Author: Pat Liberty

D.H. Laurence was correct when he wrote, “Water is hydrogen two parts, oxygen one, but there is also a third thing, that makes water and nobody knows what that is.”

The third thing is mystery. Whatever the science may be, there is another component and one way to think of it is as mystery. 

Barbara Brown Taylor noted, all the water that has ever existed on the earth still exists, in this very moment.  The water that nourished your African violet may contain water from the woman at the well which quenched Jesus’ thirst. All the earth that has ever existed is still here in this very moment.  The dirt the dog dragged in that you sucked up in the vacuum cleaner may contain the soil that Jesus washed from the disciples’ feet. You can never quite look at the stuff in the vacuum cleaner bag the same way. (An Altar in the World)

Genesis one and two are the creation stories, according to the experience of the Israelite people. (Click here to listen to Rob Lalcy’s rendition of Genesis 1. You won’t be disappointed. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-b_7YEOfoyw&t=17s ) Walter Brueggemann wrote, “Genesis one and two are particularly and peculiarly theological. They make a break from other ancient near eastern writings in that creation, all of the world, is in the very heart of God, is deeply loved and valued by God and must be valued by the creatures to whom it is entrusted.” (pp 11-12).  That would be you and me. 

There are a couple things to be teased out here.  First, because God made it (however that happened) it is holy. Genesis one and two are statements of faith made by a people who believed in and experienced God in a way profoundly different from their neighbors who had a God for every day of the week.

Second, God is in all of this creation, from a blade of grass to a sequoia.  God is in it all and all of it is in God.  The five dollar word is panentheism.  It’s not to be confused with pantheism. Everything is God in pantheism.  Everything is IN god, and God is IN everything is panentheism.  That’s what Genesis one and two proclaim.  God is in everything and everything is in God.

Bruggemann wrote, “The text is a proclamation of covenanting as the shape of reality.”  The Creator creates creation.  The creator entrusts it to us but the purpose is already defined, and the purpose is unity.  We are to be one with what God has made. We are placed in the garden as creatures, special creatures albeit, but creatures nonetheless. 

We are to be stewards. To be a steward is to take care of something that does not belong to us.

It is a posture of reverence. It is an invitation to see with new eyes and consider our lives in a context larger than ourselves.  An earthquake half a world away in Turkey and Syria is very much our business. The disappearance of the Polar Ice Cap is very much our concern. We are to hold on to the holiness of all creation and reverence it. There is a power in that which is so far beyond what we can imagine.

Being stewards of the mystery is our invitation to think theologically about something we usually think about socially and politically.  Jim Antal’s book, Climate Church, Climate World: How People of Faith Must Work for Change, https://www.amazon.com/s?k=climate+change+climate+world&crid=27YNRH45O65Z9&sprefix=climate+change+climat%2Caps%2C338&ref=nb_sb_noss_2 explores the political, social and theological implications of living on this planet in these times.

Being green is very popular these days–debates about global climate change, degradation of the earth, over use of limited natural resources.  Make no mistake these are incredibly important conversations. Our first call, however, is not to be crunchy granola tree huggers.  It is the faithful acknowledgement that all things are in God, bearing divine fingerprint. This truth asks us to live the most faithful action we can offer, for no other reason than we are awed and we are grateful.

When we begin with awareness of who we are and whose we are our, behaviors toward creation take on new importance and new significance.  It is that awareness and faith that led one of the Talmud writers to comment, “every blade of grass has its angel that bends over it and says grow grow.” 

Being stewards of the mysteries can begin by pondering the mystery.  Ponder is one of those words that has fallen on hard times, but it’s such a great word. It means to weigh in the mind with thoughtfulness and care.  I would add to it, to weigh in the spirit with gratitude and awe.  When is the last time you sat down and pondered a rock or a blade of grass or a cloud or the sound of the surf? 

It’s an invitation to get new eyes and have a new vision.  How might our lives be different if this tender sense of holiness informed how we live in our house; on our street; and in our neighborhood, church, town, country and in our world?

Whatever changes we make in behavior grow out of a changed attitude, a posture of reverence.  It’s a place to begin. And rather than give something up for Lent, I am suggesting that we ponder the mystery of creation and what it means be good stewards. Instead of doing battle with demon chocolate, or my personal favorite–all things salt and grease– I am suggesting a Lenten discipline that can raise our awareness of what it means to till the earth and keep it, to be stewards of the mysteries. 

However it happens, what matters is this:  new eyes and new vision for this fragile, gracious place we call home.  Wendell Berry said, “What I stand for is what I stand on.”

It’s a place to start.

After last week’s blog, “He Gets Us and Other Scary Things” I got to thinking, what does it mean for us to “get” Jesus? How well do we understand what Jesus was all about? As we enter the season of Lent it’s a good time to do some pondering about what Jesus was all about.

Pondering is one of those words that has fallen on hard times. It’s too bad, because it’s a great word. Pondering is an invitation, as my favorite seminary professor Maria Harris said, “to sit back on your soul.” It means we kick back and do some serious noodling on the subject at hand.

Most of the time we are so busy and our lives are so filled with noise, its seems all but impossible to carve out a few holy silent moments to ponder. I’m suggesting this might be a good Lenten discipline, to consider who Jesus really is. And if we read the gospels closely, the Jesus of the gospels is very different from the Jesus of our culture.

Lent denotes the season when Jesus makes his final entry into Jerusalem. Jesus and his ragtag band of followers have been rabble rousing wherever they and the religious poo bahs of the day were getting a little (a whole lot) annoyed with his antics. So going to Jerusalem was where the waste would hit the oscillator.

Here’s the low down. During Jesus time the Romans occupied the Holy Land. They were in some unholy cahoots with the religious leaders. They colluded to extort taxes from people who had no hope of paying them, and as a consequence lost their land. The laws of Judaism were selectively applied, and usually in ways that added tremendous piety burdens on the people.

For example, religious leaders required unblemished animals to be sacrificed at the temple. So, a marketplace was set up in the outer court of the temple where people could buy such animals. Of course the price was exorbitant and another burden was placed on the people.

At the same time other laws were systematically ignored. For example the Deuteronomic Hospitality Code, which required doing justice and loving mercy, letting the fields lie fallow in the seventh year to care for the earth, and the principles of Jubilee, which cancelled debt and returned land to its rightful owner every 50 years. Somehow they conveniently left those commandments out.

Jesus and his followers had a habit of pointing out uncomfortable truths that rocked the status quo. Those who benefited from the status quo sought a way to get rid of this trouble maker. The last trip to Jerusalem would be the time.

Jesus and his followers also had a habit of hanging around with people everyone else ignored. Tax collectors (who were particularly hated because they extorted money from people), prostitutes, various other “sinners,” lepers and more were his preferred company. It made the religious leaders look bad (an appropriate consequence).

Jesus healed on the Sabbath. He fed hungry people; he healed and set people free. For example, the woman with the issue of blood for twelve years touched the hem of Jesus garment and was healed. Her healing was a lot more than not bleeding anymore. In the ancient culture, women were ritually unclean when they were menstruating and were isolated from their community. By healing her, Jesus restored her to community. The same with healing the lepers; their disease required they be isolated from their community. By their healing they were restored to their place in their community and society.

Jesus was no friend of the status quo. Our times are not so different from his times. And our silence is the equivalent of assent to the loudest voices. The “he gets us” campaign is code language for a lot of hatred, bigotry and double standards. Our silence in the face of it means we agree.

I would love to see the loudest voice about family values be the one that says love makes a family and acceptance is how we live in the world. I want to hear the loudest voice of faith say that hatred is not a family value. I want the voice of Christianity to say that the moral issues of our time are adequate housing and healthcare, reproductive choice, elimination of poverty, global climate change and the unequal distribution of resources. I want the Christian voice to proclaim loudly that Black Lives Matter and work to dismantle racism and the system that promulgates it. I want the voice of faith to proclaim that the rich getting richer and the poor getting poorer is evil.

If we want to say we “get” Jesus, then we must see him as he was in his time and act that same way in our time.    

The “Jesus Gets Us” campaign is one of those things that walks like a duck, quacks like a duck and looks like a duck, but is really a porcupine. The hundred million dollar campaign made a huge splash at the Super Bowl with ads that cost twenty million dollars. Similar ads have appeared on other sports broadcasts and even during the Grammy Awards. On the surface, it looks sort of okay, but scratch a little deeper and there are some issues.

First, Jesus does not have a PR problem. The campaign presents a Jesus who is watered down and palatable to skeptics: Jesus washing people’s feet, Jesus hanging out with average folks, etc These ads take huge liberties with scripture in an effort to make Jesus look like an average Joe. Jesus, in truth, was a radical teacher who spoke of inclusion and love and justice. How this teacher who ushered in a new way of being in the world was co-opted into the central symbol of maintaining the social status quo is mind boggling. This watered-down Jesus does nothing for the gospel message.

The church, on the other hand, has a tremendous PR problem. Churches are closing and declining throughout the United States. More and more, church is seen as an anachronism. Think of the financial and sexual scandals, the tendency of churches to use most of their resources to power their organization and care for their building, the petty bickering and the ridiculous conflicts. People don’t have a problem with Jesus; they have a problem with his “followers.” I used to have a bumper sticker that read, “Jesus, protect me from your followers.”

The solution, however, is not a watered-down socially acceptable Jesus. There is a remedy for the church’s ills. It is called the Gospel. Jesus was likely to be found with those with whom no one else would bother: the socially unacceptable, the lepers and prostitutes. Jesus threw the money changers out of the temple, called the religious and political leaders of the Roman occupation “whited sepulchers.” He wasn’t crucified for bouncing children on his knee and blessing people at the bottom of the social heap. He was crucified for calling out the collusion and corruption of the religious and political leaders of his time. Trying to make Jesus into a politically nice guy is not a biblical view of what Jesus was all about.

And here’s where the total hypocrisy of this campaign enters the picture. Trying to make Jesus a-political is a joke when the sponsors of this campaign have a huge political agenda that is anti-women, anti-choice, anti-LGBTQI, anti-trans protection, anti-equality and anti-everything that speaks of radical love, inclusion and welcome. A main sponsor of the campaign is Hobby Lobby. This is the company that will not pay for birth control for its employees. Other donors have chosen to remain anonymous, but the agencies organizing and sponsoring the campaign have deep roots with right wing religious and political groups. At some point there is going to be a huge bait and switch. The underlying agenda of religious and political exclusion, hatred and bigotry will be exposed at some point.

The marketing group behind the campaign is Haven. Based in Grand Haven, Michigan, Haven’s president says his hope is that the campaign can bridge the gap people see between the story of Jesus and their perception and experience of his followers. They want to “rebrand” Jesus. Jesus doesn’t need rebranding, but the church surely does.   

As conservative, evangelical Christianity identifies more and more with nationalism, these ads that present a “nice” Jesus can’t be reconciled with the hateful and hurtful stances of churches that spew bigotry and exclusion.  Trying to co-opt the radically loving, totally inclusive, welcoming Jesus of the gospel into a nice guy who demands nothing is not a biblical Jesus. Trying to portray Jesus as a-political when the sponsors of this campaign have a very anti-gospel political agenda is nauseating.

Beware of “Jesus Gets Us.” It’s a pretty scary thing.

This campaign is gaining traction with people who are on the fence and wondering about Christianity. Exposing it for the duplicitous agenda it propounds is a task for all of us. Please share this blog and correct your friends when they talk about how wonderful “Jesus Gets Us” is.

On a whirlwind trip to Houston, Texas to offer expert witness testimony at a criminal trial, I had no choice but to wear my court clothes on the plane.  I was going directly to court from the airport.  Court clothes meant black suit and black clerical collar.  It is not my preferred outfit on or off a plane.   I dreaded the conversation it would occasion and did everything I could think of to send the message, “I do not want to have a conversation with you.” Open book, iPod, headphones, a simple smile of acknowledgement and minimal eye contact.  I do this on planes anyway. I am an introvert; I don’t fly to make friends.  It’s just harder to pull off when dressed like a cross between Darth Vader and Father Guido Sarducci. 

Sure enough, when the beverage cart came my seat mate saw his opening, “Are you like a priest or something?”  I guess the “or something” was the category.  I smiled politely and said that I was a minister.  “Really, why are you headed to Houston?” 

“Business,” I replied and started to put on my headphones, but I wasn’t quite quick enough. Sure enough he started to tell me all about himself. “Well, I am spiritual but not religious.”    

I don’t know what it is with people. When I meet a banker I feel no need to confess that I have never balanced my check book.  When I meet a plumber I am not overwhelmed with a desire to talk about my ability to sweat solder pipes.  But when someone learns I am a minister, it is true confessions.

Spiritual but not religious; it’s the not so new term for folks who haven’t given up on God but are more or less over organized religion.  Phyllis Tickle calls this growing group the de-churched: those who have burned out of church life for one reason or another.  She is quick to point out it includes some folks who still show up on Sunday morning but have one foot out the door. 

It’s an expression of the disconnect people feel with organized religion. 

On one end of the continuum it is a way to believe whatever you want; take a little from here a little from there, toss in some communing with nature and there you have it.   At the other end of the continuum it describes true seekers who find the church falling far short of the place where their hungers are fed. Most folks are somewhere in-between.

If people who don’t show up at church claim to be spiritual but not religious, it is often because to them the church is religious but not spiritual.    

Think about the wise people in your life–not the smart people, the wise people. Smart and wise are two very different things. Smart comes from learning and studying.  In the world of “religious but not spiritual” smart means knowing creeds and doctrines, citing bible verses and knowing six dollar theological words.  It has its place. 

But being wise is beyond what we know in our heads.  It is about what we know in our bones.  It is what happens when we join head, heart, spirit and body.  It is a maturity that joins faith, belief, experience and spirituality in ways that shape and feed each other.   It is part of what it means to die to self.  In contemporary parlance it means to get beyond the ego.

Richard Rohr notes that the ego is utterly inadequate to see what is real.  It is largely useless to talk about the very ground of your being. Getting beyond the ego means dying to the old viewing platform of the false self.

Faith and religious life are strongest when the whole person is valued as the arena for God’s transforming work. The sign that God is at work in our lives is a hunger that demands we grow and change because life as we are living it is no longer fulfilling.  If you want to hope for something, pray for something, hope for and pray for the hunger.  It is what sets it all in motion.

By always reaching toward an authentic faith we are led to humility and not hubris. Anything less and we have succumbed to being religious without being spiritual. 

Robert Fuller suggests that spirituality exists wherever we struggle with the issue of how our lives fit into the greater cosmic scheme of things. This is true even when our questions never give way to specific answers. We encounter spiritual issues every time we wonder where the universe comes from, why we are here, or what happens when we die. We also become spiritual when we become moved by values such as beauty, love, or creativity, justice, or shalom. These are all things that reveal a meaning or power beyond our visible world. An idea or practice is “spiritual” when it reveals our personal desire to establish a felt-relationship with the deepest meanings or powers governing life. 

It is a radical notion: to be spiritual and religious. 

When we embody the spiritual and religious we come to deep knowledge that what is truly radical is

• Wisdom that is constantly transforming the boxes into which we put God in so we can stay in control.
• Religion and spirituality feeding each other, changing each other and keeping the church and its practices relevant.
• Beyond our egos and self-styled identities that divide us from one another.
•  The church embodying an authentic spirituality where vital religious practice creates life changing community.

And that is the beginning of what it is all about.

The church is full of hypocrites

            This is true. And should you ever decide to go or return to church you will join their number. No one lives the faith perfectly. Even the most devout people of faith fail the faith. The church is a human institution and as such is subject to the frailties and foibles of the human condition. Frederick Buechner wrote, “We live the faith in search of the faith.”

Church is boring

            This is also true, sometimes. If you go to church and find it boring all the time, find another church. Some churches are so married to the past and the way it has always been done that they don’t deserve what you might bring to the community. Remember, though, that church is not there to entertain you. It is there to encourage your faith, provide fellowship and teach you about the faith. It isn’t always fun, nor is it supposed to be.

I don’t know what I believe

            Half the folks who people the pews aren’t sure what they believe either. You will be in good company. Church is a place where you can ask questions and grow. Again, if you are visiting a church or considering a church where your questions are not welcome, find another church. The seeds of an adult faith journey are often planted in the soil of doubt and question. Sometimes we have to figure out what we DON’T believe before we can figure out what we do believe. It’s okay to back into the faith. Beware of religious leaders and institutions that have simple answers to unanswerable questions.

I don’t know anything about the bible

            Half the people in church don’t know that much either. Most people end their religious training in high school. It isn’t until they are adults that they may begin asking questions and desire to learn more. Find a church where bible study is important. Beware of what you read online. Read books like Marcus Borg’s “Meeting Jesus Again for the First Time” and “Meeting God Again for the First Time.” Barbara Brown Taylor’s “An Altar in the World” is another excellent read.

The church is hateful and judgmental

            The “church” that has the loudest voice is often hateful and judgmental. Real churches are all about community, love, grace, justice and mercy. Don’t paint all churches with the same brush as the ones you hear about on TV. Beware of television religion and religion with a political agenda.  

I have a church– related trauma and get triggered by religious language

            More and more church leaders are coming to understand how people have been hurt by the church. Make an appointment to talk to the pastor. Trust your gut. If s/he doesn’t “get it” let that be your guide. Be mindful that if you have been wounded in community there is a part of you that will only be healed in community. That doesn’t necessarily mean a church, but we all need a group where we feel safe and welcomed. Beware of sharing too much too soon. It can become the “label” you will carry throughout your connection at the church. Guard your deepest self until you test the waters and make sure they are safe for you. Trust your gut.

My kids play sports on Sunday morning

            Many children do play sports on Sunday morning. Folks have tried (unsuccessfully) for years to change that. Experience tells me that people make time for what is important. If church is important in your life, you will find time for it. Sometimes we have to make choices.

I am mad at God because (fill in the blank)

            It’s okay to be mad at God. Sometimes being mad at God is the first step in an authentic adult faith journey. If you’re mad at God it means the relationship has some possibilities. If God didn’t matter, you wouldn’t spend the energy being angry.

I am interested in going to church but I’m not sure why

            Trust the little voice inside that is the beginning of your spiritual hunger. It’s not important to know why, it’s important to acknowledge the hunger is there. You can find your way one day at a time, trust your gut and find a place that is right for you. Remember, no one is an expert on your life. Beware of the religious leaders who “should” on you, telling you what you should do and how you should do it. A helpful pastor will assist you in finding your own way and support you as you do.

***

I think one of the bravest things that people do is walk in the door of a church for the first time. Stepping into a setting where you may have bad memories, have learned lousy theology or any one of a thousand other reasons is a brave thing to do. If you are unsure (and you probably are), and don’t want people to accost you, show up late and leave early. It’s a great way to avoid talking to people until you are ready. Remember, if you get too triggered you can leave at any time.

Every faith journey begins with a question, a thought, a hunger. Those yearnings are trustable, and if you listen carefully to your deepest inner voice, you will find the place that’s right for you.

Better late than never. This week I switched to one of my winter handbags. Transferring things from one bag to another, I mused on the junk we women carry around with us: wallet, lipstick, Chapstick, business cards, pens and pencils, used tissues, a couple of Epi-pens just in case, and keys to this and that. (I’ve always had all my keys on one ring because I’m not organized enough to keep track of more than one key ring) It’s a mish-mash of stuff that ends up in a pack-your-clothes-for-a -week handbag. When most of the stuff is moved from one bag to another, I turn the summer bag upside down and shake it. A few coins fall out: pennies, nickels and dimes with a couple quarters bringing up the rear.

It occurred to me that life is paid out in pennies, nickels and sometimes dimes or quarters. Sometimes we choose how much we spend and where. With as much wisdom and intention as we can muster, we decide where to pay out the coins of our life and time. Other times those decisions seem to be made for us by the eclipse of time, changing relationships or just plain chance. Life can change in a heartbeat, and where we dribble out the coins of our life changes in response.

Years of working for Hospice taught me a lot about how people dribble out the coins of their lives. Sometimes the coin supply is running low and won’t be replenished because the show is just about over. Some people want a rewind so they can go back and do it all over again because it was so much fun. Some people want a refund because it wasn’t so hot, and they’d like a chance to fix it. Either way, we only get one chance to dribble our coins away in this life.

And if we do it mostly kind of right, it is enough.

I gathered up the change that fell out on the bedroom floor and took it downstairs to my coin jar, a gallon mayonnaise jar. I probably haven’t used a gallon of mayonnaise in all my 65 years, so I have no idea from whence the jar came. It is about a third full, with a combination of pennies, nickels dimes and quarters. I keep it beside my desk to remind me that this is how life unfolds, a few coins here and a few coins there. I never fill it all the way up, in part because I couldn’t lift it. But it also reminds me that there is always more where that came from. I think that if I were to hoard them I would grow stingy of spirit and this is not how I want to spend the coins of my jar or my life and time. I want to spend them freely and trust they will be replaced, and that somehow the rhythm and balance of it all will continue.

Rolling the coins in preparation for depositing them in the bank, the quarters are the big things to which I give my time– friends, family, and tending my inner garden. Dimes and nickels go to more mundane yet necessary parts of life like cleaning the house and grocery shopping. Pennies are reserved for the things I would never do if given the choice, but I’m not.

This sounds simple, but I’m never quite sure what value to assign to what. I used to think of the larger amounts were things that were hard, but as time goes on I see them as the things that bring the most joy. I spend a few more minutes pondering what costs what. I wrap the last of the coins and the process starts all over again. The jar is never empty and it is never quite full.  And that’s okay with me.