Checking In

Hey, everybody. I just got e-mail from a worried blog reader who wondered what my absence here meant, and hoped I was okay.

I'm fine! Actually, better than fine, since we're leaving for another cruise on Friday. Yay!

I'm spending my time on Facebook these days because a) it gives me a sense of what my friends are up to and b) I get much more feedback there. If you're on FB too, please look for me. If you aren't on FB because you just never got around to it, think about joining: it's fun, and you don't have to spend vast amounts of time there. If you aren't on FB because you don't like it, I understand; feel free to shoot me an e-mail once in a while if you'd like to hear from me.

I'll still post long things like homilies here, although my new church -- which is having its own financial problems, and I'm praying won't go the way of the old one -- doesn't have me on the preaching schedule as often as the old one did. I'm only preaching about once a quarter now.

If there are any big publishing announcements, I'll post those here too.

Everyday nattering, though, is over at The Other Place.

Thanks! Be well, everyone!

Occupy the Kingdom of Heaven

Here's tomorrow's homily, a juggling act if ever there were one. You can read the pesky Parable of the Wedding Banquet here.

I'll be preaching at three services, and the last one will include the Blessing of the Animals, right in the middle of the service. We'll see if the barking dogs and wailing cats drown me out! As always, I'll bring photos of our three, but won't subject them to the alarm and indignity of being stuffed into their carriers and driven to a Place With Dogs.

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Today we observe the Feast of St. Francis of Assisi. Born in 1181, the son of a wealthy cloth merchant, Francis spent his early years partying with rich friends. He was a rising merchant himself, but after a religious conversion in his mid-twenties, he put aside his costly clothing to wear beggar’s rags. Determined to imitate Christ’s life by doing Christ’s work, Francis founded an order devoted to poverty. He turned from the riches of the marketplace to the splendors of the natural world, calling all creatures his brothers and sisters. He is the patron saint of the poor, of merchants – those two sound like a contradiction, until you know his story – of ecology, and of animals. At the 5:00 service today, we will bless companion animals in his name.

Today we observe the Feast of St. Francis. Today we are also called to ponder the Parable of the Wedding Feast, which contains its own contradictions. Who wouldn’t want to attend such a fabulous party? And why, after being dragged in off the street at the last minute, is one of the guests thrown out again for not wearing party apparel? That detail’s especially startling against the background of Francis pulling off his stylish threads to wear a hair shirt. Isn’t casual Friday what Christ would want? Since when does God have a dress code?

The parable offers some clues about why the people on the first guest list don’t show. “They made light of it and went away, one to his farm, another to his business.” These guests have no time for a party; they have to work. The farmer grows his own food. He doesn’t need anybody else’s banquet. Another needs to tend to his business to make money. No handouts for these two, nosirree. They’ll put their own food on their own tables all by themselves.

In his homily last week, Father Kirk talked about how difficult it can be for us to recognize grace, the unearned gifts we receive from God. The parable of the wedding banquet is a prime example. When the invited guests reject God’s grace and send regrets, the banquet’s thrown open to everybody. But we still have to wonder what’s up with the dress code.

Nine years ago, I heard a very fine preacher explain that the wedding robe is metaphorical. The guest didn’t bring his best, most joyous self to God’s banquet. Whatever his body wore, his soul wasn’t clothed in its brightest garments. That’s a good answer, but it didn’t completely satisfy me. Nine years later, preparing to preach today, I found the tensions between wealth and poverty in Francis’ life starkly mirrored in the news. Exploring those parallels, I found another possible answer to that nagging question about the banquet.

However you feel about the Occupy Wall Street Movement, the grassroots protest that has now spread across the country, no one can deny that issues of poverty and privilege are at its heart. The protest is driven by rage at economic injustice, at the growing chasm between rich and poor. Reading about it reminds me not only of Francis’ call to voluntary poverty, but of Jesus’ challenges to the wealthy and powerful of his own day. But the rhetoric on both sides is filled with anger, ugly us/them divisions. Where is the love Jesus insisted on? Watching this hurts.

And then, a few days ago, I found a blog maintained by a group of Boston-based Christians, many affiliated with the Episcopal Diocese of Massachusetts, who call themselves Protest Chaplains. One of them, Kevin Vetiac, writes about marching down Wall Street: “We were there to be a specifically Christian witness against corporate greed and excess and the exploitation of the poor.” Protest Chaplain Marisa Egerstrom, writing on the CNN blog, describes the community created by the protesters. “Trained medics volunteer their skills to treat injuries and illness. The food station is ‘loaves and fishes’ in action: There is always more than enough to eat, and homeless folks eat side by side with lawyers and students off of donated plates.” Protest Chaplain Dave Woessner, describing Occupy Boston as “real community,” lists free food, free medical care, and “the ‘really really free market’ of clothes and supplies.”

Always more than enough to eat? That sounds like a banquet to me. These descriptions also sound like the early church in the Book of Acts: “All who believed were together and had all things in common; they would sell their possessions and goods and distribute the proceeds to all, as any had need.” And when I read about the “really really free market” of clothes, the wedding robe in today’s Gospel suddenly came into new focus.

The king in the parable sends his slaves out into the streets to gather anyone they can find. What if those streets are occupied by a real community, with a really really free market of clothing? What if anyone can have a wedding robe, just for the asking, and this unnamed guest has refused to ask: out of pride, out of sloth, out of shame at accepting the generosity of others? What if he won’t take anything he hasn’t earned or paid for? What if he refuses grace? If he can’t accept a free robe, how joyously can he accept the king’s hospitality, all that free food?

This is a partial answer too. Jesus told parables to make us ask questions, to make us think. When this reading comes around in another three years, our answers will look different, because we’ll be living in different circumstances.

There is no doubt, though, that Jesus wants us to occupy the Kingdom of Heaven in the here and now. This isn’t the afterlife; it’s the reign of God here on earth. Jesus says it is within us and all around us. The keys to its gates are love of neighbors, forgiveness of enemies, and renunciation of wealth and power. Sometimes we catch glimpses of the Kingdom even in the midst of chaos and violence.

The Occupy Wall Street movement has produced disturbing reports of police brutality. They’re among the grimmest of the us/them stories coming out of the demonstrations. But Protest Chaplain Julia Capurso writes in delight about a police officer who, instead of beating or macing the sidewalk protesters, coached them instead: “You need practice! Stand together so you’ll look stronger! Keep your feet moving!” This officer proves that us/them divisions can be overcome, that those in power can reach over social barriers to offer aid and encouragement.

Here’s another story about power, poverty, and feasting. It happened right here in Reno, and it includes St. Francis’ beloved animals. During one of my volunteer shifts at the hospital, a nurse told me about a homeless patient who’d come to the ER. Waiting for some tests, the patient worried about his pets. “I had to leave them outside, with my shopping cart,” he said.

The nurse went outside, and found a shopping cart loaded with the patient’s possessions, including two clean, spacious pet carriers. In one, a calm, healthy cat was eating a piece of boneless chicken breast. In the other, a calm, healthy guinea pig was nibbling on a piece of biscotti. The nurse went back inside and told the patient, “Your pets are fine. Don’t worry.”

But a passerby saw the animals and called Animal Control. The patient was terrified that his beloved pets would be taken away. But after the Animal Control officer had looked at the cat and the guinea pig, he came back inside to talk to the patient. “Your pets look fine, sir, and I can tell you’re taking good care of them. But, you know, it’s dangerous for them out there, because someone could steal them or hurt them. So here’s my card. The next time you have to come to the ER, please call me, and I’ll come watch your animals to make sure they’re safe.”

Instead of abusing his power, the Animal Control officer used it to love a poor neighbor. I think both Francis and Jesus would approve. I think the Protest Chaplains would, too.

Amen.

Return of The Necessary Beggar!

My favorite of my books, The Necessary Beggar, is finally available on Kindle. For months, the release date read "December 31, 2012." I'm so glad they got it out there early!

The weightless edition, just in time for the holiday season!

Mass Casualty

The first I knew of the horrific crash at the Reno Air Races today was when my friend Arthur Chenin called me a little before 6:00 and said, "You should go back to the hospital." I'd only gotten back from my afternoon volunteer shift a few hours earlier.

I tried calling the ED to see if I was needed, but of course couldn't get through, so I threw my scrubs and ID badge back on and just drove down there. The ED itself was like something out of Breugel: More staff than I've ever seen in the department, because everyone had been called in, and much, much more seriously injured patients than I've ever seen in the department. As I commented later to Gary, the place made ER look like Sesame Street. I've never seen that much blood. The doctors all already had thousand-yard stares. One of them spotted me, plucked at my sleeve, and pulled me into a room where a patient was surrounded by at least five staff members, and somebody was saying "the CT looked really bad, we should go on to the next person," and I left that room and spotted a staff chaplain and asked him what to do and he told me just to go around letting people know we were there, but I couldn't get into any of the rooms because the beds were circled by so many medical people, and anyway those patients weren't conscious or in any shape to ask for chaplaincy services. I did speak briefly to a fellow in one of the minor-injury rooms -- he had a cut finger -- who, with a buddy, was watching the disaster coverage on the news, both of them wide-eyed, and I introduced myself but they didn't need anything, and I warned them that they'd probably have to wait much longer than usual to be seen, and they said, "Of course, of course, don't worry about it. Thank you for talking to us."

So I left again, spotted another staff chaplain, and followed her into the waiting room, thinking to find family members there, and indeed there were dazed and bruised and bloodied people, and other people frowning down at cell phones, but the staff chaplain and the nurses had it covered, so I went back into the ED and asked what I should do and someone said, "Go downstairs. They're setting up waiting areas for the victims' families in the auditoriums."

I went down there. I helped move tables and chairs around. Dietary was bringing in beverages and snacks, so I ate some myself, thinking I might need my strength. Various other chaplains wandered in: hospital chaplains, hospice chaplains, law-enforcement chaplains. I think every chaplain in Northern Nevada had converged on the place. We stood around chatting, and a few family members and other bystanders showed up, and we chatted with them, but at any one time, there were more chaplains in the room than chaplainees, and that was before a phalanx of smartly uniformed Trauma Intervention Program volunteers marched through the door.

To be sure, I heard my share of horrors. Several people said, "Body parts were everywhere." Someone said, "I had to step around brains." Someone said, "I saw a shoe with only a foot in it." Lots of survivors' guilt: "I heard a voice in my head telling me to get out of there, and I did, but now four of my friends are in the hospital." "I got up to go to the bathroom, and when I came back, my box wasn't there anymore." I talked to someone who saw the pilot as the plane crashed: "You could tell he was trying really hard to wrestle that plane away from the grandstand and back towards the tarmac." I talked to two people who said, "We were on either side of our buddy, and a piece of metal came flying towards us, and he got hit and we didn't." I talked to someone who knew one friend was dead and didn't know about other friends; I talked to several people who had loved ones in surgery ("Oh, he got off really lightly, he only lost a finger, he'll be fine"); I talked to people who didn't actually know if their loved ones had been brought to this hospital and were desperately trying to get information.

Most surreal moments: 1) The snippets of Brahms' lullaby that came over the PA twice, alerting us that babies had just been born in the midst of the carnage. 2) The Code Blue that came over the PA for a room in the ED. Every emergency responder in the hospital's already there: you need to call a Code to summon them?

I told the people who came to the auditorium to take good care of themselves, told them to watch out for signs of PTSD (repetitive thoughts, nightmares, etc.), told them that clergy and therapists and journaling can help. I listened a lot. But, for the most part, there was nothing for me to do that fifty other people in the building couldn't do as well or better, so after three hours, I left.

As selfish as it may sound to put it this way, here's what I learned from this experience:

1. I've always wondered if I could handle trauma. After tonight, I think I could.

2. I must really like being a chaplain, because I wanted to do more tonight, not less (not, God knows, that I don't mourn and grieve the occasion).

3. In a mass disaster, every helping resource in the area shows up, and I trust those resources will continue to be available to everyone touched by this horror -- and the psychological toll alone will be huge -- in the coming months. So, weird as it sounds, the work I did during my much quieter afternoon shift today seems more important, because those folks weren't on the news. Nobody else was rushing to their side. The suicidal patient who sobbed and hugged me and was so grateful for prayer didn't have every chaplain in northern Nevada showing up to offer help. My weekly conversations with ordinary ED patients are (usually) much less dramatic than the ones I had tonight, but they're also less redundant.

Which is all a way of saying that my quiet little niche is fine with me, thanks.

And now I'm going to have a very delayed dinner. Rice Krispie Treats and peanuts just don't count as a meal.

Handwoven Two-Pocket Shoulder Bag

Here's my latest craft project. I used lengths of wooden dowel to reinforce the top of the bag and the bottoms of the two pockets. The body of the bag's one length of fabric, folded and sewn. Fun!

The Full Set!

I inadvertently left the pretty white rock out of the first photo. My bad!

Caprica Climbing the Drying Rack

This is on Facebook, but I couldn't resist posting it here, too. Isn't she adorable?

Pretty Pebbles!

flask sent me these lovely pebbles, all individually wrapped and labeled, from New England and Canada! Thanks, flask! I love them!

Also cookies . . . which, sadly, I can't eat because of the gluten issue. But Gary and our houseguest will enjoy them!

Why God's Love Matters

I'm cross-posting this from Facebook, because I think the question's important.

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Last night, my friend Chris Coake, motivated by his intense dislike of Pat Robertson, posted some quotations from Jillette's new book about atheism. You can find that post, and responses to it, here.

My rather forceful dislike of these quotations (which imply that Christians are pathetic losers who need imaginary friends because they don't have real ones) resulted in a conversation in which Chris posed this question: "Why, exactly, is the love of Christ/God so valuable to people of faith, and not to atheists?"

There are all kinds of answers to that question, and other people have addressed it more thoroughly than I can, and my own answers change according to my mood and circumstances. But for me, right now, the answer can be summed up in two words: social justice.

Look around. There are a lot of people in the world who aren't loved by other people: prisoners, addicts, mental patients, the poor. Look at all the hatred that gets spewed on Facebook itself, not to mention a whole lot of other places. The kind of Christian faith I admire and try to practice -- because there are many versions I don't -- is predicated on the core belief that God loves everybody, and therefore we're called to love everybody, too. Even people we don't like. Even people we'd rather hate. Even people who hate us. Even -- oh, honestly, you can't mean it? -- Pat Robertson. (Insert gagging sound here.)

Jesus loved everybody, and made a particular point of loving the people the rest of his culture hated. Lepers. People with despised ethnic/tribal identities, like Samaritans. Women. The unclean, the untouchable, the stigmatized, the scapegoated. Jillette's quotations suggest that if we have the love of our family and friends, we don't need God; Jesus spoke out quite forcefully about the fact that people who remain within the cozy cocoon of their families and friends are barricading themselves against the broken, hurting world we're all called to help heal. Sure, we're called to love our families and friends, but we're also called to love "the least of these," the people who make us really uncomfortable, the people we've been told to have nothing to do with, the people we'd rather ignore. We're called to love everybody, like Jesus did. That's the whole point.

It's worth noting that even he didn't get there right away. It was a process. My favorite character in the Bible is the Samaritan woman -- despised both for her gender and her ethnicity -- who asks Jesus for healing for her daughter and, when he declines (because she's not the Right Kind of People), stands up for herself, very cleverly, and gets the blessing after all. She's the only person in the Gospels who argues with Jesus and wins, and she's a stigmatized minority. You go, girl!

The Christian story reminds us that radical love isn't easy, and that it will get you killed in, oh, three years or so if you really practice it. (MLK Jr. and Oscar Romero are more recent reminders of that fact.)

Now, to try to address some inevitable objections: can the non-faithful love this way? Sure. People who do this work as part of faith communities often have a lower burnout rate, though. And are there people who call themselves Christians who don't love this way? (Hi, Pat Robertson!) You betcha. But they aren't the only Christians out there, even if they want to make you think they are. (As a person on the left, I believe that the Christian Right is the Christian Wrong, even though I know the Christian Right considers the Christian Left the Christian Left Behind.)

As for God's love not mattering to atheists, well, I personally believe it's what sustains all of us even if we aren't aware of it. You're free to disagree.

And those lonely, pathetic people who need to believe that God loves them because nobody else does? Are you going to make fun of them? Really?

Let me tell you a story.

Many people reading this know that I volunteer as a lay ER chaplain (and if you're reading this on the blog, rather than on FB, you've probably already heard the story). One evening many years ago, I knocked on the door of a room and heard a soft, "Come in." Inside, an emaciated man hooked up to IVs lay on a gurney. When I told him I was the volunteer chaplain, he started to cry.

"No, I visit everybody here," I told him. "My being here doesn't mean you're dying. Don't be scared!"

"That's not why I'm crying," he said. "I am dying. I'm dying of AIDS, and fifteen minutes ago I was praying for God to send me a sign that he still loved me, and then you walked through the door. You're a sign from God."

He needed God's love precisely because other people had stigmatized and isolated him, but what reassured him of that love was a flesh-and-blood person, not an imaginary teddy bear. My friends who work with prisoners have lots of similar stories. God calls us to love everybody; surprisingly often, that's simply a matter of showing up.

Okay, I'll stop now. I'm sure I haven't persuaded anyone who didn't already agree with me, but well, Chris, you asked. For evidence that other people are on this side of the issue, rather than Pat Robertson's, check out The Christian Left and Seminary of the Street.