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Edwards Church

United Church of Christ | Saxonville, Massachusetts

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Building Bridges of Understanding: Three Stories

October 7, 2018 by Rev. Debbie Clark

The Pride Shabbat

It was the night before the Boston Pride Parade. Rabbi Katy and I dug through the tablecloth drawer in Edwards Hall and found enough different colors of cloth that we could set up the tables as a rainbow.  Katy put out special sabbath candles, and we filled little compostable cups with grape juice, in place of Manischevitz wine.

Then we waited. We’d never tried this before–a Shabbat dinner on the eve of the Pride Parade.  Would anyone show up?

They did! Christians–some from Edwards, some from a progressive Catholic Church in Weston.  Jews from all over, including folks who came from more than an hour away. Some folks identified as Lesbian or Gay or Trans; others came as allies.

The first person who arrived was new to Open Spirit; neither Katy nor I knew her.  June told us she had just retired after several decades in the Air Force, including a recent tour in Iraq.  She had served during the Don’t Ask-Don’t Tell era; in more recent years she no longer had to hide who she was.

June had just moved back to Newton. She didn’t have a synagogue and didn’t have a community with which to celebrate Pride. She’d seen us on Facebook and decided to come.

A few minutes later, as others arrived, she pulled out her wallet to show us photos of her in her Air Force uniform. When the sabbath prayers began, she pulled her tallis, her prayer shawl, out of her backpack and wrapped it around her shoulders. She was home.

It was a night of bridge-building–building connections between different individuals and different communities, also building connections between the different parts of June’s life. There in Edwards Hall, amongst strangers becoming friends, June was able to claim the whole of who she is–her faith, her identity as a lesbian, her pride in her military service.

Thanks be to God for bridges and bridge-builders! Amen.

A Long Journey; A New Spiritual Home

While we were on vacation this summer, Fran and I watched the news with horror–the unfolding crisis of detention and separation at our border. We felt powerless. Then we got an email from our friend Diego, from the Metrowest Worker Center and Metrowest Immigrant Solidarity Network. He told us about a mother and daughter who were being reunited because of the efforts of our group of Metrowest churches and synagogues. We didn’t feel quite as powerless.

Soon after we got home, we learned about another family being reunited–Jorge and his 5-year-old daughter Heidy. When they arrived in Framingham, an Edwards Church member offered her house for a week. Fran and I met them with groceries.

With Diego translating, Jorge told me that, while in detention, he organized prayer meetings twice a day to keep everyone’s spirits up. He promised that when he got out, he would testify in churches, telling his story and giving glory to God.

The next day, with the help of Google Translate, I texted Jorge and asked if he would like to go to El Toque del Maestro, the church that meets here on Sunday afternoons.  Si, gracias, he replied.

After all these years of sharing our sanctuary, I had never attended a service at El Toque.  When we arrived, they welcomed us warmly. As honored guests, we were invited forward, and Jorge gave his testimony. 5-year-old Heidy drew beautiful pictures in Sunday School. The preacher gave part of her sermon in English so I would feel at home.

Later that week, Pastor Teresa visited Jorge and Heidy. She arranged rides so they can get to church. She helped Heidy register for kindergarten. Jorge and Heidy are now active members of El Toque del Maestro. In the midst of trauma, turmoil and uncertainty, they have a new spiritual home.

Folks from Edwards continue to support Jorge and Heidy as well–trips to the grocery, helping them get a bed, checking in. Our two congregation are partners–building bridges to enable Jorge and Heidy as they journey toward healing and new life.

Thanks be to God for bridges and bridge builders. Amen.

Choosing Comfort over Comfortable

Who has a favorite comfort food?  What makes them comfort foods?  [feel safe, warm and hearty, familiar, good memories]

Some of the breads on this table are comfort breads–with stories and good memories and associations with home. For some of us, I suspect, there are breads on this table that push us out of our comfort zones. Perhaps they have unfamiliar flavorings or they look kind of odd. We don’t know the stories behind them, and we’re not sure if we will like them. It’s worth taking a risk to try them anyway. They might be delicious–and become new comfort breads for us.

I have been thinking about the meaning of comfort ever since our “Facing Fear and Claiming Courage” conversation about gender identity, hosted by Open Spirit a few weeks ago.

The first speaker was a man named Ray. About 20 years ago, he became godfather to a little girl named Allie, whom he loved as a family member. A few  years ago, Allie, as a teenager, identified as transgender and began to claim a new identity, as Nathan. Nathan worried about telling his godfather, because Ray was a devoted Catholic.

When Ray learned about his godchild’s transition, he did struggle–to understand it in light of the teachings of his church, even more to understand it personally, and in relationship to God as creator.

As Ray talked about his own journey to accept and ultimately celebrate Nathan’s journey, he acknowledged his struggle, and said that he came to embrace that struggle as a gift. Then he said a sentence that stuck with me: I choose comfort over comfortable.

I don’t know for sure what Ray meant; I do know what his words mean for me. When we are focused on being comfortable, we choose what is easy, we narrow our vision so we don’t see anything that will challenge our perspective. We revel in our own stories, even when it means ignoring someone else’s. Comfortable, Ray seemed to be saying, is over-rated.

Comfort is different.  Comfort means trusting God’s love can hold us up when it feels like the ground is shifting beneath us. Comfort means trusting that when our view of the world is turned upside-down, God has a broader perspective.

When we choose comfortable, we build walls to keep challenges away. When we choose comfort, we build bridges–bridges to our own deeper selves, bridges to a new relationship with God, bridges to people we don’t yet understand.

Let us choose comfort over comfortable. Let us be bridge-builders. Thanks be to God. Amen.

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