:: in.a.mirror.dimly ::

The Vermont state legislature is currently considering the passage of a bill legalizing same sex marriage. VPR’s Bob Kinzel reports:

(Kinzel) Scott Libby is the pastor of the Grace Brethren Church in Irasburg. He said the bill was in direct conflict with the word of God as written in the Bible:

(Libby) "God has given government authority to help restrain sin but when government begins to legalize and legitimize sinful practices defined by God then it starts down a road that will lead to the persecution of god [sic] fearing people. [I inserted the period here in trying to match the audio] To endorse the immoral in a sense then is to condemn the moral"

Here’s my thing, you don’t have to like same sex marriage. It’s a free country, and you can vote against it for whatever reason you like. However, once we start talking about the reasons why a Christian should adopt a particular position on an issue, we need to be careful. Christians have employed a variety of reasons for opposing same sex marriage, and this is one of the less palatable arguments—the good ole’ slippery slope toward persecution.

Fear mongering is an effective tactic used by the left and the right. The left fears those zealot Christians who want to bring back the Salem Witch trials and lock up gays and people who have had abortions. The right fears the “politically correct” liberals who preach an intolerant tolerance that aims to abolish religion, ban the Bible, and one day lock up Christians in prison. Even my caricature for  either side should at least give you an idea of the rhetoric, fear, and assumptions that get tossed around with these debates and end up clouding the debate to the point that little can be accomplished.

Supporters of same sex marriage can do a lot to advance the debate here if they can provide some guarantees to Christians of their religious liberties. Whether or not these fears are valid or justified, Christians and homosexuals have something in common here. Both groups want to be able to practice their “beliefs” in complete freedom. In a sense, if Christians like pastor Libby don’t have to worry about liberals taking over their churches and restricting their freedoms, then a major plank for their opposition is lost. The fact is that Vermont has no shortage of congregations willing to give same sex marriage their stamp of approval, so why not give the ones who don’t support it a guarantee that they won’t have their arms twisted? It’s not like same sex couples will be lining up to be married by pastor Libby any way.

Christians need to take a long and hard look at their priorities as disciples of Christ. I am not going to tell Christians which side to choose in this debate because I believe there is a higher calling for us. Some may have their reasons for opposing this legislation, and I respect that.  However, the Gospel of Jesus Christ does not give us that mandate. Jesus has given us the two greatest commandments: love God and love one another. He commanded us to go out and make disciples of all the nations, teaching them to obey his teachings.

In other words, our core identity and mandate for action as Christians comes from the living Gospel message of Jesus that reconciles us with God, not with a conservative agenda for American politics. There is nothing inherently wrong with conservative or liberal politics—big government or small government is still government. What’s wrong is making conservative policy part of our Christian calling—as if we could make more and better Christians in America by banning same sex marriage.

Same sex marriage is a badge on our nation that Christians fear—a badge that our time of cultural and political dominance is over. Whether or not homosexual practice is a sin, and the Bible sure does seem to say it is, our calling as disciples of Christ isn’t in opposing legislation for our earthly kingdom, but rather in preaching the Gospel that the Kingdom of God has come, repent and believe the Good News.

In this picture you can see what a typical Monday morning looks like. We have a pile of books I still need to pull quotes from,  the coffee mug I drink out of every day, and a book that is most likely by NT Wright. Our satellite internet modem is the dark blue thing next to the router.

Of particular note in this picture is our rabbit and writing sidekick Eva. Eva has complete run of the house, but she rarely leaves the office if I’m still in there. I put the towel at the bottom of her cage to provide a “no slide” landing pad for her when she hops out, but the towel has now become a place to hang out.

While writing I typically stoop over to pet her and even sometimes scoop her onto my lap.  The rest of the office to the left is full of rabbit cages and our other two rabbits Evan and Baxter. Off to the right, just outside the frame, are shelves and shelves of theology books.

And in case you were wondering, the pillow on the chair is used for back support, not as a seat cushion.

This post was inspired by Heather.

I thought it would be awesome to have an informal gathering of nonprofit and church/synagogue leaders from our community to discuss possible partnerships and ways we can work together, as well as things that won’t work. I’m in the planning stages now, and I’m looking for ideas.

While I have a relative direction for this, I want to make sure I take full advantage of this gathering. There is no doubt in my mind that I’m missing out on some great questions to ask. So drop me a line and let me know what you think! Thanks!

While visiting my hometown of Philly this fall I was chatting with a friend of mine who lives in the city with a community of peacemakers. We were discussing the various Christian groups in the city, and you can’t talk about that without mentioning Shane Claiborn, the Tony Campolo inspired, Jesus-driven ordinary radical who has done so much to bring justice and equality to the poor of the city and worldwide.

My friend mentioned that Shane makes his own clothes, which explains why he always seemed to be wearing a t-shirt in pictures. Shane seems to have a problem with the possibility of underpaid children making his clothing and consumer spending.

Gulp.

Yeah, so this global economy can be a real bummer sometimes.

I’ve made up my mind that for now I’m going to unplug myself partially from the system, but for the time being I don’t see a way to keep my current job and stop buying decent clothes. I also have  yet to find fair-trade clothing. Even white t-shirts are impossible to find, and t-shirts are often made with cotton from India where farmers are underpaid and gradually go insane from the pesticides drenched on the cotton. They call cotton the suicide crop… It’s not pretty. Oh, and the earth is getting trashed too.

So I’ve been thinking about ways to obey that scripture about doing justice, loving, mercy, and walking humbly with God. It’s generally pretty easy to walk humbly with God when you have insecurities and anxiety—Yay for weaknesses we can boast about. However the justice bit can be a tad more difficult.

Dare I care about the poor cotton farmers who are killing themselves just to make my shirts?

It’s a tough one when there aren’t a ton of alternatives. I’ll keep up the search for fair-trade cotton, keep my clothes as long as I can, and continue to frequent the church rummage sales. However, I can’t figure out a way to cut myself off from the system completely yet.

Thankfully there are pioneers out there like Shane who are blazing trails that the rest of us can follow, even if we do a fraction of the program, they have something to teach us. One of these pioneers is Jenna Woginrich, a writer and web designer who lives on her own little sustainable farm and makes her own things, pulling out of the consumer lifestyle.

Her book documenting her home-made switch is called Made from Scratch: Discovering the Pleasure of Handmade Life.

There are plenty of reasons why a book like this is worth reading. For our own sake, we need to save money and live simply. Our consumer economy is also not sustainable for the long-term, so we need to figure out ways to sustain ourselves other than working longer hours.

However, there are moral dimensions here worth exploring, especially if you’re a Christian who believes the earth is the Lord’s and everything in it. Production itself is causing pollution, to say nothing of the justice concerns with working conditions for many laborers. I’m not saying we need to unplug completely or that overseas labor equals abuse, however we need to carefully think through the implications of our purchases. Sometimes we may not be able to avoid it, but I’m thankful that someone like Jenna can give us stories about alternative ways to live.

One of the neat things about this book by Jenna is she lives a few minutes away from us in the next town over. In fact, her book is for sale at the local general store. I think I’ll need to purchase her book…

… Although, I could make my own book from scratch. (sorry for the lame author joke)

I heard on Vermont Public Radio last night that the Vermont Food Bank is in need of help this holiday season. They face the possibility of some major shortages, and so I gave them a call today with a pretty basic question: “Do you need food or money? What’s the best way to help?”

Being that the food bank is 2.5 hours from us, volunteering was out of the question.

The rep I spoke with said money is always best since they can purchase four times more food than I can thanks to their connections. So instead of picking up food from our swanky supermarket, or even good old Aldi, I can simply write a check or donate online.

It’s kind of nice to know that sometimes you can quadruple your impact by choosing the easier option.

Mt. Equinox

I took my camera into work today and snapped a few pictures during my “commute.” I missed the days when a few brilliant leaves were still clinging to the trees with snow-capped mountains in the background, which is a bummer. But today was awfully darn beautiful.

Two nights ago the first major frost descended on our valley as temperatures plummeted into the 20’s over night. We covered the basil, tomatoes, swiss chard, green peppers, and lettuce in our garden, but the basil and tomatoes got nailed all the same. Fortunately we were able to pluck a bunch of tomatoes off the vines, but the basil was generally beyond repair.

It has been wonderful this summer growing so much food in our garden. I haven’t had to buy lettuce, cucumbers, carrots, or tomatoes all summer, and we’ll be eating frozen swiss chard, tomatoes, and basil all winter (the basil is in little balls ground up with oil).

I wouldn’t exactly call it self-sufficient, but it is freeing to have a bit more control over our food. We know exactly what’s been done to it, trusting that it’s safe. We have also spent a good deal of time picking wild apples and no-spray blueberries this year, and have made applesauce and jam respectively, in addition to freezing some berries and apples for future baking projects.

I like all of this because I’m planning ahead, thinking of tomorrow. The growing season is limited, and so I need to work hard today in order to preserve our food for the coming months. I still need to be part of a CSA and to take trips to the grocery store, but we have laid a foundation for the coming winter by planning ahead.

Living with more awareness of the seasons and their effect on our food supply, what we eat and how we eat it, has taught me to be patient, to wait. I can’t always have exactly what I want, when I want it. Now that it’s winter, the only way I can eat a blueberry is by defrosting some for pancakes or putting blueberry jam on my bread. All summer I had to wait for apples until they were ripe on the tree next to my work. It runs counter to the have-it-now culture of consumption: wait for the right season, plan ahead when you have abundance.

Curiously, this seems to have changed more than diet.

I have never been so delighted to see an apple.

After living without apples for months on end, I happily spent 20 minutes after work this week scooping up apples from the tree at the place I work. For most of August and all of September I’ve enjoyed tomatoes every day from our garden. I’ve hardly ever had to purchase lettuce from the store all summer. We pick 10 pounds of blueberries at a local farm and feast on them all week while also making jelly. Some are frozen for the winter.

It wasn’t all that long ago that I realized you could go so long without an apple or only eat tomatoes during the peak of the season. I never knew a strawberry could be so good if you only waited until the local strawberry season.

However, lately, we’ve been trying to take a seasonal approach to our food as much as possible. Instead of picking up whatever fruit I want, I go all out for strawberries during their season and continue to do the same for tomatoes, blueberries, and apples. I think it may save a few bucks, but it also ensures I’m enjoying each fruit or vegetable at the peak of its season.

While it’s catching on all over the place, the “eat local” movement has been around for a while in small pockets of Vermont. While farmers are struggling to get by, and many dairies are closing, there remains a solid core of farmers who are making a solid go of it. Many are aided by the booming artisan cheese business. Cheddar may make everything taste better, but it doesn’t always bring in the best profits.

Perhaps I could have eaten locally and seasonally in Pennsylvania if I had worked a little harder at it–we had a strawberry field five minutes down the road from us for crying out loud. However, you just can’t miss it in Vermont where there Subarus zipping about with “Eat Local” stickers and sandwich boards for farmers markets in every town.

So for now we’ll enjoy the last of our blueberries and start sampling the various kinds of apples, not to mention apple cider donuts.

We’re up in the beautiful college town of Middlebury, VT today and tomorrow. Julie’s in MIddlebury during weekdays in July to take English Lit. graduate courses at their Breadloaf campus. I decided to tag along and then head home tomorrow. So far we had a fantastic swim in Lake Dunmore, a nice walk around town that ended in a sudden downpour that left us soaked, a comforting meal at A Taste of India, and now an evening in the library of Middlebury College.

This place makes the library at Taylor University, my alma mater, look like a road side stand–and Taylor does have a very nice little library! So yeah, this place is huge. With four stories (at least) and all kinds of wide open spaces, you couldn’t ask for a nicer place. We’re in this huge seating area facing the Green Mountains to the east sitting in–are you ready for this?–recliners. Yes, posh, blue recliners with a little desk tacked on to the side that can swing over should you need a writing area. Julie has encountered people actually snoring away on these.

So with a recliner, a view, and free wifi, I’m just about as set as can be. I’ve been very impressed with Middlebury as a town, and the college has thus far been top notch. They’ve done a nice job filling in the downtown area around a dramatic water fall, mixing in craft and gift stores with cafes and restaurants. It makes you realize just how much Manchester, VT caters to tourists and outlet shopping. Ick.

Tomorrow I’ll spend the morning goofing around at the Breadloaf campus up in the mountains while Julie’s in class, and then we are planning to take our kayaks down Otter Creek, which we hear is a rather deep and easy to navigate river. I’ll post tomorrow if we can figure out a way to get back to our cars…

The other day I read about Barack Obama’s plan to support programs run by Christian organizations and churches through government grants. The basic plan is to make money available for faith-based organizations who are addressing the essential needs of people. In other words his grants would help fund programs providing food, shelter, medical care, etc., and not religious outreach or overt “proselytizing”.

I really wrestled with this one. On one hand, once you get government money involved you’re going to make people nervous about using the tax payer’s money to fund a religious programs that aim to convert people. In addition, as a Christian it’s hard to say where this line will be exactly. While delivering food to people, I can’t rule out the possibility of sharing the Gospel. I’m delivering food because they need it, not because it’s a “cover” for sharing the Gospel. However, as a follower of Christ I will share his message of hope if it fits.

The more I think about it, however, the more I’m convinced Obama’s program could be a win-win. Grants are based on rigorous applications, and as the economy tightens, I’ve seen small donors for nonprofits drop off, even if large donors are holding steady. This means grant money could very well fill a funding gap that will keep essential human services going.

In one instance, a friend of our family is a director of a Christian operated shelter in Burlington, VT. Though participation in Bible study is encouraged, the shelter does not make this mandatory. Over the past two years the shelter has run in the red, even though town officials have recognized this shelter and it’s programs as highly successful, especially in keeping ex-convicts from re-offending. I wonder if such a shelter is just the kind of place that would benefit from the grants in Obama’s vision.

The church and state matter can be sticky, and I certainly think it’s bad for both parties involved if the government digs too deeply into the church and vise versa. However, funding effective human services, religious or not, through grants strikes me as a practical and, dare I say, promising plan.

I heard the following report this morning:

“MONTPELIER — A Northfield man is facing simple assault charges that he hit Gov. Jim Douglas in the face with a cream pie while the governor was marching in the Montpelier Independence Day parade on Thursday evening.
Witnesses say 22-year-old Michael Manning was wearing a Santa Claus suit.
Police said Manning will be charged with simple assault.
Douglas’s campaign coordinator Denise Casey said the governor was not injured and he continued in the parade after cleaning his face. Douglas went on to two other Fourth of July events on Thursday.
Barre Mayor Thomas Lauzon said he was walking with Douglas and helped wrestle Manning to the ground.”

People always talk about how Vermont is so nice because it’s pretty easy to meet the governor and other legislators. It is in deed true as I’ve been to events with the Governor and had some pretty neat meetings with prominent state Senators. They’re all very accessible for nonprofits and other groups.

However, this also means they’re within striking distance of jokers as well. Poor Jim got the Vermont version of the 3 Stooges slapped in his face. Simply hilarious.

I live next to the Battenkill river in southern Vermont. It’s a shallow, rocky river down in our town of Arlington, so we typically tube down from the covered bridge in West Arlington and hop out at our neighbor’s beach. It’s a pretty sweet set up. However, June in Vermont isn’t always very warm, and the Battenkill can be quite cold. On the warmest August day we still drink hot tea after exiting with our tubes.

Enter the kayak solution.

We purchased two nice kayaks worth $5000 for a ridiculously low price two years back. We found them at a yard sale and couldn’t pass them up. They are fiberglass and work well in lakes, ponds, and the ocean. Not so much for a shallow river that would destroy them. We use them all of the time up at Lake George and other lakes around here, but we can’t subject them to the punishment of the Battenkill.

Enter river ‘yak solution.

I found a dirt cheap, plastic river kayak on Craig’s list. We just purchased it, and yesterday, on a warm and clear late afternoon, I took the river yak on it’s first trip as our river craft of choice.

Julie is away this week taking a class, so I had to devise a plan that would enable me to kayak and still get back to my car in a timely manner. So I planned to drive the kayak down and leave my car at a parking area. I then kayaked down and pulled out at our neighbor’s and dragged it to the house. Once home, I would then hop on my bike and peddle back to the car.

So I hauled the kayak from behind it’s grassy hide-out behind the tiger lilies. I pushed the seats down in our wagon since I didn’t want to bother with the kayak rack straps. Before shoving it in, I noticed something odd on the kayak.

Peeping through a hole at the front end of the kayak was a mouse, a very still, dead mouse head. It could have been a mole I suppose, I didn’t look THAT close. I whacked it with a stick and couldn’t dislodge it. If anything, it slid further into the hole. Resigning myself to the gross task ahead of me, I used a wire to poke his 5 ” frame into the kayak. And this is the point where, if whacking the kayak with a board didn’t make me look absolutely insane, I sealed the deal.

I dragged the kayak onto the lawn, tilted it so the dead mouse slid to the middle, and then flipped it really fast. No mouse on the ground, since he just nestled under the top lip of the cockpit. I tried this over and over again. No dice. Alright, I thought, I need to get on some gloves and pick up this dead mouse. And then I had one last idea that would make me look even more imbalanced to my neighbors. Tipping the kayak upside down, I rocked it back and forth as fast as I could.

The mouse ker-plopped onto the ground. With a sigh of relief I set to work clearing out spiders, crickets, and the other nasty bugs who had set up shop in the kayak as well.

Once I settled into the river five minutes later, I quickly caught on to steering such a small kayak. It’s about 9 feet long, whereas our other kayaks are 13 and 15 feet, so I deftly whipped past rocks and enjoyed the beautiful river bank, setting sun, and birds flying all over.

Now if there’s one thing the Battenkill River is famous for, it’s fly fishing, and fly fishermen always come out in the morning and the early evening. So I was paddling through prime fishing time. Fishermen gravitate toward the deep pools at the river bends, and there’s a huge one on this stretch of the river. Of course there were two of them in my sights, casting out into the deep part that I wished to navigate.

Trying not to ruin their time, I aimed for the shallow shoreline on the inside of the curve. They were settled in the middle of the river. As I paddled over, the river unexpectedly pitched me toward shore and I nailed all kinds of rocks. While the front floundered, the back end spun around and I was just about to start going backwards right into the fishermen! I flailed my paddle and even reached my hand into the water to push off on a rock. No matter how often I straightened myself out, the river pushed me back on shore. Risking a collision with the fisherman, I managed to back away from the shore just enough to paddle between rocks and men. We didn’t say anything. They just stared.

Things went pretty smooth after that fiasco. There’s nothing like zipping through the swift rapids and your bow splashes into the waves sending a spray of water up. It’s the perfect mix of relaxation and excitement. That is, so long as you don’t have a dead mouse along for the ride.

I never thought all that much of the deck on our house. It seemed kind of tacked on. Painted battleship gray and badly peeling, it was a real eye sore. We crammed a grill and a large table onto the deck and kind of left things there. We sometimes ate dinner out back, but rarely did much else.

Then on Monday I put off some of my writing projects and started in the early morning hours on the restoration of our deck. Having swept and primed the day before, I splashed on two thick layers of semi-gloss exterior paint. White for the railings and a very light tan for the deck itself. I even ran out to the Home Depot and picked up some cheap pots, top soil, and petunias to go with the tobacco plants my in-laws gave us. You wouldn’t recognize it now from the deck it used to be, and there’s no other place I’d rather be than the back deck.

The deck is surrounded by flowers and practically glows. I’m going to bring the grill back eventually, but we’re leaving the table down on the grass until we need it and may look into a smaller table just to cut back on clutter. You can also see in the bottom right corner of the second photo the step I stuck in. It’s kind of tacked on with screws and supported by a cinder block. Hokey no doubt, but it’ll serve.

The majority of my writing is now done on the back deck. I even stay there when it’s dark. Life is pretty good I’d say.

I was out to set a world record for mowing our lawn this morning. With a new mowing pattern I was zipping through our quivering blades of grass, set to have it all done in about 90 minutes… a ridiculous number for a lawn that sometimes takes well over two hours.

And then I forgot to raise the blades over the tree roots.

CLUNK, CLUNK, CLUNK, BBBBRRRRRRR, THUNK.

It happened so fast I didn’t catch it in time. I think something on the mower deck where the blade spins got knocked loose. It’s kind of crooked. So far I haven’t figured it out.

Not to be deterred, I rolled out the push mower. After all, I only had the front lawn to mow, which isn’t large or thick. So I yanked on the cord. I yanked and yanked. On the fifth pull the tiny engine roared to life.

Unfortunately the starter chord flapped out of mower. The whole thing hung lifelessly in my hand.

This meant that I couldn’t stop the mower. Stopping meant I was really screwed. So I pushed it all over the yard and made good progress. Unfortunately the blade level can sometimes shift on this mower, and today the front left section dropped way down to the point that it was digging into the dirt. Within a minute the mower cut off.

Two mowers down in 15 minutes. Unbelievable. 20% of the lawn remains.

At the least the neighbors will have something to talk about.

“You didn’t?” is the first thing she said after peeling back the wrapping paper and seeing the sleek, white MacBook box.

Yes, I did.

With the help of family and friends, we all pitched in to purchase Julie her very own Mac. I’ve been working on this since April 7th via covert e-mails to friends and family, keeping every detail under the radar. She said she’d never been so surprised in all her life.

Keeping this so secretive has made life a bit tense, and I literally just crashed on the couch after she opened it. Now the fun begins.

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