Seeking Authentic Voice

There was a time when I said, that I only stayed in one profession for six years. I was a Technical Director of Dance Theater for six years. I was an interior designer for about six years. But, then I was a massage therapist for nine years. So, the six years thing wasn’t really accurate. Along the way I also moved often. Before Dan and I bought our first house I moved from one apartment to another every couple of years. Our first house was a little Chicago bungalow in Polish/Hispanic neighborhood. I adored that little house. It’s where we lived when both of our kids were born. We bought it in 1987 and we sold it in 1994. Seven years in one house was a record for me. The next. Several years were bumpy, moving several times to one place at seminary and then another, and then to one place after seminary and then another. It wasn’t until 2001 that we settled down again. This was for my first church as a rector. We lived there and I served that parish until 2008. So that was another seven y...

I am prone to waking up with ear worms. Sometimes I have no idea where the song has come from. But lately, because I have a two year old grand daughter, I wake up with songs like “Elmo’s World” or “When you learn something you new you do the happy dance.” But this morning I work with a song in my head and I knew exactly why it was there - it’s the ever of Pentecost and we’ve come here today to witness and celebrate the ordination of Anthony and Mitch: Breathe on me breath of God, fill me with life anew, that I may love what thou does love, and do what thou wouldst do.  Like everyone who is ordained, these two have travelled a long journey. In this diocese that means going  through EYSJ, parish discernment, seminary, field education, and more, which has culminated in this day.  So now Anthony and Mitch have completed seminary and are ready for this big day. if their seminary formation was anything like mine, they learned a whole new language, church lang...

Over twenty four years ago I began a process of deep listening to God. I had a volunteer ministry in a hospital offering massages to parents of sick children. Being a licensed massage therapist was prayerful, profound work for me, that took me to places of deep listening. I listened to people. I listened to God. I listened to myself. Eventually I discerned from all this listening that I needed to do more. So I entered a dual degree program to acquire a Masters of Divinity and a Masters of Social Work, intending to be a hospital chaplain providing opportunities to guide people into deep healing of mind, body, and spirit. I had not yet decided if I was going to do this as an ordained person, that came later. It was difficult to listen to God and discern if I was called to the priesthood when I was already in seminary, surrounded by people who had already made that decision and had it affirmed by the lay committees, diocesan committees, and Bishops. Eventually I did make that decision an...

This day, seventeen years ago, I was ordained to the transitional diaconate in the Episcopal Church. That year the church had transferred the Feast of St. John, which in my estimation was better than a feast day of martyrs. I had graduated from Seabury Western Theological Seminary AND Loyola's Graduate School of Social Work with a dual degree M.Div/MSW. This seemed to me to be no small feat because my undergraduate degree was not "academic," whereas the M.Div was sophisticated education in true Episcopal style and the MSW was gridlocked in accreditation requirements. I was naive entering into this dual degree program and faced a huge learning curve to rise to the challenge of writing at the level required to earn these degrees. To say that my professors were generous in their understanding of each student's life experience and grading accordingly, is to be grateful that these institutions appreciated diversity on many levels. My BA was in dance, a special major,  ...

In a little over a week, on December 28, it will be my 17th anniversary of ordination (transitional diaconate, priest on June 28) in the Episcopal Church. That cold December night I gathered with many of my friends and family in a dark church lit with candles, flaming the hope I felt inside. I remember trying to vest, putting on a pink long sleeved clergy blouse and having no idea how to use the collar stays. I put the stays in backward, so the more pointed end was against my skin. I had so much to learn, despite four years of advance college education to acquire a dual degree, Mdiv/MSW, with an emphasis on Family Systems for Congregations. But on that night I wasn't thinking about the challenges that would come, I was only thinking about the hurdles I'd jumped so far and where I'd finally landed. I was in a church I loved surrounded by people I loved and filled with hope for the future. The first few years were mostly good, albeit challenging to learn how to preach and p...

In the summer of 1974 I was seventeen years old and preparing to start college in the fall. My family had left the Mormon Church, the church of my ancestors and my childhood, when I was fifteen. I had no desire or intention of ever returning to an institutional church. Therefore I had no idea of what transpired in a church in Philadelphia on July 29th  when Bishops in the Episcopal Church ordained, out of order, eleven women to the priesthood. Although the church did not specifically deny women ordination, neither did it endorse women’s ordination to the priesthood. That endorsement came several years later at General Convention. Then I had never even heard of the Episcopal Church, let alone ever considered what it would take to be ordained in the church. Twenty years later I was an active member of the Episcopal Church, having found my way back to the institution in 1989. My husband and I bought our first house in a little neighborhood on the Northwest side of Chicago. Nearby was a li...

Thirteen years ago, on December 28th I was ordained a transitional deacon in the Episcopal Church. (Six months later, on June 28th, to the priesthood). That year the feast of St. John the Evangelist was transferred to December 28, supplanting the usual feast day of Holy Innocents (the day honoring the children killed by Herod - according to scripture- in his vain attempt to rid the world of the Christ-child). I much preferred the idea of an ordination on the feast of St. John. It was however the end of the 20th century, one of the last days of 1999. We all wondered what was going to happen when 2000 rolled in a few nights later. Would computers stop working? Would the stock market crash? Would the apocalypse come? Thirteen years is not a very long time to be ordained. In some ways it still feels so fresh and new. Just like in some ways I still feel twenty-something instead of nearly fifty-six. I think that's a good thing. I don't want my ministry to feel stale and old, tired...

Eleven years ago today, on the Feast of St. John (transferred that year to Dec. 28), I was ordained to the "Transitional Diaconate" in the Episcopal Church. (Transitional deacons are those who are called to the priesthood but spend six months to a year serving as transitional deacons, learning about ordained minstry, prior to ordination to the priesthood. Vocational deacons are those whose ministry will be the diaconate.) That night I stood on the chancel steps of the church where my family and I had worship for ten years. The same steps I stood on when the Bishop confirmed me into the Episcopal Church in the fall of 1990. The same church where my son was baptized. The same church where, after sixteen years away from formal Christian worship and faith, I found my way home. A church filled with memories, some of which I reflected upon when I preached there on Oct. 31, 2010 . Like this year it was cold and snowy. The church was decorated in all the grandeur of Christmas cel...