Today, I was officially received into the Episcopal church, along with three Catholic women from the congregation who'd been around about the same amount of time as I have - one for a few months longer, two for a few months less. Because it was the Bishop's visit (the only time folks can be received into the church, essentially, is by a bishop), we had two candle-bearers; because reasons I don't know, I was one of them. It was, for the most part, a pretty normal service; we bore the candles up the center aisle, my partner forgot to blow hers out (this is why she wants me doing this job more often), the bishop carried a long crook and wore a mitre, because reasons I don't know. I don't remember much about the last bishop's visit, last year - I'd only joined the church a few months prior, and was still learning the liturgy. Anyway. He preached a sermon, discussing the meeting of the House of Bishops in Taiwan, and linking up the various lessons. We were off-beat and uneven, carrying the candles for the gospel procession. It didn't matter - I think we notice that far more than anyone watching.
It threw me, slightly, that we were presented as "These four baptized Christians," for some reason - partly because it was followed by a renewal of our Baptismal covenant. I've said this one before, at... well, at Baptisms, twice. But when I was baptized, I did not say it; nor did anyone else. I remember it well. I was asked a question - something, probably, along the lines of "Do you believe in God? Will you obey Him and serve His will?" I remember something about asking if I understood what this meant. I said yes, but I did not. I'm still not sure I do, but that's not what this covenant asks. It's comforting, really. It doesn't ask us if we understand; it doesn't ask us to be perfect. It asks us to renounce evil. It asks us to live out the Love of God. And it asks those around us, our church family, to support us in that, which is a covenant that breaks my heart, a little. I have never felt so loved as I do here.
That's really what strikes me about this church - the idea of family. It comes home a lot harder after the events of the summer. I am a fucked up person, a person who has stumbled and fallen, a person who is weak in some ways that I cannot recover. I am an addict*; the terms that come to mind, from the neo-Puritan mindset, are things like "filth," and "sin," and so on. That's a truth I cannot hide from. But... it doesn't change some things. God loves me no less for my weakness; my church family loves me no less for my sins. My soul is not refused at the door, nor my heart at the altar, because I am not perfect; that is, in some ways, what being the body of Christ means. We're covered, essentially, in something far greater than ourselves, and given the grace, as we are able, to live into that.
(After that service, there was the Blessing of the Animals, to celebrate St. Francis of Assisi's Day, in the park. So that was cool too.)
*More on that later, in some post when I'm feeling a bit stronger. That's partly why I haven't been blogging so much - I've been journaling instead.
Sunday, October 5, 2014
Monday, March 3, 2014
On Denominations
There was a somewhat lengthy post on denominations, and why they matter to me, but it seems to have vanished into the space between backpacks, pockets, desk, and floor. That doesn't happen often these days, so I can't complain when it happens to a blog post inked in rough, since it used to be important term papers that would go missing. But here, let's see what I remember...
In a recent email exchange, someone mentioned that they'd never seen the point in different denominations - what was the difference, after all, between one large church on a street, and two small ones? I explained in brief what I meant, before the topic moved elsewhere, but it is something I think about, so I figure it's about time I talk here. As with most theological subjects, the subject of denominational splits has been addressed at length elsewhere by wiser and Godlier folk than I, but as with most subjects, that's hardly going to stop me putting my oar in.
Regardless of whether our church is doing Morning Prayer or Eucharist in service, the creed we recite after the Thanksgivings closes with some affirmation of "one holy catholic Church." Curious, in the first or second week after I started attending service, I looked up the word "catholic," to find out what it meant outside of the Roman Catholic church (or maybe I asked our rector; I don't recall). Basically, it means the entire communion of Christians - we are one people. Sort of. It's complicated.
But that brings up the question, of course, in the afore-mentioned email. If we are all one church, why go to separate buildings to worship? Why allow the divisions? Why remain a people divided - are we not all God's children?
So, let me go through my own background here. I was raised in a Baptist church - and I mean the conservative, Southern-in-the-North, Jesus-drank-grape-juice, my-wife's-hair-is-longer-than-your-wife's, kind of church, where "ah-men" versus "ey-men" is a serious theological concern. The kind of Baptist that all but deifies the Mennonites. I joke that my parents thought the problem with the Puritans were that they just weren't uptight enough - but I'm only half joking. So there's one denomination - the Baptists. They run the spectrum, of course - my best beloved attended a far saner Baptist church, but "...*head shake*, Baptists." is still a joke between us.
Later on in life, after a messy, painful set of traumas, my family wound up at a Pentecostal church. Still fairly conservative, but also quite entrenched in the Charismatic style of worship. After being told all my life that "speaking in tongues" was of the devil, a misunderstood reading of the Pentecost and certainly not something Christians should stand for, it was... unsettling, to suddenly be yanked into that tradition, and told that no, this is what we believe now, this is right, this is godly, this is a Gift that should be celebrated. That, and despite being fairly conservative (especially for the Northeast), the people were still far, far left of my parents' former stances. Women sometimes wore pants! And everyone was okay with this! Modern slang was frequent, and they used a modern translation, which absolutely confused the hell out of me (no pun intended).
It was not the safe, secure, home that I was used to. In hindsight, it was probably necessary for my spiritual development to be pulled out of the womb-like environment of my first childhood home, but at the time, it was extraordinarily upsetting. But here, I'm getting off-track - let me fast-forward, through the years I spent researching syncretistic Christianity, and Shamanism, and the discovery of walking as meditation, as prayer, and the rediscovery of being honest with God in prayer, painful and angry and disillusioned at night by the running stream, past the single time I tried to return to the Church by way of the Congregationalists, was quickly fed up with the watered-down, suburban-normalcy-morals, lack of theology, or the time, many years later, that I tried to return to the Baptists, and nearly broke down in the face of the hostile, defensive, angry theology that very carefully excluded all me and mine from their Holy Community.
Last summer, I dallied on the doorstep of an Episcopal church - not a grand cathedral, but a little wooden building, one large window, opaque, on the eastern side, by the side door (frequently mistaken for, and used more often than, the front door). I could hear an organ start, inside, and I took a hesitant step, and stopped, remembering the pain of rejection, the anger at God and man, feeling more turmoil than I could remember in years. Organ music? This place is fancy - and I'm late. I should probably - should I go around to the other door? A woman got out of her car, behind me, and took a moment to pull her cane out. She greeted me cheerfully, saying she was often late to services, and I walked down the path with her and held the door. She whispered me through the liturgy, which confused, terrified, and exhilarated me. I walked up with her to the altar for Communion, not sure what to do, and crossed my arms, terrified of opening myself to that sacrament.
The homily, though, is what I remember. I have been through the Prayers of the People, sung the Doxology, grinned joyfully through the Birthday Prayer, and called in unison, "And also with you!" enough that I do not remember stumbling through them, though stumble I surely did, that first day. What I remember is sitting up, paying attention, as our rector talked about evils, modern evils, and paused, at one point, to say, "The evils of today are different than the evils they had back then." (I'm not going to remember his exact words.) I nearly wept, feeling my shoulders slump in preparation for the inevitable condemnation: Women who speak out, abortions, homosexuality, transgender people, boys who defile their souls, and girls who defile their bodies. I'd heard it so, so many times. Why did I bother coming here, to open my heart to this hurt one more time?
And then he continued, "Homelessness. Drug addiction. Poverty. The ever-widening gap between the very rich, and the poor..." and my heart about stopped.
Fast-forward through the next week, wherein I faced one of the worst suicidal episodes of my life and found myself nearly broken in two in his office, carrying a burden of pain and guilt and shame and hurt and fear, and being told, for the first time in my life, that guilt was no reason to keep living, that I should not carry on because death would be a waste of the gifts of God (though it would), but that I should choose life because to go on living, to serve the Lord with the gifts I have been given, would be a delight. To be told that he had stood where I was standing, young and queer and full of pain and fear, and survived; that I could choose light.
I'm getting off-topic again. This is not a story about why I am Episcopalian - but it is. Because in the theological book study this priest organized this past winter, there is a woman who attends who is a Unitarian Universalist minister, a staunch atheist. She has very, very good reasons for having left the church. Because there is a girl who attended one service, the friend (or girlfriend, I think) of our cantor and organist, who could barely make it through the liturgy, because she had been so badly hurt by the Episcopal church in the past. Because there is a group of Methodist folks on campus here who meet weekly, and sing modern contemporary songs of praise, and sit in a circle and share worship, and although they are all very lovely, very loving, very kind and wonderful people, my heart panics in that setting with the buried pain of old services like that.
Marcus Borg writes about "thin places," the places where the line that separates us from the Divine is thinner, somehow. For me, the liturgies of the Episcopal church are such places. The Sacrament of Eucharist is - as it should be, I imagine - a thin place. My heart sings, for the antiphon and the communion hymn and the Prayers of the People. But there are people for whom all that is empty ritual, rote, dry, repetitive nonsense. There are people for whom a call-and-response service, a charismatic church, speaking in tongues, are all ways to God, and organ music puts them to sleep. There are people who cannot bear to be in the walls of a church - any church - who meditate in temples and on mountains. And they can worship down the street from the Episcopal church, and I will meet them in the street and call them brethren, and I do believe that we are part of this one holy catholic Church, regardless of how we worship...
...but that doesn't make those differences any less important for those of us who follow them.
In a recent email exchange, someone mentioned that they'd never seen the point in different denominations - what was the difference, after all, between one large church on a street, and two small ones? I explained in brief what I meant, before the topic moved elsewhere, but it is something I think about, so I figure it's about time I talk here. As with most theological subjects, the subject of denominational splits has been addressed at length elsewhere by wiser and Godlier folk than I, but as with most subjects, that's hardly going to stop me putting my oar in.
Regardless of whether our church is doing Morning Prayer or Eucharist in service, the creed we recite after the Thanksgivings closes with some affirmation of "one holy catholic Church." Curious, in the first or second week after I started attending service, I looked up the word "catholic," to find out what it meant outside of the Roman Catholic church (or maybe I asked our rector; I don't recall). Basically, it means the entire communion of Christians - we are one people. Sort of. It's complicated.
But that brings up the question, of course, in the afore-mentioned email. If we are all one church, why go to separate buildings to worship? Why allow the divisions? Why remain a people divided - are we not all God's children?
So, let me go through my own background here. I was raised in a Baptist church - and I mean the conservative, Southern-in-the-North, Jesus-drank-grape-juice, my-wife's-hair-is-longer-than-your-wife's, kind of church, where "ah-men" versus "ey-men" is a serious theological concern. The kind of Baptist that all but deifies the Mennonites. I joke that my parents thought the problem with the Puritans were that they just weren't uptight enough - but I'm only half joking. So there's one denomination - the Baptists. They run the spectrum, of course - my best beloved attended a far saner Baptist church, but "...*head shake*, Baptists." is still a joke between us.
Later on in life, after a messy, painful set of traumas, my family wound up at a Pentecostal church. Still fairly conservative, but also quite entrenched in the Charismatic style of worship. After being told all my life that "speaking in tongues" was of the devil, a misunderstood reading of the Pentecost and certainly not something Christians should stand for, it was... unsettling, to suddenly be yanked into that tradition, and told that no, this is what we believe now, this is right, this is godly, this is a Gift that should be celebrated. That, and despite being fairly conservative (especially for the Northeast), the people were still far, far left of my parents' former stances. Women sometimes wore pants! And everyone was okay with this! Modern slang was frequent, and they used a modern translation, which absolutely confused the hell out of me (no pun intended).
It was not the safe, secure, home that I was used to. In hindsight, it was probably necessary for my spiritual development to be pulled out of the womb-like environment of my first childhood home, but at the time, it was extraordinarily upsetting. But here, I'm getting off-track - let me fast-forward, through the years I spent researching syncretistic Christianity, and Shamanism, and the discovery of walking as meditation, as prayer, and the rediscovery of being honest with God in prayer, painful and angry and disillusioned at night by the running stream, past the single time I tried to return to the Church by way of the Congregationalists, was quickly fed up with the watered-down, suburban-normalcy-morals, lack of theology, or the time, many years later, that I tried to return to the Baptists, and nearly broke down in the face of the hostile, defensive, angry theology that very carefully excluded all me and mine from their Holy Community.
Last summer, I dallied on the doorstep of an Episcopal church - not a grand cathedral, but a little wooden building, one large window, opaque, on the eastern side, by the side door (frequently mistaken for, and used more often than, the front door). I could hear an organ start, inside, and I took a hesitant step, and stopped, remembering the pain of rejection, the anger at God and man, feeling more turmoil than I could remember in years. Organ music? This place is fancy - and I'm late. I should probably - should I go around to the other door? A woman got out of her car, behind me, and took a moment to pull her cane out. She greeted me cheerfully, saying she was often late to services, and I walked down the path with her and held the door. She whispered me through the liturgy, which confused, terrified, and exhilarated me. I walked up with her to the altar for Communion, not sure what to do, and crossed my arms, terrified of opening myself to that sacrament.
The homily, though, is what I remember. I have been through the Prayers of the People, sung the Doxology, grinned joyfully through the Birthday Prayer, and called in unison, "And also with you!" enough that I do not remember stumbling through them, though stumble I surely did, that first day. What I remember is sitting up, paying attention, as our rector talked about evils, modern evils, and paused, at one point, to say, "The evils of today are different than the evils they had back then." (I'm not going to remember his exact words.) I nearly wept, feeling my shoulders slump in preparation for the inevitable condemnation: Women who speak out, abortions, homosexuality, transgender people, boys who defile their souls, and girls who defile their bodies. I'd heard it so, so many times. Why did I bother coming here, to open my heart to this hurt one more time?
And then he continued, "Homelessness. Drug addiction. Poverty. The ever-widening gap between the very rich, and the poor..." and my heart about stopped.
Fast-forward through the next week, wherein I faced one of the worst suicidal episodes of my life and found myself nearly broken in two in his office, carrying a burden of pain and guilt and shame and hurt and fear, and being told, for the first time in my life, that guilt was no reason to keep living, that I should not carry on because death would be a waste of the gifts of God (though it would), but that I should choose life because to go on living, to serve the Lord with the gifts I have been given, would be a delight. To be told that he had stood where I was standing, young and queer and full of pain and fear, and survived; that I could choose light.
I'm getting off-topic again. This is not a story about why I am Episcopalian - but it is. Because in the theological book study this priest organized this past winter, there is a woman who attends who is a Unitarian Universalist minister, a staunch atheist. She has very, very good reasons for having left the church. Because there is a girl who attended one service, the friend (or girlfriend, I think) of our cantor and organist, who could barely make it through the liturgy, because she had been so badly hurt by the Episcopal church in the past. Because there is a group of Methodist folks on campus here who meet weekly, and sing modern contemporary songs of praise, and sit in a circle and share worship, and although they are all very lovely, very loving, very kind and wonderful people, my heart panics in that setting with the buried pain of old services like that.
Marcus Borg writes about "thin places," the places where the line that separates us from the Divine is thinner, somehow. For me, the liturgies of the Episcopal church are such places. The Sacrament of Eucharist is - as it should be, I imagine - a thin place. My heart sings, for the antiphon and the communion hymn and the Prayers of the People. But there are people for whom all that is empty ritual, rote, dry, repetitive nonsense. There are people for whom a call-and-response service, a charismatic church, speaking in tongues, are all ways to God, and organ music puts them to sleep. There are people who cannot bear to be in the walls of a church - any church - who meditate in temples and on mountains. And they can worship down the street from the Episcopal church, and I will meet them in the street and call them brethren, and I do believe that we are part of this one holy catholic Church, regardless of how we worship...
...but that doesn't make those differences any less important for those of us who follow them.
Sunday, January 26, 2014
Repent does not mean... well, repent.
Today's sermon talked about the importance of the metaphor of "fishers of men people," and then I learned a thing that has changed my understanding of the Gospel and the New Testament as a whole completely.
Metanoia does not mean "repent." It doesn't mean to be sorry for sins you have committed; the meanings aren't even in the same area code. This isn't even one of those debatable, "maybe it does, maybe it doesn't," things, it's a deliberate continuing error that the Church picked up on around 1000CE and just kept up because it fit in nicely with their Shame And Guilt drumbeat, and I can't even be that angry (yet) because I'm too busy being amazed.
It means something like a metamorphosis - a change in heart, a new direction, a new way of seeing. This makes so much more sense.
So, our rector told us, when you read the word "repent" in the Bible, don't say repent - don't think of sorrow, shame, guilt. Say, instead, to change your heart and mind from the inside. We should not be trying to be Christians out of shame and guilt, but out of love for God and each other. ...and, well, that's the point, isn't it?
To follow Christ - to find the Way. To change, from and into love.
I'd say more, but I think I have to go reread the entirety of the New Testament now.
(though let me just say that I am so immensely gladdened to continually be unburdened of the "KJV is Only True Word" mess. the world and the Word are so much bigger when you can actually see them.)
Metanoia does not mean "repent." It doesn't mean to be sorry for sins you have committed; the meanings aren't even in the same area code. This isn't even one of those debatable, "maybe it does, maybe it doesn't," things, it's a deliberate continuing error that the Church picked up on around 1000CE and just kept up because it fit in nicely with their Shame And Guilt drumbeat, and I can't even be that angry (yet) because I'm too busy being amazed.
It means something like a metamorphosis - a change in heart, a new direction, a new way of seeing. This makes so much more sense.
So, our rector told us, when you read the word "repent" in the Bible, don't say repent - don't think of sorrow, shame, guilt. Say, instead, to change your heart and mind from the inside. We should not be trying to be Christians out of shame and guilt, but out of love for God and each other. ...and, well, that's the point, isn't it?
To follow Christ - to find the Way. To change, from and into love.
I'd say more, but I think I have to go reread the entirety of the New Testament now.
(though let me just say that I am so immensely gladdened to continually be unburdened of the "KJV is Only True Word" mess. the world and the Word are so much bigger when you can actually see them.)
Wednesday, January 22, 2014
Suicide remains not an option.
It seems like this week, I've been surrounded on all sides by discussion about suicide. I don't know why; my usual response in situations like this is to bitch at God. Sunday, talking to folks after church, the overall conclusion of one woman was that everyone thinks about suicide at some point, just most of us don't get to the actual contemplating doing it stage. Which is where I smiled and nodded and didn't make eye contact.
Sunday night, my assistant editor told me he'd found statistics on the attempted suicide rates of trans folk as opposed to the general population: 41% (and that doesn't count successes or closeted-to-pollsters)... to 1.6% of the general population. It was the second number that staggered me. Seriously? Only one point six percent of "normal" people have tried to kill themselves? I found myself filled with something like desperate, angry, weeping jealousy. I literally cannot wrap my mind around the idea of going through life without ever thinking seriously about suicide, without having at least come close to trying it. I can't imagine life without the refrain of "kill yourself / kill yourself / kill yourself" fading in and out of the background noise. I don't understand how people can lead lives so good death never looks like an option.
In fact, my first thought was "Wait, that can't be right, I mean, after all I certainly-- oh, right." I keep forgetting where I do and don't fall into General Populace numbers.
It keeps coming up in class; art history, seems like we talked more about suicide than penises, for once. (Native history, on the other hand, we talked about how the French Jesuits were basically awesome (especially compared to the Spanish, but then, Daleks don't come off so bad compared to the conquistadores, let's be honest). We also had one kid insist that Catholics weren't actually Christians, so that was fun.)
Yesterday was the weird one, because it popped up that the only way I could extricate myself from the community of love and support that appears to have grown into existence all around me would be by death, somehow. (I briefly became convinced that I had Screwed Everything Up and needed to leave before people got mad at me. Look, I don't run my own consciousness, I just keep a record. The moment passed.) It was a bit frustrating to look down that wall again, knowing full well I couldn't do it, and be unable to beat my fists against it...
I don't even cut anymore. The closest I come these days is when my fingernails start digging against my hands when I feel like shit in a social situation where it's impossible to run and hide or yell at God. (Look, it's hard to say things like "Respectability is bullshit" while surrounded by respectable people, especially people you actually respect. But I don't know how to say "The reason I never felt welcome in the church is because it has such a stigma of being a place where well-dressed, well-polished, respectable people are. And those people don't like me. You people aren't the kind of people who approve of my kind of people." Especially because, that's the thing, they do. The dude leading the theology class is my kind of people! He's the furthest thing from respectable (once you get to know him, anyway), and yet commands respect. Church people are my people, mainly because these folks are those strange types of persons who open their hearts to just about everyone who crosses their path, and I think that's the point, but it still staggers me.
Bah, I don't know. The point is, I seem to have managed to get rid of my crutches of self-destruction, and there are enormous parts of my system that are whining, hard about that, and they keep reminding me they're there, and look, sometimes I just want to go back to the cold comfort of being alone and unloved, but I can't. I can't go back to snarling into a cold ice storm that I'm all alone and I don't give a damn what you do to me. I can't go back to burning and cutting myself as an outlet, I can't go back to staying up all night and punching trees until it hurts, wandering the streets crying out to the stars alone.
See, all that melodramatic posturing (yes, of course I know how melodramatic it was) was in reaction to the acute pain and loneliness of being... well, me, in a world that I knew didn't want me. And, as it turns out, that's something of an illusion. Even if I turned my back on the community of Grace (tough to do, even as an act of imagination), that feeling of love, of being accepted and... loved, for who I am, that doesn't go away. It's like ever since I finally opened my heart and found out God actually loved me after all, I can't go back to ignoring Him. It's really hard to extricate yourself from love, once that love is there. I imagine it could probably be done, but it would actually hurt way worse than the other normal oh-hi-mental-illness pain. And, let's face it - pulsing urge to slam my fists into a brick wall notwithstanding, my stomach for needless, pointless pain is just about gone. Damn it.
But I gotta say, having suicide as a concept waved in my face all the time is getting a little old.
Sunday night, my assistant editor told me he'd found statistics on the attempted suicide rates of trans folk as opposed to the general population: 41% (and that doesn't count successes or closeted-to-pollsters)... to 1.6% of the general population. It was the second number that staggered me. Seriously? Only one point six percent of "normal" people have tried to kill themselves? I found myself filled with something like desperate, angry, weeping jealousy. I literally cannot wrap my mind around the idea of going through life without ever thinking seriously about suicide, without having at least come close to trying it. I can't imagine life without the refrain of "kill yourself / kill yourself / kill yourself" fading in and out of the background noise. I don't understand how people can lead lives so good death never looks like an option.
In fact, my first thought was "Wait, that can't be right, I mean, after all I certainly-- oh, right." I keep forgetting where I do and don't fall into General Populace numbers.
It keeps coming up in class; art history, seems like we talked more about suicide than penises, for once. (Native history, on the other hand, we talked about how the French Jesuits were basically awesome (especially compared to the Spanish, but then, Daleks don't come off so bad compared to the conquistadores, let's be honest). We also had one kid insist that Catholics weren't actually Christians, so that was fun.)
Yesterday was the weird one, because it popped up that the only way I could extricate myself from the community of love and support that appears to have grown into existence all around me would be by death, somehow. (I briefly became convinced that I had Screwed Everything Up and needed to leave before people got mad at me. Look, I don't run my own consciousness, I just keep a record. The moment passed.) It was a bit frustrating to look down that wall again, knowing full well I couldn't do it, and be unable to beat my fists against it...
I don't even cut anymore. The closest I come these days is when my fingernails start digging against my hands when I feel like shit in a social situation where it's impossible to run and hide or yell at God. (Look, it's hard to say things like "Respectability is bullshit" while surrounded by respectable people, especially people you actually respect. But I don't know how to say "The reason I never felt welcome in the church is because it has such a stigma of being a place where well-dressed, well-polished, respectable people are. And those people don't like me. You people aren't the kind of people who approve of my kind of people." Especially because, that's the thing, they do. The dude leading the theology class is my kind of people! He's the furthest thing from respectable (once you get to know him, anyway), and yet commands respect. Church people are my people, mainly because these folks are those strange types of persons who open their hearts to just about everyone who crosses their path, and I think that's the point, but it still staggers me.
Bah, I don't know. The point is, I seem to have managed to get rid of my crutches of self-destruction, and there are enormous parts of my system that are whining, hard about that, and they keep reminding me they're there, and look, sometimes I just want to go back to the cold comfort of being alone and unloved, but I can't. I can't go back to snarling into a cold ice storm that I'm all alone and I don't give a damn what you do to me. I can't go back to burning and cutting myself as an outlet, I can't go back to staying up all night and punching trees until it hurts, wandering the streets crying out to the stars alone.
See, all that melodramatic posturing (yes, of course I know how melodramatic it was) was in reaction to the acute pain and loneliness of being... well, me, in a world that I knew didn't want me. And, as it turns out, that's something of an illusion. Even if I turned my back on the community of Grace (tough to do, even as an act of imagination), that feeling of love, of being accepted and... loved, for who I am, that doesn't go away. It's like ever since I finally opened my heart and found out God actually loved me after all, I can't go back to ignoring Him. It's really hard to extricate yourself from love, once that love is there. I imagine it could probably be done, but it would actually hurt way worse than the other normal oh-hi-mental-illness pain. And, let's face it - pulsing urge to slam my fists into a brick wall notwithstanding, my stomach for needless, pointless pain is just about gone. Damn it.
But I gotta say, having suicide as a concept waved in my face all the time is getting a little old.
Monday, January 13, 2014
Coming Out, Christian (or something like that)
A little while back, I told our Editor-in-chief that I'd like to write a column at some point about being a queer Christian. She was enthusiastic, so I started writing. Problem is, I have a lot to say, and I'm not sure how to concisely fit in all the queer issues, all the stuff about acceptance, the basic truth lines about how Christianity is based on accepting the outcasts of society, and not take up three damn pages of the newspaper.
She had what seems like a terrifying solution to that: make it a weekly column! I think I'm going to be a waffly coward and run it by our priest for advice before I actually commit. But I'm seriously considering it.
I can't think of a decent title, but I guess Coming Out Christian is almost alliterative and on-topic enough to work.
So the good news is, if I make this a weekly column, I'll be able to talk about a lot of stuff that I've been thinking about pretty often and hard lately. This is, I apologize, going to be a terribly disorganized blog entry (blame the format: I'm writing it up in Notepad, rather than transcribing a handwritten piece.)
The first thing, of course, is the obvious doctrinal stuff: No, Jesus of Nazareth never had a blessed thing to say about homosexuality (or bisexuality), though if I'm not much mistaken he does acknowledge intersex people being born at some point. (Doesn't he? "Some men are born eunuchs," in answer to one of the tricky questions he's asked by the Pharisees or the Sadducees or somebody in the crowds affiliated with his enemies.) The only people who condemn homosexuality are the authors of Leviticus, who famously also condemn shellfish, mixing fabrics, pork and bacon, cheeseburgers, touching women who are on their periods, drinking mixed wine, crossbreeding animals... the list goes on, and on, and on. You get the picture. And then there's Paul, who... well. Oh, Paul. I have a lot to say about Paul. Most of it isn't stuff I could fit in this column; I feel about him like I feel about C.S. Lewis. Initially, hero-worship, followed by a period of intense pain and loss when I realized how he would've reacted to me, followed by, far later, empathy and great pain for the pain he suffered from his own mind and self-loathing.
I've been there. I don't know if Paul was the first gay Christian. But I am convinced that he was gay (or at least bi, but I lean towards gay, reading him), that he hated himself for it, that he suffered for his lust and his self-loathing and depression. (Bishop John Shelby Spong's book pointed this out to me, and once seen, it cannot be unseen. I recognize in Paul's writings the pain and self-hatred that I have struggled with my whole life, and that's why his work is, at least for me, both so very uncomfortable to read, and sometimes so transcendent. To be reminded, anew, that God still loves us, that we cannot be separated from his Love, is such an immense relief it almost hurts. ANYWAY.) Point is, Paul is a complicated source. Women should not be subservient to their husbands, and should be allowed to speak in church; anyway, Paul contradicts himself a couple times. More on that later.
Then you get into the more metaphorical stuff, out of the realm of literalism. Because, let's face it, if you're not going to step away from the literalism perspective after reading that list, we're never going to see eye to eye anyway, which won't matter much because in order to avoid all those things you are probably going to need to go live on a commune (remember, also in the Bible is the immense importance of kindness to foreigners and strangers!). So we come to the crux, the fact that according to Christ, all the Law and all the prophets hung on two laws, and two laws alone: Love the Lord thy God (with all thy heart, mind, and strength); love thy neighbor as thyself. All the Law. All the prophets. Which means that if a law seems to contradict that, it is wrong. God is Love. I've been through this; we've all been through this. I had a lengthy blog entry years ago dedicated like three pages to this concept alone; books could be filled. The point is, if you look at the meaning of what Jesus Christ of Nazareth was actually saying, it seems to come down to something simple: sin is what you do to other people.
That's about it on the theology, except for the vision of Peter which reminded him that Gentiles were people too, and hey if uncircumcised barbarians could be loved by God, maybe so could lesbians. Who knows.
So then you come to the other part of it, the part where the rap breaks down, everything's tense no one makes a sound, uh. Well, see, I'm androgynous on the outside because I am genderqueer on the inside. I never did get around to figuring out whether I was "really" male or female; when I learned in school that sometimes fetuses start to develop male, and if something goes wrong, they revert to female, I immediately thought, "Oh, so that's what happened to me!" That impression has never left me. And then there's the whole "attracted to a smattering of individuals across all genders," which is even more damning, and the fact that I can't change that. I can't 'fix' it. I tried. It's not going away. And I flat-out refuse to "try" to present myself as something other than what I am. So I am, most likely, going to be making small children and elderly ladies double-take in bathrooms for the rest of my life; I can hope, selfishly, that that's the worst that happens to me and I never get my nose broken by some very angry husband/boyfriend/father. I have the privilege of being mostly-harmless-looking, short and white and nerdy, which means odds are good for me. I know that. I still get scared sometimes. I'm never afraid to walk town at night, nor to duck through alleys on my way home, nor to cut through unlit parks. I am afraid of guys with Confederate flag shirts when I'm coming out of a restaurant or bar bathroom. I am afraid, in a little pit inside of my soul, of how people - especially the more conservative members of my home church - are going to react to this column.
And that, I think, is why I need to write it.
She had what seems like a terrifying solution to that: make it a weekly column! I think I'm going to be a waffly coward and run it by our priest for advice before I actually commit. But I'm seriously considering it.
I can't think of a decent title, but I guess Coming Out Christian is almost alliterative and on-topic enough to work.
So the good news is, if I make this a weekly column, I'll be able to talk about a lot of stuff that I've been thinking about pretty often and hard lately. This is, I apologize, going to be a terribly disorganized blog entry (blame the format: I'm writing it up in Notepad, rather than transcribing a handwritten piece.)
The first thing, of course, is the obvious doctrinal stuff: No, Jesus of Nazareth never had a blessed thing to say about homosexuality (or bisexuality), though if I'm not much mistaken he does acknowledge intersex people being born at some point. (Doesn't he? "Some men are born eunuchs," in answer to one of the tricky questions he's asked by the Pharisees or the Sadducees or somebody in the crowds affiliated with his enemies.) The only people who condemn homosexuality are the authors of Leviticus, who famously also condemn shellfish, mixing fabrics, pork and bacon, cheeseburgers, touching women who are on their periods, drinking mixed wine, crossbreeding animals... the list goes on, and on, and on. You get the picture. And then there's Paul, who... well. Oh, Paul. I have a lot to say about Paul. Most of it isn't stuff I could fit in this column; I feel about him like I feel about C.S. Lewis. Initially, hero-worship, followed by a period of intense pain and loss when I realized how he would've reacted to me, followed by, far later, empathy and great pain for the pain he suffered from his own mind and self-loathing.
I've been there. I don't know if Paul was the first gay Christian. But I am convinced that he was gay (or at least bi, but I lean towards gay, reading him), that he hated himself for it, that he suffered for his lust and his self-loathing and depression. (Bishop John Shelby Spong's book pointed this out to me, and once seen, it cannot be unseen. I recognize in Paul's writings the pain and self-hatred that I have struggled with my whole life, and that's why his work is, at least for me, both so very uncomfortable to read, and sometimes so transcendent. To be reminded, anew, that God still loves us, that we cannot be separated from his Love, is such an immense relief it almost hurts. ANYWAY.) Point is, Paul is a complicated source. Women should not be subservient to their husbands, and should be allowed to speak in church; anyway, Paul contradicts himself a couple times. More on that later.
Then you get into the more metaphorical stuff, out of the realm of literalism. Because, let's face it, if you're not going to step away from the literalism perspective after reading that list, we're never going to see eye to eye anyway, which won't matter much because in order to avoid all those things you are probably going to need to go live on a commune (remember, also in the Bible is the immense importance of kindness to foreigners and strangers!). So we come to the crux, the fact that according to Christ, all the Law and all the prophets hung on two laws, and two laws alone: Love the Lord thy God (with all thy heart, mind, and strength); love thy neighbor as thyself. All the Law. All the prophets. Which means that if a law seems to contradict that, it is wrong. God is Love. I've been through this; we've all been through this. I had a lengthy blog entry years ago dedicated like three pages to this concept alone; books could be filled. The point is, if you look at the meaning of what Jesus Christ of Nazareth was actually saying, it seems to come down to something simple: sin is what you do to other people.
That's about it on the theology, except for the vision of Peter which reminded him that Gentiles were people too, and hey if uncircumcised barbarians could be loved by God, maybe so could lesbians. Who knows.
So then you come to the other part of it, the part where the rap breaks down, everything's tense no one makes a sound, uh. Well, see, I'm androgynous on the outside because I am genderqueer on the inside. I never did get around to figuring out whether I was "really" male or female; when I learned in school that sometimes fetuses start to develop male, and if something goes wrong, they revert to female, I immediately thought, "Oh, so that's what happened to me!" That impression has never left me. And then there's the whole "attracted to a smattering of individuals across all genders," which is even more damning, and the fact that I can't change that. I can't 'fix' it. I tried. It's not going away. And I flat-out refuse to "try" to present myself as something other than what I am. So I am, most likely, going to be making small children and elderly ladies double-take in bathrooms for the rest of my life; I can hope, selfishly, that that's the worst that happens to me and I never get my nose broken by some very angry husband/boyfriend/father. I have the privilege of being mostly-harmless-looking, short and white and nerdy, which means odds are good for me. I know that. I still get scared sometimes. I'm never afraid to walk town at night, nor to duck through alleys on my way home, nor to cut through unlit parks. I am afraid of guys with Confederate flag shirts when I'm coming out of a restaurant or bar bathroom. I am afraid, in a little pit inside of my soul, of how people - especially the more conservative members of my home church - are going to react to this column.
And that, I think, is why I need to write it.
Sunday, January 12, 2014
Theological struggles, and elections, and macaroni
Today the valley is buffeted by strong winds and driving rain, covered all over by fog. I have all the supplies for baked mac'n cheese (I hope), for the Annual Meeting/Potluck tomorrow. But I'm not going to worry. I'm trying not to worry about running for vestry. Reading the sheet of expectations, I kept thinking... "These folks think I am a lot more spiritually mature than I actually am."
But - well - I am praying more than I used to, and perhaps more honestly, too. Our rector lent me this massive brick of a New Oxford Annotated Bible (New Revised Standard), which I've been getting sucked into (!!!). You know I've never read a modern translation before? And - don't get me wrong, I do like archaic English - but I absolutely love reading a translation that's actually written in the language I live in, if that makes sense. And... well, it's not just that it's simpler to understand (in some ways), but also this translation/version feels more honest, and more direct. (I'm probably reading into it a bit.)
So, that and this other book, The Heart of Christianity, by Marcus Borg. I have to say - it was a lot easier being a Fundamentalist. "This is true; everything that contradicts it is not. Believe that and you will be Saved." Now, I think about faith as something alive, I have to look for meaning rather than just accepting literalism. It's not enough to just blindly accept what you're given - this kind of belief has me questioning myself, questioning the Scriptures and their authors, questioning everything.
I'm having to reexamine all the assumptions I had made about life and metaphysical reality. It seems unfair that I somehow internalized all this stuff without, it seems, any conscious consent. Like the doctrine of Hell - I let go of that years ago, but there are still tendrils clinging to my hindbrain that won't be removed.
More insidious, though, and more dangerous, is literalism in the Gospels. This hurts, you see, for it is so very close to the center of my faith. Can I really be a Christian without believing in every miracle in all four Gospels? All of them? Okay. Maybe I can. Embellishment happens. And then - maybe easier, because of the inherent contradiction and the poeticism in the accounts - the Shepherds, the Magi, the kind of awkward shoehorning by the author of Matthew of prophecies wherever he can fit them in.
And then, just when you thought you were safe, we come to the virgin birth. And this hurts, and this is hard, but eventually, I realize that, once again, what matters is the meaning.
And then you hit, for some folks, the resurrection, and that's where I go, "No, no, whatever else I'm letting go of, this is something I believe very truly." I don't know how I feel about the whys of the Crucifixion, but I believe in that, and I believe in the Resurrection. Because, and here's where my understanding gets way un-Orthodox, why witness otherwise. People like to point out that a lot of Old White GuysTM got really rich and powerful off of telling this story (sort of), but the fact is, the disciples and the apostles were not made rich or powerful for telling it. Any of it. They were persecuted, and attacked, and cast out, and their Lord and Savior who they had looked to for salvation was, at least in a physical easy-to-point-to sense, gone from the world. Why keep going? Because something beautiful, something amazing, happened when Jesus of Nazareth was resurrected, and his disciples found that the Good News they had been taught needed to be shared. This message was so radical, so revolutionary, so important, that they risked and suffered their freedom and their lives to spread it.
So I guess the miracles - the loaves, the walking on water, the demons, maybe the healing - is far less important than the fact that the meaning of that message, the truth that shines through the many, many layers of human fallibility that lie between Christ's life and our own, is so important, and shines such a light through our lives, that we cannot help but share it.
One can only hope, right? I mean, the whole "Live God so well people see the Spirit through you" sounds all impressive, but if we're being honest I still feel like the wrong man for the job. It's my best friend here in town, a staunch atheist, whose response to "Yeah, it's just a mile or so down the road" is "Well, I'll walk you there, and then we can walk back together," whose response to "Oh bollocks it's cold out" is "If you need a coat, I've got one." So I guess all I can do is keep trying to emulate Christ as well as my friends seem to, effortlessly.
I suppose I should say, here, that in between writing the first part of this entry (up to the virgin birth), and the second (everything after that), I: got dumped hard on the ground by a big yellow dog, made baked macaroni for the church's annual meeting, attended church, and, uh, sorta got elected to the Vestry. So I am feeling inadequate and worried, but I figure maybe... well, I'm back to trusting the judgement of those around me. Which is just as well, I suppose.
But - well - I am praying more than I used to, and perhaps more honestly, too. Our rector lent me this massive brick of a New Oxford Annotated Bible (New Revised Standard), which I've been getting sucked into (!!!). You know I've never read a modern translation before? And - don't get me wrong, I do like archaic English - but I absolutely love reading a translation that's actually written in the language I live in, if that makes sense. And... well, it's not just that it's simpler to understand (in some ways), but also this translation/version feels more honest, and more direct. (I'm probably reading into it a bit.)
So, that and this other book, The Heart of Christianity, by Marcus Borg. I have to say - it was a lot easier being a Fundamentalist. "This is true; everything that contradicts it is not. Believe that and you will be Saved." Now, I think about faith as something alive, I have to look for meaning rather than just accepting literalism. It's not enough to just blindly accept what you're given - this kind of belief has me questioning myself, questioning the Scriptures and their authors, questioning everything.
I'm having to reexamine all the assumptions I had made about life and metaphysical reality. It seems unfair that I somehow internalized all this stuff without, it seems, any conscious consent. Like the doctrine of Hell - I let go of that years ago, but there are still tendrils clinging to my hindbrain that won't be removed.
More insidious, though, and more dangerous, is literalism in the Gospels. This hurts, you see, for it is so very close to the center of my faith. Can I really be a Christian without believing in every miracle in all four Gospels? All of them? Okay. Maybe I can. Embellishment happens. And then - maybe easier, because of the inherent contradiction and the poeticism in the accounts - the Shepherds, the Magi, the kind of awkward shoehorning by the author of Matthew of prophecies wherever he can fit them in.
And then, just when you thought you were safe, we come to the virgin birth. And this hurts, and this is hard, but eventually, I realize that, once again, what matters is the meaning.
And then you hit, for some folks, the resurrection, and that's where I go, "No, no, whatever else I'm letting go of, this is something I believe very truly." I don't know how I feel about the whys of the Crucifixion, but I believe in that, and I believe in the Resurrection. Because, and here's where my understanding gets way un-Orthodox, why witness otherwise. People like to point out that a lot of Old White GuysTM got really rich and powerful off of telling this story (sort of), but the fact is, the disciples and the apostles were not made rich or powerful for telling it. Any of it. They were persecuted, and attacked, and cast out, and their Lord and Savior who they had looked to for salvation was, at least in a physical easy-to-point-to sense, gone from the world. Why keep going? Because something beautiful, something amazing, happened when Jesus of Nazareth was resurrected, and his disciples found that the Good News they had been taught needed to be shared. This message was so radical, so revolutionary, so important, that they risked and suffered their freedom and their lives to spread it.
So I guess the miracles - the loaves, the walking on water, the demons, maybe the healing - is far less important than the fact that the meaning of that message, the truth that shines through the many, many layers of human fallibility that lie between Christ's life and our own, is so important, and shines such a light through our lives, that we cannot help but share it.
One can only hope, right? I mean, the whole "Live God so well people see the Spirit through you" sounds all impressive, but if we're being honest I still feel like the wrong man for the job. It's my best friend here in town, a staunch atheist, whose response to "Yeah, it's just a mile or so down the road" is "Well, I'll walk you there, and then we can walk back together," whose response to "Oh bollocks it's cold out" is "If you need a coat, I've got one." So I guess all I can do is keep trying to emulate Christ as well as my friends seem to, effortlessly.
I suppose I should say, here, that in between writing the first part of this entry (up to the virgin birth), and the second (everything after that), I: got dumped hard on the ground by a big yellow dog, made baked macaroni for the church's annual meeting, attended church, and, uh, sorta got elected to the Vestry. So I am feeling inadequate and worried, but I figure maybe... well, I'm back to trusting the judgement of those around me. Which is just as well, I suppose.
Thursday, December 26, 2013
Entries in the rough...
I couldn't find a black pen, but other than that, this is what blog posts here usually look like before they get typed up and edited. I've been thinking about the concept of obedience, and Mary. It may require more thought.
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