Faith Story 6--Return to Corpus Christi

The second year we lived in New Jersey, CB was transferred back to Corpus Christi. Oddly, I’d been sent an application to the Walk to Emmaus in Corpus and had applied for a September Walk. Before we moved, I was sent notice that I was on the March Walk to Emmaus, which was when we were moving back. Four days after moving here, I went on that Walk. I did not experience any emotional highs (and even considered that "brainwashing" was going on!). Still, I found Methodism reinforced, and so we joined First United Methodist Church the next week. After this I see that God put me on fast-forward pace of growth in him. Although I left First United Methodist Church several years ago, I will always appreciate how God used that church and its people to nurture me along in my way.

Thanks to the Walk to Emmaus, I met someone who recommended the book, Celebration of Discipline: The Path to Spiritual Growth by Richard Foster. How I needed instruction about spiritual praxis! This book is a landmark in my spiritual life, because it taught me about ways to become more aware of the Holy, but even better, Foster’s notes and bibliography pointed me to books to read!! This is where I learned about Thomas Merton, Thomas Kelly, Soren Kierkegaard, Brother Lawrence, and saints of the ages. I really feel blessed to have begun my journey with such an ecumenical spiritual legacy. This kept me reading, especially because I always find new books from looking at the notes in the book I’m currently reading.

Looking back, I can see I was pretty much sleepwalking through life, unaware of many things, including my continued depressive state. Gradually, as my spiritual life increased, so did my inner awareness of anxiety and depression. I attended weekly Al-Anon meetings and saw a counselor, while I spiraled into deeper and deeper problems. I managed to stay afloat by walking six or more miles a day (starting at 4 am) and doing what I was supposed to do. By the time I was walking 12 miles a day and had lost 50 pounds, I was not able to cope anymore. Too many nights I stood in the bathroom with a razor blade at my wrists. I had sunk into depression so much that I thought my four children, even 5 year old MJ, would not miss me if I killed myself. I couldn’t pray, and I didn’t tell anyone about what I was thinking, because then they’d stop me.

An odd thing that I did on my extended walks was recite the first three Al-Anon steps and a prayer by John Donne that I’d found in Celebration of Discipline: “Batter my heart, three personed God—break me, blow me, burn me, make me new.” How I wanted to be God’s. And I don’t think I knew what I was praying for, because that’s what happened to me. I was broken through depression for years, but what happened then saved Chuck’s and my marriage, as well as helped us learn to parent our children. God is making me new, and God brought that prayer to me and guided me in praying it day after day. I can’t pray that prayer of Donne’s now, though God gives me others to pray, like the one in Virgin of Vladimir post, which I pray everyday. The way opens even if we don’t see it at the time.

It was very hard to see the way opening as I struggled with depression and was told to go to the hospital or I’d be committed by my counselor. So in August 1995 I spent five weeks at the Meadows Treatment Center in Arizona.

Poem

I have little to say today. So I am posting the poem for our Wisdom Class meditation tomorrow.

No, no, there is no going back.
Less and less you are
that possibility you were.
More and more you have become
those lives and deaths
that have belonged to you.
You have become a sort of grave
containing much that was
and is no more in time, beloved
then, now, and always.
And so you have become a sort of tree
standing over the grave.
Now more than ever you can be
generous toward each day
that comes, young, to disappear
forever, and yet remain
unaging in the mind.
Every day you have less reason
not to give yourself away.

~ Wendell Berry ~

Christian book review of Harry Potter

I found a review of the last Harry Potter book at Metacatholic that I really like. You should only read it if you have already read the book or won't ever read Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, because the entire plot, deaths and all, are analyzed in a Christian perspective. So go and read Cry God for Harry, if you don't mind the spoilers.

Good Links to the Universe!

For the past four weeks I've been teaching or talking about "God and the Universe" at an adult Sunday School class at First United Methodist Church, my former church home. I learned a lot and am still learning, coming from my non-scientific background. (And my husband is a PhD. chemist.) I've committed to teaching about this again in September at All Saints Episcopal Church, my church and heart home. This time I am calling the class "God, Evolution, and the Cosmos." Since I've only read half of Primack and Abrams' book The View from the Center of the Universe: Discovering Our Extraordinary Place in the Cosmos, I am planning to read the rest before this up-coming class. It is a very interesting book and one written in a way where non-physicists can start to understand some of the physics involved in cosmology. In fact, it's exciting! Like this:

The heat radiation from the Big Bang was discovered in 1965, but it could probably have been detected almost 20 years earlier when the technology needed for detecting it was invented during WW II. But no one looked! No details of the cosmic background radiation could be seen until 1992 and only sharp detail across the whole sky was detected in 2003.

And here are some "facts" that are mind-boggling (as connected to us on earth):
Number of superclusters within 1 billion light years = 100
Number of galaxy groups within 1 billion light years = 240,000
Number of large galaxies within 1 billion light years = 3 million
Number of dwarf galaxies within 1 billion light years= 60 million
Number of stars within 1 billion light years = 250,000 trillion

If you are interested in more info, read the book listed above and look at/investigate the links I'll list below:

Sloan Digital Survey/ Sky Server

This website presents data from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey, a project to make a map of a large part of the universe.

The Atlas of the Universe
Pictures, images, maps, useful internet links, and glossary

Univ. Of Oregon Astronomy: Galaxies and the Expanding Universe

The View from the Center of the Universe

Links to online resources showing videos of the universe.

Hubble Site

eSky: The Electronic Sky

My husband's birthday

Friday, July 27 was my husband CB's birthday, edging closer to 60. (Me, too) Our four kids kept contacting me about WHAT he'd like for his birthday. BUT even when asked, he would not say. DC even called up three times the week before his birthday to ask. All I gave him were t-shirts with pockets, which he insists upon. Whenever I have tried to get CB something "different," he doesn't like it. (My dad was like this, too, but at least he read books. CB reads on the internet; I read and buy enough books for both of us, he says.)

CB likes to sleep in his OWN bed each night. (In some ways he is so much like my dad!) So he didn't want to spend his birthday night to a hotel in San Antonio where we'd be for MJ's Saturday and Sunday soccer tournament. So he stayed home, while MJ and I went north. (Before we left, we ate a chocolate cake from my mother's old Betty Crocker cookbook and ice cream.)

MJ and I drove very early further north to the soccer fields in a field with a dirt road to park in. After a short while, we learned that there would be NO game, because the team the Express girls were going to play had dropped out. AND because of that, they would not play any other games at all--somehow, they qualified for the level they wanted by being at the tournament without the other team. Then we came back home.

CB planned to drive up this morning for the second later game (which did not materialize). When I called him about MJ having NO games at all, he laughed and laughed and said that this (NOT having to come to SA) was the BEST birthday gift he'd received!

MJ and I had an enjoyable time together; MJ visited a friend from church camp; MJ finished the last Harry Potter book while I drove; and CB was overjoyed. . . .CB's birthday was a success after all.

Highly Recommended

Mad Priest cited EPISCOPALOOZA for this video that explains WHAT causes ALL of our problems: "It's All Because (The Gays Are Getting Married)." Downloading videos is still too complicated for me to wrestle with right now, especially because we are leaving town soon for a soccer tournament for 17 year old MJ in San Antonio. So I am directing you to my oldest daughter's website, where she downloaded it: 我不喜歡我的中文TA, and other thoughts.

UMC Conference: Living Faith, Seeking Justice

If you are working to join justice and mercy as a clergy or layperson, Living Faith, Seeking Justice is a time to nourish and equip you for ministry.

For further information please contact Wanda Holcolme, conference coordinator at gbcs@umc-gbcs.org.

Living Faith, Seeking Justice
General Board of Church and Society
100 Maryland Ave. NE
Washington, DC 20002
202.488.5600

Cartoon-The First Illegal Immigrants

Monastic Mumblings, a Friar's Journey has this cartoon in his post about "Fear? Islamists to Immigrants." I think this is something we should think about. How arrogant white people have been in going to colonize new locales--superiority complex. Remember about taking care of the stranger in your land?

Jim Wallis: The Right Thing to Do

Jim Wallis: The Right Thing to Do

Imagine a popular program that has existed for 10 years with bipartisan support, providing health insurance to about 6 million low-income children. The State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) is up for reauthorization this year and Congress is debating how to extend the hope of coverage to 9 million children who are currently uninsured, while protecting coverage for the 6.6 million children who depend on SCHIP to see a doctor. But SCHIP is caught in the middle of a political battle—between a bipartisan majority in Congress and the nation’s governors on one hand and an isolated, defiant ideological president on the other.

A Senate bill was approved by the Finance Committee last week by a 17-4 vote, with six Republicans and all 11 Democrats supporting an increase of $35 billion over five years. Several leading conservatives were strong supporters. The New York Times reportedSenator Pat Roberts (R-Kan.) as saying, "I am proud to support this important bill, which will provide health insurance coverage to approximately four million more children who would otherwise be uninsured." According to the Los Angeles Times, Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), one of the original authors of the program, said: "It doesn't make me comfortable to advocate for such a large increase in spending. But it's important to note that [the program] has been tremendously successful. And one of the lessons we've learned is that it's going to cost more to cover additional kids." The bill is scheduled to be on the Senate floor next week.

For its part, the House is proposing legislation that would provide an increase of $50 billion, which would cover an estimated 5 million more children. Both versions would be at least partially funded by an increase in the federal tax on tobacco products.

Last weekend at their annual summer meeting, the National Governors Association sent a letter to the president and Congress. While not specifically supporting either bill, the governors said: "While we have not taken a position on the actual overall funding amount or the sources of revenue used as offsets, we are encouraged by the Senate Finance Committee's efforts to move a bipartisan reauthorization bill that provides increased funding ... "

And President Bush? He says he’ll veto either version. "It's a way to encourage people to transfer from the private sector to government health-care plans. ... I think it's wrong, and I think it's a mistake." A White House spokesman added that the president’s advisers "will certainly recommend a veto" of the Senate committee's proposal because of its size and the plan to fund it with a tax increase. The administration's plan for only an additional $5 billion wouldn’t even cover all the children currently insured.

Remember, this is a president who is content with spending $12 billion a month on war, yet finds spending $7-10 billion a year on making sure that kids have health insurance "wrong" and "a mistake." I can’t imagine a more clear case of utterly distorted priorities. Compassionate conservatism has been on life support for the last several years of this administration. President Bush's threatened veto of SCHIP will officially pronounce it dead.

We have been working with the PICO National Network, one of the leading groups organizing for SCHIP, to remind policymakers that children’s health coverage is a moral issue for the faith community. Father John Baumann, executive director of PICO, had this reaction to the president’s threat: "(SCHIP) is a highly successful program that has always had bipartisan support as a pragmatic way to help states reach children who are not poor enough for Medicaid but whose parents cannot obtain coverage for their children at work. SCHIP is a popular and successful program that should not be dragged down into a partisan political fight over health care ideology."

I agree. For far too long, Americans in poverty have been trapped in a partisan debate. Now, a strongly bipartisan program that works is trapped by a president who sees only ideology. Call your senators and members of Congress, and urge them to support the necessary expansion of SCHIP for America’s kids. It’s the right thing to do.

Take Action

Your congressional members need to hear that as a person of faith you believe that no child should go without treatment or depend on an emergency room for care because they lack health coverage. If we are judged by how we treat the least among us, we must make sure that all our children have coverage. Call your members of Congress today at (877) 367-5235, a free number set up by our friends at PICO National Network.

Tell them that people of faith are counting on them to stand up for the millions of uninsured children in the U.S. SCHIP has successfully reduced the uninsured rate for children by one-third over the past decade. Now Congress needs to pass a strong SCHIP bill by a veto-proof majority to provide hope to the millions of children in America who still go to sleep at night without health coverage.

For more information and other ways to take action, please visit www.coverallchildren.org.

***Go to The Quaker Agitator and read more about this at his post Your "pro-life" GOP & their president at work.

Daily Meditation from Eknath Easwaran

Everyday I receive a daily meditation from The Blue Mountain Center of Meditation in California. Eknath Easwaran’s Thought for the Day comes from his book Words to Live By: A Daily Guide to Leading an Exceptional Life

You can also go to the "Thought for the Day" site and choose a reading or sign up for one to be delivered to you each day, as I have done. I find Eknath Easwaran's thoughts to so often jog my mind and my heart to look at me and the world in new ways. Today the words spoke to me of my struggle with my habit of willfulness and indulgence combating my willingness to look to God's openings. It's a never-ending struggle, especially because I do not work for a living and spend my time volunteering, studying/reading, and supposedly taking care of the house. I have a great deal of freedom and do not always use it wisely.

July 26

Like a ball batted back and forth, a human being is batted by two forces within.
– Yogabindu Upanishad

As human beings we have a divided nature – partly physical, but essentially spiritual. We are constantly batted by two conflicting forces. One force is the fierce downward thrust of our past conditioning as separate, self-oriented, physical creatures. Yet built into our very nature is an inner drive that will not let us be satisfied with a life governed only by biological laws. Some inner evolutionary imperative is constantly exhorting us to grow, to reach for the highest that we can conceive.

Will Campbell, who has no President

Dana, a retired Methodist minister, sends me many good emails, both jokes and peace-oriented articles. Today he sent me the following article from Nashville, TN. He said about Will Campbell: Will Campbell was a fellow student with my wife and I at Yale Divinity. Throughout his ministry he has stirred the Southern Baptist community with his outspoken unorthodox style. A spade fir Will has always been a damn shovel. This is the first we have heard from Will for some time.

So here is the article:

By DWIGHT LEWIS

The Rev. Will Campbell will not be in town today to greet President Bush when he makes a stop in Nashville.

"I don't have a president," Campbell, 83, told me by phone Tuesday. "He doesn't represent me. . He has an evil war going, and he won't do anything about it."

Campbell, a Mississippi-born, Mt. Juliet-based preacher, author and farmer, knows a little something about war. He served in the South Pacific during World War II.

"I know what war is like," he told me. "It's hell, and nothing is being accomplished over there (in Iraq) - except a lot of people, our people and their people and their children and our sons and our daughters getting killed.''

So, Campbell wasn't very excited about the Bush visit.

"I don't care where he goes,'' said Campbell, author of Brother to a Dragonfly and whose memoir is titled, Forty Acres and a Goat: A Memoir.

I had a copy of remarks Bush made in 2001 during his first inaugural address, and I read the following excerpt to Campbell:

"I am honored and humbled to stand here where so many of America's leaders have come before me and so many will follow. We have a place, all of us, in a long story, a story we continue but whose end we will not see. It is a story of a new world that became a friend and liberator of the old, the story of a slave-holding society that became a servant of freedom, the story of a power that went into the world to protect but not possess, to defend but not to conquer.

"It is the American story, a story of flawed and fallible people united across the generations by grand and enduring ideals. The grandest of these ideals is an unfolding American promise that everyone belongs, that everyone deserves a chance, that no insignificant person was ever born.''

As I stopped reading, Campbell asked, "I wonder who wrote that for him?''

I asked Campbell whether he thinks Bush knows the war is wrong or that we're not winning.

"He must know. Enough people are telling him, and there's enough evidence that it is being lost.''

Campbell thinks the president is being stubborn, but he doesn't have too much sympathy for all the Democrats or Republicans who voted for the war, "including most everyone running for the presidency now."

He couldn't recall the name, but he remembered someone who had been to Iraq saying at the time that "there will be no weapons of mass destruction found because they do not exist."

"We knew, they knew, that there were no weapons of mass destruction there. They didn't find them because they weren't there.''

What about that, Mr. President? And by the way, while you're in Nashville talking about the budget, could you also tell us why Osama bin Laden hasn't been captured?

I don't know whether Will Campbell wants to know, but I do.

Faith Story 5--Seeking God

When I finally realized I was seeking to know God was after my mother's death in 1992. I wrote about her death--7-14-92 My mother died. Before I could fly from RI to WA to see my mother once we learned she had pancreatic cancer, my husband and I had to go on a house-hunting trip to NJ, where he was being transferred. I still remember that in the driving intervals between houses, I would cry, and then stop so I could look at the next house.

She died only 42 days after she was diagnosed. She was 72. She never accepted that she was going to die, and we never talked about her fear, about God, or anything connected with life or death. She slept a lot, and I was there with 2 year old MJ, so I also had to be busy with my toddler. It was a crazy, chaotic time and fearful time for me.

My mother was in a coma for her last 24 hours. No one knew how long she would stay in this condition, so the doctor and a chaplain told us to go home at night. I was the last one to leave. I kept telling her she could let go and float out on the waves of the ocean. She loved the water. She had worried that little MJ would not remember her, and I told her MJ would know her from the stories we would tell her. Oddly, in the past few years, MJ’s older brother and sister have commented that she does many things like her grannie. I told my mother she could leave us and float out to God. Then I went home to bed. Only my father, MJ and I were in that house. Very early in the morning I woke up with a start and knew I should go to the hospital, but I couldn’t leave MJ alone in a strange house. It was a struggle to stay in bed. I still remember that so vividly that I believe my mother died at that time. At 5:30, my dad woke me up to tell me that she had died.

He and I went to this dark, cold hospital room, where my mother lay. We looked and left, not knowing what to do. This is a sad memory which brings back the loneliness and separation that we both felt. I knew my mother was with God (way off in his heaven), but we were left in the dark, cold, and isolated world. Immediately, my father started cleaning out her things and throwing them away. That’s what we did until her funeral. It was hard.

After that, my family and I went back to Rhode Island to move to Morristown, NJ. I don’t remember much of the move, but we got everything settled in our new old house. With the kids in school, Chuck at work and traveling a lot, I only had little MJ. How she distracted and comforted me. And finally I noticed a desire to know God, a possibility I’d never known existed before. We started going to the Methodist Church in Morristown, because three years before this, friends had hauled DC to a First Methodist confirmation class in Corpus Christi—and he’d become a member there, without our attendance, as we repeated my parents’ indifference. BUT because he was already a member of the Methodist Church, that’s where we started going “for the kids” though it was more for me, in retrospect. The female associate minister kept calling and asking if we’d like to join the church, and I said I couldn’t believe the things I had to say to join. I finally went in to talk to her, and she told me something about John Wesley, which opened the way for me. She said he’d been told to preach until he believed, but she equated it to prayer—PRAY until you believe! That’s the first time anyone ever advised me to pray!! I knew no one to talk to, so I walked and walked, pushing MJ in the stroller, talking or praying to I didn’t know what. Sometime during that time, I felt like someone was listening. That’s when I started believing that God is with us rather than way off in heaven somewhere.

When I need to know something, I always search in books (and now the internet). Of course, I tried to find books about God, never even thinking of reading the Bible! The nearest Christian bookstore contained mostly fundamental books, even in New Jersey, which did not appeal to me early on my Christian journey. The only ones I could stomach were by Robert Schuller!

We joined that Methodist Church in Morristown, NJ and faithfully attended it. I was full of grief, and it seemed that CB and I drifted further and further apart. He had a difficult job and brought home anger from there. We were passively aggressive in our anger with each other--in silence. (I later learned that anger arises from pain and fear, and I know I was feeling a great deal of pain and loneliness. He probably was, too.) And we were busy with four children in school, and three of them were playing soccer. I consciously believed in God and was praying a little, in my busy-ness, grief, loneliness, anger, and probable depression.

Hafiz: Each Soul

In our weekly Wisdom Class book group, we are discussing the chapter on "The Blessed Community" in Thomas Kelly's book A Testament of Devotion. This poem by Hafiz seems like a good beginning devotion.

My

Beloved said,

“My name is not complete without

yours.”

I thought:

How could a human’s worth ever be such?

And God knowing all our thoughts – and all our

thoughts are innocent steps on the path –

then addressed my

heart,

God revealed

a sublime truth to the world,

when He

sang,

“I am made whole by your life. Each soul,

each soul completes

me.”

~ Hafiz ~

Stunted by Sameness

There is an excellent article in the latest e-magazine "Explore Faith" , which is Stunted by Sameness: "Although we all enjoy our comfort zones, growth comes about when we open ourselves to diversity." It is a good piece by Lowell Grisham. This reminds me of Thomas Kelly citing "dull habits" as ruling our lives, which sounds much like "stunted by sameness."

More Harry Potter!

After visiting Jane Redmont's blog, Acts of Hope, I took yet another Harry Potter Quiz. Jane talked about these being somewhat spiritual, and I would say the quiz is almost like an examen. So here is how I did, and I am happy about these results. (I was Ron Weasley in some other quiz.)

You scored as Albus Dumbledore, Strong and powerful you admirably defend your world and your charges against those who would seek to harm them. However sometimes you can fail to do what you must because you care too much to cause suffering.

Albus Dumbledore		90%
Hermione Granger		80%
Ron Weasley		75%
Remus Lupin		70%
Severus Snape		55%
Harry Potter		55%
Sirius Black		40%
Draco Malfoy		35%
Ginny Weasley		30%
Lord Voldemort		20%

Your Harry Potter Alter Ego Is...?

The most violent element in society is ignorance.

- Emma Goldman

Nothing in all the world is more dangerous than sincere ignorance and conscientious stupidity.

-Martin Luther King Jr.

There are more quotes like these http://www.progressiveshandbook.com/handbook/index.php?name=News&file=article&sid=3

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

I finished Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (Book 7) this afternoon. My 25 year old daughter AE in Seattle finished it last night! Good book! I know I was helped by reading Book #6 last week in preparation, because my 22 year old son BJ told me that he found the latest book too confusing and has to re-read the previous one to be ready for it.

I meet with my Renovare spiritual group every Friday morning, a group that was started in 1996 after a trip to Waco, TX to hear Richard Foster speak. People have come and gone, and now the group is composed of about nine women. Last night most of these women and their spouses came over to my house for a potluck dinner. My husband CB barbecued salmon and chili chicken. It was very nice. However, I was the only person out of 14 who was reading (or planed to read) the last Harry Potter book!

In fact, one of the husbands asked me why I was reading the books at all. I enjoy them; there is good character development; the plot goes through all seven books; an entire world is created; battle between good and evil. I like them a lot and know that sometime this year I will re-read all the books (1-7) to get the full sequence in my mind.

For a change, J. K. Rowling put two quotations in the forward of the book. For those of you who are not reading this book, I will copy the words of William Penn:

"Death is but crossing the world, as friends do the seas; they live in one another still. For they must needs be present, that love and live in that which is omnipresent. In this divine glass, they see face to face; and their converse is free, as well as pure. This the comfort of friends, that though they may be said to die, yet their friendship and society are, in the best sense, ever present, because immortal."

Tom Fox, Quaker Peace Activist

There is a moving article in the newest Christian Century magazine (July 24, 2007), entitled "Kidnapped in Iraq: A Survivor's Story" by James Loney. (This is not online yet, but will be in a week or so.) James Loney recounts the kidnapping in Iraq in November 2005 of four members of Christian Peacemaker Teams (Tom Fox, Norman Kember, James Loney, and Harmeet Singh Sooden), all accused of spying. Tom Fox was killed, but the other three survived and were rescued two weeks later. You can view Tom's own writing about being in Iraq by looking at his blog--the last thing he wrote was entitled "Why Are We Here?"(Part of his answer is: "We are here to root out all aspects of dehumanization that exist within us.")

This excerpt highlights Quaker Tom Fox's faith and actions:

"During those first days of relentless, terrifying, excruciating uncertainty, Tom dove into prayer the way a warrior might charge into battle. He turned his captivity into a sustained, unbroken meditation. The chain that bound his wrist became a kind of rosary, or sebha (the beads Muslims use to count the names of God). He would picture someone: a member of his family, a member of the Iraq team or the CPT office, one of the captors--whoever he felt needed prayer. Holding a link of the chain, he would breathe in and out, slowly, so that you could hear the air gushing in and out of his lungs, praying for the person he was holding in his mind. With the completion of each breath, he would pass a chain link through his thumb and index finger. During his first breath he would say to himself, with the warmth of my heart. In the second, with the stillness of my mind. In the third, with the fluidity of my body. And in the fourth, with the light of my soul. At the end of each series of four breaths, he would pause and simply rest in the light with the person he was praying for.

"Tom's vigilance in prayer was astounding. I sometimes felt ashamed. My mind would wander helplessly in self-preoccupation and garish tableaux in absurd cycles of repetition. His unrelenting focus called me back to prayer again and again, almost as if someone had suddenly taken hold of my shoulders, was gently shaking me and telling me, 'Wake up! Come back to your senses!'" (p. 22)

HIV and the Heart of God

An excellent book to read about HIV/AIDS is When God's People Have HIV/Aids: An Approach to Ethics by Maria Cimperman, one of my favorite professors at Oblate School of Theology in San Antonio, TX. She was also the leader of our small group of OST students who went to Zambia in June 2006--I was fortunate to be one of those students!

HIV And the Heart of God
Around the world, and especially in Africa and Asia, the Body of Christ is HIV+. Thousands are stricken; thousands more are orphaned or widowed because of HIV/AIDS. Outside the Church, many thousands more suffer. The heart of God breaks over such pain. What does it mean to know the heart of God in the midst of the crisis? What are the medical, social, and spiritual questions to ask as we seek to respond? This conference will offer a chance to hear remarkable brothers and sisters in Christ from Africa, Asia, and the Middle East bear witness to the presence of God in the midst of the crisis that is HIV/AIDS. We invite you to join us as we discover together how to more faithfully serve Jesus Christ in a world suffering with HIV/AIDS.


©2003-2007 First Presbyterian Church of Berkeley
2407 Dana Street, Berkeley, CA 94704 U.S.A.
phone: (510) 848-6242 fax: (510) 848-3118 email: info@fpcberkeley.org

Dear Mr. President

By Pink and the Indigo Girls

Did you know that Emily Saliers of the Indigo Girls is the daughter of Rev. Don Saliers, Methodist minister and Professor at Emory University?

A Cruise with Conservatives

Wild and Precious posted an article from the UK that is very interesting--about a journalist who went on a cruise with readers of the National Review. Neocons on a Cruise

New book: "Take This Bread"

One of the RGPB's recommended Take This Bread: A Radical Conversion by Sara Miles. My copy arrived yesterday and in today's mail came the latest "Christian Century" magazine (July 10, 2007 issue), which has a review of this same book! (You can even read the review online.) The reviewer (Amy Johnson Frykholm) wrote this paragraph which has piqued my interest:

"The book is sprinkled with the very self-righteousness that Miles finds repulsive in other Christians. It is saved, however, by her rigorous self-examination and her acknowledgement that faith and conversion are long, hard processes."

This sounds interesting. Thank you, whoever recommended it!

Faith Story 4

RevDrKate and Gannett Girl have been writing their memories, just like I have. This one may get too strung out as it was the last year my mother was alive, and I didn't know she was dying. You may notice that God is never mentioned, as we continued to be unaware of the Divine Presence.

Since Faith Story 3 had me moving to Rhode Island from Texas with my family, that's where I will start. In August 1991, my children's ages were: DC-12; AE-9; BJ-6; MJ-almost 2. It was our first experience of having our children ride school buses to school. I remember that on the first day, BJ was starting first grade at a new school (for him), so my husband, MJ, and I followed him on the school bus to his school, so we could walk in with him.

I was worried about BJ getting needed speech therapy in first grade, because there was such a marked RI accent in the area we lived, but the speech therapist was from Oregon, so I was relieved. He only needed a little help that year and then was fine. But we laughed a lot with words particular to RI that didn't fit with our NW and TX orientation--here are a few examples:
bubbler= water fountain; cabinet=milkshake (a "milkshake" was exactly that--blended milk with a flavoring); grinder=toasted sub sandwich. We missed tortillas and Mexican food up there, but enjoyed the seasons. I also loved the little Japanese maple tree we planted in the front yard.

My mother came to visit around Halloween, when my birthday was, and at Christmas. On the rainy, windy, cold Halloween night (quite different from our TX Halloweens), DC stayed home for the first time on a Halloween night while my mother made chocolate coated peanut butter candies, which were to be frozen for Christmas. Strong, quiet husband CB took the other three children out in the cold, bundled up so their costumes could not be seen. MJ was a fairy and no one saw her wings!

My mother and father came for Christmas. Ironically, I took a lot of pictures of my dad, thinking that he could die soon, falsely assuming that women live longer than men. Looking back, I can remember my mother saying that she couldn't eat fatty things much anymore, but I just thought that was healthier. She was always trying to live healthier, so her "healthy" body wasn't used to fats.

In April 1992, my mother planned to visit for BJ's 7th birthday (and hers the week after), but didn't feel well and so delayed her visit. We'd planned a trip to Maine with her coming along, and still went with the kids. We had two motel rooms--one for the boys and one for the girls. DC complained bitterly how BJ got sick in the bed after a dinner of spaghetti (which BJ still doesn't like much). It was rocky ride home for this poor little guy who was sick, sick, sick, without us even having a doctor yet! I don't think he remembers Maine too fondly.

Several weeks later, my mother came to see us. She, MJ, and I went up to Maine. My mother was having stomach problems and couldn't eat much. She thought it was "nerves," because her father had always had a "nervous stomach."

Sometime in May, after her return to Bellingham, WA, a doctor finally determined what was bothering her. She hadn't wanted to worry me, so finally called to say she had a "growth" on her pancreas, continuing to tell me that no one in her family had ever had cancer, so not to worry. She bought new nightwear, which was never worn, to wear to the hospital for the surgery. Somehow, I knew there was something seriously wrong, and I called her gastroenterologist, who amazingly told me what was probably wrong with her, as I explained I was her only child living across the country from her. I could not breathe or cry and had my first ever panic attack, though I didn't know that's what it was at the time. I had no one nearby to talk to, and MJ was asleep!

I will always remember that night with CB sitting on one end of the couch and me sitting on the other. I was crying and saying, "What if she has cancer?" CB never said a word. I was heartbroken, and he seemed so distant. He told me years later that he didn't say anything, because he knew that my mother was going to die and he couldn't do anything to stop it. I felt alone, and that is a marker in my mind showing the precipitous slide CB and I made in moving apart from each other.

Life

Meditation for the Wisdom Class today is from Nan Merrill's newsletter "Friends of Silence." Nan is the author of the lovely book Psalms for Praying: An Invitation to Wholeness


"The spiritual journey is a story of a return to our heart, the very center of our being, that has been obscured by our driving complusion to create our own identity."
~Fr. Pat Eastman

Remove the labels from your life!

Non-Duality Cartoons

I'm a Plugger!

Ever since we moved into our first house in Texas in 1979, I have liked to hang clothes outside on the clothesline. I tried to hang out clothes when we lived in RI and NJ, too, but it was too cold and not sunny enough! Today I hung out sheets and towels. I so like to do this!

Sorry case of Iraqi refugees

Little is said of the thousands who are fleeing sectarian violence or direct threats because the matter reflects badly on U.S. policy.

By Trudy Rubin Inquirer Columnist

When Tamara Daghistani's cell phone rings in Amman, Jordan, the caller is usually another desperate Iraqi refugee.

As we sat together last month, the call was from a woman who had fled Baghdad with her husband and three kids. Her husband was killed during a visit back to Baghdad to bury his mother. Now the woman has no way to support three young children. She sends her boys out to nightclubs at night to beg.

Daghistani spends her time helping less fortunate countrymen. With around 2 million Iraqi refugees crowded into Jordan and Syria, and 30,000 arriving in Syria weekly, this exodus is the biggest Iraqi crisis almost no one discusses. Certainly not President Bush.

The first Iraqi refugees to reach Jordan in 2003 were mostly wealthy supporters of Saddam Hussein. But their numbers have been eclipsed by waves of refugees from Baghdad and other cities.

"Most of them are fleeing sectarian violence and have been directly threatened," says Kristèle Younès of Refugees International, who just returned from Amman and Damascus. "Either they've been told to leave their homes or be killed, or they are Christians told to convert or leave, or they have been threatened because they've worked with Americans." But it's politically inconvenient for the Bush administration to directly confront this problem, because it reflects our failure to stabilize Iraq.

The United States - and the Iraqi government - appear to hope the refugees will return home. This is unlikely for the foreseeable future. More likely: If the United States draws down troops, the Iraqi exodus will turn into a refugee tsunami. But, because Iraq is such a hot-button political issue, there is no international focus on helping the refugees and their host countries cope.

"The two countries caring for the biggest proportion of Iraqi refugees - Syria and Jordan - have still received next to nothing in bilateral help from the world community," the spokesman for the United Nations' refugee agency, Ron Redmond, said last week. So far, most Iraqi refugees have been left to flounder with little or no international aid.

Jordan, a resource-poor country with high unemployment, has closed its borders to most new Iraqi entries. Most Iraqi refugees can't work legally in Jordan, or attend schools, which are already overcrowded, nor can they get health care. Jordan desperately wants to avoid another permanent refugee population, like the huge number of Palestinian refugees it has hosted for decades.

Syria still takes Iraqi refugees. But only 32,000 out of hundreds of thousands of Iraqi children there can attend school because there aren't enough classrooms. "A whole generation of Iraqi children is in danger of missing an education," Redmond says.

Middle-class refugee families are running out of funds in Jordan and Syria, with no prospect of working; some women are turning to prostitution. Unless a solution is found for this problem, it could turn into a major security threat. What better recruiting pool for terrorists than angry young Iraqi refugees with no education, no jobs, and no chance to go home?

What's to be done? There are three ways the Iraq refugee crisis could be defused, if the White House would lead.

First, mobilize international aid to help Syria and Jordan cope with the refugees in the medium term, in hopes that Iraq will one day calm down. The goal would not be to integrate Iraqis - neither country could handle the burden - but to help with local health, education and water systems during a prolonged stay.

Second, encourage the Iraqi government to use its oil surplus to help its refugee population. "They could create a temporary ministry for Iraqi expatriates," says Daghistani, "and could be planning for repatriation later. It would be a tremendous boost for Iraqis who feel no one cares."

Third, the United States must plan on absorbing a large number of Iraqi refugees, especially those under threat for working with Americans. We've only admitted a few hundred since 2003, but were supposed let a few thousand in during this fiscal year. The result, so far, is shameful. We let in a whopping 63 refugees in June, according to State Department figures, and one refugee - yes, that's ONE - in May. (Sweden, for heaven's sake, has admitted 18,000 Iraqis since 2006.)

After the Vietnam War, America resettled more than 131,000 Vietnamese. Maybe it won't come to that with Iraqis. But history will judge us extremely harshly if we leave Iraq's refugees to rot.

http://www.philly.com/inquirer/columnists/trudy_rubin/20070711_Worldview____Sorry_case_of_Iraqi_refugees.html

---

Read her recent work at http://go.philly.com/trudyrubin.

This makes me feel ashamed and sad, just like the video Katherine posted here Other Christians are so Un-Christian At Times, Aren't They?

Remember

Months after my mother died, my friend Nancy (we met in Japan in 1962) sent me a poem/prayer that she received at a memorial service for unborn children. She had lost her first baby in utero. This poem/prayer has always comforted me. I put it on the memorial folder at my father's memorial service. I send it to friends who have lost a loved one. This past year, it was read at the funeral for my friend Terry's mother in Bellingham, WA and at the memorial service for an elderly friend here in Corpus Christi.

We Remember
from the Gates of Prayer
Reform Judaism Prayerbook

In the rising of the sun
and in its going down,
We remember them;

In the blowing of the wind
and in the chill of the winter,
We remember them;

In the opening of the buds
and in the warmth of the summer,
We remember them;

In the rustling of the leaves
and the beauty of the autumn,
We remember them;

And in the beginning of the year
and when it ends,
We remember them;

When we are weary
and in need of strength,
We remember them;

When we are lost
and sick at heart,
We remember them;

When we have joys
we long to share,
We remember them;

So long as we shall live
they too shall live,
For they are now a part of us as
We remember them.

7-14-92 My mother died.

Fifteen years ago today my mother died. She had been in a coma for about 24 hours. She was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer 42 days before this date.

I am used to her being gone now. It was difficult to lose her 15 years ago. Now I realize that 15 years from now, I will be the same age she was when she died.

I remember months after my mother's death, little three year old MJ would say matter-of-factly, "Mommy is crying again." Sometimes she would even ask me when Grannie would come home from the hospital.

Death. Though I was not an observant Christian then, I believed that someone who died would be with God. I always knew my mother was all right, but I missed her greatly. It seems like the cost of love is losing what or whom we loved. I used to think the pain was so much because I had loved her so much, being an only child, after all.

Today I am also sad remembering the isolation my father and I felt, from each other and from God, whom we did not even think of. We were called and told very early in the morning that my mother had died in the hospital, so we went there in the dark. The room was unlit and gray where she was lying. My father and I looked at her and left. No prayers, no hugs, nothing. We didn't know what to do and didn't know how to turn to each other. Upon returning home, my dad started cleaning and throwing out her things from her bathroom--all the vitamins, swearing about them, as they were tossed. The discarding continued until her funeral.

Maybe some of this is due to my mother not going through all the phases of grief concerning death, according to Elizabeth Kubler-Ross. (Denial and isolation; anger; bargaining; depression; and finally acceptance.) My mother always refused the idea that she was dying, and so we never talked about it at all. She didn't cry about it, though I did down in the basement, where MJ and I were staying.

My mother had an experience of the Holy before she died, which is another reason that I believe she did not think the cancer would kill her. Although not "religious," she practiced transcendental meditation. She told me how once during a meditation, she felt (and maybe saw) herself enveloped by light and love. That told her that she would be all right. Even then, I knew that meant that she would be "all right" after she died. I don't think she told anyone else of this experience.

The day my mother went into the coma, she had had an appointment with a pancreatic specialist in Seattle. Weeks before, I had driven her to the Olympic Penninsula to visit a homeopathic specialist. I will always remember how we went on a day that my father was working out of town. As we were driving on the freeway south, my thin, jaundiced mother would crouch out of sight when we thought we saw a car like my dad's approaching. I still have pictures of her sitting with MJ on the ferry.

Since both of my parents' deaths, I have experienced several friends dying, who suffered but also seemed to be "midwifed" into death. Alice, who had pancreatic cancer, and Margy, who suffered from ovarian cancer, both talked about death and God, plus had friends and family who encouraged them with visits, singing, and care. They had longer periods to adjust to the fact of dying, which probably helped, but they also were open to the fear and the inevitable process of dying. A church community helps, too, as would a family that was more intimate than my nuclear family had the capacity to be.

Today I remember my mother and my father. Now they experience the Love they did not know while alive.

Gay Couple Show How to Live

I don't often read "Dear Abby," but today's title caught my eye. "Abby" did a great service today by printing and responding to this letter about an elderly mother being cared for by her gay son and his partner. What love, forgiveness, and generosity this couple has shown to this woman. I hope everyone in the USA reads "Dear Abby" today.

MOTHER LEARNS LATE IN LIFE TO ACCEPT GAY SON AS HE IS

DEAR ABBY: My husband and I raised our two sons and two daughters. One son and both daughters married well. Our other son, "Neil," is gay. He and his partner, "Ron," have been together 15 years, but Neil's father and I never wanted to know Ron because we disapproved of their lifestyle.

When I was 74, my husband died, leaving me in ill health and nearly penniless. No longer able to live alone, I asked my married son and two daughters if I could "visit" each of them for four months a year. (I didn't want to burden any one family, and thought living out of a suitcase would be best for everyone.) All three turned me down. Feeling unwanted, I wanted to die.

When Neil and Ron heard what had happened, they invited me to move across country and live with them. They welcomed me into their home, and even removed a wall between two rooms so I'd have a bedroom with a private bath and sitting room -- although we spend most of our time together.

They also include me in many of their plans. Since I moved in with them, I have traveled more than I have my whole life and seen places I only read about in books. They never mention the fact that they are supporting me, or that I ignored them in the past.

When old friends ask how it feels living with my gay son, I tell them I hope they're lucky enough to have one who will take them in one day. Please continue urging your readers to accept their children as they are. My only regret is that I wasted 15 years. -- GRATEFUL MOM

DEAR GRATEFUL MOM: You are indeed fortunate to have such a loving, generous and forgiving son. Sexual orientation is not a measure of anyone's humanity or worth. Thank you for pointing out how important it is that people respect each other for who they are, not for what we would like them to be.

You could have learned that lesson long ago, had you and your husband contacted Parents and Friends of Lesbians and Gays (PFLAG) when you first learned that Neil was gay. Among other things, the organization offers support groups and education for parents who need to learn more about gender issues. (The address is 1726 M St. N.W., Suite 400, Washington, D.C. 20036.)

"Impasse and Dark Night"

I need to learn to call people. I tend to put off making phone calls so long that I don't do it at all. A friend called me this morning, and that was such a nice surprise that I am still smiling. She thanked me for sending them a copy of an article, "Impasse and Dark Night" by Constance Fitzgerald, which I had found in the huge Shalem Institute notebook for the program I'm in. Sending it to them was one of those nudges from God, which usually don't reward us with results or praise. However, this article spoke to her and her husband, who is going through intensive, rigorous chemo-therapy for cancer right now.

Coincidentally, this same article was footnoted in an excellent piece by Maggie Ross entitled "The Space of Prayer" in the July/August issue of Weavings http://www.upperroom.org/weavings/ .

And I discovered that the footnote includes the web address for this article. It is such a profound paper that I hope you will at least look it up. I am almost positive that you will want to print it for yourselves.

www.geocities.com/baltimorecarmel/johncross/impasse.html

"Word for the Day" from Gratefulness.org

Today's "Word for the Day" from http://www.gratefulness.org/ is exactly what I needed to hear today. If you want to subscribe to this daily mailing, go to the above site. There is always a short quotation, which is easily deleted after reading--or saved if it is especially pertinent. (And since I had never heard of Sharif Baba, I looked him up on google http://www.sherifbaba.com/baba.htm )

If you look at every human being
as a Divine mirror,
you will know yourself
and understand life.

~Sharif Baba

God in us

“God is everywhere and always with us, by us and in us. However, we are not always with Him, for we do not remember Him, and because we do not remember, we allow ourselves to do many things that we would not allow ourselves to do if we remembered God.”

“. . . remember that the Lord is in you and close by you and looks at you and inside of you just as intently as if someone were looking right at you.”

Theophan the Recluse (1815-1894)

Russian Bishop and Staretz (elder)

Moving so much did what?

Many of you asked how I was affected by so many moves. As I grew up, it's hard to say what affected me most--frequent moves, being an only child, being introverted, or having an alcoholic father. Probably, I would say, "All of the above." (Like Gannet Girl, the circumstances sound worse than they seemed at the time. As a child, you accept your life "as the way it is." You don't know anything else, so life is this way. The only thing I ever compared my life to were families with more than one child--I always wanted a brother or sister.)

Having no siblings and being introverted were exacerbated by my father's alcoholism. Studies have shown that unwritten rules in alcoholic families are "Don't talk; don't trust; don't feel."
An isolated life came about through this lifestyle, as well as having no siblings for me, but also no other family nearby; no sense of community and no church community.

I was always a good girl and one of the best students in each class I was in. Each move seemed to cause me to become more shy. I think it took me awhile to feel safe, and then so often, we would move again.

I remember my mother telling me that she thought similar events would recur to "teach" each of us a lesson we needed to learn. (That's the closest she ever spoke to me of "divine providence," which may only be my interpretation of what she meant.) I've sometimes wondered about that when I think of all the moves that continued after we were married. If that is so, I never learned to move very well, which is another reason I reconsidered my call to ministry!

So how do moves affect the "move-ee"? I think it depends upon the person or child's support system and personality type. Also, the different lengths of time in each place would affect one.

I also think this has affected my thinking about living in a place, because I'll sometimes catch myself thinking, "Things will be different when I move." (This prevents action to change things, because I'll be moving. . . .) I don't do that as often now, but every so often I fall back into that old habit.

Meditation for Today's Wisdom Class

Belief brings me close to You
but only to the door.
It is only by disappearing into
Your mystery
that I will come in.

~Hakim Sanai
(1044?-1150?)

Places I've lived

After Mompriest commented on how many places she'd moved in only six years of her childhood, I started wondering if I could list the places I've lived. I'm not sure if I've ever done that, and I'd like to tell my children all the different locations I (and they) have been. Until I was in high school, my dad was in the Marine Corps, so he was transferred every few years.

Jan's childhood moves:
1. Bremerton, WA
2. Quantico, VA
3. Camp Pendleton, CA
4. Lubbock, TX
5. Lynden, WA (my mother's hometown, while my dad went to Japan)
6. Quantico, VA
7. Camp Pendleton, CA
8. Yokosuka, Japan
9. El Toro, CA
10. Bellingham, WA (while my dad was in Okinawa and Vietnam)
11. Camp Pendleton, CA
12. Bellingham, WA (where we moved when my dad retired from the Marine Corps) (1966-1971)

Jan's married moves:
1. Bellingham, WA
2. Seattle, WA
3. Richmond, VA
4. Newport, OR
5. Corvallis OR (where CB went to grad school)
6. Corpus Christi, TX (1978-1985)
7. Euless, TX (which I refer to as "Dallas")
8. Corpus Christi, TX (1988-1991)
9. North Kingstown, RI
10. Morristown, NJ
11. Corpus Christi, TX (1994-present)

Although I came to think of Bellingham, WA as my hometown (as I went to high school and college there and that's where we lived in my family's first non-military base housing), I have now lived in Corpus Christi, TX longer than anywhere else I've ever lived (a total of 23 years).

Faith Story 3--Having small children

In the spring of 1985, our third child was born, which was about the same time my husband found out he was transferred to Dallas. He worked up there, while we lived in Corpus Christi until the baby BJ was five months old. Right before we moved, he was baptized with my first and most enduring friend Lisa and her husband as God-parents. (We had met at a La Leche League meeting in an un-airconditioned house in the summer before our first babies were born.)

DC, AE, and BJ were baptized at All Saints Episcopal Church, my present church. In the recent baptisms here, I’ve become aware of how they were blessed then, even though I didn’t realize it. I know when they were baptized, I was too concerned about the wiggling children and crying baby that I might have to nurse in church—Horrors!! I still didn’t realize that God was in the midst of us, and now I am warmed to know he was. I have a totally new perspective on their baptisms, because I see the past with a new perspective—how the Divine enfolded us all, sealing each child for him forever. The reality was there then, but neither CB nor I saw it. The way opened, but each of us must be aware enough to enter in—we were not then, but are beginning to see so much more of God now.

We moved to Dallas and lived there for the next 2 years. CB traveled frequently; and we hardly knew anyone. BJ always wanted to be held and learned to scream to get his way. DC hated leaving his best friend and struggled and cried going to a new school for first grade. I still remember calling his kindergarten teacher, worried that he didn't like school, and she reassured me that after his first month, he'd feel better. That was true, and he suddenly shot off being able to read and loving it. 3 year old AE was very shy and hid under a coffee table at the first La Leche League meeting we went to. (I just recently learned that the LLL group this other mother and I started is still meeting!) I remember AE sweetly asking me sometime after Thanksgiving when her wish (from breaking the wishbone from the turkey) would come true--she'd wanted to become a fairy! I treasure the wistful look I recall on her face, so sweet and innocent. And this is the place where the family's interest in soccer started, with little DC playing for the first time.

We moved back to Corpus Christi with DC going into third grade; AE in kindergarten; and BJ a 2 year old toddler, who was always so chubby that he could never wear his brother's hand-me-downs. (He could only fit into Oshkosh coveralls!) My husband still traveled a great deal. I was grateful that my mother continued to visit from WA state two times a year, for several weeks each time. My dad, who hated to travel, would come for a few days each Christmas. This was a busy time of LLL meetings for me, school activities, and soccer for both DC and AE.

This is also when DC rejoined his best friend Chris, and they started a life-long bond with three other boys. (These young men have been in each other's weddings and continue to be in touch, even though they went to different colleges and live in different cities.) They always played soccer together, too. The family of one of the boys brought DC each week to the confirmation class at First United Methodist Church. We parents acted like ours had--in an a-religious way just as Gannet Girl's parents did--not caring one way or another. CB and I were in New York City when he was confirmed, and from what I hear, he had to wear an outgrown jacket and pair of pants. You can tell his parents "didn't care," which sounds reprehensible to me now.

This was at the time I was pregnant with our surprising fourth child. CB was still gone frequently, and no plans had been made, but God brought forth a baby, who is now MJ and my only child at home. It was quite a shock to find out I was pregnant, even after taking an at-home pregnancy test--When the doctor's office called after their test, I kept telling them there had to be a mistake! And how grateful am I that she was never a mistake! That spring, I remember taking DC and his four pals, with BJ to the rocks by the water here, and telling AE the secret of the coming baby, while the guys climbed and played.

When MJ was one year old, we learned that CB was being transferred to Rhode Island. That was a wrenching shock to the older kids and me. Coming from WA State, I thought I knew what "cold" weather was, but that winter (and autumn) in Rhode Island were quite a shock to us. We certainly had to buy a lot of warm clothes, coats, and blankets--things unnecessary in south Texas! So in 1991, we moved to Rhode Island.

Fundamentalists' viewpoint

Kirk Anderson http://www.kirktoons.com/

On npr this morning, two political cartoonists were interviewed in "Cartooning Bush and President Next." (And I tried to link it through the title, but somehow it didn't work, so here's the site http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=11794366)
There are other samples of political cartoons that are quite good, even better than this one. This one hit me about the problems of humanity from all time--too narrow a view of God and of his "chosen."
It's an interesting article to read (or hear).