If Only He'd Run...

for president. He'd get my vote. Just sayin'...

This video won't embed properly, so here's the link.

Sen. Russ Feingold, D-WI

Looking for An American President

Anyone who has read this blog at all knows I don't usually do politics. I might comment on issues, occasionally, but I generally don't do any big picture politics. Well I'm getting discouraged. Once again, the political prospects for this upcoming presidential election look very bleak from where I sit.

On the Republican side, there is no candidate I don't think is, not to put too fine a point on it, a jerk. What are my choices? Rudy the Rude? The Dreaded Fred? Oven-Mitt Romney? I (don't heart) Huckabee? Please. Can we talk? They're all misogynistic, exclusionary, elite white guys who don't have any idea what it's like to have to live a life that doesn't include wealth and privilege. I listen to them and I'm not just discouraged, I'm pissed off.

On the Democratic side, we find Hillary, Barack, John Edwards, and who else? Is Mike Gravel still in the race? or Dennis Kucinich? Bless their hearts, Gravel and Kucinich were the only ones I was close to agreeing with. But, my god, my god, why have you forsaken us??? Where is an electable Democrat who will stand for justice and mercy consistently?

My ideal candidate would be Andrew Shepard - the presidential character from "The American President" starring Michael Douglas and Annette Bening. It's a sappy romantic comedy, o.k.? But Douglas's character is a president with integrity. He doesn't get there easily, but he does get there. If you're not familiar with the film, Shepard as president is a widower, Bening plays Sydney Ellen Wade, a lobbyist with whom he becomes romantically involved. Shepard's political rival digs up dirt about the president's girlfriend, mixing fact with innuendo to attack Shepard's integrity - making the president's ACLU membership seem like something un-American.

The finest scene in the movie is at the end. Here it is:



I want a president like that. But I want a president like that who will make statements like "Yes I'm in favor of same-gender marriage, because marriage is a good in our society and it's discriminatory to only allow opposite-gender marriage." I want a president who will say "The Patriot Act was a bad idea, I apologize to every person who has been hurt by it, I repeal it today by Executive Order." Is this too much to ask?

I need a sick day...

...but I have to get the next section of my paper figured out. I woke up last night feeling that icky feeling of sinus drainage in the back of my throat. Ugh. On the plus side, I did NOT have a section due today and I had a nice dinner with my daughter anyway. On the down side, I'll be writing this weekend when the neighborhood urchins are doing the trick or treat thing.

In the absence of anything pithy to say myself - I will recommend to you a new blog! It's called "Belief in Context." It is written by a seminary classmate who started it as part of a class on public theology. How cool is it that the seminary even has a class on public theology?!? Of course, our president is prominent in the public square. Anyway, there's good stuff here.

Just When I Thought...

I'd heard - or read - everything from every angle about Sen. Larry Craig, I surfed to the NPR website to catch up with my favorite non-minister's homilies. It's been a busy semester and most of my weekends are spent bent over my laptop, wringing from my mind and heart my meager thoughts on theology - while listening to the music in my media library. Because of this, I haven't been listening to Scott Simon as religiously as usual. I found this piece on Sen. Craig this morning, after listening to an old favorite from Simon's occasional "Simon Says" series.

I've been to church this morning, friends. Hallelujah!

Friday Quiz Blogging!

A fun quiz - and amazingly accurate! Though I hate to say that, having re-read my last post and found a couple errors... At another time the results would have been different. Right now I have no time for reading a lot of fun mysteries, fantasies, and speculative fiction, which is (I think) why the quiz puts me in "the final stages of getting a Ph.D." Not quite - just the M.Div., thank you.

What Kind of Reader Are You? Your Result: Obsessive-Compulsive Bookworm You're probably in the final stages of a Ph.D. or otherwise finding a way to make your living out of reading. You are one of the literati. Other people's grammatical mistakes make you insane.
Book Snob
Dedicated Reader
Literate Good Citizen
Fad Reader
Non-Reader
What Kind of Reader Are You? Create Your Own Quiz

Experiencing the Divine

Rev. Matt Tittle, at Keep the Faith, is blogging about sources of wisdom, using as his guide the "six sources recognized in Unitarian Universalism." He starts off with a post about experiencing God, "that transcending mystery and wonder which moves us to a renewal of the spirit and an openness to the forces which create and uphold life." He asks at the end of his post, "When do you experience God?"

My dh's aunt once remarked, while looking at a beautiful landscape in a set of vacation slides, "how can one look at that and say there is no god?" I'm in awe of the beauty of nature too, but... what about those experiences that don't immediately make one think of a renewal of the spirit? Sometimes getting to the life-affirming part takes a little more effort. Here's my experience (adapted from a sermon of mine):

Way back in May of 1980 Mt. St. Helens in Washington State erupted - or exploded. Half the mountain fell into Spirit Lake, trees were toppled like pick up sticks, ash was thrown up into the atmosphere, falling over a huge radius out from the mountain. Total devastation, right?

Yes... and no. My brother, who lived in Yakima at the time, sent us jars of volcanic ash. I couldn't keep it - it made me shudder. Thinking of the destruction wrought by the eruption and looking at the ash made me think of crematories and death.

Seven years later, the dh and I visited Mt. St. Helens with our 16-month old son. Along with the others willing to venture out in the soggy mists, we observed the trees still lying on the ground like tossed and broken Tinker toys, the bare ground that had been scoured clean by ash, pumice and lava flow. In photos of the area before the eruption, the mountain had been postcard perfect, a symmetrical cone with snow surrounding the crater at the top, lush trees growing up the sides – just what one would imagine a scenic volcano to look like.

Now the north side appeared jaggedly broken open as if someone had taken a gigantic hammer to it. The mountain appeared lumpy and barren -- no trees, little snow, mostly bare grey ground. The formerly pristine Spirit Lake, a favorite destination of day-trippers for swimming and boating, now a swamp filled with the skeletons of rotting trees and other debris. The scene was desolate, stark and depressing. It seemed nothing was alive, that nothing could live, in this bleak environment.

The paths where visitors could walk were clearly posted. In addition to walking the self-guided paths, we opted to take advantage of a guided walk. The staff was still working out of makeshift quarters, and the visitor’s center was little more than a trailer surrounded by a gravel parking lot topping mud and ash. Our guide took us along a path that was cordoned off from the general public. After describing the eruption, she pointed out some of the obvious changes in the landscape. She then asked us if we saw any signs of life – most in the group answered negatively. She leaned over to move a few dead branches aside, exposing small green shoots with purple buds.

“Fireweed,” she said, “it’s one of the first things to come back when there’s been such heat and destruction. There are patches up and down the mountainside, the loose soil is ideal for these plants. These weeds will prepare the ground for more plants, and, eventually, trees. This is why we have to stay strictly on the paths. We don’t want to destroy the tender new plants.”

Another seven years passed, and we were able to return to Mt. St. Helens, now 14 years after the eruption. This time we approached the Volcanic Monument as a very different family. We now had three children. And, they were so excited to be in a place so different from the relatively flat Midwest.

They and their father ran ahead on the path surrounding the visitor center, while I took a minute to sit and catch my breath. I looked out on a new lake, scooped out by the previous destruction, where people were kayaking and playing. I looked up at the clear sky – blue with some wispy clouds high above me. I contemplated the ruined mountain, its jagged top and still-barren slopes. This time I noticed new growth creeping up the side of the mountain. A few trees, struggling to grow upright. Newly built visitor centers, with people inside learning about the awesome power of nature to create and destroy. Humanity taking what nature had re-shaped, continuing the work of re-forming the landscape – trying to be more intentional about working with, instead of against, nature.

This planet is not just a slab of inert matter, provided for us to shape as we will. We are not its masters, we are part of it. The forces of nature, the elements that our forebears saw as basic to life, move and change and shape the planet… and us. But we are not totally passive, either. We mold and change and shape in turn, though not always wisely. That's interdependence in action.

It was one of those moments of clarity, when my theology met reality and hummed in harmony. I like to focus on the sweet, abundant, fertile and fruitful “mother nature” image of this planet – and it’s a valid image. But, it’s only part of the story. In order to know the planet - In order to know the holy - one has to understand the whole life cycle. Death and destruction are as necessary a part of the natural cycle as the beautiful sunsets and butterflies. What results is sometimes a terrible beauty, but beauty nonetheless.

It is oh, so tempting to want to have a story of life that is always clean and beautiful. But, life is - the divine is - clean and messy, beautiful and terrible, serene and tempestuous.

Blessings on your journey.

One Last Thing

Before I MUST get to writing. Draft of chapter two is due Tuesday, promptly at 9am. No late submissions. No excuses.

There is much going on in the world I want to comment on - but many others have already expressed similar views and I commend you to them. In particular, check out Sara's post at Orcinus on Ann Coulter's latest offensiveness and PastorDan at Street Prophets on almost anything, but especially for the reminder that the newest Nobel Peace Prize winner once guest starred on "The Simpsons."

I'm going to confine myself to Friday cat-blogging!


This is a much younger Minnie, back when she was a wee kitten! You can see the mature version to the right in the profile section. Minnie is now a bit more (ahem) Maxie, with a serious case of middle-age spread - owing to an indoor life, a good diet and spending her days lying about on various horizontal surfaces in our home (usually the couch). But back in the day she was a spritely kitty, obviously ready to go for a spin a a moment's notice. And her with no driver's license...

Happy weekend!

Free Burma! Better a day late, than not at all...

Actually I did mention Burma in a post over a week ago - but I've had my head in textbooks most of this week, and yesterday had a grueling drive home (lane closures had tollway traffic bumper-to-bumper in the middle of the day). If you follow the link, you'll find things you can do. Even if you don't follow the link, you can pray - and you can contact your legislators to put pressure on the U.N.

The nuns and monks are showing the rest of the world - you do not have to become a monster to fight a monster. I pray for the transformation of the monster, and the safety of the people of Burma.

Spiritual, Not Religious?

I'm continuing to enjoy listening to Kate Braestrup read her book, Here if You Need Me. I'm also enjoying the conversations I have because of it. While classes are in session, I spend a few nights a week away from my family. I stay with a classmate and his partner, and we've become good friends over the last two years. Yesterday we were driving home at the end of a long day, talking about a variety of things - I don't know how this subject came up. I think he was talking about his former pastor teaching the congregation that it was important to come to church. Teaching them that it was important to worship together, that this built the community and the bonds that would support the actions for justice they took in the world.

Braestrup talks about how some people tell her, "Oh, I'm spiritual but I'm not religious." She goes on to discuss her late husband being deeply spiritual, and that he developed his spirituality both with solitary experiences, and by engaging in a spiritual practice within a community that helped him cultivate his ability to be spiritual.

I hear this from people, even within churches - "I'm spiritual but not religious." I don't know what that means. I do know that I think it's possible to be spiritual without being religious. I also think that solitary spirituality can result in a spirituality that is "a mile wide and an inch deep" as one of my southern classmates would say.

I didn't understand this, really, until several years ago when I began a serious meditation practice. Getting up early, getting out the cushion and sitting for 20 minutes in the morning - just sitting - seemed pointless. Wasteful of my time, really - I could be reading the newspaper, I could be emptying the dishwasher and making lunches for the kids, I could be sleeping an extra 20 minutes! Then I began to practice within a sangha, an intentional community that meets to sit together, to listen to the sutras and other spiritual writing together, to recite the five mindfulness trainings each month and consider how we attempt to live up to those tenets. Many of us are also involved in peace and justice work - and the support of the sangha and the practice helps.

While practicing with the sangha, I went on to a week long retreat with a venerable teacher, and agreed to take on those mindfulness trainings myself. As I've written before, I knew full well I would not be living up to them - that's not the point. The point is to keep one thinking about how one lives one's life, and to slowly change over time. I still don't live up to all the trainings - but I keep trying, and I make little changes that are adding up. This would not have happened without the sangha, or without the support of my church community.

One of the difficulties of life right now is that I don't get to practice with the sangha. I'm out of town on the mid-week night when we meet - and I'm usually in church on Sunday mornings. But I do carry some of the spirit of the sangha with me. After all, "I can't do this all on my own..."

Bows of gratitude and a wish for peace to you.

Animal Spirits

I spent much of the weekend laboring over the first chapter of my constructive theology paper. This is the only one that I'm not beginning with an epigraph that is a verse from a UU hymn, because it really has no theological stances in it.

Then there were two worship services to attend yesterday: one at our home congregation and one in which my dh and R participated at another church.

The result is that I did very little blog surfing over the last week, but I have a little time this morning before I'm "on the road again..."

This quiz (What type of animal spirit do you have?)
showed up on Ms. Kitty's blog from Friday. I'm not surprised by my results...and my friends probably won't be, either.

My animal spirit is...

The Camel
According to shamanistic wisdom, camel people are extremely patient and frugal. They don't get overly excited about anything and store up their energies for a rainy (or dry) day. They tend to not be into showiness of any kind.*

That's me, I guess. Stable, patient, frugal. Sounds boring. sigh......

*In case you're wondering, I tried pasting in the code from the site, but it sprawled into the whatdyacallems on the right side and looked crummy.