Things I Learned from Television

We have had an existential crisis in our house this week: the television died.

Not just any television. This is Beloved's bachelor pride-and-joy, a 57-inch big screen. I hated it when we started dating and was very unsure that I could actually be with a guy who would have a big-screen, until we watched a few movies on it and then - ah, the shame - I became a convert. Smaller would still be okay with me, but this one is already paid for. So we'll stick with it.

Naturally, the repairman is going to come any day now, which is what he's been saying for the last week. On the positive side, we've been getting a lot of reading done.

Yesterday morning, I fell down the stairs leaving the house. It had rained a little, just enough to make the wood deck slippery, and somehow I took a header down the back deck, hitting my legs on the way down and landing face-down (though thankfully not on my face) on the ground. Ouch. I sprained my right ankle and gave myself a huge goose-egg on my left shin. Ouch ouch. I was on my way to meet a friend for coffee, so after I picked myself up and sat for a minute, I decided I was well enough to go. This was very likely my need for caffeine speaking more loudly than the pain.

By the end of our coffee hour, my ankle hurt so badly that I started to worry something might be really wrong. I ended up at the urgent care clinic ("urgent" being a relative term, seeing as how it took them nearly 90 minutes to see me). Mainly, I was worried that I might have a hairline fracture and since I'm flying to Minneapolis on Sunday for a week, I really didn't want to end up 1500 miles away with a broken foot.

But the real reason behind my clinic visit, the image running through my head, was this: you know the person who comes into the ER on Grey's Anatomy and refuses to get checked out, insists he or she is just fine, and then walks away without ever having a doctor investigate their pain? You know that person? You know what always happens to that person on Grey's Anatomy? THEY DIE. Every time.

It turns out my foot is badly sprained but not broken. I will survive. Also, the doctor who saw me was no McDreamy (though he was very kind). So life goes on. But we better get the TV fixed because, you know, TV can save your life.

Or it can cost you an inordinate amount in copays because you are paranoid. Hmmm. Maybe we should leave it broken.

Friday Five: Interviews

Mother Laura at RevGals is asking about interviews...and yes, I have some thoughts on that! Here goes...

1. What was the most memorable interview you ever had?
I'll choose a portion of the interview I had for the church I serve right now. It was an all-weekend affair. On Sunday morning, I met with whoever wanted to show up at an adult forum and answered whatever they wanted to ask. The first question, right off the bat, was this: "Do you have a man in your life?" (I was single at the time.) I was a bit too stunned to answer immediately, but before I could, someone else in the room told the questioner, "You can't ask that!" We all laughed it off and there was a pause and then, BAM! the same guy asked it again: "No, seriously. Is there?" Before I could stop myself, I said, "Let's just say Jesus and leave it at that." I don't think they saw that one coming. Either that got me the call or I'm lucky I got it in spite of myself.

2. Have you ever been the interviewer rather than the interviewee? If so, are you a tiger, a creampuff, or somewhere in between?
I've been an interviewer for some staff positions. I try to make people feel comfortable. Not exactly a creampuff, but not a tiger either.

3. Do phone interviews make you more or less nervous than in-person ones?
I've done more phone interviews as the interviewer. So I've never been particularly nervous: I just really miss the in-person interaction and the chance to read body language. It's just not satisfying.

That said, it does help you narrow down the candidates.

4. What was the best advice you ever got to prepare for an interview? How about the worst?
I'm sure my dad told me this at my very first job interview ever, in high school: "Be yourself." This is his standard advice (he just gave it again a few weeks ago when I interviewed for Potential Future Congregation).

I can't think of any truly bad advice I've ever gotten about interviews.

5. Do you have any pre-interview rituals that give you confidence?
I like to dress well. Not too formal, but not sloppy. It definitely improves my confidence. Especially really, really good shoes. Materialism aside, good shoes seriously do change the way I walk.

Best wishes to any and all RevGals who are interviewing soon, or who have. Being mid-interview process myself, I know how it feels...fun, scary, exciting, overwhelming, and then some. Peace to you all.

I'm not gloating, but...

I was delighted to read this news. Delighted.

Yes, this church is an easy target. It's easy to feel self-righteous when you hear about their protests, simply because 99% of us can truly say, "I would never do that."

But it's still crucial to say no to such heinous behavior. Such a verdict convinces me that Luther was right when he reminded us that God also works outside the church. Sometimes through the court system.

Take THIS Literally

Based on the excerpt I read in the last Christian Century, I ordered The Year of Living Biblically by A.J. Jacobs and started reading it last week. If you're not familiar, the premise is this: Jacobs, an agnostic who grew up culturally Jewish ("I am officially Jewish," he writes, "but I'm Jewish in the same way the Olive Garden is an Italian restaurant") decides that he will spend a whole year trying to follow every single law given in the bible. Every single one. Which is a lot, by the way.

He wants to explore the power of the bible; what makes it such a driving force for so many people. He wants to try and learn something about the God behind these laws, though he's not sure a real conversion is on the books for him. And he wants to get deeply into the idea of literalism when it comes to scriptural interpretation. That last bit is why I bought this book.

First off, this guy is funny. ("How can these ethically advanced rules and these bizarre decrees be found in the same book? And not just the same book. Sometimes the same page. The prohibition against mixing wool and linen comes right after the command to love your neighbor. It's not like the Bible has a section called, 'And Now for Some Crazy Laws.'") "Funny" is not a word which comes up too often in a sentence also involving "book about reading the bible." For a girl who enjoys both Walter Brueggemann and Bridget Jones, this is a nice change of pace.

But he's on to something. At one point, during his concern about the whole mixed-fiber thing, he confesses, "I'm worried I could spend the whole year on the strange parts of the bible and neglect the parts about goodness and justice." Preach it.

The bible is a bizarre and lovely book. Powerful and incomprehensible and glorious and, occasionally, just plain outdated or silly. Silly to us, anyway. We live in a time when you are generally presented with two options for reading this thing: either a.) You must claim to take the whole book literally; or b.) You think of it as an antiquated book with some good ideas about justice, but basically slightly more than one of Grimm's Fairy Tales.

I have more thoughts on this than I'm going to write at the moment, partly because I want to see where Jacobs goes with this experiment. If anyone else has read this book and has reactions, post a comment.

I DID IT, I DID IT, I DID IT!

With hopefully more panache than a used-car salesman, I successfully negotiated a good package with Potential Future Congregation this afternoon. I cannot accurately describe how relieved I am that this phase is over (it's not the last phase, by any means, but it sure has been the hardest yet). Beloved is happy with the results. I am delighted. I sat at my computer with my blog open to the comments made on my post about how hard this is, and I looked at all those encouragements while I talked to the committee chair, and I DID IT!

Thanks to everyone for your good words. It made all the difference.

As Promised: The Recipe

Norwegian Apple Pie (as stolen from a cookbook belonging to my mom)

1 1/2 cups sugar
1 cup flour
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp nutmeg
2 eggs
1 tbl vanilla (yes, you read that right: I know a whole tablespoon is a lot)
2 to 3 cups apples, peeled and diced
1/2 cup walnuts, chopped

Preheat oven to 350. Sift all dry ingredients together in mixing bowl. Add eggs, vanilla, diced apples, and walnuts. Grease 2 8-inch pie pans and divide mixture between them. (NOTE: you can make this in one larger and deeper pie pan; in that case, bake for at least one hour.) Bake for 35-40 minutes. Pie makes its own crust.

Serve warm with vanilla ice cream, or whipping cream, or caramel topping. Or any combination thereof.

Enjoy! (It's more like a really good coffee cake than a pie, but we'll assume that's what the Norwegians like. I myself am Swedish so I have no idea.)

Friday Five: Pumpkins, Apples, and Halloween (Oh My!)

Singing Owl has Halloween on the brain...

All Hallows Eve (Halloween) is near. As a child, Halloween was one of my favorite holidays. We didn’t yet worry about razor blades in apples or popcorn balls or some of the other concerns people have with Halloween these days. Halloween was a chance to be mildly scared, and better yet, to dress up and pretend to be something we really weren’t. Let’s talk about that a bit, but then let’s add in some food ideas for this year. Where I live the leaves are falling, the temperature is chilly and pumpkins are for sale everywhere, along with many kids of apples. What's more, the "Holiday Season" will soon be upon us. ACK! I could use a new idea for dessert. So, here we go…

1. How did you celebrate this time of year when you were a child?
For Halloween, we did the standard trick-or-treat thing (though we never performed any actual tricks). This involved two main traditions: one, the arguing with mom over wearing your winter coat under your costume; and two, the pouring out of all the candy on the coffee table afterward to trade with siblings. That and the dumping of all black licorice-related items in dad's bag.

2. Do you and/or your family “celebrate” Halloween? Why or why not? And if you do, has it changed from what you used to do?
Not really. But now that some of our close friends have kids, we love to have them over and see their costumes. I'm not much into adults dressing up. (I was a pregnant nun once, in seminary, but that's a long story.)

2. Candy apples: Do you prefer red cinnamon or caramel covered? Or something else?
Caramel, I guess. Plain apples are my first choice.

3. Pumpkins: Do you make Jack O’ Lanterns? Any ideas of what else to do with them?
If I have time, yes; mostly, I just put them on the front porch in a "harvesty" kind of way.

4. Do you decorate your home for fall or Halloween? If so, what do you do? Bonus points for pictures.
I decorate for fall. This year I have chinese lanterns and fall leaves in an urn on the mantel. But, a few years ago, I did buy some super-cute-but-totally-unnecessary spider votive holders from Pottery Barn (75% off in November) and so we have those too. Sorry, no pictures!

5. Do you like pretending to be something different? Does a costume bring our an alternate personality?
Eh...it's not a big attraction for me. When I was a kid, I loved it. I am now either a.) totally unimaginative or b.) more comfortable in my skin.

Bonus: Share your favorite recipe for an autumn food, particularly apple or pumpkin ones.
I just found a GREAT recipe called "Norwegian Apple Pie," but it's at home. I double-pinky swear to post it later this afternoon. Extra easy and very, very tasty.

Is that so wrong?

If I remember correctly, Jon Lovitz used to do a regular skit on Saturday Night Live featuring a very whiny guy who, upon proposing some horrible idea, would follow it with, "is that so wrong?" (I tried googling this but the SNL archives online are pretty limited.) At any rate, there's a reason I feel a bit like said character today.

In the Lutheran system, here's how the call process works: the pastor goes through an interview; if the call committee chooses that person then they propose that name at a congregational meeting; the congregation votes to extend the call; then the pastor has 30 days to consider his/her response. So far, so good. We're currently in the purgatory between call committee recommendation and congregational vote.

And in this purgatory is the special hell of package negotiations. When I accepted my first call, here's how that process went for me:
1. I receive official letter of call from Current Congregation.
2. I notice that Current Congregation is planning to pay me, you know, ANYTHING.
3. I think about student loans starting repayment in six months.
4. I pray for, oh, thirty seconds.
5. I sign on dotted line and say yes. I am genuinely excited about doing ministry with Current Congregation. I am also delighted by the prospect of any salary at all. And benefits, too! I'm rich.

Now I'm married. And we have a house. And Beloved has a job. And those two latter things, plus all our friendships and family in this place, will be pulled up by the roots if we move. And we will move into a much higher-cost housing market. All of which means I need to be a little more savvy when it comes to negotiating a salary for this potential new call.

Is that so wrong? Because half of me thinks it is, and the other half thinks that's how a lot of pastors let themselves get in a financial hole.

This is something they don't teach you in seminary. And I hate that phrase, generally, because a lot of people blame all their shortcomings on the seminary, as if any educational institution could ever teach you absolutely everything you need to know. Ask any business person with an MBA or even doctor with an MD: you won't learn everything in school. Get over it.

Nevertheless...how do you balance responsible finances with Jesus' call to give up everything and take up the cross and follow? My brain tells me that asking for a salary appropriate to my experience and education is not a bad thing. My heart worries about being too demanding and self-centered.

Yet another wrinkle in an increasingly complicated pattern. Yet more on which I can fixate my anxiety - and not in a good way. Meanwhile, the six confirmands are preparing their statements of faith for Sunday and, you know what? They're really good. Those kids were six years old when I came to this congregation. I can't believe they're in high school.

I always thought that taking a new call would be a clearer process. That I would just know what to do in every situation. Life isn't like that. Is that so wrong?

Now what?

I got the phone call yesterday. The chairman of the call committee, saying, "We want you." Which was simultaneously exciting and surreal.

I've been completely unfocused for the past week waiting for that call, waiting to get rid of the tension and the wondering about whether I had read the situation accurately, whether my instincts about this were on target or totally wrong. So, on the one hand, I was relieved to hear that yes, I did have a decent sense of the interview weekend. I thought it went well, and it did, and that was good to know.

But immediately after relief I felt a not-small amount of fear. Because now the ball is in our court, and we have to make a decision. This involves things like negotiating a salary package and finding Beloved a new job and selling our house and holy freaking cow, this is going to be a lot of work.

I'm vacillating between real excitement and pure terror. Boy, this is harder than I thought.

Good to Know.

You Are a Little Scary

You've got a nice edge to you. Use it.

How Scary Are You?

Now back to sermon writing. I still think I am a little less scary than this parable.

Friday Five: Homage to the Top Chef

(I'm cheating by doing this Friday Five on Thursday, but tomorrow is going to be crammed full o' stuff and I think this is my only chance.)

RevHRod writes, This Fall my family has been energetically watching Top Chef on the Bravo channel. My teenage daughter watches with the dream of some day being a chef. My husband watches because he loves reality shows and I mean, really loves them. Plus the whole competition thing really works for him. Me, I love cooking and good food. Every so often I get an idea from this group of talented young chefs who are competing for big money and honors galore.

The winner for this season was Hung. Not the fan favorite, but he won fair and square. In his bio, he says if he were a food "I would be spicy chili - it takes a while to get used to, but once you eat it you always come back for more!" With that in mind, here is this week’s Friday Five.

1. If you were a food, what would you be?

French Onion Soup. Substantial, a little spicy, occasionally cheesy, and hot.

2. What is one of the most memorable meals you ever had? And where?

That's a hard one. Grilled flank steak and spinach salad at the lake cabin - after which my husband proposed. An amazing little French restaurant in Montreal with a friend years ago; best mushroom pasta ever. A bottle of wine, perfect bread, brie, and international friends sitting on the lawn in front of the Eiffel Tower for hours, ten years ago. My grandmother's Swedish meatballs on Christmas Eve. And the dessert buffet (complete with chocolate fountain!) at our wedding.

I realize this is more than one. Oh well.

3. What is your favorite comfort food from childhood?

My mom used to make this dish called "Saucy Chicken" when they had adult dinner parties. I remember lying in bed, listening to the adults laugh, feeling so safe and loved, and smelling that dish. Even though it involves cream of celery soup - not exactly gourmet - I still love that meal.

4. When going to a church potluck, what one recipe from your kitchen is sure to be a hit?

I make a mean potato salad.

5. What’s the strangest thing you ever willingly ate?

Cooked sea cucumber. It does not taste like chicken.

Bonus question: What’s your favorite drink to order when looking forward to a great meal?

I'm not a pre-dinner drinker, but I do love a good red wine. Pinot Noir or Merlot usually, with occasional forays into Cabernet. Unless it's winter; then I'm all about the hot buttered rum.

Today's Random Observation

I just finished a first pre-marital counseling session with a very sweet couple. As always, I had them take the Prepare/Enrich inventory.

I usually scan through a few areas to make sure there aren't any glaring issues. As I did so, I noticed something which I have seen many times before.

Under "religious affiliation," there are four choices.
a.) Catholic
b.) Jewish
c.) Protestant
d.) Other

This couple chose "other." This couple is Protestant. This happens all the time. I assume they notice the absence of the word "Lutheran" and figure that "other" is their best choice.

Meanwhile, the people who score these things probably think I'm running a Wiccan retreat center out here.

I never realized so many people didn't comprehend "protestant." No judgment on my part. Just a random observation.

Small Reasons for Gratitude

I'm so happy that our local NPR station's pledge drive is over today.

That's all. You have to take happiness where you can find it.

Change, Thou Art Difficult

I wrote awhile ago about a particularly neurotic experience in worship. (If you missed it, look here.) It had to do with my congregation's reluctance to change the Lord's Prayer, moving out of "thy and thine" to "you and yours." (The sort of language change that generally happened, you know, hundreds of years ago, but that's okay.)

I decided to write a newsletter article about this, because a.) I needed something to write about for November and frankly, the annual "be thankful!" theme is getting old and b.) I like newsletter articles to give food for thought. Plus I'm not entirely sure where else to address this, given that I don't really want to spend a whole sermon on it and there aren't too many other options. (The music director and I have decided, however, that we'll likely use the Lord's Prayer as our theme for Lenten midweek services, and "prayer" as a general Lenten theme. That should be fun.)

At any rate, the article is below. (Wherever you see "This Congregation," the actual name of my church appears, but it's been altered to protect the stubborn.) If you have any thoughts, please comment. It can't get much longer than this - I'm pushing the boundaries already - but I'd love to hear other opinions. I wilt be forever grateful for thine gracious words.



There’s an old joke: “How many Lutherans does it take to change a light bulb?” Answer: “Change?” (I said it was an old joke, not necessarily a great one.) The implication, of course, is that Lutherans aren’t big on change. That’s partly true, though I think it’s more of a general human tendency than just a Lutheran one. Change is hard. Especially when we weren’t looking for it.

Our biggest changes in the last few months at This Congregation have largely revolved around the new hymnal. New songs, new liturgy pieces, new book (small print, I know – the large print edition is coming in 2009), new version of the Apostles’ Creed. These adjustments we have handled with considerable grace and good humor, all things considered. For all that we claim not to like change very much, This Congregation has long been a congregation at ease with many changes, able to bend without breaking and learn to try new things.

But oh, it has been hard to change the Lord’s Prayer, hasn’t it? For some of us more than others, but on the whole, that’s the one piece which has certainly caused the most consternation, and about which I’ve been asked the most questions. “Why did we change the prayer? What was wrong with the old one? What if I don’t want to pray the new one? Why fix something if it isn’t broken?”

I’m not sure I can address all those questions here, but it seemed like one place to try. At the very least, I’d like to encourage you to think hard about why change is sometimes a good idea, even when it makes you uncomfortable for awhile, or when it’s a change you don’t really want. Changes in worship are always a challenge. But they do give us opportunity to think about why we worship, how we worship, and what we’re really doing when we gather on a Sunday morning.

The Lord’s Prayer appears in both Matthew and Luke’s gospels (Matthew 6:9-13; Luke 11:2-4). In Matthew, Jesus instructs the disciples to pray “in this way,” perhaps meaning that the prayer itself is a pattern to be followed for all our prayers, not simply something to be recited. It comes in the midst of Jesus’ reminder that his followers should not pray for show, nor should they worry about using big, fancy, religious words. Instead, he encourages them to pray simply, for, as he says, “your Father knows what you need before you ask him” (Matt. 6:8).

In Luke, the setting is a bit different. In Matthew, Jesus’ instruction on prayer comes during the Sermon on the Mount; in Luke, it occurs later in Jesus’ ministry, right after he has reminded Mary and Martha not to keep themselves so busy that they lose track of what really matters. Luke’s version of the prayer is also quite a bit shorter, mentioning nothing about God’s will being done or delivering us from evil. Neither gospel contains the words which traditionally close the prayer: “for thine is the kingdom, the power, and the glory, forever and ever.” I encourage you to read both versions and note some of the differences between the two.

The traditional version – the one with “thy” and “thine” and “art” – originated in 1662 and was slightly altered in 1928. It came from the Church of England Prayer Book. Both those versions, as well as the newer ones, are based on Matthew’s version of the prayer, instead of Luke’s. Since Jesus would have prayed in Aramaic, an ancient language related to Hebrew, any English version is a translation of the original.

The version we now pray on Sundays comes from the English Language Liturgical Consultation, an ecumenical body. It was formed in 1969 by many mainline churches to help develop not only prayers, but also the lectionary (the series of biblical readings we hear on Sunday mornings). The hope was that all churches, regardless of denomination, would be able to share some key things in common: the Lord’s Prayer, the Creed, and a lectionary. The “new” version of the Lord’s Prayer is not that new, since it was released in 1975. In fact, it was actually in the green hymnal!

History aside, the real struggle is about something else. Why should we change a prayer to which we have become so attached? The world already changes so fast, so often – why can’t some things stay the same? Is change for its own sake really a good thing?

These are important questions. And yet, there are also some others. Why do we have such a hard time changing our words for this prayer? Is our reluctance to change a real, theological, spiritual issue – or are we just stubborn? (That Norwegian blood runs deep, doesn’t it?) It’s uncomfortable to feel that you don’t know this prayer anymore. But then again, a little discomfort in our faith lives causes us to think. It causes us to ask pay close attention to what we are praying instead of simply reciting words from memory. That’s worth doing every once in awhile, even though it is hard.

I know that on my deathbed, I will very likely pray, “Our Father, who art in heaven…” That version of the prayer is simply imprinted in my brain, and it will always be so. And no one will ever force you to pray the new version if you truly can’t do it. But if you are struggling, ask yourself why. Wrestle a bit with change. Try on a little discomfort.

When Jesus originally taught the disciples how to pray, they were probably uncomfortable too. After all, they had grown up with traditional Hebrew prayers; they had memorized those since childhood, and here Jesus was giving them something quite different. Many Jewish prayers begin with the phrase, “Blessed are you, O God, King of the universe,” and Jesus’ prayer doesn’t begin with those words at all. It was probably a hard change for them.

A little change now and then can help keep our prayer lives vibrant, alive, and growing. Growing pains are inevitable. But we can pray about that too. No matter what words we use.

Theological Word of the Day: Dizzy.

Beloved and I spent this past weekend with Possible Congregation (see posts below for more details on this). Possible Congregation is now looking more and more like Really Exciting Hope They Call Me Congregation, and, like everything else in this particular process, I didn't see that coming.

Insofar as I can tell, this place would be a great fit for me. They describe themselves as 'theologically progressive,' and their mission statement has words like 'inclusive, compassionate, and challenging.' I love all these words. (It also has 'Jesus,' which is good.) It would be a big change, since I'd be going from Head Honcho to Second Banana (not exactly the technical terms used, but you get the idea). Honestly, I'd be quite fine most days if the buck stopped on someone else's desk. I also know that there would certainly be some moments where not being the one in charge would be a difficult adjustment.

It's a big, definitely programmatic, congregation. Current Congregation is a medium-sized, verging-on-programmatic-but-still-wrestling-with-pastoral-expectations congregation. It would mean more time managing staff and a bit less time doing all the pastoral things I do now. Again: I would enjoy working with a large staff. I'm good at that. I would also miss some things about having just 10 kids in confirmation and teaching it myself (as opposed to 80 kids in their program, with mentors and staff doing much of the teaching).

No place is perfect, and I am not foolish enough to think this one is. But I can definitely feel the pull toward a new beginning. I think that is something to pay attention to.

"What about Beloved?" you ask. Wasn't he dragging his feet on this? Wasn't he the one asking all the practical questions about the expensive housing market and where he could get a job and all the traffic and his expectation that we would live in our current city until he retired?

Here's where it must be the hand of God because, I tell you what, it's sure not me. Beloved is excited. I know for sure that he will also have a hard time leaving and he does have legitimate reasons for that. I also know that he goes up and down about this, as do I, and that I can't guarantee that he will not pull back from time to time.

Nor can I guarantee that Possible Congregation will actually extend the call to me, which is the first question. I'm getting a bit ahead of myself, I realize. But I do want to be as prepared as possible, since we will only have 30 days to decide should they indeed do as we hope.

Which brings us to the word of the day: Dizzy. I've tried to think of something more theologically sophisticated, but that's about all I can find. Dizzy with joy and confusion and grief over the real idea of leaving, dizzy with possibilities and real estate listings and jobs for Beloved, dizzy in a real, physical way (my stomach is jumping even now). Dizzy that Sunday's texts are about wrestling with God. No kidding.

Also seriously unfocused. That was today's runner-up word.

Yikes. Keep praying for us, would you? (And thanks for doing that already.) Good stuff is happening.

Your Cheatin' Heart

That's the song running through my head this morning: "Your cheatin' heart, will tell on you..."

And no, it's not because of any marital indiscretions on my part (or on Beloved's). It's because I am heading out this weekend to interview in another congregation and I feel as if I am walking around the church office today with a big scarlet letter on my chest. What would it be? "I" for interviewing? "D" for discerning? "F" for fleeing? "C" for confused? Maybe all of the above.

I have interviewed at one other congregation in the eight years I've been here, and turned down a few other opportunities. But at none of those moments did I feel the sort of pull I do about this particular possibility. Ten minutes into that other interview I knew it wasn't the right place for me nor I for them, and I sailed through the rest of it without even considering whether our conversation would go any further.

This time is different. Partly because Possible Congregation is, on paper, exactly the sort of place I have been hoping to land in for a long time. Partly because Current Congregation is in a good place but really needs someone to kick them in the proverbial (and communal, a hard image to conjure up) butt, and I'm not sure I'm the person to do that. I've had doubts about that for a long time. Partly because Beloved is not overly happy with his own career situation at the moment and thus has been much, much more open to this possibility than I had ever imagined. Partly because the timing - in spite of all the things I just mentioned - is not all that great, and one of the few things I know for sure about the mysterious workings of the Lord our God is that my individual calendar is not the trump card I prefer to think it is.

From talking to trusted colleagues, I have the sense that my image of infidelity is a common one. And yet, in the Lutheran system anyway, this is how it works. Part of the reason my sense of it is so much stronger this time is that I have to leave town for this interview, and therefore must be away on a Sunday.

It is not helping that last night I started reading a book called Loving Frank for my book club, which is a fictionalized account of the true affair between Frank Lloyd Wright and his mistress. More furtive love and secret assignations are not images I need at the moment. I might put it aside for awhile.

I have absolutely no idea what will happen. Absolutely none. That is both terrifying and thrilling. I ask for your prayers for all of us, as you have them to spare: for Beloved and for me, for Current Congregation, for Possible Congregation, and for our families (as we would move away from one and to the other - yet another wrinkle in a complicated pattern).

Breathe in. Breathe out. One more step. Time to jump into the deep end.

Gotta Love Luther

For this quote alone I am Lutheran (though yes, there are plenty of other reasons too).

If you are a preacher of grace, then preach a true not a fictitious grace; if grace is true, you must bear a true and not a fictitious sin. God does not save people who are only fictitous sinners. Be a sinner and sin boldly, but believe and rejoice in Christ even more boldly, for he is victorious over sin, death, and the world.

Martin Luther, Luther's Works, Volume 48, pgs 281-282.

Friday Five: Thankfulness List

The RevGals are keeping it simple this week and asking for list of five things for which we are thankful. Maybe because at text study this week we looked ahead at next Sunday's grateful-leper text; maybe because I've started to see ads on television inviting Canadians to come and shop for Canadian thanksgiving (a real switch in the dollar value, there); or maybe because one way I deal with personal adversity is focusing on the many reasons I have to be grateful; whatever way you slice it, I've been thinking a fair amount about thankfulness lately. So: well done, RevGals. Here goes.

1. My husband.
I make no apologies for the cheesiness of this one. We've been thrown into the deep end lately, with the surprising prospect of an interview and perhaps a move, and with the news that our Baby Quest is likely to be medically invasive, complicated, and expensive. And through it all, through even some very hard conversations and a great many tears, this man has been more patient and calm and thoughtful and hopeful than I could ever have expected. It took us a long time to find each other; when we married, I was 31 and he was 42. It was worth the wait.

2. Autumn.
From the sublime to the...well, not ridiculous, but perhaps at least less emotional. I love autumn. I love that the leaves are turning colors and it is crisply cold in the morning, that you can see your breath when you step out to get the newspaper and that we can now make things like meatballs and soup and breads and stews. I am grateful even for the descent into winter darkness (this is probably the Scandinavian in me). I think it all satisfies my nesting instincts.

3. Really, really, really good music.
This July, we welcomed a new member to our church staff: our long-awaited Director of Music Ministries. Suffice it to say that this guy ROCKS the pipe organ and the piano, already has three youth music groups well established, and can play any hymn I request. I was gearing myself up to ask him if he would be willing to learn Widor's Toccata for Easter, and found out he was planning to use it for this Sunday's postlude (we ended up changing the last hymn to a spiritual, though, so he made an adjustment on that). What a joy to hear music well done after all these years. Alleluia!

4. My parents.
The looming prospect of parenthood (and the fear of never having it) have made me so deeply appreciate my own parents. After my horrible appointment in which the doctor told me our chances of natural conception were "in the single digits," I called my mother (only because my husband was teaching and this didn't seem like the kind of thing you tell your spouse over the phone anyway). I cried and cried and so did she and, when I hung up, I thought simultaneously of how tremendously thankful I am for my parents and of how very hard it will be when they are no longer here. All our parents are in their mid-60's to early 70's and all four are exceptionally healthy, so we have no reason to panic about this. But someday, someday, they won't be here. And I am starting to understand now how they grieved when my grandparents died.

5. Hope.
There are a lot of things I could list for this last one: friends, this blogging community of clergy women, my congregation. But what all of those - and many more - have in common is the hope they inspire in me. Hope that the darkest valley is not the end. Hope that a life interrupted is not reason for despair. Hope that God who has been faithful for so long will always be so, even if that faithfulness takes a different shape than originally anticipated. It must be the Holy Spirit who gives this hope, because it sure isn't something I can generate within myself. And I certainly don't know what I would do without it.

Stupid Human Trick #286

We are proceeding through the maze of bloodwork in fertility testing (I say "we," in the royal sense, because I'm the only one getting the needle for now. This is a bit like saying that "we" had to give a sample for the semen analysis). Step one was the FSH test on cycle day 4. Good results. Step 2 is the progesterone test which needs to be done between days 20-24. I went last week and got the results back on Friday: low levels. The nurse explained that this means I do ovulate, but in some sort of weak fashion. Great, I thought. Of course we're among the - what is it? - 10% or less of couples whose infertility problem is due to both partners. Shit.

And then, last Sunday morning in the shower (sidebar: why do ideas always come to me in the shower? And so often on Sundays when frankly, I am practically in a coma anyway? Odd) I remembered something. I remembered that my period had started on September 9, not September 2. I realized this meant I had gotten ahead of myself somehow and had, therefore, done the progesterone test on the wrong day. Which meant that the poor results were very likely my own stupid fault and perhaps not accurate.

Explaining this to the nurse over the phone on Monday morning was embarrassing ("Hello, I need a new test order because I can't count to 28 correctly") but hopefully, my reprieve. Test results should come tomorrow.

Infertility is such a weird journey. Who knew I would be so glad to realize my own stupidity?

Here If You Need Me

The title of this post is also the title of a book I just finished for book club. The author, Kate Braestrup, tells the story of her work as a chaplain with the Maine Game Warden service (which, as she notes, raises a lot of questions like, "What do you do? Bless the moose?" when, in fact, she works with their search-and-rescue division).

This is a very good book. I wish I could sit and have coffee with her, since I have a lot of questions both about her work and her journey to seminary. The latter is a choice she makes after her husband, whose dream it was to go to seminary when he retired as a state trooper, dies in a car accident. Normally, this would throw up all kinds of red flags for me about transference and grief-avoidance but frankly, this woman comes off as extraordinarily healthy. And you should really read the bits about her refusal to have the funeral home care for her husband's body.

At any rate, the passage which stuck with me most was from her chapter on heaven. She's Unitarian. And she doesn't believe in heaven or any sort of afterlife, which she discusses freely. She talks a bit about this. And then she shares the following conversation with her son (who is about 12 at the time, I think):

My son Zach is the child of Unitarian Universalists, so naturally he didn't know a lot about Jesus. But I heard a lot about Jesus at my Christian seminary, and a lot of it was pretty cool. So one day, I found myself telling Zach about Jesus' life and death, the stories they told about him, what he said to his disciples.

"When Jesus talked about loving," I said, "I think he meant something really radical. I think he was talking about loving as God loves; loving completely, loving with a whole self. He told his disciples to give everything they had, everything they were, to hold nothing back, not money, not time, not even life itself. Everything was to be given over in the service of love."

I went on about this for awhile, sermonizing in a motherly sort of way, and Zach listened carefully, because even as a young boy he was always a careful listener.

"So, Mom," he said at last. "Let's say I decide to become a devoted follower of Jesus Christ."

"What?" I said, startled and alarmed.

"No, but let's say I do."

"Okay," I said cautiously.

"And I die, and because I'm a Christian, I get to go to heaven instead of going to hell."

"Yeah..."

"If I really take Jesus seriously, if I really am willing to give up everything I am and everything I have in the service of love, if I am really a Christian...it seems to me I would have to give my place in heaven to someone else, someone who otherwise wouldn't get to go."

I stared at him.

"I'd have to go to hell, so this other person could be in heaven. Right, Mom?"

That right there. That is why you need to read this book.