Author: katyandtheword

Pastor Katy has enjoyed ministry at New Covenant since 2010, where the church has solidified its community focus. She now works at Capital CFO plus as the Non Profit Director. All opinions expressed on this blog are her own and do not reflect those of Capital CFO plus. Prior to that she studied both Theology and Christian Formation at Princeton Theological Seminary. She also served as an Assistant Chaplain at Trenton Psychiatric Hospital and as the Christian Educational Coordinator at Bethany Presbyterian at Bloomfield, NJ. She is an writer and is published in Enfleshed, Sermonsuite, Presbyterian's today and Outlook. She writes prayers, liturgy, poems and public theology and is pursuing her doctorate in ministry in Creative Write and Pittsburgh Theological Seminary. She enjoys working within and connecting to the community, is known to laugh a lot during service, and tells as many stories as possible. Pastor Katy loves reading Science Fiction and Fantasy, theater, arts and crafts, music, playing with children and sunshine, and continues to try to be as (w)holistically Christian as possible. "Publisher after publisher turned down A Wrinkle in Time," L'Engle wrote, "because it deals overtly with the problem of evil, and it was too difficult for children, and was it a children's or an adult's book, anyhow?" The next year it won the prestigious John Newbery Medal. Tolkien states in the foreword to The Lord of the Rings that he disliked allegories and that the story was not one.[66] Instead he preferred what he termed "applicability", the freedom of the reader to interpret the work in the light of his or her own life and times.

#God #time #daylightsavingstime #philosophy (you know little concepts)

Why Daylight Savings Time, Why?

Most people don’t like Daylight Savings Time, I will admit that as a pastor it is a little terrifying to know that if I get the time wrong I’ll miss doing my job (yipes)

However, my kids have already adjusted their systems (at least 10 days ago) do the new time. Yep, they’ve been getting up and going to bed earlier. Apparently they have great cicada rhythms. So in some ways it will be easier for me.

On the other hand, we humans love time. We calculate it, we keep it, we try to control it. Daylight Savings Time & Leap Year serve to remind me that Time is a human measure.

Consider creation, we all still don’t know what “a day” to God was, but probably God experiences time differently than us.

When I was in Seminary, a Spiritual Practice I tried to remember when I considered deep theological questions, was the fact that God is timeless….God does not need to measure things in time. Because we do, I’m sure God does take it into consideration, but the taming and capturing of moments is a human need, not one that God has…

Puts me in mind of two beautiful concepts

Wrinkle in Time/Tesseract

Tesseract

and Dr. Who

timey-wimey

Go forth. Spring Forward (or fall back)

And think deep thoughts about God….Time…..and Humans relationship to God, Humans relationship to to time, and how we all fit together…..

Open to relationships

My colleague Rachel Young wrote an interesting piece about being missional http://pres-outlook.org/2015/02/can-introverts-missional/

which reminds me of an ongoing conversation that I have with people.

I try, try, try to practice trust, and yet still be safe. Its a particular balance. It means that sometimes your credit and debit cards get stolen right out of the church office, because you tend not to lock. I am still uncertain whether I was being too trusting or not….I now only lock when that particular group is in the church.

However, I think that the only way to build trust is to give it. You treat people with suspicion and the likelihood is they will return the favor. Plus if you don’t take chances its hard to have a relationship. You have to say hi, you have to share about yourself. Eventually you have to share your address if you want people to come over.

Basically, I feel like that trust and grace go hand in hand. In order to trust someone you have to be gracious with them, trusting that they are doing the best that they can and being gracious when people can’t live up to your standards or do things differently

Henri Nouwen calls this forgiving people for not being God i.e. all knowing and perfect.

It doesn’t mean being stomped on either, it means calling people into account, whether its because they are disrespectful to you during a meeting or they leave a mess in the church or they siphon money off the church’s accounts.

So much of my job is being open to be in relationship with people, whoever, however and whatever state they may be in. That takes trust, and graciousness and hope. It means worrying a little less, setting safe boundaries and then building a community of people who can help you if the relationship does not work out.

But I think that is a good way to describe being a minister.

Open to being in relationship with the church, the community and the world…..That is true ministry..and one in which everyone can get in on.

No Strings Attached

no-strings-attached_2

http://www.mbird.com/2009/06/theologian-of-glory-vs-theologian-of/

Ok, so according to this I am more a theologian of the glory than a theologian of the cross…sad day…wonder if these terms should be more of a balance (its the mainline thing, I like compromise)

Thoughts? Its def. a good reframing, but I’m trying to figure out the truth of it (I tend to take preaching the Good news part of my job very seriously)

Clothing #Fast: #lent

So for Lent I am fasting on my clothing.

for so many reasons

1. I am very attached to my clothes

2. I own too many

3. Laundry is not my strongpoint

The deal is you pick a certain number of outfit clothing (i.e. you can wear socks, underwear and coats) and stick to it for 40 days.

Confession: I don’t know if I could do this if Sundays counted, I tend to wear “dresses” on Sunday and don’t feel like I could wear the same thing every Sunday.

I chose 10 pieces, because the suggested 6 didn’t really include sweaters and brrrr!!!! its been cold and I’ve def. been layering and wearing sweaters inside and outside (i.e. just not as a coat accoutrement), so 3 pieces a day instead of 2 makes 9. Then there is the fact I have three small children. I sometimes get spilled or even peed on, so I feel like having a random piece of clothing for such emergencies is wise.

so here’s what I have

1 pair of black nice pants

2 pairs of yoga pants

1 blue sweater

1 black/gray sweater

1 tunic black sweater

1 red long sleeved shirt

1 black and white work blouse.

1 black sleeveless shirt (with lacy straps)

So far I’ve been doing it for a week and I’ve kept up with the laundry and I think I’ve already worn all of the different combos.

I also had the awkward moment when I wore my “really” nice clothes for the session retreat on Sat and had another Session meeting on Weds (about the budget…eeek!)  that I was running and I didn’t want to wear the same thing/but I wanted to look professional. I ended up wearing the black shirt, the blue sweater and big silver earrings.

So far so good, I’m hoping this will give me an excuse to wash and put away ALL the clothes I own, and maybe give away some more, but so far its just made me keep up with doing everyone else’s laundry so my stuff is clean (altho I’m not to folding yet).

Here Goes 30ish more days….

Baptized Ash: The Stars, the moon & me

We are brief, like flowers, like a breath of air.

We are mortal, here one moment and gone the next.

It is amazing to think that the same God who is eternal, the one who created rocks and trees that last hundreds or thousands of years, the ones who crafted the heavens that seem to be billions of years old created us as temporal beings.

stars

“When I look at your heavens, the work of your fingers,
the moon and the stars that you have established;
what are human beings that you are mindful of them,
mortals that you care for them? ” Ps 8:3

Death is real for us–it is a real part of our existence, but we our lives matter. God created us and then God sent Christ to us. Even though we are not perfect and live only a short while.

Christ baptized us, marking us, tagging us as His. Like writing a name on the bottom of a favorite toy, we are marked. Marked by the cross, reminded that God takes care of us and is particularly present to us. When we are baptized, we die with Christ, we rise with him, and we live into the fact that we are the be-loved children of God–adopted into God’s family, covenanted through Christ.

And this is important because our lives are short.

And we are not perfect–my 6 year old son has just realized he is not perfect, and he never will be. He shuts himself up in his room and cries about it. When he makes a mistake, he mourns it.

And because bad things happen in our lives, we have to deal with real things and real evil and God knows that we have to deal with all this.

Do you know what I do when my son cries forlornly all alone?

I go to him, I sit with him, I hug him and comfort him. I tell him I will love him no matter what. I know he’s not perfect, and that’s ok, because I love him.

Isn’t that what God did when we were sad, broken and alone ever-realizing our imperfection. God gathers us in Her arms, hugs & comforts us and tells us–we are not perfect, but God loves us no matter what–God loved us when we were Ash and will love us when we become Ash again.

Us humans wish we were perfect, but God made us something better than perfect–God made us loved.

Creative Prayer Experience: Ash Wednesday

Hearts & Ash Weds

Joanna's avatarSpacious Faith

collage materialsYou will need:

  • a piece of paper
  • glue or Modge Podge
  • foam brush
  • collage materials (magazines, pictures, patterned paper, etc.)
  • scissors
  • colored pencils

The Hebrew Scripture readings for Ash Wednesday have a lot of “heart” language. Joel tells us to rend our hearts and not our clothing. The psalmist writes: “teach me wisdom in my secret heart;” “create in me a clean heart, O God;” “the sacrifice acceptable to God is a broken spirit; a broken and contrite heart, O God, you will not despise.” If the imagery of the heart seems a bit trite right on the heels of Valentine’s Day, it is good to remember that the Hebrew term used for heart literally translates as “gut.” We’re talking here about the deepest place inside you.

In a sketch book or on a sheet of plain paper or card stock, create a collage that represents what is inside…

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#fairytales #theology #valentinesday

“The great lesson of ‘Beauty and the Beast,’ – a thing must be loved before it is lovable.” ― G.K. Chesterton |

This is why Beauty and the Beast is my theological fairy tale of choice

Cupid & Psyche–the basis for Beauty and the Beast– is simulataneously the last myth and the first fairy tale ever written…why? Because the transformational power of love and the possibility of “happily ever after” only come into being with the advent of Christianity and a new understanding of what theological hope is, telling a whole different story of good news