Oh,Holy Night

Oh, the beauty, the joy, the peace, the mystery of Christmas Eve Candlelight Services. At the Watchung Avenue Presbyterian Church in North Plainfield, the early service included the Children's Christmas Pageant. What is it in us all that just delights so much in seeing the children we love so dearly dressed up as angels and shepherds, as Mary and Joseph and the wise men? Singing` Silent Night', as candlelight fills the dark corners of the sanctuary blesses us individually and as a congregation—that song in particularly seems to bring the Holy Spirit into our lives, especially when we have prepared room for that Spirit—for the Christ reality.

After the children's pageant, a young soprano soloist offered up the great hymn, `O Holy Night.' Her voice was pure, lilting, just extraordinary. That hymn is rarely sung in the church, except on Christmas Eve. Musically, the hymn is a challenge with some notes that few people can reach. But the text of the hymn proclaims something of the gift and threat that come from the birth of Christ. One line sings out to the world—

    Long lay the world in sin and error pining

    Till He appeared and the soul felt its worth.

Indeed for Christians, the Incarnation through the person of Jesus is partly about this glorious gift to us of knowing our own worth in the eyes and heart of God. We are the beloved son, the beloved daughter of God, called to transformation and discipleship. This is the good news, this is the Gospel of the Lord—thanks be to God.

But Jesus, the Christ of God, is more than the baby in the Manger. And `O Holy Night' moves on. The third verse proclaims to the world and all that dwell therein--`In His Name all oppression shall cease.' At first, we take a deep, deep breath and feel the life giving words flow into us. The power, the glory, the mystery of Jesus is dedicated to the elimination of all oppression. So that means, O thank God, that all those people and systems that oppress me are contrary to the reality of Christ and so contrary to the will of God. God's purposes are gradually being worked out so this also means that God is working to destroy those systems of oppression and to restrain and control people who are the oppressors. Our hearts are filled to overflowing with rejoicing.

Then comes the moment when we are shocked into a new realization. Jesus would have a word with us and speak to us about how we are the beneficiaries of various systems of oppression and how we consciously and unconsciously participate in those systems. The temple and Rome embodied oppression during Jesus earthly life. Speaking and living over against those systems of oppression brought Jesus to torture and to death at Golgotha. God is working to dismantle and destroy those systems of oppression and I as an educated, white, male, heterosexual, American, Christian pastor have benefited from those systems. I pray that I will have the gift of rejoicing at the destruction of those systems of oppression. `In His Name, all oppression will cease' and all God's people will sing `Joy to the world the Lord has come.'

Then Jesus shocks us again. By his mysterious life and glories eternal reality he infuses us with the understanding that God works in us and through us. So we who sing the songs of Christmas are now enrolled in the Jesus army—that army's just cause is to end oppression—our weapons are truth and courage and love and hope. The enemy forces are arrayed in frightening power against us as they were arrayed against Jesus and his disciples. The battle is painful—many will perish and part of us must perish. But finally, somewhat in this life and completely in the next life, the purpose of God will triumph. Every soul will know its worth—and all oppression shall cease.

 

Divinum Mysterium

My brother reminded me of categories we had once used to describe the origins of religion. Religion has roots in Manipulation, Morality, Mortality and Meaning. Previous blogs have addressed some of the issues around Manipulation. Mike Huckabee has unloosed these issues with a vengeance--does his candidacy have the blessings of God? Is he God's will for America? Yikes!

The great gift of religion is to challenge and bless folks in their quest to find and form meaning in their interior life and their life in community. Last Sunday we sang Of the Father's Love Begotten--the music was composed in the 11th century with a beautiful monastic feel and carries the title Divinum Mysterium. Indeed, underlying and flowing in and out of all the other sources of religion is our hunger for and fear of and joy in the Divinum Mysterium.

Why fear you might ask? Reading the gospels, hearing and saying yes to the call of Christ, bearing witness to one's faith, listening to the stories of saints, we must be afraid. When virtually all the early leaders of your faith tradition are tortured and martyred, surely one has a right to fear. Certainly we may have faith in the next reality, but we don't want to put that faith to the test prematurely.

When I have had visions that I believe are of God, I am grateful and fearful.

Christmas asks us many questions. but surely one goes something like this--do you really want to experience even a little bit of the divine mystery, the divinum mysterium.

Pascal was a french philosopher and scientist. His journal from 1654 describes his encounter with the mystery. `From half past ten to half past twelve, Fire!'Not the God of the philosophers and scholars. the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Certitude.Certitude.Emoiton.Joy.Peace.'

Meiser Eckhardt says,"To serve god with fear is good, to serve god out of love is better, but to love God while fearing him is best of all."

at Christmastime,amongst all the activities and festivities, we celebrate finally one powerful expression of the explosive and blessed confrontation between humankind and the Divinum Mysterium.

Christian Resistance

In the late sixties, I participated in the draft resistance movement as part of the effort to stop the war in Vietnam. Our symbol was the Greek letter omega, which also represented resistance in physics. So as a Christian, even one loaded down with questions and skepticism, I was part of the Christian resistance.

While religion can be and has been used to control and exploit people, it has also been fuel and fire for movements of liberation and resistance and revolution.

The film Amistad tells the story of a revolt on a slave ship bound for the Caribbean coming in the 1840's. The Africans are put on trial, somewhere in New England. The leader speaks with bone chilling power and says `I want free.' The film sears our consciousness with the pain and demonic evil of slavery.

As the slave ships were leaving Africa, priests were shown blessing them on their way. We know pieces of the story of the churches complicity with the evils of slavery. Religion has been and is now used to exploit and even enslave people. As I mentioned in the last blog, that is clearly one of the purposes of religion.

How do we do battle against those systems of exploitation that live in our society and in our consciousness?

At the trial of the Africans, Christians opposed to slavery, some Quakers and some Congregationalists, protest against the slave trade and work to support the Africans. Resist evil. Resist the draft and the war. Resist those systems of exploitation that brutalize God's people and God's world.

Jesus overthrew the tables of the moneychangers in the temple saying that the temple system had become a system of exploitation, a den of robbers. Follow Jesus into the temples of today's robbers and tear the place apart. I mean, isn't that what the Bible says. Isn't that what following Jesus is about? Indeed, remember what Jesus did and then go and do likewise.

In the Watchung Avenue Presbyterian Church, we faithfully and joyfully sang the great hymn O Holy Night at the late service on Christmas Eve. The lyrics include a phrase saying that this holy night is about the soul feeling its worth. The incarnation embodies the beauty, mystery and holiness of the human body/soul. All souls are worthy, honorable, redeemable, loved ultimately by the Creator even as they are being called to radical repentance.

And the song proclaims that `in his name all oppression shall cease.'

Of course, oppresssion continues to rage through the world. Of course, religious peole and institutions use power, sometimes hocus-pocus power, to exploit and even kill people. But that is not what the Incarnation is about. That is not why Jeuss came to dwell among us full of grace and truth. He calls us oer the tumult of life's wild and restless seas to resistance. Christian resistance.

History has answers

Our question is why is there religion at all. Not many of you wanted to respond, maybe because it is one glorious and scary and dicey question to begin with.

Whether one considers oneself to be religious or non religious, it would seem to be helpful to know why this religion stuff exists to begin with. If we don't have some clear understanding of the various reasons that religion exists, of the various and even contradictory purposes that it serves, then how can we be religious with any intelligent self consciousness?

Part of one response to my previous blog, included the phrase, history has the answers.

Indeed, we can reflect on the history of the people's of the world and our own personal history and then discover one of the uses, the purposes of religion. Clearly, religion is used to control and oppress people.

Walter Brueggeman is a great biblical scholar, dynamic speaker and prolific author. He wrote a short piece about Joseph, Pharaoh and power. He reminded us, that Joseph used his powers of interpreting dreams not only to save his own skin, but to help Pharaoh. From Pharoah's dreams,Joseph had understood that there would be seven years of plenty followerd by seven years of famine. So Joseph stored up the grain in the good years and when famine struck, he brought under Pharaoh's power all the land and people of Egypt.Buy low--sell high. Genesis 47 says that "...as for the people, he made slaves of them from one end of Egypt to the other.Only the land of the priests he did not buy;for the priests had a fixed allowance from Pharaoh." Joseph who himself had been enslaved now becomes the enslaver--his actions are despicable, but he was just being a savvy businessman and a good Egyptian.

In the midst of this human and economic crisis, the priests were allowed to keep their land. Even then, said Brueggeman, the empire needed priests to bless its power and control over others.(Are we 21st century religous types guilty of blessing modern day empires/systems of oppression?)

When I was traveling in Russia, some of this was clear. The church during the Romanov dynasty was expected to bless the Tsar's wars, just like the state churches throughout Europe were expected to support their nation's rulers. That is part of the sad history of the West.

We remember other histories. The crusaders go into battle screaming God Wills It. In the movie El Cid, the Spanish battle the Moors and the battle cry is `For God, For King,For country.' The Klan lynch and burned Negroes defending white Christian civilization. The Catholic Church massacred the Albigensian Christians. Parents over children. Men have oppressed women. The priests/pastors/charismatic leaders have exploited the followers. The Tutsis over the Hutus. The Aztecs over the local tribes. And on and on it goes. People have shaped, created, exploited religion to justify their exploitation of others.

This is one of the reasons we do have religion. Pharoah and all his friends and fellow travelers find it quite useful to appear to have God on there side. Well,at least, that is what the Bible says.

Why do we have religions at all?

Chris Gibbs holds a Ph.D.in history from the University of Missouri. During the Vietnam War, he served in the military police in Vietnam. He is a novelist and professor of history.Several years ago Chris was asked to respond to a paper given by a Princeton Seminary professor who spoke at our meeting of regional Presbyterian leaders. Chris's comments were quirky, off-the-wall,vaguely heretical. So I really liked him and what he had to say.

Chris attended a class for potential new members at the Watchung Ave.Presbyterian Church where I served for 29 years. I asked the class to share any questions they had about God, religion, the Bible, the Church, the person of Jesus. With a playful smile, Chris said he had a question. "Why do we have religion at all? Where does religion come from?"

Now I was both amused and challenged. "I will have to think about that question some Chris. Let's all think about it for the next class and then we will share our insights."

So the question, my friendly readers, is indeed why do we have religion--what are the sources of the religious impulse. Please send your comments or emails.

Father Charlie Hudson radiated joy and hope and love..

Charlie Hudson,Catholic priest, created the Center for Hope Hospice with a nurse and friend of his named Peggy Coloney. He was a man of large soul. We became friends about 25 years ago and he would preach in our Presbyterian church and led retreats for us and counsel grieving individuals.

His friendship changed my life. In times of difficulty,I would remember that he was there, cheering for me. When life was abundant, his eyes rejoiced so deeply for me. His presence throbbed with the mysterious and generous love of God.

Charlie had had a heart attack and was a little overweight. He had excellent doctors who designed a cardiac rehab program. As instructed, he was exercising on a treadmill, when another heart attack came. He did not survive. Since he had served God and the people so long and energetically and joyfully, thousands and thousands came to his funeral. Those thousands offered prayers and remembrances and donations of money and time to further memorialze him.

Like Sean Taylor, Charlie believed that when your time comes, it comes.

Since I was jogging on a treadmill when I first read Sean Taylor's comments and since I have survived cardiac arrest, I thought of Charlie. Two of his brothers and his father died when he was in his early twenties. That pain was part of what led into such deep compassion. He certainly had wrestled with all these issues of God's will and death's timing and life's meaning for many years. Yet,we saw God and death and destiny differently. We loved each other none the less. The differences in our perspectives enriched our lunchtime conversation.

Somewhere, the philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche wrote: "But how can we find ourselves again? How can man know himself?... the youthful soul should look back on life with the question:what have you truly loved up to now, what has drawn your soul aloft, what has mastered and at the same time blessed it? Set up these things...before you and perhaps they will give you... the fundamental law of your own true self...for your real nature lies not buried deep within you but immeasurably high above you... There are other means of finding oneself...but I know of none better than to think of one's educators."

I rejoice in the Spirit's giving me Charlie Hudson as teacher of my soul, as friend of my journey.

Does the Spirit not give teachers of power and praise to all of us?

Sean Taylor is Dead

Sean Taylor was an all star football player. He was murdered this week and died at the age of 24. Shot by an intruder, he was protecting his 18 month old child and the child's mother.

Wednesday I was on the treadmill at Gold's Gym. ESPN flashed words that Sean had spoken some time ago. "It is important not to fear death. when your time comes, it comes. I've been blessed by God.I'm happy."

His life had taken some rough turns and he had been involved in some dicey activities,even before his tragic death. Certainly,family and friends and those of us who only know him through the media, can find a sad contentment that he was happy in himself, before he died.At least that is what he said.

Is it true though that `When your time comes, it comes.' Does God, Fate,Nature allow each person only so many days of breath and life? If that is true, then why do we bother intervening in situations where we are confronting disease? IF God has already decided the number of our days, why bother with doctors or medicine or nutrition or exercise. I think the philosophers characterize this attitude as Fatalism--and yes, in some ways it may help us overcome our fear of death. But as I have argued in earlier posts, I certainly don't believe it.

We can overcome some of our fear of death by faith in some kind of afterlife. Of course, it may just be wishful thinking. But for some of us, we have confidence that something of our essence continues on into the next reality and that confidence is based on our personal experiences as well as the testimony of others.

I choose FAITH over FATALISM. What do you think? How do you choose?

Icons and Spirit

My host in Moscow was a professor of linguistics and a devout member of the Russian Orthodox Church. In the bedroom where I stayed, she had faithfully arranged a dozen icons on a wall. On the facing wall, at the same height, she had placed maybe 20 family photos. I found the juxtaposition inspiring.

I have come to believe that God is revealed to us more through the spiritual struggles and stories of family and friends than through the stories and legends of the saints. I believe that God works in our lives, giving us dreams and visions, guiding us and chiding us and blessing us along the way. Certainly, too, the world has been enriched, especially by the spiritual autobiographies of people from Augustine to Annie Lamott. But God calls us especially to look into our own story, our own memories, there to find the spirit.

God is revealed to us sometimes in icons--but especially in those photos of our family and friends and all that lives behind their pictures. My host's grandfather was murdered by Stalin--her father jailed--released to fight for 4 years in the tank corps during WWII--her mother at 84 is still energized and heroic. Our special photos speak to us of the long journey of family and friends to find meaning and happiness,love and hope.

Those photos too remind us of how people betray the image of God within them. Family and friends and we ourselves, sometimes, distort love and abuse one another.Sin and evil abide in us all.

But some days,some moments, sometimes the light of eternity shines through us. And some days, some moments, sometimes, the light of eternity has shone through others. That light has been light to us in times of terror and darkness on our journey.

As the light of God shines through other souls, we receive light for the path and then we sometimes become light for others. The light we receive and the light that guides us and the light we share is not constant like the sun. Nor is it fleeting like a shooting star. This light is intermittent, irregular, sometimes unavailable when we feel in desperate need, sometimes a surprising interruption when we feel complacent.

So yes, for some folks icons open their hearts and minds to the mystery of God. But is it not true that God comes to us, intermittently, through our family and friends, through our life's journey and so through those precious photos that tell something of who we are?

Chaos and the Bridge of San Luis Rey

My host in Moscow gave me an icon of St.Grigory slaying the dragon of chaos. St. Grigory is the patron saint of Moscow. I became intrigued by the contrasting images of Grigory slaying the dragon and Peter controlling, the writhing, but still living serpent/dragon in Falconet's statue of the Bronze Horseman.

The dragon is an ancient symbol of chaos with the nuance that chaos itself is often thought of as evil. Does chaos sometimes come into our lives bringing disruption, destruction and sometimes even death? Does that chaos come from God or does it just happen?

Recently we rented a movie version of The Bridge of San Luis Rey, with Robert de Niro and Kathy Bates and a great cast. Published in 1927, the novel tells the story of a monk who investigates the lives of 5 people killed where a bridge collapses in Peru.

The movie was disappointing but led me to reread Thornton Wilder's Pulitzer Prize winning novel, The Bridge of San Luis Rey. The book is only 117 pages--so please go for reading the book, because such a deep compassion for the human reality flows through it. Somehow, the movie just doesn't evoke that same deep emapthy for our struggle for life and love and meaning and happiness. The Thornton Wilder Society's website says that Wilder wrote the book partly in tension with his father's Puritan sense that God controls life, rewarding the good and punishing the wicked.

Wilder is quoted a saying "Strict puritans imagine God all too easily as a petty schoolmaster who minutely weighs guilt against merit.They overlook God's caritas which is more all encompassing and powerful. God's love has to transcend his just retribution. But in my novel I have left this question unanswered. As I said earlier, we can only pose the questions correctly and clearly and have faith one will ask the question in the right way."

One thing the movie does extremely well is to help us understand the political implications of this question about God's control of life. The viceroy and the archbishop burn at the stake the Franciscan monk who dares suggest that maybe God does not control and ordain all natural events and bless all power arrangements. God and chaos--is it a war to the death or is it a dance that embraces life and death.

At the end of the story, the Abbess who runs homes for the sick and orphans as well as for the sisters reflects on the lives of those who died. 'Now learn', she commanded herself,'learn at last, that anywhere you may expect grace.'

Chaos and unexpected grace!

Moscow

Even more than most cities that I have been in, Moscow bursts with contrasts and contradictions. Under Stalin, the Russian government destroyed thousands of churches. Some were converted to swimming pools or warehouses or stables. Now the government is building Russian Orthodox Churches, including a new Cathedral downtown. I believe that this was the church originally built to celebrate the Russian victory over the Turks in 1877. A powerful statue of Tsar Nicholas II dominates the courtyard outside the church. Nicholas appears regal and in control of his mighty empire. Didn't quite turn out that way.

Riding the wonderful metro system, the traveler gets off at the Kropotkinshaya Station, named to honor Prince Kropotkin. Kropotin died in 1921 at the age of 78. He was an explorer and geographer and author--and also an anarchist socialist, who was jailed for his revolutionary activities in Russia and France. He supported the February Revolution and was dismayed by the Bolsheviks.

Kropotkin is buried at the Novedichny Monartyer. Visiting the monastery with a friend, we listened reverently to the sisters chanting the liturgy of the Russian Orthodox Church in Chruch Slavonic, a language which most worhsippers do not understand. The music is glorious, the mood solemn and mysterious. From the icons, intense eyes watch the faithful.

One particular painting on the ceiling suprises me. Jesus and God are jointly crowning Mary, Queen of Heaven while the Holy Spirit in the form of the dove hovers nearby. Since the Greek word for spirit is feminine, the painting proclaims a dramatic balance between the masculine and feminine in the mystery and reality of God. I think Carl Jung would have approved.

An Orthodox priest spoke with us. He had become a priest after perestroika, when he was married and middle aged and established in his career. Then and now, with the church's resurgence, there was a high demand for priests. At his ordination, he removed his wedding ring symbolizing that he was now married to the church. I sensed parishioner's deep veneration for their priests.

Since I had seen icons in 5 art museums and a dozen churches,I asked him about their role in religious life. Without hesitation, he said that there are many miracle working icons in Russia today. Respectfully, I listened.

I had determined to come to Russia to observe and learn and especially to be reverent before other people's religious experiences. Feeling privileged, I had observed parts of 4 Orthodox services, including ones at Novedichny and the Nevsky Monastery in Petersburg. Now though I thought to myself, this focus on icons doesn't make sense to me. Yes, icons have a deep beauty. But those elongated faces, piercing eyes and lips that never smile don't carry spiritual power for me.

I remember the scene from Tolstoy's War and Peace. In 1812, before the battle of Bordodino,as Napoleon threatens to capture Moscow and destroy the Russian army, the holy icons are brought out of the churches to the battlefield. Officers and soldiers kneel and pray in reverence,yearning to be blessed and strengthened for battle. The battle is indecisive, but Napoleon's aura of invincibility is dispelled. The icons had been brought by the priests to the battlefield for the soldiers, for the army, for Holy Mother Russia.

The Tsars, of course, wanted people to believe that God blessed them and their cause in battle. God would lead them to victory. After victory, after the destruction of our enemies, we will say prayers and build churches.

Visiting the Russian Empire, I struggled as always to think about the dynamics of the American Empire. This crusader, holy war mentality in 1812 or 1877 or 2007 is just archaic barbarism,isn't it, and condemned by the revelation of Christ.

The Bronze Horseman

While traveling in Russia, I had the privilege of speaking with a group of university students in Moscow who were majoring in computer programming and languages. Wonderful, bright, hope-filled young people. I told them that I had been blessed and challenged by the experience of thinking about the American Empire while I was traveling and reflecting on the Russian Empire. They seemed to understand.

Our topic was America in the sixties and the civil rights movement and the antiwar movement. They remembered hearing about the hippies. I assured them that yes there were some hippies, but really few in comparison to the total student population.

We were thinking together about empires. The week before I had been in St.Petersburg. In the evening, I walked from my small hotel on the Moika Canal to the square behind the Hermitage/The Winter Palace. On this plaza, Father Gapon and others led tens of thousands of people in the winter of 1905. With icons and placards they implored the help of the tsar. They sought food and work and hope and recovery from the humilaition of the defeat by Japan. But Nicholas was not at home. The Cossacks guarding the palace fired into the demonstrators killing hundreds.

I walked on along the Neva River. The city is lite in spectacular fashion. Awe is a great word. Be prepared for awe as you walk the banks of the Neva and look out to the Fortress of St.Peter and St.Paul. (Why would anyone name a fortress, prison, torture center after Peter and Paul?)

A long walk it is to the incredible statue of Peter the Great, called the Bronze Horseman. But coming up on it a nigth, having passed through the square where hundreds died in 1905, seeing the beauty and brilliance of the buildings along the Neva, I was stirred to see the statue of Peter. Only a few other people were there. My camera couldn't take a good picture and I didn't find one of the statue at night on Flickr. So maybe a friend will send us one; or I or one of you will have to go back with a better camera.

Peter sits forcefully astride a beautiful and powerful horse. A snake, still very much alive and so a threat, writhes under one of the horse's hoofs. Beneath the snake, carved in granite, are the powerful waves of the Neva and through them of all oceans, all watery chaos.

The symbolism of Falconet's sculpture,paid for by Catherine the Great is clear. A powerful ruler, a great autocrat, like Peter, and by the way like me,Catherine,masters the forces of man and nature, builds whatever the cost,in order to hold back the waters of chaos. Catherine's name on the statue is in the same size letters as Peter's. God bless Peter, God bless Catherine, as they lead us at whatever cost to victory over chaos, over the waters, over our enemies.

But the snake is not dead, only under the horse's hoof, for the time being.

The funeral director

This morning I led a funeral for a very troubled man who died from a ruptured spleen in Hawaii. I had known him and his family for 30 and been in a variety of painful and difficult situations with him.

Riding to the graveside, the funeral director and I were talking. He said that the typical cost of nursing home care in our area ranged from $7000 to $10000 per month. When people have less than $2000 in assets, the government picks up most of the costs.

I said without hesitation that I had thought about the end of my life and costs for many years. Dr.Kevorkian is absolutely right, say I. People who are ready to die or choose to die now rather than drift into dementia or whatever should of course have the right to die. They should have both the means and the courage to move on to the next reality.

Jesus says I have come that you might have life and life abundant. When life abundant is no longer a possibility and given the faith in eternity that Christians supposedly carry in their hearts,of course, they are ready to let go.

Surely, people who believe that Jesus loves all the little children of the world, red and yellow, black and white, would not want to waste $10000 per month on health care from themselves when their quality of life is gone. Surely, Christians hearing the call of Jesus would say that they know that that money could mean life for maybe hundreds of children in Namibia or Bangladesh or maybe dozens in America. What we do with our money says more about what we really believe than a thousand prayers!

Love one another not in word alone, but in deed and in truth. Even when it is costly and scares the daylights out of you.



Tomorrow, we go back to Russia and religion and politics and icons.

Ibby's Cancer

Steve Caputo is a long time friend. He is an attorney and we have worked together through a housing corporation and a refugee center. In August, his vivacious, well educated, compassionate daughter, Ibby, was diagnosed with Acute Leukemia. On September 25, she sent out the email that follows from her hospital in Boston. I share it with their permission and with the firm conviction that her struggle and compassion will touch your soul.


"Hi,

I wanted to share two experiences I've had recently. The first was a few days ago.

A doctor around my age came in during morning rounds. Brigham and Women's is a teaching hospital, so many of the doctors rotate, and I am one of their learning tools. Once I figured this out, I started to resent it and have not had much patience for the young, inexperienced docs. When I first got admitted and diagnosed and my carefree life suddenly snapped into something else, I was obsessed with the age of my doctors, especially the one who told me at 1:27 AM on August 27th that I had Acute Leukemia. She looked like me. Long brown hair, dressed well, young smiley, she even had on a turquoise ring. It was like the mirror was telling me I was sick.

Anyway,the other day a young doctor comes into my room an asks me how I'm doing. I respond by asking, "Mentally, physically or emotionally?" because I am never sure what they're asking after. She said all three so I told her: I woke up depressed,I had crazy dreams and my stomach is cramping.

Then she came around the other side of the bed to listen to my lungs, etc. and she asked me how long I've been here and how I was diagnosed. I told her the story you already know: I came in a month ago because of an infection and fever; I haven't left since.

Then the most amazing thing happened. She started to cry. The doctor. She put her hands on mine and then hugged me. She said she had a Buddhist prayer wheel she would try to find to give me. She hugged me again, still crying. I told her she was a good doctor. She kept apologizing for crying and after she had washed her hands and face at the sink, she stood in front of me and said,"It's just, I'm 28, and it could be me in that bed or one of my friends".

When she left I experienced an incredible stillness. I'm her and she's me. I suspect other doctors have had this thought and I suspect other have denied it--I can tell by the way they treat me--but this doctor had this thought and let me know it. She calmed something in me.

Now I have to tell about another experience.

I woke up yesterday morning tormented by such horrible anxiety, I couldn't lift my head off the pillow and yet I couldn't keep it still.

I felt like I was suffocating. Like I wanted to crawl out of my skin and escape. Be someone else. Be on a ferry to Marhat's Vineyard. Be working at the radio station or coffee shop. Be having a completely inane conversation. Anything else. It lasted almost all day long, until around 2 pm I curled into a crying ball with my head in the lap of my brother. I'm a strong fucking independent woman. I've never experienced vulnerable like this.

Steve stroked what is left of my hair. When the moment passed, he said, "See, you got through that moment."

I've been on a steady stream of Valium since then and I finally feel on top of the panic, at least for right now.

During that panic, though, for a moment while in the fetal position, my higher self kicked in and I realized how lucky I am: I'm suffering in a hospital, where people are nurturing me, where they are fighting for my survival, where I can get drugs like Valium, where I'm consistently being loved and supported by family and friends. I thought about all the other people in this world who are also suffering--experiencing intense claustrophobia in their pain. Most don't get the perks I get.

I shared this thought with a nurse much later on in the day and she advised me not to think about other people's suffering. I did not say this to her, but I think ignoring other peole's suffering is like ignoring the inevitability of death. Blink. It's still there.

These experiences are some of what being sick is like for me.

Love,

Ibby




Her website is ibbycaputo.com

Pete Seeger:the power of struggle

For Pete Seeger to say the 'we' in 'we shall overcome' is everybody makes sense only after a lifetime of struggle. By his life and witness, by his sacrifices and scars, by his glorious successes, he has somehow earned the right to offer an image of all of us overcoming together.

But first of all, we must hold on to We shall Overcome as a source of energy and courage for people marching on picket lines and trying to register to vote and going to jail and joing hearts and hand in mass meetings. People sang it in Gdansk,in Tianimen Square, in Pretoria. Are they singing it today in Pakistan. People need to sing their souls into their various struggles for justice.

I do believe that somehow God is present in the world through Christ(and others) reconciling the world to God. I believe in ultimate reconciliation--ultimately, we shall overcome together.

In the meantime, find the songs or write the songs that give power to the people, that lift up the downtrodden, that give courage and comfort to the afflicted.

Hannah's song. Mary's song. Your song. My song.

Thank God and Pete Seeger for the power of struggle, and of song.

Pete Seeger:The Power of Song

Pete Seeger stirs my soul. Listening to his songs and thinking about his life just challenges and blesses my heart. I am grateful to God and the spirit of life and love and justice that Pete Seeger walks the earth, breathing the air and making music.

Blessedly,I saw the documentary in New York City last week about Pete's life and love and song and struggle. The movie,"Pete Seeger:The Power of Song" gives energy and joy to our struggle--because it reveals so much of the life of a humble and happy and courageous and gifted human being.

Pete Seeger and the power of his songs and singing has lifted up the hearts of millions. Let us sing and take courage. Let us sing and in singing believe that we shall overcome. Let us sing the refrain about the troops in Vietnam--bring 'em home, bring 'em home. Pete wrote a song about the Vietnam War, called "Waste Deep in the Big Muddy." The song tells of an officer who leads his soldiers into the big muddy river and as it deepens, the officer, the big fool, can only say march on, march on. The officer marches on to his death and then the troops turn and seek to escape the morass of the big muddy. Seems like we better start singing those songs again. Sounds like a reality we know today all too well.

While Pete Seeger was being blacklisted for his prewar membership in the Communist Part and his associations with people like Paul Robeson, his musical group the Weavers recorded the hit song "Goodnight Irene". Later,desperate for work, the group agreed to do a commercial for a cigarette company over Pete's strong objections on ethical grounds. He left the band. .

The movie includes rousing scenes of Pete leading groups in singing justice songs. I was on a retreat with Pete Seeger at Kirkridge Retreat Center in Pennsylvania several years ago. Maybe sixty of us sang "We shall overcome" with both nostalgia and renewed energy. Whatever kind of personal or political mess we were in, we had hope, because of one another, because of Pete and his witness, because of the power of song, because of our faith that the Lord will see us through.

Pete was asked about the song "We shall overcome", since he had written some of the verses and done so much to share the song and energize it. Who is the 'we' in the song. Who is going to overcome? "Well,the we is everybody--finally, we are going to overcome together." That's what he said.

O deep in my heart I do believe that we shall overcome someday.

The justice movement urgently calls us to start singing together again--to lift up our hearts, to mellow our souls, to give joy and clarity to our minds and courage to our lives.

Journey

Someone wrote,`Every journey has a purpose that the traveler is not aware of.' When I was anticipating traveling to St.Petersburg, I planned especially to visit the art museums and historical sites like the Cruiser Aurora and the Peter and Paul Fortress. The Aurora was part of the Baltic fleet that sailed around Africa to do battle with the Japanese Navy in 1905. The Russian fleet was destroyed and the mighty Russian Empire humiliated. As one of the few ships to survive, the Aurora returned to be anchored in the Neva River, which flows through Petersburg. The Bolsheviks won control of the soviet, the sailor's committee, on the Aurora in 1917; that control hastened the downfall of the Provisional Government. Walking the deck of the Aurora and looking across the river to the Winter Palace is to live among ghosts of war and revolution.

I think about religion and God and spiritual experience alot. I planned to visit some churches certainly. My hotel window opened onto a vista that included the cupolas of the Church of the Spilt Blood. I discovered that in Petersburg fairly recently a museum called the Museum of the History of Religion had opened. That museum featured incredible, life sized modern icons. I was so fascinated that I stepped forward for a closer look and set off the security alarm, which was designed to keep visitors at least a foot away from the icons. Musuem was sparsely visited--very quiet.I am sure that was more excitement than the staff had experienced in weeks.

In retrospect, what surprises me about my whole journey is how many worship services I ended up wandering into. I visited the Kazan Cathedral on my first evening in Russia and stood for a while with maybe 40 people as the priest chanted the service. The Nevsky Monastery complex includes Dostoevsky's grave. I went on pilgrimage to the grave site and visited the monastery chapel. I found myself in worhsip. When I arrived in Moscow, with a friend we visited and then worshiped at the Novedichny Monastery.

My heart has always been stirred by the questions of who are we, before God, and how does God dwell among us and how has religion blessed us and cursed us.

My Russian is limited. But the liturgy's carried me back to high school days, when our Russian teacher invited us to attend the Russian Orthodox Church where he was the music director. The Monastery reminded me that in those same high school years, we had visited an Orthodox monastery somewhere in upstate New York. Of course too, my thoughts turned to Father Zossima and Alyosha and the monastery of Brothers Karamazov.

Amused at myself, I thought well I have retired as a full-time minister, but I am and always will be a person on spiritual journey, pondering some and praying some.

One of the few parts of the Orhtodox liturgy that I could understand was Godpodie Pomelie. Periodically, the people would chant this phrase meaning God have mercy.I wondered how this phrase chanted over the centuries has shaped the souls of believers. Is God some kind of absolute monarch,like the tsar, and we God's humble people can only approach with an attitude of servility, pleading for mercy?

I'm sure me understanding is too simplistic. But the question of how is God really in our lives torments and blesses me and i hope it does the same for you.

Nikos Kazantzakis tells a story of an old Greek soldier coming to the gates of heaven,slinging his musket off his should and firring a shot. An angel says `Do you think God is going to open the gate, just because you fired a shot." No, says the old man,but I want God to know that I have returned from fighting the wars.

Where is god when we fight the wars? When we are on journey? When we are lonely? When we are ecstatic?

Geschichte

As we think about God and history, I remember a conference at the University of Chicago Divinity School, which I had the privilege of attending from 1967-1969.

Scholars were addressing an audience made up largely of pastors. German theologians were very much in vogue in those days. Moltmann and Bultmann and Barth and Brunner. Their ideas and categories structured many academic debates. Did anybody finally care in the congregations? No one was ever really sure. Maybe, they did,maybe they didn't; but this was seminary and our task was to think deeply about religion and worry about the application later. A good task it was and is.

Anyway, the scholars were debating and discussing the issues of history and holy history. The German words were `geschichte' and `heilgeschichte'. Back and forth the debate sometimes raged, but more often just limped along.

At the end of the day, one seasoned, gravely voiced pastor stood and spoke briefly and to the point. He said,"We've heard today a lot about geschichte and heilgeschichte, but as far as I'm concerned, it's mostly horsegeschichte."

Symbols of Conquest

The inscription on the small church monument in Moscow indicates that it was erected to thank God for the Russian victory over the Turks in 1877. With the cross ascending in triumph, the crescent is subjugated beneath.

While in Moscow,I spoke to a group of English speaking students about America in the sixties and the various movements that I had participated in.I shared with them how fascinated I was by the opportunity to reflect on the nature of the American Empire through the lens of my being in the Russian Empire. We worked our way into the issue of how nation's tell their story. One student said that as a young person he had believed that the Russian army never lost a war. Indeed, I saw no monuments to the Crimean War or the war with Japan in 1905. Yes, those Russians really just want to focus on their armies' victories.

Have you ever noticed that the History Channel offers maybe 8 or 10 times more programs about WWII than about Vietnam. When George Bush wants to drag and deceive the nation into war, he describes the enemy as part of the axis of evil. Remember the Axis, especially the Nazis--well, this is the new axis, but they are just as evil and we are as good as ever. So let's march. Onward Christian Soldiers. Wrap the consciousness of the nation as much as possible in memories of the good wars or at least the relatively good wars. Tell them the enemy is of the devil. God is on our side, because we are good Russian Orthodox Christians or good American Christians or whatever. Our cause is just and we will win. After victory, we will build some kind of monument to thank God for blessing us.

In the US, we sometimes sing,"God Bless America". I especially love the phrase where we urge God to stand beside us and guide us. But I am finally appalled at any implication that God's preoccupation is mainly to bless us Americans and to ignore or even curse those others.

At the end of Dickens' Christmas Carol, Tiny Tim cries out in joy and thanksgiving 'God Bless Us Everyone'. That's our prayer. That's our true song.

How can we come to tell the stories of all the nations, of all the people in such a way that honors everyone for are we not all children of the Creator? How do we tell our own personal story with truth and integrity? How do we tell the story of 'our people'? Who are 'our people'?

Conscience and History

I believe we are called urgently to free ourselves from the idea that God controls history and chooses some people to prosper, to win the wars and chooses other people to die.

I share a quote from the beginning of Karl Lowith's book Meaning in History.

"History no more proves or disproves the incomparable value of a singe man's righteousness and heroism in the face of the powers of the world than it proves or disproves the existence of God. Of course, individuals as well as whole nations can be hypnotized in to the belief that God or some world-process intends them to achieve this or that and to survive while others are going under, but there is always something pathetic, if not ludicrous in beliefs of this kind. To the critical mind, neither a providential design nor a natural law of progressive development is discernible in the tragic comedy of all times. Nietzsche was right when he said that to look upon nature as if it were a proof of the goodness and care of God and to interpret history as a constant testimony to a moral order and purpose--that all this is now past because it has conscience against it. But he was wrong in assuming that the pseudo-religious makeup of nature and history is of any real consequence to a genuine Christian faith in God, as revealed in Christ and hidden in nature and history."

Lowith tells us the truth, but doesn't calculate the true cost of the belief that God intends people or nations or kings or dictators to achieve this or that. Millions have been brutalized and killed, controlled partly by fear and partly by that belief. I still feel the beauty and mystery of the St.Petersburg. Yet, I hear the anguish cries of dying peasants and soldiers and women and children. When our conscience sings yes to Lowith's perspective, then we are called to battle against the deep evil of the idea that God has chosen or blessed one particular group or nation to achieve this or that, to conquer this land or that land.

NO EXCEPTIONS. GOD IS NOT ON OUR SIDE.

No Exceptions

Last Monday, I participated in a dialogue with Muslims, Jews and Christians. God knows, we need to work and think and pray our way into mutual understanding and respect.

In the mid nineties, I realized that the only mosque I had ever been in was the El Asqa Mosque in Jerusalem. Since then I have accompanied youth and adults 3 times to the Islamic Canter. I still feel very ignorant, even though I have studied Islam some and read much of the Koran. At this conference, about 50 religiously diverse folks gathered around the theme of THE LOVE OF GOD.

For decades, I have been preoccupied with the question of whether God loves one particular group of people more than other groups. Did God love Abraham and his descendants and promise the land to them? Did God love the Jews and say you are my special people and the others are second rate and second class? Did the Christian Church then receive that mantle from God and with it a mandate to evangelize with water and with the sword, when necessary. Does God have favorites? Are there exceptional peoples? Are there nations or groups who are so favored of God, that the rules of life and history don't finally apply to them?

When I was in seminary in the late sixties, we read a classic theological text by G.Ernest Wright called THE MIGHTY ACTS OF GOD. Wright claimed that God acted in history, freeing the Hebrew slaves from Egypt, creating the kingdom of Israel, rewarding and punishing the people and the kings. Having sent the prophets for guidance and judgement, God came to dwell amongst God's people in the person of Jesue. Out of the life and death and resurrection of Jesus arises the church. God intervenes in history. God can be known in the rise and fall of the nations. God ultimately chooses who wins the wars. Oh, the wheels of justice grind slow, but they grand very fine.

I believe the truth lies elsewhere. There are no exceptions. The love of God flows to all peoples(as does the judgement and discipline of God). If the love of God flows to all people then the claim that God chooses one group over another or blesses one group and really doesn't care much about the other is exposed as an effort to capture the mantle of God's blessing for a group's selfish purposes.

'God wills it' proclaimed the crusaders a millennium ago. God wills it proclaim all crusaders. In the interviews that Richard Nixon gave to David Frost, Nixon finally says with wearied frustration but with deep conviction, 'If the president does it, it can't be illegal.' This notion that I as a person am above the law or that Russia or Israel or America or South Africa is above the law has birthed great evil.

When Christians and Jews and Muslims talk together, we must address these issues or we are just being nice and wasting time.

Years ago, with a group of wonderful 5th and 6th graders, we were studying the story of the Exodus. So what to you think I asked about what the Bible says here. It says that God killed the first born children of the Egyptians in order to force Pharaoh to let the peope of Israel go free. Do you think that God would have killed children?

Their answer brought joy to my heart.

Depression

At the end of Brothers Karamazov, Alyosha seeks to rally a group of boys whose cruelty has led to a child's death. He speaks to them and he speaks to us about cherishing those precious childhood memories of joy, love and happiness. The word is true. Alyosha has left the monastery at his spiritual father's urging to find his way and his soul in the world. He is in his early twenties at the end of the novel. So maybe it is particularly true for us in our early twenties as we launch off from the shores of our biological and spiritual parents that happy memories will sustain us.

But when we are in our forties or sixties or eighties, we need new and varied sources of sustenance. In midlife, I faced a time of significant depression. I didn't seek professional therapy and wasn't on medication. My wife helped me where she could. But sometimes I shut her out. I drank more than was good for me. Several friends provided some buoyancy as I felt my psyche tossed around by violent waves.

One morning, I was journaling in response to the question--what helps me fight off the depression and find happiness. Happy childhood memories were not enough.

Then and now, I believe that four primary areas of life bless me and strengthen me and lift up my heart.

I.Sexual love brings joy and gratitude and connection with the creation of life.

II.Sports,especially basketball,for me cleanses my body and soothes my soul.

III.Spirit and the soul's journey into God challenges me and you--there is a way home.

IV.Success. The demon of depression wanted to obliterate those places in my life where good things were happening and where blessings were flowing and the fight for justice was occasionally being won.

To do battle with the enemy both outside us and within us, we need more than happy memories from childhood.


Links for Dostoyevksy

http//www.dartmouth.edu/~karamazov

http//en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fyodor_Dostoevsky

The Gift of Loneliness

Of course, loneliness can feel like a horrible curse that threatens to crush our soul. I think especially of the loneliness that sometimes comes in the midst of a loving relationship. This man or woman sitting across the table from you or lying in bed next to you, whom you love deeply, has become almost a stranger. Something huge and ugly has come between you. There is no levity, no joy, probably no sex, maybe few if any words. Some pain filled crisis in the relationship has frozen body and soul. Causes vary dramatically. But into the midst of long term loving relationships, the curse of this kind of horrible loneliness enters on some occasions. And it is as if a black hole exists between two people sucking all light and love and happiness into it. So, yes, loneliness can be a curse.

Yes, but loneliness is a gift. While traveling in Russia, I met relatively few people who spoke English. In my wonderful, small hotel in St.Petersburg, most visitors where European or Russian and we never seemed to be able to coordinate dinner plans. So for a week, I found my way to restaurants that had been recommended by a friend and ate alone. The first 3 nights I felt very uncomfortable. Self consciously, I would drink my beer slowly and hope that the service was prompt. I would look around at happy laughing couples and families and groups of students. Not many other folks dining alone. It is not an experience I have had very often.

Loneliness or being alone though leads me to think alot about my life and story and journey. I missed my wife and yearned to be able to share the days and nights with her. But then I decided to bring my journal to dinner. At a restaurant called Faces, I observed a young woman who also happened to have brought a journal and I realized it isn't such a weird thing to do. I journaled about the day but also about old memories. In the spirit I found myself carried back into my stories and the beautiful and painful soul adventures that I had shared with others. I came to love going to the restaurant alone, with my journal. I felt surrounded by a mighty cloud of witnesses from my life and I was engaged in holy dialogue with those witnesses. There is a great gift in this kind of loneliness.

Evil

Winston Churchill said of Neville Chamberlain that he had a `limited imagination for evil.' I am angry and nauseated by niceanity--that religion that turns the power of Jesus into a call to be nice. Smile--God loves you. Yes,ok--but what about the love of God and people we have loved dying excruciating deaths. What about the love of God and those faces of the starving and dying children besieged in Leningrad in 1943?

Christianity and any other religion/world view that is worth anything must have some power/some word to say/some reality to point to that will enable us to confront radical evil. Yes, we will be scared, we will be terrified, but from deep places within us and within the universe we will find courage that has had a strong imagination for evil. This courage will have been forged in the pain and suffering of our own life. This courage will have been tempered by the waters of the tears and sufferings of others. We will remember loved ones and friends and ancestors back generations. WE will honor them by telling the truth of their life and by searching out something of the truth of their times. Memory will heal us and make us strong for the battle.

In spirit, our souls connect strangely over the centuries to particular people. Oftentimes, we identify with and rejoice in the stories and struggles of people that we know though their creations and through stories others tell about them. It is as if they give some of their soul's blood to us. We can live more vibrantly, because they lived so gloriusly even with their sins and sufferings.

Back to Brothers Karamazov. One of the brothers, Ivan, torments his brother Alyosha with stories of evil done to children. According to his notebooks, Dostoevsky gathered the stories from newspaper accounts laying bare much of the evil of the human soul The chapter is called Rebellion. I will write more of Ivan in postings to come.

To be in the beautiful and fascinating city of St. Petersbuyr and to walk the streets and visit museums was a great joy. And I felt the evil present in the memories, in the stories of Petersburg,in its history, in the deaths of millions. I saw the hollow eyes of the dying children of the siege.

I want to have a strong imagination for evil. And you?

The Joy of Children

Our granddaughter celebrated her 5th birthday in October. As I wandered the streets of St.Petersburg two weeks before her birthday,my thougths often turned to her and her exuberance and joy. Children are magical. Yes, Dostoevsky is right about our being sustained by hopefully happy memories of our childhood. Even one memory he says. certainly, we all yearn and hope for ourselves and others that we have many more than one.

We fill our hearts at least part way with joy when we embrace our grandchildren or see them smile or find them happily mastering a new task. To touch and be touched by the blessed children in our lives sustains us for the battle.

Our granddaughter lives in Sweden and my wife and i spent a wonderful week with her and her mother and family. she rides her bike with joyful abandon. Hills are for climbing. Walls--well you can go over them or walk on them. Always stop and playgrounds and explore. Love life--love your little sisters--be creative--be joyful--share joy.

Yet, walking the streets of St.Petersburg, my mind was haunted by the lives and faces of other children. Something like 800000 people died in the 900 day siege of Leningrad during WWII. at the museum of Defense of Leningrad, hollow eyes stare out of the faces of 8 year old children as they pull their sled to try to find some firewood. How does the fate of children, the cruelty they/we have endured shape our soul's response to the world in which we live?

Gratitude

I offered the meditation at a memorial service last Saturday and found myself called to use a phrase of Annie Lamott's. For her, prayer that focuses on our personal reality cries out--`Thank You, Thank You--Help Me, Help Me'. That prayer was particularly relevant for the bereaved family and all of us at the service. Annie Lamott wrote a glorious spiritual autobiography that she named Traveling Mercies. She describes some of her life struggles, her battles with addictions, and issues of body image and with poverty. Somehow, there were for her traveling mercies and her journey led to a place like home and a room like happiness.

Somehow in our culture and especially in the culture of the church, we must find our way to be touched and blessed by the real life stories of true heroes of life's journey. The questions stirs me and I hope it stirs you--who do you deeply admire? Whose stories challenge your soul?Whose face causes you to cry out Thank You, Thank You? Whose presence opens your heart to the mystery of life and opens your spirit to those moments of Presence?

Several weeks ago, I was in St Petersburg. I had chosen to study Russian in 1959, my first year in high school. I was good at it and eventually went to college with the intention of majoring in Russian and physics, so i could help save America by making bombs, better than the Russian bombs. My study of Russian fortunatley led me to Dostoevsky and in particular to his great spiritual epic Brothers Karamazov. I read it 3 times in high school and many times since. In some ways, I now realize, the book saved my soul. Besides Dostoevsky though, I am fascinated by the course of Russian history. So I had also come to see the city of Peter the First and the city of the revolution and the siege. I knew the art of the Hermitage and the Russian Museum would be glorious.

I visited the Nevsky Monastery on an unusually warm October day and felt so privileged to visit Dostoevky's grave. The spacious apartment where he wrote Brothers Karamazov and lived happily with his family is now a museum. Since I was visiting outside the usual tourist season, I was privileged to wander the apartments virtually alone. Dostoevsky's life bore the burden of turmoil. He was a gambler and so often lived under heavy debts. He was jailed by the Tsarist police and suffered a fake execution. Toward the end of his life though, his wife managed his finances and family happiness surrounded him. In the apartments, there is a display of a handwritten note from one of his daughters that says `I love you daddy.' In Russian, of course.

I am not only grateful for Dostoevsky's life and gift to the world--I rejoice that he found joy in his family as he was writing Brothers Karamazov. Standing by his desk, the visitor can imagine him writing through the night by candlelight and with his quill pens. Brothers Karamazov confronts the deep evil in the human soul and the multitude of ways that evil flows out in the world to bring torture, destruction and death to God's beloved children. Dostoevsky leads us on a search for hope. The youngest brother Alyosha adopts a band of troubled young boys and at the end of the novel says this to them:`

`You must know that there is nothing higher and stronger and more wholesome and good for life in the future than some good memory of childhood, of home. People talk to you a great deal about your education, but some good sacred memory, preserved from childhood, is perhaps the best education. If a man carries such memories with him into life, he is safe to the end of his days, and if one has only one good memory left in one's heart, even that may sometime be the means of saving us.'


Help Me, Help Me--Thank You, Thank You.

This will be a journal in which I share and reflect on memories of my involvement in movements for social justice over the last 40 years as well as my experiences as a pastor in Presbyterian churches.I want to share personal stories and images especially as those stories illuminate the struggles of faith and the search for happiness and meaning.

I like to travel and listen to others. I was recently in Russia and some early entries will respond to that experience.

I invite you to participate in this journal of memory and spirit, politics and culture, faith and skepticism.