Well, there are now less than three weeks before thousands of Episcopalians will be descending on the Happiest Place on Earth, Anaheim, California. No, we're not actually staying at Disneyland Hotels, but the mouse house is just up the street. And, from what I can see, there is already lot's of Mickey Mouse behavior going on.
First, my pet peeves: The Hilton Hotel (along with the Marriott) attached to the Convention Center, is charging $12/day for wireless. Mind you, we could stay at a Motel 6, a Super 8, a Holiday Inn Express, or virtually any other hotel in the area and get it for free. But we're special, so paying for the more expensive Hilton, which basically means not walking 5-10 minutes each morning, grants us this outrageous fee.
I might have gotten over it until I was told about the refrigerator fee: it's another $30. So much for saving money by having breakfast in my room. It's embarrassing to the hotel chain. I hope every Episcopalian who learns about it tell their friends.
Anyway, that's the rant. Right now, I'm just trying to work my way through the emails, Facebook messages and snail mail that are showing up on a daily basis. I usually ignore my spam file except once a week, but now all sorts of people I have never heard of want to share information with me. And every one of them wants to invite me to lunch/dinner/cocktails/church.
Except they really want to take me to the cleaners. These 'invitations' are running anywhere from $25-$50 per meal, and I am sure I could go to one or two each day. At least my seminary apparently actually wants to treat me; no one else does.
Even the invitations to Eucharist have to be treated with suspicion. The printed programs will no doubt tell us the worthy cause that our offering will be funding, and a second pitch will be made right before the offering is taken up. We're not being nickeled and dimed to death - this is serious money.
And, let's face it, Anaheim isn't exactly cheap to begin with. $24 for breakfast at Denny's? IHOP is a bargain at $17? Now you know why the refrigerator (yes, I already have one reserved) is so important.
And the reports. It is ironic that we will pass so many resolutions about the church going green this time around. The Blue Book (actually a shade of maroon), filled with Convention Resolutions, is over 800 pages long. Most people will probably ship it out west rather than be forced to carry it on the plane and pay excess weight fees. And it doesn't even include the proposed budget, which was a separate document. The Church Pension Fund sent me their own report, another fifty pages I probably won't be reading. And the paper keeps arriving. Yes, a rain forest was hurt in the making of this convention.
It would be nice if the rest of the world cared one whit about what we do out there. What will happen instead is that there will be one report on the day we deal with the resolutions about same sex marriage, a relatively small part of the convention agenda. But it is the, ahem, sexy part, so you can be sure it will hit the major news media unlike everything else. Condemn a war: who cares? Raise millions for fighting malaria: so what? National health insurance for church workers? Hell, the Presiding Bishop could probably swear up a storm, declare herself to be a Sarah Palin Republican, and smoke a cigar naked without gathering attention unless she was talking about same sex marriage.
Now, this is not to take anything away from the importance of that issue. BUT IT'S NOT THE ONLY THING WE TALK ABOUT!!
Personally, I am looking forward to what Brian McLaren has to say to 10,000 Episcopalians. That should be funny. I wonder if they will even understand what he has to say?
Anyway, be sure to bookmark the Episcopal Church home page for an opportunity to see daily updates about what is actually going on (http://www.episcopalchurch.org/index.htm). You will have to go through the silly "I Am Episcopalian" cover site, in which various church members prove they know nothing about Christianity except the word 'welcome', but then you'll get some actual reporting.
Or you can go to this blog. Or my Facebook page. I am going to try to write some things from my experience.
Now, let's get out there and starting talking about sex, shall we? We do it so well. Or at least so loudly. Or, well, anyway, frequently. It took the Episcopal Church to make sex boring. Go figure.
Showing posts with label Episcopal. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Episcopal. Show all posts
Wednesday, June 17, 2009
Wednesday, April 15, 2009
On to Anaheim, Round One
As some of you know, I am a deputy to the 2009 meeting of the General Convention of the Episcopal Church, which takes place in July in Anaheim California (Sorry, but the term "Mickey Mouse Convention" has already been taken!). This is that time every three years when the Episcopal church is in the news several times in a row, after which we are largely forgotten by the news media.
As part of my deputy duties, I am going to a pre-convention meeting of deputies of color this weekend.
I must admit, I am going with a bit of trepidation. It looks like this meeting is being run by the same folk who were in charge of these things when I finished seminary 25 years ago. Put another way, we appear to have Jesse Jackson leadership in a Barack Obama world. I hope I am wrong and will be pleasantly surprised.
I wouldn't really care except I think younger deputies of color have different battles they want to fight. I don't claim to represent them (I am, after all, older than President Obama), but I do get to listen to folk their age a lot as a college chaplain. Is this a time for the passing of the torch?
And I really wonder if that torch is gonna get passed right over my head to those younger than me. If so, I'll be happy to stand with the younger group, especially if they decide to try something other than the old identity politics that, quite frankly, now bore me to tears.
One thing I do know is that I will have to take a walk if we continue the old practice of people of color decrying discrimination and then turning around and refusing to support gays and lesbians in their struggles against the same thing. For me to sign on to that would be, among other things, a betrayal of the folks who are part of my ministry.
I guess what I am really doing as I write this is gathering the courage to face a potential adversary. Pray I have the strength, if needed. Fortunately, my ministry is not really tied to these folks liking me.
More on this as it develops....
As part of my deputy duties, I am going to a pre-convention meeting of deputies of color this weekend.
I must admit, I am going with a bit of trepidation. It looks like this meeting is being run by the same folk who were in charge of these things when I finished seminary 25 years ago. Put another way, we appear to have Jesse Jackson leadership in a Barack Obama world. I hope I am wrong and will be pleasantly surprised.
I wouldn't really care except I think younger deputies of color have different battles they want to fight. I don't claim to represent them (I am, after all, older than President Obama), but I do get to listen to folk their age a lot as a college chaplain. Is this a time for the passing of the torch?
And I really wonder if that torch is gonna get passed right over my head to those younger than me. If so, I'll be happy to stand with the younger group, especially if they decide to try something other than the old identity politics that, quite frankly, now bore me to tears.
One thing I do know is that I will have to take a walk if we continue the old practice of people of color decrying discrimination and then turning around and refusing to support gays and lesbians in their struggles against the same thing. For me to sign on to that would be, among other things, a betrayal of the folks who are part of my ministry.
I guess what I am really doing as I write this is gathering the courage to face a potential adversary. Pray I have the strength, if needed. Fortunately, my ministry is not really tied to these folks liking me.
More on this as it develops....
Tuesday, February 17, 2009
We're an Adult Church
I read that recently. It was a description of the Episcopal Church by a priest to a parishioner. The context was an online discussion about lifelong learning in the Episcopal Church.
Now, if your mind works in the twisted way that mine does, at least part of you read 'adult church' and thought, "When do they get to the sex?" Alas, when Episcopalians get to sex, it's all a lot of talk. It took the Episcopal Church to make sex boring--many have tried, but few have succeeded like we have in taking a subject so filled with excitement, energy, and humor and making it dull, pedantic, and mind-numbingly off putting.
Well, thankfully, this comment was not about the sex lives of Anglo-Catholics (for once). Sadly, it said something worse; this priest was saying, in effect, that the Episcopal Church is really not for children.
This, of course, was news to me, having grown up in the Episcopal Church. I did not realize that all of that Sunday school, choir, acolyting, ushering, youth group, and being a page at diocesan convention was not aimed at me. Let's not forget the diocesan youth retreats and church camp. And we can just skip past the last thirty years of my life spent leading youth events on every level from the parish to the international stage.
Apparently, being a church that encourages an intellectual approach to one's faith, that allows questioning, that changes over time, and that encourages its members to figure out for themselves who God is (working through a community of believers, of course) is not for children.
I pray that this is an attitude that very few of my fellow clergy take. Or other Episcopalians, clergy or not. And especially those Sunday school teachers and Directors of Religious Education in our churches. If it is, than we may as well relegate our work to the same trash heap where the most failing school systems in our country belong. You know, the ones that don't teach children to think but only try to keep control and make them give rote answers. The ones where history is just 'one damned thing after another' and English is designed to make the kids hate to read and crank out five paragraph theme essays that say nothing.
Oops, I'm getting off track. How much do you want to bet that the congregation of the priest who made this comment has very few children? And how long will it be before he drives away the few that are left, thereby proving his point. And wouldn't you also bet that his adult education program is pretty boring too? It's like politicians who make a career of saying how badly government fails and then get into office and set out to prove their point. Except maybe it's not quite as calculated. More like an unwillingness to admit personal failure by blaming the whole system.
The problem with this declaration, of course, is that the ministry of children and youth in the Episcopal Church is succeeding all over the place. The evidence of that can be found all over the land. Yes, there are places that struggle, especially small churches that only have a few children.
But tell me a kind of ministry where this is not true. Then say it about any other church or denomination out there. Even Saddleback Church, Rick Warren's southern California mega-entity, isn't resting on its laurels. You just know that there is some back room there where someone is tearing her hair out saying, "Why isn't our __________ ministry reaching people?"
Well, I believe children want to think too. And churches that tell children what to think lose them as soon as they decide to think for themselves. Do we really want a program with a hundred children if 99 of them are going to leave before getting out of high school? Of course not.
But the attitude is the first thing that has to go. Yes, we are an adult church. And a young adult church (that's a whole other discussion). And a teen church. And a children church. And an elder church too. The sooner we start believing that, the better. Because any group of people can figure out when a church is not interested in them. Even children.
Now, if your mind works in the twisted way that mine does, at least part of you read 'adult church' and thought, "When do they get to the sex?" Alas, when Episcopalians get to sex, it's all a lot of talk. It took the Episcopal Church to make sex boring--many have tried, but few have succeeded like we have in taking a subject so filled with excitement, energy, and humor and making it dull, pedantic, and mind-numbingly off putting.
Well, thankfully, this comment was not about the sex lives of Anglo-Catholics (for once). Sadly, it said something worse; this priest was saying, in effect, that the Episcopal Church is really not for children.
This, of course, was news to me, having grown up in the Episcopal Church. I did not realize that all of that Sunday school, choir, acolyting, ushering, youth group, and being a page at diocesan convention was not aimed at me. Let's not forget the diocesan youth retreats and church camp. And we can just skip past the last thirty years of my life spent leading youth events on every level from the parish to the international stage.
Apparently, being a church that encourages an intellectual approach to one's faith, that allows questioning, that changes over time, and that encourages its members to figure out for themselves who God is (working through a community of believers, of course) is not for children.
I pray that this is an attitude that very few of my fellow clergy take. Or other Episcopalians, clergy or not. And especially those Sunday school teachers and Directors of Religious Education in our churches. If it is, than we may as well relegate our work to the same trash heap where the most failing school systems in our country belong. You know, the ones that don't teach children to think but only try to keep control and make them give rote answers. The ones where history is just 'one damned thing after another' and English is designed to make the kids hate to read and crank out five paragraph theme essays that say nothing.
Oops, I'm getting off track. How much do you want to bet that the congregation of the priest who made this comment has very few children? And how long will it be before he drives away the few that are left, thereby proving his point. And wouldn't you also bet that his adult education program is pretty boring too? It's like politicians who make a career of saying how badly government fails and then get into office and set out to prove their point. Except maybe it's not quite as calculated. More like an unwillingness to admit personal failure by blaming the whole system.
The problem with this declaration, of course, is that the ministry of children and youth in the Episcopal Church is succeeding all over the place. The evidence of that can be found all over the land. Yes, there are places that struggle, especially small churches that only have a few children.
But tell me a kind of ministry where this is not true. Then say it about any other church or denomination out there. Even Saddleback Church, Rick Warren's southern California mega-entity, isn't resting on its laurels. You just know that there is some back room there where someone is tearing her hair out saying, "Why isn't our __________ ministry reaching people?"
Well, I believe children want to think too. And churches that tell children what to think lose them as soon as they decide to think for themselves. Do we really want a program with a hundred children if 99 of them are going to leave before getting out of high school? Of course not.
But the attitude is the first thing that has to go. Yes, we are an adult church. And a young adult church (that's a whole other discussion). And a teen church. And a children church. And an elder church too. The sooner we start believing that, the better. Because any group of people can figure out when a church is not interested in them. Even children.
Tuesday, October 21, 2008
Revolt Now
Okay, everyone who knows me knows I have resisted a blog for the longest time. So the question begging for an answer is 'why now?'
Too bad I don't really have a good answer. Maybe I just gave in to the fashion. Or maybe I realized how many people I might meet -- I like meeting people.
I do know why I should not have a blog. 'Cause I hate deadlines. I already have one. Some people call it a sermon, but from my point of view, its a deadline. There is no option but that I have something to say at 11:00 on Sunday mornings. The idea of having a blog means that you write something. And even if there is no set deadline, we've all read blogs that we STOPPED reading because the blogger didn't post often enough to make it worthwhile.
Which leads to the second reason why not; I have the basic insecurity that maybe I don't have enough to say to sustain this. As above, we've also dropped blogs that had little to say or kept repeating the same tired themes. I refuse to be one of those.
Finally, I see no reason to have a blog simply to point out stuff out there that other people have written, no matter how witty, intelligent, thoughtful, ironic, dry, or creative it might be. If I want you to see it, I'll email you. If I am going to blog, it will be mostly my own stuff, or, at the very least, my comments about someone else's works.
So who am I? Well. I am many things in this world:
- Owned by a Siberian Husky named Andy
- Home Brewer (recently reaching into wine too!)
- Former fat kid and successful dieter
- Home owner
- Episcopal Priest and Campus Minister
- Single Guy
- Person who has actually visited Kazachstan
- Surrogate Parent to Several high school and college students over the years
- Person who does not easily align with the right or the left
- General Convention Delegate (the Episcopalians out there understand what that means)
- American of African, Native, German, and Irish descent (and still looking)
- Person who is fed up with the way Christianity allows itself to be sold in the culture
- Watcher of Dr. Who from the beginning (currently on the second doctor) - Wow, what kind of a geek does that make me!?
- Survivor of an aortic aneurysm
And, I will certainly add to that list. But the title of this blog is not "Dr. Who Watcher", but "A Revolting Christian." Since no one has ever called me that to my face, you can assume that I mostly mean rebelling, rather than disgusting, though I suppose to some people that's the same thing.
What am I revolting against? How about these for starters?
- People who talk to the media as if their understanding of Christianity is the only one out there
- Media people who are too stupid to know the truth about that or fail to point it out
- Liturgical Nazis (Q: What's the difference between a terrorist and a liturgist? A: You can negotiate with a terrorist)
- Christians who threaten to leave (or actually do) when they don't get their way
- Christian litmus tests for politicians
- Biblical literalism (I've never met a literalist who was consistent about it)
- Hymns sung too slowly
- Sacristy rats (you know who you are! Only clergy with weak egos want you around.)
- Complaints about overhead projecting in church (It can be done well.)
- Middle aged women (and one guy) in black leotards prancing around the altar with streamers and calling it liturgical dance
- The use of the words 'just' and 'really' in prayers ("We just really want to thank you Jesus....")
- Interfaith services that reduce God to a warm fuzzy
- Any services that reduce God to a warm fuzzy
- Ordination processes that take five or more years
- People who retire from the military and get a call to be ordained after they begin receiving a full pension
- Complaints about acolytes in sneakers, female clergy in open toed shoes, and ushers not wearing ties
- The notion that I cannot bless two people's relationship, but I can bless your battle cruiser
- The belief that Jesus turned water into grape juice
Okay, this could go on for awhile, so I had best quit while I'm not too far behind. What I am seeking here is ways to strip the church of its silliness and to present ourselves to the world as a transformative presence like Jesus did. To do that, we need to toss a few things away and start adding a few new ones. Like not fighting all the time. Or really accepting people the way they come to us. Like doing justice, loving mercy, and walking humbly with our God.
In other words, this blog will not be aboutcreating a list of the things I dislike (see above), but about suggesting alternatives, reviewing new ideas that others are trying, and posing questions about things we might want to reconsider.
And maybe I'll talk about a few things that have little or nothing to do with the Church (remember that home brewing item?)
I bet you can add a few areas to reconsider to my list. Hopefully, I've ticked off one or two of you out there. Or maybe no one will ever read this. Does anyone ever read the first post of a new blog?
Too bad I don't really have a good answer. Maybe I just gave in to the fashion. Or maybe I realized how many people I might meet -- I like meeting people.
I do know why I should not have a blog. 'Cause I hate deadlines. I already have one. Some people call it a sermon, but from my point of view, its a deadline. There is no option but that I have something to say at 11:00 on Sunday mornings. The idea of having a blog means that you write something. And even if there is no set deadline, we've all read blogs that we STOPPED reading because the blogger didn't post often enough to make it worthwhile.
Which leads to the second reason why not; I have the basic insecurity that maybe I don't have enough to say to sustain this. As above, we've also dropped blogs that had little to say or kept repeating the same tired themes. I refuse to be one of those.
Finally, I see no reason to have a blog simply to point out stuff out there that other people have written, no matter how witty, intelligent, thoughtful, ironic, dry, or creative it might be. If I want you to see it, I'll email you. If I am going to blog, it will be mostly my own stuff, or, at the very least, my comments about someone else's works.
So who am I? Well. I am many things in this world:
- Owned by a Siberian Husky named Andy
- Home Brewer (recently reaching into wine too!)
- Former fat kid and successful dieter
- Home owner
- Episcopal Priest and Campus Minister
- Single Guy
- Person who has actually visited Kazachstan
- Surrogate Parent to Several high school and college students over the years
- Person who does not easily align with the right or the left
- General Convention Delegate (the Episcopalians out there understand what that means)
- American of African, Native, German, and Irish descent (and still looking)
- Person who is fed up with the way Christianity allows itself to be sold in the culture
- Watcher of Dr. Who from the beginning (currently on the second doctor) - Wow, what kind of a geek does that make me!?
- Survivor of an aortic aneurysm
And, I will certainly add to that list. But the title of this blog is not "Dr. Who Watcher", but "A Revolting Christian." Since no one has ever called me that to my face, you can assume that I mostly mean rebelling, rather than disgusting, though I suppose to some people that's the same thing.
What am I revolting against? How about these for starters?
- People who talk to the media as if their understanding of Christianity is the only one out there
- Media people who are too stupid to know the truth about that or fail to point it out
- Liturgical Nazis (Q: What's the difference between a terrorist and a liturgist? A: You can negotiate with a terrorist)
- Christians who threaten to leave (or actually do) when they don't get their way
- Christian litmus tests for politicians
- Biblical literalism (I've never met a literalist who was consistent about it)
- Hymns sung too slowly
- Sacristy rats (you know who you are! Only clergy with weak egos want you around.)
- Complaints about overhead projecting in church (It can be done well.)
- Middle aged women (and one guy) in black leotards prancing around the altar with streamers and calling it liturgical dance
- The use of the words 'just' and 'really' in prayers ("We just really want to thank you Jesus....")
- Interfaith services that reduce God to a warm fuzzy
- Any services that reduce God to a warm fuzzy
- Ordination processes that take five or more years
- People who retire from the military and get a call to be ordained after they begin receiving a full pension
- Complaints about acolytes in sneakers, female clergy in open toed shoes, and ushers not wearing ties
- The notion that I cannot bless two people's relationship, but I can bless your battle cruiser
- The belief that Jesus turned water into grape juice
Okay, this could go on for awhile, so I had best quit while I'm not too far behind. What I am seeking here is ways to strip the church of its silliness and to present ourselves to the world as a transformative presence like Jesus did. To do that, we need to toss a few things away and start adding a few new ones. Like not fighting all the time. Or really accepting people the way they come to us. Like doing justice, loving mercy, and walking humbly with our God.
In other words, this blog will not be aboutcreating a list of the things I dislike (see above), but about suggesting alternatives, reviewing new ideas that others are trying, and posing questions about things we might want to reconsider.
And maybe I'll talk about a few things that have little or nothing to do with the Church (remember that home brewing item?)
I bet you can add a few areas to reconsider to my list. Hopefully, I've ticked off one or two of you out there. Or maybe no one will ever read this. Does anyone ever read the first post of a new blog?
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