We’re now stepping into June and the beginning of summer, I’d like to share a few more ideas for new spiritual practices as suggested by my colleague in ministry, the Rev. Linda Kurtz, who serves at the First Presbyterian Church of Lexington, Kentucky. As we look towards a future in which those of us over the age of twelve can all be safely vaccinated, I invite you to consider changing up the way you pray and seeing if one of these practices might enrich your conversation with God.

Pray in Color

Sometimes, when we pray, we can’t find the right words. Sometimes, our minds wander and our bodies won’t stay still. Sometimes, it feels like we need to embody our prayers, to give them more than simply words as we lift them up to God.

You are invited to pray in color using these prayers for when you feel anxious from Illustrated Ministry. The document is designed to be printed double-sided. Use one coloring sheet and save the rest for later. Use them all today. It’s completely up to you. May you feel God’s presence with you this day.

This Sunday (May 23) is Pentecost, a holiday celebrated as being the birth of the church, the day when we remember the Holy Spirit coming down among us like a rushing wind and dancing like tongues of fire over our heads. The color of Pentecost is red, and you are encouraged to wear red as we worship together in our homes and as we gather over zoom.

In previous years, we’ve done a lot more for Pentecost than just wearing red. For my first Pentecost at Peoples, we closed the service with a fire drill at the benediction. Carolyn has created lovely art installations to remind us of the flames of the Holy Spirit, there have been special flowers and special music, and we’ve had lay readers share the scriptures not only in English, but in Spanish, Italian, French, German, Hebrew, and Greek.

How can we make this Pentecost special?

To celebrate Pentecost as the “birthday of the church,” you might bake a birthday cake (if you live alone, like me, you might try the microwave red velvet cake that I made last year in a mug), put up some streamers, or read about the history of Peoples Presbyterian Church.

To reflect on the Holy Spirit as a rushing wind or the breath of God, you might blow up a balloon, assemble a pinwheel, blow some bubbles, fly a kite, or just go outside and find a breeze.

To reflect on the Holy Spirit as the tongues of flame that rested on the heads of the apostles, you might light a candle, start up the grill, or print and color this Holy Spirit coloring page.

To reflect on the gift of languages, and the many different ways in which people pray to God around the world, you might read the Lord’s Prayer in another language.

And, of course, please find something red to wear as you join us for worship over Facebook Live on Sunday at 10am, so that we can celebrate Pentecost together, even though we are still separated.

The Feast of the Ascension falls this week, when, forty days after the resurrection, Jesus (appropriately enough) ascended into heaven. Last year, some of my colleagues and I put together a video telling an apocryphal story as written by the Rev. Dr. Lori Walke that dates back (more or less) to the Desert Fathers. It was a fun project and I’d like to share the story again.

The Gospels tell us in a few different ways the story of the ascension of Jesus, the story of his rising to higher ground.  The story even spills into the Book of Acts.  Perhaps you cannot recall one of the specific versions, so let me refresh your memory. Now, I don’t know if this is exactly how it happened, but I know that this story is true.

After Jesus died, he began appearing to his friends.  This, of course, usually happened when a group of them got together to talk about him – retelling his jokes and remembering what Jesus taught them.  On this particular day, a really large crowd of his friends had gathered, and what do you know, Jesus showed up, too.  He began to teach them, saying, “Resist! Pray for enemies!  Turn the other cheek!  Go the extra mile! And of course, love one another. Every single other.”

When he had said all this, a voice from the heaven boom, “ASCEND!”  And so, he did.  He spread out his arms, looked up to heaven with a smile, and slowly began to rise.

The disciples watched, stunned, and suddenly, Mary, realizing what was happening, gave a shout, backed up to get a running start, and LEAPT up to grab Jesus’s ankle.  “I’m coming too!” she cried.  John, seeing what was happening, jumped up and grabbed Jesus’ OTHER ankle.  Jesus, slightly concerned, stopped and looked down at them and then back up to heaven and asked: “God, what do I do?”  And God said, “ASCEND!”  And so, all together, holding on to one another, lifting each other up, they all began to rise.

Now the other disciples, seeing Mary and John rising with Jesus, they wanted to go, too, so suddenly all of Jesus’ friends are jumping and grabbing onto their ankles, and Mary and John and Jesus reached out to pull them up until there was a small pyramid of people swinging from each other in the sky.  A little alarmed, Jesus asked again, “What do I do, God?” Again the voice from heaven BOOMED, “ASCEND!”  And all together, holding on to one another, lifting each other up, they all began to rise.

Then people from all over, folks who had seen Jesus’ miracles or heard him preach, people who had seen the friends of Jesus feed the hungry and show kindness, they began to jump up and grab onto the lower most disciples, and slowly, all together, holding on to one another, lifting each other up, they all began to rise.

But a little girl way at the bottom shouted, “Stop, wait! I want to bring my dog!”  And Jesus, WAY up at the top yells back down, “Try to hurry – I don’t know how this works!”

So the little girl, still scanning the horizon, reached out and grabbed a tree and the branch held on tight. Everyone kept rising and the tree began to rise too, and it looked like the tree would be uprooted, but the tree curled its toes and held on tight to the earth.  And the earth started to rise, too, but it reached out to the sea, and the sea grabbed hold with its waves and HELD ON tight and no one let go and slowly, all together, holding on to one another, lifting each other up, the whole world was drawn closer to God.

Sometimes, when I’m stuck writing a sermon, I’ll take a tea break and see if I can find one on YouTube that might inspire me. It’s a very hit or miss strategy. But one thing that almost always happens is that my search results pull up a long list of sermons preached almost exclusively by middle-aged white men. When a woman shows up in a thumbnail, more often than not, she is giving a children’s message, not a sermon. I’ve been trying this technique for three and a half years now, and I can tell you the exact number of times that I’ve come across a sermon by a fellow young clergywoman:

Once.

It was one time.

When none of the voices I find online sound anything like mine, it’s a lonely feeling. It’s an echo of all the conversations I’ve had when people have assumed my clerical collar was a costume, or told me that I would never be a “real” pastor, or openly expressed shock that any woman would ever be “allowed” to preach (which is a thing that women have done for centuries, but never mind).

And it makes me wonder what other voices we aren’t hearing.

As you may know, I’m a big fan of the Academy Awards, and Oscars night is basically my super bowl. For over a decade, I’ve dressed up, paper and colored pencils in hand to sketch out my favorite dresses, and compared my predictions to the final results. I usually get about 16/24 right (which was what I got this year as well, in part because this year I decided to mark my preference rather than my prediction in categories where I couldn’t make up my mind).

I love movies, especially when they are made and written well. One of the things I love about the Oscars is having a reason to watch a bunch of movies that I might not otherwise have seen. Over the years, there have definitely been a few movies that I didn’t remotely enjoy and still don’t think deserved awards, but there have also been quite a few that I think about often.

Historically speaking, there have been many stories that Hollywood has chosen, for whatever reason, not to tell. It often makes me wonder what other stories we aren’t seeing.

Since last August, I’ve had a hard time putting into words the feeling of loss I have following the devastatingly early death of Chadwick Boseman to cancer at the age of 43. I would probably never have met him in real life, which is undoubtedly also true of any other celebrity whose career I might follow. But some people come to represent ideas and possibilities much bigger than themselves, which is certainly true for Chadwick Boseman, the actor who, to my great surprise and ire, was NOT posthumously awarded the Oscar for best actor this past weekend. Although he would have deserved it based on his work in Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom (the film he was nominated for), the Academy might also have considered the impact he has had in the world in general and in Hollywood, specifically. He first took on the mantle of Black Panther in 2016 and starred in the eponymous movie in 2018, which meant that he was an actor of color playing an extremely powerful superhero AND king in a movie that celebrated African culture and vision without assuming that an ideal society would be based on European imagery. That’s the kind of story that hadn’t ever been told before, certainly not in a huge budget mainline film.

All of this is to say that this year’s awards stirred up in me a complicated mix of sadness and regret for all the voices we don’t hear, and all the possibilities that we’ll never know because a life was lost too soon. Giving the award to Chadwick wouldn’t have brought him back, but it would have been a very fitting way for the Academy to honor and acknowledge the stories that it hasn’t always allowed to be told.

Prayer to Heal Racial Division

We thank you, O Lord,
For in your loving wisdom
You created one human family
With a diversity
That enriches our communities.

We pray to you, O Lord,
That we always recognize
each member of this human family
As being made in your image and beloved by you,
With worth and dignity.

We pray to you, O Lord,
That we may envision a way forward
To heal the racial divisions
That deny human dignity and
the bonds between all human beings.

We pray to you, O Lord
That we may affirm each person’s dignity
Through fair access for all
To economic opportunity, housing,
Education, and employment.

We pray to you, O Lord,
That we may have eyes to see
What is possible when we reach out
Beyond fear, beyond anger,
To hold the hand of our sisters, our brothers.

We thank you, O Lord,
For your call and challenge to us
That we may reveal your teachings and your love
Through our actions to end racism
And to proclaim that we are all your children,
heirs to your sacred creation.

Amen.

~ from the website of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. Copyright © 2018, United States Conference of Catholic Bishops. All rights reserved.  This text may be reproduced in whole or in part without alteration for nonprofit educational use, provided such reprints are not sold and include this notice. https://www.usccb.org/about/