tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-50745206653392829092024-03-13T10:03:48.974-07:00Life Together: The Diomass Intern Program"If you want to go quickly, go alone. If you want to go far, go together." -African proverbBoston, MAhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/08012805698123553801noreply@blogger.comBlogger64125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5074520665339282909.post-902551886102039752011-06-30T11:14:00.000-07:002011-06-30T11:22:58.403-07:00Crossing the City<a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Dtvf_uhlwRA/Tgy-rTBuV0I/AAAAAAAAACM/tl8X2uiM1zA/s1600/Untitled1.png" onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 320px; height: 240px;" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-Dtvf_uhlwRA/Tgy-rTBuV0I/AAAAAAAAACM/tl8X2uiM1zA/s320/Untitled1.png" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5624079685730064194" /></a>Over the past few months a team of dedicated individuals from All Saints Parish in Brookline have begun a new ministry with the Learn at Lenox Afterschool Program in Roxbury. Volunteers from the church spend one Friday a month conducting a workshop with the kids that demonstrate a set of skills or values that supplement the lessons taught during the week and reinforced at the center Monday through Thursday. The workshops have been diverse and included a broad range of topics including a poetry recital, personal finance lessons and a nutritional demonstration on sugar and soft drinks.Friday June 10 was the last day of the after school session for the academic year and our volunteers wanted to throw an extraordinary end of the year celebration.
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<br />Part of the mission of our fledgling ministry is to build deep relationships across different parts of the city. So while our church and the after school center may be separated geographically by only four miles and a fifteen minute drive, culturally, economically<meta equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=UTF-8"><img src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-F30qR1x2vJw/Tgy-Nw9g3yI/AAAAAAAAAB8/ofOI3MTuoJQ/s320/Untitled2.png" style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 320px; height: 240px;" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5624079178369392418" /> and aesthetically Brookline and Roxbury might as well be located on separate continents.Roxbury is gritty, densely populated and lined with unattractive circa 1970’s housing projects. Alternatively, Brookline is tree -lined, nicely manicured, pristine and the housing stock is constituted of beautifully maintained, large Victorian homes. Many of the children from the after school program are being raised in environments where crime and violence are part of daily existence while the kids of our parish are raised in an environment that encourages an unhealthy expectation of overachievement in school, in sports and in other extracurricular activities. On most days these two communities fail to interact. The kids of Roxbury and Brookline grow up in parallel but alternate universes.
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<br />The Friday Workshops have begun to change this dynamic. Once a month Brookline goes to Roxbury or Roxbury goes to Brookline. Individuals, who under normal circumstances would never have had the opportunity to meet, become friends with<meta equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=UTF-8"><img src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-Doj9kK-7FB8/Tgy-1zZysNI/AAAAAAAAACU/cavr8eeTJqs/s320/Untitled3.png" style="float:right; margin:0 0 10px 10px;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 320px; height: 240px;" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5624079866219638994" />each other. We begin to dialog together and discover the different challenges that we face in our lives and ways to support each other. This dynamic of developing a personal transformative relationship across communities is the essence of our ministry with Lenox. It is a lesson in the reality of social change. The type of radical change that takes root when actually we take the time to listen to each other’s experiences and develop relationships that cross barriers of race, class and thought. And so it is my deepest desire that last Friday, a genuinely transformative experience occurred on a sunny, warm, late spring day in Brookline over a game of tag and a bowl of ice cream.William Templehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10770894228681506010noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5074520665339282909.post-36288771099320980422011-06-26T14:50:00.001-07:002011-06-26T14:53:46.173-07:00Transformation in Time<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-hSpM8wFiK3E/TgepsGRToNI/AAAAAAAAABs/060P6PeuH8M/s1600/transform.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 314px; height: 320px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-hSpM8wFiK3E/TgepsGRToNI/AAAAAAAAABs/060P6PeuH8M/s320/transform.jpg" border="0" alt=""id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5622649234857894098" /></a><br />This past Friday I had the great opportunity to visit with my spiritual supervisor in Cambridge. Since our first meeting in early October 2010 I have found great comfort in the consistency and availability of my mentor, and now, friend. If you are unaware, parking in Cambridge can be a great task at times. Since I drive to see my spiritual supervisor from my home in Brookline, I have to find parking that is about a 5 minute walk to our meeting location. I have made this walk every few weeks and I am always refreshed by the views of changing seasons that this 6 city blocks provided.<br /><br />In the fall I witnessed the cool and crispness as colors of orange and brown surround me in the trees and on the ground I was walking. In the winter I trudged through the 4 foot snow banks to feed the parking meter and encouraged my snow boots to show me what they were made of. In the early months of 2011 I witnessed the poking through of leaves that had been hiding under a layer of snow for months, reclaiming the sun and ground as winter thawed. In the spring I was greeted with the sound of children’s voices in the playgrounds as my toes, now exposed in sandals, felt the warm street beneath.<br /><br />This blog is not about the weather however, although the description of the weather is an important aspect of this entry to give you a sense of the environment in which my entry takes place in. This blog is about a house.<br /><br />Every time I walked to my spiritual supervision meetings I passed an old house being renovated. In October they had just begun the project, with wood and studs exposed. I remember seeing the workers outside, and thinking to myself that they were beginning something very big and in the midst of some hard weather conditions. Every week I went to spiritual supervision, there were always workers inside and outside, completing and finishing a new project. I didn’t think much of these memories until this past week in my supervision meeting. “So how do you feel, looking back on your experience in Boston over the past year?”, my supervision asked me. I took a minute to think and all I could think about was that house being built. So I went with it.<br /><br />Not one for recalling things in perfect verbatim form I will explain how I saw this house as an image of my journey. I saw this house much like my spiritual journey while I was in Boston. At first, people were around as I looked inside and decided what had to go, what could stay, and if I had the means to finish the job. Studs, walls, floors all came out. New things were added, and people with different crafts entered into my life to add to the renovation. I am sure there were times when things needed to go but were covered over, to once again be exposed. I am sure things were fixed and would no longer need tending to. A whole new wing of the house was even added, and I saw this as an image of the things that I have built anew in Boston. So many people, doing so many things, and it was finally beginning to come together as a finished product. <br /><br />My life in Boston is a lot like this house that I passed every couple of weeks. I felt proud to almost see it done last week as I walked by it that I felt an urge to tell the people adding the insulation that they had done a good job. I wanted to tell the guys working on the windows that I remembered when that old building didn’t have any windows. I wanted to tell the concrete guys that the new driveway was where a big pile of scrap metal was only a month and half ago. I am sure they knew all this but I still felt the urge. I think I feel the same urge to let the people who have come into my life during this year of renovation know the impact and change they have induced.<br /><br />As I walked back to my car, after my supervision, I remembered that without having to park far away I wouldn’t have seen this beautiful transformation over the course of my time in Boston. Much like my literal move to Boston from the South, the distance from all things familiar has allowed me to witness a great transformation in my life during this time. I hope that as you come across having to walk a little further after parking far from your destination sometime in the future, you take that time to realize God might be giving you a chance to see something new, or to take a break and reflect on your journey. It might not get you to your destination any faster but I think it may give you a newfound appreciation for God's interruptions in our lives.William Templehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10770894228681506010noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5074520665339282909.post-10803504430084335872011-06-09T08:19:00.000-07:002011-06-09T08:28:04.149-07:00What does justice look like?<span style="font-style:italic;">A sermon preached by Tamra Tucker at The Crossing on May 26, 2011.<br /></span><br /><br />Do. Love. Walk.<br />Justice is intimidating to me. And appealing and I want it. It’s intimidating coming from Oklahoma, where comfort is key, to a place that lives and breaths social justice. But how do I talk about justice? How do I approach it? How do I describe what it looks like?<br /><br />I don’t know what it is, but I know what it isn’t: it isn’t kids taking care of their siblings because their parents aren’t home. It isn’t one of my kids at work losing her aunt to gang violence, being shot in a drive by. It isn’t the trafficking of young girls in our city. And it isn’t passing the mentally disabled off as crazy addicts so we have an excuse not to help them.<br /><br />But what is justice? Is it turning the tables over in the temple? Is it getting up in the face of injustice and having a shouting match? How do you use the fire that burns for justice? Maybe sometimes.<br /><br />This is the question that always bugs me. How do you make that jump into uncharted territory? This is why I love and hate this passage of the bible. People ask how to be a follower, how to devote their lives to God, how to be good. It is simple: do justice, love mercy, walk humbly with God. But how? Is it really that simple? How do you do justice? How do you love mercy? How do you walk humbly? I need opportunity; someone to say, “Come with me, I have an idea.” <br /><br />The strongest example in my life is a deacon named George Day. He lived this verse. He walked into the prisons around Oklahoma and sat with those already condemned, in a place where justice is supposedly already served. And he loved them; he loved them deep with mercy, with kindness. To him, justice wasn’t for condemning people. His call was to walk with them. He met the condemned where they were, in their cells and saw the Christ in them that was in himself, and he loved them and walked with them. He found God in those prisons and loved God and walked with God.<br /><br />George lit a fire in me. I blazed through my childhood trying to do justice, every bit of it I could. I skipped school to volunteer. I did every charitable thing I could get my hands into, but I could never get it quite right. I didn’t really know how to live this out. How to stay on fire all the time. How to walk humbly with God. How do I live day to day life, doing the simple things that need to get done, and still be on fire, fulfill my call?<br /><br />The answer is simpler than all the extravagant expressions of emotion we could make up in our mind. Micah pulled direction from Amos, Hosea and Isaiah to give a clear and simple way of obeying God. Do. Love. Walk. This verse gets a lot of attention for the justice side of things. But that isn’t all that’s here. What about the action of kindness? What about walking humbly? How do we check our passionate paths of justice with love and humility? I think there is a reason justice cannot stand alone here.<br />This passage is used to base the 5th component of our Rule of Life at the Crossing - the justice and service piece. In our rule of life, we commit to justice and service as a spiritual discipline. This discipline takes practice. That fire I had has burnt out a few times and justice doesn’t come natural to me. When I find myself in the body of Christ, with its different members, I find more than opportunity for service; I find love and humble steps, the fulfillment of this passage.<br /><br />We start this work by worshiping God with one another, and we continue with our voices, by sharing our stories and opportunities for service. We lift one another up, supporting each other not with empty words but with our actions, by our commitment to be present to each other. The point here is not to know on our own, but to keep coming together and doing this work in community, to pose this question to each other, to celebrate each other’s work, to challenge each other’s failings, to hold each in love when we burn out, and to work together to do justice, that God’s will be done on earth.William Templehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10770894228681506010noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5074520665339282909.post-51036308134422560422011-05-24T16:25:00.000-07:002011-05-24T16:26:36.456-07:00Interruptions of New Life<div><i>A sermon preached by Ben Whaley on May 22, 2011.</i></div><div><i><br /></i></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; border-collapse: collapse; color: rgb(51, 51, 51); "><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: Calibri; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: transparent; font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; ">It’s a pleasure to be back with this community this morning. I have spent the last two years as a fellow in the Life Together Intern Program, the program run by Arrington Chambliss. In the internship, we fellows commit to living in community, spending ten hours a week in leadership development and spiritual formation training, and serving 30 hours a week in a social-justice based site placement. My placement is Iglesia San Pedro - St. Peter’s Church here in Salem. I work with the Hispanic ministry there, and we primarily serve youth and families of recent immigrants from the Dominican Republic. I had the privilege of participating in a Lenten series with many members of this congregation, and so I’ve been looking forward to this time to be back with you all. </span><br /><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: Calibri; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: transparent; font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; "> Sometimes I think the disciples are pretty dense. How can they be so blind? Over and over in the gospels, we see the disciples misinterpret and just plain miss the point. For three years, Jesus has led them and loved them, and yet they say they can not see the way to follow him. For three years, he has preached to them and performed miracles, and yet they can not see the Father in him. It’s almost as if Jesus has become too real to them, too normal. His presence has become so much a part of their routine that they seem to forget he is something extraordinary. They are too comfortable with the mundane, and they get tunnel vision. It is this small-mindedness that speaks when they say, “We don’t know the way. We don’t know the Father.”</span><br /><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: Calibri; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: transparent; font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; ">This tunnel vision can be dangerous. In the reading from Acts we encounter an angry mob who is too comfortable with its own truth. The chief priests in the Acts account are so sure that they know who God is and what God looks like that they are moved to violence - they make Stephen the first Christian martyr - for the sake of not disturbing their view of the world. The high priests are so blinded by their convictions that they can’t see the truth Stephen offers. The disciples are so blinded by their need for certainty that they can’t see the truth of who Jesus is. Their need to cling to their routines leads to pain, heartache, violence.</span><br /><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: Calibri; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: transparent; font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; ">It would be nice to think that this kind of thing stopped happening 2000 years ago, but it is clear to me that it hasn’t. This fear of change, fear of the new, leads to anger and aggression and fear-mongering in our world today. I experienced a people living with this fear last fall in Arizona where I heard dozens of people – Anglos - speak out with political and social hostility toward Mexican immigrants for no reason other than the change they brought to their society – a different color skin, a different language. I went to join an immigrants-rights organization called Promise Arizona which was responding to the anti-immigration legislation in the state with a Latino- voter registration drive. I went because of the welcome and love I have received from my Latino community at St. Peter’s.</span><br /><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: Calibri; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: transparent; font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; ">I went with a small team of folks from St. Peter’s and our goal was simple: register as many Latinos as possible. Period. And you know what? We were good at it. We began to compete against other local teams to see who could get the most registrations. We set a new record each day and single-handedly, I registered about 250 people to vote. So I had the routine down - I would approach someone, make my pitch, smile my charming smile, and they’d sign on the dotted line. I would start in English. If they looked confused, I’d try again in Spanish. I moved through people like a machine. And then I met Ernesto.</span><br /><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: Calibri; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: transparent; font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; ">We were wading through the crowds at a local bus station, and I approached Ernesto as he sat alone on a bench. “Excuse me sir, are you registered to vote?” I asked. He looked at me. He had dark skin, a scraggly beard, and the oldest eyes I’d ever seen. He didn’t answer my question. “Esta usted registrado para votar?” No answer. I thought he must be drunk, or crazy, or both. I started to walk away.. And then he said. “Sit down.”</span><br /><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: Calibri; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: transparent; font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; ">I looked around. I had a deadline, and there were a lot of people to talk to on the platform.. Ernesto stared at me. I sat. I waited. I suddenly was aware of young I felt, how white I felt, how </span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: Calibri; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: transparent; font-weight: normal; font-style: italic; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; ">different </span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: Calibri; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: transparent; font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; ">I felt. I couldn’t imagine what he was thinking. Finally he said, “I’m 70 years old. I’ve never voted in my life. The way things are going around here, I think I’d better start.” So we filled out the form together. As I walked away, he called me back to ask, “What’s your name?” Ben, I said. “Benjamin,” he said. “That’s a good name.”</span><br /><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: Calibri; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: transparent; font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; ">On that park bench, Ernesto interrupted my routine. I suddenly remembered that I had come to Arizona to register</span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: Calibri; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: transparent; font-weight: normal; font-style: italic; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; ">people</span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: Calibri; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: transparent; font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; "> to vote, not numbers. Ernesto had seen me, and without realizing it, he had opened my eyes to every </span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: Calibri; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: transparent; font-weight: normal; font-style: italic; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; ">person</span><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: Calibri; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: transparent; font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; "> I would register after him. I began to listen to their stories. I began to remember their names.</span><br /><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: Calibri; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: transparent; font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; ">I learned that it’s possible to get locked into our comfort zones on many different levels – I realized I was exactly the same as those who would de-humanize immigrants if I continued to hold my vision of reaching a numerical goal and failed to connect with the people I met.</span><br /><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: Calibri; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: transparent; font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; ">It’s this kind of interruption Jesus is offering the disciples in the Gospel today. When we get tunnel vision, it’s Jesus who asks us to open our eyes. This is what Christ did for us in the resurrection. In the resurrection, he showed that the thing that seems the most real in this world, the most solid fact, death itself, is not as real as Christ himself is. In his resurrection, Christ interrupted the routine of our lives forever. In order to acknowledge that resurrection, though, we must be willing to be changed by it.</span><br /><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: Calibri; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: transparent; font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; ">I had to be willing to be changed by Ernesto. I pray every day that the citizens of this country will allow themselves to be transformed by those who come into it. And I ask you, where is Christ inviting you into life that is more real than the patterns with which you are comfortable?</span><br /><span style="font-size: 12pt; font-family: Calibri; color: rgb(0, 0, 0); background-color: transparent; font-weight: normal; font-style: normal; text-decoration: none; vertical-align: baseline; ">This kind of change can be scary. When Christ asks us to follow him into new life it is much more comfortable to stay put, to say with Thomas, “Lord, we do not know the way.” But, if we are willing to open our eyes, and our ears, we will hear Christ’s loving voice.. speaking the same tender words of encouragement to us that he spoke 2000 years ago: “You already know the way. I am the way, and the truth, and the life.” “I am the way,” Christ says. We just have to be willing to be changed by the journey.</span></span></div>William Templehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10770894228681506010noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5074520665339282909.post-87570235284202652752011-04-20T13:04:00.000-07:002011-04-20T13:10:44.749-07:00A Lenten Reflection<span style="font-size:85%;"><span style="font-family: arial;">S</span></span><span style="font-size:85%;"><span style="font-family: arial;">ubmitted by Ben Whaley</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: arial;">In our last newsletter, Charlie wrote about a koan that spoke to him in the Epiphany season. I want to share with you a koan that I have been praying with this Lent:</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: arial;">A monk went away to a cave to meditate. While he was meditating a demon came and stood in the mouth of the cave and hurled insults at him, jibing, “What makes you think you’ll ever become enlightened? You’re a worthless good-for-nothing, more ear wax than brains, wasting your life away for naught.” The demon’s jeers set doubt working in the monk’s heart. The monk took a deep breath and then said, “Mara, is that you? The tea is ready. Won’t you come enjoy it with me?”</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: arial;">Here storytellers have taken divergent paths. Some say that the demon fled, his power broken. I like to think, though, that the demon went in to the cave, that he discovered that the monk’s heart was true, and the monk discovered the demon was not so scary after all.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: arial;">Lent is the season to invite our demons to tea. Life Together has given me a unique opportunity to practice this self-examination over the last 18 months by introducing me to The Enneagram. The Enneagram is a personality typology that suggests that there are nine basic personality types of human nature, with many subtypes and variations. Each type has characteristic behaviors, senses of self, and patterns.The folks at the Enneagram Institute assert that the Enneagram doesn’t “put your personality in a box, rather, it shows you the box you are in and the way out.” I’m a type Nine, and often my box is my demon. A Nine’s basic desire in life is for peace, the absence of conflict, which sounds lovely. The downside is that Nines will often make great sacrifices of their own personal desires and will to achieve this peace.</span><br /><span style="font-family: arial;">As a Nine, I LOVE harmony in community, and I’ve been blessed with a lot of gifts to help me create that. I also tend to tune out things that trouble me, preferring mental static over discord.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: arial;">For example, last year when I was living in intentional community at SLAM, we had a problem with our dishes: we weren’t doing them. We would wash dishes as long as we could then put them in the dishrack and leave them to dry. However, when the dishrack got full, we would leave the dishes in the sink. It was my chore to clean the kitchen and finally, fed up with doing other people’s dishes, I hid the dishrack. Instead of starting a conversation about the system breakdown and risking a conflict, I took the passive aggressive route and hoped the problem would correct itself. The breakdown soon turned into a blowout, and I learned a valuable lesson about the value of addressing uncomfortable truths instead of trying to maneuver for peace.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: arial;">This Lent, I’ve invited this avoidance in for tea. I’ve been examining the things I’ve shoved into the shadows and I’m finding that they have less power when I stop avoiding them. The dishes don’t bother me nearly as much once I’ve asked my roommate to do his share. Here, with the kettle on in my kitchen, the demons don’t seem so bad.</span></span>William Templehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10770894228681506010noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5074520665339282909.post-20824530767829151692011-03-17T10:55:00.000-07:002011-03-17T11:01:24.011-07:00"what if..."<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-0tM7F8Kkk1c/TYJMZjB8Q4I/AAAAAAAAABg/uIDm0OJCb4I/s1600/kathryn.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 150px; height: 200px;" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-0tM7F8Kkk1c/TYJMZjB8Q4I/AAAAAAAAABg/uIDm0OJCb4I/s200/kathryn.jpg" border="0" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5585110489676661634" /></a>
<br /><meta name="Title" content=""> <meta name="Keywords" content=""> <meta equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"> <meta name="ProgId" content="Word.Document"> <meta name="Generator" content="Microsoft Word 2008"> <meta name="Originator" content="Microsoft Word 2008"> <link rel="File-List" href="file://localhost/Users/jasonlong/Library/Caches/TemporaryItems/msoclip/0/clip_filelist.xml"> <!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <o:documentproperties> <o:template>Normal.dotm</o:Template> <o:revision>0</o:Revision> <o:totaltime>0</o:TotalTime> <o:pages>1</o:Pages> <o:words>243</o:Words> <o:characters>1389</o:Characters> <o:company>Boston College</o:Company> <o:lines>11</o:Lines> <o:paragraphs>2</o:Paragraphs> <o:characterswithspaces>1705</o:CharactersWithSpaces> <o:version>12.0</o:Version> </o:DocumentProperties> <o:officedocumentsettings> <o:allowpng/> </o:OfficeDocumentSettings> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:worddocument> <w:zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:trackmoves>false</w:TrackMoves> <w:trackformatting/> <w:punctuationkerning/> <w:drawinggridhorizontalspacing>18 pt</w:DrawingGridHorizontalSpacing> <w:drawinggridverticalspacing>18 pt</w:DrawingGridVerticalSpacing> <w:displayhorizontaldrawinggridevery>0</w:DisplayHorizontalDrawingGridEvery> <w:displayverticaldrawinggridevery>0</w:DisplayVerticalDrawingGridEvery> <w:validateagainstschemas/> <w:saveifxmlinvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:ignoremixedcontent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:alwaysshowplaceholdertext>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:compatibility> <w:breakwrappedtables/> <w:dontgrowautofit/> <w:dontautofitconstrainedtables/> <w:dontvertalignintxbx/> </w:Compatibility> </w:WordDocument> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:latentstyles deflockedstate="false" latentstylecount="276"> </w:LatentStyles> </xml><![endif]--> <style> <!-- /* Font Definitions */ @font-face {font-family:"Courier New"; panose-1:2 7 3 9 2 2 5 2 4 4; mso-font-charset:0; mso-generic-font-family:auto; mso-font-pitch:variable; mso-font-signature:3 0 0 0 1 0;} @font-face {font-family:Times; panose-1:2 0 5 0 0 0 0 0 0 0; mso-font-charset:0; mso-generic-font-family:auto; mso-font-pitch:variable; mso-font-signature:3 0 0 0 1 0;} @font-face {font-family:Wingdings; panose-1:5 2 1 2 1 8 4 8 7 8; mso-font-charset:2; mso-generic-font-family:auto; mso-font-pitch:variable; mso-font-signature:0 0 65536 0 -2147483648 0;} @font-face {font-family:Cambria; panose-1:2 4 5 3 5 4 6 3 2 4; mso-font-charset:0; mso-generic-font-family:auto; mso-font-pitch:variable; mso-font-signature:3 0 0 0 1 0;} /* Style Definitions */ p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal {mso-style-parent:""; margin-top:0in; margin-right:0in; margin-bottom:10.0pt; margin-left:0in; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:12.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-ascii-font-family:Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:Cambria; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family:Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;} @page Section1 {size:8.5in 11.0in; margin:1.0in 1.25in 1.0in 1.25in; mso-header-margin:.5in; mso-footer-margin:.5in; mso-paper-source:0;} div.Section1 {page:Section1;} /* List Definitions */ @list l0 {mso-list-id:1907571794; mso-list-template-ids:-847999712;} @list l0:level1 {mso-level-number-format:bullet; mso-level-text:; mso-level-tab-stop:.5in; mso-level-number-position:left; text-indent:-.25in; mso-ansi-font-size:10.0pt; font-family:Symbol;} ol {margin-bottom:0in;} ul {margin-bottom:0in;} --> </style> <!--[if gte mso 10]> <style> /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin-top:0in; mso-para-margin-right:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:10.0pt; mso-para-margin-left:0in; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:12.0pt; font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-ascii-font-family:Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-hansi-font-family:Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin;} </style> <![endif]--> <!--StartFragment--> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt"><span lang="EN-GB" style="mso-bidi-font-size:10.0pt;font-family:Times;mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";color:#333333;mso-ansi-language:EN-GB">This past weekend I, and several other interns, attended the Diocese’s Spring Learning Event. This year’s event was sponsored by Episcopal Village, which is a network of people who are involved with the “<i style="mso-bidi-font-style:normal">emergent church</i>” or “<i style="mso-bidi-font-style:normal">fresh expressions.</i>” The whole day was devoted to different ways of imagining church. The Crossing hosted worship, and leaders from around the country came to lead “Missional Conversations” about different ways that innovation is happening in the Episcopal Church.</span><span style="mso-bidi-font-size:10.0pt;font-family: Times;mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman";color:#333333"><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt"><span style="mso-bidi-font-size:10.0pt;font-family:Times;mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; color:#333333"><o:p> </o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt"><span style="mso-bidi-font-size:10.0pt;font-family:Times;mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; color:#333333">During the afternoon, I attended a conversation led by Thomas Brackett, the Episcopal Church’s “Program Officer for Church Planting and Redevelopment.” During the conversation, he asked the group several questions. He’s not the first to ask these questions, nor will he be the last. That doesn’t matter though, because they are important to hear again and again – because I think they begin to outline the fundamental basis of what it means to be a follower of the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style:normal">Jesus Way</i>.<o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt"><span style="mso-bidi-font-size:10.0pt;font-family:Times;mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; color:#333333"><o:p> </o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt"><span lang="EN-GB" style="mso-bidi-font-size:10.0pt;font-family:Times;mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";color:#333333;mso-ansi-language:EN-GB">The first group of questions are a number of different ways to express the same question:</span><span style="mso-bidi-font-size:10.0pt;font-family:Times;mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; color:#333333"><o:p></o:p></span></p> <ul style="margin-top:0in" type="disc"> <li class="MsoNormal" style="color:#333333;margin-top:.1pt;margin-bottom:.1pt; mso-para-margin-top:.01gd;mso-para-margin-bottom:.01gd;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1; tab-stops:list .5in"><span style="mso-bidi-font-size:10.5pt;font-family: Times">What if I truly believed that I was beloved?<o:p></o:p></span></li> <li class="MsoNormal" style="color:#333333;margin-top:.1pt;margin-bottom:.1pt; mso-para-margin-top:.01gd;mso-para-margin-bottom:.01gd;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1; tab-stops:list .5in"><span style="mso-bidi-font-size:10.5pt;font-family: Times">What if the only approval I needed was the approval of the one that has always approved of me?<o:p></o:p></span></li> <li class="MsoNormal" style="color:#333333;margin-top:.1pt;margin-bottom:.1pt; mso-para-margin-top:.01gd;mso-para-margin-bottom:.01gd;mso-list:l0 level1 lfo1; tab-stops:list .5in"><span style="mso-bidi-font-size:10.5pt;font-family: Times">What if I didn’t need YOUR approval?<o:p></o:p></span></li> </ul> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-top:.1pt;margin-right:0in;margin-bottom:.1pt; margin-left:.5in;mso-para-margin-top:.01gd;mso-para-margin-right:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:.01gd;mso-para-margin-left:.5in"><span style="mso-bidi-font-size: 10.5pt;font-family:Times;color:#333333"><o:p> </o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt"><span lang="EN-GB" style="mso-bidi-font-size:10.0pt;font-family:Times;mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";color:#333333;mso-ansi-language:EN-GB">The second group began with the question: <i style="mso-bidi-font-style:normal">How do you smell the spirit at work?</i> What then followed was a discussion about how we can begin to trust our sense of when God is on the move, and bring that both more deeply into congregations and out into the world.</span><span style="mso-bidi-font-size:10.0pt;font-family:Times;mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; color:#333333"><o:p></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt"><span style="mso-bidi-font-size:10.0pt;font-family:Times;mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; color:#333333"><o:p> </o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt"><span lang="EN-GB" style="mso-bidi-font-size:10.0pt;font-family:Times;mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman";color:#333333;mso-ansi-language:EN-GB">I think what strikes me again and again about this kind of work is not how people in the <i style="mso-bidi-font-style:normal">fresh expressions</i> movement are saying something new, but how they are saying something <i style="mso-bidi-font-style:normal">really old.</i></span><span style="mso-bidi-font-size:10.0pt;font-family:Times;mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; color:#333333"><o:p></o:p></span></p> <!--EndFragment-->William Templehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10770894228681506010noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5074520665339282909.post-79163053675579590482011-03-09T07:55:00.000-08:002011-03-09T08:04:26.742-08:00Growing Into the Sermon on the Mount<style>@font-face { font-family: "Cambria"; }p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal { margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }div.Section1 { page: Section1; }</style> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:85%;"> Submitted by Patrick Burrows on March 7, 2011<br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:85%;"><br /></span><style>@font-face { font-family: "Cambria"; }p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal { margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }div.Section1 { page: Section1; }</style> </p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:85%;"><i style=""><span style="color:black;">"So do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will bring worries of its own. Today's trouble is enough for today."</span></i><i style=""><span style=""></span></i></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:85%;"><i style="">--St. Matthew 6.34</i></span></p><p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:85%;"><i style=""><br /></i></span></p> <p></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:85%;">When I was younger and was asked what kind of life I aspired to live, I would always point to the fifth, sixth, and seventh chapters of St. Matthew’s Gospel, also known as the Sermon on the Mount. I was completely steeped in the Bible as the guide for life, and in these chapters, I saw Jesus’ greatest teachings about what the “good life” consisted of. Turning the other cheek. Going the extra mile. Choosing the narrow gate. And even, cutting off your right hand if it caused you to sin. I have always had a highly (and if you ask my parents, overly) active imagination, and so, the imagery of these texts really gave me something to sink my teeth into.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:85%;"><br /></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:85%;"> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:85%;">As time has gone by, however, I find these messages less appealing. I still very much consider them to be the basis of Christian ethics, but I no longer look at them with the eyes of a child. It’s easy to say as a child to turn the other cheek to that kid in class who won’t share with you. It is an entirely different beast to suggest to adults that they should love their enemies and pray for those who persecute them, especially those who are actively oppressed. Even more to say do not store up your treasures on earth, when consumerism is so rampant that it takes every ounce of self-control to maintain some sense of sanity in the weeks leading up to Christmas. As a child, not storing up treasures on earth was not a problem—my treasures consisted primarily in my Hot Wheels car collection. But now, even when most of my valued possessions can fit in my car, orienting my heart towards my true Treasure is an epic task in and of itself.<br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:85%;"><br /></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:85%;"> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:85%;">But Jesus continues to go on and on with a list of increasingly demanding ethical principles. This is not the Law of the Moses, with individual commandments that can be checked off a list. This Gospel is about <i style="">metanoia</i>—transformation—, a complete change of the way we interact with the world, moving from one form to another. Later in St. Matthew’s Gospel, when Jesus claims that his “yoke is easy and [his] burden is light,” I can’t help but scoff.<br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:85%;"><br /></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:85%;"> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:85%;">But nothing is more infuriating to me than the last verse of chapter 6. The New International Version translates it as, “Do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.” When I was taking a huge course-load and was overly active in extracurriculars my junior year of high school, I had this verse written across the front of my notebooks for my two most intense classes. It was a comforting reminder to take things one day at a time and not to get overly worked up.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:85%;"><br /></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:85%;"> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:85%;">“I don’t see why that’s infuriating to you,” you might be thinking. The problem is, I’m an anxiety-prone person. Worrying is what I do. I can usually stave it off by getting ridiculously over-committed and not having time to breathe, much less to think about all the things that could be going horribly wrong all around me. But as I’ve gotten more settled into my site placement and grown into a routine that doesn’t occupy much conscious thought, my brain has time to wander and, inevitably, to start worrying. When I hear Jesus say, “Do not worry about your life,” my immediate reaction is, “Well, that’s easy for you to say. After all, you are <i style="">God</i>.”<span style=""> </span>Theologians have often argued about whether or not Jesus gave up his omniscience in taking on human flesh, using all sorts of metaphysical arguments. At least from my point of view, for Jesus to have the sheer audacity to say these words, he couldn’t have known the limits of human understanding. Telling us not to worry is akin to telling a fish to learn how to breathe air.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:85%;"><br /></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:85%;"> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:85%;">But that is the Jesus I encounter here, a Jesus who pushes me away from the conceit that I have absolute control over my life. My worrying is an attempt<span style="color:black;"> to control everything by figuring it out, and is actually implicitly a denial of God’s control in the situation. And though I don’t think that God takes offense at that, by worrying about everything, I’m not making room for God to do something. Instead, I am attempting to micromanage</span><span style="color:black;"> </span><span style="color: rgb(34, 34, 34);">grace, to bend it to my will, instead of letting it flow through me.</span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:85%;"><span style="color: rgb(34, 34, 34);"><br /></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:85%;"><span style="color: rgb(34, 34, 34);"> </span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:85%;"><span style="color:black;">Jesus’ words “do not worry about tomorrow” used to be words of comfort, then words of angst. But now, I am beginning to see that they are liberating, if only I will trust that God will take better care of my life than I would. “Tomorrow will worry about itself.”</span></span></p>William Templehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10770894228681506010noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5074520665339282909.post-36963810720035929742011-03-07T13:54:00.000-08:002011-03-07T13:57:39.370-08:00Agents of Opening<span style="font-family: arial;font-size:85%;" >[Taken from a December 8th reflection by Nicholas Hayes for the Episcopal Chaplaincy newsletter]<br /><br /><br />These last two months I have been hard at work building a leadership team for Hope in Action at Harvard, the faith-based environmental and social justice campaign I am organizing on campus through the Chaplaincy as its Justice Minister. The work reached a new high point this past weekend, when six students and one Cambridge community member joined me to receive intensive training in leadership and community organizing from Leading Change, Marshall Ganz's community organizing training group at the Kennedy School. Over one and a half very intensive days, we formed a shared purpose, divided our roles, and began the difficult work of strategically planning a spring campaign, centered on interfaith coalition building for green justice in Cambridge.<br /><br />Most meaningfully, however, we engaged in the work of sharing stories with each other, stories of why each of us was called to this work. Our stories had several common strands, but as I listened to them, what I heard emerging most clearly from all of my leadership team members was a desire--perhaps a vocation--to be agents of opening. We were a diverse group--from Episcopal, Catholic, Methodist, Pentecostal, Evangelical, and Humanist backgrounds--but all present came to the table holding a story of deep frustration with the religious--or in one case, atheist--communities they'd found around them (or found themselves within) earlier in life. And everyone's frustration had a common root: it was frustration at the way in which so often faith communities close themselves--even define themselves by closing themselves--to those outside their boundaries, to their Other. Whether it was the story of a church preaching the Christian gospel while closing its doors to the community of discomfortingly poor workers nearby, or the story a humanist community affirming to its members that they could be "Good without God" while denying the possibility that others could be "Good with God," each one of us had shared in an experience of painful awakening to our own community's self-enclosure. I call it awakening, because it was that experience which ultimately brought each of us to a table together, hoping to bear witness to a different kind of community, hoping to cross those boundaries deliberately left uncrossed by others with open minds, open hearts, open arms--hoping to be agents of opening,<br /><br /> I believe what we named in our common story that Saturday was not only our vocation, but the larger vocation of Christ's Church. What was Christ if not a profoundly boundary-crossing agent of opening? I pray that our work this coming semester will lead us further down this path, and shed more light for us and others on what still unbroken walls Christ's followers might yet be called to break open.<br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic;">Though these words were written almost three months ago, the sense of call I articulated in them for the first time has only since grown.</span>--Nicholas</span>William Templehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10770894228681506010noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5074520665339282909.post-48387627517283723582011-03-04T06:26:00.000-08:002011-03-04T06:30:25.333-08:00Where Real Church Meets Real Life<span style="font-size:85%;"><span style="font-family: arial;">Originally written by Vicki Morte for </span><a style="font-family: arial;" href="http://socialactionministries.blogspot.com/2011/01/where-real-church-meets-real-life.html">Social Action Ministries</a><span style="font-family: arial;"> on Jan. 25, 2011</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: arial;"> Last January, I was a senior at Boston College, returning from Winter Break to my final semester with absolutely no idea what to do after graduation. Struggling to figure out what was next for me, I began to look backwards, carefully taking inventory of how I was already spending my time. I was volunteering at least five hours a week at a women’s day shelter downtown, and had been doing that for four years. I was spending hours reading, writing, and discussing Theology. I began finding a clear challenge to engender justice in the world laid out before me in the Gospels as I really read them for the first time. I was actively avoiding going to Mass on campus, despite the encouragement of my Theology professors, the Campus Ministers I knew, and many of my closest friends. I knew that, for me, a full understanding of social justice and an authentic experience of my faith required that I think about both, together. I was lonely in my newly growing faith because I couldn’t find a community that understood this connection in the same way that I did.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: arial;"> Now, a full year later, I’m almost halfway through a community organizing fellowship within the </span></span> <span style="font-size:85%;"><a style="font-family: arial;" href="http://www.diomass.org/">Episcopal Diocese of Massachusetts</a><span style="font-family: arial;">. Through the </span><a style="font-family: arial;" href="http://www.diomassintern.org/Home.html">Life Together Program</a><span style="font-family: arial;">, I serve as the Minister for Justice and Action at </span><a style="font-family: arial;" href="http://www.thecrossingboston.org/">The Crossing</a><span style="font-family: arial;">, a Christian community of radical welcome that’s working to truly live church out in the world. The Crossing gathers to worship at </span><a style="font-family: arial;" href="http://www.stpaulboston.org/">St. Paul’s Episcopal Cathedral</a><span style="font-family: arial;"> on Thursday nights at 6 pm, and is a real spiritual home for people who are seeking a community that is genuinely invested in relationships and growth. Coming to The Crossing in the fall, I found the community that I was seeking, a community of friends who value and share in the understanding that lived Christian faith demands deep commitment to and radical movement for justice. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: arial;"> At The Crossing, we welcome all people to commit to each other’s mutual transformation into the fullness of Christ. That happens as we fall in love with God in Worship, as we grow in love for each other and ourselves in Community, and as we share love with the world through Action. Last year, The Crossing began work on a campaign for greater LGBTQ rights and inclusion, reaching out to and collaborating with advocacy groups around the city. The community also began building relationships with homeless youth in the area, particularly those who self-identify as Queer. This year, we’ve continued and grown this work, collaborating in bigger and better ways with other groups and providers. We’ve renewed our commitment to working with young adults who are homeless, forging a new relationship with </span></span> <span style="font-size:85%;"><a style="font-family: arial;" href="http://www.bridgeotw.org/">Bridge Over Troubled Waters</a><span style="font-family: arial;"> and maintaining our connection to </span><a style="font-family: arial;" href="http://www.thehome.org/site/PageServer">The Home For Little Wanderers’</a><span style="font-family: arial;"> LGBTQ group home, </span><a style="font-family: arial;" href="http://www.thehome.org/site/PageServer?pagename=programs_waltham_house">Waltham House</a><span style="font-family: arial;">.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: arial;"> Following Worship on the fourth Thursday of each month, The Crossing offers Education for Action to the community. </span></span> <span style="font-size:85%;"><strong style="font-family: arial;">On Thursday, March 24, we will be welcoming Robb Zarges, Executive Director of Bridge Over Troubled Waters, and Caitlin Golden, Social Action Ministries Coordinator at the Massachusetts Housing and Shelter Alliance, to begin a conversation about youth homelessness and learn about the many ways that we can take action to support young people and end the cycle of homelessness in our city. </strong><br /><br /><span style="font-family: arial;"> Be with us at 6 pm for Worship or join us at 7:30 pm for this special event. We’re excited to welcome you into this important and powerful work with us.</span></span> <span style="font-size:85%;"><br /><br /><span style="font-family: arial;"> Peace,</span></span> <span style="font-size:85%;"><br /><br /><span style="font-family: arial;"> Vicki Morte – Minister for Justice & Action @ The Crossing</span></span> <span style="font-size:85%;"><br /><br /><span style="font-style: italic; font-family: arial;">If you are interested in attending the event, please RSVP to Vicki at vicki@thecrossingboston.org</span></span>William Templehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10770894228681506010noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5074520665339282909.post-42884414411956056152011-02-28T11:25:00.000-08:002011-02-28T11:31:08.426-08:00Running Towards My Vocation<span style="font-family:arial;font-size:85%;">Submitted by Kyle Boudreau on February 15, 2011</span><br /><br /><span style=";font-family:arial;font-size:85%;" >During these cold winter months, I am continuing to use running as a spiritual practice to keep myself centered and to reflect upon the important things in my life. As I dodge (or run right through) the puddles of slush and hurdle the humungous snow banks, I think about how I can connect with God and where God is calling me. While I know I am not called to run a marathon anytime soon, I know that I can connect with God while running as I look out at the frozen Charles River or the snow covered trees of Corey Hill. The beauty of nature reminds me that God’s love is all around me. As a result, I naturally connect with God as I am running the streets of Boston, Cambridge and Brookline.<br /><br />As a part of my spiritual practice, I take the time to have a conversation with God and search for the places God is calling me. While I know I am not going to be a professional runner, I do know some of the things that set my heart on fire: building relationships, empowering people in a local community to solve some of their own problems and hearing people’s stories. My work at St. Stephen’s is a natural fit for finding opportunities to put these passions into action. I am doing my 1:1’s with parents, community partners and members of the St. Stephen’s congregation to really learn about the South End and its needs. I know that I have a lot of room to grow as a community organizer and often find myself full of self-doubt. Yet, the one certainty I am sure of is that I learn best by doing. I believe that the idea of a church-school partnership between St. Stephen’s and the Blackstone can work, but I will not get anywhere if I just sit around planning out ideas. It is important that I try out my ideas for supporting the school because even if they fail, I will learn valuable lessons about organizing along the way.<br /><br />At this point, I do believe God is calling me to serve others as a community organizer. I believe I have some great gifts such as public speaking, determination and a love of people that will serve me well. Certain things will be challenging and I will be tentative to take action. Similarly, there are many cold mornings where I would rather sleep in than go out running and face the cold, harsh wind, but I only get better at running by doing. I know that God I know that I am able to connect with God more clearly when I am running, just as I am able to connect with God more clearly when I am taking action and meeting with people as a community organizer. Both require the effort to get over the initial hump, but once I am out there, it isn’t so bad. I continue to ask God for support on both of these efforts and I am rewarded with the beauty of God when I take action. I plan on continuing to simply ‘dive in’ to both my running and my community organizing, knowing that God is supporting me while encouraging me to ‘just do it’.<br /></span><br /><style>p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal { margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }div.Section1 { page: Section1; }</style>William Templehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10770894228681506010noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5074520665339282909.post-85239528272571916052011-02-24T08:41:00.000-08:002011-02-24T08:44:26.081-08:00Organizing Wisdom from a Life Together Alumna!Submitted February 7, 2011<br /><br /><span style="font-size:85%;"><span style="font-family: arial;">Two years into this deal as a “community organizer” I think I’m just realizing the real work of organizing. The realization comes down to something pretty simple, to the definition of the title.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: arial;">Being an organizer takes a keen awareness of where energy exists and moving on that energy. It means seeing how a community works, what resources it has, what its needs are and helping match already present resources to existing needs. It’s about helping folks see that they already have the answers to the problems they want some one else to solve. It’s looking at the community with a different sense of eyes and organizing it so it fits right.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: arial;">The job isn’t about me or the btcke team doing everything. It’s about the community doing everything or at least as much as we can do together. This isn’t always the easiest thing to ensure. People often want you to do everything (I often want to do everything) but if we (me or you) do everything it leaves a lot of time and a little responsibility on everyone else’s plate. The truth is, we ALL have something to give to this world. This is our home and the other people living here are our community members, our neighbors and it’s time we act like it.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: arial;">We may be thousands of miles apart or living in drastically different place but deep down, we’re all in this together, that’s the truth. And, to see change, we’re going to need to start living by that truth.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: arial;">Helping you realize that truth, helping me realize that truth, helping the global community realize that truth – that’s my job as a community organizer.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: arial;">Natalie Finstad :: Be The Change Kenya Executive Director</span></span>William Templehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10770894228681506010noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5074520665339282909.post-9670828064691697162011-02-23T10:32:00.000-08:002011-02-23T10:41:38.145-08:00Sermon: Putting the "Micah" in Micah Intern<span style="font-size:85%;"><span style="font-family: arial;">Delivered by Paul Hartge on January 30, 2011, at Christ Church Waltham</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: arial;">Have any of you wondered why my official title is a Micah intern? Probably not, but let’s pretend you had. It seems a bit odd, doesn’t it, to name an internship after an obscure Hebrew prophet. Why not name the position, “young adult intern”? The answer lies in the last verse of the Old Testament reading for today, Micah 6:8, “What does the Lord require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness and to walk humbly with your God”. In my internship program, we strive to follow Micah’s threefold commandment through our vocations. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: arial;"> We are not the only ones who use this verse either. In the past ten years, Micah 6:8 has become a slogan for many Christians. The verse has been invoked in campaigns to fight poverty here and abroad including another Micah Project that does street outreach to children in Honduras. The reason this verse is so appealing is that it shows an alternative to the false dichotomy that is presented about Christianity. This dichotomy says that the Christian life is either about one’s personal piety and social issues don’t matter or that it should focus on fighting social ills and personal piety isn’t that important. Instead, Micah 6:8 shows that both are necessary. Working to create a better world and working to make yourself a better person, that walks with God, are equally important parts of the Christian life. And both should be done with kindness. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: arial;">So what does it actually mean to follow this verse as a slogan of our faith? Does it mean donating to diaper depot, coming to service and doing a good turn daily. Yes and no. These are great examples of ways to follow Micah’s teaching and thus, to follow God. However, if it is reduced to a checklist, then the point is lost. One of the ideas that Micah is trying to convey in the broader passage is that God does not want us to follow a passionless checklist. Instead, God wants us to undergo an inner transformation that causes us to want to do that which is on the checklist and so much more.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: arial;">One person who underwent this transformation, that I have been inspired by recently, is the late Archbishop Oscar Romero. From his writings it is clear to me that he answered Micah’s call with his life. He strove to let his soul be possessed entirely by God. Romero did this through an intentional and very deep spiritual life. This inner devotion eventually changed his outer work. When his friend was assassinated for helping the poor, he began to use his position of influence to speak out against the rampant poverty and violence in El Salvador. This ultimately led to his assassination. Now, Romero is almost universally respected as a modern martyr. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: arial;">By devoting himself to God, to the point of Martyrdom, Oscar Romero lived out not only Micah’s description of a Godly life, but Jesus’ description of the Christian life, which he lays out in the Gospel reading for today. Like Micah, Jesus invites us to live lives of justice, kindness and humility. Except while Micah gives us a slogan with three key points, in the Beatitudes, Jesus gives us a cryptic and somewhat mystical list. This is a list that, as many have pointed out, seems to turn reality on its head. Even though these characteristics are often seen as important virtues, the world rarely treats these virtues kindly, or rewards them properly. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: arial;">Yet, Jesus says that God blesses those who exhibit these qualities. Another translation of the beatitudes is “happy are those” instead of “blessed are those”. It still doesn’t seem to make that much sense that these characteristics would lead a person to be happy. But that’s just the point of the beatitudes. Working to further God’s kingdom in the world requires living in a way that society tells us will not make us happy. However, when we live this life, God will give us a contentedness, or even joy, that we would not have expected. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: arial;"> The question then becomes, what does this mean for us? What exactly does it mean to inherit the earth or see God and when exactly do these things happen. Are we supposed to act into these characteristics or just accept them when they happen? Sometimes, life thrusts these qualities upon us without our choice. We do not always choose to be mourning or to be in a state of poverty. Sometimes, these just happen to us. But we can all make the decision to act mercifully towards others, to cultivate a pure heart and to work to create a peaceful world. It takes a conscious decision to follow this radical way of life that Jesus calls us to.</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: arial;"> I also think that we can live out the other side of the Beatitudes. I’m not saying we can force God’s hand. The pace that God works at is outside of our control. But I do think we can allow ourselves to be the vessels through which God blesses others. In this way, I think that the Beatitudes are not counterintuitive, but instead speak to our better nature. Who among us doesn’t try to comfort someone in mourning? When you hear of someone who is trying to work for peace in the Middle East, or in Sudan or the inner city, it only seems natural to call that person a child of God. When a young mother who doesn’t know how she is going to provide for her child comes to our doorstep, we can give her some diapers saying that this is part of the bounty of God’s kingdom, which is for you. Then, when someone stops you and asks you why you are doing this, you could tell them you are trying to live out the beatitudes. Or you could just tell them that that your life slogan is Micah 6:8.</span></span>William Templehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10770894228681506010noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5074520665339282909.post-51573943724557494942010-12-16T17:16:00.000-08:002010-12-16T17:21:37.936-08:00Advent: Moving beyond opening doors<span style="font-size:85%;"><span style="font-family: arial;">Submitted by Isabelle Jenkins on December 15, 2010</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: arial;">For me, Advent has always been the wreath with the purple and pink candles and the calendars full of chocolate and covered in sparkles. Despite the fact I attended Catholic high school and a Jesuit college, Advent was never really explained to me, or, perhaps, I never really listened. </span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: arial;">For the first time this year however, I had to listen. At my site, Church of the Good Shepherd in Watertown, my supervisor and the priest-in-charge, Amy McCreath, asked me if I would be willing to lead a justice themed bible study for Advent for some of the parishioners. My initial inclination was to say no because not only did I have no idea what Advent really was, but I also had no idea what justice had to do with Advent. How am I practicing social justice by opening a numbered door and eating the small, essentially tasteless chocolate inside?</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: arial;">After posing this question to Amy (using different words, of course), this mindset changed completely. Advent is Amy’s favorite season and, for her, it is perhaps the ultimate example of God’s desire for social justice. God chose Mary to bring into the world Jesus, the social transformer who turned over the tables in the temple, broke bread with the sick, the poor, and the needy, and was crucified for his resistance. In other words, God chose an unwed, common woman to give birth to God on earth. This is why Advent is the ultimate season for justice to Amy—what could model social transformation more than the time that glorifies the woman on the margins who brought God into being through the person of Jesus, the man who wanted to bring those on the outside to the center?</span><br /><br /><span style="font-family: arial;">This conversation made something click in my mind. As a huge fan of liberation theology, I have always envisioned Jesus as a person who wanted to mobilize people to change the socially divided and marginalized world. Thus, Amy’s view of advent completely stuck with me. Advent is the time when we wait and hope for this vision of justice to arrive again. So even though I’m still opening those little doors and eating that chocolate, the counting down of the days is starting to mean something else to me. With each door I open, a little light shines through, beaming God’s vision for justice back into this world.</span></span>William Templehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10770894228681506010noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5074520665339282909.post-79522715995660009292010-12-08T15:25:00.000-08:002010-12-16T17:22:17.125-08:00Bridging the Gap<style>@font-face { font-family: "Calibri"; }p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal { margin: 0in 0in 10pt; line-height: 115%; font-size: 11pt; font-family: "Times New Roman"; }div.Section1 { page: Section1; }</style> <p style="font-family: arial;font-family:arial;" class="MsoNormal" ><span style="font-size:85%;">Submitted by Paul Hartge on December 2, 2010</span></p><p style="font-family: arial;font-family:arial;" class="MsoNormal" ><span style="font-size:85%;"><br /></span></p><p style="font-family: arial;font-family:arial;" class="MsoNormal" ><span style="font-size:85%;"><b style=""><span style=""> </span></b>One of the most memorable moments of my internship so far has been the joint pot luck between Christ Church and St. Peters in September.<span style=""> </span>The anticipation of the event was actually quite nerve racking.<span style=""> </span>Would people from Christ Church stay later for the lunch?<span style=""> </span>Would people from St. Peter’s come early?<span style=""> </span>Was anyone actually going to bring any food?<span style=""> </span>Thankfully, it worked out.<span style=""> </span>People from both parishes showed up, and there was plenty to eat.<span style=""> </span>Not only that, but the two parishes were even mingling together.<span style=""> </span>The best part of the morning was when we all sang “What a Friend we have in Jesus”, switching between verses in English and verses in Lugandan.</span></p><p style="font-family: arial;font-family:arial;" class="MsoNormal" ><span style="font-size:85%;"><br /><span style=""> </span></span></p> <p style="font-family: arial;font-family:arial;" class="MsoNormal" ><span style="font-size:85%;"><span style=""> </span>Since then, I have been attending St. Peter’s service and coffee hour each weak.<span style=""> </span>It is a very interesting experience worshiping in a language that I don’t understand.<span style=""> </span>The highlight of their service is Rev. Alex’s children’s story, because it is the only part of the service that is in English.<span style=""> </span>Other than that, I’m usually completely lost. <span style=""> </span>Normally, during the sermon I explore the Book of Common Prayer, the Hymnal or any other reading material I have in front of me (unless Rev. Christine switches to English in the middle of her sermon single me out and explain what she will be preaching on).<span style=""> </span>Once in a while, someone will translate the service for me.<span style=""> </span>However, what is most powerful for me is singing with St. Peter’s.<span style=""> </span>Despite not knowing what I am singing, I am moved when I realize that we are all worshiping God in their native language.</span></p><p style="font-family: arial;font-family:arial;" class="MsoNormal" ><span style="font-size:85%;"><br /></span></p> <p style="font-family: arial;font-family:arial;" class="MsoNormal" ><span style="font-size:85%;"><span style=""> </span>After the service I stay for their coffee hour.<span style=""> </span>I’m not sure Upper Fales Hall is ever as crowded as it is during their coffee hour.<span style=""> </span>This is when I can really connect with people in St. Peter’s.<span style=""> </span>I will chat with them and here stories of their immigration experience.<span style=""> </span>One of the best conversations I had was with Andrew, a third grader.<span style=""> </span>Andrew told me that his favorite thing to do is help people and pick up litter whenever he can.<span style=""> </span>I think fifteen years from now Andrew should be a Micah intern.</span></p><p style="font-family: arial;font-family:arial;" class="MsoNormal" ><span style="font-size:85%;"><br /><span style=""> </span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-family: arial;font-size:85%;" > I know that some people, in both congregations, are skeptical about the project of creating more fellowship between the two parishes. I am hopeful. At the potluck I saw children from both parishes running around the room. Why shouldn’t they run around the room together? In fact, I am already seeing that happen in small ways. Last week after the 10:00 service, Alisha, the daughter of the Senior Warden, asked me where her Dad was. I told her that Jonathan had to stay late for some meetings. Her response was that she was going to go see if some of her Ugandan friends had arrived, while she waited for the meeting to end.</span><a name="_GoBack"></a></p>William Templehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10770894228681506010noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5074520665339282909.post-46019239833573819382010-11-29T19:53:00.000-08:002010-12-08T15:31:32.809-08:00The Rewards of Letting Go<style>@font-face { font-family: "Arial"; }p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal { margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Arial"; }div.Section1 { page: Section1; }</style> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:78%;">Submitted by Sarah Currer on November 27, 2010.<br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:78%;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:78%;">It is always nice to be reminded why what you do is important.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:78%;"><br /></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:78%;"> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:78%;">I’m something of a perfectionist and it can be hard for me to let go of a project when I feel like I can do it better.<span style=""> </span>So I was in a tricky position when I found myself with two of my high school students trying to craft a letter in a delicate political climate.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:78%;"><br /></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:78%;"> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:78%;"><span style=""> </span>I work with the Boston Student Advisory Council (BSAC), a group of high school students that works in partnership with Boston Public Schools (BPS) to put the student voice in education reform.<span style=""> </span>I’m always impressed with these students and what they’ve accomplished and the passion and savvy with which they argue. But they are a little rough around the edges, and BSAC always has to be careful about the stance we take because we work within the organization we are trying to change. Recently, BPS has been in a highly publicized fight with the teachers union and the Superintendent has proposed several highly controversial changes to the Boston school system, including closing several schools. In light of these things a newspaper article highly critical of the Superintendent was published. </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:78%;"> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:78%;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:78%;">My job with BSAC is to support the students in their advocacy, and usually this involves setting up meetings, answering emails and researching the current state of affairs. But last Wednesday afternoon it involved me sitting down with this harsh newspaper article, two students, and the instructions to write up some sort of response. I had them read the article themselves without any explanation and then asked them what they thought. Through our discussion we reached the same conclusion that my boss had: the students should personally write the Superintendent. As they put down their initial thoughts I cringed a little internally and had to go do work at another desk to not say anything.</span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:78%;"><br /></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:78%;"> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="font-size:85%;"><span style="font-family:Arial;"><span style=";font-family:arial;font-size:78%;" >To my surprise, though, as they continued their back and forth on each word, sentence, and paragraph that they typed, the letter got more and more refined. The initial outpouring of sympathy and support, peppered with SAT vocabulary slightly misused and the awkward wordage that can come from English as a second language, was slowly transforming. As I answered their questions and they continued to pour over their work I became really impressed with the document they were producing. Their heartfelt, genuine emotions and unguarded turn of phrase were so much more meaningful than any precise and careful response I could have written, however beautiful my turn of phrase. Letting them take the reins not only gave them a better sense of the difficulties of political relationships and got them more personally invested in their project. It also produced better results! Their letter brought a smile to its recipient’s face and reminded me how powerful it can be to step back and let others speak up.</span><span style=""> </span></span></span></p> <style>p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal { margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: "Arial"; }div.Section1 { page: Section1; }</style>William Templehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10770894228681506010noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5074520665339282909.post-19176766922284558322010-11-29T19:48:00.000-08:002010-11-29T20:06:42.899-08:00A Day at Diocesan Convention<style>@font-face { font-family: "Courier New"; }@font-face { font-family: "Wingdings"; }@font-face { font-family: "MS ゴシック"; }@font-face { font-family: "Verdana"; }@font-face { font-family: "Tahoma"; }@font-face { font-family: "SimSun"; }p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal { margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; font-family: Tahoma; }p.MsoHeader, li.MsoHeader, div.MsoHeader { margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt; font-size: 12pt; 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font-size: 12pt; font-family: Tahoma; }p.MsoNoteLevel9, li.MsoNoteLevel9, div.MsoNoteLevel9 { margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt 4.25in; text-indent: -0.25in; page-break-after: avoid; font-size: 12pt; font-family: Tahoma; }p.MsoNoteLevel9CxSpFirst, li.MsoNoteLevel9CxSpFirst, div.MsoNoteLevel9CxSpFirst { margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt 4.25in; text-indent: -0.25in; page-break-after: avoid; font-size: 12pt; font-family: Tahoma; }p.MsoNoteLevel9CxSpMiddle, li.MsoNoteLevel9CxSpMiddle, div.MsoNoteLevel9CxSpMiddle { margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt 4.25in; text-indent: -0.25in; page-break-after: avoid; font-size: 12pt; font-family: Tahoma; }p.MsoNoteLevel9CxSpLast, li.MsoNoteLevel9CxSpLast, div.MsoNoteLevel9CxSpLast { margin: 0in 0in 0.0001pt 4.25in; text-indent: -0.25in; page-break-after: avoid; font-size: 12pt; font-family: Tahoma; }span.HeaderChar { font-family: SimSun; }div.Section1 { page: Section1; }ol { margin-bottom: 0in; }ul { margin-bottom: 0in; }</style> <p class="MsoNoteLevel1CxSpFirst" style="margin-left: 0in; text-indent: 0in;"><span style=""> </span><span style=";font-family:arial;font-size:78%;" >Submitted by Cara Mills on November 16th, 2010<br /></span></p><p class="MsoNoteLevel1CxSpFirst" style="margin-left: 0in; text-indent: 0in;font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:78%;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNoteLevel1CxSpFirst" style="margin-left: 0in; text-indent: 0in;font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:78%;">On Saturday November 6<sup>th</sup> the Episcopal diocese of Massachusetts held its annual convention.</span><span style="font-size:78%;"> </span><span style="font-size:78%;">The entire Life Together Program was invited to attend and participate.</span><span style="font-size:78%;"> </span><span style="font-size:78%;">Leading up to this day I was unsure of what the convention would consist of and how we, the interns, would play a role. I was excited to see how a diocesan convention was run as well as to see the many priests I work with on a daily basis in</span><span style="font-size:78%;"> </span><span style="font-size:78%;">a new environment.</span><span style="font-size:78%;"> </span><span style="font-size:78%;">I accompanied a fellow intern to Lynn the day before the convention to see the space and to prepare for the many tasks the intern program had been asked to kelp with the next day.</span><span style="font-size:78%;"> </span><span style="font-size:78%;">St. Stephen's in Lynn is a beautiful church with an intricate history and a wealth of character.</span><span style="font-size:78%;"> </span><span style="font-size:78%;">The church is full of long hallways, many small rooms, and multiple stairwells.</span><span style="font-size:78%;"> </span><span style="font-size:78%;">As I was shown around the space I learned many details for the day like where the coffee would be served, what rooms lunch would be eaten, and how to direct someone in need to the nursery.</span><span style="font-size:78%;"> </span><span style="font-size:78%;">I thought to myself, how are 500 hundred people ever going to fit in this building?<br /></span></p><p class="MsoNoteLevel1CxSpFirst" style="margin-left: 0in; text-indent: 0in;font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:78%;"><br /></span></p> <p class="MsoNoteLevel1CxSpLast" style="margin-left: 0in; text-indent: 0in;font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:78%;"> </span><span style="font-size:78%;">Saturday started early and dark.</span><span style="font-size:78%;"> </span><span style="font-size:78%;">Upon arriving at St. Stephen's in Lynn I was assigned to direct traffic with many of the other Life Together interns.</span><span style="font-size:78%;"> </span><span style="font-size:78%;">The two large parking lots were empty and the buildings quiet. I smiled at fellow interns across the road as we waved our welcome signs at one another anxiously awaiting the arrival of 500 expected guest.</span><span style="font-size:78%;"> </span><span style="font-size:78%;">Slowly the cars began turning the corner and quickly the first parking lot was filled.</span><span style="font-size:78%;"> </span><span style="font-size:78%;">All of us standing in the streets and the sidewalks were jumping and dancing with our signs attempting to stay warm in the cold morning air.</span><span style="font-size:78%;"> </span><span style="font-size:78%;">Our excitement to see the many guests we had been anticipating all morning was returned through waving hands and friendly hellos out of the car windows.</span><span style="font-size:78%;"> </span><span style="font-size:78%;">The welcome grew in its joyfulness as more and more priests and lay people filled the sidewalks and doorways. Old friends greeted one another and new introductions were exchanged.</span><span style="font-size:78%;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNoteLevel1CxSpLast" style="margin-left: 0in; text-indent: 0in;font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:78%;"><br /></span></p><p class="MsoNoteLevel1CxSpLast" style="margin-left: 0in; text-indent: 0in;font-family:arial;"><span style="font-size:78%;">I don't think this excitement faltered all day as the convention progressed. I was especially moved by the convention's acknowledgment of the Life Together program. It meant so much to me to see how deeply we are supported by the diocese. There was so much power in having everyone from the diocese join together that day.</span><span style="font-size:78%;"> </span><span style="font-size:78%;">It was an inspiration to see how we are all working together for a common goal.</span><span style="font-size:78%;"> </span><span style="font-size:78%;">Each of the people in the building that day was working to build faith communities and fight injustice in their own way.</span><span style="font-size:78%;"> </span><span style="font-size:78%;">During the lunch break I witnessed the miracle of 600 people successfully fitting in to that building and sharing a meal together.</span></p>William Templehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10770894228681506010noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5074520665339282909.post-22019668717658299812010-11-04T09:18:00.000-07:002010-11-04T09:20:56.734-07:00Becoming the Future Church<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Submitted by Paul Hartge on November 3, 2010</span><div><!--StartFragment--> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">In January, I saw Rev. Dr. Soong-Chan Rah speak at Calvin College, my alma matter, as part of our J-term lecture series. He suggested that the concern over the dwindling church in America is misguided and that Christianity in America has a vibrant future, with ethnic and immigrant churches. I think Professor Rah is right, which is why I am excited about the work that I am doing with Christ Church in Waltham and St. Peter’s Anglican Church of Uganda, in Waltham.</span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Christ Church is a beautiful Episcopal Church and congregation that has been around for 160 years. St. Peter’s is a Ugandan immigrant congregation that meets at Christ Church on Sunday afternoons. My job is to facilitate more fellowship between Christ Church and St. Peter’s. By bringing these two congregations together, they can both represent what the church can look like in an increasingly globalized world. </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">This goal will not come without difficulties of course. Even though everyone at St. Peter’s speaks English, they have their service in Lugandan. Also, their parishioners come from a wide, twenty mile radius, so many can only make it to Waltham for Sunday service. There are also, of course, the cultural and theological differences between the two congregations that can at times create tension. </span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">We can overcome these difficulties though. In September, the two congregations had a joint potluck. I will admit no one was quite sure how it would turn out until it actually happened. The lunch, however, was quite successful. Both the Americans and the Ugandans enjoyed trying each other’s food. We also sang “What a Friend I have in Jesus” in both English and Ugandan. We are now looking forward to having an Advent party together and doing a joint Bible study. I am also hearing from members of each congregation that they are interested in learning about the other’s culture. In their own way, Christ Church and St. Peter’s are becoming the future of the Church.</span></p> <!--EndFragment--> </div>William Templehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10770894228681506010noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5074520665339282909.post-44903942435060605412010-11-01T15:25:00.000-07:002010-11-01T15:31:31.596-07:00A Story of Now: St. Stephen's and the Blackstone School<!--StartFragment--> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;mso-pagination: none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:Helvetica;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style=" color: rgb(51, 51, 51); line-height: 18px; font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">Submitted by Kyle Boudreau on Tuesday, October 26th, 2010</span></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;mso-pagination: none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family: Helvetica;mso-bidi-font-family:Helvetica;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">This year, I am charged with the exciting task of building a stronger connection between The St. Stephen's and the Blackstone Elementary School Communities. The tag line we use at St. Stephen's is "stronger communities = stronger schools," as we hope to make the South End a more desirable place to be by making the Blackstone a school where parents really want to send their children. I know this task is worthwhile because of my belief in the power of community organizing and the great opportunity for positive change at this particular school. The Blackstone Elementary School is one of Boston's "turn-around" schools. This means the school had to hire a new principal, had to require every staff person re-apply for their job, and had to hire at least 50% new staff. As a result, 85% of the staff at the Blackstone is new and teachers were brought in from around the country to invest in this school's children. </span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;mso-pagination: none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family: Helvetica;mso-bidi-font-family:Helvetica;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">The students at the Blackstone are in dire need. On the 2009 MCAS, 88% of 4th graders either failed the MCAS English/Language Arts section or needed improvement. Similarly 84% failed or needed improvement on the math section of the MCAS. These students are falling behind their peers and need the support of the community. St. Stephen's is providing support to the Blackstone community in many ways. In addition to providing an after-school program for 90 elementary-age children, 30 of which come from the Blackstone, St. Stephen's has spearheaded an effort to renovate and reopen the Blackstone's school library and has approximately 10 volunteers serving in the library or in a classroom setting each week. Along with approximately 50 other partners, the South End community is making a strong effort to help the Blackstone improve its MCAS scores and provide an overall better learning environment.<o:p></o:p></span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt;mso-pagination: none;mso-layout-grid-align:none;text-autospace:none"><span style="font-family: Helvetica;mso-bidi-font-family:Helvetica;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"> </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style=" ;font-family:Helvetica;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">However, there is much more work to be done. The library is still a work in progress and it will be a while before it can lend books out to students. Many of the students at the Blackstone need a mentor and need their parents to get involved in their school. I am making an effort to push for parental involvement in the parent council and I am continuing to look for strong leaders from the St. Stephen's community who can help make this partnership stronger.By empowering the community to make the Blackstone a school that parents really want to send their kids instead of a last resort, I can empower the community to make a stronger, more vibrant South End neighborhood for everyone.</span></span></p> <!--EndFragment-->William Templehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10770894228681506010noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5074520665339282909.post-68261556661684103582010-10-13T06:16:00.000-07:002010-10-13T06:21:29.782-07:00Morning Prayer on the MBTA<!--StartFragment--> <p class="Body"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Submitted by S. Angell on Thursday, October 7th, 2010</span></span></p><p class="Body"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"></span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: arial; font-size: small; ">Every morning greets me with one inevitability: commuting to work. I have decided to devote this time as a time of prayer. the transformational nature of a commute seems to be the perfect place to prepare myself to a day of striving for Justice. As I board the 47 bus at Lenox in Brookline I am surrounded by the “those who haves” just on south side of the BU bridge. When I depart the bus at Washington Street opposite Ruggles it feels like I am in a different world. From the well manicured lawns of Brookline to the Abandoned lots and discount stores of Dudley Square, it is hard to believe that these two places are just 2.1 miles away from each other.</span></p> <p class="Body"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">The Bus ride provides me with 30 minutes of time where i have no immediate task. A perfect opportunity for prayer and people watching. As i leave the house in the morning I play on my ipod</span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">“A Prayer of Desmond Tutu.” </span></span></p> <p class="Body"><o:p><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> </span></span></o:p></p> <p class="Body"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Goodness is stronger than evil</span></span></p> <p class="Body"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Love is stronger than hate</span></span></p> <p class="Body"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Light is stronger than darkness</span></span></p> <p class="Body"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Life is stronger than death</span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> </span></span></p> <p class="Body"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Victory is OURS through him who loves us</span></span></p> <p class="Body"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">This has become my centering prayer throughout the day. It reminds me that we can win this fight and bring the kingdom of God through those stronger ideas. We live in a world that is dominated by the ideas of hate, darkness, and death. The duty of the church is to love, show light, and value life, in all forms.</span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:arial;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">As i see the population change from the med students and doctors when I get on the bus to a dramatically different population as I disembark, I let that time be a time of reflection on the work I am about to do to further the cause of Justice in the world.</span></span><span style="font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-Times New Roman";font-family:";font-size:10.0pt;color:windowtext;"><o:p></o:p></span></p> <!--EndFragment-->William Templehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10770894228681506010noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5074520665339282909.post-73959883525451781512010-10-06T05:31:00.000-07:002010-10-06T05:34:58.688-07:00Closing Thoughts on Arizona, Jesus, Democracy<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; border-collapse: collapse; "><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; border-collapse: collapse; ">Submitted by Caroline Hunter on Tuesday, October 5, 2010</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family: arial, sans-serif; font-size: 13px; border-collapse: collapse; "><br /></span></div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">In Massachusetts, it’s always been clear to me: Jesus was a Democrat. He often used flowery language and parables instead of giving direct answers. He was a neighborhood guy, but didn’t make promises about bringing about new prosperity. He rarely, if ever, had sex and constantly pointed out people’s hypocrisy. He was an </span><a href="http://www.7streets.com/republican-jesus.jpg" target="_blank" style="color: rgb(42, 93, 176); "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Irish Catholic Democrat, to be sure</span></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">.<br /><br />For the past week, I’ve been in Arizona registering voters in preparation for the first big election since the state’s infamous</span><a href="http://www.azleg.gov/legtext/49leg/2r/bills/sb1070p.htm" target="_blank" style="color: rgb(42, 93, 176); "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">SB1070 </span></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">legislation was written. What a wildly, wonderfully different place!<br /><br />Arizona is one-third Democratic, one-third Republican and the last third is Independent. After speaking to hundreds of people every day here for over a week, I’ve come to see that politics can be more than the cartoon I've come to see it as. Newt Gingrich isn’t just the guy with a squinty face spewing ignorant values into the public sphere; neither is Barack Obama the captain of a ship headed toward financial stability and national dignity. I am not an audience for either of them.<br /><br />I am a person out in 100-plus degree weather working to get people to care about a political system of which I can't grasp a definition yet. Alongside my team of </span><a href="http://www.promiseaz.org/" target="_blank" style="color: rgb(42, 93, 176); "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">PromiseArizona</span></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> colleagues, I am trying to figure out if I’m a narcissistic do-gooder with a political agenda that I refuse to expose even to myself; or if I am more akin to Glenn Beck, a man so sincere in bereaved, irate confusion that he spreads it to the otherwise-logical. From within the Catholic and academic hierarchies I've grown up in in Massachusetts, his apparent intellectual humility can be a relief; Glenn claims to not even </span><a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/03/magazine/03beck-t.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=being%20glenn%20beck&st=cse" target="_blank" style="color: rgb(42, 93, 176); "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">know what he's going to say before he says it.</span></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><br /><br />No, I don’t want to be an </span><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_Idiot" target="_blank" style="color: rgb(42, 93, 176); "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">American Idiot</span></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">, but I’m not sure anymore what defines one. Or if I want to participate in an American politics that can’t function without someone being pinned as one type of donkey or another.<br /><br />I feel closer to Jesus this week because I’ve been getting a tan and getting my feet dirty on the ground here in Arizona. I feel more American in that I’m finding ways to reinvent myself in an environment different from what I have known.<br /><br />Maybe those feelings are the same one. Maybe not. I only care about the people I’ll meet tomorrow, and with whom I’ll vote on November 2.</span></span>William Templehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10770894228681506010noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5074520665339282909.post-17523764749268903342010-10-06T05:21:00.000-07:002010-10-06T05:31:09.713-07:00News from MIT: The Challenge We Face<!--StartFragment--> <p class="MsoNormal">Submitted by Mary Beth Mills-Curran, Friday, October 1, 2010.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">One of the largest challenges we face, at the MIT, site is trying to create sustainable, collective action, rather than just short-term service.</span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"> </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">This challenge also offers a large potential pay-off.</span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"> </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">We have struggled to figure out how we can engage the 70 people that committed to us last year in real collective action.</span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"> </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">It would probably have been easier for us to just plug into an existing organization, but none of them really had the collective community perspective that we wanted to develop.</span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"> </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">In addition, if all of the people who committed 1% of their time to Hope in Action were to turn out, we would overwhelm any single community partner.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><b><span lang="EN-GB"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">Why Area IV?<o:p></o:p></span></span></b></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">Area IV is the neighbourhood that lies between MIT and Central Square.</span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"> </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">It is not only MIT’s immediate neighbour, but it also is possibly the most underserved community in Cambridge.</span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"> </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">It is home to a vibrant immigrant population, mostly from the Caribbean, but also from Côte d’Ivoire.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><b><span lang="EN-GB"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">Our Strategy</span></span></b></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">As I see it, our work has two main components, which may be served by the same activities, but have different goals. The first is to honour the commitments we made last year.</span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"> </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">The second is the use</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt"><i><span lang="EN-GB"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">Last year’s time commitments</span></span></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">In order to give the people who commitments of time last year, we want to provide a number of “plug-in” service opportunities.</span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"> </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">This will probably consist primarily of encouraging them to become regular volunteers at non-profit organizations at work in Area IV.</span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"> </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">The main drawback of this is that we feel that it does not adequately satisfy our desire to engage in </span><b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">collective</span></b><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"> action.</span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"> </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">It is, however, probably the best thing we can do at this stage in our development.</span></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt"><i><span lang="EN-GB"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">Making our work collective</span></span></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt"><span lang="EN-GB"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">In order to make our work more genuinely an expression of collective action, we want to add several types of community building events. </span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"> </span></span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt"></p><ol><li> <span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Occasional large group service events possibly incorporating an environmental </span><span class="Apple-tab-span" style="white-space: pre; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">perspective.</span></li><li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Social Events--among MIT members of Hope in Action, and with both MIT and Area IV residents</span></li><li><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Lectures, forums, films, or other more reflective/awareness-raising types of events </span></li></ol><p></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt"><span lang="EN-GB"><o:p><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"> </span></o:p></span></p> <p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom:0in;margin-bottom:.0001pt"><i><span lang="EN-GB"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">Moving forward to real collective action</span></span></i></p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span lang="EN-GB"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">The main work of this year’s campaign will be to figure out how we can take these relationships that we have built and transform them into collective action.</span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"> </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">In that vein, it seems like it will make sense to try to have a few members of the leadership team engaged in listening in the Area IV community.</span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"> </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">We spent last year listening at MIT, but now we need to listen in the community that we wish to serve.</span><span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"> </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;">So for a while I guess we will just be showing up at events in Area IV and meeting people.</span></span></p> <!--EndFragment-->William Templehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10770894228681506010noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5074520665339282909.post-24279946210433798672010-09-27T10:19:00.000-07:002010-09-27T10:31:16.864-07:00On the Justice Trail in Arizona, Part 2<span class="Apple-style-span" style=" border-collapse: collapse; font-family:arial, sans-serif;font-size:13px;"><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style=" border-collapse: collapse; font-family:arial, sans-serif;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Written by Ben Whaley, Sunday, September 26</span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px; ">Tucson feels different than Phoenix. First of all, it's a college town. Secondly, even though it's much closer to the border, it feels removed from the political hotbed that is Maricopa County, AZ. </span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px; "><br /></span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px; ">I can honestly say I attended more college-football related events in the last 48 hours than I did in the whole of my university career. Yesterday our team of volunteers hit the University of Arizona campus HARD. We registered voters at an ethics forum in the morning (did you know the AZ legislature is trying to cut the funding of ethnic-studies programs across the state.. and at the same time claim they're not racist?), we swarmed the UofA food court, we went to the tailgating, and we hit the post-game crowd at the local college-bar strip. I bet I registered a couple students last night that didn't remember getting registered this morning...</span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px; "><br /></span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px; ">In all that chaos, it's easy to feel like this is just a numbers-game. It is, really, a numbers-game. Staying connected to our motivation is more difficult here. In Phoenix it felt like the challenge was right in front of us. Here, there are seas of apathetic students. Tonight, we went to a park and for the first time registered a high concentration of picnicking Latinos. It was great to see large families out enjoying the relatively cool evening, and it felt good that even though many of them told us they were undocumented and couldn't vote they were still excited and happy that we were out specifically targeting the Latinos that could vote. It was good to feel connected to the warmth of the Latino community that I fell in love with in Salem... the warmth that led to my desire to come to Arizona.</span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px; "><br /></span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px; ">On the note of folks just flat out telling us they're undocumented... I'm surprised at how many of them actually do just come out and say it. I suppose we're not the most intimidating bunch (a gringo chico speaking terrible spanish, a UCC minister in a collar, a soft-spoken Philipino, and a young woman with the heart and soul of a teacher) but I'm still curious about what brings people to be so open with that information. I imagine, with all the danger of crossing the desert, and the added danger </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px; ">of living in such a threatening community, being undocumented is something to celebrate indeed.</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px; "><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px; ">The word mojado - or wetback, a colloquial slur for someone who swam across the Rio Grande to get into the US - is sort of a joke when uttered on friendly lips. But tonight, Cornelio taught us another reason. </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px; ">He approached one man to ask if he was interested in registering to vote, and the man informed him, "No, I can't, I'm a mojado." </span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px; ">"Yo tambien," Cornelio replied, "Porque estoy sudando." 'Me too,' he said, 'because I'm sweating.' </span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px; "><br />It's true. In this desert, todos estamos mojados.</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px; "><br /></span></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:100%;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: 13px;"><br /></span></span></div></span>William Templehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10770894228681506010noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5074520665339282909.post-28979253469032562212010-09-27T10:17:00.000-07:002010-09-27T10:26:23.929-07:00On the Justice Trail in Arizona, Part 1<span class="Apple-style-span" style=" border-collapse: collapse; font-family:arial, sans-serif;font-size:13px;"><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Written by Ben Whaley, Friday, September 24<br /><br /></span><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">It’s no wonder tempers seem to flare so easily around issues here in Arizona. It’s hot. It’s hard to say anything else about my first impressions of Arizona. But have you ever heard the expression “where there’s smoke there’s fire”? I can tell you here it feels more like.. where there’s heat there’s fire. More than fire, an explosion.</span><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">The logo of Promise Arizona (PAZ, the organization with which I'm volunteering to register voters in AZ) is a dove rising phoenix-like out of flame to symbolize the justice that will come after the struggle for immigrant’s rights here. But it's very clear to me that we're still in the flame.</span></span></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="margin-top: 0px; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; "><span class="Apple-style-span"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><br /></span></span></p></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Yesterday started early and brightly. As soon as we arrived, we were hooked up with Michelle (a fellow Boston-er) who's working on coordinating out of state volunteers for PAZ. Michelle has Boston connections to MIRA (</span><cite><span class="Apple-style-span" style="border-collapse: separate; font-family:arial;"><a href="http://www.miracoalition.org/"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">www.miracoalition.org</span></a></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">) </span></cite><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">and SIM (</span><cite><a href="http://www.simforus.com/" target="_blank" style="color: rgb(42, 93, 176); "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">www.simforus.com</span></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">) </span></cite><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">and knows the Massachusetts Immigration Rights scene well, so when I get back to Boston I'll definitely be emailing her for some perspective. She took us to lunch, we shared our stories of self, and then we got to work registering students to vote at a local community college. We had an awesome afternoon, registering votes at a ridiculously high rate (they tell you to shoot for getting one an hour and we got 8 in a half hour).</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><br />As the day died down at the community college (and after we were asked to leave by the friendly police officers), we headed to Ranch Market which is a supermarket chain in Phoenix. All the Ranch Markets have given permission for PAZ to come register voters in their stores, and it was soon clear why: 75% of their clients were Latino. They have a vested financial interest in immigrants staying in AZ.<br /><br /></span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">This is when the day finally felt real, when the people we were registering began to take shape in my eyes. Many people I approached with my question "Excuse me, con permiso, are you registered to vote?" smiled and responded, happy that I was out doing this work. Many others showed wide eyes and shared nervous glances with their companions at being approached by a gringo with a clipboard. Their fear made me feel guilty - guilty for startling them, guilty for being a part and product of this country that is terrorizing them.</span></div><div><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><br />Others, still, seemed defiant of the state's new laws. I approached one woman and her daughter and when I asked, in my broken Spanish, if she was registered to vote, she laughed and fired something in rapid Spanish to her daughter. I didn't understand it, but the daughter told me "She can't."<br />"No problem," I said, "Someday soon I hope." The girl relayed this to her mother, who laughed again - a full, deep laugh - and said something else I didn't quite catch to her daughter, who looked hesitant.<br />"Dile, dile" the mother said, 'tell him, tell him.'<br />Finally the daughter said, a little sheepishly, "She says she's a wetback." We all laughed together for a long time right there in the aisle.<br />And then I said "Well... Bienvenidas."<br /><br />Today, the work has been more difficult. We're told that Fridays are always hard days for voter registration campaigns, but I think we're all still feeling a little disappointed. We've been invited to leave a movie theatre and a grocery store. We went to a football game that wasn't actually happening. We tried a community college that was deserted on a Friday afternoon.<br /><br />Voter Registration is not glamorous work. It's guesswork and luck and perseverance, so far, but it's also rewarding. Every completed form feels like a mini victory. Every new vote is a voice that wasn't being heard before. I only regret that there are so many voices that will not be heard in the election, voices that are proud and warm. But, like the woman in the supermarket, I have hope that if those voices are persistent they will one day be heard. And when they do speak, I hope this country gets to enjoy a long deep laugh in the supermarket aisle, a release after so much fighting and tension.<br /><br /><span style="display: inline; "></span></span><i><span style="display: inline; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">"Come, let us return to the Lord; for it is he who has torn, and he will heal us; he has struck down, and he will bind us up.</span></span><span style="display: inline; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> After two days he will revive us; on the third day he will raise us up, that we may live before him. </span></span><span style="display: inline; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"> Let us know, let us press on to know the Lord; his going forth is as certain the dawn; he will come to us like the showers, like the spring rains that water the earth." </span></span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><span style="display: inline; "></span></span></i><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;"><br /></span><span style="display: inline; "><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size: small;">Hosea 6:1-3 </span></span><br /></div></span>William Templehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10770894228681506010noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5074520665339282909.post-25219974717010156062010-09-27T08:21:00.000-07:002010-09-27T08:24:56.055-07:00A First Encounter with the Enneagram<!--StartFragment--> <p class="MsoNormal">Submitted by Laura Zeugner, September 24, 201</p><p class="MsoNormal">This past week in training, the Life Together program delved into the complex world of personality typing. We spent time with the Enneagram, getting to better know ourselves and our community members, and ultimately putting this knowledge to use through type- specific spiritual practices. </p> <p class="MsoNormal">As a lover of personality tests, I was excited to begin working with the Enneagram’s 9 types of being. I quickly identified my type as well as a few of my peers’ types. But for some this was a difficult process- there were many who identified with multiple types or with none at all. I am sure there are still also those in our group who doubt the Enneagram’s accuracy or importance. </p> <p class="MsoNormal">I, however, immediately saw the attributes of my type at work within myself and could easily relate them to my spirituality. As a type 4, or Individualist, I am ruled by my emotions and value identity and personal significance above all else. At my healthiest, I can be seen as imaginative, creative, and unique. At my worst I become filled with emotional turmoil and can turn to self-indulgence or self-harm.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-tab-count:1"> </span>It has always been easy for me to believe in God, perhaps because I live in my heart and not in my mind, like some of the other Enneagram types. Once I had an emotional experience of spirituality, I did not question or over-think it, but embraced it and refused to believe that something I felt so strongly could not be real or true. It is also easy to understand that, as a type 4, some of the biggest questions I have for God involve my own personal call. And as for my spiritual downfalls, they often fall into the categories of self-indulgence or moodiness and melancholy.</p> <p class="MsoNormal"><span style="mso-tab-count:1"> </span>Our work with the Enneagram has been extremely eye-opening for me. Not only in regards to my own personality and spiritual journey, but for the whole community’s. It’s fascinating to watch other types discover their deepest motivations and fears, and see how these present themselves in their beliefs. I plan on continuing to research my type and to use the Enneagram to help strengthen my relationship with God. </p> <!--EndFragment-->William Templehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10770894228681506010noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5074520665339282909.post-79792845280438946322010-09-21T07:47:00.000-07:002010-09-21T08:02:10.634-07:00Remembering 9/11 along the Jesus Way<!--StartFragment--> <p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent:.5in;line-height:200%"><span style="font-family:Georgia;color:#262626;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:'trebuchet ms';"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"></span></span></span></p><div>Submitted by Patrick Burrows, September 14, 2010</div><div><br /></div>This past Saturday was the ninth anniversary of the tragedy of September 11, 2001. Everyone remembers where they were when the news of the events in New York, Washington, D.C., and Pennsylvania came across the airwaves. I was sitting in Mrs. Bowman’s 8th grade English class when our principal made an announcement in a choked voice that still stands as the only time I witnessed her emotions. For the remainder of the day, the entire school stared at the television, transfixed by the horror that was happening too close to home. For my generation, this moment in time sits as a pivot: that moment when suddenly, everything changed. <div><br /><div> Last year, President Obama made a call to service in remembrance of 9/11 and of those who perished on that day. The Life Together program, in conjunction with the Episcopal Diocese of Massachusetts, organized its second annual day of service stemming from this call. We came to serve alongside our brothers and sisters from across Eastern Massachusetts, both inside and outside of the Church. Service in this way struck me as an act of radical protest. By serving, we protest against the violence and hatred of that day with humility and love–the opposite virtues–rather than with violence and hatred as some are wont to do. This is what Christianity is about: Love in the face of hatred and fear.</div><div><br /></div><div> I had the privilege on Friday night of travelling with another intern to St. Stephen’s, Lynn to watch the premiere of the youth group’s short film, “I am Lynn”, which many of you will have the opportunity to see at Diocesan Convention in November. In it, I heard the youth of St. Stephen’s recount stories of violence and fear from their past that shook me to my very core. But the striking thing was not the fear, but the fact that these youth were able to stand up in the face of these horrific moments and show compassion, not only towards the people around them, but also on themselves as witnesses, survivors, or perpetrators. Though they would likely be hesitant to view it this way, the love I witnessed in these youth who have so much slated against them blew me away. Rather than buckling to fear, they counter it with love. </div><div><br /></div><div>It strikes me, then, that three days after September 11, the Church celebrates the Feast of the Holy Cross. The collect of the day reads: “Almighty God, whose Son our Savior Jesus Christ was lifted high upon the cross that he might draw the whole world to himself…” quoting the Gospel according to St. John, 12:32. For first century denizens of the Roman Empire, the cross was the symbol of the most shameful, most horrifying way to die imaginable. But upon that cross, Jesus stretched forth his arms in a loving embrace, not bowing to the violence of that moment. And through that embrace, the symbol of the cross—once the incarnation of terror—has become the symbol of God’s saving act of love for us. </div><div><br /></div><div> This is the Jesus way: to stand boldly in the face of terror, violence, and hatred and proclaim peace, humility, and love.<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-indent:.5in;line-height:200%"><span style="font-family:Georgia;color:#262626;"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-family:'trebuchet ms';"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-size:small;"></span></span><o:p></o:p></span></p> <!--EndFragment--></div></div>William Templehttp://www.blogger.com/profile/10770894228681506010noreply@blogger.com0