Category: Kim’s Blog

What to do about Williams Park? This has been a topic on the front burner in St. Petersburg recently. The park is in the heart of downtown and has become a gathering point for homeless people, drug use, and other less than savory activities.

A church in the vicinity mentioned paying $30,000 a year for security because of the risks posed by those who are currently using the park. In a letter to the editor published in the Tampa Bay Times, Bruce Fournier of St. Petersburg responds: “I thought the work of churches was to minister to the needy. I feel badly for the state of organized religion when it has to pay to keep the riffraff out of their churches by hiring security instead of helping these lost human beings. . . It’s a sad commentary when a Christ-driven organization is so un-Christlike in how it handles the less fortunate.” [Feb. 25, 2013]

Well, organized religion got a lift from Pope Francis yesterday at his inauguration. He called upon government leaders as well as the church to “protect all of God’s people and embrace with tender affection the whole of humanity, especially the poorest, the weakest, the least important. “ [Tampa Bay Times 3/20/13, “Pope Shares vision of caring, hope,” p. 3A] This is something for the whole church to hear, not just the Catholic Church. The church exists to serve the poor. That’s what Jesus did and that is what we are to do.

This is what I feel our church was doing in our involvement with the Coalition of Immokalee Workers as well as our support of Operation Attack, the mission trip to the Dominican Republic, as well as the youth mission trip to California. These are just a few of the ways we are ministering to the poor.

We also want to take to heart the words of the pope encouraging us to treat the poor, the weak, and the least important “with tender affection.” In our personal encounters with people, may we always treat everyone with respect, dignity, and, yes, tender affection.

Prayer: The church has always been called to carry out the ministry of Jesus. May we never loose sight of our calling, as a community and as individuals. There is no one beneath the love of God. May we seek out the needs around us and not avoid the ministry which is needed from us. Amen.

This week marks the 10th Anniversary of the start of the war with Iraq. It is a time to remember the ruse of WMD. It is a time to remember the many lives lost of service men and women as well as civilians. Can we ever forget the toppling of Saddam Hussein?

So, 10 years later, are we safer? Do you feel safer? We get robo calls at our house several times a week from security companies offering to set us up with a security system. Do I feel safer than I did 10 years ago? There was an article in the paper today about a former student at the University of Central Florida who was heavily armed and planning an attack on the campus. Do we feel safer? I love to visit Mexico. I read today that the 253,000 guns are smuggled each year from the US into Mexico. Will I feel safer on my next trip to Mexico? And what am I really afraid of? In the short term as well as long term, what I am really afraid of is global climate change and environmental destruction. So, this war with Iraq, did it make me safer? Are we less afraid?

I must say that I am not less afraid. In fact, I may be more afraid than I was 10 years ago. And much of that fear has nothing to do with foreign terrorist groups, but with policies, trends, laws, and enforcement, involving our domestic society. The resources used for the Iraq war could have gone a long way toward making me feel safer by being applied to certain domestic issues.

I am listening to the novel, The Falls, by Joyce Carol Oates. As usual for her, it is very dark. At one point in the story, it’s the mid ’70’s and a burly, gruff young man who is coming to the end of his high school career decides that he wants to take home economics. He then takes up cooking at this uncle’s restaurant. He’s very good at it. But at 6’2” tall and 220 pounds, his family wants him to be a prize fighter; make more money, bring more notoriety to the family. Reluctantly, he goes to his first Golden Gloves tournament. And though he is big and strong, he is pummeled. His coach tries to egg him on. The young man replies, “I don’t want to hit some guy, I want to feed him.” [Disk 14, section 12] The family lets him give up boxing and go back to cooking in the diner. He has won.

I don’t know about you, but I think that feeding someone is a lot more likely to make the world a safer place than hitting someone. You are not as likely to bite the hand that feeds you. I find the image of feeding a good one for us as Christians. There are images of food and meals throughout scripture and certainly woven through the gospels. Jesus was continuously eating with people and feeding them. To eat together not only meets a bodily need but it creates community. Food truly does sustain life. Think of what we could have accomplished if we had used all of the money for the war with Iraq on food. Then, we might actually be able to say that we feel safer.

Prayer – We are grateful, God, for the many ways that we are fed. May we be fed by your word, and by the teachings of Jesus. May we ingest and digest his way of peace. Help us to create security in the world through service, empowerment, and respect. Violence only begets violence. When will we ever learn? Help us to learn and grow in the ways of peace. Amen.

“Research portrays Americans as increasingly insecure, isolated, and lonely.” This comes from the book Alone Together: Why We Expect More from Technology and Less from Each Other by MIT Professor Sherry Turkle [p. 157]. This is a book I highly recommend. But this one observation is quite interesting to me. Insecure, isolated, and lonely. To me this is exactly what the church is supposed to be preventing. When you are part of a church, you celebrate that you and all people are loved. This undermines insecurity. As for being isolated and lonely, a church gives you a community in which to be yourself and be loved. Church brings people together with common values. Jesus’ ministry specifically addressed welcoming those who were outcast and ostracized into the community. In the mission statement of Lakewood UCC we commit to offering “the hospitality and inclusive love of Christ to all people.” The church should be all about combatting insecurity, isolation, and loneliness. How are we doing?

I would be interested in research that compares the rate of insecurity, isolation, and loneliness among people who go to church (or some other faith community) and those who do not. I have friends who do not go to church. And one of the reasons they do not go is because they feel church is exclusivistic, judgmental, and irrelevant. These characteristics would contribute to insecurity, isolation, and loneliness. If you feel that the church is continuously telling you that you are “unworthy” then what do you have to contribute to a relationship?

But at it’s best, at its truest and most genuine, the church should be directly countering insecurity, isolation and loneliness. We are created in God’s image to live in community. Research showing an increase in insecurity, isolation, and loneliness is but another reminder that there are many people who need the church. But do they know that church is available to them and what it has to offer? Maybe not. It is our responsibility to see that people know that at church there is an antidote to insecurity, isolation, and loneliness. Not only do individuals need this, but it will improve the well-being of our society. A culture of insecure, isolated, lonely people is a very scary proposition.

Prayer: We pray for all those who feel insecure, isolated and lonely. There is so much heartache in the world. While we have ever more ways of connecting, we can become more and more separate. We pray for hearts open to reach out and extend the love and communion of Christ to those who feel abandoned and alone. May we not be afraid to create community through shared honesty and vulnerability. Amen.

Sunday afternoon 9 people from Lakewood UCC went to the Publix Headquarters in Lakeland to be part of the finale of the farmworker march from Ft. Myers to Lakeland.
It was inspiring. There was an incredibly diverse group of people including many, many young people. People were there from all over the country. They had flown in specifically to attend this event. It made me realize that this is part of a much bigger movement. While we think of the Coalition of Immokalee Workers (CIW) as a local group, which they are, they are also of world renown. The Coalition has been nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize and they are known not only in Florida and the US, but around the world. They are considered a premier model for effective non violent change.

The motto for the CIW used to be “Se si puede” meaning it can be done or we can do it. Today there was a different chant. An adaptation. I was with Claudia Rodriguez, our Nursery Attendant, who speaks Spanish, and I asked her , “What does this new chant mean?” She said it was in the past tense: “’It has been done,’ or ‘We did it.’”

While the CIW is still trying to get Publix to come to the table to discuss the Fair Food agreement, they have successfully negotiated agreements with 11 other major food corporations including Burger King, Taco Bell, McDonald’s, Subway and Pizza Hut. This “has been done.” So, there is a new motto.

Sometimes when we are working for change or trying to accomplish something that is important to us, we may be focussing on what is yet to be accomplished. And we may lose sight of what has already been done. Again and again in the Bible the people recount the amazing things that God has done for them in the past. This gives them hope and strength in the present as they work for a new future. It is important for us in our spiritual lives and in our life together as a church to celebrate how far we have come, what we have been able to accomplish, the positive change that has already occurred. This then inspires us to keep up our efforts and not to give up. Let’s make sure that we are not ignoring what “has been done.”

Prayer: Sometimes we can only see that the glass is half empty. May we have eyes to see how far we have come and to pay attention to the strides that have been made that deserve to be celebrated. This gives us strength and hope to continue the struggle. When we see what God has done and is doing, we can trust that eventually our efforts for justice will bear fruit. God does not give up on us. May we not give up. Amen.

Creation or evolution? Bumper stickers and candidates and school boards hold forth on this topic. Creation, Genesis style, by God who specifically images each life form and species. Or evolution à la Darwin, purported to be a godless, scientific explanation for the vastly profuse effusion of life.

While Charles Darwin may not have been a regular church-goer, it should be noted that the one book Darwin took on his voyages was Milton’s Paradise Lost, the epic poem on based on the biblical story of Adam and Eve and their expulsion from the Garden of Eden.

The third edition of On the Origin of Species ended with a hymn of praise to God. Darwin was awed that “from so simple a beginning endless forms most beautiful and most wonderful have been and are being evolved. “ [Quoted in The Christian Century, 3/20/13, p. 8] Using today’s description, maybe we would say that Darwin was “spiritual but not religious.”

The design of an ever adaptive, changing natural world. Circumstances converging creating the “perfect storm” which resulted in a life-supporting habitat. A simple, almost unremarkable emergence of life gradually spreading and diversifying resulting in the current profusion of nature. To me there is nothing more awe-inspiring or miraculous than this incredible process. The theory of evolution is enough to prevent one from lapsing into agnosticism or atheism.

To look at the human species and the harm we have done to one another and the planet; that could drive you to agnosticism or atheism. But the examination of the natural world and affirming the system of evolution, it’s hard not to see a God of some kind at the heart of it all.

Creation or evolution? Yes! God creating evolution. That’s a God to which I will gladly give my love and trust.

Prayer: May we take delight in the glory of creation. May we see the hand of the divine in the natural world. May we celebrate that we are part of the amazing, awe-inspiring, miraculous creation. We hope to have hearts centered on the God of creation and to cherish and care for God’s miraculous gift. Amen.