Sonja!

April 20 was the day of baby Sonja's birth. At 4 am that morning a week ago, we got a phone call and soon to be big sister Erika was brought over by her parents to be with us. She woke up at gramma and grandpa's house hours later not even remembering coming here. Before I'd even gone back to sleep the phone rang again with news Sonja had arrived. In a rush, in a hurry she arrived, so fast they barely made it to the hospital.

Waiting in those early morning hours, I was unable to sleep, eagerly anticipating the long-awaited arrival of our newest grandchild remembering my own labors. My thoughts hovered above the waters of chaos, this place of new life. In this thin place, where dreams merge into consciousness, I remember realizing profoundly the connectedness I had not only with this event, but also with all life. It is through the totality of all of our experiences and memories that we are able to recognize our common humanity. It is in this tender most human of all spaces that we become aware of how we all come from the same place, the same molecules only so ever slightly rearranged. I thought of the women all over the world who were giving birth this very morning. Thinking of the labor pains my thoughts settled on the current intense Spring I am experiencing here in Michigan. The words from the bible about all of creation groaning in labor for a new creation took on new relevancy.

This new creation, the kingdom Jesus spoke so often about in the gospels, is like the force of the sap pushing up from the roots of the big trees and little bulbs here, rising to feed the newly growing buds and flowers. It is like the force of the labor contractions pushing out that baby into new life. This force of life connects us and truly literally makes us one even as each one of us is a unique creation of this stuff of life. Each new life bursting forth is a miracle and changing the world forever. Why is it that this is so hard for us to see? Life is so amazing!

Waiting

Flying to Michigan last week was, for me, an experience of moving backwards in seasonal time. I had just found my inner Spring and here the daffodils were just beginning to brighten the brown leaf covered garden beds. Here it is still cold and it is early spring. Winter doesn't seem to want to let go of her icy grip. Just before we arrived more than three inches of heavy wet snow fell. It still lies in melting dirty heaps at the edges of parking lots reminding me of cast off children's snowmen slowly returning to the earth. Erika asked "is it winter again?"

We are here to help when the new baby is born, tenderly tending big sister, Erika, who will no longer be the only kid in the house as well as to cook, drive and generally keep order. Our daughter-in-law is now very pregnant, tomorrow is her due date and she is ready for the new life to come. I see in her, as well as in the lilac bushes outside our house and in every growing living thing here in Michigan, the pulse of life. Life eager to burst forth and do what life does—grow into the fullness of what they are.

But today it is gray and cloudy again and I wonder if this Easter promise of new life is just a pipe dream. Waiting for new life, waiting for Spring once again, waiting for resurrection is challenging my patience. It is too easy to stop watching, to close my eyes and tell others to wake
me up when it is finally here. How difficult it is to remember to trust not only the promise, but the pulse of life, forever pushing forward, forever renewing, forever alive. Patience is such a hard thing to learn.

Finding voice again

Spring, that riotous season of new life breaking forth, has finally come to me. I did not recognize that I have been living in the season of winter. Day by day, I put one foot in front of the other. Time passed. I was silent. I could not find words for what was happening within me. I have not been sad. I have not been depressed, only still and silent, like the molecules that make me up having been cooled and have been moving more slowly.

But while all seemed silent, much has been going on underground. Leaving the church in October and then going on the trip to Palestine in November shook up my comfortable certainties. I went on the trip to learn about another perspective in our Holy Land. I had never been exposed so clearly to unspeakable oppression, injustice and hope destroying situations. Everybody is afraid of everybody. Fear hangs over the country like the smell of sweat in a busy gym.

Venue and voice finally came together for me several weeks ago. I was able to give a slide presentation about my trip to the Friday Group I attend at the Berkeley church. My goal was to stand in what Parker Palmer calls "the tragic gap." By that he means the place where one stands in the place between our deepest hopes and the current realities, however bad they are. In this place of tension one does not give in to cynicism, to fluffy clichés, one does not become polarized, taking one or the other side. Standing in this hard place literally took my voice away.

While I have no answers, I occasionally find I am more clearly able to find footing. In this place of tension, there is no judgment. Standing in this holy place of tension, I see the face of Christ.

In these final days before Easter, Christians everywhere are called to stand in this tragic gap of tension between what is and what could be. I pray we all can find steady inner ground and trust that by holding the tension, new life, new compassionate possibilities can come.

Check out my slide show of Palestine on the web! www.jstokstad.com/Palenstine

From Fabulous to Glorious

For the better part of the last week, we have been in the Washington D.C. area visiting our oldest son. It is great to be treated like an honored guest! He met us at the airport, whisked us back to his house and served us homemade soup and lasagna. After dinner he suggested we go out to see a mansion, decorated for Christmas and specially opened that night. Out we went on that cold rainy night to visit Hillwood, the estate of the heiress, Marjorie Merriweather Post. She is remembered for her passion of collecting expensive and rare art treasures. Her home was like a museum: Russian liturgical art and icons, 19th century porcelain and Faberge eggs stand out in my mind. The place advertises "Where Fabulous Lives" and I thought, it isn't only money but the good taste she had that makes this place "fabulous."

The reason for the trip was to hear the Christmas Concert of the Cathedral Choral Society, a large chorus in which our son has sung for more than ten years. I'd never been to one of their concerts. The program advertised "Glorious music in a Glorious Setting" and it was. As we approached the Washington National Cathedral, the late afternoon light gave an inner glow as the Carillon rang joyously. Inside the stained glass windows glowed and cast rainbows on opposite walls, it was a sight to see. Then a brass quintet began to play and the choral procession began. It was a "Glorious" experience. As we all stood and joined with the brass and the organ and the hundred plus chorus to sing "O Come, All Ye Faithful" I knew this was the grandest hearing of this favorite hymn I'd ever hear. My tears flowed both to see our son singing and for my incredible sadness for the plight of the oppressed people of Bethlehem today.

Fabulous and Glorious it all was and thrilling to behold. Yet when I think back 2000 years to that first Christmas when Jesus was born, it wasn't fabulous or glorious at least not in the sense I experienced in Washington. Jesus was born in an occupied land, to gravely oppressed peasants who had little hope their circumstances would ever change. "Fabulous and Glorious" were found in Rome, where the power and wealth were. In this Christmas season, when our economy's collapse has put new pressure on us all, I wonder if it isn't a real opportunity to recover a bit of what it means to celebrate the birth of Jesus?

Beginning to talk

December 10, 2008

Yesterday on a walk at the Berkeley Marina, I was excited to see a
black-shouldered kite hovering over the coastal scrub hunting. I've
seen fewer than ten of these in my life, and never one this close
up. The bird appeared to stand still in the sky, fluttering its
wings rapidly, and then after a time it would just open its wings and
effortlessly glide off, until it spotted something else and hovered
again. I couldn't help but think of the extreme effort and energy
the bird used just to keep in the same place.

This got me thinking about what hard work it is to maintain the
status quo. This is opposite from how we think things are, but I'm
beginning to recognize that this is how the universe works. Keeping
things the same is what takes effort, not going with change.
Instead of holding tightly to what is, we must open our hands and
trust that what will be there in a new form will be fine, perhaps
even a lot better. What would the world look like if we responded to
it differently?

After my trip to Palestine, I have been in tender dialogue with my
dear Israeli friend of more than 30 years. She came up to Jerusalem
to meet me for lunch while I was at the Sabeel Conference.
Conversation at lunch focused on our lives and our families, safe
topics. We both kept away from politics. She knew my trip was
focused primarily on the Palestinian perspective of the long on-going
Israeli-Palestinian conflict. I saw with my own eyes egregious
violations of human rights. I saw refugee camps where the challenge
is keeping hope alive for the fifth generation growing up in horrible
ghettos in their own land but we didn't speak of these things. Not
then. I remember as she drove me back to my hotel that she pointed
out the building where her youngest son had taken cello lessons and
then mentioned that the café next door was bombed in 2002 killing
many innocent by-standers. "It could have been me,: she said. I
didn't tell her of the homes I had seen that had been destroyed by
soldiers just a few days before or of my shock at the huge number of
settlements illegally taking over Palestinian land.

And now we begin to speak to each other of the things we avoided
before. In a series of emails we are beginning to tell each other
what we really think. After I sent her my recent sermon on peace-
making, she commented that I had not pointed out all the human rights
abuses the US has committed. I could only agree. We listen to each
other and in each exchange I feel that something big is happening. I
don't know exactly what, but one by one, group by group, we must
listen to other points of view. We have to stop holding on to only
one point of view. There has to be another way.

Maybe this will be the Christmas a new spirit will be come alive.
There has to be another way. It is costing too much for everyone the
way it has been. What we have done is not working. There has to be
another way.

Seeking Peace in Jerusalem

  Even though I've been only out of the pulpit for six weeks, I miss preaching.  It's not so much the telling as the struggle sitting with and integrating scripture to the world around me and within me.  In this sermon I will tell you a little bit about my experiences in Palestine.  I have struggled to find a way to bring them to you in the light of the scriptures (Psalm 85 and Mark 1:1-8) and our common search for peace.

            The poetic vision of Psalm 85 touched my heart.  Imagine faith and loving kindness meeting.  What would they say to each other?  Imagine justice and peace kissing.  How beautiful would their embrace be?   To be sure this Psalm brought hope to the Jews, sustaining them in hard times over the centuries.  Continuously beleaguered from captivities and then Diaspora, culminating in the horrors of the Holocaust, no one doubts today that Jews have suffered.  God speaks peace to his people in this Psalm but tells them it will come only if they stop their sinning.  Can they or we see the suffering they are now causing others?

            In the gospel John the Baptist prepares us for the coming of Jesus.  We are admonished to get their lives in order.  His life-changing baptism leads to the forgiveness of sins.  No poetry in John's message, just an urgent stark message for us to be ready to meet this coming Great One.  Do we believe new life is possible?  Could peace be that change that is coming?

            I went to Palestine in November hoping to encounter Christ.  I prayed to remain open to a life-changing new path for me however it might come.  Our group, mostly from Marin and Sonoma Counties, met once a month for nearly a year to prepare for our trip.  We heard speakers, read books, saw videos, but none of it adequately prepared me for the oppression and violations of human rights I saw.  It was the dark side of my beloved friend Israel.  You see, even though this trip intentionally looked only at the Palestinian perspective, Bob and I had lived in Israel for half a year in 1977, I have a soft spot in my heart for Israel.  Living there was an especially happy and innocent time for me.  I came alive in the warmth and genuine hospitality and friendship I found there.  1977 was a time of relative calm with economic prosperity benefiting Jews and Arabs.  I got used to seeing soldiers with Uzi machine guns at the grocery store.  I didn't think about why the Arabs were angry.  This was a time of hope for peace with Jimmy Carter, Sadat and Begin meeting at Camp David.  So even though I studied, I was not prepared for changes those 30 years had brought.

            These are a few of my impressions: I found Israel to be liked a giant gated community----surrounded by a huge 12 foot high concrete wall.  It snakes through the West Bank separating Israeli Jews from Palestinian Arabs, separating Palestinian homes from their fields, annexing illegally Palestinian land.  My Israeli friends said it makes them feel much safer, but Palestinians feel they are in jail.  More than 600 security check-points restrict Palestinian movement and degrade and humiliate them daily.  I saw the enormous proliferation of settlements.  Settlers number nearly half a million now and all the hundreds of settlements are on illegally confiscated land, controlling most of the water for the region.  From the hilltops, settlers threaten and attack Palestinian farmers and school children.  By far the biggest change I found is that everybody is afraid.  Fear has infected the Holy Land bringing a paralyzing fog of toxic negativity and desperation along with harsher restrictions for the Palestinians.  I came away deeply sad for everyone and deeply concerned about the urgent need and the increasingly distant possibility of peace for Jerusalem.

            I found hope in the many young people we met.  I saw the face of hope in a tall thin Palestinian lawyer working for Defense for Children International in Ramallah.  I saw the face of hope in an arts center, teaching photography, drama and dance as well as non-violence to teens in the Aida refugee camp in Bethlehem.  The center's director has a PhD in biology yet works to help teens.  I saw hope in the curious smiling faces of the beautiful children, the fifth generation to grow up in refugee camps in their own land.  I have many stories, but let me tell you one that stands out. 

            It is the story of Josef ben-Eliezar.  He came to an evening session at the Sabeel Conference we were attending.  He is a small wizened very old man who came from London to tell his story.   Born a Jew in Frankfurt, he fled with his family in the 1930's first to Poland and then to Siberia to avoid the Nazis.  As a teenager, he found his way to Palestine in 1943.  I continue to his words:  "I struggled with the British colonial occupation over the next three years.  I was filled with hatred for the British, especially after they began to restrict the immigration of Holocaust survivors to Palestine.   We Jews said that we would never again go like sheep to slaughter, at least not without putting up a good fight. We felt we lived in a world of wild beasts, and to survive, we would become like them.  When the British mandate in Palestine came to an end, there was more fighting for land between the Jews and the Arabs. I joined the army because I was convinced that I could no longer allow myself to be trampled on.  During a campaign in Ramla and Lod, my unit ordered the Palestinians to leave their homes within hours. We didn't allow them to leave in peace but turned on them out of sheer hatred. We beat them and interrogated them brutally. Some were even murdered. We had not been ordered to do this but acted on our own initiative. Our lowest instincts had been released.  Suddenly, my childhood in wartime Poland flashed before my eyes. In my mind I relived my own experience as a ten-year-old, driven from my hometown. Here, too, were people men, women, and children -fleeing with whatever they could carry. And there was fear in their eyes, a fear that I myself knew all too well. I was terribly distressed, but I was under orders, and I continued to search them for valuables. I knew that I was no longer a victim. I was now in power."  (from The Search by J. ben-Eliezar)

He found he could not live anymore in Israel and ended up in England.  He ended his story by asking the Palestinians present for their forgiveness.   Then Samia Khoury, Palestinian Christian who had been forced from her home in 1948 as a child,  came forward and answered him.  I quote own words:  "I wonder how many Israelis would have the courage and the magnanimity of Josef to admit that they have done the Palestinians wrong, let alone ask for forgiveness.  Although his testimony was mostly in front of an international audience, yet there were a number of Palestinians from Jerusalem and Nazareth who heard him loud and clear.  I was so moved that I felt I needed to get up and recognize his courage and thank him for his testimony assuring him that we do forgive him.   As people came up to thank me later on for my words, I could not help but wonder how meaningful for the Palestinian people it would have been and how much suffering could have been spared had the Israelis since day one of the establishment of the state in 1948 admitted the wrong and grave injustice that they had inflicted upon the Palestinians, asked for forgiveness, and allowed all who were evicted to return to their homes."  (private email from Samia Khoury) Watching this, I saw justice and peace embracing.  There was healing and in that I saw a way for peace to come. 

            Peace is dynamic not sweet or placid.  Maybe we need to remember that peace will be more like childbirth than our sweet sanitized Christmas carol images.  It's a messy process, all engaging and alive.  Peace is like a dance where everyone doesn't know all the steps, but God is truly present when peace is sought.  For peace to come, injustice must end.  The oppressor must let-go or be forced to let-go of the power over the other.  There must be acknowledgement of wrong, in theological terms--confession of sins as both our scriptures said.  Then the oppressed must forgive, not forget but let-go and move forward.  We forgive because God forgives each of us unconditionally.  And then reconciliation and new life can begin.  Peace is a process.   It has happened in Ireland and in South Africa and I can see it happening in Palestine. 

            God's yearning for peace can only come if justice comes for all the people.   I see this is a kind of new life I was looking for on my trip. I can no longer be passive.  It is the sure knowledge that once I recognized the ugly face of injustice I have the absolute responsibility for some kind of moral action.   Yet I know that whatever actions I take must be energized not by anger but in a non-violent way, with love for all people and a yearning for peace.  Peace can only begin here right within each of us.

So, the big question is how does all this relate to you?  Are you yearning for true inner peace?  If so, then listen carefully:  there is no peace without justice.   There is much injustice in our world, in our country, right here in California, in our lives.   If the story of the Palestinians touched a place within you, like it did me, here are a few suggestions for what to do. First, don't just believe me.  Form a study group and learn for yourselves. There is an abundance of resources and I am happy to share some of my favorites.  Second, if you should be so moved speak or write to your elected officials telling them of your concern about human rights violations.  Israel can only continue its flagrant violation of so many U.N. Resolutions because the United States backs its actions without questions.  Third, consider non-violent action, like participating in boycotting companies that do business with illegal settlements.  Fourth, commit yourself to a ministry of reconciliation, through studying non-violent communication and the wisdom of Gandhi, Martin Luther King.  Learn about forgiveness and begin to practice it yourself. 

If we truly dream of peace, then we cannot stand by and let injustice go unchallenged.  Peace is not the absence of conflict, it is a vital place where mercy and truth meet.   Peace starts right here, in our own hearts.  When each of us begins to straighten out our life, begins to receive God's grace and love and forgiveness, then we are able to be that peace in the world.  In Palestine, I found the face of Jesus calling me to have courage to speak out against injustice, to stand in solidarity with those who are oppressed and to work actively and prayerfully for peace.   May each of you find new life and light this holy Advent season and have the courage to respond to it.  Amen.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Standing in Jerusalem

December 4, 2008

Here is a little known fact: time speeds up when there is too much to
do and too much happening. Have you experienced it? Time speeds up
every December and before we even blink, it is January. This year
time sped up for me in November! Since leaving my position at the
church, I've traveled perhaps a bit too much. The most significant
trip was to Palestine. I was a part of a group that met and studied
once a month for a year. Nevertheless I felt singularly unprepared
for what I saw with my own eyes and the stories I heard with my own
ears in my two plus weeks there. How hard it is to face the dark
side of power in a dear and beloved friend, Israel.

I start at the end to try to make sense of the trip. I stood with
the Women in Black at Hagar Square, a busy intersection in West
Jerusalem. The Women have stood every Friday at 1 pm for 25 years in
silent protest of Israel's occupation of the West Bank and Gaza.
They stand no matter what the weather. They stand reminding all who
pass by that peace can only come with justice for all people. You
need to know that protesting is not my habit. My people left this
sort of thing for others for others to do, not wanting to make a
scene and fearing confrontation, I guess. On this day, I knew it was
very important for me to stand in solidarity because the burden of
the injustice I had seen traveling brings with it the absolute
necessity of some kind of moral action.

As the group slowly gathered, I wondered what this experience would
be like. One came with a suitcase full of signs fashioned as black
fists with the words "Stop the Occupation" in Hebrew, Arabic or
English. They were passed out. I took one in written in English and
moved into a line of silent women. Lucky for me, someone who had
been doing this for 25 years stood right next to me, translating all
the angry slurs and gestures (actually, the gestures didn't need
translation). Some passer-bys actually gave us a smile or a thumbs
up. I was surprised to find that the anger and hostility directed
toward us had the effect of grounding me more deeply and I felt more
peaceful. Standing together with others gave me strength. It is
important not to be alone. It was as though my roots grew deeper and
I felt sustained by a deep yearning for justice flowing up from the
land through me in the holy city of Jerusalem.

Towards the end of the hour, a busload of Palestinian school-girls
went by. Because the traffic was so heavy, the bus moved very
slowly. Watching, I saw their eyes begin to shine and then shy
smiles come to their faces as they saw our signs. They began to
wave, tentatively at first and then with big smiles they waved and
blew us kisses. I said to my friend, this is why we are here today.