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.

Narrative Lectionary: Saints, Prophets and Love!

Let it be known that I am pairing this week’s scripture (of which I am using 1 Kings 19: 9-15, John 12:27-28)

with 1 Corinthians 13:1-3….

Saints, Prophets and Love, oh my!

1 corinthians 13

If I speak in the tongues of mortals and of angels, but do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. 2And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing. 3If I give away all my possessions, and if I hand over my body so that I may boast, but do not have love, I gain nothing.

Something about the sound of Love, and Silent presence, Silent Love are among my musings…I feel like this ties it all together…

So I am doing THREE readings for Sunday (how unpresbyterian of me boowahahahahahah)

Something to consider as you sermonize!

PS Hallows not Horcruxes might make its way in there too!

Root Beer & M&Ms

To me, church tastes like root beer and M&M’s, thanks to First Pres in Malvern Arkansas that had old school GLASS bottled root beer. My parents office had an M&M machine.

Being a pastor’s kid, I’ve probably put in more hours at church than most people, I’ve also probably done a lot more at church, so I feel comfortable.

To me, church feels like home.

Which is awesome, because it doesn’t matter where I am (or even what type of religious house I’m in), to me its a place to call home!

Church is a place for God to dwell. Its a place for us to enact the body of Christ. Sure we aren’t perfect, but in church we are more reflective, we think more carefully about our interactions. (the faults tend to sting more but, more importantly) the good actions are even more meaningful. These moments are what make church important, and for each of us, we start to accumulate these sacred moments, we start to build sacred relationships and the more we build, the more we are able to carry them onto our lives.

That is what is meaningful to me about sacred spaces and sacred relationships in a time where being spiritual-but-not-religious is another way to go.

For me, root beer and M&Ms will alway taste and feel sacred–like church….and certain interactions and reactions will alway put me in mind of God, and they are my church, my carrying of Christ’s Body into the everyday world!

Why do we have these buildings for God?

Solomon built a temple, because he knew he couldn’t contain God.

Ironic as it is….

The Temple is empty, except for the 10 commandments, so that all the priest, and elders and leaders and everyone important can come into the temple for its dedication.

And the moment they call on God (we would call this the Prayer of Illumination) God’s Cloud fills the entire temple

And when the priests came out of the Holy Place,a cloud filled the house of the Lord, 11 so that the priests could not stand to minister because of the cloud, for the glory of the Lord filled the house of the Lord. 1 Kings 8:10-11

God is all that is in the temple! The temple wasn’t big enough to hold God, yet God filled it! That’s why it wasn’t about limiting God, but noticing how infinite God is.

This is (one) story of how God came to dwell on Earth.

Another is Jesus

Another is Communion

Another is baptism

Another is us–the people, the body of Christ, Christ’s promise that whenever we gather in his name, he’ll be present.

With Christ, God was invited to be present in church, but not just in the building but in our very relationships.

Faith

Faith is work, its communal, its varied, it contains all our varied beliefs and doubts.

Belief is us reaching towards God

Faith is God reaching towards us

In order to have faith, you must have community. Its different than asceticism or belief, it is more than the individual spirituality.

Spirituality is how we practice our beliefs.

Faith is RELATIONAL, its about our relationship with God and therefore is about our relationship with each other.

Our relationships with one another help us to understand God- hence God gives us Faith.

 

Have Faith!

Book Review: The Runaway King

This is the 2nd book in the Ascendancy Series.

In the first “A False Prince” the Duke takes 3 orphans to try to train one up to take the throne.

In the second, the King runs away to

I don’t want to spoil the plot, but this first person narrative is character driven, giving the author a personalized view of the politicking and shennanigans of the court. I am overtly impressed with the smart plot, ongoing character development (YAY character development) and interesting relationships that are not only about romantic interests.

Here is the thing, the politics are tricky…the “best” course of action is not the safest (or safe at all), so it has to do not only with self-sacrifice but the realities of the intricacies of political intrigue…..All of which means that the hero has to be pretty tricksy to get around all of that!

Huge plus, the main character is wry, making the book itself wry!

Genre Matches: I have my own unique way of looking at genre. A lot of it has to do with the TONE of a book, as well as the broad categories i.e. Fantasy.

Can’t wait for the third book!

so much so, I’m actually re-reading it now.

This book’s TONE and Genre was very reminincance of Mehan Whalen Turner’s “Queen’s Thief” series. Again, I think these are NOT copycat series, just two very well written series that show different versions of genre, tone and characterization.

Another good series for wryness (with first character voice narrative) is Patricia C. Wrede’s Enchanted Forest Series, a little less disguise/court-intrigue oriented, so its not a genre match, but I would say that if you like the tone of The Runaway King I would definitely check out Wrede and Turner

Silly Humans… (or Do you Have a Flag?)

Eddie Izzard explains how we like to lay claim on things, instead of say, naming things (which I think is our Biblical Calling), we take them over and call them as our own. Or worse, say that God prefers us to own this instead of someone else..

How do we do this? with flags of course

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UTduy7Qkvk8

Or in church’s its with keys. The number of conversations, wranglings, making, processing, changing of and trying to account for  keys is amazing. 

Keys to the Kingdom, right? That is what its really about!

But, to me, the doors to church should be wide open..

I guess I should come out…I am anti-key

I know there are safety concerns and I understand why congregants (esp. older ladies) don’t want to be alone in an unlocked building in the middle of town..

But, I don’t know how we can build trust if we don’t practice it…how can we make people responsible for God’s Kingdom if we can’t hand them responsibilities? How can we work together better?

We give each other space–both figuratively and literally, to make mistakes. 

Tearing Down Walls

Some may call this idealistic, I call it practical faith…

I don’t know how we are going to unlock all the doors we put between each other….but Itrust that God will show us the way!

PS watch the link 🙂

“Where true inner freedom is, there God is. And where God is, there we want to be…When we meet a truly free person there are no expectations, only an invitation to reach into ourselves and discover there our own freedom.”

Henri Nouwen

We have been practicing breath prayer of “Freedom, in Christ” some thoughts for that…

hesychasm in tradition has been the process of retiring inward by ceasing to register the senses, in order to achieve an experiential knowledge of God. It is often repeated continually as a part of personal ascetic practice, its use being an integral part of the eremitic (hermit) tradition of prayer known as Hesychasm (Ancient Greek: ἡσυχάζω, hesychazo, “to keep stillness” stillness, rest, quiet, silence). The prayer is particularly esteemed by the spiritual fathers of this tradition (see Philokalia) as a method of opening up the heart (kardia) and bringing about the Prayer of the Heart (Καρδιακή Προσευχή). The Prayer of The Heart is considered to be the Unceasing Prayer that the apostle Paul advocates in the New Testament. St. Theophan the Recluse regarded the Jesus Prayer stronger than all other prayers by virtue of the power of the Holy Name of Jesus.