So I’ve spent much of the first year of my new job helping plan e-Formation 2013, a conference on faith formation for a connected digital world. Yesterday, I had the distinct pleasure of introducing our keynote speaker, Sarah Lumbard, vice president of content strategy and operations at NPR (she was really great, by the way, but that’s not what this post is about). Suffice it to say, I am a big fan of NPR, and of certain brands in particular.
I’ll admit it, I geeked out a little. Rather than give you a bunch of self-conscious narrative, let me just set it up with some tweets and then tell you what I said.
Like many Episcopalians, I am a serious fan of public radio. But my relationship with NPR changed recently. I’d listened for years to a couple of their podcasts, but only to catch up with the on-air shows I care about. Then about six months ago, my friend Randall Curtis told me about an NPR show called Pop Culture Happy Hour. PCHH isn’t a radio show; it’s a standalone podcast, featuring four otherwise “off-air” NPR contributors.
These friends get together each week and talk about the stuff they love: movies, TV shows, music, books, comics … you name it. They are smart, they are funny, and they end each episode with a segment about what’s making them happy this week. I fell instantly in love and proceeded to devour more than a hundred back episodes. I’ve since gotten hooked on a number of other podcasts, many of which I found out about from PCHH panelist Glen Weldon.
Let me share two quick reflections on this experience that are relevant to our task today.
First: Imagine if the hundreds of hours I spent listening to podcasts this spring had included even a small percentage of time listening to religious programming–not Pat Robertson stuff but thoughtful, culturally engaged, theologically sophisticated content. That could be a couple dozen hours, about the same amount of time that a fairly serious parishioner might have spent in church during those same months. As it turns out, I do listen to a small percentage of religious podcasting, and a lot of it is really good. I have an increasingly difficult time imagining what my faith life would be like without podcasts, and that’s just one of the media available to us for touching people’s lives “between Sundays.”
Second: This experience has reassured me of the power of new media to create genuine connection and remarkable loyalty, both key to any process of discipleship. I rush home on the afternoons that new episodes of PCHH get released, and not just because that happens on Fridays. And when I tweet the gang a question or comment after listening, I know there’s a pretty good chance they’ll respond. Am I “friends” with any of them in the way we’ve historically understood that word? Of course not. But they bring a lot of joy and fun into my life, and they regularly share a bit of theirs with me and thousands of like-minded listeners. That’s something I’m very grateful for, and I bet I’m not the only person in this room who can say the same sort of thing about a faith leader they’ve connected with through similar means: sermon podcasts, YouTube videos, blog posts, Facebook updates, etc.
I think we’re just beginning to understand how the new media ecology creates opportunities for the church to reach out and touch the people we serve, and the people we hope to serve. With that, it’s my privilege to introduce someone who can teach us a thing or two about this water we’re dipping our toes into.
“As Vice President of Content Strategy and Operations, [NPR’s] Sarah Lumbard helps coordinate strategy across the News, Programming and Digital divisions.” Previously, “she served as Senior Director of Product Strategy and Development, and led and managed all of the NPR digital initiatives on existing and emerging platforms to ensure that the public can find and enjoy NPR and station content wherever they choose … Under her leadership, NPR has achieved triple-digit growth across all mobile platforms.” Please join me in welcoming Sarah Lumbard.
It was a great day. Thanks Sarah, Linda, and all you supportive conference-goers who were willing to indulge me. I hope my thoughts were pedagogically valuable in context besides being “all fan girl,” as someone said to me afterward.
“O LORD our Governor, * how exalted is your Name in all the world.” Amen.
For those of you who might be new to liturgical churches or to Christianity, let me start by saying that this is an odd day. Today is Trinity Sunday, so our celebration is guided by a belief that is at the center of our faith and yet does not appear in the bible in any easy-to-point-to form. Perhaps as a result, there’s been a lot of debate during two thousand years of Christianity about how we should talk of the beautiful and peculiar character of the God revealed and experienced as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
Lots of debate, as I’m sure you’ve experienced in this town, leads to complicated decisions. The result, in our case, is a lot of fancy Greek and Latin words to describe the church’s shared discernment of the nature of the Divine, lots of dos and don’ts for our Christian God-talk. We also have lots of jokes about how hard those words are to understand, how complicated and abstruse the doctrines associated with them.
If you ask me, that all gets in the way. I’d like to invite us to set this baggage aside for a few moments, if we are carrying it. The doctrine of the Trinity is a far more interesting and vital thing than the jokes about accidental heresy would lead us to believe. In a sense, this doctrine is a story, the story of God calling out to us in dynamic ways, and our inspired but inadequate attempts to give that God a name. Let’s all take Trinity Sunday as an occasion to boldly tell the story without fear that we might say something theologically questionable. Let’s just tell the story, and if you’d like to discuss any heresies I’ve committed, speak to me after the service.
[Pause.] It begins with the people of Israel and their faith in the God who chose their ancestor Abraham. At the core of belief and practice in the faith from which Christianity developed, and that our Lord claimed as his own, is the ancient statement of faith we know as Deuteronomy 6:4 and Jews know as the Shema, from the word with which it begins:
שְׁמַע יִשְׂרָאֵל יְהוָה אֱלֹהֵינוּ יְהוָה אֶחָֽד
Hear, O Israel! The LORD your God: the LORD is one.
The LORD is one. It sounds obvious enough to us, and it’s now a common enough belief in this world shaped so strongly by Judaism, Islam, and Christianity. But it was a radical notion when the people of Israel first heard and proclaimed it. If the LORD is one, then the world is not a capricious playground, much less a violent battleground, in which a pantheon of gods jockey for position. It is reliable, after a fashion, subject to a unified purpose–governed by the Lord GOD. The tone throughout today’s psalm is of majesty and awe in the presence of so great a Governor: “What is man that you should be mindful of him? * the son of man that you should seek him out? … O LORD our Governor, * how exalted is your Name in all the world!” (Psalm 8:5,10)
How exalted is your Name. That name was so exalted for the people of Israel that they never actually spoke it, just as modern Jews do not speak it today. The name of God in the Hebrew Scriptures is four letters that were not meant to be pronounced. In fact, the text in Hebrew includes nonsensical vowels that indiciate what to say instead; sometimes the vowels are from the word for Lord, sometimes they are from the word for God.
Whenever you see LORD or GOD written in all caps in an English translation, you’re encountering the unspeakable name of the God of Israel, the name of the God who called out to Moses on Mt. Sinai, the name that means “I AM WHO I AM” or “I WILL BE WHAT I WILL BE” (Exodus 3:14). So the story begins with a people and a proclamation: The LORD is one. Exalted is the Name of the LORD our Governor, who led us out of Egypt and claims us as God’s** own.
But Christians believe that the story of the name of God doesn’t end there. The founders of our faith had an experience that added something to their notion of God’s exalted name, and of God’s oneness, something they struggled to make sense of but that they knew would change everything. They met a peculiar teacher from Nazareth.
We’ve been telling his story since the church year began at the beginning of December. He was born and grew to be a man. He healed the sick. He brought hope to those in need. He preached a message of repentance, of purity of heart, of relationships mattering more than rules and customs. He said he came that they might have life and have it abundantly. He told them to begin their prayers with these words: “Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name.” He seemed to radiate a certain presence and power. He knew his disciples better than they knew themselves. He began as their teacher. By the end he was their Lord.
And then he died. It seemed like all hope was lost, like it had all been a fantastical dream. But word started to spread, first from the women who had gone to the tomb to finish preparing his body. “He is not here, he has risen!” Soon he had appeared to them all, and they started to make sense of the things he had said about himself. Years later, followers would write about his life on Earth, connecting the dots of his proclamation and their experience of him. So we hear from Peter: “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God” (Matthew 16:16); from Thomas: “My Lord and my God” (John 20:28); from Jesus himself: “Before Abraham was, I AM” (John 8:58). The Lord is one, they said, and yet we have seen the Lord made manifest in Jesus of Nazareth. The Lord is one. The Son shows us the Father.
Of course, something else happened amid all this, and that’s the part of the story we celebrated last week. On the night before he died for them, the Son of God made a promise to his friends, the promise we heard this morning: “I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth; for he will not speak on his own, but will speak whatever he hears, and he will declare to you the things that are to come. He will glorify me, because he will take what is mine and declare it to you. All that the Father has is mine. For this reason I said that he will take what is mine and declare it to you” (John 16:12-14).
The last gift of Jesus to his friends and the first gift of Christ to his church was the Spirit. The Spirit guided their ministry in the days to come, and guides it still. The Spirit poured the love of God into their hearts, and pours it still. The Spirit was faithful to the promise of the Son and is faithful still: “And remember, I am with you always, to the end of the age” (Matthew 28:20). [pause] And so the story continues ever on: The Lord is one. God’s Spirit is among us.
It took us a long time to find some precise language for what this all meant, 400 years or so to reach something resembling an agreement about the Lord who is one but whom we experience in these different ways. Truth be told, that’s an interesting story too, a story that suggests other points to emphasize and clarify. But it’s not the essential part. The essential part is the story of God reaching out: reaching out to deliver the people of Israel, reaching out to teach and heal the disciples and so many others throughout Galilee, reaching out to unite the followers in Jerusalem with Gentiles all around the Mediterranean and all around the world. Here’s how my favorite theologian sums it all up:
“That which is believed in is not a certain scheme of divinity, but a name … [And through our speaking that name] we claim our spiritual position, we assert our union with that Being” (Maurice, F.D. The Kingdom of Christ [New York: D. Appleton, 1843]: 240-241). We claim our part in the story by speaking the name as we have learned and experienced it, the name that was spoken when we were adopted in baptism. We bind unto ourselves today the strong name of the Trinity, and we do it in just a minute with these words: “I believe in one God, the Father Almighty … and in one Lord, Jesus Christ, the only begotten Son of God … and I believe in the Holy Ghost, the Lord and giver of life.”
When you sing those words today, remember that you are part of God’s great and ongoing love story, a story we are blessed to be helping write. As the Father reaches out to us with the gift of the Son, as the Son reaches out to us with the gift of the Spirit, as the Spirit reaches out to us with the gift of the never-failing love of the Father and the Son, so may we reach out in love to each other and to all the world, in God’s exalted and hallowed name: Father, Son, Spirit.
* Therefore I share this post under the same license (CC BY-SA 2.0) instead of my usual license (CC BY 3.0).
I was speaking recently with a teacher at a religious high school. She had been studying this passage from John’s gospel with her students and was both charmed and surprised by their reaction. The conversation had apparently become totally unglued by the class’s collective dismay at Jesus’s final words: “You always have the poor with you, but you do not always have me.”
“How can he say that?” they asked. I think they sensed in his words either an indifference to a tragic fact or a hopelessness in the face of a challenge that Jesus could have solved. After all, he has just raised poor Lazarus from the dead; surely with a strategic loaves and fishes campaign he could have raised the poor’s standard of living. And that 300 denarii for the perfume could have been important seed money.
But I don’t want to pick on my friend’s students, because in many ways I agree with them. Like so many of my fellow Midwesterners, I have a pronounced cultural discomfort with luxury and ostentatious displays of wealth. Insert Garrison Keillor joke here. I’m very much the son of two parents who went out shopping for what they called “a midlife crisis car” but who came back not with the Mustang or Charger they’d imaged but with a Volkswagon Cabrio. It’s the world’s most sensible convertible.
And there’s nothing sensible about Mary’s action in this story, at least not at first glance. To even possess a jar of perfume worth a year’s wages is very strange for a woman we assume was poor, so strange that one commentator speculates that it must have been a “family treasure” (209). Of course, Judas’s disingenuous suggestion still stands in that case: why not give this wealth away to those in need? And why squander it so wantonly on a sentimental act, especially toward someone who has carefully avoided the trappings of wealth and power?
The answer Jesus gives is all about preparation. “Jesus said, ‘Leave her alone. She bought it so that she might keep it for the day of my burial.’” We’ve all just had an encounter with the stench of death, he seems to say, and another death is coming. Let this fragrance fill the room and remind us that the next death will make possible the royal victory for which I have been anointed.
So my answer to my friend’s students is that Jesus is neither indifferent to nor hopeless against the plight of people who are poor—then or now. However, in this luxurious scene, he is being prepared for a task he must accomplish for the whole world’s sake. Mary’s prophetic action draws our attention to the nature and the gravity of that work. Perhaps it’s even necessary, in a way, that Jesus be anointed now rather than in the tomb, for in John’s gospel, Jesus reigns not just from beyond the grave but from the cross, not with an anguished cry but with a dignified declaration: “It is finished.” However you look at it, though, the perfume incident only makes sense in light of what is to come.
So I wonder if we might, with apologies to Blessed John, read this story as a sort of parable of the season of Lent, a parable of our own preparation for what lies ahead. Though many in the church are fasting, Lent is in other ways a season of indulgence. The act of examination and repentance is an inward journey, requiring an almost lavish self-focus, for a time. I’ve noticed that the brief homilies I give at daily masses have followed that pattern, dwelling on our inner lives and our life as a congregation. And I know my own Lenten practice has been less about giving alms than about resting in God’s arms.
They warn us at the seminary that inward focus is a recipe for stagnation, because disciples, to be disciples, must ultimately look outward. Indeed, that idea will probably sound familiar to those of you who attended Canon Joey Rick’s presentation on evangelism and congregational vitality on Wednesday. The point is, if we’ve been dwelling on ourselves a bit more than usual of late, then it had better be to prepare for something bigger.
What are we preparing for? If the answer is just our experience of the Triduum and the Easter celebration that follows, then we’re not hearing the fullness of Jesus’s call for us to live lives of service to those in need.
What are we preparing for? If the answer is just that outpouring of peace and thanksgiving that comes with the sure knowledge of our forgiveness, then we’re living large on God’s gift of grace, a gift that imparts its full meaning not just when we receive it, but when we give it away.
What are we preparing for? Not just to be redeemed and sanctified, although we surely will be. We are preparing as well to be renewed and sent out, to be vessels of grace in a world that needs it now as ever.
The more I’ve thought about it this week, the more I’ve believed that we’re preparing to be like that little jar of perfume. Could that be true?
What if we are God’s precious investment, bought for a costly price indeed, but ultimately worth it because of our sacred purpose? If that’s true, it reminds us of the importance of this period of discernment in the life of St. Paul’s and our need to answer anew our questions of God’s purposes for us.
What if we are the oil of anointing for the sick and the suffering, marking those we serve with a sign of their true dignity and stature in the kingdom of God? If that’s true, then visiting parishioners who are ill and feeding neighbors who are hungry will become, more and more, not just our duty but our joy. Jesus, and my friend’s high school religion class, would approve.
What if we are the fragrance that fills this house of worship and then spills into the streets, making it possible for our neighbors to encounter in us the beauty of holiness? If that’s true, then our amazing Ash Wednesday experience might mark the beginning of a new chapter in the story of our life as friends and neighbors in Foggy Bottom.
What if we are holy vessels, chosen and sanctified for carrying to others the grace of God in Christ?
My sisters and brothers I pray that Lent continue to be, for us, forty luxurious days of preparation, so that when the time comes, we may follow the Risen Christ from “What if?”s to what’s next.
I realized today, in preparation for a talk on science and faith for Region IV of the Episcopal Diocese of Virginia (about which: more in a subsequent post), that I never uploaded my MDiv thesis: “Becoming truth about ‘true becoming’: Providence, causality, and science in a secular age.” So I’m doing so now (click here to download it).
The very brief gist: I believe many people intellectually dismiss religion because of a perceived conflict with science, especially thanks to the influence of the New Atheists (who are generally better scientists than they are philosophers) and despite exciting advancements in science during the twentieth century. These advancements make science much more hospitable to claims about metaphysical reality than was the science of the nineteenth century.
Lots of smart Christians have written about why these two not-so-distant cousins needn’t be in conflict, and this is my little contribution. I wrote about providence because “what do Christians believe God actually does?” is an important question in these proceedings. The fledgling position I stake out certainly isn’t going to revolutionize the debate. But I do hope my summary of the common positions and the lens with which I look at them is of some value.
The best part of the experience was getting to chat about it over Skype with my advisor, Ian Markham, and my outside reader, Keith Ward. They are two important voices in these scholarly but very public conversations, and they took me to school in important ways. My only regret is that I haven’t spent more time with this subject since. So I’m grateful for this opportunity tonight.
I was at Bier Baron in Washington last night, celebrating the birthday of a friend of mine who routinely hosts a theology pub there (it’s probably my favorite bar in Washington, because it reminds me of places like this).
It was a typical Washington social gathering, in that I met like half a dozen super-impressive people who do really interesting things (online journalism in particular: Exhibit A, Exhibit B).
Amid all those fascinating conversations, I could see across the room someone I dimly recognized. I was pretty sure I hadn’t met him through the people I knew at this gathering (this turned out to be only partially true), but that only got me so far.
I finally realized with a laugh and then a sigh (because: church geek—me, not him) how I recognized this guy. I knew him from this (not 100% work-safe) video, which I believe was actually shot by the other person whose birthday we were celebrating (someone correct me if I’m wrong about that):
It was kinda like meeting a celebrity, at least in the strange online world I inhabit. And I’m glad we connected, because Erik’s involved in some interesting communities here in town.
Here’s to beer, birthdays, and the, uh, stuff seminarians say.
Addendum: So, actually, the other birthday boy’s video is here:
See here and here for my presentation (which we streamed via Google+ Hangouts on Air) and my “handout” (via Storify). Or see below. Enjoy!
CMT 2.0: Taking a resource center online
The story of a faith formation resource center at a large Episcopal seminary and its adventures in learning to serve a church being reborn. First told at the 2013 Forma Tapestry Conference in Albuquerque, NM, on February 1, 2013.
Like a lot of resource centers, and a lot of churches, the Center for the Ministry of Teaching at Virginia Theological Seminary has seen a major reduction in our foot traffic over the last five or ten years. If we were solely dependent on this walk-in business, we’d probably be closed. Thanks be to God, though, we are embedded in a seminary of considerable means and great faith that it is in the best interest of our institution to help parishes, schools, and other church groups to thrive.
Thus, we have the luxury of some time to think strategically about how to be a faith formation resource center for the church being born in our connected, digital world. We’d like to share our story with you, because (a) we hope it might be a helpful model for your own strategic planning in your context, and (b) more importantly, we hope something we share strikes a chord and could lead to further conversation about how we can be a resource for you.
We’re telling this story with Storify as a way of modeling our usual practice: We strive to be a center where we and others learn primarily by doing and reflecting. So in the telling of the story (and with a relatively new tool, to boot), we engage in the very action-reflection process we advocate for good ministry in any context. This tool is particularly suitable to our work because it allows us to collect the digital artifacts we create as we do it.
Come hear our story at #episcoforma! CMT 2.0: Taking a Resource Center Online. Handout: http://bit.ly/CMTstorify Hangout: https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=oY4vDxiQA2g#!CMT@VTS
<div>Hear our story at the <a href="/groups/194501327325205/?group_id=0" class="">Forma</a> Tapestry Conference (or via YouTube): <br> CMT 2.0: Taking a Resource Center Online<br> <br> "Handout": <a href="http://storify.com/KyleOliver/cmt-2-0-taking-a-resource-center-online" class="">http://storify.com/KyleOliver/cmt-2-0-taking-a-resource-center-online</a><br> <br> Hangout: <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=oY4vDxiQA2g" class="">https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=oY4vDxiQA2g</a># …! — with <a href="https://www.facebook.com/missymorain" class="">Missy Morain</a> and <a href="/browse/participants/?q=AeIWMaIjRGcNJ3v4Nx1tas0N6rkq6RiGaPVXfpR5CQj65CUGLeRVIUZl_qpr9gCDo_XrPq6H0YQ4L9AhNvMQxscH17wlLJNRPj5yeqZGKBoehuNUIEYofZ_9OqnZ58DME-aomXfovsT80iyHwN6xVfZPM71XTjF7VWiHIl5JLVmJ07xef9zzDfmj0pYbD84OR_rRASPWisudNBAPPQSWwIDYZkYziBoyGJENRktc5WL3SA" class="">2 others</a> at <a href="/events/424296167584240/" class="">2013 Forma Tapestry Conference</a>.</div>Kyle Oliver
The Process
A series of increasingly intentional events has focused our discernment of where and how the Spirit is calling our center to serve:
(1) Early CMT forays into digital content included IntoAllTheWWWorld.org, an Evangelical Education Society-sponsored site for posting formation resources created by seminarians, which was launched in the summer of 2011. This project was a collaboration between the CMT and grant recipient Kyle Oliver (now a CMT employee and the person telling this story).
intoallthewwworld.org
(2) Strategic planning conversations surrounding the departure of a CMT staff member led to the creation of a new staff position, a digital missioner and learning lab coordinator who began working July 2, 2012 (that’s me).
Virginia Theological Seminary ~ Tuesday, July 3, 2012Tuesday, July 3, 2012 7/3/2012The Center for the Ministry of Teaching (CMT) is one of the most influential sources of information for tho…
What does a digital missioner do? Part 1: ConnectMy name is Kyle Matthew Oliver, and I’m the new Digital Missioner and Learning Lab Coordinator in the Center for the Ministry of Teaching…
Digital Missioner ( @kmoliver) + incoming class of @VTS_Seminary = future of theological education (see @VTS_CMT)! #chsocmLisa Kimball
(3) On August 27, 2012, CMT staff and volunteers past and present gathered to discuss where we’ve been and where we’re going. Founder Locke Bowman encouraged us to continue our mission of training teachers first and curating resources second. The event refocuses our energy on development of laboratory for teaching and learning.
Around VTSPinterest
"We ought to do some demonstrating of what in the world we mean by teaching." Locke Bowman on his thought process forming CMT & predecessorsCMT@VTS
Final brainstorming. Thanks for a rich day and many ideas! St. Francis would approve. #cmtvision http://pic.twitter.com/jj09ZXY9CMT@VTS
New Directions in Curation: From one-stop shop to network hub
The movement of curriculum materials online and decreased demand for looking at samples of paper curriculum has removed some of the pressure for us to have everything. We focus instead on knowing where to send people to look for what they need and participating in conversations about the best materials:
(1) It sometimes feels like we make our living learning from and pointing to materials from Sharon Ely Pearson, especially on her excellent blog, Building Faith. If you’re not following Sharon online, you should be!
Lenten StudiesLenten Studies by Sharon Ely Pearson Although Epiphany has just begun, in 2013 it will be a relatively short season. Ash Wednesday is Feb…
Faith at HomeI am the Christian Formation Specialist for Church Publishing Incorporated, offering assistance and consulting to The Episcopal Church. I…
(2) We’re working with Robbin Whittington at the Center for Spiritual Resources to build and populate a searchable, browsable curated site for faith formation resources. This effort has grown to include many other stakeholders in the Episcopal Church, who are currently seeking funding to facilitate development.
Church Life & Ministry | Center for Spiritual ResourcesA resource for understanding old age, written from the perspective of an older adult (he’s 87). Older readers have reviewed it and said, …
CSR Portal Submission Trainingkylematthewoliver
(3) We regularly refer Christian formation people to the 21st Century Faith Formation workshops put on by John Roberto and Vibrant Faith Ministries. John’s special gift is in teaching educators to become faith formation curators themselves, sending church families the best free resources and building networks of parishioners who want to learn together. We now partner with the Faith Formation Learning Exchange, which John also coordinates and for which Kyle begins contributing young adult and digital & online media content in February, 2013.
Curating 21st Century Faith FormationWe live surrounded by an abundance of content. Just imagine how many blogs are written and published daily (there over 150 million blogs)…
Putting People in the Center through NetworksFrom the Winter 2013 issue of Episcopal Teacher: The first half-hour or so of The Social Network, the 2010 film about Mark Zuckerberg and…
Young AdultsDiscover the most significant trends and issues in our society and culture that are influencing young adults (20s-30s). Discover the late…
(4) We add our own two cents about strong resources and where to find them, especially in our areas of interest and expertise (developmental styles and demographics, teaching and learning theory, formation of formation leaders, mentor network development, the intersection of formation and evangelism). You can find our take on Tumblr (VTS-CMT), on Twitter (VTS_CMT), in our print publication (Episcopal Teacher), on Pinterest (CMT@VTS), and on our soon-to-be-relaunched pages on the VTS website.
Forma 2013, Day 1: Cool stuff we learned aboutI’m in New Mexico representing the CMT at the 2013 Forma Tapestry Conference.
The only thing you can lose by dying is your false self. #Rohr #episcoformaCMT@VTS
Teaching & LearningPinterest
Virginia Theological Seminary ~ Center for the Ministry of Teaching, Christian Education DevelopmentThe Center for the Ministry of Teaching supports and enriches christian education development in the Episcopal Church. The CMT is part of…
New Directions in Consultation: From high-expertise courses to mid-expertise conversation and learning
The CMT has traditionally done a lot of formal training and courses (think “how to run a vacation bible school” or “how to train your Sunday school teachers”). We were “Sunday school experts” and passed on our knowledge to “Sunday school clients.” While we continue to do some of this work, it seems to us that the nature of consultation and training for faith formation has to become more conversational, more exploratory, more rooted in opportunities to be immersed in diverse contexts and respond to them. In short, we believe the old models are working less and less well, so we need to become more collaborative to identify and implement new models:
(1) We talk. A lot. With folks all over the country. Usually by telephone or video conference. We’re finding that our reaching out in this manner helps us put similarly tasked practitioners in touch with each other. What has emerged for us is essentially a model of asset-based community organizing within the faith formation world, mostly via conversations online.
Building Organizational CapacityGreg Troxell
Learning about Twitter best practices for congregations from @anna_r of @vibrantfaith at #21centFF.CMT@VTS
Tip #2: Create a Sermon Series as a Tool for Faith Formationrevleo: Structure a sermon series that draw not only from the lectionary but also from the liturgical practices and worship space. This w…
(2) Tools like Adobe Presenter are allowing us to shorten our training cycles, so we can learn new skills and immediately pass them on to others. We’ve had considerable demand for a web tools video training series and are making preparations to launch it soon.
A brief welcome and tutorial from your CTS 450 TAkylematthewoliver
Introduction to Using the ATLAReligion Database
Impromptu VTS email smartphone integration workshop starts as soon as students arrive! 🙂 #techtacticsCMT@VTS
(3) An increasingly respectable information and educational technology infrastructure, and a growing collection of digital media creation hardware in our learning lab, is helping our center and VTS more broadly to convene conversations about using new technology for faith formation. We’re hosting conferences, teaching seminary classes (“The Teaching Church” and “Spiritual or Religious”), gathering students for practice and training, participating in research projects (including a Lilly Grant entitled “Christian Youth: Learning and Living Faith Project”) and even learning how to develop mobile apps for faith formation. We’re also hoping to participate in Forma’s efforts to launch a denominational Christian formation certification effort.
Announcing e-Formation 2013: May 31-June 2 – e-FormationMore and more, the work of Christian faith formation and discipleship is happening online, or at least with help from social media and ot…
With dear colleagues (<a href="https://www.facebook.com/randall.curtis?group_id=0" class="">Randall Curtis</a>, <a href="https://www.facebook.com/robbin.b.whittington?group_id=0" class="">Robbin Brent Whittington</a>, John Roberto of <a href="https://www.facebook.com/LifelongFaithAssociates?group_id=0" class="">LifelongFaith Associates</a>, <a href="https://www.facebook.com/lisa.kimball.589?group_id=0" class="">Lisa Kimball</a>, <a href="https://www.facebook.com/julie.lytle.39?group_id=0" class="">Julie Lytle</a>) planning e-Formation 2.0, a conference at <a href="https://www.facebook.com/VirginiaTheologicalSeminary?group_id=0" class="">Virginia Theological Seminary</a> that I am now transcendentally excited about: <a href="http://www.facebook.com/l.php?u=http%3A%2F%2Fbit.ly%2FXIRJB2&h=MAQHU3dJl&s=1" class="">http://bit.ly/XIRJB2</a>
Amber Carswell and Lisa Kimball train students in a VTS practical ministry class to use the Mahara e-portfolio tool at foliofor.me to reflect on their work in this course and beyond.vts-cmt.tumblr.com
Ranting About How We Poorly Share Our FaithThursday I took part in a web-conference facilitated by my dear friend Lisa Kimball for her course on the teaching church. My role was to…
Excited about the collaborative possibilities in this emerging area of ministry. Lots of talent in that room!
@VTS_Seminary-ians practicing #chsocm: A year in reviewThe increasingly tech-engaged students of Virginia Theological Seminary are learning to use social media to tell the story of how they’ve…
App Development: Day 6 – Contraria Sunt ComplementaIt’s been a short but gratifying day here. Got some good feedback from members of the community and am looking forward to finishing the f…
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Final Reflections
In making our way forward, we’ve learned a lot about how to proceed in the future, and how not to. We’ve learned the value of reading very widely and seeking out as much cross-fertilization as possible (non-Episcopal circles, non-Christian circles, etc.). We’ve learned to alternate between periods of dreaming big (“ooh, we could try this”) and focusing on the immediate and practical (“let’s finish that training video by Thursday”). And we’ve learned to produce a prototype before trying to drum up support for a bigger effort.
An interesting thought that we’ve been left with is a bigger point about making a major transition—in this case, from being a physical resource room to an online resource center. We’ve learned to think like J.R.R. Tolkien rather than C.S. Lewis. Lewis, as you probably know, wrote a fair bit of allegory, where a character in a story corresponded directly to a character in another story (Aslan = Jesus). Tolkien avoided this approach in favor of what he called analogy, a looser approach that avoids overly direct thinking (Gandalf is analogous to Jesus, but so is Aragorn).
Shadow and Light: Analogy vs. AllegoryJ.R.R Tolkien’s literary writings, especially Lord of the Rings, were influenced by his experience in World War I. Tolkien served in the …
We believe our future life as a resource center needs to be analogous to our past life rather than an allegory of it. Some of our tasks as a drop-in center with circulating collection and curriculum samples will be very similar to our tasks as curators at an online hub. The same goes for our changing roles as Christian formation consultants. As we move ahead, we expect that a spirit of flexibility, adventure, and collaboration will help us carry on our past mission in ways that will be relevant to the church’s future and always rooted in the Good News of God among us.
I wonder if Epiphany is easier in the southern hemisphere. “In your light, we see light,” was the phrase from this morning’s psalm that stuck with me all week. But this matra had to be almost purely metaphorical, since, until yesterday, Metro Washington seemed to have been transported to the Scottish Highlands, or maybe San Francisco in the summer. Short days, overcast skies, and regular blankets of fog interfered with our season of light. I’m guessing my colleague who traveled to Grahamstown, South Africa, this week had no such difficulties.
The gloom is distressing because it’s hard to be what you can’t see. Epiphany is about uncovering, about revelation, about enlightenment. We asked in today’s collect that we might “shine with the radiance of Christ’s glory, that he may be known, worshiped, and obeyed to the ends of the earth.” It’s hard to turn our spiritual imagination to the ends of the earth when we can’t even see to the end of the block.
But all literalism aside, there are real questions for us here: Can we believe right now that each of us, personally and corporately, manifests the divine light? And in particular, is that light a light for the whole world? Have we been empowered by the love of Christ incarnate and the baptism we share with him? Have we been equipped to serve God and one another in his name?
This morning, our patron saint responds with a resounding yes. This passage from 1 Corinthians is one we study often here at St. Paul’s, but to hear it during Epiphany is to discover the full force of its proclamation: “Now there are varieties of gifts, but the same Spirit; and there are varieties of services, but the same Lord; and there are varieties of activities, but it is the same God who activates all of them in everyone. To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit for the common good” (1 Corinthians 12:4–7).
To each is given the manifestation of the Spirit. Despite our doubts, Paul asks us to trust that we have been shown and given what we need to be a light to the world; God has put that light within us. Sometimes we hide it under a bushel basket, but that is not its purpose and not our destiny. Our vocation is to shine, to become an ever-more-transparent window around the light of Christ within us. The potential is already there inside, yearning to be made manifest.
Adding to the beauty of Paul’s portrait is that the light shines differently in each of us, through a variety of gifts, services, and activities. Regarding that last word, in particular, our translators have been very clever. To say that there are “varieties of activities” and one God who “activates … them” signals to us that activities and activates translate words that share the same Greek root: ἐνεργέω (energeō), from which we get our word “energy.” Energeō means “to be operative, be at work, put forth power” or “to display one’s activity, show one’s self operative.”
So there’s a sense here both of work and of witness, of doing but also demonstrating. We might paraphrase that there are “varieties of works” but “the same God visibly at work in them,” or maybe “varieties of passions” but “the same passionate Spirit as their source and significance.” So to shine is to get caught up in the work of the Spirit by discovering and using the Spirit’s gifts. And because those gifts are varied, the process of their discovery and growth in us will look different for everyone. But let me take a stab at describing the process, with an analogy that I think Paul’s word choice supports.
You might remember from high school chemistry that certain kinds of reactions do not take place immediately upon mixing two ingredients. These transformations need a little kickstart, a boost of heat called activation energy. Often, it’s the flame of a bunsen burner that provides this requirement and activates the change to come. But whatever the source, some reactions simply will not take place without it. Yes there’s potential, but there’s also a barrier that must be overcome.
So I think about this concept when Paul talks about energeō, about spiritual gifts that God will activate (e.g., 1 Corinthians 12:11).
Some of our gifts don’t seem to require activation energy at all; God has given us the potential for a particular kind of work, and it bubbles and spills out into our lives like baking soda and vinegar mixing in a model volcano.
You probably know a lot about the spiritual gifts God has given you in this manner. They might be useful for the work you do every day, and they’re almost certainly on display as a light to others in your ministry at St. Paul’s. For example, the members of the choir, among many others here, have been given musical gifts. Most of them probably learned this at a relatively young age and have been shining in this particular area of service for years.
Some gifts, though, are still waiting for God to give them that little boost, and in many cases we increase the energy required through the chill of our own fears. For many of us, hospitality is a challenge in this way. I myself have often used as an excuse my shyness or fear of looking stupid or desire to avoid rejection. I let myself off the hook for introducing myself to someone, or learning more about them, or extending to them an invitation to church or some event.
And yet at a few points in my life, I believe God has really needed me to welcome a particular stranger in a particular situation. And so I’ve been given in those important moments, and I bet you have too, the activation energy to overcome the barriers that are a natural part of us and the barriers we have contributed through sin. I hope in those moments that the light of Christ has indeed been made manifest to the people we have encountered.
Let me extend this analogy just a little further. I believe God has given us another, complementary path of spiritual growth: The Spirit has called us into community here and elsewhere, and in community we encounter catalysts. Catalysts, you may recall, lower and sometimes remove the activation energy required for a certain reaction. So too can our transformations be aided by the people and situations we encounter in community. They catalyze us, lowering or even breaking down the barriers to our fuller discovery and exercise of the gifts we have been given. It is not always an easy process, though.
Again, hospitality may be a telling example: the person who recognizes in us the potential for offering welcome and asks us to join in some new role can be just the catalyst we need, helping speed up a process of spiritual maturing that might have taken much longer otherwise. To be accountable to a community is to be challenged grow in the Spirit.
I spent the week before last living at Richmond Hill, a convent-turned-ecumenical-retreat-center in Virginia’s capital. Richmond Hill is run by volunteers and by ten or so house residents who make a 3–5 year commitment to the ministries of hospitality, racial reconciliation, educational reform, and thrice-daily prayer for Metropolitan Richmond. I don’t believe I’ve ever seen a more potent catalyst. You see it in the web of relationships among the residents, between the residents and the wider community of volunteers, between that community and city, and between this whole matrix and the visitors who show up at their door for retreat.
In my week in Richmond, I was challenged and I hope changed by the residents in particular. Each one makes discernment of the Spirit a priority in their own lives and shares this gift with those they welcome and listen to so intently. If you visit there, and I hope you will, you’ll see the way their community shines for the city they serve, catalyzing change that manifests the reconciling love of Christ in classrooms, housing projects, council meetings, churches, coffee shops, and individual relationships. It is a sight to behold. As is any place where the Spirit is at work among the faithful—including St. Paul’s, K Street.
In this season of manifestation and light, and in the seasons to come, I hope we too can be on the lookout for signs of our individual and corporate gifts, especially the ones we have not yet discovered. I pray that God will provide the appropriate nudge in the moments when we need it. I pray that in our attentiveness to each other we can be catalysts for spiritual growth that will bear much fruit in this parish and in our communities. If we are faithful to this process, we can’t help but be a light to the world, no matter what the weather, and no matter how we are called to serve the common good.
It’s been a short but gratifying day here. Got some good feedback from members of the community and am looking forward to finishing the functionality of the app in the coming days. But the interface is done, or very nearly done (pending some final decisions about how one should remind oneself to pray). With any luck, you’ll be able to download “RH Prayer” from the app store in the coming weeks (months?–I’ve heard it’s tough to get final approval). Since I haven’t done a very good job of describing it in these posts, let me just say it’s sort of the app-equivalent of the “Rule of Life and Weekly Prayer Cycle” pamphlets that float around this place. But there are some interactive twists, and the interface should remind you faith formation folks of Westerhoff’s stages of faith (very loosely)–the gradual process by which our connections strengthen, commitments deepen, etc.
I’ve gotta say, training to write software with a real test problem while embedded within the community you’re writing for is an incredible experience. Technically, it gave me the space I needed (i.e., not “at the office”) to be immersed in a programming language and development paradigm that was new to me. Missionally, it gave some focus to the app, so that it could solve a real problem that I could get feedback on “in situ” (inviting people to engage more fully in the prayer life of this intercessing community). Spiritually, it provided me with a community of gracious hosts who kept me motivated and from going too deep into the “programmer’s cave” (Richmond Hill: thank you, thank you, thank you. You all are the best.)
I feel like the Spirit has been up to something really wonderful in all this, and I feel grateful to be a part of it. Stay tuned for info on where this app, and our faith formation app development efforts in the Center for the Ministry of Teaching, go in the months ahead. In the meantime…screenshots! (These were taken on the iOS simulator for Mac, but I can see the same thing on my phone, which is just too cool.)
App launching screenSplash screenThe home screenHome screen scrolledSetting the prayer context
Dynamic prayer list by day according to the community’s cycle of prayerPrayer schedule for joining the community in person
Place to set a prayer reminder–like the bells that ring hereInvitation to live into the Richmond Hill rule of lifeInvitation to volunteer in one of the community’s programs
It’s with a somewhat heavy heart that I leave this wonderful religious community, but I’m sure this won’t be my last trip.
