October 16, 2007
July 29, 2007
Sermon Podcasts
I recently began podcasting my sermons at www.brimfielducc.podcast.com My three most recent sermons were inspired by the work I am doing for the Mass. Audubon Breeding Bird Atlas. You can listen to them using the embedded players here:
Dependence
Questions for the Journey
Scrambled Eggs
Dependence
Questions for the Journey
Scrambled Eggs
May 25, 2007
There Is No They
At the World Series of Birding, there is a longstanding tradition of “breaking bread with the enemy.” This takes the formal form of a “swap meet” on the Thursday night before the competition. The informal breaking of bread with the enemy is a continual process that begins as soon as two birders who are scouting for their respective teams meet in the field. It also takes the form of shared trips into the field, and this year it even included a web site updated daily by one of the top-flight teams. Our team, the Wicked Witchities, was able to add a number of nests and one particularly active feeder because we were in regular contact with other teams’ scouts. In fact, on most days of the week preceding the competition, at least one of my teammates was scouting with one or more scouts from another team. One day I met up with another team’s scout in the field who had been speaking to one of my teammates more recently than I had! All of this is the case because we all believe that a rising tide raises all boats. In other words, one way to help one team do well is by helping all the teams do better. Even though this is a competitive event, there is more emphasis on the birds than the birders. Of course I want my team to do better than other teams, but while we are witchities and they are luna-ticks or lagerheads, we are all lovers of birds and trying to help preserve them and the environment that sustains them.
Unfortunately, this sort of mutual aid and cooperation is all too rare in our dog-eat-dog world today. Even more sad is the way in which the divisive and demeaning practices rampant in our culture work their way into the practices of our churches. I’m particularly sorry that our local congregations remain islands of independent effort. There is a wealth of talent eager to be used in God’s service residing in the pews of all the church buildings around us as well as our own. We have all found ourselves from time to time bemoaning the fact that we don’t have enough people or other resource to accomplish some worthy goal. Perhaps if we paused every time we spoke like this and simply imagined the same conversation happening in another congregation we would begin to understand the truth that “there is no they….just more of us!” Some of us here and some more of us there could get together and get more done. I really don’t understand why there isn’t more desire for this sort of solution. Perhaps part of it lies in diminished expectations based on history. The expected way of connecting with other churches would first be through our denomination. Particularly in the United Church of Christ, we only have connection if we make it happen since there is no hierarchy to impose it. Since there seems to be a natural tendency to grant authority to those willing to represent us at wider settings, we have at times gotten ourselves into the spot of looking to “them” (i.e. the staff in Framingham or in Cleveland) to do things for “us.” But (and don’t tell me you didn’t see this coming) there is no they! There is no “they” who will come and fix our problems, there is no “they” who are the cause of our problems, there is no “they” who are the ones we need to oppose…or support. The truth about the church is that we are the body of Christ and therefore we are one. We are the ones who are both solution and source of all our problems, we are the one body, which includes diverse and opposing views and positions. With Christ as our head we don’t lack for direction. With the Holy Spirit as the breath filling the lungs of this body with life, we lack for nothing. We are strong enough to change the world, but only as we recognize our unity. If a bunch of crazed birders can find a way to work together for the common good in the course of a heated competition, then perhaps there is hope for the
April 03, 2007
Reading the Landscape
I recently participated in the Interfaith Walk for Climate Rescue sponsored by the Religious Witness for the Earth. A hearty core of walkers traveled all the way from Northampton to Boston, I simply joined in on a couple of days. But on those days I experienced what Brown-headed Cowbirds must. They are raised by surrogate parents so the first time they meet others of their species is after they leave the nest and venture out into the world. I have no idea how a cowbird raised by something other than a cowbird actually knows that it is a cowbird, but someone they find others of their species. I knew I was with my own species when I joined the tribe of compassionate walkers bold enough to believe that we can reverse the damage we are doing to the planet.
One subject of discussion during our time together was our need as humans to reconnect to the planet; to learn again how to read the landscape. Too often, we are at a complete disconnect from the environment that sustains us. If we only had a better understanding of the fragile ecological balance that keeps us alive we might treat the earth better. Of course for me reading the landscape involves identifying birds. I kept lists each of my two days of walking.
On Monday we walked 16 miles from Ware to Spencer. I recorded 350 birds of 29 species.
On Saturday we walked 4.5 miles from Cambridge to Boston. I recorded 91 birds of 7 species.
Interestingly, the density of birds was nearly the same, 22 birds/mile on Monday and 20 birds/mile on Saturday. Obviously, the diversity was vastly different. Clearly, the difference between a rural and urban setting shows in these numbers. Likewise telling are these numbers: on Monday we passed 1 Dunkin' Donuts and 1 McDonald's in 8.5 hours; on Saturday in just over 2 hours we passed 2 Dunkin' Donuts, 2 McDonald's, and 3 Starbucks!
While some of my fellow travelers marveled at my ability to find and identify so many birds, none of them had any difficulty understanding the difference between the two ecosystems and the need for more of the former and less of the latter. For me, I didn't consider either day a very good day birding, most of the species where what I expected. Indeed, in less than a half-hour in my driveway awaiting my ride to the city, I heard a dozen country birds singing. As a birder I tend to live for the surprises. The real surprises for me lay in the encounters I had with the walkers. In fact it was my encounter with a not-quite 5 year-old that led to my birding highlight of the walk.
Wren, who is four-and-three-quarters, was not familiar with the song of the Carolina Wren before I shared it with her. At the end of our 16 miles of walking together she was cheerfully singing "teakettle, teakettle, teakettle" letting me know that she was a Carolina Wren. Sadly, we had not encountered one that day. But moments before I was about to rejoin my newfound tribe on Saturday, just as I put my hand to the door handle of Christ Church in Cambridge, a loud, jubilant sound reached my ears...."teakettle, teakettle, teakettle!" I smile at the serendipity of the the Spirit's gift and with the eagerness of the four-and-three-quarter year-old that still lives in me, I set out to share the good news.
One subject of discussion during our time together was our need as humans to reconnect to the planet; to learn again how to read the landscape. Too often, we are at a complete disconnect from the environment that sustains us. If we only had a better understanding of the fragile ecological balance that keeps us alive we might treat the earth better. Of course for me reading the landscape involves identifying birds. I kept lists each of my two days of walking.
On Monday we walked 16 miles from Ware to Spencer. I recorded 350 birds of 29 species.
On Saturday we walked 4.5 miles from Cambridge to Boston. I recorded 91 birds of 7 species.
Interestingly, the density of birds was nearly the same, 22 birds/mile on Monday and 20 birds/mile on Saturday. Obviously, the diversity was vastly different. Clearly, the difference between a rural and urban setting shows in these numbers. Likewise telling are these numbers: on Monday we passed 1 Dunkin' Donuts and 1 McDonald's in 8.5 hours; on Saturday in just over 2 hours we passed 2 Dunkin' Donuts, 2 McDonald's, and 3 Starbucks!
While some of my fellow travelers marveled at my ability to find and identify so many birds, none of them had any difficulty understanding the difference between the two ecosystems and the need for more of the former and less of the latter. For me, I didn't consider either day a very good day birding, most of the species where what I expected. Indeed, in less than a half-hour in my driveway awaiting my ride to the city, I heard a dozen country birds singing. As a birder I tend to live for the surprises. The real surprises for me lay in the encounters I had with the walkers. In fact it was my encounter with a not-quite 5 year-old that led to my birding highlight of the walk.
Wren, who is four-and-three-quarters, was not familiar with the song of the Carolina Wren before I shared it with her. At the end of our 16 miles of walking together she was cheerfully singing "teakettle, teakettle, teakettle" letting me know that she was a Carolina Wren. Sadly, we had not encountered one that day. But moments before I was about to rejoin my newfound tribe on Saturday, just as I put my hand to the door handle of Christ Church in Cambridge, a loud, jubilant sound reached my ears...."teakettle, teakettle, teakettle!" I smile at the serendipity of the the Spirit's gift and with the eagerness of the four-and-three-quarter year-old that still lives in me, I set out to share the good news.February 03, 2007
What if....?
So after my Super Bowl of Birding Team, the Wicked Pishahs, failed (miserably by my perhaps over-demanding estimation) to defend their championship over the weekend, missing out on the opportunity to again lift the crystal Great Blue Heron seen here, I got to thinking the inevitable what if...? I wondered, what if we had gone for owls in Essex? What if we had left more time for Newburyport? What if we tried harder for a vulture in Ipswich? You get the picture. It was a painful case of Monday morning quarterbacking.One tiny consolation was that the month of January was not yet over and I had a list for the state for the month of 98 species, just two shy of the personal best I had set just last year (when my team won the Super Bowl...ouch). So I thought maybe I could up the record. So on the last day of the month I spent some cold minutes waiting out the Red-headed Woodpecker here in town. No look, but I heard it in the distance, so I got one species closer. The only good chance I had of getting to 101 was to search for owls before midnight. I gave the hardest one (screech owl) a shot and came up short, so I let my hopes go with it and went home. Then I started a whole new "what if" game. What if that large black bird over the reservoir a couple weeks ago was a raven? What if I count the murre we saw on the Super Bowl (but was it thick-billed or common?)?
In the end it didn't really matter, first of all because it wouldn't get me to the record I wanted, but mostly because it was just my personal birding and nothing all that critical. Not to mention that I was worrying about a past I couldn't change. How much of our lives do we spend considering alternate pasts that obviously can have no impact on the actual present, let alone the future? I realized that at some point I had to give up the "what ifs" and simply replace it with "so what?"
But I do want to hold on to one important use of "what if...?" I want to look to the future and continuously ask "what if...?" Faith demands the sort of optimism that can envision all sorts of wonderful future outcomes. What if the God who cares for the birds of the field actually does care even more so for me...and for you?
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