The Mainline Minister

Last week the Daily Telegraph reported that the Rev. Tim Ross, a Methodist minister in the UK, was planning to use Twitter to administer communion ( http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/twitter/7908263/Church-minister-to-tweet-Holy-Communion-to-the-faithful.html ). While I applaud Rev. Ross' desire to use 21st century tools to spread the Good News, and I believe that real communities of interest can be formed online, I rather think this liturgical initiative rather misses the point. Communion a/k/a the Eucharist a/k/a the Lord's Supper is based on a shared meal. Yes, you and I could both sit down to eat and drink in different locations and email, text, or tweet one another about what were consuming, and we would have a common experience -- but would we really be sharing a meal? I don't think so. Some Christians believe that the host and wine are literally transformed into the body and blood of Christ. Others believe they are compelling representations of God's lov...

Originally posted at www.fccleb.org on July 20, 2010 I felt like I was back in B-school rather than Divinity School when I was working on yesterday’s sermon. As part of a series of reflections on the über-productive hymn writer Isaac Watts (he penned more than 750, some of which remain very popular – Joy to the World, anyone?), I wanted to see which hymns appeared most frequently among seven different hymnals published between 1906 and 2007. The easiest way to do this was by using a spreadsheet. Memories of sensitivity analyses, crosstabs, and other ways of playing with data came rushing back. A lot’s been said and written about the ways the Internet can be used to spread the Gospel. But number crunching? Not so much.

Originally posted at www.fccleb.org on July 16, 2010 Older readers and stand-up comedy fans may remember George Carlin’s “Seven Words You Can’t Say on Television” routine. The days when you could excite comment by uttering a profanity on television are long behind us. And, thanks to a court ruling, so too are the days when you could break the law ( http://www.nytimes.com/2010/07/14/business/media/14indecent.html?_r=1&ref=television ). According to a Federal Appeals Court in New York, the FCC’s current ban on the use of fleeting obscenities is unconstitutional because it supposedly has a chilling effect. The upshot: it’s okay for Cher, Bono, and other stars who have cursed during live broadcasts to do so in the future. It doesn’t matter that some v...

Originally posted at www.fccleb.org on July 8, 2010 From the “We Never Got Around To This in Divinity School” Files … The past few days have seen the mercury climb into in the high 90s in the Upper Valley; my car’s thermometer has twice displayed a temperature of 100. The bottom line: it’s been hot, hot, hot. Which got me to thinking about hell. In the popular imagination, hell is a very hot place, defined by fire and brimstone. Nothing is every said about humidity, though, which I find interesting. For me, it’s the humidity that has given the recent weather its edge. I can tolerate the heat (though I’d much prefer temperatures in the high 60s or low 70s). The damp, cloying air is what gets to me. If...

Originally Posted at www.fccleb.org on June 29 When the Old Man in the Mountain fell from his rocky perch a few years ago, I idly wondered what that meant for all of the state road signs that sported his silhouette. “Would they be redesigned?” I wondered. As we all now know, the answer was no. After all, no good Yankee would waste a perfectly functional sign. And, on an existential level, the Old Man had become part of the state’s psyche; the fact that it no longer actually existed did nothing to diminish what it represented for and to the people of New Hampshire. Symbols are like that, helping us connect with our past. The highly urbanized and ever-idiosyncratic Golden State prominently features the long-instinct Califor...

Originally posted at www.fccleb.org on June 23 The Guardian of London reports that a 4th century fresco depicting John and Andrew was discovered under a street in Rome (go here for more: www.guardian.co.uk/science/2010/jun/22/apostles-images-john-andrew-italy ). Finds like this are always welcome news to this Roman and Church history fan. They help us learn more about the ancient world and the people who inhabited it, making classical times come alive. One of the most striking things about the fresco is that it portrays a youthful Andrew. In most art, he’s shown as an old man. Here we have him at his prime, allowing us to imagine the disciple as he was when he knew Jesus. He’s a young man, and we can picture him setting out on the great adventure in ministry and service to which he’d been called. ...

Originally posted at fccleb.org on June 15, 2010 Last September I thought I’d try my hand at writing a blog. I posted one entry and then my bloggy muse fell silent. Now I’ve decided to give it another try. Talk about returning to the scene of the authorial crime! Here’s what I wrote last fall … Inspired by my friend Sam Barry, I have decided to take the plunge and begin blogging. My hope in emulating Sam, a real, live published author who wrote How to Play the Harmonica: and Other Life Lessons is that I, too, may someday write a book that someone will actually want to pay real money to read. Ideally, this book will be such a hit that I’ll sell so many copies that I’ll eventually be able to hire someone smarter, wittier, and taller to write this blog for me. Until that blessed (and unlikely) day occurs, I plan to share my thoughts and observations on the wild and wooly world of (dis)organized religion, which happens to be of particular interest to me as a minister in the United Churc...