{"id":138,"date":"2013-12-22T20:18:44","date_gmt":"2013-12-22T20:18:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/maybegoosefeathers.com\/wp\/?p=138"},"modified":"2013-12-22T20:29:06","modified_gmt":"2013-12-22T20:29:06","slug":"advent-ponderings","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/maybegoosefeathers.com\/wp\/?p=138","title":{"rendered":"Advent Ponderings"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Advent<\/a>When Advent began, the brilliant colors of autumn had long since faded to dull brown.\u00a0 Everything was gray-tinged \u2026 the old leaves \u2026 the bare trunks and branches \u2026 the dormant grass.\u00a0 The world looked ready to be tucked into bed for the winter-long nap with a blanket of snowy white.\u00a0 A few days into Advent, that blanket arrived in the form of several inches of snow \u2026 which improved appearances considerably (even if it made for difficult driving and cancelled the first of the mid-week Advent services).\u00a0 However, the coming of the longed-for snow was followed immediately by a swift plunge into sub-zero temperatures \u2026 which did NOT help.\u00a0 It felt as though we had skipped all the way through December and gone straight into January.\u00a0 But with the bitter cold, we do get clear skies and sun (mostly because all the moisture has completely frozen out of the air).\u00a0 The increased sunlight helps because there is so little daylight this time of year.<\/p>\n

\"Sunset<\/a>When there\u2019s scarcely eight hours of any sort of daylight, it\u2019s easy to see why so many ancient winter festivals about light have held such enduring popularity.\u00a0 In the midst of cold and dark, in landscapes that look more dead than dormant, we need some sort of hopeful sign \u2026 something to keep us pressing on toward a brighter time.\u00a0 Whether the eventual association of the Christian celebration of Jesus\u2019 birth was an attempt to sanctify unstoppable pagan practices or an effort to subvert the cultural practice for a different religious purpose hardly matters.\u00a0 The symbolism works.\u00a0 In the midst of darkness, dormancy, and death, we long for signs of light and life.\u00a0 Even if we get something of what we\u2019re longing for (like the snow earlier this month), we\u2019re still not fully satisfied for the results.\u00a0 Partial fulfillment leaves us longing for more \u2026 just as our Advent season of preparing for the coming of Christ holds both the remembrance of Jesus\u2019 birth so long ago and the longing for the coming of the Reign and Realm of God toward which that birth still points.<\/p>\n

\"Advent<\/a>Christ has come \u2026 and the Reign of God is still yet to be.\u00a0 So we wait with longing, with expectation, and sometimes even with hope.\u00a0 But that hope can be so fragile and tenuous and easily crushed.\u00a0 With the beginning of a new year in the church and the closing of the year on the calendar, some reflection seems in order.\u00a0 What has been?\u00a0 What do we still long for to be?<\/p>\n

\"Sandy-Hook-Elementary-School-elite-daily\"<\/a>Last weekend marked the anniversary of the tragic shootings at Sandy Hook Elementary in Newtown Connecticut.\u00a0 The deaths of those twenty children \u2013 just five or six years old \u2013 shattered the peace we cling to in the Christmas season.\u00a0 However we may celebrate, in society or in church, Christmas has a child at its center.\u00a0 As we heard the news, how could we not imagine the stockings that would not be emptied on Christmas morning \u2026 the presents already purchased, perhaps even wrapped, never to be opened by the children whom those gifts were to delight?\u00a0 How could we not think about the Christmases of our own childhoods, of our own children (or grandchildren or nieces and nephews) and not be stabbed in the heart?\u00a0 Christmas, it\u2019s often said, is for children \u2026 and these twenty children were no more.<\/p>\n

It was too much \u2013 one too many of these sorts of tragedies, too many victims at such a young age.\u00a0 Many of us vowed it would be the last of these events.\u00a0 This time, things would have to change.\u00a0 From the President on down the ladder of public offices, leaders stepped up to make some changes \u2026 even if the proposed changes were rather small things, if it could make a difference, it would be worth doing.\u00a0 Something had to be done.<\/p>\n

But in the end, for the most part, nothing was done.\u00a0 In a few places, here and there, some laws were changed.\u00a0 But in most places efforts for any sensible changes to gun regulations were quickly shouted down by the well-funded, well-oiled machine that is the NRA.\u00a0 So much hope \u2026 so little has come of it \u2026 and here we are a year later \u2026 still longing for things to be better.\u00a0 A year later, 200 more children and teens have been lost in episodes of gun violence.\u00a0 The most recent victim of a school shooting died yesterday.\u00a0 \u00a0 It\u2019s almost as though we have a Sandy Hook incident a month \u2026 except that it takes a lot longer than five minutes when it happens one or two at a time \u2026 and most of the time, the children are not picture-perfect white angel babies.\u00a0 (And what does it say to mothers of color, grieving their slain children, that little white children shot to death in an elementary school matter so very much but theirs do not?)<\/p>\n

\"imagesCA3C3SBR\"<\/a>Back at the beginning of the year, I sat among the people gathered for the Martin Luther King Day Breakfast at Progressive Baptist Church in Saint Paul.\u00a0 In an unusual, but highly significant, alignment of events, President Obama would be inaugurated for his second term a few hours after the breakfast.\u00a0 The explosion of excitement in that room at any mention of the inauguration was contagious.\u00a0 What had for so long seemed impossible to many in the crowd gathered that morning \u2013 that someone who looked like most of them could be elected President of the United States \u2013 had not only happened once, it had happened again.\u00a0 Was anything still impossible?<\/p>\n

\"untitled<\/a>Later, as Richard Blanco read his poem \u201cOne\u201d during the inauguration ceremony, it seemed that we could indeed be one people in one land under one sky sharing at least as many commonalities as we have differences.\u00a0 Blanco\u2019s soaring, sweeping work that ranged over the landscape and homes of the country, the daily routines of individuals and everyone, concludes with the words \u201c\u2026hope \u2013 a new constellation waiting for us to map it, waiting for us to name it \u2013 together<\/em>.\u201d\u00a0 Perhaps this time the talk of working together, of putting differences aside to serve the interests of the people would finally be more than just talk.\u00a0 On that day, for a few shining hours, it seemed possible.\u00a0 (Even if you don’t think much of the President or the poet or the whole idea of inaugural poets or poems in general, the whole poem <\/a>is worth a read.)<\/p>\n

But it has proved impossible again.\u00a0 Hope, that new constellation Blanco envisioned, remained unmapped and unnamed as things went on in the same old, same old ways.\u00a0 If anything, the divisiveness and inflexibility were as dominant as ever.\u00a0 Each side continued to vent to its own supporters, vilifying those who might see things differently.\u00a0 Problems drag on and brokenness persists as solutions remain elusive \u2026 or perhaps even unsought.<\/p>\n

\"Advent<\/a>We watch the craziness of the weather \u2013 the superstorms and mudslides, the wildfires and the droughts.\u00a0 Backyard weather watchers can tell you things are changing.\u00a0 They see different birds, different plants, and different wildlife.\u00a0 Scientists know things are changing and they know human activity is a part of it.\u00a0 It may be too late to reverse these changes.\u00a0 The best we might be able to hope for is to find ways to mitigate the changes and slow the process of change and the extreme it could reach by changing our behaviors now.\u00a0 But few want to listen.\u00a0 Many deep pockets are heavily invested in keeping things just the way they are.\u00a0 Until there is a financial incentive to make some changes, they see no point in even considering the possibility.\u00a0 The wellbeing of their future customers and employees means nothing compared to the profits to be had today.\u00a0 So creation continues to groan around us.<\/p>\n

\"imagesCAYX4ICO\"<\/a>The world watched as Pope Benedict XVI broke with all precedent and tradition by resigning this spring.\u00a0 Then, as Pope Francis, a heretofore obscure Argentine archbishop named Jorge Mario Bergogilo, charmed the world with his aversion to the trappings of wealth and power, empowering his call for a return to the basics of Christian practice: love and acceptance of all comers, care for the poor.\u00a0 Many of my non-Catholic friends and ministry colleagues were hoping for some serious policy reforms around ordination, homosexuality, even human reproduction. They\u2019re likely to be disappointed.\u00a0 My hopes for Pope Francis are more modest: honestly and fully address the plague of sexual abuse by the clergy and reform the highly insular and apparently corrupt Vatican governance.\u00a0 That might happen \u2026 and I hope it does.<\/p>\n

What happens in Rome impacts all of us who name the name of Christ, whether we feel any particular connection to the Roman Catholic Church or not.\u00a0 Just as denominational affiliations don\u2019t matter much to people \u201cshopping\u201d for churches to join, those same labels don\u2019t matter to people on the outside of our congregations looking in.\u00a0 One church is no better than another.\u00a0 If one church is unsafe, none are safe.\u00a0 It may not be fair, but that is what\u2019s happening.\u00a0 So it\u2019s going to take a better witness to the gospel from all of us to change that public perception.\u00a0 One thing that has not changed is the aching need in the world to see the love of God lived out, acted out, demonstrated in ways that people can perceive, observe, and understand.\u00a0 The way people have reacted and responded to Pope Francis is proof enough the need is there.<\/p>\n

\"untitled\"<\/a>But in my own church, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America <\/a>(ELCA), we struggle as much as the next to venture into the unknowable future.\u00a0 What used to be called \u201cmainline\u201d is anything but anymore.\u00a0 We built for an era that has passed and seems unlikely to return. Sunday school rooms are largely empty \u2026 worship attendance continues to drop as youth wander away and elders become homebound \u2026 membership continues to decline as people pass away (or are finally dropped from membership rolls when it becomes clear no one knows where these people have gone).\u00a0 The trends are frightening and troubling.\u00a0 Clearly things must change.\u00a0 But more of our attention and energy is directed toward shoring up and preserving what is in the hope that the good times of a past era will return again.\u00a0 We know that past; we don\u2019t know the future \u2026 and because the unknown is so very frightening we balk at venturing forth to find the new ways we must.<\/p>\n

\"untitled<\/a>In my own house, we also chose a new leader this summer \u2013 although it was not nearly the news magnet that the election of a Pope can be.\u00a0 However, the choice of Elizabeth Eaton as the first woman to serve as Presiding Bishop in the ELCA did catch some attention from the news media and much rejoicing from my peers.\u00a0 I wish her all the best.\u00a0 But her election scarcely marks the shattering of the \u201cstained glass ceiling,\u201d the opening of a new era in which the ministry of our female clergy is valued equally with that of male clergy.\u00a0 Much as I long for it, that day can wait.\u00a0 The more pressing problem is the need for massive changes in our structures throughout the church.\u00a0 Whatever the future holds for our congregations, it will not be just like the past.\u00a0 Letting go of such dreams is a loss requiring attention to the work of grieving.\u00a0 Turning towards an unknowable future is a work of faith and courage.<\/p>\n

\"Frozen<\/a>Another year is passing, and still I am waiting for a new call to ministry.\u00a0 In the meantime, I hear the cries of the people who call where I work.\u00a0 The lack of affordable housing is staggering \u2026 rent assistance is limited \u2026 shelters are often full.\u00a0 Many nights I must tell a mother (just like me) that there is no place where she and her children can go for shelter that she has not already tried or that shelter\u00a0will not be available to her until the next day.\u00a0 There are people asking for food shelves that are open in the evening or on the weekends, places they can go to that will be open at times when they are not working at their jobs. Working people are not bringing home enough to pay for their housing and feed their families.\u00a0 But any talk of raising wages is squashed by doomsday prediction of $10 for a hamburger at McDonalds \u2026 never mind how many economists demonstrate that it\u2019s the gaping inequality in wealth that\u2019s keeping the economy stagnant for all of us.<\/p>\n

\"Ornaments<\/a>None of this is to say that I\u2019m untouched by the delights of this season.\u00a0 My Christmas tree is up and decorated.\u00a0 Holiday baking is in full swish.\u00a0 I still sing along with the songs of Christmas on the radio and in the stores.\u00a0 I\u2019ve appreciated the beautiful holiday decorations as I\u2019ve shopped in the stores and the malls this season.\u00a0 I light the candles on my Advent wreath and pray with hopeful expectations.<\/p>\n

\"Advent<\/a>I just hope we\u2019re getting more than a baby this year, because it\u2019s going to take something a lot bigger than a baby to change us, to change the world, to turn things around.\u00a0 When we pray \u201cStir up your power, O Lord, and come \u2026\u201d, I really hope God does come with power to stir us up and move things around.\u00a0 Something has to change \u2013 and change soon.\u00a0 Maybe it\u2019s us \u2026 all of us who are striving in this holy season to keep our focus on the birth of our savior.\u00a0 But we\u2019ll need to lift our eyes beyond the baby in the manger to see that what we celebrate then is still what we long for now \u2013 God actually breaking into this weary world \u2026 to change us \u2026 to change things \u2026 to move the world a little closer to what God longs for it to be.<\/p>\n

Here\u2019s the best prayer I\u2019ve seen this season \u2026by Andrew Foster Connors<\/a> in Journal for Preachers<\/i>, Advent 2013:<\/p>\n

\"IMG_0081\"<\/a>Dear God, we are in the deep muddy.\u00a0 We have messed up this world in a terrible way.\u00a0 Our lives are not what we hoped they would be.\u00a0 Our relationships are not what we hoped they would be.\u00a0 Our faith is not what we hoped it would be.\u00a0 We are out of hope and we know it.\u00a0 But we\u2019re tired of living in this kind of brokenness.\u00a0 And you are the only one who can mend it.\u00a0 You are the only one who can give us our future.<\/i><\/p>\n

Amen!\u00a0 Even so, come, Lord Jesus.\u00a0 Stir up your power, O Lord, and come!\u00a0 Come with the power to make all things new.\u00a0 Come to us with the power to make us new.\u00a0 Stir up your power in us and send us to make things new.\u00a0 You were sent into our world; now send us into the world in your name to do the work you have come to do: making all things new.<\/p>\n

\"Sunset<\/a>All earth is hopeful, the Savior comes at last!<\/i><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0 A virgin mother will bear Emmanuel<\/i><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0Almost here! \u00a0God is nearing in beauty and grace!<\/i><\/p>\n

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0All clear every gateway, in haste, come out in haste!<\/i><\/p>\n

\u201cAll Earth is Hopeful<\/a>\u201d Alberto Taul\u00e9 <\/i><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When Advent began, the brilliant colors of autumn had long since faded to dull brown.\u00a0 Everything was gray-tinged \u2026 the old leaves \u2026 the bare trunks and branches \u2026 the dormant grass.\u00a0 The world looked ready to be tucked into bed for the winter-long nap with a blanket of snowy …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-138","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-church-life","category-musings"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/maybegoosefeathers.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/138","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/maybegoosefeathers.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/maybegoosefeathers.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/maybegoosefeathers.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/maybegoosefeathers.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=138"}],"version-history":[{"count":12,"href":"http:\/\/maybegoosefeathers.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/138\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":169,"href":"http:\/\/maybegoosefeathers.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/138\/revisions\/169"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/maybegoosefeathers.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=138"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/maybegoosefeathers.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=138"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/maybegoosefeathers.com\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=138"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}