Holy Ground

The high school youth and I began our Montreat@Home journey the Sunday before last. Since Montreat, our usual summer youth conference site, was unable to host guests this summer, the leadership for the six weeks of high school youth conferences that they hold each summer came together to create a great resource for re-creating a Montreat experience at home. Now, it certainly doesn’t hold a candle to the real thing – being in the mountains of North Carolina, hearing wonderful keynote speakers and preachers, doing energizers with a thousand high school students, meeting up after small group for ice cream at The Huck, meeting new people, or concluding the week with a candlelight worship service around Lake Susan; but it is a great option when none of those things is possible. (Check out the pictures below for the vast difference between this year and last.)

2019 Montreat Youth Conference

2020 Montreat Youth Conference

The theme for this year’s conference was slated to be, “We Are”. In keeping with that theme, our first session was entitled, “We Are Here.” No, we are not “here” at Montreat, but we are “here”. We are gathered virtually all over the country to worship God as we would if we were all able to gather in one space. The speaker for this session, Rev. CeCe Armstrong, reminded us that wherever we are – here or there, Montreat or at home – God is there also. Wherever we are able to gather, whether it was physically distanced in a fellowship hall or via zoom, God was there. She reminded us that the same is true even as we go about our daily lives, whatever that may look like in these strange times. If we are sitting in our houses day in and day out, God is there. If we are masking up to run some errands, God is there. If we are continuing our daily routine as “essential workers,” God is there. Wherever we are, God is there also.

As part of this session, the group was issued a “photo challenge.” Our challenge was the spend some time outside in the coming week, to take our shoes off and take a picture. We are then supposed to post these pictures on social media with the hashtag #holyground. For where we are, God is also; and the place on which we are standing is holy ground.

We invite you to join us in this photo challenge. As you spend some time outside in the next few days, take off your shoes and soak up God’s presence. Take a picture, and e-mail it to me. I’ll compile all of our #holyground pictures and post them on the church’s social media.

A Message from Pastor Tim & The Session

As you are most likely aware, there has been a dramatic rise in active Knox County Covid-19 cases in recent weeks, including an increase in both hospitalizations and deaths. Currently, two of the five benchmarks for reopening are red, two are green, and one is yellow. Therefore, out of an abundance of caution and in an effort to do our part in not contributing to the further spread of the novel coronavirus, the Session has taken the following actions:

Worship

We will no longer resume in-person worship on August 2^nd and will continue to worship solely via streaming until further notice. We hope to resume in-person worship after Labor Day, but will reevaluate at the August 18^th Stated Session meeting.

Committees/Groups

Effective immediately all group meetings in the church building will be cancelled for the remainder of July and the month of August. Groups and committees of the church may continue to meet via technology or in small groups away from the church building, but the church building itself will be closed to all groups except the Preschool through the end of August. We will reevaluate at the August 18^th Stated Session meeting.

 

Church Office

The church staff will continue to work their normal hours at the church building in order to coordinate and facilitate the ministry of the congregation. The church office, however, will be closed except for deliveries, contractors, and other necessary business.

 

We appreciate that this may cause frustration for some while alleviating anxiety for others. We do not take this action lightly but we do feel this is the best way to safeguard the health of our members, our staff, and the community of Knoxville. Please stay home if you do not have to go out and please remember the Five Core Principles for health: practice [physical distancing; wear face coverings when in public and physical distancing cannot be achieved; wash hand properly and often; clean surfaces regularly; stay home when sick.

 

• The Session of Second Presbyterian Church

The Eyes are a Window...

More people are wearing face coverings these days, which is good. However, I've noticed something. No, not about politics or distancing or age groups that are wearing them versus age groups who aren't or anything else like that. I've noticed something about myself. Well, two somethings actually.

First, I've realized that prior to this I rarely looked people in the eyes. Now that the eyes are pretty much the only thing to look at, it occurs to me that in the past I have usually directed my gaze somewhere else when speaking with someone. I think I usually look at a person's mouth because I've also discovered that I have a hard time hearing people speaking through a face covering. So I think that maybe all those years of playing loud music and being on stage have finally caught up with me and I think maybe I have been watching peoples' mouths as a crutch in my listening and hearing and understanding them. Maybe. 

Whether or not that is the case, I know that I don't normally look people in the eyes when I talk to them because now that I can only look people in the eyes when I talk to them I have discovered that I am uncomfortable looking people in the eyes when I talk to them. It's so personal and...intimate. I feel like I am intruding in some sort of personal space to which I'm not sure I've been invited. Yes, I was taught like everyone else, "When you meet someone, shake their hand and look them in the eyes." And I have done that...when meeting them. But I think I haven't done that for the rest of the conversation. And now that the whole shaking hands things is gone the eyes are all we have and it makes me uncomfortable to look people in the eyes but I don't want to not look people in the eyes because there really is nowhere else to look. And I wonder what that says about me and my openness to others.

Second, as there is no place else to look, I have noticed that most people...in fact, almost ALL people...have beautiful eyes. Really. I have been astonished at how beautiful peoples' eyes truly are. There is such a variety of shapes, colors, expressiveness, and light in peoples' eyes. I've always heard the old saying that the eyes are the window to the soul, but being someone that rarely looked people in the eyes, I hadn't really thought about the truth of that statement much at all. In fact, I think I've really only ever truly looked into the eyes of people I'm really close with. Which, obviously, says more about me than anything. But still.

I think one of the things I am grateful for in this time of physical-but-not-social distancing is face coverings. Not just because they indicate that someone cares about me enough to protect me from any potential infection they might have, though that is part of it. Mostly, it's because face coverings have forced me to move outside my comfort zone and actually look people in the eye and connect with them, human to human. And that has made me a better human.

Grace and peace...

PT

Frederick Douglass' and the Fifth of July

Frederick Douglass had a way with words. The former slave who taught himself to read and write became one of the greatest and most powerful orators this nation has ever known. People would travel many miles to hear him speak and he was on the road for about 6 months out of every year, giving lectures on abolition. His words, as well as his logic and rhetoric, moved people. When Frederick Douglass came to speak, it was an event in whatever community hosted him.

On July 5, 1852, Frederick Douglass had gave a keynote speech at an Independence Day celebration in Rochester, New York. It's title was, "What to the Slave is the Fourth of July?" He begins the speech by acknowledging the brilliance of Founding Fathers of America, the architects of the Declaration of Independence, and praises their commitment to "life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness." He calls them "brave men" and "great men" for their ideals for freedom. He declares them to be "statesmen, patriots and heroes" who deserve to be honored.

All throughout this first section he puts his listeners at ease, even as he sets up the rest of the speech with phrases like "your national independence". Then he makes a rhetorical shift, calling on the listener to help him understand why the "great principles of political freedom and of natural justice" are not "extended to us".

He goes on to remind the audience that not all people in America are free to pursue life, liberty and happiness. He reminds them of the "sad sense of disparity between us". He tells them, 

"The sunlight that brought light and healing to you, has brought stripes and death to me. This Fourth of July is yours, not mine."

He asks and answers his own question about what the Fourth of July means to the slave:

"What, to the American slave, is your 4th of July? I answer; a day that reveals to him, more than all other days in the year, the gross injustice and cruelty to which he is the constant victim."

 He closes the speech not with condemnation, however, but with hope.

"Notwithstanding the dark picture I have this day presented, of the state of the nation, I do not despair of this country. There are forces in operation which must inevitably work the downfall of slavery. 'The arm of the Lord is not shortened,' and the doom of slavery is certain. I, therefore, leave off where I began, with hope."

He then paints a picture of America as it could be - America as it should be - in a world without walls and boundaries and where all the nations of the earth work together to give all people the freedom and equality with which they have been endowed by God, a freedom and equality every person deserves as part of the justice of God.

It is a majestic speech, one of the most important ever delivered in celebration of our country's founding. It looks towards the ideals and principles upon which our country stands and demands that we strive towards making them a reality for all, not just for some.

You can read the entire speech for yourself here. It isn't very long and I commend it to you highly. Because, sadly, I think if Frederick Douglass were alive today, he would still be giving the same speech.

Grace and peace...

PT

Our General Assembly

A lot of you may not realize it, but our denomination just completed it's 224th General Assembly. The Assembly, which meets every two years, met electronically using a combination of Zoom and PC Biz. The agenda was limited to items that needed immediate attention, though as Presbyterians like to do there was a good deal of arguing over what needed immediate attention and what didn't!

If you want to see everything the GA did you can go to www.pcusa.org or www.pres-outlook.org. However, I would like to lift up one item that was approved by the assembly for your reading. It's a special statement from the assembly entitled Responding to the Sin of Racism and a Call to Action. You can read it here. (A small warning: this was just approved and hasn't been "cleaned up" yet. So the underlined bold parts were added to the original motion as an amendment and any lined out parts were deleted from the original as an amendment. This is the reason for the different fonts.)

Mostly I would like to share a poem that was included in the statement. The General Assembly commended it "to the entirety of the PC(USA), its members, congregation, presbyteries, synods, and the GA entities...for reading, reflection, and meditation.

A knee on a neck

laying bare for all to see

the evil of

callous

soulless

entitled

power

choking the life from

God's beloved

just because.

We know what must change.

Will we, church?

We have written many

true, significant,

sometimes even sincere

words.

We have confessed:

Belhar, C'67, Barmen...

Enough words?

Never enough witness.

We know we must change.

Will we, church?

Grace and peace...

PT

Whatever Happened to Being Considerate?

Be considerate of others. It is one of the earliest lessons I remember learning as a child. I learned it from my parents and grandparents, my Sunday School teachers, my pastor, the lovely saints of Gallatin First Presbyterian Church, my mentors, and my teachers at school. Some of them said it out loud, but mostly I learned from watching them and how they acted. Maybe I'm looking back through rose colored lenses. Maybe people in my family and church and community weren't as considerate as I remember. But I had to learn it somewhere, right? Who else would it have been?

To be considerate is to be kind and thoughtful of others. It means putting others before yourself. It can be as simple as holding a door open, letting someone go before you in line, or leaving the last bite of sweet potatoes for someone else. It's simply being aware that other human beings exist and understanding they have thoughts and feelings and desires and fears, just like you.

Being considerate is part of what it means to be a Christian. Jesus summed up being considerate in one special rule, "In everything, treat other people the way you would want to be treated." Paul argues for the ethic in his letters to the Corinthians and the Philippians. "Treat others as if they were better than you" and "Seek the welfare of others" is how he puts it. This second one is language he borrows from Jeremiah who urges the Israelites in Exile to "seek the welfare of the city" to which they have been exiled. "For in its welfare," he continues, "you will find your welfare."

It isn't just Christians who value this ethic of putting others first. All the major religions of the world have some form of the "Golden Rule" as it is called. It's one of the things that unites people of every faith. It's also just part of being a human being, according to two interesting sources. 

Charles Darwin (we all know who he is) argued that our instinct to be considerate is even stronger than our instinct to be self-serving. Research conducted by Dr. Dacher Keltner (professor of psychology at UC Berkeley and host of the podcast The Science of Happiness) showed that our brains react exactly the same when we see other people in pain as when we experience pain ourselves. Watching someone else experience pain also activates the structure deep inside the brain that's responsible for nurturing behavior, called the peraqueductal gray. He also showed that when we are considerate of others, the brain's reward center is triggered, which elevates the feel-good chemicals dopamine, oxytocin, and endogenous opioids. This gives you a great feeling, similar to what is known as "runner's high," plus all that oxytocin is good for your heart.

To recap - that's Christianity, every other major religion, Charles Darwin, a hero of atheists, and a psychology professor from liberal bastion UC Berkely, a favorite of secularists, ALL in agreement that part of being human is being considerate of others. So here's my question: What is wrong with us?

Is something wrong with our brain chemistry? Are we all infected with some disease that blocks those feel-good chemicals in the brain when we are considerate? Are Confucius, Buddha, Jeremiah, Jesus, Paul, Mohammed, and Charles Darwin ALL wrong???

Also - what are our children learning? This is perhaps the source of my greatest concern. If I learned to be considerate from watching the adults in my community growing up, what are the children of today learning from watching us, the adults in their community and on television?

Here's just a quick glance at the top stories today:

- An older man (I can't call him a gentleman) in Florida who didn't want to wear a mask pushed his way into a Wal-Mart, knocking over the greeter that tried to stop him because Wal-Mart has a policy that customers must wear masks.

- A noose was left in the garage stall of Bubba Wallace, the only African-American NASCAR driver and outspoken supporter of Black Lives Matter who pushed for a ban of the Confederate Flag at NASCAR events, at the Talladega 500.

- Protesters at said Talladega 500 insisted on their right to display the Confederate Flag as a matter of pride in their heritage, despite being told by African-Americans that the flag is painful to them. (And in spite of it being the flag of a country that took up arms against the United States of America.)

- The President called peaceful protesters a disgrace to our country.

- A person who tested positive for Covid-19 was so angry at the health department for being placed in quarantine that they posted on social media that their civil liberties had been violated, and then posted the name, address, and phone number of the public health official that had called them. The health official received threatening phone calls and letters from around the country.

This is just the last few days. If you have watched any news over the last several years you will know, this is the rule, not the exception, when it comes to our behavior these days. Just in the last month I personally have witnessed people yelling at each other in stores, calling each other names, expressing an unbelievable amount of anger towards one another. One of our neighbors told my wife that their friendship was over and to never speak to her again after my wife told her, lovingly, that she didn't agree with something she had said.

Civil discourse has been replaced with uncivil discourse - not just in the local grocery store but in our neighborhoods, over our television and radio airwaves, in our schools, in our homes, and even in our churches.

Given what's at stake, wouldn't it be nice if people started being more considerate? Wouldn't it be nice if we put our energy into being kind and thoughtful of others? Wouldn't it be nice if people actually lived according to the teachings of whichever belief system they fall into - either one of the major religions in the world or atheism or secularism?

Wouldn't it be nice if we could treat each other with civility? Civility means the exercise of patience, integrity, humility, and mutual respect, especially with those with whom we disagree. Civility doesn't mean we retreat from our convictions, it means being a decent human being who treats other people as human beings. Our politics is almost devoid of civility these days, and I think the lack of consideration is one of the by-products. 

The virtues of civility - patience, integrity, humility, patience - are not just political values, they are theological ones, as well. We who are Christian call them the "fruits of the Spirit". When applied to our public conduct, they can infuse our conversations and interactions with grace. And I think more than anything, we need more grace in our conversations and interactions.

I realize that I may just be "a bored pastor that can't determine how to spend his time other than producing pontifical meanderings to the congregation," as one anonymous, inconsiderate person quite hurtfully said on our reopening survey a few weeks ago. But I truly think this is important. After all, if we Christians can't be considerate of one another in the church, if we can't be civil to those whom we are supposed to love, what hope is there for our society?

Grace and peace...

PT

Energizer Fun

The high school youth and I are supposed to be at the Montreat Youth Conference this week, so in the spirit of all things Presbyterian youth conference, I thought this might be the perfect opportunity to share an energizer with our church family.

For those that are not familiar with Presbyterian youth conference culture, our days often start with what we call “energizers”. These are silly dances that are meant to get everyone loosened up, energized, and ready for the day; and generally speaking, you either love them or hate them. I am on team ‘love energizers’. You’ll have to ask each of our youth their feelings about energizers when you see them!

Here’s the one I’ll share with you today. It’s to the song, “Ordinary Day” by Great Big Sea; and if you’re like me and you’ve been sitting too much during quarantine, here’s your opportunity to get up and “dance like no one is watching”!

Click here for a video of one of the counselors at Massanetta explaining the moves and here for a mediocre video of participants at a Montreat Youth Conference doing the energizer. And finally, here’s a link to the song, so you can try it for yourself if you think you’ve got it from watching those two videos, or if you want to make it up as you go!

Also, in case it’s helpful, here are the ‘instructions’ for the energizer, naming the moves and the order in which they occur. Though if you don’t already know the moves, it’ll just be up to your best guess what each of them is until you watch the instructional video.

Ordinary Day

Morse Code

Casting fishing pole and reel it in

Throw out net and pull it in

Sunshine

(hands over head in sun bursts)

Bob around in the water

Mop the deck

Wash the windows

Look left and right

Half row a boat, half blink like a lighthouse, then switch (repeat)

Deck party!

I told you they were silly! J Let’s see what you’ve got!