Rambling thoughts after a weekend ramble.

Poetry is not my thing. Maybe it is my inherent lack of rhythm. Perhaps I am too practical a person. For whatever reason, I don’t get poetry and, frankly, I don’t care all that much for poetry. If ever I were to aspire to be a man of letters, I would need much remedial work in the poet’s art.

I thought well of myself, then, this past Monday as Becky and I were making our way across Michigan’s Upper Peninsula. We had spend a glorious weekend with friends in our old stomping grounds around Menominee at the furthest southwest point of the U.P. Our route along U.S. 2 on the south side of the peninsula and the shore of Lake Michigan was partly through the Hiawatha National Forest.

I turned to Becky and asked, “So other than Longfellow and the shore of Gitchee Gumee?” what did Hiawatha do to have a National Forest named after her? We had enough of a cell signal for a quick Google search. It turned out I would have scored some Trivial Pursuit points, but maybe not a pie slice worth.  “The Song of Hiawatha” is a Henry Wadsworth Longfellow poem, and it is known for the line “By the shore of Gitchee Gumee…” (In fact, you don’t get to Gitchee Gumee until Part 22 of a way too long epic poem). But Hiawatha was not the princess I thought she was; he was an Ojibwe warrior in love with Minnehaha, a Dakota maiden. Continue reading →

In March we bought a new car. A Honda CR-V, it is our retirement-grandparent-road trip car.  We like it a lot. The Honda is a smart car, and smarter than any car we’ve owned before.  In addition to telling us when to change the oil and informing us of our current fuel consumption rate, the car keeps us in our lane, slows down when we’re too close to the car in front of us, and flashes a warning when there’s a car or truck in our blind spots.  One of the features allows us to round curves with our hands off the steering wheel (though the owner’s manual advises us not to take our hands off the steering wheel – ever).

The car can be a bit of a nag, telling us we’ve been a bit inattentive and that it’s time to stop for a cup of coffee.
 
The Honda is usually right. I did wander across the center line or forgot to use the turn signal on that lane change.  But it is not always right. It gets upset in some construction zones when its cameras and its algorithms cannot determine the lane lines in order to remind me to stay within them. Back in April we were driving through Montana when we hit a mini-blizzard and a few minutes of close-to-whiteout conditions.  Without a word of apology, the car told me its radar was obstructed and that I was on my own to make it through.  Continue reading →

This coming Sunday is July 4.  How shall we celebrate the Lord’s Day when it falls on Independence Day?  And how shall we celebrate Independence Day when it falls on the Lord’s Day?

I’ve just entered my second year of retirement, so the question of Lord’s Day worship on July 4 takes on more of an academic tint than it had when I was planning worship week by week.  For sure, my musings are more for me than for our church here in Auburn or the church we will attend this Sunday in Memphis during a visit to our daughter and her family.

The question of July 4 worship (or first Sunday in July worship) has been a question since maybe 1776, but perhaps it takes on a new urgency in a time when a malignant nationalism has badly infected too many American churches.

Some churches will drape the flag over their crosses, recite the Pledge of Allegiance, sing God Bless America, and, if their tech team is up to it, explode indoor fireworks during the worship hour. A few pastors may find opportunity to curse the country, while still others will faithfully preach the texts given for the Fourteenth Sunday in Ordinary Time. Continue reading →

It was a funeral mass, and the sanctuary was packed.  I was present with another person from my congregation because the daughter of the deceased was a member of our Presbyterian church, and we were there to support her. The missalette (Protestants, read: bulletin) contained some explanatory notes about the service including these words about the Eucharist (Protestants, read: Communion):

We welcome our fellow Christians to this celebration of the Eucharist as our brothers and sisters. We pray that our common baptism and the action of the Holy Spirit in this Eucharist will draw us closer to one another and begin to dispel the sad divisions which separate us. We pray that these will lessen and finally disappear, in keeping with Christ’s prayer for us “that they may all be one” (Jn 17:21).

Because Catholics believe that the celebration of the Eucharist is a sign of the reality of the oneness of faith, life, and worship, members of those churches with whom we are not yet fully united are ordinarily not admitted to Holy Communion.

It was a kind reminder that my friend and I should not go forward to receive the sacrament, and I did not. My friend, however, was indignant and insisted that she had a right to receive the elements. Her insistence was more a reflection of her personality than any theological or ecclesiastical convictions. Continue reading →

A friend and fellow pastor just announced his plans for retirement – he plans to leave his pulpit in about six months, and after conferring with the elders at his church and then his congregation, he posted his plans on social media. The Facebook announcement garnered nearly a hundred “loves” and “likes” and over forty comments, most filled with encouragement, congratulations, and thanks.

One of the comments, good-natured, judging by the emojis used, was one I’ve seen and heard before: WAIT a second Rev! WHERE do you find a reference to “retirement” in the Bible? The only “alternative” I see mentioned to that ain’t good”!

My friend, in a good-natured reply, pointed out that the priests mentioned in Numbers 4 apparently faced mandatory retirement at age 50.  Good enough. By the way, the Bible doesn’t mention emergency appendectomies or air conditioning, and both are good alternatives to, say, death or Midwest summer humidity.

Recently I was talking with another generational peer who said he prefers to think of his life after paid employment as “repurposement” rather than retirement. I once knew a pastor, who at 85 (“I’m 85 years young” he’d tell us), served as chaplain for a retirement (repurposement?) community.  He liked to say he was reinspired instead of retired.

Really?  Is retirement so bad that some of us need a prooftext to justify it or a euphemism to cover it? It may have something to do with growing old. Continue reading →