No, really... Have you?
Every once in a while someone asks me about what being a minister is actually like. People are curious. Some people are even interested in exploring it as a career. I must confess that at least sometimes (okay, most of the time) I probably sound discouraging. This is because I care about the people who ask me these questions. Also, I care about the ministry so I spent a great deal of time thinking about its future. Parts of that future can sound pretty bleak. In conversations with prospective clergy folks, I usually point out that we have no solid idea of what organized religion will ultimately look like. In many ministry settings there is a great deal of anxiety, conflict, and dysfunction brought about by the larger challenge and by local ones. I also tell folks that if financial rewards are part of one's concept of success, than the ministry will only bring frustration. In the future (as in the present) we will be in the position of re-making the profession. In your early settlements you will struggle to be solvent. In your later ones you will probably never "keep up with the Joneses". In the material world we live in, you will always feel a little bit behind. HOWEVER, I would like to set the record straight about what the profession has meant to me personally. I absolutely love being a minister! There are hard times, sure, and some of the specifics can stink. Still, in general I have never felt the need to question my call. So if you--dear reader-- have ever considered taking the plunge, here are some reasons to do so. 1) You Are Called to Directly and Consistently Help People: This is a big deal. Many, many folks go to jobs in which "helping" basically comes down to convincing someone to buy something. They find other ways (at least most of them) but their impact is lessened because of those hours doing something else. The ministry is not like that. Sometimes one can get overwhelmed with the number of ways to help and the number of individuals needing assistance. That said, if you want to make a difference in the lives of friends, enemies, frenemies, and strangers, the ministry might be for you. You may not always feel like you did enough, but you will pretty much always go to bed feeling like you did something to change people's lives for the better. 2) You Want To Impact Your (Our) World: Maybe you want to do more than comfort individuals. That's fine, part of the ministry is about standing up for the oppressed. Have you heard of the "Religious Left"? Google it. There are religious leaders of every faith tradition providing moral, intellectual, strategic, and practical support to what is sometimes referred to as "The Resistance". If you want to never be in the position of being unable to speak out against the evils and sins of this world, then grab yourself a pulpit! Join one of many justice ministries or start your own. Be a chaplain to young people, old people, the sick, the well, to activists, students, the military, and many more groups besides. If you want to be relevant in the conversations and debates of this dark time, the ministry may be the place for you. Now, of course, these two first points call people to a great many professions. I know. Trust me. I am married to a clinical social worker. My congregation, my extended family and my collection of friends are filled with other people who--like clergy people--would be classified by The Rev. Mr. Rogers as among "the helpers" that folks in need should seek out. That is cool. None of these are unique to the ministry. Still, it take all kinds and the pastoral approach is unique and essential. 3a) You Are Interested In Your Own Spiritual Growth and Religious Tradition: One of the most important facts of clergy life is that it occurs for the most part in community. That community-- even if some members are more interested in the topic than other members-- is dedicated to the spiritual dimension of our identity and walk through life. As clergy, part of our job is to develop our own spiritual lives. That is, we practice what we preach to the best of our ability. This kind of religious discipline may not be for everybody, Yet I have found, both as a church member and a church leader, that I have grown spiritually and religiously from the work that I do. Sometimes this is through my own efforts. Sometimes it is through the in-breaking of the spirit. Sometimes I learned through my failures or through the advice of someone else. That regular practice is important. It is also part of the job. Whenever I end up in the thicket, I know that I have the obligation and the tools to get back on the path. 3b) You Are Interested In Other Religions: It is popular these days to think of religious groups retreating into their own corners and sniping at each other. Certainly there are plenty of examples of this! However, the opposite is also true. In many circles, in fact, opportunities for cooperation and dialogue are growing rapidly. As a minister I have had many chances to discuss theology, spirituality, justice, family and current events with representatives of other world religions. See that picture at the top of this post? Those folks meet monthly for lunch. We genuinely enjoy each other's presence. Clergy of all stripes tend to end up hanging out together. We influence each other. Who else would we talk to? We are interested in the world around us and in each others' perspectives about that world. 4) You Want To Delve Deeply Into A Variety of Subjects: One of the great parts of my job is that every week I am expected to stand in front of my congregation and talk about something. Sometimes these issues are explicitly religious or philosophical. Sometimes (as you may have gathered) they are about how we should act in the world both as individuals and as a society. Every week I set aside time to study. Sometimes the topic is one that excites me. At other times it is one that my congregation is excited about. Most of the time both of these statements are true. In any case, I always find the process of learning and exploring these topics to be a fruitful one. This opportunity for study and for delving into an issue exists outside the pulpit as well. I lead and attend workshops, classes, and seminars for adults and children on a variety of topics. I also learn by participating in community and by conversing with others. Many people go to church in part to keep their hearts, minds, and souls strong. As a minister I get to be part of that. 5) You Get To Exercise Your Creativity (And Encourage Creativity In Others): One of the things that people expect from their ministers (parish or otherwise) is that they bring their own passions and interests to the community. For me, this has meant a number of things. Elsewhere on this webpage you can find references to the church's ukulele-based music ministry (the "Ukestra"), it's garden, and it's justice and outreach work (among other things). I have also mentioned the Dungeons & Dragons Club I run for our youth (and for the youth of a local learning community). In worship we try to be creative every week. This is a cooperative process. I have ideas and projects and so do others. Much of the time we work and grow things together. Since I have arrived at this place we have made and re-made the congregation every year. It is a workshop and a family. Our core, our spirit, is always the same. How we manifest that spirit keeps up with the times and with our interests. Of course, there are ways to be creative in the broader conversation. The great advantage to being a minister at this time is that the old rules and ways are failing us. We get to explore the ruins and build the new faith communities of the future. Who wouldn't want to do that? If you are worried about joining profession that is old, fusty, boring, and wearing the chains of conformity, don't be. Every day clergy are striding into the temples and turning over the tables. We would love to have you join us! 6) You Get To Hang With The Most Interesting Folks: Now a lot of those interesting folks are, in fact, the lay people you will work with. That said, I want to say something about my colleagues. I could not ask for better, more interesting people to spend my time with. Most of my friends are clergy people, their partners and children. They are all writers, artists, poets, academics, deep thinkers, and eccentric individuals. They are never boring. They always have something to say or do. They all tell great stories and play great music. They support each other with an openness that the rest of the world would do well to emulate. Clergy also provide each other with accountability. Yeah, we have rules "for the good of the order" but I've never found them to be a burden. Instead they are a gift. After all, we try to structure our lives in the way that we encourage others to live their's. My community of religious friends helps me to do that. I could go on, but I promised myself that why would only share six reasons today. We are in a time of transition. The whole culture is. Our religious institutions need to decide where they (we) will stand. My desire is that we will stand for inclusion, justice, forgiveness, and hope. To do this we need people of all kinds to form faith communities. We also need professionals to help these people realize their dreams. As many of you know (I just mentioned it after all!), I am a Game Master for a variety of role-playing groups. At the table we GM's try to be in conversation with the other players. When they have an idea (or we have an idea they like) our job is to say "yes...and". This attitude helps us to collaborate in building the world we are imagining together. So I ask you again, can you be a "yes...and" person for faith communities? If the answer is yes (or yes,..and) then please give a clergy career a closer look. It is as much a way of life as a job.
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Yup, it is now officially Lent.
For most folks I know (including many in the church), Lent isn't all that big a deal. I must admit that in a way, I am right there with them. Lent sneaks up on a person. There is so much to do in "normal" life and--since Easter doesn't have the same commercial requirements as Christmas--there isn't the same sense of panic about getting everything done in time. Also, there is the theme. Lent is about introspection, sacrifice, and connecting to the Divine (whatever that may be for you). Those are non-starters compared to other religious holidays. For most of us, accountability stinks a bit. However, I have gotten a lot out of Lent in the "giving things up" or "taking things on" department. My approach--perhaps not surprisingly--is from the perspective of what the Transcendentalists (among others) call "self-culture" which is a fancy way of saying self-directed self-improvement. The fact is, Lent is a much more efficient time for resolutions than the new year. First of all, spring is coming so we are feeling more energetic. Also, it is a religious holiday, so there is a sense of sacred responsibility that is harder to generate while hung over on New Year's Day. Finally, there is the unit of time. Forty days just works better when you are trying a new thing. On Easter morning I look back at my Lenten efforts and decide which life-changes I am bringing with me and which ones were fine for six weeks, but not forever. Lent is when I took my first music lesson as an adult (mandolin), for example. It is also when I decided to learn everything I could about Abraham Lincoln. I still play music every day. The Lincoln thing has died down substantially. This year I am focusing on three things, which no doubt I will tell you about here or in church over the next month or so. First, I always take on some esoteric study project that I know I will like (as with "Old Abe" last year). This year it is Bronson Alcott. Second, I am trying to get back in shape. I have never been--shall we say--"affirmed" when it comes to physical activity so it is a challenge for me to exercise in public. The problem is that I won't do it when I am alone. I have an accountability issue in this part of life apparently. Therefore I have signed myself up for Jiu Jitsu twice a week. In fact it has already started and it hurts like Hell. Only forty more days... On a related note, this year I have decided to give up alcohol for a while. It is a challenge for me. There are all kinds of reasons to do it. Most pressingly, every beer I don't drink is weight that won't be slamming down on the mat with me in Jiu Jitsu class. There are other reasons, too. On a personal level, if we say that we can stop drinking any time, shouldn't that be a hypothesis that gets tested occasionally? It is a good thing to do in the more "traditional" sense of the season, too. It is a fast. So when I miss having a drink this month I will be reminded of God...or at least that is the idea. Actually what I will probably miss most isn't beer,,,it's bars and the welcoming social ritual that grabbing a drink represents. Like Alcott, my preferred mode of communication is conversation. My favorite venue is a causal place with food that won't kick you out right away. In fact, the picture I put on this post is there because it reminds me of a really great breakfast I had with friends in Long Beach during UCC General Synod. I plan on having a lot of breakfast meetings I guess...but with coffee. Fortunately I love coffee. Anyway, are you doing anything for Lent? Most of my minister friends have plans. This is even even true for low-church Puritan types like me, who don't come from traditions where the season is officially a thing. We are borrowing it. My Facebook feed is filled with the plans of colleagues. What about lay folks? Anyone? We always make Lent sound so grim, and of course there is a reason for that in the story of death and resurrection that brings us to Easter, However, it is a great way to attempt a positive change in our lives. I, for one, don't plan on passing it up. I am up super-early this Christmas. I think this happens to me most years. My reverend mother says that when I was kid I was sick every Christmas morning because I was so excited during the week before. It is probably true. I am not sick this year (yay!) but there is a lot running through my head so I thought I would spend the restless time trying to put my 5pm Christmas Eve sermon notes into a readable form. Folks really seemed to like it and I enjoyed delivering it to a packed sanctuary of friends and visitors. Unfortunately I was basically a hinderance to the readers at the--more formal and traditional--7pm worship, getting lost in the order of service a couple of times and nearly skipping the offering! The formats and style are different for each. Still, maybe I should have just preached this twice. Anyway, here it is! I am going to console myself with Facebook posts of other pastors who had similar hiccups on the way to the morning. We are reminding each other that Christmas still comes no matter how many balls we drop. My youngest will be up soon in any case. He takes after me. Perhaps he will let me help him empty his stocking. The Work of Christmas Rev Adam Tierney-Eliot December 24, 2016 So, I was going through an archive of old Christmas sermons in preparation for this evening and I found a script to the pageant we used here at Eliot when I first arrived. Now I realize that some of you probably remember it (and some of you were no doubt in it). For the rest of you, let me just say that it was...different from the way we do it now. After all, back then it began--oddly enough--with this exchange between Mrs. Claus and a reindeer. “Santa” says Mrs, Claus “You need to get busy. There’s so much to do to get ready delivering presents!” Then the Reindeer--mostly innocently--says “Is that what Christmas is all about--delivering presents?” “Not really,” says Mrs. Claus “Santa [she says while turning to her husband] while you are getting up, why don’t you tell us the real story” Now, these days our pageant tends to go straight to the “real” story. However, we still are able to recognize the tension this pageant exchange reflects. We do, after all, understand the young reindeer's confusion. We see and feel the tension ourselves between the call toward the spiritual birth and rebirth that this time has represented (on the one hand) and the excuse for consumption and acquisition--an engine for the economy (on the other hand). It is this second group of activities that dominate much of our surplus time over Advent. I certainly know this to be true. Every year I try and fail to avoid the chaos of the malls and shopping centers of route 9. Every year I try to cut back on my purchases, too. In fact, I even more or less succeed at the cutting back. However, I still end up feeling like I should have gotten a couple more things for a few folks on my list. This commercial element of our culture is pervasive. Our understanding of this time is deeply connected to the exchange and display of material goods. So it isn’t all that hard to see how someone like Ebenezer Scrooge could downplay or ignore the religious and ethical obligations of the season. In Dicken’s classic Christmas Carol, his nephew, Fred, tried his best to set Scrooge straight. At one point he describes the holiday as “The only time I know of, in the long calendar of the year, when men and women...think of people...as if they really were fellow-passengers to the grave, and not another race of creatures bound on other journeys.” Still, it isn’t hard to imagine--given all the noise that can surround the sentiment of the season--how that message can be missed. After all, in the song of Mary she sings that “God has scattered the proud...and brought down rulers..and raised up the humble. Has filled the hungry with good things and sent the rich away with nothing”. Yet nothing in our observation of the holiday this year seems to indicate any great victory on that front. This Advent it has been difficult to accept the idea that our fellow-passengers do in fact take the message of Christmas to heart. The birth of Jesus, like any birthday can be an excuse for a celebration. However, it feels like the meaning of his life, death, and teachings has fallen on many unheeding ears. Together this Advent we have had our hearts broken by the news from places like Syria. We have journeyed together through a contentious and demoralizing election cycle. We have had our hearts injured again by stories of bigotry and discrimination here in our own towns and in our own neighborhood. So, Mindless cheerfulness is pretty hard to maintain given the current situation. Like the Grinch there are times we wish to escape to the hills, or like Scrooge maybe even to our counting houses. It is enough to make some of us build walls between ourselves and the love we yearn to share and receive. But...here is the thing. Specifically because it is so hard to put on the usual festive veneer, many of us haven’t really tried! Instead we have put our energy elsewhere this December. Sure, maybe our Christmas trees and our lights went up late. Maybe our gift list is still a shambles and there is nothing we can do about it by tomorrow, but we took the time and energy we normally spend on these things and put it somewhere else. That’s right. We put it somewhere else. Looking out into the troubled world of 2016 we have chose to find ways to help. We did this for the of others. We did it for our own sakes, too. For example, this church took on the Christmas Open Door community meal this week, which is no mean feat in the midst of everything else. We also went caroling at Riverbend Nursing Home. In addition, many of us have found some healing in the work of Natick Is United. The rainbow “Peace” flag campaign, the marches and vigils, the joint statements and all the rest have drawn our minds away from despair and into action. Then through action we have been drawn back to hope. Hope, is, after all, what this holiday truly is about. It is about Hope for a light in the dark, a light that is kindled by our fellow beings through the exercise of a broad, dynamic faith And an all-encompassing love. This year we are learning to live into the words of the civil rights leader Howard Thurman. The work of Christmas begins he tells us to find the lost to heal the broken, to feed the hungry, to release the prisoner, to rebuild the nations, to bring peace among the brothers and sisters, to make music in the heart Our lives--and hopefully the lives of others--will be better for this work, so tonight we remember. We remember that the birthday we are celebrating is not our own. We remember that we are called to walk the path of faith. We remember we are called to walk the path of justice. When I was a kid, this machine shed was a big part of my life. I painted it (twice). I helped reshingle it after the world's largest raccoon tore racoon-sized holes in the roof. I learned to sharpen various dangerous farming implements in its back room. I learned to "grease" vintage hay rakes that I would then pull behind a 1948 Ford tractor when I was learning to drive. Perhaps most importantly, it was the base of operations for my grandfather's Christmas tree farm and--therefore--one of the most formative elements in my understanding of how to celebrate the holidays. You see, even then Christmas and Advent were part of my job. I would spend my summers up on the side of those hills as a teen swinging a machete along the edge of a young tree in long, diagonal, downward strokes. I would try (and fail) to avoid the poison ivy, sunstroke, and angry critters who lived at the base in the underbrush. I did manage to not cut myself, which was an achievement considering how much I enjoyed sharpening things. Planting was the worst. It was heavy, boring work and there was no way to pretend you were fighting trolls. Thankfully my little brother, Dan, started to come down with me after a couple years. Then I had a friend and ally in my misery. At some point we would head back to school and family in Maine. Other relatives (cousins mostly) would help Grampa look after the trees along with the rest of the farm until we could come back around Thanksgiving. Thanksgiving meant tagging and counting the trees, mowing one last time between them, and decorating the machine shed to attract families from Poughkeepsie and New York looking for "authenticity" in their holiday rituals. It also meant dragging the immensely heavy antique sleigh onto the porch of the house. Everyone helped with that. The day after Thanksgiving we would cut one of the largest trees and put it in the front hall of my grandparents' house. The day after that we would cut one for ourselves. Usually it was slightly ungainly and unlikely to sell otherwise. Then we would tie it on (or put it in) the car to drive six hours north to our home. Yes, it was a bit "coals to Newcastle" to bring a tree from Dutchess County, New York to Maine. but we weren't the only ones! It was part of our family tradition. It was something from the ancestral home. Eight generations of our family had lived and farmed there. It was something that made my mother happy, a part of her childhood that we would keep in the house for a couple months until it was just too dangerous to comprehend. I don't do any of that now. When I became an adult and lived in places like Chicago and Detroit we had a plastic tree. When I served churches in northern Maine we went back to sawing one down at a place where you left a $20 bill in a can by the road. However, when we finally moved to the 'burbs I had a sudden realization. I am still deathly allergic to poison ivy. We persisted cutting our own for a while but after a year or two of me preaching my Advent sermons like a goblin on Benadryl we resigned ourselves to picking one up at the local "mom and pop". They are nice folks. I also get my turkey and pumpkins from them. Still, I do think about what it was like back in the day.
Life moves on and the rituals of the season remind us of that. Climbing into the attic to fish out the lights and the decorations is easy in the years when memories are mostly good or if bad ones feel distant and the future seems bright. Other times it is a rough go. Either way, we hold on to the acts that make this time special. Putting a tree in your house can be a simple thing that you do because you always have. It can also be an act of resistance. It is a strange activity when you really think about it. This is why we often wait until the time feels right. It took a while for us to get one this year. Years ago as a blade-wielding teenager in the hot sun I wondered who would end up with the tree I was preparing. What place would it hold in the celebration? What sort of family would it witness? It always seemed worthwhile to give it the attention it deserved both then and now. Be mindful, whether you are handling tools or hanging lights. I have been both busy and mindful lately, just not with trees. I have been fortunate that my present includes the promise of Christmas Eve services and Advent candles. There is still holiday stuff for me to do. It is still part of my job. These days that job is quite a bit less isolated than raising trees can be. Besides, there are other rituals that help bring meaning and underline the specialness of the season. This year the idea of a small, hot flame in the cold dark has been more compelling than the festive pine with its promise of Christmas morn. Back on the first Sunday in Advent we held a rally against racism on the town common. After the recent election there has been a rash of racist activity in the area that needed to be addressed by our community. Our interfaith clergy association was among the groups that stepped up. We lit candles. We stood in a group. We held our lights near each other to push back the dark. I said a quick prayer at the mic that I do not remember and as I stood, listening to various colleagues say (and pray) their piece, I felt a different sort of spirit. I was reminded that even as we walk through hard times in our lives we are not alone. There are friends and strangers to hold us up. There are people for us to lift up, too. I value them and am grateful for them all. It was another chance for mindfulness. Anyway, we got the tree up this evening. We bought it at supper time so it sits in its stand undecorated for now. Tomorrow the house will smell like coffee and evergreen. Eventually we will put up those lights. Then we will go up to attic. After that we will continue to live in hope and love for another season. These days when you see something with the title of "White House Blues" a million possibilities spring to mind. Perhaps it is about the election and who will be entering the White House. Maybe it is an expression of sadness concerning Obama's upcoming departure. Those blues themes would make sense where this a protest song. It would be an expression of unhappiness with the country and where it is going. In this particular case, however, I am thinking of something else. You might have to turn up the volume on the video but it is what we've got. "White House Blues" is an old song, first recorded by the banjo player Charlie Poole back in 1926. However, it is probably even older than that. Poole, himself, knew a thing or two about the blues in both his musical and personal life. A factory worker, musical visionary, and hard drinker, Poole died of heart attack in 1931, bringing a 13-week bender to a close. Yes. He had been drinking steadily for 13 weeks. The purpose of this song--other than to entertain--is actually historical. That is, it preserves a moment in history. The song, itself, is about the 1931 assassination of President McKinley by the anarchist Leon Czolgosz. Mckinley was shot twice. One of the bullets was found. However, the other one got lost somewhere in the soft tissue of the corpulent president and gangrene set in.. This is why both our version and Poole's begins with the lines "McKinley hollered, McKinley squalled, the doctor said 'McKinley I can't find the ball.' You're bound to die. You're bound to die.." It is historically accurate! Cheerful. In fact, this song is oddly perky, which is what initially attracted me to it. The juxtaposition of words and tone may be part of the reason for its survival. Folk music loves a dance-able murder ballad. In addition the chord progression is very simple and fun to play, so many gifted bluegrass musicians use it as a platform for their improvisational solos. There are plenty of examples of this online. The singers mess a bit with the tune to fit their own treatment as well as that of the soloists. That is OK. It is a folk song. Again...you can't break it. I also find it interesting because of its rather casual treatment of violence. A couple of weeks after we played this in church, The country experienced the Orlando nightclub shooting and a number of similar events in short order. Shootings of and by police have increasingly appeared in the news. Even politicians began to make threats toward their opponents. This song reminds us that we have struggled with issues like these for a long time. On the technical side, this song makes ample use of 7th chords. This is a key aspect of much of the blues. 7th chords make the song sound ragged and "unfinished" to modern pop-infested ears. Thank God for that! As with the last one, I encourage you to sing along with recordings to learn the words. However, here are the chord changes: G/G7/C7/G7/D7/G. Some folks make that middle G7 (after the C7) a regular G. You can if you want. I do not. In the video I actually have the uke capo'ed at the 9th fret. I did this to get it out of the range of the banjo. The song is still in G but the chord forms are in C (C/C7/F7/C7/C). Also, I violated ukulele orthodoxy by using a pick! The was done for reasons of texture and volume. Volume is also why I used the "Fluke" instead of a more conventional uke. It is the loudest thing I've got...other than the mando of course. As you can see we have a slightly different instrumentation on this from what one might think. We have a uke, a banjo, and a bass. Each instrument keeps out of the way of the others. We didn't use a regular guitar because this way it had more of an "Old Time" feel. Guitars were actually a bit late to American music (certainly when compared to the banjo). Also, the uke and the banjo are two of the greatest instruments our country ever produced. They deserve to be heard! Anyway, here it is, a song from another era that--like ours--was filled with stress and division. Maybe that is one of its most important functions for today. As a country we have been bitterly divided before but have found a way to come back together and move on. Perhaps looking into the past, we can gain some assurance that we will survive yet again. If you check out other videos you will see the range of approaches and treatments. I am including two here. The first is the original recording by Charlie Poole. Here is a different video featuring the bluegrass tendency to use it as a platform for solos... I wanted to share this video with you. I had held off doing so before because of a variety of reasons. The sound isn't quite right. Lee forgot her strap. The lens on the camera made it seem like we were in different rooms when we are actually right next to each other. We did not reject Lee! There was also mic trouble. Anyway, we had plans to clean it up or make a slide show, but things didn't work out that way. Still, we thought we would put it out even with its imperfections. The message of this song is important to hear right now. We hoped that the context would be different. “Marching Together” is an old song from the women's suffrage movement, used in the state of Kansas (among other places) to urge men to support women in their quest for equal rights. It was part of our Reformation Sunday service honoring the 19th Century trailblazer, Rev. Olympia Brown. You can hear the congregation singing it with us. We were proud and pleased and hopeful that the work of people like Brown would finally result in the election of a female president in these United States. As we all know now, it was not to be...at least this time. Of course, it makes even more sense to post this now. It makes even more sense for us all to learn it and sing it. Polls show that most white men supported Trump over Clinton. Many, many did not support him and I am one of those white men. However, we have our work cut out for us. It appears that our society has not come as far as we had hoped from that Kansas suffrage campaign in 1867. Now, about this song; Songs from the Kansas movement were collected and published together in a variety of forms over the years. This one comes from a book published in 1909. There is a lot of great stuff in it, including the lyrics we are using. I will link to it below. Actually, there are other versions, too. After we performed it at church we learned that the tune--also used for a happy song about Sherman's march to the sea--had been used for a song supporting the candidacy of President McKinley! There were also many variations to the suffragist version. However, most of of them played the “mother/daughter” card. These days we should be careful about men defining women based on the relationship those women may have to men (sorry Louis CK). I didn't vote for Hillary Clinton to honor my mom. I did it because she was (and is) the right person to lead the country at this time. We also chose this version because of the Kansas connection. It is quite likely a version that Olympia Brown would have sung during her work organizing there. I know I have mentioned her elsewhere. She is a hero of mine. A gifted minister, businessperson, and politician, she was the first woman ordained and recognized by her denomination (Universalist). She was also one of very few first generation suffragists who lived long enough to vote, herself. The song has simple chord pattern which, of course, is best for something everyone should sing. Marching Together G G Bring the good old bugle, boys! C G And let the truth be shown G G That woman has as many rights A(7) D(7) As any man has known; G C And let us help her win the fight G G She may not win alone A(7) D G While we go marching together CHORUS: G G C G Hurrah! Hurrah! We bring the jubilee! G G A D Hurrah! Hurrah! For woman shall be free! G C G G (Em) And have as many sacred rights as God gave you and me, A(7) D G While we go marching together! This is our arrangement, more or less. The other lyrics are in that songbook linked below. Lee Manuel set this up for us. Anything in parentheses is optional. 7th chords (in case you don't know) will make it sound old timey. We used them in the video but usually had someone else just play the regular chord at the same time. It keeps things exciting! Don't worry about changing stuff around to suit your style, skill level, and taste. You can't break it. It is a folk song. So there you go. Apparently some Trump supporters want to take the country back to a magical before-time. Let's give it to 'em and fight the patriarchy the 19th Century way! Here is a link to that book. It is wicked cool! You will notice that most of these songs are set to older tunes. This is a common practice in actual folk as singing along is a key part of the exercise. Just like hymns in church. It is about 11:50pm on election night and I was planning to go to bed. The "paths to victory" for my candidate, Hillary Clinton, are closing rapidly and I don't know if we will win or lose, but the tone of conversation among the pundits, my friends, and my family makes it clear. We are expecting the worst. I was going to hit the sack, rest up, and head back out tomorrow. I really was going to do that. The computer was off and the lights were out. ...But first... I want to say something that will hopefully still make sense when I look at it in the morning. I just went into the living room to turn off the TV and I saw my son falling asleep on the couch, still waiting for Pennsylvania. When I saw him, my mind drifted back to when I was his age. It was election night and I was in the "Governor's Suite" at the Portland Sonesta Hotel. We had gathered the family along with close friends and key campaign officials to plan the exact steps that would lead to my father's concession speech in his race for governor of the state of Maine. There was silence mostly, and tears. Eventually we lined up and walked to the door, Then we slowly marched down the hall and into the elevator to the 1980's-tacky ballroom where more people waited. There was more silence and more tears. The son of the outgoing governor appeared next to me and guided me, my sister and brothers up to the riser and behind the lecturn. "It is going to be OK," he said. Then he drifted into the crowd. I was standing directly behind my parents and slightly to the right. My mom was standing next to my dad. Then he began to talk. I don't remember much about the speech but it was one of those gracious ones. Dad had lost to a man who had been a friend and rival since high school. They had the sort of respect for each other you don't see anymore. What I do remember was watching Dad finish reading a handwritten page of his speech and then slipping it to Mom in a way that the people out in the audience--shocked and dismayed--could not see. Her hand was on his back and Dad stood as still as he could but we were all shaking. It was one of the darkest moments of my life and I haven't really felt that way since. Now I remember it. I remember the sadness. I remember the sense that we happy few had worked so long and so hard and all had been for naught. All that we had hoped and dreamed wasn't going to happen after all. We--all of us in that hotel ballroom--had lost. In the morning we would need to face the new world. We would have to live with someone else's goals and dreams. You know what? I remember something else, too. I cannot tell you where the voice came from. Maybe it was inside me. Maybe it was something my parents said. Maybe it came from somewhere else in the room. Whatever it was and wherever it came from I remember standing up there looking out at the people and the cameras while saying four short words to myself over and over and over again. "So now we fight". So now we fight. That is what rattled around in my head at the lowest of moments when I was fifteen years old. We fight for every person who stood by our side. We fight for everyone who needs someone to struggle with them or on their behalf. We stand up for that cause we believed in enough to dedicate our time, our effort and our money. We will enter this new world with a firmness of resolve and a chip on our shoulders. Dammit we were right! That rightness was--and is--worth fighting for. You know what? Those four words have guided my life. That awkward kid in the picture is seventeen-year-old me at the 1988 Democratic convention fighting again, this time for Jesse Jackson. I sure know how to pick a winner, right? That week in Atlanta was when I heard the call to ministry. I chose to be a pastor because it gave me a voice. It gave me a way to enter into the struggle. It is now 12:30 and I have spent more time on this than I should. The outcome is clearer now. My son is yelling at the TV. I am glad he is a fighter. We are entering another new world. There will parts of it that will truly be awful. We need to keep hope alive. We need to check in with each other. We need to stand up for each other, especially for those who will probably receive the heavy blunt end of the backlash against our shared dream. Women, Muslims, LGBTQIA, poor people, Native-Americans, African-Americans, latinx and other minority groups need every ally they can get. We cannot let the side down. Dammit, we are still right! We will act that way. We may have lost but we are not defeated or dead. We must remember the requirements and responsibilities of a just society and we must shout them from the rooftops. We need to rush out of our houses tomorrow to continue what we began. Hold your heads high. Meet every gaze firmly and with confidence. No sulking. No hiding. Now is not the time. So now we fight. We will be back. The truth is on our side. and in the end... We. Will. Win. This Friday is the big Coffeehouse. We have two a year. This one--youth only--has always been the largest in terms of both participants and audience. There is an art show attached to it as well. The visual artists display their works and we keep them up for Reformation Sunday, which is also a big day in our church that includes worship, a "pageant" (about Olympia Brown), D&D, pumpkin carving, and the Jack-O-Lantern competition. Anyway, Friday is an important day for some of the kids and they work pretty hard to get the weekend going properly. It has always been interesting to watch the youth prepare. As young artists they are learning a variety of "languages" they can use to express their inner thoughts and feelings. It is a challenge for them. We all want to be understood. We also all know that our audience--our "public"-- will fall short of fully comprehending our message. Still, we try to get it right, don't we? To be fully human we have to try. A song--a painting, a poem, a photograph--comes from deep inside us. As artists our hopes are high. However, it helps to keep our expectations more realistic without also crushing that dream we wanted to share in the first place. I know how the kids feel. I have struggled to be understood in a variety of media over the years. However, the one I care about the most is preaching. I will never be a great (or even good) musician. My photography doesn't get much past the "pretty picture" phase. In pottery class I once made a 4-foot tall unbalanced black vase which may have been the ugliest thing ever offered up at a school art exhibit. I admit that I abandoned it. I walked away. For all I know it still sits there by the door to the North Yarmouth Academy teacher's lounge collecting cigarettes and dust. Preaching, though, I care about doing well. I feel it when I don't quite hit the mark. Yeah, preaching is an art. At least it is sometimes. It falls into the same category as chairs and benches. They can be built just to keep your bottom off the ground or they can be built to also elicit a feeling or a thought. I bet they--chairs--can even inspire action. I can go to the Museum of Fine Art to see (and sometimes sit on) a wide variety of items, or I can sit at my computer to get my emails done. One chair is not better than the other. They just have different purposes. One is a practical item that helps support our daily living. Our bodies and our backs are grateful for its presence. Another is all of that plus art. It makes us look up, out, down, or in. Even though we may be physically stationary we are, in fact, moved. Sermons should fall into that second category, even when people do not notice the "soul" within it. I have plenty of friends and acquaintances who work in professions where talking is part of the job. Politicians and lecturers (the good ones anyway) often use some of the techniques of preaching to improve their own work. Others believe there is no difference between a good lecture and a good sermon. Those folks are wrong, of course. You can give a fine presentation, but performing it in church doesn't necessarily mean you have come close to touching the sacred. After all, I can make a witty, informative, entertaining, motivational talk using the tools I am teaching those teens in my public speaking class. However, I still fail to preach sometimes. I have done it before (sadly) and I will do it again. The fact is, to create art one must dig deep. A good sermon--just like any of the offerings at our coffeehouses--requires a bit of personal exploration. It requires a moment of connection to the great "out there". In the moment of creation and interpretation we find that part of us and/or our world where normal conversation fails. Then we try once again to articulate it. As the Apostle Paul says in his letter to the Corinthians, "If I speak in the tongues of mortals and of angels and have not love, I am but a noisy gong or a clanging symbol." Finding that love (here used in its broad, theological sense) is the task of any artist--and we are all artists. The preacher tries to find some small glimmer of it each week to issue an invitation and offer up a path for people who hopefully feel drawn enough to walk another mile along the way. Preaching, like any art, requires discipline. We grow into our voices and into our "vision". Whenever you hear a sermon, you are listening to the product of hours, days, and years of prayer, meditation, and study focused into a tiny window of mere minutes. Sometimes it stinks. Sometimes it just isn't your bag. That said, have faith at least that the preacher is working hard. The colleagues I have met who didn't accept the preaching moment as a sacred one are all doing something else with their lives now. Leading worship isn't something you do without love. When I think of the kids getting ready for this weekend, I think of this process. I hope and pray that in their important and necessary playing around they find what they need to build a life of deep spiritual expression. I hope they find something that motivates them and makes all the steep lonely hours of practice and study worthwhile. The world of hard matter may never give them a measurable reward for their efforts, but maybe they will find that reward where they keep their souls and spirits. Maybe they will reach others through the foggy chaos of their existence.
Then--maybe--they will make us all a little less broken. Last night my wife and I slept on cots in the living room as our bedroom ceiling is being repaired and the walls painted. In fact, this is going on in every room in the parsonage, in order. Each time the contractors move on to another room, we engage in a deep cleaning and a culling of stuff. Then we shove what is left into the middle in anticipation of the tarp that will protect our possessions. Then we do it again...and again. Of course each effort reveals a new problem that needs to be addressed. There is some ancient wiring that must be removed at some point before it catches fire. There are leaks in the plumbing that have developed over the last 15 years. There is also the usual sort of wear and tear that can be expected in an old building occupied by clumsy humans. In a weird sense, it fits right into my experience of sabbatical. In my mind I expected it to be peaceful, with an abundance of time for reflection and study. Instead it has reveled in impracticality and inconvenience. It underlines disorder. It shines a light on places in life where the workmanship has been haphazard. In my last post I described the church as being a place that sometimes gets wrapped up in measurable tasks at the expense of the spirit. It turns out that pastors get wrapped up too. We are as guilty as anyone of losing track of that path of faith and exploration. As much as anyone, clergy folks like to point to what we have built and--if it is good--say "I did this". At least we say it to ourselves. We also stress out about those times when we have failed. When we do, many of us are still capable of seeing our hands and voices in those moments. My sabbatical is full of tasks and goals. It is full of things that I can point to--good, bad, or indifferent--and account for time spent. However, I have lately felt the absence of that Transcendence which makes all the activity worthwhile. Or maybe I have just gotten around to noticing the absence. Maybe it drifted away a while ago and now as I search around for that connection I depend on, it is finally missed There are plenty of reasons why the feeling would recede, just as there are reasons I need it. Not only are all our possessions being shifted around the parsonage. There is plenty of motion and chaos elsewhere. One son is in college now. The car that has been a constant since before our youngest was born finally kicked the bucket while cruising down Rt. 128. Sabbatical, itself, has its own rhythm and requirements that open and close doors for me every day. I am getting stretched. Also, there are the more global issues. Black Lives Matter continues to underscore the existence of a system of racism that I--like the rest of you--participate in. The presidential election has made us all think about the pool of sexism we cannot seem to get out of. In fact, any member of the male species who hasn't been challenged by the antics of Donald Trump must be spiritually dead. It is a time for self examination. We cannot say we don't recognize him, even if we have never been like him. What are we men to become in this exciting new world? I know what I don't want to be. I don't want to be a burden, an impediment to progress, or a creep. What I am trying to say is that, like most people, I want to walk through the garbage dump of life equipped to be the best human being I can be. That is a hard thing to do. There is no way I am not getting some garbage on me. My spiritual life is what I rely on to get me through. I am (we are) reminded of various inequalities and oppression. We all push through times of personal; transition. We should be. What is the faithful response? What is my faithful response? The question today isn't about my work as a progressive and liberal minister of a progressive and liberal church. We all have jobs and I am blessed to have one that enables me to work toward solutions. The question is more existential and fundamental. How should I act? What should I do as a human being? More basic: Who. Am. I? One change for sabbatical is that I have made time for study and--consciously or unconsciously--also ended up with a system of accountability. I have written elsewhere about how Dungeons and Dragons encourages the imagination. That curriculum for the RE program requires not just facts and figures but a a level of religious intention. Those courses I am teaching force me to explain and examine some fundamental elements of my own belief system. Hanging out with teens can change your perspective as well. However, maybe the best articulation of the spiritual problem I found was thanks to good ol' Ralph Waldo Emerson.
If you read this blog you are aware of the fact that one of the courses I am teaching is entitled "Nature and Spirituality". Perhaps not surprisingly, one of the readings--in fact the key one--is Emerson's "Nature". It turns out that it is a bit of a challenge to explain to kids, particularly because I and they get hung up at the same place Emerson did when he wrote it. That place is the philosophical concept of "Idealism". For Emerson this material world (or "nature") is infused with the Divine. Ultimately what is real is the soul, It is God, It is the spirit that has ultimate and permanent substance, not the matter that it inhabits. I could go on about his take, but instead you should read the book. The problem is that for those of us who try to live a life of the spirit face an enormous hill to climb. The problems that we are all wrestling with and that cast a pall over our regular lives need material ("real-world") solutions as much as spiritual ones. In fact, our basic needs in a world in crisis obscure the spiritual ones to a large degree. How, for example, do you explain to someone who cannot get enough food to eat, or who fears the reality of daily violence that they should contemplate the divine spirit that flows through all things? Of course, there is another question that should hit closer to home for most readers of Burbania Posts. How do we connect with the spirit in people who put their own ambitions and desires over the basic needs of others? What do we do to make them (us) see that spirit in such a way that there is a change of heart? We aren't starving. In fact, most of the people I know are not lacking in material wealth. We are the ones who can make the changes to create abundance for the rest of the world. In giving up our own material ways we can free ourselves, too. Such potential! Such inertia! Dang! If you asked me what my bedrock beliefs are I, like Emerson, would claim to be an idealist, but we are living (to quote a certain 20th century bard and philosopher) in a material world or, at least, in a material culture. There lies my own tension (again, in the philosophical sense). I expect it does for others. To be a person on a faith journey is to be a person who at some level accepts that there is more. There is something greater (maybe "God", maybe not). There is something behind what we see and interact with that is worth knowing better. We expect it to sustain us, after all. We may even hope, like Emerson, that we can experience a holy and absolute connection to that "Oneness" that will give us the strength to let go of all the crap--material, emotional, spiritual--that we cling to. As we let go we may fall, but where we land will be a better land than the one we left. That said, the journey is long. When we feel the absence of meaning it is important to fill the space with the right thing. I do believe that there is more to the world than what we see. However, it takes patience, insight, and effort to connect to what lie behind our mundane existence. Over the last few months I have gained a new appreciation for this dynamic in life. I have also gained an appreciation for the institution of Sabbath. A question, I think, for all of us as a community and as individuals is how to bring the sabbath back. It is more than "time off" after all. How do we find the structured time to return the sacred to our hasty lives? Thank God I go to a house of worship. Thank the Divine presence that I can take part in a community to support my own journey even as I support them. I give thanks that sometimes--during my better moments--I can get a glimpse of the spirit that flows through us all. Thanks for the strength to move through the darkness and the struggle. Thanks for the power to grow and change. There is an article floating around my Facebook page that suggests the near death of spirituality in the protestant churches of the United States. In one way it is just another clergy clickbait article. It has one of those titles, after all; "5 Reasons Spirituality is No Longer Important to the American Church!" Also, it comes from a long line of "this is why we are shrinking" complaints and it--although the author points out that we haven't ever really be that good at spirituality in the first place--at least implies a fix . In these ways it fits just the sort of church-story I warn people about. However, it does underline a problem and it is a serious one. Here is an example; my dad, who isn't a church person at all, told me the other day that he had noticed that a certain type of institution was "picking up the slack" from declining churches. Guess what they were. Were they new age bookstores? Retreat centers? Martial Arts and yoga? Nope. He said they were libraries. Libraries!? What could he mean by that? The problem is we know exactly what he means. Libraries are another place--just like churches--that provide non-religious and non-spiritual services. They are a good gathering spot to talk about issues and to get to know people. I have a great one a block from my house. I love it. Dad's implication, of course, was that what libraries do is also what churches do. That is, not spiritual services, but community services. It is hard to view something as a spiritual place or a house of worship if you aren't interested in what those terms might imply. Secular society frequently sees a community center where some of the people engage in magical thinking. To a large extent, this is exactly how we sell ourselves to the world. That is the problem. Folks inside and outside the church see the congregation in pragmatic terms. It does what libraries do. Or what the salad bar did for single people in the '90's. Where can I meet people? What is the best way for me to impact and improve my community? Where can the kids get that little bit of enrichment--often with very little home reinforcement--that comes from Sunday school? I could go on. We see church as an avenue for good works. What we frequently miss is the spiritual grounding that is supposed to go into those works. Isn't spirituality supposed to be what the church does best? In my previous post we learned that for Frederick Henry Hedge the "north pole" of the church represents mystical connection to the Divine. The south is for rituals to help us get there. The west draws us to adventure and exploration of ourselves and of the great and wondrous world. The east grounds us in our core beliefs. Many people work hard to situate themselves and their communities on this compass but we are so distracted by the practical bits--rental agreements, the big fundraiser, the fall fair or the new initiative--that we can lose track of why we are doing these things. Church isn't just a place to be busy or to be in some sense a good citizen. We do these things through a congregation because we are spiritual beings trying to live lives that are in some sense religious. Sometimes I wonder if all our activity actually is part of the problem. Most of the ministers I know work hard to develop their own spiritual paths. Some of them are involved in rituals and pilgrimages. Others are more likely to study or discuss. Virtually all of them try to pray and meditate. They offer these options at their church from time to time. They try to provide explicitly spiritual opportunities for children and adults. Rarely do these programs become popular. There is a small core in each congregation who has the interest and can make the time. There are others who would like to participate as well. Yet we instinctively know what will bring the most people out and the emphasis goes there. When we do this we risk becoming a library without books. Which is to say a library you might visit but are unlikely to join. I do wonder what the new church will do to lift up this central element of church life. The challenges are many. People cannot (or will not) make it to worship on Sunday morning in the numbers they used to. Other times all seem problematic. Clergy are expected to be a resource on these topics (and are) but few people ever ask them a question. Some people feel that there is so much "important" stuff to think about (like the acquisition and maintenance of money and stuff) which leaves little time to consider the reason we exist, and what makes a just and holy life. The new church will need to find a way to reach out to those folks. Also, the church needs to figure out a way to cast a line to those people who try to be part of the spiritual life and cannot do it on their own. These are the people who grace our pews when they can. They may think they are there for the coffee and the committee meeting but they aren't. They chose the church (or synagogue or mosque) over the library (or rotary or diner). There is a hunger that may not be fully understood and articulated in each of them. How does the new church find that hunger? And how do we feed it? Here are some links... First, to the article I mentioned: 5 Reasons... Next, here is a link to my local library. Frankly public libraries are struggling, too. In fact, most places where people gather together for free are having a hard time. Patronize them, and drop some money in the plate. They do good work. Here are links for other articles in this series The first one is a "Prequel" Here is Chapter 1 Here is Chapter 2 Here is Chapter 3 |
Adam Tierney-EliotThis is my old weblog of many years. I will probably post here from time to time is there is a subject that does not fit WWG. However WWG is the more active page at this point. Archives
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