On my way to the Church-wide Assembly

What is this Blog and Why am I Writing It?

This is the first post in a series I will be posting over the next several weeks, leading up to and perhaps after the Church-wide Assembly (CWA) of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. The assembly will be in Minneapolis (nuts, I missed out on a great trip to some exotic location! like Chicago!) and will go from August 17 through August 23.

I hope to help the readers of this blog understand more about what the CWA is and its meaning for the ELCA and the world at large.

I will share with you some of my opinions about the issues the CWA will tackle, as well as some of the “inside baseball” of the CWA, in hopes the reader will understand more about how the CWA works and how people can get involved in the larger church.

Feel free to comment to my posts. I’d love to hear from you.

How I Got Here

Well, I’m not posing the question in an existential or religious way!

However, you might be wondering, “How does one become a voting member of the CWA?” Good question.

There are at least two opportunities where Lutherans can be elected as a voting member to the CWA. First, you can be elected at the conference level. Pilgrim Lutheran in St. Paul is part of the South Central Conference of the St. Paul Synod. Voting members elected from their conference were elected in February, 2008, in our synod.

Additional voting members can be elected from the synod assembly. I was elected as a voting member at our synod assembly, last year in May, 2008.

In the election process, you are asked to put together a biography outlining your work with the church and the community.

I was successful in being elected a voting member at the May, 2008 synod assembly. We have about 30 voting members who will be attending the CWA from St. Paul Synod.

Big Issues Debated and Voted on at CWA

There will be a number of major issues debated and voted on at the CWA. As many of you know, the Social Statement on Human Sexuality and accompanying implementing resolutions will be voted on at the CWA.

Here is the website for the CWA, where you can find lots of information about the agenda of the CWA and the issues we will vote on:

Main Web Page for the CWA

Our bishop, Rev. Peter Rogness, made an excellent statement at our synod assembly in late May, and here is a link to it:

Bishop Peter Rogness’ statement to the St. Paul Synod Assembly, May, 2009

Watch for a post from me soon on my comments about the synod assembly.

Serving dinner at The Family Place

Saturday afternoon, a bunch of us turned out at The Family Place, a day shelter for homeless families.  We brought food and prepared dinner.  Marsha Foss, in the red shirt to the left, volunteers regularly at the shelter.   Volunteer Bob Fallat (not pictured) gave us a tour of the shelter, located behind First Baptist Church of St. Paul.  On average, the families helped by the shelter are homeless for no more than six months.

Summer Worship is at 9:30 AM

Pilgrim Lutheran Church Summer schedule began last week, May 24.

All Sunday morning services are now at 9:30 AM.

Sunday May 31: The Festival of Pentecost, Holy Communion, Pastor Wayne Weissenbuehler preaching

A Pilgrim writes to the Metro Lutheran

In February, ELCA St. Paul Bishop Peter Rogness wrote about his recent visit to Israel and Palestine. The depth of the region’s conflict, Rogness wrote, comes from each groups’ religious and historic beliefs that they have a right to the land. He further states that God chose this area to be a holy place, where the Prince of Peace came.

 

The beliefs held by Palestinians, Jews and Christians have two things in common. First, they are certain their beliefs are true, Second, their beliefs are an “accident.” For the most part, everyone’s beliefs are an accident. We get them from the culture into which we are born (an accident of birth). Be born somewhere else and you’ll believe something else … and you’ll believe it with certainty. If we Metro Lutheran readers were born in Tibet we wouldn’t be Lutheran.

 

The accidental, yet strongly held, beliefs of human beings fuel world conflicts. The feeling of certainty, of being right, of having the truth, is a natural human emotion. But in a complex world, living and fighting based on accidental beliefs isn’t working. Somehow we have to transform the way we think and believe.

 

Bishop Rogness ended his article expressing uncertainty about how to deal with the Middle East conflict. I don’t know either. It seems, though, that showing up at the peace table with the attitude that our beliefs are accidents, and that the feeling of certainty about our beliefs may be an illusion, would be a new start.

 

Allen Zumach

St. Paul, Minnesota

Our confession last Sunday

I went to workshop on genocide at Christ the King church last Saturday.  It was excellent.  We first learned about the genocide in Cambodia, then in Rwanda.  Carl Wilkins, a relief worker in Rwanda for a number of years before the civil war broke out and the only American to stay during the genocide, was at the workshop and told his personal story.  

Two Tutsi people were living with Carl and his family and Carl knew these Tutsi people would be killed when they left.  His wife and children left for safety, but Carl stayed.  He protected his Tutsi friends and also prevented the killing of children in an orphanage. 
 
His talk was disjointed, rambling, loopy, but intelligent and he finally got his points across.  Sometimes he cried and he said he does that.  Fifteen years have passed and I think he’s still suffering from post traumatic stress disorder. 

The nations of the world knew that genocide was happening, yet not one nation attempted to stop it.  The UN sent troops but they were ordered to not use force, not even to protect Rwandans from mass slaughter.  Madeline Albright tried to get the interest of President Bill Clinton, but was unable.  The U.S. had “no interests” in Rwanda.  We did nothing.  Neither did Belgium, the past colonizer of Rwanda nor France, a protectorate of Rwanda.

I went to church Sunday heavy with this information and needful of something, I didn’t know what.  But I found it in our confession:

Leader:       God of history and Creator of all peoples, we stand before you as among those

accountable for the well-being of your creation.

Congregation:      We have failed you – as individuals, as a church, as a nation. We have easily spoken a commitment our lives do not confirm. We have lightly proclaimed a gospel our common life has denied. We have stood firmly against sins we were never tempted to commit.

L:      When we kept silent before popular evil,

C:      we called ourselves realistic.

L:       When we endorsed what everyone favored,

C:      we called ourselves good.

L:       When we forsook Christ’s cause of well-being for all your children,

C:      we called ourselves merely human.

L:       Blessed with riches,

C:      we have let the walls of gold entomb us.

L:       Honored with prophets and critics,

C:     we have abandoned their dreams and tamed their cries for justice,

L:      Commanded to serve,

C:      we have expected service.

L:       Pardoned in order to pardon,

C:      we have forgiven only ourselves.

L:       Received in order to give,

C:      we have given in order to receive.

L:       Blessed in order to bless,

C:     we have blessed in order to get.

L:       Saved by your grace,

C:     we thought we had it coming.

All:    Lord, have mercy upon us. Christ, have mercy upon us. Lord, have mercy upon us.

L:       Gracious God, make us all bold to ask for the saving grace of your forgiveness, through Jesus Christ our Lord.

All:    Amen.

 

Pastor Wayne granted us absolution. 

 

I am not one to assign guilt and shame, but after spending a day contemplating two genocides in the recent past and knowing that one continues in Darfur, I needed that confession and the absolution.  I do not have a personal hand in these horrors but I have responsibilities.  We all do.  We are one people.  Now, what will we do?

Reva Rasmussen, Deacon

Jiggling in the pews gets you closer to God

I always sit on the right side of the sanctuary for the service; it’s just my habit.  Sunday, I needed to talk to Kent about teaching at the Fine Arts week at Camp Vermillion this summer.  I found him and his wife, Penny, and seven month-old son, Theo, on the left side, so I sat next to Kent before church started and chatted with him.  When church began,  I stayed.  Pastor Wayne announced that one of our church members, Jim Holisky had died on March 17 and our first hymn would be sung to honor his passing.  Into Paradise May the Angels Lead You  is a beautiful and comforting hymn: 

At your coming may the martyrs receive you and lead you into the holy city, Jerusalem, Jerusalem.  

May a choir of angels welcome you, and where Lazarus is poor no more,

may you have everlasting rest, may you have everlasting rest, may you have everlasting rest.

There was no rest in the pews on the left side of the sanctuary.   Theo had started to fuss, so mom was jig-jiggling him to quiet him.  Meanwhile behind us, a mother was trying to quiet six-year-old Henry who was jig-jiggling a crayon box into a cha-cha-cha.   As the hymn went on, another parent moved out of the pew and down the outside aisle in quiet pursuit of his toddler. 

My mother died recently, and I wanted to sing about everlasting peace, but this was impossible with all the life going on about me – all these young parents, trying their best to keep the chaos under control.

The kids were beautiful, these little cherubs, full of life’s new energy, needing to be taught how to manage their curiosity, how to live with others, how to be safe in a world full of risks.  There we were together,  having to tolerate each other while we enjoyed and were annoyed by each other.  That’s how community works.

Yes, that’s how community works:  For Jim and my mom, for the parents who showed up and still missed most of the service, for the youngsters whose innocence will be quickly outgrown, the people on the right side of the church sang: 

Into paradise may the angels lead you, 

at your coming may the martyrs receive you and lead you into the holy city, Jerusalem, Jerusalem.   

Reva Rasmussen, Deacon

No One is Outside the Love of God – No One

Sunday, January 25, our sermon was given by David R. Weiss.   David is a theologian, writer, poet and hymnist and a member of St. Paul-Reformation Lutheran Church in St. Paul.  He is committed to doing “public theology” around issues of sexuality, justice, diversity, and peace. 

He delivered a terrific sermon, “Jesus is here to recruit you to follow,”   in which he reminded us that God is inclusive, even though God’s children – us - tend to think God is exclusively on our side. 

As David says, “When Jesus begins his ministry . . . this is the God whose kingdom he announces, whose swirling activity of welcoming presence he declares is at hand. This is the God about whom he poses parables that challenge the world. This is the God for whom he sets a table at which – scandalously – everyone is welcome. This is the God on whose behalf he touches lepers, talks with women, blesses children, speaks to Samaritans, and fellowships with outcasts. In Jesus – and among the community of his followers – the Welcoming God portrayed in the story of Jonah comes fully to life. And as this holy and hopeful Presence moves in Jesus’ life, time and again those around him are surprised by the reach of God into lives [in which] they thought God could never go.”

David’s ministry has been captured in part by his book, To the Tune of a Welcoming God, a collection of poems, essays and hymns he has written.  You can learn more at his website http://www.davidrweiss.com/index.php

Reva Rasmussen, Deacon

A Church Blessing from Ireland

Enter this door as if the floor within were gold,

And every wall of jewels, all of wealth untold,

As if a choir, in robes of fire were singing here;

Nor shout, nor rush, but hush,

For God is here. 

–found in an old church in Ireland by Al and Phyllis Zumach last fall.

Jonathan Rundman Sings to Us

December 13, Jonathan Rundman gave a concert at our church.  He’s a local guy who sings and writes a bluesy, folky, Christian pop-rock music.  There, did I get it right?  Do you have the idea that this gentle, friendly showman who performs nationally covers a few genres of music?   Do you get the idea that he makes spirituality an everyday experience?  That the Christian mystery is always present in his music?  He’s terrific.  Go to his website to learn more www.jonathanrundman.com or youtube.  Here, he leads a Texas Kyrie and this youtube has my favorite song, If you have a question  (He says it’s a favorite of four-year-olds, too.)

Reva Rasmussen