Rodeo and the Church Calendar

March 15, 2013 By 5 Comments

Despite my Christian upbringing, I didn’t grow up with the church calendar. Easter was a single day affair involving plastic eggs hidden in hill country pastures and Sunday school handouts with coppery brads to swing a construction paper stone away from an empty tomb. The graphic was always neat and tidy—flowers and grass and “He is Risen!” written alongside.

I knew the story of the suffering, but the celebration made more of an impact.

So between Valentines Day and Easter when my elementary school started serving fish sticks at the end of each week, I asked my reluctant classmates, “Why do you eat fish on Fridays?”

“It’s bad to eat meat on Fridays,” my friend Adrian told me.

“Why?” I asked. [Read more...]

Filed Under: Faith, Jessica Eddings-Roeser Tagged With: , , , , 5 Comments

Will a Migraine Make Me Holy?

March 5, 2013 By 6 Comments

In her collection The White Album, published in 1979, Joan Didion has an essay called “In Bed.” The essay is about migraine headaches, which Didion suffers “three, four, sometimes five times a month.”

Her migraines are much, much worse than mine, but every few weeks, when my first conscious moment involves the awareness of a headache, I think of her.

I don’t take the powerful drugs she does—for me, over-the-counter Excedrin does the job—and I don’t suffer the aura. I don’t run through red lights or give the appearance of being drunk.

But I do give in. [Read more...]

Filed Under: Faith, Lindsey Crittenden Tagged With: , 6 Comments

What are You Doing for Lent?

February 13, 2013 By 5 Comments

“So what are you doing for Lent this year, Bill?”

This was my annual question to my spiritual director, Fr. Bill Shannon, for the twenty-five years that I went to him for monthly counsel. (I wrote about our relationship in a previous post.)

When I posed the question in 1995, about ten years into our relationship, Bill’s eyes twinkled in a smile as he answered. “Each day I’m going to write a letter to someone, and then keep that person in my prayers during that day. It’s a way of participating in the Communion of Saints.”

That impish eye-twinkling came from Bill’s knowing that his answer would take me by surprise. A fairly new Catholic, I’d expected that he would be “giving up” something for Lent.

He explained. “You shouldn’t be focusing on the negative for Lent. It’s a positive opportunity—to attend in a special way to one’s relation to God.” [Read more...]

Filed Under: Faith, Peggy Rosenthal, Uncategorized Tagged With: , 5 Comments

Jesus Died for Somebody’s Sins (But Not Mine)

February 11, 2013 By 4 Comments

For Pastor Matt, who hopes to convert my skeptical ears to belief in bluegrass, and our new Associate Pastor Meredith, who has added intellectual hipster chic to our congregation with her PhD and her nose piercing alike. You two help make First Baptist Church in Lawrence, Kansas feel like home.

Patti Smith’s 1975 debut album, Horses, famously opens with the line, “Jesus died for somebody’s sins, but not mine.” Smith goes on to sing, “My sins my own, they belong to me, me.”

I think about this when I serve communion at church, as partaking of this sacrament is a way for believers to proclaim, “Jesus died for me—even me.” In my three years as communion coordinator, I have only seen a few people dismiss the bread or the cup. They wave their hands at the plate as if to say, “Sorry, this isn’t for me.”

Of course, that may not be what they mean at all. I cannot read minds. They may be allergic to wheat or grapes, for all I know. But if Patti Smith’s lyric speaks for them, I understand. Doubt, disbelief, and disillusionment with the church are rampant, and for many good reasons. [Read more...]

Filed Under: Chad Thomas Johnston, Faith Tagged With: , 4 Comments