"Are you married?" "No, I am in covenant."

One of the most anticipated topics and resolutions of discussion at General Convention will be the work of the Standing Commission on Liturgy and Music, who have presented I Will Bless You, and You Will Be a Blessing: Resources for Blessing Same-Gender Relationships.*  This is a hefty report of some 96 pages, and I have yet to finish reading all the work.  However, to this point, I have several concerns and reservations with what I have read.

"I will bless you and you will be a blessing."  

The Abrahamic Covenant

These begin with the comments made by a member of one of the churches in the Diocese of Lexington who attended one of the several Town Meetings about General Convention that were hosted at various churches in the diocese.  He approached the microphone to share his thoughts about potential blessings of same-gender relationships.  I paraphrase:

"To me, it seems that there is as much sense in authorizing a separate rite for blessing of same-gender relationships as there is authorizing a rite for the ordination of women to the diaconate, priesthood, or episcopate.  Why not change the language in the marriage rite to make it available for same-gender couples?  Creating a separate and different rite is only institutionalizing discrimination and otherness."

His impassioned commentary has been with me as I've read this report from the Standing Commission on Liturgy and Music.

The report includes what I consider to be solid and significant work on the theology of covenant and covenantal relationships.  Indeed, I deeply felt the following to be true in reading the report: "Heterosexual people may also find their own vocations and ministries strengthened and empowered in those moments of blessing [of relationships]..." (The Blue Book, page 198)

Similarly, the work of this Standing Committee in this report was to present history, theology, exegesis, and more in effort to provide a thorough discourse on The Episcopal Church's encounter with the topic of safe-gender relationships.  However, the report was much more than that.  To this point in my reading, I have felt my own vocation to my covenantal relationship with my husband strengthened and blessed.  I wish that portions of this report had been available to us when we were going through pre-marital counseling.

The language and theology that I particularly wish we had had available to us for study and discussion was that of "covenantal relationship."  The Standing Committee describes covenantal relationship in a variety of ways, including:

• "love that is self-giving and other-receiving" (205)
• a relationship in which "painful aspects are exposed"(209) but can be healed and made whole
• a relationship that is set apart as "'a sign of Christ's love to this sinful and broken world, that unity may overcome estrangement, forgiveness heal guilt, and joy conquer despair'" (201)

And, the report recalls Resolution D039 from General Convention in 2000, where the characteristics the Church expects to see in lifelong, committed relationships include "fidelity, monogamy, mutual affection and respect, careful, honest communication, and the holy love which enables those in such relationships to see in each other the image of God." (202)

This covenantal relationship sounds pretty good, right?  It sounds like the type of relationship to which my husband and I aspire and toward which we continually work.  

But, there's a problem that I see in the work of the Standing Committee - and it's the problem the gentleman raised at the Town Hall meeting.  It is that same-gendered relationships are being discussed as covenantal relationships while not being called marriage.  And that our society places a higher premium on "marriage" and excludes same-gendered couples from this civil (and religious) union.

"While the Canons of the Episcopal Church describe marriage as a union of a man and a woman, the patterns of marriage can help us understand other kinds of covenantal relationship, such as vowed religious life and the commitments of same-gender couples." (206)

The authors of the report seem to be trying to level the proverbial playing field and remove a culturally-understood hierarchy of types of covenantal relationships.   They explain that, "Indeed, for the first half of its history, the Church understood vowed religious life as a calling higher than marriage, a view that changed decisively only during the Protestant Reformation (206)." That is no longer the case, and "in all of these covenantal relationships [marriage, same-gender committed relationships, vowed religious life], the partners promise to be trustworthy, to remain faithful to one another despite other demands on their time and energy of possibilities of engagement with others (206)."  

However, the culture still disallows same-gender couples to be in unions with all the rights and privileges afforded to different-gender couples on discriminatory grounds.  The culture says that same-gender relationships are lesser, and not worthy of the same rights and privileges given to married different-gender couples.  "Marriage," the civil union that allows for a plethora of rights to couples, is forbidden to same-gender couples.  No matter what The Episcopal Church does to uplift and bless covenantal relationships of same-gender couples, the simple fact is this: same-gender couples are denied "marriage" in civil society and thereby are denied rights and benefits.  It is a human rights and social justice issue.

So, while I appreciate the theology of covenantal relationships presented in this report, especially in the sense that it allowed me time for reflection and prayer about my marriage, the report neglects to address the human rights and social justice issues surrounding same-gender relationships in our society.  The dominant culture doesn't care if same-gender couples are in "covenantal relationship" when it comes down to end-of-life visitation rights.  They're not married, and they are denied these rights.

Clergy bless the unions of nine same-gendered couples in the Diocese of Southeast Florida 

The report distinguishes between "married different-gender couples and covenanted same-gender couples (208)."  Why the different terms?  If a covenantal relationship between two people is a relationship in the image of the Triune, inherently relational God of Christian faith, if it is a relationship in the image of God's relationship with the Church, the shouldn't we dispense with the terms "marriage" and "matrimony" altogether?  Are not they inappropriate or inaccurate, and filled with histories of exploitation, economic arrangements, patriarchy, and on and on?  

Isn't covenantal relationship what we should be blessing, and not marriage - for any couple - same-gendered or different-gendered?  

All I know is that covenantal relationship as defined by this Report is what I aspire to in my relationship with my husband.  I don't know that marriage, with all its baggage, is the most accurate to describe the type of relationship that we wish to have.

So, when people ask me, "Are you married?" 

I believe I'll respond, "No, I am in covenant." 

*This portion of the report is intended for consideration of the 77th General Convention and for study in preparation for Convention.  None of the material in the document is authorized for use in TEC.

Chorizo and Theology

"We cannot avoid the conclusion that our irresponsible industrial production and consumption-driven economy lie at the heart of the current environmental crisis."

"Privileged Christians in our present global context need to move from a culture of consumerism to a culture of conservation and sharing."


"The challenge is to examine one's own participation in ecologically destructive habits."
- from A Pastoral Teaching on the Environment, The Episcopal Church House of Bishops Theology Committee

I don't want to think about barbecue chicken pizza and pork chops as moral issues, but they are.

What I put in my mouth is a statement about who I am and what I believe.

Yesterday, I approached a vendor at my local Farmer's Market whose posters advertised, "Local pork."  I selected zesty Italian sausage and chorizo, made the purchase, and was about to turn to leave when I decided to ask a question that the documentary "Food, Inc." had convinced me to ask.  

"I have a question, if you have a minute."

"Sure," the young farmer said, taking a seat on the stool behind the cash box.

"So, I saw a documentary," I said, feeling my cheeks flush, "and I wanted to ask you how you raise and care for your pigs.  Because the documentary had all this information about how horrible the industrial food system is, and it made me very concerned about where my meat comes from."

"Well, my pigs only see one bad day," he said.  "Only one bad day.  And it's their last day."

I smiled.

"My pigs are not kept indoors; they never see concrete or asphalt unless they escape.  They roam freely outdoors.  I bring the mothers inside when they are about to give birth, but still, they are given a large pen where they can move freely, unconstrained.  They never see a cage."

"That makes me feel so much better," I said.  "I used to buy vegetables at the market, and conventional meat from the grocery, but I don't think I'll ever buy conventional meat again."

"You know how they started calling pork 'the other white meat?'" he asked.  "The meat became white because industrial farming doesn't allow the pigs to move.  They stand still all day, building up fat and bulk with hormones and antibiotics, and they don't develop muscle.  When you cook up one of my pork chops, you'll see it's not white.  It's not red like red meat, but it's not white - because my meat is not all fat.  My pigs build muscle."

"That chorizo you bought there," he said, "if you cook that up in a pan and try to drain the excess fat, nothing will drain.  There's no excess fat there.  It's good, lean meat."

And he was right.  I cooked up the chorizo - two links on the grill and some bulk chorizo in the frying pan - and there was no fat to drain.  No neon orange grease to soak up on a mound of paper towels.

Just good, farm-fresh, lean meat.  

 

"Our current environmental challenges call us to ongoing forms of repentance: we must turn ourselves around, and come to think, feel, and act in new ways.  Ancient wisdom and spiritual disciplines from our faith offer deep resources to help address this environmental crisis.  Time-honored practices of fasting, Sabbath-keeping, and Christ-centered mindfulness bear particular promise for our time."

My deepest hope is that this newest endeavor to act in new ways, and purchase my food locally and mindfully, will continue.

In my role as a deputy to General Convention, I take time to read hundreds of pages of reports issued by various bodies in The Episcopal Church.  While I am so very proud that our House of Bishops issued a pastoral report on the environment, I am so very disappointed that the issues raised by the report are not a topic of normal discussion in our parishes and missions.  

Where are the sermons that make a connection between the commandment to keep the Sabbath and the industrial food system?  Where are the sermons that draw the connection between obesity, corn subsidies, and poverty in developing countries?

Where are everyday Episcopalians in this dialogue?

turning out; not trying to control

So, I realized after Sunday's dance class with Mrs. Hall that I don't turn out enough.

That's not a new realization; I go through phases where I fall prey to the illusion that I do turn just perfectly, thank you very much, only to sit down on my perceived laurels and then realize, to my great dismay, that I've undone all my work because I incorrectly believed that I had "arrived." That I had learned to turn out just fine. Instead, I'd lost it all.

Silly me.

(And isn't that how it is with everything? I go about my life, thinking that I'm doing everything fairly well, and then all of a sudden, a sin of commission or omission hurts someone else or hurts me, or damages my relationship with someOne. And then, I realize, that I have again fallen prey to the illusion that I was doing everything correctly or right - only to remember that I must constantly be a student. I must intentionally be a learner. And I've got to strive to live in that state of learning, of openness, and stop closing myself and my mind).

So - with the turn-out and the dancing. Yesterday's practice was easier in the sense that I wasn't dancing for stamina or endurance, but it was very difficult in other respects. I spent about an hour at the studio before church, working on crossing. One of the other dancers there watched the middle step of my treble jig, which turns backwards for the last five bars, and she noted, "Allison, you're crossing, but you're not turning out. It goes straight at that part."

Oh NO!

So, I spent the last ten minutes of studio time pushing my un-cooperative hips to turn out more, for my legs to cross more.

Then, protein bar, liter of water, apple, and a choir practice later, I was at the gym, focused and determined to get my hips to turn-out more.

Plié squats, leg lifts, calf presses, forward & reverse lunges, two-heels-to-seat jumps, bi's/tri's/delts, hip abductor and adductor (my least favorite, for good reason).

And then, up to the studio at the gym. I walked through the motions of my treble jig, willing my hips to rotate just a few more degrees so that my heels would be just slightly more visible, my positioning just slightly more correct.

And again. And again. And again. By the time I was finished, I FELT it. My hips really felt it.

To finish the day, I started my "envisioning" work. I envisioned myself on the huge Worlds stage, envisioned the stage lights, the darkness of the audience out there, the size of the stage, the sense of one or two dancers on stage with me. And I asked myself, "How do I want to look? What expression do I want to wear? How do I want to present myself?"

I am told often to smile, and I know why. First, it's pleasant to see. Secondly, if I don't do something deliberate with my face, I wear a fearful bunny-rabbit-in-the-headlights look. However, I do not like to smile while dancing. My smile ends up looking plastered, disengaged, and, I think, goofy.

So, I worked on the same face that I have worked on with one of my students - a content, pleased, satisfied, and joyful calm expression. One that says, "I know what I'm doing. I love this dance, and I'm entirely comfortable with it." And I danced each of my dances for turn-out, crossing, and a joyful calm face.

And then collapsed onto a mat on the floor and stretched out my poor hips.

Irish dancing is such an internal battle, truly 85% mental over 15% physical. Sure, the physical training takes up 15-20 hours of my week, but it's my brain and my thoughts that either make or break that time spent working my body. If my head is in the right place, my work will be high-quality, the results will be spectacular, and I will have learned something. If my head is in the wrong place, I will be aimless or I will force things to happen. Regardless, a wrong-headedness will un-do all the work I have done, will leave me frustrated and upset, lacking motivation.

So, it really all boils down to a fight in my brain.

Which means that this blog, at least for the next three weeks, will boil down to my brain processing everything it needs to process before Worlds. Will come down to me trying to develop the right mindset, make these last days of physical practice count. Will boil down to me giving my all - 110% of my mental and physical ability.

Shwew.

Today's Tao Te Ching passage is Chapter 10 from the Stephen Mitchell translation:

Can you coax your mind from its wandering
and keep to the original oneness?
Can you let your body become
supple as a newborn child's?
Can you cleanse your inner vision
until you see nothing but the light?
Can you love people and lead them
without imposing your will?
Can you deal with the most vital matters
by letting events take their course?
Can you step back from your own mind
and thus understand all things?

Giving birth and nourishing,
having without possessing,
acting with no expectations,
leading and not trying to control:
this is the supreme virtue.

Embodying the light...

"I'm not looking for the best players, I'm looking for the right players."

- The film "Miracle"

Chapter 27, from the Tao Te Ching, translated by Stephen Mitchell

A good traveler has no fixed plans
and is not intent upon arriving.
A good artist lets his intuition
lead him wherever it wants.
A good scientist has freed himself of concepts
and keeps his mind open to what is.

Thus the Master is available to all people
and doesn't reject anyone.
He is ready to use all situations
and doesn't waste anything.
This is called embodying the light.

What is a good man but a bad man's teacher?
What is a bad man but a good man's job?
If you don't understand this, you will get lost,
however intelligent you are.
It is the great secret.

Isn't it always the case that we try to exist on our own devices, on our own cleverness, on our own egos and pomposity - until we realize that it's really all out of our hands?

If I had a dollar for each time my ego, my belief in my own abilities, my arrogance got the better of me and came back to bite me in the butt - well, I'd be a millionaire.

My ego bit me in the butt recently, hit me upside the head in the studio when I realized that I was pushing, pushing, pushing, struggling, frustrated, beating myself up because I was expecting to have arrived. I was expecting to have it all figured out. Expecting to have all the answers. And they weren't coming, because I was clinging too much. Holding on too tightly. Forcing myself to breathe, instead of just taking in the air.

And then, I opened the Tao Te Ching this morning to this very chapter, with these all-too-appropriate words:

A good traveler has no fixed plans and is not intent upon arriving.

If I just let go, just let intuition lead me, trust my body, allow energy to flow through me, and stop trying to force a premature "arrival," stop trying to force a tight and tense victory, then things will fall into place.

I will be a good traveler. Worlds is a highlight on the journey, but it is not the fixed plan, not the place of arrival. It is simply an emboldening new learning experience along the way.

So, I will stop clinging so tightly. I will stop my painstaking inventory of my luggage (knees crossed, toes pointed, land on point there, jump higher, extend, extend, move move, focus focus), stop forcing myself to complete an impossibly long laundry list every time I dance, and I will instead let go.

I will stop trying to wring my body dry like a wet sponge - stop trying to force things out of my practice sessions. I will just let things arise out of them.

I will trust that the building blocks are there. I will trust my body. I will trust my training. I will trust my preparation.

I will embody the light.

I will not be intent upon arriving.

I will just ride the wave, and enjoy the journey.

Aa3udu al-ifriqiya ash-shamaal. ehlesh?

I return to North Africa. Why?

If you get outside of your own tourist-head, it's hard not to feel guilty in North Africa.

I rode a camel being pulled by three teenage boys in a southern Moroccan village that bordered the rise of the mighty Sahara. They spoke five languages fluently. They knew the rudiments of five more. They dressed in the expected bright blue Berber tunics that the tourist guidebooks boasted they would wear. As the led me on my camel over the sand dunes, I looked back to see twelve more teenage boys sitting idle on a dune near the village.

They took turns leading Western tourists on camels; took turns at making a few dhirham.

And that was all they had to live for. Rural, poor, highly conversant in multiple languages and yet illiterate in Arabic, their futures were in the village. They couldn't even fathom going to university, if they wanted to.

And back in the city, all of my Moroccan peers were in university. One of our professors at the CCCL (Center for Cross-Cultural Learning) was also a professor at Mohammad V University in Agdal. You could tell he lived to teach, and that he loved every minute of life. He brimmed with joie de vivre. And, he brimmed with hope and dreams for his students - particularly his Moroccan students.

He brought one of his classes to the CCCL to do true cross-cultural learning with us. They could not speak as many languages as the village boys, but they were hyper-literate: they could read, write, and speak Arabic, Spanish, French, and English, and some of them also Italian, German, and Tamazight, Riffi, or Tashelhit, one of the Berber languages, which were just beginning to be transcribed in Latin script, Arabic script, or a newly devised Amazigh (Berber) alphabet.

Huge pangs of guilt hit me while I was there, while I developed deeper friendships with my homestay sister and two other young women who were students at Mohammad V University. Just as talented as me, much more knowledgeable, with fluency in at least three languages - these three young women and thousands more young people like them had no hope. None. I knew that after my holiday in North Africa, I would return home to America. And while I might be marginally employed, our economy can swallow me into it, what with my entrepreneurial spirit, interest and education in several specialized fields, and my optimism. Thanks be to America.

But this is not only unfair, but unjust. Unjust that even in an economic downturn, I am able to take my skill set and carve out a living in America. A travesty that in North Africa, young people are fluent and literate in a literal handfull of languages, with bachelors' and masters' degress in diverse and necessary fields, and there are no jobs. Not one.

Doesn't matter how entrepreneurial you are. How smart. How clever. You will not find a job as a young person in North Africa. As a young person in the Middle East.

So, yes, the Middle East and North Africa make me feel guilty. Guilty for being American, guilty for staying in five star hotels and being waited on by young people lucky enough to get a job as a valet, a bellhop, or a janitor.

I'm a glutton for this guilt, I guess. It's a vital, enlivening sense of guilt. It makes me more human. It makes me more thankful. It gets me outside of my American brain, my American life, my American hang-ups. It reminds me to live simply, to live small, to live joyfully, to live gratefully.

And now, instead of returning for the usual sense of guilt that I find in the Arab world - that I found in 2007 in Morocco, 2008 in Egypt, Palestine, and Morocco, and 2010 in Palestine - I will be returning to let my eyes well with tears of joy, happiness, and pride that I do not deserve to feel.

I will swell with pride and awe at the youth of the Middle East - the young Arabs who have taken their lives, their countries, their governments into their own hands and are demanding something more. Something better. Something they deserve - and oh God do they deserve it more than I do, more than any American youth does.

Tears will roll down my cheeks as I remember my friends and peers in Morocco, and then think of millions of young people just like them, across the Arab world, recognizing their power, efficacy, and their righteousness, and fighting for their lives. Truly. For their lives.

After years of Insha' Allah, it is happening.

That is why I am returning.

Keep North Africa and the Middle East in your prayers, if you make them, or in your thoughts, if you don't.


Some notes, to enflesh the revolutions with quantitative data that represents the qualitative way of living in this part of the world:

Country
Percentage of total household consumption expenditures going to food
Percentage of population under age 30
Percentage of 15-29 population not working and not going to school

Morocco

36%+

57%

34%

Algeria

36%+

58%

37%

Tunisia

36%

52%

no data

Libya

no data

58%

29%

Egypt

38%

61%

37%

Jordan

36%+

64%

23%

Palestinian Territories

no data

72%

37%

Lebanon

no data

51%

16%

Iraq

no data

68%

43%

Yemen

no data

74%

49%

Choose life

Sermon for St. Martha's Episcopal Church

Sixth Sunday after Epiphany, February 13, 2011

Deuteronomy 30:15-20, 1 Corinthians 3:19, Matthew 5:21-37

I puzzled over this week’s Gospel for quite some time. Preaching without ever having taken a Homiletics course can be something of a challenge. So, I waited patiently with the text, and finally, in relation to this morning’s Old Testament lesson, something spoke to me. As Jesus discourses before his audience, he is laying before them choice. The choice between anger and reconciliation; fractured relationship and wholeness; the choice between our worst selves and our best selves.

A choice between a risen life and a living death.

Let your “yes” be “yes,” and your “no” be “no.”

In the Revised Common Lectionary, there are two appointed Hebrew Bible readings for Sixth Epiphany. Two – requiring a choice. The first reading is Ecclesiastes 15:15-20, where God “has placed before you fire and water; stretch out your hand for whichever you choose. Before each person are life and death, and whichever one chooses will be given.” And the second is what we read this morning in Deuteronomy, “Moses said to all Israel the words which the Lord commanded him, ‘See, I have set before you today life and prosperity, death and adversity. If you obey the commandments of the Lord your God… by loving the Lord.., walking in his ways … then you shall live and become numerous… If your heart turns away and you do not hear… I declare to you today that you shall perish….

Choose life so that you and your descendants may live…”

Fr. Tim allowed me to select the Hebrew Bible passage this morning, and you can see that, despite the choice I made to use Deuteronomy, the same message comes across in both. Brilliant lectionary. And the message to all of us is exactly what I faced when I chose the lesson: we have options set before us, and we all have a choice to make. Thousands of choices to make. And as the epistle reading this morning says, we're merely human.

So many choices, so little time.

There is a small piece of paper pinned on the bulletin board in my office – a piece of paper that reminds me of a series of choices a few summers ago.

Dear Allison
I hope Clay comes back next year. I hope you have a good time when we have ice cream and s’mores. Thank you for making camp fun and letting me come to camp. I hope I can come back next year.
From Billy.

Billy and his twin brother Patrick live in Pineville (pahn-vuhl) with their father Bill, and they attended Reading Camp at Pine Mountain for their second year this past summer. I have notes from my first conversation with their father, back in 2009, when I was calling all the campers’ parents and preparing for camp:

(grumbling): “This’ Bill.”
“Hi, Bill, this is Allison, the director of Reading Camp. How are you?”
“Oh, I’m fine, I’m fine. That lady done filled out those papers for the boys. They’re comin’ to yer camp.”
“I’m glad to hear it. And I’ve got it down that they’ll be on the bus.”
“mmm hmm. Now, I want to tell you ‘bout my boys. I’m the only one who’s raised ‘em, and they’re good boys. But, if you need to, you use a switch to make ‘em mind. If they wuz ever hateful, you tell ‘em I told you you could use a switch.”
“Oh, I’m sure we won’t have to do that.”
“Well, if you need to.”
“(haha). Alright. Well, Bill, you just call me if you have any questions.”

The first choice I made with these boys was to accept them to camp at all. It was a leap of faith, to say the least. We generally accept children who are in the middle 50^th percentile in reading. Patrick and Billy were definitely not in the middle 50^th. Their teacher had written on their forms, in all capital letters, “NON-READER.” Where he was given the option to name each boy’s strengths and weaknesses, he put “x’s” next to each weakness. “Phonics – weak, comprehension – weak, fluency – weak.” The parent-guardian form had been filled out by “that lady,” (Deb Obermann from St. Mary’s in Middlesboro) because Bill, the father, was illiterate and could not fill it out himself. His signature was simply, “Bill,” not “William Miracle or even Bill Miracle,” just “Bill,” in a scrawl-like cursive that looked like a first grader’s.

So, yes, it was a big decision to accept them at all. The first of many choices.

The boys arrived at camp on Sunday very sullen, shut-off, and internal. They were gruff, abrasive, and rude. Most volunteers had an immediate reaction of “uh oh, these kids are trouble.” I have to admit, I didn’t particularly like them. Which brings us to choice #2: to react as many of us would have liked, with discipline and rules and inflexibility, or react with patience, firmness, and create a structure in which they might feel comfortable and begin to open up. We committed to the latter. Reading Camp volunteers are pretty remarkable, actually. There’s an understanding amongst all of us that the children who are the hardest to handle, the easiest to dislike – those are the ones we will not give up on, the ones that we will commit to loving. They are the ones who need the encouragement and patience of a caring adult the most.

Patrick and Billy remained gruff and mean until Wednesday morning, when it finally seemed to “click” for them that everyone at camp cared desperately about them, that no one cared that they struggled so much to write their names, and that the teachers were ecstatic when they finally named all the letters of the alphabet. They formed a close bond with Aaron, a young man who was a writing center teacher. Mischevious and creative as he was, Aaron was able to envelop the learning process in games so that Billy and Patrick forgot that they were actually working. It was funny to watch the realization come to their eyes when Aaron would make a connection between the game and writing or reading. “Wait a minute…” their eyes said, and they would shut down all over again.

But, Aaron made a choice to commit to Patrick and Billy. Aaron kept working to find something to engage the boys, and midweek, he found their muse. Billy and Patrick really wanted to write letters to Marcie, a beautiful young woman who was our Pleasure Reading “librarian.” But, now they had a choice to make: out of their fear of failing again, out of their fear of embarrassment, they could be defensive, uncooperative, and unwilling, OR they could let their guard down, take a deep breath, and let Aaron help them. They chose the latter, thank God. It took Aaron’s coaxing, prodding, encouragement, and help with every letter of every word, but by Friday morning, the boys had written their letters to Marcie, and they beamed when they handed them to her. It was a sobering moment for all of us – smiles and not a few happy tears that these boys had been able to achieve something their public school teacher never thought possible. And I guess, an awe at the fact that in the course of a short week, several choices made us fall in love with those two very stubborn little boys.

To begin the ministry of Reading Camp at all was a choice made by several passionate members of our churches, who heard the Bishop’s call to “give away” the treasure of the Cathedral Domain, and who also heard devastating statistics about illiteracy, and put two and two together. It was a choice to respond, in whatever way we – the Episcopal Church - could, to the fact that

In the inner cities and poor rural areas, 68% of low-income 4^th graders cannot read at a basic level. (www.educyberpg.org)

To respond to the fact that

More than three out of four of those on welfare, 85% of unwed mothers and 68% of those arrested are illiterate. About three in five of America's prison inmates are illiterate. (Washington Literacy Council)

And to respond to the fact that in California, Arizona, and many other jurisdictions, prisons project how many jail cells they will need in 10, 15 or 20 years by looking at the number of fourth graders who are failing in reading.

St. Martha’s is a community centered on outreach. A community that sees a need, looks at its own resources, and puts two and two together. You have done book drives for Reading Camp in the past, and I know you are preparing to have another drive. I thank you. Our campers do need books – some of them have never owned a new book in their lives - and you are choosing to respond.

However, there is another opportunity I would like to share with you, another choice I would like you to consider.

Reading Camp needs your help – not only financially, not only through the donations of goods. We need YOU.

There will be six camps in our diocese this summer: day camps in Lexington, Covington, Danville, and Winchester; and overnight camps at the Domain and Pine Mountain. I have been in close communication with the directors of the camps, and I have looked at volunteer trends over the last few years. And I will tell you, we need you to run successful, life-giving programs for children like Patrick and Billy. Winchester needs your Spirit. Lexington needs your enthusiasm and know-how. The Cathedral Domain needs your ability to help build a cohesive camp community.

The choice before you is not as dire as Ecclesiastes– between fire and water, life and death – nor as dire as Deuteronomy – life and prosperity versus death and adversity. Your choice is between a transformed summer, a new experience of the grace of God, and the somewhat normal and expected course of June and July. At Reading Camp, you will feel the Spirit. You won’t face death and adversity if you can’t volunteer at Reading Camp, but if you do volunteer, you will feel life.

“Choose life so that you and your descendants may live, loving the Lord your God, obeying him, and holding fast to him,” Moses says.

Choose a new experience of life through Reading Camp. We need you to have successful camp programs, but more importantly, the children need you. The children need you to help them make the choice between fear and hope, between a reticence to try again and a desire to learn, between the life and prosperity of education and the death and adversity of a lack of academic opportunities and the poverty that follows – financial, mental, emotional, and spiritual.

Life and prosperity versus death and adversity.

A summer adventure versus something more humdrum.

Moses said, “Choose life so that you may live…’

Amen.

perfectly whole

I was at the gym last night, working on my balance. My ankles are weak, and landing my jumps safely, with rebound and buoyant ankles cushioning the impact, has become difficult. So, I stood, one-legged, in the center of a Bosu ball, leaning this way and that, trying to perform different maneuvers so to strengthen my ankles and improve my dancing.

Next to me was a woman on a pink yoga mat, breathing deeply, moving fluidly through the postures of the Sun Salutation. Her class had been canceled due to the sudden and rapid snowfall, but, she said when she finished, "I still needed to get my yoga in." I had trouble focusing on my own balance work, I was so enchanted by her. The Y is beautifully chaotic, with children running around and yelling on the basketball court, preteens trying to use machines and dropping the weights every so often, muscle men in the free weight area grunting and yelling with their exertion, the pound of feet on the treadmills. And yet here she was, quiet, peaceful, entranced, as though there was nothing going on around her. There was only her form, her mind, her breath, and the Sun Salutation.

I met with my confirmand again this week - the young woman whom I'm "mentoring" through her confirmation in the Episcopal Church. When I took on this mentor role, I didn't know I would like it so much. But I do. She's a bubbly, intelligent, and thoughtful fifteen year old, and we both are reaching a point of comfort where we can be candid, and frank, and honest. And, truth be told, our meetings may give me more to think about than they give her. I find this to be the case with most ministry-type things: I always receive far more than I give.

Towards the end of this particular meeting, we were again discussing youth in the church and how the service gets really boring, because "we do the same thing every single week." That was my brothers' perennial complaint: it never changes. It feels dead and static. It's boring.

I had to think for a while before I found a way to respond. I used to think it was deathly boring as well, and my poor mother had to put up with my obnoxious rebellion against church. She still made me go to church, but she let me sit out in the garden or wander around the building until the service was over. Now, I really do appreciate the Episcopal mass, so how was I going to convey its "magic" to myself - my own teenage self whom I saw in my confirmand's eyes?

She's an actor, and she attends the same arts high school I attended, so there's already some common ground there. I thought that a good place to start. "Well, you know how when you finally get "off-book" for a show, and you're able to really become your character? It's no longer you play-acting your character - you begin to fall away, and the character becomes you, you become your character?" She nodded. "That's what I think I love the most about playing piano, or singing, and definitely dancing - the moment when I've learned my piece so well, or learned my dance so well, that there's no longer a distinction between me and the music, or me and the dance. The veil is lifted. The music flows through me, the dance flows through me. And I become the dance."

"I think that's what distinguishes the student from the artist. What do you think? Are you still a student or have you experienced moments when you've been an artist?"

"Well," she said, "I think mostly I still struggle as a student, but sometimes there's these moments when I finally get off book, and the other actors get off book, and we really become our characters. We really feel the action of the play - we're no longer pretending."

"Exactly," I said. "And I think the biggest reason I'm able to appreciate Episcopal worship, which is really a catholic mass - we don't call it the "mass," but that's what it is - is because I am a student of the arts. I understand what it's like to practice and work to the point where I am no longer struggling to perform, but I AM the performance. I AM the dance, or the music. And I think knowing how to do that in the arts has allowed me to do that in worship, too. I know the words so well - I could say the Nicene Creed in my sleep - so when I go to church to worship, I don't have to think anymore. I can let myself fall away, and kind of let my mind go to another place. Will you try that sometime? It might make church a little more interesting."

"Yeah. Yeah, I will."

My youngest brother is a baseball player, and I wish I could share this same thing with him. Baseball players have hours and hours of batting practice, swinging the bat over and over so that in the heat of a game, they can focus, let worries and anxieties fall away, and focus on the pitcher and the ball speeding toward them. So they can stop thinking "turn my hips, pull the bat back, lean into the swing, see the ball, see the bat contact the ball, follow through, and now run like hell," and they can just be entirely in the moment, entirely focused and calm, letting thoughts about HOW to hit the ball fall away so that they can just DO it.

The same is true of all art forms and all sports.

And, the same is true for Episcopal worship.

Batting practice can get boring, but if you want to be a good baseball player, you do it anyway. Having to learn your lines as an actor can be tedious and frustrating, but you do it so you can BECOME your character.

Repeating my jig for the thousandth time is likewise monotonous, but I do it so that when I'm finally onstage, the dance can flow through me. Worries, cares, and details fall away so that the dance becomes a perfect whole. So that I can be made perfectly whole.

If you're bored with the mass, perhaps approach it in a new way, with fresh eyes. Immerse yourself in the experience, let reality drift away and let the worship take you to a different plain of being.

Be made perfectly whole.