Vacation

I'm headed for a vacation. I have always been in favor of vacations. It typically takes me a day or two to even realize that I am on vacation. Once I realize it I try to get into "relax" mode. This can take some doing depending on what precedes the vacation time. While I would love to think that I'm really good and self-differentiated about most things in life - my work often consumes me and I find myself thinking about things way too much. I'm headed into this vacation having just finished an Annual Meeting, a search for new staff members and a few church conflicts thrown in for good measure. It might take me a little more than a day to decompress. However, I'm looking forward to the graduation ceremonies, some golf and reconnecting with friends. I probably will put a post up or two during this time. I have been so busy that my attention to the blog has been less than what it probably should be - but hey its my blog and Ill write when I want to?

Mama don't let grow up to be pastors...

Graduations...sort of....

This week I will be headed to Connecticut to watch my daughter walk in her college graduation. Both daughters are "almost" finished with their college education. They have a couple of courses to finish. What is strange is that one gets to walk in her graduation despite being short of a few credits and the other did not. One is a large state school the other is a small private school. I have had to curb my expectations around the whole cap and gown nostalgia and realize that these are my expectations and not my children's expectations.

I have found a lot of parenting to be like that quite honestly. What I want for my children at the end of the day is for them to be happy and whole human beings. It is a wonderful experience being a parent and one filled with great challenges, frustrations and much joy. Our children can be our best teachers and I have marveled at the gifts they have been in my life.

Memorial Day

The observance of Memorial Day began in 1868. Here is the text of the order:

The 30th day of May, 1868, is designated for the purpose of strewing with flowers, or otherwise decorating the graves of comrades who died in defense of their country during the late rebellion, and whose bodies now lie in almost every city, village, and hamlet churchyard in the land. In this observance no form or ceremony is prescribed, but Posts and comrades will, in their own way, arrange such fitting services and testimonials of respect as circumstances may permit.

We are organized, Comrades, as our regulations tell us, for the purpose among other things, "of preserving and strengthening those kind and fraternal feelings which have bound together the soldiers sailors and Marines, who united to suppress the late rebellion." What can aid more to assure this result than by cherishing tenderly the memory of our heroic dead? We should guard their graves with sacred vigilance. All that the consecrated wealth and taste of the nation can add to their adornment and security, is but a fitting tribute to the memory of her slain defenders. Let pleasant paths invite the coming and going of reverent visitors and fond mourners. Let no neglect, no ravages of time, testify to the present or to the coming generations that we have forgotten as a people the cost of a free and undivided republic.

If other eyes grow dull and other hands slack, and other hearts cold in the solemn trust, ours shall keep it well as long as the light and warmth of life remain in us.

Let us, then, at the time appointed, gather around their sacred remains, and garland the passionless mounds above them with choicest flowers of springtime; let us raise above them the dear old flag they saved; let us in this solemn presence renew our pledge to aid and assist those whom they have left among us a sacred charge upon the Nation's gratitude—the soldier's and sailor's widow and orphan.

II. It is the purpose of the Commander in Chief to inaugurate this observance with the hope that it will be kept up from year to year, while a survivor of the war remains to honor the memory of his departed comrades. He earnestly desires the public press to call attention to this Order, and lend its friendly aid in bringing it to the notice of comrades in all parts of the country in time for simultaneous compliance therewith

This poem is one that has moved me on Memorial Day:

In Flanders Fields
By: Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae, MD (1872-1918)
Canadian Army

In Flanders Fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.

We are the Dead. Short days ago
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,
Loved and were loved, and now we lie
In Flanders fields.

Take up our quarrel with the foe:
To you from failing hands we throw
The torch; be yours to hold it high.
If ye break faith with us who die
We shall not sleep, though poppies grow
In Flanders fields.

To be honest, I am not real big on patriotic celebrations. I love living in this country and I will probably never live anywhere else. Love of one's country is a secondary love for me - and when it becomes a primary love I think that leads to some of the worst behavior and thinking that history has demonstrated.

However, I do think it is important to honor those who have given their lives in defense of their ideals and the freedom that we enjoy. I only wish that we would give as much energy and attention to peace building and peacemaking that we give to military intelligence and the Pentagon budget. Nevertheless - my prayer today is for those who have died in conflicts across the world - and their grieving families.

Interesting Times Article

One Sunday in late March, Lynette Sparks stood at the altar of a Presbyterian church in upstate New York to sermonize about seven verses from Romans and the notion of transitions. Ms. Sparks talked about the early Christians waiting for divine revelation. She talked about the construction project under way near the sanctuary. She talked, as preachers sometimes do, indirectly about herself.

When Ms. Sparks had entered seminary at the Colgate Rochester Crozer Divinity School here in 2005, a career-switcher in her 40s with an M.B.A., financial need was the furthest thing from her profound sense of being called. The Dow Jones average hovered above 10,000, the unemployment rate barely grazed 5 percent, and homes were selling nationally at a record pace.

Read story here

From a Friend's Blog

This post comes from my friend Grant's blog of a few days ago - you can read his blog by clicking on Grant's blog over there on the right...

Suicide is not painless


One of the lines from the great TV series MASH I've never liked is from the opening theme song: "Suicide is painless, it brings on many changes, and I can take or leave it if I please.." I suppose if the one committing suicide does it via carbon monoxide poisoning or a drug overdose, it could be considered painless; hanging oneself or slitting one's wrists or throat would, I assume, not happen without pain. Here in northern California the #1 method of suicide used to be jumping off the Golden Gate Bridge. Now it is jumping in front of a train on the Caltrain tracks and it occurs with alarming frequency.
I'm writing this because a very good friend of mine from my time in Cleveland took his life this week. I don't know why - not that it would alter my emotions - but according to a friend of his, Scott was having "difficulties." I myself was hospitalized twice in a psych unit in 1996 for suicidal ideation. I wanted to take my life because I was newly disabled and didn't see any future for myself. Fortunately, my psychiatrist did see a future for me and made sure I was safe and taken care of in the hospital. In a twist of irony, it was my friend Scott who drove me home after I was released the first time. On the way to my house he told me about a mutual friend of ours who had taken her life while I was in the hospital and I was shocked and deeply saddened that Shana would choose to sit in her garage with the engine running for some unknown reason. She had a new boyfriend and they seemed to be doing well together. When I finally saw him he was so grief-stricken that he could barely talk.
This is the part of suicide I think of most when I think about it not being painless: the tremendous hurt and grief it causes family members and friends who survive. Scott has two sons, both in Arizona where his former wife lives. The oldest boy, Thomas, is in college; the younger one, Allen, is about to graduate from high school. Whatever happiness or sense of accomplishment he would have felt at commencement will now be nearly blotted out by the shadow of grief hanging over his head.
Here is what I've learned about suicide: It often happens when the person feels there is no way out for whatever situation they are in. It could be a relationship issue, financial difficulties, a job loss, or even the death of other family members. What one needs in such a predicament is this:
1. To be surrounded by others who can help him or her see that their problem can be dealt with. There are all kinds of community resources and private practitioners who can provide counseling, debt consolidation or whatever. How many of us have lived through the break-up of a relationship, a divorce, the death of a loved one or a sudden job loss? There IS life after these things happen; the person contemplating suicide just doesn't see it.
There was a woman in the psych unit with me the first time who had slit her wrists in frustration because her husband had become unstable and she was overburdened with caring for him around the clock. Since I was newly disabled and being cared for by home health aides, I suggested to her that she could hire someone to look after her husband. Surprisingly, that idea had not occurred to her. Just think of all the stress, the grief and drama that could have been avoided had she known about home health agencies.
On the Caltrain tracks near where I live there are now signs posted at regular intervals that read, in both English and Spanish, "STOP! If you need help for a problem, call this number..."
I don't know what was troubling Scott. In all our emails, phone conversations and occasional face to face meetings over the last few years, he never mentioned anything. And this is the other thing one needs to do when feeling overwhelmed:
2. Get help. Let someone know what you are going through; don't be ashamed to ask for help - it is not a sign of weakness but of strength.
When I look back on my two incidents of nearly taking my life in 1996, I now realize several things:

* I could easily have been hurt and not dead - alive and in tremendous pain.
* I would have inflicted upon my family and friends a grief so terrible they would end up burdened for the rest of their lives
* I would have missed out on all the wonderful experiences I've had in the last 13 years - and all those that still await me.

The Blind Boys of Alabama

Transitions

So both my kids are finishing up their college educations. Ironically they both need a couple of more classes to get their diplomas - which they will both do this summer. As I ponder these life cycle events in my children's lives I wonder - where on earth did the time go? How could I possibly be the parent of a 24 and 21 year old? What about health insurance for them? How about paying off those college loans? Yikes.

The good news is that they both have jobs. Our oldest is a super nanny who has an amazing gift with children. The youngest just got a job working with a Children's Museum in a summer program teaching children about growing food. Like anyone who has children you know that they are unique individuals. It is completely amazing to me to see the ways in which they have blossomed and grown into incredible human beings. I am so grateful and thankful for them and the gifts that they are not only to our family - but to the world!

The Story of Mother's Day

This comes from spiritualprogressives.org


Reaffirming Julia Ward Howe's Mother's Day Vision

Julia Ward Howe offered her Mother's Day Proclamation to the world in 1870. Her dream was the establishment of an international Mothers' Day Festival dedicated to the cause of nonviolent resolution of conflict and international solidarity among all women. Her pacifist consciousness had been provoked by the bloodshed of the Franco-Prussian War. Her activism was cultivated in the struggles for abolition of slavery and the quest for women's suffrage. She had the proclamation translated into French, Spanish, Italian, German, and Swedish, working for the establishment of Mother's Day in concert with women internationally celebrating peace and women's empowerment.

Howe died in 1910, four years before President Woodrow Wilson officially declared the day in 1914 in response to the burgeoning success of the movement she inspired. But Wilson avoided any mention of the thrust of Howe's cause in his declaration, instead emphasizing only the nurturing "home and hearth" dimension of motherhood. He also spurned the internationalist concern that was central to Howe's consciousness, distorting this into American nationalism. Howe's central concerns, the universality of motherhood and its natural expression in anti-war sentiment, was excised from the official meaning of the day.

President Wilson proclaimed: "Now, therefore, I, Woodrow Wilson, President of the United States of America, by virtue of the authority vested in me by the said Joint Resolution, do hereby direct the government officials to display the United States flag on all government buildings and do invite the people of the United States to display the flag at their homes or other suitable places on the second Sunday in May as a public expression of our love and reverence for the mothers of our country."

Compare this to Howe's far more high minded vision, still so desperately needed in this suffering divided world. Here is the text of her 1870 Mother's Day Proclamation, so prescient in its understanding, so courageous in its call, so plaintiff in its currency nearly a century and a half later.

Arise then...women of this day!
Arise, all women who have hearts!
Whether your baptism be of water or of tears!
Say firmly:
"We will not have questions answered by irrelevant agencies,
Our husbands will not come to us, reeking with carnage,
For caresses and applause.
Our sons shall not be taken from us to unlearn
All that we have been able to teach them of charity, mercy and patience.
We, the women of one country,
Will be too tender of those of another country
To allow our sons to be trained to injure theirs."

From the voice of a devastated Earth a voice goes up with
Our own. It says: "Disarm! Disarm!
The sword of murder is not the balance of justice."
Blood does not wipe our dishonor,
Nor violence indicate possession.
As men have often forsaken the plough and the anvil
At the summons of war,
Let women now leave all that may be left of home
For a great and earnest day of counsel.
Let them meet first, as women, to bewail and commemorate the dead.
Let them solemnly take counsel with each other as to the means
Whereby the great human family can live in peace...
Each bearing after his own time the sacred impress, not of Caesar,
But of God -
In the name of womanhood and humanity, I earnestly ask
That a general congress of women without limit of nationality,
May be appointed and held at someplace deemed most convenient
And the earliest period consistent with its objects,
To promote the alliance of the different nationalities,
The amicable settlement of international questions,
The great and general interests of peace.


This is by Jonathan Klate who resides in Amherst, Massachusetts where he writes frequently about spirituality, compassionate politics, and the relationship between these two. Please feel welcome to forward.
________________________________________
web: www.spiritualprogressives.org
email: info@spiritualprogressives.org

Whew

Bill to Allow Jesus License Plates in Fla. Dies
Monday May 4, 2009

(RNS) Moves to create two Florida license plates with images of a crucified Jesus on one, and a stained glass window and cross on another, have died in the Florida legislature.

Both plates had come under blistering criticism from Americans United for Separation of Church and State and the American Civil Liberties Union. The Associated Press reported that bills to create the plates died at the end of the regular legislative session on Friday (May 1).

State Sen. Gary Siplin, an Orlando Democrat, had proposed the plate with "a picture of my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ." The plate portrayed an image of Jesus' head lowered under the weight of a crown of thorns.

Siplin was not available Monday for comment.

Gov. Charlie Crist, a Republican, had earlier said he would support the plate. "If they (critics) don't want one, they don't have to buy one," Crist told The St. Petersburg Times.

Florida drivers are able to purchase more than 100 specialized license plates. Proceeds, which normally run between $15 and $25, support various causes and groups.

Cinco de Mayo