Seeking Authentic Voice

On my sixteenth birthday I came home from high school to find a bouquet of long stemmed blue iris’s, a gift from parents. My birthday falls in February, one of the bleakest months of the year, when fresh flowers are an especially delightful reminder of the warmer weather to come. During the long season of Lent the church was void of fresh flowers. Instead we had dried sunflowers in muted browns and tan colors, and bare branches, rocks and ashes, stark symbols of winter and the spiritual journey of a season intentionally focused on our broken human nature, of the need for forgiving others and being forgiven ourselves.  Now the space is once again filled with flowers, in such an abundance that I have to use Flonase just to be in this room. Potted tulips, hydrangeas, hyacinths, daffodils, and lilies. They fill the altar space and the transept, overflowing from altar to step, down to the font. It is a heady sight. One church I served use to plant the bulbs left over from these...

One sunny afternoon in 1987 I found myself having lunch with my boss, who was the owner of an interior design firm, and his clients, Maria Tall Chief Paschen and her husband Buddy. A dance major in college, I was thrilled, and a little intimidated to have lunch with this prima ballerina. I don’t remember much from that lunch, and I’m sure I said very little. However the topic of dance must have come up because I recall her comparing modern dance and ballet saying, in what I perceived as a condescending tone, that ballet was a much more sophisticated form of dance than those moderns “danced in their bare feet”. If Maria were still alive she’d probably be aghast that many modern ballerina’s now perform in the traditional ballet pointe shoes as well as in bare feet.  I have always loved being barefoot. Maybe it’s the result of growing up in the west, where everything is more informal? I recall spending all day outside, usually barefoot, climbing trees and running through fields a...

In a small town where life has been the same for 100 years, a war is about to break out between the tranquility of tradition and the fear of change. A power struggle ensues between acts of compassion and hospitality and a fierce adherence to protocol.  The shock of something  new, the excitement of letting go of what have become meaningless “rules for life”, the dangers of denying people joy and the consequences of intolerance are aroused by a chocolatier’s delectable sweets in the movie CHOCOLAT. At the heart of the story in CHOCOLAT is a gypsy-like woman named Vianne born with special powers. Vianne arrives as a mysterious outsider to the French village of Lansquenet where she opens a chocolate shop offering candy and beverages that can cure lost hopes and awaken long deprived emotions. Vianne's effect, and the impact of her chocolate, is immediate and extraordinary: the elderly find themselves recalling young love, troubled couples regain their spark, sniping neighbors...

Being There, a movie from 1979 starring Peter Sellers, tells the story of Chance, the gardener. Chance grew up secluded in a house in Washington DC the apparent offspring of a very wealthy eccentric named Jennings. Chance’s life is simple and routine. He’s allowed to garden in the small plot in the walled-in backyard, and dressed in expensive handmade suits. His only knowledge of the outside world comes from watching television. But when Jennings dies, and no provisions were made for Chance, the housekeeper is fired, Chance is evicted, and the house is sold. Chance walks out of the house for the first time in his life and encounters a street gang, which he tries to make go away with a remote control TV changer, and then, after a freak accident ends up in the home of a wealthy but dying industrialist and his wife, played by Shirley McLaine.  McLaine’s character misunderstands him when he says his name is Chance, the Gardner, she thinks he says Chauncey Gardner. Over time the ch...

Our young children in the Prayer Room are learning about chocolate for the season of Lent using a curriculum called “No Chocolate Know Chocolate”. They are learning about how chocolate is made, beginning with cacao pods through the harvesting and production of chocolate, as a metaphor for how people grow in their faith as Christians. For example, did you know that cacao trees require very special growing conditions?  A cacao tree can only develop within twenty degrees of the equator in rainforests. It needs a place that is warm and moist, with a canopy of leaves to provide the tender plant some shade and protection.The cacao tree blossoms all year long, not just in certain seasons. And the blossoms can occur any place on the tree—usually the flowers are directly attached to the trunk - not the end of branches like other seeds. Flying all around the blooms are tiny midge flies that pollinate the blossoms so that they can grow into football-shaped pods the size of pineapples...

Do you recognize any of these wrappers? [Hold up empty chocolate wrappers.] Too bad these are empty! Is one of these a favorite of yours? [Allow suggestions of favorites.] Have you ever heard anyone say that he or she plans to give up something for Lent? Maybe something like chocolate?  Giving up something we find tempting—especially chocolate—serves as a tool to help focus our minds and hearts during the season of Lent. Every time we crave whatever we have given up we are reminded that its Lent. Whether we give in to the craving or not, the practice is intended to be a trigger to focus on the real point of Lent, growing our relationship with God, with ourselves, and with others; growing deeper in our faith and growing as Christians. During this Lenten season, I want to suggest a different way to prepare for Easter. Instead of NO – N-O—chocolate for Lent, how about KNOW – K–N–O–W—chocolate for Lent? This is the curriculum our youngest children in the Prayer Room ar...

When I was in seminary and the members of my class were preparing for ordination there was a Greek term, Ontological, that we talked about a lot. Ontology means the study of “being,” the study of who one is, at one’s most fundamental core self. The conversations we had involved what was going to happen to us, ontologically, when we were ordained? If ordination is a particular calling forth of the Holy Spirit making one a priest, and that once ordained one could never be unordained, did that not mean that one was changed, fundamentally, at one’s core self? Many wondered if they would actually feel changed. Most were sad to report that following ordination they felt no different from the day before. I have to say that the dominant feeling that I have had since being ordained a priest is an acute awareness that I am always a priest. It’s not the collar that makes me a priest nor the vestments. Regardless of where I am, what I am wearing, or what I am doing, I am a priest. It calls me up ...