Hello Synod Leaders,
The MAY 2021 edition of The Spirit is now available.
The Spirit is a monthly publication of the NW Washington Synod. This month's edition features articles written by Bishop Shelley Bryan Wee and Synod Vice President, Kay Edgerton. Our hope is that these will be included for sharing in your congregation's April newsletter.
For the next few months we are trying an experiment.
As you know, our hope is that congregations will place these articles in their own newsletters and communications. It appears that most often when The Spirit is shared in a congregational communication, it is a simple "cut and paste" from our WORD version. So... the next few months we are only creating and sending a WORD version that you can download and utilize. Please let me know if this works well for your sharing. Thanks!
Holding you in prayer as we continue to navigate these days together,
Susan Lindsay Berg
Communications & Events
NW Washington Synod | ELCA
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Here are the full articles if you simply wish to read them!
From the Bishop:
In the book Anxious People, the author, Fredrik Backman, crafts a humorous, poignant, and wise story of a group of people thrown together because of a bank robbery. But the bank robbery is the least interesting part of the book. The characters, who seem flighty and weird and strange or just unlikeable at the beginning of the book, change into complex humans with such rich inner lives that you love each of them by the end of the story. This was one book that I was sad to see end because I wanted to continue with each character in their journey.
I finished this book during Holy Week. And I couldn’t help but reflect on the flighty, weird, strange and unlikeable people that surrounded Jesus that we get to know in the Gospels. These men and women who leave everything to follow Jesus – and who end up leaving Jesus after his arrest – only to once again connect with Jesus after his death and resurrection – are (we must admit) flighty, weird, strange and unlikeable.
· Thomas who is skeptical throughout the Jesus story and who won’t recognize Jesus until seeing his wounds.
· Mary Magdalene who can’t recognize Jesus until he calls her by her name.
· The disciples locked in a room, afraid to go out, and finally just going back to fishing until Jesus shows up once again.
I mean, ask yourself:
· Would we really have wanted John the Baptist over for a barbecue?
· Would we really have accepted a woman who washed Jesus’ feet as being justified when she extravagantly wasted an expensive bottle of perfume?
· Would we have embraced the woman who bled for over a decade and invited her to our book club even after she assured us that she was cured and clean?
I finished this book during Holy Week. And I couldn’t help but reflect on the flighty, weird, strange and unlikeable people around me – on the news, on social media, in my neighborhood – and how I have judged them based on a very superficial understanding of who they are and what makes up their story. I call them ignorant or lazy, bigoted or uncaring, dirty or smelly or unclean in some way.
But as I continue to reflect on Backman’s compelling story of seven “idiots” (as he calls them), and, as I continue to reflect on Holy Week, (even though it is now way past Holy Week), I see Jesus kneeling down and washing feet. I hear Jesus saying, “Peace be with you.” I experience Jesus embracing disciples on a beach, offering them fish, and saying, “Feed my sheep.” Loving and caring and forgiving – even though these humans are flighty, weird, strange and, at times, unlikeable.
None of us are Jesus. None of us can embrace the other as Jesus did. And yet, we are called, as sinners and as beloved children of God, to hear another’s story. To listen. To reflect. To forgive. To ask for forgiveness. To engage. To be silent when needed and speak when necessary.
For my part, I repent. I repent for my judgment, for my verdict that I render without knowing the complexity of another’s story, for my blindness to my complicity, for my withholding forgiveness in the name of self-righteousness, for my refusing to acknowledge my need for forgiveness, and for my judgment on who God loves and who God does not love (because, as I have been taught, if God only loves those I love, than I have remade God in my image).
So I ask you, dear Beloveds of NWWA Synod, with all of your stories, how may your stories be joined into the One Story? How may your hearts be open to the flighty, weird, strange, sometimes unlikeable (but always God’s beloved) people that we are called to love? What are your thoughts, feelings, explorations, attempts, experiments? I’d love to hear how you are living into God’s Holy Community of love, grace, compassion, justice and peace.
As for you, you are called. By name. Embraced, loved, and cherished – in all your flighty, weird, strange, sometimes unlikeable ways. And always, always, God’s beloved.
+ Bishop Shelley Bryan Wee
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From the VEEP:
The New Normal. How often have we heard that phase recently? It seems like it is showing up everywhere, even in the funny pages. In the March 21, 2021 comic strip “Frazz,” the punchline was: “By the time we know something is normal, it won’t be new.” That made me stop and think. How true is that? I think one thing the last year has taught me is how quickly we adapt and how quickly things begin to feel normal. Thoreau, in his book Walden comments, “It is remarkable how easily and insensibly we fall into a particular route, and make a beaten track for ourselves.” That kind of adaptability can help us cope with the kind of upheaval we’ve had the past year, but it can also allow us to normalize things that should not be considered normal. When our response to the question “Have you heard about the latest shooting?” is “Mass or police?” we might want to stop and reflect on what track we have beaten for ourselves.
During this Eastertide, I’ve thought a lot about that first Holy Week and Easter. What upheaval the disciples experienced! They went from entering the city cheered on by the crowd, to the cries of, “Crucify Him!” in less than a week. Then came the very public execution and the miraculous resurrection. I’ve wondered what the disciples thought of their new normal as these events unfolded. We know there was fear and denial and doubt. Who should they believe? What should they do in this world turned upside down? They had to sort through all the fake news of the day, all the rumors and whispers, to decide who to believe. They sure didn’t believe Mary Magdalene nor the others who brought the first reports of the resurrection: “But these words seemed to them an idle tale, and they did not believe them” (Luke 24:11). Even once they saw with their own eyes, some doubted (Matthew 28:17). Called to proclaim the Good News of the risen Christ, first they had to believe. According to the book of Mark, Jesus even upbraided them for their lack of faith and stubbornness before sending them forth in His name. It took a while for them to adapt to their new normal.
As I help plan for a return to in-person school and worship, how do I go forward in faith and adapt to the changes that have happened and continue to happen? How do I push for a new normal that is better then the old normal? How can I normalize love, justice, forgiveness, and peace? Like those first disciples, I will probably do so with both fear and great joy (Matthew 28:8) knowing that Jesus is going ahead of me and it is His beaten track I follow.
Here are a few things I or the Synod Council have been up to:
· Continued work on Synod Assembly Planning
· The Synod Vice Presidents met on April 10 by Zoom. The agenda included assembly planning and anti-racism work and resources.
· Executive Committee met on April 15.
· The COVID-19 Relief Grant team met to award grants.
I would be happy to visit and worship with you— online.
See you at our online assembly on May 15!
Kay Edgerton, Vice President
NW Washington Synod/ELCA
