The Sad State of Religion and American Public Life

Posted on March 1, 2024 by smaxreisert

When I was in Divinity School, way back in the later years of the twentieth century, one of the courses I took was a seminar taught by the then Dean of Harvard Divinity School, Ron Thiemann. The seminar focused on religion in American public life, a subject that was at the center of much of Dean Thiemann’s own scholarship. I don’t remember that seminar very well (it’s been several decades, after all), but I do remember, in a general way, the rather heady class discussions about various aspects of the relationship between religion and community life.

If I remember correctly, Dean Thiemann’s scholarship on this issue tried to argue for a way to consider religious conviction in public life without that conviction: a) being dismissed as solely a private matter, or b) becoming a weapon to dominate everything in its path. In the bits and pieces I can recall about our readings and class discussions in light of what’s happening in this current moment, it feels like those of us who shared that seminar together were all so ridiculously naïve. There we were talking about how to engage with the variety of religious experiences of those living in the United States, inviting differing voices into the public square, not only to assist in learning more about those with different belief systems, but to gain a deeper appreciation for one’s own tradition. We discussed the possibility of something that was beyond tolerance and acceptance, casting a vision of welcome and curiosity regarding the variety of faith practices of those who call the United States home. While we all recognized that these visions would be challenging to make even remotely real, there was a sense of possibility, that the grand visions were, at least partially, achievable.

These many years later, I can’t help but feel a profound sadness regarding the reality in which we find ourselves. The American public, generally speaking, seems far from curious when it comes to the religious landscape of our communities. Instead, there’s suspicion and even hatred for those who are different and, for those who do not practice any religion at all, there can be a harmful cynicism directed at those who do.

It’s a strange thing to try to hold together the shrinking numbers of active members of religious communities (according to a Public Religion Research Institute study, only 16% of Americans consider religion to be the most important thing in their lives), including (and in some cases most dramatically) Christianity, while at the same time reckoning with judges, politicians, and policy makers who declare, in their decisions and votes, the guidance of Christian scriptures and the Christian God. This is especially troubling given that there is no agreement across Christian traditions regarding the authority of scripture or how the faithful should perceive the presence of the God they worship. Those who assert a Christian “worldview” are actually asserting only their particular view. There is no way to assert one single Christian worldview. It simply doesn’t exist. Christianity is a sort of umbrella term for a myriad of denominations, churches, communities, and groups that feel a belief in or affinity for Jesus of Nazareth as the Messiah. Those who go about asserting a “Christian” worldview appear, in my humble opinion, to have no knowledge of the lessons actually contained in the scriptures they declare holy.

For anyone to make such a strong claim regarding his/her/their clear knowledge of God’s wishes and desires demonstrates a remarkable lack of awareness of what it actually means for mere mortals to worship God. Among those who claim to be people of faith, there must exist some degree of humility, a crucial recognition that to worship God is to acknowledge that one is NOT God and therefore limited in how one understands God. Such humility is essential for everyone if we are ever to share community space and community institutions in a respectful, productive and peaceful way.

The recent declaration of the chief justice of the Alabama Supreme Court stating that embryos created through IVF should be considered children, is one troubling example of the efforts among some Christians to assert their own brand of Christianity on the community in general. The justice, Tom Parker, stated, “Human life cannot be wrongfully destroyed without incurring the wrath of a holy God.” Just this statement alone begs a whole host of significant questions when it comes to the intersection of religious convictions and American public life— how is “wrongfully” defined and to what extent does God allow for the destruction of human life in not “wrongful” ways? What is the wrath of God? What does it mean to call God holy? Doesn’t “holiness” of a divine being imply that one should not be going about making such definitive statements about what a “holy God” expects and demands from human beings?

I could go on, but you probably get the picture.

Scanning the religious and political landscape of these days, when there is so little interest in learning and talking, working together, seeking common ground or compromise, we are left with a decided mess. And, more than that, we are left with an environment clearly lacking in anything that can be characterized as holy or meaningful. We people of faith ought to aspire to something better, a place where our convictions can help lead us to understanding and growth, grace and blessing.

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It’s Time to Put Aside the Rose-Colored Glasses

Posted on February 16, 2024 by smaxreisert

In the first church I served, as a student minister and then as the assistant pastor, way back in the early 1990s, I had the chance to experience a fairly wide range of the typical world of the local church pastor. I participated in worship, preached about once a month, met with a couple of church committees, and went on regular home visits to a few parishioners. One of the people who was on my visit list was an elderly woman named Louise. Louise had lived in Cambridge all of her life and graduated from Radcliffe College, class of 1925. Although her husband had died a couple of decades before I met her, she was the sort of person who could talk about her life with her husband without ever falling into a morose, depressed, woe-is-me kind of attitude. Louise was upbeat about life in general. She enjoyed getting to know younger people and was a bit of a magnet in her old Cambridge neighborhood, with various neighbors eager to join her to watch her favorite PBS shows or to discuss the latest bestsellers over tea. I remember one of my visits involved Louise asking me to compare Al Gore’s Earth in the Balance with an environmental book written by Harvard professor E.O. Wilson. At the time, I hadn’t read either.

Louise lived not far from the Radcliffe campus, in a neighborhood that had caught the attention of the powers-that-be at Harvard, especially those who dealt with real estate. Harvard had started buying up houses in Louise’s neighborhood. This wasn’t much of a concern for Louise— until Harvard started painting those houses using “historically informed” colors. Louise was outraged. ”Those colors went out of fashion for a reason!” I remember her declaring during one visit. And, then she went on, just in case I had missed her point, “Those colors are ugly! They were then and they still are. And, now I have to look at them every day.”

My visits with Louise often involved this sort of scenario. While Louise loved to talk about the past, her early life growing up in Cambridge, how she had met her husband and then their life together, she never talked about any of it with rose-colored glasses. To listen to her stories involved the good, the bad and everything in between. 

We could use a good dose of that in lots of things, including at Old South. As we continue to shrink in number and try to deal with the reality of our very needy buildings, there is the occasional comment about how things “used to be.” Those comments usually connect to memories of a regularly full sanctuary and the sense of the signficance of the church to the community in general. Anybody who was anyone was a member of Old South, etc.

But, in the midst of the nostalgia, there are a few troubling truths. One person who is a life-long member of the church recently told me about something that happened in the 1970s. A national publication had listed Hallowell as a gay-friendly place. Some of the members of Old South, especially those who lived in Hallowell, were furious. They didn’t like their small city becoming associated with an openness to gays and lesbians. When Old South was going through its Open and Affirming process that resulted in an Open and Affirming statement that was approved by the congregation in 2008, the then-moderator of the congregation told me that in the 1980s, there were church members who wouldn’t eat at certain Hallowell restaurants because there was “something in the water.” The implication was that the water somehow caused people to become homosexual.

The past isn’t always so rosy as people remember. That’s certainly true for Old South, sometimes in heartbreaking ways. In my first few years of serving as pastor at Old South, in the latter half of the first decade of the 2000s, I officiated at the memorial service for a young man who had died in a tragic accident in San Francisco. When I met with the family, they shared with me that this young man, who had known from an early age that he was gay, had never felt welcome at his family’s church. It was deeply distressing to realize that the only time when this young man would receive a full and unconditional welcome at Old South was at his funeral.

There are plenty of other stories as well, of times when the church was not exactly a loving, accepting and welcoming place. Other churches have even more horrible tales to tell, especially around the abuse of children and women.

It’s time to take the rose-colored glasses off and ditch them permanently. If we are to look back, it ought to be with a clear, unfiltered gaze. Our future is not back there and that’s a good thing. Plus, there are important realities of the Church’s past that must be acknowledged. We may be smaller in these days, but maybe, just maybe, we might find a new awareness of what it means to be a faithful and loving church, walking in the ways of our Savior who so often sought out and lifted up the marginalized.

We won’t be perfect either, but we have an important opportunity to do a bit better.

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Haunted

Posted on January 31, 2024 by smaxreisert

Over the last few years, as Old South has focused on how to move into the future with our shrinking congregation and our stubbornly unshrinking, and demanding, physical plant, people have had a variety of responses to the plans we have considered. As we began to coalesce around the possibility of putting the sanctuary building up for sale, and have now done so, I have heard from several people— none of them currently active members of Old South— who have denigrated this particular decision by way of conjuring what seems to them the certain assessment of people who were once devoted Old South members, but are now no longer among the living. The comment usually goes something like, “If so-and-so were still alive, this would surely kill him (or her).”

I haven’t yet figured out how to respond to this sort of appraisal of the church’s situation. In one case, I’m not in agreement that the person, who cannot speak for herself (at least not without the aid of a Ouija board), would be so devastated by the decision to put the building up for sale. That particular person was always practical and realistic, able to adjust to changes and circumstances. The other now deceased former members who have been lifted up in this way probably would be raging against the possible sale of their beloved sanctuary. Still, these individuals are no longer with us (although if they were, in significant enough numbers, we wouldn’t be in the difficult position we are in).

It’s strange to me that names of former members are invoked in this way. I realize that the people who make these sorts of declarations are using the deceased as proxies for their own view, but it feels deeply disrespectful to use the deceased in this way, to make such brazen assumptions about their views and perceptions. To call out the disrespect, though, feels unproductive, at best.

How do we deal with the ghosts of the past? Should we consider in any way, how those who have gone before might perceive the process and actions that have taken place in their absence? Why should those who have left us have any sway over our decisions or how we live in the midst of those decisions? Should we consider inviting a medium to our meetings and gatherings to see if those from the great beyond have something meaningful to share?

What seems especially problematic about all of this is that those who invoke the names of the deceased are all, themselves, not currently actively engaged in the work, ministry or worship of the Old South community. While they may have been in the past, they are no longer and have not been for some time. They are akin to living ghosts, haunting us with their judgments that are rooted firmly in the past and in their connection to Old South that exists only in their memories.

While the life of a faith community is always connected to the past, as we regularly and significantly look to ancient story for guidance in living our individual and collective lives, communities of faith are called to look forward. In our balancing act of considering the old, the new and the current, we cannot be beholden to the presumed opinions of individuals who are now bereft of life, have ceased to be, whose metabolic processes are history, those who have joined the choir invisible (it’s difficult to mention death without a nod to the Monty Python Dead Parrot sketch). Communities of faith are living things. Our work, and mission, is about now and what is to be. While it’s appropriate to honor and memorialize those who are no longer with us, the deceased cannot (for obvious reasons) be actively engaged in our life together as we seek to be the Body of Christ. 

The only dead person who matters is the One who was also resurrected, the One who gives us life and points the way to hope, love, joy and the fullness of life. He’s the One whose opinion ought be at the core of all we do.

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On to Cincinnati

Posted on January 14, 2024 by smaxreisert

Although my status as a fan of the New England Patriots has waned a bit in recent years (not just because of the excessive losses; the danger associated with playing football is increasingly unsettling), I’ve been a very enthusiastic fan in the past. I’ve been an especially avid fan of the now former head coach, Bill Belichick. I’ve written at least a couple blog posts that involve the dour countenance of the Greatest Of All Time (GOAT) coach in the NFL.

Among the qualities associated with the GOAT that I’ve admired: do your job, trusting that the team works best when each player is fully focused on their own job; do your job well, going above and beyond the basic requirements of one’s position; an understanding that sentimentality is often detrimental to the health of an organization; and, while there are lessons to be learned from the past, an organization that wishes to endure must always look to the future. These are good qualities to consider in a church environment as well.

One of Bill Belichick’s most famous (infamous?) post-game press conferences occurred in 2014. The Patriots had just been blown out of the water in a stunning, humiliating defeat, losing to the Kansas City Chiefs 41-14. Patriots fans, and non-fans, thought the season was over. During the press conference that followed that horrible game (for Patriots fans), Bill Belichick repeated multiple times, “We’re on to Cincinnati.” Coach Belichick didn’t want to spend time outlining the team’s faults, issues and problems. There were many and they were obvious to anyone paying attention. The Coach was ready to put the loss aside and move onto the next game, which happened to be against the Cincinnati Bengals. That season, the Patriots did more than simply move on to the next game. They won the Super Bowl.

There’s something to be said about learning when it’s time to move on, when it’s time to let go of something that has happened in the past—whether good, bad or neutral— and move on to the next thing. Congregations would do well to employ something along these lines. There’s a lot of “remember when” talk in congregations, especially among those that have been around for a long while and are now feeling distress in declining numbers. It’s not always a bad thing to talk about the past, except when visions of the past interfere with the present and the future. I think that’s what Belichick was trying to convey in his memorable comeback to the press in 2014.

Congregations, of course, are not professional sports teams. Still, there are lessons from team sports that make for good moments for reflection. While concepts of “winning” and “losing” are not easily transferred to a church setting, other aspects of teamwork ought to be considered, as a community works together to remain a vital congregation, actively connected to the Spirit. Vibrant congregations (regardless of size) are ones that, while appreciating the past, are not beholden to that past. In this regard, I cannot help but think of a congregational gathering at Old South in which one person was so outraged at the possibility that the congregation would put at least one of the buildings up for sale that she asked, “What do you think ______ would think about this? ______ would be outraged!” The person she was referring to is dead, and has been for several years.

We cannot keep looking to the past. The past may hold many wonderful and powerful memories, and moments of significant meaning, but the past doesn’t hold the future, or even the present. Especially for congregations that are shrinking, dwelling in the past is downright dangerous. We forget that the past had its own problems. Plus, remembering only that the past involved more people can cause us to fall into a sort of communal self-pity that leads to despair. Despair is not a constructive attitude for the life of faith. We may not exactly be “on to Cincinnatti,” but we are being led, through faith and trust, by our God who loves us more than we can imagine and challenges us always to live in holy relationship, open to the sometimes unexpected twists and turns that seem always to be a crucial element of the story of God and God’s people.

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Mary, Her Womb, and Her Choice

Posted on December 23, 2023 by smaxreisert

Then Mary said, “I am the Lord’s servant. Let it be with me just as you have said.” Then the angel left her.

Luke 1:38 (CEB)

For all of my adult life, reproductive rights have been a key component of my awareness of the world in which I live and the point around which, for the most part, my political decisions are made. I believe strongly that a woman has a fundamental right to determine how she will deal with her reproductive capacity. I also believe strongly that women must be trusted in making moral decisions regarding their own bodies.

Just like Mary.

At this Christmas, as we reflect on a difficult and brutally violent year, the scale of the erosion not only on reproductive rights, but of female autonomy and agency, is dramatic and alarming. Although voters in various states have made it abundantly clear that they favor reproductive rights for women, many lawmakers and policy makers take a different view. That different view has taken on a brazenly misogynistic tone.

I wonder what Mary would think. In her song of praise from the Gospel According to Luke, Mary lifts up her understanding, appreciation, and awareness of God as a God who looks after the lowly and considers the powerful and arrogant with scorn. Luke’s Gospel offers a view of Mary, who may be lowly in status, but is thoughtful and intelligent, and cognizant of her choice to carry the Son of God.

Too bad— and it’s very seriously too bad— that many Republicans aren’t paying attention. Like Texas Attorney General, Ken Paxton, who believes that a woman must continue to carry a fetus, even though that fetus has a fatal condition. And, then there’s Speaker of the House Mike Johnson who, at a House Judiciary Committee hearing in 2022, suggested that the right to abortion was harming the national economy by depriving the country of “able-bodied workers.” Mr. Johnson has also suggested that his worldview is dictated by the Bible. Yet, he doesn’t seem all that aware of Mary, her song of praise, or the implication that Mary was more than a womb.

Women ought not be defined by their reproductive capacity. If we look to Mary, as depicted by Luke, we have a woman not bound solely to her ability to carry that holy pregnancy to term, then deliver and raise the Son of the Most High. Mary engages in mutual support and encouragement in the time she shared with Elizabeth, pregnant with the one who would become known as John the Baptist. In her song of praise, Mary articulates a heady theological understanding of the God she worships and a good clue regarding why she chose to say yes to this most profound of pregnancy and birth experiences. Mary is pragmatic and flexible, giving birth in less than ideal surroundings. She’s a bold and brave adventurer, traveling to Bethlehem so close to her delivery date. And, she’s thoughtful and contemplative, as she ponders the visit of the shepherds after the birth.

Time and time again, the Church, capably accompanied by those who serve as clergy and those who faithfully worship, backs Mary into a very small corner. While many Roman Catholics find her to be helpful in prayer, one to whom they are eager to pray especially when life gets challenging, she rarely is able to break free from the role of mediator between humble human beings and their Savior. Many Christians, especially Protestants, think little of Mary. Christians generally don’t spend a lot of time reflecting on Mary as a person, as a parent, as a woman. 

Mary offers rich territory where faithful Christians ought to spend more time pondering. It’s well beyond time to take Mary out of her corner, out of that stable, and allow her to share a lesson or two about what it means to be faithful, what it means to have choice, what it means to live in family and community, and what it means to trust and to be trusted.

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In the “Words Matter” Department

Posted on December 15, 2023 by smaxreisert

In November, the members of Old South Church in Hallowell, Maine gathered in a congregational meeting and voted to put the church’s sanctuary building up for sale. The church community had spent a great deal of time considering our various issues and problems and trying to devise some sort of solution to the growing problem of maintaining and sustaining two separate— aging and needy— buildings. At some point, it became clear that the best way forward was to put the sanctuary building up for sale, since it is the building in more need of repair while it also possesses problems that cannot be easily solved— the building is nestled into a hillside, making it difficult to access, even for the very mobile; it has only a couple of parking spots immediately adjacent to the building, with no space to add new spots; and, the sloped sanctuary floor (stadium seating!) is problematic for anyone in a wheelchair as well as those who are even a little unsteady on their feet.

The not so unexpected, but still frustrating, problem that has arisen from the vote in November is this: there are too many people who refer to our “selling of the church.” We have people who will say things like, “It’s a shame that it’s come to this, that we need to sell the church.” Or, “I’m disappointed, but I understand why it’s necessary that we sell the church.”

WE ARE NOT SELLING THE CHURCH!

Whenever I correct someone, reminding them that we are not, in fact, selling “the church,” that we are selling the sanctuary building and that there’s a big difference, they usually respond with a sound of annoyance and a “you know what I mean.” Yes, I know what they mean, but I also know that words matter. In this instance, it’s crucial that we get the language right. Not only are we not “selling the church,” but we are actually making decisions that will allow the church, if we are able to sell the sanctuary building, to exist longer into the future.

By keeping both buildings, we would need to drain our resources in a serious and precipitous way. The basic maintenance for both buildings is significant, but certainly more for the sanctuary building. Add needed renovation costs and Old South’s future is looking a lot more precarious. We would not only be “selling the church,” but closing it. If we can sell the sanctuary building, we can extend our existence for a much longer period of time.

Words matter here. They matter to how we think of ourselves, as individuals and as a group. They matter to how we perceive our call, how we endeavor to live out our faith. They matter to how we share the Good News of Jesus Christ.

Jesus did not call on his followers to build big, grand buildings in order to worship him, to feel more closely drawn to God. Buildings in which the faithful gather can be extraordinarily beautiful and awe-inspiring. Buildings can help people connect to the divine. Still, the building is not the church. 

The church is made up of the people who gather within its walls. There’s no question that it’s nice to have a convenient place where we can gather and it’s even nicer when that space can be described as beautiful. But the building is significantly and importantly not the church. 

We’ll see how this plays out in our process. I hope that as we follow this path, more people will grasp the significance of the people being the church, while also gaining an appreciation that the words we use matter as we talk about ourselves as a church, as the Body of Christ. Our words reflect our knowledge of and connection to who we are and to whom we belong. In this holiday season, it is even more important to embrace that it’s the characters who count and not the structures in which they congregate. The manger didn’t do anything to share the Good News of birth. It was the people who gathered there.

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The Allure and Emptiness of Strength, in the Face of Advent

Posted on November 30, 2023 by smaxreisert

With Thanksgiving in the rearview mirror, we turn our attention to Advent and Christmas. In the midst this busy time and all of the difficulties this country (and the world) is facing, I (along with a whole lot of other people) continue to find myself puzzling over the strange allegiance of so many evangelical Christians to a certain former president. The media I read on a regular basis consistently admits to a general state of bafflement at the tenacious attachment of so-called Christians to the former president, now charged with various crimes, and sounding more and more brazenly thuggish and mean-spirited. Recent news headlines include: “Facing Off in Washington, DeSantis Tries to Shake Trump’s Hold on Christian Right” (New York Times, 9/15/23); “Donald Trump and Christian Nationalism” (Opinion, New York Times, 10/24/23); “Vulgarities, Insults, Baseless Attacks. Trump backers follow his lead” (Washington Post, 11/19/23); “The GOP’s top ‘person of faith’: More Republicans think Trump is religious than Pence, Romney” (Salon.com, 9/27/23).

Advent and Christmas offer an especially stark contrast between basic Christian teachings and the near constant barrage of utterances (verbal or otherwise) from the former president. So, I wonder: what’s going on here? My mother might offer a clue.

About a year ago, I was visiting with my mother at the nursing home where she now lives, as she continues her aggressive descent into dementia. We were in the nursing home’s atrium area and there was a television on, broadcasting the news. I don’t know what news story they were covering, but a video or a picture of the current president popped up. My mother pointed and said, “I don’t like him. I like the other guy.” I knew what she was talking about. My mother, a life-long Christian although not an evangelical, had been a big fan of Donald Trump and I am sure, if she were in a healthier state, she would be cheering him on still and forwarding obnoxious emails to relatives and friends about how great Trump is.

I asked her why, why she preferred that other guy to the current guy. She thought for a moment, furrowing her brow. Finally, she said, “strength.” After thinking a bit more she said, “The other guy was stronger. This guy [Joe Biden, who’s face had disappeared from the television at that point] is weak. Strong is better.”

Despite her dementia, my mother offers a bit of insight into what may be a steep, uphill battle to separate at least some self-identified Christians from their allegiance to Trump. There’s really no way another candidate is going to come across as stronger than Trump. Pretty much every other candidate is, more or less, in their right mind and is not an egotistical crazed power-hungry fanatic who will say anything to regain the presidency, including egregiously dangerous statements about power and strength.

Strength is certainly a significant issue. But, how do faithful Christians grapple with the complex intersection of strength, in terms of the teachings of Jesus, and strength, as an element of public and national safety and security?

We are about to begin Advent, the season of spiritual preparation leading to Christmas. Pretty much every Christian in this country will have some sort of representation of the story of the birth of Jesus in their home and in their church and maybe even outside their church. The “manger” scene will, typically, involve a strange, but familiar, mash-up of the birth stories offered in the Gospels of Luke and Matthew (Mark and John don’t include birth narratives and those in Luke and Matthew don’t actually line up all that well— but that’s another issue). In the middle of those scenes, there will be a very small human, clearly an infant: Jesus. God incarnate. Presumably, God could have taken on human flesh in a whole bunch of different ways. But God chose the path of pregnancy, birth, infancy, and childhood. God chose to take on human flesh in the small and vulnerable.

There is no strength here. Instead, there is dependence. One might even say “weakness.”

So how in the world can it be that so many Christians, mostly of an evangelical inclination, are so smitten with a very different kind of strength? How can it be that so many evangelical Christians seem to relish in the guns blazing approach of Trump, contorting that sort of strength to line up with the very different image of strength that Christmas so blatantly and obviously provides?

If we consider other crucial components of Jesus‘s life, and certainly the end of Jesus‘s earthly life, it is crystal clear that Jesus did not subscribe to the notion that armies, tanks, guns and high-powered weaponry are the way to show strength. In fact, Jesus did just the opposite by submitting to the violence of the age, trying to demonstrate through his life, and death, that the worldly desire for strength leads only to destruction, chaos and fear.

This final Christmas before the next presidential election, the situation we are in feels very precarious and shakier still when there’s such a wide gap between perceptions and reality, or basic theology. For my mother, I suspect her desire for strength has a lot to do with wanting to feel secure, that a certain kind of rhetoric, and demonstration of forcefulness, could offer the equivalent of a security blanket, something that feels like it will protect when life gets scary.

The problem is that Jesus never had anything to do with that kind of strength, except to teach— time and time again— that it was not part of his ministry, or what he expected from his followers. Yet, many seem completely convinced that Jesus and a Trump-style strength are easily connected. This year, they ought to take a closer look at that beloved manger scene and consider anew what that tiny infant is trying to say.

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What’s the Word?

Posted on November 11, 2023 by smaxreisert

The members of Old South Church in Hallowell, Maine will gather after worship tomorrow, Sunday, November 12, 2023, to vote on a plan put forward by the governing body of the church to put the sanctuary building up for sale. We’ve known this day would come— eventually. Our congregation is shrinking and our buildings are becoming harder and harder to maintain. Nestled into a hill with only a couple of parking spots immediately adjacent, the sanctuary building has also become harder for our older (and younger) folks to access.

One of the things that I’m finding especially interesting is to listen in for the words that are uttered as people talk about the decision ahead. Some of the words are not surprising: sad, anxious, worried, it’s time, heartbroken. Other words are surprising, like “angry.” One woman started talking about how sad she was about the vote. She hasn’t been attending Old South for very long and loves the sanctuary. And, now we are voting on a decision to try to sell it. “I’m just so . . . ., “she said lingering on what to say after “so.” The first word she said was “sad,” but then she said that wasn’t the right word. Finally, the word popped out: “angry.”

People at Old South don’t use the word “angry” a lot. I found it interesting to hear this woman not only utter the word, but struggle to find a comparable word before finally uttering the word that clearly was on her mind. She just wasn’t sure what sort of reception it would get.

She’s actually not the first to say the word “angry” in recent months. Others are angry too. What prompts the anger is connected to the realization that we find ourselves in a situation we never imagined. When most, if not all, of us first became actively connected to a church, we assumed that the church would continue, mostly as is. Sure, there would be change, but nothing so dramatic as selling a building or, as other congregations have been forced to face, closure. For those of us who like to attend church, who count on our community of faith to get through life, it’s very difficult to find ourselves with the sort of decision point that looms before us. How did this happen?

In the book The Great Dechurching, Jim Davis and Michael Graham seek to unravel the various issues that have led to the “largest and fastest shift [in the religious landscape] in US history.” From their more evangelical position, the trends are especially alarming. From a traditional mainline church, we’ve been in the midst of the shift for a very long time. There’s a lot going on in the great shift, but at Old South, part of our response is anger— anger directed at those expressions of the Church that have torn at the fabric of Christian legitimacy. Those who are angry are especially angry at those who have perpetrated or have participated in—directly or indirectly— the myriad moral and ethical scandals that have rocked the Roman Catholic Church, the Southern Baptists and many evangelical churches. While no denomination is free from error and sin, the United Church of Christ has not experienced anything like the terrible scandals of clergy abuse of children and women. Yet, we feel the punishment, as people flee Christian communities. We feel the judgment. While we certainly feel sympathy toward those who have left the Church because of serious moral lapses and hypocrisy, some of us our angry at those who have so wantonly harmed the Church and her denominations.

So, along with the sense of heartbreak, sadness and anxiety, there’s anger. And, it’s not just about the scandals. There are other issues too, like the decline in attendance that began in the 1970s, especially in mainline churches. The anger is not simply about what we ourselves are losing, but what wider communities are losing as churches shrink to the point of vanishing. It doesn’t take much looking to see the brokenness of our society, the frayed edges of our threadbare social fabric. The Church, and her denominations, is not the perfect antidote. But, churches have been significant resources of hope and healing. They are places that are usually good at reaching out to the lost and least, the isolated and the lonely. They are places, usually, that help people appreciate that each person is valued and treasured.

That we are being stifled and harmed from the inside and the outside, it’s no wonder that we are struggling to find just the right words to describe our experience. Heartbreak and anger. Sadness and frustration. But, it’s important that in this time we consider not only our words, but the Word, the One who offers hope and love even when things look so bleak, even unto death.

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Way Too Many Names

Posted on October 28, 2023 by smaxreisert

I’m not sure when I started this practice, but whenever there’s a mass shooting, I look for the names of the victims and I read through them. If there’s information on each individual’s life, I read that too. When I started this little practice, I had no idea how often it would become a part of my life or that I would read so many names and learn about so many people who were usually engaging in some completely normal aspect of life when a terrible violence was visited upon them.

This morning, I read through the names of those who were shot and killed in this week’s mass shooting in Maine. Eighteen people. Eighteen. Shot and killed by a man with clear mental health struggles who somehow still had access to weapons that could produce such massive slaughter in such a short period of time. Eighteen people shot and killed just a forty-five minute drive from Old South. Plus, at least thirteen others injured. While Maine has experienced other mass shootings, this week’s incident was, by far, the largest and the first not to be a domestic violence situation (horrible in their own way, but different from the random nature of the violence that took place this week).

It’s not that I thought such a horrific event would never take place in Maine, although Maine was recently declared the safest state in the country. But, I had hoped that maybe we would somehow escape what seems to have become a component of American life. Maine is a decidedly gun-friendly state. I remember when we first moved here and a neighbor tried to help me appreciate the significance of hunting. Eventually, I came to sort of understand, although I always bristle in November when I must don myself in blaze orange whenever I leave the house. I’ve also bristled when I’ve encountered people with “open carry” permits who, in fact, openly carry their guns on their person. I usually simply move away from them as quickly as possible. For the most part, though, I feel very safe in Maine. There’s a sense of safety and security in the small population of people. We may not all know each other, but there’s likely only one or two degrees of separation between any two random people in this state.

When the news came of the shooting in Lewiston, it was alarming and shocking. It also brought a sense of numbness, especially around the feeling that, once again, a lot of words would be spoken, but nothing meaningful will happen to prevent such clearly preventable tragedies.

Out of respect for those who perished— Billy Brackett, Maxx Hathaway, Bill Young, Aaron Young, Stephen Vozella, Arthur Strout, Joshua Seal, Ronald Morin, Michael Deslauriers, Joe Walker, Lucy Violette, Bob Violette, Peyton Brewer-Ross, Tricia Asselin, Bryan MacFarlane, Thomas Conrad, Jason Walker and Keith Macneir— as well as those who were injured, and for all of their friends and loved ones, I offer this prayer from our Thursday prayer service at Old South:

We gather with weary spirits.  As if there’s not already too much in the world that weighs on our hearts and minds, a mass shooting has taken place in our own backyard.  Gather us in, holy God, and offer us the balm of love and hope that only You can offer.  Help us to lean upon you in this time of great need, in this time of terrible tragedy. We lift up in prayer: the families and friends of those who were killed; those who were injured; for family and friends awaiting news; for law enforcement and first responders, for doctors and nurses and medical staff; for the perpetrator of this monstrous act and for his family; for those who feel the pull to commit such an atrocity upon their neighbors; for community leaders, mental health professionals, those who have reached out to help, to listen, to offer a caring hand or ear; for young people who are frightened about the dangerous and violent world in which they are growing up; for lawmakers and policy makers who lift up their thoughts and prayers, but do nothing else, who fail to do anything meaningful to stem the violence and the access to weapons with the power to kill so many so quickly; for each and every one who desires a better way, who works diligently for more sustainably peaceful communities. Be with us, Holy God, and strengthen us. Walk with us on the journey, that we may be be about your holy work, to bring healing and hope. God in your infinite mercy, hear our prayer. Amen.

And, help us, O God, to be mindful of the long, long list of the names of your beloved children, that we find the will and the way to keep that list from growing and growing and growing and growing. There are way too many names already.

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Big Questions

Posted on October 17, 2023 by smaxreisert

At last week’s Bible study session, the main topic of conversation revolved around the current worship series (looking for new wisdom in the old stories of the Hebrew Scriptures) and the previous Sunday’s scripture and sermon on the Ten Commandments. It didn’t take long for the small group to engage in lively conversation. To what extent are the Ten Commandments relevant to us today? Do we think about them? Do we use them as a guide for how we live our lives? Is the sternness of “commandment” helpful or not, as we consider the significance of the demands that are contained in the famous list? And in what ways do we find connection between the Ten Commandments and the summary of the “the Law” set out by Jesus in the “Golden Rule,” to love God and to love one’s neighbor as oneself?

Our conversation hummed along, as we reflected on the fact that, while murder seems an easy commandment to follow, other commandments are more complicated, like coveting and bearing false witness (lying). What about the white lies we tell, like the ones we must tell to a loved one with dementia? What does it mean to break a commandment in that way? And, what about “honoring father and mother”? What does honoring look like when one was raised in a dysfunctional environment?

We moved on to consider what it means to “love,” as in love God with all your heart, mind, soul and strength and love your neighbor as yourself. I’ve always found Frederick Buechner’s insight very helpful to this point. While we are called to “love our neighbor,” being attentive to the well-being of others, we are not called to “like” our neighbors. The difference is significant.

Finally, one of the group piped up, “What about evil and those who commit evil acts? How do we honor the commandments in the face of, in the midst of, evil? How do we deal with people who essentially break all of the commandments? What sort of responsibility does a person of faith have in the face of evil? The conversation turned to the horrific events that had recently taken place in Israel, and then to Hitler, along with his very willing companions. I also thought of the subject matter of the soon-to-be-released film, Killers of the Flower Moon. I read the book, written by David Grann, last year. It’s a deeply unsettling book not only about evil, but the complex web that develops around evil acts, pulling even the unwitting and unwilling into its sticky strands.

What is required of the faithful? We might prefer to think that we aspire to walk in the ways of the words of the prophet Micah, acting justly, loving kindness and walking humbly with God (Micah 6:8), but the reality of our lives is complicated and there are certainly times when we participate in evil without even knowing it. And, then there is the enormity of evil. How do we find value in our small acts of resistance to evil and in our seemingly inconsequential commitment to looking out for the well-being of our neighbors, both near and far.

It may not be much, but I found myself moved by the conversation that took place during that Bible study gathering. Though we were a small group, there was both the willingness and the desire to engage with big questions, important questions. Those gathered there articulated an important vulnerability, that our lives of faith are always a work in progress and, if we can agree on one thing that is required of us, that we are called to take our faith seriously and to appreciate that God calls us to do things that are hard and sometimes even dangerous. Walking humbly with God is just the beginning.

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