Brigadoon

For years, I have heard pastors and laypersons alike talk about Chautauqua Institution in upper New York state. I had a couple of preconceptions about Chautauqua before I arrived. One was that the accomodations in the Disciples House were rather primitive with no air conditioning and shared bathrooms. This proved to true in this house that dated to the 19th Cenury. Nonetheless, it was quite comfortable, well-kempt, and with updates. I also had this idea that experiencing Chautauqua was like stepping back in time and resembled something out of the Music Man or Mayberry RFD. This was also generally true except that there were plenty of modern amenities mixed in with the hundred-year-old houses and facilities.

Chautaqua Institution was founded as a place to train Methodist Sunday School teachers. Within a few years, other churches including the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ)discovered this wonderful summer retreat. Every year, since 1874, Chautauqua comes alive for nine weeks in the summer. It becomes a place of worship, music, arts, lectures and discussion. It reminds me a bit of Brigadoon which is the mythical village of musicals past where a little town came alive one day every one hundred years. Why do I say that? Because Chautauqua is blessed each winter with an average of 300 inches of snow. The Disciples House alone had EIGHTEEN feet of snow built up between the houses blurring where one house began and another began. Believe it or not, some people actually live in Chautauqua year round. I can't figure out why, but they do.

Every week of the summer has a theme and the worship and lectures all center around this theme. Our week's focus was Ethical Leadership. Every morning, we heard a compelling sermon by Dr. James Forbes, pastor emeritus of Riverside Church in New York City and President of the Healing of the Nations Foundation. He is listed on numerous surveys as one of the top preachers in the world. Using numerous Biblical texts, Dr. Forbes emphsized that God didn't give us the responsibility of leadership to perpetuate a spirit of victimization, a spirit that he says is rampant in the United States right now. Americans, who have never thought of themselves as victims of anything before, now see themselves as victims of terrorism, victims of the economy, victims of government and Christians aren't doing enough to counter this predominant mood of the nation. God didn't create us to drown in a spirit of victimization. Our nation wasn't founded on a spirit of victimization and it can't thrive there, said Forbes.

Northern Exposure

This the phase of the Sabbatical in which Donna, my wife, joins me. These weeks are times of renewal for me but also great nourishment for our marriage. This porton of the Sabbatical is highlighted by learning opportunities.

Two themes have arisen during this time which I am calling the Chautauqua portion of the Sabbatical. The first is the power of water, it's power to shape and change it's surroundings. The second is that of the rich diversity of religious expressions which infuse our world and enliven the human family.
Donna and I began in Chicago, which sits on the big toe of the Great Lakes. One of my lifelong dreams has been to experience the Great Lakes in person. I have delighted in experiencing Lakes Michigan, Eria, and Ontario. In the midst of these powerful water views are some equally powerful learnings.

Old Church New Church

I didn't expect to be in Rockwall on June 27. We dropped Tim off at FCC Rockwall for the Mission Trip presentation and then proceeded to worship at St. Matthias Old Catholic Church, which, if you didn't know, is the congregation that worships in our old sanctuary, now owned by the Rockwall Wedding Chapel. It was at the same time very familiar and excedingly strange. That's not just because I weeping mess during every song in the wake of my grief. It was familiar because of the pews. Besides that, the walls and ceiling were all remodeled. And here in the midst of the 1916 building, a Catholic liturgy was being celebrated. My good friend Todd Bell is priest/bishop of that congregation and he led what ended up being a healing balm for my soul. If you are unfamilar with the Old Catholic church, they are in no way a part of the Roman Catholic church and do not recognize the pope. They allow their priests to marry and allow all comers to particpate in the communion service. The blending of the old and comforting with the new and unfamiliar was the perfect salve for me this Sunday.

Boiled to Perfection

One of the really fun parts of spending a week of learning on Washington Island was experiencing an American island culture. On signs everywhere, I saw the phrase, "You are now north of the tension line." In essence, they were telling all us urbanites and surbabanites to calm down, relax and just enjoy being away from it all. The last time I slept in a room in summer without air conditioning was when I served as a counselor on the creative side at our Athens church camp. The difference was that in Wisconsin, it was really cool and comfortable both day and night.
Washington Island is a blend of Scandanavian and German cultures, evidenced by the Lutheran church, the many sausage "wursts" and the fish boils. The church above is the Lutheran church where our sessions were held as well as their Norwegian chapel, the Stavkirke, built across from the Lutheran church inmeditation garden. On Wednesday evening, one restaurant held a fish boil. I thought I knew what one was but soon realized I had no clue. Great lakes whitefish are placed in a huge iron pot along with potatoes, onions,etc. along with spices. At some crucial point known only by the boiler, a can of kerosene is tossed on the fire to cause a "boil over." And then he runs like the dickens. The boil over causes the skin of the fish to burn off and separates the bones from the flesh. It was probably one of the best fish dinners I ever enjoyed.

Moral Therapeutic Deism

What in the world is Moral Therapeutic Deism (MTD)? Is it a disease? A social disorder? A new counseling technique? Needless to say, it sounds like one of those phrases that is more complicated than it needs to be. Strangely, it fits. MTD was key concept I learned at the Washington Island Forum.
Kenda Creasy Dean is the associate professor of youth, church, and culture at Princeton Theological Seminary, where she works closely with the Institute for Youth Ministry. Before this year, I was unaware of any professor of youth ministry in any seminary. Dr. Dean was the keynote speaker at the Washington Island Forum, an annual event for church leaders held every June on this beautiful land mass off the tip of Wisconsin’s thumb. The forum is sponsored by the Wisconsin Council of Churches. As I shared earlier, it was not easy to make the journey to Wisconsin so soon after my mother’s memorial service. When I heard what Professor Dean had to say the first morning, I knew that I was where I needed to be.
Dr. Dean shared with us results of a seven-year-study on the faith of teenagers. The first somewhat shocking conclusion she shared was that there is a new way to think about the timeline for becoming an adult. Whereas in the past, we assumed that a person reached adulthood in his or her 20s (Some would even say age 18), we now can think that one reaches adulthood around the end of one's first third of life. That would put the age one reaches adulthood anywhere from 25 to 35 years of age. The study revealed that the consumer culture allows young people to prolong adolescence and to operate perfectly fine within society without taking on the full responsibility of adulthood.
So what does that say about their faith. Dr. Dean says that young people, including young adults, have a "whatever" attitude about their faith. While they can clearly articulate their favorite musician's life, style of music and exactly why they like the music the musician makes, they are far from articulate about their faith. They often refer to their faith in terms of “faith stuff” or “that Bible stuff.” This is what Christian Smith calls Moral Therapeutic Deism. The tenets of this faith are:
1. "A god exists who created and ordered the world and watches over human life on earth."
2. "God wants people to be good, nice, and fair to each other, as taught in the Bible and by most world religions."
3. "The central goal of life is to be happy and to feel good about oneself."
4. "God does not need to be particularly involved in one's life except when God is needed to resolve a problem."
5. "Good people go to heaven when they die."
Many of us may look at this list and say, “So, sounds all right. I can affirm those things.” The problem is that there is no Jesus in this faith and no sense of discipleship. There is no grace and no salvation. Scripture is basically ignored. And if this is what the predominant belief, and studies show it is, then what will our children’s children believe and what is the future of the Christian faith?
Dr. Dean maintains that MTD is not just predominant among teenagers and young adults, but it is affirmed and modeled by parents. We fail to share with our children our own faith beliefs and neglect to tell them that we give and share and act based on our belief in Jesus Christ as Savior.

So MTD may be a disease, a disease of closed lips and disassociated actions. We now the antidote. Its a matter of sharing more fully, deeply, and honestly why we do what we do.

How Do You Sum Up a Life?

These are the words I shared in honor and celebration of my mother, Miriam Patricia Irons:

You may feel you know Miriam Irons, especiallly those of you who have known her since she and my father first moved to Bryan in 1986. I suspect that it is the case for most of you that she knows you better than you know her. That's nothing against you. Rather it has everything to do with my Mom who wanted to know everything about you, your family, your in-laws, your friends, your acquaintances, your home towns, your bosses' neighbors, etc. So many of my conversations with Mom were about some connection she made with someone's neighbor, cousin or aunt and I would have to stop her and ask, "Now who are you talking about? And how do I know them?" She'd say I didn't, but she commenced to tell me how I was connected. If you met her, I guaranteed she knew about you, and she may have known about you if you never met her. Let me share some things about Miriam Irons that you may not know.
Miriam Patricia Irons, my mother, was born in Beatrice, Nebraska on November 14, 1935 to Donald and Virdelia Morton. She was 74 when she was born anew to God's everlasting peace on Thursday, June 17, 2010 after battling first with breast cancer and then with colon cancer. Mom was the oldest of four daughters that were born into the Alpine Dairy Farm just outside of Beatrice. She liked to talk about, OK, brag about riding to her one-room school on a horse and driving a tractor at 9 years old. She also confessed about putting same tractor in the ditch and having to have it pulled out.
Mom moved to the "town" school in the ninth grade and graduated from Beatrice High School in 1953. She entered the University of Nebraska and graduated with a degree in Home Economics in 1957. She did graduate work in early childhood education and special education through the University of Missouri but never completed her Masters.
She met my father at Nebraska church camp, the Disciples CYF Conference of the day. Subsequently, Dad came and worked summers on the farm between college semesters. They married on June 14, 1958, 52 years ago this past Monday. They were married 46 years before Dad left us in 2004. They lived in towns in Nebraska, Missouri, and Texas.
I believe that Mom and Dad's first home was in the grand metropolis of Beaver Crossing, Nebraska where Dad preached and Mom taught in a one-room school house. After Dad finished college, they moved to New Franklin, MO. Close to Columbia, Missouri, Dad went to seminary there and Mom did her graduate work. In Dawn, Missouri, Mom taught second grade until a pesky demanding son came along. Mom never taught full-time in public school again, but she substituted, she worked for the Dept. of Agriculture in Missouri teaching recipients how to use government commodity foods. She taught cooking at Kerrville State School. Most recently, you may know, she taught Mother's Day Out in this church (First Christian Church of Bryan) and then at the First Presbyterian Church's Young Childhood Center.
Always creative, she came up with fun ways to teach and engage her students, even her kids. Halloween was a particularly favorite holiday for her. She dressed us up as Uncle Sam, clowns, panthers, walking totem poles, and robots. We never had to worry about being unique.
The song that the choir will sing in a little bit is a good summation of my mother. She approached the world from an attitude of humility. It was so shocking to hear her say a harsh word about anybody. Mom was an adventurer, approahed the world and others with excitment about what she could learn and she never prejudged. As we were growing up, we had a succession of International 4-H Youth Exchange stuents in our house, from Turkey, Thailand, Nepal, Holland, and New Zealand. She was never afraid to try new things - even belly dancing when she was in her 70s! I think it was because of her spirit of adventure that I became an exchange student overseas in New Zealand myself. I think under the right circumstances, Mom could have easily been a world traveler, an international food consultant, or even a missionary.
She loved to show kindness to others, especially those who were on the fringes of society: the little children, the poor, the disadvantaged, children and adults with special needs. She hated injustice and hated for anybody to be excluded for any reason, race, age, disability, etc. She hated exclusiveness and she hated for us to say hate. All three of us who grew up with her can recite: Don't say "hate." You don't hate anybody, you hate what they do.
But something she hated more than anything else was the thought of moving. I know, she married into the wrong profession. Her sense of adventure stopped right there. With a passion and masterfully creative skill, she avoided attempts to move her out of this home and church of 24 years. The only real argument I can remember having with my mother in her adult life was when we talked about her moving after Dad died.
Miriam Irons was a pioneer in the Green Movement. Ralph Nader and the Green Party had nothing on her. She practiced the premise "God doesn't make any trash" on a very personal daily basis. She did her personal part to keep the landfills free of clutter. Her favorite question, "You're not going to throw that away, are you?" In her mind, everything was recyclable. I stopped wrapping my friends houses with toilet paper at an early age, and not for the reason you think. I stopped wrapping houses because "friends" then would wrap mine. And when our house was wrapped, my mother jumped for joy. She ran out and collected the toilet paper in paper bags and I didn't know why at first. Only when we went to the restroom and there wasn't any toilet paper on the roll... just this paper bag on the floor.

Mom had one particular hobby that stands out. She loved to knit and perhaps even more give away dish cloths and pot holders. I would guess that many of you possess one or more of those. To me, they represent her view of God's world, that we are wonderfully knit together, all of us. The adventure is to find out how.

Mom's legacy lives on in me and my two sisters, Janel and Megan; in our respective spouses: Donna Irons, Clay McQuerry, and Justin Loflin. Her legacy lives on in her grandchildren in: Kimberly Johnson, Joel Johnson, Bethany McQuerry, Ami Irons, Casey McQuerry, Timothy Irons, Zachary Loflin and Kaylee Loflin; sisters and brothers-in-law, Deanna and Wally White of Missouri, Linda and George Mahathy of Tennessee and Virginia Young of Missouri; and numerous extended family and friends.

You are all aware, I'm sure, that I ended up in the ministry following my Dad's footsteps, but it was the example, commitment and faith of my mother which provided the greatest reinforcement of my calling. When I was fourteen, my maternal grandfather, Donald Morton, died. It hit me hard, the first death of a loved one I had really experienced. I remember traveling in the funeral car to the service and my aunts and uncles were joking, laughing, and having a good time. I was furious and my Mom could tell. I couldn't believe that they were laughing and I said so, scowling as only a 14-year-old can. Mom said, "Don't you believe Grandpa is in heaven that he's found joy and peace?" I responded, "I don't know what I believe" and stomped away to the service. It was the utter joy and confidence in her eyes that remained with me.

Mom, if you had any doubt, I've come around. I believe there is a place of eternal peace, of overwhelming grace and acceptance. It's an adventure like no other. You'll never be asked to throw anything away - and I don't believe you'll have to worry about moving.