Maybe it's because I had another funeral to preside over this week.
Or maybe it's because my Wednesday night Bible study and I have spent 8 weeks this fall dwelling deeply in the book of Revelation.
Or maybe it's because our celebration of All Saints Sunday is still so fresh in my heart and my mind.
Or maybe it's because I am no longer surrounded by church musicians who do funky things like dropping out on a verse so that you pay attention to the words in a different way.
Or maybe it's because we simply don't sing "O Morning Star How Fair and Bright" often enough.
But we were honored to host Jonathan Rundman on Monday night as part of his East Coast Tour, and he ended the concert with this fantastic hymn of Epiphany, and I just HEARD it in a way that I've never heard it before.
Jonathan made a point of telling us that his favorite verse is number two, which ends:
Now, though daily
Earth's deep sadness
May perplex us
And distress us
Yet with heavenly joy you bless us.
But on verse five, he dropped out after the first chord, and we sang a capella:
What joy to know when life is past
The Lord we love is first and last
The end and the beginning!
He will one day, oh, glorious grace
Transport us to that happy place
Beyond all tears and sinning!
Amen! Amen!
Come, Lord Jesus!
Crown of gladness!
We are yearning
For the day of your returning.
To hear our little group of voices singing that particular verse in this particluar week, anticipating the burial of yet another brother in Christ, coming off an 8 week study of the book of Revelation, creeping up on the turning of the liturgical year and sitting patiently between All Saints Day and Advent - well, it was simply profound.
Jonathan came back in for verse six, which felt both like an answer to the deep sadness which perplexes and distresses, and like a glorious benediction:
Oh, let the harps break forth in sound!
Our joy be all with music crowned,
Our voices gaily blending!
For Christ goes with us all the way-
Today, tomorrow, ev'ry day!
His love is never ending!
Sing out! Ring out!
Jubilation!
Exultation!
Tell the story!
Great is he, the King of glory!
What a great hymn. And after really hearing the words again for the first time in a long time, I don't know why we don't sing it in seasons outside of Epiphany - it's beautiful and it works in any season of the year. So join with me in Jonathan's crusade to get this gem into the mouths of the people more often!
Peace,
Catrina
PS - Your inner church music nerd wants to know that both the text and the tune of "O Morning Star" were written by Philipp Nicolai, purveryor of such other fine hymnody as "Wake, Awake, for Night is Flying."
Wednesday, November 14, 2007
Friday, November 9, 2007
Say It Ain't So, Jo
Alright, with a war going on and the economy in the tank and another funeral to preside over next week (why is it that the angel of death never takes my "Please stop" memos seriously?), I realize this is a trifling concern.
But I am deeply disturbed by this article in today's New York Times.
I am disturbed because Minnesota "raised" Johan Santana - we brought him up through our farm system and developed his talent. Though he's only 28, he's already been playing for the Twins for many years.
But now that everybody else wants him and he can command a salary beyond what this small club is generally willing or able to pay, now the current state of baseball dictates that the management is wise to trade him and at least get SOMETHING out of this investment rather than lose him to free agency the following year.
It just makes me sad that this is the way the game is played now. I grew up in the days of Kirby Puckett and Kent Hrbek. Maybe I'm romanticizing, but it seemed like team loyalty carried more weight with the players back then. I don't remember there being so many pre-emptive trades based on the fear that you could no longer afford you best players, so you better do something while you still have power over them.
The Twins have always been scrappers. They win by building up their talent and teamwork, and Minnesota fans suffered through many years of crappy baseball as the team rebuilt, as Johan and Torii and Justin and Michael and Joe and all the rest became the ballplayers, became the team, that they are today.
And it just doesn't seem fair, now that the team is clicking and MN baseball is once again fun to watch, that these other teams will swoop in and steal these guys we've supported through their developing years, and have really grown to love and claim as our own.
Which is why it is particularly disturbing that the Yankees, of all teams, might pick Santana up in a trade. Because the Yankees, to me, represent all that is wrong and reprehensible in the world of baseball today. They're driving up the cost of all these players, they essentially buy their victories because they can simply afford to snap up all the top talent, and I never see them really working as a team, they're just a bunch of individual primadonnas strutting their stuff - trends that are also increasingly prevalent, and equally bothersome, in the larger society.
It just turns my stomach to think of one of our best beloved boys of summer donning that uniform and becoming part of the machine that is driving the insane excesses and injustices of the market.
I guess what it really boils down to - I can't stand it when Goliath wins.
Peace,
Catrina
But I am deeply disturbed by this article in today's New York Times.
I am disturbed because Minnesota "raised" Johan Santana - we brought him up through our farm system and developed his talent. Though he's only 28, he's already been playing for the Twins for many years.
But now that everybody else wants him and he can command a salary beyond what this small club is generally willing or able to pay, now the current state of baseball dictates that the management is wise to trade him and at least get SOMETHING out of this investment rather than lose him to free agency the following year.
It just makes me sad that this is the way the game is played now. I grew up in the days of Kirby Puckett and Kent Hrbek. Maybe I'm romanticizing, but it seemed like team loyalty carried more weight with the players back then. I don't remember there being so many pre-emptive trades based on the fear that you could no longer afford you best players, so you better do something while you still have power over them.
The Twins have always been scrappers. They win by building up their talent and teamwork, and Minnesota fans suffered through many years of crappy baseball as the team rebuilt, as Johan and Torii and Justin and Michael and Joe and all the rest became the ballplayers, became the team, that they are today.
And it just doesn't seem fair, now that the team is clicking and MN baseball is once again fun to watch, that these other teams will swoop in and steal these guys we've supported through their developing years, and have really grown to love and claim as our own.
Which is why it is particularly disturbing that the Yankees, of all teams, might pick Santana up in a trade. Because the Yankees, to me, represent all that is wrong and reprehensible in the world of baseball today. They're driving up the cost of all these players, they essentially buy their victories because they can simply afford to snap up all the top talent, and I never see them really working as a team, they're just a bunch of individual primadonnas strutting their stuff - trends that are also increasingly prevalent, and equally bothersome, in the larger society.
It just turns my stomach to think of one of our best beloved boys of summer donning that uniform and becoming part of the machine that is driving the insane excesses and injustices of the market.
I guess what it really boils down to - I can't stand it when Goliath wins.
Peace,
Catrina
Thursday, November 8, 2007
Milking the Deer
So, I just got back from my final First Call Theological Retreat (for the non-pastors who are reading this, the ELCA requires all pastors to attend a special retreat for the first three years of their ministry).
Region 8 does the first call retreat altogether - so the pastors at this gathering are serving somewhere among Metro/Suburban DC, Maryland, Delaware, West Virginia, or the western 2/3s of Pennsylvania. So you've got people serving the full range of areas, from extremely rural to small towns to small cities to sprawling suburbs to the inner city. As you can imagine, it's interesting to be mixing it up with people working in such widely varied contexts.
Inevitably, we start sharing some of our craziest stories, and this morning at breakfast we were doing just that.
I shared the story of my first funeral/interment, when the funeral director accidentally locked the ashes in his minivan, and had to borrow a family member's cell phone and wander around this little country graveyard until he got reception and could call his assistant to bring the other set of keys.
Someone else spoke of a shut-in they went to visit. This elderly, legally blind man had a neat row of birdfeeders out behind his house. The pastor commented on how they had never seen that many birdfeeders so close in a row like that. The old man said he can't get out to hunt anymore, so when he feels like hunting, he just sits on his back porch and picks off the birds at the birdfeeder. "But my eyesight's not so good anymore, pastor, that's where this automatic really comes in handy. . ." !!!
Then there was the pastor who had a woman leave a bible study early because she had to get home to milk the deer. Well, this pastor had heard of milking cows and even goats - but deer? This they had to see. Turns out, this woman and her family were deer breeders, their goal is to breed bucks with bigger and bigger racks, which they then set loose on their property, and people pay lots of money for the right to hunt on the land and catch a trophy buck. "Milking the deer" is collecting a, um, donation from the bucks with the biggest antlers for breeding purposes.
Uff da - talk about a dirty job!
That pretty much stopped the conversation, because nobody could top that. And because we were all laughing so hard, along with this poor colleague, at the memory of them finding out what milking the deer really entailed.
The world takes all kinds. And if you stay in this gig long enough, eventually you'll meet them.
Peace,
Catrina
Region 8 does the first call retreat altogether - so the pastors at this gathering are serving somewhere among Metro/Suburban DC, Maryland, Delaware, West Virginia, or the western 2/3s of Pennsylvania. So you've got people serving the full range of areas, from extremely rural to small towns to small cities to sprawling suburbs to the inner city. As you can imagine, it's interesting to be mixing it up with people working in such widely varied contexts.
Inevitably, we start sharing some of our craziest stories, and this morning at breakfast we were doing just that.
I shared the story of my first funeral/interment, when the funeral director accidentally locked the ashes in his minivan, and had to borrow a family member's cell phone and wander around this little country graveyard until he got reception and could call his assistant to bring the other set of keys.
Someone else spoke of a shut-in they went to visit. This elderly, legally blind man had a neat row of birdfeeders out behind his house. The pastor commented on how they had never seen that many birdfeeders so close in a row like that. The old man said he can't get out to hunt anymore, so when he feels like hunting, he just sits on his back porch and picks off the birds at the birdfeeder. "But my eyesight's not so good anymore, pastor, that's where this automatic really comes in handy. . ." !!!
Then there was the pastor who had a woman leave a bible study early because she had to get home to milk the deer. Well, this pastor had heard of milking cows and even goats - but deer? This they had to see. Turns out, this woman and her family were deer breeders, their goal is to breed bucks with bigger and bigger racks, which they then set loose on their property, and people pay lots of money for the right to hunt on the land and catch a trophy buck. "Milking the deer" is collecting a, um, donation from the bucks with the biggest antlers for breeding purposes.
Uff da - talk about a dirty job!
That pretty much stopped the conversation, because nobody could top that. And because we were all laughing so hard, along with this poor colleague, at the memory of them finding out what milking the deer really entailed.
The world takes all kinds. And if you stay in this gig long enough, eventually you'll meet them.
Peace,
Catrina
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