What I'm Doing for Lent this Year

They say that it's easier to stick to something if you tell someone else about it. And since I would feel funny telling most people I know in person about my Lenten plans, here goes. 

(I know that technically we're not supposed to brag about what we're doing. That's not what this is about. This is about hoping that making my plans public will help me keep at it). 

My goal for this Lent was to do something that would be beneficial for those around me, especially my husband. After deciding that forgoing sweets would help my waistline but little else - and might well increase my temper - I went with tackling my poor (as in, horrific) bedtime and morning habits. Aristotle said that the way to grow in virtue is by forming good habits. So if I want to develop the virtue of self-discipline, Lent is a great time to form new habits which, hopefully, I can carry with me after Lent is over. The way I picked these particular habits was that each of these are things that my husband has said time and again that he wishes I would do - and that I've said I wish could do if only it wasn't so inconvenient.

Habit Number One: Get up when the alarm clock goes off, as opposed to hitting snooze eight times.

Habit Number Two: Leave my phone off the bed, as opposed to playing Words with Friends when I'm supposedly "trying to sleep." 

Habit Number Three: Take a shower right after getting up, as opposed to moving my lurching body from bed to couch with little additional change.

Habit Number Four: Stop saying "sorry." 

The fourth one will actually be the hardest. I've gotten into the bad habit of saying "I'm sorry" reflexively, the minute I think someone might be the tiniest bit annoyed with me. The thought of fasting from it began in January with Laura's post about how saying you're sorry can be a sign of pride. (Guilty). This bad habit does damage in a lot of ways: to my marriage, to my self-perception, to my career, to my friendships. Best to nip it in the bud. 

What are your plans for Lent this year?

My Relationship with Mommy Blogs: It's Complicated

Last night, my husband and I watched a new movie called The Secret Life of Walter Mitty. As you may recall from high school English class, this was originally a short story by James Thurber, of The New Yorker fame in the early-mid 20th century, about a forgetful and imaginative man who escapes from his nagging wife and boring life into fantastic daydreams. (If you haven't read it, you're missing out. You should also read other James Thurber pieces, such as Nine Needles and The Night the Bed Fell on my Father. They don't write like that anymore). 

The movie took artistic liberties, with beautiful results. Walter still escapes into his head, but he's now running from the new boss at LIFE magazine who is managing the "transition" to an all-online magazine - mostly by being a dick to everyone except his few favorites. The film's Walter, however, is triumphant; for most of the film, you wonder if these fantastic events are really real or just in his head, and you'll be cheering for this mild-mannered, balding "negative assets" man whose job is being phased out. 

In a phone conversation with "Ted" from eHarmony, who becomes his shrink by default, Walter learns that "people who daydream lack contentment." For Walter, these dreams ranged from tiny verbal victories, perfectly timed jokes that socially destroyed his cynical boss but that never actually happened, to a Spiderman-style rescue of a dog in a burning skyscraper. I don't even have to exercise the imagination anymore - just open the laptop and gaze on the (mostly Catholic) mommy blogs, with homemade king cakes and Advent wreaths and lots of children and housework but also - and here's the kicker - the financial stability to stay at home with them. 

Oops, guess I wasn't supposed to say that out loud. It's Not the Done Thing to say that stay-at-home moms require husbands with full-time jobs and sufficiently lucrative paychecks. Politicians learned this to their chagrin, not knowing that of course, these moms can only stay home because they make homemade broth and save pennies on homemade detergent and don't have to pay for professional wardrobes or day-care. "It's not a privilege to stay at home" was preached from the rooftops. Some moms just exercised choice differently. The upper-middle class family life of four-eight kids, home-schooled, perhaps on a few acres of land with gardens and chickens, is attainable by all.

Yes, I know that all stay-at-home moms aren't like that. My own mom hasn't had a full-time job - or even a steady part-time job - since before I was born. Her jobless state was sanctioned and approved by her old-fashioned mother while I was growing up, even though I was an only child who went to school, even though we desperately needed the income from even a regular part-time job. An aunt who once hinted to her that maybe she would be happier with a part-time job was told off in no uncertain terms by my father, who said that if my mother "wanted to stay at home and raise her child, that was her choice." The "child" in question was about 15 and rarely at home, because it wasn't about me at all. It was about my mom's severe depression which made her incapable of managing the most basic household tasks, much less a job on the side. Having a stay-at-home mom was less about homemade baked goods and more about waking her up at 2 p.m. on a Saturday because I worried about her health. 

As a child, I idolized working mothers. They always had clean hair, polished nails - their fingernails fascinated me - makeup, high heels. Their kids went to after-school programs that looked fun to me, more fun than waiting thirty minutes to an hour for my perpetually-late mom to pick me up from school. They had a briskness and efficiency that I admired. 

I grew up in the 90s, before the internet really took off, before Facebook and social networking, before blogs. My mom only had to compare herself with the working moms in suits or scrubs who were up at respectable hours and making money, or with her own idolized mother who raised five children on a large piece of property in the 50s-60s and never succumbed to something so embarrassing as depression. Thank God she didn't have the extra burden of mommy blogs. Even homeschooling wasn't big in our area yet - the Deep South is a little slow on the uptake when it comes to fashion, and people I knew bought chemical-laden shampoos and conventional medicines and cooked with condensed soup.

Well-meaning people always told me that "little girls turn into their mothers and marry their fathers." Do yourself a favor and never say this to anyone, ever. You never know whose mother is clinically depressed or whose father is emotionally abusive, or what other skeletons they hide safely at home. I escaped the second downfall, but now I'm the one sleeping in, staying up until 2 a.m., only working part-time, lacking motivation. Sure, there are differences: I'm on medication, and I see two therapists weekly. I'm not in denial about what's going on, and neither is my husband. Still, there are days when I look in the mirror and imagine a few more wrinkles, thinner hair, glasses. It's getting easier.

Like Walter Mitty, my fantasies increase as my contentment decreases. Unlike the old Walter, the internet is always here, always ready with a new fantastic vision of what another life could be. And how harmful could it be, anyway, as long as it's wholesome. 

**I want to make it clear that I don't mean to disparage all mommy bloggers, or moms who just happen to blog, or stay-at-home moms, or non-working women with disposable income. Some of you I wish I could know in person because you seem like the bees' knees. These are my own personal demons.

The Importance of the Inessentials

The last two weeks, I spent almost every night either in rehearsal or performance for a community play. It was a Christmas play, albeit a nontraditional one with zombies and salty language. I haven't done any theatre at all since high school, so it was both scary and delightful to get my feet wet again. Doing the first reading in front of the other performers was about 1,000 times scarier than doing the first real performance. Audiences are much less frightening than peers, in my opinion. In fact, that's why theatre is so addictive. There's something sublime about making people laugh, or applaud, or cry.

Now was not a practical time to involve myself in a play. We are poor, and I lost wages because a lot of my shifts conflicted with rehearsal times. I am struggling to keep my head above water, to get things done, to be organized when my default is total disorganization on a massive scale. Our laundry pile is embarrassing, especially considering that we don't have children. Our dishwasher has been coming out of the wall since we moved in, and our apartment complex has yet to respond to my latest plea for help. Meanwhile, my car keeps breaking down, as it has ever since we sent it to the no-good mechanics in August, and I have yet to get my tag replaced. And, you know, Christmas.

It was the best decision I could have made.

If you wait until you have a perfect routine to add something fun, you never will. Human nature doesn't work that way, or at least mine doesn't. Perhaps there are people, real ones and not just robots, that can do all of the things you're supposed to do, can refrain from wasting a single penny on nonessentials, can only eat healthy foods, never pick up fast food when they're tired, always have a clean house, never waste a minute at work, always feel ready to have strangers inspect their closets and kitchen cabinets and basements without a sliver of embarrassment, never get behind on laundry or dishes, and wait until all these things are true before even thinking about "wasting time."

Instead I acted recklessly, volunteered to participate and tried out for a major role, landed it (primarily because they really needed someone, anyone), and found myself in nightly rehearsals, saying lines to myself in the car on my way to work. It's been the first time in awhile that I was doing something that required something of me (i.e. isn't just mindlessly surfing the internet) but was inessential, impractical, and fun. It did not give me exercise (other than simply "being active"), or help my nutrition, or put money in my pocket, or increase my sleep.

What it did do was get me out of the apartment and around people, which in turn helped my depression and anxiety, which in turn helped the rest of my life. I had to keep a commitment, which is something I struggle with, without financial pressure but with peer pressure, i.e., I didn't want to lose face. I missed one rehearsal because of a panic attack, but this is a good record for me.

So go ahead. Stay in the car so you can sing with the radio, even if you really need to get inside and get busy. Say yes to something that seems crazy if there's an inexplicable sense of peace about it.

Why I'm Not Color-Blind

Unless you live under a rock and don't have a TV or internet, you've heard about Ferguson and Staten Island. I won't belabor those events here. Since I was not at either hearing, nor have I poured over the Ferguson grand jury notes, I do not feel knowledgeable enough to comment.

However, I do have extensive experience about what it's like to grow up in the South as a white kid, and I don't think we're "over" racism.

When certain scandals arise, like Paula Deen's "nigger" statement, folks around the country are shocked that someone could ever say such a thing. There's a sincere element of bewilderment. After all, aren't we a "post-racial society"? Didn't we elect a black president? Don't we have integrated schools? Haven't we ended job and housing discrimination against blacks? Aren't blacks given the same benefit of the doubt that whites are given in a court of law?

(Short answer: not really. These rights are enshrined by law but either not enforced or not enforceable. Society has many methods of self-segregation).

The way that we see these instances of racism - indeed, if we call them racist at all - has deep roots in the very core of our being. No meme, or even nuanced article, that you post on Facebook will change anyone's mind, though I've tried. That ship sailed a long time ago, and some of us are honestly waiting for the truly die-hard racists to grow old and die out. Sounds harsh, but I'm talking about people I love and care about, like my granddad, who I'm longing to see again before he dies. In some respects, maybe time does heal all wounds.

However, time moves slowly at best, and meanwhile the next generation is growing up. My generation is raising them, and we learned Racism 101 both explicitly and implicitly from the time we were toddlers. At the same time, those from outside the South who were taught to be "color blind," but never actually interacted with those outside of their race, absorb all kinds of racist signals unawares. And that's the most dangerous problem of all, because it's subconscious and therefore cannot be fought.

A friend of mine from diapers informed me that he was "deleting me" from Facebook because of my posts, that I had completely disrespected my parents and rejected everything they taught me. Though his statement was obviously hyperbolic, it got me thinking. Did my parents raise me to be racist? To be colorblind? Or something else entirely?

I found this quote five minutes ago. I never learned it in school. We never took a field trip to the town's civil rights museum, and I didn't know it existed until I was in college. I had not read the Letter from Birmingham Jail until college. We never learned about the Albany Movement, or that there even was a movement. I heard that Dr. King tried to come to Albany and was derailed, and that was that. I didn't know that the Shiloh Baptist Church was the headquarters for a civil rights singing group that toured throughout the South in the 60s at the risk of their lives. I didn't know about the sit-ins and boycotts. I'd never seen pictures of police carrying black girls out of the whites only library. I'd never seen the images of black children and teenagers crowded into a jail cell in the country outside of town. My eleventh grade English teacher tried to rectify the situation by teaching the Harlem Renaissance, and apparently she had to fight the administration to do so.

Here's what I heard about Dr. King coming to Georgia: 

"Well son," my granddad said to my dad one day, "my brother and I were sitting on the porch watching them [MLK and others march in Atlanta]. My brother said 'look at that, a whole bunch of niggers, only some of them are white'." My dad and granddad laughed. 

My private Baptist school didn't have to teach us about Civil Rights if they didn't want to. Our Bob Jones University Press history books were courtesy of a college that lost its accreditation because they believed that "Biblical" marriages were segregated, that God didn't want "the races to mix." We got MLK Day off, but for the first few years I was in school it was called a "teacher work day." Another private school in the area did not get this day off, but they get a holiday for Stonewall Jackson's birthday. Like most elementary and middle schools, we never managed to get to the 20th century in history classes, which might explain the gap in our civil rights knowledge. I pity the teachers that had to cover the Civil War and Reconstruction. (Southerners don't call it that. The more scholarly ones say "The War between the States," the sarcastic ones say "The War of Northern Aggression," and older generations simply say "The War.") My parents said that public schools had "changed" their history textbooks to make sure they were politically correct, and that the truth was being suppressed. In reality, slavery had very little to do with the Civil War - it was all about States' Rights. We never discussed which rights the states wanted beyond the right to own slaves. Lincoln was not our favorite president, though at school he was moderately praised in vague terms. 

Albany State University under water in 1994

In 1994 we had an historic flood that wiped out whole neighborhoods, and because the poorer areas were closer to the Flint River, it was mostly black neighborhoods that were effected. Jesse Jackson came to town to say that the white leaders in town somehow arranged this catastrophe. He was an example of an "outside agitator," a common designator that also applied to the kids that came down with Freedom Summer in Mississippi. 

Example of outside agitators: nuns registering black voters in Albany

The real education about race happens in day to day interactions, both within the family and in the broader community. My hometown is majority black, and I grew up in a majority black neighborhood in one of the poorer areas of town, though not the poorest. I remember the day that I first noticed race. I was playing with two children who lived in temporary government housing next door, a little girl about my age and her younger brother: I think I was about 5 or 6. The boy touched my face and asked if I was sick, and his sister punched him, apologized to me, said that "he's never seen white people before, so he doesn't know about freckles." Then I learned that I was white, and that I was a different specimen in the neighborhood. The black kids treated me with kid gloves. I was never pushed or shoved even in play.

I also learned what "black" means. The children I played with that day had rotting teeth; they had probably never seen a dentist or a pediatrician. Their house was unairconditioned (in the 90s, in south Georgia), and the word "house" is a generous description for the random collection of painted red duplexes with ratty screen doors that dotted a dirt landscape. The adults sat on porches and drank or used drugs. Fights broke out frequently, and the police were called regularly for noise and other complaints. (It's only fair to add that the worst neighbors we ever had were white, however). Their mother and her... boyfriend?.... didn't seem to work. Like most of our neighbors, they were here today, gone tomorrow, moving from one dilapidated dwelling to the next. Black kids in my town will tell you where they "stay," not where they live. Where they stay can change from week to week, and their fellow housing occupants are just as variable. 

"Modern" housing

In the whiter side of my world, there were black people, but they were shadows on the edges. My grandmama "had" a black man for well over two decades. He was not formally employed, but he started working in the pecan orchard and eventually lived in the white shack across the back yard. In the early morning I would get up to spend time with my grandmama, and she would make coffee for herself and Henry*. He had his own mug and juice jar that no one else used. Like a good Southern kid, I said sir and ma'am to adults, and Mr. or Miss/Mrs. I called him by his first name, unadorned, and never said sir. No one ever corrected me, and everyone referred to him by his first name. I meant no disrespect; it was just "the way it was." When he moved into a place with his girlfriend, an illiterate woman with a difficult past, burn marks on her face and about two teeth, my grandmama insisted they get married. When they had a son, she paid for his yearbook photos and doctor appointments, and always gave him books for his birthday and Christmas. I have pictures of me holding him as a baby on the back porch, when I was probably about 10 or 11, with his mother beside me. The pictures could easily be from the 50s except for the color. 

 The word "nigger" was not something my mother's family said. It was low-class and "common." My grandmama was never mean to anyone, she just believed that black people had "their place." In college I read about paternalism and almost had a heart attack, right there in the classroom. Paternalism is the concept of benevolent white Southerners taking care of "their" black people. I grew up on stories of white folks in that small Alabama town who bailed their black employees out of jail. When my uncle hired a Northern manager at a factory, he had to do the communicating for him because the fellow "didn't know how to talk to blacks." This was my life. And I grew up in the 1990s, not the 1890s. 

An abandoned shack in a pecan orchard, probably an old slave quarters

In middle and high school, my friends and I talked about race from time to time, usually at one-on-one sleepovers when the talk got deep. One friend from the country had a Confederate flag hung over her bed, and probably more black friends in one year than I've had in my life, and we wondered together what our daddies would do if we ever dated a black man, and confessed that we thought some were sexy. Another friend and I wondered what we would do if we lived in the Confederate South, if we would be traitors by siding with the US, if we could be pro-South without being pro-slavery. Another friend's father openly declared his affinity for slavery and wished aloud that he could have one. I had one "black friend" in high school, one of the few black kids at my private school. We bonded over Alicia Keys and basketball (street-style, no fouls for punches) and dancing, and she hung out in the same group with the kids I just described. She sang soprano in Show Choir with me, but on our own we harmonized, and she took the alto or descant, because I couldn't make my voice sling around the room like she could. 

Recording of Albany's Shiloh Baptist Church singing group

Did my parents raise me to be a racist? The question doesn't even make sense. It assumes that some people, "bad" people, in America are racists, while others are "good people" and don't see race at all. I see race. I have seen race since that day as a child, and on very few occasions, with certain people, the consciousness fades. My parents did not raise me to be colorblind: I didn't know any kids that were truly raised to be colorblind. As an adult, I had to make a decision: how to use that information. How would I look at race in America? What are my responsibilities? How should I educate myself?

I've heard that being colorblind is the goal. Maybe it is. But right now, in our society of America, do you think that African Americans see color? Do you think that they recognize a difference between their lives and the lives of whites, especially in the Deep South? Do you think it makes things better to say that you can't see color, or that you know that color makes no difference in America today?

*Name has been changed.

Cleaning up My Own Crap

This evening I had a mind-changing conversation with my husband over health insurance. (Stick with me here). As we both cried, as I tried to apologize for forgetting to mail a check almost a month ago, as he tried to express his feelings of hopelessness, the Holy Spirit hit me in the head with a two-by-four, because apparently that's what it takes.

In a flash, I remembered my wedding vows, and it occured to me that those weren't only for my husband. I too had promised things in that ceremony. I know, it's shocking.

You see, in the course of my legitimate health problems and depression, I forgot about responsibility. I believed, with the fervency of a True Believer, that depression was a valid excuse for neglecting my health, my marriage, my friendships, my work, and any other duty or relationship in my life. And if a small voice ventured to disagree, I shot it down with woe is me histrionics that ended in suicidal fantasies, pulling my hair out by the roots, and other constructive behaviors. In addition, I had convinced myself that my husband's job was to put up with it all, because after all he had taken those vows didn't he?

There is more than one way to leave your spouse. There's the one we see in divorce courts, but there's the one I grew up watching my parents model for me. They are still married in a technical sense, and they still live in the same house. But anyone who knows them at all knows it's a farce. The lack of mutual respect is palpable.

I thought that because I'd married "better" (that is, we're more compatible than my parents, though total opposites in many ways), that we'd weather the storm. However, I asked him to do all the weathering. And now he's starting to crack under the pressure.

What's so humbling is that the things he asks of me seem so small. To take care of myself; to get up at a reasonable hour; to make friends locally so that I'm not so dependent on him for social interaction; to get exercise and fresh air; to put in the hours at my job that I need in order to finish my work. You know, to act like an adult.

It's true, part of my problem is depression. Depression/ anxiety/ PTSD make those "simple" tasks seem monumental. However, I threw in the towel before the depression had a chance to attack. My self-respect shriveled so low that I drifted through life, emerging occasionally to decry injustices on the internet rather than face my own problems.

What does God ask of me? The simple and boring, the acts of love that they don't talk about in women's magazines, the daily duties that require perseverance rather than sprints.

7 Quick Takes: Weddings as Sacrament

1

Well, I hadn't done a 7QT in awhile, and since my blogging has been sporadic at best lately decided it's now or never! 

2

In my defense, I've been to two out-of-town weddings in the same number of weeks. In the first (which was also out of state), my husband was best man, and in the second I was a bridesmaid. Both weddings were lovely though very different, and both did an excellent job of highlighting the personalities of the couple while providing a gracious environment for guests. Naturally it got me thinking about weddings, and marriage. 

3

My father walking me down the aisle. It doesn't show faces so I'm OK with showing it.

I married an Episcopalian before I'd ever been to an Episcopal wedding (or a Catholic one for that matter). In my Protestant, Southern experience, the ceremonies were short and almost informal. There might be a little special music (heaven help us) or a congregational hymn, probably a reading of 1 Corinthians 13, the exchange of rings and vows, and sometimes a short talk (we don't say homily) given by the preacher/ celebrant. Weddings are a big deal, but they aren't sacraments. I'd certainly never heard of taking communion at a wedding. Why, that would seem sacrilegious! Weddings might be held in churches, but they don't hold the same reverential value that a regular church service does; it would seem profane to have the Lord's supper mingled with a wedding service. 

Like most converts though, I was determined to go full bore. We had the full shebang, communion and all, which caused much wailing and gnashing of teeth among my more Protestant family members. (In their defense, everyone was sweet the day of, although they all decided not to partake of communion. I guess they thought it was idolatry or something). It just made so much sense to start off my new married life with a miracle. The moment that my husband and I knelt and partook together was like nothing I have ever experienced. 

4

My husband is not the "strong and silent" type. In our wedding, I was dry-eyed and grinning from ear to ear, and he was the one tearing up. He's a very emotional soul, which I adore. During the wedding of his best friends, I caught his eye once or twice from the congregation, and we were both thinking the same thoughts. How has our marriage held up? It's been a very hard two and half years, what with my mental health issues, family problems, three moves across states, job changes, his time in seminary, preparing for ordination to the priesthood, etc. It's easy for us to be jealous of other couples who seem to have it easy, to groan when we hear yet another preacher talk about the trials of newly weds including toothpaste brands. Mental health problems are a heavy burden on a marriage, even with the support we've been blessed to have.

5

Thinking of marriage as sacrament helps. When you were baptized, you were promised grace, not freedom from sin and trouble. The sacraments never remove our trials, do they? (Sometimes it feels like they add to them!) The Christian life is not easy, and in fact can be an inconvenient faith as Chesterton said. Sacraments give grace upon grace because that grace is needed so desperately. 

6

My husband and I were blessed (in retrospect) to have weathered trials as an engaged couple. However, nothing can prepare you for the work of being married, no matter how much pre-marital counseling you receive - though it helps! The joy and hardship of being two people and yet one flesh is something that must be lived out to be believed. Before we got married, I trusted on faith that marriage is sacramental, but I didn't really get it. Like any sacrament, until you make that "leap of faith" it won't really click. 

7

In closing, pray for your spouse! One thing I've started practicing is offering a Rosary up for our marriage. Funny how spending time meditating on God's grace changes your perspective on marriage and love. 

Accepting Grace, in spite of Pride

I finally went to confession. It had been a few months, and I felt particularly nervous since this was a new priest, a new place. Therefore, I wanted to plan, to spend several hours examining my conscience.

One morning I got up and went to the Catholic cathedral in downtown Savannah. It's open all day to visitors, and there are always tourists taking pictures. I had been meaning to go, so I went, lit a candle, prayed a Rosary, admired the iconography and statues. Thinking that was that, I got in my car and started home. Halfway there, I felt a tug to call and see if any priests in the area were available to hear my confession that day.

Confused but feeling strangely urgent, I parked in a strange neighborhood and started searching for churches on my phone. In no time I saw a church with which my husband and I have no connections and called the office. To my surprise, the priest himself answered. Yes, he would be happy to hear my confession, no, he had nothing going on at the moment, why not come on over?

The church was in south Savannah, so I did have some time to consider my recent past as I drove. It's been a chaotic last few months: moving from D.C. to Savannah, my husband's graduation from seminary and ordination to the diaconnate, my sojourn in a mental hospital. There were many opportunities for sin, but as I drove the thing that reverberated in my heart was my intense self-hatred.

I met the priest, talked a bit about my situation, made my confession. To my consternation, he was more concerned with my suicidal tendencies than with anything else. He gave me his card and made me promise to call him, day or night, if I was in any way tempted to end my life or hurt myself.

One of my religious quirks is the desire to earn my own way. Maybe it's part of overcorrecting from my Calvinist past, in which man could do nothing and had no free will. Or maybe it's human nature that cringes from gifts and would rather give to charity than be charity. I would rather be given a harsh penance than be told that most of my confessed "sins" require being more merciful to myself.

Maybe that's why it took me so long to confess in the first place: I know from past experience that the grace found there is abundant and embarrassingly free.

To Jesus Through Mary

Mary is always looking out for me. How else can I explain that I had no plans of going to Mass today, but found myself following my husband's advice to attend an evening service, where the feast of the assumption was being celebrated?

The church was so quiet, full of incense. It was everything my soul needed.

Hail Holy Queen, Mother of mercy,
our life, our sweetness and our hope.
To Thee do we cry, poor banished children of Eve,
To Thee do we send forth our sighs,
Mourning and weeping in this vale of tears.

Turn, then, most gracious Advocate,
Thine eyes of mercy towards us.
And after this our exile,
Show unto us the blessed fruit of Thy womb, Jesus.
O clement, O loving,
O sweet Virgin Mary.

Pray for us, O holy Mother of God,
That we may be made worthy of the promises of Christ.


As I walked up the aisle, I noticed a sign over the crucifix. It said "For God so loved the world."

I managed not to break down crying until I reached the pew again. It struck me in a way it never did as a child. I felt almost resentful, then, because Jesus' sufferings were thrust up in our faces whenever we doubted. How can you do that after all that Jesus did for you? It was the ultimate guilt trip. It meant that Jesus was tortured to satisfy the Father's wrath so that I could go to heaven. It felt so remote and cold to me then.

Now I see it so differently. Now I see a God who saw His creatures in pain, saw their hurt and agony and fears, knew that without the greatest sacrifice He would never be trusted. He suffered for our peace, to hold out his hands with the nails and say look, feel the prints, you can trust me. Rest in me, abide in me, you are safe my child.

Those images of suffering are not a guilt trip anymore. They are assurance of His love, assurance of His tender care for us. My mother knew what I needed to see before I could believe it.

When "The World" is better than "the Church"

I wish I didn't have to write this post. Truly. I wish that my experience was so singular that no one could relate, that everyone else felt truly at home in a Christian setting.

Say yes if the following fits your experience:

1. You ask for "silent" or "unspoken" prayer requests/ intentions because you worry that your prayer group will gossip about them

2. You have received more empathy and compassion about mental health issues from "secular heathens" than you have from Christians

3. You have endured or witnessed bullies in church environments who were either ignored or encouraged by leadership

4. Those bullies were the leadership

5. You have a "church smile"

6. You have been to revivals or discipleship events or camps or retreats which acknowledged these realities, but when the emotions died down nothing changed

7. You feel shame about your lack of Christian friends, afraid that you're not good enough for that ever-elusive fellowship, afraid that your spiritual life suffers as a result

8. You feel extra shame if you are perfectly able to find friends outside of church/ Christian settings


Here is the typical response to this problem: well, the church is full of sinful people. What do you expect? When people get in groups you naturally get gossip and infighting and favorites.

Friends, are you as tired of that excuse as I am?

Here's why that reason isn't good enough: because I've had better friends and support in non-Christian environments, almost without exception, than I have in Christian ones. Those groups were also filled with people, non-perfect people who make lots of mistakes. And yet, the fellowship was better. Those friendships were made without the fear, perfectionism, and one-upmanship that plagues most Christian groups. Not to say life was perfect, because of course not. However, most of my truly supportive friends are not "believers." They aren't crazy heathens - they are law-abiding citizens who make plenty of mistakes but try their darndest to live peacefully with others. But they also are not Christians, or they are burned Christians who keep their distance from religious organizations.

What's the answer? I don't know. I'm struggling with church locally, for reasons too private to put online, but I'm also struggling with church in general. There is only one thing that I can do, and it's one of the hardest things to do.

I can be honest. I can refuse to put on the church smile. I can tell anyone who asks how I'm doing that I'm battling depression. I can be honest about my recent sojourn in a mental hospital.

If we aren't honest about our real selves, the problem will persist. As someone whose husband is working for a church full-time, whose life is wrapped up in things related to "church," that's not a viable option for me. At bottom, I'm simply tired of hiding.

Friends, let's stop hiding. As long as we hide, nothing will ever get better. And if we reveal our true selves and are still disliked... Then we make friends with those on the outside, like we always did. At the end of the day, we are responsible for living authentic lives, not for how others talked about our truth.

What's Your "Rubbled Heart" Experience?

From the South African Times online, May 22, 2014, after bombing in Jos, Nigeria

My latest devotional find is the 1997 translation of Karl Rahner's The Need and the Blessing of Prayer, which I discovered in the church library. Rahner was Jesuit theologian who was highly influential at Vatican II, but before that he was just another German trying to survive the Nazi regime. Speaking to his fellow Germans, he recalls the common experience of bomb shelters, as my parents' generation might say "Where were you when you heard about JFK?" And just as we might say "9/11" without explanation, he begins without preamble:


Do you remember the nights in the cellar, the nights of deadly loneliness amidst the harrowing crush of people? The nights of helplessness and of waiting for a senseless death? The nights when the lights went out, when horror and impotence gripped one's heart, when one mimed being courageous and unaffected? When one's innocently bold and brave words sounded so strangely wooden and empty, as if they were already dead before they even reached the other person? When one finally gave up, when one became silent, when one only waited hopelessly for the end, death? Alone, powerless, empty. And if the cellar really became buried by rubble, then the picture of today's man is complete. For such are we people of today, even if we already have crawled out of the rubbled-over cellars, even if our everyday has already begun again.... As such we have already entered into an exterior destiny, because the exterior destiny - by God, it is so even if it sounds so fantastic and romantic - is only the shadow of events which have occurred in the depths of men: that their hearts are rubbled-over. 


He goes on to explain that we cannot escape the rubble in our hearts as they had escaped the cellars, no matter how much we try to ignore it by a constant stream of work and entertainment. Rahner, you just didn't know - imagine a world so plugged in as ours, trying even more desperately to shut out the pain in our hearts.

I was fascinated by the cellar passage, and it even took me a minute to piece together the exact circumstance, given the author's time and place. All over the world people crouch in make-shift cellars, or in refugee camps or immigration detainment centers. But what of us who live relatively safe lives, who don't wonder when the next bomb will drop? Where does our rubble come from?

As I write, I am hyperaware of every noise, even though my anxiety level is fairly low. That is life with PTSD - in my case, due to experiences working at a rape crisis center. Being with rape/ assault survivors mere hours after the trauma seared my brain in a dramatic way, and I am still trying to recover. I have buried those memories, tried not to think about them let alone talk about them, until I was finally unable to function in daily life and am forced to deal with it. There's a lot of rubble to dig through. In the process, I bump up against random bits from the wear and tear of life: from believing God would damn me to hell and there was nothing I could do about it, among other things. Denying the existence of the rubble in my heart doesn't make it magically disappear.

According to Rahner, I'm one of the lucky ones because I cannot ignore it. I can't pretend that everything is OK, and the God of joy has not allowed me to believe that despair is somehow Real, that innocence and laughter are fake. This position hurts, but what is the alternative? To think that despair is a sign of strength, to become a nihilist? To ignore the pain, "suck it up," and model myself after the man in the grey flannel suit?

What about religion? Rahner calls Christianity the best possible way to escape true salvation, for those so inclined:


One can be a Christian, not because one believes but because one wants to hide one's unbelief for and from himself because this would otherwise frighten oneself too much. Indeed, from the nature of the matter, Christianity is the best disguise of unbelief for man's deceived heart, the best facade to hide the rubbled-over heart. 


What is the rubble in my heart? What weight has the inner part collapsed under? What facades do I build to hide, even and especially from myself?

God, are you here with me under it all?

The Other Side of Leaving Fundamentalism

Leanne at Provoking Beauty was writing about her reading plans for a retreat, and among them was a book by NT Wright. We talked a bit about how he was taboo for me growing up due to his controversial take on Paul's theology.

Later that day, I discovered a Rachel Held Evans post about Wright in which she ponders the meaning of "Calvinism." You see, NT Wright considers himself a disciple of Calvin and even some of his theology as "Calvinist," though his ecclesiastical home is Anglicanism. (I'm beginning to think that Anglicanism is more of a liturgical and ecclesiastical lens than a theological one, but maybe that's because I'm new to the thing). The famous German theologian Karl Barth, while more Lutheran than Calvinist, was also working within the Reformed framework, but his definition of election is vastly different from John MacArthur's. Rachel has the same issue with this that I do: how can you claim to  be Calvinist in any degree when you don't believe in individual predestination of souls to heaven or hell?

And that, in a nutshell, is the problem with growing up fundamentalist (whether you claimed the label or not - it's more a way of thinking than it is a belief system. Some have argued that Richard Dawkins is an atheist fundamentalist, which I'm sure gave him the vapors). In the fundamentalist framework, everything must fit neatly into categories. It's not really about rules; that's one of the misconceptions of fundamentalism. I inadvertently fed into that with my "Catholics Don't Let Your Babies Grow up to be Fundies" post, which was born out of irritation. As Samantha at Defeating the Dragons argues - from vast personal experience - it's not the rules that make fundamentalism toxic. It's the mindset. Ankle length denim jumpers are a symptom, not the disease.

Those of us who grew up in this mindset find it hard to shake. We retain the fundamentalism but change our loyalties. We become fundamentalist Episcopalians (oh yes honey they exist), fundamentalist Catholics, fundamentalist Muslims, fundamentalist secularists. We find a cult to join.

(To be clear, this fundamentalist mindset is distinct from passion or even passionate disagreement. Dawkins himself argues that other atheists object to his passion for science. Hardly. Neil Degrasse Tyson has plenty of scientific passion, but he readily acknowledges the rights of others to practice their own faith traditions, so long as he has the equal right to disagree.) Check it:




One of the hardest thing to shake about growing up fundy is the belief that Real Christians Think X. Catholics, the reason why many evangelicals find it hard to accept you as fellow believers is that Real Christians believe in once saved always saved, or justification by faith alone, or Sola Scriptura. These are not trivial matters: these are the core doctrines that we grew up believing as the foundation of our faith. When a Catholic says in one breath "I'm a Christian" and in the next breath espouses belief in Purgatory, the evangelical has a massive cognitive dissonance headache. (If you really want to have fun, tell them that CS Lewis also believed in purgatory. Mind Blown.)

Well, I thought I was past that. I had accepted that Catholics are Christians - that Eastern Orthodox and Roman Catholics are our big brothers in fact, and it might behoove us Johnny-come-latelies to listen. But there was another side of the "Real Christians Think X" that I had not shed. There was a still a part of me that turned away the minute someone calls themselves Baptist or Presbyterian or Reformed or (God forbid) Calvinist. Why? Because Real Baptists think that my baptism was invalid. Because Real Presbyterians are most certainly not PCUSA (posers). Because Real Presbyterians are the ultimate insiders, always talking about their Shorter catechisms and Book of Church Order and General Assemblies and expecting the world to care. Because Real Calvinists listen to Mark Driscoll podcasts (if they're young and hip) or read Spurgeon. And at the minimum, a real Reformed Christian believes in the TULIP as applied to individual persons. Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God and all that.

Well, butter my butt and call me a biscuit (Southern speak for being shocked). The world just isn't that simple, go figure. It's far easier to be a fundamentalist thinker than it is to actually think. If you're a fundamentalist, you know exactly where you stand and exactly where everyone else stands. You can pinpoint someone's beliefs and drop them in your mental filing cabinet behind the Creationist label or the Secular Humanist label or the Pentecostal label. Once the person is filed, everything he says gets placed under one of the subheadings in their main file. When you get really good at it, you can watch out for buzzwords and sayings. That way, you can file away the person without having to listen to an entire conversation. And now you get to talk, which is what you wanted all along.

This comes naturally to children. For the purposes of language acquisition, it's even crucial that children learn to match labels with objects. However, eventually we grow up, and the process is painful. Did you ever wonder why high school students work so hard to label each other as geek or freak or jock? It's just too damn hard otherwise, when you're dealing with pimples and periods and sexual tension, to suddenly unlearn the labeling process. That has to wait until college or adulthood in general, when we learn that people are complex individuals who can't be plopped into filing cabinets.

Fundamentalism is intentional arrested development. Parents, horrified that children go to college and learn that their liberal roommate is not the devil incarnate, seek to abort the process with Worldview Camps and books and conferences. It's crucial to fundamentalist parents that their children remain children, that they never listen to another person without their labeling pens. The well-trained fundamentalist college student knows that biology professors are anti-faith, that feminist professors hate men, and that everyone is out to get them. Best to plug up your ears and join a like-minded fellowship group on day one, for solidarity.

Some of us manage to escape. Unfortunately, those of us who are proudly "post fundamentalist" are not, perhaps, as grown up as we think. So you don't believe in 24 hour 6 day Creationism anymore? Hurrah, here's a cookie. The hard part is throwing out the filing cabinet and learning to listen.

Public Life, "Private" Life

One of my favorite bloggers (hell, writers) Betty Duffy wrote a marvelous piece about the public life of the family. She remembers the early days of their marriage in which she and her husband graciously accepted relatives who needed a place to stay. She reminisces about the conversations and good times on the porch, but she's blunt about the inconveniences.

I'm re-reading this post as I contemplate our move to Savannah, Georgia (yes, God heard my prayer and we won't be building snowmen in October). The diocese has graciously provided us with housing and utilities since my husband's second job will be supervising a group home of young adult interns for the diocese. We will be living on the top floor of a big, rambling 3 story built in the 20s when wrap-around porches and high-ceilings still existed in the South. We stayed there this past weekend while he had final interviews with the diocesan committee to approve his ordination - and yes, we're ready to roll! It already feels like home. I grew up in an old neighborhood completely shaded by ancient live oaks draped in Spanish moss; my apartment in grad school was a second-story with wood floors, art deco bathroom tile, and questionable plumbing. The cynic in me was checking ceilings and door frames for the tell-tale signs of decay, but I was too giddy to give it a good once-over.

We will be sharing the house with an unknown number of single adults working internships for the Episcopal Church. In this case, "sharing" means participating in morning and evening prayer (at least so far as my work schedule will allow), frequently sharing meals, participating in a Tuesday night Bible study that's open to the community, and knowing that on Friday afternoons a group from the church across the street will be running a backpack food service for underprivileged children out the back door. We share a kitchen, dining room, and living room with the interns, but we have our own bathroom, bedroom, spare bedroom, and study upstairs. It's an adventure in full-time hospitality.

I'd be lying if I denied any hesitations and worries.

This is one of those "absolutely the best thing that could happen to us" moments while also being a "really God? Why?" moments. I know that financially, it's an answered prayer. Socially, it will help us meet people more quickly (not that that would be an issue - we're in the heart of Savannah and surrounded by Episcopalians). It's a great opportunity for my husband to practice the kind of ministry he most wants to do - radical hospitality and welcoming of outsiders. The location is excellent, right in downtown. What am I afraid of?

Inconvenience. Vulnerability.

I like to shut my door on the world, throw on some cookie pants and flop on the couch. I like dashing naked from the bathroom when I remember that my shampoo is still in my travel bag. I like leaving dishes in the sink when I'm tired, having a grocery bag with pads on the living room floor that I'll put away "later."

I like hiding from the world when I'm depressed, avoiding the questions and concern, withdrawing from social events because I don't know when the next panic attack will strike.

When I told my husband I was OK with him pursuing the priesthood, I knew about the price. I knew about the loss of privacy, the loss of control, the loss of anonymity. I also knew that my besetting sins are bound up in those words: fear of loosing a tight grip on reality, paranoia about what other people think, craving to be alone whenever I feel like it regardless of the needs of others. And I know that God knows what He's doing.

But damn, I'm going to miss eating ice cream out of the carton in the living room.

Do or do not, there is no try

I love the start of Lent. Ash Wednesday is one of my favorite services; going up to have the priest put the sign of the Cross on my forehead gives me chill bumps every time. It's one of the few religious activities I can count on to be emotionally meaningful every time. And as many have noted, the beginning of Lent is great because you feel all spiritual and shit and get a thrill from your penances/ devotions/ whatever you decided to do. It's beautiful in a clean, pristine way, kind of like snow. Sometimes you even get that cool blue skies and sunshine over thick snow.

And then it gets grim. The snow starts melting, and in the city it's just gross. There's nothing pretty about that devotion anymore, and the penance starts to feel like penance. Instead of freshly fallen snow, you get that chilly, icy rain when it's 34 degrees that the weather channel calls a "wintry mix."






So it was cool when I got to see tulips on my way to the Easter Vigil, even though I'm struggling to feel the whole "Easter joy" thing. Usually I'm Easter's biggest fan, mostly because I love spring and am wimpy about cold. This time around, it feels anticlimactic. Maybe it's because we're moving the third, not the last, week in May, and I'm scrambling to get a new job. Maybe it's because we've discovered that those experiences I had working at a rape crisis center are still haunting me, that I'm not "over it." Maybe it's because the therapist says "it will be a long haul," and dear Jesus we've already had a long haul. We're ready for this 4-year Lent in our lives to be over.


I don't have a pithy statement to wrap it all, make it flowers and sunshine and beauty. At this juncture, spring is a choice, not just something that happens around April and May. I can choose life, choose to pursue healing and growth with a vengeance, or I can give up and throw myself into the fires of Mount Doom while clutching the ring, my precious despair and pride. I can smell the flowers or cough up the ashes, gorge myself on animal fodder or relish the feast. There's nothing I can do to pull myself up by some non-existent bootstraps, but I can turn in the right direction and stubbornly crawl.

"But even as hope died in Sam, or seemed to die, it was turned to new strength. Sam's plain hobbit-face grew stern, almost grim, as the will hardened in him, and he felt through all his limbs a thrill, as if he was turning into some creature of stone and steel that neither despair no weariness nor endless barren miles could subdue."

Thoughts on Ecumenism

There are holy, loving folk who throw themselves into Christian unity out of the goodness of their hearts. I've met them, and they are delightful people who see nothing extraordinary about their actions.

And then there are those of us who care about ecumenism because life forces us to.

When you grow up conservative Presbyterian, attend a Southern Baptist school, and marry an Episcopalian called to the priesthood, there's no choice. You have to deal with the fact that you and your parents now see the world differently. You have to deal with the fact that you will hear sermons at home that spur panic attacks - or rage. You have to deal with the fact that people you grew up and love would never take communion at your church. The pressure is great, even for people who move from one Protestant tradition to another. Heck, all I really had to do was get confirmed - imagine the pressure for those who have to be rebaptized. I can only imagine what it's like for Protestant converts to Catholicism or Eastern Orthodoxy, or vice versa. And at the very worst end of the spectrum are those whose parents disown them or their spouses divorce them, sometimes simply for changing denominations.

For those of us who speak multiple faith languages, there's a kind of dual citizenship or double consciousness. We end up being ambassadors for "the other" at every turn, or as interpreters in religious debates. (I can't tell you how many times I've said "Well, what he means by formation is sort of like discipleship -  we're not becoming pod people," etc.) We bilinguals are tempted to pride and arrogance too. Look at me, I can talk to everyone! Check out little miss peacemaker over here! Or more subtly - well, it's so nice that I straddle the fence, since now I can avoid the mistakes of both sides. I'm above all that. (Yes, I'm looking at you, Episcopalians who like to say "via media.")

Except you're not above anything - you're floundering in a sea of pride, hurt feelings, and confusion. And by you I mean me.

I'd love to write some insightful tips on becoming more ecumenical. Unfortunately, my own house stinks. I mock those I grew up with, eager to separate myself, to prove that I know better now. I pretend to be tolerant and then blow up over minor issues. I want to be part of the body of Christ as long as I can avoid the parts I don't like.

I have only one tip, and it's really a plea. There are many Christians who grieve for someone because they've fallen away - because their evangelical son became Eastern Orthodox and has an icon corner in his living room, or their daughter left the Baptists and joined the Catholic church at Easter, or their sedate, Episcopal husband had a religious experience and now attends the Pentecostal church where they speak in tongues, or their grandchildren are being raised as Methodists so the Calvinist grandparents sneak Lacrae CDs into their Christmas stockings. Did I miss anyone? OK, let me bring it home: my daughter decides that the Bible explicitly teaches Reformed theology, becomes OP because the PCA is too liberal, and has a classical homeschooling group with her church.

Now that we're all offended or worried, let me be clear: it's not our job to show them the light. They are adults. They are well aware of what you think, and they made a conscious decision to move elsewhere. You owe them respect - the respect of making their own decisions, teaching their children what they believe, and marrying someone who shares their thoughts.

And if you're the son/daughter/ husband/ wife, then take a good long look in the mirror before you get uppity.

Lent, Prayer, and all that Jazz

So, this will be my last post until after Easter. I suspect that the earth will keep spinning.

My plan is to "unplug" as much as possible, to go from the virtual life to real life, from the spirit to the flesh. I talked about the need to become a fleshly person, to accept the bodies God gave us, to treat our bodies with care and health, to remember that we aren't just brains-in-a-jar.

I also wanted to get back into prayer. I'm really, really terrible at praying, like, worse than you think you are. I get bored - by talking to God. How fucked up is that? And I try to read the daily office (the Episcopal liturgical daily prayers), and it goes right into the confession of sin, and I just sigh. I'm sick of my sins. I'm sick of doing the same ones over and over. I should just record a list and play it for the priest at confession (kidding). Speaking of which, my last confession was terrible: I mean, I needed to go and it was good that I went, and the priest is always wonderful, but I didn't prepare really well. By really well I mean at all. I had a particular sin hanging over me plus a semi-pervasive problem so that's what I went with, but I knew there was more and just didn't take the time to remember and think it through. I was "busy" you know, something was more important than taking the time to really heal from the sins that burden me.

With everything that's been going on lately (depression, sickness for me and my husband, a pretty intense regiment of counselors and other doctors, and just the regular work and commute and keeping our bodies fed and clothed) let's just say that it's been hard to keep my priorities straight. I commit to things without thinking them through because a call for volunteers tugs at my heart, and then I realize what a foolish mistake it was way, way too late. I feel overwhelmed with trying to keep up with a slew of relationships back home (several states away) while keeping life going up here. And in the back of mind I wonder: where will we be in 3 months? Will the diocese come through and find a position? Will we have to look elsewhere? Nick thought they'd be in South Carolina and now they're in Arizona. I'd be OK with Arizona, but please oh please Jesus not Michigan or Minnesota or North Dakota, the cold would do me in. And God don't You dare get that shifty grin on Your face. I'm onto Your tricks.

Sorry y'all, got lost in my own dialogue in my crazy head. Where was I?

Right, so, prayer. Really just my relationship with God just sucks on my part. He's done everything of course - held me in my panic attacks and gave me a surge of spiritual comfort, gave me the energy to get to Mass and Bible study on Wednesday, sent social events to me that I desperately needed but would never have sought out. God is so good.

Whenever I say God is good, I think of some homeless folks I've met. If you ask them how their days are going, 9 out of 10 they'll say "God is good, He's keeping me safe. A day with the Lord is a good day." "As long as I'm breathing I can praise God." "God sends down the rain and the sunshine, and it's no good to complain about the rain. You got to have the rain to get the green grass and trees."

Maybe I need to spend more quality time chatting. I've been avoiding the chats lately because it's cold and I'm a wimp, and because it's cold more of them are in shelters. But that's me being a pansy. If I'm going to build a relationship with God, I need to talk to the best theologians in town.

I also need to work with my strengths. It's no good fighting to stay awake on the bus before my coffee, trying to read morning prayer on my phone or going through the Rosary app. It is the epitome of a lost battle. So what can I do? What has worked for me in the past?

That was the question that our bishop asked us in study. What do you need in order to have a closer relationship with God? And the answer that popped into my mind was "retreats."

Not retreats where you go to a conference center in the woods and eat in a cafeteria and go to prayers and workshops and sit on porches with the older women. No, I need a retreat of just me and God in nature, even if it's just one of DC's natural parks, but even better if it's out in the country. Certain things feed different souls. Country, grass, walking on crunchy trees [haha just editing this and realized how tired I was when I wrote it, I meant grass], watching squirrels chase each other, fighting my way through brambles up a hill - these things nourish me. I'm starving, distracting myself from this hunger by the internet, but it burns inside me. My eyes need to look at things without written words. My body needs to deal with outdoor weather for awhile even if it's not my preference (it won't be until May). My nose needs to smell trees after the rain. My hands need to get little cuts and callouses and dirty fingernails. My legs need to walk for so long that when I climb into bed I am bone and muscle tired but my mind is refreshed and at peace. These days it's the other way around. We weren't meant to live like this: sitting all day, leaving the office after dark, sitting up late staring at glowing screens, eating in front of a laptop instead of around a table with friends.

But all that's just talk. I won't get this done without hard and fast rules and the kick in the butt that is Lent. But the rules can't be too onerous or I'll throw in the towel. That's why I'm writing this here, publically. Not to show off (I've read enough Lenten plans to know that I'm a rank beginner and that this will impress absolutely nobody), but to know that someone else knows my plans. If anyone reads this, I expect you to ask me I kept to it after Easter week.

Here are the rules:

1. No updates to the blog, and comments will be turned off Tuesday night through Pascua Sunday.
2. No reading any blogs, responding to previous comments, etc. No social media whatsoever.
3.No You Tube. That place is an evil trap of doom.
4.The websites I can use are as follows: gmail, weather.com, pandora, netflix for things my husband and I watch together, dish anywhere for the same purpose, project gutenberg, bbc.com for news, my church website, and sites with prayers and devotions such as divine mercy chaplet, audio rosary, mission st clare, etc.
5. A retreat on Saturday or Sunday each weekend in which I drive to a natural park in the area, perhaps taking a sketch book, journal, Bible, and Book of Common Prayer, or maybe the devotional books I'm reading, The Imitation of Christ, Interior Castle, or No Man is an Island. And spend time doing whatever feels best - walking vigorously, drawing, praying, reading the Psalms, Lectio Divino, reading an office, doing some intercessory prayer for people, whatever.
6. Take 5 minutes (timed) every evening in silence, seated, doing nothing.
7. Commit myself to daily intercessory prayer in the evening. Please leave any intentions you have for me and I'll add them to the list.
8. Pray this short prayer from the daily devotions section of the BCP as a morning offering:

Lord God, almighty and everlasting Father, You have brought us in safety to this new day: preserve us with Your mighty power, that we may not fall into sin, or be overcome by adversity; and in all we do, direct us to the fulfilling of Your purpose; through Jesus Christ our Lord, Amen.


Hold me to it friends! Have a blessed and fruitful Lent. And I'm cheating and going ahead and posting this "Sunday" post on Saturday. I mean, it's technically Sabbath the night before, right?

I Can't Be Cured of Depression

**For anyone who reads this and relates, please know that my prayers and thoughts are with you. If you ever think of committing suicide, please call 9-11 or a suicide hotline for help.**


Those of you with major depression know what I'm talking about. You get on medication, start doing counseling, and things are looking up. You have interests again! You don't want to sleep all day! You have the energy to get through a full day of work! All those little things that "normal" people take for granted are yours, or at least in part.

And then one day you think to yourself that the medication has worked so well that you can "finally" get off it. You dream of never again taking Zoloft/ Klonapin/ Prozac/ Welbutrin (I've done them all baby). You dream of "finally kicking this thing" and "functioning like a normal human being."

So maybe you decide to skip every other day. Just to experiment, just to see if it's just a sugar pill and you're experiencing a major placebo effect. Maybe you find yourself pretending to take your medication so that your spouse won't suspect you. You hate being deceitful, but "nobody understands" that you need to be strong, to kick the pill-popping, to stand on your own two feet.

And then one day you find yourself clinging to a rail at the metro station, tears welling up in your eyes as you try not to huddle on the filthy tile floor and sob. You want to call your husband but your hands are shaking so badly that you can't make a call. You try to focus on breathing slowly, in and out, while you listen to your heart pound. And when the train comes roaring by you jump like a hunted animal, and it's all you can do not to claw at your face.

The term for this is "medical non-compliance." It sounds so rebellious doesn't it? It doesn't sound at all like someone who just wants to "get off those meds." But there's one thing this past year has taught me, and that's not to judge people. People, don't ask God to teach you this, because He will, and it will hurt.

When you've found yourself in the psych department of the ER laughing hysterically and threatening the doctor - yes you, you little white middle class college-educated nerd - then everything changes. That woman on the street with the matted hair that's picking through the garbage and yelling at pigeons? That could be me without my advantages - without my husband, without medication, without our support system, without capable doctors, and yes, without meds. When I look at a "crazy person" I see myself, and it ain't pretty.

And when you are forced to look at all this, to take in the pain, then you finally admit that you are weak. I need medication in order to do things that "normal" people do without thinking, and you know what? Even with the meds it's not working so well. I still get panic attacks that require fast-acting medication and well-honed relaxation techniques. I still wonder if anyone actually likes me or if they just put up with me. I still wonder when my husband will realize what a mistake he's made and leave me, even though he's said over and over again how much he loves me, how he will never leave me. I still struggle to make it through work. A "good day" for me is a day without a full-blown panic attack. Thus far, today has been a good day.

So there are a couple of things I won't say anymore:

"I struggle with depression." No. I don't struggle with it, any more than someone struggles with diabetes. I have it, or it has me, but with the proper treatment and support it doesn't have to rule me.

"Once I get off the meds...". It is humiliating to realize that I may always require medication to balance my brain chemistry. It's humiliating because we stigmatize mental health, and I just want to be normal damnit. Apparently that's not in the cards. Oh well. Slowly but surely I'm discovering that maybe the strong thing to do is to accept that I need help.

I'm not looking for a cure anymore. I'm using the supports I have - the excellent cognitive-behavioral therapy I found in DC, the excellent psychiatrist at the same place (The Ross Center for Anxiety if you live in the area - it has excellent doctors and counselors), the medication, the breathing exercises, the yoga mat that I pull out every night though I rarely feel like it.

It's kind of like when you've done your first confession, and you feel light as a cloud, and then you sin again - badly. So you go a second time, and then a third, and then a fourth, and you start to wonder if you're a worse sinner than the others. And then one day you accept that for the rest of your life you will go to confession, and a huge weight rolls away. (Please note: I am emphatically NOT saying that depression is a sin. No, no, and no. The point of the analogy is that these problems ain't goin' nowhere).

I don't think it's coincidental that I had these epiphanies within days of each other.

And now I try to let it soak in. I will always need confession. I will always need treatment for depression. I will always need other people. I will always be dependent, and I will never be rich enough to turn away the gifts that God sends my way.

My Culture of Fear: TULIP

Growing up, I thought that we Calvinists were a persecuted minority among American Christians. The mythology went like this: all Protestants (except Methodists) were originally Calvinist. Baptists, Lutherans, Anglicans, Presbyterians, and the like, all believed in predestination, total depravity, and all the rest. However, the American churches in particular had been lead astray by false human doctrines called Armenianism, and now only a minority were faithful to the Word of God. (Catholics and early Christianity didn't really figure into the story; nobody ever talked about pre-Reformation Christianity except how corrupt the Popes were). We were part of that minority: those who were both conservative and Reformed, who hadn't given in to liberalism or Armenianism. If you've been part of a fearful group, you know the drill, except maybe you spoke in tongues amongst a bunch of Baptists or were the only group that knew the TRUTH about Jesus coming back for your congregation. It didn't help that a prominent Southern Baptist church in our town had our denomination listed as a cult. It also didn't help that I grew up in an area crawling with Baptists and Methodists and a bit slim on conservative Presbyterians.

That mythology has been burst. In a couple of decades, Calvinism has become cool again, as evidenced by the gradual take-over of the Southern Baptist Convention and the popularity of dominionist groups. Young people are especially attracted to this theology, perhaps because they've been disenchanted from the altar-call style evangelism of their youth. The image of a Calvinist is no longer Mark Twain's frozen chosen choir boy but a bald-headed hipster seminarian smoking a pipe with his ale. As one who was Calvinist before Calvinism was cool, I'm terrified by this turn of events.

Part of my worry is that young people are diving in head-first without thinking through the repercussions for their children. That may sound strong, but I have been severely wounded by Calvinist theology, and those wounds haven't healed yet. So nothing I say is meant to be against a particular Calvinist, unless he or she is obviously being manipulative or controlling of others. However, I'm not going to mince words when it comes to the theology, if only because many, many people have been wounded by it, some of them losing faith altogether. There are also many misconceptions about the theology, and it's good to know what people actually think outside of the stereotypes.

Here's what I grew up believing:

God is completely holy, pure, incorruptible. He is also unchanging - "immortal, invisible, God only wise." This means that God never changes His mind, or His "will," and that because He is God, His will is both unshakable and perfect.

Furthermore, because God is holy, He cannot look upon sin. This means that He cannot love a sinner whose sin is still visible to Him. Moreover, His perfect justice demands that all sins be punished. To be clear, this punishment is not meant to be a deterent for future sins, or a refining fire for penatants. This punishment is needed because God's holiness demands punishment for sins, full stop. Think of it as a mathematical equation, and in order to solve for X, sins must be punished by suffering.

Now, this holy God made everything, including Satan and mankind. In the beginning, Adam and Eve had free will, meaning that they could chose whether or not to obey God. They chose to disobey God. This act of rebellion spawned "The Fall," and this fall was total and complete. Because Adam and Eve ate the forbidden fruit, every human being is born without free will. In other words, no one can chose to worship or serve God, and no one desires to. Not only that, but we are spiritually dead and completely incapable of doing any good. The only reason we haven't all killed each other is because of "common grace," which means that God allots a certain amount of grace to most humans in order for human civilization to continue. I was taught that people like Hitler were not given common grace in order to show us what we are really like, but I don't know that all Calvinists think that. Most Calvinists would compare the unregenerate human heart to Lazarus' dead body, simply incapable of waking himself up or walking without Jesus' miraculous healing. Also, most Calvinists would never say that God pre-ordained evil, so there's a very fine line that one must walk. This is what is known as "total depravity," the T in TULIP.

In response to the Fall, God's holy nature requires punishment of sins (see number 2 above). However, God is also love, and He loved His elect so much that He sacrificed His Son in their place. This is similar to garden-variety evangelicalism but with a distinction. An Armenian would agree that God's holy nature requires punishment of sins; however, they would argue that Christ's death on the Cross was meant for all humanity. The onus is then on individual humans to accept the gift of Christ's death and believe that their sins are therefore forgiven. Calvinism is different: in this paradigm, Christ only died for those already predestined by God "before the foundation of the world." What this means is that Christ's sufferings are mathematical, an exact calculation for an exact number of people. The Calvinist would never say that Christ died for everyone, but only that He died for His elect. I was told that this way none of Christ's sufferings were "wasted" on those who would decide to reject Him (again, I don't know if all Calvinists think this, but it's certainly a common belief). This belief is called "limited atonement" and, for obvious reasons, is the most controversial Calvinist belief. There are so-called "Four Point Calvinists" who believe all the tulip except the L because of a niggling sense of compassion.

The U, for unconditional election, follows from those beliefs. Because of The Fall, man is totally depraved and has no free will. Because God is holy, all sins must be punished. Because God is love, He sacrificed His Son in place of the elect. Because man is totally depraved, i.e. has no free will, he requires direct intervention; ergo, God predestined a certain number of human souls to be saved. His election of these souls is eternal, meaning that it is outside of time altogether. Some Armenians would interpret election to mean that God foreknew - i.e. saw into the future - and knew that Sally Sue would accept Jesus Christ, and therefore Sally Sue is part of the elect. This is not how the Calvinist sees it. In Calvinism, God predestined Sally Sue before the foundation of the world for no discernible reason other than simply because He willed it. It had nothing to do with any choice or good works on her part, and it only had to do with God's (admittedly capricious) choice. This is called "unconditional election" because it is not conditional based on our will or works.

The I, for "irresistible grace," follows logically from unconditional election. If the creator of the universe wills for Sally Sue to be saved, then nothing can stop Sally from being saved. God's saving grace cannot be resisted by her or anyone else, cannot be stopped, cannot be negated by human sins. Those alarm bells ringing in your head are correct - this does sound a lot like rape. When I was a Calvinist though, I was derisive of those who called it divine rape. It goes back to the Lazarus analogy: Christ brought Lazarus back to life, and Lazarus didn't have anything to do with it. Lazarus came forth from the tomb because he had no choice, but no one thought Jesus was guilty of rape!

The P is for "perseverance of the saints," which is kind of controversial. I've heard it called "once saved always saved," but I've also heard Calvinists take great pains to distinguish it from once saved always saved. What I believed growing up is that if Sally is elect, then she will persevere in God until she dies. She may fall away for a time, but she will never be totally separated from God. This is the part where fear and legalism really come into play, because if you're not showing "signs of the elect" then you must not be saved. Jonathan Edwards was mildly obsessed with this problem and wrote a book about it called "Religious Affections." This is why so many atheists get the "No True Scotsman" fallacy thrown at them. After all, the existence of fallen Christians is really frightening if you believe in TULIP. These people thought they were saved, sincerely believed, and now they don't.

John Calvin actually took it a step further and believed that God would trick people into thinking they were chosen when they weren't, a little godly cat and mouse game. Not all Calvinists espouse this though, for obvious reasons. There is also disagreement on whether God foreordains souls for destruction or simply foreordains those whom He saves. In my opinion this is a non-sequiter because if you're not elect, you're headed for Hell, whether God assigned you a seat there or not. There are philosophical reasons to believe or not believe in "double predestination" (or as some would call it double secret predestination), but I'm not going to go into that here.

The other key element is that of "imputation." On the cross, our sins were imputed onto Jesus, and His righteousness is imputed to the elect. This is different from the Catholic idea of infused grace for many reasons. Unlike infused grace, imputed grace doesn't require an act of human will (see: unconditional election); the transaction can't be resisted by human will (see: irresistible grace); it's only offered to those whom God has chosen (see: limited atonement), and it can't be lost through human sin (see: perseverance of the saints). This grace also doesn't mean that we stop sinning or "aren't living in Mortal sin." What it does mean is that we are, in Martin Luther's phrase, a "snow-covered dung heap." We need the covering of Christ's righteousness (i.e. His perfect obedience on earth) so that God can stand to look at us, because a holy God cannot look on sin. I didn't understand this concept as a child, which is interesting because without it the whole building collapses. You want to try something disheartening, try being a Calvinist without understanding imputed grace, with a little Armenian altar-call theology and Last Times obsession stirred in for good luck.

If you're confused, the now-disbanded Caedmon's Call (the band Derek Webb used to write for) explains this quite clearly, in a more positive light than I can manage:






Now, most people would say that the above beliefs make God a monster. However, there's a catch: "who are you, O man, to question God?" You're totally depraved, remember? Your spiritual intellect is decayed, rotten to the core, and your moral compass is shot unless God supernaturally corrects it. So who are you to say that God is being capricious? You're a tiny, sinful human, and God is the pure, holy, sovereign creator. Aren't you being a wee bit presumptuous to judge God?

I'll let you sit with that.