Maybe It's Not So Bad Out There

It has been a few weeks since my last post. I have been doing that quintessentially Fringe Episcopal Ministry thing: traveling around telling Southside Abbey's story in hopes that money will come our way. While we fell far short of our fund-raising goals, we did deepen some relationships, and that is impossible to put a price tag on. There was also a wonderful side effect, I've come to accept that maybe it's not so bad out there.

Earlier this month, I was blessed to teach a class at the School of Theology at Sewanee and preach at a parish in a Toronto suburb. I don't know what I was really expecting either place. The last time Sewanee was foolish or brave enough to unleash my brand of this-is-how-it-is on their students, I was not invited back for two years. I found that two-year-ago class utterly naïve to, or in denial of, the realities facing the Church.

This year's class was very receptive to my dispatches from the frontline of missional/emergent ministry. They are aware that in the next fifteen years 17 Trillion dollars (with a “T”) will change hands, and the Church is pretty low on the list of where benefactors are distributing said money. The students are aware that the Church is shrinking, as individual churches and as a denomination. They are aware that there are no jobs, especially for those seeking full-time employment. Seminarians know these things and they are there, studying to be priests anyway. They are there, giving themselves to God in service to the Church.

A few short days later, I found myself preaching in front of a parish in the greater metro area of that oh-so-secular city, Toronto, Ontario. Not only will that appearance double my fee for speaking engagements, as I am now internationally-known – 2 x $0 is still $0 – but it also was a great opportunity to visit a country that, by all counts is about a generation ahead of us in terms of Church decline. Imagine my surprise when I arrived at a worship service full of worshipers, Canadian worshipers. I thought that everyone in Canada played soccer on Sunday morning or something like that. Did these people not get the message? Had they not heard that Canada was like Europe and no one goes to Church anymore? Some very friendly Canadians informed me that they had heard these things, but that they were there anyway. Every week they are there, in spite of trends, projections, and statistics. They are there, giving themselves to God in service to the Church.

I don't know about you, dear reader, but Lent was very long for this writer. I needed some Resurrection in my life and this was the Holy Spirit's gift to me this Easter Season, this Season of Resurrection. Maybe it's not so bad out there. Maybe we just have to trust that the Holy Spirit is right in the middle of all that is going on, as the Holy Spirit has been since the Church began. It certainly takes a lot of the pressure off.

This post was originally published on the Episcopal Church Foundation's Vital Practices Vital Posts blog on April 23, 2015. It has been reprinted here with permission.

Three Blogs on Stewardship: #3 "Buy" the Numbers

Okay, so my last post about paid and unpaid, professional and amateur Christians sparked some discussion. I need to be clear about something from the beginning. I am not a cynic. I know that it is tough to discern tone from prose, but am not jaded, fed up, or otherwise done with the Church. In fact, I love the movement that Jesus started. I am spiritually fed by what people would consider “typical” church worship. As we have been clear from the beginning, Southside Abbey is not a move away from anything, but rather a branch of the same limb.

The reality of the numbers is stark. What are the two largest expenses facing every Episcopal church in the land? Property and Personnel. Southside Abbey is a model of another way to be church without a building. Notice I said “a” model, not “the” model. We are providing one solution to the problem of the expense of a building.

Now what about that other expense? Can't you just feel the collective sphincter tightening at the very mention of this issue? In the Episcopal Church, we like our priests. We like to have someone up there we can point to as the expert on God, someone who will interact – on our behalf – with those we don't want to see or know.

Let me break it down in our context. The Diocese of East Tennessee's minimum compensation package for full time employment is $47,000. Church Pension adds eighteen percent, or $8,460. Include (as we must for full time work) health insurance to the tune of $11,148 for the cheapest plan for a couple. Including the life and disability insurance offered by our diocese adds another $1,036. That makes a total of $67,644. If we are to take the Church Pension formula, the math is similarly inflated. Their minimum compensation for full time work is $18,500, which costs $34,014. Now that you know the context, let me put it in perspective.

Southside Abbey's budget for 2014 was $33,811. For that amount we:

• Kept the seasons of the Church Year, engaging in liturgical worship with our community.
• Served over 3,000 meals as part of that liturgical worship.
• Celebrated St. Nicholas' Day with presents & meals for 175 neighborhood children & families.
• Shared 250 pounds of Epiphany pickles as a way to hear our neighbors' stories.
• Shared 400 cups of homemade soup as an excuse to visit retired folks in section 8 housing.
• Gathered over 200 pairs of shoes & socks for the local elementary school on Maundy Thursday.
• Held a chili cook-off with with about forty gallons of chili from members of our community.
• Made over 210 lunches for neighborhood children on fall break, shared at an Oktoberfest.
• Housed a theologian-in-residence who worked with us while obtaining an STM from Sewanee.
• Were brought under the 501(c)(3) umbrella of the Episcopal Church.
• Became a Jubilee Ministry Center of the Episcopal Church.
• Raised nearly $50,000 to be spent on outside ministries as part of the Southside Jubilee Fund.
• Were featured in articles from Christian Century to the Chattanooga Times-Free Press.
• Mentored three Education for Ministry (EfM) groups.
• Trained leaders, forming 4 postulants, 1 aspirant, 2 seminarians & a lots of lay ministers.

We did these things with help, particularly from the Holy Spirit. We also had some terrestrial partners, perhaps too many to mention, but look at what we were able to do with $34,000 – $34,000 that did not include a clergy compensation package! Such a package would either double or triple our budget depending on which “minimum” we can get away with.

This reality is what makes it difficult to “buy” these numbers. I realize that I am an important part of this ministry, but am I really that much more important than all of my brothers and sisters in Christ who follow Jesus just as faithfully but do it at no cost to Southside Abbey? That is what we as a community and I am personally wrestling with. This is a really cool possibility. I just have to be brave enough to say “yes” to the Holy Spirit. Your prayers are most welcome.

This post was originally published on the Episcopal Church Foundation's Vital Practices Vital Posts blog on February 27, 2015. It has been reprinted here with permission.

3 Blogs on Stewardship: #2 Just What Exactly Are We Funding?

As I mentioned in my last post, Southside Abbey's funding is up. More accurately, my funding is up with the Episcopal Diocese of East Tennessee in August. It has really been on my mind of late that I am confusing these two issues. Nothing about the funding of Southside Abbey's ministry is jeopardy. The Holy Spirit doesn't call us to ministries without providing for them. No, the only change will be in my compensation.

If I think back to three years ago, I was perfectly willing to do this ministry for free as this was as clear a call as I had ever heard. It's fascinating to me just how quickly I got comfortable with the notion of full-time employment once it was offered through the diocese.

Without going too far down the rabbit trail, I am concerned about the two-tiered system of those who follow Jesus. There are “professional” Christians and “amateur” Christians. Before I spark a firestorm with this distinction, remember that Olympians are considered “amateur.”

This two-tiered system is less about lay and ordained as it is about paid and unpaid, but don't think that ordination isn't often a deciding factor in who is on what side of that line. I really have to face the fact that I am a professional Christian. I get paid to do all of the great and wonderful things to which Jesus is calling me everyday. Would I do the same if I didn't get paid? Does the pay merely free me up to do that which all of us should be doing anyway? What a blessing, right? Before the reader jumps up in arms over “the laborer deserves to be paid”-type cherry-picked bible verses, hear me out.

Recently, clergy from our portion of the Diocese of East Tennessee gathered for conversation, led by our bishop, George Young. When we were asked to share our anxieties, I spoke up. I do not think that the model of professional Christians is either sustainable or, truth be told, very biblical. Routinely the best Followers of Jesus I know are those who don't get paid for it. This shut the conversation down. It was too much for those who had dedicated their lives to this system. No more fears were shared and the conversation turned pretty pat-on-the-back-ish after that.

I have written about working myself out of a job before, but I am really starting to wrestle with what that means. Am I being called to be a tent-maker or bass-player to pay the bills? Maybe there are some places that are really making bi-vocational ministry work, but here in the South, I haven't heard too much about it. Here, it seems to be something that is done as a last resort.

These days are days of deep discernment for me. I often meditate on a would-be-throw-away line from Steve Martin's autobiography of his stand-up career, Born Standing Up. Steve tells the story of being on Johnny Carson's couch on a tonight show break. After Steve has delighted Johnny and his audience with prestidigitation, jokes, and rope tricks, Johnny leans over and whispers to Steve, “You will use everything you ever learned.”

Johnny's words both haunt and inspire me, as they could the Church. How could we use what we learned from the Early Church, a time when there was no distinction between professional and amateur Christians? How could we use what we learned from Paul who made tents or Peter the fisherman?

So, I return to the title of this post, just what exactly are we funding? If two generations of young clergy walk away from the expectation of compensation for following Jesus, what do we lose? More importantly, what might we gain? At thirty-five years old am I really already that much a slave to the Church Pension Fund? For every “the laborer deserves to be paid” I hear, I can find a “do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth.”

I feel like Southside Abbey has broken open a way to be church without a building. Maybe we are being called to break open the system of two-tiered Christians.

This post was originally published on the Episcopal Church Foundation's Vital Practices Vital Posts blog on February 20, 2015. It has been reprinted here with permission.

3 Blogs on Stewardship: #1 Year 'Round Stewardship

I have to be honest, I agonized about the apostrophe in the title of this post for much longer than I should have. I share this with you to show just how much I still have to learn about stewardship (particularly stewardship of time). Take this post with a larger-than-usual grain of salt.

As I have been aware since our beginning nearly two-and-a-half years ago, diocesan-funded compensation for a full-time priest atSouthside Abbey is up in August. Our leadership council has seen this as an opportunity to step up. Or, as our wonderfully super warden, Kim Smith (who also unicycles and can often be found in caves) put it, “it's time to put on our 'big-girl' panties!”

Before we head to the Changes book for a prayer about the transition to grown-up underwear, I guess some background is in order. At Southside Abbey we make our budget a little bit differently (of course). We begin with a few questions:

• What do we want to do again?
• What is the Holy Spirit already doing around us that we can jump on?
• What are we being called to do that is new?

As I understanding it, this is a bit different than what some parishes do: wait until the pledges come in and decide what gets funded.

Our process? We asked the leadership council (and others in leadership roles, as all of our council meetings are open) to answer these questions. This led to modules named for different colors as there was less hierarchy than using number or letters. The group then prioritized the modules and the budget is the result. This meant that some things did not make the budget, but they are in our hearts and on our minds in case the Holy Spirit drops some “opportunity” in our lap.

I feel pretty good about this budget. If you would like to see the fruits of that work, we share our budget (along with liturgies and all kinds of other stuff) on our website.

If you get far enough down the 2015 budget, you can see that in order to accomplish the modules that did make it into the budget, we still have to raise about $44,000 or so. Divide that figure by twelve months, and that is around $3,600 per month. While this sum may seem like peanuts to some readers, know that half of Southside Abbey's congregants are homeless and the other half are working-class.

This means we are going to have to venture out into the community. So far, I have not asked for any money for Southside Abbey outside of grant applications. We do not pass a collection plate. So far the Holy Spirit has provided for us to do as much ministry as we can handle. I expect this year to be no different. Year 'round stewardship? It may be that we as a church need year 'round trust. The Holy Spirit will provide, year 'round.

This post was originally published on the Episcopal Church Foundation's Vital Practices Vital Posts blog on February 13, 2015. It has been reprinted here with permission.

When the LORD Won't Let You Sleep

So this is a blog? 

Do reader’s read this blog when they choose to read?

Does it depend on what the blogger blogs?

My name is Graham, and I am the lay missioner at Southside Abbey. We are a quirky church to say the least, with the homeless and the over-housed hanging out over pizza and chili. If you want to know more, stop by The Hart Gallery on a Friday night at 6:11pm and worship with us. It will be no less than a genuine, awkward human interaction with a brooding sense of the divine hovering all about.

With no further ado, let us continue on to what I actually intended to talk about, namely, the Old Testament lectionary reading for this upcoming Sunday: 

1 Samuel 3:1-20

¹Now the boy Samuel ministered to the LORD before Eli. 

And the word of the LORD was rare in those days; there was no widespread revelation. 

²And it came to pass at that time, while Eli was lying down in his place, 

and when his eyes had begun to grow so dim that he could not see, 

³and before the lamp of God went out in the tabernacle of the LORD where the ark of God was, and while Samuel was lying down, 

⁴that the LORD called Samuel. And he answered, "Here I am!" 

⁵So he ran to Eli and said, "Here I am, for you called me." 

And he said, "I did not call; lie down again." 

And he went and lay down. 

⁶Then the LORD called yet again, "Samuel!" 

So Samuel arose and went to Eli, and said, "Here I am, for you called me." 

He answered, "I did not call, my son; lie down again." 

⁷(Now Samuel did not yet know the LORD, 

nor was the word of the LORD yet revealed to him.)

 ⁸And the LORD called Samuel again the third time.

 So he arose and went to Eli, and said, "Here I am, for you did call me." 

Then Eli perceived that the LORD had called the boy. 

⁹Therefore Eli said to Samuel, "Go, lie down; and it shall be, 

if He calls you, that you must say, 'Speak, LORD, for Your servant hears.'" 

So Samuel went and lay down in his place. 

¹⁰Now the LORD came and stood and called as at other times, "Samuel! Samuel!"

 And Samuel answered, "Speak, for Your servant hears." 

¹¹Then the LORD said to Samuel: "Behold, 

I will do something in Israel at which both ears of everyone who hears it will tingle. 

¹²In that day I will perform against Eli 

all that I have spoken concerning his house, from beginning to end. 

¹³For I have told him that I will judge his house forever for the iniquity which he knows, 

because his sons made themselves vile, and he did not restrain them. 

¹⁴And therefore I have sworn to the house of Eli 

that the iniquity of Eli's house shall not be atoned for by sacrifice or offering forever." 

¹⁵So Samuel lay down until morning, and opened the doors of the house of the LORD.

 And Samuel was afraid to tell Eli the vision. 

¹⁶Then Eli called Samuel and said, "Samuel, my son!" 

He answered, "Here I am." 

¹⁷And he said, "What is the word that the LORD spoke to you? 

Please do not hide it from me. 

God do so to you, and more also, 

if you hide anything from me of all the things that He said to you." 

¹⁸Then Samuel told him everything, and hid nothing from him. 

And he said, "It is the LORD. Let Him do what seems good to Him." 

¹⁹So Samuel grew, and the LORD was with him 

and let none of his words fall to the ground. 

²⁰And all Israel from Dan to Beersheba 

knew that Samuel had been established as a prophet of the LORD.

NKJV

Did both of your ears tingle?

There is a lot that can go into interpreting a passage like this. We could delve into the history, context, and culture. When was it written? Who was it written to? What seems to be the author’s intent? We could talk about Eli’s no good sons, using their religious privilege to abuse women. Or we could talk about the character of Samuel, the first son of a barren woman dedicated to a life of ministry in the temple. This is, after all, a story about real people in a real place, and as such, there is an almost overwhelming amount of complexity.  And then there is God mucking about in the middle of it. 

Ultimately, I am the most curious about this “LORD” character. What is God doing waking everybody up in the middle of the night? Wouldn’t a mid-morning call be a little more civil? Doesn’t he know he is ruining their entire night?  This is the season of Ephiphany, when God reveals himself like a light in the darkness. Why is he moving around in the shadows?

 Can you imagine how exasperated Samuel and Eli must have been getting? They had spent a long day in the temple praying, offering sacrifices, and expiating the guilt of thoroughly screwed up human beings before a perfect and holy God. That’s exhausting.  Samuel thinks Eli keeps calling for him. He recognizes authority in the call, but Eli keeps denying it’s him. Why is the old man messing with him? 

Eli is wondering what the heck is wrong with this kid who keeps waking him up. Why can’t the kid just go back to sleep?

Then Eli realizes something else is going on.  God, that troubling God they worship, is getting himself involved. I love the line “Now the LORD came and stood and called...” God is intervening with, what  sounds like, a very physical presence. Can you imagine the Creator God of the cosmos standing in your hallway and calling your name?

Then God puts Samuel in an extremely awkward and even dangerous position. Samuel has to condemn the very person in authority over him. Eli provides everything for Samuel. Eli can ruin Samuel’s life.  Why is God asking a child to deliver this troubling message to his elder? 

You have to credit Eli, who, even though he hears the words from a boy, knows that they are the LORD’s words. It is a fascinating response, “It is the LORD. Let him do what seems good to him.” 

Is the correct response? Should he have pleaded with God? Is he actually repenting or just resigning himself? Should he have gone out and drove his sons out the temple? Out of the body of Israel? 

Perhaps.

I think of the other characters in the Bible who struggle against God. David pleading for the life of his bastard son. Abraham bargaining against the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. Moses convincing God to not wipe-out all the Israelites. Habakuk decrying the seeming absence of God in the violence that plagued his society. Mary asking Jesus to miracle up some new wine. Jesus asking the Father if there is any way forward besides crucifixion. There is no one answer, but there seems to be space for asking.

So struggle with God. Listen for his voice. Obey. God may be troubling, but God is also Love.

I Had an Epiphany! No Wait, a Theophany!

I want to begin this week's post by wishing everyone a holy Epiphany-tide. Epiphany is a church word that gets tossed around outside of the church. Often my first response when I hear someone say, “I had an epiphany,” is: “no you didn't!” I know I am reacting to how the word gets used, but something about the word Epiphany has to do with our ability to see the “striking appearance.” The onus is on the individual and not the Divine.

In the Eastern Church they use the word, “Theophany,” meaning a vision of God. It is tough to corroborate, but theophany feels more about God's revelation of God's self, not our personal self's ability to see that revelation.

This flies in the face of the more-than-opportunistic advertise-at-every-opportunity of consumerist culture. God isn't just going to use the super-bowl commercial to get our attention. God can use the ordinary too, like eyelashes or splinters. God has used salt, light, water, mud, bread, and wine to get our attention. Occasionally God shows up in something miraculous like a burning bush, but for a mystic like Julian of Norwich, it was due to a hazelnut that she knew the whole world exists because God loves it. God is always there: revealing and revealing despite our – at times – poor perception.

At times aspects of the Episcopal Church can get me down. As a denomination, we often find ourselves glamorized with the glamorous. At this point in my journey following Jesus, I am less and less concerned with where (or if) someone went to seminary, what books he or she has written (or read), if he or she works in the Episcopal Mecca or Medina (New York City or Los Angeles). This Theophany Season, I am intentionally taking the Eastern road – looking for how God is revealing God's self all around me. I am walking the mystic's path – looking for how God is revealing God's self through what is already happening – what the Holy Spirit is doing – all around me.

One whole day into this intentional journey, here is the truth that has been revealed to me...

In my music career, people would talk about the “best drummer ever” or something like that. The superlative musician in question was invariably the herald's favorite. (Not that I am against favorites – Southside Abbey's warden prayerfully reminds herself daily: “I am God's very favorite, and so are you.”) But favorite does not equal best. I'm going to go on record and state that the best drummer is not Neil Peart, John Fishman, Steve Gadd (although I might entertain this argument), or Mike Clark. The best drummer in the world is a field worker in Cuba cutting sugar in a cane field or a stamp-canceller in a Ghanaian post office – using rhythm in their vocation everyday until it doesn't seem like work anymore. It is someone that – odds are – we will never hear about, because they don't put cane field workers or postal employees on the cover of magazines.

This makes me think about our beloved church. There are lots of people doing lots of really effective ministry that we may never hear about, because they are not marketing themselves, they are marketing Jesus. They are speaking the language of our sacred story through their vocation. As Paul put it: “We do not proclaim ourselves; we proclaim Jesus Christ as Lord and ourselves as your slaves for Jesus’ sake” (2 Cor. 4:5).

For those of you toiling for Jesus in relative obscurity, let me use this platform to offer heart-felt thanks and blessings. If you are talking to college students about Jesus in Michigan, if you are starting a street ministry in North Carolina, if you are celebrating Holy Communion daily with a handful of the faithful in New Jersey, if you are hosting a medical mission at your rural Oregon parish, if you are practicing counter-cultural radically inclusive welcome in suburban Texas, if you are expanding the affordable housing options in Minnesota, if you are trying to engage in justice ministries with secular Vermonters, if you are in ecumenical conversations about greening food deserts in Ohio, if you wait in contemplation in New Mexico’s high desert, or if you are quietly, faithfully doing the work of Jesus that will probably never land you on the cover of a magazine...

Thanks be to God for your ministry and for your willingness to serve. May God bless you and the fruits of these ministries. 

This post was originally published on the Episcopal Church Foundation's Vital Practices Vital Posts blog on January 8, 2015. It has been reprinted here with permission.

In the Name of the Refugees

A few years ago I was part of a large staff that afforded me a big, cushy office. I had lots of wall space for posters – Jesus Died to Take Away Your Sins, Not Your Minds – and the like.

Beyond the standard fare, I also had a reprint of a poster produced by the Diocese of Ohio from 1938. The poster depicts Mary, with the baby Jesus clutched in her arms, mounted atop a donkey. Joseph looks behind to see if he is being followed. It bears the phrase: “In the Name of These Refugees . . . Aid All Refugees: Through Interest – Friendship – Gifts.” This reprint came from Episcopal Migration Ministries and – while we may not use words like Refugee anymore – I love the sentiment. This is a time of year to treasure the vulnerability of God as the baby Jesus in our hearts.

These days, whenever I see a baby, I marvel. We were all once that size. We were all dependent upon someone to feed us and bathe us and change us and make sure we didn't suffocate or get sick or throw up too much. We were all completely dependent upon others for care and love. We were all that small. . . and through the Mystery of the Incarnation, so was God.

My mind returns to that poster originally printed in 1938: who would have been the Refugees who would have been aided through friendship, interest, and/or gifts in 1938? Who would have been vulnerable in 1938? The world was on the brink of destruction. Humanity was acting pretty far-from-human. As we break through the veil of Advent, we see that Christ comes to us – in the form of the vulnerable – once more.

Do I miss my big, cushy office? Some days, but on those days I like to think about that poster. Christ Jesus did his work in this world in an ordinary body, with ordinary people. God came to dwell with us in the most vulnerable way. When we encounter the vulnerable or when we ourselves are those vulnerable, we have the opportunity to see God, present in that relationship. What a gift to receive.

Merry Christmas.

This post was originally published on the Episcopal Church Foundation's Vital Practices Vital Posts blog on December 25, 2014. It has been reprinted here with permission.