Holy Lingering

In the midst of death there is life

     My dad was rushed to the hospital yesterday.  He fell, and his neck hit a chair, which crushed his larynx.  At first he thought he was okay, but once swelling and bleeding started obstructing his airway, he realized he needed to go to the hospital.  The paramedics got him to the Sylva hospital quickly, giving him a tracheotomy in the process.  We got to see him before they then transferred him to Asheville where we are now keeping vigil.  He's in critical condition, and while we are hoping for the best, we are preparing for the worst, or something in between.

     Death is a possibility, which is frightening, of course.  And here we are in this liminal time - just waiting, wondering.

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     The photo I chose for my facebook profile for now is the compost bucket used one day as one of the sisters (Community of the Holy Spirit) at the Bluestone Farm in Brewster, NY, shucked some fresh veggies.  I thought the colors were beautiful, and thought that they would make an excellent inspiration for a stole for "ordinary" time - the colors of growth, and the colors of harvest.  Harvest implies a sort of death, a sacrifice of the earth, but also a cycle - the cycle of life in the ongoing passing of seasons.

     My mom is working on embroidery (I didn't know she embroidered.... probably because she had two sons and never had time!).  She's embroidering a jumper my grandma made for my brother, which we are going to give to baby Sawyer, my nephew.

    Baby newphew Sawyer was up here last night.... the giggling and cooing of a baby is such a delight, it reminds me that even in the midst tragedy, there is life, and that's what it means to peek in an empty tomb.

Street art... 104 & Amsterdam

     I didn't find God in any particular way on the corner of Amistad... didn't even find Amistad if there is one in NYC.  But I did find some great street art near the corner of 104th and Amsterdam: a broken t/v tray and an a single shoe.

     Unwanted artifacts left before a wall of graffiti.  What are their story?  Wouldn't it be fascinating to know?  

(C) Michael P. Barham, 2009

     Or just plane mundane?  

     It reminds me of when I was at Magnolia Middle School, 6th or 7th grade, and the librarian put a bunch of different shoes in the library display window.  We were invited to enter a short story in a contest (I won, one of the few things I ever won!) in which we were to imagine the life of one of the shoes.  Being the good gay man that I am, I picked a rhinestone covered high heel that looked like it was meant for a 1920's flapper dress.

     What would this shoe's story be for you?  Where is it's mate?  

     Barbara Brown Taylor - I've been reading her new book An Altar in the World  - writes about the spiritual practice of blessing.  I tried to offer a blessing for the shoe - and whoever once owned it.  Can we find Jesus in a little street art, or the presence of the Holy One in discarded items?  Isn't God often most visible, if we get close enough to see, in the lives of those who have been "discarded" by society, by culture?

Pumpkins

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I took this photo in the Whole Foods in New Orleans, LA, while home in Mississippi - I thought it would make a pleasant fall, Halloween contribution to my Facebook page.

The diversity of the pumpkins is amazing to me - all sizes and shapes and colors. Earlier in my trip I was in a market in Madison, MS.   Madison is a place where all the houses and businesses look alike (McDonald's, and Shell are onlyi distinguishable from their red brick and white columns by their logo signs).  At that market, which also had a lovely array of pumpkins - some decorated with cute and toothy grins - I noticed that most of the employees were not white.

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Most of the shoppers were white.

I noted that to someone shopping with me, someone who taught me about respecting the dignity of all people long before I knew that phrase from the baptismal rite.  This someone, an intelligent, caring person said, "I've never noticed that before."

That's how broken we still are as a country, when even thoughtful, respectful human beings pass through everyday life  with blinders on at the level of our separations: economic, physical, racial, educational, sexual, etc.

This is why any form of "separate and equal," or worse, intentionally unequal, such as the laws regarding same-sex unions, is such a social evil: we will all be broken by our systems of separation and hate.

I wish we could appreciate the diversity among humans that we enjoy among all the other species of the creation.

Photo and writing: (C) Michael P. Barham, November, 2009.

Fishers of people

A couple of weeks ago, I broke down and purchased a lovely polynesian-style fish hook, hand made by a local Hawaiian artist.  It's wonderful swirls match my tattoo, and the koa wood that is mixed with cow bone to make a stunning, creative design is endemic (I think) to Hawai`i, and has a beautiful grain.  I bought it to wear on liturgical occasions... occasionally.... part of the emphasis on discipleship I learned as a Methodist, and the imperative of our closing ritual at one of the summer youth mission trips I went on several years - "Mt. T.O.P." - fishers of men.

Today I woke before dawn to join my uncle, Otha on a fishing expedition to a highly top secret pond in the area of Kemper County.  It's the best fishing in the new world, and quite possibly all the continents and oceans.  It was fun.

We told stories, and I got a chance to ask him his favorite memories of his father and mother.  

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I have to admit I was surprised at myself to discover that I was surprised at the feeling of killing.  I've fished before, although years ago.  I certainly have no compunction about eating meat, though I attempt to buy "happy meat" when possible (free-range, etc.).  Yet, when unpacking the fish from the ice chest an hour after our trip, I noticed some of the fish were still twitching - 'looking at me!'  I couldn't help but feel a connection to these lives.  I thanked them, because they gave up their life for my sport and table.  

How often do we stop to ponder the death that happens around us, deaths which sustain us, and provide life for us?  I told the fish 'thank you,' and hoped my sense of obligation to life around me will increase as I ponder the delight of this journey with my uncle.

Fortunately my calling is to be a fisher of people, not.... fish.

photo copyright (C) Michael Barham, 2009.

Teloschistes flavicans

Teloschistes flavicans

Looking closely at the lovely orange-yellow growing on branches, I noticed this lichen webbing among the outstretched arms of the trees. I had only noticed this on the very top of Koko Crater, and then again last Friday when I reached rain-forrest height on the Kuli`ou`ou Ridge Trail.

The green is quite prolific at that height on the Ridge Trail, but the other colors are more hidden - tiny petals of pink, violet or purple, the orange of this lichen, the rust color of the lave-soil.  The vibrancy of the greens makes the tiny hidden petals that much more beautiful to behold.

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A close of this pin-thin lichen seemed perfect for adorning my profile pic the next couple of days.

I have always loved the quote from Shug to Miss. Celie in "The Color Purple."  She says that she thinks it "really pisses God" when folks walk through a field of the color purple and don't even notice.

Perhaps it does.  In today's scripture reading, we see that folks believed that if they touched even the hem of Christ's garment they would be healed.  What if, even just the thin fiber of thread that frayed of Jesus' well worn traveling tunic were enough to emit the Divine's love and power?  Could a tiny bit of lichen - like a tangled thread caught on a limb - couldn't an orange thread of lichen be enough to witness to the marvelous touch of the creator, when draped in the setting of cavern carved between two ridges stair-stepping to the angels' mezzanine?

The canoe and the church.

Sounds like the title of a child's book?  The Canoe and the Church?  Some of the photos on my Facebook page have been of canoes and me canoeing.  

canoe

These pictures were posted to show my pleasure in participating in a canoe team - in spite of the moments while practicing that I think to myself "Argh.... why am I doing this!!!!".

Of course, my time in and around canoes - limited though it has been - is not without reflection on the beauty of the metaphor of the Church as a ship or boat, and of Jesus' time on or near the water and our life on board.

Canoe 2

There is something beautiful, I think I've already called it Benedictine, about the spirituality of paddling on a team.  But now that The Episcopal Church is having it's grand synod in Anneheim, the General Convention is making me wonder if the metaphor of six people rowing in complete unison is perfect or flawed.

Yes, in a sense our unity, our oneness, our being one voice is beauty, and symbolizes the prayer of Christ, 'that we all may be one'.

However, what of the times when we paddle out of sync?  Then we fail to be 'productive' - something over valued in my estimation.  Maybe the church, like canoe teams, needs times when we can all jump out of the boat and forget about making it move faster and farther - just taking time to play around and cool off in the peaceful ocean's undulations.  That reminds me of Catherine of Siena, who talks about the pacific abyss, the peaceful depths of God's love.  Is it that we are on a linear trajectory as a church, a boat moving to a particular distant harbor?  Or is it really that the boat is always where it needs to be when it is in the middle of God's sea, whether paddling or swimming?

Tall Ship (South America)

Musings that come with denominational angst.

Night blooming cereus ~ Midnight resurrection

Hylocereus undatus & MPB

I've added a new photo as a my profile picture, a no-flash late night photo of a night blooming cereus - that wonderfully  fabulous succulent-cactus that blooms only at night, on a cycle that someone told me is lunar-based.  It's flower, fit for crowning Carmen Miranda, and large enough, is like a firework explosion.

Hylocereus undatus

Every day I pass by Punahou school - which takes on a bit more than a full block, failing to notice regularly the green cacti lining its wall.  Yesterday, I saw a couple taking a photo during the day, but was on the way home from dinner and a movie with a friend when he pointed out the cereus, and its beautiful blooms - a block long spray of flowers fit for a royal parade. 

Of course, everything creation sings God's praise, but this reminds me a little of the story of creation - the waiting, the ignoring, the ignorance of the fomentation occurring - until suddenly one finds the most extravagant message of love blooming our of the middle of the night, having been there all along, though we never allowed ourselves to imagine the outpouring of 

Hylocereus undatus with flash

such a gift, nor that it would be from a prickly cactus, or happen in the darker hours - but isn't that when the brightness of the light of Christ is most piercing, when it emerges in contrast to what we perceive as our darkest night?

Maybe we need to become like Nicodemus, and when our heart is troubling us at night, go and seek out the One who brings our heart to bloom.

Learn to listen all over again.

Saturday, my friend BR took this photo of me just after we had finished the novice B race in the McFarlane - an annual 4th of July race down at Waikiki, a time of year when the surf is up, which makes operating a canoe a little more interesting.

Hui Nalu novice B team

Even as I was exuberant with my first race, coach reminded us that we really weren't acting like a team out on the water.  Distractions, focusing on our own paddling, rather than getting in sync with the team.

Paddling very much reminds me of the Benedicting ways of praying the Psalms, and what a teacher once told me about brothers trying to pray the psalm in a way that was not only rhythmically connected with others praying, but was also in a way that allowed them to hear the voice of the person on either side of them, so that they were neither to little, nor too loud.  This reminds me of the singing rules by John Wesley, in which he talks about neither lagging behind nor running ahead of other singers.

While we are individuals who do not lose our distinctiveness, the gifts unique to our personal creation, we are also called to live into more authentic communion with others; paddling reminds me of the importance of trying to become part of a group motion or a group way of life's fullness, over than an individual self - we cannot live alone.  The boat only moves when we are reality paying attention to one another, timing to one another. 

The empty hull of the canoe fills with six individuals, who either quickly learn to become one, or, who fight against one another and the waves for a muggy, thick trail of sweat lagging behind the tails of faster, more unified teams.

Reflecting on rigging - the tie that binds

I was recently at a canoe blessing, and felt a calm and beauty there - it was a wonderful day because I began and ended my social outings by standing in a circle of blessing.  In the AM, at a canoe blessing, and in the PM, at the end of our Confirmation celebration banquet.

I took a short video of my coach and some other guys from the Hui rigging one of the Koa Canoes, named Enay for one of the Hui's "saints", a former coach.  Rigging is the process of tying the yaka (yoke) to the ama (outrigger/floater) and to the hull of the canoe.  In all, the yoke is tied in four places.  It takes a couple of folks, at least, to do this, and up to four can be helpful (two on each side).  You have to hold the line in place while it is being stretched taught, and then while it is being threaded through the wholes in ama or in the canoe made for the line to thread through.

Video of guys rigging outrigger to canoe

Think of the details in the process, the symetry, the beauty and elegance of the threading the cord to yoke the ama to the canoe with the yaka ("yoke").  There is much spiritual in canoes, and many metaphors that I am sure will make sermon analogies.  Today, I'm thinking about the beauty of the cords, and remember the hymn I sang so often as a child, youth and young adult - "Blest be the tie that binds/our hearts in Christian love..."  The fellowship is like that to that above.

In these days of divisions, and persnickityness, I'm pleased to meditate on the strength of that which unites us, and tethers us one to another.

hello, it's been awhile....

It's been some time since I forced myself to blog, so I figure now it is about time.  I've had the idea of writing a brief explanation of photos I take and place on my facebook page as my "profile picture."  I'll start with the current, and update you as I change.  When possible, I'll try to go back through some of the photos I have taken.

They are, in many ways, a record of being "on pilgrimage", and a practice of "holy lingering" - moments of peeking in an empty tomb.

Michael @ communion

Well, I did not take this photo - someone took it at our regional Confirmation services at St. Peter's in Honolulu.  I can't recall his name, but will try to add it here soon, because he took some wonderful photos.

This was an intimate moment - each moment between me and another person, when we are sharing Eucharist, is a moment of holy intimacy; a moment of tenderness.  No borders, no distinctions or differences that animate a difference.  Only a holy connection between two hands touching the same chalice, drinking from the same cup.  "It has become for us the cup of salvation."