Category Archives: Religion

Lent Day 5: Work and Lunch

Today at church, Matt talked about work and the ways in which our attitudes and actions at our jobs reflect our Christian faith. He brought his sermon to a close with four main points:

  1. Your work has eternal implications even if it has no apparent eternal value.
  2. How you perform at work is as important as where you work.
  3. How you perform at work is as important as how you act at work.
  4. Putting your heart into your work allows God to bless your work.

The thread of the sermon that struck me the most was, again, this idea of being placed somewhere to do a work, like Nehemiah, who was working so hard on a great work that he couldn’t come down off the wall. How can I put my whole self into my work? How can I let my work reflect my spirituality in a way that witnesses Christ’s love to my colleagues? I know it isn’t the way I’ve been working, nor the way I’ve acted in the past. I just need to keep reminding myself that I need to remember whose I am before acting or speaking. I am a new creation, so I should act like one.

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After church I went to my parents’ house and spent a few hours with them while we planned our summer vacation. We got everything taken care of, except for the tickets to the Minor League AAA All Star Game. Supposedly they are on sale, but it seems as if we may just have to mail in the order form, which seems odd in this digital age. We tried to call today, but they didn’t have access to the tickets. Hopefully, tomorrow I’ll be able to get them ordered when the box office is open.

When I was finished at my parents’ house, I met Merideth’s mom, Alane, at Ivanhoe’s for lunch. I got the half fruit plate and it was HUGE! There is no way anyone could ever eat the whole fruit plate, unless I just can’t put away fruit like other people can. Alane had the grilled cheese which she said was really delicious, but she couldn’t finish hers either.

We had a nice chat.

There is no easy way to move on when someone dies. Dave wasn’t my dad, he certainly wasn’t my husband, but he was my friend, and I miss him. I can only try to imagine the pain, the sadness, the overwhelming grief of his very close friends and family, and all I can say is that sometimes things are hard, they don’t get easier fast, and sometimes they never get easier. Sometimes our losses are so deep and so painful, they just sit there seething, chafing under the surface, and I, personally, have no way of helping someone through that type of pain other than just sitting across the table from them and opening my heart to try to absorb some of it. And even then I feel so inadequate. So fucking cheap and fraudulent. I don’t understand, so I just sit and try to love.

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I’m emotionally spent today, so I don’t have any excellent spiritual insights to give. Instead, I invite you to give yours. What did you learn today? Something I could learn from? What bit of knowledge, what gem, did you receive?

Lent Day 4: Naked Equality

The evening prayer begins each night with these words: “Naked I came from my mother’s womb, and naked will I return. The Lord gives, and the Lord takes away. Blessed be the name of the Lord.” Every night I am reminded of one of one of my key beliefs in life: we are all born equally vulnerable.

Job's Despair by Marc Chagall

At times in my life when I have been intimidated by people in “high” positions, I have been reminded that “we all put our pants on the same way, one leg at a time.” I think this prayer is a daily reminder of this little gem of advice. Not only do we all put our pants on the same way, we all are equally favored, equally unfavored. In fact, in Matthew during the Sermon on the Mount Jesus reminds us what it means to be perfect or holy. We are called to love our enemies, to pray for those who persecute us, and to remember, “He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.” By sending the sun and the rain to fall on the just and the unjust, God reinforces our equality and demonstrates the ultimate act of grace.

I think Jesus also wants us to realize that God is providing all of us with the ability to support ourselves. By giving people sun and water, God is essentially making sure that all people can make a living off of the land. God does not withhold sustenance from even the most evil people. Instead, God gives them the same potential as the righteous to sustain their bodies. This seems to be a central idea of the Scriptures. We are designed to work and to be self-sustaining, but not the point of individualism with no regard for our community. In fact, to me the Scriptures seem to strike a delicate balance between self-sustenance and communal living, all while pointing out our equality and the necessity of reliance on God. The narrative arc of the Bible always amazes me, as what happens from the very beginning in Job subtly unfolds and is commented upon again and again, up through Revelation when we are again made equal before the Lord. We are all vulnerable to the forces of nature, but equally vulnerable.

Peace.

 

 

Lent Day 3: Date Night

Today I kept up with the common prayers, and I find that it settles my otherwise erratic personality. Maybe between the niacin, vitamin C, paleo diet, and following the daily liturgy, I can make a way to keep myself on track emotionally. If you read this blog at all, you know that’s something I struggle with, and it’s finally something I feel like I am getting a strong hold on, or control over, rather than it controlling me. Maybe one day, I’ll be able to get past writing about it.

I also had the opportunity today to go on a date with my significant other. We went to Indianapolis to pick up a friend of ours, so we decided to make a special time of it. First we went to Rock Bottom Brewery and had a couple of beers, then we walked through Circle Center Mall for a bit, really just using it to walk to and from our car without being lambasted by the ridiculous Indiana spring-winter wind. Finally, we picked Elizabeth up at the train station, and then went to Peppy Grill in Fountain Square.

The workers at Peppy are amazing. Talk about your sassy, ornery, short order cooking and serving staff. I never leave disappointed, even when I realize that my corned beef hash comes directly from a Hormel can (not so paleo/primal) and gets heated up on the grill. I think I may leave that dish for Brunchies and just return to my ham and eggs at Peppy. But it was still good, of course, and greasy spoon!

Beautiful Sky on Binford in Indy

Looking South on Meridian and Vermont: Monument Circle

South Side of the Circle: Turning onto Meridian

After A Rock Bottom White Ale: A Little Out of Focus

1004 Virginia Avenue: Peppy Grill

Good Thing We Had Three People

Corned Beef Hash for My Love and Me

Today was a nothing’s profound, but everything’s lovely, kind of day. Peace.

Ash Wednesday 2012

For Lent this year, I am going to try to post something here each day. Maybe I will post a blessing that I have experienced for the day, maybe it will be a bit of Scripture I read that day, or maybe it will simply be an anecdote or story. No matter what, though, my goal is to post for 46 days straight, from now until Easter.

Today, I just want to acknowledge that it’s Ash Wednesday, and I missed going to a service. Last year, I was in Florida and went to Sebring’s nice Methodist Church. This year, I was going to go this morning to St. Mary’s, but I wasn’t sure if a sort of Protestant, kind of Buddhist woman could attend a Catholic Ash Wednesday service. I guess it’s only the Eucharist that they’re insular about, and other ceremonies are not so important as that. It’s okay, Catholic folks, I believe in transubstantiation too.

As I was walking from my free parking space by St. Mary’s into school this morning, I started thinking about Lent, because if there is one traditional thing I hold onto about Christianity, it’s the Church calendar. I love the way the seasons ebb and flow, and I love that it marks up the year into manageable pieces. The Christian calendar is like the seasonal calendar, reminding me about who I am and who God is. For example, Lent for me is a time of penance and so is winter. Advent is a time of anticipation and rebirth, so is spring. You see, the same, but different.

But I digress, as I was walking into school this morning, I thought about whether or not I’d do anything for Lent this year. By “do anything,” I mean give up something, or the new version of that, which is to add something, and I decided that I’d try to write here every day, and I’d start celebrating the liturgy through Common Prayer. My friend Sarah had heard Shane Claiborne speak and purchased the book, and I’d heard about it, but hadn’t purchased it, so I thought I’d give it a try. I ordered it, but it wasn’t supposed to be delivered until the 23-28 of February. So, as I walked this morning, I thought to myself, well, when that book gets here, I’ll get started with my spiritual practice for Lent. I figured it would be here when I got back from Chicago next weekend, so I’d be a bit behind. Sure enough, Common Prayer was delivered in today’s mail.

Tonight I’m reading the introduction. Peace.

Josh Garrels: Love & War & The Sea In Between

I’ve had this free download since a couple of days after it came out, but I haven’t really listened to it or any other music since school started in the fall. In fact, once school starts, the work for it is all consuming and I pretty much don’t do anything for myself aside from exercising and cooking, so I was pleasantly surprised when I listened to it last night while I was sitting on the couch reading magazine articles and blog posts on the Interwebs. Each song is presented in a different style, and yet retains the overall theme of grace and redemption and healing.Love & War & The Sea in Betweentakes the listeners on a quest or a coming of age journey, but I never did feel as if I’d left the sight of the shore. There is challenge and comfort in the lyrics in a way I don’t often feel in Christian music. Garrels asks us to be self-reflective, but always reminds us that there is comfort just around the bend.

“The Resistence” is somewhere between a rap and a spoken word poem, “Ulysses” uses the story of the Odyssey as the background for a beauty rocking folk song, and “Beyond the Blue” inspires the listener to look beyond themselves with lyrics like “Plumbing the depths to the place in between/The tangible world and the land of a dreams/Because everything ain’t quite it seems/There’s more beneath the appearance of things/A beggar could be king within the shadows,/Of a wing.” I could go on, because each separate track has its own feel and its own message or lesson. But, the lessons aren’t heavy handed. The tracks are so well-written, they make my writer’s heart smile. Poetic, poignant, and beautiful. Each song is simply a comfortable reminder to be who we are purposed to be. Challenging but comfortable, like walking and talking with an old friend.

Josh Garrels