Don't Worry About the 1st Amendment Either...

Post on hell lands pastor in hot water - UMC.org

The United Methodist Church continues to major in minors with another episode that is good for garnering headlines but does very little to fulfill Jesus' commandment to go and make disciples, to feed the hungry, care for the sick, the impoverished, those in jail. I have to give credit to my life long denomination for its consistency: it continues to find ways to self-destruct, or at least prepare itself for a preemptive strike, by its failure to disagree without being disagreeable. Each side of constituents of a particular issue, be it abortion, death penalty, homosexuality, sexuality, healthcare reform, federal budget priorities, and now it seems the appropriateness of whether a person can have doubts or re-think or change one's view of theological doctrine, whip up a tempest in a teapot. God forbid we struggle with our faith--no one else ever has, right? You hear that Mother Teresa? You too John Wesley, Paul, Abraham, and Jesus. Heaven help us if our pastors are resorting to reading books and reflecting on what they say. But anyway, the UMC is consistent in its lack of civility and tolerance in theological discourse, and its decades long decline in membership. Wesley said that he did not fear that the Methodist Church in America would ever cease to exist but referencing scripture said he feared it would be holding "to the outward form of godliness but denying its power" (2 Tim. 3:5).

"Where Have You Gone Joe DiMaggio?"

I remember sitting in school on warm early fall days, trying to hide the little transistor radio from the watchful eyes of my teacher. My friends would pass coded notes or silently mouth the score while pretending to yawn. After school we'd rush to the closest friend's house to try and watch a little bit of the fall classic World Series. I remember the angst created  way too early for an eight year old whose father had to go to New York City for a business meeting but he and my mother managed to see a game of the 1960 World Series between the Yankees and Pittsburgh Pirates. I still have the faded and slightly tattered banner they brought me in a mostly successful attempt to buy me off and assuage their guilt of my not being able to be there; after school was school and was important.

I have shared this elsewhere but I wish we were blessed with more athletes today with the "power of silence" instead of the self-aggrandizing noise and hype of "look at me, listen to me, pay me more". I know the athletes of "back in the day" were far from perfect angels but I miss those days more than I enjoy the "business" of sports today. Oh indeed, to borrow from S & G, "where have you gone Joe DiMaggio?"

The following story and review is from NPR's Weekend Edition Saturday. You can find it here: http://www.npr.org/2011/03/26/134858078/joe-dimaggio-a-star-with-the-power-of-silence


Joe DiMaggio, A Star With The Power of Silence
Weekend Edition Saturday [5 min 17 sec]



Enlarge Hulton Archive/ Getty Images

In a new biography of Joe DiMaggio, author Jerome Charyn writes that "there was a kind of heartbreak, as we worried that he might disappear in that enormous expanse of space ... that the leaping gazelle we saw was some aberration, a phantom put there by our own wish to create some creature more perfect than ourselves. No fellow human being could possibly look that good, but DiMaggio did."

For a couple of generations, Joe DiMaggio symbolized the word class. He was called the Yankee Clipper because he seemed to glide across the baseball field: stately, graceful and powerful. He set an untouchable baseball record of hits in 56 consecutive games, and he married Marilyn Monroe, who quickly jilted him even as he remained devoted to her through sickness, health and death.

'Joe really couldn't function away from baseball,' Charyn says. 'That was his language; that was his beauty; that was his grace.'

But DiMaggio never appeared to be anxious, troubled or unruffled; he didn't bare his soul on talk shows and refused millions to write his autobiography. As Paul Simon, who put his name into a song, once said, "Joe DiMaggio understood the power of silence."

Jerome Charyn tries to find the key to soft-spoken DiMaggio's inner life in a new book, Joe DiMaggio: The Long Vigil. In the book, Charyn uses the phrase "idiot savant" to describe DiMaggio on more than one occasion: His magic was born on the baseball field, and abandoned him once he left it.

"Joe really couldn't function away from baseball," Charyn says. "That was his language; that was his beauty; that was his grace."

When he stepped on the field, everybody fell silent; but Charyn refers to DiMaggio's inability to cope outside baseball as "the sadness of his life," as DiMaggio fell into a state of being as "a legend without a purpose."

Joe DiMaggio: The Long Vigil
By Jerome Charyn
Hardcover, 192 pages
Yale University Press
List Price: $24

Wake Up and Smell the ... Beans?

This is the second of my two new favorite blogs. If only there was a way to embed the aroma as well as the links. The post below is from the site Dear Coffee, I Love You. You can find the web site here: http://www.dearcoffeeiloveyou.com/

A Belated Coffee Valentine

02.14

A little belated Valentine’s Day post for all the coffee lover’s and romantics out there.
[via @LisaFrame's Valentine's Day gift] posted by bwj on 02.14.2011, under Art, Misc.

 

Love coffee? Take it or leave it? Meh?

And Do You Still Have the Pocket Protector?

Ink Links

The Pen Addict: There Are Worse Addictions, Right?

This is one of two of new favorite blogs. It might seem incongruous to write electronically about pens but I still have fond memories of my first Scheaffer catridge pen.

 What about you? Any interest in good writing instruments? Memories of disastrous ink spills?

The Insanity Virus

The Insanity Virus
Schizophrenia has long been blamed on bad genes or even bad parents. Wrong, says a growing group of psychiatrists. The real culprit, they claim, is a virus that lives entwined in every person's DNA.

A Book With No Words

I am re-posting this entry from  Seeing Creation Reflections on God & Nature by Chuck Summers & Rob Sheppard. You should be able to go to the site by clicking on above or the title below. If not, the url is http://www.seeingcreation.com/  I lived in West Virginia for six years and have been to the locations pictured; enjoy!  

A Book With No Words

St. Augustine is one of the most significant figures or voices in church history.  In seminary I read his Confessions and came to see why it is considered a classic of Christian devotional literature.  In this book Augustine notes, “God has made us for Himself and our hearts are restless until they find their rest in Him.”  I consider this passage to almost be on the same level as Scripture.  It rings true in my heart and explains a lot of things.

I also appreciate what Augustine had to say about God and nature.  Writing in the fourth century he said “Some people, in order to discover God, read books.  But there is a great book; the very appearance of created things.  Look about you!  Look below you!  Note it.  Read it.  God, who you want to discover, never wrote that book with ink.  Instead He set before your eyes the things He had made.  Can you ask for a louder voice than that?”

I happen to be one of those people Augustine wrote about when he said some people read books to discover God.  I have a personal library of over 15,000 books.  I love to read and have learned much about God through the books I’ve read.  Still, I, and others, need Augustine’s reminder that there is another book that we need to be turning to—a book not written with ink.  In Creation we find a wonderful volume that will teach us much about the God we seek to discover.
Augustine is pretty emphatic about this.  He says “look about you!,” “look below you!,” “note it,”  “read it.”   It was his conviction that we hear God speak louder here—in Creation–than in all the books written about God.   I suspect he would have even included his own books in this great claim.
If you are one who longs to “discover God” or want to know Him better, I encourage you to take Augustine’s advice.  Start reading that “book not written with ink.”  Get outside and get to know God.
–Chuck
(I took the images above in West Virginia last week.  The top image was captured at Blackwater Falls State Park.  The bottom image was taken in the Monogahela National Forest.)

no comments   |  tags: Blackwater Falls State Park, books, Monongahela National Forest, St. Augustine, The Confessions of Augustine, West Virginia | posted in Nature photography, Spirituality

Hiatus Interrupted

It's been a while; not that it's been that long or that I stopped writing or thinking about things to write. I just have been on something akin to a blogging hiatus. As we all know, things happen. In my case it was primarily two things that happened: one good and one not so good. The first thing, which was and is exceedingly good, was the birth of our first grandchild, Edward Riley Tompkins, in May. Silly almost how something for which I can take very little credit, if any, can be the source of great pride and joy. Maybe that's the grace of it all.

The second thing that happened resulted in our leaving the church I had served for four years and move to another church and community. That's what happens to Methodist preachers from time to time. Often it's time to move or there's a good reason for it to happen. Sometimes the logic is less clear. However, as a full time hospital chaplain, I supply smaller churches part time and serve at the pleasure and discretion of the bishop and her cabinet. Without re-hashing all the nuances of what happened, I have spent the past few months packing, saying goodbye, moving, unpacking, saying hello all during one of the hottest and most humid summers I can ever remember. None of what happened reflects poorly on my new congregation. They are lovely folks and I'm honored to serve as their pastor. But the transition to a new church and community does explain partially the hiatus I allowed myself.

So now that I have once again picked up the metaphorical blogging pen, what next? Well, I expect occasional bursts of grandfatherly prerogatives with cute pictures and whimsical anecdotes so consider yourself forewarned although I will attempt not to abuse the privilege.

I will probably give in, now and then, to my semi-obsessive affection for the elegant and intuitive devices made by Apple as I have added an iPad and iPhone to my long standing solitary iMac. I expect a tidbit now and then from a recent sermon or a reflection after a long night at the hospital will find their way here. But I imagine more will come from thoughts elicited from those coveted occasions of being outside on the river, at the lake, in the mountains, on the beach, sitting around a campfire with a tin cup in hand, always in awe and newly surprised by the beauty and wonder of it all.

"Ite in pace, ad Deum laudandum et serviendum ei"