April 29, 2008
I was within 20 feet of the president of the republic of Liberia today. And I got hugged by a bunch of little dancing children from Africa. Uganda to be specific. They were great dancing singing little machines. Seriously, I got tired watching then with all their energy. Apparently these kids are orphaned and vulnerable kids from Uganda. Orphaned by war or by AIDS they lived in Internally Displaced Person’s camps where they lived in cramped mud huts with many people.
I am not sure how I feel about it. Are they singing for their supper now? I mean, I think if they had to choose, they would chose, as I would, singing for their supper over cramped mud huts. But aside from that. Zoo animals to be viewed and forced to perform on command. But perhaps I am just too cynical.
I had the opportunity with the other staff of the Secretary of the General conference to talk to the children and thank them for blessing us with their presence afterwards. They were loving children who wanted to hug me when I went to shake their hands. Whatever, I said that weird, but they hugged me and I hugged them back. I’m just saying. Its good that they are not in a hot cramped mud hut (I realized I am saying that with all my American privilege) and I certainly don’t begrudge them but something like the prostitution of culture or of self to the great white American people…keeps popping up in my head. Maybe exploitation of the children...
Am I really just too cynical and projecting my issues on this children’s choir? Maybe, but I would like to add that my conference sent a Native children’s choir that sang the day before and we just got one photo in the Daily Christian Advocate (the daily report of General Conference happenings) and the Uganda children got a entire page write up. Is it because our children sang in native tongue and not in English as the Uganda children? Our kids were just as cute and talented but perhaps it was because the Uganda children were more grateful to great white America and our kids and our conference wouldn’t have been.
Yes, I also think I sound bitter but I am here listening to various people making comments like, “I will support the Native American Comprehensive Plan as long as the money would not be used for gambling.”
Though I suppose to be fair (it is a bad habit of mine, this unrelenting desire to be fair) the pacific islanders got shut down with their request for funding to do ministry to their community. It was scary to see how quickly and easily the floor rejected their need.
And I got to be within 20 feet of the president of the Republic of Liberia. It could have been twenty feet of G. W. Bush. Luckily he sent a letter declined to attend General Conference this year. I was much more excited about Liberia.
Wednesday, April 30, 2008
Tuesday, April 29, 2008
Report from General Conference 1
I am at General Conference. Well, actually I am working at General Conference. I am one of the Secretary of the General Conference’s volunteer staff. I was not all that impressed with my status of staff but since I have been here, it has been cool. I have an all access red badge. I can go anywhere and no one will tell me no. I don’t go everywhere, I am still kinda lazy but I get tell pages and marshals what to do and they do it. Everyone else is impressed with my red badge. And that is cool, but really the Secretary of the General Conference is important, not me. But whatever. I get all the candy I want. But I am feeling kinda sick with the all the time access to candy. Endless baskets of Skittles is bad for the tum tum.
I am also working my ass off. Since Tuesday the 22nd I have been at work at 7:00am and working til 10:00 pm – 11:30 pm. Its been exhausting. But kinda fun. I am getting use to not having any of my short term memory left. Really, someone says something to me and two seconds later I have no memory of it. Its weird. I think I am missing my previous life where I woke up around 9:00am or 10:00am and took several naps during the day. Perhaps I have been preparing for this lack of sleep.
In regards to General conference reports, I would like to say that many of these people should never try stand up comedy. It is just not funny when you are reading a joke during a report or something.
I have been shadowing the Petitions Secretary and sitting in the Reference committee meetings. They decide to move things, or decide to not to move things or decide whether a petition will be voided or sent through the process. It is very exciting considering it happens at 7:00 am and everyone is tired. I found the petition process facinating. Like if you write a petition that can't easily be put in to one category, such as Church and society or local church or judicial administration etc, then it has a higher chance of getting voided because only one committee can get that petition. Common sense, I guess, but if I was writting a petition I wouldn't have considered that. And it is a pity because there were petitions that were thick and probably worked on very hard and long but they addressed too much and all that hard work was wasted. There will be more later.
I am also working my ass off. Since Tuesday the 22nd I have been at work at 7:00am and working til 10:00 pm – 11:30 pm. Its been exhausting. But kinda fun. I am getting use to not having any of my short term memory left. Really, someone says something to me and two seconds later I have no memory of it. Its weird. I think I am missing my previous life where I woke up around 9:00am or 10:00am and took several naps during the day. Perhaps I have been preparing for this lack of sleep.
In regards to General conference reports, I would like to say that many of these people should never try stand up comedy. It is just not funny when you are reading a joke during a report or something.
I have been shadowing the Petitions Secretary and sitting in the Reference committee meetings. They decide to move things, or decide to not to move things or decide whether a petition will be voided or sent through the process. It is very exciting considering it happens at 7:00 am and everyone is tired. I found the petition process facinating. Like if you write a petition that can't easily be put in to one category, such as Church and society or local church or judicial administration etc, then it has a higher chance of getting voided because only one committee can get that petition. Common sense, I guess, but if I was writting a petition I wouldn't have considered that. And it is a pity because there were petitions that were thick and probably worked on very hard and long but they addressed too much and all that hard work was wasted. There will be more later.
Tuesday, April 8, 2008
April showers, winds and hailstorms have beat down the flowers
Last night I preached at my 2nd revival. In a little Creek church in the middle of nowhere. There were rock covered dirt roads. My mom was driving kinda like one of the Dukes of Hazard and it scared the crap out of me. I have been away from home too long...
So I preached at Wewoka Indian UMC. At the first revival I was asked to preach at, I had asked the theme. I was told there was no theme and that I should just pick a favorite theme of mine and go with it. I had a little trouble with that and I think I tried to preach the entire Bible in 40 minutes.
I was able to narrow my focus this time around and went only 25 mins. I preached on an Easter theme and talked about the empty tomb and wild turbulent Pentecostal winds of change. I had fun last night. I made it through the alter call with little trouble. I even had a little kid come and ask for prayer which makes me glad because I think I am a better minister to children than to adults.
Oh, and I am on vacation too. Til tomorrow. I probably shouldn't have agreed to preach but I thought it would be kinda fun. I have a weird idea of what fun is these days.
In random news, I also agreed to preach at Student Forum of the UMC in Washington, DC on Memorial day weekend. I am kinda excited about that one too. Mostly because I get to see and work with a good friend of mine, Delyn. Yea!!! We are playing Tom Petty during the Saturday evening worship service. I think doing church is more fun as a group effort.
A few weeks ago, I had the opportunity to be in on the South Central jurisdiction episcopal interviews for my conference. We interviewed potential bishops from our area. That's the great thing about being from a tiny conference. I get the chance to be a part of almost anything that is going on in my conference. We interviewed 8 of the 9 candidates and the sad thing about being from a tiny conference is that when asked what they knew about the Oklahoma Indian Missionary Conference, almost every began with, I looked on your website last night...
I think I would be more understanding of their lack of knowledge if they hadn't been from the same jurisdiction as us. At the same time, I do know that the Oklahoma conference is barely aware of us and we are in the same state. In Clinton, where my kids church is, the other Methodist church in town was unaware that we existed even though it has been there since the 1950s. I am just not sure what to think about that. Is it lack of effort on our part or theirs or both? And a couple of them admitted that in their UM churches they do not observe special Sundays. What?!? How is that even possible that they were not embarrassed to admit that? I try very hard to make sure that we observe those days and we are tiny churches compared to the churches that they served...my 25/35 to their 500/800 member churches. One boasted of a 9 million dollar sanctuary but the special Sundays get ignored. Does that seem wrong to you? I was a little sick after the interviews of trying to explain that we in our conference apparently lived in a completely different world than they did.
I was trying explain this by telling of the time that I ran out of money for gas. Rising gas prices, the 1.5 hour commute, the fact that I pay for everything out of my own pocket for the kids church, and even though I am making more as a seminary graduate the pay is still lower than any other pastor in the UM church, well, running out of money, its bound to happen from time to time.
I told the story to explain that this was a common problem for all pastors in OIMC, and more so for the people we serve, that this is the world we live in. I was telling the story with the candidate looking at me with horrified eyes, when his eyes filled up with tears and then I stopped talking because if someone cries, I usually do too, and my eyes started filling up too. We just started at each other for about a full minute. He told me he was sorry that had happened to me and I didn't get to tell him that this happens to all of us in OIMC.
I had to leave early that day so the next guy that came in, my gas money story was repeated and the next week that guy sent some money for me and another young pastor in my conference. I am not sure what to think about it because that was not my intention to get him to send me money. Also he was one whose large wealthy church does not observe special Sundays. I think I would have appreciated a letter from him saying that he understood the struggles of my conference and that he would see that his church would observe all the special Sundays which includes Native American Ministries Sunday.
But I leave on a high note with a story about my kids church, last Sunday. I pulled up to the parking lot and a group of them came running out calling my name. They were so excited to see me and to tell me happy late b-day. They had made me paper cut out butterflys with stickers on them and a card which all of them signed. Then they handed me a jewelry box and demanded I open it. Inside was a lapel pin that said Angel and an arrowhead necklace on top of cotton balls. Under the cotton balls was some money they had collected among themselves. $3.25. I think I told them when my birthday was back in October and had not mentioned it since. (I tend to think its tacky to tell people when my b-day is...) But they remembered. I wish all churches were as great as that kids church, maybe then I wouldn't be fighting so hard against ordination.
So I preached at Wewoka Indian UMC. At the first revival I was asked to preach at, I had asked the theme. I was told there was no theme and that I should just pick a favorite theme of mine and go with it. I had a little trouble with that and I think I tried to preach the entire Bible in 40 minutes.
I was able to narrow my focus this time around and went only 25 mins. I preached on an Easter theme and talked about the empty tomb and wild turbulent Pentecostal winds of change. I had fun last night. I made it through the alter call with little trouble. I even had a little kid come and ask for prayer which makes me glad because I think I am a better minister to children than to adults.
Oh, and I am on vacation too. Til tomorrow. I probably shouldn't have agreed to preach but I thought it would be kinda fun. I have a weird idea of what fun is these days.
In random news, I also agreed to preach at Student Forum of the UMC in Washington, DC on Memorial day weekend. I am kinda excited about that one too. Mostly because I get to see and work with a good friend of mine, Delyn. Yea!!! We are playing Tom Petty during the Saturday evening worship service. I think doing church is more fun as a group effort.
A few weeks ago, I had the opportunity to be in on the South Central jurisdiction episcopal interviews for my conference. We interviewed potential bishops from our area. That's the great thing about being from a tiny conference. I get the chance to be a part of almost anything that is going on in my conference. We interviewed 8 of the 9 candidates and the sad thing about being from a tiny conference is that when asked what they knew about the Oklahoma Indian Missionary Conference, almost every began with, I looked on your website last night...
I think I would be more understanding of their lack of knowledge if they hadn't been from the same jurisdiction as us. At the same time, I do know that the Oklahoma conference is barely aware of us and we are in the same state. In Clinton, where my kids church is, the other Methodist church in town was unaware that we existed even though it has been there since the 1950s. I am just not sure what to think about that. Is it lack of effort on our part or theirs or both? And a couple of them admitted that in their UM churches they do not observe special Sundays. What?!? How is that even possible that they were not embarrassed to admit that? I try very hard to make sure that we observe those days and we are tiny churches compared to the churches that they served...my 25/35 to their 500/800 member churches. One boasted of a 9 million dollar sanctuary but the special Sundays get ignored. Does that seem wrong to you? I was a little sick after the interviews of trying to explain that we in our conference apparently lived in a completely different world than they did.
I was trying explain this by telling of the time that I ran out of money for gas. Rising gas prices, the 1.5 hour commute, the fact that I pay for everything out of my own pocket for the kids church, and even though I am making more as a seminary graduate the pay is still lower than any other pastor in the UM church, well, running out of money, its bound to happen from time to time.
I told the story to explain that this was a common problem for all pastors in OIMC, and more so for the people we serve, that this is the world we live in. I was telling the story with the candidate looking at me with horrified eyes, when his eyes filled up with tears and then I stopped talking because if someone cries, I usually do too, and my eyes started filling up too. We just started at each other for about a full minute. He told me he was sorry that had happened to me and I didn't get to tell him that this happens to all of us in OIMC.
I had to leave early that day so the next guy that came in, my gas money story was repeated and the next week that guy sent some money for me and another young pastor in my conference. I am not sure what to think about it because that was not my intention to get him to send me money. Also he was one whose large wealthy church does not observe special Sundays. I think I would have appreciated a letter from him saying that he understood the struggles of my conference and that he would see that his church would observe all the special Sundays which includes Native American Ministries Sunday.
But I leave on a high note with a story about my kids church, last Sunday. I pulled up to the parking lot and a group of them came running out calling my name. They were so excited to see me and to tell me happy late b-day. They had made me paper cut out butterflys with stickers on them and a card which all of them signed. Then they handed me a jewelry box and demanded I open it. Inside was a lapel pin that said Angel and an arrowhead necklace on top of cotton balls. Under the cotton balls was some money they had collected among themselves. $3.25. I think I told them when my birthday was back in October and had not mentioned it since. (I tend to think its tacky to tell people when my b-day is...) But they remembered. I wish all churches were as great as that kids church, maybe then I wouldn't be fighting so hard against ordination.
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