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LJ Idol: A Writer's Game

1/29/2014

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For the last couple of years, I've played a writer's game called LJ Idol.  This writer's game has taken me from being a sorta-confident-about-my-writing writer to a full-fledged this-is-a-huge-and-indispensable-part-of-my-call-in-life writer.  With the ninth and final season of this game scheduled to begin in March, I decided to give the creator/moderator of the game, Gary Dreslinski, the third degree.  (I mean, an interview.)


With over 300 writers playing last season, it's fair to say that this game has become quite popular, drawing back numerous participants from seasons past.  Why did you start this game, and when did you realize that it had taken on a life beyond your imagining?

In 2006 I was a couple years out from my divorce. There were a couple really rocky points where I was trying to figure out what exactly someone is supposed to do with themselves after being with someone for 10 years.  It was a lot of spending time alone in my apartment with my cats!  Which also means that I was spending time on internet, and on LiveJournal. My divorce was practically live blogged, from both sides, on LJ! Over the years, the place, and the people, really got to be a larger portion of my life.  Definitely more than was healthy at times. But come on, who hasn’t been there? ;)

I was at the point where, in order to get people on my Friends List to mingle, I came up with this idea for “LJ Fights!”  I would match up people on my friends list and write a couple paragraphs about which one of them would win in a fight.  This kept up until we had a winner.

It was a completely silly idea, but people had some fun with it. 

When that finished, I wanted another project!  A few years before, when I was heavily into the fanfic community, I had set up a game called “Fanfic Survivor” in which I tried to merge the two worlds that I loved.

That didn’t work out so well. But again, people had fun and more importantly for this interview, I learned some important lessons!

So I when I was trying to think of “What now?” I listed a bunch of names for projects. They weren’t ideas. They were literally just names. I was mostly joking about it when I set up the poll!

One of the ideas was the name “LJ Idol”. 

For some reason, that name stuck with me, and I literally woke up one morning and I *knew how to make the idea work*!

LiveJournal is about writing and relationships.  If you were going to have a competition, that needed to be at the core.

Once I decided on how things were going to work, I pretty much announced “This is going to happen!” and put a sign-up sheet on my page. I wasn’t sure what to expect, but 9 people signed up for it. I got impatient and didn’t wait around to see if we could grab a 10th! 

It was pretty successful. But I got a lot of complaints about it being on my page. So one of my friends suggested we set up a community instead. I didn’t have the faintest notion how to do that. So she put the first page together for me, and the internet went downhill from there! :D

The second part of “when did I realize that it took on a life beyond my imaging” implies that I didn’t imagine that it could be as big as it has become!  Heck, I imagined that it could get a whole lot bigger!

Seriously though, I think the tipping point for me was the start of Season 4.  You see it happening in Season 2 and 3, but when we hit Season 4 the majority of people involved were people that I didn’t already know!

Which I think played a huge part in how infamous that season ended up becoming!


As a liturgist, the highly ritualized character of LJ Idol stands out for me.  How long did it take before the basic ingredients for Idol's success became evident, and what are some of those ingredients?

I’m glad you noticed that!

Ritual is everything when you deal with something like this. People need to have a sense of place, and purpose.  I like to think we manage that.

I was still very much trying to get a handle on what this thing was in Season 1 and 2. If you look back, you will see the first Green Room didn’t appear until Season 3!  I started them because people were commenting in the “Topic threads” and it was becoming difficult to locate the actual entries! 

Being that the entries are *the* most important priority, and people wanted to talk, I needed to come up with a separate area for that to happen.

I took the term “Green Room” from the stage term for the area backstage where people can hang out between performances.

There are definitely more, and they mostly came about from necessity. There was something that I needed to have done, so I had to figure out what it was, and how it was going to fit into the overall structure of Idol.

The key to that is that making sure that the attention is on the writers themselves and not the construct.  When things are going smoothly, you shouldn’t realize that the ride is in motion!


Every major endeavor of one's life has the potential to be disappointing in at least some respects. Have you had any regrets about beginning/continuing Idol?

Of course.

I’ve definitely lost/damaged some friendships as a direct result of it.  Some of it is the need to separate being “the guy who runs Idol” from “the guy who is your friend”. And of course some of it is that I’m human and get caught up and say something stupid! Again though, who hasn’t done that, and ended up paying the price.  There are always regrets when it comes down to things like that.

There is definitely the question of “if I put my attention to something else the way I did Idol, where would I be now?”  Heck, if I monetized the process early on, which people were urging me to do – would I have been in a better financial situation over the years?  Or would that, as I suspect, collapse the whole thing after a season or two?


It seems odd to shut things down when Idol has become such a beloved pastime for so many of its participants.  Why are you choosing to make Season 9 the final full-length season?  Do you have any plans to hand off moderation of Idol to someone else?

Taking the second part first: Idol started in my hands, and it will end in my hands.  Bill Watterson, creator of Calvin and Hobbes is a hero of mine. He did his thing, and then he walked away. Some people respect that, and others make counterfeit C&H for your cars.  You just have to hope that people honor what it is that you’ve created.

When I did the interview that is featured in Idol Musings, I was asked how long that I could foresee Idol going. I answered as honestly as I could, at the time, and said that as long as I thought that I was able to add something to the conversation.  Or something like that!  ;)

I still think that I, and Idol, can. 

On the other hand, I’m 42 now.  Could Idol go on another 10 years?  Heck, will LJ be around another 10 years? (The former is possible, the latter is extremely questionable.) I’m no longer that guy who lives in the apartment above and ice cream shop, hanging out with his cats.

I’m engaged to a wonderful woman, who has a daughter.  Season 8 was the first time that I’ve tried to manage both having a life and running Idol, and there were definitely some bumps in that road.   COULD I figure it out? Absolutely.

But before any of that happened, back before Season 7, I had made a decision that Season 9 should be the end.

At the start of every season I would advertise, and I was seeing more and more people say “I’ll sit out this time. But maybe I’ll play next year!” without seeming to understand that I wasn’t promising anyone another year!  So I would point out that if people weren’t participating, that I wasn’t just going to keep doing it!

Season 7 marked the first time that I had ever promised future seasons. But it had that catch. I’ll admit, at that point, Season 9 seemed like a really long way around. Now that it’s here: I won’t lie,  I’ve been back and forth with my emotions about it.  

There were 9 original contestants though, and I think if I am going to end this thing any time before I drop dead while posting a poll, that 9 is the appropriate number to go out on.


Novices are as important to each season as the veterans.  What can a writer expect from playing LJ Idol if s/he has never participated before?

I love “newbies”!

Every season is a little bit different, but just as a general rule what they can look forward to is writing at least once a week. Sometimes they will love the topic.  Sometimes they will hate it.  At some point they will learn the art of taking something you thought you hated and twisting it to the side just enough so it becomes something that inspires you to create something you may have never done on our own!

I’d also say to expect “fear”! ;)

Idol is very much a Rorschach. You are going to see what you want to be there, and hopefully be able to get what you actually need from the experience. You just have to come in open to it.


Writers who are serious about their craft are likely to have an outlet for their writing already.  What are some of the unique ways LJ Idol supports participants in their craft?

Over the years, we’ve actually had quite a few professionals come through the doors of Idol. Which was a shock when it first started happening, but was certainly nice to see.

I think the biggest support that Idol provides people of *any* skill level is that it gets them out their comfort zone. It doesn’t “make people think outside the box”, it’s a trash compactor that takes the box and pulverizes it.

Writing on a regular basis makes you better. Spending time with other writers, and bouncing off ideas with them, makes you better.

Idol is an extremely diverse community. If you don’t walk out of your time there having learned something about others, and yourself, you probably “did it wrong”! ;)


As in any ritual situation, it helps if new participants have a sense of how to conduct themselves.  What are your top three recommendations for "fitting in" in this game?


Hmmm… just three? Off the top of my head I’ll say:  Read other people’s entries and leave them comments. People love feedback.  They are more likely to give you feedback in return and increase your visibility early on in the competition.

Remember why you are here.  People can get caught up in the competition aspect and lose their heads.  It happens.  At the end of the day, it’s about your writing. Share what you have, and let other people share with you. It will take you far in “the game”, and in life.

Be open. To everything. There are twists and turns in the game. Some will seem dreadfully unfair. When they happen, go with it.  Use the experience instead of allowing yourself to be distracted by it.    Heck, that’s not “game advice”, that’s more “general life advice”. Then again, that’s why I put the twists in there. Because life is always going to find a way to sidetrack you, and make things difficult, and it’s rarely “fair”.

I try to make my twists much more balanced than life does,  but it’s the same general principle. :D


Let's not forget about the nitty-gritty details: when does Season 9 start, what does a writer need to do to sign up, and where can a person go to find answers if s/he has other questions?

Season 9 starts March 3rd.  I will be posting a Sign Up sheet on site http://therealljidol.livejournal.com/ on that day!

Sometime before that, I will also be posting a FAQ.  But if there is anything not covered there, you can also ask me directly clauderainsrm@gmail.com.

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Thursday Night Mystagogy

1/26/2014

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PicturePhoto by Thad Botham
A dozen or more holy bodies gather in an oval, looking at and past the sacred, central flame to behold the divine spark in one another.

Thursday night invites something a little different at St. Augustine's Episcopal Church.  The community that gathers then has many names. St. Brigid's. ECMASU. Young People and Families. The Thursday Night Community.

There are nearly as many children as adults in the community. The adults are powerful, each in their own way: well-educated, thoughtful, driven, accomplished.  They are students, parents, doctors, teachers, professors, and even brain guys. For countless reasons, these people come together to share words, silence, and nourishment with one another. 

It may be those three things--words, silence, and nourishment--that best characterize this community's fellowship. 

~~~

I was asked by the pastor--without advance warning--to be a minister of the holy bread during the eucharist last Thursday.

Surprising things like that happen. A moment of need arrives, and suddenly someone finds herself being called on to serve. Not because she's uniquely qualified to do so, but because she has offered her presence in that community, and her presence is enough. Anyone who shows up can serve, if they are willing.

Anyone who shows up can serve, if they are willing.

Anyone who shows up can serve, if they are willing.

The Thursday Night Community is a gathering of folks who, more importantly than anything else, choose to show up.  If they're called, and if they're willing, they serve.  Their presence is Christ's presence.  Their willingness is Christ's willingness.  Their service is Christ's service. 

The Thursday night gathering is a rehearsal of the reign of God. 

~~~

Time slowed when I stood up to serve the community last Thursday.  I strained my ears to hear the words that I would speak to the others: Body of Christ, Bread of Heaven.
  As I moved around the oval, I looked at each person's face, and a few raised their eyes to meet mine.  What a shock of communion it is to meet eyes and hold another's gaze from mere inches away, while offering a precious morsel of food!  It is as intimate as dancing.  (My best friend, Betsy, would get that.)

I don't know what it all meant to me, or what it may have meant to the others there, but I can say confidently that last Thursday was game-changing.  Perhaps it was initiation--a sort of baptism by fire.

I just know I won't ever be the same.

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Quitting = Failure

1/23/2014

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I quit my job today. 

Several days ago, I agreed to take on an editing job.  In discussing the job with the client, I asked many questions, and I also made several assumptions. 

I bid for what I thought would be 30-35 hours of work.  It turned out that this job would require at least a hundred hours, and possibly many more.  Since I had given a flat-rate bid, my hourly rate for the job went from normal-for-me to piddly--not even a decent fraction of minimum wage. 

So I quit.

And I felt terrible about it.

Then the mental onslaught began.

You didn't keep your word.

You didn't stick it out when things got rough.

You took the easy way out.

You need the money--you should have just sucked it up.

You're a lousy contractor.

You're an unreliable editor. 


(Oh, and the client, when I offered to send along the fruits of my already many hours of work in exchange for pro-rated pay, accused me of scamming.  So--)

Your client thinks you're a cheat and a scammer.

Quitters are losers. 

Want it spelled out?  Foxtrot. Alpha. India. Lima. Uniform. Romeo. Echo.


Quitting doesn't sit well with me, not even a little.  Quitting produces a magnifying glass that channels rays of truth and burns me.  Quitting elicits a shockwave of realization and memory that knocks the breath out of me. 

Once, when I was twelve years old,  I jumped off a swing and landed on my back.  I couldn't breathe for at least thirty seconds, maybe more.  I was terrified.  The pain mounted with every passing second.  Worse, I was alone, without help, and without any means to summon help.  I wondered if I was going to pass out.  I wondered if I was about to die.

Quitting is like that.  It's an admission of inability to do what I've said I can do.  It's self-mutilation of the picture-perfect persona I've worked so hard to build and maintain.

It's an unfathomable crack in my impenetrable defenses, a loophole of vulnerability.  It's the potential for destruction.

Quitting is the seed of weedy humiliation.  How can I sink any lower than to go back on my word, to admit that I was wrong in my own self-expectation?


Is there anything worthy of redemption in a quitter?


I am forced to face my own genuine failings so infrequently that it's world-shifting when it happens.  It's one thing to admit failing in a general way, as in Psalm 51, but to name and own particular failings is a much more daunting task.  I don't want anyone to know that I'm not as awesome as I present myself to be.  I don't want anyone to know that I fail.  I don't want anyone to know that I'm not a model feminist.  I don't want anyone to know that sometimes I'm a lousy parent or spouse or friend.

Because then I might be ordinary, right?  Then I might require a reexamination of the awesome person I think I manage to be most of the time.

And that might change who I am.  And if I change, then who am I?

Do you suppose this is why we describe God as immutable, unchanging, and sinless?  Because we are so fearful of change and sin in ourselves, and so resentful of it in others?

What if God
were more like humans?  What if God were more like me?

What if bearing the divine spark within me meant accepting my failings without idolizing them
, so that the awesomeness could shine through the muck?

What if quitting and failure are two sides of the same tool, designed to cut facets in us so we can capture light more brilliantly, like jewels?


What if failure is the only available path to discovering who I really am, as shone through God's marvelous light
?

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An Open Letter to Pope Francis from a Roman Catholic

1/17/2014

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PictureM. Kate Allen
To Pope Francis:

In my almost thirty-two years as a Roman Catholic, I have never been prouder of any pope. Granted, I've only encountered three in my lifetime, but I am also a student of Christian history. You stand out among your predecessors.

You have rocked the entire world with your embodied proclamations of the good news. You kiss the wounds of the sick. You share tables with those who have neither tables of their own nor food to put on them. You warn your clergy again and again against the glamour of clericalism. Your love is abundant, like Christ's was and is, and I have seen it have a multiplying effect, even (perhaps especially) among non-Roman Catholics.

I am tremendously grateful to God for your faithful, living witness to the teachings of Jesus. Your heart is wide open, and I feel quite certain that if I happened to walk into your midst, you would smile and greet me with the warmth of an old friend, and I would greet you likewise.

I need to confess something to you. On February 16, 2014, God willing, I will leave my cloak of Roman Catholic identity behind in order to be received as a member of the Episcopal Church.

Despite having spent my entire life as a devoted (albeit flawed) Roman Catholic, I cannot remain Roman Catholic any longer. Because despite the gospel of Jesus you now proclaim miraculously through your very body, and despite the many ways in which I encounter Christ's presence through your holy example, I'm afraid there is at least one way in which you, like most if not all of your predecessors, have failed to hear the voice of God and heed it: in the calling of thousands upon thousands of women around the world to ordained ministry.

I was able to name my own God-given call to ordained ministry thirteen years ago. I was still a teenager then. I am close with several Roman Catholic women who share the same call. Yet you, like your papal predecessors, have dismissed even the possibility that women might be called to ordained ministry.

I don't understand this hardness of heart. Not from you.

What I do understand is how hard it can be to hear God's earnest whispers when so much of one's culture screams against it. My favorite psalm is Psalm 51, because it is a perpetual invitation to be changed, transformed, turned around:

Create in me a clean heart, o God.
...
Then will I teach transgressors Thy ways
and sinners shall be converted unto Thee.

I suspect this psalm is as dear to you as it is to me. Please, then, let God's whispers reach your ear through my meager words: God calls some women to serve as ordained ministers. That the Roman Catholic hierarchy refuses to acknowledge this (or even to discuss it) is gravely sinful. It is presumptuous to deny God's calling to those whom God has chosen.

Please, for God's sake, don't allow whatever is lacking in me cause you to be deaf to what God is speaking to you through me in this moment. If anyone with the authority to effect gospel change in the Roman Catholic Church can hear this prophetic word, I believe you can.

Please, open your heart and listen for the sake of my daughters, who will grow up in the midst of your legacy even if they never set foot in a Roman Catholic church.

Please, listen. Listen because you know better than almost anyone that God speaks prophetically through those who are marginalized, women included.

Please, I beg you from the bottom of my heart, listen--allow yourself to be importuned by me, just like the judge was importuned by the widow, or like Jesus was importuned by the woman begging for scraps. You and I both know what happened in those latter two instances. If Jesus' mind could be changed, surely yours can.

I believe that the world-wide turning of hearts to God, if you listened in this one way and acted accordingly, would be a miracle of biblical proportion.

With blessings and love in the One who creates, redeems, and sanctifies all the world,

M. Kate Allen




This letter originally appeared at parentwin.com, where I am a regular contributor on topics of religion.  The letter went viral among my Facebook friends and received more discussion and shares there than anything else I've every written, anywhere.  A friend of mine encouraged me to mail it to Pope Francis.  I did.  If he responds, I will share his response here.  (Unless he asks me not to.)

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Spiritual Direction: For a New Beginning

1/13/2014

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PicturePhoto by M. Kate Allen
I met with my new spiritual director for the first time about a week ago, and now I feel like my new spiritual dwelling has all.  It's one thing to journey forth in a community; it's another to have a holy listener dedicated to hearing your story and helping you recognize divine whispers in it.

Choosing a spiritual director who's a good fit isn't a simple endeavor--not all spiritual directors are good for all people.  Part of discerning who might be a good fit is figuring out whether the spiritual director you meet with is the sort of person you can imagine yourself either wanting to be or called to be in some respect.  My spiritual director is a female Episcopal deacon, and I have long felt called to ordained life as a female, even though my own female identity has prevented me from pursuing ordained life for my entire life as a Roman Catholic.

Meeting with someone who shares (or who can adapt to) your communication style helps as well.  If you're forthright and want to hash things out in an objective way while your spiritual director is highly sentimental, you may feel as though you're talking past your director.  Compatible communication styles help bring forth the substance of the conversation rather than serving as a barrier to it. 


That being said, meeting with someone who isn't exactly like you can sometimes be the most helpful thing of all--someone who is older (or younger), someone who's from a different faith or spiritual tradition, or someone who has had major life experiences that differ from your own may be able to lend a fresh perspective to your context.
 

For me, the most important aspect of a spiritual director is always my gut feeling about that person: Is this someone I trust?  Faith and trust are of the same root, and one can hardly develop one's faith with another if one doesn't deeply trust that other from the very beginning.

My spiritual director shared a poem with me that I had never heard before as we began our first conversation together, and it seems to me to be a perfect encapsulation of what one experiences when one is ready for a spiritual director.

In out of the way places of the heart
Where your thoughts never think to wander
This beginning has been quietly forming
Waiting until you were ready to emerge.

For a long time it has watched your desire
Feeling the emptiness grow inside you
Noticing how you willed yourself on
Still unable to leave what you had outgrown.

It watched you play with the seduction of safety
And the grey promises that sameness whispered
Heard the waves of turmoil rise and relent
Wondered would you always live like this.

Then the delight, when your courage kindled,
And out you stepped onto new ground,
Your eyes young again with energy and dream
A path of plenitude opening before you.

Though your destination is not clear
You can trust the promise of this opening;
Unfurl yourself into the grace of beginning
That is one with your life’s desire.

Awaken your spirit to adventure
Hold nothing back, learn to find ease in risk
Soon you will be home in a new rhythm
For your soul senses the world that awaits you.
                 -John O'Donohue, "For a New Beginning"
A spiritual director, or spiritual companion, is someone who bears witness to what is stretching and unfolding in the midst of your life and heart.  A spiritual director is someone who walks with you, not to guide you, but to help you name how God/dess is guiding you.
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Words with friends

1/10/2014

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While sipping a hot cup of Ten Ren King's tea and chatting with a dear friend from the San Francisco Bay Area on Facebook, my friend wrote this to me:

"kate, I am so happy for you - it seems your life is developing in amazing ways"

(NB: The editor in me would like to capitalize and punctuate that sentence, but the friend in me knows better.)

My friend is right, you know.  I'm struck by how very much my life has changed in a very, very short period of time.

I started this blog/site two years ago today.  I wrote this:

Hurrah!  Thanks to the inspiration of a dear friend of mine, Noach, I have planted the seed of this blog (and broader website).  I hope it will yield many vibrant, lush, delicious fruits, and perhaps yield some long-lasting connections in the process. 
Is it any surprise that the same friend who helped me plant this seed of a website and blog is now bursting with joy for me at what has risen up from the dark, fertile soil of my dreams and yearning?

I look back at the woman I was in 2012--a first time mom; an office manager at a small synagogue; a frustrated, well-educated, sad, and increasingly jaded Roman Catholic--and I see someone who knew that 2012 was a beginning rather than an end.  I had no real idea of where the road would lead, but I knew I would be creating the road for myself as I went along, and that I would visit some unusual and unfamiliar places along the way.

My mantra lately, when folks ask me how I like Arizona, is, "I never thought I'd like living in the desert."  But I do. 
My family is happy here.  My husband has a job in which he thrives.  I'm able to be at home with my girls for now, do fun-to-me gigs, and write to my heart's content.  And finally, at long last, I get to be a both-feet-all-the-way-in member of a religious community in which I am valued, period--no strings attached, no hidden agendas, no glass ceiling.  I love this community so much that my heart aches, as if it might burst.  It's like being home again, but it's more than that.  I'm not just part of the beauty that is my new community; I'm becoming a leader in bringing forth that beauty.  Me.  A woman.  A thirty-something from Ohio who very early on learned to shut up and take it when something or someone wasn't good enough, even when what was good enough was within my reach, and even when what wasn't good enough was sanctioned by my religious leaders.

Two years later, in 2014, I find myself in the midst of imperfect, beautiful people, and just by being my own imperfect self, I am amazing.  I am vibrant.  I am what I was searching for two years ago.  It just took being planted in a fertile garden, free of choking weeds, for me to see myself stretched up tall and completely radiant for the first time.
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Praying with Icons: Miriam

1/5/2014

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While on retreat with St. Augustine's Church this weekend, adults were invited to pray with an icon.  One of the mothers there had just commented that my daughter, Miriam, certainly qualified as an icon.  So I prayed with Miriam, allowing God to behold me through her.  I gave voice to my encounter in this way:



We are Godparents.
We are God's parents.
God is our child.

On the seventh day she rested because she was exhausted. She needed rest.

God needs the safety of our arms. God needs our vigilant care and protection.

God would die without us.
God grows up in our midst.

We have a critical role to play in God's destiny.

God is a child and we are her parents. Without our constant attention, she suffers.
We are her caregiver. She needs us to survive.

We are the parents of God, and she loves us implicitly.
May we never betray her love.
Our excuses not to care for her will burst like old wineskins.

She trusts that we will give her all she needs. She trusts that we will be there when she awakes. She trusts that if we put her in the arms of another, that that other will care for her just as well.

We are God's parents and we would die for her.

Her radiant smile stops time in an eternal, brilliant moment.

We feed her with good things.

We love God, for she is our own daughter, wonderfully made in our image.
Her voice causes us to laugh, dance, and run.
Her smile melts our chill anger.
Her cries alert us.

We listen when she calls.

Listen, o mother, give ear to My words.

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Luke 1:5-8

1/2/2014

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(Today's pericope for memorization is here.)

As I move forward into this gospel, the first four lines of it come back to me.  It's written to Theophilus that he may know the truth about the things on which he's been instructed.  In other words, there's intention in how this gospel is being shaped.  Not everything that appears in this gospel appears in the other gospels (the birth narrative, for example); and not everything that appears in the other gospels appears in this one.  Why does the author choose to present the life of Jesus in this way, not others?  Why does it matter that John the Baptist is included in the story of Jesus' life?  Why does it matter that John's parents were a priest (the father) and a descendant of Aaron (the mother)?  What is this gospel writer (or gospel writers) trying to tell us?

Moreover, what has been lost, added, and mixes up in this narrative as one manuscript after the next has been copied and distributed throughout the centuries, up to the time of Gutenberg's revolutionary method for mass production of texts? 

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Happy New Year! Luke 1:1-4

1/1/2014

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Behold, the first four verses of the gospel according to Luke:


Since many have undertaken to set down an orderly account of the events that have been fulfilled among us, just as they were handed on to us by those who from the beginning were eyewitnesses and servants of the word, I too decided, after investigating everything carefully from the very first, to write an orderly account for you, most excellent Theophilus, so that you may know the truth concerning the things about which you have been instructed.
Theophilus is a name, but it could also be taken as a title: "Lover" (philus) of "God" (Theo).  Taken that way, this gospel isn't just directed to a guy with an awesome Greek name.  This gospel is directed to every lover of God.

Now the memorization begins in order to fulfill my resolution for the new calendar year.  Blessings to each of you, and thanks for reading along here.
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    Rev. M. Kate Allen

    Thean. House church priest. Published author. Mother and wife. Vocal feminist. Faith-filled dissenter in the face of the status quo.

    I address G-d as Thea more often than not.


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