Archives for: November 2008
11/29/08
06:10:50 pm, Categories: media Plain View #95 was lost, but now it's found. Sorry about the mix up. I need to work on my click and drag skills.
11/25/08
Here's an edited version of my most recent communion meditation.
It may be surprising to some of you, but in my experience, high school students have a lot of interests outside of their class work. In some cases their only interests lie outside their class work. And believe it or not, one of the things that students talk about a lot is religion. In the last couple of weeks alone, I have been privy to (that means I have eavesdropped and horned my way into various conversations), I have been privy to discussions about what happens to us when we die, the relative wrongness of homosexuality in comparison to other sins, and how various denominations read certain scriptures differently. None of these discussions were initiated by me (although I did stick my big beak in and contribute my two cents).
One recent student's comment that has stuck with me was this: "Doctrine is everything." What this student meant by that, I think, is that believing the right things about all things spiritual, is the most important thing. As I pondered this, I came to the conclusion that I couldn't disagree more. If the church, the millions of brothers and sisters around the world who are celebrating communion or washing each other's feet, or singing and listening to a sermon instead of doing either of these things, if we are only united by what we believe about the trinity, virgin birth, transubstantiation, predestination, preventient (pre-veen'-ynt) grace, how many angels can dance on the head of a pin, and a hundred other things that as far as I know, Jesus never took the time to talk about, then we're done for. If that's everything, then all is lost.
But, if when we come together for communion, when we remember that we are part of a community of believers, a global community of believers, a community of believers that disagrees about a lot, but can agree that Jesus is the Christ, the son of the living God, and that he is our lord and savior, then that's something.
But it's just the start. When we participate in communion this morning, and remember what Christ has done for us, and who we are, and what we're part of; and when we go out into the world bringing the love of Christ to the lonely, the hurt and the hungry; then that, I believe, is everything.
11/20/08
08:33:18 am, Categories: church Things mention today in the "bible study" that's held in my classroom every week, that will make you a better Christian: reading the bible, praying, going to church. Things not mentioned: loving our neighbors, feeding the hungry, vising the sick, living justly, loving mercy, walking humbly. Things called into question: The Twilight books, the Harry Potter books.
11/05/08
11/04/08
the sitter
a mangy shack of a thing
across the street from the giant grain elevators
next to the railroad tracks
a mean little place
in the middle of a neighborhood
abandoned by time
waist-high wire fence
surrounds the place
weeds grow up along the fence
framing the paint chipped house
and the neglected lawn
a portrait of loss
we enter the house
gloom settles over me
dryness grips my eyes and nose
inside the gray front room I meander
my brother stays beside mother
as she talks with the sitter
as I wander careful not to touch
any of the vague colorless furnishings
an old eye watches me warns me
my mother's green dress
the only color in the room
and that soon is gone
the husband behind us
sleeps snores snorts in his Lazy Boy
as we try to enjoy Speed Racer
at first commercial break
the TV is turned off and
we are banished to the outside
to roam around the back yard
with a rusted and broken pedal-tractor
that grazes on the over-grown grass
we stare down into the darkness
of the storm cellar
daring one another to descend
and wait for our mother to retrieve us
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