Family Gathering in Chicago

As I type this, I suspect that Nathan's still driving back to St. Paul, and perhaps mom and dad and Quentin are in the air (they had a long delay at Ohare.) I'm done studying and writing (at least for now, but maybe for the night - I already did 3 short papers, isn't that enough?!).

It was great to see you all...

Some memories: I enjoyed playing the slot machine, although I feel destined to be forever a loser. Juliana, as you can see by this picture, is not a loser! The funniest part of the whole thing was when Grandma starting giving us back our money, because she "couldn't take all that from us!!!" Grandpa was disgusted, but she gave us all back a dollar!

I love the smell of Grandma and Grandpa's house; it has this particular smell that I can't quite identify as anything other than G and G's house.

I also love it that Juliana came down from T-town to meet my grandparents. She handled Grandma like an old pro and I think both of them loved her! She deftly handled Grandma's questions and at one point, asked Grandma, "Where did you neck when you were young?!" Grandma confessed that she necked out in the hallway of the dorm (in fact, I think mom said the same thing!) Anyway, it was stellar to have Juliana there, even if she was fighting a cold and feeling stressed with work stuff.

So - I love you all - thanks for the laughter, tears, beers, pool games, snow walks (JJ), and more...it was good times!

Spring Time in Chicago

This is hardly the Chicago I remember from Januaries past (this is my 4th January here, in the Modified Residency Program at Meadville Lombard). It has been down right balmy, with lots of rain. Yesterday, it couldn't decide between rain and snow and ended up sticking with rain. Bizarre. I wish it would snow.

It feels like spring, actually. The grass is somewhat green, there's all these Hyde Park parrots flying around, and it feels like tulips and crocuses can't be far behind. It's actually got me in the mood for spring and gardening. During class this week (it was a class on Unitarian Universalist Congregational Polity (ie, how our churches govern themselves; despite the title it was a fascinating class. We have our roots in the Pilgrims and the Puritans and their desire to form 'freely gathered' churches outside the church of England. Of course, it was based on the their understanding of the early church in the Christian Scriptures, but the key part was to be able to gather freely together, without coercion, to love and care for one another, to walk together, and to listen to the 'holy spirit' as it guided them...anyway, this is the tradition that we come out of...that freedom of conscience and independent churches, relating laterally to each other, is more important that hierarchy and coercion..))....so, back to the point: I've been looking at old pictures of our house and the awesome garden we have. I realize that many of you have no idea what the back yard even looks like so I've decided to share some pictures, given that it feels like spring time and I'm in the mood for planting. And on a more metaphorical note, I feel like I'm being "reborn" here - spending time connecting with colleagues, with my grandparents, and probably soon, with Laurel (and then a whole bunch of you next weekend!).

So - above: In March of 2003, while Juliana was away, I started work on the backyard patio. I order two tons of dirt and a ton of sand and a pallet and a half of sandstone rocks. Below is an updated shot from this summer (2005). There's another photo above, too. It has been the best part of this house, being able to garden, plant, work in the soil, and end good food that comes from 20 feet away. Last summer, we had eggplant, tomato, greenbeans, lettuce, watermelons, cantelope, cucumber, beets, peas, zukes, lots of strawberries, and more... I'm not a farmer, or even an expert gardener, but I really love it, and moving to an apartment in St. Paul has me a bit sad about not being able to garden. Just being connected to the soil/soul of the earth is healing for me...Maybe I'll do a little box garden.

Chicago Update

Well, I've been in Chicago now since Monday. It feels like it's been a year. I arrived on Monday, after a significant delay in the Tulsa airport because of the weather in Chicago. So I sat at the Sport and Grub place and ate some Chicken Tenders (someone remind me again how gross and horrible the meat industry is) and drank some Jack and Cokes. I finally arrived and check into the cool pad - an apartment building about 4 blocks south of Meadville Lombard. It is the bomb apartment. Kitchenette, washer, dryer, two bedrooms. We've got an extra bed, too. There's three of us - Dennis from Eugene, OR, and James from Washington. James and I are 4th year Modified Residents at Meadville, Dennis is 2nd year. But when I arrived, no one was here, so I unpacked and ordered some Dominos Pizza, which I haven't done in years. It was stellar. Then I went to bed anticipating my Peapod order arriving the next morning. It did and I was set.

I left Tuesday afternoon for Ohare to meet Juliana to fly up to St. Paul to meet with the ministers at Unity Church, where I'll be doing my intern next year. Both Juliana and I are super excited about this opportunity, even though it will mean leaving Tulsa. I took a couple of pictures of the church, which I'll try to include here. On the left is the Courtyard in the middle of the church building. On the rigth is the sanctuary, still with Christmas Trees (the wood paneling is called the reredos (pronounced rere-re-doss, I think).

On Wednesday night, Juliana and I visited with Nathan, Karen, and Bruno for a little while, and got to see their cool digs.
That was nice, but I was tired, so we left after a little while. We went back to our bed and breakfast and crashed out for sleep.

Thursday morning, Juliana and I flew back to Chicago...and I came to Meadville and she went back to Tulsa. I miss her...

Now I'm settling into things here...this will be my last January here, then I'll do my internship and graduate in Spring of '07, I think.

Finally, instead of doing a recap of the time with family over the holidays (which was awesome!), I'll include my sermon from January 1st. I mention Grandpa and mom in it, and how spending time with you all made me think more about my mortality and the gift that life is. The time we had was incredible and has influenced my thinking about family and priorities. This sermon expresses some of that.

Until next time,
J

Here's that sermon:

Sermon: “After the Party” Jan 1, 2006 by Justin Schroeder

There’s only 358 shopping days left until next Christmas.
You know what that means? (Aside from just being ridiculous!)
It means we’ve made it through the holidays and have come to January 1st, with an entire new year spread out in front of us, and an entire old year behind us.
As you heard in the 2nd reading, Janus, (from which the word January comes), was the Roman god of gates, doorways, beginnings, and endings – transitions, in other words.
Today, January 1st, is doorway into the New Year.
Today, the great whale we’re riding on – planet earth – pauses before it begins another trip around the sun, spinning through the ocean of our galaxy.

Actually, as you know, the earth doesn’t ever really stop rotating and revolving around the sun, but today, as we sit in the doorway between the old and the new, we can imagine the earth pausing just long enough for us take inventory of our lives.
I like the New Year not for New Year’s resolutions, but for New Year’s reflections, to take stock of where I’ve been, and where I’d like to be.

After all, in this New Year, I don’t want to be pushed around by the waves of life and drift listlessly in the ocean.
Instead, I want to hoist my sail, and direct my little boat, my life, in a direction that matters.
I want to reflect on who I’ve been in the past year – what parts of myself have dominated, what parts have timidly hidden, what parts are begging to emerge.

Whether it’s today, this week, or next month, I believe we all need to stop and evaluate our lives – to ask, “How am I doing with my living?” - because we don’t live forever.
If we did live forever, perhaps we would never stop and reflect: “I’ll get to that next decade…you know, I’ll get to that next century, if ever…” Nothing would be pressing if we lived forever.

By stopping and reflecting, we have the chance to face our demons, to find meaning in our lives, to invite our best selves forward, and in this process of reflecting, to take the road less traveled.

Although it’s perhaps easier to just stay on the road of routine and familiarity, I don’t want to follow the same road from 2005 to 2006, without at least stopping to pause and see what’s around me.

And as I pause, I feel my mortality all the more deeply.
This is what it means to be human: to live, laugh, love, and struggle, knowing that we will one day die.
It all hit home over the Christmas holiday in Colorado with my family, my brothers and sisters and my parents, all being together for the first time in years.
While we were there, we received word that my grandfather, my mom’s father, who lives in Baltimore, was back in the ICU with continuing heart problems.
In the midst of the joy of our family reunion, there was deep sadness as well, as I (my family, too) realized that my grandfather, who’s in his nineties, will probably die in this new year…which means that soon both my mom’s parents will be gone (my grandmother died 9 years ago)…which means that my mom and I will both move one step closer to the edge of that great diving board – that all of us are lined up at, that all of us one day must go off of.

I enter this New Year knowing more than ever how short and precious life is, and how important loved ones are. Thinking of my own life fills me with appreciation and gratitude, and I am aware of how I must live try in the service of love, justice, and all that is life giving.
I enter this New Year aware of how important relationships are – with loved ones, with friends, with God or the mystery of life itself.
It is relationships that sustain and strengthen us, giving meaning and purpose to our lives. My relationship with so many of you, over this past year, has been a source of great joy.

And it is our relationship together, as a covenanted church community, coming together in this time and place, “to seek the truth in love and to help one another,” it is this promise that speaks to the better angels of our nature, and reminds us of who we might yet become.

It is appropriate to pause, because as the poet says in Ecclesiastes, there is a time for everything under the heavens – which means, there is a time to pause, to stop being busy, to reflect, to be in infinite moment.

Robert Fulghum, the Unitarian minister and well known author, offers an updated version of Ecclesiastes in the form of a story.
He explains that everyday his neighbor, Sam, takes his dogs for a walk.
Sam has an old dog and a new puppy. They walk at different paces, with differing levels of enthusiasm. They seek different things on their walks.
Fulghum writes, "Sam knows the old dog will not live much longer, so the young dog is there to overlap the inevitable loss. Sam thinks the young dog will learn a lot from the older dog that he can't learn from people. And having the young dog is an acknowledgment of life and death and a gesture toward the future - of Sam's continuing to be around for a while himself.”
“Several years ago Sam spent weeks at the bedside of a close friend who was dying of cancer. His friend was a man who had many regrets.
He said if he had only known death was so near, he would not have hurried to meet it. When asked what he would have done differently, he thought for a long time and said something surprising: For one thing, he would have taken time to walk his dog.
Fulghum continues: “There is, indeed, a time for all things under heaven.
And for all the great rites of passage; weddings and funerals, graduations and retirements. a time for anniversaries and reunions; for sunrise and sundown, for moon and rain, for stars. A time for the first breath - "ah" - and the last breath - "oh."
But in the meantime, there is the infinite moment - a time to do the dishes, and a time to walk the dog." (http://www.uusterling.org/sermons/1998/sermon%201998-01-04.htm)

This New Year, I don’t want to hurry toward death, blazing through the year, not really “awake.” I don’t want to be in such a hurry that I ignore (at my own peril) my inner shadows and demons; I don’t want to be in such a hurry that I don’t have time to plumb the depths of my own soul; or time to pray, or tend to my relationships.
I wish to pause and then move forward with intention into the days that are mine to live.

Although the Jewish New Year, Rosh Hashanah, doesn’t happen until Sept of 2006, the ten days of Rosh Hashanah are about taking yourself and your relationships seriously, asking, “Where did I go astray in the past year? Who have I harmed? How can I return to the service of life?”
Rosh Hashanah is also is a time to renew one’s connection to life, responsibility, forgiveness, inspiration and commitment. Rosh Hashanah concludes with Yom Kippur (the day of atonement), when people focus on making amends and restoring their sense of living a life that is, as Rev. Elizabeth Lerner says, “meaningful, spiritual, and most important of all, right.”

The New Year, whether you celebrate it in Jan. (as many of us do) or Sept., (if you’re Jewish) can be a time of awakening and renewing your focus on relationships and right living.
Speaking of awakening, this Friday is Epiphany, which we don’t often celebrate. However, like many religious holidays, Epiphany holds powerful truths about the human condition.
Epiphany, as you know, is the 12th day of Christmas, the day when the Three Wise Men (or Three Kings or Magi) are said to have visited baby Jesus, the first to recognize him as the new born king.
Thus, the term epiphany means "to make known" or "to reveal." Their visit revealed Jesus for who he was.
Today, when we use the word epiphany, we speak of “a sudden, intuitive realization,” or a deep insight, awakening, or revelation about something in life.

This New Year, may we all pause long enough to be open to “sudden, intuitive realizations,” in our lives. After all, it is often the smallest of things, a new born baby, for example, that can lead to life changing insights, and great changes, even in the darkest of times. These epiphanies can be life saving.
Years ago, UU minister Clark Wells wrote about large changes contained in small things, in other words, epiphanies. He wrote:
“During my first year in theological school I was in despair about life, my own included. One cold, dreary Chicago day during the worst of it, wandering aimlessly along 63rd Street, going silently crazy, I suddenly, without intending or willing it, turned and stepped into a fresh fruit bar and ordered a glass of orange juice.
I drank it unthinkingly, then tasted the juice, the pulp. And slowly something happened. The orangeness of that orange juice, its sweetness and sunfilled-ness, the feel of it going into my throat and into my body, awakened me.
I remember mumbling to myself how those oranges were doing good by me, actually caring for me without my asking, and the least I could do was say—if not “thank you”—at least “okay”.
Maybe if oranges could be such a pal—zinging good things through me—why not other things? The sun, the air, the sidewalk, the music pouring from the bells of Rockefeller Chapel across the midway. I finished my orange juice, walked back to the Meadville Library, wrote an A paper on Luther and the Anabaptists and went on into the ministry.”



Clark Wells continues, “…I have faith that…down the street somewhere, around a corner, the gift awaits, like the grace of God in the peeling of a fruit, when I listened to the orange.” (From: http://home.att.net/~USNH/20020106.html)
Epiphanies, these sudden manifestations of new truth in our lives, come in surprising and unexpected ways. Be open to these moments of grace and new insight.

Undoubtedly, this New Year will bring many changes in our lives, people we know and love will probably die.
People we don’t know will come into our lives and impact us in ways we cannot imagine.
Old friends will continue to bless us in the New Year.

But today, the party’s of last night are over. The ball has dropped. We’re arrived, in the New Year.

My wish for you in this New Year is that by pausing and taking stock of where you’re at in your life journey, you might bring forth something beautiful and healing into the world.
My wish for you in this New Year is that you have time to walk your dog, to play with your children, to spend time with those you love, to just sit under the open sky.

My wish for you in this New Year is that you taste the miracle in orange juice, that you feel in a real and tangible way, the miracle of your own life, of all life, and that you stop to smell the flowers along the road less traveled.
I promise you, when you come to the end of your days, it will have made all the difference.
Amen.