Category Archives: Church

My Friend Philip

28 Saturday Oct 2017

Posted by in Caring, Church, Faith, Growing up, Learning from mistakes, Words

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , ,

3 Owls  Was it an accident or part of a larger plan that gave me Philip as my first “college roommate?” The college was Local Preacher’s Licensing School at Illinois Wesleyan University in the summer of 1963. At the ripe old age of 29, Philip was among the older students. I was the youngest, perhaps in the history of the program, at age 16.
Philip was a musician, an organist, who had completed a fine arts degree at Illinois Wesleyan nine years earlier. As a prodigy he had played the organ for his hometown skating rink and theater from the age of 8, and his home church soon after that. After years of playing for other people’s worship services, he had the justified impression that he could lead worship as well or better than many of those whom he had served.
I had read all of the recommended texts for the school, which gave me an advantage over some of the students who hadn’t yet cracked a book. Philip had probably devoured the whole reading list in a couple of hours. He could have been arrogant and condescending. In reality he was encouraging and solicitous. He read my assignment papers and offered good advice, respecting my motives and ambitions at face value, and seeming to value my participation in the school as the equal of the older and more experienced men (There were no women in the clergy licensing schools in those years.).
One of the professors, Dr. Richard Stegner, recommended my theological position paper to the class, saying it was the best of the lot, but I knew that it was the product of many of the conversations between Philip and me, and his helpful editing. We talked at length during those days and began a correspondence that lasted for several years.
While I went on to college, Philip began to serve congregations as both pastor and musician. I visited his parishes at Humboldt and Greenup during the five years that followed the Local Preacher’s School. I admired his skill in leading congregations, in youth programs, adult studies, choirs, counseling, pastoral visiting, and administrative boards.
In the many hours that we spent alone together, sharing personal experiences and private thoughts, I never had a feeling of jeopardy or improper approach from him. He had many opportunities to take advantage of my innocence and vulnerability. It never crossed my mind to question his status as an unmarried man who seemed to take no romantic interest in the opposite sex.
I was not prepared for his reaction when I used the word ‘perverse’ to describe the homosexuality of another friend of mine. He said that I was wrong to judge a loving homosexual relationship with such a word, as if the love that people shared was false or their attraction to each other was not real. I realized that he was personally offended. We shared a deep friendship and caring for each other, although it was not sexual in any overt way, and I had demeaned a part of his identity with my disparagement of another person, just because of their sexual orientation.
As I examined my own words and feelings I found that I had uncritically accepted common prejudices. My own affection and respect for both Phillip and the other friend were violated by my careless language about perversity.
Philip was not able to accept my request to play at Jan’s and my wedding a few years later, just before I went on to graduate school. We lost track of each other in the busy years that followed. I often thought of him though and wondered how he was doing, hoping someday to find him again.

Plenty to Preach About

26 Thursday Oct 2017

Posted by in Church, Citizenship, Faith, Growing up, People, Small town life

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, ,

God and Country   Two Paxton, Illinois, Boy Scouts received the God and Country Award during the summer of 1960. Charlie Newman had initiated the work toward the award. Gary Chapman observed his work and joined the effort. After several months they satisfied the minister and committee in charge of the award.
Having two God and Country award recipients in Troop 32 gave the troop’s adult leaders an option that they did not have before. The troop regularly went on weekend outings, far from a church where they could visit, smelling like campfires and sweat. Taking the whole troop to a church near their campsite took valuable time away from activities that they wanted to complete, like twenty-mile hikes, camp skill competitions between patrols or troops, canoe trips, and traveling to and fro. Perhaps their G&C scouts could lead worship services in camp.
The town ministerial association gave the idea mixed reviews. The Catholic priest understandably asked that “his boys” continue to be taken to Mass while the Protestant boys had their service. The Scoutmaster agreed to continue that practice. Masses were available more often and conveniently as a rule. The Protestant clergy disagreed with one another, but they found that there were no participating Scouts at the time from the congregations of the ministers who disapproved, so the rest of the ministers gave tentative permission. Newman’s and Chapman’s pastor, Rev. Glen Sims, agreed to offer guidance if the boys were willing.
Charlie did not see himself in the role of chaplain. Chapman on the other hand was nervously willing to try. He already was leading the Troop’s Indian Dancers, so he was overcoming his fear of public performance. What remained was to put together the materials needed for a service—songsheets, prayers, scripture readings, sermons, responsive readings—the usual elements of group worship. It was an experimental effort. Would the boys, given their rowdy behavior when in charge of each other, cooperate in being “reverent’ according to their “Scout Law?” Would Chapman, an inexperienced speaker, be able to hold their attention? Would the group be able to sing sacred songs together, when they were only used to singing fun camp songs.
The standards and the expectations for the services were low, appropriate to the juveniles who were in charge. Boys took turns filling various leadership roles, and the services were usually “short and sweet.” The service themes focused on what the troop was doing at the time and the natural world around them. As in most things, the boys learned by doing, but all of them cooperated remarkably and tolerated the halting efforts of their 13…14…15…16-year-old chaplain, and he learned the most in the process.
After three years the Paxton Record editor, Herb Stevens, heard about the Scout services and interviewed Chapman. When he said that he learned more from leading the troop services than he had in Sunday School, he probably validated the opinions of the ministers who originally opposed the idea. But Rev. Sims was still supportive. When the editor asked whether he ever ran out of material to preach about, Chapman said, “No. There’s always plenty.”

“Here I Stand”

25 Wednesday Oct 2017

Posted by in Church, Citizenship, Events, Faith, Learning from mistakes

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , ,

Luther at Worms   “Here I stand. I cannot do otherwise.” So spoke Martin Luther in 1521 at his fateful trial in Worms (pronounce that ‘Voorms’). His words during that formative period of the German Evangelical (Lutheran) Church signaled an emphasis on individual conscience that has remained a part of our identity to this day.
We visited Worms in 1987. My family indulged my appetite for places and events that heretofore had meant little to them. We found a clean little pension house (cheap family rooms) underneath the great tower of the Dom of Worms (the cathedral). All night long the deep reverberating tones of the huge bells awakened us marking each hour. Allied bombs had demolished the immense cathedral during World War II. The painstaking reconstruction was displayed in many photographs along the walls of the nave, like stations of the cross.
The same thing happened to Luther Memorial Church two blocks away. It also was rebuilt in detail from the ruins. Significant words from Luther are inscribed on the walls of that church, and in the small chapel a crucifix depicts Jesus reaching down from the cross to embrace both a German civilian and a German soldier prostrate on the ground. The bulletin boards of both churches stressed Catholic-Protestant cooperative activities ongoing in their current lives.
A few blocks away on the Judenstrasse (Jewish Street) is the ancient synagogue of Worms, home of one of the first Hebrew congregations in Northern Europe, where Rashi, one of the greatest interpreters of the Hebrew scriptures of all time, studied as a child. Nazi thugs burned the synagogue on Kristallnacht, November 9, 1938. Members salvaged what they could and sent sacred articles as far away as California to preserve them against the Holocaust that was coming. Now the synagogue building is fully restored, although it serves mostly as a memorial to the hundreds of its members killed in the Holocaust.
Still a few more blocks away is the church of Martin of Tours, on the site where, according to local belief, the fourth century saint was imprisoned for a time after his conversion to Christianity and his leaving his youthful occupation as a Roman soldier.
We visited and meditated on these landmarks of human conscience. We sat in the town square by the fountain with its fanciful sculpture in honor of another local product—the smooth German wine called Liebfraumilch, “Mother’s Milk.” Indeed as we rested, a woman strolled past, nursing her baby.
The best and the worst of human behavior is represented there. Intolerance and steadfast conscience exist side by side. Can we tolerate the differences of opinion and attitude that make life difficult? Like mother’s milk, may the wine of tolerance, kindness, mutual acceptance, assent, and dissent flow.

Confessions of a Gullible Cler-G-man

30 Sunday Apr 2017

Posted by in Caring, Church, Faith, Growing up, Gullibility, Learning from mistakes

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, ,

psspectacledowl1

I grew up as the youngest of three brothers by ten and five years, so at an early age I developed the unfortunate habit of believing everything my brothers told me, only to have to unlearn some of it later. For example, my brother told me that it was all right to hunt for Christmas presents before Christmas and to peek at them before they were wrapped. That was not right. My brother showed me (without telling me) that it was all right to hide certain magazines under my bed. Whether right or not, it was a mistake. As a result, the challenge for me, whether due to my position in the family or not, has been to know whom to believe, when the story is convincingly, seemingly sincerely, told. I have wanted to believe what is revealed to me.

My middle brother provided the context for the most glaring family truths while I was in seminary and shortly thereafter. His wife—a charming, attractive, and voluble woman—found that every time she had a serious issue with her husband was an opportunity to involve me and my young wife on her side, representing her point of view and history of events. She was always a convincing storyteller and, I learned to my sorrow, she had a proclivity for invention and misdirection. Not that my brother was an angel in their relationship, far from it, but neither was he the intractable villain she consistently portrayed. The best result of this time of third party mis-interventions was the time we got to spend with our niece and nephew, but that came to an abrupt end. After she had run through a series of jobs and made a reputation for dishonesty, she decided to empty the house of their possessions and as much of their bank account as she had access to, while he was away at work, and moved the three of them five hours away, without a forwarding address. You might conclude that he was physically and emotionally abusive, but that was not the case, at least not in any flagrant way.

I have lost track of the times when, as a clergyman and counselor, I have been tempted to replay this scenario, recruited to side with one partner in a relationship, only to learn that the truth was not so easy to find.  

A husband came with complaints about his wife’s domineering and excessive expectations, presumably seeking to bring his wife into counseling with him.  She would not come. He replayed the drama for his parents and siblings that he wanted to reconcile, but his wife was unwilling. We met twice, while I followed the principle that I could only help the one who comes for help, and the same story unfolded in several variations about her stubbornness and unreasonableness. When I finally succeeded in visiting with her, the problem that she identified was not only his absence from home and family duties, but his serial adultery that kept him away from home with an abundance of excuses. She believed that his effort to seek counseling was aimed at persuading other people that he had tried, but she was unwilling, therefore his divorce was justified. When he knew that I was aware of this background, he dropped the idea of counseling and proceeded with the divorce and remarriage.

A wife came with grievances against her husband’s time-consuming involvements in a volunteer fire and rescue service, while she was pursuing an advanced college degree. He never made time for her and her needs. It was difficult to find a time to meet with both of them, and at first he seemed oblivious to the idea that they were having any problems. When we met together, he claimed that he got so heavily involved in emergency response because she was never at home, and he wanted to stay busy at the same time that he supported the wife that he was so proud of. When they talked to each other, it became obvious that they had married a short time after high school graduation when they had no sense of their different life interests. The wife had become aware of her intellectual superiority, and that attitude showed in every verbal exchange. She wanted affirmation that it was all right for her to move to a new person in her life, after her husband had financed her education, and her excuse was his inattention.  

It is necessary to understand that the people whom we care for as members of our parishes, or the family members that we love, may not be presenting the real reasons for their actions, their confusions, or their emotional states. We want to believe them when they sound sincere. We must often do some investigating of the deeper holes that people dig for themselves and the empty spaces in their hearts that they need to fill with something or someone.

The Play Preacher

28 Friday Apr 2017

Posted by in Caring, Church, Faith, Growing up

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , ,

hot-owl-southern-white-faced-owl-in-botswana-trying-to-keep-cool

Scott and Tammy were a couple of twenty-year-olds living together in a small apartment near Lincoln United Methodist Church when I came there to serve as their first Intern Pastor in 1970. They were a local version of the “flower children” of the Sixties, smoking weed, sitting on pillows on the floor since they had no chairs, and working for just enough to get by. They were also expecting their first child, so their lives were about to change, and they were giving some thought to getting married when I knocked on their door and introduced myself as a neighbor, working at the church.

“Strange you should come,” they said, “We were just thinking we might go knock on your door, and see if someone at your church could help us get married.”

“I’m your guy,” I said, explaining that I was there for a year to serve as an intern. To their follow-up questions I answered that, as an intern, I would be visiting people, helping with the church school and adult study groups, filling in for the regular pastor from time to time, working with students at the community college, and helping a church in Tilton get reorganized. (I didn’t say that I would also be writing verbatims of many counseling sessions and visits, providing copies and recordings of sermons and worship services, meeting agendas and notes, evaluations of projects, and meeting with my seminary supervisor.) “And I can marry and bury or get you in touch with the regular pastor to do it.”

“So there’s a regular preacher and you’re the play preacher,” Scott said.

I admitted that I hadn’t heard that job title yet, but it fit. So began my first wedding counseling session on my own, since the regular pastor, my on-site supervisor, didn’t like to spend much time doing jobs that wouldn’t “build the church.” He was on a fast track to becoming one of the youngest bishops in the history of the church, or so it seemed in his own mind. In reality, he was on track to burn out before he made it to forty-five.

Scott and Tammy offered me a cup of some odd tasting herbal concoction, and we proceeded to talk about their thoughts on getting married and having a baby and life in general. As the plans progressed in the next few weeks, they were simple and easy, but they also wanted to talk about faith and God and finding meaning in life, so our get-togethers continued through the year past the date of their simple wedding ceremony by the lake with a few friends and family attending.

At the end of the year they both thanked me for coming to see them regularly, and told me they would miss our get-togethers. I told them I enjoyed our talks, too, and wished them well for a long life together with their beautiful baby and each other. I don’t know what became of them later, but I am confident that they had as many or more chances for that wish being fulfilled as any of the over five hundred couples that I have counseled since.

“You’re not just a play preacher,” Scott said. “You’re the first real preacher that I’ve ever known.”

“Thanks, but don’t rush me,” I said. “I’ve got a lot more to learn and I’m beginning to feel like ‘play preacher’ will suit me just fine.”

Seeing Jesus

11 Tuesday Apr 2017

Posted by in Church, Death, Faith, People, Prayer, Suffering

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , , ,

Pentecostal banner

Lillian lived a rough life. She had been married a short time, but she got out of it because she saw quickly that it had been a mistake. She made a living as a secretary, in an assembly line, and finally as a clerk in a package liquor store. She was a chain smoker for many years, so it was not a surprise when Chronic Pulmonary Disease took over her final years.

Her older sister, Margaret, on the other hand, lived a comfortable life, married to Bob for over fifty years, mother of two daughters, who were also married and raising families. With her husband, Margaret was active in her church and as a volunteer in the community, but she never had to earn a living outside of the home. Margaret always worried about her little sister, and when Lillian became sick and lived by herself, she made sure that her sister had a comfortable home near her own, had help when she needed it, and that her pastor would visit Lillian and, with the Elders, offer her communion as they did for other shut-ins in the community.

That is how I met Lillian. She didn’t resemble her sister, until she shared a picture of them together as young women. When I met her, Lillian was extremely thin, wrinkled, and leathery, while Margaret was plump, relatively youthful-looking, and often smiling. They were a study in contrasts in appearance, temperament, and life histories.

Underneath the obvious differences, they did share not only their childhood history, but other characteristics as well. They both had worked hard in their own ways and neither took an easy route when the harder route appeared better. Both were questioners and somewhat skeptical, not accepting a superficial answer, but digging deeper. In spite of the different paths their lives had taken, they shared many values underneath the surface.

Lillian did not respond immediately when I first visited her. She seemed a little irked that her sister had asked me to come. She was distant and unresponsive, but I persisted, saying that I liked to keep in touch with the people of our village, whether they were church members or not, just to see if there were needs that we could fill, which was part of our purpose as a church, and Margaret was one of those who made sure that we served that purpose. It was my usual spiel when talking to our non-member and indifferent neighbors. She allowed me to come and eventually to bring the communion elements that she had not received since she was a young woman.

Eventually her health deteriorated to the point that she no longer could stay at home and use oxygen there. She made several trips back and forth to the hospital and spent her final year in a nursing home, where I continued to see her about once a month. It was likely in her last trip to the hospital that she would not be discharged back to the nursing home. She seemed to be slipping deeper into unresponsiveness every day.

Then one day it was different, and she seemed to be unusually bright and alert. After a few light comments, she announced that she had a wonderful experience the night before. Jesus had come to visit her. She saw that I was taken aback, for she continued, “No, really. I know that you were here earlier, even though I didn’t feel like talking. And I know what you’re thinking—that I mistook you with your beard for him, but it really was him. I know the difference between you and Jesus! Don’t think I don’t!”

By this time we both were smiling, for this was the old plain-spoken Lillian that I hadn’t seen for a while. “Well, then, what did Jesus say to you, that made such a difference in you?”

 “He said, not to worry, that I would be coming home with him tomorrow night, and I would be able to breathe again. We had a wonderful talk, and then I relaxed and fell asleep. When I awoke he was gone.”

I don’t know what else we said about that visit with Jesus, but soon I was praying a thank you prayer with Lillian, and telling her that, one way or another, I expected to see her again. That night she fell asleep for the last time.

Churches Against Torture and Impoverishment

06 Thursday Apr 2017

Posted by in Church, Citizenship, Faith, People, Travel

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , ,

800px-Le_sacre_coeur_(paris_-_france)

Reaching a sabbatical year in 1987, while serving St Paul UCC in Minonk, Jan and I planned a trip to Europe that coincided with our daughter Alicia’s Spanish Club trip. Jan, Nathan, and I flew to London for a week, traveled to Amsterdam by train and ferry, and then met Alicia in Paris on Bastille Day, while she came from Madrid; we stayed in Paris for a week, traveled to Geneva for a few days and then to Frankfurt—these destinations by train. We rented an automobile for the two weeks in Germany, beginning and ending in Frankfurt. All in all it was a month, using $25 a day tour guides and a tight budget.

Western Illinois University provided a course adaptable to my sabbatical plan, which was to study church-state relationships, with a faculty consultation in Paris and Frankfurt. I made contacts for interviews in the cities we visited, mostly making appointments after arriving in the cities. My family were good sports as we moved from church to church, office to office, and museum to museum.  I surrendered a few times to their desire for McDonalds, KFC, and pizza, but we did find that the definition of pizza was often as adventurous as other local cuisine, as peas, broccoli, tuna, and squid found their way onto our pizza orders.

The vitality of churches and the means of support for church budgets and buildings varied substantially. We found worshiping groups in all sizes, in traditional and non-traditional settings, and enjoyed facilities that were as new as a Methodist Church in Chelsea that finally rebuilt and opened in 1986 after being destroyed by bombs in the Second World War, and as old as the EKU (United Protestant Church) in Trier that met in a Fourth Century Roman basilica.

Some congregations derived much of their support from state church tax formulas, that for the most part maintained traditional buildings—great cathedrals such as St. Paul’s in London and Notre Dame in Paris, and historic buildings such as Calvin’s church in Geneva. The Kirchentag met in Frankfurt and hundreds of young people from across Germany and many international guests gathered, mostly paying their own way, for a week of worship, lectures, workshops, and service opportunities. Some buildings were supported by international contributions, such as the Synagogue at Worms, where a small Hebrew congregation gathered in honor and memory of the centuries of congregational life before the Holocaust. Some places seemed to be full of worshipers every day, such as Sacre-Coeur in Paris, and others closed even on Sunday, such as the Oude Kerk in Amsterdam. Some congregations were entirely self-supporting, refusing even the offers of voluntary tax-channeled donations, in their traditions of independence.

Often we were noticed as guests and invited to join in meals, as was customary at the Third Order of Saint Francis Hospitality House and the “Pilgrim Church” in Amsterdam, and in many of the places that we visited.

Another thing that we noticed everywhere, whether it was in the active announcements in the services or the bulletin boards of buildings that we visited, even when we were not there during events, was common support for organizations and movements that oppose torture. Also, there were humanitarian efforts for community and international development, food, and disaster relief that we occasionally saw in the United States, but the opposition to torture and political imprisonment worldwide was remarkable, since at the time there was so little evidence of that kind of involvement in American churches. The support was evident in Catholic, Protestant, and Jewish congregations, in settings that otherwise appeared apolitical, conservative and liberal in their creeds.

Far from finding a lifeless church uninvolved in the issues facing people in the world, we found faithful communities actively concerned about the well-being of people throughout the world. If this was the evidence of the “post-Christian era” in Europe, then it held some lessons for self-congratulating religious life in the United States.

Part 2: “I sought the Lord, and afterward…”

16 Thursday Mar 2017

Posted by in Church, Events, Faith, Growing up, Learning from mistakes, Prayer

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , , ,

 

Pentecostal bannerThere was a retreat for campus leaders just before the beginning of my sophomore year, which resulted in the development of a goal—a campus coffeehouse. As the newly elected president of the Methodist Student Movement, I took part, and I was excited about the idea of a place where people could come to talk informally and explore serious issues of the day—religious, social and political issues. Other campus venues seemed to be purely social or academic, not existentially grounded, and not open to student leadership. When leaders in the Student Senate developed the idea, however, it leaned more toward an intimate center for student performance as actors and musicians, than an organizing center for serious conversation. I publicly criticized the development as a betrayal of the original purpose.

There was a lot of support for the developing performance center coffeehouse idea, and I failed to provide a coherent and attractive vision of a place where we dealt with heady issues. It was embarrassing. Clearly the different visions for using the coffeehouse were not mutually exclusive, and I apologized for my critique. We would get to use the coffeehouse for many different issue conversations and presentations, but my criticism had proven counter-productive for the “Student Movement.” I had alienated some of the people I wanted as allies and dialogue partners.

Other matters added to my emotional turmoil. A trip to Chicago to take part in the SCLC-sponsored open housing marches had opened my eyes to the violence of the opposition to racial integration on Chicago’s southwestern suburbs. The war was expanding in Southeast Asia where the “Ugly American” had colored the conflict. My health was deteriorating. A friend whom I had joined for morning prayer frequently in my freshman year had become obsessed with Hindu yoga meditation, and I was not willing to pursue that for more than the satisfaction of curiosity. I was not finding a way through the spiritual solipsism that had confounded me.

In the middle of the fall semester a new hymnal was published for the Methodist Church, and Choir Professor David Nott invited everyone to the Presser Auditorium one evening to explore the hymnal. I was not involved in the choirs, but music was always helpful when I was distressed, and the prospect of hearing familiar and new hymns attracted me. Dr. Nott led enthusiastically. Then he introduced a hymn and arrangement that was new to him, though an anonymous person had written the words a century before: “I sought the Lord, and afterward I knew, God moved my soul to seek ‘him,’ seeking me. It was not I that found, O Savior true; no, I was found by You.”

I was singing the song and praying the words, and suddenly I realized that the experience was real, and I was filled with a joy that had no measure. “You did reach forth Your hand and mine enfold; I walked and sank not on the stormy sea; not so much that I on You took hold, as You, dear Lord, on me.” Every word added to my joy through the last verse. “I find, I walk, I love, but oh, the whole of love is but my answer, Lord, to You! For You were long beforehand with my soul, Always You loved me.”

I had not yet read C. S. Lewis Surprised by Joy, although John Wesley’s sense of “having his heart warmed” was always entertained in my thoughts. This experience went far beyond either, as I felt so light that I nearly floated out into the night when the program ended. This was the experience of God’s Real Presence.

Real challenges would bring me back down to earth, and the awareness that my ideas of God would always fall far short of the reality of God’s Spirit would keep me from lifting my thoughts too high. There would be more to come than insight, more than comfort, more than strength, more than an answer to my feeble prayers.

Part 1: “I sought the Lord, and afterward…”?

15 Wednesday Mar 2017

Posted by in Church, Faith, Growing up, Gullibility, Learning from mistakes

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, , , , ,

Pentecostal banner

In the first semester of my freshman year at Illinois Wesleyan University I wrote an essay and titled it “Is God a Teddy Bear?” I was exploring the psychological roles of anchoring for personal security in a god and the projection of good and bad attributes onto one’s idea of god. This was based naturally in the different characterizations of gods as judgmental, oppressive, vindictive at one end of the spectrum to loving, generous, and forgiving at the other end. These seem to be tied to personal experiences with parents, leaders, and others, to degrees of stress in environment, and the coping mechanisms we adopt for dealing with them and for understanding ourselves. The result for me was not only an “A” on the paper, but also a crisis in my own faith that lasted throughout the year.

If I was only praying to and worshipping an aspect of myself projected onto an idea of a personal being, there was not much power in my activity. If I was refusing or delaying the mature behavior of taking responsibility for myself and for my own potential, even when connected to other people, then such worship provided no service that could be characterized as healthy, “saving,” or mature. Worshipping oneself, even as a projected self, is a dead end. I began to think of the practices of devotion that I had exercised increasingly during my adolescence as an echo chamber that simply revealed to myself what I was thinking. Obviously I was on the wrong track in planning to be a minister, and I began to think of a career in psychology instead, or perhaps I should return to my earlier interest in anthropology.  The immediate dilemma was practical—my scholarship was tied to my status as a pre-theological student, and IWU had a psychology department which was devoted to behavioral psychology only, with its theoretical foundations in B. F. Skinner, whose work did not inspire me in the least.

I wanted to believe. The means to that end seemed to be retreating, and the awareness of my practical and psychological needs only accelerated the retreat. Even the fact that my own projections were positive, based in loving parents and family, and helpful, intelligent advisors and mentors, did not provide the answer if they were only projections. Relying on the faith of others does not provide a substitute for one’s own faith. My advisor for my work with the Illinois Conference Methodist Youth Fellowship noted that sometimes we “act our way” into belief. We continue to do as much as we know how to do until the ultimate goal becomes real for us. I knew “how to act” but the advice did not deliver me from the circle of my own subjectivity. The college chaplain suggested that the analogy of projection relied not only on a projector but also on a screen; something had to be there to receive the projected image, or something had to be “behind the screen” that was true. While I agreed with the analogical point, it did not construct anything more than an idea of god, not God-as-personally-known-in-the-universe.

I had no idea about what could deliver me from this conundrum, but I continued seeking an answer.

A Church Embraces People with AIDS

23 Thursday Feb 2017

Posted by in Caring, Church, Citizenship, Death, Faith, Health, People, Suffering

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

, ,

 

spiral aurura

In the 1980’s and early 90’s, when AIDS was still a scandal to many people, a modern leprosy, popularly associated with promiscuous homosexual activity, although we knew it was acquired by other means as well, a church invited AIDS Burlington to use their facilities without charge for their regular and special meetings. AIDS Burlington consisted of people with AIDS, their friends, partners, and families, public health workers, and other interested and compassionate people who wanted to work together to learn how to respond personally, medically, educationally, and politically. They needed to meet regularly and have safe space to talk confidentially as well as space to present information to the public as it became available. They had no funds for these purposes, especially when medical bills were already overwhelming.

 

The church consistory discussed the possibilities. Outsiders might consider this church a sponsor of the activities associated with AIDS, instead of a giver of hospitality to people in need. We might receive threats from extremists. People might avoid our building, thinking it was contaminated. AIDS sufferers and their families might want to come to worship or take part in other activities, which could be a benefit to them, or it could drive other people away, who were afraid of contact with them. Not much helpful information was available for the first few years and misinformation was rampant. It was such a small thing to give space and to be present with the people who were trying to confront the medical and social problems that came with AIDS. Should we hide from those who needed our help?

 

The church offered space and the offer was accepted. For a few years, when several members of the community and their families were dealing with the AIDS crisis, before there was any systematic treatment or undisputed public information, AIDS Burlington were our guests, and they were both appreciative and respectful guests, who, as usual, gave at least as much to us as we gave to them. Some of those who able to survive and those who had to say farewell to their loved ones became a part of ‘us.’

We faced some of the unwelcome responses we feared, but never enough to make us regret the decision that we had made.