Pastors’ Panel

We asked pastors to reflect on theological education and abundant life in their congregational contexts. Here is what they told us.

What is your vision of abundant life? Reverend Stella Burkhalter (MDiv’10) Pastor of Kyle United Methodist Church, Kyle, Texas Biblical language is such a gift. Abundant life captures the essence of a life that is whole and at peace, but more than that. It is a life that is so full of joy that it bubbles up, bursts out, and spills over. When scripture promises abundant life to us, we, like the woman at the well, immediately want to know where we can get it. Also, like the woman at the well, we have trouble grasping the definition, but we know it when we see it. She saw it in Jesus, and so do we. Since 1 Peter admonishes us to be always prepared to give a defense for the hope that is in us, I will try this: Abundant life is what it looks like when perfect love casts out all fear.

Reverend Matthew Miller (MDiv’03) Pastor of First Presbyterian Church, Albuquerque, New Mexico A life that is abundant is more than simple survival and reproduction. Rather, abundance suggests thriving, or to use the Psalmist’s image, a cup overflowing. This requires that a person have access to an unending source of that which allows one to thrive. Ultimately, for me, that means a connection to God as that source. In a sense, connecting to God is a little like connecting to the internet—to do so opens up a whole universe (one might say an abundance) of other connections: to one’s neighbors, to the wonder of creation, and to the truest form of one’s self.

Reverend Hannah Hooks (MDiv’05) Pastor of Shorter Chapel AME Church, Giddings, Texas When I envision an abundant life, I see a balance between the personal, emotional, home, work, spiritual, and social areas. An abundant life is full engagement in each aspect—not easy to achieve. One’s personal life requires prioritizing, time management, self-awareness, and communication. When these areas are intentionally addressed it leads us to a more satisfying and productive life. The ability to design and follow a well-balanced life allows us to better follow the commandment “love your neighbor as yourself.” We are commanded to go into all the world to create disciples, which means having a healthy and balanced life guiding our discipling. This is an abundant life, living God’s commandments and showing God’s love, grace, and mercy—living a life of worship.

Derek Forbes (MDiv’08) Pastor of First Presbyterian Church of Logan, Logan, Utah The idea of abundant life speaks to me of living outside oneself. Living only for ourselves makes abundant life elusive. But living outside ourselves, as part of a community, with and for that community, makes abundant life more accessible. As a congregation, one of the more important activities we do together is to gather for worship. But merely worshiping together with no awareness of the needs of the community can leave us with an inward, rather than outward, focus. Which in turn means that we must prepare ourselves to carry our focus during worship—Jesus Christ—to the world outside of our walls.

What in your community cries out for healing? Derek Forbes Loving our neighbors requires us to be aware of the way that our communities are crying out for healing. I serve a congregation in northern Utah, and we are keenly aware that a good number of people in our larger community are hurting because they have been shunned not only by their faith community but also by their families. Many think that they will never be accepted in a faith community again.

Matthew Miller In keeping with my vision of abundant life, I think what most cries out for healing are the wounds created by disconnection. This is the ironic difference between God and the internet. The internet provides an array of unprecedented connections, yet often leaves people terribly lonely, like being at a party surrounded by people and feeling lonelier than you would being all alone. This epidemic of loneliness is exacerbated by systems that isolate people groups and are intentional in dividing people from their neighbors.

Hannah Hooks I live in a small community and pastor a small, but loving and open congregation. The town’s populace, however, tends toward conservative and fundamentalist Christianity and politics. The greatest healing need that I have found is deliverance from religious practices created by implicit biases and narrow theological teachings. The community is great at rallying in times of crisis, but the acts of compassion tend to end with the crisis, until the next emergency arises, rather than the transforming agape love of a God-inspired heart.

Stella Burkhalter Kyle, Texas, is one of the fastest growing cities in the country; you can almost hear the growing pains. (You can definitely hear the road construction crews!) The church I am serving was established in 1880, so when I arrived, I expected to find deeply entrenched people who might be unwilling to change. I certainly found many elderly people, but surprisingly, most of them are fairly new arrivals and all were

graciously open to new ideas, even hungry for them. Once during a sermon, I asked if anyone was from Kyle and not one person raised a hand. In the second service, the one hand that went up belonged to a 15-year-old. Like all communities, we deal with cancer diagnoses, broken families, addiction, and mourning, but uniquely, we are dealing with the loneliness of displaced, rootless people longing for home.

How do you prepare church members for carrying out the church’s mission of healing the hurts of the world? Hannah Hooks In Bible study and in my sermons, I use many examples of LOVE and how it is a better tool than hate and apathy. I encourage the congregation to become involved in different community volunteer programs, and I teach them how to recognize divine opportunity. I try to lead by example in my own personal community service. One shouldn’t expect the congregants to do what we pastoral leaders would not do.

Stella Burkhalter Especially during Lent, I seek opportunities to teach spiritual disciplines. Thankfully, the liturgical calendar serves as a good reminder of the soul work we have to do and re-do. We cannot hear the cries of God’s people when our own cries are drowning them out, so I lean on this season to go deep and address our own hurts. I also use this season to set definable challenges in the areas of prayer, fasting, and service.

Matthew Miller I think one of the best things that pastors can do is facilitate connections by encouraging friendship within a church community as well as strengthening relationships with the communities in which churches are located. If the second great commandment is to love one’s neighbor as ourselves, we need to know our neighbors. So much healing begins with simply getting to know each other in the personal ways that run much deeper than the labels we use to classify each other.

Derek Forbes As a pastor I address such issues in sermons and through other means, but I am most grateful that the people of this Presbyterian congregation seem to take the message of the gospel quite seriously. Over many years their Christian faith has been formed to welcome those on the margins in our community, those who have been shunned by other faith communities, and in doing so they encounter this thing which we describe as abundant life.

We took time during worship recently to allow everyone in our congregation to pack food bags for hungry children and their families, along with other emergency food bags for local seniors who might be home bound during a winter blizzard. We packed nearly 400 food bags that morning. We turned “worship” into helping to heal wounds in our community. Our Mission Committee has asked if we can hold

two of these Mission Sundays during the coming year. Our next conversations will be about how we might help the situations of hungry families in the long term, in addition to providing the temporary support of the food bags. Christ calls each of us not only to live, but to live abundantly. Abundant life for one should lead to abundant life for others.

What aspect of your theological education has proven most valuable for your practice of ministry? Matthew Miller I couldn’t pick one facet of the coursework that I consider more valuable than another. I certainly had my preferences. But from this distance, what I see as most valuable is the way theological education gave me the skills to frame things in terms of what is ultimate. One of the variables in that is the experience of grappling with these questions in conversation with professors who have thought deeply from their specialty, as well as with classmates from a wide range of traditions and perspectives. I do have to remind people sometimes that I didn’t get an MBA, or a master’s in counseling. To me, having an MDiv means that I am a trained theologian. What’s most valuable about that is that it allows me to approach things from an entirely different framework that often points to what is easily avoided.

Hannah Hooks Pastoral care has benefitted me well, because I pastor an aging family congregation and it requires understanding family dynamics in times of crisis as well as in times of joy. This knowledge has also helped in my assimilating back into small-town life. Theological education is second, only because people don’t care about what you have to say until they know how much you care. Love says it all!

Stella Burkhalter I entered seminary expecting to learn to speak with authority and eloquence. The most valuable training I received, though, was in listening. The offer of excellent spiritual direction helped me deal with the things that made me feel I had to say important things in order to be valued. Pastoral care classes taught me techniques to get myself out of the way. Christian education called my attention to the Holy Spirit going before us and inspiring interactions. Bible, theology, and history classes encouraged me to appreciate and identify differing experiences and perspectives that influence how we see. Supervised Practice of Ministry allowed me to watch how miscommunication can torpedo ministry. Interaction with classmates and professors provided a treasure trove of things worth listening to. Over the years, any eloquence or authority I have been able to muster has flowed from this aspect of my education. If I speak well at all, it is only because I have received training in listening. v

Recent publications by Austin Seminary professors

Preaching About Racism: A Guide for Faith Leaders and Anxious to Talk About it: Helping White Christians Talk Faithfully about Racism, by Carolyn B. Helsel, Assistant Professor of Homiletics, Austin Seminary Challice Press, 2018, 231 pages / 128 pages, $20 /$16 (paper). Reviewed by Rev. Dr. Robert D. Cornwall, senior minister of Central Woodward Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), Troy, Michigan

Rarely does one admit to being racist. So how do you have a conversation about something most people believe is someone else’s problem? Considering that churches, for the most part, are racially segregated, how do predominantly white congregations have this conversation without feeling shame and guilt? Accompanying this question: How do white preachers take up the subject in constructive ways? Carolyn Helsel’s books Preaching about Racism and Anxious to Talk About It—honored as companion pieces by the Academy of Parish Clergy as Book of the Year (I am the chair of the awards committee)—answer both questions. Anxious invites predominantly white congregations to explore a topic most of us are reluctant to engage with, while Preaching helps preachers take up the subject in constructive ways in the pulpit. In both books, Helsel addresses this deep-seated anxiety that inhabits the lives of white Christians, especially those who believe in justice and equality for all, and helps us move forward to more healthy responses.

As Helsel reveals up front, she wrote Anxious to Talk About It out of her own sense

of anxiety. Having made that confession, she is able to acknowledge anxieties possibly felt by readers. Nonetheless, she writes in the hope that “by reading it, you will feel yourself honored and cared for, your emotions attended to, and not feel shamed for getting it wrong” (3). In other words, this isn’t a harangue about racism meant to create shame or guilt. Instead, this is a guide to a conversation that can transform the lives of readers, as well as the church and society. In the six chapters of this book, Helsel addresses questions such as whether we should be colorblind (isn’t that the point of Dr. Martin Luther King’s dream?). When I picked up Preaching about Racism, I figured it might be just another guide to preaching against racism. It is a guide to preaching against racism, but it offers a more realistic picture than I expected, including the challenges of addressing racism in the context of predominately white congregations that see themselves as progressive and welcoming. For Helsel, preaching about racism is more than standing in the pulpit and railing against white privilege and white supremacy, using guilt and shame as the key motivators. The “righteous indignation” that often goes by the name of prophetic preaching might get some applause in certain circles, but it likely doesn’t get us far toward change. It might make the preacher feel good, but if it doesn’t lead to real change, is it worth the breath? At the same time, racism must be addressed from the pulpit if change is to take place. Silence is not appropriate.

Helsel recognizes racism is a politically powerful subject, making conversation more difficult in congregations that like to avoid politically sensitive issues. While it is political, however, it is not partisan. It is a concern of the polis, the community, of which the congregation is a part. Yes, preachers could lose jobs if

they broach the subject, but again, it is one of the most important conversations of our day. It affects so many other conversations, including conversations on immigration, poverty, policing, and more. Helsel strives to provide foundations and strategies that can succeed without simply making people feel guilty or endangering the jobs of preachers. I read Preaching About Racism first and found it powerful and compelling. There is overlap between the two books, but they are directed toward different audiences. If you are clergy, I suggest reading Preaching about Racism first. It takes the conversations deeper. After clergy work through the preaching book, they will be ready to take their congregations into the conversation using Anxious to Talk About It. It is my sense that most people of good faith and heart do not wish to be racist. Yet, we know that many of us have been taught ideas that create fears and stereotypes. Although it’s easier to avoid the questions, progress in our world requires that we all address racism. Carolyn Helsel provides us with an excellent set of tools for accomplishing this goal. The reason why these books are important is that they help those of us who are white to understand how to take steps toward reconciliation. This involves addressing our own past as well as our own perceptions of ourselves and our neighbors. If we do this, we can move into new and exciting relationships that cross racial and ethnic lines. I invite my white brothers and sisters to take and read.

Holding Faith: A Practical Introduction to Christian Doctrine, by Cynthia Rigby, The W.C. Brown Professor of Theology, Austin Seminary Abingdon Press, 2018, 408 pages, $44 (hardback). Reviewed by Rev. Dr. Rodger Nishioka, senior associate pastor at Village Presbyterian Church in Prairie Village, Kansas

“H olding faith.” For some, those two words mean faith is embraced and treasured. For others, they mean faith

is held up as something venerated or “other.” For many in these days, faith is something to be held far away. So, I was more than intrigued when I offered a class for adults that required them to purchase a copy of Dr. Rigby’s book and read and study a chapter before coming to class. In advertising I noted the subtitle: “A Practical Introduction to Christian Doctrine.” One church member asked me if it was possible to be “practical” about anything having to do with “Christian doctrine.” For him, a selfidentified “evangelical,” those terms seemed mutually opposed. I smiled and invited him to come find out for himself. To my delight, he accepted my invitation. So did twenty-six others.

We met from 10 to 11 a.m. every Thursday morning for ten weeks. Since we met during the day, I thought the students would all be retirees, but I was surprised to discover that four persons worked (including one lawyer with her own private practice and one realtor with flexibility in her schedule). There were also two young stay-at-home mothers who arranged care for their toddlers. All lay persons, a few of them had taken religion classes long ago as undergrads. At our first session, I invited all to introduce themselves and tell why they chose to attend. The responses were as varied as the participants. A number were just curious. Others yearned for a serious study about God and God’s activity in the world. One young mother said she

wanted to know how to respond to her toddler’s questions about God. One older woman’s husband of sixty-two years had died, and she found herself filled with questions about life and meaning and death. Ever since he had died, she said she had been praying and praying, but that God was not responding. So she signed up and was stunned when she read the first

chapter about the doctrine of revelation— about how God chooses to reveal God’s self to us. Thus, the adventure began.

As each week passed, the group became more comfortable with one another. As they grew more trusting, their questions and our discussion became more real, more honest. All of this was prompted by the Holy Spirit through Rigby’s faithful work. Through ten chapters and nearly 400 pages, Rigby invites the reader to engage the doctrines of revelation, scripture, incarnation, the Trinity, creation, sin and salvation, the church, the Christian life, Christian hope, and Christian vocation. As she explains each doctrine, she weaves in the history of the church, citing Councils and Church Fathers in ways that are instructive but not burdensome. She relates doctrines to her own experience as a teacher, scholar, pastor, spouse, mother, daughter, friend. She connects the doctrine to how the church worships, how we are governed, and how we go about mission in the world. One of the class members, knowing that I know Rigby personally, resonated with the author so much she kept asking me, “So, what is she REALLY like?” She admitted that Cindy Rigby was her latest “author crush” and seemed glad when I assured her that Cindy really is smart, funny, honest, real, and pretty much lives just the way she writes—with great hope and humility.

As we read, we kept our Bibles nearby to explore Rigby’s numerous biblical citations. A helpful scripture index is provided. We began using the reflection and discussion questions provided, but by the third week the students were coming with their own queries and comments.

I marveled at the faithfulness of the Holy Spirit as each week it seemed the particular doctrine we studied resonated in profound ways with persons in the class. When studying incarnation, one member shared she was struggling with infertility. When studying creation, one student related she had just experienced her first gleaning of a field in rural Kansas. When studying Christian vocation, one member told us her husband had just been laid off. Time and again, Holding Faith helped us live the intersection between practice and doctrine.

When finished, the class opted to share a potluck lunch. One member invited everyone to sign a card to send to the author. Sitting next to me was that evangelical. As he passed Cindy’s card to me, he smiled and said, “Remember when I told you that I didn’t think ‘practical’ had anything to do with ‘doctrine?’ I get it now,” he said, “in the very best sense, ‘practical’ and ‘Christian doctrine’ belong together.” v

Americans are notoriously religious, and while today the place of Christianity may be weakening, spirituality abounds. Scholars in recent decades have extensively theorized the shift away from theocentric religion. Recently, David Zahl put flesh on the theoretical bones in Seculosity: How Career, Parenting, Technology, Food, Politics, and Romance Became our New Religion and What To Do About It (Fortress Press, 2019). Zahl innovates the term “seculosity” as a catchall for pseudo-religious activities people do here on earth without reference to God. Zahl argues that the human needs historically met by big-R Religion have not waned as 3,500 churches close each year. In fact, people are seeking to fulfill those needs in a diverse array of small-r religious practices of seculosity.

Zahl, an Episcopal priest and co-founder of Mockingbird Ministries, elaborates seculosity with generosity, not judgmentalism. He affirms the value of commitment to health, parenting, work, and more. Good practices, he explains, become religious when people vest them with salvific power, believing that when they accomplish their goals, loneliness, meaninglessness, guilt, or despair will fall away, and their lives will become fulfilling and whole.

Melissa Wiginton is research professor in Methodist studies and serves on the administrative cabinet at Austin Seminary. As vice president for Education Beyond the Walls, she has developed innovative programs for faith leaders and learners. She holds MDiv and JD degrees and served twelve years at the Fund for Theological Education prior to her appointment at Austin Seminary.

Take the example of food. Zahl wonderfully unfolds the way the culinary arts now permeate television, magazines and newspapers, social media and social life, and have even become significant markers for identity and morality. Yes, Zahl says, attention to diet is positive. Enjoying the pleasure of food is lovely. But a person is not “bad” if they eat a bag of Fritos or “good” if they eat a carrot instead. In Zahl’s view, a tragic failing of small r-religion is unmasked by the toxic results of overdependence on its promises. For instance, he points to a new eating disorder, orthorexia, the obsession with healthful or proper eating.

While Zahl focuses on describing small r-religion in individual lives, Angie Thurston and Casper ter Kuile (pronounced “ter Kyle”), two graduates of Harvard Divinity School, look at it from the perspective of community. Where, they ask, do young adults gather to meet religious needs if not in church? They studied dozens of communities which incorporate spiritual dimensions of life. Six themes of the small r-religious life, to use Zahl’s terminology, emerged: community, personal transformation, social transformation, purpose finding, creativity, and accountability. Not every organization encompasses all six themes, but each provides community. (Their four monographs, How We Gather, Care of Souls, Something More and Faithful, are available for download at https://sacred.design/insights.) “CrossFit” illustrates Thurston and ter Kuile’s analysis. CrossFit boxes (gyms) are workout places for the people Zahl describes in his chapter on “Seculosity and Leisure.” CrossFitters follow a small-l liturgy. All the boxes do the same workouts on the same days. Many workouts are named for soldiers or other heroes (saints?) who have died. Further, members publicly set aspirational goals, hold each other to them, and celebrate when they are accomplished. Members also engage in care for each other outside the box. They hold fundraisers to support each other’s causes and pick up each other’s dogs at the vet.

The Dinner Party is another example, but of a different genesis. Founder Lennon Flowers’s mother died at age 53 when Ms. Flowers was in her 20s. Few peers shared this experience, so she created the community she needed. People in their 20s and 30s who have had a significant loss get together over homemade food to talk about their losses and how they impact their lives. Communities exist all over the country. They share recipes and rituals to welcome strangers to tables in their homes.

To understand why people gather in these ways, and not in institutional religious communities, Thurston and ter Kuile draw from “Jobs to be Done” theory originated at Harvard Business School. The theory drives producers to pay close attention to users’ needs. Rather than making improvements that engineers recommend from their offices, they get curious about the contexts and purposes of their users. Applied to religion, Thurston and ter Kuile argue that people “fire” institutional religion because it does not do the jobs they need done—belonging (rather than believing) and becoming something more. People then “hire” other experiences, like CrossFit and Dinner Party, because those communities do the jobs they need done. Thurston and ter Kuile focus on young adults, but the percent of older generations leaving institutional religious organizations is on the rise, perhaps for similar reasons.

Thurston and ter Kuile’s theory of firing church has its limitations. Many young adults have never participated in a Christian congregation to fire. And it may be that the polemical rhetoric of the Religious Right alienates large numbers of people from churches generally, including mainline and progressive churches. Moreover, the notion of Jobs to be Done leans mechanical, while holy mystery, not only need, lies at the heart of religion. Nevertheless, Christians have something to learn from Thurston and ter Kuile.

Thurston and ter Kuile, and Zahl, bring the good news that the religious impulse is alive in America. People are investing time and resources striving to meet these needs. But while we can affirm these diverse efforts, we who have been touched by gracious love might expect the Holy Spirit to be stirring a desire for something more; that is, for God who is and gives gracious love. We can worry that these self projects rely on a kind of earned salvation. Christianity holds that salvation—freedom from the hell of our fundamental alienation, fear, and hopelessness and for love—cannot be earned.

To be sure, many practicing Christians are also in the thick of seculosity, trying to earn salvation with everyone else. A pastor told me last week that in her high-achieving, upper middle-class congregation of white professionals, people are tortured by anxiety they are not doing enough—at work, with children, at home, in relationships, for their health, with their leisure. “Hear the good news,” she wants to proclaim … “Nothing you do will ever be enough. By grace you are enough.” What can that mean in a world of small r-religion?

Christianity teaches the promise of grace is for all. Indeed, grace does weave through communities like the ones described in Thurston and ter Kuile’s work— not only through communities with “Christian” in the name. But the reality and distinct gifts of grace are hobbled by the practical idolatry of individual work and achievement. Christianity pulls from a different center. It holds forth texts and traditions that name, encourage, and enhance the concrete reality and power of grace. The question that burdens my soul is this: Where and how do we enter the conversation? How can we understand and share Christian understandings and practices of grace that meet the religious needs for belonging and becoming?

Zahl offers one grace-filled approach. He starts with compassion for the ways people are trying to do the jobs of meaning-making, connection, and love for self and other. He lifts up the life-giving practices embedded in the ways of small-r religions. For example, he recognizes the value of mindfulness as a practice of leisure addressing our need for respite. Then, as he does in each section, he brings good news not as a scold but as a vital supplement. He says, “Yes. And …” He opens up the impulse to reliance on more than self-invention. He turns to scripture and Christian teaching to bless and to deepen. He affirms seculosity even as he strives to make manifest Luther’s conviction: “It is impossible to gain peace by the methods and means of the world … We find no rest for our weary bones unless we cling to the word of grace.”

Some congregations also work to bridge faith and seculosity. ’Sup? is a regular dinner conversation among young adults in Austin and First English Lutheran

Church. The congregation buys dinner at a good restaurant and invites an equal number of young adults and older church members. Guests linger over excellent food as they share, learn, listen, and offer wisdom, inspiration, and mutual appreciation. They don’t necessarily talk about Christianity, but they gather around a table where there is enough for all and relationships are born. ‘Sup? is not about getting people to join First English. It is about being Christian people in relationship. One young adult woman told an older church member, “I don’t have a church, but if I did, I would want it to be just like yours.” She has “fired” some church or idea of church. Perhaps she is “hiring” the community feeding her with physical and spiritual food.

This is not the first time in American history that small r-religions are flourishing as people desperately strive to meet spiritual needs. But this is our time. We can see with empathetic eyes the goods of seculosity. We can hear with compassionate ears the longing for meaning, connection, and love of self and neighbor. What is the Holy Spirit stirring? How can we, as individuals and as churches, attend and respond with humility, creativity, and courage and, ultimately, bear forth grace? v

Theodore J. Wardlaw, President

Board of Trustees G. Archer Frierson II, Chair

James C. Allison Janice L. Bryant (MDiv’01, DMin’11) Kelley Cooper Cameron Claudia D. Carroll Katherine B. Cummings (MDiv’05) Thomas Christian Currie James A. DeMent (MDiv’17) Jill Duffield (DMin’13) Britta Martin Dukes (MDiv’05) Jackson Farrow Jr. Beth Blanton Flowers, M.D. Stephen Giles Jesús Juan González (MDiv’92) William Greenway Walter Harris Jr. John S. Hartman Keatan A. King Steve LeBlanc Sue B. McCoy Matthew Miller (MDiv’03) David Pardue Denice Nance Pierce (MATS’11) Mark B. Ramsey Stephen J. Rhoades Sharon Risher (MDiv’07) Conrad M. Rocha Lana Russell Lita Simpson John L. Van Osdall Teresa Welborn Elizabeth C. Williams Michael G. Wright

Trustees Emeriti Lyndon Olson, B.W. Payne, Max Sherman, Anne Vickery Stevenson, Louis H. Zbinden Jr.

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