Category: Michael D
a Future story
Twice a month I publish an eNews that helps connect Oklahoma Disciples of Christ congregations. It is an advocacy piece as much as it tells stories about ministry that individual congregations are doing and sharing through the Oklahoma Regional Church. Sometimes, I use some space to discuss issues and vision. Below is my column in the Aug. 15, 2011 CYYA Intersection.
Summer is coming to a close. Families are either resetting school routines or will soon be organizing calendars and rides to this and that activity, including church. Many that serve with children, youth, or young adults, try to squeeze in a little down time between Aug. 1 and Labor Day when fall CYYA programming really kicks into high gear. FCC, Norman is kicking off their fall programming by having evening gatherings each night this week to welcome, group build, and prepare for a weekend away (this weekend) to plan for the coming year. FCC, Enid is hosting a Lock-In this Friday night to give youth the opportunity to see camp friends one more time before school gets too busy. This summer was good. Use the links below to see photos from the summer ministry experiences. 524 children and youth attended a Regional Church camp experience this year. 309 youth and adults made a difference in many, many lives through Mission Camp hosted by FCC, Stillwater. At last count, 82 children and youth participated in Texoma’s summer camp offerings and 28 children attended NEACCO’s Discovery camp at Camp Christian. There is a lot to celebrate, there are many stories to tell, and there is ministry waiting for us to do together.
The news of the economy, images of famine in Somalia, budgets, dysfunctional institutions, jobs, and survival are dominating conversations in public and in many congregations. We move toward the fall with such pace and anticipation of football season that it can be hard to remember the good moments from the summer. In the coming weeks the CYYA Intersection will publish short stories (please email or snail mail yours) from summer activities, trips, and camp. If you participated in some way with your congregation, your Area, or the Regional Church with children, with youth, or with young adults this summer, thank you.
You probably receive five to eight requests for funding a week either by phone, mailings, or email. This is not an “ask” for money. Personal budgets and congregational budgets are stretched as we all make choices about what to support with our finances as well as our time and talents. All this anxiety and worry, legitimate as it is, typically siphons the creative energy to problem solve, to imagine the possible, and chart a course to a future story. The CYYA (commission with children, youth, and young adults) will meet in September to review where we have been this year and chart new courses into a future based on abundance.
A part of this future story involves our relationships and intentional connections. Our competitive culture divides into winners and losers, but is that what intentional Christian community is to be about doing? Our gifts for ministry, laity and ordained, compliment our shared witness of being followers of Jesus with the children, youth, and young adults in our midst. Our identity informs our advocacy. I trust you have two or three Disciples siblings in Oklahoma that you can call to share ideas or talk to when times are good and bad. The CYYA will explore how it can support the Disciples working in CYYA ministries all across Oklahoma and celebrate the variety of ways that gospel is being shared with children, youth, and young adults.
A part of this future story involves our time. This year 98 adults volunteered as counselors and directors for the Regional Church Summer Ministry (camp) program. These adults represent 40 different congregations in Oklahoma. These numbers do not include the adults that gave their time at Texoma Christian Camp or at Camp Christian this summer for experiences that these sites offered through area leadership. Disciples are grateful for the time, talent, life and faith experience that adults gifted to our children and youth this summer. The Regional Church is thankful for the vision of congregations that gifted the time of their pastors (Associate and Senior) to the summer camp program wherever it was offered.
A part of this future story involves money. Here, cliche can inform. First, quality experiences do not always cost a lot of money. We all do our best to stretch every dollar for maximum effect. Second, you do get what you pay for. We live in a “value for dollar” culture that has found its way into congregational life. Expensive does not mean better, but nor does generic mean the same or even like substance. Third, you know the “priceless” commercials. There are some things you cannot put a dollar amount. CYYA ministry is “missional” because it is new church planting. If Disciples congregations are going to be a relevant voice of Gospel in the future it is because we invested today in the relationships and experiences that provide opportunities for our children, youth, and young adult to grasp the divine in their midst as well as the unique witness of our expression of Christian faith. That is how many current Disciples found their way to pews and fellowship halls. This is what happens during intentional Christian (Disciples of Christ) community at summer camp, on mission trips, and retreats. That is different than supporting a generic or popular Christianity. It trusts the Church into the hands of prepared children, youth, and young adults that are leading now and will lead it in the future. CYYA Ministries are Missional for our brand of Christian witness and the whole Church. We will need to find funding, the Regional Church and congregations, for this missional ministry that is both budgeted money and specialized fundraising as we live into our future story.
There is ministry that only the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) can do and much of it requires us to do it in covenant, together. CYYA Ministries is one example of what missional ministry can look like for our denomination. Thanks for your support of minisitry in your local congregation and through the Regional Church.
Memorial
Another Memorial Day. I pause to remember former youth group members, all adults now, a second cousin, and a friend in ministry that have all, at one time or another since 2002, been in Iraq or Afghanistan either on the ground or in the airspace. They have all come home alive, but in remembering these I also recall the memory of a silent airplane last year. A flight from Atlanta to Tulsa. A Marine was returning home to his family, flag draped and escorted, by another Marine. In Atlanta military volunteers saluted as his body was loaded on the plane, the last to go into the luggage compartment. Passengers were then allowed to board. In Tulsa, the escort did a quick change in the plane bathroom and emerged in a dress uniform. People did not move when we arrived at the gate. Few cell phones were turned on and only whispered voices were heard asking others to please be quiet. I could see out the window across the plane. A hearse, with flags, and more military personnel approached the plane. A flight attendant announced, “Ladies and gentlemen, please remain in your seats and observe a moment of silence as we honor the service of this fallen soldier.” It was a moment that lasted and lasted. It was at least 10 minutes. The captain echoed the flight attendant, “Ladies and Gentlemen, my thanks on behalf of the entire crew for your silence and respect. We are cleared to deplane.” Few spoke as we left the plane, walked the jet bridge and scattered into the terminal.
Memorial Day Weekend is called the official start of the summer. Many swimming pools will open and there will be sales, flags, and speeches. That is all well and good, but if you have a moment visit a military cemetery and walk the land. Listen, read the headstones and then see if any of what we do feels appropriate. Yes, it can be argued that many have died protecting our freedom to splash, travel, shop, and consume, but is that a fitting memorial? Is that freedom? “The really important kind of freedom involves attention, and awareness, and discipline, and effort, and being able truly to care about other people and to sacrifice for them, over and over, in a myriad petty little unsexy ways, every day. That is real freedom.”(1)
I believe that the many that gave their lives in battles did so for the people serving next to them. Some may have coupled this with freedom or the idea that our Nation can be a light shining on a hill. I come to this belief after having talked to many that came home, burdened by what they saw and how they survived, thankful to be home without the aid of an escort or a letter delivered to family on their behalf. Ours is a Nation that has practiced grace filled moments and shame filled moments both accidental and intentional. Let us, this Memorial Day, remember the fallen of this decade of death, poverty, and multinational greed by lobbying congress for accountability through the rule of law rather than rhetoric. Those that breached the public trust and human decency, no matter their station in life, must be held accountable if our Nation is to move beyond the civic grief that has driven policy, economic and foreign, to embrace a future worthy of the children who were birthed during this first decade of the 21st century, honor the dead, and the living.
So now, I turn to watching the HBO film, “Taking Chance”. It is one way to understand the humanity of our wars and see a bit of a final journey that I witnessed in silence from inside an airplane.
Note
1) David Foster Wallace, This Is Water, p. 102-21.