upon reflection

Now that I've started getting more than 5 hours of sleep per night, some of the craziness of General Conference seems, well, crazier.

Take, for instance, the fear-mongering arguments floated for why we should preserve a pastor's right to deny membership to particular people (in recent times, a gay man...).  Folks suggested that, unless we preserved this right, we might have Klan members in our churches.  (As if we haven't already.)

I've been imagining this possibility, and it seems to me that this is exactly what church is for.  For sinners and all those who need help being made perfect in love.  For people who want to claim new identity in the body of Christ--membership in the sense of belonging together, flaws and all, as we seek to live into our calling from God.  What better place is there for us sinners and folk who carry hatred and prejudice in our hearts?

(I should also say, incidentally, that I don't label homosexuality as sin, so their arguments seem especially absurd.  But, just for the sake of argument, let's run with them...)

Denying membership to people seems to me to make church into an "irrelevant social club."  That is, if we have to have things figured out and straightened out in order to join, we become like a club of folks who've earned membership by good behavior.

I prefer to think of church as a place where we belong from the beginning, whose welcome comes from the God of infinite grace, who has power to transform us all into something more loving and beautiful than we've been on our own.

The "irrelevant social club" argument was given on the floor as the scary image of what we might become if we open up the possibility of redefining marriage to include same-gendered couples.  But I think we had it in totally the wrong place!  We're like an irrelevant social club when we suggest that God's including love and transforming grace aren't big enough for some people--that we need to keep them outside of the church community or we might be destroyed.

That's absurd.

So, here for your viewing pleasure is a picture of me on the big screen at GC, looking a bit like a trouble-identifier, I think.  My new friend Steve from NC emailed it to me.  ;)

how do we get there from here?

I'm back from my trip to General Conference and to see Matt before his deployment, and I'm wishing I knew how to get to somewhere else: away from this horrible war in Iraq, and toward a church that gets over its homophobia and finally, fully includes and affirms gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgendered folks.

Both seem too often driven by fear--fear we've been tricked into.  And now we have to live in this meantime, trying to get to a better way.

more moments from general conference

Yesterday, our votes to retain existing language about homosexuality were depressing.  It would be hard to choreograph a more wrenching moment that we had on the floor: after the vote, as reconciling folks stood in the balconies, the conference business went on to a report from the judicial council.  As the Secretary read the long report, people slowing began standing on the floor in solidarity.  And then voices from the balcony began singing "Jesus Loves Me," and it moved around the hall.  The layers of sound were incredible--the drone of a church mired in long technicalities, detailing out the ways in which its bodies would protect their own power, layered over voices from the margins, singing an affirmation of God's love.  Powerful.

Another powerful moment was when Ellen Johnson Sirleaf spoke.  It was truly beautiful, hopeful and a wonderful symbol of the best fruits of good mission and ministry, empowering people like her to be about the work of transforming the world.  As she leads Liberia in the wake of too many years of violent rule, she's building hope.
Here's our friend JJ getting interviewed by UMNews.  It's a good thing they interviewed today, after some healing and hopeful actions by Reconciling folks and by our Bishops.  We all had much better things to say today.
And, I ought to say thanks to Ken, who's been helping me start my days with a Texas waffle.  Who knew: they have waffle makers here that make state-shaped waffles.  Incredible.  

at the end of the day

It all looks a little fuzzy and confusing.

My question of the night is: why haven't we come up with a better way of moving through legislative proposals than Roberts Rules of Order?  There's gotta be something better.

Anyhow...here's a shot of one of my favorite passages in the book of proposed legislation.  It's a little blurry, but maybe that adds to the effect.  I took the shot around 10:30 tonight, before we spent another hour slogging on.
Here's the bus ride back to my distant hotel.

Now, sleep.

But first: a happy birthday shout-out to ForeverKC.  (Recognizing that, technically, it's not her b-day anymore, at least in Texas.  The party in California could still be going on.  But it would have to be without her, since she's partyin' down here at the ol' General Conference, too.)

My little bright moment of the day was the 10 minutes in which we took a "recess" from our formal meeting for the purpose of genuine discussion.  The tone of the meeting changed in our little sub-committee.  My desires that we would create more space in our definition of marriage and of what healthy, holy sexual relationships might be didn't come true, but the conversation was much better.  

I'll take what I can get...

Here's hoping for the Spirit's movement tomorrow!

some good moments

Just a couple pictures of fun folks I've found in Fort Worth.  (That's a lot of "f's.")  I haven't perfected how to aim my phone's camera, as you can see.  I did, however, enjoy being with all these good people today.

And I'm too tired to reflect any more meaningfully on the work of General Conference yet...

Keep praying for us!

order, a triptych

as viewed from my cellphone this week:

one last call for everyone to get in order and in line before a few days of leave from fort bragg before a deployment to iraq.
the beautiful natural order of waves coming into shore
in the form of a whole series of plenary votes, establishing the rules for general conference, voted with these orderly devices.

gifted

I'm feeling lucky again.  Besides the fact that I'm getting to enjoy a few days of relaxed, beachy delight in North Carolina with my dear husband before he deploys, I'm also headed toward General Conference with some cool reminders of good friends and their prayers.

Like these MissMatched socks from Colleen.  Surely, clothed in such non-conformist glory, we might have a shot at some grace?  I'm pretty taken with the idea of socks sold in 3's, none of which is an exact match of another.  Glorious.

Trinitarian, even...

Of course, I'm also clothed in a whole bunch of clothes my mother sent, along with the mother of all handbags, big enough for my laptop and all 3 books of GC material.  That's over 1500 pages of legislative fun.