Welcome, baby, to the Family of those who believe.
We believe that the world’s rightful King was born on a night like this, small and helpless like you, and lived and died a rebel in His own country. We believe our job is to continue the rebellion against hate, against greed, against arrogance, against all that would destroy the things that matter.
We believe that, as water cleanses the body, so He can cleanse the soul, and make us who and what we know deep down we ought to be.
We believe that, as bread and wine feed and restore the body, so He can feed and restore the soul, and give us continued strength to do the work He has given us to do.
We believe that, as a little incense fills a whole building with a sweet smell, so His Spirit can cause a little work of kindness to sweeten all the world.
We believe that, as music is not mere noise, but a pattern that turns chaos into order, so the Conductor of all things has made the world to be more than just sound and fury, but a Pattern in which everything makes sense, everything has its place in the whole.
We believe that God is with us. We believe that, in these things we see and hear and taste and touch and smell, we perceive the things too big for us to perceive.
And we believe that the miracle of your life is only the beginning, that there is a different and greater kind of Life into which you will be born if you receive it. We believe that your new Family will help you learn how to live the new Life.
We believe the impossible, and we know that the impossible is more real than we are. And we believe that it will make us truly Real.
© John M. Munzer
Friday, December 25, 2009
Saturday, December 19, 2009
God with us
To all who mourn, to all who wait,
To all whose lives seem to abate,
To all who still in sadness dwell -
O come, O come Emmanuel.
To all who pray, to all who hope,
To all who triumph, or just cope,
To all who manage pretty well -
O come, O come Emmanuel.
To all in need, to all who give,
To all who die, and all who live,
To all who watch for time to tell -
O come, O come Emmanuel.
To all who listen for the Word;
To all who wonder what they heard,
What meaning comes from each Noel -
O come, O come Emmanuel.
To all who strive to be Your hands,
To follow Your two Great Commands:
To love You, and neighbors as well –
O come, O come Emmanuel.
To You, whose hunger we must feed,
To You, who comes to us in need,
Thirsty, in prison, in pain, in Hell –
You call us to come, Emmanuel.
To You who comes broken to our door,
Our tired, our hurting, our empty, our poor,
And to the ones who help them as well –
We come, we come, Emmanuel.
O God, Who is with us in the least of these,
Grant mercifully that soon each of us sees
In our brothers that You have already come.
Emmanuel, may we welcome You home.
© John M. Munzer
To all whose lives seem to abate,
To all who still in sadness dwell -
O come, O come Emmanuel.
To all who pray, to all who hope,
To all who triumph, or just cope,
To all who manage pretty well -
O come, O come Emmanuel.
To all in need, to all who give,
To all who die, and all who live,
To all who watch for time to tell -
O come, O come Emmanuel.
To all who listen for the Word;
To all who wonder what they heard,
What meaning comes from each Noel -
O come, O come Emmanuel.
To all who strive to be Your hands,
To follow Your two Great Commands:
To love You, and neighbors as well –
O come, O come Emmanuel.
To You, whose hunger we must feed,
To You, who comes to us in need,
Thirsty, in prison, in pain, in Hell –
You call us to come, Emmanuel.
To You who comes broken to our door,
Our tired, our hurting, our empty, our poor,
And to the ones who help them as well –
We come, we come, Emmanuel.
O God, Who is with us in the least of these,
Grant mercifully that soon each of us sees
In our brothers that You have already come.
Emmanuel, may we welcome You home.
© John M. Munzer
Sunday, December 13, 2009
While by my sheep...
A blinding flash - a beautiful, terrible Glory that burns, chills, hurts, heals all at once - an overwhelming Presence - a Voice that makes the earth tremble - All the host of heaven singing praise to YHWH (they spoke His Name aloud!) - and peace and goodwill to us - and then the impossible vision is gone and we are again surrounded by darkness and the stench of sheep. A moment of Silence, and we are running towards Bethlehem, our thoughts tripping over each other - Why here? Why now? Why us? - Wonder if the priests got a message like that? - Ha, wonder if the Romans are hearing that their tyranny is broken? - But the message said joy to all people - maybe Romans don't count - but then shepherds shouldn't count - not in this stable either - be up all night looking - never sleep again anyway if we don't find - The inn? Really? God is surely with us tonight! - and we are here, breathless and sore but here.
For this?
What is this? Yes, in a manger, wrapped in graveclothes - rather morbid for a childbirth - but an ordinary baby. The stink of donkeys - yes, and shepherds, I know - the parents, such plain, poor people - like us - such an unremarkable child after all - No. That unbearable Presence is here - No, ma'am, I couldn't - well, alright - I am holding a baby. I am remembering the last time I went to the Temple with Father - the lamb we slaughtered - why am I trembling so? - So should I play peekaboo with him or bow before him? Or – can it really be permitted, that I can simply hold Him? – Child, what are you? Why is it more terrible to look on this plain face than upon the Host of Heaven? And - yes, please take him, I am rough, I may - hurt - him - O God, did Jacob feel like this when he realized who he'd been wrestling with? - "All we like sheep have strayed, and ELOHIM has laid on him our iniquity " - why that? - A baby in graveclothes - the mother says she is a virgin?!? - I hope our sheep are okay, we didn't even stop to lock up - but when angels speak to shepherds, the angel's business comes first - I'm surprised, there's no royalty, no priests - even the innkeeper hasn't stopped to visit, can it be he doesn't know? - well, I wouldn't have known, either, without the message - Why wasn't he born into royalty or something? What can a carpenter do? - But that Presence - what can he not do? - and yet I feel, somehow, that he will be a shepherd. And I am afraid, because a good shepherd lays down his life for his sheep.
© John M. Munzer
For this?
What is this? Yes, in a manger, wrapped in graveclothes - rather morbid for a childbirth - but an ordinary baby. The stink of donkeys - yes, and shepherds, I know - the parents, such plain, poor people - like us - such an unremarkable child after all - No. That unbearable Presence is here - No, ma'am, I couldn't - well, alright - I am holding a baby. I am remembering the last time I went to the Temple with Father - the lamb we slaughtered - why am I trembling so? - So should I play peekaboo with him or bow before him? Or – can it really be permitted, that I can simply hold Him? – Child, what are you? Why is it more terrible to look on this plain face than upon the Host of Heaven? And - yes, please take him, I am rough, I may - hurt - him - O God, did Jacob feel like this when he realized who he'd been wrestling with? - "All we like sheep have strayed, and ELOHIM has laid on him our iniquity " - why that? - A baby in graveclothes - the mother says she is a virgin?!? - I hope our sheep are okay, we didn't even stop to lock up - but when angels speak to shepherds, the angel's business comes first - I'm surprised, there's no royalty, no priests - even the innkeeper hasn't stopped to visit, can it be he doesn't know? - well, I wouldn't have known, either, without the message - Why wasn't he born into royalty or something? What can a carpenter do? - But that Presence - what can he not do? - and yet I feel, somehow, that he will be a shepherd. And I am afraid, because a good shepherd lays down his life for his sheep.
© John M. Munzer
Sunday, December 6, 2009
What it's all about
I work with people who have developmental disabilities. One of the people I’ve grown closest to is T, a woman with Cerebral Palsy. T was at my wedding, and was the first to meet us at the door in the reception hall, with a huge smile and a huge present. I think the reason T and I have bonded so much is that T needs a lot of help to communicate. She’s only able to do so by blinking to say “yes”, and shaking her head a little to say “no”. We have a book of topics she usually wants to discuss, and she can tell us what she wants if we use the book and ask “yes/no” questions until we get to the one she wants. So it takes a lot of time and attention to find out what T is trying to say. And because I’ve invested so much time in understanding her, she’s also come to understand me, and that makes us close.
Over the years, T’s ability to digest food has gradually decreased. At the wedding, she was able to have cake and non-alcoholic champagne. A year later, the risk of choking had become too great, so she was switched to tube feeding. After a while, that type of tube feeding wasn’t working, so they had to use another type. After another while, she began to need medication to keep her bowels moving. Then more medication, then different medication, then more and more frequent hospitalization.
This week, her bowels stopped working entirely, and there’s nothing the doctors can do to start them again. She can no longer take in nutrients. This means that she will die. We could make the process slow and painful if we intervened, but she will still die. So we decided not to intervene, except with pain medication.
I was the one who told her she was going to die. She surprised and impressed me by taking it better than I did. She’s angry, sad, and scared, and so are we, but she’s still taking it better than we on her team took it.
Soon after she got the news, she wanted to tell one of her staff something. After playing 20 questions, staff found that T wanted to write cards to people. When asked which people, she indicated “yes” to each person, until we asked “Do you want to write to everyone?” YES. YES. YES.
So I got stationery and markers and asked who she wanted to start with. She wanted to start with her boyfriend D. I helped her pick out the color of the card, the color of the marker, then asked her what she wanted to say. She indicated “Love, love, love, yes, yes, yes.” I asked a few more questions to make sure I got the wording right, and what she wanted to say was this:
“I love you. Thank you for loving me.”
So, I put the marker in her hand, and hand-over-hand, we wrote those words and signed her name.
D has a disability too. He has autism, and noises overwhelm him so much that he has to wear headphones ALL THE TIME. He finds hospitals especially overwhelming and scary. But when his mom told him T was in the hospital, very sick, and this might be the last time he would ever see her, and asked if he wanted to visit, D was dressed and in the car in less than a minute. When he came in, he smiled, touched foreheads with T, waved bye-bye, and walked out. He came in a few minutes later, smiled, touched foreheads, waved bye-bye, and walked out. Once more he came in, smiled, touched foreheads, waved bye-bye, and walked out, and that was all he could cope with.
Later, his mom read him the card. D smiled, signed “Love” and pointed to T’s picture. “Love, T. Love, T. Love, T.”
That’s humanity, stripped down to the core. That is who we are, and what’s important about us – giving and receiving love. T and D helped me remember that this week.
© John M. Munzer
Over the years, T’s ability to digest food has gradually decreased. At the wedding, she was able to have cake and non-alcoholic champagne. A year later, the risk of choking had become too great, so she was switched to tube feeding. After a while, that type of tube feeding wasn’t working, so they had to use another type. After another while, she began to need medication to keep her bowels moving. Then more medication, then different medication, then more and more frequent hospitalization.
This week, her bowels stopped working entirely, and there’s nothing the doctors can do to start them again. She can no longer take in nutrients. This means that she will die. We could make the process slow and painful if we intervened, but she will still die. So we decided not to intervene, except with pain medication.
I was the one who told her she was going to die. She surprised and impressed me by taking it better than I did. She’s angry, sad, and scared, and so are we, but she’s still taking it better than we on her team took it.
Soon after she got the news, she wanted to tell one of her staff something. After playing 20 questions, staff found that T wanted to write cards to people. When asked which people, she indicated “yes” to each person, until we asked “Do you want to write to everyone?” YES. YES. YES.
So I got stationery and markers and asked who she wanted to start with. She wanted to start with her boyfriend D. I helped her pick out the color of the card, the color of the marker, then asked her what she wanted to say. She indicated “Love, love, love, yes, yes, yes.” I asked a few more questions to make sure I got the wording right, and what she wanted to say was this:
“I love you. Thank you for loving me.”
So, I put the marker in her hand, and hand-over-hand, we wrote those words and signed her name.
D has a disability too. He has autism, and noises overwhelm him so much that he has to wear headphones ALL THE TIME. He finds hospitals especially overwhelming and scary. But when his mom told him T was in the hospital, very sick, and this might be the last time he would ever see her, and asked if he wanted to visit, D was dressed and in the car in less than a minute. When he came in, he smiled, touched foreheads with T, waved bye-bye, and walked out. He came in a few minutes later, smiled, touched foreheads, waved bye-bye, and walked out. Once more he came in, smiled, touched foreheads, waved bye-bye, and walked out, and that was all he could cope with.
Later, his mom read him the card. D smiled, signed “Love” and pointed to T’s picture. “Love, T. Love, T. Love, T.”
That’s humanity, stripped down to the core. That is who we are, and what’s important about us – giving and receiving love. T and D helped me remember that this week.
© John M. Munzer
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