Caught in the Storm

For those of you following the news of Tropical Storm Debby, we're doing OK here in our pocket of Tallahassee. The rain has been falling non-stop all day, at times heavy downpours and blowing wind. This is the South's version of a Nor'easter.
It sets an interesting backdrop for the things on my mind. Yesterday's gospel lesson was the story from Mark about the raging sea, and the frightened disciples, and the sleeping Jesus who wakes up to their cries of "Help!" and calms the storm. It seems that this metaphor was appropriate as the rain blew against the stained glass windows, and as we made our way from the safety of our sanctuary to the parish hall for an update on General Convention 2012 by our rector.
There are lots of issues that will be facing the bishops and deputies of the Episcopal Church next week in Indianapolis. From the description of the budget situation, it seems there is an intent to cut many program areas at the church headquarters (environmental justice, diversity, Christian formation). From what I understand, the idea is to shift these responsibilities down to the diocesan and even the parish level. What's not clear is what kind of funding will accompany that shift. And years of covering state politics showed me, when the state decided it wasn't going to be in the business of "xx" and it would be up to the counties or cities to provide "xx", it would be up to the County and City Commissioners to figure out how they were going to pay for "xx" to continue in their communities. My guess is that is going to be the upshot of this budget cutting and shifting down to the local level. It's going to be painful. And apparently has already had its own internal pain in the process of creating a budget for the Episcopal Church as reported by Katie Sherrod, who is a member of the Executive Council, the group normally charged with carrying out the duty of drafting a budget.
There is the matter of the Anglican Covenant. Thankfully, from the description I heard the rector giving, it would seem that our deputation going to Indianapolis is inclined to vote against the document. He gave the impression that there was a resolution that would be offered which would say, "We want to continue in dialogue, but we don't support the Anglican Communion Covenant." That would sound like D007, which is what me and my fellow bloggers in the No Anglican Covenant Coalition are supporting. But I know that is not the only idea out there, and my rector couldn't tell me which resolution he was referencing. To be clear, the only option that I find acceptable is the one that politely, but firmly, says, "No, thank you; non, merci; no gracias; nein, danke (have I covered all the languages of the Episcopal Church?)" This flawed proposal, the outgrowth of the Windsor Report which was the outgrowth of fear of gay people becoming bishops, just needs to die and go away. Period.
Speaking of fear, we get to one of the biggest hot button issues: blessing same-sex unions. There was much made of the term "union" vs. "marriage" at our forum. Mainly, it seemed there was a desire to make it clear that the rites to be considered by GC2012 would allow the blessing of "unions" not "marriages." I found this a bizarre distinction given that there are states and the District of Columbia where the civil government has said it is OK for us LGBT people to get married. But whatever! Our bishop, John Howard, has again written a letter to all of us on the topic of General Convention, with extra special attention given to this particular resolution. And, again, the bishop has gone on record opposing the idea of allowing LGBT people of faith to have our partnerships recognized by the diocese of Florida. Nevermind that if we cared to get the blessing of an Episcopal priest, all we'd have to do is travel to Miami where Bishop Frade has already given the green light to bless marriages that couples have entered into in those six states and DC where it is allowed. Suddenly, it just seemed so fitting that the sky was pouring down rain on our roof as this topic was being discussed. Unless you have lived in society's margins, you have no idea how painful it is to have an institution founded on the basis of Christ's love telling you, "We want your time, talent and treasure, but we don't really want you." The church ought to be the great equalizer where no one is greater or lesser than another. Ah, but then, they don't call it an "institution" for nothin'.
I have had enough meetings with our rector to know that he doesn't share +John's opinions about same-sex unions, marriages, blessings, etc. And rather than attempt to defend or explain the bishop's attitude (beyond saying +John is a "traditionalist"), Fr. Dave offered to people that they could take hard copies of his letter and read it for themselves. And the copies quickly went around the room.
I did not take one. I didn't need it. I had already read, marked, learned and inwardly rejected his reasoning on Friday when the letter showed up on the diocesan website. If there was any silver-lining in what I saw in his words, words, words on this issue: at least he owned the opinion as his own. In 2009, the bishop sent a letter back to all of us during the convention to denounce the adoption of D025 which lifted the moratorium on electing and consecrating LGBT people to the episcopate. It was an incredibly hurtful letter which framed the argument in the "fears" of Florida's deputation and grounding the argument against gays in what "We Florida Episcopalians" know about "Christian marriage" and so on.
In a change of approach, this letter makes it clear that the opinion expressed is that of Bishop John Howard and not necessarily our deputies. My hope is that when the voting occurs in Indianapolis, our deputies will find it in their hearts to consider the faces of the LGBT people they have encountered (and you know that they have), and that they will choose to see us as the face of Christ worthy of the compassion of our Savior as expressed in Matthew 25.
And, once again, our bishop will stand firm in the quick sand of "No" as the rest of the church says "Yes." Perhaps then, Bishop Howard will realize that the storm that is sending waves crashing over the bow of his boat is not one that will drown him, or me, or any of us. Because this, too, will pass.
Perhaps by then, Tropical Storm Debby will stop raining down buckets of water on our heads and we'll see the sun again. And maybe even a rainbow.

Shameless Plug...and Happy Pride Month

It's June. It's that sweaty hot season here in the southern United States where you have to shower in the morning and the evening. And that must mean it's time for Gay Pride Month!

Here in Tallahassee, the local LGBT community tends to go elsewhere for Pride celebrations. But a few of us in the Mickee Faust Club, that band of misfits making mirth and mischief on stage in Railroad Square, decided that it was an abomination to neglect the historical Pride month, or proclaim how proud we are to be queer...in someone else's backyard rather than our own. And so, despite the heat, we have been staging what we call our "Queer As Faust" festival at the Mickee Faust Clubhouse, which has no pleasantries of climate control, but plenty of water and fans to keep the audience comfortable. This is our fifth year doing QAF, which nicely coincides with the 25th anniversary of the Mickee Faust Club. And because it is our silver celebration, all the material we are performing is from the 600+ skits, songs, bad jokes, monologues the troupe has written over the past 25 years. Hence, we are calling this cabaret, "The Queerest of Faust."

I was surprised and flattered that one of the pieces selected for this show was the video I did three years ago called, "Queer vs. Christian Relationship". It is the foundation of a yet-to-be-written solo performance piece in which I struggle with the identity of being both a lesbian and a Christian. Most folks reading this blog may think those two things are perfectly compatible. And they are. And they are not. At least not when you start to talk to the gay community or the Christian community. If these two identities were the natural extensions of each other, we wouldn't be wasting so many years locked in fights over same-sex blessings and Anglican Covenants, and a crucifix worn around the neck wouldn't be a conversation killer amongst queers.

I think the problem is s-e-x. Gay people...oh, my...are sexual beings who do make love to one another. Straight people are and do as well. But some straight women have actually told me that I'm not really having sex because I'm not experiencing penetration by a penis, and that just tells me that straight women have either been fed a whole bunch of crap about what "sex" should be, or they just don't know how to have any fun, or both! The church is scared to death to talk about sex in an honest and open way because it is such an "earthy" activity. But some of the early formers of our Christian beliefs were also some of the randiess guys in tunics and sandals. So rather than talk about it, they just classify it as something that is not to be mentioned.

Ah, but then God has this funny way of getting into the mix. And a strange thing happened along the way to blissfully ignoring a part of our humanity: gay people started appearing in churches and synagogues, and being honest about who they are in God. There was an initial response to this of treating the LGBT faithful like the modern day lepers, or tax collectors, or demoniacs (take your pick). The unchecked vitriol spouted from the pulpit proved an effective way to alienate LGBT people from their communities, and from God.

Oh, but then God isn't so easily foiled. Because when God wants a person to taste and see that God is good, that will happen... whether the institution is ready for it or not. And that's what's been happening over the past 40 years. Gay people of faith have been knocking at the gate and demanding to be allowed in with no strings attached. In some cases, those gates have opened only to find there are even more gates to get through before we are embraced fully. One of the ways the institution tries to reconcile its dis-ease with sex is to tell the LGBT people of faith that they must be celibate (this would be a string attached). I'm often curious why we must take on an additional vocation like celibacy. I mean, there is the expectation, as foolish as it is, that straight people who are UNmarried will not be having sex. But if straight people do have sex...well, does anyone really care? But when gay people have sex--EEK! I imagine this is why it's so much easier to deal with single LGBT people because then there is no temptation to think about how that person might be having sex. And if they are partnered? Well, we just don't talk about that...

These failures in communication have contributed to the difficulties of having gay people feel at home in a faith community. And because the gay community at-large have felt unwelcomed by the faith communities, many have chucked the church entirely. And sadly, they've tossed out God with it because (as I mentioned in previous entries) there is the mistaken idea that "God" and "church" are the same thing. Again, I don't worship the institution; I worship God. And my presence, and that of other LGBT people, is part of God's intention to make the institution look more like the image of God: one massive face of diversity and beauty.

I'm pleased with the audience response to my "Queer vs. Christian" video. One person last night told me he thought it added a nice balance to the otherwise broad and bawdy humor in our Faust show. I notice how quiet the audience gets. Until the punchline when they laugh and applaud with delight.

Three more performances to go! Buy your tickets now at www.mickeefaust.com! And Happy Pride month, my queer brothers and sisters around the globe!

Brother, Can You Spare A Dime (or more)?

The General Convention is less than two weeks away, and amidst the battles expected over the budget of the Episcopal Church and the debate about allowing the blessing of same-sex marriages, there is that nagging matter of the Anglican Covenant going before the church.

Our No Anglican Covenant Coalition is sending our moderator, Revd. Malcolm French, and our Episcopal Church convenor, Lionel Deimel, to GC 2012 in Indianapolis. And that is no small expense. Our group is making this appeal:

For the first time, the No Anglican Covenant Coalition needs to solicit financial help in support of our efforts. To date, coalition members have run our operations on a shoestring, and some members have made significant personal sacrifices to enable us to oppose what we believe is a disastrous change in direction for the Anglican Communion. Our presence at General Convention, however, will be our most expensive undertaking, requiring funds for travel, lodging, meals, buttons, brochures, and other expenses. Your help is urgently needed. Please consider a making a generous donation to this important effort. The No Anglican Covenant Coalition is an unincorporated organization, and contributions are not tax-deductible.

As a bonus to those who make contributions to our cause of $25 or more, you will get one of our eye-catching buttons with the message, "Yes to Communion; No to the Covenant."

Below is a link that will allow you to donate via PayPal. Please help us have a presence in Indianapolis, so that our church may follow in the footsteps of the Church of Scotland, and the majority of English dioceses and defeat the Anglican Covenant.

Driving a Wedge Between God and God's People

It's a mystery.

That's apparently what Pope Benedict XVI had to say about the 50+ years of documented sex abuse scandals in a videotaped message played to an assembled multitude of 75,000 Irish Catholics over the weekend.

Meanwhile, the Guardian newspaper ran a scathing, and sadly accurate, commentary by Nick Cohen titled, "A Church Fit Only for Bigots and Hypocrites."   Cohen was speaking of the Church of England, "the Mother Church" of Anglicanism, which has been bound and determined to dig its heels into the quick sand of prejudice against gays and women.   The result:  a church that is teetering on the edge of going over the waterfall of total irrelevancy.

For me, the worst part about all of these articles (which are getting posted multiple times on social networking sites) is that it further undermines the efforts of those of us who know that the institution, and the hierarchies of these institutions, are not--repeat, not--God.   Too often, people associate what they see and hear coming from these supposed spiritual leaders for being the word of the Creator, Redeemer and Sustainer.  Rather than take the time to establish their own relationship with God, and taste and see how good that really is, they look at the Pope, or the Archbishop of Canterbury, and think that's what God is.

Really, no, they are not God.

At the same time, the continued crucifixion of Christ by both the Pope and the Archbishop of Canterbury is appalling.  Who is Christ, gentlemen, but the very people that you refuse to see!  Christ is the child who suffered abuse.  Christ is the woman seeking to follow her calling.  Christ is the gay man wanting to marry his beloved, not simply be "civilly partnered."  Have you forgotten your lesson from Matthew 25:

Then he will say to those at his left hand, “You that are accursed, depart from me into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels; for I was hungry and you gave me no food, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, I was a stranger and you did not welcome me, naked and you did not give me clothing, sick and in prison and you did not visit me.” Then they also will answer, “Lord, when was it that we saw you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and did not take care of you?” Then he will answer them, “Truly I tell you, just as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me.” And these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.’ 

Don't speak: I already know the answer to my own question.


I really do wonder if Hollywood shouldn't put in a call to the Vatican and Lambeth Palace and ask if the two would like to participate in a new reality TV show in which the two contestants compete for who can drive a further wedge between God and God's People.

Perhaps that reality is a little too real.

One Life in Sunset; Another in Sun Rise

I've been procrastinating at starting on a writing project.   It's not that I don't want to craft another solo performance piece.  It's that I can't seem to make the time to do it.  Or maybe it's that I know how much work that is and I can think of a half-dozen other "things" that need doing.  Hence, I am slow to getting started. 

But this weekend my foot-dragging has been pricking at my conscience more.  And I am pretty sure it's because of Father's Day.   Father's Day holds no special meaning for me any more.  My dad passed away in 2007, and yet all week I have been deleting message after message from chain stores that want me to know what I can buy for my late father.

I thought about that for a moment.  There is nothing for dad in this world.  He's not part of this world.  And the last few years of his life, he didn't enjoy comfort in the body which held his soul here.  One of the few things I could do for my dad was to rub his neck, sometimes his shoulders and his arms as well.  The disease that was progressively taking away his ability to move made his muscles stiff and achy.  And although he wasn't thrilled when I told him that I was leaving a career in radio journalism to become a massage therapist, I know he was thankful for my newly-acquired skills when he felt my fingers making gentle, yet firm, circular motions along his neck.

Both my parents factor into my spiritual autobiography, but it was my dad's death that brought me back into the church.   Not just for the funerals although that was the start of it.  But something bizarre happened when my dad died.  I heard hymns.

I know.  That sounds like, "I see dead people."  And it is a little like that sort of "The Sixth Sense" weirdness.

But really,  my head became a virtual jukebox of the 1982 Hymnal:  "I Bind Unto Myself Today"; "God is Working His Purpose Out"; "Crown Him With Many Crowns"; "The Strife is O'er"; and even fraction anthems from my youth when we did Morning Prayer every other Sunday and some of the tunes at the Eucharist like Agnus Dei.  It was unsettling, almost maddening, at times. And the intention seemed to be geared toward shoving me out of my comfort zone of spending Sunday mornings drinking coffee and doing crossword puzzles into this church that I had decided was dead to me years ago.  I was being called to be present in a Christian community and not in a fake way.  And I was to arrive as myself with no defenses, no chips on the shoulder, and my fists loosened and at my side.  It was only in this state of  being totally receptive and unbounded that I could feel myself showered in a steady rain of words from Scripture to hymns to the prayers which all spoke a single phrase:

"You are loved, totally and completely, unconditionally, forever and ever."

These words watered the soil of my being and the tiny mustard seed I wore around my neck since I turned 16 was finally coming into its full growth and pushing itself above the weeds that had been choking it down.  My dad's life had reached sunset, in fact the sun had gone down below the horizon.  And out of that death came a sunrise in my heart.  Or is that S-o-n?

This morning, as I idly flipped pages in the hymnal, I landed on "Eternal Father, Strong to Save,"  also known as the U.S. Navy hymn, and one of the pieces we sang at my dad's funerals.  Somehow it seemed fitting to see this one on Father's Day.

Eternal Father strong to save

Whose arm hath bound the restless wave

Who bidd'st the mighty ocean deep

Its own appointed limits keep

O hear us when we cry to thee

For those in peril on the sea.

Interesting since so much of this spiritual journey has felt like a boat ride, one in which I am always looking for a way either to steer the boat or find a way out of the boat.  Or leap into the belly of a whale and hope that any further pestering from God will pass me by.  None of which has seemed to work.  Perhaps it's time for me to listen to the words of this hymn, too.

Eternal Father, strong to save....
     

Purple Shirt on the Field!

photo by Rev. Canon Susan Russell and posted at All Saints Pasadena blog

Play Ball and Go Blue!

Normally, a game between the Los Angeles Dodgers and the Chicago White Sox wouldn't matter to me.  I haven't liked the Dodgers since the abbreviated 1981 season when they knocked out the Montreal Expos from the play-offs.   And the "real" Sox of baseball are the boys in Beantown who play at Fenway Park home of the Green "Monstah".

So, why then am I devoting a blog post to this game?

Because the two teams are number one in their respective divisions?  No. 

Because interleague play is exciting?  No.

Because it's Episcopal Night at Dodger Stadium?

Yes!!

And to mark the occasion, the Dodgers have invited Bishop Mary Glasspool to throw out the first pitch.  How super cool is that??

First, you rarely see women being given the chance to toss the ball to the catcher in the traditional start of the game (a huge oversight, I believe, of many Major League Baseball franchises.)  Women are baseball fans, and there are plenty of girls who love to swing for the fences, too.  Showcasing a prominent woman at a major league game is just good public relations.

Second, it's Pride Month, and what an honor to have a lesbian be on the mound at Dodger Stadium to start the game.  Two snaps for that PR move.

And last of all, she's an Episcopal bishop.   And the church goes to the ballpark and drinks bad beer and eats hot dogs and roots for the home team just like the rest of the world.  That is the way it ought to be.  Yes, we have lovely sanctuaries, beautiful stained glass windows, and amazing music.   But part of being in the Body of Christ is to be that body in common spaces as well and remove the idea that we are so apart from "the world" that we don't participate in it.   And if there is one Christian denomination that knows how to party, it would be the Episcopal Church.  It also establishes the idea that "the world" will embrace the church and allow it to take part in its rituals of sport.   A win-win PR coup for both the Episcopal Diocese of Los Angeles and the Dodgers.

So, for my money, tonight's game will be won in the first 30 seconds when Bishop Glasspool makes her throw to home plate, and then takes her seat to watch two young, talented left-handers attempt to keep the batters off the bases.

May the peace of the Lord which passes all understanding keep your hearts and minds in the game, L.A.! Play ball!!