2023.10.29 It's In The Mail! Lyn G. Brakeman, Spiritual Lemons, blog post

The whole idea of there being a divine kingdom, or of God being a King, has always made me restless, full of discomfort about throning divinity in any one place anywhere. 

It feels distancing to me, the same way Santa Claus felt to me as a young child. Why did they seat him on a big chair, like a throne, in the middle of a crowded department store, playing Christmas music at high speed in the background, and telling us little kids we should sit on Santa’s lap and we might, or would, get all the stuff we wanted for Christmas? I hung back.

Even now, I call the “kingdom” of God the reign of God. This keeps God’s godliness  mobile and accessible. In fact, the more I allow my mind to detach itself from the omni-ness of divinity, the more potent, powerful, present, wise, and truly loving this one God becomes.  

All it takes to know this expansiveness of divine love is a true story, full of heartache, heartbreak, and hope—everywhere for everyone, and told over and over.  

*  *  *  * 

A four-year old girl wrote a letter to God about her beloved dog Abby who had just died.  She wanted to make sure God would recognize Abby when she got to heaven. With help from her mother, Meredith wrote the letter and inserted a picture of herself with Abby.

Dear God, Will you take care of my dog? She died yesterday and is with you in heaven. I miss her very much. I’m happy that you let me have her as my dog even though she got sick. I hope you play with her. She likes to swim and play with balls. I am sending a picture of her so when you see her you will know that she is my dog. Love, Meredith. 

Before long a package arrived for Meredith. It was wrapped in gold paper. The original letter that had been opened was taped to the package which contained a book by Mr. Rogers called When a Pet Dies. There was also the photo and another letter. 

Dear Meredith, Abby arrived safely in heaven. Having the picture was a big help and I recognized her right away. Abby isn’t sick any more. Her spirit is here with me just like it stays in your heart. Abby loved being your dog. Since we don’t need our bodies in heaven, I don’t have any pockets to keep your picture in so I’m sending it back to you in this little book for you to keep and have something to remember Abby by. 

Thank you for the beautiful letter and thank your mother for helping you write it and sending it to me. What a wonderful mother you have. I picked her especially for you. I send blessings every day and remember that I love you very much. 

By the way, I’m easy to find. I am wherever there is love.    Love, God 

2023.10.22 $ $ $ ? Lyn G. Brakeman, Spiritual Lemons, blog post

Our world right now is in such social upheaval that many of us have no idea who is in charge, who will save us, how we will carry on, whether to laugh or cry. 

We desperately grope for some external power to tell us what to do, how to be. We listen addictively to the NEWS. Isn’t the President going to tell us what to do? We curl up with some wise book, become blind to its words smudged up and blurred on a page. We call or text or email a friend or family, get no answer. We go shopping, because money has power to save. Some even say it “talks.” 

Jesus, the New Testament Christian hero, talked a lot about money. He wasn’t against it. He knew it was necessary to pay taxes. In fact, he told people to respect Caesar’s coinage, identified by the emperor’ s own image on its face (just like President George Washington’s face on our quarter). But this is not the coinage of God. I have heard, even preached myself, many a pious sermon about the value of paying your “taxes”—in other words pledge your money to the parish church. Money buys respect, authority, a place in the Kingdom of Heaven. It’s a deal, right?

NO.

At times like ours right now, power and violence are tightly conjoined, and when you add money to the list you create a conflagration—a large hellish fire, a vicious trinity.

*  *  *  *

Jesus recommended paying “taxes” to God. He meant to pray, laying bare your own heart, fears, your desires, your hopes, and your powerlessness. 

You can pray even if you don't believe in a god or anyone else's God/G-d/Godde/HigherPower. When you "pray" you enter the depths of your own soul, therein accessing your own compassion—the heart of love for the world beyond your reach. This you give?

YES.

2023.10.15 The Guest List? Lyn G. Brakeman, Spiritual Lemons, blog post

Have you ever made out a guest list for a big important and personal event? Something important like your own wedding? Now, imagine if you just bagged the list, flung wide the doors and invited everyone—absolutely everyone.                                                                                                                                      

The parable of the wedding feast was told by Jesus in answer to those who asked: what  is this kindom of heaven like?  Kindom sounds silly, right?  Where is THE KING?  What ruler would throw a huge banquet to honor the family heir, send invitations to those on the guest list, then be astonished when the entire guest list declines—  too busy with their own enterprises, and some even murdering the ruler’s emissaries?

This ruler became furious, ordered his military to burn the murderers and destroy towns and businesses, then went out to invite everyone and anyone, good and bad, credentialed and not, to the feast. The new guests all ran on it and celebrated mightily. Well, except for one poor soul who had no proper wedding garments so was kicked out by rough bouncers and removed from that guest list forever. 

*  *  *  *

When I read this story, I felt my mood soar and plummet immediately. Of course it’s only a metaphor, but . . . a godly guest list? 

THE DIVINE REALM SHOULD BE TRULY INVITATIONAL WITHOUT COST, YES?

*  *  *  * 

Once I was ordained and serving in a parish I started a gospel drama group. Acting out stories would be fun and educational I thought. Better than a one-preacher sermon from a solo pulpit. I invited anyone interested to join. We gathered. I suggested that we try an impromptu and improvisational version of Jesus’s ancient wedding feast parable. We used the altar area as our stage. I read the story, and told them to begin the drama. Everyone started to talk at once. Some thought they didn’t deserve to be invited. Others claimed they had been invited because they were best friends of the family. Still others hung back uncertain. One woman, trying to play Jesus’s mother, Mary, shouted: “Son, this isn’t working!”  We all suddenly burst out laughing and crying at once. We had created chaos. 

*  *  *  *

This drama group certainly was a failed idea, I thought. Right? 

THIS IS THE REIGN OF HEAVEN-ON-EARTH. IT’S OPEN TO ALL, RIGHT? 

*  *  *  *

Why in the world would God with whom I’d had lively one-sided conversations since I was a small child  kick me out, kick anyone out? If this God is CREATOR, then that word itself automatically means to do something new, to challenge traditional ways, to respect the vast array of offerings and opportunities and not insist on or rigidify just one single way.

*  *  *  *

My drama group kept going. We sized down by choice not by rejection. I acted as a director, figuring that a great orchestra needs its conductor to make good music together. We read biblical stories and shared thoughts and feelings not “answers.” By Easter we were ready for the Vigil. A group of six or seven women came into a darkened church in single file and solemn. They slowly walked up into the altar area, which became, well, an empty tomb. One shroud-like blanket was lying on the floor. The group gathered in silence. Some knelt, some stood, some close, some with a bit of distance. Very slowly the women began each to say something as slowly the lights were coming up—dawn. There was no script. One woman who did not believe in God, stayed silent except quietly to say something like, I just don’t get it? When the lights were fully on, the drama finished and the women all walked slowly away from the empty tomb and out of the church using the side entrance. The watching congregation stayed silent. One woman snuck back into the church, snatched the “shroud” and left again. As she was leaving she turned back three time to say, “But what does it mean?”

2023.10.08 STOP! Lyn G. Brakeman, Spiritual Lemons, blog post

"Everywhere we look we see violence, in our homes, on our streets, in our schools. We see it in advertising, in films, on the news. We see it in strife within companies, communities and nations, and between them. We find it expressed physically, sexually, emotionally and psychologically. It is everywhere and we feel powerless in the face of it.

Let's just stop it. Let the writers, producers, editors and actors who portray violence stop. Let the media stop presenting stories on violence. Let parents and teachers, brothers and sisters, men and women and children stop. Let the political, social economic, judicial and religious institutions stop. 

Let us all spend time in silence, stillness, meditation and prayer each day, drawing on the spirit within us to lead us into kindness, openness of heart, goodness, well-being and goodwill."  from Sister Stan, "Gardening the Soul", 2001.

AND TWENTY-TWO YEARS LATER WHAT DO WE STILL SEE, HEAR AND WITNESS ALL THE TIME?     LET'S JUST STOP!  (This is hard for news reporters and media, but does it always have to make the front page?  NO.

*  *  * *

Just a few small things to help us all stop and consider:

-The government collapses when the governed refuse to cease hostilities.

-Attend to small gestures alongside huge unmanageable items. 

-STOP!: 

Do, see, say, live, love in different ways. Breathe don’t pant.

Make the sign of the cross western style (up, down, right, left).

Make the sign of the cross eastern style (up, down left, right).

See yourself as a child at play enchanted, creating with, say, Lincoln Logs.

Be a priest. Consecrate/bless bread and wine using ancient Hebrew words.

Watch grass push slowly up through tiny cracks in cement sidewalks.

Spell divinity God, Godde, G-d, godde—same sound different variations.

Use words of immanence alongside, or instead of, words of transcendence.

Avoid gendered (he, him, his) or role-bound (Father) words for Divinity. 

Because everything is scientific, doesn’t mean everything is not spiritual. 

All life—human, plant, animal—is both vulnerable and venerable. G-d bless you and keep you. The face of Godde shine upon you and from within you today and always. AMEN. 

2023.10.01 "Who Says So?" Lyn G. Brakeman, Spiritual Lemons, blog post

From the Gospel of Jesus the Christ according to Matthew 21: 23-32 comes one of those tough choices stories we love to hate. It’s about authority and how some things are not really part of the Kingdom of Heaven plans, but if you must………..

One of my favorite rejoinders to my mother when she told me not to do something was: “Who says so?” Of course her greater authority, though highly questionable in my mind, won over—sort of.  I somehow found a way round it when she told me to stop sucking my thumb, an activity of consolation that seemed to me to be absolutely and indispensably necessary to my salvation at the time. After all, they’d gotten rid of the dining room table under which I hid to assert my own authority and to hold my secret one-sided conversations with God whom I’d met in a book. All I had left for my soul’s comfort after that table was gone, was my thumb.  I practically sucked it raw as I grieved the loss of my hideout.  

*  *  *  *

In this gospel story, Jesus asks the Temple authorities where John the Baptist got his authority to baptize people. Was it divine or human? Not easily fooled, they conferred and knew that if they said “divine” Jesus would ask them why they refused the baptism? BUT if they said ’human’ the people would rise up against them, because they understood John the Baptist to be a prophet sent from God. So they answered, “We don’t know.” to which Jesus replied  Well then, neither will I tell you by what authority I do, and say, the things that I do and say. 

Brilliant! 

Now, substitute abortion for baptism for a moment.  You can see, even experience, the authority bind: is it “God’s will aka divine authority,” that we all have equal rights/freedom of will? Or is it by divine authority that we do not murder ever and under any circumstance whatsoever—even under the best, most loving/caring/compassionate/true circumstances. 

                                        ?

Most all our worldwide current quarrels, uncertainties, even murders or executions are about one thing: AUTHORITY. Are you, and can you be, the AUTHOR of your own divinely given freedom—no matter what?  "It depends" really doesn't cut it—or does it? 

2023.09.24 Mercy Me! Lyn G. Brakeman, Spiritual Lemons, blog post

I’ve been a Mercy Associate for over thirty years now. I’m not mercy-full enough. Still, I’m venerable and vulnerable enough to have mercy on God for not living up to our righteous/wrongful expectations.

*  *  *  *

Before I get too tangled up in Chronos—ancient personification of time/chronology/sequence on clock, calendar, or map  let me heed Kairos—ancient Greek for just the right time, opportune timING, often identified as Godde’s time. Chronos is quantitative. Kairos is qualitative.  

*  *  *  * 

When I was a young elementary school age child I was short. I hated to have to be the first in a line-up for walking into some all-school assembly. On the other hand, I hated as well to be last in line.  I also— secretly—hated God for making me short! Why couldn’t I be statuesque like Lucy Lofty, or at least curvaceous like Mimi Malarkey?  

Now, by Chronos, I am eighty-five years old, and guess what? I’m growing shorter, day by bloomin’ day. Of course I know there’s a genetic and scientific explanation for my height. I know my height isn’t a diagnosable condition. I know my bones are worried about support and my skin is shriveling, my memory pillowing—my Chronos is almost up. 

*  *  *  *

Today, I read the biblical parable ( Mt. 20:1-16, also told in Mark, Luke), told by Jesus about the laborers in the vineyard. This small story, considered by Jesus scholars to be authentic to Jesus’ words and teachings, has created more argumentation, more ire from fair-minded business practitioners and even more spiritual chaos than most any other story Jesus told.  Equal pay for equal work is a quantitative Chronos-based practice. 

The refrain “the last will be first and the first last” is attached, although scholars doubt its placement here. Jesus doesn’t mock those who hold onto that practice, however, he does offer a Kairos way to understand why the vineyard keeper, the boss, often thought to be God/Creator, would pay ALL workers the same day’s wage, even though some arrived late and worked less time than those who labored all day. 

I don’t know exactly what Jesus might have been up to in his day. I do know that he  consistently spoke hope and blessing to the “poor”—those in deep need. 

I do know that every single worker was EQUAL in need, EQUAL in willingness to labor, and EQUAL in gratitude. And I do know that the vineyard owner freely chose to use his money in this UNEQUAL way.  UNFAIR shout the Chronos-bound people. 

THANKS BE TO GODDE, shout the Kairos-aware people. This is a Kairos parable.

*  *  *  * 

P.S. Consider the metaphoric parable of a tug-of-war. Two groups pull to WIN. One group finally loses strength and will and drops the rope—LOSERS.  The other group all fall down on their butts and declare themselves the WINNERS.    Now laugh! 

2023.09.17 Judgment. Lyn G. Brakeman, Spiritual Lemons, blog post

Ouch and cringe!  We cry and run in fear, imagining that there is a fierce God high above us who sees all and judges all—our every move, and even our inner thoughts. 

Not True! 

What I was a young child of six or seven we summered in a small farmhouse in Ancramdale, New York. This farming community was radically rural without a skyscraper in sight—an exhilarating contrast to the big city I lived in and loved. Here I could see vast expanses of open sky and empty fields where cows grazed and crops grew.  On clear nights I saw all the twinkling stars, twinkling just for me. The “heavens”.

Next to our house an enormous cornfield stretched out as far as my eye could see. I wanted to explore it but felt scared. What if I got lost?  But that was impossible I figured, because the rows were neat and orderly just like the lines on my school writing tablet. I could count each row and the number of stalks. I wouldn’t get lost. Excitedly, I stepped into the field and walked up and down some rows. Soon I began to run. Then I stood still and listened to the gentle whooshing of the sleek green leaves looping from each stalk. The field became my hideout—a place safe enough to whisper my secret.

I hated my mother. Well, not all the time and not for everything, but I hated that she gave me too much attention, lavishing me with praise and telling me I was perfect. I knew I wasn’t. I even stole a pack of gum once. No one should hate such an adoring mother, right?  I bet God would totally disapprove. Still, I had to tell my secret, very softly at first, then louder and louder, daily until harvest. I felt relieved when each time it all floated away in the hush and sh-h-h of the cornfield, every summer for years. 

And do you know that cornfield never told my secret. Never. 

                                    *  *  *  *  

This is how I learned that God is not vengeful, punitive. We are. Godde is not. Judgment did NOT mean divine condemnation or rejection. It simply means exposure to truth, bringing something into the light, no more and no less. 

YES, it might hurt a lot. 

NO, the world does not need to know.

YES, there are consequences. 

        YES, nothing is beyond forgiveness—not yours, not your neighbors, not G-d’s.