As I fly high above California's Central Valley on my way to the 7th week of the Academy for Spiritual Formation the question of escape or retreat is beginning to focus my awareness. I had noble intentions to post last week. I had a wonderful reflection on the book of Ezekiel, which I will probable post in the future. Life and death got in the way of those intentions. Monday began with the tragedy at Virginia Tech University. The week became increasingly impacted as each day passed. Pastoral care needs grew as parishoners entered the hospital and one returned home from the hospital with hospice care. By midweek it was already a full week, but it was not over. I caught wind of a threat at one of our local high schools. It was a graffiti threat invoking the memory of the Columbine High School shooting of 1999. The threat was eventually deemed a hoax, but the emotions were already raw given the events in Virginia and the growing reports of campus and workplace violence across the country.
The sermon that I had intended to preach about the transformational power of the resurrection was taking on new and very real dimensions. Bearing witness to the power of the resurrection to continue to transform lives was becoming more and more necessary as we became increasingly confronted with the pain, grief and brokenness that was expressing itself in violence across the country.
Thursday's early morning sleep was interrupted by a call to the home of a church member whose adult daughter had been murdered in her home by her estranged husband, who then took his own life. This crime was witnessed by the couple's three children. I have been concerned about family violence for a number of years. I have, in my previous congregation, held annual domestic violence awareness events to raise people's consciousness about the epidemic. I didn't realize how much I'd back burnered this ministry until I was confronted with the pain of this family. It became very difficult and much more real than it had ever been as I ministered to this family.
I have arrived in San Francisco now and am sitting in a Starbucks enjoying a relatively quiet moment in anticipation of the beginning of the week. As I feel myself begin to unspool from the week's events I'm working through the conflicted feelings of whether I'm "escaping" or "retreating". There is a significant part of me that could very easily run away from this. I think about the Bob Seger song, "Against the Wind" where he speaks these words that cry out from my heart today: "I wish I didn't know now what I didn't know then." I could be content with keeping these tragedies, this kind of violence at arms length...someone else's family, someone else's congregation. I suppose that there is a certain amount of sanity and normalcy to a comment like this. But I also realize that that train has left the station. I do know now what I didn't know then. So I guess one could make the argument that escape is simply not possible.
Therefore, if escape is not possible what do I do with the idea of retreat? Retreat feels different. It isn't desertion. It isn't a permanent state of separation. It is not withdrawal with no thought of ever returning to the fray. As I begin this week my only thought is to take a deep breath. I want to slow down enough to breath in deeply the Spirit and the Spirit's power. I want to draw into my soul the Spirit's healing and wholeness. This is a time to rest a little, retool, resupply and reorient myself. One of the things that I know about myself is that I can very easily develop a bunker mentality. I sharpen my focus and narrow my field of vision in order to address a crisis. It happens quickly and almost imperceptibly but I have found it very difficult to break out of it without some kind of retreat.
Last week was a seminal week in my life and my ministry. It shook me in a lot of ways. By the grace of God, I have an opportunity this week. I have a retreat laid out before me and I pray that I might experience the grace that I will need to grow into this new experience. This is not simply a prayer for myself. It is a prayer for my church family. It is a prayer for all whose lives have been touched and forever altered by violence. It is a prayer for all those who are searching for a new way through.
The sermon that I had intended to preach about the transformational power of the resurrection was taking on new and very real dimensions. Bearing witness to the power of the resurrection to continue to transform lives was becoming more and more necessary as we became increasingly confronted with the pain, grief and brokenness that was expressing itself in violence across the country.
Thursday's early morning sleep was interrupted by a call to the home of a church member whose adult daughter had been murdered in her home by her estranged husband, who then took his own life. This crime was witnessed by the couple's three children. I have been concerned about family violence for a number of years. I have, in my previous congregation, held annual domestic violence awareness events to raise people's consciousness about the epidemic. I didn't realize how much I'd back burnered this ministry until I was confronted with the pain of this family. It became very difficult and much more real than it had ever been as I ministered to this family.
I have arrived in San Francisco now and am sitting in a Starbucks enjoying a relatively quiet moment in anticipation of the beginning of the week. As I feel myself begin to unspool from the week's events I'm working through the conflicted feelings of whether I'm "escaping" or "retreating". There is a significant part of me that could very easily run away from this. I think about the Bob Seger song, "Against the Wind" where he speaks these words that cry out from my heart today: "I wish I didn't know now what I didn't know then." I could be content with keeping these tragedies, this kind of violence at arms length...someone else's family, someone else's congregation. I suppose that there is a certain amount of sanity and normalcy to a comment like this. But I also realize that that train has left the station. I do know now what I didn't know then. So I guess one could make the argument that escape is simply not possible.
Therefore, if escape is not possible what do I do with the idea of retreat? Retreat feels different. It isn't desertion. It isn't a permanent state of separation. It is not withdrawal with no thought of ever returning to the fray. As I begin this week my only thought is to take a deep breath. I want to slow down enough to breath in deeply the Spirit and the Spirit's power. I want to draw into my soul the Spirit's healing and wholeness. This is a time to rest a little, retool, resupply and reorient myself. One of the things that I know about myself is that I can very easily develop a bunker mentality. I sharpen my focus and narrow my field of vision in order to address a crisis. It happens quickly and almost imperceptibly but I have found it very difficult to break out of it without some kind of retreat.
Last week was a seminal week in my life and my ministry. It shook me in a lot of ways. By the grace of God, I have an opportunity this week. I have a retreat laid out before me and I pray that I might experience the grace that I will need to grow into this new experience. This is not simply a prayer for myself. It is a prayer for my church family. It is a prayer for all whose lives have been touched and forever altered by violence. It is a prayer for all those who are searching for a new way through.
