The Sustainist

Cash the Check of Human Rights

Fifty years ago on August 28, 1963, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. addressed 250,000 people who gathered at the nation’s capital for the March for Jobs and Freedom.  Most people knew about the segment of the speech with the refrain:  I have a dream . . .

My associate Ray Hess used the following lessor known excerpt of the speech to begin our leadership training institute last week in North Bend, Washington State.

In a sense we’ve come to our nation’s capital to cash a check.  When the architects of our republic wrote the magnificent words of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence, they were signing a promissory note to which every American was to fall heir.  This note was a promise that all men, yes, black men as well as white men, would be guaranteed the “unalienable Rights of Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.”  It is obvious today that America has defaulted on the promissory note insofar as her citizens of color are concerned.  Instead of honoring this solemn obligation, America has given the Negro people a bad check, a check which has been marked “insufficient funds.”

But we refuse to believe that the bank of justice is bankrupt.  We refuse to believe that there are insufficient funds in the great vaults of opportunity of the nation.  And so we’ve come to cash the check, a check that will give us upon demand the riches of freedom and the security of justice.

We have also come to this hallowed spot to remind America of the fierce urgency of now.  This is no time to engage in the luxury of cooling off or to take the tranquilizing drug of gradualism.  Now is the time to make real the promises of democracy.  Now is the time to rise from the dark and desolate valley of segregation to the sunlit path of racial justice.  Now is the time to lift our nation from the quicksand of racial injustice to the solid rock of brotherhood.  Now is the time to make justice a reality for all of God’s children.

Here is a question for reflection and dialogue:  To create a sustainable community today, what “check” do we need to cash?

Reflection Questions for Proper 17 (Year C) Jeremiah 2:4-13    How have we gone after worthless things? Psalm 81:1, 10-16  What does God yearn for? Hebrews 13:1-8, 15-16   How have you entertained “angels”? Luke 14:1, 7-14   What does this text teach you about leadership?

Eric H. F. Law
Kaleidoscope Institute
For competent leadership in a diverse changing world
www.kscopeinstitute.org

Reach for Beauty

In Gezi Park, Taksim Square, Istanbul on June 12, 2013, protesters were preparing for another assault by police. They were stockpiling gas masks and goggles to protect against tear gas, which police used with abandon the night before. The first aid tent was bustling with activity bracing for what might come. In the midst of this high-tension, violence- prone environment, a German pianist, Davide Martello, unloaded his grand piano on the edge of the park and started playing.  Within a few hours, the atmosphere in the square changed.  Not only did the protesters listen calmly to the soothing music, the police were there, mixing with the crowd, some talking about what was happening.  Martello gave 13 hours of beautiful calming music for peace, providing a grace margin in which people were just people enjoying together the beauty of sound that humankind could create.

Lily Yeh, founder of Barefoot Artists, an organization that revitalizes neighborhoods around the globe through the transformative power of art, said, “I have found that the broken spaces are my living canvas,” Yeh says. “In our brokenness, our hearts reach for beauty.”

We are living in a broken world riddled with tension, violence, hunger, poverty, injustice --  all signs of unsustainability.  We need to reach for beauty more than ever in place with broken buildings, broken relationships, broken government, broken lives.   Another way to think about this: arts and beauty are signs of hope and reality of sustainable communities.  How can we be artists, who engage people in creating beauty so others in our communities can reach for it, touch it, share it, connect through it? 

Reflection Questions for Proper 16 (Year C) Jeremiah 1:4-10    What does God appoint you to be? Psalm 71:1-6  How does God sustain you? Hebrews 12:18-29   What does it mean to have received a realm that cannot be shaken? Luke 13:10-17   What does this story teach you about being healed?

Eric H. F. Law
Kaleidoscope Institute
For competent leadership in a diverse changing world
www.kscopeinstitute.org

Missional Ministry, Grace Margins and Holy Currency

Holy Currencies Work

I have been offering Holy Currency workshops for over 2 years and I have been receiving stories of missional and sustainable (MAS) ministries from people who had participated in these workshops.  Here is one of them from the Rev. Michael Cunningham, my guest blogger this week:

While doing a weekend ministry event a couple of years ago with the Rev. Eric Law here at St. Mary’s in Lompoc, we developed a response to Eric’s teachings concerning missional ministry and a new way of encountering opportunities.  Here is a brief description of that event…and the remarkable results.

Since coming to St. Mary’s in 2007, the Holy Spirit has given me the ministry of death and dying and funerals.  Lots of funerals.  As of this writing in August of 2013…over 100 now and counting.  When our teams from St. Mary’s in Lompoc and St. Peter’s in Santa Maria gathered, my team discovered that the Spirit was giving us an opportunity for evangelism and growth that we had not recognized until Eric’s brilliant work helped us to “see”. 

That Saturday, the 2^nd day of the three day event, my community wrote and developed a “gracious invitation” which was conveyed to the congregation the next day at both services to invite members of the church to meet on Tuesday evening to discern together what the Spirit was calling us to do with regards to funerals and the ministry of radical hospitality.  Over 20 persons attended and gathered into teams that (a) cared for family members; (b) assisted newcomers and guests with the service; (c) worked on the particulars of a reception after the service; (d) greeted each person who came to the church at the edge of the patio and remained with them to the door of the church; (e) assisted the priest with the service and (f) set up and cleaned up before and after.  The funeral that all were working on was two days after the Tuesday night gathering and had over 300 persons in attendance.

Since that vanguard moment in the life of our congregation, we have had many, many more funerals…and each one has been assisted by members of the congregation, including about 14 of the original 23, but now added to by many others as part of the ongoing work of ministry in this place. 

The Daughters of the King, a lay-order of women dedicated to prayer and support for the clergy of an Episcopal Parish, have taken on the ministry of caring for the family, but all other aspects of the original identified ministry, including issuing “gracious invitations”, has remained the work of the laity of the church.

St. Mary’s has grown from the 120 or so persons who attended in 2007 when I first got here to over 450 as of this writing.  Average Sunday attendance hovers around 160 to 180 with large occasions, Christmas and Easter and Pentecost averaging close to 500.  Holy Currency, and the terminology of Eric’s work, has become part of the lexicon here at St. Mary’s…and the working understanding that we are living in a Grace Margin and evaluating decisions we make in terms of what sort of Holy Currency we are employing for each opportunity the Spirit gives us is now how we do things here. 

I have known and worked with Eric for over 17 years now and can say with great conviction that his work is visionary and life-changing.  Much of the work we have done together defines how I view congregational development, but none more exciting than Holy Currency.

The Reverend Michael Cunningham, Rector   St. Mary’s Episcopal Church in Lompoc, CA

Reflection Questions for Proper 15 (Year C) Isaiah 5:1-7    What does God expect from us? Psalm 80:1-2,8-18  How does God restore us? Hebrews 11:29-12:2   Who have been witnesses of faith for you? Luke 12:49-56   How does this text challenge your idea of Jesus?

Eric H. F. Law
Kaleidoscope Institute
For competent leadership in a diverse changing world
www.kscopeinstitute.org

2013 Opportunities to Study with The Sustainist: August 19-23 Fundamental Skills for Building Inclusive Community and Holy Currencies Orientation Rainbow Lodge Retreat Center, North Bend (near Seattle), WA Register at:  www.kscopeinstitute.org

Higher Plane of Dignity and Discipline

Fifty years ago, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., on August 28, 1963 gave the famous “I have a dream” speech at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C. to over 250,000 civil right supporters.  There was a lot more substance to the speech besides the most well-known “I have a dream” portion.  Dr. King came from a long line of prophetic voices rooted in the Judeo-Christian tradition.  They have the unshakable faith of a vision of a sustainable world that has not yet been realized. Dr. King was a sustainist, in my book, because his passion was centered on creating a sustainable and just community that values multiple perspectives. 

Here are the lesser known excerpts from his speech:

We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of dignity and discipline. We must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence. Again and again we must rise to the majestic heights of meeting physical force with soul force.

And the marvelous new militarism which has engulfed the Negro community must not lead us to a distrust of all white people, for many of our white brothers have evidenced by their presence here today that they have come to realize that their destiny is part of our destiny.

So even though we face the difficulties of today and tomorrow I still have a dream. It is a dream deeply rooted in the American dream.

. . .

I have a dream that one day every valley shall be exalted, every hill and mountain shall be made low, the rough places plains, and the crooked places will be made straight, and before the Lord will be revealed, and all flesh shall see it together.

This is our hope. This is the faith that I go back to the mount with. With this faith we will be able to hew out of the mountain of despair a stone of hope. With this faith we will be able to transform the genuine discords of our nation into a beautiful symphony of brotherhood. With this faith we will be able to work together, pray together; to struggle together, to go to jail together, to stand up for freedom forever, knowing that we will be free one day.

Now faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen.  (Hebrews 11:1)

Reflection Questions for Proper 14 (Year C) Isaiah 1:1, 10-20    How can we achieve a right relationship with God? Psalm 50:1-8, 23-24  What did you learn from this psalm about God’s judgment? Hebrews 11:1-3, 8-16   What did you learn from this text about faith? Luke 12:32-40   What does it mean to be ready for the coming of the Son of Man?

Eric H. F. Law
Kaleidoscope Institute
For competent leadership in a diverse changing world
www.kscopeinstitute.org

2013 Opportunities to Study with The Sustainist: August 19-23 Fundamental Skills for Building Inclusive Community and Holy Currencies Orientation Rainbow Lodge Retreat Center, North Bend (near Seattle), WA Register at:  www.kscopeinstitute.org