The latest unsolicited installment of the Word Alone "Network News" came sometime back between Thanksgiving and Christmas, which meant I didn't have time to look at it until more recently, which at least spared our secretary from my usual post-reading rant for a while.
What I found most interesting in this one was the announcement that Word Alone is launching its own publishing house, called Sola Publishing. I don't know why this surprises me, they've already held their own youth gatherings, started their own House of Studies, have their own call process that circumvents the ELCA's - clearly, Augsburg Fortress is too enmeshed in the ELCA's "liberal agenda" to produce decent resources, so why not start a Word Alone publishing house as well?
The name is taken from the Reformation battle cries: Sola Fide, Sola Gratia, Sola Scriptura (Faith Alone, Grace Alone, Scripture Alone), which is all well and good and clever, except that when you remove Fide, Gratia, and Scriptura, all you're left with is ALONE.
Which is a crummy (not to mention, anti-body of Christ) thing to be.
And yet, it seems what the Word Alone folks are inevtiably heading for. Because already they are factioning off even further - there's Word Alone (allegedly a reform movement within the ELCA), there's Lutheran Churches in Mission for Christ (churches that have already left the ELCA and formed their own national body), and according to the seniors I was talking to last spring, there's some new fangled Augustana synod for those who are ticked at Word Alone. And that's just the ones I know about. Who knows how many other fractions and factions are out there.
But that's the thing about being so terribly convinced of your own rightness and righteousness, is that you have to keep backing up and drawing another line in the sand to separate yourself from those who would compromise your dogma or your conscience. Live like that and it doesn't take long to find yourself boxed into a corner, utterly alone.
And the whole thing just makes me sad, because that's not at all what we as children of God are created or called or envisioned to be; it makes me sad because there are people within this movement, good people, people I once considered mentors and friends, who keep backing themselves away.
Sigh. . .
Sola Pax,
Catrina
Tuesday, January 22, 2008
Sunday, January 6, 2008
Happy Epiphany
This all started a month or so ago, as we were planning last weeks youth service/nativity play, and one of the guys made a passing comment about coming in as the three kings. Epiphany landing on a Sunday, we were actually celebrating it this year, so the passing comment snowballed into Balthazar, Melchior, and Caspar (Kyle, Brandon, and Robert) and their camel (Kelsey and Krista in a costume borrowed from camp) making a surprise visit to the children's sermon this morning to tell their story in person.
It was a riot - big kids and little kids alike had fun with this. It was funny how secretive the teenagers were about it - they wanted it to be a big surprise, so they kept insisting their families and friends be there today, but wouldn't tell them why, just that "it's never been done before, and it's going to be good!"
The camel costume was rigged with a water bottle so it could "spit" and I told the girls they could spit on the kings or the kids a couple times for comic effect. Unfortunately, they had some difficulties manipulating the head, so I'm in the middle of interviewing the three wise guys and young Dalton points and says "Pastor Catrina, the camel is drooling!" Great comedic effect, just not quite the one we were aiming for!
Friday, January 4, 2008
A Vast Hymn Sing Conspiracy
So I was talking to a friend the other day, who happened to have spent Christmas with people rather well-placed in the music department at St. Olaf. And these good folks mentioned over dinner that Olaf had received some complaints about the Christmas Festival this year. These complainers were all folks who had watched the Festival on TV (so, likely have no other affiliation to or knowledge of the college), and they made it clear that the music was fantastic, but they didn't think it was appropriate for the choirs to be decked in red, white, and blue - that is a violation of the separation of church and state.
Now, I'll be the first to admit that the current administration is blurring the lines between church and state in many instances, AND that there are a number of private, church-affiliated institutions of higher learning that would intentionally paint themselves patriotic for an event like that. So, there is good reason to be sensitive to and vigilant about abuses of the First Amendment.
But Olaf is not such a place. And anybody with an inkling of knowledge about the school would know that. If nothing else, you'd think the big PURPLE mass of the St. Olaf Choir right up front would cause the complainers to second-guess their theory. Yes, other choirs involved have red (actually, cranberry) and white or blue and white robes (Cantorei's can be green and white, but they set their reversible stole to blue because that is the liturgically appropriate color for Advent) - but not to give some wink-wink, nudge-nudge nod to patriotism - those have been the colors and styles of robe for those choirs for as long as I can remember, long before the "you're either with us or against us" mentality took hold of the nation, long before color-coded threat levels made us all wary of our neighbors.
I mean, I get it - there's a lot of subtle meaning-making and symbolism that goes on in the world, and some of the most subtle and unquestioned stuff is what entrenches some of our worst systemic evils. So I don't begrudge folks for raising the issue and asking the questions.
I do get annoyed, however, when people presume that their worldview is 100% correct and untainted, and all they are really interested in is letting people they disagree with know why and how, exactly, they are wrong. Such folks tend to lob reactionary judgments and then run away, refusing to engage in actual dialogue that might lead to better understanding on all sides.
Because sometimes, a robe is just a robe.
But you won't know that if you presume to know what the wearing of robes and their various colors mean. You won't know that if you don't bother to talk with the robe-wearer, but instead choose to talk at them, only telling them why they are wrong to wear the color of robe that they do.
The whole situation reminds me of a few years ago, when I was verbally accosted by a man at the corner of Hendon and Fulham (the heart of Luther Seminary's campus). He was a middle-aged white man, presumably a resident of the neighborhood. He asked me if I was a student at Luther, and when I said yes, launched into this tirade against us for being anti-Islamic. He came to this conclusion thanks to the banners for the new "Called and Sent" development campaign, which depicted a stylized triptych of fire, a cross inside a heart, and a hand. In his mind, these images were clearly invoking the crusades (he saw the heart and cross as a shield, and the hand as a reference to Islamic law allowing the chopping off of a hand for punishment), and the banners slyly indicating we were called and sent to destroy Islam.
Again, if he'd had an inkling of knowledge about the school, he would've known Luther offers a Master of Arts in Islamic Studies, and even has a few Islamic students enrolled. As it was, I patiently tried to explain to him that the campaign was about calling and sending ministers out into a needy world - that fire is a symbol of Pentecost, of being called and anointed by the Holy Spirit, that the "shield" was actually a heart, meant to be an intense close-up of Luther's seal, the symbolism of which was sin redeemed by love, and that the hand represented service to the world.
But he would hear none of it, just kept going on and on about the crusades and the whole institution and every individual associated therewith being anti-Islamic. Exasperated, I finally suggested he provide this feedback to the development office and pointed him in the right direction, but of course, he didn't have time for that. He was satisfied to have told me what for, having assumed he knew all about me and my worldview based on his interpretation of a banner hanging on my school's property.
You know, that old adage about what happens when one assumes is an old adage for a reason. And right here you've got two cases that prove it.
And now for something completely different: how cool is it that over 300,000 people turned out to caucus in Iowa last night? That's not just show up to a poll and cast a ballot - that's democracy in action, that's 300,000 people engaging each other, discussing and discerning who will best lead us through the next four years. Oh, be still my populist heart!
Peace,
Catrina
Now, I'll be the first to admit that the current administration is blurring the lines between church and state in many instances, AND that there are a number of private, church-affiliated institutions of higher learning that would intentionally paint themselves patriotic for an event like that. So, there is good reason to be sensitive to and vigilant about abuses of the First Amendment.
But Olaf is not such a place. And anybody with an inkling of knowledge about the school would know that. If nothing else, you'd think the big PURPLE mass of the St. Olaf Choir right up front would cause the complainers to second-guess their theory. Yes, other choirs involved have red (actually, cranberry) and white or blue and white robes (Cantorei's can be green and white, but they set their reversible stole to blue because that is the liturgically appropriate color for Advent) - but not to give some wink-wink, nudge-nudge nod to patriotism - those have been the colors and styles of robe for those choirs for as long as I can remember, long before the "you're either with us or against us" mentality took hold of the nation, long before color-coded threat levels made us all wary of our neighbors.
I mean, I get it - there's a lot of subtle meaning-making and symbolism that goes on in the world, and some of the most subtle and unquestioned stuff is what entrenches some of our worst systemic evils. So I don't begrudge folks for raising the issue and asking the questions.
I do get annoyed, however, when people presume that their worldview is 100% correct and untainted, and all they are really interested in is letting people they disagree with know why and how, exactly, they are wrong. Such folks tend to lob reactionary judgments and then run away, refusing to engage in actual dialogue that might lead to better understanding on all sides.
Because sometimes, a robe is just a robe.
But you won't know that if you presume to know what the wearing of robes and their various colors mean. You won't know that if you don't bother to talk with the robe-wearer, but instead choose to talk at them, only telling them why they are wrong to wear the color of robe that they do.
The whole situation reminds me of a few years ago, when I was verbally accosted by a man at the corner of Hendon and Fulham (the heart of Luther Seminary's campus). He was a middle-aged white man, presumably a resident of the neighborhood. He asked me if I was a student at Luther, and when I said yes, launched into this tirade against us for being anti-Islamic. He came to this conclusion thanks to the banners for the new "Called and Sent" development campaign, which depicted a stylized triptych of fire, a cross inside a heart, and a hand. In his mind, these images were clearly invoking the crusades (he saw the heart and cross as a shield, and the hand as a reference to Islamic law allowing the chopping off of a hand for punishment), and the banners slyly indicating we were called and sent to destroy Islam.
Again, if he'd had an inkling of knowledge about the school, he would've known Luther offers a Master of Arts in Islamic Studies, and even has a few Islamic students enrolled. As it was, I patiently tried to explain to him that the campaign was about calling and sending ministers out into a needy world - that fire is a symbol of Pentecost, of being called and anointed by the Holy Spirit, that the "shield" was actually a heart, meant to be an intense close-up of Luther's seal, the symbolism of which was sin redeemed by love, and that the hand represented service to the world.
But he would hear none of it, just kept going on and on about the crusades and the whole institution and every individual associated therewith being anti-Islamic. Exasperated, I finally suggested he provide this feedback to the development office and pointed him in the right direction, but of course, he didn't have time for that. He was satisfied to have told me what for, having assumed he knew all about me and my worldview based on his interpretation of a banner hanging on my school's property.
You know, that old adage about what happens when one assumes is an old adage for a reason. And right here you've got two cases that prove it.
And now for something completely different: how cool is it that over 300,000 people turned out to caucus in Iowa last night? That's not just show up to a poll and cast a ballot - that's democracy in action, that's 300,000 people engaging each other, discussing and discerning who will best lead us through the next four years. Oh, be still my populist heart!
Peace,
Catrina
Saturday, December 29, 2007
Call them "Chuggles"?
This past week I finally fulfilled a long overdue date with Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. I got the book for Christmas two years ago, but I knew once I started reading it, I would not be able to put it down, and I just haven't had that kind of time, to disappear into Hogwarts for 48 hours, until just a few days ago.
I already knew who was going to die, as a confirmation student accidentally blabbed that info to me before they realized I hadn't yet read the book. But I have to say, I'm still kind of in shock over who killed the deceased - I don't want to say more, lest I accidentally ruin the details for anyone, but suffice it to say, I am still disturbed and brewing over how that all shook down.
And I also find myself, as I do after watching the Star Wars saga, somewhat jealous of the characters' abilities and gadgets, because in many respects I think we have similar callings. Ok, granted, I do not personally face immanent mortal peril nearly so often as Harry or Obi-Wan, but I do still deal with matters of life and death on a regular basis. And we are all three of us stewards and ministers of a powerful and mysterious force that holds the universe together; we are all three of us constantly on the frontlines of the battle between good and evil (and most often employ sacrifice and love as our weapons of choice in that battle). And like the Jedi, pastors are called to a certain Zen-like detachment from particular places and people in order that we might better love all of God's children and be free to serve the universal church.
So we're all basically fighting the good fight, but they get such way cooler perks - a lightsaber, a wand, a flying broomstick, the ability to move objects or even themselves with their trained mind. . .I get health insurance and a pension plan.
(which, especially in this day and age, I'm certainly grateful for, but they don't hum when you wave them around in the air, and on most days, don't seem nearly as useful as the ability to apparate)
But I digress.
The "chuggles" in the title above is inspired by reading Harry Potter just a few days after Christmas - just a few days after the "C&Es" (short for "Christmas and Easter Christians") have made their annual or semi-annual pilgrimmage to church.
Now, perhaps I am lacking in my sympathetic imagination here, but I suspect the people who only show up once or twice a year come more for the sake of grandma, or nostalgia, or tradition, than they do out of any expectation of encountering the divine. Which is just weird to me, because my understanding of worship is that it's an intentional encounter with God in a place where God has promised to be found. And I'm not just blithering around up front, going off on my own opinions, or giving a nice speech, or trying to uplift or edify the people - I'm charged with both the burden and the gift of bringing the good news, I'm (hopefully) handing over a word of life from God that you can cling to in a world full of death. And I fully believe that the Word of God, though it may travel a wide and circuitous route, always, ultimately, bears fruit, it never returns to God empty. So, I'm just kind of confused by people who don't share this understanding, who don't come to worship with these same expectations to encounter God and the living Word - and I find myself wondering what they do expect, and why they bother coming at all?
(I should clarify at this point, that I'm not trying to pick on C&Es - I have met plenty of people who are regularly in the pews, and sadly, even a few colleagues, who also seem to lack any expectations of an actual encounter with the divine through the Word and the Sacraments - and I often wonder the same things about them)
And I also wonder, then, what these folks day-to-day lives are like. Because if you don't expect to meet God in a place where God has promised to be found and where you have actually bothered showing up - do you honestly expect to meet God anywhere at all? Again, I could simply be lacking a charitable imagination here, but I suspect the answer, for most, is no. Which is, again, just weird to me, whose world is infused with the divine, who sees God on the loose as much in the New York City subway as in the purple mountain's majesty, as much in a Puccini aria as in Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip.
So, I'm thinking perhaps a new sociological category is in order, dubbed "Chuggles" - people who claim affiliation with the Christian faith but who are as void of any expectation of meeting, as oblivious to the actual presence of, the divine, as the muggles of Harry Potter are to the magical.
The good news is, I don't think it's a doomed "once a chuggle, always a chuggle" situation. I think people can learn to expect to meet God in the places God has promised to be found, I even think they can have their hearts and minds and ears and eyes broken open to see God running loose in all sorts of unexpected places in the world.
The question, the great challenge before us who steward such immense mysteries, is HOW? How do we de-chuggle or un-chuggle a person? And how much more fun would it be if lightsabers or flying broomsticks were involved? :)
Peace,
Catrina
I already knew who was going to die, as a confirmation student accidentally blabbed that info to me before they realized I hadn't yet read the book. But I have to say, I'm still kind of in shock over who killed the deceased - I don't want to say more, lest I accidentally ruin the details for anyone, but suffice it to say, I am still disturbed and brewing over how that all shook down.
And I also find myself, as I do after watching the Star Wars saga, somewhat jealous of the characters' abilities and gadgets, because in many respects I think we have similar callings. Ok, granted, I do not personally face immanent mortal peril nearly so often as Harry or Obi-Wan, but I do still deal with matters of life and death on a regular basis. And we are all three of us stewards and ministers of a powerful and mysterious force that holds the universe together; we are all three of us constantly on the frontlines of the battle between good and evil (and most often employ sacrifice and love as our weapons of choice in that battle). And like the Jedi, pastors are called to a certain Zen-like detachment from particular places and people in order that we might better love all of God's children and be free to serve the universal church.
So we're all basically fighting the good fight, but they get such way cooler perks - a lightsaber, a wand, a flying broomstick, the ability to move objects or even themselves with their trained mind. . .I get health insurance and a pension plan.
(which, especially in this day and age, I'm certainly grateful for, but they don't hum when you wave them around in the air, and on most days, don't seem nearly as useful as the ability to apparate)
But I digress.
The "chuggles" in the title above is inspired by reading Harry Potter just a few days after Christmas - just a few days after the "C&Es" (short for "Christmas and Easter Christians") have made their annual or semi-annual pilgrimmage to church.
Now, perhaps I am lacking in my sympathetic imagination here, but I suspect the people who only show up once or twice a year come more for the sake of grandma, or nostalgia, or tradition, than they do out of any expectation of encountering the divine. Which is just weird to me, because my understanding of worship is that it's an intentional encounter with God in a place where God has promised to be found. And I'm not just blithering around up front, going off on my own opinions, or giving a nice speech, or trying to uplift or edify the people - I'm charged with both the burden and the gift of bringing the good news, I'm (hopefully) handing over a word of life from God that you can cling to in a world full of death. And I fully believe that the Word of God, though it may travel a wide and circuitous route, always, ultimately, bears fruit, it never returns to God empty. So, I'm just kind of confused by people who don't share this understanding, who don't come to worship with these same expectations to encounter God and the living Word - and I find myself wondering what they do expect, and why they bother coming at all?
(I should clarify at this point, that I'm not trying to pick on C&Es - I have met plenty of people who are regularly in the pews, and sadly, even a few colleagues, who also seem to lack any expectations of an actual encounter with the divine through the Word and the Sacraments - and I often wonder the same things about them)
And I also wonder, then, what these folks day-to-day lives are like. Because if you don't expect to meet God in a place where God has promised to be found and where you have actually bothered showing up - do you honestly expect to meet God anywhere at all? Again, I could simply be lacking a charitable imagination here, but I suspect the answer, for most, is no. Which is, again, just weird to me, whose world is infused with the divine, who sees God on the loose as much in the New York City subway as in the purple mountain's majesty, as much in a Puccini aria as in Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip.
So, I'm thinking perhaps a new sociological category is in order, dubbed "Chuggles" - people who claim affiliation with the Christian faith but who are as void of any expectation of meeting, as oblivious to the actual presence of, the divine, as the muggles of Harry Potter are to the magical.
The good news is, I don't think it's a doomed "once a chuggle, always a chuggle" situation. I think people can learn to expect to meet God in the places God has promised to be found, I even think they can have their hearts and minds and ears and eyes broken open to see God running loose in all sorts of unexpected places in the world.
The question, the great challenge before us who steward such immense mysteries, is HOW? How do we de-chuggle or un-chuggle a person? And how much more fun would it be if lightsabers or flying broomsticks were involved? :)
Peace,
Catrina
Friday, December 28, 2007
On the Fourth Day of Christmas
. . .I'm putting up pictures of the new paper cutting at our church - the Star of Bethlehem. It's 16' tall, so it makes a big impression, and I think it's really enhanced our worship space this season (we put it up Advent 2 - that's probably rushing the star thing a bit, but c'mon, it's huge and blue, and the liturgy we were using really emphasized God as creator, and the cutting does too). Below is an intense close-up so you can see all the cool detail. Young Owen is convinced there's a dragon in there, though I'm not so sure. Let me know if you find one!
PS - If anyone knows how to get these buggers to rotate, please let me know that too!
Wednesday, December 19, 2007
The Zen of the Midwest
A post to the host over at the Prairie Home Companion site asked Garrison Keillor for his famous Christmas quote, and he responded in kind:
"Craving only causes frustration, intense desire makes the object recede. If the game is really important, you're going to lose. If you're wildly in love, you're going to lose and you know it. The trick is to keep it from being that important. Be cool. Don't want it that much. Want it less. When you get to where you don't want it at all, then you're more likely to get it. And if you don't get it, you don't care so much."
As GK added afterwards - that one's so true sometimes that it hurts.
"Craving only causes frustration, intense desire makes the object recede. If the game is really important, you're going to lose. If you're wildly in love, you're going to lose and you know it. The trick is to keep it from being that important. Be cool. Don't want it that much. Want it less. When you get to where you don't want it at all, then you're more likely to get it. And if you don't get it, you don't care so much."
As GK added afterwards - that one's so true sometimes that it hurts.
Wednesday, December 12, 2007
Mind the Gap
Sorry for the long delay in writing. I went to Minnesota for Thanksgiving, and between the getting ready for vacation, the being on vacation, and the catching up from vacation, well, there hasn't been much time for blogging.
But now I'm back with some half-baked thoughts that have been kicking around my head for the past month or so. It all started the week before vacation, when I went out to lunch with a parishioner who I am mentoring through our synod's Authorized Lay Worship Leader program. When our food came, she volunteered to pray (so nice to go to lunch with someone who doesn't assume that I am the "token pray-er"!), so we bowed our heads and she said the following:
"For Food in a world where many walk in hunger,
For Faith in a world where many walk in fear,
and for Friends in a world where many walk alone,
We give you thanks"
And I looked up and said "That's Keith's prayer from Six Feet Under!"
We were both, frankly, kind of surprised to find a fellow fan in one another, but we quickly moved beyond that and into an engaging conversation about what a well-written and thought-provoking television show that it is, and how many incredible discussions of life and death and faith it could launch, EXCEPT. . .
. . .except there is always too much graphic language and sex for me to be able to use it as a resource at church. I mean, I have some parishioners whose piety is such that they would be offended at the mere thought of their pastor watching a show like Six Feet Under - there's no way they would tolerate showing it or using it as the basis for a small group study at church. And yet I've obviously got other parishioners who are watching it and would love to have a group with which to discuss some of those deep meaning of life and death questions that it raises.
So this is a constant frustration for me - because I could write entire small group studies on the theology of Six Feet Under, or the Dave Matthews Band, or the Star Wars saga, or other such pop culture phenomena where I see God on the loose. And I have this nagging feeling that to do so would be to meet a lot of the unchurched and de-churched of my generation where they are at. But those kinds of studies aren't going to appeal to the vast majority of my current parishioners.
So do I serve the majority of the congregation to which I am called? Or do I reach out to serve and engage the whole people of God (isn't that also part of my calling)? And if I do go for broke one day and offer up a "God running loose in pop culture" kind of study, how in the world do I find and convince the people who would most dig it to take part?
So then when I was on vacation, I went to worship at the Mercy Seat, a new church plant in NE Minneapolis that seems to be very intentionally reaching out to the de-churched/unchurched/disenfranchised by the church/disillusioned by the church, and engaging them through "critical orthodoxy." The service was very solid liturgical worship, essentially the same texts and ordo as the LBW, but in an improvisational jazz medium. The sermon was excellent, a thoughtful well-crafted proclamation, thoroughly grounded in the theology of the cross, that skillfully wove deep theological insights with illustrations from The Simpsons and references to a Jesus who "goes all the way to 11" (and the congregation actually got and laughed at that line!). Their announcements included a plug for their stewardship pledge drive, a hilarious and ingenious campaign to "stop the hostile takeover" - they claimed that a multinational corporation was threatening to buy the congregation and outsource the sacraments unless they could "prove their viability" through 50 pledging households.
My impresion of this congregation is that it is very intentionally rooting itself in the best and most essential core of the Lutheran tradition while also very intentionally engaging not-so-traditionally-churchy people at the intersection of art and faith and culture. In other words, it is a church that could get away with, and would have an audience for, a Six Feet Under small group study.
Which makes it very hard not to be jealous of those pastors and the kind of work they get to do and the kind of sermons they get to preach, EXCEPT. . .
. . .except I refuse to believe that the only solution to my frustrations is to head to Chicago for mission start training and start up a completely new congregation. I mean, it's certainly easier in some respects to be creating a congregational culture as you go, instead of trying to retradition and reform longstanding cultures that you inherit. And it's probably easier to convince the disenfranchised and disillusioned to come and see in a group that's rather new and somewhat different, than a group that looks and sounds and acts an awful lot like the church that disenfranchised or disillusioned them to begin with.
But we are called to be one body in Christ. And it is one of the greatest strengths - and gifts - of the church to hold people of widely divergent backgrounds and opinions and interests together AS the one body of Christ. So I keep thinking, there's got to be a way to bridge the traditionally churched and all those who are de-churched, unchurched, disillusioned and/or disenfranchised by the church. I refuse to settle for an either/or answer - I keep thinking there's got to be a both/and, there's got to be a way to draw them all into community together.
So, I keep looking for ways to mind the gap, tending to both the now and the not yet, caring for the church as it currently is, and caring for the church that the Holy Spirit is even now birthing us to be.
Peace,
Catrina
But now I'm back with some half-baked thoughts that have been kicking around my head for the past month or so. It all started the week before vacation, when I went out to lunch with a parishioner who I am mentoring through our synod's Authorized Lay Worship Leader program. When our food came, she volunteered to pray (so nice to go to lunch with someone who doesn't assume that I am the "token pray-er"!), so we bowed our heads and she said the following:
"For Food in a world where many walk in hunger,
For Faith in a world where many walk in fear,
and for Friends in a world where many walk alone,
We give you thanks"
And I looked up and said "That's Keith's prayer from Six Feet Under!"
We were both, frankly, kind of surprised to find a fellow fan in one another, but we quickly moved beyond that and into an engaging conversation about what a well-written and thought-provoking television show that it is, and how many incredible discussions of life and death and faith it could launch, EXCEPT. . .
. . .except there is always too much graphic language and sex for me to be able to use it as a resource at church. I mean, I have some parishioners whose piety is such that they would be offended at the mere thought of their pastor watching a show like Six Feet Under - there's no way they would tolerate showing it or using it as the basis for a small group study at church. And yet I've obviously got other parishioners who are watching it and would love to have a group with which to discuss some of those deep meaning of life and death questions that it raises.
So this is a constant frustration for me - because I could write entire small group studies on the theology of Six Feet Under, or the Dave Matthews Band, or the Star Wars saga, or other such pop culture phenomena where I see God on the loose. And I have this nagging feeling that to do so would be to meet a lot of the unchurched and de-churched of my generation where they are at. But those kinds of studies aren't going to appeal to the vast majority of my current parishioners.
So do I serve the majority of the congregation to which I am called? Or do I reach out to serve and engage the whole people of God (isn't that also part of my calling)? And if I do go for broke one day and offer up a "God running loose in pop culture" kind of study, how in the world do I find and convince the people who would most dig it to take part?
So then when I was on vacation, I went to worship at the Mercy Seat, a new church plant in NE Minneapolis that seems to be very intentionally reaching out to the de-churched/unchurched/disenfranchised by the church/disillusioned by the church, and engaging them through "critical orthodoxy." The service was very solid liturgical worship, essentially the same texts and ordo as the LBW, but in an improvisational jazz medium. The sermon was excellent, a thoughtful well-crafted proclamation, thoroughly grounded in the theology of the cross, that skillfully wove deep theological insights with illustrations from The Simpsons and references to a Jesus who "goes all the way to 11" (and the congregation actually got and laughed at that line!). Their announcements included a plug for their stewardship pledge drive, a hilarious and ingenious campaign to "stop the hostile takeover" - they claimed that a multinational corporation was threatening to buy the congregation and outsource the sacraments unless they could "prove their viability" through 50 pledging households.
My impresion of this congregation is that it is very intentionally rooting itself in the best and most essential core of the Lutheran tradition while also very intentionally engaging not-so-traditionally-churchy people at the intersection of art and faith and culture. In other words, it is a church that could get away with, and would have an audience for, a Six Feet Under small group study.
Which makes it very hard not to be jealous of those pastors and the kind of work they get to do and the kind of sermons they get to preach, EXCEPT. . .
. . .except I refuse to believe that the only solution to my frustrations is to head to Chicago for mission start training and start up a completely new congregation. I mean, it's certainly easier in some respects to be creating a congregational culture as you go, instead of trying to retradition and reform longstanding cultures that you inherit. And it's probably easier to convince the disenfranchised and disillusioned to come and see in a group that's rather new and somewhat different, than a group that looks and sounds and acts an awful lot like the church that disenfranchised or disillusioned them to begin with.
But we are called to be one body in Christ. And it is one of the greatest strengths - and gifts - of the church to hold people of widely divergent backgrounds and opinions and interests together AS the one body of Christ. So I keep thinking, there's got to be a way to bridge the traditionally churched and all those who are de-churched, unchurched, disillusioned and/or disenfranchised by the church. I refuse to settle for an either/or answer - I keep thinking there's got to be a both/and, there's got to be a way to draw them all into community together.
So, I keep looking for ways to mind the gap, tending to both the now and the not yet, caring for the church as it currently is, and caring for the church that the Holy Spirit is even now birthing us to be.
Peace,
Catrina
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