Join Me in Glad Adoration

Praise to the Lord the Almighty the King of creation

Oh my soul praise him for he is thy health and salvation

All ye who hear now to his temple draw near

Join me in glad adoration

In the course of six days, I both sang and heard this choir piece in the context of two very different worship services.  There were tears on both occasions.

I sang it last Sunday in celebration of my friends Heather and Jess’ legal nuptials.  They had been illegally married six years prior, in defiance of both the national church that would not bless their covenant and the government that would not recognize their relationship.  Even so, on that day they assembled a choir and asked them to sing the F. Melius arrangement of Praise to the Lord the Almighty.

On Sunday, with the blessing of the national church and the legal recognition of the great state of Minnesota, they renewed their vows.  Before worship started, they came into the choir room to thank us for singing, and Heather gave basically the best pep talk ever.

“Six years ago today we were illegally married, and the choir sang this piece, and I said it would take an act of God for us to be allowed to marry legally… * tearing up * …today you get to sing about it.”

Praise to the Lord who will prosper thy work and defend thee

Surely his goodness and mercy here daily attend thee

Wonder anew what the Almighty can do

If with his love he befriend thee

Then yesterday, I heard this exact same piece sung by the St. Olaf Choir at my friend and mentor Jennifer’s funeral.  Jennifer, who beautifully embodied the grace of God, perhaps better than anyone I’ve ever known, who died at the tragically young age of 47 after a courageous and graceful battle with brain cancer.  The service was full of song, both choral and congregational, and was profoundly powerful in a way that I can’t quite explain, but we all experienced it, even out-of-state friends watching via livestream on the internet felt and commented about it on social media.

And then later last night, I was finishing up Nadia Bolz-Weber’s new book, Pastrix, and in the final chapter she writes, “Singing in the midst of evil is what it means to be disciples. Like Mary Magdalene, the reason we can stand and weep and listen for Jesus is because we, like Mary, are bearers of resurrection, we are made new. On the third day, Jesus rose again, and we do not need to be afraid. To sing to God amidst sorrow is to defiantly proclaim, like Mary Magdalene did to the apostles, and like my friend Don did at Dylan Klebold's funeral, that death is not the final word. To defiantly say, once again, that a light shines in the darkness and the darkness cannot, will not, shall not overcome it. And so, evil be damned, because even as we go to the grave, still we make our song alleluia. Alleluia. Alleluia.”

It made me cry all over again, but

YES.  EXACTLY.

Cancer be damned.  Join me in glad adoration.

Praise to the Lord O let all that is in me adore him

All that has life and breath come now with praises before him

Let the amen sound from his people again

Gladly for aye we adore him

From the Creepy Letter Files

Today in my seminary mail I received an anonymous letter, handwritten but not signed, no return address, postmark from St. Cloud.  It was some form of a sinner's prayer and then a passage from Ezekiel about receiving a new heart.  Not clear if this is someone who feels the need to confess these things to me, or if they are implying I need to pray them myself.  If the latter (more likely, the way these things typically go), not clear what particular sins I've committed lately to bring this on - by simply being a PhD student, or by something I have written or spoken publicly, or what.

But since I don't tolerate passive aggression any better now than I did in the parish, let me tell you what I think of anonymous letters: people who truly hold a conviction are willing to put their name behind it.  

That's why this blog has never been anonymous, even though I'm certain not everyone will like or agree with some of the things I have written here.

That is all I have to say about that.

And if you want to know the prayer I actually prayed in response to this: Jesus, I love you, but please save me from your followers.

Good Thoughts in a Polarized Political World

Two different college friends both happened to post some excellent thoughts recently.  Both ultimately long for real conversation amongst and between all of us, instead of conversation only with ourselves (or those very much like ourselves).

To which I can only say: Amen.

Here is Erica.

Here is Josh.

Thank you, friends.

Every Day I'm Pastorin'

Whoa, has it really been December since I last posted on here?  Yikes.

Life has been busy.  PhDland has been kicking my academic rump up one curb and down another.  And I no longer have much spare time or money to do things like watch a movie or read a book for fun or buy 10 new CDs, which was part of what provided grist for this mill.

Also, I've found myself increasingly tongue-tied this year.  Some of that is feeling caught in this no-woman's land between normal everyday speech and academese.  And some of it is inherent perfectionism - the more I know that I don't know, the less I feel I have to say.

This tumblr, however, is hilarious, so I felt the need to share it.  With all three of you who might still be checking this page once in a while.

I will try not to take such an extended hiatus this time.

Peace,
C

My Response to Perry's "Strong" Commercial

I was trying to think of an appropriate response to Rick Perry's most recent commercial, and consequently wrote this facebook status a couple hours ago.  It's getting a lot of traction over there, so I thought I might as well share it with the rest of the world on here:

I'm not ashamed to admit that I'm a Christian, but you don't need to be in the pew every Sunday to know there's something wrong with the body of Christ when the good news of God's overwhelming love and desire to be in relationship with us is leveraged, not to liberate and reconcile the world, but to stir up fear and resentment in pursuit of political gain.

Happy Holidays everyone!  Some day when I'm not swamped with homework I will get back to blogging. :)

Because Stormtroopers Are People Too

I also don't want to lose track of this awesome project.  A brilliant photographer doing family style portraits of the Dark Side, one photo a day for every day of the year (click here to go to her flickr account and scroll through the others).

Breaking Open the Conversation

Still behind in pretty much everything (school, life, blogging) but sticking this here for a wider audience.  I posted a link to this HuffPo article about the Kardashian debacle on my facebook page, and an old high school friend of mine commented, "Why rejoice in anyone's failed marriage?"

It was a fair question, and here is what I wrote in response (his name has been changed to protect the innocent):

John, I don't rejoice in anyone's failed marriage. I do lament what I see as a grave injustice, that someone who has such obvious disrespect for marriage is nevertheless legally allowed to keep making a mockery of marriage (and to make a crapload of money ON her mockery of it), while my LGBT brothers and sisters are (in most places) legally denied the ability to marry, and so must fight and scrape and go to great personal expense to pull together a very fragile system of support and protection and acknowledgment of their relationship. At its best this is still a fraction of the kind of support and protection and acknowledgment that Ms. Kardashian is granted by default. . .sacred relationship, support, protection, and acknowledgment which she has - twice now - casually thrown away.

I do not rejoice in the failure of her marriages. But I will rejoice if her continued mockery of marriage breaks open the conversation about what is just, and what respect for marriage truly looks like, and I will rejoice if breaking open that conversation ultimately helps secure justice, support, and protection for those who DO hold marriage sacred but are categorically denied participation in that gift.

Peace to you, brother. And thanks for pushing back with your question.