Upon entering week three

Back in the days when I was a sign language interpreter, one summer I worked with a summer school class of five kids: three boys and two girls. One day, the teacher divvied them up into two teams for a Jeopardy-style lesson: boys on one team, girls on the other. And even though there were more boys than girls, and even though every time the girls answered a question, the teacher said to the boys "Get ready to steal!", and even though the girls team was in the lead the entire time, at the end of the game, when the girls' team had won, the boys yelled, "It's not fair!" And the teacher, for reasons I shall never fathom, said, "OK, let's call it a draw."

What I see with the government shutdown reminds me daily of this incident.

Picture from the rally at the WWII Memorial on Sunday

On the feast of John Muir

Cross posted at 50 Days of Fabulous 


Read
“Everybody needs beauty as well as bread, places to play in and pray in, where nature may heal and give strength to body and soul.” — John Muir

Reflect
John Muir’s home in Martinez, a National Historic Site, is 15 miles away from where I now live. I’ve never visited. Even though it’s free and open to the public. Even though it’s open 7 days a week. Even though it’s dog-friendly. Even though I’m writing a friggin’ reflection on John Muir.

“Oh, I’ll get to it,” I say. “But first there are so many important busy things I have to do. I have plenty of time to do fun stuff later.”

And strangely, the important busy things keep knocking on my door saying, “I’m important and busy. Do you know how important and busy I am? Meet my needs!” while the John Muir house sits 15 miles away inviting me to stop by, walk around the orchard with a dog or two, enjoy the scenery.

Important and Busy say, “Don’t stop now! Don’t ever stop! Keep your head down! Focus!”

The John Muir house says, stop for a moment, look around and something new, be refreshed, be replenished.

Is it the John Muir house that’s calling me? Or is it something else? Something more fundamental.

We do not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God, Jesus tells us. And weren’t the first words that came from the mouth of God the words of creation?

I promise to visit the John Muir house. Not because I ought to. Because I want to. Because I’ve been invited. Because Important and Busy can only give me bread. And because God created all of us for more than bread alone.

Respond
Schedule the time to do something you’ve been wanting to do to feed your spirit that you’ve been putting off. Then do it!

Extra personal response:
I went by the John Muir House on Saturday with every intention of poking around, albeit briefly. As it happens, they were having an Earth Day Celebration, which would have required parking the car a long way off since the regular parking lot was full/reserved for mobility impaired, and taking a shuttle, which with three dogs was not going to happen. So we just took the photo you see up there. I'll have to go back another time. I did, however, go for a great hike on the Franklin Ridge Trail in the Carquinez Regional Shoreline Park. It was wonderful.

Various & Sundry: Starting with National Hot Tea Month and ending with sloths

Let's see what's been piling up during the week that I'm bursting to share with one and all.

First things first: January is National Hot Tea Month. Well, to be honest, every month is National Hot Tea Month, as far as I'm concerned, so I don't have any special celebrations planned. I did think that these tea pods were pretty cute, though.

See how the tag is a little origami boat so it floats on the tea water?

What? Too precious for you? Fine.

How about a website that helps you plan your living wills and stuff? That real enough for you? It's called Get Your Shit Together.

I don't have all my shit together, but I did get my flu shot today, thanks in part to this old post of mine about passing the peace without spreading the flu. I kept noticing it coming up in the stats as people look for what to do in the midst of the flu outbreak. I've added a brief update, based on the comments that were made. I wish there were a perfect solution - or no flu.

After going to the meeting on Wednesday about how Washington plans to reduce gun violence, I was drawn to two articles focused on the NRA: this article traces the fairly recent history of the NRA's connection to fighting for the interests of the firearm industry as opposed to gun owners; while this article suggests the White House may just ignore the NRA. I'd be fine with that.

Lance Mannion has been writing Miserable Thoughts about Les Mis and tying them to our contemporary culture, politics, and religion. I thought his post about the character of the Bishop of Digne was particularly spectacular. Truly, I hope you'll read it. Here's how it ends:

Conservative Christian leaders are quick to tell us that every hurricane, terrorist attack, and school shooting is an angry God’s will. He’s punishing us for abortion, feminism, secularism, “the homosexual agenda,” etc. But he never punishes us for our greed and our lack of charity. We’re punished for allowing gay couples to get married but not for letting children go hungry and old people freeze or swelter to death or sick people to go without medicine or a doctor’s care.

God is always punishing us for not being mean enough to each other and ourselves and never for not doing a good enough job of loving one another.

I'd never heard it put that way. His Fifth Miserable Thought on Jalvert the Republican (French, not American) is also fantastic.

This long reflection on how we need to ask ourselves questions when we consume media was eye-opening to me. I had never thought of the Disney movie Beauty and the Beast as an abuse-apologist narrative. Now, I will not be able to see it as anything but.

I get that it’s hard to see something you love get lambasted, or tarred with a brush you’d rather not think about, or called bad names. I get that it feels like things are being ruined, like people are looking for things to hate, like people are taking things too seriously.

But consuming media critically is a skill, and in an age where media is more prevalent than ever before, it’s a skill worth having. It’s a skill worth having because you are going to continue to be exposed to media, and it is going to continue to attempt to manipulate you. It’s a skill worth having because it makes it less difficult to see people talking shit about things you like, not more. It’s a skill worth having because some of the shit being taught en masse by media is horrible scary damaging shit, and maybe you don’t think you’ve learned that horrible scary damaging shit, and maybe you don’t think you’re susceptible to that horrible scary damaging shit, and honestly? Maybe you haven’t. Maybe you’re not. I don’t know you. But I know that a classroom full of average southern Ohio state school students went silent in horror at the full realization of what Beauty and the Beast teaches kids too young to know better.

On a lighter note, I admire the chutzpah of the man who claimed he was driving legally in the carpool lane with two people because he had Articles of Incorporation in the passenger seat. Corporations are people, my friends.

And finally, because it's been a long week, slow down with some true facts about sloths.

Their Own Country

Cross-posted on the Confirm not Conform blog.

I had an epiphany a couple of days ago.

I have heard many a sermon on the magi that talked about how they traveled home by a different road. But this year, it was the snippet of a phrase immediately before that that caught my attention: “they left for their own country.”

It reminded me of a sermon I heard many, many years ago, probably when I was a teenager myself. I even remember the title: “The three unwise men.” And the argument made by the preacher was, “It’s all well and good that they came to worship Jesus, but why didn’t they stick around?” Thinking about it now, that seemed to be a pointed jab at the Christmas and Easter crowd for Not Faithfully Attending, but I remember being annoyed at the time on behalf of the wise men who had made the effort to travel a very long way. After all, the chief priests and scribes who told the magi where the child would be born were in a town just a few miles away. Why weren’t they there?

But that’s not the epiphany. The epiphany was this: people live in different countries. Metaphorically speaking, I mean. And believe me when I say I think our church can do a heck of a lot better job keeping people involved and included – people for whom our churches are their native land.

But I think a lot of us are like that preacher long ago: we believe that to be truly faithful, you need to stay in our country. Never mind how far you have traveled. Never mind what efforts you have made. If you don’t stay with us, then clearly you are not truly faithful. And all our efforts are spent on making sure you stay in our country, our denomination, our worship services, our programs.

Maybe this year we need to do some more traveling. Maybe this year, we need to visit their countries – not to change people, not to convince them, not to draw them back, but simply to visit, to bring gifts, to rejoice, to pay homage, and to return to our own country, transformed by the God who leads us home.

Reading Auden for Christmas

I tend to look at blog stats too much, but I'm glad I did so recently when I noticed someone had clicked on Christmas Oratorio. What's that? I wondered, and found a post I'd done a year ago that was a poem by W.H. Auden that is fantastic. (It's reposted below.)

I did a little more digging and found it was one small snippet of a very long piece called For the Time Being: A Christmas Oratorio. The plan was for Benjamin Britten to set it to music, which would have been fantastic except it probably would have taken days to perform. It's 37 pages of text in the edition of Collected Poems I checked out of the library, and covers from Advent to the Flight Into Egypt.

And it ends there, with the flight into Egypt. I hadn't thought about that, about how Christmas ends with a cliffhanger. The order of events gets so mixed up in the calendar, with the magi arriving tomorrow on Epiphany (in the church year), but the Slaughter of the Innocents, which happens after they leave, occurred a week ago on December 28.

And so, with Joseph and Mary and Jesus on the lam, and with the recitative immediately before beginning, "Fly, Holy Family, from our immediate rage," the next-to-last section begins with "Well, so that is that." So shocking, and so wonderful.

There are so many wonderful, shocking moments in this work. I haven't made my way through it all yet. I loved part II in the Temptation of Joseph section. Here's a little bit:

  For those delicious memories
Cigars and sips of brandy can restore
To old dried boys, for gallantry that scrawls
  In idolatrous detail and size
A symbol of aggression on toilet walls,
For having reasoned -- "Woman is naturally pure
since she has no moustache," for having said,
  "No woman has a business head,"
You must learn now that masculinity,
To nature, is a non-essential luxury.

And Herod's essay/proclamation on The Massacre of the Innocents is incredible.

But the whole thing is. It's worth savoring. It gave me so much to think about in a deep Christmas mode, far past the manger. I can see this is a work I will have to revisit when Advent rolls around.

The oratorio ends with this text, which is in the Episcopal hymnal and have never heard sung. It makes much more sense in its original context.

He is the Way.
Follow him through the Land of Unlikeness;
You will see rare beasts, and have unique adventures.

He is the Truth.
Seek Him in the Kingdom of Anxiety;
You will come to a great city that has expected your return for years.

He is the Life.
Love Him in the World of the Flesh;
And at your marriage all its occasions shall dance for joy.

October 1941-July 1942

From "For the Time Being: A Christmas Oratorio" by W.H. Auden

The Flight Into Egypt
III
Narrator

Well, so that is that. Now we must dismantle the tree,
Putting the decorations back into their cardboard boxes --
Some have got broken -- and carrying them up to the attic.
The holly and the mistletoe must be taken down and burnt,
And the children got ready for school. There are enough
Left-overs to do, warmed-up, for the rest of the week --
Not that we have much appetite, having drunk such a lot,
Stayed up so late, attempted -- quite unsuccessfully --
To love all of our relatives, and in general
Grossly overestimated our powers. Once again
As in previous years we have seen the actual Vision and failed
To do more than entertain it as an agreeable
Possibility, once again we have sent Him away,
Begging though to remain His disobedient servant,
The promising child who cannot keep His word for long.
The Christmas Feast is already a fading memory,
And already the mind begins to be vaguely aware
Of an unpleasant whiff of apprehension at the thought
Of Lent and Good Friday which cannot, after all, now
Be very far off. But, for the time being, here we all are,
Back in the moderate Aristotelian city
Of darning and the Eight-Fifteen, where Euclid's geometry
And Newton's mechanics would account for our experience,
And the kitchen table exists because I scrub it.
It seems to have shrunk during the holidays. The streets
Are much narrower than we remembered; we had forgotten
The office was as depressing as this. To those who have seen
The Child, however dimly, however incredulously,
The Time Being is, in a sense, the most trying time of all.
For the innocent children who whispered so excitedly
Outside the locked door where they knew the presents to be
Grew up when it opened. Now, recollecting that moment
We can repress the joy, but the guilt remains conscious;
Remembering the stable where for once in our lives
Everything became a You and nothing was an It.
And craving the sensation but ignoring the cause,
We look round for something, no matter what, to inhibit
Our self-reflection, and the obvious thing for that purpose
Would be some great suffering. So, once we have met the Son,
We are tempted ever after to pray to the Father;
"Lead us into temptation and evil for our sake."
They will come, all right, don't worry; probably in a form
That we do not expect, and certainly with a force
More dreadful than we can imagine. In the meantime
There are bills to be paid, machines to keep in repair,
Irregular verbs to learn, the Time Being to redeem
From insignificance. The happy morning is over,
The night of agony still to come; the time is noon:
When the Spirit must practice his scales of rejoicing
Without even a hostile audience, and the Soul endure
A silence that is neither for nor against her faith
That God's Will will be done, That, in spite of her prayers,
God will cheat no one, not even the world of its triumph.

Various & Sundry: Maximum Guns

As you can tell, since Sandy Hook, the issue of guns has been on my mind. Here are a few more things I've seen that I thought were illuminating, thought-provoking, helpful, or hopeful in the swirl of information.

Let me start here so it doesn't get buried: In the "but what can we do?" category, the most helpful thing I've found this week is the Children's Defense Fund's document Protect Children, Not Guns. It was written earlier this year, and is an issue they have been working on a long time, so it wasn't a rush-to-find-an-answer kind of a thing. I also like that they had calls to action for all of us, not just "them."

Knowing that you can examine any non-profit's 990 tax form, I thought I'd take a look at the NRA's, and found this post examining their finances for 2010, the year in which Wayne LaPierre, president of the NRA, made $835,469 (plus another $125K and change in "other compensation"). It's a fascinating document to dig into. You know who's on the board of directors? Grover Norquist.

If you are wondering, "How did we get to this place?", Terry Gross's interview with Tom Diaz of the Violence Policy Center, tracing the history of the rise of the assault-style weapon for the civilian market, may be something you want to listen to, or read the transcript. The information is disturbingly fascinating, and presented in a very matter-of-fact way.

Also looking at history, Tony Horwitz notes the similarities between the gun lobby and the slavery lobby of the 18th century. And blogger Nancy Kho found similar parallels after seeing the movie Lincoln on the day of the Sandy Hook shootings.

Lance Mannion had two posts that resonated with me. The first is the satirical Dear Gun Nuts, Uncle Sam needs you! The second, Against any grand unifying  theories explaining Sandy Hook, is one he says he's not happy with and will add to later. His summary in the comments is this: "I think rather than trying to explain anything and everything in reference to broad social issues, we'll learn more if we focus on the individual stories of the killers themselves and we're better off asking not what causes violence in general but what would have stopped this particular killer well before he got to killing people." But everything we're posting and thinking right now is a work in progress, it seems to me.

In the thought-provoking category, Mike the Mad Biologist writes that Nothing in Movement Conservatism Makes Sense Except in the Light of Creationism: The Second-Amendment Edition, which shows similar ways of thinking about gun rights and creationism, the same resentment about anyone who wants to "take them away," or not take their logic seriously. It's worth reading for the "oh" of understanding.

I'm assuming you've read Adam Gopnik's article in the New Yorker about the Simple Truth about Gun Control. I'm just not sure it will convince anyone who isn't already convinced. But it just seems to damn obvious. As tweeter Mary Matthews said, "The 'right' says to limit IN ANY WAY an American's right to drive a racecar down a suburban road at 150 mph infringes on their freedom."

After all of this, I don't know about you, but I needed to see a picture of baby hedgehogs. Here you go.

Peace be with you.

Review: The Leftovers

I'm not really sure if I'm writing a review per se. I'm still trying to figure this one out.

The Leftovers starts with this premise: what would people do if a rapture-like event happened? And what would happen if it didn't look like what anyone expected? Would you rename it, as the people in this novel do, the Sudden Departure?

When I talked to a friend of mine about this, she said she would set up a huge database to run the information on all of the people who had disappeared to find out what they had in common. Which makes sense. And perhaps somewhere in some government office in this alternate world, someone is doing this. But that is not this novel.

This is not a plot-driven book; it's character-driven -- something that rarely works for me any more unless I am really intrigued by the people, as I am here. And I'm not sure why they are so interesting to me, except that the author allows their confusion to shine through in different ways. The book focuses on one family: mother, father, two kids (one starting college, one starting high school) and how they respond. There's another woman who gets a spotlight, whose husband and two children both disappeared. I liked them all. I sympathized with them all.

I can see how this book might frustrate you if you're looking for answers. What's in that database? What really happened? But I think one of the points of this book is, there is no common denominator why one person is taken and another stays; sometimes you will never know why things happen. And isn't that life as well? Why does one person get cancer and another doesn't? Why is one person in a car accident and not another? You can find some commonalities, but you just can't get it all nailed down, settled, and answered. Live your life as best you can, but it's not about whether or not you will be rewarded. And be kind to one another; you do not know what they have seen or experienced.

Various and Sundry: Andrew, Advent, Aid, and Autism, among others

"I'm not barking at YOU."

Happy end of November! It's the feast of St. Andrew who, to my astonishment, I've never written about. This is especially egregious since we have a dog named Andrew who's registered name is Tollwest Quack Come and See. Did you know that according to legend, "young women should note the location of barking dogs on Saint Andrew’s Eve: their future husbands will come from that direction"? Too late now. You'll have to wait until next November 29th. I wonder if Andrew is the patron saint of single women because he was a fisher of men...

Of course the feast of St. Andrew means Advent is nigh, and I loved this collection of the 42 worst nativity sets, some of which I admit I like, and one of which I bought for my mother. It's not this one, though.

This spinach salad with warm bacon vinaigrette looks delicious, doesn't it? And it contains an actual vegetable! (And lots of bacon.)

In other food and wine news, I appreciated this post about teaching people to appreciate the pleasure in wine with flavors that sound awful: minerals, barnyard aromas. And it goes beyond that to talk about appreciating those things that challenge us -- in food, in art, in life.

[I]f we think more deeply about pleasure, we realize it isn’t always so straightforward or even comfortable. After all, why do so many of us love sad poems, disturbing horror films, or intense, subtitled psychological dramas. Why am I capable of loving Bruce Springsteen’s “Nebraska” or The Smith’s “Meat Is Murder” or Elliott Smith’s “From a Basement on the Hill” — while at the same time I can enjoy T. Pain, Taylor Swift, and dancing with my kids to Psy’s “Gangnam Style”?

Here's a really touching story from Bill Murray about Gilda Radner.

In obituary news, I have two impressive as hell women to bring to your attention. First is Vladka Meed, "who with her flawless Polish and Aryan good looks was able to smuggle pistols, gasoline for firebombs and even dynamite to the Jewish fighters inside the Warsaw Ghetto," who died this week at the age of 90.

The other is a woman named Maria Santos Gorrostieta who was found dead on November 17 at the age of 36. She "was a former mayor of the small Mexican town of Tiquicheo and became famous for her refusal to be cowed by the drug gangs battling for control of the western state of Michoacan."

A doctor and mother of three, Maria Santos Gorrostieta served as mayor from 2008 to 2011. Over that time she survived at least two assassination attempts, including one that killed her husband Jose and another that left her body peppered with bullet holes and scars.

May she rest in peace. My prayers are with her family.

You may recall that last week I posted the parody video of Radi-Aid: Africa for Norway. As a follow-up, here's a terrific interview with the people who created the project, explaining why and how they did it and what they want it to accomplish. Good stuff.

Finally, on the Confirm not Conform blog, I hope you'll check out this interview I got to do with my friend Emily LeBlanc, talking about how the church can better work with people with autism. Really helpful stuff.

Have a great weekend!

Various & Sundry: Gnawing on Leftover Knee-Jerk Reactions

Gromit had a good Thanksgiving.

Hello! Have a good Thanksgiving, everyone in the U.S. or American citizens celebrating abroad? How about Black Friday? Or otherwise, a good end of the week? Well, good. I've got a few leftovers all ready for you to take home and eat later. Ready?

If you're in a profession that requires fundraising, here's information that might help you as we enter the race to the end of tax deductible donation season: 5 things charities do that turn off young donors. And, I might add, middle aged donors as well.

While we're on the subject of donations: get that Donate button up on your website!

After posting my very vague thoughts on Black Friday yesterday, I found these articles that challenge my assumptions about the evils of WalMart. (h/t @PeterSuderman on Twitter who wrote Why Black Friday is My Favorite Holiday, also enlightening.)

Meanwhile, to appeal to the lefty-ness part of my nature, I thought this post on the Propaganda of Shared Sacrifice was powerful; and though I haven't finished watching it yet, this conversation between Infusion fave Ta-Nehisi Coates and Chris Hayes about Chris' book The Twilight of the Elites is extremely interesting. I'm going to have to add this book to my reading list.

And to finish up this compilation of Challenges to My Knee-Jerk Reactions, I loved this website for Radi-Aid: Africa for Norway. Set up by various aid organizations in Norway, the website asks, "Imagine if every person in Africa saw the “Africa for Norway”-video, and this was the only information they ever got about Norway. What would they think about Norway?"

What indeed? Watch the video and see what you think:

10 things I've learned from working at the winery

As of this week, I will have worked at Hendry Winery for one full year, which I find hard to believe. I thought I'd mark the occasion by sharing some things I've learned from working there, some wine-related and many not.

Pinot Gris grapes can change from white to red!

1. Wine grapes are intensely sweet. Much sweeter than table grapes. I hadn't realized that, but it makes sense when you realize that the sugar in the grapes is what turns into alcohol.

2. Visa cards always start with a 4. And Master Cards always start with a 5. And AmEx always starts with a 3. I don't know what Discover always starts with because no one ever tries to use a Discover card.

3. Leave your phone number twice. I can't tell you how helpful it is when you're picking up messages to have the phone number twice. It helps you catch up with the numbers on the message. You can also double-check that you got the phone number right.

4. If someone doesn't call you back, it is likely they couldn't hear your phone number. I can't tell you how frustrating it is to not be able to call back a potential visitor because I couldn't hear the friggin' number! We want you to visit, really! We're not blowing you off!

5. Sometimes it's worth ignoring the "by appointment only" sign. As much as it pains me to admit this, because it's very disruptive to go out and deal with people who drop in, there is sometimes a chance that you'll get what you want. This goes along with the "just because someone doesn't call you back doesn't mean they're not interested." Persistence has its virtues.

6. No still means no. At the same time, if you show up without an appointment to a place that's "by appointment only" and the person says, "I'm sorry, there's no more room today," you know what? That means there's no more room today. We are not in the habit of turning people away for fun. We actually like having customers, you know. I really don't care that it's "just two people;" the tour is full.

7. Bottlecaps really are better. For many wines, anyway. Bottlecaps are actually going to be better because air won't get into the bottle. Oxidation can allow wine to be "corked," which I will explain below.

8. "Corked" wine has a wet newspaper taste. Or so I'm told. A "corked" wine, or "cork taint," is a wine affected by TCA or tricholoroanisole. (I looked that up.) At the winery, when a "corked" wine gets opened in the tasting room, it's added to the tasting as a way to help people understand what that tastes like so they don't drink bad wines. Folks keep trying to help me taste it too, so far with limited success. "It has a musty, dank smell, like old newspapers," they tell me. I haven't been able to sense it yet. Angela very kindly told me it took her a while too.

9. People taste different wines differently. Because people have different taste receptors. Some are particularly sensitive to bitter tastes so wines with high tannins (aka red wines) will be unpleasant. Not liking a highly rated wine is not a sign of moral failing. If you like it, drink it.

10. Wow, is making wine a complicated business! It's expensive, time-consuming, complex, weather-dependent, market-dependent, and just plain hard work. Enjoy that glass of wine. A lot more went into it than you know.

OK, I'm off to work!

On the 11th anniversary of 9/11

I woke up this morning with the song Englishman In New York in my head. One line in particular kept coming back to me, "Be yourself, no matter what they say."

I didn't even know I knew the lyrics. In fact, I went back to check them and make sure I wasn't making that up. And there they were, but it's the line before that got me:

It takes a man to suffer ignorance and smile
Be yourself no matter what they say

***
In my email today, the daily article from Obit Magazine suggested I go to what they called an exquisite web-based 9/11 memorial. The Make History page of the National 9/11 Memorial is soliciting stories from people's experiences of 9/11. I have to admit, I didn't even look further than the opening page.

***
On her blog today, Brene Brown writes that her 9/11 tradition is to buy a couple dozen petit fours and drop them off at a local fire station with a note that simply says, "We appreciate you." She writes,

I started my research right before 9/11 and if there's one thing I've learned over the past decade, it's this: We're still in a lot of fear and pain about the events that took place that day and how they marked a huge change in our world. I also learned that the best way to overcome fear and to heal hurt is by practicing gratitude and kindness.

In this big, loud, anxious world, the small things matter so much.

***
I'm not sure why this year's commemoration of 9/11 seems particularly tender to me. Perhaps because it's a Tuesday, and that was a Tuesday. Perhaps it was realizing that the youth going through the confirmation program I worked to develop are not going to have any memories of that day. Perhaps it's simply because it's a quiet morning and I can allow myself to sit and think and feel, and there they are, thoughts and feelings, looking for a little attention.

And so I'm going to allow myself to feel tender, despite the voice in my head that says, "why is this troubling you? Why aren't you over it? How did this really affect you?" I'll suffer the voices' ignorance and smile. My tenderness is my own, whether it should be there or not. I'm grateful for the chance to sit in silence and reflect.

Be kind to one another today. And every day.

What exactly is the World Domination Summit?

When I would tell people I was going to the World Domination Summit, I was at a loss to explain what it was, exactly. I floundered around a bit, waving my hands and vaguely talking about start-ups and travel, but I pretty much didn't have a clue. I was mostly going to hear Brene Brown.

It's been a couple of weeks now, and I think I finally have it figured out. So for those of you who have been wondering, here it is in a nutshell:

The World Domination Summit is all about encouraging people to discover practical ways to live a meaningful life.

I use the word "encouraging" deliberately--and not just in the rah-rah sense. I'd say encouragement--giving courage--was the underlying tone of the whole conference. And as Brene Brown points out, the word courage comes from the word coeur--heart. To practice courage, she says, is to tell your story with all your heart.

So there were lots of people there telling their stories and giving everyone there permission to do the same. That was the first amazing thing. We were told over and over again in ways large and small, "You are amazing. You are enough. What you bring to the table is important."

But if it had stopped there, it wouldn't have been very helpful. In fact, Chris Gillebeau, the organizer, sent out an email a few weeks before the conference that began, "You are awesome!" and I instantly deleted it. I couldn't even read any more. I was offended by it, and am instantly suspicious of people who will tell me I'm awesome who also happen to have books to sell.

Here's the thing: it didn't stop with a feel good fest. It prodded us to ask "what does a meaningful life look like for you?" And that was very different for different people. For some it was travel; for some it was starting a business; for some it was finding a company to work for that reflected their values; for some it was service and philanthropy; for some it was using the system to your advantage; for some it was running a marathon; for some it was writing a book. You get the idea. The important thing was finding those things that indeed matched your skills, interests, and (most importantly) values.

But again, if it had stopped there, it would have been only moderately helpful. In fact, this is the part I don't have yet. If I had left with only this piece, I would have left frustrated because I would feel like a fraud, like everyone else had it all figured out and I didn't.

It didn't stop there. We heard stories from people who had found what made their lives meaningful, but we also got extremely practical advice. I went to a workshop on self-publishing, for example, and it was chock-full of which publishing platforms are good for what material and how you promote things. Another talked about how you set up your work week so that you know you get the most important things done. We heard from speakers who talked about how to best utilize creativity and how "follow your passion" isn't terribly helpful advice.

It was that practical piece that made it work for me. I don't know what's next for me, but at least I have some ideas of the next step, the next little piece that will help me figure it out. But I needed the encouragement in order to do that, and I needed to know how to ask what makes my life meaningful. It all works together, and I'm grateful to the World Domination Summit for offering that.

Bravo and well done. Here's looking forward to 2013. Maybe I'll have some stories to tell. In the meantime, my deepest thanks.

photos from the WDS Flickr Stream, copyright Armosa Studios, used by permission.

Brene Brown: Be Uncool

"The only true currency in this bankrupt world is what we share with someone else when we're uncool."

Almost Famous

One thing that drew me to the World Domination Summit was the chance to hear Brene Brown live and in person, and, man, was that a good call or what! If all I had heard last weekend was Brene's opening talk, it would have been worth the price of the conference. It was that good. I sure hope they have that talk on video and post it because I want the world to hear it. Or at least you guys.

She started with the quote above and talked to us about how important it was to be uncool. She ended with "the most uncool thing" she could think of: having us all join in a rousing rendition of "Don't Stop Believing"--the Glee version (she invited the first row to join her on stage singing). In between she talked about the vulnerability and being a creative person (her area of expertise is vulnerability and shame) saying, among other wonderful things, "Unused creativity is not benign. It turns into grief, judgement and shame." Isn't that a fascinating insight? Here's another: "Who you are will always trump who people want you to be." Ain't that the truth. However hard we may try, who we are trumps our facade.

In the afternoon, I attended "A Conversation with Brene Brown," where she took questions and again blew us away with her humor and insight. For example, she clarified the difference among vulnerability, intimacy, and TMI.

Here's what she said: oversharing, she notes, is actually a protection against vulnerability. She calls it "floodlighting." What happens when someone shines a floodlight in your face? You back away. Vulnerability, on the other hand, is like little twinkle lights. And intimacy is to be shared with those who have earned the right to hear it. So fabulous.

She had so much more to say about shame, vulnerability, joy, and creativity. Really, I hope the video is available soon so that I can make you sit there and watch it. But if there's one take-away from the whole weekend, it was the question she asked us at the end of the hour: What's worth doing even if you fuck it up? Like, for example, asking 1,000 people sing "Don't Stop Believing" even if they think you're a complete nutjob for doing it. Or maybe they'll join in with gusto and joy and tears.

 

photos from the WDS Flickr stream, copyright Armosa Studios, used by permission.

World Domination Summit: Closing Story

We were about to be dismissed from the World Domination Summit. Our minds were already full to bursting from everything we'd heard and seen. Then the organizer, Chris Guillebeau, came on the stage. He said, "I want to tell you a story. It's an old story, you may already know it.

"There was a man who was about to go on a trip. But he decided before he left he should take some of his money and invest it. So he found a few people and he gave each of them some money and said, 'do something with this while I'm gone.'

"A lot of people have explained this story by talking about the character of the people who got the money and what they did with it. I'm more interested in the person who gave the money. Why did he do that? Why didn't he take it with him, or save it in a safe place? Maybe it's because he believed in the people he was giving it to."

Then he told us that there had been a little profit from the conference, and they had been trying to figure out what to do with it. And then, along came someone who wanted to support the conference through a private donation. When Guillebeau said there wouldn't be any sponsors, the anonymous donor said it wasn't about that. And they tried to figure out what to do.

You know where this is going, don't you? I sure did, sitting there in my seat, thinking, "You're going to do this, aren't you?"

Suddenly, we were in the story, and it wasn't so theoretical any more.

As the attendees at the conference left the theater on Sunday afternoon, we each received an envelope--all 1,000 of us. Inside the envelope was $100 (do the math) and a note saying, "Thanks for making #WDS2012 a fantastic experience. We'd love to see how you put these funds to good use. Start a project, surprise someone, or do something entirely different--it's up to you."

I got my envelope and started crying. Why? Because it Scared. Me. Shitless. What was I going to do with this money? How could I use it wisely and well? How could I turn it into something else, bigger and better than the original investment?

It may be better to give than to receive. I also think it's a hell of a lot easier. My first impulse was to hand that money on to somebody else, somebody who could use it. But I already have $100 to give to others. I think the more challenging thing for me is to figure out something else to do with it, something different. I just have no idea what it is. Yet.

I'll be spending much of the week blogging about my experiences at WDS. I had no idea what to expect from it. I still don't know quite how to explain it. Maybe it has something to do with the underlying assumption that each of us is a good investment. Whatever it was, it was amazing.

Much more to come.

Some practical advice for clergy considering a parish job

Last week, I posted some practical advice for pastoral search committees. That advice had been part of a sermon in which I confessed that I lied on the ethics portion of the General Ordination Exam--and got the highest possible score.

What I didn't mention was that the ethics question had to do with whether or not a rector should consider taking a new job.  I don't have the answer I gave any more; what I remember was that I wrote a whole lot of Christian blather about discernment and the leading of the Holy Spirit when the truth was far more practical and (I feel) better serves both the clergy and the church.

I sense that many of us use spiritual blather to mask or justify our more personal or practical reasons for making the decisions we do.  I think that's a shame that we feel we cannot give our real reasons.

Don't believe me?  There was one time when I decided that a parish was not right for me.  I told various friends what I had chosen, and one (also a priest) asked me I had really discerned, wanting to know my spiritual reasons for saying no.  I could certainly gin some up, but to this day I resent the fact that turning down a job needed to be approved by spiritual signs when what it boiled down to was, "Not interested.  Sorry."

There are some jobs I'm very sorry I didn't get, jobs to which I felt called.  But I have also turned down a few positions, and I regret none of them.  But, my goodness, the pressure I have felt to take them from people who had all sorts of oh-so-spiritual reasons why I should--oh-so-spiritual reasons that just happened to coincide with what they wanted.

So with that in mind, here is my very blunt advice on the whole job search process.

• You need to look out for yourself and your own needs.  First and foremost.  And it sounds selfish and horrible, but I don't care.  This is priority one.  Does the job offer you enough to live on?  Will you be able to take care of yourself and your family?  Will your basic needs for your health and well-being be met? Will you be able to do this job without going into debt?  (You would not believe...well, maybe you would.) Who is going to take care of you? By and large, my friends, you are going to need to take care of yourself, so make sure you have the resources to do so.  And by "resources," I mean money, housing, health insurance, friends, and time off.  Spiritual resources are not enough.

• "I'm interested!" is a good enough reason.   Forget the spiritual clap-trap.  Does the job sound fun? Interesting?  Is it in a place you'd like to live?  A place that will provide opportunities for you and your family?  Does the job description intrigue you?  Well, then, apply.

• Pity is not a good enough reason.  Just because a parish neeeeeeds a priest and you have the skills and you could heeeelp them is not a good enough reason to apply.  Do NOT be guilted into applying for a job.  Guilt, pity, and shame are no basis for a good working relationship.

• Be honest about what you can and cannot do.  I've already told the pastoral search committee that priests lie in interviews, but let me tell you: don't lie in interviews.  If they're looking for an administrator and you're no good at administration, don't say, "I'm great at administration."  Say something like, "I can do x and y, but I will need someone to help me with a and b.  Here is how I have been able to manage those tasks in other places."  If they need someone who is good at something you're not good at, you are not the person for the job.

• Negotiate at the outset.  See "looking out for your needs," above.  Do you need a day to be with your family?  Do you need to have your office painted before you move into it?  Do you need internet access?  Do you need a cap placed on the hours you work in a week?  Be clear about it--as clear as you can, given that you don't know all the circumstances.  Now is your best time to set expectations.  Stick to them.

• Get the money.  See "looking out for your needs," above.  One thing I really regret in my church career is not pushing harder on the financial side.  I don't even want to think of how many thousands of dollars I've lost because I did not say, "that is not acceptable."  One thing I'm proud of is turning down a job that paid below the set diocesan minimum (see "pity is not a good enough reason," above).  I probably would have lost one other job, or walked away from it, because they were not following their own diocesan standards for salaries, but I took it anyway.  I still regret that I did not stand my ground and say, "This needs to be different" and let the chips fall where they may.

One more thing about the money side: as long as the Church can get away with underpaying its clergy, it will do so.  And the way for that to change is for clergy not to take jobs where they are underpaid, or to do part-time work for the part-time pay you are being offered.  "Diocesan minimum" is a very nice concept, but in my experience, diocesan minimums are made to be broken.  Hold the Church accountable to its own standards.  This is not being greedy.  It is an act of courage and an act of justice--not just for yourself, but for others.  And be aware that it may cost you jobs.

•  Get it in writing.  Just do.  When you negotiate new terms, when you agree on hours, when you settle on a salary...get it in writing.

• Sometimes it's just dumb luck. I was just looking this morning this morning at the readings for May 20th, and the Acts reading is about the call of Matthias, which was basically eenie, meenie, meinie, moe.   I think we downplay the role of luck in the search process in general.   Leading of the Holy Spirit, my ass.  If you get a job you really wanted, don't get all holy-moly on us.  Maybe your resume was at the top of the pile when people were fresh and excited.  If you don't get a job, don't bow your head and ask what you did wrong.  Maybe you had the same name as the search committee chair's horrible first grade teacher.  There are people involved in this search process, and people are people.

• Remember it's just a job.  Really.  It's a job.  Yes, it's a calling, but no more or less than being a professor or a politician or a police officer.  It's. A. Job.  Treat it with the respect it deserves, but always remember that reverence belongs to God alone.

End rant.

Monday Morning Preacher: A Quarter of your Time

I didn't preach this weekend, and it's amazing how much I was able to get done.  I'll have more to say later this week (probably) on the clergy side of the job search equation, but one thing that really struck me, writing the advice for pastoral search committees, is that preaching and Sunday services are a quarter-time job.

This is not the "every minute of your sermon takes an hour" dictum; I think that's a bit too pat.  But I have found over the years that despite my best efforts, there's always a day (usually called "Saturday") that has to be fully dedicated to preparing the sermon.  Even if I'm not sitting and writing, or reading commentaries, or pondering deeply, the whole day is colored by the need to get the sermon written.

So there's that, and then there's the services.  For one service, that's at least 2 hours.  For two, at least 4 1/2, which includes the time prepping before the service, cleaning up afterwards, and talking with people at coffee hour.

All of which adds up to, at a minimum, 10 hours, or a quarter of your time.

I would love it if that became the assumption in clergy job descriptions, that sermon prep and Sunday services are a quarter of the job, and that only the remaining 30 hours are up for negotiation.  Having looked at a good many clergy job descriptions, they seem to jam so much stuff in there as if they were worried you wouldn't have enough to do.  Would that change, do you think, if there were a deeper understanding that preaching and presiding took up 1/4 of their allotted work week?

More later.

Whatever happened to Kony 2012?

Remember #Kony2012 that I got into such a snit about last month? Well, April 20 is the date for their Cover the Night action thingey so I was kind of curious what was up.

I was very happy to stumble across Un-Cover the Night, a Tumblr that includes a lot of great background information in an info kit, a petition to President Obama to withdraw military support from Uganda instead of increasing it, and a petition to Invisible Children to present a more complete picture of the situation in Uganda and stop using Ugandans for their own commercial ends.

As with #Kony2012, I encourage you to ask questions of these approaches and the information you have been given and then take the action that seems best to you given what you have learned.

I'll be curious what happens tomorrow night.

4 things I learned about elections from Lent Madness

Lent Madness was a much better spiritual discipline than I had imagined.  After a week of being aggravated at the stupidity of people who didn't vote for the saints I thought should move forward, I learned to laugh at myself because--hello!--this doesn't actually count for anything.  Except the glory of the Golden Halo, of course.

And so I started to watch with some fascination what kinds of things seemed to lead to one saint's victory over another.  It wasn't always clear, but there were a few things that seem like practical tidbits as we enter into the slavering maw of a presidential election year.

1. You can't change votes that are already cast.  Over and over, I saw people writing agonized comments wondering how on earth more people could vote for that other saint than the saint of their choosing.  Well, water under the bridge, people. You may never know why, but it also doesn't matter.  Those votes are already in! Moving on.

2. It is easier to recruit new voters than to persuade current voters (who may have already decided).  With Lent Madness this was particularly stark.  All due credit to Lent Madness for drawing a couple of thousand votes each day--but that's still only a couple of thousand votes out of a much, much larger potential pool. If you're only advocating among the faithful voters, boy are you missing a huge opportunity.

3. People are partisan, so find a way to make your team their team.  Emma of Hawaii's triumphant march to the finals was an excellent example of this.  The "of Hawaii" part was important as the Hawaiian vote turned the tide on several apparent shoo-ins. Big Pineapple or no, Emma got votes for being Hawaiian--as well as being a worthy saint.

4. People vote for weird reasons.  I know I did.  I voted for Jerome because I liked the lion puppet. I would have voted for Enmegahbowh because of his awesome wife, had I not been the writer for David Oakerhater (I voted for St. E. in the next round). I voted for some saints because I liked one write-up over another, with nothing to do with the saint at all! People voted because they liked the name, or because their saint day was their birthday, or because the icon was cool.

Are we "voting against our interests"? Maybe, but we have our reasons. I can tell you one thing that didn't help, though, is being told I was voting the wrong way.  It would just get my back up. Or shrug and say, "You don't understand."

Lent Madness made clear to me that if I want to make a difference in the November elections, I shouldn't bother arguing with people whose minds are made up. Instead, I should look for the pockets of people who have a strong interest in one thing or another, make the case why my candidate is their candidate, and make sure they are able to vote. And then let it go, knowing that people do what they do. People. That's democracy for you.

Monday Morning Preacher: Palm Sunday redux

Well, that's done.  The gospel didn't get the sermon it deserved, I'm afraid.  I wanted to keep it short because the gospel reading was so long, but at the same time I'm afraid I put in too many concepts to be clear.

The keeper is the line from the ever-wonderful Interpreter's Bible (1952) (bolded in the text of the sermon below).  Here's a fuller version:

The unmeasured generosity of her giving moved him.  It was a glorious maximum of sacrifice which never stopped to calculate what might have been a passable minimum--the kind of mathematical computation that so easily besets us...She did not pour out a few drops and say, "Well, I guess that ought to be enough for this occasion."...  She was lifted clear out of arithmetic into love--one of the greatest leaps which a life can take.

The paragraph about how Palm Sunday and the palm fronds we use symbolize the glorious maximum and the passable minimum was a last-second addition, added in the moment and not in the text I had written.  I just thought, standing there, watching each person carefully take one single frond and no more, that this was just the kind of "passable minimum" I was talking about. But that does mean that it is pretty clunky and disjointed at the end.

There was lots going on behind the sermon that didn't get mentioned: a book I'm reading called Evolving in Monkey Town (more on that soon), memories of Palm Sunday in Kampala, the other readings (which never got mentioned but were in play), thoughts on stewardship and how that plays the "passable minimum" card, other incidents of the passable minimum in church life.  It may be that a single story would have been more effective than all this explanation, but I couldn't come up with one that didn't require even further exposition.

It was odd.  The sermon came out more...sharp than I had intended it to.  And a little muddled.  Clearly something I haven't thought through well enough myself so the end got in a bit of a tangle, there, which is a shame because the core idea is an important one.

But it's done, as I said.  It's not the worst sermon in the world; just a bit of a clunker, I think, rushed and awkward. On to Good Friday.