Do We Worship God or America?

This weekend is the annual protest against the Western HemisphereInstitute for Security Cooperation, formerly known as the School of the Americas, located at Fort Benning, Georgia. This military institute has been known to train Latin American general in brutal tactics that have been used to silence the opposition in numerous ways. Some of the victims have been Catholic priests and nuns working alongside the poor.

Photo by Patrick Mulvaney of 2004 SOA Protest Funeral Procession
Read his recount here

The vigil is held the weekend before Thanksgiving annually to commemorate the anniversary of the deaths of 6 priests, theirhousekeeper and her daughter in El Salvador on November 16, 1989, just eight people of the thousands killed by the graduates of SOA. About 15,000-20,000 people will attend this vigil. School groups, college groups, peace activists, Catholics, and Protestants from the US and Latin America comes to peacefully protest this institute. I went twice with fellow classmates from Earlham College. Every year the vigil ends in a giant funeral procession remembering all the people who have been killed by the graduates of the School of the Americas.

Yet, outside of a handful of Catholic and Protestant churches, will this protest get any attention this Sunday in our churches? How many churches will remember the victims of our military actions in their prayers of the people? Will there be any special services to commemorate this ongoing suffering tragedy?


I want to contrast this with what I saw earlier this month all over social media, in the news and with my own eyes. On the Sunday before Veterans Day, there were special services, invitations to military families, and prayers for our troops. Here is just one of many examples: Rick Warren's Saddleback Church had a special invitation to military families.

If you're a veteran or currently serving, we'll honor you today at all USA campuses.Invite veterans! pic.twitter.com/XqPuzwVVoB
— Rick Warren (@RickWarren) November 10, 2013

When will Saddleback Church make a special invitation to peacemakers and their families? Or any church for that matter?

When will churches give prayers for the victims of war in the Prayers of the People? When will we remember the deaths of our fellow Christians or even humans affected by our extremely large military? Even more, when will we recognize that we are all complicit with the military industrial complex that feed off a patriotic Christianity in the United States? This is one of our sins that we need to recognize!

I have seen pastors who are worried about saying anything to disrupt their congregants on Veterans Day weekend. If they didn't want to glorify war, most of them stay silent and did not mention their real beliefs. Veterans Day weekend in the Church should have been one of mourning. Yes, mourning that the War to End All Wars did not do accomplish that. Instead it continued a brutal and violent history. We should mourn how we so eagerly send off young people to fight to keep the Defense Industry wealthy, while we ignore veterans on the streets?

Sadly American Christianity is currently more interested in upholding American Exceptionalism rather than having a prophetic voice. When will we recognize that God does not just love us but the whole world? Until that point, American Christianity will continue to worship America more than God.  

The Need for Eldering

Last week I wrote about where I see hope among Quakers today. Let me be clear that was only a partial list of the good news and I was primarily focusing on YAFs because I have read and heard YAFs talk about their negative experiences of not being supportive. With the post I did not want to diminish these concerns, but I do not think that is the only storyline out there about the current state of YAFs. But that is the only storyline I see being repeated over and over.

With that being said, I do have a concern about the current state of Quakerism: Our lack of effective eldering (that is, eldering that is spiritual-led and not personal attacks).

We need eldering again. We need people to be elders. We need people who are willing to be eldered.

We need Quaker meetings/churches to be a guide for ministers and a nurturing place for them, but also a place for people in ministry to be challenged and held accountable. I do not see this happening a lot and I, for one, have ran away from eldering on several occasions.

I have held this concern for a while, but I have not written about it yet because I do not have any concrete ideas on how to get to that point. But I feel like I needed to write this post anyways.

Overall, I do not think ministry happens just because of one person or a small group. I do not believe if the one person or group does not act or is not adequately supported, that ministry will disappear forever into the abyss. I know this because I have seen this happen a couple times where people independently feel led towards a particular ministry. Sometimes they join together and work towards this common vision. Sometimes only one or two goes forward with the ministry while others find other callings.

I want to share a personal story about not following a leading. After the last YouthQuake in 2004 (a triennial event that bought together teens and younger young adults from all kinds of Quakerism), I was pumped to have an event for Young Adult Friends across the divide and hold it during the summer at Earlham College. I even gathered together some traveling Quakers in a room to talk about this idea and to gather their opinions about this kind of event. I had found someone else to join me in this work. But it never got off the ground.

But this event still happened about four years later in May 2008 and the people who ultimately organized the conference were not in that room when I shared my idea. I did not feel called or I was not ready to take on the leading, but that energy was not lost because I did not stand up to follow. I am glad others did. It was a great conference. In the future, I hope I can stand up and follow a leading that others had, but, for some reason, they couldn't follow through.

God works in mysterious ways and being in ministry is about being faithful to God and to your own self. But also ministry is also about the community and is larger than one person or a handful of people. I am wary of ministries being focused on the glorification of an individual or a small group. Ministries are a way to live out God's Kingdom here and to show people to see what is possible through God.

This lead me to offer some queries rather than solutions:
How can ministers ground themselves into monthly meetings/churches?
How can monthly meetings/churches hold ministers accountable and ask difficult questions?
How can ministers hear these difficult questions and not feel personally attacked?

I have more questions than answers on this subject, but I am clear that Quakers need eldering again.

Update About Life

I wrote a letter to my home church, Columbia Friends Meeting, updating them on how seminary is going so far and my life. I thought others may want to read it too, so I edited it slightly for a wider audience. 

Dear all,

I want to update you all on how I am doing at Princeton Theological Seminary so far. This past year has been a year of learning and growing. At several points through the year, I felt challenged both by the mainline Protestant theology and being one of the most theologically liberal students here. At the same time, I missed being a part of a diverse religious community which I had grown accustomed to after attending Earlham College and then living in Washington, DC. But through these challenges, I have learned more about Christianity, leading me to more closely examine my own beliefs and deepen my faith. Some of the classes I have enjoyed the most have been Theology and Practice of Community Organizing, Critical Race Theory, Pastoral Care of Adolescents, and Models of Young Adult Ministry.

With the other Quaker student at the seminary and her husband, we have held meeting for worship one evening a week over the past year, whenever possible with the rigorous academic schedule. We have welcomed several visitors in the past year, including a local young adult who is new to Quakerism. We will start again in the fall, and we hope to attract more people from the seminary and wider community. At the same time, I have begun making connections with Princeton Friends Meeting. I look forward to spending more time with the meeting starting in the fall and helping them think about outreach.

As part of my field education, I have to intern at two sites. I decided to do both of my site placements outside of the Friends tradition because I wanted to see how other church bodies function. This summer, I am interning at Princeton United Methodist Church. As part of my duties, I am working with youth and young adults as well as running their social media outreach campaign. In the fall, I will work at an Episcopal campus ministry on Rutgers University campus in New Brunswick. I look forward to working with the campus minister on growing relationships with groups from other faiths and to encourage service among the campus ministry student population.

Last Sunday I preached for the first time on Amos 7 about the plumb line. The sermon was received well! I enjoyed preaching so much that I asked to preach more, so I will preach again on July 1 and August 5. I welcome your prayers as I plan these sermons. I will follow Friends tradition so I will have an elder with me when I preach.

In other news, Jenn moved to Princeton in late April, and we are glad not to be dating long distance anymore. She graduated this Spring with a Masters in Social Work degree and currently works at a farm for the season helping with their Community-Supported Agriculture (CSA) program. In the fall, she will look for a social work job. Lastly, at the start of this year, I joined the board of Quaker Voluntary Service. We are launching our first service house in Atlanta with seven young adult Quakers, and we hope to expand in the following years to other cities. It is very exciting!

In service & peace,

(signed)

Greg