“May I come speak with you about a religious matter?”

June 29, 2015June 30, 2015 / Beth Merrill Neel / 2 Comments

I was expecting a call like this, on a Monday after the Supreme Court’s decision about marriage. Our office manager buzzed me. “There’s someone on the phone who would like to speak with a pastor about a religious matter.” Sigh. “I’ll take it.”

“This is Reverend Beth Neel. How may I help you?” I usually don’t refer to myself as Reverend Beth Neel, but when strangers call and want to talk about a religious matter, I do like to be clear about my role and authority.

“I’d like to come speak with you about a religious matter.” We agreed on the time of 11:30.

Here’s what I assumed: that this woman, who self-identified as Presbyterian, wanted to talk with me about either the SCOTUS ruling or about what had happened in Charleston. I confess that normally I try to pass this sort of thing along to one of my colleagues, but it was just me in the office today.

At 10:15 I ran downstairs to look at something in the building, and when I came back up to my office, she was waiting for me, 45 minutes early. I took one look at her, wearing her down coat on a day when it was supposed to get up to 90, carrying two laden shopping bags, smelling a bit of stale cigarette smoke, and I knew that the SCOTUS ruling was probably the last thing on her mind.

She did mention it, sort of. She said when she got off the bus in Portland and saw two men holding hands, if her mother had been with her and had seen that, she would’ve had a fit. So much for hearing a proof-text about the sin of gay marriage.

We talked for an hour. She poured out her life story without any self-pity, talking about her family, her mom and dad who married and divorced three times. Her sister, who married the wrong guy. A Mexican restaurant in the Memorial area of Houston; did I know it? Her work at a car dealership. Her time in Oklahoma, in Nebraska, in Seattle. When she worked at a hotel run by East Indians, and their conversations about the Gideons Bibles and why her boss would need to talk to Jesus if he wanted her to work on Sundays.

After an hour, I asked her what her religious question was. “Religious? I don’t believe in God anymore. I’m so tired I just can’t believe in anything. I don’t know if I can go on.” Turns out she had no where to stretch out and sleep; at her age, sleeping under the bridges wasn’t an option. She tried to sneak in naps at Denny’s or Shari’s, but that’s no rest at all.

“Can we provide a motel room for you for a couple of nights?” Sure. We did, and gave her something for some food. Should I have done more – connect her with social services, give her a ride to the motel? Should I have done less – tell her we couldn’t help but that I’d pray for her?” She was grateful for what we offered, said yes with dignity; she didn’t ask for anything more and I sensed (rightly or wrongly) that she really wasn’t looking for anything else.

Her name was Joy, and I don’t know if there was a higher purpose to Joy showing up in my office this morning. Was it to challenge my assumptions that gay marriage is on everyone’s mind? Was it to remind me that a big part of my calling as a pastor is not time efficiency but kindness?

Maybe there was no higher purpose. Maybe there was just a child of God who needed a little help today. And so Joy came in. And so Joy left.

A prayer for such a time as this

June 19, 2015 / Beth Merrill Neel / 4 Comments

Holy God,

We are appalled – but not enough.
We are grieved – but not enough.
We are fed up – but not enough.

Our hearts are breaking for the loss of those nine beautiful lives, nine of Your faithful children who were killed doing what You ask us to do – study and pray. So however appalled and grieved and fed up we are, You most be all those things to the millionth degree.

But God, I’m not sure our feelings are enough; I’m not sure my feelings are enough. I have spent the last day with tears in my eyes, learning the names of the dead, reading about their lives, reading about their church, and that is not enough. I have spent time learning about the hate in my own city’s past, about the exclusion this state used to practice, and I have listened to conversations by those who are displaced because their neighborhood suddenly becomes “desirable.”

And God, I’m not sure my knowledge is enough.

Please, Holy God, do not let us go back to the same-old same-old. Please do not let us mourn for a week or so, and sign some petitions, and shake our heads and cry, and then be done. Hold our feet to the fire, to the refiner’s fire. Let us not speak but listen, and when we are done listening, let us act. Do whatever You have to do to make us so outraged that Your children were gunned down in your house, make us so ashamed of our own complicity or inaction in matters of race, that we don’t sit and tsk-tsk anymore.

But what do we do, O God? Show me the way. Show us the way. Lead us out of this abyss we have gotten ourselves into.

And comfort the families of Reverend Clementa Pinckney, and Rev. Daniel Simmons, Sr., and Ethel Lance, and Cynthia Hurd, and Rev. Sharonda Coleman-Singleton, and Myra Thompson, and Tywanza Sanders, and Rev. DePayne Middleton-Doctor, and Susie Jackson. And comfort the family of the shooter, because although I do not believe it, I think You would say that he is Your child too.

Amen.

Confession of faith, sung

April 13, 2015April 21, 2015 / Beth Merrill Neel / 3 Comments

“O to grace how great a debtor daily I’m constrained to be
Let that grace now, like a fetter, bind my wand’ring heart to Thee.
Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it; prone to leave the God I love;
Here’s my heart, O take and seal it, seal if for Thy courts above.”

The Sunday after Easter is such a relief. I do love all the pageantry and crowds and flowers of Easter, but somehow the Sunday after Easter feels more real and more to the point. There are no processions to organize, no flowers to maneuver around, fewer handshakes and smiles after the service, and no eggs to clean up. It’s normal worship again – or as normal as worship ever gets – and the folks who are there are there because it’s their church and they come rain or shine, flowery holiday or regular holy day.

Which is not to say that things cannot be wonderful and gut-wrenching and good.

It was the offertory that got me. Our choir (who did not take off the Sunday after Easter because they love singing in worship) sang a beautiful arrangement of “Come, Thou Fount of Every Blessing.” Now I love that hymn. I love the poetry of the words and I am a complete sucker for any tune out of the Southern Harmony tradition. So the choir starts in, the women first, and a little organ interlude, the men coming in on a new verse in a new key, a cappella. And then it gets going with the culmination of that line “O to grace how great a debtor daily I’m constrained to be” and it hit me:

That is why I do all of this.

That was my first sense of call, my push toward ordination, the thing that motivates me week after week and year after year to be a part of the gorgeous flawed thing called church and to be a member of this hilarious and weird and flawed thing called the clergy. It’s because I am indebted to the grace of God every single moment of my life, and in gratitude and penance and hope I do this Christianity thing and I do this ministry thing because grace has overpowered my will, my guilt, my ego, my sense of worthlessness, my sense of awesomeness, and all the misery the world can throw at me. That is why I do all of this.

We have an ongoing conversation, the congregation and I, about the Apostles’ Creed. Some aren’t happy we ever say it, some wish we said it more, and I insist on saying it when we have baptisms. As I said, it’s an ongoing conversations and nobody’s really budging. But that’s okay. Last year our choir sang Robert Ray’s Gospel Mass as the sermon one week, and the Credo in that is pretty much spectacular. One of our folks, one of the ones who wishes we would never say the Apostles’ Creed again, did admit that if we could sing that Credo instead of saying the words, she’d be good. But we don’t – not yet, anyway.

But what if our creed were those words Robert Roberston wrote in 1758? What if our creed were the admittance of our utter reliance on the grace of God, and the hope that God would fetter us, and that all of this life is just part of sealing our hearts for something more? What if those words were our confession of sin, and our profession of faith, and our proclamation of the good word, and our marching cry every week? Would that my heart were tuned to sing that grace.

The grace of the saints, and they didn’t even know it

April 5, 2015 / Beth Merrill Neel / 3 Comments

Well, Easter is over; at least, Easter Day services are done and it’s “get a latte and put on comfly clothes and maybe take a nap” time. For all of you who are church people, who in some way did something to help make this morning beautiful, thank you. Thank you, flower arrangers and communion setters. Thank you, sound system gal/guy, ushers, van drivers. Thank you, coffee hour servers who had double duty today. Thank you, bulletin stuffers and tenors, altos, basses, and sopranos, and organists, and choir directors, and custodians. Oh, God bless all the custodians. Thank you egg dyers, and banner makers, and families processing with azaleas and eggs. Thank you, all you who showed up. And thank you, all you who celebrated LIFE today.

I was a bit under the weather on Holy Saturday, and tentative about how I would be on Easter. Admittedly, it was a slow start, but by the time the second service began, it was all good. The sermon was early in the service, which meant that I got to worship without worrying for the last half. My colleagues offered a beautiful invitation and beautiful communion prayer. Our elders helped serve the bread and cup. And then the saints showed up.

The woman I’ve never seen before carrying up her sleeping toddler. The woman now using a cane, but by God she was here on Easter despite the recent stroke. The man who’s mother is dying more quickly than any of us would like. The person who is still a bit put out with me over a recent unpopular decision, who did not avoid my station but received the bread from me. The teenager who was just confirmed a few minutes earlier. The grandpa with his whole family in tow, even though they go to other churches they came with Dad today, because it’s Easter and because they miss their mom who died a few years ago. Our administrative assistant who makes so much run so smoothly, bringing her mom. The woman who prays without ceasing for all of us. My daughter. Her friend. The strangers, the leaders, the wondering, the wandering, and the lost. The saints showed up.

I had one critique after the service, from someone who doesn’t come that often. She regretted that in my sermon I didn’t mention that Jesus had risen. I thought I had, but perhaps too obliquely for her. All the same, whether or not anyone there thought Jesus showed up this morning, spanking-fresh and resurrected, I will tell you this: the saints showed up this morning. Thank you all.

And for good measure: He is risen! He is risen indeed.

My circus, my monkeys

January 19, 2015January 21, 2015 / Beth Merrill Neel / 3 Comments

An old Polish proverb is making a comeback these days: “not my circus, not my monkeys”. In essence, it means that whatever is going on is not my problem. It also suggests that whatever craziness one is experiencing, whatever whirls of discontent, dysfunction, or badness are flying around, it’s not of my doing and it’s not my responsibility. The proverb indicates good boundaries: that is crazy but I am not. But I wonder, too, if the proverb does not also suggest some leave taking of responsibility.

In many ways, the denomination of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) is my home. Since I started attending church in third grade, I have been a part of a Presbyterian church. It’s what I know and yes, at times, it is my circus. And lately my circus has had some tent poles crashing down within it.

There’s an ongoing investigation into the misuse of funds in the 1001 New Worshiping Communities initiative. Some folks started a 501(c)(3) without the correct approval, and an appointed attorney is looking into it, and four people in the national office have been put on administrative leave.

More recent is a misguided marketing campaign for one of our longtime annual offerings, the One Great Hour of Sharing. The campaign featured photographs of youngish people, all of whom were people of color, with an attention-grabbing line. One said, “Needs help with a drinking problem” implying that this young Hispanic girl/woman was an alcoholic. In smaller font were the words “She can’t find water.” Many leaders throughout the denomination many people of color raised an appropriate uproar and the campaign has been pulled. When our materials arrived at the church office last week, we put them in the recycling bin and confirmed that new materials would be sent out shortly.

In other words, the national office has experienced two very big and very public mistakes in the past few months. Leadership has been applauded by some for their honesty in owning up to the errors, and scourged by others for lack of transparency, top-down decisions, and general ineptitude. My husband’s take is that ever since so many of the conservatives have left, we have no one to fight with so we fight with ourselves. Isn’t that sad, if it’s true.

But here’s the thing: this is my circus, and these are my monkeys. We Presbyterians hold fast to the idea that we are a connectional church, which means we are connected when we get it right and we are connected when we get it wrong.

Many years ago a friend of mine was the moderator of her presbytery. She served at a time when the pastor of a very big church had been found guilty of sexual misconduct with a member of the congregation. The church court voted to have him reprimanded on the floor of presbytery. There is a script for these things, and the time came for the reprimand. The moderator asked the pastor to stand, and as he did, about fifty members of his congregation, who could not fathom that their pastor was guilty of such a thing, stood with him. My friend quickly got the lay of the land, and in a stroke of brilliance, said something along the lines of “when one member of the body sins, all sin, so let us all stand with our brother.” I’m still awed by her quick thinking and deep theology.

She had a point. When people talk about “them” – the presbytery, the national office – I always want to jump in and say “there is no ‘they’ – we are the presbytery!” “We are the PC(USA)!” And we are the national office, too, in the sense that we’re all Presbyterians and we are all connected and we are all in the same beautiful and broken three-ring circus.

I pray for the national staff because it must be pretty rough right now. Everyone who works in the center can be lumped together – those who made the awful decisions and those who had no part in their making. And I pray for the people of color in our denomination who have long felt that their voices have been neither heard nor heeded. It’s all my circus.

I’m just glad I’m not the person in the middle in the top hat.

Holding fast to the good: Christmas Eve

January 16, 2015January 27, 2015 / Beth Merrill Neel / 2 Comments

One of the readers of this blog recently commented that a few of my recent posts have been a bit on the down side, and as I looked over them, I realized she was right. I have been in a bit of a professional funk, which happens. I tend to be a glass-half-full kind of person, evidenced by the title of this blog. The funk needs some personal reflection and you all don’t need to be a part of that. But I have encouraged myself not only to hold fast to what is good, but to look for what is good, and to share some stories of good news. So here’s one of those stories. (And those in it gave me their permission to tell it.)

Our later Christmas Eve service is a beautiful thing. Our choir sings like the angels. Our deacons are on it, hospitable with first-timers, alert when all the candles are lit, staying late to clean up afterwards. The worship committee has worked hard on decorations and details. But the management of all that falls on me as the pastor for worship. Do the pastors and ushers have their big candles? Will the lights go out in the right order at the right time? Did we print enough bulletins? Did our communion team put the elements in the loft for the choir? Did I remember to remind our congressman that the service starts an hour earlier than it used to, so he won’t show up an hour late? All of which is to say that sometimes it’s hard to get in the mood for worship when all those details are swirling around in my head.

But I do try to set those details aside; at some point what will happen will happen because of or in spite of all our planning. And Christmas Eve is so beautiful in the necessary sort of way, even magical for some. And I love Incarnation maybe more than I love Resurrection. So here’s a bit of Incarnation reality on Christmas Eve.

Like almost every other church, we light Advent candles for the weeks leading up to Christmas, and on Christmas Eve we light the three purples, the pink, and the big white Christ candle. We usually ask our new members, folks who have joined in the last year, to light the candles as a way to include them and introduce them. This Christmas Eve two of our new members were the lighter/readers. One a soprano from the choir, and one a transgender woman who came to know us because of a tragedy – the murder of a friend of hers who was a member of our church. They carried out their roles with aplomb and grace and poise.

We pastors processed in during the prelude, and as I settled in and tried to rid my brain of the detaily things and the gnats of minutia, I watched the people come in. Some I knew; many I didn’t, but there is a joy to watching people come in because it’s Christmas Eve and they want to be in church. Arriving just a minute or so late were some other new members: a lovely woman and her son who is physically disabled and in a large motorized wheelchair, her best friend, her sister-in-law, and his nurse. We don’t have a good space for folks in wheelchairs, so they came up and sat in the front row.

As I watched them settle in, I realized that because we were having communion by intinction, everyone who came up would pass by this family as they returned to their pews. I wondered if it would be hard for some to see this young man in his wheelchair, if for some there is an expectation that everything is pretty and “normal” on Christmas Eve, if the sight of this man would be jarring. I hoped not, because I know him a little, and because I know that the sight of him in his chair doesn’t begin to capture his personality or his mind, or the love this family has for each other.

Three weeks later, as I think about Christmas Eve and those who were a part of the service, I think we got something right. Maybe the lights didn’t go out quite right, maybe my meditation was a little more depressing than I had intended, but we got at least one thing right: people who in the past would have been shunned at church were not only welcomed, they were front and center, a part of things. Because if there is one thing to take away from that stable in Bethlehem, it is that everyone has a place there. And I will hold fast to that.

“Remembering the stable where for once in our lives

Everything became a You and nothing was an It.

(W.H. Auden, For the Time Being, A Christmas Oratorio)

John Galt is loose!

January 13, 2015 / Beth Merrill Neel / 2 Comments

True confession: I love Atlas Shrugged. I think it is a wonderful romance novel, complete with striking beauty Dagney and the bevy of men who wish to bed her. I think the next edition of Ayn Rand’s hot masterpiece should include an image of Dagney, corseted under her stern suit, breathless in the arms of John Galt, immortalized by Fabio who has cut his hair short for the occasion. Really, I think that’s the only way to read this Rand-y romance. And I have, more than once, though I’ve never made it through the 70 page manifesto/radio address/proclamation of love by John Galt in the latter part of the book. There’s something romantic about the notion of leaving all those talentless mucks behind and creating one’s own utopia of talent, hidden away in the gorgeous and rugged landscape in Colorado. A brain drain is afoot, and John Galt is behind it all, whispering to the best and brightest to come away, to leave the world, to create a community where their talent will be tested and validated.

Every so often I feel that way about the church – not that it’s full of talentless mucks; not that at all. But when I learn of another pastor friend leaving the parish, or of a parishioner who has decided he or she is done with church, I wonder: what is luring them away? Is there some spiritual equivalent of John Galt that whispers to them, “There is more… come away… leave it all… you are better than this… enjoy your Sunday mornings….”

The people I know who have answered a new call to non-parish ministry are good folk. They are faithful. They are talented. They have not made this decision lightly. But every time I hear a friend is leaving her or his congregation to head up a non-profit, or to go into counseling, or just to take a break, a part of me gets so very sad. The church needs them, I think. But I also think, is the church so broken they had to leave?

I don’t think the church is that broken, or better put, I don’t think the church is any more broken now than it ever was. We are an imperfect people called together into community, and that right there means brokenness. I think my friends who leave parish ministry leave not because of brokenness but because of faithfulness – faithfulness to the call they discern from God, faithfulness to their true selves.

We pastors are broken people who minister to other broken people in a broken world. We are all in the process of mending. We are not super-human, uber-faithful, crazy talented folks who deign to share our gifts with the undermasses. We are not Dagney Taggart; we are not John Galt. We understand that however flawed or perfect we are, there is One who is more perfect, One who accepts and even uses our flaws. And if that One calls one of us to go do something new, to minister in a classroom or a counseling office or a non-profit, then okay: it’s not that the one is leaving the church, but taking the church and God to the world.

So Miss Ayn, you can have your John Galt luring the arrogant away. You may have all those people. I’ll keep the rest, in the church or in the world or in the home. But thanks all the same for the trashy romance novel.

Putting the “vent” back in “Advent”

December 2, 2014January 7, 2015 / Beth Merrill Neel / 3 Comments

Advent is upon us, and I’m just not feeling it this year. Granted, it is only the second day of Advent, it’s only December 1, but I’m not sure I can muster up all the mystery and purple and candles again this year.

Yesterday I heard myself say in my sermon something about making our hearts ready to receive the Christ Child this season. I said it yesterday as I have said it every Advent for the last twenty-one years. And tonight while I was doing the dishes I realized that I haven’t the foggiest idea what I mean by that.

Every liturgical season has its church-speak. Some of my favorites: Transfiguration, when He was “changed from glory into glory.” Easter as we leave the cross and face the beauty of the empty tomb. Pentecost, when God set our hearts on fire. Lent, as we make our way to Calvary/Golgotha/the cross. And Advent, when we prepare our hearts to receive the Little Lord Jesus.

“Little Lord Jesus” makes me think of Little Lord Fauntleroy which I’m pretty sure is not an incarnation of anything divine; Jesus in satin knickers, a ruffly pirate blouse, and pilgrim shoes with buckles. I do not want to make my heart ready for that.

NowI can be as awestruck as the next person by a baby. I love to think deeply about the theology of the incarnation, the foolishness of God who chose to take on human flesh. But making my heart ready for baby Jesus? Or really, making my heart ready for anything? What the hell does that mean? It probably means I shouldn’t use the word “hell.”

Does it mean I’m supposed to be nicer to people this season? Does it mean I’m supposed to be very generous? Does it mean I should confess all my sins? (As if there were time for that in this busy season.) Does it mean I rid myself of impure thoughts? Does it mean I wake at 4 every morning to meditate on Christ? Does it mean I look for ways to tell people about the Good News?

The problem is that my heart is unreachable. It’s not that I don’t feel; it’s not that I don’t respond emotionally to the sorrows of the world. It’s not some things don’t hit me in the gut because they do. It’s that the heart as a metaphor isn’t working for me right now. Maybe it’s cardiac overload. Maybe it was the cheesy Christmas carols I heard while in the dentist chair today having my teeth cleaned.

I know how to get my house ready for Christmas: move the desk, put up the tree and lights, figure out where to put the Christmas and holiday cards that come in. I know how to get the church ready for Advent: know who is leading worship when and figure out the logistics of the candles lighting and blanket brigade. Write the candle liturgy. Thank the volunteers. Pick the right balance of Advent and Christmas hymns. Be sensitive to those who are having a hard time because it’s Christmas. Wear purple on Sunday, red for parties.

But I don’t know how to get my heart ready for Jesus. So I’m not going to worry about it anymore.

Instead, this year, I think I’ll make my hands ready for Incarnation. They will be ready to type words that are as true as I can make them, about God and this weird life we’re called to. They will be ready to hold the hand of the woman whose Christmas is her first as a widow. They will be ready to wrap presents for the family whose name we pick in our giving program. They will be ready to chop and dice and stir the soup I’ll make for the volunteer thank-you lunch. They will take up the green pen to address the Christmas cards, and they will wrap about my sweet girl on Christmas morning when she gets up early, excited because it’s Christmas, excited because it’s a day we have together as a family and no one has to be at work.

You get your hearts ready, and I’ll get my hands ready, and if we don’t, Jesus will come anyway.

Whatever that means….

A time to keep and a time to throw away

November 3, 2014November 4, 2014 / Beth Merrill Neel / 3 Comments

I have moved a lot, and by move, I mean pack up all my belongings and take them out of one dwelling and unpack them in another dwelling. I, with or without my family, moved in 1966, 1968, 1972, 1984, 1986, 1987, 1988, 1989, 1991, 1992, 1993, 1997, 1998, 1999, 2001, 2004, 2005, 2008, and 2011. That’s a lot of cardboard and bubblewrap.

Each time I have moved as an adult, I have purged before and after the move. I am so happy for those who love garage sales, but I’m not one of you, so the Goodwill and Salvation Army have benefitted well from my peripatetic life. Each time I have moved I have looked forward to the new thing and at the same time mourned all that is left behind. During the crunch time of moving, I’ve have lived in two places at once, said hello while saying goodbye, closed things up and opened new things.

Serving as a pastor in a mainline church in the 21st century feels like being in the throes of moving. I am in two worlds at once. I am in the world for which I was trained in seminary, serving a church with the physical plant and administration of yesteryear. I am in my old house, and while it does creak, I know which floorboards creak. It is a comfortable place. And God is calling me – and us – to move.

Not only do I feel completely unprepared to be a post-modern pastor of a church in the 21st century, I am living in two places at once. I am still pastoring in 20th century mode, supporting our work done in the 20th century, leading worship in the style of the old way. I am trying to learn about the new ways, too, and find it getting hard to be holding on to the old stuff while making room for the new stuff. A good purge is needed.

We once lived in a house that was taken by eminent domain and torn down. The evening after the wrecking ball finished its work, I drove by the old place, saw the pile of rubble that had been the home we brought our baby daughter to, and sobbed. Some folks had lined up across the street to watch the destruction, but I couldn’t do it. It felt violent, somehow. Now there’s a brand new fire station there, one that the city needed. Intellectually it all makes sense. Emotionally, it still hurts to look at pictures of the rubble that had been our home.

I’m not suggesting we tear the old church down with a wrecking ball. My friend Christine Chakoian wrote a great piece called “Sifting Our Inheritance: What to Keep and What to Let Go” in churchleadership.com. She rightly points out that we do keep some things. But we also let some things go.

Do we let go of the organ? If we did that at my congregation, that would getting rid of something that many of our folk consider a prime marker of our identity. Do we get rid of committees? I would love to, and I would love to think creatively about how we would get our work done. I don’t think anyone would mind having one less meeting to go to, but there would be anxiety in the in-between time. Do we let go of paid clergy? Shouldn’t all of us pastor types be working ourselves out of a job? That’s a terrifying thought.

When we made our last move, my husband, daughter and I loaded up our Honda Civic and spend four nights and five days driving from Wisconsin to Oregon. It was a great transition time. It was just the three of us and the clothes we needed for the trip and the things they wouldn’t take on the moving van. We promised our daughter we would stay in motels that had pools so that she could go swimming every day. We visited the Badlands and Mt. Rushmore. We marveled at the open skies of the west. We listened to the Wicked soundtrack, over and over and over again. We were cocooned and in each other’s company with no distractions. We needed that, after the hubbub of packing up and saying goodbye, and before the stress of starting anew and unpacking.

Maybe the church needs a cocooned, communal transition time, when we take with us only what we need for a short journey. We could do a little sight seeing, and we could sing, and we could find ways to refresh each day. Because there is a new home that awaits with all its own quirks. There will be boxes to unpack and recycle. There will be grief over what is no longer, and joy at what is.

But I really don’t want to move again.

ADDENDUM: There are no physical moves or job changes in our near future!

On replacing refrigerators and turning ocean liners

October 10, 2014October 13, 2014 / Beth Merrill Neel / 1 Comment

We had to replace our refrigerator this year. Serving the ice cream semi-soft is one thing, but pouring ice cream into a bowl and not a milkshake glass is something else all together. The dearly departed fridge lasted all of nine years. We bought it when we bought our first house together; it resided in two houses in Wisconsin and one in Portland, and then it died a fairly painless but noisy death. When one’s refrigerator dies suddenly, one really cannot spend weeks researching a new model. A quick look at Consumer Reports and a visit to Sears and three days later, a new fridge.

Here’s something we learned from the experience: they no longer make refrigerators that last twenty years, at least not any that are affordable. We anticipate our new one will last another eight to ten years, and then we will fork over a grand or two for a new one. I am not pleased about that. Nor am I pleased that things like cell phones and computers don’t last more than three to five years. Short-lived appliances are a new trend and if Jesus were around today he might say it’s a sign of the impending apocalypse.

There’s talk in church and other circles these days about nimbleness – nimble leaders who can change hats quickly, congregations that adapt to 21st church, nimble decision-making processes that are not subject to arduous months of meetings and Robert’s Rules of Order. I am all for nimbleness. I said to my husband the other day, “After twenty-one years of committee meetings, I would be happy if I never had to go to another one.” Committee meetings, board meetings, session and presbytery and synod and General Assembly meetings can be productive, but rarely have I seen them exhibit nimbleness.

Is there a connection between nimbleness and short-lived-ness? One could say we made our refrigerator-buying decision nimbly, and in eight to ten years we will be nimble again. But will a decision that is made nimbly prove to be long-lived? Is there merit in taking our time about some things, or is the deliberate pace merely an excuse for how very long it takes to turn an ocean liner around?

If manufacturers took more time to make appliances, would they last longer? Has technology become our master, and are we subject to the almost daily innovations that lead to faster connection speeds, more apps, and a greater variety of bells and whistles?

I have no answers today, but I am glad the fridge is working.

Hold Fast to What Is Good

A blog and some art and some liturgy

Ministry