Mystical Murmurs: My Interfaith Life

After many years of attending an anemic Easter Vigil, I finally understand what it's all about (proving that it's never too late to learn). Our Easter Vigil started after dark. The Rector appeared on the church porch with a medium-sized pyrex bowl, into which she proceeded to pour a large box of epsom salts. I was perplexed, standing in the back of the nave with the choir -- I had never seen this before. Into the bowl she then poured rubbing alcohol. Moving back from the bowl, she set it afire with a barbecue lighter. Wow! The flames rose up. It was our Easter fire. The Rector blessed it and lit the Paschal Candle from it. Then she extinguished the bowl by putting on its lid, entered the church, and began the Exsultet. As we processed down the aisle, the person on the end of every pew lit a candle from the Paschal Candle, then passing the flame to his neighbor's candle. The first half of the service, the reading of lessons (including my favorite, "The Valley of Dry...

Today I reached out on email to two women who were my close friends at my old church, asking after their families, giving them the news of my own, and wishing them a blessed Easter. It was a chatty little note, with a little news from my new parish mixed in. I thought it was a cordial note. I suggested lunch some Saturday. I got back, "Happy Easter" from both of them. One line, more or less, including good wishes for my new life. I guess this is what it feels like to be thrown under the bus. I guess it's the price for being honest about what I saw happening at the Church on the Pike. But sending that letter to my bishop was (as the commercial says).... priceless.

Five years ago today I sat on my bed and watched the "Shock and Awe" campaign of the U.S. military against Saddam Hussein. Against the night sky over Baghdad, fatal blooms of yellow and orange erupted as we dropped bunker-busters. Take that, Saddam! And we were going to find his weapons of mass destruction and put him out of business, not to mention out of the presidential palace(s). It didn't quite work out that way. The WMDs were MIA. But it was OK, because we knew anyway that Saddam had been in cahoots with Al Qaeda, right? That Al Qaeda had been in contact with him prior to 9/11? Nope, wrong again. We had it all wrong from the beginning. That's the Bush administration: often wrong, but never in doubt. And people on both sides are still dying. Kyrie eleison. Christe eleison. Kyrie eleison.

Palm Sunday dawned raw and drizzly here, with a thick layer of morning fog that had mostly burned off by the time I picked up my rider-to-church, a lady named Dorothy who is not able to drive right now. It was a rainy drive, but by the time we had arrived at church the drizzle had nearly stopped. We were able to have our Palm Sunday procession, from the parish hall down to the intersection, across the street and up to the Church on the Hill. This is the first Palm Sunday in years that it has not rained out a procession! We had a full congregation, and most of them processed. We even had a local police officer as our crossing guard! After the service, the sun came out, and I developed an itch. Well, it can't be holy week without flowers, right? Even a Holy Week as early as this one. Soon I found myself at the garden center, almost against my will, having a real pansy attack. I love pansies -- I love the deep, pure colors against the spring-green leaves and the gentle way the flower...

Here's a copy of the letter I sent to the Vestry of the Church on the Pike, edited to protect everyone's privacy. Where I refer to recent parish history, you should know that we suffered periods of tumult resulting in "dissolution of the pastoral relationship" (meaning we fired our Rectors) twice in the last 20 years. So we have a history of conflict, but had been through a long period of healing. Until the recent nonsense! My original email had some attachments, but I couldn't figure out how to attach those documents here. But you'll get the general idea of their content. "Dear Vestry Friends, This afternoon my letter of transfer arrived at St. [ ]'s. Forgive me for not saying goodbye to you all in person, but last Sunday was a difficult day for me. Moving to St. [ ]'s is the decision I reached following a process of discernment that began with the first departures from St. [ ]'s, back in September. After 5 months of prayer...

OK, I left my church and found one I liked better. But when I left, I wrote a letter to the Vestry, explaining my position, why I left, and what I objected to. I also sent them three attachments, in the hope that these would better explain my doubts: why I don't want to become a fundamentalist; why I don't think everyone needs to agree on every point of doctrine; why the "Purpose-Driven" programs are splitting congregations; and why the enforcement of uniform opinion is not in the least Anglican. First, I sent the email to a friend on the Vestry, and asked her to distribute it to other Vestry members, since I didn't have everyone's email address. In a couple of weeks, and following a Vestry meeting, it became clear to me that my friend's best intentions had gotten cut off at the pass -- no one got my letter. So then I got really annoyed, and emailed the letter to everyone on Vestry for whom I had an address, on the supposition that a few are better than ...

I've been tagged for two interesting memes, but I've had my head in a dark place and didn't notice one of them till today. My apologies to Psalmist , who tagged me way back on Feb. 8 for this book meme. I may be slow, but I do get there! Book meme : Pick up the nearest book of 123 pages or more. (No cheating!) Find Page 123. Find the first 5 sentences. Post the next 3 sentences. Oh, boy, I hope you're not holding your collective breath in anticipation, because I happen to be at my desk on my lunch hour, and the nearest book is (drum roll, please): Lieberman, Joseph I. In Praise of Public Life , 2000 And the text, according to the rules of the meme, is: "American politicians have become so hungry for campaign contributions largely because, as I noted earlier, so much of politics has become driven by and wedded to television, which costs a lot of money. In 1974, which was a midterm election year, a record-shattering total of$356 million was spent by the nation's...