows the power of love, the magical quality of attraction between two human beings, as stated so appealingly on the "Magic" album song "Girls in their Summer Clothes".

Back to Alterman's treatment of Springsteen. Alterman is one of our best political commentators right now. See his blog on www.mediamatters.com

Alterman speaks of Springsteen as "the mythos of rock'n'roll sprung to life". A painful home life growing up, a father who refused his blessing and heaped scorn on Springsteen's musical aspirations, an Italian ethnic heritage, a sense of marginalization, rebellion against a strict Catholic school education; all this and more fueled the inner fire to hit the open road to explore identity and to create a sense of self.

Springsteen expresses this search in the song lyric:

Now every man has the right to live
The right to a chance to give what he has to give
The right to fight for the things that he believes
For the things that come to him in dreams.

As I read Alterman's book about Springsteen's life and music, I came away with a renewed appreciation for what the Boss has been doing in his music. While he has certainly been a popular artist in many ways, Springsteen has also examined the political and religious concerns of "being alive". As someone once commented, there are really only 3 issues worth sustained conversation: Religion, Sex, and Politics. After that, what else is there? Springsteen fearlessly and hopefully sings about all three dimensions of our existence. Take away any of those three themes and life is pitifully reduced in scale and passion.

In a blog spot invitation, Alterman once invited fans of Springsteen to share what he has meant to them. Here are a few of those responses:

"He makes me feel like I belong in this world."
"Bruce Springsteen's art keeps my conscience alive."
"He matters to me because he is like my backup heartbeat."
"He has opened places in my mind, provided me with music to live my life, given me solace in my grief, provided me with joy for celebrations, introduced me to lifelong friends, raised my blood pressure, increased my heart rate, added smile lines to my face, and made me dance on a a folding chair and scream, 'Gooba, gooba, gooba."

As a person of faith and a pastor, I ask myself. "Has my experience of church and faith offered that much passion and joy?" Is that a description of what the church at its best should offer?
Personally, I think so.

At the end of Alterman's exploration of Springsteen's life and music, he offers up this wonderful
piece of philosophy from the Boss. The "greatest challenge of adulthood," Springsteen once explained, "is holding on to your idealism after you lose your innocence."

On his recent "Magic" tour with the E Street Band, I heard that evocative question:
"Is there anyone alive out there?" And I screamed, standing beside my son:
"Yes, we're alive!"

Converting the Church for the 21st Century- Part 2

2008-06-06T10:00:00.000-07:00

What does a flourishing congregation look like?

What are the marks of a congregation that is thriving and alive?

A good friend shared a profile of what a lively community of faith looks like from her work with a Lilly Endowment research project. The results come from a event sponsored by the Indianapolis Center for Congregations with the focus theme- "Flourishing Congregations: Moving from Dreams to Reality."

I've been serving as interim senior pastor of a congregation that has faced a good many struggles and challenges over the last several years, and I've discovered a hunger to know what a "flourishing congregation" looks like beyond the 3 Bs of "budget, building, and butts in the pews".

Here's the list of 16 attributes that mark a flourishing congregation drawn from the aforementioned Lilly Endowment consultation:

Welcoming and deliberate about forming relationships
Open to new ideas, change, etc.
Risk-taking, focused on the positive
Intentional about building bridges between people, between the church and its immediate community, between people who have faith and those searching for faith...
Always finding commonalities- asking what are those things that unite us, rather than asking what are those things that divide us
Coming together as children of God- acknowledging our mutual need of God's love in visible ways
Places where each member is honored
Safe places to do dangerous things
Nurturing- where leaders and members are built up, instead of used up
Active- reaching out- both locally and beyond
Passionate
Generous
Spirit led
Inter-generational
Places to dream
Energetic- where spiritual energy is always being renewed and people come away not feeling depleted, but enlivened by faith

Flourishing congregations are about new ways of helping people talk and think about what it means to be the "church at its best".

Someone asked me recently about the church I currently serve. Is there hope? My response, "of course there is hope." Where there is God, there is hope! And God never abandons us!

This challenges the business as usual side of church life, according to the consultation on "Flourishing Congregations". Too often, church life is the opposite of hope. Instead, we're entangled in such things as long meetings to balance budgets, resolve staff conflicts, restore aging facilities, or to plan the next strategic plan. Everything becomes a downward spiral of negative energy. We can't allow such things to diminish the energy, passion, and imagination of church leaders and members.

Here are a few questions that I have been asking church members and leaders in the last year quite regularly.

"What gives life in your congregation when it functions at its best?

"What drew you to this community of faith?"

"Where in worship and fellowship and service do you experience God and the love of God's people?"

Spend some time in conversations about questions like these, and spend some time focusing on the 16 attributes of flourishing congregations. You just might begin to discover renewed spiritual energy, which is a gift of God and a call to nurture.

Un-Christian: What a New Generation Really Thinks About Christianity

2008-06-03T10:14:00.000-07:00

Christianity has an image problem.

That's the main thesis of a new book published by the Barna Group, a major research organization that performs original demographic studies much like the Gallup Poll, only the Barna Group specializes in research on churches and trends in spirituality.

Here's a further conclusion by David Kinnamon, primary author of the book "Un-Christian":
"Our research shows that many of those outside of Christianity, especially younger adults, have little trust in the Christian faith, and esteem for the lifestyle of Christ followers is quickly fading among outsiders. They admit their emotional and intellectual barriers go up when they are around Christians, and they reject Jesus because they feel rejected by Christians."

Consider the more detailed impressions held by younger adults about Christianity, and it's cause for alarm. According to Kinnaman, outsiders to the church hold these views of Christians and Christian faith:

1. Christianity is antihomosexual- a view held by 91% of those outside the church
2. Christianity is judgmental- a view held by 87% of those outside the church
3. Christianity is hypocritical- a view held by 85% of those outside the church.
4. Christianity is too involved in politics- a view held by 75% of those outside the church
5. Christianity is out of touch with reality- a view held by 72%
6. Christianity is old-fashioned- a view held by 78% of those outside the church

Now you may feel yourself getting a little defensive about all of the above attitudes held by young adults ages 16-29, but Kinnaman then adds this summary perspective.
On a profile of 12 traits that describe Christianity and the church, young adult outsiders hold negative views on 9 of the 12 traits. There is no organization I know of personally, that can thrive and grow if negative attitudes of this breadth and depth characterize the life and purpose of the organization. And that's true, whether we believe those negative attitudes are fair or not.

One of the real questions for church insiders to ask is this. Do we care about the reputation of the church and Christianity? Are we willing to consider the reasons that younger adults hold such negative attitudes? Or do we just want to pretend that these attitudes don't exist. In fact, reports Kinnaman, if we raise the age level of those with negative attitudes to include all ages of adults, some 50 million adult Americans report negative or hurtful experiences with the church.

Kinnaman frames the issue at stake in these words: "If you are interested in communicating and expressing Christ to new generations, you must understand the intensity with which they hold these views. As Christians, we cannot just throw up our hands in disgust or defensiveness. We have a responsbility to our friends and neighbors to have a sober, reasonable understanding of their perspectives."

There are 3 options.
1. We can say we don't care what attitudes that outsiders hold about the church and Christianity.
And this response often holds true of those who do not know any outsiders to the church faith.
2. We can care what outsiders think and wish we knew what to do. But this response won't prove effective if we don't get to know outsiders and why they think what they think.
3. We can both care what outsiders think and we can learn why, and we can engage them in relationships and conversations that build trust and a right to a hearing.

UnChristian is a book well worth reading and pondering and discussing by church leaders, pastors, and anyone who wants to make a case for a different practice and understanding of what it means to be a Christian in today's world. I strongly recommend it.

Converting the Church for the 21st Century

2008-05-28T09:31:00.001-07:00

A few pithy comments to wake us from our slumbers about life in today's church:

"We are out there on the cutting edge of the uncontroversial." Martin Amis
"When we all think alike, no one thinks very much." Walter Lippman
"A pastor won't solve all our problems." --a member of a pastor nominating committee
"We're in a state of transition."- Another honest member of a pastor nominating committee

All churches are in a state of constant transition, as are all of us as individuals. Some churches and some people recognize this.

I've been reading a new book recently titled The Hidden Lives of Congregations by Israel Galindo, published by the Alban Institute. Galindo teaches ministry to seminarians and engages in a great deal of consulting and leadership training for churches. One of Galindo's chief observations is that churches are often unaware of the dynamics that are shaping their lives and futures.

Stay around long enough as a congregation, Galindo observes, and sooner or later; "One of the most powerful of the hidden life forces (emerges)-- the congealing effect of settling into a maintenance mentality more focused on self-preservation than on mission."

Galindo then goes on to cite another author and consultant for churches, Eddie Hammet, and his comments in Making the Church Work. Hammet lists some indicators that provide evidence of a church's drift into a maintenance posture:

When committee meetings focus on institutional concerns (budgets, maintenance, and relationships) rather than on mission concerns (reaching new people groups, reconciling/relationship, rallying to change the injustices in the community and/or world.)
When budget planning begins with what we have to work with rather than what God has in mind for us.
When annual planning consists of doing what we did last year, just on another calendar date (or maybe even on the same date one year later).
When most conversations revolve around meeting the needs of those in attendance rather than on reaching out to those who are not in attendance.
When planning, budgeting, and calendaring revolve around institutional buildings and schedules rather than around the needs, conveniences, and comfort zones of those outside the organization.
When preserving programs, traditions, and rituals get more meeting time, dialogue time, and budget than creating and resourcing new strategies to reach the unchurched, lost, and broken world;
When people's intent and energy focus more on humoring those in the pew than on penetrating their communities, families, and work-places for the cause of Christ.

Distill all this down to one observation, and you come to the balance or more likely out-of-balance dynamic of the Inward and Outward dimension of a church's life. Ask yourself this question. Is your church tilted more in the inward direction of the church's life? Or does your church seek to be inwardly strong in order to embrace a strong, passionate outward focus on a hurting world and the people around you? Now that would be a worthwhile conversation to hold!

What do you think?

The Big Trifecta!

2008-05-26T08:11:00.000-07:00

Last Saturday, we celebrated the graduations of two of our sons from the University of Missouri-Columbia. What a day! And this coming Saturday we all get together as a family to celebrate our youngest son's graduation from high school. Amazing! Three graduations in the space of two weeks. As a close family friend remarked, "You never anticipated all this when you were having three sons, did you?" I've taken to thinking there needs to be a support group for parents with this many graduations. But I wouldn't trade the experience for any thing in the world.

Was I ready to become a parent when I got married? Absolutely not! But then life has a way of changing you. I've come to see that sometimes we have to grow into what we need to be, in order to do the things we're meant to do.

Two books informed some of my parenting along the way, in the early years of our sons growing up. "The Wonder of Boys" and "A Fine Young Man" by Michael Gurian played a key role in how I came to understand what it means to help boys grow into manhood. Yes, there is wonder in the experience of being a father and a parent. My wife will have to speak for herself in what it was like for her. But as for me, I know that I've become a better human being and a better man for having been a father to our three sons. I've grown up with them.

I guess I'm also experiencing the first signs of the empty nest stage as well. All kinds of feelings surface in me in recent days, feelings of elation and feelings of some sadness at thinking my sons are moving toward their own independent lives. But then, that was always the goal. Now, there are some new dimensions of our relationship to savor. While I'll always be a father to my sons, I also realize I'm becoming their friend as well. It's a delight to move in this direction.

A friend in the church stopped by one morning to ask how I was doing. My friend has young adult children as well, and she's navigated some changes in her relationships with them as well.
My friend also knew the mix of feelings I was having. And as a pastor, it was wonderful to be on the receiving end of some pastoral care from a member of the church. Pastors are human beings! As my friend commented, our young adult children don't stop relying on us. They just come to us with a different set of questions and issues.

My oldest son graduated from medical schoool, our middle son finished his undergraduate studies in preparation for grad school at my alma mater the Univerisity of North Carolina, and our youngest son heads off to the University of Missouri where he plans to enter the School of Journalism his junior year. There are fine young men. And I have come to embrace a need for our society to focus on the need to help boys grow into manhood, when so many boys do not have fathers actively involved in their lives. In some ways, I've been a mentor to many boys through my involvement in Boy Scouts and youth sports and church youth groups. It isn't just my own boys that I've cared about; through the years I came to know their friends as well.
That has been a great joy as well.

As I see my sons embark on the next stages of their journey in life, I am reminded also of how important it has been for me to pass on a sense of call or vocation to them that goes beyond just deciding what job they want to have one day.

With these sons of mine, I've also sought to pass on what novelist and theologian and preacher Frederick Buechner has offered about finding our purpose in life.

"The place God calls you to is the place where your deep gladness and the world's deep hunger meet."

Two crucial books on sharing faith with youth

2008-04-08T12:51:00.000-07:00

In the church I currently serve as interim senior pastor, we are coming to grips with the need for a fresh approach to youth ministry. Too many churches are stuck in a form of youth ministry that amounts to a pizza holding tank, where adults and families hope and pray that their sons and daughters will just be protected from trouble. Do anything you can to keep them happy and interested and out of trouble seems to be the tacit message! Only usually it's put out there much more directly. Save our kids! You teach them faith! We don't know how! Help!

Two critically important books address the current realities of youth ministry and point the way toward discernment and fresh approaches to leadership and partnership between youth and adults in handing off faith. The first I'll note is "The Godbearing Life" with co-author Kendra Creasey Dean. She makes a few trenchant observations.

"Today's teenagers have less adult contact than any generation in human history, in large part because of working parents."
All too often, churches practice the Mickey Mouse one-eared strategy of ministry with youth. Just picture Mickey Mouse with only 1 ear. The large round face is the congregation, and the small ear is the segregated collection of youth, who often have little contact with adults. And yet, younger generations crave solid and affirming and spiritual connections with adults who can be "adult guarantors" as one youth ministry educator once described it.
Thirdly, the average tenure of a youth minister across denominational lines is about 18 months. Often these youth ministers are expected to be charismatic, personality magnets for youth, with a drawing power totally unrealistic to sustain.
In the "Godbearing Life", Kenda Creasy Dean observes that 'Studies consistently indicate that a relationship with an 'adult guarantor' during adolescence outweighs all other forms of youth ministry in terms of positive influence on youth development."
Finally, youth ministry is not just for youth. It's for adults who are called to be "Godbearers" and in the process are called to spiritual ministry and growth themselves.

The second crucial book for leaders and churches to read regarding youth ministry is titled "Soul Searching: The Religious and Spiritual Lives of American Teenagers" by Christian Smith, with Melinda Lundquist Denton. This book draws from intense sociological study designed by Christian Smith to learn more through first hand interviews and surveys of young people across America.

Here's the first comment in the book: "American teenagers can embody adult's highest hopes and most gripping fears. They represent a radiant energy that opens doors to the future for famlies, communities, and society. But they also evoke deep adult anxieties about teen rebellion, trouble, and broken and compromised lives. Parents, teachers, and youth workers behold their teenagers with pride, hope, and enjoyment, but also often worry, distress, and frustration."

Smith's book lays out the main survey and interview findings of the National Study of Youth and Religion, a research project on the religious and spiritual lives of American adolescents conducted from 2001 to 2005 at the University of North Carolina.

"Soul Searching' paints a picture of immense variety and diversity among American teens in terms of spiritual involvement. The good news, Smith reports, is that there is a positive correlation for teens and spirituality that shows more religiously active teens as doing significantly better in life on a variety of important outcomes than less religiously active teens.

Both the "Godbearing Life" and "Soul Searching" are of immense value to church leaders, pastors, parents, religious educators, and all for whom the spiritual health of adolescents is a major concern. Get them both! Study them! Discuss them! Find ways to implement their suggestions...

Springsteen is "Magic" in Omaha!

2008-04-08T12:29:00.000-07:00

Bruce Springsteen's new CD is titled "Magic" and his show on Friday March 14 was pure alchemy. Taking the stage about 8:40 p.m. with the E Street Band, Springsteen yelled out:
"Are you ready to be transformed? Are you ready to crawl on your belly like a snake. Is there anyone alive out there?" And a mighty roar kicked off 160 minutes of pure magic from the Boss and the veterans of the E Street Band.

My son sat beside along with some new friends. With my son's graduation from medical school coming up in May, I thought this was the perfect way to celebrate his own wonderful accomplishment. It's hard to say who screamed and yelled and was more pumped up by the music of Springsteen. We both find Springsteens' music transcendant, spiritual, and high energy rock and roll!

Early in the playlist, Springsteen sang the power ballad "Radio Nowhere" from his new CD and it's a pure adrenaline rush to hear it live with the E Street regulars. Scattered through the night
we heard several tunes from Magic: "Long Walk Home", "Gypsy Biker", "Last to die for a mistake", and "Girls in their Summer Clothes." Springsteen sings songs about love and loss,
despair and hope, and yes he does address in fearless fashion the costs of a war that raises the question: "Last to die for a mistake". Springsteen has a moral and spiritual imagination that fires passion and spirit and soul. I told people at church on Sunday that I had received my spiritual infusion for the Easter Season in a good old fashioned rock and roll revival. Actually, there's lots of baptismal imagery in a number of Springsteen songs. He's aiming on transformation. And he's set on calling people to life! That's our own in- church type preaching, taken outside and put into out-church preaching, as the great David Buttick calls it in his work on preaching "Homiletic".

On our drive to the Quest Center in downtown Omaha, I played "Waitin' on a Sunny Day" as my son and I drove to the concert. I hope we get to sing along on that one, I said to him. And wouldn't you know it, we did. Not just that one either. Singing along with some 17,000 highly pumped fans of the "Boss" and with him live and in person with his band, was a spiritual high.

One nice surprise in the evening toward the end, was the special guest appearance of local indie musician Conor Oberst of the band Bright Eyes. He sang along with Springsteen's "Thunder Road." Awesome stuff!

The night ended with an encore of hit tunes that must have gone on another 20-25 minutes.
People held up signs requesting favorites and we sang "Jungeland" together. "The people have spoken", Springsteen said in granting requests. To top it all off, we closed with some foot stomping Irish tunes to observe St. Patrick's Day.

My heart was truly full after that night with Springsteen. My son and I said almost together, we need to do this again soon!

Springsteen's Coming!

2008-03-11T11:28:00.000-07:00

Bruce Springsteen is coming to Omaha this Friday night, and I can't believe I was able to get tickets. Awesome! When the Boss takes the stage Friday, I expect him to shout out:
Is there anybody alive out there? as he usually does to begin a concert.

I saw a comment in the paper by a fan of Springsteen that's on the mark. "He's as great as the Rolling Stones, only better. We're not talking flash-in-the-pan here. He sings the songs of life. He's like an old friend to me."

How well put!

Lately I've been listening to Springsteen's latest album, "Magic", and it's vintage stuff, right from the beginning with the power anthem "Radio Nowhere". It's classic stuff, with Springsteen singing of being behind the wheel of a car cruising along the highways of America, wondering in the chaotic noise of radio, whether there's anybody really alive out there.

There's a deep spiritual quality to much of Springsteen's songs. He deals with individuals seeking to escape dismal surroundings and places with no future; he examines love, loneliness, self-reliance and self-preservation, and in Magic treats the madness of war with the song "The Last to Die for a Mistake." There's nothing superficial about Springsteen.

After the tragedy of 9/11, no one voiced the agony and hurt and anger of Americans better than Springsteen in his album "The Rising".

And in the Seeger Sessions album, along with "Live in Dublin: the Seeger Sessions", Springsteen makes connections with the best of the folk and roots tradition of American music. The Boss is versatile!

So, come Friday, I plan to join my voice with thousands of others in welcoming the Boss to town.
I'll follow up with some comments.

One Step Closer: Why U2 Matters to those Seeking God

2008-01-02T13:50:00.000-08:00

Over the holiday, Omaha welcomed an interesting visitor. And I don't mean Santa Claus.
Rock star legend and humanitarian, Bono (of U2 fame) came to town to visit with members of billionaire Warren Buffett's family who work together on various global philanthropies.

While in town, Bono sat down for a Sunday morning late breakfast at my favorite restaurant- the Dundee Dell. The waitresses still haven't gotten over the excitement! I know; I ate there for lunch today with a good friend. "Where did he sit?" I asked the hostess as I came in for my favorite meal of fish & chips. "Over there against the wall, in booth number 4", she said.

"Come over with me," I said, and we walked over to where Bono sat. I sat down, put my hands against the wall, put both palms firmly down on the table top, leaned back in my seat, closed my eyes, and told the hostess, "I'm just chanelling his spirit and energy!" She laughed and so did everyone around me.

Over Christmas I've been reading a couple of Bono/U2 related books that share something of the restless energy and world encompassing spirituality of Bono and U2. One book is by
Christian Scharen, a theologian at the Yale Center for Faith and Culture and it's titled:
One Step Closer: Why U2 Matters to Those Seeking God. It's a wonderful exploration of the music and spirituality revealed and concealed in the lyrics of the large U2 catalogue of rock songs and ballads that have propelled them to world wide celebrity.

Scharen's book is a marvelous examination of the unconventional faith of U2 and Bono, from the perspective of the central icon of Christian faith- the Cross. Here's a quick summary of Sharen's approach:

"The theology of the Cross fits U2 because it avoids the all too common proclamation of faith, hope, and love that ignores the present realities of doubt, despair, suffering, and injustice.
It is a tradition that looks at the world and speaks the truth about what it sees: the good, the bad, and the ugly...One need not ignore or be surprised by the many difficulties and sorrows in life. Rather, such faith allows us to take life's challenges straight on knowing that in our struggles we are not alone. Jesus, the crucified and risen one, has already faced the worst of life."

Sharen's book explores how U2 and Bono sing that kind of honest faith. I heartily recommend it if you are a passionate U2 fan, like me. Even if you aren't!

As I was sitting there at the Dundee Dell eating my lunch, our waitress came by again, and I asked her for another Bono anecdote. Here's one she said. She told us that Bono came in with a great big, Russian looking fur hat on, with flaps down around his ears. He was really friendly she said. She offered him a taste of their famous Scotch single malt whiskey, the best anywhere in
town, but he politely declined, saying he' partied enough the night before.

He then got to talking and told about a recent concert in Dublin, where he was singing "Sunday, Bloody Sunday". Bono told her how he stopped singing and started clapping his hands, and told the crowd that everytime he clapped a child died in Africa from AIDS or hunger or war.
"Then stop your bloody clapping," Bono heard someone shout out! And our waitress laughed, but I could tell, that for all that was going on in churches in Omaha that Sunday morning, this was where the unconventional Spirit of Jesus spoke most provocatively.

Our waitress then said she told her 5 year old grandson who she had met later in the day, and he said, "But who is that?" She replied, "He's like God and Santa Claus". He comes to sing and to love children, bringing them gifts of love and hope.

"Wow!" I thought to myself.

Here's a quote from Bono himself, about what's going on with his music:

"There's two kinds of people, there's those who are asleep and those that are awake. I've used my music to wake me up and if it wakes other people up on the way that's okay because we get used to the sound of a bomb going off in Belfast and to the roll call of bad news on television, we get used to the fact that a third of the population on earth are starving. We get used to all these things and we eventually fall asleep in the comfort of our freedom."

The second book I've been reading is On the Move, by Bono himself. It's a small little book that contains the speech he gave in 2006 at the Annual Washington Prayer Breakfast, with the
most powerful political figures in town. Little did they know that they had invited a prophet for breakfast. It was an angry, audacious, hopeful, prophetic address to self-styled movers and shakers.

Here's just a taste of that prophetic speech by Bono:

"God is in the slums, in the cardboard boxes where the poor play house. God is in the silence of a mother who has infected her child with a virus that will end both their lives. God is in the cries heard under the rubble of war. God is in the debris of wasted opportunity and lives, and God is with us if we are with them."

"This is what happens when God gets on the Move!" - Bono

On Celebrating New Year's 2008

2008-01-01T15:40:00.000-08:00

Moments to savor as the New Year begins.....

A leisurely beginning to the day.
Feeding the ducks and geese at the small lake out behind our home, with stale bread that's been collecting for a week or so. Wondering why in the world these birds content themselves to swim round and round on a shrinking pool of water as the lake freezes over. What seems like a couple hundred birds flap towards me as the slices of old honey wheat bread get tossed left and right.
Sitting in the chair by the fire to watch the Mizzou Tigers win the Cotton Bowl, and getting calls from my two oldest sons who are Mizzou students, back on campus for work and school commitments
Sharing a bowl of ham & bean soup with my wife, along with the homemade cornbread I've baked!
Taking a drive to Lake Manawa over the Missouri River from Omaha to Council Bluffs to see if we can spot nesting eagles around the lake
Watching someone ski out on the lake propelled by a parachute overhead that catches the wind and sends him flying across frozen Lake Manawa
Back home a freshly brewed cup of Nicaraugan coffee in front of the fire
Relaxing and enjoying P.D. James novel 'The Lighthouse", an Adam Dalgliesh detective mystery. The British seem to feature very thoughtfully constructed murder mysteries; where else but in a British detective series would the protagonist be both a poet and son of a Church of England priest?
And here toward early evening, I can smell fresh banana nut bread baking in the oven; time for more coffee....
A perfect beginning to a new year, and not single resolution made, except maybe to enjoy more days like this!

A Second Inconvenient Truth

2007-12-29T10:48:00.000-08:00

While climate change has now risen to national and global conscience, in large part because of Al Gore's remarkable documentary and richly deserved Nobel Prize, another looming crisis sits in the wings, waiting for its own advocates on the world stage. The issue is tied to climate change, but possesses its own vital agenda as well; this biosphere we call earth needs friends and protectors. The pauperization of the earth itself, brought on by pollution, species extinction, and plundering of the planet carries with it an enormous cost.

Currently, experts warn, we are on the verge of destroying much of our ecological diversity in the coming century, if the present course of human behavior continues. A passionate movement to address climate change has started. A similar effort is required to rescue all living organisms.

One advocate who has long spoken with an eloquent and compelling voice is the noted biologist E.O. Wilson. Wilson served on the faculty at Harvard for over 50 years and won two Pulitzer Prizes for his writing in biology. He writes like a poet. But he's also one of the world's great scientists.

In his recent book The Creation, E.O. Wilson constructs an imaginary correspondence through letters with a Southern Baptist Pastor. Wilson's aim is to enlist the commitment of church leaders, and evangelicals in particular, for care of the creation. As a native of Alabama who grew up in the intense religious atmosphere of Baptist revivalism, Wilson seeks to build a bridge to a world he had long since abandoned. He's clear about his reasons for this effort, because he recognizes that religion and science are the two most powerful forces in the world today. And the very creation itself, along with the future of all life, depends on a growing partnership between religion and science for the health of the planet entrusted to our care.

Here are a few persuasive observations from Wilson about what is at stake:

In Wilson's imaginary correspondence with a minister, he sets forth the ominous fact that we are entering a period of mass extinction never before seen on our planet. We are about to enter, what poets and scientists alike may choose to call "the Eremozoic Era- the Age of Loneliness...Humanity must make a decision, and make it now: conserve Earth's natural heritage, or let future generations adjust to a biologically impoverished world."

"Because wild natural ecosystems are in plain sight, it is also easy to take for granted the environmental services they provide humanity. Wild species enrich the soil, cleanse the water, pollinate most of the flowering plants. They create the very air we breathe. Without these amenities, the remainder of human history would be nasty and brief."

"According to estimates by a team of experts in 2004, climate change alone, if left unabated, could be the primary cause of extinction of quarter of the species of plants and animals on the land by midcentury."

The sad thing is that we do not understand what we are doing. Wilson argues that the priority shouldn't be exploration of Mars or other planets; we need to mount an expedition to Earth itself. The number of species of organisms discovered to date, comprising all known plants, animals, and microorganisms, lies somewhere between 1.5 and 1.8 million. Estimates of the true number vary widely from 3.6 million at the low end to 112.00 million at the high end. About most of these species we know very little.

Reading Wilson's book, I learned for example, that we owe the churning of the soil not to earthworms, but to ants and termites. People need insects to survive, but insects do not need us.

Wilson argues that we need to build an Encyclopedia of Life to learn about and document the rich diversity of life, all of which has a purpose in the grand scheme of nature, but about which we know so very little. Already, discoveries have led to medical and scientific advances of remarkable value.

According to Wilson, the value in dollars (call it world-wide Gross Domestic Product) of the environment either matches or exceeds the value of human generated economic value.
Can we afford to dispense with this contribution of nature to our welfare?

Wilson passionately argues that the "obliteration of Nature is a dangerous strategy. For one thing, we have become a species specialized to eat the seeds of four kinds of grass- wheat, rice, corn, and millet. If these fail from disease or climate change, we too shall fail."

Wilson's book is a self-described class-action suit on behalf of biological diversity on our planet.
With an investment world-wide of some $30 billion dollars to combat species extinction and human practices that degrade the environment, Wilson believes that enormous progress could be attained. As he argues, "conserving biodiversity is the best economic deal humanity has ever had placed before it since the invention of agriculture."

I ended my reading of "The Creation" with a heightened awareness of how much our own tenuous life on this planet owes to the embattled natural world. People of faith should partner with the scientific community to face this second inconvenient truth- 'Blinded by ignorance and self-absorption humanity is destroying the Creation."

Here's a taste of a testimony/sermon that Wilson shares with his Southern Baptist pastor correspondent:

"Save the Creation, save all of it! No lesser goal is defensible. However biodiversity arose, it was not put on this planet to be erased by any one species. This is not the time, nor will there ever be a time, when circumstances justify destroying Earth's natural heritage. Proud though we are of our special status, and justifiably so, let us keep our world-changing capabilities in perspective. All that human beings can imagine, all the fantasies we can conjure, all our games, simulations, epics, myths, and histories, and yes, all our science dwindle to little beside the full productions of the biosphere.We have not even discovered more than a fraction of Earth's life forms. We understand fully no one species among the millions that have survived our onslaught."

Welcome to the Wisdom of the World

2007-12-28T14:17:00.001-08:00

For the last several weeks, I've begun my day by reading a chapter from Joan Chittister's new book Welcome to the Wisdom of the World: universal spiritual insights distilled from five religious traditions. I've long counted Chittister one of the great modern voices and writers in spirituality, and her newest book adds to the warm-hearted and socially engaged perspectives of her own Catholic/ecumenical faith. I recommend a visit to Chittister's web site:
Benetvision.org for further connection to this remarkable spiritual leader and author.

In an inviting way, Chittister explores the wisdom/spiritual traditions of 5 of the world' great religions - Hindu, Buddhist, Judaism, Islam, and Christianity- and examines how each intersects with contemporary spiritual concerns. Chittister grounds these explorations in personal encounters she has had with individuals she has known or has counseled through her ministry.

Here's a sampling of the chapters in Chittister's book and the questions about life that she explores from the perspective of each spiritual tradition:

Hindu Wisdom:

Why Does My Life Feel So Hectic?
What Does It Mean to "Make A Difference?"
How Can I Learn To Let Go of the Past?

2. Buddhist Enlightenment:

Would I Do It All Again?
Is It Possible to Make Up for Past Mistakes?

3. Jewish Community:

Where Did I Lose My Idealism?
Why Do I Feel Stuck?

4. Chrisianity:

What Does it Take to Put Excitement Back into My Life?
What's Wrong with Me: Why Can't I Change?

5. Islam:

What is Happiness?
What's Important in Life?

As I've spent my mornings with one of the chapters of this book, I've savored the deeply caring and wise ways that each of these 5 great spiritual traditions has sought to offer guidance for the human quest for spiritual truth and for the divine And I've wondered, what would it be like if human beings across national and religious divides sought to encounter each other from the best of our respective spiritual traditions.

What does it take to be known?

2007-12-08T09:57:00.000-08:00

This past Wednesday, December 5 my city- Omaha, Nebraska- joined in the sad and tragic line of communities across our nation who have experienced the devastation of mass murder. My son called that night from Missouri to tell me that he was watching CNN's coverage of this horrific act. It's hard to believe this happened in Omaha my son said. Another friend commented that he had liked living in Omaha because it is a city that ranks in the top 50 in size in the United States, while keeping a low profile. Omaha offers a wonderful quality of life he said. And now this!

What could have driven young Robert Hawkins to take a semi-automatic weapon to a shopping mall where he opened fire on innocent people, killing 8 and wounding several others. This is a city in shock!

Hawkins left a suicide note apparently, saying he couldn't cope with life any longer, while anticipating that he would finally be known and achieve fame. What a sad and ultimately pathetic search for some scrap of significance. To think that becoming significant must involve fame! I shudder at the images of Peter Hawkins splashed across the front pages of the Omaha World Herald, his grainy image pointing his rifle ahead.

At times like these, there's little to be said in explanation of such senseless actions. Rather, people of faith, along with others who may or may not claim faith, need to reaffirm the most basic truths about what matters.

I've been reading a book by the eminent Jewish Rabbi and theologian, Rabbi Jonathan Sacks, that helps me reaffirm fundamental touchstones of my own faith. It's a book titled, To Heal a Fractured World." The subtitle is "The Ethics of Responsibility."

Sacks opens with a quote from Psalm 8:
When I behold Your heavens, the work of your fingers,
The moon and the stars that You set in place
What is man that You are mindful of him,
Mortal man that You take notice of him?
Yet You have made him little less than the angels
And adorned him with glory and majesty.

That's long been one of my favorite psalms, for it speaks to the enormous dignity and worth of human creatures to God. But I also remember one of my first teachers of theology saying,
"We human beings are both the glory of God and the scum of the earth." Dr. John Bray was indicating that we human beings are capable of co-creating with God such wonderful gifts for life, and at the same time we retain an awful capacity for evil. It's a frightening paradox.
The events this past week are indicative of our human capacity for evil.

Rabbi Sacks in true Jewish tradition professes that "One of Judaism's most distinctive and challenging ideas is its ethics of responsibility, the idea that God invites us to become, in the rabbinic phrase, his 'partners in the work of creation.'

Rabbic Sacks points to the reality that we also live in a fractured world:
"The gossamer filaments of connection between us and others that once held together families, communities and societies, have become attentuated. We have become lonely selves in search of purely personal fulfillment."

I think of that twisted young man, Peter Hawkins, and what led him to believe that he was making a name for himself. What fragments of faith, family, and community became so frayed that he felt so isolated and rejected? I'm not in any sense making excuses for this deed of personal responsibility. I'm just wondering.

As I reflect on what it means to be known, I'm also led to consider what we as a society and we as communities of faith have sought to make known about the things that count, the contours of an ethic of responsibility.

I appreciate Rabbi Sack's emphatic remark that "the ethical life is a form of celebration.
Doing good is not painful, a matter of dour duty and a chastising conscience."
The Hebrew word for this comments Rabbi Sacks is "Simha", usually translated as joy.
What it really means writes Sacks, is the happiness we share, or better still, the happiness we make by sharing.

The ethic of of responsibility, of sharing what we have, is the best answer I know to the meaning and meaningfulness of a life. I wish that Peter Hawkins had experienced this ethic in a deeper way. I pray that our communities of faith here in Omaha will come together, and that all people will know that we share in the call to mutual responsibility, even as we share our grief.

Bonhoeffer at the Coffee Shop

2007-11-26T13:29:00.000-08:00

Sitting by the fire at our favorite coffee shop this morning, my wife and I were enjoying a morning together with some of our favorite books along with coffee and tea. We had a book about Dietrich Bonhoeffer with the title "The Bonhoeffer Phenomenon" by Stephen R. Haynes, with the subtitle "Portraits of a Protestant Saint".

The cover of the book featured a portrait of Bonhoeffer in profile, that is familiar to many of his readers. So familiar that a man walking by us stopped to say, Bonhoeffer means so much to me and my faith.

In his book on Bonhoeffer, the author Stephen Haynes remarks that a fairly recent poll among "religious seekers" asked what modern figures they would propose for sainthood. Participants nominated Mother Teresa, Albert Schweitzer, Bill W. (AA founder) and others. But the person most listed was Bonhoeffer.

I recall first reading "Letters and Papers from Prison" when I was in high school after a seminary intern suggested it. And I introduced my oldest son to Bonhoeffer when he was in high school.

There's a quality about Bonhoeffer that attracts seekers and Christians from a wide spiritual and theological spectrum. Haynes examines this in his book, noting that Bonhoeffer has assumed a variety of roles in the religious imagination- seer, prophet, apostle, hero, bridge, martyr, and even saint.

In the church I currently serve, this was born out to me when a man in the church noticed a copy of my "Cost of Discipleship" by Bonhoeffer some months ago. It reawakened his own interest and he subsequently led a men's study group in a discussion of some of Bonhoeffer's writings. Another man in the group observed that conservatives as well as liberals were drawn to Bonhoeffer. How striking! At the same time, that's a refreshing insight into the power of Bonhoeffer's lived theology. He challenges us all!

For me, the attaction of Bonhoeffer is that he linked thought with life, theology with practice in a world of moral and ethical challenge. Bonhoeffer's courageous stand against Nazism and willingness to put his own life at risk continues to appeal to me, and I think to many.

I think that's what caused our fellow coffee shop acquaintance to stop and visit for a while this morning.

On Pakistan: Religion and Violence

2007-11-21T12:40:00.000-08:00

The volatile situation in Pakistan, with President Musharraf clamping down on civil protests, brought to mind a recent dinner experience I shared with three traveling journalists from India, Pakistan, and China. Part of an international visitors program, these three individuals helped me see not only how Pakistan and other parts of the world are perceived by those of us in America, but how our nation is viewed by peoples around the world. At our host's home the evening we all met, I still recall our conversation around the dinner table. I should say that it took some time for us to gather, because our Pakistani guest required some time for his evening prayers out on the back lawn to fulfill his Muslim faith requirement.

As we became more familiar with each other that evening, our journalist friends dispensed with superficial topics of conversation and pressed on for a more substantive exchange about religion, violence and politics. The Indian journalist asked us a challenging question:
"Why does the American government believe it has the right to dictate terms to the rest of the world about how peace can be achieved?" I personally had no easy answer to that question, nor to the follow-up question about whether America saw itself as an empire. Since several of the neo-cons in the Bush administration have voiced that very ambition, it is difficult to deny that some of our leaders do entertain grandiose visions of American hegemony.

The Pakistani journalist then raised the issue of terroism and religion. You see all of us Muslims as terrorists here in America he said. But we are not! He then told us he rejected violence as a Muslim. In heart-breaking detail he described covering a terrorist attack in Pakistan that resulted in the deaths of several young school children. That is not part of my faith he said to us.

Our Indian journalist dining companion then asked us a challenging question: "What does religion mean to people here in America? I have heard many say that religion is a private matter. But I don't understand that. My faith is everything to me. I don't separate my life into religious and non-religious categories." None of us sitting around the table that evening had an easy answer to that line of conversation.

As I follow the events in Pakistan and the Middle East, I think back on the lively conversation I shared one evening with Hindu, Muslim and Chinese journalists who in a couple of hours provoked more intense and meaningful conversation about faith and religion and violence than I've heard in several years. These are concerns that will remain with us, and call us as American and people of faith to become muli-lingual in matters of faith and religion. We live in a nation with more than 6 million Muslims, more than the adherents of the Presbyterian and Episcopal Churches combined at present. What does that say to us about understanding people of other faith traditions? Can we afford not to learn about what faith means to Muslims, Hindus, Jews, and many other religions?

Are we alive yet?

2007-07-24T08:24:00.000-07:00

I was watching the Global Climate Change concerts hosted by Al Gore, live from England a couple of week-ends ago when I heard the lead singer for the group Metallica call out:
"Are we alive yet?" A rousing shout out came back from thousands gathered at the concert venue Wembley Stadium. "Yes!"

Then I came across this quote from the book "When You Catch an Adjective, Kill It: The Parts of Speech, for Better and/or Worse," by Ben Yagoda that echoes what I heard from the Metallica singer.

"I realized some time ago that I have a tendency to divide all experience- buildings, people, movies, songs, weather, roads, hamburgers--
into two categories.

The first category makes me happy to be alive.

The other category makes me sad, or at best neutral.

And in the realm of language, that's the kind of Manichaean division that I care about, and that you'll find throughout this book."

A rock star and an author agree on a fundamental matter. Does your music, does your experience of worship, does your approach to life contribute to the fullness of living?
Not just for yourself, but for others as well. That's a good way for those of us in the church to think about what we're offering God and our neighbors in the life of worship, discipleship, and Christian living. Lots of people outside faith have some real questions about that! Are we becoming more fully alive?

After all, we speak of the Spirit of God as the giver and renewer of life. What makes you alive as a Christian? How can you help others see that faith is about aliveness?

Born on the Fourth of July

2007-07-05T14:22:00.000-07:00

Last night was another great celebration in our family, with a birthday party for our son, who is now 18. What a wonderful birthday! I still remember my excitement on having a son born on the fourth of July. We were in Bismarck, North Dakota at the time and it happened to be the Centennial Celebration of Statehood with thousands of people gathered on the grounds of the capitol. It was an auspicious day. Ever since our son has had a great day to celebrate his birthday with us and family and friends. For a long time, he thought the fire-works on the 4th of July were planned especially for him. I did nothing to disabuse of him of that notion while he was growing up. Looking out over the skyline of Omaha, Nebraska last night from our vantage point to see the fireworks put on at the capacious grounds of Boys Town, I saw fireworks from one end of the horizon to the other. It was fantastic!

The 4th of July is also an occasion to celebrate my favorite holiday, and to enjoy the meaning of our nation's founding. Lately I've been listening to jazz and reading a lot about it. I came across this wonderful quote in Ken Burn's book Jazz: A History of America's Music. The book is a companion piece to the PBS documentary Burns did a few years back. Burns includes a comment by the writer and essayist Gerald Early from St. Louis, who remarked that "when they study our civilization two thousand years from now, there will be three things that Americans will be known for: the Constitution, baseball and jazz music. They're the three most beautiful things Americans have ever created."

I'm disposed to agree with Early. St. Louis is the home of my favorite baseball team, the St. Louis Cardinals and it has long been a host to some of the best jazz music in America. Just think about Miles Davis, the great jazz man who was born in East St. Louis. Then there's Chuck Berry, the great blues musician who still holds forth in St. Louis. The blues and jazz were intimately related at the beginning.

Burns also quotes the great master Duke Ellington:
"Put it this way. Jazz is a good barometer of freedom....In its beginnings, the United States of America spawned certain ideals of freedom and independence through which, eventually, jazz was evolved, and the music is so free that many people say it is the only unhampered, unhindered expression of complete freedom yet produced in this country."

Ellington puts forth some challenging thoughts. Reading the history of jazz by Ken Burns and listening to lots of the music recently, I've come to a far deeper appreciation of how music and jazz have reflected larger social tensions and developments in our society, particularly about issues of race and class, which have been the chief points of dispute often in our culture.

Wynton Marsalis said it well: "In American life you have all these different agendas. You have conflict all the time and we're attempting to achieve harmony through conflict. It seems strange to say that, but it's like an argument that you have with the intent to work something out, not an argument that you have with the intent to argue. And that's what jazz music is. You havae eight musicians on the bandstand and each one has his own personality and his own agenda. There's written music but then you leave that score and are left to make intelligent decisions. Decisions that have soul."

Marsalis' comments are a pretty good way to think about how we have inherited the independence granted to us on July 4th. What have we done with the freedom we've been given as Americans? How are we creatively dealing with your conflicts? Are we making decisions that have real soul? Sometimes, you've got to wonder about where things are going.

Sean Wilentz, author of the magisterial study The Rise of American Democracy: Jefferson to Lincoln reminds us that we still have to negotiate the meaning and terms of democracy in each generation as he writes:

"Democracy is never a gift bestowed by benevolent, farseeing rulers who seek to reinforce their own legitimacy. It must alwasy be fought for, by political coalitions that cut across distinctions of wealth, power, and interest. It succeeds and survives only when it is rooted in the lives and expectations of its citizens, and continually reinvigorated in each generation. Democratic successes are never irreversible."

What a great time to be an American! Now, tonight I think I'm ready for some Cardinals baseball.

New Orleans - 18 months after Katrina

2007-05-28T09:52:00.000-07:00

This past January I attended the Presbyterian Health, Education, and Welfare Assocation (PHEWA) Biennial Conference in New Orleans with the theme: "Repairers of the Breach" based on Isaiah 58: 12. At the conference our plenary address was given by Bill Quigley, a noted law professor in New Orleans and Director of the Law Clinic and the Gillis Long Poverty Law Center at Loyola University.

Quigley has provided updated information on the situation in New Orleans some 18 months later and it is a troubling report that he offers in the recent PHEWA Newsletter. Here are some of the facts:

18 months after Katrina, a third of a million people in the New Orleans metro area have not returned.
80% of the 5100 New Orleans occupied public housing apartments remain closed by order of the U.S. Dept. of Housing and Urban Dev. (HUD)
A key figure- Louisiana received $10 billion to fix up housing. Over 109,000 homeowners applied for federal funds to fix up their homes. 18 months later (Feb. 27, 2007), fewer than 700 families have received this federal assistance.
Renters, who comprised a majority of New Orleans residents, are worse off; they get nothing at all. Quigley observes that many in New Orleans do not want the poor who lived in public housing to return at all.
Tens of thousands of migrant workers have come to the Gulf Coast to work in the recover. Most workers tell of being promised good wages and working conditions, and plenty of work. Most of these promises were broken.
Healthcare is in crisis. Charity Hospital, which saw 350,000 patient visits a year, remains closed, as do half the hospitals in the city.

It's a disturbing account that Quigley presents. Where is the kind of national leadership that our President and Congress should be offering the Gulf Coast? This remains a moral and political challenge to our nation, and so far we are not responding.

Quigley observes that "Katrina did not create the inequalities of gender, race, and class; it provided a window to see them more clearly. But the aftermath of Katrina has aggravated these inequalities."

I wonder what the future holds for New Orleans and the Gulf Coast. I consider this one of the great moral issues of our day. Increasingly, I believe people of faith must rise to the challenge of mission in the Gulf.

Historian Douglas Brinkley frames the issue well in his monumental account of the week of the flood in New Orleans brought on by Katrina: "I have no doubt that New Orleans will recover, in time, form Hurricane Katrina. But America as a nation will never get over what happened."

(The Great Deluge, Douglas Brinkley, William Morrow Publishing, 2006)

This Memorial Day Week-end is a opportunity to realize that all battles for good aren't fought on distant battle-fields between armed combatants. Sometimes the battles are closer to home and they are moral and spiritual and political, and they will define the kind of people we are as a nation just as surely as other engagements we have entered as a nation.

This Life!

2007-05-21T08:09:00.000-07:00

This life, therefore,
is not godliness but the process of becoming godly,
not health but getting well,
not being but becoming,
not rest but exercise.

We are not now what we shall be, but we are on the way.
The process is not yet finished, but is actively going on.
This is not the goal, but it is the right road.

At present, everything does not gleam and sparkle,
but everything is being cleansed.
Martin Luther

This past Sunday afternoon, my new friend George, from Michigan
shared the above thought from Martin Luther at the concluding worship gathering
for "Great Plains Pilgrimage #1" at Calvin Crest, our presbytery camp located along the banks of the Platte River here in Nebraska. Actually, he gave this quote to me on a printed page as a parting gift. Something in the words and in the spirit of the giver made Luther's observations come alive for me.

In just a couple of meetings with George, I experienced a grace-filled man who later on in life, in his retirement, has discovered a deep calling to invite others into a relationship with the living Christ. It was just last Tuesday that I met some of the 40 lay and clergy Pilgrimage leaders who flew in from North Carolina, Georgia, Oklahoma, Michigan, Minnesota, and Iowa.
All came at their own expense to offer service and leadership for the inaugural Great Plains Pilgrimage. It's based on Cursillo, a Spanish renewal movement in the church that came to the United States and has been appropriated by Methodists in Walk to Emmaus and by Catholics and Lutherans and Presbyterians among others. Cursillo means a short course in Christian faith.

What I experienced in meeting these Pilgrimage new friends was a deep joy about growing in faith. My wife Cheryl was the Pilgrimage pastor for the week-end and far more involved than I, since I had other commitments. But sitting around a table for lunch even on the first day of the arrival of Pilgrimage servant leaders was enough for me to see how contagious this movement of Christians can be.

Arriving late on Sunday afternoon with a couple of vans to pick up these new friends and drive them to the airport, I had the delight of experiencing the closing worship celebration. Joyful music, inviting worship leaders, an embracing feeling of fellowship and hospitality all drew me in. And imagine this! Hearing Presbyterians getting up and briefly speaking about their faith and experience of grace over the course of 3 1/2 days of a renewal week-end. I heard and saw all this and thought, this is the kind of discipleship experience that I want to have with other followers of Christ.

Luther said it well, in the quote my friend George shared:

We are not now what we shall be, but we are on the way.
The process is not yet finished, but is actively going on.
This is not the goal, but it is the right road.

Report from the Border

2007-05-16T07:42:00.000-07:00

Rarely a day goes by that Lou Dobbs of CNN Broadcasting doesn't feature a piece of advocacy journalism on immigration from a very biased perspective. Build a wall is usually his recommendation. Deport illegal immigrants is another argument. The issue is much more complex and politically and economically charged. What role does faith play in this national conversation?

This week the Mission Committee of Missouri River Valley Presbytery made a conference call to BorderLinks in Tucson, AZ to speak with Michael Plank who is spending a year along the border with Mexico as part of a Presbyterian Church (USA) mission internship that sends recent college graduates all over the world. It's an exciting program and we wanted to talk with Michael about his experience. Michael is from Omaha, Nebraska where we made our call. First a word about BorderLinks.

BorderLinks is headquartered in Tucson, AZ across the border from Nogales, Mexico. Founded in 1987, BorderLinks is a bi-national non-profit organization that offers experiential education seminars along the border with Mexico focusing on the issues of global economics, militarization along the border, immigration, environmentalism and health issues, and concerns of oppression and violence. The web site is BorderLinks.org

Mexican immigrants crossing the border into the United States put their lives in jeopardy to find some kind of economic opportunity for themselves and their families Michael told us. We grasped that. As one member of our committee said, if the restaurants in West Omaha had to let go all their immigrant workers most of these eating establishments would close. It's a controversial issue. Some argue that immigrants are taking jobs from Americans. Others maintain that the jobs most often taken by immigrants are jobs no one else wants.

Michael described the dangerous journey across the desert into the United States that immigrants usually take over the course of 3-4 days with little water or food or medical supplies. Since 1994 an estimataed 2,500 deaths have occurred during the crossing. I can hear Lou Dobbs voice now, saying, no one forced them to take such a risk.

What would you say to Dobbs, I asked Michael. First, Michael observed, migrants are people who are desparate to work to feed their families. They are not criminals. They are sons and daughters, and mothers and fathers and uncles and aunts and family members just trying to survive in a global economy. Secondly, Michael commented, militarization along the border isn't working. We need to adddress the root causes of migration and work with the Mexican government to urge them to find ways to improve economic opportunity. And we need to partner with them to help that process.

Michael spoke about humanitarian efforts to offer assistance to immigrants, such as the Samaritan patrols into the desert to offer first aid, food and water and medical attention. These teams consist of one Spanish speaker and a doctor. Water tanks marked by a blue flag are also placed at strategic passage points in the desert.

How is border security and enforcement currently working, we asked Michael. He told us that som 2,000 people per day are being arrested for illegal entry. But he estimates that this is only 25% of the total who are successfully entering. Those who cross are often preyed upon by coyotes transporters who charge signifant fees to smuggle immigrants. Other criminal activity is occurring with human trafficking for sex and trafficking for what amounts to indentured servitude. There are many justice issues at stake along the border.

BorderLinks offers experiential learning seminars to groups who want to learn more about the complexity of the immigration issue and related concerns of life along the border with Mexico. Michael shared with us that a typical size group would be 10-15 participants who might come for 1-6 days for a customized seminar. Many groups are college age students or high school students.

BorderLinks is an ecumenical group with the goal "to give participants the opportunity to personally experience" all the complex of issues that are part of the border debate and "to develop their own opinions" about these concerns. If you go to the BorderLinks.org site you will see a calendar of groups from all over the United States coming to experience first-hand the crisis of the border. It's a pressing issue of public policy and a serious matter for people of faith to consider. The controversy isn't going away. In fact, it's building.

We were delighted to speak with Michael and learn more about his mission experience with the Presbyterian Church USA. For more information, go to the pcusa.org web site and go to the site search engine alphabetical list and lick on "m" for mission and you can read Michael's letters from the mission field.

Earth's Changing Climate: What is in Store for the Future?

2007-05-04T12:21:00.000-07:00

It was raining last night as I walked into the Scott Conference Center at University of Nebraska-Omaha to hear a lecture on climate change. Did the rain deter attendance? Absolutely not! There was a capacity crowd gathered in the conference center, perhaps as many as 500. I looked around the room and saw a broad age range of people - high school and college students, middle adults, and many older adults. The room was energized and alert for the presenter.

The lecturer was Dr. Henry N. Pollack, a native of Omaha, and for more than 40 years a professor of geophysics at the University of Michigan. Pollack carries a reputation as one of the world's leading experts on the temperature of the earth, both today and in the geological past. He's been a consultant with leaders in government and business on climate change. As he remarked, "The idea of a global economy is readily grasped. Why would we deny the existence of global climate impacts by human behavior?"

Pollack began by commenting that no other scientific topic has been so consistently present in the news over the last 10 years. Climate change generates considerable interest. The roomful of listeners last night bore out that claim

In 2007, over the course of recent months, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has issued 3 major reports on behalf of the United Nations and the World Meteorological Organinzation that detail major new findings that Pollack summarized for us.

Four major questions served as the outline for the lecture by Dr. Pollack:
1. Is the climate changing?
2. What is causing climate change?
3. What will be the consequences?
4. What should be done about climate change?

The first 3 questions are scientific in nature. The last question is primarily political, economic, ethical, and religious in nature.

Question #1: Pollack used power point slides of temperature measurements of the oceans and land masses over the last 120 years to illustrate conclusive proof that the climate is changing and temperatures are rising. 20 of the 25 hottest temperatures on record have occurred in the last 50 years. Most striking was Pollack's powerful use of slides to conclusively show the loss of mountain glacial fields and loss of snow mass on mountains such as Kilamanjaro in Africa.
Ice melt in Greenland and breaking of ice masses from the mainland in Antarctica from satellite photos were also shown.

According to the 2007 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, "Warming of the climate system is unequivocal."

Question #2: What is causing climate change? Scientific evidence decisively points to human agency as the overwhelming cause for climate change. Greenhouse gases are trapping heat in the atmosphere and thereby warming surface temperatures. IPCC asserts that this is a 90% probability.

Question #3: What are the consequences? Take your pick:
* A warmer planet
* Higher sea levels
*Extreme weather events
*Ocean acidification
*Geographic shifts of biota (changing plant & animal life)

Ice is melting and there will eventually be no glacier mountains. This is catastrophic in that 1/6 of the world's population, some 1 billion people, depend on glacial melt for water and for crops.

More dangerous heat waves are coming

Human health will be impacted.

Rising sea levels carry catastrophic impacts. The IPCC projects that a 1 meter rise in sea level in the coming century would displace 100 million people as "climate refugees". Compare that Dr. Pollack told us to our inability to cope with 100,000 refugees from Hurricane Katrina.

Question #4: What should we be doing? First, we must move out of denial! You can't confront a problem without admitting it, Dr. Pollack told us. Enormous denial exists. The good news is increased public awareness is growing. Looking around the room the night of this lecture was proof of that reality.

Here's where Pollack issued a principle of climate change policy:
"Avoid the unmanageable, while seeking to manage the unavoidable."

Another principle is to mitigate or slow and reverse climate change and its consequences. This will be a slow, but determined process for the rest of the 21st century.

Actions to be taken include:
1. Conseration of electricity and other energy fuels.
2. More efficient transportation. We could set a target to drive 500 million cars 5,000 fewer miles each year. Increase fuel economy from 30-60 mpg.
3. Renewable energy sources. Wind power and solar cells must be expanded.
4. Biofuels increased
5. Nuclear power. We haven't build a new nuclear plant in 30 years.

I came away from last night's lecture with a far greater understanding of the issues in climate change and a resolve to learn more and to do something.

Pollack made a strong challenge: "The United States must blaze the trail for others to follow."

I wonder. Will we take up the challenge?

How do we Design Worship Together?

2007-04-19T07:47:00.000-07:00

Recently, I was speaking with some church leaders about two critical worship concerns. As is commonly the case, they had experienced some tension in their church around worship and how staff members worked together, and how lay leaders felt a need for more support in their roles as worship committee members. Here's what I heard from these church leaders:

How to plan vital worship for a healthy congregation?
What does vital, healthy worship look like? What are some marks of healthy, dynamic worship that are easily grasped?

One marvelous resource I suggest for those two questions and many others is the recent book

Designing Worship Together: Models and Strategies for Worship Planning by Norma deWaal Malefyt and Howard Vanderwell, who are affiliated with the Calvin Institute of Christian Worship, at Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Michigan.

I attended the Calvin Symposium on Worship, a yearly event, a couple of years ago and found it to be an outstanding event. It's held in January of each year.

In their book, Malefyt and Vanderwell make a strong case for collaboration in worship planning, a practice often missing in many churches and sometimes not handled all that effectively. They also note some common obstacles to collaboration:

Incompatible views of worship. Some have a particular view of what traditional worship looks and feels like, while others have a certain notion of what contemporary worship means. Often, either assumption can be narrow or idiosyncratic.
Insufficient available time. When key worship leaders, musicians and pastor, don't make the needed time to work together, along with lay leaders, worship planning suffers.
Failure of partnerships
Unwillingness of some to carry their weight
Political poll taking. Those with different points of view, or with anxieties about fresh approaches, defensively start taking the pulse of the congregtion.
Failure to plan ahead.

Malefyt and Vanderwell believe that a congregation's worship life will be richer when more people are involved in planning. At the same time, they recognize that bringing in more people presents challenges. Teams must communicate clearly and fully with one another. An important question they raise is, "Will all of the participants have adequate training in matters of worship?"

I find the suggestion to work on a Worship Purpose Statement to be quite valuable. It offers the opportunity to test our assumptions about worship in light of biblical, theological, and local customs. In my own Presbyterian (PCUSA church) we have an excellent "Directory for Worship" in our Consitution that offers much help in dealing with these theological and practical concerns.

In the course of reading Designing Worship Together, I came across a summary of vital and faithful worship offered by the well respected Presbyterian worship theologian, Tom Long, who teaches at Emory University. Long says that vital and faithful congregations:

Make room, somewhere in worship, for the experience of mystery.
Make planned and concerted efforts to show hospitality to the stranger
Have recovered and made visible the sense of drama inherent in Christian worship
Emphasize congregational music that is both excellent and eclectic in style and genre
Creatively adapt the space and environment of worship
Forge a strong connection between worship and local mission- expressed in how God's word calls us to service and discipleship
Maintain a relatively stable order of service and a significant repertoire of worship elements and responses that the congregation knows by heart
Moves to a joyous, festival experience toward the end of worship
Have strong, appealing pastors as worship leaders

This is just a taste of the rich abundance of materials to be found in Designing Worship Together. It's one of the best resouces I know of for learning how to collaborate in worship planning, and it shows a real understanding of some of the common obstacles.

Compass Point #9 What's Christian about family values?

2007-04-14T07:18:00.000-07:00

This past Easter Sunday our church offered up a wonderful brunch between worship services, featuring what I considerd award winning egg and sausauge casseroles. I told the Presbyterian church I serve that if they weren't careful about it, they'd be rivaling the Lutherans pretty soon and our next target would be the tuna hot dish casserole competition. They laughed. We all enjoyed the food and fellowship.

At one table I noticed four generations of a family gathered together. Now you don't see that everyday. Great-grandmother Evelyn was in town from out of state. I could tell she was greatly loved. Her daughter had shared a newspaper article about her mom after a recent sharing time in worship, when I asked people to say something about people who had shaped their faith. "I want you to read this about my mom," was the comment I heard as a copy of an old newspaper article was handed to me after worship. It was a moving story about her mom and dad and the difference their lives made to foster children through the years.

Evelyn and her husband Roy began caring for foster children in 1945 stated the newspaper article I was reading. The article also showed them at their kitchen table, with a pile of pictures spread out. Here's what I read:

"Children's faces-infants, toddlers, teenagers, spill over the table s the graying grandmother picks through them, a collection going back 37 years. There are hundreds of pictures but for every face there is a name and a special memory" 'This is Maggie, the first little girl we had...Bob, we had him the longest, 10 years...These are the five babies under 2 that we had at one time. I had just dressed them to go to church.' Eddie, Judy, Danny, Butch, Susan, Penny, Jane, Joey- the names, more than 800--go on and on."

Evelyn and Roy ended up providing care for 823 children. The governor of South Dakota issued a special proclamation noting their service quite a few years back, commending them "for opening their home and their hearts in lifetime labors of unusual understanding, uncommon devotion, and unbounded love to the young people of South Dakota."

Their foster children came from family backgrounds that included abuse, alcoholism, mental illness, economic hardship, parent separations and other problems. "We had children with physical problems too," said Evelyn, citing allergies, cleft palate, impetigo, respiratory disease and a child who had been accidentally burned.

I think of my own three sons and how it was, shall we say, occasionally stressful to deal with certain issues, like ear-aches or banged up shins from a soccer game , and I marvel at the capacity for love and care that Evelyn and her husband Roy shared. In the article, Roy (who is now deceased) remarked: "When I went to work in the morning I never knew how many children would be there when I got home at night."

Evelyn tells about one young boy named Bob who came to them as a youthful gang leader. "I hesitated at first, but then I thought, what if he was my son." "At first he was always getting in trouble at school and I made many trips to the principal's office." Young Bob lived with Roy and Evelyn until he was 19, finishing high school and college. Some years later he brought his wife and two sons back for a visit with Roy and Evelyn, "to meet the people who raised me," he said.

I thought about that story as I sat down for a visit on Easter Sunday with a four generation family table. This is what it looks like to be a Christian. I'm rather dubious when I hear that contested phrase "family values" used in political and religious circles, but if I had to venture a description it would look something like the families shaped by Roy and Evelyn.

"Who are my mother and my brothers?" Jesus asked. And looking at those who sat around him, he said, "Here are my mother and my brothers! Whoever does the will of God is my brother and sister and mother." (Mark 3: 33-35)

Compass Point #8 Doubt and Disbelief in the Life of Discipleship

2007-04-12T13:08:00.000-07:00

What does it mean to be a Christian? That's the question I've been exploring now for several weeks, after I saw a CNN program with Anderson Cooper that explored that very issue. Some of those profiled by Cooper were Christians whose faith I recognized and identified with. Others, particularly those from the Christian right, offered up statements and commitments about faith that I reject. Does that sound harsh?

Consider these statements from Christopher Morse's book Not Every Spirit: A Dogmatics (theology) of Christian Disbelief:

"To believe in God is not to believe everything. In fact, it is hard to imagine what believing everything would mean....Surely a tendency to trust everything without awareness of what is untrustworthy is not the faith in God to which we have been called by the gospel. But are there some things that Christian faith refuses to believe? And if so, how do we come to recognize what they are?"

"Running through the traditions of scripture within the Bible there is what may be termed a call to "faithful disbelief" A key instance of this is most simply expressed in words of the First Epistle of John: "Beloved, do not believe every spirit, but test the spirits to see whether they are from God; for many false prophets have gone out into the world." (I John 4: 1)

"Faithful disbelief" occupies an important place in the life of faith. As Morse rightly points out, how could we believe everything? Over a year ago, while I was visiting in Rome, my son and I visited the church where Galileo stopped to pray before facing the rather terrifing trial regarding the orthodoxy of his faith. Galileo had the temerity to suggest that the sun does not revolve around the earth. Not a smart thing to say at the time! It took the church quite a while to acknowledge that Galileo was correct and the church was wrong. That would not be the last instance of a courageous soul facing up to the power of a church bent on obedience, even when the solitary, courageous human spirit was in the right.

It's becoming more prevalent to hear state governments making official apologies for complicity with slavery in our nation's history. My own home state, North Carolina, recently issued a statement of "contrition" for condoning slavery in its past history. That sounds rather biblical, that word contrition. The psalmist knew something of what it meant to seek a "contrite heart". On occasion, I think it would be good for most every religious body to make a clean admission of error.

Many times the church has called for obedience and assent to certain aspects of supposedly right belief that were later acknowledged to be wrong. Church bodies in recent years have made statements of repentance for tacitly condoning slavery. Southern Baptists have done so. Some have admitted limited understandings of ministry in years past by not calling women as well as men to all offices of ministry. Others like the Southern Baptists continue their intransigence on that topic.

And now, some church bodies are expressing regret for a profoundly inadequate appreciation for God's good creation, the planet earth, which more and more Christians now realize is a sacred trust that we must manage with tender care and reverence. The current debate over global warming is part of that ongoing dispute. I admired the National Association of Evangelicals for backing its Vice President, Richard Cizek, who was under fire by the likes of James Dobson of Focus on the Family, after Cizek led the NAE in addressing such issues as global warming and for issuing a declaration opposing the use of torture in war. A process of doubt and examination of previous assumptions about the core of faith "undoubtedly" played a role in this evolution of evangelical understanding by the NAE.

The upcoming lectionary reading for this Sunday is John 20: 24-31 which includes the story of "doubting Thomas". Mention the word doubt in Christian circles, ask people their initial reaction to that word at a gut level and wait for the responses. Rarely do people first express an appreciation for the place of doubt in faith. The Apostle Paul celebrates the triune virtues of "faith,hope, and love", but I would add another to that list, "faith, hope, love and doubt." Without a place for doubt, I know I could not be a Christian. There would be no place for me to have faith in such a worldview.

How is doubt a powerful aid to confront false belief? I find that question to be crucial in the practice of discipleship and faith. Look around you and see the beliefs and practices that ought to be doubted. Some courageous people have been distinguished by the fact that in the face of universally accepted falsehoods, they dared to stand up and cry: "I doubt that." Without doubt, as many have observed, only an oppressive status quo and its established dogmas would exist.

What I appreciate about this Sunday's lectionary is how Jesus treated Thomas. Jesus does not shame Thomas for his questioning faith. Rather, he invites Thomas to reach out with his hand and touch the wounds in his hands and side. Doubt, it seems to me, is sometimes a wounded faith or idealistic trust that needs acceptance and healing. Doubting people recognize the credibility and authenticity of those who have suffered for what they believe and trust and are willing to risk.

Someone has written that Thomas is the "apostle from the show me state," almost the official slogan for the state of Missouri. Having lived in Missouri for almost ten years, I find that comment humorous. But I don't think it was just stubbornness on Thomas' part. He was willing to stand apart from a conventional faith that doesn't question; he was also willing to engage in an earnest search for Jesus as "the way, the truth, and the life." Call him the first seeker!

Religion, Peace, and World Affairs

2007-04-11T06:46:00.000-07:00

Several months ago, I read Madeline Albright's recent book The Mighty and the Almighty,
in which the former Secretary of State under President Clinton explored the intersections of religion, politics, and foreign policy. It's an excellent book for reading and discussion. Given the volatile nature of religion and politics in the world today, Albright sought to address what she acknowleded to be a long neglected topic in foreign affairs, that can no longer stand.

Recently I've come across another significant resource for relating religion to politics and world affairs, located at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C. The website is as follows
www.berkleycenter.georgetown.edu A brief description of this university program follows:

The Berkley Center for Religion, Peace, and World Affairs
The Berkley Center explores the intersection of religion with contemporary global challenges: relations among states and societies; global development; democracy and human rights; and culture and identity. Two foundational premises guide the Center's work: that scholarship on religion and its role in world affairs can help to address these challenges effectively; and that the open engagement of religious traditions with one another and with the wider society can promote peace. The Center was created in March 2006 through a generous grant by William R. Berkley.

The Berkley Center also offers major databases for education and research, one of which I particulary found interesting: Faith 2008 which explores the following questions-

Will faith play the role in the 2008 election that it did in 2004 ?
How will candidates articulate their personal beliefs?
How will they relate their beliefs to public policy issues ranging from education and social policy to terrorism and the war in Iraq?

I think you'll find this site quite interesting and valuable.

World Affairs: It's unavoidable for us all to care and learn

2007-04-10T08:35:00.000-07:00

My high school son wanted to talk one night recently about his new course in "world affairs."
He needed help in selecting 3 topics to read about and research on a weekly basis. Did I have any ideas? he wanted to know. I did, but I also wanted to draw out his interests, and so we talked about a number of topics. World affairs is an unavoidable topic for us all anymore, but it is a concern that so few Americans spend much effort trying to learn about a topic that just can't be ignored any longer. My son finally selected these topics:

The Iraq War (see below for an introduction to a deeper look at this concern from the excellent Catholic journal "Commonweal."
Global Warming (Al Gore's Academy Award for "An Inconvenient Truth" has spurred lots of discussion and debate, right down to younger adults, who do increasingly care about the environment. Although one family member in another state, asked, "How can there be global warming when we've just had a snow storm in the spring?" That's a question for another day.)
Hugo Chavez and Venezeula, the admittedly controversial leader of a nation we are currently at odds with.

Each of the research topics my son selected bears enormous consequences for the United States and the world. All too often, I shared with my son, our public discussion of such topics gets refined down to slogans, cliches, and political manipulation for partisan advantage. It's an old American propensity. Take one example. President Bush spoke a few years ago of a "global axis of evil". It places the United States in the role of white knight and defender of freedom. But that's not how the rest of the world views us anymore.

Benjamin R. Barber in his book "Fear's Empire: War, Terrorism, and Democracy" frames the issue in another way, identifying what he calls a "global axis of inequality". Nations and peoples around the world look at the United States with a mixture of admiration, envy, and resentment for our military and economic dominance. And that has led to a dangerous situation. We can no longer turn a blind eye to that reality.

So take a look at Andrew J. Bacevich's introduction to the current hot topic: The war in Iraq.

Downsizing: From the April 6, 2006 issue Commonweal Magazine

www.commonwealmagazine.org

WHAT THE ‘SURGE’ REALLY MEANS
Andrew J. Bacevich
War, we must always remind ourselves, is the continuation of politics by other means. Understanding any war requires first understanding that war’s political basis. What brings the parties into conflict? What are they fighting for?
The challenge of grasping the politics underlying the “Global War on Terror” begins with its very name: it obfuscates rather than clarifies. To contend that the United States is currently engaged in a worldwide military campaign to root out terrorism is to perpetrate a ruse. Generically classifying our adversaries as “terrorists” or “killers” obviates any need to examine their actual purposes or, for that matter, our own. It encourages politicians to spout clichés about “good” and “evil” while permitting them to dodge any serious discussion of power and interests.
In any war, political purpose finds ultimate expression in geopolitics. This war is no exception. The contest fully joined on September 11, 2001, occurs in a concrete and readily identifiable context: the “Global War on Terror” is actually a struggle to determine who will control the Persian Gulf and its environs.

Death on a Friday Afternoon

2007-04-06T11:53:00.000-07:00

Quote from "Meditations on the Last Words of Jesus From the Cross" by Richard John Neuhaus, in his book Death on a Friday Afternoon.

"Good Friday is not just one day of the year. It is a day relived in every day of the world, and of our lives in the world. In the Christian view of things, all reality turns around the "paschal mystery" of the death and resurrection of Christ.
As Passover marks the liberation from bondage in Egypt, so the paschal mystery marks humanity's passage from death to life. Good Friday cannot be confined to Holy Week. It is not simply the dismal but necessary prelude to the joy of Easter, although I'm afraid many Christians think of it that way. Every day of the year is a good day to think more deeply about Good Friday, for Good Friday is the drama of the love by which our every day is sustained."

Neuhaus' book has been part of my Holy Week reading for a few years now. I come back to it during the course of this week for the keen spiritual, pastoral, and social insights that Neuhaus provides from this sustained examination of Good Friday.

During the course of Holy Week, Good Friday forms part of what Christians have long called the Triduum Sacrum, the three sacred days of: Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, and Easter Sunday. Some scholars speculate that "Good Friday" comes from "God's Friday", as "good-bye"
was originally "God be by you." But as Neuhaus remarks, it is just as odd that it should be called God's Friday, when it is the day we say good-bye to the glory of God.

In "Death on a Friday Afternoon," Neuhaus offers reflections on the Seven Last Words of Jesus from the Cross, although they are really Seven Statements of varied perspective:

"Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do."
"Truly, I say to you, today you will be with me in paradise."
"Woman, behold your son. Son, behold your mother."
"My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?"
"I thirst"
"It is finished."
"Father, into your hands I commend my spirit."

In the course of reading "Death on a Friday Afternoon," each year, I find honest reflections about the strength of faith and the struggle for faith offered up by Neuhaus. There's a fierce honesty about the presence of evil and suffering in the life of faith, no shrinking back from looking at this challenge to the goodness and power of God. And yet there's an equal and courageous presentation of the mystery and "awe-full" power of God's redemptive work in the suffering of Jesus. Personally, I need to hold on to both sides of this examination of the cross and human suffering. I need the freedom to question and doubt how the cross of Jesus is relevant and effective for human salvation. And I need the strong courage and illuminating insights provided by the resilience of a theology offered up by Neuhaus.

Neuhaus shows how in touch he is with the honest struggles of people to apprehend the meaning of the cross and Good Friday:

"I suppose I should not be surprised anymore, but I am. With remarkable frequency I run into people who admit that, when it comes to this business abut the cross and curcifixion, they just don't "get it." Some of these people are lifelong and devout Christians, others are inquirers and still others are devout unbelievers for whom the bloodiness of Good Friday is just one more reason for not being a Christian."

Neuhaus doesn't shrink from addressing any of these doubts.

Toward the very end of the book, in a chapter titled "The Scars of God", Neuhaus speaks of how a soldier pierces Jesus' side with a spear, and how "at once there came out blood and water." It is the wound of Christ, but it reminds us that in the very heart of God a scar was left that heals.

Years ago, when I was in seminary preparing for ministry, news came to me that my mother had received a diagnosis of terminal cancer. It was during the Easter Season that I received this news. I remember the shock and difficulty of coming to terms with this news about a woman who was not just my mother, but a person of deep faith and love. I was angry at God. It was so unfair. It was, as Neuhaus has so poignantly observed, a reminder that Good Friday is not limited to a day or a single moment in time.

I remember what one of my seminary teachers said at the time, "If the cross means anything at all, it means that God can take human sin and suffering and human anger into the divine heart, and heal and transform us." God's own heart has been scarred in the crucifixion.

When the soldier pierced Jesus' side, Neuhaus professes, one strand of devotional thought in later centuries saw the piercing of the very heart of Christ, and in that action "the invitation to all humanity to enter into the Body of Christ, which is the Church."

But with that invitation comes a powerful call to discipleship and faith:
"Then (at the time of crucifixion) the body of Christ was on the cross, and now the Body of Christ, the Church, is on the cross, and with it the whole of humanity."

Everyone has a heart. Neuhaus concludes by affirming that in the heart of Jesus, "every heart is broken, and every heart is healed."

God's heart is big enough and strong enough to bear both scars and healing.

3 Big Questions Congregations Need to Ask

2007-03-29T08:40:00.000-07:00

Today's post includes material from Chris, my UCC minister friend and colleague from New York. We both are participants in the Lombard Mennonite Peace Center "Clergy Clinic", a year long program that deals with healthy congregations and healthy leadership. With colleagues across the denominational spectrum, we've found lots of shared experiences and common issues in ministry. Here's what Chris had to share recently from an Alban Institute workshop:

"There are three big questions that all congregations need to think about and answer for themselves: Who are we? What has God called us to do? And, who is our neighbor? Although each of these questions can be answered quickly and glibly, in truth each calls for profound and prayerful discernment, over a significant period of time, not just by the pastor or the pastoral staff, but by the entire congregation.

Our three days together at the Alban seminar focused on congregational style and culture. Every congregation has a signature style—which we usually think of as being represented by certain key symbols. These styles and symbols can be greatly varied; often, they are evident in worship.

For example, three very different churches can all think of themselves as having “excellent music.” In one congregation this may mean Bach fugues, and piano-violin pieces by Mendolssohn. In another church, it may mean a contemporary service, complete with rock or rap music, and a monthly jazz vespers service. In a third congregation the emphasis could be on heartfelt African American spiritual music.

Our workshop presenter said something about the planning process that impressed me. There are three kinds of planning that churches typically do: problem-solving planning, which is quick, immediate, and addresses specific concerns (There’s no hot water in the kitchen. What do we do to fix it?); long-range or developmental planning which addresses the question, “What’s next?” (e.g., should we expand the sanctuary, or go to a second service to handle the large crowds?); and frame-bending planning, which is really strategic planning and asks those “Who-are-We, What-has-God-called-us-to-do, Who-is-our-neighbor” sorts of questions.

What I found interesting is that many of the problems facing churches today are complicated. They are triggered by external (e.g., environmental, economic, community) changes. They are systemic problems, and they require frame-bending planning. They require churches to ask those “Who-are-we, what-has-God-called-us-to-do, Who-is-our-neighbor questions.Yet many churches try to address such problems with problem-solving or developmental planning.

They apply linear solutions to systemic problems. But it doesn’t work. When the neighborhood changes, and giving, attendance and membership goes down, it may take more than a special program, or an invite-your-neighbor campaign to turn things around. Churches have to rethink who they are, what God has called them to do, and who their neighbor is. A simple but profound idea, this is. "

That's what Chris took away from a fine workshop with the Alban Institute. Getting beyond those quick-fix solutions and problem solving approaches is, nevertheless, quite a challenge. As Chris and I and others have been learning, there's often a deep-seated anxiety in many churches that narrows the kind of imaginative work that is needed to re-vision Christian discipleship and ministry in today's world.

Jesus spoke about these spiritual realities with keen insight in Mark 2: 21-22. "No one sews a piece of unshrunk cloth on an old cloak; otherwise, the patch pulls away from it, the new from the old, and a worse tear is made. And no one puts new wine into old wineskins; otherwise, the wine will burst the skins; but one puts new wine into fresh wineskins."

In this season of Lent, that Jesus view is worth deep pondering. Are we just trying to patch something together to last a little longer? Are we afraid of the fresh, invigorating life of the Spirit that Jesus offers? What do you think?

Tar Heel "Blue"

2007-03-26T12:15:00.000-07:00

Yesterday's game between Carolina and Georgetown was hugely exciting the first half, with my Tar Heels showing what looked like dominance, but then the air came out of the ball for my team the second half. As Coach Roy Williams said in a press conference afterward, the highs in basketball competition are never as high as the lows are low! Did he ever get that right!

To say there was great gnashing of teeth at my house over the loss of a game it looked like we had won, is putting it mildly.

Over the years, since my childhood really in North Carolina, I've followed the Tar Heels with great enthusiasm.

A few years ago, when my two older sons were in high school, they got to attend Basketball Camp at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill. My sister Beverly, at the time, gave me a book I've enjoyed titled "The 12 Leadership Principles of Dean Smith" by David Chadwick, a former player. Smith is the icon of coaching at Carolina and is the man who gave Roy Williams his chance to become an assistant coach and started him on his own great career.

Leadership principle #10 in Chadwick's study of Coach Dean Smith is called "Making Failure Your Friend." Chadwick recalls visiting Coach Smith to inform him of his plans to deal with this subject and I think to get the o.k.

As Chadwick visited with his former coach and mentor, Dean Smith recalled a particular day in practice when a player named Matt Wenstrom did something wrong, and then started to pout.
Coach Smith went over to him and asked, "How do you handle mistakes in life?"

Wenstrom quickly recited the thought for the day from the practice plan. "When faced with failure, recognize it, admit it, learn from it, forget it!"

Coach said to the players, "If you can learn any one thing in life, learn that! Learn from your mistakes and move on."

There's an old saying that "You don't drown by falling in the water. You drown by staying there!"

As David Chadwick remarks, Coach Smith's career was marked by many failures. But he continued to learn from them. He steadfastly refused to stay in the water and drown. Instead, he learned how to become a fantastic swimmer.

As I think back on this Sunday's game, it was a failure in many ways. Fans of Tar Heels basketball could be tempted to drown in our sorrows. But the reason I've long admired Carolina Basketball is because of the leadership and character of people like Dean Smith and his successor Roy Williams.

I still remember the story of Dean Smith's commitment to equality and racial justice. It was 1959 when Coach Smith and his pastor took an African-American seminary student and sat down in a Chapel Hill whites-only restaurant. It was the first step toward serious integration in Chapel Hill. When asked about it, Coach Smith simply said, "It was the right thing to do."

That's really what Tar Heel Blue means to me and many others. There will be other days to celebrate victory, but there's also something to be learned from "making friends with failure."

Compass Point #7 Being Like Jesus

2007-03-26T09:50:00.000-07:00

Something about Jesus

by Barbara Brown Taylor
Most Christians are stubbornly fixed on being like Jesus. He is the gold standard for what it means to be fully human, in full union with the Divine. They tell me what it costs to love unconditionally, to forgive 70-times-seven, to show compassion for the poor—all essential hallmarks of Jesus' ministry. What I hear less about is what it costs to oppose the traditions of the elders, to upset pious expectations of what a child of God should say or do, to subvert religious certainty, and to make people responsible for their own lives. Yet all of these are present in his example too.

Jesus is an agitator, and Barbara Brown Taylor captures that agitation quite powerfully in the above comment. She goes on to say in this article, found in the current issue of Christian Century Magazine, that Christian discipleship might be less about being like Jesus and more along the lines of seeing ourselves in the human efforts of disciples like Peter, Mary, and John in following Jesus. If we're going to follow Jesus, then we have to follow behind him.
Like those first disciples we have a tendency to wander off by ourselves, until we hear the voice of Jesus calling us back.

Garry Wills in his wonderful recent book, What Jesus Meant, would seem to find common cause with Barbara Brown Taylor's reminder that we're not really much like Jesus. Wills does some tough agitating himself. As he observes, in certain religious circles the letters WWJD serve as a kind of pithy summary of what Christian discipleship is supposed to look like. "What Would Jesus Do?" assures us that doing the same thing is the goal of real Christians.

But here's the rub according to Wills. "Can we really aspire to do what Jesus did?" As Wills remarks, it would never have occurred to the first disciples to wear a WWJD bracelet. "Jesus ghosted in and out of people's lives, blessing and cursing, curing and condemning....The last thing he can be considered is a 'gentle Jesus meek and mild."

I recommend Garry Wills book What Jesus Meant highly as a corrective to the smooth assumption that we know what it means to be "like Jesus". Jesus the agitator and boundary breaker doesn't allow neat assumptions about "doing things like him". Here's just a short summary of Wills close reading of the gospels about Jesus:

"His very presence was subversive".

Jesus was called an agent of the devil, or the devil himself (Mk 3:32, Jn 7:20)
He was unclean (Lk. 11:38), a consorter with Samartians (Lk 17:16) and with loose women (Lk &:39)
He was a promoter of immorality (Mk 2:16), a glutton and a drunkard (Lk 7:34)
A mocker of the Jewish law (Mt. 12: 10; Jn 5:16(
A schismatic (Jn 8:48)

"He was never respectable"

Jesus, in fact, seemed to prefer the company of the less-than-respectable (Lk 6:35)
He was a friend of tax collectors and sinners Lk 15

Jesus challenged conventional thinking in many ways.

If your relatives came asking about why you weren't sufficiently committed to family values, would you answer like Jesus, that you have no relatives but those who do God's will? (Mk 3: 33-35)
If we could cast out devils, would we send them into a herd of pigs, destroying two thousand animals (Mk 5:13)? Christians who place a very high value on property rights might have a problem with that.

And so when I think about what it means to follow Jesus, I'm drawn to the conclusion that following him seems to be guaranteed to lead to some element of trouble. Usually, that's the last place we expect him to lead us.

What do you think?

Get busy living, or get busy dying!

2007-03-25T19:53:00.000-07:00

As a native Tar Heel, I watched with great anticipation the 60 minutes interview by Katie Couric of Presidential candidate John Edwards and his wife Elizabeth discussing her fight with cancer and their decision as a couple to continue the campaign. I was deeply moved by their comments. They spoke with courage while answering Couric's tough questioning. How can you go forward? Couric asked in several different ways. Here's the response by Elizabeth Edwards:

Anticipating the demands of the campaign trail, Elizabeth Edwards said her options were clear.
"Either you push forward with the things that you were doing yesterday or you start dying. That seems to be your only two choices," she said. "If I had given up everything that my life was about — first of all, I'd let cancer win before it needed to."

Like many others, I've had close family members die because of cancer. And so I found Elizabeth Edwards' courage enormously inspiring. At the same time, the cynical element in American political discourse would seek to undermine the integrity of John and Elizabeth Edwards. What a sad commentary on the level of public discussion of such a deeply moving story.

I think that ultimately, the Edward's decision is a deeply spiritual choice. We are all going to die, as they pointed out. It's a matter of time and circumstance. But how we live in facing the ultimate challenge of death makes all the difference.

"Nothing in life or in death can separate us from the love of God in Jesus Christ," says the Apostle Paul in Romans 8.

I applaud John and Elizabeth Edwards for their courage and their faith.

What does leadership look like? Some thoughts inspired by Peter Drucker

2007-03-20T10:14:00.000-07:00

Recently I was browsing through Barnes & Noble Bookstore, when I came across a new book inspired by the noted management/leadership consultant Peter Drucker. It was titled The Daily Drucker: 366 Days of Insight and Motivation. What struck me was how the packaging of the book made it seem like a small bible, complete with red ribbon marker, as if one's daily spiritual reading were to be found inside.

Aside from the slick packaging of Drucker's new book, I have to say that I have benefited from this noted management guru in my efforts to become a more effective leader through the years.
Mention the name Drucker in business circles, and the response is akin to a modern day prophet whose works are often cited like scripture. I guess that accounts for the devotional quality of the aforementioned book "366 Days of Insight and Motivation".

One of Drucker's suggestions is that we move away from the question, "How can I achieve?" to a different sort of concern, "How can I contribute?" That second question is not far from a more spiritual question, "How can I serve?" The focus moves from a narrow, sometimes narcissistic concern with self to a healthier interest in our contributions to the welfare of others.

In a book I've found valuable, The Essential Drucker, some key insights about leadership and organizational vitality are helpfully summarized. These insights offer value to non-profits and church organizations as well.

First, according to Drucker, every organization needs performance in three areas:

direct results
building of values and their reaffirmation
building and developing people for tomorrow

As Drucker argues, there has to be something this organization stands for, or else it degenerates into disorganization, confusion, and paralysis.

As someone who is called to contribute to the church and its mission in the world, I find Drucker's pithy summary of organizational leadership quite challenging. Having been around church organizations most of my professional career, I can say that spelling out "what the church stands for" is often quite frustrating. Ask the average person what their church is about, and mostly you get the answer, "we're a friendly group of people". Rarely do you get the sense that people explaining their church are describing a people or community who are on a journey to learn a different way of life.

If we are talking about results, think how more satisfying it would be to talk about "faith as a verb", where church is a group of people called to put faith and love into action, to make them real, to make them come alive for people.

Or when it comes to Drucker's second emphasis on "building values and their reaffirmation" consider an example like Habitat for Humanity. Its stated goal is to make shelter a matter of conscience. Now that's a value that an organization like a church should be able to seize on. And many have!

Or take Drucker's third emphasis on "building people for tomorrow". How do we approach such a task? Quite often it feels like we in the church have a greater investment in the past than we do in the future. Some time ago, I said to a group of colleagues, "I don't care if I ever celebrate another church anniversary. I don't want to celebrate the past. I want to make some history and live for the future." A few of my colleagues nodded agreement, some lifted an eyebrow.

I like what noted religion scholar Huston Smith once suggested as a mission focus for a church:

"Committed to Making People Real"

As Smith observed, that's not a bad way to describe the religious project: the effort to transcend religious phoniness.

Peter Drucker held a deep appreciation for spiritual organizations and values. He held that the foundation of effective leadership is thinking through:

the organization's mission
defining it
and establishing it, clearly and visibly.

All of those tasks require sizeable energy. All too often, I see churches avoid the hard task of focusing on the tasks of leadership and the tough wrestling with purpose and goals out of fear of offending anyone. Far too many church mission statements are so generically vague that they are in no danger of inspiring anyone to great dreams or actions.

A t.v. commercial used to ask, "Where's the beef?"

For those of us who care about the church's mission, there's a pointed question as well:
"Where's the passion?"

Compass Point #6 Celtic Spirituality Features of Celtic Christianity

2007-03-17T15:39:00.000-07:00

At a meeting of our Presbytery today, I heard a man give thanks for his dear departed mother, who was an O'Toole he told us. Later in the day, he assured us, he would celebrate her life properly in the Irish fashion. I thought, to myself, now that's a fine way to give thanks for a saint!

Not to feel left out, I'm grateful that I was invited to celebrate St. Patrick's Day later in the evening, in another venue with some good friends. Come with an Irish blessing, I was told!

In some of my reading in recent years, I've been drawn to features of Celtic spirituality that offer strong appeal for many today, and not just the Irish.

One observer of Celtic Spirituality ("spiritualities" to be more accurate), Richard J. Woods in his book The Spirituality of the Celtic Saints, writes that spirituality is best traced to the biblical view of "spirit" in ancient Hebrew culture as the "breath of life" which is a direct gift of God - spirit is "ruach" in Hebrew. "Spirit" is that virtue by which a person is open to and transmits the life of God. We breath out and we breath in and in so doing, the very breath of God is in us. It is the capacity to respond to God and the gift of life in all its dimensions.

Richard Woods believes that spirituality is best understood as "the story of our life as a whole as we have directed it toward the realization of our deepest longings and highest aspirations."
But all life is most authentically shared in community. We all share the same air on earth; the same life-giving oxygen circulates and re-circulates in us all. A private spirituality would be no spirituality at all, as it would mean closing ourselves off from the "Spirit" of God who animates all living things.

And so, I give thanks for the following elements of Celtic spirituality, which are not exclusive to that tradition, but seem to have received deep emphasis in this tradition of faith and spirit:

Community:
Ø Shared faith and life are not just one aspect of faith, but the chief feature of this understanding of the Christian journey

Pilgrimage:

Ø Life is seen as a journey.
Ø Certain places are very significant; they are “thin” places, where we feel the closeness of God in a deep way.
Ø Just as Jesus was drawn to mountain and deserts; these thin places
become landmarks in life; a place of new beginnings; or of fresh resolve

Soul Friends:

Ø If life is a journey, it can be a lonely one
Ø We all need friends along the way.
Ø We all need a mature, experienced Christian; who will walk the road
With us, modeling the life of Jesus.
Ø The Celts referred to such a person as a soul friend
Ø They help us develop a more Christ-like life, and help us with the many choices along life’s way.
Ø Their aim is a more general means of support, to encourage us to wholeness of life and faith

Rhythms of life and faith:
Ø The Celtic Christians lived closer to nature, and saw and experienced the change of seasons in life.
Ø They felt closer to God in the experience of nature and of God’s presence in the whole of the world and life.
Ø Celebrated rites of passage

Prayer:
Ø Took seriously the scripture to “pray without ceasing”
Ø Prayed for all experiences: getting up, going to bed, prayers for the house, for work and leisure music, starting fires, Prayers of protection: they knew they lived in a dangerous world

So, on this St. Patrick's Day, I wish you god-speed as you explore further these elements of the
spirit that bring life and sometimes a "second breath".

Compass Point #5 St.Patrick, Following Jesus, and being a Disciple Today

2007-03-14T08:27:00.000-07:00

With St. Patrick's Day quickly approaching; visions of green beer, corned beef and cabbage and shamrocks fill the imagination and stoke the appetite. At my church's Lenten Study on "Learning/Living Jesus" tonight, we'll share in some great corned beef and cabbage by one of the church's premier cooks. Did you get stuck with that job? she was asked. "No", she replied, "I want to do it!" This wonderful woman considers her gift of cooking for others to be a way she shares in the church's life of hospitality. And I can't wait to benefit !

As a centering prayer tonight, we'll pray the prayer of St. Patrick. I love this prayer like many others do, particularly for its earthiness and concrete imagery of the Trinity. So often our prayers seem so light that they float in a pool of warm maple syrup, not grounded in the tough, sinewy realties of life. Our prayers sometimes feel like "chicken soup for the soul", minus all the chicken and rice and vegetables. Just a thin watery stuff.

That's why St. Patrick's so appealing in his life and prayer. The opening section of the famous St. Patrick prayer starts with a bold affirmation: "I bind unto myself today." That binding action signifies an almost physical action to claim, hold, and hang on for dear life to the presence of God in all circumstances. There's none of that tepid, Christ in "my heart" kind of spirituality, that reduces Jesus to a kind of warm, fuzzy feeling that wouldn't say boo to a danger threatening close at hand, or to a bold adventure in living faith out in the world. Here's how St. Patrick prays:

"I bind unto myself today
the power of God to hold and lead,
God's eye to watch, God's might to stay,
God's ear to hearken to my need,
the wisdom of my God to teach,
God's hand to guide, God's shield to ward,
the word of God to give me speech,
God's heavenly host to be my guard."

Now a God like that can be counted on to face dangers, and wild animals, and lurking enemies.
A God like that is worth trusting and following into the wild world, like the missionaries trained by St. Patrick to face all manner of threats in service of Christ to the world.

Glenn McDonald trenchantly observes what we've done to earthy spirituality and discipleship in his book The Disciplemaking Church:

"The earliest Christian heresies were Gnostic in flavor- that is, the mind was excessively valued above the body. Physicality was assumed to be a secondary arena for God's work, if indeed God cared at all for "that awful thing", my body. The church's first theological giants joined to state the case that embodiment is the gift of God, who created the earth and our own bodies and pronounced them "good".

"The spirit of our times ...is alive with Gnostic sensibilities. "True spirituality" concerns my inner life, not how I do the laundry. Progress in my life with God is attitudinal, emotional, ecstatic, or cerebral- not whether I happen to help my neighbor clean out his garage.

"Contemporary spirituality, in other words, is assumed to be an invisible, personal, and
internal experience."

"A number of Christians have falsely concluded that, if we give our intellectual assent to Jesus then what we do "on our own time"-- commercially, physically, socially- is entirely up to us."

St. Patrick's prayer grabs hold of our whole lives and being:
"Christ be with me, Christ within me,
Christ behind me, Christ before me,
Christ beside me, Christ to win me,
Christ to comfort and restore me,
Christ in quiet, Christ in danger,
Christ in hearts of all that love me,
Christ in mouth of friend and stranger"

This kind of Christ leads us out into the world.

Glenn McDonald catches the spirit of earthy spirituality in ways that St. Patrick would gladly say yes to:

"We can invite Jesus to take a walk with us, asking him to come alongside us during our routine visits to all our routine places.

Invite Jesus to look through your stock porfolio. Are your investments consistent with a kingdom perspective?

Ride with Jesus to your office. What does he think about your strategies to pull ahead of business competitors?

Walk with him through your neighborhood, asking Jesus to let you see the people on your street through his eyes. What relationships need to be repaired? What acts of kindness have been deferred?"

Tonight, I'll pray St. Patrick's prayer. I'll eat some wonderful corned beef and cabbage, and thank God (minus the green beer!) for a saint who took Jesus with him into the world, and all the time discovered "Christ beside him....Christ beneath him...Christ in danger...Christ in mouth of friend and stranger."

Healthy Congregations and Servant Leadership

2007-03-08T07:48:00.000-08:00

"I believe it is possible for us to get better in chaos, suffering, and difficulty, rather than getting worse." (International Journal of Servant Leadership, 2005 vol.)

How is the above remark a healing thought for you?

I've been giving the above comment some reflective thought as I've been engaged in some consulting work with local congregations and our presbytery recently. These are anxious times in our culture as well, and that anxiety is certainly present in many churches.

A congregation struggles with a merger, or a down-sizing of staff, a church experiences loss or gains in membership, perhaps a church envisions a whole new opportunity to grow in concert with a strategic building expansion, or a regional church governing body faces conflict with a particular church and its attitudes toward the entire denomination in light of theological disagreements. The examples of change and organizational transition could be endlessly multiplied. How do leaders cope? "Being calm and courageous no matter what" can be a call to deeper servant leadership and organizational health.

Three questions keep surfacing for me as I try to grow in my own leadership capacities:

1) What is a healthy organization?
My ongoing work with Edwin Friedman's work in "Generation to Generation" and training with the Lombard Mennonite Peace Center in its clergy clinic for healthy leadership has brought this question into much sharper focus for me.

2) What would it take for our organization (or church) to fulfill their mission and reach their vision while developing healthy members who share their gifts and talents with greater joy?

3) What kind of leadership could make this happen?
This is an exciting and challenging question in all organizations today.

For many years I have been drawn to the work of Robert Greenleaf, author of "Servant Leadership" and mentor to a generation of business, non-profit, government, education and religious organizations. As I move deeper into my own growth as a healthy, self-differentiated leader, I find the following definition of leadership compelling:

"Servant-leadership is....
an understanding and practice of leadership
that places the good of those led
over the self-interest of the leader.

Servant-leadership promotes the valuing and developing of people,
the building of community,
the practice of authenticity,
the providing of leadership for the good of those led,
and the sharing of power and status
for the common good of each individual,
the total organization,
and those served by the organization."

It's an inspiring definition, but as the "International Journal of Servant Leadership" reports,
most organizations that view themselves as servant organizations may be, in fact, simply positive versions of a paternalistic organization. In such an organization, the leader functions as a parent figure who treats others as children. Sadly, too many churches willingly adopt that view of leadership and remain in a dependent relationship with a leader- figure they hope will provide all the vision and answers for their needs. "What will you do for us?" is generally the tacit or openly expressed question, instead of, "How can you help us transform to become the kind of people we need to become?"

What is a healthy organization? A dependent group of people, who are not being developed as strong people runs counter to healthy leadership, and ultimately weakens relationships and effective achievement of vision.

Six levels of organizational health and vitality have been posited, which I will only briefly summarize:
Levels 1-2: Org#1 and Org#1 Exhibit poor organizational health according to the vision of
of Servant-leadership
Levels 3-4: Org#3 and Org#4 Exhibit limited or moderate health and vitality
Levels 5-6: Org#5 and Org #6 Display excellent optimal health and functioning

In the first levels, there is a profound inertia or inability to move or change. Often the church or group operates only on the energy of the past. It lacks energy and health to move toward the future. Theologian David Buttrick puts it this way: "No wonder our churches cling to the past-they have forgotten the excitement of God's unfolding future. Without some bright future vision, a people cannot change."

In the second level (Org#3 and #4) there is gradual or incremental change. This church or group can change, but it will begin to rest on a plateau of "good enough", dulled by its own achievement and success, with an ever-growing contentment with being just a little better than the rest.

Third, there is the quantum/ongoing change of Org #5 and #6 which calls for a new level of thinking and and leadership and behavior. It's the view of leadership that Ron Heifitz calls adaptive leadership in his wonderful book "Leadership Without Easy Answers". This type of organization embraces ongoing change and growth and seeks to mature as a servant-leadership culture.

"A sailor without a destination has trouble discerning a good wind from an ill wind."
Seneca 65 A.D.

If you don't know where you're going, what do you do when the storms come?

Increasingly, I am convinced that at all levels of culture (including the church), we must focus on healthy organizations and healthy servant-leaders.

In a recent letter from the Board of Pensions, the health provider of my denomination, it was stated that less than 25% of ministers get regular health check-ups. Not a good trend for leaders. But then, when was the last time your church sought out an extensive spiritual health check-up for its functioning as a healthy congregation?

Compass Point #4 A tale of two Christianities

2007-03-06T07:34:00.000-08:00

A blizzard was making its way through Omaha this past Friday night, with high winds and falling snow, as I drove to a mid-town church to hear the beginning of a series of week-end lectures by Marcus Borg, a noted scholar in Jesus studies and a prolific author. Borg's highly popular writings include "Meeting Jesus Again for the First Time" "Reading the Bible Again for the First Time," "The Last Week" with John Dominic Crossan", and most recently the book "Jesus". That last book bears the subtitle "Uncovering the Life, Teachings, and Relevance of a Religious Revolutionary".

As I entered the santuary of the church for the Friday evening lecture on "A Tale of Two Christianities: Seeing the Differences, Building Bridges", I looked around at who had braved the fierce storm to come hear a lecture on Christianity by a late-middle aged scholar of some repute and not a little controversy. Some 250-300 listeners were in attendance. Most were middle aged, some older, and there were several college age or twenty-somethings in attendance.

Borg stepped to the podium with a relaxed manner, greeted us and asked for our religious affiliation (if we had one!) and then offered news that all across the country there were gatherings of people like us who are not part of the Christian Religious Right! Smiles and light laughter was the response. In response to a few other questions, Borg asked, we all learned that over 2/3 of those present had changed denominations over the course of time. That in itself is increasingly the case for people.

Then Borg commented: "The renewal of Christianity in our time is of increasing interest."
Our presence was testimony of that. He added that adult theological re-education is an urgent task. In a thought-provoking comment he added that "The purpose of the gospel is to move us away from self-preoccupation." What a striking comment from someone who is often labeled liberal, a term that Borg finds problematic and unhelpful.

Borg's lecture on "A Tale of Two Christianities" presented a tabular comparison of what he referred to as "two different paradigms". He commented that we could "shamelessly borrow his material" because he was committed to the renewal of Christianity in our time, so I'll summarize the two paradigms below. (much of this is found in Borg's book "The Heart of Christianity")

Earlier Christian Paradigm/ or Belief-centered Xnity
*Being Xn is about "believing" the right things
*Afterlife centered
*Requirements and rewards
*Christianity is the only way
*Literalist or semi-literalist
*In conflict with Enlightenment
Creation vs. Evolution
*Tends to be apolitical, or politically conservative
*Centered in one's own well-being (in this world or the next)

Emerging Christian Paradigm Or:
Transformation-Centered Xnity
*Being Xn is about "a way, a path," Faith as "centering in God"
*"This life" centered
*Relationship and transformation
*Affirms religious pluralism
*Beyond literalism: much of Xn/biblical language
understood metaphorically
*Integration of Enlightenment; No conflict, and some mutuality
*Tends to be apolitical or moderate/progressive
*Centered in God
(If you line up the two columns, you can compare point by point)

I'll offer a few comments now about these two paradigms and in a later post, explore more of Borg's first lecture. First, I found Borg's exploration of the two paradigms helpful. In the media currently, when the term Christian is used, often it's as a conjunction of Christian and Right-wing politics or theology. There's a growing movement across the country of vital mainline churches that does not fit such a strait-jacket.

Borg did observe that even many mainline Christians grew up in the old paradigm of faith as "belief centered". His own family roots in North Dakota were centered in such a view of faith.
But a growing transformation is taking place. Many of those missing from the mainline churches today, Borg contends and research verifies, moved away from the older paradigm as too "un-believe-able". They did not transfer to conservative churches! That's a myth! Instead, they dropped out.

Borg argues that the task and vocation of the mainline churches centers more in a transmission and embodiment of the new paradigm of "Transformation Centered Christianity". I strongly agree, even though I do not follow Borg completely in all aspects of his theology. Nevertheless,
I do believe that the newer paradigm embraces more clearly, many aspects of a deeper and more ancient tradition of faith in the church. The so-called earlier, belief-centered paradigm, it may be argued, is a more recent phenomenon. More about that later.

What Katrina Revealed Part 2

2007-01-18T08:44:00.000-08:00

This is a second post on my trip last week to New Orleans for the Biennial Conference of PHEWA (Presbyterian Health, Education, and Welfare Association). The conference theme came from Isaiah 58:12.
"You shall be called the Repairer of the Breach, the Restorer of Streets to live in."

On the second day of the conference, Friday January 12, we took bus tours through the streets of neighborhoods around New Orleans to see first hand the effects of breached canals and levees.

My own tour guide was Aaron, a middle aged Black man and leader in the Presbyterian Church in New Orleans. As we set out on our trip, Aaron told us that over 200,000 homes had been significantly damaged by Katrina and the flood waters. Now think about this, Aaron commented, "It took Habitat for Humanity 30 years to build 200,000 homes. So imagine the scope of our challenge here in New Orleans."

The Presbytery of South Louisiana has a vision to rebuild 300 homes in 2007 through a revolving loan fund much like Habitat for Humanity.
The Katrina Cottage fund would build a home for $30,000 with volunteers doing all but electrical and plumbing work.

As we entered the Lower Ninth Ward, a scene of almost complete devastation loomed before us. FEMA trailers could be seen where families and individuals were still living. A FEMA trailer, Aaron told us, has about 200 square feet. The average room in a house is 240 square feet. Some individuals and families have been living in FEMA trailers over a year now. Aaron told us that the air quality in trailers has been said to be worse than the air quality experienced by professional embalmers who daily work with chemicals. People living in these FEMA trailers experience nausea, burning eyes, nose and throat discomfort and other symptoms.

We got out of our bus in the Lower Ninth Ward to walk through the streets, where many houses were empty or severely damaged beyond any standard of liveability. I turned down Roman Street in the Lower Ninth and came across an older black man named Harold who was working in his driveway.

After introducing myself, Harold told me his story. He had lived in 3 states with various family members since Katrina and had recently returned to work on the home he had build with his own hands back in 1950. Harold told me about surviving Hurricane Betsy in 1965. Here in his home the water from Katrina rose above the roof line, leaving mud all through the house. It was obvious that Harold loved his home and community.

As I looked around Harold's home, I saw that across the street the houses were gone, washed away by Katrina flood waters. Other homes were severely damaged. For several blocks around, no one else was working or living in their home.

Our tour guide, Aaron, told us that situations like Harold's pose major issues. How can a single home owner survive and truly live if no one else returns to their block? What kind of economic sense does it make for city service such as sanitation, light and electric to be provided a solitary home owner in a community?

We were then told that Mayor Nagin has taken a laissez-faire attitude toward rebuilding in neighborhoods, after his recommended policy to not rebuild drew deep and bitter opposition. "Build at your own risk," is the mayor's policy today.

As our bus tour members regathered, I saw tears in the eyes of several. This was my second trip to New Orleans and I had seen the Lower Ninth previously, but it was a moving moment.

One of our group asked if she could offer a prayer, in these words.
"O God, it is so desolate and abandoned here and recovery seems so slow. Like the Psalmist prayed, 'Do not forget us Lord. Our help is in the Thee, O Lord."

As of this writing, 12 Billion Dollars have been allocated for Gulf Coast Recovery. 97,000 applicants have applied for 7 billion dollars in home recovery. Only 153 awards have been made for homes, at up to $150,000 per home. The average award is $50,000.

Homes in the Lower Ninth are rarely valued above $50,000. It is unclear, when and how the streets of many neighborhoods will ever be restored. It raises deep questions about our nation and its government. Have the people of New Orleans and the Gulf Coast been forgotten? Why do we not see the urgency of this challenge to our nation's people? Has the war in Iraq numbed our consciousness as a nation?
What leadership do we need? When will people of America demand justice and compassion for the people of the Gulf?

What Katrina Revealed

2007-01-17T08:13:00.000-08:00

While many football fans enjoyed the remarkable victory of the New Orleans Saints football team over the Philadelphia Eagles this past Saturday, I saw a different vision of the city while attending a four day "Social Justice Biennial Conference" put on by the Presbyterian Health, Education, and Welfare Association (PHEWA) of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) I have to admit the football scene in New Orleans on Saturday was electric. And on my return to the Louis Armstrong Airport, I even met the 11 year old boy from Tennessee who won the NFL Punt, Pass and Kick Contest. Estimates are that the Super Bowl- scene of so much heartbreaking human tragedy during Hurricane Katrina- was repaired for a cost of some $180,000,000. The football stadium is repaired, but it will take decades for New Orleans to recover.

Much more remains to be repaired in New Orleans. Our conference theme was drawn from the prophet Isaiah: "You shall be called the Repairer of the Breach, the Restorer of Streets to live in." (Isaiah 58:12)

Some 500 Presbyterians from across the United States gathered in New Orleans to witness and engage in "Action/Reflection" on the nature of mission in a great devastated city. Our keynote plenary address was presented by Bill Quigley, a law professor and Director of the Law Clinic and the Gillis Long Poverty Law Center at Loyola University New Orleans. Bill Quigley has been engaged in a variety of issues, including Katrina Social Justice issues, voting rights, civil liberties, public housing, and educational reform among other concerns. He is the author of
"Ending Poverty As We Know It: Guaranteeing a Right to a Job at a Living Wage" (Temple University Press, 2003)

Here are some of the stark facts that citizens and leaders of New Orleans must contend with in "Repairing the Breach".

*280,000 people were displaced by Katrina out of a pre-Katrina population of nearly
480,000.

*The African-American population dropped 73% from 325,000 to 89,000.

*The White population declined from 136,000 to 81,000 for a loss of 41%.

*Children dropped from 145,000 to 40,000.

*Over 80% of New Orleans was covered by the flood waters.

*100,000 people were left behind in the course of the city's flooding, most of them elderly, children, disabled, and those without transportation.

*25% of the displaced were disabled.

* 1,500 died....mostly elderly.

*75% of Physicians have left, due to loss of patients and closure of hospitals and clinics.

*84,000 rental units were destroyed.

*90,000 square miles were damaged by Katrina.

*250,000 displaced citizens are now living in Texas

*100,000 displaced citizens are living in Georgia.

The impact of the storm was unequal. It was born overwhelmingly by the black, elderly, children and renters.

And yet the Spirit of Christ and the spirit of hope and compassion is present in New Orleans. Bill Quigley summarized his faith in this way:

"Our Hearts must be open totally
to injustice and pain
and totally open
to hope and love."

Quigley observed that 1,700 law students came in the last year to offer assistance.

During our second day in New Orleans we were taken into the devastated neighborhoods of the city on buses with the opportunity to walk the streets and see evidence of the destruction, but also to witness signs of hope and love.

We stopped along the way at Musicians Village, a Habitat for Humanity Project to house the struggling musicans of New Orleans. Harry Connick, Jr. and Wynton Marsalis- both esteemed musicians from New Orleans- had organized this effort. It's very difficult for many musicians to rebuild and afford housing, because the music life isn't always highly remunerated.

Walking down the street at Musicians Village, I saw very modest Habitat homes raised up some 6-8 feet above the ground. All were painted with bold colors: yellow, purple, robins egg blue and green. At one house I saw three young college students, all women, taking a break on the front steps.

"What brings you here?" I asked.

"We're from the University of Minnesota-Duluth" they told me. "There are 38 of us here for a week, during semester break. We raised money for the trip, recruited faculty advisors to come with us, and came down to help out."

"Wow" I said. And then they told me, I had just missed 238 members of the University of Maryland marching band who had also come for the week!

All that was inspiring. I remember a couple of other comments by Bill Quigley at his opening plenary address to members of PHEWA:

"Mourn for the Dead
and Fight like Hell for the Living!"

I heard Quigley share another prophetic comment: "New Orleans is a warning for other communities in America. People are left behind in every one of our cities as they struggle with poverty, loss of jobs, lack of health care, poor schools, disabilities, and the sense that cities and people can be disposable."

And I thought, yes, our heart and minds must be totally open to injustice and pain; but also open to hope and love.

I'll be posting a few more blogs from my experience in New Orleans.

Compass Point #3 What is a Christian? Where do you fit?

2007-01-10T12:40:00.000-08:00

What kind of world and church do we find ourselves in and how does Jesus meet us there? As I reflect further on the question "What is a Christian?" I realize that we face a new situation for faith, new at least for many in today's world.

Here's a thought-provoking passage from Shirley Guthrie's book "Always Being Reformed" which provides a "compass point" for navigating our way toward faithful discipleship. Guthrie was a long time professor of theology at Columbia Theological Seminary in Decatur, Georgia and an esteemed theologian in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) His book "Christian Doctrine" has been much valued for teaching theology in churches and seminaries.

"We live in a post-Christian, multicultural, pluralistic society in which people who are different from one another have to learn to respect one another and live together in peace: people of different religions and the ever-increasing number of people with no religious faith at all; people who live by different ethical values and norms; men and women who are no longer willing to play the subservient role traditionally assigned to them, people who differ in sexual orientation, race, class and cultural heritage. In the past, we assumed that our traditional white, middle-class, Euro-American, male-defined Protestant understanding of God and Christian faith and life is or should be normative for everyone. But now we have to learn what it means to be Christians (and Presbyterians) in a church and world that no longer belongs to people like us."

Guthrie comments that he made that above observation in a church context and heard someone remark: "How can we get it all back?" and was then applauded for saying so.

When we are honest about things, we know that we'll never get back that older cultural experience of church. And we should be glad about it. Every experience of what it means to be a Christian is culturally conditioned, and sometimes those cultural factors are in fact oppressive and limiting of the gospel.

I think of one of my favorite New Testament passages, Ephesians 2: 11-11. Paul writes that "in Christ you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. For he is our peace; in his flesh he has made both groups (Jew and Gentile) into one and has broken down the dividing wall of hostility." Eph 2:13-14

Something about the gospel and Jesus Christ does not like dividing walls of hostility. When we ask about the meaning of being a Christian in today's world, that is surely one of the affirmations we need to make.

In the church I now serve I regularly celebrate the wonderful diversity of those who worship in a congregation near a major military base in a metropolitan area. We have a growing number of Korean worshipers and a plan by some to reach out even more effectively to the Korean community; an African American man and his family join us frequently; a young man from Central America and his American wife have come; native born German and Scottish and Japanese members participate. You could account for some of this diversity by proximity to a military base. But not all. I am welcomed each Sunday by a Downs Syndrome adult in her early forties with the most loving hospitality at church. She is well loved by us all. And I remember how my own autistic sister, when she was young, was not always understood or easily embraced.
So many things are changing in how we understand what it means to be a Christian and to be a church.

We are leaving behind the era of Christendom, when being church was the norm and where certain expectations of what Christians should look like were fixed in all too stereotypical ways.

We are progressively entering the post-Christendom era which "is not designed to change your mind- it is designed to change your life." By that, I mean that we no longer view being a Christian as just thinking the right thoughts, but practicing a way of life that does in fact break down barriers, where Christ makes peace between those who are "different".

Part 2 What is a Christian? Where do you fit in?

2007-01-10T08:12:00.000-08:00

A number of years ago when I was a Scoutmaster in Missouri, reliving some childhood adventures with my sons and their fellow scouts, I planned an outdoor experience in Orienteering. It's a great skill. And it's also a fun experience to gain confidence in navigating in strange or unfamiliar places. With a map and compass, and adequate skills, you can learn to find your way.

So, I picked a 6,000 acre state park with my fellow adult leaders for a week-end experience of orienteering and lessons in how to use a map and compass. I remember setting out that Saturday morning with about a dozen scouts and six adult leaders. We hiked for about an hour, until all familiar landmarks and bearings had been left behind. That was done on purpose!

And then I gathered the scouts and adult leaders in a circle around me and my fellow adult leader, a skilled outdoorsman named Al. Al said to the group, we need to find our way to the camp site about 2 miles away. Here's a map and a compass. What do we do next? One of the younger scouts picked up the compass and said, that way is West. Let's go that way. "Why?" said Al. Your compass is no good unless you have a map to use with it. Or as someone has commented, "when you don't know which way you're going, any direction will do." So right away, we had our first lesson in how to put together map and compass to chart a course. We learned about true North and various symbols on the map legend (symbols to denote features on the map). We taught our scouts how to read a topographical map, to learn about elevations in the terrain. There was a lot to learn in one week-end. But we made progress.

I think about the questions, What is a Christian? And, where do you fit in?, in much the same way I do about that experience in map and compass reading with young scouts. Lots of people do not have the set of skills and practices to begin figuring out which direction to head in becoming a follower of Jesus. Who will teach them?
Does the church know which direction it is taking in this effort? We live in strange and unfamiliar times and places. How will we find our way?

A few years ago I read a wonderful book by Diogenes Allen, a Presbyterian minister and one time professor at Princeton Seminary, titled "Quest". The subtitle of the book is "The Search for Meaning Through Christ". Using that image of map and compass, Diogenes Allen explores how we navigate our way toward an understanding of what it means to be a Christian in today's world. Allen writes, "Jesus becomes our light when we study his life and teachings and let them illumine the world in which we live, allowing them to show us what is worth striving for and what is reliable and trustworthy." Jesus is a living presence and a teacher to us still. He is true North. In the words of Scripture we hear his voice anew to guide us in unfamiliar settings. And the focus of both Jesus and his word is to show the way forward in the world where we are sent to live and serve him. All three of those elements of finding our way are critical: Jesus - his teachings - the world. Strikingly, the early Christians according to the Book of Acts, were known as "people of the way". They learned a way of life, a practice of life that helped them find meaning.
I sometimes think we have failed to grasp that Jesus is leading us out into the world where we have to find our way in serving him. It isn't just our inner world or soul Jesus is affecting; he calls us to be salt and light to others who do not know him or his way.

Diogenes Allen comments in his book "Quest" on how many people do not know they have lost their way. "Even the finest and most remarkable of people need God." For us to learn more about what kind of life Jesus calls us to live we need to study the gospels, where we are likely to find out something essential about ourselves and what it means to be a Christian. Allen comments that the people in the Gospels are what literary critics call "figures". A figure is an individual that reveals something about other people and from whose life we can gain guidance for our own.

And here is my summary thought for today, drawn from Diogenes Allen's book, "Quest":
"To become like Jesus, to realize the divine image in our own lives, we are not to look at him in isolation, but at his interactions with people. We, too, need to interact with him now by seeking his help, as people did during his earthly ministry, and by obeying his teaching."

What is a Christian? Where do you fit?

2006-12-31T15:58:00.000-08:00

Here on the last day of the year, I've just seen a good portion of a CNN special hosted by Anderson Cooper on "What is a Christian? and Where do you fit?"

It was a surprisingly thoughtful effort to examine in some depth the mutually irreconcilable presentations of Christianity that exist in the United States today; ranging from the prosperity gospels of Joel Osteen (noted pastor and author in Houston) and Crespo Dollar (pastor of a Black mega-church outside Atlanta) to John Hagee's bizarre end-times gospel celebrating an impending Rapture and the centrality of the Jewish State in the apocalyptic battle between good and evil in his interpretation of Revelation. Alongside these movements, other spokespersons were heard as well; a young couple from a Unitarian Church in Washington D.C., Rick Warren of Purpose Driven Church fame, and James Forbes from the Riverside Church in New York. Catholics, Protestants, Evangelicals and Independents were all featured in this CNN special broadcast about Christianity in America today. It was a lively discussion and debate.

I listened to the profiles of these wildly divergent spiritualities and answers to the question, "What is a Christian?", and I thought; there is an epic struggle for the soul of faith taking place. And yet for those who make the effort to study the history of the church and faith there is a certain deja vu. We've seen epic struggles for the soul of faith in previous centuries as well. The books of the Bible were selected for the canon after intense battles over what should be included and what excluded by the rule of faith. Throughout the history of Chistianity, the core values of faith have been tested in controversy and in life and death circumstances. In Nazi Germany, the soul of faith was tested by Hitler and the corrupting forces of Aryan theology. The Confessing Church theology of prominent Swiss theologian Karl Barth and the heroic example of Dietrich Bonhoeffer are a part of that struggle. Here in America, the beloved community of Civil Rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr. adds additional perspective to the contested meaning of faith and Christianity.

In each era of history; churches, reform leaders, theologians and common believers are all engaged in the question Jesus asked his first disciples (and Peter particulary in Mark 8) "Who do people say that I am" and "Who do you say that I am?"
(Mark 8: 27, 29) Not surprisingly, the answers have diverged and a spirited struggle for the essence of faith has ensued.

Personally, I find the crass materialism of the prosperity gospel and the end-times Rapture theology of proponents such as John Hagee and Pat Robertson especially troubling. Both are major distortions of the essence of Christian faith as defined by the person and work of Jesus Christ.

At the end of the show, Rev. Jim Wallis of Sojourner's Community and editor of Sojourner's Magazine, Rev. Richard Land, a key Southern Baptist leader and Rev. Dwight Hopkins of the University of Chicago Divinity School summed up their reactions to a variety of brief segments profiling the wild diversity of responses to how Americans in particular are seeking the meaning of their faith.

Jim Wallis commented that prosperity isn't a bad thing, as long as we're generous in sharing what we have with those in need. Especially in a world where billions of people live on less than $2 a day, there is a moral imperative to share. As Wallis noted, the prophetic faith of the Bible stands against such selfish materialism. Jesus taught much about wealth and poverty in the gospels, and he advocated generosity as a mark of the Kingdom of God. Richard Land called the prosperity gospel a heresy, and I think he's right. Equally heretical, I believe, is the violent scenario of the End-times theology of Hagee and Robertson. To listen to these preachers and their theology is to sense that the Cross and Resurrection are peripheral to the book of Revelation in the New Testament. Hagee and others are advocating a violent action by God for the redemption of the world. What separates this view from the violent approach of Islamic fundamentalists? It's an abhorrent theology, and ultimately selfish, in picturing so-called "true believers" who are Raptured to some idyllic heaven while leaving everyone else behind. As a friend of mine says about those who drive fancy cars with bumper stickers that say "In Case of Rapture this vehicle will be empty", please go ahead and give me the keys now!

In the coming weeks and months, I plan to revisit the question posed by Anderson Cooper on CNN: What is a Christian? Where do any of us fit in? This question is controversial; it calls Christians and churches to step forward and state their faith; it's a question that demands an answer with how we live our lives. 2007 can be a good year to wrestle with such a question.

A water buffalo, a chocolate cake and a Christmas gift

2006-12-22T08:08:00.000-08:00

What do a water buffalo, a chocolate cake and the most important gift catalogue in the world have in common? We discovered the answer to that question at the church I serve over the course of the last few weeks. The answer came fully alive on the third Sunday of Advent, appropriately known as Joy Sunday in the Season of Advent.

The short answer to the above question is the Heifer Project. For more than 60 years, Heifer International and its friends and supporters have been proving that there's no better way to help a family escape poverty and hunger than by providing them with sustainable means of supporting themselves. Since 1944 Heifer has helped more than 7 million families in more than 125 countries improve their quality of life and move toward greater self-reliance. Heifer started with heifers: pregnant cows, that upon arrival are not only ready to give birth- making it possible to quickly pass on the gift of offspring- but will also provide life-giving milk almost immediately.

That's where the chocolate cake and the water buffalo come into the story. We began promoting Heifer as an alternative for Christmas giving at our church. At one of our minutes for mission during worship, a church elder commented that pledging money for Heifer animals could be a wonderful way to give a gift on behalf of a loved one. Instead of giving someone another sweater they don't need, or a gizmo toy that would soon fade in interest, why not give a gift card pledge on behalf of someone at Christmas.

That's where the chocolate cake comes in. In one of those intuitive moments that sometimes strike me, I said, "Let's hold a pie, cake, and bread auction during our Christmas pot-luck on the 3rd Sunday of Advent. I'll even bake a chocolate cake myself to auction."

That's where things got out of control! A woman sitting in the church piped up and said, "It had better be a cake baked from scratch, Pastor Hart. And the chocolate icing should be from scratch. And I think it should have some of those shaved chocolate swirly pieces on top." Wow!!!! What had I gotten myself into?

And that's where the water buffalo comes in. Another member commented to me, "Wouldn't it be great for us to raise enough money to buy a water buffalo for $250?"

Joy Sunday, the third Sunday of Advent arrived. In the fellowship hall, I saw pies and cakes and home made bread collecting on several tables. And our church has unusually good cooks. I figured we'd easily raise $250. Little did I count on the generosity of people. The church treasurer announced before the auction even started that three people had already pledged to buy 3 water buffalo.

Our auctioneer started the bidding, which I had first suggested range from $5-10.
Another elder in the church said that was too limiting. She had told her husband to offer some challenging bids. And so the fun began. I bought a shoe-fly pie for $9.
Then the bidding started going higher. Back and forth people bid, with pies and cakes going for $15, 20, 25 and $30. I bought a lemon meringue pie, myself, for $26. It was the best pie I ever tasted! One family really got into the spirit of things and bought a table full of chocolate pies and cakes. And yes, my chocolate cake brought some spirited bidding, after I explained it was a sanctified chocolate cake! Guaranteed to improve one's spiritual life with each bite!

By the time our auction ended, our treasurer announced that we had raised almost $1,000 from the auction alone. We had raised enough pledges for a small herd of 7 water buffalo, assorted goats, sheep and chickens. I saw happy, joyful faces all over the room that day.

And now more about the water buffalo. Because water buffalo can provide a family with protein-rich milk, organic fertilizer, and pulling power, they are among the most sought-after livestock in many parts of the world. So mild-mannered in fact, that children often become fast friends with their water-buffalo and take an active role in its care. With the pulling power of a water buffalo, a one acre field that takes two weeks to sow with a hoe can be plowed and planted in just two days. That's why many small farming families are able to plant Four Times more with a water buffalo than by hand.

Water buffalo, pie and cake, and the best gift catalogue in the world all came together for a delightful Advent family church dinner on Joy Sunday. Check out this giving option at www.catalog.heifer.org. While you're at it, read more about Heifer Project online at www.heifer.org

Don't forget who you are!

2006-12-08T08:05:00.000-08:00

At the men's lunch-time study group this week, our conversation turned from the book, "The Jesus I Never Knew" by Philip Yancey, to an interesting theological question. What's the meaning of baptism? Do Christians really need baptism for their faith and salvation?, was how one member in our group phrased it.

This lively theological question got kicked into high gear in the thick of a busy restaurant, with one of our group asking me, "What would you do Hart, if someone wanted their grandchild baptized, without the parents' involvement or practice of faith?" That's no longer a theoretical question in today's world. In fact, more than once I've been asked to baptize children without the active participation of
parents in the life of the church. The most challenging request for baptism comes when at least one of the parents has no interest in their child's baptism, or even actively opposes it.

What's the role of baptism? I'm convinced that one reason we have so much confusion about the meaning of baptism lies in the "thinness" of baptismal practice and imagery in our worship services. Ask yourself this question. Do you know where your church's baptismal font is located? More than once I've ventured into churches where you would be hard pressed to know where the baptismal font can be found. It just might be pushed over into some corner of the sanctuary gathering dust. The absence of the baptismal font or its lack of prominent visual placement in the worship space actually speaks volumes about the lack of a baptismal theology and practice in the life of the worshiping body. When that happens, we shouldn't be surprised that the sacrament of baptism is held in such low esteem.

For several years now, my new church development experience has taught me the crucial value of the sacraments, both baptism and Lord's Supper. Usually, our worship experience has begun with a sacramental focus for the people of God. Briefly stated, this has meant we call attention to the centrality of baptism by placing the baptismal font or a large earthen bowl in the center of the gathering. Then someone comes forward with a large earthen pitcher to pour water into the bowl or font with these words: "This is the font of your identity" while the water is lavishly and visibly poured. If you sit close enough, you might even get wet!

There are many prayers that can be used for this as well, such as:
"Eternal God, at the baptism of Jesus in the River Jordan
you proclaimed him your beloved Son,
and anointed him with the Holy Spirit.
Grant that all who are baptized into his name
may keep the covenant they have made,
and boldly confess him as Lord and Savior..." (Book of Common Worship, PCUSA)

We are "baptized into his name". What powerful words! Baptism means we take our identity from Jesus.

William Willimon, noted United Methodist preacher and prolific author and former Chaplain at Duke University, told this story in a book he once wrote about baptism.
Willimon tells about being a young teenager going out on a date one night and hearing these words from his mother as he headed out the door. "Don't forget who you are!" Those were a mother's words of wisdom to remember what kind of son she was raising. Likewise, Willimon remarked, in baptism God claims us for purposes grander than our own.

One of my favorite books on the sacraments is by James F. White, titled "Sacraments as God's Self Giving" (Abingdon Press, 1988) White remarks that "God's self giving is the basis of the Christian sacraments...The Incarnation is the story of God's self giving through becoming one of us. (And) God's self giving, just like that of human beings, has to take visible or audible form so others may recognize it."

White then offers a challenging thought about the state of our celebration of the sacraments in worship: "When we underplay a sacrament, it is the same as mumbling a sermon. In either case, the people are not fed,"

Sacraments not only signify God's love for us, they also cause grace, White goes on to say.

I think back on a time in our new church development ministry, where a young couple requested baptism. For many years they had been on the margins of faith and church until they were drawn to our new church community. Through relationships with our young church, this couple discovered a greater depth of God's love for them. And so we happily baptized them, generously pouring water over each of them in turn. Not long afterward, another adult woman requested baptism. I'm convinced that our regular and lavish use of sacramental practice and imagery in worship contributed to these exeriences. John Wesley, the founder of Methodism, believed that the sacraments are a "converting grace". He believed that people are drawn to God through the joyous celebration of Baptism and the Lords' Supper.

I share that belief. What is the practice of baptism and lord's supper like in your worship experience? Are they underplayed? Do you sense a deep celebration of these sacraments in your worship life? I believe James White's comment calls us to a deeper celebration: "When we speak of sacraments, we are speaking of actions through which God relates to us here and now in establishing or renewing personal relationships. God once acted definitively in the underlying sacrament, Christ, who came into the world to make the Father known." God still practices self-giving in the sacraments we share with each other and the world.

Who mentored you?

2006-11-28T10:06:00.000-08:00

In Greek mythology, Mentor was an older man who was a friend of Odysseus. When Odysseus left for the Trojan War he placed Mentor in charge of his son, Telemachus.
Mentor was to support, counsel, befriend, and serve as a constructive example for Telemachus in the young boy's growth toward mature manhood.

I remembered that story this past Sunday, as I received a "Mentor" pin from a young man in our church who was receiving his Eagle Scout Award, the highest rank in Boy Scouting. I was present, along with several members of our church, where I offered the Invocation and Benediction at the Eagle Scout Ceremony. We were all delighted to be present. The young man from our church was surrounded by friends, family members, Scout leaders, fellow scouts and members of his church family for this milestone of achievement. As a former Scout master and father of two sons who are Eagle Scouts, I was again deeply moved by the Eagle Scout Ceremony. It is a challenging journey. I saw the obvious pride in this young man's parents and scout leaders. Not a few adults had tears of celebration misting their eyes.

But I am also aware that many young men and women do not have the mentors they need in their lives. Frank Pittman, in his fine book "Man Enough" writes that, "For a couple of hundred years now, each generation of fathers has passed on less to his sons; not just less power but less wisdom, and less love. We have finally reached a point where most fathers are largely irrelevant in the lives of their sons."
There is a "father hunger" in our society Pittman argues. He writes that, "Life for most boys and for many grown men is a frustrating search for the lost father who has not yet offered protection, provision, nurturing, modeling, or, especially, anointment."

I take that word "anointment" to mean the conferring of a blessing that a young man or a young woman, receives from parents and other mentors. That blessing means that a young person is prepared to live life confidently and will be capable of giving life to others as well. The alternative, Pittman notes, is to go through life ashamed and pulling back from exposure to intimacy with men, women, and children.

So, who is your mentor? Thank them... and pass it on. That's the encouragement of a national movement called the Mentoring Project (www.mentoring.org)

I have come to believe that it's never too late to fill the need for mentors or those who can teach us about life. One of my favorite inspirational books on this topic is by Marian Wright Edelman, in her book "Lanterns: A Memoir of Mentors".
Marian Wright Edelman is the president of the "Children's Defense Fund", a leading advocacy group for the needs of our nation's children. She wrote a brief book to her sons a few years ago titled "The Measure of our Success", in which she sought to distill some of life's wisdom for her sons.

In "Lanterns", Marian Wright Edelman looks back at all of the mentors she has been blessed by in life; some are people who were family, others teachers or pastors, some national figures, and others are individuals in history.

Receiving that "Mentor" pin this past Sunday was a great honor. I was not close to my own father, but I've had a number of mentors through the years, both men and women who have "anointed" me. And I've wanted to pass on what I've received, which is a key part of life's purpose.

Marian Wright Edelman offers up a number of nuggets of wisdom for "mentees" in her book "Lanterns". Here are a few:

"God has a job for all of us to do. Open up the envelope of your soul and try to discern the Creator's orders inside."

"Don't ever give up on life. It is God's gift. When trouble comes, hang in."

"Be a good ancestor. Stand for something bigger than yourself. Add value to the Earth during your sojourn."

"Never judge the contents of a box by its wrappings."

"Possessions and power don't make the man or woman: principles, character, and love do."

Who are your mentors? Who are you anointing or seeking to bless? All around us there are people hungry for support, counsel, friendship, reinforcement, and a constructive example.

World Communion and the Call to Discipleship

2006-10-03T07:55:00.000-07:00

Over the course of the last few days I've had the opportunity to reflect on the depth of meaning offered in our celebration of World Communion this past Sunday.
Meeting three recent college graduates who have just completed one year tours of service in Argentina and Belfast, Ireland as mission volunteers with the World Mission office of General Assembly helped bring World Communion into focus for me. I've been helping host these students in our presbytery this week, as they are doing mission interpretation of their experiences.

Add to that growing appreciation for World Communion, our worship experience this past Sunday with a young Sudanese college student here in Omaha, who engaged in a dialogue sermon with me about escaping the genocide in Sudan. Coming to Omaha 6 years ago with nothing literally but the clothes on his back, this young man has come to experience the goodness of God in the welcoming friendship of many, including several Presbyterians who have mentored and loved him. Here in Omaha, thousands of miles away from Africa, I learned how we are touching the lives of people a world away.

World Communion was initiated by Presbyterians in 1936 in the gathering shadows of danger leading up to World War II. In a growing climate of fear and anxiety about the future, Presbyterians and Christians around the world began to celebrate the Lordship of Jesus Christ and his invitation to those who would come "from East and West and North and South to sit at table in the kingdom of God", according to Luke's Gospel. World Communion is a profound act of faith, in which we acknowledge the living Lord who would set his claim upon us. The gospel reading for Sunday ended with these words of Jesus, "Have salt in yourselves, and be at peace with one another." (Mark 9: 50) Christians aren't meant to be like two lumps of sugar in a cup of coffee. We're meant to stand out and be noticed, to work like agents of salt in purifying the world and standing against the forces of evil that corrupt and degrade. Christians are meant to add zest to life.

Last night I joined a group of friends at dinner with those three college students to hear their stories about mission service in Belfast, Ireland for two of them and Argentina for the third member of the team. Listening to these young adults was inspiring. The two young men who spent a year in Belfast, Ireland spoke about the ongoing tensions between Catholics and Protestants in Northern Ireland, where the "troubles" resulted in so much death and destruction. The two young men who were posted to Belfast worked with Catholic and Protestant youth inside and outside the church. One of these young men was assigned to a Presbyterian church which was fire bombed about four years ago by a group of IRA connected youth in the neighborhood. But the Presbyterian pastor of the church, who happens to be a woman pastor (very unusual there!) didn't give up hope and worked succesfully to raise money to rebuild the church. And it's a beautiful new facility now. "Have salt in yourselves and be at peace with one another", says Jesus. I thought after hearing this story last night that this woman pastor and her church members were quite a "salty" bunch of Chrisitians, who didn't give in to fear and intimidation. And they have worked to reach out to the IRA youth responsible for the fire bombing.
Now that's discipleship.

The young woman who spent her year in mission working in Argentina, outside Buenos Aires, spoke about working with poor and struggling families in a church setting doing outreach ministries. It was deeply moving to hear her stories about working with children and mothers, teaching the children and helping their mothers learn parenting skills. Each week she also helped lead a bread baking class, where mothers had the chance to take home bread for their families. I asked about the social/economic challenges of Argentina and others around the dinner table asked what attitudes the people of Argentina had toward the United States.

Argentina is experiencing profound economic challenges which are exacerbated by requirements to repay debt to international banks. Their currency is valued a third less than it was before the Argentine banking crisis of a few years back. Poverty is extreme.

Attitudes toward the United States are very mixed. In the early 1980s the United States helped topple the government there, for fears of its socialist leanings. A military coup ensued. And for several years the military dictatorship "disappeared" thousands of young adults who opposed the regime. Thousands were drowned in the ocean or otherwise murdered and tortured. Lingering resentment toward the United States remains. However, this young mission worker told us the citizens of Argentina differentiate their feelings toward Americans from their thoughts about our government. As people, we Americans are admired. But the policies of our government are often questioned.

I asked these three young mission workers a question that's often on my mind.
What can we as church and as Presbyterians do to appeal to young adults like themselves? We've become increasingly disconnected from young adult generations for the last 20-30 years, so much so that of those ages 17-34; it's reported that only about 17% remain involved in a Presbyterian church after confirmation.

Each of these young mission workers echoed a common thought. Don't make discipleship so easy. Don't tell young adults that nothing much is required to become a follower of Jesus. "We want a challenging faith," I heard them say.
They also spoke of hearing our previous Moderator of General Assembly, Rick Ufford-Chase, speak to them before departing to their mission fields. "He really challenged us to take risks for our faith," was their comment. Become a salty presence wherever God leads you seemed to be the deep passion of these young mission workers. Their faith and their courage were strongly evident, as I've come to know these young leaders in the church. I found myself encouraged about the capacity of our Presbyterian church to relate to young adults like these. And I asked myself, "What more can I do to present the kind of challenging faith that speaks to young adults like these?" (I'll write in my next blog about Sudan and the World Communion experience I shared with a young Sudanese college student)

Christianity for the Rest of Us

2006-09-28T11:44:00.000-07:00

Have you ever thought that the media seems to have only one idea of what exists in our religious world? Here in the United States the media portrays Christianity and the church from a single perspective it often feels: the Christian Right or the mega-church movement. And often those two seem to be joined in the public mind.

This past Tuesday evening I heard a fresh and encouraging take on "Christianity for the Rest of Us" by Dr. Diana Butler Bass, who was reporting on her three year Lilly Endowment research project of vital, mainline churches. In a somewhat ironic and humorous remark, Dr. Bass commented that research grants have usually been directed toward how we mainline churches have failed. Her study, by contrast, focuses on how vital churches in the mainline are discovering renewed energy and purpose.

Her summary observation is as follows. "I can say with great confidence that something new is happening in American religion; all across the country, people with a similar vision of practicing faith in community, of re-engaging tradition, and seeking wisdom is coming into focus. This kind of Christianity stands outside that old "right-left" divide of American religion and is trying to create a new theological language, new structures of leadership and community, and a responsible, peace-filled, and just global Christian (and Jewish and Muslim and Buddhist, etc.) vision...."

Dr. Bass observes that three major themes seem to be emerging in this movement of vital mainline churches, alongside 10 practices of faith. The three major themes are:

1. Renewed interest in Tradition with a capital "T" and not lower case tradition, that often only goes back a generation or two. This hunger for a deeper Tradition goes back to the ancient faith and practices of the church, often abandoned in our modern world. It's fascinating Dr. Bass observes to learn that many younger generations are drawn to an ancient faith. Ironically, some churches who claim to be "traditional" just aren't "Traditional" enough says Bass.
Reclaiming practices of reading Scripture like lectio divina are an example of this hunger for the ancient roots and practices of faith.

2. A second theme of these vital mainline churches emerges in a growing attraction to "Practices of Faith". Often, said Dr. Bass, the church has been known only for negative practices, things we aren't supposed to do. She laughingly commented that as a young girl growing up in a conservative church, this meant not associating with boys who "chewed", danced, or drank. What's positive about that?

These positive practices include: Hospitality (a genuine welcoming of all into the faith community), Discernment (people wondering about how to make wise choices for their lives), Healing, Testimony (being able to speak about the impact of one's faith), Diversity, Justice (the realization that our world can be unfair and asking what can be done about that), Worship, Theological Reflection, and Beauty.

This emphasis on "Practices" stands in contrast and sometimes in tension with the typical focus on "Programs" in the church's ministry. Programs may or may not focus on practice or personal transformation. In her research study, Dr. Bass reports that the word "program" generally had a negative connotation for respondents. In a follow-up question, I stated that this appears to be a real paradigm shift, which Dr. Bass confirmed.

3) The third theme Dr. Bass and her research colleagues observed among these vital mainline churches was a desire to learn how to live "Wisely". As Dr. Bass commented, "There's almost no place for wisdom today to be found" in our culture. Faith communities are one of the few places where this hunger for wisdom in learning how to have a well-lived life can be pursued in an intentional way with others.

As Dr. Bass shared with us, this movement of vital mainline (moderate to liberal)
congregations doesn't really have a name yet- but it is for those who are tired, bored, dissatisfied with business-as-usual faith and are doing- or want to do- something about it. It's Christianity for the Rest of Us.

One possible term for these churches may be to speak of them as "Pilgrim" churches, who know that Christian faith is not an accomplished act, but a life-long journey."

I came away from Dr. Bass' presentation feeling hopeful about this fresh movement of
the Spirit. In my next blog, I'll do some reflection on contextual issues that are calling forth the "Practices" of faith that Dr. Bass has been studying.

Healing a Fractured World: in the Shadows of 9/11

2006-09-11T12:15:00.000-07:00

Reading: Jeremiah 9: 23-24
Prayer
O God, we are your people…
Bring your best to our worst,
Bring your peace to our pain,
God of love, heal your people.

Last week-end, Cheryl and I visited with our sons Jason and Scott over Labor Day week-end, where they are both enrolled at the Univ. of Missouri.
It was one of their last long week-ends of the semester, and we wanted to be together as a family, all five of us.

While barbecuing on the grill outside his apartment, one evening,
I enjoyed talking with our son Jason about the start of his 3rd year of medical school.

What kind of doctor do you want to be, Jason? I asked.
Both Cheryl and I have been discussing this question with him.

For a time it was being an orthopedic surgeon, and he’s considered oncology,
and other specialties such as cardiology.
And now he’s thinking about opthamology.
And I thought after successful recent cataract surgery for Cheryl’s father,
how wonderful it would be to help improve or correct a person’s vision.
As Cheryl’s dad said recently, “I haven’t seen colors like this in years.”

But what really made this discussion most interesting, was hearing Jason talk about
helping a patient recently during his Internal Medicine 8 week rotation.
After prescribing some treatment and planning for a follow-up appointment,
the woman in question said, “Mr. Edmonds, Can I see you when I return?”

In that moment, our son began to feel like a doctor and a healer.
I felt pride. I experienced delight in seeing his growth and development.
I sensed his own joy in working to bring health and healing to another human being.

And I thought, this is what we human beings are meant to offer each other.
The healing part of me encounters the need for healing in you.
The healing power in you, meets the hurting need in me.
Together we experience the healing power of God’s Spirit.

Imagine God looking down on us and saying, in the words of Jeremiah we read:
“I am the Lord who exercises kindness,
justice and righteousness on earth;
for in these I delight,” declares the Lord.

God takes delight, God experiences enjoyment with us, when we live and act with deeds of kindness, justice and righteousness.
We give God great pleasure when our lives are lived that way, and when we do;
we offer Healing for others.

Our opening hymn portrays the delight of the worshiping community in how this is a vital part of the character of God.
“O my soul, praise Him, for He is thy health and salvation.”

It is God’s desire to heal us and to use a Jewish phrase- Tikkun Olam,
mend or heal the whole Creation.

The Bible speaks of this desire of God to mend or heal the whole Creation in various ways.

There is that beautiful phrase in Psalm 126.
‘Restore our fortunes, O Lord…
May those who sow in tears
reap with shouts of joy.
Those who go out weeping,
bearing the seed for sowing,
shall come home with shouts of joy.”

In the presence and experience of God,
there is a deeper healing,
and the promise that seeds of hope can be planted, through eyes of tears,
that will eventually yield a harvest of joy.

And yet for many, the healing promise and power of religious faith itself
seems suspect in our world today.

Following the attacks on 9/11 five years ago, one commentator remarked:
“We’re told that the attackers were zealots fueled by religious fervor.

Said this commentator:
“Religious fervor?
And if you lived to be a thousand years old,
will that make any sense to you?”

In the aftermath of 9/11, Charles Kimball, a professor at Wake Forest University,
a Baptist university in the best tradition of the ideals of that denomination
wrote a book titled, When Religion Becomes Evil. He writes:
“Religion is arguably the most powerful and pervasive force on earth.
Throughout history religious ideas and commitments
have inspired individuals and communities of faith to transcend narrow self-interest
in pursuit of higher values and truths.
As Charles Kimball observes:
..history shows that noble acts of love, self-sacrifice, and service to others
are frequently rooted in deeply held religious worldviews.

At the same time, history clearly shows that religion has often been linked
directly to the worst examples of human behavior…
That includes all of the world’s great religions, including Christianity.

For a long time in the course of my life as a Christian and as a minister,
I’ve had people say to me, “My faith is a private matter between me and God.”
I’ve been baffled as to where that belief comes from, since it runs totally
counter to biblical faith, from the prophets to Jesus,
who said “let your light shine before others.”

Or, I’ve had people say, in different ways, it’s just not possible or polite
to talk about religion and politics in public.
Those topics are too divisive. We can’t talk about them.
And I would now say, we can’t afford not to talk about them in today’s world.

As I commented to the men’s spirituality group I belong to over lunch the other day; the
three most important topics of life are: Religion, Politics, and Sex.
What else do you talk about if not those concerns? The weather?

The solution is not to ignore religion, to pretend that it can’t be talked about;
in fact, we must share with each a growing understanding of how
Religion should not just do harm in the world, but how
Religion should make a healing difference.

That passage from Jeremiah we read for today speaks of the healing, mending ways
of God in a variety of ways.

“He (who) understands and knows Me, (knows)
that I am the Lord, who exercises kindness,
justice, and righteousness on earth,
for it is in these I delight, declares the Lord.

In that list, kindness comes first. The Hebrew word is Hesed.
It also means “steadfast love”

As one great Jewish OT writer and rabbi observes:
More than anything else, hesed (kindness) humanizes the world.”
(Rabbi Jonathon Sacks, “To Heal a Fractured World: The Ethics of Responsibility”, p.46)

Kindness is intensely personal.
Justice, by contrast, is impersonal and impartial.

We say that Justice is Blind.

Kindness looks at people with open eyes of compassion, sees them for who they are,
and acts to humanize and heal.

Just as my son, the young doctor, met a woman patient in his teaching hospital,
who knew this young medical student cared about her.
She asked to see him again, because she knew she had been treated personally.

Jeremiah held up this exalted view of God’s desire for us,
that we act with Kindness, Justice and Righteousness.

We live at a critical moment in the world’s history. These are difficult times
for us as a nation and a people. I firmly believe that.

But, if the world only knows us for our demand for justice, in the aftermath
Of 9/11; it will never know kindness in us.

And if the world does not see and know our kindness,
the people of the world will never come to love the things we love,
the freedom we celebrate, the gifts of God we treasure.

In the city of Washington D.C., where one of the attacks of 9/11 took place,
There comes a story that I was reminded of recently.
(“To Heal a Fractured World”, Rabbi Sacks, pp 44-45)

It was the year 1966, and an 11 year old black boy moved with his parents
And family to a white neighborhood in Washington, D.C.

Sitting with his two brothers and sisters on the front step of the house,
he waited to see how they would be greeted.

They were not.

Passers-by turned to look at them but no one gave them a smile
or even a glance of recognition.

All the fearful stories this young boy had heard about how whites
treated blacks seemed to be coming true.

Years later, writing about those first days in their new home, he wrote,
“I knew we were not welcome here.
I knew we would not be liked here.
I knew we would have no friends here.
I knew we should not have moved here….

As he was thinking those thoughts, a white woman coming home from work
passed by on the other side of the road.

She turned to the children and with a broad smile said, ‘Welcome!”

Disappearing into the house, she emerged minutes later with a tray laden
with drinks and cream cheese and jelly sandwiches which she brought over to the children, making them feel at home.

That moment- the young man later wrote- changed his life.

It gave him a sense of belonging where there was none before.

It made him realize, at a time when race relations in the United States
were still tense and conflicted,
that a black family could feel at home in a white area
and that there could be relationships that were colour-blind.

This greeting, this welcome, broke down a wall of separation
and turned strangers into friends.

The young man in this story, Steven Carter, is now a law professor at Yale,
And he eventually wrote a book about what he learned that day.
He called it Civility.

The name of the woman, he tells us, was Sara Kestenbaum,
And he adds that she was a religious Jews.

In the Jewish tradition, such civility is called “hesed”-
which in turn comes from the understanding that human beings
are made in the image of God.

“I learned that truth in 1966,” writes Carter
“and to this day, I can close my eyes and feel on my tongue
the smooth, slick sweetness of the cream cheese and jelly sandwiches
that I gobbled on that summer afternoon when I discovered how a single act of (kindness) can change a life for ever.”

Religion should not just do harm in the world;
Religion should make a healing difference.

What we need is not less religion, as Jim Wallis writes in his wonderful book
God’s Politics.

What we need is better religion.
We need a religion that knows and understands God,

the God who says, if you want to know me,
know that I am the Lord, who exercises kindness, justice and righteousness on earth,
for in these I delight.

It’s a hard thing to say, but the world does not currently look upon the
United States in this way.

As a nation and a people of faith, with a vital healing religious experience,
we need to be seen as people who promote kindness.

A central teaching in most spiritual traditions is this:
what you wish to experience, provide for another.

Look to see, now, what it is you wish to experience- in your own life and world.

Then, see if there is another for whom you may be the source of that.

If you wish to experience peace, provide peace for another.

If you wish to know that you are safe, cause another to know that they are safe.

If you wish to heal your own sadness, or anger, seek to heal the sadness
or anger of another.

Some 8-9 years ago, 2 young Sudanese boys moved to Omaha, NE
after the great civil war and terrorisim in their own native land began.

One of these boys witnessed the murder of his father.
His mother remains in a refugee camp in Ethiopia.

The two boys have remained friends.

And they have been welcomed with kindness by many here in Omaha,
including a number of Presbyterian friends.

One Presbyterian, Dr. Lynn Graves, started a Scout Troup for Sudanese boys
and both these young boys joined and each became an Eagle Scout.

They graduated from high school and a couple of years ago began college.
Other Presbyterian friends helped each of them apply to college
and find scholarships, when they had no idea how to accomplish that.

One friend in particular, Don Royer, took it upon himself to guide these two young men through the college and financial aid process. Without his wise guidance, a wonderful opportunity may have been lost.

Our former church purchased clothing and a computer for these two young men.

And now just a few weeks ago, one of them Buey Ruey, was noted in
the Omaha World Herald for a summer internship he did with Congressman Lee Terry in Washington.

Buey and Jacob want to return to Sudan one day
to lead and help heal their country.

And they have a vision. They have started a group called Aqua Africa.
It’s mission is to organize efforts to drill for water in the Southern Sudan.
So that the people of their tribe and others in Sudan can plant crops and water livestock.

They have suffered, both of these young men. But they have also been loved
and have received kindness.

The psalmist said it well.
“May those who sow in tears,
reap with shouts of joy.
Those who go out weeping,
bearing the seed for sowing
shall come home with shouts of joy.”

What seeds of hope and healing do you feel called to plant?

What the Waters Reveal: on God and Katrina

2006-08-29T13:30:00.000-07:00

(The following is a sermon from Sunday, August 29, 2006 in which I used Romans 8: 28-39 as the text for these reflections on Hurricane Katrina's aftermath)

In the coming few days, Tuesday, August 29 to be precise, we as a nation will struggle to observe the first year anniversary of Hurricane Katrina’s devastations.

While in New Orleans this past May, on our Presbytery mission trip, we could visibly
see the high mark of the flood waters, that had covered over 80% of the city.
Going into the Lakeview neighborhood, the 7th Ward, and other neighborhoods, we saw the high water mark above the door frames of homes everywhere.
As someone remarked, it was like a dark bathtub ring was etched on homes and buildings everywhere in New Orleans.

Once the water receded, things that were once covered were now seen more clearly.

Katrina, in unexpected ways, revealed to us as a nation that life can be fragile,
that may of our fellow citizens in New Orleans and the Gulf were desperately poor;
and that things we love and care about can be suddenly and massively lost.

The Preservation Hall Jazz Band captures this feeling on the benefit album:
“Our New Orleans”. (Nonesuch Records: Net proceeds donated to Habitat for Humanity
Executive Producers: Robert Hurwitz and David Bither)

“Do you know what it means
to miss New Orleans
and miss it each night and day…

Miss those moss-covered vines
The tall sugar-pines
Where mockingbirds used to sing.

And I’d like to see the lazy Mississippi
A hurrying about to spring
The moonlight on the Bayou
Those Creole tunes that fill the air.

(And then the song brings it all home in an earthy way we can all appreciate)

Do you know what it means
to miss those red beans
When that’s where you left your heart

And there’s one thing more
I miss the one I care for
More than I miss New Orleans”

That great old song captures the feeling and loss of separation,
from things that make life valued and treasured.
And it’s the relationships and friendships and loved ones, that are missed the most.

A year later, less than half of the population of New Orleans has returned.
Families and friends are scattered all across the country, maybe never to return.

At John Calvin Presbyterian Church in Metairie, where a group of us
stayed during our mission trip to New Orleans in May,
nearly half of the congregation had not returned and few of the children.
Imagine feeling the loss of laughter from the children of the church.

At Lake View Presbyterian Church, another church we visited,
over half of the congregation had not returned, in one of great old neighborhoods
devastated by flooding.

Imagine how much people miss each other!

Already, I miss the people we met in New Orleans last May on our mission trip,
and the people I met in June on a second trip to D’Iberville, Miss.

I miss Michael and Kyle in New Orleans, two young doctors whose home we gutted
in the Lakeview District.
Lakeview was a desirable close-in suburb, before the hurricane, but when we arrived
it was largely a ghost-town.

These two talented young doctors, grads of Tulane Medical School,
could move anywhere in the country to work., but they love New Orleans and its people,
and they’ve made a commitment to stay and help rebuild a great city.

I miss Darrell, the African American man we helped in the 7th Ward one very long day,
gutting his house in hard, bone-weary work, that surprisingly lifted our spirits.

I’ll never forget Darrell’s comment:
”My neighbors and I didn’t know each other much before the flood,
but we look out for each other and help each other now.”

Something about facing disaster has the potential to tear down the walls of indifference
and mistrust we let grow up between us as people.

I miss Ed Cake and Irene McIntosh in D’Iberville, Ms. near Biloxi.
These two college professors, not far from retirement, looked at the devastation
in their home of D’Iberville and decided to do something,
So they helped organize the Presbyterian Disaster Village there,
where up to 200 volunteers from all over the country come to serve.

And I miss Joan, an older woman in New Orleans,
who welcomed us with such a loving and yet care-worn greeting.

In typical New Orleans language she told us,
“Baby, it’s so good of you’all to come help us.
I just don’t know if God has given up on us or not.”
“But you being here helps me believe God hasn’t forgotten us yet.”

I miss those people.

And I think of the questions the Apostle Paul raises in his writing here in Romans.

“Who will separate us from the love of Christ?
Will hardship, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness,
Or peril or sword?

Or hurricanes and flood?

Paul’s answer is a resounding “No”. Nothing can separate us from the love of God.

But before the “No’ there’s also a passage of time, of grief and healing needed.

Paul expressed it well, later on in Romans 12:5
when he said it is our call as Christians “to mourn with those who mourn”.

When Paul offers this direction for Christians,
he doesn’t go on to say, “and be sure to explain away all the suffering.”

But this we can affirm.
Suffering is not a sign of God’s absence in Christian faith.
Suffering doesn’t mean that God loves us less. God in Christ suffers with us.

I remember one night in D’Iberville, Miss during our mission trip in June,
when we had a time of sharing after our day’s work.

And a young teenager got up and said, “Our homeowner told us the hurricane came because people in Mississippi and Louisiana are bad sinners.”

And any number of famous fundamentalist preachers sounded the same bad theology.

What that claim about a punishing God fails to remember is that God in Christ
is redeeming us through the cross of Jesus Christ.

In the suffering of Christ on the cross, God takes our sin and our suffering into the very life of God and identifies with us and our suffering.
God bears the cost of our failure and our sin. God takes our pain into the divine heart and offers healing and hope for today.

God, in fact, shares our suffering with us.
That’s the God we know in the Bible and in the life and ministry and death of Christ.
Our is a redeeming God, not a punishing God!

But God is also a God of justice who calls us to examine our own actions and attitudes.
God is the one according to the prophet Micah, who calls us to do justice, to love kindness and to walk humbly with our God. (Micah 6:8)

There are still hard questions to be wrestled with in looking back on Katrina.
Questions of God’s goodness and love, but also sharp, challenging questions about human responsibility and sinfulness.

Jed Horne, editor of the New Orleans Times Picayune, has a recent book titled
"Breach of Faith: Hurricane Katrina and the Near Death of a Great Amerian City"
(Random House: 2006, pp 382-384) that poses some hard questions for our nation in doing justice and loving kindness.

1. Was New Orleans treated to second rate flood protection and a lethargic federal response because it was a majority black city?

2. Was New Orleans treated differently because many of its people are so desperately poor?

Before Katrina, NO, with a 67% black pop. had more than 103,000 poor.
That’s a poverty rate of 23%, 76% higher than the national avg. of 13.1%.

Ø The Gulf Coast had already been drowning in extreme poverty. More than 90,000 people in each of the areas stormed by Katrina in Louisiana, Miss., and Alabama
Made less than $10,000 per year.

Ø New Orleans, itself, ranks 7th in poverty among 290 large counties.

Ø 27% of blacks in New Orleans had no cars and no way to escape the flood and no family to go and stay with

Ø Some 57% of the elderly in NO have disabilities, while the national avg is 39%
Ø Nearly 50,000 poor folk in NO lived in areas where the poverty rate approached 40%

Jed Horne asks a variety of hard questions about human responsibility in the wake of Hurricane Katrina.

3. Was Katrina best explained as a weather-man’s warning to our denial as a nation about the long-range implications of global warning?

4. Has the focus on terrorism blinkered America to other threats just as grave?
Has the war on Iraq taken so much of our energy and resources that we can’t
respond to national emergencies and needs? Or protect our own citizens at home?

5. Have we come to believe that government is incapable and incompetent
to help its citizens? What does it even mean to ask that question?

6. Or was Katrina more than even the richest and most powerful country on earth could have handled?

Jed Horne suggests that we could say Yes to most of those questions he has posed.
As he observes, there is no one answer to the tragedy and bone-headed mistakes that were made at all levels in responding to the disaster in New Orleans.

Even the Army Corps of Engineers has now admitted to major mistakes in the levee system. For decades, informed residents of NO, have known the levees were sub-standard.

All of these observations point to human responsibility, arrogance, and incompetence.

What the Bible helps us is to see is that we live in a fallen world,
where both people and nature are twisted and broken by sin and in need of redemption.

In ways that we cannot understand,
the sin of Adam and Eve and collective humanity
has set loose destructive forces that operate in our world.

What Paul concludes is that “the whole creation has been groaning as in the pains
of childbirth right up to the present.”

Of all the things about Hurricane Katrina that challenge us, the most curious
and sometimes infuriating is to hear this disaster
called an “Act of God”.

The Psalmist reminds us of a far different God.

“God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in time of trouble.
Therefore we will not fear…. Psalm 46: 1-3

Our God stands against fear and how fear paralyzes us; how fear is used by some of our leaders to manipulate and to mislead us in our common responsibility to care for each other. Fear is being used so often in our national life to bring out the worst in us, instead of the Best in us.

Thinking back on Joan, the woman who greeted us in New Orleans, one bright sunny day to work on repairing her home, I still remember her soft, lilting NO’s voice:

“Baby I’m so glad you’re here.
I wondered if God had given up on us.”

I think, no this was not an Act of God, this hurricane.

But God is Active in giving us all the strength and courage to face
these hard times together. (Lutheran theologian Gary Harbaugh’s use of Act of God, versus Active God)

Joan had it right in one important way. Our presence, along with hundreds and thousands of other volunteers and hard-working people, in the Gulf Coast
says that God is Active.

And that God’s people are called to be active together as servants of compassion
and justice and mercy.

The people of New Orleans and the whole Gulf Coast call for us to act
as good Samaritans and to demonstrate as a nation that we are a compassionate people who care for all of our citizens.

The opening song on the benefit album, ‘Our New Orleans” puts it well:

”Now is the time for all good men (and women)

To get together to make this a better land,

To iron out our troubles and to help one another,

To make peace without stepping on one another…

I know we can work it out. Yes can, Yes we can.” (Allen Toussaint, “Yes We Can Can”)

"The Mighty and the Almighty" by Madeline Albright reviewed

2006-07-13T11:40:00.000-07:00

Until recently, of all the subjects diplomats needed to master, religion ranked near the bottom of the list. When I graduated from the University of North Carolina with a degree in political science, the only reference to religion was the old Karl Marx maxim, that "religion is the opium of the masses." Even that reference was taken out of context, but that was the state of the conversation.

Madeline Albright, former Secretary of State under President Bill Clinton, seeks to address the new dynamic of religion and foreign affairs in her recent book, "The Mighty and the Almighty", with the subtitle, "Reflections on America, God, and World Affairs." This is an extraordinarily vital topic, not only for governments, but for the church and for all people of faith and spiritual interest.

Consider a recent news article.

Pastors of American's evangelical megachurches, the "Los Angeles Times" reports...have launched a "Billion Souls Initiative" to reach every heathen on Earth.
'Our purpose is to hasten the End Times,' says Bill McCartney, co-founder of Promise Keepers. Those who fail to heed Christ's message, McCartney warns, are "toast."

Meanwhile, Iran's alarming president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, is just as eager to see infidels turned to toast. Within two years, he asserts, the Mahdi, the last of the Prophet Mohammed's heirs, will return to Tehran, ushering in a bloody, cataclysmic confrontation with the non-Muslim world.

Even in our own, enlightened nation, 40 % of the population believes the End Times are nigh, according to several polls, and prominent advocates of conservative churches have substantial political influence in the current administration.

If a bloody cataclysm in Israel is all part of a vengeful God's grand plan, why bother trying to negotiate peace? Why not, as one skeptic asks, welcome a global religious war between Christianity and Islam?

Early on in Albright's very fine book, she comments: "History would be far different if we did not tend to hear God most clearly when we think He is telling us exactly what it is we want to hear." That statement is in keeping with our nation's greatest public theologian, Abraham Lincoln, who asked not whether God is on our side but whether we are on God's.

As Albright remarks, "We have...the right to ask- but never to insist or blithely assume- that God bless American."

Madeline Albright's own personal religious history is disclosed in her book. She was Jewish by family history, but was raised Catholic, after her diplomat father brought her and the family to the United States after the communist take-over of Czechoslovakia in the 1950s. Albright was only 11 at the time, and it wasn't until just a few years ago that she learned of her Jewish ancestry.

Albright's book is an engaging, timely, and informative overview of the current world political crisis as it pertains to terrorism, religious conflicts, the complexity of Middle Eastern religion and politics, and the importance of hearing different religious voices in American foreign policy. Only recently has the State Department, she notes, incorporated experts in understanding the role of religion in societies around the world. While Albright affirms President Bush's leadership in the days immediately following 9/11, she makes no bones about offering policy differences with him in the days since.

Here are some engaging questions drawn from Albright's examination of religion and foreign policy:
1) "Freedom is God's gift to everyone," proclaims President Bush. But does he imply that God has appointed America to deliver that gift?

2) Does the United States believe it has a special relationship with God? We would not be the first nation to think so. What are the dangers of such a view?
Are we willing to address the human propensity to sin and pride that biblical faith fearlessly asserts of all human endeavors?

3) While individuals are created in the "image of God" according to Genesis, are we claiming that our own nation was created in the "image of God"?

4) How can religion serve more as a potential means for reconciliation than as a source of conflict? Each of the 3 great religions of the Middle East has Abrahamic roots and elements of faith that make for peace.

5) Are we so sure that we as Americans can easily determine between good and evil in the world? As Albright comments, "Although good and evil exist, they tend to be mixed together, not separately packaged." The lessons of Abu Ghraib and the ongoing revelations of American military misconduct in Iraq are examples of how even good intentions can become corrupted.

Albright's book would make for a an enlightening and challenging work for any church group, book club, or gathering of citizens who rightly are concerned about what role religion plays in current policy decisions in our government. Why would people of faith naively assume that government, in any hands, will provide a fair and sympathetic portrait of anyone's religious beliefs?

"I am an optimist who worries a lot," says Albright. With good reason....

Understanding Conflict

2006-06-30T12:46:00.000-07:00

One day this week I was sitting around a table planning an upcoming workshop on "Healthy Congregations" with a group of leaders in our presbytery. One of the topics includes the theme: "Healthy Congregations Manage Conflict". Looking around the table, I could see that some people were unpursuaded, to say the least.

In most of our churches, one person said, "People avoid conflict like the plague, because they are afraid of what will happen." Another person said, "Yeah, we don't do conflict well." Those aren't surprising statements. And yet, it's rather difficult to be a human being and not experience conflicts or disagreements in the course of life, not just in church, but in our family life and work life and oh yes, out on the baseball or soccer fields. A recent minor league baseball game here in Omaha featured the manager of the visiting team exploding in anger over an umpire's call. So, after a heated dispute, he went and pulled up 2nd base in protest. Needless to say, he got tossed from the game! In reality, none of us can effectively "stuff conflict", but we can learn to better manage our experience of it.

The Latin root of conflict is "confligere" and means "to strike together", which offers the image of flint and stone, sparks, heat and fire. "Heat" is a common metaphor for conflict.

Interestingly, the Chinese symbol for confict combines two terms: danger and opportunity. In this perspective, conflict is not seen in terms of collision, of force and heat, but rather as a challenge.

Some time ago I read a book with the intriguing title, "When You Say Yes, But Mean No," by Leslie Perlow. Perlow offers a number of challenging and ultimately helpful and healing insights about conflict.

First, "Each time we silence conflict, we create an environment in which we're all the more likely to silence the next time."

"Silencing conflict creates resentment, anger, and frustration in a person"

"When there is pressure to go fast, people are all the more likely to silence their differences to keep things moving as quickly as possible."

"When we silence conflict, we may also hinder our ability to be creative and to learn in the process."

"Creativity requires an environment that lets us be ourselves and feel comfortable in taking risks."

A few months ago, I attended a week-long training in Mediation Skills conducted by staff from the Lombard Mennonite Peace Center. It was an exceptional training event.

We all bring skills and experiences to an understanding of conflict we were told.
The trainer also shared with us that conflict is usually composed of three elements:
people, process, and problems". We were told to be "soft" on people, but tough about adhering to good process and determined in our approach to facing the problems.
That's good advice.

Rabbi Edwin Friedman once remarked that leadership seems to be about "leading people". But it all begins with being able to "lead oneself". I think that's true of conflict. The more confident and healthy we become in facing conflict, the better able we are to help lead others in managing conflict.

The gospel of Jesus Christ is a message fundamentally about reconciliation. Reconciliation should be a living dynamic and practice of our faith. The world greatly needs reconciling forces and people, who have the confidence and skill to move toward healing relationships. When you think about it, that's not an optional part of Christian faith. It should describe what Christian community looks like.

College World Series

2006-06-22T07:59:00.000-07:00

The University of North Carolina Tar Heels, my alma mater, is known primarily for its success in basketball. Well, this week right here in Omaha the Tar Heels are set to play for the College World Series Championship after a tense 6-5 win over Cal State Fullerton Wednesday night. I was there! What a great experience it was to attend my first College World Series game with my son Jason, who is home for a few weeks doing a medical school clerkship in family practice medicine before he starts his third year at the University of Missouri. Sitting with him, enjoying a great baseball game together was like an extra added post-father's day present.

Just a few rows below us we saw a t.v. crew camera-man filming a shot of a father holding up his son, who may have been a year old. And I thought about my son Jason's birth nearly 24 years ago in Baltimore, Maryland at Union Memorial Hospital just a short distance from the old Baltimore Orioles Memorial Baseball Stadium.
Watching that father hold up his delightful son to the camera and then seeing the image on the huge jumbo video screen out in center field at Rosenblatt Stadium in Omaha, I felt what a deep blessing my own three sons have been in my life.

The Tar Heels game against Cal State Fullerton was really exciting. Behind 2-0 after the first couple of innings, my Tar Heels roared back on home runs and excellent defense. Coming into the ninth inning the game tightened up to 6-5, until the ace of the staff, Andrew Miller came in to pitch the last out, and the Heels moved into the championship game this week-end. I plan to be there.
So does my son.

Designing Worship Together

2006-06-19T09:18:00.000-07:00

Recently I was asked a rather interesting question by a group of church leaders. What would I do if lay members leading a worship experience said or did something that I strongly disagreed with either theologically or spiritually?

Describe the circumstances I replied. This family worship gathering, I was told, was an early morning service that preceded a more traditional worship experience in the life of the church. All the pastor had to do in this family worship gathering was to show up and offer a brief message in a casual atmosphere, while lay leaders took care of everything else. What do you think such dynamics are bound to produce?

I thought to myself in hearing that early family service described, that any number of confusions and misunderstandings were bound to arise over time. Lack of communication, a perfunctory role for the pastor, and an obvious lack of worship planning could all contribute toward conflict.

A part of my answer to this group of lay leaders was that worship is "the work of the people" and that misunderstandings can arise when either pastor or people fail to join their best efforts in designing a compelling and appealing worship experience for all ages and stages of faith.

One quite helpful resource to help in worship planning is the book "Designing Worship Together", with the subtitle "Models and Strategies for Worship Planning".
Authors Norma deWaal Malefyt and Howard Vanderwell offer up a wealth of practical and exciting suggestions about how teams of people in the life of the church can be empowered to do the work of the people of God in worship.

The authors of "Designing Worship Together" remark that "When the two of us began our ministries in the late 1970s and early 1980s, worship planning consisted of selecting three songs to "plug in" to the standard order of service, phoning in the song numbers to the organist of the day- and worship planning was done!" You could call that style of worship design the "fill in the blanks" style of worship planning. The problem is that such a style doesn't offer any opportunity, much less encouragement to employ the creative gifts of members for worship. Drama, liturgical dance, visual backgrounds for scripture using power-point technology, use of multiple voices in reading and speaking the texts of worship; you name it, all of these elements of a vital and engaging worship experience are omitted with cut and paste or fill in the blank worship services.

How is it that the creative God we worship, who is all about inspiring creative gifts and accomplishments of people in the world, would not want to invite our best creative efforts in planning worship?

"Designing Worship Together" makes a pursuasive case for collaboration in planning worship. An honest part of this case for collaboration also involves a look at obstacles to collaboration: Incompatible views of worship, insufficient available time to plan, failure of partnerships, personal agendas, and yes, the failure of pastors to plan ahead. But none of these challenges is insurmountable.

"Designing Worship Together" offers a mini-course for pastors and lay worship leaders or committees on how to work together. One helpful suggestion calls for worship leaders to come up with a thoughtful and appealing "purpose statement" for worship that guides the worship and mission of the church.

A number of other suggestions are offered, including a reference to work by noted Presbyterian pastor and worship leader Tom Long of Emory University. Long says that vital and faithful congregations:

1. Make room, somewhere in worship, for the experience of mystery.
2. Make planned and concerted efforts to show hospitality to the stranger.
3. Have recovered and made visible the sense of drama inherent in Christian worship.
4. Creatively adapt the space and environment of worship.
5. Forge a strong connection between worship and local mission
6. Maintain a relatively stable order of service and a signficant repertoire of worship elements and responses that the congregation knows by heart.
7. Moves to a joyous experience toward the end of the service.

What would I do if I disagreed with others leading worship? Well, a sense of humility calls for each of us to recognize that our worship and our leadership of worship is always in need of reform. No experience of worship is ever perfect, but ours is a gracious and loving God who welcomes us into the divine presence, and gladly receives our gifts. This loving God also seeks to transform us and change us and make us more holy. Together we are called to design worship that honors the goodness of our God. The good news is that we are called to do this together!

At the Village in D'Iberville, Mississippi June 4-9

2006-06-14T07:47:00.000-07:00

"God is loving and kind and caring and full of miracles," was the message I and about 75 volunteers heard from Dr. Irene McIntosh during our orientation at the Presbyterian Disaster Assistance Village in D'Iberville, Ms. last week. Irene is the President of D'Iberville Volunteer Center & Village near Biloxi, one of the hardest hit areas damaged by Hurricane Katrina. Presbyterian Disaster Assistance helps operate this Village, which can house 100 volunteers at a time while they fan out across the community to rehab homes severely damaged by the storm surge of Katrina. The accomodations aren't fancy: large military style olive drab field tents that have received ply-wall interior walls and air-conditioners, an outdoor shower facility, group meals in the large meeting tent, and simple food prepared by volunteers. But the spirit of the Village is alive and bustling and filled with people on a mission to make a difference.

Irene was riveting in her stories of Hurricane Katrina's devastating force. She was an eye-witness and survivor herself. In her opening remarks she shared with the group of some 75 volunteers meeting with her under a large white tent: "In 12 hours, the people of D'Iberville went from middle class status to that of a 3rd world country. We had no jobs, no homes, no grocery stores, no electricity, no sewer and 65% of buildings were useless. No one was coming to help us. Not FEMA. Not the Red Cross."

But miracles did begin to happen, Irene told us. "The government of the people, by the people, and for the people" began to respond in the presence of church volunteers from all across the country.

Our charter bus from Omaha had driven through the night, leaving on Saturday afternoon at 4p.m., and arriving some 20 hours later with our group of 25 high school and college students and another 6 adults. We had come to live in the "Village at D'Iberville" and to contribute our volunteer efforts at helping local residents recover and rebuild.

My own team of 8 high school students and a young teacher in her early twenties was assigned to dry-wall the home of a man named Don, who is 75 years old. When Don saw our group of inexperienced youth,I think his hopes sank, not expecting that we would accomplish very much. His smile was still present on his face that first day, just not a real big one. Just watch, I told our youth, and see how that smile of Don's will grow.

I was standing in the hallway of Don's home that first day, removing a glass globe light fixture, so that fresh drywall could be hung, when I noticed something interesting. Come on over here, I asked the youth in my team. Watch this. I then shook that glass globe, which was full of water from the storm surge that engulfed the homes in the neighborhood. Don, the homeowner, told us the water was half way up in his attic. Everything in his home was destroyed. The tragedy was compounded when Don's wife died 12 days after the storm. For some 6 weeks, Don told us, he then lived in his car until a FEMA trailer was delivered.

Each night in the Village we gathered for a simple evening devotion and group sharing about the day's experience. On the second night, a teenage boy in our group got up to share and told us what he heard an older woman say to his group. "Maybe God is punishing us for our sins," she said. The boy in our group sat down, unsure of what to say next. Before I knew it, I popped up out of my seat, like something had grabbed hold of me, pushing me forward. I had heard comments like that before, from fundamentalist leaders.

That is not the God we worship and experience, I said. Ours is a loving and just God, who is revealed most fully in the life and ministry of Jesus. "Our presence here this week," I said, "shows that we believe God has sent us as the hands and feet of Christ in service to those in desperate need." "God so loved the world, that he gave his Son. Indeed, God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world," was the scripture passage I cited. And then I sat down.

Our homeowner, Don, whose home my team worked on offered witness to God's presence in many ways. Don was not a church goer, but each day he seemed to draw closer to our team. As we arrived about 8:30 a.m. each morning, he came out the door of his trailer to greet us. None of us had done much drywalling before. So the first day, we labored to get one room finished. The next day, we finished two rooms. And each day afterward we doubled or tripled our work production. Seeing this group of energetic high school students learn to do something they had never done before was a minor miracle of God's goodness. And Don's smile grew larger each day we were at his home.

On our last day, I invited Don to join our group in a circle to offer a blessing prayer for his home. I'd like that, Hart, he said. And I would like to pray for you too. So, I offered up a prayer and a blessing, and we experienced the miracle of God's presence in the life of a new friend.

Mission to the Big Uneasy: Part 2

2006-06-03T12:41:00.001-07:00

After our long 10 hour day Monday, we returned to our host church site, John Calvin Presbyterian Church, muscles aching but feeling the ache was worthwhile. Barb Lewellen, our food director, had no problem organizing our group of eleven to cook up a wonderful meal together. Afterward, Greg Carlson led us in our regular evening devotions, with a centering question: “Where did you experience God during the day?”
We all, in some fashion, felt that experience of God’s presence in our work with Darrell, sharing in his joy of the beginning of a new chapter in his life.

Tuesday and Wednesday our assignment took us to the Lakeview neighborhood, which is primarily Caucasian and a nearby community to downtown New Orleans. Lakeview seemed like a ghost town when we arrived. It’s a large neighborhood, considered to have been highly desirable for middle to upper middle class residents. It’s a long established community, with many older adults and growing numbers of young professionals. Our project was to gut a house for two young doctors, Michael and Kyle. They are in their internship year. They had purchased their home just a month before Katrina, only to lose it. I asked them whether they had debated over whether to rebuild, and they said, “most definitely.” Kyle grew up in the area, but Michael is from Baton Rouge. They are graduates of Tulane Medical School. Posted in their front yard was a sign, “We’re Coming Home to Lakeview”. The sign captured their feelings and commitment, along with a number of other residents. Kyle’s mother greeted us as well. She’s part of a network of small business owners advocating for federal loans to restart businesses in greater New Orleans. There’s much dissatisfaction with a slow federal response. Following 9-ll in NYC, some 18,000 businesses were lost. Three months later federal loans and aid were available. In New Orleans, some 18,000 businesses were also lost, but federal aid and loans have yet to be received.

Kyle and Michael both worked with us on their house. They wore t-shirts with the logo, ‘Doctors Without Hospitals” as a reference to how doctors from Tulane and other hospitals had to function in the days after Katrina. They opened clinics wherever a dry space could be found. Our mission group felt satisfaction in knowing that we were helping retain two young doctors for New Orleans. One report we heard is that some 1,500 doctors are leaving greater New Orleans because they’ve lost patients to displacement, or their jobs have been eliminated due to hospital closings. At the end of our work on Wednesday, we shared in another prayer with the Cash’s and received heartfelt thanks. It was again a moving experience.

When we left Kyle and Michael’s home, we decided to take a drive down to the 9th Ward, scene of some of the greatest flood destruction, and home to many of the poorest of New Orleans’ back population. It’s hard to describe the scene in the 9th Ward, which looks like a war zone in some ways. Many homes and buildings are just completely destroyed. The 9th ward is a very large area, home to thousands of black families, many with roots going back over a hundred years. It’s a place of great poverty. Small frame houses are the norm for housing there and stood little chance of surviving the flood waters. Many of the residents couldn’t leave ahead of Katrina because they had no cars to drive. Some 25% or more of people in New Orleans had no automobile transportation. After witnessing the scene, we left realizing how desperate the lives of many people are in New Orleans.

Wednesday evening back at John Calvin Church, we were invited to share in a dinner that night with residents of the neighborhoods around the church. Following Katrina, the church began hosting these Wednesday dinners for residents who had no kitchens in their homes left. About 125 or more attended that evening, and most were not members of the church. One woman seated at my table, with a charming New Orleans accent commented, ‘It’s awesome that there are people like yourselves, willing to come here and help us. God is using you in a wonderful way.” Then she said, “You’re really fortunate with the cool weather this week. You don’t know what a bad hair day is like until you’ve lived in New Orleans for the summer.”

On Thursday our work took us to an American Legion facility where a lone woman in her seventies was sorting through the equipment and belongings of the Legion. It was quite clear that she was in some disarray and was clearly overwhelmed by the task of what to do with the two story building. A term we learned this week was the “Katrina effect”, which refers to the emotional trauma and aftermath of the devastation experienced. One observer stated that, “the mental health concerns here are far greater than those we can expect from infectious diseases or household injuries.” Former New Orleans public health director Brobson Luty commented “that, in the immediate aftermath of all this, the primary psychiatric care in this city was being provided by the bartenders at Johnny White’s and Molly’s”. You get a feel for the flood’s destruction when you “drive around a town that has a permanent bathtub ring around it.” (1 dead in attic by Chris Rose of the Times Picayune)

Thursday we also worked for several hours tearing out a back porch owned a 65 year old woman named Joan Patrick in the suburb of Kenner. When I arrived, I heard Joan say in a typical New Orleans greeting, “Hello baby. I’m so glad you all are here. We can’t survive another Katrina. You just live day by day. I take it a little bit at a time. I wonder if we’ll ever recover from this.” Again, post-traumatic stress was evident, or the “Katrina effect.” Barb Lewellen was marvelous in responding to Joan Patrick, engaging in warm pastoral care and support. Barb also practiced what I would call “practical theodicy” in sharing with Joan that God did not will Katrina. Many public preachers in America have suggested that cruel nonsense. Even though we worked for several hours at Joan’s home, I think we all realized that our chief work was to serve as an encouraging presence that day. Joan Patrick almost literally drank in the attention and human contact from all members of our team. She hugged us on arrival and hugged and kissed everyone of us when it was time to depart.

On Thursday evening, we had a great opportunity to attend a book signing at Border’s Book Store by the prominent local historian Douglas Brinkley, who is a professor at Tulane University. Brinkley was frequently a t.v. commentator in the aftermath of Katrina. His recently released book is titled, The Great Deluge: Hurricane Katrina, New Orleans, and the Mississippi Gulf Coast. Brinkley’s publisher Wm Morrow asked him to produce this book. He is also leading up an oral history project of the flood for Rice University. The book is an account of “Louisianans saving Louisianans”. In the book, Brinkley recounts dozens of stories of heroism by average citizens and some not-so-average people. First responders didn’t think of race when they were coming to the aid of people. He tells the story of people like “Mama D and the soul-patrol” and how this older African American activist leader gathered up urban young people as a rescue force.
Brinkley notes how “some people felt guilty about Katrina in their grief as survivors.” On the political front, Brinkley offers up sharp criticism of governmental responses at all levels, but shares particular disdain for FEMA. Brinkley shared with us in his talk that night that “some wanted me not to tell these stories,” believing that examining the failures of government and individuals was too painful. Brinkley’s response is notable. His intention is “to collectively heal by sharing stories.” Here, Brinkley’s Catholic Christian roots are evident and encouraging. “I wrote this book out of hope,” said Brinkley, for the city of his birth. This is an inspiring collection of stories. Brinkley’s further goal is “to create an awareness that it’s o.k. to speak out and not let politicians off the hook.”

Our last day of work on Friday we gutted our last house, or at least three fourths of the job, back in the Lakeview neighborhood. Just down the block from this house was the Lakeview Presbyterian Church, which Greg Carlson and I visited. We met the two pastors, Rev. Jean Marie Peacock and Rev. Neale L. Miller. Both had lost their homes and were operating with cell phones and lap-tops in a make-shift office on the second floor of the church. The look on their eyes, Greg and I agreed, was one of physical and emotional exhaustion. They’ve lost their own homes and nearly 50% of their congregation as well. On Sunday’s they are now worshiping back in the sanctuary with about 75 in attendance. Some church teams have helped with gutting the church and its preschool building. A huge challenge remains. Jean, the associate pastor, commented that emotional stress is an enormous challenge for survivors and that they envision recruiting volunteer mental health professionals from the PCUSA to come and spend anywhere from 1-3 months at a time doing counseling and training volunteers. They will need funds to support this effort. Greg and I agreed to follow up on this.

We completed our mission work on early Friday afternoon, returned to John Calvin to store our equipment, and get ready for the journey home. But we also made time for another final trip down to the French Quarter for the afternoon and early evening. Why should Americans care about this historic city? Why should we rebuild and spend tax-payer money on restoring the city? Those are hard and tough questions, in our current political climate. That afternoon in the French Quarter, Greg Carlson and I stood in the Cabildo historic Spanish building on Jackson Square where the Louisiana Purchase was transferred to the United States, a signal accomplishment under President Thomas Jefferson. The city of New Orleans has been an influential port at the mouth of the Mississippi for over 200 hundred years. New Orleans contribution to the economic growth and cultural heritage of the nation and world has been enormous. That Friday afternoon in the French Quarter, Greg Carlson and I sat drinking café au lait and eating beignets in the Café du Monde. I saw at a table nearby someone with a t-shirt with this logo, quoting the late, great jazz pioneer Louis Armstrong: “What we play is life.”

There’s a funky, charming, sometimes outrageous quality to the cultural life of greater New Orleans. There’s an undeniable relish for life present in the city. I keep coming back to the greeting from Jean Patrick at her flooded home one afternoon, “Hello baby…I’m so glad you’re here.”

Mission to the Big Uneasy: Part 1

2006-06-01T12:34:00.000-07:00

Our Katrina Mission Team gathered at Faithful Shepherd PC on Friday, May 12 at 1p.m. to begin our trip to New Orleans. We packed the vans and then Greg Carlson, a Presbyterian pastor and trip chaplain, offered a sending prayer for our mission team. It was a good way to begin, asking for safe travels and a sense of common purpose for a group of people who were new to each other. Preparations for this trip began back in December, when I and a few others in Presbytery felt a call to organize a mission trip to the Gulf Coast.

That Friday night we stopped in Columbia, Mo where I arranged overnight accommodations at Trinity Presbyterian Church, whose pastor is Rev. Rim Massey, a long time friend. The next morning, Rim and his wife Judy treated our entire team to breakfast at Cracker Barrel as a way of offering encouragement and support to our efforts. What a great way to get started!

On Saturday, May 13 we began our long drive to New Orleans and arrived that night about 11:30 p.m. in Metairie. It was a long day! We broke up the day with a short stop in Memphis to visit Graceland and to pay tribute to Elvis. Paul Simon’s “Graceland” album echoed in my memory.

“The Mississippi Delta was shining
Like a National Guitar
I am following the river
Down the highway
Through the cradle of the civil war.”

Simon concludes that song with a mystical allusion:
“Maybe I’ve a reason to believe
We all will be received
In Graceland.”

For a group of eleven pilgrims traveling to New Orleans, that’s a good sending song.

We were met at John Calvin Church in Metairie by Bob Tobey, one of the church elders, late on that Saturday night, about 11:30 p .m. He welcomed us with enthusiasm despite the lateness of the hour and said not to worry; the last group had pulled in at 2a.m.. After unloading, we settled in for the night anxious to begin our adventure in the “Big Uneasy”. Our accommodations were in the church’s family life center, almost a Hilton Hotel for mission workers, with a couple of showers and a nice commercial grade kitchen to prepare our meals. Our rooms were the regular Sunday School class-rooms. My room was in the high school room where I noticed a prominent sign posted:

”Thawing the frozen chosen, one at a time!” I thought I’d take that line back with me for future use….

Sunday morning we worshipped with the John Calvin congregation. The congregation was warmly welcoming of our presence for the week, even giving us a round of applause during the announcements. There may have been 100-125 in attendance that morning. The music was great, not surprisingly, since the pianist/organist also plays regularly at the famous French Quarter restaurant “Pat O’Brien’s”. Afterward we were told that nearly 30% of the membership has not returned to New Orleans, including most of the families with children. This has been a hard blow emotionally for the church, but it’s a typical story we were to learn. After worship, we received a good orientation to the situation in New Orleans from our coordinator Richard Britson, a retired attorney, and Bob Tobey. Bob informed us he had been the owner of a wholesale hardware business destroyed by the flood. He is able to now retire, but as he said, not everyone is so fortunate. Most of the flood damage in greater New Orleans and Metairie occurred from the levees either being topped or undermined from Lake Ponchatrain, to the North of the cities. Continuing debate and controversies regarding Army Corps of Engineers past levee construction work and failures of government funding for adequate levee systems remain as part of the ongoing story of Katrina.

Sunday afternoon our group drove down to the French Quarter for a walking tour and enjoyment of the cultural scene. We had dinner at the Acme Oyster House, a favorite local place that’s served as a setting in a number of movies. I challenged everyone to sample a raw oyster from a platter I ordered for the group. You should have seen the look on some faces as the oysters slid down. Afterward we wondered through the streets to Jackson Square, the heart of the quarter. Our group divided up, allowing our group of five college age members some freedom to explore. My friend Greg and I wandered around the square and then up to the river walk-way, where the Mississippi flows. I thought about the river and how crucial it has been in American history, from the time of the Louisiana Purchase down to the War of 1812 and Andrew Jackson’s defense of the city in that war. His statue atop a stallion rearing back on two legs is the centerpiece of Jackson Square. After our walk, we stopped at the famous Café Du Monde for a café au lait and an opportunity to enjoy the street scene and listen to some fabulous jazz musicians playing outside the café.

We struck up a conversation with a group at a nearby table who asked where we were from and what had brought us to New Orleans. After telling them we were on a mission trip to help in flooded housing areas, the smiles and expressions of warmth from our nearby table mates made us feel even more welcome. “What do people here need?” I asked. “We need compassion and patience,” a woman at the adjoining table said. I kept that comment in my mind the rest of the week.

Monday was our first full day, and it was a busy start to the week. Our first project was in the 7th Ward, largely African-American, where we gutted a house for Darrell Kennedy, an accountant with the Depart. of Agriculture. His house had to be totally gutted, down to removing the flooring. We spent over 10 hours that day completing the job. Darrell worked side by side with us. In the neighborhood, his neighbors were in various stages of recovery. At the end of the day, we took pictures and shared in a blessing prayer. Darrell warmly hugged each of us and thanked us profusely for our help. It was quite moving.

That afternoon Darrell went to his next-door neighbor to ask if he could borrow a water hose for us to get fresh water and wash up a little before lunch. Darrell told me that before the flood, no one much knew each other in the neighborhood, but now they all did. And they were all looking out for each other and helping in any way they could.

It was a long, hard day of work that Monday in New Orleans, but it was the reason we had come. All day I looked around at our team of eleven, who worked with enthusiasm and great humor all day. We were quite a sight, with helmets on, eye goggles to protect against dust and other flying debris, swinging hammers and crow-bars and shovels all through the day. It's a great way to relieve pent up stress, I concluded. There was also a wonderful sense of being part of a team in service to someone else. All day Darrell worked by our side, with a huge smile beaming on his face. I don't think any of us will ever forget that smile, knowing we were helping someone begin the process of rebuilding his life.

Our New Orleans Mission

2006-05-01T20:25:00.000-07:00

For several months now, I've been planning and working with others here in Omaha for a mission trip to New Orleans. Finally, it looks like we're getting closer to making it all happen. Last week, I met with our mission team participants for an orientation and group building experience. Our departure date is May 12 and there's been a lot of work already done for our trip dates of May 12-21. I talked to our on site coordinator down in New Orleans, Sonia, who's the Christian Education Director at John Calvin Presbyterian Church. How are you all doing? I asked. We're hanging in there and doing the best we can, she said.

As I'm writing this, I'm listening to the benefit album, "Our New Orleans", with the music of Dr. John playing. A comment inside the album says:
"Much of the world is grappling with how to understand the loss of the
New Orleans we knew, searching for metaphors to describe the sinking
feelings about the fate of America's great city of music, food, and
architecture, that is at once south of the South and north of the
Caribbean. Headed home or still displaced, many New Orleanians are
moving from mourning to hope, from grief to planning a return."

I'm wondering what we'll encounter and experience in that great city.
During our team building orientation last week, we each shared why we
were interested in making this trip. "I want to help the people there,"
said a couple of college students. "I need to do this to make a difference
in some people's lives," said another person. We all said much the same.
Our group includes college students, a couple of pastors, a couple of
retired college professors, a man who's been retired for several years and
before that worked on 4 continents, and a computer consultant. One of the college students attended culinary arts cooking skill for a couple of years, before changing majors, and he's volunteered to whip up some Creole cooking one night.

Last Friday, I met with another college student who's making the trip. He's
just gotten involved in one of our supporting churches, and he's already
invited a fellow student there and also asked him to join our mission
group. Isn't that interesting? Already, this young college student is
engaged in the fullness of the missional life Jesus calls us to. Jesus
doesn't separate how we serve those in need, for our own personal response
to live as disciples. This long division between evangelism and social
justice just can't be traced to Jesus. It's a modern church division the
gospel won't permit.

Today, I've been reading the very recent book "Come Hell or High Water", with the subtitle "Hurricane Katrina and the Color of Disaster" by Michael Dyson,
one of the foremost authorities on the black experience in America.
Dyson's searing indictment of governmental incompetence and review of all that happened in the course of Katrina and the days afterward lays bear the racial, economic and political disasters that harmed the black poor in the Delta, long before Katrina hit.

As Dyson argues, "Hurricane Katrina's violent winds and killing waters swept into the mainstream a stark realization: the poor had been abandoned by society...
long before the storm."

Consider these realities:
* The Gulf Coast had already been drowning in extreme poverty. More than 90,000
people in each of the areas stormed by Katrina in Louisiana, Mississippi, and Alabama
made less than $10,000 per year.
* Blacks in those areas were strapped by incomes that were 40% less than that
earned by whites.
* Before Katrina, New Orleans, with a 67% black population had more that 103,000 poor. That's a poverty rate of 23%, 76% higher than the national rate of 13.1%.
* New Orleans poverty rate ranked 7th out of 290 large counties.
* New Orleans ranks 4th out of 297 metro areas in the proportion of households lacking access to cars.
* 27% of blacks in New Orleans were without cars, while only 5% of non-Latino whites were without cars.
*Children and the elderly were even more likely to not have access to cars.
They accounted for 48% of households without access to cars.
*Nearly 50,000 poor folk in NO lived in areas where the poverty rate approached 40%
* The national average for elders with disabilities is 39.6%, while in NO it's 57%.

During the hurricane, some commentators chided the people of New Orleans for not leaving the city after being warned to depart. They couldn't! Many had no access to cars, and transportation was unavailable.

(They weren' shiftless, stupid, or stubborn as some suggested, like FEMA's Mike Brown.)

As Dyson points out, concentrated poverty is the product of decades of public policies and political measures that isolate blacks in the poorest parts of the city, where transportation and schools and jobs and medical care are sub-standard.

Dyson records that Senator Barack Obama believes there was no racial intent to deny the predominant black population of New Orleans the help it so desparately needed during Katrina. Yet, as Dyson notes, the consequences for people of color in that city were undeniably the result of policies that had the same virtual effects as intentional racism.

I recommend Dyson's book. It isn't an easy book to read. His account of the devastations in New Orleans are heart-breaking. His hour by hour, day by day accounts of the fumbling, sometimes criminally incompetent national leadership is enraging. "Don't play the blame game," was a mantra often stated in the days after Katrina. But attention must be paid to this disaster and to the parties who compounded Katrina's devastations. Dyson's chapter on the history of FEMA and its subsequent role as a place for employing incompetent political cronies stirs your blood.

One of the strongest chapters in Dyson's book is titled "Supernatural Disasters?
Theodicy and Prophetic Faith." In that chapter, Dyson examines the behavior and statements of several high-profile fundamentalist preachers who blamed the sinfulness of New Orleans for God's wrathful judgment upon the city. These false prophets argued that it was "God's will" that New Orleans be destroyed. Political commentators, or hacks, like Bill O'Reilly piled on the judgement as well.

As Dyson asks, "To assume that New Orleans was a greater divine target for wiping out poor blacks than bigger cities with bigger black populations is to accuse God of poor sight or planning. And if God wanted to destroy abortion clinics, there are more in other states... (And) thousands of straight people die in earthqakes just as they do in hurricanes. Did not conservative Christians die in the flood?
Does God punish the innocent to get a message to the guilty? What about the babies who died, who practiced neither abortion nor voodoo...." You get the point. Dyson lets the absurdity of those who claim God was destroying New Orleans speak in all its horror.

Where, asks Dyson, is God's judgement for all those responsible for the plight of the poor and the sick and elderly and defensely in New Orleans and the Delta?

"Suffering is an unavoidable aspect of our human pilgrimage; the deepest faith
cannot prevent our walk through the valley of the shadow of death. For the victims, and survivors, of Hurricane Katrina," claims Dyson, "black faith refuses to offer pat answers or theological cliches. It is a tragedy of untold proportion, a catastrophe that causes the heart of God to break." Dyson's examination of the spiritual and theological concerns of Katrina merit long consideration and discussion.

The opening song of the benefit album "Our New Orleans" by Allen Touissant issues
a clarion call for the common good: "Now is the time for all good men (and women) to get together to make this a better land, to iron out our troubles and to help one another, to make peace without stepping on one another... I know we can work it out. I know we can make it if we try. Yes, we can, can." Let it be so!

Dyson quotes Martin Luther King, Jr. who in a sermon the year before he was murdered said:
"On the one hand we are called to play the good Samaritan on life's roadside:
but that will be only an initial act. One day we must come to see that the
whole Jericho road must be transformed so that men and women will not be
constantly beaten and robbed as they make their journey on life's highway."

The people of New Orleans call for us to act as good Samaritans and to demonstrate as a nation that we are willing to build a better highway for the lives of those living there in the mighty Delta region that has given so much to our culture and welfare.

God's Politics Means Hope

2006-04-27T07:06:00.001-07:00

Last night Jim Wallis, founder of Sojourner's Magazine and community as well as author of "God's Politics", spoke here in Omaha and announced that the "monologue about religion and politics" has ended. By that, Wallis confidently announced that the Right wing fundamentalist agenda to narrowly define the values and meaning of Jesus and Christian faith has been engaged by an alternative vision. This is good news!

Wallis addressed two audiences in Omaha this Wednesday, the first was a college group at Creigton University in the afternoon and then an audience of over 600 people of all ages at Countryside Community Church in the evening. I know that's true because my 16 year old son Daniel sat beside me. In his opening remarks, Jim Wallis observed that there is great "confusion and disillusionment" about religion in the United States at this time. In a humorous aside, he commented that
"I'm spiritual, but not religious is the fastest growing denomination in America today!" Some conclude that abandoning the church and religion is maybe the best choice one can make. Wallis disagrees.

Good religion pulls out our best stuff, in the American religious tradition. Bad religion pulls out our worst stuff. Reviewing some of the best stuff in our American religious history, Wallis asked, "Where would we be as a nation without the religious vision of abolitionists who worked to bring about the end of slavery?
Where would we be without the vision of Martin Luther King, Jr. and others who worked to end segregation and injustice for blacks? Where would we be without a long list of Americans who had a profound vision for God's concern for the poor, the weak, and the oppressed?" Wallis contends that every major social reform movement in American life has been fueled by faith.

"I believe in the separation of church and state," said Wallis, "but not segregation of faith values from public life."

Religion is about the big issues of life. "The big stuff is so big, only religion is big enough to face the challenges." In his book "The Call to Conversion", Wallis sums this up well in his statement that "faith is always personal but never private."
The biblical faith includes the prophets who advocated for the widow, the orphans, the homeless, the hungry and destitute. The prophets spoke truth to power and challenged the kings and rulers to fulfill their call to compassion for the weak.
In our day, it sometimes feels like the powerful feel a deeper compassion for the rich than for the weak. As Wallis puts it in his book, "God's Politics", since when did Jesus become pro-rich? pro-war? and only pro-American?

Yet, Wallis realistically argues that "America isn't hungry for a religious left, but for a moral center" to our problems and divisions." Americans increasingly aren't just red or blue state in their loyalties and values. There's more purple than we've been led to believe. Sitting beside a good Christian friend last night who is more conservative than I am on many issues, I agreed with Wallis' contention that "religion has been used as a wedge to divide us, rather than a bridge to connect us." My friend and I disagree on some issues, but we mutually acknowledge the sincerity of each other's faith. And we often agree on what end results should look like in society, while disagreeing some times on the proper means to achieve them. Even more importantly, we see in each other the presence of Christ who is transforming us both.

Wallis spoke to the issue of values in religion and American life last night.
Speaking about the fundamentalist right, he said they often seem to believe there are only two moral values that are critical: abortion and gay marriage.
That's too narrow an agenda from a biblical perspective argued Wallis. It's reductionist. Biblical faith and values includes a concern for the poor, a sense of our responsibilty for stewardship of the creation, an urgent concern for the war in Iraq, and a commitment to healthy families.

A pro-family agenda means more than being anti-gay marriage, argues Wallis. Family break-down is a crisis in our nation he acknowledges. In his urban Washington, D.C. neighborhood, Wallis reported that 80% of families are single-parent families. Kids fall through the cracks. There is a challenge to raising children in our society, and parenting and marriage do not receive much social support or public policy assistance.

"Parenting is a counter-cultural practice in society," today argues Wallis. And neither political party has a pro-family agenda.

In one of his lecture tours across the country, Wallis recounted the conversation he had with a young student who had her grasp of key moral issues challenged and deepened during the "God's Politics" lecture. She told Wallis that he had alerted her to the "silent Tsunami" that kills 30,000 children daily around the world from hungry, disease, and warfare.

The latter part of Wallis comments last night addressed the moral development of children and youth, and the role they will play in leading our nation and churches in the future. Following a lecture in the Northwest, Wallis mentioned a conversation with an 11 year old girl. "What did you get out of this talk tonight?" he asked her. Imagine that 11 year old girl speaking to Wallis, a man who has been on the front lines of religious leadership and social change for over 30 years. Confidently, she responded to Wallis, "We're just going to have to change the world." Do we adults have enough idealism and faith to measure up to that young girls idealistic vision?

The big choice today is between cynicism and hope Wallis shared with us in the concluding remarks of last night's address. Cynics are against the bad stuff in our world, but don't believe or hope that things can be different. Cynicism is a buffer against commitment said Wallis. The only real alternative is Hope. Hope isn't a feeling; it's a choice because of our faith. Hope means believing in spite of the evidence and waiting to see the evidence change.

At the conclusion of the evening, I stood in line for a book signing with Wallis for his book "God's Politics". My son Daniel was with me. He said to me, "Dad I want to read this book." Jim Wallis signed my son's book and asked him what his plans were for college and life. Daniel was a little shy at first, but then shared his interest in writing. With genuine interest, Wallis encouraged Daniel's ambition and challenged him to write a little each day. I could tell Wallis cares about young people. We owe it to them, as adults, to be people of Hope.

God's Politics

2006-04-25T06:50:00.000-07:00

Omaha is set to welcome Jim Wallis, author of "God's Politics" with the subtitle
"Why the Right Gets It Wrong and the Left Doesn't Get It." Wallis will be in town this Wednesday, speaking at Creighton University and later in the evening at Countryside Community Church. Missouri River Valley Presbytery, Creighton University and Countryside Church are the sponsors for this whirlwind tour and speaking engagement. Since last November I've been leading coffee shop discussions of "God's Politics". It's been a great learning experience for me.

Last Friday, I shared a cup of coffee with my friend Doug, a college professor and therapist here in town. Doug isn't a church goer; in fact, he has a lot of struggles with organized religion. Don't worry about that with us Presbyterians I said to Doug, "We're far from being organized!" For a long time now, Doug and I have had this running series of coffee shop discussions about faith, doubt, current politics, and where the church I'm part of looks at all this. Although Doug is far from conventional in his views of religion and church, he shares with me and many others a belief that current presentations of right-wing Christianity are distortions of Jesus' teachings.

Jim Wallis puts it well in his book "God's Politcs". Since when did Jesus become pro-war, pro-rich, and only a selective moralist whose primary concern is our sexual behavior?

It's an interesting question to reflect on how evangelism and social justice or concerns for doing acts of mercy and justice in the world are related. For some time now, we mainline Christians have been conflicted about both evangelism and social concerns. We've made an artificial separation of the these two vital elements of faith, just as arbitrarily as our more conservative church counterparts.
It's really hard to see Jesus separating the two. Wallis makes this point quite clearly in "God's Politcs." As Wallis points out, there are over 2,000 verses in the Bible that show God's concern for the poor. And Jesus came preaching "good news to the poor, recovery of sight to the blind, release to the captives, and the favorable year of our Lord (the Jubilee year of redistribution of wealth so that power and wealth were'nt forever concentrated in the hands of a few) Luke 4

For some time now in our nation, we've been engaged in a debate about the importance of values in national life and in cultural debates. But as Jim Wallis asks, "Which values and whose values are we talking about?" How narrowly or widely will the discussion be? Will the moral values debate cut both ways in politics, challenging both the political Left and Right, Democrat and Republican?

God is not a Republican or a Democrat! That has been the message Jim Wallis and the Sojourners Community he founded has been proclaiming for some time now.

Wallis identifies issues and values that Christians should care about:
*poverty is a religious issue
*the environment, God's creation, is a religious concern and increasingly evangelicals and mainliners are coming to agreement on this
*the war in Iraq is a continuing moral issue that touches on the issue of just war in relation to the controversy over preemptive war, not to mention the sad spectacle of our soldiers involved in prisoner abuse
*our muli-racial society and the growing debate over immigration calls for our faith communities to lead the way in the vision and practice of reconciliation
*personal and social responsbility are both at the heart of religion
*defeating terrorism is both practically and spiritually connected to the deeper work of addressing global poverty and resolving the conflicts that sow the bitter seeds of despair.

Just this week, I've been helping my son Daniel write a paper on the conflicts in the Middle East and how religion plays a key role in these disputes and conflicts.
The three major religions of the world: Judaism, Christianity, and Islam are each a party to these conflicts. If we believe that moral values and religious faith are crucial to our identity and values, then leaders from these great religions must be a party to peaceful resolutions of conflict. Government can't do that alone. Government doesn't really comprehend, fully, the meaning and power of religion.
Usually, government seeks to coopt religion for its own power manipulations. That's often what we're witnessing in contemporary politics.

And with the above should come a genuine humility. As Jim Wallis observes, "Religious people do not have an exclusive hold on the issues of morality."

Some might argue that religion is too volatile a force to take into the public sphere of values and politics. My friend Doug raised this very question with me. And it's a good question. As Wallis notes, "Conventional wisdom suggests that the antitdote to religious fundamentalism is more secularism. But that is a very big mistake. Bad theology and bad religion need to be corrected by a better theology and a better religion."

The three great monotheistice traditions (Judaism, Christianity, and Islam) are all religions of the "book". The key question is how do we interpret the book?
Better interpretations of the book are a much better, more effective response to fundamentalism than throwing the book away. I think this is a vital insight. This past week-end, I saw a CNN special featuring the writer and influential interpreter of world religions, Karen Armstrong. She argues that at their core, the major world religions do share in common a basic compassion for human persons and a belief that God, however understood, does call human beings to mercy. Those of us who follow the life and teachings of Jesus do believe that God calls us to do justice, to live kindness, and to walk humbly with our God. (Micah 6: 6-8) Jesus incarnated this way of life.

Near the end of his book, "God's Politics", Jim Wallis makes this statement:
"Prophetic faith does not see the primary battle as the struggle between belief and secularism. It understands that the real battle, the big struggle of our times,
is the fundamental choice between cynicism and hope." I find that comment both encouraging and challenging to my faith. How about you?

How do we grow SMART Leadership?

2006-04-22T09:06:00.000-07:00

This morning I joined in an Eagle Scout project at church for Bradley, one of our fine youth members. The sun was shining brightly on this gorgeous spring day when I pulled into the parking lot, to be greeted by about 25 scouts and at least 10 parents gathered for the day's work: planting a large number of trees around the perimeter of our new parking lot. Shovels were lined up against a wall for the project, trees were waiting to be planted, and young scouts had their gloves on for the work ahead. I told the leaders present, "We've got enough energy and work readiness here to plant 5 acres of corn by hand!" How did we get to this project? What were the steps involved that led to a successful service project to benefit the church? And what does this have to do with life and faith and ministry?

Let me share the meaning of the SMART acronym:
S..........Strategic/Specific objectives and goals
M..........Measurable goals, avoiding fuzzy thinking about the specific objective
A..........Attainable goals that stretch you to achieve, but are realizable
R..........Relevant results that contribute something of real value or significance
T..........Timely process of accomplishment

Several months ago, Bradley approached me at church one day about his desire to plan an Eagle Scout service project that would benefit the church. As a former Scoutmaster and father of two Eagle Scouts, Bradley knew I cared about scouting and that I had some experience in helping plan Eagle projects. I was also honored to be asked to help Bradley. So, we began the service project in a collaborative way and I helped Bradley through several steps of his goal, always bearing in mind the Scout focus on developing "boy leadership", not taking away the opportunity or challenge for a Scout to learn leadership priniciples. Scouts are expected to carry out their Eagle project as an independent leadership project, with the objective of involving adults and other scouts in a team process along the way. The benefits involve preparation for leadership in life.

S......Strategic/Specific I coached Bradley to approach the Building and Grounds
Committee at church to gather ideas about service projects of worth and
benefit to the church. A number of ideas were considered. One involved
ripping out the old carpet in the fellowship hall, where a remodeling effort
was underway. Bradley briefly considered this project, but decided it
involved skills that were not aligned with Scout experience or abilities.
Finally, after a few other ideas were considered, it was determined that the
new parking lot would benefit from landscaping, especially the planting of
several ornamental trees. A plan for raising money followed. With some
brainstorming, Bradley decided to offer church members a chance to pledge
money for the trees. Since most of the trees were over $100, we decided that
was a little costly for some members. And so I suggested breaking the request
down into $20 shares, with an opportunity to designate memorial gifts for
a plaque to be displayed. This idea was a huge success with our membership!

M......Measureable: Bradley worked with the Building and Grounds Committee to
determine the number of trees that were needed for the new parking lot.
He also researched the cost per tree, and he did some research on the most
desireable tree varieties. He had a complete assessment of needs and costs.

A......Attainable: Clearly, the landscaping plan met a need of the church. After
doing some brainstorming about a reasonable pledge for a share, Bradley was
confident that $20 shares were easily within reach of member giving. Added to
the appeal of the project, was a plaque in memory or honor of members. For a
few weeks ahead of the project, Bradley made announcements to the church
regarding his project, and he was enthusiastically supported.

R......Relevant results: Bradley's Eagle Scout project focused on the needs of
his church. He discarded some ideas as either unrealistic or unattainable,
given the skill level of scouts or financial costs. He settled on a very
appealing project.

T.......Timely planning and accomplishment: Spring time is the ideal time for
planting new trees. The weather is good and the trees do not suffer from
extreme heat. Several months of planning and coordinating scout and adult
leaders resulted in a well designed and executed project.

"Find yourself so that others may follow," is a principle in leadership development in the scouting movement. If we seek to lead others, then we must first learn how to lead ourselves. Bradley accomplished this with his Eagle Scout project, and he should be able to continue applying these leadership principles.

In church life, we too could benefit from SMART leadership. There's the proverb that says, "Without vision the people perish." That sense of "perishing" has the sense of being confused, directionless, aimless, and wandering. Too often our churches drift into that visionless wandering when we do not practice effective leadership skills and apply wise understandings of leadership. The SMART process of goal setting offers one reliable, easily grasped, and tested approach to shared and personal leadership. More and more, I am applying it in my own life and ministry.

What do you feel are benefits to this SMART model? Are there any limitations?

Hero

2006-04-17T11:07:00.000-07:00

On a recent flight to Nashville, Tennessee just before Easter to visit my wife's family, I had an interesting encounter in the Dallas Airport waiting for our plane connection. I was sitting reading a copy of the Kansas City Star, the entertainment section it so happened. A young black man walked by and stopped right in front of me and said, "Can I have your paper?" "That picture there is me." I looked at the picture and then looked at him and said, "You're right. It is you!"

It turns out that this confident, edgy, energetic man was the great gospel recording artist Kirk Franklin, who lives in Dallas. (Franklin's known for a variety of great recordings such as "The Rebirth of Kirk Franklin.") He was on his way, like me, to Nashville, where he was set to co-host the Gospel Music Awards. I gave Mr. Franklin the paper and then asked if I could have his autograph. Sure he said. We chatted for a few minutes and I met a few others in his group. "Bless you man," he said to me, tapping his chest, and we shook hands. "I like your name, Hart" Reminds me of that old t.v. show "Hart to Hart".

Franklin's new cd is titled "Hero", and it's a power-house collection of 20 songs lasting over an hour. Joining him on this fusion of soul, classic Gospel, contemporary urban hip-hop, and soaring gospel choruses are the likes of Marvin L. Winans, Dorinda Clark-Cole, and the great Stevie Wonder. It's an awesome, sometimes overpowering expression of faith and struggle.

One reviewer says of Franklin's new CD, that "Hero is full of admissions of struggle and challenges, but Franklin always weaves a message of hope and encouragement to take the focus off the negative."

That's right! Take the first track, "Looking for you."
Verse 1 "I've been down so long/I've been hurt for so long/ There were times I thought I'd never see the break of day/ It was hard for me to see Your plan for me/ And I tried to believe struggling won't last always/ See night after night I prayed Lord/ Don't take Your joy from me/ And then late one night/ I read in Your love letter that it's gonna get better"

Listening to that track several times, I've thought the Black Church in America gets the raw honesty of struggle in life, clearly voiced in the psalms, while we in the White Church often gloss over these realities. A seminary class-mate put it this way once in a discussion. "We've taken the Apostle Paul's trinity of faith, hope, and love and reduced them to faith, hope and good taste."

In the duet titled "Why" with Stevie Wonder, Franklin makes the tough statement,
"We're building churches/But are we building people?" That song asks the painful question, "Why Oh Why, Lord tell me when our change is gon' come/ There are no fathers and (the system's holding me down)/ Sisters are dying of AIDS Why Oh Why can't our soldiers comes back home?/It seems like innocence is gone

The answer to the struggles, the pain, the discouragement and the doubts is the "Hero" who is Jesus, in the title song.

"We needed a Hero to come and save the day/Famine and hunger,disease in the land/The hatred, the killing/ Taking lives from your hand/ Creation waits. through darkness we pray./Tell me where is the hero to come and save the day/ Through the nails, through the thorns/From the hill to the grave/ Was a hero in the distance/ To the homeless, the widow, the fatherless son/ To the sick and the broken, alone with no one/Lift up your head, your hope is on the way."

In that Kansas City Star paper, the interviewer asked Kirk Franklin an interesting question. "You were raised in the church, yet this record, "Hero", is loaded with great music: the old-school sounds of Motown and classic soul, some '80s funk and some contemporary R&B and hip-hop. How did all that music inspire a guy who grew up in church?

Kirk Franklin responded: "I was raised in the church, but church music didn't inspire me. The music that has always inspired me is urban music, what I heard on the street corner. When I was 15, I trusted Christ with my heart, but that didn't change my swagger. If you grew up liking seafood, God isn't going to change that after you turn to him....I wanted the theme of this album to be, like "Christ in the Culture," you know, like "Jesus in the workplace, on the corner." That was my approach."

From where I'm listening as a paleface Presbyterian, I feel Franklin succeeded!
Like Mr. Franklin put it, "Although we live in a world of wars and desolation, Jesus is the ultimate Hero." Amen brother! Franklin's opening line in this great CD is to offer some "pain medicine for your soul." You'll find that and courage for the struggle! Let's share it...

Illuminating the Word

2006-03-25T20:07:00.000-08:00

Our two sons came home for Spring Break from the University of Missouri last night.
The older son joined us for a trip to the Joslyn Museum to see the magnificent exhibit "The Saint John's Bible". Since 2000, scribes and artists in Wales have been crafting The Saint John's Bible, the first illuminated bible made since the advent of the printing press more than 500 years ago. Go to www.saintjohnsbible.org
for more information, but here's a brief sketch.

Saint John's University and Abbey in Minnesota commissioned this unique bible as a richly ornamented masterwork, written and illustrated by hand on oversized vellum with hand-ground pigments and gold leaf. A modern English translation is used, with illuminations reflecting a multicultural world and humanity's strides in science, technology, and space exploration. In the Joslyn exhibit 100 original pages from this project are featured along with sketches, tools, and other materials.

Those who commissioned the work make this statement: "The Saint John's Bible aspires to be ecumenical as well- to unite humankind, not further divide it...it will speak in words and pictures to people of all faiths."

Our experience at the exhibit seemed to validate this claim. I saw an extraordinarily diverse group of people today. Lots of young people, children and teenagers and college students were present. Imagine that! Standing in front of one of the bible pages I saw a teenage boy wrap his arms around his girlfriend while they talked about a scene from one of the gospels. A middle aged woman was pushing what must have been her mother in a wheel-chair as they talked. Several hundred people of varied ages and races were present. I ran into an Hispanic pastor I've come to know. African Americans, pale faces such as myself, Asians, and who knows how many other ethnicities were present to enjoy this exhibit on the Bible. I thought to myself, What a powerful experience to see the Saint John's Bible draw such a varied group of people!

Standing in front of the large page from the Gospel portraying Jesus feeding the 5,000 I saw a father holding his 4-5 year daughter in one arm while a somewhat older daughter was holding his other hand. They talked about the story as the older girl read about Jesus feeding people. I saw lots of parents with young children pushing them in strollers.

This was my third visit to the exhibit and each time a new page among the 100 exhibited has captured my interest. Today it was the scene of Lazarus being raised to new life after his death. On the page, Lazarus is pictured in dark swirling shapes and forms as if he's in a deep cave on the left-hand margin of the page. To the far right, in smaller perspective there's a circle of light with the figure of Jesus calling Lazarus to come out and live. But the figure of Lazarus is leaning backward, almost as if he's reluctant to come toward the light. The note card beside the page offers the thought that this page has been influenced by descriptions of near-death experiences individuals have reported. The tunnel or shaft of light mirrors the near-death encounter some have described.

This portrait of Lazrus, who in the gospel of John, does come forth, also includes the account of witnesses having to unbind him, so that he can fully live. In this Lenten season, it's a good reminder of the near-death lives of despair or bitterness or desperation that some people face in life. Being called to a fuller experience of life by Christ is an ongoing spiritual journey for us all.

Another page that caught my attention was the page where I saw the father with his two daughters. Colorful baskets of bread influenced by Native American art are part of the page. The comment posted next to this page is memorable. "The baskets symbolize the multiplying effect of any act of love, such as sharing."

I came away today realizing once more how powerfully Word and Image serve to engage our fuller response to the text of Scripture. Seeing hundreds of people of all ages and conditions in life affirmed the intention of those who commissioned this Bible as an effort to "unite humankind, not further divide it." Sadly, the Bible has far too often been used to create division and sow disharmony. That's not what I experienced today. I'm grateful!

What are friends for?

2006-03-13T10:34:00.000-08:00

We began our Lenten spiritual journey last Wednesday at church with a beginning conversation about "The Spiritual Journey and Friendship". I invited people around tables to share an early experience with friendship in life. Here was mine.
When I was a 12 year old boy, I learned a key biblical insight into friendship.
It was a Wednesday night fellowship gathering at church, and I was playing with a large group of boys outside, when Graham Creech, an older boy and notorius bully took a dislike to me and said: "I'm going to beat the snot out of you!"

Tommy Bunnell, another boy a year older than me who had been a friend since I was in first grade and he was in second, quickly stepped between us and said to Graham Creech: "You'll have to go through me first."

"There are friends who pretend to be friends, and there is a friend who sticks closer than a brother," says one of the Proverbs. That was my biblical insight.
Friends protect each other.

Of coure that early experience also confirmed my belief in miracles. God saved me from a sure and certain Death in the presence of Tommy Bunnell.

That night around our tables at the beginning of our Lenten journey, several people contributed insights about friendship. One young girl and her invited friend shared this: "Friends don't gossip about each other. They keep your secrets". What an insight from a couple of young girls all of about ten years of age. Friends are people we can confide in, and share both the best and worst about ourselves- and still be loved.

John O'Donohue writing in his book "Anam Cara" (a Celtic view of spiritual friendship) feels "there's a huge crisis of belonging in postmodern culture."
I think he's right for a number of reasons. After childhood, I think lots of adults shut down their friend-making capacity. It's not easy to make friends in a business/consumer culture where lots of people look like competitors, and sharing secrets in the workplace is definitely a career killer. Then there's the anonymity of much of suburban culture, or the fear-factor in more urban settings.

Here's where we have to acknowledge our need to develop or recapture some friend-making capacities. Alered of Rievaulx was a monk of the 12 century in Britain who was drawn to the experience of "Spiritual Friendship" and wrote about the way of friendship. Now, there's a spiritual practice worth acquiring, the ability to develop friendship. I think it's a calling that we in the church need to respond to in our postmodern period of disposable relationships.

Where have you learned about the qualities of authentic friendships? Who has been your most unlikely friend? What disappointments have you experienced within a friendship- how it felt, and what you did, and what your friend did?

One older woman at our Lenten gathering shared this: "True friends are those who really know you, but love you anyway."

Why New Orleans Needs Saving

2006-03-07T07:13:00.000-08:00

Of the 455,000 people who once lived in New Orleans, only 144,000 have returned. In biblical terms, a great exile of the people has occurred with residents of the city scattered all across the United States. I've been thinking about this challenge for many weeks now, as I work with fellow Presbyterians here in Omaha to send our first mission team to the New Orleans area in May for a service project. Why should we care about New Orleans here in Omaha? First of all, we have a call as people of faith to reach out to our neighbors in their time of crisis. What we are learning six months after Hurricane Katrina is that caring support for those in need can begin to challenge us after a period of time. In the news this week, reports from Houston, Texas indicate a level of compassion fatigue has begun to develop. The people of Houston, its public officials and churches, deserve our highest admiration. But it isn't surprising that fatigue has begun to set in. In many ways, our national character is being tested by this experience and as the story unfolds there will be much courage and hope to celebrate, as well as failures of imagination and love to honestly confess. Love and compassionate sharing aren't easy.

In the last few days I bought the benefit cd album "Our New Orleans" which offers a wide range of the best of New Orleans musical talent, from Allen Toussaint to Dr. John, Buckwheat Zydeco, Beausoleil and the Preservation Hall Jazz Band. It's fantastic.

"Our New Orleans" opens with a rocking number by Allen Toussaint titled "Yes We Can".
It calls on the spirit of hope and mutual love to overcome tragedy and loss. Toussaint spoke with remarkable calm after the storm: "My Steinway, my records, my arrangements, my studio- it's all gone. I had eight feet of water in my house near Bayou St. John" He escaped from his drowning city with little more than the clothes he had on. In the production of this benefit cd, Toussaint added, "But the spirit didn't drown. I still have my music. Give me a hammer. I'm ready to do my part." What a courageous man!

Are we all "ready to do our part?" That's the question people of faith need to struggle with. That's what we as Americans need to wrestle with together.

One of the great lyrics on this album reminds of what it would mean to give up on New Orleans. It's played by the Preservation Hall Jazz Band....

Do you know what it means
To miss New Orleans
And miss it each night and day
Well I know I'm not wrong
The feeling's getting stronger
The longer I stay away
Miss those moss-covered vines
The tall sugar-pines
Where mockingbirds used to sing
And I'd like to see the lazy Mississippi
A hurrying about to spring
The moonlight on the Bayous*
Those Creole tunes that fill the air
You know I dream about magnolias in bloom
And soon I'm wishing that I were there
Do you know what it means
To miss those Red Beans
When that's where you left your heart
And there's one thing more
I miss the one I care for
More than I miss New Orleans