Today is Fat Tuesday. Not being culturally Catholic, I’ve never had a grasp on when Mardi Gras occurs, but I think it’s today – a huge blow out before Ash Wednesday tomorrow when Lent begins for Catholics and other Christians. Eastern Orthodoxy doesn’t have this tradition. The two weeks leading up to Lent (which begins next week for them) are Meat Fare (eat the meat) and Cheese Fare (eat all the dairy but no meat), where they wind down before their vegan Lenten fast.

I used to observe the Orthodox fast for Lent. I viewed it as a spring cleaning and a form of positive self- and spiritual discipline. It’s been a few years since I’ve observed it, since I’ve not had a spring free of pregnancy or breastfeeding for four years now. This year, I’m still nursing, but I am going to observe the fast – only in an entirely non-traditional way. Late last spring I read a bunch of material (among it Why We Get Fat by Gary Taubes) that sold me on the primal/paleo style of eating. After eating that way more, but often less, for six months I felt great and had lost some of the baby weight I’d gained, but since arriving in the US we’ve reverted to a more standard American diet, and I’ve noticed some distinct results. I won’t go into detail, but I think I’ve got a gluten allergy. My form of Lent this year is to do a strict primal eating challenge. That takes me to end of this quarter; seeing as how I’m missing Easter, it all lines up nicely.

But let’s talk about Lent. I’ve talked before about fasting before (here and here). I think fasting is, over all, a beneficial practice, for our bodies and our spiritual practice, particularly for those of us, like myself, who are lucky enough to always have enough food to eat. Whether we go vegan, give up sugar, or fast from all food, the goal is to hone our senses, bodies, and focus – to gain strength from discipline, offer a sacrifice to the gods, and thus connect more deeply with the Divine. For some, fasting can bring about a trance-like or other euphoric experience.

But mostly? I hate the way Lent is discussed in the Western Christian tradition/s. In college, when I was most recently active in Protestant Christian life, people would talk about Lent and how they were giving up chocolate or something so banal and pointless as to actually make a mockery of the fast. I know, super judgmental, but there it is. That isn’t to say giving up chocolate couldn’t be a great start – after all, we need to set ourselves up for success, not failure and perhaps success with chocolate one year might lead to heftier goals the next. But generally, my experience was listening to people give up nothing costly and then forget about the practice in two weeks’ time.

On the flip side, the major theological idea underpinning Lent is suffering. The idea is that we fast so that we might share in the suffering of Christ. I have oodles of issues with this concept and I’m going to write about this…. later.

Here’s a breakdown of posts of I’m formulating and series I’m thinking of writing in the next five weeks:

I will finish my Testimony. I want to write about the Virgin Mary: a book review, discussion of some theology around her, and another music post for her. I have two additional books reviews I’m hoping to do: books by Rob Bell (and an interview/dialog with the person who recommended them to me) and one by Bertrand Russell. I also want to do a series on theological concepts in the Christian tradition: suffering, Incarnation, the crucifixion, and the resurrection. I may even attend a church service.

Are you observing Lent? If so, how? What does it mean to you? If you’re not Christian, is there some other way you ‘spring clean’?

I think I always knew I was going to end up in Berkeley at the Graduate Theological Union. It had been on my radar for years. I liked the small school consortium and the ecumenical and interfaith make up of the place. It had a small Orthodox seminary with a chapel, and also had some of the most liberal Christian seminaries in the country. Liberal, but also academically respected. Rosemary Radford Ruether, pioneering feminist theologian, also taught there. I was very excited to dive deep into feminist theology.

And dive I did. I explored so many things. I bought my first tarot deck, something I’d been wanting to do for years but had been dissuaded by my ex-girlfriend. I read all kinds of new theologies. I started studying Latin. I loved most of my classes and, honestly? I could stay taking classes like those for the rest of my life. Nerd Niki was in heaven.

Emotionally and spiritually things were more complicated.

I still considered myself a Christian, although I recognized how ill-fitting the label was. I spent a year considering converting, officially, to Orthodoxy. I spent Tuesday evenings at the Orthodox Institute, attending services and fellowship (dinner and conversation). I was able to participate in readings and chanting (my first and only visit to the area Greek Orthodox church reminded me how rare it is to be able to participate like that). I felt welcomed despite my lack of ‘official’ status.

One of the things that I love about Orthodoxy is the lack of questions around ‘being saved.’ While most of the students attending services were ‘cradle Orthodox’, those born into the faith, many were also converts, and baptism is the act that yokes you to the Church. I’ve never been baptized, but I pondered it in my heart.

I felt more attached than ever to the Christian tradition. Attending services on Tuesday evenings at the Orthodox Institute, taking advanced theological classes, spending my days with other seminarians who were there to become priests and pastors, community organizers and activists, scholars and professors. Of course the more I found a potential fit, the more confused I was in general. One of the few times I went to chapel I had a vision of Athena standing at the altar, filling the entire vaulted space.

I was incredibly – and privately – judgmental about many of the people who arrived at school to be pastors. It seemed to me that those who sought to lead, inspire and heal others were the most in need of guidance, wisdom and healing themselves. Of course, only now do I recognize that perhaps those of there to study and perhaps someday contribute to the greater discourse might have been searching for wisdom and knowledge in an equally hungry and dysfunctional way. I know I was.

Still, I had a hard time feeling like I was on the same page with most of the Christians at seminary. I think I was so used to feeling like the odd one out and used to clinging to what I found liberating in the tradition that I never considered just walking away. Even after finding T Thorn Coyle’s book Evolutionary Witchcraft.

I was working part-time at a neighborhood bookstore. One day while tidying the shelves, I noticed a new book with an intriguing title. I pulled it off the shelf and read the flaps, the back, the table of contents, looked through the notes and index, and skimmed the introduction (isn’t that how you check out a new book? no?). I bought the book and took it home with me. I read the whole thing, then went back and worked through the exercises. Here was an approach to witchcraft that I could relate to. There was no polarity or gender essentialism. I liked that while ritual was part of the work, the way magic was described was not as some mystical gift that you discovered on your 13th birthday, but as a tool that one could hone and use. My queer, feminist, practical heart was pleased, as was my mystery loving, devout soul. After I discovered that Thorn lived in San Francisco, I emailed her and asked if she spoke or taught in the area. Yes, but not right now, was the reply; she’d put me on her mailing list.

And so I continued on with my work. I wrote my master’s thesis, mainly a literature review of white,* contemporary, feminist writing on the Virgin Mary. That process was a struggle, a dark night of the soul. I remember little of the three months I spent writing: 16 hour days in front of my laptop, double and triple checking my notes and sources, freaking out, fearing I had nothing to say, and what did any of this matter anyway? In the end, my thesis isn’t that great, but I passed and got my degree and moved on, with one eye to possibly going back to school to work on a PhD.

I found a job with a Bay Area adult Jewish education non-profit. I loved it. To someone raised secular and in what feels like at times, a rather tradition-less, white-bread non-culture, the rich tapestry of the Jewish world was inviting. I grew up with several Jewish friends and have long loved much about Jewish culture. At one point I asked myself ‘why not Judaism?’ There are so many things to love about Judaism. I particularly like its long tradition of questioning – questioning scripture, tradition and God Himself. But that last piece is part of my inability to embrace Judaism: I’m not a fan of Yahweh (or YHWH or G-d). I also realized that the narrative of Judaism is not my story. I remain a committed and loving friend of the Jewish tradition (and according to my former boss – and totally tongue-in-cheek here – an honorary Jew).

Realizing that piece about one’s narrative tradition was an eye opener for me. It’s helped me also see that while much of my own personal journey has followed along the Christian path, often times right along with it, the Christian narrative isn’t mine either. But I still didn’t see that clearly then.

About two years after reading Thorn’s book, I finally got an email saying that she would be teaching a two-year class on Feri witchcraft, using her book as a basis for the structure. I, and my then-fiance (now husband), signed up. I think there were 32 people initially, whittling down to about 23 or so by the end. This was my first ‘real’ forray into formal paganism of any kind – I still identified as a Christian! My love of the Virgin Mary was the only thing keeping me there, but still I clung to the claim. While many participants came to Feri and/or Paganism from a Christian background, now long rejected, no one ever dismissed my claims or experience. No one ever outwardly judged me. I felt very welcome.

What I struggled with was ritual. The theory, the personal work, the strong emphasis on personal practice – all that was welcome. But group ritual? I was profoundly uncomfortable. Chanting? Singing? Trance work? In ‘public’? I was freaked out. I look back and I realize that there were a few personalities and ‘performance styles’ that clashed intensely with mine. These days those things would be less of a problem, but starting out, with my issues of personal spiritual expression and performance anxiety…. it was a hot mess for me. I didn’t get much out of the rituals and mostly thought that they were psychological exercises.

After the two years were up, I felt changed. More open. More confident. Part of a larger, if amorphous, community. I felt I had connected with something – even if I was just touching the fringe on a great train of a cloak, like the woman being healed by touching the hem of Jesus’s tunic…. Early on in the training I remember thinking ‘This is great, but Feri isn’t for me.’ At the end of it, I wanted more. Feri was for me. But I wasn’t sure quite how. I was pregnant with my first child during the second half of the Feri training. He arrived just 8 weeks before the final gathering. Juggling new motherhood, work and a new degree program took up a lot of my energy.

During this time I was also getting more and more involved in yoga. I’d had my first yoga class when I was living in Seattle. It was mainly Iyengar style. I liked it a lot, and I incorporated a lot of what I’d learned into my own daily stretching and workouts. When I moved to Oakland after grad school the neighborhood studio had a woman teaching Anusara** style yoga and I loved it. In fact, much of the metaphysics sounded a lot like Feri to me.

Yoga and Feri were more and more the realities of my spiritual practice and informed how I viewed the world. Still, I did not take them on as identities. I clung to the last remaining shreds of a Christian identity. When our son was 7 months old my husband and I went on our first ever vacation together. We were in Australia visiting my family (my mother is Australian). My parents and sister had my son for the weekend. Husband and I were driving off to Daylesford in Victoria, talking about life and what to do next. We couldn’t stay in the Bay Area and raise kids – too expensive, not enough trees. I had recently started a PhD program through a university in Wales. My adviser was one of the few feminist theologians specializing in Mary and she was the only one I wanted to study with. What to do? Where to go?

In the midst of the discussion about what things we needed in a community, my husband turned to me and said, ‘Let’s move to Wales.’ It was like a bolt of inspiration from gods. We both recognized the sheer insanity of it, but also the odd ‘rightness’ of it. While in Daylesford we both got tarot readings – separately and by different people. Both readers commented on our up coming move abroad. Neither of us had said anything to anyone about this decision. Nine months later, almost to the day, we arrived in Wales. We’d sold or given away almost everything we owned. We’d scraped together the $10,000 for moving costs, plane tickets, and visas. And there we were. In rural Wales. We’d followed the voice of God and …… it led us into the verdant wilderness. Which will be the subject of part five.

Holy cow, five parts. Thanks for reading!

*White, because I am not fluent in Spanish, and so much of Latin America’s writing on Mary is inaccessible to me, and because there is little written about her in the African-American Christian tradition or in other cultures. Most of the writing on Mary comes from white European or white American writers (or if they’re not white, they are not writing in a racially intersectional way, which defaults to white, at this point). To include other cultures and a wider discussion on race within the theological discussion of Mary would have made my masters thesis unruly and way too long.

**Anusara is in the middle of a huge ‘scandal’ and upheaval. You can google it for yourself. I still think the system has much to offer and I continue to practice in this style, while also being deeply disappointed by what has unfolded.

After talking about our kids, our spouses, my recent move, the topic invariably turned to matters of religion. John’s a Christian, one who attends a mainline church on the liberal side of things. He told me he’s come to terms with the fact that there’s just a ton of stuff he doesn’t know, might never know, and that’s ok. He was honest about the fact that he doesn’t read my blog (“I suspect you have a lot of words about this topic.” He has no idea, does he?); this isn’t the topic he spends his precious non-working hours reading. I can respect that.

What the conversation highlighted to me is that I love talking about religion. I had to dial down my enthusiasm, scale back the two dollar words. I want to know what people think, and then talk about that. This particular conversation reminded me how much my thinking has shifted in the last few years. I do not view the world as a monotheist might; I definitely have a polytheistic view point. It makes discussing spiritual relativism interesting. I see little conflict; the monotheist sees quite a bit.

My baby (who is one today!) was fussing and tired and full of snot, so John and I cut our time together  short, right as we were in the thick of conversation. We’ll have other times to talk, now that I’m back in the great state of Washington for the long haul. I drove home buzzing. What do I do with this passion for religion? I could teach. I have a master’s degree. Perhaps the local community college would hire me or the nearby Evergreen State College. The thought of creating an entire class and teaching it scares me: I have many professor friends and I hear all about the struggles of teaching. And I don’t feel like I know enough! But I do.

I could get a PhD. I tried that. I may go back, but not to the same topic, not to the same type of program. I was really tired of engaging Christian theology so exclusively. I certainly won’t go back to a PhD program with wee children. I can barely keep up with this blog right now, due to sleep exhaustion.

I’ve even thought about looking at spiritual direction programs. Of course, starting another program seems silly right now. And I’m not sure I’m empathetic enough for this type of ‘counseling.’

Today, I’m enjoying the surge of enthusiasm I have for my chosen subject from the conversation with my friend. I’m fired up! This coincides with some dreams I’ve had recently and a strong pull to practice – not to practice Christianity, but to dive back into Feri, tarot, meditation, things I’ve put on the shelf for this quarter. I see them up there, shiny and inviting, familiar and full of surprises, and I want to stop reading theology, stop praying for mercy, stop rehashing my testimony (yes, I’m dragging my heels on part four).

This is good information. I’m grateful for this blog project. I feel like it is doing just what I’d hoped it would do: refine my own path, get me more comfortable with vulnerability and visibility, challenge my writing skills, and open up dialog with others. Thanks for joining me.

Here are some links for your weekend reading:

Earlier this week I wrote a book review on Ten Moons: The Inner Journey of Pregnancy for Pagan Families.

This is an interesting essay on the difference between prayer and meditation.

Enjoy!

One of the things I love about the Eastern Orthodox tradition in all its ‘flavors’ (the Church is divided along ethnic and national lines) is that mysticism is front and center: in its liturgy, traditions, stories and practice. Mysticism is more than theology or incense or icons or even an embrace of mystery. Part of mysticism is the belief that every individual has access to and the ability for deep union with the Divine. The Pilgrim’s Tale is focused on the Hesychastic tradition of inner prayer, also called prayer of the heart or the Jesus prayer: Lord Jesus Christ, son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner. It can be shortened to: Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me.

This type of prayer is essentially a form of Christian meditation; it’s a mantra for deep inner meditation. When I started reading the book I decided that I would start praying it as well. Except, the prayer as is doesn’t sit well with me. Jesus and I don’t have much to say to each other, and I while I believe in sin and that I am flawed, I don’t believe in sin and being a sinner the way this tradition does. So I altered the prayer to the following: Holy God, Holy Mighty, Holy Immortal, have mercy/Holy Mother, Holy Mighty, Holy Immortal, have mercy. It’s another form of Orthodox prayer (using God, instead of Mother), so I felt the spirit was there. I also didn’t just want to pray for mercy on myself. For a week now I’ve been praying this aloud or under my breath while walking, folding laundry, doing dishes, lying in bed at night, etc.

What has been surprising to me is how deeply this prayer affects me. I’ll just be standing at the sink doing the dishes, thinking about my day or what chore I’ll tackle next or which park I’ll take the 3-year-old to, and I find myself feeling things, things I didn’t know I was feeling, needing to coat those feelings in mercy.

See, I’m not so good with feelings. There’s a lot of Stuff I know I haven’t dealt with. This mantra prayer is like a distraction for my brain. While brain and body are busy forming the words, heart bubbles up Stuff and it needs mercy. I have feelings about being so frustrated with my son’s inability to stop pushing his sister over – have mercy on me for being so angry, have mercy on my son, may his feelings find a better outlet, have mercy on my daughter’s body, and thank you that she didn’t whack her head this time. I have feelings, mostly judgment, for various thing I’m doing or not doing – or even feeling! Have mercy on me, that I’ll be more compassionate to myself, that I’ve so far to go before enlightenment, that I’ll stop judging even that. Have mercy on the sadness that trickles out from the edges of my thoughts, have mercy, have mercy, have mercy.

Just as the Pilgrim describes, the repeated request for mercy also comes out as a thanksgiving. Have mercy (thank you that we are so well fed and have mercy on those who aren’t and have mercy on the hands that made it possible have this food at all), have mercy (thank you that my friends arrived safely), have mercy (thank you for this opportunity, thank you for the support to push forward even when I feel scared). Oh have mercy. Oh thank you for this life.

There’s a lot in this book that’s repetitive and rather boring. It is firmly situated in the Orthodox trope in form and content; I’m used to it, but I could see it boring the crap out of most people. There are some gems in here, though, things that I think many people can relate to.

On the very first page we see the Pilgrim coming across the instruction in the Gospel to ‘pray without ceasing.’ He is stumped; how in the world is that possible? This entire book is his search to find out how and what happens when he does.

“I thought and thought but could find no answer. So I asked a cleric: ‘What does it mean to pray unceasingly and how does one do it?’ He replied: ‘Just pray it as it says.’ I asked again: ‘Yes, but how do you pray unceasingly?’ ‘You’re still asking?’ said the cleric and left.”

I love this. This is the opening. On one hand I see the frustration of a beginner, seeking and asking and basically being brushed off by someone who seems to know but won’t tell. I think many of us have had similar experiences. We want to know something, to go deeper and the person we’ve asked gives us some crappy line: ‘Well, if you haven’t figured it out by now you never will’ or ‘One either is ready and therefore gets it, or one is not.’ On the other hand, to pray unceasingly, we must start praying. That’s something this blog project has taught me: dive in, just begin, sort out the how later, it will make sense eventually.

The Pilgrim asks another man about this prayer:

“Unceasing interior prayer is the uninterrupted striving of the human spirit toward attentiveness in the divine center. … You will not understand. But if you pray as you know how, this very prayer will itself reveal to you how it can be unceasing. Everything takes its own time….”

I believe this is true of so much of the mystic life. Knowledge come from words, but wisdom comes from experience. Both are important, but all the words in the world will not give us the wisdom we seek.

This book has a few little one-off moments of anti-Semitism and anti-Catholicism, and claims that the Hindu yogis got this meditative prayer from the Eastern Fathers (it is likely the other way around). This is par for the course in a Russian Orthodox book of this era. Despite these flaws, I will be keeping this book on my shelf. And I will be continuing to pray this prayer for the remainder of this quarter.

Without getting into the gory and very personal details I’ll sum up what happened next: I jumped ship. I fell in love with a woman and got a divorce. In that order.

At this point I felt like I had tried the traditional Christian rules/path for long enough. I was listening, I was enduring, I was praying, but the responses (and at times lack of response) I was getting from On High did not line up with what traditional Christianity was telling me I should be hearing. It was time to start listening honestly to the ‘still, small voice within.’

Having said that, I was still committed to my spiritual path, which was still Christianity. I recognized then, as I do now, that there are so many beautiful parts of this tradition. I wasn’t ready to give that up. When I was exploring Catholicism I had remembered the third ‘branch’ of Christianity, a rather big, old and gnarled trunk that those of us in the West generally forget about: Eastern Orthodoxy.

Juneau has its own Russian Orthodox church, St. Nicholas, established in 1894. It’s a very iconic part of the town, even though most people have never set foot inside! I decided to check it out…. and I fell in love. I loved the liturgy, the incense, the icons. I loved that all of the congregation was allowed to join in the chanting and singing – and that in Orthodoxy a service cannot take place without two people: a priest and one other, as the liturgy is truly a back and forth conversation, not simply the priest doing all the work. (I would later discover that most Orthodox churches only let the formal choir do the chanting, which I think is a pity and makes services especially dull and passive.) I loved that Orthodoxy has always been in the vernacular, and this church said the ‘Our Father’ prayer in many languages, which represented the people in the congregation. At that time, there were Romanian-, Tlingit- (the indigenous people of my part of SE Alaska), Yupik-, and Russian-speaking congregants, in addition to English-only-speakers.

I ended up living with my girlfriend in an apartment directly across the street from the church. I would run across for services in my slippers. What is interesting is that my personal life was never mentioned. I kept it to myself – neither raising it, nor hiding it. I knew that the Orthodox Church, as an institution, wasn’t gay-friendly.

At the time the community had three priests, one of whom became a good friend to me. We would meet for coffee dates and talk music, books, theology, life. He gave me a small polished rock and a vial of holy oil, both of which I have kept with me all these years. The priest knew about my personal life and, while he didn’t seem to personally object, he towed the line of the Church (I have found this to be the case with many Orthodox believers). He also gave me a piece of advice regarding observing Lent that has positively impacted my life in many ways.

Many religions, particularly the mystic strains, use fasting as a discipline for deeper spiritual connection. My only exposure to fasting at this point had been in a vaguely Catholic way. I never really liked listening to Protestant Christians talk about Lent. Giving up chocolate for Lent seemed to miss the point entirely. But the Orthodox? Those guys know about fasting. They fast for just about anything, covering nearly half the year (not all at once though)! They don’t give up all food or water; they give up five things: meat, dairy, olive oil, alcohol and sex. Giving up olive oil isn’t a big deal for us today, but in the Mediterranean region, back in the day, olive oil was an indispensible part of cooking and living. Giving that up was a huge hardship. For my first Lent I tried to do it all. But here’s what my priest friend said: set yourself up for success, not failure.

Fasting isn’t supposed to be a contest in which we prove how holy or hardcore we are. Fasting is a tool for going deeper into the spiritual life. I personally think that fasting can be very useful, particularly for those of us for whom food is plentiful. If trying to ‘go all the way’ meant that I was slipping all the time and/or beating myself up for that, I would be missing the point. Maybe just give up meat. Or meat and alcohol. Set myself up for success, so that I might reap the benefits of the practice. I have used this advice in many areas of my life. Not that I should always go easy and never challenge myself, but I should instead assess what the goal of the activity is and then work to achieve that as best I can.

I decided that olive oil didn’t matter to me, so I didn’t give that up. It’s not a ‘thing’ for me, culinarily or culturally. I don’t remember that I gave up sex. I think that if you’ve got a partner that isn’t observing then asking him or her to abstain is forcing a fast on some one else. But I vent vegan and gave up alcohol. And since that time, even after waking away from Christianity, I have enjoyed observing Lent. I thought the Lenten fast was a good physical spring cleaning.

I spent about two years attending St. Nick’s. It was during this time that two more very important spiritual developments occurred in my life: I got to the know the Virgin Mary (aka the Theotokos, in Orthodox terms) and I started reading actual feminist theology, both Christian and not-specifically Christian. Books that made an impact on me were Rosemary Radford Ruether’s Sexism and God-Talk, Merlin Stone’s When God was a Woman, Jean Markale’s The Great Goddess (Markale is of questionable scholarly repute, but at the time this book was huge for me), and Tikvah Frymer-Kensky’s In the Wake of the Goddesses (this last one is by a Jewish Near Eastern scholar, and while the work throws ancient Paganism under the bus, it is still a very valuable contribution to the field of feminist theologies). Yes, those were the sorts of books I was reading for fun. In the back of my head I planned to attend graduate school in religious studies and these books fueled that desire.

The Orthodox Church was a good fit for me. Mysticism is a valuable and pervasive part of the Church as a whole, culturally, theologically, liturgically. Mysticism and personal practice are not afterthoughts, but are at the core of the Church and its practices. Many homes have an icon corner. Priests bless homes and boats. During the month of January priests bless the waters, because the earth is part of God’s creation too. The current Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew is considered the ‘green Patriarch’ for his extensive work on environmental issues. The entirety of life and the world is part of the spiritual life.

Part of this mysticism is the Church’s adoration of the Theotokos, a word which means ‘god-bearer’ in Greek. She who bore God. It’s a paradox, something which Orthodoxy revels in. I am a fan of mysticism and of paradox.

Unfortunately, for all the joys of Orthodoxy and its beautiful and rather liberating theology, the Church is mired in social conservatism. There are many reasons for this, which I won’t go into, but I was not a good fit for the Church: queer, feminist, and outspoken. I was getting more critical of Christianity, the more I lived, the more I read. But the beauty of the Theotokos kept me in Christianity.

After a year or so, my girlfriend and I moved to Seattle. I pursued music studies and worked at bookstores, while she pursued her education as well. I attended church infrequently. I kept reading. I started looking around on the internet and my feminist spiritual searching started turning up Wicca resources. I took this in. There was so much that was helpful and felt right at home!

I discovered that much of Wicca and goddess worship was not in fact some weird anti-Christian devil worship, but most of the time just called divinity by a female name (very subversive). There was a reverence for nature and connection with divinity through it – I could completely relate to that. There were other attitudinal shifts with which I also resonated. I felt empowered by the way that Wiccans created their own altars and led their own rituals. Many of those pieces made perfect sense from my understanding of ‘traditional’ liturgical theory and practice. I hungered for more, but the internet ten years ago did not so easily offer up information and community at that time. Plus, Angelfire and Geocities websites, particularly with the sparkly purple and black aesthetic so often used by witches and Pagans, were visually awkward and off-putting.

I practiced setting up an altar in the bedroom. I practiced meditating with a candle. I walked and walked and walked around the neighborhood listening to what I was hearing and sensing: birds, clouds, the concrete under my feet, blossoms, wind. A house on one of the corners had enormous rosemary plants growing. I took some sprigs from the parts that overflowed onto the sidewalk (I did knock on the door to ask permission, but no one answered). I look back now and I’m positive it was a Pagan household! I just couldn’t recognize it so easily at the time.

My partner wasn’t thrilled with this development. She’d been only loosely supportive of my spiritual leanings. I applied to grad school entirely without support from her. Our relationship was suffering and pulling apart at the seams. My going off to Berkeley for graduate school was too much, highlighting many of the problems we had, and I broke up her. Rather badly, too, I have to admit.

A quote I’ve long loved is the quote below by Pat Robertson:

(taken from this website)

I find it amusing that discovering feminism did indeed lead to me leaving my husband, becoming a lesbian, and practicing witchcraft! I may not want to destroy capitalism, but I sure do want to overhaul it. But I’ll not kill my children, thanks.

My book to review for this section is the Russian spiritual classic, The Pilgrim’s Tale. Next up in my testimony is what happened when I went to graduate school. Stay tuned.

Revisiting things that once held meaning for me is both tedious and informative. For example, Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s The Cost of Discipleship. I studied Bonhoeffer in college. I wrote my senior history thesis on him. And I barely remember anything about him, other than: influential Lutheran German pastor, who resisted the Nazi co-option of the German church and joined the resistance movement, eventually being sent to concentration camps, where he was killed just days before the liberation. I believe I wrote about how he reconciled his Christian pacifist ideology with joining the resistance movement, which worked to assassinate Hitler. At least, I think it was. You might remember that my memory from this stretch of my life is minimal, at best.

I remember really liking The Cost of Discipleship. I’ve kept a copy on my bookshelf all these years. I connect Bonhoeffer with integrity in my mind, with doing the right thing in trying circumstances, with staying true to one’s beliefs and treating his fellow prisoners, as well as his captors, with dignity and love. Those thoughts haven’t changed one bit in my re-reading. However, I’ll be removing this book from my library. I can’t understand what about it I could have possibly found edifying (ha! great Christian word there).

Before we go any further, let me admit: I haven’t finished the book. I only re-read the first third. I can’t do it. I just don’t care. Besides Bonhoeffer being far more traditional and conservative than I remember, his book is basically by a man for men who need a male saviour.

In the beginning of the book Bonhoeffer writes about how grace has been cheapened. I think he would weep were he to witness the rise of mega-churches, prosperity gospel preaching, and mainstream American evangelicalism (which I think is basically cultural Christianity and not much connected with the gospels). “The real trouble is that the pure Word of Jesus has been overlaid with so much human ballast – burdensome rules and regulations, false hopes and consolations – that is has become extremely difficult to make a genuine decision for Christ.” (p. 35)

The majority of the first part of the book is about obedience: obedience to The Call, to Jesus. Let it be known that obedience has never been my strong suit. Rules apply to me only if I like the rules. This has been a sticking point for my spiritual development my whole life. But I also have a romantic view of discipleship. I intellectually recognize the wisdom that obeying can have – I’d better, I’m a parent! But the extent to which Bonhoeffer insists we obey Jesus – no questions, just following – worries me. Bonhoeffer writes about the ways in which we use our questions to attempt to ‘outsmart’ our would-be saviours, to avoid the hard work of Becoming (my language). He makes a really good point here. But the opportunity for maturation is not the point. He goes on to say that “…only he who believes is obedient, and only he who is obedient believes.” (p. 63) “Doubt and reflection take the place of spontaneous obedience.” (p. 73) Yikes.

While I can see that excessive questioning can be a form of self-delusion and avoidance of actually doing the Work, I think it is healthy to question. In fact, I think it is our duty to question. Jesus challenged the Powers that Be, the status quo. The implication that we ought never question our spiritual authority (be that God or the Bible – a document put together by men, even if I agree that it is divinely inspired, or a pastor) because we are only sinful humans steals our human agency from us. Many Christians don’t have a problem with this. I believe the example of Adam and Eve in the garden is all most people need to say ‘yup, humans can’t be trusted.’ But Jesus was also fully human, even if he was infinitely wiser than we are by virtue of being also fully divine,* he was still fully human, and he was not satisfied with the status quo. Blind obedience is problematic for all living things. It is even more problematic for women and other marginalized people.

Women suffer uniquely in communities where questioning is discouraged. The kind of Christianity described by Bonhoeffer may win points for its integrity, but not for its compassion or sense of community. The pastors in Christianity like this are almost always male, and if a woman were to question her lot in life or her struggle then she would likely be told that she is questioning God’s Order. I have no sources to cite from this particular book, but after years of studying feminist theology and from living my own life I know there are scores of books (and blogs) that address this very phenomenon. God (who is He and male) knows best, the Bible (in spite of being written 1900 years ago in a specific time, place and culture) is the Way It Should Be, and Pastor (likely male) knows if you’re being obedient. All Others need to tow the line and know their places.

Obedience usually leads to a discussion of suffering, and this book does not disappoint. Like Roman Catholic theology, suffering is the center of Bonhoeffer’s Christianity. The point of Jesus is rejection and suffering. His crucifixion “must be a passion without honor. Suffering and rejection sum up the whole cross of Jesus. To die on the cross means to die despised and rejected of men. Suffering and rejection are laid upon Jesus as a divine necessity…” (p. 87) Why?? Why does giving of self have to equate with rejection? I reject all of this as completely untrue! Even in a Christian context I reject this as Not True. I believe that Jesus could have still accomplished the Christian message if everyone present at that time was mortified by his execution, if his followers and fellow Jews hadn’t rejected him but had instead embraced him. Suffering is NOT a divine necessity.

Suffering occurs in this life. We cannot have life without suffering. Learning to make sense of that is important, whether or not we follow a spiritual path. Jesus, by being part of this human existence and by fighting the Powers That Be, had to embrace suffering. What is to me the heart of the Christian message is that when suffering and death and rejection occur (because they occur to us all at some point, in some form) resurrection is possible. Suffering is not the core of the message, resurrection is. We rise again, in glory. We rise again, glorified.

“Suffering, then, is the true badge of discipleship” (p. 91) says Bonhoeffer. Once again women and other marginalized people lose out when this is the core of a theology. We already have noted the culture of not questioning. A woman in an unhappy marriage, a slave being a …well, slave, a child being abused by his parents – they are true disciples because they are not questioning the systems of the status quo and are enduring their suffering. People who choose not to suffer are then considered disobedient, less faithful, not True Christians. People who choose not to suffer are denying Jesus, in this context. Who are true disciples of Christ, according to Bonhoeffer? “They simply bear the suffering which comes their way as they try to follow Jesus Christ, and bear it for his sake.” (p. 109, emphasis Bonhoeffer’s) How can we bear anything for Christ’s sake? If he bore all for us, what can we possibly bear for God? How does our suffering improve or profit anything?? It profits nothing. I see it as a way to prove that one person is holier than another, or worse, a way to keep women and other marginalized people in their place.

I have no problem with a theology that has place for suffering, but when it is the crux of the faith then the only way into heaven is through suffering. To that I say, every one deserves in to heaven then, because everyone suffers. Or, change the fulcrum on which the tradition balances. I choose not to be obedient or to suffer, not in the Christian context, not according to patriarchal tradition of Western civilization. I will not be obedient to a deity or spiritual leader that insists I deny my own suffering, that I increase my suffering, that I submit to patriarchal status quo systems of injustice, on the flawed logic that we live in a fallen world and only Jesus will make it better…. in the world to come.

To some it may seem like I’m taking Bonhoeffer way out of context or addressing him in anachronistic terms. He was man writing during World War II. When he says things like “What can the call to discipleship mean to-day for the worker, the business man, the squire and the soldier?” (p. 38) am I being a deliberate trouble maker by pointing out that he has excluded women from the list? Sure, a woman is a worker, but so are business men. I believe he is listing by class. He doesn’t mention the mother, which might be the main ‘job’ of women at that time. No, women are left out of this entire discussion of discipleship.

In this book there is an entire chapter titled “Woman.” Great! I thought, here he will address the 51% of the population! No. It’s an entire chapter on Jesus’s teaching on divorce and whether male disciples should marry. This chapter is not about women at all. If this is the only context for women, then we are merely equated with male desires and functions.

After getting to this point in the book I just threw my hands up and decided it’s time to move on. This is one of the reasons I quit my PhD program. I am beyond tired of this sort of theology: written by men for male believers in a male saviour who saves men.

*I actually think we – all of us – are fully human and fully divine already and that the point of the Incarnation was revealing that to us. The work of the spiritual life is to embrace both, to be Whole.

As I was lying awake in the wee hours of the night, I had a realization.* The vast majority of Western music is based in Christianity. Gospel music, spirituals, a lot of folk and roots music too. And let’s not forget most choral music. I am embarrassed it took me so long to remember this: I have twenty years of classical singing under my belt. Sheesh.

So, below, I present to you some of my favorite ‘Christian’ pieces.

The first up is the Dies Irae movement from Verdi’s Requiem. I am a huge fan of requiems. This particular movement is a key piece of the form. It means ‘day of wrath’ and is all about God’s judgment. I have always thought Verdi’s the best example of the dies irae. The trumpets, the timpani, the singing… it really does sound like God and all his angels are coming down the heavens right now to kick some ass. I never fail to get goosebumps. This is usually sung by 200-400 voices. I would fast for a week to be able to sing this entire requiem with a quality chorus and orchestra.

I also adore Mozart. His requiem is a classic for good reason. Below is the Lacrimosa  movement, a movement about grief.

Next up is the second movement from Brahms’ German Requiem, All Flesh is as Grass. This was considered a more secular requiem, as it breaks from the standard form and lyrics.

Obviously, I have a thing for huge choral productions. I also love the various versions of Ave Maria and the Stabat Mater, both in honor of the Virgin Mary, but I think I’ll make those a post of their own when I eventually get to writing about My Lady.

Now for something simpler. Mahalia Jackson. She’s only simpler because she is a single voice – but what a voice! It’s hard to pick just one for her. Here she is singing Moses Hogan’s Elijah Rock. You’ll need to turn the volume up, because the recording is looks like it’s from tv in the 1960s. The following piece is a jazzier version of ‘Wade in the Water’ by a singer I quite like.

Speaking of gospel, has anyone seen the new Queen Latifah film ‘Joyful Noise’? It looks like a cheesy feel-good movie, but if it’s got good singing I just may take myself to the theatre for some Christian-ish distraction. Enjoy all this good music. I’ll be here on the couch, reading and sucking down tea.

*I had several. I was awake for two or three hours. I have a cold. Are we surprised? I am not. I’ve been trying to plow through Bonhoeffer’s book, but everything is moving a bit more slowly right now.

Let’s continue my testimony. (You can read part one here.) In this installment I get personal and talk about things I’d rather not.

We last left off as I approached college. I considered myself a Christian, but was wary of Christian culture and of people who grew up in youth group. So you can imagine my enthusiasm when the summer before leaving for college (leaving Alaska to go to Washington) I got my roommate assignment in the mail. Her name was Jennie, she was from Washington. Her phone number was listed and I called. Turned out she was very active in her youth group. ‘She’s nice,’ I thought, ‘but we’ll never be good friends.’ When I arrived at our dorm in September I noticed her tape collection held the delights of Michael W. Smith and Amy Grant. I was not impressed.

I like telling that story because my randomly placed roommate ended up becoming my best friend and within weeks we were inseparable. I can probably blame Jennie for my deepening my activity in mainstream Christianity. She had had a great, trauma-free experience growing up Christian and she wanted to continue to seek that out in college. I followed her lead as we checked out various campus Christian groups, eventually joining Campus Crusade for Christ rather regularly. Yes, you read that correctly. I attended CCC, which I used to jokingly call KKK. I was not the most mature wit, I will admit. CCC was, surprisingly, the middle path for Christians at my uni – neither the most conservative, nor the stereotypical mostly social youth group on campus.

I can also blame Jennie for showing me how open, ‘normal’ and healthy a practicing Christian could be. Her entire family was a revelation to me. Her parents honestly enjoyed their kids and were interested in them as individuals. Her parents came from fascinating religious backgrounds: one raised in the Cameroon by missionary parents, the other raised by a pastor who taught in Lebanon and in the deep, segregated South. And yet, this family was not afraid of difference, of non-Christians, of questions, of the wider world. Instead, they were genuinely interested in people and ideas. This family was a safe haven for me and an example of what a fully lived, healthy Christian life – and just straight up healthy family – could look like.

My spiritual experience in college was much like my experience in high school, only more so. Personally I was seeking a deeper connection. I woke most mornings and read a passage from the bible and prayed/pondered over it. I think I did this regularly for over five years straight. I’m grateful for this as the daily practice of quiet, meditative reflection is nearly universal and has been perhaps the single most beneficial practice to growing my ‘faith’ and spiritual strength.

I also continued to seek knowledge from books. I shuffled around my majors. I went from vocal performance to history, emphasizing religious history, with a minor in religious studies. I wrote papers looking at the influence of the Sermon on the Mount on Gandhi, on the influence of the Catholic Church on the Solidarity movement in Poland; I gave a 45 minute presentation on the works of CS Lewis and a workshop on how Mormon’s weren’t Christians. I also read pseudo-intellectual books, such as More Than a Carpenter and stuff on Pascal’s wager, stuff that now would make the academic in me cringe, but at the time I thought was well-reasoned writing! I had absorbed the idea that if not the Christian god, then nothing.

Socially, I struggled with insularity and us-vs-them ideology. I struggled with Christian culture. I remember one time early on in my first semester of school hanging out with some people from one of the youth groups. One of the guys asked me what church I went to. ‘I don’t go to church,’ I said. ‘Are you a Christian?’ he asked. ‘Yes,’ I replied. ‘But you don’t go to church?’ He was terribly confused. ‘No.’ ‘Have you read the bible?’ ‘Yes,’ I said, beginning to get defensive. ‘I’ve read the entire New Testament a couple of times, and most of the Old Testament. How about you?’ That shut him up. It also reflects a lot of what I experienced as a type of ‘outsider,’ a status I both could not escape due to my upbringing and one that I cultivated by choice by not joining in. I still wasn’t comfortable with the Father God prayer language or the waving of hands during praise songs.

I shouldn’t play down that I went through waves of evangelical fervor of my own. My faith was important to me and I wanted other people to know God too. In the mid to late ’90s Alaska was debating whether or not to amend its constitution to say that marriage was between a man and a woman (it eventually did so). I remember having a debate with a friend’s gay brother that marriage was just that: between a man and woman. Oh, the irony (which you’ll read about in part 3).

The summer between my second and third years of college I had a what I can only describe as a ‘dark night of the soul,’ also known as a depressive episode. It didn’t help that I spent the summer in a crappy almost-relationship with a dude that later date-raped me and then refused to talk to me for the rest of the summer. I spent that summer feeling spiritually numb (that started before the aforementioned event), reading through Psalms for solace. Before then I had hated the smarmy poetry of Psalms, but I gained a new appreciation for them. David too had struggled. In fact, some of the Psalms involve him wondering just where God was. He got angry! Depressed! And he lusted. Just like me. I also loved the nature themes and the rejoicing themes. I particularly loved Psalm 98.

When I returned to school for my third year I was restless. I lived in a house with other Christian women and we all attended the same church. The church had started as a 50 person church, split off from one of about 200 people, which I had attended once or twice pre-split. Two years later the church had hundreds of people and was meeting in an old department store space. I sang with the short-lived choir. I joined bible study/small group. It was all very nice, but I was restless, wanting more. I thought about transferring schools again (the year previously I had applied for and been accepted for transfer to the Berklee College of Music, but backed out at the 11th hour; this time the all-girl Smith College sounded fantastic). Instead I got hooked into YWAM, an international youth ministry. Their entry-level program was a 5-6 month program of classes, small group and ministry training, usually culminating in a ‘mission’ to a second location (usually a third world country) to ‘save the lost.’ I think I equated ministry with mysticism. I was wary of the evangelizing and ended up choosing to go to Ireland, where instead of going to a different country, that branch stayed put and assisted the local church.

To complicate things, shortly after signing up for the program, I fell in love – with a non-Christian of course. Before leaving for Ireland for 6 months we got engaged. It was spur of the moment. I crazy about the guy, and he asked. I said yes. No one else thought it was a good idea. In retrospect it was stupid. But I didn’t know any better.

My time in Ireland was truly amazing. Again, I was the odd one out. I didn’t quite mesh with the program. But I gained a lot from all the time to read and pray and think. I met incredible and diverse people from all over the world. One Czech woman, with whom I’ve long since fallen out of touch, was a devout Roman Catholic with a devotion to the Virgin Mary. I didn’t know too much about Mary then. My friend went on a pilgrimage to Croagh Patrick, a mountain that she hiked up barefoot. She brought me back a rock, which I still have and it sits on my altar today. Overall, while I was deeply uncomfortable with the evangelical aspects of the organization, I loved the social aspects and the ways that YWAM supported young people’s personal faith and growth and gave them skills for some sort of future in the religious world. I really wanted to stay on as staff in the west of Ireland. I think my desire to stay was mostly the pull of the land, which spoke so deeply and intensely to me. But I went home to get married.

During my time in Ireland my issues with anxiety came up in full force. Again, I prayed and prayed and cried. I thought something was just wrong with me or that maybe I wasn’t listening right to God. More than one person suggested that I not marry an unbeliever.

After my wedding I fell into a profound depression. I was married, back at school and struggling with anxiety worse than ever. I forgot all the lyrics to my audition piece for the excellent concert choir – the choir which I had sung with for two years! This devastated me and I retreated more deeply, spiraling into a depression that I didn’t come out of for more than two years.

In fact there’s not a lot I remember from those two years.

I do remember feeling frustrated with church after my return. I stopped going to Christ the King. I was distrustful and uninterested in the conflation of culture and religion. Being a ‘good’ Christian often looked like being a certain kind of man or woman, but I knew that wasn’t actual Christianity. Bible studies were often separated into men and women, the women’s studies often talked about being a good wife. I think this was the period where I discovered feminism.

After my positive experience in Ireland, living with both Catholics and Protestants, I started attending a Catholic church. I love me some liturgy, so it was a good fit. I remember flippantly dismissing a family friend’s suggestion that I check out the Episcopalian Church, saying that it’s origins were dubious. Oh, what an ignorant smart-ass I was. Now I think it would be a pretty good fit for me, were I to remain in the Christian fold. But Catholicism was Grand and had History and Theologians and was There First. I read the entire catechism, cover to cover. Because that’s what I do. I wasn’t very impressed with the Church’s opinion of women, and yet parts of the catechism were so beautiful.

My husband and I moved back to my hometown after we finally graduated from college. I joined the local RCIA (Rites for Christian Initiation for Adults, a study group for adults considering converting to Catholicism) and realized around the same time that there was an older strain of Christianity – the Orthodox Church! And there was one in my town! Alaska has a long tradition of Orthodoxy.

All of this time I was still reading scripture and praying every morning. (At least I think I was, the last few years are hazy, remember.) My depression was severe, even though I wasn’t aware that’s what it was. I was seeking. I was miserable. I remember sitting at the computer, going through the Sacred Space daily devotional and just sobbing. I sat and prayed over and over and over again to God for help. I didn’t know what to do. This was the only time I have ever ‘heard a voice.’ I heard an immediate disembodied response. It said ‘You need to choose. You need to make a choice.’ And I realized that God couldn’t help me if I was refusing to act. I either needed to get help and fix my marriage, or get help and leave. I had to choose to stay or choose to leave. The wasting away I was doing wasn’t actually choosing. But either choice was terrifying.

What happened next takes us into part three.

In my next post I’ll write about my re-reading Dietrich Bonhoeffer‘s The Cost of Discipleship. I wrote my college senior thesis on him and I haven’t read his works since then. I remember being impressed by him and have kept this particular book in my collection since college, even though I’ve never opened it since. We’ll see what I think it of now.

Something I remember from my religious studies days, and which was clear as day to me as I read Matthew, is that this gospel was written with a Jewish audience in mind. Jesus is written to parallel Moses – climbing up on mountains and receiving wisdom (Sermon on the Mount and the Transfiguration), the flight of exile into Egypt (this one doesn’t occur in any other gospel). The genealogy in the beginning of the book is there to establish Jesus’s Jewish cred. Jesus very specifically mentions a couple of times that he is not here to preach to the Gentiles and even instructs his disciples not to worry about the Gentiles. (‘Go nowhere among the Gentiles, and enter no town of the Samaritans…’ 10:5)

And that, plus all the references to ‘Old Testament’ scripture, drives home the fact that I don’t feel like this religion is for me. I know full well that there is a mystic strain in Christianity that I quite like. I find it the Eastern Orthodox tradition and parts of the Roman Catholic and Protestant traditions, and in the Gnostic side of things. That mystic essence is beautiful, powerful and fully part of the greater Christian tradition. But if I actually read the Gospels and read what Jesus says…. well, in spite of all his wisdom (and there are great, universal truths and wisdom for the ages that I think almost all spiritual/religious people can agree on) I am not Jewish and he is not speaking to me.

Something that surprised me as I read along was that parts jumped out at me – verses that I hadn’t thought about in years but are so deeply ingrained into my memory that I could tell which parts I had given a lot of thought to once, parts I had prayed over. I have taken the words of Jesus deeply into my person. It’s fascinating to realize how important his words have been in shaping my morals, my spiritual strength, my view of the world. I notice that I have especially taken to heart the verses about knowing a tree by its fruit (12:33).

See, even then and even now I see Jesus as an agent of social justice. I also see him as a Jewish radical – hoping to shake up his faith and also the secular powers that be, but most importantly he wanted spiritual renewal among his people; chapter 23 is especially harsh toward the Pharisees. Cool. I can totally support that. All aspects of the status quo need shaking up from time to time. ‘Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth; I have not come to bring peace, but a sword.’ (10:34) Jesus in the temple at the tables of the money changers sure sounds like the Occupy movement/s to me! (12:-13)

I love the admonishments to get one’s own person in order and eschew public praise for holiness (6:1-8, 6:16-18), to forgo attachment to wealth and things, to be humble (7:1-5), to pursue mercy, and to basically pursue the spirit of the law over the letter of the law (7:12; all of the Sermon on the Mount, in my opinion).

A favorite passage: ‘Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and rust consume and where thieves break in and steal; but store up for yourselves treasure in heaven, where neither moth nor rust consumes and where thieves do not break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.’ (6:19-21)

I also like the parables that talk about the worth of the kingdom of heaven, which for me is not so much the Kingdom of Heaven as it is the spiritual life. ‘The kingdom of heaven is like a merchant in search of fine pearls; on finding one pearl of great value, he went and sold that he had and bought it.’ (13:45)

I’d love to know what Jesus really meant by the ‘Son of Man.’ I’d love to know if he was as cantankerous and joyless as the gospel suggests. Surely he must have been extremely charismatic – beyond his acts of magic (because that’s what miracles are, and I don’t doubt that he healed and did some amazing things).

The book of Matthew starts out as what feels like a history lesson full of great spiritual insight and slowly gets more militant and concerned with the Messiah’s return/apocalypse. And that’s something else that’s bothered me for a long time: if Jesus was the Messiah and he was here on earth (‘God with us’) then why are we still waiting around for him to return? Why did Jesus himself talk about the ‘coming of the Son of Man’ and all of his parables about lamps and oil and brides and bridegrooms (24:36-25:13)?

I also admit I dislike the tremendous amount of slave/lord language. I can dismiss a lot of this knowing that this books was written in a vastly different time and place. What is more troubling to me is the continued insistence on using Lord and Master language today. The feudal context does not sit well in modern times; it is not a worthwhile metaphor anymore.

We all know how the story ends (SPOILER ALERT): crucifixion and resurrection. The hero dies. But he doesn’t really! Jesus has been foreshadowing this… ok, straight up telling us his death is coming for a while now. But I find the scene in the garden of Gethsemane very moving (26:36-56). Jesus is vulnerable and praying. He wants his friends with him. He says to God, ‘My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from me, yet not what I want but you want.’ This is one of the few moments where I see Jesus as an emotional, multi-dimensional person. He might actually be scared. He might not actually want what he sees as inevitable. Much of the language in the Christian church goes on and on about Jesus dying for sins and the will of God, but here, we see it wasn’t an easy thing for Jesus to do. (This is not to say that I subscribe to the idea that we all are responsible for killing Jesus because of our sin. I have huge problems with the economic and juridical theories of salvation.)

I also find the mocking of Jesus (27:27-32) particularly sad and pitiless. Who mocks a man on the way to his death? Who mocks a man dying before your very eyes – or even as you are dying as well?? (27:39-44)

So there. I’ve re-read the Gospel of Matthew. The Sermon on the Mount wasn’t as amazing this time around. I know too much. I still find the first half of the story to contain an incredible amount of worthy spiritual advice. But I was not all that moved, nor have I gained any new insights.