The Record - Winter 2018

The Episcopal Diocese of Michigan | edomi.org

CELEBRATE EDUCATE CREATE

THE

RECORD Winter 2018

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CONTENTS Winter 2018

02 Letter From The Editor 04 The Bishop’s Address

Anna Schroen, Director of Communications

He is the one you praise; he is your God, who performed for you those great and awesome wonders you saw with your own eyes.

Deuteronomy 10:21

Lorem Lo L ore rem Ip IIpsum pssuum

The Rt. Rev. Wendell N. Gibbs, Jr.

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Election Results

18

Dying Well

From the 184th Convention of the Diocese of Michigan

How Do We Get To Awe?

Mary Eldridge, Church of the Incarnation, Ann Arbor

Bill Wylie-Kellermann, St. Peter’s Detroit

20 Diocesan Resolutions

From the 184th Convention of the Diocese of Michigan

The Record is an official publication of the Episcopal Diocese of Michigan. Our mission is to celebrate, educate, and create community within our diocese.

EDITOR: Anna Schroen PUBLISHER: The Rt. Rev. Wendell N. Gibbs, Jr. The Record is published by the Episcopal Diocese of Michigan, 4800 Woodward Ave., Detroit, MI 48201.

Address changes may be emailed to TheRecord@edomi.org.

Image permissions and copyright: Cover: Mary Eldridge, inside cover: James Wheeler, p. 1: TJ Samuels, Mary Eldridge and Bill Wylie-Kellermann p. 2: studiom1, p. 3: Natalia Perevochikova, p. 4-11: Anna Schroen, p. 12-17: Mary Eldridge, p. 18-19: Bill Wylie-Kellermann, back cover: Eric Travis

Winter ‘18 | 01

LETTER FROM THE EDITOR Dear Reader, Thank you so much for picking up this issue of The Record. I hope that Advent and the winter season have given you joy, peace, and patience.

This year has been one of growth, introspection, and forward movement for this diocese. I am so proud of our community’s willingness to dive deeply into ourselves and to examine who we are and where we are headed together.

Thank you so much to all those who have supported this publication. Whether through reading and sharing the magazine, submitting your stories and ideas, or donating to our printing and mailing costs, your support has been incredibly inspiring and motivating.

Thank you so much for an incredible year. I hope you continue to stay involved with us both in person and online and continue sharing your lives and your blessings with us.

We love providing The Record to our diocese at no cost, ensuring that there are no barriers receiving this work. If you can, please help support us so that we can continue to bring the stories of our good works to the doorsteps of our diocese and beyond.

Your contributions don’t just help us edit, print, and mail the magazine. They help us maintain a strong online presence , take inspiring photographs, and share God’s word and this diocese’s’ incredible ministry with the world.

Just $5 would cover the printing and mailing cost for your household for the whole year. We gratefully accept checks and online donations at www.edomi.org/donate.

Sincer rely, Sincerely, Anna na Schroen ector of Communications Director scopal Diocese of Michigan Episcopal

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THE RECORD/COMMUNICATIONS MINISTRY 4800 Woodward Ave, Detroit MI, 48201 Anna Schroen

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Winter Wint Wi nter er ‘17 1 | 0033 17

THE BISHOP’S ADDRESS

One day, after a visit from my mother, I went to put on my favorite shirt and discovered it missing. I searched the laundry, the clothes hamper, even the rag pile. I wanted my shirt. I simply could not find it. Several days later, I received a letter from my mom with a picture of my shirt, indicating that it had been “shirt napped”! I was horrified. And what made it worse, there was no ransom demand to get it back; I was simply instructed to say good-bye to the shirt.

Now that was a change that I never saw coming and one that was terribly traumatic. However, change doesn’t have to be traumatic whether we see it coming or not.

Change is a part of life; change is a sign of life. In fact, the speed at which our skin cells regenerate means that we are not exactly the same as we were just a month ago. How’s that for change?

Fire of Renewal: Being and Becoming God’s Beloved The 184th Annual Convention of the Episcopal Diocese of Michigan The Rt. Rev. Wendell N. Gibbs, Jr., 10th Bishop of Michigan October 27, 2018 The philosopher Heraclitus said, “The only constant in life is change.” In the time since our last gathering as the convention of the Diocese of Michigan, I think it would be safe to say a few things have changed and are changing! Each of you has experienced change in your personal life, as have I. The diocese is in the midst of change that will continue for several more months. The Episcopal Church continues to stretch herself in responding to the continual call to change and be the Jesus movement we have inherited. People of faith around the world continue to be changed and challenged by the radical and too often violent nationalist movements that seem to have swept into power around the globe. And folks everywhere are struggling to understand the change that continues to manifest itself in a growing lack of care for children; families; the elders of our communities; people of color; women; and other diversities of ethnicity, traditions, sexuality, and sexual identity. Change is happening at what seems to be a breakneck speed, and some are beginning to feel powerless in its wake. Change may be an inevitable fact of life; how we deal with change reflects our understanding of our role in the change that is occurring or the change we seek.

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Change! For many, it is a four-letter word to be avoided at all costs. Change is feared, misjudged, and regarded with great suspicion. Change is often seen as an attack on our personal haven of comfort, and those who suggest change are seen as little more than traitors to the foundations of life as we know it. Let’s face it—many of us, myself included, simply don’t like change and could survive life just fine without any change, thank you very much. Or at least we think so!

As for me, when I find something that’s comfortable and works to lower my anxiety and meets my needs for a peaceful way of being, then I’m not very open to change. Recently, I shared the story about the time my wife and my mother conspired against me to force a change. I had an admittedly old flannel shirt that was soft and warm and comfortable. I used to look forward to going home after a long or difficult day in the office to put on my favorite shirt and sit and decompress in front of the television. I will admit it wasn’t the best-looking shirt on the rack, but it was my shirt and it met my needs. However, Karlah and my mother were simply tired of seeing what they considered was an ugly old rag of a shirt that needed to go.

a beloved of God, meaning one who is cherished and adored by the creator.

As we face the change and transition that will embrace our diocese over the next year, I want each of you to reflect on what your passion in the ministry we share is. Where can you put your enthusiasm as we begin to move toward new leadership, new opportunities, and new ideas for how we can best be the church in Southeast Michigan?

In the time I have served as your bishop, I have witnessed your ability as individuals and as a community to be passionate about issues of justice, equality, and equity. I have seen your enthusiasm as we work to provide learning and spiritual growth opportunities for our youth and young adults. I have experienced the fervor of your desire to be a more inclusive community. I have appreciated your commitment to building a tent here in Southeast Michigan that has breadth, depth, and width enough to welcome all to dwell with us.

Yet, change is not just something that happens to us.

We are also capable of effecting change. Unfortunately, the usual posture for too many is to sit back, complain, and wait for someone else to work for or make the change that is important to us. President Barack Obama And, my friends, I want to see you carry those once said, “Change will not come if we wait for some passions, that enthusiasm, that other person, or if we wait for some We need to be agents of fervor, that commitment into the other time. We are the ones we've the change we want to chapter that lies ahead. We will been waiting for. We are the change see, not merely heirs of need to continue to learn that we seek.” How very true that the efforts of others. together, to play together, and continues to be, especially in a world together go beyond our comfortable and in a nation where the gospel value to boundaries into a world that needs to see and hear “strive for justice and peace among all people, and our witness to the loving power of our God. We respect the dignity of every human being” is under need to be agents of the change we want to see, not constant attack from those who do not appreciate or merely heirs of the efforts of others. understand the beloved nature of the relationship of humankind to our God. People of faith must embrace The time of transition that is upon us, and that will the need and the will to change—and that often means continue to unfold over the next year, will require us self-change—if the justice, domestic tranquility, and to embrace an era of revitalization and renaissance. general welfare of all people as signaled in the preamble We have got to be equipped to think outside the of our country’s constitution have any hope of being a box and be ready to climb out of the box to claim reality today and into the future. our place as part of the Jesus movement. Our thinking about the church must change; our thinking Of course, the biggest opportunity facing us— the about the world must broaden and change. question we have to ask and seek answers to—as people of faith in any discussion about change is, how do We need to move from a fixed mindset to a we get to a place where we can embrace, endorse, and renaissance mindset—from a place where we believe effect change that is loving, liberating, and life-giving? our gifts and talents are fixed traits and where we spend our time showing off how wonderful we are, The theme for our convention this year speaks of fire, to a place where, as part of our desire to be truly renewal, and being and becoming God’s beloved. In reborn in the Spirit, we work to cultivate and some very real ways, being active as a change agent both develop our gifts for the good of all and for the in the world and right here in our diocese will require building up of the body of Christ. In the midst of the lots of fire, meaning enthusiasm and passion; a change happening around us, we must find ways to commitment toward renewal, meaning revitalization and be active, aware, and informed in the change so renaissance; and an appreciation of what it means to be continued on p. 06

so things don’t just happen to us.

Of course, the best foundation for spiritual renaissance is the willingness to embrace our belovedness: both that which we imperfectly cling to at present and that which we still desire to accept.

As I have journeyed through life and through my ministry, I have met and counseled a number of people who needed to know or be convinced or be reminded that they are loved by God. I think if we’re all very honest with ourselves, each of us needs a bit of reassurance that we truly are one of God’s beloved. I suspect that is most true when we feel life is providing us with undesirable life circumstances and opportunities, when things simply are not going our way, or when change is happening and we can’t or don’t know how to engage it. The person I know the most about when it comes to the need for reassurance is me.

Because I know I’m not perfect, because I know I am human, because I know I am a sinner among sinners, I have, at times, had a difficult time truly accepting myself as one of God’s beloved. Of course, I read scripture and I know that the Gospel of John tells me that, “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.”

[John 3:16] But I needed more. With the help of very patient spiritual directors and understanding therapists, eventually I came to embrace the reality that there was nothing I could ever do that would make God stop loving me. It has been a journey! That was an awesome moment then and continues to be amazing, awe-inspiring, breathtaking, and life-giving each time I allow myself to reside in that reality.

But I didn’t get to that place simply by having people tell

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me I was beloved. I had to learn it and feel it and allow it to become a vital part of who I am. You can do that, too.

Everyone can do it. One of the best ways to truly know love is to live love. And to live love is to follow the way of Jesus. In Colossians we hear: “As God’s chosen ones, holy and beloved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience. Bear with one another and, if anyone has a complaint against another, forgive each other; just as the Lord has forgiven you, so you also must forgive. Above all, clothe yourselves with love, which binds everything together in perfect harmony. And let the peace of Christ rule in your hearts, to which indeed you were called in the one body. And be thankful .”

[Colossians 3:12-15] Living in love makes it possible to approach, challenge, engage, and accept or reject change. Living in love takes practice.

This past summer at General Convention, our presiding bishop called the entire church to join him in the practices for a Jesus-centered life, to follow the way of Jesus, for his way is the way of love.

Over the past few years, as we immersed ourselves in the waters of reconciliation, we engaged in a lifelong learning process meant to open our hearts and our minds to the beauty of our world’s diversity and the imperative that we participate in true listening to one another. We engaged in a process that continues to teach us how to make space, even for the one with whom we disagree.

We engaged a process that continues to reveal to us the many ways God’s image is represented in the other. The work we have done with VISIONS, Inc. was only the first of many steps along the way and only the beginning of

the journey with VISIONS. We are at the beginning of what it means to be trained and prepared to live a life centered on Jesus. As our world changes, as our diocese faces into transition and change, I am of the firm belief that becoming conversant with the way of love and learning the practices for a Jesus -centered life, we will be the catalyst for the change we seek.

You can find more information about the way of love on the Episcopal Church website at www.episcopalchurch.org/wayoflove.

are witnessing outside these doors and you are the change the world needs.

So, now you’ve seen and heard the presiding bishop’s invitation to follow the way of love. You’ve got a small souvenir to remind you of one way you can approach this journey. Let me make some suggestions about some of the ways we can go into the world—how we can cross the boundaries—to witness to the love, justice, and truth of God and to join God in healing a hurting world.

First, let me say this as clearly as I possibly can: It is not my place or my intention to tell anyone how to vote. It is my place to remind each of us that voting is a right, a privilege, and a duty that is supported in a variety of places in Holy Scripture where we are reminded to be good citizens of where we are. As it says in Jeremiah, “Seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to the Lord on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your welfare.” It is my place to remind each of us that our values of God’s love for “Seek the welfare of the city all of God’s creation are not an ideal where I have sent you into that should live only inside the walls exile, and pray to the Lord on of the church.

Through the website, you are invited to share and develop resources and to share stories. This is truly something we, as church writ large, are called to do to live into being the Episcopal branch of the Jesus movement. In my vision for the future of this diocese, the way of love is a natural continuation of our lifelong learning process around diversity, inclusion, and equity, and it lays important foundations for each of us to know just how much God loves us.

In many ways, we have been becoming beloved community for some time now. We have been its behalf, for in its welfare changing. And, in that sense, you will find your welfare.”

As children of God, we have a duty compared to times past we are a to speak truth to power and witness to more beloved community than we have ever been. It also and participate in God’s call to respect all of God’s seems to reason that we will become a more beloved children in love. If you want to effect change, you have to community as we walk the way of love, the way of Jesus. be part of making change happen. It is not a viable option We will continue to change. to sit idly on the margins hoping and praying that things will be different. Praying is good; action supported by Now I realize that for, some of you, observing some set prayer is better. If you choose not to vote, then your of practices in your life may be the thing you have most whining and complaining from the sidelines is hollow and dreaded. Why do I need to have a checklist of ways in illogical. So, do something; embrace your membership in that I mark my journey with Jesus? For others, this may the Jesus movement, make your voice heard. Vote! be the perfect answer to your prayer for a way to be accountable for your spiritual life. And, for others still Secondly, I have made it no secret throughout my tenure who just want to sit in the pew and be left alone, you as your bishop that I am not a fan of resolutions that do may see this way of love to be another gimmick to try to not call us or challenge us to action. On a trip to get you to be more involved.

Washington, DC, when those of us in the group had an opportunity to meet with legislators, the one thing we I would like to suggest that this way of love is none of heard from both sides of political divide is that one letter those things. Rather, it is a call and a challenge to do from a group or organization like a diocesan convention, something different for your spiritual side that serves to regardless of the number of people it represents is barely reassure you, remind you, or convince you that God noticed when it arrives. What is noticed is a large loves you, that you are a beloved of God. Whether you number of letters from the individuals in that organization follow these eight practices or a different process of all arriving at about the same time. The sheer volume of centering or no process at all, our common focus for the mail commands attention from the legislators and their next year necessarily must involve enthusiasm, rebirth, staffs in ways that make each individual an important and love. Honestly, that is a change from the world we catalyst for change. Letter-writing or postcard-writing

continued on p. 08

campaigns invite people to participate in ways that simply raising a voting card do not.

future, there are more subtle changes that, in my opinion, are signaling a change in the polity of our church.

Now, please hear me. I am not saying that this convention or any other convention should not go on record either for or against an action or unjust policy proposed or adopted by our political leaders. After all, it is our duty to speak truth to power. I am saying that simply voting to have the secretary of convention send a letter to tell our senators or others in our congressional representation that the Episcopal Diocese of Michigan voted to oppose or support a particular action or inaction is simply not enough. In this day and age, we have to be realistic about the waning influence the Episcopal Church has in the halls of political power. We may once have been a powerful voice as an entity, but we’re not anymore. Our power comes from the use of our individual voices collected together and presented in such a way that the numbers make it clear that actual voters are unhappy with the actions of the elected.

The most common name for our church—The Episcopal Church—is quite descriptive of who we are. We are a church led by bishops. A favorite phrase among Anglicans worldwide is that we are a church that is Episcopally led and synodically governed. The word “synod” comes from the Greek meaning “walking together.” Essentially, as Anglicans we “believe that, within this ‘walking together’—within a church government that provides checks and balances against the concentration of power over and against any one part of the church (bishops, clergy, and laity)—we always recognize the unique leadership of bishops in faithfully teaching and guarding the faith, doctrine, and worship/liturgy of the church. No one else in the church has this role and responsibility.”

[Anglican Mainstream]

Some of the subtle changes appear to me to be an attempt to confuse roles and responsibilities such that the specific roles that each of us has as either laity, In the past, it has been suggested that I am simply trying clergy, or bishop will get conflated and scrambled. to do away with the one legislative tool we have to allow Some of these changes multiple voices to be heard. I’m The Sufi mystic and poet Rumi unfortunately have arisen from sorry if that’s the way you see it. once said, “Yesterday I was seeds of suspicion that have It is precisely because there is clever, so I wanted to change the been sown between the two great passion around many issues world. Today I am wise, so I am houses of convention— that come before this convention changing myself.” suspicion because some don’t that I want to find ways that allow for like that bishops actually have the greater expression of that passion rather than being authority to function in the role the church has called satisfied with a note in next year’s journal that a matter them to. Some of these changes seem to stem from was proposed, discussed, and a letter sent. At that low attempts to redistribute power, and this power grab is level of engagement, a fair question could be, “Who misguided because it assumes that power and authority cares?” However, if this truly is going to be a time of are always synonymous. And, unfortunately, some of mindset renaissance, I believe we can find a way to make these changes seem to have their origins in the ugliness what happens here once each year part of the ongoing of racism and sexism. And all of this, in my opinion, is life and focus of every congregant and congregation as we mired in fear. move through the days that follow our gathering.

The Sufi mystic and poet Rumi once said, “Yesterday I was clever, so I wanted to change the world. Today I am wise, so I am changing myself.” I understand that I may be suggesting a new way of accomplishing goals. I also realize that one of the passions of this diocese that I have come to appreciate is the true desire for justice for all. We can change the world if we start with ourselves. Thus, again, I commend the way of love as a spiritual guide for becoming the change we seek.

While the changes being considered and voted on most likely will not affect the average churchgoer in the near

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Having said all this, I don’t want you to think that I have suddenly gone negative on the church. I love our church and cannot see myself anywhere but the Episcopal Church. What I want you to take from my experience of General Convention is the need for all of us to be involved in the governance of the church. We cannot be complacent and simply allow change to happen to us; we need to be involved.

To that end, let me say a word about our bishop search and election. It should not come as a complete surprise to any of you that since I announced my intention to step

down as Bishop of Michigan at the end of 2019, the Standing Committee, the Search and Nominating Committee, and the Transitions Committee have all been very busy performing the canonical and practical duties that are their purview in this time of transition.

As we gather here today, the Search and Nominating Committee continues to receive names and submissions from those who feel a sense of call to the ministry of a bishop. Prior to that time, input was sought from you, the members of the diocese, to help form and guide a profile that would delineate what your hopes, dreams, expectations, and perhaps even some changes you would like to see in the next season of Episcopal leadership. Once all the applicants have been screened and vetted, and once a slate is presented to you for consideration, once again, you the people of the Diocese of Michigan, will be invited to be involved in the final discernment of who God is calling to be the 11th Bishop of Michigan.

Once you’ve seen the list of candidates, I’m sure there will be conversations in clericus groups, deanery caucuses, midweek Bible study groups, and even in the parking lot after church on Sunday. More importantly, there will be opportunities called “the Walk About” for folks to meet and ask questions of those who are doing

their best to be faithful to respond to the call God has put on their hearts. I urge and implore you: do not stay home and expect others to do the work for you. If you want to effect change, you have to be part of making change happen. Use the next several months to listen, learn, pray, and act. It is not just your future that matters; it is the future of what this diocese will be for our children and grandchildren that you have an opportunity to affect. Your participation, whether you are an elector at the Special Convention in June or not, is important and is an opportunity for each of you to reflect your belovedness before God and God’s people.

Before I close, a personal word.

We still have a little more than 14 months until I retire and thus another year or so to say good-bye. At the next annual convention, I will probably have to have major shares in Kleenex just to get through to adjournment.

Meanwhile, many of you have been asking a lot of the same questions like: How are you? Is Karlah excited that you’re retiring? What are you going to do when you retire? Are you and Karlah staying in Michigan? That sort of thing. So, if you will indulge me a moment, I will give you some answers so more of you can hear them at the same time.

continued on p. 10

As for how I am: I’m great! I am more and more convinced every day that I have made the right decision at the right time. When I went through the Walk About in 1999, I said that I would stay as long as I believed God was calling me to be here. Over the last couple of years, I have come to discern that God is now calling me to do other things in and with my life. From entering the monastery in 1972 through my upcoming retirement, I will have given to the church in one way or another, 47 years of my nearly 66 years of life. I feel good that the time is coming when I can spend more time with family—and especially Karlah—and finally have some time to get caught up on all the reading I’ve wanted to do.

As far as Karlah’s excitement: you should probably ask her. However, many of you do not know that Karlah retired in 2017 and has been patiently (sometimes) waiting for me to join her. Although we have travelled a lot together while I have been bishop, there are places we want to go for us rather than for the church, and we’re looking forward to that opportunity.

What am I going to do? This is an unresolved question. I know there are things I want to do and things I don’t want to do. Along with this question has been the inquiry as to whether I will go to be an assisting bishop somewhere or become provisional bishop in another diocese. My answer to the presiding bishop has been and will be no! As I have indicated to him, if I wanted to keep doing this diocesan bishop stuff, I would stay in Michigan.

I’m really ready to move on to something else. Of course, you all know of my passion for baseball, so I do want to avail myself of my favorite American pastime more often, but it remains to be seen how that will play out.

Are we staying in Michigan? The answer is no. I want to give my successor the space that he or she will need to be the Bishop of Michigan. And I need the space to really let go and be the resigned Bishop of Michigan. I know me and I don’t let go very easily, so going someplace where the day to day of the diocese is not right before me will make it an easier transition. Where are we going, you might ask? Well, that’s privileged information at the moment; we’re not at a place where we’re ready to share that just yet.

One final question folks have been asking: Aren’t there an awful lot of bishop elections happening around the church? What’s going on? Will we find a new bishop?

Yes, there are more elections happening over the next

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year than we’ve seen in a long time. Usually, there is a large number of resignations and retirements just following a meeting of the worldwide Communion at Lambeth. If you remember, Lambeth was supposed to have happened this year, 2018, but was delayed by the Archbishop of Canterbury and the other primates out of a hope that some of those bishops who have chosen to walk apart from the Communion for one reason or another might agree to return. Lambeth is now scheduled for 2020. I know that some bishops who have announced their retirements chose this timing so that their successors could attend the next Lambeth. Some of my colleagues are simply at an age and number of years of service that they, too, want more time with family, etc. I do not believe anything in particular is happening that has caused such a large number of retirements; it’s just timing!

In spite of the larger-than-usual number of election processes going on, I believe that the Diocese of Michigan is in a healthy place and should attract a strong pool of candidates. Our finances are on a solid foundation. Our sense of obligation to embrace the marginalized and our strong commitment to living ever more fully into our baptismal vows makes this a diocese that will attract those with a deeply spiritual sense of discernment that this is not just a job but a vocation.

I hope that helps; thank you for indulging me.

Let me close where I began: “The only constant in life is change.” Even in our Eucharistic liturgy when we commemorate those who have died, our prayer proclaims that “to your faithful people, O Lord, life is changed, not ended.” Ultimately, it is not the change that is of the greatest import, but how we prepare for and how we prepare to be part of the change. I believe that love—God’s love—is the way. As the violence of speech and action continue to dominate the headlines, the God of love continues to invite us, God’s beloved, to open our hearts to God’s love.

The American novelist Walter Mosley once wrote, “We are not trapped or locked up in these bones. No, no. We are free to change. And love changes us. And if we can love one another, we can break open the sky.”

Let us love one another; let us break open the sky.

184th Diocesan Convention Election Results Cathedral Chapter Clergy: The Rev. Paul Castelli – St. George’s, Milford* Lay: Mr. Zachary Baker – St. Luke’s, Ferndale Dr. Ronald Charles – St. Matthew’s & St. Joseph’s, Detroit

Commission on Ministry Clergy: The Rev. Joshua Hoover – St. James’, Birmingham The Rev. Christopher Johnson – All Saints’, Pontiac* The Rev. Deacon Jenny Ritter – St. Paul’s, Brighton* Lay: Mr. Matthew Evett – St. Clare’s, Ann Arbor* Mr. David Volker – St. George’s, Milford

Disciplinary Board Clergy: The Rev. Judith Schellhammer – St. Michael & All Angels, Cambridge Jct. Lay: Mr. Reavis Graham – St. George’s, Milford

Standing Committee Clergy: The Rev. Carol Mader – St. James’, Dexter Lay: Ms. Joyce Holden – Christ Church, Adrian

Trustees Clergy: The Very Rev. S. Scott Hunter – Cathedral Church of St. Paul, Detroit Lay: Mr. Ralph Castelli – St. James’, Birmingham Mr. Jim Treece – Christ Church, Detroit Mr. Giles Rhodenhiser – Christ Church Cranbrook, Bloomfield Hills Marc Robinson – Christ Church Cranbrook, Bloomfield Hills*

Amen. *Appointed by Bishop Gibbs post-convention

Winter ‘18 | 11

How Do We Get To Awe?

by Mary Eldridge

Church of the Incarnation, Ann Arbor

How do we keep our hearts wide open? After the week we've just been through, how do we not succumb to despair, hatred, cynicism, and rage?

What is going to see us through this storm?

I believe in beauty. It’s the thing I started pursuing like my soul depended on it a year-and-a-half ago. The day after the election, like so many people, I felt literally punched in the gut. I felt like I was a fortune teller who was already seeing too much, knew what was to come, and I was horrified and overwhelmed by it.

I went to the Diag. I needed company, and I hoped I’d find comfort there. I did. Written in chalk, all over the Diag and benches, were words of anger and hope, insistence and resistance. I started crying. How embarrassing to be a mom on campus, losing it! I realized I couldn’t stay and make a spectacle of myself, so I stumbled into the Canterbury House and eventually had a good chat with Reid Hamilton. I knew the church I was attending at the time was not going to respond to this moment or the struggles ahead. I said I needed to “church shop” and asked him for recommendations. The Episcopal Church of the Incarnation (ECI) was one of three suggestions he gave me, the second one I attended, and I never bothered with the third.

Before I go on, I want to say I'm grateful for ECI's involvement in the Poor People's Campaign. Poverty is a complex knot of many systemic evils. Naming them and fighting them together has been sustaining, and it's expanded my community at a crucial time. I've been poor off and on throughout my life, and I've been a single mother living by the skin of her teeth. I'm white and educated, so I never experienced the bone-crushing poverty of some of the people I've lived among the years I was in Detroit, and now here in Ann Arbor. But I experienced the way the system attempts to rob a person of their dignity and their humanity. I will never forget the shocks of those humiliations. To see how a punitive system doubles down, triples down on people of color is to see systemic racism. Poor people may not look how we think, or act how we think they should.

That’s because poor people are a ton of individuals, all with a few million separate stories to tell. We cannot be white-washed into the drug addict or the sofa lounger scamming the system. That is a lie perpetuated by the system and believed now by most of this country, it seems to me, even across party lines.

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In the end, whatever we decide about poor people doesn’t matter. Jesus said to help them. He didn’t indicate we should pick out the “truly worthy” ones from the bunch. He didn’t suggest a method of sifting out who he felt deserved his help. The risk of being Christian, I believe, is that we risk being made fools of because we help all. Jesus invited us to be foolish in love by loving, no matter who or what. The church needs to be about that love and that foolishness. I’m glad we’re here, seeking that ability to love for ourselves and with each other.

So I shared with Joe that I believe in beauty and he, naturally, prodded me to expand upon that. This was hard; I’m a creative person but not exactly capable of a lot of intellectual or analytical verbosity around it. Joe, however, supplied me some.

When I say I’m a creative person, though, I think there may be people who hear that and think that they are not. Creativity exists in so many of the choices we make daily—from what to wear, eat, and do to how to be in relationship or deal with challenges. We are constantly touching ground to some source for guidance beyond ourselves, some place where our ego has given up and our joy or curiosity or desperation has taken over. A lot of times, this takes tragedy. And I find that really interesting.

“In every new arising there are three forces involved: affirming, denying, and reconciling,” writes Cynthia Bourgeault in the Richard Rohr meditation Joe shared with me. “Let’s consider a simple example. A seed, as Jesus said, ‘unless it falls into the ground and dies, remains a single seed.’ (See John 12:24). Seed, the first or affirming force, meets ground, the second or ‘denying’ force ... but even in this encounter, nothing will happen until sunlight, the third or ‘reconciling’ force, enters the equation. Then among the three they generate a sprout, which is the actualization of the possibility latent in the seed—and a whole new ‘field’ of possibility.”

She goes on: “The Paschal Mystery is another example, with affirming as Jesus the human teacher of the path of love; denying as the crucifixion and the forces of hatred driving it; and reconciling as the principle of self-emptying, or kenotic love willingly engaged.” And then she writes, “The fourth new arising revealed

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through this weaving is the Kingdom of Heaven, visibly manifested in the very midst of human cruelty and brokenness.”

This, hopefully, resonates with us as believers in Jesus, as creative people, and as people dealing with cruelty, brokenness, loss, and grief.

I’d always thought I was a writer, a poet. When I had to choose between English or theater as a major in college, I gave up my first love (English) and joined the theater wagon. I didn’t want to be alone, at a desk, with a piece of paper. But after years of training and performing in theater, I realized I wasn’t a theater person at all.

Theater had been my therapy. It had enabled me to overcome extreme physical and emotional inhibitions, or at least to overcome them extremely—repeatedly and literally, I was on stage before hundreds of people, with barely an ounce of shame. It’s a handy quality for an actor. It’s really strange, but having left the theater years ago I now can barely speak aloud in a book discussion group. I think all that lack of shame caught up with me.

And here’s where the dance comes in. “The creative, transformative dance between attachment and detachment is sometimes called the Third Way. It is the middle way between fight and flight, as Walter Wink describes it. Some prefer to take on the world: to fight it, change it, fix it, and rearrange it. Others deny there is a problem at all. ‘Everything is beautiful,’ they say, and look the other way. Both instincts avoid holding the tension, the pain, and the essentially tragic nature of human existence.”

There is the question of what we mean by beauty ... what’s beautiful to me may not be beautiful to you. But as I age, what I find beautiful is changing. Is that happening to you? Beauty used to be for me—and still is in part—order, calm, and a certain amount of pleasantness. I think that aesthetic is understandable, given that I was raised in the home of an abusive alcoholic. Order and calm were my long-sought refuges.

But these days are different for me. I’m practicing holding uncertainty in my hands and not dropping it like a hot potato. I’m confused and disappointed, even anguished at times, and it’s not going to go away soon, if ever. I can’t and don’t want to shut it out or deny it’s happening. If I paint that energy, or release that energy with paint, it sometimes looks like this …

This is where I think our dualistic minds just can’t cope.

We want either/or, and instead we’re called to dance, to non-dual consciousness, or the mind of Christ.

How to get there.

I’m a fighter, a changer, a fixer. I’m not a contemplative, although Joe has pointed out to me that art can be prayer and contemplation. When words failed me about a year-and-a-half ago, I unexpectedly discovered painting.

It was against the bleak, scratchy canvas of our social and political mess that the need in me for beauty asserted itself. Every Loss can expression of color felt, and still feels, provide the like defiance, a delicious and exuberant alchemy for defiance that leans toward grace.

Now I paint, which is neither theater nor poetry. It was born out of that Law of Three though, I think.

Affirming, denying, reconciling. In a more simplistic understanding, we can creation. thrive in resistance. Limitations can offer These days, I like the kind of painting that us the avenue to release. Loss can provide the alchemy seems to rely almost totally on grace. I supply the puddle of paint or the swipe of the spatula, but grace for creation. makes it look like the Lake District in England, or the spray and freedom of ocean waters. I’m trying to take Someone got elected; ugliness, fear and cruelty became myself and my ego out of it more and more. I don’t the norm. And we have to not just survive it, but know if that will get me to accept my judgmentalism transform and be transformed by it. It’s like we can stretch out our arms to the boundaries of the cage and and believe in my transcendence, but it counters the loss and grief. I enter the space full of fight and fear, and feel the immense isometric power that the cage has I leave having answered with something beyond me and revealed to us. What we experience as one thing, such as defeat or loss, can yield the surprise—the sprout. And something I consider beautiful. Maybe this is, as Rohr says, “...where creativity and new forms of life and it is a surprise, always. healing emerge.”

Another meditation from Joe describes our faith as a Many of you are far more experienced practitioners of dance. Richard Rohr writes, “Our religion is neither contemplation and creativity than I. I revere your solely detachment nor attachment; it’s a dance between discipline. To the rest of us just stumbling onto it, or the two. It’s neither entirely isolation, as symbolized by the desert, nor is it complete engagement, as symbolized even doubting its existence within us, I say just risk it.

We are followers of Christ, we are risk-takers, and we by the city. Jesus moves back and forth between desert are foolish. Let’s own it. and city.”

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If I’m feeling defiantly life-affirming and joyful and I want to put that, literally, into people’s hands, it looks like this …

I’m loving what some call street art more and more. It’s got the power, color, and the ability to astonish me these days like few things in a museum. I don’t feel I fit the demographic to be into street art. But that’s another false reducer that exists in my mind, and I need to dismantle it. Creativity is about releasing the entire universe within us. Some weird, small voice in my own mind keeps trying to tell me to stick to grey-haired white-woman’s art, whatever that could possibly be.

And here I hear Joe ask: How does my own lens try to rob me of my voice? What stifling legacies of harm or privilege would it be good for me to come nose to nose with?

I’m seeing how expanding the creativity within me is expanding my definition of myself. It’s also tapping into a need for community and revealing new pathways to help with that connection. And I believe creativity is part of the journey toward wholeness and the goodness God wants for all of us.

If I’m with the people in the struggle and we’re marching in the Poor People’s Campaign, it can look like this …

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I want to be sure and mention, too, the creativity hierarchy and how, like all hierarchies, we need to undo its presence in our minds. I know I see fine art as the peak (and thank God for people with that kind of talent), but I have to catch myself constantly from taking on how critical and dismissive our culture is of the things we make with our hands and offer with our hearts. If it can’t produce money and be reproduced cheaply and incessantly, I know I’ve been trained to

devalue it. Things are either shiny, plastic and new or breathtaking genius, right? breathtaking genius, right?

These are false standards, or standards sure to stop our creative urge dead in its tracks. I’m finding some of the crude cardboard signs individuals have made for the Poor People’s Campaign to be amazing in their originality and power.

Lastly, color just may help us through the storm. At the Massachusetts Museum of Contemporary Art, there’s an exhibit of the artist James Turrell called “Into the Light.” In the exhibit, you enter a large three-story room that is all white and curved at the floor and ceiling, so there are no edges. The lights go out, and the color begins. The lighting is such that the room is drenched in gradually shifting color—pinks to peach to greens—and there are no boundaries, no top and no bottom. You exist in intense color. You walk and slowly circle about in a universe of vibrant color. I thought it might make me claustrophobic, eight minutes of disorientation.

It turned out to be eight minutes of awe, eight minutes of wordless prayer, which really felt out of time. It seemed like it had been only moments, and then it was over. It was color as a portal to the mind of God, color as the generator of awe. And awe, however you find it, may be the boat that carries us through the storm.

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EXPLORING

INWARD

Byy The B The Rev. Rev. Judith Judith Schellhammer, Schellhammer, St. St. M Michael ichael aand nd A Allll A Angels, ngels, C Cambridge ambridge JJunction unction Byy The B The Rev. Rev. Judith Judith Schellhammer, Schellhammer, St. St. M Michael ichael aand nd A Allll A Angels, ngels, C Cambridge ambridge JJunction unction

Jeanie Wylie-Kellermann, former editor of The Record and The Witness died in 2005 of a Jeanie former editor of The and The Witness diedBill in in 2005 of aWell: severe Wylie-Kellermann, brain tumor. The story of her death andRecord life is told by her husband Dying severe brain tumor.

The story of her death and life is told by her husband Bill in Dying Well: the Resurrected Life of Jeanie Wylie-Kellermann. The following is an excerpt from a circular the Resurrected Life of in Jeanie Wylie-Kellermann. The following is an excerpt from a circular update letter included the book. update letter included in the book.

You can purchase the book at http://bit.ly/dying-well You can purchase the book at http://bit.ly/dying-well August 8, 2000: Heavenly Signs: Trailing the Luminous Dome August 8, 2000: Heavenly Signs: Trailing the Luminous Dome Dear Friends Dear Friends …We did go to Denver for General Convention and the Witness events. It was a far flyin’ piece …We did go to Denver for General Convention and the Witness events. It was a far flyin’ piece from familiar medical support, but once home, I was glad we did it. So many folks startled with from familiar medical support, but once home, I was glad we did it. So many folks startled with joy to lay eyes on Jeanie. Momentously, at a board meeting there, her torch officially was passed. joy to lay eyes on Jeanie. Momentously, at a board meeting there, her torch officially was passed.

Julie Wortman is now editor/publisher of The Witness, as Jeanie intuitively fore-maneuvered long Julie Wortman is now editor/publisher of The Witness, as Jeanie intuitively fore-maneuvered long ago. The magazine reception was not designed to honor her, but one of the honorees, a good ago. The magazine reception was not designed to honor her, but one of the honorees, a good bishop, did – calling Jeanie into the light of a standing ovation… bishop, did – calling Jeanie into the light of a standing ovation…

I’ve been mindful that I don’t get much solitude these days. When I’m home, even working, I stay I’ve been mindful that I don’t get much solitude these days. When I’m home, even working, I stay close to Jeanie – round the clock in earshot. We ask so much of friends and family in covering for close to Jeanie – round the clock in earshot. We ask so much of friends and family in covering for me when I’m I’m on on the the road road that that asking asking for for more, more, so so II could could get get aa sabbath sabbath at at the the cabin, cabin,seems seems too too me when much. (I (I do do know know this this is is actually actually wrong, wrong, but but feel feel we we are are straining straining people, people,and and who who knows knows what’s what’s much. to come?). to come?).

Anyway, several several weeks weeks back, back, at at our our cabin cabin in in the the Thumb, Thumb, as as II was was headed headed off off to to work work briefly briefly on on Anyway, some paths, Jeanie followed me into the clearing with a question that never fully formed.

At the some paths, Jeanie followed me into the clearing with a question that never fully formed. At the far end, end, II turned turned her her around, around, saying saying I’d I’d watch watch her her back back to to the the cabin cabin where where her her sister sister was was waiting. waiting. far As she turned, I said what suddenly dawned on me: “Hey, you never get any solitude either, do As she turned, I said what suddenly dawned on me: “Hey, you never get any solitude either, do you?”

“No,” she replied wistfully over her shoulder, “I sure don’t.” you?” “No,” she replied wistfully over her shoulder, “I sure don’t.”

Then again. again. Last Last week week the the four four of of us us were were up up to to the the cabin. cabin. Late Late afternoon, afternoon,we we stood stood at at the the Then window watching watching Lucy Lucy dance dance in in aa downpour, downpour, soaking soaking itit all all in in through through her her sundress, sundress,when when suddenly suddenly window time that lit, the sky changed.

We hustled out to witness a double rainbow, noticing for the first lit, the sky changed. We hustled out to witness a double rainbow, noticing for the first time that the two mirror one another, reversing the order of colors.

We stood agog and posed for each the two mirror one another, reversing the order of colors. We stood agog and posed for each other framed framed beneath beneath the the covenant covenant with with all all creation… creation… other Then last last night, night, Jeanie Jeanie rousing rousing repeatedly, repeatedly, got got me me up up at at 44 a.m. a.m.The The moon moon was was down, down,but but II noticed noticed aa Then through the the window. window. Northern Northern lights! lights! Out Out back back the the clearing clearing was was covered covered subtle shimmering flash through with this shifting luminous dome. dome.Then, Then, light light upon upon light, light, aa falling falling star. star.And And another. another.And And again, again,with with aa long orange tail.

Unbeknownst, we’d been waked waked to to the the Perseid Perseid meteor meteor shower. shower.Through Through the the wisps wisps of of light light trailing trailing for healing healing aura, aura, to to be be soaked soaked in in though though Jeanie’s Jeanie’s nightgown. nightgown.Down Down up, they fell. We claimed it all for was scattered scattered to to the the horizon horizon or or forgotten. forgotten.AA different different hand, hand,thanks thanks and up they blessed. Dread was be, upon my guts. shall sing… sing… ’Til the last morning star shall Bill

CONVENTION RESOLUTIONS Resolution #1 The Opioid Crisis

Resolution #3 Protecting Voting Rights

RESOLVED that the 184th Convention of the Diocese of Michigan urges the people and worshipping communities thereof to study all parts of C037 Call to Respond to Opioid Epidemic, adopted in July by the 79th General Convention detailing our nation’s opioid public health crisis.

RESOLVED, that this 184th Convention of the Diocese of Michigan urges the people and congregations of the Episcopal Diocese of Michigan to support the 79th General Convention of The Episcopal Church D003 in working to overcome efforts that suppress the voting rights of the citizens of Michigan and the United States, and

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the 184th Convention of the Diocese of Michigan urges each participant to contact legislators in support of legislation that strengthens and funds the fight against opioid addiction, specifically HB 5085 and/or any other act designed to eliminate or lessen the harm caused by this public health crisis.

RESOLVED, That this 184th Convention of the Diocese of Michigan urges the people and congregations of the Episcopal Diocese of Michigan to follow the lead of the 79th General Convention of The Episcopal Church D003 calling “on governments on all levels to create policies to enhance voter participation by, among other strategies, seeking to implement policies that will increase early voting, extend registration periods, guarantee an adequate number of voting locations, allow absentee balloting without the necessity of having an excuse, and prohibit forms of identification that restrict voter participation…” and be it further

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the 184th Convention of the Diocese of Michigan urges people to visit websites with resources helping in the battle against opioid addiction such as Bryan’s HOPE (Heroin & Opiate Prevention & Education), www.bryanshope.org.

BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the 184th Convention of the Diocese of Michigan encourage deaneries and congregations to explore opportunities to work together with Bryan's HOPE and other organizations to eliminate or lessen this public health crisis.

Resolution #2 One Person One Vote RESOLVED, that this 184th Convention of the Diocese of Michigan urges the people and congregations of the Episcopal Diocese of Michigan to follow the lead of the 79th General Convention of The Episcopal Church in reaffirming that one person one vote means that the votes of all citizens of all races and ethnicities are fairly represented, counted and accounted for, and RESOLVED, that this 184th Convention of the Diocese of Michigan lifts up the 79th General Convention of The Episcopal Church, Resolution D003 Addressing the issue of Voter Suppression, and opposes any form of partisan gerrymandering which has the same effect of racial gerrymandering; https://www.vbinder.net/resolutions/D003?house=hd&lang=en and be it further RESOLVED, that this 184th Convention of the Diocese of Michigan urges the people and congregations of the Diocese of Michigan learn about, educate others and support the Voters Not Politicians Ballot Initiative on the November 2018 ballot that offers an amendment to the State Constitution that addresses gerrymandering and offers a fair process to protect one person one vote and to end the partisan gerrymandering process in Michigan.

RESOLVED, That this 184th Convention of the Diocese of Michigan urges the people and congregations of the Diocese of Michigan to learn about, educate others and support the Promote the Vote Ballot Initiative on the November 2018 ballot that offers an amendment to the State Constitution that provides safeguards our elections, puts voters first, and removes barriers that make it more difficult for voters to vote and for their votes to be counted: by protecting the right to vote a secret ballot, ensuring military service members and overseas voters get their ballots in time for their votes to count, providing voters with the option to vote straight party, automatically registering citizens to vote at the Secretary of State’s office unless the citizen declines, allowing a citizen to register to vote anytime with proof of residency, providing all registered voters access to an absentee ballot for any reason and ensuring the accuracy and integrity of elections by auditing election results. https://promotethevotemi.com/

Resolution #5 Recognition and Affirmation of the Inherent Dignity of Transgender and Nonbinary Persons as Beloved Children of God RESOLVED, that the 184th Convention of the Episcopal Diocese of Michigan affirms that all transgender and nonbinary people, and anyone whose gender identity and expression differs from that assigned at birth, are beloved children of God and are to be treated with equal rights and privileges as other human beings; and be it further RESOLVED, that the 184th Convention of the Episcopal Diocese of Michigan opposes any attempt to legislate or make public policy that defines sex and/or gender on the basis of physical appearance of external genitalia present at birth or presence of certain chromosomes within a person’s DNA; and be it further RESOLVED, that the Episcopal Diocese of Michigan support educational, pastoral, liturgical, and legislative efforts that seek to end systemic violence against transgender people, calling special attention to violence against transgender women of color; and be it further RESOLVED, that the Secretary of Convention convey this resolution to appropriate state and federal policy makers, such as the President, the Federal Cabinet, the Governor, the State Cabinet, and state and federal legislators representing districts in this Diocese, and be it further RESOLVED, that this 184 th Convention of the Diocese of Michigan urge each member of the convention to encourage their worshipping communities likewise to convey this resolution to appropriate state and federal policy makers whenever the equal rights and privileges of transgender and nonbinary persons is at stake.

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Pilgrimage to Ireland with The Bishop Pilgrimage to Ireland with The Bishop April 23 - May 2, 2019

The Diocese of Michigan is planning a pilgrimage to Ireland in 2019 with Bishop Gibbs April 23 - per May 2, 2019 and The Rev. Dr. Susan Carter. Price: $3498.00 person, based on double occupancy round trip from Detroit. Limited number of single rooms available at supplement of $400.

The of Michigan planning pilgrimage to Ireland in 2019 with Gibbs SingleDiocese room must be paidisfor at timea of deposit. Price includes round tripBishop air, hotels, and The Rev. Dr. Susan $3498.00 per person, basedofonone double occupancy transfers, sightseeing in Carter. private Price: air conditioned coach, porterage suitcase in and round from Detroit. Limited number entrance of single rooms at supplement out of trip hotels, sightseeing as per itinerary, fees to available those sites listed, mealsofas$400.

Single roominmust be paid at time deposit.

Price includes round trip air, hotels, mentioned itinerary, VATfor taxes and of service charges. transfers, sightseeing in private air conditioned coach, porterage of one suitcase in and out of hotels, sightseeing as per itinerary, entrance fees to those sites listed, meals as For more information, contact: sucarter@msu.edu or 517-599-0380 mentioned in itinerary, VAT taxes and service charges.

For more information, contact: sucarter@msu.edu or 517-599-0380