Regret

I had to write a paper for my indigenous ways of knowing class on things I might regret. This is what I came up with:

Regret. I am supposed to write about what I regret in life for this class. The funny thing is this: I have come to really reframe my attitudes about regret as I have gotten older. The thing is this: I am 29 years old and I can honestly say that I have no regrets in my life.

In reflecting over my life, yes, maybe there are things that I might have done differently if I knew some things about myself and the world that I know now. I realize that I have preferred to go to a university that had classes in some of the more specific things that I was interested in instead of going to the Luther college in Iowa. But I do not know if I really knew enough about myself at the time to know that I prefer musical theater over church music and opera, that I enjoy connecting with people but I tend to prefer going out for a quiet drink with someone instead of going to a large party or gathering, and the list could go on and on. The truth is that in my late teens and early twenties I do not think I really knew myself the same way I know myself now.

I have learned not to agonize over what did not happen, as even though I struggled with a more conservative approach to theology that was dominant in some of the campus ministry circles that I tried to run in, that it was the tears that I cried and the questions that I asked that actually made the campus pastors encourage me to come to seminary. So even though there were ways that the Luther College Community did not match up to what I would learn later that my true desires are, I do not regret going to that college because that is what lead me to want to come to a more liberal leaning seminary.

Now that I am more aware of who I am and the way that the world operates, I think that there are things I could have done differently in my personal life. However, I honestly did the best that I could with those decisions at those points in time. I always been a believer in reflecting over things before moving onto what is next so that I do not repeat the same mistakes again. For example, when I first moved out to Berkeley I lived with a roommate that I did not have a chance to get to know at all first. It wound up being a terrible experience, but I honestly was one of the last students in my class to confirm my enrollment, and I honestly could not afford to live by myself. I lived with her for my first semester, but then I was committed to moving on. After that, I realized that even though it is important to be cautious about how much I spend on housing that it is actually a very good thing to feel discerning about who I could actually live with. I knew to get out of that housing situation and I have been in a variety of living situations since then. I could look at this as a big regret as it had a large negative influence on my life at that point in time. If I had to do it over again, I probably would have practiced more of a right to say no to living with her if I went back in time and made that decision now. Yet it was almost as if I needed to have that situation in order to really learn that it is okay to be picky about who I live with. I have looked at it as a learning experience to allow myself to be discerning about who I can and can not live with.

There are some things that I would like the opportunity to do still, but I do not regret not doing them as the appropriate circumstances have never presented themselves.I would like to be married but I do not regret not being married at this point in my life, I just do not feel like I have found someone I feel like I could marry yet. I also have things that I was not happy to leave behind, but it was absolutely necessary to do so in order to do well with what was in front of me. For example, I was never enthusiastic to leave things like creative writing and theater behind, but it was necessary to do so in order for me to stay focused on getting to and through seminary. But now that my academic work is almost done, I feel more freedom to pursue these types of things again. Do I “regret” leaving them behind for the past few years? No, I needed to focus my energy on having the money to go to school and on my school work once I was in school. But I never viewed not being married or not pursuing my creative tendencies in seminary as permanent decisions, but rather as things that are not in the current season of my life.

I am coming out of a very academically oriented season of my life. Its been what I needed to do in my time in seminary. I do not know what the next “season” will bring, however, I am realizing that pursuing projects and communities that encourage my interests in theater or creative writing is something that is important to me and I would l. That is something that I will seek to incorporate somehow in my next season of serving in parish ministry outside my church. I do not know what kind of shape that this will take. I guess I do not view it as a regret of something I did not pursue more these past few years, but as an opportunity of knowing the sort of things that I do want to embrace now that I am almost done. I am just curious to see what kind of shape that it is going to take.

I think that I have come to terms with the fact that I have multiple interests and multiple things that I would like to have a chance to do while I am still on this earth. But I feel like the life that I have lead up to this point in time has been very full and that I think that I have often made the decisions that I needed to make at particular points in time. I realized that I was still learning about myself while I was in college and that while on one hand if I knew about myself now that I knew then that I would have made some different choices in where I went to school. But had I done that, I might not have felt as encouraged to come to seminary, and I might not have wound up in seminary here in Berkeley California. This is what I call the “Back to the Future” effect, and quite honestly I am happy to be where I am at right now. I realize that there are things I could have done differently had I known the effect they would have, like my initial rooming situation in Berkeley, but that was a learning experience for me as I not only got out of the situation, but reflected over what needed to happen for that pattern not to have been continued. I realize that I am only 29 years old and that the things that I wished I could have for myself these past few years are things that I still have the opportunity to make happen for myself.

These are the reasons why I can say that I have no regret. Yes, there are things that I could have done differently. Yes, there are things that I still want the opportunity to do. And I trust that as I have even more life experiences that there will always be more in each category. Yet I have come to a certain level of peace in understanding that I will never behave perfectly in any situation. I have come to a certain level of excitement in understanding that life will always bring more opportunities. I think that it has been in learning to listen to who I really am while being committed to honoring the people around me as much as possible that may have contributed to not living with a lot of regret. I think it may be because I view life as something that is not over, but there for me every day that I wake up that makes me realize that every day is a learning experience and an opportunity.

Facebook Quizzes

Oh, facebook quizzes. I normally have avoided them, but they seem to be very mindless when I have needed something to do to clear my mind for under what it would take me to watch an episode of "Sex and the City" or "Buffy" when I need to keep going. Its funny what some of these things can say about a person, and I am always fascinated by what people choose to put on their facebook walls. And well, there are many ways I am not too surprised, but there might be a result or two that I find pretty laughable. Maybe in the long hall, I like writing better as I can interact with this kind of material more in my own way. However, for something like facebook its fun that i can leave people guessing a little bit as to which ones of these are merely to distract my mind and which ones are pretty accurate. Yet anyone who has been following this blog might not be too surprised at some of the results I have had. I thought it would be fun to share these with you all:

Betsy completed the quiz "Are You A Fundamentalist?" with the result Liberal.
You are a liberal. You don't really believe anything except that God is love. The Bible is not really inspired, but is a cool book for stories. You think the Gospel is making sure that people have personal freedom to find their own way. Non-Christians like to be around you, but Christians think you are going to corrupt everything..

Betsy completed the quiz "The Political Idealogy Quiz" with the result Very Liberal.
You are very liberal. You are about as far left as you can be before heading into Stalin's backyard..

Betsy completed the quiz "Which 60's subculture would you belong to?" with the result HIPPIE.
Free Love! You belong to the Hippies. You likely hang out in the Haight and your friends are the Diggers and the Brotherhood of Eternal Love. Your motto is: Turn On, Tune In and Drop Out. Your heroes are people like Timothy Leary and Stephen Gaskin..

Betsy completed the quiz "Which book character are you?" with the result Jonas, The Giver.
You are the reciever! You like to learn new things and you are different from the others around you! You have a very senstivie personality and you care for people a lot! You are very modest and helping people is very important. You probably do some volunteer work in your free time and people appreciate what you are doing. You are very determined and heroic..


Betsy completed the quiz "What Disney Movie Song are You?" with the result "Colors of the Wind" from Pocahontas.
You are a creative person. You are a free spirit..

You Are New York
Source: www.blogthings.com
Cosmopolitan and sophisticated, you enjoy the best in food, art, and culture. You also appreciate a good amount of grit - and very little shocks you. You're competitive, driven, and very likely to succeed. Famous people from New York: Sarah Michelle Gellar, Tupac Shakur, Woody Allen

You Belong in London
Source: www.blogthings.com
A little old fashioned, and a little modern. A little traditional, and a little bit punk rock. A unique soul like you needs a city that offers everything. No wonder you and London will get along so well.

Betsy just took the Who Were You In A Past Life? quiz and got the result: Pablo Picasso..

Pablo Picasso: In your past life you were Pablo Picasso. In this life you continue to be revolutionary, stubborn, an active lover, enjoy breaking the rules, and reactly poorly to heartbreak.

Betsy took the Which San Francisco Neighborhood do you belong in? quiz and the result is You belong in SOMA!

Perhaps you are one of the people that did well during the dot-com boom. You are highly likely to own your residence - perhaps it's a small loft near the ballpark, but that baby is YOURS. You are familiar with all the super trendy restaurants South of Market, you might have a dog, jogging down the Embarcadero is a weekly (if not daily) ritual, and you know what the season schedule at the Ballpark it directly affects you.

Betsy completed the quiz "What breed of dog are you?" with the result Basset Hound.
The breed that best describes you is the Basset Hound. You are sweet and gentle. You are peaceful and enjoy relaxing often. You are a friendly person who enjoys being around others. You are a mild and calm and prefer to work things out rather than argue. You are often the person who will discourage a fight and calm someone down who is angry or upset. .

Betsy completed the quiz "Which Early Christian Heretic are you?" with the result Marcellus of Ancyra.
Marcellus of Ancyra (? - c. 374 C.E.) was one of the bishops present at the Councils of Ancyra and of Nicaea. He was a strong opponent of Arianism, but was accused of adopting the opposite extreme of modified Sabellianism. He was condemned by a council of his enemies and expelled from his see, though he was able to return there to live quietly with a small congregation in the last years of his life. He was accused of maintaining that the Trinity of persons in the Godhead was but a transitory dispensation. According to the surviving fragments, God was originally only One Being (hypostasis), but at the creation of the universe the Word or Logos went out from the Father and was God's Activity in the world. This Logos became incarnate in Christ and was thus constituted Image of God. The Holy Ghost likewise went forth as third Divine Personality from the Father and from Christ according to John 20:22. At the consummation of all things, however, Christ will return to the Father and the Godhead be again an absolute Unity..


Betsy completed the quiz "What Literary Time Period Are You?" with the result Medieval Period.
You resemble Chaucer, Dante, and several anonymous writers of epics. You're often read as conservative, as religious, as quaint and old-fashioned -- but you know better! Even on pilgrimages, you tell stories about chivalrous tournaments and fart jokes; your hell is cooler than your heaven, and your mystery plays double as sitcoms; and while purists quibble over the correct spelling of "judgment," you drop Latin, Greek, French, German, and more into your language, wholesale. Good job, Medieval Period! You are eormenþéod..

Betsy completed the quiz "What do your eyes say?" with the result Deep Thinker
You think deeply about things going on in the present, past, and sometimes even future. You often drift off during work or class and start thinking about other things. You always hide what your thoughts form your friends and it often takes a poke or a snap of the fingers to bring you back to reality. Your eyes often portray a different personality than you are. Your eyes are a different part of your soul..

Betsy completed the quiz "THE INNER NATIONALITY QUIZ: WHAT ARE YOU REALLY?" with the result You are German..
You are precise yet romantic, efficient yet dreamy, friendly yet somewhat suspicious of others. You rarely smile, but when you do it's very meaningful. You like it best when there is a group consensus, and yet you are easily annoyed by the slowness and/or stupidity of others. Sometimes you think that if only you could live on an island or move to some wonderful place far away where things are different, everything would be better, and if you can't realize this dream you often lose yourself in books/vacations/recipes/sports -- anything for an escape! All in all, however, you make your peace with life, and have many old friends. .

Betsy completed the quiz "Which Shakespearean Character Would You Be?" with the result Viola.
You are Viola, the disguised young lover who rightly claims, "I am not what I am." ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Alone in unfamiliar territory, believing all is lost, you are not the kind to give up...even if it means disguising yourself as the oppposite sex...even if it means taking a job wooing your own rival for the one you love. Witty and intelligent, you sorely feel the irony of your situation, but your honor compels you to carry through. Will true love conquer all? ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Shakespearean kindred spirits: Rosalind (As You Like It), Portia (the Merchant of Venice), Imogen, Perdita, Antipholus of Syracuse, Romeo, Juliet, Hamlet .

Betsy completed the quiz "Which decade are you?" with the result 1940s Glamorous Revolutionary.
You are quite the glamorous revolutionary! You have a sense of pride in everything that you take on, whether it's filling in to do a man's job during wartime or raise your daughters to step up to the challenge of helping to establish women's rights, you take things head on! You are a hard worker and are always looking out for others. Your style centers around clean lines and timeless designs. Women in the 40s had the same sense of pride in their bodies and dressed in a way that accentuated their figures! You are not one to stand by and let things happen to you, you go after what you want and you are respected and admired for it! .

Betsy took the What kind of historian are you? quiz and the result is Gender Historian
Learning about the past through facts and quantative data is all very well, but for you, like Catherine Hall, or Leonore Davidoff, the real stuff of history is to be found in relationships, and where better to start than the fundamental social relation: the battle of the sexes? Women have been written out of 'HIS-story' for centuries, and gender historians, following on from their polemicist predecessors, the feminist historians, attempt to balance the scales by stressing the importance of the relationship between the sexes, and how the one cannot be defined by the other. This is important work, but recently, many gender historians have taken a new direction in their work, choosing to embrace the tenets of post-structuralism in order to problematise the concept of gender as pre-set, choosing to present it instead as fluid and culturally defined. Have a look at the work of Judith Butler if you want to explore new concepts.


Betsy took the What State should i live in? quiz and the result is Florida
You like the sun all the time with slight rain you like the beach but not much monuments

Betsy completed the quiz "Which 80s movie defines you?" with the result Princess Bride.
It's as real as the feelings you feel. Take the quiz!

Betsy took Who Is Your Soulmate? quiz and the result is Belongs With Someone With Class
Your future lover should be someone with class. You belong with someone polite and never afraid to admit their mistakes. They will help you see the good in life and appreciate everything.

Which Buffy the Vampire Slayer Character Are You?
Buffy
You are a loyal person with tragic circumstances, but yet you still remain strong for others, a leader. In older times you would be known as a knight.

Which Sex and the City Character are You?
Carrie
You're quirky, witty, and every guy's perfect first date.


Betsy just took the "Which Desperate Housewife are you?" quiz and the result is Bree Van de Kamp Hodge.

Bree Van de Kamp Hodge may very well be suffering from obsessive-compulsive personality disorder, the character herself refers to her “quirks” in terms of anal retentiveness and not obsessive-compulsiveness. Bree is known for her cooking, cleaning, ironing, gardening, doing her lawn, and reupholstering her own furniture, on the level of Martha Stewart. She is also known for making gourmet meals and breakfast treats, including her pineapple bran muffins. Besides being a dedicated homemaker, she also is well-versed in regards to firearm training: she owns four guns and is a card-carrying member of the National Rifle Association.

Newsweek Article on Abortion

Here is an article on language, politics and abortion that I recently read. I think that the ideas are helpful in considering the perspective that I am struggling to find on homosexuality:

http://www.newsweek.com/id/194637

Reconciling In Christ

Its official: My seminary is now a reconciling in Christ seminary!

I do endorse a theology that struggles with viewing erotic love of any kind as sinful. I am an advocate for making sure that people feel welcomed and respected within a context of a church community. I do not think that people should be judged by the color of their skin, their sexual orientation, their gender their economic status, physical capabilities, age, etc. I also do not believe that people should be judged for their spiritual or religious beliefs either. I firmly believe in living out an ethic that Paul states in Galatians 3 that in Christ there is neither Jew nor Greek, slave or free. Inclusion is a wonderful thing to practice and I think that I have been blessed to be a part of a very accepting community these past few years.

However, despite the fact that I am a huge advocate for what it means to be reconciling in christ, I do not feel like this title has any place at a seminary in the ELCA Lutheran church.

Currently, as a church whole, we are still living in a lot of division over the issue of homosexuality. Already, people who tend to have the same view point on homosexuality as I do tend to come to seminary in PLTS because it is a welcoming, accepting enviornment on this particular issue. However, within this, I have seen a large tendency to place people who do NOT hold this same opinion to be hateful and ignorant. In my time in really engaging people who disagree with me on this issue, however, I find the opposite to be true, as I have encountered a real sense of wanting to be loving and respectful of people who are homosexual, even if they find homosexuality itself to be wrong. Its almost as though the hatred that is perceived from people who have a more conservative stance on this issue is targeted towards any tendency toward conservatism in itself. In the end, if I had to choose I would much rather be an advocate for people who are gay and lesbian than for people who uphold a more conservative stance on homosexuality if it were that simple. But the truth is it is not that simple. And the other truth is that people from both extremes consists of where the church is currently at. To have a seminary that directly favors only one camp of thinking on this issue is only going to attract people who are more liberal on this issue, which is not going to adequately prepare people for the realities of the spectrum of attitudes that people truly do hold on hoomosexuality. Even though I have a liberal stance on homosexuality I am not in favor of a church split, and I fear that an RIC status may be the equivalent of seminex in my generation.

One of the other big reasons why I am opposed to PLTS being a Reconciling in Christ seminary is that I fear that it might automatically disqualify people who agree with this particular stance from serving in a more multicultural setting. We have been taught to be readers of our surrounding culture in addition to being a public voice in this context. In my time working at Resurrection Lutheran Church, I found that it was an amazing congregation in terms of dealing with the needs of this large African population that was there. It truly was concerned about addressing the real concerns about race and poverty in that particular neighborhood. However, as a large percentage of the congregation were immigrants from African countries, a more conservative stance on homosexuality was held. And to come out in strong favor of homosexuality right away would have been to alienate the people who this congregation was trying to serve. There was a similar sentiment at a church in LA that I visited that had a lot of immigrants from Mexico as well. Would we be taking away the possiblity of people serving in more multicultural settings BECAUSE we are a reconciling in christ seminary???

PLTS has been concerned with making sure that we are given a variety of ways to practice what it means to be readers of the culture that we are in. It has become very apparent to me that while the church could be more welcoming to homosexuals, I think that we have a longer way to go when it comes to things that are related to race and poverty. Perpetually, I find that it is well educated, white, middle class settings that are wanting to have statements about accepting homosexuality. And oddly enough it is the voices of people who are going hungry or are still oppressed by racism that are ignored if their rhetoric on homosexuality is one that the church does not want to embrace.

I am an advocate for congregations becoming reconciling in christ. This is because they are usually having a consensus about being RIC before they make the decision and this generally has a community with more continuity. But I am not an advocate for a seminary being reconcling in christ because 50% of the student body changes every year. I am not an advocate for a seminary being reconciling in christ because it only embodies one way of thinking about homosexuality when there is a wide spectrum of beliefs about this in the church.

However, I have not felt like this is a perspective that I would have been able to endorse publically this semester. For starters I think I would have said more at the beginning of my career in seminary than at the end as I would have felt more invested in what my community would say. Also, there has been a general consensus of enthusiasm of the seminary being Reconciling in Christ and to speak up too much on the issue would have been social suicide in a year that I have felt a little more isolated than usual already. And my work load I have from school work and internship prep has been intense enough that haven't had a lot of emotional energy left. I have been a big believer in choosing my battles wisely. It would have taken too long to describe to a lot of people why I beleive in what RIC stands for but I do not think that it has a place in a seminary. Yet that sounds like somehing I would do, have an unconventional third option in a land of black and white...

GOING THROUGH THE MOTIONS

Will I stay this way forever, sleepwalk through my life's endeavor???? Because lately when it comes to my school work, I kind of feel like I am going through the motions.....
My studies just don't seem to penetrate my heart the same way these days....hence, this wonderful video of "Buffy"....

"Decade List"

On face book someone recently had a potential "note" you could write that involved the top ten things you want to do in the next ten years. As I started writing, I found myself going in reverse and I realized that I have accomplished ALOT in these past 10 years myself of things I wanted to do. And I guess that It seemed more appropriate to me to put this on my blog instead of facebook. (As my internship supervisors are both on face book I am kind of proceeding with a lot of caution right now. Also, I think that this is more of the audience that is legitimately interested in what I have to say than if I put it on face book where everyone can see this)

THINGS I HAVE ACCOMPLISHED IN THE PAST 10 YEARS
(one item for every year that I am alive...)

1) I have been proposed to three times, yet I am still single. I feel the night is longer when the lad’s not right! This does not mean I won't give someone a chance though nor does it mean I want to ultimately be alone, but I must have done something right to have had three proposals...
2) I have a bachelors degree from Luther College in sociology
3) I had always wanted to work at Good Earth Village in Spring Valley when I was a kid because I loved Bible Camp, and I worked there during the summers in college
4) At my time at Luther I managed to stay in the vocal music department while not being a music major my entire time there and I was elected to church council, which I realize were probably not as easy as they might have felt at the time
5) I survived a car accident that should have killed me. And I got back on my own two feet, able to live independently.
6) I bought a car after I got back on my own two feet instead of letting the experience paralyze me with fear and moved into an apartment with a friend
7) I used time on disability when I started to feel better to do things that I had wanted to do: I helped at a food shelf, I performed in community theater, self published a book and I helped out with a confirmation program.
8) I worked at Target again after all of this was over, and in missing community and church involvement, was pro-active and decided to go to seminary.
9) I moved all the way across the country to Berkeley California to go to grad school
10) I served as a chaplain at Mayo Clinic
11) I interned at a nonviolence organization called Pace e Bene
12) I served my contextual requirements in two vastly different congregations. While I did prefer one over the other, having both experiences was eye opening to me.
13) I have taken classes at the graduate theological union where I have been exposed to a variety of ways of thinking about Christianity and spirituality
14) I moved into my own apartment
15) I have learned how to cook most of my food from scratch
16) I have learned how to get rid of books and movies when I feel like I do not need them around anymore (although they still somehow seem to accumulate)
17) I have went from being a very messy person to being a bit of a neat freak
18) I have been wine tasting in Napa several times
19) I sang “Creature of the Night” at a karaoke bar
20) I have had interesting conversations with people walking down Telegraph in Berkeley on the weekend
21) I got a tattoo
22) I have spent an entire day at the Chicago Art Institute
23) I had a conversation with Barbara Ehernreicht at a workers justice conference.
24) As I referred to in #7 I self published a book this one deserves its own category
25) I managed to sucessfully drive my car all the way across the country after my first semester of Berkeley
26) I survived a whole year of New Testament Greek. (I can no longer say its greek to me all the time, although I wont pretend to be profiecent at it either)
27) I have learned that it is okay to prefer to watch "Buffy" or to do well on my schoolwork over going to a large party with my precious spare time
28) I have started to view looking young for my age as an asset instead of a liability
29)I am almost done with the academic component of my masters of divinity

I realize that I have had a very full life that God has blessed me with so much. I have learned that some of the best things are not necessarily planned, but it is still a good idea to have an idea of things you want to do in this life. So I could think of a few things for my own "decade" list:


1) Do a Spanish immersion trip so that I can say more than “habla no espanol” and so that I really can have a deeper understanding for south American culture.
2) Take dance classes…if I do this, I will be able to say that I have trained in voice, acting AND dance just because I wanted to.
3) Take acting classes again… honestly I have always been thrilled by every aspect of the theater for as long as I can remember, its just that I set it aside when I realized that I did not want to do this professionally. But I still dream of being in a musical and I do need some kind of hobby!
4) Live somewhere for at least 5 years! That’s long enough to provide continuous pastoral care and leadership to a congregation, to possibly buy a house, to really shop for furniture, to be open to being in a long term romantic relationship, to watch friends’ children grow up, to be involved in a variety of aspects of a community theater or music program. I guess that this is more than just one thing in this statement, but its very much a vision that I have for myself.
5) To take a trip to New York so that I can say that I have hung in every corner of the country. (I have already done Florida, Washington and I currently live in CA, seriously, I just need one more to say BINGO)
6) To go from living off of loans to paying off loans
7) Start working on a phD in sociology of religion

Maybe I will check many of these off my list in the next ten years, and I will probably also have a few things that I will add to the list as to what God has blessed me with in terms of experiences that I have had!!!

Power

I am the one with the power.
I am the one with the power who choose whether or not I interact with a person on the street.
I am the one with the power to decide whether or not they seem like a safe or an unsafe person when I choose to interact with them.
I am the one with the power when I avoid a person in order to stay safe because my hunch tells me to.
I am the one with the power to give them money or to not give them money when someone asks for it.
I am the one with the power who decides not to give a person money when I have a hunch that they will use it for alcohol or drugs.
I am the one with the power who decides how much money to give to a person when they ask for it whether I give them a dime from my wallet or a dollar bill.
I am the one with the power who decides whether or not to give that money to a person or to walk down the street further to buy a beer for myself.
I am the one with the power to be able to go into the bookstore and buying something used and still have enough money to eat
I am the one with the power when I realize that I have limitations on how I can and can not help someone
I am the one with the power when I realize that we are all children of God regardless of how much or how little money we have.
I am the one with the power when I act out of love that does not care about economic status.
I am the one with the power when I ask God for forgiveness when I realize that I avoided someone else’s needs.
I am the one with the power.

It's The End Of The World As We Know It

I am in the homestretch of my semester. Right now, it is in the midst of the final project craziness that I haven't necessarily gotten to yet in the midst of things like internship prep and self care. However, I must admit that in realizing that this is my last semester being a full time student in Berkeley, I can not help but think of this particular song. Yes, its kind of the end of the world as I know it in terms of managing life to fit around the multiple demands of student-hood. Yet, lately, the more I have been thinking about it, I realize that I actually feel fine about this. I am excited to embark on the new adventure of full time ministry. It won't always be easy, but I am ready for the new adventure. I realize that I might make some different choices in the life of internship on how i spend my time and money than i do right now. But the truth is that I feel fine with the fact that I am reaching the end of my time in Berkeley....

Ironically, I am posting this on the internet.....

Sometimes I feel a little apathetic for the fact that I can not process things as well as I feel like I should when I am reading it on an internet page. I have spent a lot of money on printer paper this semester as I have had professors trying to be earth friendly and placing readings on the internet, because I just can not focus the way I need to when I am reading something off a computer screen. If my mind is about to start wandering, facebook, my netflix account, my email and youtube is only just a click away. And its easy for me to want to look at links that are similar when I am actually very interested in what I am reading, and so as a result, I wind up spending too much time trying to find as many resources as I can and not enough time really trying to comprehend.

I kind of became aware of these habits, and I have advocated for a push AWAY from the computer whenever possible for getting work done. Its a useful tool, but I want to use it, and I do not want it to use me. I find that I need to take a sabbath from the internet.I find some things on there very convienent and useful.

However, I will never forget this semester when my computer needed to be taken to the computer emergency room, actually feeling RELEIVED. Well, it was annoying with the work that I actually needed to get done on the internet. However, I found myself going to the library to print out the things that I needed printed out. I just sat down at the end of the day and watched "Buffy" on DVD which is what I really wanted to do with my spare time anyway. The next day, while I did have to run errands, I went on a walk. In an odd way, I felt a lot better for all of this. I tried to bring up some questions with people about the way we let the internet rule our lives. Are we not really processing the information? How are we really spending our time? Are we really being creative and engaged in the world? I got a lot of resistance on some of these ideas that I found myself questioning, telling me that we live in a digital age, and that I need to accept this, especially if I am going to be a pastor in this day and age.

I am not one to be completely against the use of the internet, but I do have a level of skepticism with the effects that it has on me. Last summer, I read this article in a PRINT version of the Atlantic:

http://www.facebook.com/ext/share.php?sid=32924989978&h=BbrwA&u=vP-zg&ref=mf

I think that it brings up some interesting points in the way people process information in our digitial age. Maybe it scares me just a little bit, because if I ever have kids, I would want them to love to read Shakespeare just as much as I do. And I feel ironic posting this on my blog, but I have always made an effort to really be honest about what my thought process is on here...

Simpsons Don't Make Fun of Grad Students

Saw this posted on facebook by someone and it is probably the most I have laughed in a long time. Figured that this is something that would be appreciated by this crowd

INTERNSHIP ASSIGNMENT

Hey friends. I thought that I would let you know that I got my internship assignment today. And...I am going to be at the North Dakota State University in conjunction with doing parish ministry at Elim Lutheran Church in Fargo, North Dakota!!!

Honestly, my initial reaction was to kind of cry a little bit. I am NOT looking forward to facing winter full time again by any means, and my main driving phobia remains to be driving in snow and ice. And I am a little worried that I might be prone to being a little sore with all the broken bones that I have had during the winter months as well.

Also, I realized that my heart was set on NOT going back to the mid-west but in living somewhere completely different. However, I felt like I needed to get past geography and look at the kinds of ministries that I could be a part of, and the idea of doing joint campus ministry and parish ministry seemed very appealing to me because I want the chance to actually work in a real parish setting, but I also like the idea quite a bit of working with college students.

However, I am honestly looking forward to doing the work quite a bit. For my mission impossible class, I am actually doing my final project on Lutheran mission to young adults, which strikes me as maybe fitting quite a bit for me.

Its funny, because I have been playing this what if game with myself these days about what my life would have been if I made different choices. I remain fully convinced that had I known I was going to go to seminary eventually I often have thought that I probably would have attended a university to get an undergraduate degree in creative writing or in musical theater along with a degree in peace studies or women's studies. Because I realized that the main reason why I did not pursue these kinds of studies in my undergraduate degree was not a lack of interest in them as much as it was wanting to do something other than wait tables, and I wanted to be able to support myself.

I also struggled quite a bit in running in campus ministry circles when I was in college as I realized that I really wanted to be in christian community but that piety regarding alcohol and sexuality I found stifling as my morality tended to be based more on economic justice and our globalized world. (and the ways i did live up to this had more to do with my busy schedule than with piety...) But I wanted to be a part of christian community so badly, and I stuck with it and I found it formulative in other ways. And honestly, I think it was encouragement from campus pastors that probably made me feel like I should consider seminary in the first place.

I came at this quite honestly in my interview, and actually, I think that the honest assessment of this and not looking at college and college ministries in particular with rosy colored glasses is one of the big things that got me this particular placement. I think I got along well with the supervisors well and I felt that I would enjoy working with them but that they would challenge me as well.

However, the more I think about all of this, the more I am feeling quite excited as well too. I think that I would enjoy and benefit from working in a university setting. I have been thinking a lot lately about taking theater and/or dance classes and read things because they sound interesting to me, not just because they are assigned. I have been wanting to hang out with non-church people these days. I think that I might have more of these kinds of resources at my finger tips in a university setting.

And my gifts IN ministry are things that I think would go well in a college setting as I encourage the exploration of difficult questions, as I really like to push on finding links between church and society. I think that college students are busy but they would not have the kind of commitments that would prevent them from taking a moral stance against the school of americas or in considering going and doing a service trip on their time off in a way that I have observed is not always easy to do once one has children, a spouse and/or a full time job.

Also, college is a VERY exciting time in terms of personal development which I think can be synonmous with one's understanding of spirituality. This is when people start to think about what they want to accept or reject from the worldview that they grew up with. Its actually a life long process, but this is when it truly begins. This is also whe people generally start thinking seriously about what they really want to do in this world versus what they do not want to do and what they would do for fun. These questions are truly exciting and the way they effect one's religious journey could be fascinating.

The fact that I would be doing parish ministry as well is exciting too. I will be more exposed more to things that go on in the life of an actual congregation in the capacity of my own pastoral identity which is exciting to me as well.

The more I thought about all of this, honestly even if they were not my first choice initially, I have a hunch that i was their first choice. And it kind of hit me that college ministries is probably a little more competitive to get into than general parish ministry and I landed the opportunity to do this on my INTERNSHIP. I realize that I am excited about the ministry, but I am not thrilled about the geography of North Dakota.

However the truth in the matter is that I may need to get over my driving in snow phobia for a lot of locations for doing ministry. Even if it is a place with good public transportation, ministry is very relational and entails being able to visit people in their homes as well as being able to visit someone unexpectedly in the emergency room one minute before heading to the gym or a rehearsal of some sort for my own sanity before I have that dinner that I was invited to. As a result, getting over my driving in snow phobia might do wonders for what I can accomplish in ordained ministry.

The other truth is that Fargo, North Dakota is a lot closer to the Twin Cities, and its the point of realization that some of my dearest friends and the best theater I have ever seen are in a drivable proximity from Fargo as well!

The other thing is that I was having anxieties about what I was going to do before internship and since its a very drivable distance from MN, I can keep things at my parents apartments and borrow less money from my parents in the short interim time that I will have, as I honestly won't have enough time off to find much for work, especially in this economy.

And I can honestly say....God is good, I am excited, and its all going to turn out for the best. Now I just need to finish my semester sucessfully!

Senioritis

I have really enjoyed being a student, but I have found myself craving to put the books down a little bit. It is Friday, which is always the day that I always set aside for my mental clarity; but that generally consists of taking care of things in my apartment and watching DVDs. Then, if I feel like it I go to social gatherings.

I have been really good at being responsible and dedicated as a student and developing some healthy habits, however, I find myself craving some of the things that I put aside to be a successful student. I miss doing theater; I am aware that worship has a lot of theatrical qualities to it, however I guess I have come to miss the process of putting a play together. I have thought about taking acting or dance classes while I am on internship as a means to start to get back into it again and to meet non church people. I miss reading for fun; I enjoy what I am reading for my classes, but I miss having more freedom to read what I want to when I come home from work the way I did when I worked at Target. I also feel really behind in being attentive to current events; as it feels like my classes seem to take up much of my mental energy. I also feel like my social world in Berkeley is kind of limited to the seminary people and while in some regards it has been kind of nice knowing that I do share a certain level of ideological ground with people, I kind of miss having more diversity in my social circle.

I totally anticipate internship and ordained ministry as things that might be emotionally draining for me at times and that I will still need days like today. (ultimately, my sabbath) However, I am looking forward to picking these other aspects of myself up again that I have put on the shelf to be a successful student. I have been reflecting on this a little bit lately in light of a dream that I had over my spring break. I honestly think that I have done everything I have needed to do to be a healthy, sucessful student. I realize a lot of the things that I voiced interest in can be used within the context of the church, but I guess I want activities that are not explictly church activities as well. So in that regard I feel very ready to be more in the "real world" than in the world of student ville.

The other thing is I have loved being academically driven in my studies. My first few years here I found myself very eager to be engaged in these discussions in a classroom. I do find my classes enjoyable and pertinent to what I want and need to know as a future minister. However, I find myself wondering what people who may not have a theological education might think about these things, whether they are in the church or outside of the church. But in a funny sense, I think that the minute that I started to be interested in these kinds of questions, that is when I knew that I am ready to go on internship next year as well. I guess to me that is an indication that I really do care about the needs of the world, and not just having conversations comfortably with other people who have made studying theology a priority as well. However, the fact that it seems to take more effort for me to crack open the books these days I think is an indication of senioritis.

I find out about internship next week. I am feeling both excited and scared when I think of this next step, as I deliberate out what it is going to mean for me, as a single woman in ministry whose ministry seems to lean a lot more for prophetic/social justice type of work and whose outside interests are in the arts. I realize that there is a lot of who I am that I am ready to tap into in multiple ways. However, right now the future kind of seems blank, which breeds uncertainty and excitement. I have accomplished a lot and I have come a long way. However, right now I think that I would diagnose myself with a case of senioritis.

Blogging Spring Break

Hey everyone...I am on my break right now and I realize that I haven't written much in a while. I have been enjoying life and there has been a lot going on. I thought I would write an overview of what is going on as best as possible. So "Adventures In My Own Apartment" and "Living in the Question" are things that I just wrote as a basic update as to where I am at right now. Please start with Living in the Question, as that has more serious prayer requests, while Adventures in My Own Apartment is meant to be a more fun update. I love and miss you all!

Living In the Question

I have a lot of mixed feelings about heading on internship for next year. However, I realize that I feel quite ready. I LOVE being a student, however, I feel like I am at a point in my theological development where I need to put the books aside to develop a theology that is rooted in people's concerns a lot more. So I have felt kind of antsy this semester in this regard.

However, I won't forget trying to buy a shirt a few weeks ago. It was then that I realized that I wanted something that would be attractive enough that screamed that I was datable. But I also wanted something conservative enough that someone would not question a female pastor wearing it. This seemed to unleash a lot of my worries that I have about being a single woman in public ministry. The realization that for some jobs one has work clothes and then they go home and change before going out on the town, and that I will never be able to take "off" being a pastor is a big fear that I have. However, I am finding that I want to learn how to grow into this in my own ways as well.

I interviewed with 5 different places for my internship in the fall. There were two churches that I did not like enough to serve. The first one was a church in Iowa which seemed like they had a lot of good ministries and a good pastor. However at the end of the interview, they mentioned that they required staff to say that sexuality can only occur between a man and a woman in marriage. Interns were considered staff. I truthfully and diplomatically answered that I am in favor of gay and lesbian rights, but that I have been able to work sucessfully with people who have different opinions. However I went away realizing that I would not be able to feel like I could ethically say what was expected of me. And I realized what a small world it is that when I first talked to my mother afterward, she was heading out to lunch with the person that I interviewed with.

The other church that I can not serve was with a large church in Green Bay, Wisconsin. The location would have ensured visitation from my family during football season, however there were reasons why I could not serve there. The pastor seemed like a good, sweet man. However, it did not sound like our visions for ministry were similar enough for me to have it be a pro-active experience.

As for the churches I am willing to serve? A large church in Vegas, where I felt that the pastor seemed really awesome and someone I would enjoy working with. He said that they were not a reconcling in christ church because he thought that the inclusion was too limited to sexuality in that statement, which was something that I found awesome. And it sounds like that there is a lot of good creativity and energy at this church making it a good potential internship site.

There was an urban church in Everett, Washington that was not interviewing, however I decided that this would be a place that I might enjoy doing my internship. I am attracted to the urban setting. I am also attracted to the fact that there are a lot of people who do not go to church in the Washington area, which sounds like it could be really exciting in terms of trying to make connections between secular culture and Lutheran culture to communicate the message of the gospel.

Not on account of the weather, my third choice is in Fargo, North Dakota, where I would be doing joint campus ministry and parish ministry. The combination of the two sounds really exciting to me. I honestly think that a lot of my interests in ministry would go over very well in a campus ministry setting as I even though I am a little tired right now, I am academically driven. And I think that this would be a context where BOTH my passions for popular media and social justice could be expressed well. However, I am petrified of the idea of having to drive in ice, snow and wind!

I also interviewed with a mission start in Arizona. Its a retirement community that I would serve. The congregation sounds like a very healthy community that is very outwardly focused, which really appeals to me. Because its a retirement community, most of the church activities would happen during the day, and I would have my evenings off. On one hand, this sounds appealing to me as I do enjoy doing my own thing. On the other hand, there are not a lot of young adults in this community at all which is a source of concern for me as well. Even though I enjoy my own space, I do like socializing with people around my age. One of the reasons why the apartments are working out so well for me is because I actually am surrounded more by people in their late twenties and early thirties. The dorms seemed like a weird combination of a retirement community and people who were freshly out of college, so the apartments are working out wonderfully in this regard. On one hand, there are a lot of couples around here which is hard to be exposed to at this point in time. However, I have made friends with a lot of the singles in the apartments. I have also learned that it is not so much of an issue of if people are married or in a serious relationship, as much as how they go about it, as I have found that there is one couple in the apartments that I enjoy and tolerate being around. Anyway, what I am trying to say is that I do like to be social with people in my age group. This is a fear of being in Arizona. However, I have the attitude that I can do anything for a year as well. So we will see where this goes.

I am supposed to find out sometime in April where I am going in the fall, and it is unnerving. Usually by now I have started to make summer plans, but right now I haven't. I realize that I want to go to the Twin Cities for awhile this summer, but I only want to make one trip back to the midwest. Will I be moving to North Dakota and driving to MN, or will I be moving to Washington State, Vegas, or Arizona and taking a plane ride back? Will my fears be driving in the winter or getting sunburnt while trying to find other young adults? My lease goes till June, and ideally I would drive to my internship site in July after moving out of my apartment, having time to get settled and to get to know the area before internship starts in August, but I would need to negotiate this with an internship supervisor.

This is all unnerving! I realize that I am kind of living in the question of where I am going to be and what kind of ministry I am going to do in the fall. I seriously request all of your prayers at this point in time. I am nervous, but I am ready to serve the church. And I have moments where I could stand to be a lot more calm about knowing where I am going to be. I promise that I will write at least a paragraph on my blog and make an announcement on my facebook status when I know where I am going! However, I really need a lot of prayers about this right now.

Yet, I was watching my copy of "Shakespeare in Love" the other day and one of the lines in the movie really resonates with me and my situation here: "It will all work out, I don't know how, its a mystery." I trust that God is in control as I have been able to make it this far by faith. Yet it is unnerving living in the question.

Adventures In My Own Apartment

I actually have my own apartment this semester, which I LOVE. I have never lived completely on my own before, and I find that I enjoy it quite a bit. Cooking, cleaning, paying bills---these are all things that i have done before, but for the first time I am the one who is in charge of everything and I absolutely love it. Its not without its challenges, my first night in the apartment I did not have any heat in my apartment and it was really cold that night. Then there was the day that my shower rod fell out of the shower and then when I went to go to my closet, the closet door fell out. There was also the day that I lost my apartment keys after doing a major grocery store run after being in a psychotherapy appointment. I wound up making phone calls from a friend's apartment and having my landlord let me into my apartment for much of the weekend before I got a new set of keys. So its not like it has been a flawless experience by any means, but it is an adventure that i quite enjoy.

In living on my own, I have become more aware of what my own quirks are. I have found that I absolutely love being by myself on the couch while playing a DVD after a long day. The new found addiction I have is to "Buffy the Vampire Slayer." (thanks to netflix i am in the middle of season 5).

I have found TV shows that I enjoy before, but for some reason "Buffy" reminds me of being a young girl again, as it is the sort of story i would have been obsessed with when I was younger. When I bring this up, I often hear other women say "isn't Angel so hot?" And while he is not bad to look at, he is not the one I would have crushed after as a young girl. In high school, I often imagined that I was like Buffy, finding ways to heroically save the day. And in high school, I would have had a huge crush on Giles, the really smart, bookish librarian who is also really sweet as he appeals to my brainy side that wants to be treated like a lady. I would also have had a crush on Spike, the vampire who specifically wants to be bad, but seems to often reluctantly do the right thing, and as the bad guy sometimes he is able to get away with more blunt observations that everyone else is reluctant to say.

While these are some interesting observations I have about my reactions to other people's reactions on my interest in the show, the real reason why I am drawn to the show is because of Buffy. Buffy fights for herself, and she is the one to be more likely to save the guy, not the other way around. She is no damsel in distress. I have often imagined being like Buffy for as long as I can remember. When I told my mother this, she said that it reminded her of the book The Paperbag Princess. I scored a copy of this book as it seemed fitting to have it in my apartment as I adore the fact that the princess goes to save the prince and when he does not like how she looks while doing this, they decide not to get married. That's more of the way that I have tended to imagine myself being. Being bookworm and a movie buff, sometimes I have to suspend some of my feminist tendencies for certain genres. (I am clearly not a fan of the damsel in distress) And its refreshing not to have to do this for "Buffy". And I love that the plot lines tend to be more of a fantasy plot as well as I have always loved stories of magic and adventure, and battles between good and evil. The evil vampire theme reminds me of my love of stories about evil witches as a young child.

So the show reminds me of being a young girl again in a good way, as it reminds me of a lot of the things I gravitated towards as a young girl. And there is something symbolic I think about being addicted to a show about a strong woman who can fight for herself in the first time that I have my own place.

I also find that I like it quiet quite a bit around here when the TV is not on. It is not only easier to work that way, but it is really pleasant when it is quiet. I have been able to lose myself in thought over my studies and I have been able to get into my own world of imagination again. I have developed ideas for some creative writing pieces that I would love to pursue, however my academic studies seem to take a vast majority of my energy for writing for right now. Yet, when I do listen to music, I notice that I listen to a lot of classical music. I was telling someone the other day that when I listen to Mozart, my cyncism about romantic love fades away, because there is something about listening to Mozart that makes me feel like I am near to one of the most beautiful things in the world that I have never tired of at all. My apartment could use to have nicer floors and bathroom tiling. Its obvious that it is a lower income apartment. But when I am listening to Mozart I feel like the richest woman in the world.

I love having my own kitchen as well. No roommates to have to deal with at all. I find that I love to work in my kitchen when I get the chance, as I find the process to feel very thereputic and healthy. I find that I generally like to keep the kitchen pretty clean, willingness to not pick up after myself indicates exhaustion, which I was feeling a lot before the break. Fortunately, I do not have enough dishes to let them pile up for more than a day. The exception is if I lived only off of wine, as I have plenty of wine glasses as a result of a nice birthday gift from my brother and several trips to Napa. I eat a lot of homemade hummus, because it is cheap. However I feel classy doing this in my own kitchen while listening to Mozart!

It is also liberating to not feel like I need to leave when I do not feel like talking to people. Its nice to have a place where I can make my own cup of tea and light a candle while I am working. However, I still find that I study outside the house sometimes as I have too many possible introverted adventures in my apartment that come in the form of my netflixed Buffy DVDs and my New Yorker that come every week, novels in my bedroom, things that I want to make in my kitchen.

My favorite Rogers and Hammerstein song is "In My Own Little Corner" from their "Cinderella". Cinderella sings "In my own little corner, in my own little chair, I can be whatever I want to be..." There is something about that which makes me think of having my own apartment. I am never lacking for adventures here, as I enjoy having my own little corner that I enjoy living in.

However, I am always willing to invite people inside as well, but it feels nice inviting them instead of merely trying to coexist with them. I make sure that I always have ice cream and wine, as the intent of them is to have something to offer in hospitality. However, it is nice that these are things that I don't complain about enjoying by myself either.

Ethical Autobiography

I just wrote this ethical autobiography for my ethics class at PLTS. I thought you all might enjoy it:

I confess to having a major addiction in my life right now: Joss Whedon’s “Buffy the Vampire Slayer.” I know that my weekend is approaching when the next few DVDs of the show arrive through my netflix account. Once all my school work is done and my apartment is clean from my week, my favorite thing to do is to sit down and to find myself imagining that I am in Sunnydale, California where Buffy Summers is fighting supernatural forces of evil, with her specialty being vampires, with her friends assisting her in this battle.
I mostly started to watch it to understand why some of my friends back in MN think that the show is just amazing. You see, on one hand, I feel like I should be appalled. I worked for Pace e Bene, a non-violence organization last semester and I believe fully in nonviolent conflict resolution, and feel like I should not support Hollywood images of redemptive violence. The idea of dividing the world into “good” people and “bad” people (even if they are mostly portrayed by fictive vampires) is not a worldview that I generally uphold. The other thing is that my major in college was sociology where I found that my true passion was for examining gender and media from a lens of sociology and cultural history. While I do find it refreshing that the primary fighter is a strong female figure, it does follow the common Hollywood problem of putting women in “types” when they are together as her friend Willow is a very intelligent woman and Cordelia is a very beautiful woman. Its as though a woman can not be both. From a feminist perspective, there is also the problem with the eroticism behind the vampire violence as well. What can I say? I have a heart for justice and I have been trained to be immensely culturally critical.
I guess that this is the side of me that many people tend to see as I really have strongly called to be a voice for justice in the world, and in the realm of my ministry. From this perspective this does not make any sense. However, from a few other perspectives about my life journey, it makes perfect sense.
You see, I have always had a strong inclination to enjoy the world of fantasy. I was able to sing arias from Mozart’s “Magic Flute” at a very young age, and I have adored both the glorious music and the story of magic that accompanied it my whole life. I have also always been an avid reader, reading any books I could get my hands on and spending my money on books. As a child, I absolutely adored C.S. Lewis’s The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe, L. Frank Baum’s Oz books, and any stories about evil witches that I could find. In high school, I adored Arthurian legend from the lens of Marion Zimmer Bradley and T.H. White. In college, my obsession was for Tolkien and Robert Jordan’s Wheel of Time books and the movie Labyrinth. Stories about magic, other-worldly creatures and travels to magical lands have always been incredibly appealing to me. I honestly love the fantasy section of the bookstore and some of the amazing things that can be done with these types of stories on the screen in our digital age.
Yet , when I started to really see that I had a heart for justice in my surrounding world, this is something that I did struggle with. A common motif in these sort of tales is to portraying characters as either being definitely good or bad. Occasionally, there are exceptions to this, and occasionally characters are portrayed as both, but this is not a paper on the literary analysis of these tales. I have often heard the argument that these characters in these stories, like the vampires on Buffy the Vampire Slayer, are pure evil and therefore the violence in these stories are justifiable. However, when I analyze this on my own, my Lutheran theology says that all people tend to be both saints and sinners, both good and evil. Is the portrayal of one type of creature/character/ or person as pure evil in a story truly helpful in terms of the way we want to categorize the world? The way I have personally come to understand this in my own way of thinking of dealing with issues of injustice is to view actions as being bad, but people not necessarily being evil. An example is that when George W Bush was president, I was strongly opposed to the militaristic actions that he took, but I made an effort to be opposed to his actions as a president instead of being opposed to George W Bush as a person. Because of this idea of good people versus bad people, these kinds of stories often involve at least one intense battle of some kind in the climax of the story and the denouement is frequently the resolution of this battle. This is something that I know that I have had a strong tendency to struggle with in my love of these kinds of tales, which includes my current obsession with “Buffy,” when I advocate for nonviolence in my surrounding world.
I have made sense of this in my own sense of ethics by realizing that I do not like what I consider “realistic” portrayals of violence. To me, this means that I tend to handle it better when one of the characters involved are not human, but happens to be something like a vampire, an evil witch or any other fictitious creature (at least to our own sense of awareness). And I generally prefer a comic portrayal of a sword fight or a fist fight over the use of guns and bombs. There is something that is more artistic about this on the screen as it has a lot more dance-type moves. Because when I observe these more dance type moves, it seems like something that can be portrayed on the stage as well.
In considering the stage, it makes me also think of some of the decisions that I had made about my life in my youth that I found to be incredibly ethical decisions for me at the time. You see, I had done a lot of theater when I was in junior high and high school and I have a deep respect for good theatrical movement as a result. I was always taking acting classes and I performed in a numerous amounts of plays. I found that I loved it quite a bit. I loved the process of bringing a story to life before an audience. Even though I tended to be exhausted afterwards, it really did thrill me quite a bit. Initially because I had a lot of enthusiasm for theater as a teenager and encouragement to pursue it, I strongly considered being a theater major in college initially. There were a lot of reasons why I decided not to pursue theater professionally even though my love of it has never gone away, which is why I never wound up taking a single theater class in college.
In my mind, there were some very ethical decisions not to do this. To begin with, I wanted to be a strong role model for young women and felt that the images of empowered women in plays and movies are incredibly minimal, even though I love many of these stories for one reason or another. My other ethical argument against this was that I did not want to join the masses of people who were hoping to break into show business somehow who often were unemployed and/or living in poverty when they were dreaming of making it on stage. I was privileged to receive a college education at a good liberal arts school, and I wanted to do something that would enable me to make more of a difference in my surrounding world.
My problem? My other strong interests were in literature and creative writing, and I found that I spent a lot of time on vocal music because it was both enjoyable and easy for me. The thing is that these were other strong artistic pursuits which left me back to the ethical dilemma of my economical argument that I had before in pursuing anything in the arts professionally. And while I found these pursuits to be very spiritually rich for me, I did not feel like I was contributing anything good back to society either as I had no desire to teach in the arts.
I finally ended in a sociology major because I felt like I was really exploring issues of poverty, racism, and injustice in more detail in my sociology classes than I was able to in any of my other classes. These were the issues that I felt like I ought to be pursuing with an undergraduate degree. I think that on one hand, it really was a vocational calling to be dealing with justice issues more directly. On the other hand, I found this to be an ethical issue as well. It was an ethical imperative for me that these were issues that I had the tools to really explore these issues of inequality in our culture. I guess that I had a deep sense of utilitarianism in me, as I wanted to find something that not only I enjoyed, but also could benefit more people than just myself in the long run no matter what I did with this degree.
After I settled on a sociology major, I started to pick up a music minor for my own pleasure and to be very active with Amnesty International because of this imperative and sense of urgency I felt to be addressing issues of inequality in our world. However this was around the same semester that September 11th occurred. I did view this as a great tragedy to our nation. However, I had a dream a few nights before September 11th, where I saw some buildings tumbling to the ground and I was helpless as to what I could do. In the background, I heard a commanding, gentle voice telling me these words over and over again, “TELL MY PEOPLE I AM A GOD OF PEACE.” Unfortunately, this was not a popular opinion, but it was one that I felt mandated to bring because of the dream I had. It was then that I found another reason to stop the intensity that I had with my music books, as I realized that my voice was still being used, but in a way that I had not expected.
After that, working for justice and peace became a really central piece of my life. It came with some high consequences of my losing some supportive friends who did not like how far I took this, and it caused me to break off an engagement and while I did pursue some interesting projects, they were not always the kinds of things that tended to land employment right away.
I still struggle with a lot of the same questions now as I did then in asking questions as to whether products are fairly traded, what various companies practices are, ecological effects of driving my car, stressing nonviolent conflict resolution, etc. However, while I still have these same ethics, I feel like I approach them a lot differently now than I did when I was in college. I really feel like in college and in my early twenties I made sure that MY perspective was heard and I did have a strong tendency towards self righteousness in the way that I did live up to my own sense of what was right. In a way, I think the rest of the world seemed “wrong.”
I jump ahead 6 years later now since I have graduated from college. I do not want to talk about it in detail, but not long after college I had a near death experience in a car accident and I was completely disabled for a period of time. In this time, I had to depend a lot on other people and I was determined not to let my disabled body make me be a negative person. Maybe that is one of the things that transformed my ways of approaching these kinds of issues quite a bit, as I found myself committed to building bridges with all of the people surrounding me, not just the people who seemed to think like me.
Also since then, I have grown into this sense of really wanting to serve in parish ministry, which affirms this need to build bridges with people as well. I think that deliberating ethical ramifications of things like the products that I buy, my environmental impact on this earth and being a voice against violence in this world is important to the way that I deliberate my place in the world. However, I do not view it my role in pastoral ministry to impose my own opinion on other people, but to find ways to help people deliberate these issues out. If they come to similar conclusions that I have, then I think that finding ways to take action as a congregation is appropriate. But I realize that there is a diversity of opinions that people can have as well, and I have come to have a deep reverence and acceptance for these varieties of opinions.
And as my heart has grown to accept a large variety of opinions on difficult issues, I have found that I have been able to revisit parts of myself from a different ethical perspective than I did before. It leaves room in my life for a perspective that includes speaking against war and violence in our world and an obsession with “Buffy the Vampire Slayer.”

SLOWING DOWN ON THE STREET

I am doing a course on evangelism at the Pacific School of Religion this week for January term. Tomorrow is the last day of class already! I will probably share more about the course and J-term at the end of the week on this blog. However, I thought that my paper for tomorrow may be of interest on this blog as it involved observing a setting and trying to figure out how we would think of doing evangelism in this particular setting.

SLOWING DOWN ON THE STREET:

BRINGING GOD’S WORD OUTSIDE THE DOWNTOWN BERKELEY BART

I lingered outside of the BART in the downtown Berkeley area. It was still chilly out from the rain earlier today. To warm myself up, I bought myself a cup of tea from Tully’s, which is the coffee shop that is right outside the BART area. I was tempted to work on my reading for class for the day during this time but opted not to, as I wanted to fully enjoy what was going on around me. I felt drawn to hang out down there to observe for this project because just the previous weekend I went down to this part of town to go to the movies. On the way to the movies, I briefly talked with a homeless man and then another woman stopped me, wanting to know where I had purchased my shoes because she really liked them. These varied interchanges that I had last weekend made me intrigued to see what kind of conclusions I would come to for this assignment just hanging out on the street downtown.

One of the very first things that I noticed was a rose sitting on top of a garbage can. That seems like the last place you would expect to find something so beautiful. And yet I realized that I usually get caught up in the busy-ness that goes around the area in my own way, so it seemed metaphorical to some of the things that I found myself able to observe in the downtown area.

I saw several people in wheelchairs, one woman who I found by herself. There were school aged children heading from the BART, there were university students heading toward the BART. There were people who were rushing to work, there were people who were rushing home from work. There were people who had used the BART to get downtown to enjoy the various businesses that are in the area, as there are many fun shops and restaurants in the area. I heard people speak in different languages, I observed people who were in wheelchairs. While the destination they were heading to and the social location in which that they were coming from was all visibly different, these facts remained the same: most of them used the BART for their transportation, whether it was out of convenience in not wanting to park in downtown Berkeley or out of not having the economic means to have a car. But they shared this means of transporting themselves in common. The other thing that they seemed to share in common is a sense of rushing from one thing to the next.

The good news that this setting makes me think of is how God’s love is for everyone. It does not matter what the color of your skin is, how much money you make, where you are heading, or how important or unimportant society makes you feel. God loves everyone equally. But how often within a crowd of people do we really notice each other? How often when people are approached on the street it is for money or to sign on to a cause? What if someone stopped them on the street, not to do any of these things but to let them know that God loves them? What if someone really listened when asking “how are you” instead of having it be a form of greeting! This is a way that an evangelist could operate on the street! There was a man selling flowers on the corner of the street, what if someone were to buy flowers from him and to pass them out to anyone along with the message that God loves them? It could come along with no requests for money, and no requests to make anyone do anything. Because that is what the Lutheran understanding of what God’s grace for us through Jesus is! Questions that people may have about this could lead to being moments of sharing more of the story of Jesus or an invitation to church.

However, this was only one of the observations that I found that I had hanging out around the downtown BART station. There were two young men who were in their twenties who were playing music outside the BART station. It struck me that this is the most that I ever heard anyone play on the street. It usually is because I either pass them by and only catch part of what they are doing or because if I do stop, it is only for one song. I observed that this is the pattern in which most people took doing this as well. I realize that I received a good portion of a concert just hanging out in the street as well. It seemed reminiscent of the rose that I had found earlier in such an unexpected place in the regards that I was hearing something beautiful. The Holy Spirit often works through our own creations of art, poetry and music. This is a reminder of how beautiful God has made the world surrounding us.

In terms of the evangelism that I thought would be potentially pertinent in this particular situation, I could not help but think that it would be really powerful if someone just stopped and listened to the music a street performer did for more than just a song. I wasn’t a visible audience, however in terms of evangelism, what if someone sat down and just listened to them for the rest of the duration when they were playing? One of the songs that I heard them play, the singer kept singing “you don’t know my name” over and over again. And I found it ironic that people just kept walking by when he was singing this. It made me think of the Simon and Garfunkel’s line “people hearing without listening” in their “Song of Silence.” It was as though that noise was something they could deal with, but did they understand the underlying message? Did they really get it?

I would like to think that if someone just lingered and listened to a performer for an entire afternoon, that they would learn their name and maybe some of the stories behind the music. The most that they get from people is spare change, not a captive audience. And an evangelist that could do this could share their own story, possibly building bridges between what was being said in these stories and in these songs. There is one who not only knows each of our names, but the number of hairs on our head. This is God who loves them so much! If the performer wanted to be compensated for having someone listen to them that much, maybe an invitation for more conversation over lunch or coffee would be a wonderful way to build a relationship.

The other person I observed was a homeless man selling the Streetwise newspaper on the corner of the street. I made sure to give him my spare dollar in exchange for the Streetwise. Upon observing him, I went and sought him out specifically to get Streetwise. Then as I observed the other things going on around me, I kept noticing him in the corner of my eye. He was persistent in talking to people, in acknowledgement of the economy I heard him telling people that no matter how little they could give for Streetwise he would take. I observed that few people gave him any money. The more I observed this, the more concerned that I felt that he would be able to eat. I wanted to make sure that he would be able to eat dinner before I left the downtown area, but I lost track of him.

This made me think of something that I know a friend of mine had done before, which is going out into the streets and inviting homeless people to go to lunch with him. Why couldn’t this be a form of evangelism? This could be a way to really get to know what the homeless person’s experience is and they would become more of a person instead of someone who received your leftover quarter. This could also be a way to share the fact that God loves them too. As a young woman, however, I have been advised listen to my gut feelings in terms of keeping myself safe. The fine line I walk is while I do not want to act discriminatory, listening to my instincts is important when it comes to keeping myself safe in surviving the city on my own. So I think that this kind of evangelism opportunity would be best done in pairs to be smart about this. Being in pairs to do this would reduce the personal risk factor and increase the amount of people who are showing compassion towards a homeless person. I think that this could be a very powerful experience in terms of sharing God’s love and hearing about another person’s experience of being on the margins of our culture.

The last thing I observed was a sign right outside the BART that read “Marriage is the important means of establishing God’s kingdom on earth. This is done through sexual purity before marriage and absolute sex after marriage.” My initial instinct from this sign was that God’s kingdom was here amongst everything I had just seen, whether it was a homeless man, the street performers or the various people running to and from the BART. I seriously thought as though I was seeing the beauty of God’s creation around me, and the tension between that beauty now and the justice that needs to occur for even more of the kingdom to be fulfilled on earth so that no one feels marginalized. I found myself heading to the sign as it had more information, another man was reading the same information. He turned to me and said, “I bet these people are not supportive of same sex marriage,” then he walked away. Then it hit me: even though this is not a theology I personally endorse, right outside the BART is a great place to put a sign to get someone’s attention. Clearly even though this man and I did not view it favorably, we at least took the time to look at it and see what was there. What if a sign was there for a Lutheran church that emphasized God’s amazing love for the world? At least the location would receive more attention.

It was not long after this that my mint tea was gone, and I realized the two hours had flown by. I also realized that there were a variety of ways that I thought about being an evangelist on this street corner in ways that seemed rather simple: through putting a sign up, through inviting a homeless man to lunch, through taking time to listen at length to a street performer and through simply telling people on the streets that God loves them. And yet, I think I would find if I were to attempt to implement any of these I would feel nervous because I realize how radical this message of God’s love for the world really is. Yet it would need to be implemented radically too, as it would involve slowing down on the street to really notice the roses on the garbage cans in addition to really taking the time to notice people.