New Directions, Light in the Darkness

I am not the leader of one of the historic mainline Protestant denominations. That is likely a very good thing. But I am an ordained Presbyterian minister and a hospital Chaplain in Behavioral Health for over two decades. I listen to people for a living. I listen with an ear to truly, deeply understanding their pain and, with close attention, to the whispers and movements of the Holy Spirit in their hearts and in their living.

I know that the great majority of the people I see are deeply longing to be lifted out of despair and anxiety, they are longing for a reliable voice of hope in the dark, wilderness of these difficult and confusing days. More and more, I listen to people who cannot hear or identify that voice in the mainline Protestant Churches. Often, they would like to but even if they hear a word of hope and grace, of forgiveness and compassionate direction, they fear, based on strong experience, they cannot trust the actions of the leaders and the people to be follow suit.

We church people are quick to defend that among leadership and the people, Christ calls and gathers sinners and the broken. That is most certainly true, I am a huge sinner and quite broken—as are we all. But defenses, especially, those often practiced and employed, prevent our growth toward deeper and more authentic union with Christ. The more we practice them, the more the relieve us of our faithful responsibility of inviting the Holy Spirit to heal and grow our hearts and communities of faith beyond the boundaries of our broken-sinfulness into deeper and more authentic union with Christ. Jesus is the way the truth and the life (John 14). To know Jesus’ truth, to grow closer to God, to live our great mission of participating in bring about God’s Kingdom in this world, we cannot hide from our own sin and brokenness—our own truth.

Mainline Protestants leaders, local pastors and congregations now have an amazing invitation to stand on a national and world stage (pulpit) proclaiming the truth of the heart of the Gospel before the mania, mayhem and message of Donald Trump’s run for President of the United States.   

In my email I have received statements by two of the major Protestant Denominations denouncing Trump’s latest statements about banning our Muslim sisters and brothers from our nation founded on religious freedom. It seems opportune for the leadership of these denominations, and all others, to take a more public and united stand. And, it seems well for the rest of us, clergy and lay, to follow suit from the pulpit, in adult and youth/children’s education, around the water cooler, board room table and on the 19^th hole to do the same.

Based on what I hear from people who are honestly, and in earnest, seeking places of spiritual, communal and social compassion and integrity to call home, such a prayerful, public, faith-filled commitment to concerted action might be a good way to witness being Church in new way for this new mullein. Witnessing our faith in Christ with the integrity of our actions such that the people trapped in the land of deep darkness can see the shining light of Christ (Is. 9).  Jesus is the way, the truth and the light….

PCUSA:
https://www.pcusa.org/news/2015/10/2/clerk-issues-letter-trump-refugees-immigrants/

United Church of Christ: http://www.globalministries.org/ucc_doc_statement_on_vilification_of_muslims

Baptist:  http://www.abc-usa.org/2015/12/08/general-secretary-addresses-recent-attacks/ 

We Commit Togeather to be the Church in Service to the World

Commitment Sunday at the First Presbyterian Church of Lake Forest, Lake Forest, IL.

 

 

How will we run the race that is before us?

 

 

 

Together as the Church of love and service to the world.

Amen.

Prayer for the Leadership of all the Churches

 

I was talking with a friend about the very public troubles his denomination is having—public to the level of the NYT. And, here is what I heard myself hoping for him and his family and all those he loves in his church, and for the leadership of his church: “I hope the people who are really driving all of this behind the scenes are those who love Jesus and your church the most. They are the hope of your children and your grandchildren.” And, they are the hope of witnessing Jesus to the world.

 Then there was some very internal trouble in my denomination where opinions have been hot and heavy. And, I found myself praying that my church, the PCUSA, and for all churches which are going through so much change and turmoil at this time, that those who are really driving things behind the scenes are those who love Jesus and your church the most. They are the hope of our children and our grandchildren.  And, they are the hope of Christ’s witness of grace, blessing and forgiveness to all the hurting, longing, suffering, lonely hearts throughout the world. Amen.

Perhaps There Were Two Services of Ordination?

“Before I formed you in the womb I knew you, and before you were born I consecrated you…” (Jeremiah 1:5a)

“Then the king will say to those at his right hand, ‘Come, you that are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world; for I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, was naked and you gave me clothing, I was sick and you took care of me, I was in prison and you visited me.’

“And the king will answer them, ‘Truly I tell you, just as you did it to one of the least of these who are members of my family,           you did it to me.’”(Matthew 25: 34-36, 40)

God calls each of us across the lifespan through hundreds of thousands of movements and experiences, joys and struggles, in the places and, most importantly, in the people that mark our lives.

None can hear and respond to God’s calling without being changes and inspired, challenges and formed, confronted and encouraged.

Such is the media through which the Holy Spirit speaks, the holy mingling of God’s grace with the stuff of our everyday living; the alchemy God’s Calling, the mystery of our truest knowing our own deepest gladness meeting the greatest hungers of our world.

In putting together my service of ordination, I prayed to keep my heart open to the leading of the Holy Spirit. And, I kept central in my thought my work among the longing, anxious, grieving hearts who come to the hospital, where I am Chaplain specializing in mental health and perinatal bereavement, to find health, hope and healing for their living.   

The service, celebrated on All Saints Day, was dedicated to the glory of God’s Calling in all our lives, and to my parents, William and Frances Symonds, raised among the Saints Eternal over three decades. By God’s good grace, the service somehow wove together a the President of a Lutheran (ELCA) congregation—the most holy man I know; my Jesuit Spiritual Director of 15 years; dear noble friends, a Buddhist Bhikkhuni and Bhante; a reformation hearted Mormon Bishop friend and coworker; Presbyterians of every sort and station; all leaning upon the good and solid bones of traditional Reformed worship and the great and classic hymns of the Church.

As I was driving to my beautiful and blessed service of ordination my mobile rang. Could I come see a woman whose baby died a while back?  On that same drive, a text message from a friend, could I recommend a therapist for a family member? The following day, a phone call from an old friend I haven’t seen in years who I had invited to the service, could I recommend an inpatient treatment facility?

Then on Tuesday, there was a beautiful email from a friend that had traveled with his wife from Chicago to attend my ordination service. Attached was a script of a one-man play wrote, and performed on Monday, about the real-life journey in faith and prayer, healing and friendship of the past 28 months of his beloved wife’s journey with stage-4 cancer. The play celebrates the fact that she is now cancer free; it celebrates in his gratitude to God and the rich tapestry of blessed prayers from friends representing more religions than the Parliament of Word Religions that he credits for her healing. The conclusion of the play, my friend wrote, was inspired by my blessed and beautiful service.

We are all members of God’s family. I am left wondering, if there were not two beautiful and blessed celebrations of my ordination last week: one in the Church which ordained me to Ministry of Word and Sacrament, Teaching Elder and one in the world where the mystery of my truest knowing and my own deepest gladness kept meeting up with the greatest hungers of our world.

Dementia: In Life and In Death We Belong to God

 

One of the beautiful ordination gifts from my magnificent sisters and brothers in Christ at Presbyterian Church of Barrington was a copy of John Swinton’s Dementia: Living in the Memories of God.  Perhaps the adjective “beautiful” strikes some as odd or gratuitous in relationship to a book on dementia, perhaps some have wondered if it wasn’t all together a bit of an odd gift to begin with for such a joyous occasion.

Swinton is an ordained minister in the Church of Scotland and a RN with decades of experience in mental health nursing, also an ambitious researcher and a prolific author.  He was a keynote at the University of Chicago Conference on Medicine and Religion when I presented there several years ago. About 5 minutes into his presentation I developed a deep and enduring intellectual crush.

When I did my second Clinical Pastoral Care (CPE) internship at the Colorado State Psychiatric Hospital, back in the “bad ol’ days” before dedicated memory care units, those who suffered most with the indignities of dementia in its most combative and assaultive forms were consigned until death to the Geriatric Forensic Ward.   My learning struggles that summer would bring me to know, deep in the marrow of my bones, the existential fallacy of Descartes.  We, who are created in the image of God, are so much more than our thoughts. Swinton reminds every one of us of abiding holy truth of our species: though we may forget—our family, our friends, our surroundings, to feed ourselves, even to know ourselves—God never forgets us.

 

Swinton asks us, among many things, to consider (I’d say in prayer and discernment) the final line of the tender and grief riddled poem Dietrich Bonhoeffer wrote in his Nazi prison cell: “Whoever I am, Thou knowest, “God, I am Thine.” When we forget all that we know of ourselves and our world we are never forgotten. We are always known by the One who gave us life. As Presbyterians we affirm this deep and transcendent truth of our living in the Brief Statement of Faith: “In life and in death we belong to God.” And, so I am grateful to proclaim and affirm with my sisters and brothers at PCB the final lines of that same Brief Statement of Faith, as we join togeather: “With believers in every time and place, we rejoice that nothing in life or in death can separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord. Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit. Amen.”

Ordaination in the PCUSA a Great Interfaith Celebration

God is in all things.

God calls us across the lifespan through hundreds of thousands of movements and experinces, joys ans struggles, in the places and, most importantly, with the people that mark our lives.

There was a bagpiper and  Buddhists, a  Jesuit, a Moderator and Stated Clerk. Teaching and Ruling Elders from four Presbyteries. If you know me, you wouldn't be surprised.

The Table was set, Jesus invites us --to share bread and wine, to discern the graceful presence of the Risen Lord in times of consolation and desolation ("thank you" Ignatius Loyola), to hear the Spirit's voice in "Scotland the Brave" and in the ancient sacred chants of Sri Lankan Buddhism, nestled in between the notes of a most beautiful rendition of “Precious Lord,” in the faithful prayer of my friend and colleague, a former Mormon Bishop, who every day witnesses for grace and hope in the midst of old outdated structures, and, in the coming together of people of deep and traditional faith with those who seek and doubt and object…. All to celebrate what God has done, is doing and will continue to do among us all. As Ignatius said, “God is in ALL things.” With all thanksgiving and gratitude to God. Amen.