A Perspective on the Health Care Debate from Someone Who Knows

My friend and colleague Nancy Speas-Hill, with whom I have been privileged to be friends since high school, has posted an article on her blog about the current health care debate. She knows that of which she speaks in a way that few others do.

A bit of background: Nancy's daughter, Becca, was born 13 months ago an was the tiniest premie ever born at Vanderbilt Hospital, only 13 ounces and 9.5 inches long. Her very existence is a miracle, and as you can imagine, Nancy and her husband, John (both United Methodist Pastors), have received quite an education in the American health care system over the last year.

Nancy has both the practical experience and the theological grounding to be able to speak with integrity about the larger issues at stake in the current debate over health care reform. If only more intelligent, informed people like her were guiding the debate, an not angry, misinformed, paranoid people who all too often betray the latent racism that is, sadly, still present in most white Americans.

May we all listen to our better angels and speak up in favor of the Beccas of the world.

Frustration with the Political Climate

This is a very sad video, but I'm posting it because it sums up very well the disdain I've been feeling toward the political environment of late.

I first became aware of Sen. McCain in the 2000 Presidential Primaries, and had he won the Republican nomination, I would have voted for him in the general election.

I did not vote for him in 2008 because I believe he came to represent things that he probably doesn't actually stand for, but I was worried his potential administration (symbolized by his unfortunate choice of Sarah Palin for Vice President) would have allowed those forces that ran the Bush administration to stay in power.

That being said, I have great admiration and respect for the man. His true character came through in campaign events where he vocally rejected trumped up lies about the character of President Obama, and was booed for doing so. This video shows him in a recent town hall meeting doing the same thing, and receiving the same reaction.

It's sad to see an honorable public servant be booed for refusing to participate in the outright lies, smear tactics, and fear mongering of the radical base that is ruining his party. More often than not I find myself aligned with the moderate political left, but I greatly value the positive contributions and balance that the voice of the moderate right (folks like George Will and Bill Kristol before he became a darling of Faux News) has to offer.

Sen. McCain, I don't agree with you much of the time, but I respect your integrity and honor your service to our country. Keep up the good work even if your base doesn't appreciate you.

Addendum- not an hour after this posted, I learned of Sen. Ted Kennedy's death. Kennedy represented the mixture of strong ideological belief and willingness to dialogue and compromise that is sadly lacking in our current political climate. This rare mixture often gets one labeled as "wishy-washy" or a "flip-flopper", but is more properly called "integrity". Sen. Kennedy, and the integrity he represented, will be sorely missed.

Reflections on Calling: Learn to Swim!

As promised, here it is. My reflections on discerning my calling.

In elementary school I was taught to restate the question in my answer. The questions (according to Jenny Smith of UMC Young Clergy) are: What are the struggles, joys, surprises and outcomes? Who helped you along? Where are you now? What do you wish someone told you at the beginning of discernment?

I’m somewhat envious of those who have a specific, precise experience of calling and/or conversion a la St. Augustine. For those who share this type of experience, their certainty of their status before God and what they are supposed to do with their lives is unshakeable.

However, I believe that I am like most people, in that I have not had a singular moment of epiphany, and that my sense of calling has been worked out “with great fear and trembling”, as it were, through a lot of trial and error.

Specifically, God has shown me my calling in life by throwing me in the deep end and forcing me to learn to swim.

According to the most recent theories on parenting (I have a six month old daughter, and I’m, for better or worse, quite well read on such things), many of the “old school” parenting techniques we and our parents grew up with are now anathema and tantamount to child abuse.

I had swimming lessons as a child, but I know a lot of people whose fathers would throw them in the deep end of the pool so they would learn to swim, trusting that there is a fundamental human survival instinct that would lead the child to learn to swim.

So while I am not so presumptuous as to call God an "abusive" parent, I so see God as an “old school” parent who has repeatedly thrown me in the deep end and shouted “Learn to swim!” over my loud and persistent screaming.

When I was 18 years old, God blessed me with a youth pastor named Will who had more faith in me than I did. Will was also the church’s choir director, and one week at choir practice he told us that he wouldn’t be present on the following Sunday. “Who’s going to direct us?” one member asked. Will took one look at me and said, “Matt, get down here. You’re the choir director this Sunday.” I had never directed a choir before, but he walked me through it, and I ended up doing a passable job.

(Splash! “Learn to swim!”)

A few months later I found myself in the summer between high school and college, working at a missions camp. A church from the town in which I would be attending college was at our camp one week, and decided I should come work with their youth. A few days later I got a call from the pastor, asking if I’d be willing not only to work with the youth, but direct the youth program. Remember, I’m only 18 years old.

(Splash! “Learn to swim!”)

Fast forward a few years, and I’m straight out of seminary in my first solo appointment. Three weeks after I’ve begun this appointment, I’m starting to feel comfortable, and I even think I know what I’m doing. Then I get a phone call from an older member: “Matt, (church member)’s daughter was murdered last night. It’s all over the cable news stations!” Long story short, the circumstances of her death were rather sensational, and it led to a lot of media attention. The funeral is that Saturday, and we have to keep the information about services out of the papers, for fear of CNN trucks being outside the church. The next day, Sunday, I’ve already scheduled an infant baptism, so I’ve got a third of the congregation overjoyed at the baptism of a new baby, one third grief stricken over the death of this woman, and another third in between, not sure what to think. And I’ve got to preach one sermon to speak to all of them!

(Splash! “Learn to swim!”)

Two years later, I’ve settled in to my role as a Senior Pastor quite nicely. I’m in Costa Rica on a mission trip, and very early one morning my wife calls me (on the cell phone of the one group member who brought it for emergencies) to tell me our church building was hit by a bolt of lightning and burned to the ground. I spend the entire day getting back into the United States, out of communication, with very little idea as to what’s going on. When I do get back, I have less than 48 hours to plan a worship service from scratch, having to rely on favors from a half dozen other churches for chairs, hymnals, a keyboard, etc. Not to mention, of course, the media attention this draws and the hundreds of people grieving the loss of this beloved, historic building, now looking to their 28 year old pastor for guidance.

(Splash! “Learn to swim!”)

To all the young adults reading this: please know that discerning your calling will likely not be an objective, completely certain thing. It will most likely be worked out through your experiences, with a lot of mistakes, and only having any kind of discernible form in hindsight.

I pray that God lets you wade in gradually, but don’t be surprised if you’re thrown into the deep end and told to learn how to swim. God is a good and loving parent who will let you struggle for your own good, but won’t let you drown.

My prayers are with each and every one of you on this journey. If I can ever be of any help whatsoever, don’t hesitate to contact me by email or through the blog.

Coming Thursday- Reflections on Calling

Jenny Smith over at UMC Young Clergy has issued a call for folks to post their reflections on discerning their calling on Thursday, August 20. I'll be doing this, and I encourage any other young adults in ministry (Methodist or otherwise) to do the same.

Jenny writes:

What are the struggles, joys, surprises and outcomes? Who helped you along? Where are you now? What do you wish someone told you at the beginning of discernment?

Write the post, send the link to umcyoungclergy@gmail.com and they'll all be posted at www.umcyoungclergy.com on the 20th.

We hope the outcome is two fold:
They'll be shared with young adults ages 18-24 considering a call into ministry
They'll also be helpful for young adults interested in attending Exploration 2009 this November 13-15

I'll be posting some reflections (including both joys and frustrations), which I hope will be beneficial to other young adults considering these issues. This is often a lonely road we travel, and one of the benefits of social networking sites and blogs is connecting with others who are on this journey who may not be physically close by, and knowing that we are not alone.

Health Care Creed

In the midst of the partisan screaming over health care reform, it seems like few people are taking the time to consider the larger theological and moral issues at hand.

As a Christian, I believe that each and every one of God's children is of sacred worth, and that access to quality, affordable health care is a fundamental right of all human beings, not just those who have the means to afford it.

Although I voted for President Obama and my theological and moral convictions generally cause me to lean toward the political left, I don't know enough yet about the specific proposals for health care reform to know whether I would be in favor of a specific bill or not.

What I do know is that in Matthew 25, when Jesus talks about the differences between the sheep and the goats (those who are participating in the life of the Kingdom of God, and those who are not, respectively), one of the identifying marks of the sheep is caring for the "least of these" when they are sick, because whatever one does to any of God's children, they do unto God.

With that in mind, I'd like to share something I received in an email the other day from Tony Garr, director of the Tennessee Health Care Campaign (THCC), which contained a "Health Care Creed" developed by People Improving Communities through Organizing (PICO), and Sojourners.

As one of God's children, I believe that protecting the health of each human being is a profoundly important personal and communal responsibility for people of faith.

I believe God created each person in the divine image to be spiritually and physically healthy. I feel the pain of sickness and disease in our broken world (Genesis 1:27, Romans 8:22).

I believe life and healing are core tenets of the Christian life. Christ's ministry included physical healing, and we are called to participate in God's new creation as instruments of healing and redemption (Matthew 4:23, Luke 9:1-6; Mark 7:32-35, Acts 10:38). Our nation should strive to ensure all people have access to life-giving treatments and care.

I believe, as taught by the Hebrew prophets and Jesus, that the measure of a society is seen in how it treats the most vulnerable. The current discussion about health-care reform is important for the United States to move toward a more just system of providing care to all people (Isaiah 1:16-17, Jeremiah 7:5-7, Matthew 25:31-45).

I believe that all people have a moral obligation to tell the truth. To serve the common good of our entire nation, all parties debating reform should tell the truth and refrain from distorting facts or using fear-based messaging (Leviticus 19:11; Ephesians 4:14-15, 25; Proverbs 6:16-19).

I believe that Christians should seek to bring health and well-being (shalom) to the society into which God has placed us, for a healthy society benefits all members (Jeremiah 29:7).

I believe in a time when all will live long and healthy lives, from infancy to old age (Isaiah 65:20), and "mourning and crying and pain will be no more" (Revelation 21:4). My heart breaks for my brothers and sisters who watch their loved ones suffer, or who suffer themselves, because they cannot afford a trip to the doctor. I stand with them in their suffering.

I believe health-care reform must rest on a foundation of values that affirm each and every life as a sacred gift from the Creator (Genesis 2:7).

If you share the conviction that health is a fundamental right of all God's children, regardless of your political leanings, I hope you will share this creed with others on your blog, Facebook page, or whatever other means you have of communicating your beliefs to others.

(Note: the biblical passages cited and linked above are not intended as "proof-texts" to argue that God is in favor of one political position over another. They're simply intended to point to some biblical passages that inform these convictions. If you read and interpret these and other biblical passages differently, I affirm and honor your convictions, just as I hope you will affirm and honor mine.)

Truth in "fake" news

Once again, the "fake" news has hit on a profound truth that the "real" news is too busy covering sensational stories to boost ratings and rake in ad revenue to notice.

I think I'm like most folks in that I'm not sure what to make of all the outrage on display over health care reform at these town hall meetings. Is it genuinely grassroots? Is it manufactured? Are that many people really in a blind rage? How can people get so angry when so few specifics have been proposed or discussed?

One of the strangest things these protesters and talking heads on Faux News are yelling about is the supposed "death panels" that will decide if someone is worthy of treatment, hence determining if they live or die. "The Daily Show" hilariously points out that insurance companies already make such decisions.

My favorite line: "the US government should not be running death panels. It's far too big and out of control to effectively run something that important. That responsibility should remain where it is now: with private insurance companies."

We'd all be better off if we stepped back for a second, laughed at how seriously we take ourselves, calmed down, and actually talked with each other instead of screaming sound-bytes so we could get on TV.

Further Shameless Self Pomotion

I just published an article on Youth Ministry Today. It's a piece I wrote a few years back for my Seminary Field Ed class, and we were asked to pick a guiding metaphor for the ministry context in which we were working.

I was a youth pastor, and I chose "shepherd", specifically a shepherd herding cats. Enjoy.

Herding Cats: The Unexpected Surprises of Ministering to Young People

Contemplative Concrete

A few weeks ago I was in Costa Rica on a mission trip. Pretty much all I've written about the trip thus far was how it was abbreviated by the church fire. Initially I was upset that I was out of the country when this disaster occurred, preventing me from being on the scene right away. But in a way it was actually a good thing for me, in that it created a kind of liminal space between the type of everyday ministry I was used to and the new, chaotic reality I came back to.

I also found the trip to be a great opportunity to engage in some contemplative practices and focus completely on the moment I was in, which has been so crucial for me in these last few weeks.

In Costa Rica we were working on the orphanage in Coronado (a town in the mountains just outside San Jose) that the Methodist Church of Costa Rica hopes to open next year. The foundation had been dug, so we were doing concrete work all week. Here in the States we usually see one or more large concrete mixing trucks doing all the work, requiring only a few people and very little time. This was not the case at the orphanage.

The only power tool we had was a cement mixer with a loud diesel motor. Everything else was done by hand.

A massive pile of silt had been taken from a river bed, and we had to sift it, separating the gravel from the sand.

We then had to shovel the sand and gravel into buckets, so they could be poured into the cement mixer in the correct proportions along with water and cement to make mortar to lay block and concrete for the foundation.

Once the mixer had done its thing, we had to take the concrete one wheelbarrow-load at a time over to the foundation to pour over the re bar, which was being hand tied by some other members of our group.

Needless to say, the progress was very slow and the work was as physically strenuous as most of us had ever experienced. And some folks very quickly got frustrated by the slow progress and how much effort was required for the smallest result. "Let's pass the hat and rent us a cement truck!" was frequently overheard, not always jokingly.

I had the good fortune of having brought Thomas Merton's New Seeds of Contemplation along with me. The book is a series of essays where Merton is attempting to explain the contemplative life to people who aren't in a monastery. It's not a series of exercises, just reflections.

In one of the chapters, Merton talks about how much we let other things distract us from what is happening in the present moment. We worry about unpaid bills, what our neighbor thinks of us, etc. We let a million thoughts run through our heads and it becomes very hard to focus.

Being one of the younger, stronger guys on the team, I had the "privilege" of doing a lot of the heavy lifting, which often meant pushing heavy wheelbarrows full of concrete up and down the very steep hillside. I quickly became overwhelmed when I thought about how many more loads it would take to finish a certain task, how long it was until lunch, or how badly my back was going to hurt the next morning.

So I decided to try and follow Merton's advice and do everything I could to concentrate on what I was doing at that moment. I only thought about filling the bucket in front of me with sand or gravel, not about how many buckets I would fill the entire day. I concentrated just on the wheelbarrow I was pushing at the moment, not how many I would push all day. I concentrated on each breath I was taking.

A very strange thing happened as I did this. I became very aware of my body and how I was using it as I did this hard physical labor. I quickly realized that when I was pushing or lifting something heavy I wasn't breathing at all, or taking very shallow breaths. This, combined with the altitude, was why I was out of breath all the time.

I discovered that when I was pushing the wheelbarrows up the hill, I was keeping my arms tense unnecessarily, and that I was pushing my hips forward, putting all the pressure on my lower back, instead of letting my legs do the work. Because I was focusing on what I was doing at the moment, I was able to make small corrections and more effectively use my body to do the work.

At the end of each day I found myself exhausted, but not very sore at all. Even though I was burning more calories each day that I probably do in a normal week, I found myself very relaxed and refreshed. It took every ounce of mental discipline I have (which is, admittedly, not very much), but focusing solely on what I was doing in each moment enabled me to enjoy the whole experience more, quiet my soul, and draw closer to God.

In the three weeks since the church fire that forced me to cut the mission trip short, I've had no shortage of things to worry about. Whenever I consider the totality of the task before us, I get overwhelmed, scared, and depressed. But if I can quiet those voices in my head and focus solely on the task before me, it doesn't seem so daunting, and I'm actually able to get more done.

All because I was able to practice some contemplative concrete work! God works in mysterious ways, indeed!

The Gospel According to "Rachel Getting Married"

This weekend Jessica and I watched a film that had been on our Netflix que for quite a while, Jonathan Demme's "Rachel Getting Married". It was a pretty good movie, thanks mostly to Anne Hathaway's performance.

I was really surprised, though, to see a tremendous message of redemption and some (most likely unintended) gospel metaphors at the end of the movie.

Anne Hathaway's character, Kym, reminds me of a number of people I've encountered at various times in my life. She's just come home from another stint in rehab, and it becomes clear very quickly that Kym has constructed her entire identity around being messed up. She wants everyone to know all about her problems, and she always has to be the center of attention. It's most likely crippling insecurity masquerading as vapid narcissism, and it works. We find out that her whole family is oriented around her disease. Her father is the peacemaker who will do anything to keep things peaceful keep her from going off the deep end. Her sister, Rachel (who is getting married, hence the title), is getting a PhD in Psychology so she can give voice to all the dysfunctions in her family. This is a textbook case of what addiction does to individuals and families.

Disclaimer- spoilers ahead. If you haven't seen this movie and don't want to know what happens, stop reading!

The night before the wedding, Kym gets in a fight with her estranged mother that gets physical, leaving her with a black eye and a swollen lip. She runs from her mom's house in a very emotional state, drives off, and quickly totals her car. She then falls asleep in the car, only to be awoken by police in the morning. Kym arrives back at the house as everyone is getting ready for the wedding in terrible shape with her father worried sick. Even though this is her sister's wedding day, she is once again drawing all the attention to herself.

Here's where the fantastic gospel metaphor shows up. Kym knocks on the door of Rachel's room and just stands there saying nothing. Rachel is already in her dress, but she takes it off to help Kym get cleaned up, made up to cover her eye and lip, and dressed for the ceremony. Even though Rachel had gotten fed up with Kym's antics in an earlier scene, we see Kym broken and contrite and helpless, so Rachel's actions show her forgiveness in a way words never could.

Kym's silence is significant because she has had the vast majority of the dialogue throughout the film. But from the moment at Rachel's door, she barely has any lines at all. The director, Jonathan Demme, had made Kym the center of almost every shot, but all through the wedding day she is on the margins of the screen. Kym has finally gotten over herself and thought of somebody else for a change. She has accepted that life is not all about her and her problems, and that she truly needs others to help her make it through each day.

This isn't a "Christian film" by any stretch, and I doubt if any of the filmmakers have any particular religious inclinations, and yet we see the gospel shown in the brokenness and humility Kym shows after she crashes her car. She's finally hit rock bottom and has accepted her powerlessness in the face of her addictions and other problems. She understands and accepts that redemption is going to have to come from a force outside herself.

The movie may not have the requisite doctrinal presentation (the only mention of Jesus is when the characters frequently break the third commandment) for some Christians to consider this film as containing a legitimate gospel message, but I think the humility and redemption Kym displays speaks for itself.

Conspiracy Theories and Media

I hate even bringing up this issue, because doing so might somehow indicate that I believe that the people on this particular bandwagon have a point or that is even the slightest bit legitimate. Reticence noted, here goes.

It seems that the so called "Birther" movement just won't go away. This is a relatively small but unbelievably vocal group of people who insist that, in spite of ironclad evidence to the contrary, President Obama is not a US citizen and thus not eligible to be President.

What really amazes me about this whole issue is not that fringe groups make thinly veiled racist arguments driven more by paranoia, prejudice, and an unhealthy obsession with conspiracy theories. Living in the South so close to the home base of the KKK, I see that sort of garbage all the time. What really blows my mind is how members of the mainstream media not only give this issue any attention, but some of them are even keeping this story alive.

I'm not just talking about Faux News, either. They just added Glen Beck to their stable of nut jobs, which tells you all you need to know about their priorities. I'm talking about CNN, the network that claims to pride itself on staying above the partisan fray.

CNN anchor Lou Dobbs, a well known xenophobe (see his almost nightly attacks on undocumented laborers) is one of the chief proponents of the "birther" conspiracy theory (side note: Jon Stewart, as he often does, superbly illustrates the absurdity of this whole thing). In an interview with Politico, CNN President Jon Klein sidestepped any responsibility for this yellow journalism masquerading as legitimate, impartial journalism, by claiming that what Dobbs says on his radio show, part of a different media company, is of no concern to CNN.

I don't believe that for a second. If Dobbs or any other on-air personality at CNN or any other network got a DUI or was accused of a violent crime, the network would suspend them, if not outright fire them. We need look no further than Don Imus or Charles Barkley for proof of that. Saying "This person did X act outside of our airwaves" would not be acceptable, because networks live and die by the public perception of their on-air talent.

Dobbs draws big ratings, hence CNN can charge more to run ads on his show. The same goes for incendiary talking heads like Glen Beck, Keith Olberman, and Bill O'Reiley. As long as the sponsors are happy, they can go on saying any incendiary thing they want. The more outrageous the better, because it keeps us all tuning in.

The majority of us who are sick of this kind of thing passing for legitimate news do have some recourse, however. We can simply turn off the TV, thus negatively affecting the ratings of these talking heads. If we're so inclined we could even contact these networks or even their advertisers and tell them that we expect better of them if they are going to be our voice.

Taking a few minutes to speak up might do us all a lot of good.

Lessons thus far

I've learned a lot of things in the nearly two weeks since the church fire. Among them are the grace and resiliency of the people of Bethlehem UMC- a lesson I learn over and over again as I continue with the honor of being their pastor.

Another thing I've learned is how any comment, no matter how small, can generate a lot of buzz. For example, I tweeted the following thing yesterday (which also becomes my Facebook status): "really getting sick of all these sharks using our church's tragedy as a way to drum up business".

This phrase quickly generated a number of questions from folks who read it. So let me clarify/elaborate.

Over the past two weeks I have received dozens of phone calls and emails from businesses whose products and services may be useful to us as we begin the process of rebuilding. Some of these phone calls and emails have evidenced genuine concern, apologies for seeming opportunistic in contacting me, and offers of some kind of discount in light of our tragedy. These are not the "sharks" to whom I am referring.

The "sharks" in question are, sadly, the majority of these phone calls and emails from businesses who express half-hearted condolences for our loss, and immediately launch into a lengthy sales pitch for their products/services. Particularly unsettling are the individuals who have offered legal consultation in dealing with our insurance company. These are probably the same guys who advertise their services during "The Price Is Right" if you've been injured in an accident and can't work. My friends who've been to law school have a term for these people: ambulance chasers.

Before I sound too negative, however, let me say that most of the communication I've had from folks has been messages of support and prayer, along with offers to help with no expectation of reciprocity. The small minority whose behavior is, at best, ethically gray, does not overshadow the majority of folks who have been nothing but loving and gracious.

As to this small minority, I get that these practices may be "good business", but it's pretty poor manners.

PS- today is Kate's 6 month birthday! Check out our family blog, The Parsonage Family, for a recap of the last half year!

Moving Forward

Bethlehem UMC will be meeting at the Montgomery County Civic Hall for at least the next four weeks. All are welcome to join us for Breakfast at 8:30, Sunday School at 9, and Worship at 10.

The Civic Hall is located in Veterans Plaza on Pageant Ln., just off of Madison Street in Clarksville, TN. Here is a Google Map to the location.

View Larger Map

Media Coverage

There was a lot of media coverage of our service yesterday. Here is what is up on the web so far:

WKRN (channel 2, Nashville's ABC affiliate) did a really nice piece. It was strange to see my voice leading off the 5pm news yesterday!

Here is the link to the video on their site.

Fox 17 (anchored by my fraternity brother, John Dunn) also did a piece. Here is the link.

Our local paper, the Leaf Chronicle, also did a very nice article, along with a great photo gallery.

Thank you to all the members of the press who came out yesterday and treated the event with such respect and reverence. Your care and grace comes through in the pieces you produced.

We have an informational meeting tonight at 7pm at Sango UMC. By then I'm hoping to be able to announce our temporary worship location and some other events for the coming days.

As always, please keep our congregation in your prayers.

Funeral for a Friend

Today we held worship next to where the church building stood. I adapted part of the funeral liturgy from the Book of Worship, as well as part of the liturgy for taking leave of a building. In many ways today was a funeral for our building. The church is the people, but the building was a beloved family member.

Nearly 200 people came to worship with us today, including Dr. Ron Lowrey, our District Superintendent, and Rev. Roger Hobson, executive assistant to our Bishop.

As part of the service, we had taken bricks from one of the chimneys that had collapsed and used it to build a Wailing Wall, like the one in Jerusalem, and during our prayer time we wrote down prayers and put them in the cracks of the wall.

Our historical marker survived the fire, and will be kept as part of a memorial that will be in our new building.

We also celebrated Holy Communion in our worship. Today was a bittersweet yet beautiful time of mourning and celebration. Tomorrow we will begin the long work of rebuilding. Please keep our congregation in your prayers.

photos courtesy of the Leaf Chronicle and Jessica Kelley.

What Once was Lost

There were so many irreplaceable things we lost in the fire that I can't even begin to list them here. One small grace is that I didn't have an office in the church, so I the only things I personally lost were my vestments. They were nice, but were all replaceable. 

All of them, that is, except the pectoral cross Jessica purchased for me in England a few years ago. It was of tremendous sentimental value to me and I was heartbroken that I lost it.

Even though we technically weren't supposed to, some of us started combing through the rubble today, and I went over to the area where the closet with my vestments was. Digging around I discovered a half burned pile of cloths that I realized had been my robes and stoles, and a large hunk of plastic that had been the hangers on which they hung.

And in the middle of that hunk of melted plastic:

It turns out that the plastic formed a protective casing around the cross, so the damage to it was minimal. I will be wearing it tomorrow, stains and all, and I'll take it to a jewelry shop this week to get it cleaned up.

God works small miracles even in the midst of great tragedies. This is only one of many that are yet to come.

The latest info

I spent most of the day, today, at the church. To call it a heartbreaking experience is an understatement. Seeing our beloved church building reduced to ashes and rubble is an experience that defies description. And yet it was a day filled with strange beauty as people came together and laughed, cried, and shared memories of all the wonderful things that happened in this building over the last century.

We will be worshipping at the site at 10am on Sunday. The worship will include Holy Communion. There will also be an informational meeting at Sango UMC at 7pm on Monday evening. Dr. Ron Lowrey, our District Superintendent, and I will be there to share information and answer questions.

Here are some photos I took today:

Please keep our congregation in your prayers.

A Tragic Loss

Many of you all have already heard the news that Bethlehem UMC was struck by lightning last night and burned down. Here are the photos that the Leaf Chronicle published.

I was in Costa Rica at the time of the fire. I got on a plane as soon as I heard, and arrived back in Clarksville this evening.

Please pray for our congregation in the difficult days ahead as we figure out the next steps and move forward.

Out until the 19th

I will be in Costa Rica until July 19th.

I'm going as part of a mission team of United Methodists from the Clarksville area to work on making structural improvements to the orphanage run by the United Methodist Church just outside of San Jose. We'll be staying at the seminary in San Jose while we do our work.

I'm very much looking forward to this mission trip, because in the past few years I haven't found mission experiences to be as fulfilling as I used to. I think it's largely because I've been in charge on these trips, and the burdens of leadership have hindered me from experiencing these trips as times of spiritual renewal. I'm merely a participant on this trip, so I'm looking forward to a time of refreshment and renewal (physically, however, I'll be exhausted when I get back).

Please pray for safe travels and blessings for our mission team. I'll share pictures and stories when I return. Until then, blessings to you all on wherever your journey leads you.

How do you do that funeral?

The headlines here in the Nashville area have been dominated in the last week by the death of Steve McNair, the former quarter back of the Tennessee Titans. In the last few days we've learned that he was killed by his mistress, who then killed herself, leaving behind his wife and four children who apparently knew nothing about this woman.

Since he was famous, and since the circumstances of his untimely death were scandalous, questions have been swirling around the mainstream media, blogs, and sports talk radio. What does this do to his legacy? How will we remember him now?

I've heard a slightly different version of this question tossed about by clergy and others in the religion business. They've asked, "how do you do this guy's funeral?" At a funeral we're talk about how good the deceased was, so those who have raised this question are wondering if we're just supposed to ignore the fact that he was cheating on his wife.

I can't help but wonder if raising this question in this way is a sign of the very poor understanding of grace that most of us have. We tend look at someone who was doing something wrong, if we're religious we might even say they were sinning (and make no mistake, cheating on your wife is a sin), and we assume that they didn't just do a bad thing, we assume that they're a bad person.

In other words, we assume that the power of sin is greater than the power of grace. Or at the very least we assume that for God's grace to really be effective we have to have purged our lives of sin, or at least the major ones (however we define what "major" sins are).

The truth is, though, that God's grace can be working powerfully in our lives and we'll still mess up. Grace overcomes the power of Sin, yes, but it's a lifelong process, not an instantaneous cure.

Steve McNair was a loving father, someone devoted to numerous philanthropic causes, and took time time to mentor young men like Vince Young, who grew up without a father in his life. The sin of adultery doesn't negate these good things. He was a good man who did a bad thing. Nothing less, nothing more.

So how does a pastor do this particular funeral? Steve's pastor, Bishop Joseph Walker, a man who clearly believes in "grace greater than our sin", gave a pretty definitive answer. Take a look for yourself:

(This is only part of the sermon. I encourage you to watch the whole thing.)

May we all have the courage to drop our stones of judgment and live like God's grace is greater than any sin.

Sacraments in Cyber-Space

I meant to post on this last week, but moderating comments from the post I put up last Monday took up a lot of time!

A very popular liturgy blogger in New Zealand joined in the conversation about if and how sacraments can be done in a virtual environment, specifically Second Life.

Apparently there are churches in Second Life where one's avatar can go and participate in worship, including Holy Communion. This is problematic for Rev. Bosco Peters, who maintains the Liturgy blog, because he is an Anglican, thus his theology of Communion is very high (as in "High Church").

Note to my theologian colleagues out there: please forgive the gross oversimplifications that follow. I'm trying to make this accessible to everyone.

High church traditions (Catholic, Anglican/Episcopalian) are very restrictive in terms of who can preside over the sacraments, because it understands God's grace to be tangibly present in them. Thus, only an ordained person can preside at the sacraments so as to ensure that they are administered properly and those who receive them are getting the full benefit.

Low church traditions (Baptist, Disciples of Christ, etc.), on the other hand have a much more relaxed view of the sacraments, viewing them as symbols of God's grace that will not be negated if they're not done "correctly" (however one defines it) or by the "right" person. These traditions believe the effectiveness of God's grace has much more to do with the sincerity of the receiver, not the clergy person presiding.  Thus, low church traditions have been very eager to make use of the internet, as evidenced by the plethora of evangelical sites that walk one step-by-step through the process of "accepting Christ" and being saved.

So we can see how the practice of administering and receiving sacraments in a virtual environment is problematic for those with a high sacramental theology. Can the invocation of the Holy Spirit (the epiclesis) really be effective from the real world to the virtual world? Can the virtual bread and wine effectively mediate the presence of Christ? Can the grace of taking the sacrament in the virtual world be fully transmitted to the receiver in the real world?

Being a Methodist, I'm somewhere between these two theological extremes. We were born in the Church of England, which is decidedly high church, yet Methodism grew and prospered as a frontier revival movement in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries in America, where the lack of ordained clergy necessitated some decidedly low church practices. So the joke that Methodists are half Episcopalian and half Baptist is actually pretty accurate.

In our tradition we talk about sacraments as "an outward and visible sign of an inward and spiritual grace", meaning that while we don't believe the bread and wine of communion or the water of baptism are transformed in any way as to become exclusive mediators of God's grace, we do believe in the real presence of God in these elements. It doesn't depend on the character or correct performance of the presider (which is of great relief to me as a pastor), nor is it dependent on the sincerity or knowledge of the receiver (which is of great relief to me as a highly imperfect person), but on God's promise to be with us always. We trust in the mysterious power of God that has been revealed to us in part, and we look forward to when we will  know it fully, to paraphrase 1 Corinthians 13.

So ultimately, I think it is fine to participate in church and even to take communion in Second Life or any other online environment, but I would also encourage someone not to stop there. God's grace is no less real in the virtual realm, but there is no substitute for having a community where one can grow in their discipleship. Such communities can happen online, but actual human interaction can never be fully recreated, no matter how good the technology.