"When we move beyond the safety of everyone else's approval and stand firmly upon our own, we assume responsibility for own own apostolate."(Speaking to the Soul Vicki K. Black p. 21)
I am certain that one of my flaws is that I am a people pleaser. An apple polisher as a youth. While I have tried to become firmer in my resolve to do what I believe to be right, I often fall prey to the fear that someone might get upset. And of course the reality is that no matter what we do, someone is going to be upset.
When we are able to stand on our own, without seeking the approval of others, we may in fact find that the very thing we actually receive, because we didn't make that the end, is in fact approval. When folks can look at us as someone who is consistent in where they stand, and yet not in a way that makes them rigid and heartless, we move closer to being the real person that we are called to be.
As a Christian I am called to the service of others, but not so that they'll applaud me.
Blessings,
Ed
Thursday, January 26, 2012
Tuesday, January 24, 2012
Reflections for 1/24/12
One of the hazards of being a clergy person is that you might get called on the spot to say a prayer, offer a blessing, invocation etc. I know it is in the job description and I really don't have a problem with it and generally have not been taken to task for any prayers I've ever offered.
It has happened to me twice where someone has taken umbrage with how I prayed. The first time came when I was accosted after offering an opening prayer at the beginning of town soccer season. A fellow Christian decided that since I didn't pray in Jesus' name I was clearly ashamed of him and I should never be ashamed of our Lord. Of course I'm not ashamed, and tried to point out that we should be thankful I was asked to pray at all in this day and age.
But I heard some of what she said and tried to adapt by ending my more public with prayers with "in Jesus name I pray." And that seemed fine until last night. This time I was asked on the spot not given any advance notice. The usual "chaplain" had not shown up to the meeting, would I mind? Sure why not. After offering the invocation and the benediction at the end, up came the parliamentarian to tell me I had violated the rules and that I was only allowed to offer non-sectarian prayers.
I replied that I didn't feel I could do that, and in the future I would just decline the invitation. It did however get me thinking, what in the world makes something a non-sectarian prayer? I sort of know the answer you don't invoke specific deities. But I do wonder if I'm there in clericals how am I not clearly a sectarian. Would a doctor be asked to not use medical terminology, or a lawyer legal terms when speaking? Probably not. I also wondered if it was only Christians that aren't allowed to pray in their tradition these days. I honestly haven't seen a rabbi or imman or other faith leader ever asked so I don't know if they take the sect out of their prayers. And this doesn't even begin to address how an atheist might receive any kind of prayer.
I know this actually isn't a huge issue. No hungry people will be fed, or oppressed people set free over it. But for the moment it was a total distraction.
Blessings,
Ed
It has happened to me twice where someone has taken umbrage with how I prayed. The first time came when I was accosted after offering an opening prayer at the beginning of town soccer season. A fellow Christian decided that since I didn't pray in Jesus' name I was clearly ashamed of him and I should never be ashamed of our Lord. Of course I'm not ashamed, and tried to point out that we should be thankful I was asked to pray at all in this day and age.
But I heard some of what she said and tried to adapt by ending my more public with prayers with "in Jesus name I pray." And that seemed fine until last night. This time I was asked on the spot not given any advance notice. The usual "chaplain" had not shown up to the meeting, would I mind? Sure why not. After offering the invocation and the benediction at the end, up came the parliamentarian to tell me I had violated the rules and that I was only allowed to offer non-sectarian prayers.
I replied that I didn't feel I could do that, and in the future I would just decline the invitation. It did however get me thinking, what in the world makes something a non-sectarian prayer? I sort of know the answer you don't invoke specific deities. But I do wonder if I'm there in clericals how am I not clearly a sectarian. Would a doctor be asked to not use medical terminology, or a lawyer legal terms when speaking? Probably not. I also wondered if it was only Christians that aren't allowed to pray in their tradition these days. I honestly haven't seen a rabbi or imman or other faith leader ever asked so I don't know if they take the sect out of their prayers. And this doesn't even begin to address how an atheist might receive any kind of prayer.
I know this actually isn't a huge issue. No hungry people will be fed, or oppressed people set free over it. But for the moment it was a total distraction.
Blessings,
Ed
Saturday, January 21, 2012
Reflections for 1/21/12
"In the west Christians tended to meet their ancestors through the worship space, liturgy, and calendar of the church."(Speaking to the Soul Vicki K. Black, p.17)
All of our lives have history. We have our own personal story and we have those of our ancestors. We also have "heroes" within our lives. They can be religious, sports, vocational and familial.
There are also places we go to that give significance to who we are and whence we come. For me I have specific places that have deep meaning for me. They have memories, and associations that still feed my soul. Haddonfield and Ocean City New Jersey are two places. Copake Falls NY is becoming such a place. I rediscovered how important Grinnell Iowa is to me.
I certainly feel a deep connection to my faith past anytime I'm in church. I'm not wedded to any specific building or building type, but there is definitely a liturgical practice and hymnody that speaks to me.
What are the places in your life that are important to you? What are the "liturgies" of your life, whether church or not, that connect you to something beyond yourself?
Blessings,
Ed
All of our lives have history. We have our own personal story and we have those of our ancestors. We also have "heroes" within our lives. They can be religious, sports, vocational and familial.
There are also places we go to that give significance to who we are and whence we come. For me I have specific places that have deep meaning for me. They have memories, and associations that still feed my soul. Haddonfield and Ocean City New Jersey are two places. Copake Falls NY is becoming such a place. I rediscovered how important Grinnell Iowa is to me.
I certainly feel a deep connection to my faith past anytime I'm in church. I'm not wedded to any specific building or building type, but there is definitely a liturgical practice and hymnody that speaks to me.
What are the places in your life that are important to you? What are the "liturgies" of your life, whether church or not, that connect you to something beyond yourself?
Blessings,
Ed
Thursday, January 12, 2012
Reflections for 1/12/12
"There are four qualities which characterize a friend: loyalty, right intention, discretion, and patience." Aelred of Rievaulx
Today at our service we commemorated Aelred a 12th century monk. You probably don't know much about him unless you're a real church junky. All of the readings for his day revolved around friendship.
I certainly have friends. On Facebook I have well over 500. Some of these are people I see regularly. Some are of course relatives and others people from various chapters of my life. Only a few are people I have never met outside of that medium.
If I were to apply Aelred's qualities of friendship, I know that my best friend Gail meets all four. I have two others people that I feel meet those four for sure.
I do try to relate to all people, no matter who they are and what are relationship is, in a similar fashion. If you count me as a friend you probably have my loyalty unless you really burn me. I try to interact with right intention and certainly to use discretion and be patient with most.
Who are your friends? What are the characteristics that are important to you in determining who your friends are? Are they as old as Aelred's, or do we have different litmus tests these days?
Blessings,
Ed
Today at our service we commemorated Aelred a 12th century monk. You probably don't know much about him unless you're a real church junky. All of the readings for his day revolved around friendship.
I certainly have friends. On Facebook I have well over 500. Some of these are people I see regularly. Some are of course relatives and others people from various chapters of my life. Only a few are people I have never met outside of that medium.
If I were to apply Aelred's qualities of friendship, I know that my best friend Gail meets all four. I have two others people that I feel meet those four for sure.
I do try to relate to all people, no matter who they are and what are relationship is, in a similar fashion. If you count me as a friend you probably have my loyalty unless you really burn me. I try to interact with right intention and certainly to use discretion and be patient with most.
Who are your friends? What are the characteristics that are important to you in determining who your friends are? Are they as old as Aelred's, or do we have different litmus tests these days?
Blessings,
Ed
Sunday, January 8, 2012
Reflections for 1/8/12
"You are my beloved son, in you I am well pleased."
These are the words that we are told in the Gospel's that were said to, or about Jesus at his baptism. Powerful words actually. From that moment on Jesus went off into the world teaching, healing, forgiving and acting as compassionately to a hurting world as he had the power to do. All of it though starting with a word of encouragement, an empowering sentence if you will. An affirmation of faith in, before anything had actually been done. I know that I do much better when I hear positive things about me. I can even name people who have said close to such things that have helped me to achieve what I'm capable of, even when I didn't believe it to be possible.
As I checked into the social media sites today, I was amazed at all the proclamations about how much God loves Tim Tebow. After all God really must love him to let him win a football game. Because by all accounts he's not a very good passer. His team was .500. The odds were not really in his favor and yet his team came out victorious in the end. They didn't destroy the Steelers mind you, but a win is a win.
I do believe Tim Tebow is a beloved child of God, I do not believe that God rewarded that status with a win for the Broncos. The Steelers have their share of Evangelical Christians too. What is intriguing to me about Tim Tebow is not that he is so much more blessed than me or anyone else. But how he seems to have translated that beloved child of God status and used it to bring something much deeper to the surface and intangible that goes beyond any actual talent he has. Lord knows he's a better football player than I am, I know that God loves me just as much.
I also if some people realize that they are actually making fun of Tim's beliefs with statements about God loving him more. Tim being a person of faith will give credit to God for giving him more talent than most of us have at playing football. And for giving him the one thing he and certainly share a belief that we've been given what we need to succeed and be happy with what we are able to do.
Congratulations Broncos and all the other teams that won. Now if we could get as excited about ending hunger, poverty, hatred and war because those are things God actually cares about.
Blessings,
Ed
These are the words that we are told in the Gospel's that were said to, or about Jesus at his baptism. Powerful words actually. From that moment on Jesus went off into the world teaching, healing, forgiving and acting as compassionately to a hurting world as he had the power to do. All of it though starting with a word of encouragement, an empowering sentence if you will. An affirmation of faith in, before anything had actually been done. I know that I do much better when I hear positive things about me. I can even name people who have said close to such things that have helped me to achieve what I'm capable of, even when I didn't believe it to be possible.
As I checked into the social media sites today, I was amazed at all the proclamations about how much God loves Tim Tebow. After all God really must love him to let him win a football game. Because by all accounts he's not a very good passer. His team was .500. The odds were not really in his favor and yet his team came out victorious in the end. They didn't destroy the Steelers mind you, but a win is a win.
I do believe Tim Tebow is a beloved child of God, I do not believe that God rewarded that status with a win for the Broncos. The Steelers have their share of Evangelical Christians too. What is intriguing to me about Tim Tebow is not that he is so much more blessed than me or anyone else. But how he seems to have translated that beloved child of God status and used it to bring something much deeper to the surface and intangible that goes beyond any actual talent he has. Lord knows he's a better football player than I am, I know that God loves me just as much.
I also if some people realize that they are actually making fun of Tim's beliefs with statements about God loving him more. Tim being a person of faith will give credit to God for giving him more talent than most of us have at playing football. And for giving him the one thing he and certainly share a belief that we've been given what we need to succeed and be happy with what we are able to do.
Congratulations Broncos and all the other teams that won. Now if we could get as excited about ending hunger, poverty, hatred and war because those are things God actually cares about.
Blessings,
Ed
Wednesday, January 4, 2012
Reflections for 1/3/12
Today is the Iowa Caucus. The first round of attempting to figure out who a political party's presidential candidate will be. This year happens to be only about Republicans as the Democrats have a seated president.
You may wonder why a Democrat from New Jersey is reflecting on Iowa Caucuses? It isn't so much that I care about the results, frankly I don't. What it did was take me back 25 years to when I actually did participate in the Caucus. As a "resident" in Iowa, I was going to college there, I went to the Caucus to see what it was all about. I don't know if my presence made a difference. If I recall the person who invited me was supporting Bruce Babbitt.
It was interesting however to see how this very different way of choosing worked. I don't know if it would work in a densely populated state such as New Jersey, but the concept of neighbors talking with each other about why they liked a particular candidate is intriguing. I don't recall too much name calling in the caucus sight. You might actually have had to come with some supporting reason for your choice without engaging in character assassination.
And maybe that's why I found it interesting. It revealed that it can be possible for people with different opinions to be in the same room and still remain cordial. A good model not only for politics but for life in general.
Blessings,
Ed
You may wonder why a Democrat from New Jersey is reflecting on Iowa Caucuses? It isn't so much that I care about the results, frankly I don't. What it did was take me back 25 years to when I actually did participate in the Caucus. As a "resident" in Iowa, I was going to college there, I went to the Caucus to see what it was all about. I don't know if my presence made a difference. If I recall the person who invited me was supporting Bruce Babbitt.
It was interesting however to see how this very different way of choosing worked. I don't know if it would work in a densely populated state such as New Jersey, but the concept of neighbors talking with each other about why they liked a particular candidate is intriguing. I don't recall too much name calling in the caucus sight. You might actually have had to come with some supporting reason for your choice without engaging in character assassination.
And maybe that's why I found it interesting. It revealed that it can be possible for people with different opinions to be in the same room and still remain cordial. A good model not only for politics but for life in general.
Blessings,
Ed
Monday, January 2, 2012
Reflections for 1/2/12
Today was the last day of Christmas break. I wish I could say it was a day filled with relaxing fun, but that was not to be the case. Part of what I'm feeling is still just tired. Granted I didn't help myself much on New Year's Eve by staying up until 1:30 am New Years Day, not partying but just playing Angry Birds. I should have been asleep as soon the ball dropped. But I made a different choice, knowing full well that the alarm would be going off at 6 am, since the next day was Sunday and that is a work day for me.
So here it is Monday. I slept later than normal 9:15, and then it was time to get people to practice. Go to the gym. The day was so far not terribly off. It wasn't until after lunch that the wheels came off. Part of the problem is just being a parent of teenagers. The type that always know better than you, whose negotiation skills are superior to yours and when things go oops, your day gets worse.
I don't know why I care about this but I do. It is the single most frustrating part of being a parent that I know of, days like these. Granted it isn't every day, but when it happens it just puts me in a really foul mood.
Much like yesterday being the start of a new year, I need to remember that tomorrow is another day. Perhaps it will be better, perhaps not. Only tomorrow will tell.
Blessings,
Ed
So here it is Monday. I slept later than normal 9:15, and then it was time to get people to practice. Go to the gym. The day was so far not terribly off. It wasn't until after lunch that the wheels came off. Part of the problem is just being a parent of teenagers. The type that always know better than you, whose negotiation skills are superior to yours and when things go oops, your day gets worse.
I don't know why I care about this but I do. It is the single most frustrating part of being a parent that I know of, days like these. Granted it isn't every day, but when it happens it just puts me in a really foul mood.
Much like yesterday being the start of a new year, I need to remember that tomorrow is another day. Perhaps it will be better, perhaps not. Only tomorrow will tell.
Blessings,
Ed
Sunday, January 1, 2012
Reflections for 1/1/12
Part of my New Year's promise to myself was to get back on track with this blog. Honestly I'd run out of steam. It wasn't a matter of not having enough time. I had time just found other things to occupy myself with. But I realized that I was missing out on something more creative. And while I still like to do what had taken the time away from this writing, I felt it was time to get back to it. Because part of this for me is prayer time, part of it feeds a need to be thinking. So for those who've missed it, let's see how long I can keep it up. For you the reader certainly but for myself as well.
Today was the Feast of the Holy Name. Frankly it interrupted Christmas for me. I didn't preach today, but I did think about names and the power of naming.
First there's my name. While my friends call me Ed, that is of course short for something. And for those who know me, it is short not for Edward or Edwin, the more common ones, but Edmund a not so common one.
It's an old English name meaning "prosperous protector." I don't know if it fits me or not. My parents weren't trying to predict my future. I'm named after my dad, who was named after his dad. I stopped the it by naming my first born something different.
Will say that calling me Ed is what those that are close to me do. The only people that call me Edmund are telemarketers these days.
Aside from our given names, there is also the power of naming something. If you've created anything you get to name it. A great part of creative discovery no doubt.
There is also naming something, or calling it out. By naming something in that way, we get to free ourselves from whatever it is we've named. Or embrace it as important to who we are. I think this is also the hardest to do. When I can name a problem or problematic behavior I release myself from its grip. Or at least begin the process, by deflating its power over me. A bold step in turning one's life around.
So what does all of this mean for any of us. We are who we are named. Those people who created us, namely our parents may or may not have put much thought into it. What does your name mean? Does it say something about you, or just honors some member of your family.
Are there things in your life that as 2012 breaks upon us, that need to be named. Called out and either banished or nourished. An interesting journey no doubt.
Blessings,
Ed
Today was the Feast of the Holy Name. Frankly it interrupted Christmas for me. I didn't preach today, but I did think about names and the power of naming.
First there's my name. While my friends call me Ed, that is of course short for something. And for those who know me, it is short not for Edward or Edwin, the more common ones, but Edmund a not so common one.
It's an old English name meaning "prosperous protector." I don't know if it fits me or not. My parents weren't trying to predict my future. I'm named after my dad, who was named after his dad. I stopped the it by naming my first born something different.
Will say that calling me Ed is what those that are close to me do. The only people that call me Edmund are telemarketers these days.
Aside from our given names, there is also the power of naming something. If you've created anything you get to name it. A great part of creative discovery no doubt.
There is also naming something, or calling it out. By naming something in that way, we get to free ourselves from whatever it is we've named. Or embrace it as important to who we are. I think this is also the hardest to do. When I can name a problem or problematic behavior I release myself from its grip. Or at least begin the process, by deflating its power over me. A bold step in turning one's life around.
So what does all of this mean for any of us. We are who we are named. Those people who created us, namely our parents may or may not have put much thought into it. What does your name mean? Does it say something about you, or just honors some member of your family.
Are there things in your life that as 2012 breaks upon us, that need to be named. Called out and either banished or nourished. An interesting journey no doubt.
Blessings,
Ed
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