Motivation

This is going to be my motivation for some things for the rest of the term:

"Be bold and courageous. When you look back on your life, you'll regret the things you didn't do more than the ones you did." - H. Jackson Brown, Jr.

I didn't get the grant.  I need to tighten my budget...but not to the point of not living the rest of the term.  :) All shall be well.

Sharing the Gospel is Dangerous

"If we say we want to translate the gospel with young people, this is what we are saying: we are willing to put the very power of the gospel itself -- the very power of the Word of God -- into the hands of teenagers, people who do not view culture the way we view culture, who do not hear God the way we hear God, who will not worship the way we worship, who will not 'do church' the way we want them to simply because they will be listening to Jesus and not to us.  Catechesis behind the wall is a mixed bag.  Yes, young people fortified by these conversations quickly puncture the flimsy spiritualities of Therapeutic Moralistic Deism as the on-the-wall conversation with culture begins to include them.  But what if they trust us?  What if they love the God we say we love?  What if they imitate Christ, share his wasteful grace, and embody his self-giving love in the world?  In short, what if they get their hands on the gospel?  Then where will we be?" - Kenda Creasy Dean, Almost Christian


This kind of thing I love.  But it also scares me.  Dean is writing about youth ministry, but I read it as I am twenty-four and preparing for ordination...and I read it as just a young adult.  She's targeting youth ministers I'm thinking that a lot of what she is saying is applicable to me and people my age.  I don't want to say that I'll be listening to Jesus and not "adults" but I do get nervous sometimes about an Establishment shutting down ideas from me or my peers because its different.  Maybe they'll have other reasons, and maybe some of them will be valid.

But I've already encountered (not about me) push back from higher ups when people want to do something different.  And it's just that it's different.  They may've tried to say something else, but it was just words and they were scared of something different.  I hope that system doesn't chew me up and spit me out.

Identity

"The gospel's central message -- that God loves us enough to die for us -- severs self-serving spiritualities like Moralistic Therapeutic Deism at the root. Christian identity comes from worshipping a God who loves us enough to suffer on our behalf, and who calls us to enact this kind of love for others: "As the Father has sent me, so I send you." - Kenda Creasy Dean, Almost Christian.

I'm reading this and getting lots of good data...and having to ask myself lots of hard questions about how to articulate what I believe.  I have been trained with a vocabulary that I don't find useful anymore (it's heavily focused on penal substitutionary atonement), but I haven't been in another school long enough to be able to talk about it much.  Yesterday I was wrestling with this some and now maybe I'll stat getting some new vocabulary, too.

What the Church Needs

"What we need at present for our Church's well-being, is not invention, nor originality, nor sagacity, nor even learning in our divines, at least in the first place, though all gifts of God are in a measure needed, and never can be unseasonable when used religiously, but we need peculiarly a sound judgment, patient thought, discrimination, a comprehensive mind, an abstinence from all private fantasies and caprices into personal tastes - in a word, Divine Wisdom." (emphasis added) - John Henry Newman, Priest and Theologian

Quote of the Day

"You're a good person and whatever it is that makes you be that way, be it religion, Madonna's entire repertoire, and/or a fantastic bf, it's ok with me so long as you don't force it on me, which you don't." - My friend Dan after having been thanked for not being an ass about my faith.

Quotation for Christ the King

"Just a friendly reminder to my American brethren and sistren: your altar this morning should be arrayed as to suit a king not a farmer. Save the cornucopia and faux vegetables for Thursday." - Fr. Oscar Late

The Full Derek Webb Quotation

from After the Handbasket(emphasis mine):

Derek Webb, on the CD The House Show talks about community and the gospel as he introduces the song Nobody Loves Me. He talks about the risk that we run as we enter into community with each other…

…which we necessarily are. We are called into community together. If you divorce the people of God, the local community, from the gospel, then it ceases to be the gospel. There is no other context for your faith as a Christian than to be in community with other people. I’ve heard a lot of people say to me over the years, “It’s just me and Jesus, and that’s all I need.” Well, that’s not the gospel in Scripture. If you’re going to be those who claim to love Jesus, then you’ll be compelled, and I’ll be compelled to love the things that he loved. And he not only loved, but came and gave himself up for the church. And that makes it our concern as well.

And if that’s not hard enough, that we just live in community together, we are also called with a mandate that we preach the gospel to each other – which seems probably like a backwards idea to a lot of us. If you’ve grown up in church, you think that, “well, if we’re the church gathering, then we certainly know the gospel. We certainly don’t need to hear the gospel. That’s the last thing we need to hear, because we know that.” But that’s not true. We mistake as a Christian culture so often the gospel for only the thing we preach to non-believers in hopes that they would come down the aisles of our churches and place their faith in Jesus. Now, it certainly is that. But much more than that, the gospel must have, and necessarily has a primary place in the life of believers. We’ve got to hear it every week if not every day.

There’s a great quote by Martin Luther in the sixteenth century. He had a church that he was the pastor of and some came to him and said, “Pastor, why is it that week after week after week all you ever preach to us is the gospel?” – implying that “we’re ready to move on to something else. Certainly we know this by now.” Luther’s response was, “Well, because week after week you forget it, because week after week you walk in here looking like a people who don’t believe the gospel. And until you walk in looking like people who are truly liberated by the truth of the gospel, I’m going to continue to preach it to you.” And, until his dying day, he did.

And if we stop hearing that every single day – especially in light of the great righteousness that we might prop up as an idol from time to time – then we are never, ever going to grow. Our hearts are never going to change, our communities will never be sanctified. Because, here’s the truth, flattery at its very best will encourage nothing more in you and in your community than behavior modification – modifying your behavior to act the way you should, to hide the things you do that are wrong, and to try to amplify the things you do that are right. But, see, here’s the truth: all the behavior modification in the world will never change your hearts, and it can never change our communities. Jesus however, does change our hearts and he will change our communities. And that is why boldness is called for.

We have got to be honest. We should have no fear in being honest with each other about who we really are – not just offering up the sins that we feel safe confessing, but being completely bold, being completely forthcoming about who we really are. And saying, “You know what? I am going to stop hiding from you, and I’m going to tell you who I really am because I believe the gospel is true. I can only admit to you who I really am to you because I believe that Jesus is who he really is as well.” And you’re never going to be truly filled with joy unless you truly know yourself for who you really are. And until you are a real sinner with a real Savior, you will be a hypothetical and theoretical sinner – and therefore, with a hypothetical and theoretical savior.

If you confess, “Oh, I know I’m sinful. Scripture tells me, ‘we’ve all fallen short,’ right? And that’s me too, man. I’m sinful.” – but you can’t honestly put your finger on one sin you’ve committed all day because your view of sin has become nothing more than this cultural hiding game, then you’re not experiencing real joy. Because if all I can confess is a knowledge of how sin has affected me, but not any of my real sins – if I don’t really know that I’m sinful – then I don’t truly know, and I’m not truly encouraged by the fact that I’ve been saved. Because, saved from what? If I’m not really sinful then what’s the big deal? What’s the good news? It’s just news.

But if you know yourself as exposed by the cross, then I believe you will begin to experience true joy. Because you will not constantly be looking over your shoulder all the time – constantly checking the knots in this great suit of fig leaves that you’ve sewn for yourself. But rather, you will be comfortably exposed in your sin and boasting in your great Savior because he is real.

Charles Spurgeon once said, “If your sin is small then your Savior will be small also. But if your sin is great, then your Savior must be great.” And, folks, our Savior is great. And what does that tell us about our great sin?

This should be a great encouragement to us as we struggle to live in community with each other. As we struggle to be the bearer or recipient of hard words of truth that might actually change our hearts.

Much thanks to the author of that post for the transcription. I think that sin or not, this type of called-for honesty has some place in the Anglican Communion right now.

Dame Julian

Friday night I had too much to drink. As I was making my way back from Harrah's to Circus Circus I was going to start an entry, but my phone died. By the time I got back to my room I managed to get the following notes to guide myself...and I understand

Francis. Fr. Ingram. Br. Abbott General. cn. dunnam. "all shall be well" emily scott. blog. drunk text.

What I was getting at is that I've just finished Glamorous Powers by Susan Howatch. I'll be blogging quotations from it very soon. I don't know why I was thinking about it while waiting for the bus, but I was. Throughout the book I pictured the character Francis Ingram as Cn. Dunnam. Lots of good quotations, but that's not the point of this entry.

The initial point of this entry was to avoid sending Emily Scott a drunk text...and now I know how I got to Cn.Dunnam/Francis. AS I walked from the piano bar to the bus stop and from the bus stop to my room I was singing in my head "All Shall Be Well," which I happened to be singing in San Francisco when I was last that intoxicated. It gave me something repetitive to think about to focus on accomplishing my objective of getting back to the hotel. In SF I was having a conversation with the bar tender and had to collect my thoughts before I could speak, that's what I had in my head.

I texted Emily about it then, but decided to blog about it Friday night since I was on Pacific TIme and it was late and she was in Eastern time. So I'm singing, "All shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of things shall be well," and remember that it plays prominently in the end of Glamorous Powers. Earlier in the book Francis said, "Must we bring Dame Julian into this!?" in an interview with Fr. Jonathan Darrow (the book's main character). Oh, Blogpress Lite, how you get my thoughts onto the interwebs. Drunk texting to a whole new level: blogging.

So, Fr. Jeff and other Commission members: I have fun. ;) Sometimes too much!

Greek Quotations

"It's all explained in the preface in several languages. Pick English."

Textbook Quotation

"The article [of a proper noun] must, of course, be omitted in the translation."

Must it? I might enjoy reading about the Jesus.

Quotation of the Day

Dear Wisconsin Man,

Dinner Church comes from God.  If you don't have that, you can't have this.

Martin Luther King, Jr. Quotations

These are things that appeared on Facebook or e-mail today.

• From Joe Mitchell (and The Episcopal Church):
  "Almighty God, by the hand of Moses your servant you led your people out of slavery, and made them free at last: Grant that your Church, following the example of your prophet Martin Luther King, may resist oppression in the name of your love, and may secure for ALL your children the blessed liberty of the Gospel of Jesus Christ; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen."
• From Fr. Scott Russell:
  "The hope of a secure and livable world lies with disciplined nonconformists who are dedicated to justice, peace and brotherhood." - Martin Luther King, Jr.
• From Rachel Swan:
  "We must develop and maintain the capacity to forgive. He who is devoid of the power to forgive is devoid of the power to love. There is some good in the worst of us and some evil in the best of us. When we discover this, we are less prone to hate our enemies. We must learn to live together as brothers or perish together as fools." - Martin Luther King, Jr.
• From Ashley Wright:
  "A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual doom." -Martin Luther King, Jr
• From Ingrid McIntyre:
  "Every man must decide whether he will walk in the light of creative altruism or in the darkness of destructive selfishness." -Martin Luther King, Jr.
• From Juan C. Huertas:
  "Let us develop a kind of dangerous unselfishness" - Martin Luther King, Jr.
• From David Meredith:
  "Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter." - Martin Luther King, Jr.
  
• From Erin J. Warde:
  "Nonviolence is the answer to the crucial political and moral questions of our time: the need for man to overcome oppression and violence without resorting to oppression and violence. Man must evolve for all human conflict a method which rejects revenge, aggression and retaliation. The foundation of such a method is love." - Martin Luther King, Jr.
• From Integrity^USA:
  "Homophobia is like racism and anti-Semitism and other forms of bigotry in that it seeks to dehumanize a large group of people, to deny their humanity, their dignity and personhood. This sets the stage for further repression and violence that spread all too easily to victimize the next minority group." Coretta Scott King, beloved wife of The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
• From Bridget Cabrera:
  "History will have to record that the greatest tragedy of this period of social transition was not the strident clamor of the bad people, but the appalling silence of the good people." - Martin Luther King, Jr.
  
• E-mail from the Center for Constitutional Rights:
  "Of all the forms of inequality, injustice in health care is the most shocking and inhumane." -Martin Luther King, Jr.
• From Becca Cramer:
  "If the church does not recapture its prophetic zeal, it will become an irrelevant social club without moral or spiritual authority.” - Martin Luther King, Jr.
  
• From Joshua Marsh:
  "Darkness cannot drive out darkness; only light can do that. Hate cannot drive out hate; only love can do that." - Martin Luther King, Jr.
  

A Tweet

Dance like the photo's not tagged, love like you've never been unfriended, tweet (and post things) like nobody's following.

A Nice Little Quotation

"..The bishop acting outside or apart from the church as an episcopus vagans is like an electric fan unplugged from its source of power. Its blades may show some signs of movement in a strong wind, but are of no effect in actually generating a breeze. And the same is true of any minister, ordered or lay, who amputated from the body of fellow-believers attempts still to function as an organ of the body.

We are, in the long run, all in this together. Lone wolves go hungry. And shepherds are nothing without their sheep."

-In a Godward Direction: "The Coinherent Bishop"

Notes, Quotations, and Thoughts

from Understanding Genesis by Nahum S. Sarna.

"The literalistic approach serves to direct attention to those aspects of the narrative that reflect the time and place of its composition while it tends to obscure the elements that are meaningful and enduring, thus distorting the biblical message and destroying its relevancy." p. 3

"In the popular mind the word myth has come to be identified with fairy tale and associated with the imaginary and the fantastic...Myths, then, in the final analysis, have as their subjects the eternal problems of mankind communicated through the medium of highly imaginative language." p.6

"The theme of creation, important as it is in the Bible, is nevertheless only introductory to what is its central motif, namely, the Exodus from Egypt." p. 8

"[T]here is no room for magic in the religion of the Bible. The God of Creation is eternally existent, removed from all corporeality, and independent of time and space. Creation comes about through the simple divine fiat: Let there be!" pp.11-12

The creation narrative may be myth, but it's not mythological; there is no account of how God came into being.

"Evil then was a permanent necessity and there was nothing essentially good in the pagan universe...Far different is the outlook in Genesis. One of its seemingly naïve features is God's pleasure at His own artistry, the repeated declaration, after each completed act of creation, that God saw how good His work was." pp 17-18

"This basic belief in the essential goodness of the universe was, of course, destined to exert a powerful influence upon the direction of the religion of Israel and to affect the outlook on life of the people." p. 18

"[T]here are no biblical sources recounting the founding of the weekly sabbath-day. The antiquity of its existence is presupposed in all the legislation and even in the narratives."p. 19

Lots of things in Genesis, while having some overlap with other regional myths are distinctly a)unique and b)probably reaction to other things going on at the time in other narratives.

It [the serpent] is not an independent creature; it possesses no occult powers; it is not a demoniacal being; it is not even described as evil, merely as being extraordinarily shrewd...The role of the creature is that of seducer, laying before the woman the enticing nature of evil and fanning her desire for it." p.26

[W]e are being told by he Garden of Eden story that evil is a product of human behavior, not a principle inherent in the cosmos." p.27

[A] brief word must be said about the notion expressed in God's rebuke

Hark, you brother's blood cries out to Me from the ground. (Gen 4.10)

The Hebrew verb employed here is the same as that used on many another occasion when the cry of the oppressed comes before God. The idea is that injustice sets in motion countervailing forces that must ultimately prevail because they are sustained by God." p.31-32

September Meditation

By Burton D. Carley

I do not know if the seasons remember their history or if the days and nights by which we count time remember their own passing.

I do not know if the oak tree remembers its planting or if the pine remembers its slow climb toward sun and stars.

I do not know if the squirrel remembers last fall's gathering or if the bluejay remembers the meaning of snow.

I do not know if the air remembers September or if the night remembers the moon.

I do not know if the earth remembers the flowers from last spring or if the evergreen remembers that it shall stay so.

Perhaps that is the reason for our births -- to be the memory for creation.

Perhaps salvation is something very different than anyone ever expected.

Perhaps this will be the only question we will have to answer:

"What can you tell me about September?"

Quotations from Class

"Do you have a fat Bible with the Apocrypha in it? If not, why not?" - Dierdre Good, Professor of New Testament

"We have a thousand ways in scripture that remind us that pure morality is not the simple mechanism by which the divine work proceeds in the world." - Bob Owens, Professor of Old Testament

Readings and Quotations

These are just ramblings I'm finding while reading that I feel like sharing.

"An institutional church is implied in the Church's humanity. One might argue that an institutional church is implied in an incarnational faith." - Daniel B. Stivick, "Canon Law," The Study of Anglicanism

"The deepist nature of the Church is a mystery, 'hidden with Christ in God' (Col 3.3), which it it always exploring. No forms of institutional life fully bring it to expression. The Church lives by ceaseless self-discovery and self-correction, and all of its laws, procedures, and institutions are provisional." - ibid.

"In time, the American church secured continuity in doctrine, liturgy, sacraments and ministry with the Church of England--revising the Prayer Book (but not radically), retaining the Articles of Religion (but not requiring anyone to subscribe to them), and securing the episcopate (but not easily)." - ibid.

"The problem is the fear of what everyone knows is hidden and no one will talk about." - remaining anonymous (having a conversation during a break from reading)

"Social norms are not universal, but are always specific to a culture, and thus differ at least in some measure from on society or subculture to another. Churches have interacted with the particular moral traditions in which they are set, partly criticizing and partly sanctioning what is done. Thus, although convictions among Christians are strong, they are not uniform." - Daniel B. Stivick, "Canon Law," The Study of Anglicanism

"Canons are the Church's effort to shape the life of a community which is called into being by that which transcends law. They regulate a life which they do not create." - ibid.

"Anglicanism exits from the deep Christian past, and it moves through many deaths and resurrections toward the reunited Church to come --a church that will grow from the present, although it may look significantly different from any church of today." - ibid.

"The Church's members always have access to [the] gospel, and when the gospel leads them into new, authentic forms of obedience and ministry, canons must test and then follow." - ibid.

"Change is the human condition and hence the Christian condition. Change in the church is not just a matter of shifty teachings or liturgical practices. It is measure in personal biographies and in the histories of groups in which change is often perceived at first as loss." - ibid.

"Baptism is a conferral of worth and dignity, it brings into the life in Christ persons regardless of the place they have occupied in the general society (Gal. 3.27-28)." - ibid.

Maintaining Fellowship

I’m writing at National History Day, on 14 June 2009 and have no idea when this will actually be posted. I spent last week in Pensacola taking a break from being at home and just having some fun time with no obligations. I made it to the beach one day (of my objective of every day) and got bored there after two hours. It rained a whole lot at the beginning of the week. While I was at the beach I read through the latest Katalyst and Episcopal Peace Witness.
As I was reading the witness I came across a quotation that really “spoke” to me, as it were, particularly in light of some recent events in my life and the way I handle some situations. In Cost of Discipleship Bonhoeffer writes, “The followers of Christ have been called to peace...And they must not only have peace but also make it. And to that end they renounce all violence and tumult. In the cause of Christ nothing is to be gained by such methods...His disciples keep the peace by choosing to endure suffering themselves rather than inflict it o others. They maintain fellowship where others would break it off. They renounce hatred and wrong. In so doing they over-come evil with good, and establish the peace of God in the midst of a world of war and hate.” [emphasis added]
Some friends of mine really don’t get it, but I think that maintaining fellowship is an essential part of my theology and understanding of Christian faith. It would be a lot easier when someone drives me up the wall or leaves me hanging because they don’t think we should be friends to wash my hands of them and be done. It might make a whole lot more sense to not set myself up for the anguish of some friendships I try to maintain when people go from driving me up the wall to actually really hurting me by their words and actions.
But it’s very, very difficult for me to just be done with someone. Over the course of time I may set boundaries to keep myself from getting as hurt, but when people -- consciously or unconsciously, directly or indirectly -- hurt me, I have to seek reconciliation. In the same way the father welcomes the prodigal back with celebration and the way God welcomes us back ad infinitum (through the fullness of time, no less!), I have to try to do my best to welcome people back. And if I’m not actively pursuing a friendship (maybe as part of a boundary to keep myself from getting hurt), I feel like I have to at least keep lines of communication open: I may delete you from my buddy list so that I don’t know when you’re online, but I won’t block you. I may hide you in my stalker feed on Facebook, but again I won’t block you.
I seek reconciliation. But sometimes I don’t. Sometimes I am content to let a friendship fall to the wayside, particularly if I think that my attempts at communicating hurt are failing. But if someone seeks reconciliation, I won’t turn them away. And if someone tells me we can’t be friends anymore, I try to receive and respond to that in love and charity.

Thoughts From Morning Prayer

I do morning and evening prayer from the DailyOffice.org's Blog because I can RSS it into Mail. I'm going to try to do some reflecting on things or highlighting things on here as they pop out to me. There may not be analysis, maybe just copying and pasting to share thoughts.
"O LORD, you have dealt graciously with your servant, according to your word. Teach me discernment and knowledge, for I have believed in your commandments." - Psalm 119.66-67
The following was a canticle that isn't in the BCP, but I liked it and thought it appropriate...and that the handfull of people who read this will enjoy seeing it, too.
"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 that 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 though I may know nothing about it. Therefore will I 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, Life in Solitude.