On February 25/12, UCiM will be sharing space with Barrier-Free MB, in order to offer faith communities in Winnipeg some time to reflect on pending/developing legislation in Manitoba. This legislation mirrors a process similar to what has unfolded in Ontario around endeavouring to make public spaces accessible to all citizens, which is known as the Accessibility Standards. Now you may be reading this blog and wondering what this has to do with UCiM … and that is the place from which I have begun to reflect.

One of the literary genres that was contemporary during Jesus’ ministry was called Miracle Stories. Anyone worth telling a story about had to be a healer. And, even a quick scan of our Sacred Stories, clearly illustrates that Jesus was at the top of the class … he even tops the Miracle Stories with an actual resurrection!

Too often, however, I would suggest we, as those who endeavour to be Disciples in this ministry we have come to call Christianity, get stuck at the Miracle itself. That has, in turn, been most harmful to many people. Those who are ill – suffer chronic pain, experience that their own bodies have become their enemy, whose physical body may seem sound but their neuro-chemical balance is askew and thus suffer the silent challenges of mental illness – have suffered from a Christianity that holds up Jesus’ healing miracles as a cure from ailment, if only we pray hard enough or believe strongly enough.

Aside: Please do not infer this means a rejection of the power of prayer or the reality of miracles – two topics worthy of a blog unto themselves. Let’s just say too often they are discussed in ways that hurt rather than heal.

Furthermore, certain Christian theologies have espoused that wholeness, therefore, must mean that bodies are fully functional. And, most harmfully, the men and women in our midst are dismissed, even though they long to be part of an egalitarian Christian community. Yet, contrary to the potential modelled by Jesus’ own ministry, they are shunned by our cultural indoctrination into this circular formula:

Broken Body = Bad: Heal + Broken Body = Cured ∴ Rejected Until Healed

It is my belief, however that the Miracles Stories point beyond themselves not to curing but to healing from the various kinds of discrimination that have always existed in our human condition. Those who are different – pick your ‘ism or ‘phobia – must be kept away from those of us who imagine we are normal. In Christian tradition, this normalcy has – unfortunately – been equated with purity. Without acknowledging this history, therefore, we simply perpetuate keeping people apart and isolated from one another.

 The Accessibility Standards, which are now before the Manitoba Legislature, highlight a long tradition of Christianity that too often is silenced when human systems maintain who is in and who is out. For members of the Early Church all people were welcomed into the communities in which they endeavoured to live. Regardless of all the ‘isms that surrounded them in the culture of the day – a Roman context – men and women chose to live with one another, shared their resources corporately and recognised that all present were God’s Beloved Children. And these Christian groups were composed of lepers, the poor, criminals, wealthy, and children. The gauge of living into this ideal was not who was excluded, but the degree to which all were accepted. As UCiM itself and our larger denominational context – The United Church of Canada – wrestles with the developments within the secular world, I believe we have to look into the mirror and ask how and where are we being called to act as a Christian expression in the 21^st Century.

 Any legislation is often written in legalese and this can feel intimidating. But I believe that the intent behind the legislation complements our historical endeavour to welcome all within our midst; to accept people for who they are; and to recognise the gifts that are inherently theirs. Just one example of a Christian experience that endeavours to see the Holy within all are L’Arche Communities, in which they attempt to live into mutuality with men and women who live with developmental disabilities. But even this expression, for some, may still feel exclusive. This opportunity that Barrier-Free MB advocates within our Manitoba context feels like a logical continuation of the work of mutual respect and mutuality. In Christian language, this might mean we live into the Kingdom to Come now – it is the reality of a New Creation. This Kingdom to Come is not some metaphysical otherworldliness. It lies in conscious choices to challenge ourselves and to push both our own faith communities and support direct action. Such action must advocate that until the barriers that separate us from one another are deconstructed and dismantled we simply preserve the systems we know do not heal, but cause harm. This harm occurs to both bodies & souls that are often housed in the same person whom we should not see as the Other, but as our Sister & Brother!

A Deacon’s Musing blog

In about a week, my team-mate – Shelly – and I will have the honour to sit with youth & young adults from Selkirk Presbytery. During that time, we will reflect on, discuss, wrestle with and consider the challenges posed by the documentary Miss Representation. The intent of this documentary is borne from Jennifer Siebel Newsom’s, the writer & director, experience as her daughter’s birth day approached. In this exploration, Newsom poses this challenge: “In a society where media is the most persuasive force shaping cultural norms, the collective message that our young women and men overwhelmingly receive is that a woman’s value and power lie in her youth, beauty, and sexuality, and not in her capacity as a leader.”

The documentary is not easy – the difficulties experienced as girls grow into women is shocking, hurtful and angering. The vulnerability and truth shared in this documentary is humbling and I found myself wondering how I might respond, reflect and share my impressions prior to Feb 18/12 … A Deacon’s Musing seemed one way to begin …

I first began to consider my own background … I was raised and nurtured by two women who, for various reasons that speaks to their own contexts, chose to challenge the deep patriarchal culture into which I was born. When my Giddo (Arabic for grandfather) directed my Sitto (Arabic for grandmother) to divorce him so he could marry another, he made it clear that if she did not, she would suffer the emotional and financial pressure he could bring to bear. In turn, in a culture in which divorce was shunned, she became a single mother and entrepreneur. My mother, later on, chose to raise me as a single unwed parent. And while people picketed the first daycare I attended, as it was open to bastard children such as myself, these women loved me deeply and sincerely.

One of the other things that I have been considering is the Early Church – this crazy collection of men and women who came together to form community around the teachings of Jesus. A man who modelled an egalitarian community in which the very gender and age divisions we continue to experience to this day were rejected. In fact, if it were not for many of the women of the Early Church – such as Phoebe, Priscilla, Aquila, & Junia, to mention only a few – there would likely be little of the Christianity that we practice today. Some of these women, who held significant wealth, used their own financial resources to nurture this new way of being. They planted seeds and recognised the strong and vibrant potential that existed when all members, regardless of gender or age, were encouraged to recognise their equal gifts as Children of God.

Another avenue of thought that I have gone down is our own denominational experience: the United Church of Canada (UCC). As a denomination, we have been part of the suffrage movement, we were the first Canadian denomination to recognise that women could actually be effective Ministers and, as such Lydia Gruchy was ordained in 1936. From these early steps, the UCC has gone onto to further embrace an egalitarian ministry that does not preclude access to ministry based on sexual orientation. From here, we have recognised that no marriage, regardless of sexual orientation, should be denied to consenting adults.

I have also recognised, as I prepared this blog, that my experiences, those of the Early Church and even our denomination, are not normative – though we may wish that were the case. Miss Representation clearly highlights that all of the work that has been done since the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s is both laudable and in constant danger of reversal. I think what struck me most is the danger of complacency by those of us who ASSUME the work is done, when this documentary clearly demonstrates this is not the case …

So what do we do with this challenge?
How do we respond to the challenge that our hoped for
civil and equal society may possibly be an illusion?

The music video that completes this blog was designed by young men and women (with the assistance of the Manitoba Council for International Cooperation) who have chosen to share stories, name the reality that women are objectified by our culture and, ultimately, sings of the importance of the empowerment of women for ALL of us. It is a response to the challenge with which the documentary itself leaves the viewer: share your stories, take action to continue the work for equality and confront the human systems that diminish women, because when my mother, niece, aunt, sister and spouse are lessened then my own male potential is equally harmed. It is in healthy communities, grounded in equality and respect, that we find our full potential as Brothers and Sisters in Christ!

A Deacon’s Musing blog

There I am on my morning 10k run. Boomer at my side – enduring my slow, plodding bipedal gate –  surrounded by the beauty of hoar frost embracing any and every surface upon which moisture might cling and above a brilliant robin’s blue sky pushing out the morning fog, when suddenly the lyric, “‘Cause hate is all the world has ever seen lately,” jarred me out of the longed-for-runner’s-high!

For me, my daily run is the time I set aside to try to reflect on the day that has been, what might lie before me and where I might be called to reflect. In essence, this is one of my spiritual disciplines … and with any ritual or practice, there’s always the potential that you get stopped in your tracks … this was one of those times …

Now I know this may not be a surprise to you, really it is not as such to me either – at least from a head space perspective. But something, today, was shocking … shocking because – I guess upon reflection – I was surrounded by beauty. And this lyric cut through all of that beyond my intellect into my body and my heart and there was this ‘duh aha’ moment.

It’s unequivocally true … lately likely being the entire course of human history is pocked, marked, scarred with hate. Have you read any of our Hebrew Scriptures lately? Not exactly a lot of egalitarian love going on in there – in fact quite the opposite: people rationalising murder, mayhem, genocide all in the name of ‘God.’ After all, we all know God is on our side, right? Well at least insofar as those who get to write the story are able to shift the narrative from hate to God’s preference, from oppression to protection, from selfishness to self-preservation, from offence to defence …

I have blogged – loosely – about this during Advent in A Deacon’s Musing: Advent & the Rattling of Swords, but there is more than simply being in a culture of war that I have not explored. A constant message of hate, which is so easy to internalise and with which then to paint everyone whom we meet, is insidious. It becomes a pattern that we repeat without knowing … in a text based environment, one of the revelations has been that ‘more offence is taken than is ever intended.’ This insight is born from the reality that most communication is non-verbal – so the words we use do not often necessarily mean what we are actually saying!

What’s the point? In a culture inundated with various media that do not require interacting with another human being, it has become easier to ASSUME what people actually say before we even meet them. This race is like this, that person does that, their culture always responds this way, is a recording that becomes part of our ASSUMPTIONS when we finally meet someone new …

And, of course, into the fray comes Jesus – the one whom Christians use as a guide, gauge, mentor, teacher – that not only challenges those whom we have come to call the Disciples, but those of us who continue to endeavour to share his message! And, as is evident in the discomfort when you start to listen to him, hate is really not part of his vocabulary. A recent image from facebook seems to sum this up by using examples of what Jesus would NOT do:

Hate – it’s insidious! Until we confront how we ourselves are affected by it, it is likely we will be defensive when we are told we hate so & so or such & such … but if we take Jesus’ ministry seriously, if we aspire to be LOVE in the world, maybe we need to be jarred out of our assumptions. When we hear the challenge that ‘all the world has ever seen lately’ is hate, maybe we need to Take a Look Around. In turn, we might have to reflect on how we might be something different …

A Deacon’s Musing blog

Recently, here in Manitoba, the city of Brandon released a proposed budget that indicated taxes would increase by as much as 20%. And, as you can well imagine, there has been A LOT of response and most of it, well at least all that I have heard through traditional media, has transmitted voices of discontent, disagreement and, in some cases, anger.

I am not writing either to approve or disapprove of the choices of a possible municipal budget, especially when I do not live in that context. What I have found most interesting, however, is the clear bias in the media that this is, in fact, a bad idea. And, regardless of whether or not this is the case, it confounds me that there seems to be no balance in regard to the context of taxation, most significantly owing to the historical context of the Prairies, Manitoba and, in many ways, Winnipeg itself!

Much of the concern in Brandon has to do with the fact that there are, from what I understand, four collective agreements that require an increase in the municipal budget line. In a province where collective bargaining, labour rights and the social good has a rich history, I admit, therefore, that I am concerned that we are not discussing our historical connexion to the need for a collective social-democratic network that offers all an aspired to equal playing field …

• The social good, as far as I understand it, is a political framework that endeavours to put in place a system of processes that endeavour to insure that there is equity and equality for all citizens;
• Collective bargaining & labour rights, here in Winnipeg, are clearly evident in the struggles and conflict that arose during the 1919 Winnipeg General Strike when profit was placed before the social good at the expense of those providing the labour;
• From our United Church context, the Social Gospel was our articulation of the social good and, in turn, was core to why we were involved in the advocacy & establishment of the social network that is critical to our social democracy here in Canada.

This brief, and albeit glossed, history is not part of the current narrative within traditional media. Moreover, the challenges to this infrastructure, which arose from the Social Gospel movement within Canada during the early 20^th Century, has been challenged by a 30 year fiscal policy that I believe is clearly akin to libertarian economics.

Though a libertarian programme would contend that the state has no role in the lives of the individual (i.e. taxation, social programming and/or limitation on financial endeavours) and that left to our own devices the social good can be realised, the underlying supposition is that all members of society are playing on an equal footing or, at the very least, can aspire to such. From a United Church of Canada understanding, however, articulated through the social good and often practiced on any Sunday during the Prayers of Confession, we realise that human society has and does create systems that benefit others to the detriment of others. And, in turn, much of the reason why we – as Canadians – enjoy what we do as citizens within this country is connected to a taxation system that evolved from that historical context, which recognised that sometimes we need to hold one another with care.

So back to Brandon … and in many cases current Canadian realities, we have slowly changed the narrative from the social good to one that places us against the state/government vis-à-vis taxation. As well, we have divested or simply stopped investing in municipal infrastructure by decreasing/failing to match taxation to our expectations. Now we have a collective and national deficit in respect to what we can afford on the one hand, and what we all expect to be provided through our taxes, on the other. And, when this financial crisis arises and politicians must confront the deficit through increased taxes the response is as though we are being taken for a ride, as opposed to any recognition that we have democratically enabled government – municipal, provincial and federal – over the last few decades to rationalise shifting the conversation from the social good to individual libertarian entitlement.

Okay, hold on, my rant is almost over … I am not saying whether this is right or wrong – though I have a strong inkling my bias for the Social Gospel is clear, but the only wrong vote/choice/decision is an uninformed one. And, therein, lays my concern: while we begin to collectively realise our infrastructure deficits, the only narrative we are hearing clearly ignores the history of why we have the system we do. If we do not acknowledge the context of such a history we cannot make informed choices. And – perhaps equally disturbing – we may very well recreate the same circumstances that led to the discontent in 1919 and the collapse of the economic system in the dirty 30s and, some would contend, that are again being echoed in the Occupy Wall Street Movement that is afoot within our own context. And, should this rant actually resonate, our denomination’s experience with the social good, as articulated through the Social Gospel, is as appropriate almost a century ago as it is today!

A Deacon’s Musing blog

These two words – Faith & Belief – have always been with me as I have journeyed along my path. How do they fit? Do they fit? Do they compete with one another? Are they complementary? Where do they reside in me?

This last week I have been able to do just one of the things that I find so very feeding in my ministry as a Deacon: I got to visit with no less than four Brothers and one Sister in the faith, who shared part of their stories and I, in turn, also shared a bit of my own. What is amazing in these places of trust, questions and most hopefully non-judgement is how deep people are willing to go, if given the opportunity to explore their journey as a Child of God.

Sometimes – though not always – these encounters are new for people. Sometime a person’s inner monologue may have glossed over some of the questions I ask – So where was God in that for you? Does it feel like you were alone? What does Jesus’ own ministry have to say to that experience? – but until given voice and life, it is easy to be distracted, to avoid those paths that might lead you down the rabbit hole …

One of the places we often arrive at in these conversations is what is Faith and what is Belief? At this point, I share what has been helpful for me and use my experience to frame where we might go next if there seems to be an impasse or a lack of language to proceed. For me, Faith resides in the body, whereas Belief is in the head. Sometimes there is another pause in the conversation and should it feel appropriate, I would share the following framework …

Faith is intrinsic to every person; it often defies articulation and is something that is simply known in one’s core. When words are applied to Faith or, perhaps more clearly, when one tries to translate Faith through words, it seems to me that poetry might be as close as one can come to transmit that truth. An experience that has been helpful me to describe this sense of Faith is the experience one has after diving a little too deep into the water of a cold, Canadian Shield lake. As one rises with kicking legs and pumping arms to the beckoning light just beyond the water’s edge, you know, you anticipate, your lungs are prepared to draw deeply of the fresh air for which your body longs. And as you break the barrier, there is a pause, your head suddenly warmer than the rest of your still submerged body, and then you draw in what you knew was there to replenish, purify and cleanse your oxygen deprived being … Faith is the trust that drawing in that longed for breath is literally life-giving …

Faith – that intrinsic sense of the Other, something bigger, larger, and yet implying a deep interconnection that defies initial experience – often requires, in a human culture of words, the scientific-method, and the need to qualify and quantify, an explanation! Unfortunately, the human condition is often uncomfortable with ambiguity and, as such, Faith moves from the body into the head as an exercise to explain what that means: Belief. Belief and the systems that arise are simply the language, the coding, the matrix, the framework upon which a collective experience attempts to explain Faith.

Now I can already hear those Orthodox voices – right opinion/true thinking – that would and will reject this critique. Though that might be an interesting and intellectually stimulating conversation, the fact is that most people – especially those who are exploring the Christian experience/language for the first time – would and do not appreciate a nuance that feels more akin to judgement than exploration and dialogue.

This tension between Faith and Belief has become clearly evident since my last blog – A Deacon’s Musing: Christian by Culture or Christian by Choice. The video – Why I Hate Religion, But Love Jesus – which I used at the end and has now been viewed on YouTube millions of times, has proven challenging because of the poet’s use of ‘religious.’ What I understand by the poet’s use of ‘religious’ speaks to the institutionalised aspect that often occurs as Belief systems evolve. What happens in this development of a system is that the intrinsic aspect – Faith – must be superseded, in order to ensure the clarity espoused by the institutional expression. And it is this tension, when trust is present, in which I get to muck about. When Brothers and Sisters, who are trying to reclaim a sense of Jesus’ ministry in their lives, experience his words being mocked by the institutions that claim to speak on his behalf, it is here that a conversation about Faith and Belief has proven an interesting stepping point …

A Deacon’s Musing blog

This question is not new for those who have been looking at generational theory, in respect to the church and where it has been and where it might be heading. We know that the church – what was once a cornerstone of western expressions of political organisation – no longer enjoys this same position. And, in much of the study and analysis, it is not likely to occur again for some time, if ever. And though many may debate whether this is a good thing or not, it is what it is and it allows those of us who have opted into institutional expressions of the Christian experience to discern what this means … and for some this expression of Christianity has been called the ‘Emerging Church.’

It would be misleading of me to imply that this is not of interest to me. The reality is that I began blogging because of The United Church of Canada’s response to this growing discussion and was called, Emerging Spirit. The research and data has helped me in my own journey in ministry to understand the world-view­ of the various generations with whom I have the honour to walk as a Deacon! This blog, however, does not find its catalyst in this background …

This last Sunday, UCiM celebrated Baptism, one of two Sacraments that our denomination holds. The other is Communion … for me, the Baptism ritual is one of the most powerful and significant things we do as a faith community. It recognises the responsibility that we collectively have in nurturing and raising the children in our midst. It also opens the door to reflect on our own faith choices and to gauge the degree to which our own journey has matured allowing us to embrace compassion, as opposed to ego, to walk with others in humility, as opposed to self-righteousness.

As these children and their families, accompanied by Godparents & a member of UCiM’s community, came forward during the ritual, we learned that the garment, which was worn by one of the babies, was over 100 years old and had been worn by five generations of boys and girls of the faith! I was humbled, I was wowed and something clicked that was more than a head space recognition of something significantly different for Christians in that Sanctuary last Sunday than the original child who wore that gown for the first time in a Celtic land over the pond a century prior!

A Christian by Culture is imbued with assumptions that are integrated into the codes and mores of a society that has often accommodated, some would say appropriated, a faith system with expectations that are not necessarily in keeping with beliefs inherent to the Christian tradition. I do not want to imply that a hundred years ago a child being baptised was not an event filled with import or meaning, but there was no choice, per se. It was what was done, everyone else did it and the church was as much the social fabric as much as it was a place where one’s spiritual exploration occurred through a religious institution. Watching these families on a Sunday, in the 21^st Century, however, I was awed by the fact that they were making a choice – this was what they wanted for their child!

We live in a consumer culture that is lulled into schedules that are so busy that we have no time to discern between the freedom to make a choice, as opposed to the illusion offered by purchasing what feels like anything on Amazon. A real choice, for Christians historically, has meant the possibility of rejecting the mores and values of the culture around them and this last Baptism drove that home for me. What is even clearer, and I think the video at the end of this blog reinforces, is the tension we all – those who CHOOSE Christianity in an age when the human genome has been catalogued and we have embarked on space travel – must confront: what we have been TOLD is Christianity is, in many ways, more a modification/manipulation/appropriation of a set of values that were modelled by a man – Jesus – who did not come to build churches, but to free people from the oppression and limitations placed upon them. And, perhaps with irony, those very teachings have been usurped to imprison men and women during a time when one was a Christian by Culture. I do not finish this blog with judging those who have come before – I am simply hoping to acknowledge that the choice of Baptism in our context means re-examining the assumptions that we have inherited and, when we do that, we must be prepared to hear our Sacred Stories and our faith tradition with new ears that are, I would suggest, actually quite old …

 A Deacon’s Musing blog

It seems that during my Sabbath, following the Holy Season of Christmas, the Canadian Federal Government has added to its bureaucracy: The Office of Religious Freedom. I have been reflecting on how I might best – through A Deacon’s Musing – convey some of my thoughts …

First of all, I guess I need to acknowledge that I believe there are multiple truths that lead to God: whether all are equally helpful or useful to appreciate the Creator, which we know is beyond all our understanding, is more of head-space exercise than one of faith. The truth through which I spy God is Christianity: a ministry exemplified by Jesus and the resurrection that occurred among his Disciples, when giving up could have been very well what they chose after his execution. When in doubt, I default to this mantra: “If what you believe leads you to compassion for all of Creation, grounded in humility, then who am I to challenge.”

Okay back to this new Office …many critiques & challenges have occurred to me. The first hearkens to Orwellian doublethink, especially in relationship to human political structures. In other words, what we say or write does not necessarily mean what they do upon face value. Though no doubt this would be an interesting exploration, another avenue might be a discussion about how political ideological agenda of any given government can usurp, compromise or take over the language of another: in this case faith-based expression through the language of Human Rights. And, as I read over this last paragraph, perhaps these are not mutually exclusive to one another … regardless this is not the route upon which I chosen to tread …

What occurs to me, as a Christian who – like the rest of humanity – is political by nature is the equal recognition that the Christian experience, and in particular that of the Early Church, did not support the dominant political structures called Empire. In today’s parlance of politics we talk about the government, the state, or country. All, I believe, are simply expressions of the same thing: Empire. The very act of the Christian community has been to advocate, through lived experience, a manner of engagement that was political in nature, yet did not support the status quo.

The Early Church, composed of men and women, rejected the dominant structures and chose for themselves what life in community could look like and aspired to an egalitarian life that was both inclusive to all who were seeking and yet endeavoured to remove itself from the coercion of the dominant narrative of Empire. Members of The Way knew that the moment that faith became integrated into the state, it would be compromised and would not bode well for those who choose to continue to adhere to their path.

There were two ways this tension of compromise was confronted as the Christian church developed after the execution of Jesus. The first was immediately following the fall of the Jewish Temple in approximately 70 CE. In essence, as the Christian community moved away from the Synagogue it was seen to be a group that lived in tension with the Roman understanding of the Pax Deorum. What was central to this superficial understanding of multiple religious truths was that all were equal to one another, but only in as much as they reinforced the mechanisms of Empire. If, however, you lived your truth in a way that threatened this hierarchy, then you were deemed to have violated the Pax Deorum … and it is under this guise that we hear of Christians in the early movement being tortured and executed because they chose not to compromise …

After a few centuries of this, something weird happened and that is that the state – the Roman Empire – adopted Christianity as its official religion. Another thing the Way was aware of was that the closer to power you got the harder it was to maintain your identity. And the Christian community could not be any closer to power than on that fateful day in 312 CE when Constantine thought this might help him out of a lurch! The next struggle – and one that has been much more challenging for Christians – has been the development of Orthodoxy: no state can tolerate various expressions of truth if it is intending to maintain control. As power becomes centralised right truth (orthodoxy) must be utilised to quell wrong opinion (heresy).

So what’s the point of this historical gloss in respect to an Office of Religious Freedom? As a Christian exploring one’s place in Canadian culture, I think I have to be wary, perhaps even concerned, when my faith expression of truth now falls under the purview of an extension of any bureaucratic body. What is the role that the state has in determining what freedom means and how does that affect me if my faith leads me to a contradictory conclusion with the state? 20^th Century Civil Rights movements have often been grounded in an understanding firmly rooted in faith and, in turn, has led to acts of civil disobedience and resistance. Whether one talks about faith communities that range from the Social Gospel movement, to the marches of Martin Luther King Jr. and more recently the Occupy Wall Street Movement, it has been a way in which Christians have testified to their faith. And now, in Canada, there is an Office that will be monitoring Religious Freedom and I have to ask: what happens when my faith comes into contradiction with the Office’s ultimate mandate of protecting the state? I guess, as Jayne says to Mal, in Pt.2 of the Pilot for the Firefly TV Series, “Well, that’ll be an interesting day.”

A Deacon’s Musing blog

Advent: It’s time to wait. For whom are we waiting? As Christians, we say that is Jesus! This is a Holy Time in our Christian calendar when we might make space for reflection, silence and – hopefully – confront some of the import of the choices that lay before us.

We use too many words … we fill our spaces with loud sounds, the clanging of cymbals, blaring of MP3s intrude the silence … we have more distractions than we know what to do with & they numb … they numb us to the point that we forget our longings, our prayers, our hopes … Deep down, in those moments when suddenly the glaring of the screen or the ringing of the cell phone halts, can you hear it, can you hear the whisper, can you hear the calling, the beckoning?

Too often, as Christians, we get stuck in thinking the work, the social justice, the giving & the doing are to what we are Called. Not that the digging & praying are not important, but Advent is an opportunity to reconnect with something central & core to our being & a recognition that it is by Grace that we are transformed & renewed. Grace, that gift freely offered to each of us without qualification, regardless of what we do …

Do you feel something missing? Does it feel as you walk into each day, through your routine that is perhaps more rote than choice that something is wrong? Do you turn on the news & see images of pain & suffering, sorrow & sadness & have an inkling that this is not right? That something is not quite fitting into what you imagine the ways things should be & the way we – as a culture – have fashioned our reality?

What does this Grace look like? Do we want to seek it? Do we want to be transformed from a person filled with doubts & questions, brokenness & addictions into something whole & new? Are we willing to let go … truly let go?

On that imagined, literal, mythologised Christmas Day whose truth transcends superficial discussions of ‘actuality,’ something happened to those present. This wee babe, surrounded by the poor, the marginalised, foreigners & the lowly, ushered in something radical. The men & women, the discarded gave themselves up & experienced the revelation of the Hope of this child & experienced Grace, which did not judge them according to their race, age, gender, wealth, ability, sexual identity or orientation. They awoke in this child’s presence to the core of their being, which defies words & remains dully defined even in poetry.

Are you ready? Do you really want to meet this child? Do you really want to awaken to a reality outside of reinforced self-focused individuality & confront our interconnectedness? Do you REALLY want to realise that all of Creation is your neighbour – that you are the rocks & leaves, the cats & dogs, the baying donkey & the crooning Mourning Dove? Are you prepared to embrace that what you do to another LITERALLY causes you harm or care depending on the choices you make?

2000 years ago, people – men & women – began to give up their lives for renewal & rebirth into a family that was not segregated or stratified. A family that was egalitarian in nature, open to the gifts that we all possess as the Children of God & as a result they went out into the world, with a star announcing the child’s birth knowing that their very lives had been gained & that losing them no longer mattered.

Should you find yourself in worship during this Holy Season, should an offering plate come your way, should you hold it in your hands with quivering expectation, know that should you be prepared to let go & seek Grace freely offered, a response is no longer an obligation or expectation, but simply one way that you begin to live a life of gratitude & action. The Christ is coming: do you really want to meet him?

A Deacon’s Musing blog

Advent: It’s time to wait. For whom are we waiting? As Christians, we say that is Jesus! This is a Holy Time in our Christian calendar when we might make space for reflection, silence and – hopefully – confront some of the import of the choices that lay before us.

Can you hear it? Metal being drawn from scabbards? The puffing of chests? The pomp? Sort of like the schoolyard, except the outcome of the rattling of swords has much more dire implications once the schoolyard becomes global, interconnected politics.

The most recent and apparent rattling of swords seems to have entered the media’s narrative at the end of November, when the British government expelled Iranian diplomats following attacks on its embassy. Shortly thereafter, France removed its own diplomats from Iran. Following this rattling, President Obama asked for the US’ military drone back. And, recently, former Vice President Cheney has called for a quick airstrike against Iran.

Within our own context is Canada’s geopolitical choices around Kyoto. Our choices to withdraw from collective agreements that endeavour to seek balance with our footprint upon Creation certainly sounds like rattling. Another recent Canadian example, to consider, is our government’s refusal to allow some women freedom of choice and religious expression in citizenship ceremonies.

My point is not to contextualise, critique, defend or challenge these realities – rather it is to acknowledge that, as Christians walking through Advent, we have ALWAYS been surrounded by Empire. And one of the most significant tools that is utilised to enforce power is the making of war, regardless of whether that is expressed with arms, propaganda or terror.

Those who endeavour into discipleship of the Christ are confronted with the humble arriving of a child that was born into the midst of violence, quickly shepherded away from his birthplace during his early years because he was such a threat – according to our Sacred Stories – that an entire generation of baby boys were executed. And what was his threat to those in power that they utilised the tools of terror?

One of adages that I often quote, and I apologise if you have heard me say this too often, is that ‘you will always get, what you have always got, if you keeping doing what you’ve always done.’ What we – as a species – have always done is create systems of inequity, systems that create illusions of freedom, but which are always built on the backs of those with the least. And the tools of war, with too much irony, are often carried by the young men and women of Empire who do not benefit from the illusion of freedom: to be more direct, wars are fought by the have-nots on behalf of the haves.

And into this repeated pattern comes this child that will model that the tools of war do not work! More pointedly, they do not work in leading to actual freedom: a freedom that nurtures the realisation that life is sacred, that we are all interconnected and when one harms another human being, one is actually perpetuating hurt upon oneself! But that realisation – in Christian-language revelation – carries with it a burden. You can’t go back – there’s no Blue Pill … and with this awakening comes both gift and choice: do you help birth change, again in Christian-language, do you choose to begin to bring about the Kingdom to Come?

As I continue these Advent blogs, it occurs to me that it would be easy to say, “but Richard, you’re being too naïve,” or “the situation is too complex, your glossing over the threat that X is.” And, I realise that might be and likely is an initial reaction, and all I can say is that is part of the distraction, that’s part of the challenge of our letting go that we are a part of this Empire. Empire is not us and them. It’s not the American or Roman Empire vs. the oppressed people from X. The ENTIRE human construct is Empire. It’s what we have fashioned to make sense of our day-to-day live: it is the illusion that we are in control and it does not easily let go of us, nor we of it. And it is this time of year for Christians that we must face our own choices and whether we are prepared to go to the manger to welcome this boy and lay down our own gifts or whether we will pass by this radical birth and continue to be comfortable in the illusion, even though there is always that constant whisper that something is wrong, that another world is possible, that there is real freedom …

A Deacon’s Musing blog

Before Dea. Richard began blogging for UCiM, he was exploring the blog as a spiritual discipline with the United Church of Canada’s Emerging Spirit programme. Feel free to read some of what he contributed between 2008-2010:

Dea. Richard @ Emerging Spirit

If you have any challenges, feedback or questions for Dea. Richard, please comment in A Deacon’s Musing , as the Emerging Spirit site is primarily an archive now.

A Deacon’s Musing blog