"Rest" - Monday Moment - May 8, 2023

Happy Monday, my friends! Some people do vacations really well. They know what they want, what they need, and what they enjoy. They easily disconnect and settle into whatever their time away is going to be. I know one couple who love cruises, another couple who need some type of adventure, many of my fraternity brothers need to burn energy hiking or skiing. My family all needs different things and our vacations are always an exercise in compromise. My mom wants quiet away from home; my sister wants the same thing, but with a bit of adventure thrown in; my brother-in-law needs adventure and activity of some kind; my dad would be perfectly happy doing what he does every day in retirement; and my ideal vacation involves being left alone with only enough WiFi to stream music, my laptop to write, and no temptation of email, social media, TV, or news reports. Like I said, family vacations are a compromise.

No matter what type of vacation you prefer or what you consider relaxing, rest is important. In fact, rest is sacred. After creating the world, God rests and sets that day as the first day of the week, meaning that God recognizes that we all need rest to be ready for our work and lives. Sleep, rest, and time away from the business of the world features heavily throughout the Bible with Moses going up various mountains to speak directly to God, John the Baptist and Jesus going into the desert to pray and reflect. Almost every religious tradition includes some version of contemplative or monastic experience which can be forms of rest.

Tricia Hersey, found of the Nap Ministry, calls a rest a form of resistance. When we intentionally take time for ourselves, we fight back against a culture which tells us that success and achievement can only be won through work and more work. Often called “grind culture,” the American work culture, even post pandemic, reflects a model of white supremacy where if you only work harder than everyone else you will eventually get ahead. The truth is that many people—white people included—will never be able to improve their conditions through hard work alone. While commitment and dedication are helpful, money, connections, and luck all have more ability to lift a person and their ideas. Resisting this narrative and even refusing to participate in it, is a way of reclaiming ourselves and our mental and physical health.

How do you rest? What do you need to feel relaxed?

Let us pray: God, make our rest an act of resistance to the world and its culture of endless work. Help us step away from moments of “powering through” and from goals of “grinding.” Empower us to take time away and disconnect. Remind us that until quite recently rest and relaxation was more than a passing whim. In all things, help us know that even you, creator of all, rested. Amen.

Blessings on your week, my friends! Let me know if there is anything I can do for you.

Faithfully,

Ben

"Siblings" - Monday Moment - May 1, 2023

Happy Monday, my friends! Just as each family is unique so too is each sibling relationship. When my sister was born—32 years ago today to be exact—I was neither ready nor pleased with the arrival of this small, premature child. I would not grow into the good big brother I was expected to be. In fact, at just shy of four years old, I was introduced to Emma in my mom’s hospital room and, to my eternal shame, smacked her on the back. The next memory I have is being at the airport watching the planes land and takeoff with my aunt, but I’m told the scene turned into something out of a movie as my parents sat shocked, my sister cried, the nurse gave me a look that could kill, and my aunt whisked me out of the room. Our relationship remained rocky throughout childhood and adulthood, perhaps only improving as I moved around the East Coast. Where she is practical, conservative, and predictable, I’m quirky, liberal, and change my mind all the time. I was a loner who liked school, church, and ample quiet time. She likes being around friends and was indifferent to school (though she is smarter than me). She was the athlete in the family, while I was in theater or church. She’s straight, married to a man with a good job, and the mother of an adorable little boy. I’m Queer, single (and looking!), and much too busy/poor to raise a child. Simply put, we’re different.

The Bible is not particularly full of good sibling examples. Of the very first pair of siblings mentioned, Cain kills Abel. Joseph’s brothers sell him into slavery. Jacob deceives his father to steal Esau’s inheritance. Moses leaves the Israelite camp in the charge of his brother and sister only to return to find that they created an idol which they are worshipping. Even chosen sibling relationships sour: the apostles can’t stay awake with Jesus and Peter denies even knowing Jesus.

Sibling rivalries are normal, even expected. No matter the number of siblings or the resources to be contested, siblings tend to find something to challenge each other over. Most of us, granted, come to some type of peace with our siblings. We learn how to get along or at least we learn which buttons not to push. We learn that as different as these people might be from us, they are our closest family members, and that connection will never fully end.

My sister and I may have a weird, sometimes distant, sometimes very close relationship—made even stronger by her son who I adore and who thinks the world of me—but we are always there for each other. We even talk to each other sometimes, a fact that astonishes our skeptical parents.

Who are your siblings—biological, chosen, or adoptive? What place do they have in your life?

Let us pray: God, thank you for our siblings…even when they test our patience, drive us bonkers, and make us tear our remaining hair out. Thank you for giving us people who challenged us to develop diplomacy when we were young and who continue to teach us grace as we get older. Thank you for the chosen siblings you have brought into our lives, yes, even when they too test our limits. We ask this all in Jesus’ name, remembering that like us he had siblings. Amen.

Blessings on your week, my friends! Please let me know if there is anything I can do for you.

Faithfully,

Ben

"Act Up for What You Believe" - Monday Moment - April 24, 2023

Happy Monday, my friends! Following on my theme of drawing inspiration from Christopher Sunami’s Hero for Christ, I’m turning to his third point with a slight modification: Act up for what you believe. Sunami reminds us that, “[Christians] buy into the myth that a real Christian hero is never political…you need to understand that every political choice involves a moral choice.” Particularly in the United States, two distinct camps of Christians have developed. First, there are Christian nationalists and Evangelicals who shout loudly or empower those who do. They weaponize their faith and assault those people who dare question or oppose their worldview. The second group are the polite, apathetic Christians whose silence in the face of moral crisis is deafening. And so, Christianity is viewed as either a religion of hate or a religion of apathy.

There must be Christians and people who follow Jesus who are willing to act up and take moral positions. The telling part is that when you follow Jesus and you act up for the LGBTQIA+ community or act against gun violence or agitate against racism, the Christian nationalists will tell you that you are perverting the gospel even while they worship a blond hair, blue-eyed Jesus carrying a gun. So too the apathetic Christians will tell you that you are making the gospels political. You can’t make the gospels political; the gospels are political. In fact, the progressive Christianity that I so readily claim, should seem as redundant to us as “ATM machine.” Christianity should be about being on the very fringes of the political spectrum. To be a Christian should be a declaration that we will protect and advocate with the least and the most marginalized of our siblings.

Some of you know that a mentor and friend from my college days passed away this week. He was someone who stood up for what he believed in. He was part of the first generation of Black students at our college, the first Black person to hold one of the three top student leadership roles on campus, and for nearly 40 years he served as our director of multicultural affairs. He was passionate about the success of BIPOC students and was an equally dedicated ally to the LGBTQIA+ community. As an ally to the Queer community, he modelled the role of allies who use their privilege to effect change, but who defer leadership to the members of the community. I strive to follow that example when working as an ally with other communities.

How do you act up for justice? Where do the gospels and scripture compel you to act?

Let us pray: Radical God, compel us to act up for justice in a world that is full of injustice. Convict our souls to fight against the message of oppression and the rhetoric of hate. Send your spirit to strengthen us when we falter and to challenge us when it seems like the fight is hopeless. Help us to see the moral imperatives in political questions. Help us to see you behind those moral imperatives. Amen.

Blessings on your week, my friends, let me know if there is anything I can do for you.

Faithfully,

Ben