Strangers to Neighbors

In person meetings are stressful. I have found the last number of months, as we all slip into post corona gatherings either hybrid or in-person, less of a relief than I thought it would be. I am not ‘socially challenged’, not one who hides in corners, not shy at all and occasionally even given to a bit of grandstanding – at least according to my wife.😏 So this opening stress reference is not merely about extroverts or introverts or social preferences. I’m thinking about this as possibly a post corona (almost post corona?) sociological phenomenon – a new day - a corporate dynamic changing right before and among all of us.

Examples come to mind illustrating ... I don't know what, just stress I suppose. Perhaps at the end of this ramble a theme will have emerged. Perhaps I’ll even conclude that stress is good for us. Maybe!

Traffic. I’m not a timid driver, and also not aggressive. I have spent a considerable chunk of my working years as a professional driver without mishap, and I think I still drive quite normal. In this last week, however, I know there were several persons who would beg to differ. Yesterday it was the unhappy horn of a big white pickup truck who did not like me changing lane into the very one he had in mind. The day before in my rear-view mirror I saw a woman with both arms in the air obviously frustrated because I was driving only the speed limit and there was no open lane either side of me; she perhaps in a huge hurry to pick up her kids at daycare – maybe after a hard day at the office! Day before that it was the middle finger of a young construction worker. Oh my, all this in one week. The irony is that I have  encountered very little of this in my whole lifetime, including 2+ million miles on the highways and interstates of Canada and the U.S! They say mental health is affecting our driving habits. Is it Corona after effects or is it Alberta pre-election blues? I will soon pose this dilemma to my coffee buddies and I know they will add a few tales of their own plus some interesting theories on the cause(s) of all this road stress. 😀

Eating together.  Many modern kitchens, including my daughter’s condo recently purchased, have a design that leaves me kind of confused. Is it a fast food serving facility or is it a kitchen? Latest style homes with counter-like structures and barstools facing the food prep area. Where are the tables and chairs? Usually a dinette or dining room somewhere nearby with table or chairs beladen with shopping bags or purses or IPads and other unrelated non-food items. This arrangement is probably a nod to door-dash or skip-the-dishes or other versions of the fast food world, which has taken hold during covid. [I do not get the logic of extra time at home requiring extra take-out. Why not cook while you’re at home?] Meals complete with table settings and the holy pause for table grace require a bit of assertion. Interesting, the setting and the pause is always appreciated especially if followed by super delicious food. Sit down mealtimes have become a lifestyle challenge.

Singing together. I am a beneficiary of a faith tradition that believes the presence of Almighty God can be fully claimed and experienced simply by gathering for that purpose (Matthew 18:20). Singing together is a celebration of that presence. Within our Christian denomination, even as we have ample ability to provide the power points and lyrics and music on screens, considerable effort has recently been invested in creation of a new hymnbook! The motivation for this is our ongoing theology of community. And surprise, it’s gaining traction! Old hymns, gospel songs with new time signatures and guitar chords, complete with digital version of the new hymnbook is now a considerable gift as we stumble back into church services to be with one another. Unfortunately the return to in-person now also includes the loud rock music option of the church next door. Among the many worship preferences I appreciate the practice of singing together in four-part harmony some of the time, contemporary other times including some African and Spanish tunes, still affirming our basic holy community values.

Being together. Closely related to the above, this one is simply an acknowledgement that we are a part of the whole of God's creation. This is a ‘deep thinker one.' For me in these early retirement years - much reading and volunteer work and also quiet times - it has become increasingly clear that to be alive is to be in relationship, not only with humans but animals and plants as well[i]. “No man is an Island” said Thomas Merton once upon a time[ii]. I find it to be true, even when there is nothing to do. We are made for one another and the lockdowns provided opportunity for us to either meditate and become peaceful with this reality or go crazy. My hunch is that those desperately restless drivers, etc. have not taken advantage of the quiet option and therefore mental illness is in the driver's seat of some of today's traffic!

Knowledge is not the most important pastoral quality. I found out very early in my experience that whatever knowledge I gained in private study needed to be accompanied by silence and meditation to help it to be metered out in a loving way.“Knowledge puffs up while love builds up," so it says in the Bible (1 Corinthians 8:2). I enjoyed a recent article in a denominational magazine about “one-anotherness,” absolutely essential in today’s intercultural church.[iii] Joon Park, pastor in an Edmonton church, notes that there are 339 occurrences of ‘one another’ in the New Testament. He reminds us of the importance of encountering one another in genuine relationships – especially important in this new day as brothers and sisters in the church increasingly of varied ethnic background. 

 

To genuinely encounter one another is essential not only for Christians, but for people of all faiths. This is especially evident as the world emerges out of pandemic wishing we could ignore the warfare in Eastern Europe, East Africa, Middle East, ad nauseam. Recognizing this worldwide dilemma, the latest Calgary observance of United Nations World Interfaith Harmony Week has been kind of prophetic in its creativity. “Strangers to Neighbors” was the theme chosen for this year, meetings to be a hybrid of in-person and Zoom gatherings. Highlight for me was an in-person potluck dinner featuring not only standard North American fare, but halal and kosher and other ethnic contributions – our food offerings carefully labeled and enjoyed by all, fully accommodating dietary constraints. Oh, and no coffee and no strong drink – water only, requiring considerable self-discipline especially by us modernizing Christians! 😮 What a celebration it was to eat together heartily and respectfully. As stated by several participants during the enjoyable food and fellowship, “Not only strangers to neighbors, but strangers to brothers and sisters.” That sentiment of course a stretch, but the neighborhoods in this city are benefiting from the very best possibilities that can happen when neighbors actually meet with one another. 

   

 Not only meet and eat, but why not meet and work together? On the last day of this UNWIHW we had twelve volunteers from our interfaith community join Habitat for Humanity in a BUILD. My muscles slightly sore but totally benefited from the good outdoor stress, and what an inspiring way to provide housing for needy families. 

Obviously in-person or virtual are not the only options. It is also a matter of what we did with our minds (?) in the trauma of Covid and also what we do with our minds and bodies now almost running free! A new day indeed. Some of that is now showing up in driving records and mental health files. And probably also in our file at the end of our day (Hebrews 9:27).

It is a privilege now, whether in worship or work or play among others to discover (rediscover?) the One who is here still, not only with each one of us, but among all of us. 

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[i] See Robin Wall Kimmerer, Braiding Sweetgrass, Milkweed Editions, 2013.

[ii] Thomas Merton, No Man is an Island, Souvenir Press, 1988.

[iii] Canadian Mennonite, Vol 27, no 1, p.5

 

Majoring in Minors

This morning quite early I was offered today's paper along with my coffee at McDonald’s. These stops have become kind of routine at halfway point of my morning exercise regimen, the paper a small gesture (customer relations 😉) from the big corporation. So I sit down with my little hot brew and start reading. In a few minutes I’ve read enough. Never having subscribed to The Calgary Sun, I realize afresh why it’s available at giveaway price to indiscriminate half-awake morning oldtimers. The irony is in titles; top of front page “Smith Clears the Air”, with little arrows pointing. At page 5 is the referenced article, “No Interference: Premier”. Lead paragraph describes her latest “walk back” about earlier claims that she had spoken with Crown Prosecutors regarding several covid-related charges, now saying she didn’t say that. What did she say? We’re not sure. The correction she offers is that she asked the questions differently than earlier stated, and that should be fair and square, also no longer as important because public interest isn’t as strong as it was then. This of course ridiculed by the NDP, asking whether Crown Prosecutors need to consider polling numbers in doing their jobs? That would be political interference in the justice system. Thus ends the article. Nothing is clarified and I am left to wonder what air was cleared!

We read much of this these days. Choose you which magazine or which disseminator of news you will watch or read or listen to. Editorials and Op-eds churn out the required themes of particular publications. This morning’s Alberta ‘news’ in this particular paper reads almost like American news of the last while. Was former President Donald Trump an instigator in the Washington, DC Capitol Hill riots, January 6, 2021? Legal procedures are reported by journalists and endless media experts who provide a full menu of investigations, indictments, lawyers and official statements complete with all necessary sound and video clips including some of today’s responses by supporters or opponents of the former president. To what purpose? Apparently this is to get to the bottom of a disturbing event after last election. Yes, we want and we need believable credible elected officials, and violators of the electoral system must be found out, but this preoccupation with investigative reporting I find quite tiring. It causes me to wonder whether anything else is happening anywhere.

Same thing in professional sport. Last night, after watching an impressive hockey game, Edmonton Oilers defeating the Seattle Kraken, and savoring that victory I take in a little further news (opinions?) at Sportsnet Central. There it was center stage, indeed  like breaking news. Philadelphia Flyers’ Ivan Provorov had refused to participate in warmups because the team’s rainbow colored exercise jerseys in keeping with Philadelphia’s Pride Night violated his religious beliefs. Coach John Tortorelli, NHL’s most colorful and outspoken on many issues, met the media with surprising candor. He spoke clearly about Provorov, saying “Provy’s being true to himself and his religion. I respect that.” Provy would not be benched. No more questions about that; hockey only. Interesting, the talking heads could not quite leave it alone, making sure we get all the info; Provorov is Russian Orthodox! Even on Sportsnet the main events of the evening, the games with winners and losers are all but forgotten. The news of the evening is rainbow colored hockey jerseys.

I do not fully agree with Torts's antics on some occasions, but this time I appreciate his perspective. Even as we live in a free country including freedom of religion and freedom of assembly and of course freedom of the press I find myself still looking for the “main thing as the main thing” as I heard in a sermon once upon a time. A coach's job is to lead a hockey team. In the last several decades as religious and other assemblies are turning themselves inside out to prove to everyone that they are affirming, not prejudiced and dealing only in the love of god (small g my emphasis) there is a real tendency to inflict our open-mindedness on everyone. And before you know it we have religious assemblies, christian churches and others, spending half their worship or assembly time doing land acknowledgements and assuring everybody that they are a welcoming community and you won't find anything offensive here! God may well be in agreement with open-mindedness, but I know the son of God dealt with much closed-mindedness. It cost him his life. My understanding is that we gather to worship the God who is greater than all these statements!! 

The biggest armament of ‘progressive’ thinking is social media. Almost all notifications in Facebook these days are by those unable to write full sentences of their own thoughts. So they forward smart-ass sayings posted by creative jokesters, cynical friends, inspiring friends, questionable or inspiring organizations, woke friends, redneck friends, or ...?  Social media is the art of deflection, and it's unfortunate when it becomes a driving force in religious assemblies.

The NHL and all professional sport along with churches et al are now seeking to improve the image, hence these current media scrums.This is like other media frenzies ongoing right now (eg Prince Harry dissing his Royal family and of course NFL players ‘taking the knee’ during U.S. National anthem because of racism and other issues). Image or perception of images is a very real distraction. 

Even as I point this out regarding news media and churches and institutions, I confess that some of the ‘distractions’ may in fact be okay, especially if one is a person of faith. There is need for discernment among all this. One of humankind's greatest sins is self-centredness, especially prevalent among those of us with ready opinions! God is beyond the things which I might deem to be important, indeed able to do abundantly beyond all that I might ask or think or understand for that matter. 

Among all things that may want to be absolutely 'modernly' important but perhaps are not, I cannot but remember a benediction from that little epistle Jude, near end of the New Testament, oft quoted, 

²⁴ To him who is able to keep you from stumbling and to present you before his glorious presence without fault and with great joy— ²⁵ to the only God our Savior be glory, majesty, power and authority, through Jesus Christ our Lord, before all ages, now and forevermore! Amen.

Neither the news nor the media give the full picture, and it behooves us to be careful to keep main things as the main things. And even the Russian Orthodox Church (Vladimir Putin also a member) may have some snippets worth considering.😳

 

Why am I Walking?

It is four years since I participated with a group of fellow Christians, indigenous, and unionists in a walk from Edmonton to Calgary, Alberta. It was one of those occasions spanning two weeks and about 300 kilometers. I have provided snippets of that walk in other articles written since that memorable experience. Interesting how time flies, and how that kronos of months and years can be compressed in one's memory bank almost as though it happened but yesterday; and that memory a kairos moment which remains for the rest of your life. This walk did that. A short article of self declaration prior to that walk qualifies as fodder for further reflection - very much worth thinking about as my walking journey continues, even if only to hold my Type 2 diabetes at bay or to help a local political candidate prepare for upcoming election (see "On Behalf Of" Dec. 12, 2022)! 😘 Hear ye! Hear ye! To some of my elder coffee drinking limping buddies who like to spend a lot of time exercising the jaw, nothing better than to keep it all moving! Here's that earlier article.

Walking for Common Ground

May 18, 2019           

WHY AM I WALKING?

Why am I walking?  Good question.  Increasingly my original clarity of the first ‘declaration of intent’ has suffered some review, and a slight muddying of intent, especially as I notice myself carefully choosing the occasions where I tell others of my intent to walk this walk.  The early lighthearted trepidation of walking along speedy highways is now a minor concern as I read about treaties and contracts, and always with a good dose of covenant (I am after all a preacher). Treaties and subsequent colonial history is an exercise of reflection – and indeed self- reflection – and some cause for self-critique. 

I notice announcements and invitation for walkers in Area Church website and also appearance in church bulletins. I sense however a certain distance. There are several of us declared walkers, but further comments seem avoided, and no groundswell of others a-coming – at least not yet! Perhaps it’s because we just finished the Alberta election and people would rather breathe a sigh of relief on that – and hope for the best (!?), and now here is the month of Ramadan and some also feel uncomfortably obligated to learn a few things about our Muslim friends, and then Pentecost just around the corner (yes outpouring of the Holy Spirit on fresh new Christians already hailing from varying backgrounds).  So what’s a guy to do?  While I think about all this I’m also reminded of a troubling verse in the Bible, 2 Timothy 3:7, “always learning but never able to acknowledge the truth”.  

I think I will be somewhat quiet as I tread these kilometers; not a sullen quiet but a meditative quiet.  There are important things to think about – indeed many even beyond the constraints mentioned above.  The topic is large, larger even than Settlers or Colonialists, larger than Canada or Turtle Island.  As I walk there may be a slight wringing of the hands, perhaps along with Pontius Pilate who did that long ago as the religious ones clamored for the death of Jesus, and Pilate yielded, yet still wondering “What is truth?”  

Okay I’ll say it.  Truth is larger than the benefactors or the victims of Treaties, not fully described in the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.  As a Christian, fully committed to Jesus Christ my savior and Lord, and beneficiary of Treaty 6, I confess also, “What is truth?” 

Randy Woodley, in an article in Sojourners, “The Fullness Thereof” (May 2019) says “Change your lenses please. Okay, maybe you can’t change lenses right now, but would you at least notice the lenses you are currently wearing? If you are like, say 99.9% of us in the U.S., you have been influenced by a very particular set of perspectives that interpret life from an Enlightenment-bound Western worldview.”   Dr. Woodley, an Indigenous Christian seminary professor, reminds his fellow Americans –  and us too – that dualistic thinking, inherited from the Greeks, has absolutized the realm of the abstract (spirit, soul, mind) and reduced the importance of the concrete (earth, body, material) disengaging them from one another. 

Without going into further implications of this assertion, I say at this point that this will be on my mind in the next while. As an Anabaptist Christian I am not enslaved to the polemics of systematic theology or Christian apologetics, but nonetheless confess that I too am a product of much dualistic thinking, and a changing of the lenses is essential for history to move forward in a God-honoring truthful just manner. 

I will be pleased to walk quietly thinking about this, and to spend considerable time in talking circles, not necessarily to hammer out a new land-rights strategy, or a new inclusive Christian indigenous theology, but to learn a new angle on truth.  It behooves this preacher even in his retirement years.  I believe it behooves all of us.  And please pray with me that my body (flat feet) doesn’t give up before my mind (spirit) does.
😫😉

 

 

From the Least

 Whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me. (Matthew 25:40)

Apparently I am one who thinks a lot, perhaps a little too much – at least according to some family members. This little piece must begin with that confessional, however, because the opening thought is so elementary, so basic, that everybody in the whole wide world already knows it, and why do I waste time typing out some further thoughts on that? Why? Because I just received a refreshing insight about that very old truth.

The old truth comes from a most familiar portion of scripture. It is so familiar that even those who never read the Bible may know about it, especially when feeling some spiritual insecurity. The scary one is Matthew 24 with warnings and signals about end of time, verses which once were regular fare utilized by fire and brimstone preachers (Not so much at present. Most sermons these days are the feel good variety). Anyway, next is chapter 25, still on end-of-life, and end-time topic, but presented less timorously, quite helpfully I think, kind of personal (Check it out. Read it. It wont hurt! 😏). There is undeniably an end awaiting all of us! What will we do about it? Matthew 25 is about that day, including judgement, sheep to the right and goats to the left ³⁴ “Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. ³⁵ For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, ³⁶ I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’ The way you have treated others is the way you have treated God. It's as simple as the heading above. 

The end of our days will be very much about us, each one of us. Also very much about others - how we have related especially to the hungry, the strangers, the destitute, the prisoners, the losers. The person of true faith will prove it by … doing all these good things. This is so undeniably true that anybody of healthy demeanor will agree. It is a humanity point also supported in other parts of the Bible, (eg Luke 10:27, Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind’; and, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.  and James 2:20, faith without deeds is useless), and arguably also emphasized by other faiths. Muslims, for example, claim takat (charity) a surefire qualifier, one of the very important conditionals for getting into heaven!

I just read a neat article a few days ago. Very very refreshing. It fully endorses the above, affirming our important actions of charity (and an obvious dis to those not so inclined). To all of us thinking only of the logic of doing good, doing it to the least of these, Mackenzie Nicolle (Rejoice!, MennoMedia, Vol 58, no 2) speaks of Jesus in among all this charity. “By loving our neighbors and enemies, we remember the core elements of our faith that we are called to” (p.36). In other words, think of what you love and what brings you childlike joy, even as you “do good things.” If done with bad attitude or out of obligation or legalism it is as useless as walking on the other side of the street. Jesus on one occasion demonstrated this to all his diligent listeners asking him to explain many things. He took a child in his arms and said, "unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven" (Matt 18:3).

In the last several years I have encountered many homeless especially as I walk considerable daily steps to hold my Type 2 at bay. This habit of mine has led to my being designated a distributor of gift cards as provided by a local group of our city’s interfaith council, which I am a member of. In short order I discovered that these cards, although readily received, can become extra valuable currency if accompanied by some conversation (blogpost “Hey What’s your name,” Apr 15, 2021). By now I know several of these better than the neighbors on my street.  Similarly, I am a volunteer working among immigrants coming from several East African countries. Even as relationships and program efforts have met with Corona or other untold stresses and interruptions, by now several of these are close friends. Even after major hiccups and curve balls in fundraising or project efforts and I’m licking my offended wounds, these are the ones who will call for the little favors or just to have coffee, quite beyond the regular scheduled social habits organized in orb of my church community. Yes, life and love is being bestowed on me by those very persons I have been trying to help. 😉 No problem, life goes on.

Even as I commit to that very believable mandate to give heed to the least of these, the reminder for this year ahead is to pay attention to and receive from those who offer unconditional love. That life-giving love is a gift available from the greatest or from the least of these.