The Ministry and the Church

I don't normally write posts about the ministry and its challenges.  I tend to think that they can come through to many people as whiny and complaining.  I do my job, after all, because I love it and wouldn't want to give a false impression.  However, the fact is, most folks who are not ministers think they have a pretty good grasp of what the job entails...and they are usually pretty much wrong. 

I feel safe saying "most" folks because most people do not go to a church, synagogue, or mosque enough to have any real grasp of religious professionals.  They are working off contemporary media, hazy memories of childhood (maybe), weddings and funerals, personal biases, and the occasional work of a writer or "expert" who knows less about the clergy than they think.  There is also the fact that they made a choice not to belong to a faith community.  Often the reasons for that non-participation--consciously or not--are mixed into the understanding of both the job and clergy personally.  Minsters are irrelevant and/or judgemental.  They are somehow "backward".  They are boring.  They only work once a week.

 Folks who do frequent houses of worship still struggle with the same information, but at least they know a few clergy people (and their families) and see them on a regular basis.  This solves some of the problem.  Active members have a much better grasp of our general humanity.  They see holes in the stereotypes that--even if they still apply those to other ministers--they know do not apply to their minister.  This is a variation of what one sees in politics.  "All people in Congress are crooks...except the one that represents me."

Still, so much of the work that a minister does is unseen.  Or, at least, it isn't seen by a large number of people on a regular basis.  That is why congregations still attempt to quantify the unquantifiable.  After all, most people do, in fact, have jobs that can be broken down into component parts.  There are deadlines and products in the working world.  In houses of worship this cultural work-norm is reflected in discussions about "hours" and "units" as if they have some relevance to the organic ebb and flow of a congregation that is at the mercy of the cycles of our culture and of individual lives. 

What we religious professionals hope for, of course, is trust.  We try to do our job to the best of our ability and we hope that people understand that.  The fact that we are never quite sure that they do is the cause of a tremendous amount of stress.

So I am linking a couple of blog posts from others that I thought were quite accurate and interesting.  The first of these is from "Dirty Sexy Ministry" entitled What Priests Want You to Know.  This blog is written by two Episcopal priests--both women--who have a solid inside perspective on the job and a better way of putting things than I have.  Their "10 Things" are true--all of them--and are worth a read if you want to get a sense of what the ministry feels like to ministers.  The comments are also interesting if you have the time....

The other post--expanding on "Priests"--is at "News From the Underground" and is called 6 Things You Should Know Before Going to Seminary.  It's a little bit about seminary, but is mostly (again) about the life and realities of being a minister.  In particular, there are some observations about the future of the church and how churches function.

I finally want to note that I like these articles partly because of what they don't say.  They recognize that--regardless of occupation--everyone works hard at what they do.  They are not making claims for any particular virtue in that respect.  However, the ministry is different.  It is misunderstood.  This is a way to help explain.

The Hot Stove and Ezra Stiles Gannett

One of the more exhilarating things about March is that the "free agency period" for both professional football and the liberal church occur at the very same time.  For one, I follow NFL.com and boy, has it been interesting.  There were many big moves.  Some of them will no doubt look like acts of brilliance this time next year.  Others will be head scratchers.  For the comings and going of my colleagues--at least in the UUA--I check out the Hot Stove Report on Facebook.  The Hot Stove is followed mostly by clergy and search committees and--now after a few years--former search committee members.  Links will be provided below.

One thing that I see during this period for both groups is a certain mentality of high expectations and big dreams.  In a way this is good.  It makes churches and teams look closely at who they are and who they want to be.  It makes ministers and players think in similar terms.  The purpose, after all, is a good match.  In both cases not just any person will do.  A minister--like a football player--has to fit in to the system and the culture.  It is not just a case of getting the very best or the most popular person because each organization's "best" is different.  Sometimes folks realize this.  There are very good personnel people and search committees in both the NFL and the UUA.  Sometimes, though, they don't.  The pastor may have an imperfect or unrealistic understanding of his or her abilities.  The church leadership (in search or not) sees greener grass elsewhere.  Whether this gap can be bridged is one of the challenges of being in relationship over time.

These days, too, there is a tendency to try to quantify and measure tasks that are unmeasurable.  There is a sense in which pastoring and playing are arts They naturally defy easy description.  Still the folks doing the hiring often haven't done the work, themselves (interestingly it is becoming less common in the NFL for coaches to do the hiring and opportunities to have a clergy person on a search or personnel committee are rare).  They may want to focus on those skills that help them in their own jobs (transferable or not) or break things down into seemingly more controllable tasks and pieces.

Why do they do this?  I think it is because they--search committees of both stripes and stakeholders in general--are tense.  It takes courage to step away from the bullet points and statistics and take the leap based on those "intangibles".  This is why during the recent Payton Manning sweepstakes two teams--the Broncos and the 49ers--tried to hire him even though their own quarterbacks had taken their teams to the playoffs.  Alex Smith--who came within a few feet of the Super Bowl--got to keep his job because Tim Tebow's Broncos got Manning.  Tebow has gone to New York.  Smith has stayed in San Francisco and a relationship now needs fixing. 

Meanwhile,  there is no clear evidence that Manning will be the player he was with the Colts.  Different teams have different systems and different cultures.  Yes, by the way,  this chasing after celebrity happens in churches, too.

Churches in search, of course, have a luxury that football teams do not.  They can take another interim year.  There seems to be quite a bit of this going on right now.  Ministers I know have also turned down offers for congregations that--while perfectly fine for someone else--just wouldn't work for them. It is a good, thoughtful move when this happens.  That said, my heart goes out to the people and congregations that have made this choice. Now there is yet another year of uncertainty ahead. 

So for these folks I am posting a brief paragraph about the ministry from the Rev. Ezra Stiles Gannett.  He was quite the lion of Unitarianism in his day.  It should be said, though, that he comes from the tightly-wrapped, often-ill, self-recriminating branch of my profession.  A kind and brilliant man who rarely cut himself any slack.  It is a branch that many of my colleagues are familiar with, so understand that he writes with experience to us today from back in 1839.

All ministers were not made for the same kind of work.  Each holds the ministry according as he [or she, it was 1839 after all] has received mercy.  One loves study, another action; one is of a logical turn of mind, another feels the truth which he cannot reason out; one will touch and subdue his hearers on Sunday, another's powers of persuasion must be exercised in private...Now what can be more absurd than to place all these different capacities of usefulness upon one Procrustes' bed, and stretch and lop until they are all brought to what is considered the standard of  ministerial service!  ...

I have known so much needless suffering to be endured by ministers, and so much unjust comparison to be instituted by the people, that I am the more anxious to expose the error of imagining that there is only one road of professional success; that what one person does well another can and ought to do equally well.  Hence the impatience of a congregation when they hear a better preacher than their own, forgetful of the influence which he exerts in private....We cannot all be alike.  Our success must lie in different lines of usefulness.  It is through a variety of endowments, and, therefore of exercises, that the church must be benefited.  "As every man hath received the gift," says the apostle, "even so minister the same one to another, as good stewards of the manifold"--mark the word!--"the manifold grace of  God."


Here are links to the NFL
And the Hot Stove Report

My prayers are with those colleagues and churches in transition.  Good luck and God speed.

Bibles For Kids

I wrote an article in one of my previous blogs about the "right" Bible for kids.  The post bothered me then and it still bothers me.  What bothers me is not that I wrote it but that the subject presents to me as something of a jungle. I am a firm believer that kids should have access to the Jewish and Christian scriptures.  They should be able to read them for themselves without too much doctrinal interference and should be allowed to make their own conclusions.  That said, it can be a complicated issue for parents.  The Bible is complicated.  It encompasses a wide variety of topics and a vast array of styles.  It is also--to be honest--a book that many parents (including church-goers) do not know very well, even if they like to believe that they do.

 I know that some folks don't like their kids to read it because of the violence and sex.  The fact that many of these same people allow their kids to play video games and watch TV would indicate that there may actually be other reasons.  I know that there are others who are concerned with what sort of conclusions that kids will make.  It is this second group that actually prints and purchases children's Bibles.  This dynamic is also part of the reason it is hard to find a "good" one. 

The parental urge to tidy things up can wreak havoc on the book.  It can also create a final product that reflect the theological leanings of its editors as much as it does the Bible, itself.  A similar process goes on with Bibles for teens.  There is sometimes a desperate attempt to make scripture more accessible by re-packaging scripture and--in some sense--rewriting it.  It may then read like what old people think of as "cool"...but is it still the Bible?  Is it still accurate enough for kids to make their own conclusions?  If you truly believe that accepting a specific creed or doctrine is a necessary prerequisite for eternal life, wouldn't you naturally want to emphasize that which might reinforce your position?

Well, anyway, you see the problem.  I think that more important than which Bible is read is how it is read.  As parents and religious educators it falls to us to explain our approach.  That, of course, means that we need to educate ourselves about what that approach is.  That means taking a little time to do some research, to read a bit, to ask our pastors and others what their take is.  A couple of weeks ago at Eliot we had an after-church forum about our approach to scripture.  I have written about my own take in previous posts.  Others had their own--yet mostly compatible--ideas.  Discussions like this give us the tools to teach or, even better, be "learning companions" with our children.

The homeschooler in me is a big believer in participating in the education of our offspring.  In no place is that more necessary than in their moral and spiritual development.  After all, the schools don't do this work (separation of church and state is a good thing!).  Sunday school is only an hour a week and (were we to be honest) most of us don't make it every week, do we?

So here is the link to that old post.  It now lives on the web page of the Unitarian Universalist Christian Fellowship.  If you are looking for specific book suggestions, you can start there.  Like I said, though, it bothers me that I cannot think of better ones. 

Finally, if you are looking for a Bible yourself, I recommend the Oxford Annotated Bible (with Apocrypha).   It's translation (New Revised Standard) strikes the best balance, I think, between readability and scholarship.  The Annotated Bible also provides a wealth of clues and notes for a deeper understanding of the work.

Article Postscripts
My thoughts have changed a bit since that UUCF article was posted so there are two things worth mentioning...

1) The grade levels are merely suggestions!  The DK Bible that I mentioned is actually fine for K-2 as well as pre-K...just expect your 2nd graders to be ready to move on...

2)  I should note that these days we are handing out "Good News" Bibles to the 2nd graders instead of the version listed in the article. Ostensibly the Good News is more readable for younger kids, which is great if they actually do read it.  Honestly, though, the one my kids read is the one in the article, which is an NRSV translation with age-appropriate notes.  They didn't look at it much in 2nd grade but picked it up again in middle school....

And The Church Goes On...Thinking About the Bible

To read this blog lately, one would think all I do is sit around thinking about "Occupy".  In real life, of course, this isn't true at all.  Right now, in fact, I am psyching myself up to get into "Sunday preparation" mode.  Things will be busy this week.  I am organising a discussion group about Thoreau's "Civil Disobedience" and its influence on current social movements like Occupy, The Tea Party, and the Arab Spring.  That isn't close to the half of it, however...

On Sunday, in fact, we will be wrapping up a series of services on the liberal church.  This week we will be thinking about how liberals approach the Bible.  There will be two discussion groups (one before church and one after) and, of course, the service itself.  In my experience (by no means exhaustive) most of the folks attracted to religious liberalism practice a sort of "theology of subtraction".  We approach our faith looking for things that are not divine so that we may remove them from our understanding of God (or whatever term one might wish to use).  This is, by the way, a very ancient and accepted technique. The idea is to peel away Christianity's human-made complexities to reveal the simplicities.  Or--to use slightly different language--we seek the permanent within the transient. 

We even do this with scripture.  Certain passages make sense to us.  Others seem nonsensical.  Still others we find ourselves arguing against.  Each case is different and has something for us.  When we agree with scripture, it can bring insight to the topic.  When we are confused we can seek further clarity like religious detectives.  When we disagree either our own view is modified or strengthened because of the challenge.  In each case, though, we can ask where God is and where God isn't.

I think most people do this, but not everyone is able to acknowledge it or articulate it.  Some traditions make claims for their own approach.  There are those who believe the Bible is, in fact, internally consistent.  There are those who use the complexities of their own tradition to mediate the meaning of scripture.  I like subtraction. 

Folks familiar with the tradition can probably figure out some of the readings.  One will be Theodore Parker.  Another will be Palfrey Perkins.  I am also questing for a Bible verse that would fit.  Feel free to let me know if you think of one!  Perhaps I should have known this would be difficult....

Anyway, back to it.  I don't mind, of course.  I love talking about the Bible...

So Who Are The UU Christians?

I get this question (and it's variants, including "How can you be both UU and Christian?") much more often than I wish to.  It isn't a bad question, but it is a difficult one.  The fact is, I have never come up with a good answer.  The problem, I think, comes down to one of perspective and language.  What does the questioner mean by "Christian"?  More importantly, what does the questioner mean by "Unitarian" and Universalist"? 

It is really quite awkward that a non-creedal organization like the UUA has consistently chosen to use two theological doctrines in its name.  There have been other name suggestions over the years, many of which would be much more accurate.  Still, we keep this name to reflect the merger of two distinct liberal movements within Christianity.  They weren't (and aren't) the only liberal movements out there, but they are two with profound stories to tell.

Yes, I said that they were Christian movements.  These are Christian doctrines, of course, and really make the most sense in that context.  For most of their history the Unitarians and the Universalists just assumed they were Christians.  In the case of the Unitarians, they were Christians with an eccentric but not always strictly "Unitarian" christology.  In the case of the Universalists they were Christians who believed that all people (both Christian and non-Christian) went to heaven.  Universalists themselves had a variety of views on the nature of Jesus. If these famous UU predecessors (Emerson, Channing, Ballou, et. al.) were asked this question, they might respond by saying "How can you be UU and not be Christian?"

Again, the problem of language appears.  The modern Unitarian Universalist Association, after all, is not a Christian institution. There is still a sense among some (not me) that the UUA is anti-Christian.  As you may have gathered, I don't believe that this is because of the two theological positions stated in its name.  There have been many more forces involved in creating the Association we know today.

Either way ("anti-" or "non-"), the current situation is a circumstance divorced from its historic roots. Honestly, it isn't one that gets in my way all that much except when I have to answer this "UU Christian" question.  In this context one could simply respond by pointing out all you have to do institutionally is be a Christian who goes to a UU church.  In spite of attempts to clarify what, exactly, the UUA stands for, it remains non-creedal.

This, however, isn't usually what people mean either.  There is a sense in the way the UU Christians themselves use the term that implies (accidentally, I believe) doctrinal adherence.  That is, if you are  a Buddhist in the UUA, putting "Unitarian Universalist" in front of your theological preference is primarily a geographical designation.  "I am Buddhist but I go to the UU Church".  Theologically, you might also be saying "I support the free and responsible search for truth and meaning".   Good stuff.  I support that, too.   However, if you are a Christian in the UUA, doing the same thing it sounds (gasp!) downright creedal.  It is misleading.  There are, after all, many Trinitarians in the UUA. There always have been.  Also, many Christians in this context (and in other contexts) are Arians (look it up), or Agnostics, or don't particularly see formal christology as terribly relevant to their faith.  In the UUA some Christians, in fact, are Athiests...

I have always preferred the terms "Free Christian" and "Liberal Christian" as they encompass my own faith and those of many other people on similar journeys.  For all three of these terms, the nutshell definition is that we choose to "freely follow Jesus" without adherence to specific creeds.  The particulars, are up to individuals to discern.  We also make a point of claiming the word "Christian".  To those who tell us we are not, we respond by asking who made them the gatekeepers of the faith.  We will decide for ourselves if we are Christian, thank you very much!

Of course, many of us choose to do our discernment in groups.  We congregate in many different ways.  The way I am most familiar with, though, is the Christian church.  Later I will write a bit about what being a member of a Christian Church in the UUA is like.  I am very interested in discovering what these churches can be in the future. Until then, here are some links.  The first one is particularly useful.

Here is a brief essay written by the Rev. Tom Wintle.  Tom is the Senior Minister of First Parish Weston, a member congregation of the Council of Christian Churches in the UUA (note the formulation of the name).  He is also one of the senior prophets in our movement, having held many leadership positions in the UUCF, the CCCUUA and other organizations.  Once again, if you have questions like the one in the title of this post, it is probably the most important and helpful thing to read.

Also....

Unitarian Universalist Christian Fellowship (UUCF)

Council of Christian Churches in the UUA (CCCUUA)

Arius (I wouldn't really leave you hangin' would I?)

Swimming Transcendentalism

Life at the parsonage has been a bit crazy lately.  Summer is upon us and various programs for the kids have coincided with various projects of my own and of the family in general.  Also, there have been maintenance issues.  Right now contractors are digging up my garden to put in a pipe that will connect the ol' parsonage to the town sewer.  Losing the garden has been sad.  However, retiring the cesspool most likely put in a century ago when plumbing finally came to Eliot Church is such an overdue joy I can put up with re-planting.  Sadly though, all this action does mean that I am home on a beautiful day.  I would rather be swimming. 

Swimming is my preferred form of exercise.  However, I see no real reason to do it in a pool.  The pool always has a "fast lane" and a "slow lane".  Both are for folks who are getting their assigned laps in so they can be healthier people.  There is nothing wrong with that.  I am just not linear enough as a person to enjoy it.  Why isn' there a "treading water for a while" lane?  Perhaps a "pretend you are a whale" lane would add some zing to Adult Swim.  I drive the kids to the "Y" every weekday.  I believe I am qualified to assert that there is no place or reason there for an "admire the view" lane. 

So sue me for wanting swimming to be more stately and entertaining.  I will stay out of your way at the pool and go to the lake. This weekend we managed to get over to Walden Pond.  Many of you will remember it from literature.  Every once in a while the 'burbs make a lasting positive contribution to society.  Impressionism springs to mind.  So does Transcendentalism...OK it has been a while...

Lots has happened to the poor old pond since Henry Thoreau (with the help of his buddy Bronson Alcott) cleared a small piece of Ralph Waldo Emerson's Burbanian possessions to build his one-room house.  The plan was that Henry would play flute to the fishes, garden, write and walk to his friends' homes for dinner.  It worked out famously.  Fame has both preserved this area in the midst of development and attracted many, many visitors.

The pond is quite a bit more crowded than it was back in Thoreau's day.  It is a state park with a changing room, two small beach areas and a life-sized statue of the great man, himself.  There is also a mock-up of his cabin located near the parking lot.  The original cabin site is about half way around the lake near a large pile of rocks.  It turned out that Alcott's memory was a bit off when showing folks where the house was.  Thankfully this meant that the stone-offerings brought by Thoreau worshippers failed to obscure the actual foundation when it was finally located.

Anyway, it was a fantastic day for a swim.  The crowds stayed right on or next to the shore.  The wet-suited fast-lane folks jumped in, swam across the lake, came back, stripped off their wet suits and marched on to their power-bars or power lunches or whatever.  This left the middle of the lake for boaters (no motors, please) and random water-treading back-floaters like myself.  It was awesome. it was rejuvenating.  I was reminded, in fact, of a sentence describing Horace Bushnell written by one of his biographers, Barbara Cross.  "In isolation, a 'sweet sense of estrangement' crept over him, and he responded to the 'sublime cataracts' of the East Hampton ocean and of Niagara as to the 'divine music' which he heard in the 'lofty passes of the alps.'"  OK, Concord Massachusetts isn't an Alp.  Still, it was nice and with my eyes pointed to the sky and my ears in the water I could have been anywhere.

Walden isn't where I usually do my swimming, though.  The next day we went to Dug Pond, the town beach in my own municipality.  It was somewhat less crowded, but judging by the number of brief conversations and encounters I had there, it appears that I know a lot of teenagers and middle-aged men.  I must be old and semi-respectable (sigh).  The view is a bit different as well.  Instead of forest and wet-suits there were familiar faces and the emerging facade of our new high school.  You could hear the power-tools and the trucks trying to get it ready for the students of a year from now. Still, with your head in the water you could be anywhere. 

I like fresh-water swimming.  I like it up in Northern Maine where the water is cold and the crowds are thin.  I like here in town, too.  It isn't just exercise.  Watching the landscape and the people who enjoy it I am reminded that--along with William Henry Furness--I can "rejoice that we can so freely approach the infinite majesty of heaven, that in this vast and various creation we are not lonely and forsaken".

I think I am OK going to Dug Pond.  I wish I was there now...


Here is a link to Walden Pond for you non-MetroWesters.

Here is a link to Dug Pond, in case you plan to visit me this summer.

Here is Horace Bushnell.  Incidentally, for a more nuanced view of the man, I would recommend Gary Dorrien's work on liberal Christianity.  Cross wrote in 1958 and rather glossed over some of Bushnell's less liberal traits.  Also...yes, I really did think of that sentence about Bushnell while floating in Walden Pond.  I just read the book and that is the best sentence in it...

Here is  William Henry Furness.

Say It Ain't So Dr. Willimon...

Hello Dr. Willimon,

You don't know me but I thought I would drop you a quick line this morning.  Last night before bed I was reading the lovely obituary of Peter Gomes that you wrote in the Christian Century magazine.  I am sure you miss him.  We all do.  He was a lion of the pulpit and a leader and mentor to many of us.  Peter Gomes is someone many preachers around these parts strive to be like and that is a good thing.  However, I must take exception with something you wrote.  It was a little phrase and--no doubt--you put it in because you like the sound and cadence. It is a preacher's phrase.  I said it out loud.  Too bad it is incorrect.

You were writing about Peter Gomes' writing--I think--but you may have been being a bit more general that that when you described the man as "a sort of eloquent last hurrah of New England Christian liberalism at its very best."  Excuse me?  Last hurrah?  Understand, sir, that I mean no disrespect to you or to Dr. Gomes, but we are not ready for our last hurrah just yet.  Every week great preachers in the tradition of New England Christian liberalism climb into their pulpits to stand between the rampant forces of conservatism and intolerance on the one hand and that flood of secular indifference on the other.

Notice I didn't say we "hold back" those forces. We are still realists though still we try. The intolerance we know how to fight.  The indifference hurts us badly but we have not given up.  We stand there in our churches--from half a dozen denominations--preaching the gospel as we know it to those members of our congregations who have the will to hear.  We will do so until all of New England has turned its back on us.  That will take a while.  In fact it may never ever happen! I promise you if there is a last hurrah, there will be no Dr. William Willimon around to see it and write us a splendid eulogy.

Perhaps you meant only to suggest that Gomes was better than we who remain.  You did, after all, say he represented our tradition at its very best.  I respectfully submit that there are plenty of people today who will rise up and take his place.  It is what Dr. Gomes would have wanted, by the way.  You may not know these people.  Perhaps you thought all the New England churches were filled with historical recreations like Sturbridge Village.  That's OK.  On the blank edges of some of our maps are the words "Here there be W. Willimon".  We haven't met you either, but we suspect you might exist.  Most of our churches have a pastor or two.  Others have determined lay people.  They are all doing good work and, again, we have not given up to the point where we will not do our very, very, best!

Cheer up!  I am writing to reassure you.  Your friend Peter lives on in more ways than one.  The fact is, we carry more light and truth than even we realize. That truth, doctor, will never die...

Yours in New England Christian Liberalism,

Rev. Dr. Adam Tierney-Eliot

Athenaeum Flood

The Boston Athenaeum flooded yesterday.  According to the general email and the Athenaeum website, it started with a plumbing problem on the first floor--the "public" section where much of the art (and the Children's Library) is kept.  Then the water seeped down into the basement stacks.  They library be closed for a while as they assess the damage.  Possibly thousands of books will be affected in some way.  Water is the bane of libraries--even dampness--so the books will need to be taken offsite and (hopefully) dried out enough to return to circulation.  The library, itself, will need to dry out, too.

The Atheneaum is a private library with a large reputation and an impressive collection of books--mostly in the arts and humanities--that cannot be easily gotten elsewhere.  I have always admired it.   It serves as a lighthouse for those pursuing disciplines that often fall out of vogue.  These days the arts and humanities suffer in the public eye for the frequent absence of immediate financial return.  This fact alone makes it important to have institutions of scholarship, education, and  preservation that are like this.  They help to show that contemplation is not dead and that broad, dynamic thought is still essential to the American life.

I joined this year as part of my staybattical.  Partly, it was because I thought it would be good for Norm, and it has been.  Mostly, however, it was because I wanted access to the sort of works that I would need for my research into transcendentalist Christianity, preaching, and the creative act.  They have some great material, some of which I have referenced in my previous posts. 

My athenaeum year has been a wonderful experience.  I have found the collections to be fulfilling, the silence to be gratifying, and the architecture inspiring.  In fact, I think I will keep a membership next year.  One of the more pleasant side effects of my Fridays with Norm is that, while he does his own work, I sit in one of those first floor chairs (or sometimes on the second floor) and outline my sermon.  There will be plenty of sermons to outline in the future.

There are, of course, other attractions.  If I just wanted to write, after all, there are plenty of desks closer to the parsonage.  In addition to the books, there is art.  One of my favorite seats, in fact, is the one right below John Singer Sargent's portrait of George McCulloch.  There is also the beauty of the space, and there is the location to consider.  Occasionally I gaze out the window at the view of the Granary Burial Ground.  The cemetery, itself, is quite the spectacle  It is busy in the summer and fall with tour guides in period costume giving the talk about Paul Revere's two gravestones. It is a  a grey, cold, quiet in winter. All of this helps elevate the soul and brings it closer to Creation.

Reading an old book from the Athenaeum--the kind they keep in the basement stacks--puts one in touch with history, too.  The book on my desk as I write this still has its original circulation card.  There are a number of illegible signatures along with a number of legible dates: June 4, 1886, October 11, 1886, September 13, 1888, October 8, 1894, December 2, 1897.  The list stops then.  I wonder who has read this book before me?  Who were they?  What were they like?  The book's topic would indicate they were most likely liberal clergy.  I hope its fellow-books have survived the deluge.

The library is private, but you can join.  If you are under 40, an individual membership costs $115 and a family membership is $175.  If you are over 40, then it is $230 and $290.  It is is worth it, believe me.  It may also be worth making a donation, if you can.  After all, there will be quite a lot of cleaning up to do and, honestly, many people benefit from the library's existence even if they don't belong themselves.  Just think of all the papers that have been researched and written there.  Imagine all the sermons.

Of course, once you join, it is hard to leave.  Fellow-member Nathaniel Hawthorne claimed to have shared the reading room for some time with the ghost of Unitarian minister Thaddeus Mason Harris a "small, withered, infirm, but brisk old gentleman, with snow-white hair, a somewhat stooping figure but yet remarkable alacrity of movement."  Rev. Dr. Harris' portrait still (hopefully) hangs on the first floor...

Here are links to

The library's website (it will open on the membership page)

And Thaddeus Mason Harris (from the Dorchester Atheneaum website, I do not know if he was also a member there)

Hawthorne, I think you all know...

The Treasures of the Snow Revisited

As we sit and work, or sit and dream, a day comes in which stillness falls.  A hush is on the earth; a gray sky is overspread above; an uneasiness is in the air which is not wind.  Go to the window and watch. 

With these words William Channing Gannett calls us to contemplate the storm.  He makes it sound so peaceful--even though he goes on to describe the snow as a sort of occupying army.  Somehow I think he wasn't the one responsible for the kids when they stayed home from school!  My wife works from home, so she doesn't have the day off.  This does influence the nature of the day.

Norm put in a couple of hours this morning as Son #1 did the homework he didn't do last night.  Then they went outside to build a snow fort, throw snowballs, etc.  I shovelled the walk and the driveway, took pictures, chipped in a bit on the fort (in a supervisory role) and then got right into the administering of "time-outs".

Son #3 has veered from fragility to truculence to outright rebellion all morning.  He doesn't want to be outside or inside (in opposition, of course, to where the rest are most happy at any moment).  He wants to watch TV and play video games.  Who are these people who get to sit by the window with some hot chocolate and watch the snow fall?  I think I know, and I think I have a way to go before I am one of them.

Anyway, the storm has postponed a potentially more interesting post about a couple of parenting books I just read.  I am sure I will get to them at some point.  They are all about how we should let our children raise themselves a bit more than we do.  I am all for that.



The storm, by the way, is fantastic.  The snow is piling up on the trees and the frozen river and the road.  This sabbatical I am really enjoying the show that winter has put on for us.  Every day the landscape changes.  Every day I have tried to get out into it and this has been good.  Again I wish I had Gannett's gift for language so that I could tell you all about it, but I don't.  Suffice it to say that I have always gotten pretty tired of winter and its difficulties in the past.  This year--with the extra time--it has not been the case.  This winter I have weekends (thank you Labor Movement!).  It has been a long time since I have had so many strung together.  Perhaps this time with nature will be the best part part of staybattical.   It wouldn't surprise me in the least.

Here is a bit of the "occupying army" part of Gannett's essay
A few heralds clad in white come floating down, turning this way, turning that way, like scouts seeking for paths and camping-places.  Then, of a sudden, the thick, dull sky is alive with trooping forms!  The ways of the air are filled with the army of Snow!  Their tread is not with sound, but second by second they arrive, and alight, and possess themselves of the hills and the hollows.  The fields grow silent and white with their gleaming camp.

I would say that they have pretty much taken over here in Burbania...



Hedge and The Broad Church

     Back when I was trying to make sense of DMin Project, I spent a great deal of time with the work of Frederic Henry Hedge.  Hedge held a variety of posts over the years and was a major component in the early development of what became Transcendentalism.  Many current scholars assert that he ultimately turned away from this movement in reaction to its drift away from traditional Christianity.  I am not so sure about that.  It seems to me that those scholars are--for the most part--studying something more akin to "Emersonism" rather than an intellectual movement with various "schools" and wings. 

     Hedge (along with fellow travellers like James Freeman Clarke) did disagree with his friends on many points.  However, many of these differences came from his commitment to the church.  Hedge and Clarke were, essentially, churchmen.  Their job was to translate these new ideas into something that was actually useful for  regular people.  Thoreau could go to the woods.  Emerson could go on his lecture tours.  Alcott could...um...do whatever he was into at that moment.  Everyone else had to live in the mundane everyday world.  Many of them wanted to go to church to learn how to live into their beliefs.  Many of them saw themselves as Christians (and still do).  They saw (and see) no reason why the new ideas required an abandonment of this faith identity.

     One of Hedge's most famous sermons--"the Broad Church"-- was re-published in 1981 by the Unitarian Universalist Christian Fellowship and can still be found in many UU church libraries.  In it he attempts to situate the church according to the four directions of the compass.  This is well before modern versions of paganism entered our consciousness--it was first published in 1891--so the compass allusion came from scripture "and they shall come from the east and from the west, and from the north, and from the south, and shall sit down in the kingdom of God."  (Luke 13:29)
    
     That he chose a geographic metaphor is, I think, telling. Each of the four points helps to situate the church in the religious landscape. for a liberal Christian they are not, in themselves, surprising. The east, for example, represents the permanent core of the Christian faith, “Fundamental and indispensable to every church is the idea of Christ,--not the moral teacher and philosopher, but Christ, the Son of man and the Son of God”.  For many of us who are part of liberal Christian churches in the UUA there remains this sense of Jesus Christ as being something more than just a good guy, or an effective teacher.  Of course, not everyone would articulate what Jesus is in the same way as Hedge.  There are plenty of divergent opinions!  However, as I mentioned in a previous post, at my church not everyone is Christian, but we all have had to come to terms with what Jesus means to us.  He is mentioned or quoted nearly every week.

      The western compass point stands for the rapidly growing and developing interpretation of our faith. “Christianity, though bound to a given idea and to certain immutable truths, is not, for the rest, a fixture, but a movement and a growth; not a divinely established system of views and institutions…but a flowing demonstration of the spirit in such forms and aspects and embodiments as each successive age required.”   The Bible--and the larger tradition, itself--is a text to be in conversation with and that must itself speak to the world in which it exists.  This, of course, is at the center of many liberal or progressive faith traditions.
    
     For Hedge--perhaps not surprisingly--the northern point stands for mysticism. To him and to his spiritual inheritors, the experience of God comes from a variety of sources, including nature and life, itself. "Mysticism is a very important element in religion 'if haply we may find him.'  It is that by which religion lays hold of the invisible and enters into fuller, that is, more conscious and intimate, communion with the spiritual and heavenly world."  Unlike many of his friends, however, his understanding of this mystical dimension was firmly grounded in the institution of the church. This openness to a variety of religious perspectives is the hallmark of liberal worship, Christian or otherwise.  I see this dynamic in both the UUA and the UCC.  However, openness still requires an understanding of one's own lens.  In this case, the Christian one that naturally alters our perspective of the faith of others.
    
     The life of the church rounds out Hedge’s compass points. The southern (and sometimes neglected) point is reserved for ritual. Again, perhaps unlike the more famous Transcendentalists, Hedge’s theology had a stronger corporate dimension. The religious life is something that is done in community and that includes communal worship.

“A church without a ritual, without symbols and sacraments and a corporate organism…is an impossibility, a contradiction in terms. The religious sentiment, it is true, is spontaneous and eternal; in one form or another it will always exist where man exists; but this spontaneous religion, unfixed and uncertain, may so degenerate as to become only evil rather than good.”


     This model from Hedge is more than just an academic exercise or historical curiosity. The theological tradition of the church is what has attracted and sustained its membership though the years. As with Hedge’s thought, theology is lived out with openness to other traditions and perspectives. However, also like Hedge, many liberals have made an intentional decision to articulate our faith journey through the language, tradition, and stories of the Jewish and Christian faiths.  Hedge, I think, is worth a read ans surprisingly easy to come by.  I would suggest "Frederic Henry Hedge: Unitarian Theologian of the Broad Church" (UU Christian v.36 n. 1-2) as a good place to start.  If you want to be particularly Hedgian, there is "Reason in Religion" as well as numerous sermon collections, theses and dissertations.

     Ultimately Hedge dropped out of my doctorate with the exception of some of his work in Reason.  I think I will catch up with him during sabbatical, both for what he says about liberalism and for what he says about the church, itself.


Here is a link to the UUCF Bookstore where I don't see any Hedge stuff for sale at the moment.  However, if you are interested, there is some good stuff and there may be a way to get back copies of specific articles...

Return of the Staybattical Part III: Old, Dead, Liberals

There are times--like this morning--when it is hard to get going.  It is cold outside.  The trees, the road, the houses, and the people are all varying shades of slate-grey.  The dim outlines of the many school buses that ply their trade though the Burbanian morning are moving slowly, making the horrible noise of metal grinding against itself.  Ah Monday, when all that has been delayed reminds you of its tedious presence.

Later on Norm will wake up and we will get to work.  There will be more reading and writing for him.  There will be phone calls for me..  At some point, however.  I will get a few moments and will be able to indulge in the least systematic element of my staybattical.  Namely, the reading of old dead liberals.

Regular readers already know about this tendency.  I have gotten a membership this year in the Boston Athenaeum and have sought to make it my theological playground and frontier.  However, since I have kept the whole thing casual (picking books based on whim, mostly) my reading is rather scattered and unscientific.  At B.P. I have tried to take note of passages or ideas that might interest others.  Past posts are filled pithy quotes from random religious liberals and their mostly long-out-of-print books. 

They are all religious liberals, of course.  I am a Parish minister after all, and the purpose is to get a better sense of the thought and thinkers that have informed the thinking of the sort of people who make up my congregation.  Not that folks need to know their names, but I should know them.

The Eliot Church, being affiliated with the Unitarian Universalist Association and the United Church of Christ, is both liberal and explicitly Christian.  Not all members claim to be Christian, but that is not unusual in the UCC or (obviously) the UUA.  Our UCC half, however, does require us to come to terms with what Jesus means to us and the answers vary.  The point is, not all of these liberals I am reading are of the "Emerson Fan Club" sort that I might be expected to read were I somewhere else.  Currently I am reading works by Frederic Henry Hedge (one of my faves), Harry Emerson Fosdick, Henry Ward Beecher, and the somewhat problematic Horace Bushnell.  At some point they all will be quoted and discussed here at Burbania Posts.

Actually, I have most recently been reading a small book written by William Channing Gannett entitled "A Year of Miracle".  It is a collection of four essays, each corresponding to one of the seasons.  The first essay is the best and takes its text from Job 38:22 (King James Version for all you KJ fans).  Here is his (Gannett's, not Job's) beginning...

If a sunset were as rare as a comet, the people would all be out upon the hill-tops--astronomers with their telescopes, poets with their pens, artists with their brushes--to capture what they could of it, and give it immortality.  Or, if only once a year the eastern skies held sunrise, we should be out of bed betimes that morning to watch the gold and crimson pageant passing up the sky.  But because these glories face us every day, we are color-blind to them.  Still worse with glories that are near as well as frequent.  We envy a friend starting for Europe, going where there is "so much to see," we say--Alps, cathedrals, and old art: as if a year spent in the nearest pasture would not crowd our mind with miracles, if only we had eyes to see with!

"Hast thou entered into the treasures of the snow?"  Probably not: for he who asked the question spoke of a treasure-chamber, rare in Bible-lands, but opened to us anew with each December...

Man he has a way words...

Beginners

I hope the new year is getting off to the start you hoped it would be.  I spent time with family and friends over the last couple of days and it was quite nice.  For many people this is the end of the holiday season.  I will hang on until Epiphany, when (I believe) I and a few other folks will be bottling a Porter and an IPA to get us through the rest of the winter.

I don't make resolutions based on this holiday (New Year's, not Epiphany).  I am enough of a church animal at this point in my life that I do that on the first Sunday in Advent.  So while others are making them, I have reached the time when I start to forget them.  Actually, I have a suggestion for folks who are looking for something in this area which--not surprisingly--is the real subject of this post.... 

Why don't you resolve to become a beginner?

In my (admittedly messy) car, I keep a copy of "Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind" by Shunryu Suzuki.  It is what I read when I am early for something.  In it he tells us that "In the beginner's mind there are many possibilities, but in the expert's mind there are few."  It is a good thing to remember, of course, but it is hard to do. 

Also, we can lull ourselves into thinking we are doing this when we are not.  A beginner approaches a subject with curiosity, enthusiasm and openness.  Sometimes we try this approach with subjects we just know too much about to really experience with a beginner's mind so directly.  This is when we pay someone to come to work and tell us to "think outside the box".  Often this involves filling out boxes.  This is when we resort to the self-help books as well.

I think the better way to a beginner's mind comes from actually being a beginner at something.  Yes, I am talking about hobbies--sort of.  However, sometimes it is something else, volunteer work, activism, even, perhaps, a career change.  Not all hobbies will work either.  If you resolve to "take up cabinet making" for example, the goal is to become as good a cabinet maker as you can.  You can certainly cultivate a beginner's mind and become a good cabinet maker, but it is a different goal.  In this case, the question isn't "am I making a good cabinet" but instead is, "is this cabinet making thing still super cool?"  Perhaps the best thing to do is find something that you can accept you won't ever be an expert at.

For my beginner's mind exercise I have the uke.  Ukuleles are not really conducive to expertise.  There are great masters, of course, but they study really hard and, for the most part, still maintain a strong sense of irony concerning what they do.  That is, they do it for kicks.  There is a reason why the most famous uke players are comedians, after all.  Bringing my own limitations to an instrument that already has limitations itself  means that I can only get so good.  I do not plan to compose inspirational (or other) music.  I do not plan to work my way to semi-legitimacy in a bar-band (though that would be funny).  I just hack around on it and play it in public settings where its natural charisma is more important than its tone or range. 

The point is, I will always be a beginner and this fact helps me to be a beginner elsewhere.  For example, the beginner's mind has helped to open up new possibilities in my preaching.  The uke has helped me to do this. It has punctured the "expert bubble" more than once.  As you know, I do a great deal of preaching.  I have a doctorate on the subject and a regular gig at the Eliot Church.  However, it is hard to be the Rev. Dr. Adam Tierney-Eliot who knows a lot about preaching when I am leading the congregation in singing "White Christmas".  I have to loosen up.  In that loosening comes new ideas and new perspectives and growth.  That is...more beginnings.

Do you see what I am getting at?  To maintain your "beginner's mind" in all areas of life, why not add an area in which you will always be a beginner?  It will probably not be the same one I chose (and I am choosing others as well).  That's not the point.  Find something you are interested in but that you have chosen not to do in the past because you were afraid you wouldn't be good at it.  Then explore doing that thing not so you will become an expert but so that you will have the experience of something new and exciting.  That is real outside the box thinking and it will come back to serve you well in your future expert endeavors.

Perhaps not something that could get you killed, though.  I mean, really, skydiving?

Advent

So last night we hung up the Advent Calendars.  This year my mother put together one for each kid.  Looks like some sort of Lego set...very cool.  We also dug out the Advent Wreath and put up the lights on the porch.  One almost feels like Christmas is upon us...if it wasn't for the stunning lack of snow...

Advent is a season that sneaks up on us.  For most people, it isn't always clear when it starts.  Money says it starts the day after Thanksgiving, when people leave the warmth of their families to wait in darkened parking lots for "doorbuster" sales.  For the church, it began last Sunday.  This past Sunday we lit the candles in the windows of the sanctuary, saying a reading for each one.  Some were traditional readings (Magnificat, Benedictus) others were not (May Sarton, Nathan Graziano).  We were trying to give a sense of moving from darkness and struggle into the light.  In our Ann Weems reading, she talked about "running to Bethlehem" which seemed an apt metaphor, whether or not you buy the whole Bethlehem-manger thing.  Then we lit the first candle of the Advent wreath (in our church the "hope" candle).  There was a sermon (featuring my magic uke).   Then we finished everything off with a carol.  We had solid attendance, too.  It was a great way to kick everything off.

Of course, for many people Advent started yesterday.  I suspect that this is an American thing.  After all, folks are still recovering from Thanksgiving when that first Sunday rolls around.  This simple fact makes us mark the beginning at the next obvious opportunity...when we haul out the Advent Calendars.  No matter how it begins, it ends with Christmas.  Christmas should be twelve days at least, but of course it doesn't work that way.  Money needs to pull down the red and green for the (rather arbitrary) colors for New Year's Eve.  There are fancy drinks to be made, after all, and someone needs to sell them.  However, Epiphany is on the 6th of January and "Epiphany Sunday" will be on the 9th.  Therefore, we are given some flexibility if we want it.

In my family we stretch the holiday out.  Advent is Advent and Christmas starts on the 25th.  What this means is a variety of family gatherings (of course) and a much saner family holiday on Epiphany, itself.  It means there isn't any crazy crash on the 26th or 27th.  There is less stress because there is more time to do things during Christmastide and there is more time in Advent to be..well...Adventish.  In church we have been talking about this, too.  Advent needs to be its own thing, not a vague sort of "Christmastime" filled with frantic activity shoehorned into regular life.  We have a good chunk of time.  Let it move slowly.  Then Christmas, itself needs to slow down too. 

Reclaiming the liturgical calendar can help with this.  There is a certain wisdom in the pacing of the days.  More than any other "tradition" of modern times (I'm looking at you  Black Friday!) this old traditional pattern of celebration is there to bring us into the spirit of the season and to take us out again with our good humor intact and our souls a little better off than they were before.  Running through the darkness will not get us to the light any quicker.  Let us try to take our time this year...

Here is an old hymn, written in the 1860's, by the transcendentalist Christian (and, yes, Unitarian) Frederic Henry Hedge.

CHRISTMAS HYMN--F.H. Hedge

'Twas in the East, the mystic East,
     Where Time his race began,
Where new-born Nature spread the feast
     For new created man,--

The tree of life was planted first,
     So holy scriptures tell,
Before the earth with sin was cursed,
     And man from Eden fell.

That tree untasted passed away,
     And sin and sorrow grew,
And tarried long the wished-for day
     To waiting Israel due:--

Till from the land where Jordan old
     Still washes Judah's shore,
When God's own hand the page unrolled,
     Of Judah's sacred lore,

Sprung, to requite that early loss,
     From David's royal root,
Another tree, whose stem the cross,
     And Christendom its fruit.

Blest be the Tree of life divine!
     The hand that gave it blest!
Lord, through the earth extend its line,
     And give the nations rest!

In us implant its sacred seed,
     And with thy grace bedew,
And let it, ripening into deed,
     For aye itself renew.

Thanksgiving Day Prayer

This Sunday my colleagues and I split the sermon into three "reflections", each taking a piece.  It went well and folks enjoyed it.  The first reflection was actually the Children's Focus, an important element in an intergenerational service!  I went last and talked about how hard it is to feel thankful sometimes, particularly around the holidays.  At least it is for me.  Frankly, being told to be thankful makes me wonder what it is that I should be the rest of the time. 

I just don't follow orders well. I know a lot of other people in the same boat.  Christmas can be like this, too.  Everything says "be happy" which makes many people ask themselves why.  There is always the flip side of these holidays.  What are we trying to gloss over with all the decorations and lights, and presents?  What pains in our lives?  What injustices?  Are we thankful for things that necessarily make life hard for others?  Are we hoping our celebrations will be loud enough to ignore the tears of others...or our own tears?  This is why Amos yells at us in the Bible, "I hate, I despise your festivals and I take no delight in your solemn assemblies...but let justice roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream." 

Still, we can turn that coin over once again and remind ourselves that in the midst of human selfishness there is still good in us yet.  Yes, there are times when gratitude is used as a form of self-congratulation, but not all the time.  It is also genuine at times.  Gratitude--thanksgiving--comes from the best part of ourselves, the part that touches the Divine.  Hopefully we don't wait for Turkey-Day to be grateful. 

My grandfather, during his final illness found things to be thankful for that may not have occurred to many of us kids at the time.  As I get older, I think I get them better.  God's love is in our pain and our failures after all.  God walks with us in the dark places of our lives.  We have the gift of compassion, though we may not always use it.  We have the gift of love.  We can always be thankful for these things, even when our gratitude is tempered by the world in which we live.

Here is a poem by Theodore Parker.  I used on Sunday as a closing reading to my remarks.


Thankfulness and Trust, Theodore Parker

For all the trials of my earlier day
     I thank thee, Father, that they all have been;
That darkness lay about the rugged way
     Which I must tread alone. For all I’ve seen
Of disappointment, sorrow, pain, and loss,
     I thank thee for them all. And did I sin,
I grieve not I’ve been tried; for e’en the cross
     Of penitence has taught me how to win.
Yet, of the ills as child or man I’ve borne—
     My hopes laid waste, or friends sent off by death,--
Remorse has most of all my bosom torn
     For time misspent, ill deeds or evil breath.
But yet, for every grief my heart has worn,
     Father, I thank thee still, trusting with hearty faith

Update I meant to do this yesterday but completely forgot.  Here is a link to another (much, much longer) Thanksgiving prayer by Parker....

More Preaching...

I have been reading "Samuel Longfellow: Memoirs and Letters," which was edited by Joseph May and published in 1894.  It is a remarkably good read, comprised mostly (so far) of letters from Longfellow to his collaborators and colleagues.  Chief among them are Samuel Johnson and Edward Everett Hale.  So far--in the vein of very old gossip--it appears that he wasn't so fond of Theodore Parker as a person.  He does seem to have still been impressed with Parker's ideas and was willing to preach at his church when invited.

The passages that I have found most interesting up to this point have been the ones where he describes his early attempts at preaching.  After his first sermon (preached in Dedham, MA) he told Johnson that "on the whole, I liked it very well...Still, I felt no seriousness or solemnity about the matter, that I must tell you."  This appears to have been an early concern of his.  He seems to have been expecting (good transcendentalist that he eventually became) to be moved himself by the sermon.  Joseph May in his commentary says it best, and reflects on this general tendency early in a preaching ministry:

"The genuineness of Longfellow's sentiments is intimated in his disappointment at the effect on himself of his early essays in preaching, the importance of which, as spiritual experiences, a sincere beginner naturally magnifies in his youthful anticipations, not realizing that these first occasions must needs be matters of form, largely."

I think what May is trying to say here is that one must crawl before one walks and that issues of style and form take precedence early on and then fade away as the preacher becomes more comfortable.  That makes sense.  I would add that revisiting performance issues is a good and responsible task for the parish minister, otherwise preaching becomes repetitive and stale.  I also wonder how he expected to be moved. 

I know some preachers who seem very impressed with their own composition.  This leaves me as a listener out in the cold.  Perhaps he meant that he was having trouble being moved by the topic or the preaching text?  This, I think, is a greater concern for many of us.  More than one of my preaching professors in the DMin program emphasized that we should choose texts that connect with us personally.  In my project paper I cited works by Jana Childers, Theodore Jennings, and Henry Mitchell on this.  Preachers; of these I would seriously recommend Mitchell's book "Celebration and Experience in Preaching".

Of course, R.W. Emerson's Divinity School address has that oft-quoted segment about the preacher and the snowstorm which hits the same note.  Emerson's concern here is similar to Longfellow's and to many others as well.  How do we develop ways in which we connect intuitively and emotionally to a text or topic?  Also, how do we convey this connection to our congregations?  I will say that it wasn't clear that this was the question my first time through seminary.  Emerson isn't so sure it was part of the curriculum in his day either. In school we read Emerson's address, made fun of the poor, now-dead preacher who served his church the best he knew how, had a conversation about how these things are important, then moved on to more cerebral topics.  I don't think my experience was unique. 

I honestly believe that preaching is something that can only be learned by doing.  Modes of communication are often determined by context and our understanding of that context happens over time as we live with (and in) a specific community.  Still, it is good to know the question as we try to answer it for ourselves.  Longfellow ended up becoming quite the preacher later on.  These sorts of questions and the self-doubt they reveal must have helped him to improve over time. 

This all any of us can hope for, by the way.  Every once in a while I find a sermon that I preached some years ago and I am usually a bit embarrassed that I once thought it was worth saving.  No doubt (I hope!) I will feel the same way about what I am doing now.  My prayers are with all of my friends and colleagues whose job it is to preach and to lead worship.  It is an honor and a challenge.  May we all grow in the doing.

An Update: I found this description of Longfellow's preaching written by Mays.  "His  power in the pulpit lay in reaching individual hearts with truth, more than dealing with abstruse and difficult questions of philosophy and theology."


Links:

It is hard to find things on Joseph May, but here is a brief bio (scroll down) from his old church.

The others are more easy to find....

Theodore Jennings Jr.  is more of a theologian than a preacher.

Jana Childers' work focuses on those performance and style issues.  Her book, "Performing the Word: Preaching as Theater" is excellent.

Henry Mitchell is probably better known and more widely read, but if you haven't, you should!

 And here is a link to Emerson's Divinity School Address.  Honestly, I don't think it is his best work...

Singers and Songs of the Liberal Faith

So normally I am watching the Patriots right about now.  However, they drew the prime time game and I finally have the opportunity to post.  The staybattical is on hold until after the holidays and I am back at work, preparing for the season and just doing the work of the parish ministry.  It was nice to be in the pulpit today.  It was also great to have the chance to participate in our "first coffee hour" discussion about Christmas.  We are looking for ways to keep it holy.  This is a new format for us.  We have coffee and discussion (a sort of Adult Religious Enrichment program for the constantly overbooked) at 9am, then worship at 10, then regular social coffee hour after church.  The plan is to let people make a morning of it.  So far, so good...

As regular readers know, I have been interested in music as of late.  My own gifts as a musician are limited.  I play the uke as part of my ministry when necessary and, of course, I sing the hymns.  Other than that, not so much.  However, I have found that many, many of my colleagues have written the occasional hymn and even let people sing them!  I am impressed.  Turns out that, in spite of what it may look like at times, there has been a long tradition of amateur hymn writers in the liberal tradition.

I found a book this week that is worth examining a bit closer.  It is entitled "Singers and Songs of the Liberal Church: Being Selections of Hymns and Sacred Poems of the Liberal Church in America".  Alfred Putnam was the author/editor and it was published in 1875.  The copy I am reading belongs to the Boston Atheneaum, which they received in the waning days of 1874...

Here is a piece by the Rev. Samuel Willard (1776-1859).  He is described by Putnam as "a recognized pioneer of the Liberal movement in Western Massachusetts, bravely contending by voice and pen for a larger freedom, and willingly suffering not a little odium and persecution for the sake of what he believed to be the truth."

FOR THE PEACE OF THE CHURCH

Lo, they come from East and West;
Come to enjoy the heavenly rest:
North and South, in bliss complete,
Round the eternal altar meet.

Saints of different ages come;
Find in heaven one common home;
Who on earth have walked by faith
Breathe the same inspiring breath.

Mighty throng! how great! how blest!
Wondrous peace, and joy and rest!
What shall fit us, Lord, for this?
Fit our souls for heavenly bliss?

Peace on earth, and peace alone;
Peace, that makes all churches one;
Peace the fruit of Christian love,
Fits the soul for bliss above.

I preached today on the topic of "Inner Peace".  My texts were from Proverbs, Thomas Merton, and Luke Chapter 5.  The choir sang--and sang beautifully--for the first time under their new director.  Maybe I will work some these hymns into future services (perhaps as readings).  This one might just have fit today...

"A Spiritual and Working Church"

Before I say goodbye to the collection of Samuel Longfellow's sermons that has given me much food for thought over the past two weeks, I wanted to pick out one more sermon in which he described the church that he hoped to build in Brooklyn.  The date is October 30, 1853, the day he officially "assumed the pastorate" in the words of his editor.  The topic for the day was his vision of the church, how it should function, and what its role should be in the rapidly growing city they were a part of.

Like many sermons of its era, it is one with a clear structure.  It was meant to convey fairly complicated and important concepts to his listeners and to do it efficiently by the standards of the time.  It is short on stories and humor, but it still reads well and it isn't all that hard to imagine it being spoken.  He begins by reminding us that the word "church" "implies some common idea or purpose.  It represents something more than a mere aggregate of persons such as individual and separate errands may bring together at any hour in the crowded streets of a city...we limit, however, the word church to that unity whose central idea is a religious one--the idea of God."  he goes on to list a variety of "churches".  There are Jews, Muslims, Hindus and Christians at least, and he leaves room for others as well.  Not too bad for the 19th Century pastor (though he really does use the term "church" for each of them, which was rather jarring to my modern ears).

Then, after waxing poetic for a while about the virtues of faith communities, he gets down to his first set of "three points" (preachers know what I mean) by defining church as "a society of men and women and children, associated by a religious spirit, and for religious work".  The first word he picks out of his definition is the word "religious".  "A church must justify its existence by this, that it holds as its special thought--not its exclusive possession, but its special thought--the idea of God."  Today we might argue about what his (or our) definition of that "special thought" might be.  After all, there are plenty of devoted church-goers in my congregation and not all of them are sure what they think or believe about God.  However, the idea if God is an obvious--if sometimes ambiguous--one. 

He then also chooses to emphasize the word "spirit".  There are many folks who like to say that they are "spiritual but not religious".  For Longfellow, however,  the term is rooted deeply in the life of faith communities.  In fact, in the liberal church the religious spirit is essential as these bonds may tie us more closely than the those of belief.  "I do not deny that similarity of opinion is a bond of union.  We are drawn to those who think like ourselves.  But it is not the strongest or deepest bond.  It is easily overridden by spiritual sympathy, or annulled by the want of that."  There are few ministers who have served for any period of time that could disagree with this.  Many, many congregations come together over shared ideas, but if the the connections between individuals aren't also felt then there is no real community.  Some congregations find this spirit quickly.  For some it takes longer.  It also ebbs and flows.  When the spirit is lost (or at least not present) the congregation is dead--whether they continue to meet or not--and something else must rise to replace it.

Finally, he addresses the word "work".  The church is not a private debating society or health club, or therapy session.  It is meant to be out in the world.  " It seems to me as if, whenever a new church is formed, earth's suffering, sinning, wronged, and perishing ones should lift up their heads and a new hope light up their eyes, as they cried, "You will help us, you will save us".  Churches should work together to support each other and work beyond their doors to alleviate suffering and follow the teachings of Jesus.  It is a tall order.  However, work is needed to balance out the otherwise navel-gazy nature of religious communities.

Finding this balance is the challenge that faces our churches today.  Sometimes we lean one way.  At other times we tilt in another direction.  It is our way as people.  Sabbatical, perhaps not surprisingly, is designed to help the pastor to find that balance.  The religious work of the church is the job of the minister.  It is the job of others as well, but usually part-time.  Pastors are paid to think about the church and its members full-time.  Often to the detriment of the her or his own religious spirit.  Hence the extended sabbath. 

Longfellow has three more "points" to his sermon.  They are the kinds of work that the church does.  First he lists the Culture of the Religious Spirit by which he means those things that spring most quickly to mind when we think of church.  Worship, rites of passage, and communion are examples of this first type of work.  The second is Religious Education, the deepening and growing of the faith for both young and old.  Finally (and he cheats here by including two things as one) there is the category of Religious Benefice and Philanthropic Action.  Here he is thinking of what we more often call "social service" and "social justice."  It is clear that he does mean both.  Again there is the question of balance.  We have limited time and resources.  Where do we put them?

It seems to me that finding balance between both sets of "points" comes down to our capacity for thoughtful discernment.  How do we, as people and as congregations, find ways to consider issues of importance with as little anxiety as possible?  How do we remember the spirit that flows through us and between us, while also nurturing that spirit?  How do we become religious?  How do we make our communities of faith this way as well?

The answers to these questions vary.  We are a diverse species and our faith reflects that.  However, I think these are questions that we all must consider both for ourselves and for the congregations we love.

Samuel Longfellow and Preaching

     What a mystery is a word--a movement of the lips, a vibration of the air, no more.  Yet see it call the swift crimson of shame to the face, or blanch it with fear; see it light up the glazed eye of despair; beat down the defiant lids of villainy; bring floods of assuaging or repentant tears;  see it hush multitudes... What a mystery is a word!  Because it is the image and person of the soul; thought articulate; intoned emotion; spirit uttered, and put forth.  (Samuel Longfellow "The Word Preached"  1853)


     Samuel Longfellow labored in the shadow of his brother Henry during life and has been pretty much obscured by that shadow since his death.  I don't mean to take anything away from Henry, of course, but, like William Dawes, there is more to Sam than mere affiliation with another's greatness.

     Longfellow (in this post that means Sam) was a hymn writer of some force and renown.  In fact, we still sing his hymns today.  Singing The Living Tradition, the dominant UU hymnal has nine of his hymns.  He also appears in other hymn books of other denominations.  Something that I find reassuring in ecumenical gatherings.  His lyrics (and he was primarily a lyricist) are poetic.  O Life That Maketh All Things New (SLT #12) is one of my favorites and sneaks its way into worship in my congregation probably more than it should.  O.B. Frothingham once contrasted Longfellow's hymns with those of Sam's friend and collaborator  Samuel Johnson in this way; "Johnson's were the more intellectual, Longfellow's the more tender; Johnson's the more aspiring, Longfellow's the more devout; Johnson's the more heroic and passionate, Longfellow's the more mystical and reflective."

     The reason I am writing about him today is that Longfellow, like Hedge, Clarke, and other pastors, spent a great deal of his adult life making sense of the new ideas of his transcendentalist friends in ways that took into account the profoundly communal nature of his own faith and that of his congregation.  There is a tendency to read Emerson and believe that wandering around in the woods for an hour is an adequate substitute for belonging to a community of faith.  For the "mystical and reflective" Longfellow, however, it was not.

     I will return to Longfellow a few times over the course of my sabbatical.  However--and perhaps no surprisingly--I am beginning with his sermons.  It should be noted that his editor felt Longfellow's digressions were among the the best parts of his preaching.  This is a situation I totally understand.  Today I want to note the sermon he gave  on April 23, 1853 near the beginning of his ministry in Brooklyn, NY.  Also not surprisingly the sermon is entitled "The Word Preached". 

     He begins with a defense of a very modern complaint, "The Institution of preaching, whatever may be said of it's present want of power or of the inadequacy of the results it produces--and doubtless, a good deal may be said with truth--has not yet vacated its claim to exist.  However poorly the pulpit may do its work, it still has work to do."  He then goes on to both acknowledge its failings and to promise to do the best job he can to remain engaging.  He doesn't want to waste people's time.  He sincerely (as all preachers do) wants to help his congregants live a spiritual life.

     However, he also has some strong words for the congregation.  Preaching to him is a conversation in which a certain openness and commitment is required from the hearer.  It isn't a commitment to agree.  He is a Unitarian, after all, and well aware that total agreement is unlikely.  He does, however, want them to show up and to pay attention. "The inefficacy of preaching is not all to be laid at the preacher's door.  I do not care how great a claim you make on him, that he should be living and earnest.  It is all just.  But I make the same claim upon the hearers that they be so too... For if there be not willingness, receptiveness, desire on their part, the most angelic eloquence must often fail.  Jesus could not touch those who wrapped themselves up in worldliness, prejudice, and self-righteousness."

     This raises an interesting question for me.  The vast bulk of my training in preaching has to do with how to preach in ways that can reach people.  I have done quite a bit of research for my DMin that had to do with the question of how preachers can better understand the local language, culture, and imagery in order to use it to communicate effectively--often to hostile or indifferent audiences.  Longfellow seems to be saying that this work--while important--only goes so far before we are essentially cut off.  The people have to put in some of the effort.  In this sermon he tried to shake his congregation awake and to compel them to at least consider listening.  I am sure that many people didn't need the reminder and others were quite receptive.  Longfellow--by all accounts--was good in the pulpit and worked hard out of it to be a good pastor to his people.  He wouldn't have mentioned this tendency to not listen, however, if he didn't see it in his work.

      "The mere critic, who comes to enjoy finely-turned sentences, brilliant word-painting, elegant oratory; the intellectually curious, who comes to hear some novelty of speculation; the sectarian or polemic, who comes to get his theological combativeness pleasantly excited; the listless, who comes to have his feelings played upon; the indifferent, who comes get the credit of conforming to a respectable custom; the self-righteous, who comes to set an example, not having himself any need--these may get, possibly, what they seek.
     They cannot hope to get--for they have not sought--spiritual quickening; clear sight of duty; strength to conquer temptation; noble purposes; consciousness of immortality; sense of God's presence; the Christ-like temper; a wider and more active humanity."

     So he urges his listeners to "Bring this seeking spirit; this sense of personal need; this desire to know the truth that you may know the duty; bring this life, and how it must needs kindle the preacher's heart and put fire on his lips!"

     So the question (preachers) is, how do people listen?  How willing  to bring that seeking spirit are they when they are so rarely there on Sunday morning?  I know that many people care deeply about what they hear in worship.  I know that others probably can't remember what we talked about after they leave coffee hour.  How much of the preaching dynamic is the minister's responsibility?  How much is the listener's?  How (when the spirit isn't willing in them) do we get them to listen rather than be merely entertained?


Brief Note:  No, not that Samuel Johnson...this one.

Coffee Houses 19th Century Style

I have been reading those pamphlets compiled by James Freeman Clarke entitled "Coffee Houses and Coffee Palaces in England".  The copyright is 1882 and the purpose--lest we get all Rick Steves--is not so travelling Americans will know where to get their caffeine fix, but instead to find ways to establish "coffee houses in Boston as one means of promoting temperance."  Temperance, far from being a dead concern, continues to be something that we worry about today.  It is an old word that could be applied to anything from the illegal drug trade to college binge-drinking.  Clarke's idea is at once quaint and intriguing.

It is based on the belief that people drink so they can be together and that the only place where the working classes could gather was in pubs or "gin palaces". Think "crack-house" or "opium den" for this last one.  There was a time in England when the government promoted beer drinking because of the evils of hard liquor.  Obviously these temperance advocates fall into a famous trap.  They seem to think that only poor people become alcoholics.  This we know is not true.  Also (though they could not have anticipated it) today most people drink most of their alcohol at home!  The social element of both "public houses" and "cocoa bars" has been heavily eroded over the years.

Still, they do recognize the social needs of human beings and the desire to gather together.  Clarke's coffee houses of England offer entertainment, reading (and smoking) rooms, and parties and "meetings" of various kinds.  They remind me of the "all ages" shows in Portland's Old Port when I was in high school, or the "chem-free" punk shows in church basements all over New England.  People were drawn together (I assume they still are) for corporate activity.  That is, for the purpose of having fun. 

Fun was recognized by progressives of the era as something that all people deserved and enjoyed.  Early on the pamphlet quotes a letter from Florence Nightingale in which she writes "What these men want is a place where they can have coffee, read the newspapers, and play games (without temptations to gambling); also a place where they can eat and have decent sleeping accommodation."  The houses served and invited both women and men. The ones in Dundee provided tickets for those "who preferred to give food rather than money to needy people"  which could be redeemed at the coffee houses for food and (of course) coffee.  The menus do seem a bit light on the chocolate croissants, but did feature waiters and waitresses, which is nice.

Coffee today still serves a role and function both in Burbania and elsewhere.  I live near a very nice coffee shop, for example.  Few of its regular patrons are looking for a place to sleep, but if you go after the dangerous melee of rush hour, it is a great place to read the paper or to chat.  I have meetings there often.  Others do as well.  Nothing wildly sophisticated ever happens there I suspect, but it is all still good. 

Sometimes (OK, often) I wonder if there wouldn't be a way to integrate this coffee house culture (both new and old, but particularly old) into the church. There is a connection to that "church of the future" that I wrote about last week.  The coffee house is (or was) a public space.  The clientele ebbs and flows at various times and yet the community remains stable.  It was a community that in large part determined how they would spend their time.  Clarke's coffee houses were service-based as well as promoting intellectual and (I suspect) spiritual stimulation.  They were also inexpensive, which cannot be said for the modern versions.  I believe there are lessons there.

 I cannot end this post without providing some links.

The very best (and modern) coffee house I ever went to was in Detroit.  It was run by Serbian immigrants.  My wife and I frequented it a lifetime ago when we lived there.  Sadly I could not actually find a link to it, but I thought it should be mentioned anyway.  This link is to the Coffee Shop near my house.  Weirdly, the picture at the top of the page is of a different coffee shop.  The smaller pictures, however, are local.

The best place for inspiring James Freeman Clarke quotes is here.

Finally, a link to my earlier post on the church of the future.