After a bit of evening prayer, we ate and then went straight into Compline. Lots of praying and bible-ing, but afterwards I think we all felt very relaxed and ready to face whatever deadlines we still had for the evening.
Tuesday, March 29, 2011
Compline
Wednesday, March 16, 2011
Prayer for Japan
I'd like to encourage you all to visit the Rev. James Richardson's blog HERE to view and read two prayers: one issued by the Church of England and the other from the Office of the Bishop of the Diocese of Virginia. They're inspiring and full of compassion. Whatever your faith tradition, please keep thinking warm and healing thoughts for all affected by this natural disaster.
Tuesday, March 15, 2011
It's almost here!!!!
Like a kid in a candy shop or a youngster eagerly awaiting Christmas morning, I am ohhho soooo excited for the Virginia Festival of the Book. The event kicks off tomorrow morning with a breakfast and then program at 9am.
You can see the schedule by clicking here
My only qualm: that it didn't begin today -- the Ides of March.
Take some time this week to attend one of these spectacular readings or talks by talented writers, both new and veteran.
You can see the schedule by clicking here
My only qualm: that it didn't begin today -- the Ides of March.
Take some time this week to attend one of these spectacular readings or talks by talented writers, both new and veteran.
Monday Morning Wake-Up Call
The Corner Starbucks was busy this morning. And that means that Spring Break has officially ended; which means that graduation weekend is only 9 weeks away. Yes, a meager 9 weeks until the University graduates the Class of 2011. Just the anticipation itself is overwhelming. Thankfully, the friendly staff at Starbucks managed to distract me from this fact; however, I couldn't help thinking how, soon, universities all over the Union will graduate students who have completed their degree programs, sending them out into the world. This thought, paired with the natural disaster in Japan, has spurred me to consider just what it means to be an educated person in the modern, global world. If you're like me and are reaching the end of your four years as an undergraduate, you're likely searching for jobs - well, less job searching and more facing that childhood question everyone asked you at every developmental stage of your life: "What do you want to be when you grow up?" Frankly, I haven't the slightest clue. The statement itself implies that I'd have to grow up; that somehow, when we reach the end of a milestone, we're different than we were before. Implicit in this statement is the sentiment that "growing up" exists as a static point in the life of a human individual; that at some point, whenever that point arrives, we're suddenly grown up. Now I don't know about you, but I'm not quite there yet. It's okay, I confess - I have zero, nada, nilch, ideas what I'd like to be when I grow up; but the more I think about it, the stronger pull I feel towards this zenith. Currently, I'm living in a penultimate, liminal plane where I don't have to get there if I don't want to. And I suspect that, on some level, many of us feel that way; however, how do we - as the formally educated - employ such a privilege for the betterment of the world.
When I was 14, still bright eyed and bushy tailed, my Algebra I teacher (who was more of a sage than a math instructor) impressed upon all his students the importance of getting an education. Yet with that conviction came also the grain of salt; that to receive that education meant that you were bound to serve others in your life. He put it something like "You go to school so you can get a piece of paper to hang up on the wall. And the more pieces of paper you have, the better educated you are and thus, the more obliged you should be to use them." Sometimes I think he meant that we should use our powers for good and not evil. Maybe he meant we should always remain aware that with great power comes great responsibility (to borrow a line from the live-action Spiderman film). People with degrees are certainly helping to solve the nuclear crisis of failed power plants in Japan. But what about closer to home? Of course, I don't mean to discount the focus and work being channeled into Japan at present; but a question that always takes me by surprise asks how can I use my education to effect change my own community? I'll refrain here from quoting Jefferson (affectionately T.J.) because the quotations, while well intentioned, can easily be misconstrued given the time in which they were written and the context with which they concerned themselves.
At the very least, though, I think it bears merit to consider how those of us with formal educations can use them for the social good.
When I was 14, still bright eyed and bushy tailed, my Algebra I teacher (who was more of a sage than a math instructor) impressed upon all his students the importance of getting an education. Yet with that conviction came also the grain of salt; that to receive that education meant that you were bound to serve others in your life. He put it something like "You go to school so you can get a piece of paper to hang up on the wall. And the more pieces of paper you have, the better educated you are and thus, the more obliged you should be to use them." Sometimes I think he meant that we should use our powers for good and not evil. Maybe he meant we should always remain aware that with great power comes great responsibility (to borrow a line from the live-action Spiderman film). People with degrees are certainly helping to solve the nuclear crisis of failed power plants in Japan. But what about closer to home? Of course, I don't mean to discount the focus and work being channeled into Japan at present; but a question that always takes me by surprise asks how can I use my education to effect change my own community? I'll refrain here from quoting Jefferson (affectionately T.J.) because the quotations, while well intentioned, can easily be misconstrued given the time in which they were written and the context with which they concerned themselves.
At the very least, though, I think it bears merit to consider how those of us with formal educations can use them for the social good.
Wednesday, March 9, 2011
Eros of the Beloved
Sunday, I wrote a post meditating on the verse from Matthew 17 where God speaks to Peter, James, and John while they're stand on the mountain, witnessing Jesus' transfiguration. This verse reads "This is my Son, the Beloved; with him I am well pleased..." I'd like to return to this notion of the Beloved as it appears in this passage from Matthew. We know that a cloud descends over the place where Jesus stands with those three apostles and from that cloud the voice of God speak.
Although we read the Gospel's in translation from their original, there are still features of the English translation that we can pay attention to. I'd like to focus on what's happening with the language metrically. When I read scripture, I encounter it as a very long, elaborate, and intricate piece of verse. We see it more concretely in the Psalms, which are themselves, verse; and not just poems of devotion, but poems charged with the language of Eros, with a deep longing to reconnect with the divine. Anne Carson, a Canadian poet who has published numerous collections of poetry (including Glass, Irony, and God; Decreation; and Nox) and translations of Sappho's work, says that we begin to live the minute Eros enters us. Carson, a highly trained classics scholar, wrote her doctoral research on Greek lyric poetry, wherein she unearths and then develops a fundamental concept about Eros that we, as readers of any text (especially religious ones) can dwell on to aid in our interpretations of these stories. What she discovers of the Greek language is that desire (Eros) moves; that it functions like a verb.
Returning to our passage from Matthew 17:1-9, we can interpret Jesus' and his apostle's ascent to the mountain as an intentional act of devotion. Building on the metaphor of the mountain as a place of spiritual awakening, what we see in this passage is just that, a spiritual awakening. This awakening, manifest in the transfiguration, presents itself in the language's rhythm - its meter. What little knowledge I have of the Greek language is that their poetry was organized according to a quantitative meter, that we refer to as hendecasyllabics, also known as the Sapphic. Unlike English verse, which most naturally falls into a pentameter line (accentual-syllabic), measuring lines by feet whose primary unit is the iamb, the Sapphic line typically consists of eleven syllables, which aren't grouped into feet per se, but the choriamb which provides a framework for scansion. This structure organizes verse according to length of vowel, rather than the English accentual-syllabic system which concerns itself with the accentual stress of a given syllable. You'll notice that there are thirteen syllables in this line: "This is my Son, the Beloved; with him I am well pleased...", so we're already breaking out of both the pentameter and Sapphic lines; yet the meter of this line still illuminates what's happening at this moment when God speaks to Peter, James, and John. It's certainly difficult to force the line into an iambic scansion, but is possible. Doing so would establish the pattern " x / x / x / x / x /;" and in order to appreciate the linguistic characteristics of this line, we would have to . Without it, we wouldn't catch two of the most important phenomena that occur here: the revisionary disclosure and what Hopkins refers to as "sprung rhythm." Let's begin with Hopkin's idea.
Gerard Manley Hopkins claimed to have discovered this feature metered verse, which he describes as the most natural way to imitate everyday speech in poetry. He characterizes it as (assuming we're operating on an accentual-syllabic metrical system) as beginning a foot with a stressed, as opposed to unstressed, syllable from which the line may deviate by any number of variable stressed-unstressed patterns. In our line, we find that it's possible to read it by placing the stress on the first syllable (This), thereby creating two possible measurements for the foot: a trochee or a spondee, trochee meaning stressed/unstressed and spondee stressed/stressed. If we read the first foot using a trochaic measurement, then we place the emphasis on "this," thus diminishing the importance of the verb "is," as if to say that God wants to affirm that Jesus, the person occupying the space in which we imagine Jesus to reside, is in fact Jesus - not Peter, James, or John; and after the initial foot, the rest of the line falls into a fairly regular iambic patter. However, if we scan the first foot as a spondee (stressed/stressed), then we place the emphasis on both "this" and "is," therefore allowing for an entirely different reading where we incorporate the trochaic reading and complicate matters by raising the significance of the verb "is", or "to-be" to a level where both Jesus and the space he inhabits become a sort of metaphorical Christ figure. Of course, if we just imposed a strictly iambic scansion onto this line, the effect would also amplify the significance of "is," in much the same way that a spondaic scansion would; but the benefit of scanning in opposition to the regular pentameter allows our reading to create a space wherein the transfiguration actually happens. And this space is then the place where Eros enters, transforming Jesus into the Christ figure. We feel Eros's movement in the meter of the line, in the organic rise and fall of accents. Furthermore, the verse that follows the transfiguration compliments the presence of Eros amongst Jesus and the apostles: "When the disciples heard this, they fell to the ground and were overcome by fear." (Matthew 17:6).
Returning to Anne Carson's idea that we begin to live the moment Eros enters us, we witness both Christ and the apostles being birthed into a new understanding of their world. Again, we find ourselves confronted with a situation wherein we undergo a death and are reborn, ultimately assimilating into the environment that was previously foreign to us. There's a tension between a self and an other, a pull and tug. Models for this relationship may assume many forms, from the self and other being the same to the other donning the guise of the divine, another mortal, etc. But what matters is the moment when Eros enters into the binary.
Although we read the Gospel's in translation from their original, there are still features of the English translation that we can pay attention to. I'd like to focus on what's happening with the language metrically. When I read scripture, I encounter it as a very long, elaborate, and intricate piece of verse. We see it more concretely in the Psalms, which are themselves, verse; and not just poems of devotion, but poems charged with the language of Eros, with a deep longing to reconnect with the divine. Anne Carson, a Canadian poet who has published numerous collections of poetry (including Glass, Irony, and God; Decreation; and Nox) and translations of Sappho's work, says that we begin to live the minute Eros enters us. Carson, a highly trained classics scholar, wrote her doctoral research on Greek lyric poetry, wherein she unearths and then develops a fundamental concept about Eros that we, as readers of any text (especially religious ones) can dwell on to aid in our interpretations of these stories. What she discovers of the Greek language is that desire (Eros) moves; that it functions like a verb.
 |
| The Saviour's Transfiguration, Theophanes the Greek, ca. early 15th C |
Gerard Manley Hopkins claimed to have discovered this feature metered verse, which he describes as the most natural way to imitate everyday speech in poetry. He characterizes it as (assuming we're operating on an accentual-syllabic metrical system) as beginning a foot with a stressed, as opposed to unstressed, syllable from which the line may deviate by any number of variable stressed-unstressed patterns. In our line, we find that it's possible to read it by placing the stress on the first syllable (This), thereby creating two possible measurements for the foot: a trochee or a spondee, trochee meaning stressed/unstressed and spondee stressed/stressed. If we read the first foot using a trochaic measurement, then we place the emphasis on "this," thus diminishing the importance of the verb "is," as if to say that God wants to affirm that Jesus, the person occupying the space in which we imagine Jesus to reside, is in fact Jesus - not Peter, James, or John; and after the initial foot, the rest of the line falls into a fairly regular iambic patter. However, if we scan the first foot as a spondee (stressed/stressed), then we place the emphasis on both "this" and "is," therefore allowing for an entirely different reading where we incorporate the trochaic reading and complicate matters by raising the significance of the verb "is", or "to-be" to a level where both Jesus and the space he inhabits become a sort of metaphorical Christ figure. Of course, if we just imposed a strictly iambic scansion onto this line, the effect would also amplify the significance of "is," in much the same way that a spondaic scansion would; but the benefit of scanning in opposition to the regular pentameter allows our reading to create a space wherein the transfiguration actually happens. And this space is then the place where Eros enters, transforming Jesus into the Christ figure. We feel Eros's movement in the meter of the line, in the organic rise and fall of accents. Furthermore, the verse that follows the transfiguration compliments the presence of Eros amongst Jesus and the apostles: "When the disciples heard this, they fell to the ground and were overcome by fear." (Matthew 17:6).
Returning to Anne Carson's idea that we begin to live the moment Eros enters us, we witness both Christ and the apostles being birthed into a new understanding of their world. Again, we find ourselves confronted with a situation wherein we undergo a death and are reborn, ultimately assimilating into the environment that was previously foreign to us. There's a tension between a self and an other, a pull and tug. Models for this relationship may assume many forms, from the self and other being the same to the other donning the guise of the divine, another mortal, etc. But what matters is the moment when Eros enters into the binary.
Tuesday, March 8, 2011
Spring Break, Charlottesville Edition
Sunday, March 6, 2011
You, too, are Beloved
This evening, I heard our chaplain, Nik Forti, preach on the Transfiguration. I'm almost certain that this was Nik's third time through the sermon, but also probably his best. The particular gospel passage appointed for today, the Last Sunday after the Epiphany, was Matthew 17:1-9 (NRSV). This particular passage focuses on, obviously, the transfiguration of Christ; and while I'm no theologian, language is my medium. So I'd like to offer a few thoughts that stuck with me after hearing the gospel and Nik's Sermon.
Taken from the gospel, the text reads -
Six days after Peter had acknowledged Jesus as the Christ, the Son of the Living God, Jesus took with him Peter and James and his brother John and led them up a high mountain, by themselves. And he was transfigured before them, and his face shone like the sun, and his clothes became dazzling white. Suddenly there appeared to them Moses and Elijah, talking with him. Then Peter said to Jesus, Lord, it is good for us to be here; if you wish, I will make three dwellings here, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah. While he was still speaking, suddenly a bright cloud overshadowed them, and from the cloud a voice said This is my Son, the Beloved; with whom, I am well pleased. When the disciples heard this, they fell to the ground and were overcome by fear. But Jesus came and touched them, saying, Get up and do not be afraid. And when they looked up, they saw no one except Jesus himself alone.
As they were coming down the mountain, Jesus ordered them, Tell no one about the vision until after the Son of Man has been raised from the dead. (Matthew 17: 1-9).
Now, as I said above, I'm no theologian, so I would welcome all interpretations of this passage. I don't know much about the reasons why this passage would be significant theologically; but as a poet, what I spend my life obsessing over and dealing with is language: its intricacies, personality, and being. These things interest me. My own interpretation of this passage I base largely in my knowledge of how humans construct stories; what objects take on symbolic meaning and why. For this passage, I would say that the journey up the mountain places it into a long standing tradition of culturally diverse stories involving mountains and men. There's a reason that we still use the adage "a mountain top experience." Some great characters throughout history have experienced extraordinary things while on top of mountains. Legend hold's that Noah's ark landed on the peak of Mount Ararat, from whence he, his family, and the animals descended to re-populate the Earth after the Great Flood; Moses receives the Ten Commandments from Jehovah on Mount Sinai (or, if you're a Mel Brooks fan, the 15 Commandments). In Chinese mythology, Qin Shi Huang searches for the elixir of life, believed to be somewhere on Mount Penglai. And then, there are some not so pleasant experiences with mountains, like Prometheus, who stole fire from Zeus, giving it to mortals; his reward? To have his liver eaten by an eagle, only to have it grow back and be eaten again, for all eternity. I mean, we're thankful Prometheus. Fire is nice; just sucks that that's your punishment. My only intent for this digression is to illustrate how mountains have played crucial roles in storytelling. We can view them as metonymous for places where secrets are kept, places where amazing phenomena happen. And I think that's certainly the case for this mountain story as well. The image of earth raises towards the sky fascinates us, rendering us incapacitated and unable to escape its lure. It's a symbol of growing closer to the divine; something we can use to enable ourselves and thus lessen (perhaps even close) the gap between man and creator.
So here we are, on a mountain, watching Jesus be transfigured into the Christ. For a moment, we are Peter, James, and John standing before the Son of God, when a voice descends from the sky saying "This my Son, the Beloved; with whom I am well pleased." My reaction would've been the same as that of Peter, James, and John. I too would have fallen to the ground "...overcome by fear." Whenever a disembodied voice speaks to you, you can be pretty certain you're experiencing one of two things: either you've finally had one too many Venti Americanos and haven't slept in days; or, you've just witnessed a divine act. In this case, I'd tend to believe the latter. During the Eucharist this evening, I shared this experience with those three apostles. And no, I don't mean I had a divine revelation. If I had, somebody may want to think about having me committed. No, what I experienced was an unbelievable epiphany about the meaning of this phrase: "...the Beloved."
Recently, I've been re-reading some of Gregory Orr's poetry. Greg is Professor of English in Poetry Writing at the University of Virginia, where he founded and served as the first director of our M.F.A in Writing. Although he's published numerous works (including 10 original collections of poetry), his most recent work is easily the most fascinating; he too uses this language of the body: the Beloved, the Divine, etc. Most specifically, I find myself thinking of his 2005 collection: Concerning the Book That is the Body of the Beloved and it's "sequel" How Beautiful the Beloved. I had the pleasure of studying with Greg this summer. It was then that I was introduced to this idea about the poetics of the body.
In Concerning the Book That is the Body of the Beloved, Greg opens with a "lobby-poem", of sorts:
Resurrection of the body of the beloved,
Which is the world.
Which is the poem
Of the world, the poem of the body.
Mortal ourselves and filled with awe,
We gather the scattered limbs
Of Osiris.
That he should live again.
That death not be oblivion.
The first connection I had with this work and the passage from Matthew was the Beloved; God's Beloved, his son felt like Greg's Beloved, the conceptual. He uses the Egyptian myth of Isis and Osiris to frame these lyric sequences. Osiris, the Egyptian god of the Afterlife, the underworld, and the dead, exists scattered about the Earth; and so, to conceive of resurrecting a deceased deity requires us (the readers) to also undergo a death of our own. We must redefine what it means to die and be resurrected, so as to escape oblivion
In the opening poem, Greg writes
The beloved is dead. Limbs
And all the body's
Miraculous parts
Scattered across Egypt,
Stained with dark mud.
We must find them, gather
Them together, bring them
Into a single place
As an anthologist might collect
All the poems that matter
Into a single book, a book
Which is the body of the beloved,
Which is the world.
Immediately we recognize that the beloved's identity becomes conflated with that of poems, language, and the world. In the context of this poem, the beloved manifests as all these things. What is so striking about this poem, for me at least, is how the beloved becomes the world and how the world becomes us. We are the beloved; and Greg charges us with resurrecting the beloved. Though not at once apparent, I feel that the legend of the Phoenix haunts this language, specifically in the "...dark mud." The beloved has died and resurrects itself from the ashes, the dust, of its former self. To begin the conversation in death and move towards life definitely seems counter-intuitive, but certainly forces us to reconsider the nature of our existences in time. Moreover, starting here implies that we do not lose our sentience by death, but may actually regain it.
With lent fast approaching, we'll soon find ourselves thinking about the incantatory prayer we've all grown up with "Remember that you are but dust and to dust you shall return." It's cyclical, circadian, in nature. We begin in dust, are formed, and return to dust. These images become allegorical for Jesus' transfiguration into the Beloved when God speaks. In that moment Jesus' identity suffers a death, then emerges as the Beloved; and like the Beloved, we also experience a death before we rise as beloved.
Tomorrow, and the rest of this week, I'll continue this mini-series of postings using poems from Greg's book as a guide.
Taken from the gospel, the text reads -
Six days after Peter had acknowledged Jesus as the Christ, the Son of the Living God, Jesus took with him Peter and James and his brother John and led them up a high mountain, by themselves. And he was transfigured before them, and his face shone like the sun, and his clothes became dazzling white. Suddenly there appeared to them Moses and Elijah, talking with him. Then Peter said to Jesus, Lord, it is good for us to be here; if you wish, I will make three dwellings here, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah. While he was still speaking, suddenly a bright cloud overshadowed them, and from the cloud a voice said This is my Son, the Beloved; with whom, I am well pleased. When the disciples heard this, they fell to the ground and were overcome by fear. But Jesus came and touched them, saying, Get up and do not be afraid. And when they looked up, they saw no one except Jesus himself alone.
As they were coming down the mountain, Jesus ordered them, Tell no one about the vision until after the Son of Man has been raised from the dead. (Matthew 17: 1-9).
Now, as I said above, I'm no theologian, so I would welcome all interpretations of this passage. I don't know much about the reasons why this passage would be significant theologically; but as a poet, what I spend my life obsessing over and dealing with is language: its intricacies, personality, and being. These things interest me. My own interpretation of this passage I base largely in my knowledge of how humans construct stories; what objects take on symbolic meaning and why. For this passage, I would say that the journey up the mountain places it into a long standing tradition of culturally diverse stories involving mountains and men. There's a reason that we still use the adage "a mountain top experience." Some great characters throughout history have experienced extraordinary things while on top of mountains. Legend hold's that Noah's ark landed on the peak of Mount Ararat, from whence he, his family, and the animals descended to re-populate the Earth after the Great Flood; Moses receives the Ten Commandments from Jehovah on Mount Sinai (or, if you're a Mel Brooks fan, the 15 Commandments). In Chinese mythology, Qin Shi Huang searches for the elixir of life, believed to be somewhere on Mount Penglai. And then, there are some not so pleasant experiences with mountains, like Prometheus, who stole fire from Zeus, giving it to mortals; his reward? To have his liver eaten by an eagle, only to have it grow back and be eaten again, for all eternity. I mean, we're thankful Prometheus. Fire is nice; just sucks that that's your punishment. My only intent for this digression is to illustrate how mountains have played crucial roles in storytelling. We can view them as metonymous for places where secrets are kept, places where amazing phenomena happen. And I think that's certainly the case for this mountain story as well. The image of earth raises towards the sky fascinates us, rendering us incapacitated and unable to escape its lure. It's a symbol of growing closer to the divine; something we can use to enable ourselves and thus lessen (perhaps even close) the gap between man and creator.
So here we are, on a mountain, watching Jesus be transfigured into the Christ. For a moment, we are Peter, James, and John standing before the Son of God, when a voice descends from the sky saying "This my Son, the Beloved; with whom I am well pleased." My reaction would've been the same as that of Peter, James, and John. I too would have fallen to the ground "...overcome by fear." Whenever a disembodied voice speaks to you, you can be pretty certain you're experiencing one of two things: either you've finally had one too many Venti Americanos and haven't slept in days; or, you've just witnessed a divine act. In this case, I'd tend to believe the latter. During the Eucharist this evening, I shared this experience with those three apostles. And no, I don't mean I had a divine revelation. If I had, somebody may want to think about having me committed. No, what I experienced was an unbelievable epiphany about the meaning of this phrase: "...the Beloved."
Recently, I've been re-reading some of Gregory Orr's poetry. Greg is Professor of English in Poetry Writing at the University of Virginia, where he founded and served as the first director of our M.F.A in Writing. Although he's published numerous works (including 10 original collections of poetry), his most recent work is easily the most fascinating; he too uses this language of the body: the Beloved, the Divine, etc. Most specifically, I find myself thinking of his 2005 collection: Concerning the Book That is the Body of the Beloved and it's "sequel" How Beautiful the Beloved. I had the pleasure of studying with Greg this summer. It was then that I was introduced to this idea about the poetics of the body.
In Concerning the Book That is the Body of the Beloved, Greg opens with a "lobby-poem", of sorts:
Resurrection of the body of the beloved,
Which is the world.
Which is the poem
Of the world, the poem of the body.
Mortal ourselves and filled with awe,
We gather the scattered limbs
Of Osiris.
That he should live again.
That death not be oblivion.
 |
| Phoenix from the Aberdeen Bestiary, ca. 12th C. |
In the opening poem, Greg writes
The beloved is dead. Limbs
And all the body's
Miraculous parts
Scattered across Egypt,
Stained with dark mud.
We must find them, gather
Them together, bring them
Into a single place
As an anthologist might collect
All the poems that matter
Into a single book, a book
Which is the body of the beloved,
Which is the world.
Immediately we recognize that the beloved's identity becomes conflated with that of poems, language, and the world. In the context of this poem, the beloved manifests as all these things. What is so striking about this poem, for me at least, is how the beloved becomes the world and how the world becomes us. We are the beloved; and Greg charges us with resurrecting the beloved. Though not at once apparent, I feel that the legend of the Phoenix haunts this language, specifically in the "...dark mud." The beloved has died and resurrects itself from the ashes, the dust, of its former self. To begin the conversation in death and move towards life definitely seems counter-intuitive, but certainly forces us to reconsider the nature of our existences in time. Moreover, starting here implies that we do not lose our sentience by death, but may actually regain it.
With lent fast approaching, we'll soon find ourselves thinking about the incantatory prayer we've all grown up with "Remember that you are but dust and to dust you shall return." It's cyclical, circadian, in nature. We begin in dust, are formed, and return to dust. These images become allegorical for Jesus' transfiguration into the Beloved when God speaks. In that moment Jesus' identity suffers a death, then emerges as the Beloved; and like the Beloved, we also experience a death before we rise as beloved.
Tomorrow, and the rest of this week, I'll continue this mini-series of postings using poems from Greg's book as a guide.
Saturday, March 5, 2011
Where is your Haven?
Right off the bat, I have to say how elated I am to have learned about the concept, history, and daily operations for one of Charlottesville's most exciting social projects. Being the bleeding heart liberal that I am (yes, I did enjoy reading Dickens' fiction as a child), the social justice takes one of the higher ranks on my list of "Things I really care about" - right next to purity of art and loving everyone for who they are. How does this all fit into Canterbury and this blog that, by its title, is the Canter Blog; so you would think that everything on here would have to do with Canterbury. What we're up to; what our weeks look like, etc. All sort of existential questions in their own right.
Well, I'll tell you. This week, we had a wonderfully thought-provoking visit and talk from a Haven representative (Stephen) who told us so much about a community in Charlottesville that finds itself brutally marginalized by many of us. We've all been there, walking down the Corner or the Downtown Mall when a homeless person walks up and asks for a dollar; or maybe they just call to you as they rest their weary backs against brick walls that, in winter are frigid, unforgiving and in summer, a vertical frying pan. I'm sure at some point, we've all just passed by without so much of a concern, our ears glued into our iPods, Blackberries, or internet phones, rocking out to the latest hit from Katy Perry or reminiscing about the good ole days when Keith Richards would take your head off with his runs. Two feet later, after telling that person that no, we don't have any cash, we either drop it into the case of an aspiring fiddle player or meet an old friend for drinks at The Nook, where we tip in cash. Too often, I hear the argument: "Oh, never give a homeless person cash; they're just going to waste it on booze or something that's not food." And well, while that may be true, the act of not acknowledging, of ignoring another human being because of social conventions is where the problem begins. Maybe you don't want to give that woman or man cash. And that's fine. But what's worse is not conceding their existence, of pretending that this person is merely part of the scenery; that oh, it's some-one else's problem. And it is. It's the problem that the Haven, at First and Market Streets, seeks to address.
This organization, funded by the Thomas Jefferson Area Coalition for the Homeless, provides a day shelter for many of Charlottesville's homeless. From the time they open their doors at 7am until they close them again at 5pm, Haven staff care for a group of people who have no other place to turn. They're in need of a support system, found at this shelter. Stephen, the Haven representative who visited Canterbury had many wonderful, eye-opening stories to tell; but maybe the ones that stuck with me the longest were how, when you begin to look around you, you'll notice an entirely different citizenry that inhabits Charlottesville: a citizenry that, comprised of people from all walks of life, remains invisible until you look for them; and how, when you get to know them, these people are just that - they're people. There individuals who have stories to tell. For me, that's the first, most important step to addressing this issue. We have to realize that these people are people too and that they have stories to tell.
Stephen also went on to talk about how, when you're homeless and trying to support yourself, the dynamic between you and the world changes. No longer do you have this concept of exterior versus interior, of public spaces versus private ones. Everything is exterior and public. He made the point that you suddenly find yourself in a position where simple, daily activities (such as using the restroom and sleeping) transform into things that you never thought of before into realities that thrust themselves into the forefront of your mind.
Prior to this Wednesday, I also didn't know that the mean time for homelessness is approximately 6 months. Just 6 months. That's astounding, because sometimes I think we tend to believe that once you're homeless you spend the rest of your life there; that it's a sort of "point of no return," which it's not, at all. There's still hope even after you've found yourself at rock-bottom. So the final thing to think about, if we're interested in changing our relationship with Charlottesville's homeless population, is to deconstruct the way we think about them and realize that they're also people, just normally people who have fallen down on their luck.
Well, I'll tell you. This week, we had a wonderfully thought-provoking visit and talk from a Haven representative (Stephen) who told us so much about a community in Charlottesville that finds itself brutally marginalized by many of us. We've all been there, walking down the Corner or the Downtown Mall when a homeless person walks up and asks for a dollar; or maybe they just call to you as they rest their weary backs against brick walls that, in winter are frigid, unforgiving and in summer, a vertical frying pan. I'm sure at some point, we've all just passed by without so much of a concern, our ears glued into our iPods, Blackberries, or internet phones, rocking out to the latest hit from Katy Perry or reminiscing about the good ole days when Keith Richards would take your head off with his runs. Two feet later, after telling that person that no, we don't have any cash, we either drop it into the case of an aspiring fiddle player or meet an old friend for drinks at The Nook, where we tip in cash. Too often, I hear the argument: "Oh, never give a homeless person cash; they're just going to waste it on booze or something that's not food." And well, while that may be true, the act of not acknowledging, of ignoring another human being because of social conventions is where the problem begins. Maybe you don't want to give that woman or man cash. And that's fine. But what's worse is not conceding their existence, of pretending that this person is merely part of the scenery; that oh, it's some-one else's problem. And it is. It's the problem that the Haven, at First and Market Streets, seeks to address.
This organization, funded by the Thomas Jefferson Area Coalition for the Homeless, provides a day shelter for many of Charlottesville's homeless. From the time they open their doors at 7am until they close them again at 5pm, Haven staff care for a group of people who have no other place to turn. They're in need of a support system, found at this shelter. Stephen, the Haven representative who visited Canterbury had many wonderful, eye-opening stories to tell; but maybe the ones that stuck with me the longest were how, when you begin to look around you, you'll notice an entirely different citizenry that inhabits Charlottesville: a citizenry that, comprised of people from all walks of life, remains invisible until you look for them; and how, when you get to know them, these people are just that - they're people. There individuals who have stories to tell. For me, that's the first, most important step to addressing this issue. We have to realize that these people are people too and that they have stories to tell.
Stephen also went on to talk about how, when you're homeless and trying to support yourself, the dynamic between you and the world changes. No longer do you have this concept of exterior versus interior, of public spaces versus private ones. Everything is exterior and public. He made the point that you suddenly find yourself in a position where simple, daily activities (such as using the restroom and sleeping) transform into things that you never thought of before into realities that thrust themselves into the forefront of your mind.
Prior to this Wednesday, I also didn't know that the mean time for homelessness is approximately 6 months. Just 6 months. That's astounding, because sometimes I think we tend to believe that once you're homeless you spend the rest of your life there; that it's a sort of "point of no return," which it's not, at all. There's still hope even after you've found yourself at rock-bottom. So the final thing to think about, if we're interested in changing our relationship with Charlottesville's homeless population, is to deconstruct the way we think about them and realize that they're also people, just normally people who have fallen down on their luck.
Wednesday, March 2, 2011
While the rest of us sleep
So it's 3.20am, and I'm still awake. Probably due to that late night double-tall cappuccino I had, fearing that I wouldn't get through all of my work tonight. This week has been a tough one for many students. Mid-terms are here, meaning many of my peers are still at the library, studying for their tests; although, most of the Canterbury House is asleep - at least, I think they are. The lights are all out.
As I was at the library earlier this evening/morning, I got to thinking about that passage from Matthew that Greg preached on this past Sunday, the one about not worrying about tomorrow. Frantically making photocopies of essays from out-of-print Prosody books, I wondered, why do we as students, subject ourselves to such, frankly, insane schedules: just to get our work finished on time. Naturally, there's the argument that "If there were only just more hours in the day, I'd be able to complete all of my work." Well, yes and no. We'd probably find something else to occupy our time, instead of spending it in quiet.
Yes, I am a periodic insomniac who goes through spells of sleeping 4-5 hours a night (or less). In fact, a good night would be when I made it to 6. Then I spend the rest of my waking hours doing other things; thinking up ideas for poems; brainstorming what to write on this blog; and reading, yes, reading. But what if we just said, at whatever point, that enough was enough, that the day's work was finished (even though there's still something left to do)? I'd like to think we'd feel better. The other day, sitting outside my advisor's office, I was drawn to a print-out she had tacked up to her door. It's by Roz Chast called "Insomnia Jeopardy." Thought you all might like to check it out if you're like me and still awake. In the last column, I'd substitute "Screenplays" for "Poems, Essays, & Stories," but everyone's different.
Each "category" really fascinates me, especially since these are all things I think about when I'm awake; and though I think we sometimes wish that we didn't have so much to do, there's a certain magic that happens when you're awake, doing something, when others sleep. This though occurred to me earlier this evening as I read some of Rilke's poetry (which I'll save for another posting ^-~ ). But, if you find yourself still up at this hour and in need of something to do, I'd recommend reading this essay "Seeing in the Dark" by U.Va. Professor of Creative Writing and fellow Episcopalian, Lisa Russ Spaar, published in The New York Times, March 2010.
Stay well all!
As I was at the library earlier this evening/morning, I got to thinking about that passage from Matthew that Greg preached on this past Sunday, the one about not worrying about tomorrow. Frantically making photocopies of essays from out-of-print Prosody books, I wondered, why do we as students, subject ourselves to such, frankly, insane schedules: just to get our work finished on time. Naturally, there's the argument that "If there were only just more hours in the day, I'd be able to complete all of my work." Well, yes and no. We'd probably find something else to occupy our time, instead of spending it in quiet.
Yes, I am a periodic insomniac who goes through spells of sleeping 4-5 hours a night (or less). In fact, a good night would be when I made it to 6. Then I spend the rest of my waking hours doing other things; thinking up ideas for poems; brainstorming what to write on this blog; and reading, yes, reading. But what if we just said, at whatever point, that enough was enough, that the day's work was finished (even though there's still something left to do)? I'd like to think we'd feel better. The other day, sitting outside my advisor's office, I was drawn to a print-out she had tacked up to her door. It's by Roz Chast called "Insomnia Jeopardy." Thought you all might like to check it out if you're like me and still awake. In the last column, I'd substitute "Screenplays" for "Poems, Essays, & Stories," but everyone's different.
Stay well all!
Tuesday, March 1, 2011
Visit with Bishop Ted
Sunday, we had the privilege to visit with one of the Diocese of Virginia's Bishops, Bishop Ted. I'd never met him before and really didn't know what to expect. Bishops can be such interesting characters that none are ever the same
During his time here he performed Baptisms, Confirmations, and Receptions into the church; but he also was very interested in meeting the members of U.Va.'s Canterbury Connection, showing his (and the diocese's) interest in supporting youth/campus ministry at several colleges and universities around the state.
There was a lovely catered lunch, courtesy of St. Paul's and great conversation on not just our concerns for campus ministry, but also the bishop's experiences in other parts of the country where he previously worked to help other youth/campus ministry programs flourish. Especially in this day, it was very refreshing to know that the church's administration was not only aware of, but committed to the importance of ministering to their youth since, with the predominant trend among people our age being disillusionment towards organized religion (and yes, I often count myself amongst those people), we're in danger of losing very talented individuals from the body of the church. He really emphasized the responsibility we have, as people of faith, to encourage others (either those who grew up in the church or are thinking of coming to it for the first time), to think about their faith, to think about those tough questions, and to not just "sweep them underneath the rug" -- so to speak. We have a duty to let people know that it's OKAY to not have all the answers and that it's good, in fact (my own opinion), healthy to question a belief system: rather than taking it for granted.
I snapped a few pictures for you all on my internet phone to share with the community.
Here are some photos of the lovely spread and interested group that assembled at the Canterbury House this Sunday.
During his time here he performed Baptisms, Confirmations, and Receptions into the church; but he also was very interested in meeting the members of U.Va.'s Canterbury Connection, showing his (and the diocese's) interest in supporting youth/campus ministry at several colleges and universities around the state.
There was a lovely catered lunch, courtesy of St. Paul's and great conversation on not just our concerns for campus ministry, but also the bishop's experiences in other parts of the country where he previously worked to help other youth/campus ministry programs flourish. Especially in this day, it was very refreshing to know that the church's administration was not only aware of, but committed to the importance of ministering to their youth since, with the predominant trend among people our age being disillusionment towards organized religion (and yes, I often count myself amongst those people), we're in danger of losing very talented individuals from the body of the church. He really emphasized the responsibility we have, as people of faith, to encourage others (either those who grew up in the church or are thinking of coming to it for the first time), to think about their faith, to think about those tough questions, and to not just "sweep them underneath the rug" -- so to speak. We have a duty to let people know that it's OKAY to not have all the answers and that it's good, in fact (my own opinion), healthy to question a belief system: rather than taking it for granted.
I snapped a few pictures for you all on my internet phone to share with the community.
Here are some photos of the lovely spread and interested group that assembled at the Canterbury House this Sunday.
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