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28 de Octubre 2009
Liturgy... sort of.
This is the order for the communion service for 102809 at Mars Hill Graduate School:
A Welcome to Sinners & Saints Alike: A Brief Order of Confession
Got My List
Performed by Jonah's onelinedrawing
Sometimes I feel affected, then it all disappears,
The rain and clouds above my head, then all that disappears
I'd understand it, if I could grab it,
Another with on my list
One more day we made it through now, got my list
One more time we made it through yeah, got my list
Some days I feel protected, then all that disappears
We breathe as two but think as one, and it all disappears
Service of the Word
John 14:21-27 (The Message)
21"The person who knows my commandments and keeps them, that's who loves me. And the person who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I will love him and make myself plain to him."
22Judas (not Iscariot) said, "Master, why is it that you are about to make yourself plain to us but not to the world?"
23-24"Because a loveless world," said Jesus, "is a sightless world. If anyone loves me, he will carefully keep my word and my Father will love him--we'll move right into the neighborhood! Not loving me means not keeping my words. The message you are hearing isn't mine. It's the message of the Father who sent me.
25-27"I'm telling you these things while I'm still living with you. The Friend, the Holy Spirit whom the Father will send at my request, will make everything plain to you. He will remind you of all the things I have told you. I'm leaving you well and whole. That's my parting gift to you. Peace. I don't leave you the way you're used to being left--feeling abandoned, bereft. So don't be upset. Don't be distraught.
Service of the Meal
"On the rostrum, seated in three compact rows of auditorium chairs, were about twenty children, mostly girls, ranging in age from about seven to thirteen. At the moment, their choir coach, an enormous woman in tweeds, was advising them to open their mouths wider when they sang. Had anyone, she asked, ever heard of a little dickeybird that dared to sing his charming song without first opening his little beak wide, wide, wide? Apparently nobody ever had. She was given a steady, opaque look."
All:
Therefore we praise you,
joining our voices with choirs of angels,
with prophets, apostles, and martyrs,
and with all the faithful of every time and place
who forever sing to the glory of your name:
Holy, holy, holy Lord, God of power and might,
heaven and earth are full of your glory.
Hosanna in the highest.
Blessed is the one who comes in the name of the Lord.
Hosanna in the highest.
"She went on to say that she wanted all her children to absorb the meaning of the words they sang, not just mouth them, like silly-billy parrots. She then blew a note on her pitch pipe, and the children, like so many underage weightlifters, raised their hymnbooks."
Words of Institution
"They sang without instrumental accompaniment--or, more accurately in their case, without any interference. Their voices were melodious and unsentimental, almost to the point where a somewhat more denominational man than myself might, without straining, have experienced levitation. A couple of the very youngest children dragged the tempo a trifle, but in a way that only the composer's mother could have found fault with. I had never heard the hymn, but I kept hoping it was one with a dozen or more verses."
The Lord is with you
All: And also with you.
We give you thanks that the Lord Jesus,
on the night before he died, took bread,
and after giving thanks to you,
he broke it, and gave it to his disciples, saying:
Take, eat. This is my body, given for you.
Do this in remembrance of me.
In the same way he took the cup, saying:
This cup is the new covenant sealed in my blood,
shed for you for the forgiveness of sins.
Whenever you drink it, do this in remembrance of me.
As our Savior Christ has taught us, we are bold to pray.
All: Our Father, who art in heaven,
hallowed be thy name,
thy kingdom come, thy will be done,
on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread;
and forgive us our debts,
as we forgive our debtors;
and lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from evil.
For thine is the kingdom,
and the power, and the glory, forever. Amen.
The gifts of God for the people of God
Amen.
All is prepared. Eat, Drink and be satisfied.
(please pass the elements and serve one another saying, "The body of Christ, given for you; the blood of Christ, given for you.")
High and Dry
Performed by Radiohead
Two jumps in a week, I bet you think that's pretty clever don't you boy.
Flying on your motorcycle, watching all the ground beneath you drop.
You'd kill yourself for recognition; kill yourself to never ever stop.
You broke another mirror; you're turning into something you are not.
Don't leave me high, don't leave me dry
Don't leave me high, don't leave me dry
Drying up in conversation, you will be the one who cannot talk.
All your insides fall to pieces, you just sit there wishing you could still make love
They're the ones who'll hate you when you think you've got the world all sussed out
They're the ones who'll spit at you. You will be the one screaming out.
Don't leave me high, don't leave me dry
Don't leave me high, don't leave me dry
It's the best thing that you've ever had, the best thing that you've ever, ever
had.
It's the best thing that you've ever had; the best thing you've had has gone away.
Laugh, follow The Road
Performed by Jonah's Onelinedrawing
I pretend these lights are on for free
I clean up for rewards
I share the parts of myself that taste good
and hide the rot
I nibble on alone in times like these
I want you to bury me
to make you live to say
and every inch is one more flaming lung
My laugh, fall, or the road
Sleep is the best drug
I saw my Moon
That and wishing she was on Mars
Anything but saying she wished she was
dead
I remember wonder what was the
difference to people left around
Messes not picked up
Infections let to green
I laugh, follow the road
Hymn of Response
How Firm a Foundation
How firm a foundation, ye saints of the Lord,
is laid for your faith in his excellent word!
What more can he say than to you he hath said,
to you who for refuge to Jesus have fled?
Fear not, I am with thee, O be not dismayed,
for I am thy God and will still give thee aid;
I'll strengthen and help thee, and cause thee to
stand
upheld by my righteous, omnipotent hand.
When through deep waters I call thee to go,
the rivers of woe shall not thee overflow;
for I will be with thee, thy troubles to bless,
and sanctify to thee thy deepest distress.
When through fiery trials thy pathways shall
lie,
my grace, all-sufficient, shall be thy supply;
the flame shall not hurt thee; I only design
thy dross to consume, and thy gold to refine.
Benediction
Let us Pray... Gracious God, you are God of the heart and soul, God of the details and fingernails. We know,
We know You,
We know You arrive--
Even when we don't.
An invitation to Return to us...
The Visitation
by Abigail Jimenez
She asks if there is anything she can
bring
I think first of the tree under her nest:
of the tiny maple,
the dwarf lemon
but most tenderly
the tall olive tree
(a mere branch leaning down across the soil
when she brought it home bowing, like a blessing
to her lover)
bring a branch from the olive tree, my dove:
my heart has been afloat too long now.
When you arrive, carry in your mouth the proof,
tell me
there are trees again
bursting from the horizon.
Tell me silently that the earth reaches out her arborized hands, and leafy fingers,
hoping to hold you up, proudly (loving your tiny toes curving around her fingers)
where you perch and play
and perform your miracles.
If there is solid ground again, a place to make a home,
I know you will tell me and you will bring a bit of it
wordlessly, weightlessly
leave leaves with me, my peace, my piece of home.
Credits: Short Story excerpts taken from "For Esme--With Love and Squalor" by JD Salinger
Words of Institution provided by the Presbyterian Church, USA
This liturgy has been composed to intentionally incorporate Word (poetry, prose, scripture, lyric, hymn) and Sacrament. For an electronic reference please find me at
skinnytree.berkeleyblogs.com
Thank you.
Posted by crymytinyflood at 12:14 AM | Comments (0)
23 de Octubre 2009
dangerous, like communion
Pr. Hoffman is always on about the life-giving choice. He isn't talking about abortion or euthanasia. He is talking about choosing kind words, safe speed limits, exegetical method, salad, controlling affect, vacation plans, organic strawberries.
I can follow him, mostly.
I get a little stuck on Eucharist because Holy Communion happens every Sunday and we don't get a choice about that--even if or when it seems like we might. What is more, communion happens every moment, every hour, every day every week for us.
So every week we have the choice about whether or not to drag ourselves up to the altar.
It is just one more example of the way the life-giving choice happens to you, you turn around and feel like you never really made it, it made you.
so I'm working it out, hoping the poems will explain it to me:
I love you so much
The blood will always be there
soaking in around and through us, the everyday every day, and sometimes in the sweaty brow of your midnight body twisted in bedsheets,
like in a dream:; :; :;
one thought connects to another without making any real sense, but this is not a dream;
It is a restful choice, for body and blood
like a ribbon unfurling,
from some one body to another,
chalice to lips and then out again, when we whisper the words we know will cost
us, everything:
--I love you so much--
in honesty and hope
this is only a wasted moment,
a fantasy, or harmful
if we disconnect from all that we have learned--:
about choices.
Sometimes we make a choice.
Sometimes a choice makes us
Because it is
who we are, who we want to be, who we were made to be,
called to be: among the living.
if you ever doubt heaven exists let it be
because I am not there,
I am here with you
always.
so here, watch this sad little video for someday you will be loved. it may make your stomach hurt.
I once knew a girl
In the years of my youth
With eyes like the summer
All beauty and truth
In the morning I fled
Left a note and it read
Someday you will be loved.
I cannot pretend that I felt any regret
Cause each broken heart will eventually mend
As the blood runs red down the needle and thread
Someday you will be loved
You'll be loved you'll be loved
Like you never have known
The memories of me
Will seem more like bad dreams
Just a series of blurs
Like I never occurred
Someday you will be loved
You may feel alone when you're falling asleep
And everytime tears roll down your cheeks
But I know your heart belongs to someone you've yet to meet
Someday you will be loved
You'll be loved you'll be loved
Like you never have known
The memories of me
Will seem more like bad dreams
Just a series of blurs
Like I never occurred
Someday you will be loved
Posted by crymytinyflood at 10:27 AM | Comments (0)
12 de Octubre 2009
if you need the practice
or at least a little validation
because it is not easy to tell someone how you really feel, you can sing along.
these days, when i hear the songs that were written in the language of love i am suddenly able to understand them. the trees so boldly in love with the wind in their leaves, the spiders at home in their webs, the dogs willing to run, fetch and always return, the way diamonds reflect light and sun shines through a window all make a little more sense now because they are all confessions of love,
a message meant to concede that love shows up in the oddest places and tiniest spaces, between all the living, moving parts of the hopeful machinations of a God whose first creation is love.
love is such a complicated confession. i tell you about the scent of a redwood tree in autumn and i am confessing that i love that tree, and i love to tell you about the tree, because i love you. these confessions are a wading into the waters of repentance, i take your hand and tell you i am turning toward you, away from the days when i was afraid to tell you about the smell of a tree. i am asking you to trust me, knowing full well that this is a drastic change in the way i have used these words before, that trust is always a risk and i am asking you to endure nightmares about betrayal, fend off the monstrous absence of proof, and you may at any moment climb to the top of the very tree that started all this trouble just to make sure heaven doesn't exist because i am not there...
because
sometimes the words are just so deep down
at the bottom of my shipwrecked heart, in a tiny box, that is impossible to pry open. and if the words were to surface, if you or i could raise the titanic vocabulary of the way i had hoped things would be, well, that would change everything--i know because Hope tells me this is true.
but the pressure is so great and the fear so strong the words crumble on the way to the surface, they cringe in the light of sunset as we stand on the on the sandy beach holding onto mere fragments oxidated, disintegrated, and my hands shake and i can't breathe because on the way up i was moving too fast and breathing too much and i got the bends... it is undeniably overwhelming.
it takes a certain strong kind of man to look at me and my too many little pieces of broken lines, rusty thoughts, salty, barnacled inarticulate hopes and dreams and appreciate
that this is the best thing that has ever happened to him, that i am the best thing that has ever happened to him, because it is an offering, a confession, priceless, irreplaceable, proof of the serious weight of my story, and it is enough to change how he feels his own.
those Avetts, they know how this happens and they are very helpful.
when you can't say love to each other anymore, you have to leave the place you called home because you were just calling it that, even though it wasn't. the real words for it, the strong words like hate and anger, were buried under an ocean of denial, along with the words
I and love and you
Load the car and write the note.
Grab your bag and grab your coat.
Tell the ones that need to know.
We are headed north.
One foot in and one foot back.
But it don't pay to live like that.
So I cut the ties and I jumped the track.
For never to return.
Ahh Brooklyn, Brooklyn take me in.
Are you aware the shape I'm in?
My hands they shake, my head it spins.
Ahh Brooklyn, Brooklyn take me in.
When at first I learned to speak.
I used all my words to fight.
With him and her and you and me.
Ahh, but it's just a waste of time.
Yeah it's such a waste of time.
That woman she's got eyes that shine.
Like a pair of stolen polished dimes.
She asked to dance I said it's fine.
I'll see you in the morning time.
Ahh Brooklyn, Brooklyn take me in.
Are you aware the shape I'm in?
My hands they shake, my head it spins.
Ahh Brooklyn, Brooklyn take me in.
Three words that became hard to say.
I and Love and You.
What you were than I am today.
Look at the things I do.
Ahh Brooklyn, Brooklyn take me in.
Are you aware the shape I'm in?
My hands they shake, my head it spins.
Ahh Brooklyn, Brooklyn take me in.
Ahh Brooklyn, Brooklyn take me in.
Are you aware the shape I'm in?
My hands they shake, my head it spins.
Ahh Brooklyn, Brooklyn take me in.
Dumbed down and numbed by time and age.
You're dreams that catch the world the cage.
The highway sets the travelers stage.
All exits look the same.
Three words that became hard to say.
I and Love and You.
I and Love and You.
I and Love and You.
Posted by crymytinyflood at 9:40 AM | Comments (0)
10 de Octubre 2009
This fall
October is Domestic Violence Awareness Month...
so there is this:
NATIONAL DECLARATION BY RELIGIOUS AND SPIRITUAL LEADERS
TO ADDRESS VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN
We proclaim with one voice as national spiritual and religious leaders that violence against women exists in all communities, including our own, and is morally, spiritually and universally intolerable.
We acknowledge that our sacred texts, traditions and values have too often been misused to perpetuate and condone abuse.
We commit ourselves to working toward the day when
all women will be safe and abuse will be no more.
We draw upon our healing texts and practices to
help make our families and societies whole.
Our religious and spiritual traditions compel us to work for justice and the eradication of violence against women."
* * *
then there is also this thought I'm working on, a part of my self, my story, haunting me, like a ghost of an idea about falling and failing in love, jumpers, flight and fight and all these other ways we move into love and out again.
there was a moment yesterday, crossing the aurora bridge, the one famous for all the jumping from its trestles, and I thought of flying instead of falling.
I thought of the birds, like swallows, moving wings once or twice and then stealing through the air without moving a muscle. Chins up, wings folded, toes curled, feeling the power of the one thrust propelling them toward the next tree.
I straightened my back, closed my arms straight down my sides, and stretched my neck toward the sky, blue and filled with the cold of autumn against my face. I had pulled back against the wind of fear, and it lifted me up higher than it ever has so I could rest against it for a moment and slide myself between clouds like bed sheets or warm water.
I thought of all the times and places to fall in love.
The truth is that these days I am better than I've been in years. Old friends tell me they see me again, the ways I used to be and new friends say it is nice to hear me sing along, to see me play along, bounce down the sidewalk, smile honestly, weep it out, and hold on to myself.
But there are moments, when I feel so alone.
In those moments I think of all the missed opportunities: the chances we didn't take.
if you stop taking advantage of the chances to fall in love, they begin to disappear, they are replaced by anger, dead ends, silence, yelling, screaming, hating... you begin taking risks to fall in love. I began to let myself fall for hurtful things because that was all I knew and all that was offered and so the falling in love became more like suicide jumping. I was falling for anything, everything and not just falling but jumping and hurling, hurtling, hurting,
like a kamikaze fighter pilot, heading straight into death, fearlessly, gracefully and powerfully into the pain (to cause it, to feel it)... but not honestly, or hopefully and not in a healthy way--only silently, secretly, furtively, dangerously, thinking only of saving my marriage, not myself.
then there was one night
i sat on a park bench, smoked two cigarettes, drank a can of simpler times lager
and then
i called a friend who said haven't you been through enough?
i called my dad who said you can feel guilty if you want to but you didn't do anything wrong.
i called my sister who said it sounds just awful.
i called my mother...
and by the grace of God she said
don't ever give up hope
but i heard her say
Love can happen to anyone, anywhere, it can happen over and over again. The way birds migrate toward warmer weather, or return for a break from the heat of things with full bellies and nearly grown babies. think of love following you, waiting for you, wanting you, even when you are moving from one warm place to another, trading trees for oceans, not life for death.
you needn't go about love like you're on a suicide mission. that is not hopeful, not helpful.
so
here is a list of things to look out for, excerpted from a pamphlet published by planned parenthood:
"Does your partner...
Threaten to harm you, pets, or himself?
Blame you for everything that goes wrong?
Lie or break promises to you a lot?
Ever say, "you make me get this angry," or "I can't help being so mad with you around."?
Expect you to do everything he says?
Ignore or dismiss your ideas or the things you want to do?
Get jealous when you spend time with family or friends?
Seem very overprotective or ask other people to watch over you?
Call you all the time?
Accuse you of flirting or getting romantically involved with someone else?
Keep you from having money of your own?
Force you to have sex when you're asleep?
Get angry and threaten you when you don't want to have sex?
Force you to have sex without protection against pregnancy
Hurt your genitals or any part of your body during sex?
Criticize your sexual performance or use sex as a way to punish you?
Only care about his own sexual pleasure?
Refuse to take full responsibility for the abuse?
Refuse to get professional help?
Become more and more abusive?
if you answer yes to any of the above, you are in an unsafe relationship."
Don't rush forward. Get some space, take a deep breath, that might be all you can do for now. But the day will come when someone will offer you help, hope...
because there is more out there and you have not missed your chance to be loved, you just aren't loved by that person, and that doesn't mean you are unlovable altogether.
one day
there will be a different yes because there will be a different set of questions...
"Do you talk openly about your feelings and tell the truth without fear?
Do you listen to each other's ideas?
Do you solve problems and disagreements together?
Do you each have friends, interests and activities of your own, and ones that you share?
Do you respect each other's privacy?
Are you proud of each other's talents and accomplishments?
Do you talk openly about your sexual needs and desires?
Do you protect each other from unintended pregnancy?
Do you always have each other's consent for sex?
Do you help take care of each other?
Do you have disagreements without becoming violent?
Do you respect each other's belongings?
Do you feel closer to your partner as times goes on?
Do you feel happy when you think about staying together?
Do you solve problems together more and more?"
Well, do you? Do you want to? Do you know you could, would, will?
Don't ever give up hope. Look for the next chance, take the next chance to be loved but if you feel yourself falling too far, too fast, don't forget
hope is a set of wings, a warm updraft, a curl in your toes and a lift in your chin, hope does not search the horizon for an enemy, watch the ground for signs of life that must be snuffed out, hope does not increase the speed of disaster, hope turns falling around and failure takes flight...
Posted by crymytinyflood at 1:37 PM | Comments (3)