Lutheran cemetery----I mean, seminary

This happened last year about this time. The students are all on such overwhelm and exhaustion, we are now making the Freudian slip of calling this school a cemetery....

I kid you not.

I have eight papers due in three weeks.

And just for fun, my husband lost his job and can't find another one, yet.

I'm having increasing health issues---insomnia, psoriasis, strange cysts---all stress related, says the doctor.

Hence, I am a student at a Lutheran cemetary.

"Hi, my name is Alison. I am a seminary student and my life has become unmanageable...."

"Welcome Home"

OH MY GOOD-NESS!

I am loved and wanted here.
I am not taken for granted.
I am treated like a gift and an addition, not a burden or a nuisance or something to be feared.

One of the first things the new pastor at The Church of the Good Shepherd said to me is "Welcome Home." It brought tears to my eyes.
He invited me to come to the pastoral team meetings, and Good Shepherd considers me "their seminarian."
It is overwhelming.
I'm not accustomed to this level of welcome and inclusion. It is so warm!

It is scary. What if I mess up?

At my first pastoral team meeting, John, the new pastor said, "I'm so glad you're here," and I think he really means it!

It's going to take awhile to get used to this trust and inclusion and warmth.

"Christian hospitality." It is a concept I have heard at the seminary and have wondered what it meant. "The hospitality of the Gospel" is another way it is put. The idea is that God's primary message for us, "the Good News," is His love. He includes us all. His promise is for everyone. There is no one among us too wrong or too broken or so stupid or so misguided that He cannot reach us and hold us and comfort us and redeem us when we are ready.

Our biggest block is our own self-hatred and self-judgment. We see our imperfections and flaws and are ashamed. WE hide.

I am still afraid that the people at Good Shepherd will eventually figure out what a jerk I am and need to push me away. I don't think God wants me to feel that way or have that attitude. I want that fear healed and removed. I want to just accept the love and grow in it, and give it back tenfold. I'm not used to unconditional love.

Get this: One motto for the seminary is "Developing Leaders for Church and the World" which I love, and this year I've seen, "Equipping for Healing Relationships" which knocks my socks off!
Amen!
Isn't that what it is all about? Healing relationships? Loving, healthy relationships? ---By removal of arrogance and exclusive thinking and competition and contempt?
It works for me.

Last year I battled such loneliness in my unique Swedenborgian perspective. This year I am filled with gratitude for such a warm and inclusive seminary---and for learning how to include myself and speak the common lingo. The ideas aren't all that different. The Lutherans (and no doubt many other faith systems) are discussing and wrestling with many of the same observations and issues that I have been, but have discussed them in a different lingo and from a different perspective. I've simply needed to learn to see our sameness.

And how shocking to my protected little self, to discover that many of the great thoughts that I thought were uniquely Swedenborgian have been popping up in the Christian dialogue in various forms for many centuries. I was so, um, almost hurt to have one professor say, "Oh. That sounds like Origen...."

I wanted to put my hands on my hips and pout and say, "Nuh-uh! This is brand new stuff! Nobody has ever said this or thought this before!" I was actually offended, and clung to the need of Swedenborg's spin being completely and utterly new.

Sure it's new. Nobody has put it together in quite this way---at least, not by his day. But his thoughts didn't arrive in a vacuum. He must have been exposed to lots of the great Christian fathers of the past and studied and debated their various stances. Of course he would take a little from here and a little from there....

It's mind-bending for me. I have been very attached to seeing Swedenborg's perspective as utterly new and different.
It is and it isn't.
And the things he was writing about 200 years ago are becoming part of the collective consciousness, with or without his name attached. I doubt he would care for or want credit for having seen and written something that ends up being universally acknowledged as true. Besides, he communicated them into such a relatively dense and primitive context of spiritual understanding, in terms that remain fairly dense and abstruse to the average reader today, its no wonder it is hard to see any connection.

The point is, the light is growing and the healing is happening!
It is this that keeps me going.
I would have no faith by now, if God didn't keep revealing himself (herself) in new ways every day. And I think I would see and feel him (her) even more frequently, if I wasn't so attached to the few, narrow, specific ways that I expect to encounter him. He's right there, but I'm looking the wrong way. I'm saying, "Don't bother me. I'm trying to find God," and waving God away as he's chuckling and tapping me on the shoulder....

Thank God he has such a patient and wonderful sense of humour.

When I was a Boy

Too busy to write much. I'll just quote this amazing song. The music is a huge part of it. But I'll let the words suffice.

When I Was A Boy
By Dar Williams

I won't forget when Peter Pan
Came to my house, took my hand
I said I was a boy, I'm glad he didn't check
I learned to fly, I learned to fight
I lived a whole life in one night
We saved each other's lives out on the pirate's deck
And I remember that night
When I'm leaving a late night with some friends
And I hear somebody tell me it's not safe
Someone should help me
I need to find a nice man to walk me home

When I was a boy, I scared the pants off of my mom
Climbed what I could climb upon
And I don't know how I survived
I guess I knew the tricks that all boys knew
And you can walk me home, but I was a boy, too

I was a kid that you would like
Just a small boy on her bike
Riding topless, yeah, I never cared who saw
My neighbour came outside to say
"Get your shirt," I said "No way.
It's the last time; I'm not breaking any law"
And now I'm in a clothing store
And the sign says, "Less is More"
More that's tight means more to see
More for them, not more for me
That can't help me climb a tree in ten seconds flat

When I was a boy, see that picture, that was me
Grass-stained shirt and dusty knees
And I know things have gotta change
They got pills to sell, they've got implants to put in
They've got implants to remove
But I am not forgetting
That I was a boy too

And like the woods where I would creep
It's a secret I can keep
Except when I'm tired, except when I'm being caught off guard
I've had a lonesome awful day
The conversation finds its way
To catching fire-flies out in the backyard
And so I tell the man I'm with
About the other life I lived
And I say, "Now you're top gun
I have lost and you have won."
And he says, "Oh no, no, can't you see

When I was a girl, my mom and I we always talked
And I picked flowers everywhere that I walked
And I could always cry, now even when I'm alone I seldom do
And I have lost some kindness
But I was a girl too
And you were just like me, and I was just like you"

What it looks like today

Good morning. I have written about five blog entries in my head since this second year of schooling began.
My lack of actual entries attests perfectly to the crazy workload I am juggling.
This sort of ambition is not for the faint of heart.

One of my new school mates is a woman whose family accidentally shut down the White House for a day this past summer (I LIKE this woman!). They had innocently set their knapsack of home-made sandwiches under a bush while touring. Consequently their family was separated and angrily interrogated for several hours, while the bomb squad prepared to detonate egg salad for the safety and democracy of the free world.
God bless America.
(Those scary Canadians. You gotta watch them every step of the way!)
I feel much safer now.

Back to school: I have several new professors this year, and continue to be impressed with the calibre of teachers here at WLS.
I alternate between deep frustration and profound gratitude. I remain good-naturedly different in many of my views and interpretations, at times struggling to be understood, and at other times lapping up the generations of wisdom. There is so much about the practical side of my coming profession that I never imagined. Yesterday we had an eye opening discussion about what is gained and what is lost in "crossing to the other side of the rail." Good stuff!
It would be fasinating to compare notes with those trained by the GCNJ (the group that raised me). Do they talk about these same things?

I've been noticing a great deal of rage lately --- deep, profound rage. I have been avoiding it for YEARS.

But now there is mounting evidence that our ancestors' unresolved issues are passed down to us, and on to our kids, until they are dealt with. This theory helps me push away the fear and shame of simply experiencing the rage, and allows me to step back and study it. It gives me an opportunity to learn about my legacy, and possibly help to ease the load for the next generation. Instead of viewing myself as an evil loser for having these feelings, I now see these feelings as bringing a motherload of information about my parents, my parents' parents, and so on.

What a relief! It also explains the enormous disproportion of the rage to the apparent causes.

So anyway, for anyone coming after me on this path, it is HARD to juggle all the housework and school work. My family (currently all male) is really testing the boundaries of how much they can demand of me and avoid helping with the house work, which is part of my frustration. While saying they support me, they are ramping up their demands. "Change back," they say with their actions, while their lips vow helpfulness.
I get it. It's normal. It's what people do. It's in all the psychology text books.
It sucks.

Not "doing for them," according to some, makes me a bad wife and mother. The program is running in my head. "Bad wife! Do more!" Guilt gnaws at my stomach lining.

So I get pissed off! (This adds to the evidence of my being a bad person.)

It takes a lot of work to stand strong in such social programming and social dynamics. For me, it seems to take rage in order to yell at the guilt, "I'm not going to be a door-mat any more!"

And it isn't good for my son or my daughters to see me being a door mat. I'm a GOOD mother for setting the example of living out my life and my dreams. I have taught them independance for a reason. I will not live through them.

Also, I experience grief and loss on a daily basis for the heritage I have had to leave behind.

HOWEVER. . . .
I was dying. Now I am alive again.
No matter what "they" say, I had no choice but to go forward. Yes, I'm mad as hell that "they" didn't want me. My death wasn't worth growing or changing for. The profound repeated message that I wasn't wanted unless I fit their mold came through loud and clear. When I refused, I was a nuisance that they were better rid of.

How's that for a message of love and respect and human worth?

No wonder I'm so stinking angry!

Is your protasis in your apodosis?

Only when it's hortatory.

That pretty much says it all.

Is it a whole sipple, or just a part-of-a-sipple?

Lego moi ego!

When in doubt, pretend it's second aorist.

How do you translate the subjunctive, anyway?
Very carefully....

If it has a thigh, it's one of those sexy infinitives.

Furthermore, if it has "eh" or "moose" in it, we are looking at a Canadian kind of greek word.
Hence, "po-leh-moose" would be "Moose wars..."

That also makes canadians imperfect, which we knew, but also AORIST!

Hah hah!

Agh! GREEK!!!

The Dragon and the Woman of Babylon

Swedenborgians have their own, somewhat unique spin on the book of Revelation.

Swedenborg, a man of 1700's Europe, wrote his explanation of the Apocalypse using somewhat divisive language, identifying "The Reformed" Christians as "the dragon" and The "Roman Catholic" Church as the "Whore of Babylon."

Maybe it's just me, but that strikes me as a bit off-putting if you belong to either (any?) of the above-mentioned organizations. And, uh, doesn't that pretty much cover the whole of Christianity? (Except for a few splitters, like, say, Swedenborgians which, of course, didn't exist at the time of Swedenborg's writing....)

The thing is, Swedenborg's style of writing makes it oh-so-easy for Swedenborgians (or anyone who self-identifies as not Reformed and not RC) to point fingers and say, "Thank God we are not like they are."

"The Pharisee stood up and prayed about himself: 'God, I thank you that I am not like other men. . . ." Luke 18:11

Whoops. My experience is that the Word is never about somebody else being wrong.

If a weakness or tendency is highlighted in the Biblical narrative, it is in all of us, no matter what our flavour, colour, gender, or planetary origin. Nobody gets to say, "Thank God I'm not like them...."

The more dramatic an image in the Bible, perhaps the more God is asking us to pay attention to the attitudes and qualities embodied in that image.

The dragon and the woman of Babylon are fairly dramatic images. Yet nobody wants to point at either and say, "Yes! That's me!"

These images are not in the Bible to shame us---they are there to remind us to pay attention. All of us tend toward both the intellectual arrogance of the "right club" mind-set (dragon); and the "my choices and actions are saving me, so I need to help control and educate everyone else (who are not as lucky as me) so they can be saved too" (whore of Babylon) mind-set.

The dragon and whore basically boil down to Arrogance and Control, two qualities which may appear to oppose each other, but actually mirror and complement each other. Whenever you find the one, you won't have to look far to find the other. They are like partners in an unhealthy marriage, appearing to oppose and fight, while depending on each other for their very survival.

Arrogance (dragon) includes certainty of one's rightness, an attitude of entitlement, a "chosen people" mind-set, and can be clothed in a buzzing energy of fear for "loved ones," praying for them to join the same "right club." It can manifest as all sorts of social and emotional manipulation of others "for their own good,"---a decidedly unattractive and divisive quality in a family member. It can also manifest as intellectual arrogance, unnatural emotional attachments or lack of attachment (all religiously explained and justified), and behaviours that illustrate an attitude of special status---like breaking copyright laws and tax evasion, and justification of the oppression of the poor. (Did you know that some of the worst tax evaders are Christians? According to them, they are justified because they are "saving money for God." What, exactly, is their definition of God?)

Control (whore) goes hand-in hand with arrogance. It has a different spin, but is just as dysfunctional. The thing about control is that it can't stand to lose power and influence. By necessity, it needs its adherents to stay dependent on it. It requires a hierarchy in which an upper echelon dictates to the lesser ranks The Rules. Members are rewarded for proper adherence to The Rules, and there are definite consequences for non-adherence, from simple social coldness, to gossip, to demotion or job-loss if one happens to be employed by the Powers that Be, to shunning or out-right excommunication. The Roman Catholic Church by no means holds a corner on this dynamic. The Mormons, the Amish, and the GCNJ all practice variations on the same theme. I'm sure lots of religious bodies wrestle with this dynamic from time to time.
But any religious order that requires dependents is like a parent that needs to keep her children under her thumb, even though they've reached maturity. A church's job is to raise spiritual adults, not perpetual spiritual children.

The dragon is in all of us. We steer clear when we develop humility, and when we refuse to fall for the attractive illusion that our one denomination is the one true-est, rightest faith system. Each faith is one among many in God's created universe. Each is from God. Each has gifts and weaknesses. Each serves a purpose. There is no chosen people. We are all chosen people.

The harlot of Babylon is in all of us too. It is far too easy to become drunk with the notion of our own superiority. Sometimes we seem to think we can speak for God---that we have more truth than others and need to control and protect the things of the church for God. The flocks of such churches become spiritually underdeveloped---specifically trained to subjugate their intelligence to the dominating leadership. Thinking for oneself---challenging the status quo---is highly threatening to the church and is discouraged in every possible way, even when the church claims to encourage thinking for one-self (so long as you think the right things).

We need to hang in there, always steering back toward humility, both personal and institutional, and back to minding our own spiritual business. I have enough work keeping my own house clean. It is far from helpful for me to be trying to tell others how to clean theirs.

Instead of supporting the disfunctional alliance of Arrogance and Control, we can support the healthy alliance of humilty and respect.

(We all live in glass houses. Could we please stop throwing stones?)

Religious Boundaries and Fundamentalism

One topic that comes up repeatedly among the seminary students is how to achieve a mutually respectful dialogue with any group of people who are certain of their rightness. Intensely religious people are often of such a type, which tends to make ecumenism a singularly oxymoronic effort.

ec·u·me·nism
A movement promoting unity among Christian churches or denominations.
A movement promoting worldwide unity among religions through greater cooperation and improved understanding.

ox·y·mo·ron
A rhetorical figure in which incongruous or contradictory terms are combined, as in a deafening silence and a mournful optimist.

"Is an oxymoron better or worse than a regular moron?"

How can there be a respectful dialogue, when one member is invested in recruiting the world to its mind set? There is an inequality in the approach.

About six months ago, Larry King had a panel of religious leaders on his show to discuss varying religious teachings about life after death. Apparently it quickly broke down into a squabble over The Rules, and Who Would be Saved and Who Wouldn't, and was far from a mutually curious and celebratory information exchange on our various heritages and their differences and uniqueness.

What is it that makes us do this?

How do I feel mutually respected when there isn't mutual respect? How do I find respect for someone who is so invested in trying to save ME according to THEIR rule book, that I can barely stand to be in the room with them?

Let's say the People of the Superiority of the Supreme Ectoplasm (POSSE) have decided that they have latched on to the One, True Religion. AND, even though the Supreme Ectoplasm has emitted sacred writings about tolerating other religions, there is still a certain tendency among the followers that bar them from appreciating all that is good and precious about, say, the followers of the Great and Loving Glob, or the believers in the All-Encompassing Goo. (Not to mention the Disciples of the Almighty Amoeba! They are the Anti-Ectoplasm itself!)

Now, let's say the greater part of the planetary population has discovered certain patterns of behaviour that are beneficial to all planetary beings, and certain patterns that detract from planetary good will and peace. But POSSE (see above) in its certainty of rightness and superiority, doesn't stick to the beneficial patterns, because it "has a mission from God to educate the world to follow God just like POSSE." This recruiting mindset precludes mutual respect, because there is such a heavy agenda in the way. The non POSSE member is, by definition "wrong," and won't be "right" until they become a member of POSSE too.

"Fundamentalist" is the popular name to call any religious individual or group who is so certain of its rightness that it is above the rules. Though the broader population may be doing its best to establish and live by broadly accepted group rules that promote peaceful co-existence, fundamentalists tend to forget the "Thou shalt not kill" part of these group rules, and the "Trust God to handle the salvation of the other" part as well. Fundamentalists don't see much point in peaceful co-existence with different religions, if their JOB, as they see it, is to obliterate all other faiths, because they are WRONG.

It is a puzzlement. The United Nations, though flawed, has as its goal mutual respect and peaceful co-existence. But many Fundamentalist Christians have decided that the United Nations is the Anti-Christ---I kid you not---which lets them decide they don't have to abide by UN rules. They are "above" them.

Sigh.

Fundamentalists tend to have a certain notion of entitlement. They are entitled to pick and choose which UN rules they'll stick by. And they are entitled, even obligated, to charge across other people's religious boundaries and trash their faith systems "to save them."

I see no way to have an open respectful dialogue with someone who is not open nor respectful.

What are we to do?
http://www.rk-world.org/peace/wcrp.html

Integrity and Trustworthiness

I've been pondering the forces that push people toward integrity or support people in being divided.

By "integrity" I mean "an inner wholeness such that we are able to be fully true in any environment, and will not betray ourselves, our friends, or our beliefs." Our heart and mind are in unity. We walk undivided.

But by this sort of integrity, I don't mean "certain of our rightness." This integrity leaves space for the other to be whole in themselves too, even if their view is different.

I have always liked to think that I had that sort of integrity. But over time, I have observed how quick I have been to speak disrespectfully of certain others behind their backs. At the time I was doing it, I didn't even see it. I think it has been a raw "survival" technique. Primitive. Immature. Hurtful.

I have begun to choose consciously not to partake in this behaviour, and am appalled every time I realize I have done it again.
Sometimes I find myself in a group that begins speaking disrespectfully of someone or something I love, and I am speechless. I don't even have the awareness, the brains, or the courage to stand up for the thing or person I love in real time. It is like watching a friend being stoned, and yet being unable to stick my own neck out to help them. After the fact I feel ashamed of my immobility, ashamed of my unwillingness to step in and defend. Why can't I consistently stand up for my loved ones or my values?

We all know what the phrase "two-faced" means. I wonder if we don't all start out more or less "two-faced" and have to learn over time to have genuine integrity? I hope it is true that we are all in the process of learning how to be more loving and respectful.

I'm particularly wondering about any system that values ideology over humanity, or that encourages people to be so disconnected from their hearts that they will sacrifice their souls and sell out their children for the sake of the preserving the ideology. There are many religious systems that develope this tendency. Truth is NEVER more important than humankind. In fact, when it makes itself so, it ceases to be true in any way.

Yesterday, one of the channels was having a preliminary show for the Da Vinci Code movie. They were taking a look at the Opus Dei organization. A former member was discussing the psychological manipulation used to gain and hold onto members. She said that she was taught to see everyone as a possible recruit, and to befriend them, so long as the person was a possible convert to their faith. If a person was happy elsewhere, or was walking away, they were no longer worth any energy. They became meaningless and invisible. In this mindset, there is no real human or heart connection. There is no respect for the individuality of the other, or of the way God might be leading them. It is all about the rightness of the ideology (in this case, the Opus Dei sect) and about making its organization swell in numbers. There is no sense of loyalty to friends or family, because primary loyalty belongs to "the one true, right" belief system. The belief system is seen as the only true path to God. The belief system becomes the only God, because every other belief system is seen as wrong or false, never as an alternative path to God created BY God.

The heart can't but help to scream out at the injustice and inhumanity of this attitude. This mind-set produces a highly attractive and deeply manipulative hold on the psyche of the follower. At first it is very sweet. How wonderful it feels to have found the one most correct path to God! (How full of loving compassion I have felt, when I believed myself to be in the one true right organization, for my poor fellow humans who had not yet found what I had found. It felt really good. I was completely unable to see how arrogant and simplistic my faith was at that time.)
But with these groups over time, one is asked to sacrifice more and more for the group---sacrifice family time and means, sacrifice friends if they don't wholeheartedly come on board, even sacrifice your health by endless serving and self-neglect (which is called "being unselfish".) Give time, give money, give your whole self to the ORGANIZATION, because if you don't, you don't really love God....

When people from my childhood denomination have lived out in the world, and subsequently moved back to our "Mecca" in Pennsylvania, a common (and insulting) statement is, "It must be wonderful to be back, where you can have REAL friends." (Clearly, the friends one had "out in the world" were disposable and insignificant, because they weren't "in the church." They weren't "real.") This is believed with genuine sincerity and backed up with fervent explanations.

Emanuel Swedenborg has a big problem with "faith alone," and the group that raised me always pointed fingers at the reformed churches when they discussed how terrible faith alone is.

Now I'm wondering if "Ideology alone" might not be exactly what Swedenborg was objecting to.
Ideology over humanity. Doctrine, to the sacrifice of heart experience.

But we aren't supposed to place truth over love. The minute we do, it stops being truth.
Humanity matters. Christ illustrated that by taking it on and walking among us. "Stop rejecting your human part!" He says. "Look, I unite it with My Divine. I don't chop it off! YOU beat it up and kill it! I raise it back up."

The twelve-steppers say, "We will not regret the past nor wish to shut the door on it." To me that means, I will not hide or cover up or beat myself up for all my faults and stupid behaviours---they are part of who I am. I'm not proud of them, but I'm not ashamed either. (Well, I AM ashamed, but I try not to let it cripple my forward movement.) They are for learning from.

To me, that is connected to not chopping off our humanity, but letting it be gradually raised up towards something divine.

Swedenborg talks a lot about the marriage of good and truth, and how we are born with our heart and mind disconnected and must seek to have them be reconnected in a healthy way.

It seems as if some think this will happen by stifling, shaming, blaming, and banishing all uncomfortable feelings, and being "nice." Feelings are treated much the way girls are. They are to be pretty and ornamental, never angry or expressive. "Anger is from hell and is to be shunned."

But we remain blind, ignorant, and stuck until we learn to value and listen to our feelings. There is an immense richness of information in the simplest of feelings. If you stifle the ones that aren't pretty, you stifle them all. That's what depression is. If you don't believe me, there is an enormous amount of data about this in Psychology and in the field of study called Emotional Intelligence.

Others think that the union of love and wisdom happens if you contract a heterosexual marriage and stick to it. These people promote heterosexual marriage with tremendous energy, with hardly any attention to personal growth skills or personal integrity and development skills. I think this approach is missing the main point too. An external marriage won't ever substitute for an internal one, period. It is better to be externally single and internally united, than internally split no matter how externally married one might be, IMHO. (In My Honest Opinion).

Sigh.
And we are all internally split, most of the time. External marriage has all sorts of great things about it, but it isn't the path to salvation. Life is the path to salvation. Personal humility and integrity and reliance on a higher power are the paths to salvation. Kindness and compassion and a passionate investment in the common good are part of that path too.

For me, personal integrity returns when I remember love. It isn't about battling stupid thinking. It just keeps looking like it was stupid thinking that caused all my hurt, so my first impulse is to go slay the stupid, hurtful ideologies, or to chastise those who promote them. ("Hurtful and stupid" by MY definition. There I go, missing the point again.)

Battling about ideology always comes down to winning and losing. "Rightness" is the ultimate value. "Wrongness" is the greatest fear. I can love the person but hate the ideology. But when we disagree, especially in the church, it can be so hard to separate the ideas from the people who promote them.

Perhaps that is why I have been the target of so many personal attacks, and why I feel like I want to attack the people themselves who represent all the hurtful attitudes and practices to me. I keep swearing that I don't want to go there, and yet I keep waking up there. Again.

"God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change...."

How does one accept spiritual alcoholism and sexual abuse, because I don't seem able to stop it or change it?

How do I find integrity in such a mire? I refuse to stand for any abuse, but I don't want to hurt ANY people, even the abusers.

I believe the only truly trustworthy people are the people who truly know themselves, who understand the bulk of their feelings and motivations, and who exercise rational choices based on their best thinking AND intuition. The only truly trustworthy people respect the other as much as they respect themselves, no more, and no less.

Will I ever have that?

Thou shalt not commit publicity

In Martha Beck's "Leaving the Saints," with her usual candor and humour, she expresses that one of the unspoken commandments of her faith of origin is "Thou shalt not commit publicity."

Thou shalt not ever say anything in any way that might reflect badly on THE CHURCH.

She comes from a different denomination, but the dynamic is the same for me. I am amazed at how deeply the fear and hesitation runs. Even if the church has abused me and hurt me and denies my pain and dismisses me and minimizes me, I have been afraid to ever, EVER actually mention this in public. No longer. Now I commit publicity.

Other women in the church who have confessed their deep pain and hurt and disillusionment, still have enormous hesitation in letting anyone outside the church know it or see it. We are deeply socialized to maintain the reputation of the church at all costs.

"After all, the General Church is the Lord's True New Church, isn't it?"
How could we ever criticize that? We might as well criticize God!
(Actually, God is much more forgiving. God is also not co-dependent, nor does He have financial interests that He values more than His children.)

Why are we so afraid to commit publicity?

I am not the first to observe that the dynamics of the alcoholic family runs true in every aspect of the General Church, all the way down to the "look good to the world at all costs," dynamic and the "keep the family secrets---especially the sexual abuse!" dynamic---we shame and blame and cut off the the ones who dare to try to break through the denial.

"That's not true any more!" some cry.
(Except for all the ways it still is, and is still hurting and wounding and dismissing and invalidating and minimizing....)

I have been getting slapped about for committing publicity. I am "personally disparaging" and "insulting" people. Shame on me.

Martha Beck's family of origin has published very rational sounding objections, which imply that she is sadly mistaken and mentally and emotionally unstable. (They are all card-carrying members of the Mormon faith. Actually listening to her means they would have to question the underlying dynamics, the pain and deep disfunction and fear and control that runs in their dear mother church. They simply can't do it. The only alternative is to make Martha wrong.)

She's my hero.

ow, ow, ow........

We are so horrible to each other. How do we bear it?

To the church

When I was born, you were disappointed because I was not a boy.
That told me that boys are better than girls.

When I was growing up, you told me that boys can do whatever they want, but girls really should be wives and mothers---that a GOOD girl would want nothing else. You criticized and gossiped about the women who had jobs and careers, and questioned their femininity.
That told me that, as a girl, I had no real choice in my future, and was wrong to even want anything besides the role of wife and mother.

I wanted to be a good girl.

When puberty hit, I was feared and controlled and told to wear special clothes that show I am a girl---alluring, but not too alluring---and I was told that wanting to keep wearing pants because they are practical and comfortable is worldly and unfeminine.
That told me that my freedom was over. That I was special in a way I didn't want to be. I was to be ornamental, curbed, and feared for the rest of my fertile days.

If a girl was unattractive, she was criticized. If a girl was pretty, she was praised. If a girl was too pretty, she was feared and criticized.
That taught me that a girl's essential worth is in her appearance---and that I, too, should expect to be discussed and criticized and judged by the group like a piece of merchandise. It also reminded me to be afraid of my sexuality.

When our sister denomination started ordaining women, you shrieked and howled and mocked and laughed. You questioned their intelligence, their doctrine, their love for the Lord, and their ability to understand the Word.
That taught me to mock, howl, shriek, and laugh at different ideas. That taught me that only our denomination was right. It showed me that, if I ever agreed with the other denomination, I too would be mocked, reviled, and laughed at---that my intelligence, judgment and mental stability would be called into question.

In our denomination, only men are allowed to be ministers. Women are taught the doctrine, but are not ever to question it. Women are taught how to translate ancient texts, but are not allowed to officially translate, except as proofreaders, or when there are not enough men. When intelligent, educated women question the church positions, they are called "clever but undoctrinal."
That showed me that women's voices would never, ever be respected unless they say what the boys want to hear; that women will always be second class, and that even when the girls play by the boys' rules, the boys will dismiss and invalidate them anyway.

When the loving, respectful, women-honouring minister was taken from our congregation and replaced with a conservative, "Let's celebrate men's wisdom!" minister, I cried out in pain and anguish. When he took away our artistic, circular, inclusive contemporary service and insisted that everyone should be content to worship in the traditional manner, I watched the death of the only acceptable avenue of heart-ministry for me. When I told you I was suffering, and please, please, was there no way to allow our contemporary service to come back? you told me I was an essentially unhappy person who did nothing but complain, and really should get counseling.
I died.

You criticized me for dying.

My latest rant

In my upbringing, there was a lot of talk about "being selfish," and "being worldly." There was a lot of, "Don't be selfish!" and "Don't be worldly!" announced with a stern countenance, and generally was used as a socialization tool. Not wanting to volunteer at a church event was "selfish." Not donating money to the church was "worldly."

Not that long ago, I watched four kids riding bikes in my home town, and the kid in the back of the pack, after shouting, "Hey, wait up!" to no effect, tried louder, "You're being selfish!"
I realized then how early even the children were socialized to use the same "motivational" tools. If all else fails, accuse the uncooperative soul of being selfish or worldly.

I was taught that I was essentially prone to evil of all kind. The effect, combined with voices of authority telling me when my unwillingness was simply selfishness or worldliness, was that I believed I could never trust my inner voice. My inner voice was "really the voice of hell," and I needed to listen to my superiors if I wanted to be saved from it.

It's a great way to produce a fearful, compliant laity!

This sort of socialization cuts a person off from their essential self and from the still small voice of God within. It systematically plugs up the inner ear that hears the voice of God (because the inner voice "is only, always, and ever selfish and worldly!") and replaces it with (in my case "The Word," which was really) the views, interpretations and biases of the all-male clergy. We were always encouraged to read and study the Word, but should we ever come up with an insight or interpretation that was contradictory to the standard interpretation, we were a threat, and obviously wrong. The lay person was always, by definition, wrong. Should she be a woman, worse still. So we "read the Word," but came up with what we were told to come up with.

Something was true because it was "in the Word," but if two people disagreed on what "the Word" said, males won over females, and ordained males won over everybody. The ordained males whose interpretations disagreed with the power base were (and still are) given desk jobs of no influence, or are assigned to the backwater placements that nobody wants, or simply left unassigned. Their training is so disconnected from that of the broader brotherhood/sisterhood of Christian clergy that they would be hard pressed to find work anywhere else but within their own, tiny denomination. Daring to disagree means losing your livelihood, your community and even your family---so tightly wound are the bonds of fear and loyalty.

Has anyone read "Leaving the Saints" by Martha Beck?

In my childhood reality, it turned out that the Church was essentially God. Woe betide those who dare to challenge it. We sang to the church, toasted the church, vowed to place her well-being above all else, called her glorious, the bride of the Lord, etc. etc. OUR church was "the crown of all the churches."
The best.
"We're number one!"
(Maybe there is no "number one?" Maybe God doesn't play favourites?)

We were taught that the teachings of the church came directly from the Word. "The Word" was essentially any standard General Church interpretation of Swedenborg's writings, which means more or less according to The Doctrine of Wm. H. Benade.

Apparently, the folks who were reading the Writings for a hundred years before Benade ever came on the scene had somehow missed completely the exclusive, purist, patriarchal, fear-based, "new chosen people" interpretation Benade found and promoted. But thanks to Benade's influence, the tiny denomination of Swedenborgians that existed pre-Benade was spun rapidly into civil war, dividing families, and creating such a hurtful split that the wounds still smart 100 years later.

I certainly witnessed and continue to witness nothing but contempt for our mother denomination. They are reading the same material as us, but the General Church gets it "right" and they QED, must get it wrong. God forbid we should be like them, since they seem to find a gentle, loving, inclusive, non-purist, love and trust-based message in the very same books.

Hm. Sound like any other Christian splits we know? Fundamentalists and .....

I can't count the number of female employees who have secretly confessed they think the leadership and micro-managing style of employment is utterly ludicrous. Still, they stay for many reasons. I can't blame them. Many stay for the sake of the next generation. But the politics involved, the tightrope-walking, gang-warfare, back-stabbing, and gag-orders would have to be seen to be believed. And most of it is cloaked in tremendous Niceness. Smile. Be polite. Look nice. Volunteer until you have lost your health and your children, and smile while you're at it.

No wonder so many lay people in the General Church are afraid to say what they really think. No wonder they are terrified to leave. We are so used to a tight, homogenous community, and so alienated from our nearest cousins. Where do we go if we leave? We are trained to feel so special and different, we have a hard time feeling "at home" anywhere else.

Right now, "staying" for me looks more like staying with an abusive parent or husband because one has never learned or believed one can survive without them. Funny thing is, the farther I get from the fear and cowering and hiding, the more I come home to the Lord.

I can hear in my head the huge array of voices telling me I am wrong, lying, making it up, exaggerating, defaming, falsifying.....
I can see the head-shaking and tsk-tsk-ing, and sad concern for my mental health that I could dare say such terrible, misguided things.

It makes me sick.

Did I mention the incredible invalidation of personal feeling and experience at all levels?

What? I'm not bitter! Who, me?

Gossip

In my life, I have known a series of people who would be my friend to my face and criticize me behind my back. I was well into my naive twenties before I realized that these "friends," who would be so warm and supportive and complimentary in my presence while running down other people, were doing the same with everyone. The impression that I was a special friend, above reproach, while the other people were unfortunately flawed, was a tough illusion to let go of.

I can't believe how long I clung to the illusion that I held a special status with these people. Even after one "friend's" gossip got back to me, I couldn't quite believe that she really was the two-faced energy I had begun to suspect. After that, I began to suspect each person I knew that would gossip about others in my presence (often under the guise of "concern"). It was and continues to be a hard exercise for me.

So many people are charming and likeable! And who among us isn't trying to find esteem and belonging with other people? While I suspect this sort of two-faced behaviour comes from a damaged psyche and unexamined habits, I also see how toxic this quality is in a "friend," and I have had to choose to cut some of these people out of my life---not so much out of judgment of them, but out of self-preservation. I don't want to be around that sort of energy; it is far too easy a behaviour to pick up.
When I disconnect from this sort of energy, I (wisely or unwisely) try to make a space to explain why. "Thus and so got back to me. It made me realize how much gossip is a part of how we spend time together, and that feels bad. If you are gossiping about others to me, why would I think you wouldn't gossip about me to others? If we spend more time together, let's only talk about ourselves from now on."

I got one rage-filled door slammed in my face. No doubt I am now simply a target for that person, rather than a buddy and gossip participant.

I got one stuttering excuse, and that person disappeared, and was soon buddying up with someone else.

The third person is elderly and forgetful and regressing, and simply gossips anyway. It is distressing, because life circumstances require that I spend a certain amount of time in her presence. I have to go into her presence prepared with changes of topic and exit strategies.

It tears me up in so many ways.

How much do I do this thing I can't stand? I know I have! I bet I still do!
It makes me cringe and want to vomit.

One thing I have discovered, is that the more I find a safe place inside myself, and the more I know myself and what I believe in, the more alert I am to gossip, and the less prone I am to fall into it.
No doubt I will be prone to it for the rest of my life, and that thought sucks. But because that is true, I pray that my friends will have the guts and the love to call me on it if and when I do it. Don't let me get away with it!

Low Christology

Low Christology does not exalt the Divinity of Jesus over his humanity. It opens itself to the reality of Jesus' human experience. His immediacy and connection with our experience is reflected in architecture and art.
We see Low Christology reflected in the church architectures which bring the altar down toward the people and even into their center, as it were. It tends to have a more semi-circular design with the activities around the altar being brought physically and psychologically closer to the people. The circular-style seating also promotes much more of a feeling of community and connection with fellow worshippers. The warmth of this sort of arrangement contrasts the austerity of the high cathedrals of Europe.

In art, we find depictions of the temptations and suffering of Christ looking like suffering. No longer does the art look like mild discomfort or a slightly bad afternoon, but the agony described in the gospels.

I recently watched the 6-hour Jesus of Nazareth movie from the 1970s, and was blown away by how the actor's facial expressions are almost robotic or trancelike. This represents the ideology of the directors or producers - Jesus could barely crack a smile. He was remote and disconnected from his disciples. He was blank or sober in expression much of the time. I guess he was busy being Divine.

Contrast this with the made-for-TV movie entitled "Jesus" released in 2000. Jesus smiles, dances, laughs, is shown chanting in the temple with the "law" on his forehead according to tradition, teases his cousin John, feels insecure, loves and goofs around with his disciples, and plays with the children.
In Gethsemane He claws at the grass, and some the temptation is depicted as a struggle to stand strong in his path as Satan offers ways out of the coming torture and assures Jesus that His efforts will be in vain. I really cared about this Jesus and felt conflicted and torn by "Satan's" arguments.

The production sought to bring us into Jesus' experience, and Him into ours.

I didn't cry when the 1970's movie Jesus was crucified. It was an awful intellectual exercise to watch, but I had no personal attachment to the figure. But in the 2000 movie, I bawled my eyes out. I had LOVED this Jesus. I was devastated. A precious, beloved mentor was being unjustly tortured and killed before our eyes. It seems to me that this emotional response to Jesus' crucifixion is far more appropriate than a merely intellectual dismay and distaste.

While the Gibson movie certainly didn't shy from showing incredibly hideous torture in all it's physicality, it failed to generate in me a feeling of connection to the figure on the screen before the torture started. Again, I spent most of the movie in a state of horrified fascination---in an intellectual and analytical response---critiquing the scholarship and almost finding a morbid humour in how "horrible" advanced to insufferably hideous, to ridiculously horrendous. The only times I wept were when humanity, in efforts to support and comfort Jesus, broke through the relentless torture. Otherwise, it didn't bring me into my heart at all. I stayed in my head, just to survive.

So, what is the thing about High Christology and Low Christology? Is Low Christology "better" than high Christology?
I don't think so. I think separation of Human and Divine is harmful, either way you slice it.
If we make Jesus too human, he becomes our buddy, our yes-man, or our "sweet" friend who is essentially a powerless wuss.
We need to really get it in our very blood that Christ is Divine and human, Human and divine. They don't cancel each other out. They aren't mutually exclusive.
I think this is hard for us. I think we tend to be out of balance with it, and it takes a lifetime to "get-it-together" or see that they are One.
God with us.
GOD with us.
God WITH us.
God with us.

High Christology

"Christology" is how a person or group views Jesus in relationship to the Divine and in relationship to the Human. "High Christology" emphasizes the Divinity of Jesus, with a greater and greater removal from the human aspect. It is evidenced in art and architecture and theology.


High Christology venerates the sacred texts and the holiness of God so much so that the altar in High Christology cathedrals is removed farther and farther from the people. The structure tends to be linear, with the populace kept back by series of barriers or rails beyond which only special holy servants may go. Teaching happens from a lofty pulpit. Only the holy servants, almost always historically exclusively male, are allowed access to the sacred texts, which they then interpret and feed to the populace. Even holy communion was removed from the people in stages. From drinking for themselves from the cup, the people then had to have it held for them. Finally, when the thought of a peasant possibly spilling the "sacred blood" was so dreadful (and required a ritual cleansing or even removal and ritual burning of the flooring material affected), they no longer wanted to risk this possibility and took the wine out of the ritual altogether.

Contact of the sacred and the "secular" was so abhorrent, they built in layer after layer of removal, as if the "special" humans had the need to or even the ability to "protect" the holy things of the Word and of God from mere peasant-human contamination.

High Christology produces shame and fear in relation to God, and makes God so powerful and removed and essentially Judgmental and unloving, that we turn our faces away out of fear of destruction because of our own unworthiness.

High Christology doesn't like anything from mere humanity to touch or taint God's holiness. Jesus is pictured as always serene. While being flogged, he looks a little sad or somewhat bored. While in Gethsemane or on the cross, he looks slightly sad, with every hair in place and his garments artfully arranged. The famous movie, "Jesus of Nazareth" shows Him as virtually without emotion, no joy, no laughter, virtually no humanity, always apart and separate. Different. Disconnected from real human experience or emotion or process. He never looks messy or dirty.


There is a place for reverence, but as soon as we are making the "real" God inhuman, pushing God as far away as possible from humanity, we are completely missing the point of His incarnation.
When we make God so Divine and pure and unable to accept our humanity that we hide our faces out of fear and shame, something has gone terribly wrong. It is WE that cannot accept our imperfections, not God.

There is a place for reverence for the holy texts, but any human or group of humans that sees itself as especially appointed to interpret God's Word for others and tries to cut off the people from direct access to the Word is presuming that God cannot handle his creation nor take care of His own Word. It is a case of mistaken self-importance and actually shows disrespect for God by trying to handle things on His behalf, as if he can't manage---all in the name of His holiness.

Clergy are consultants and wise advisors. They should never presume to know better than the one they are supporting. They are teachers and empower-ers (is there such a word?) not parents, not police, not dictators.

God's two great commandments?
LOVE the Lord and Love the neighbour.

Not "fear the Lord and judge the neighbour."
Not "presume that you are closer to the Lord than the neighbour and therefore must control the neighbour for their own good."

The Lord is pressing to be received at every second, not recoiling in horror from His children and needing the nanny to wash us and bathe us and dress us up and feed us before He deigns to let us cower at His footstool.

Fear is the opposite of love. Fear, when not understood or addressed or handed over to God, almost always ends up as controlling behaviours and justification of controlling behaviour.

Just some thoughts.

Amazing Grace

It has been an unusually busy week emotionally. I do often experience this type of lead-up to Easter, but it still seems to catch me off guard.
I have been reflecting on the theology in which I was raised.
Douglas John Hall, in his book, "Why Christian" (I think that's where he says this... heh-heh...) talks about the phenomenon of even faith itself being viewed as a personal accomplishment by some....
It made me think.
Among some in the system that raised me---indeed, among those who influenced me the most, the common sentiment seemed to be that if one went to heaven, it was all God's doing, and if one went to hell, it was one's own fault. (There is a truth in this. But all truths become false if overemphasized.) Indeed, if you were even suffering, it was your fault. If you doubted, it was your fault. If you strayed from "true doctrine" it was your fault. One needed to study Swedenborg ad infinitum, like stacking up bricks in the tower of.... well, you get my drift.)
Having faith itself, in other words, became a "work," though nobody would have put it that way.
(Certainly not! We were the "one true church" that keeps love and faith in perfect balance always! Er, except when we don't, which seems to be most of the time. I think we went wrong the minute we said "one true faith" in combination with "US".... A lot of happy energy went into and still does go into pointing fingers at other Christian groups as the ones who "have it wrong.")
Even faith has become a "work." This was an epiphany for me.
So ...following that logic... If I get it "wrong" (and getting it RIGHT is everything---essentially salvation) it is my fault. Last time I checked, that was works-based salvation. (Besides, there was no real way to know how to "get it right" other than watching others and the code of approval/disapproval that runs the community, and best of all, to surrender one's intelligence to that of the authorities because "they have a fast track to the TRUTH and lay-people tend to mess it up and get it wrong.")
I was told to read the Word and pray a lot, both of which are very good things, except when doing so put me increasingly in conflict with the governing body, rather than fixing everything. Among other things, the more I read and studied, the more I loved the Lord and the Word, and consequently wanted to be a "minister," (though not in the governing model that currently serves the church.) The reply to the fact that reading the Word and praying put me in increasing conflict with the church, was that I was "doing it wrong."
Works again.
My salvation depended on "doing it right." And if it didn't "work," I was doing it wrong.
Hmmm. Circular reasoning? Who gets to define whether it is "working" or not?

Now wait. I want to be fair.
This is how I internalized the messages taught me. Though nothing grows in a vacuum, I freely admit that how I heard what was said might have been different than what was actually said.
Various childhood wounds certainly set me up to believe that my survival depended on figuring out what I needed to do and not do to keep from being chucked in the garbage or given up for adoption. I had already committed the sin of being born a girl. The THIRD girl. (You'd think I would have known better. Sheesh!) I was given lots of information about the tragedy and unfairness of it all. My cousin's family had gotten to the hospital first and "gotten the boy." I was the booby prize. So, I "knew" my chances of survival were perilous at best. I was at the bottom. Steerage on the Titanic. The first to be drowned. My three-year-old mind knew I would not survive if I made one false move.
Adult common sense aside. Three-year-olds are not capable of adult common sense.
How ironic that I have now jumped ship.

I suppose that is why I found the story of Moses's exclusion from Canaan such an uncomfortable story. He'd served the Lord faithfully for YEARS, and yet one false move, and he's excluded forever. (That's the presenting story. The internal meaning is something quite different.)
But I had accepted this reality as "the way things are with God" and never questioned it. It was my reality. "Learn everything you can. Stay on your toes! Watch out! Be vigilant! One false move and that's it!"
Fear, vigilance, hyper-responsibility and constant overhanging JUDGMENT.
No wiggle room. No room to stumble, learn, and try again. No mercy. No GRACE.
In Lutheran terminology, we are talking about the tension between Law and Gospel.
In Swedenborgian terms, this is the tension between Judgment and Mercy.
Judgment raised me. I was born on the Isle of Judgment. My maiden name is Judgment.
No wonder I am falling madly in love with Mercy.

Remarkable Cows

Listening to Sandra Boynton's "Philadelphia Chickens" CD as I answer some email and catch my breath. My toes are tapping and I'm humming along to, "We're remarkable cows. . . ."
What would we do without music or humour?

I've just finished reading "Leaving the Saints" by Martha Beck, which I read almost non-stop from the minute it crossed my palms. It is my story, and thousands of other people's story, with variations. I find her humour and breathtaking honesty and compassion more than enough to get me through the difficult material. I had to stop reading to shake and shudder for awhile.
Our stories are so similar, except in my case, much more subtle, and I have no extant scars. Just symptoms, which are so much more deniable.

Despite my playing hookey to read a book on surviving religious oppression and sexual abuse, I made it through my oral New Testament "exam" yesterday with flying colours, which is a huge relief! HUGE.
Now I just have a few smaller hurdles, and my year of course work is done!
Yay!
(Only three years left....Sigh!)

I also, by chance, got to be a support for a sweet soul who is passing through a rough patch. I was the only other person in the room during an innocuous activity when this person was abruptly battling deep grief and tears. It was rather like being in an elevator with an admired and respected acquaintance when they go into serious labour.
There is such a strong social code that "said" this person shouldn't lean on me and I shouldn't really offer it. I did what I could, feeling tender. Feeling privileged. Feeling like I was on Holy ground. It felt sacred.
It was also terribly frustrating. I wanted to sweep away all the stupid social mores and hold this person and let them shake and cry and scream and grieve.... "The only way out is through."
But I don't think this person knows the healing modalities I believe in, and the elevator doors could have flown open at any moment, so to speak.
Ah, what would we do without euphemism and metaphor?
Well, the Lord is in charge of all of it. ALL of it. So I need to let it go.

When I shake and cry, I get what I call my "hamburger face." It's all red and lumpy.
Somehow that ties in with how we are all remarkable cows.
I give EVERYONE permission to shake and cry and scream at every opportunity.
Sometimes it is the only appropriate response to life.

Douglas John Hall

On Friday night, I went up to the lecture at St. Jerome's, which is a catholic college connected to the University of Waterloo. The lecture was free, and featured Douglas John Hall, who is perhaps the leading most respected theological scholar in Canada. He has won just about every honour there is, including the Order of Canada.
He is in his seventies, and I did not know if this opportunity would ever present itself in my lifetime again, so I dragged my exhausted self up there.

For a really good outline of what he had to say, go to: http://dancingwiththespirit.blogspot.com/ dated Friday, March 24, 2006. That's my good friend and heart-sister Sara's blog.

I was too tired to be as excited as I ought to have been, but I'm glad I went. He has a marvelous lecture style, very eloquent and elegant and yet accessible. Very classy.
His message was profoundly "Swedenborgian," if one can claim such a thing of someone who read Swedenborg "many years ago" and is . . . uh . . . United?
It is deeply exciting to find a message such as his being spoken to the broad Christian audience, and being heard and applauded. The Second Coming is happening like light growing at the dawn. The Lord is managing it, with or without various Swedenborgians' tiny and frequently misguided efforts.

I strongly recommend picking up a copy of D. J. Hall's "Why Christian?"
If you have read it, I'd love to hear from you! I'd love to discuss it.

The Book of Revelation

It gets REALLY lonely sometimes, and I forget that I AM surrounded by love and support, when I can't physically see it and feel it.
I am not alone.
But oh, to be able to have daily conversations with like-minded people at a similar level!
On Thursday night I gave my 1-1/2 hour presentation on the Book of Revelation to my New testament class.
Everything that could go wrong with the technology did, despite my careful prep and redundancies, but fortunately I knew the material well enough to stand and give it old-fashioned lecture style (donkey and cart) while my laptop (Cadillac) sat and sizzled uselessly.
Most of my notes were within the sizzling, inaccessible computer program, so I had to speak from heart and memory, and perhaps that was how it should be, but I'm still frustrated as heck about it!

I had found all sorts of amazing art on the internet, like the images included here, and they added so much, combined with the text, to make a wholistic, left-brain/right-brain experience.... I had spent DAYS on that presentation. And the whole file got deleted. ALL MY WORK gone without a trace, except for one old copy, missing a huge amount of work.
Yes ..."we can rebuild it, we have the technology,"
but I need to grieve and sulk and stomp around for a few days.
I was in such a rush to finish it, I didn't save a copy to a removable disk.
Shut up.
Believe me, I've learned my lesson.

Actually, the musical slide show worked well enough to get a round of enthusiastic applause when finished. Yay!

And it felt excellent to finally express at length what I love about the concepts of the inner sense of the Bible and the divisions in creation and the Word of everything into (more or less) a "Wisdom, Intellect, Linear, analytical, scientific, left-brain, Male, truth" category; and a "Love, Intuition, circular, wholistic, mystical, right-brain, Female, kindness" category.
Everyone was nodding and with me.
I talked about basic correspondences like horses and wine and rocks and blood and water and oil....
When I gave my low-tech talk, I resorted to "So, when it describes the Son of man as having 'eyes like a flame of fire,' what would that mean?" One person piped up, "Truth?" and another, "Love?"
Hee hee!
I nodded and answered, "He looks at us with Love, intense love. And since the eyes 'see' they are about the understanding, so he looks at us with Divine understanding, and intense love...."
As near as I could tell, the whole room was one with me at that moment.
It felt really, really wonderful.

One student said, if nothing else, he had only heard terrifying messages about the meaning of Revelation, and he had lain awake afraid for his loved ones, and that now he had a whole new way to see the book that was loving and hopeful. It balances the scary, "you'd better get your act together or you're toast" messages that others preach.

I got goose-bumps repeatedly while doing the research. I saw things I had never seen before and found all sorts of amazing connections.... It is so beautiful and compassionate and hopeful and incredible --- very Kara Tennis --- though hiding within some first-glance judgmental and divisive language. When I get past a fear-blame mindset and remember that everyone and every group has both dragon and harlot tendencies and the whole point is the promise PROMISE of our gradual and inevitable release and freedom from both tendencies (from intellectual religious arrogance, and the assumption of "rightness" so deep that we feel justified in trying to control everybody),
then it is no longer about "that group over there who is so wrong, aren't-we-lucky-we're-not-them." The judgment is a loving promise of release from these nasty inclinations inside each one of us, and the consequent relative heavenly life we have once free of those things....

I was also adamant about the language Swedenborg uses. I was up front about how he talks about "The Reformed" and also the Roman Catholics as the (apparent) bad guys , and firmly declared, as I believe, that that talk is all about my (and your) inner tendency to want out thinking to save us, apart from our life, and our list of accomplishments to save us, apart from the state of our heart. It is not about those groups, per se, at all.

Everyone was nodding. They know. They know that it is the heart and life that matter, not just right thinking, or many good deeds without a good heart and effort to live according to the commandments. Despite official institutional dogmas, the new perspectives and good-heartedness is already so clearly alive among the people of the world.
Baruch bashan!

What it Looks Like Today

I created this blog with the idea that it would be some sort of documentation or historic record. My recent long silence says more than any journal entry.
There is no time! My head is down, my back is straining, I am leaning into the traces....
And the appropriately expressive picture I wish to upload refuses to cooperate. I feel very Ghandi-esque, juggling latrine duty with lofty inspirational thoughts.
Housework is so OLD today.

Reflections on pride

So, my second class back after San Francisco, the professor hands me a paper back and says I need to rewrite it or get a failing mark.
!
Ouch.
I felt nothing, and expressed gratitude for the opportunity to rewrite it.
It was in the car on the way home when the universe caved in. I felt embarrassed and ashamed and frightened. The old tape of "I'm not actually smart, I can just bull-shit really well and nobody has figured it out yet," started playing loud and clear. "They are finally seeing through you. You don't have a good mind at all. You can't possibly earn a masters. A PhD? Hah! Just go home and do the dishes and laundry and be grateful somebody even married you...."

Hmmm. A case of "all or nothing" thinking?
So I had a good cry, and Phil said all the right things and was very wonderful.

The truth is, I don't know why I get A's in school. Yes, I work hard, but mostly it seems as if my brain just knows what to write and teachers like it. I just live in the same body and watch the show. I'm certainly not the brightest and best, but I do okay. So, if my brain ever stopped performing, I'd be sunk.

The experience made me realize how much of my worth I place in my academic ability. It was an eye-opener to see how quickly I felt completely worthless because of one academic "try again." Perhaps I haven't experienced enough "failure" in school to develop more of a resiliency and pluck.

And it made me reflect on pride. I haven't encountered much discussion of pride in my Swedenborgian context, though we do have buzz-words like "selfishness" and "proprium" which are basically the same thing. But it seems to me that I struggle with pride a lot. Pride is a brittle thing. It doesn't take much to shatter it, and it shatters. All or nothing. I think it is connected to my craving for perfection. I feel anxious if I don't do every little thing possibly expected of me, and then a little extra credit. It has been a spiritual exercise NOT to seek perfection, but just aim to be "good enough." It brings up so much fear, and I feel like achievement is meaningless, if it isn't "my best."

So my pride took a real hit when this loved and respected professor told me I did the worst in the class. How appalling that he should see me being glaringly inadequate! It doesn't matter that this wouldn't be a basis upon which I would stop liking or respecting someone, I leapt instantly into the fear that he could never respect me again.

But it was more than that, it was a fear that attached my human worth to my academic performance. Somewhere inside, I felt a fear on a scale appropriate to a life or death situation. Maybe it traces back to my cave-man, or rather cave-woman genes, when belonging in a group ensured survival far better than isolation from the group.
Who knows.
It was a bad moment.

Anyway, since this blog is meant to be a historic record of what theological school can look like for a General Church raised woman, it seemed apropos to announce my failures as well as my successes. I wouldn't want any subsequent seekers to have a warped view of what this process can look like.

(Though it is debatable whether anything I could write wouldn't be a little warped....)

The Bushman and Lent

Somebody told us there would be no palm trees in San Francisco. They were mistaken. There are plenty of other kinds of trees, but there is also a variety of palms. Some seriously tall ones lined Ridge Road, along the direct route to our favourite coffee and fruit smoothie haunt---the Brewed Awakening. Here are two shots looking down Ridge Road toward Euclid, and they simply don't do justice to the dramatic down and up of the place. If you look carefully, you might be able to see the road climbing again, but the houses on the hillside don't show at all. That is a BIG hill, with several houses perched on its slopes.

This green, green picture is the view from the Rose's kitchen window. Those steps, which Frank has counted and knows by heart, climb up to the main office building for the Pacific School of Religion, in which is housed the Swedenborg House of Studies and Frank's office. What a hard life!
Anyway, I took that picture shortly before we left to tour with Louise, and I wanted to say a bit more about that. For our final sight to see, we went down to Fisherman's wharf and Pier 39. We were pretty tired by then, so we got something to eat and went to stare out over the water at Alcatraz. After we had caught our wind a bit, we walked down to Pier 39 simply to see it, as it had come so highly recommended. It is something to see. We then caught a bicycle cab back to Fisherman's wharf, and the cabbie pointed out a famous San Francisco sight: the Bushman!
He is a man who crouches at the side of a walkway hiding behind a branch. When somebody walks near him, he shakes his branch and growls, just to make people jump. It's very funny! Apparently he makes a good living at this, and has been there a long time.
I loved the playful, relaxed, artistic atmosphere in San Francisco. I love the fact that somebody can make a living in such a creative, silly way.

So anyway, today is the second day of lent, and I'm fighting the flu.
I looked up Lent on the internet, because I've never paid much attention to it. This year, I feel like observing it somehow, but didn't even know why it is and what it is, really.
The idea seems to be to practice a spiritual discipline, in rememberance of Christ's forty days in the wilderness. So, for my spiritual discipline I am giving up the computer game, the SIMS, for the whole forty days, which is huge. I am also surrendering chocolate, yes, even organic dark chocolate. I am surrendering all sugar AND artificial sweeteners, except Splenda. That's gonna be big. Oh yeah, and all caffeine except tea, which I don't like very much.
What the heck am I going to do? Feel feelings? Live life? Horrors!

Knowing I was going to do this, I enjoyed many yummy things the last days of our vacation. I am consequently foggy and exhausted and slightly depressed, which it makes it that much harder. Funny me. What was I thinking?
I've already blown-it. I was dropping off books and audiobooks at the "Silver Spoon" chocolatier, and the woman "Sue" who works there, offered me a free sample. It was in my mouth before I thought.
It was really, knee-bendingly yummy. Dark chocolate truffle.
So I blew it.
I decided that it makes me human, and that I need to get right back on the horse. Soon, this discipline will be habit if I just stick with it.
But, Oh! With fighting sickness, I am SO tired! I want nothing but caffeine from morning to night, and when I feel overwhelmed, which is all the time when I'm sick and have tons I should be doing, I want to escape into the SIMS..... It's my favourite way to pass the time when I'm sick.
Whose bright idea was this lent thing, anyway?

San Francisco with Louise Rose

So, yesterday, Eden and I went with Louise Rose by way of the BART (Bay Area Rapid Transit, I assume) to San Francisco proper. We are all new to the area and yet somehow fumbled our way along with the help of kind residents, and knowledgeable tourists. The first picture is of Eden and Louise looking back across the bay and the Bay Bridge, from where we had lunch outside the Ferry Terminal Building.
We didn't know what to do next, but ultimately decided that riding one of the cable cars up one of the ridiculously steep San Francisco roads was a must.
We rode the California street cable car, which was a blast. Louise's wide smile was probably a mirror of mine. It is astonishing how long and steep these hills are. I pity the first horses brought to the area. The pictures really don't quite show how dramatic the climb is. Nevertheless, here I am, with Louise hiding behind one of the posts, and a friendly resident who told us lots of interesting San Francisco trivia as we climbed. A very nice man.
At the top of the climb we jumped off and caught our breath at a Starbucks, trying to decide what next to do.

We had heard that we must see Lombard Street, "the crookedest street in the world." So we decided to hike to it, since it wasn't too far. Well, when we struck it, west of the famous "crookedest" part, we certainly were impressed by how STEEP it was! We had to climb it to get to the crooked part.
These pictures don't show the reality, but see how ridiculous the angles are, if you can. Find the horizontal from the window lines or the tops of doors to soak up just how steep the angle of the road is. See how creative residents had to be just to have a level entrance to a garage, and how the cars are parked, looking like they are

about to roll over sideways down the street.
Well, we climbed up and up, stopping to pant and look back at the view occasionally, and exchange remarks with some tourists trying to ride their bicycles up that hill.
(They walked them.)
When we finally got to the next cross street, we panted and rested, with just a short climb to the crest, and whatever this "crookedest" road could be that waited for us on the other side.
Here is a picture, looking back from that cross street westward as a car emerges from the climb as if up out of an abyss. Can you see, from the scale of the apartment buildings behind the car just how long and steep that climb is?
We couldn't picture, by looking at the map, how the short little bit on the map ahead of us could be the huge hair-pin turns we were picturing, or anything like as remarkable as the climb we had just accomplished.

WELL......

Get ready....

Over the top we go...........

This is the view from the walled railing at the top. There is a one-way, brick-paved insanely curvy and beautifully landscaped road going down the other side. There are stairs for people on each side instead of sidewalks. You can see some people descending the steps, and the top of a small silver car as it heads into the first insane curve. Just beyond the second curve you can see the top of another vehicle. Look at that view!

People LIVE on this street. They have short little parking areas, or carefully leveled entrances to garages, and front doors. You can see that the white house in this picture has its front door just off the edge of the picture, and an abreviated parking area coming off the second curve.

It is one of the craziest things I've ever seen.

Here is a picture of the curviest road in the world from a distance. See how the houses are practically stacked on top of each other. This is a stock photo as is the closer one, showing the amazing gardens and hedges they have cultivated along the curves.

It was quite the thing to see! We had no idea. And our day was not over! But I need to sleep!

I am Official!

Whew! Experience on top of experience, and not enough time to process it all.
I am overwhelmed by the awesome architecture, insane topography, great-smelling air, and beautiful sunshine.
My fantasy of achieving a PhD and teaching here seems eminently do-able while I'm here. It seems hopelessly unreachable when I think about what obstacles stand in the way, and all the things that could stop my forward movement.
I try not to think about it. Just do this step. Then this step....
"Just keep swimming. Just keep swimming, swimming, swimming...."

So, yesterday at 3:30 in the afternoon I met with CAM, the Committee for Admission to Ministry. They asked me several questions, about my vision and hopes and background and where I am in my schooling currently.... Then they sent me out of the room to discuss whether I meet the requirements so far. It wasn't too long that I was sitting out all alone in the hallway. Eric Allison came out and asked me back in, and they all started clapping and smiling....
I wasn't prepared for how significant it would feel.
I looked around at the ring of faces, all dear and kind and sincere people genuinely delighted to welcome me to the ministry track.
It's huge.

I am official.
I am a ministerial candidate.

Ahhhhhhhhhhhh!!!!!!!!!
They prayed with me, all in a circle.
They all hugged me.
I cried.