no way out of risk

RISK
What comes to your mind when you first hear that word? Risk. Some people associate it with “danger” most of the time, and most people some of the time. Risk is to the manic-depressive as hair-trigger is to gun. “Be careful! Watch out! This might be too much and could set you off.” Risk is, well, risky. The old adage what doesn’t kill you will make you stronger (or something like that) is somewhat ironic in the context of manic-depression. Those of us with manic-depression do have to be particularly vigilant, discerning, and diligent with regards to how we invest our energies and how we put ourselves out there. We have to ask ourselves, “How much is too much? If I push myself in this area will I trigger myself?” We have the proverbial manic episode that can cleverly masquerade as an optimistic adventure void of danger. The illness, though firmly grounded in unpredictability due to arbitrary fluctuations in our body or brain chemistry, is none-the-less easily influenced by circumstances. It regularly upsets me that normal risk taking behavior can catapult me into mania or depression depending on the outcome. Sometimes I find I have to question myself all the time. It is tedious. Sometimes I think it is unfair.

In the same way the insulin dependent diabetic must be ever vigilant about what they consume and their physical activity, the manic-depressive lifestyle is managed, monitored, and sometimes curtailed. I always think of Nicole Kidman’s well deserved academy award winning portrayal of Virginia Woolf in the movie The Hours. Virginia Woolf herself suffered from manic-depression. In fact she died by suicide, a statistically significant form of death for manic-depressives. It is so heartbreaking to think of the pain she must have been experiencing when she drowned herself in a small river off their property.

In the movie, The Hours, Virginia’s husband has moved her and their printing business out to the country to get her away from the provocative intensity of the London scene that frequently triggered her episodes. The scene from The Hours, included below, takes place after her sister and nieces left abruptly after an all too short visit with Woolf. Virginia, upset and agitated, runs off to the train station. Her husband panics when he discovers she has disappeared and he runs to the station where he finds her. The dialog is right on, and one of the most accurate portrayals of what living with manic-depression looks like and feels like. I wholly identify with the passion and pain with which she tries to convey how she alone has to live with the uncertainties, how she wants to live despite the cruelty of her illness.

Go ahead and watch the clip below.

“You cannot find peace by avoiding life, Leonard.” Woolf ultimately did die at their country home and not in London. It seems that it didn’t matter where she was, the disease was there with her. It reminds me of a saying my friend Cheryl and I pass back and forth to one another, “Wherever you go, there you are.” I can't avoid myself with this illness. I am a force to contend with. To help me see myself when I don’t, I have people. People who love me. People who love me despite the many reasons they should run the other direction. These people say things to me like Leonard says to Virginia. They tell me what I need to know for my own good because they care. They know, or are scared, that I can easily get myself in over my head and pay a high price. Me getting myself in over my head is like buying a house when you are bankrupt. By the time I'm over my head it is already too late.

In fact, I have to depend on people to help me remember. Help me see what I’m headed toward if I proceed in a manner that is blatantly unaware and less than discriminatory. They say things like, “Isn’t that a trigger for you?” which, in my ears, sounds like “Hey, stop living would you. It's bad for your health.” I, like Virginia, want to live and our standard has been significantly informed by the manic years. Normal life pales, restricts, and sometimes feels like death. People’s cautionary tones sound like a death sentence sometimes. I hear, “You can’t do it”, and “I would rather you live a life of death so I don’t have to be scared what’s going to happen to you if you do this thing.” Don’t hear me wrong. I want them to love me this way. It’s just really heartbreaking and frustrating sometimes. It's hard to know where the line is.

I’m like a moth to the flame when it comes to doing things that could potentially “trigger” my illness. I ask myself this all the time, “Is my passion reflective of common human passion or is it manic passion?” It is tiresome. Sometimes it really isn’t a clear delineation just as Kidman’s Woolf tries painfully to explain to her husband.

Aimee Mann wrote a great song The Moth which speaks to the passion with which any of us wrestle with the passion and fear. When we are faced with uncertainties made complex by passion and desire. Is something we want the best thing for our growth or is it to our detriment? Though we are not left to our own devices to determine our actions –because, God seems always willing to offer his opinion if we ask for it– we all know it really isn’t idealistically simple. We obviously were equipped with free will and responsibility for our own lives.

So we find ourselves immersed in a battle involving passion, desire, and fear (or avoidance). People “fight” these battles differently. Some people live on the mean side of avoidance. In lieu of living and creating, they often chose not to create at all. Creativity is more than artistic, but real life is fully creative. These folks are not usually that fun to be around. Others cause us to feel like the parent of a baby learning to walk. We sit on the edge of our seat anxiously waiting to catch them when they climb their way to their feet, arms flailing about, narrowly avoiding the sharp edges of furniture and drowsy unsuspecting kitty cats. It is uncomfortable to watch someone else go out on the veritable limb. In the end we are all responsible for our own soil.

Here are the partial lyrics to The Moth.

The moth don't care when he sees the flame
he might get burned but he's in the game
and once he's in he can't go back, and
beat his wings 'til he burns them black
no the moth don't care when he sees the flame
no the moth don't care when he sees the flame
the moth don't care if the flame is real
cuz flame and moth got a sweetheart deal
and nothing fuels a good flirtation
like need and anger and desperation
no the moth don't care if the flame is real
no the moth don't care if the flame is real
So come on let's go ready or not
cuz there's a flame I know hotter than hot
and with a fuse that's so thoroughly shotaway

Can’t we all relate to that moth? I have to offer my opinion here (even though you didn’t ask) that anyone who doesn’t see him or her self as the moth is clearly one of two things: boring or deluded. Fortunately, none of my friends fall into the former category. We fall into that category, I think, when we believe that the flame is bad. “No good can come of that flame. Steer clear of it! You’ll burn yourself!”

Yet where would we be without that flame? The flame being inspiration! Desire, passion, curiosity, and ambition are all provoked and fueled by the flame? What about the bazillion things that have been accomplished throughout human history because of the lure of the flame and the desire to risk everything even in the face of an uncertain outcome? Remember, inherent to risk is uncertainty. We don’t get to know the end of the story without going all the way through the uncertainties step by unpredictable step. In order to say you rode the scariest roller coaster ride(isn’t the word “coaster” is misnomer?) you have to actually pay for and then ride the thing. Then puke.

The inventors, the movers of society, the lovers, the poets, the inspirations and muses to our own lives are indeed people who look into the flame and get captured. They “get” captured and then allow themselves, often disregarding other people’s advice and cautionary tones, to follow their passion. Don’t you think? I think so.

Love is risk. And with regards to romantic endeavors, especially in the beginning. Additionally, risk should always be embodied by love. The outcome is uncertain and, actually, inconsequential. It is hardly easy to live out love in our actions and words. Love is risky because we never know what price we will pay for giving it.

I hate living in uncertainty. But I have to. It’s like the drowning man out in the ocean. Sink or swim baby! Uncertainty is all around you and there's no denying it.

Why do we resist/fear uncertainty? We even work concertedly and ineffectually to eradicate it from our lives. Why do we so often view risk only in the context of “dangerous”? How come we cannot clearly delineate the ultimate nature of the endeavors we face? We never really know if it is going to ultimately be beneficial or dangerous. I don’t care how much you pray, God rarely spares us mystery by making things crystal clear. The Bible, other people, prayer, all of these things do not explain why God seems not to tell us anything any sooner than we need to hear it. Which is usually right at each footfall. Most often we have to take the first step with very little information...and even that information requires great faith to move on.

Perhaps, risk is both beneficial AND dangerous. BOTH is GOOD news! Mostly we don’t feel that giddy about it. It isn't always good news. We like our cake, we want to eat it, and we don’t want it to show up on our hips. However, we don’t know the benefit and danger until we really live (which is like eating our cake piece by piece so the calories get spread out over time).
We don’t know until we follow through the unknown.
We don’t know until we try.
We don’t know until we’ve failed.
We don’t quit before we’ve even tried.
We don’t know because risk is fundamentally unclear and mysterious.

Who doesn’t like the idea of risking if the benefits are all spelled out and secured? But who’s ever experienced that? That’s what movies, books, and t.v. are for –i.e. stories of unpredictable steps of uncertainty (if it is good writing) condensed into a concise story with a clear beginning and end. As I’ve explained before, that just isn’t life. That’s art.

Speaking of art (and don’t hear me saying that t.v. is art), I think it takes a lot of guts and tremendous risk is involved in living an authentic life. Good art is always authentic. Another way to look at authenticity is to think of Jesus. If you are Christian we might say an authentic life “looks like Jesus”. Following the footsteps of Jesus is less fundamental or predictable, and more uncommon. That kind of life is lived entirely out of passionate love. Radical but not fundamental. It is a life of authenticity that provokes.

Love is risky. It certainly is not easy. Come on, you know it’s true. I can give you a second to think of the multitude of ways you have failed to love those around you. How in the world can we love well without being authentic? In other words, how can inauthenticity be at all loving? To yourself, to God, or to others? And let me tell you again, authenticity is hard. You HAVE to know that! It’s no cakewalk and it’s no common life that endeavors and desires a common life.

People who really live, who allow themselves to follow through on their desires and passions (i.e. risk) are like watersheds for future generations.

What do you think Sir Edmund Hillary said when he first set his eyes on Chomolungma (Mt. Everest)? I always assume that, after exclaiming “That is one big ________ mountain”, he crooned with the far off look of a man in love, “I’m in trouble now”. Trouble for sure.

Have you ever experienced this kind of "trouble"? “I’m in trouble.” Risk’s middle name is Trouble. Why? This kind of trouble excites and incites the best in a person while posing the most danger to his life. The twofold signatures or the fuel of this kind of trouble are desire and passion. That’s what makes risk so uncertain. It is born out of passion and desire. These two words have so much luggage attached (especially for Christians and anyone who grew up in a puritanical culture) that the plane can’t get off the ground. Yet, whether we want to accept it or not, desire and passion make the world go around, so to speak.

In 1953 Hillary looked upon that mountain knowing full well he would live or die in his attempt to summit. Remember, they didn’t even have oxygen tanks or Gortex back then. He knew he was in trouble in the same way we know we are in trouble when we fall in love the instant we are introduced to someone. Trouble. Can’t stop thinking about someone. Trouble. What do I do? Do I risk? Do I hide? Do I run? Do I concede, “she’s out of my league?” Do I completely avoid the whole potentially messy involvement because I don’t know how it will be beneficial or detrimental? Do I look upon the insurmountable and believe in the attempt, in the approach? Am I going to learn something beneficial no matter the outcome?

Not that I’ve asked myself these questions lately ; )

“Trouble” in this sense is not to be avoided (that's another kind of trouble), nor are we meant to go headlong without wisdom and temperance of our desire and passion. Of course you know that I really mean this. May I remind you that I take medications to accomplish temperance!

So, imagine Hillary NOT taking the inordinate amount of time to plan the execution of his ascent of Chomolungma. He had to find other crazy people like Tenzing Norgay, his sherpa, to join in his insanity. He would have squandered his passion if he’d gone headlong. The dangerous species of risk is the risk that jumps in without temperance, time, wait, patience, and love.

Passion, good passion, can indeed be squandered. The most beautiful picture of passion and desire is the sacred final and brutal hours of Jesus’ life, appropriately termed “the Passion of Christ”, which encapsulates and illuminates LOVE itself. Jesus had tunnel vision. He embodied risk. “WHAT?” you exclaim. “No”, you say, “Jesus KNEW he wasn’t risking…he knew the outcome.” I beg to differ. He knew that many of us would not care one iota and would reject his incredible love. Unrequited love is the most painful, and once you’ve experienced it you might understand how much risk is involved. I mean, couldn’t God have sat on the whole idea of Jesus’ dying, shelved it and come up with something with greater prospects? I can imagine Jesus one day, early on before he took it on the road, looking in the face of an abused woman, an angry young man, or a beautiful child, feeling passionate love for them swell his heart.

I image him thinking, “I’m in trouble.”

Risk is what progresses us if it doesn’t kill us. I guess that is what I’m trying to say. I’m also saying that I struggle to understand my “limitations” and live boldly in the face of them, or even despite them. When I am manic I take very dangerous and often irrational risks. It feels bold and exhilarating. Feels like real living. Yet it only mirrors passion and desire. It is a charlatan. Perhaps I have learned more than most about boldness and risk for these reasons. It is not because I am courageous. Maybe my more than average vigilance has produced a keen eye. A cop knows a criminal when he sees one. A criminal also knows a criminal. Even more than a cop knows a criminal.

There’s no good way to describe the pain of clinical depression. You’ll never understand it if you haven’t been there, and you must thank GOD right now if you’ve never been there. There is no good way to spell out the finality with which one experiences life. It is as if life is over. Not “as if” but really over. There’s no viability, no thriving, and a lot of pain. There is no convincing otherwise. Depression is an ending. She who resides there is out of chances and second chances. Contrary to popular belief it isn’t self-hate or loathing, it is pain that drives the hand to suicide. Perhaps, being rescued from the grip of suicide, I now know what life is. Maybe I’m even glad for that lesson…but I can’t even say that without hurting deeply inside. I’ve seen death alone a hundred times, and stopped short. When I look at living without risk it really feels like that place. And I think, “Why would anyone intentionally chose that or any approximation of that?” In some ways I see that I have two options. Live boldly or die.

In my eyes, if I’m not engaged in one I’m engaged in the other. I guess I feel pretty passionate about that : )

The Hours - Virginia Woolf at the Train Station

Instructions for Station #5

Please read the Station text for station 5 BEFORE viewing the video below. The text is posted below the video. You will be prompted to watch the video.

The Passion of the Christ - Simon from Cyrene

way of the cross: station #5

This is station #5

Simon forced to carry Jesus' cross

Jesus is terribly weak now. The violence against his body has taken a tremendous toll. He has fallen and his cross beam is too heavy for him. The soldiers who escort the prisoners to Golgotha, a hill some distance from the city, grab a man from the crowd and force him to take Jesus’ cross. He didn’t volunteer. He was just passing through and stopped to check out what the excitement was all about. But now we know his name. We know his son’s names too, and where he’s from.

“A certain man from Cyrene, Simon, the father of Alexander and Rufus, was passing by on his way in from the country, and they forced him to carry the cross.” Mt 27:31-32

Why is it that 2000 years later we know this man’s name, where he lived, and what his son’s names were? He was just passing by...probably a ‘rubber-necker’ if you think about it. We don’t know if he knew who Jesus was, or if he had any feelings toward the man before being forced to carry the condemned man’s cross. Yet we know his name.

Can you imagine being there for this part of Jesus’ story? We can safely assume Simon did not want to be involved. But he became part of the story. He just stumbled into Jesus’ story. What do you think happened between Simon and Jesus as he helped Jesus carry the heavy timber up that hill? What do you imagine Simon experienced during and after the event that he is an intimate part of Jesus' story and the history of Christianity as a whole?

Watch the video clip above.

Then pray:
This is for me. I feel anguish and gratitude as I see your body so broken. I express a desire to help you. Seeing you in this way I let my heart go out to you. I want to store this image in my heart for when I feel I can’t go on. I recognize that you really do understand my inability to carry my burdens alone.

Art:

1) Bosch Heironymous, oil

2) Unknown

3) (above) edited video from the movie The Passion (Mel Gibson, Dir)

fairy godparents

If I’ve learned nothing else in life I have learned that life is full of surprises. Some feel like surprise “attacks” while others feel like surprise “parties”. I think my friends Kristin and Michael might have something to say about surprises that fall in some no man’s land between the two…and then eventually tip wholly into the category of “gift”.

Kristin gave birth to their first child, Caedmon, a couple years ago. He’s a walking talking machine now. The other day we were all over at his grandma’s house. Grandma, a.k.a. Michael’s mom, bought a small place in Bellingham so that when she travels here to visit her grandchildren a few times a year she has a comfortable place to stay and have the kids over. You have to also know that the whole family, Kristin and Michael as well, have accents that implicate they are from somewhere in the southern states. Even though his parents’ accents have been fairly tempered by the northwest, and though he was born in Bellingham, for some reason Caedmon speaks with a very distinct and rich southern accent. In the midst of our conversation that day Kristin interjected an age-old parental query, “It’s quiet. Where’s Caedmon?”

She found him in one of grandma’s bedrooms pretending like he was dusting the lamps of all things. He turned to Kristin and said, “We’re cleaning the hotel,” pronounced “ho-tay-ell”. Words like “house” are pronounced “hay-ows”, and “plate”, “play-ette”.

Caedmon’s little sister, Mirella, was born last year. The moment they were born they were both the most beautiful babies. Serious Gerber babies. Ask anyone. I’m not biased! They are both still very, very cute children.

I am a godparent to both children. Don’t tell Kristin and Michael that I am already a godparent and I’m not really that great of a godparent. But then again I think the role of the godparent is sort of like the role of the appendices in the human body –no one really knows what it does, because there’s no apparent practical use, but most people have one. So I guess my role is to stand around, look pretty, and in the case of an emergency make sure the mail is brought in.

I have a co-godparent. His name is Dale. I met Dale the first time at Caedmon’s baptism. All I can tell you of that initial meeting is that I was impressed by his long hair and equally long beard. He sort of intimidated me. He isn’t a large man in stature, but his eyes are piercing and reveal wisdom, or, mischief. I wasn’t sure. Now I know it as equal parts both.

I am getting to know Dale a lot more recently as he just returned to Bellingham from living a very solitary life in the Ozarks for the past year. Dale is a Malabar rite priest, but don’t ask me what that means because I have no idea and believe it may take awhile before I do. He epitomizes, though he may disagree, the word “eccentric”. He would likely say he is living the natural ordered life, whereas most of us are not. Which makes him eccentric. He must be a little younger than my dad. I really don’t know. If you look at his blog, which you can by clicking the link at the bottom of my blog, he describes his “industry” as “religion” and his “occupation” “monk”.

Now don’t go thinking he is either off his rocker or unapproachably pious and holy. He may say he is a bit of both. He also might have a few words for after reading this because I’m assuming a lot about what he might say. He is a very grounded man who challenges me in ways no one has challenged me in a very long time. Not only does he ask incredibly targeted questions, he looks you right in the eye. Which tends to disarm and cause me to consider my answers as if I were strapped to a polygraph. But I like that. Sometimes I’ll be confounded but it is not so I will agree. I like having someone around me who challenges me, ups the ante, and makes me think about what I’m saying. Someone who intimidates ME.

That doesn’t mean conversation with him is like that each and every sentence. He has a sharp and witty sense of humor. He is easy to be around as he leads a contemplative and unconventional life that slows him down to the, what I call, “Jesus” speed of life. Where at first I was intimidated by the way he spoke with calm command of subjects such as God, religion, and life, I now spend our time asking him really dumb questions. Mostly I repeat “What does that mean?” over and over. He speaks a language I have no grasp of because he has steeped his spirit in orthodoxy and liturgical language.

I’m moving into a house in which he lives too. He lured me there with promises of good coffee and good conversation. It is a large home built around 1900. There are about 12 tenants. It was the first brick house built north of San Francisco. It is painted 3 shades of purple and looks out over the bay. It is a very Bellingham’ish house. Squalicum creek and the busy railroad tracks run just down the hill. Both are audible and comforting. He will be my housemate now. It makes me feel more at home there already. That says a lot. I like to think of it as having my very own monk who I can visit and drink coffee with at any hour.

He is also a gay brother. I know this accentuated my draw to him. I feel comfortable with Dale. I get the idea that he is a man who takes responsibility. He lives a life free of the trappings most of us desire and juggle semi-successfully. I can confidently assume he has no debt though I am not privy to any information about that. That I know, he doesn’t own a house, a car, or anything else that he couldn’t leave behind or give to someone who really needs it. I think he puts a lot of importance on relationships. Not for his own benefit either. But he enjoys people, and it's evident in his descriptions of them.

He actively defies categorical labels. Just when you think he might agree with you on something, he’ll explain to you, in an economy of words what his perspective really is. I’ve quickly learned not to assume anything about Dale or his perspective. I assume he likes it that way (wink). Even to write about my new friend is difficult since I have no desire for my readers to conclude anything erroneous about him. In fact, I think Dale would rather me spend time describing someone entirely different since his goal is centeredness on God. But I might be wrong.

So, Kristin and Michael. For some reason the two of them chose to designate me as a godparent. They made a far better choice when they chose Dale as the other godparent. They had met Dale at St. Paul’s Episcopal church not long after they began attending a couple years ago. Dale explains that the average age of the parishioners at St. Paul’s was older than necessary. So when Kristin and Michael walked through the door he says he made a B line for them after church. He is drawn to youth because, as he and I talked about today, he has not grown up yet himself. Although, I said he’s half way. Actually, he took it upon himself to do what he could to get and keep the younger folks involved.

Surprises!

My good friends Kristen and Michael had no idea until this February that Dale is gay. They found out when they read about it in an entry on Dale’s blog. They were shocked that they had not known this before. Dale neither hides nor advertises his homosexuality. He just lives quite comfortably as a gay man. A gay monk rather. He came out when he was younger than I am. He has children and was married. He is comfortable but a practicing celibate. The reason Kristin and Michael probably didn’t see it is due to the same phenomena that occurs when, after hearing a word for the first time we suddenly come across it everywhere and can’t figure out how we never noticed it before.

Just a week before stumbling across the fact that Dale is gay, I had told them I was gay. When I came out to them the new information prompted some pretty funny responses. Like Kristin, who after putting her children to bed, come into the livingroom, sat down exhaustedly, and said, “So, about this gay thing.” On the subject of homosexuality I think they had existed on the very center of the fence perhaps tipping to the left. They had just witnessed their church being torn apart over many issues, not the least of which was homosexuality. There are many gay members and couples at their church. But the former priest took a lot of people with him for reasons that were explained as the church “questioning the divinity of Christ.” Which is a strange explanation since all my friends who remained at St. Paul’s know exactly who Christ is and that his divinity insinuates an authority over their very lives.

Michael and Kristin pondered over the my revelatory information with great integrity. They realized, like a lot of my friends and family, that homosexuality had always been a disembodied “issue” that really never affected them personally. Even when your church is torn apart by it you can still remain relatively "undecided". No one really has to THINK about it. We might believe we thought about it, but mostly we agree with the majority rather than THINK and CONSIDER. And when someone you love enters the equation...well, let's just say it's more in your face. When their good friend told them she was gay, Kristin and Michael's found they couldn't ignore the implications. They have embodied “family” in their response. They have loved me, supported me, come to my defense, and even actively keep a look out for other gay women. Now that’s a good friendship! I never intended for them to come to agree with me. As with most people in my life I only desire honesty. If someone is honest with me about their negative stance toward homosexuality, then I won’t be surprised when they openly disagree with my lifestyle in word or deed somewhere down the road. I think these two have had lingering questions…but then Dale came along.

I might have some semblance of integrity in their eyes, but I think it pales in comparison to Dale’s. So when they became privy of Dale’s orientation I think I witnessed an increased earnest desire to understand God and homosexuals, and the relationship therein.

Dale showed up in Bellingham about 3 weeks ago. Here’s a snippet concerning his move from his blog:

“after being away from bellingham for a year and two weeks, i am finding re-entry somewhat difficult. when living as a semi-hermit in the gentle hills of the ozarks, amidst slabs of ancient limestone, my life fell easily into a rhythm that i found deeply satisfying.now i am back to the city, where at any given moment it seems there are more cars whizzing down squalicum parkway, the quiet street beyond my deck, than there are in the whole of eureka springs on a busy weekend.i am trying to find another rhythm, one that keeps me centred on the holy one in our midst but which makes me available in "the conversation that leads us to new acts as todays apostles" in real time and not just on this blog.”

A few weeks ago we all, along with a few other friends, got together for a movie, popcorn, homemade ice cream, and strong coffee. The movie was a Russian movie called The Island. A fantastically simple movie, visually and script-wise, about a monk who keeps a secret that he shot someone before he was a monk. People come from all over to seek his healing and prophecy. It is a must see if you like subtitles.

The strong coffee bolstered good conversation that doesn’t really actually need much encouragement. That’s when Dale and I first really talked. We talked about being gay, probably more than he may have wanted to but I'm sure he humored me because I’m just so “new” at this. That’s also when he told a story about some friends of his who had a baby years ago. He and several of their other gay friends dressed up in drag for the baby shower. They called themselves the “fairy godmothers”.

Fairy godparents! Dale and I are Caedmon & Mirella's fairy godparents. Now THAT'S funny. Most remarkable is that Kristen and Michael had no idea BOTH of us were gay when they chose both of us to be their children’s godparents. What are the odds? You can’t plan that. I suppose it is tempting to turn the incredible coincidence into some kind of sign from God. Don’t these types of amazing coincidences imply a purpose for their unfolding? Mostly however we just laugh over it, drink some strong coffee, and enjoy great conversation and community. Family. That's what this is really about.

way of the cross: station #4

Crown of Thorns

Violence…

“…Again and again they struck him on the head with a staff and spit on him.” Mark 15:17-19

Have you ever looked closely at the scriptures and really considered the sheer violence brought down on Jesus’ body? The gory pictures we’ve seen in movies are no exaggeration. He was beat violently. Consider that Jesus knew, while being led to the Roman governor, that this was just the beginning of hours of pain and humiliation, ending in a violent and excruciating execution.

“The governor’s soldiers took Jesus…They stripped him and put a scarlet robe on him, and twisted together a crown of thorns and set it on his head. They put a staff in his right hand and knelt in front of him and mocked him. ‘Hail, king of the Jews!’ they said. They spit on him, and took the staff and struck him on the head again and again.” Mt 27:27-30. “When Jesus came out wearing the crown of thorns and the purple robe, Pilate said to them, ‘Here is the man!’ As soon as the chief priests and their officials saw Him, they shouted, ‘Crucify! Crucify!’” John 19:4-6.














And still, before handing him over to the people, Pilate “had Jesus flogged…” Mt 27:26...

Look at the thorns. They are long and thin. Consider the cruelty and violence Christ had suffered at the hands of the very people He loved enough to bear unjust, undeserved punishment for.

He’s been betrayed by a friend into the hands of angry religious leaders, violent soldiers, and now a mocking ruler. His commitment, to enter our lives completely, now approaches the final steps. He has said he would go where God led him. Now, we follow him in his final surrender, contemplating at each place along the way how he was broken for us to know the Father’s love for us.

The Art:
1) The Flogging, Brouwer
2) From The Passion, movie (Mel Gibson, Dir.)
3) Crowning With Thorns, Caravaggio
4) Painting unknown
5) Charcoal unknown
6) The Passion, movie
7) Thorn branches, Jerusalem
8) Detail of Statue of Christ in the Cathedral of San Christobel, Jeffery Becom
9) The Passion, movie

way of the cross: station #3

This is station #3

Jesus Condemned

Jesus’ “trial” is a timeless event. Imagine Jesus was on trial today. Imagine you are a religious leader who has heard about the coming Messiah your whole life. Now you’re involved in this hasty trial involving a highly public and controversial figure. Because of your status as a leader you are automatically assumed a member of the jury that decides whether he is to be condemned to death for his blasphemy.

You question the evidence, and the anger with which it is brought to light, but nearly every leader has already decided that this man is not the Messiah. Though you don’t trust the witnesses who’ve provided evidence against Jesus of Nazareth, you agree that he ought to go before the local government officials who will ultimately decide his fate. After all, when the high priest asked him directly if he was “the Christ, the Son of God,” this disheveled and obviously poor man answered, “Yes, it is as you say.” You find his claim to be disturbing, heretical, and blasphemous. You’ve seen his popularity rise among the population, among both the believers in God and the ones outside the church. The message he preaches has threatened to undermine the very church that has waited so hopefully for the real Messiah to come build a great kingdom for you and all those you love. This man is clearly not that man.


Wrapped up in your own thoughts, you are suddenly shaken back to reality. The high priest is shouting, “What do you think?” You join in with the others, saying, “He is worthy of death!” Everyone must come to a consensus. As you close your eyes for a minute to contemplate your decision you hear the sounds of hatred behind you as many of the leaders take their turn spiting in Jesus’ face, slapping him, and striking him in the face with their fists.

Despite your disagreement with the degredation with which they are treating the man, when it comes time to give your answer you agree that Jesus should be put to death.

Now pray:
I too have condemned you in my willingness to follow the crowd. I have on many occasions doubted that you are the Son of God because you aren’t doing all the fantastic, wonderful, and grand things I expect of you. Give me eyes to see who you really are. I sometimes allow my religious righteousness and position to give me a sense of power. Give me a heart to follow you in humility.

The art:

(1) Maes

(2) Intimate Portrait, Mike Lewis

(3) Unknown

(4) Ecco Homo Pilate, Caravaggio

(5) Unknown

(6) Condemned, He Qi

(7) Unknown

the bible & homosexuality

Dr. Jack Rogers wrote a book titled Jesus, the Bible, and Homosexuality: Explode the Myths, Heal the Church. *** (see review & link to purchase below)

I haven't read the book yet, but my pastor, Doug, recently passed his copy on to me. He read it in preparation of facilitating a discussion at a meeting of regional Presbytery clergy and leaders. He highly recommended the book and also made it clear to me that it had not changed his "position".

I posted a very short video below of Dr. Rogers. Take a moment to view it. Dr. Rogers has made that list of people I respect greatly. NOT because he agrees with me that being a homosexual is not cause for my citizenship to be curtailed and my service in Christ's church limited to mere attendance and my identity tolerated. NOT because he is gay and in a "powerful" position in the Presbyterian church (PCUSA, the denomination I am ordained by). He is not gay. He is very straight.

The reason I respect him greatly is due to the simple fact that he chose to study, contemplate, and then speak out on the issue of homosexuality and the church, and for no apparent personal reason. His impetus is nothing short of selfless. He simply decided not to ignore the prime issue that tears churches apart. I respect him --and others who I am glad to know personally-- who have taken on such an inflammatory issue and publicly speak against the church's continuing stance and behavior toward the homosexual Christian, and homosexuals generally. Obviously, I am personally invested, which connotes emotional bias. So, my opposition to the Presbyterian USA's negative stance on homosexuality is personally motivated. You can see why people such as Dr. Rogers strike me as wonderful. Why I look at them and see an advocate even though I feel I personally don't need an advocate. They stand as people who have said, "I can't watch this any longer. I can't let myself continue to say 'homosexuality' is wrong and not even really know WHY." They question tradition and simply desire the church to look more like Jesus. Something I didn't even have the courage to do before I came out.

But here's the thing. The people I know in the Presbyterian church who have taken a stand against the prejudice against homosexuals will likely never (never say never) face being removed from their positions of leadership and ordination for their views. Not "legitimately" that is. On the other hand, I will be removed from my ordained position as soon as I "become" a "practicing" homosexual (because I'm not a real homosexual -or a real bad one- until I'm having sex with someone!). Their advantage is that they can always be somewhat guaranteed to keep their position because, though they oppose the current church position, they are not committing the actual "sin" of homosexuality. I'm not implying that we should go back to the days when someone defending such an issue would be removed from their position. I also know that leaders in the church can be covertly "removed" from their position based on their stance toward homosexuality. However, it is my understanding that this is not a common occurrence in my denomination -PCUSA. In my denomination my sexual orientation is considered legitimate, but I cannot hold an ordained position if I "act" on it sexually.

The PCUSA commissioned a task force that drew up a statement titled "Peace, Purity, and Unity". The statement prepared for and presented to the PCUSA general assembly which would once again vote on the issue of homosexuality and ordination in the Presbyterian church. The assembly did eventually vote to stick with current/traditional denominational laws regarding ordination (found in the Book of Order), i.e. no ordination of homosexuals ("practicing").

Anyway, prior to the 2006 assembly, the PCUSA set the task force of 20 people ("selected because they represented the range & variety of backgrounds, views, and values of contemporary Presbyterians") to discover ways the church can "live more faithfully in the face of deep disagreements".

Here are some selected quotes from the statement. I know that there may be bias in what I have chosen, but I am simply being kind to my readers and am not including the entire text. If you are so inclined to read the entire statement, go to http://www.pcusa.org/peaceunitypurity/resources/finalreport.pdf

"Some examples of what we learned from each other about the consequences of our attitudes
and actions include the following:

+ Many of us came to understand how alienating it is for gay, lesbian, bisexual, and transgender persons to be so regularly identified as a major threat to the peace, unity, and purity of the church.

+ Many of us also came to understand how alienating it is for those who support a ban on the ordination of non-celibate gay and lesbian persons to be accused of prejudice, and how
alienating it is for those who oppose such a ban to be accused of moral laxity.

Though we know that by stereotyping and demeaning each other we have hurt not only our
opponents, but also ourselves and the whole church, we cannot claim that we have recognized all the ways we have damaged the church and hurt one another. Nor can we claim that we have amended our lives adequately to signal full repentance for the harm we have done. What we can report is that as we became more deeply acquainted with one another’s thinking and life situations, we were chastened and humbled by the recognition that insofar as the body of Christ in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A) is broken, we have all played a part in betraying and denying our Savior and in inflicting the damage from which the church, as His body, is suffering today.

C. Sexuality and Ordination
The task force gave sustained attention to two interconnected issues that have generated more disagreement and conflict in recent years than any others: (1) the church’s teaching on human sexuality; (2) the theology and practice of ordination. We explored a range of opinions on issues of human sexuality...We benefited greatly from this way of grappling with issues and we commend it to the church.

The task force was not asked to take a position on human sexuality or ordination and we have not attempted to do so. We did invest considerable time and energy in conversation, seeking to understand one another’s points of view. We did not try...to decide whether the church’s current position should be changed. At the same time, we found we could reach ready agreement on several points:

+ It is a grave error to deny baptism or church membership to gay and lesbian persons or to withhold pastoral care to them and their families.

+ Those who aspire to ordination must lead faithful lives. Those who demonstrate licentious behavior should not be ordained.

+ Sexual behavior is integral to Christian discipleship, leadership, and community life. It is not a purely personal matter.

+ Sexual orientation is, in itself, no barrier to ordination.

The foregoing agreements left the task force with a wide range of theological views and
positions before it... Members of the task force reflect this range of views personally. Some
strongly support the church’s current position; others strongly question it or want to change it; others are still forming their thinking about sexuality and ordination...Many believe that, instead of beginning with the question of ordination, it would be more profitable first to explore a more basic theological question: How does God’s gracious drama of creation, reconciliation, and redemption work itself out in the lives of baptized gay and lesbian persons who are committed to exclusive, covenanted relationships?

We all were able to recognize in the views on sexuality and ordination held by other task
force members concerns for the peace, unity, and purity of the church and the integrity of the
gospel. The differences on these matters are strenuous and serious, but precisely because they are so important, we have been encouraged to stay together, speaking the truth in love, learning from one another, and building up the body. Further, we were all able to agree that perspectives on questions of sexuality, ordination and same-gender covenantal relationships are rich and complex, and our fellow task force members who hold these views are sincere, faithful and guided by Scripture. Therefore, we believe, the church should seek constructive, Christ-like alternatives to the “yes/no” forms in which questions about sexuality, ordination, and same-gender covenantal relationships have been put to the church in recent decades. "

AND STILL THEY VOTED that the CHURCH'S CURRENT POSITION ON ORDINATION & HOMOSEXUALITY SHOULD BE MAINTAINED.

*** Here is a review of Jack Rogers' book:

"In a powerful new book, evangelical theologian and former Moderator of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) Jack Rogers argues unequivocally for equal rights in the church and in society for people who are lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender. Throughout history, he observes, Christianity has moved towards ever greater openness and inclusiveness. Today's church is led by many of those who were once cast out: people of color, women, and divorced and remarried people. He argues that when we interpret the Bible through the lens of Jesus' redemptive life and ministry, we see that the church is called to grant equal rights to all people. Jesus, the Bible, and Homosexuality describes Rogers' own change of mind and heart on the issue; charts the church's well-documented history of using biblical passages to oppress marginalized groups; argues for a Christ-centered reading of Scripture; debunks oft-repeated stereotypes about gays and lesbians; and concludes with ideas for how the church can heal itself and move forward again. A fascinating combination of personal narrative, theology, and church history, this book is essential reading for all concerned with the future of the church and the health of the nation. 'This is an extraordinary book, arguably the best to appear in the long, drawn-out debates within churches over homosexuality,' says J. Philip Wogaman, former senior minister at Foundry United Methodist Church in Washington, D.C. 'Rogers book will be useful to people of ALL mainline denomination...' says the Right Reverend V. Gene Robinson, Episcopal Bishop of New Hampshire. 'For those who truly wish to know what the Bible does and does not say, this is a real find.'"

I hope to read the book soon. I will comment on it in my blog. If you would like to read it along with me you can purchase the book at Amazon.com (Click here: http://www.amazon.com/Jesus-Bible-Homosexuality-Explode-Church/dp/0664229395/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1213146665&sr=1-1).

Dr. Jack Rogers on the Bible and Homosexuality

way of the cross: station #2

This is Station #2

Betrayal & the Writings of the Prophets Fulfilled

Many of us know the story. Judas tips off the authorities who want Jesus arrested. A large armed crowd descends upon the path to the garden. Judas, who Jesus called “my friend”, audaciously uses a kiss to identify Jesus to the authorities on that dark night.

Jesus is seized. One of the disciples—it’s not clear which one—tries to defend Jesus and ends up cutting someone’s ear off with his sword. Jesus looks at him and says, “Do you think I cannot call on my Father?”

It was chaos and actions were desperate and hasty.

In the end, all his friends had fled the scene of his arrest…

Study the painting “Taking of Christ” by Caravaggio below:

In the chaos of that night, among that crowd of friends, betrayers, authorities, soldiers—Do you identify with any of these people present at Jesus’ arrest? Do you see yourself in the painting? Do you see yourself in any of the paintings here? Where do you stand?

Jesus said to all those present that night:
“Do you think I cannot call on my Father, and he will at once put at my disposal more than twelve legions of angels? But how then would the Scriptures be fulfilled that say it must happen this way?” Mt 26:53-54

Now pray:

I have been one of these. I have betrayed Jesus. I have betrayed those I love. I can identify with all those present that night you were arrested. Thank you for fulfilling the Scriptures that prophesied the sacrifice you would make for me. Thank you for your forgiveness.

The art:

1) Unknown

2) (L) Unknown

3) (R) Kiss of Judas, Giusto

4) The Capture of Christ (detail), Cimabue (Fresco)

5) The Arrest of Christ (Kiss of Judas), Giotto di Bondone

6) The Capture, Gothic sculptor, German (cathedral, Naumburg)

7) Anonymous, 12th Century

8) Relief, Ghiberti

9) Taking of Christ, Caravaggio

denouement

I keep thinking, “How do I even begin telling this story?”

Some of our stories are so long in the making that how it really began is non distinguishable anymore. Those stories that stop and start, sometimes seemingly coming to an end or serious conclusion only to start up again when and where we least expect. Stories and themes in our lives often have infinite beginnings and endings. Meaning they have not just one true beginning and never actually conclude cleanly. Often we experience beginnings that are more like endings. Usually the stories and themes in our lives are not neat, tidy, and linear…except maybe in retrospect. Life is actually a narrative. Go ahead, try to write yours out in a neat, tidy, and linear fashion. If you can, then I’ll hire you as my ghost writer while you’re waiting for the Pulitzer on your own autobiography. Life, as a narrative, is not neat. It’s not really “readable”. The extraordinary and mundane collide like maniacal bumper cars out on the floor in a carnival ride.

For this reason I find it difficult not only to trace my stories but also to craft them into stories that others might choose to read over a cup of coffee. “Difficult” is not a strong enough word for my obsessive distraction to make life “readable”. As fascinating and incredibly rich as life is, it is amazingly difficult to make it interesting in story form, and requires the ability to entertain so that an audience will be hooked. If you or I were to record my life the way we actually experience it, it would look like an endless unpunctuated stream of thought and dialog without composition and written on the back of envelopes sent to me by credit card companies who obviously have no idea that my credit rating tanked some three years ago. That previous sentence is a really good example of what it would look like.

True life narrative is more like a Dostoevsky novel --or any classic Russian novelist for that matter-- where, in wading through endless and run-on sentences (usually called paragraphs in Russian literature) and confusing dialog, one might wonder on more than one occasion if a plot might unfold at some point. Narrative is a rambling without stopping to explain. Narrative is somewhat unexamined in essence. Narrative is not necessarily confined or constricted into a neat easy to follow story with a clear beginning and end. It is fluid and unexpected. Serendipity is not contrived, and within the narrative are treasures that can be mined by the writer and eventually exploited for cash flow. There are ongoing themes, threads, predestinations, extraordinary moments that nearly defy words and take your breath away, and plots that thicken with every honest attempt to live authentically into your calling and potential. It is these things that rise to the top like cream as you churn your narrative. It is these things the writer tries to bring to the table –of both feast and communion.

Clearly though, out of true narrative come beginnings that are not always at the beginning, and endings that really aren’t. Sometimes a beginning is an end and visa verse. Some of us try to make our living sorting through all of this information, distilling meaning and truth. In fact, many of us do this for pay, but all of us do this all of the time. Even the most seemingly shallow. But some of us try to get paid for doing it. This requires talent, time, blind ambition, and sometimes(I’ve always dreaded this part) a ruthless loss of privacy.

The Beatles were mostly right when they proclaimed that the only two certainties in life are death and taxes. However, I think they left out the whole certainty of “birth”, but then I think we all take coming to life for granted once we’ve gotten it over with. So then, there on either side of taxation (a.k.a. life) sits the two benchmarks of literary composition, birth & death. Beginning and end. Everything in between is narrative, unless, in your existential belief system you understand that there is life before birth as well as life after death, in which case your story has an eternal narrative to it. But let’s stick with the taxation period of your eternal life for the sake of my “point”, okay.

These two prime certainties exist in every story. Except the story of Jesus. Even if you aren’t a Christian you do have to at some point face the fact that the story of Jesus is the only story, believed by billions of people throughout history, of a person who actually lives postmortem, and not merely in a metaphorical or oxymoronical way. Not only is the story believed and transcendent, it transcends history and culture. However, we tend to view the world and our own lives in the context of “things have beginnings” and “things have endings”. Beginnings and endings are the standard protocol for stories. Ever watch a movie that just ends without proper resolution of the storyor does't set the stage from the beginning? Frustrating isn’t it. We don’t like sitting through a story where the plot lines aren’t clear and then reconciled. I heard Seinfeld was anticlimactic as well as The Sopranos finale. People still talk about how irritating that was.

How about a play with no resolution? No dénouement moment. Dénouement is a French word meaning, literally, untying. A dénouement is the final outcome of a main dramatic or literary complication (Jane Austin does it best). It is the outcome of a complex sequence of events. The culmination and untying of a thickening plot. It’s what we all hope life is filled with, not just theater, literature, and fiction. The dénouement. Art imitates life, only it condenses it to make it more interesting.

If you are at a cocktail party and someone asks you what you do for a living, they really only want to hear the beginning and the highlights in rapid succession. Then they want it wrapped up with a bow. Most impressive to your new cocktail party friend is a clever dénouement finale to bring it all together. If you were to amble lackadaisically through the intricate narrative of your professional life you might find yourself quickly abandoned for lighter conversation concerning sports and favorite vacation spots. As well, you might never be invited to another cocktail party (at least that’s been my experience).

All good fairy tales start predictably with, “Once upon a time…”, and end comfortingly with some variation of living “happily ever after”. Even the Christian/Hebrew bibles start out, “In the beginning…” and ends, “So be it” (a.k.a “amen”). We like closure to our beginnings, even if we’ve forgotten what the beginning looked like (such was my experience reading and finally finishing Crime & Punishment). We like the well crafted story. Who doesn’t?

A tidy story that has a clear beginning and a clear end is easy on the brain. I worship and love a God who lays claim to being “THE beginning” and “THE end”. Also referred to as the “Alpha and Omega”, God simply IS. I also IS but not in the same way God IS. God does not merely claim to have been “there in the beginning”, or “started it all and took off for Bali”. The Christian and Hebrew texts (and most likely the Muslim/Islamic narrative as well) say that God IS the beginning, IS the ending, and simply IS the sustaining force in all of existence. The Beginning and End are attributes of God’s personality. Wow, weird, huh?

Yet there is no beginning to God, really. And just because God refers to himself as “the ending” doesn’t mean Nietzsche was on to something when he proclaimed God had died quietly somewhere in the early 1900’s. My point is, since God IS (beginning, end, and everything between) then God is part of all narrative. It also means that God is the only one who can ramble on and on, with seemingly unrelate plot lines and threads, and get away with it. But as a writer I can’t get away with it. I often wish he would have found different writers for some of his stuff. The whole story sometimes seems fairly unwieldy at times. Also, the way God weaves a story in our actual lives would not take so much effort on our part to understand what he’s driving at if there were well defined and clear plot lines. Maybe?

Anyway, I do have a point to all of this. Actually, no, the function of this discourse is to prove that life is lived in narrative form, which oftentimes seems to elude detection of related plot lines and climatic endings. It is hard to tell where to begin when telling a story. It is equally hard to weave all the necessary threads into the story in order to illuminate the value of the dénouement when it does occur. Sometimes you just have to start right in the middle of the story, even if you’re not sure how to bring it all together. Sometimes you have to believe that the story itself is not your own. That it is a story we all understand and find meaning in. Sometimes you just have to start and hope that you’ll be invited back to the cocktail party again.

I went to a retreat two weekends ago.

I didn’t know a single soul when I arrived Friday evening (except a couple I'd briefly met prior). When I left on Sunday evening I knew my life had truly entered a new chapter. A chapter in the middle of the book.

The weekend was a beginning, an ending, a coalescence of my life’s story. It was the “aha” moment at the end of a long conversation with God. It was the meeting of new people who I fell in love with. I left with their kisses on my cheeks and a knowledge that I only have to pick up the phone to find a soul mate on the other end. No doubt.

A year ago I would not have believed you if you had predicted:

“In one year you will be attending a Christian retreat where you will sit with gay men and women worshipping God together. God will be there, and happy with all of it. The gay Christian is part of God’s whole plan of the church looking like Jesus. You will laugh and cry and tell one another that God is not only loving, not only intending to be glorified in, but is using the homosexual community as part of his ongoing story to restore people to himself. In one year you will see all the things God has told you over the years become clearer as you embrace a lifestyle you have felt it necessary to condemn up to now. You will find friends, not just friends but family, in a place that has always seemed off limits. A place you thought might drag you into a spiritually dark abyss. You will weep when you look out over a congregation made up of a grocery list of outcast and marginalized people, and you will suddenly realize how deeply loved by God each one is and how deeply loved God is. You will see Jesus. You will. You’ll look and see brother, sister, no walls, no differences. You’ll not have to work to be there, because you’ll know these brothers and sisters like you know yourself. You’ll cry not for your own relief. You’ll cry because you will suddenly understand that there is no exception to God’s grace in the communion of believers. If he is loved by someone, he knows it. You will see for the first time that God really loves. And you will finally understand this at a global level. You have longed to understand God’s love this way since the day you saw Jesus for the first time. You will see that God is indeed greater than you ever imagined, but hoped. And you will praise him for that.”

Early in that weekend I realized two things. One, I am definitely gay. Okay, I hadn’t been questioning that, but the experience affirmed in ways I’ll get into another time. Two, I wasn’t just making up justifications in my head when I sat on the couch 10 months ago and was oddly certain God was asking me to come on out and live a courageous life. That he would still be there with me…and people would see him. I wasn’t just making up that God breathed into me a renewed love for Jesus who loves, for Jesus who IS the church, and for Jesus who wants the unbeliever to see himself in us. I knew God was changing my limited view of his mercy, grace, and power that day 10 months ago. This is what God affirmed that weekend. Not just me sitting on a couch alone, but me standing with a whole bunch of crazy people who’ve heard the same thing!

I arrived knowing no one. Now I have another family (okay, let loose with the "YMCA" Village People jokes) in Vancouver, B.C. The church that put the retreat on, Rainbow Church (“Everyone is welcome…and we mean it”), is also raising money (like Obama, not like Hilary) to establish a building. Right now they meet in another church on Sunda evenings. But this new building won’t be only a church. That's a small part of it. It will be a place to seriously serve the hungry, the poor, the hurting families, the addict, the outcast. The same people Jesus concentrated his time on. They're already doing it. They just heard God say, "More light!"

I’m not exaggerating or being dramatic when I tell you that God is emboldening the homosexual community and it looks like Jesus. My heart feels like it sank its teeth into a big huge portion of _____________ (insert favorite comfort food).

The narrative of this one story is so complex. There are threads of so many stories that weave into this one 3 day weekend. The threads are too numerous, I feel, to adequately give this dénouement experience justice. I feel it might require a book to explain. But not a Russian novel. More like Jane Austin with the exception of...well, heterosexual relationships.

way of the cross devotion: station #1

This is Station #1

Agony in the Garden

This is the garden where Jesus prayed, bled, agonized, wept, and plead with His Father. He was fully aware of what was ahead of Him—betrayal, violence, pain, and eventual separation from His Father. He repeatedly asked if this was really the path God wanted for Him.

He said: “My soul is overwhelmed with sorrow to the point of death.” Mt 26:38

Author Max Lucado has written that in the garden Jesus was, “perhaps never more human than at this hour, never nearer to us than when he hurt.”

As your own journey through the next 8 devotionals begins, enter into this experience today by reading from Scripture, and with Jesus pray:

“My Father, if it is possible, may this cup be taken from me. Yet not as I will, but as you will...may your will be done.” Mt 39 & 42

Pray again:
This is for me. Every step of suffering that day over 2000 years ago was for me. That I might be free. That I might have eternal life. As this journey begins I ask to be with Jesus. To follow in his footsteps. I follow with gratitude and humility.

(1) Gauguin
(2) Unknown artist, Africa
(3) Stained glass depiction of the "cup"
(4) El Greco
(5) Unknown artist

there's more to writing than words

You have been spoiled as I have been sending my blog entries straight to your email box (if indeed you are on that short list). That will change soon. However, if you plead your case with great persuasion I will continue to send you the blog entries. Otherwise everyone is encouraged to regularly visit my Blog site in lieu of receiving my entries by email. As you know, I post other forms of media and art that add to the whole ambiance of my blog entries, so visiting is most preferable.

Check out my most recent poem "Intermingle". Let me know what you think of when you read it. What images/ideas come to mind?

I was thinking about this last Easter recently. Easter always lingers in my mind quite a while afterwards. Like a good wine in the nasal passages. But more spiritual than alcoholic. You might know that for the past two years I've put together an "event" called Stations of the Cross at our church during the week before Easter. Let me briefly summarize what Stations of the Cross is.

The Stations of the Cross (also known as Way of Sorrows; Via Dolorosa; Way of the Cross…) is a tradition generally associated with Catholicism. The tradition has been traced back to St. Francis of Assisi. Originally, the Stations of the Cross were only located in Jerusalem. To this day pilgrims make the journey to the city to walk along the same path Jesus walked in his final hours. Walking the Via Dolorosa in Jerusalem you would stop at several “stations” along the road which commemorate such events as “Where Christ was Condemned”, “His Third Fall”, and “Jesus Nailed to the Cross”.

As such a pilgrimage used to be impossible for most of the world's believers, Stations of the Cross began to be erected all over the world. Churches were built with stations as part of the church design and floor plan. More recently, churches have begun erecting temporary Stations of the Cross particularly around Easter time.

In essence, the object of Stations of the Cross is to provide a space in which the faithful can make a spiritual pilgrimage, as it were, through the scenes and events of Christ’s suffering & death. It is a somber journey of reflection and meditation on Christ's suffering. The Stations are a series of devotionals which enable us to take up our cross alongside Jesus and follow Him down the Way of Sorrows. I've heard of many people who have experienced Jesus RIGHT THERE with them as they walked through the stations.

The Stations I have been erecting are temporary (only available at the church during the week approaching Easter Sunday). The Stations do not actually include any reference to the resurrection of Jesus. The events of his suffering up to the grave are depicted. This is purposeful. The Stations have traditionally only marked the events of Jesus’ final hours up to his crucifixion and are often observed on Good Friday—a somber day on the Christian calendar. Essentially, when you leave the final station you are leaving the grave site of Jesus’ body in anticipation of the celebration of His resurrection Easter morning.

Over the next week or two I am going to post the Stations of the Cross text and images I used during this past Easter/Holy Week event. I hope you will use it as a devotional. There will be references to actions that you will not be able to perform. However, do your best to understand what that action would require emotionally, mentally, physically.

A word to those who receive this as an email...in order to experience the devotions fully it will be necessary to visit the blog site. There will be images that will enhance your reading of the words.

I've included various pictures mostly of the Via Dolorosa in Jerusalem. Above are photos of groups walking the Via Dolorosa. To the right is a picture of part of the Via Dolorosa looking toward the "Condemnation Chapel" (which apparently has absolutely nothing to do with the condemnation of Jesus by Pilate).

Below is a photo of a relief in a rock wall found at Station #8 in Jerusalem.

Worshippers in one of the many chapels (a.k.a. station) visited along the Way.

The left picture is of an Israeli soldier providing security along a portion of the Via Dolorosa. The last photo was taken at the Western Wall (otherwise known as the Wailing Wall)