2022 By the Numbers
2022 BY THE NUMBERS (and our promise)
Happy New Year! At Theological Horizons, we are jumping headlong into 2022, equipped by your generosity (thank you!!) and inspired by fresh research:
#1 Among the Gen Z adults we serve, spirituality is a key to well-being right now:
FLOURISHING: across every indicator (work, relationships, physical and mental health) “very religious” adults under 25 are faring better than their nonreligious peers.
MEANING & PURPOSE: Highly spiritual young adults are more than twice as likely to say what they do in life feels valuable and worthwhile.
#2 Gen Z adults prize genuine connection with adult friends and spiritual mentors:
FAILURE: Only 10% of all young people told researchers that a faith leader had reached out to check in with them during the first year of the pandemic.
TRUST: The vast majority of young people (87%) say they trust adults who take time to foster relationships with them
Studies show (and we know!) that the adults of Gen Z are exploring everything, asking questions constantly, and craving guidance – even as they navigate an increasingly digitalized society that prioritizes connectivity and productivity. READ MORE OF THE RESEARCH
In light of this astonishing need, here is our Theological Horizons Promise for 2022:
Theological Horizons is committed to
initiating conversations with questions of genuine curiosity,
forging sustained, authentic connections, and
speaking truthfully to the unchanging love of God in Jesus Christ.
Thank you, thank you for wholeheartedly supporting this ministry with your financial gifts in 2021. We know that you are praying for us and cheering us on as we step out into a new year!
Karen
Karen Wright Marsh, Executive Director
P.S. Check out the new findings reported in Christianity Today. We created a pdf just for you!
New Years Prayers | January 2022
GREETINGS, FRIENDS!
As we enter into this new year, many of us come with questions for our futures; all of us come with uncertainty. From a people who have deeply known and yet not known what ground they stand on, may these words from Scripture translated by our First Nations sisters and brothers and a Lakota Sioux prayer give us a new vision of hope. - Christy Yates, Associate Director
“He will keep your feet on solid ground and guide you to the end of the trail so that you will have a good reputation when the day comes for our Honored Chief Creator Sets Free (Jesus) the Chosen One to be revealed."
1 Corinthians 1:8 - First Nations Version
Oh, Great Spirit,
Whose voice I hear in the winds
and whose breath gives life to all the world.
Hear me! I need your strength and wisdom.
Let me walk in beauty, and make my eyes
ever hold the red and purple sunset.
Make my hands respect the things you have made
and my ears sharp to hear your voice.
Make me wise so that I may understand
the things you have taught my people.
Let me learn the lessons you have hidden
in every leaf and rock.
Help me remain calm and strong in the
face of all that comes towards me.
Help me find compassion without
empathy overwhelming me.
I seek strength, not to be greater than my brother,
but to fight my greatest enemy: myself.
Make me always ready to come to you
with clean hands and straight eyes.
So when life fades, as the fading sunset,
my spirit may come to you without shame.
- Translated by Lakota Sioux Chief Yellow Lark in 1887
Christmas Day | Heart
“BUT MARY TREASURED ALL OF THESE WORDS AND PONDERED THEM IN HER HEART.”
LUKE 2:19
Mary listened as the shepherd shared all they had been told about her infant, and treasured and pondered them in her heart. No doubt, as Jesus grew, Mary would return to the shepherds’ proclamation and that of Gabriel’s before them. When raising the Son of God got complicated and painful, when Jesus went missing as an adolescent or began to get in trouble with the authorities, Mary must have pondered in her heart all the more, mulling over treasured words to reassure her of her son’s well-being despite all the danger his mission engendered.
Like Mary, some of our lives’ twists and turns, divine messages and earthly suffering, bring forth an ongoing conversation between us and the God whom we long to trust. When we attempt to hear and heed God’s call and faithfully go, we need God’s treasured words in order to remain steadfast.
Through it all, God’s call persists. God’s words, once spoken to us, cannot be unheard. Once written on our hearts, may we treasure them, ponder them, return to them and, with the help of the Holy Spirit, act on them. Glory to God in the highest!
FOR REFLECTION
When have you heard God's voice? How was it communicated to you? How did you discern that it was God speaking?
When you think of God's call to you, what comes to mind? What word of the Lord to you do you treasure? Ponder in your heart?
Have you had times in your life of faith when you questioned God's providence? What words of God sustained you during that time?
God of angels and shepherds, you speak to us in a multitude of ways, always seeking us out to inhabit your work and ways. We cannot fathom your glorious mysteries! Help us treasure up your words and ponder in our hearts the Word made flesh, Jesus Christ, come to earth this Christmas Day. Amen.
Christmas Eve | Cloth
“AND SHE GAVE BIRTH TO HER FIRSTBORN SON AND WRAPPED HIM IN BANDS OF CLOTH, AND LAID HIM IN A MANGER, BECAUSE THERE WAS NO PLACE FOR THEM IN THE INN.”
LUKE 2:1-7
Can you picture Mary? Exhausted from her trip and from childbirth, taking each strip of cloth and tenderly wrapping it around her firstborn son. I wonder if she did so haltingly, unsure if she was getting it right. On Christmas Eve, the full humanness of Jesus stuns me no less than when I looked at my own firstborn. After all this waiting and a preparation that cannot really prepare us: he is finally here and oh-so-beloved.
Mary wraps him in bands of cloth, for warmth, for security, comfort, and so much more. Mary swaddles the baby in whom we will be clothed, all of us enveloped by the unrelenting compassion and grace of our God. Even as we stumble and bumble, learn and fail, nothing can undo the mantle of love in which we are covered. We see the baby Jesus wrapped by his mother in bands of cloth and know that the One she holds has the whole world in his hands; therefore we can rest secure.
FOR REFLECTION
What are your most vivid Christmas Eve memories? What do they mean to you?
Have you ever swaddled a baby? Does this image speak to you of God’s love for us?
Whenever you touch cloth today, allow it to remind you that you are clothed in Christ, wrapped in the love of God. What might that feel like?
Immanuel, God with us, our wait is over, you are here. When we picture you, wrapped in bands of cloth, resting in your mother’s arms, we marvel that you came to us so humbly, without any earthly status. You truly are fully human, intimately aware of what it means to rely on others for care, to depend on people for help, to cry and hurt, to laugh and grow. You have compassion for us because you empathize with our vulnerability. As we celebrate your birth, we rejoice that we are enveloped in your love no less than you were swaddled in the manger.
Amen.
Vocation & Longing | Reflection by Victoria Van Dixhoorn '22
“How foolish!” my ten-year-old self would think, shaking my head at prosperity gospel preaching.
Growing up in a Christian home with two wise parents, I knew the promises of the prosperity gospel rang hollow and delivered little in the way of lasting hope. And yet, I have recognized a strain of prosperity gospel in my own thinking as it relates to feelings of ‘spiritual intimacy’ or closeness with God.
God does reward the faithful. “The prayer of a righteous person has great power as it is working,” says James 5:16. David writes in Psalm 34:17, “The righteous cry out, and the LORD hears them; he delivers them from all their troubles.”
Seeing answered prayers and recognizing God’s hand moving in our daily interactions often challenges me; and yet it is not so much the absence of my idea of deliverance that bothers my mind as much as the words about a righteous person.
To our human minds, so much of life seems paradoxical or at least conflicting.
“God is in control and has a sovereign plan for our lives.” Do we ditch retirement planning and the 401ks? Unfortunately, no. “We could die at any moment so live like there’s no tomorrow.” Do we spend all our money on Mojitos and Prada? Again, I hate to say it, no. “God has plans to use our talents as we work.” Do we forget LinkedIn and the hundreds of job adverts? Not yet.
The Bible gives us more general examples. ‘Live in the world but not of it.’ Live as someone who is fully saved but not fully sanctified. Live as new creations in your old broken body - that body which will drag you into the ruts of winter depression or push you towards too many drinks. God has a plan for our lives, every second and nanosecond of our lives, but we must still plan for our lives. I have always wrestled with this.
As humans, ‘things’ in a very meta sense, are beyond us.
Even staunch atheists will admit to this fact. Often, we view the world through distorted lenses: either overly optimistic, because it is either easier or brings us comfort, or pessimistic, because the problems are too large and the worries too beyond us. In her Ted Talk, “Everything Happens for a Reason,” Kate Bowler, professor at Duke, Stage IV cancer survivor and four-time author, remarks: “Sometimes we cannot even explain the happenings in our lives. We find ourselves unable to explain our ever trusted logic, “everything happens for a reason,” even if we can still believe it.
This is not the problem; the problem arises when we deny this fact - that things are beyond us - and try to make meaning and purpose for ourselves.
We have only to read the news or an occasional Buzzfeed article to see celebrities and other people we celebrate as ‘achievers’ wrestling with the same issue. Award-winning writer Melissa Broder puts the struggle to especially fine words in an article for the New York Times. In the article, Broder discusses how her disillusioned hope that she could make “meaning of life” ultimately left her with a “spiritual longing…for some kind of eternal beauty or ineffable truth…always just out of reach.”[i]
The struggle Broder voiced actually relates to issues of desire and longing, Dr. Chris Yates argues, in a piece he wrote for The Hedgehog Review. “Desire has become longing’s counterfeit,” Yates writes. We fail to see that desire is something cultivated in us by culture, society and nature to a degree, while longing extends past the physical reality of our world to something greater. In short, we can often satisfy desire, but we cannot satisfy longing.
My generation gets (probably well-deserved) shade for our distracted nature, our obsession with technology, and our idealism, among other things. But we have made progress in other areas of life, such as the fresh value many young adults place on tying purpose to work. Michael Jackson may have sung about personal commitments to make a change and address homelessness and child hunger on the streets in 1988, but the difference is that we seek to do so through our work, not just on the side. That is unique.
You may wonder where I am going with this, and here it is: sometimes we take our quest for purpose in our work too far; we try to satisfy our longing for Good and Meaning with our own efforts. As in an article for One Republic, many people feel a profound sense of disappointment in their search for purpose if they look to their work as the source. Indeed, the search for capital ‘P’ Purpose in any activity or relationship of this world will leave us unsatisfied, wanting more. And yet, we should pursue good relationships; we should seek a job that aligns with our values and uses our talents.
So how then can we make sense of vocation? Vocation suggests a commitment to something beyond ourselves and a hope for something greater than ourselves. When it comes to vocation, I am learning a few things.
First, that there is value in doing things we do not always enjoy. When we are challenged, often our perseverance and perspective grows. Relatedly, I am learning that much of life consists of showing up, completing responsibilities, and fulfilling duties to our coworkers, friends, and family. Third, I am realizing that we are called to live step-by-step and walk with wisdom - what some have called ‘doing the next right thing.’ We are not called to plan every second and nanosecond of our lives. God has done that already.
Much of life is not black and white. God has not left us with a template for how much to sleep and eat, where to work and who to befriend. So much of life is beyond us. We are simply called to constantly realign our desires with our longing for heaven and harmony with God. This requires immediate action and immediate waiting. Ah yes, another paradox. We act in faith and we wait in faith. This must become our practice.
The practice of realigning our desires toward longing, and thus toward God, requires that we cultivate this ability in our minds and hearts. Cultivation may mean slowing down or stepping back from certain commitments; it may mean beginning some friendships and ending others; it may mean walks in nature or afternoons of pick-up soccer. Cultivating an active and waiting heart in our daily lives, attuned to our responsibilities and God’s will takes work. In fact, it is our vocation.
“Oh what a bother,” you may be thinking. “How tiring and discouraging this will be.” God knows our human frailty. He knows our frame better than we know ourselves. Thankfully, God hears us when we cry out not on the merit of our own righteousness or our belief; rather, we are given the prosperity of heaven by the merit of His grace and Christ’s saving work on the cross. Our Father knows our needs and has given us the Holy Spirit to guide us in our vocation and cultivate our hearts. With his help, when we cultivate them with intention, our desires will move us in the moment, but our longing will move us toward eternity.
In Ephesians 1:18, Paul writes, “I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened in order that you may know the hope to which he has called you, the riches of his glorious inheritance in his holy people.” To anyone who stumbles across this reflection, as I pray this for myself, I pray this for you: that you may draw close to He who guides our vocation, fulfills our longing and restores our souls.
[i] Melissa Broder, “Life without Longing,” New York Times, February 9, 2019, https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/09/style/love-infatuation-longing.html.)
Advent Week 4 | Trees
“OUT OF THE GROUND THE LORD GOD MADE TO GROW EVERY TREE THAT IS PLEASANT TO THE SIGHT AND GOOD FOR FOOD, THE TREE OF LIFE ALSO THAT IS IN THE MIDST OF THE GARDEN, AND THE TREE OF THE KNOWLEDGE OF GOOD AND EVIL.”
GENESIS 2:9
God is good, all the time. Recognizing the foundational truth of divine goodness allows people of faith to call out evil and even dare to combat it with tenacious love.
Seeing the glory, tenacity, longevity, variety of the trees that surround me reveals God's goodness, all the time, when I am awake enough to pay attention to them. The tree of life in Genesis exists not only in the garden of Eden, but in my backyard and indeed all over the world. God's good creation provides and sustains life, abundant life, not merely survival. Trees clean the air and water, they provide shade and produce fruit, they mark the seasons and time. They are life-giving reflections of our life-giving God. They remind us that God is good, all the time. All the time, God is good.
This season many of us will put up a tree within the walls of our homes, string it with lights, and decorate it with ornaments for no purpose other than to enjoy its superfluous beauty. Why go through all the effort? What's the point? Perhaps we yearn to participate in God's creative, lovely, life-affirming, good creation in a way that defies whatever conspires to overtake the light and love of the One who sends Jesus Christ not to condemn the world but to save it. Maybe we, too, want to be over-the-top in our expressions of beauty that signal to those with eyes to see that God is good, all the time. All the time, God is good.
FOR REFLECTION
What reminds you of God's goodness? Is there something in creation that reminds you of God's good and life-giving presence?
During this Advent season, when we are called to be awake to God, what is giving you a sense of God's nearness?
Could your prayer today the call and response, “God is good, all the time”? How does repeating this truth color your perspective?
God, you are good, all the time. Your goodness resounds through creation and through every creature. You gift us with beauty so diverse and persistent that were we to notice all of it, we would be utterly overwhelmed by your life-affirming power. As we go about our day, grant us eyes to see the trees of life that surround us, giving thanks for their ability to provide food, shelter for animals, air for us to breathe, leaves and flowers that are breathtakingly pleasing to our sight. All the time, you, God, are good. Help us to recognize your goodness and make it visible to others.
Amen.
Advent in Plain Sight - Book Talk with Jill Duffield
Did you miss our Advent in Plain Sign Book talk with Jill Duffield? Not to worry! Pour yourself a cup of tea, get the laundry to fold or go for a walk and enjoy this 30 min. conversation.
Advent Week 3 | Belts
“RIGHTEOUSNESS WILL BE THE BELT AROUND HIS WAIST,
AND FAITHFULNESS THE SASH AROUND HIS HIPS.”ISAIAH 11:1-9
The Savior soon-to-become incarnate ushers in a peaceable kingdom that is difficult for us to imagine. The The Savior soon-to-become incarnate ushers in a peaceable kingdom that is difficult for us to imagine. The One sent by God reverses what seems like an intractable order of things, where the strong suppress the weak, creation is perpetually exploited, where wars are endlessly fought. Isaiah declares what seems impossible: that equity will be enacted for the meek, the wolf and the lamb will lie down together, and that the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord.
Isaiah’s words are more than simply lovely poetry to assuage our weary souls. They expand our imagination and call us to wrap ourselves with God’s belt of righteousness, gird our hips with faithfulness, and make a holy commitment to reshape our world right here and right now. Where raw power threatens to overtake moral authority, our determined effort to preserve ideals can serve as a bridge to the future.
This Advent, may we put on the belt of righteousness and daily pursue the ideals of delight, faithfulness, fear and knowledge of the Lord, living out God’s promise of a peaceable kingdom.
FOR REFLECTION
Read Isaiah 11 slowly. Do you see glimpses of this vision in your life? In the world?
What would it mean for you to wear a belt of righteousness? Of being wrapped with faithfulness?
What is the role of vision in shaping change, both personally and as a community and culture?
PRAYER
Loving God, as we anticipate the coming of the Christ child, we lament how limited our vision is. We often give in to the sentiment that things never really change, that transformation is impossible. Kindle our hope with the prophet’s words of equity, justice, and delight. Wrap us in your righteousness and faithfulness, that we might see the world through the eyes of divine promise and enact holy possibilities for Jesus’ sake. Amen.
Pay Attention & Wait | Reflections by Fellow Gen Charles '22
I haven’t been doing much deep thinking lately. I’ve been caught up in normal school life and fun activities, classes and work, that I forgot to check in regularly, both with God and with myself.
When I was fifteen, I started journaling. My journals were filled with the typical teenage angst mixed in with questions about God and what I should do with my life and who I wanted to become. And in some ways, my current journal is the same. Or at least it should be. I still have questions about God and who I want to be, but I haven’t been asking them.
I haven’t set aside the time to settle down and put my finger on what’s going on deep inside me. Part of that is busyness and how I don’t want to miss anything as a fourth year (because FOMO). The other part of it is fear. There are some questions we don’t ask because we’re afraid of the answer. Calling is a hard thing to think about. It’s sort of amorphous. Maybe I’m not quite sure of the definition of calling. For me, in some sense, it’s a deeper longing. A long lasting desire that doesn’t bend to the whims of time and circumstance. And for people like me, that’s hard to figure out. You have to learn to (and be willing to) strip away the noise—what you are told to desire, what you feel you should desire, what you even believe you are allowed to desire.
Strip it all away and get to the root of what is beneath the surface, hiding behind the muck to get to calling. That’s where God comes in. He lovingly calls us out of hiding, out of our misconceptions of what life should be and asks us to trust him into what he can make it. It’s tempting to chase after the answer of What is my calling? that we forget the one who is doing the calling.
While working towards calling (or stumbling into it) is important, I’ve neglected the more important thing: to pay attention to God. The gift of time and attention is what we long for in our deepest relationships. And though relationships also include giving gifts and affirmations and are about joy and sorrow, they boil down to presence. To sacrifice time and energy in other pursuits for the greater reward of being present together. This is God’s call to me, and I suspect for you too. That I wouldn’t chase answers but that I would pay attention to him and trust that he will lead me where he wants me to go.
Paying attention goes hand in hand with waiting. Lingering long enough to watch something happen. Focusing my gaze for a particular glimpse. It’s enticing for me to take things into my own hands and start building a list of jobs to apply to and contacting everyone I know about what they think I should do. It’s a greater act of faith to sit and be attentive to God. To watch and wait as he writes my story. To pay attention to this God who calls me his beloved and walks with me wherever he leads. That’s my calling for today.
Advent Week 2 | Tears
“O LORD GOD OF HOSTS,
HOW LONG WILL YOU BE ANGRY WITH YOUR PEOPLE’S PRAYERS?
YOU HAVE FED THEM WITH THE BREAD OF TEARS,
AND GIVEN THEM TEARS TO DRINK IN FULL MEASURE.”
-PSALM 80:4-5
As jaunty holiday music blasts sentimental happiness, the psalmist’s talk of eating and drinking tears feels inappropriate, even rude. Yet the message of Advent is not one of superficial optimism, but rather of tenacious hope. Jesus becomes incarnate not because the world overflows with peace, joy and kindness. Jesus comes to earth to bring light to those who sit in deep darkness.
Days of aching, seasons of longing – each of us serves terms of suffering.
The birth of Jesus, the colliding of the mystery of divinity with the finitude of humanity, means that nothing – no feeling, no experience, no question, no doubt, no pain – is off-limits to God’s redemptive power and saving grace. Jesus himself knows the diet of tear-filled bread and water; his mother, Mary, does, too. Do not be ashamed of screaming, “O Lord God of Hosts, how long?” That groan from the dark night of the soul reverberates through history and all the way up to heaven. That cry is answered by Immanuel, God with us, no matter what.
FOR REFLECTION
When have you eaten the “bread of tears”? How about your neighbors? Our country? Our world? How might the bread of tears be replaced with the bread of life?
Around Christmas it feels difficult to express lament and sadness. How can you make room for those who may find this season not one of delight but one of pain?
How long, O Lord God of Hosts, will we eat and drink salty tears? We trust that no feeling or experience is off-limits to your redemptive grace, Lord, and so we cry out to you in our weakness and sorrow without shame or embarrassment. We pour out our hearts to the One who sends Immanuel to save us. We wait for your face to shine upon us, the light no darkness can overcome. We wait in hope even as we pray in anguish. Amen.
December Prayers | In him all things hold together
“All Things.” Oil, gold & silver leaf on panel. 48 x 36 inches.
GREETINGS, FRIENDS!
I recently was commissioned by my church, All Souls, to commemorate Christ the King Sunday. This painting above, entitled, “All Things," is, I think, a fitting way to mark both the end and beginning of our church year. I hope you can sit with it for a minute in a brief “visio divina” to see what the Christ child might be saying to you this day.
Christians in the Visual Arts (CIVA) is hosting a juried virtual Advent exhibit entitled, Yes!. The above work as well as 26 others are available for your Advent meditations.
“He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn of all creation: for by Him all things were created, both in the heavens and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones, or dominions, or rulers, or authorities—all things have been created through Him and for Him. He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together."
Colossians 1:15-17
The Love of Morning
It is hard sometimes to drag ourselves
back to the love of morning
after we’ve lain in the dark crying out
O God, save us from the horror. . . .
God has saved the world one more day
even with its leaden burden of human evil;
we wake to birdsong.
And if sunlight’s gossamer lifts in its net
the weight of all that is solid,
our hearts, too, are lifted,
swung like laughing infants;
but on gray mornings,
all incident—our own hunger,
the dear tasks of continuance,
the footsteps before us in the earth’s
belovéd dust, leading the way—all,
is hard to love again
for we resent a summons
that disregards our sloth, and this
calls us, calls us.
-Denise Levertov
Advent Week 1 | Gates
“AND JACOB WAS AFRAID, AND SAID, ‘HOW AWESOME IS THIS PLACE! THIS IS NONE OTHER THAN THE HOUSE OF GOD, AND THIS IS THE GATE OF HEAVEN.”
GENESIS 28:17
Jacob sets out on a journey. On his way he stops for the night, finds a stone for a pillow, and settles into sleep, only to have his slumber disrupted by a vivid dream of a ladder travelled by angels, bridging the divide between heaven and earth, between the holy and human. God comes up close to Jacob, speaking promises of eternal blessing and companionship.
As we prepare for the birth of Jesus and the return of Christ, all around us God opens the gates of heaven, breaches whatever barriers we erect, and reveals ladders between the divine and dailiness in our lives. God arrives to stand beside us – to bless us and make us a blessing, even to all the families of the earth.
FOR REFLECTION
As you enter this season of Advent, where do you sense God’s close presence? How can you invite an awareness of God with you wherever you are?
Where do you encounter gates? What are they keeping in or keeping out? When you see a gate this week, imagine God breaching it and seeking out those on the other side.
How might you be blessed in order to be a blessing to all the families of the earth?
Lord, who knows no bounds and whose blessing is for all the families of the earth, forgive our limited vision and diminished imagination. Visit us in our vulnerability and open any gate that seeks to keep you at bay from any aspect of our lives. Open our eyes to see your angels all around us and unlatch our hearts to welcome you. Amen.
Join us on Thursday, December 9 from 12:00-12:30 for a virtual Lunchtime Book Talk with Jill Duffield, author of Advent In Plain Sight: A Devotion Through Ten Objects. To register: karen@theologicalhorizons.org. Thanks to Jill for allowing us to adapt her book for these Advent e-devotionals!
For your Thanksgiving Table | Growing in Gratitude
During this season of Thanksgiving, we invite you to gather with friends, family -- or simply take time on your own -- to count your blessings. May these tools help you to “cultivate a buoyant, joyous sense of the crowded kindnesses of God in your daily life.” (Alexander Maclaren, 19th c.) We are grateful for YOU!
O Taste and See That the Lord is Good (3 minutes)
Bring your awareness to your five senses. Now craft a prayer to the God who surrounds you with good things and the capacity to savor them!
O God who created this body of mine,
I am thankful that I can TASTE ______________________
I am thankful that I can SEE __________________________
I am thankful that I can TOUCH _______________________
I am thankful that I can SMELL _______________________
I am thankful that I can HEAR ________________________
Personalize the Psalm (4 minutes)
Reflect on prayers you’ve prayed over the past year --- and times when you have been aware of God’s provision and protection. As you read Psalm 28, imagine yourself jumping, shouting and singing in gratitude to God – then finish the psalm with your own words of thanks!
Psalm 28:6-9 The Message
Blessed be God— he heard me praying.
He proved he’s on my side; I’ve thrown my lot in with him.Now I’m jumping for joy, and shouting and singing my thanks to God:
The Silent Gratitude Map (15 minutes)
Gather into groups of up to 5 people and take a large sheet of paper and pens or colored markers for each group. Follow these prompts
#1 Silently reflect upon things in life for which you are grateful.
As each of you thinks of something, write it onto the sheet, and place a circle around the word/s. Everyone can write at once! Write as many as come to mind.
#2 Now draw a line from your circled items and write a reason why you are grateful for each one.
For example, if Ali writes, ‘my home,’ she might draw a line to it and write the words, ‘I can relax.’
#3 Take a few minutes to silently read others’ various responses and draw your own lines and write reasons you’re grateful for others’ items. Fill up the paper!
For example, if Jon also feels grateful for a home, then he might draw a line from Ali’s circle and write his own a reason.
#4 Now talk together about what you learned through the exercise.
Share Your Blessings (4 minutes)
“All the blessings we enjoy are Divine deposits, committed to our trust on this condition, that they should be dispensed for the benefit of our neighbors.” (John Calvin, 16thc.)
Consider the “Divine deposits” in your life.
Can you think of one particular blessing that you might use for the benefit of a neighbor, friend, family member or stranger? How might you put that into action this coming week?
Write your intention.
It’s THANKSGIVING Time! (8 minutes)
When does it feel like THANKSGIVING to you? Read the poem “Thanksgiving Time” by Langston Hughes (1902-1967) then recruit family or friends to help write one more verse of your own. (Rhyming is optional!)
When the night winds whistle through the trees
and blow the crisp brown leaves a-crackling down,
When the autumn moon is big and yellow-orange and round,
When old Jack Frost is sparkling on the ground,
It's Thanksgiving Time!
When the pantry jars are full of mince-meat
and the shelves are laden with sweet spices for a cake,
When the butcher man sends up a turkey nice and fat to bake,
When the stores are crammed with everything ingenious cooks can make,
It's Thanksgiving Time!
When the gales of coming winter outside your window howl,
When the air is sharp and cheery so it drives away your scowl,
When one's appetite craves turkey and will have no other fowl,
It's Thanksgiving Time!
What says THANKSGIVING to you? Write one final verse!
When…(use lines or opaque/tinted blocks beginning with the word When -- To create three-four lines of poetry)
When…
When…
It’s Thanksgiving Time!
Better Late Than Never (15 minutes)
#1 Collect notecards, envelopes and stamps.
#2 Take a few minutes to think about the past. Now write a letter of gratitude to someone in your life who has never been properly thanked for their kindness, whether large or small.
#3 Address the envelope and put it in the mailbox. Better yet, deliver and read your letter in person. Emails and phone calls count, too!
Calling & Constraints | Reflections by Fellow Thomas Hamilton '21
I grew up with a great reverence for NASA. My father was a kid when American heroes like Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin were plastered across every newspaper, with the Apollo program hitting its stride. I couldn’t help but adopt the same enthusiasm for everything space travel. Ostensibly, I was pretty good at math in high school, and I did alright in the one physics class I took. So, I was keen on being an astrophysicist before coming into college. I quickly learned that my skills were not as developed as some of the geniuses that go here, but I figured nothing comes easy. I was willing to struggle, to grind myself down to the bone to give this dream a fighting chance.
The Holy Spirit, the third Person of the Trinity, certainly speaks. Maybe His voice isn’t explicit or well defined, but God has the wonderful ability to place special convictions within us. When it came to rebuilding the walls of Jerusalem, Nehemiah didn’t have some booming command from God. He said that He simply “put it into his heart” (Neh. 2:12). Paul redirected his ministry based on a personal “ambition”, preaching where Christ has not already been named (Rom. 15:20). I’ll go ahead and say these are examples of a “calling”, a growing desire and ability to serve the Lord through satisfying the hunger of the world. The hope is that whatever our perceived purpose or calling is: 1) we’re good at it, 2) we love it , 3) we can be paid for it and 4) the world needs it. What’s maybe left out of the whole “calling” conversation is the reality that we will face constraints. Not all of these areas are going to intersect and that is the inevitability of our fallen nature.
I decided to stop pursuing my dream of being the cool space guy a while ago. I simply was not that good at physics, and grad school was entirely too expensive. Was I disobedient to God’s call? Nah. I’ve found I can do other things too. I lead a bible study once a week. I like being a vessel for the Lord to lead others to faith. I enjoy listening and giving a space for others to share. Heck, I’m pursuing a career in vocational ministry. It’s a complete 180 for sure, and I’m not saying our callings have to be that radical. But, it’s something I truly love, and it’s a job where I believe I can honor God best. There are still some constraints that come with that. The pay isn’t exactly that great (sorry Dad), and as a white guy, I’m going to have to spend some extra energy breaking down my own privilege to be able to empathize with ALL of the members of my community. It’s a privilege and a blessing to even have the ability to consider a calling. Those in poverty are just trying to make ends meet, taking up whatever job is available. Soon-to-be mothers are pressured with the task of finding a work-life balance, juggling new constraints on time and energy while raising a needy child. I champion that purpose can be found in whatever job we undertake. As Christians, our work is a form of worship to our Lord; it is how we work that gives shape to our respective part within the body of Christ (Col. 3:23 & 1 Cor. 12:12). The Great Commission, the duty we’ve been assigned to “make disciples of all nations” (Matt. 28:19), is more than enough purpose. It is within our worldly jobs that we have been given the holy authority to be the salt and light of the earth! How wonderful is that.
November Prayers | For God's nearness in the coming dark
GREETINGS, FRIENDS!
As we settle deeper into fall, let's attend gently to our bodies and those around us and know that the Lord is near, especially in those places of fear and decay and increasing darkness.
“The Lord is near to those who call upon him: to all who call upon him faithfully.”
Strange God who made dying beautiful,
I abandon myself to your curious beauty this day.
Let me cherish the blood and bone of all the life you have given
when the fears of no-life creep in and I am cold.
May I befriend the dark with open eye at summer's end.
May I stoke the feisty fire of my desire as vibrant as the leaves I see.
May my creative impulses leap like the speckled salmon as I embrace the
fertility of winter.
May I love the ground on which I stand, as the leaf mould and decay of
summer mulches the soil and strengthens roots.
May I hunker down, curled up like a hedgehog, in dark peace of quiet.
May my wholesome table bulge with roasted earth fruits, steaming pies and
warming drink, fuelling my body for the wintry days.
Let me celebrate the sacred vigour of dying as I welcome this autumn day.
O Living One,
bring comfort in the warm damp drizzly days
when the copper glow of autumn is colourless and grey.
For it is summer’s end and all is put away,
hidden in the unknown darkness,
like our fears of womb and tomb that we do not willingly invite,
until they interrupt our day-to-day and reckon with our real time.
Be with all this day living in that slow moment-by-moment capsule
of birth and grief.
Protect our fragility when we are sealed in by shock,
and help us to honour the special gift of tenderness at that time.
Treasure of my soul, as the light glints with topaz and amber,
And you gild the season and crown the trees
bejewel my time with moments when your presence shines through.
Bless me with your precious love as I set out this day/lie down this night.
-Tess Ward
From The Celtic Wheel of the Year: Celtic and Christian Seasonal Prayers
Leadership Lessons | Vintage Lunch with CDR Simpson + Natasha Sistrunk Robinson
Mentoring coach Natasha Sistrunk Robinson returns for a conversation with Navy Cdr. LaDonna M. Simpson, decorated Commanding Officer of the USS Carter Hall. Commander Simpson and Ms. Robinson are both graduates of the U.S. Naval Academy with much to share on faith and leadership. All are welcome. In person outdoors under the white tent at St. Paul’s on the Corner and livestreamed on Facebook on Friday, Nov 5.
Free lunch catered by Soul Food Joint will be served at 1:00. The program begins at 1:15pm ET.
Books Sojourner’s Truth and Mentor for Life by Natasha Sistrunk Robinson will be for sale by Sycamore Tree Bookstore.
Commander LaDonna Simpson is a graduate of the United States Naval Academy with a Bachelor of Science in Chemistry and holds a Master of Engineering Management from Old Dominion University.
CDR Simpson serves as Commanding Officer of USS CARTER HALL (LSD 50). Her operational tours have spanned the Fifth and Sixth Fleet Areas of Responsibility to include deployments in support of Operations IRAQI FREEDOM and ENDURING FREEDOM. She served aboard USS CARTER HALL (LSD 50), USS THEODORE ROOSEVELT (CVN 71), USS BULKELEY (DDG 84), USS HARRY S. TRUMAN (CVN 75), and recently served as Executive Officer onboard USS CARTER HALL (LSD 50).
Shore assignments included duty on the staff of the Director, Surface Warfare (N96) as the Anti-Submarine Warfare (ASW) Section Head, the staff of the Deputy Chief of Naval Operations (Manpower, Personnel, Training and Education) (N133) as the Surface Nuclear Officer Program Manager and within the Navy Appropriations Matters Office for the Assistant Secretary of the Navy (FM&C) as a congressional liaison.
Decorations include the Meritorious Service Medal, Navy and Marine Corps Commendation Medal (four awards), the Navy and Marine Corps Achievement Medal (three awards), and the Navy Meritorious Unit Commendation (two awards).
For All Saints Day | November 1
“God creates out of nothing. Wonderful! you say. Yes, to be sure, but God does what is still more wonderful: God makes saints out of sinners.”
Søren Kierkegaard
All Saints Day, in which the global church honors those saints who have passed on, both known and unknown, both famous and obscure; is celebrated by Methodist, Lutheran, Anglican, and Roman Catholic traditions on November 1. Here is a litany for that day.
A Litany for All Saints Day by Fran Pratt
God, we remember those Saints who have gone before us;
We lament their passing,
And honor their legacy.
We give thanks for all we have learned from them.
Those who followed the Way of Christ faithfully,
We follow their example.
Those who made mistakes along the way,
We learn from their experience.
Those who made progress for peace,
We continue their work.
Those who lived simply and quietly,
We are enlightened by them.
Those who gained honor and distinction without pride,
We are humbled by them.
Those who were martyred for their faith,
We commend them to your care.
They have finished their work on earth,
And it lives on,
Reverberating into our lives now
As the work of Christ lives on.
May the peace of Christ continue to inspire us
To good works, humility, simplicity and peacemaking,
As those foremothers and forefathers were inspired by him
To live in grace and love.
Amen
Interview with Goodwin Prize Winner Clare Kemmerer
We are thrilled to introduce you to our top Goodwin Prize winner, Clare Kemmerer (Yale Institute of Sacred Music), for her essay, "Sisters in Complicity: Anti-Judaism at a Late Medieval Convent.”
Abstract: Building upon the frameworks developed by Stephanie Jones-Rogers and Elizabeth McRae which centralize the role of women in perpetuating racial violence and discrimination, this paper expands their application to the racial and religious persecution of Jews in late medieval Europe. Offering a case-study of a medieval German convent, this paper seeks to complicate both the study of medieval racial politics and that of medieval women religious. Using artistic, economic and written evidence from the fourteenth-century life at Kloster Lüne, this paper explores the ways that class, gender, and religion allowed the nuns to uniquely participate in a culture of anti-Judaism.
Where do you see connections between your personal faith, your intellectual work and the other aspects of your life?
I spend a lot of time thinking about complicity writ large—and some of that time is spent considering my own complicity, and some of it that of historic figures or members of the Church. My research has taught me to be critical of institutional teachings, to acknowledge complex power relationships, and to have empathy for people who are radicalized by misinformation; practices that are I think as important (if not more important) to being a Christian leftist as they are to being a good medievalist.
How would you summarize your paper for someone without a theological background?
This is a tough question, as I'm not sure *I* have a theological background--my training is in art history. But put simply, this paper uses material evidence from a medieval convent (in the form of a large embroidery) to make a theoretical argument concerning the participation of the nuns at that convent in anti-Judaism in the Middle Ages. To be clear, I’m not talking about participation in some kind of physical event (i.e. a pogrom), but a slippery, hard to quantify participation in cultural anti-Judaism. To make this argument, I drew a lot from historians like Elizabeth McRae and Stephanie Jones-Rogers, who have both written about the role of white women in different aspects of white supremacy in the United States. My argument predominantly concerns the role of nuns as artists and religious figures in articulating an anti-Jewish theology, a role that is often scholastically ignored due to the assumption that women, especially monastic women, were so cloistered as to be completely removed from society. In a sentence, the paper seeks to complicate narratives of religious and racial oppression in the Middle Ages by acknowledging the complicity of Christian women, and highlighting their position at the complex intersection of oppressor and oppressed.
How might this award make a difference in your life as you consider your future?
Materially, it’ll allow me to do some follow-up research on this project, tracking down further archival materials in Germany. It’s also been a helpful and needed reminder that the work I do is in conversation with the modern Church, despite my medieval focus. I hope I’ll be able this coming year to do some writing about theology and complicity in a more modern and accessible context.
After completing my MAR at the Institute of Sacred Music, I’m planning to pursue doctoral studies in the History of Art, continuing my concentration in the art and material culture of the Middle Ages. Beyond that—we’ll see! It would be a joy to spend my time teaching or working with objects, but I’m open to all of the ways I might pursue those things, in and especially beyond the academic world.
How do you spend your time when you are not studying?
Recently, I’ve been trying to fall in love with reading novels again; Connie Willis’ beautiful science-fiction tributes to the joys and heartbreaks of history have been sustenance for many long train rides. I spent most of the pandemic living in New Orleans, where I enjoyed long walks around Bayou St. John, where the sunsets are magical and sherbet-colored and there are often pelicans diving. My partner converted to Catholicism this past Easter, so a lot of my down time has been theological, too; re-encountering or encountering aspects of the tradition through the lens of her curiosity. Lately I’ve been in Connecticut full-time, so I’m learning to love my new home through long walks among the changing leaves, glorious fresh bread from the bakery next-door, and trying to get to know my neighbors.
Any other comments?
My thanks to Theological Horizons, for their support of graduate students, to my advisor at the ISM, Vasileios Marinis, and to Nicole Paxton Sullo, who kindly edited an early iteration of this paper.
Jesus Christ & The Importance of History | A webinar with N.T. Wright
Please join us and our friends at the Consortium for Christian Study Centers for a webinar with renowned New Testament Scholar, N.T. Wright.
Christianity appeals to history. Something happened, in the events concerning Jesus, as a result of which — so Christians claim — the world is a different place. But how does ‘history’ actually work? What can it do to help the tasks of theology and apologetics, and above all the work of the gospel?
N. T. Wright is an English New Testament scholar, Pauline theologian, and Anglican bishop. Author of numerous books and articles, he is perhaps best known in scholarly circles for his multi-volume work Christian Origins and the Question of God, which includes The Resurrection of the Son of God and Paul and the Faithfulness of God. On the popular side, his commentaries in The New Testament for Everyone series stand out for their clarity and readability. Equally at home in the church and the academy, Wright was the bishop of Durham from 2003 to 2010. He then became research professor of New Testament and Early Christianity at St Mary’s College in the University of St Andrews in Scotland until 2019, when he became a senior research fellow at Wycliffe Hall at the University of Oxford.
Shaka Sydnor on Hope
Shake Sydnor shares a 12 minute Spark Talk on Hope at our September Deeper Dialogues.
WHAT IS THE DEEPER DIALOGUES INITIATIVE AT UVA?
Deeper Dialogues is a series of facilitated and structured small-group conversations around five topics of human flourishing taking place through June 2022. It is sponsored by Theological Horizons in partnership with Essential Partners. ALL ARE WELCOME.
WHAT IS THE GOAL OF DEEPER DIALOGUES?
The Deeper Dialogues initiative has three primary goals:
● To convene a variety of stakeholders — faculty, students, staff & administrators — from across the university community to improve understanding and connection around common challenges and goals;
● To leverage the unique resources of the university context (e.g. intellectual curiosity, original research, physical proximity) to facilitate honest exchange and promote greater collaboration between and among various members of the university community; AND
● To give community members an experience of reflective structured dialogue in which conversations of meaning and purpose foster a university culture of greater compassion and care, with the added hope that participants will leave equipped with dialogic communication tools transferable to other UVA spaces, groups and discussions.