Moving Slowly Toward...What?

Another good meeting today. I may hear something definitive within 10 days. I like what I hear, although I am surprised some members of the Committee think my sermons lean liberal, given the sermons I sent to them.

I have some interim work lined up between the first of the month and when I would take this other job, should they decide to call me.

I am wondering if I will feel a "this is it!" moment - when I sense the Holy Spirit whispering in my ear. I'm not getting that feeling about any of the places with whom I am talking, but with this one, I'm getting a gentle breeze in my heart. And I smile in, and after, every meeting, and when I think of working there.

Perhaps that just means that the Holy Spirit is more subtle than I am...



P.S. Gov. Mark Sanford is a fool of the first order. He and his family are in my prayers. It never ceases to amaze me how politicians begin to think they are not to be held to the same rules as the rest of us, and how oblivious they can be to the pain they will cause. Narcissism and risk-taking are behaviors common to successful politicians (on both side of the aisle) and to philanderers, so I shouldn't be surprised. Nevertheless, I'm still annoyed and disappointed at the steady parade of misbehavior from elected officials.

Back in Wait State

It was a quiet and lovely weekend, mostly.



PH and I had plans to attend the 10:30 service at a wonderful and creative parish about 8 miles from here. We were utterly bumfuzzled by street closures due to a triathlon. I wouldn't have minded except for the fact that the traffic website showed no such closures.

On a normal Sunday, getting from our place to that church would take about 25 minutes. We left the house at 9:15, and at 10:23 were still entangled in a jam up around the Library of Congress, a good 3 miles from the church. Given that most parishes have gone over to summer schedule and their services start at 10 or 10:30, we gave up. Turned around, drove back into VA, and had brunch, complete with Father's Day mimosas. I know french toast and mimosas aren't a eucharistic feast, but it was a love feast of a different sort.

The job thing is in a state of suspended animation. I had a phone interview (one of four candidates) for a rectorship on Saturday morning. Good folks, working hard to discern what God wants for their parish. I think they may get hung up on the fact that I am a transitional deacon and won't be ordained to the priesthood until early December, even though I laid out a whole plan of how we could make it work well. I hope to hear something from them within the next week or so.

There is a part-time job for which I am a candidate. I don't mind the part-time nature of it, since it's a wonderful parish with a great mentor-rector, and the diocese has another part-time task in mind for me to complement that work. I had hoped to hear from the rector last week, since I've been through the interviews, but maybe today or tomorrow.

Another job, a full-time one nearby, is also in play, but that rector is on vacation until next Friday, so I don't expect to hear much of anything soon from him.

I'm also in the running for a non-parish job in the Midwest, and I expect to have a phone interview one of these days with those folks, but I don't know how my bishops would feel about that one. They tend to want us in parish settings.

In any case, something will happen reasonably soon, I hope.

PH and I amused ourselves after brunch by going to Open Houses in a townhouse community nearby. Definitely a step up from seminary housing, and when I run the numbers, it's clear we can afford to buy there. I checked the FICO score this morning and got a nice high number. Living within one's means is a good idea, it seems. This community would work well with the part-time job, and would work well for PH as well. The townhouses are big enough to accomodate our baby grand (yes, KW, I will want the piano back after the September concert!) and the kitchens are much closer to the really beautiful little kitchen in our old house than to the pretty sad one in our seminary housing. Still a fantasy until we know where I will accept a call, but fun nevertheless.

So I sit and wait. At least I feel like I'm closer to something than two months ago.

Things I Like

I have time to knit.

I have time to read, and not only academic stuff.

StrongOpinions is semi-settled into her new apartment in the Big Apple.

I have gone for long walks four out of the past five days.

I have job prospects - something interim and several permanent. We'll see what actually materializes.

I'll go to church at a fun and interesting place tomorrow.

PH and I may go on a mini-vacation next weekend to see StrongOpinion's new place in the hiptastic borough across the bridge from lower Manhattan.

We are all reasonably healthy and happy.

Yes, there are still several questions about what lies ahead. But with all this good stuff going on, it's easier to let go of the reins and let them just unfold.

Friday Five: Life is a Verb

A lovely Friday Five from Jan this morning....

1. What awakens you to the present moment?

Coffee and possibilities.


2. What are 5 things you see out your window right now?

Satellite dishes (lots of sports fans in my townhouse community), a thousand shades of green in the leaves of the trees, bushes and grass, a squirrel on a branch, lots of wires running from house to house (lots of electricity used around here), a tilted fence.

3. Which verbs describe your experience of God?

Being, doing, listening, smiling, weeping.

4. From the book on p. 197:
Who were you when you were 13? Where did that kid go?

Book nerd, musician, thinker. I'm pretty much the same as then, just a little grayer and a little fatter.

5. From the book on p. 88:
If your work were the answer to a question, what would the question be?

Can I tell you my story?

Bonus idea for you here or on your own--from the book on p. 149:
"Go outside. Walk slowly forward. Open your hand and let something fall into it from the sky. It might be an idea, it might be an object. Name it. Set it aside. Walk forward. Open your hand and let something fall into it from the sky. Name it. Set it aside. Repeat.

Breeze brushing my hand and the side of my face. Warmth of the sun, blessed after yesterday's wild rain storms, brightening my skin.

Meetings

In the past two days I've had four meetings related either directly or indirectly to employment. They've all been delightful, but a tad tiring. I have told my "call story" a couple of times, I've talked about my strengths and weaknesses ad infinitum, I've answered a zillion questions. I have another interview (phone interview) on Saturday morning, and am waiting to talk with the rector at the place I visited last night. It looks like I've got an interim gig that will start in a few weeks, so that makes it a bit less pressured, but I still have lots of questions about where the Lord will lead me. Tiring, indeed, not knowing.

And yet there is a certain pleasure in floating without a specific professional identity for a bit, while waiting for the Spirit to whisper in my ear. Free-floating possibilities. It is all good, even without firm answers. Imagination, fantasy, creativity...it can work even in the religion business, maybe especially in the religion business.

A Wonderful Video

I don't usually do this sort of thing, but it is too good not to share.

Bad Blogger

Yes, I know I've neglected you, and I apologize.

Various and sundry things have been cooking and life has been verrrrrrry interesting. Mostly all job search stuff, and I can't talk about any of it yet, except to say that after the very long dry spell, I may end up with a couple of options to choose from. I had a delightful conversation with one of my bishops yesterday. We're fortunate to have three (the one that is retiring, the one that will replace him, and the suffragan, who focuses on mission churches and other creative stuff.) It was the suffragan with whom I met.

In the meantime, I am cleaning, filing, tossing, and working on my Spanish. I figure I'm bad at French and Italian, why not add a lack of facility in a third Romance language to my resume?

StrongOpinions is moving from the spicy Spanish Harlem neighborhood one subway stop away from her university all the way downtown and then some to Brooklyn, to a safer neighborhood where she has a lot of friends. It will make for a nasty commute to school, but I think overall it will be a better environment for her. After she gets settled in to the apartment, she will take a weeklong vacation in Paris. Her stepfather and I will most likely be car-camping in the Shenandoah, but the girlchild gets to go to Paris. Not that I'm jealous or anything....my mother had left her a small bequest just for things like this, so it's covered, and my mother took me there when I was 18, so I can understand her desire to be in the city of the flaneurs. She'll be staying with a friend who is doing a research project there. Ah, to be 21 and in Paris. Actually, I'd rather be my age (approaching crone-dom) and in Paris, but that will wait for another year.

My laptop, which died ignominiously on Friday, is back to life. New motherboard, new screen, new speaker, and functional wifi. A few weeks ago, when I shelled out the money I didn't have to extend the service contract for another two years, I ground my teeth and wondered if it was a waste of money. Now I am very, very glad that I did. It was much cheaper than a new computer. Boy, am I glad this happened now and not when I was in the midst of thesis madness.

God does seem to watch out for me, even when I forget that God does that all the time. Thanks be to God!

An Embarrassment of Riches, or Not

Stuff is starting to pop on the job front.

As I mentioned before, I had a good interview earlier this week at a wonderful place, and will be talking with the committee helping that rector in the near future about next steps.

I had a good very preliminary interview with another nearby place last week, and I hear through the grapevine that I favorably impressed that rector...hope to hear more from there very soon.

I had a request from a search committee for a rectorship for more materials, which I take as a positive.

A couple of friends have given me heads up about a few other opportunities.

So stuff is starting to move a bit, for which I'm grateful. I don't know how far any of these will go, whether there is something else out there that I haven't heard about yet, whether I will have more than one option ahead, but I sure am grateful to have SOMETHING happening. Thanks for the prayers thus far, and please keep praying.

In the meantime, I'm continuing work on the research project with my professor, and it is getting very interesting indeed. Love this work!

StrongOpinions is in the Big Apple, moving her stuff to her new apartment. I may have to go up there next week to help move the bed, but I'm glad she's settled for next fall. She is almost ready to publish the first issue of her new literary magazine...wow! She will be going to Colorado for a writer's conference after the apartment and magazine stuff is done, then to Paris for a week. Must be nice to be 21. Meanwhile, I'm trying to figure out if PH and I can swing some sort of mini-vacation. It may end up being car-camping in the Shenandoah, which would be just fine by me.

I am just whupped. All the emotion about the ordination plus all the family visiting seems to have just caught up to me, and I slept until 8 this morning (unusually late for me) and I'm still foggy.

I guess it's time to go take a shower and get dressed.

Monday. Wow.

I recovered from the ordination, the intensity of having eleven family members all here at the same time, the challenges of getting various people to various airports, a very full morning of serving as a deacon at my sponsoring parish - boy, being introduced as Rev. Mibi was an odd sensation - dealing with various and sundry little crises around the house.

So day before yesterday I got an email from a blogo-friend who is just headed to seminary, telling me about a part-time job at his church, and how he and his wife think I might consider applying for the job.

Now this is a job that has morphed from full to part-time over the past few months when the prior incumbent left. I've sent my stuff in there several times, as has the diocesan deployment officer, to no response.

But when my friend sent me that message, I thought this might be one of those Spirit-led moments, so I went ahead and sent a message to the rector, with my stuff. And he replied this morning asking me to come talk to him, and I ended up having a marvelous two-hour interview with him. He will pass me along to the personnel committee next (I just emailed them some audio files of sermons), and we will see what happens from there. I've got a good feeling about how things went, and the rector seems like a good mentor. The only funny moment was when he asked why I hadn't applied for the job earlier.

"Erm, I sent my resume and profile in three times already..."

"Did you hear back from us?"

"Uh, no, I didn't."

"Why do you think they didn't contact you?"

"I'm not really sure. Perhaps it's one of those wonderful surprises that God has for us..."

I mean, what else could I say?

All you can do sometimes is just smile.

Then I came home to find an invitation to apply for a rectorship a couple hours north of here.

We shall see how this all plays out, shan't we?

A couple of pictures from the ordination...

A little fuzzy (taken by a friend with an iPhone) but here the Bishop is laying hands on me and ordaining me a deacon. A remarkable picture of the entire clan. It is well nigh impossible to get everyone in the same place at the same time, since they are spread across six states and both coasts. Two stepsons, two daughters-in-law, two sons, one daughter, four grandchildren...plus PH and me. To the extreme right is StrongOpinions. To the left of her, StoneMason. Litigator is immediately to the left of me, holding one of the grandkids. PH is, of course, in the Geneva robe with the red stole.

We are now officially a two-clergy family. PH served as the Gospeller for the service today. Since he is ordained in another tradition, we needed special permission from the Bishop for him to serve in this capacity. As the Bishop said later, "What's a few rubrics among friends?"

Name Change

Until this moment, this blog was named "Rev-to-be-Mibi." It chronicled my journey through discernment and seminary.

Now, since the Bishop and the people consented and I was ordained to the transitional diaconate this morning, the name no longer fits. So this place has a new name, and I have a new title.

Rev Mibi. Wow.

TOH to The Rev. Matthew C, who took this picture of me receiving my Bible from my Bishop from the Amen Corner of the church where I was ordained this morning. Interesting factoid: I was standing in front of the exact spot on the altar rail where Robt. E. Lee was confirmed in the mid-1800s. George Washington's pew is over beyond the right side of this picture.

Moving and Changing Friday Five

Given our very up-in-the-air state (graduated from seminary and in the midst of job search), this Friday Five from Sally is very apt indeed!

1. A big move is looming, name one thing that you could not possibly part with, it must be packed ?
I've learned that most everything is expendable, but I suspect the family photo albums would top the list of the "must haves."

2. Name one thing that you would gladly leave behind...
Oh, dear, where to begin? The ancient sofabed that is virtually impossible to open up anymore? The recliner that has somehow gotten torqued so that sitting in it for an extended period of time necessitates a trip to the chiropractor? No...wait...it's the cabinets and drawers in this seminary housing that are so old that all the shelves bow and none of the drawers remain closed. Hate. Them. Stupid kitchen.

3. How do you prepare for a move
a. practically?
I have become a list-maker in my later years, so I make vast quantities of lists. I also plan where everything will go in the new place, and pack our things to fit the new place, not the old. What that might mean is that not all kitchenware will be put in boxes labelled "kitchen," some might be labelled "pantry" or "basement storage." Having moved at least 18 times thus far in my life, I'm pretty good at organizing and moving. The other thing that is essential is the purge of all things that need to be thrown or donated or given to others. The thing that neither PH or I are good at is disposing of books. When we moved into the seminary housing, we had 150 boxes of books. When we leave this place, I expect it will be over 200. It's just very hard to get rid of books, emotionally and practically.
b. spiritually/ emotionally?
That process of purging the excess becomes a cathartic spiritual practice. Sorting through, deciding what is necessary and what is not...it's a good thing to do periodically. At Big Old Seminary we have something called the SPIRIT closet, run by the partners/spouses of seminarians. You can donate unwanted but serviceable clothing to it; you can take whatever you want that you find there.for free It's particularly a boon for the parents of children, who can find all sorts of useful clothing there as their children grow, but it's also helpful for the grown-ups. This year I gave much of the contents of my closet (mostly business clothing that I no longer can fit into) to the SPIRIT closet, and I expect that there are many folks who will have some excellent wardrobes as a result. It felt good, it felt cathartic, and it was reminiscent of the concept of "packing light for the journey."

4. What is the first thing you look for in a new place?
I'm presuming I already have found the church, since that's the thing that will drive my move. I need to find a good grocery store, a good bakery, a good coffee shop and lunch place, and a hardware store. Hard to tell which of these would come first; probably the hardware store, with the grocery store a very close second. Got to get a new broom and picture hangers, don't you know...

5. Do you settle in easily, or does it take time for you to find your feet in a new location?
I actually do settle in pretty easily. All those moves over all those years have made it possible even for introverted me to find people and places and things to connect to.

The bonus for today; a new opportunity has come up for you to spend 5 years in a new area, where would you go and why?
The fantasy position would be an Anglican church in Italy, ministering to expats of various sorts. I like working with people who are out of their comfort zones. I like good art and good music and good food. I speak some Italian and would love to improve my skills. Alas, most jobs like this go to elderly British clerics with plummy voices, not to middle-aged American women who sometimes laugh a little too loudly!

Gifts

We talk a lot about gifts in the religion business. Gifts we've received from God, how we use our gifts, surprising gifts of grace from others, gifts as talents....you get the picture.

I am not the first to have thought of this, but it strikes me that the giving of gifts is in itself a pleasurable gift, and it is one we often enjoy more than the receiving. I am as subject to that as the next person.

Don't get me wrong - I do like to get gifts. But it is easier to give...then I'm doing the nice thing, and the burden is on the one who receives to appreciate it or respond in some other way. The response is sometimes hard work.

Like for instance, the time that PH got me perfume one Christmas. Bless him, he went to the department store and smelled twenty different perfumes before he picked one he thought I would like. So Christmas morning we opened the gifts, and I got to the perfume - a brand I didn't recognize - and oohed and aahed, and then opened it up, because of course you can't tell what a perfume is like until you open up the package. That, of course, renders it impossible to return. How bad could it be? said I to myself, hopefully.

Bad. Very strong. Very, very, very....everything. But he had that beautiful hopeful look on his face, so what could I say but "Thank you, sweetie. This is wonderful."

So I lied. It wasn't wonderful. The thought was wonderful, but the perfume itself was not.

It was a gift of love. What could I do but receive it with something approximating grace?

Turnabout fair play here. I've failed at the gift-giving end of things, too. Shirts he didn't really like, a CD of music that just wasn't his cup of tea, man-stuff for the grill that really wasn't useful. And he did the same thing that I did...receiving it with something approximating grace.

We've come to an agreement about gifts now, after being together many years. We tell each other what we would like...give each other ideas and options so that the gift we receive is what we want or need. Less of a surprise, but also less chance that it will be the bad-smelling perfume or the stupid grill accessory.

This works well in a marriage, of course. But gifts in the realm of theology are often unexpected, uncomfortable, not necessarily what we think are a good fit. What God gives us carries expectations - we are expected to use the gift from God. We can't return it to the department store, although sometimes we're tempted to put it in the back of the closet (as I did with that perfume) for a couple of years .

Actually, sometimes we put it in the back of the closet until we're ready to try it again...at which point we discover it actually may be a better fit than we thought. The funny thing about the perfume is that when I took out of the closet a few years later and tried it, it was actually pretty nice. I don't know whether I changed or it changed over the intervening years, but I was able to receive the gift differently. Yet another gift, I would say.

Sort of like a call to ministry. Didn't feel like a fit. Put it in the back of my mental closet for several years. Talked myself out of it time and time again, until God peeled away all the objections I set for Him and for myself. Finally, when I was brave enough to take another look at this gift, I realized it fit me better than anything else that had been a part of my life before.

The corollary to this, of course, is that we worry about giving the perfect gift to someone else, and often their reaction is not what we would expect. God has no such problem. God gives, and waits patiently for our response, knowing God's gifts are always the right ones, even when the receiver of the gift doesn't understand.

That's the thing about gifts. They carry more than the immediate and obvious characteristics that we recognize. Like a perfume that our noses don't like right now, but which might grow on us if we actually try it on, it is our response to the gift in the long term that truly matters.

The good thing is that God is willing to wait.

If the Word "Evangelism" Gives You The Fantods...

...you must read this.

TOH to Fr. Terry, who also blogged about this piece. It is brilliant, and makes me want to go sit in a bar with the author and talk for a long, long time.

Wednesday

Wednesday was called "Hump Day" when I worked downtown. The idea, of course, was that it was the halfway point of the work week. If we survived Wednesday, it was a smooth downhill slide to Friday afternoon and the joys of the weekend.

Now, of course, I'm in a different business entirely. So what's Wednesday now?

• If I'm scheduled to preach, I hope I've got at least the bare bones of the sermon down, maybe even a first draft. Wednesday is also usually when I think the sermon is a flea-bitten dog, to be put out of its misery, and that I should start over. I rarely do - this is my normal worrying pattern.

• If I'm teaching on Sunday (as is the case for me this week), I am thinking about what materials might need to be duplicated, if I'm going to use the projector, in which case I have to make sure that the Keeper of the Projector gets it to church, and if I'm on the right track at all (the flea-bitten dog thing again), and if this was all a Big Mistake.*

• If the alb is at the cleaner's, I should pick it up. I will forget it if I wait any longer. Nothing like waking up on Sunday morning and realizing it is in the cleaner's, which of course is closed on Sunday.

• And Wednesday is also food-shopping day chez Mibi, especially this week, when the assembled masses of kids and grandkids are coming for the ordination on Saturday.

So what are my plans for today, outside of blogging?

• Yes, food shopping. Necessary. We are out of tonic water and ingredients for guacamole. This must be remedied.

• A pedicure. Appropriate liturgical color for ordination is red, so it will be red toenails, invisible in my cute new shoes, but as important as good undergarments for a special day. Purple toenails would be overreaching. Pink would be not celebratory enough.

• A massage from the estimable Erin, who weighs something like 83 pounds but has the hands of a sumo wrestler.

• Oh yes, the Sunday School class. Talking about the thesis and the surprises to be found in the Gospel of Matthew, using the story of the Canaanite woman's encounter with Jesus. Got to print off copies of the text...beyond that, it is finished.

So Wednesday is not really Hump Day in the same way anymore, because the weight of the week falls differently now. It becomes an odd sort of midweek Sabbath, when I can catch my breath and say I may indeed be ready for what awaits me in the days ahead. May it be so!



* "Big Mistake:" A story from our honeymoon in Italy. We had lunch with a food-writer friend and some other folks in a wonderful Florentine restaurant. When we got to the secondi, my friend told us that the chef, an enormous guy with flaming red hair, said that you cannot eat risotto with a spoon - it harms the grains of rice. You have to eat it with a fork. She warned us that he was pretty passionate about that. The risotto arrived at the table, and,sure enough, one of the group started eating it with a spoon. The chef, Fabio, came rushing out of the kitchen, screaming "Is mistake. Is Beeeeg Mistake!" He snatched the spoon out of her hand and told her that for her transgression, she was not getting any dessert. Some folks' ideas of mistakes are different than others, I learned. Context matters. So around our house, Big Mistakes can be about all sorts of things, and the one who names it as a Big Mistake has the right to do so, even if others think it's no big deal. We own our neuroses here at chez Mibi, and we're even a little proud of them.

Weddings

PH and I went to a wedding this weekend. The bride and groom were 18 years old. Nope, not kidding. They really were just 18. This was not a shotgun wedding. These two young people share an arts-related profession and wanted to be married so they could continue to pursue their dream together. Both sets of parents were supportive of this decision. The bride was gorgeous in a dress that seemed to be about a size 0 or maybe even a negative number, and the groom was very handsome and attentive.

For 18, they seemed pretty mature.

Still. though, 18?

Clergy folk out there, would you have presided at the wedding?

I'm still chewing on it, because I know way too much about failed marriages even among folks who should be old enough to handle it all. They had premarital counseling with the minister who presided and who is a pastoral counselor.

Still, though, 18?

Meditations on George Tiller's Death

I commend for your reading Cheesehead's post on the murder of Dr. George Tiller, a doctor who provided abortion services to women in Kansas.

Pray for Dr Tiller, his family, his friends, those who witnessed his murder at his church.

Pray for the deluded soul who thought this was a solution.

Pray for the women who may lose safe medical care in Kansas because of this.

Saint Middle School

I had a lovely morning today at Saint Middle School. Although my official last Sunday with them was two weeks ago, they asked me to come back today for a farewell. They gave me some very generous gifts - so kind and such a stretch for such a tiny parish.

I gave them the icon that I made for them - not everyone realized at first that this wasn't something store-bought, but something I had made for them over several months. I do hope they have a building someday soon to hang it in.

Several members of the choir there will be participating in the choir that will sing at my ordination on Saturday - it is so wonderful of them to make the long trek into Old Town for the event. Good folks. They were very good to me, and I am grateful for all they have done.

Rolling, Rolling, Rolling

StrongOpinions and I left Your Nation's Capitol at 6 this morning, headed up to the Big Apple to get her stuff out of her apartment for the summer. She has found someone to sublet and finish out her lease, since the neighborhood is way too sketchy and the roommates are unsuitable. We are still negotiating what will happen in terms of housing for September. I left her up there staying with her friends - she is going on up to her father's in New England tomorrow, and will wend her way back down in time for my ordination next weekend.

It was a marvelously easy drive up - only a couple little spots of traffic. The only challenge was making it from the Lincoln Tunnel to the West Side Hwy - the surface traffic was bearish. We got up to her place, climbed the four flights to her apartment, packed her stuff, carted it all downstairs, and loaded it into the car. One giant LLBean rolling duffel with clothes, one large clothes hamper full of shoes, several boxes of books, one tote full of kitchen stuff - she is her mother's daughter. Then we drove down from Spanish Harlem to Columbia, wandered around the campus a bit, and had some lunch at a French bistro. Quite lovely. Then I got back into the car and headed south. I managed to avoid traffic jams almost all the way home (the usual snafu on the Beltway because of a couple of rain-induced accidents) and I made it back through the door by 8 pm. Listened to Peter Gomes' "The Scandalous Gospel of Jesus" on the iPod for most of the ride...might be an accessible book for the right church small group to go through, chapter by chapter.

Things I noted on this trip:

• the girl is not a housekeeper. Her room in the apartment was pretty chaotic, consistent with her room at home when she is in residence. So why did it surprise me?
• the city, even when overcast, still enchants. I wish I could find a job there, but even if I did, I couldn't afford to live there, so it will remain a lovely fantasy.
• Columbia is the kind of university I should have gone to as an undergraduate, but my working class parents couldn't even conceive of me going somewhere like that (even though I probably would have been admitted to Barnard, then the women's college there, given my grades and SATs and such). The girl is fortunate to have been aware of the possibilities and to have been encouraged to explore them.
• even though I grew up in the NYC metro area and have been driving in and out of the city since I was 18, StrongOpinions felt it necessary to check if I knew the way to find my way back out of the city and over the river. I'd be ticked off if I wasn't so charmed by our mutual love for the city.
• I am no longer the chic New Yorker that I was when I worked in the city as an international software consultant (another life ago) in the early '80's. I felt quite lumpen in my jeans, twin set and sneakers, except when we were in Spanish Harlem, where the women are more "traditionally built." Had I worn a sequined, low-cut tank top, I would have fit in even more perfectly. Ah, well, another "fashion don't" moment for Rev-to-be-Mibi.
• people watching is still my favorite city activity, and the most affordable one.

Just count me grateful to be home with car and nerves intact. I'm lumpen here, too, but somehow I can't seem to get very worked up about it.

Becoming Fruitful

Today's offering from Inward/Outward is this lovely quotation from Meister Eckhardt:

"Becoming fruitful as a result of a gift is the only gratitude for the gift."

It reminds me again why the late poet and philosopher John O'Donahue said "Meister Eckhardt is the man." It also explains my unease as I sit in this wait-state between the end of school and a call to some sort of job somewhere.

After some rattles of interest last week, things have gone quiet again. I was to have met someone for a conversation about a possible job yesterday afternoon, and the person didn't show. I am presuming it is because the power was down at his church - their phones weren't answered yesterday afternoon, nor is their system receiving emails. Still, a tad aggravating to not receive a phone call, unless his calendar exists only on his computer network.

At the heart of it, I view my vocation as a precious and surprising gift. I've spent the past few years working hard to properly prepare to be fruitful, to live out the gift of that vocation. The silence right now is deafening, and is also frustrating. This is, of course, my own impatience opening me up to unhealthy musings about why I haven't heard anything definitive from anyone, except for turn-downs.

Being fruitful is what I long for. Patience is a burr under the saddle; persistence is the only virtue that remains.

Picture above is "Still Life with Watermelons and Apples in a Landscape" Luis Meléndez (1715-1780)

Random Dots of Tuesday

• I went to the eye doctor for my annual visit, fully expecting that my visual acuity had gone to hell in a handbasket given the quantity of reading and computer time this past year. But no! The reading prescription had to be cranked up a notch, and otherwise all the numbers were the same. In the interest of experimentation, and because I am always losing my glasses, I am now trying monovision contact lenses (left eye for reading, right eye for seeing distance). We shall see. The distance thing works fine; the reading thing not so much yet, but I do need to adjust to this.

• A priest friend called last night to tell me that she received a call from her sponsoring parish about four hours north of here. Unbeknownst to me, she comes from one of the parishes to which I made application this past week. They seem interested, asked her all sorts of questions. She told me all about it (she has worked with me and likes what she has seen) and gave me a lot of helpful info about the church, the community, and the folks on the search committee. I would like this one to go to the next step and enter into some conversations with them...in many ways, it would be a very good fit for me. Nice to know I'm (possibly) in the running for something.

• Another priest called regarding another job about an hour north of here...shared some interesting things about the place and seemed somewhat impressed with me. We will see if the search committee wants to go the next step.

• Leaving in two hours for coffee with another priest friend who has an assistantship open. This one is in my old neighborhood, and I have mixed feelings about that. I don't know if it is a fit or not, but it is always good to have conversations with good people. You never know where the conversations lead.

• Yet another friend made a call on my behalf for another position north of here.

All of this feels good - like stuff is moving in the right direction.

Speaking of things moving in the right direction, I'm excited about the nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor to the US Supreme Court. I want to read more about her track record in the appellate court, but what I know so far sounds very promising. A Latina on the Court...si, se puede!

They Can't Take That Away From Me...

Ascension Day

TOH to Seven Whole Days, one of my favorite blogs in the whole wide world.

Graduated/Commencing

Our commencement happened this morning. You can watch it here if you like. It was lovely, with the exception of a slightly balky PA system. I graduated with honors, for which I thank my husband, editor and cheerleader extraordinaire; the Holy Spirit,who gave me inspiration when the brain was not coming up with stuff; and Sister Mary Malachi, my eighth grade teacher. who beat the rules of expository writing into us with the paddle from one of those kids' paddle balls. Some lessons stick better than others.

Our commencement speaker was the Rt Rev Barbara Harris, retired suffragan bishop of Massachusetts and the first woman ordained a bishop in the Anglican communion. Powerful words on being a movement rather than an institution, and on working through the church for social justice.

There was a reception afterwards for us - lots of lovely little finger foods and such. Too many people for me at an emotional time, so I was ready after a half hour for us to leave for luncheon at a nearby restaurant with the family. We had a great time, and headed for home at about 2, after which I crashed. I'm still pretty tired with the heat and the emotion of the day, and with eating wayyyy too much.

It was wonderful having PH's family and StrongOpinions with me for this event, and I am grateful to have come this far. where I go from here, God will let me know in due time.

Random Dots of Graduation Eve

• Various and sundry in-laws, plus StrongOpinions, arrived yesterday evening. We ate a lot, laughed a lot, drank a wee bit, and enjoyed each other's company. Unfortunately, somebody brought a cold with them, which I now have inherited. Since I have to be a cantor tonight, it is slightly worrisome, but I shall prevail!

• Still trying to figure out exactly what I'm going to wear tomorrow, since it's going to be hot and the cassock and surplice and academic hood are pretty warm. We're going out to lunch after the graduation and reception, so I think I can't get away with a bathing suit. I suspect the Gold Bond powder will be liberally applied.

• Got the lovely news that I will graduate with honors. Working hard does pay off. Not necessarily with a job (yet) but with the pleasure of knowing it was a job well and faithfully done.

• Getting a job is still a work in progress. Please pray.

• Thesis advisor was so taken with her icon (the St Paul that has been on this website for a while) that she is going to start taking classes with us. Very wonderful!

• This is a time of turning away from one source of light and heat to another. There are brief moments of chill in the process, bits of clouds overhead every now and again. We need reminding that behind the cloud, beyond the chill, is the warmth and love of Him who provides all.

Today's Sermon: John 15:9-17

I had a major surprise earlier this week. And it’s a surprise that will warm the hearts of some folks in this room, who made a pilgrimage out to the Udvar-Hazy Space Center a week ago Thursday to see the premiere of the new Star Trek movie on the big IMAX screen.

Here’s the surprise: I discovered that Biblical scholars – or scripture geeks, as some folks call them – may also be Star Trek geeks, too. One of my Old Testament professors, JFW, talked last week about the new Star Trek movie and some biblical parallels.

Now if this sounds a little like those books that talk about the Gospel according to Harry Potter, let me reassure you…that’s not where I am going with this.

But J talked very convincingly about some of the physics of Star Trek and its application in the Gospel of John, and what she said had great relevance both to the Gospel passage we read today, and the ending of my time with you at St. Middle School.

So how many of you in this room know about the space-time continuum? You engineers, put your hands down…I know you know about it. But what about those of us who AREN’T engineers or rocket scientists?

Well, here’s the little bit I know about the space time continuum. We understand our world in terms of space – the three dimensions. We see it, we feel it, we are a part of it. But there is actually a fourth dimension, one that really changes our perception of our world…it is time. Time can radically shift the way we perceive the shape of our world.

Think of it like this: how many of you have given directions by saying “well, you take a right down by where the old Hecht’s store used to be?” You and I both know that the Hecht’s store isn’t there in our present time, but we alter our perception of present space by referring to another time. How many of you have said, “Well, that was before I met your father?” Who we are is the same as that person from back then, but somehow we are changed.

It’s like those episodes in Star Trek where they jump to warp speed and break all the rules of time and space, making all sorts of weird time anomalies. Here’s a really nifty bit of Star Trek trivia: in the Voyager series, the Krenim weapon ship used by Annorax worked by pushing the target outside the space time continuum, thus deleting it from history.[1]

Time changes our perception, and it changes relationships. The old rules don’t apply, or at least they don’t apply in the same way.

This is just what Jesus is talking about in this gospel today. It is nearly the end of Jesus’ time with his disciples. He is waxing almost poetic in his great love for them. He tells them that their job, going forward, is to love one another. And not just to love one another, but to love as he has loved them, to be willing to die for each other. And he talks about how their relationship is now changing, that they are no longer subordinates, but his friends. Jesus, the savior, the son of God…says they are his friends. He has entered their lives, he has taught them “everything I have heard from my Father.” They have been transformed by his loving teaching. He has been transformed by their loving discipleship. And now they are no longer teacher and student, they are his friends.

Although several elements of the story are different, we, too, have shared a transformation. I came here almost two years ago, to be your seminarian. You didn’t know me. I didn’t know you. All I knew was that there were many things I needed to learn and this seemed like a good place to do that learning.

What I discovered in this particular space time continuum was that we were both transformed. You welcomed me, you encouraged me, you told me what I needed to learn, you entrusted me with your stories, with your joys, with your secrets. I was changed not only in the ways I expected – in my learning of the practice of ministry – but also in some surprising ways. I learned to trust my instincts, to listen for the story beneath the story, to preach in an approachable way. I doubt I would have preached on Star Trek when I first got here.

We were both transformed when Pastor J left to join her husband C in Southern Virginia. My original plan – that she would serve as my supervisor in the Field Ed experience for the full two years – was thrown out the window. There was a very real possibility that I would have to leave St Middle School in January, something I did not want to do. With your encouragement, I asked for permission to stay as your seminarian, to walk this journey with you as part of my learning about transitional ministry. I got a new job description: I was to be a “continuing pastoral presence.” Some weeks, that meant proofreading the bulletin (with mixed results) over and over until we thought we had it right. Some weeks, it meant briefing supply clergy and herding acolytes. Some weeks, it meant vestry meetings. Some weeks, it meant conversations about troubles and illness and death. It was all rich. It changed me.

I hope, too, that my work among you was transforming as well. I hope that you learned a little bit. I hope that I was a comfort in a time of change. I hope that my imperfection helped you all to realize that everyone in the Body of Christ is imperfect, but if we minister faithfully, whether we are laypeople or clergy, we honor God.

I came here as a stranger, intending to be taught. I leave it as a friend, having learned much. And I am reminded of another fact about the space time continuum and Star Trek – if you accelerate to warp 10, you exist on every point on the space time continuum. Even if you aren’t there physically, you’re there on the continuum.

Sounds sort of like Jesus, doesn’t it? When he tells the disciples to “Abide in my love,” he isn’t saying “abide in it just when I’m sitting here alongside you.” He is saying that same thing he says at the end of the Gospel of Matthew: “I am with you even unto the end of the age.”

That’s the ultimate transformation that comes to us on our space time continuum: wherever we are, whenever we are, Jesus is with us. Always. Loving us. With us. It doesn’t get better than that.

And in a small way, that’s the joy that overcomes the sadness of this moment when I bid you goodbye. Our time together has been one of transformation and love. So wherever you and I go, whenever we go, we are together, bound in a space time continuum that is the Body of Christ.

You are no longer my teachers; you are my friends. It doesn’t get better than that.

Amen.

[1] http://memory-alpha.org/en/wiki/Space-time_continuum

Friday Five: Friends

Jan has given us a great Friday Five:

"today let's write about the different kinds of friends we have, like childhood friends, lost friends, tennis friends, work friends, and the list goes on. List 5 different types of friends you have had in your life and what they were/are like.As a bonus, put a link to a new (to you) blogging friend and introduce us!"

1) The Call-In-The-Middle-Of-The-Night friend: the person whom I could call in an emergency (and have) without thinking twice about whether it would wake her up, or her kids, because she knows I would do the same for her (and have).

2) The Woman of Wisdom and Power friend: who taught me wonderful things, and continues to teach me wonderful things, and says that I teach her, too, which is the ultimate compliment.

3) the Adult Child friend: I have a few of these, and one of the joys of this stage of life is that our relationship has shifted (think this Sunday's gospel: John 15.9-17) from a parental one to a friend one. Even my youngest (now 21) is starting to evolve into this kind of dialogue, and I am blessed in our conversations (mostly).

4) The Mentor friend: we don't talk often, but when we do, it is because I need some sage advice. This friend always is there for me in this way, with humor and grace.

5) My husband: he exceeds all categorization. Enough said.

Bonus: http://christiandifferent.wordpress.com/ Mike is a junior at my seminary - very bright and funny, with big ideas. He stretches my mind, particularly about young adult ministry, every time I read his blog and talk to him.

Random Dots of Remarkable

• I did my last bit of schoolwork at Big Old Seminary this morning - a group presentation on an ethnographic study of a young-adult predominant neighborhood. We rocked - what a great, diligent, creative team!

• Then I served as acolyte for noon Eucharist, serving with our dean (quite cool) and chanting the fraction (also quite cool). The preacher was delightful and brilliant OT professor, who actually gave me the hook I needed for my sermon for this coming Sunday (who knew Bible geeks could also be Star Trek geeks?)

• Then I paid my massive copying/printing bill...one of the last effects of the thesis. Many trees died in the production of this project. I repent me of my (copying) sins!

So I am done. I'll have a few more little things to do (leading Morning Prayer tomorrow morning, singing with the choir in the service tomorrow night and at Commencement, serving as a cantor for the Service for the Mission of the Church next Wednesday), but the school-school stuff is done.

Remarkable. There were times (this past year particularly, with the medical issues that landed me in the hospital more than once) that I wondered if I would make it through. And now here I am, at the end of this journey, looking down the road at the next part of the journey. One week from today, I will graduate, and a few weeks later, I will be ordained a transitional deacon in the Episcopal Church. I still don't know where I will be called, but I know at some point I will be called.

God is good. I am grateful and hopeful.

- And now I am off to tea with seven of my most delightful senior friends plus one faculty member. I suspect champagne will be drunk, in addition to the tea. For that, too, I am grateful!

Competition

Today was the competition for the Dudley Speech Prize for graduating seniors at Big Old Seminary. We each had to read Isaiah 6:1-8 (the call story with the coal and the tongs and all that) and then either read part of the Great Litany (BCP p 150) or Eucharistic Prayer Rite 1, prayer 1 (the one with more participial phrases than anything in the Pauline corpus). I think there were about 20 of us who did it.

It was an oddly lovely feeling to do the Eucharistic Prayer standing at the altar, reading from the altar book, doing the manual acts that accompany it. No chalice or paten or elements, of course, so it was rather like dancing on one of those mats with the footprints and arrows and numbers instead of spinning in the arms of a dear one, but it still was close enough to send a chill down my spine.

The Isaiah reading is one of my favorites; I've been meditating on it for several years. I hope I did it justice. I had read at the noon Eucharist and had gotten compliments for those readings (Acts and 1 John), so I hope the mojo continued.

I think I did well. I suspect I'm on the short list for the prize. I don't think we will know until Commencement who won, but it was a delight to see my OT professor, one of the judges, smiling broadly while I said "Woe is me, for I am a man with unclean lips and I live among people with unclean lips."

Knowing my proclivity for salty language, truer words were never spoken!

And in the Category of Most Graceless Turn-Downs

I offer you this:

"... we have concluded that you do not meet several of the attributes the Lord is leading us to desire in our next rector. As others have applied who more nearly meet this expectations, we have decided to drop you from further consideration."

I guess my walking on water was not up to snuff.

Meh

Mother's Day has been a little odd, with none of my kids anywhere near. One called, the others sent lovely flowers and will probably call later since they're on West Coast time. I'm so glad they are all coming to ordination.

I spent the weekend at the beautiful diocesan retreat camp way far away - it was my next-to-last time with Saint Middle School and I can tell in the way that things have gone uncomfortably silent that they probably aren't going to offer me even part-time work during their transitional period. Not a total surprise, since I can see what the numbers look like as well as anyone.

What has been most difficult about this long hard slog with no results on the job front is all the folks asking me what's happening in my search for employment. God love them, I know they love and care for me, but every time I have to say I don't have anything yet, it hurts a bit. I know the question isn't meant to hurt, and that this is my stuff I'm working through, but it feels like the broken glass of failure spoken aloud.

So for those who love me, know that you will be the first to know when I've got good news (or for that matter, vaguely promising news). Just pray, please. For that I'd be very, very grateful.

Plugging Along

I'm wrapping up the final group project for my last class, and just sent it off to my group for their edits and comments. I'll be glad to get this done.

No news on the job front. No further word from the little parish nearby that's looking for a rector. No further word from Saint Middle School, who had intimated that they wanted to keep me on part-time to keep things going during their transition time. The other places that I'm intrigued by haven't posted their parish profile yet, so I can't even apply there. I've sent out several more applications. This is getting very old indeed. I'm truly tired of hearing people say "whatever church gets you will certainly be lucky." I'm not feeling the love, and every time I hear another classmate has been called, I rejoice for them a lot, and grieve for myself a little.

And now the series of "lasts" begins. One of the practices of Big Old Seminary is that we meet for small group worship and advisee meetings with our advisor every Friday, in our advisor's home. Since our advisor is retiring in June, we all were feeling it a bit today as we had our last small group worship. We've had our last Wednesday Community Eucharist already.

It's a bittersweet feeling.

Keeping Fingers Crossed and Praying and All That Good Stuff

I've gotten a callback from a possible job opportunity, to be rector of a small multi-ethnic parish near here. Yeah, there are problems in this place, but there are also very interesting opportunities. It also comes with a rectory, which in this housing market is a good thing indeed.

They wanted recordings of sermons, and I sent them the two I submitted for the Big Preaching Award (haven't heard anything back from them yet, BTW), so we'll see what happens next. In any case, it sure feels good to have something vaguely positive to say on the job front!

It's also my understanding that St Middle School wants me to stay on board on a part-time basis to keep the trains running on time until they call someone or until I get a job. They haven't officially asked, but I was told by someone who should know that I am about to be asked and should be prepared for the question. Of course, they may decide they want to call me, but who knows. I'm trying to suss out how I might structure part-time work with them, probably something like identifying the needed blocks of time, then calculating out what percentage of a full-time job that is, and then calculating it against the diocesan guidelines. But first they need to figure out what they want me to do for them...on a part-time basis, of course.

As a dear friend said this morning, this stuff is exhaustipating!

Good News

No, don't get all excited. It's not a job or anything...

It just dawned on me that I've got time to knit again.

A rational person would look at the decreased workload as time to clean or pack books or something like that, but we know I'm not rational. I'm happy to knit.

Friday Needs and Wants

Chocolate.

Sushi.

Focus.

A job.

Hitting the Mega Millions (which is up to $220 million, by the way).

A vacation.

I suspect I am going to have to settle for numbers 1 and 2 for the moment.

The publication copy of the thesis is printing as we speak. I will take it to be bound this afternoon.

I completed three of the four assignments for my last class, and the final one is a group effort that will be done next Thursday.

I have some writing to do for the research project, and I intend to knock it out this weekend, come hell or high water.

Last, but most definitely not least, I've just received the invitations for my ordination to the diaconate on June 6th. Woohoo!

Sweet!

I found some lovely things (on sale, no less) to wear for my ordination, under the alb, of course.

A black and white silk skirt with flashes of lime green.

A great lime green jacket that will work when I don't have the alb on.

I got a little white top to wear underneath it for other times, but the black clerical shirt will actually work well with this.

So am I brave enough to wear this on ordination day with these shoes? I'm afraid not, as adorable as they are. I guess my madness is under control.

Why didn't someone tell me about this three years ago?

http://www.christianbook.com/Christian/Books/product?item_no=201603&netp_id=431415&event=ESRCN&item_code=WW&view=covers

I could have had a much less stressful life!

Mondays Aren't Always a Drag!

I delivered the final final of the thesis to my Advisor's box this morning. I don't know whether she will do any last edits, but as far as I am concerned it is done. The beast ended up being 86 pages. Over 200 footnotes. Advisor has already told me what my grade will be (yes, I am smiling about it) and that should guarantee that I will graduate with honors. Sweet. A lot of hard work and some scary health challenges over these past few years, and I still managed to pull it out. God is good.

I'm glad I did the thesis, and I'm equally glad it's over.

I celebrated by swapping out the winter and summer clothes, getting the car's emissions inspection done along with the repair of the emergency flashers, getting the car washed, and having a pedicure with hot pink polish. Life is good.

I've got some work to do for the Young Adult Ministry class - will do some ethnographic work in a neighborhood near here on Thursday and I'm in the midst of writing a resource guide for working with LGBTQ young people in the parish, but I'm quite close to being done.

One of my most gifted classmates (class leader, proven fundraising track record, lovely wife and little son, articulate, bright) and I had a long conversation about the job search. He doesn't have a job yet either, while all around us there are folks with more modest gifts gainfully employed. I don't know if it makes me feel better or worse that my friend - a world-class networker - hasn't found anything yet either. All I know is that the church is doing a pretty poor job of helping seminarians find their first call, and that's a shame. But you've heard this from me before, so I'll be quiet now.

The end-of-year celebrations are beginning to start - tea with the Dean, special commissioning services, etc. I'm ready for this phase of my life to gradually come to a close. I'm also ready for something new...and I'll be so happy when I know what it is!

In any case, how can I do anything but smile with hot pink toenails?

Today's Sermon: Luke 24:36b-48

If anyone wonders whether or not knowing Christ is a full-body experience, this passage from the Gospel of Luke answers those doubts.

I mean, after all…broiled fish?

It is a little surprising, that line about the broiled fish, isn’t it?

Easter time, all that talk about Jesus’ glorious resurrection, and we’re talking a little halibut here.

Sort of brings it back down to earth. You can smell the rich salty aroma of the fish, can’t you? Maybe a little rice, some pita bread, a cup of wine…Jesus fed the 5000 with some bread and some fish, and now here he is, asking for a bit of what he offered back in the early days of his ministry.

And that’s the whole point of this gospel passage: Jesus wants to bring it back down to earth, to prove that he is back down to earth. And how does he do it? With a little nosh. Some broiled fish, to be specific.

Luke tells us that the apostles already knew that Jesus had risen from the dead – they were talking about it among themselves when Jesus showed up – but even though they knew that Jesus had risen, when he showed up, they were frightened. They thought they were seeing a ghost. They didn’t fully understand that he was real. So he invited them to touch him, to see that he was real, to see his hands and his feet (because in that culture, ghosts were not supposed to have hands or feet) .

He understood that they needed the full-body experience of the risen Christ to understand all that had happened.

Before he addressed their fear and mental confusion, reminding them of the prophecies fulfilled in him, before he opened their minds to the scriptures, before he called on them to act as witnesses to the repentance and forgiveness of sins that his passion and death brought…before he did any of these things, he let them touch him, and he sat down and ate with them.

Knowing Christ is a full-body experience.

It is no wonder that those who are on a spiritual journey speak of their hunger to know truth, to know God. It is a gnawing in the gut, that hunger. It is visceral. It is no wonder that at the important markers of our lives – birth, marriage, death – physical acts like food or dance or even special clothing are a necessary piece of living into transitions. It is not only about the spirit – it is about the body as well.

And since I’m the sort of person who tends to live “in her head,” I need to preach this to myself regularly.

I think of a time when I had to meet someone who had betrayed me. Not surprisingly, I was feeling ill at the very thought of having to be in the same room as him. As I sat in a chair in the room, wondering what would happen next, wondering if I could stand the anger and the pain that I felt, I prayed that Jesus would be with me. I prayed that I could get through the meeting with my dignity and my roiling stomach intact. I prayed for the physical sensation that Jesus was with me, that I was not alone in this time when I felt abandoned and isolated and in the wilderness, much like those disciples, trying to figure out what would happen next.

And Jesus was there with me. I felt his arms around me, a warmth and a peace I hadn’t felt in a long time.

It wasn’t something I’d call a miracle. It was more like an awakening to the realization that he had been there all along. By stopping and asking to be awake to his presence, I made room to feel Jesus with me, in me, around me. Not just in my heart, but the physical sensation of his presence.

Knowing Christ is a full-body experience.

During Communion, on the fourth Sunday of every month, we have the healing rail. If you are struggling with something in need of healing, in your body or in your heart, or if you want to pray for someone you know in need of healing, you come to that rail. You kneel. The prayer team gathers around you and prays with you and for you, laying their hands on you, asking God for healing. Your forehead is anointed with blessed oil, in a ritual that dates back to Jesus and that jar of expensive nard that Mary Magdelene poured on his head, and back beyond that, to the anointing of David. The sign of the cross is made on your forehead. The warmth of those hands, the pressure of them on your head and on your shoulders, the soothing oil, the creaking of your knees, the sensation of Jesus with you, in you, around you.
Knowing Christ is a full-body experience.

In a few minutes, we will share God’s peace with one another. This isn’t a prayer that we say standing in place, our arms firmly clamped to our sides. No, here, we move, we hug, we kiss, we hold hands, we look each other in the eye for a few moments. The physical connection is the reminder of the spiritual connection.

And a few minutes after that, we will share in the bread and wine. We will commune with each other and with God in the sacrament of his body and blood. Real bread, real wine. The taste of it on our tongue, the warmth of it in our bellies and in our hearts.

This Risen Lord is a full-body experience. We cannot try to limit our relationship with God to a mere intellectual exercise. And that is why, as we end this Eucharistic meal together today, we are sent out with a dismissal : “Alleluia, alleluia – Go in peace to love and serve the Lord.” Having received the gift of the meal, God in us, we then turn around to face the world, to witness to the living Christ just as Jesus told us to in the Gospel. We do that with our voices when we share the word, with our hands when we help others, with our feet when we walk to help others….

Knowing Christ is a full-body experience. May we rejoice in that, as we approach his altar.

Amen.

Yes, It's Saturday, Folks....

...and completely out of character for me, the sermon for tomorrow isn't written yet. I've been in the midst of a full court press incorporating revisions from my outside reader into my thesis, so it can be done,done,done forever. For the sermon, I have some vague ideas about how sitting down at a meal is what makes a relationship real, how it's so easy to label someone "other" until you've shared a table with them...I'm hoping the Spirit will grace me with some more ideas and that the sermon will flow.

I showed three icons (Sophia, Paul, Angel) at the Big Old Seminary art show. Got lots of props from folks, including my thesis advisor, who doesn't know she will receive the Paul as a gift after grades are turned in. Several folks wanted to buy or commission, but that's not really what icon-writing is about, for me. I occasionally give them as gifts, but it doesn't feel like something I could ask money for.

Job search is still job search. I'm waiting for the final go-ahead from the bishop to apply for clergy-in-charge positions. I should get that okay, but I can't really do anything until he says yes officially. and I got passed over (yet again) by a nearby parish because it is a youth ministry job and I'm too old. Not that I'm bitter or anything.

I'm also thinking creatively about an idea that's a little outside the box, but would also need the diocese to buy in...still chewing on some of this stuff.

Other school stuff: there are a couple of odds and ends in my Young Adult Minsitry class to tend to, but they are quite manageable. I've got to get kicking on the research project now that the thesis is winding down.

Grateful that my eyes haven't given out yet from all the reading I've been doing (and not fun stuff, either). Amazed that in less than 30 days I will have a Master of Divinity degree.

it's time, God. Give me a job.

Thesis Redux

I got the comments from the outside reader for my thesis. 7 pages worth. He has raised some interesting questions, some that indicate he didn't read it quite as closely as my advisor did, and some that I outright disagree with. I will meet sometime over the next day or two with my advisor to figure out which we will address in the final.

He did, however, say "the exegetical discussion...is strong, well-informed, and insightful. The writing style is clear and lucid...I enjoyed reading it."

PH tells me that the reader's level of engagement with the thesis is indicative of the quality of my work, that the reader wouldn't have given me such detailed notes if this was just a blah piece of work. I'm just trying to figure out what work needs to be done to get this puppy done.

Signs of the Times

I now own several clergy shirts, plus the requisite "Clericool" collars. No, that's not me on the right. I'm much cuter!

I also now own a white stole from Juliet Hemingray in England (can't show you a picture since she blocks downloading the pictures) and a red stole from Amani ya Juu - http://www.amaniafrica.org/ - in Rwanda (that's the one on the left). I'm still planning on the purple one (my SIL may be bringing me back some purple silk from the souq in Doha). Saint Middle School might be giving me a green one as they have with seminarians in the past. The stoles are gifts out of my stole fund - a year or two ago, I told family members that in lieu of gifts, I'd like a contribution to a fund to buy these things, since they can be rather pricey.

I've already got an alb and a cassock and surplice and a black wool cape for wintertime.

Now all I need is a place to wear them. Sigh.

Friday Five (Hours, That Is)

Actually more like 5.5 hours of driving down and up Rte 95. For a 25 minute meeting, but that's okay.

The bishop said my plan made sense and we talked through some possibilities. He wants to confer with the suffragan and the coadjutor, since he will retire in a few months and they will have to live with me once he's gone, but he is still the Grand Fromage, so I am hopeful that the plan will work.

Now I need to start looking closer at some of the options and figure out how this might work...

Note to self: next time, take the car with the automatic transmission if you're going to be stuck in stop and go traffic.

Stuff

The thesis went out yesterday to the outside reader. He has two weeks to read and comment, then I've got a week to incorporate changes and give it to my advisor. She said a number of wonderful things as we wrapped it up, including "I've really become more and more convinced by your argument" and "It was a privilege to work with you on this project." Given the fact that she is well known to be over-the-top brilliant and measures the rest of the world to her ridiculously high standard, usually finding it wanting, it was very moving to hear this. Getting the thesis done in the midst of three hospitalizations and one surgery was rather insane. I'm grateful that it is (mostly) over and the thesis is (mostly) quite good.

I had an interview for a job in a lovely Southern small city near the place where Nick Nolte and Robert DeNiro had a scary movie conflict. This one is an associate job in a large multi-clergy parish. Focus on pastoral care and family ministry, which are both strengths. Sounds promising. We shall see.

I will be meeting with my bishop tomorrow afternoon to see if he will let me interview for vicar or rector jobs now, despite the fact that this isn't the norm in our diocese. I am cautiously optimistic (see below).

I had a great conversation with my field ed supervisor, who continues to insist that I am ready to be clergy-in-charge someplace, perhaps even at Saint Middle School. He was going to call the bishop this afternoon to say the bishop should let me do that. Since Field Ed Supervisor is held in very high regard by the bishop, that may help. And the fact that FES is willing to ask it of the bishop as a favor is quite wonderful. So say a prayer that the meeting with the Bishop goes well.

I'm trying to keep my game on for the last class I am taking at Big Old Seminary, but I've got a whiff of senioritis. When I stopped by the public library, I got an armload of books that wouldn't qualify as edifying by anyone's standards. On the other hand, the last time I was there, I found a book that gave me a great quote for the last chapter of the thesis:


“This dialogue with Others has never been and will never be easy…[the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis of linguistic relativity] says that thinking is formed on the basis of language, and as we speak different languages, each of us creates his own image of the world, unlike any other. These images are not compatible and are not replaceable. For this reason, dialogue, though not impossible, demands a serious effort, patience, and the will of its participants to understand and communicate. Being aware of the fact that in conversing with the Other I am communing with someone who at the same time sees the world differently from me and understands it another way is important in creating a positive atmosphere for dialogue.”
----Ryszard Kapuściński, “The Other”

...and that is why I really love going to the library.

Easter Sermon: Noli Me Tangere

So you want to hear the story, eh? You want to hear it from this old woman, this old crone who was in that garden that day?

I’ve told it so many times over these decades since it happened. I am tired…but no.. I will tell it to you again, because I see the hunger in your eyes. You want to know what happened? Sit down there, by the door, where you can feel a breeze on this hot afternoon, and I will tell you.

It was a strange day, after an even stranger week. We started out thinking we would be sharing our Passover dinner together, in Jerusalem, a blessed time. There are others who say differently, that we had that Passover dinner, but this is my story…we dined, and the Teacher blessed that dinner, but it was no Seder…it was something else. But we hardly understood how different this meal, those days would be.

They killed him, you know. It was ugly. The chief priests had made a devil’s deal with Pilate; they had aroused the passions of the crowd. Pilate didn’t really want to do it, but shrewd politician that he was, he did the deed without taking any of the blame for his acts.

They killed him. It was vile and ugly, as crucifixions always are, but this one was even uglier, because this was a gentlest, most loving Teacher. He had done nothing wrong.

Jealousy.

Pigheadedness.

Odd to accuse those righteous priests and scribes of a quality of an unclean animal, but there it is. They refused to hear what he was teaching. They simply saw him as a threat to their established order. So they used the power of the Roman Empire to dispose of someone they hated, not because they thought his teachings were wrong or sinful, but because they thought he would take their power away.

Men! Consumed with themselves, with power, with control.

We women know better…only God has power. Only God has control.

Where was I? Yes….he died. Miserable pain. Only a little sour wine at the end to ease his agony. He died, and Pilate did the one gracious thing in his power…he let Joseph, that rich man , Arimathean, take the body of our poor dead teacher.

Good man, that Joseph. He put the Teacher’s body in his very own tomb. A nice tomb it was, freshly hewn, no animals in there, just a stone slab on which to lay him down. A hard bed, but at least a clean one. Nicodemus came, too…he brought the spices, the myrrh, the aloes. We buried him properly, wrapped in fine linen, with the spices in the folds of the cloth, as was our custom in those days. And Joseph and Nicodemus and four of Joseph’s servants heaved a great stone across the opening. None could get in to disturb dear Teacher in his resting place.

And so we left. Our eyes were dry. There were no tears left to weep. The beloved one, with his arm around Mary, Jesus’ mother…they were both beyond words. The rest of us, too, feeling nothing but the hard cold emptiness of our loss.

I could not sleep. No surprise…my mind always raced ahead at breakneck speed, trying to understand the Teacher’s beautiful words. But now there would be no more words…I wanted to repeat them, over and over, so I would never forget. But it was not enough.

And so I got up, before the sun’s rays warmed the air, and went back.

Back to the tomb, back to the Teacher. The words were not enough. I wanted…no, I needed, to be near him.

I wandered down path, tripping over stones in the darkness, hearing the cries of animals around me. I was frightened. Darkness is a harsh world. You imagine much evil that you cannot see in the dark. And evil had been all around me these past days.

When I got to the cave where we had buried him, I stopped. I thought it was a trick of the light, as the sun crept over the horizon…no…it was true…the stone was rolled away. There could be only one reason – some evil ones had rolled away that stone and taken the Teacher’s body.

I had been frightened walking in the dark…now I was even more frightened, and angry, too. Who had done this? Where had they taken him? It was more than I could bear…first they killed him, then they took him. Why? To what purpose?

So I turned and I ran. I ran faster than I had ever run before, most certainly much faster than these old legs could carry me now. I found Peter and the beloved one, and told them…He’s gone. Someone has taken him from the tomb. I don’t know where he is.
And now they were running, the two of them, running even faster than I had, and the beloved one – oh how he loved the Teacher! – he got there first, but when he looked in and saw, he would not go in. But Peter, he did go in, and it was a strange thing he found there…

The linens cloths, neatly folded. The head wrapping rolled up separately on the slab. But no Teacher. And the beloved one went in, too, and saw it…they did not know what to make of it, I tell you, nor did I. They said not a word to me, but their faces were greatly troubled…they simply left. Walked back home.

But I could not leave. This was the final insult to my dear teacher, to have him taken from us by death and now by…what? Who? I did not know. So I sat on the ground and wept.

I had thought my tears were spent. I was wrong. I cried, and I looked into the tomb.

You know, it is foolishness to look once and see nothing, then look again as if something might magically be there. And perhaps I was a fool to look, but I did, as if I could once again imagine his body there as we had left it.

This fool looked, and saw something beyond belief…two angels. Perhaps I was mad with grief, but I tell you now, they were real. There were two of them sitting on that cold hard slab of rock, one at the head, one at the foot. They saw me weeping there, and asked me why I wept.

Why did I weep? Why should I not weep? The pain..first, to see the Teacher killed, then to have his body removed from the tomb? Such ridiculous questions…I turned away again in my anger.

And there was a man standing there. I thought he was the gardener at first…his face was in shadow, my eyes were blinded by my tears. And he asked the same question “Why are you weeping? Whom do you seek?”

I thought he might have been the one to take the Teacher away, so I asked him where he had put him…

My eyes were blinded by my tears, but my ears were not. I should have recognized that voice, shouldn’t I? But it was only when he said my name, “Mary” that I knew. It was my teacher. He was alive…I reached for him

Dear Teacher, let me touch you and hold you! Let me embrace you!

But he said no.

I could not touch him. He would not let me.

But the tomb was empty! He was alive! He had conquered death!

I wanted to embrace him.

But he had something else in mind… to tell the others what I had seen, and that he was ascending to the father in heaven.

I wanted to hold on to the old Teacher, the man I had known, had anointed with nard, had dined with. But this Teacher was something new and wondrous. He was no longer someone for human embrace…all I could say to the others was the truth “I have seen the Lord.”

So that, my young friend, is the story. The years have taught me what I did not understand then. The human embrace would never have been enough. It was when I embraced this risen Teacher by living as he taught me, by teaching others as he so often did, by loving my brothers and sisters with the depth of the oceans and by loving my God more than anything or anyone….that was the true embrace. The miracle of that moment in the garden was the release from clinging to the man so that I could reach out with those same hungry arms to hold on to the world that he came to save.

And I am tired now. Even now, decades later, the story still has the power to make me emotional. I have tried to be faithful to the Teacher, and I suppose the best way I know to do that is to pass on the story to the young ones, like you.

So will you go and do the same? I would like that, and I know that the Teacher would, too.

Amen.

So Here's the Deal...

The standard model of post-seminary life is that one gets a job as an assistant in a parish for a few years.

That model works well if you're young, (generally) male, and you want to focus on youth ministry, since most rectors want someone to bring in young families, and it is their perception that young deacons/priests do that.

I am not young chronologically. I have done youth ministry, and can do it well, particularly if the work is around recruiting, motivating, and training lay persons to do the work. Junior High lock-ins, not so much.

Nevertheless, it has become clear that I have a tough time even getting into an interview because committees and rectors look at my resume and think "Hmmm, middle-aged female. Academic chops, great preacher, lots of major league life experience. This is not what feels like a youth ministry assistant." And the resume goes into the B or C pile.

As I've mentioned before, this passing over has happened several times now, and in one case I was told I was overqualified for such a job.

So here's the epiphany moment: yes, I am overqualified for most of these jobs. So maybe these aren't the jobs I should be applying for. Maybe my husband, my Field Ed supervisor, and the last guy who turned me down for a job are right.

Henceforth, I'll be focusing my efforts on vicar and rector positions. Smaller places with challenges like prior conflict, dwindling membership in changing neighborhoods, confusion about their mission. Calls that would utilize my skills in conflict resolution, transitional ministry, and administration as well as preaching, pastoral care, and spiritual formation.

Now, this bucks the Standard Operating Procedure in a number of ways. I will be ordained to the Transitional Diaconate right after I graduate, so there is that sticky problem of what to do about Eucharist for the six months between ordination to the diaconate and priesting...not insurmountable, since there are retired priests in many of the areas where i'm looking at positions. If I stay in this diocese, I would need for my bishop to do something that hasn't been done here before in approving a deacon to take the reins of a parish. it's been done successfully elsewhere, though. And if I didn't think I could make a good case for it, I wouldn't be going down this road.

This will also most likely mean it will take me a bit longer to find a job than I thought, but Lord knows I'm not beating off offers right now.

Don't know, but it feels like the Spirit nudging me. What do you think?

Random Dots of Monday

• I emailed the final draft of the thesis to my advisor and will meet with her tomorrow at 2 to go over it. When I saw her today and told her it was done, she gave me a hug. She is by nature a very reserved person, so it felt rather like a hug from Queen Elizabeth. Then again, QEII tolerated an arm around her back by our First Lady last week, so I suppose all sorts of miracles occur. We shall see if the advisor still wants to hug me after she reads all 70+ pages of the thing.

• Still not much happening on the job front. I have decided to put it all aside until after Holy Week, since I've got the revisions to the thesis to do, plus sermons for Good Friday and Easter as well as presiding at our Tenebrae service tomorrow night and the Good Friday service, plus assisting at Maundy Thursday and Easter, and singing the Vittoria Improperia at the Good Friday morning service at Big Old Seminary. I'm bummed that I'm not working anywhere where I could chant the Exsultet, but maybe next year, wherever I am.

• I was pleasantly surprised when I checked into the price of auto insurance with the company that has the spokesGecko. Turned out they will charge me some $800 less per year than the company we have been with for the past several years, namely the one with the spokesSnoopy. The gecko is, after all, leaner than the beagle.

• StrongOpinions is back at school after her last week's meltdown. We've got her hooked up with some resources up there that I hope will help the remainder of the semester go more smoothly. I love her madly, but it was not a good week for her to have a meltdown. I suppose it could have been worse - it could have been this week, and I would have required much chocolate and red wine to get through it all. I will still need the chocolate and the wine for this week, just in slightly lesser quantities.

• I wrote an email to a deployment officer in a diocese not my own that shall remain nameless and got a rather snarky reply: "We are the coolest most desirable diocese on earth and everyone wants to come here, so why should we be interested in you? Why are you wasting my precious time?" Oh, dear, I thought we were the church or something. I thought perhaps I was overreacting to it so I passed it along to PH, who shook his head and suggested that it was downright rude. Proves once again that the church is a human institution with all the attendant human frailties.

• I finished the icon of Sophia, the Wisdom of god. She is off getting varnished. I hope to have her back next Saturday, at which time I will post a picture of the very strange but lovely finished product. Next in the queue is an icon of Christ Pantocrator.

• We went out to dinner with in-law family (sister-in-law's brother and wife and daughters). It was a lovely evening, but that glass of sangria with dinner and another glass at their hotel suite after dinner really whomped me one. Getting up today was a challenge, and I'm still not feeling 100%. Lovely evening otherwise, although they would have been game to chitchat for another hour or two when we said we had to leave at 10 pm. We are old wusses, I guess.

• The prayers for the week, then, are that two sermons get written, that all the bulletins I've modified and proofed for this week for Saint Middle School are printed with no fatal errors, that the revisions from the advisor are within the realm of reasonability, that I will be able to fit into my rather snug cassock, and that God gives me some hints on the job front. Oh, and no rain on Sunday morning for our outdoor service on the land.

Prayer for today:

Thank you God for the wonderful sermon by DG at noon Eucharist at BOS. It was just what we all needed to refocus. Thank you, too, for folks who care even in the midst of their own struggles, and for Saint Middle School, where I have been given extraordinary responsibilities and have been applauded for my work. Keep me focused on what is really important this week. Keep me from obsessing over things I cannot change. Hold me in your hand when I feel small and in need of warmth. Bless me and give me the courage to do your work, because it is only with you and through you and in you that the work really gets done.

In your name we pray.

Amen.

Mostly Because I Need To Remind Myself of This Every Day

MY LORD GOD, I have no idea where I am going.
I do not see the road ahead of me.
I cannot know for certain where it will end.
Nor do I really know myself, and the fact that I think that I am following your will does not mean that I am actually doing so.
But I believe that the desire to please you does in fact please you.
And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing.
I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire.
And I know that if I do this you will lead me by the right road though I may know nothing about it.
Therefore will I trust you always though I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death.
I will not fear, for you are ever with me, and you will never leave me to face my perils alone. ~Thomas Merton

(TOH to RDM, who brought this prayer back to the forefront of my memory.)

Page Count Update - Thursday Edition

Now 71 pages, and pretty much done. I've got maybe a page more to do on the conclusion section, and another page to finish excursus II. Then it's all copy-editing. It should be ready for the advisor on Monday morning. Wow.

Various and Sundry

Only added one more page to the thesis today - a lot of stuff to be tended to that made the day get away from me. Tomorrow will be productive. I swear it!

Another turn-down on a job, but for a novel reason: I am "overqualified." Don't know whether to laugh or cry. Thank goodness I had a meeting with my spiritual director today.

Time to do some more reading....