Ashamed to Be White

I’ve known for a while that racial reconciliation was going to be a particular focus of my ministry and vocation. Lately, I’ve embraced that with full force, especially in my choices for reading material—I’ve read Stokely Carmichael’s Black Power and The Autobiography of Malcolm X, and I’m almost done with James H. Cone’s Black Theology and Black Power.

People don’t understand my interest in and stance on race issues (I’m white, by the way). They tell me that it’s the 21st century, that the 1960s were a long time ago. They tell me race isn’t as much of an issue anymore. When Obama was elected, I wanted to talk about the significance of his racial background but was told by several people that it didn’t matter that he was black. True, his ethnicity has nothing to do with how well he’ll lead the country, but I couldn’t help but notice that everyone who said this to me was white. My black friends knew it mattered that they had a black president.

You can tell me that race isn’t an issue, even that Obama’s victory ushered in a new era in race relations, but I won’t believe you. After the election, students at N.C. State wrote graffiti on a wall on campus with such hateful messages as “Hang Obama by a noose” and “Shoot that n----- in the head.” And this at a respected institution of higher learning. What were you saying about race not being an issue anymore?

Now it’s time to relate all of this to Christianity. What is the Church supposed to do about the lingering racism that festers in our nation? One student’s response to the graffiti at NSCU offered a partial answer: when the wall had been whitewashed, he wrote, “Ashamed to be white.” Malcolm X and Carmichael both believed that whites admitting the sin of racism was the first step to the emancipation of blacks—and, as Cone would add, the emancipation of whites, for “the man who enslaves another enslaves himself.” Most churches confess corporate sin on at least a weekly basis. How do we confess the inherited sin of racism?

One answer comes from Malcolm Boyd in his book Are You Running With Me, Jesus? “During a Freedom Ride in the Deep South in 1961, one of my fellow Episcopalian priests said: ‘It seems to me this is really a kind of prayer—a kind of corporate confession of sin.’” This aligns with James H. Cone’s insistence that Christ’s very being is tied up with his identification with the oppressed peoples of the world—and that the Church must enter into a radical identification with that oppressed Christ and our neighbors with whom he shares his person.

The first step towards reconciliation is confession. The off-Broadway hit Avenue Q, although crass at times (or half the time) makes a good point in its song “Everyone’s a Little Bit Racist.” If we insist that race is not an issue, we only prop up old systems of injustice. The Church must help confront Americans with the sin of racism. And the Church must provide a model for radical identification with the oppressed. To do otherwise is to deny Christ.

Take Advantage of Me

Every Sunday, I take the exit off the highway towards my church, and at the stoplight, there is always at least one man either panhandling or selling newspapers. I rarely have cash, so I don't often give them money or buy a paper, but the sight challenges me every time. I've talked to many people, both Christian and not, who have various rationales for whether or not they should give money to panhandlers. I think the argument that fascinates me most is that you don't want to be taken advantage of—that you want to make sure your money goes to good use.

Lately, I've been wondering if maybe we are called to be taken advantage of by others. I don't know exactly where he says this, but Dietrich Bonhoeffer, a German pastor-theologian who died in a Nazi concentration camp and is a personal hero of mine, said that this is the case. He said that we serve a God who allowed himself to be taken advantage of to the point of being crucified, and, as people living in the shadow of the cross, we should not cling to our pride so much that we fail to participate in the crucifixion by taking up our own cross.

This has come up for me a lot lately because I've gotten myself into some situations and relationships where I sometimes wonder if I should feel taken advantage of. Last summer, I taught music at a new kids' program at my church, and I formed bonds with several of the children that lasted past the summer, particularly with a few who live near me. One brother-sister combo who went to the camp live in a challenging home situation and have begun to look to me for all kinds of support. Most recently, this has meant that several times in the past few weeks I have been woken up around 7 a.m. by a phone call from my 12-year-old friend asking for a ride to school because she missed her bus. More than once, when I've dragged myself out of bed to go pick her up, one or more of her 6 siblings has also begged a ride.

Something in me starts to resent the early-morning phone calls and the gas I'm using driving these kids to school, but I can't quite feel that way. For one thing, I can see a tendency of the haves to exercise power over the have-nots, even—and especially—when the haves do something good for the have-nots. Good deeds might be done out of a selfless desire to follow Christ, but if we are frustrated when we don't see gratitude or when handouts aren't used "correctly," we have moved from serving to controlling. When we dictate the terms of our justice and charity, it becomes simply another means of maintaining the status quo and socioeconomic inequality.

I'm 21 years old and I have my own car. I attend one of the most prestigious universities in the country. My parents love me and continue to support me financially and otherwise. I can't pride myself in having these things that others don't; and, in fact, I believe that I am obligated as a Christian to share my various forms of wealth with others without micromanaging the ways in which that plays out. As long as I live in a society that makes a 12-year-old immigrant girl one of the downtrodden, I will get out of bed at 7 in the morning to drive that girl to school.

I Am Not What I Own (Prayer)

Dear God,
I am so afraid to open my clenched fists!
Who will I be when I have nothing left to hold on to?
Who will I be when I stand before you with my empty hands?
Please help me gradually open my hands
and to discover that I am not what I own,
but what you want to give me.
And what you want to give me is love,
unconditional, everlasting love.

— Henri Nouwen

Jesus, Take the Wheel?

Last Thursday evening, I was driving home with four of my housemates in the car when a man in a pickup truck blew through a stop sign and slammed into me. My car wound up in someone's front yard with the hood completely smashed and one rear taillight destroyed. Despite extensive damage, no one in my car was hurt except for a few bruises, and though an unbuckled 9-year-old in the truck lost a few teeth, it could have been much worse.

Once we had all calmed down and called the police, we were able to laugh a little. As we had started our drive home that night, in the midst of confusion about which way to turn at the first intersection, one of my friends had exclaimed, "Jesus, take the wheel!" We had all half-jokingly repeated the exhortation just minutes before the wreck.

The police came, and a few of our friends with whom we had just had dinner rushed over to check on us and to help take us and the contents of my trunk back to the house. As we surveyed the damage, someone remarked, "God must have really big plans for you guys, because he saved you all tonight."

At those words, I felt like a stone had dropped into my stomach. It's not that I don't believe it. One friend who came to help said he'd never seen a wreck with damage like that—severe damage to the front and the back of the car—where the area containing the passengers had been left intact. If I had been driving a tiny bit faster, my friend in the seat next to me would be seriously injured or maybe even dead. Someone was watching out for us that night.

But I have always struggled to balance gratitude for God's power to heal and protect with the knowledge that not everyone is healed and not every car crash ends the way ours did. In trying to wrap my mind around my friend’s assertion that I am important enough to God's plan for him to save me and my friends, I can't help but ask—what about people I know who have died in similar situations? What about Molly, the college student who worked with my youth group when I was in middle school and was killed in a head-on collision? Did God not have important enough plans for her?

I don’t know that I ever want a definitive answer to these questions. I sometimes feel like in this world we are too dissatisfied with mystery. If we are to serve the God who makes himself known in bread and wine, the God who allows some people to linger a little while on Earth but welcomes those who go home before we are ready to let them go, we have to be able to accept difficult mysteries.

I wonder if the only response we have to miracles and to tragedy alike is love. Whether rejoicing at someone being plucked out of the fire (John Wesley, anyone?) or mourning with someone for whom healing did not take the form they most wanted, we are told, "Let all that you do be done in love" (1 Corinthians 16:14). Maybe understanding is not the most important thing.

From What I Am Not (Prayer)

My prayers, God, flow from what I am not;
I think thy answers make me what I am.
Like weary waves thought flows upon thought,
But the still depth beneath is all thine own.
And there thou movest in paths to us unknown.
Out of the strange strife thy peace is strangely wrought;
If the lion in us pray—thou answerest the lamb.
— George MacDonald

Leaving Christ on the Street

And the least of these look like criminals to me
So I leave Christ on the street
— Caedmon's Call

Nothing that I Need

This world has nothing for me
And this world has everything
All that I could want
And nothing that I need
— Caedmon's Call

Your Face Is Lovely

I'm spending my summer working at my church in Durham and living in community with 5 other Duke undergraduates. We have a variety of communal spiritual disciplines and the like, one of which is our weekly Thursday night worship and theological reflection. Last night, our theological reflection ended with three girls crunched together on a couch crying as we all prayed for each other. It was pretty amazing and, I think, healing in some way.

What had started as a discussion of how to begin a conversation with a homeless person with whom you seem to have nothing in common evolved into talking about why one of my housemates was upset by catcalls received from those seeking help from the shelter where she works. I think she surprised herself with the intensity of the emotion that was elicited when we pressed the issue. Another female housemate of mine spoke up and shared this verse from the Song of Songs:

O my dove, in the clefts of the rock,
in the covert of the cliff,
let me see your face,
let me hear your voice;
for your voice is sweet,
and your face is lovely. — Song of Songs 2:14

She said that a mentor of hers had once told her about this verse in order to help her understand why comments about a woman's physical appearance can be so damaging and hurtful, even when they're supposedly complimentary. In this verse, she said, Jesus calls you to a cleft in the rock, where it's just you and him, and says "let me see your face." He sees you and knows you as you are, and he tells you that you are beautiful. This, she said, is what women really, truly long for, but that deep desire is often confused with a desire for attention from men and can sometimes be destructive. The reason that catcalls can be so upsetting is that they cheapen the whispered "your face is lovely" and compound the world's insistence that what matters most is the approval of man (mankind and, in this case particularly, men).

I didn't put it as eloquently as she did, but the conversation deeply affected me and is forcing me to think and pray hard about my self-image and the kinds of attention I seek. Of course, these issues are nothing new to me, but hearing that verse and her interpretation of it gave me a greater sense of the degree to which this really matters. I'll be praying about this a lot.

Just To Waste It At Your Feet

I want to take my passion,
Put it in a bottle,
Just to break it at your feet.
I want to take my affection,
Put it in a bottle,
Just to waste it at your feet. — Misty Edwards

The Devil Made Me Do It

This summer, I'm living in a house in Durham with 5 other Duke undergraduates. We're all doing internships at various churches and nonprofits in the community, and we share meals and do spiritual formation together. We all come from different backgrounds—there are 2 guys and 4 girls; 2 black and 4 white; 2 Pentecostal/nondenominational (black), 1 nondenominational (white), 1 Baptist, 1 Catholic, 1 United Methodist. Needless to say, I'm already being challenged in a lot of ways, and I'm learning a lot.

At our morning Bible study today, we looked at Luke 4:31-37. In this passage, Jesus goes to Capernaum and casts out a demon. We talked about authority for most of the time, then someone asked, "Wait, are we saying that demons actually exist?" and that opened a whole new can of worms. Present at the table were 2 people who had seen demon possession, 3 who had not, and me...who is leery but not unbelieving.

Later, I had a conversation with one of my housemates (who had not been present at the Bible study). It's intriguing to me that I have 2 housemates who consistently use language like "child of the Devil" and the like, while the rest of us pseudo-mainliners don't often hear the Devil spoken of, certainly not personified.

Thomas Merton, in Seeds of Contemplation, says that what the Devil likes most is attention, and the best way to make the Devil mad is to ignore him. You don't want to give the Devil credit for everything bad that happens, or blame the Devil for sins you commit yourself. You don't want to have to see demons around every corner and live a life of defensiveness and apprehension.

Then again, my housemates for whom the Devil is a part of their everyday spiritual vocabulary seem to take sin and temptation much more seriously than mainline Christians do. For them, the tempter is very real and very present, and he/she needs to be recognized, met and rebuked. It is important to pray constantly and not to open yourself up to possession or temptation.

I wonder if, by glossing over the Devil and demons and the like, mainline Christians domesticate sin and temptation. Perhaps the best way to piss the Devil off is to ignore him—but if we are fallen and sinful, is that just going to make us more susceptible to falling further?

For the record, I've seen mental illness that was diagnosable but which also was able to be commanded and controlled by prayer. Maybe in Biblical times demon possession was their name for mental illness. Maybe we don't like to acknowledge the face of evil in depression and other disorders. My dad said that twice in his ministerial career, he has prayed over someone to have demons cast out, because they've been such extreme cases that he hasn't known what else to do, and there is Biblical precedent. So...yes. I'm not talking The Exorcist here, but it's still pretty fascinating, not just intellectually, but in how it affects the ways in which people meet and conquer temptation.

I Pray for You, You Pray for Me

Today I had a jarring but bittersweet experience. I met a man named Paul who had come to Asbury Temple to get food. He started talking to me while he was waiting for Julius to bag his groceries. He told me that he was bipolar, that his mother had died two weeks ago, and that he just wanted to die himself. A lot of what he said was incoherent, and honestly I was terrified because I didn't know how to respond, but something calmed my heart and allowed me simply to listen to Paul as he rambled.

I didn't actually find out his name until the end of our conversation because he wouldn't tell me at first because he doesn't trust people. I told him I only wanted to know so that I could pray for him, and he started crying. Finally I learned that his name was Paul, and as I left to go back upstairs, I told him I'd be praying for him, and I asked if he would pray for me. That made him cry again, but by then it seemed that he was in a better place, and as I left I heard him excitedly telling Julius that I had asked him to pray for me and that he was going to do so.

I can't remember where I learned to do that, or if it was even something I learned and not just the Spirit moving, but I somehow doubt Paul has ever been asked to pray for someone. I suspect prayers are often offered for him, but never solicited from him. I also suspect there's something empowering and meaningful about being given the responsibility of praying for someone. So...yeah. It's like in the song "I Need You to Survive": "I pray for you / You pray for me / I love you / I need you to survive." I pray for you, you pray for me. Only in this way can we be made whole.

The Parable of the Young Man and the Old (poem)

So Abram rose, and clave the wood, and went,
And took the fire with him, and a knife.
And as they sojourned, both of them together,
Isaac the first-born spake, and said, My Father,
Behold the preparations, fire and iron,
But where the lamb for this burnt-offering?
Then Abram bound the youth with belts and straps,
And builded parapets the trenches there,
And stretched forth the knife to slay his son.
When lo! an angel called him out of heaven,
Saying, Lay not thy hand upon the lad,
Neither do anything to him. Behold,
A ram, caught in a thicket by its horns;
Offer the Ram of Pride instead of him.
But the old man would not so, but slew his son,
And half the seed of Europe, one by one. — Wilfred Owen

Loving in Sadness (a quote from G. K. Chesterton)

"When you do love a thing, its gladness is a reason for loving it, and its sadness a reason for loving it more." — G. K. Chesterton

Sorry, Blame It On Me

This past weekend, I attended the United Methodist Student Movement's 2008 Student Forum at American University in Washington, D.C. Focusing on the theme "Be The Change," we spent the weekend in worship, fellowship, and learning about the legislative process in the United Methodist Church and the issues facing church and society today.

This issue of racism and the church's response came up frequently. On Friday, there were a variety of immersion trips into D.C. My group focused on gentrification and toured the historical Shaw neighborhood, the location of the 1968 race riots and, of course, Ben's Chili Bowl. Other groups learned about civil rights, women's rights, racism of mascots and so on. We were blessed to have present at Forum representatives from the Oklahoma Indian Missionary Conference; we heard from a number of people regarding the church's responsibility to honor the indigenous people of this country and participated in a letter-writing campaign urging the Washington Redskins to change the name of their mascot.

One thing that struck me in particular was beautifully framed in a sermon delivered by Jennifer Battiest of the Oklahoma Indian Missionary Conference. Jennifer described some of the injustices that persist in this world and reflected on the ways in which the church often refuses to shoulder responsibility for past crimes. She cited R&B singer Akon, whose song "Sorry, Blame It On Me" begins with an apology for his own misdeeds but then goes on to apologize for things he did not do but for which the guilty party refuses to take blame. Jennifer reminded us of another person who long ago took blame that wasn't his. She asked us why we can't use that as a model for righting wrongs that perhaps we did not take a part in personally but, because we are the body of Christ, for which we are collectively responsible.

Later, I was having a conversation with a group of students attending Forum, and one of them, a young white man, told us that he was tired of being preached at. Why, he asked, should he be made to feel guilty for things he didn't do? I reacted very strongly to his question in part because, just days before the conference, I had read Toni Morrison's novel The Bluest Eye. In this heartbreaking but compelling story, Morrison tells about a young black girl, Pecola Breedlove, who prays every day for the blue eyes that are so beautiful on the white baby dolls she had seen all her life. This summer, I will be working at Asbury Temple UMC in Durham, North Carolina, a predominantly African-American congregation. I will spend a great deal of my time working with the children of the surrounding community. I am white, and I have blonde hair and green eyes. I somehow must become a role model for these children while affirming them in their own identity. As long as little black girls are told that their dark skin and eyes don't match the standard of beauty in this country, I will be accountable for that sin and for combating that and many other injustices perpetrated by history and by our media.

The important thing in situations where the church or some sector of the church is guilty of injustice is not that those of us who are privileged guilt-trip ourselves into oblivion. However, as long as individuals and groups are marginalized and oppressed, even because of sins committed hundreds, even thousands of years ago, the church must be brave enough and compassionate enough to take responsibility and action. Paul notes that being part of the body of Christ means that "If one member suffers, all suffer together with it" (1 Corinthians 12:26). If even a single member of the body of Christ is oppressed, we are all oppressed. None of us can be whole until all are honored and loved. Practically speaking, this is not easy, because as much as this is a communal effort, it takes individuals who are willing to take the blame and be the change.

Time for Prayer (a quote from Fr. Hilary)

"Until you are convinced that prayer is the best use of your time, you will not find time for prayer." — Fr. Hilary, OSB

Care: To Cry Out With (a quote from Henri Nouwen)

"The word 'care' finds its roots in the Gothic 'Kara' which means lament. The basic meaning of care is: to grieve, to experience sorrow, to cry out with. I am very much struck by this background of the word care because we tend to look at caring as an attitude of the strong toward the weak, of the powerful toward the powerless, of the have's toward the have-not's. And, in fact, we feel quite uncomfortable with an invitation to enter into someone's pain before doing something about it." — Henri Nouwen

Endless Forgiveness (a quote from Jean Vanier)

"Love is an act of endless forgiveness." — Jean Vanier

Serving Necessity (a quote from John Patrick)

"He who remains good simply because he must serves necessity, not God." — John M. Patrick

World on Fire (a new song)

I have searched
All my life for love that never ends
And I have found it
In the one who has called us friends

If we are his body
If we are his arms
We can hold each other's pain
We're brother and sister
We're daughter and son
And together we hear him say

"I came to set the world on fire"
We will be his kindling
And our hearts will be consumed by mercy
We will burn so brightly

Just look around
If you ever doubt true love exists
Just look, look around
Beyond the world's deceptive kiss

There's hope for the broken
There's love for the lost
We don't have to feel alone
Where two lonely hearts
Sit together in Christ
They're no longer on their own

And he said
"I came to set the world on fire"
We will be his kindling
And our hearts will be consumed by mercy
We will burn so brightly

Listen, I will tell you a mystery
We will not all die
But we will all, all be changed
In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye
At the last trumpet
The trumpet will sound
And the dead will be raised
And we will all, all be changed

And he said
"I came to set the world on fire"
We will be his kindling
And our hearts will be consumed by mercy
We will burn so brightly

It's our time to set the world on fire
We will be his kindling
And our love will be a blaze of glory
We will burn so brightly

— For the Duke Awakening community. Luke 12:49, John 15:15, 1 Corinthians 15:51-52.

The Ground So Dirty

This past weekend, I was at Awakening, a retreat led by Duke's Catholic Student Center. I went last semester as a first-time participant and was on staff for this retreat; for the next one, I'll be on leadership. There are some funny reflections on how a hardcore Methodist wound up in a leadership position for a Catholic retreat, but that's not what this entry is about. This past weekend, I saw the body of Christ in full force. One moment in particular was nothing short of miraculous and summed up what I think a visualization of a truly Christocentric ecclesiology might look like.

On the Awakening retreat, there are a series of talks. The topics are always the same, and they include Faith, Love, Prayer, etc. They are given by students whose lives have been changed by Awakening, and they are always incredible.

This year, a friend of mine delivered the talk on the Mystical Body of Christ (MBOC). We hadn't met long before this weekend, but we both went on the monastery trip this spring break. Naturally, both of us having a strong connection to Awakening, we talked at length about the body of Christ, the Eucharist and ecumenism while we were at the monastery. The MBOC is central to her faith, and I could tell not only in her preparation but also in the talk itself that she poured every ounce of her being into telling us what it meant to be the body of Christ.

Her talk was real, raw and challenging, but the miracle came at the end. Exhorting us to recognize Christ in each other, not in a warm-fuzzy sort of way but in a way that calls us into the suffering of our neighbor, she declared to us that we were Christ to her, and she knelt before us all. Later she told us that she was planning to kneel for about 10 seconds and then go sit down for the reflection song that is played after each talk. But that isn't what happened. She knelt for a few moments, and then there was the sound of chairs being pushed back and shoes scuffling on the floor. All of a sudden, every one of the roughly 100 people in the room was kneeling. It was not a domino effect; it wasn't as if someone thought it was a cool idea and then everyone else followed suit. Everyone just knelt. We all stayed there on our knees throughout the reflection song, "Jesus" by Page France. We knelt, smiling and crying and knowing that we could never look at each other, or anyone else, the same ever again.


I will sing a song to you
And you will shake the ground for me
And the birds and the bees and the old fruit trees
Will spit out songs like gushing streams

And Jesus will come through the ground so dirty
With worms in his hair and a hand so sturdy
To call us his magic, we call him worthy
Jesus came up through the ground so dirty

I will sing a song for you
And you will stomp your feet for me
And the bears and the bees and banana trees
Will play kazoos and tambourines

And Jesus will dance while we drink his wine
With soldiers and thieves and a sword in his side
And we will be joy and we will be right
Jesus will dance while we drink his wine

And Jesus will come through the ground so dirty
With worms in his hair and a hand so sturdy
To call us his magic, we call him worthy
Jesus came up through the ground so dirty

— "Jesus" by Page France

A Prayer from Susannah Wesley

Help me, Lord, to remember that religion is not to be confined to the church, or closet, nor exercised only in prayer and meditation, but that everywhere I am in thy presence. So may my every word and action have a moral content. May all the happenings of my life prove useful to me. May all things instruct me and afford me an opportunity of exercising some virtue and daily learning and growing toward thy likeness. Amen.

The Place of the Skull

"So they took Jesus; and carrying the cross by himself, he went out to what is called The Place of the Skull, which in Hebrew is called Golgotha." — John 19:16b-17

Golgotha is one of the few locations I remember clearly from my visit to the Holy Land as an 8-year-old. For one thing, to see the hill, you stand in a beautiful garden, which itself leaves an impression. For another, in the midst of the flowers, the rock of Golgotha really does look an awful lot like a skull (see the picture below). I recall being simultaneously repulsed by and attracted to the strangeness of the place.

Perhaps this post is a bit late, since we're into Easter now, but my dad's Good Friday sermon taught me something about Golgotha that I didn't know, something that I found fascinating and meaningful. He began by talking about the story of David and Goliath. We all know how the narrative goes, but there's a small detail that we often miss at the end: "David took the head of the Philistine and brought it to Jerusalem" (1 Samuel 17:54a). This is odd in and of itself because Jerusalem was not an Israelite city at the time. I won't get into that, since I'm not an Old Testament scholar, but there's something else at work here.

What my dad pointed out that I had never thought of is that it is no accident that the beginning of the Hebrew name for "place of the skull" is an abbreviated version of Goliath's name. Golgotha. Goliath's head had been brought to Jerusalem. Jesus was crucified at the place of the skull. Goliath's skull.

Now that revelation is enough fun as an interesting play on words, but there are a million directions you could take that. I've already got a sermon formulating in my head for whenever I may be called upon to preach on 1 Samuel 17 or John 19. When my dad drew the connection between Christ's crucifixion and young David's victory over Goliath, I immediately thought of 2 Corinthians 12:9: "My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness." God turns the world's paradigms of strength and weakness on end. "God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong" (1 Corinthians 1:27b). This theme can be seen throughout Scripture. An inarticulate Hebrew leads the Israelites out of slavery in Egypt. Barren women conceive and bear the rulers of the people (just take Sarah and Hannah as two examples, though there are plenty more). A shepherd boy fells a giant with a slingshot. A young girl is visited by an angel and told that she is to bear the Son of God. A carpenter's son from Nazareth is not simply used by God—he is God.

How wonderful, then, that at the moment of Christ's crucifixion, as he is led to Calvary, when all seems to be hopelessness and darkness, there is a subtle reminder of God's promise that what the world sees as weakness may in fact be strength beyond all imagining. Golgotha, which invoked fear in me as a child, carries in it a reminder of David's victory over Goliath—perhaps a hint of what is to come, a gentle rebuke for those of us who may see the cross and despair. It was precisely Christ's seeming weakness that allowed him to save us. God meets us in our weakness in Christ and transforms us by the power of his Holy Spirit so that we might be strengthened in him and him alone.

Golgotha, "The Place of the Skull"

Christ the Lord Is Risen Today (Hymn)

Made like him, like him we rise; Alleluia!
Ours the cross, the grave, the skies; Alleluia!

— Charles Wesley

He Descended Into Hell

In my United Methodist Church, our version of the Apostle's Creed leaves out the line "he descended into Hell." I've always lamented this (or at least wondered about, since I doubt I was too concerned about it as an 8-year-old), because the descent into Hell is fascinating, redemptive and gives meaning to Holy Saturday.

One of the best reflections I've ever had to do on the descent to hell involved studying a Russian icon of the Harrowing of Hades:

It may be hard to see at this resolution, but there are really neat aspects that can be picked out. Jesus is in the center, and he's standing on the gates of Hell, which have been broken and now form the shape of a cross. On his left and right are Adam and Eve, whom he raises from Hell, and ranked behind them are the Old Testament kings and prophets, including Abraham and Sarah, David, Samuel and so on. Below, in the depths of Hell, two angels bind Satan, whose power has been broken, with chains.

There are plenty more minute details that make this icon not only aesthetically pleasing but also illustrative and instructive of the events of Holy Saturday, but I'll spare you. I just love the thought that even in the silence of the in-between time of Holy Saturday, even on that Sabbath day, Jesus was hard at work rescuing damned souls. Perhaps this should give us a hint that in these in-between times, here and now, with the Kingdom being already-but-not-yet, Christ is striving to save our souls so that we can be raised with him in glory at the last trumpet.

The Saints Who Had Fallen Asleep

"At that moment the curtain of the temple was torn in two, from top to bottom. The earth shook, and the rocks were split. The tombs were also opened, and many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised. After his resurrection they came out of the tombs and entered the holy city and appeared to many." — Matthew 27:51-53

I have always thought that this passage was just so, so cool. The first time I heard this after having learned about the general resurrection, I was shocked. It's eschatologically problematic to have dead people walking around before the end times. I've never read a commentary on this passage, and I know that this particular part is unique to Matthew's Gospel, but what else could this possibly be than a graphic foretaste of the coming resurrection of the body? Jesus' own resurrection was in and of itself a prefiguration of the general resurrection—"for as all die in Adam, so all will be made alive in Christ" (1 Corinthians 15:22)—but, as if the point needed to be driven home further still, here we have regular people getting up out of the grave. So all will be made alive.

O Sacred Head Now Wounded (Hymn)

What language shall I borrow
To thank thee, dearest friend,
For this, thy dying sorrow,
Thy pity without end?
O make me thine forever;
And should I fainting be,
Lord let me never, never
Outlive my love for me.

— Anonymous

The Monastery

There are always surprises waiting at Christ in the Desert Monastery. There is, of course, a degree of asceticism to the monastic life, but these monks are not afraid to use modern innovations within the reason and limits of the Benedictine Rule; their website, maintained by the monks, makes that clear. Even more surprising, the first time I went, I was there for the last week of the filming of a reality TV show. TLC's series The Monastery chronicled the lives of 5 men as they spent 40 days living and working with the monks of Christ in the Desert. Certainly some of the brothers had reservations, not only about having television cameras in their cloisters but also about the guests themselves—there was at least one incident where some of the men removed a skylight to pilfer beer from the monks' pantry. Then, too, they may have started with 5 men, but by the time I got there, there were only four. You can see the show's website here.

A place like Christ in the Desert, both in terms of its location and its rhythm of life, can seem at first to have been dropped down from heaven. One of the blessings I've experienced in being able to return there multiple times is that I've become somewhat familiar with a few of the brothers and have learned that they really are human—something they insist upon frequently, but which really must be witnessed first-hand. There's something of a surprising joy in observing the discipline of these men who wake up every day for 4 a.m. Vigils alongside the seemingly more "normal" aspects of their life. They play soccer, watch movies and, we're told, sometimes go into town together to sing karaoke. Their days are spent largely in quiet or even silence, but even they need the company and friendship not only of their fellow brothers but also of the guests and visitors who come to the monastery. Our last night there this year, we were told that they were having anticipated Vigils at 8 p.m. that evening in place of the usual 4 a.m. prayer, and we later learned that the reason for this was that they were having a going away party for a visiting priest, who was returning to Mexico the next day.

There's something comforting in seeing the human side of the seemingly divine monastic life. To me, it says that it doesn't take supernatural powers to be a devoted Christian. I saw a monk fall asleep during Vigils one morning; and I beat myself up for dozing off before my evening prayer is finished? One of the other students on the trip this year remarked that monastic life seems so radical, but, in the context of the Christian faith, it really isn't all that crazy—it's just, she said, a bunch of guys living together. Even Protestants living in intentional community, as with several hospitality houses with which I am familiar in my area, are not so different from these Catholic monks. Their vocation may look ostensibly disparate to what I perceive my calling to be, but the truth is that we as Christians are all called to community, with the understanding that any earthly community will be imperfect—it just has to be faithful.

Broken for You

This spring break, I traveled to Christ in the Desert Monastery in New Mexico with a group of 5 other college students and our fearless leader. We enjoyed a week of prayer, contemplation, conversation, reading, and hiking. On our last day, we all gathered to reflect on the week. Our leader asked what had been one of the most important moments for us, and I, a thoroughbred Protestant, immediately thought of attending Mass.

I may never be able to explain in words what I experience in the Eucharist. I have an unusually high sacramental understanding for a Protestant, I realize, but the importance cannot be lost on anyone, particularly when the question of ecumenism is raised. During the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity, back in January, the mainline Protestant campus ministry groups and our Catholic Student Center held an ecumenical vespers service each night. During discussion one evening, we were asked where we saw unity in the church and where we saw disunity. My answer was one and the same: at Catholic Mass. That conversation started a longer reflection for me that reached a mental climax at Christ in the Desert.

Mass exposes both unity and disunity in the church. As I participated in the liturgy of the Mass, my senses were heightened by the spoken word, the incense and the bells. I was fully alert, even after having attended 4:00 a.m. Vigils and 5:45 a.m. Lauds. I was very much a part of the sacrament—I felt like I could almost reach out and touch the body of Christ, not just on the altar but in the gathering of people in that sanctuary. However, when it came time to receive the elements, I was obliged to cross my arms over my chest to be given a blessing by the priest. Moving towards the altar, I wanted to laugh with joy at the beauty of the moment, and at the same time I wanted to weep for the divisions that keep us apart at table.

No matter what the theological interpretation of what exactly happens at Eucharist may be, the communion table is (or should be) a central point of Christian worship and life together. Christ institutes the Lord’s Supper himself with a command: "Do this in remembrance of me" (Luke 22:19). Then, too, it was in the breaking of bread on the walk to Emmaus that the disciples recognized Jesus (Luke 24). In his book Torture and Eucharist (which I read at the monastery), William Cavanaugh makes this observation: "It was not uncommon…for the ancient church to connect failure to recognize Christ in the consecrated bread and wine with failure to treat others as brothers and sisters in Christ." Understood seriously, the communion table is a place not only of communion with God but also of communion with each other. Whatever the future holds for the ecumenical movement, it seems to me that the question of unity relies greatly on table manners, on where we recognize and honor Christ in the sacraments and how we recognize Christ in others.

Too Tightly Tangled Together (quote)

"Christ did not descend from the cross except into the grave. And why not otherwise? Wouldn't it have put fine comical expressions on the faces of the scribes and the chief priests and the soldiers if at that moment He had come down in power and glory? Why didn't He do it? Why hasn't He done it at any one of a thousand good times between then and now?

I knew the answer. I knew it a long time before I could admit it, for all the suffering of the world is in it. He didn't, He hasn't, because from the moment He did, He would be the absolute tyrant of the world and we would be His slaves. Even those who hated Him and hated one another and hated their own souls would have to believe in Him then. From that moment the possibility that we might be bound to Him and He to us and us to one another by love forever would be ended.

And so, I thought, He must forbear to reveal His power and glory by presenting Himself as Himself, and must be present only in the ordinary miracle of the existence of His creatures. Those who wish to see Him must see Him in the poor, the hungry, the hurt, the wordless creatures, the groaning and travailing beautiful world.

I would sometimes be horrified in every moment I was alone. I could see no escape. We are too tightly tangled together to be able to separate ourselves from one another either by good or by evil. We all are involved in all and any good, and in all and any evil. For any sin, we all suffer. That is why our suffering is endless. It is why God grieves and Christ's wounds still are bleeding."

— Wendell Berry, Jayber Crow

Dulce lignum, dulces clavos

Vere languores nostros ipse tulit
et doloros nostros ipse portavit
cujus livore sanati sumus
Dulce lignum, dulces clavos
Dulcia ferens pondera
Quae sola fuistis digna sustinere
Regem coelorum et Dominum

Truly, our failings he has taken upon himself
And our sorrows he has borne
By his wounds we have been healed
O sweet wood, O sweet nails
That bore his sweet burden
Which alone were worthy to support
The King of Heaven and Lord

— Vere languores nostros, Tomas Luis de Victoria

Come, O Thou Traveler Unknown (Hymn)

Come, O thou Traveler unknown,
Whom still I hold, but cannot see!
My company before is gone,
And I am left alone with thee.

With thee all night I mean to stay,
And wrestle till the break of day;
With thee all night I mean to stay,
And wrestle till the break of day.

I need not tell thee who I am,
My misery and sin declare;
Thyself hast called me by me name,
Look on thy hands and read it there.

But who, I ask thee, who art thou?
Tell me thy name, and tell me now.
But who, I ask thee, who art thou?
Tell me thy name, and tell me now.

Yield to me now, for I am weak,
But confident in self-despair!
Speak to my heart, in blessing speak,
Bo conquered by my instant prayer.

Speak, or thou never hence shalt move,
And tell me if thy name is Love.
Speak, or thou never hence shalt move,
And tell me if thy name is Love.

'Tis Love! 'tis Love! Thou diedst for me,
I hear thy whisper in my heart.
The morning breaks, the shadows flee,
Pure, Universal Love thou art.

To me, to all, thy mercies move;
Thy nature and thy name is Love.
To me, to all, thy mercies move;
Thy nature and thy name is Love.

— Charles Wesley

A Prayer from St. Augustine

O Lord,
the house of my soul is narrow;
enlarge it that you may enter in.
It is ruinous, O repair it!
It displeases your sight.
I confess it, I know.
But who shall cleanse it,
to whom shall I cry but you?
Cleanse me from my secret faults, O Lord,
and spare your servant from strange sins. — Augustine

We're All Just People, Aren't We?

This morning, I went and helped out at the food ministry my church does the second and fourth Saturday of each month. I'd never been before, and it terrified me at first. I was the only white person, and it's hard even to pretend to blend in when you have long, blonde hair and the complexion of a Swede. I walked in, talked to a few people, and then bolted. I got back in my car, turned the engine on, and got ready to drive away. I'd come back another time, I thought. But then I took a deep breath and made myself go back inside.

Julius, another member of Asbury Temple, took me on, explaining to me how the food ministry works and taking me through the line to show what kinds of food people can pick up. He was adamant about their insistence on getting fresh produce from the food bank and not just canned goods and snacks.

I was then turned over to the ladies working the table, handing numbers to people as they walked in, calling them up and taking information from newcomers. One man waiting in line saw me smile and called out, "Hey, what's up dimples?" Later that same man was asking me a question, to which I didn't know the answer, and when I apologized for being unhelpful, he just smiled and said, "You'll fit in. You'll get it. I mean, we're all just people, aren't we?"

I watched a woman named Valencia as she handed out numbers and kept track of where we were on the list. From talking to her, I learned that she had started coming to the food ministry when she lost her job, and that she tries to help out sometimes. She's been coming to church at Asbury Temple lately. She just got a new job that starts Monday, so she won't be needing to come back for food. However, she promised she'd come out to volunteer.

When I told him all this, my boyfriend remarked that it's really neat that Asbury Temple can be functional for people like Valencia even though it has become something of a novelty for Duke Divinity students. I think ATUMC has something really good going on, which is why I love it so much. I can acknowledge the white guilt that sometimes compels me in those settings, but I'd be foolish to deny it, and I do feel called to that place, to that community. I'll keep going back to the food ministry and I'll learn even more if I work there over the summer. Maybe, if I'm around long enough, I'll start to learn the names of people who come through every other Saturday. That's a start, isn't it?

My Physic and My Sword (quote)

The bloody cross of my dear Lord
Is both my physic and my sword. — George Herbert

Making Peace Through the Blood of the Cross

"[Christ] himself is before all things, and in him all things hold together. He is the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, so that he might come to have first place in everything. For in him all the fullness of God was pleased to dwell, and through him God was pleased to reconcile to himself all things, whether on earth or in heaven, by making peace through the blood of the cross." — Colossians 1:17-20

Choose This Day Whom You Will Serve

This morning I heard a friend of mine talk about a recent mission trip he took to West Africa. He had had a great experience, and I'm thrilled for that, but there was something he said that I hear over and over that just irritates me. He talked about how these people live in huts made of straw and mud and sometimes cinderblocks, but despite their poverty their worship is filled with joy.

The observation doesn't bother me in the image itself, because it's a powerful one tinged with truth and beauty. What bothers me about it is that it is always such a surprise for middle-class, white Americans to find that poor people are often happier than they are.

It seems to me that we shouldn't be surprised that the hymns sung in Cameroon sound more genuine than those lifted in some American churches. I'm definitely not going to try and romanticize poverty, but it seems to have escaped our attention that we live in a society that is often toxic. We live in a culture driven by fear, in an economy built on perceived lack, in a country where happiness often requires drugs—and I'm not even talking about the illegal kind.

I am frequently troubled by the prevalence of eating disorders, depression and other forms of mental illness in those around me. I am bothered not only because the darkness in people's lives is often so complete I don't know how to penetrate it, but also because I believe that those kinds of things are encouraged by our culture. In the face of world poverty, anorexia and bulimia disturb me; a starving girl in Tanzania can't worry about her body image because she doesn't even have a choice as to whether or not she'll eat today, while an economically comfortable, intelligent Duke undergraduate has the luxury of choosing to starve themselves. Antidepressants are not for people living in war-torn regions where death and illness and trauma and hunger are plainly recognizable in the face of daily life; Zoloft is for those with the leisure time to realize how empty their lives have become.

I'm not trying to downplay the seriousness of illnesses like anorexia, depression, ADD and so on—I've seen these things take hold of the lives of those very close to me; I know their power. Nor am I trying to suggest that someone should feel guilty for dieting when there are people literally dying for the food that others can choose to consume or to throw out. The guilty party is not any individual, but a consumer culture that dictates a gospel of success, inane happiness and hedonism, which should be completely foreign to the Gospel of Christ—but which, unfortunately, is not always read as such.

The thing is, I'm not in the least bit surprised that the Christians in Cameroon seem more joyful in God than the Christians in America. We are tempted daily to put our trust in wealth, good looks, success and human approval; none of these temptations are held before those who live in mud shacks. Without the distractions of an idolatrous culture, West Africans have no trouble discerning to whom they should turn in times of trouble and in times of rejoicing: it's always God. The challenges of their lives seem obvious to those of us who never want for food or shelter, but the struggles in our lives are subtle and insidious, products of a culture that tells us we can't be happy unless we have an iPhone, that we won't be able to meet people unless we drink Budweiser, that our lives are not meaningful without a Lexus to match that executive position. We need to learn to recognize cultural icons as potential idols, as alternative gods, and "choose this day whom you will serve" (Joshua 24:15).

A Covenant Prayer in the Wesleyan Tradition

I am no longer my own, but thine.
Put me to what thou wilt, rank me with whom thou wilt.
Put me to doing, put me to suffering.
Let me be employed by thee or laid aside for thee,
exalted for thee or brought low for thee.
Let me be full, let me be empty.
Let me have all things, let me have nothing.
I freely and heartily yield all things
to thy pleasure and disposal.
And now, O glorious and blessed God,
Father, Son, and Holy Spirit,
thou art mine, and I am thine. So be it.
And the covenant which I have made on earth,
let it be ratified in heaven. Amen.

L.E.N.T.

I remember being in about 6th grade when a guest speaker at youth group told us to think of this handy acronym for the word "Lent": Let's Eliminate Negative Thinking. At the time, I thought that was a great idea. At the time, I was maybe 11 years old.

Maybe this guy was trying to encourage us to give up destructive mindsets and attitudes instead of just avoiding chocolate for 40 days. I somehow doubt that. The thing is, if Lent is a time of repentance (and by "if" I mean clearly it is), it makes no sense to eliminate negative thinking, because acknowledging sin tends to have some negative connotations for us, the sinners. Psalm 51, one of the great biblical pleas for forgiveness, is full of negative thinking. "For I know my transgressions, and my sin is ever before me" (v. 3). "Indeed, I was born guilty, a sinner when my mother conceived me" (v. 5). Lighten up, Dave!

I'll admit, I'm a bit of a weirdo when it comes to this sort of thing. I love Lent. Fat Tuesday's fun, but I can't wait for Ash Wednesday. My favorite holiday is Good Friday; the service where I feel most spiritually aware is the Tenebrae. I know this is not normal. Liturgically speaking, I love Christmas and Easter's even better, but the external trappings of those holidays (in-laws, last-minute shopping trips, lilies in the sanctuary that make me sneeze) often succeed in distracting me from the true celebration at hand. The literal stripping of the sanctuary on Maundy Thursday mirrors the way in which the days between the commemoration of the Last Supper and the festival of Christ's resurrection are figuratively stripped of decorative and secular white noise.

I haven't quite hammered out what my Lenten discipline will entail this year. I'll commit to attending morning prayer at the Divinity School 3 times a week (if not more) and I'd love to give up caffeine...but the point is, that goofy little acronym I've heard so many times completely misses the point of Lent. If we are seriously to confess and repent of our sins, that means we must acknowledge them. Confronting the sin in our lives is never a pleasant experience. It's not all gloom and doom, of course; we know that Easter's coming, that Jesus saved, saves and is saving us from the fear of sin and death. There is freedom in confession, joy in repentance. But we have to be willing to face the fact that we're a mess before we can ask Jesus to clean it up.

Grace Sufficient

"Therefore, to keep me from being too elated, a thorn was given me in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to torment me, to keep me from being too elated. Three time I appealed to the Lord about this, that it would leave me, but he said to me, 'My grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness.' So, I will boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me. Therefore I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, ad calamities for the sake of Christ; for whenever I am weak, then I am strong." — 2 Corinthians 12:7b-10

A Prisoner of Hope (quote)

"I am a prisoner of hope." — Desmond Tutu

With Unveiled Faces

"And all of us, with unveiled faces, seeing the glory of the Lord as though reflected in a mirror, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another; for this comes from the Lord, the Spirit." — 2 Corinthians 3:18

A Seismic Conversion

Today, in a class I'm taking about Christian icons, Kavin Rowe, assistant professor of New Testament at Duke Divinity School, came in as a guest speaker to talk about the earliest uses of images in a Christian context. Plenty of what he said about the question of images and idolatry was intriguing, but it was a comment made in passing that stuck with me in a very real way.

When discussing a Gentile's conversion to Christianity, Rowe described the move as "tectonic." Especially in the nascent Christian Church of the New Testament, conversion to Christianity meant not only assenting to a set of beliefs but also radically and fundamentally changing one's way of life and way of thinking. For Jews who followed Christ and even more so for Gentiles coming from pagan backgrounds, to subscribe to a faith that bowed before a triune God, a savior who was incarnate as fully human and fully divine, was to completely overthrow previous modes of thought surrounding material culture and the relationship of humankind to God.

Today, we live in what is often referred to as Christendom, a term that can be used as a reference to the western world and generally understood. Rarely do conversion in this hemisphere require such a seismic conversion. Lesslie Newbigin, a theologian and Presbyterian pastor who spent years as a missionary in India, notes that for Indians and other peoples in non-Western cultures, converting to Christianity means drastically changing basic elements of daily life. Only in places where Christianity is not so domesticated as in the industrialized West can the kind of conversion that the earliest Christians went through be seen today.

I spent this past weekend on a retreat with my campus ministry group discussing evangelism. Since I've read Newbigin, I couldn't help but suggest that it is not only non-Christians who oftentimes need to hear the Gospel, to be brought to Christ. Newbigin believes that the West needs to be re-converted. Living in a nation where the American flag is often as common as the cross (if not more so) in sanctuaries, I think he might be right.

Christian (Dis)Unity

January 18-25, 2008 marked the 100th anniversary year of the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity. Christians all around the world gathered throughout the week to pray for the unity of the Church. For my part, some of the religious life groups here at Duke organized five consecutive nights of vespers services, each hosted by a different campus ministry. Though the fact that the idea for the services came a little too last-minute to expect large crowds, those of us who did attend were able to meet representatives of other flavors of Christianity at Duke, experience nuances in how each group worships and talk about our own experiences of Christian unity.

The Wesley Fellowship, my campus ministry group, hosted the final service of the week. In lieu of a homily, we chose to split everyone up into small groups with people from different Christian groups for discussion. The questions put to us were simple: first, we were to talk about a time when we experienced disunity in the church; and second, we were to share an example of unity in the church.

Oddly enough, I found that my response to both questions lay in one place: at Eucharist. It was funny too, because in my small group was another Methodist from Wesley and a good friend of mine who is Catholic. So I got to have this conversation with someone with whom I share in the bread and wine on an almost weekly basis, and with another person with whom I most likely will never be able to be in communion.

I'm a Methodist with a very high understanding of the Eucharist (most Methodist call it communion...), so that particular sacrament is extremely important to me. Because of my field of study and my personal interests, I've read an awful lot about the theology of the Eucharist, so I understand the theological underpinnings of the arguments that have resulted in the varying restrictions on who can partake when and where. I'm intrigued by all of this on an intellectual level, but equally so on a personal and liturgical level.

Basically, here's where I see disunity: when, on a Catholic retreat, I sit through Mass and hear most of the very same words uttered in the consecration of the elements, but then must go forward with my arms crossed over my chest, asking for a blessing instead of the physical Host. The closed table has for me a sort of morbid fascination, an abiding sense of sadness but also a deep respect that would lead me never, ever to take a resentful or slighted attitude towards the differences in doctrine that make it so that I cannot receive the Eucharist in a Catholic church. You will never find me whining about why can't we all just get along. The differences are there and they are real. We may say the same words, invoke the same God, but something different happens at that moment of consecration, something that makes my communion and their communion two different things.

But let's not forget that I also named the Eucharist as the point at which I experience Christian unity. It's easy to see how I see it when I'm sharing in communion at my own church, when myself and other Protestants can share in the elements. But I'm not just talking about that—I actually am referring to those times when maybe I can't receive communion. Somehow, even when I've gone up only for a blessing when at Catholic Mass, tied up in the twinge of sadness and separation I feel is a deep sense of connectedness, even with those with whom I cannot sit at the Lord's table. Though the theological specifics may vary, Eucharist is a sharing in the body of Christ, and we, broken and confused, we are the body of Christ.

I know little about the ecumenical movement but I feel more and more called to seek out avenues of reconciliation and unification within the Christian Church. I hope to be able to have more conversations, especially with Catholics, about what keeps us apart at communion, and about what that particular instance implies for the broader body of Christ. I experience sadness when considering the division between Catholics at Protestants at the Eucharist, but it's not personal—it's not about me. In unity and disunity alike, I am not the focal point, but perhaps I can learn to dream of Christ's body made whole, in some form or fashion—if not here and now, then in God's due time.

Surpassed in our Desires (quote)

"We always wanted to measure your fulfillments by the standard of our desires. More than what our hollow space contains, so we thought, we cannot obtain from you. But when your Spirit began to blow in us, we experienced so much greater space that our own standard became meaningless to us. We noticed the first installment and pledge of a wholly other freedom. ...And thus is fulfilled the promise which is the blowing Spirit itself in person: Because he blows the fulfillment toward us. He does it infallibly, if we are ready to allow ourselves to be surpassed in our desires. The religion and desire of all peoples means ultimately this: to get beyond one's own desires."
— Hans Urs von Balthasar

Speaking in Tongues

"Those who speak in a tongue build up themselves, but those who prophesy build up the church." — 1 Corinthians 14:4

"I would rather speak five words with my mind, in order to instruct others, than ten thousand words in a tongue." — 1 Corinthians 14:19

"If anyone speaks in a tongue...let one interpret. But if there is no one to interpret, let them be silent in church and speak to themselves and to God." — 1 Corinthians 14:27-28


To preface this post, let me say that I grew up mostly in big Methodist churches whose congregations consisted largely of middle-class white folk. Needless to say, I did not hear anyone speaking in tongues in these churches. Since coming to college, however, I have heard this happen, and I've been able to have conversations with people about the place of speaking in tongues in Christian worship. The purpose of this post is mostly for my own musing over a spiritual gift that I obviously do not have and that I rarely encounter.

The first (and only) time I saw someone speaking in tongues was at my church here in Durham. A predominantly African-American church, Asbury Temple UMC is Methodist with a heavy dose of gospel. Although calls of "Amen," "Preach" and "Thank you, Jesus" are common during sermons, prayers, songs...whenever...it's not a pentecostal church, and in almost 2 years attending there, I've only seen someone speak in tongues once. The experience was weird for me simply because it was so foreign—at my old church at home, you risk a dirty look if you whisper a joke to your sibling sitting next to you in worship, never mind standing up and producing a 15-minute monologue in what doesn't seem to resemble any known language.

The question that came to me was whether speaking in tongues is something that gratifies him or her who does it or whether it is beneficial to all present. Surely this depends in some degree on the setting. I spoke to a friend here at Duke who attends a church where speaking in tongues is pretty common. In a place where such a thing is expected as a manifestation of the Spirit at work in the congregation, I could see how that could be something the whole church would be engaged in, even if only one person were speaking. It's not as if speaking in tongues is completely out of the box—Paul writes, "Now I would like all of you to speak in tongues" (1 Cor. 14:5). It might not be an experience with which mainline denominations like my own are familiar, but it's been around since the days of the early church.

My current line of questioning has emerged because I listened to 1 Corinthians 14 (clearly) last night before going to bed, and besides the verses I've already quoted, there was one passage that struck me as interesting. "There are doubtless many different kinds of sounds in the world, and nothing is without sound. If then I do not know the meaning of a sound, I will be a foreigner to the speaker and the speaker a foreigner to me. So with yourselves; since you are eager for spiritual gifts, strive to excel in them for building up the church" (1 Cor. 14:10-12). That got me thinking, not just about speaking in tongues, but about various elements of worship. When I witnessed the man speaking in tongues, he was very much a foreigner to me; I knew him, I knew his name, but in that moment a strangeness arose between me and him. Certainly a lot of that has to do with my white, middle-class background, and I was probably one of the least comfortable people in the room at the time, but it just makes me wonder. What, then, of other parts of worship that may make people feel like foreigners? Does the liturgy of a Catholic or Anglican service make a low-church visitor feel like a stranger? Does raucous gospel music or a praise band put a cradle Catholic visiting a contemporary worship service?

Obviously there are problems with this, because we certainly don't want to create a sterile, nonthreatening worship environment out of fear of making someone feel like a foreigner. I've been to churches that say they've stopped sharing the Eucharist because it makes some people uncomfortable. A church should never trade liturgical integrity for the benefit of being a "seeker-friendly" church. I wonder if somehow the recognizability of Jesus in all these forms of worship is what keeps Christians, even those from very different backgrounds, from feeling like strangers—maybe if I had been a little more willing to see Christ and the work of the Spirit in the man speaking in tongues, I would not have felt like a foreigner. I would say that churches who say that if you don't speak in tongues, you do not have the Spirit, err and take too narrow a view of the nature of spiritual gifts. But maybe middle-class, white churches like the ones I grew up in could do with a does of an unfamiliar spiritual gifts like speaking in tongues. It's just an interesting question to me.

Deuteronomy 23:1

I'm sure you've all heard stories—maybe some of you have experienced this phenomenon—of people who, when in a difficult situation, open the Bible randomly and stumble upon a verse that speaks directly to them. The Holy Spirit, they say, led them to that particular verse, and they gained the strength they needed to press on.

Wondering what it might be like to receive this sort of individualized affirmation from Scripture myself, I tried this once. I opened to Deuteronomy 23:1—"No one whose testicles are crushed or whose penis is cut off shall be admitted to the assembly of the Lord." Wow. Thanks, Holy Spirit. I'm not sure what you were trying to say to me there, but at least I know I'll never have that particular problem.

Maybe I'm just unlucky with Spirit-led Bible browsing, but if people sometimes find the faith and motivation they need to press on from such random acts of Scripture reading, who am I to deny its validity to that particular person? The thing is, the popularity of this odd method of reading the Bible evinces a trend in how Christians today sometimes approach the Word in error.

I'm not saying that the Holy Spirit can't lead people to certain Bible passages; God's Word may whisper a lot of the time, but every now and then it can be a loudspeaker right in your face. But the concept of asking for an answer to a question or problem and then finding the answer by opening the Bible at random assumes a flippant treatment of Scripture. For one, it makes it seem as if the Bible were written specifically for me; for another, it allows for select verses to be taken completely out of context, something that is also popular in the realm of naming favorite Bible verses.

Any Christian who reads the Bible alone in their room, seeking the guidance of the Holy Spirit alone, misses a crucial component of the Christian life: the Church. The Bible cannot be read outside the Church. Certainly Scripture is often treated from an academic perspective, but it is my conviction that although a historical approach can be beneficial, it is only, to paraphrase Barth, a preparation of knowledge. True knowledge of the content, context and active power of the Bible is found only within the Christian community. We read the Bible together in order to build each other up in our understanding, to keep each other from error in interpretation or application and to encourage each other to live the commands presented in the Bible.

I've heard people say that they think the Bible should be read by individuals, its morals followed as part of a personal decision; that the Church has corrupted its message and that institutionalized religion gets away from the purity of the Word itself. The problem here is that the Bible would not exist without the Church. The canon was established by the community of faith in order to shape the common belief and the common life. You can try to read the Bible in a vacuum, but you simply can't do it. The story in the Bible is not a story about how you can live your best life now—it's a story of a whole nation called to do God's will, together.

It's fine to open the Bible at random and see what you find. Maybe you'll come across such gems as 2 Kings 4:40 ("O man of God, there is death in the pot!"), Jeremiah 20:9b ("I am weary of holding it in / and I cannot") or Leviticus 3:16b ("All fat is the Lord's"). Heck, maybe that is the Spirit at work—maybe God's trying to make you laugh. Or maybe you'll get lucky and run across something that speaks to the heart of what you're going through. The Bible wasn't written to help you through your life's troubles, but that doesn't mean that it's not applicable. Then again, which would you prefer: a random Bible verse that lifts your spirits momentarily, or a steadfast community of faith, living in the Word, that can continually build you up over time? I'll take that over the comforting words of Deuteronomy 23:1 any day.

Politics in the Pulpit

Lately I've heard questions about whether a preacher should endorse a presidential candidate from the pulpit. The general consensus seems to be that this is bad taste. Some people hold this opinion because they feel that sermons shouldn't deal with politics, but I disagree—Jesus himself was a highly political figure. However, I think there is a point embedded in here about how the church should think about the upcoming election.

An issue that seems to me to go along with this question is that of having an American flag on display in the sanctuary. This could probably take up a whole post on its own, but I am in the camp that just doesn't want stars and bars as a backdrop when I'm in worship. The rationale behind that conviction is lengthier than this, but one of the major things is that the church, the body of Christ, is so much bigger than anything the American flag represents. I love the song "King and a Kingdom" by Derek Webb. Here's part of the chorus: "My first allegiance is not to a flag, a country or a man; / ... / It's to a King and a Kingdom." The truth that lies in those words is that the Christian church is intensely political, but that our first allegiance is not to Old Glory but to the cross.

The second verse of that Derek Webb song goes like this: "There are two great lies that I've heard: / The day you eat of the fruit of that tree, you will not surely die / and that Jesus Christ was a white, middle-class Republican / and if you wanna be saved you have to learn to be like Him." These lines may evince a certain political bent, but the point is much broader than that: Jesus was not a Democrat or a Republican. He wasn't even American. Sometimes I feel like we domesticate Jesus so much that we forget that basic fact. Jesus was particular in that he was an individual Israelite, but he was and is universal in that he died for the sins of all. That alone should strike Christians as a command to recognize a power beyond temporal authority, a power that should shape the way in which we conceive of that authority, a power that in a perfect world would be mirrored, though dimly, in human leaders.

The politics of Christ are not about political parties or individual presidential candidates. This does not mean that Christians should not talk about whether they are registered Republicans or Democrats, or whom they favor in the primaries. Too often the American vote is jealously guarded as a personal decision when really there are endless issues surrounding elections that should be talked about in communities whose concern is not for the supposed sanctity or autonomy of each individual's vote but for the greater good. These days it has become very difficult to talk politics with people whose views differ from your own. However, the church should be a place not of fear or dissent but of honesty, respect and love. We are challenged by our communal life in Christ to live out our faith in front of one another, willing to change and improve our understanding and actions if necessary. Perhaps it is inappropriate to endorse a candidate from the pulpit, but that does not mean that all talk of politics should be left at the door when going to church. The moment the church becomes a place where politics are taboo, we forget where we came from and where we are going—we forget Christ.

Room for Doubt

"Without somehow destroying me in the process, how could God reveal himself in a way that would leave no room for doubt? If there were no room for doubt, there would be no room for me." — Frederick Buechner

Doubt is something that is underappreciated in today's society. Doubt is not welcome on Wall Street, in classrooms (on either side of the evolution debate) and even in the pulpit. In a world where security is supposedly constantly threatened, few want leaders, political or religious, to express doubt.

Buechner does not believe, and I do not believe, that this fear of doubt is in the nature of Christianity. In fact, this room for doubt is one of the most appealing aspects of the faith for some. Saying that doubt is OK allows believers to be human. Space for fear and uncertainty is created by the examples of the first followers of Christ, not only his disciples but also others he met in his ministry. The man who cried, "I believe; help my unbelief!" (Mark 9:24) illustrates the give-and-take of belief and doubt with which many Christians are intimately familiar.

Of course, there is a flipside to the question of doubt. A friend of mine attended a secular summer program in high school, and their motto became "Question Everything." Sponsored by but separate from the public school system, this program was supposed to encourage the state's brightest thinkers to take a step outside the box and to challenge presuppositions; and in this, it succeeded. However, I wonder if "Question Everything" is really applicable in the church. Certainly members should never be discouraged from asking questions, but what I have come to learn over the years both as a believer and as a student of religion is that theology and faith involve a different method of formulating questions than other fields. I wonder if part of this is because the implication of "Question Everything" is that these questions expect answers, but Christians must learn that questions often lead only to more questions, that the wondering and the wandering must be lived into and is not always brought to a neat conclusion. There seems to be a creative tension throughout Scripture and Christian experience between doubt and belief.

Peter doubted and was given the keys to the kingdom of heaven; but it is clear that when he nearly drowned walking to Jesus on the water, it was because he doubted. When Thomas puts his hands into the risen Christ's wounds, Jesus said, "Do not doubt, but believe" (John 20:27). Jesus would prefer for us not to doubt, to believe wholeheartedly, genuinely and without question, but it is also important to note that Jesus rescues Peter from the waves and from his doubt; Jesus does not chide Thomas but willingly gives him the tangible evidence he needs. Christ has the power to help our unbelief, to reveal himself to us, if not always as obviously as to Thomas.

However, throughout Scripture we see that even revelation does not preclude doubt. Many saw Jesus and the prophets before him and heard them speak, but did not believe. Perhaps this is what Buechner meant: doubt is intrinsic to the disconnected state of humanity, and for God to devise a revelation that would leave no room for doubt would be to destroy what it means to be human. As long as we understand ourselves as God's imperfect but well-loved creation, there will always be room for doubt.

Children's Sermons

I have always been wary of children's sermons. At my old church, we had problems with a children's minister who managed to show an abhorrent level of insensitivity towards a pair of girls whose mother died young. Since that string of incidents, no church I've been a part of has had children's sermons. However, I had an interesting experience a few months ago that made me think.

While visiting a friend, I attended her church, a relatively small Methodist congregation. They have a children's sermon every Sunday and apparently everyone in the church absolutely loves delivering the children's sermon—there's a long waiting list just to be able to do it. The particular Sunday I was present, I listened to a late-middle-aged woman deliver a completely incoherent children's sermon that focused solely on the Canada goose.

Jesus was never mentioned. God played no part in her story. Even the environmental tack I think she was trying to take was weakly developed and unclear. Those kids probably walked away having no idea what was said.

But you know what? Any church in America should get down on its knees and thank God for a congregation like that, where the adults are literally lining up to be engaged with the children and youth of the church. The same can be said of a pastor who wants to be a tangible presence in the life of the children there and not just a "pontificating" figure in the pulpit.

Today I see many large, well-established churches suffer for want of youth volunteers and children's Sunday School teachers. If a children's sermon can discourage the sort of age-class silos that are shored up around the children and youth in our churches today, then I will happily listen to a children's sermon on geese if it shows that the adults are taking a genuine interest in the younger generation of believers.