Southwest Conference Blog

The Book of Joy

by Rev. Lynne Hinton

I gave new books to members of my class today. One student, a somber woman who has only recently begun to share what she has written, told me she has never owned a book. I watched how careful she was when she opened it, how she moved her fingers across the cover as if it were the hand of a child or someone she loved. Tender, grateful, surprised at how it felt.

They all treated the gifts like treasures.

We have been talking about “perspective” in these classes I teach at the substance abuse recovery center, perspective and how it matters to our joy. I am awash in ideas they have given me, moved by the words of love written in letters, our last assignment, meant to be sent from a loved one now dead. This is the perspective of wisdom, of being out and away from this world, the perspective of unconditional love, coming from the other side.

I am unable to speak after every essay because they are so profoundly beautiful and there is nothing I can say.

This work of sobriety, this hard work of feeling the forgotten feelings they have pushed down and covered up and numbed themselves to for years, the childhood trauma, abuse, neglect, prison, loss, the list goes on and on, this hard work can sometimes seem overwhelming. It is not for the weak-minded or the faint of heart.

“I’m not sure I understand joy,” one of them says. “I’m not sure I’ve ever had it.”

I struggled with the focus on joy for our writing prompts for this class. Aren’t they just trying to survive? Doesn’t joy seem like a privilege they can’t afford to imagine? Do they even think it’s attainable? These are the questions I have asked myself as we read and study the sentiments of the Dalai Lama and Archbishop Desmond Tutu.

And it’s true that there are days when I speak of joy as a spiritual discipline, joy as being available to everyone; and I watch as their eyes glaze over and I think maybe this was an ill-planned direction to take them.

But then there’s something else that gnaws at me every time I think I should choose another topic; and that’s the thought, the bothersome thought that they don’t comprehend the concept of joy because they don’t think they deserve it. And that thought, the one from deep, deep inside the hidden reservoir of my own self-doubt, one that is a direct result of my own brokenness, causes me to weep.

So, I asked them if such a thing is possible, if there’s the slightest chance they believe they don’t deserve joy. A few looked away, eyes averted, feet slide back and forth under chairs, heads dropped. No one answered. No one confirmed or denied the possibility.

“Well, whether that is true or not,” I said. “Hear me when I say you do. Every one of you deserves to have joy.” I waited though I’m not sure exactly for what.

“You hear me?” I asked, because I needed to know.

And they looked up and they nodded, but still, they didn’t speak. But somehow, just meeting their eyes, just seeing them nod, that was enough. And with that, we carried on. We opened our new books, The Book of Joy, some of them for the very first time.

How to assess your emotional bandwidth

by Kay Klinkenborg, Church of the Palms UCC

Broad bandwidth for cell phones went to 5G in late February in this part of AZ. I just traded in an old iPhone 6, and when I looked at the bars of signal strength, there it was: 5G. Oxford Dictionary gives two definitions:

A range of frequencies within a given band that is used for transmitting a signal. The transmission capacity of a computer network or other telecommunication system.
The energy or mental capacity required to deal with a situation.

There it was…an alternative definition applicable to my life. How does one measure mental capacity required to deal with a situation? Is it IQ capacity? Is it spiritual capacity? Then we have that famous book, Emotional IQ: is it our emotional capacity? And the word “energy” was offered as an evaluative tool: what kind of energy? Emotional energy? Spiritual energy? Physical energy…am I too tired, too wired?

Quite complex, it appears. Where would you go to find your energy or mental capacity to deal with a situation? Maybe more questions bring clarity. Emotional bandwidth is the ability to honestly catch up on your emotional state.

How do you listen to yourself? Do you listen to what your mind is saying, linear thinking? Do you have a place in your body where you know something is right or wrong, called “gut feeling?” Do you identify your intuition a certain way? I can’t answer one of these questions for you. You must do the work.

So I offer a simple tool to assist us at any time to assess our “emotional bandwidth.” Using this tool helps me take a step back, see where my emotional center is and make wiser choices, possibly to wait a while for that hard conversation, get something to eat if I am hungry and ignoring that hunger edge, maybe I am overextended. Here is how to use the Emotional Bandwidth Tool.

Bandwidth 5: I am rested, refreshed, and able to focus and respond without feeling put upon, angry or testy.

Bandwidth 4: I am aware I feel somewhat irritated, that I am being bothered, but I can respond appropriately. I know I need to take a break, drink some fluids, maybe eat lunch. Space to regroup.

Bandwidth 3: I am edgy, having trouble concentrating, and don’t really want to be participating in this conversation/event. I am not actively listening, out ahead of the person talking, thinking of what I will respond. I might have a headache and not ask for the break I need to regroup.

Bandwidth 2: I am sharp in my responses, not focused, blaming others for what is happening or what I am experiencing. I am tired and ignoring it. I am over-committed and ignoring that, as well. I keep pushing, but feel like I am moving through mud.

Bandwidth 1: My mind and body are screaming: “Please, not one more request of me, I can’t even do the list I have.” I have no coping skills for emotional conversations. I really want to be left alone. In the past, I have called this place for myself “emotionally thin,” not much reserve left to give to anyone. A clear message that self-care needs to be a priority and a plan for that put into action.

So, let’s do an experiment together. Pick one or two people with whom you agree to share where you are on your Emotional Band Width Scale. Just a fun project to help you take a pause and look at your response to life. Want to be 5G…good goal. But life happens – bumps in the road – and I can’t be Pollyanna when I don’t feel that way. So being honest about my Emotional Bandwidth will benefit those with whom I interact and help me be more balanced with self-care, able to respond to support others when I pay attention.

Bad law, bad logic, and bad interpretation philosophy

by Brendan Mahoney

Many are rightly shocked by the Supreme Court’s repudiating the constitutional right to reproductive choice. Less surprising is the Supreme Court’s recent history of saying anything, however contradictory, to get to a desired result. Because issues of constitutional law are not always easily understood, some explanation is helpful, but it is also likely to cause further shock over the Supreme Court’s disingenuous philosophies of legal interpretation called “originalism” and “textualism.”

The Bill of Rights, adopted in 1791, applies to the federal government, not the states. That means that the US Constitution, when written, prohibited the federal government from infringing free speech, for example, but the states were free to do otherwise (and they often did, depending on their own constitutions).

After the Civil War in 1868, the US adopted the 14th Amendment, and the critical portion insofar as rights go is in Section 1:

No State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws. (emphasis added)

The “due process” clause of Section 1 of the 14th Amendment, over time, came to be understood as incorporating, selectively, the original Bill of Rights to be made applicable to the states, meaning, states cannot infringe free speech, religion, search and seizure, etc. Notably, the Second Amendment right to bear arms was not incorporated into 14th Amendment jurisprudence until 2010. This is an example of the Supreme Court continuing new rights in the 14th Amendment while it rejects the concept of other rights such as reproductive choice in the 14th Amendment as being “non-textual.” The 14th Amendment, however, does not mention guns either, so that non-textual right is just fine. Justice Clarence Thomas further believes that the rights to contraception, freedom of consensual same-sex activities, and same sex marriage also should go because they are non-textual. He conveniently omitted from that list the right to non-textual interracial marriage (his own marriage is interracial).

The willingness of the current Supreme Court to say anything in support of a favored result under the guise of textualism and original intent is flabbergasting. Last Thursday, the Court declared unconstitutional a 100-year-old New York law concerning licensing for firearms. The Court insisted it must look to the laws in 1791 for original intent (few restrictions on gun ownership) rather than 1868 where gun restrictions were common in order to clairvoyantly divine the intention of the drafters. One day later, in the case overturning Roe v. Wade, the same court did just the opposite. It insisted that for reproductive rights, we must look to 1868 for original intent, where restrictions on abortion were common, rather than to 1791 where abortion restrictions were nearly unheard of.

Originalism and textualism are just sophistry – the Supreme Court’s willingness to dodge and weave in methods of analysis shows that clearly. It’s no different than Biblical literalism, which allows a person to declare an interpretation literal and any other views non-Biblical. One of the most famous conservative Supreme Court Chief Justices, Oliver Wendell Holmes, had this to say in 1920 about original intent in interpreting the text of the Constitution:

“[W]e must realize that [the Framers] have called into life a being[,] the development of which could not have been foreseen completely by the most gifted of its begetters. … The [Constitution] must be considered in the light of our whole experience and not merely in that of what was said a hundred years ago.” Missouri v. Holland, 252 U.S. 416 (1920).

The Supreme Court’s decision to repudiate the constitutional right to reproductive choice is more than just morally wrong. It is bad law, bad logic, and bad interpretation philosophy. Worse, they know that too.

Divinity in Daily Life: Busy Times as Spiritual Practice

by Rev. Teresa Blythe

To get better at something we consider challenging, we have to practice. You know what’s hard for me in spiritual direction? Exploring with a client ways to deepen in relationship with God when they are truly and unavoidably busy. Spiritual directors are not “fixers,” yet I’m always tempted to suggest ways to squeeze more time out of a packed person’s day. Never, ever have my suggestions on this when I gave them worked. I’m especially cautious about doing this to caregivers of people who are ill, elderly, disabled or who have young children in their lives.

As I was reading Mirabai Starr’s amazing book, Wild Mercy: Living the Fierce and Tender Wisdom of the Women Mystics, I came across her beautiful reflection on this. She tells the story of her friend Asha, mother to four girls, who came to the conclusion that “unless she focused on parenting as a spiritual practice, she would have no spiritual life.” (p 122) Overworked people could substitute any number of responsibilities for the word “parenting” in that statement.

That’s the reality! If we say that all of life is spiritual, then the practice of daily life is a good part of our spiritual practice. For caregivers, the act of giving unconditional love to your loved one has to connect you to God. It just has to! Especially since those of us who are Christians constantly refer to God as Comforter, Restorer, Father and Mother.

What part of your life do you need to begin to see and experience as spiritual practice? Is it cooking a healthy meal? Taking an afternoon walk? Sharing tea with a friend? Or maybe even staring at the wall when you are too tired to do anything but.

I have always loved how spiritual director and storyteller Mark Yaconelli looks at it. He is fond of asking people what daily activities really get them excited? Then when they name it, he says, “go and do that.” Do it with all the exuberance and life you have.

I’m convinced that’s the kind of practice that makes the Divine One happy.

Pick Up Your Mat and Walk (Part 2!)

by Rev. Deb Worley

Jesus said to him, “Stand up, take your mat and walk.” At once the man was made well, and he took up his mat and began to walk. (John 5:8-9, CEB)

For those of you who were here last Sunday, you may be wondering if I forgot to change the Gospel passage for today, and accidentally read the same passage as last week! Whoops! That’s embarrassing!!

Except, I didn’t forget to change the Gospel passage. I chose to stick with this passage for another week. When I went home last Sunday, after worship and then the “God Sightings” discussion, I felt like there was more to consider, more that needed to be said. Which is true, of course, with every scripture passage, always! There’s never a time when everything has been said that needs to be said about any one scripture passage. It’s the Living Word. There’s always more to say…because God is still speaking.

But with this passage in particular, at this particular time, I felt the need to have another go. So…here we go!

Because not all of you were here last week, and because this past week has been…well, it’s been quite a week…I’m going to start with a very quick review of the gist of last week’s sermon. (Part 1)

Those of you who were here will likely remember the story I began with, about growing up on a farm in upstate NY, and a specific memory of my dad asking my then-teenaged brother, one wintry day, if he’d like to help him bring in some wood for the wood stove, and my brother saying, “Umm, no,” and my dad getting mad and my mom telling my dad that if he wanted my brother to help him, then to just tell him to help him, don’t ask him! Remember??

Well, as you can see and have heard, all three of those family members are here this morning! And all three of them will confirm the veracity of that story after the service, if anyone was thinking I made it up…

But then I shifted from the question my dad asked my brother, to the question Jesus asked the man in today’s passage: “Do you want to get well?”

And I pointed to how the man didn’t respond with yes or no, but with some of the reasons he hadn’t gotten well up to that point, some of the reasons he was still sick after thirty-eight years of sitting by the side of the pool…

And I imagined some of what the man might have been feeling: hopelessness, discouragement, despair. I imagined that he might have felt like being well would take more courage than he had, that doing things differently than he had done them for his whole life would take more strength and commitment than he had, that stepping into a new way of living would be hard and uncomfortable and scary–even if that way of living led from sickness and a diminished self to healing and wholeness–and that changing, even for the better, would take more patience and practice than he thought he could find.

And I imagined how Jesus might have responded, from his heart to the man’s heart, taking into account his fears and his despair, his excuses and his stuck-ness, his reluctance to say, “Yes! I want to be well!”… And I wondered if we, too, might need to hear that response, because we, too, can be reluctant to commit to being made well; we, too, aren’t always sure that we have the courage and strength we need to be made whole; we, too, can doubt that healing is worth the hard work and discomfort and commitment that are required…

And just quickly, here’s what I suggested Jesus might have communicated to the man by the side of the pool in his hopelessness, and what he might also be communicating to us in our own stuckness:

Yes, it will be hard to be well. Harder than it has been to be sick.

Yes, it will require courage. Remaining stuck is easy.

Yes, it will require strength. It takes no effort to keep doing what you’ve always done.

Yes, it will require patience and commitment and practice. I will get you started; you will have to keep choosing to be well. Day after day, hour after hour, moment by moment.

Yes, it will be uncomfortable and unfamiliar and scary.

And it will be hard! Or did I mention that already??

Get up. Pick up your mat and walk.

Stop watching others participate in the world around you, and step more fully into living yourself. Live life more deeply and be who God created you to be more fully.

Get up. Pick up your mat and walk.

What you’ve been doing all these years that’s comfortable? Do less of that. Leave that behind.

What you’re considering doing right now that feels uncomfortable? Do more of that. Walk toward that.

Those thoughts of “It’s too hard. I’m scared. It doesn’t feel good!”? Acknowledge them, name them, say them out loud. And let go of them. They are not going to make you well.

Get up. Pick up your mat and walk.

Walk forward. One foot in front of the other. One step at a time.

Walk toward healing. Toward wellness. Toward being whole.

And step into Life.

Get up. Pick up your mat and walk.

So, a lot of that was me taking literary license. Imagining what might have been going on in the man, and, yes, in Jesus. Imagining what it might have been like for someone who had been sick, who had been incapacitated, who had been diminished in his self, in some way, for 38 years, most of his life–and at that point to be offered healing… And I imagined what that healing might have looked like, what that healing would feel like, what, really, it was that Jesus was offering.

And we are told, after Jesus said to him, “Stand up, take your mat and walk,” that “At once the man was made well, and he took up his mat and began to walk.” (Jn. 5:8-9)

And again, I can’t help but wonder!! Did it really happen like that? Was the man completely healed, once and for all? Able to walk with confidence and strength, without a single stumble or misstep, without needing to rest? Simply getting up and stepping into this new way of being, with no looking back?

“Stand up,” Jesus told him. “Take your mat and walk.” And “At once the man was made well, and he took up his mat and began to walk.”

I wonder…because in our lives and in our world, we need healing. Desperately. In our lives and in our world, we need to be made well. There’s so much pain, so much brokenness, so much suffering, so much chaos, so much darkness…

We need healing, so that as people of faith we can stand up.

We need healing, so that as people of faith we can stand up and begin to walk.

We need healing, so that as people of faith we can stand up and speak up.

We need healing, so that as people of faith we can stand up and be light in the darkness.

We need healing, so that as people of faith we can stand up and fight for justice.

And, we need courage. And strength. And commitment. And patience. And practice. Because while maybe the man in today’s passage was completely healed, once and for all, never to stumble again, my experience has generally been otherwise, and I suspect yours has been, too.

We can say yes to healing and stand up–with God’s help–and begin to walk toward healing–with God’s help–with courage and strength and commitment–with God’s help–and we still stumble. We still take missteps, maybe even falling flat on our faces. We still need to rest from time to time.

But then we can say yes to healing again–with God’s help. And we can stand up again–with God’s help. And we can begin to speak up, with courage and strength and commitment–with God’s help! And then we stumble and misstep and fall and need to rest. Again.

And then we can say yes to healing again–are you seeing the pattern??–and stand up again, and be light in the darkness and fight for justice–all with God’s help.

All, and always, with God’s help.

With God’s help, always.

With God’s presence, always.

With God’s power, always…

Hear these words once more, from God’s heart to ours, knowing that as God reaches out to us and offers healing and wholeness, God knows our fears and our despair and the comfort we find in our familiar stuckness. And God continues to call us to new life:

Yes, it will be hard to be well. Harder than it has been to be sick.

Yes, it will require courage. Remaining stuck is easy.

Yes, it will require strength. It takes no effort to keep doing what you’ve always done.

Yes, it will require patience and commitment and practice. I will get you started, and will be with you; you will have to keep choosing to be well. Day after day, hour after hour, moment by moment. Again and again and again.

Yes, it will be uncomfortable and unfamiliar and scary.

And it will be hard! Or did I mention that already??

All of that is true. And I am here, I am with you, and I want you to be well!

Get up. Pick up your mat and walk.

And this morning, hear these additional words:

Get up and walk–and when you stumble, which you will, reach out for me and steady yourself, and keep going. Get up and walk–and when you take a misstep, which you will, look for me and reorient yourself, and keep going. Get up and walk–and when you fall flat on your face, which you will, let me help you up and brush you off, so you can take a breath, and keep going. Get up and walk–and when you need to rest, which you will, rest. Find the sacred in your rest. And when you’ve rested, keep going.

Get up. Pick up your mat and walk.

And know that I am with you, always.

May each of you, and me, and all of us, and our world, find the healing we so desperately need, the healing God offers us in Jesus Christ.

Amen.

Beyond the Bell Jar: Reclaiming the Life and Art of Sylvia Plath

by Kathryn Andrews, Desert Palm United Church of Christ Council and W.I.S.E. Committee

For many years, I knew Sylvia Plath only as an author who ended her life at age 30 after producing an excellent but depressing book called The Bell Jar. That understanding changed after I read Heather Clark’s Red Comet: The Short Life and Blazing Art of Sylvia Plath. This biography celebrates Plath as a disciplined and prolific artist who helped to reform modern poetry and posthumously earned the Pulitzer Prize for her Collected Poems. The book also contains a sobering history of Plath’s struggle with mental health issues.

Plath’s family was riddled with mental illness. Her immigrant father engaged in a slow-moving suicide by refusing treatment for diabetes for two years. He died in 1940 when Plath was eight. The book points out that young children who lose a parent run an increased risk of suicide later in life. Plath fit that pattern. Unknown to Plath, her paternal grandmother had died in an Oregon insane asylum years before. When Plath’s own depression surfaced at age 20, doctors repeatedly subjected her to a primitive form of electroshock therapy without anesthetic. According to Clark, Plath “was at the mercy of a patriarchal medical system that assumed that highly ambitious, strong-willed women were neurotic. As women, Plath and her mother had no power to defy the system.”

The absence of her father and family financial worries galvanized and haunted Plath. She was able to partially finance her education at Smith by selling her poems and stories to national magazines. Plath later won a Fulbright Fellowship to Cambridge. There she met and married Ted Hughes, who eventually became England’s Poet Laureate. Each contributed to the other’s professional growth; both were working toward an “unliterary” poetry “composed as much for the ear as for the eye.” Their relationship was progressive for its time, but also volatile. Plath seethed over the patriarchy and male humanist tradition that frequently denied her recognition while celebrating her husband’s accomplishments. In Daddy, Plath rages against her lost father, who also personifies “a bankrupt culture” and “patriarchal tormentors.” Linking her father and husband, Plath writes, “I made a model of you . . .and I said I do, I do” but by the end of the poem Plath declares: “I’m through.”

Following the birth of their second child and her husband’s departure, Plath entered a new level of depression while also taking her art to a new level. Plath’s own mental health crisis and her father’s immigrant struggles gave her insights into the life of the outcast, and her writings from this period explore the viewpoints of marginalized mothers, refugees, and Jews. She became one of the first poets to write about miscarriage and post-partum anxiety. More generally, her poems “open up new aesthetic possibilities that would change the direction of modern poetry.” The darkness also came through, as in Sheep in Fog: “My bones hold a stillness, the far/Fields melt my heart./They threaten/To let me through to a heaven/Starless and fatherless, a dark water.”

Plath would not live to see widespread critical acclaim or her works become best-sellers. As her depression deepened, Plath feared another round of botched electroshock therapy. She ended her life on the morning she was scheduled to enter a psychiatric hospital. But as Plath’s daughter later wrote, and Red Comet affirms, “The art was not to fall.”

Slaughters of the Innocents

by Rev. John Indermark

The second chapter of Matthew contains a story routinely left out of the Christmas narrative. Shortly after Magi arrive, and then leave, a mass murderer enters the scene. Intent on clinging to office, King Herod ordered the slaughter of innocent children.

I have heard reasons for this story’s banishment from the season’ readings. No other record exists of this massacre, so scholars say we cannot establish its factual truth. In services with sanctuaries still decked for Christmas, we also don’t want Herod raining on our parade. And so, typically, we leave it for another day, a day that tends never to come. Of course, our thoughts and prayers are with the families of those children…

I wrote very similar words to these in December of 2012, when the Innocents of Sandy Hook went slaughtered. To be sure, other mass shootings had occurred in prior years: Virginia Tech, Columbine. But in Sandy Hook, these were children. First-graders. Innocents. Murdered by – oh, I don’t know. A deranged young man. A culture infatuated with guns. An industry that had the gall to announce shortly afterward that the only way to stop a bad guy with a gun is a good guy with a gun. You know, increase sales.

I had truly – and naively – hoped that the Slaughter of Innocents in Sandy Hook might be the turning point. Again, these were children assaulted with an assault weapon. But the key word there is naively. I may not know if Herod’s story is factual, but by God it is true. Clinging to power, abetted here by the political ammo of campaign contributions, brought to a screeching halt any hope of change after Sandy Hook. As it has ever since.

And after slaughters in El Paso and Parkland and Buffalo and elsewhere, innocent people going about their daily lives gunned down because, by gum, we have a right to any weapon of our choice: now we are back to the Slaughter of Innocent Children. In Uvalde. In a state where the governor campaigned not to be number 2 in the country for gun ownership but number 1. Congratulations – I guess you got your wish. Of course, as your lieutenant predictably tweeted, our thoughts and prayers are requested.

Unless and until pious words for gun victims become righteous actions to prevent gun violence, the Slaughter of Innocents will continue unabated. How did Hosea 8:7 put it?

They who sow the wind will reap the whirlwind.

Consent Matters!

by Rev. Teresa Blythe

How do we have a relationship with God that is truly consensual? I’ve been thinking a lot about this in light of all the cases of religious teachers and leaders who preyed on parishioners, abusing them sexually without a single thought to the power dynamic at play. These abusive religious leaders may think the relationship is consensual, but how much consent does a person really have if the one pursuing them is a trusted, powerful force in their life? How does one have mutuality with someone so high on a pedestal?

Let’s expand the question by infinity and consider our free will with God. I’ll never forget a conversation I had with a friend when we were both in seminary. I asked her if she believed in hell. She said, “NO. I don’t believe God is a violent abuser.” Growing up in an evangelical Christian tradition, I always had a question about consent related to what they taught about salvation. If my choice to follow Jesus is a choice between that or having the proverbial gun to my head (believe, or go to hell), then is it really a choice? It seemed like a religious version of the 70’s National Lampoon cover, “If you don’t buy this magazine, we’ll kill this dog.” You’re gonna buy the magazine!

A couple of years ago, the empowerment movement against sexual assault and abuse known as #MeToo spawned a similar #ChurchToo movement. Women from a wide variety of Christian denominations spoke out about sexual abuse at the hands of church leaders. Protestants who used to point fingers at the Catholic sex scandals now saw the finger pointed at them for the same crimes. It catalyzed whole new conversations about consent.

Did Mary actually have a choice about bearing God’s son? Wouldn’t anyone visited by an angel and told they would be incarnating a holy child feel compelled to say, well, OK?

Are we doomed to a life separated from God if we don’t say yes to God’s attempts to heal and renew us?

Is God more like a sensitive lover who makes sure we are ready to take the next step in our relationship before asking more of us? Or is God transactional and pushy, using God’s power to press us forward? “Do this and you’ll be OK. Don’t do it and you will be in a world of hurt.”

Many of the saints, mystics and today’s contemplative Christians line up on the side of God as sensitive lover, who uses divine lure and patience with us, waiting for us to fully consent before the transformative work begins. My favorite part of the welcoming prayer based on Fr. Thomas Keating’s teachings names this consent: “I welcome what I am experiencing this moment in my body as an opportunity to consent to the Divine Indwelling.”

Consent is of primary importance in spirituality. Do not allow anyone to coerce you into any belief, activity, or relationship. Spiritual directors must be especially careful not to be coercive in any way so that our clients always have freedom. I believe our consent is important to God. And that means it is important to spiritual leaders and guides.

Our Trip to the Border

by Jane McNamara, Chair, Immigration Task Force, First Church UCC Phoenix

Hidden along the edge of the concrete ramp were 20 or 25 coins. I carefully picked them out of the sand and put them in the back pocket of my jeans. Nearby were torn pieces of paper money from Cuba – and strewn everywhere were shoelaces, belts, clothing items of all kinds, backpacks and shoes. Lots of shoes.

There is an explanation for what we saw at the border last week. Our guides, Fernie and Nathalie with the non-profit AZCA Humanitarian Coalition, said that Border Patrol agents require all migrants to leave their possessions behind. Agents say they don’t have the personnel to do the needed security checks. So, when they process migrants seeking asylum after they’ve crossed the border into the United States, migrants are given a clear plastic bag for their papers and perhaps a phone – and that is what they bring with them to the Welcome Center in Phoenix.

And the shoes? Since many cross water, they leave their muddy, wet shoes and wear someone else’s that have dried in the sun. An explanation, perhaps, for why so many guests at the Welcome Center are wearing shoes that fit them so poorly.

It was clear from our visit that Fernie and Nathalie would like to find ways to reuse more belongings but there isn’t the volunteer network that would be needed to undertake such a project. Instead, the AZCA Humanitarian Coalition organizes border aid trips, leaving water and fruit for asylum-seekers and, importantly, “restoring” the land. Five of us helped them one morning last week, following them along the dirt road by the border from Yuma to San Luis, making six stops and encountering migrants in many places along the way. And yes there are gaps in the wall near Yuma – and the wall will never be “finished.” Farmers demand access to water and the federal wall ends where the Cocopah Reservation begins.

We did not see Border Patrol process any asylum-seekers while we were there, but the evidence that they do indeed require everyone to throw away their personal possessions is everywhere. We filled bags and bags of “trash” and left them in the dumpsters parked along the border. In a few places, migrants picked up bags and helped us.

And afterwards, some of us brought items we found on the border to the Welcome Center. I washed hundreds of shoelaces in hopes our visitors to the Ropa (clothing) Room might be able to use them. My sister brought in the white confirmation dress she found and pinned it on a wall in the Ropa Room, thinking the mother who left it behind might visit us and see it, just waiting for her to reclaim it.

And I kept the coins I had found in my pocket.

Late last Saturday afternoon, four women who had chosen some clothing items from the Ropa Room were sitting on benches in the hallway, and one of the women was crying. I gave her a small stuffed dog and asked if she missed her family. One of the other women said she had been talking to her mother in Peru. Peru? I had never met anyone at the Welcome Center from Peru, but the coins in my pocket were Peruvian. I gave them to her and she placed them in her hand and stroked them ever so gently.

It was surely another one of the “God things” we witness so often at the Welcome Center.

We are truly blessed to be able to help welcome our newest immigrants to this country, and assist them as they pass through Phoenix on their way to sponsors throughout the country. And everyone who has donated clothing or shoes or tote bags or who has contributed to our meal fund is part of our First Church team. We are making a difference in people’s lives. Thank you.

Will the Minority Rule Again?

by Rev. Dr. Richard Einerson

There is a strong majority in this country that is pro-choice for women. Yet the minority can rule on this issue if we allow it. I have some background in medical ethics and from that background I feel compelled to make some comments. I was co-chair of the Medical Ethics Committee at Meritcare Medical Center in Fargo, ND where I was a chaplain for 18 years. In that role I attended weeklong seminars in medical ethics at the University of Washington as well as the “Managing Mortality” conference at the University of Minnesota. I heard the families of two major medical ethics cases, Karen Ann Quinlan and Nancy Cruzan. The first had to do with disconnecting a ventilator, the latter with discontinuing feeding tubes. Ever since the religious right has fought to have the government enforce quasi-religious values in families and personal life which continues today. (Comas: Karen Quinlan, Nancy Cruzan, and Terry Schiavo, Chapter 2). We are in the middle of that fight over women’s health and pro-choice issues now.

The battle has been going a while. I had an annual lecture in medicine and religions and invited Kristie Cruzan White, Nancy’s sister to tell their story to our physicians and community. Shortly thereafter (around 1991} I invited Dr. Daniel Maguire to lecture. His topic was going to be on grief in families who lose young children to incurable diseases as he and his wife had experienced. Maguire was a Jesuit teaching at Marquette but had become in the top ten on the hit list of his Catholic Church by an article he published in the Christian Century describing a visit he and his wife had made to a Planned Parent Center in Milwaukie. Contrary to the Republican notion that it is primarily “loose women” who get abortions, they found it was often women such as a schizophrenic whose medications would malform the fetus; other women whose pregnancies were not proceeding normally.

As a result of his unorthodox notions on abortion, I received a phone call on a Monday morning from the Chairman of the Bank which funded our lecture and who was more than nervous about our choice of lecture. I inquired who was objecting. It was the Bishop’s office and at least one of our conservative physicians. I said: “Norman, would you give me 24 hours to speak with them.” He reluctantly agreed. But in mid-afternoon I got a call from the President. After several statements I said: “Are you suggesting we pay his honorarium and have him stay home?” Of course, the answer was yes. Fortunately, we had friends in the philosophy department at Moorhead State University across the river who paid his airfare, and we had the largest turnout ever in their huge auditorium. Then Maguire did talk about abortion, quoting a Catholic Bishop in the 16^th century. With his Irish humor he said: “He didn’t lose his job, and his lectures weren’t cancelled!” Let’s be clear: This was an attempt of overruled FREEDOM OF SPEECH.

In another article, A Question of Catholic Honesty, Maguire takes on his church’s absolute stance on abortion: wrong all the time. He says: “As a Catholic theology I find this situation abhorrent and unworthy of the richness of the Roman Catholic traditions that have nourished me. I indict not only the bishops, but also the ‘petulant silence’ (Beverly Harrison’s phrase) or indifference of many Catholic Theologians who recognize the morality of certain abortions, but still will not address the subject publicly. I also indict the male dominated liberal Catholic press which does too little to dissipate the myth of a Catholic monolith on abortion.”

To me this is clearly an issue of women’s healthcare. It is an issue to be dealt with honestly in the privacy of a doctor’s office. I personally, as a man, cannot imagine the agony a woman goes through who may need an abortion. But I know that many of those who have FREEDOM as bumper stickers are all for LIMITING FREEDOM OF CHOICE FOR WOMEN. l It is amazing the me that the Supreme Court may be seriously nullifying Roe v Wade, established precedent. It says more about this court than it does about law. But if it does so, it is up to Congress. Our question as a society is: will be allow the minority to rule? Is the filibuster more important than a woman’s civil liberties? It is time for the majority to work at claiming its power. We should query and pressure our congressional representatives and senators. We should show up in the streets. The minority and their religious dogmatism should not prevail! It is time that the most strident voices be put down. I am not talking about their freedom of speech, but their trying to impose their will on the majority.

An unfortunate concomitant of the extreme right is the downright viciousness of their attacks. I mention the Nancy Cruzan case. The right consistently demonstrated where Nancy was lying in a persistent vegetative state. One of the signs on that Christmas eve read: LOOK WHAT NANCY GOT FOR CHRISTMAS: DEATH! I would hope that kind of viciousness might cease but I doubt that will ever be the case. Religion always has its zealots. They must not win this battle. We need to demonstrate that there are other Christians who are not zealots, who are champions of women’s rights, and who believe in the constitutional rights of all Americans!