Into the desert

Promise me you won't hurt yourself. 

Because you are more precious to me that anything I can imagine.  Because it was you, my sweet one, that taught me to grow out of myself and become something new.  It was you, in those early days, who stridently, gently, insistently invited me to let go of myself and consider, for the first time, someone else.  It was a painful transition, from me to you.  But oh, how rich and full of joy this journey has been so far.

Know that I love you unconditionally.  Know that I pray for you every day.  Know that in Christ, you are beautiful. 

Promise me.

You aren't who you say you are

Or even who you think you are.  You are the you you know, but there is so much more.

There have been a few times in my life when I have caught a glimpse of myself through God's eyes.  Mostly it has been after making my confession to a priest.  There would be a moment, an afternoon, maybe even a day, when I would see past the constructs, the sin, the confusion, the complexity and see myself as simple, beautiful, joy. My heart as wide as the earth.  In those moments, I saw myself as I imagine God sees me.  And I saw you that way, too. 

And I am telling you.  You are not who you say you are.  Or who you think you are.  You are the you you know.  But friend, there is so much more.

Drawing closer

I'll admit that when I am unjustly accused, my human nature wants to defend myself.  I want to stand up in righteous indignation.

But in my quieter moments, I think of the trials of our Lord.  How, when he was accused, he never defended himself, saying only "you say so" to his accusers.

I pray that today, I can be relieved of my indignation and allow this small crucifixion to draw me nearer to him.  Lent is an especially good time to examine my own sins and try to forgive those who sin against me, as I have been forgiven by God.

Getting yelled at

Today I realized that in the last few weeks I have been yelled at by 3 different people.  Like, actual yelling.  Raised voices.  Red in the face.  Angry yelling.

And in all three cases my first reaction was to try and suppress the weird nervous giggle that inevitably bubbles to the surface when I am extremely uncomfortable.  In all cases, I more or less succeeded in not laughing in the face of the person yelling.

I wonder what is going on with this rash of yelling?  There doesn't really seem to be a pattern to what is triggering it. Three different circumstances, with three different people.  The only thing that is common to each is that while I said or did something to trigger the anger, it was not about me at all.  In all three cases, I touched some sort of nerve in them that threw the switch.  I was basically caught in the crossfire of emotions that had very little to do with me.  It was their own stuff.

In each case, my reaction was to walk away, figuratively if not literally.  I just stopped engaging.  I suppose in the past, I would have fought back, but these days, I pretty much offer the other cheek.  And like Christ's example, it isn't about rolling over and letting people walk over me, it is about understanding that by refusing to engage, I maintain a hold on my own power.  I don't hand it over to the person doing the ranting.  My power comes not from my tongue or my adrenaline, but from Him who is all powerful.

Where do we meet?

I have only been a 'minority' a few times in my life.  When I was 18 I went to Hawaii for several months and experienced being a minority for the first time.  I was living in a neighborhood with very few white people.  Every day I took the bus into Honolulu and heard Samoan kids calling each other Haoli as an insult.  It is the word for 'white'.

In Vietnam I stood out like a sore thumb.  I towered over most people, with my crazy red hair and well-padded physique. Little old ladies would giggle and poke me to see what my skin felt like.  

In Mali, you can't miss me.  My skin is not just white... it is white.  I slather myself in sunblock to stay pale in the hot West African sun.  I wear hats and shades and cower from the bright light.  In a crowd, my clothes and skin and hair mark me as utterly different.  I met a few kids with albinism and wondered how they manage to keep from burning to a crisp.  Once we met a little baby who took one look at us and started howling from fear.  He was inconsolable until his mom took him to another room to calm him down.  He had never seen a white person up close.

A few times as a minority is not the same as a lifetime.  And I don't carry baggage from generations of oppression.  For me, being a minority once in awhile is a reality check, but it isn't my normal reality.

So, really, I am not sure what to make of an African language forum on the internet that wouldn't let me join because I wrote 'caucasian' in the application questionnaire.  It is a forum for people of Afrikan descent.  I wanted to join because they offer West African language information.  I want to learn Bambara because, although I can get by in French, it is the language of the colonial powers.  The Bamanakan word for French, in fact, translates as 'White persons language'. I have become convinced that if I want to know the Malian people, I need to learn their language.

When I got the rejection email today, I knew right away that the forum owner was not, despite his name, an African.  I knew he had to be American.  I have yet to meet an African  who decides things based on race.  That seems to be an American phenomenon.  But maybe this isn't just about race.  Or, maybe it is, but in a less obvious way.  This is a club for people with a shared ancestry and a shared experience.  An experience that I truly can never understand. 

So, I won't be taking classes on the Afrikan Language forum.  Instead, I will be learning Bambara from my friends in Mali.  And will pray for healing for all of us.

Things to pack when traveling to Mali

I am a fastidious packer.  In fact, my husband makes relentless fun of me when we are getting ready to travel.  He is a 'throw a few pairs of shorts in a backpack'' kind of guy, while I am of the school that makes multiple lists, organizes with a staging area for weeks before the big trip and spends countless hours thinking about what I am likely to need.

Having said that, the following is a snapshot of what my suitcases are going to contain for a 17 day trip to Mali, West Africa.

• Bug repellent.  I use 3M Ultrathon, a long acting, highly effective repellent reccomended by the travel clinic.  I bring one tube per week and bring it in my carry on bag so it won't get lost in transit.  
• Sunscreen.  I am a ginger.  Need I say more?
• Hat.  Ditto.
• Travel plug adapters.  Turns out most modern electronic gear does not need an actual converter, but does need an adapter to plug in to Mali outlets, which are 220v European style.
• Clothes, of course.
• Electronics.  An embarrassing array, really:
• Ipad
• Still camera
• Video camera
• Good quality digital recorder.  (I am going to Mali, after all, home of the best musicians in the world.)
• Bluetooth speakers (See above) 
• NIMH battery chargers
• Kindle
• plugs, outlets, av cables, aux cables, etc. for all of the above
• A small throw for chilly nights
• A well-stocked medical kit which includes:
• Antibacterial cream
• bandaids
• gauze pads
• Zpac antibiotics
• Malarone anti-malarial meds
• Cipro - for diarrhea
• Ambien- for sleeping on the plane and jet lag
• homeopathic jet lag medicine
• Airborne
• Emergen-C
• tweezers
• small scissors
• Benadryl

• A tripod
• A sketchpad and some pencils
• Deck of cards
• My pillow
• Ear plugs
• Chap stick
• 2 pairs of sandals- one dressy and one casual
• flip flops for the bathroom
• And speaking of bathrooms- wetwipes and mini kleenex packs for the public bathrooms in Mali.  

I also pack my positive attitude and prayer.  Travel is an adventure that is so much better when you are in a good place spiritually and emotionally.

There is neither Jew nor Gentile, neither slave nor free, nor is there male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. Galatians 3:28

Facebook Wisdom

A few of my facebook friends posted this:

Don't like gay marriages? Don't get one.. Don't like cigarettes? Don't smoke them.. Don't like abortions? Don't get one.. Don't like sex? Don't have it.. Don't like drugs? Don't do them.. Don't like porn? Don't watch it.. Don't like alcohol? Don't drink it.. Don't like guns? Don't buy one.. Don't like your rights taken away??? Don't take away someone else's. {re-post if you agree}

Needless to say, I didn't repost.

It is so hard for people to understand that personal rights can't trump the health and well being of the society as a whole. My right to kill you is trumped by your right to live.

Illegal drugs, for example. A personal right? Really? Tell that to the 40,000 Mexicans who have been murdered recently in the drug wars. Maybe the Mexicans would disagree that this is a victimless crime.

And abortion is a personal right? Tell that to the 45 million people who have died in the world this year.

Even something like smoking cigarettes has massive impact on the society as a whole. We ALL pay for health insurance. We all have to bear the burden of the people who are killing themselves with cigarettes. We are all impacted if we go into a public space where people are smoking. So, not only am I a fan of banning smoking in public places, but I also favor taxing cigarettes. I KNOW it has been a factor in some of my friends choosing to quit. And the tax money can go towards supplementing the health care costs that weigh all of us down.

Yup. No. I won't be reposting this one.

Resting in the Lord

Is it possible that the act of trusting another person can also lead to a deeper trust in the Lord?

I have learned to trust in the act of confession. I trust the sacramental nature of it. I trust the person sitting on the other side of the screen. In my case, my confessor is always someone I know, so it is an even greater trust knowing that I will see him again outside of the box.

But God has led me to a place of courage.

And in that place of courage, Love resides. God is there and his love surrounds and fills us and invites us to rest in him.

Which I do from time to time.

But never more than after a challenging confession.

The art of medium well

Today a friend was talking about her 50th birthday.

It makes me wonder if I am ever going to do anything significant, she said.

I believe that for me, the answer is no.

I used to think that I was going to be exceptional. At what, I was less sure, but I really thought that someday, somehow, I would be.... known for something.

I know I have posted before about my exceptional parents. I grew up thinking that everyone had parents that were well known. I grew up thinking that it was expected that you would accomplish at least one extraordinary thing in your life.

Some of my parent's exceptional friends seem to have had exceptional offspring. One is releasing his 4th or 5 album this month. Another just won a genius grant from the MacArthur folks. (He is, incidentally, the second one of his exceptionally talented family to snag that particular distinction.)

And since I have posted about this before, it might seem like I am obsessing, but since my friend brought it up, I decided that I really need to set the record straight.

I am not exceptional, except perhaps in my fondness for junk television and fascination with historical travelogues of West Africa. (I love you, Mungo Park. Hope to meet you on the other side some day.)

I think that it was the King himself who finally lifted the burden of exceptional from me. Jesus pointed to the beauty of ordinariness. He calls us to be extraordinary in the most ordinary of ways. He asks us to be Holy, as God is Holy, even as he tells us that no one is Good except God.

We cannot be extraordinary Christians. We are always going to be mediocre, stumbling in our faith, prone to sin and selfishness, spiritual goofballs that have to learn the same lessons over and over again.

But truly I tell you, I would rather be a striving to be better Christian than an exceptional anything else.

Sunday

And after a weekend of gorgeous weather, lovely drumming, church, great food, even a beer or two, I am trying to get back into work brain.

It is a tough transition sometimes.

So, off to bed I go to read some psalms and say some prayers and get ready for the week ahead.

Does this mean I am officially a zealot?

Almost every day, one of my facebook friends posts a picture of a dog that is destined to be put to sleep in a shelter, somewhere in the country.

I am never sure what we are supposed to do about it, but every time I see it, I think of the thousands of tiny, unwanted babies who die every day at the hands of a doctor in a clinic.

It's not that I don't love dogs. It's that I think our society is just, well, a little confused in it's priorities.

Holy Week was just one big LOVE fest this year

I am still feeling like I spent a weekend away with the love of my life.

My Sweet Friend has drawn me close in the last week. I feel very blessed indeed.

And joyful that the Easter season lasts until Pentecost...

The Paschal Homily of St. John Chrysostom

The Paschal Homily of St. John Chrysostom is read at the end of Orthros (Matins) at Pascha, the feast of the Resurrection of Jesus Christ, universally throughout the Orthodox Church. It was composed sometime during his ministry in the late 4th or early 5th century.

"If anyone is devout and a lover of God, let him enjoy this beautiful and radiant festival. If anyone is a wise servant, let him, rejoicing, enter into the joy of his Lord. If anyone has wearied himself in fasting, let him now receive his recompense."

If anyone has labored from the first hour, let him today receive his just reward. If anyone has come at the third hour, with thanksgiving let him keep the feast. If anyone has arrived at the sixth hour, let him have no misgivings; for he shall suffer no loss. If anyone has delayed until the ninth hour, let him draw near without hesitation. If anyone has arrived even at the eleventh hour, let him not fear on account of his delay. For the Master is gracious and receives the last, even as the first; he gives rest to him that comes at the eleventh hour, just as to him who has labored from the first. He has mercy upon the last and cares for the first; to the one he gives, and to the other he is gracious. He both honors the work and praises the intention.

Enter all of you, therefore, into the joy of our Lord, and, whether first or last, receive your reward. O rich and poor, one with another, dance for joy! O you ascetics and you negligent, celebrate the day! You that have fasted and you that have disregarded the fast, rejoice today! The table is rich-laden; feast royally, all of you! The calf is fatted; let no one go forth hungry!

Let all partake of the feast of faith. Let all receive the riches of goodness.
Let no one lament his poverty, for the universal kingdom has been revealed.
Let no one mourn his transgressions, for pardon has dawned from the grave.
Let no one fear death, for the Saviour's death has set us free.

Thank you to Peter+ for sending this to me.

News from the Vigil

I have good news.

Yesterday during the three hour meditation at church, I was reflecting on Jesus crying out to God from the cross.

My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?

Sadder words have never been spoken. A more anguished cry I could not imagine. And for years now I have tried to understand how it could be that Jesus would be forsaken.

Good Friday has been for me, in the past, a day to meditate on my sins. I bring them to the foot of the cross and spend three mostly agonizing hours contemplating that the weight of them is partly what brought Jesus to hang on the tree. In Triduums past, the heaviness of my sin and the depth of my grief over His death has lingered long past the Easter Sunday service. It was like Lent sprawled beyond it's 40 days and seeped into the Easter season. One year it was nearly Pentecost before I got to feel the resurrection in my heart.

So it was strange, then, in the midst of a Good Friday service, to suddenly feel a sense of overwhelming joy. And stranger still that the joy would come from the words of Christ's agony on the cross.

My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?

The joy was this: Jesus took upon himself the sins, hurts, anger and grief of the world. He carried these things with him onto the cross so that we could be forgiven, redeemed, set free. He became fully human in order to save us humans. And part of being human is to be forsaken by God. It is an integral part of the human experience. King David felt it. Job certainly felt it. Scripture is full of stories of men and women suffering because they feel forsaken by God. I can't explain why. I just know that there have been moments in my own life, even as a Christian, when I felt distant from God. Like he had slid far away, to a place where I could not follow.

A few years before becoming a Christian, a friend of mine died of a heroin overdose. I went to his funeral at a Catholic church in Providence. I was into the new age stuff at that point, and was having a hard time reconciling my grief for my friend's death with the sense that I was somehow supposed to feel peace knowing that he was in a better place. Imagine my relief, then, when the priest spoke of Jesus at Lazarus' graveside, weeping with Mary and Martha. Even Jesus, who understood that Lazarus was going to rise from the dead, was weeping in grief. My sweet Friend, whom I did not yet know, came to me in that darkened church and gave me permission to feel as grief stricken as I did.... no apologies, no trying to pretend I was too enlightened for grief. He sat with me and wept at the grave of my friend. Because Jesus was fully human, too... and cried right along with me.

Last year when the flood destroyed Nguyen's business, I spent several weeks feeling like I was supposed to be handling the whole thing better. I am a Christian, after all. I know that God has a plan and that he can redeem even the most difficult situations. So why was I in such pain, such anger, such helplessness? I cried so much... all the while having to listen to some of my Christian friends tell me that God had a plan for all of it. Sometimes it didn't feel that way. And knowing it didn't seem to help. In fact, sometimes their words felt like hollow shortcuts through my fear and pain... a way for them to avoid the unpleasant reality of my suffering.

Yesterday in the church, as we contemplated the last words of Christ before his death, I suddenly understood that even our Lord felt forsaken while he suffered.

Let me repeat that.

Our Lord felt forsaken on the cross.

And because he was fully human and came to earth to redeem us, his experience means something. It means that no matter how separated from God we might feel in our moments of grief or loss or anger, we are not alone in that. Jesus is there with us. He is experiencing it right along with us.

Which means we are never actually alone.

So maybe next time something happens that causes me grief, I will rest a little easier knowing that Jesus is truly there with me.

My sweet, sweet Friend. Even in your agony, you draw close to us. Even in your pain, you give so generously. Thank you my Beloved. In your suffering, Lord, ours is redeemed. I praise you and worship and love you. Lord, you have taken on the sins of the world. Have mercy on us.

Holy Holy Holy

This is my 7th Lent as a Christian, and every year I am given a gift from our Lord. And every year so far it has been some kind of painful. It isn't easy spending time in the desert. No. Not at all.

I was having lunch with my spiritual director this week and remembered something from my days as a student of tarot. In the ancient Jewish tradition of the Tree of Life, there is one branch that has both Mercy and Severity.

For me, Lent is both of those things. Severe and Merciful.

Holy Week is fast approaching and this year I have chosen to not organize the overnight vigil at Grace Church. Every year since I have been there I have accepted the task of the vigil... writing a newsletter article explaining what it is, putting out sign up sheets, chasing people to try and fill up the time slots until morning. And then, when there were vast spaces of time left unfilled, I would sit in the church, sometimes alone, sometimes with someone else, often for hours at a time. One year I was there for 5 hours. Last year, the day after the flood destroyed our shop, I was there from midnight until 3am. Then Nguyen relieved me and sat for the rest of the night.

I am not complaining. I love the vigil. It has been, for me, a highpoint of my year. Every year I have something to bring to the altar. A death. A near death. A miraculous recovery. A loss. I lay them at our Lord's feet and ask his forgiveness. I lay myself at his feet at the base of the big stone altar and spend hours in his presence. One year the priest left the chalice uncovered and the heady fragrance of the sacramental wine wafted through the tiny chapel. I was sitting on the cold stone floor with the smell of gardens and burning wax and wine. It was incredible.

But this year, I am not up for organizing much of anything. This year I will be Mary and find a place to just sit at his feet and adore him for awhile. I will let someone else be Martha this year.

Mercy.

Severity.

Chesed

Geborah