Faith

Faith. It's defined by Merriam-Webster thusly: 1 a : allegiance to duty or a person : loyalty b (1) : fidelity to one's promises (2) : sincerity of intentions
2 a (1) : belief and trust in and loyalty to God (2) : belief in the traditional doctrines of a religion b (1) : firm belief in something for which there is no proof (2) : complete trust3 : something that is believed especially with strong conviction; especially : a system of religious beliefs <the Protestant faith>
I was raised to be a Christian, from very early on. As an infant I was baptized in the Lutheran church, and honestly, I don't remember going to Sunday School & church when I was small, though we must have, because I knew that the Greek Orthodox church our Greek friends attended did things differently than "our" church. Even when we returned to the States, and moved to Kansas, I recall going with my friend next door to her Presbyterian church, and it being a little bit different, but more like what I was familiar with. I always knew that Christmas was about the birth of Christ, and that Easter was related to his crucifixion and resurrection, even when we weren't going to church or Sunday School regularly. When we moved back to TX, we first joined a Lutheran church in our town, in what I suppose was Mom's attempt to try and salvage her marriage and hoping that we would attend church "as a family". Yeah, that didn't last terribly long, a little over a year, I think. Eventually she gave up and we returned to her United Methodist roots. I got involved in the youth group and made friends, went through confirmation classes, and joined the church. For the past 30 years, I've been a Methodist. I haven't always been active in a church, and many times my membership has been at a church nowhere near where I was living, simply because I didn't move it, either because I was lazy, or because, well, the church I found that I was most comfortable in just wasn't quite home.
In 1987, a friend and neighbor invited me to a Bible Study, held in her home, led by a member of her church, for young adults. By the beginning of 1988 I had joined her church. Epworth United Methodist Church. Immediately, Epworth was more like home for me than even the church I first joined upon completion of confirmation, a church I was active in for several years. That summer, my younger brother died in a motorcycle accident, in the wee hours of a Sunday morning. After blood family, the first people I called were those neighbors who had introduced me to Epworth. I made that call as soon as I saw a light on at their house, shortly after 7 a.m., I think. Before 8, my pastor had arrived at my house. Note that I was the ONLY member of my family who attended Epworth. My mother, grandmother & brother had all kept their memberships at a larger Methodist church in town. By the time I arrived for Sunday School, the entire congregation had heard the news, and was praying for and with me. Those same people, fewer than a dozen of whom had ever met my brother or my mother, filled the sanctuary to overflowing, practically, for his funeral a few days later. As much as I was loved at my first "membership" church, Epworth has truly been family for me, for many years now.
Over the years, my faith has remained strong, despite hardships and sadness. My beliefs have evolved, and I've come to a point in my life that I embrace and incorporate bits and pieces of various belief systems into my daily life and it works for me. I try very hard not to be judgmental, especially of other people's beliefs. It is not my place to judge. Your salvation or future lives are between you and whatever deity you choose to worship. Personally, I think that we are all worshipping the same entity, it's just that we visualize and refer to that entity in different ways. My beliefs are not any more right/wrong or valid/invalid than yours.
Through some personal experiences, and experiences of those close to me, combined with some study on my own, and talking with people with other beliefs, I've come to the conclusion that I am a Methodist, and that at least as long as my Christian journey continues, I am always going to be a Methodist. I am always going to have a preference for a traditional service on Sunday mornings when I'm in church, complete with piano or organ, hymns that I know and love and can find the words and music to in the hymnals in the pews, rather than a contemporary service with a bunch of amplified instruments, words to the songs on a screen, and a show.
I have never understood why I needed to go through anyone else to talk to God… I was taught from early on that I could talk to Him whenever I wanted or needed. I have never understood the mentality of roles in the church being defined by gender. I have never understood why someone other than the actual parties involved in a marriage having any say in the religious upbringing of the children born of that marriage. I have never understood excluding anyone from church based on location, color, gender, sexual orientation, marital status, parenting status, clothing, living situation, or anything else.

Many years ago, I went to church with a guy I was dating. It was a relatively conservative, small church affiliated with a much larger VERY conservative denomination. The Sunday School teacher went on and on about "ritualistic churches, such as the Methodist church." Uhh, what??? Because my boyfriend was divorced, he was not allowed to be a greeter, usher, read aloud, or lead a prayer in church. The fact that he thought they "loved and accepted" him completely baffled me.

This past weekend, I attended a small church out in the country with some friends. Friend A is a member there, and they've been wonderful to her over the years, so I understand, and she loves it. So Friends C & D met the pastor at the funeral for A's husband in the Spring. Friend C went a couple of weeks ago to the regular service, and LOVED it. Since then, she's said to me a few times "I really wish you would come with us one week, I think you'd like it for the times you don't make it to Epworth". So this weekend, C&D decided to go again, and I went with them. NOT my cuppa tea. I DID have a bit of background: Pastor was raised in a conservative (and in my experience largely judgmental and closed-minded) denomination, and spent some time on the country music scene. The church looks much like a warehouse or industrial sort of building from the outside, with a steeple on top. The inside has some lovely woodwork, and the altar area seems more like a stage than an altar. There was a drum kit, an electronic keyboard, an electric guitar, a bass, an acoustic guitar (plugged in), and a fiddle, in addition to a half dozen microphones. It really felt like to me, after a few minutes of initial hellos and visiting with a handful of people who welcomed us, that we'd been dropped into an old-tyme country gospel show… There were maybe 3 songs that had the words projected onto a screen above the pulpit, but much of the music was the musicians/singers (pastor, 3 other instruments, & pastor's wife singing). I will say that everyone up there is talented, though country is NOT my choice in music, unless the only other option is rap. The men were invited down to pray at the altar prior to the sermon, though at one point there was an invitation for anyone to come down. The message was good, about having people around you who will have faith FOR you during those times when yours might falter, as the man who was lowered through the roof by his friends who were trying to get him in to see Jesus so his paralysis might be healed (Mark 2:1-12); as well as being one of those people for others in your life. I just don't think that church needs to go on for an hour and 45 minutes… especially when close to 45 of those minutes were a country gospel show and included 85% of the music for the entire service. Yeah, NOT going to be going back there, probably EVER. I don't think that it's wrong, or bad, or anything like that, it just doesn't appeal to me, and as sweet and welcoming as the people were, it's not going to meet my needs on those days I can't make it to Epworth.
It did remind me, again, that I am blessed to be part of a church that is at least as welcoming as that little country church. We have awesome kids, and awesome adults, and an awesome pastor. We are small, some would say we are old-fashioned, and we are family, and I like that whole family thing. 

After Christmas

Well, what a week. Christmas has come and gone. On Tuesday I did a little too much, and on Wednesday I paid for it with more pain than I’d had in several days. Since my #2 nephew’s flight home from Alaska got totally screwed up by the storms around Seattle, our family Christmas got moved from Thursday to Friday. I had all day Thursday to just play on the computer and watch tv. Yeah, I needed a day with no times that I was required to be anywhere! It did make for a bit of a lonely day though. I’ve gotten pretty accustomed to spending Christmas out west with my BFF & her kids. While the oldest has been humoring us for several years with the whole Santa thing, but we did get the magic back when the baby came. I did miss, terribly the look on their faces when they see what Santa left. So yesterday I baked cookies and headed to my sister’s house around 1:30 with cookies and chex mix on hand, in addition to the gifts for the kids. It was great to see #2, who, as it turns out, had been delayed YET AGAIN, and had only arrived at 1:15 that afternoon. Now, see, I figure that’s what he gets for moving to Alaska and wanting to live there in the winter… you have to expect delays when it’s that cold outside! My sister cooked a rib roast, and my brother-in-law made the most awesome mashed potatoes using ranch dip mix, in addition to sour cream, bacon bits & chives YUMMMMY. In all honesty, today has been the day I’ve been looking forward to, for a couple of reasons, but mostly because it marked the end of a week that had some of my favorite usual activities unavailable to me, through no control of mine. Yeah, silly me, I kinda thought it might actually end up the way that it should, but alas it didn’t, and I guess I just have to keep being patient. Or else give up completely, and I’m just not quite ready to do that yet, so I’ll keep on with my masochistic ways, I suppose.

FINALLY

I’m in a good place, I think, finally. The last few weeks have been dramatic and trying for me, and I’ve been rather a whiny brat, I know. And those of you who have put up with my whiny, ranting, frustrated or just plain down in the dumps texts, bulletins, blogs, and tweets, I love you and thank you for your patience with me. I know I’ve been hard to live with for awhile. Maybe it’s that the 341 Christmas songs on my Ipod have finally penetrated my brain. Maybe it’s that I see the light at the end of the tunnel to being uterus free. 11 days for those of you who are counting. Maybe it’s that I’ve come to a better understanding with someone who has frankly confounded me for the last couple of months. Maybe it’s a combination of those things. I don’t know, and frankly, I don’t really care, I’m just glad that the happy pills are kicking in and I’m not so crabby all the time anymore. In about an hour, I’m leaving the office to run by the bank before I head to the airport for my weekend in Galveston. Last year, the first time I went to Dickens on the Strand, I loved it. There were several shops that I didn’t make it into, and I’m hoping that they are not among the ones that have elected not to return after Ike. I had a grand plan to get together a whole Victorian outfit for this weekend, but alas, life intervened, and I didn’t get it done. Perhaps next year I will be healthier, and thus feel better and be better able to get my shit together. Yeah, don’t hold your breath for that, I’ve been saying it for years. I’ve done a lot of traveling this fall, and I can honestly say that this is only the 2nd trip that I’ve truly been looking forward to. Sure, I was looking forward to the others, but most of them, by the time they came around, I was not as enthusiastic as I had been, and would almost (and in a couple of cases definitely) rather have stayed home. That is not to say that any of my trips were a waste, they were all a learning experience of one sort or another, and they afforded me the opportunity to spend time with people that I enjoy, and only get to see once or twice a year. This is my last trip for the year, and quite frankly, I think it’s high time I stopped for awhile. Among all the faires and festivals I’ve been to, I’ve been at faire/fest a total of 16 weekends, traveling for other Celtic events 2 or 3 weekends, family related travel 2 weekends, plus I moved in March and early April, I don’t think I’ve been that busy in YEARS! I’m TIRED, and am going to take advantage of the time off after surgery to try to finish getting my house in order, and do some real relaxing. Back to the Christmas music… I LOVE Christmas music, and this year, one of my purchases was the Tartan Terrors’ Christmas album. Carol of the Bells has always been one of my favorites, and as much as I love the bagpipes, I never thought about having a version of that tune done on bagpipes. Yep, I love it. What’s not to love, it’s bagpipes, right? J I should create links in this post, but you know what? Right now I’m not gonna, because I’ve got a couple of other things to do before I leave, but I’ll probably get back into it and create them later. Have a great weekend, I know I will!