A Church for Starving Artists

Sometimes we just want to feel fluffier.

No real world Church People – male or female –  have hair like Sofia Vergara but we, too, can visit one of the Dry Bars popping up in cities all over to get that blown out look.  These hair salons don’t cut your hair.  They don’t color your hair.  They just fluff it and maybe put a glass of chardonnay in your hand.  It takes just a few minutes and then tah dah – you are fresh and new.

This article has some not-so-new-but-still-we-need-to-pay-attention ideas about who we are as Followers of Jesus.  Hint:  most of us are not good at it.

Yes, there are lots of cultural Christians, many congregational Christians, and many fewer convictional Christians, but – I agree with Steve McSwain  – that many followers of Jesus have left the church to try to save their faith.  They are not satisfied with a simple blow out.  They want water and color.  They don’t want to appear fresh and fluffy.  They want to be turned inside out.  They don’t want a brief moment of respite.  They want a life of peace.

I’m not sure the institutional church will ever again look anything like it did in the 1960s.  But it’s not going to look – at all – like a dry bar much longer.

There are people that share interesting ideas.

And then there are people that spark us to come up with interesting ideas.  It’s a holy thing actually.

I adore Chicago Ideas Week for the ideas shared by so many interesting people.  Danny Schuman, Tig Notaro, and Catherine Hoke are among those whose ideas have made me happy this week.

But yesterday I heard ideas that sparked my own.

Love.  These.  People.

When we are inspired our lives change forever.  My top three Life Inspiration Moments – not counting the days I met Jesus, my husband, and our children –  happened at a bus stop in London (had just finished reading Crime and Punishment), DAR Constitution Hall (at an Aretha concert), and today at the “At the Chef’s Table” Talk for Chicago Ideas Week featuring Melissa Clark, Cat Cora, Graham Elliot, Mollie Katzen, and the others I already mentioned.  [Note to self:  read everything Josh Kilmer-Purcell has ever written.]

I have a new life plan today.  So many new ideas.  So what inspires you with life-changing ideas?

It’s Ideas Week in Chicago – one of my favorite annual events – and while the talks this year lack many overtly religious/spiritual/interfaith options, there will be much to inform Church World.  More about that later.

With today being Columbus Day, I was pondering his ideas – as disturbing and backwards as they sound today.  According to Backstory, here are some of the ideas that Columbus did and did not have:

• Columbus did not initiate the idea that the earth was round.  Aristotle had already established that (c. 330 BCE) not to mention a guy named Yajnavalkya (c. 9th–8th century BCE.)  But Columbus did have the idea that the earth was small – hence his confusion in believing that Cuba was China.
• Columbus did believe that the lovely people he met in what is now the Bahamas would make docile servants for the royals.

And there was more, but here’s my point:  Ideas Are Important.  But not all ideas are good, reasonable, or true.  And still, all thriving institutions need ideas and idea people.

A couple of things about ideas in general:

• We can try out an idea and if it doesn’t work, it’s okay.  Failure is an excellent teacher.  Or maybe an idea hasn’t failed as much as it needs to be tweaked a little and then voila!
• Fear of  institutionalizing ideas paralyzes us.  Saying “let’s try this for 3 months and then evaluate” sets everyone’s heart at ease.
• Mistakes introduce unlikely discoveries.  This is how we got the color mauve.  Excellent.
• Everything is spiritual.  Among the Chicago Ideas Week talks and labs I’ll be attending include “Twist: The Joy of Solving” and “Work: Fueling Performance.”  They seem to have nothing to do with God, except that they do.
• For churches to thrive, they need more than creative pastoral leadership.  Read/re-read this by Patrick Scriven.

I’ll be blogging on ideas all week.  Please share yours as well.

Let’s be honest here.  Some people make our lives easier and some make our lives harder.

I remember driving into the church parking lot years ago and the sight of certain cars made my heart tighten up.  It meant that my immediate future would involve a conversation with someone who always seems to be making a racket.  You can read about such children of God here.

You know them. They complain constantly, behave belligerently, and focus on the spiderweb in the corner when the building is actually on fire.

And then there are the people whose very presence calm us like the best quality anti-depressant.  We need these people.

So, as you read this today, I am spending time with one of my favorite human anti-depressants.  I hope you have some too.  Thanks be to God.

Christians are warned not to be Laodiceans.  In other words we are not supposed to be lukewarm followers of Jesus.

But  – at the risk of being labeled wishy-washy –  I believe we need more bridge builders.  Actually, I believe some of us need to live on the bridge.

It’s not about being two-faced.  It’s even not about being wishy-washy.  It’s about loving and respecting people on both sides of an issue.  It’s about recognizing that none of us has cornered the market on God’s Truth.  It’s about theological humility.

Being a bridge builder is a valuable competency for today’s spiritual leader.  And living on the bridge seems to be good too if we welcome those who are inching towards the other side from either direction.  I’m feeling like we need this now more than ever.  But it’s kind of exhausting.

Image of the Pont Vecchio bridging the Arno River in Florence.

PS  I think this is my 8th or 9th blogoversary.

A retired clergywoman friend of mine has been ordained for almost 50 years. 

As someone who’s been ordained for almost 30 years, we share some common experiences as women pastors.   Like Y,  I was often the first clergywoman parishioners had ever laid eyes on.  Like Y, I was sometimes  the only female at a clergy conference in those early years.  Like Y,  I even experienced colleagues making passes at me.  Clergy colleagues.

But my long-retired friend tells me that  – as a young (under 40) clergywoman, she never attended a clergy conference, clergy retreat, or continuing education class without a male colleague making a pass at her.  There was an expectation that – because she was there – she must have been “available.”

So last night I read this article from the online version of Vanity Fair about teenage girls, teenage boys, social media, and the expectation that the girls are fair game to the boys sexually.  Because they are there.

The VF article is disturbing for countless reasons.  But I wonder:  have things not evolved in terms of boys and men expecting sexual favors from girls and women just because they are there?  Is the article hyperbolizing possible problems with social media?  Or is it truly the expectation of some males regarding all females?

Just wondering.

And where is the church in all this? What is the church teaching our boys and girls, our men and women about why we are valuable?  Can you share specific conversations/programs/opportunities that your spiritual community is offering to talk about this with our kids and their parents?

Image is Male and Female 1942 by Jackson Pollock.

There are several explanations for why so many people seem to require gluten-free diets these days.  Check these out.

But regardless of the reason, we church people have some alterations to make  – from our communion bread recipes to the ingredients in our consecrated casseroles.

• It used to be true that a church member returned from the hospital to find enough mac and cheese to feed a small army.
• It used to be true that pot luck dinners featured numerous versions of lasagna along with assorted pasta salads and ham biscuits.
• It used to be true that communion bread was chewy and delicious.  Or at least those little white bread squares were nice and spongy.

Many churches who never used communion wafers before are now offering gluten free wafers which, by the way, are tasteless.  Other churches are serving gluten free soda bread to all partakers during the Eucharist, but – let’s be honest – it makes a crumbly mess during intinction.

Today the most hospitable pastoral caregivers will ask – before taking dinner to families with new babies – if anyone has food allergies.  The most welcoming congregations will make the Eucharist available to everyone – even those who cannot tolerate gluten.

I recently heard someone grouse about these shifts:  “Who are all these people who can’t eat wheat?  Don’t they know they are making things difficult for everybody?”

And therein lies the reason why so many congregations are in survival mode.  We have forgotten that the church is not about us, even  – and especially – when it comes to food.

Whether we are 25 years old or 95 years old, Boundary Training is required for all pastors in our Presbytery who serve congregations in any way.  

Some scoff at this because it’s required every three years.   If we have been serving churches for 3 years or 43 years, we still have to attend the same training.  Most of us get it:  Don’t have sex with parishioners.

But, of course, there is much, much more to it than that.

Among the boundary issues that come up regularly involve retired pastors.  We have several gifted retired pastors who:

• Continue to love the people they served prior to retirement (not a problem)
• Miss the practice of preaching, teaching, and leading God’s people (understandable)
• Feel adrift without their previous pastoral identity (also understandable)
• And are inadvertently hurting the ministry of the churches they’ve loved (not okay).

It occurs to me that maybe we need to start early in preparing our pastors for Life After Retirement.

What if – starting at age 55 – all pastors (already-retired and not-yet-retired) were invited to a different kind of Boundary Training?

Military personnel – prior to retirement after 20+ years – are treated to workshops from How to Dress (when your wardrobe no longer includes military uniforms) to How to Find Work in Civilian Life.

Clergy need the same kind of preparation as we look forward to or find ourselves already in retirement.  Carol Howard Merritt shared at a recent conference that, in the next 10+ years, a huge number of Baby Boomer clergy will be retiring.  (Note:  While many say that there are too many clergy, there will be a huge need for gifted clergy in the coming years.  Get thee to a seminary, young spiritual leader.)

We get financial preparation from our Board of Pensions.  But few of us are prepared for retirement emotionally and spiritually.  Imagine if we had conversations/boundary training before and after retirement around these issues:

• What do we do if all of our friends are in our last congregation?  (Tip:  make friends who have nothing to do with your church well before retirement.)
• What do we do if all our spouses friends are in that last congregation?  (Tip: see above)
• What if we miss our former church so much that we really, really want to drop in on church functions, get together with former parishioners, continue to offer pastoral care?  (Tip:  When you get the urge to connect with former parishioners, remember what this does to your former church – the congregation you love so much:  It confuses people.  It keeps them looking back at the past.  It sabotages the ministry of the current and future pastors.)
• What if the new pastor has finally arrived to our former church and we want to partner with her/him because – after all – we have a lot of information about that congregation and we could help?  (Tip:  Don’t do this unless asked.)
• What if we left under a cloud and we are still bitter/angry?  (Tip:  Vent to a therapist.  Don’t shred your former congregation or former colleagues.)
• What if we were elected Pastor Emeritus and we are still connected to the church from which we retired?  (Tip:  Being Pastor Emeritus is an honorary status.  It doesn’t mean you are still on the church staff or that the church is obliged to invite you to preach, teach, or attend church functions.)

Healthy pastors of every age have a life outside the church.  Healthy pastors of every age have interests and friends who are not part of their congregation’s activities.  Healthy pastors of every age don’t make church about themselves.

But we need to help each other be healthy.

Is the Preparation for Professional Ministry process like The Hunger Games? Really? Or does that simply make a better story?

This question sparked a conversation on Facebook yesterday and I was surprised at how many people shared that either:

1. Their own experience had not been so bad, and
2. Some people have a difficult experience because they should have a difficult experience (i.e. they have misunderstood their call, they need guidance but don’t think they need guidance, they are maybe not called to professional ministry.)

I recently heard someone compare her experience on the road to ordination to The Hunger Games.  I did not walk alongside her in her entire journey, but for the small part I witnessed, it actually seemed quite supportive with constructive criticism and good questions asked.

Keep in mind that, in The Hunger Games, the participants killed each other.  I’m pretty sure that Preparation for Ministry is not like this.  At all.  What has been your experience, O Pastors/Candidates/Inquirers?

Image source.

What could a stranger learn about you from exegeting your wallet?

Either I lost or someone pick pocketed my wallet in the ten steps between the Giordano’s Restaurant in our office building and the main door into the office building yesterday.  I didn’t realize my wallet was gone until I headed home and needed money for my CTA card.  Ugh.

In the process of canceling cards, I noticed a stranger who wanted to connect with me on LinkedIn and I was just about to delete (I don’t know this person.) when I saw the words: “I have your wallet.”

A maintenance person had found it in the men’s bathroom of another office building several blocks from mine.  The money was gone (it was literally a couple quarters and pennies) but the cards and my license were still there.

My new LinkedIn friend had studied the contents and learned that:

• I buy things in bulk.  (Costco card)
• I probably eat gluten. (Panera card)
• I’m a clergyperson. (PCUSA ID, Board of Pensions ID)
• I’m not much of a shopper. (Basic debit card. One business charge card.)

She looked up the website of my office (the office charge card) and matched my photos (Google images) with the (bad) photo on my debit card. Voila!

Sometimes HH and I play “what can you tell about that driver” as we travel down the interstate.  It’s amazing what you can learn:  political proclivities, educational connections, extracurricular activities, number of pets and children.

Our wallets also tell our story.  So, what’s in your wallet that would help someone figure you out – or find you?  I’m still using my Virginia driver’s license.  (I know, I know, it needs to be changed to my new state)  so she couldn’t have located me via ID address.  But – thanks to LinkedIn – I have my wallet back.

And to the person who took/found my wallet:  thanks for not tossing my driver’s license and cards, although I’m still changing them.