The World's Okayest Pastor

I tried taking a client to worship on a Wednesday and ran into some problems (different church from other posts). The door at the top of the wheelchair ramp did have a button so the door would automatically open. However, there's a switch that has to be turned on to allow the door to open. That switch wasn't on so I got to do some interesting moves to get the door opened without sending my client flying down a ramp. Other people were standing inside the doors and decided to watch this "dance" occur instead of help and when I finally got my client and myself in the door decided to tell me that there was switch on a wall over there and that it needed to be flipped. What was welcoming about being told how to make someone else's church accessible? What is welcoming about standing there and not doing something when you know what to do? I think there are a few missing links there. Another issue I've run into is congregations using lifts and ramps as a place to stor...

It's always so much easier to list what you're not or the negative then it is the positive. A good faith journey person asked me recently what do I want to do...ummm...silence. I had to sit and stew because all I could do was start the running list of what I don't want to do. Then that's followed by the list of things that I can do and be decent at but it's not what I'm passionate about. And then the brain stops at the thought about what I'd like to do...the good, happy, life giving stuff. So that makes me wonder and ask myself the questions of why don't I know what would make me happy and why don't I do what makes me happy? The first answer I can come up with is that being responsible doesn't always equal being happy. The fact is that I have bills and loans to pay. As much as I wish I didn't have to pay them, I do. I made choices in life to acquire these bills so now I have to pay them. So I do a job that helps me pay my bills but doesn'...

So there's naturally backlash that people are focused on Chick-fil-a. The biggest thing I hear is why don't we focus on hungry children or the unemployment rate or pick your topic of choice. Well I'd like to offer another option...that being a faithful Christian means that I can fight for marriage equality and equal rights for the LBGTQ community and also work to feed the hungry, fight the high unemployment rates, work towards a creating a better environment and other issues that I support. It doesn't have to be a either or situation. What I see as a wrong is a wrong to me. When I see my faith being used to cause hurt, pain and discrimination on any issue I have the right to fight it just like you have your right to support it. I am no less of a faithful person for my stances then you are for holding your stance. Just because I choose to add my 2 cents worth to a highly discussed topic doesn't mean I'm giving up on everything else I support. I can multitask. Tru...

So clearly if you read a post of mine from a couple of days ago you know that I'm not a big fan of places of worship going overboard on crap. This past Saturday I returned with my 2 clients to go to worship to find that they were having their yearly celebration of summer. They rented inflatables, large grills for cook for the community. There was a petting zoo and all of the carnival stuff you could want. Celebrating the summer is great. Feeding the community (it was free and advertised as all are welcome - I'll give them points for that outreach to the community) is great. But there was a crucial thing that forgot - accessibility. In order to do this, this church blocked off a large part of their parking lot. They decided to use their church buses and rent large golf carts to transport people to and from parking spots they were using away from their property so people wouldn't have to walk so far. This was a very nice thought. But yet none of these carts or buses were equi...

When I moved from Des Moines, IA to Lexington, KY I was introduced to this place called Chick-fil-a. I love chicken and theirs is good...I mean good! I understood that the folks who own the company were conservative but then again isn't half of America? I was cool with letting them believe their own thing and I believe mine. But now records and statements come out about how millions of dollars are being spent to prevent my friends, family and people that I don't know from being officially allowed to be who they are. I have a major issues with this because they're dragging in my faith to speak for them. They're quoting Bible passages left and right to say that marriage is defined as 1 man and 1 woman. They're saying that marriage is the Church's to decide. Well let's take a look at all that's wrong with these statements. 1) Marriage did not start out as a Biblical act. It was an act of protecting property therefore it was a civil act first and foremost. R...

"You're going to hell." Common phrase and one that has been hurled at me many times for various reasons. My usually response is laughter because I don't believe in hell. Let me explain myself. There really isn't a biblical base for the concept of a place in another realm. What people have contrived as a place called hell, a fire pit, generally comes from Dante's book. Also there isn't really a biblical base for purgatory either. For me, from a theological stand point there's not room for hell - a place void of God and one that is full of endless pain and suffering. Genesis starts with a litany about how all things are created good. We then read throughout both testaments that God is good and all loving. So why would God, who is all loving and creates all things good create something that is bad and leave souls there to suffer. For me there are just too many inconsistencies in this idea of hell. If anything I believe that this concept of heaven/hell was...

Part of my job right now is to take clients to their places of worship. I don't mind taking them, in fact I encourage it if it's what they want to do. I can generally set aside my wants and tastes in worship for my clients because it's not about me. But this past weekend I hit a limit of what I could take in. With two of my clients with me I walked into VBS hell. While I applaud the congregations' desire to offer programing and to come up with their own curriculum, that's about the most positive I can offer. The church ripped off Mario brothers for their theme of "Game On with Jesus." No main characters but there was the coins, stars, plants, tubes, a large scale game controller and other things. Decorations were every where: hallways, worship centers (yes plural) and even in bathrooms. Do you really need to decorate the bathroom? Just just gross in general. Let the bathroom be the bathroom please. Apparently the "bad guy" (I have a whole other...

Anxiety - oh how I don't like it. It's a big ego thing in general but alas anxiety still lives and reigns in my life/body. I have been working for about 6 weeks on a CMA class. I was making peace with things and then the next thing I knew it was the night before the test. Can we say major anxiety attack??? A little background...I'm the girl in high school who set the chem lab on fire (I put it out myself), I've never done well in the sciences or math and I don't test well. So I've carried around tons of anxiety about not being good at this stuff for decades. So I found myself sitting in a meeting the night before the test with a massive headache, nausea, having hot flashes and having a hard time keeping my body from shaking. Driving home in a storm, at dark on the interstate just about pushes me over the edge because it's all not going to be okay. Getting mad at myself for being this upset and worked up....can you say too much!!! It's amazing how all of ...

As I continue on this journey of spirit/self I'm on, I find that I just don't have the energy to play games or to BS people. So when asked a question about my opinion I give it as it is. Today while sitting in a class the instructor asked about how things had gone with the preparing for the class my opinion was asked for specifically. I have worked with this instructor for 7 months. I value her opinion and she values mine because we have built that relationship that is honest and we both know we have the best interest of those we work with at heart. So after hearing other people complain about how they "couldn't" get the book read when they had more then a month to do so I gave my opinion. I stated that I was able to get the book read, review questions worked on and make flashcards for terms while still having a life and working my full time hours. My response was met with "that was blunt and mean" and with the look of "you need to take it back....

Speaking truth is something that is supposedly valued by culture. We try to teach our children to not lie but once we all enter the real world we find that truth is something that we categorize. We withhold parts of the information, we ignore things, we turn blind eyes to situations.This often common in many workplaces. You don't say the truth because you do have to fear losing your job or suffering other consequences. And for those of you who want to argue that people can't do that because that's retribution, let me just say people find unofficial ways of doing it. So when someone comes along and speaks truth to power it's generally not met with positivity. So with all of the consequences why speak truth to power? Because if you follow beliefs of most faith traditions then it is your job as a person in the universe to speak truth to the powers that oppress or commit wrongs. It is our job to question those who hold power over others. If no one ever said anything to powe...

A common statement I hear from church folk is if we had more programs people would come - the whole field of dreams philosophy. And while in theory this works people forget that's more to having programs in a congregation. It takes time, money and talent. And when I say time and talent I'm not just saying that it's the minister's responsibility. I've seen that the biggest complainers about lack of programming are the ones who don't show up to things most of the time. I've heard the excuses "they had soccer, band, ROTC" the list goes on and on. I'd hate to tell people this but with the rise of social media and when your whole family are my friends I know that you are not busy with those things every weekend. You just choose not to show up. And when you choose not to show up that's when the frustration kicks in. Think about it...most people don't like to work hard to create a program to not have people to show up. Why is it okay to think ...

I tend to be nomadic in my life so my car is my sanctuary. Probably my need for control also explains why I look around my car and all I see is a mess of stuff every where. There's full and empty pop cans and bottles, books, papers, clothes and other stuff. It's pretty much an explosion of the things that I do and how I try to avoid things. I try to keep my life so full of stuff that I can avoid dealing with things that are truly important. Or there's also my other favorite technique of putting stuff in the backseat so I can get to it later and then I bury it with more crap and garbage. So as I spent time cleaning out my car over the last couple of days. Still have work to do on the car and that's very much like my life. It's not the most fun thing in the world to do to clean up your life. It's often something that you do and then it's very easy to trash again. Maybe someday my car will get clean. I know my life will never be the shining pretty thing that dr...

I just have to wonder when it became okay to try to break a person's spirit in American society today? When did it become an excepted practice to "make examples" out of people? After some experiences over the last several days I'm deeply concerned that this seems to be a standard practice in business today but I see it in other places too. While it is important to make sure people understand what's acceptable and excepted there is a long way to trying to break a person down in front of others to set the example. This is not respect, this is not love. This is not a good way to teach anything. This goes against every aspect of the Divine that is in every living, breathing thing. This world is already hard enough to live in and then we intentional inflict more harm. The other thing that worries me is that often times people watch this sort of thing happen and don't speak truth to the power. Instead of hiding in cubicles, pretending not to hear and see why not say...

Home, it comes from within a wise person told me recently. That's a notion I struggle with. For so many home is a physical place. Maybe you lived there for your whole childhood, maybe it's a place where you had a major life event or two. Maybe it's the places where you felt at peace and rooted. Right now I feel like I embody the song "Motherless Child" - a very long way from home . I do not feel connected to a place. Kentucky was home for 9 solid years but when I left and then went back it clearly was not home. Des Moines is my hometown on paper. Lived there since I was 2. It's the place I've come back to when needing to regroup. May parents and brother are there. My sister is not that far away. But it doesn't feel like home. I feel like a visitor in others' space. I don't see myself being here for an extended period of time, which is not all a bad thing either. So if I don't feel connected to a place then maybe my opening sentence needs fu...

I'm a person that tends to live out of my heart. In the Enegram I'm a 3w2 for those that know what that means. I tend to lead and act from my emotions. This has some blessings but also some curses. While I'm often able to pick up on others feelings and tend to be able to sympathize and empathize with others it also means that I tend to take things said to heart, deeply into my heart. To be more specific I tend to take the critics and negative said about me to heart and forget about the postive things or I tend to write them off as just fluff. That's where I find myself as I write this...living in my heart and taking the negative things said to me to heart and feeling the overwhelming urge to ball my eyes out, which I've done several times recently. The energy is off. I wish I could be different at times. Maybe live in my brain. But alas I am who I am, firmly and undeniably rooted in the heart. Sometimes it feels okay to live here and others it doesn't. It does h...

Kelly Clarkson has a new song out called "Dark Side." It asks the question that if someone really knew her dark side would they still love her and would they be willing to know her dark side. It's a very good question. There are many philosophies about people and their dark sides. Basically I think it's the stuff in life that we want to keep covered up. We're not always aware of the stuff in there. Sometimes we are aware that we have stuff there but we try to cover it up and ignore it. We all have them and some people are able to live a life without really ever engaging their dark sides. Then there are others who dive on in and try to work on their dark side. That's what I'm trying to do - explore the stuff in my dark side. The dark side does affect me even when I wish it didn't. It's not an easy process and can be painful. There have been many times were I have been brought to tears and crying to the point of hyper-ventilating. I fight myself ofte...

Sometimes I just look at places of worship and just sigh. As much as they often process that they're welcoming to all and that it doesn't matter who you are you're welcome often they're not. I think that the honest truth is that the signs and banners should really say "welcome as long as you agree with the majority." I know that not every one agrees on things in any congregation. However, when someone comes into many places of worship that is different from the majority ethos, they are not welcomed. I feel that church has become more about labeling. "This is the progressive church." "That's the conservative." "That's the church with a female pastor." "She's a republican, he's a democrat." You know the things people say. I'm sure I've said it about places many time. I'd like to see places of worship be different. How about we stop labeling the people that worship with us. How about we offer pla...

One of the songs that I thought that I tended to live by is Heart's "Alone." You know the power ballad of "til now I always got by on my own." Good song to sing too. But alas...I think I'm starting to embrace it more then I want to admit. I've prided myself on being an independent person. I know enough to get myself in and out of trouble - hence probably how I've master duct tape. But as I spend about the next 3 weeks house and dog sitting I'm starting to realize how alone I am not. I tend to spend a lot of my time being around people. I sit at coffee shops to do my work, get my caffeine addiction needs met and to be around people. I spend a lot of time checking Facebook so I can see what everyone is doing. I used to think that I could be fine without being around people. But less the 48 hours into my 3 weeks sitting at the house with 3 snoozing puppies makes me uncomfortable. TV and studying only take up so much time. Chores...well that's no...

It is often hard to discuss topics in the Church because I see that too often all sides of the argument believe that they know where the other already stands on the issue. "We can't even discuss being an O & A congregation because these people/that person is against it." I'm sure you've heard the sayings. But I think the real question that needs to be asked when these statements go flying around is "Did you really go and talk to this person or are you just assuming you know what they're going to say?" And even if you do go over and talk to another person do you 1) let the person speak, 2) really listen to what they're saying and 3) do it in a non-threatening way? Many issues involving religion and faith are very personal. That's part of what makes faith great is that it is personal. People can arrive at different conclusions for very different reasons and that's okay because it's their faith and it doesn't have to be yours. Bu...

Saying "no" is not always the easiest thing to do in the world. Try saying it to a cute little child or your dog when they make that face...not so easy. However, I have become a master at it. Having done my fair share of youth and children ministry and now with the work I do it has become a very important word. I'm there to ensure that those entrusted into my care, for no matter how short of a time, are to be taken care of and that they learn things. Often the word no gets met with anger and resistance. Why can't I (fill in the blank)? But I want too. These are just two of the common responses I get. Well the answer is that I say no because in my assessment of the situation it is in your best interest to say no. Maybe what you think you want is not a healthy choice. Maybe it will benefit you but at the cost of someone else. And while I could say no, sometimes, just to say no and be mean, I find that I do my best to limit those occurrences. Yet it's interesting tha...

I love a boxer named Sadie. She's been in my life for about 5 years now. She was 2 when we got her, we think or best guess there. Sadie came from the local rescue league and all we know about her past is that she was part of a court case and that she was under weight. Sadie started out as a very shy and fearful puppy. She didn't like sudden movement, noise or new people. She still isn't sure to this day that it's okay for her to eat her food out of her dish unless sits watch for her. She has grown up to show those characteristic boxer qualities, gained and maintained a healthy weight and has learned to love. I'm in awe of how she has let go of her past and has embraced who she's meant to be: a funny, curious, smart but stubborn, sometimes pain in the butt dog that loves to be loved and to love. Always wanting to go with, waiting and watching for her people to come back. She loves. She keeps watch of the house to make sure all is in order and I'm sure would p...

When you're clergy you have a decision to make: to put a clergy sticker on your car or not? A clergy sticker does have it's benefits at time: decent and most of the time free parking spaces at hospitals. No questions when you park in those spaces for the pastor. But it also has its draw backs for me. If you get pulled over driving, you generally get the "you of all people should have known better." Then there's the whole thing of to honk or not to honk, to give the New York wave or not. To speed more then just a few over or not? I do have a clergy sticker on my car and I do find myself going ohh...maybe I shouldn't do this or that. Some days I think I just scrap the thing off. I'm not sure that it stands for what I once thought it was and I'm not sure that I like being defined by a sticker on my car. I don't think the perks of having the sticker on my car outweigh everything else. So I guess I just created a new project for myself. I wonder how lon...

Holding on to things...some people do it with stuff, others with emotions and still others with people. When its with stuff we call those people hoarders. When it's emotions we say that person is (insert psychological diagnosis here). When it's people its co-dependency. It's the last one that I've been thinking about and trying to work on. If you know me I'm not big on stuff, I live completely behind the 6 month rule of use it or get rid of it. Emotions - I tend to wear my heart on my sleeve these days even though I wish I didn't. But people - that's a hard one for me. There's that overwhelming sense of not wanting to be alone. To want to know that I have my person out there. So in order to feel like that, even though I know that I have people out there, I've been holding onto a person that in all honesty I should have let go awhile ago...probably more like 2 or 3 years ago. But there was something that kept me there in a friendship and relationship ...