How will the daily missions of every member show up in your church this Fall?
This month
STORIES
• “There is a friend in the garden – sip lemonade and visit”
• A family vacation, a reunion, and a gold wedding anniversary!
• Faith-based reconciliation – where and by whom . . .
RESOURCES as you plan for September start-ups
• Appoint a ministry development coordinator
• An email tip
• “How to Live the Mission Everywhere: the Three Major Learnings of Member Mission”
• A member mission bookmark
• “Modern Missionary”
• Nanopreaching for everyday living
• “We Joined Jesus’ Mission in Our Baptism”
• “A Weekly Parish Prayer Cycle: The Baptized in Their Daily Life and Work”
FOR MEDITATION
• “I am a Christian” by Maya Angelou
STORIES
“There is a friend in the garden – sip lemonade and visit”
On summer Wednesdays from 10:00 a.m. to Noon, Libby Holland puts this sign outside the garden of the church of St. Thomas the Apostle, Alamosa, in the San Luis Valley of southwestern Colorado. Ten o’clock is the time when most working people can get a break. She serves pink lemonade as they talk about anything from daisies and snapdragons to concerns to pleasures. Visitors have included customers of the flower shop next door, lawyers, and homeless people. She can offer information ranging from church life to where to find food and a shower. When a Catholic woman asked if the church did the Eucharist, she traced the Eucharist as a constant part of all Christian belief throughout the ages although done in different ways. The idea for “a friend in the garden” came to her in the course of “listening.” She believes her brothers and sisters always need a companion. God helps her to talk easily with people without judging what is said. The church provides the garden and a key to respond to the request of almost every visitor when they say, “I’ve always wanted to look inside that church.”
Contact: http://slvepiscopal.org offers a picture of the church; reach Libby at POB 577, Manassa, CO 81141; 719-843-9007
A family vacation, a reunion, and a golden wedding anniversary!
Matthew, Brandon, Walter, Norma, Shannon, Michael
Shannon and her family spent their vacation at the family reunion observing the fiftieth wedding anniversary of her parents, Walter and Norma. Shannon, who makes great PowerPoint shows, knows she does not do them alone but with God’s hand guiding her. That help came in four ways this time. First, when she could not find a specific picture she wanted among the thousands to choose from and had given up all hope of finding it, it came on a CD from her brother! Second, she chose as a song for inclusion “Have I told you lately that I love you” and it turned out to have been the song her parents were dancing to the first time her father said, “I love you,” to her mother! Third, Shannon’s twenty-year old son, Matthew, was quite fussed when he was ruled to be underage for a glass of champagne to toast his grandparents. Shannon, having told him she understood but to settle down, was quite touched later when normally reserved Matthew rose to offer his own toast ending with, “I love you both very much.” Fourth, Shannon, who had hoped the show would touch her mother, was surprised and moved to look over to see tears in her father’s eyes!
Faith-based reconciliation – where and by whom . . .
Brian Cox has been doing faith-based reconciliation work for 17 years. While the rector of Christ the King Episcopal Church in Santa Barbara, CA, he is also Senior Vice President of The International Center for Religion and Diplomacy in DC (www.icrd.org). Currently, he is working in the Srinigar area of Kashmir and in the Middle East.
“We bring religion and politics together in the cause of peace and reconciliation in international diplomacy. Faith-based reconciliation is an idea that seems to resonate across the spectrum. It seems to be imbedded in all of our sacred texts. I’ve worked with Muslims, Hindus, Sikhs, and Buddhists, and, at times, even atheists. They don’t feel like it’s a western import from Christianity. http://www.reconcilers.netWe are pioneering a new concept in international diplomacy. It is particularly important in the Muslim world because they tend to distrust anything that’s coming out of what they see as the secular western perspective. Secular forms of conflict resolution from the West do not tend to work very well in the Muslim world. They have a strong integration of faith and politics in Islam. That’s why this type of diplomacy gains an enthusiastic hearing even when one is from the US in places that are known for not being our friends.”
He’s been working in Kashmir the last seven years with the younger generation of Kashmiris to develop faith-based reconciliation as a moral vision for their society training them as reconcilers in that context. “I’ve been on both the Indian and Pakistani sides of the Line of Control that separates the two sides in Kashmir. You have an intractable identity-based conflict that traditional conflict resolution and diplomacy do not really solve. Faith-based reconciliation offers a different paradigm. You work for not just a political settlement but to build bridges across communities. How do we deal with hostility in the environment that is a barrier to a more inclusive community? How do we deal with both historic and contemporary issues of injustice? How do we deal with forgiveness and the need to work on our relationships? How do we deal with historical wounds that have created the situation that exists? How do we talk about the authority of God and what that means for society? You are looking through a broader lens than a strict conflict resolution lens.”
“In identity-based conflict, seldom is the answer bringing in the gifted peace maker or finding some creative solution. It really requires the transformation of people’s hearts and the transformation of relationships. When that transformation begins, new possibilities emerge.”
“We use ‘the reconciliation-based seminar’ as the medium. Civil society leaders have come to embrace a vision of reconciliation through this seminar in which they reflect on what their own faith traditions teach about subjects like conflict resolution, social justice, healing historical wounds, and forgiveness and on the meaning of these teaching s for themselves and their communities. Our seminars have created linkages across civil society raising up a core group of committed leaders and a network of cell groups that meet together for mutual encouragement in reconciliation. We have also established spiritual friendships with various top political, religious, and military leaders.”
“At the end of the day it is really God’s Holy Spirit that changes people’s hearts. Even in Muslims, Hindus, all, we see the works of God’s grace changing people’s hearts in situations. We bring people together for three or four days and teach the principles of faith-based reconciliation. We train them in skills related to reconciliation in a structured learning situation.”
“When I first met militant leaders in Kashmir, they were quite hostile to reconciliation when I suggested coming to the seminars. They started to come and God changed their hearts. Now we see former militant leaders working for reconciliation in Kashmir. That is God’s work. A recent participant said, ‘Religion is often blamed for conflicts. This is a whole new concept. Reconciliation is in the religious texts. We can study that and bring reconciliation to this place. My heart has been changed.’”
“One man had many of his family killed by militant leaders. All he could think about was getting even and killing them. When he came to that first seminar and heard the talk about forgiveness, every ounce of his being wrestled with it. The seminar includes a service of reconciliation. He found himself forgiving those men. When they were later killed by Indian security forces, he adopted their children and is supporting them for food and school and the like.”
As the ICRD’s director of Dispute Resolution Training, Brian comments: “The trainees in our seminars are both clergy and laity. Most of them are laity – both conservative and liberal. Of twenty at the last training event, almost two-thirds were laity.”
The founder and president of the ICRD is Dr. Douglas M. Johnston, former U.S.N. officer, holder of a doctoral degree in Political Science from Harvard, appointee to many roles in U.S. government, and author. On 12/8/06, he addressed the Secretary’s Forum at the U.S. State Department saying: “Muslims speak the language of integration – of religion and politics; while we in the West speak the language of separation – of church and state. We say ‘secular;’ they hear ‘Godless;’ when what was intended was ‘freedom to worship as you please.’ They hear ‘Godless’ in large part because of the cultural image we project.”
Joanne O’Donnell, a judge of the Los Angeles Superior Court, works with Brian as part of the leadership team for the seminars. While most of her work has been done in the United States, she has served in Damascus, Syria as well. She makes presentations and leads small groups of six to eight.
How does God help her in this work? “I am supported in everything I do by my faith community – my local parish, the diocese, and the national church. All provide support of one kind or another.” In her presentations, she finds God helping her in their preparation by guiding her to which materials will be the most effective to use. While the presentations have the same basic content, she brings to them the unique spiritual insight God has formed in her. In the small groups, as she draws on her insights as a spiritual director, she sees God working in the hearts of the people to peel back layers of resistance to faith-based reconciliation. Joanne finds church support for her work in the Diocese of Los Angeles where Bishop Jon Bruno created a diocesan ministry of faith-based reconciliation seven years ago. He asked Joanne, Brian, and another to lead it. She works in training leaders in an annual national conference; in leading parish-based seminars; and in leading seminars for the clergy and lay leaders of other dioceses.
She has also found support as a member of the General Convention’s Standing Commission on Domestic Mission and Evangelism. At her first meeting in 2003, she suggested to the commission that the church needed to train people in the spirituality of faith-based reconciliation to provide it as a tool. They agreed to make this training one of the action items for the triennium of their work. A resolution of the 2006 General Convention set, as a priority, for all church members and for the House of Bishops to obtain formal training in faith-based reconciliation.
In her parish: “My job is to help people to understand that I can be an active proponent of liberal causes in the church and, at the same time, find my real calling in ministry as a reconciler. My parish is like parents of teens who, while they cannot fully understand their teens, still love and support them. Accordingly, the parish hosted the first national training event in faith-based reconciliation!”
Contact: The Rev. Brian Cox, Christ the King, 5073 Hollister Ave., Santa Barbara, CA 93111; 805-964-9966; briancox@cox.net
RESOURCES as you plan for September start-ups
Appoint a ministry development coordinator: Peyton Craighill has been asked by Peter Sipple, rector of the 1600-member Church of the Redeemer in Bryan Mawr, PA, to spend the next nine months working to introduce to the congregation the meaning and practice of ministry in daily life. For more, contact Peyton at 610-667-9298; peyton.g@comcast.net. [While Peyton is a retired Episcopal priest, his real qualifications are that he gets the vision of each member on mission from Monday to Saturday and that retirement gives him to opportunity to respond to such a challenge. He comments that he finds the member mission resources invaluable as he contemplates his assignment. – AWS]
An email tip: Two rules – “Think before you send” and “Send email you would like to receive” come from David Shipley and Will Schwalbe in The Essential Guide to Email for Office and Home (Alfred A. Knopf).
“How to Live the Mission Everywhere: the Three Major Learnings of Member Mission”: a sermon of A. Wayne Schwab preached on Lent 5, 3/25/07 at St. James Church, Danbury, CT. The Gospel was Luke 20:9-19. Situation: the theme for the Lenten series with visiting preachers was mission at work. This sermon was planned to end the series with a focus on living the mission everywhere. Go to www.membermission.org > Making the Vision Work > Sermons and Talks > “How to Live . . . ”
A member mission bookmark: at St. Francis’, South Fork, CO, Frank and Cindy Walter give out homemade book marks of 2½ x 8½ " on heavy paper. On one side: MEMBERS AS “MISSIONARIES”; “MISSIONARIES” OFFER: Reconciliation, Justice, Love; “MISSIONARY” FIELDS; Home, Work, Community, Larger World, Leisure, Church; REMEMBER: The Lord is already here and at work. On the other side: “MISSIONARY” QUESTIONS: (the questions from pp. 189-191 of WTMATM slightly adapted). Contact them as in “We Joined . . .” below.
“Modern Missionary” is part of the monthly publication of the Diocese of Keewatin in Canada. Fiona Brownlee, its editor, features a half page story of a member's daily missions and his / her journey in faith. Two examples: Marlene is a nurse, a wife and mother, and a Sunday School and Bible Camp teacher who grew up as part of the church in Newfoundland; she challenges today's church to deepen community, to make worship more meaningful for youth, and to remember that spiritual growth is intended to help us to feed the life of the whole world. Kathy is a wife and mother, a vestry member, a volunteer for palliative care, and a justice-seeking representative for the worldwide Anglican Appeal in her church; she found the local Anglican Church the only constant in her life after a move to new place as a young adult and now challenges the church to take back Sunday from shopping and sports events. Try to get such a feature into your diocesan / judicatory monthly and get help to do it from Fiona at fbrownlee@gokenora.com or 807-547-3353, ext. 5.
Nanopreaching for everyday living: Member Mission wants to share examples of sermons that help worshipers take their faith into their daily lives – ways they can live out their daily missions in the world. Dr. William David Thompson, retired Professor of Preaching at the Eastern Baptist Theological Seminary in Philadelphia, says that most sermons are macropreaching. They deal with grand themes and leave it up to listeners to figure out what those themes might mean in their daily lives from Monday to Saturday. Sermons like that are easy to find.
• Rather, we are looking for sermons in two other categories whose names are among these three terms that Bill has coined.
Micropreaching – with at least some mention of where, how and when does God acts in our everyday lives – in families, workplaces, communities, times and places of leisure, the wider world and, of course, in the life of congregations.
Nanopreaching – the kind of preaching that goes beyond micropreachng. The prefix nano adds the minute details of human life, frequently in the telling of stories, the use of metaphors, the allusions to some small piece of human life that makes listeners move from understanding what is being said to engagement with it. It tells stories about concrete life situations where someone in a cubicle or on the shop floor shares the life of Christ by the quality of their faith. It evokes clear and concrete images in peoples' minds of a moment on the golf course, or in the question and answer period at the school board meeting, or the struggle to decide on an investment that is socially responsible. This is the preaching that reaches right into the midst of peoples' everyday lives with a specificity they can't sidestep or ignore. It is the rare kind of preaching that Jesus did so beautifully. We would like to share examples of it. Send them to membermission@aol.com.
Reach Bill at 610-626-1810 or at Thompcom@aol.com.
“We Joined Jesus’ Mission in Our Baptism”: a sermon preached by lay leader Frank Walter, III, on the Fourth Sunday of Easter, 4/29/07 at St. Francis’ Church, South Fork, CO and based on John 10:22-30. Reach Frank at 222 Caddis Circle, South Fork, CO 81154-9671; 719-873-5358; f_c_walter@hotmail.com. Go to www.membermission.org > Making the Vision Work > Sermons and Talks > “We Joined . . . ”
“A Weekly Parish Prayer Cycle: The Baptized in Their Daily Life and Work” from J. Fletcher Lowe, Jr. is a series of petitions for the baptized in the places where they work. Each week, these petitions offer a different workplace ministry, e.g., health care, environmental, social service, etc. Begin with something like: “Pray for all the baptized in their daily work, especially those of our congregation who are: . . . ” For a copy, write membermission@aol.com or reach Fletcher at 11221 Wellesley Terrace Court, Richmond, VA 23233; 804-360-8655 or 804-360-8681; JFLowe@aol.com.
FOR MEDITATION: “I am a Christian” by Maya Angelou
When I say . . . "I am a Christian"
I'm not shouting "I'm clean living."
I'm whispering "I was lost,"
Now I'm found and forgiven.
When I say . . . "I am a Christian"
I don't speak of this with pride.
I'm confessing that I stumble
and need CHRIST to be my guide.
When I say . . . "I am a Christian"
I'm not trying to be strong.
I'm professing that I'm weak
and need HIS strength to carry on.
When I say . . . "I am a Christian"
I'm not bragging of success.
I'm admitting I have failed
and need God to clean my mess.
When I say . . . "I am a Christian"
I'm not claiming to be perfect,
My flaws are far too visible
but, God believes I am worth it.
When I say . . . "I am a Christian"
I still feel the sting of pain,
I have my share of heartaches
So I call upon His name.
When I say . . . "I am a Christian"
I'm not holier than thou,
I was just a simple sinner
Who received God's good grace, somehow.