rivervision

i just read that the folks at westbor0 baptist church are going to protest at va tech on friday – one week before the anniversary of the shootings. why? from their website:

WBC to picket Virginia Tech to connect the dots. God sent the killer because of your proud sin! You raise your kids to believe they can disobey God with impunity, and that His commandments are all on the table to be disposed of whenever you please. That’s why they think fornication, adultery, and sodomy are all just in good fun (instead of the filthy practices they are), and that’s why the wrath of God is on them. God is cursing you by killing those same children that you have lied to all their lives. VA Tech was just GodSmacked — another of your students murdered — and you still refuse to heed and obey the standards of God. Woe unto you! “Woe unto them that call evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness…!” Isa. 5:20. You’re going to Hell, and you’re taking your kids with you.

oh, and then they are going over to my high school to protest some more..

WBC to picket Blacksburg High School. We are determined that each place we go, all the children who you adults have lied to, get this message: TWO WORDS define Antichrist Obama’s “Education Plan”, to wit: KEVIN JENNINGS, United States Education Czar. This fag who started GSAs and GLSEN Organizations all across DOOMED america. Now 63 years old, with ZERO CHILDREN of his own, this fag is DETERMINED to sodomize all of you children he and Obama can get their filthy, bloody hands on. Flee these lying false prophets, kids. God hates fags (Romans 1) and their hateful enablers. Jennings/Obama say “screw you buddy” to God. That is why God has sent them to punish your parents for lying to you all your lives long. Praise God and Fear Him! AMEN!

and finally.. they are going to do some interfaith work.. cause they are like that. they are going to the hillel center:

The Jews of this world substitute their “tradition” for obedience to their God. No beanies in the Torah! Put away the pride and arrogance. Being jewish does not equate to entry into heaven. You must obey!! We are looking for those good figs who will repent for killing the Messiah and mourn for their sins.

thank God, there is going to be a counter protest at Va Tech. i wish i could be there to participate as well, and then to move to b’burg high and the hillel center as well. i don’t understand why these people are doing this. i never understand why the folks at westboro baptist do what they do. as super religious as this sounds – it’s true – these people are my brothers and sisters in christ.. it just amazes me how different we interpret His message of peace and truly loving and honoring all people. i know that God still loves them, and thank Him that we are all afforded His grace. i just wish they would leave blacksburg alone (and everyone else they picket for that matter).

3 years later and the events of the day are still close the the surface of my heart. i won’t ever forget when i first heard and how the events played out for me so far away. i was lucky – my stepfather’s class was on the 3rd floor and not the 2nd floor of norris hall – there were a lot who weren’t so lucky. i hope this doesn’t stir up too much for those who were so impacted by the events. i hope what it stirs is a continued to call to peace and acceptance and love in the face of tragedy and trauma. that is what Christ called us to do, in His sacrifice he called us to do our best to act with and in the same the love towards all others that He had for us.

thanks to my good friends i finally got the fridge i bought awhile ago moved in.. (i had broken the one that was here). they went so far as to take 2 doors off of hinges to get the thing in. it’s nice to no longer be using the windowsill as my fridge..

it was an interesting practice and i think a reflection about what is most important to me when i put the magnets back on (yes, i am a fridge magnet fan).

here’s the freezer door.. or – what is at eye level:

• on the left top- a card of anne frank and her quote: “in spite of everything i still believe that people are good at heart”

• below that: a closing song from when i was a uu: “spirit of live, come unto me. sing in my heart all the stirrings of compassion. blow in the wind, rise in the sea. move in the hand, giving life the shape of justice. roots hold me close; wings set me free; spirit of life, come to me, come to me.” this is attached with a magnet with lilith on it.

• next to that: a card of the “hail, mary” painting by merson.. i love this painting. she’s there, holding her Son, with a halo around her head, barely visible. when i first look at this painting my eye goes to the fellow with the sickle and eventually it drifts over to her. i love that They aren’t the center of the painting and yet extremely important fixtures and actually in the forefront of it. i saw this painting in the high museum of art in atlanta and was immediately attracted to it. i never ever got it out of my mind and then found these cards.. i’m not sure – maybe i’d actually bought it  when i was there.. that should have been a sign back then that i was a christian.

• then a magnet from cape hatteras – the trip i went on with my dad et. al.

• my grandparents – my father’s parents (i just noticed tonight that he’s actually in the corner of it), and a picture of baby dad. these two pictures are at eye level and are held on by a magnet with a recipe for maryland crab cakes (my grandparents lived in annapolis until i was 18 and my grandfather is a graduate of the naval academy).

• there is also a postcard that i sent myself from bethlehem (palestine, not pennsylvania)..

• dr. king’s principles of non-violence
• baby max cat, 12 years ago.

• 2 magnets from my b’ friends -> baby Jesus in the manger & the star of bethlehem
• a young picture of jtb
• a magnet “serenity is not freedom from the storm, but peace within it”
• and activism words.

the door to the fridge? random magnets from around my life.. + a postcard i sent myself from dahab, egypt and a postcard of the naval academy. it’s not that those things aren’t important, it’s just that they are less important and i only had so much space at eye level..

i gotta say, it’s nice having a fridge again.. if not for the luxury of actually having a fridge and being able to have things like eggs and stuff, but actually for the magnets, pictures and postcards i get to walk by every time i go to the bathroom or into the kitchen.

Oh, Come, Oh, Come Emmanuel
Translated: John Neal, 1818-66

Oh, come, oh, come, Emmanuel,
And ransom captive Israel,
That mourns in lonely exile here
Until the Son of God appear.
Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel
Shall come to you, O Israel!

Oh, come, our Wisdom from on high,
Who ordered all things mightily;
To us the path of knowledge show,
and teach us in her ways to go.
Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel
Shall come to you, O Israel!

Oh, come, oh, come, our Lord of might,
Who to your tribes on Sinai’s height
In ancient times gave holy law,
In cloud and majesty and awe.
Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel
Shall come to you, O Israel!

Oh, come O Rod of Jesse’s stem,
From ev’ry foe deliver them
That trust your mighty pow’r to save;
Bring them in vict’ry through the grave.
Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel
Shall come to you, O Israel!

Oh, come, O Key of David, come,
And open wide our heav’nly home;
Make safe the way that leads on high,
And close the path to misery.
Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel
Shall come to you, O Israel!

Oh, come, our Dayspring from on high,
And cheer us by your drawing nigh,
Disperse the gloomy clouds of night,
And death’s dark shadows put to flight.
Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel
Shall come to you, O Israel!

Oh, come, Desire of nations, bind
In one the hearts of all mankind;
Oh, bid our sad divisions cease,
And be yourself our King of Peace.
Rejoice! Rejoice! Emmanuel
Shall come to you, O Israel!

“I am rarely influenced by someone yelling at my or acting like a jerk towards me. I don’t think I ever change my mind about something if it comes with an insult or hostility. Why does that seem to be the currency of exchange in so many instances these days? I’m going to work really hard to dial it back in my world and I hope you will, too.” ~vickie buenger, erin’s ma.

“For Love is the beginning and the middle and the end. And wherever we go, there we are, and wherever we are, God is there.” ~ Rev. Katie Mulligan, Mt. Laurel Covenant Church, NJ (blog here)

so here’s a picture of of the new technology.. yeah, yeah.. y’all have seen lots of pictures of these things.. but this one is mine.

see – now i REALLY like my iphone.  why?  because i got a case that i like so much more.  the case i originally bought for it kept falling apart (it was 2 pieces) and the colors were 2 i didn’t really like – so i took it back. this case is one piece and purple with pink edges and button covers. now it feels like *mine.*

oh and if you missed it – the evangelical lutheran church of america (ELCA) voted to ordain openly gay, non-celibate, pastors AND to recognize same-gender marriages! yes, i sent a hearty congratulations to pr. corinne thul of logan’s prince of peace lutheran – an ELCA church. today’s vote finally opened a door to my friend l, in case she feels God’s call to the clergy (she would be a blessing to any church). it’s very exciting and i can’t wait until my own PCUSA (pres church, USA) is able to follow their excellent example.

bruce reyes-chow, moderator of pcusa’s (presbyterian church usa) general assembly asked on twitter (@breyeschow) why people are members of pcusa.  i sent him 9 reasons why i am, and i thought it would make for a good blog post.  so here goes:

1. belief in the trinity.  the father, son and holy ghost – all in one.  yes, this is different than the mormons.
2. belief that Jesus Christ died, and was resurrected, for us.  i was unitarian universalist for 10 years.  this is not a church-wide belief held w/in that church (of course, if you know anything about the uu’s).
3. the bottom up form of governance of the church, the way we make decisions.
4. belief that we don’t hold the only truth and way to connect with God.
5. we don’t evangelize through our words, we do so through our actions.  no, there aren’t presbyterian missionaries that walk door to door or stand on street corners condemning you to hell if you don’t believe what we believe..
6. belief that the bible is a living word, though i’m not sure if this is specific to pastor paul or denomination wide.
7. the diversity of people within pcusa.  as someone beholden to peace and justice i can feel comfortable within the denomination, but people who are pro-war, anti-lgbt rights also feel comfortable in it too.
8. i read the heidleberg and westminster confessions and they felt right to me.
9. repeat #2, it’s so incredibly important to me.

i thought i’d mention this.. john shuck tweeted asking if anyone had ever compared the presbyterians w/ the rastafarians.  i responded back my own faith journey.  i told him that before joining pcusa i’d:

• been a member of the unitarian universalists (for 10 years) and the mormons for 1.5 years, along with being a practicing wiccan at different times, and
• spent time with the evangelicals, episcopalians, and unprogrammed quakers, and
• have read a lot on buddhism (and i didn’t mention this to him) and judaism, and
• when i got back from palestine, after realizing i had to leave the mormons researched the episcopalians more in depth, the mennonites and generally the anabaptists, and the lutherans along with reading a lot about the presbyterians.

all of this was a part of a 26 year search for faith, a search that began at age 9.  why did i search?  because i wasn’t raised in any faith.  my father was raised episcopalian and my mother’s mother went to an evangelical church which my mother openly held great disdain for.

during college i went to the episcopal church for awhile and then found the wiccans.  in graduate school #1 i stumbled upon the uu’s which really made the most sense to me in all my years of searching.. though after awhile i found the whole God / Christ peace missing and after a lot of soul searching i realized i really do believe in good ol’ JC’s resurrection and the Christian God.

when i got here to logan i joined the mormons, because of the whole JC thing and because i wanted to belong, though all along i knew there was some non-resonance for me in the faith.  i couldn’t believe that gordon hinkley was a prophet of God and Dr. King wasn’t.  i also just couldn’t uphold the church’s definition of marriage and that women can’t hold the priesthood (clergy) or any official roles of governance within the church.  it was a huge blessing that pieter niemeyer said to me, on the way back to bethlehem from the negev desert, “you aren’t mormon.”  i will be forever grateful for his courage to say such a thing.

but, as i said to john, if i’d ever walked into a presbyterian (pcusa) church before my trip to the Holy Land i’m not sure if i would have realized i’d found what i was looking for.  i strongly believe that going to Palestine, to the places where Christ walked, made me ready to finally find my religious home.

does this mean i’m no longer searching and looking?  oh goodness no.  i find myself drawn to the works and writings of the emerging church movement.  does that mean i’ll leave the pcusa and head there?  i hope not.  the cool thing about pcusa is someone drawn to the values of the emerging church doesn’t have to leave to find others drawn to those values as well.

i cleaned out the chest in my entry way – the thing that collects the various things i pick up as i walk into my apt and just plop them down. it’s been a long time since i’ve done it. in the huge pile of stuff i found the journal i kept last year as i was getting back from palestine and starting this new leg of my faith journey. of course there’s stuff in the journal i never ever ever want to read again, but i also found some quotes collected along the way. so, here’s a little food for your thoughts:

“Do you know what I want? I want justice — oceans of it. I want fairness — rivers of it. That’s what I want. That’s all I want.” Amos 5:24

and from.. i’m not sure.. the bulletin for some service.. not sure who’s words these are:

“Gracious and Loving God, as the crowds followed you into the wilderness, we come to you for forgiveness and healing. We rejoice that we can trust completely in your compassion for us.

and from a UU World:

Believe
Each person is important
Be kind in all you do
We’re free to learn together
And search for what is true
All people need a voice
Build a fair and peaceful world
care for Earth’s lifeboat.

and pastor p sent me this.

“We who have run for our very lives to God have every reason to grab the promised hope with both hands and never let go. It’s an unbreakable spiritual lifeline, reaching past all appearances right to the very presence of God..” Hebrews 6:18-20, the Message

and dietrich bonhoeffer says:

“Whenever Christ calls – his call leads us to death.” from “The Discipleship”

pastor bonhoeffer also says:

“Where God tears grat gaps we should not try to fill them with human words. They should remain open. Our only comfort is the God of the resurrection, this father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who was and is his God.” (not sure of the source).

his holiness the dalai lama says:

“Everything is interconnected, so therefore destruction of your enemy is destruction of yourself.” from 10 questions for the dalai lama

his holiness also said in the the movie “10 questions for the dalai lama”:

“All major world religious traditions have the potential to create harmony, and to create peace.”

and the narrator of the movie “10 questions for the dalai lama,” rick ray, said:

“If you have very little in life, you have little to loose. If you have a lot in life you have much too loose.”

and finally, rick ray also said this in the movie “10 questions for the dalai lama”:

“The happiest people I met were the poorest.”

i stopped by prince of peace lutheran today. i went over there because pastor corinne had gone to palestine / israel last year and had picked up a bunch of small crosses, fish and stars of Bethlehem made from olive wood by palestinian christians for people who may not ever get a chance to go there and who having something from the Holy Land would be meaningful. i have a catholic someone who is important to me who is going through a rough time right now and i thought that bringing this person a cross from bethlehem would be meaningful to them (pastor corinne agreed). while i was there she asked if i’d seen her in the paper with the hummingbirds, and being that i don’t read the print version of it, no i hadn’t. apparently i’d missed something cool, so cool that i wanted to share it with y’all.

c. logan herald journal, 2009

want to see more? go see the other 11 pictures in the album.

corinne invited me over for an event going on at her place tonight – for the fellowship and to hang with the birds. i can’t wait. the added bonus? corinne lives at one of my new favorite spots to hang, so afterward i’m going to go hang with the birds i’m starting to think of as friends.

i’ve just started reading “jesus for president: politics for ordinary radicals” by shane claiborne and chris haw. i’m only into the first chapter, ‘before there were kings and presidents’ and it’s already full of highlights and underlines. the following quote is from the section on the prophets and it hit home to me who the prophets really were (are (and in are – i don’t believe that the prophet of the lds church is a true prophet of God, i believe that people like Dr. King and Emma Goldman were prophets of God):

“Rabbi Abraham Heschel puts it like this: “To us a single act of injustice — cheating in business, exploitation of the poor — is slight; to the prophets, a disaster. To us injustice is injurious to the welfare of the people; to the prophets it is a deathblow to existence; to us, an episode, to them, a catastrophe, a threat to the world (Heschel, 2003, p. 4).” After all, a lot is at stake. And sometimes it takes just one voice to interrupt the pattern of injustice (p. 40).”

Heschel, A. (2003). The Prophets, 5th ed. Peabody, MA: Prince Press.

“life begins in Bethlehem. here our Lord Jesus Christ was born.”