Earth People

I wrote this reflection as a part of a weekly Lenten series that my field education supervisor and I are doing. I have been working as a pastoral intern at Broadway Presbyterian Church since September. One of my primary responsibilities is leading the college and young adult group, called Upper Room. Recently, this group has decided to begin an exciting project of creating a rooftop garden.

I spent most of Ash Wednesday in the sanctuary offering ashes to those who came in. About a hundred times I said the words “Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return” in English or Spanish. I felt an overwhelming sadness for first few people to whom I said this as I rubbed my ash-covered thumb on their forehead in the shape of a cross—aching as I reminded them of their own mortality and was also forced to remember my own. As the day went on, this feeling of sadness faded until it was just a dull ache, like sore muscles the day after carrying something too heavy, a constant-but-not-always-conscious reminder of the reality that we are limited—our bodies, our time, our energy.

As the day went on I also began to think more about the second half of the statement that we say on Ash Wednesday—“Remember that you are dust, and to dust you shall return.” This second part reminds us that even though we are limited and our time on this earth is finite, we are a part of the earth and will always be a part of creation, connected in life and in death to every other living thing.

We first see this idea in the creation story in Genesis 2-3. After the first humans have eaten from the tree of knowledge, the Creator says, “By the sweat of your face you shall eat bread until you return to the ground, for out of it you were taken; you are dust, and to dust you shall return” (3:19). We often think of this as a punishment for the humans’ disobedience, but the text itself does not suggest divine retribution, but simply a divine description of what it means to be human—that surviving is hard work, and when it is over we return to the place from which we came, back to the earth that God created and called “good” in the Genesis 1 version of the creation story.  We are of the earth, we return to the earth, and we depend on the earth and the other creatures here with us.

Just a few days ago, on Monday evening, the BPC Session voiced their support of a rooftop garden project initiated by the Upper Room group. Upper Room has been talking a lot this year about food, faith, and the justice issues that surround our food and where it comes from. We hope that this project, now in its seedling phase, will be a way for the whole BPC community to connect to the earth from which we are made and to which we will return. Our vision is that a rooftop garden at BPC would be a way of living more sustainably in our own community, justice-making in our own neighborhood, and connecting with creation and, thus, with the Creator who breathes life into us and who reminds us that we are beloved, we are finite, and we are inextricably linked to the earth—indeed, we were taken out of the ground, we are dust, and to dust we shall return.

Is it Sex???

I am in the second phase of the ordination process with the Presbyterian Church (USA). Like many of my peers at Union Theological Seminary, I meet with my ordination committee annually. Ideally, these meetings are a time for the candidate for ministry to talk with the committee about where they are in their process of discernment, education, etc. and for the committee to affirm and helpfully challenge the candidate as she continues on the path of ordination. Sometimes this process works beautifully, but sometimes these meetings can be anxiety-producing for people in the ordination process, especially for queer/LGBT folks for whom the ability to even enter into the ordination process and being out is a recent development in many denominations, including my own (and in many it has yet to happen).

Because of all the recent conversations and policy-changes around ordination of queer/LGBT folks in mainline denominations, there is a lot of buzz around the sexuality and sex lives of ministry candidates. I'm not sure if it was like this in the past, but several of my Presbyterian friends have been asked about their sex lives--whether they've been faithful in their marriage, whether they've ever had sex with someone of the same gender--and many of my peers in other denominations are asked or required to publicly state that they are celibate.

Some of my peers who are in denominations that require a vow of celibacy in singleness do not have sex because it's a personal choice and/or because it is important to them to follow the rules of the ordination process in this way. Many of them do have sex and lie about it. I also know several people who do have sex but believe they're being truthful when they tell their committees that they are not having sex.

Wait, what? Yes. It depends on the definition of sex, and I think many people--in the world, in the ordination process, and on ordination committees--have a very narrow definition of what sex is.

The long and short of it is that when we say "sex" we often think that means the act of a penis in a vagina that ends with the person with the penis achieving orgasm (and it's a bonus if the person with the vagina achieves orgasm, but it's not necessarily a requirement for it to be sex). I attribute a lot of this very boring understanding of sex to our ideas about the morality of sexuality that seems to go back to property and inheritance laws. If you were a man, you wanted to be sure any kid who stood to inherit your property was actually yours so the right person would inherit your money and land after you died. Therefore, regulating who was having sexual-intercourse-that-could-potentially-produce-offspring-who-would-then-stand-to-inherit-everything-after-you-died became really important, and those actions became the definition of sex so that those actions could then be regulated. Also, it’s the most androcentric, heteronormative definition of sex and we live in a very androcentric, heteronormative culture of which the Church is a part.

This definition (hopefully) sounds ridiculous, but I think it's still largely the definition out of which we operate. So under this definition, some friends and I have come up with a helpful list for people who are worried about going in front of their ordination committees that may (or definitely will) ask them if they have had sex or not. Especially if those committees are expecting you to say "no" in order to continue with the ordination process, we hope this is helpful. (*Note: I'm publishing this blog post, because my committee doesn't have any hard and fast rules about celibacy. Others who contributed do have committees who take a black-and-white view to sexual morality, so those friends prefer to remain anonymous).

IS IT SEX?????

Fingers touching or in vagina? IT'S NOT SEX!

Fingers touching penis? IT'S NOT SEX!

Anything involving the clitoris? DEFINITELY NOT SEX!

Penis (or anything else) in anus? IT'S NOT SEX!

Are you using toys? IT'S NOT SEX!

Is there licking, sucking, kissing, biting, etc of genitals? IT'S NOT SEX!

Clearly, we're being facetious. All of these actions are sex. Sex should be an experience that is mutual, life-giving, vulnerable, pleasurable, intimate, fun, funny, serious, playful, messy, physical. Sex does not always include all of these things all of the time, but sex should ideally have the potential for all of these things. And so should ministry. So why do so many denominations expect their candidates for ministry to be celibate? If the candidates choose to do so, they should be able to explain how being celibate contributes to their own well-being and experience of life, the health of their community, and their connection to the divine. And if they do choose to have sex, they should be able to explain why and how it contributes to their own well-being and experience of life, the health of their community, and their connection to the divine. That’s it.

May it be so.

Blest Be the Bind that Ties

Blest be the tie that binds
Our hearts in Christian love:
The Fellowship of kindred minds
Is like to that above.

These were the words that the congregation sang yesterday as I joined Trinity Presbyterian Church as an affiliate member with two others joining in full membership.  I am keeping my membership at New Providence Presbyterian Church in Maryville, but I also feel a strong affection and affinity for Trinity Presbyterian where I have been attending since I moved to Nashville eighteen months ago, and I wanted to more formally acknowledge that tie that binds.

I began thinking about joining Trinity in the fall when I began filling out and writing essays for seminary applications.  I also decided to begin the ordination process.  The first step to ordination in the PC(USA) is becoming an inquirer, which is done through your church of membership and presbytery.  I grew up in New Providence--I was baptized and confirmed there, and there are people there who have changed my diapers, rocked me in the nursery, taught me VBS, loved me when I was an awkward middle-schooler with braces, took me on youth trips, sent me care packages in college, and supported me prayerfully and financially during both of my YAV years.  It is at New Providence that I learned how to love and how to ask questions and where I was first encouraged to think about ministry as a vocation.  Belst be these ties that bind.  When I go to New Providence I feel as if I am going home.

But I also feel as if I am at home on Sunday mornings at Trinity.  My faith changed in dramatic and subtle ways while I was in Guatemala, and when I came to Trinity just a month after returning to the US from Guatemala I was welcomed with enthusiasm and invited to participate in the life of the church  but never felt obligated to do so.  Trinity is openly and unapologetically progressive on issues that are important to me, but does so with love and joyful hospitality.  And while New Providence has continued to support in many ways since I returned from Guatemala, Trinity is where I have been living out and processing some of these changes in my faith and values since returning from Guatemala, and they have helped carry me through a time of major transition and change in my life.  It is strange sometimes to be in a church where no one knew me before I was 23, but they have loved me for who I am now, and it is at Trinity that I am learning how to live a faith that is not only intellectual but joyful.  Blest also be these ties that bind.

So this is why I joined Trinity as an affiliate member at the same time as I begin the ordination process through New Providence.  I have found a home in both places and am grateful for the ties that bind me to the churches and the individuals in them.

First Fridays

We haven't quite been in Nashville long enough to really have "regular" places yet, but we're definitely working on it. There is this one bar down the street that has $2 pint Tuesdays and (often decent) live music that we have frequented a bit.

I think one of my favorite new things in Nashville, though, that we are trying to make a regular thing, is the First Friday services at Christ Church Cathedral downtown. It's a gorgeous old church that opens its door the first Friday of every month to the whole community for an ecumenical worship service. We (the 7 YAVs) have gone both of the first Fridays we've been here for. We joke that we go for the free wine and expensive cheese served afterward, which is partly true, but it's also nice to get to all worship together and the services are different enough to be interesting, but no so much as to be uncomfortable.

For example, in September the theme was something to do with Labor Day, and for the sermon there was a singing group that did some pieces from a musical talking about lots of different jobs, etc. The prayers and liturgy all had to do with honoring the work that people do.

This week the theme was creation. In place of the sermon, A local dance group presented a story of creation--one woman narrated while the dancers did their thing.

(Note: In my experience, liturgical dance is very tricky. It can be done well, in a way that reminds us educated WASPs that our bodies are an important part of this whole religion thing. It can also be over-done, which makes for a really awkward and uncomfortable worship service. The one Friday was really good).

The creation story itself was adapted from a film called "The Awakening Universe" by Neal Rogin, and I don't think it ever said anything about God in the whole thing, but it was a very reflective/spiritual way of understanding of how the universe came into being via the big bang, and, subsequently, how things evolved all the way up to humans.

The prayers and liturgy are also very progressive and all connect to the theme of the service nicely. For example... here is the last verse from the closing hymn, called "The Burning Love:"
The union of created life and God eludes our understanding, but we trust that here and now and through the sweep in time we each exist in God and God in us.

Good stuff. I really do like the service, but it is such a stark contrast to my worship experience in Guatemala that sometimes it just makes me laugh. I appreciate the inclusive language and more reflective theology of the First Friday services. I also really appreciate the solemnity and organization of the First Friday services, because I can relax more when there are not children running around and crying and a preacher slipping back and forth between two languages (only one of which I mostly understand) and the deafening feedback when the preacher starts walking around all in front of the gigantic speakers that are really unnecessary for a congregation of fifty.

The First Friday services are comfortable, and they feed a lot of my intellectual worship needs. They even have motions to go along with the Sanctus before communion, so that we are using our bodies and not just our minds in worship. However, I sometimes miss the disorganized confusion of the three-hour long worship service in Guatemala and the enthusiasm of their faith (even if it was often theologically offensive). I also miss (and I never thought I'd say this) the communal praying, where everyone prays their own prayers out loud (often very loudly) at the same time.

This past Friday, as I was sitting in my pew, patiently and obediently waiting for the usher to come and tell me when my row could go up to receive communion, I even missed the cheap white sandwich bread and grape soda communion of Guatemala.

When I was in Guatemala, one of the things that made me most homesick was going to church. I was homesick for the familiar faces in my church and the familiar order of the service (and the predictable one-hour-ness of it). I also longed for some more familiar (read: more progressive) theology. And now that I have all of that again, I miss the chaos and the rough-around-the-edges and the humility of my worship experience in Guatemala.

But I guess it will always be like that.