Archive for the Category »spirituality «

Feb
17

Ash Wednesday 2010

Fig

I’m very sleepy today.  Maybe I should be napping right now.  The baby is napping and the big boys are playing Lego Batman on the Xbox.  I went to bed rather late, though I intended to go to bed early — one of those nights where I kept thinking of other things I should do before hitting the hay.  Then I got up early to make it to the 7:30 service at church.  I usually go to the noon service on Ash Wednesday, but since it falls during the kids’ vacation this year (and since it’s a difficult service to take kids to) I asked Brian to stay home a little later so I could go over there by myself. It was nice to have a little walk and a little church service without the rugrats, but I’m pooped now.

Our priest gave a lovely short sermon and one thing he talked about was how a good Lenten practice would be to look in the mirror every morning and think about the things you like about the person looking back at you, and also how to make the person in the mirror better.  He said it more eloquently, but I like the idea.  It was a message more about mercy and God’s love than about sin and penitence, which is what I usually think of Lent being about.  Oddly, Lent is my favorite time of the church year. Maybe I’m a masochist.

Anyway, this year I’m giving up shopping as usual and…wait for it…chocolate. I know a lot of people give up chocolate but I’ve never done it.  I do love my chocolate.  But I’m also going to try to add some things—like the looking-in-the-mirror thing as Father Richard said.  Also, I ordered some Anglican rosary beads on eBay, so when those get here I’m going to start praying the rosary—an Anglican/Episcopal version I found online.  I’m also going to start a new workout program, but I’ll save discussion of that for my Fit Fig blog.

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Jan
18

The Dude Abides

Fig

The Dude Abides – Presidential Pray-ers

This is a good post on one of my favorite blogs.

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Apr
02

Whoa, Camel!: Does the Almighty Come in Hot Pink?

Fig

Whoa, Camel!: Does the Almighty Come in Hot Pink?

Love this post–wish I’d written it.

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Feb
25

For the Bible Tells Me So–Gays vs. the Church

Fig

I read a review of the movie For the Bible Tells Me So that really intrigued me. I don’t know when I’ll get around to seeing this movie (I don’t see any films in the theater anymore and not many on DVD) but I would like to see it. The rejection of gays by so many Christian churches sort of puzzles me. Yes, I know where they’re coming from as far as what certain scriptures say, but sometimes they are so vehement about it. How many adulterers, usurers, abusers, and other sinners sit comfortably in church pews condemning gays for who they choose to love. I especially don’t understand how it’s “pro-family” to be anti-gay. How would allowing gays to marry affect my marriage in some negative way? It’s sort of bizarre. Something I like about our current church is how it is warm and accepting of all people and all kinds of families.

I apologize if I offend any readers (don’t think there are many out there, anyway) but this is supposed to be my honest, spiritual blog, so I’m getting honest. I could go on and argue about the fact that Jesus spent a ton of time talking about money and loving your neighbor, and never mentioned homosexuality, but I am not in the mood for that. I’ll just give you the link to the review here. Please be warned that there may be language you find offensive–just the nature of the website. I still haven’t finished reading all the comments, but the comments on Pajiba are usually worth the read.

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Feb
08

Childhood Spirituality

Fig

Growing up, my mom and step-father could not attend the same church, and at home church often seemed like a divisive issue. I love my parents (all 4 of them) but I sometimes envied friends whose families agreed religiously and attended services together.

In spite of this, I always had a great interest in Jesus and the Bible. I remember sometimes “preaching” to my dolls and stuffed animals if we didn’t go to church on a Sunday. I went to Vacation Bible Schools every summer at various churches and did well at memorizing scriptures and that sort of thing. I remember my favorite VBS was at the local Baptist church–perhaps it prepared me well for all the later Baptist Vacation Bible Schools I worked at as a college student. My best buddy Alyssa went to that church and so I went along with her every summer. From what I remember, this church seemed to be in the middle of nowhere–it was definitely rural. Well, most everywhere we went was rural back then, because I grew up way out in the country in north Texas. Of course, the best parts of that VBS were not necessarily of a spiritual nature. What we loved doing was playing games in the church graveyard (trying to avoid stepping on actual grave mounds) and the frog races at the end of the week. Seriously, we all had to bring a frog to race. Usually some boy would bring a massive bullfrog who could beat the others with one big hop, if you could just get him to do it.

Anyway, I digress. The first significant spiritual memory I have was when I had nightmares as a child. I was often sick and feverish and every fever brought on vivid nightmares (I still have extremely wacky dreams and nightmares). I remember crying out one night in fear, sure that demons were crawling along the ceiling toward me. My mother came and comforted me (now that I’m a mom I feel bad for how many sleepless nights I must have given her). Probably desperate for sleep herself, she told me that if I prayed to Jesus, he would have his angels watch over me in the night. So we prayed together and I went to bed peacefully (and I hope she got more rest that night but I don’t remember). I just know that I did feel a great peace and I remembered it later. This was my child’s understanding of God and his love.

It was shortly after this that I prayed to receive Christ into my heart. I don’t know what on earth this really meant to me as a 6-year old, except I knew that afterward I would get to partake of communion with everyone else at church. At the time we were going to the Church of Christ with Daddy Bob (my step-father) so I was baptized there by Daddy Bob himself. I still remember the thrill of getting to take my cracker and grape juice with the rest of the church the next Sunday. I even got to have it at my friend’s Baptist church. Now I attend an Episcopal church with a Eucharist of a wafer and wine, but the experience is so beautifully similar to the crackers and grape juice of my childhood. I love that connection, though I have had so many changes in life since those days. I love how my faith has changed in so many ways, but some essential things don’t really change.

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Feb
07

My Family

Fig

My family is a big part of my spiritual life. In the picture you’ll see my beautiful little boys. They are such happy, sweet children. I feel so lucky to be their mother. They have their little monster moments, of course, but overall they are amazing.

It’s a struggle as a Christian mother to decide how to instruct my kids in spiritual matters. I don’t want to force it on them so that they resent it. On the other hand, I don’t want to raise them without God.

We have attended 4 churches since my first son was born. He was dedicated in the first one–a Baptist church in Houston. Then we moved when he was just 5 weeks old, so he has no memory of that church. We also visited again a few times on visits home, but I still doubt he remembers any of that. Then when we lived in the Netherlands, we attended an international interdenominational church. Of course, he was pretty young there, as well. We went from there to London, where we attended an Anglican church (but a very Evangelical Anglican church–not at all what they call “high church”). I believe Isaac does remember some things from there, since he makes references to things that happened in London.

Over a year ago we moved back to the U.S. and here we are attending an Episcopal church. I was raised in several churches (Church of Christ, Assembly of God, Baptist, etc.) and my husband was raised Baptist, but here we are in an Episcopal church.

We are at our church every Sunday as well as occasional other meetings. Isaac goes to Church School and Ewan will as well when he reaches the age of 3. I also work on teaching them about God at home. We read a Bible story and pray before bedtime, and we pray (very simply) before meals.

Now that we are Episcopalians and embracing the seasons of the Christian calendar (I love the rituals of the changing spiritual seasons), I also try to teach my kids a little about that. We talked about Advent before Christmas and now I’m talking to them about Lent. It’s still whooshing right over their heads, but I want to start that dialogue early so it will just be a part of their lives.

I know that they will probably doubt and rebel as they get older. Even the obedient little teen that I generally was, I had plenty of that, sometimes well-hidden. When I was in college, I was part of a group at my Baptist Student Union that secretly called itself “Heretics” because we didn’t really feel our beliefs lined up with those of the rest of the BSU members. We were still God-believers but not straight up Baptists. It’s kind of sad in retrospect that we felt we had to hide what we thought. That’s part of what I love about my current church. When we get into spiritual discussions at church, no one is scolded for disagreeing or doubting something.
In a later post, I will go into more detail about what I like about the Episcopal Church, but for now it’s time to go to bed….

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Feb
06

Ash Wednesday

Fig

I moved this over from my Spiritual Fig blog, which I’m merging into this one because I haven’t added much to it.

Today is Ash Wednesday. I struggled to make it to the special service at church today, because my 2-year old son gets out of nursery school at 11:30, but the service was at noon. I had to feed him and get him to cooperate and then get us both over there. We were late (missed the ashes application in fact, but it was o.k. because I had it done at the end after everyone else went out).

My plan for this Lent is to give up shopping for the 40 day season. I did this last year, but I cheated a bit. For instance, if I sold something on eBay, I allowed myself to order something with the money I made. I figured it was just sitting in my PayPal account and it wasn’t like spending new money…. Excuses, excuses. I’m going to try to be tougher this year. It’s not like I need anything in particular except groceries (and I am allowed to get those, of course).

With the spare time I will save not shopping, I am beginning this little spiritual blog. At first when I had the idea to begin this, I thought “No, my spirituality should be more private and I don’t want to show off my so-called righteousness and act like I’m especially spiritual or something.” But I also knew if I declared my Lenten shopping fast publicly, I would be much better about following it. And I’m the first to admit that I am not a spiritual giant but a regular Christian full of doubts and problems like anyone else.

So here I am. I don’t know if anyone will even read this, but it will be a good practice for me, and perhaps it will continue past Lent. I hope to expound on my spiritual history as well as talk about how I became Episcopalian. I was confirmed in the Episcopal Church last year and it was very exciting for me.

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