I Hate Mother’s Day

I hate Mother’s day.  Passionately.

When most moms I know are appreciating cards from their kids, breakfast in bed, and general doting, I usually beg my family to leave me alone for Mother’s day.  After a morning of pastoral duties, I crawl into bed, put the covers over my head, and wait for the day to end.

I wish I wasn’t so damned dramatic about the whole thing.

My mom was diagnosed with cancer on my 18th birthday, and my first several years of adulthood were spent in and out of hospitals with her, learning more about cancer, adhesions, chemotherapy and radiation than any young adult should ever know.  She died when I was 22–the age when I was just beginning to like my mom, as my adolescent eye-rolling and snarkiness was ebbing.

After my mom’s death, Mother’s day came to represent the unfinished business of my relationship with my own mother.  I needed to do something to remember my mother and mark her end of suffering and my ongoing pain, so, I turned Mother’s day into this awful day of tribute to what never was.  I walked with my sister in law (whose mother also died of cancer) and my friends at the Mother’s Day Race for the Cure in Philadelphia.  I wore my mom’s name on my back “In memory of Reba”, and my friends wore her name on their backs too.  We walked together, in what felt like a death march, even though we were surrounded by thousands of perky, pink wearing people all around us.

When my kids were stroller-aged, I would bring them with me to the walk. But as they got older, they wanted to do things to celebrate me, not remember their grandmother, who lived only in their memories, through stories I’d tell about her.

Two year ago, my husband came to me the week before Mother’s day, and asked the perennial question, “What can we do for you on Mother’s day?”  I prepared my annual speech in return, “Just leave me alone, and let me sleep.”  Before I could really finish it, he stopped me, “Amy, the kids and I want to celebrate you.  We know this is a hard day for you, but can you let us celebrate what you mean to us?”

I had to say yes.  But I didn’t want to.  And I wasn’t looking forward to it.

Before Mother’s day that year, I talked to my friend, Jennifer, from college, who lost her mother to cancer a few years before I did. She shared my dislike for Mother’s day, but she also realized that her kids needed an opportunity to celebrate their mother.  Our issues around our own mothers were not our children’s issues, and we should not impose it on them.  We needed to find a way to be celebrated by our children.

Jennifer suggested that I make a Mother’s day practice of taking a selfie with each of my kids.  Jennifer and I didn’t have nearly enough pictures with our mothers, and we wanted our kids to have many more pictures with us.

So, after a Mother’s day nap, my family took me to the park.  We sat on a blanket in the sunshine with sandwiches from our favorite deli.  We played frisbee.  We watched the dogs run and play nearby.  And, I made sure to take pictures with each of the kids.  I took pictures for them to have later, and to share with their own children.  I took pictures for me, to remember that moment when I put my anger at the unfinished business aside, to make room for celebration.  And, I took the pictures for my mom, because she’d be mad if I passed my baggage onto my kids.

As Mother’s day approaches, I still hate the idea of it.  It forces all my issues to the surface of my deep pool of loss.  It still makes me want to hide under the covers and wait for the day to end.

But this day is not about me and my unfinished business with my mother.  It’s about celebrating the love my family has for me, and receiving that for the beautiful gift that it is.  So, every year, I try to open myself a little wider to the love my family has for me, and every year I try to release more of that unfinished business with my mom.  It doesn’t make the day easier, but it gives the day a focus.  And that’s the best I can hope for on this day that I still really, really hate.

Loved. No Matter What.

Cross posted at practicingfamilies.com

I’d like to think that my kids (age 11 and 14 now) would come to me and tell me anything.  I would like to believe that there is no problem too big, too difficult or too painful for us to discuss.  We’ve talked about a lot of things together–conflicts with friends, changing bodies, our values and boundaries around sex–I’d like to think that if we can talk together about sex without too much squirming or funny faces, then we can talk about anything.

But, I can never assume it.

Last week, a family in a neighboring town looked frantically for their thirteen year old son who left their home on a cold night, right before a big snowstorm.  He was missing for four days and nights.  In those terrible long days and nights, the parents learned that he left home after receiving an email from school about a homework assignment that was late.

This story was difficult for me as a parent for a few reasons.  First, this child is around the same age as my kids, and second, he was in the struggle that I face too often with my own kids–the relationship between homework and self-esteem.

My kids put a lot of stock in their grades.  So if they forget or avoid an assignment and get an unsatisfying grade, in their eyes they have failed.  I work really hard not to put the pressure on them around grades, because they do that without my help.  They need me to tell them that they are loved.  They need me to set good, safe boundaries for them.

Monday morning, after this child was missing for almost five days, he was found in a neighbor’s back yard.  He took a gun from his family home–a gun that was fitted with a trigger lock–and he took his life.  At thirteen.

Last night at dinner, I told the kids the story of this child–a child that could have been their friend.  And I reminded them that there was nothing they couldn’t tell me.  They never had to worry about me not loving them in the difficult times.

Sometimes it’s hard for kids to remember that.  I remember as a kid being worried that my parent’s love was conditional.  I remember the terrible fear that I would disappoint or embarrass them.  Looking back on that now, it seems a little silly.  I don’t think my parents would have been disappointed in me or angry with the little things I saw as a failure then.  But, these are the things our kids worry about.  These things can paralyze our children, and lead them to think and do some unimaginable things.

Suicide is a very complicated thing.  To be honest, I hesitate to write about it it here–it’s tempting to be judgemental about gun safety or homework or parenting in the case of the child that took his life.  And I refuse to go there–the story of this child’s death is probably far more complicated than we can ever imagine.  What I do know is that my children and your children need to hear that they are loved regardless of grades, performance or ability.

Tear open the Heavens

An article cross posted at https://adventhealingandhope.wordpress.com/2014/12/01/tear-open-heaven/

O that you would tear open the heavens and come down,

   so that the mountains would quake at your presence—

as when fire kindles brushwood

   and the fire causes water to boil—

to make your name known to your adversaries,

   so that the nations might tremble at your presence!

When you did awesome deeds that we did not expect,

   you came down, the mountains quaked at your presence.

Isaiah 64:1-3

There’s been a lot going on in my beloved city of Philadelphia, and so much of is is heartbreaking.

On election day, a few weeks ago, there was a shooting at the gas station across the street from my church.  I was in the church at the time, as were the polling volunteers, and several voters.  School was out, so there lots of people–young and old–moving up and down the street.

After I watched part of the shooting from the window of my church office, and saw the victim get into his car, and race away, I called 911.  I ran downstairs to check on the rest of the folks in the building, and found them huddled together in fear.  I was filled with anger.  Why is this happening in my neighborhood?  What were these guys thinking, settling their disputes about family issues with guns and in such a public place?

How I wish that God would tear open the heavens and fix this mess!

On Monday, we heard the news from Furgeson, that there would be no indictment for Darren Wilson, the police officer that shot and killed Michael Brown.   I gathered with other Philadelphia clergy to hear the decision, and we grieved and marched in the streets of Philadelphia.  We offered a peaceful presence in the march as young people of color expressed their rage at the injustice as they screamed, “Hands up, don’t shoot!” and “No justice, no peace!”

That night, I wanted the sky to open, and for God’s justice to rain down on this terrible system we have in place.  Instead police helicopters watched the protests from the sky, and officers on bikes and on foot surrounded the protest.

“Tear open the heavens!”  This was the cry of the people of Israel in the diaspora.  “Tear open the heavens, God!  Fix this mess, just as you have in times before!” They too had enough of their enslavement, of a system that was not in place to protect them.  They cried out to God to rescue them, to save them from this mess.

This passage from Isaiah introduces Advent this season with our communal cry for help and salvation.  “Help us!  Save us, God!”  And what we later learn from the incarnation, is that God is already here; the reign of God is among us.  We don’t have to beg God to rip open the sky because God is present among us.  This is what my friend, Bishop Duane Royster, reminded the angry crowds in Philadelphia on Monday night, “God is here with us, sharing in our pain.”

There’s been a lot going on in my city, and so much of is is heartbreaking.  But there is still hope.

While I’ve been angry about the violence that threatens the neighborhood I live in and love, I’ve been encouraged too.  The week of the shooting across from the church, I drove by another neighborhood church and found a memorial to the victims of gun violence in their front yard.  I’m not alone in feeling this anger and pain.  Others hold it with me.  And we’re trying to do something about it.

My heart has broken for the family of Michael Brown, for Furgeson, and for all the places in our world where the laws and systems in place to protect are skewed against people of color.  But, while marching in the streets of Philadelphia on Monday night, I received a series of texts from my thirteen year old son–he wanted to know the verdict, and how people were doing.  His heart was breaking too.  Living in a multi-racial city, and going to one of the most diverse schools in the state, he understood what this verdict meant.  He and all the young folks marching in Philadelphia gave me hope that maybe the next generation could do this better, and that perhaps we may learn from this death.

This is what the incarnation looks like.  We cry for God to save us, yet God is already here, embodied in human flesh, and walking with us.

The violence in my city feels unbearable some days.  The events of Furguson makes me question our humanity.  But God is here among us, feeling the pain with us, weeping and mourning with us.  We look up, we cry out for God to tear open the heavens, but God is here–the incarnate one, God with us.

We still need to talk about Ferguson

Cross posted at Practicing Families, and Mennonite World Review

I know, I know. The news cycle on this is over, and thoughts are elsewhere. But, Ferguson’s story happens in some form every day in our country. The sad truth is that too many folks consider brown bodies to be less important than others.

In the height of the Ferguson crisis in August, I attended a prayer service, remembering Mike Brown and all the other unnamed Mikes and Trayvons out there. A friend publicly shared her experience of parenting her brown-skinned son, how she is constantly worried that he will be stopped by the police, or worse, shot and killed. She shared the painful reality that so many families of color have to give “the talk” to their children, a talk about the ways they should present themselves in public, and how they should act if they are stopped by the police.

Those are conversations that I have never even dreamed of having with my blond-haired, blue-eyed, teenaged son.

My friend, whose conversations with her son is a fact of life, called on her white friends at that prayer service to make a pledge to do something about Ferguson. What would I do with my white privilege to influence this world positively?

This challenge has been on my mind for weeks. It’s why we still need to be talking about Ferguson and thinking about racism, and praying to see another way to live in this world. The Mike Browns and Trayvon Martins show us the sad reality of this country — that racism is alive and well, and that have so much to teach our children.

My pledge to my friends who parent brown-skinned boys and girls is that I will teach my own children to recognize their privilege. I’ve taught my teenaged son to stay with his brown-skinned friends if they are stopped by the police, and to never, ever leave them alone in times when they feel threatened. I’ve been teaching him to notice the different ways that people are treated, to be mindful of his own behavior. I’ve been talking to my daughter about the ways that different life experiences impact how people treat each other.

This is hard work, but I know it’s the work that Jesus engaged in, and the work to which we are called. Just because Ferguson isn’t on the front page doesn’t mean we stop thinking about it, talking about it with our kids, and working to make our world better and safer for all God’s children.

Give it a Rest!

Cross-posted at http://practicingfamilies.com/2014/08/06/give-it-a-rest/ and at http://mennoworld.org/2014/08/07/give-it-a-rest/

Now when Jesus heard this, he withdrew from there in a boat to a deserted place by himself.  Matthew 14:13

I say every summer, “this summer is going to be more relaxed than last summer.”  And every summer it’s just not.  It’s not that the summer is bad, but that it is more busy than I’d like it to be.  There’s sleep away camp, trips to the ocean, camping in the woods, the baseball game we always go to (even though none of us really like baseball), and the outdoor movies at the library that we love so much.  This summer we’ve been in “hurry up so we can have fun” mode, which as it turns out, isn’t very fun.

Yesterday was my day off with the kids, and there was a big “to do” list. We had to plan meals for the week, go shopping, do some laundry, clean the house, and make sure the kids were packed for their big visit to their Aunt and Uncle’s house for the week.

But when I woke up and looked at the kids, they looked exhausted.  I was exhausted too.  We were trying to cram too much into our short summer, and we needed to take a rest.

So after a quick trip to the grocery store and a few chores, we all collapsed into our rooms for some extended quiet time.  It felt a little naughty–laying around inside on a gorgeous summer day–but it also felt necessary.  We needed some down time–a chance to restore our spirits, catch up on rest, and come back to ourselves.

Jesus is an excellent model for self care.  In the midst of his work, he made time for himself.  He knew that he couldn’t keep going without a Sabbath rest.  He couldn’t continue if he was always exhausted.  That was easier said than done in an intense ministry such as his–even during his times of rest, he was sought out for healing, help and wisdom.  But even in the midst of his intense work, he tried to find moments of rest.

Obviously our lives are not like Jesus’–we have it much easier.  The fact that we have options about what to do with our time and where we spend it is far more than many have.  And so we must choose wisely what we do with our time.

Sometimes we need to forsake a beautiful day of running around for a much needed day of sleeping in and snuggling up.  Sometimes we need to recharge our batteries, and hide away.  And yesterday was just such a day.  Next week, the day off will probably be more vigorous.  We’ll probably try to slip in a walk in the Wissahickon park, or meet up with some friends for a play date.  But yesterday, we needed to play hookie, to give ourselves a rest, and to restore our spirits for what’s to come next.

May we all find ways to rest, even in the midst of our hectic lives.

This was supposed to be about Pentectost

Cross posted at Practicing Families: http://goo.gl/BD389d

This was going to be a post about Pentecost, a reflection on my family’s love for our city wide Mennonite Pentecost service, a service that involves as many languages at the building can hold, as service that reminds me that from time to time, we can get along and be one.

But I don’t think I can write that post today. Because today I received one of those texts you never want to get from your child, “Mom, the school’s on lockdown; what do I do?.”

My thirteen year old son goes to school in downtown Philadelphia. He takes the train with his friends to school and back every day. He has a lot of freedom for a middle schooler, freedom that is well earned as a mostly-responsible kid.

Today, he went to school, and did all the things he was supposed to do. But today, an angry student from the college across the street, pulled out a gun in class and threatened a classmate. And that sparked a lockdown of the college, and my son’s school. The lockdown was an appropriate response to a violent situation. But, it terrified my son, and me.

The Columbine High school shootings happened fifteen years ago, and the attacks on the Twin Towers thirteen years ago. Both of those incidents changed how we parent. We raise our kids in times of terror, when our schoolchildren no longer prepare for distant cold war threats, but for angry people who only know how to express themselves with extreme violence. And that violence happens in places where we are trying to keep our kids safe.

What do we as parents do to respond? How do we keep our children safe, but teach them to live in a spirit of hope and not fear?

One of the things I love about Pentecost is that for one day in our church life, we can imagine being one. We can imagine that the church can put aside our theological, cultural, race and class divisions, a for one day and worship together in unity. This is–of course–much easier said than done. But it’s exactly why I love this day. It’s something to work towards together with other communities of faith, particularly when our own congregations look less like Pentecost than we wish they would.

But when things are frightening out there, it’s tempting to shut our doors, to shut out the spirit, to live in fear. We are tempted to keep to ourselves, to isolate from others, to stay only with those that share our culture and values.

But this is not how we are called to live. This is not what we are called to teach our children.

As difficult as it is to send my son out to the train some mornings, not knowing what his day will bring, I trust him into the care of the Beloved. I trust him with what he’s been taught in our home and community, and what we try to practice in our lives–that God loves all God’s children, and is present in every moment of their lives.

I also know that isolation does not give us glimpses of the beloved community. It does not give us Pentecost. It doesn’t bring us any closer to understanding who God is and what it means to follow in the way of Jesus.

When we our tempted shudder our doors and windows, to hide from a world that feels too violent to bear, may we open ourselves to the wonder of Pentecost. While fraught with unknowns, there is still joy in the gathering together, in the sharing fellowship with others who experience the world differently, and learning from them.

May we teach our young people to be God’s hopeful Pentecost children, even when the world feels frightening. AMEN.

I Doubt It

Cross posted at Practicing Families

At the dinner table, my pre-teen kids and I sometimes play a game called, “I doubt it.”  Somebody says something about their day, and the rest of us get to say whether we believe it or not.

“Today in school, the electricity went out in the school, and we had to work by candlelight, like in the olden times.”  

“I DOUBT IT!”

“I met Taylor Swift and she wants me to be a backup singer!”

“I DOUBT IT!”

“They were just handing out free tickets to Disney World today–flight and hotel included!”

“I DOUBT IT!”

It’s a silly game, but it’s fun and gives us permission to dream and imagine the seemingly impossible.

It may be an overcorrection on my part, but when I was a kid, there was not permission given to say “I doubt it.”  Not about the Bible anyway.  But I had doubts–plenty of them–and I felt such guilt for them.  I was not allowed to voice that very human feeling of doubt, because doubt meant that I didn’t believe.  And that was certainly not true for me.  .

With the Easter season just beginning, we tell this crazy, unbelievable story of Jesus coming back to life. After Jesus was murdered, he was put in the grave, and three days later, he came back to life and spent time with his friends, teaching them and helping them to understand.  This is what happens in fictional books our kids read–did this really truly happen to Jesus?  And if it did, how was it possible?

Jesus’ disciple, Thomas, had doubts.  When the rest of the disciples saw Jesus after the resurrection, they told Thomas, and he said, in so many words, “I doubt it.”

So when Jesus showed up again in the room, without opening any doors or windows, Jesus knew Thomas had doubts.  He went directly to Thomas, and invited him to touch his wounds and sore spots.

But Thomas didn’t even have to do touch Jesus to believe.  Just the invitation to have his doubts gave Thomas what he needed to believe.  Just the invitation to wonder was enough for Thomas to believe, enough for him to say, “Jesus, I believe!”

Our kids have doubts about the things we talk about in church, the things we believe, the faith we hold dear.  And if we are raising them to believe in something, they have to have space to put that to the test.  They have to have space to make it their own.  This doesn’t happen in great depth when they are very young, but as they get older they need space to question, to say, “I doubt it.”

Doubt doesn’t mean we don’t believe.  It means that we are trying to understand more deeply.  It means we are trying to make our faith our own.

We can hold on tightly to our children, and ask them to believe what we do, or we can give a space for them to say, “I doubt it.”  I’m convinced that when we give them a safe place to ask their questions and to doubt, they will be stronger, more faithful followers because of it.

Just like Thomas.

The Other Side of Fear

Fear has been a bit of a theme for me this year.  It started at the Laurelville Worship and Song Leaders retreat in January when Megan Ramer (the pastor at Chicago Community Mennonite Church), preached an amazing Easter sermon called “Fear Not.”  Then, in preparation for lent, the theme of fear sprung from the gospel stories–Jesus being tempted in the wilderness, Nicodemus facing his wealth, the Samaritan woman speaking with Jesus, and Jesus’ journey to the cross.

The question for Germantown Mennonite this lenten season is, “What lies beyond the fear?”  As we’ve begun to reflect on that, the story of our removal from conference and denomination has been a strange source of hope for some of us.

In 1997 and again in 2001, we were removed from two separate Mennonite conferences.  And with these removals, Germantown Mennonite, the oldest Mennonite church in North America, was no longer part of the denomination it brought to the New World.

There was a ten year period where it was very difficult to be at Germantown Mennonite church.  We were angry, we were heartbroken, and we were fearful.  We wondered where God was in all this.  And, we wondered what would happen next.

One lenten season, shortly after our 1997 removal, I remember my friend, Doug Brunk, dramatically reading Ezekiel 37.

After Ezekiel lamented to God, “Can these dry bones live?”, the Lord told Ezekiel to prophesy to the dry bones, saying, “I will put my spirit within you, and you shall live, and I will place you on your own soil; then you shall know that I, the Lord, have spoken and will act, says the Lord.”

This was where we were at the time.  We were brittle and needed the Holy Spirit to breathe new life into us.

And eventually, the Spirit began to stir within this congregation.  And amazing things started to happen.  New life emerged.  The church began to grow, not just in size but in joy.  We began to laugh and talk and play again.  Now, seventeen years after our removal from Franconia conference, there is a joy in having been through the hard things together, and lived to experience a resurrection of our own.  It doesn’t mean that there aren’t hard times, or that we don’t ever experience the sadness of life.  It means that we carry with us a wisdom of living through death, and coming to a deeper appreciation of our life together.  

Perhaps it feels a little cliche right now to say that after this current mess with the denomination, there will be joy and dancing.  If I heard someone tell me this in 1997, I would have reacted with anger.  Joy doesn’t feel like the right answer in times like this.

But take it from a congregation that has lived through two removals from conferences, a congregation that gets put in the “other” category whenever we register for any Mennonite event, a congregation that loves this tradition for which we are a part–there will be joy.  It will happen.  The bones of this denomination feel brittle and void of life, but our God is opening the graves and breathing new life into God’s people.

It’s a hard time to be a Mennonite.  There are things that the denomination has done that feel awful, and have done violence to our spirits.  But there is hope.  God is moving among us.  And soon, very soon, we will dance joyfully together.

  The Decemberists, “After the bombs”.

After the bombs subside

This long low campaign calls it good for the night

We meet in the streets, we meet in the bar’s cold light

We grip at our hands, we hold just a little tighter

After the bombs subside….we’ll go dancing, we’ll go dancing, we’ll go dancing.

Written on our Hearts

I treasure your word in my heart, so that I may not sin against you.  Psalm 119:11

When my kids were little, I’d sing them the same song every night, “My Life Flows On.”  It’s a favorite hymn of mine.  It’s the song my church community sang after a difficult experience with our wider denomination; it’s a song I sang after my mom died; and it’s a song that I go back to in times of trouble.  I’d sing it to my kids at night as I’d rub their backs, stroke their hair, and enjoy a moment of calm before they drifted to sleep.

I’d sing:

My life flows on in endless song

Above earth’s lamentations

I catch a sweet though far off hymn

that hails a new creation

No storm can shake my inmost calm

while to that rock I’m clinging

Since love is Lord of heaven and earth

how can I keep from singing?

Rarely am I able to sing this song without a tearing up.  It is my song of hope and comfort, and a reminder of God’s faithfulness through so many difficult moments in my life.  It’s the song that brings me back to my center, and back into the comforting arms of a loving God.

That ritual of singing it to the kids every night phased out as the kids grew up, but they didn’t forget this song.  A few weeks ago during worship, the congregation sang My Life Flows On, and my daughter’s face lit up.  She leaned into me, and whispered in my ear, “I know this song!  How do I know all the words?”

I couldn’t help but chuckle.  She knew every word to the song because long before her consciousness could hold a memory, she was learning the words to the song.  The words of faith were being written on her young heart from infancy.

This is one of the ways that the word of God is written on the hearts of our children.  In song, in talking together about the stories of faith, and holding the scripture close to us every day.

Though we don’t emphasize scripture memorization in the church the way we used to, music is a way to have the words of faith written on our hearts.  Music speaks to the soul, and says things that we cannot communicate with words alone.  This is as true for kids as it is for adults.

Keep singing, families.  Those songs rest deep in the hearts of our kids, and will come to them when they need them most.

Time Out for Advent

Advent is one of my favorite times in the church year. It’s a call to the church to wait and prepare. This is not a frenzied preparation, but a hopeful time of anticipation.

But, this is not usually how it feels in my life between Thanksgiving and Christmas.

As a pastor, my advent is busier than other times of year. My church has extra services, worship becomes more involved, there’s a Christmas pageant, the choir has extra rehearsals, and the sanctuary needs to be decorated. And that’s just at work–in our family, the kids have holiday concerts, recitals, school parties and secret santa exchanges.

(Just typing that last paragraph made my blood pressure rise!)

The time between Thanksgiving and Christmas has the potential to be too full and too stressful. This can result in flared anger, running at an unsustainable pace, and a schedule filled with too many “must do” activities. Let’s face it, the season has the potential to absolutely stink.

Our family visited with my dad in Arizona over Thanksgiving. We flew out from the east coast, then took a 2.5 day train ride home. The train ride was spectacular–our family read, played cards, napped, laughed and talked together. We had a wonderful time.

We were excited to get home, but we had no choice but to rest and enjoy the ride. We had to slow down, notice the scenery and observe the change from mountains to plains, from rural to urban. This was a much better experience than the airplane ride to Phoenix–while the plane trip was short, we were cramped and everyone around us was grumpy and in a hurry.

In this season of advent, I’m thinking of the time of advent preparation as a leisurely train trip, rather than an unpleasant airplane ride. We will arrive at our destination, and we will enjoy the ride. We have plenty of time along the way to notice, to rest and to enjoy the scenery as we go.

A parents, we get to set the tone for advent with our kids. We are their tour guides through the first seasons of their lives. What do we want our kids to notice? What do we want their sights set on?

We are preparing our children to be like branches from the roots of Jesse, and in doing this, we tell them the story of Jesus, and of God’s work in the world. What better way to nurture the roots than by slowing down and telling them the story–that’s the best nutrition our little trees could ask for!

May our sights be set on preparation, waiting, and noticing Jesus in our midst, and may that anticipation be the root our children’s love for God and others.

Blessed Advent!