Corridors

Some of them are mine

2012-01-16T13:20:00.002-07:00

I've been searching for some time to find Anglican/Episcopal congregations using engaging non-traditional music. (I know that the word "traditional" can mean a whole lot of things, but that's beyond the scope of this post.) Now, I'm not in favor of off-the-shelf approaches of any kind, as I think music must come out of the community that's making it; it has to be authentic and genuine to the community. This has been a tough search, as I haven't much known where to look to find examples of this.

In my experience of being a visitor in churches of several denominations, nearly all of these non-traditional worship styles I've encountered could be classified in a few specific categories. I'll lay those out here so you know what I'm thinking:

Blended Praise and Worship - a mix of well-known gospel hymns combined with praise songs/choruses. Usually includes a drum set, guitars, and possibly a praise team of individually-microphoned singers, possibly augmented by a larger traditional choir in the larger congregations. I've mostly seen this in evangelical churches.
Folk-Style - I've seen this primarily in Catholic congregations. The music has a definite folk flavor to it, with guitars and perhaps a few other instruments, but rarely a drum set. Several of the prominent songs are "voice of God songs", where the congregation is singing a paraphrase of words God has spoken to prophets in the Scriptures. Sometimes a few gospel hymns or traditional hymns are thrown in.
Rock Worship - Often led by a small instrumental ensemble of guitars, drums, bass, and perhaps a keyboard, this style offers very timely worship songs drawn from a variety of sources, often featuring music from Vineyard, contemporary Christian music one might here on the radio, or newly composed songs written by the songleader. I've often seen these in the very large evangelical churches of the suburbs, and both the musicians and people in attendance are definitely younger.

Each of these styles has its positives and negatives. The blended praise and worship seems to appeal more to an older boomer crowd, in my observation, and some of the songs can be quite dated. The folk style seems to hit a similar demographic, and also has some world-music influences and social justice influences. The more edgey rock worship seems to come out of a younger person's world, but some of the music is very difficult to sing and is done without any type of printed music, and seems to be more oriented to an audience listening rather than participating in other ways.

However, I'm not sure that any of these styles can work for mainstream non-traditional Episcopal churches looking for authentic worship expressions. Several of these styles were born out of evangelical churches whose theology can sometimes be dogmatic and judgmental. There are many young adults like myself who left congregations and denominations like this to come to the Episcopal Church's inclusive and traditional worship style and theology.

But my preferred traditional style of worship - with texts full of poetic, complex imagery and hymns that are equally subtle and well-crafted - doesn't work for everybody.

So what else is there that might be more accessible, yet still very Anglican?

Last Saturday, I was fortunate to be able to attend a daylong workshop here in Seattle led by Dent Davidson - a native of the Pacific Northwest and a nationally known "Leader of Song" (as he describes himself) in the Episcopal Church. The question addressed there was, "Can these bones live?" building on the reading from the Great Vigil where Elijah sees the valley of dry bones that later come to life.

Dent helped to answer some of my questions by giving many, many examples of non-traditional songs - and then he put those songs in an Anglican context by talking about how they all reflected an incarnational theology, catholicity, expansive language, and social concern.

The theme song of the day had lyrics that sang, "some of these bones are my father's bones, and some of them bones is mine." The song and the day's experience had me asking about my own attitudes towards Episcopal church music that were themselves a little dry and crunchy, maybe a little too much stuck in my own ideas of what music should be, a little too governed by my own tastes and in need of opening up to something new.

I felt the day gave me a good foundation and a good framework to be able to build on for some of my own community musical endeavors. Perhaps some of my bones, too, can live.

A night-light in Glendale

2011-08-05T23:06:00.004-07:00

My fuzzy, distant memories recall moving into my childhood house and neighborhood in Glendale, Arizona . . . which at that time was an isolated development surrounded by agricultural land. I remember looking out from our back patio and seeing grain silos not far away, and remembering the main street closest to our house - Peoria Avenue - lined with large, stately trees just a few streets to the East of where I lived.

Even as the housing developments filled in, and the roads turned from dirt to asphalt and began to be built through, it was still a quiet place. There were not too many other kids, and there certainly wasn't much going on. For most of my time growing up, grocery shopping was a long ways away (the Smitty's in downtown Peoria, about four miles away), and the shopping center was even further in the opposite direction. Where I lived was simply street after street of houses that all looked pretty much the same - large garage in front with a side wing of bedrooms.

Each day there was the same - I'd be dropped off at school (and school was not at all a pleasant experience for me) and then I'd be picked up again, going home for a night of math homework, perhaps watching television, and then going to sleep. This happened day in and day out, and the weekends weren't that different.

There really wasn't anywhere to go anywhere a kid could get to, so the whole of life there began to suffocate me.

I spent my whole childhood growing up in the same house, with the same routine, staying in the same place, with very little to do there and not much of anywhere to go. It would almost be like the movie, Pleasantville, except it wasn't that pleasant - not that anyone said or thought it was.

If banality could be lived out, I'm convinced that's what it would look like - growing up in Glendale, Arizona in the mid 80s.

For a good part of my childhood, I had a set of bunk beds in my room, which was an unusual thing for an only child. I think the bunk beds were given to us by a neighbor, or perhaps another family member. I don't quite recall, but I somehow ended up with two of them in my room, one stacked on the other.

This was the time that I was in the middle grades of school - probably about fourth or fifth grade. I remember because they sent home a brochure with all of the kids in school with posters that we could order that would be mailed to the school. Now, we rarely spent money on any of these types of things, but this was an exception, so I ordered a poster of the famous shot of row houses in San Francisco, with the city's skyline in back.

And I put that picture up on the wall right next to my bunk bed, so that I could see it right before I went to sleep at night, and dream of what it would be like to live in a place like that - in a city!

My bed was maybe a foot or so away from that wall, so the other thing I did was fetch a nightlight from the hallway's linen closet. It was a kind that had a switch on the front of it, so you could turn it on and off by hand. I plugged that nightlight in many nights, and I imagined that night-light was the glow of a convenience store sign, glowing and open all night, with me standing outside or above it, watching the comings and goings.

For a little while, I was able to imagine an escape from the world I inhabited - a world I experienced as bland, repetitive, pointless, even anemic - like living out an existentialist play.

What brought me some type of comfort was seeing that poster above my bed, and looking down at that night light, knowing that there was something out there more than the nothingness of that. The city was a place where something would happen, good or ill.

Not everyone experiences these things in the same way, and another individual could have an experience that is completely and totally different, with the exact opposite kind of reactions I've described. I must, however, own and love this part of my story, because it is an important part, for this seed of urban longing is what eventually grew into my deep dream of living here in Seattle, and then have the courage to realize its fulfillment of leaving everything I knew behind to come here.

It was many years ago, in Glendale, far away from skyscrapers, bustle, loud music, people, street crime, the Space Needle, traffic, panhandlers, public art, and everything - far away from any firsthand experience of anything urban - that my love and passion for city life was born in me.

For whatever reason, some things come to live inside you.

And then they are just inside you.

The Water Calls to Me

2011-08-01T21:08:00.003-07:00

There's something about water for me . . . something about it that I find calms my soul or allows for some sort of insight to come about when I commune with it. I've been wondering what this means - what water is for me.

I have to confess that the muses speak to me in the shower and they have for a long time. There are many days where my plan of action is formulated in that time of breathing, solitude, and creativity that this small daily ritual invokes in me.

Some of this spirit is present in the purity of the swimming pool, the gentle swish of the hands on the surface, the literal immersion and surrender of self to the calm and purity of the waters, perhaps lying on one's back, trusting in the water to buoy you up while you look up at the stars of the night sky at twilight.

The movie "Big Fish", with it's themes around being a part of the water and returning to the water reminds me of what I think must be our humanity's archetypal relationship with water - one that we see referenced in several places in the Hebrew scriptures and in my own Christian tradition.

Part of the longing I had in the desert to be in Seattle was to be in a place nurtured by water - in rain, lakes, streams, and the sea, the Seattle area is a place that is baptized, sprinkled, enfolded, and kissed by water.

I spent the early evening tonight at Seattle's Alki Beach, where I gradually waded into the waters of the Salish Sea, the rhythm of the waves lapping at my feet and surrounding my ankles in a gentle rhythm as the sun dapples played over the rolling waters.

After walking out a short ways, I planted myself there, trying to keep an eye on my belongings on the shore while wanting to move further and further into the sea, yet nervous about my concerns on the shore. I was reminded of a saying that has floated around on the Internet for a while, whose source I could not immediately find: "One cannot discover new oceans until he has the courage to lose sight of the shore."

As I stayed in place, the tide was coming in, and I watched as a place where I had been sitting had gradually come under more layers of water. It was no longer familiar.

The water was full of seaweed and other plant materials, bird feathers, driftwood pieces mid-sized and small. It was a little murky and very messy, but I stayed planted there a while longer.

The water was cold, and seemed to get colder around my legs the more I stood in it. I warned some a grandmother and her son about the cold who were getting ready to dive into it, and she said, "We know it's cold - this is why we do it!"

I stayed planted in the one spot longer and longer as these gentle waves became slightly more agitated, with the recession of one wave seemingly reinforcing the the crest of another, as it come in with a louder and more forceful splash, ever claiming more of its rightful space.

The sea spoke to me, and it said,

Come, come to me, my child,
I am Mother Water.
Come further into me, give yourself to me, my child
Walk into me and rest, and surrender to my churning
I am your mother Water. Walk into me further . . . rest. . . rest

Whether this was a siren song, the beckoning of Sweet Death, the Holy Spirit - or, as I suspect, some combination of all three somehow . . . I do not know. I only know that this is what I heard today at the beach.

Pride in Seattle

2011-06-26T19:08:00.002-07:00

Despite a busy morning schedule, I was able to see the last half hour or so of the Pride parade here in Seattle, which unfortunately happens each year on a Sunday when I have other obligations.

I'm impressed that so many people from all over the city come out to support the event, which I know has had its detractors over the past several years for being too commercialized with all of its corporate sponsors. It's a bit cynical to look at it that way, since I think one of the measures of the gay-supportiveness of a municipality is how well gay people are mainstreamed. Having many corporate sponsors shows that gays are simply a part of life in the city.

It was so nice to see the diversity of people there at the party afterwards: everyone from proudly naked older men to butch lesbians to kissing straight couples to folks in unusual and creative costumes. I was one of the most "typical-looking" people there. (And one of the most boring, of course.)

One article in the New York Times I read over the course of the last few days, in referring to the gay marriage victory in New York spoke about the average age of those protesting for gay marriage as being far younger than those who were against it. I'm sure Seattle's supportive attitude towards those of varying lifestyles. I noticed this year at the Pride event here that there were many more younger people than typically go to Pride in Phoenix, which I think is more a function of the demographics of this town.

Any way you slice it, I was glad to go to another delightfully unusual festival in Seattle - a town that really can say a healthy "whatever" to the oddity of humanity dwelling in it.

Two Years

2011-06-18T21:03:00.002-07:00

It was right around this date two years ago that I arrived in Seattle from my former residence in Phoenix. I told a few people recently that one has to occasionally knock a life or a system into chaos to get it to change, and I think this has been the case for me, as I have a whole new life here.

My dad asks me most every time I call him on the phone, "So, you still like it there?" The answer is always yes, and not because this place is without its problems. The city fits me pretty well, as I feel like many of my own values are in line with the values of the city, with some exceptions.

Much of the surrounding area, besides the natural beauty of the place and the uniqueness inherent in any locale, seems to feel much like the suburbs/exurbs of any other city. Christopher is very happy with the suburbs, and he and I are often in sharp disagreement about our feelings towards Seattle, since I still very much love the peculiar energy of this town.

The Freemont Solstice Parade that I saw today I really think highlights the things I love about this city. I think it's just delightful that I can live in a city where the police make sure we clothed, "normal" people don't get in the way of a naked bicyclists and have a policy that makes clear that there are better things to do than to go after pot smokers - not that I want to try either activity.

Besides being more aware of earth-centered celebrations, I can think of several big ways I've changed:

I understand first-hand what a post-Christian world looks like and I feel better equipped to deal with it. I know very few people who identify as Christians and fewer who go to church. Church is just not on the radar screen at all here.
I'm more understanding of the labor movement and why organized labor is important.
I'm a more calm person from living here in this place of refreshing rain and peaceful lakes and seas.
I'm much more aware of how we not only function as individuals, but also function as groups, and how groups and systems can be healthy or unhealthy, and the ways to create change in systems.
It's not a big deal to be single here, as many people live by themselves and do things on their own.
Being an introvert isn't an automatic liability in Seattle; there is lots of support and encouragement to have a rich inner life.
Artistic expression of all kinds is a way of life, so my artistic spirit is encouraged and able to better be itself, without needing outside justification.
I'm less judgmental, as the spirit of this place encourages one to be aware of group consequences of individual actions, but allows for freethinking.
I'm far less materialistic. I don't need to live in a fancy apartment or drive a nice, big car, since both just don't work here. Simplicity is practical and expected in these parts.
I'm more generous. There's a lot of emphasis on stewardship here in this Diocese, and starting afresh lets you prioritize expenditures differently.
I don't feel stuck in one monolithic city, since there are many municipalities all around the region, each with Northwest sensibilities, but a slightly different take on them.
I'm a more flexible person that doesn't feel like things always need to be done the way I want them done. I'm more open to change and far more adaptable.
I'm a lot more happy. I was able to start anew in a place that was better for me all around.

Two years later, being much more used to the weather than I was even a year ago and much more used to the rhythm of life in the Northwest, I'm very glad to be here. I'm glad I made the choice to follow this dream I'd had for so many years and come here. It was the right decision.

Holy Information

2011-04-24T20:17:00.003-07:00

I have several friends who would consider themselves agnostic or atheist. Maybe even most of my friends fit into this category. God is not something that can be proven scientifically or reasonably to them (although I understand many in the Western Christian tradition have tried to make these arguments).

Tonight at church we read the resurrection accounts from John's Gospel, where Mary Magdalene sees angels, and later mistakes Jesus for the gardener. This is a very different story from the Matthew readings I heard this morning, where guards "became like dead men" upon seeing an angel.

In John's gospel, Jesus somehow had to have changed in appearance from how he looked in this life if Mary Magdalene did not recognize him at first. The angels also seem to be something everyday somehow, and are people one asks questions of, not the terrifying beings we're usually told about.

If we were to just have this gospel account to go from, and if we were to lay over this account into today's world, I'm not sure this account would be very convincing to anybody - especially my agnostic or atheist friends, because it seems so subjective.

Tonight, Mary doesn't recognize Jesus until he calls her by name. In a couple weeks, in Luke, we'll hear about those on the road to Emmaus who don't recognize Jesus until he breaks bread with them.

Jesus's and the angels' appearance looks typical, perhaps, until overlaid with a mystical meaning that is mediated through a very personal experience.

All of this seems to give support to the idea that faith is ultimately an irrational and subjective thing, something that can only come to us through our own unique way we're set up to receive types of holy information. It seems increasingly ridiculous to me that one can successfully reason one's way to faith in God. Yet, we know when we've heard it, because it's unmistakable (and, apparently, life changing) once we have.

What can I do, if anything, to help others hear holy information?

A Belated Review of 2010

2011-01-27T19:51:00.003-07:00

Well, I'm finally getting around to posting my yearly update, which I usually try to do right after Christmas, or at least by Epiphany.

Not this year! I'm far behind, but it's time to do some catching up.

At the beginning of 2010, I had just started "going steady" with Christopher, was looking for work, and was still quite concerned about my dad's health. By the end of this year, I've ended up employed in several places, my dad is doing better, I've had some wonderful adventures up here, and Christopher and I have been dating for one year (plus one month, as of tonight).

In the first several months of the year, I spent a lot of time doing some serious networking in the area, trying to get a sense of what was going on in churches of many denominations. I also spent a bit of time talking with students and faculty at UW, Seattle University and other local schools about offerings at their various locations.

Early in the year, I began getting several things going on musical fronts. In January, I had joined the local GLBT+ band out here, which was a rewarding experience. I played my first concert with them last Spring. Unfortunately, due to work scheduling on the evening of their rehearsals, I haven't been able to continue performing with them. I also began a relationship with a Presbyterian church in the area where a friend of mine is the organist, and have sung solos for a couple of funerals and collaborated with her on a deeply meaningful All Saints' concert offered there in early November.

In March, I began work as the Associate for Music and Liturgy for a small Episcopal Church in the area, which has been a time of discovery for me on many levels. I am blessed for the opportunity.

In late February, I tried (without success) to sell the white van I had purchased in Phoenix that I subsequently used to move my stuff out here. But it was a good thing I didn't sell it, because during the summer a presumably drunk driver rear ended the Lexus LS400 I'd driven for many years and then took off. Fortunately, I was home in bed when it was hit, and the insurance settlement was more than I probably could have gotten for it if I tried to sell it myself. Neither vehicle, though, is/was good for driving or parking on the narrow, congested streets of Seattle. It is past time for another smaller vehicle, but I'm in no mood to spend money in this economy.

This past spring was full of both job interviews (for a "day job") and getting settled into work at St. Columba's. Both were enlightening experiences. I eventually began work in early June for a center doing ministry to seafarers, which has certainly been a very new experience being as I'm from the desert Southwest. Ministry to seafarers in Seattle, as in many other places around the country, is undergoing a great deal of change, forcing these ministries to adapt to the new needs of seafarers. So, this has been a good opportunity to be a part of making change happen.

My second Gay Pride in Seattle was certainly more eventful than the first, as I experienced the Saturday Capitol Hill pride celebration, then caught the last bit of the parade (which happens on Sunday here - clearly they don't care about competing with church), and finally wandered through the Seattle Center festival grounds with Christopher and his friends. I loved seeing many odd floats and booths sponsored by mainstream businesses. Because of the very gay-friendly nature of this city, gays and straights are so well-integrated that I don't feel the gay community has as much of a distinct identity. I've decided that this is a very good thing that has some side effects that aren't as good - and . . . I remain very aware that many GLBT people in our country wish they had such problems in their cities.

In the summer, I made the decision to join St. Paul's Episcopal Church in Seattle, knowing both that I was looking to move into the neighborhood immediately around it, and wanting a place to hang my hat that wasn't a congregation I was working for. Although I subsequently began a very part-time job there, it's been a place of blessing and encouragement for me as I do ministry in some other areas. I consider it home - for now.

In August, I moved out of the house I was sharing with friends into my own (small) apartment in the vibrant Uptown neighborhood, roughly between Belltown and Queen Anne, if you're familiar with those neighborhoods, and within easy walking distance of the Space Needle. Not that I go to the Space Needle much. I get to enjoy expansive views of the Puget Sound, a rooftop deck with a striking view of downtown and the Space Needle, Queen Anne hill, and the Sound, and some type of old but effective heating technology that's paid for by the complex.

Christopher and I also made several day trips in the late spring and early summer to the coast, Camano Island, Olympia, and other exotic locales. He is not a wandering soul as I am, but I was blessed to have him enjoy some of these adventures with me. Later, in September, he and I went on a trip to Portland together for a couple days, and I got to contrast Seattle with Portland as only a resident of Seattle could. I got to see just how different those two cities are - differences I didn't notice when visiting as a Phoenician.

In October, I hosted my first house party here in Seattle. Both attending and throwing house parties are an indispensable part of expanding your social circle here in Seattle if you are a newcomer. (Take note, any Arizona refugees . . .) Attendance was a little sparse, but it was good practice for future shindigs. Later in the month I tagged along at the Diocesan Convention, watching a friend get ordained to the Diaconate.

I was not at all looking forward to November, since last November was about the worst weather I ever could have imagined - days and days of heavy rain and oppressive levels of increasing darkness and cold. Fortunately, this November wasn't nearly as horrible, and we actually had several days of sun - and a crippling snowstorm a few days before Thanksgiving.

In December, however, I got to learn about the phenomenon called the "Pineapple Express", a persistent weather pattern that seems to happen during winter months when warm air trucks on up from near Hawaii and dumps buckets and buckets of rain on the area. Heavy rains continued for days on end with no breaks. (This is probably what happened in November of 2009 here; I just didn't know what it was.) It was very horrible, but I dealt with it a lot better since we'd had more interesting weather in November.

It helped, too, that I got to go back home to Phoenix for five days in December, where I went through a frenzy of meet-ups with friends. It was wonderful to say hello to everyone that I could, although I missed many others I would have liked to have seen. It was also very depressing to see how sad Phoenix was looking with all of its vacant lots, shuttered businesses, and empty streets. The Dean of the Cathedral there wrote recently that "Arizona has a lot of problems, but winter weather ain't one of them." I couldn't agree more - on both counts. I was glad to return to Seattle for Christmas.

The New Year has been filled with a lot of busyness, which isn't surprising for January. That's just how it goes. I've been doing a lot of juggling between the three jobs I have now. While that sounds like a lot of work (and it is) it's been really good for me. I'm very thankful to be fully employed. A lot of others are not as lucky.

I'm looking to begin some formal discernment work this year about future vocation/career in the church -or elsewhere- and I'm open-minded about where that will take me. I've accomplished several of the biggest goals I set for myself when I moved out here, but returning to school is one that is coming up quickly on the radar again now that the economy appears to be (finally) on the road to recovery. That will be another thing to juggle, but I can't dither with it any longer. It will just need to happen.

So, a very good year from up here. I hope all of you have had a good one also, and I wish all of you the best for 2011!

The Last Day of Christmas

2011-01-05T20:34:00.002-07:00

When I heard Fr. Vernon Myer, formerly a priest in the Catholic Diocese of Phoenix, do a devotional class in Advent, I remember him talking about the shift from the use of purple to blue as the Church's liturgical color. Not just any blue, but the darkest blue. He said it was the blue of the sky right before twilight begins - before a perceptible hint of dawn appears.

Living in Phoenix for as many years as I did, I don't think I had as much of an appreciation of all of the (convenient?) theological symbolism that can be drawn from the Feast of the Incarnation being celebrated right around the time of the solstice. Now, though, I can understand the Pagan spirituality that commemorates the movement of the seasons and celebrates this inching from the gloom and dark to warmth and light.

Just about all of our Christian observances have at least some root in Earth-centric traditions of one kind or another, but I don't see this as a problem for my faith. At the same time, I know this is a stumbling block to those of deep faith and those of no faith. I was reminded of this by a non-Christian friend who asked this past week, "Wasn't Jesus born in the spring or summer time? That's what I heard."

I don't even know what Jesus actual birth looked like, what town it happened in, and what, if anything, was outwardly special about it at that moment. I'm not sure it matters, though, because God "pitching his tent and staying with us awhile", as I heard one person put it, was the key moment in history, and certainly worthy of angels' song and astrologers' visit.

The story is beautiful, and the story is important because it is the story of our spiritual ancestors who believed then as we do now - that when we see Jesus, we are seeing God - albeit in some ultimately unfathomable way.

I think that we are also following in the faith of our spiritual ancestors when we allow ourselves to see Jesus as someone who actively calls out the injustice that he sees - injustice towards the sick, the poor, the "sinners", the foreigners, the "unclean".

On this Last Day of Christmas, I wonder what Mary and Joseph thought of Jesus a few days after he was born, when all of the craziness of actually bringing a new life into the world had faded, and they had time to think about who this child would become. I don't find myself wondering, as the singer of a popular Christian song does, if the "baby boy would one day walk on water".

Instead, I wonder if Mary and Joseph sensed the miracle of their baby boy who would one day speak of the blessedness of the poor, and of the sin of oppressive systems and unjust power. I wonder if they knew, on some level, that he'd end up dead because of it.

Putting aside the angels, the shepherds, the wise men, and all the rest, as beautiful and meaningful as they are and as their story is, even in the probable everydayness of that birth, I still think Jesus' Holy Family had some sense of who Jesus would become. Down inside themselves, they knew that this was no ordinary event, even if it may have appeared outwardly so.

Maybe that feeling they had is something like the sense of wonder, song, and light I feel today, on this Last Day of Christmas. I think it's the same feeling our fore-parents had, and the reason why they have told the stories and sung the carols ever since on each of these Twelve Days.

They did, and I still do. I hope you do also.

Merry Christmas everybody.

New friends . . .

2010-11-22T21:09:00.003-07:00

Awaking from a nap yesterday, and watching Christopher lighting a firelog, I mentioned that I had only seen snow actually falling about three times in my life.

But there it was, floating down from the sky, the flakes descending in a beautiful unison downward motion, their synchronized perfection interrupted only occasionally with whorls of wind.

I worried about driving home, but Christopher asked, "What does the ground look like?"

"It looks wet," I said.

"Then you have nothing to worry about," he said. I did trust his judgment, since he's lived here his whole life, and was certainly more of an expert on winter weather than was I.

On a lovely Sunday afternoon, it was snowing in Renton, and this was time number four for me.

As we sat by the fire, we spoke about Seattle - a frustrating place for Christopher because of the cockeyed street grids, lack of parking, and too-colorful urban warriors and their creative panhandling.

"Yes, it's a mess," I agreed, remembering one of my favorite Sixpence None the Richer songs, "but it's a beautiful mess."

The weatherman said that this wouldn't be "Snowmageddon", referring to the horrible storms of 2008/2009 right around Christmas that literally shut down most of the city.

The winter weather advisory wasn't overblown - it snowed all night last night, as far as I could tell. My live snowfall number five happened this morning when I again saw the swirling white dust of snow, blowing and falling so beautifully out my window. In the background, I saw that the wintry weather did not stop the ferries from floating back and forth across the Sound.

Seeing the world dusted with snow is only something I've seen when traveling in other places. As I walked out the door with a hood over my head, I breathed in the unusual scent of snow-filled sky and exhilarated in the feeling of actually living in a place where the snow falls, not just being a tourist there.

After arriving at the bus stop for my usual morning ride to work, and realizing there were probably about 70 people standing there at once, I knew something was amiss, even considering that buses were on "snow routes". After checking a real-time iPhone app that tracks local buses (and finding a complete absence of real-time information), I threw in the towel and walked the mile or so to the office.

It was hard to get anything done, as busy as it was. Snow was falling in the midst of my adopted hometown. It was an amazing thing for this transplanted Phoenician to see. On the walk home, the snow clearly was sticking, as the sidewalks were piled at least two inches high with this playful white powder. I had to remember my experiences of walking in Flagstaff to remember how to avoid slipping on the ice: avoiding the mushy, icy spots where others had walked and instead creating new footprints in the fluff.

Tonight, the weather has continued to get colder, and the snow does not fall gently among the trees, as in Renton, but now blows back and forth before coming to a rest on the rooftops.

So, after some piano practice and shopping for groceries, I wandered up to the roof of my building with my black, thick, waterproof down ski jacket on. Standing there in the cold, I watched the tufts of snow hit the sleeve of my jacket - the white flecks against the black shiny fabric, and I saw that each of the little tufts were made up of very tiny, beautiful snowflakes, often sticking together, and almost no bigger than the head of a pin.

The flakes landed on my sleeve and I carefully studied them in the golden light of the stairwell lamp. This tiny work of natural beauty gleamed like a diamond, before an evanescent melting into the fabric, or flying away on a sudden breeze.

These fragile things of crystalline beauty became became a treasure for me in that moment, stopping for just a second or two on my arms to offer their ephemeral wonders.

Tonight, I made friends with snowflakes.

What's DADT about?

2010-09-29T21:17:00.003-07:00

I think I was between my sophomore and junior in high school and away at a summer music camp when I had my first opportunity to think about "Don't Ask, Don't Tell"

Here we all were in some type of hall meeting for all of the guys who shared my floor of the dorm - a soulless mid-century building that reminded me of mobile home park trailers stacked on top of one another. Yes, it was a music camp, so there were plenty of people there who didn't "fit in". Still, we were all "horny teenagers", as one friend of mine says. Undoubtedly, all of us were still figuring things out about ourselves on all levels and wrestling into who we were going to eventually be as adults. That's what one does at that age.

The counselors were explaining the ground rules and expectations of behavior, all of which seemed pretty straightforward. It was the typical awkward conversation that you experience in a community of young people thrown together from various background. It was a litany of strictures that needed to be endured: be at orientation at 7AM, make sure to eat breakfast, don't wait to do your laundry until Saturday (since everybody does it then), have fun and attend the social functions we've planned for you, don't forget to practice . . . a lot . . .

And then, here it was, but with a twist - Girls aren't allowed in your room. And then they added something like, if you're going to have boys over, that's your business . . . I mean, this isn't the military or anything.

Fast forward about 17 years . . . and things haven't really changed.

I was speaking with an acquaintance this weekend who talked about the idea of being gay as an identity thing - as being something separate from simply being "same gender-attracted".

And I understood what he meant, after he spelled it out in that way. One could look at them as stereotypes, or one could look at them as important cultural markers that need to be embraced. In either case, "gay" has a lot of stuff that goes along with it.

There is a case to be made that there is a gay culture that can be identified, it is valuable, and it should be embraced by those who are same-gender attracted - both as a way of paying homage to those who helped form idea of what "gay" is in wider culture and as a way of accepting oneself. In doing this, they'd say, we take the same road that our foreparents in the gay rights movement took, making our sexual orientation that much less frightening and more acceptable - taking another step out of the shadows.

We're a long way from being out of the shadows with "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" still the policy in our military, because we have to live in polite silence - and not just those in the military, but in the wider society as well.

Why?

Because I've observed more and more that this idea of "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" provides a convenient blueprint for how the wider culture can relate to gay people. It's a baseline for how to operate in an institution some say is infused with all kinds of prejudice. If it's good enough for the military, then all of us can say "we know they're there, but we don't want to know about it, and they certainly shouldn't flaunt it." (Where "flaunting" usually just means doing the same things the straight people are doing in a given setting.)

Really, it's time for a new way for us to relate to each other, isn't it? We have to move beyond the unspoken policy that says it's okay to be gay, but it's not okay to live by the same social rules and expectations that straight people do. It's okay to be gay, but just keep it to yourself- nobody needs to know.

Last weekend, as some of us contrasted same-gender attraction and gay identity, we also wondered about what an America would be like when straight young people might even have to "come out" - when nobody automatically/negatively assumed your sexual orientation one way or another, and when a person could wrestle with the idea that he or she was actually straight in a supportive environment.

That won't be happening anytime soon, it doesn't seem. Not unless there's an end to "Don't Ask, Don't Tell", first in the military, and then with all of us.

DADT needs to die quickly. It should not be the de facto standard for our dealings with one another anymore, because those of us who happen to be same-gender attracted need to be able to choose to identify with gay culture or not . . . and be respected for whatever choice we make.

A Seattle Evening Reflection

2010-09-08T19:10:00.003-07:00

I love the sunset time of day in Seattle.

I love seeing the light brighten the broken western clouds, and the ships move quietly in Elliot Bay. How delightful are the low clouds creep along the mountains - I think somewhere on the Kitsap - kind of like a high flying fog gently caressing the Olympics, the rays of sun shining through the misty rains that are falling in the distance.

For several days, I wondered at the strange, symmetrical ship that always seemed to be moving between the north and south, parallel to Bainbridge Island each morning, until one evening I recognized it as one of the ferries going between there and Seattle.

I spend time wondering just how far in miles it is from here to Bremerton as I see its radio towers flicker. The Olympics seem like they are not much further away from downtown Seattle than are the White Tanks from Phoenix. Could such tall mountains be that close? The Cascades certainly are.

Queen Anne is upscale, to be sure, but not ostentatiously so. The lovely, old houses seem a little more subdued than the grand and gorgeous Capitol Hill mansions. These homes instead are warmer, with soft incandescent lights glowing in windows surrounded by dark green plants growing close to red brick walls. The architectural variations are significant, also, from homes that look vaguely Bavarian to sprawling Santa Barbara style compounds with palm trees.

While I'm usually bothered by palm trees in Seattle as simply not fitting the climate and landscape, as my boyfriend will attest, since he puts up with much of my complaining about it, somehow the don't bother me as much when planted near these Spanish revival homes.

It is fascinating to me that a city can feel so much like California, let still retain flavors of the pioneer Old West. While perhaps the gloomy days contribute to the culture feeling passive-aggressive, most seem to be up-front about their indifference.

Friends, living in a place is so different from being a tourist in it. Much that is charming is overlooked by natives or other longtime residents, who themselves are somewhat irritated by the gawking aliens who arrive by the droves in the gorgeous summers.

When this time of year came around, one of my good friends in Phoenix used to say "the season is upon us". A few weeks ago, in mid-August, a priest friend of mine wrote in a church newsletter that "fall is here". Now, Christopher tells me that he thinks that the season has ended.

This morning, when I awoke, it was dark and felt cold. Last night, in the rain, it was the first time in probably three months that I felt as though there was a chill to the air. I think that my friends are onto something here. I think that Fall is beginning here - that Summer, if it is still with us, is gradually fading away.

I am sad about this, because this season - it was too short - and perhaps not quite warm enough for me. I wanted to feel a significant staying of warmth. A warmth that felt as though it was enduring, but not oppressive. I think that type nurturing, present summer is only found further south on the California coast.

The ship horn is blowing now, perhaps that of one of the ferries, reminding me that I probably have been too long at the task of writing and watching the sun sink in the west.

Tomorrow will be a day for cruise ship arrivals, and Friday for their departures. Those floating resorts are as grand as they are invasive, their passengers could be seen as either invading locusts or a serendipitous source of dollars. Surely there presence is an opportunity for us to show the world just a sense of Seattle - even if it is one concocted mostly for them.

What do you think about these times that we are in, Seattle? Do you feel confident in your economic diversity, in your eco-consciousness, in your tolerance and your progressive politics?

Are you hopeful?

What do you alone have to offer the world?

Stories from Old Warriors

2010-07-20T21:13:00.003-07:00

Yesterday towards the end of the afternoon, a retired Navy man with whom I've become acquainted stopped in and offered his usual comments about any number of things: politics, Catholic church teaching, neighborhood antics.

A more reflective moment emerged when he offered something different, telling me that he continues to be haunted of traumatic dreams of World War II where he witnessed much death.

While I won't repeat the graphic details, it is enough to say that he spoke of the last moments of friends as he watched them leave this world in some of the most horrific ways possible. I could hear what must be the unfathomable trauma of watching that.

Earlier in the week, I'd heard the story of a woman who was telling me of her brother, who is himself in hospice care and deteriorating deeper and deeper into confusion as his illness overtakes him. I heard the pain of a sister who enacts her love for her brother by being by his side, giving but a moment's respite to her sister-in-law who is beside herself with sadness as her husband's life is transformed into something almost alien in his last days.

In thinking about these thoughts, I remember the prayer from the BCP - one that moves me deeply, and one which I've written into a choral anthem (to be performed someday, somewhere perhaps):

Holy God, holy and mighty, holy and merciful Savior:

deliver us not into bitterness of eternal death . . .

O worthy and eternal Judge,

Do not let the pains of death turn us away

At our last hour

What will our last hour be like? Will we depart this world suddenly? Will we be aware of our final months, weeks, days, hours? Will our friends watch us turn into people they don't know? Will we be remembered mostly as we are at our death, or who we were when we were alive? Or some mixture? Are we more truly ourselves when we come to the end of our time here?

I think I have learned to not try to offer people any type of answers when I hear these stories. I have not seen death, so I cannot relate to the deep psychic pain it must unearth.

I do, though, have some sense of the existential angst it arouses, and it is a feeling that compels me to wade into the water with them and swim along beside them for a while in the blackness of that ocean, since I know the eddies and currents.

I think the best theological picture I can offer of my own belief is seeing God as the Person who gives us the ability to endure the blackness of this ocean of existential anxiety, perhaps in the hope that we will be brought home, through mystery, to safe harbor.

A part of my heart wants to offer something of that presence of safe harbor to others, even if I do not much know how exactly to do it.

Perhaps I will learn.

The Inevitability of Mercy

2010-05-27T21:28:00.003-07:00

Several weeks ago, I had the opportunity to hear anew the story of Jonah as told by a Godly Play teacher. I've always loved the simplicity of those stories.

I've heard very different interpretations of the Jonah story - what I think of as the more traditional interpretation of Jonah who runs away from God, but also the interpretation of the story of Jonah as being a complete parody of the stories of other famous prophets.

Whichever way it goes, it's a fascinating story. Jonah hears God, but finds reasons to run away in exactly the opposite direction. But later, he admits to being the source of the problems when the storm arises and advises people to throw him overboard. He says one sentence to Ninevah and everyone believes him.

It seems like most people say that Jonah is mad at the end of the story because God didn't destroy Ninevah.

For me, it makes more sense that Jonah is mad at God for being asked to play a part in God's merciful plan that would have happened regardless of Jonah's intervention. He's not so much mad at God's mercy but in the inevitability of God's mercy.

Either way, he's not much of a hero. He is a prophet, but not one who is larger than life. Eventually, he does what is asked of him and good comes of it.

His story makes me mindful that even in my stubbornness and my failings, my hands and my voice and my efforts are still those that God needs to do God's work in the world.

I think it's something like the same idea conveyed in this Orthodox prayer I like so much:

O Lord my God, even if I had not done anything good before Thee, do Thou help me, in Thy grace, to make a good beginning.

All-Natural Ingredients

2010-04-06T20:32:00.005-07:00

An interesting article in the April 4 edition of New York Times Magazine asking, "Can Animals Be Gay?" This is a silly headline for a very thought-provoking article on the complexities of drawing implications from scientific research.

The most interesting paragraph, for me, was this one:

But later in our conversation, Esseks paused and stayed silent for a while. He was thinking like a lawyer again now, and found a hole in that line of reasoning. “I guess, some of these animals could actually be quote-unquote making a choice,” he said. How could we, as humans, ever know? “Huh,” he said. “I’m just stopping to think that through. I’m not quite sure what to do with that.” Esseks had stumbled right back into what he originally identified as the underlying problem. Those wanting to discriminate against gays and lesbians may have roped the rest of us into an argument over what’s “natural” just by asserting for so long that homosexuality is not. But affixing any importance to the question of whether something is natural or unnatural is a red herring; it’s impossible to pin down what those words mean even in a purely scientific context. (Zuk notes that animals don’t drive cars or watch movies, and no one calls those activities “unnatural.”) In the end, there’s just no coherent debate there to have.

I've often wondered about the word "natural" and the way it's thrown around. Kind of like when my cereal advertises itself as "all natural". What does that mean exactly? Even the most synthetic concoction wasn't brought here by aliens from Alpha Centauri.

The article's title isn't so much as asking if homosexuality exists in the animal kingdom, but does it make sense to speak of certain animal behaviors between two animals of the same sex as "homosexual" or "gay" - human words with loads of baggage. It goes on to talk about various scientific observations of animal behavior we might identify as human-like - an octopus hiding under a coconut shell, for instance.

Reminds me a bit about discussions around the implications of quantum theory which I've had with friends. (Not that I pretend to understand that.) But it also reminds me of Kierkegaard, who said, "If I am capable of grasping God objectively, I do not believe, but precisely because I cannot do this I must believe."

These types of very practical questions about how given data is interpreted make me question how much sense it makes in this postmodern world to be dogmatic about anything . . .

Recession Statistics

2010-04-02T10:39:00.002-07:00

From the Washington Times:

"In terms of regional giving, the survey pinpointed the Pacific Rim states as being the hardest hit. Fifty-five percent of the churches in Hawaii, Alaska, California, Oregon and Washington saw giving decline, the survey said. In Rocky Mountain states (Nevada, Utah, Colorado, New Mexico, Montana, Wyoming and Idaho), 48 percent of the churches saw giving drop."

Seems like the churches in the west are getting hit the hardest. If you combine these with the Barna figures saying that the average drop is 7 percent across the board (but among those who have seen a drop in giving, it's more like 14 percent, with others doing okay), it seems to me that churches here in the West must be being hit the hardest.

Although there was some positive news that 35% reported increased giving in 2009, the article went on to say:

"Other sources have reported huge crimps in church budgets. On March 8, the United Methodist News Service reported a $24 million shortfall in the denomination's 2009 budget. It also reported a 1 percent membership drop in 2008, the latest year for which it has figures. It's the largest percentage drop since 1974, putting total membership at 7.7 million."

My response to this "new normal" is to check into jobs in the for-profit sector . . . and look into accounting and business classes at the community colleges around here. Registration for the summer starts in mid-May . . . we'll see what happens.

Owning It

2010-03-12T12:39:00.005-07:00

Boundaries

I'm seeing again and again examples of boundary issues in the news lately - Eric Massa, Toyota, Tiger Woods, and Glenn Beck. Ouch!

I watched the now infamous and painful Eric Massa interview the other night - one that hurt him far, far more than it ever could have helped. While I'm sure others enjoyed laughs at his expense, I could only feel bad for him as he aired out his dirty laundry on national television. My first thought when watching this was, "he has boundary issues". I could deeply sympathize on so many levels. Not only in his possible struggles with sexuality, but being in situations where boundaries were very muddy indeed. I didn't recognize it in myself or in the greater situation, so I couldn't (and didn't) work to change it.

One thing that really resonated with me was his idea of "owning it", recognizing that he was the one who had the problem and needed to change.

This idea of owning problems also is directly relevant to the Toyota situation, where a company now has serious brand identity issues. Friends of mine have wondered if their cars are going to kill them. (For my part, I have even more reason to question my decision to buy an old Lexus.) Many of the chattering class have talked about what communications steps they need to do to resolve this crisis, with many talking about how Toyota needs to own their problems, taking responsibility for their failures by talking about how they're going to fix it.

Street Level Social Problems - Our Problem

Today when doing some research for a potential job opportunity here, I came across a paper written by a UW professor for the Canada West Foundation on addressing drug dealing, prostitution, burglary, graffiti, and other urban crime problems. One thing I've noticed in his paper is the number of times he cites churches as having a role in the neighborhood improvement process - just about as frequently as various nonprofits community organizations and government-sponsored groups.

A few days ago, a couple of friends mine in the Phoenix area, Robert Berra and Mike Hegeman, separately forwarded news about Glenn Beck dissing social justice-oriented churches. As I've heard others talking about recently, it's not just the progressive mainline churches that are targets, but evangelical churches that are following an emergent church model that seems to have a greater heart for these issues.

Anglo-Catholicism - One response

After working for a self described Anglo-Catholic dean at the Cathedral in Phoenix who began introducing me to some of these ideas (and so many other good ones), I wanted to explore this sector of Anglican heritage more, so I started regularly attending an Anglo-Catholic church in Seattle, so these things have been on my heart and mind much lately. A new acquaintance and priest there at St. Paul's, Sam Torvend, who is a professor at PLU and a highly gifted teacher, laid it all out a few weeks ago when he talked about Anglo-Catholicism's explicit commitment to social justice- how these ideas are at the core of Anglo-Catholic theology.

Progressive mainline protestants strongly hold to these ideas. More and more, I am seeing how they are owning them, even as this is a different kind of owning than owning problems. Still, it is owning an identity.

I think that if the general public knew that we progressive Christians owned this sense of social justice, all Christians would be in a better place than we are right now with our brand.

Our Branding Problem - A Communication Failure

As I've said before, Christianity continues to have a real PR problem - at least here in the U.S., and probably in other countries in the West also.

We have to own this, because this is a failure in communication. Even more than that, because our country is becoming increasingly stratified, we have to own (understand and interface with) the culture in which we are in - both on the large level and on the community level. The community level means social justice and addressing urban problems for those of us in the city.

One way an evangelical church here in Seattle is owning it is paying ambivalent non-Christian "church shoppers" $50 per service to come and offer feedback on Sunday morning. A Seattle Times columnist writes about this here, although I remember seeing this advert on my own on the Craigslist job postings and being both a little surprised and impressed by it at the same time.

Change Begins With Me

However we're going to respond, I don't think that progressive Christians can or should sit on their hands and blame more conservative folks for creating a bad brand in the mind of the general public - we have to to own the issue as our problem and think about ways to change it.

Embracing the intersection of our faith with social justice makes us stand out. We have to own it. We also have to own our PR issues and deal with them appropriately. As we as individuals Christians do it, this is one key picture of making our brand change - by looking different, changing, and doing things differently. And quickly.

Where the church is now - or where the church is going.

2010-03-05T12:58:00.005-07:00

I was meeting with a local pastor here who said that giving overall is up in churches during this recession. I've heard similar things, yet an article in last week's Kansas City Star reports:

Among all Protestant churches, budgets are down about 7 percent from a year ago, but the typical “down” church has lost an average of 14 percent of its budget.

At the same time that giving is going up, it seems to me that costs for churches are rising faster. Healthcare costs continue to rise, vendors to churches charge more for their services (I remember a round of this a couple of years ago when gas prices had risen substantially, and charges have not come down), and regional-level church organizations are strapped for cash and seem to be cutting back on grants to local congregations that have supported burgeoning new programs.

Churches that were on the edge already seem to be especially hard-hit.

Some of the smaller, older congregations seem to be dipping into their long-term savings, perhaps hoping to wait things out. Other congregations that are newer or less stable, not having saved up for these kinds of times, might not have endowment or savings funds that can be used this way, so they have to look at cutting expenses rather than going into debt for themselves.

I've seen this as the case in a lot of situations, where the first target for discretionary spending is staff, who are either furloughed (a more creative approach), hours (and, therefore, benefits) reduced, other positions are going unfilled after a resignation, or individuals are simply let go.

So I did some math with this 14% figure for the churches that are struggling. A small church with a $150K budget before the recession would have to trim $21K from its expenses, and this is about what a small church might pay a part-time administrative assistant. Sometimes churches can see various lay staff as "paid volunteers", so it's not a stretch to think that this would be a place leadership would look to cut.

It seems the direction that churches are moving in right now targets administrators of various types, from basic secretaries (a rarity) to those with increased responsibility and oversight of staff members. The National Association for Church Business Administrators put out a press release recently saying that the 85% of churches who don't hire a high-level, trained administrator put themselves at increasing risk for problems.

I'm not sure it's valid to say that these churches are automatically more at risk, because I've seen others stepping up to the plate and taking on some of these roles. (Obviously this professional organization wants to get this message across for the benefit of the profession, too.) One of the biggest things I'm seeing is the tendency for pastors to do more of this type of heavy lifting and leave other tasks to volunteers.

At least in Seattle, it seems as though the church volunteer base is bigger than it was in Phoenix where I lived for many years - and I don't just mean among an older population of retired folks. I think volunteering with organizations is a much bigger part of the fabric here in this city who have a more community-oriented civic ethic that transfers over into church life. (Among those who have a church life . . . the community oriented ethic for some seems to make religion engaging in these tasks a redundancy in the minds of many here.)

This makes me wonder about the future of church administration as a profession - if the churches of the future are really going to be able to afford to have paid people in these functions, or if clergy and volunteers are going to be forced (in the short term) and expected (in the long term) take on these roles.

I'm betting that the clergy of the future are going to have to look more like the higher-level administrators of the past - this is already the case on many levels. I'm certainly seeing that, as I hear many denominational leaders of different stripes talk about the entrepreneurial characteristics they are looking for in potential new pastors.

So is this where the church is now, or where the church is going?

So if clergy jobs are less about being people of prayer, preaching, and pastoral care, and more about leadership of the congregation as a business or a nonprofit organization, is this a good thing, I wonder . . . Yes, on some level, this means that congregations are going to want clergy to look more like "do-it-all" messiahs. Are clergy going to be shouldered with too much? It's tough enough for church professionals to stay healthy. Is this going to make it worse?

I don't have any of these answers.

A colleague of mine told me the other day, "the church has changed forever." I'm not quite sure I agree with this, because I think a better way to put it is that "the church will have to change forever".

Yet in this environment of ambiguity, we all have to take responsibility for making our decisions about which direction things are changing, and play our cards accordingly.

Problems and Promise

2010-02-25T00:32:00.004-07:00

A good friend of mine who shares my Christian faith has been coming out of the closet in various ways over the past year and a half. When I asked him about what happened to get him to make the decision that being both gay and Christian was okay, he said something like, "I heard about Christians and churches that accepted gays, and I wanted to go check them out to see what they had to say."

The more I have thought about this answer, the more important the words become to me. Looking at the bigger picture here, the story could be told a different way: a person who is searching for an expression of Christianity that he or she finds more authentic hears about a rhythm of belief that may be more expansive and relevant - and therefore attractive.

This gives me a lot of hope for mainline Protestant Christianity, if we can open our hearts to own who we truly are. The Episcopal Church especially has a good product, because liturgy is timeless, as is the ethos of true community and trusting faith shaped gradually out of a common experience of shared prayer and eating a simple meal together.

I think we are different - and this difference is what makes us attractive.

When I think about my own interests, I think about my intrigue with how systems function. I think of cities with their complex transportation networks, infrastructure, architecture, and social concerns. I think of our political system and its (dys)functions as it is influenced by varied factors and the techniques those within the system use to bring about change. I think about social challenges, how they come about and how they can be mitigated.

More than all of these, though, I think about the church and the Church and how it functions in similar ways to all of these things. I think about the ways that it is unhealthy - perhaps made up of people who are more broken than average: people who squabble, who hurt, who have trouble setting limits, who avoid confrontation, who have unrealized longings, who have vague but very sincere ideas about how to change the world, who have hidden agendas they don't even know within themselves.

Yet even in this brokenness, we can still create churches where people who need a place for healing can come and find wholeness in Christ - to be nurtured into a place of being different in the world and for the world. Places where outsiders will hear a word so fresh that they experience a joyful attraction to something they did not know existed.

Even with all of its problems - and I've both experienced them and contributed to them, in ways known and unknown - the Church is at its best a place of blessing.

What is in my heart is to be a person that understands my own deep desires, good and bad, strong and weak, discovering and using my own gifts to help churches be a place of blessing - knowing the problems, but also loving the promise of the Church.

I pray for God's grace to have opportunities to do this - and God's strength and knowledge to do a good job of it.

Changing ourselves - the changing church

2010-02-12T22:29:00.003-07:00

I've been meeting with many pastors, priests, and musicians over the past several weeks, making connections and listening to stories.

Today, I sat down with a Presbyterian minister at a local congregation. We shared some stories of ministry with one another.

My acquaintance asked me an important question: observing that churches can become like clubs, how should churches keep this from happening? My answer was that churches have to be able to genuinely include people who are exactly the opposite of who they are, which I think means that the liberal, white, upper-middle-class, progressive churches so many are proud of in mainline Christianity need to welcome the homeless, working poor, lower middle class, and the Republicans equally well so that all have a part to play in community.

That was a pretty good answer, but I don't know if it was good enough or right enough. But the second part of my response was that each church needs to have an identity, and this act of creating an identity naturally means that congregations and denominations cannot be all things to all people. This means that we have to live into own identity as congregations and denominations. My priest at the church I've been attending reminded us at the annual meeting that we "have an identity" and we "become more and more of ourselves each year".

It seems this question of church identity is not too far from the identity we seek to live into as people who are baptized into Christ, discovering who we are in our deepest places and then wrestling with these truths within ourselves.

Because he was in something equivalent to the committee on ministry in his own denomination's local offices, I asked him about what qualities they were looking for in clergy candidates. He spoke of the very changing nature of the church and the need for upcoming clergy to be less about being good preachers, theologians, etc., and more about the need for people to bring people to faith and nurture them in that faith in the context of what the wider culture has become.

The question I had for him was something like this, "If we are entering this new era in the church, where the old ways of doing things won't work, how do we know enough about what the church of this new era will look like to identify qualities of clergy who will minister effectively in it?"

Through the conversation, my acquaintance told me the story of his ministry in several churches in various parts of the country, and of his internal sense of the go message he heard before he went to accept a new call.

Some of his observations have become a bit conflated with what I'm reading in Barbara Brown Taylor's Leaving Church, recommended to me by another clergy acquaintance I have met here in the Seattle area.

What I have heard in both of these stories is the sense of weariness encountered through working in the church and the questioning one has about why one is doing the work. More than this, I have heard the voices of those people who are clergy and in charge of congregations, and all of the weight they carry and the struggles they must live with - both the tiny, day-to-day tasks that soak up energy, the weekly struggle with loving the "difficult" people that fill churches, and the bigger picture questions of the institution and the faith's ongoing relevance and survival.

I am just beginning to empathize with the very difficult role of being a clergy person in charge of a congregation. Earlier in my experience, I did not have such empathy, and found it far too easy at times to pass judgment on my Christian brothers and sisters who were called to do this work.

It is easy to judge others, criticize, and question when you do not have the weight of their responsibility on your own shoulders. I think this is part of the reason why churches have developed the often exasperating processes, hierarchies, and authority structures they have.

When asked recently about how I handle conflict, a part of me wanted to say that I hide under the covers until I can't deal with it and then burst out in anger when the noise bothers me too much. It's such a human thing, and I have engaged in this very human behavior more times than I'd like to admit.

The better part of me wanted to talk about how when one agrees to be a part of a community, one must remember that one submits to the authority structures of that community. Authority structures are not something I have had explicitly explained to me at times when I needed to understand them, and have on more than one occasion thrown rocks at out of frustration, or kicked unintentionally in the act of learning how to dance.

We do make a lot of mistakes on our life journey, and I certainly hope that I have learned from mine. As my clergy friend told me today, sometimes one must pay a high tuition for the privilege of learning from these big mistakes.

The Mirror

2010-02-03T00:55:00.003-07:00

One of my favorite movies is Big Fish, a movie rich with colorful images and thoughtful metaphors - but a film that is mostly about myth and the stories that we tell to interpret our lives as individuals and communities.

I have been doing some reading in psychology lately and I was reminded of the pragmatic truth (and perhaps philosophical as well) that there is no reality, only perception.

Put another way, we write our own stories as we can tell the stories of our lives by overlaying these details with the deep meaning of our profound experiences.

I found myself telling a priest recently that my job-hunting process was yielding such fruitful results, even as I have not yet come across the right fit yet. I realize that the factual incidents that brought me here could be seen as data - or they could be seen, and are best seen, as part of a story.

My story, like your story, is still being written. If you are like me, your story is one in which you have unintentionally made wrong turns, done embarrassing things out of ignorance, and remained blind to the very plain truth always in front of you.

I talked a bit with a close friend the other day about these times where I have been very human and made many mistakes. I used the analogy of feeling like I had missed the train - made mistakes and otherwise screwed up opportunities - all the while being aware of the ticking clock of life that says that one does not have forever to wait around for the next one.

My friend offered that if you miss the train, there is a bus following behind that will take you on a different route, but you'll end up in about the same place. He also reminded me that God's watchfulness and guidance hovers over us like a cloud, even if we mistakenly (or intentionally, for that matter) run out from underneath it through our own ignorance.

And should we do this again and again, this loving cloud always quickly reroutes itself to cover us again.

This type of concrete guidance makes the difficult struggle of job hunting and discernment not easy, but worth it.

Perhaps the best part of the process has been my meetings with many clergy of a variety of denominations, listening to their stories and the stories of their churches here in the Puget Sound area. I have been energized by many of them and what they are doing. More than this, I have been captivated by their own stories of their call to ministry and how these came about - how they made these choices to serve the Church in a full-time, professional way, and how they took this call seriously.

In this search, I also happened by a helpful website from the vocations office of the Catholic Archdiocese of Seattle, that outlined a few "signs of a call". (Obviously to an exclusively male, celibate, Catholic priesthood, but still very much useful.) One question I found very piercing was this: "If those who are called don’t respond, how will our faithful people receive the Eucharist in the future?"

One could substitute Eucharist with just about any type of ministry to which one can be called.

I am reminded in this question of Romans Chapter 10 . . . How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching? And how are they to preach unless they are sent?

Every now and then, one has the opportunity to meet an individual who not only has answered God's call, but who is deeply gifted with a surprising ability to see and tell forth. I had the rare good fortune to encounter this type of pastor today. I've only met a handful of these, but it seems like when I do, they have very important truths to share.

He told his story, and, with different language but familiar ideas, spoke of the sense of not just internal call, but the external call that culminates in ordination, bringing conclusion to the discernment process.

And then this pastor listened a bit more to my story, and then held up the mirror.

A friend of mine tells me that priests are those who hold up the mirror and gently ask you to look deeply into it to see yourself as you truly are . . . and, I would think, to also see the potentials of who you might be in Christ.

As I tell my story, and others listen to my story, I feel as though I am beginning to hear what that story is saying more and more clearly each time I share it.

And as the mirror is held up to me, I pray for courage.

Just feeling it

2010-01-21T17:41:00.003-07:00

Last Sunday night, I had an opportunity to hear Rob, a priest from the UK, speak at Church of the Apostles, a congregation known for its attractiveness to 20 & 30-somethings and its postmodern, emergent structure and risk-taking. The priest was speaking about a new initiative in the Church of England called Fresh Expressions, exploring unorthodox ways of doing church to reach out to those people for whom traditional types of church seem irrelevant or otherwise uninteresting.

I took several things away from the conversation that evening. First, that church planting here may far more resemble missionary work overseas than more typical ways of starting new churches that perhaps attract people who are more familiar with terminology and church lingo, having some history in the church.

When hearing in particular from Rob, this missionary (or "pioneer") priest as he called himself, he spoke of sitting down all morning in a local pub after praying and walking through the neighborhood, asking where God would have him go. I asked him, "How do you know that it was God who led you to go to this place?"

Two answers came back. The first from the pastor of the Apostles congregation, who said very matter-of-factly, "You just feel it!" The second was from Rob who said something like, "I pray that God would show me where to go, and then I trust that God has guided me to the place I'm drawn to. I trust in God's work and not my own efforts."

Earlier last week, I had a conversation with a UCC pastor, when I asked him about how he knew it was God calling him to be a pastor and not his own ego. He remarked that his own father had asked him the same question, and the conclusion he came to was that it was both his own ego and God who led him in that direction - but it took him a long time to get to that place of the dialectic- arriving where he found truth to be.

Yesterday at a job interview, I was asked questions about my own journey and how work for this particular congregation may fit into that place - they asked me where I was, and the only thing I could offer was that I was in a place of discernment. Much of me wanted to cheerfully say something along the lines of, "if you can figure this out, let me know, and then we'll both have an answer!"

My new UCC acquaintance reminded me of the prayer I've often offered - that my will would be molded to God's will - that I would be given the intuition and sense to know the right path to walk.

This attitude of prayer and careful decisions was the attitude I've practiced during all of my time in Seattle, and in my decision to come here. This attitude of prayer and discernment was the attitude I earnestly sought during my years in Phoenix and at Trinity Cathedral and St. Augustine's.

The road has been difficult lately, but I still feel I am on the right road somehow, because I feel as though I am making very tough decisions, guided by the very subjective "you just feel it" methodology.

When I think about my frantic search to gather all of the data relevant to a decision, and then make decisions based on trying to crunch all of the information, I think more and more that such things are very complex distractions. My head swirls in the clouds with possibilities, theories, contingency plans, and all manner of confusion.

Perhaps the best advice is the one that rings richly with truth - the one that pierces so deeply: "You just feel it".

I pray that God would guide my intuition and give me confidence in it as I try to make the best decisions for myself and others I may be called to serve.

The Long Process of Hello

2009-12-15T01:07:00.003-07:00

A beloved new friend tonight took me to see the Seattle Men's Chorus perform, and the whole evening was a treat from start to finish. I was very thankful for the experience - one of so many new things I'm encountering here.

I was surprised tonight in a few ways.

Benaroya Hall downtown was so very acoustically dead compared to other performance halls I've experienced. I remember Symphony Hall in Phoenix being far more live, and Gammage Auditorium on the campus of ASU to be even more reverberant yet. I wondered why this fairly new performance space, that I'm assuming was designed for musical performance in mind, would have such an un-resonant acoustic.

The hall also was much smaller than corresponding places in Phoenix. Why is this?

I think both of these things reminded me that Seattle and this metro area in general are much smaller than my sprawly and populous hometown. I know I've heard some people criticize Seattle as being a place that fancies itself a major metropolis, when it's really just an overgrown mid-size city. I think there is certainly some truth to this, as it does seem at times that Seattle is perhaps still in its adolescence in many ways.

As we were driving back and forth to the concert hall, crisscrossing the complex tangle of streets in the central part of town, my friend again pointed out various landmarks and spoke a bit of the history of them. He was a person steeped in his knowledge of this place, although he was not a native of the area.

At the concert, I also thought back to my habits of attending concerts of the Phoenix Symphony on many weekends, and how I would always recognize many audience members - often fellow musicians or music afficiandos that I knew from what became many years of living and working in central Phoenix.

This experience of unfamiliarity with the players invited more and more of my typical comparisons to my hometown. Again, not in a way that makes me want to go back, but in a way that makes me realize how much time and labor it takes to get to a level of familiarity and experience with a life within a place.

When will I come to the point where I can walk about the audience at a concert like this and know many people both on stage and off? How many years will that take? How will I get "plugged in" so that I know deeply who in town does what, where one can go to best do certain things, who the players are in various realms that my professional endeavors will inevitably touch?

The truth is that it happens person-by-person and relationship-by-relationship - just as familiarity with a place happens street-by-street. And, in the case of Seattle, neighborhood-by-neighborhood.

I found myself today wanting to hurry this process along - to introduce myself to 50 different people at once in hopes that we would both have an accurate and respectful thumbnail summary of ourselves to draw upon should a scenario warrant our deepening our connections to each other.

But no - this is a long process of hello, of introducing ourselves, perhaps several times over, until we begin to move into some type of relationship with one another - some type of profound, simple (not simplistic) true knowing instead of simply seeing and hearing one another.

I think tonight that this is another experiential reminder that efficiency is the opposite of love, as a former priest of mine used to say.

... but I so love efficiency.

What will we do differently?

2009-12-13T22:09:00.003-07:00

I found myself attending the 5PM service this evening at St. Paul's here in Seattle - the second time I've been there on a Sunday night. I've found that the musical and liturgical aesthetic there seems to work a lot better for me as a Sunday evening experience of transformation and reflection. For me, it feels similar in some ways to the Thursday night service and formation piece at St. Augustine's in Phoenix and in other ways to the Sunday evening formation and Compline service at Trinity Cathedral.

Following tonight's service, I had a brief chat with one of the members of St. Paul's, where I talked with him about my move from Phoenix, briefly describing all of the roots I have there. He spoke of the ease one has in very familiar environments, and then mentioned the efficiency one experiences from being in those familiar places. Simply living one's normal life in a new city can take twice as much time, as one tries to "figure out" even very simple things like how to drive from one place to another.

This certainly has been my experience, as this has been a tough transition on so many levels. My inability to be as efficient as I would have liked to be has certainly been a major contributor to this difficulty.

But this is a new endeavor - an adventure - and adventure is different from amusement.

These ideas of adventure vs. amusement were present in some of the discussion time that followed this 5PM service, since I stuck around afterwards for their "questions around the table". The question of the evening was "How do we follow Christ in a consumer culture?"

The Bishop was there, and he challenged those of us who were gathered to think about how we as Christians "looked just like everybody else", especially at this time of Advent, and fleshed out these thoughts with some concrete examples - that would make us stand out from the crowd and be noticed. Not just for the sake of being noticed, but for the sake of taking our faith and our traditions seriously.

This was the first opportunity I've had to hear Bishop Rickel's teaching, and I was most impressed with his very frank approaches, his matter-of-fact sensibility, and pragmatic convictions.

In many ways, I think he echoed what I remember hearing from Bishop Shahan, who used to remind us that we "make a difference by being different".

Truth is truth no matter where you find it, and certainly draws attention to itself (and, really, away from the person conveying the truth when it is spoken forthrightly) in unmistakable ways.

One of the associate clergy was there also helping to facilitate the discussion, and I continued to be fascinated by his knowledge and perspectives on Christian culture here in the Seattle area. This was the second time I'd sat in on is teaching.

I feel a little sponge-like in these encounters, trying to absorb so much information, trying to hook in this new data into previous experience, giving it some context- rolling it around in my head to see how thinking may be different here than it was elsewhere. Then, I must ask, "Why am I experiencing this as different?" Is it me that has changed? Is the culture here articulating the same things in new ways? Are these new things the product of certain socio-economic or parish personalities?

I suppose I'm fascinated by these questions - although they don't seem to be practical questions whatsoever.

After this sponge-time, I helped out a bit to put away chairs from the service, and began to think about how I started to feel at home in this situation. Even the priest in charge of the congregation made mention that putting away furniture was more of a sign of belonging to a group than was some formal letter of transfer. She was right about that.

If there's one thing that I really am seeking now, it's stability and a sense of home. This is far different from the boring and familiar stuck-in-the-mud life I had fallen into in Phoenix.

This stability that I seem to be groping for might be quite the illusion, as I may be feeling the same thing that everyone else is feeling, given the current economic situation. I know the same as everyone else that the "normal" of the early 2000s is not coming back.

It's a new life for all of us, really. What will we do with ourselves?

Ends and Means

2009-12-07T22:15:00.004-07:00

I had dinner with a new friend this evening, and we had a fairly wide-ranging conversation, but several pieces of it centered around our life in the church, as he is a fellow Episcopalian and lay person.

It's usually the third time I spend quality time with a person that we begin moving past the interesting, but basic questions to move deeper into the heart of things, as I am reminded again that our humanity is only fully known in relationship to another.

The conversation seemed to move a in and out of the realm of how our religious ideas shape our value systems and specific behaviors.

One of the dangers I'm trying very hard to avoid is finding a church home that is not a place where I feel very comfortable - where people process things in the same ways I do and ask the same questions. I don't want to find a supportive environment only - or even one that is challenging, because those are places where I might not necessarily be asked the questions I need to be asked in this point on my journey.

My friend (who is a member of an Anglo-Catholic church) and I talked a bit about Anglo-Catholicism, a label I'm still trying to wrap my head around. Some of my experience of people who describe themselves as "Anglo-Catholic" has been of young people in various stages of discernment of one kind or another who are very interested in debating the proper ways to do liturgy.

Sometimes I have been bewildered by conversations among folks that cross the line from curious squabbles over what movements should be done where during the Eucharist to a much more judgmental discussion of how certain liturgical practices are so incorrect that one questions the appropriateness of common worship and communion with those there.

The more I experience different rhythms of life in the Episcopal Church, the more convinced I become that we can't be dogmatic about things like liturgy and music choices, convinced that certain practices are correct and others are not.

Does that make me a hopelessly misguided fundamentalist hick who is somehow returning to his Baptist roots on some level? I feel that way sometimes, and it may be closer to the truth than I want to admit.

I told my dinner companion tonight that what I think is important about a church is whether there is a true sense of community present and whether people are brought closer to relationship with God and driven out into the world to live out the Gospel because they are a part of that community. Whether or not incense is swung, bells rung at the right time, or the best choral anthems are performed doesn't matter.

One of the sayings I've heard passed around church choirs - and it's very important - is this . . . and I know you've read this before if you read my blog with any regularity: If your ministry leads you to music, it has led you astray. If your ministry leads you to God, it has brought you home.

The same thing is true for liturgy and for any other endeavor we undertake in the church.

Some of my experiences over recent months have really driven home this truth for me, as I again have been reminded of the fork in the road that I face professionally- the reality of asking myself what my work really must be for the sake of my soul, how that work will or will not put food on the table, and how that work is fulfilling the firm leading I feel to serve God in a significant and serious way.

These questions become more pressing when I realize the current limits of my expertise in certain areas. However, this is coupled with my understanding that one can be good at doing work in these areas up to a certain point, but (frighteningly) that this work is exhausting. This is not the draining that comes from emptying yourself in beloved work, but the true burnout that happens when one is doing what one is able to do rather than what one should do.

My plan and hope has been that what I am able to do will be a means to discover and draw closer to the ends - to what I am called to do . . . not unlike a good liturgy that perhaps is one means to go deeper into community and the world beyond.

Raising Walls . . .

2009-11-26T22:34:00.003-07:00

On the days surrounding Thanksgiving, it's been my own tradition to listen to and reflect on Early-American music. I think my favorite hymn tune to hear at this time of the year is Africa by William Billings, with text by Isaac Watts.

I heard this hymn again today, and found these three stanzas especially meaningful:

Yet, saith the Lord, should Nature change,

And Mothers Monsters prove,

Sion still dwells upon the Heart

Of everlasting Love.

Deep on the Palms of both my Hands

I have engrav'd her Name;

My Hands shall raise her ruin'd Walls,

And build her broken Frame.

When hearing these words that speak of raising ruined walls and building broken frames, I am reminded of two experiences: one old, and one new.

Before I left Phoenix for Seattle, one of the last sermons I heard at St. Augustine's was a reflection on the Jesus' parable of the mustard seed. You can read the whole thing here - and I certainly encourage you to do so. Here's just a piece of Gil's powerful message:

The Church, that’s us, is the farmer in both these stories. It is our responsibility to plant the seeds. But the seeds we plant are not the seeds that everyone else would expect – no the Church is called to plant the seed that will attract birds of every kind. The mustard seed is the seed of revolution – a revolution of inclusion.

I recall on the Thursday prior to the sermon, the Thursday night community of pilgrims at St. Augustine's pondered the question of how we could go about sowing pesky seeds of revolution. That question has stuck with me - perhaps itself not unlike the mustard seed buried in my soul.

This Sunday, Jerome Berryman, the priest who developed the Godly Play method of Christian formation, offered a story about the Church and the church - far too beautiful and poignant to adequately reference here. But it was a metaphorical tale of religious institutions and how they respond to the small change that arrives, and what that change eventually brings about.

I sometimes think that in my own confused and often bumbling way, the seed that I am led to plant is the seed of asking tough questions - perhaps poking sacred cows or handing bathrobes to a nude Caesar.

My intuition and judgment was literally and figuratively beaten out of me as a child. This natural ability takes a long time to dig out within oneself when it has been buried so deeply under the layers of negativity and doubt that have nearly suffocated it. This is a talent at the core of my self that is easily bruised by perhaps well-meaning but highly critical voices who wonder why the obviously visible tools are not easily grasped and put to good use.

This antenna to the universe is very battered and bent, and yet I feel it still picks up signals that are discernible to me through all of the static and distraction.

While I dare not equate whatever this signal is I receive with the Holy, I still feel as though this battered and broken antenna is what I have and what I must use . . . and what I must lovingly repair within myself through much intentional effort and patience.

When I am able to hear - to really hear - that's when I feel I am ready to know where to plant the seeds that need to be planted, and ready to water and tend whatever perhaps undesirable tree then pops up in its place.

But only until it is the right time to leave this tree for others to water, care for, and love - while I go to plant new seeds elsewhere.

I think it is in some small way that these wounded parts of ourselves are the parts we must use - as in Watt's stanzas - to raise ruined walls and mend broken frames, and this is the way that we ourselves, as broken people, participate in God's redemption of the world.

My desire and prayer is that I never simply laugh and point at naked emperors, but offer a robe. That I don't shoot sacred cows, but help all too drink the milk that they offer. That ruined walls are not just razed, but raised.

Perhaps, with God's help, I shall succeed in this endeavor.

New Responsibility

2009-10-24T16:07:00.002-07:00

So, I've returned to Phoenix briefly under than less than ideal circumstances. Many of you know that my dad has been in ill health for a while, and this has been of a lot of concern to me over these recent days. Yesterday, he had quadruple bypass surgery, which he fortunately was able to schedule during a time I was already able to be out this way.

He's doing very well - better than I think both he and I expected, but perhaps some of that is the worrisome nature that he and I seem to share. It's that same side of me that can see the worst possibility of any of several outcomes and wants to prevent this or other less-than-ideal outcomes.

I think that many of my experiences of late- having moved to a whole new city, started new work, and having to help encourage responsibility and new life in my father during a difficult time have stretched me quite a bit. As difficult as some of these transitions have been, I feel like I've become so much stronger because of them.

Several important realizations have come out of this process. The most important is my awareness of the ambiguity of our existence - living in a life that does not have an instruction manual of foolproof guidelines that may be followed in any situation. I think we always have before us choices that are good or not as good, and this world as we experience it is a product of our own and many others' best choices they have been able to make. Some of these decisions have been good, others have been less than good - and this is where we find ourselves.

Several coworkers and acquaintances in Seattle have been giving me warnings about things from preparing for the cold, snow, and dark of the approaching winter to the slippery nature of all of the leaves that will continue to fall on the ground through the remainder of the season and make for slippery walking. I also realize that certain practices and techniques that bring about desired outcomes in one city and situation do not work in new ones.

The biggest truth to come out of this for me has been my gradual awareness that while I'm doing similar jobs in Seattle that I did in Phoenix, even the "same jobs" with the same general responsibilities are played out in amazingly different ways given the new context.

These experiences have made me profoundly aware of the responsibility and difficulty people who are new to a place have in trying to figure out the best path forward - and how many people there will be offering both solicited and unsolicited advice on how to proceed.

It has made me mindful of times in the past where I was perhaps less patient and more judgmental than I should have been with someone who was new to some area of responsibility.

A valuable lesson, indeed.

A rant about Seattle

2009-09-07T19:40:00.003-07:00

You readers regularly heard me talk about all of the issues that Phoenix had, but Seattle is no utopia, even if it has been the city I've dreamed about living in for years.

The longer I live here, the more I realize that living in a new city is different from being a tourist in that city. It's much easier to love a city when you're a tourist. But a few months later, the reality of actually living kicks in.

Not that I have any buyer's remorse . . . (a couple of friends have asked me about that).

So, here's the list:

1) Many people in Phoenix talk about what a good public transit system Seattle has. Sorry y'all, but you're wrong. The bus system here is very confusing, almost always late, does not go in any direct route (usually routes through downtown), and putters around so slowly that it's almost faster to walk. (I'm not kidding.) The light rail here doesn't really go anywhere interesting (at least, not yet), so there's not much reason to ride it. I should say though that light rail construction is an economic development engine dressed as a transportation solution. Knowing this, the light rail will serve it's purpose very well: increasing investment in more depressed areas to the south of the city. An exciting idea that had been floated around for a while was building a monorail system around the city, perhaps something like Chicago's elevated heavy rail. Interestingly, the light rail system here largely runs on elevated tracks and stops less frequently, so at least seems faster than the shorter Phoenix version. Still, needs work.

2) There's a phenomenon here called the "Seattle Chill" (or Freeze, or Cold Shoulder), meaning that while people are very polite, it's hard to make friends here. Some also speak about the social awkwardness of people who live here and the suspicion that natives have about non-natives. Others question whether this is really a phenomenon unique to Seattle, or other cities comparable in some way to Seattle. My verdict is that the effect is real - people are friendly, but you don't make friends with them. Everyone is very courteous, enjoys talking to you at a party, but when you ask them to get together to have a drink or do something socially, inevitably the answer is some form of "I don't have time" or a noncommital response referring to a happening in the indefinite future.

3) This city is not run well: the streets are filled with potholes and ruts, nobody seems able to figure out the best way to repair a deteriorating and dangerous double-decker bridge, and the local politics seem to be based either on creating a political machine or manipulating the often myopic nature of our human condition to vote against something. Consequently, not much gets done, and people have argued for years about ideals rather than doing what's best and what's needed. Per-capita crime rates are pretty high, and this town isn't that much bigger than Tucson.

4) People who are longtime residents either sell the city short, lamenting that we're not San Francisco or Los Angeles and have a lack of culture and amenities, or they have a cynical view that we're trying too much to be a world-class city and have become an overgrown small town in the process. World-class cities don't have to be big, but they do have to have personality, vision, and distinctives. Our biggest defict as a city seems to me to be a lack appreciation for our strengths and a lack of vision for what we can or should become.

I'm still trying to get my head wrapped around the philosophy of this place, which seems to be "leave me alone and let me be a liberal". It seems to both have a simultaneously libertarian and liberal streak to it's "progressive" character, eschewing "nanny state" regulation in favor of "practical" green practices and strong be-whatever-you-want attitudes vs. an aggressive fight for traditional liberal causes.

But while I'm talking about this area's problems, I only have to start thinking of the scenic beauty, the off-kilter culture, the attractive density, and the cooperative and progressive spirit of this place to realize why I love it here so much.

Now just I need to find a way to conquer the hills on my bike so I can actually get around this city.

Fall Approaches in Rain City

2009-09-06T18:20:00.002-07:00

This morning just before church started, I said something like, "Hello, good morning! Nice to see you on this rainy day" to a family that was walking into church. The mom told me a minute later after her family had gone inside that she was surprised to hear me say something like that, because the weather today was normal, and nobody from the area would have commented on it at all - this was a common happening.

Last weekend, several friends and acquaintances from my former life at Trinity Cathedral in Phoenix were in town for various reasons. I was visiting with some of them in the office here at the Cathedral of St. Mark where two former colleagues of mine work, and we were talking about how we all were adjusting to life in Seattle. The comment was made that I seemed to be getting used to it more quickly, perhaps, than others from the area. I said it had a lot to do with the fact that it's been my longtime dream to live here.

When I was looking at the New York Times this afternoon while stopping into a coffee shop downtown, I noticed that the high temperatures in the Cascades were only in the 40s. There wasn't any large area on the weather map in the whole country with temperatures that low, except for the northern portions of Alaska. I think our high today was somewhere in the upper 50s or lower 60s - with a lot of wind.

Even with the wind and the rain - and there was a lot of it today in Sammamish - there were lovely sun breaks here and there throughout the day. As I drove home over one of the bridges over Lake Washington, it was lovely to see the scattered rain showers moving across the lake, with cloud cover in some areas of the hills but with sun bathing Husky stadium and the UW to the north. The light and the rain on the lake was truly lovely, as was yesterday when I sat at a restaurant in the small town-like suburb of Issaquah, surrounded on three sides by large hills, with low clouds swirling around the tops of the mountains. What a beautiful time in this forested land!

Two weeks ago, I started a "regular" day job - working as the Church Administrator for University Unitarian Church. I'm sure I'll have more to say about this place later and how I came upon this work, but for now I can say that it seems to be a wonderful fit for me - a delightful challenge of working collaboratively with a very competent staff and a fun, intelligent group of church members, many of whom are longtime social justice leaders and thinkers in the Seattle area.

Of course, learning a new job is a lot of work, and I'm spending quite a bit of time doing that and getting the music season started at my other work in Sammamish. I haven't had time at all for the writing and reflection that allows the cauldron of ideas to function efficiently in smelting process of my philosophical/spiritual self-evolution.

Many of you know that I've been doing a lot of reading about vocation - most of which has been on hiatus for the past two weeks while I've been doing the work of my new job and some related reading. But I have been thinking back to the poigniant book by Parker Palmer, Let Your Life Speak. One of the central tenets is that your life itself, when you listen carefully, will tell you about what your true calling is. Sometimes one's calling is not what we want to do, but what the inner voice, the inner light, who we truly are, what our treasured gifts lead us to do. It's about being authentic to who we are.

This condition of authenticity is coming to the forefront of my mind, as I think about how to be an Anglican in the midst of ministry to and from Unitarians and to and from people in the suburb of Sammamish.

As the priest of the church in Sammamish is known to say, "It will be come clear."

Individualism and Vocation

2009-07-23T21:55:00.003-07:00

Last night, I went to the Cathedral here in Seattle to listen to a presentation by Victor Atta-Baffoe, the Dean of the Anglican seminary in Cape Coast, Ghana, discuss the African perspective on what he called a "crisis" in the Anglican communion. He offered many very important perspectives, and validated comments that I'd heard from Kirk Smith, Nicholas Knisely, and others on what was really going on behind the scenes in some of the politics in the Anglican world.

In particular, he put the actions of the American church into the wider political context of the perceptions of other countries of America's unilateralist tendencies, contrasting our individualist perspective with the more African concept of Ubuntu - the theme of this year's General Convention. He said the western Cartesian philosophy of "I think, therefore I am" stood in contrast to the African concept of "I am because we are." So, he placed the understanding of individualism in the context of how we individuals are shaped by community.

He made so very many good and thoroughly Biblical points that anyone listening to him could no longer in anything resembling good conscience caricature all African Anglican thinkers as backward, uncharitable, or hateful.

Truly this was a hopeful message from a very articulate and intelligent theologian. It really brought home how much we in the "Global North" or elsewhere in the Anglican Communion will lose if we somehow choose to walk apart from one another.

With my 32nd birthday behind me, I took time on Monday to reflect on where I was in this whole life transition process I've recently undergone, realizing that all of the heavy-hitting moving work was finally over, even if there are a few odd projects still to be completed.

Since all of this has been winding down, I have had more time to look for additional employment, realizing that despite my major cutbacks in spending, I'm still going to have a pretty significantly negative cashflow until I can obtain some additional sources of income.

I've begun to try to incorporate some sort of structure into my daily activities now that I don't have the consistent rhythm of a regular day job type of work life to settle into. Framework is good for me to keep me on task - otherwise, I end up wasting a lot of time.

I knew going into all of this that a period like this was a crossroads. I know also that this time of underemployment also needs to be seen as a gift - one that should not be squandered. So, I am trying to balance out the four parts of what my life is at this moment: church music work, Sabbath time, discernment, and job hunting.

Each of these four areas is leading me to ask more and more questions that circle around the meta-issue of vocation - allowing me to sort out some of my recent spiritual experiences in light of my overall faith journey and particular life circumstances. I am remembering recent times of embarrassment and soul-cutting advice that I've heard.

As I do this work - this very important work - I'm mindful of my community and the ways I have been shaped by it, realizing both that I'm not the same person I was when I became an Anglican back in 1997, and that who I am today is largely a product of my local Anglican communities I've ministered to and received ministry from.

In a progressive, community-oriented city like Seattle, I think these values are ones I have to chew on a bit more - to see how these values may be lived out in a place like this - and to think about how life and culture is different here in the Northwest.

(Semantic Diversion: I continue to wonder exactly what region is actually referred to by the term "Northwest" when it is used locally. It could be something analogous to "the Valley" as it is used to refer to the metropolitan Phoenix area. If so, it is just as amorphous as that term while being just as inaccurate - with maybe a touch of hubris. Hopefully they're including Oregon, eastern Idaho, and perhaps northern California as part of the idea. Hopefully the denizens of Seattle and environs are not overly parochial in their usage of the word.)

Seattle is both exactly as I thought it would be and everything I hoped it would be, so I think this is a very, very good start, as I've not experienced anything resembling buyer's remorse after being here for a month. I do not know how long I will be here, although as of now I certainly hope it will be a long time. What I do know is that this time in this wondrous city and landscape is a beautiful and very fragile gift - one that I may be led to give up at any time, as I knew I had to do when I left Phoenix.

Again it shows that life can be, at once, both exhilarating and sad, expansive and austere. This pruning of the excessive or unnecessary is elegant in its simplicity, really, because I think it makes me think more about the God I experience and know through community - namely, the Church.

This crossroads is difficult, and the immediate road ahead will be rough. Perhaps very rough. But this is a time of beautiful opportunity for me, and I pray that I use the gift wisely.

If I do not, I pray in faith that God will bring me to the place where She would have me be. Through this, I remember that all shall be well.

The Great and the Sad

2009-06-17T22:17:00.004-07:00

Most all readers of this blog should know that I'm in the process of moving to Seattle, and tonight's entry is being typed from a motel room in Boise, Idaho, that is lacking most of the buttons on the in-room phone, was lacking toilet paper upon check in, and has a curious brown substance emerging from the faucet when I turn on the cold water.

Yet, this is all part of the adventure for me. I love staying in crappy motels and enjoying all of the fascinating problems and/or challenges that they offer me.

My absolute favorite is the one in San Diego that is directly across the street from the end of the runway of the airport there. When the jets fly over, they fly immediately overhead, such that somebody with a decent pitcher's arm could literally ding the fuselage with a well-lobbed baseball. When the jets fly over, my whole room would quake - and I would squeal with glee at the fun of it.

I'm not trying to make a vacation out of this journey north, but I am trying to be intentional about this process: leaving, journey, experience, reflection . . . and either tomorrow or Friday, arrival.

Let me commend to any of my Phoenician friends with wandering souls the drive from Flagstaff to Page. It's been a very long while since I've driven that route - or, the route from Page to Salt Lake City for that matter. The scenery is amazing along that stretch of road - from the holy emptiness that is the Navajo reservation to the amazing mountains that frame the cities from Provo to Ogden. It is all deeply beautiful.

The holy emptiness is what draws me to my favorite places in the Southwest, because I think myself is reflected back to me. Much of my worldview is that of the Preacher. The writer of Ecclesiastes sees meaninglessness - but sees that in the context of God's meaning that embraces our experience of meaninglessness without nullifying it.

Earlier this week, one of my new colleagues in Seattle and I were talking about the idea of being present to "both the great and the sad", as he put it.

As I was leaving town on Monday, I was having much more of the experience of the bitter rather than the sweet as I was remembering my goodbyes to my Phoenix friends, wondering how many of them I would actually see again. One person who popped up suddenly on that goodbye tableau was a high school acquaintance that I hadn't seen in 13 years. This simply tells me that we cannot ever have any kind of leaving that is assuredly permanent.

At the same time, we can't ever be completely sure we're going to see - in person - these loved ones again that we leave behind.

As one of the members of St. Augustine's reminded me on Sunday - I'm leaving Phoenix for Seattle, but Phoenix is going to go on without me, and when I next step back into its desert, it is guaranteed to be a very different place than the one I've left.

This is a sad reality, isn't it?

Again and again these past week's, I've heard priest friends of mine preaching and talking about the ideas of letting go - of not trying to cling to the past tightly or for unfortunate reasons remaining entangled in one's old life that is left behind - for good or ill.

These messages are so right, so very true, so very prescient.

However, it is a corollary to this thought that is swirling through my head this late night in Boise: letting go of potential situations that, were it not for some slight change in circumstances, would have resulted in a more favorable outcome than what actually came about.

In other words, if the butterfly had flapped its wings a few more seconds, life would have been totally different.

And, of course, I don't know what all of those parameters of that life would be, and nobody does. At the same time, I think that I personally have acknowledge some very likely possibilities that could have arisen should the deck have been shuffled just one more time before the cards were dealt.

This is coming up because I had a very powerful experience yesterday of this very fact. I could see how my whole life could have been different - and someone else's life could have been different - if the wind had just blown in a slightly different direction.

Friends, I am sad this evening that the dice did not roll as favorably as I would have had them roll.

I could patronize myself and talk about how everything that happens is willed by God or some other such pandering crap, or I could go a little more Anglican and talk about how God makes good things come out of a bad situation. Or, I could go a step further and speak like Bishop Shahan used to say, that God's will for any situation is always the same - it is God's will to redeem it.

Those words again are good words, full of truthfulness and wisdom, words that need to work themselves more deeply into my soul and psyche.

It's accurate to say that I am a person that often does choose the road less traveled- in so many ways that are sometimes bewildering to me and my friends, but even actualized rewards can't compensate for a greater potential that could be envisioned.

So, today, I had to spend a little time on the boring road to Boise grieving the economics of life that do not allow us to experience both the well-worn road and the path that we have to blaze for ourselves.

I'm sad that I'm not an electron - I cannot potentially live the consequences of all of the butterfly's actions in the same instant and then, also in the same instant, choose the one I like best.

Instead, I - like all of us - have to make the best decisions we can based on limited data and our most realistic projections and contingencies, and then live through the consequences of those decisions.

Which means that before, during, and after any decision, we do have to be intentional - or, as my Seattle colleague said - be present . . .

...to both the great and the sad.

Have You Seen the Easter Mummy

2009-04-12T19:22:00.003-07:00

We had a good laugh in the midst of my rehearsal with brass and choir this morning before the 10 o'clock service at the church I work for in Tempe.

I told them that we had a bunch of kids at our service on Good Friday and at the Great Vigil. Those can be pretty heady services to connect with, but something was getting through to them about it; here's what one of them left.

Hmmmmm - alleluia, the Lord is risen. . . maybe something like that?

Pope's Palaces and Flowers

2009-04-06T07:16:00.003-07:00

Here's what came to me this morning. I don't know what it means:

I was running late for church. Very late. I squeezed in through a side door and sat down in the pew ahead of a couple of priests I know from around town.

It wasn't any church I go to now. It was another much newer building, suburban-looking, with carpet and modern drywall, but still with pews in the midst of it. It was an Episcopal church, with many banners and candles high up on the front wall on either side of the altar space.

The church wasn't full of what I'd call typical parishioners. It was full of mostly rough street kids who were coming to church and being brought to faith in Jesus. I knew that these were young men from a mission outreach congregation started by one of the churches I work for.

One of the best preachers I know was standing in front of the church, in the midst of his sermon. It wasn't a traditional sermon. Behind him, he had prepared four small television screens on pedestals covered with a royal blue cloth. Each of the TVs had graphics of different types of flowers. They were all rotating and spinning or otherwise engaged in some kind of action.

Below each of them was labeled the words: Maundy Thursday, Good Friday, Holy Saturday, and Easter.

The preacher began talking about various palaces the Pope has for himself. (These were not true places, of course . . .) He talked about palaces in India and other palaces in Europe. After describing each of the palaces, he concluded each of his descriptions with this sentence, "When you are outside of the walls, nothing can contain you."

As he then began to speak about the flower graphics on the television, suddenly there was a commotion from the opposite side of the church from where I was sitting. Some of the guys had seen flames from one of the candles on the wall suddenly jump up and nearly catch one of the banners on fire.

I couldn't see from where I was sitting, but huge panic suddenly filled me as I was flooded with thoughts of another church fire I'd personally experienced. I jumped up to see the beginnings of these flames.

The preacher said that the flames were just larger than normal, and that nobody should worry. There was no cause for alarm. I could see that he was right. We all sat back down.

Attention again turned towards the screens, and the preacher described each of the flowers on the screens and what they symbolized. I don't remember what he was saying, but it was reaching deep into my soul as visual art or music often does, and I could feel God's presence.

The flowers on the Maundy Thursay and Good Friday screens were spinning, and they would gradually drop their petals and wilt. The graphics were on a loop, but still seemed slightly randomized so that you didn't know their exact behavior.

The Holy Saturday graphic was of images of dead flowers, perhaps with a dark thunder/lightning storm in the background. Sometimes there were pictures of dead leaves.

The preacher said that we experience all of these things during Holy Week - all of these thoughts during Holy Week, and assumably, in our lives. But even in the midst of this, we remember what spring looks like - the trees leafing and the bright sun shining.

The Easter television had pictures fading in and out of grey, foggy, mysterious and ambiguous screens of the sun shining through big, leafy, windswept trees - the ones one would see on a warm, fly-a-kite, spring day. It reminded me very much of the abstract pictures of Zen types of heaven - wide open grassy fields with a solitary tree in the center. Kind of a large, warm emptiness.

I began to cry - even to sob - because I realized there was a deep message from God in this sermon for me.

Now if I just knew what it was . . .

The Reason Why

2009-04-01T20:58:00.003-07:00

Some of the readers of my ramblings here know that almost all of my closest friends (people I "hang out" with regularly) are agnostic, atheist, or are not really involved with religion in a personal or serious way.

Other readers here may not be aware that in my professional life, I work for two churches, so I am, therefore, a supporter and strong advocate of organized religion.

Many of my current crop of friends are people I've met in one way or another through the complex dance of "dating" - or whatever word you want to use to describe social activities among people who are potentially interested in each other romantically at some point down the road.

I've written before on here that my experience has shown that Christianity is anathema to all but a very small percentage of gay people under 40. This might be because gay people are young and generally don't have children, because people past high school age being drawn to the prevailing religion of our culture in any significant way. However, it seems like when people start to have kids, I've observed that young people start to come back to church, presumably because they want their children to be raised with religious values, even if they themselves weren't all that serious about them before. Most denominations "gave up" gays to their "sin", so it's not surprising that gays don't want to have anything to do with the church that has already condemned them.

Given all of these factors, I've noticed some interesting things. They young gay people I do know who are showing up for church are really, really serious about it. They seem to be the only ones that have been able to machete through the brush of marginalization and misunderstanding to arrive at a place where they can take their faith seriously in the context of organized religion.

Also, because attitudes towards gays have come a long way in some mainline Christian churches, young gay people who are coming to church are not necessarily supportive of the same types of "liberal" theology that the older generations tend to promote. They feel welcome enough that they don't have to set aside traditional teachings as a necessary precondition for belonging in the church.

Even more surprisingly, some of them are even politically conservative as well - which I don't see as much of in mainline Protestant churches - especially of the more liberal varieties. (I would count the Episcopal Church in with this mix.)

I'm definitely seeing a trend here, and I think it's an important one, because it tells us a few things:

First, the Episcopal Church is working through it's issues, and it's coming out of them in a way where the historic vision of what the Church has always taught is being embraced and promoted within a truly pluralistic and fully inclusive context.
Second, our denomination needs very quickly find the resources to nurture and take full advantage of the serious faith these young people are bringing to the table.
Third, if more gay people are engaging with their faith in a serious way, our denomination needs to have solid teachings, social structures, and liturgies that guide gay people in acceptable ways of doing "dating" and relationships.
Fourth, if young gay people are leading the way in taking their faith seriously and wrestling with these big questions, let's make sure we do the favor of recognizing them as pioneers among their generation in bringing young people of all walks of life back into the church.

Finally, I need to put this out there for those agnostic friends of mine who wonder in bewilderment why I do take my faith seriously, why I feel called to work in the Church, and why I'm an advocate for people drawing closer to God. Here it is:

When I was 6 years old, and my father dropped me off at the local church as a punishment for happily calling Grandma at 6AM in the morning, he unwittingly kicked me into the door of a place of deep healing and solace. This church - this gathering of people - was a place where people were expected to treat each other as they would want to be treated, which meant that the multiple types of abuse and rejection I experienced in every other facet of my young life were not going to be ultimately tolerated in this place. And they were not.

So, I met God, because I encountered the love of the Body of Christ, the Church. I encountered the love of my Lord Jesus Christ within the context of organized religion. To this day, this is the way that I connect with God - through the Church. I know of no other way that I can effectively "plug into" what I have come to understand as God; I'm just not that talented, disciplined, enlightened, or whatever enough on my own to do that. I'm not convinced that anybody really is.

If I encounter something of infinite and indescribable importance and meaning through the Church, it makes tremendous sense for me to devote my life to support the work of the Church, since I know this - I testify to this - that this is a way I have encountered the power of God in a direct and deep way.

When I "Wish to see Jesus", as I (photo?) -blogged about yesterday, I know this can happen when I walk through the doors of the church and meet God in corporate worship, and in particular, in the worship of the Episcopal Church, which then inspires me to work for God and God's Realm when I go back out into the world.

I can do nothing else - when I see God's light, God's star, even if it is only a faint glimmer far in the distance, I am going to follow that star. I must. That is the way of Life. It compels me, it draws me, and I know that my soul is restless in my blindness of heart unless I am actively walking towards God's star.

What do we wish for?

2009-03-30T23:27:00.005-07:00

Last year, it was the Maundy Thursday rocket ship. This year, it's a little note somebody stuck somewhere (for some reason).

God comes to us in the most odd ways, sometimes.

Speaking of theodicy . . .

2009-03-08T17:29:00.003-07:00

Along the same lines as my last post . . . thanks goes out to my friend Tyler who dug up this comic from Saturday Morning Breakfast Cereal.

God can't be surprised.

2009-03-08T16:14:00.003-07:00

Is anybody else bothered by this snippet coming from the news of the church shooting in Illinois?

"Our great God is not surprised by this, or anything," Nate Adams, executive director of the Illinois Baptist State Association, said in a statement. "That He allows evil and free will to have their way in tragedies like this is a mystery in many ways."

God is not surprised? I have problems with this kind of theology. I don't know that it's orthodox to believe this, and that concerns me - still . . . "our great God is not surprised . . . by anything"

Does God really want evil things to happen to people? There's something wrong here.

A God who isn't surprised sounds like a God who is callous; a God who is indifferent to our sorrows and grief.

Is that the God that Jesus shows us? The God who wrestles with Jacob? The God who argues with Moses?

I'm frustrated by this.

Being Phony - Measuring progress with a secular yardstick

2009-02-28T21:54:00.006-07:00

I just ran across a story on Boing Boing that I'm sure some of my readers will have come across. (They have wonderful things there, ya know . . .) Perhaps not surprisingly, a study has come out showing that among states with people looking at the most online porn, 8 of the top 10 were "red states" that went for McCain this year. Another interesting finding revealed that people with increased church attendance tended to buy less online porn on Sundays.

Since I know there's a strong correlation between people who go to church every week and those who vote Republican, this is not just a political issue but a religious one also.

Again, I have to remember what my former Baptist pastor told us one day - based on one of the Barna Group's studies of perceptions of Christianity. He said the only difference that non-Christians saw between Christians and non-Christians are that the former "go to church more" and "are more judgmental".

This means that nonbelievers see Christians as hypocritical. I'm not sure those perceptions are really wrong, because in the minds of the wider secular culture, "Christian" and "Christianity" mean something very much different from what many millions of people believe in and experience each day.

I've said before that Christianity has a real PR problem, and we still don't have really good ways of ameliorating this, because the fringe ideas are better at getting press when handled well. (Some of my libertarian aquaintences know how to play this game better than anyone I've seen.)

Most of us can agree that this is symptomatic of a larger problem - but identifying the problem is tricky and finding solutions is even harder.

We could put forth (tired) ideas about how Republican politics' power base is in Evangelical Christianity which fuels itself through moralism, us/them thinking, and fearmongering. We could continue by saying that these attitudes lead to repression of natural human sexuality, requiring it to be lived out in the supposed anonimity of the Internet and clandestine and unseemly sexual activities.

If we go with these ideas, and there are many who will, then a lot of secular people I met who feel that the world would be better if we throw the Bible in the trashcan might be right. To keep that from happening, others will say that we need to adopt better marketing and PR strategies to help get different ideas out into the market. (Which is naturally more difficult, many will say, because black & white is much more quickly made into a soundbite than are nuanced ideas.)

I've written before on this blog about my hypothesis that one needs to make a religious product cost more (in all ways) in order to increase the value of that religious product and therefore attract more adherents to the religious product being offered - that is, if you want your religious product to be consumed by more people.

This means that if you want to grow your church you have to at at least give lip service to a lot of moral requirements and emphasize assent to certain doctrinal statements. You have to show how what you offer is distinctive and even unique. If you emphasize high standards of giving/tithing to the local church, membership in the local church would seem more attractive because you belong to a group with more stringent membership standards. You are elite.

I have seen many pastors and other people clamoring for church growth that seem to say these kinds of things - in varying degrees of subtletly. While they may have a point, this seems to me to be a very dangerous path to follow, because you begin to measure your religious success through secular standards, even as you have to compete in a secular world for the same - here it comes - "church shoppers" that everyone else is looking for.

If we do this - become PR shills and adopt "butts in the seats" attitudes - aren't we being fake Christians? Aren't we emphasizing the strategy more than the results? Don't we need to be focused on improving the spiritual health of congregants (drawing people closer to God) and let this drive what we're doing?

I feel like mainline churches are focusing too much on methods and not doing enough evaluation to see whether the methods are producing quality religious results, rather than simply good secular ones.

To me, a church or denomination that has religious goals (and specifc ways to measure them) as its focus is going eventually going to give people a much better moral framework through which to live their lives - so that maybe their sexuality won't seem hypocritical anymore.

Does Riding a Bike Make You Gay?

2009-01-25T18:44:00.003-07:00

Ugh, I hate traffic.

Yes, nobody likes traffic, but I really despise having to drive through it on my way to or from work. In a nauseatingly sprawling city like Phoenix, it's not unusual at all for people to spend 45 minutes to an hour driving each way to their place of employment.

It's not just that I need to have whatever level of urbanity is possible in our vaguely-named polis of "the Valley", I feel like life is very much wasted if you're spending as much as 1/12th of 5/7ths of your life behind the wheel of a car. (The average, according to a 2005 story I dug up on ABC news, is an hour and a half a day or 100 hours per year.)

My faithful readers have already heard me rant about how our favored mode of transportation is subsidized by the government in multiple ways - and how disgusted I am that building more and more roads is a favorite pork-barrel project for Republicans. Make no mistake - driving is a significant part of our culture, and there's lots of money tied up in the driving industry, so it's no wonder that this beast wants to be fed all of the money we can give it.

My solution is simply to live as close to work as possible, without feeling like I've moved into the office. At present, this means that most days I ride my bike to work.

The upside is that I usually don't have to deal with the aggressive driving threatening my life and impolite gestures wounding my ego.

Still, biking and walking in my neighborhood still has it's pleasures

Case #1

So - it was about a week and a half or so ago, and I was biking in the right of way - off to the right side of the road, staying out of the way, being a dilligent cyclist. I was approaching the intersection of Central and Roosevelt Street, going east on Roosevelt, and I had a green light. I saw that the flashing hand on the walk sign was blinking, so I knew I didn't have much time.

I rapidly pedaled through the intersection, and I was halfway through the intersection when the light turned yellow and some guy in a blue Prius couldn't wait any longer to turn left, so he decided to begin barreling toward me. I slowed down as I saw him coming at me, thinking that he was going to hit me.

He came within probably about two yards of doing so, and I have to say that this was not my most charitable moment.

As I was on my way to the other side after realizing he had kindly decided to spare my life that morning (the light was still yellow) , I asked - ummm, yelled - "Hey, hey, hey! Are you fucking going to run me over, you bastard!?!?!"

The reply? The window rolled down and out came something like, "Shut up you faggot!"

Case #2

It was earlier this week, and I decided that I was going to avoid biking in the right of way when I was going home, and instead stick to the sidewalk to make it through the odd intersection of Roosevelt/Central/First Avenue so as to avoid driving in the heavy traffic and getting caught behind a red arrow with impatient drivers on my tail waiting for the light rail to go by.

This time, I was going east on Roosevelt Street just past Central on the sidewalk, and I was slowing down a lot because there's a bus stop just past the intersection where there are often people waiting. If I'm on my bike and people are on the sidewalk, I always either go into the street to go around them or get off my bike and walk so they don't feel like I'm going to run them over.

I noticed up ahead that one guy was standing on the street edge of the sidewalk, looking down in my direction (west), assumably hoping that the bus was coming. I noticed that he was wearing all black, including some type of acrylic or otherwise shiny shirt or coat.

He also had a pair of handcuffs in his back pocket. (A friend who I told this story to asked me if he had two pairs of handcuffs . . . )

Anyway, this guy saw me coming and stepped back off of the sidewalk and under the bus shelter to let me get by just as I was pedaling in that direction. As I rolled by, I said, "thank you" to him for stepping out of the way. Reasonable and polite and all that, right?

So, just as I'm rolling past him, he steps towards me and whispers in about half-voice, "Let's go make love!"

My response? I laughed nervously and said, "Ummm, no thanks, not today."

Hey, it's all I could think of to say. (And no, I don't know whether it was one set of handcuffs or two . . . I certainly wasn't checking anything out.)

==================

Okay - so, guy in the Prius - I called him a bastard, he called me a faggot. I figure that's about fair. (Him just about running me over was not.) But what kind of information was I giving out that made him label me as gay? That's what I can't figure out.

It was probably the same kind of information that black-clad handcuff man drew upon in his quest for an afternoon quickie.

Is it because I was on a bicicyle? Maybe that's considered un-macho, except if you're college-aged. Because I was wearing a helmet? That's gotta be pretty un-macho. Real men don't wear helmets, I'm sure. Did I make a limp-wristed gesture? Doubtful, although I'm the first to admit I'm not the most butch person in the world, but I'm not ready to break out the high heels and lip-synch to Cher either.

Perhaps the first guy was just a jerk and threw together some quick observations to deliver what he considered to be the most immediately-available angry cut, and perhaps the second was a one of our friendly neighborhood hustlers who was simply offering his services to whomever looked the most palatable and convenient at the time. This is probably the most likely scenario.

Regardless of what exactly all of that meant, I find it an interesting exercise to figure out exactly what kind of cultural perceptions we have built into ourselves that cause us to label people as homosexual when we really know almost nothing about them.

What are the "rules" of what's perceived to be correct straight male behavior? I'm sure some sociologists or psychologists must have studied these things pretty intensely and figured out what these are. There's probably some type of list online somewhere.

Anyway, I really don't want to bother looking any of that up right now. I think I want to go for a bike ride.

Simple and Scary

2009-01-18T20:01:00.002-07:00

Many of us here in Phoenix are muddling through bewilderment at the Cardinals status as Super Bowl contenders, even those like me who don't play football. More importantly, all of us are gearing up for the inauguration on Tuesday, coming on the heels of MLK, Jr., day . . . and all of us are asking if King's dream is a little closer to reality. It will certainly be a momentous occasion.

It will certainly be a good thing for us to focus a little on this happy news - even if only for a short time. We need a bit of distraction and breathing space.

But on this evening, while I have the time to gather my thoughts, I want to share with you all a couple of very straightforward predictions:

The economy is going to get much, much worse because we continue to use the same solutions of manipulating interest rates, printing more and more money, re-regulating (aka "deregulation", which bears no resemblance to actual free market principles), and going even further into debt.
The price of oil is going to get so expensive again that people will have terribly difficult times affording gas. This will lead to the economic devastation of suburbia.
We're not going to be able to take hits of the cocaine of consumption and inflation forever, or continue to prop up the Ponzi scheme of Social Security.
Massive bailouts of financial institutions who've made horrible choices only serve to show that you can make horrible choices and not suffer consequences for it. This will make things worse, not better.

All bets are off, folks, because this is a depression.

The only way we come out of depressions is if our whole economic system changes - like it did in the 1940s when we moved to a wartime economy.

The only meaningful response to this grim outlook is for us to be ahead of the curve in contracting and adapting our lifestyles and business practices to this new world we're entering, because the era of consumption will soon be over. We're not going to go back to the way things were before, and many of us will not be able to adapt fast enough.

That means there will be a lot of suffering, and most assuredly a lot of desperation. This, of course, can lead to the type of totalitarianism we saw arise in 1930s Germany. Yes, it could happen here, either when we are killed for our own good or caught in the crossfire of a bloody rebellion.

Things will eventually get that bad. Even though I think this will happen sooner rather than later. This means if it does happen later, it will still happen. Yes, you personally may run out the clock, but the chances become increasingly likely with each subsequent generation that they will not.

Okay, enough bad news - how 'bout them Cardinals?

First Ride on the Light Rail

2008-12-29T20:01:00.004-07:00

Back in earnest now from my trip to -4 degree Flagstaff, I decided that today would be "Light Rail Day" for me.

Light rail is the big news now in Phoenix - all kinds of articles in the paper and lots of chatter about it from all of the local blogs I read. It's clearly created quite a stir.

I didn't want to miss out, so I jumped on at about 11AM or so this morning. Here are my observations:

There were hordes of people on there today, two days after the official grand opening. In itself, this is a good thing.
Probably about 10% of the people on Light Rail today were people I'd consider those who were actually using it for transit purposes, rather than just checking it out for the novelty of it. I'd consider myself in that 10%, since I'm a downtown denizen and because my seizure condition is preventing me from driving. (So you know where I'm coming from.)
The biggest group coming from downtown north were businesspeople. It was around the lunch hour, so I'm not sure if they were on their way to lunch or just amusing themselves with a quick jaunt. These were not the typical bus riders - these were all well-dressed professionals, most who were on there when I got on, and most all of them got off at Central & Camelback.
The next largest group I observed over the course of the trip there and back were families with children, all of whom were very excited about seeing the train. It was quite a lot of fun to be on their with them.
Interestingly, the third largest contingent I met were retirees, most of whom seemed to be from Mesa, based on who I talked to. Many of them had parked in Mesa and took the train in to Phoenix, and some even got off the train to have lunch downtown. This group wanted to ride the whole way, as if it were some kind of amusement ride, and about half seemed to have mixed feelings about it. These retirees I heard talking about it were very well-informed about the light rail in general - where it goes, how much it costs to ride, the politics behind constructing it, the reasons why light rail is constructed in cities (what it is and isn't supposed to accomplish). These are people who are paying attention to urban design and what it means.
Probably the best thing about being on the train was seeing how much people actually talked to each other. Greater Phoenix has a growing reputation as an unfriendly city - part of it is the heat, but my hypothesis is that the unfriendliness and disconnect has to do with the sprawl and poor urban planning. Light rail, whatever its flaws and problems, is a force for community. People were having conversations, interacting with each other- total strangers were able to find moments of connection. This is what we need for our city.
Many, although not all of the stops, were labeled with both the street intersection and the name of the neighborhood they serve: Melrose District, Cultural District, Christown, Arts District, etc. I thought this was a nice touch, although not without controversy, I'm sure, as every organization wants the stop named after them. (As does one of the organizations I work for . . . If anyone cares Trinity Triangle works better than Cathedral Square, btw, but I'm happy to tell people to get off at the 'Arts District' stop. That makes us pretty cool, right?).
I saw officers from the Department of Homeland Security and the Transportation Security Administration at at least two of the stops. There were also plenty of Valley Metro employees and lots of police around as well.

There were problems with riding today - there were massive crowds, especially at Christown Mall, where I went. Most of the people were simply riding all the way to the end of the line, starting from wherever they happened to hop on. Big Brother was there, of course, constantly on the loudpseaker, encouraging people to deboard at intermediate stops and "explore", then hop on the next train. Finally, a voice came on and asked everyone to get off at the downtown stop to make room for others.

Speaking of Big Brother, I tried to take my first ride last night up to Charlie's, a country-western gay bar near 7th Avenue and Camelback. I looked on the website and saw that the trains run until at least 11PM (you can and should do better, than this). So, I walked to the stop at Central and Roosevelt, which took 10 minutes. I didn't see any northbound trains go by, and I remembered that they were supposed to go every 20 minutes. So, I got to the stop, and waited for another 20 minutes. I thought, "Why is the train so late." After waiting another 10 minutes, I was getting a little irritated (and cold), when suddenly a loudspeaker computer-generated voice said, "Thank you for riding Light Rail! We will resume operation tomorrow at 4:40AM. Have a good evening."

And then, it said it again. And again, and again, and again.

I was a little puzzled, but after about the fourth time, I realized the message was saying that there weren't any more trains for the night and that I should just get up and leave. Curious that those messages to the whole platform stopped when I started to get up . . .

It was more than a little irritating to be sitting there waiting for a train that should have come, but when I called today, I was told by the Valley Metro representative that the weekend was the Grand Opening celebration and not the official start of trains running on a regular schedule. Fair enough- I'll try it again some other time.

I myself still have mixed feelings about light rail. I voted in favor of it when it was intially on the ballot many years ago. (That was before I was a Libertarian). My political principles say that I absolutely should not support light rail, but I absolutely will not be lumped in with these ridiculous right-wing people in our state governments who de-fund every public or social program they can find and instead spend their time making sure people can bring their guns into bars.

Local hard-right people who are disenchanted Republicans (and members of the national Libertarian Party) need to not go along with this piecemeal attack of bits and pieces of big government. Our state legislature proves that it's just pandering when it de-funds public services and programs its (usually wealthy and sometimes retired enclave-dweller) constituency doesn't approve of.

Where are these legislators when it comes to rolling back laws that take away our social freedoms? Or, what radical free-market solutions (private jitney services, eliminating the bus monopoly, ending favorable treatment for certain cab companies, etc) are they providing to offset the elimination of funding for mass transit? They don't do this, because they don't care. They instead perpetuate the stigma that public transit (which, in their minds, can only equal buses) is for poor people, who they don't represent anyway. They're happy, though, to pour in all kinds of money into freeways in the middle of the desert, which help line the pockets of all in the real-estate lobby and contribute to the terrible problems of traffic and sprawl we have here in this city. They allocate huge amounts of money to freeway projects, and then have the nerve to criticize light rail advocates for wanting to lay down "inflexible" track instead of flexible and changable bus service.

As many of you know, I am not a person who advocates for solutions that help put band-aids on problems; I don't support programs that poke another finger into the dike. I am an advocate for a complete reprogramming of our entire social and economic system into one of liberty in finance and choices.

If you are not going to join me in this, understand that dealing with the reality of what our country and society is now means that we must put resources - time and money - into public works like light rail, commuter rail, buses, green technologies, and ending the exploitation of people into a class of serfs (as one friend of mine puts it) through intentionally oppressive immigration policies. Shame on all of you for both your lack of principles and your lack of foresight.

... and get on the light rail and experience some genuine community.

Is it worth it?

2008-12-27T12:32:00.005-07:00

Frozen in Flagstaff

I've been up in Flagstaff now for almost a full day, and the weather here has been amazing. I posted a status update on Facebook this morning saying that I was "enjoying -4 degrees" here. I realized as I've been walking around today that "enjoy" is not the right verb. I've not seen snow piled up this high before . . . in fact, the whole scene reminds me of some kind of poster one would see saying something like "Christmas in Switzerland" or something. There are heavy icicles on the roofs and as much as 2 feet of snow piled on top of them. Some accumulations have literally been taller than me (but they may be covering bushes, I don't know).

The very frigid temperatures and icy walkways have discouraged me from wandering around for great lengths of time outside (I usually like to walk a lot when I'm up here), so I've been sticking around the hotel and spending a lot of time reading.

(As a side note, I should say that when my dad asked me what I was going to be doing in Flagstaff, I told him, "as little as possible". I'm living up to expectations, despite my obsessive checking of work E-mail.)

Portrait of a Cactus

At any rate, I brought down many issues of Arizona Highways and New Mexico Magazine that I haven't had time to read in the past 3 months or so.

The November issue of AH is a "photography issue", with one photographer talking about his techniques of photographing various desert flora against a dark background (usually with monsoon clouds looming) while illuminating the subjects with a strobe light. An interesting technique, to be sure.

One of the photos, though, was of a prickly pear cactus - except it was done up like somebody's portrait you'd see hanging over the fireplace - along with a standard grey backdrop and just the right kind of highlighting, surrounded by an appropriate frame. The cactus was taken out of context and treated like a pretty girl wearing her Sunday dress in a parlor room chair.

The cactus collector

This picture of a cactus like this reminded me, ironically, of one of my dating experiences.

Oh, and I shouldn't say the word "date" or "dating", because those concepts are either frightening or passé - at least in the gay community - except to only the most old-fashioned among us. (Old-fashioned is also either frightening or passé, in case you were wondering, except when it comes to government-recognized marriage. Go figure.)

Now, many of you friends know that I'm not one for the whole bar experience. I'm not good at walking up to people and striking up conversations. Few people find my eccentricities entertaining upon first meeting me, and other than that, all I have to offer is boring small-talk. (I'm pretty much bereft of any knowledge of pop culture - which seems to serve as the departure point for any successful bar conversation.) Also, I don't think gay men go to bars to really meet people anymore, and if they do, it's usually for a one-night stand type of thing. But I've written about that before.

Ok, I'm getting off on a tangent. (Surprise, surprise!)

All this to say that I usually have far better luck with the whole online dating thing. Such was the case with a very nice fellow I met who seemed to conform to the bullet points I typically have with guys I'm interested in. Smart? Check. Good writer/conversationalist? Check. Well-educated? Check. Charming? Check. Cute? Yes, very!

But, we found a mutual time to meet up, and I put that time down on my calendar. Interestingly, he loved to collect various cacti, and was somewhat of an armchair expert on different varieties. While I'm no collect or expert on cacti, I certainly do enjoy them very, very much - so we decided to both drive out to a cactus place the next free day and browse around.

Now all of this is very good, right? Meets all of the criteria, cute, and we have a mutual interest! That's gotta be a recipe for success, right.

Umm, not really - it means that he's going to be one of the fraction of one percent of guys that I actually *like*. They only come around maybe once a year.

So, let the anxiety begin!

Now, you friends will already know how strict I am about keeping my word about things. Staying on top of appointments, following through with tasks, doing what I say I'm going to do when I'm going to do it. I'm very anti-flaky with my own life, and the biggest irritation I have with people is when they get flaky.

Well, when it's just about time for my outing, I suddenly start to sneeze. And my nose runs. And I sneeze more. Of course, I think it's springtime allergies - and I really do.

But I go out with this very friendly man - who is a gentleman in all respects - and certainly quite the lover of cacti.

And how am I? I sniffly wreck with a runny nose, who couldn't think of anything except where the nearest Kleenex box was. Pretty looking cacti were about the furthest thing from my mind.

Of course, I hope for the best, and I did send him a follow up E-mail (or phone call or whatever), even though if it were me, I'd not want to go out again with somebody who spent the whole time sneezing and didn't really seem interested at all in cacti. No, we didn't end up going out again.

Missing the train

Alright, so what was the point of that whole story? Surely not something about cacti . . .

Maybe more to say that I've only seemed to have a lot of not-so-good dating experiences (with one or two exceptions) - sometimes ones I didn't do so well with, and sometimes ones that the other guy didn't do so well with. And it's worth mentioning that I really don't want to be single. That's just not my thing.

I read an article by a woman who, at 36, was very concerned that having kids at that age would begin to be dangerous, since she was getting older. Eeek, that really scared me, because I know the clock is ticking for me the same way as it is ticking for straight women - and on the same timetable.

Has the train left the station on this one? Did I miss it? I think that perhaps I did, like I missed several trains that I hoped to have caught by this point in my life. If I did miss it, is it my fault? Or is that simply the way of the universe or some type of personal destiny (or even punishment)?

Was it worth it?

I was talking with an acquaintance of mine who is working on her PhD, and told me about how difficult and lonely that graduate school experience was. I ask a lot of people I know in various doctoral programs this very important question: is it worth it? I don't recall one of them saying "Yes". I do recall most of them giving an answer like, "it's been a very good experience".

In the same way I ask them if it's worth it, I also ask myself if the choices I've made over the past 10 years or so since college have been "worth it". Especially when I think that some of those choices have meant that I've had to give up a lot of the things I hoped to have accomplished. I don't know if those choices were the "right" choices (if there even are such things as "right" or "wrong", and if there are, if one can even determine that).

I've written on here before about the deep existential pain I feel about the road that I have not traveled - about the choices that I've given up. In deciding to walk through open doors, I may have chosen an easier path, rather than ignoring open doors and deciding to be more independent - to strike out on my own and follow a path that was more risky. I don't think that I've necessarily chosen the road less traveled- I may have chosen the road that was easier for me, or made the choice that I needed to make at whatever point in my life I made it.

Is there an answer to the question?

Maybe the lesson in all of the conversations here is that nobody can ever answer "Yes" to the question of "Is it worth it?", because there's no way to tell where the other road would have led you. One can only speculate . . . and we all know how good we are at predicting the future. We really have no idea whether or not we're living in the best of all possible worlds - or the worst of them either.

"Is it worth it" requires one to make a judgement based on information one does not have access to. Do people really live the life they've wanted to? Or do they live the life they got? Maybe the question is irrelevant because answering it is impossible.

I'd really like there to be an answer, though . . . I'd like to say at the end of 10 years since I've finished college (coming up this May) that this time has been "worth it". I don't simply want to say that I've "had a good experience", even if that may be very true.

Isn't that a scary thought - to ask yourself if you had to do it over again, would you make the same choices? Would you do it all again? Everybody I've heard answer that question always says yes - but is that the honest answer? If the honest answer is "No", what do we make of that- for ourselves and others? What are the implications?

Back from a Long Hiatus

2008-12-27T12:19:00.002-07:00

We're finally into the Christmas season and away from all of the busyness of Advent.

I have to apologize to all of my regular readers that I have not posted any updates in a very long time. My schedule has been pretty frantic with dress rehearsals and all kinds of Christmas concerts. The set I was doing with one ensemble had concerts all over the metro area the weekend before Christmas.

Some of you friends probably also heard that I had what was probably my third grand mal seizure a couple of weeks ago. While that's not good news, several people witnessed it happening, so I at least now know what it is, where before it was something like a preponderance of the evidence guess.

I was planning on going to Seattle for this week between Christmas and New Year's Day, but because of concerns I have about how the economy may affect me personally, I didn't think it was prudent to go on a major (expensive) vacation. Besides this, I have some definite savings priorities that have moved up in the list, even though the timing is not good.

So, this is a time certainly to be cutting back on things, and I'm working to trim my budget even further than I did last year. I may need to give up several things that I really like.

Hopefully with a somewhat less hectic schedule in the New Year, I'll be able to make time more for the writing I enjoy so much.

I hope all of you readers had a wonderful Christmas.

Merry Christmas! Here's your semi-automatic weapon!

2008-11-15T13:33:00.000-07:00

One of the people I worked with just asked me today about what the Libertarians were saying about Obama.

Now, I don't like McCain, and I think the Republicans have caused a lot more harm than the Democrats. I think Obama's election was an important moment that needs to be celebrated because of its historic character.

Yet, my straightforward answer to that question was that I haven't been keeping up much with the libertarian news and blogs as of late, since I'm hardly home any more, but that I was sure no libertarians believed that Obama would advocate for a libertarian agenda.

His response was something about how people want bigger government in times of crisis. I'm not sure if he meant to imply the reverse of that as well - that people want smaller government in good times.

I really don't think people ever want big government. I think people want to be left alone, and they want more money. They want both of those things, neither of which are automatically bad. But people have also been indoctrinated into the whole carrot-and-stick system of promises of a glowing future if they will continue to either support (or ignore the growth of) big government.

The techniques of indoctrination involve a media that is, in fact, regulated by the government - through agencies like the FCC and through programs of disinformation. It involves the public school system, run by government agencies, that naturally teaches people not to question authority, and has at least the harmful potential interest in keeping subsections of the population uneducated and easily manipulated for the benefit of others.

The government also has an interest in keeping us hooked on its power- like a drug. So, just like neighborhood mob thugs, the government will tax us "for our own good", until we become so used to paying this money, that we think less and less of it. Whether the taxes come in the form of income taxes or inflation, either way, we spend more and more of our time in subservience to an ever-growing authoritarian system. It makes things more pleasant by giving us tax refunds, just at the time we need to be a little more happy. The regulated media is able to keep us distracted by reporting human interest stories on the news (fuzzy cats rescued from trees, the latest celebrity breakups, and the like) while allowing politicians to offer spin and dodge questions.

So, the government is able to create a specific culture that keeps those who participate it in power. Our culture is so used to the idea of government control of so many aspects of our lives that we don't even acknowledge the baseline of control and servitude that we buy into - simply because we are born into this world. They call this a "social contract", saying that we must follow their plans simply because we continue to breathe.

Even today, I hear about how some in the gay community are pressing for laws to make marriage solely a civil institution, so that religious bodies can't be involved in it. This can only happen in a culture that is completely comfortable with government control - and is prime evidence that now we trust the government more than we trust even our religious institutions. We're willing to damage our religious institutions for the sake of promoting government power.

How sad.

While I think that the past 8 years under President Bush have been truly horrible for our country, this does not make Barack Obama any type of savior. He will be the President. He is not Jesus.

And yes, let's tell the truth here, we want a savior right now, and we'll glom onto somebody who inspires us. We need inspiration and we need hope, and Obama offers both of those things. Let's first acknowledge that these are very valuable and important to us right now - but let's also tell the truth and say that they are platitudes. Laudable platitudes, but still platitudes.

What is really going to change for us?

Are we going to see an end to the war in Iraq? Doubtful. Perhaps there will be some troop withdrawls and then a lot of spin. Maybe a great press conference and photo op . . . But after the dust settles, we quietly continue to occupy that country while the government distracts the news media with some other event. And, poof! The war in Iraq is over!

Will we see the economy improve? No way. The bailout is already a failure, and we're throwing even more money at the problem. Our country is going to go bankrupt, because the free market, like freedom, always wins in the end - it just extracts a very high cost along the way.

(By the way . . . Do you have your guns yet? How about your solar- and wind-powered compound built from old tires and soda cans out in the desert with a groundwater well, vegetable garden, rainwater collectors, water purifier, fallout shelter, barbed wire fencing, and arsenal? You may need it . . . the criminals are already well-armed, and the cities are full of millions of people who will get very angry when they're hungry. Hope you've practiced your paramilitary maneuvers . . .)

Will we see healthcare for everybody? Well, no, we don't have any money to pay for that - unless we find a 60% flat tax tolerable - and we spend our lives filling out government paperwork in the hopes of getting some of it back.

So, I don't know what other libertarians think of Obama. But I can guess . . . more of the McSame.

I'll take fries with that . . . and a side of bullets.

Crusade for Gay Marriage is the Wrong Battle to Fight

2008-11-12T22:55:00.000-07:00

An aquaintence from Facebook sent me a message urging me to sign a petition to have the 501(c)3 status of the Mormon church investigated because of their support of ballot measures around the country banning gay marriage.

Here's my response . . .

You should be wary about supporting this kind of effort. What you are advocating for here is using the power of the government to curb the actions of a group of individuals, so the philosophy behind the strategy is immediately faulty. It should not be the purpose of government to interfere with a person's religious activities or with a group of individuals' rights to speak freely and influence public opinion.

It's ironic that gay people think that politicians should stay out of marriage, but that politicians and bureaucrats should have their nose in the business of religious organizations. We of all people should be the first to know that the cult of the omnipotent state is something to be opposed, not encouraged. If we learned that lesson, we'd know why the whole crusade for gay marriage wastes a lot of time. That's why, politically, I'm not for gay marriage. (Mind you, I'm not against it in any way at all, and I always will vote against any anti-gay ballot measures whenever I have the opportunity.) As far as politics goes, I'm completely against state marriage of any kind- it's not the job of the state to decide who should get married and who shouldn't.

Some are surprised to know that there are a fair number of gay people who join me in my skepticism about gay marriage. When well-meaning people want to expand the definition of "marriage", which much of our society believes is the union of one man and one woman as a foundational institutions of our society, you're fighting a battle against what's perceived to be thousands of years of history.

Really, it's a battle over semantics. And for what? Yes, we've made tremendous progress - but at a price, and we're still going to lose a lot of battles for the near future. Sadly, the only way I think we'll win the fight won't have anything to do with rational arguments in our favor. It will happen as our culture becomes increasingly secular and finds religious ideas ("traditional" or otherwise) irrelevant at best and oppressive at worst. When the idea of marriage as a sacrament (or a sacred, binding, holy, lifetime commitment) vanishes from our corporate consciousness, that's when we'll get the right to marry - in the eyes of the State.

Marriage is undermined through this whole process, because the religious ideals that promote Christian marriage are being eroded in the eyes of the public who are tired of a religious perspective that is increasingly seen in a negative light. While blame for this can be placed squarely on the doorstep of religious institutions that have failed to understand the core of their message, those who fight for gay marriage exacerbate these prejudices unnecessarily when we fight over the definition of marriage, no matter how much we see state recognition of civil unions as a "separate but equal" issue.

Why do we let the State - this instrument and promoter of war, theft, greed, and oppression - define who we are? We may be bedazzled by words like "reform" or even a nebulous idea like "change". And let's face it - these lofty ideals really do speak to us in very anxious times like these. We all know that now.

But we also know that the more things change, the more things stay the same - we have lots of promises that things will be different, but then things really aren't different - because powerful politicos can't help themselves from gobbling up more authority. They encourage this mindset by saying that every problem should be and can be addressed by State-sponsored "solutions". The cures are always worse than the problems, feeding the monster of expansive government in the name of reform and change.

The reality is this - reform just means that government gets bigger and more intrusive. Change just means a blank check to let those in power do whatever they want to do, even if we only vote for and support them when we agree with half of their agenda.

This is why we have to make a difference by not offering typical liberal platitudes, as inspiring as they are. We in the gay community would have more success - and get more buzz - by putting aside socialism lite and saying something with the ring of a much deeper truth that is based on principle, not political opportunism. We instead should argue that the state doesn't have a legitimate interest in promoting one type of social structure and living arrangement over another, but instead better serves us by enforcing the promises or contracts individuals make between or among themselves.

Do not get distracted by the red herring of "marriage". The fight is for equal rights for everybody, regardless of what you or anybody else calls any same-sex relationships we choose to have.

Isn't this what freedom is really supposed to be about?

And don't forget - if you go after the Mormon church, you open the door to similar attacks on the Religious Left, of which I consider myself to be a part. Soon, right-wing groups will try to use the power of the IRS to come after the United Church of Christ for trying to influence gay-positive legislation. They'll go after the Episcopal Church for its work to openly address racism and how white people have historically and presently benefited from the exploitation of Blacks and other people of color. They'll go after the Quakers for promoting pacifism and an end to war after needless war.

Is this the kind of America you really want? Because that's what kind of America you're asking for. I hope it's not the kind of America we're going to get!

Facing the blackness

2008-11-01T21:32:00.000-07:00

I never used to like New Year's Day very much. It was another secular holiday - and, being a very religious person, I really don't give a mole's whack about any of these observances. It's always been kind of a nothing day for me - like making a whole civic festival out of an odometer change. What's the point??!?!?

But - my mind changed about this a couple of years ago when my best friend, who is militantly agnostic, told me about how meaningful New Year's was to him. It was the day he set aside to consider his life and what he had accomplished. He used the day to make out a list of resolutions for the coming year, and created a ritual out of it. So, he was able to create meaning out something I dismissed as secular, and I found myself borrowing some of his traditions to make that observance meaningful for me.

I think that Halloween now may be moving into that category.

I've always been pretty militantly agnostic about Halloween. It's another holiday filled with commercialism, but I don't mind it because I've never considered it religious. In fact, for many years, I was taught that Halloween was simply satanic. This was the time when we all dressed up as demons and in some way worshiped the devil himself. It was the night of Lucifer's greatest power.

Now, I'm not sure that the people who say this are wrong. (Like I said in my last post, I'm wrestling against a lot of agnosticism now - which really depresses/disturbs me, but that's another issue.) In fact, I think they might be right, in a way. I was talking with a priest friend of mine about this last night, and he told me that Halloween helps us explore the blackness, so that the light looks brighter in comparison. (Or something like this - I think it was more poetic when he said it. He's wordy like that.) So, the blackness might be at its most black on Halloween, but maybe this is the time for us to face it.

Last night was a time for me to face it. After a frustrating and sad end to an otherwise good day, I found myself eating dinner and trying to chase away my existential melancholia by listening to the news. (That always works!) After giving up on that, I was flipping through my radio channels, and I came across some very weird music by a group called "The Residents".

I listen to a lot of weird music, as any of my close friends will tell you, but it's contemporary classical music, and not avant garde rock or pop or some other genre of whatever music falls outside of the category of "classical". (Whooo hoo, that's a big debate right there.)

At any rate, this group used a lot of electronic sounds, with lyrics that told a surreal, but not violent or grotesque, story. However, the lyrics were about things like death, mayhem, and confusion. The soundscapes were mind-twistingly odd - featuring lots of repetition, recognizable samples, and arresting noises. It was really well done, and so very disturbing.

I found myself thinking a lot about death in that moment, and of an article I'd just read (on Episcopal Cafe of all places) about how we cannot comprehend the cessation of our being, since a dead person can't feel, think, or experience anything at all. So, death is a black void, but something that's only frightening on approach, not in the actual experience. If there were anything to experience, that is.

When I hear from my agnostic friends who talk about death, and when I read what science has to say about it, I again have to deal with these existential ideas, my own doubts, and my own thoughts about how we can address these as Christians, given what science says.

My understanding is that the Church has taken consideration of scientific discoveries and then re-read scripture and the writings of the saints in light of them. So, we've changed our mind about how the earth was created and the orbits of the planets around the sun and how we've come from monkeys and on and on. Don't apologists of various stripes spend all kinds of time explaining how miraculous events described in scripture could have happened according to perfectly scientific explanations we understand and experience today, so that we can actually believe things happened in the Bible really happened in history, rather than just being instructive and very helpful community fables?

So, why don't we do this with death? Is there a way we can hold this idea of blackness - of finality - in our hands at the same time that we speak of Heaven and Resurrection?

Now, please don't think I like asking this question. I don't. I want to and do believe in the Resurrection. But it is a completely unreasonable thing for me to do so. It flies in the face of reason. If I am truly a reasonable person, I have to find a way to explain all of these Christian ideas in some scientific way, just like crossing the Red Sea happened because of an unusual earthquake and high winds or some other phenomenon we all know about.

If Heaven actually is our subjective experience of a massive release of happy neurochemicals to placate our panicky dying brain, does this make it any less heavenly? Any less divine? Any less beautiful or holy? If our experience of God is a product of a "God Spot" or a "God Net", as some have written about, does that diminish the reality of God?

And still more worrisome, does the fact that we may never know if we're in Heaven - only that we think we know we're in Heaven - bother us after we get there? In other words, if we get to Heaven - whatever it is - that very well could simply be a completely subjective experience.

When I was talking with a priest the other day, I again offered my analogy of the Episcopal Church - this time saying that it was like a big question mark dressed up in fancy vestments. Even those Episcopalians I've met who seem most sure of the authority of the answers say that ultimately we can't prove things about God - we can only make many educated guesses and believe based on the preponderance of the evidence. But in the final analysis, we have uncertainty, even if it is small.

If uncertainty is what we find at the end of our rainbow, if we find blackness rather than a pot of gold, it seems like we have to find a way to come to terms with that while still really believing and expecting the Resurrection.

But how?

A Whimsically Macabre Strut

2008-11-01T21:03:00.000-07:00

Well, it wouldn't be Saturday night if I weren't obsessively moving furniture, fiddling with electronic equipment of one kind or another, or ruminating about the screwed up world.

And so it was that this evening I was doing two of the three, when my fiddlings and concernere were slightly distracted by the sound of some type of noisy music coming from outside.

Now, it's not unusual for me to hear that kind of thing - usually it's just some inconsiderate boob blaring his car sound system out into the streets to make sure everyone can admire his taste in booming bad-ass noise pollution.

But this was different- it kept getting louder and louder, and it was interrupting my audio system tweaking. Finally, it sounded like it was right outside my door - and it sounded like a freakin' marching band!

What the hell!?!?!?!

Okay, so I went out onto my back patio and stood on a chair, peering over our cheerfully painted (and heavily spiked) wrought iron fence and saw one of the weirdest things I've ever seen in Phoenix.

I saw what looked a little bit like a New Orleans funeral procession. There was a marching band, complete with drums and brass instruments, and people dressed up in all kinds of odd costumes - mostly with Day of the Dead themes. There were others waving aqua-noodle pool toys in the air, and others seemed to be wearing mummers costumes or walking around on stilts. Many had draped battery-powered Christmas lights around themselves, and others were riding bikes or other types of weird contraptions. Some were pushing carts, and there were many children jumping around.

The parade was not large, but certainly festive, and after it passed, I quickly threw on my shoes and went out to look to see where it was going - hearing music coming from 5th Street and Roosevelt.

On my way there, I passed by a building on the corner of 3rd Street and Roosevelt that just yesterday morning had almost completely burned to the ground. There were fire trucks all around it again tonight, and firefighters crawling down into the building. The air was hazy around and that's when I really smelled it . . . the smell of completely burned building wood.

Suddenly, my mind was ripped back to those moments back on October 9, 2002 when just after I started playing piano for a Taizé service at the Cathedral, the whole west part of the building began to go up in flames. I could smell that smell - and when you do, all of those terrible memories of that night come back, and you have to relive a little bit of it again.

It was something like remembering a moment of the death of a loved one.

Really, this was the theme over at the parade also. I found its terminus- at 5th Street and Garfield. The event was called "Phoenix Annual Parade of the Arts", and I discovered later that it was supposed to actually have a UFO/Alien theme. Instead, they had a small soundstage set up there performers were wearing Day of the Dead outfits and playing amplified acoustic latin-sounding rhythms with occasional chanting.

I think this really was supposed to be some type of Day of the Dead parade, but I don't think the city can call it that. Whatever it was, it was very bizarre and really fascinating.

Why Bob Barr is wrong

2008-10-12T17:22:00.000-07:00

Okay, so, I just checked out Bob Barr's website. For my eaders who don't know, he's the Libertarian Party's candidate for president.

I've never liked Bob Barr - he's in many ways a Republican in libertarian clothing. Then again, there are lots of these types of people in the Libertarian party, so it's not surprising. Many of these types are some of the most hateful and bigoted people you will ever meet.

Bob Barr was elected as the Libertarian Party's representative because he was a former congressman from Georgia and seemed to be the most famous person running. Quite a bit of the work of the national Libertarian Party is on actually getting people elected to office.

This is a real mistake - the Libertarian Party isn't going to get somebody elected anytime soon, and by focusing excessively on this goal, they're compromising libertarian (small "l") values, watering down freedom for the sake of not appearing too radical. They combine this philosophy with trying to recruit the most famous person they can find to run at the top of the ticket - a la Jesse Ventura -as long as they followed some libertarian principles.

A lot of these types of folks are responsible for having Bob Barr on the ticket. Here's where I disagree with Bob Barr:

Freedom means that peaceful people should be allowed to cross borders freely. This means that the immigration system reforms need to be structured to make it really easy for people to become citizens. It should not be an onerous process.
Drilling in public areas like the Alaskan wildlife refuge is just dumb, and Bob Barr seems to want to let this happen. This means that these organizations who drill in these areas can damage the environment as much as they want, because these places are commonly owned rather than being privately controlled. Want to eliminate the national debt? Sell our national parks to private companies or organizations. People won't decimate what they themselves own.
He's played switcheroo on a host of issues: the Defense of Marriage Act, the Patriot Act, the Iraq War, and others. This is a Republican opportunist who walked through a door when it opened, exploiting Libertarian Party nominating rules to manipulate things in his favor. (Kind of like what happens here in Arizona when out of state interests come in and put crazy experimental propositions on our ballot to try to get things passed here as a test environment to encourage copycat legislation elsewhere.)

So, he's a disaffected Republican trying to punish the party by turning Libertarian. But even a big L nomination does not a little l libertarian make.

Depending on how things go, Barr could be the kingmaker in a few key states, like Georgia - his home state. Good things will come out of this, though - they'll be a few less votes for McCain, and the Republican party may actually wake up and take its libertarian-leaning wing (Newt Gingrich and other house members who voted against the bailout) seriously.

While a McCain-Palin presidency scares the hell out of me. (Can you imagine Palin as President? Republicans, you need to, because it's not unlikely.) But I can't bring myself to vote for Obama - even though I was considering severely compromising my values to do so before he came out in favor of the bailout. Unquestionably, if there really were only two choices, I would vote for him - but I know better.

So, unfortunately, the choice for me is to either abstain (or essentially do the same thing and write in somebody who I actually support that would do a decent job) or hold my nose and vote for Bob Barr.

The depressing part is that I'm not sure that either will send the message that I really want to send or accomplish what needs to be accomplished at this sad hour.

Ick.

What caused the Great Depression?

2008-10-12T17:09:00.000-07:00

For any of you out there who are interested in a pretty concise explanation of what's happening right now with our monetary policy, here are a few links for you to check out.

Now vs. Great Depression

Ron Paul re: Propping up a failed system

Mistakes of the Federal Reserve

The government breaks your legs and then offers to pay for your cast and crutch! Bring it on!

The day of judgment is near

2008-10-09T22:37:00.000-07:00

I posted a status update on Facebook back on September 30, predicting that the Dow would drop to 8,000 before Christmas, regardless of any bailout. A colleague of mine seemed surprised by this prediction and pretty skeptical.

We only have about 1,000 more points to go for me to be right, and we're still quite a ways away from Halloween.

One of my work colleagues half-jokingly told me not to make any more predictions.

People have asked me many times since I moved away from home why I didn't purchase a place for myself, and my answer was that I felt the bottom was going to drop out of the economy- that it was a ticking time-bomb. I said that it was dumb for people to put money into real estate, a commodity that you don't really own, you simply rent from the government.

Another colleague advised me that a house will eventually always be more than what you paid for it in our American economy. Few things are ever "always" true, and this is no exception. Even if it is usually or almost always true, your lives, and your children's lives, may not be long enough to see it happen. You and your children may be out on the street, with the bank owning your house, before you can see if my friend's advice holds true.

Truth is, our economy is collapsing, and with it, much of the life we've been used to up to this point. Things aren't falling apart slowly now, as they have been for the past several years, so that the disintegration can be papered over with pop culture distractions and government propaganda. Our world is coming apart so fast, many people - and not just the poor (who we conveniently ignore) - will be able to adapt in time to deal with it.

We can blame the greedy bankers and greedy Wall Street if we want, even though these are companies employing many of our friends and family that many Americans have investments in. We can blame high-powered executives for entering into legal contracts that protect them in the event they're dismissed, even though all parties knew what was happening when they signed their golden parachute-laden contracts. We can get mad and make short selling illegal, as we've done, enacting new regulations that seem to be based on a misguided sense that a free individual's calculatedly risky investment decisions are somehow done out of a collective schadenfreude.

But really - the blame sits with us Americans.

Collectively, we as Americans have decided to live high on the hog. We've bought expensive new cars and SUVs for $20K, $30K, $40K or even more. Some have gotten 30 year mortgages for homes costing perhaps 8 to 10 times our total yearly income because of low interest rates and balloon payments, thinking that we could simply hold on to one house, sell it at a profit, then buy and other, selling it at a profit, and going on and on until we have oodles of money. We've confused speculating with investing, thinking that we should concentrate our money in just a handful of well-performing stocks - instead of planning to grow our money slowly through balanced portfolios that will do well in any economic climate.

So, now, we have companies that chose to make bad loans to people who couldn't ever afford them, then tie these loan paybacks to an abstract set of calculations, selling them to others who were fooled into thinking this kind of intangible formula is somehow worth a great deal of tangible money. Now, these companies who took the risk want to get a free pass - to get out of the problems they have created for themselves. Our government has decided that it will do this, and that all of us will pay for it eventually when the government takes what belongs to us by force to pay off what it has done.

There is no accountability for these companies - so it teaches them that they can continue to make risky choices that make a few very, very rich, knowing that they will not have to face any consequences. This is a key example of moral hazard - disguised or made more palatable alongside patter about "increased regulation".

Meanwhile, many commentators praise the end of "deregulation", using equivocations and newspeak to reframe highly imbalanced and disruptive half-regulation policies that wreak havoc on our economy and push for a de facto totalitarian agenda that's supposed to save all of us.

All who chose to live high on the hog may also largely get a free pass to continue making bad choices, emphasizing the idea in our collective American thinking that the government should be there to help us. This is a great idea if you are the government and you want to continue to control the masses with cocaine-like infusions of capital to keep everyone glassy-eyed and happy.

We are also being distracted by the circus that is our presidential election. Many can agree that McCain is nothing more than a politically-savvy opportunist and warmonger. One who deeply understands that war is the health of the state and the path to immortality and greatness. We can see this most clearly in this 72-year-old's rash choice of a vice presidential candidate who is both frighteningly appealing through her folksy style and (sexual?) charisma, but frighteningly appalling in her implicit promotion of the American popular concept of ignorance as virtue.

The alternatives, while better, don't cut it. Simply put, Barack Obama showed his true colors when he voted the same way McCain did - to support this "bailout from hell", as Bob Barr calls it. That's not change, that's more of the same - the same economic policies that got us into the huge mess we're in.

Sadly, as we are finding out, this Ponzi scheme eventually collapses. Sooner or later, we come to realize that we simply can't obtain enough drugs to make us feel better. There comes a time when we can't print up more fiat currency, because all of our paper becomes worthless.

My friends, the judgment day long predicted by some of our most sensible thinkers is coming. It may already be here.

Yes, Julian of Norwich reminds us that "All shall be well, and all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well." I believe this to be true. We who are Christians know this to be true.

But we also know that there are times when many, many people have died before we have seen this peace arrive for us here.

It is at times like these, when we may be coming face to face with a Malthusian scenario, that we have to look for theologians who speak of the atonement as God's action in Jesus' death on the cross as providing us a model of how to endure the most painful and pointless of situations. This may be the time that we hear the words from Ecclesiastes deep in our heart: "Meaningless, meaningless, says the Preacher, everything is meaningless!"

The question I'm asking is, what does our faith say to those of us caught in a situation that can only be seen as meaningless? One in which there is no hope? What does redemption look like in that place devoid of hope? Can we reconcile an idea of redemption with this concept?

This may not be time for us to hear comforting words. Perhaps it is time for us to face a judgement or a reckoning of some kind or another, embracing Purgatory for what it will ultimately bring us.

The Hiatus of Busyness and the Blackness of the Abyss

2008-09-28T18:03:00.000-07:00

All of my faithful readers will notice that I've gone almost a month without having anything to say - and you know that I'm not one for being lacking in comments. (One work acquaintance recently called one of my E-mail responses to her "windy". I'll have to hold on to that one.)

The reason for my silence is pretty easy to figure out - we're fully into the arts season here, so I've been immersed in rehearsals and preparation for Sunday services. Christmas is no longer in the peripheral vision, but is now kind of like McDonald's Grimace approaching waddling slowly toward at 2 o'clock. I'm performing with two community ensembles and have a lot of musical church responsibilities as well, so I'm very much aware of the typical arts schedule and the even greater level of activity that is approaching after Thanksgiving.

In 2007, one of my resolutions was for music to "become my primary avocation". This is a goal that I can say was very much accomplished, although it took me until this year to have it happen, and it happened in a way requiring more commitment and work than if it were a simple hobby. That's what I meant to have happen, but it's already nearly what I'd classify as "semi-professional".

When you decide that you are going to be a serious amateur musician and try to do more paid gigs on the side, which is where I am with it now, you have to give up other things in your life that have taken up your time. My free time is much more scarce, which means my time has become more valuable to me - this is a difficult place to be in at the beginning of what could be an economic calamity. This is going to cost all of us and we're going to feel it - perhaps very, very painfully in a great day of reckoning.

In life's economy, we all must understand that we cannot do everything - even everything that is important. My friends are important, but I'm not able to spend nearly as much time with them. Staying on top of the news is important to me, but others are now telling me about big news that I should have heard about already. Listening to music at home and having a deep experience with it is important to me, but I hardly have time to even turn on FM radio. My online friends are important to me, but I struggle to be able to set aside time to talk to them, knowing that my online time is a huge time-sucker that I nearly can't afford to touch. Reading is important to me, but I'm often so tired that when I pick up a book or magazine, I fall asleep before I can even get started with it.

Frankly, this means that I'm less sociable, less up-to-date, less inspired, less communicative, and less knowledgeable than I was before about July or so.

This gives me a greater appreciation, in a tangential way, for those who juggle multiple commitments of career, family, relationships, and hobbies - and also a greater awareness of how our culture values many of our commitments as having a greater weight than others, even if we don't personally prioritize our commitments in the same way.

All of these competing ideas, implications, concerns, distractions, and ambiguity are always swirling in my head - but now the whole amalgamation of them is bigger as they entangle themselves together and interact with one another. As I told one friend recently, it is a lonely road, but it is also a very existentially-frightening one, as getting too caught up in it will lead your mind - your very self, into a vortex from which you cannot emerge.

I think what we're experiencing now in terms of our financial crisis is the same sort of thing - only a product of our collective efforts and thinking.

Our financial system is really a Tower of Babel - it was something designed to reach the heavens. The tower was reaching for something so grand that even trying to figure out what it is reaching for is something too mind-stretching for even our best minds to comprehend. If we as a collective can't figure out what it is we're trying to build and how it all works, one can make an argument that we very well are trying to reach God.

Flawed and limited as it is, if we talk about the old analogy of religious devotion that speaks of many paths to God leading up the mountain, starting from different places and meeting at the top, can we then say that one of the paths people take up the mountain is through economics? Do we believe that Moore's Law also applies to the economic system, so that we're going to reach some type of Age of Spiritual Money after a certain amount of time?

As a libertarian, I do believe that a truly free-market (which is only theoretical and may only be able to be theoretical) does promise some type of shimmeringly beautiful destination that we can only see in our minds, but I'm not sure humanity has the ability to carry it out - because power over other people may be much more intoxicating than the more concrete posession of money.

In the same way that all of the complexities of our personal life threaten to consume us if we let them (and I'm not altogether convinced that the "keep it simple" adage is always the right course of action), I think we're similarly staring down into an economic chasm. We're going to have to dive in sometime - because the day of recokoning, the day of judgment is coming.

Thinking about this reminds me of all of the great minds I've read about through history who have gone completely insane. Some people on the street will tell you that people let themselves go into this kind of mental illness. But I find myself wondering if this is really somehow our destiny . . .

When I listen to some of the most brilliant people I know, or read the work of some of the most brilliant people who have walked the Earth, many of them seem to me to point to a kind of Medusa-truth: a nickel-black, undulating well of mystery that is so incomprehensible, that responding to its beckoning causes you to gaze inward and subsequently fall into what we can only see from our perspective as blackness.

I wonder if those who get sucked into this well actually experience the blackness we assume they do? Or if they do come to some type of understanding of (or peace with) the truth that we have replaced with a much more comforting and comprehensible fiction?

The same busyness I occupy myself with in the quest to be a musician and a "real Christian" (as one colleague said recently) and to experience the truth that I find in those particular pursuits might be a type of truth that our world has chased after. Can we really say that it's only about money? I think it's too dismissive to say that we've created some type of greedy and rickety edifice to only wealth - to say that we are coming crashing down because of our love of money is naive preacher-talk. It is something much more significant than that we've been reaching for with our incredibly complex financial formulas and investment devices.

I know that if I look at the whole of what my life now seems to be, trying to take in all of its tasks and responsibilities, my mind becomes filled with the anxiety of comprehending the whole of what my life currently is about. Our culture is filled with this same sort of anxiety, because I don't think any one of us individuals really understands the whole of our economic system, and evening examining it is going to bring us all down.

Perhaps we all (including me) need to be, or are destined to be, brought down into the abyss. But my Christian heart (and libertarian head), says that redemption somehow awaits us on the other end of the wormhole.

You too can profit from others' misfortune!

2008-08-31T18:23:00.000-07:00

(Sorry for the lack of posts lately - I've been crazy busy with work and personal commitments, so I haven't been home to write or read the news much. Hope all of you are well.)

A few days ago, one of my close friends wrote me the following E-mail:

I was just reading an article decrying Harper opening the door to privatizing prisons in Canada, a la US model (doesn't he get crowded being in bed with so many corporate interests???)

http://www.straight.com/article-119340/stephen-harper-opens-door-to-prison-privatization

While reading this, a thought struck me...in part, is the US judicial system run as it is, and the war on drugs continues, because it is profitable to these corporate interests to have people in prisons?!? It's a horrifying idea, but it makes an extremely sick and scary kind of sense...

Will someone PLEASE hold me?

We had some discussion among our group of friends about the "War on Drugs" and who is making money off of it - others were wondering if there's really that much lobbying power on the part of government contractors who are running U.S. prisons.

My response . . .

----------------------------------------------------------------

What's really going on here is that the you have opportunism on the part of a relative handful of powerful people. So, I think a few business-savy people in key areas with major political influence see this a new lucrative avenue - the byproduct of a fascist state. You have to, on some level, admire the intelligence of evil people before you can hope to stop them.

It's a classic strategy: develop a large set of incomprehensible and/or broadly-worded laws, not easily appropriated by the vast majority of the population. This way, everyone becomes a de facto felon. Of course, there's a lot of social engineering that goes along with this to create the fascist system (flag waving, whipping up religious fervor, controlling the educational system, manipulating energy supplies, fearmongering, etc.) so this is only one piece of a much larger strategy of control and oppression.

This is a great time to get into the prison business! (Raytheon and Halliburton are always good bets, but diversity is a good thing. You can profit from the coming armageddon!)

We have a goverment, working in partnership with other major business interests, that needs to silence people who speak out against it. There's a massive system in place to guarantee that anyone who needs to be locked up can be locked up - and quickly - while the brainwashed and ignorant populace is distracted by celebrity gossip and TV crap.

The smart money knows what the military-industrial complex is planning, so this creates an opportunity for those in the well-connected business community (who because of their wealth and power are largely immune to draconian and capricious legal action) to make money by gaming the system in favor of prison privitization.

This should be more frightening as a leading indicator of an impending military-dictatorship takeover rather than something like a powerful industry with traditional lobbying power flexing its muscles. They already have the motivation to lock up anybody they want to - they're already going for the low-hanging fruit, as Eric has pointed out.

This doesn't mean that a powerful industry won't eventually sprout up around this. Not sure that it would rival big pharma . . . but plenty big enough. But I don't see that happening anytime soon. Maybe this is sort of like the idea some neocons had after 9-11 to set up a stock market type of system for people to invest in based on when the next terrorist attack is going to happen. Following the money can provide you with all kinds of valuable information.

I think this news out of Canada may mean there's something much sinister coming sooner rather than later. In this case, following the money doesn't lead to a pleasant outcome, even if we are more informed. (That is, unless you like to benifit off of the suffering of others, which we all do to one extent or another by living the lives we do here in America).

So ---- here's to hoping your underground bunker east of Yuma is well stocked!

Church of The Batman

2008-08-11T14:16:00.003-07:00

I went to go see the new(?) Batman movie last Saturday with a friend, after hearing another friend tell me that it was "really, really dark". Most of you know I'm not one of those people has ever read many comic books or graphic novels in my life, except for maybe the Archie and Jughead digest from when I was about 8. Of course, none of that deals with any type of profound philosophical questions, other than who likes who and what the latest silly teenage drama is.

Maybe that's the root of my thing I used to have for teen dramas like 90210, and even a little Dawson's Creek (I watched it for the verbiage-filled dialogue . . . no, really, I did . . . maybe . . . well, that and Joshua Jackson = mega HAWT!)

But the point is, while I know graphic novels are more than that from my (usually younger) friends who read them, I certainly have trouble taking the medium or anything associated with it seriously.

Of course, this movie was different, but you all already know that, and you're not reading this for my movie reviews. For those who haven't seen it or aren't familiar with it, know that the whole movie dealt with really deep ethical questions - the kind of questions our whole society is facing now. Will people do the right thing if easily presented with a tempting wrong? Will others do something evil to someone they don't know if it means someone they do know will be helped? Does it make sense to singularly stand up against evil when truly nobody else will?

Usually the movies I see are very serious and deal with deep, often painful questions of one sort or another. Otherwise, why see them? I can entertain myself through other meaningless diversions.

So, I'm not one for mindless comedies that appeal to silly teenagers or screw-off college students, and I'll pass on the shoot-'em-up movies that tend to also appeal to this demographic (and some of their possibly emotionally underdeveloped fathers?).

Good movies sit with me for a while, and I couldn't help but think about these themes over the past few days as I'm also thinking through everyday battles in local churches versus bigger struggles happening in ever wider circles: families, workplaces, communities, cities, states, nations, and finally in diplomacy and drama being played out before us in wars cold and hot across the world.

A great deal of our lives are all about politics. It's everywhere. We're all politicians and diplomats in one degree or another at any given time. Some of us have to deal with it on a daily basis and hate it. Even fewer of us deal with it on a daily basis and love it.

I'm one of those who hates it, especially when wrong choices are made that leave big messes for others to clean up. As I see this happening on the local level, I realize that the battles I see locally really follow the same recipe as the battles on the higher levels, although there may just be different ingredients in the mix.

The recipes seem to be archetypal battles, often of "old ways" of doing things verses "new ways". It's far too simplistic to break all battles down into this category, since there are also deep ideologies battling for attention at any time, each with their own subtleties and nuances.

That said, one sometimes helpful way to analyze the methods and the techniques of these situations could be to see them as old vs. new. We may dress up the factions with positive-sounding labels to create understanding and broker peace, but we still see walking and quacking.

All of us who are players in a political system - whether large or small - have to make sure our ethics are solid. This means we have to have thought through our system of arriving at decisions of what is good and evil, and we have to know what that system is based on and how we follow through with it.

The church might not have been instituted by humans, but it is, of course, a human organization, led by the Spirit, as we have willingness and strength to listen to the Spirit's guidance. Even so, I have a hard time with the idea that the Church is infallible, even from those who can argue from a biblical and Traditional perspective that it is. In fact, this infallibility idea (and the concomitant Spirit-led quality) it's only something that can be understood theoretically, because we can't really define the boundaries of the Church (big C) and say how it can definitively arrive at an authoritative position, and therefore a correct one.

Authority and power are usually, though not always, intertwined. When we are part of these political systems on any level, we are confronted with the dangers inherent in ever-increasing levels of power. This means that we must legitimately and frankly ask ourselves whether power is something that corrupts in direct proportion to its allotment to any individual or group.

The Batman movie, in particular, forces us to ask if humanity's natural movement is regressive. You'll have to see the show to find out what their answer is. Still, some may argue we are all moving to higher levels of moral disorder in a very Darwinist mindset, where we'll shoot our best friend to stay alive as we descend into a hell of chaos. This very negative view could be consistent with what many see as the orthodox Christian view: our nature by itself tends toward evil.

Is humanity collectively entropic? At least when it comes to morals?

As I ask that question as a Christian, I understand that in some way my asking of that is very threatening. We're supposed to point to hope, right? We're supposed to say "no" to that question while pointing heavenward.

Even if we acknowledge the specificity of evil, as something contained in an isolated situation, we're supposed to, as Christians, say that God's ultimate, big-picture plan is an active redeeming of the world in a way we cannot comprehend (or, at least, cannot comprehend now), but something that will be revealed later. The redemption may come through a supernatural event or through God's working through humanity to bring about justice and peace over the whole earth, depending on your views.

This is pretty much my thumbnail understanding of quite a bit of mainline (liberal) Protestant pastoral teaching and preaching, and I'm not saying I disagree with it. But, if we're going to be honest, un-fake Christians (the only type younger people will bother listening to), we cannot neglect to deal with the question of whether we are evil at our core, and only becoming more evil overall.

The corollary to that question - and one that has been asked from the beginning of time - is about whether God's redemption is going to come about in time, and what that will consist of. And if we say we don't know, isn't that exactly like saying "hope is just around the corner"? When said eloquently, it's comforting, to be sure, but how long can we keep it up? Is it a Ponzi scheme?

Can the church offer reasonable, compelling answers to this without them being simply pat or contrived? I don't know the answer to that, and I wish I did, because I've almost always heard ones that were not. If we're serious about evangelism, we better be ready to face these questions - any questions - and even tougher ones that this, at least in our increasingly secular, but still "spiritual" and non-religious American culture.

The big secret is that the Anglican church, in a lot of ways, may be best poised to answer these types of questions in a way that other Christian denominations can't.

We can answer them because we are asking ourselves right now, like Bonhoeffer did, if we should do a relatively small evil in order to bring about a much greater good in the long term.

That's all well and good, but do we realize we have to live with the consequences of that smaller evil and answer for it? Even as we choose this smaller evil, we have to say yes to and accept the judgment of God for that evil, and perhaps one that doesn't allow for mitigating circumstances when it comes to sentencing.

Make no mistake, the so-called conservatives in the Anglican church face this same question as do the so-called liberals. This means that we'll all have to face the music, and that nobody's really right in this fight.

Whether or not a moderate position between two choices is possible when we come to a crossroads such as this, even as we know a core part of our Anglican identity is to be "both/and" people and to find truth in and be okay with the dialectic of opposing views, we have to recognize that any choice we make: "liberal", "conservative", or "moderate" is still a choice.

Any choice we are making now or will make necessarily entails a commingling of good and evil. This gets personal, because we remember that politics isn't just a global, national, or statewide thing. We have other choices, but we all face the same God.

For us Anglicans, there's no easy way out, but we have to understand that even our treasured fuzziness has limits - and consequences.

We'd better- and not just for our good, but for the good of all God's Church.

Gays abandoned to a destroyed culture

2008-08-08T19:03:00.001-07:00

An essay on gay newsmagazine Out's website has one of the most striking essays I've read in years on "social" internet sites' effects on gay male culture.

This article contains some frank and (frankly) very disturbing information that some of my straight friends who read my blogs might not care to know about, so be warned.

That said, I think this is a must read for anyone reading this blog, anyone who is friends with gay men (especially younger, single ones).

Here are a few excerpts:

During the 15 years since America Online men-4-men chat rooms introduced mass-market online cruising (earlier Internet cruising technologies, like IRC chat rooms, were mostly for techies), some aspects of our lives have become more visible than ever. We are ubiquitous in mainstream culture; we are out to our families, friends, and employers; we’re able to hold hands in public, in some places, without having to worry that we might get beaten up; and some states and cities now permit gay marriage or civil unions (more will inevitably follow now that California has joined Massachusetts). As this wave of enculturation advanced, AIDS treatments made the ravages of that disease less visible and dispelled the sense of crisis that strengthened our connection to each other in the 1980s. These factors, along with straight gentrification of gay neighborhoods and the growth of the long-tail economy, hastened the decline of many urban gay enclaves, and the demise of many bars, businesses, and social groups that gave structure to gay life.

“Post-gay” social life grew mixed, and the physical drive that defines us as gay -- the drive to have sex with each other -- increasingly found vent online. This aspect of our lives became more private, and even secret, than ever. In 1993, 2.3% of gay men found their first male sexual partner online. In 2003 the number was 61.2%. (These figures come from the United Kingdom, and there’s been no parallel study in the United States, but sociologists believe the findings here would be similar.)

“The implications of that trend are enormous,” says Jeffrey Klausner of the San Francisco Department of Public Health. “It means that gay men who were once socialized in brick-and-mortar establishments, surrounded by other people, are now being socialized online.” Gay men still go out as well, but our nightlife habits are very different than they were 12 years ago. Jeffrey Parsons, professor of psychology at New York’s Hunter College, says his unpublished research confirms the common sense that “when guys go to bars, they’re going to be with their friends, not to meet new people.”

and later . . .

The seemingly endless stream of available men on Manhunt is, according to marketing director Henricks, “addictive, like a slot machine. You keep hitting next, to see another screen of profiles, thinking you’re gonna get lucky sevens.” This drive, according to Alan Downs, a psychologist and author of The Velvet Rage: Overcoming the Pain of Growing Up Gay in a Straight Man’s World, lies at the core of the appeal of online cruising: “Variable payout schedule, which is used in slot machine designs, is the most addictive form of psychological conditioning, because you never know when you’ll get paid. It could be every 10 times you play, or every hundred.” In the same way, Downs adds, “every time you log on, you never know what you’ll find. That’s why it expands to fill a person’s time. Last night was a bust, but who knows who will be online this morning or tonight.”

and a little later

As a normative way of socializing for gay men, online cruising is a disaster. We need to recognize its effects -- including its tendency to isolate us, encourage objectification, and diminish our sense of life’s nonsexual possibilities -- as disasters. We need to recognize that too many of us, too much of the time, are cruising online because it is easier and feels safer than thinking about the love we are missing and the power we do not have. Too many of us, too much of the time, are cruising online because it’s easier and feels safer than mustering the courage, patience, discipline, and imagination required to help ourselves and each other become the men that, in our strongest moments, we want to be.

There are tons of great points in the essay. The picture is kind of bleak, and those who already have issues with gay behavior may point to what they see as outrageous and sexual public displays at gay pride festivals and then claim that while these may be disappearing, many more shocking and secretive practices are happening in the shadows.

But it is time for anyone who is involved with the online gay "community", if it can be called that, to understand what it's doing to us, and what impact our Internet culture is having on our whole society.

Part of the solution Michael Joseph Gross, the article's author, alludes to here is the necessity of defining normal social behavior and expectations for gay and lesbian people. This is something I've written about at length before on this blog.

Because gays and lesbians have not been given access to our cultural/societal methods for working through both sexual and relational ideas, and especially by the church, we've been given up to whatever moral compass (or lack thereof) we care to follow as individuals. This is why Gross can speak of sex in our community as being "the gay handshake".

Many of my friends will know the profound struggles I personally have had with trying to interface with this culture and find some type of moral standards I can live with, when this discussion isn't even on the table in the organization I look to for guidance: the Episcopal Church (or even mainline liberal Protestant thinking generally).

Now, I'm not talking about a whole list of rules here, saying one specific thing is okay and another isn't. That's dogma - and, at least to my religious way of thinking, it doesn't ultimately work.

What does work is creating an ethical framework for moving through these issues - and certainly same-sex blessings of relationships is one important step in that direction. If my faith tradition goes down that road, and I know they will in the long run, I think that will be a profoundly good thing for those of us who are gays and lesbians who really are seeking God very seriously. At the same time, do those of us theological progressives (or moderates) who care about our witness as Anglicans to the wider world really think this is worth splitting the church over?

It cuts both ways, and we have to remember that.

But when I encounter the gay community online, not just in sleazy sex sites, my own heart hurts when I know that only a very few younger gay men (say under 40), even those who come from strong religious backgrounds, identify themselves as Christians. Among those who do, only a very few of them take their faith seriously.

For those of us who do, myself included, it is an impossibly lonely place - and in our worst moments, hopelessly so - made even more sad when we see that almost all of our brothers are in a different place from us.

A place where they are abandoned by the church - and to the hell that we have created for ourselves in trying to cope with it.

Disturbed by Purgatory

2008-07-25T20:48:00.002-07:00

I usually don't write about stuff like this on this blog, but this is one of those things I need to kind of get out of my head. I should have done it earlier - of course, didn't have much time to think then . . . it was in the morning.

I think I've mentioned to my friends a few times before that I tend to have some very dark dreams. Now, these aren't nightmares or other truly frightful things, but I seem to have a lot of bizarre and unfunny things running through my head at night, when I can remember them by the morning.

When I say bizarre, I'm not referring to some type of colorful acid-trip. This isn't happening in a teletubby-filled land with multicolored trees and rainbows and the like. While we both stared at some artwork hanging in my church gallery, an older Catholic priest acquaintance of mine told me that his dreams were like that art - happy technicolor. (My baby boomer readers might think of something like the Beatles' Yellow Submarine album cover.)

Unlike my friend, my dreams seem to be more like the feeling (if not the picture) you get when you see a Dali painting. Perhaps that's why I'm so drawn to his art. Perhaps in actual experience they're something like being in the midst of a Samuel Beckett play.

The other night's dream could easily fall into that category, I think. Except it was a bit more disturbing to me in the moment than many of the others, especially in an abiding sort of way.

Here it is . . .

In some way or another, I had found myself in Florida. I'm not sure why I was in Florida in this dream. Perhaps because my mother used to live there? Or because it's full of frightening alligators everywhere or a miserably hot & humid climate with no interesting topography? I'm not sure. That's enough to disturb anybody.

At any rate, I was there to watch a football game. Yes, friends! A football game. (For those who don't know me as well, keep in mind that I've never been to a football game, other than for marching band, in my whole life. I don't really like the sport, although I did used to watch it on television. So, I was in Florida, in a huge stadium, ready to watch a football game.

Suddenly, off to the left of the stadium there was a bright glowing light - like an explosion - and everyone in the stadium started to clap - like at a symphony concert. They were not at all rowdy or rambunctious about it. Over the rim of the stadium appeared the space shuttle, just having launched from Cape Canaveral.

(My mother used to live just a stone's throw away from there, in a neighborhood full of NASA employees. I hope this isn't supposed to tell me something Oedipal about my psyche. That'd be creepy.)

So, the Space Shuttle came up and over us at about a 45 degree angle past the rim of the stadium, and rose slightly higher and began turning in a corkscrew direction, when the right rocket booster naturally flew off but then began zooming straight down towards us.

As I watched it, I remember a fleeting feeling of resigned panic as I realized that this is how it was written in God's plan that I would die - as the missle flew off the spaceship and exploded into the midst of the crowd, killing everyone painlessly and instantly in a burst of bright, clear light.

After the flash, I suddenly found myself in a plain grey room - something like a doctor's waiting room. It had a feeling of uncomfortable meaninglessness to it. But I was not alone. There were others there with me, who seemed to be also stuck in this very grey place. It was unpleasant, but not horrifying.

I thought to myself, perhaps this is what Hell is. My life is ended and I have arrived at my designated place.

As I began to unpack this idea, I remember at some point that there was a long line of people - men and women - who I remember as being dressed in middle-class business-casual attire who were walking in a moderately moving line through the room on the opposite side of where I was sitting. (We were sitting in chairs along one of the wide walls of a rectangular room.) These bored-looking people were basically walking from one door on one end to the other, and I had the impression that they were perhaps en route to be processed in some type of arraignment situation. For all I knew, they could have been plucked straight from the line of any grocery store, only without carrying anything to buy.

After much waiting and watching this happen, I think I must have asked one of the people beside me about this place. The lady who was sitting beside me was kind of a glasses-wearing, mousey, friendly, and studious librarian type with shoulder-length brown hair and a medium build. She must've been sitting there for a long time, because she told me, with an air of resignation, something that came across to me like, "Oh, of course you know, this is Purgatory."

It's worth mentioning here that I wonder a lot about what we will actually experience after we depart from this Earthly life. Nobody really knows, of course, what that will actually be like. A lot of me tends to think that on some level we need to be punished for some of the sins we've committed in a way that cleanses us from them, before we can enter into the presence of God. For those who are relentless self-critics, like myself, this may be our coping mechanism that allows us to not judge ourselves so harshly, knowing that in some twisted way that we'll be okay because God will punish us in the end. Perhaps, as an Orthodox priest first told me, Hell is what happens while we encounter such pure holiness that is God. I'm not sure. Either way, I think this detail of the dream was a reasonable approximation of what my current expectations are about what my immediate afterlife will be like.

At some point after hearing this woman fill me in on what was going on, I walked over to a closed door on the left side of the room - the one that I remember people may have been either walking into or out of. I opened it to see what was inside.

Immediately after opening it, I felt a very harsh and evil presence before me. The doorway was filled with a swirling mass of very dark and thick smoke, almost like something you could grab with your hand, like sand. It may have also felt hot with an inner sense of deep pain and anguish. This was certainly the doorway to Hell, and I remember reaching just my hand inside it to feel what it was. I needed to experience it on some level - perhaps to not be as afraid of it.

I remember when I woke up, I felt very surprised to actually be back to my real life. My calm and detached reaction was, "Oh, I guess I did not die yet."

Over the past year, I've read some of the stories collected by near-death researchers. What may be surprising for some is that not all people have these beautiful visions of heaven you hear about in the media. Quite a few certainly do have experiences that are either unpleasant or truly terrifying and hell-like.

But what comes of this in the lives of the people who see them is something different altogether. Surprisingly, some who have had the grandest visions of heaven then find their lives changed dramatically for the worse after having had this experience. Others who go through some type of hell-like experience have found it to be one of the most healing things they could ever imagine encountering.

While there is a lot of me that is very frightened of death and of the eternal consequences facing me, just as they will face everybody, I feel like I'm starting to deal with the picture of God I developed as a child. This was an idea of a very angry, judgmental, and probably capricious deity who will crush us and torture us with pain for every willful sin we have committed - every act of disobedience. Then, in an act of transactional mercy for all the good we've done in this life, this God then banishes us into a state of ultimate and deep nothingness as our final destiny.

When I think about it in this way, I have to take this picture of God seriously, since the vestiges of this vision of God are present in me even now, deeply corkscrewed as they became into the sponge of my grey matter. At the same time, my reason and my more recent Christian formation know that this picture is not true.

Yet, on some level, I know I must fight against these types of distorted and disturbed visions by facing them head-on and taking them seriously. I can do that for myself by asking questions: How is God's mercy and love revealed or hidden through this picture of an angry God and a torturing hell? How is redemption brought about by this type of God and the way this God acts? Does this God remind me of Jesus? Does this God remind me of other visions of God as they are found in the Hebrew scriptures? These questions aren't so much to challenge this idea of God, but to really ask how this vision of God is one that is right and correct. How healing comes through a deep experience of pain or meaninglessness, without the meaninglessness going away.

When I talk to some of my close friends who are strict rationalist agnostics or atheists, they challenge me with some scientific facts about these near-death experiences people write about and how they've been duplicated in lab settings, complete with having visions of divine or traditionally figures, meeting deceased relatives, encountering visions of light or experiencing tunnels, etc.

The question from my skeptical mind follows: what if our ideas about God are really based on these types of tales that many generations have heard from those who were somewhere on the borderline of death. The dying brain releases these chemicals to deal with its demise, and we begin to have some type of very vivid dream - a dream that is the culmination of all of our experiences and efforts and expectations of what we think we will find when we arrive at this final moment. Then, before we vanish into nonexistence, our last vision in our dying head is the one we have built upon and created throughout our whole lives.

May this be the scientific explanation for "heaven" - just as we have had other scientific explanations for other phenomena we had formerly thought as miraculous or holy? What if we were to go with this as true? Would our faith survive as we embraced these types of ideas? Can we find meaning even if heaven itself is completely explained as a scientific and rational phenomenon? Will there be healing in this as finally the great arguments of the atheists and agnostics can finally come together with those who believe?

I recently told a colleague of mine that yes, I wanted to be cremated, but that I firmly believe in the Resurrection of the Body. (Surprised by this, she said, "Oh, so you'll come back as a dust devil!) At times, my belief in God and the teachings of the Church as I have come to receive them is sometimes an angst-filled struggle to want to believe in these things, telling them to myself over and over again to somehow convince myself.

Yet, there is something compelling about the message of Jesus Christ that I simply cannot let go of - or that will not let go of me.

Whatever it is that is so compelling and overwhelming - this is what is ultimately deeply moving in my life and what draws me closer to what I label as "God". It is what makes me say, even after long days of working in the church and dealing with politics, arguments, and mini-crises, that I am, in the overall scheme of things, furthering God's Realm.

I'm unconvinced that my giving into this pulling forward will lead to any type of eternal reward - or even guarantee an after-death pleasantness or tolerability. I'm also not sure that any decision I make will lead me into "Heaven".

What I do know is that something that is truly compelling cannot be ultimately resisted. It is something much stronger than anything within me, and I cannot resist.

But, as one friend reminds me, "Why would you want to?" The question is moot - I wouldn't even if I could.

Big SF update

2008-07-12T15:37:00.002-07:00

I haven't had time to post anything over the last several days, although I've done some status updates on Facebook.

For you friends who are wondering what I'm doing, here's the latest . . .

First, some other random observations:

- Tons of people here have iPhones, and I'm not talking about those who just bought them today or yesterday, like at least two of my friends have. The market share on these is far higher than it is in Phoenix. Besides the fact that Apple is down the street, maybe that tells you something . . .

- Barbers wear surgical masks here, and I've seen bartenders wearing latex gloves.

- It's far easier to figure out how to get into the city from the Oakland airport than it is from SFO. Surprisingly, my Southwest airlines flight was cheaper to fly into SFO.

Now for the update:

Yesterday, I spent most of the day at the de Young museum. In particular, I wanted to focus in on contemporary art. They had a fair selection of this, along with several other galleries of art from the americas. While I wasn't as interested in this, I really enjoyed seeing it. The architecture of the place is stunning, and that's another reason why I wanted to go see it.

Whenever I go to art museums in other cities, the thing I most treasure is seeing famous artworks that are recognizable to anybody who paid attention in high school. I'm not knowledgeable about art whatsoever, so my ignorance level is high. Yet, when I see pictures done by Picasso, Rothko, Matisse, Pollack, O'Keefe, Dali, or other world-renown figures in the art world, I'm just amazed and honored to be able to look at pieces of history like this.

Percussion Concert

Last night, I attended an avant garde concert in some type of warehouse district - either in the Mission or close to it. It was centered around percussion, and much of it was improvised, or greatly improvised from minimal composer's notes. The most amazing thing about this was that there were probably about 35 people in attendance. After hearing the first couple of numbers, I was surprised that the concert would draw this many people, or that the musicians performing in it would make enough of a living to spend as much time gigging as they seemed to.

The first piece featured a barefoot girl kneeling on the ground, playing a large bass drum with various mallets and a snare drum turned on its side, along with banging or bowing several found objects. I wasn't impressed, since the piece did not seem to be planned whatsoever, apart from simply assembling the somewhat ordinary "instruments".

The next performer was a man who did all of his work with various drum machines, samplers, and mixers, hooked up to various processors, including guitar distortion pedals and other effects systems. The guy looked like he'd spent a few too many weeks attending Star Trek festivals around the country (I thought he was kinda cute, which scares me a little), and his music was expectedly repetitive but also very bland, and his number seemed to go on and on forever.

The second half of the concert was a real treat, though. The next number featured a girl playing an electronic drum pad, singing, and sampling her voice, along with interspersing a number of sampled and looped sounds she had preset before the concert. Part poetry and part banging, she exhibited a great deal of thoughtfulness and artistry in this very edgy performance. The highlight was a song she said she'd literally written at 3AM the night before- with verses about knowing the pills by the sound they make. The choruses featuring rambling, half-awake, and slightly psychedelic lyrics were aptly descriptive of contemporary urban obsessions with prescription medication to cure all ailments. These choruses were interspersed with ethereal synth sounds, drum patters, and real-time sampled and looped recordings of her beautifully austere soprano voice. Of course, the connecting factor with all of these was her shaking of her various prescription and over-the-counter medicines she was taking. An amazingly thoughtful work in progress. Her other pieces were equally well-developed and enjoyable.

The fourth artist on the program was another percussionist and performance artist who offered one of the most shocking pieces I've seen. He began his performance by rubbing rubber balls on the ends of metal rods along the hardwood floor of the art gallery, causing them to make a low squeals slightly out of tune with each other. He also rubbed these rubber ball sticks against a large cylindrical tube. The tube was connected by two taut 4 foot pieces of masking tape to a snare drum and a tom-tom (?) drum from a drumset. After the rubber balls dragging, he rubbed his fingers along the length of the tape, magnified by resonance of the cylinder and vibrating the snares.

It pretty much got crazier from there, as he rumbled the tom tom over the hardwood and concrete floors, beat on a large bass drum with various mallets, stepped on old cymbals on the floor with his boots, and wacked the hell out of four de-stringed and de-necked violins. His performance grew more and more intense as he rapidly beat upon more and more objects. It was furiously crazy, reaching its zenith with him wacking on old vinyl records laid on top of grey acoustical foam. One-by-one, the records broke in half, which he then proceeded to wack those, producing even more sounds as he changed patterns on the fly in response to the broken pieces. Eventually, the records were all shattered into a hundred pieces each, with parts literally flying into the audience. (Sometimes the audience would throw some of the flying objects back to him, which he would then catch and beat on for a while.)

The point of all of this is that what's considered New Music in Phoenix is nothing like what I saw here in San Francisco. The line between art and crazy-ass crap is obviously a pretty fine one here.

Oh, before I forget, I saw a Yahoo employee last night at the restaurant I went to before the concert. I was tempted to ask him about the state of the company, but I thought that would be gauche at best. I should add that I really wanted to go down to San Jose this trip and try to take in some of the whole tech culture down there, but I cancelled those plans because of the hot weather. I'm hoping that I can schedule another time to take in some of that scene, find out what companies are doing tours, etc.

This hotel is one of the nicest I've stayed at, but the neighborhood is the worst I've stayed in. I've had to make a conscious effort to take certain routes home at night to avoid potential problems. And- while I was eating pizza for lunch this afternoon, I'm pretty sure I was watching several drug deals go down across the street. Also, there are tons of prostitutes in the neighborhood. They seem to be around at all hours, also, although maybe not as actively looking for johns.

Of course, this is a colorful city - and it is, I think, the capital city of the western United States. While some, including myself, may not like it as much as other cities, it's a joy for me to be here in this culturally rich, progressive, and truly cosmopolitan environment.

Conversations in SF

2008-07-09T19:08:00.000-07:00

Last night, after I had spent the afternoon wandering around the financial district and Chinatown, I decided to unwind a little by getting some coffee somewhere in the Union Square area. I think it's something of a tradition for me to do this now.

A friendly gentleman came by and sat beside me as I was drinking my coffee on one of the benches in the square. He was homeless, and asked for some money, and I did give him some. Rightly or wrongly, I'm giving more money away to these folks I see. They have no money to even eat, and I'm enjoying a $4 coffee. Something's not right about that.

When I told him I was from Phoenix, he had asked me about Joe Arpaio. Of course, I don't think highly of him. This man told me that he had at one time been arrested by the sheriff's department, and had been forced to wear the pink underwear and eat one skimpy meal a day. He thought that Arpaio was good at protecting rich people - and he thought I was one of those: a yuppie who had gone to a private college. But my new acquaintance also had a problem with illegal immigrants. I never quite figured out why, but I told him people shouldn't be targeted for arrest only because of their race/culture/language.

Later, when I was out at one of the gay bars in Castro, I met a couple who had recently moved here. One was a travel nurse. He'd always wanted to live in San Francisco, but like me, had found the gay scene underwhelming. We talked about the high cost of housing in the area, the way gay men seem to run their relationships, and how SF compares to places like Seattle and Minneapolis.

The most interesting moment came probably when Tim, the partner of the travel nurse, began a conversation about gay marriage, which he plainly told me he was against. He was curious, w, given my faith, what I thought about it. After explaining my somewhat complex libertarian ideas about the government's involvement with marriage, he agreed with me on one point - that marriage is a word that refers to something that is religious. He said that gay activists will lose battles for equal rights more and more because they insist on labeling these things with a religious label, which is like sticking your finger in the eye of the dragon of the religious right.

From a strategy perspective, he may have a very good point, but from a perspective of principle, I'm not sure he does, since we've seen that separate but equal doesn't cut it, perhaps because separate by nature cannot be equal. Plus, most all of the gay marriage debate is just about using people's bigotry as a tool for people to gain political power. That's nothing new. Only the morbidly homophobic care enough to get openly angry about it. Republicans are great at affirming the soft prejudice that offers smiles and jokes with you in person but pulls the lever for anti-gay legislation on election day.

The bus conversations are interesting here. Last night I talked with a professional singer and conservatory student, who had been a "vagabond" in recent days. He considered himself marginally Episcopalian (singing for jobs but not religious at all) and seemed to have spent a lot of time making connections with those in AAM and AGO, and talked about some of his strategy for working toward becoming a performer. He said he didn't know where he would be singing this season, since he could get a job with tons of commitment and rehearsal time here in the city, or take BART to a church full of old people in an outlying area and simply sightread the music each Sunday morning.

Today, I overheard two people talking about destinations in Paris and where one could get pastries of equal quality here in the city. On the same bus, toward the back, young people in their early 20s were discussing the exchange rates between various currencies - some of them obscure. They appeared to be students. I've hardly heard those kinds of conversations anywhere in Phoenix, let alone on the bus. What does that tell you?

Observations from San Francisco

2008-07-09T01:19:00.000-07:00

Just a few short notes:

- It's a lot harder to figure out how to take transit out of San Francisco International than it is in Oakland, although you don't have to deal with trying to pile yourself and your bags into an overcrowded shuttle bus to the station like you do in Oakland.

- This city is even more gay-friendly than I'd remembered. Not only are gays and lesbians everywhere, nobody even thinks twice about public displays of affection that would be normal for straight people. Gay-themed and targeted advertisements are everywhere on the streets. Rainbow flags on just about every block. I really feel a very strong sense of acceptance here; and not the live and let live kind of acceptance that is par for the course in Phoenix. People also don't seem to assume you're straight. Impressive.

- Incredibly diverse - I can't tell you how many languages I've heard spoken on the streets here. Minimum: several Asian languages and Indian dialects, Spanish, German and whatever language they speak in Tunisia. Several others as well that I couldn't identify. Oh- and restaurants to go with all of them.

- 85 degrees in here in the city is considered a heat wave.

- In two bars, I smelled people not doing much to hide the fact they were smoking pot.

- The last time I was here, I thought the gay scene was kinda meh. This time, the gay bar scene is still kinda meh. What's the big deal about Castro? Other than it's historic significance, it doesn't seem to be any more gay-friendly than any other part of town. Lots of our team around so I guess it's a somewhat of a "gay ghetto" - that's the only thing I see as different from Phoenix, but no different than Seattle. Plenty of straight girls hanging out in the gay neighborhood bars also (not that that's bad, just different from Phoenix).

- Hotel is superb- probably 2.5 to 3 stars for a very reasonable rate. The best I've ever stayed in when I was paying myself. Why? Tenderloin location is dicey at best. Example: I saw a man showing off his cat-o-nine-tails to passersby on the street corner. The homeless situation is much worse here than in Phoenix, since the city is much more dense. People were literally sleeping on the sidewalks, even occasionally forcing you to step around them or over them. Plenty of shady characters just hanging around on the sidewalks, and they're even more creepy at night, especially women of the evening lurking in the shadows. Aggressive panhandling and other tit-for-tat tricks- "Hey there, hey there! Don't be mean. Okay? Don't be mean. I'm the joke man. I'll tell you a joke!"

- Buskers in all major plaza areas - sometimes more than one competing for attention.

I really like this city, but I still don't think it has anything on Seattle.

What am I supposed to do with all this, exactly?

2008-06-30T20:23:00.001-07:00

Seriously Southern Baptist
There was some fuzzy point when I was about a little over halfway through college, after a lot of education and exploration, when I realized that I wasn't going to be a Southern Baptist music minister. Actually, that's what I went to college to do, and why I went to the college I went to.

With just that statement in front of you, you might think that I had some crisis of faith. I didn't. My regular readers might think that because I had stopped condemning myself because of my sexual orientation, I didn't want to be in a denomination that did this so systematically and forcefully. If you think that, you'd be kinda right . . . because I knew staying in the closet (which I define as lying about your sexuality when asked a direct question about it) wasn't an option. While through my childhood I'd never been happy or comfortable about my differences from other people, I had no desire for conformity solely for being accepted or more popular.

I do not know of any *Southern* Baptist churches that have openly gay ministers of any kind. Even those with female deacons or pastors were often "disfellowshipped". So, my career path crashed into the ground like a hastily-folded paper airplane.

Of course, I had been in the Southern Baptist denomination for about 4 years up to that point, all the while attending First Southern, which was on the corner of 33rd Avenue and Camelback, right next to the Grand Canyon University campus. I was very involved with the music program there, as I had been in the church I grew up in- singing in the youth choir while still in High School, playing Euphonium in the orchestra, singing in the adult choir, acting in a couple of church musicals, volunteering to sort music before Wednesday rehearsals, and even swinging a few bells. (I was never really good with handbells.) I'd become increasingly active in some of the local denominational things, like attending the statewide convention, and was considering doing practicums and internships at some of the more musically-traditional churches in the area.

I'd laid a lot of groundwork and built much of my training on this model - of the church musician as minister.

What does vocation mean exactly?
So, as I began my explorations through several mainline Protestant churches on my way to my eventual home in the Episcopal Church, I continued to find myself dismayed that hardly any of these denominations had this kind of view of the music ministry as a vocation.

My observation has been that people who are recognized as having a vocation are the ones who are in spiritual leadership of one sort of another in the churches, and musicians are seen as secular professionals who are brought in to do a specific task. At minimum, they are asked to practice their art and craft in a way that is religiously edifying, whether or not they themselves are religious. More rarely is a higher view of this type of work, where the music leaders themselves are people of Christian faith who are fulfilling a religious purpose, but not necessarily as ministers who are called-out by either a designated group of the faithful or seen as being called directly by God in some way.

Coming from this rich evangelical and Southern Baptist experience, this has been the one characteristic of sacramental church practice that has most frustrated me. Part of this is tied in to what I've sometimes seen in my own denomination as clergy somehow are seen as bearers of the kernel of religious truth that is, at best, inadequately accessible to the person in the pew. They are the magisterium - the trustees and guardians of a sacred, and mysterious (or is it secret?) truth.

Don't think I'm dissing this view - there's a lot to be said for it on numerous levels, and, although I've cast it in a negative light in the above paragraph, I buy into a lot of it for a whole host of reasons which I don't want to go into in this essay.

Yet, somehow, there must be some type of qualification to this - because the trouble comes when those who hold the keys to the kingdom of heaven fail to acknowledge the mediation of God's power through other instruments - most often in the sacramental and everyday functions of the laity. One could even cynically argue that what is created by this system is a self-perpetuating class of individuals whose goal is to promote their own caste, perhaps creating useful byproducts in the process that may happen to edify others on the outside.

While I feel there is a lot of just plain sinful clericalism out there, especially in liturgical and sacramental churches, I don't believe this cynical view is accurate.

What are we - what am I - left with?

My own questions
During my senior year of college, I began some very informal discussions with various Episcopal clergy about becoming a priest. At around that time, I was told that there was a "glut" of clergy, and your best hope for finding a job if you were entering seminary was to try to get a job as a Lutheran pastor, since they were having a shortage.

I was also told that while it was certainly possible for gays to be ordained, you pretty much had to be a stellar and overwhelmingly ( by this I think they meant overqualified) candidate to be considered, whereas straight people could simply have the desire, be competently mediocre, not have any type of noticeable psychological issues, be well-liked and would pretty much make it through the process and be on their own for seminary funding. (By the way, these comments came from a straight male priest.)

Some observed that those tending to make it through the process were trendy liberal white people. Others said that I was simply too young to be asking the questions, and should wait 10 years until I was about 30 to consider it.

The messages here were discouraging, but not personally so, since they didn't really have to do with me. As I've had people I consider friends and close acquaintances move through the process to be ordained either as priests or deacons, I've observed some of the qualities they have.

All of these are unquestionably committed to God and undeniably qualified and competent for the work they're doing. Whether or not God has actually called them, I can't say, and I'm not sure anyone else could either.

We have one call
In fact, I think we have it very wrong. When I sat on a discernment committee recently for a friend who was considering the priesthood, I told him frankly that my opinion was this: we only receive one call as Christians, and that's the call to follow Jesus. There isn't another call we have. As a consequence of this call, we may be led to into a profession where we devote all of our work life to walking Jesus' path, to the best of our understanding and ability, and serving the Body of Christ through those actions.

That means, then, that I don't presently think that people are called by God to be deacons, priests, or bishops. I think the Church calls people to be deacons, priests, or bishops.

Semantics of the ordination vows aside, this view really leads me to think that all of us are called by God, and any of us can be led to follow God's call in a particular path in God's service. Even in the midst of this, I am mindful of the Roman Catholic teaching that if we are going to be serious Christians, we must aspire to be saints - just as much as Peter, Paul, Barnabas, Luther, and Bonhoeffer.

My personal frustrations
While one friend suggested that I would benefit from some formal discernment work, I hadn't really gotten to any point where I felt it necessary to discuss any of this in a formal way whatsoever, especially in the group setting of some type of committee. It's been my observation that the Episcopal church tends to have this black and white distinction of ministry. (Crudely, those with collars are ministers, and those without probably aren't supposed to be, unless they're walking around in habits or something. If you are serious about it, you should be wearing a collar, or trying to.)

So, my observation has been that folks in a discernment committee are really trained to ask questions about whether or not you're called to be a priest or a deacon, not really to help you figure out what you are supposed to do with yourself in the context of ministry, although I realize there's a big push to ideally have ongoing church-level committees do this. To me, they'd then either push you toward being a priest or away from being a priest, but not necessarily be able to help you move along any other axis.

It was about a year and a half ago - around January of 2007, that I decided to throw in the towel on any of the ordained ministry stuff. I was very frustrated at all of the politics of the church on all levels, and did not at all see myself as able to make any type of commitment necessary for ordained ministry.

Gradual rediscovery of forgotten passion
In this past year and a half, my focus has shifted considerably in the music direction. I'd carved out time to play with community bands, looking for scattered one-time singing gigs, did a couple of auditions, did some intensive graduate-school research, and decided to step out and sing at another large church in the Phoenix area for a while. I've also started to play with the instrumental group associated with the Phoenix Metropolitan Men's Chorus. (It's called the Phoenix Metropolitan Philharmonic Ensemble. But we only have an odd collection of about 10 - 12 players, so I think "gay band" is a good nickname. I'll have more to write about this later.)

What I have been taking away from all of it was this, and it really hit home to me this week with the conclusion of our Gay Band performances, was another example of how I was able to be a musician again. I've noticed that every time recently that I'm able to engage with music in a very serious way - whether it's singing for a performance, teaching a class, playing piano for a Taizé service, or playing the Euphonium - I am truly energized by being able to be a musician in a significant way.

If there's anything that's speaking to my heart, it's this same feeling I've had about music. There is an intensity there that I have to pursue. I sometimes forget about it or ignore it out of necessity if I get too busy and too stressed with other immediately pressing concerns.

I know I can't ever let it go.

A Maze of Contradictions and Conflicts
The trouble is, I can't let go of the other side of the coin either. I don't want to be a "casual Christian", as the CCM song goes. I know when I hear the Roman teaching about sainthood that those words are for me. In my mind, serving God must be about doing the work that God has commanded us to do, and the way we hear and receive that is through the Church in all of its levels.

The trouble is that I just want there to be an easy to discern path that says if you're both A and B (with a little C thrown in), walk through door Y.

Instead, what I find is that I don't seem to be able to walk down one path easily at all, being the mysterious conglomeration of oddities that I seem to be. In politics, I do not fit in with either Republicans or Democrats, conservatives or liberals, since in very twisted ways I'm as much one as the other. Most all of my gay friends have given up on organized religion and/or God, and often wonder how I can be so irrational as to believe in as much as I do. In church, my impression is that my denomination doesn't really know what to do with laypeople who are serious about their faith. And let's not even touch what the Church has to say to gay people besides "Most of us don't think you're living in sin, but beyond that, we can't really give you any moral direction or support in faithfully living out your life. Sorry!"

What am I supposed to do with all this, exactly?

How does Phoenix stack up?

2008-06-23T21:35:00.000-07:00

I saw this post on Valleywag talking about a mapping system Startup Warrior has put together.

Take just a minute and compare the number of startups we have here in the Phoenix metro area with those in other metro areas that are far, far smaller in population. Also, note that Phoenix itself has very, very few. Again, don't believe the hype coming out of city hall - ours is not a forward thinking city - and we need to do a lot more than just installing light rail if we want to move forward.

And, if that's not bad enough, the top story on AZCentral's local site is how the commuter bus system is now bursting at the seams because of the high gas prices. Be sure to read some of the comments at the end of the story, especially from "Rick" who writes:

Not surprising considering our extremely inadequate approach to mass transit on top of our urban sprawl. We're always reacting to something when it becomes a big problem instead of planning ahead. You can argue that its because of the gas prices, but I'd disagree and say that many people dont use mass transit because our system isnt available or even worth trying to use. Look at the 4 US cities larger and smaller than Phoenix and compare, they have subways, light rail, many more bus routes. Compared to them our system doesnt even exist.

Heres a chart showing we rank 13th based on passenger miles and unlinked trips (meaning a person is counted each time they enter instead of once for the whole trip). Were the 5th largest city in the US yet dont even register in the top 10.

RANK URBANIZED AREA UNLINKED TRIPS PASSENGER MILES
=====================================================

1. New York-Newark, NY-NJ-CT 3,383,886.2 18,966,321.2
2. Los Angeles-Long Beach 606,842.5 2,790,328.1
3. Chicago, IL-IN 582,785.7 3,751,324.8
4. Philadelphia, PA-NJ-DE-MD 350,517.6 1,589,177.9
5. Miami, FL 151,222.1 756,782.9
6. Dallas-Fort Worth 85,764.4 436,105.1
7. Boston, MA-NH-RI 396,087.1 1,888,774.3
8. Washington, DC-VA-MD 442,936.2 2,266,691.6
9. Detroit, MI 45,393.2 242,781.5
10. Houston, TX 95,881.6 565,113.0
11. Atlanta, GA 147,582.3 802,673.6
12. San Francisco-Oakland, CA 415,112.8 2,233,441.3
13. Phoenix-Mesa, AZ 55,334.2 224,274.4

Some other commentators talk about how subsidized these bus rides actually are. To a point, they're right. Check out some of the very well-researched report by John Seemens at the Goldwater institute.

While I agree a lot with Seemen's analysis, here's the trouble with saying that we're subsidizing mass transit so heavily that the a $1.25 ride actually costs $5:

First, nobody is yet going to pay even $5 one way to wait for a horribly long time in the sun, then ride a bus with chancy air conditioning and lack of adequate seating or storage areas that in traffic goes much slower than a bicycle, often taking at least 3 to 4 times as long as a car trip.
Governments at all levels - and our society in general - has subsidized us owning automobiles for a long time. Think about what we pay for constructing roads, repairing roads, and policing the freeways.

Take just a moment to think about how much we, through government, actually pay for the privledge of owning a vehicle - and the hidden costs involved Building cities around the automobile, like we have in Phoenix, also is a drain on our economy as people spend largely unproductive time behind the wheels of their vehicles. Traffic deaths kill tens of thousands of people each year. We have to consume vast quantities of oil, which requires a foreign policy of interference in world affairs - which is both dangerous and expensive. We have air pollution that certainly may cause a lot of cancer and breathing problems, requiring medical treatment - much of which is government-provided. We have to pay heavy environmental prices for driving - that will eventually require trillions of dollars in resources to even slightly ameliorate.

The only way to tackle these kinds of problems is not through chipping away piecemeal at government programs or imposing bulky and inefficient socialist systems that leave everyone in misery. We have been conditioned towards incrementalism and lulled by the false dichotomy of either Republican tax cuts and "deregulation" versus Democrat gimmicks that might even make some feel good at the expense of a sicker society.

All of us need to be advocates for the wholesale overhaul of society. And this is why I don't support some of these hardline conservative Republicans who might give us tax cuts here and there or Democrats who will let gays get married and at least talk about ending the drug war. These aren't even really steps in the right direction, because they only serve to further screw up an already screwed up system.

Unfortunately, as I've said before on here, the road to heaven first winds through hell, and we won't get the free society we all yearn for - whether we know it or not - until the current one collapses under its own weight.

This isn't something I want to happen. It is simply something that will happen. It's the only thing that will wake us up.

Softening the blow of the apocolypse

2008-06-19T22:20:00.001-07:00

Back in about 2005 and 2006, I was living in an uptown Phoenix hi-rise, and I happened to hear about a weekly freedom-community breakfast that was held each Saturday nearly across the street from me.

The person who chaired the meeting, Ernest Hancock, was somebody I remembered as having run for some high political office as a Libertarian when I was young. I remember watching him on debates on our PBS affiliate here. Later, I remember when he came to speak to our high school government class (which, by the way, was nothing but a big joke, as each of my non-honors HS academic classes were, but there was no more challenging alternative offered). It's also worth noting that the Libertarians were the ones who best responded to requests from teachers to send out representatives to talk to us.

When I told this story to some others, some state Libertarian Party leaders thought that this was the moment of my conversion and embracing of most of my libertarian ideas.

It wasn't, though, because I grew up in a very libertarian-leaning Republican household, so I was exposed to these ideas from a young age, even if they weren't very organized.

While I'm not active in Libertarian politics now (my work for the church was - and is - far more important to me than being a politician), my closer association with these folks was extremely beneficial on a number of levels, not the least of which was being exposed to how real libertarian activism works and how the ideals of libertarian thought were put into practice.

Most all attending the meetings were staunch Second Amendment supporters and active gun owners. Many, if not most, of those I met were hardcore Republicans and social conservatives who had a lot of overlapping ideas with pure libertarian thinking.

Of course, I've heard a lot of crazy things out of people in the freedom community: nutbars who I'm sure are mellowed out on pot, jaw-droppingly racist people that probably dress up in white sheets on the weekend, pie-in-the-sky theorists who are raising money to crash a space vehicle full of CFC-filled aerosol cans on Mars, New Age crystal-rubbers who are ready to jump on a spaceship in 2012 . . . you get my drift.

Some of the most interesting characters I heard about were people who floated way below the radar, perhaps not even carrying a driver's license or identification, having an ambiguous street address, and living totally off-grid in what I assume are well-armed compounds in the desert.

These hardcore members of the freedom community were the examples many said we needed to follow, because bad times - horrible times - were on the horizon.

I wouldn't have been inclined to believe them, except for the one thing that sticks in my mind from those days over 2 years ago. A couple of those I associated with most closely were insistent in their predictions about how the dollar was going to "take a dump", and how much we needed to be ready for it.

Of course I know now that what they predicted has come true, as anyone who hasn't jumped on the spaceship yet will know.

The scarier thing? The same folks who were talking about this loss in dollar value are now talking about the Second Great Depression that's coming and what kind of effect that will have on us. Recent mainstream news reports about the Royal Bank of Scotland seem to support this idea.

If they're right, it's going to be dire - the question is just how dire how many of our social and economic freedoms will be taken away by the government as it pretends to solve the problem (which will solve itself if given enough time).

Some of my close friends have already begun to make plans about how they will respond. Some of them have talked to me about buying guns and learning how to shoot with them to get ready for the rioting, pillaging, violent mayhem, and martial law that will be coming. Others are actively making plans to leave the country within the next 12 to 16 months, mailing their keys to the bank and relying on a likely favorable immigration status to get their feet in the door.

This talk of chaos is almost assuredly alarmist and overblown. Yet massacres, panic, and violence are not out of the question.

What will be our response? Are we making plans to flee? Are we gathering our guns about us and building our underground family fortress in the desert? Are we stocking up on cheap vodka? Are we donning our camouflage outfits and practicing paramilitary maneuvers in Kingman? Are we learning to enjoy the taste of crickets, rabbits, cacti, and rattlesnake? Will we give up and take our chances with the rest of the throngs of humanity and hope we beat the odds? Will we stockpile food in our suburban homes and hope the bank doesn't foreclose? Shall we buy an old RV and pretend we're on vacation until the gas runs out? Will we be resolved to stay in the city, and convince ourselves that instead of starving, we will die a noble death as we "challenge the cult of the omnipotent state"?

I don't know what I would do. (I know some of what I wouldn't do based on my convictions.) While it may be too late for myself and many others, we'd be doing ourselves a disservice if we did not at least now consider the answers to these questions.

Do the trick before you get a treat

2008-06-17T22:20:00.000-07:00

Here's an interesting take on the whole California gay marriage thing . . .

Leah Garchik in the San Francisco Chronicle ran a short blurb last Friday about Mayor Gavin Newsom's latest eyebrow-raiser:

Mayor Gavin Newsom has written to instrumental and vocal ensembles that are supported by Grants for the Arts, asking small groups - from one to six performers - to play two-hour sets of "music appropriate for the occasion" at City Hall during peak wedding times next week.
This sounds like a lovely concept, but perhaps the wording of the call for volunteers is a bit heavy-handed: "With City funding comes civic responsibility. ... We expect that Grants for the Arts organizations will make every effort to cooperate with these requests."

While it's unmistakable that Gavin Newsom is a socialist, given our current screwed-up political environment, I can't help but commend him for a lot of work that he's done in San Francisco, and he's a great friend to the gay community by helping to push through gay marriage. (Which, even some gay people, including myself, don't advocate in terms of public policy.)

But this article points to another great truth regarding the overall failure of a socialist system to yield good results . . .

Here's how it works: if you take government money, you become the government's bitch.

The article I referenced above goes on to talk about how some of these musicians were grumbling about the mayors words regarding "civic responsibility", mentioning that the mix of politics and art is "unseemly".

First - these musicians need to quit their whining. Anytime you take money, it comes with strings. In almost no instance will somebody hand you money and not tell you how to spend it - in one way or another. And even in those cases where the instructions for the use of the funds are not made explicit (which does happen with some academic type of prizes, of course) , there is almost always an expectation of better things from the recipient of the funds.

If you're gonna take the city money, you better start dancing when they pull you're marionette strings.

And, pardon me if this whole thing about the mix of politics and art is unseemly. How many times in the history of music have politics and music been intertwined in one way or another? It's always about politics - from the musicians who were supported by the royalty or other noble landed gentry to the many nationalist composers of the Romantic period who were at times either supporting government ideals or writing reactionary, protest works against them.

So, musicians cannot criticize their patrons on one hand when our musical ancestors have intentionally mixed themselves with politics to stay employed.

Unless you're taking after Charles Ives and can write your symphonies when riding the subway to your insurance day job, you better get yourself entangled with an organization if you want to be able to both fiddle and eat.

While we all want to selfishly live in the best place for ourselves (and I'd be the first in line to move to San Francisco), all of us would do well to again remember the ideal, instead of cheering on triumphs of progressiveness within our current irreparably broken system.

Instead, we must imagine and promote a world where the government does not tax us - waste half of our money in the process of deciding how to spend it - and then only funds things that most taxpayers feel are worthless.

Not just the geodesic dome . . .

2008-06-17T22:04:00.000-07:00

I came across a great article in New Yorker magazine on the work and thought of Buckminster Fuller. As I read, it brought to mind some of Stewart Brand's comments about Fuller in his book _How Buildings Learn_ , which I highly recommend to anyone with an interest in either architecture or systems analysis/theory.

Here's a quick excerpt:

All the Dymaxion projects generated a great deal of hype, and that was clearly Fuller’s desire. All of them also flopped. The first prototype of the Dymaxion Vehicle had been on the road for just three months when it crashed, near the entrance to the Chicago World’s Fair; the driver was killed, and one of the passengers—a British aviation expert—was seriously injured. Eventually, it was revealed that another car was responsible for the accident, but only two more Dymaxion Vehicles were produced before production was halted, in 1934. Only thirteen models of the Dymaxion Bathroom—a single unit that came with a built-in tub, toilet, and sink—were constructed before the manufacturer pulled the plug on that project, in 1936. The Dymaxion Deployment Unit, which Fuller imagined being used as a mobile shelter, failed because after the United States entered the Second World War he could no longer obtain any steel. In 1945, Fuller attempted to mass-produce the Dymaxion House, entering into a joint effort with Beech Aircraft, which was based in Wichita. Two examples of the house were built before that project, too, collapsed. (The only surviving prototype, known as the Wichita House, looks like a cross between an onion dome and a flying saucer; it is now on display at the Henry Ford Museum, in Dearborn, Michigan.)

Following this string of disappointments, Fuller might have decided that his “experiment” had run its course. Instead, he kept right on going. Turning his attention to mathematics, he concluded that the Cartesian coördinate system had got things all wrong and invented his own system, which he called Synergetic Geometry. Synergetic Geometry was based on sixty-degree (rather than ninety-degree) angles, took the tetrahedron to be the basic building block of the universe, and avoided the use of pi, a number that Fuller found deeply distasteful. By 1948, Fuller’s geometric investigations had led him to the idea of the geodesic dome—essentially, a series of struts that could support a covering skin. That summer, he was invited to teach at Black Mountain College, in North Carolina, where some of the other instructors included Josef Albers, Willem and Elaine de Kooning, John Cage, and Merce Cunningham. (“I remember thinking it’s Bucky Fuller and his magic show,” Cunningham would later recall of Fuller’s arrival.) Toward the end of his stay, Fuller and a team of students assembled a trial dome out of Venetian-blind slats. Immediately upon being completed, the dome sagged and fell in on itself. (Some of the observers referred to it as a “flopahedron.”) Fuller insisted that this outcome had been intentional—he was, he said, trying to determine the critical point at which the dome would collapse—but no one seems to have believed this. The following year, Anne Fuller sold thirty thousand dollars’ worth of I.B.M. stock to finance Bucky’s continuing research, and in 1950 he succeeded in erecting a dome fifty feet in diameter.

It's definitely worth reading the whole article.

The most important thing I took away from this was that obviously Fuller was much more of a theorist than a practical architect. Perhaps one could think of him as something like a social philosopher who practiced architecture. While that idea is interesting itself, it led me to explore the other idea about how one could develop a system of thought and then practice it through a surprising, or tangentially-related field.

I'm still trying to think about different research areas if I decide to do some type of graduate study, and I'm sure some of you may remember the several references I've made to the intersection of urban planning, architecture, theology, and music.

It seems to me that at least one way to begin to think in an interdisciplinary way is to study the thought of people like Buckminister Fuller - who, though not a practically successful architect, certainly had a lot of fervent ideology that is certainly worth exploring.

Drinks at a hotel bar

2008-06-14T20:55:00.000-07:00

Most of you friends know that I enjoy wandering around downtown and soaking in its urban energy.

That's what I ended up doing last night since I wanted to get out of the house after a few hours of much-needed rest. So after being disappointed again at the pathetic level of activity at about 9PM on the streets of America's 5th largest city, I wandered into a hotel bar/restaurant and sat down in an empty chair.

Let me stop ya for a sec so you know right here that if I go out to any kind of nightlife activity, it's almost always to a gay bar - so that's the scene I'm familiar with.

So, there are several hotels around here, and I like going into their bars. Not necessarily for a (really expensive) drink, but just because some are quite swanky, and I'm an elegance whore like that.

One person I know who travels extensively for work told me that she had quite the experience in hotel bars - mostly with men surreptitiously pulling rings off their right hand fingers as they're sliding into the seats next to her. I have to say that the curiously sinister part of me wants to watch a lot of these interactions . . . maybe like watching monkeys in the zoo.

Last night was certainly an opportune time to experience some of these things. I sat down at the bar, ordered some food and some soda, and began to absent-mindedly watch soccer (what's the point of that sport anyway?) on the TVs in there.

Gradually, I became aware of the cast of characters surrounding me. To my immediate right was an older gentleman with white hair and neatly trimmed beard wearing a nondistinctive baseball cap. I didn't really notice him much, until I realized he was drinking Budwiser after Budwiser. He was already sitting down when I had arrived with a half-empty bottle in front of him, and he drank at least 4 more bottles while I was there. He didn't say much, but when I looked into his glazed and teary eyes, I couldn't help but feel sad for him - whatever his circumstances were.

On my near right were a couple from somewhere in a colder climate, who had flown down here to see some type of sporting event, having gotten Southwest airlines tickets. They were mostly talking about fare prices on airlines and commenting on how amazed they were at the fact that Phoenix was a "ghost town" of a city.

On the far left of the bar sat a friendly Native American fellow with another woman, who I assumed was his girlfriend. Later, after he became more and more inebriated as she sat mostly sober, I found out that she was his mother. (After telling this to a friend of mine today, he said, at least it's good that he's not drinking alone.)

After the chatty out of town couple left, a young girl come in and sat next to me. She was one of those fascinating characters that you watch on newer, trendy movies. Full of personality, a sarcastic wit, and keen observation, all wrapped up in a slightly granola, liberal bohemian package. When she sat down, I could tell that she'd already enjoyed quite a bit of the juice before she arrived, and proceeded to order Wild Turkey bourbon - straight.

The friendly drunk fellow with his mother was surprised that she was drinking something like this, and I wondered about it too, especially since, with wide-eyed innocence, she told me she was from Iowa, but had lived here for a little over a year.

As she became increasingly inebriated, she told me a lot of juicy details - most of which came after I moved into the seat next to her to hear here better as I said that "my boat doesn't float in your direction . . . if you know what I mean." (She was very interested in whether I liked the brown-haired one or the blond one in Dukes of Hazzard, so I think she got it, but I don't remember that show well enough to tell for sure . . . I think I said something about not liking yokels.)

She'd been a teacher and a nurse in other cities, but gave this up for a wild and free life of moving around from city to city with few possessions, and moving from one low-level job to another. So, she said she lived in an apartment complex just up the street from the bar. She didn't know it when she moved in, but found out later - because of the women outside leaning into car windows - that the apartments were basically flop-houses for prostitutes. (I then remembered that I'd seen several scantily-clad women walking around in front of there, showing men into their places.) She worked somewhere in the mental health industry, and was familiar with the Magellan psychosis intake center just a few blocks from where I work.

Aside from some of her self-deprecating mumblings, the most fascinating part of the whole encounter was watching some of the interactions between her and the green-eyed, black haired, tall, dark, and handsomely hot bartender.

Keep in mind that I don't even understand the subtleties of gay flirting, let alone what happens with straight people.

It was late, and they were getting ready to close up the bar, I became very concerned about her - since she just looked like a complete lush at that point. I told her that I would walk her home, but she said that she was going to "stumble over to Seamus McCaffrey's" (an Irish pub several blocks away) or "jump on somebody's Harley".

My eyebrows must've gone up, because I said to her (with all of my wondrously suave and thoroughly honed skills with women), "Oh, so you're going to trick it."

I wasn't sure that means the same thing in straight culture as it does in gay culture, but I asked two of my brunch friends this morning about whether or not she would have gotten it. The answer was something about that being a prostitute's terms for her johns.

She didn't seem to react at all to the question, so I'm not sure what that means.

No matter - I have a good spin on it: I came *this* close to taking a hooker home!

Do we know - I mean really know - what's coming?

2008-06-14T20:25:00.000-07:00

Tonight I came across a fairly technical interview, originally from Cluster magazine by way of the Doors of Perception blog that focuses on the interlinked ideas of economics, urban design (and management of that design), architecture, and how all of these will respond to the spiking energy costs.

Here are a couple of highlights:

All cities are part of a larger ecology of resource extraction, energy use, environmental impact, waste flows, and social networks. The rules that govern how this larger ecology works - or not - are political rules shaped by an era in which we could burn cheap fossil fuel while ignoring the ecological consequences. That era is now over, and its eco-cidal politics (and economic development) have become obstacles to our survival. The only meaningful task of design, now, is to help people transform the ways they obtain food, energy, materials, and water - in cities, or outside them. This kind of design is of course “political” in that it opposes the demands of industrial society for limitless resources in a world whose carrying capacity is finite. But ecodesign - and hence, eco politics - is about new ways of inhabiting places; it is not about new ways of organising representative government.

and

Cluster: Many cities invest in the quality of their architecture to show the world an attractive, dynamic face. The big names and big projects are given the task of conveying the centrality and ability of cities to attract high-class players. But the dynamic image of a city does not always correspond to its ability to make room for the creative energies of its inhabitants.

JT. Show me a city with a “dynamic image” and I will show you an unsustainable city. “Dynamic” usually means high entropy buildings, financial speculation on a massive scale, and a low degree of social participation. From now on, the most interesting cities will be those whose citizens are able to invest their energy and creativity on “re-inhabitation” within the unique ecosystems of their place. This approach will often involve adaptive or more intense uses of existing infrastructure rather than the construction of signature buildings - and sometimes this approach will mean building nothing, nothing at all. To live sustainably we need to place more value on the here and now: a lot of destruction is caused when design is obsessed with the there, and the next - and the “dynamic”.

Read the whole article here.

Ironically, two of my friends were just having this conversation about what truly bad shape Phoenix is going to be in if the economy continues to worsen. While lately I've heard some commentators say that economic figures lately are looking better, I'm hearing others say that the continued rise in fuel costs will plainly bring about a recession, and more mainstream writers are continuing to talk about a depression, although it seems like this talk has lessened a great deal over the past 4 to 6 weeks.

Regardless, I'm hearing about more people here in Phoenix being out of work and also hearing about layoffs in companies, especially those that seem to rely on disposable income.

Is the future of Greater Phoenix a bizarre form of picture-perfectly identical suburban homes on the fringes of town gradually deteriorating into abandonment and desperation? Our whole economy of Phoenix is built around being able to drive long distances, to get to the mall, to get to the store, etc.

Some acquaintances of mine continue to trumpet the light rail, having this view that people will just "take the light rail" everywhere. That may work for those living in the central corridor, but it's far, far from the panacea that these people think that it will be. Molly in Maryvale and Paul in Peoria will not be able to just hop on some form of mass transit and get to their work in, say, east Phoenix.

We may very well see SUVs abandoned to the repo man as people simply cannot afford to drive them. Or worse- we'll see formerly middle-class people living out of the SUVs. Can you imagine huge parking lots full of SUVs in our modern version of Hoovervilles?

Yes, this is worst-case here . . . but imagine what a post-economic apocolypse Phoenix would look like? A lot of us living in central cities are going to be very hungry - we don't know how to grow our own food, and there's nowhere for us to do it. If buses are still running to get working people to their jobs, they will be filled to overflowing. Among the lucky few who come together, households will have to be combined into something resembling mini communes.

Of course, we could go on and on with these kinds of speculations - but the important thing to remember is that the economy will adjust after a long period of settling down into a wholly new life and things will get better. They won't be the "better" that we think of today, since so much of our wealth and prosperity over these past 80 years has depended on cheap and easy access to energy.

But as those who are my age get firmly into our middle age years, we may have an amazing world we live in that is far cleaner, far healthier, far more sustainable, and far less wasteful and far more innovative than we do now.

The question is how much suffering (and even bloodshed) will there be before this happens?

I hate to tell all y'all, but it's going to hit all of us powerfully, which means that the poor family we hear about living in the shelter, or the low-hanging-fruit friend we hear about who's never been able to hold down a decent job are what we all could very well experience not long from now.

Because we do reap what we sow, and it's gonna get personal.

Facebook, Twitter, and Blogging - the right data in the right place

2008-06-09T10:52:00.000-07:00

I spent 5 days in Flagstaff last week, and had a very enjoyable time. I did some blogging about it, but for whatever reason, blogger doesn't seem to work really well on my Mac laptop, and I'm not sure why. I'm still trying to learn its quirks and differences from Windows.

Blog problems aside, you think I might have sent out E-mails to folks, but I'm not interested in using up a lot of bandwidth, and I don't think people read E-mail much anyway anymore, between spam and mostly unwanted newsletters. I've been blogging here for a long time, as many of my online friends have, and I appreciate them for it, because it's an easier way to keep up with what they're doing and saves me space in my Inbox for other items.

Some have commented to me in other places about my writing on here being "verbose". That's true. I don't post shorter news items or commentary simply because I have no desire to be a journalist with an agenda. (I just have an agenda.)

While you might not see those shorter things here, instead of E-mailing out jokes, news stories, or other similar things, for now, I've decided to try using Twitter as a substitute for that. It's not pushing what I think is important into your inbox - you can decide to read it if you want.

The whole "what are you doing" concept of Twitter is simply irritating by itself. If you're going to tell me about what you're having for dinner or what time your plane landed, do it somewhere else. If I'm relatively bored, I may choose to do it on Facebook which is full of all kinds of self-indulgent silliness and time-wasting fun anyway.

And, sorry, but I'm not going to get those updates on my cellphone. That has a ridiculous impact on productivity if you're willing to allow yourself to be interrupted by text messages of what all of your various friends and acquaintances are doing each minute. I love you, but I'll catch up with your tweets later, thanks.

One has to be aware of the transience of these types of communication media and the importance of the data that's being stored in the respective places - both because of privacy and because of the value of the data itself. Of course, Facebook and Twitter (and Blogger, I'm sure) will go out of style, but I'm paying attention to what types of information I'm putting in there. Facebook material is either fluff or standard profile stuff which I can mostly rattle off anyway in an instant on any social site. Twitter updates are probably only interesting for about 2 weeks, at the very most, so if they vanish, it's no great loss. I do care about what I write here, and I can export that and back it up locally if I need to.

Let me know what you all think of this use for Twitter, or if any of you know of some better way to do this (that is getting social traction so it's not completely unfamiliar to people).

Music, Drugs, and Government in Mexico

2008-06-02T21:07:00.000-07:00

In one of the most complicated and convoluted stories I've read in a long time, The Telegraph reports on musicians killed in Mexico's growing drug war.

I was about to write a post reacting to some of this, but the further I read in the article, the more I realized I couldn't really say anything about it to make sense of it.

When you first start reading it, you may quickly think that these musicians are speaking out against the drug traffickers in Mexico, which the article says has now become the top country in the world for drug trafficking.

(Incidentally, some of my libertarian acquaintances who are local leaders and activists in the Arizona LP have talked about the small-scale invasions that happen regularly on the border, with these drug-money armed militias fighting with both Mexican police and our own federal agents, turning our border literally into a battlefield.)

But as you read further in the article, these musicians are said to be singing "drug ballads" as part of a whole "narco culture", referring to these particular songs as narco corridos. Further, it goes on to reference women attending funerals of the victims of drug violence who will one minute be mourning the loss and the next minute will show off their opium plants growing in plain sight.

We may not acknowledge it from our safe places on the north side of the border, but this is a violent country with a highly complex culture most of us who are middle-class white people just don't even begin to understand.

(A side note: the article spends a few paragraphs toward the end talking about how these "corridos" were vehicles for the distribution of information, as these songs about drug killings would be passed around by word of mouth when modern methods of news distribution were not available. Now musicians are paid to write songs about drug leaders in order to increase the kingpens' street cred. An interesting study on music as propaganda, no doubt.)

The Future of Greater Phoenix

2008-05-26T19:43:00.001-07:00

Downtown Buzz

Those friends who read my blog will remember a few rants where I've talked about Phoenix not being much of a real city. While I don't mean that literally, of course, I continue to be frustrated about how far behind Phoenix when we compare it to other Western cities.

Any city on the West Coast, Salt Lake City, and Denver are just a few places that spring immediately to mind. Let's also not leave out Albuquerque, which ranks a lot higher on the coolness scale for a lot of young people than our city does, even though they are not as progressive as we are in some ways. There's even a better vibe in many of the metropolises in Texas.

There were a handful of articles that sparked my interest around all of this today. First, a post by Mark Shinkonis up on Downtown Phoenix Journal talks about younger people moving to downtown:

Things are changing. This time looking for a renter using only craig's list I'm getting far younger people coming to look at the place. (Last time I looked for renters was in 2006.) There's definitely a buzz starting among the 20 somethings about downtown being a cool place to live. I expect that buzz will continue to grow. Hopefully rentals will continue to stay affordable in neighborhoods like mine.

While I don't have any scientific evidence I can pull out of my back pocket on this, I'd say that if kids are saying a place is cool, that's the first thing you need to begin to achieve a critical mass of urban energy to really attract residents, businesses, and investment in general into a new area.

Energy Crisis Consequences

You also may remember that I've mentioned how much I diligently Jon Talton over on Rogue Columnist - highly recommend to anybody who has an interest in the intersection of politics and Phoenix urban issues, especially highlighting some of the ways Arizona tends to (badly) do business.

Talton pointed the way to a "Weekend Must Read" in the Washington Post about the consequences of this "Peak Oil" phenomenon. (I've not done much research on the facts, so I'm not in a position to judge it, but I have two friends who follow the issue who completely agree with this interpretation of the available data.) Read the short Washington Post essay here. When mainstream media outlets start mentioning things like this, it moves from the level of conspiracy theory or doomsday internet yowling to something that somebody wants on our radar screens.

As I've been riding my bike around a lot lately, I've thought more and more about what our Phoenix metro area will look like. In many ways, our whole city is built on having cheap and abundant energy. Some people think nothing of driving 25 miles round-trip to work. Others who simply "drive a lot" will put 50 miles on their cars each day. One friend told me that he recently paid $90 to fill up the gas tank of his beautiful car with premium-grade gasoline.

Also, Greater Phoenix wouldn't be what it is today without lots of air conditioning, which takes a tremendous amount of energy. This is a city that exploded in population because of air conditioning. We were only given the potential to be the 5th largest city in America because of these things. (And some would say we got there because we continue to pave over our desert in ever-expanding circles of real estate development.)

If the price of gas goes up to $12 per gallon - which isn't completely out of the question - what are we going to do? Will we be able to adapt fast enough? Will we be forced to get rid of our air-conditioners and migrate en masse to Northern Arizona to spend the summer? What will our lives look like here?

Adaptive Citizenry + Backward-looking, Slow Government = A Unique City

We're not going to be able to build mass transit options fast enough here, so Phoenix will be in a difficult position in the medium-term. What are we going to do for the next 10 or 15 years while we struggle to catch up with what we should have put into place 20 years ago?

If we're smart and adaptable, we'll begin to buy bikes for ourselves. Small, neighborhood businesses and local food growers and distributions systems will begin to concentrate their supplies in clusters of retail establishments throughout the metro area. Our present government won't have the foresight to do things like rip up big box stores and parking lots themselves in any short order to help ameliorate the heat island effect, so the best solutions will come from individuals working out their own solutions through community-based networks. Our lives will change tremendously in this process, but I think we'll have a much higher quality of life at the end of it.

But most importantly - because we have not built in this infrastructure - we could become truly unique in American cities with how we respond to this energy crisis. Government can't move fast enough to help fix it, so the transit plans they offer will follow what the citizenry has begun to implement on it's own. Our local planning agencies will see where development areas are springing up and work to connect those nodes with a revamped transportation network - probably consisting of light rail and increased bus service, perhaps with neighborhood circulator vans transporting people from the outlying neighborhoods to these hubs.

Chances are, the hubs will not be shopping malls - at least not how we think of them. We may see these shopping malls be completely redesigned to focus around pedestrians, mass transit, bicycles, and walkable spaces surrounded by many apartment complexes. These very well may become the nodes in the system.

The best thing that our cities can do is eliminate any bans or special contracts awarded to taxi companies or bus services. Imagine if private companies could run their own jitneys - they would be able to figure out the market of where individuals needed to go and respond in ways that the city bus service could never do. People would be able to get rid of their cars if they had an option that was nearly as convenient - and certainly vans moving from one destination node to the other could do this.

It's the transportation pieces that will need to be dealt with first - and they won't be dealt with by slow-moving bureaucratic committees. It won't work with our short-sighted Legislature or even our comparatively progressive Phoenix City Council. The best thing they can do for us is to get out of the way . . . at least for now . . . and begin to enact ordinances and policies that dismantle our car-based society.

UPDATE: After finishing this, I came across a story on the City Journal about how private nonprofit efforts are helping New Orleans rebuild after the city government pretty much threw up their hands. Take a look: The Big Easy Rebuilds, Bottom Up

Dropping into an Evangelical Conference

2008-05-25T20:22:00.000-07:00

It's been a crazy weekend. On Thursday, I got a call from a good friend of mine, Justin, who lives in Raleigh, North Carolina who said that he just flew into town to do a presentation at a conference of GLBT-affirming Evangelicals on reaching youth with technology.

So, I made the trek via bike and bus out to the conference center in East Mesa on Friday night to see him. After I got there, I snacked on some takeout Chinese food with some people who were staffing the conference. The six or seven of us around the table were probably in age range from about 25 to (at most) 40.

We started off with a lot of chit chat, but about halfway through the topic turned toward the various worship services that they were going to have. And I should say at this point that we were in a registration room that was right next to the main hall where the plenary sessions of the conference were held. There was a music group rehearsing during this dinner break time for the closing worship service coming up later in the evening.

At about that time, I happened to turn my ear to hear the music that they were playing next door, and a lot of it were Praise & Worship pieces from the mid to late 80s. I remember them well because I played so many of them at a small storefront charismatic liturgical church I was involved with for about a year when I was a junior in college. (Ironically, the Bishop of that tiny church - one of the founders of The Evangelical Network - was also speaking at this conference - guess the music hasn't changed much.)

I mentioned something to the folks around the table about how I didn't care for this style of music in church. I had told them that I was an Episcopalian, so they asked me what kind of music we used. Without thinking, I casually replied that we used traditional music.

They looked at me, completely befuddled.

One of them then said something like, "Traditional music? They're rehearsing next door for our traditional worship tonight. The contemporary service is tomorrow morning."

It's ironic how our use of language gets in the way of real communication - but even more than that, when referring to church music (and maybe even to theological bent) - "traditional" seems to basically mean "whatever I grew up with" or "whatever I'm familiar with", regardless of its age or style.

Justin, his conference suitemate who is a music professor from Northwestern University, and I all spent a couple of hours talking about reaching people - touching on issues of authenticity and being fully present in the moment. We also discussed ideas on how to reach young people.

One point we discussed was how churches often try to start "contemporary services" thinking that doing this will attract young people. As if this were the magic formula for bringing youth in. Almost all of these efforts fail, because it is an inauthentic - or fake - experience. The importance of this can't be underestimated - especially since so many young people, who are very turned off by Christianity, see most of us as very hypocritical. Perhaps the epitome of "fake".

[RANT ALERT] I've personally seen examples of this here in Phoenix. At best, they start with well-intentioned pastors who want to do something to be relevant to the younger generation. Others may simply want to appear progressive and make themselves look especially hip, or build a megachurch that will get them looking powerful or make them a lot of money.

Regardless, they will use justifying phrases similar to "not changing the message but changing the way it's presented". And then the gimmicks and pandering begin. How about hiring out a "praise team" of about 6 university students to come and sing rock music week after week at a Sunday night service in a liturgically-oriented Lutheran church? Or pretty much overnight dismantling the organ installed in the church, eliminating the sizable choir, firing the organist and choir director, and replacing the music with something contemporary? Result? Immediately losing 1/3rd to 1/2 of the church membership. Maybe instead you'd like to try Wednesday night "Andy Griffith Bible Study"? That'll bring the young people in for sure! [END OF RANT]

All the ranting aside, the important thing that I took out of that conversation is that these efforts to reach out to others need to be organic - which, in my mind, need to come from the legitimate desires of the congregation or group that's doing the reaching. They cannot be forced upon a group from the outside.

That said, I think it is very important to note that a function of leadership is to help to inspire a group with a compelling vision. Not one that is dictated from on high, but one that comes from a deep knowledge of a congregation's desires - a prophetic word that articulates something that many people can quickly become excited about. Then, it is the job of the leaders to be bearers of the vision and to remind the wider group of the vision that is commonly shared.

While I wasn't able to spend any more time with Justin or my new acquaintance this weekend, I was very happy that I got to see him for the short time that I did, because it is always energizing and hopeful to be able to spend time with someone who shares the same passions that you do.

Perceiving Differently - Clocks, Numbers, and Music

2008-05-17T16:51:00.000-07:00

I got a new pocket watch about two weeks ago when I was out shopping somewhere untrendy. (Not WalMart . . .) It's battery-powered, but it looked appealing and had an interesting design to it, so I picked it up - and it wasn't too expensive. Good thing, because my digital watch batteries decided to die about two weeks later. Plus, it looks old-fashioned, and I like that kind of thing sometimes.

One thing I've noticed as I've been using it is how my idea of how I measure time is perceived differently when I'm looking at a clock with hands rather than numbers.

Of course, most every event in our life doesn't start at an odd time like 3:24 in the afternoon - at least not events we have control of. They start usually at the top or bottom of the hour. So when we measure time as individuals, we're usually measuring time as moving toward or away from these markers

Digital clocks aren't really as good for that - they're not as intuitive that way. When you see a time like 4:48, you have to consciously or unconsciously think about how far away that is from some other more important moment.

So, analog clocks are, in many ways, much more useful communicators of this common bit of information, since we can think fractionally to see what part of the pie has already been eaten up or is still left for us. As long as the clock is running, it's communicating key information through just a split-second of glancing.

This is a large part of the philosophy behind Ambient Devices - a company whose ideas I've been interested in more than their products. The idea is that how we measure things can change our perceptions of given pieces of information.

This isn't a new idea, but it struck me again this week when I came across a Math Factor podcast about AT&T's Online Encyclopedia of Integer Sequences. You can type in a lot of different number sequences here, and you'll get all kinds of information about the sequences, the oftentimes simple rules behind them, and the complex results achieved through them.

You can see graphs of these integer sequences - but even more interestingly than that, you can listen to MIDI files of the sequences played on a simple piano tone, with the results wrapping around the piano keys as they extend off the upper edge. As a musician, when I listen to these sequences, I can very quickly discern the general pattern of numbers when I hear the fast-moving notes.

Even more than this, though, I think just about anyone can tell that they're not hearing noise - which I'm using in this context to be completely randomly-generated pitches. There is an organization to them, even if we can't consciously identify what that organizing principle is just by listening.

That's why it drives me crazy when people criticize atonal music as simply being noise. It isn't noise, because it is something that is organized using some type of system.

Of course, there's a lot of math in music - but I wonder what implications a greater use of translating mathematical concepts into music could have for music education, even starting from beginning concepts. Since we all have so many different learning styles, this is undoubtedly something worth exploring for it's practical uses.

Dying Cities, Air Travel, and Politics

2008-05-05T21:15:00.000-07:00

Some may remember a post I made a while back ago about the decay happening in the Rustbelt.

Here's a different take on endangered cities from EnvironmentalGraffiti.com. The city that I'm most immediately concerned about? Here it is:

5. Atlanta

We may have gotten a preview of the untenable expansion the capital city of the south has undertaken with the drought that dominated 2007, and will be felt through 2008 despite above-average rainfall so far. Being located in an area that is far away from any large water source may eventually force Atlanta to scale back, and climate change, as it takes hold, will only complicate matters, transforming the greenest city in America into a semi-desert environment.

Of course, there was tons of news about Atlanta's water crisis at the end of last year, and it's not much of a leap to also become concerned about Phoenix. Not just because of the water issues, but because of the continually-increasing costs of gasoline and the effect that this is having on our far-flung suburbs.

Gas prices are only going to climb higher, and nobody is really realizing that it means we won't be able to drive as far anymore, so one way or another, everything is going to have to be much more localized around hubs of commerce and housing.

Those hubs - perhaps "Edge Cities" as Joel Garreau puts it, will need to be connected in some manner that doesn't rely on the personal automobile to get us around.

Our air transportation system is also really hurting, when the only thing these companies can do to save themselves is to merge and create less competition in the midst of soaring jet fuel costs. But this really isn't a solution - and the government contributes to the problem by continuing to approve these mergers and simply displaying the shortsightedness that gets these politicians elected.

The Practical Nomad has this to say about the relationship between the government and the airlines. Highlights from this thoughtful article:

"Air travellers in the USA get the worst of all worlds: prices artificially inflated by protectionism, taxes increased to support government subsidies, exemption of the airlines from state and local consumer protection laws, and a hands-off attitude by the Federal government towards even the most egregious violations by the airlines of existing federal consumer fraud and truth-in-advertising laws."

"It's the government of the USA, and airlines based in the USA, that are whining self-righteously about "open skies", "free markets", and the "unfair" protectionism of other countries' reciprocal restrictions on access to their much smaller, much less significant, domestic airline markets. Like so much else the airlines are saying in their quest for even more special treatment and subsidies from governments, it's pure hypocrisy, motivated by pure greed."
"It's particularly unfair that taxpayers are required to subsidize air travel -- directly and indirectly -- more than such other means of transportation as Amtrak trains or public mass transportation. Ordinary people in the USA could afford to travel more by air, especially internationally, but they don't. Outside of a small "jet set", most people in the USA do their regular travelling by land, and fly only rarely. Most air travellers [sic] are relatively wealthy. Government subsidies to air travel are among the most regressive taxes in the USA."
If airlines want true deregulation, they should accept truly open skies, including abolition of the restrictions on cabotage and foreign ownership, and truly free markets, including an end to government subsidies and bailouts. If, on the other hand, airlines want governments (i.e. taxpayers) to underwrite their continued operations, and grant them special privileges, they should accept a reinstatement of government regulation of prices and services (i.e. a return to regulation), to ensure that they use those government subsidies, and exercise those special privileges, in the public interest.

This is another example of how bad government policy continues to actively harm people. Barack Obama, of course, points out an example of this when he criticizes Hillary Clinton's idea of a gas tax holiday as nothing more than a political gimmick that won't work. Unfortunately, the media are really not holding Clinton's (and McCain's) feet to the fire with this as they both gang up on Obama.

Why isn't Obama perceived to be electable? Because he does not offer bumper-sticker solutions or soundbites. One one level, this may be a failure on his part to communicate, but the forces are massed against anyone who does not feed people the pablum of easy answers - people who refuse to take part in what amounts to a gigantic Ponzi scheme, staying out of trouble by fooling enough people.

This may tell us is that the only really electable people in our political system today are those who basically perpetuate the status quo, keeping the country one step ahead of disaster and do only a minimally-acceptable job. Just enough to keep people from rioting in the streets.

That day may be coming sooner than all of us think.

Libertarianism on the Local Level

2008-04-27T19:09:00.000-07:00

I'm beginning to struggle a little bit with my political identity as of late.

Partly, I blame Barack Obama. (No, I'm not going to vote for him, even though he's not fake and he gets it, unlike just about every other mainstream candidate I know, save for Howard Dean.)

The struggle is one that is rooted in pragmatism. When I think about the cities I love, the cities that are appealing, they are cities that are well-planned by a central, guiding authority. People want to live in dynamic places with strong local government initiatives to improve the quality of life for their residents.

San Francisco is the city that springs immediately to mind. It's not a large city, but it's considered in many ways to be on par with New York in terms of its stature of America's finest cities. It's not just its favorable weather - it succeeds because the local government has intentionally created a place that people want to live in, with a vibrant cultural life, numerous educational opportunities, excellent transit, beautiful parks, well-designed civic spaces that foster interaction and community, and so much more.

Each city in the country that puts effort into this attracts knowledge workers, dynamic businesses, and the type of people that are intentional about creating a good community.

Now, I don't doubt for one moment that a libertarian solution would work better- from the bottom to the top, we could have a breathtakingly different society that would be far more beautiful than anything we've experienced. This would not be a cure-all for all of our social ills . . . nothing ever is . . . but most of us can't even imagine what this type of world would look like on a practical level.

This type of society would take a minimum of 200 years to be fully realized, even if we suddenly started now to put these practices into place. Our love of big government is not something that can just be ended and replaced with something better. It is ingrained into our culture and our thinking on such deep levels.

I want to continue to be an advocate for this vision - I want to read about what others have to say about it and learn how to articulate this vision of a libertarian world to those who dismiss it as too far-fetched or idealistic. Where there is no vision, the people perish, and somebody has to carry the vision forward. I certainly want to help.

At the same time, I have to recognize that our lives are lived out in localities. In today's world, those are both real and virtual (Second Life, etc.). In meatspace, though, we can see much more immediate and rewarding results when we decide that we will accept these characteristics of cities we love and cherish. When we think carefully about the idea of place - how we shape it and how it shapes us.

We learn to love the city and nurture its growth, to revel in both its gleaming buildings and grittiness, and we have to learn how to weep for the city when it loses its way.

How emotionally attached are we to our places? Oh, I'm not talking necessarily here about personal buildings - our beloved homes, churches, schools - these are places mostly of nostalgia, and that's a bit different. I'm talking more about neighborhoods and streets. Why do we love them? What makes them interesting? Most of us don't spend much time thinking about this, although we know it when we see it, and we know it very clearly and are inspired by it.

This can even extend to buildings that we come to love - either through simply working and interacting in a well-designed space or lovingly getting our hands dirty in manipulating places that aren't worth as much into treasured enclaves. Those, too, can be beautiful.

No matter how you look at it, great cities and great places are a product of some type of central authority, and if we want to have these types of places, we have to be able to willingly yield to this authority.

The real question is, do I have to turn in my libertarian card to think like this? I don't think so, because I think we have to say that a central tenet of sensible libertarian thought is that the power that may be legitimately allocated to authority varies inversely with the size of the public organization being overseen.

That means that you can run your house and your business any way you like. You can live in a commune with a bunch of other people or set up an business, civic, or social organization with all types of strict rules. But everyone chooses to be a part of these entities and can easily leave at any time. The smaller the organization, the (theoretically) easier it is to leave, and the more chance there is for the free market to work through competition to balance out harmful or less-useful anomalies.

This has to extend to cities and states as well. If we begin to see the hyper-locality as the seat of power, they we may still be able to think like good libertarians - if pragmatic ones. The practical reality is that the more local the organization, the greater the influence it has on our everyday life. (At least, this is my hypothesis - show me how I'm significantly wrong and I'll be happy to change my mind.) How we live our lives at home has a lot more affect on us than what the United Nations decides to do, even though we often seem to be concerned a lot more about the latter.

All this to say that perhaps I need to be more of an advocate for stronger, more influential city government and centralized planning. Our states in these United States need to be seen more as 50 sovereign entities; more like nations that covenant together for the common defense. (Which, of course, is the original intention of the Constitution as I see it.)

Why is our patriotism only confined to our national identity? Can we not see ourselves as Arizonans first? Is there something wrong with this view? Why must we think of our states as divisions of convenience rather than places that inspire us. Why do we place so much of our pride in our national identity? Certainly we used to have much more of a state-by-state identity than we do today (Articles of Confederation, Civil War, etc.) .

It's not that our states are too small, as Joel Garreau and others have written about. It may be that instead they are too nebulous without a sufficient identity.

Is there a stream of libertarian thought that articulates this type of local awareness and advocacy? Should there be? If not, we need to find a way to approach and expand upon this theoretically, since it seems to be an issue that could be vitally important for us as we make strategic alliances with those who identify as Democrats or liberals who are strong on local values, and those Republicans who both speak out and carry out the philosophy of less government.

Yes, it's pragmatism here, and I hate that on a lot of levels, but if we want to see positive change in our lifetimes, even if it's not strictly "liberty in our lifetime", we need to develop this sense of local engagement and how this can legitimately weave into our libertarian identity.

A Forgotten Generation

2008-04-27T18:17:00.000-07:00

Whoo boy, what did I ever do without my iPhone. I've discovered the wonders of podcasts, so I feel like my time waiting for the bus or running around on the stair machine in the exercise room is so much more productive. I'm one of those people that can only do one intense thing at a time, or I need to be doing about 2 to 3 less-intense things to really feel like I'm operating at peak efficiency.

So, I was at home unpacking things after my recent move and catching up on podcasts, when I listened to an old episode of NPR's Speaking of Faith, which featured the Secular Humanist chaplain at Harvard, Greg Epstein, discussing how he ministers to people in that community from outside a faith perspective.

The interview was fascinating to listen to, but the biggest tidbit I took away from all of it was a comment he made saying something like one out of every five 18 to 26 year olds didn't believe in God.

I was startled by that number, for several reasons. First, he didn't say that twenty percent didn't follow any type of organized religion, he said that this number didn't believe in God at all. I first thought that this was surprisingly high, and I wondered if this was simply a product of the time in their life they were experiencing- being away from home and exposed to so many different ideas.

It's not at all trendy to be a Christian and a young person today. In a recent discussion with Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts-Schori and some young adutls in Seattle (read about it in the Seattle PI here), we found this comment interspersed in some very frank dialogue:

Katrina Hamilton, a University of Washington student, talked about how many of her friends are removed from and ignorant of religion, and noted "an increase in the stereotyping of Christians."

"It is much more acceptable in my circle to be gay than to be Christian," said Hamilton.

When I hear things like that, and I speak with all of the 20- and 30-somethings I bump into in my social circle, I'm convinced that Greg Epstein isn't that far off with his numbers. Some young people might be dabbling a bit in "spirituality", but they have very little interest in organized religion.

One of my closest friends, who describes himself as a "militant agnostic" and pretty much believes that Christianity is not only annoying but actively brings about a lot of evil in the world, once met me for lunch one Saturday when I was working at my church. There was some type of meeting or conference going on that day where he saw a bunch of people around. As we were heading out the door, his immediate comment was, "they're all old people." His stereotype of church being for old people was confirmed.

When I think about most of the mainline protestant churches I've visited, it's very rare that I see older teens or people under 40 who don't have kids in tow. It's almost as if the adults don't really care much about church, but they think it's good for their kids to be exposed to, since it was a positive influence on their lives. Maybe church is supposed to be something akin to school - part of your formation as a child, but pretty much irrelevant after you get old enough to think for yourself.

Really, we sometimes have to ask ourselves why we need organized religion when we can turn on the television and watch TV preacher, download a podcast of a sermon, pick up a CD of Praise and Worship hits from the store, or visit BeliefNet online.

The reason why you have organized religion is simply to be a part of a community - it's more about the community than it is about the religion, and Boomers, the Silent Generation, and especially "the Greatest Generation" before them were far more civicially engaged than any of us Xers and Yers are. (Think service organizations like Kiwanis, Rotary, Lions Club, etc - how many young people do you know who are involved with those things? It's not a part of the culture.)

This again goes back to my whole question about churches being more social and service organizations first, with any kind of real religion being soft-pedaled. The protestant megachurches do things differently, offering a lot of religion (and a lot of rules) along with striving to be "casual" and "relevant", and therefore attract a lot of Boomers - who seem to be into that kind of thing.

Does this happen in every generation until people start to want to reach kids that have been forgotten about up until that point? (I think of the Jesus Freak movement of the 1960s, Ralph Carmichael, and all of that . . .) Maybe that's what's going on now with the whole PoMo crowd - Brian McClaren and the evangelicals in the emergent church, and people like Diana Butler Bass out of the more liberal perspective. They're following a particular path that seems to be resonating with mostly younger people . . .

Will it result in Christianity becoming trendy? Is that a good thing? I'm not sure - but I know there's a ton of indifference and hostility out there now towards Christianity, and we all have to actively engage that if we take evangelism seriously.

Young Gay Marriage

2008-04-27T17:58:00.001-07:00

There's long, but interesting, article up today in the New York Times Magazine about young gay men feeling the rush to get married:

But I could also relate to young gay men yearning for companionship and emotional security. Had gay marriage been an option when I was 23 and recently out of the closet, I might very well have proposed to my first gay love. Like many gay men my age and older, I grew up believing that gay men in a happy long-term relationship was an oxymoron. (I entered high school in 1989, before gay teenagers started taking their boyfriends to the prom.) If I was lucky enough to find love, I thought, I’d better hold onto it. And part of me tried, but a bigger part of me wanted to pitch a tent in my favorite gay bar. I wasn’t alone. Everywhere I looked, gay men in their 20s — or, if they hadn’t come out until later, their 30s, 40s and 50s — seemed to be eschewing commitment in favor of the excitement promised by unabashedly sexualized urban gay communities. There was a reason, of course, why so many gay men my age and older seemed intent on living a protracted adolescence: We had been cheated of our actual adolescence. While most of our heterosexual peers had experienced, in their teens, socialization around courtship, dating and sexuality, many of us had grown up closeted and fearful, “our most precious and tender feelings rarely validated or reflected back to us by our families and communities,” as Alan Downs, the author of “The Velvet Rage: Overcoming the Pain of Growing Up Gay in a Straight Man’s World,” puts it. When we managed to express our sexuality, the experience often came booby-trapped with secrecy, manipulation or debilitating shame.

I've really spent a lot of time wondering about what the statistics are on gay marriage. Gay relationships are notorious for being short-lived. I remember reading one comment from somebody that referred to a just-ended gay relationship of seven years as being "incredible" for its longevity.

Does institutionalizing marriage help them to last longer? Is fitting gay relationships into a framework of traditional heterosexual marriage really sensible? Are the two that interchangeable, or do we need to find a completely different language and framework for referring to these? (Already I know how problematic it is for me to talk about some of my close friends who are together. Are they boyfriends? Partners? Husbands? I don't even know the adjective to use.)

I've expressed to friends and written before about how the church doesn't provide any sort of moral framework for gays and lesbian Christians about how they should conduct their relationships in both sensible and holy ways. This is, of course, because they're still stuck on discussing whether these relationships should be blessed and supported, and if so, how. In the meantime, those of us who are trying to find our way through this are left a little in the lurch.

Of course, this is probably quite a bit of my fundamentalist upbringing talking . . . a religion of "requirements and rewards", to quote Marcus Borg. There were plenty of very specific rules for things - you mostly knew what they were and knew of the dire consequences of not following them (eternal punishment in the fires of hell).

While I've left that perspective behind, at least in my head, if not completely in my heart (long story and many psychotherapy sessions later), I'm still not quite sure what to do with myself.

Of course, I think the issues are the same for single adults who are at least into their mid-20s. Simple commandments encouraging chastity, pointing to dogma, smack of junior high or high school dating strictures that seem pretty irrelevant to us. Why should we listen? Give us something nuanced, thoughtful, and smart to chew on here.

Why? Because today's liberal American culture pretty much doesn't care, as long as nobody gets hurt in any obvious and immediately perceptible way. And that's just not an ethic that works.

But it seems like that's all we got until people start to figure out those of us - especially younger GenXers and Millennials - who seem to have moved beyond these tired debates.

Twitter?

2008-04-27T17:47:00.001-07:00

Okay, so I’m really wondering exactly what all of the fuss is about.

I’ve been stumbling across a lot of chatter on line where people are talking about Twitter, and I’m very skeptical about the whole thing. Thanks to the information superhighway, we’re already deluged with data to the point that we don’t really know what to do with all of it. Of course, there are a lot of companies out there trying to make money by helping us to organize it or otherwise interface with it.

So, the question is why do we even have a service like this, and why should any of us use it. I remember a few years ago some friends of mine wanted me to join up with this cell phone text-messaging service – I don’t immediately recall the name – that gave short updates similar to Twitter that talked about where people were and what they were doing.

One of my innumerable nerdy friends wanted me to try it out, and I found myself on the receiving end of notices from people I didn’t even care about that much about much of the pointless minutiae of their lives.

I mean, I don’t really need to know that you’re standing in line at Burger King.

From what people say, though, you learn to find out a lot about other people when you begin to get all kinds of frequent updates from them on what exactly they’re doing, which could be fascinating on one hand.

However, this assumes that you really want to know what these other people are doing on a very granular level. The Internet is very good for creating a large web of very shallow (and I don’t mean this to sound pejorative at all) relationships, which can be extremely valuable. At the same time, I don’t really want to know what these folks are doing each minute of their lives.

Yes, I can control how I access the data through a service like Twitter, but I think that people that you “follow” really need to be very interesting on some type of level. Just like bloggers, they need to be able to use the medium well – otherwise it’s just adding to all of the noise in the background.

I don’t think it’s dissimilar to what’s happened to sites like Reddit, where you have moments of revelation, a few fascinating updates on current memes, shocking stories the mainstream media is intentionally ignoring or hasn’t caught up to. But mostly it’s a whole lotta stupid pics, whining, slightly amusing dirty pictures, and lolcats thrown in.

All of my skepticsm aside, I signed up for an account anyway earlier today, if only to just better keep an eye on what’s going on there and see if it really is going to catch on among my circle of friends, which is really the only group that would be remotely interested in anything I have to say anyway. (Insert SHOUTOUT to all my buddies here: ) But all of them are all pretty much on Facebook anyway, and they can read my status updates there.

So, if any of you all use Twitter and can tell me how it is such a breakthrough, I’m all ears – or eyes – or whatever.