This I Believe on NPR

I found this essay very interesting this morning as I listened to NPR. Check it out here. This is a great program called "This I Believe." It advocates making personal statements of belief. Maybe I should submit an essay of my own. What in the world might that look like?! Below is the portrait "Freedom of Worship" by Norman Rockwell that mentioned in this essay.

With Kindness

Here's a song I heard last week based on a prayer by St. Teresa of Avila.

With Kindness
Christ has no body here but ours,
No hands, no feet, here on earth but ours.
Ours are the eyes through which He looks
On this world With kindness.

Ours are the hands through which he works.
Ours are the feet on which he moves
Ours are the voices through which he speaks
To this world With kindness.

Through our touch, our smile, our listening ear,
Embodied in us, Jesus is living here.
Let us go now, Filled with the Spirit.
Into this world With kindness.

i just don't get it

Two great friends gave me a really cool ipod shuffle for my birthday.

But, now this has got to be one of the dumbest things I've seen this week!

And check out the scripture reference!!!!

I'm not that kind of Christian.

Spiritual Life as Journey

Here's a little talk I did at the Baptist Student Union tonight. Any thoughts?

The Spiritual Life as Journey:
Curiosity and Community while Wandering in the Wilderness

Speaking to you students tonight is a great opportunity. I know how valuable your time is. Furthermore, I know that you came here tonight for a couple of different reasons. Of which, one of those, is not necessarily to hear me speak. (That’s just a little bonus at no extra charge.) But, I have come to believe that you are here week after week looking, for two things…communion with God and a community with others.

I have a sense that both are taking place.

So, I speak to you tonight as one experiencing communion with God in so many different ways AND as one from the community of people following in the way of Jesus.

I want to talk with you about something very personal, that is, my spiritual life, my spiritual journey. You should understand, first, that this is a journey in progress. I have not yet arrived, nor have I succeeded at anything spiritual, and I am not an expert. I am a sojourner…just like you.

There are lots of biblical images of journeys (e.g. The Exodus from Egypt, Wilderness Wanderings, the Temptation of Jesus in the Wilderness, the Birth of Jesus (from Nazareth to Bethlehem), Jesus’ journey to Jerusalem…Triumphal Entry, journey of the church in Acts, Paul’s missionary journeys, etc.)

(Story #1)
The beginning of my spiritual journey is rooted in my curiosity. (arguably, a spiritual discipline)

As a kid, I remember going into my parent’s room to look at books. I looked through my mother’s and father’s high school yearbooks. I saw the lives of young people in the late 1950s and early 1960s. (Or I , at least, saw it through the eyes of each yearbook’s editor.) No one was smoking. No one was strung out on crack cocaine. Maybe there was some drinking, but certainly there was no casual drug use or sex! Beyond the yearbooks, there were books about sex too. And my parents had a few…not the pornographic kind, but the educational kind. There were four, maybe six volumes, that could give me all I needed to know about my body parts, a girl’s body parts, and how they worked together to bring about a baby. As a kid, that’s what sex was for…babies. I don’t remember anything about intimacy, love, or “how far is too far?”

More to the point, there were still other books, about Jesus and Christianity (which, by the way, is my topic tonight, lest, you thought I wanted to talk with you about sex, sexuality, and that good ole question of “how far is too far?”) The books about Jesus were what captivated my curiosity and my journey began. I remember one book in particular that had a picture of Jesus on the cross complete with bloody hands and feet, a crown of thorns, and a few mourners at the foot of the cross. Oddly, I remember “sneaking” into my parents room, not to look at the yearbooks and sex-books, but to gaze curiously at, even meditate on, this picture of Jesus whom I had heard about at church.

(Observation #1) – about curiosity
They say, “curiosity killed the cat.” While that cliché may be true, I also believe that curiosity can carry us to some interesting places of a spiritual nature. So, the next step is the questioning and the searching, but not necessarily answers and discoveries.

Too many times in our lives, our Christian lives, we are focused more on the final result, the end of the journey, the right answer, or the destination. In doing so, we risk missing much of what God is doing by way of our spiritual formation.

In the Exodus story, we don’t just move from Egypt all the way to the Promised Land. We wander in desert places. We journey through dry times. We question. We doubt. We are uncertain. We are afraid. It’s what one of my favorite writers, Parker Palmer, calls the “Journey through Darkness.” And any experience of living in light is better understood when we’ve experienced that pain of being in darkness. (Repeat)

(Story #2)
What am I curious about now? (Lots of curiosity in between) For now…church. Communal Christian faith.

I didn’t always like going to church, but when I became a minister I felt like I had to go. Growing up in North Carolina made it easy to be a Christian. Children went to Sunday School every Sunday even if your parents just dropped you off then joined you later for “big” church. You didn’t have to stay in “big” church long. The minister welcomed people, prayed a prayer and everyone sang two hymns. During the second hymn all the children came to the first few rows to hear a special message just for them. I cannot remember any specific lesson taught during these moments. I remember it being a time when bible stories were told. Stories about Jesus that we had just heard in Sunday School were retold with the minister’s explanation tagged on the end. After the children’s time in worship, we were led back to the Sunday School rooms for Children’s Church. (Did you go to this?) Perhaps, this is where the idea of “church” was formed. Church, for children, meant sitting back in the Sunday School rooms waiting for our parents to finish whatever church meant to them. Children’s church consisted of playing “Bible” Football or “Bible” Charades or “Bible” Baseball. It was all knowledge-based. Therefore, church meant knowing something.

I wanted to go to church. More specifically, I wanted to go to Sunday School. Every quarter there was a special assembly held in the fellowship hall to honor attendance in Sunday School. Pins were awarded for perfect attendance. I cannot remember in what increments awards were given, but I certainly remember that I earned the “one-year” pin. However, it was a lie. It was not a lie that I told or my parents, but my Sunday School teacher fudged the books a little in my favor.

One winter Sunday morning, I remember both of my parents coming into my room. After waking me up, they informed me that it had snowed all night and that we might not be able to drive to church safely. Knowing that my sights were set on the attendance award, they asked very gently if it would be okay to stay home. I agreed. The following Sunday the Sunday School teacher asked me if I would have come to Sunday school if it had not snowed. I said yes. She changed the attendance book and some time later, I was awarded a pin for perfect attendance at Sunday school for one year. And so I was taught another lesson about church. Church meant achieving something.

(Observation #2)
These are not bad memories, but ones that come to the forefront of my mind as I think now about the nature of church. Is church about knowing something? Is church about achieving something? For many, I am afraid it is. Church is about knowing AND agreeing with a statement of faith. Many use wording such as, “We believe in….” or “We confess…” But, isn’t it true that many of these statements of faith could be said, “We know this about God,” or “We know that about the Bible,” and so forth? The implication, then, is that they know something I (you?) do not. I am not interested in that. (Don’t misunderstand…there is a place for doctrine and orthodoxy). Furthermore, the Christian life itself is characterized by achieving something (e.g., a better relationship with God, a revelation of life’s purpose, or the satisfaction on Sunday afternoon that I actually went to church and everyone saw me there and I can speak all next week with the piety of the Pharisees).

Part of this journey for me now is waiting for an experience, a revelation, a vision of what church means. So, I go back to a biblical image.

Like the Israelites wandering through the wilderness, I am afraid. I am terrified that what I might find along this journey is not what I set out to see. I’m afraid that what I might actually see is a church that is radically different than the way it looks now. Different means change and change is hard! I am not suggesting “going back” to anything, to the way things used to be. That’s what the miserable Hebrews wanted, grumbling that things were better being slaves in Egypt than nomads in the desert. No. I am hopeful and trusting in God’s faithfulness who always leads people from the desert to an oasis. I believe that even though we may be facing darkness, a light still shines. And the light is found in Jesus. Communion with God is found in a relationship with God through Jesus. It’s not knowing about Jesus. It’s knowing Jesus. It’s not about some personal pious achievement. It’s relating to others who are wandering (or wondering?) in the same way, the way of Jesus.

(A Final Image)
There’s a final image or impression I’d like to give about this idea of the spiritual life as a journey that begins with curiosity, leads through darkness, encounters Jesus all along the way, and calls us into faithful community. It comes from philosopher/theologian, Jimmy Buffet, in his song “He Went to Paris.”

He went to Paris lookin’ for answers
To questions that bothered him so
He was impressive, young and aggressive
Savin’ the world on his own

But the warm summer breezes
The french wines and cheeses
Put his ambition at bay
The summers and winters
Scattered like splinters
And four or five years slipped away

Then he went to england, played the piano
And married an actress named kim
They had a fine life, she was a good wife
And bore him a young son named jim

And all of the answers and all of the questions
Locked in his attic one day
’cause he liked the quiet clean country livin’
And twenty more years slipped away

Well the war took his baby, the bombs killed his lady
And left him with only one eye
His body was battered, his whole world was shattered
And all he could do was just cry

While the tears were a-fallin’ he was recallin’
Answers he never found
So he hopped on a freighter, skidded the ocean
And left england without a sound

Now he lives in the islands, fishes the pilin’s
And drinks his green label each day
Writing his memoirs, losin’ his hearin’
But he don’t care what most people say

Through eighty-six years of perpetual motion
If he likes you he’ll smile and he’ll say
Jimmy, some of it’s magic, some of it’s tragic
But I had a good life all the way

Coda:
And he went to paris lookin’ for answers
To questions that bothered him so

(Conclusion)
The spiritual life is a journey. (Even a journey as Buffet describes here.) It’s about questions, searching, and even wandering. Growth happens in the midst of the journey even when you find yourself journeying through the wilderness. Remember, “some of it’s magic and some of it’s tragic.” Certainly, the spiritual life is magical, mystical, and full of experiences to celebrate and glorify God. But, it’s also tragic, full of doubt, fear, unanswerable questions, and desperate times in the wilderness that can lead us to Promised Land, or allow us to sing, “I had a good life all the way.”

From my perspective that I’ve tried to share here…Curiosity gets things moving. Along the way, we come to know Jesus and relate to God through a relationship with him that leads us into relationships with other sojourners.

recommended reading

Here's a blog from a good friend about the Enter the Worship Circle event BSU held last Sunday. You really should read his blog. He's one of the most insightful people I know.

Read the BSU blog here.
Read his other blogs here.

church planting vs. conceiving a new church

Two things that are worth sharing.

First, a psalm from U2/Bono & The Edge…a song that, as Bono introduced it in Philadelphia back in May, is a “new song that feels like an old song.”

Yahweh

Take these shoes/Click clacking down some dead end street
Take these shoes/And make them fit
Take this shirt/Polyester white trash made in nowhere
Take this shirt/And make it clean (clean)
Take this soul/Stranded in some skin and bones
Take this soul/And make it sing

Yahweh, Yahweh/Always pain before a child is born
Yahweh, Yahweh/Still I'm waiting for the dawn

Take these hands/Teach them what to carry
Take these hands/Don't make a fist (no)
Take this mouth/So quick to criticise
Take this mouth/Give it a kiss

Yahweh, Yahweh/Always pain before a child is born
Yahweh, Yahweh/Still I'm waiting for the dawn

Still waiting for the dawn... sun is coming up
Sun is coming up on the ocean
This love is like a drop in the ocean
This love is like a drop in the ocean

Yahweh, Yahweh/Always pain before a child is born
Yahweh, tell me now/Why the dark before the dawn?

Take this city/A city should be shining on a hill
Take this city/If it be your will
What no man can own, no man can take
Take this heart/Take this heart/Take this heart
And make it break

Second, a poem that I read in the recent edition Sojourners magazine. Read “Come As You Are” by Debra Elramey here. It really is worth the time.

Always pain before a child is born.

Just come as you are.

Here’s the connection…that which is born is a community of faith built on mouths that kiss instead of criticize, hands that bring help instead of violence, hearts that break instead of harden. Even further, it is a community where…

You have nothing to fear, nothing to dread
There is no religion here, but for the laying
on of hands and the resurrection of the dead.

Sweet Home…Kentucky, Where the skies are so blue…

Last night a commercial came on for KFC (I guess still standing for “Kentucky Fried Chicken”), but the background music without lyrics was unmistakably, “Sweet Home Alabama.” I guess there’s a little identity crisis in the marketing department. Or, maybe it’s now acceptable to send out a mixed message, confusing communication, or perplexing point of view. I’m not sure KFC remembers who they are.

What about Christians? The church?

I’ve said it before in different places and various contexts that I think that much of religion today, Christianity specifically, is schizophrenic. Put more plainly, I really don’t think we know who we are. More times than not, we choose our religious associations based on what we’re not, rather than what we are, what we embrace, or what we embody.

Too many times, the “commercial” that advertises who we are shows one thing yet has the background music that tells a different story.

Sporadically, I watch The Daily Show with John Stewart. On one particular episode, Stewart (the show's host) made a music recommendation that I must acknowledge gratefully. He recommended two new CD releases and after a few weeks now, I have purchased them and, I must say, I am enjoying them very much.

The first one was Coldplay's new release, X&Y. I like this CD all the way through to the hidden 13th track, "Til Kingdom Come." It is a mystery to me how fresh, but familiar this song is. I think you can watch/hear it here.

The other recommendation was the dual disk "In Your Honor" by Foo Fighters. Disk one rocks. Disk two sooths. Curious words..."Mine is yours and yours is mine/There is no divide/In Your Honor I would die tonight." I can see why they've put additional digital files on their CD to keep it from being ripped. Had this been released years ago, this is one I would have definitely stolen from my sister. (I would have also taken her Coldplay CD...along with her copy of the Sugar Hill Gang's album, "Rapper's Delight!")

I am hopeful, if not certain, that as I listen more closely I'll find a few more pearls from Foo Fighters and Coldplay. I am also certain that I'd sell the Sugar Hill Gang's album on ebay for less than $9.99.

ponce de leon and a guy called skud

The first time I went to Disneyworld was when I was in elementary school. My parents took my sister and me out of school for a numbers of days for the road trip, park visits, and additional stops along the way. I don’t remember anything about the trip driving down I-95 southbound for Orlando. But, I do remember going to St. Augustine, Florida to visit the Fountain of Youth. Like all other visitors, we drank with the hopes of staying young.

It seems that in the past several months I have been hoping that this Fountain of Youth thing really works.

I have played golf with my best friend from high school twice this summer. He knows me. He knew me at 12 years old. We lived together during Freshmen year. We did the beach thing as teen-aged boys. We were very good at baseball, fair at football, and pretty much sucked when it came to going along with the crowd. I invited him to youth church camp. He ran over me with a motorcycle. We both played guitar and we finally learned to sing and played simultaneously. I still remember the first song I sang while he played,…the classic rock ballad from Night Ranger called “Goodbye.”

"Yet it's hard/Living life on this memory-go-round/Always up, always down/Turning 'round and 'round and 'round/And all this could be/Just a dream so it seems/I was never much good at goodbye."

The walls of Burkot Hall 114 begged us to stop until our first floor fan club came to offer their own harmony and humor.

On one particular gift-giving occasion, I gave him a Bible. But before giving it to him, I highlighted Philippians 1.3, “I thank my God every time I remember you.” This was sort of a promise I wanted to make to him. And it’s still true. I thank God to have had such a friend. I thank God even more that I still have him as a friend. I thank God because every memory of him makes me feel 13 all over again.

So, in the last weeks, we’ve played golf. We talked. We laughed a lot. And yeah, we cussed a lot too. It’s what we did when we were 13, so it certainly can work when we’re 34.

No one likes to say “goodbye” to their youth. But, life’s not a dream. Life is real. Life is two nostalgic guys in their mid-thirties with beautiful families, large mortgages, and enough memories in the bank to stay young even without Ponce De Leon’s elixir.

Thanks Franki! (by the way, which one of us is "skud" anyway)

where's the emergency exit? we can't take this anymore!

Last week we went on vacation to Orlando. Mostly we stayed by the pool, but a few times we ventured over to Disneyworld. Among the many trips down the waterslide with Bailey and float-side conversations with Kim, I had another memorable experience.

One night we made our way to Magic Kingdom and got there just in time for the nightly Spectromagic parade. The music soared through the air. "On this magic night, a million stars... da da da da..." What made this a neat experience is that 12 1/2 years earlier in just about the same place, I stood with Kim on our honeymoon having just been married a day or so before. Same place. Same music. Same parade. I remember holding her hand then. But, this time I watched the parade holding our daughter's hand. Bailey had her other hand on her mom's shoulder who had sat down on the curb placing her own hands close to our unborn daughter who I imagine felt the rhythm of the parade inside the womb.

It's amazing how fast 12 years can fly by. It's even more amazing how slowly that parade went by. I wish that more often I would take the time to soak in the richness of life's moments.

Whether ironic is the right way to describe what we did next, it was nonetheless, equally enjoyable. After living in the moment, we went to Tomorrowland and experienced the Carousel of Progress. The robot-like host sang, "There's a great big beautiful tomorrow shinin' at the end of ev'ry day. There's a great big beautiful tomorrow and tomorrow's just a dream away." I must say that everyone in the Newell family shared the same opinion. This was the cheesiest thing at Disney. We laughed. We mocked the characters. We sang the song with more than an ounce of sarcasm in our tone. And we laughed some more.

We missed the fireworks because the Carousel of Progress was creeping from the future back to the present. Nonetheless, we held hands while leaving the park walking through thousands of other families and honeymooners. And at least for an hour or so, I think we were the happiest family at Disneyworld.

Given the choice between living in the moment or visiting Tomorrowland, I'm pretty sure I'll go with living in the moments where a family can hold hands and sing of the magic nights and star-filled skies without being rushed into doing whatever comes next.

i hope i'm still married after posting this

You know how Taco Bell’s sauce packets have funny little sayings on them? Last night here’s the conversation I had with Kim, the mother of my daughter, who is now pregnant with our second offspring, and who is also smarter than I am.

Kim: (reading the taco sauce) “If you throw me across the room, does it mean I’m a flying saucer?”

Kim: (in her own words) But, it’s not even shaped like a flying saucer.

TM: KIM, It’s “sauce.”

Kim: Oh.

She’s also the funniest person I know.

She also sent me this...which is pretty funny too.

Watch.

everyone

please watch this

"remember when the days were long and rolled beneath a deep blue sky..."

Memory is a wonderful gift. Get any group of old friends together and it will not be long before someone and everyone begins sentences like, “Remember when…” or “Do you remember the time we…” or “I remember the last time we..” Memory is something often taken for granted. I came to realize this as I watched my wife’s maternal grandmother slip into a form of dementia at the end of her life. It really is a terrible disease. During that time, I read an article about the pastoral care of persons suffering from Alzheimer’s disease. The point was made that forms of dementia, such as Alzheimer’s disease, are unique from other diseases. Some diseases rob persons of the present in that the present misery lasts only a short time. Other terminal illnesses deprive a person of the present and the future in that they not only feel bad now, but they also ultimately take away the future ending in death. Dementia is unique because it denies one of the present, future, and the past. The ones who suffer cannot remember.

I performed the funeral service for Kim’s grandmother. This was hard for me. I never grieved her death. I never sat next to Kim, held her hand during the service, and cried with her. I only saw her cry. I put Myrtle Boyd’s life into words to help those who were grieving to remember her. We remembered her sense of humor. We called to mind her love for fishing perhaps only because she married a fisherman. We recalled how she loved Kure Beach Pier who served the best cone of ice cream and how the salt air of the seaside would cure any kind of ailment - physical, mental, or spiritual. I believe she was right about that.

I remember growing up going to Atlantic Beach on the coast of North Carolina. We would spend a week at the oceanfront Oceania Motel. I remember eating breakfast outside. I remember the motel had bikes, a playground, shuffleboard, and a fishing pier next door. I remember sleeping in the same room with my mother and father and sister. I remember having fun. The pool was small, but adequate for the families staying there with us. My mother never much liked to swim. She always swam trying to keep head out of the water. It seems my father always loved to play and make us laugh, and was responsible for taking care of my sister and me while in the pool. I remember laughing at him when he jumped from the diving board. I hope our children remember our family beach trips with the same fondness that I recall my own childhood vacations.

In May of 1987, Kim and I went to the Junior-Senior Prom. We had had a couple of dates prior to that, but I think this was the first event we attended together. Kim wore a white dress with a pink bow which she borrowed from a friend. Of course, I wore a rented tuxedo. We went to eat supper at Northgreen Country Club. I think we both ate lobster. I had never eaten lobster tail and was unaware how much it cost, but my parents paid for supper so I do not remember worrying too much about the extravagance. After the prom, perhaps even a few years later, Kim told me how embarrassed she was when the server came to remove her plate and she had crumbs all around her plate. I did not notice.

I remember meeting Kim’s father, “Toejoe,” for the first time that night. I believe he was more nervous than I was. (Having a daughter now, I realize why he was so anxious.) I picked Kim up about 3:30 in the afternoon so we could have our pictures made before supper. This must have been a good thing since Kim thought she was such a messy eater and might have spilled food on her prom dress.

The day after the prom Kim and I went with my best friend Franki to Atlantic Beach. As soon as we reached Morehead City which is directly across the bridge from Atlantic Beach traffic came to an absolute halt. There was a beach music festival the same day and we received word that a boat had over-turned on the only bridge accessing the island. We waited for some time until we could reach the beach. We went to the Fort Macon beach access, fell asleep, woke up, and went home. Kim looked wonderful in her dress the day before, but as a 17 year old male, I remember how wonderful she looked in her bathing suit. She still does.

At least for me, the beach is a way to remember. The beach is therapeutic. It brings back differing memories each time I step onto the sand. I remember this trip and that one. I remember this day and another one. If anyone could read my mind, they would hear a conversation beginning with sentences like, “Remember when…” or “Do you remember the time you…” or “I remember the last time you…” The beach can heal all your ailments, Myrtle used to say. Perhaps, it could even cure dementia, or prevent it.

questioning ecclesiology in the wilderness

I didn’t always like going to church, but when I became a minister I felt like I had to go. Growing up in North Carolina made it easy to be a Christian. Children went to Sunday School every Sunday even if your parents just dropped you off then joined you later for “big” church. You didn’t have to stay in “big” church long. The minister welcomed people, prayed a prayer and everyone sang two hymns. During the second hymn all the children came to the first few rows to hear a special message just for them. I cannot remember any specific lesson taught during these moments. I remember it being a time when bible stories were told. Stories about Jesus that we had just heard in Sunday School were retold with the minister’s explanation tagged on the end. After the children’s time in worship, we were led back to the Sunday School rooms for Children’s Church. Perhaps, this is where the idea of “church” was formed. Church, for children, meant sitting back in the Sunday School rooms waiting for our parents to finish whatever church meant to them. Children’s church consisted of playing “Bible” Football or “Bible” Charades or “Bible” Baseball. It was all knowledge-based. Therefore, church meant knowing something.

I wanted to go to church. More specifically, I wanted to go to Sunday School. Every quarter there was a special assembly held in the fellowship hall to honor attendance in Sunday School. Pins were awarded for perfect attendance. I cannot remember in what increments awards were given, but I certainly remember that I earned the “one-year” pin. However, it was a lie. It was not a lie that I told or my parents, but my Sunday School teacher fudged the books a little in my favor.

One winter Sunday morning, I remember both of my parents coming into my room. After waking me up, they informed me that it had snowed all night and that we might not be able to drive to church safely. Knowing that my sights were set on the attendance award, they asked very gently if it would be okay to stay home. I agreed. The following Sunday the Sunday School teacher asked me if I would have come to Sunday school if it had not snowed. I said yes. She changed the attendance book and some time later, I was awarded a pin for perfect attendance at Sunday school for one year. And so I was taught another lesson about church. Church meant achieving something.

These are not bad memories, but ones that come to the forefront of my mind as I think now about the nature of church. Is church about knowing something? Is church about achieving something? For many, I am afraid it is. Church is about knowing AND agreeing with a statement of faith. Many use wording such as, “We believe in….” or “We confess…” But, isn’t it true that many of these statements of faith could be said, “We know this about God,” or “We know that about the Bible,” and so forth? The implication, then, is that they know something I (you?) do not. I am not interested in that. Furthermore, the Christian life itself is characterized by achieving something (e.g., a better relationship with God, a revelation of life’s purpose, or the satisfaction on Sunday afternoon that I actually went to church and everyone saw me there and I can speak all next week with the piety of the Pharisees).

I wait for an experience, a revelation, a vision of what church means.

Like the Israelites wandering through the wilderness, I am afraid. I am terrified that what I might find along this journey is not what I set out to see. I’m afraid that what I might actually see is a church that is radically different than the way it looks now.

Is the “promised land” just another place to rest in our unfaithfulness until we’re wiped out by the Assyrians, the Babylonians, or whoever comes along with a bigger army than ours?

liberation theology

When I was younger, I thought growing up in Rocky Mount, North Carolina was not as good as say growing up in Atlantic Beach, NC or California. Like every kid, I guess I had some sense that life would be better somewhere else. I did not necessarily want to be away from my family. In fact, the opposite was true. I liked being home. I just thought that home would be better at the beach or in California.

Saturday nights were sacred especially in the summer. They were ritual. Mama would cook baked potatoes and make a tossed salad. She always made me a salad that I never ate. She made salad dressing and stored it in a yellow Tupperware container. The tea was sweet. Daddy would cook steaks on the grill. It was a charcoal grill that my maternal grandfather (“Big Daddy”) bought or had made somewhere. One for us and one for grandma and him. The steak was always good. Mostly we cooked sirloin steak as opposed to strip, filet, or rib eye. Of course, Daddy would always cut off a few pieces to eat right from the grill. It tasted better that way. I guess every family has rituals. Perhaps even the most sporadic families has them as well.

Our backyard was large enough for a kickball/baseball/football field. Actually, it wasn’t that big, but it was for eight-year old professional athletes. Sometimes we would play in the neighbors’ back yard since it was free from any trees, storage buildings, or workshops. They did not have any children and never seemed to mind. Our sports changed with the seasons. In the fall we played football complete with uniform, protective pads, helmets, and the fights that came when we tackled each other too hard. In the winter, we tried to play basketball though besides the weather being cool, our abilities were frozen in some respects. The spring and summer were the best. We played baseball and always ran the risk of breaking a window with an extreme foul ball or long home run. I cannot remember ever breaking a window.

My great granddaddy lived “across the railroad tracks.” This meant he was white, lived in his home in the neighborhood where he had lived for many years, and had new neighbors due to the fact that the old ones had either died or moved away. I loved visiting his house. He had a garden, a work shop, and lawn chairs to sit in outside and talk. Rarely, do I remember going to visit him and talking inside. Although I do remember that the kitchen always smelled like great grandma’s biscuits and country ham. The entire family on my father’s side would cross the tracks every year on the Saturday following Thanksgiving for an oyster roast. We would eat, talk, catch up with cousins, uncles, and aunts. The day would end with two other rituals – shaking the pecan trees and taking the family photograph for that year.

I cannot think of any real reason that I believed growing up somewhere other than Rocky Mount would have been better. Life creates rituals. Rituals, sometimes, keeps life interesting and familiar. Wherever we are we probably create rituals that connect us to home and family. Ritual gives a sense of meaning and purpose and understanding. Ritual makes an imprint on our memory perhaps so that when we’ve grown up and recall our childhood, the rituals are now liberating.

ashes to ashes, dust to dump

I think I have made hauling trash into a ritual. Most often, I take our household trash to the Harnett County Landfill on Saturday mornings. I get up, put on my ratty jeans, a t-shirt, and my work boots. I gather the trash from inside the house, bag any loose rubbish from around the garage, load my truck, and head to town. As a habit, I stop at the T-Mart for a country ham and egg biscuit which I eat in the cab of my truck in the parking lot. Most of the time, I do this silently while watching the blue collar folks. They enter for their breakfast, coffee and morning cigarette before heading off to do their Saturday chores or to punch their six-day a week time clock. I then drive to the outskirts of town where the land has to be cheaper the closer it is to the dump. At the scale house, I inform the county employee of my desire to leave my trash in his possession. He checks for my landfill permit and instructs me where to put my trash. With all landfill authority, yet with a hint of mundane repetition, he says, “In the building” or “Box number one.”

The box is preferable to the building since the latter is normally wet and smells exactly like what it contains. There’s a mixture of Tuesday night’s fish and last Sunday’s chicken bones. It’s a stench, a disgusting odor, that no amount of potpourri can redeem. Nonetheless, I drive from the building leaving behind everything I don’t want anymore, everything I can’t keep, and even some things that I’ve held on to for a while, but need to let go. There’s a relief. Relief comes from knowing that the trash is gone from our house, that we don’t have to deal with it anymore, at least until we create more of it. And the ritual repeats itself the next Saturday.

Today is Ash Wednesday, the beginning of Lent. Like most of us, I reflect on my sin, the dark side of life, and my need to get rid of some of junk that clutters my life with God. Like taking off the trash, forgiveness has its rituals too. It’s the ways we prepare ourselves to worship, ratty jeans and all. It’s the ways we acknowledge our place in the community with a morsel of bread and sip of wine. It’s the ways we let go of the past and live in the present. These rituals, too, lead us to relief. The relief is in God’s grace. Grace comes from knowing that the sin, the junk, the clutter, and the obstacles, no longer confine us to misery, that we don’t have to deal with it anymore, at least until we create more of it. And the ritual repeats itself…