home, coming.

I was probably 15 years old when the brilliant Jon Fox was quite upset with someone who was trying to relive childhood, I suppose. "You can never go home." he said. I'm not sure, but I might bet that he would still believe this to be true.
It felt so true. It was the first time I had ever heard anyone say it out loud, though I had suspected it, felt it acutely and I knew it wasn't just about returning to a house. He seemed to me to be goading, yes goading, us all onto greater things than crawling back to the skeletal remains of some childhood fantasy about safe places and familiar spaces.

For years already I had wondered if home existed; I had tried on homelessness and it wasn't quite right but there was something very wrong about the custody shuffling back and forth after my parents' divorce. There were long trips and multiple locations we were taught to call home. In one home we referred to the other home as though it belonged to someone else. Home was supposed to be the word assigned to something that was mine or conjure an image of ownership and stability. Instead the word was confusing, distressing and never stuck to one house the way it should have.

Then I grew up as much as I could and moved out entirely and things only got worse.
You know the feeling: old teddy bears remain in one attic and old books in another. Favorite clothes are fine stuffed in bags that you carry with you from one new bedroom to the next. Maybe you have some towels and a hammer you've acquired along the way. Maybe a good school or a new job waits in the next town or, even better, a lover will be there to kiss you when you arrive. And so you go and you take what you can and you figure home is where you make it.

Those were days when I figured I would be fine like a snail and carry home with me. In fact, all I carried was the idea of home. I fantasized about walls to hang pictures on and the sounds of a house settling into its foundation as I drifted off to sleep. I yearned for familiarity to rush in and hoped for comfort to follow just as quickly.

Now I am settling down. I have stopped searching, stopped trying to define the word or make it stick to a new place merely because I pay rent on time and turn the heat on when I want to. Even if all my clothes and books are here, even if my records are safe and I know how long it takes the oven to preheat, even if I am enjoying the street sounds and recognize the song of the neighbor birds...it isn't easy to make the word home work here. Don't get me wrong, I feel safer here than I have felt anywhere. I enjoy this little space with all its gentle quirks and I am proud to call it mine. But I just don't know if it is home.

I call it that. If you asked me where I am, I would tell you I am at home. But that is mostly so you would know my geographic location, not so you would know how safe I feel or how long I intend to stay here.

So there is the problem of feeling home and being home and then there is the problem of love.

When I leave town, my father always tells me he loves me.
Then there was one day he didn't say he loved me. He didn't have to
instead he said
you
can
always
come home.
and I was not shocked, not surprised but I sure as hell had never imagined that possibility in that way before that moment.

And I thought it over quite a lot because I always believed what Jon had said. What is more, I still do. You can never go back in time. You should never expect your parents to take care of you the way they once tried to--you'll only be disappointed. But you do deserve to feel safe, to be protected and to most of us that means finding a place where someone or something will remind you that you are loved.
For a blessed few of us that is a place that we can find. For even fewer of us it is a place we can return to and for about two or three of the 6 billion of us on the planet it is a place we are invited to return to.

So if you ever wonder how it is that I am strong enough to do what I do or say what I say or live the brave life I live. If you ever think I am a weirdo, or a crazy, or (God bless you!) special you can trust it is because, well, I am. I am not like most people who can't find home, can't return to one they knew, or have never been invited back.

I'm not telling you this to brag or to give you the impression that it would be easy and glorious for me to go home. I am not the prodigal and probably never will be so please set aside any resentment brewing about some kind of backwards heroics. I am telling you all this because it explains a lot about me and how I keep hoping to be helpful to you. See, generosity begets generosity and that is why it is possible for me to at least hope that one day I will be brave enough to give when I want to give and take when I want to take with a degree of careful consistency and heartfelt nurture.

Jon was right. You can never go home because the building and the people in it just won't be the same. But to know where love is and then to be invited toward it--call it home if you want to--that is what really matters. And that is precisely the problem: being invited home or rather being assured that there is a place in which someone can and will love you when you need it most, or protect you if you want protection, is just as much a homecoming as an arrival on your parents doorstep.

When I feel desperately alone I try to name it and I find myself saying: "I want to go home." But I'm not thinking of a bedroom or walls or a front door I once knew; I'm thinking of doing anything to avoid the wild world in which I live mostly out of doors and sometimes out of sorts. And the most comforting responses to date called me back to a warm embrace... they had nothing to do with something you could rent or own because they were about right here, right now and love.

Hoarders H(e)aven

The house (in slumps and sizzles)
welcomes
rain hitting the grease along its eaves.
Engine 19 exhales a cargo of smoke junkies as the compromise causes collapse.
Captain pinches at a speck of tobacco from his tongue and flicks it toward the flames...
the remnant of a lucky strike dislodged by a curious tongue from between one yellow tooth and one gold,
Hopes of fighting gone out like a radio signal reverberating until caught on too steep an incline.

the invitation

Like toddling drunkards compelled

To follow the meandering cliff edges

Separating the halves of one heart

Until we fall

into the center,

One part’s departure through

Two part’s aperture.

We see

One heart pure and sure;

On two hearts’ adventure.

Movement

rhymes against

the cement:

The hardened human (sur)faces meet each other in persuasive rhythm; ; ;

So the dancer rebels

To trust the boards pinned down by a turning silk pointe.

Like bramble reaching for sun

(teaching us) to travel in spirals

Because the globe spins under us, renewed like a log in water—

Because the shameless and saintly horizon flirts and retreats in haze of half sun

Forced to rise by our approach.

It is an eternal invitation

:To tickle the earth

with your toes as does a duck stirring the muck.

Let each clod

greet you as she meets the hoof of a donkey plodding.

:To remember

A journey is caused

By gravity;

We know nothing else

Because this is

Love’s only assurance.

water song

If it were not called—

Water—

Would be

The edges of the knife that carved away the side of a stone

Hung from the clouds

Gathering storms

Like admirers;

The shiv held in the

Fist of the goddess

As she slices through

the stone rising;

The scalpel

Drawing the white lines that curve around and soften the pebbles,

where fish trails will appear and rush;

The disparate masses, pristine in protest, crawling slowly away from the poles, creating a fleet of frozen foundations,

Melting to a rage as they suffer;

If it were not called

Water—

It would be the

mystery conjured

Out of our bodies by the siren song of sun

Or sadness.

One must learn

Never tell the sky not to cry

Or the stop the man from sweating in the fields—these

Are just two types of rain.

One must learn

never call down the cold hearts of the Antarctic armada

Or ask the enemy to warm her hands in yours—these

Are just two types of glacier.

-->

neighbor

neighbor
for Street Psalms: between rocks and hard places

The city rock collection: an installation
(boulders in a nest of rosebushes and thorn shrub)
appears in the usual grassy patches
once held down by crows and cackling human bodies
fidgeting with rolling papers and radio dials,
(w)rapping in the respite of sunshine and branches.
The silhouette an echo of Cascadian skyline
(falling and rising) in curves
and points
at flashes of mockery:::
a landscape crushed by the albatross landing of
stones thrown at the already stoned.

A traveling carnival of attempt interrupts
the green horizon in tragic monument to misspent intent.

From amidst the parable of bramble
on edge
rises
an idea:
We are all
rolling and smoking and high
looking down on smokestack and barge--
the whole story tells itself--
our reflection in the signs of the deaf
economy, an unyielding and aloof parabola
obvious in the geography of rocks and hard won graces.

write hard; die free

On the occasion that a friend has taken a break from one calling to pursue another...
As Brenda Hillman would say: the poems know!
Mer, may the ocean of you keep us awash in shitty first drafts redeemed and reinterpretations of a world with which we grew so bored until you took up the mighty pen!

A prayer to the words, for the words
to Meredith

Blank pages can be
a frightening matter --It takes great courage-- Sweet Jesus.

to conjure the words,,, to order the chaos
to carve out the meaning
...in shifting white sands of wordless deserts
Is it easier with a friend nearby? A silent, judgmental cat of thought
perched in the sill?
Perhaps,...no.

It is an act
:of faith and solitary confinement
:of the line connecting head, heart, hand to larger worlds
:to let the wild thoughts out to roam in the delicate garden of expectations.

So you

gently let the pen dance it's way across,
let the !!! of the key be
and reflect
-even if it is not what you wanted-
it is what you made: yours.
It is your line and you may command it.

So you

Be free courageous conjurer;
Let loose wild thought;
Dance hands and fingers.
Amen.

First,,, Mexican...Really?

It’s official: the Clergy Session voted yesterday to commission me: a Mexican American, mother, partner, poet, preacher, creature.

 Here in the Pacific Northwest we advocate for immigrant clergy and continue to work for inclusion of those who identify as Ethnic Minority Clergy and Lay Ministers. We have Hispanic and Latino ministers who are Licensed Local Pastors and Certified Lay Ministers. We have a committee to serve us and a Director of Hispanic/Latino Ministries in the Office of Connectional Ministries.

So it might seem that we could/should/would have ordained a Mexican American before now. Perhaps that is why it is really difficult to determine for sure if we have ever ordained a Mexican American. When people hear that I may be the first Mexican American or even the first Latino/Latina to be ordained their reactions tend to stem from shock and sadness. They experience something like whiplash because they were moving toward realizing diversity at such a clip until I awoke them to this halting reality.

            The most common response to the news that I might be the first is one of surprise. First they have to recall the fact that I am Mexican American-because I don’t look or sound like their idea of Mexican. Then they wonder, how can it be that it took this long?! Finally, they begin to wonder how to respond. It is painful enough to have to defend or remind someone that my Mexican heritage is real and authentic. As part of my ordination process, I have had to be an unwelcome reminder that systematic exclusions are still in place and undermining our efforts to be a diverse community.

This is such hard work! There will be a temptation to minimize this achievement for our conference; it’s a somewhat dubious honor to be the first in our annual conference because it means it has taken us this long to smuggle someone in. There are such high walls- both literal and figurative -that were meant to reinforce beliefs about what belongs to whom. My pastoral work is marked by the fact that my mere presence might cause people to see a kingdom in which the last shall be first-and those who have been first heretofore may not like what they see. Inviting me to join the ranks of clergy is an open invitation to all of us (you and me both!) to see the system (and ourselves in it) with new eyes that look kindly on what we struggle to understand.

Those who hold the institutional memory either in a digital format or in their heads and hearts want to be sure before we claim that I am first before we do so. They are just now beginning the research. But just as my commissioning has not been a solo effort, nor will this next project be. This next project of spreading the question abroad and checking the archives is fraught with danger: will we do the work as if it is holy and important? Will we celebrate well if we arrive at the conclusion it has taken us this long to take this next step of faith? Will we hold the sadness and the joy so that we are moved to action?

I hope we do: my ordination will be a call to action for all who believe in lifting up those who are underrepresented, disenfranchised and suffering federally mandated exclusion. Including me in the ranks of clergy gives me a vote, invites me to the table and begins a new age of increasing diversity in our institution. I think that is worth celebrating even if we experience pain along the way.

In a recent article Sam Hodges briefly explained the many factors that hold so many Hispanics and Latinos back from becoming ordained elders or keep us out of seminary.[1] The temptation for Hispanic/Latinos to remain Licensed Local Pastors or Certified Lay Ministers is strong because we are a necessary part of leadership right now –we don’t have time to go to school far away from our congregations- and at pay rates new faith communities can afford. Hodges also mentions, however, the danger inherent in relying on the office of LLP or CLM: we will remain underrepresented and underpaid. An already complex process of discerning a call to ministry is made more so by questions immigrants must answer about their unique position in a glocal society where cultural loyalties create deep-seated ambivalence in our families. Add to this ambivalence questions about legal status and the immigrant experience of itinerancy. In a recent conversation with a friend who attended seminary as a DACA student we discussed the ways the experience of immigration affects our ability to fully embrace the itinerant system that is just now learning to adapt to account for the unique needs of qualified clergy whose citizenship is in limbo.

Until those of us with power and privilege use such assets to raise up another who identifies as Hispanic/Latino I will be the only recognized ethnic representative on many issues for some of our nearest and dearest neighbors.  I’m not exactly the first person I would have chosen to do this task; I’m biracial, my Spanish language skill is only slowly growing as my friends and family graciously correct me in our Spanglish conversations. But I was born on American soil, raised to speak English fairly well and managed to get an MDiv and although this qualifiers are standard among my Anglo colleagues, I’m a rarity among my talented Hispanic/Latino colleagues.

As the daughter of a Caucasian mother and Mexican American father I was born with very light skin and a family that urged me to chase the same dreams my white(r) friends pursued. Of course, my road was a bit bumpier than most because no one in my family had ever earned a masters degree. Looking back on the myriad cultural misgivings and mistakes I made (just trying to “pass” and pass one more class) I see now that there were people along the way who recognized what I was going through. They reminded me to be myself even (especially) when I least wanted to be. They didn’t do it for my sake but because they knew their world would need me to have a sturdy sense of what set me apart. They taught me to recognize my unique gifts as a privilege. As time passed I realized that if I want to steward this privilege well, I needed to take on the responsibility of stepping out into the fray, leading, in such a way that will make it easy for others to follow.

The questions that I must answer as I continue this journey are daunting. How will others recognize and receive my gift to the church and how will I find my place in the church if there has never been anyone else like me to fill these pulpits? How do I hold on to what makes me unique as the system that prepares us urges in compelling and/or subversive ways to adopt it’s ways spiritually, theologically, emotionally? The answers to these seem to lie in naming the people, polity and projects that have helped me to identify the ways in which the Order mandates I hold on to what makes me different.

The committees and clergy who have walked with me the last ten years of work toward ordination have helped me discover who I am called to be. What is more, they have had to imagine how I fit into a system that wasn’t built to include me. In some cases, they have even had to recognize my budding calling long before I did. They have consulted with those who saved a place for me at The Table. They have murmured to one another in awe that we have come this far. There are those who prayed for me before I was born, hoping that one day there would be a young biracial Latina mother with arms wide and strong enough to carry us into the next phase of diversity.

So it’s not me we celebrate. We celebrate movement that truly opens doors, and gives voice to the unheard. Commissioning has never been about passing privilege between friends. It is a chance for all God’s people to relish and renew your commitment to welcoming the strangers into your power structure, clothing the orphans with robes and stoles, and standing aside when the widows take their places in your pulpits.

…By the power of Christ the blessed outcast, the holy coyote who smuggles us across borders built by fear so we may preside over the plate for all people, Amen.

---

[1] http://www.umc.org/news-and-media/local-pastors-lead-hispanic-outreach

On the Occasion We Were Brazen Enough to Baptize A Baby Doll (in the category of questionable ecclesiology I will never regret)

Metaphors are vital they compare what we trust with what we want to trust.

We imagine God. We wrap the old stories in new language…for a kind of
courageous knowing and language that calls forth a new way of being
with our children.

I love to teach first communion classes, and there are those who question
why I teach it to little ones, only 3 years old.  Parents and
grandparents say those little ones don’t understand what communion is
about. To which I answer that we don’t really
understand it all either…We don’t! because, we are always discovering
new things about it every week.  So I invite everyone and anyone to
First Communion class as soon as they begin to realize that they have
been excluded from the table over which we proclaim “For you” every
week.  This little story I’m about to tell you (and hundreds like it)
are my instruction manual/apologetic for seemingly irreverent things we do that are in fact a means of grace.

One day a baby doll came to First Communion class.  That baby doll’s
owner asked if the baby doll could take Communion.  

And what else
could I say but, 

Has she been baptized?  

There was a tiny moment for
grieving and hoping, simultaneously, as the seven 3 year olds sat
quietly munching popcorn, wondering what to do about a baby doll that
hasn’t been baptized.  So we tucked our napkins into paper cups,
recycled the whole lot, and marched in true baptismal style down to
the baptismal font.  They climbed up into the pews all around the
bowl, wavering as they carefully stood on the seats to get a better view, and I took that tiny baby, the size of a premature hope, born about a month too soon, held her body over the waters and cupped in my hand holy water to drench
her little head thrice.  In the name of the Creator, in the name of
the Son, and in the name of the Holy Spirit.  And we all breathed
again, not realizing we had held our breath.  

She had been such a good baby!  She didn’t even wince at the cold of the April weather outside! Then we took her, all of us bumbling our way to the altar, and sat around it on red carpet, and we all cupped our hands. We looked into
the little boats we had made, palm-edge to palm-edge, the same boats
that hold water, that hold wine, that hold babies hovering over the
waters of covenant and creation. The same boats that hold the Christ as he sleeps through the storm.  

Made from the same hands that hit and scold.
The very same that pat heads and grab at candy that hold too
tight and sweat and slip and wave hello sometimes but goodbye most of
the time.  

And the newly baptized baby must have been sleeping,
because she didn’t make a peep where she lay, beside the lap of her
little Momma.  The little Momma looked at me and asked me, “Now?
Can she have Communion now?”  And I thought of the way that Cookie
Monster eats cookies.  So that unless you’re really paying attention,
you just see cookies flying- And you don’t realize that he is more of
a real person- a genuine honest friend- than most humans.  

And yet he doesn’t actually swallow those cookies.  I asked her, can she put
her hands together and show me that she is ready all by herself, the
way that you can?   Sadly, but not too sadly, the answer was a small
and wondrous “No, not yet.”  

And me, from my perspective peering out from my infinite abyss of adulthood thought of the phrase ready as I’ll ever be.  And the planet may have stopped turning for a moment because all I really know for sure was my heart spinning out of control as I thought of days when there were 

"Not yets" about baby dolls, and flower buds, and I thought of the days before baby fat was lost, and cheeks and eyes were wide and hopeful and unafraid of a certain type of reality that allows for hope larger than life itself.

So I taught them that day:

This is how I will know you are ready, when you show me a place to put
the bread of life and I will see it and then I will look into your eyes and
tell you that this is given for you.  And you will say, ...well what will
you say?  And they all said, quietly, because they were still feeling
shyly, but reverently sure of themselves, “Amen.”

Radical Sabbatical: Why I told a growing congregation to stop coming to church.

We’ve all done it: we wake on Sunday morning and think of all the things we would like to do with a balmy PNW summer day and then stuffed all that desire down into a black hole where our love for worship used to reside. Honestly, I think it’s part of what is killing our churches in the region. We have about three months of sunshine and we spend too much of it sitting indoors, doing the exact same things we did when the rain forced us to come in out of the cold.

It’s tradition and it may even be holy but it’s not ideal. So like any good pastor I’ve been looking for options and then I found one in an article sent by a colleague. It was about a congregation in Minneapolis that chose to meet weekly but they only had Sunday morning liturgy every two weeks. They meet Sunday one week and Saturday the next week so they spend every other Sunday morning doing myriad things that bring them joy. That is the one rule: whatever you do on Sunday mornings make sure you do it out of a desire for joy-if it’s an obligation, it’s not Sabbath.[1]

The congregation I lead is setting out on the next leg of a long journey. We’ve come through one heck of a year: a beloved pastor was removed without much explanation. Half the worshipping congregation left in frustration. The other half remained and has thoroughly exhausted themselves with all that it takes to jumpstart a stalling congregation. The same volunteer runs the soundboard every week. The same teacher prepares lessons for Sunday school hoping at least one child will arrive early enough for a lesson. The same volunteer plays the piano, prepares the bread and juice, sets the altar, counts the money and chairs the finance committee… you guessed it: every single week.

The church is growing in numbers, in financial stability and in faith: we’ve added new members, managed to keep up with pledges and the scripture study group and vision team have grown. But the money and energy for the weekly and daily tasks are running out.

It’s only going to get worse as Summer vacations take people away and the warm weather makes it that much harder to sit in a stuffy sanctuary when we could be at the park or garden. What is more, we realized we do not know our neighborhood like we could. We do not know our city like we should. Ask a long time church member what is keeping young families away from church on Sundays and you’ll get a bunch of good guesses… but if you really want to know where people are and what they’re about on Sunday mornings you probably have to go out and see for yourself.

And what about those struggling with homelessness, addictions and poverty? Are we supposed to spend Sunday mornings waiting for them to come looking for a tank of gas or a voucher for a hotel? What kind of street ministry would we be able to do Saturday nights if we didn’t have to be up early on Sundays? We asked ourselves these very questions and decided it was time for a new plan I’m calling Radical Sabbatical.  After an initial 2 months period of worshipping together every other Sunday we will spend July, August and September exploring the city, worshipping with other churches and resting on the Sabbath.

            I know this congregation needs a break but I also know they have the spiritual foundation to really take a sabbatical. They have been studying scripture and praying together with fervor. They go to pains to visit the homebound, hospitalized and show great respect for their elders and their saints. They care for one another well through a ministry of presence and service through a local foodbank… but I know they need rest because faith is formed in our working and in our resting. They’re a little nervous about this next leg of their journey together, and so am I. But more than nervous I am excited to see how this experience shakes them out of their habits and forces them to notice what brings them joy.

The last week before our Radical Sabbatical officially began we studied psalm 103:7-12. I preached about the size of God’s love and the ways that God communicates that love for us. The Psalm sings over ways God makes The Way plain to people-doesn’t say that can only happen in church or on Sunday mornings. It says that God spoke to Moses (a murdering, stuttering runaway) and God spoke to the people of Israel (a people who time and time again turned away from God’s promises). I take this to mean that God speaks to all people in all places… not just to those of us who show up at a brick and mortar outlet for praise songs and handshakes on Sunday mornings. If God is speaking to those who cannot or do not come to us on Sunday mornings then we are to go out and find these people

We talk about outreach as an outpouring of our love but in the poetry of this Psalm it becomes a source of goodness. Being with the lost and least is not just about loving but being loved. The Psalm encourages us to listen with our whole self and trust that they will testify to God’s love and show us God’s love the same way we see it and hear it when we are together on Sunday mornings.

I know that it is quite shocking for a pastor to tell her congregation to stop coming to worship on Sundays. I also know that we have to get out into the world to experience more of God. It might seem like I’m pushing an agenda that I pulled out of a hat or being negligent in my devotion to worship. But I’m not. The radical Sabbatical is part of a larger strategy to restart our church-not just our congregation but the Church in South Tacoma and maybe beyond.  And I’m not the only one here who believes this. Many in our congregation are already beginning to see the value in this new way of doing church (not just coming to church but being a part of the larger community in faith) and it hasn’t even started yet as of the writing of this article!

One of the people who can only attend on Wednesday nights wrote to tell me:

“My thought this morning is about those in the congregation who might want to get together and research who the Homeless really are and how many and what kind of homeless people might hang out in the neighborhood.  They won't be able to find out by attending church on Sunday morning unless a person shows up asking for a handout.  It may take hanging around the church and neighboring buildings late at night to see some of the homeless.  It may also take some time just hanging around outside the church building or down the street at the park and talking with people to find out about other kinds of homelessness. It may require this group to meet over a meal to not only talk about the different reasons people come to be homeless but to also share what they have found when they actually meet and talk with people.  Some of the talking may be with people in the neighborhood and discussing their views in homelessness in their neighborhood and finding out what resources that they might have or know to help in ways the group feels called to. 

There is a lot in the news these days about homelessness and a church group with the heart to find a way to reach out and give hope could create quite a bit of relationship and community building as well as a feeling of doing church.”

The worship band leader wrote to me last week to tell me about a dream that he believes explains this perfectly:

I had a dream…I was in a neighborhood community.  There were two men standing in front of a garage.  One was a black gang member, the other was a white biker.  They didn’t seem like they should be in the same neighborhood, but they both had a serenity about them.  They clearly had a deep bond and friendship. I was talking with the black man in front of the garage.  I marveled at how he and the biker, people from different worlds could have forged such a close bond.  He told me “The most important thing for you to learn from this is to serve others.  If you don’t remember anything else, remember that.”

But it wasn’t just the dream: he wrote on to tell me about something that really happened:

“Sometimes the best things happen in the oddest locations.  

We went out for lunch after church yesterday.  While in the bathroom washing my hands, I was standing next to a gentleman.  We exchanged pleasantries.  

He said he had a great day at church.  He then asked about my church.  I told him we were embarking on a new journey called Radical Sabbatical.  I explained that every other Sunday we were not going to have a church service.  Instead we were going to do outreach work in the community.  

At this point he got really excited!  He talked about how after Jesus died upon the cross that his followers went out by twos to spread the word.  He said that he was really excited for us for going on this journey!”

I know that we’re not all like the two men in this story- some will think we’re killing our church if we’re brave enough to tell them what we’re up to. Some think I’m crazy or lazy but we are called to be like Christ-even if it calls us toward death and insult- even if it isn’t the popular thing to do. And if it looks like it will be the end of our church as we know it, then that may be a good thing because the church we see now is not going to survive anyway. The dead branches are not bearing fruit; they’re choking out the growth. We must find ways to prune her back and even rip out the stump if we have to in order to make room for what God is going to do in this place. Even Christ knew when to take time away for prayer and meditation. Being on a sabbatical means we study and learn, but we also take time to be still, to enjoy the things we are experiencing so that we can come back to our work with a renewed vitality.

Ministry in the None and Done Zone is not a contest to see which church can survive all the others. It’s not a lack of faith that calls us out into the wilderness of non-religious expression of faith; our trek into the wilderness of Radical Sabbatical is a response to the goodness we are pursuing in the orphans, widows and strangers who will reveal God’s love to us.

The woman who leads an outreach at the Gospel Mission wrote to me this week to share her “Radical Sabbatical Note to self:”

“When in the midst of kicking a four week bug that makes you crash once again, realize that when the body screams "No!" it is because the mind has not been saying "No!" when it should! Accept that I am only one person; that I have limits and need to always preserve the necessary energy that I need to be positive, healthy and thrive. No matter how negative and demanding or how positive and rewarding the task, I also need to rest my mind, spirit and body so that I can refocus, refresh and revitalize into a balanced space.”

I have urged the congregation to continue to attend Wednesday nights. These will be times for us to study the word and pray together and they will be vital especially during July, August and September when we are spread out all over the city on Sunday mornings. But they will not be much like our Sunday morning liturgy. We’ll have a potluck rather than bread and juice every week; we’ll have bible study rather than a sermon and we’ll choose to sing whichever hymns strike us as appropriate on any given night.

After the visioning session in which I shared the idea with stakeholders I received a letter written by a long time Methodist who has lived all over the world. She began worshipping with us around the same time our vision team formed. She writes, “We want everyone to participate in this Radical Sabbatical, as a community, to discover "how it is with our soul"; to allow God into our hearts to reveal anything that is not pleasing to Him.  As each person works on their individual relationship with God during this time, it will create a place for Worship for us as a community, when we meet together.” This is why I’m writing this article: so that everyone can participate in Radical Sabbatical.

The forty people who are sent out from our congregation may come to visit your church for Holy Eucharist or we might find communion elsewhere. Some will attend your child’s soccer game and share in the common meal of granola bars and Gatorade or meet friends at “St. Arbucks” breaking croissant and coffee on a Sunday morning. You may see us watching a baseball game receiving the host of hotdogs and cokes on a Sunday afternoon, but we’re not skipping church to do it. We’re discovering who we are, who you are, who God is and how we might put all of this to use for the community we love… because that is our definition of what it means to be the church.

Don’t get me wrong: we’re not disrespecting Sunday morning worship and communion. We’re diligently searching it out. We are desperately seeking the means of grace in all places, all people and all manner of hosts. We are ever mindful of the myriad ways we break bread when we cannot do it at our usual altar in our traditional ways. And we do it always in remembrance of the new covenant and the risen Christ so that we will be in the presence of forgiveness for our trespasses.

There are many questions about how all this will feel, what we will do and how or if we will return to each other after our Radical Sabbatical ends. But we don’t wonder if it is the right thing or the wrong thing. We know God gives us all we have and if we are given a chance to seek God in new ways and new places then God will show up there. And when we feel the questions and doubts coming on we will embrace them and give them voice because faith is formed in the questions and doubts-

In the name of the Creator of our labor, rest and worship. Amen.

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[1] https://www.faithandleadership.com/minneapolis-congregation-finds-new-life-through-ancient-practice-keeping-sabbath?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=content&utm_campaign=fl_feature