Yr. C, Wk. 3: Sanctuary and our Relationships with God

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Worship and Gathering
Before the meeting, Nuno sent us this:

For Worship tonight I thought we might try something different. Below is a simple song I often sing on repeat to lul my kids to sleep. I invite us to each take a turn reading, singing, praying, or expressing these words as we feel called.

Lord, prepare me
To be a sanctuary,
Pure and Holy,
Tried and true.
With Thanksgiving,
I'll be a living
Sanctuary
For you.

Nuno then asked where we find sanctuary outside of church? Outside on the bike trail, the playing field, the wilderness, the back porch (with screens "so I don't have to crush God's little creatures," Susan said), but also inside the home, with some preference for the basement, and anywhere near water.

Yr. C, Living as Spiritually Mature Christians, Unit 1 Spiritual Autobiography and Listening: 1st yr: Tom, Joyce, Donfred; 2nd yr: Jessica; 3rd yr, Susan; 4th yr, Pete, Nuno, Marilyn. Mentors: Susan and Scott. Absent: None.

Discussion of the Readings
Marilyn led with an observation about the importance between past and present. It's not only the contents of ancient texts, but the ways later communities fit them together, and the ways later communities used/interpreted/fought over those texts. Readings in different years highlighted the choices that translators through the millennia have had to make.

First year may be overwhelming at first, Jessica said, but she remembered how she gained perspective when our friend Kathy said, “My 8-year-old heart broke when I learned that Jesus didn’t invent the golden rule.” The theories about sources were already familiar to some of us from college, though there was some interest in what's been updated since the 70s -- including a critical look at scripture from the perspectives of marginalized people (as in the other text edited by Yee) and cultures that have been colonized. Tom remarked on the new theory that Abraham's story has new meaning if we allow that it might have been written/edited after the Babylonian exile instead of centuries before.

Pete led another thread of conversation as he reflected on this, his fourth year (fourth-and-a-half, actually) in EfM. “It’s finally coming together for me." He recommended the essay in the RRG on being theologically literate (pp. 182-190). That literacy makes a solid background / springboard for theology – something we take with us the rest of our lives. “We’ve got to stay with the times without losing tradition.” Nuno joined in: we 'DO theology,' it's not just a briefcase of information. Literacy gives a sense of belonging, security in yourself and in your beliefs: “I’m amazed how much I’ve learned and how natural the cumulative process has become.”

Theological Reflection
Given 3-5 minutes each, we shared our stories of desires for relationship with God -- desires we have, or have had. I hope that we all practiced good listening habits that we identified last week: some note-making, eye contact, attention to places where the emotion or energy increased. We certainly had a wide emotional range in our stories. Because these stories are confidential, that's all I'm writing about them here now.

For Next Week
Marilyn will lead worship and bring a gathering question. We're all doing the readings assigned for our years in the RRG, week four. The RRG gives each year some things to focus on, so do take the moment to read what the RRG says. I've asked that we all "respond" to the questions for all years on page 40 regarding movies and books. There's a good reason to do this at this point in the year!

I like the last paragraph on p 40, too: "Listen to the stories around you during the week.... What concerns are expressed? What hopes do you hear? How do you discern truth in what you hear?"

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Yr. C, Wk. 2: Green Light

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Worship and Gathering
Pete could not be with us, but he prepared a worship consisting of thanksgivings. For a gathering question, Scott gave everyone two minutes to find an object of gratitude for show and tell. These included Bella the big dog, Nora the one-eyed cat, a mosaic cross (that brought to Marilyn's mind her gratitude for what this group has meant), a trophy from the game where Donfred scored the winning points in double-overtime, the Book of Common Prayer (along with the Bible, Tom's "owner's manual"), and the resin knob from a shifter -- Nuno told a miraculous story from his grandfather's earlier years.

We were sorry to hear that Kathy needs to sit out this year.

Yr. C, Living as Spiritually Mature Christians, Unit One Listening and Spiritual Autobiographies: 1st yr: Tom, Joyce, Donfred; 2nd yr: Jessica; 3rd yr, Susan; 4th yr, Pete, Nuno, Marilyn. Mentors: Susan and Scott. Absent: Pete, Joyce.

Discussion of the Readings
The most interesting piece of the RRG's essay seems to have been the micro-meso-macro levels to our lives, our consciousness, and theology itself.

Theological Reflection
After a break, we met in breakout rooms to imagine norms for our cohort with the color scheme of a traffic light. (see image) To those strictures, admonitions, and recommendations, Sewanee would add these:

• Speak in "I" statements, not "you" or "we"
• Respect privacy and confidentiality.

Before we practice theological reflection, we'll be sharing five-minute episodes from our spiritual autobiographies, one per week for the next five weeks.

Scott explained how the autobiographies "feed four birds with one scone" - building community, exploring the process of spiritual growth over the years of our lives, and listening. This year's autobiography prompts derive from the premise that theology, too, is about listening to our own lives -- our desires, discomforts, and fears -- and to the culture of our generation. So, as the RRG said, theology is not just pages of information or a list of settled "imperatives"; every generation must find how Jesus speaks to the world of their time.

In breakout rooms, we paired up to pitch our ideas for stories we'll share over the next five weeks.

For Next Week
Nuno will lead worship and ask a gathering question. We all will be reading assignments for our own years. During the second part of class, we'll each have five minutes to tell about a desire for relationship with God that we have, or have had.

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Yr. C, Wk. 1: Our Works, Our Names

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Worship and Gathering
Scott led worship through Evening Prayer, edited so that everyone spoke in turn.

The worship leader will typically ask a "gathering" question to give us all a chance to share what's in our lives each week. This week's question covered a broader swath of life: When we pray that "our works may find favor in [God's] sight," what "works" are you thinking of? Several of us shared photos (see collage).

Yr. C, Living as Spiritually Mature Christians, Unit 1 Listening and Spiritual Autobiography:
1st yr: Tom, Joyce, Donfred; 2nd yr: Jessica; 3rd yr, Susan; 4th yr, Pete, Nuno, Marilyn, Kathy. Mentors: Susan and Scott. Absent: Kathy.

Discussion of the Readings
We looked at the opening materials, especially pp. 8-10. In discussion, we noted that EfM goes beyond a knowledge base to teach us habits of applying theology to our experience and to involve us in community; that the mentors are not expected to be experts, but guides or facilitators.

We then anticipated next week's reading by listening to each other in small groups. While each of us told about our name -- its origin and its influence in our lives -- others listened intently so that they could relate the story to the whole group.

Theological Reflection
After a break, we heard those name stories and then reflected on the experience.

• What thoughts or feelings did you have as you heard the stories? Confusion, a theme of kinship, discovery that two very different names (Nuñez and Jagusch) derive from the same Biblical hero, Joshua, son of Nun.
• What do we read about names in our Bible and tradition? Lots of re-namings to show re-orientations towards God, geneologies that show the passing on of tradition and that validate a person's authority, God's going unnamed, and the question "Who do you say that I am?"
• What did we learn about listening? Lots of smiles: delighted to learn; we were attuned to emotions while we listened to facts; we felt the responsibility to get the story right; it was funny to hear what others picked up in our own stories.

When Scott read aloud some guidance for listening from p. 272 in the Reading and Reflection Guide, our own ideas were affirmed. One was added: don't be thinking about what you want to say next while the other person is speaking.

For Next Week
Pete volunteered to lead worship and to bring a gathering question for us.

All are reading chapter 2 in the Reading and Reflection Guide (RRG). We now have two links for that material:

• Opening chapters
• The entire book for download. Hard copies have already been shipped to us.

In week 3, we will begin the sharing of our spiritual autobiographies according to the RRG's alternative plan, each sharing about 3-5 minutes each week:

• Desire for God: Share a story about a desire you have or have had for your relationship with God.
• Person or Event: Share a story about how a person or event contributed to your maturing in faith.
• Questions: Share a story about questions that have had an impact on your maturing in faith.
• An Imperative: Share a story about an imperative you have experienced as you work toward maturing in your relationship with God.
• Image for your journey: Email a picture of a work of art that represents your journey of maturing faith. We will share on Zoom. Notice and give thanks for the rich variety of individual journeys in your group.

The guide suggests that we associate each chapter with a color. "Any color(s) can be assigned to any question. Your association of color and experience is what is important. In each case you may wish to share the color you assigned to the story and reason(s) for doing so."

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Yr. C: Preparations for our first meeting

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I'm Scott Smoot, Keeper of the Blog, pictured here with co-mentor Dr. Susan Rouse.

At our first meeting Tuesday at 7pm (E.S.T.), we'll make introductions to each other and reacquaint ourselves with Zoom. Then, we'll follow the agenda outlined below. Please do read it all the way through, because there are a couple of homework assignments embedded in the text.

Worship and Gathering

Yr. C, Living as Spiritually Mature Christians, Unit 1, Spiritual Autobiography and Listening: 1st yr: Tom, Joyce, Donfred; 2nd yr: Jessica; 3rd yr, Susan; 4th yr, Pete, Nuno, Marilyn, Kathy. Mentors: Susan and Scott. Absent: None.

I will lead us in Evening Prayer II, adapted for Zoom. All of us will have lines to read.

The lectionary assigns for Tuesday some readings that share a theme of "works". Workmen complete the temple. James asks about the value of faith absent works. Peter illustrates James: he has faith about Jesus, but not the heart to stand up for those beliefs in public. We ourselves will pray in Form III "that our works may find favor in God’s sight."

Homework: Before Tuesday afternoon, please email me a photo or other image that represents something you’ve been working on in the past few months. I’ll put them all into a slide show, and, after the readings, we’ll each have the opportunity to explain what the group is seeing. Please send the image to me in the JPG (or JPEG) format. My email address is smootws@yahoo.com

Discussion of the Readings
We usually have readings to do before we show up on Tuesday. This week, it's introductory material in EfM's Reading and Reflection Guide (RRG). A hard copy of the book is already on its way to everyone who completed their registration. You should receive tracking information by email. Email me any questions about the delivery of your RRG; EfM wants to mitigate a flood of emails by filtering questions through the mentors.

You can read the material on a PDF with this link: RRG, Intro and Unit 1. We can all use this until our RRGs show up at our doorsteps.

Frankly, the introduction is too full of information and terms that we'll use later. I do recommend that everyone read (or re-read) pp. 8,9, and 10 about expectations for participants and mentors. I recommend skimming the rest. The table of contents is interesting, mapping out the year by weeks. In the intro, p. xi lists books we'll be reading, and p. xv gives some useful online links. Bring to the session any questions you have.

Theological Reflection
For this unit on "Spiritual Autobiography and Listening," we won't be practicing formal theological reflection; that's for the next unit.

We will, however, practice listening.

For Next Week
Summary: Send a photo of work in progress (or all finished!) to smootws@yahoo.com and read selectively in RRG, Intro and Unit 1.

The link for our Zoom meeting is in the email I sent out Saturday morning.

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Yr. B, Wk. 36: Close of the Year

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Worship and Gathering
We met in the choir stalls of St. James. Though some of us had never met face-to-face, it felt like a reunion. We thought of Marilyn, taking care of her ailing dog Besi.

We followed the order for the Close of the Day (BCP 140) and, from our new printed book of collects and prayers, recited our own prayer for hands and then favorite collects. Scott ended with this collect from 2018:

Collect for Theological Reflection
Lord, if we ascend to the Heavens, You are there; if we descend to Sheol, You are there: Help us to maintain the practice of theological reflection, always conscious of different levels in our lives, that we may examine both our mundane experiences and the sensational presentations of our culture in the revealing light of Scripture. Amen.

We then strolled to Tacqueria Tsunami for a fine supper.

Living Faithfully in a Multicultural World, Unit 5, Vocation:
1st yr: Jessica; 2nd yr: Susan; 3rd yr, Pete, Nuno, Marilyn, Kathy ; 4th yr, Scott. Mentors: Susan and Scott. Absent: Marilyn.

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Yr. B, Wk. 35: Vocation in a Multicultural World

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Worship and Gathering
We shared concerns for Marilyn and her dog Besi, for Jessica's good old dog recovering from vertigo. Pete chose prayers of gratitude and matched them to our personalities. He asked what we're going to be grateful for, now that EfM is over and we'll have extra time? We answered Read...read...read...read...read.

Living Faithfully in a Multicultural World, Unit 5, Vocation:
1st yr: Jessica; 2nd yr: Susan; 3rd yr, Pete, Nuno, Marilyn, Kathy ; 4th yr, Scott. Mentors: Susan and Scott. Absent: Marilyn.

[Photo: Monsignor Oscar Romero, assassinated in El Salvador by the regime that the US supported. Read more quotations and more about his story at LaSalette.org]

Discussion of the Readings
To get the discussion of "Culture Wars" rolling, Scott shared the story from My Neighbor's Faith that makes him laugh and tear up every time he reads it. A rabbi's taxi driver is both a recovering addict and evangelical who presses him with questions about beliefs. The driver swerves when he hears, "You don't have to be wrong for me to be right." Then it gets more serious, because the driver's pastor has told him that his wife's atheism is endangering his soul and he'll have to leave her. The rabbi observes that the driver's love for his wife and his love for Jesus are the two greatest blessings in his life, and there's room in his life for both. This rabbi's approach seems like a good one when we find ourselves in a skirmish of the culture war.

Susan brought us this precious nugget from Powell's chapter on Revelation: "Look at it like a kaleidoscope rather than as a chronology."

Jessica wished she had read ahead in Yee, because this last chapter put so much else in perspective. She even reevaluated her view of Ben Sirach from last week. The chapter pointed out the "layering" of Greek misogyny on top of Hebrew tradition. Ben Sirach promoted the feminine embodiment of Wisdom but also transmitted the Greek teachings so prevalent in his world in the century before Jesus.

Those who read MacCulloch saw the roots of today's political/cultural polarization in the liberations of the 60s and 70s. We said: MacCulloch – "never has the Church borne fruit without a long period in the darkness of loneliness into the light of community." Angry tone of “Conservatism” in 1970s sounds like now – focus on gender roles attracts white straight Christian males who feel like they are the ones being marginalized.

[That narrative was promoted in media by Don Black and his son Derek -- until the son experienced acceptance from the very people he'd preached against. Read about it in Scott's blogpost A White Nationalist's Change of Mind: Change of Heart Came First]

Pete saw the Spirit of Jesus in movements to alleviate poverty in Latin America, including the activism of Archbishop Oscar Romero – and civil rights movement in US – and Korea’s “ordinary people” – and anti-apartheid in South Africa. We were reminded that the fear of Communism motivated both parties in the US to oppose all of those positive movements. That mistrust and that Communist label linger. Kathy was inspired by what she read to learn more about the years when she was raising children and wasn't so aware of what was happening in the larger world.

Theological Reflection
We spent time writing responses to any three consecutive questions posed at the end of this week's lesson in the RRG. When we came back together, we reviewed what we wrote and posted these comments to "chat":

Vocation: Our Takeaways

• Pete: I feel more fulfilled and in tune with others when I give freely of my time and efforts for the benefit of others.
• Jessica: Every Sunday at the end of the service, my congregation says the prayer attributed to St. Teresa: Christ has no body now on earth, but yours. No hands, no feet, on earth but yours. Yours are the eyes through which He looks with compassion on this world. Christ has no body now on earth, but yours. Being so heavily involved in the worship service allows me to feel like I am living into that mission statement of being the actual hands and feet of Christ in this world and helping to share the Good News of His Resurrection.
• Scott: Answering the call for someone to do the parish newsletter, I'm excited by the opportunity to connect all the ways that our parishioners perceive our church, to promote the idea that the church is as Paul says, one body, not just a collection of different programs and offerings. In many ways, this has been something I've wanted to do for 20 years.
• Susan: My take-away is that Mentoring is being part of a community and builds on what I have done as work at KSU for years now
• Kathy: In my previous professional life as an adolescent counselor/therapist/social worker, I was often conftonted with unusual/ dangerous/ contradictory senarios. Many times the answer to the confusion would hit me solidly, in a way that can only described as a message, a revelation from God... Brokenness was always the issue... Without my divine message, I would never have been able to address the situation in a timely, perhaps life-saving manner... I am always left with the feeling that I was not alone in my endeavor.
• Nuno: Keep listening and praying. There is a peace that comes with knowing who you follow and what you believe that overshadows every hardship. While some are called to great tasks and far off places the more frequent calling is to bloom where you are planted. While serving on the church Vestry has been like stepping into the spiritual life of the church in new and deeper ways I feel most engaged doing the little things like washing dishes and working on the landscaping crew at church.

For Next Week
We meet at the same time but in person at St. James. After worship, we'll walk to Taqueria Tsunami (taqueriatsunami.com) on the south side of the Square.

Directions to St. James: It's 161 Church Street, Marietta. GPS will probably take you to the small driveway one inch past the playground of the Presbyterian Church on your right. Park in the small parking lot there and walk out onto the sidewalk along Church Street to the bell tower. When you see red doors in the alcove under the bell tower, you've arrived -- but we use the door just around the corner from that. Knock, and it shall be opened to you.

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Yr. B, Wk. 34: Coming Home, Being Grateful, not Hateful

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Worship and Gathering
We held the recovery of our friend Pete in mind as we prayed.

Marilyn chose prayers and poetry with the theme of gratitude to counterbalance the darkness in the Y3 reading. Naturally, she asked us to share something we were grateful for in the past week. Answers include sleeping in my own bed again... returning home to happy dogs ... for the ministry of St. James' Associate Rector Fr. Daron Vroon as he prepares to leave... a week of celebrations for daughter's 8th birthday, Nuno's birthday, and the anniversary of his marriage... a job promotion (yay!)... and a downpour on the bike trail that made for a difficult but exhilarating ride.

Living Faithfully in a Multicultural World, Unit 5, Vocation:
1st yr: Jessica; 2nd yr: Susan; 3rd yr, Pete, Nuno, Marilyn, Kathy ; 4th yr, Scott. Mentors: Susan and Scott. Absent: Pete.

Discussion of the Readings
A citation of Howard Thurman in the Y4 book brought to Scott's mind this passage from his blogpost about Martin Luther King's mentor: Thurman acknowledges that hatred releases energy and feels positive. Recalling then-recent WWII experiences, Thurman tells how hatred can "masquerade" as patriotism (64), or "the illusion of righteousness" (72). He observes that hatred, once "released," "cannot be confined to the offenders alone" (76). [Blogpost: Jesus and the Disinherited: Real Prophecy]

This evoked observations about anger and hate in the readings. Jessica deplored the condescension towards women expressed by Ben Sirach, however much he elevates a female personification of Wisdom. A lot of comments centered on the complicity of Pope Pius and other churches with fascist dictators Hitler, Mussolini, Franco, and Salozar. The state and its dominant ethnic group, replacing God, effectively made an idol to which common humanity was sacrificed. This was the story in Y3, but was also echoed in blandishments against idolatry and its evils in Y1 (Sirach, Wisdom of Solomon) and Y2 (Jude -- a "polemic").

Not wanting to end on a dark note, Scott asked for signs of God at work in the readings. Nuno pointed out that those colonized by powerful Christian states showed (and show) spirit in questioning their colonizers' whole view of the world, bringing something new to Christianity. He remembered mariachi band services when he read of the Mexican congregations that told church authorities, “if there is no brass band, there is not a service!” Marilyn feels like our churches are getting closer to what we were intended to be as a church. Susan reminded us of many examples in the world wars and in the civil rights era of people from the majority who stood up for those who were oppressed, and both Scott and Kathy remembered people from Jackson MS who did just that.

Jessica closed the discussion with a hopeful teaching from her reading in the Wisdom of Solomon: In every age, Wisdom passes into holy souls and makes them friends of God and the prophets.

Kathy's prize for choosing the secret square when she added her thoughts to our table of comments

Theological Reflection
From her recent trip to Portugal, Kathy brought us four porcelain tiles bearing the numerals of her home address. "We've brought a little bit of Portugal back with us," Kathy said. The blue recalled Portugal's colonization by the Moors (and came close to being the color of Kathy's new peacock!). While most of our associations with markers of home were positive, we also thought about the numbers tattooed on prisoners and markers on gravestones. We focused on the door itself.

Creation: When we considered the nature of our world when reflected by the image of a door, we thought of the door as a demarcation of both where we've been and where we're going. We noted the inherent choice: to open or to close.

Sin, or brokenness: We thought in terms of barriers, locks, separation. We thought from our culture how a locked door often becomes the object of an obsession. Being afraid to open a door can also a sign of brokenness.

Redemption, reorientation, restoration: The key... the secret password... Jesus: "Knock and it shall be opened to you."

Besides that quotation from Jesus, we found many doors in our tradition: "I am the way"... doors leading to doors in the Temple... blood over the doorway at the first Passover, and the Torah portion held by the doorframe at the entrance of a Jewish home... the "showstopper red" of the entrance to a church, a traditional designation of a place of refuge... the guarded gate that Adam and Eve left behind... language of "doorways" into blessings for Pentecostalists... the little doors on Advent calendars.

Put those in dialogue with what we found in our culture: doors to nowhere (art series from the 1920s)... portals in sci-fi and fantasy (Stargate, Narnia books, Alice through Looking-Glass and rabbit-hole... trope in horror movies of the door you shouldn't open (but they always do)... the other trope in horror movies of the door you defend from the evil outside ("Honey, I'm home!" - The Shining).

We decided that the feeling of being locked out of somewhere is the worst, and that passing through doors is a strong enough experience to qualify in some situations as a sacrament. At this point, we were running late and exhausted.

For Next Week
We volunteered Pete for worship in week 35. Instead of a TR, we'll be doing a personal writing assignment from the RRG. We expect to meet in person at St. James, Marietta the week after that.

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