2022.08.28 A Wedding Does Not A Marriage Make, Lyn G. Brakeman, Spiritual Lemons, blog post

Everyone has a wedding story or two, and many great films are made about weddings. 

Even the New Testament has a wedding story. No, Jesus did not preside or wed any brides, but he did once miraculously fill wine jugs with more wine to make sure the hosts of the wedding feast (reception) did not run out and that the guests could drink their fill—and then some. That wine “miracle” has been traditionally viewed as one of the first “signs” to indicate that Jesus of Nazareth was indeed destined for messiahship or something even bigger, like Son of God, or a big messianic title such as the Christ. Stated less grandly, however, most weddings are in themselves miracles of love and commitment bonded—by the grace of God or the bride’s mother.  After that you are married and the hard work of intimacy-forever begins.

*  *  *  *

Seriously though, I bet everyone has amusing wedding stories to tell. Here are a few of my own.

-At the wedding when I married my first husband I was so nervous I clung onto my father’s arm a bit too long. I doubt that anyone noticed, and he never said a thing. I just was terrified about this transition from dependence on my parents to dependence to my new husband.  I figured marriage to be a solemnly sworn trap—till death us do part. It was 1961, and my fears were not far off, given the way church and society viewed marriage and the role of women. It is said that love overcomes fear. I wonder if fear can overcome love?  Will a couple grow together— together?  

-At the wedding when I married my second husband, 26 years later, I was more sure of myself in love. Still, I cried saying my vows. My dearly beloved looked terrified. I saw his mustache quiver. My tears were not from fear but from something much deeper, something grief-like, some combination of mystery and miracle. My second marriage is 35 years old and holding—till death us do part. But what is death? If someone has resided in your heart for any length of time, that person never leaves your heart. 

-At a wedding at which I presided as priest in my first parish after I was ordained, I was waiting for the organist to finish her musical prelude, when I poked my head out to view the congregation seated and waiting. What to my wondering eyes should appear, but several little bridesmaids teetering/wobbling on skyscraper high heels down the aisle toward the altar where no one was waiting for them—no groom, no officiant. I had to make an instant decision. I moved quickly from the sacristy out into the sanctuary and headed down the aisle to meet these  lovelies and turn them around. I gently whispered to them that the music they had heard was NOT the wedding processional—their cue to start to hit the aisle.  Turn about and let’s start over, sweeties. 

-At a good friend’s wedding, there was a “guard” posted at the church doors to make sure the groom’s mother did not enter the sanctuary. We knew that if she showed up she would voice a loud objection and create a commotion worthy of going down in history.  Of course there was no clear plan about what this “guard,” a small woman, friend of the bride’s sister, would do to block a raging, scorned mother of the groom, who, mercifully never appeared.

-And one wedding in which I was a bridesmaid, the whole spectacular event had suddenly to be switched from the church to the bride’s home, and from June to January. The bride’s mother pulled off this miracle—smoothing the fury of her husband as well as lining everyone up for a grand procession‚ of sorts.  

*  *  *  *

So you see, there’s no such thing really as a glitch-less wedding. Nor for that matter is there a glitch-less marriage, or a glitch-free love. Love grows and matures slowly as you go, and both people must invest in its care. Take regular stock of your relationship, for it is like a precious child for whom you care tenderly and into whom you invest yourself with hope, trust, and your own vigor. 

The trick is to keep the commitment renewed and renewed and renewed in your heart and with your behavior. Also, get therapeutic help when you feel the marital sag or snag. I think such therapeutic re-fueling is called forgiveness—or God. 

  

    

Just Say Yes, Lyn G. Brakeman, Spiritual Lemons, blog post, 8/21/22

There are many ways to be “bent.”

The New Testament story on the healing of the bent woman is compelling. I once suggested to a friend who was riddled with arthritis and, yes, bent, that she pray with this story. I suggested that she read it slowly and carefully, then imagine herself in the story as Jesus calls for her to come forth from the shadows into the light. “Are you crazy?” she said. “Not really,” I said. She did not believe me. I wondered about myself, too. 

*  *  *  *

In this story, Jesus was teaching in the synagogue. This fact signals us that it was the Sabbath, and he, the Rabbi, was teaching listeners wisdom for life. Nevertheless, Jesus interrupted himself, and in an almost nonchalant way, called this woman, bent double and unable to straighten herself, crippled for eighteen years, to come towards him.  Are you crazy?—she must have thought, but it all happened so fast. She approached, he touched her and told her to stand up straight. She stood.

Such stories are unbelievably shocking, even scary. And yet, our desire to believe them is intense. The woman herself does not thank him, or apologize for being a nuisance—on the Sabbath no less. She simply gives thanks to God. That’s all. Is that enough? 

Yes, it is enough. 

*  *  *  *

But no! Onlookers start a FIGHT!  Jesus broke a rule—healing on the Sabbath, The Sabbath is to be sacred for God alone. Well, who do they think created this miracle?  Who in this story is “bent”?  

They then, and we now, fight about miracles, about Jesus being God or a phony actor, about her condition being God’s fault or will, about it being her own fault in some way, (or today, some would say it was her childhood trauma), about the authenticity of scripture itself, about Luke’s political agenda trying to persuade the Gentiles about Jesus’s godliness by making it all up. 

I think that the very worst perspective on this or any miracle is to override its splendor with self-aggrandizement: Mea culpa, mea maxima culpa. In other words, I did something wrong that qualified me for a miracle. Bad me. This habit of self-deprecation is common, and it is anti-theistic, leaving little or no room for divine action, no matter how that comes, no matter how dark, how sinful. How much almighty energy will it take to break through such sinister pride? It takes a miracle!  

*  *  *  *

And even when such a miracle takes place we often take the credit for it, as if we ourselves had created this miracle‚ by “fighting” no less. Our language is revealing. The poet Ocean Vuong in his novel, On Earth We’re Briefly Gorgeous, wonders about the overuse of warrior language for everything: “But why can’t the language for creativity be the language of regeneration?" Vuong asks. Instead we use violent language, as Vuong notes, citing some reactions from his fans: You killed that poem. You’re a killer. You came in to that novel guns blazing. I am hammering this paragraph., I am banging them out, we say. I owned that workshop. I shut it down. I crushed them. We smashed the competition. I’m wrestling with the muse. The state, where people live is a battleground state. The audience a target audience. “Good for you, man,” a man once said to me at a party. “you’re making a killing with poetry. You’re knocking ‘em dead.” 

Even in the biblical story violence erupts. They can’t believe the bent woman is straight, so the onlookers start a FIGHT—about rule-breaking for the sake of a bent old woman, no less. And we too, alas, remain addicted to the need for explanations, preferably our own, and yes, violence in word and deed.

Who in this story is bent? 

*  *  *  * 

What to do? Well, do not go passive or give up in the face of impossible adversity. Even the dictionary tells us that the word “miracle” comes from the  Latin root mirari, to wonder. If you are able, find ways to join WITH—co-operate—using your natural gifts, medical care, therapeutic help, friends, family, prayer, whatever is creative for you—including the unexpected, WITH an inexplicable miracle when it happens. God, it turns out, transcends science, logic, reason, fights, religion, politics, ritual, even our love and prayer. So just wonder.

The best definition of “miracle” I’ve ever encountered, is one offered by Anglican theologian and priest, John MacQuarrie (1917-2007), pictured below: “A miracle is something we are grateful for.”  Simply so. 

So rejoice!  Something incredibly good, small, unforeseen, inexplicable, eccentric, impossible, yes, miraculous, will happen. Just say yes.

And, because there’s no one worldly source, including yourself, to thank, thank God as the bent woman did with her prayers. Then straighten up and walk on. 

    

Whither the Weather? Lyn G. Brakeman, Spiritual Lemons, blog post, 8/14/22

 

“You hypocrites! If you can interpret the portents of earth and sky, why can’t you interpret the present time?”  

Who said this? Not some pulpit politician trying to get elected. Not some weather forecaster, trying to defend the forecasts made by his or her network—obviously more accurate than any other. Not some academic or clinician pretending to know more than anyone else, or some self-righteous preacher name-calling.  

Jesus of Nazareth, as remembered and communicated in the New Testament gospels of Luke 12:46-59 and Matthew 16:2-3, said this. It’s pretty harsh, and it is preceded by a forceful denial of the common assumption—both then and now—that Jesus the Christ is a bringer of peace, a kingdom of it, no less. Apparently not. We are expected, I believe, to learn from this harsh teachings that WE are to create and work hard for Peace. Instead, we fight and murder each other, even within a family, over differing politics, religions, on and on. No true, lasting peace is ever had by means of war or warring language. 

*  *  *  *

So what is a hypocrite? A hypocrite is an ACTOR, a pretender, one who pretends to know and be sure of the facts and their correct meanings—and does not. Hypocrites only know things from their own point of view, as do actors on stage, as if life itself were a script. 

The best wisdom over all time would suggest that our capacity to know is so imperfect that  we cannot know anything alone. We can contribute our perspectives; then we listen to others, that’s all. Then with care and courtesy WE come to some decision, solution or conclusion that is a workable compromise toward a mutual gain.  

So, we are first-class phonies—hypocrites—when we bloviate (I love that word) with certainty about all we think we know. We are “pulpiteers” full of opinions, few of which are tested by time or expertise. Even science, which many worship as inviolate and inerrant, does not have certain answers.  

I too am a hypocrite. I think most high-gear hypocrisy comes from fear. Right now this world, this planet, lives with a lot of fear of its own demise. Sometimes I pretend to be calm and cool while my innards quiver. 

*  *  *  * 

Ironically, it is the “weather” or climate, through which we can read the signs. It IS the sign of the present time. It is the “weather” that is demanding to be heard—water, fire, and wind. WE don’t, can’t, or won’t interpret the “portents" of earth and sky.” All created life depends on our willingness to stop arguing and start listening. Will we read the portents of our time in the weather itself? 

I’m trying not follow the hypocritical temptation to soften Jesus’s proclamations, saying, oh the Bible is not literal, and oh, it’s more important to love and do good works, and oh, Jesus spoke for his own day not ours, etc.etc.  Well, sometimes the Bible has something so applicable to say that, well, it must be taken at its word—literally. 

When Jesus tells his friends he comes

that crisis might increase,

it must, it must be time to seek

a wider, deeper peace.  

                       Michael Hudson, text for Hymn #680

(“O God our help in ages past…”)

2022.08.07 A Special Date, Lyn G. Brakeman, Spiritual Lemons, blog post

 

Today is the day I was born 84 years ago, some time in the early morning hours. I, of course, was a joy to behold—at least that’s what my happy mother told me. 

Today is also the day, my marriage partner, Dick Simeone, was born 81 years ago. He, of course, was also a joy to behold—at least that’s what his happy mother told him. 

Forty-eight and forty-five years later we met, and in 1986, we made a love choice that grew into a commitment called marriage, the second such commitment for both of us, married to each other now for 36 years come November, 2022. Every night, no matter what grief or anger might still lie unresolved between us, we reach our hands under the bed covers for a squeeze as we say, “Okay, good night.”  A love choice. 

*  *  *  *

When a child is born, few birthing, laboring mothers have a choice about loving this child immediately. It’s instinct. After that, love begins to lose its infant sheen and gets more and more complicated over time, depending on one’s circumstances. You all know what I mean. This post is not a plea for abortion care, but simply a plea for women, the politics of the womb, and the justice and compassion society and the law should guarantee all citizens, male and female and everything in between. 

If, as the early 2nd-century Christian Bishop, St. Irenaeus of Lyons, said, “The glory of God is the human person fully alive,” then it is up to all of us human persons to help make sure that glory happens, that it is visible, honored. Every effort towards this vision involves love choices. What are love choices?  

Love choices are the most difficult kinds of choices. And there are many in life. Love choices are always painful, always require aborting something or someone precious, including oneself. Doing a cost/benefit analysis may ease the emotional tension, but it is merely a mental exercise, emotionally inefficient. No one is unbroken by love choices, personal or professional. No one. Also, no one can be free without love choices. Let’s face it, love choices are hard, specially those love choices you make that you know will hurt someone else. Many women tend to make love choices that leave themselves out, or too far out, of the satisfaction circle. In truth, many men do the same. Love choices are God choices. 

As I age, I have learned that love choices always include worry, just as love itself does. Worry is not about control, but simply what you feel when you love. Love choices, also always, are driven by the energy of deep caring and Love that is available to us but that we do not possess. God’s love is in Love with us—no matter what. 

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO US!!  

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AND to recall today’s readings from Holy Scriptures, God tells Abraham and Sarai, who desperately want a child of their own for the faith, yes, and for them to love, to wait and trust. And Jesus tells his followers to wait and trust and pray and watch for Christ’s Presence even after Jesus’s death, because, there are warning signs, discord among people, and weather events we can see, and before which we are afraid and helpless. We live in a climate of grief. To wait and watch and trust is a love choice. 

I tell you a story about a young man, a monastic, who recently heard a presentation about the urgency of global warming  and with it, the possibility of a massive extinction event. The man walked into the winter woods, found a lone hemlock tree, dug a clearing in the snow beneath it until he could see and touch the body of the earth. He nestled against the cold dark soil and prayed as if his life depended upon it. He sobbed and sobbed, feeling  grief and love and gratitude as his flesh knew the earth intimately. He laid claim to a “grief like no other.”  

To grieve deeply and truly is a love choice. 

2022.07.31 How Rich Are You? Lyn G. Brakeman, Spiritual Lemons, blog post

What makes you feel rich? Of course it is very nice to have enough money to live comfortably, pay your rent, and buy good food. Yes, nice, but  don’t watch the news—photos of all the world’s poor huddled masses shrinking from bombs, children all ribs and all filth. I do not know what to do at all about the spirituality of all this. I do not know how to keep myself from bad moods at the very least. I do not know how to pray, except in anger and abject pleading. Gratitude simply does not work for me, because it feels like I am being holier than thou. Can I dare to be grateful when others have nothing? Would I happily wave my palm on the way to a death by Crucifixion? Am I that naive?  

All that I can manage is to pray limply, bless and breathe fresh air into my still-pumping lungs, look and listen for some small beauty that looks authentic and makes me grin.  

Abraham, patriarch of note, well acquainted with grief and pain, can make me laugh out loud. In Genesis 18 he has a long conversation with God, really all with himself, in which he prays that God will not destroy a whole city, because what if there are some righteous people still living there? Ok, says God. But Abraham persists with his descending stats: Will you spare this city of sinners if there are 30? 20? 10, five? What if there is only ONE righteous person? Abraham whittles God down to the nubbin. We don’t know if the sex-riddled sin city called Sodom is spared, but we know Abraham gives his all into his efforts. The story makes me laugh out loud. It makes me stop worrying about the theology in this story about God being punitive and destructive. What matters to me is not the bad image of God presented here, but the portrait of someone who prays anyway even when everything is obviously lost, and God appears to be the culprit. It’s as stupid as kissing a child’s “boo boo” and saying that your kiss will make is all go away. And the child believes you. Sometimes all we have is bandaids and small but mighty lies. 

Here are some images that make me rich with laughter, raise my gloom irrationally. I believe them all anyway. 

Here is a wooden brightly colored sea horse at the edge of our friends’ swimming pool. An ornament with no purpose but delight.  

And here is a gnome with the same foolish errand of Mercy—cheer up anyway, say these ladybugs aflutter below. 

And here is an old woman who just turned 100. There’s a party to acknowledge such age of course—balloons, a cake, and a cheery song.  A good neighbor makes sure the birthday girl shows up. What for? You’re 100 years old!  “I am?” 

And here’s a quote from French essayist, playwright, and poet, Paul Claudel (1868-1995). He nearly became a monk after a religious conversion he experienced at age eighteen, but instead of following the call of God and joining a Benedictine monastery, he followed his own rather cynical temperament and became a poet full of sardonic prophetic assessments about his religion, his times, and his country. He had lost hope for all of it, especially “the stench and the starch of partisan politics.” He even made it to the cover of Time Magazine, but fame is no substitute for faith. 

I can identify with such disgust, but I’m not quite as consistently cynical as he was. Claudel felt it all as grief, perhaps depression as well. Still, in helpless sorrow, without cover-up or denial, there is hope. Because you know and name your sorrow without pretense, you become a prayer, a helpless fool, a poet, and a prophet. 

“There is something sadder to lose than life— the reason for living;

  Sadder than to lose one’s possessions is to lose one’s hope.” 

Il y a une chose plus triste a perdre que la vie, c’est la raison de vivre,

Plus triste que do perdre ses biens, c’est de perdre son espérance.”   

“Jesus did not come to explain away suffering or remove it. He came to fill it with his presence.” I think this poet filled his writings with spiritual richness—Soul.

And finally, here is a small bear playing delightedly with an old and empty bird feeder. This bear is sure that if she or he tosses the feeder about enough, delicious sugary water, or honey, or something delicious that will miraculously pour forth and fill his hungry belly. A bear rich with Hope in a friend's back yard—posing, no less.

   

2022.07.24 The Lord's Prayer. Lyn G. Brakeman, Spiritual Lemons, blog post

This ancient prayer, is remembered as being offered by Jesus, after his disciples saw that he engaged in regular prayer times. They asked: “Lord, teach us to pray like John (the Baptist) taught his disciples. ” (What they meant was “just like you pray”. Obviously, all of them prayed, using prayers familiar to the traditions of their day. But they, like children, wanted to pray exactly like Jesus.)  So Jesus, as remembered in Luke 11, according to the 2001 New Revised Standard Version (NRSV) of the Bible, accommodated:  

When you pray say. . .   

Father, hallowed be your name,

  Your kingdom come.

               Give us each day our daily bread.

                And forgive us our sins,

For we ourselves forgive everyone

    indebted to us. 

And do not bring us to the time of Trial.

Jesus follows with a small homily about grudging givers and forgivers, with a punch line: “Is there anyone among you who, if your child asks for a fish, will give a snake instead of a fish?” This line makes my heart cringe, for I know times when I have not given or forgiven. But then I’m not God, and this is a prayer, a breathless hope. 

In a later translation of this prayer, according to The Inclusive Bible, published by Priests for Equality in 2007, this prayer is written this way:

When you pray say,

Abba God,

Hallowed by your Name!

May your reign come.

Give us today

Tomorrow’s bread. 

Forgive us our sins,

for we too forgive everyone who sins against us;

And don’t let us be subjected to the Test.

This too continues with the same metaphor and advice to keep on asking, knocking and, by implication, needing, for this Abba God will give the Holy Spirit to those who ask. 

And so we keep asking. Most prayer is begging or boasting and everything in between, but prayer itself is almost impossible to avoid or evade. Usually it just happens. I remember visiting a woman who was very sick in a mental hospital. I had nothing to comfort her—nothing. She looked at me with frantic eyes and said, “I can’t pray.” I said, “Don’t worry, we will pray for you.” I meant, in her stead. 

I’ve always remembered that small exchange as God saving us both from the time of Trial, the Test, and in earlier translations, “Lead us not into Temptation.” These words, Trial, Test, are capitalized. Why?  I assume they matter every day as much as daily bread. 

There’s nothing like a home with two priests to make a “church.” When Dick and I together celebrate the Eucharist each Sunday, we say the Lord’s Prayer this way:

Our God in heaven

Hallowed be your name

Your kingdom come

Your will be done

    on earth as in heaven.

Give us today our daily bread

Forgive us our sins  

as we forgive those who sin against us.

Save us from the time of Trial.

For the kingdom, the power and the glory are yours

forever and ever. AMEN.

We do not say Father or Abba, even Lord, because neither of us thinks that God has a gender, neither masculine or feminine. Just God.  Maybe the words, Our Father are the hardest for people to give up, so accustomed are we to the “Our Father.” So am I. No translation can change the feeling or meaning behind these words, however. 

Oh, and the words “as” or “for” preceding "forgive us our sins as/for we forgive others," are conditional words. God forgives us even when we cannot forgive others, for God’s grace is expansive. I do believe that when you pray that God will forgive whatever is unforgivable to you. You may find that the prayer focus, itself, suddenly eases what you experience as unforgivable. 

I will always believe and try to live by the ancient words of this prayer, as Jesus did. So this prayer will never die. It has survived, and will survive, any number of translations and versions. It is eternal and intimate. I call the whole prayer,  God.  Amen.