sojourn stories...

a few tidbits...

busy...busy... terribly busy.. as Madame Blueberry would say ;)  (the theology of Veggie Tales is right on the money at times ;)

Just a few tidbits to help catch you and me up!  I have the privilege of being part of  planning an event that focuses on the issues of Race and Diversity in the Emerging Church.  Many of you may have read the recent emergent/c where Tony Jones referenced this upcoming event.  It will be a theological discussion, far more than it will be a how to get a token ethnic family involved in your church or ministry.  It will be a place to confront our own prejudices and presuppositions and a forum to listen and to learn from others.  I am so excited about being part of this event!  If you are passionate about the issues of race: of inclusion and embrace then please email me!  or join the discussion on the blog that Jay Vorhees has set up and help shape the unfolding of this event!

I have been involved in some advocacy issue regarding the Lost Boys of Sudan; humbled at their courage and desire to return to their country in order to help with the rebuilding.  One of  my new friends, Angelo, is planning to return to Sudan in December and is seeking financial support for his trip.  If you are interested in supporting his courageous venture, please email me. 

I have been talking with Natala about the lack of writing that has plague me of late... since hurricane Katrina, when i struggled to find words, i have remained tongue tied and finger twisted. i love to write and yet i have found little solace in the written word.  i have done a lot of collaging of late...as the visual and tactile seem to be more cathartic. what i do write these days is profoundly inward and private... it is odd to not blog, to have lost the therapeutic and cathartic nature of this forum. 

if you have read any of my posts, you know that i do not post news, updates, FYI's or bullet points very often.  instead, i blog, for the most part, about the wrestlings of my heart, the ponderings of my mind and the theological and life questions that haunt me.  therefore, given that i have written little in my own writing life, i have had even less to say in this forum of late...

i am sorry for that.  i have felt guilty for that.  i have tried to be different in this reality.  i cannot force it.  the daily-ness of life has gotten the better of me recently. 

i wonder if surrender is just allowing "what is" to "be"

does that make sense?  equating surrender with acceptance of what i didn't plan on, may not like, would choose to change...

for example...the fact that my kids are in need of more attention, my high-schoolers are needing quantity time?  that my work has taken on new dimensions and requires more of my attention?  that my health has required me to cut back in every arena of my life, and thus put a number of my dreams on the back burner...

in younger days, i think i would fight, trying to make what i wanted to be true, come to be... now, in my middle years, i am wise enough to know that i cannot beat the reality of my daily-ness.  so i am joining it.  i am doing that which i know i am called to, taking care of the small circle of the world that is mine, and waiting... quietly.

i am becoming convinced that growth , that maturity in Christ is a willingness to surrender to what is real, what is true, whether i like it or not...

don't give up on me, i will be back... and i the meantime, every so often, i will be here...

banned books, fear and complex questions...

will has a great post on the issue of banned books.  He cites a list of the 100 most challenged books and asks which we have read.

the banning of books perplexes me...i am intrigued by the idea that "if we don't tell, then it won't be true!" 

i remember long ago, being challenged,

"Why is it that "non-christians make movies like The Killing Fields, and not christians?  What are we afraid of?"  With great passion, my friend declared, "We of anyone should be able to name and speak and tell and engage in what is true in the world today!  Until we do the gospel will continue to be distorted!"

I think that we Christians, we who claim to know the Truth, to have an intimate relationship with Jesus, who scandalously calimed to be The Truth, we must be willing to face the reality of this fallen world.

Why is it then that, far too often, our actions don't align with our beliefs?  Are we fearful of truth, or are we unwilling to tell it? Are we willing to engage in the messiness of life and enter into conversation about it?  through a book, through a neighbor's broken truth, through the concrete jungle that our children navigate every day in public school...?

I am not advocating reading every book every written, i am not saying that some books are better left unread...

I am simply asking, what guides us to reject or flee from certain topics, what makes us refuse to name the truth that is, especially when it is often ugly, difficult and without answer---seemingly beyond redemption?  (do we believe that there is a category of "beyond redemption?)

What motivates a fear driven posture in relationship to the world, the culture, the truth and stories that we cannot comprehend?  What justifies our refusal to see and name certain truth's however awful...

can we examine this energy in our own souls and stories... can we reflect on what this recoil, and the desire to control and contain says about our theology, our beliefs and the radical claims of Jesus?

will muses that he encounterd this list while reading an essay by Any Plantinga Pauw   in Practicing Theology,  entitled Attending to the Gaps between Beleifs and Practices

surfacing, treading water and not sure which way is toward land!

it has been a while... a long while since i have posted. 

life, stuff, and more life have gotten the better of me, threatened at times to engulf me in the crashing wave of "the urgent" 

there have been days of great delight, laughter and celebration as all of our birthdays fall within this six week interval...there have been tears and well wishing as my eldest left for college, older and wiser than i ever was at 20!

waves of fear and anticipation followed my youngest, my son to his first days as a freshman, and i must admit that these feelings and how to deal with them are not in the "how to mother a teenage boy manual."    (though the Scriptures bear out a few principles that have sustained me, as i watch and pray...but there are no guarantees, and that is risky, so profoundly risky, that it make me stand in awe of the freedom and love that G-d bestows on me).

i have had little to say in this forum of writing.  and i am increasingly aware that there is a dearth of content in my journal, empty pages in my sketch book, accompanied by a drowning sense of boredom...

and the only way out is through (as alanis so poetically sings it;)

in the recent stream of unending tasks, "to do" lists and urgent matters at hand, i have missed this medium of communicating, missed my friends in the blogosphere and missed the sanity that comes from a sojourn here...

so, i am finally surfacing.

it has been a long 6 weeks. 

i am treading water...

and

i am hoping to post more often...

my mind feels dry from the lack of conversation and thought provoking posts that pepper my bloglines, my heart is heavy in the midst of so much national tragedy and i must confess that i have been overwhelmed into silence and a small sphere of action through my local community.  I have even avoided reading blogs... yes a true absence!  and i miss this unique forum for interchange, expression and growth. 

they say that absence does make the heart grow fonder;)  just as soon as it gets over the guilt of shoulds and coulds and begins to engage in the "is" of now! 

I am waking up here, in the midst of incredible tension... increasingly aware of the frustrating finitude of the human life and the relentless passing of time, yet longing for the luxury of unstructured days...or even structured days that include time for that which is really important... the care and tending of my own soul...

the needs of my children and family have consumed me of late, and the care and tending of their souls brings me great joy and satisfaction.  they are my "important, " yet the chaos of being a mom, also makes them my "urgent" far too often, and i have neglected the care and tending of me...

i feel the limits of this mortal life pressing in on many sides and

i have struggled to find balance and clarity...

i am still struggling to find balance and clarity... why do i buy into the myth that i will ever arrive?  ;)

maybe that is the wrong struggle, struggling to "find"  rather than simply seeking "to be."

be-ing and time...

so, enough rambling... for now...

i just wanted the beginnings of a post...as i have learned that far too often that "beginning again" is the hardest step, and this is my feeble effort at such a leap...