Worshipping a Differently-Abled Christ

Each Masters Senior at Princeton Theological Seminary is eligible to give the message during the weekday service. I gave my message on April 1. If you want to listen to the sermon or the whole service, you can. Here is the link to the sermon and the service before and after the sermon.

The passage for this sermon is John 9:1-5

Throughout my life I have been trying to understand why I have a speech impediment. Why did God do this to me? At first I thought it was a curse done to me because of past sins; just as the Disciples ask Christ about the man who is blind. Then I wondered for some time if it was a prank on me. One day, I would wake up and this impediment would be gone. Jesus would be appearing more like Buddy Jesus from the movie Dogma and He would say “April Fools!”

Most of my life, I longed for that day to be whole, to feel whole. Why God? Why am I not whole? Then throughout seminary I have tried to reconcile my speech impediment through looking at it as a gift, as Jesus seems to proclaim in John 9. Christ must have meant for this to happen. A way to use me in the world. In wrestling with this, I have come to see that this too is not true. Being a person with a disability is not a gift nor is it about sin. I have realized the reason that I have felt like an outcast has nothing to do with my relationship with Christ. The source of my pain has been the reactions of my fellow brothers and sisters in Christ here on Earth.

Part of Jesus' witness in the Gospels is about restoring outcasts to their communities. The Ecumenical Disability Advocates Network contends that “The healing stories in the gospels, [like John 9] are primarily concerned with restoration of persons to their communities, not the cure of their physiological conditions.” This man who was blind was not welcome in his community and is only restored to his community after the miracle.

Furthermore, at the end of this story, Christ proclaims that people who can physically see are spirituality blind. Then the inverse must be true: People who have disabilities can be spiritually whole. This speech impediment is just a part of who I am, not a sin, not a gift. Our collective sin have been trying to reach an unrealistic perfection while living in an imperfect world.

• Let's remember: We are asked to live faithfully, not sinlessly. 

• Let's admit: We as humans err a lot. 

• Let's confess: We will not be perfect as it is currently defined in the modern world. 

Lent is an ideal time to think about this restoration. The theologian Lisa Eiesland writes in Disabled God that after the resurrection in Luke, Christ appears with injuries to His hands and feet. By doing so, she claims that Jesus' disability indicates not a flawed humanity but a full humanity. 

By acknowledging this truth that we worship a God who is differently abled and yet still whole, we can admit that our faithfulness, not our perfection, bring us into the body of Christ. Therefore, the resurrection in two and a half weeks is a collective restoration for all of us. We each have different abilities and struggles. We all have gifts to offer each other and the world. 

Let me caution you all today too: People with disabilities are not here for abled body people to feel blessed or feel lucky. We are not here for others' self-realizations. We are here to be active parts of the body of Christ and to offer our own gifts and talents to the world. Attitudes of pity, judgement, and fear of people with disabilities interfere with this restoration. 

 This is the Good News! On Easter, we, as an imperfect people, will be restored back into this whole living differently-abled body of Christ.

Looking for Perfect Victims = Foolish Search

This past semester I took a class on the Book of Job. For the final project, I wrote a series of reflections looking at Job from a personal and societal liberation standpoint. Here is one of these reflections concerning the monologue of Elihu in Chapters 32-37. I might share other reflections from the my notebook on Job.

The Wrath of Elihu by William Blake (Source)

One of the reasons the Elihu rejects Job as being an innocent victim is because he doesn't resemble what Elihu think an innocent victim would look like: Himself. Daniel Berrigan, in his commentary on Job, writes, “Since Job drastically falls short of Elihu's estimate of a just one, a question occurs; What form would his “ideal Job” take? Elihu and his cohorts suggest the form rather consistently; the paragon would resemble—themselves,” (Berrigan 293). Often, then and now, innocence is only reserved for the judging parties, not for judged. Rarely will we ever find a totally innocent victim.

In December, my friend Nyle through sharing a post by Son of Baldwin on Facebook called my attention to an article of a recent horrific murder in Ohio. A 16 year old African American male teen, Dione Payne, was beaten up and violently raped by his killers because they, two white men in their older thirties, wanted to rob him of drugs and money. The hometown newspaper ran an article about the killing under the headline of “Dayton Teen Beaten to Death Had Trouble Past”, even though looking at the URL, it seems that the headline was at one time was supposed to be “Bond Set at $1 Million for Men Accused of Beating Teen.”

(Update: While editing this journal entry on December 20th for final submission, I discovered that the headline now reads “Bond set for Franklin men accused in teen's beating death” and there is no acknowledgment of the headline change or apology for the mistake. Also still no mention of the brutal rape he suffered before his death. A petition has also been started on change.org to pressure the prosecutor to add hate crime and rape to the charges)

Dione Payne in 2012 (Source)

Why did the headline change, if it did at all? Can a black teen with a trouble past not be a victim? Will the eventual court case put him on trial as much as the media has? Will the deceased be tried along with his killers as if his drug dealing compelled the men to savagely kill him as some sort of accomplice? Yes Dione was probably not an honor student and had a criminal record, but he did not deserve to die for dealing drugs, much less to be beaten and rape to the point of death. The point of the article was to tell about a heinous crime he was a victim of. With the headline and the focus of the article on the past, they make his heinous violent death into a passive one.

By looking for innocent victims, we want to ignore the complexities that come with faith and suffering. Neither faith nor suffering will ever be simple topics to deal. By maintaining an image of a perfect victim, we try to do this and not challenge ourselves on difficult topics. Let ask if we ourselves are really innocent before we try to convince others of their guilt. If we do, why do a majority of us Christians confess our sins each Sunday and ask for forgiveness? As Christians when we do this, we end up reducing our faith and the resurrection to a fairy tale and nothing to ever struggle with. Hence we will continue to believe in a shallow faith that requires no deeper inspection. This will just end up reducing the resurrection to a passive meaningless death. How will that reduction ever serve as a force to liberate the oppressed and the oppressors?

Let us not be foolish like Elihu in our presumptions of others and God!

The Unpredictability of March

A couple weeks ago, I attended the meeting for worship at Princeton Friends School, which the school calls "Settling In". Each week they meet for 30 minutes and a student offers a query. Since it was the first day of March, the assigned student asked "What are you looking forward to in March?"

Students talked about upcoming birthdays, looking forward to playing outside more, and summer coming closer. They were ready to shed their winter clothes and activities for sunny days spent outside. Eighth graders expected to hear back from high schools soon and they were nervous and eager to find out where they were accepted. These students were eager to take the next step in their education and life.

One of the teachers stood up and talked about how March could bring different weather. In March it is still normal for there to be a late snowstorm he said, but we also could expect sunny days to happen where short sleeves can be worn and bike riding could be done. The theme of his message was that March brought unpredictability, at a time when we wanted something concrete, ie the end of Winter and the start of Spring or the end of one stage of life and the becoming of another. We know that Spring is coming and we will hear about where we go on the next stage of our life, but March always brings surprises and bumps along the way.

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In my experience this rang true. I used to go to New Orleans in March from Washington DC with a group of high school students for an alternative spring break trip. I remember often times bundling up to go to the airport in DC and then shedding all the layers once we landed in New Orleans. New Orleans was usually sunny with highs in the 70s and 80s that week in March. It gave us our first glimpse of Spring that helped us make it through the last few weeks of a DC winter/early Spring when we returned home. We were given a chance to see what was awaiting us once we waited out the dreadful last weeks of the winter season.

But that was not always true. Once I remember arriving to the airport in DC when it was in the 70s there. Instead of the group all wearing shorts and T-shirts in preparation for warm weather to follow us, we were carrying jackets and coats while wearing jeans. I actually expressed concern for two students who arrived with shorts on. "Did you come prepared? Did you look at the weather forecast?" Once we landed in New Orleans, it was a different than other years. It was cloudy with a high in the upper 40s. That night the temps dipped down to about freezing. We were cold that night sleeping in the not well insulated dorm room. It did warm up by the end of the week, but it seemed strange.
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A week later after the Settling In worship, I was reminded of the teacher's words. A small snowstorm dumped a couple inches on Princeton, ruining any plans for bicycling or playing outside. It was beautiful and Princeton looked more like it was early January than early March. Jenn and I would have appreciated the snow more if we weren't in a hurry to make it to DC. We left that morning instead of the night before due to forecasts of snow. Yet, despite the weather forecasters' predictions, the snow came that morning.
The unpredictability of March caught us and we were not prepared or happy. We were worried that we were going to be late. Even though we knew it would clear up as we headed south, we were still worried in the moment. We knew that we needed to just keep driving until we were out of the storm

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I feel like being a religious seeker is living perpetually in a state of March. Hopefully most of us have made it through the long journey towards God, the Light, the Holy Spirit. We know that we are almost there to the glory and unlocking the mystery, but we are not there just yet. Instead we will encounter a little more doubt and weariness and we will encounter quick fixes that promises happiness sooner than later. Sometimes I feel like that this time is harder than the journey I experienced at my lowest point in time. I am ready for the low point to be over. I am ready for God! That thought, much like looking forward to sunny days during a late winter snowstorm, keep me going in my faith.  

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.

Bringing the Good News about the Current State of Quakerism

This summer, I preached three times at the church where I was interning. Part of sermon writing is to bring the good news at the end of the sermon that let people know that Christ loves them and to point out the good in our world that sometimes look like anything but good.

Over the past few months, I have read blog posts about how Quakerism is dying, no one is supporting Young Adult Friends' ministry, etc... I think these points do have a point, but I don't see it as that as the only point. I have seen several instances of Young Adult Friends being supported by the wider community and I believe that we are growing.

Here is some of the good news:

• New York YM Young Adult Friends Field Secretary Gabi just wrote a post about her travels among Young Adults Friends in New York and New Jersey in the past six months. She has been busy attending to the needs of Young Adults there.

• Christina has been carrying a leading since 2002 about a Quaker yearlong service program. She followed the leading and others joined her along the way. She was supportive by Friends all over and by her home meeting.  In August her leading came into reality when seven Young Adult Friends arrived in Atlanta to begin a yearlong internship with Quaker Voluntary Service. The leading is still growing. Houses will open in Philadelphia and Portland, Oregon next August too. And it will not stop there... People are energized about bringing this explicitly Quaker program to their community and our dream (Currently I serve on the board) is to keep growing a network of houses. 

• In Portland, two Evangelical Friends churches and an unprogrammed meeting have joined together to support the new QVS house there. That is amazing and exciting to see the branches working together!

• Another Young Adult Friend, Ana, followed a leading to create a Quaker summer camp in the Intermountain Yearly Meeting region. She worked for several summers at different Quaker summer camps and visited others. She and her partner, Ariel, have shared their vision with Friends across the Southwest. The camp, Mountain Friends Camp, has been going three years now and it keeps growing each summer. 

• An unprogrammed Young Adult Friend, Zachary, was led into Navy chaplaincy. He is currently serving in the Navy under the care of an Evangelical Friends church, who have taken him in and supported him in his ministry. Next month he will speak at a Convergent Friends gathering in the Northwest, A Nursery of Truth. I wish I could go. Hopefully others can go!

• Friends General Conference just started the New Meetings Project. The coordinator, Brent, has found that more than 70 Friends worship groups/meetings/church have started in the last ten years. That translates to one new group starting roughly every seven weeks. I have been to several of these new groups and they have a great sense of community.

• I am a big proponent of online outreach, but two of these new meetings, West Philadelphia Worship Group and Silver River Meeting, do not have an online presence. They grow because of the community they have created. They see each other throughout the week in between meetings for worship and are deeply connected to each other lives. How can we grow to know each other outside of worship? 

Lastly, God loves us for the imperfect human beings we are.

These are just a few examples I know of and why I have not lost all hope in my faith community.

Yes, there is a lot to be sad about with Friends today, but I don't see it as just doom and gloom. I am having conversations with Friends all over about a whole range of topics and I am excited. Yes we have a lot of divisions, but amazing conversations and projects are starting!

Where do you see hope in the world of Friends today?

A Messy Faith- Inclusivity Within Friends

I love Quakers, yet they frustrate me endlessly. Regardless, all of them are still part of my religious family. I have traveled among Friends of all types, backgrounds, theological perspectives, ages, etc.... and we are an interesting, diverse community worldwide. We have a lot of room for improvement, for spiritual growth, for outreach. But I do not want to kick any one out, instead Quakerism to me means to be on a journey with God within a community of seekers, not a community of know-it-alls.

If we start saying, "I am a Quaker and you are not." We are setting up Quakerism to be an enclosed community, a gated community, again. Who will have the keys? Who will make up the rules?

I am grateful that Quakers believe in continuing revelations, that God is still speaking to us. In that belief, I feel that we do not need to conform to 1600s Quakerism, but instead ask ourselves, "How is God leading us today?" (See another blog post I wrote: "If I wanted to live by 1600s standards, I would be Amish")

The 1600s Quakers were radicals, then the 1700s US Quakers started to close themselves from the outside world, which continued until the mid 1800s. Especially in the mid 1700s, US Quakers read people out of meeting for a lot of infractions of all kinds, like attending a wedding of another denomination. This was meant to keep the faith pure. For example, meetings would issue traveling minutes as ways of introducing their members to other meetings, but it was also a way to track members, to keep them honest, and make sure that they did not wander off.*

So if we start kicking people out, what will be the list of infractions we will enforce? Who will decide? Do we want to return Quakerism to a pure state? Do we want to isolate ourselves again? Do we want to track each other's movements all the time?

Or, instead, do we want to invest in the spiritual growth of all Quakers and help each other grow? Do we want to struggle and grow together in faith?

I want to keep Quakerism a messy community. I want to invest in my fellow Quakers and to keep challenging them to go deeper in their faith, while they challenge me to go deeper. I do not want to be involved in a faith where everybody follows the rules for fear of being expelled.

There are a lot of conflicts within Quakerism today. They are hard, difficult, and painful. But, if dealt with loving kindness, these conflicts will help all of us to go deeper with our faith.

Lets keep challenging each other and keep Quakerism a messy faith, instead of a pure, exclusive community open only to the members who follow strict rules.

What would the Religious Society of Friends look like, if we challenge each other to go deeper?

*I recommend reading The Reformation of American Quakerism, 1748-1783 by Jack Marietta