Youth Group 2-Messy Games

Youth Group today was awesome!  My mini-phone campaign last week paid off and 5 lovely youth ladies showed up to get good and messy.  Today we did a variety of messy games including: whipped cream pie in the face, chocolate sauce and marshmallow toss facial, shaving cream twister, and crisco hair styling--culminating in a 36' long slip-n-slide.

We got messy, I got to know the girls and they laughed and got to know one another better.  Overall I'd say it was a major success.  

Here are just a few of the photos from today.

Youth Group 1

Approached quantitatively today would have been a complete bust.  One youth from the church in Fall River showed up for Youth Group this afternoon following the service.  Normally this would have sent me into a whirlwind of telling myself that I'd somehow failed as a youth director.  However, I decided to just "go with the flow," which for a type A personality is severely challenging.

Instead of having a newspaper fashion show--followed by swing dancing lessons I ended up having an awesome conversation with a particularly awesome 8th grader.  What amazed me the most was the vast changes that have occurred in society from when I was in 8th grade (far too long ago to pleasantly thing about) to today.  The experience of the contemporary 8th grade female is WAY different.  Not different in a decidedly bad way--just different.  For example, today's eight graders have cell phones, they are completely comfortable with cussing in front of their teachers (n.b not this particularly awesome 8th grader), and they are dealing with things that no 12-13 year old should have to be handling.  What amazed me the most was how graciously this young person was handling the life of an adolescent.  Let's face it, being a preteen kind of stinks.  You're too old to want to be considered a "child" but not yet old enough to be categorized as a full fledged teenager.  It's an awkward time in life.

As strange as middle school might be, I was pleasantly surprised to learn about the exciting life of competitive cheerleading.  It's a whole lot more challenging and athletic than I had ever pictured (n.b perfect example of my temporary failure to withhold judgement).  There's a lot of working out and conditioning, throwing, lifting….all in all incredibly similar to the higher levels of competitive synchronized skating.

I learned some things today that I would not have if the day had gone as planned:

1) I would suck as an 8th grader in 2014
2) Cheerleading is a sport and is challenging and takes skills that I don't have
3) Youth are really awesome and engaging when you give them an opportunity to shine (I already knew this but it's worthing including again)
4) Intergenerational conversations are insightful and meaningful
5) Young people feel incredibly over scheduled and overbooked
6) I can learn a lot from deeply listening to young people.

Interfaith Book Club- Sept 17, 2014 on Repentance

When you bring up the term "interfaith" in Louisville, KY there is an understanding of the term to incorporate representatives of many of the world's religions traditions.  Being in Louisville allowed me to be in a community that was vibrantly diverse in religious expression.  So, thinking of interfaith as a group of many different traditions and systems of belief and practice, representing Christian (Orthodox, Catholic, Protestant, Non-Denominational), Jewish (Orthodox, Conservative, Reform), Islamic, Hindi, Buddhist, Baha'i, Taoist, and so many more became common place for me.  However, "interfaith" in Fall River, MA holds a very different meaning.  Here--the diversity in the religious world is small.  Most people in this area are Roman Catholic.  Outside of that there is a fairly decently sized Episcopal tradition (aka why I'm here), some Baptists, some Congregational communities, some UCC's, some non-denominationals, a Lebanon immigrant based Presbyterian congregation, and a super tiny Jewish community.  However, the Baptist, Congregational, UCC's, Presbys, and non-denom's are hard to come by.  Also, just as a fun fact--according to Diana Eck's Pluralism Project based out of Harvard University in Boston, there is NOTHING in Fall River.  No interfaith centers, and for that matter, no religious centers period.  (Reaffirming the Boston-centric mentality of me being in "no one cares Mass".).


Today I attended my first Fall River Interfaith event.  A group of 6 individuals representing the Episcopal (2), Jewish (3) and Presbyterian (1) faith traditions gathered to bring texts from their traditions or background that spoke to the theme of repentance.  In the Jewish tradition, the High Holy days are approaching…one of which, Yom Kippur is a day to ask for forgiveness, to purify oneself, and return to G-d.

Each person present brought a text to share with the group.  My supervisor Matt, in true Episcopalian form, brought two liturgical texts for corporate prayer, one from the Book of Common Prayer (1928) and one from the recent Enriching Our Worship Vol. 2.  Both texts spoke to a need to repent for the sins that are ultimately present in humanity.  One of the members representing the Jewish tradition, Soshanna, read from the Color Purple.  I found this to be quite interesting because the passage she chose spoke to the ability to forgive people and not hold them in a certain place of distain due to things that happened in the past.  The Rabbi of the local synagogue here in Fall River Temple Beth-El, Mark read from a series of Hassidic rabbinical commentaries on the need and reason to repent.  What I found most illuminating was the ability of repentance being inside the sinner.

Myself, in good Presbyterian tradition brought up the topic of predestination and how it might, or does, or can, or doesn't apply to repentance.  I feel like this is similar to bringing up the concept of the Trinity to non-Christians.  WHAT?????!!!!!!

So what did I do…..I glanced at this: "Though some have interpreted predestination to mean that God eternally accepts some and rejects others (double-predestination), Campbell said the text shows that “God’s plan is to bring human beings into God’s glory and planned to love us from before the beginning and calls us now into eternal relationship with God.

“That plan, that hope, applies to each and every one of us,” she said." from the PC (USA) website.  Then came across this litany of Repentance from a church in New Zealand.

"Leader: Jesus calls us to love one another as he loves us.

Person 1: We know from our experience that loving like that is a risk, a risk we are often not willing to take. Why should we risk anything for the unlovely?

Leader: "To love one another ... as he loves us" - even to the extent of the cross, risking everything, and receiving ridicule, pain and death.

People: God, forgive us. We will try to love as you love us.

Leader: Jesus calls us to forgive one another.

Person 2: We have forgiven in the past, and people walked all over us. For some of us it hurts too much to try again. Besides, if people do wrong shouldn't they pay the consequences for this.

Leader: Jesus forgave us, our ignoring him, reviling him, killing him.

People: God, forgive us. We will try to forgive as you forgive us.

Leader: Jesus calls us to work for justice for all.

Person 3: But we don't have the time. The issues are often too hard to understand properly. Others are far more able speakers than us.

Leader: Through the prophets God makes it quite clear: "stop your noisy songs, instead let justice flow like a stream, and righteousness like a river that never goes dry."

People: God forgive us. We will try to work for justice as you did.

Leader: Jesus calls us to share all we have with each other.

Person 4: This is too hard. It's hard enough to keep our own heads above water. We have worked hard to get where we are today, and the possessions we enjoy.

Leader: Jesus says: "Whenever you refused to help one of these least important ones, you refused to help me."

People: God, forgive us. We will try in your strength to share what we have. Amen."

I shared the above prayer.  The discussion afterwards really made me again think, WHAAAAATTTTTT????  This is so hard to explain!!!!  I basically said that in Presbyterian land there is nothing anyone can do to "escape the grace of G-d."  You cannot get away from the love….which in itself is awesome.  However, it's also confusing and complicated.  The question of "how does free will fit in" came up and I noticed myself going…well….ummm…."I think that Presbyterians would say that we have free will as well and that we cling to the understanding that G-d is mysterious and that as humans we are not meant to fully comprehend the Divine."  Did I just take the easy out?  Was this an escape from really answering that question?

After returning to my office I came across this: http://www.presbyterianmission.org/ministries/today/predestination/

Perplexing.  Good 'ol Calvin.  So, G-d chooses some people that will "get" or accept or have the "faith" and some that just won't.  Well….that's not cool.  Also, all people are saved through the grace and salvific reality of Jesus Christ through the justification of grace.  Huh?  Come again?  I still find myself pondering this idea.  I'll leave it at that for now.     

    

The Episcopal Service Corps and a Presbyterian

It is that time of the year where I would normally be heading back to school, plunging head first into a vigorously academic year of religious and theological study.  Not being in the atmosphere of books and so much homework that I can't think of what else would ever consume my life--is something that I am learning to accept.

I won't lie.  I love school.  I am one of those unique individuals that thrives in the classroom.  I love the dialogue and discussion;  I love engaging with other people that are genuinely wanting to learn as well. When the school year ended last year I was faced with the dilemma of what to do with my life next.  As fantastic as having a BA in Comparative Religion and a MA in Religion is, I came to find out that in the globalized, consumer, STEM and business-centric job climate that we are in, finding a job that would allow me to combine my academic interests and degrees with my job skills and experience was a daunting task. 

After what seemed close to 1,000 job applications in all sorts of industries, from food service and hospitality and travel to the corporate world of business ethics I came across a job entitled "Faith-Based Social Justice Fellowship" on idealist.org.  This led me to a program called Life Together that is run by the Episcopal Diocese of MA which is part of the Episcopal Service Corps.

Not being of the Episcopal tradition myself I was intrigued by the open-faced model of the Life Together program which is ecumenical in its acceptance of program fellows.  Due to the fact that my interest in ecumenical and interfaith cooperation is what drove me into seminary and through seminary I decided to give this program a try.  I was accepted into the program as a Life Together-South Coast Mission Hub Fellow, which is a satellite entity of the larger Boston based Life Together program.  After an interview process of a few different potential site placement opportunities I arrived in Fall River, MA as the new Urban Mission Fellow for Youth and Homeless Ministries at two area Episcopal churches. 

The beginning of the program placed me in an intensive two-week orientation and training in Brookline, MA with the Boston Life Together program directors and the various organizations that they work with closely.  Along with those of us on the South Coast there are 4 fellows based in Lawrence, MA; 5 second-year fellows in Boston; and 14 first-year fellows in Boston.  We all come from various religious background and are all centered on the idea of building intentional community and spending a year in service to the communities that we are in. 

It's been about a month now and my Presbyterian soul has found a new home to be housed in for the next ten months.  I've come to find out that the Presbyterian and Episcopal traditions are not all that different when it comes to ecclesiology, theology, Christology, dogmatics, or any of the other tenants of Christian "organized religions."  There are certainly different worship and liturgical practices that are particular to both the Episcopal and the Presbyterian traditions--however, none are drastic enough to make me feel totally and completely out of synch. 

I must confess though, it is still very weird to have bishops and priests with unusually "high-church" vestments.  It is also still strange to have the Eucharist every Sunday and to say so many creedal statements at each service.  Yet-I must say that my Presbyterian self is quite at home in my new Episcopal environment.