Economic Trinity Found At The table
Triune God Essay for Theology 1 Nov, 2020
Communion holds the Trinity’s mystery of inclusion in view (Boff, 399). If our Trinitarian faith can be expressed in our daily practice of Christian life, then the Eucharist brings forth the intimacy of the Trinity (Migliore, 85; Boff, 395). The bread symbolizes God who is life force of our living and continued creation in seeking flourishing for all (Migliore, 79). Jesus is the offering and vessel of this truth and tangible witness of how we can and are called to participate in this communal act of life and love together (Boff, 401-402). The cup of salvation symbolizes the Holy Spirit, which unifies this wisdom, our knowing of beloved-ness, and continues the stirring of our communal relations and receiving of God’s love (Boff, 402). At the table we find the unity of our Triune God, which is for everyone who has and will ever be in creation (Boff, 391-392).
“Life is the essence of God” (Boff, 399). Boff’s explanation of life offers room for the unfathomable mystery of God who has never been seen, yet deeply felt, through the life offered by God’s loving nature for creation through the Trinity (401). God is for every living being and for the relationships we can foster together (Boff, 399). When the morsels of grains hit our tongues upon receiving this sacrament of life, I think of this essence of God who gives life to us as we co-habitat together in creation, love, and living. I believe God is Triune because God offers us life – life that is wrapped in the richness of love (Migliore, 83).
Jesus reveals himself as the visible image of God at the first communion (Boff, 402). His life, emotion, subversions to patriarchy and hierarchy call forth a tangible truth of our Triune God – that God is for us and has made a way for participation in life and in love together (Boff, 393, 402; Migliore, 83). Jesus draws us in communion and shows us that we are a part of the Trinitarian family – that we are a part of what can be radical in this world offering and receiving the life of God (Boff, 402). I believe God is Triune because Jesus offers us models of how to be human with one another and commune with the mystery of God’s love for us as kin (Tanner, 382).
The Holy Spirit stirs our communal natures and reminds us and calls us into participation of what Jesus’ life and ministry showcases and God’s desire for love for all. “Where there is the Spirit, there is freedom” (Boff, 402). As we partake in the cup of salvation, we remember in this practice God’s grace, love, and compassion for all of us. It is here I believe in God as Triune because as the wine touches our lips, the Spirit reminds us of Jesus’ words and inspires us to participate in liberative ways with our gifts (402).
At the communal table, the Trinity gives life to all. The Triune God indwells 3 in 1 and 1 in 3 offering mutuality, dignity, love, and reciprocal communion (Boff, 392). This economic Trinity creates a divine community where “each divine person is for the others, with the others, and in the others.” The communion table is a meeting place where humanity can come and commune in a relational way and experience the consistency of the divine persons, 3 in 1 – 1 in 3, and be reminded of God’s love for us, Jesus’ offering and witness, and the Spirit’s gift of restored memory and comfort (Tanner, 384).
God as Triune is bonded in a deep love of which we will yearn to taste in bread, wine and in relationship with Jesus for the rest of our lives. In communion we remember God, Son, and Spirit in tension of their mystery and their economic hope for humanity. Through God’s love, Jesus’ divine and human vulnerability, and the Spirit’s prompts to participate – no matter where we are when we arrive at the table of indwelling – the Trinity finds us and welcomes us.
Her Name Is Martha
Martha carried a love for me that was unconditional and ever-flowing. She was the champion of our family and the glue of which held these opposites attract to each other. She was a storyteller, an amateur botanist, lover of travel and the beauty of this world, and a deeply rooted King James quoting Christian.
She believed in the good of every soul she met and she left marks on every person she encountered the decades she worked at her and my grandfather’s hardware store. There is and will never be anyone like Martha.
Growing up as child I would wander the aisles filled with boxes of hardware gadgets and pretend they were my harbor of safety and imagination. She gave me a place to build my imagination. She believed in my creative nature before I even knew how life saving it would become to this queer, non-binary human I am today. Every drawing or story I told she would re-tell to customers or place me on top of the counter so I could see the humanity that walked in and out of their store. She instilled in me the valuable lesson that every human being had value in their stories and in their being. She was my entry point to pastoral care - my anchor.
It saddens me our own story. Riddled with detachment as I would abandon my closeness with her in college as my mother threatened the death of her if I told her my “secret” of being queer. I do not regret the world’s unfolding with this - I only wish we had more time to reclaim what a cruel theology robbed us.
Despite my detachment, she would continue to reach out. She’d call me at all hours randomly to ask, “Rachael, baby, how are you?” She was the voice of honesty and God in human form. She never ever gave up on my becoming. She believed in every action and step I took - even if it was un-useful. She believed in God’s guidance and the truth of Isaiah 41:10….”’Fear not, for I am with you;Be not dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you, Yes, I will help you, I will uphold you with My righteous right hand.’” She was the living witness of a God who will never abandon you. She preached it in her love and action. She did this until her very last possible breath as she battled an impossible recovery from surgery.
I came out to her in 2018. It took me an hour because of the years of being told such a false truth. She melted my fear instantly as I stood outside in the snow walking up and down my street. “Tell me all about your friend,” she said. Her check in calls became calls about us - my now wife and I. She always remembered. She always asked. I would cry on the phone with her that day and apologize for the lost time. I would do this once more in 2019 when she called me to ask to come to our wedding a mere 24 hours after a dinner with my parents who informed her they were denying my invitation.
She traveled to Asheville with my grandfather and made their way up steps as they wobbled in. My grandmother grabbed my wife lovingly and said, “welcome to the family.” They beamed; she beamed. The photo I’m holding is of her telling my birth story to C’s family. She loved this story. It was her favorite one of all stories to tell. The moment I burst into the world was the moment life changed for her she would pronounce boldly. I was someone special; her baby.
My grandmother would also tell me whenever she saw me, “you’ll never know how much I love you.” The last time I saw her before she died I was visiting her bedside at home. She used every ounce of energy to force words through her windpipe to say her phrase…and then she paused. She looked at me differently. She said to me, “you do know, don’t you?” I shook my head and told her, “I believe you and I love you.” She told me that her love would go with me wherever I am. I left that day knowing that my entire life my grandmother loved me unconditionally and gave me opportunities to become that no one else would offer. She loved me truly without condition.
The night of her death I dreamed of her. I was trying to walk up to her but she shook her hands no. But she looked like herself. No loss of life; just joy. I woke up that morning and continued into my day feeling a cosmic shift. I received a phone call that afternoon she had passed early morning exactly when I woke up from my vivid dream. She loved me in flesh and in spirit. She loved me so much she left me with the image of her as I knew her. My God a saint.
Her name is Martha. She loves stories, birds, nature, the mountains, and watching human life unfold. She loves my wife and our family. She is watching over us all under the great cloud of witnesses.
At her funeral I believe I experienced what transcendence is and why resurrection is so powerful. During her visitation, being with her felt like sitting in her favorite sun room of her home, except she didn’t share stories - our family did. When we left the room for the burial, I knew then, she was no longer on this earth. You had risen, indeed to be with the God you knew never left your side. Before the visitation concluded, I came to her side and I whispered, “I believe you and I love you.”
Moses’ Death As A Hopeful Word
Sermon & Prayer as Text
Prayer offering before Sermon: Spirit be with us now in this hour. Quite our minds, our worries for this moment that we may meet you here, that we may hear a word from you O God and be blessed for it. You know our hearts and how they ache, rejoice, and try to navigate this liminal space we are in. Hold the hearts of those gathered now – soothe them, speak to them, and open them to your offering. In your holy and precious comfort, we pray, amen.
Sermon Text:
A seed knows how to wait. What exactly each seed is waiting for is known only to that seed. Some unique trigger-combination of temperature-moisture-light and many other things is required to convince a seed to jump off the deep end and take its chance – to take its chance to grow. And, while a seed waits, did you know it’s alive?...Beneath the soil, these seeds are alive and waiting for its moment to flourish.
When you walk underneath the trees of Happy Valley’s fall weather you are in the midst of hundreds of trees waiting in the soil, alive, and wishing to be. Sometimes seeds can be buried in the soil for years keeping hope of its future; a future it cannot see yet believes in deeply – its life depends on it.
Moses was a seed who knew how to wait. He was patient with Israel as she rebelled, moaned in the wilderness, and loved the people deeply even though they could not see just how close they were to the promised land. Moses knew their future and he saw it right before his death – a confirmation that his patience and willingness to sprout and grow was indeed not in vain.
You see Moses was also a stubborn seed. He moaned once too. He was not interested in being the voice for the people of Israel. He saw injustice circling around him and felt an ache for something new, yet when called upon, he wasn’t sure he could speak up for the cause.
Moses feels familiar to me. He was a shepherd – lowest of the low – an average human amongst a hierarchical world. It makes all the sense in the world to me that he was unsure of being able to speak on behalf of the oppressed people. Perhaps he thought to himself, I am just one person.
We’re one week away from an election that asks of us to raise our voices; to speak up on behalf of the people. And just like Moses, there is no time to wait on speaking truth to power as oppression swirls around us. Yet, I wish to offer you Faith that we are the shepherds who will usher in a unified voice for new growth. We will do so as we take to the polls and we can do so from this liminal space we inhabit – in our forest – as our seeds wait.
If this feels impossible to see right now, you’re not alone. Perhaps seeing the promised land isn’t visible right now, however, the hopeful word here is Moses has and the countless other ancestors who have followed him have as well.
They have left markers for us of which to wait by, live into, and believe despite lacking imagination - because sometimes our seeds need caressing. So, we turn to our ancestors for help - to see what our call is in this world, in this moment, – for our future.
Hope Jahren, a botanist, shares that sometimes scientists will coddle the embryo of seeds to provoke growth. Some seeds, she shares, have been waiting for someone to do so for thousands of years – all for the sake and belief that these seeds too deserve to flourish.
That is who Moses is to us in this story. Moses' sight of the promised land is the caress for us to not give in, give up, or turn inward. It is to look outward, to love deeper, to cultivate flourishing for the sake of the promised land.
Faith, who will we be together as we build heaven on earth, as we plant our gardens, and tend to each other’s seeds?
May we reflect together. May we look around our forest and offer nourishment. May we believe in the unseen; the transition of seed to tree. This moment of liminal transition will become new growth and we Faith get to be a part of it.
Let’s lean on the words of our justice ancestor John Lewis to guide us in ways to be such seeds:
“Ordinary people with extraordinary vision can redeem the soul of America by getting in what I call good trouble, necessary trouble….You must also study and learn the lessons of history because humanity has been involved in this soul-wrenching, existential struggle for a very long time. People on every continent have stood in your shoes, through decades and centuries before you. The truth does not change, and that is why the answers worked out long ago can help you find solutions to the challenges of our time….Though I may not be here with you, I urge you to answer the highest calling of your heart and stand up for what you truly believe….When historians pick up their pens to write the story of the 21st century, let them say that it was your generation who laid down the heavy burdens of hate at last and that peace finally triumphed over violence, aggression and war. So, I say to you, walk with the wind, (siblings), and let the spirit of peace and the power of everlasting love be your guide.”
May we answer the highest calling of our hearts. May we live into our call to be a church who loves relentlessly and tends to the garden for the promised land unfolding.
May it be so.
Prayer Offered Post Sermon: Caress our imaginations, O God. Hold our collective seedlings and whisper truths of how we can become voices of peace and truth for our generation and beyond. Thank you, God for our ancestors who show us a way forward, who call to us to keep going, who have seen the promised land and shared with us it’s living waters. Helps us continue to be and become a church who loves relentlessly, tend to the garden for the promised land unfolding – amen.
Video of Sermon
Because of People like you
It’s 11:03 PM. My wife just ten minutes ago told me goodnight. Our tabby is snuggled in-between us and our German Shepard is making dreaming sounds at the foot of our bed.
Every day I think of how much I love C. I tell her probably more than an enneagram 5 needs to know, but I can’t help it - I love my her, deeply.
When the Supreme Court ruled for marriage equality, I was working for a law firm and very much closeted. I lived in fear of losing my job due to the fact that my employer was an oozing republican. So, there in my grey four-walled cubicle I cried silently. I cried silently as Jim Obergefell received a phone call from President Obama. I wept silent tears all day and held my breath in the hope that, I too, could be equal.
I left my job a year later, as Trump’s first presidential bid began. Finally, I wasn’t weeping in silence. I was completely out. There was no more hiding of any degree in the workplace and beyond. I wrote President Obama that year to say thank you for his support of marriage equality and how his voice and countless others in this movement helped me to live fully into myself. To my shock and surprise, a few weeks later a large envelope from the White House was on my doorstep.
I had received a copy of the proclamation for June as national pride month, a signed photo of the president, and a letter. I cried once more, but not in silence.
That letter from President Obama ended with “because of people like you who are brave…” and I will never forget the first time I read those words. That letter hangs in my work office where I am openly accepted for my sexuality.
Tonight’s appointment of Amy Coney Barrett threatens so much of the peace that has come from historic landmark judicial process on my queer communities rights. It threatens all those who identify as women, our health care rights as human beings, my marriage to the woman I love, and so much more.
All I know in this moment is this offering of pastoral presence - lament is holy. Being afraid is holy. Being angry is holy. Being hopeful is holy. Being unsure is holy. Crying is holy. Expressing and sitting in these emotions is holy. And we are still here and our voices still matter. Rest first. Grieve first.
We weep tonight loudly and tomorrow, because of people like you, we will keep advocating and keep fighting.
The Claim of Jesus’ Resurrection
Orthodox icon Resurrection of Christ. Greece.
Essay Written for Theology 1: What do you believe about the claim Jesus was raised from the dead?
Within the conviction of “Christ has died, Christ is risen, Christ will come again,” I bear witness to the claim that Jesus indeed was raised from the dead. I see this claim as true through the Hebrew prophets (Madigan and Levenson, 6-19), Jesus’ resurrection instilling the hope of transformation (21-23), and Jesus’ resurrection as an opening of the new world unfolding, which offers an invitation that as we wait we live for a God who loves unconditionally for a just more unified world (Oduyoye, 107; Migliore, 202-203; Gilliss, 134-135).
Even though Gilliss speaks to the mystery of resurrection, which I believe in, Madigan and Levenson illuminate viewing the resurrection through the belief and practice of Judaism which brings the mystery of resurrection closer through the unfolding of scripture and time (2). This hint of mystery makes resurrection less binary and invitational toward hope. These hints are crucial, as Madigan and Levenson state, and enrich the “anchor of Christian hope” through historical understanding and human experience (2-3). Even though Jesus’ resurrection was a surprise to the context, it wasn’t past the imagination as Israel had been living with “well-established norms” that God would come to restore and lift up their suffering into justice and life (4-7). In this understanding of Israel and its people into the first century, I can hold the claim of Jesus raised from the dead with deeper understanding and reverence for just how powerful this event was and is today for all of us.
Jesus’ risen body speaks to hope of transformation (Madigan and Levenson 3, 21-23). The fulfillment of Jesus’ resurrection is within the bodily and communal understanding of resurrection through ancient Jews and Christians (3). The risen Christ’s body “testifies to the reality and materiality of Jesus’ body after the resurrection” and to show Jesus’ body is not exactly the same - “it is a transformed body” (21-22). This difference in bodily representation not only speaks to the “the sign” our friends of the first century saw but offers an entry point for our present moments that resurrection is for us, too. I can hold the claim of Jesus raised from the dead with hope knowing that my queer body will be trans-magically transformed bearing the wounds of this world but separated from its harm through the embodiment of everlasting life with Jesus (22).
Migliore and Oduyoye bring forth the focus of Christ’s resurrection as a subversion of empire. “Jesus exposed the structures of oppression” and through Jesus’ resurrection radically subverts forever such structures having reign over God’s people (Oduyoye, 101; Migliore 202-203). Through this exposure and subversion is an invitation in Jesus’ resurrection. “Christ will come again” lives in this moment that we are now resurrection people with a call to believe and know our present moment and future is handled by God and our partnership. As Gillis offers, “Christ’s ongoing transformation of the world calls us to active participation” (134). Through resurrection God gives us the capacity to forgive, reconcile and the charge to “refuse to accept unjust suffering” (135-137).
Every Easter we wade through Good Friday’s silence and Holy Saturday’s somberness before crying, “He is Risen.” If we are Easter people, then we are resurrection people. To believe in Jesus’s resurrection means we lean into Jesus’ time, his bodily transformation and his resurrection invitation to participate in the new cosmos. With these held together, I believe in the claim Jesus indeed was raised from the dead and hold these beliefs whenever I speak, “Christ has died, Christ is risen, Christ will come again.”
Greek Religious Icon of Second Coming, c. 1700
Give Me The Death I Deserve
And there comes a time when we are born out of our dormant state into being. Unfolding our petals to reveal a sacred gift - a life fully lived; fully realized as our own. There will be moments of death and grief; moments of joy and love - all of them a story worth sharing. As I hold onto the words of Women Who Run With The Wolves as dear, I reflect on the poetic offering of “give me the death I deserve,” to mean give me the hope I need through the death of things that which are not useful.
Last year during year one of seminary I was angry & coping still with a traumatic event that still washes the shoreline, as trauma does...I was angry at the Church for taking from me from my place and people. I was angry at having to retell that story so much to cohort members & faculty. I was angry to the point of clinging to my death narrative as the only option. There is no resurrection in a death narrative. And, still, as my tattoo from year one reads, “I’m still here.” Why, though! Perhaps that was my anger’s center point of grief. When we strip queer people of place and connection, we burden the souls of their calls - whether it be ministry or not. So answering the why was muddy. So here we are releasing the death narrative and resurrecting the truth birthed - I am beloved. I am called.
I am allowing the death I deserve to live the life I am seeking & asked to walk. And I’m giving myself grace through it all. I’m six weeks into my second year of seminary and here is what I believe: I am called to be a pastor for the people, for the Church and for my queer community & so it will be as it will be.
To my chosen family, I love you all deeply. You help me continue to become
Is Jesus of one Being?
Theological Interrogation Essay for Theology 1, Sept 2020
Jesus is one being with God because Jesus is fully human and fully divine seeking the restoration of humankind through an inseparable grace. Of one being is a God who dwells amongst humankind to offer transformation. I lay claim to Athanasius views that Jesus is of one being - fully divine and fully human – dwelling with to return us to our genesis state of being (Norris, 18-19; Athanasius in Norris 88, 94, 98). Scripture points to the importance of Jesus’ humanity and divinity as one. The humanity of Jesus allows an entry point to see Christ as one being with God and ultimately God’s openness to value all people at all intersections of their particularity for salvation.
In the Gospel of John, we hear “in the beginning was the Logos and the Logos was with God and the Logos was God” marking a truth that God and Jesus (Logos) have been and are one since Genesis. The divinity of God becomes one in flesh and dwells amongst humanity in John 1:14. Athanasius’ offering of why Jesus becomes human is rooted in humankind’s “origin (to be) relocated in God” (Athanasius in Norris 89, 92). I agree with Athanasius and see this restoration of humankind throughout scripture where “God is within Christ (Logos) reconciling the world” (2 Cor. 5:19 NRSV). This reconciliation within scripture is through a divine bodily form of Jesus that is shocking and scandalous proof of a God that is for us and in mutual relationship with us – a God who challenges, questions and transforms through their divine nature for our sake collectively (Rigby. 61, 63).
I need Jesus to be of a “new humanity” one that removes the oppressor, understands my suffering, and is born through the womb of a woman not corrupt. This Jesus in his new humanity offers forgiveness, solidarity and promise of the kin-dom of God (Migliore, 181-182). The embodied form of Jesus as one being knows the suffering of my community and of this world. Because Jesus is God being with us, God acts on behalf of all of us through the flesh’s suffering (Athanasius in Norris 93-94, 100).
It is critical, however, as Rigby offers us, to note that Jesus is a representation of humanity – not the sole example of humanity (58, 62). Jesus’ fully divine self offers an inseparable grace that is for all people. Although I resonate deeply with Athanasius, it must be stated how his theological understanding of Jesus as one being tastes of rightness instead of a God who operates in full mutuality for all. Rigby takes the hand of Athanasius and offers liberation to rightness and shows us Jesus of one being – a God who seeks mutual inseparable grace for all and values all people as worthy of salvation (Norris, 18-19; Rigby, 63-65; 72-73).
Through a divine God who desires mutual relationship, offers us the Logos as a way to commune, and scriptural evidence of God with us, we are invited to look at the “particular creatures that surround us to gain insight on what it means to claim that God has entered into existence with us” (71). Here, I believe, is where the claim Jesus is of one being with God is transformative. When such belief brings humankind to the table, despite difference or particularity, then we remain open to the value of all people as God does through Logos and in relationship with us. Therefore, leaving open the possibility for restoration of humankind. This is the scandal and shock of our belief in this claim – that God does this transformation with us.
If Jesus is not of one being with God, then the offering of mutual relationship through God’s divine intervention and dwelling is separated and thus the understanding of our suffering and need for God’s grace is disrupted. This pursuit of grace for all becomes nothing more than salvation for the few. Of one being is not mediator as Arius claims, but God with humanity, dwelling with our human condition in order to offer divine salvation (Athanasius in Norris, 94).
To Hold Grief & Belief
Published May 2019
Last Sunday I took a “field trip,” as my therapist liked to call it, to the site of my trauma. Tomorrow is one year since the altering of my world. And my entire body yearns to write about it. Not to write about the details, but yet to describe the isolation and torment of the relationship to grief inside my Christian faith.
I’ve spent the last year in my writing sprinkling water droplets of this trauma inside my pieces. And now, as I approach this very odd and unimaginable anniversary, I want to share a few thoughts…thoughts I hope bring a new perspective on how we interact with such “intense” grief / trauma in our communities, with our friends and in our own being.
Lent is really where the urge to write about this started to surface like hot lava. It is of no surprise that a valley filled season – the one I’ve been in for a year now – would evoke viewing texts differently and trying to find where the suffering in the Bible could speak to where I am presently. This is what we do – as Christians – we are on a search to find our existence in one another through the lens of a book older than the dirt of which we came from and I’d like to say we can still find ourselves in this story.
In those few weeks of Lent that I managed to write every day I felt more call to my processing from the Spirit than I had in an entire year. The valley of death; the valley of unknown forces us to a place of intimacy like no other. I’m here to say so does trauma.
One year ago someone tried to take my life from me. In many ways, they succeeded in derailing it significantly. And currently I am awaiting the start of many things – seminary, further discernment in ordination, healing, a trial for justice and walking the valley ever so slowly to a hill of brightness.
I’m tired of holding this truama and looking “normal” to the world. Because quite honestly I am far from normal. Sharing any of this isn’t an ask for empathy, nor sympathy – it’s merely to pose a few questions and to share into this dark spectrum of internet humans that I am in fact still here.
There have been two chairs in the imagination of my mind and now more so in my body which have held two words: grief & belief.
Throughout this year I have been asking both of these friends of mine to speak up, to show me a way through and equally yelling at them for trying to isolate me.
When you face death there are portions of your belief systems that come to be no longer constructs or hard to imagine. If there ever was a time where I was closer to understanding the anguish and pain of the crucifixion, it is now. If there ever was a time where I felt Thomas wasn’t so much of a doubter, but a human who did not want to forget harm and also himself facing the shock of trauma, it is now.
These stories of pain, loss and tragedy are no longer stories that create a “what the hell” reaction, but instead pose deeper questioning with them. What have I been missing inside the violence and harm of the Bible? And, why in our Churches today do we isolate this harm, stuff this harm into a pretty like repentance box and never discuss it – never hold it with ourselves and others?
Let’s ask our chairs:
I’ve been asking grief a lot of questions like….
“Why do you urge me to remain in isolation?” “Are you evil?” “Why will no one touch me because of you?”
In return, I’ve been asking my belief questions like…
“Why does it feel so isolating to be dealing with grief as a Christian?” “This isn’t how my core feels this is supposed to work, is it?” “Where are the siblings who remain?”
What I have realized in the course of this year is that I’ve been asking these two words to unify – to become one in a way that harmoniously makes sense and creates healing.
And just as Jacob wrestled with God, I am wrestling for my blessing. I’m wrestling for acknowledgment. I’m wrestling for a change in how we have dialogue in our churches and in our faith that doesn’t negate harm as brokenness, but sees it as human condition which by proxy is held just as tightly as the joy we yearn for – it is a part of our human experience. And when we do not acknowledge it we are erasing harm. We are sending a message that stability is looking ok, praying a lot and holding our pain in silence.
Here’s the point where I share a vocabulary sheet of re-written words.
The first word I heard after this traumatic event that enraged me was “stability.” This idea that once I had re-ordered my life again, tended to tasks and found wellness I would present as stable and feel good. This is a lie by any right.
When you have your world turned upside down the reality sinks in that plans break, patterns cannot always stay the same and stability is an unhealthy perspective (this is my opinion).
I quickly replaced this word with rhythm. Music has measures complete with hair raising volume, softness, pauses and measures of complete and utter silence. Rhythm adjusts to its tempo and in life the tempo is often changing. Rhythm can adjust and is allowed to pause without question of being “broken.”
This leads to the second word: “brokenness”
For the love of all that is holy in this world, the day we stop referring to brokenness in churches will be a blessed day. We must take into account that this word inherently means something is wrong in you.
At this point in my life, I don’t believe God created wrongness in me or of you. God cultivated this vast depth of imagination and choice to choose how we interact with our creator, the world and our flourishing. God wills and desires so much for our lives, the lives of others and the world at large.
We entered in shalom and the world, which does not live in shalom, rocks our peace. I believe it is why we spin in our minds, bodies and spirits to discover how we can play our vital role in creating this heaven on earth space. And because it was first in us and in the breath given to us, we know shalom exists.
I have not once in this year used this word to describe where I am. Part of this has to deal with living with trauma — we don’t want to be “broken.” We don’t want to admit that harm has taken place, that our lives have altered and we have to fight like hell every day to just breathe. Again, I believe, broken means something is wrong in you.
Our bodies know when we are under attack. Our blood cells seek to find the bacteria at play and eradicate it. Our bodies, I feel, do the same in our emotions and in our harm.
How do I fill this void with something new? How do I move through to even get to a space where I can feel less overwhelmed by the void itself? How can I fall into my body once being near forced out?
The body knows and it most certainly keeps score and it is certainly not broken after trauma. It’s working at its highest function to make things new.
So, why in our churches and in our society do we seek out to discredit the body and discredit the harm as brokenness we must drown out?
When this took place a year ago I wasn’t screaming at God about how broken I was…I was screaming at God to show me how to heal because I had zero idea of how to sit with grief, harm and this unthinkable acts against me.
Now, portions of my experience no one could prepare a person for – but to move through emotion and grieve… well that could be a practice.
I’ve spent the last year also researching different religions practices around grief. And, thankfully because I love a woman who loves podcasts more than I do I came across an episode on Terrible, Thanks for Askingthat discussed Shiva – a Jewish practice for grief.
Shiva is the third of the five stages of mourning in Judaism. It’s a seven day period for those who have lost a loved one to be embraced and comforted by individuals in the community. What continues from Shiva is an openness and understanding that grief unfold differently for each person, but is not to be forgotten.
We are living creatures who desire to be seen in our fullness, in our grief, our trauma, our heavy and our light.
What I have learned most in holding this line of harm is that we are capable of two things: harm & healing. That our grief runs parallel in the human experience with joy. They relate and they work together in harmony. When we try to separate these emotions; these realities we break our bodies in ways God never desired for us in our communities.
Yes, it is true that harm happens. No, I do not have the answers of why such things are allowed in the world and I do not blame God for such terror of the evil that exists. I know and believe greatly that God does not ask of us to hold suffering as a holy and divine calling to experience. I just cannot use that theology in practice.
What I do believe in my being is that God desires healing. God desires Shalom. God desires us to know ourselves and know others.
We are resurrection people has never meant more in my life than it does right now. My God I am anew once more. Even in the midst of death and suffering God found me, supplied me water when I wasn’t sure of when I would receive my next drink and sustained me to this point. The journey ahead in this horrible unthinkable act is painful. It will be filled with more re-living to get through. I am in the valley of death mourning and shouting Hosanna at the same time.
Grief & Grace. Grief & joy. Grief & love.
We are marked by it. But, we will be free of it as well.
Here I am to say, God willing, your truth be found in my calling, in this living and in our ability to see each other in all that we are and that we may have the ability to sit with the depths of this world and hold it well…
I’m still here.
Defining Pride
Published June 20, 2019
PRIDE MATTERS.
Pride month is here and once again it has been full of rainbow capitalism and overused hashtags.
Every June major corporations shift their platforms to inform us that on this month we do indeed matter. But where is their allyship the remaining 11 months of the year? Better yet do they mean what they say? For some the answer is no.
Alongside corporations, every June people hashtag away #pride #gaypride #ally and many more.
As society over stimulates the senses with rainbow flag crystalized clothing and hashtags, I wonder if we’re erasing the true root of pride’s existence.
When we close our eyes to define pride is this all we see?
Parades, countless individuals adorned in rainbows & parties
I love Pride parades, I do. The first time I ever attended Pride I curled up into the arms of a marching PFLAG member and bawled my queer southern butt off — but, I wonder if capitalism and it’s glitz & glam has our minds distracted from the origin story.
It’s been fifty years since Stonewall and as celebrations are ongoing to memorialize this milestone I am curious as to if we have erased the inner identity of pride.
Pride was born through the grassroots movement of Queer Trans People of Color. It was a movement which ushered in the truth that yes, queer people exist. “We’re here. We’re Queer.” And, we will not be oppressed for being.
The first ever Gay Pride parade was born through Stonewall. Christopher Street Liberation Day, exactly one year after Stonewall, began at Greenwich Village and went 51 blocks up Sixth Avenue to Central Park. Reports at the time estimated between 3,000 and 15,000 people took part.
At the core of these celebrations was the truth of liberation. That being who you are wasn’t a crime, but a freedom all should be able to discover their identity in. No one has the authority to diminish one’s discovery of self or community.
Pride is identity on display. Pride is visibility. Pride is justice. Pride is needed.
This year for Pride I’m asking myself what does Pride mean to me. What definition would I give someone if they asked? What and where do I feel this pride in me?
Recently, I shared a story of a moment with a neighbor from my apartment complex. And it jumpstarted my exploration of the questions I just named.
There’s an older gentleman who every afternoon in his veteran’s cap and cane rests outside of the Dairy Queen of my apartment complex. He appears rigid and shares few words with those who pass. Over the last few weeks, he’s become comfortable briefly chatting with me, my partner and my German Shepherd, Jack. It’s been pleasant to watch our afternoon routines evolve into expecting each other around 5 pm for hello’s.
Recently, I walked downstairs on a Saturday with Jack and he happened to be downstairs in his corner chair. He jumps up in excitement and walks over to me. He’s visibly thrilled to see me and as he walks over says, “I’ve been meaning to ask you a question…”
He stands mere inches from me and asks “isn’t it Pride month?” Startled and unsure of how to react I timidly answer, “Yes, it is.” He extends his arms in the air as wide as possible and let’s out a large, audible and visiable “Happy Pride!”
He continues to explain how he’s been waiting to see me all day just to wish me a happy pride.
In that 2 minute interaction I felt seen. I was so overcome by emotion that I was near tears. The pure joy of this man’s kindness and willingness to see me renewed in me, once more, how significant my identity in my queer body matters. Pride regained it’s meaning.
Universally, at our core, the desire to be valued, appreciated, loved and seen is present. For some our vulnerability (living) is a privilege. Even in the hard work of being vulnerable there is privilege.
To be vulnerable in our queer bodies is to risk the experience of shame, oppression, unjust acts of aggression, harm, loss of income, marginalization and death.
Brave space for many queer humans is stepping outside to live, waking up to breathe and owning into our bones our identity. It’s living into the truth that our queerness is sacred, deserves to be seen, needs to be seen and is one piece of a whole sum.
Too many QTPOC individuals are murdered in their communities for living into that brave space. Too many queer humans are brutally attacked for being. Too many youth are taken into closed door situations to be gas lighted and abused with religion as a weapon into denying their being.
Our vulnerability to live is resistance and for many it is dangerous to be seen. So, at our core, a fundamental right we have as humans to be loved and love is negated by hatred, misunderstanding, poor interpretations of scripture and power.
Biblically speaking God desires for us to know a few truths about creation (which includes our queer bodies)
That we are indeed – all – wonderfully made with no exceptions (Psalm 139:14)
We were created from the same breath, tasked to bear witness to the conscious of God’s dream for us and take hold to the intention that we were made in the image of God to live in harmony. Isolation is not the intention for humanity, but shalom is. (Col. 3:12-15; Genesis 1:27)
To believe in one’s worth, identity and to make a way for yourself & others (In Old Testament scripture we’re provided examples of how to restore worth to those placed in the margins. From leaving crops, to Jubilee year, to loving your neighbor – it’s clear God desires for us to know our worth as Children of God, discover our ways of giving into community that not only practices compassion, grace, mercy, etc on ourselves but offers it to others)
God celebrates our pride in what we are made of, as it is of the creator – including our queerness. That is something to celebrate, to not be erased or forgotten in our own understanding of our individual and collective creation. God has blessed this as good.
We are a portion of the creation of the creator. We were made to be prophets of the nations. In our queerness we are showering the world with the reminder that all things are indeed of and from God. There is more to God’s creation than what the eye can see or the perspective one has been given.
Perhaps we glorify God in our bodies by honoring the temple of which it comes from by not hiding or shying away into society’s created darkness, but by living, showing our pride in our uniqueness, living boldly into the creations we are and sparking a light which spreads faster than the darkness which strives to trap us.
By living into our queerness and showcasing our pride of this piece of our identity, we collectively replace systems which try to silence us. We regain power in our truth-telling. We allow ourselves and those along the way to flourish.
So how do I define Pride?
PRIDE IS A FEELING, ACT OR BELIEF THAT ONE’S WORTH IS NOT WRAPPED UP IN SOCIETAL NORMS, BUT WITHIN CORE BEING; CREATION. THIS CORE BELONGS TO OUR TRUTH & IS SHARED BY INTERNAL & EXTERNAL EXPRESSION, LOVE AND GIFTS. SOME MAY BELIEVE THESE ARE HOLY GIFTS GIVEN BY GOD. PRIDE IS A VIBRANT COLOR OF THE RADICAL IMAGINATION OF GOD BREAKING FREE AND ALLOWING LIBERATION TO TAKE FORM. PRIDE IS KNOWING OF WHICH WE ARE MADE, HOW GOOD THAT SUBSTANCE IS AND HOW NEEDED IT IS AMONGST THE LIGHT.
Death is a Friend
Published August 2019
There is something about death. It sticks to the roof of our mouths as we whisper it to one another. Death is a word covered in the smut of an overused chimney – full of ash and lack of oxygen. Personally, death feels like an ending.
What if this perception of death isn’t actually fruitful, helpful or true?
Enter life / death / life cycle.
Recently, I’ve been reading out loud to my partner every night Women Who Run With The Wolves and it has been doing something magical to my perception of death, healing and faith. Yes, something has my gears feeling awake again.
My faith feels like that ash filled chimney. I’m choking on guilt of adolescent evangelical upbringing and why don’t I feel God in my body, around me and in this walk called discernment.
The answer isn’t so hard to find. Cue highlight reel of not so great things: Last year I was violently attacked & lived leading to my diagnosis of PTSD, accepted into grad school lacking a faith community home, went deeper into deconstruction of faith semantics and family dynamics of origin.
In two weeks I start seminary and God feels like a distant fairy tale character in a book I no longer read. I am battered and limited on supply. And, for the many, this could look like a death season.
What is death season?
Inner monologue: I’m doing something wrong and it’s caused my spirit to die. If I don’t replenish soon I will die and then it’s over. Life as a Christian is over and I’m never getting back to where I once was – sound like a familiar narrative to you?
As a society we have drenched loss in sacristy and painted death as negative. From a faith context, death is painted as the entry to life. So why does it feel like life won’t be found when we are deathly low on resource? Or, when we might be dying spiritually?
We need oil to light our lamp. Sometimes that supply is dwindling. It is not of our own fault or creation – it is simply the life/death/life cycle of living. And, God knew this cycle to be true. Right now I’m processing so much because of this renewal of death. Biblically speaking, I’m looking at resurrection and the creation story differently.
We came from life so that we might live, die and live again.
*hello life/death/life
In order to move into something new then something else must die and this is painful and it’s not a fast-moving transition. But life emerges from death – still.
In Women Who Run With The Wolves there’s this excerpt that has really helped me lessen the death grip on the urgency of how my Christian faith is in utter disarray and I need to figure it out right now. I want to share it and then unpack it a bit:
“Nature does not ask permission. Blossom and birth whenever you feel like. As adults we need little permission but rather more engendering, much more encouraging of the wild cycles, must more original vision…the life/ death / life forces are part of our own nature, part of an inner authority that knows the steps, knows the dance of life and death…’dame la muerte que me falta’… Give me the death I need.” – Women Who Run With The Wolves
What does it mean to you to unleash your inner authority to live into the wild of daring to let die what must and live through it?
Healing is not linear and it is forever. It teaches us. And, life emerges from it. It’s the life/death/life cycle at work.
It’s not what we must make of it, but how it will make a new way through with us.
If you’re embracing healing or facing the journey through harm, know that if you somethings must die it isn’t the end of you. It is once more a new beginning.
It is a continued resurrection of the development of your humanity and spirituality.
I do believe we carry our harm with us for life, but something else comes out of death and that is life. Death is a friend. Let die what must and maybe it will come again next Spring, but for now you deserve to blossom no matter the season. Whether it is covered in darkness or lack of resource, you still deserve to blossom there and that doesn’t have to look full and bright.
Currently my heart lives outside of my chest exposed, bleeding, exhausted and in need of oxygen; of movement. And as it pumps from one chamber to the next – with every breath – life and death to life again is happening. And there inside the chambers of life and death is God.
There inside my heart she is feverishly workmen to pump life from one chamber to the next. She’s move death to resurrection – anew. She’s in my breath giving me pause before next steps. She’s moving my feet towards a call I can’t describe. She’s in my body building up muscle to move through PTSD and harm. She’s whispering to me, “child I’ve got you. You can yell, be angry with me, cry or be still… I will be working in the dark to bring you life.”
I believe that inside the darkness is our greatest life; our greatest renewal. May it be so and may we all have peace. May we know that inside our moments of utter darkness something new is coming. Let us have the wild nature to release what is causing harm to wilt for another time and continue our re-birth time and time again. What a delicate dance; what a burden we do not have to walk alone.
I’m here for the wild nature of our living & God’s embrace in the breath of our life/death/life cycle. That is enough. No grand gesture needed in the deepening of my faith – just breathing.
Breathe easy, friends.
Death is a friend.