Wisdom during this pandemic

Wisdom during this pandemic
from Ecclesiastes 3:1-8

For everything there is a season,

  and a time for every matter under heaven:

a time to be born,

  and a time to die;

a time to move around,

  and a time to shelter in place;

a time to experience dis-ease,

  and a time to heal;

a time to break down in despair,

  and a time to build up immunities;

a time to screen,

  and a time to share a laugh with the screener;

a time to mourn the economic toll of this pandemic,

  and a time to offer support to neighbors and strangers in need;

a time to throw away personal protection equipment,

  and a time to gather personal protection equipment together;

a time to embrace,

  and a time to refrain from embracing;

a time to listen the news,

  and a time to talk to family;

a time to keep calm,

  and a time to throw away fears;

a time to tear up grudges,

  and a time to sew masks;

a time to study,

  and a time to play;

a time to love spreading love,

  and a time to hate spreading the virus;

a time for washing hands,

  and a time for washing hands again.

Our spirits are immune!

Our spirits are immune!

During this pandemic, remember that the human spirit is immune to the virus.

Your spirit is immune.

My spirit is immune.

Our spirits are alive and well – while we practice social physical distancing.

Right now, in this moment, and each day to come.

Fears are normal; they are human;

     but even our worst fears cannot contaminate our spirits.

Gloves and masks and personal protection equipment are important to keeping

     our bodies healthy, but our spirits don’t need them in order to be healthy.

Sheltering in place can slow the spread of covid-19,

     but our spirits are free to increase the spread of love and compassion.

Our spirits give us courage – whenever we face unknowns.

Our spirits fill us with joy – even in the midst of tragedy.

Our spirits produce acts of kindness – more kindness than the media has

     time to report, such as neighbors caring for strangers all over the world.

Our spirits touch one another in real, physical ways – through closed doors,

     over barriers, across geographic boundaries.

Our spirits sustain us – in and out of quarantine.

Our spirits connect all of us who are affected by the virus,

     and our spirits continue to connect all of us who are infected by the virus.

Our spirits provide healing – especially when there is no cure.

The human spirit is immune to the virus in China.

The human spirit is immune to the virus in Italy.

The human spirit is immune to the virus in each country and state.

The human spirit is immune to the virus everywhere.

Your spirit, my spirit, is immune to any virus, any where, any time –

     this pandemic doesn’t stand a chance!

A Time to Choose

A Time to Choose

For everything there is a season,

   and a time for every matter under heaven:

a time to want to get pregnant,

   and a time to want options for birth control;

a time to plan to have children,

   and a time to plan not to have children;

a time to choose to end a pregnancy,

   and a time to heal after a pregnancy;

a time to break down stereotypes about “pregnant teenage girls,”

   and a time to build up boys’ and girls’ knowledge 

      about human sexuality and reproduction;

a time to weep for the lives of female children and adults

      who find themselves with little or no opportunities,

   and a time to laugh at the hypocrisy of politicians who vote

      against equal opportunities but ensure their own are covered;

a time to mourn underfunded health and welfare systems that threaten

      the lives of individuals and families in poor areas, rural or urban,

   and a time to dance whenever interfaith or non-profit coalitions help

      make miracles happen in peoples’ real lives;

a time to throw away patriarchal laws governing females’ bodies,

   and a time to gather women into administrative, judicial, and

      legislative bodies to govern;

a time to embrace the truth that female human beings are created in

      the divine image,

   and a time to refrain from treating females as inferior to males

      or sub-human;

a time to vote one’s clear conscience,

   and a time to lose one’s guilt and shame;

a time to keep hope,

   and a time to throw away despair;

a time to tear up “shoulds,”

   and a time to sew commitments;

a time to keep silence and listen to her,

   and a time to speak and tell her you believe her;

a time to love bodies of all colors, shapes, sizes, and abilities,

   and a time to hate any violence against females;

a time for war against rape and incest,

   and a time for peace — to pray to end the need for abortion.

Prayer for Asylum Seekers and Refugees

Prayer for Asylum Seekers and Refugees

Guide them, O thou great Jehovah,

pilgrims, refugees, asylum seekers, freedom seekers.

They are weak, but thou art mighty;

hold them with thy powerful hand.

When they tread the verge of Jordan,

the Mediterranean Sea, the River Clyde,

bid their anxious fears subside!

Let your Divine Hospitality flow through each one of us

to welcome, shelter, and share our daily bread

as it is shared from Heaven.

Amen.

Re-imagining Marriage

Re-imagining Marriage

The phone rang, and a staff member at my seminary in Washington, D.C., from which I had recently graduated, in May 1989, had a problem that he hoped I could help resolve: a couple he knew was planning to have their relationship blessed by their minister in the United Methodist Church where they were members—until the Bishop heard about it and declared that such blessing ceremonies were not to be conducted by United Methodist ministers or take place in United Methodist churches under the Bishop’s authority.

The Bishop’s problem was that the couple was gay.

The seminary staff person knew that I was one of many Presbyterians for Lesbian and Gay Concerns, thanks to my having trained at a More Light Presbyterian Church which publicly welcomed into membership and leadership all persons, whatever their gender or sexual orientation. I myself was not yet ordained, but did I know a Presbyterian minister who would be willing to step in and conduct this Holy Union in their Presbyterian church?

I referred them to my training supervisor, the Rev. Jeanne Mackenzie, minister of Westminster Presbyterian Church in Southwest D.C., and to the Rev. Carla Gorrell, a Presbyterian graduate of my seminary who worked in Westminster as Director of a program preparing and delivering meals to people with AIDS-related illnesses. As it turned out, Carla was able to conduct the ceremony, and Jeanne was more than happy for it to take place in Westminster—until the Presbytery heard about it and tried to ban such blessing ceremonies from being conducted by any of its ministers or taking place in any of its churches.

One debate led to another, until finally it was decided that Presbyterian ministers were free to bless same-gender relationships as long as they were not called “marriages.” This was a moot point in the days before civil jurisdictions in the United States started to issue marriage licenses to gay couples.

This month the Presbyterian Church (USA) became the first denomination to “re-define” marriage. Its Book of Order now holds that marriage is “between two persons, traditionally a man and a woman.” And last summer the General Assembly of the PC(USA) decided that its ministers may conduct same-gender weddings wherever they are legal.

“Will you marry me?”—It’s no longer just a straight question.

“I do!”—It’s not simply a straight answer.

The human right to marry, whatever your gender or sexual orientation, is simply just.

Heavenly Manna

 Heavenly Manna

I attended a small Presbyterian college in North Carolina, Davidson, where the Dean of Students, the Rev. Dr. William Holt Terry—whom we all called “Will”—taught me how to make biscuits.

Part of my job on the College Union Board was to organize the annual Short Courses, which were non-credited classes offered by members of the Davidson community for us students to take for fun. By far the most popular course was Will’s “Southern Cooking” which he hosted in his home, across the street from campus. It was limited by the size of his kitchen to a half-dozen students, but since I had an inside role as organizer I signed up me and my friends—only to learn there was a waiting list!

I did manage to get us all signed up the next year, however, and we practiced making biscuits and other Southern delicacies under Will’s hands-on guidance, peppered with wit and graciously administered with glasses of wine. 

I think of Will every time I make biscuits, and I’m grateful for going to a college where my dean taught me how to make what for me is manna from heaven.

I give thanks to God for the life of Will Terry, Davidson Class of 1954, who was born in 1932 and died in 2015, age 82.