The best piece of advice I got before taking this job was from the Rev. Dan Handschy, rector of Church of the Advent in Crestwood. I asked him how he ran a vestry meeting. And Dan told me that when he sits at the vestry table or any other table in the Advent community, it is an extension of him standing at the Eucharistic table. His role is always the same.
It is to gather people around the presence of Christ.
Lead everyone in laying our lives on the table with Christ.
Lead everyone in asking that great question I learned from Donald Schell “What do you notice?”
Lead everyone in joining the Spirit in playing with what is on that table and being a part of new life being created.
And then all be sent out into the world to live this new life in amazing ways (that's the deacon's job).
That's our job as priests. That's my job as Dean of Christ Church Cathedral. To gather people around the presence of Christ – around the hope – and to reject the pressures of hubris and fear as priests to define exactly what it looks like. That’s for the whole community to discover together.
The Rev. Dr. Susanna Singer said in her talk at Gathering of Leaders that the theological opposite of hope is not fear but certainty. What a critical insight. In this post-expert era, we need to resist the temptation to tell our communities absolutely certainties that give them only the options of lining up with us or against us.
We gather around what we hope is the presence of Christ ... keep the attention trained on Christ ... don’t let the gaze shift from Christ ... and then watch what happens.
Daniel Simons (my friend and colleague group member at Trinity, Wall Street) said something like this to me a couple years ago. That what was really emerging about an emerging church is not flashy liturgy or some other thing out of a bag of tricks in the Emerging Church Industrial Complex but a new/old way of being priest that is about us getting back to our central role of presiding at the table. Of gathering around the presence of Christ.
What that looks like at Christ Church Cathedral is that we are working together - first as a Chapter and then beyond. We brought in an excellent consultant, Jane Klieve – ‘cause I don’t know how to do this stuff nearly as well as she does – we brought her in to work with all of us on building structures of shared leadership. And now we have started a process as a chapter – fairly standard organizational stuff – of figuring out what our shared, core values are. Which is another way of saying “what is it that we believe Jesus dreams for us to love and be.” And we’re figuring out how to involve not just the congregation but the diocese and even the city in that conversation.
We are being an incubator for ministries like Magdalene St. Louis that involve us gathering the diocese and the city around something we think might be Christ ... encouraging people to lay their lives on the table with Christ ... and seeing what happens.
And you know what we're discovering? It's fun! When we start asking the question "Is this Jesus?"really fun, joyful things happen.
Why is this important for Christ Church Cathedral?
Because it's opening up wonderful new ways of being the Body of Christ for us. Here's an example:
Sandy Coburn (one of our diocesan reps from St. Michael and St. George)heard about this artist named Stuart Morse who gathers diverse groups of kids together to create beautiful urban murals. Wow -- gathering diverse groups of kids to create beauty. That could be Jesus! So she brought the idea to us and tomorrow at Chapter, Stuart will make a presentation about gathering a large, diverse group of youth to do a giant gothic urban mural on the BTM that tells the story of the mission and ministry of Christ Church Cathedral.
Will it end up happening? Well .. we'll see. But if it does, it won't be because THE DEAN said "make it so" but because we looked at something and said "that looks enough like Jesus that we're willing to put our lives into this."And we'll see what happens.
What fun!
What do you think?
What do you think about the way I've described the role of the priest? What is exciting for you about this way of being church? What is challenging or scary? What can we all do to better center ourselves on Christ and continually ask ourselves "what do we notice?"
It is to gather people around the presence of Christ.
Lead everyone in laying our lives on the table with Christ.
Lead everyone in asking that great question I learned from Donald Schell “What do you notice?”
Lead everyone in joining the Spirit in playing with what is on that table and being a part of new life being created.
And then all be sent out into the world to live this new life in amazing ways (that's the deacon's job).
That's our job as priests. That's my job as Dean of Christ Church Cathedral. To gather people around the presence of Christ – around the hope – and to reject the pressures of hubris and fear as priests to define exactly what it looks like. That’s for the whole community to discover together.
The Rev. Dr. Susanna Singer said in her talk at Gathering of Leaders that the theological opposite of hope is not fear but certainty. What a critical insight. In this post-expert era, we need to resist the temptation to tell our communities absolutely certainties that give them only the options of lining up with us or against us.
We gather around what we hope is the presence of Christ ... keep the attention trained on Christ ... don’t let the gaze shift from Christ ... and then watch what happens.
Daniel Simons (my friend and colleague group member at Trinity, Wall Street) said something like this to me a couple years ago. That what was really emerging about an emerging church is not flashy liturgy or some other thing out of a bag of tricks in the Emerging Church Industrial Complex but a new/old way of being priest that is about us getting back to our central role of presiding at the table. Of gathering around the presence of Christ.
What that looks like at Christ Church Cathedral is that we are working together - first as a Chapter and then beyond. We brought in an excellent consultant, Jane Klieve – ‘cause I don’t know how to do this stuff nearly as well as she does – we brought her in to work with all of us on building structures of shared leadership. And now we have started a process as a chapter – fairly standard organizational stuff – of figuring out what our shared, core values are. Which is another way of saying “what is it that we believe Jesus dreams for us to love and be.” And we’re figuring out how to involve not just the congregation but the diocese and even the city in that conversation.
We are being an incubator for ministries like Magdalene St. Louis that involve us gathering the diocese and the city around something we think might be Christ ... encouraging people to lay their lives on the table with Christ ... and seeing what happens.
And you know what we're discovering? It's fun! When we start asking the question "Is this Jesus?"really fun, joyful things happen.
Why is this important for Christ Church Cathedral?
Because it's opening up wonderful new ways of being the Body of Christ for us. Here's an example:
Sandy Coburn (one of our diocesan reps from St. Michael and St. George)heard about this artist named Stuart Morse who gathers diverse groups of kids together to create beautiful urban murals. Wow -- gathering diverse groups of kids to create beauty. That could be Jesus! So she brought the idea to us and tomorrow at Chapter, Stuart will make a presentation about gathering a large, diverse group of youth to do a giant gothic urban mural on the BTM that tells the story of the mission and ministry of Christ Church Cathedral.
Will it end up happening? Well .. we'll see. But if it does, it won't be because THE DEAN said "make it so" but because we looked at something and said "that looks enough like Jesus that we're willing to put our lives into this."And we'll see what happens.
What fun!
What do you think?
What do you think about the way I've described the role of the priest? What is exciting for you about this way of being church? What is challenging or scary? What can we all do to better center ourselves on Christ and continually ask ourselves "what do we notice?"
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