Fully Alive in God

Wandering and wondering There have been many blessings to this pilgrimage so far. While you are in the Holy Land you can feel such intense moments of connection to the triune God, and especially to Jesus. But there is a strange tension at almost every holy site- too many of us want to be there having our connection to Jesus or our spiritual tourism (to be honest it is a bit of both for even the most holy). And so there are almost always people at each site rushing you along. In Shepherd's Fields yesterday we ran into signs that said "Five minutes only" in each chapel. In the Holy Sepulchre we had about 3 minutes to pray at the traditional site of Jesus' burial. In the Church of the Nativity there was no one supervising and a group kept the rest of us waiting about half an hour as they sang songs. I was rather annoyed and then started singing along. What to do? So you try to be in the moment, and grateful that you are here. You find the moment however brief to pray...

One of the highlights of this pilgrimage so far is glimpses of the unexpected joy of the early church and of Mary's life. Yesterday we went to Nazareth and got to see the place where tradition holds that Mary had her simple house built out of a cave. In a typical fashion the old cave is preserved and around it the ruins of pre-Byzantine Jewish/Christian synagogue, a crusader church and then the second floor was added in the 20th century. The Church of the Annunciation has Marian scenes from all over the world. Check out a few in this post. As I paused by the grate before the cave, my heart flipped with the unexpected joy that I imagine Mary felt (along perhaps with trepidation) at knowing she would bear Jesus, Emmanuel. Later in the day we went to the Sea of Galilee area and we saw Capernaum, the town out of which Jesus did much of his ministry. There we saw an old synagogue - 5th century but possibly over an older one which may possibly have been the one Jesus attended. ...

Today Alene and I explored the Mount of Olives, Garden of Gethsemane, St. Stephen's martyrdom site and church, the Church of All Nations adjacent to the Garden of Gethsemane and the Dominus Flevit Church where Jesus wept over Jerusalem.  A couple of days ago we explored the Old City of Jerusalem with a tour group and rushed through the Church of the Holy Sepulcher so today we went back and saw a bit more of it. After seeng the resurrected Jesus in a new way in Manoppello, we were struck by the focus in Jerusalem on Christ's passion and death. I loved the Garden of Gethsemane recreated by the Franciscans but I found I wanted to focus on Jesus' quiet prayer time there with the many trees and birds and lizards. The focus was largely on Jesus' passion. I found it meaningful to lean against the rock and pray with him, but for me that was not the only moment I could imagine in that place with Jesus. It was also a tranquil retreat for Jesus and his disciples. Likewise...

Hello friends, I have been quiet for a bit because since arriving in the Holy Land we have been quite active! I will begin with the ancient city of Joppa (now a part of Tel Aviv-Yafo) where we stayed when we began our time in Israel. We walked from our Airbnb to the old Port of Joppa where many believe Jonah went to get on the boat to escape God and his call to go to Ninevah. There is a whale statue near Joppa Port in Jonah's honor. But another meaningful site for Christians in this four thousand year old town is Simon the Tanner's House, pictured here. It is in Old Jaffa, right next to the ocean facing the port. An Armenian family has owned it for generations and runs the lighthouse that is on top of the house and is still operational today. This is the place where Peter would have come up to the roof (Acts 9-10). Now in the Middle East sometimes a roof can be more exposed, but here right next to the ocean with the breeze it would have been a pleasant place to wait for th...

In the Bible, God tells Moses that one cannot see the face of God and live. And yet those thousands of years later, Jesus showed up and there was something about him- about his face that was both human and divine, that allowed the face of God to be visible to people. Yet there was surely something about Jesus that blinded people a bit. He was always knocking folks sideways. People met him and just knew he was the real thing. Paul Badde's book, The Face of God , and the shorter The Holy Veil of Manoppello outline how he found out about a small veil over an altar in a far off part of Italy- tucked into a tiny town in the Abruzzi mountains, that beguiled him and many others. While many faithful people (including Padre Pío) believed that the veil was perhaps our most precious "relic" of the church, others were put off by the claim that several had made that this was indeed a true image of Christ's face made at the moment of resurrection. The day before yesterday Alene,...

St Paul's-Within-the-Walls, Rome Home churches, churches that feel less like home, and coming home again to Jesus One of the blessings of the sabbatical time so far has been visiting various home churches around the world. As you may know, we Episcopalians and Anglicans Can often find a home church almost anywhere in the world. And I have the joy of also having many churches all over which I consider to be second homes. There is Holy Innocents Lahaina where I spent almost every Christmas (lucky/blessed I know) until I went to seminary, and where we attended in late June. Additionally there is Good Shepherd, Berkeley where we still have many friends from seminary. We even attended a home church here in Rome, although in this case not one I had seen before, St Paul's-Within-the-Walls, on Sunday. We joined the tiny Spanish speaking service at 12:30 and Genesis so enjoyed a familiar tongue after all of the Italian! But all of this home church business got me thinking ab...

7.4.19 Reconnection / Re-conexión En route to Rome we traveled via Knoxville, TN to see our relatives David and Roxana and their two small children. This visit has been heartwarming, including meeting a new (to us) family member. But I have also been thinking about how before seeing something new we need to re-ground in something old. We need to reconnect to our roots. Two days before we flew to Tennessee, we visited with Genesis' first family and then my parents, brother and sister in law and nephew in Pasadena. Being with them is never completely uncomplicated, but it is always important in terms of feeling connected to our roots. Similarly, traveling via Tennessee and seeing family helped us feel even more grounded in the love of family and ready for our voyage. When you feel connected to your roots, you are able to be open to the new and the strange. En camino hacia Roma viajamos a Knoxville, TN para ver a unos familiares, David y Roxana y sus niños pequeños. E...

6.30.19 Preparation / Preparación The week we were home between trips was filled with preparation for our upcoming big voyage. When one is traveling overseas and to a variety of different climates, one has to prepare in many ways. A couple of months ago we not only booked flights and hotel rooms but began the process of buying the correct travel adapters – we will need a different kind for Italy, Israel and the UK – and other preparations. This past week was filled with laundry, ordering and receiving space saver bags for our laundry, packing health supplies so we don't have to search for them in foreign languages, and meeting with Genesis' school so that she is ready for the fall. We purchased a futon so that our house-sitter would not be consigned to the small child's bed we previously had in the guest room while we were all in the house. We even managed a trip to the AAA office where they got us a great deal on train tickets in the United Kingdom. I found our Londo...