The Importance of Being Earnest

So much has happened, structurally, in my first semester at seminary. Both in my academic world, and in my own mind. I had planned (and am still planning, but you know how that goes) to write a post about what I learned in each of my classes from last semester, but right now I want to talk about two experiences I've had in the past couple of days that really sum things up for me.

First of all, you should know that I've changed my program at Luther. I was excepted into the Children, Youth and Family Ministry program last fall, but as things went on I began to find that my heart was really in a slightly different place. Luther's programs are set up in such a way that, depending on what your concentration is, you are thought of as being on either the "ministry" track or the "academic" track. CYF, of course, is considered to be a ministry track concentration, which means that it's gearing you up for work in that particular field. What I found was what people have been telling me my whole life; I love academia. I love learning, and being in school, and research, and writing papers, and discussing big ideas with professors. BUT, at the same time, I love my job working for SpringHouse ministry center, teaching middle schoolers and working with young adults, and being part of a ministry team.
So, long story short(er), at the end of last semester I officially changed my concentration to "Old Testament," which means 1) that I can finally say my Hebrew class last semester was for fun AND relating to my field of study, and 2) that I will probably be going on to a PhD program after I graduate, and 3) that I successfully wrangled Luther into letting me change my concentration AND keep my job at SpringHouse, thereby smashing the two tracks into one. WOO!

And this is where the first story comes in, because ever since I changed my program, when people ask me what I'm in grad school for, I find myself totally out of words to describe what I'm doing. I used to say, "oh, I'm at Luther Seminary for children's education." People understood that. They always did the kind of "that's wonderful!" nod you do at people who work in community service, as if your job is so obviously worthwhile and fulfilling. Now, when I'm asked in the course of conversation by the person cutting my hair, I choke up because, let's be honest, what kind of reaction would YOU give someone who answered the question "what are you studying?" with "scripture!" It's like saying you're majoring in under-water-basket-weaving, except with loaded-gun potential, and you can see them immediately wondering "is this person about to tell me I'm going to hell??"

So, the point here is that for the last couple of weeks I haven't really told anybody the truth when they ask me what I do. And it's not because I'm ashamed; it's because I'm scared.
But. Tonight, at the coffee shop, the barista said "any big plans for the night?" and I said "homework. Grad school, you know?" and he said "yeah, I hear that. What are you studying?" and I said "Scripture, actually."

To which he replied, "oh, no way! What parts? I really like Job myself. That stuff is so weird and interesting. It really made me afraid of God."

And I grinned and said "oh yeah? Why, exactly?" and we went on to talk about what he thought about Job while he made my mocha. So. Crisis averted. And not only that, but I feel like it's a sign of encouragement. I walked away smiling like an idiot, and feeling so much less scared. Because I jumped and put myself in a place of sensitivity and discomfort, another person met me in the middle, and for a couple minutes we connected.

It was great.

The second story is related, in that it deals with my own inner dialogue and learning that, of course, it's not all about me. Last Sunday in church Pastor Jen, who is one of three supervising pastors for SpringHouse, was about to give communion, but realized she was out one assistant, so she asked me. I said yes without really thinking, and then realized that I've never assisted with communion before, and didn't really know what to do. When she signaled me up to the altar I picked up the two chalices of wine and followed her like I'd seen other assistants do. Then, we were in place, and she motioned people to come up to the front. Suddenly I thought, "oh my gosh, what's my line. What do I say??" It took me a couple of seconds to remember hearing "blood of Christ, shed for you" almost every Sunday for the last four years. I had remembered; I felt better.

But then I thought, "wow, what a weird thing to say to someone. I don't like this metaphor  I don't even know how I feel or what I believe about communion! THIS IS SUDDENLY REALLY UNCOMFORTABLE FOR ME."

But people kept filing up to the front, and I kept saying it. I kept looking into the eyes of the ones I knew, and smiling at the ones I didn't, and bending down and saying the names of the children who came up. And I felt an incredible peace. It didn't matter what I believed about this wine. I was giving something to these people, but it was not ME giving it, and so I didn't matter in this equation. It was like being a drop of water disappearing into an ocean, but an ocean that understood the individuality of each atom of hydrogen, oxygen and saline. I have never felt so unsure of myself one minute, and then so absolutely certain the next.

And this is part of what ministry is, for me, right now. I have a lot of doubts and a lot of questions, and even though I can now write in another language and create lesson plans, I still don't know anything. I look forward to another semester of searching for answers, but even more so to the moments when I realize my ability to do good in the world, despite myself.

Translation, and Going Local

"If we take the Incarnation seriously, mission becomes more like translation than ideological, territorial, or even spiritual conquest. God models translation by pouring out the divine self into human form; as Walls puts it, 'The Incarnation is God's perfect translation.' God is an unapologetic locavore, using local means (human biology, local customs and languages, and cultural institutions like families and religious communities) to translate the good news of salvation into human form. And then, Christ sends us into the world as translations of God's love as well--'lesser translations, to be sure,' says Walls--but translations nonetheless."

-pg 97, Almost Christian: What the Faith of Our Teenagers is Telling the American Church, by Kendra Creasy Dean

Building

"Imagine yourself as a living house. God comes in to rebuild that house. At first, perhaps, you can understand what He is doing. He is getting the drains right and stopping the leaks in the roof and so on; you knew that those jobs needed doing and so you are not surprised. But presently He starts knocking the house about in a way that hurts abominably and does not seem to make any sense. What on earth is He up to? The explanation is that He is building quite a different house from the one you thought of - throwing out a new wing here, putting on an extra floor there, running up towers, making courtyards. You thought you were being made into a decent little cottage: but He is building a palace. He intends to come and live in it Himself."

 - George MacDonald, from C. S. Lewis' "Mere Christianity"

And now a quick break for idealism--

So, I was originally going to make a post diving into what I've been doing with the synagogue here over the last few weeks, but then I got dragged into watching the videos from the ELCA (Evangelical Lutheran Church in America) Youth Gathering, which is happening right now in New Orleans. I'm gonna get back to all my Jewish learnin', but for now I just want to talk about this conference.

I am SO EXCITED to see what's happening at the Youth Gathering, and what's going on with the next generation of the Church. They've had speakers like the always-wonderful Nadia Bolz-Weber, and this guy, Shane Claiborne, who I've never heard of before, who sounds like an old-timey tent revival preacher but who looks like a dirty hippie, and who walks the walk.

"I went up to one of those bishops afterwards and I said 'bishop, I gotta tell ya, this is so powerful and I had no idea that there were so many Christians in Iraq.' That bishop was gentle with me, but this is what he said, 'son, this is where Christianity started.' He said, 'you didn't invent Christianity in America, you just domesticated it.'"

And that's exactly how I feel about so much of the Christianity I've experienced in my life; it's domesticated. But there have always been people around to remind us, in the words of C. S. Lewis, that Aslan is not a tame lion. Martin Luther reminded us that God can't be domesticated into an economic system where forgiveness can be bought, and Martin Luther King Jr. reminded us that God can't be domesticated and reformed in the image of our own prejudices for the sake of upholding hate, and what I see in the eyes of these Christian kids today is hope that God will be set free again among us and within us.

Don't get me wrong, I love the Lutheran church. I love the hymns, I love the order of service, I love many of the ways we do things. I love that we have a history, and if I've learned nothing else from my study of all things Jewish, it's that a common history helps to bind community together when we disagree about things like which hymn book to use.

But I also believe that, as my friend Emmy says, we need to start doing church differently, and reforming the image of what it means to be a Christian in this world. And I can see the beginnings of this in people like Nadia and Shane, and in the enthusiasm of the kids at the Youth Gathering. One of the things Shane reminded me of in this video was a song we used to sing at camp that I'd totally forgotten about, but want to bring back in a big way:

"And they will know we are Christians by our love."

Learnin' About The Jews

Well, as usual, it's been a while since I posted! And instead of going all retroactive, I'm just gonna jump right in where I am right now.

I've been going to classes at Knesset Israel, which is the synagogue here in Pittsfield, where I'm staying for the summer. They're hour-and-a-half classes once per week, and the series is called "An Introduction to Judaism," or, as Ari calls it "Jew Class 101." So far I've only been able to sit in for two weeks, both of which focused on prayer; the first on prayer as a concept in Judaism and the second on the Conservative prayer book and it's use at this particular synagogue.

I've been interested in Judaism since I knew what it was, which, living in Minnesota, probably the most homogeneously Lutheran place in the country, wasn't until I was about 10 and saw "The Prince of Egypt." There were a couple of songs with bits sung in Hebrew, and I couldn't get over what a beautiful language it was. Flash forward to last year, and I had a total of two Jewish friends, both of whom were at college and somewhat disconnected from their family and their faith, but who still answered many of my questions. Then, about six months ago, I met Ari, and I promptly flooded her with questions about everything, which she graciously answered.

I'm fascinated by the similarities and differences in different religious paths, and especially the commonalities shared by the "people of the book;" Christians, Jews, and Muslims. The more I learn about Christianity and the state of the world during the formation of the early church, the more sure I am that one can't fully understand Christianity without understanding, at least in part, Jewish faith, life, and teachings. And it's with that intention that I'm soaking up as much as I can about all things Jewish while I'm here, in a place with a thriving Jewish community.

The first thing I learned was that, like in Christianity, there are several distinct branches of Judaism with different teachings about different issues, and with somewhat different histories. Just as Luther broke from the Catholic church during the reformation, and the tree began branching out from there, Judaism split during the 19th century in Europe into four separate branches; Orthodox, Conservative, Reform, and Reconstructionist. I won't get into these branches too much, except to say that it was explained to me this way; that Orthodox Jews are the most conservative and adhere most strictly to biblical law, Conservative Jews hold to most of the same teachings, but take everything much less literally (to me, Conservative Jews are to Orthodox Jews as Lutherans are to Catholics), and Reform Jews differ from the first two in that they don't believe Jewish laws taken from the bible to be binding, but they still retain the same values and ethics. I honestly can't say much about Reconstructionist Jews, because I don't know much about them, except that they seem to be more concerned with the preservation of Jewish heritage and culture than religion itself.

Knesset Israel, where I've been taking classes, is a Conservative synagogue, and everyone who's been nice enough to put up with my incessant questioning has made sure that I know that they can only answer for themselves, and to some extent for their synagogue, and for their branch of Judaism, and just as if I asked a Catholic and a Lutheran to explain the Eucharist, there will be different answers if I ask an Orthodox Jew and a Conservative Jew to explain the origin of the Torah.

So anyway, this has been an introduction to my introduction, and I hope to write another post soon about the two classes I've sat in on, and the Hebrew classes I start tomorrow! I've been learning Hebrew on my own for about two months now, but I'm still not really past learning the alphabet (or aleph-bet, as it's called in Hebrew!). Wish me luck, and I'll report back soon!

Is It All Coming Together?

This is just a quick post, because tonight at church I felt like something was slipping through me, and I want to remember it. I've had a couple of moments in the past few days that have centered around kids, and that pulled something inside me that I can't ignore.

• Last night I had a very vivid dream about a boy who looked about 8 years old. He was standing on train tracks, facing me, and singing a song about a goat that he'd owned, that was his favorite, that he knew would feed his family when it grew, but the goat was killed by a group of angry men, and now he didn't know what would happen. He was scared, and sad, and was trying to tell me why.
• I remembered a story in the book on compassion that I read over Lent, about a woman named Christina Noble who grew up on the streets in Northern Ireland, and who had a dream about helping children in Vietnam after the war. Her story has been sticking in my mind lately.
• Tonight, Pastor Mary at Bethlehem Lutheran read a couple of children's quotes from "The All Better Book," by Suzy Becker. One came from a boy named Brian, who, when asked "with billions of people in the world, someone should be able to figure out a system where no one is lonely. What do you suggest?" answered, "sing a song. Stomp your feet. Read a book. Sometimes when I think no one loves me, I do one of those." I almost started crying, partly because I felt what Brian felt, and partly because I don't want any kid to ever feel like they're not loved. It's so basic, and so necessary.
• I've been thinking a lot about my theory that the best way to overcome fear and/or anxiety (at least for me) is to find something I want more than I'm afraid of it. Does that make sense? For example, I may be afraid to fly or to travel to someplace new, but my desire to see the mountains and rivers of New Zealand was stronger than my fear. Keeping this in mind, I've recently discovered that when I'm around people who need help, I am more courageous than I would be if it was only ME needing help. My desire to protect others is stronger than my fear for my own well-being in almost every situation where other people are directly involved. For instance, when I'm traveling and I get panicky, I try to find someone who looks more scared and lost than I am, and I think about protecting them, and that somehow makes me less anxious. What I'm saying here is that not only am I beginning to think that there's a reason my brain works this way, but that there's good sense in my using this unusual spark of courage in the service of protecting and helping kids who can't help themselves. Maybe I should be concentrating less on what my anxiety keeps me from doing, and instead see what it makes me good at.

While I'm full of a very clear certainty that I'm supposed to go to Luther, up until now I haven't had much of an end-game in mind in terms of what I'll do when I graduate. I signed up for the Youth and Family Ministry masters program because I knew I like working with kids, but the whole blurry idea is just now starting to crystallize in my head into a more complete picture. I can still only see outlines, but I feel like I keep getting these hints, and to be honest, I'm kind of enjoying the scavenger hunt.

Doing Church in the Post-Easter Season

Yes, yes, I know, "post-Easter season" isn't actually a thing. Technically, in the Lutheran church at least, we're still IN the Easter season, but I tend to have a hard time remembering it.

It's a little bit like Christmas, in that within a week afterwards New Year's has come and gone, and people are putting their trees out by the side of the road, stores are starting to prepare for Valentines Day already, and there's this sense of let-down that "the most wonderful time of the year" is now over. The same thing happens, for me, with Easter. After the 40 days of waiting and watching that we have in Lent, it's easy to see Easter Sunday as the culmination, and then for goodnessake chuck all that fake plastic grass, visit the bargain candy isle, and then get on with it! We've got more important things to do than spend seven more weeks talking about an empty tomb!

Right?

I hope not. I hope that there's a way to make this joyful spirit and focus on love and gratitude last for more than just the springtime. I feel keenly the first part of the reading from 1st John chapter 1, today:

That which was from the beginning, which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked at and our hands have touched—this we proclaim concerning the Word of life. The life appeared; we have seen it and testify to it, and we proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and has appeared to us. We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard, so that you also may have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ. We write this to make our joy complete.

It's as if the writer and the other apostles weren't capable of feeling the joy of Easter fully without sharing it. I hold tightly to that idea, the same way Chris McCandless, the ill-fated explorer, did when he finally realized at the end of his life that "happiness is only real when shared." It seems to me that the way to extend the Easter season, not just through the proscribed dates in the lectionary, but throughout the whole year, is to share this joy with others. We give when we have it in abundance, and others give it back when we run short. That's the kind of world I want to live in.

And so I'm writing this to make our joy complete, and I'm giving the money I saved during lent to charity to make our joy complete, and I'm asking questions and soaking in all the knowledge I can to make our joy complete, and the more I do and see and ask and give, the happier I am, and the happier the people around me seem to be.

Easter Sunday is over, but I refuse to let go of the feeling I had when I sang the hymns that morning. God exists, and exists not only as a power beyond comprehension by the human mind, but as a courageous man who loved people who he knew would hurt him; who taught us how to take care of one another, how to open our eyes to the way that fear divides and love unifies, who offers us an unending love that will never be scarce, and who answers death with life.

I can't stop being joyful about that.