Or… I’ve spent all weekend writing this blog post. And a lifetime learning enough to share it!!!
Don’t panic… you just get the gifts which have come after all the ranting and raving and expeditions to the dusty library stacks in the basement. (Thanks, dear Legendary Husband!)
If you’ve been reading along for a bit, you won’t be at all shocked that we’re starting with context and input… aka news from Capitol Hill. I’ll assume that you’ve consumed or avoided, according to your need.
Yep! We’re putting the Filters thing to work. And, yes… it does indeed feel to me like 2-3 billion bits in this moment!
And, no… I’m not really enjoying my experience of all this.
Grandmother Moon, blessedly, got involved – with more input – really early Saturday morning, whispering C-67 in my ear. (Translation to follow!)
In my world, writing begins with hatching, which is good because hatching is easier than writing since a new splint/brace device has entered my life and lives, as much as I can stand it, on my right wrist, which helps with the pain way more than with the typing!
For me, the key to hatching is one of my favorite strategies, noticing and wondering.
Noticing, for example, how glad I am that my girls aren’t here to witness me swearing at the news… or (likely) exploding if I don’t.
Noticing the stack of books which has grown next to my chair in these last few days.
Wondering how to live this painting known as Revelation! which has returned from its excursion to Columbia Theological Seminary, for finishing touches like a gold thumb print with a red circle on the back and newly finished edges, complete with fingerprint prayer dots. Dots, literally, for the courage to follow what I learned as I painted.
So… the translation of C-67.
The faith tradition which raised me right is currently known as the Presbyterian Church, USA. And, yes, it’s been through a whole lot of growing pains through the ages.
Part of our tradition is the claiming of confessional statements. Not as in going to confession, which I learned all about in our suburban St. Louis neighborhood, back in the days of Vatican II. Rather, in the sense of making formal, public statements about what we believe.
Basically, it’s a collection of how “we” said who we are, from the time Constantine was trying to unify his empire, through the ages, until the days of the Civil Rights Movement in the USA. Here’s the part of that statement which fascinates me:
In every age the church has expressed its witness in words and deeds as the need of the time required.
Which is to say that things change. Not Divine things, perhaps, but human things, for sure.
Oddly, there’s another voice in my head, just now… the voice of Joan Baez! Joan was singing in the days C-67 was being written and one of her songs is doing the earworm thing for me in this moment…
I really hope you’ll take 3 minutes and listen! Just in case that doesn’t work, I’ll give you the punchline:
I believe in God and God ain’t me!
Which, were I preaching on MSNBC this morning, might well be the punchline, not that the people who need to hear it would be likely to be watching…
As I’m not preaching… a brief story about sorting holidays in our family.
My son, Dave, and I are the omnivores. (This hasn’t always been the case.) Bill is a diabetic, who doesn’t do well with gluten and dairy, trying really hard to feel better. Kelly and the girls are pescatarians (Fish, yes. Meat, no.) and one of the Littles has gluten and dairy challenges, too.
Thus, was my book born!
WE GATHER TOGETHER… holiday feasts with the family you have!
It’s an adventure! One which results – I truly believe – in good, clean food and a deep sense of empowered belonging. And, somewhere in the great beyond, I trust that those who believed that doing things the way we’d always done them was the way to stay safe, are at peace with the ways we’re doing things now.
Or, as some of our Intentional Creativity® tribe are claiming:
I matter. You matter. We matter. Mattering Matters.
ps… we Presbyterian types are still trying to say who we are, and there are newer copies of the tattered blue book in the stack, with even newer words, but this is the one which first helped me to understand the notion of witness and so it’s the one talking to me in this moment.
pps… curious about the Filters thing? Ask me! The calendar elves will hook you up. 45 min. My gift. Bring a cuppa, some red or purple thread if it’s handy, and your dream. The real one!
ppps… got holidays coming up? People you love to feed? Check it out!
