IS IT GETTING BETTER?

I really should be grateful for all the improvements in life. Dishwashers and automatic washers and driers make life a lot easier. Air conditioning in cars (when it works) makes life bearable during Florida summers. Cell phones, computers, internet, jet plane travel. Great improvements.

Other things aren’t such great improvements–credit cards with revolving balances. These are an unmitigated disaster. Instead of saving for something, people go into debt. It’s not like a car loan or something where you make payments and eventually it’s paid for. No, these have been designed to go into greater and greater debt.

Fiberboard furniture and cabinets are another non-improvement. Sure it’s a lot cheaper and it does use up all the saw dust and wood chips and stuff but it come apart. And there isn’t much elegance about it. I had hopes that I would be able to install a wall of real wood cabinets in my dining room when I retired to hold the books that will have to be relocated from the office, but Home Depot no longer sells the nice seven-foot real wood bookcases they did 25 years ago.

Then there are the things that have disappeared altogether–dime stores, for instance. I suppose K-Mart is like a dime store, since it is the successor to S. S.Kresge, but it doesn’t feel the same. Everything is self service, no one know the merchandise, and nothing costs a dime. And they don’t have a lunch counter. Oh yes, I know you can get stuff to eat at K-Mart, but you cant sit at a counter where an older lady comes by with a pad of paper and asks, “What’ll you have, hun?”

At the other extreme I miss the uniqueness of a city’s own stores. Miami had Burdines and Chicago had Marshall Field’s. Now they are both homogenized as Macy’s. I like Marcy’s. I was glad when they opened a store in Miami, but it was different from Burdines and both were different from Marshal Field’s. Now it’s all the same.



Television was better in the good old days, too. Shows like “Our Miss Brooks” started off as radio programs that depended on dialogue to convey everything. That produced TV that was simpler, more like live theater than films. And there were local productions, also. In Chicago we had “Elmer the Elephant” and “Garfield Goose” as well as the big time shows of “Howdy Doody.” Maybe the most famous local production was “Kukla, Fran, and Ollie” which went on to the big times. Nothing but puppets and Fran Allison. No digitalized effects. And from what I understand most of the show was improvised.



And something about church was better. There was a rhythm to things you could count on–Sunday School, Vacation Church School, Church Picnic– all against a pattern of worship determined by the church year. And then it all started to fal apart. At least in part it was the inability to pass on the tradition from one generation to the next. Communities were far more mobile than in the past. But also there was a kind of shaking lose of the foundations that people had counted on. It’s hard to put my finger on it. It wasn’t just change; there has always been change in the church. It was a surrender of the essentials of the church. Often times the church came to be at odds with it’s own members rather than with the world it was meant to transform. People were bewildered by it all.

I am approaching my last years of active church leadership. Although I often frustrated by the silly spats that go on in the local congregation, I am even more wearied by the nonsense that comes from”The-Powers-That-Be.” Don’t those people belong to real congregations? Why do they so often ignore what people need? Why do they spend so much time and money doing things that just makes it harder for us on the front lines? Doesn’t the collapsing membership tell them anything?

Isn’t there a way to hold on to the good of the past and the good of the present? Of course! Why should Past and Present always be at war, why should they be polar opposites? No reason other than a lack of effort. We have to discern what is right, and that requires us to examine our values. For me as a Christian it means surrendering what I want for what God wants.

One verse of a hymn by a splendid modern writer firmly grounded in Christ, who brings the best of what is handed on from the past into the present. This is from her book; A Royal “Waste” of Time.”

Come, then children, with your burdens –
Life’s confusions, fears, and pain,
Leave them at the cross of Jesus;
take instead his kingdom’s reign.
Bring your thirsts, for he will quench them –
he alone will satisfy.
All our longings find attainment
when to self we gladly die.

May the Lord who blessed the Past, bless you on your Present journey and greet on your Future arrival.

Wayne





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SOLITUDE

ONE of the highlights of my week is a prayer group I attend. Over the eleven years I have been part of it, we have declined in members until there are only three of us left–Trish, Father George, and myself. They are both wonderful people from whom I have learned a great deal. We always read from a spiritual book as part of our meeting. I should mention that we are technically a Centering Prayer group, but we were long ago banished from the ranks of official Centering Prayer groups. It was a control issue. The officials didn’t know exactly what we were doing and were rather disturbed to find we were reading from a book which isn’t part of the approved program. As a result we were taken off the list of groups to prevent anyone else from finding us. We don’t care. We’re going to continue praying without official sanction. So there. Bzzzzpt!

We are reading Seeds a topical collection of excepts from the writings of Thomas Merton. Here’s a quote on Solitude, “Ours is certainly a time for solitaries and hermits. But merely to reduce the simplicity, austerity, and prayer of these primitive souls is not a complete or satisfactory answer. We must transcend them, and . . . liberate ourselves, in our own way, from involvement in a world that is plunging to disaster” (pp. 65-66). That’s Merton describing the situation in 1960. If the world was plunging toward disaster 50 years ago, we must buried in disaster by now. Just look at how some people call the president a Nazi because he is trying to provide health care for millions of people.

Merton was a strange bird, though. A Cistercian monk, Merton lived in a community of silence, but that was never enough for him. For years he badgered his abbot to allow him to live as a hermit apart from the community. And yet when he was allowed to do that, he disturbed his own solitude by writing books, carrying correspondence, and receiving visitor. And increasingly he involved himself in the struggles of the world, especially race, the nuclear threat and war in Vietnam. And as soon as he had the opportunity to travel outside the monastery, the solitude-loving Merton was off the Alaska and the Asia. And the final irony, Merton died not in his monastery, but in a hotel in Thailand. Well, Merton had to work out his own version of solitude.

And so I have to work out my own version of solitude. There is something I lack and have lacked for sometime. It’s something Merton misunderstands completely. He writes: “But if you have to live in a city and work among machines and ride in the subways and eat in a place where the radio makes you deaf with spurious news and where the food destroys your life and the sentiments of those around you poison your heart with boredom, do not be impatient, but accept it as the love of God and as a seed of solitude planted in your soul” (p. 67). The thing that Merton misses has to do with subways: they are actually wonderful places to be alone.

I rode the elevated and subway trains in Chicago for years. When they are packed like sardine cans, they are generally unpleasant, but when the number of available seats equals or exceeds the number of passengers they are perfect places for reading, study, or just staring. People on the trains do not acknowledge the existence of one another. It is the height of rudeness to speak to a stranger on a train except to say, “excuse me” when having to climb over them to get out.

I got a lot of reading done traveling on trains. Driving doesn’t provide the same opportunities. You may be alone in your car, but you’d better pay attention to what you’re doing, where you’re going, what the clowns in the other cars are doing, to say nothing of what the friendly officer with the radar gun is up to.

I understand solitude and am quite comfortable with it. Strange that I pursued careers which always puts me out in public in front of people. I manage it by performing. And then I go home to collapse. Alone. In solitude.

Alone or together, may the Lord bless you on your journey and greet you on your arrival.

Wayne





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CONNECTING III

I have been rambling on about connecting for three weeks now. One of the times when I made a serious disconnect was when I suggested to some members that when we read the Epistles of Paul we are reading someone else's mail. Boy did that tick them off, but it is true for the most part. Paul wrote 1 Corinthians to Christians he knew in Corinth. He addressed issues that concerned them in particular. He connected with them. Since we live 2,000 years later in a very different culture, we need to do some careful reading to connect with Paul. Hence my metaphor about reading someone else's mail.

The same thing is true about the Gospels. Mark, for instance, was written to a specific group of people that Mark knew. We don’t know exactly who they were (or who Mark was), but we can make some guesses. They are people who are able to communicate in Greek and probably didn’t understand Aramic because Mark translates Aramaic words. They were largely a group of Gentiles (non-Jews) because Mark explains Jewish customs to his audience. They were Christians. Throughout his Gospel Mark makes connections with his audience, sometimes breaking into his narrative to speak to the audience. For example in Mk 13:14 he writes “let the reader understand.” It’s a sort of stage whisper to the audience.

Actually, it probably came off as a stage whisper. The practice in Mark’s day was for writings to be read aloud. You can imagine a group of Christians gathered for worship as one of their number read aloud a portion of the Gospel and changing voice tone at the words “let the reader understand” and people either nodding appreciatively or perhaps looking perplexed when they failed to understand.

Actually the whole Gospel tradition is far more oral (spoken) and aural (heard) than we moderns are used to. The bits and pieces that Mark used in his Gospel were certainly shared by word of mouth for a generation before he wrote them down. The stories had certain forms that made them easier to remember. When Mark connected the stories, he was able to make points that extended over a far quantity of material than the original oral tradition. But in an age when few people would have had a scroll of Mark’s writing to study carefully, Mark would have had to written in such a way as to constantly remind the hearers of themes so they wouldn’t forget them over the time it took to read the whole Gospel.

An example. Early in the Gospel, Mark introduces the phrase “Son of man” used by Jesus to refer to himself. In performing a miracle Jesus announces: “ But so that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins"--he said to the paralytic- ‘I say to you, stand up, take your mat and go to your home.’ And he stood up, and immediately took the mat and went out before all of them; so that they were all amazed and glorified God, saying, ‘We have never seen anything like this!’” (Mark 2:10-12). So the Son of Man is confirmed as having the power to forgive sins by demonstrating the power to heal a paralyzed man. And having established that point. Mark adds a very different significance to the title. “Then he began to teach them that the Son of Man must undergo great suffering, and be rejected by the elders, the chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again” (Mark 8:31). Again and again Mark repeats that connection. This is the primary theme of his Gospel. You must understand Jesus as the one who dies and rises. It is not Jesus the miracle worker or even Jesus the teacher who is most important, but rather Jesus the crucified Savior.

Maybe the most subtle way this is displayed is near the end of the Gospel. “Now when the centurion, who stood facing him, saw that in this way he breathed his last, he said, ‘Truly this man was God's Son!’” (Mark 15:39). The centurion (a gentile) has seen no miracles. He has heard no teachings. He has seen Jesus die, and that convinces him that Jesus is the Son of God.

All of this is about making a connection with Mark’s audience. It’s not just a technique being used to keep the audience on topic, but a speaking to their concerns. They are Christians for whom adoption of the new religion has resulted in suffering and persecution. This can’t be right, can it? Yes, says, Mark. This is exactly right because it is what happened to Jesus. He was revealed as Son of God in his suffering. Don’t give up your faith. So Mark connects the story of Jesus to the situation of his audience.

Stay connected.

May the Lord bless you on your journey and greet you on your arrival.

Wayne




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CONNECTING II

Last week I was talking about connecting with an audience and theatre and suggested that had something to do with the Scriptures as well. For probably the last 15 years or so I have encouraged people to “find themselves” in Scripture. Where are you in the story? Occasionally I have done imaging exercises to help people find themselves in a particular story. For some people it is a powerful experience.

Let me relate one of the most fascinating experiences I had with a person who suddenly connected with Scripture. A youngster around 14 came to me with a question. She had attended a Christian school during her elementary years and now was enduring the rocky experience of a public high school. The inevitable science-religion conflict arose. So she asked, “How do Adam and Eve fit with the cavemen?” I stumbled through some unsatisfactory explanation until I hit on this. “Think of Adam and Eve not as a story about people who lived a long time ago, but as a story about you.” And her faced brightened as if the sun had suddenly shone in her. “You mean it’s like drama.” “Exactly,” I said. And she went away satisfied. She knew how drama worked, how it revealed much more than the mere story. She knew how to find herself in a drama, now she knew you could find yourself in Scripture. She connected.

This was my first experience with a “theatre kid.” (Side note: I wrote a short skit for her and a friend to perform at a Christmas Eve service that year. One of the few works I’ve ever had performed.) Since this was shortly before I moved to a new church, I didn’t have the opportunity to see how she developed over the years. But I know from later experiences that young people involved in theatre often have better insights into people than psychologists. I suspect that when they are free of strictures about how you’re “supposed” to read scripture, they probably have amazing insights there also. They know how to connect.

I had another experience some years earlier that taught me what happens when a person is prevented from connecting with Scripture. A member of my congregation asked me to speak to a youngster around 12 who she was trying to “convert” to Christianity. I said I would meet with them as long as the girl’s mother was aware we were meeting and knew what we were going to talk about. My member and the girl had been reading the Bible together. Unfortunately, they had started in Genesis rather than with the Gospels. The stories of Genesis seemed so outlandish to her that they were an insurmountable obstacle. Noah was the story causing the greatest problem because she couldn’t figure out how Noah could have stopped the lions from eating the antelopes and so forth. And it occurred to her that there was no way no many creatures would fit on the ark. I wanted to help her understand the story as a metaphor when the woman from my church began banging on the table with her fist and shouting at her, “You have to believe. You have to believe.” She had reduced faith in God to believing every word in the Bible was literally and historically true. Because I couldn’t around this woman’s views, I couldn’t open the Scriptures to the girl. She couldn’t connect. I lost her. (Eventually the woman quit the church because I was obviously a heathen.)

An observation: one of the greatest catastrophes in Scriptural studies was the addition of verse numbers to the text. It chopped everything into isolated pieces that people string together like beads rather reading to grasp the wholeness of what is being said.A very different approach is offered by Craig Bartholomew and Michael Goheen in their book The Drama of Scripture. The present the entire Bible as a Drama in six acts: Act 1, God Establishes his Kingdom: Creation. Act 2, Rebellion in the Kingdom: Fall. Act 3, The King Chooses Israel: Redemption Initiated. Interlude, a Kingdom Sstory Waitning for an Ending: The Intertestamental Period. Act 4, The Coming of the King: Redemption Accomplished. Act 5 Spreading the News of the King: The Mission of the Church. Act 6, The Return of the King: Redemption Completed.

It’s a sweeping approach to Scripture, but it is the subtitle of the book that grabbed my attention: Finding Our Place in the Biblical Story. Hey! I’ve been saying that for years! I don’t even get a footnote, but they do credit N. T. Wright, the Anglican Bishop of Durham for coming up with the idea of the Bible as a Drama. I guess my special contribution to the discussion will be the notion of connecting. How do we connect to the Scripture? Where are we in the story?

I suggested in discussing theatre that the actors connect with the audience to convey the wholeness of the play. Did you ever consider that the writers of the Bible were intentionally trying to connect with their audience? They didn’t just write stuff for others to figure out, they tried to communicate where people fit into the story and what it ought to say to people.

Well, this is getting a little long again. So I’ll try next week to show you what I mean. (Note: Those of you who have been in my Bible Study on Mark will already know everything I have to say next week, so you may take a break.)

I hope you will always be connected with a loving community and with a loving Lord. May the Lord bless you on your journey, and greet you on your arrival.

Wayne

P.S.

I note that last week's blog received 46 hits, more than any of my blogs to date. I don't think it has anything to do with the quality of my writing, but maybe people searching out a review of "Once Upon A Mattress." Having seen it four times, I can testify that it was a great success.

That being the case, here's a shout out to O.C.T. performers Alex, Christine, Angela, Amanda, Scotty, Christopher, David, & of course Katie who contributed so much. And to Jason and Shane down in the pit. And to the director, Tom.

BRAVI!



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