Thoughts on Giving

There is a dogwood tree planted in Lawton, MI in honor of my grandpa who passed away this summer. My grandpa was no environmentalist. It would perhaps be accurate to say any stewarding he did of the earth was accidental, though I don’t know for sure. But I know up until the end of his life, he was still getting speeding tickets, and family stories of him include his using dynamite to uproot a tree trunk in his back yard, among other things.

Still, he loved wild spaces and spent much of his life on one wild adventure or another—on horseback in Wyoming or fishing in Canada. It is a love that I inherited from him, however muted. I have had the opportunity to experience glorious vistas of Lake Superior on Isle Royale and to experience on various trips through Minnesota’s waters, utter silence broken by the haunting depth of a loon’s cry.  

In moments and places like these when I can fully experience being surrounded by so much life that will outlive me, such beauty that reflects my quite small place on this planet, and even the absurd precariousness of life, I seem so often filled to bursting with awe and gratitude. Evoked is a deep response of “thank you.” I suspect my grandpa was drawn to wild places for some of the same reasons. The stewardship I do of the life around me including at Pilgrim, I know to be deeply connected to this gratitude.

At times, held by the brilliant colors of fall leaves, I remember why I might buy one less plastic container. And at times, held by the same spirit at a Celtic or Nordic Service, I remember why I might give another night of ushering or offer a few more sustaining dollars. 

In the same way that I, my Grandpa, and others experience the soil and sky that outlive us and the beauty that reminds us of our finiteness, I experience the longevity and wonder in the Life that infuses Pilgrim. Like trees and rocks hold stories that have and will far outlive me, I understand that so, too, does the living community that includes Pilgrim. I am held in amazement and respond to the Life that gives by giving, though always in process. And so it is, for example, that a renewed worship space for us, for younger others and yet unborn is like the beauty and shade during hotter days of a mutured dogwood.

This temple talk was written and voiced by Pilgrim Bree Lloyd November 1, 2009

Pilgrim is proud to welcome ALL God’s children

David R. Weiss has been a guest speaker at Pilgrim in the past.  He sent us his essay below, and as it reflects Pilgrim’s glad embracing of the ELCA’s decision, we have posted it.   — Reva

The heart of the Reformation

David R. Weiss – October 28, 2009

Last August the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) changed its policy to allow for blessing same-gender couples and ordaining persons in committed same-gender relationships.

Since then very few “official” Lutheran voices have dared to publicly celebrate and rejoice in the good news this offers to our gay and lesbian members (and to their families and friends as well). Our leaders prefer to downplay any real significance to this policy change—which is a bit like pretending that when the early church began recognizing Gentiles (non-Jews) as fully Christian without needing to become Jewish in diet and practice, it was “no big deal.” Right.

They keep saying “nothing has changed.” Individual churches continue to have final say over whose relationships are blessed in their sanctuaries and who is called to serve in their parishes. Churches unconvinced that homosexuality is part of the diversity of God’s creation can continue to call it an abomination if they prefer. So, in this sense, I suppose nothing has changed.

However, for some folks things clearly have changed—and not for the better. The most vocal Lutherans these days are threatening to take their wallets, their memberships, and occasionally their entire congregations elsewhere. They say that in August the ELCA jettisoned its understanding of sin, its respect for the Bible, and its fidelity to the Lutheran confessions. Yikes.

So, what’s a Lutheran to do if you’re actually pleased by the August actions? Short of posting my words on the door of every ELCA Lutheran church, I’ll settle for having my brief say in three short points here in print. (You can certainly post the column on your own church door if you wish!)

1. We have not chosen to ignore sin. In good Lutheran fashion we see sin as broken relationship, whether with God, our fellow humans, or the world. And for all of us our understanding of what specifically constitutes sin has changed in every era. Ninety years ago—at a good Lutheran elementary school—my grandfather’s left arm was literally tied to his desk to keep him from “sinning” by writing with “the devil’s hand.” There are a lot of specific behaviors that used to be seen as sins, but which we now realize don’t break relationship with God or anyone else. We may not all agree on that list, but it’s a cheap shot to say that we’ve dismissed the whole notion of sin. We haven’t. And to say otherwise is to bear false witness against your neighbor, which is, by all accounts, sin.

2. We have not rejected the Bible. Luther was himself a Scripture scholar; he was no biblical literalist. Though he hardly had access to all the knowledge that today’s scholars enjoy, he used all the scholarship at his disposal, and through it he heard genuinely good news in the Bible. In a similar way, through scholarship and prayer we’ve been convinced that there is yet more good news to proclaim. In a very Lutheran way, we respect the Bible too much to think that it’s best understood by just reading the words off the page. For Luther the Bible only becomes “God’s Word” when it offers life. He would be outraged to see the Bible used like a club to batter people. In such a scenario, Luther would say, “that’s not the Word of God, it’s just a heavy book being used to inflict harm.”

3. We have not forsaken the Lutheran confessions. The heart of the Reformation, “the doctrine by which the church stands or falls,” as Luther wrote, is “justification by faith.” To people dreadfully anxious about their salvation, Luther declared that our behavior—whether good or bad—had nothing to do with fixing our relationship with God. God fixes the relationship … as a gift. For many of us right now, the words of those who are angry about the changed policies seem determined, in a very unLutheran way, to make one whole category of people eternally anxious about their salvation. The Reformation was about ending that anxiety, not institutionalizing it. We believe that being true to the confessions means using the principle of “justification by faith” to ask afresh in every era, “what shall we say now in order to be life-giving today?”—and then to make sometimes difficult and daring choices in response. We say this is entirely in character with the Reformation.

So, to those who say that the ELCA betrayed its own Lutheran heritage last August, I beg to differ. The heart of the Reformation is alive and well among us. It’s about grace and welcome offered as a free gift to people otherwise made anxious by social and religious forces. And this year, both long overdue and also at long last, from the heart of the Reformation I’m saying to my gay and lesbian brothers and sisters, “Welcome home.”

November 4, 2009 it was published online in the Star Tribune

http://www.startribune.com/opinion/commentary/68993067.html?page=1&c=y

David R. Weiss is the author of To the Tune of a Welcoming God: Lyrical reflections on sexuality, spirituality and the wideness of God’s welcome (Langdon Street Press, 2008, www.davidrweiss.com).  A theologian, writer, poet and hymnist committed to doing “public theology” around issues of sexuality, justice, diversity, and peace, David lives in St. Paul and is a self-employed speaker and writer on the intersection of sexuality and spirituality. You can reach him at http://tothetune.wordpress.com.

 

A Bolt of Lightening

I’ve been holding off on writing this posting, hoping that things would become more clear in my mind about just what happened last Wednesday. I’m watching the complete video of the debate and vote on the Social Statement on Human Sexuality to help me confirm, in my own mind, just what happened…..because the result of the vote seemed so incredible. I’ve come to realize that I’ll have to write and rewrite my observations of the Assembly,[ perhaps writing will help things become more clear in my thinking about just what happened.]“

The afternoon started with a charged atmosphere, figuratively and literally.

The fifth plenary began with an excellent Bible study, led by Dr. Diane Jacobson, a prime leader in the “Book of Faith” initiative and a seminar professor. She does a wonderful job–we enjoyed her presentations at our St. Paul Synod Assembly in late May.

Poor Diane! No sooner had she started her Bible study, then Bp. Mark Hanson broke in and told us a tornado had touched down at 15th and LaSalle–just a few blocks from the convention center.

Then sirens went off and PA announcements were heard throughout the convention center. “A tornado has damaged parts of the convention center. Please remain in the hall.”

Finally, we got the all-clear from the warnings, but our nerves were put on edge, right from the start.

Then, we moved into the Social Statement. There were a number of attempts to revise the Social Statement, but all of the major amendments were defeated. I was so impressed with the professionalism that was used to take each amendment, consider it, and then present it to the assembly. A special Reference and Counsel Committee was set up, just to vet the amendments to the Social Statements. Our electronic voting devices saved hours of time tabulating results. And, they were much more reliable than looking at colored cards or judging from a voice vote.

And, then, after all the amendments, we were at the cross roads. The big decision. It came very quickly. I think everyone was suddenly caught with the realization–”this is it. This is the decision-time.”

Then, we prayed. Bp. Hanson asked all of us to pray silently. What thoughts and feelings must have been going through the minds and hearts of all in the hall–voting members, visitors, staff.

So, we voted. Bp. Hanson always hesitated a few moments to announce votes, just to be sure he saw the results correctly. This time, it was different. He looked at his computer screen, where he could see the results, but we couldn’t. He looked somewhat shocked, but he kept his composure. He simply said, “Let me check the results.”

After a few moments of discussion with the technicians, he turned to us, and asked that the results be revealed.

Yes: 66.67%

No: 33.33%

So, by precisely the margin required by the ELCA constitution, the Social Statement was adopted. A change of one vote, from “yes” to “no” would have defeated the Social Statement.

There was silence, at first, in the hall. Then, gasps and small cheers in the back of the hall. It was like an electric charge–a bolt of lightening–went through the whole hall.

Bp. Hanson called for silence.

Then, he gave a beautiful message about the importance of understanding the feelings of all those who were in the hall and all those, all over the world,  watching our vote.

I would love to talk to many of my fellow voting members about why they voted the way they did. The initial rules votes showed a preliminary indication of a majority of support for the Social Statement. So, what happened? How did the vote count increase from the preliminary vote to the final vote?

Was it the Holy Spirit? Was it majority rule?

I talked to breakfast partners the next morning. One said, “The silent prayer before the Social Statement vote moved me to support the Social Statement.” Another breakfast partner, a bishop, said, “It was the bishops. They finally got behind the Social Statements [In 2005, some of the bishops spoke to turn down and delay the Social Statement.]“

As a voting member, I came to appreciate deeply the times of prayer and silence, before we cast our votes.

So, what do you think? Spirit? Political Power?

I’ll comment a bit later on the surface similarities between our assembly and a political convention.

Next entry: Implementing the Social Statement

Video and photos at the CWA

While I compose some thoughts on the momentous events of Tuesday afternoon during the CWA, I’ll post some links to photo galleries and videos from the CWA:

Photo Galleries from the CWA (there are lots of pictures of St. Paul Synod folks, since we were sitting in the front row-right under the speaker lecterns.)

Video highlights of CWA

Breakfast conversations

Our days are long at the CWA, so you’ll have to forgive me for my late posts to this blog. I’m going to try to get caught up through today, Thursday, in the next 24 hours. If you’ve been following the news and/or my Tweets

twitter.com/paulhardt

you’ll know it’s been an eventful CWA–in more ways than one.

One of the respites we have from our busy schedule of hearings, plenary sessions, quasi-committee of the whole sessions, etc. is our breakfasts and lunches.

Most of us meet in the ballrooms at the Minneapolis Convention Center,when breakfast and/or lunch is offered there. It’s very convenient, and we have some great meals.

We don’t have any assigned seats, so we just sit where ever we want. I don’t think I’ve ever sat at a table where there was another St. Paul Synod voting member, so we have a great opportunity to meet folks from all over the country.

During one of my first meals in the banquet style, I met Pastor Duane Miller, an “Intentional Interim Pastor” from West Des Moines, Iowa, soon to serve a church in the Southwest Synod of Minnesota. Duane is a really interesting person. He got his undergrad degree in Public Administration from Michigan State. What a great degree for the ministry! The more I see of the pastoring “business” the more I value the administrative skills pastors must have. Duane is also a certified parliamentarian, so we compared notes on a few of the parliamentary questions that would be coming before the assembly.

The best parliamentary procedure demonstrations I’ve seen in a long time (and I’ve been to a lot of political conventions and other events where parliamentary procedure is used) is seen at church assemblies. In the Lutheran Church, we’re very serious about it.

Another lunch mate from another lunch was Pastor Jon Rhodes from Rockford, MN. I met him in the concourse outside our assembly hall, when he was talking to our Pastor Cassie Nault, a seminary acquaintance of Pastor Rhodes. Jon and I had a very nice conversation about his work in an exurban community. It seems that Rockford is very much like Farmington, where Char and I lived for seven years. Rockford is experiencing some of the same challenges Farmington faced around growth and holding on the the old.

At lunch today, Pastor Pablo Obregon, Willmar, MN, gave me a lesson in “don’t assume.” I was sitting down at our lunch table, and Pastor Obregon sat down along side me. We started chatting about where we were from, and he told me he was from Willmar. I knew there were a lot of Latino immigrants in that area, so I asked, “Are you doing a lot of work with the immigrants in western Minnesota?” He said, with a straight face, “Yes, I am…the Norwegian and Swedish immigrants at the nursing home in Willmar. I’m the chaplain there.” We all had a good laugh…fortunately, he has a good sense of humor.

There’s is tremendous diversity in the people who are working with the Lutheran church in so many communities in the US. It’s great to meet so many of them.

Tomorrow–A Bolt of Lightning

First day at Churchwide Assembly

I’ll try to be keeping up a daily log of happenings at the ELCA Churchwide Assembly (CWA), and this is my first entry. I’m also Twittering at:

twitter.com/paulhardt

I’m able to Twitter pretty regularly, even though there is no internet access on the assembly floor. There is an internet cafe they’ve set up for us (thanks Luther Seminary!).

After a very effortless registration process, we started the assembly with an orientation for new voting members. We’re called “voting members”  because, strictly speaking, we don’t represent our congregations or synods. We vote our consciences.

The whole CWA is being broadcasted on the web, and we opened with a very impressive worship service. Here’s a link:

Monday Video Clip page

Bishop Mark Hanson had a strong message of “unity,” a very timely message considering all the expectations for this assembly to be divisive. Bp.Hanson’s message was most timely, “The message of this Assembly has not been written, yet, despite all the expectations…” (I’m paraphrasing).

I think that was a great message–we don’t have to follow the expectations that have been set up for this Assembly.

The main administrative news was the debate about the rules. In democracies, and the ELCA is very democratic, it all starts with the rules.

The biggest issue was “what will be the required vote for passing social statements and related policies?” The ELCA constitution is quite clear about social statements–they require a 2/3 majority to be adopted. Policies, on the other hand, have only required a simple majority (50% plus 1) to pass.

A motion to admend the rules to require an extraordinary majority for policy adoption (2/3 majority) was proposed and debated vigorously. However, the assembly voted to maintain the present practice of requiring 0nly a simple majority for policy decisions.

This rules vote was an early test of the strength of the pro- and anti- Human Sexuality Statement forces. The anti-Human Sexuality statement folks wanted the extra0rdinary majority to adopt policies, to make it tougher to adopt any of the implementing policies of the statement, including the ministerial policies. The prposed change in the rules failed on a 59% to 41% vote (approximate).

So, preliminarily, it looks like the pro-Human Sexuality statement folks have about 59% of the votes of the assembly and the anti-statment folks have about 41% of the vote.

While minds certainly can change, and there has been some good debate on the statement today (Tuesday), this early test of the strength of the two camps seems to indicate that the statement will not be adopted. As Bp. Hanson said, “We decide our own witness this week,” so nothing is in stone, yet. We’ll see what happens between Monday evening and later in the week.

Join other Reconciling Lutherans

I’m proud to belong to a strong RIC (Reconciled in Christ) congregation. We are, in just about any sense of the term, a welcoming congregation. We welcome anyone with a hungry soul and mind.

In fact, the rainbow banner outside our church was one of the things that first caught our attention, when we drove by Pilgrim, just 4 years ago this week.

There are thousands of other Lutherans who are equally proud of their RIC home churches.

Edina Community Lutheran, in Edina, MN, is one of those congregations.

Edina Community is promoting a campaign to get 10,000 people to sign an online statement of support for the ELCA to be inclusive of persons of all sexual orientations and gender identities.

Here’s the online form, where you can sign-up:

Reconciling Lutherans Website

I hope you’ll sign up. I did.

Tweeting at the CWA

I plan on Tweeting at the Church-wide Assembly, and I want to share with you my Twitter account info.

You can go to this URL and you’ll see my Tweets:

http://twitter.com/paulhardt

You can just copy and paste that link into your browser, and you’ll see my Twitter page.

While we’re told there will be no internet access on the floor of the Assembly, there will be wireless areas, provided by the publishers and some of the other vendors/exhibitors.

So, sign up now as one of my “followers,” and I’ll let you know about how things are going at the Assembly–”as they happen.”

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.