Will Willimon writes of a friend of his, an Episcopal priest, “was looking to buy a motorcycle.  The salesman said, ‘This baby can go from zero to 80 in 40 seconds.  Nothing can touch you when you are on this baby.’  Then the salesman asked, ‘And what do you do for a living?’  My friend answered that he was clergy.  The salesman said, ‘This is a very, very safe motorcycle you got here.’  And I am haunted by what somebody said back at my graduation.  ‘Remember one thing as you go forth into life: Even if you win the rat race, you are still a rat.’”

From Peter’s Emmanuel News and Notes: July 1, 2007

Here’s my catch-all post.  First off, tune into WNRI tomorrow morning from 10 am through 11 to hear Scott Gunn and I talk about the recent Pew report on religion in America.  It said, among other things, that a good majority of Americans believe that there are numerous ways to God, not one exclusive path.  We’ll also talk a bit about the recent passage of Rhode Island’s state budget that is balanced on the backs of the poor and marginalized.  It’s 1380 on your AM dial, and www.wnri.com online.

We’ve been meeting with a few capital campaign consultants over the past two weeks.  Our final interview is tonight, and the process has been terribly exciting and informative.  I don’t think we’ll be able to make a bad choice, as each group we’ve met with has tremendous experience and seems to be chomping at the bit to work with us.  We’ll keep you up to date throughout the summer.  For now, we expect to begin ‘discerning’ this fall: ‘discerning’ is a fancy church word that means ‘deciding’, or ‘figuring out’.  It’s what we do all the time.  Ordinary people say they’re ‘thinking about stuff’.  Church people say they’re ‘discerning’.  So we’ll discern what our vision will be: what space we want to see, what ministries will benefit, and how our growth will be best suited by renovation and expansion.

In other news, I continue to meet with applicants for our position of choir director.  I’ve already met some very qualified candidates, and I expect that when I get back from vacation, I will be calling a few to meet with members of our music team and choir.  The goal is to have the right person in place for September. 

Our last Saltshakers dinner was this past Sunday evening at Marilyn Sayles’ house in Lonsdale.  I don’t know what your experience with the Saltshakers ministry has been, but ours has been nothing short of fantastic.  All the people we’ve had the pleasure of meeting with (the Freunds, Crowleys and Nancy Ryan in year 1; the Hales, Cunninghams and Marilyn Sayles in year 2) are great friends at this point.  I’ve heard great stories about other groups as well.  If you haven’t gotten involved in a Saltshakers group (it’s dinner rotated between three or four houses over eight months), we’ll be starting up again in September.  Look for it.

We’ve been told by American Lawnmower of Cranston that our tractor will be delivered back to us today.  Many thanks to Brad Dean for the use of his tractor mower this past Sunday, thanks to Brian Smith and Ed Greene for doing the mowing, and thanks to Bill and William Hawthorne who showed up after church to see if they could help!  When we all pitch in, look what happens!  Anyway, I look forward to getting the tractor back.

One more note: we took one of our capital campaign visitors to Andrew’s Bistro on Tuesday (in the midst of one of our big thunderstorms).  I had called Andrew about 30 minutes before to let him know we were coming–mostly to make sure he was open.  Since I hadn’t been in a while, I wanted to make sure.  When we showed up around 6:20, the place was PACKED.  And who was the first one to greet us but Andrew himself.  We were seated immediately, and had a great meal.  I am so glad the Bistro seems to be doing well, and that they haven’t lost their hospitality.  Do yourself a favor and visit them, but make reservations if you can.

Some of you know that in 1982, in a dairy-farm surrounded college town in upstate New York, future Episcopal priest Peter Mayer was selected as one of 14 players to represent Oneonta in the Little League All-Stars.  ESPN was but three years old, and the biggest perk of being an All-Star was a red nylon jacket.  There were also bragging rights to my best friend who was not selected; he would’ve made the previous year’s team, but the competition was too much. 

Even though I didn’t see any ‘game action’, unless you count standing in the first base coach’s box as ‘game action’, and we lost our first game 3-1 on a disputed home run call, it was something I remember fondly.  So when our own Jonathan Lanoue was selected for one of the Cumberland teams, I had to do something.  So I made a mix of some great songs from 1982 that remind me of those Little League salad days:

Subdivisions-Rush

Heat of the Moment-Asia

Another One Bites the Dust-Queen

(Don’t Fear) The Reaper-Blue Oyster Cult

Edge of Seventeen-Stevie Nicks

Waiting on a Friend-The Rolling Stones

De Do Do Do, De Da Da Da-The Police

You Dropped A Bomb On Me-The Gap Band

Wanna Be Startin’ Somethin’-Michael Jackson

Tainted Love-Soft Cell

I Want Candy-Bow Wow Wow

Shadows Of The Night-Pat Benatar

Should I Stay Or Should I Go-The Clash

Under Pressure-Queen and David Bowie

Don’t Stop Believin’-Journey

A few notes are in order.  Don’t Stop Believin’ was first and foremost a big swim team song for the Oneotters, our YMCA team, before the Sopranos was a twinkle in its creators’ eyes.  Under Pressure has a great line on love: “Cause love’s such an old-fashioned word and love dares you to care for the people on the edge of the night and love dares you to change our way of caring about ourselves”.  The Clash’s Combat Rock was just a seminal album for me, almost as much as Sandanista!  You might be surprised to see Pat Benatar, or Soft Cell on there, but hey, it’s memories.  And of course, Another One Bites the Dust was one of our all-time favorite request songs on WZOZ: “This one goes out to Elks from Landmark Datsun.  Watch out tomorrow, boys!”  My team was Eagles.  Good luck to Jonathan, whose first game is Monday. 

Summertime is movie time for me; it’s a good time to weed down the Netflix list and spend time in air-conditioning while telling yourself that Twizzlers really are good for you.  Our clergy study group caught “The Happening” on Friday, and ummm, don’t go see it, unless you have a really good excuse.

I almost dumped on this movie during Sunday’s announcements, it was so bad.  Scott Gunn posted the following science link for further explanation of the finer points of the movie.  What I would like to know is if you know that there’s a toxin that makes you want to kill yourself, why wouldn’t you go to a place where killing yourself would be really hard?  Avoid lawnmowers, ropes, sharp objects, windows, etc.  That’s supposing you were thinking clearly, which I would not be.  If this stuff was going down in my neighborhood, I would lose it quickly. 

And I caught the first twenty minutes of “First Blood” on Spike (the anti-Lifetime channel) last night.  If you think that Rambo is just a roided-up American gunslinger, do yourself a favor and re-watch the first in the franchise.  John J. Rambo was just another Vietnam vet, disillusioned upon finding himself back in the US after his hellish tours.  He wanders into Hope, a small, “boring” town run by Sheriff Will Teasle, and is kicked out just for how he looks and smells.  I wonder how many of our churches are run this way.  In smaller churches (ASA 150 and down), there are people who act as “gate-keepers”.  These are the insiders who either keep others out or let others in.  Pastors should know who their gate-keepers are, and introduce them to Sheriff Teasle.  Make sure they let Rambo into their town.  Otherwise it gets out of hand. 

Amid the ache in my tummy due to pills described for my sore neck, I was in a mood to watch an ‘end-of-the-civilization’ movie last night.  So in anticipation for “The Happening” to come out, I saw Will Smith’s “I Am Legend” last night.  I’m sure “The Happening” will be just as disappointing.

How cool is it to look at NYC after three years of no one living in it?  However, do I really think Will Smith would drive through Central Park amid a herd of antelope?  Ehhh.  I could write a lot of those “I don’t really think it would be like that…” or “how come if they want us to believe this did that just happen?”  I won’t.  I’ll leave it by saying that it felt an awful lot like M. Night Shyamalan’s “Signs” with Mel Gibson.  The whole coincidence thing with his daughter saying “look, a butterfly”, and then Anne has one on her neck…the whole question of God’s plan, or God’s providence.  It was almost as if someone had watched that movie one night, and watched “28 Days” the next.  I was left wanting more of a story, and less of a tidy ending.

Yes, I was selected for jury duty this week.  At first, like most others, I cringed at the thought of it, and decided to wear my full black cassock and one of those little beanies that the Pope-wannabes wear.  But upon further reflection and prayer, and after finishing this excellent book, I decided that this is the best time of the church year to be called to serve.  And dagummit, serve I will!  It helped that serving meant driving into Providence on the two hottest days of the year to an air-conditioned building. 

After about two hours of jury instruction yesterday, I waited in the juror’s lounge–three rooms in all: one with a tv tuned into whatever junk NBC has on from 9-noon, one with a tv tuned into ESPN2 (not qualilty programming until noon when Euro 2008 comes on) and the quiet room.  That’s where I went, to read, perchance to dream, and I really did get lots done.  Needless to say, I was one of the 33 or so jurors who were never called to even try to get on a case; we were all let go both days at around noon. 

I just checked, and it’s 84 in the church.  It’s a cool 80 in the parish hall.  Thanks to the vestry of 2005 for approving a wall a/c unit for the office. 

It’s another joint production between Christ Church, Lincoln and EmCh, Cumberland, Bookapalooza 2008!  Well, not really, it’s just a book study, but it promises to be good, and slightly different from the ones we’ve done in the past few months.  The idea is that we read one book a month, and get together at the end of the month to discuss it.  To recap.  Read.  Gather.  Discuss. 

In June, we’ll read Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America by Barbara Ehrenreich.  I know it came out six years ago, but it’s timely because believe it or not, things haven’t gotten better for those who are just barely making ends meet.  As a matter of fact, there are more of us who are getting closer to that poverty line, so this book might give us some new eyes as we look at our economy heading into an important election cycle.  We’ll discuss this book on Wednesday, June 25 at Christ Church, Lincoln from 7 PM through 8:30 PM.

In July, the book will be The Return of the Prodigal Son: A Story of Homecoming by Henri Nouwen.  I read this a few years ago and it changed the way I hear that story.  Nouwen is such a spiritual giant that you can read one page, ONE PAGE, and get something out of it.  Luckily, there’s more than one page to this book, so there’s lots of rich material to mine.  We’ll discuss this book on Wednesday, July 30 at Emmanuel, Cumberland from 7 PM through 8:30 PM.

Finally, in August, we’ll look at A.J. Jacobs’ brilliant book, The Year of Living Biblically: One Man’s Humble Quest to Follow the Bible as Literally as Possible.  I ordered this book when it came out after reading a few excerpts here and there.  Right away, my wife read it; shortly thereafter, I lent it to a friend who loved it.  If the subtitle is too confusing for you, it’s the thoughts of a guy living in New York City, who tries to follow ALL the rules in the Bible, even the ones that contradict each other.  How does one make sense of it all?  While much fun is poked at the insanity of taking the Bible literally, Jacobs has a number of epiphanies on God and religion.  We’ll discuss this book on August 27 at Christ Church, Lincoln from 7 PM through 8:30 PM. 

You can click on the titles to order from Amazon, but I am hoping to have a few copies on sale after worship on Sundays.  No need to register, but you do need to read the books.  And again, it’s the last Wednesday of each month, at Christ Church in June and August, and at Emmanuel in July.  On behalf of Scott, I hope you’ll join us.

The Episcopal Church is pushing a summer media blitz with the message “Put Your Faith To Work” as the centerpiece.  The start is an ad saying “Get Closer to God.  Slice Carrots.”  Read more here. 

Now those who know me know that I am the last to pat the institutional church on the back.  However, I give them full marks for deciding to advertise in something other than “Episcopal Life” or “The Living Church”.  And to go so far as to proclaim a “summer run in public media” is downright 20th-century. 

So let’s hope that a few people see these ads and find carrot-slicing inspiring enough to visit an Episcopal Church on Sunday.  Well, they better have enough slicers ready!  In other words, when we advertise, we’d better be damn sure that what people get is what we said they’d get.  “Slicing carrots” means serving the poor, feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, things like that.  So again, if someone is inspired by a church that says “hey, we feed the hungry”, that person better see hungry people being fed by that church.

It has to do with code and congruity.  Lots of churches say “all are welcome”.  Yet our experiences of those churches are that not all are welcome.  If you look like us, act like us, pray like us, sing like us (not better, please; we have enough insecurity issues as it is), believe the things that we believe, carry suspicions of the same people we are suspicious of, then you are welcome.  And even then, no one will talk to you at coffee hour.  THAT EVEN HAPPENS HERE AT EMMANUEL, more than I care to admit.  So if we say we’re a serving church, we’d better be serving.  If we say we’re a welcoming church, we’d better be welcoming.  Or we shouldn’t call ourselves a church.

Just an update from our meeting last night:

Based on information from other churches that have been in our situation (the need for increased or improved space), we’re going to begin contacting some capital campaign consultants in the coming weeks.  Our hope is that some will want to and be able to meet with us before the end of June.  If they can’t do that, we hope to at least get an idea of what they think needs to be ready from our end (plans for building, drawings, etc) by the time we get started with a consultant.  One consultant that we know of has a proven track record of starting campaigns in the fall of the year.  Since it’s already May, we wouldn’t be able to start until the fall of 2009, by which time the economy will hopefully have picked up. 

The other piece that we are working on is a session that will seek to capture some of our dreams for our church.  What is possible here at Emmanuel?  What can be built?  What is our future?  This isn’t just pie-in-the-sky stuff; it’s imagining what we look like with an average Sunday attendance of 200 people.  (FYI, right now, we’re at 173 for 2008.  We will most likely finish the year around 150)  So what does worship look like with an extra 40 people in the pews?  How many of those people are children (probably 15-20, if current trends hold up)?  What does that mean for our Sunday School space?  And let’s face it, one priest isn’t enough for 150 people, much less 200.  So how much more office space will we need? 

We hope to begin these sessions in the late summer, but we’ll test the questions and process on ourselves first (on June 5) and on the Vestry (June 20).  Obviously, you’ll be kept up to date, and don’t hesitate to call with any questions.

This from “The New France” by Mitchell Beasley, talking about how French wine-growers are learning from New World (i.e. South America, North America, Australia):
“A spell in South Africa, Chile or Australia is now an essential part of the education of many young French wine-growers.  What they tend to learn…are the best lessons of New World winemaking.  Rethink every action; do nothing for precedent’s sake alone; understand as much as possible; and practice your vocation with absolute commitment.” 

He goes on to say that the lesson they don’t bring back to France is that winemaking “can be a brand-driven industry like any other…and that marketing strategies are more important than scent and flavour in selling wine.” 

What would the church look like if we rethought everything we did, and everything we did had a purpose that was in step with our vocation and mission?  What would it be like if we did nothing for precedent’s sake, but understood the “scent and flavour” of our liturgy completely?  What would Sundays look like?