I Must Be Weird

Well, I just finished my first hospital visit since being called as Rector at St. Thomas in Eugene, Oregon. Yes, I have been here since August 1st and this is my first hospital call. I don't know why. An unexplained outbreak of good health? An unwillingness to trust the new guy? Whatever has been causing a lack of need for the Rector at hospital bedside, that drought is now over. Well, at least I did get to do one visit.
What's wierd is that I really enjoy being in the hospital. I don't know if it is the fact that I have worked in hospitals before. I don't know if it that feeling of being truly needed (and wanted) that you don't always get day-to-day or even Sunday-to-Sunday. Whatever is the reason, I just like being in the hospital.
I had a wonderful visit with an 86 year old parishioner who is in for some complications of COPD. Nothing serious. I got a chance to learn all about his incredible interesting life. He has done some incredible things! His courage and willingness to risk throughout his life was impressive. I really enjoyed getting to know him. He used to do hospital visits with one of his parish priests as a young man, so was very open to praying, being annointed, and taking communion.
All in all, it was a wonderful and blessed visit. I think I got as much out of the visit as he did! Praise God for all his mysteries.

I Hate Packing!

I hate the whole moving thing. Packing up, cleaning up, getting the house ready to show, packing your office (not too soon, but not too late either!). It is stressful and difficult and, despite my best intentions, I never do if very well. I always get stressed because I want to clean, organize, discard, recycle, and then pack, but what actually happens is mad packing at the last moment which leaves me feeling guilty and inadequate. I look forward to it all being over some day soon!

New job, new city, new excitement, new fears

Well, it is official. I have been called as the next Rector of St. Thomas Episcopal Church in Eugene, Oregon. It is a wonderful parish full of incredible people who are spiritual and involved and who do wonderful outreach. I am truly honored and excited that they felt called to hire me.
The process of finding a new ministry is long and difficult. It is much like dropping marbles into the Grand Canyon and waiting to hear an echo. You send out your information and then wait and wait and wait. Then, if you do hear something, they want you to reply to a set of questions. Then you wait and wait and wait. Then if you hear...etc. etc. etc. It is a very nerve-wracking process. It seems so easy to say, "oh, just put your trust in God and all will work out." That is fine, except when you have a family to consider and support, both now and ongoing. A family that is going to be impacted by whatever develops in your search.
Well, my search is over for now. I am excited to be starting a new ministry with a great parish. I am excited to be moving to Oregon. Please keep me and St. Thomas in your prayers. Peace.

Holy Sickness

Why, Oh, Why??!! Every year I come down with a cold or the flu around Holy Week. I am currently suffering a head cold that is just kicking my butt! (or is it my sinuses?) Last year it was the flu, so I guess I should be thankful that it is nothing worse. Right now, though, it feels about as bad as it can get! Achoo, achoo, drip, drip, drip, cough, hack, achoo, achoo (the sound track of my life!) Please, dear Lord, send healing!

Wow! It has been a tough Lent!

I somehow managed to get myself put in charge of the Lenten Sunday Adult Forum Series on the Renewal of Baptismal vows, as well as the Wednesday evening Lenten Book series. Well, okay, I do know how it happened, I can't keep my mouth shut! All I did was suggest the series and *BAM* I was in charge of it! When will I learn, Oh Lord! I have been as busy researching as I was during seminary. While it has been very fruitful (and even enjoyable), I am exhausted! I can't believe that it is almost over already. I feel like this Lenten season has just flown by, which is a weird feeling because Lent usually seems to drag by. Ironic difference in taking on something(s) versus giving up something (though, my wife would say that I had given up any kind of family life). I miss the monastic feel of my typical Lent. Maybe, as I get better at my ministry, I will learn how to incorporate both in my life during Lent. (or maybe learn to say 'no')

Enough whining!

I do love my job and have exciting parts to it as well as challenges! I am finalizing the preparations for my first youth/parents meeting and am excited about the schedule and mission trips and service projects that are planned. I can't wait for the meeting. I hope it goes as well as I am excited about having it! Yeah!

Passive Aggressive Rudeness

Why is it that people feel that it is okay not to return phone calls, emails, facebook posts, etc? Is it the anonymity of the electronic medium? I spend so much time trying to stay in contact with people who just never respond. Often, when I see them in church on Sunday, they say nothing. If they would even try to justify their behavior by saying, "Oh, I meant to return your call/email/posting, but I just never got the time." I would be okay with that, but they don't. It seems to be okay to blow another person off if you do it electronically. As long as I don't actually catch you when I phone, then you are free to ignore me. Oh well, I guess I need to join the 21st century and just accept that people want to hear that I called/emailed/texted them and not be concerned with the fact that no content was ever exchanged. I guess it is more about trying than succeeding. It's about performing roles, not actually interacting. How sad.

It must get better from here.

I've been employed as the Associate Rector for Family and Young Adult Ministry for 8 months. I've been ordained clergy for 7 months (since my transitional Diaconate ordination). I've been an ordained priest for a month. When, oh when, will I start getting good at this job?
Oh, the liturgical functions like celebrating and preaching go just fine, but it is the day-to-day stuff that kills me. The high school group dislikes me. The junior high group is bored with me. The parents want to turn into the "villagers with pitchforks and burning pine knots." If I communicate one way, they want it another. If I follow this person's suggestion, then that person is upset. If I plan something, they want to do something else...or just don't show up.
I really, really wish that some experienced and successful youth minister would just wave their magic wand and make good and successful at this!

Consider yourself invited

God willing
and the people consenting
The Right Reverend Jeffrey D. Lee
Bishop of Chicago
will ordain

Phillip J.A. Fackler
Shelley A. Forrester
Tyrone Fowlkes
Bradley W. Pace
Courtlyn G. Williams

to the Sacred Order of Priests
in Christ's One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church
Saturday, the sixth of December
Two Thousand and Eight
at eleven o'clock in the morning
Saint James Cathedral
Sixty-Five East Huron Street
Chicago, Illinois
Your prayers and presence are requested

The liturgical color is white
Reception following in the narthex

What a week!

Well, it is turning out to be an interesting week.

First, I was preparing for ordination on Saturday. Of course, this mainly consists of being antsy and trying to focus on all the work I should be doing (like preparing a sermon for Wednesday), but it is still something that is occupying my mind. In some ways I feel like I should be preparing in a more "real" way. I don't have time for a full-blown retreat, so it seems like a should be doing something "holy" and "preparatory," but I just have too much work to do between now and then. I truly hope I remember to bring my vestments that day!

Second, I just found out that I am officiating a funeral that day (no Eucharist). We had the planning meeting with the widow and it went very well. I learned a great deal about how that process works, especially how you get info to write a sermon for a person you really don't know very well (his wife is a parishioner and her mother is a founding member of the parish). The funeral is going to be very cool as the man was a policeman and the police and fire departments are providing honor guards. His police motorcycle will be parked by the church entrance and there will be a police bagpiper "piping" us as we process to the church yard for internment of ashes in the columbarium.

Lots and lots to do this week. At least it will make the time go by faster and I will quit fidgeting so much. I hope.

Well, It's Official!

The Standing Committee has recommended me for ordination and the Bishop has concurred! The Bishop's admin has sent an email letting me know that she has sent out the official letter to me saying that I am going to be ordained a priest! It is hard to imagine that after such a long process (7 years) that it is finally going to happen. So many work things fill my days that I hardly have time to notice that I only have 3 weeks and 3 days until my priestly ordination! Woo Hoo!

Fortune

I was sorting through some stuff in my calendar and I found a fortune cookie fortune that I had saved, but forgotten. We had gone out for Chinese shortly after my ordination to the Transitional Diaconate. My fortune read:
"You will be unusually successful in an entertainment career."

Confused about technology and youth

So, I have been encouraged by all (many of whom I would assume are "in-the-know") to create electronic ways to reach out to the youth. So I did. I have a blog and am familiar with blogging, so I created a youth blog for the church. I am on Facebook and am familiar with it, so I created a Facebook group for the youth group. I put links on our parish website so that youth and parents could reach these sites. I sent out emails to them with links so that they could reach the sites. I even set up parent specific areas on these sites, so that parents could remain in touch with what was going on. And then.........I found out that youth don't even use email. They consider email slow (and old) technology. They don't blog anymore ("so last year"). Facebook is still new and they use it, but I can't get them to join the group that I set up. AAARRRGGGHHH! I guess I go back to posting things on a bulletin board and then calling them on a telephone (oh my, how last century!) :-)

Paving!

Finally! After weeks of parking in an empty lot, hiking through the wood-lot, and tip-toeing through the mud, the parking lot is being paved. Yeah. Unfortunately, due to the ground still being too wet from our "biblical" rain last week, they won't put the second coat on until next Monday. Oh well, at least we are getting closer!
As I look at the parking lot, which up to now has been a mish-mash of gravel, newly poured concrete, and dirt, I am amazed at how pleased I am with uniformity. The sight of the black asphalt making the entire expanse of the parking lot a uniform color really pleases my eye and my sensibilities. Why? It makes me question whether or not I really do value diversity. Do I really prefer that everything look the same? Do I really prefer that everything is all one uniform color? I know that it doesn't really equate to compare a parking lot to life in general, but I really had to stop when I realized just how satisfying that uniformity was to me. I sincerely hope that in my day to day life, in my interactions with people, that I really do see and appreciate each piece of gravel, each section of newly poured concrete, and each clod of fresh, life-giving earth.

Feeling a bit selfish today (or maybe self-pity)

I'm a little down today because I wasn't invited to a friend's wedding. I know all the reasons that Brides and Grooms can't invite everyone to their celebration, but to see the pictures posted and all my friends there having a good time made me sad. Yeah, I know, it's not about me, but I really would have loved to have been there. Oh well, enough pity-party. Back to work now.

We Lived!

Well, I took 7 youths on a mission trip and came back with all 7! Yeah! We went to the Heifer International Overlook Farm in Rutland, Mass. (just outside Boston). It was a great experience. The kids got to learn about, experience, and live as most of the rest of the world. There were morning and evening chores to do, which included taking care of the animals. We had service projects to accomplish on the farm, which kept us very busy. We also had learning sessions which focused on issues such as why are people poor and hungry, why can't they just grow more food or move or something, gender inequality and what it means, and the global distribution of wealth and resources. We even spent one whole day living, working, and eating in one of the global village villages. One part of our group was in the Peruvian village and one was in the Thai village. We had to barter for our food at the local market (what meager amount we could get), build a fire, cook it, and then eat. We spent the evening discussing various aspects of our village's culture and then spent the night in our village (out under the stars with the mosquitoes, spiders, skunks, and barn cats!). All in all, a very good learning experience. I would recommend it for others.

Paul Bunyon and Babe, the Blue Ox

In preparation for the start of the rebuilding of our Parish's drainage system and parking lot, the tree company has been here for the last two days clearing a section of the "forest" next to our church offices. On the first day, they parked a HUGE wood chipper (think large, diesel engine powered, ground shaking, ear splitting, tree grinding piece o' machinery) right outside my office window. Just lovely! Between that thing, the chainsaws, and the gas powered blowers, I am about to lose my mind!
And it just gets better! I just found out that they are going to start the process of grinding off the black top next Monday! Yes, GRINDING off the blacktop! They stopped in the office to let us know that next week might be kind of loud and dusty! Woo Hoo! Aint progress great! :-)
Repeat the mantra: "The new parking lot will be more welcoming, the new parking lot will be more welcoming, the new parking lot....."

They're Done!!! Yeah!!!

I just received word that my GOE re-writes are SATISFACTORY!! Yeah!! I am officially done with the GOEs!!! It is seriously time to party!! Hallelujah! "The strife is o'er, the battle done...."

Skunk Incident, Part Three - The Saga Continues

When the exterminator arrived yesterday and set out a trap for the skunk, we asked him many questions about how we might get the skunk to leave the window well without having to resort to carnage. He gave us some ideas which we tried. We used tuna fish and cat food to try to entice the skunk up the tree branch and out of his confinement. What we ended up with though, was not a rescued skunk, but a skunk which began to feel quite pampered. Last night we left with the hope that, instead of entering the trap, he would figure out how to get out of his confinement. To quote yesterday's post, "skunks isn't the brightest of God's critters." This morning he was in the trap. Mr. Exterminator arrived silently and quickly dispatched the skunk before we had any chance to bemoan the event. All that was left was to mourn the empty window well. Well, at least it was a painless death by gas as opposed to being crushed by a Hummer's radial! Poor Mr. Skunk. RIP.

Skunk Incident, Part Two

Well, apparently skunks isn't the brightest of God's critters. We put a beautiful climbing branch down into the window well for him to climb out (and was told by one expert that once it got dark he would do so), but this morning, there he was, faithfully avoiding that branch. Unfortunately for the skunk, they do not "relocate" skunks in the Chicago suburbs, they "humanely euthanize" them. So 11:00 a.m. CDST time is when the bell tolls for our little friend. We have tried every thing suggested by the experts to entice him out, but to no avail. We are trying to assuage our guilt at his impending demise with the thought that he won't be suffering from a cruel death from dehydration and/or starvation. :-{