Solitude & Solidarity

Solitude & Solidarity – Thursday, 9 a.m.

These halls would swallow me if they could,
but I sit by myself outside the governor’s office
in solitude and solidarity.

Listening.
These walls do talk—echoes upon echoes;
each word bounces up hallways and down stairwells.
Each word!
How many times? How long?
Are the deals that were struck
to strike yet again at my time with my daughter—
are those deals still echoing in some dark corner?

Damn them. But I am here.
First this morning to set the vigil,
my “Susanna-sign” bright beside me,
bearing witness to a sixteen year-old girl
worth the world to me.
Humiliated umpteen times over a decade,
but never once ashamed of my love for her.

I know, life is complicated; each situation is unique.
To be sure. To be sure.
But the Governor’s paused pen,
the legislative maneuverings, the false alarms and fear-mongering—
these “complications” aren’t about kids.
No, dollars and the backroom deals
bury the best interests of our children
one more session.

But, as I say, I am here. Alone, but soon to be joined by others.
And I—we—stand here for countless more.

So already now, undaunted, in solitude and solidarity,
I meet the eye of everyone who passes—
holding my Susanna-sign, I hold their gaze, not pleading,
but with calm urgent conviction I beckon
beyond all the complications—
see me, see her, see this simple truth:
“Every child … deserves … every parent …
in their life … as much as possible.”

Someday. Someday soon.

David R. Weiss

This poem remembers my participation in a vigil in front of Governor Dayton’s office. We hoped he would sign a “Shared Parenting” bill that would make a small first step toward more justice dads and kids in divorce cases. He chose instead to let it die on his desk. We were a small group keeping vigil. I was a latecomer on Wednesday, but first to arrive on Thursday. I am new to this activism. Paralyzed for years by my anguish, I have only recently begun to claim my voice, and only in the past weeks begun to make friends. These are not my last words; I’m just getting warmed up.

Question One – Losing Marriage Equality in Maine

Losing Marriage Equality in Maine: Question One this week at the Mall of America!

David R. Weiss, May 13, 2012

 Question One, an award-winning documentary is playing this week, May 14-19, at the Mall of America Theaters. Monday through Saturday at 7 p.m. (except Thursday’s showing is already sold out), you can see an essential documentary about the struggle for marriage equality in Maine that matters for Minnesota. (Get tickets.)

In May 2009 Maine became the first state in the country where a legislature passed a bill granting same-sex couples the right to marry. But just seven months later, in November, that law was overturned by popular vote through a referendum.

Filmmaker Joe Fox went behind the scenes (and back into the closet) to chronicle the final three months of the campaign. I had a chance to preview Question One last month. The film ranges from insightful to infuriating, from hope to heartbreak (and not quite back again). Fox offers a glimpse into the dynamics, the demons, and the drive that fuels both sides of the battle in Maine. (See Fox’s May 10 guest column in the Star Tribune.)

I urge you to see it for yourself. If you intend to work for marriage equality in Minnesota—which right now means working to defeat the proposed amendment this fall—this movie is essential education.

Let me share a few thoughts the film raised for me

Question One: Facing the Enemy

I’m a pacifist. Not given to “enemy” talk. We accomplish nothing—indeed, we undermine our own humanity when we resort to language and metaphor that undermines the humanity of others. I don’t offer that as a timidly tendered opinion. I state it as a simple truth for which I take no credit, but about which I say baldly: you test it at the price of failure.

So, why “Facing the Enemy”? I mean this in two ways. First, the film forces us to ‘face”—to humanize the people who work so fervently against our rights, who believe so sincerely that we pose a threat to them. We may completely disagree with, even despise their thinking; we may at times mock their piety, but Fox manages to keep them fully human. And we need to be reminded that the people poised against us are not the enemy; we need to “face” them, to feel their humanity. We need to run a campaign that aims to fashion a Minnesota to which they, too, can aspire.

But the second way. As St. Paul might remind us, “we contend not against flesh and blood, but against powers and principalities” (Ephesians 6:12). In more contemporary language we contend against systemic and psychic forces that have more money and fewer scruples than we can imagine.

There is an enemy here, and the closest it comes to having a human name is Frank Schubert. He’s the public relations strategist who guided the successful 2008 Prop 8 campaign in California and the successful 2009 Question One campaign in Maine and the successful 2010 effort in Iowa to remove the Supreme Court justice who had ruled for marriage equality there and the most recently successful 2012 Amendment 1 campaign in North Carolina. And who is guiding the amendment campaign here in Minnesota today.

But Schubert himself isn’t the enemy. His strategy is: which is to be relentless in using sensationalized claims—and images—to evoke emotions that foster doubts that get leveraged into fears that get turned into votes … that ultimately serve the powers and principalities well above Schubert’s own pay grade. This is finally less about anyone’s personal prejudice than it is about the frailty of the human psyche and the way that systemic corporate, political (in retrospect we will write fascist) forces manipulate that frailty for profit, for political gain, and for the perverse joy of dividing us against ourselves.

Of Heresy and Hope

So, now I will venture a bit of heresy. Not theological, but campaign heresy. Yes, we need to tell stories. We need to have thousands, tens of thousands, maybe hundreds of thousands of conversations about why marriage matters to us and to our LGBT friends if we hope to defeat this fiendish amendment. But here is the heresy: stories will not win this campaign.

Stories are feel good. And they are certainly useful because by telling them we empower ourselves and we do invite (and sometimes prompt) a change of heart (and mind) in others. They are more than just campaign busywork (ways to keep the population engaged and occupied while the real strategists wage the real campaign behind closed doors). Indeed, stories will change cultural attitudes over the long haul. We saw this in our work—stretched out for more than a decade—in the ELCA.

But here’s the catch. Here’s what Schubert knows that I’m not sure we do yet, but which I saw clearly in Question One. He doesn’t need to change attitudes over the long haul. He just needs to use a handful of well-funded and well-placed commercials over the last month or two of this campaign. His ads about the risks to our kids will reach into even the hearts and minds of the movable middle who want to like us————and ratchet up their emotions-doubts-fears just enough to flip the handful of votes that will actually decide whether injustice makes it into our constitution. That’s all he needs to do to deliver another victory to his handlers.

And because of the frailty—the simple vulnerability—of the human psyche, the votes that make the difference won’t be cast by mean-spirited folks. They’ll be cast by troubled souls who simply and truly want what’s best for the state they share with us. And they won’t be able to see or feel past the fear.

And while our stories may change attitudes over the long haul, once the amendment is in place, it will be another decade at least before changed attitudes lead to changed laws. (And there will always be others to play off against us in the future. And Schubert may even see the writing on the wall; who knows, he may decide at some point to take his wares over to Uganda where there are other powers and principalities looking for a few good men like him.)

Political campaigns aren’t won by stories. Not often. (Some will say that Obama won by stories. And there is some truth to that. But he was an exception, a man with the benefit of kairos—the right place and the right time … and a man who has sadly squandered that benefit and failed to govern with the same vision of the stories with which he campaigned.) These days political campaigns are won, more often than not, by fear. Negative ads are cheaper to produce and quicker and more reliable to deliver than ads that rely on substance. And Schubert has raised the negative ad to an art form, an insidious but undeniably effective art form.

If we want, not simply to change our culture, but also to achieve justice at the ballot box in November, we will need to leverage HOPE. Because hope is the only thing that can be more appealing to an unsettled psyche than fear. We will need a well-funded and extraordinarily creative ad campaign of our own. We will need to use social media in every way possible to inspire hope.

We cannot simply counter the lies. And we surely cannot dehumanize those who oppose us. If we go down that road, we will have given them the victory already.

It seems to trivialize things to call it a “game,” but those who specialize in “game theory” know that there is nothing trivial in the term. A political campaign is a game played to win. And here’s my heretical take. Fear beats story. Not every time, but often enough to win the vote every time. THE ONLY THING THAT BEATS FEAR IS HOPE. And when fear takes over the air waves this fall—as it surely will—unless hope is ready to meet it with creative vibrant compelling images of a Minnesota where every family (including those of our adversaries) flourishes, unless we can do that, it’s game over.

But if we do that, it’s a game changer. In the struggle for something that is just and true, even amidst the frailty of the human psyche and its propensity to be moved by fear, hope is the one thing that can appeal to our better angels. Hope is what invites us—the vast majority of us, the 99% and then some—to see the arc of the universe bending toward justice … and to feel a hint of joy. Crassly put: we need an ad campaign to leverage that.

# # #

David R. Weiss is the author of To the Tune of a Welcoming God: Lyrical reflections on sexuality, spirituality and the wideness of God’s welcome (2008, Langdon Street Press). A theologian, writer, poet and hymnist, David is committed to doing “public theology” around issues of sexuality, justice, diversity, and peace. He lives in St. Paul and speaks on college campuses and at church and community events. Reach him at drw59@comcast.net. Read more at www.tothetune.com where he blogs under the theme, “Full Frontal Faith: Erring on the Edge of Honest.”

From Margin to Center

Today’s post comes in quiet solidarity with my United Methodist brothers and sisters, LGBT persons and Allies, who struggle to be embraced in a church that as yet would rather they be erased. I am stretched taut, between anguish and outrage. These words, which appear in my book, To the Tune of a Welcoming God, come from Orlando in 2005, where Lutherans passed through a similar moment …

From margin to center: holding our ground
David R. Weiss
August 14, 2005

In the Palms Ballroom at the Marriott Hotel the 1000+ voting delegates for the ELCA Churchwide Assembly were seated at tables in the center two-thirds of the room.  At either end of the room two wide swaths of seats held another couple hundred registered visitors.  And, at the outer edges of everything, in two single lines, we stood – about 20 of us at a time at each edge – in silent vigil.  At times wearing stoles given by (or in honor of) gay and lesbian persons called to ministry but removed from their calls or denied the opportunity to answer them in the first place, we were barely noticeable.  We were less than 2% of the people in the room.  And the dais and video screens were positioned so that the voting delegates never even noticed that we were there – unless they looked to the margins.  But we were there.  At the margins, standing in “stolen” silence, bearing witness to stolen voices.  We amounted to next to nothing, no more than mustard weeds . . . scattered on good soil.

We kept that silent vigil throughout most of the plenary sessions from Monday evening until Friday afternoon.  During that time, as hearings and debates were held over resolutions asking that our relationships be blessed and that our calls to ministry be honored, we occasionally heard faithful witness to our lives, our loves, and our calls from the Assembly microphones.  Yet just as often we heard painful witness to a church held captive not to the gospel but to fear and prejudice, to views of Scripture, tradition, and ecumenism that are not life-giving but life-denying.  And we stood, silent, holding our ground.

But on Friday afternoon all of that changed.  Following the defeat of a proposed amendment that would have removed all barriers to ordination of gay and lesbian persons, the only resolution remaining on the floor sought to create a second-class tier of clergy in the church.  It sought to institutionalize injustice under the guise of generosity and compromise.  At that moment, alongside this resolution, we moved ourselves onto the floor as well.  About 100 members of Goodsoil, the alliance of Lutheran groups working for full participation of GLBT persons in the church, left the visitors gallery and moved quietly, respectfully – but quite unmistakably – from margin to center.  Despite the bishop’s request that we return to “our place” in the visitor’s section, we kept vigil in front of the podium, making uncomfortably clear to the voting delegates that real persons, “marked forever with the cross of Christ,” stand – quite literally – at the center of any debate about the fate of our vocations and our lives.

Some persons, including some of our friends and allies, have questioned the wisdom of our actions.  They have wondered aloud, sometimes with anguish and frustration, whether our actions set back our cause.  Whether we alienated persons whose hearts were beginning to soften.  This is a real concern, and we need to sit with it for a while.  If we wish to model what it means to “journey together faithfully amid disagreement,” we must hear these words and let them challenge us.  We must also speak to these words and ask that our friends and allies hear us as well.

We took our action thoughtfully, after hours (really months) of deliberation, prayer, and community-building.  Every person who entered the Assembly floor had received training on active nonviolence, a posture rooted in the teaching of Jesus and refined in the practice of Gandhi.  Each of us had further signed a pledge to regard our adversaries as full children of God.  We respectfully held our ground despite the bishop’s request because our goal was not to demonstrate our good obedience to authority but our resolute faithfulness to the gospel.  In the face of this church’s efforts over decades – including this most recent “faithful” journey – to keep us in the shadows, to talk about us but not with us, our witness was undeniably disconcerting.  And so it had the power to unsettle because it brought to the surface the moral dilemma buried deep in many persons – how dare we treat gay and lesbian persons as though they are ever merely nameless and faceless “behaviors” and “lifestyles”?  We took on flesh for the voting delegates, confronting them face to face with our very real humanity.  No wonder they felt agitated inside.  It is often in moments like this that the Holy Spirit births new awareness in persons, new capacity for empathy, for compassion, for justice.  This moment of agitation, a moment of kairos in biblical terms, sits at the heart of active nonviolence.  As participants in this action we made the audacious choice to play midwife to God’s longing for justice, seeking to create a moment in which God might do a new thing in the hearts of others in the Assembly hall.

It is certainly debatable whether we accomplished that, but I think there is evidence to suggest that we did.  More than a few of the voting delegates wept while we kept our vigil.  Many hymnals were brought forward and shared with us during the singing.  Countless hugs were offered to us afterwards.  And I know that not all of these tears and hugs and hymnals came from our strong allies.  At least some of these came from our adversaries – moved in this moment to do some thing new.  Perhaps most significantly, in the immediate context of our defiant witness the Assembly still refused by a healthy majority to call for a firm enforcement of Vision & Expectations.  In the very moment when they had most reason to legislate us back into hiding (as if that were possible!) they did not.  Altogether it seems to me a moment of decisive victory though not measurable on any voting machine.

We can debate our success further, but any debate should be framed with a clear understanding of the principles of nonviolence.  Obviously, we crossed the boundaries of “Minnesota nice” that colors much of the Lutheran landscape quite beyond the shores of Lake Woebegone, but we must not forget that Jesus crossed those boundaries so regularly that they collected the tales of his boundary crossings and made them into a set of books that we call gospel – good news.

Finally, I want to suggest that as Lutherans we have a unique resource for appreciating the power of nonviolent action.  Luther’s theology of the cross, responsible for the Lutheran love affair with “paradox,” makes this daring claim: that God is most clearly revealed and fully present in deep vulnerability.  That in Jesus we are shown that weakness is not the absence of power but the doorway through which God’s presence moves.  As we stood, making calm eye contact with the voting delegates, we stood at the foot of the cross.  And, my friends, God stood there with us.  We held our ground – “like trees planted by the waters,” we could not be moved.  As we stood there – for nearly three hours – unarmed, unthreatening, unspeaking, simply and vulnerably present to our brothers and sisters, we were the theology of the cross made incarnate.

In “Calling Down Fire,” my pre-Assembly meditation, I wrote, “What the church does with us in that event [of faithful witness] is its own affair.  What God does with us in that event is nothing less than Pentecost.”  You will not read it in the newspaper accounts, but ask any one of us on the floor yesterday afternoon, and you will hear: we “were all together in one place.  And suddenly a sound came from heaven like the rush of a mighty wind, and it filled all the house where they were sitting.”  Our liturgical calendar is off this year.  Pentecost fell on August 12, 2005.

This church – including some of our deepest adversaries and some of our dearest friends is feeling off balance right now.  I will hazard a guess why.  Something transpired in Orlando that none of us could have predicted.  It happened because of the legislative work done, the votes cast, the vigils kept, the messages handed out, the lines crossed, the ground held, and most especially because of the God who came to keep us company.  We did not get the legislative victories we had hoped far.  But more than ever before, in the very midst of a church that continues to disempower us, we claimed our power and held onto it.  If many of us are a little off balance today, I suspect it is because we have lived so long – really all of our lives, every last one of us – in a church clouded on this issue by unabating darkness, and so our eyes were not prepared for the first strong glint of the coming dawn.

* * *

David R. Weiss is the author of To the Tune of a Welcoming God: Lyrical reflections on sexuality, spirituality and the wideness of God’s welcome (2008, Langdon Street Press)–from which this post is excerpted. A theologian, writer, poet and hymnist, David is committed to doing “public theology” around issues of sexuality, justice, diversity, and peace. He lives in St. Paul and speaks on college campuses and at church and community events. You can reach him at drw59@comcast.net and read more at www.tothetune.com where he blogs under the theme, “Full Frontal Faith: Erring on the Edge of Honest.”

A vote to heal families rather than break them

Senate File 1402 / House File 322 – a vote for healing families rather than breaking them

David R. Weiss – April 25, 2012

Today, April 25, is the seventh annual Parental Alienation Awareness Day. Parental Alienation is behavior by one parent (or others) that works to alienate a child from the other parent. It undermines what every child deserves: a rich and abundant relationship with both parents. It has done this to me.

Perhaps the single biggest driver of parental alienation is family court, which pushes parents into a winner-take-all system that enriches attorneys, enables judicial bias, and impoverishes children in their parental relationships. Right now in Minnesota, Senate File 1402, the Joint Physical Custody / Shared Parenting Bill (referred to as SF1402/HF322 since it has a companion bill in the House) is being killed in the Senate Judiciary Committee despite having been passed with bi-partisan support in the House (80-53). As a father who has spent a DOZEN years battling court-empowered parental alienation in my relationship with my daughter, I urge you to call your state senator tomorrow and tell them to get SF1402/HF32, the Joint Custody/Shared Parenting Bill, out of Committee and onto the floor of the Senate for a vote. Our children deserve so much more than political games.

Foremost this bill insists that courts begin with the presumption that when both parents are fit parents, the child benefits from a custody arrangement that presumes equal and shared parenting. Study after study shows that such arrangements lessen parental conflict and heighten children’s health. It’s time that family courts actually recognize what the research shows.

SF1402/HF322 includes provisions to insure full protection for children in cases of abuse, while also addressing the use of false allegations of violence or abuse, which not only break the parental relationship but also create an uphill battle for justice even when these allegations have been found to 100% false. The “kids-will-be-place-with-an-abusive-dad” card is used here exactly the same way that the “they’ll-teach-our kids-gayness” card is played in the debate around marriage equality. It pushes emotional buttons but has no grounding in fact.

The only real threat posed by this bill, is that it threatens to make post-marital conflict far less lucrative to the professionals who run the system. I say, it’s about time! And I urge you to join me in pressing furiously tomorrow – Thursday April 26 – to get this bill out of Committee and onto the floor of the Senate. Not simply for my sake, but for the sake of children and parents everywhere who are trying to create the best environment for their children after a divorce.

SF1402/HF322 will help redirect a family court system that right now too often further breaks “broken” families. The fact is, we’re not broken families, we’re families trying to heal, and we need a system that fosters healing rather than further breakage.

Please call. (See my remarks at the very bottom about whom to call.)

As a life-long DFL voter, I know this issue (often compressed down to “dads’ rights” as opposed to “parents’ rights and children’s benefits”) has been largely pressed forward by Republicans—although, truth be told, even some Republicans have flinched because of powerful forces within the family court system that do not want change. But this is NOT a partisan issue. It’s an issue that touches all of our lives. And this bill has a chance to make a difference for all of us. Again, please call. Thanks.

Here are the calls to make: anyone and everyone on the Senate Judiciary Committee; that’s where the bill is being buried right now. If any of these folks are YOUR Senator, make sure they hear your voice loud and clear. If none of them are, still call, and tell them you’re calling because they are the Committee where this bill is being held back. If, like me, you’re DFL, I’d encourage you to let DFL Senators hear that this issue matters deeply to their constituents as well—and let the Republican Senators know this issue has bipartisan support. The starred names are critical leaders, but any of them … all of them … need to hear from you on Thursday. Of course, you should contact your own Senator as well, so that they hear from you before a floor vote happens. And the Governor should hear from you, too.

Senate Judiciary – Republicans
*Sen Warren Limmer (Chair, Senate Judiciary) 651.296.2159; sen.warren.limmer@senate.mn
*Sen Scott Newman (Vice Chair, Senate Judiciary) 651 296-4131; sen.scott.newman@senate.mn
*Sen Julianne Ortman (Deputy Majority Leader) 651-296-4837; sen.julianne.ortman@senate.mn
*Sen Dave Thompson (651) 296-5252; sen.dave.thompson@senate.mn
Sen Dan Hall 651.296.5975; sen.dan.hall@senate.mn
Sen Gretchen Hoffman (bill author) 651.296.5655; sen.gretchen.hoffman@senate.mn
Sen Bill Ingebrigtsen 651.297.8063; sen.bill.ingebrigtsen@senate.mn
Sen Mike Jungbauer (651) 296-3733; sen.mike.jungbauer@senate.mn

Senate Judiciary – Democrats
Sen Ron Latz 651.297.8065; sen.ron.latz@senate.mn
Sen Barb Goodwin 651.296.4334; sen.barb.goodwin@senate.mn
Sen John Harrington 651.296.5285; sen.john.harrington@senate.mn
Sen John Marty 651.296.5645; sen.john.marty@senate.mn
Sen Mary Jo McGuire 651.296.5537; maryjom@senate.mn

Governor Dayton 651-201-3400 or 800-657-3717 mark.dayton@state.mn.us

# # #

David R. Weiss is the author of To the Tune of a Welcoming God: Lyrical reflections on sexuality, spirituality and the wideness of God’s welcome (2008, Langdon Street Press). A theologian, writer, poet and hymnist, David is committed to doing “public theology” around issues of sexuality, justice, diversity, and peace. He lives in St. Paul and speaks on college campuses and at church and community events. You can reach him at drw59@comcast.net and read more at www.tothetune.com where he blogs under the theme, “Full Frontal Faith: Erring on the Edge of Honest.”

 

Stumbling into grief & falling into hope

Stumbling into grief & falling into hope
David Weiss, April 17, 2012

An unfolding series of reflections in Full Frontal Faith: Erring on the Edge of Honest. (You’ve been warned.) I don’t do this for a living; I do it to stay alive. Please, subscribe!

Funny how things happen. Tonight an innocent phrase sent me reeling headlong … into yesterday. I pulled out a pair of old writings, made fresh by new tears and a hint of hope. I share them both below.

In May 2001, my brother was still losing his battle with alcoholism. My parents were at wits end in anguish. Determined not to “enable” his behavior, but heartbroken by his own self-destructive choices. At one point I offered my mom reassurance on the phone; she called later that day and left a message asking if I could put my words to her into writing. This was my attempt to do just that, on May 9, 2001.

Hi, Mom.

I got your phone message. Here is one attempt to put these thoughts into writing:

When he is on the cross, Jesus at one point says, “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” It seems a curious thing to say. Does he mean that at this point in time he—the Son of God—is actually forsaken by the Father? Does he at this point falter in his own faith and actually think God has forsaken him (even though God is there all along)?

Most likely, he is quoting the first line of Psalm 22. And he means to recite the entire Psalm, though it would have been physically impossible to do this from the cross (you couldn’t speak in more than a gasping voice). If we heard him say “My father who is in heaven …” or “The Lord is my shepherd …” we’d assume he had the whole Lord’s Prayer or all of Psalm 23 in mind. But because we’re less familiar with Psalm 22, we don’t hear his words as a Psalm quote that implied the whole Psalm; we hear it as a cry of abject anguish and despair. (If you read all of Psalm 22 you’ll see it begins with anguish and despair and concludes with hope and confidence.)

In any case, even if he’s thinking the whole Psalm, we Christians have often lost the audacity of our Jewish cousins to name feelings like forsakeness so bluntly.

But, liberation theologians, those who write theology out of their experience of living among the poor (often in Latin America), have reclaimed this audacity. They say, yes, there are moments when our experiences of poverty and injustice leave us feeling genuinely forsaken.  And how do we talk about God in those moments? If we think of God only in terms of an omnipotent deity who could fix anything instantly, then all those who are oppressed need to wonder why God doesn’t fix their situation. But what if one central aspect of God’s power is not the ability to fix everything, but the ability to be with us through everything?

These theologians often say that forsakeness itself WAS God’s way of being with Jesus on the cross. That although God did not (and maybe could not) act to change that situation, God could be fully present to Jesus in the midst of it.

Thinking about Don then.

Part of the price of being creatures with free will is that God allows us the freedom to mess up. God seems to have promised to God’s own self (and to all of us) not to interfere in our lives in ways that disrupt free will. Sometimes that means disastrous things (the Holocaust, Hiroshima, lynchings, rapes, etc.) occur. But God seems to prize freedom too much to limit it in order to make the world a safer place. Perhaps a world with complete safety but little/no freedom would be very “black & white” versus “full color.” On the other hand, sometimes that same freedom leads to great beauty (Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I have a dream” speech, the tumbling of the Berlin wall, Anita’s recent ordination turnout).

Don has freedom. He has made a whole series of choices that have led him to the place he is today. After a while that series of bad choices develops its own momentum, both physically and psychologically; we call it “addiction.” Additionally, we all have also made choices that have helped Don get to this place. We have seen warning signs and downplayed them. We have “respected” his right to patterns of isolation that are now killing him. None of us are really “innocent.” That’s part of the mystery of evil in the world. It’s like gum on your shoes. We all step in it at some point, and once we do it clings to us. And so we all suffer right now, too. Even though Don, of course, suffers most of all.

And God doesn’t promise to fix it, no matter how much we pray. But God does promise to be with us, no matter how low or dark “rock bottom” becomes. As Don feels more and more forsaken, God promises to be ever closer to him in that feeling. As you weep your tears of anguish, God is weeping them with you.

And, if you think of the “still small voice” that Elijah hears, it is in this stillness, this being present to us and with us that the power of God is most revealed. If there is healing for Don—and God does not promise that, but if there is healing for him, God’s promise of ongoing presence means that at any moment, whether in your grief or his grief, in your despair or his, God is there ready to spark healing. However, the terrible mystery of free will means that Don also needs to accept, want, and claim this healing. And it seems to me that healing occurs precisely when we (and right now, the first part of “we” needs to be Don) claim this healing together.

Until Don is ready to claim it, the best we can do is be honest in our own emotions, to let ourselves feel the full depth of our anguish—and to know that God is riding that roller coaster with us, not as a powerful fix-it God, but as a humble God who accompanies us into the depths of our own darkness. And as a God able to spark flames of healing at any moments that we choose to welcome it.

One last thing. What if Don never claims this healing? What if he drinks himself into destitution and then death? Does God ever fix that?

I say, yes. Once Don has left the world of finite life, then God’s freedom doesn’t need to be limited to preserve ours. If Don dies without ever claiming healing, then after his death God will scoop him up in arms shaking with grief that will run even deeper than yours and Dad’s. But in that moment God’s grief, no longer limited by time and space, will restore Don to the fullness that God has always intended for him.

We can hope and pray that this happens yet in this life while we can see it and rejoice with him now. If it does not, then we can know that it will happen in the next life, and we will need to be patient and rejoice with him then.

I love you, Mom. Dad, too. More than words can say. You have carried Don as well and as far as you can right now. So for a while you may need to carry only grief. But know that in your grief you carry also the presence of God. And wherever God’s presence is carried, there is always hope.

*     *     *

I wrote this hymn for my brother, Don, setting his life within the message of John Ylvisaker’s hymn “Borning Cry” …

To follow my imagery you should know that Don was a cost accountant, a wonderful cook (who especially loved garlic), a devoted son, grandson, brother, and uncle. Bourbon, which he drank at home alone, nearly killed him until he chose sobriety during the summer of 2001. Unfortunately, having lost his job and his health insurance before becoming sober, he died unexpectedly of a chronic lung disease that went undiagnosed until it had nearly consumed both his lungs. He was hospitalized just days after seeing a doctor; his lungs failed within hours of entering the hospital, and he died after spending several days in a coma.

The doctors said later that although Don ate like a horse during his final months, he showed signs of malnutrition. His lungs were so compromised that he probably could not have eaten enough calories to fuel his own breathing. Ironically, as he lived into his sobriety at my parents’ home, he began cooking again and took particular joy in the last year of his life in cooking meals for a homebound relative. He fed others, even while he could not feed himself enough.

Throughout his sobriety Don seemed wounded. Having lost his job to drinking in 2000, even after regaining his sobriety—something he only managed after he moved in with my parents at age 43—he never had a job interview. He never “moved forward”; it was as though it took everything he had to simply stop drinking. And having managed that, he had nothing left. He was, however, faithful in attending weekly AA meetings for the last three years of his life. And when he died we were stunned to hear story after story after story after story of the lives he touched at AA, of the quiet welcome and steady words he offered to so many unseen by us. He “moved forward.” Into worlds unseen by us.

He died 2 days after his 46^th birthday and 5 days after I wrote these words. At times the hymn is painfully honest, yet our hope rests in a God who knows the whole of our lives and loves us nonetheless.  My hymn sings that for Don.

Borning Cry, for Don

I was there to hear your borning cry; / I’ll be there when you are old.
I rejoiced the day you were baptized / To see your life unfold
I was there when you were but a child, / With a faith to suit you well.
In a blaze of light you wandered off / To find where demons dwell.

I was there while numbers filled your days / And while cookbooks filled your heart.
In the fam’ly, friends that gave you love, / I always played a part
In the years when bourbon stole your hope, / And your days and nights were hell,
Though you thought you always drank alone, / Yet I was there as well.

If you start a journey back to health, / And you weary on the way,
Need a place to pause and catch your breath, / Beside you I will stay.
I’ll be there when there are no more words, / When your senses slow and cease.
With a hint of garlic in the air / I’ll bring you home to feast.

I was there to hear your borning cry, / I’ll be there when you are old.
I rejoiced the day you were baptized / To see your life unfold.

Text: © David Weiss (vv 2-3) 09.04.04; © John Ylvisaker (v 1)
Tune: John Ylvisaker, Waterlife (Borning Cry, With One Voice Hymnal 770)

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David R. Weiss is the author of To the Tune of a Welcoming God: Lyrical reflections on sexuality, spirituality and the wideness of God’s welcome (2008, Langdon Street Press). A theologian, writer, poet and hymnist, David is committed to doing “public theology” around issues of sexuality, justice, diversity, and peace. He lives in St. Paul and speaks on college campuses and at church and community events. You can reach him at drw59@comcast.net and read more at www.tothetune.com where he blogs under the theme, “Full Frontal Faith: Erring on the Edge of Honest.”

The Appeal for Grace

The Appeal for Grace
David Weiss, April 11, 2012

An unfolding series of reflections in Full Frontal Faith: Erring on the Edge of Honest. (You’ve been warned.) And, please, subscribe!

Here it is, short and sweet: I want to help Grace Community United Church of Christ here in St. Paul, and so I’m making all of you an offer. For every copy of my book, To the Tune of a Welcoming God, that I sell from now through May 31st I will donate $5 to Grace. If you live here in St. Paul you can buy copies directly from me. Otherwise you can order them off my website using PayPal. In either case, if you want the book to be a gift to someone else, I’ll sign it for them and ship it to them; just be sure to give me the shipping info.

If you’re not familiar with my book yet, this is a great opportunity to pick up a copy. If you already own a copy, this is a great chance to send one as a gift to someone else.

Now let me tell you why I’m doing this.

Grace Community UCC is a precious rarity: a predominately African American congregation that is open and affirming to LGBT persons. Their pastor, the Rev. Oliver White, never set out to become a “gay rights activist”; my impression is that he still doesn’t see himself like that. But after facing fire hoses strong enough to rip his clothing during the civil rights struggle, he knows something deep in his bones about the struggle for justice.

So in 2005 he joined the UCC national synod in voting to endorse marriage equality for same-sex couples. And it has cost him dearly. Many of his parishioners simply couldn’t agree with his stand, so his congregation has shrunk. On the other hand, some fifty-plus parishioners have accompanied Rev. White in a courageous journey toward the fullness of freedom that lays somewhere on the far side of their present wilderness. I cannot offer them much, but then, when God provided the Hebrews with manna for their own wilderness sojourn, it was never much, only just enough.

If this were all of the story, it would be more than enough to justify my plea. But there is one more piece. A piece that tugs at my heart and makes this all very personal.

Many of you know that over the years, as a father, I’ve seen my access to my daughter, Susanna, shredded by the Wisconsin Family Court system. That’s a whole other story, but about five years ago, a young female attorney believed in me when the whole system tore me apart. She did not win a great victory for me, but she worked tirelessly to empower me as a self-advocate and eventually worked pro bono to file an (unsuccessful) appeal on my behalf. Of all the persons whose paths I’ve crossed in the Wisconsin Family Court system, Anne is the one person who saw me and valued me as a father. The one person.

About ten weeks ago—right as Black History Month began—Anne adopted Amira, a gorgeous newborn African American baby girl. Anne knows that, living in rural Wisconsin, Amira will not grow up surrounded by African American people. So, determined to be the best mother she can be, Anne wrote to me asking if I might recommend a welcoming congregation in the Twin Cities were Amira could see herself—her heritage, her culture, her beauty—reflected around her. Anne’s question led me to discover the story of Grace Community. And I, in turn, led Anne to make her way, as a single white mom, to Grace Community UCC on Easter Sunday, where she and Amira were welcomed warmly with many, many hugs.

When I learned of her decision to attend Grace, I wrote to her: “It is so true that love for our children inspires, stretches, and challenges us to be more than we are otherwise capable of. I am convinced that resurrection is less about what happened to Jesus’ body and more about happens to our bodies each day of our lives: it is the challenge of living with a fierce tenacity for justice and with a gentle touch for love. Tomorrow morning [Easter Day] I will think of you and Amira, and I will remember how very real resurrection is.”

So, beyond the courage of Rev. White and his small flock of wilderness wanderers, I am also moved by the courage of Anne. She believed in me years ago when no one else did. And because this congregation matters so much to her—and to Amira—today, I ask that you let it matter for you, too.

Here is a final image. Back in April 2001, Anita Hill was ordained to be a pastor at St. Paul-Reformation Lutheran Church (SPR) here in St. Paul. I was teaching at Luther College, down in Decorah, Iowa, at the time. Fred Phelps, infamous for his “God Hates Fags” protests, came from Kansas with a handful of his followers and a sampling of his ugly banners to keep vigil on the morning of her installation. I came from Iowa, with 35 Luther College students in three college vans, to worship in solidarity with SPR. We brought with us a beautiful banner created by a student of mine, Tara Smith. The banner featured Anita’s bright red ordination stole entwined by a green garland bursting with blooms, and it carried these words from Zechariah 8:23 – “We have heard that God is with you, and so we want to share in your destiny.”

“We have heard that God is with you, and so we want to share in your destiny.” Zechariah 8:23

Please consider a book purchase as a way to affirm these words for Grace Community UCC. Your purchase lengthens the reach of my work, which is more important than ever these days. And it supports the ministry of Grace Community UCC, which is just as important. Each book will be signed by me and come with a simple cardstock bookmark that will commemorate “The Appeal for Grace.”

As they say, “Operators are standing by. Call now to order your copy.”

Thanks so much for reading.

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David R. Weiss is the author of To the Tune of a Welcoming God: Lyrical reflections on sexuality, spirituality and the wideness of God’s welcome (2008, Langdon Street Press). A theologian, writer, poet and hymnist, David is committed to doing “public theology” around issues of sexuality, justice, diversity, and peace. He lives in St. Paul and speaks on college campuses and at church and community events. You can reach him at drw59@comcast.net and read more at www.tothetune.com where he blogs under the theme, “Full Frontal Faith: Erring on the Edge of Honest.”

Full Frontal Faith: Erring on the Edge of Honest

Full Frontal Faith: Erring on the Edge of Honest. (You’ve been warned.)
David Weiss, April 5, 2012

Today, I begin blogging with a new passion: to offer my musings about life and faith “full frontal”—with nothing held back. I imagine I’ll unsettle more than a few of my readers, but I also anticipate that others will be recipients of grace and hope. Which is why from now on I’ll be erring on the edge of honest.

Here we go.

I absolutely need to write. Really. The way most of you need to breathe.

I’ve spent most of my life being appropriate. Polite, reserved, measured. Not always, for sure, but mostly. I’ve tried hard to pass for “normal.” But—

I’m in my 50’s now, and while none of us know just how much time we have left, the undeniable truth for me is that I have a lot less time than I used to. And I don’t want to waste anymore of it being normal.

For most of my life I’ve heard voices in my head. Literally? Well, more or less. I mean, I consider them my voices. But, seriously, I want you to hear this. I’ve spent most of my life knowing that most of the time, no matter what I’m doing, there are conversations going on in my head. Like elevator music that never shuts off, but with words. Always there. Always.

“Conversations” overstates it. More like multiple monologues. Like some part of me just below the surface is always—always, dammit!—thinking and mumbling away in multiple directions at the same times. Voices. Not like I’m talking to myself. More like my inner mind is set on “autopilot” and “multitask” … all the time. Talking to me.

Every now and then I manage to let myself sink inside and actually attend to one of these monologues. I tease it into a poem or an essay or a hymn. But mostly they just echo around inside me until they fade away. Lost.

I’m tired of losing my voices.

In the film Chariots of Fire, Eric Liddell seems destined to follow the family tradition and join his sister in the mission field. At one point he tries to explain to his exasperated sister why he feels compelled to run instead. I mean, how is it possible that something like running around a track could be more important than missionary work?! Finally he tells her, “God made me fast. And when I run I feel the pleasure of God upon me.” He goes on to win a gold medal in the Olympics and the story of his faith reaches further than ever … because he dared to run.

For as long as I can remember I have been in love with words. More than anything. God made me a writer. And when I attend to the voices within me and birth them into texts I feel the pleasure of God upon me.

Two-and-a-half years ago, creeping to the edge of normal, I acknowledged to a friend, in an email: I am swallowed whole by the Word, and all I can do with my life is write little words in echo. In every direction, grace. It is all the world.

Honestly, if I never said another word out loud and just wrote for the rest of my life, I would not run out of things to share. That’s not an overstatement; it’s more likely an understatement. Anyway, for far too long—a whole lifetime, more or less—I’ve allowed myself to be distracted by the lure and the comfort of “normal.”

“You’d make such a fine pastor.” “You’ll be a great college professor.” “We could really use your gifts on this committee.” “And this committee.” “And this committee.” Yes, yes, yes. But listen. I have these voices inside me. And they’ve been waiting all my life to get my full attention. And you cannot imagine how talkative they are. And I really think it’s time for me to listen to them—as my first priority. Not as the last thing, the thing I rarely get to because so much of my time and energy is spoken for by other people’s aspirations for me.

So, thanks for all the invitations and praise, but I’m going to do this for a while. A long while. The rest of my life, I hope.

See, if I’m going to die—and that much seems certain—then I want to die writing. I do not want to die having fulfilled all my obligations and commitments to everyone but me.

For about twenty years I’ve had a very simple prayer. A bit quirky, a bit mystical, but it has seemed like the most important seven words in my life: “Papa, bury me into your silence. Amen.” I’ve prayed it for twenty years like a mantra. At times weekly, daily, even hourly. But I’ve mostly kept myself surrounded by noise. As though I’ve wanted to make sure God never actually answers the prayer.

Well, I’m ready now. (Slowly losing my voice, in fact, as my vocal chords continue to deteriorate. Isn’t that an ironic case of not being specific enough in a prayer request!) In that coming silence, I am quite convinced that the cacophony of competing voices in my head will actually become more like a series of concertos in which each voice finally has a turn at being well-heard as I wrap what I hear in words for the rest of you.

I am sure I will still “do” things. I will still be “involved” at church … but I will not let myself feel obligated anymore. I will still teach—I really love teaching. (Although I am humbly promising to use the microphone in the lecture room.) And as long as my voice lasts, I expect I’ll keep on speaking here and there about the wideness of God’s welcome. Although at some point, truthfully, if I can’t figure out what wrong with my vocal chords and reverse it, I think I’d like to save up some of the “talk time” I have left on them for my family, especially my grandchildren. I hope that doesn’t seem overly selfish.

So please don’t be offended if I seem a little preoccupied. I’ve been preoccupied ever since the voices started talking some forty years ago. I’m just sensing now that I’ve let a lifetime slip by while being preoccupied in the wrong place. Cliché alert. It’s time to occupy myself.

I want to die writing. And I do not want to have a bunch of ink left in the cartridge or a bunch of voices lost up in my head. Hell, I don’t even understand all the words yet, but I know they’re true: I am swallowed whole by the Word, and all I can do with my life is write little words in echo. In every direction, grace. It is all the world.

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David R. Weiss is the author of To the Tune of a Welcoming God: Lyrical reflections on sexuality, spirituality and the wideness of God’s welcome (2008, Langdon Street Press). A theologian, writer, poet and hymnist, David is committed to doing “public theology” around issues of sexuality, justice, diversity, and peace. He lives in St. Paul and speaks on college campuses and at church and community events. You can reach him at drw59@comcast.net and read more at www.tothetune.com.

Give Me Oil in My Lamp …

Give Me Oil in My Lamp …
David R. Weiss
March 21, 2012

A brief mid-week Lenten reflection on Matthew 25:1-13 (the maidens and the oil lamps) and Luke 23:39-43 (the penitent thief).

How many of you remember Paul Harvey—the radio journalist who, in his own peculiar intonations, gave us “The Rest of the Story”?

This parable needs a “rest of the story” in order to be gospel. As it stands, it’s little more than a self-righteous warning. The sort of simple tale that might be owned with pride by those folks up at the Capitol arguing right now for photo ids as the ticket to vote. The simple, and unapologetically harsh message is this: Be ready … or else.

But that isn’t gospel. So, in good Jewish fashion, I’m going to argue with it.

In graduate school I was profoundly struck by an essay in which a Jewish biblical scholar explored differences in how Christians and Jews approach the Bible.

The author noted that most Christian see the Bible’s value in being able to end an argument. You find the right text, and you pronounce with satisfaction, “That settles it.”

For Jews, however, the Bible’s value—especially among rabbis—rests in its ability to start an argument. A biblical text is more valuable if it’s worth arguing about. And the best texts are the ones worth arguing with.

So—for the sake of argument—let me offer “the rest of the story” about this parable. It’s pretty clear that Jesus told parables for a living. He surely told some that never got recorded. And the ones we find in the gospels were undoubtedly ones that he told again and again. That’s why they were remembered and written down.

And Jesus told them not just because he liked the style, but also because he hoped for an impact. He wanted us to be stopped short, caught off guard, surprised into wonder and called into action by hearing something so unexpected that our world would be different afterwards.

So let’s imagine Jesus, telling this parable dozens of times throughout his public ministry. And every time the crowds listen intently … and then nervously … and then fringed with fear and wondering, “What if I’m one of the foolish ones, what then?”

And with each telling, Jesus sighs. Maybe he reminds himself, “You can’t connect all the dots for them. They have ears to hear, but they cannot hear. And grace anyway, need to be heard with the heart. With wonder. And with surprise. It’s not time yet.”

And then one day, finally, it happens. He tells the parable. And there’s the usual shifting of feet and awkward silence at the end. Until a young child steps forward, some spunky kid about to embarrass his or her parents. And the child says, “But, Jesus, what if those other maidens just didn’t have enough money to buy extra oil? How is that fair? Or who even cares if they were foolish, after all? Who cares? Didn’t your mama teach you to share?

“You gone and told us to be kind and merciful and even to love our enemies. So I’m tellin’ you what I’m doin.’ I’m takin’ my flask of oil, and I’m sharin’ it with them’s that’s got too little. And if it means I miss the marriage feast, fine, I’ll have my own party with the least of them folk on the outside.”

And Jesus stops. A smile moves across his face like the sunrise. He scoops the child up, high for the crowds to see. Then he says simply, “The kingdom of God belongs to children such as this.” And, to the child he whispers, with a wink, “In God’s house, the party is always ‘with the least of them folk on the outside.’ I’m with you, kid.”

Now Matthew didn’t write it that way. And I can’t say why. But that is the rest of the story. And here’s how I know: Because on the cross, one of those foolish maidens is right there hanging alongside Jesus, and he asks for oil. And Jesus doesn’t call him “foolish.” He doesn’t tell him he should’ve planned ahead. He doesn’t respond, “Truly I say to you, I do not know you.” He’s hanging there on the cross, oil dripping out of his flask, like his own life, leaking away. And still he says to the foolish maiden, “Sure, I got plenty of oil to share, and today you will be with me in Paradise.”

That, my friends … is the rest of the story. You see, the last word uttered by God may well surprise us, but it will not fail to welcome us. Ever. That’s why we call it good news.

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David R. Weiss is the author of To the Tune of a Welcoming God: Lyrical reflections on sexuality, spirituality and the wideness of God’s welcome (2008, Langdon Street Press). A theologian, writer, poet and hymnist, David is committed to doing “public theology” around issues of sexuality, justice, diversity, and peace. He lives in St. Paul and speaks on college campuses and at church and community events. You can reach him at drw59@comcast.net and read more at www.tothetune.com.

Words Offered at the End of the Day …

Almost exactly 15 years ago (February 27, 1997) I “came out” publicly as an Ally for LGBT persons when this piece appeared in Notre Dame’s Scholastic Magazine. I wrote in response to a poem that appeared in Scholastic a week earlier.  Entitled “Living in Fear,” it was written by an anonymous gay senior student at Notre Dame and recounted his daily four-year battle toward self-acceptance while driven by fear to remain in the closet.  I was unexpectedly moved by his lament. I wept and wrote long into the night. And this piece was my response to him. However, it became much more than that. It signaled a seismic shift in my vocation. Since then I have written hundreds of pages and given dozens of talks to thousands of people about THE CHRISTIAN BASIS FOR WELCOMING LGBT PERSONS. I never learned this young man’s name, but I owe my life to him. These were my–

Words offered at the end of the day to an unknown friend living in fear
David R. Weiss, February 27, 1997

I need to say this quietly in deference to your eloquent anguish.  But I need to say it nonetheless.  And I am angry, and it will be hard to keep my voice down; angry not at you but for you.  And if I misread the last lines of your poem and you already know all this, that’s okay.  I’m sure someone else needs to hear it.  You say, “God knows, but God loves me anyway.”  Wait.  Let me say it gently but firmly—unequivocally.  God does not love you “anyway”—despite your being gay.  God does not need to overlook the way you are to smile at the beauty of your humanity, at the earthy reflection of divine love as you are gaily—and I don’t mean just “happily”—imago Dei.  Do you hear me, my friend?  I will be downright strident about this because I see now that if God keeps silent in the face of your anguish, it is only because I wouldn’t lend God the use of my words.  Well, here they are.

When Hosea spoke of a day when God would have pity on “Not-pitied” and would say to “Not-my-people,” you are my people—Hosea meant you, and I hope that day is now.  When Isaiah welcomed foreigners and eunuchs (ever before outcast from the presence of God) into the Temple—well, Isaiah meant to welcome you as well, and to name your praise, like their praise, as more dear to God than even that of the faithful Jews (or Christians), perhaps because your praise is brought over the objections and insults of so many of us—and yet still finds its way to God.  And when Peter was treated to that heavenly picnic of assorted forbidden foods it was to remind him of Isaiah’s self-same insight, that the church dare not exclude those who come at God’s own call.

When Jesus stopped to speak and sip with the Samaritan woman at the well, perhaps she, too, thought that his fellowship came to her “anyway,” despite her ethnic outcast baggage.  But I tell you, my friend, and I am not scared to be flamboyant if need be: Jesus offered her living words and living water because of who she was.  He relished her Samaritan beauty; he chose her for the Kingdom, and when he did, he meant for you to feel chosen, too, not despite, but because of your gayness.  So, when you picture her and him standing at the well, remember that while many in the church might prefer you didn’t exist, or at least didn’t tell us who you are, Jesus is stopping to chat because you caught his eye not “anyway”—but just the way you are.

Can you hear me, yet, my friend?  I am not afraid to be audacious if I have to.  When Jesus sent his disciples out two by two, he said to them if any town refused to welcome them in his name, well, on judgment day those towns would fare far worse than Sodom and Gomorrah.  Okay, it isn’t in the text—I admit it—but I will say it anyway because it’s true: Jesus meant to say as much to all you same-sex couples who, not unlike those disciples, come, two by two, hoping for a bit of hospitality from the church.  What irony that we who have so long burdened you with the guilt of Sodom and Gomorrah find that the fire and brimstone are finally aimed our way.

And when Jesus said that foxes have holes and birds have nests but the Son of Man has no place to lay his head he knew that if ever a day came when churches with their omnipresent crosses of gilded gold thought that now Christ surely had a place to lay his head, he knew that you, my friend, would know better.  For with your anguish every night you bear a fearful witness to us all.  Until your head rests fully welcome within these walls—until then Christ keeps his weary watch outside with you, still after all these years aching and envious of foxes and birds.

I hope that you have heard, my friend.  I tremble for the silent “no” that closes out—and closets in—each day, the quiet daily unmaking of yourself by fears all too well founded.  Against all this that you know so well I can offer only words—but maybe this is precisely what I have not done often enough or loud enough or long enough.  So, I hope, my unknown friend, that at the end of this day, and the next, and on and on, that when you crawl beneath your covers of so much more than linen you remember these words I offer in gentle but firm—unequivocal, strident, flamboyant, audacious witness: You are loved by God already now, not “anyway,” but fully because of who and how you are.

And I wait with you for the day when “no” becomes “yes,” and you place yourself truthful in our midst.  I wait patiently, because who am I to tell you when to step beyond the fears that we have heaped up in your way?  And because who am I to think your fear is not, in part indebted to the comfort of my own silence? And I wait impatiently, because I know at least this much that God is anxious for you to share the joy God takes in the very beauty of who and how you are.

***

David R. Weiss is the author of To the Tune of a Welcoming God: Lyrical reflections on sexuality, spirituality and the wideness of God’s welcome (2008, Langdon Street Press). A theologian, writer, poet and hymnist, David is committed to doing “public theology” around issues of sexuality, justice, diversity, and peace. He lives in St. Paul and speaks on college campuses and at church and community events. You can reach him at drw59@comcast.net and read more at www.tothetune.com.

A Venture in Song and Grace

Being the Body of Christ: A Venture in Song and Grace
David R. Weiss

I was overwhelmed. Invited to lead a hymn sing at the Women of the ELCA Fall Gathering for the Florida-Bahamas Synod, I was alone on the stage listening to these women, nearly 300 strong, swell my verses into glorious song, in this case borrowing the tune of “I wonder as I wander”:

There’s a welcome in the wooden out back of the inn,
A sweetness in swaddles like new-sewn wineskin,
And poorly strewn straw hints at ripe wheat rolled thin.
There’s a welcome in the wooden out back of the inn.

These women had themselves wandered from every corner of the state—many driving hours to explore the theme, “Who is Our Neighbor?” I came almost 1500 miles from the Twin Cities to join them in central Florida. It was a venture marked by song and grace.

Among the women there that evening was my Aunt Cathy. Fifty-two years earlier, she cradled me in her arms at the font at St. Paul Lutheran, in Michigan City, Indiana, when the waters of grace first splashed on my forehead. Now, her body slowed considerably by a stroke, but her mind still clear and her spirit still bright, she beamed to hear all these sisters singing together the harvest of words from that child she first brought to the Word so many years ago.

O Christ who came in rushing Wind of Spirit
In Pentecost of welcome flaming bright
Unstop our ears that we might finally hear it;
Soften our hearts; as well, restore our sight.
O Calling God, whose voice is never ending,
Whose hope is strong, whose Spirit yet does roam;
O Christ who comes in all we are befriending
Your kin-dom come, your children welcome home.

Those words, set to the tune of “O Christ Who Came,” speak my ministry. The Central Florida chapter of Lutherans Concerned flew me down to lead a workshop on congregational welcome at this women’s event. When the Gathering leaders learned I was also a hymnist, they asked me to offer a hymn sing for all the women on Friday evening. I selected hymn texts that echoed their theme (“Who is my neighbor?”) without forcing the issue of GLBT welcome onto anyone. Instead, my chosen hymns simply lifted up the deep welcome present in the biblical story and invited them to sing that welcome into their own stories.

So, after singing verses recounting a whole series of persons who touch Jesus in the gospels, their voices owned these words (to the tune of “Precious Lord”):

Precious Lord, still your hands, bear your wounds, many lands:
Some are lost, some are least, some are hurt,
Let me touch you in deed, as I touch those in need;
Use my hands, Precious Lord, make them whole!

And after singing images of Jesus’ welcome to so many of the “least of these,” and the early church’s welcome to the Gentiles, their voices claimed these words (to the tune of “Thine the Amen”):

Now the wonders, now the signs, mark of God’s surprise designs
Now the mustard seed grown full, now the lamp atop the bowl
Now the thirsting, now the bursting, now the new wine spilling out
Now the welcome of our God hear us shout, hear us shout!

And they were nearly shouting. Later on, countless women sought me out and shared why one particular text or tune moved them. But there was a common theme as well. To a person they thanked me for matching fresh, eloquent, vibrant words with familiar tunes so they could feel their faith come alive in song.

I spent eleven days in Florida altogether, making seven more presentations around welcome to GLBT persons for Presbyterian, Lutheran, and Episcopal communities. I shared my journey as an Ally and the faith that grounds my work. At each stop I received warm words of special greeting. Many from Minnesotan transplants, pleased to greet a traveler from the north. But more poignantly, I received words of thanks from many parents—most old enough to be my parents—who told me they had a gay son or lesbian daughter who had left the church years ago. They spoke with cautious hope that perhaps today, for other parents and other children, it will be different.

This has been my work for almost three years now. I left my day job in July 2009 to become something of an itinerant apostle for welcome. I write. I speak. I travel. At times I fret when the income is too little to pay the bills. At one point, tallying the expenses of the Florida trip, I realized how far from sustainable my work is, based on honoraria alone.

Luckily, as I learned in Florida, my work is supported in other ways. One group bought my plane tickets. Another group, and a dozen different individuals provided my housing and meals. I traveled some 600 miles in Florida, all either in a borrowed car or through the generous driving of others. When I call myself an “apostle” for welcome, I use the metaphor humbly. My ministry moves, from song to song, from grace to grace. Sustained by saints along the way—from that first font in Michigan City to the last fall gathering in Florida. This is the church … being the Body of Christ.

David R. Weiss is the author of To the Tune of a Welcoming God: Lyrical reflections on sexuality, spirituality and the wideness of God’s welcome (2008, Langdon Street Press). A theologian, writer, poet and hymnist, David is committed to doing “public theology” around issues of sexuality, justice, diversity, and peace. He lives in St. Paul and speaks on college campuses and at church and community events. You can reach him at drw59@comcast.net and read more at www.tothetune.com.