National Day of Prayer

I am very uncomfortable with the National Day of Prayer.

From the website:
"In 1952, a joint resolution by Congress, signed by President Truman, declared an annual, national day of prayer. In 1988, the law was amended and signed by President Reagan, permanently setting the day as the first Thursday of every May. Each year, the president signs a proclamation, encouraging all Americans to pray on this day."

This year, the Day is May 1, this Thursday. (Which, for Catholics and Anglicans anyway, is Ascension Thursday -- which makes me wonder if this is a pretty Protestant-centric event? The concurrence isn't mentioned anywhere on the website, that I could find.)

Here's what I REALLY don't understand. If the website says this:
"The National Day of Prayer belongs to all Americans. It is a day that transcends differences, bringing together citizens from all backgrounds. "

...how can it also declare this? --
"The National Day of Prayer Task Force was a creation of the National Prayer Committee for the expressed purpose of organizing and promoting prayer observances conforming to a Judeo-Christian system of values. People with other theological and philosophical views are, of course, free to organize and participate in activities that are consistent with their own beliefs. This diversity is what Congress intended when it designated the Day of Prayer, not that every faith and creed would be homogenized, but that all who sought to pray for this nation would be encouraged to do so in any way deemed appropriate. It is that broad invitation to the American people that led, in our case, to the creation of the Task Force and the Judeo-Christian principles on which it is based."

If Muslims, in particular, are going to be so explicitly excluded, I can't, in good conscience, believe that it's truly a *National Day.* Or a day that can united us as a country. Or a day that God would be very happy about -- Muslims are also a people of prayer after all: they formally pray FIVE times a day. Together.

My wardens agree with me, and so the Church of St. Benedict is not participating.

Wow

Foreclosure Bus Tours in our neighborhood...

I am horrified, and yet I also wish I had enough savings for a down payment.

More about Anglicanism

I'm carrying a comment from my friend, Jon, a Presbyterian, over to a new post...

"I thought the mention of Luther, Calvin, and Aquinas was insightful. It may be that Anglicanism, lacking a theological "founder," has more flexibility about doctrine and belief. I doubt there's a default theologian that all Anglicans read."


Thanks, Jon. Right: we don't quite have a default theologian, although Richard Hooker comes close. People often define Anglican theology by a "three-legged stool" metaphor -- one leg is scripture, one leg is tradition, one leg is reason -- that gets attributed to him (it's a metaphor that can be drawn from his writings, but not directly) but few have actually read him! I've read a couple essays.

You could say our default theologian is simply the Book of Common Prayer. Everyone reads that. And we tend to say often: "As we pray, so we believe," or "Praying Shapes Believing," as one of our prominent liturgical theologians, Leonel Mitchell, called one of his books.

"I do think it's not quite fair to claim all English authors as Anglican. Julian, for instance, is before the split."

Well, Julian was an English Catholic -- and, I would argue, more English than Roman. And Anglicans (Western ones, anyway) celebrate her all over the place. She has 2-3 canticles in one of our most-used liturgical supplements. We have a co-ed monastery called the "Order of St. Julian" up in Wisconsin. She's barely mentioned by RCs, perhaps because of her feminine imagery of Christ and her sensual mystical language. So, I'm going to continue to claim her as Anglican, or at least as one of the mothers of Anglicanism.

Here's one of those canticles, where God AND Jesus are seen as female:

A Song of True Motherhood

Julian of Norwich

God chose to be our mother in all things *

and so made the foundation of his work,

most humbly and most pure, in the Virgin’s womb.

God, the perfect wisdom of all, *

arrayed himself in this humble place.

Christ came in our poor flesh *

to share a mother’s care.

Our mothers bear us for pain and for death; *

our true mother, Jesus, bears us for joy and endless life.

Christ carried us within him in love and travail, *

until the full time of his passion.

And when all was completed and he had carried us so for joy, *

still all this could not satisfy the power of his wonderful love.

All that we owe is redeemed in truly loving God, *

for the love of Christ works in us;

Christ is the one whom we love.

"And in the 19th c. at least, as many people were attending nonconformist chapels on Sunday as were at Episcopal churches. I'm not sure how things stand today. ... I wonder what the Catholic/ Anglican / Mainline / Evangelical split is."

That's certainly true. The United Kingdom has never been monolithically Anglican. The Church of Scotland is Presbyterian, of course, and Catholicism and Methodism (I think) -- and now, Islam and evangelical Christian expressions -- are strong communities of faith in England. There has been a strong Jewish community in England, too. I don't know the exact demographics, but I do know that England is one of those Western European countries where worship attendance is way down.

And yet, Anglicanism is the national church. I met a priest from Manchester at my conference in Vancouver who said they're always having people show up to be married, have kids baptized, or bury their loved one at "our church." Whether you attend or not, the local church belongs to you. There is no membership, really. The parish belongs to the people of its community. I really like that.

"Was Blair's conversion a big deal?"

I don't know much about how this went over in England. It wasn't much talked about over here, at least in the circles I run in.

"How tight do you think the Episcopal connection is to England?"


The Episcopal connection to England is strong in terms of nostalgia, I'd say. Not much else. Many of us are Anglophiles. Parishes like to plan choir tours or sightseeing trips. We use old Anglican terms like vicar, nave, close, canon, lady chapel, vestry. And we pepper our liturgical calendar, still, with old English religious days like "Ember Days" (these come three at a time, four times a year, and are days for people in the ordination process); Rogation Day (the sixth Sunday of Easter, when the English used to process around their parish, blessing the earth and farms); Whitsunday (Pentecost). We use English-style vestments and choir robes. But we don't really pay attention to how the Church of England does things anymore. I mean, the Queen and Parliament pick their bishops! (See comments for a correction on this.) We just like "the pretties," I'd say.

The Lambeth Conference is somewhere in between. Lambeth is a gathering of Anglican bishops from all the provinces all over the world at Lambeth Palace, the home of the Archbishop of Canterbury or the "ABC" (cute, huh?). Anyway, it's not a legislative session, because the ABC has no real power over us. He's kind of like the Queen -- a symbol that we sometimes love and sometimes get very annoyed with. So, Lambeth is sort of like a retreat, a meeting, or "tea at the Palace" for two weeks in July, every 10 years or so. It's a powerful symbol. Gene Robinson, the only openly gay bishop in the Episcopal Church is not invited. Many other bishops are refusing to come because other Episcopal bishops are coming, and they believe we should be punished for allowing Robinson to be consecrated.

a blur of purple...

So, it's just "tea at Lambeth Palace" and yet, it means a lot to many folks, especially clergy, who are a little more interested in the national and international church, as a rule. So, sometimes, England is very important.

What he said

WARNING: Anglican dorks only. All others, proceed at your peril.

The [insufficiency of the] Quadrilateral (as in, the Chicago-Lambeth Quadrilateral, circa 1870).

This is a similar argument to my previous post, in a much more intellectual, historical way, by a much more studied, lettered, and established priest than moi (Warden of Trinity College, the University of Melbourne, a Canon of St Paul's Cathedral, Melbourne, author of numerous articles).

Thanks, Adam!

What is Anglicanism?

WARNING: This is a Anglican dork post... if this sort of thing bores you, please do not read on.

So, I was putting together a post for my church's website about the new movie, "Prince Caspian." I wrote something like, "this is a movie that comes out of our Anglican heritage." And I wanted to post a link to a site that might say a little more about that. Instead, I found a lot of really boring sites about Anglicanism. Like:

on The Episcopal Church website: What Makes Us Anglican?
(yawn.)

Wikipedia: Anglicanism
(booooring)

Church of England: What it means to be an Anglican
(all Christian jargon)

on The Anglican Communion website: Anglican Communion Information Service
(and you may think, in trying to prove a point, that I've selected the most boring page on the AC website... but THE WHOLE SITE IS LIKE THIS! It's: the Instruments of Communion, the Provinces, the Creeds, the Chicago-Lambeth Quadrilateral, the Berkeley Statement, a dozen news services, blah blah blah)

I'm longing for something more than creeds, theological catechism, or dogmatic statements. I'm looking for something that might actually drawn someone in... that might make them fall in love with Anglicanism, the way I did. (Nice essay about such a falling in love here.)

Those are not unimportant -- but when I think of Anglicanism, I think of something Brian McLaren, the author of A Generous Orthodoxy, said about Anglicanism: that it is the expression of Christianity that celebrates the "beauty of God."

Where's the beauty, folks???

--Our church is centered around a book of beautiful, poetic prayers.

--Our church emerged in Tudor England, where the Benedictine monastery had been a center for spirituality, education, and community. Also from monastic life, we inherited an emphasis on the cycles of the day (morning prayer, noonday prayer, evening prayer) and the year (Advent, Epiphany, Lent, Easter, Pentecost), still central to our worship life.

--We have more prominent poets (Donne, Herbert, Eliot), mystics (Julian of Norwich, Nicholas Ferrar), and fantasy writers (C.S. Lewis) than theologians. And even the theologians (Thomas Cranmer, Richard Hooker, Lancelot Andrewes, Jeremy Taylor, Joseph Butler) were more liturgists, preachers, and ethicists, than theologians per se. And all their books and essays were quite short!

--We're a church centered around the mystery of the bread and wine -- every Sunday, we lift up those things and share them together. We celebrate them as precious and sacred, ordinary things that become holy, extraordinary, and transcendent.

-- The student whose article I linked to above, about falling in love with Anglicanism describes feeling "[an] inclination towards an intuitive truth that is believed and understood rather than 'known' and towards a greater appreciation for uncertainty and grayness -- which is, of course, a defining characteristic of Anglicanism as a whole." (Although I don't want to say this isn't true of other mainline denominations, but I think it's more characteristic of Anglican theology historically than it is of say, Calvin, Luther, or Aquinas, for instance.)

And so, a movie like "Prince Caspian," that explains theology and the Christian life through a story -- a fantasy! -- set in a beautiful land, with fanciful creatures, with a theme of faith and perseverance, and WITHOUT a dogmatic message so thick you could choke on it, is essentially Anglican.

Hopefully, the movie won't be a dud.

Heidi in the news

Here's the link to the (front page!) story about yours truly. I'm flattered by it. Not everything is totally accurate (we have a Giving Sunday once a month to receive food for a local food pantry, but I'm not actually personally responsible for it), but for the most part, it's right on target!

http://www.suburbanchicagonews.com/bolingbrooksun/news/900791,6_1_NA18_PASTOR_S1.article"

(And that's Peg, one of my faithful blog readers, holding the gospel book in the photo! Go Peg!)

Front page news?

Gosh, I made the front page of the local paper -- the Bolingbrook Sun. I was interviewed and photographed back in December... and I thought they'd forgotten about me. Now suddenly, I'm a headline. (Must've been a slow newsweek?)

I can't find a weblink, or I'd post it. I actually haven't even seen the article yet, just heard about it from a parishioner and our church secretary. I haven't been in the paper since I was Jesus in the Passion Play at my church in 6th grade.

But I'm excited to share the mission of the Church of St. Benedict with the community!

A haircut and a wedding mag

I got my hair cut yesterday... picture forthcoming! I went to one of those cheap chain places, and had a fun and chatty woman tell me about putting off school so she can raise her little girls, and all trials and drama she's had with her own hair.

I read a wedding magazine while I was there, which always is delightfully shocking: the opulence, the obsession with details (a whole wedding done in 1940s South Florida colors and themes!), the fairy-tale princess-ness of it all. But then I always start to get a stomachache. I don't understand how this is a foundation for a marriage. What does it mean that your wedding theme is 1940s South Florida? What does that have to do with marriage?

Morning coffee and color

Ok, so I'm addicted to images. Maybe you've noticed, if you've been reading this blog.

And slowly, perhaps, to coffee. I'm amazed how good coffee makes me feel in the morning. Surprisingly, it makes me feel mellow. I have a theory that this is because it reminds me of my mother, who is Scandinavian by birth. Coffee is an intimate activity that brings people together. Even when I'm by myself in the morning, I feel connected and grounded in my cup of coffee. And half-and-half just makes it all the better.

Oh, and I like to look out the window in the morning, to pray and reflect. This is what the view was, not too long ago:
ALL WHITE... it got depressing. But now:

Color! And see the big fat red buds in the maple tree in the foreground? I wish that red and the blue of the river in the back left was brighter.

Ok, I need to go get ready for work.

At home on my day off

There are many ways pastors may choose to rejuvenate themselves on their sabbath day. So, a few methods I am learning are listed below, since frantic housework, errands, and too many social visits with friends (much as I love them), haven't been doing the trick. Some rambling commentary is included.

Sunset watching. Despite power lines. (Adam and I will probably get a two-bedroom together when we get married, but if I lose this view...! I hope we can get another forest-preserve-facing place.)

Sliced orange. (I've been trying to eat more fruit... it's just I have this personal problem with not eating toast with honey and coffee for breakfast. Cereal, sometimes. So, maybe fruit in the afternoon/evening could work. And sometimes with peanut butter?)

Knitting. This is acrylic yarn. I used to be a wool yarn snob. But I finished a scarf at the conference in Vancouver, and didn't have enough wool to start another one. So my dear Aunt Beth, who lives out there, gave me some yarn from an unfinished sweater... I thought the texture was pretty cool-looking. She meant it to look like the ocean. And I've probably become an acrylic-convert. (Anyone want some wool yarn?)

Did some tidying up, but not too much. I actually find it relaxing to wash floors, so I washed the kitchen and bathroom floors (the bathroom is the size of a Manhattan apartment, I swear -- it takes 5 minutes to walk from the door to the toilet! That floor took me the whole of Marketplace on NPR.) I was going to vacuum, but then I found I needed to sit and do nothing some more. Another day.

Advice for Sabbath-keeping (clergy or otherwise!): sit, be quiet, and make sure you have enough silence stored up inside yourself to be a sane and compassionate person during the week.

A walk on my day off

Whalon Marsh (I think this is its name) is right across the Des Plaines River from my apartment. But it takes about ten minutes to drive there, because there is no bridge across for a few miles in either direction. There's my apartment complex, right there -- I can even pick out my bedroom window. I started walking, in gorgeous sunshine...

WHAT?!?
Whatever. Not to be deterred, after walking for only about 8 minutes, I decided to bushwhack a little -- someone else had the same idea, because there was a board set across the trickle of a creek just past the end of the asphault. I found a few footpaths through the thicket in the background, there. I picked one...

And found myself in another open area, totally deserted, and huge... spread out under the powerlines. (Power lines are a theme in my life in Bolingbrook, I tell you! See here.) I love wide-open spaces -- for some reason, my mild agoraphobia does not play out here -- and being alone in a lot of quiet openness is just what I've been needing lately, after all that travel, conferences, and making wedding invitations for eight hours (more on this to come).

Green leaves! A sight for sore eyes, let me tell you.
How come bramble bushes turn green first?

More green. Leaves, curled up like tiny fists! In wet ground...

Whalon Marsh is part of the floodplain of the Des Plaines River.
The water hasn't entirely dried up since our last flooding, last week -- so there's both brown, dry grass and wet, muddy green patches. But it's wet deep down, even under the dry grass.

I got my feet wet, more than once.

Here's the Des Plaines, a low, brown, muddy, Midwestern river. Classic Midwest spring ugly, too. But it smells like dirt and life. It's swollen with rainwater, and it's good to walk along...

especially all by yourself.

A church welcome, done by another vicar...

The last line is the best...

The problem of evil

This from an article forwarded to me by Episcopal News Service:

"'If art is the language of the soul,' as Robert Redford said at the Sundance Film Festival this year, 'I look at the "souls" of most of the Academy Award nominees for best picture and see dead people.' ... All five nominees portray human capacity for evil and fallenness, and explore, in a way, whether there is reason for hope. With one exception, these films reveal a sense of inevitable doom and a pervasive pessimism about the human condition."

I remember noticing that during the Oscars this year. All the top pictures were about deep dark evil, with very little redemption or hope. It is somewhat worrisome, in a world where public killings (Columbine, Virginia Tech, NIU, and random shopping malls) are becoming more and more common. I haven't seen "Juno" yet, but it sounds like a good antidote to all that -- a counter to irresponsibility, selfishness, violence, and even nihilism. Funny that teen pregnancy could do that!

"If these films reveal the soul of today's filmmakers, it is clear that their souls are troubled with the pervasiveness of evil. None offers an easy way out; as a matter of fact, only 'Juno' really offers any way out at all.

They generally seem to have concluded that darkness has prevailed over light, good over evil, and this pattern is unbreakable.

Based on these films it would be fair to conclude that the human race needs good news."

Some more photos from Vancouver

A suspension bridge over a deep ravine, that I crossed with friends from Washington state, Victoria BC, and Manchester, England.

A group of Sikhs hiking alongside the skiers on Grouse Mountain.

A view of Grouse Mountain from the gondola that you have to take to get to the top (for $34! locals buy a seasonal pass for $47).

There are a lot of folks who commute, even daily, by seaplane! They take off and land regularly, filling the waterside park with the smell of plane fuel.

Start Up! Start Over! is a good program, but I've jumped right into another conference, here in the diocese of Chicago, with Kennon Callahan. He seems much more intuitive about church growth, where as SUSO is based more on research and statistics. Both are important, but it's interesting to observe the differences in their advice and values for church growth. Callahan is more positive about small churches, and even says they will be the places people gravitate this century -- there are so much immensity around us -- stadium seating, huge theaters, large corporations, globalization -- that people are drawn to places like Starbucks, with less than 50 seats a store. He says the same is true for small churches. I think that's interesting.

A few Vancouver photos

Waiting in line at the border -- we flew into Seattle and drove up from there.

An interesting sculpture in downtown Vancouver, near our hotel. Is an upsidedown church an elegant and beautiful thing? Disturbing? Whimsical? Dizzying? Disrespectful?

Mountain views behind the stoplights -- not something we see much of in Chicago.

Most of the Chicago posse... three priests, five laypeople!

More soon!

P.S. I didn't get all braggy about being a priest on the plane -- I was right and fatigue settled in soon enough, and all punchiness dissolved into knitting, reading, and napping.