Breaking dishes

It is my experience that when I'm about to have a move or major life change, God gives me a bit of a kick out the door by breaking dishes. I have no explanation for this. My motto for college graduation was, "the grace and the coffee will be sufficient," followed closely by, "and He will break my dishes until I let them go." So over the years, I've learned to hold dishes loosely. Also, I kind of rejoice at their demise, because it means (probably) good things coming.


In the last three days, we've broken a framed picture, a china mug from our honeymoon in Scotland, and my thrift store rose china serving bowl. Smashed to smithereens. :-D

Jonathan wanted me to add this story, too... so yesterday I spent HOURS helping Meg clean up her room. We finally finished just about bedtime, and I called Jonathan in to admire the clean. He fell on his knees in the middle of the room, proclaiming, "I AM NOT WORTHY!" and on cue, a framed treasure map and a dinosaur postcard fluttered to the floor, and something else thumped down from inside the closet. Apparently he really wasn't worthy of the clean, or wasn't good for it, or something. It was a great moment.

My pretty mantel, and how decorating is going

Oh, Christmas decorations.

I found a really cute printable Christmas village on Pinterest and I actually printed it out and set it on the mantel. I arranged it with my little wooden snowmen, a rose, and the origami tree made out of a book, and I have been experimenting with a few candles because they are glowy and warm. And because nothing goes better with paper than fire? Apparently. It turned out darling. Also, despite the free printables, nobody will have one like it! But it is a mantel, and well out of reach of curious fingers, so I think I can get away with the candles.

I'm operating this whole Christmas season, as far as I can, on the principle that if it helps us celebrate, awesome, and if it's a burden, we aren't going do it. Isn't there a saying about not letting the perfect become the enemy of the good? Christmas is too good to ruin with perfectionism. For instance, right here, the photo quality is not that great because my camera is not talking to my computer these days. I'd like to have beautifully lit and styled pictures for my blog, because I do actually know what well-done is like, but I would probably have to download the camera to Jonathan's computer and transfer them over on a flash drive, and then actually edit them, which all is obviously not going to happen, so until further notice you get cell phone pictures.

We were able to show hospitality with our Christmas tree this year, which I thought was incredibly cool. Meg had friends over, aged three and four, and she was so excited about CHRISTMAS that they and she and I put our tree up then and there. When we decorated it, I left half our ornaments in the box, because Kate is one and her favorite thing to do is pull everything off the tree. When we had other friends over today, the toddler inspected what was within reach and the older kids all pulled the bells off the tree and rang them to a very loud version of Jingle Bells. I could have a perfect tree, possibly, or I can think indestructible thoughts and include the littles in our celebration. There's precedent for that.

I really meant to do a proper Advent devotional, with cute illustrations and Bible readings, and that just didn't happen this year. I had the craft all ready. I never even managed to buy chocolate Advent calendars. Now that's sad. But I'm pretty sure the Bible never commands us to observe Advent calendars, chocolate or otherwise. Jesus is pleased to have us, squashed candle holders and salt-dough dinosaur ornaments and all.  Isn't that encouraging? And so we are looking back and forward to His coming.

The country has bugs

Also, I got caught behind a hay truck yesterday and people held the door for me at the dollar store. True story.

Meg: Mom, did God make flies?
Me, confidently: Yes.
Meg: RATS! Then it's a BAD UNIVERSE!

We moved to Berryville this weekend, which isn't that far from Leesburg, except for being worlds away. I am in shock. Hang on if I haven't gotten back to you; we just got internet this morning.

Good use of an if-then statement

I tried to read Meg some psalms this morning. I made it through a couple, and then got as far as...

Me: "A Psalm of David. You know David!"
Meg: "Yeah, I know him! I have a picture of him in my Bible. I'll go get it for you." She disappears. "Oh, Bible! Where are you, Bible? If I didn't have my Bible, I didn't have my picture of David. Hmmm."

A daughter's prayer

In one of my notebooks, I came across something Meg prayed for me a while back. I think I had a headache that day, and it was too sweet not to write down.

"Oh dear Lord, please heal my muvver's head and her feelings. Please give her wisdom and patience and ibuprofen and her lipstick and... what else do you need, Mommy?" Meg 12/16/12

I think the Lord definitely heard her. :-) He has definitely kept me well supplied with lipstick and ibuprofen (jury's still out on wisdom!).

I love her more than monsters, too

"Mommy, you're the best mommy and God's the best God of any other gods in the whole world! I love you and God more than monsters." She frowned. "I don't love monsters." Then she gave me a kiss. "That's because I love you so, so much."

She's so sweet.
Jonathan: "And quotable."

::update:: Meg came and kissed me again. "Just because I love you. QUOTE IT!"

Meg and the wise men

"Do you know who the 'starlit magi' were, Meg?"
"No, who?"
"The three wise men, who followed the star!"
"Oh. What were their names?"
"Well, the Bible doesn't really say, but according to tradition, their names were Gaspar, Melchior, and Balthazar."

I was vaguely pleased with this passing-down of knowledge that Everyone Should Have. I'm so glad to have seized a teachable moment. Meanwhile, Meg was contemplating.

"I think their names were Pinky, Dinky, and Binky."

Falling off a horse

I fell off a horse yesterday.  Poor Navarre spooked just as I asked him to trot, and he went one way and I went the other. I was wearing a helmet and Navarre is pretty short, as horses go, so I don't think there was any damage, but I'm here to say, landing on your backside is not romantic. It's a life experience -- hopefully a once-in-a-lifetime one!

I did get right back up and rode some more. I didn't want to, but it would have been too embarrassing to admit I hadn't. I've read books! I know what you're supposed to do!

Since I'm too sore to hoist her around today, Meg has had to take responsibility for things like crawling into and out of her own carseat and not leaping into the middle of my lap. She's doing an excellent job. She doesn't think much of it and so asked God to heal me, which I appreciated, but I think she was disappointed her prayer didn't take effect immediately. I kind of was disappointed, too.

In everything give thanks. Literally.

Poor Tigger's tail got caught between Meg and the scissors. He had to go away and recuperate on a high shelf until I got a chance to make repairs. Last night I stitched up his lacerations and tucked him in with his sleeping lady, and when she woke up this morning there was much delight.

"Mommy stitched up Tigger's tail. That's kind of nice. SANK 'OO, LORD!"

Best answer EVER

Ring, ring! Meg gave me her cell phone to answer.
"Who is it?" I asked.
"Jesus," she says matter-of-factly. So I talk to Jesus on Meg's phone.

YES!!!

We're official now!

Nope, not officially courting... we got married a couple years back, in case you missed it... official church members! We were presented during this morning's service.

Immediately after the membership part, Meg got baptized! She grinned hugely as the pastor put the water on her head and charmed everyone. At one point, she actually covered her eyes and played peekaboo with the audience. I love it. It was also pretty cool that FIVE little church girls got baptized this morning, including our friend Maren from small group. Meg's Nana and Poppie got to come down and videotape the ceremony, and we all went to Panera's for lunch afterward.

How exciting was that??

The main difference now that we're church members, I think, is that we take a turn at nursery duty (totally fair) and go to annual meetings. The main difference for Meg is that the sign has been put on her: GOD HAS HIS HAND ON YOU! She isn't saved yet... but He'll be faithful to her, like He has been to us. And she'll always know about Jesus. So hopefully she'll come to Him soon. :-) I think I accepted Him at the hardened age of four.

Honestly, it was kind of a sticky point whether we were going to baptize her as an infant or wait till after she had professed for herself. Jonathan felt strongly and I came around, because I really do see their point, and if we're wrong, God can still count it perfectly well. It's not like she's going to be disowned for getting the ceremony wrong. And if she grows up and decides she needs to be baptized again, that's quite doable.

For the occasion, we all dressed to the nines. I've got to admit, that made me happy too, as a stay-at-home mom doesn't get a lot of dress-up excuses. Jonathan was the easiest: a good suit with a shirt and tie. I found Meg a fluffy white dress. She was a bit old for a classic super-long christening dress, like some of the other baptizees wore, but Target had a cutesy dress with a raw-silk-looking top and a big tulle skirt. I realized it actually looked a lot like my wedding dress (only Meg's was not strapless, of course).

And for me, I hunted all over and finally found the perfect dress in Williamsburg. We went to the beach on Friday and stopped for a smoothie on the way home, and there across the parking lot -- a Ross's. ::cue ethereal music:: It's a really darling retro style, in an almost ikat black and white floral, with a crossed surplice bodice, waist tie detail, full a-line skirt, and little flutter sleeves. I wore it with pearls and my famous red heels and looked like a classic church lady.

Since my life goals have been to be a church lady and home school mom - I'm well on the way!

Yes, Eureka, there is a real meaning of Christmas

I finally read Thrones, Dominations, the unfinished Sayers book the Jill Paton Walsh took in hand and completed a few years ago. It wasn't as good as a pure Sayers, but it was better than some of the mysteries I've been reading lately. She didn't so much ruin our beloved characters as flatten them out: everybody's characterization got less nuanced and more sledgehammer-like. The Duke of Denver and Lady Helen came off worst of all, although Peter became so sensitive as to be slightly henpecked (Peter!! Henpecked by Harriet??). She tried really hard to keep Sayers' contemporary attitudes and worldview, but a modern apparently just can't. Not on marriage: not on class. A pity. Also, the solution to the mystery was kind of perverted, so I wouldn't recommend it for young readers.

The long-awaited Eureka Christmas episode came out this week! Spoilers! It was called "O Little Town," and I think they'd been watching Honey, I Shrunk the Kids, because Taggart, in a life-long pursuit of Santa, has developed a shrinker-ray for presents that shrinks Eureka! Oh noes! So Jack and Taggart figure out how to take Dr. Drummer's (guest star) magic energy snowball thing and throw it at the EMP shield and reverse the shrinkage.

There were some genuinely funny moments, but I don't think the writers of this episode ever watched Eureka. Taggart's thing is hunting with big guns, right? And Jack is a huge baseball fan, right? So when the time comes for them to go up in the sleigh (I am not making this up), throw the snowball at the shield, and shoot it, what do the writers do but assign Jack to the gun and Taggart to the pitching. Huh? But then, the writing on Eureka this whole season has been lazy. They did get a bunch of new writers on, I know. The dialogue isn't that funny, the plots aren't particularly scientific, and the characters randomly do things totally out of character. Too bad. Also, I really wish they'd hurry up and get Jo and Zane sorted out, or at least advance their story somehow. That's the most interesting subplot at this point, now that the parallel world is more or less at an equilibrium. Sigh.

It's also a pity that Eureka is such a metaphysically empty world. It really is. They do a whole Christmas episode, leaving out even the vaguest hint of Christianity (of course), and this is what we wind up with:
- Christmas isn't about being with your blood family, but being with those you're with (and hopefully love) - Jack's, Jo's, and the nameless snowed-in kids' subplots.
- Everybody makes their own Christmas magic. Allison's subplot was she tries so hard to make things wonderful for her kids, because her parents were straight-up scientists and she never got a present from Santa.
- Growing up doesn't mean you have to stop believing in magic and eating candy canes (at least, so Dr. Drummer/Santa tells Jo).
- Science doesn't work on Santa. You can't capture him and study him, but he'll be back next year - Taggart's subplot.
-Fruitcake has like a million calories, especially when it's shrunk so a whole fruitcake is in one bite.

Seriously? That's the best meaning of Christmas you've got? They know science isn't enough, and there's a better myth, if you like. Imagine a world where a happy God invented people and parsley and astrophysics because He wanted to, and because having them was better and awesomer than not. Then imagine people messed it up. Then, imagine God Himself was born as a human person, to live here for thirty years, be murdered, but be so intensely full of life that He swallowed up death. And, if you want to, you can join this God, and He will swap your death for His life, and your depressingness for His happiness. Incidentally, this means you can investigate this world - i.e. do science - all you like and only learn more about this God because it tells you what He's like. Science has meaning; life has meaning; language even has meaning. Altogether a more satisfactory state of affairs.

Eureka ignores God, and in their metaphysical flailings they've lost science too. We get to wish for Santa and eat candy canes? Seriously? I really miss the scientific plots. Come to the light side. We have cookies! And a philosophical foundation for them!

Meg walks! and I read books

We're all excited at this end because Meg took her official first unsupported step on Monday. It was just one, and she took a spill right after, but she's so close. She knows it too, and has taken to crawling on her hands and feet, legs straight. She hasn't ventured out by herself again, but she's sure cruising along the furniture.

I've been reading quite a bit lately, which is always fun. Some of the highlights:

The New Policeman by Kate Thompson. This is a fairy tale set in modern Ireland. The premise was mildly entertaining, and I liked it for all the music. The main character and the fairies were always fiddling and dancing, and Thompson even put a tune at the beginning of each chapter, usually relating to that chapter's events. I didn't so much care for the way the priest was the villain (in his monomaniacal urge to rid the countryside of fairies, music, and dancing, he nearly destroyed time). It was a bit creepy, but mostly because I kept thinking it was going to get creepy and it didn't. I think one thing I like about Celtic stories is the way they force an author to reveal his loyalties. Either he will come down on the side of Christianity or against it. It's very hard to be "neutral" when the fairies get involved, though Gerald Morris and Lawhead partly manage it.

The Reason for God by Timothy Keller. Keller is the pastor of that huge Presbyterian church in New York City. I'd read an interview with him and his wife in which they admitted to liking Tolkien, so I was inclined to like him going in. Now I know I like him: he mostly quotes authors and philosophers I know and respect. He's pretty sound, though I differ with him on creation. Keller's great gift is, Lewis-like, being able to drop the Christianese and speak to ordinary, intelligent unbelievers in their language and make theological sense. It's a wonderful quality, but a little like having college friends come home for a visit - my worlds are colliding! A couple of his chapters actually really encouraged me and were relevant in Bible study on Tuesday. I wish I could remember what they were.

Kilt Dead by Kaitlyn Dunnett. A cute murder mystery about a forcibly retired Scottish dancer. It was a fun, quick read, though about page thirty I was demanding she get a lawyer to deal with the harassing police investigator and that didn't occur to her till about page seventy, after she saw the lawyer for something else entirely. Also she seemed shocked and hurt that a small town would gossip about her morals when she moved in, purely platonically, with an eligible bachelor. As it turned out, the gossip was later fully justified, and in an incredibly off-hand, boring way too. (Sheesh.) Our Heroine had read far too many mysteries herself to excuse her actions in the final chapter when she confronted the murderer all by herself. At least she told someone where she was going, and was able to be rescued before the good-for-nothing threw her off the roof. Anyway, it was adequate enough I do intend to read the sequel Scone Cold Dead, which conveniently I have already checked out, and it inspired me to go upstairs and sketch out a better plot myself. When I get it published I'll let you know.

A Dismal Thing to Do by Charlotte MacLeod, writing as Alisa Craig. I've liked MacLeod for years, but I'd never gotten around to her Inspector Madoc Rhys books until just lately. The mysteries are usually respectably constructed, and her characters are quite the characters. I was incredibly impressed by a previous book, in which Janet got kicked out of her room in the middle of the night by a promiscuous roommate and had to take refuge in Madoc's. In contrast to Kilt Dead, they had a discussion about where Madoc should sleep, and voted for the library, Janet being of the opinion that when they slept together it should be special and mean something. Sensible people! Madoc and Janet are newly married in this one and, as Madoc said, it's a poor investigator who can't find a can of oil for squeaky guest-room bedsprings. So we're all happy. This particular plot was a little contrived, but it was fun to run around with Janet and Madoc and all of Janet's relatives in the heavy snow, with explosions and people getting shot and moonshine-running and whatnot. Keeps life exciting.

AND... I have The Chestnut King, by N.D. Wilson! I didn't even know it was out yet, but the new Glen Allen branch had a copy of it sitting there on the shelf. So I checked it out. :-)

Cool things from Brandywine Books

The BBC has up a 26-minute documentary on Tolkien from 1968. It's rather sweet - you get to see Tolkien himself saying some of the quotes attributed to him, and sharing a couple funny stories I'd never heard before. We even get to watch him at a fireworks-and-bonfire party. There are also interviews with some of his students, varying from fan-clubbers to one earnest chap who despised LOTR as avoiding the really important things, like politics. (That one doesn't even merit a response.) The cinematography struck me as quite the period piece, complete with creepy synthesizer music. Hat tip to Brandywine Books.

Also from Brandywine: this cool youtube video on thinking and loving God. I wasn't sure where it was going, but it turned out to be an ad for the desiringGod 2010 conference. Well worth a watch. Too bad we won't be remotely near Minneapolis at the beginning of October.

And... also from Brandywine: a review of Heat Wave, the Castle tv show tie-in book, which I've been kind of wanting to read. I had no idea Lars Walker was a Castle fan.

Seriously, Brandywine has the best blog. They pretty much always have something interesting going on.

Book reviews

In between work, Meg, housework, and guests, I've been reading lately. Some of the fun new books I've come across:

Notes from the Tilt-a-Whirl by N.D. Wilson. I'd heard this recommended, and when Kanary spent the night with us, he was kind enough to bring us a copy. So I devoured it in its entirety within the day. :-) Wilson is a literary heir of C. S. Lewis. You know how at the end of The Last Battle, they get into the new Narnia and the sunlight is brighter, the colors more intense, the peaches more flavorful, than anything in this world? That's what Wilson does for our world. He talks about everything - philosophers, quarks, flamingos (real and artificial), creepy things wasps do, raking leaves, and, of course, Tilt-a-Whirls - and shows us a world spoken by God that can lick your materialist narrative hollow. The book is different, and not precisely comfortable, but it's good.

God's Secretaries: The Making of the King James Bible by Adam Nicolson. This book we found at our church library. I haven't quite finished it, but it's fascinating on its own and in contrast to Notes from the Tilt-a-Whirl. Nicolson's premise: The KJV could only have come out of a particular culture like King James, that managed to combine such contraries as Donne's sermons and racy sonnets, the barren sanctuaries and elaborate Inigo Jones mansions, and an entire generation of scholars that channelled all that brilliance and wordcraft and secular and sacred energy into one exuberant tapestry of words: specifically, the Word of God. He calls the KJV the cathedral that Renaissance England never built. I like it. Also, I'm learning a lot from the mini-biographies he sprinkles throughout. At one point he talks about the man that hounded the Pilgrims to go to the new world, and how that man was actually pretty tolerant by Jacobean standards, and rather bored by the whole Scrooby affair.

To jump back a thousand years or so, I read Bloodline by Katy Moran. I picked it up because it looked like decent historical fiction set in early Britain, the warring tribes, Mercia, King Penda, that era. And so it was: well written and researched, a lot like Rosemary Sutcliff. I can recommend it. My main beef with Moran is her anachronistic attitudes. Her character was very modern about disobedience and not wanting to belong to anyone (i.e. no lord). What we get out of the "The Wanderer" poem... doesn't back up that sort of attitude at all. Also, Christianity. I don't mind if characters hate Christianity for the reasons that people back then hated it; people have been hating Christianity for a long time. It's kind of expected. But it did irk me that instead of characterizing it as a dangerous interloping new religion that was going to make their gods angry, she made all the Christians foolish, stupid, or hypocritical. Furthermore, her tribal religion was a comfortable thing that didn't require, say, the occasional man thrown in a bog or burnt alive in a wicker basket. Neither God nor the gods were particularly real to her. Which is a pity. She had a tiresome afterword too, that patronized Bede (!). He was a monk who wrote the first history of England, which had good results, but you know, monks have their perspectives and we don't really have to take them seriously.

In retaliation, I picked back up Bede's Ecclesiastical History of the English People, which I've been working my way back through since about last Thanksgiving. Bede wasn't just a monk. He was pretty much the most brilliant, cosmopolitan scholar Britain had produced to date, and an interesting writer, even in translation. His history did focus on the church in England, rather than a more political history, though there's plenty of politics. Bede did his research, found original documents, and interviewed eyewitnesses, so he's actually quite reliable. But as for "perspective," people don't seem to realize that being a monk entails believing in a God who will get you if you lie, so it behooves monks to tell the truth. Of course, he did think what you believe matters, right down to the date of Easter, so if you find belief a little off-putting, I can see why you'd want to dismiss him as just a monk...

To think that I should live to see this day!

"A Christian endeavor of almost 2,000 years could be substantially completed by 2025. Protestant translators expect to have the Bible - or at least some of it - written in every one of the world's 6,909 living languages." Read the full Denver Post article here.

Talk about high adventure. Talk about projects worth doing. Talk about prophecies being fulfilled. Come soon, Lord Jesus.


Hat tip to Brandywine Books. They find the coolest news, seriously.

Mall-shoppers beware

She really tried to talk me into believing in God the Mother. She also believed in the Trinity, consisting of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, so I'm not quite clear where the Mother fit into all this - shape-shifting, maybe?

To her credit, she had an actual Bible with her, of reputable translation, and kept thrusting verses under my nose. She assured me that she was only saying what Scripture said, and she wouldn't say it if it wasn't in there! I really tried to make sense of her claims. I think she was arguing that:

a) when God created male and female in His image, that proved His image was female;

b) that we're living in the end times, so the verses about mysteries being revealed in the end refer specifically to God being female;

c) the verse in Galatians about "if anyone preaches a different Gospel, he is to be accursed" doesn't apply to this new revelation because it's the same gospel;

d) When Paul is talking about the Jerusalem that is above and the earthly Jerusalem, the heavenly Jerusalem is female, so God is female.

e) Something about "elohim" being plural, and sure that might refer to the Trinity, but it could also be interpreted as referring to His/Her femininity.

A lot of other things came into it too, like the order of Melchizedek, though I have no idea what he did to deserve that. Nobody had ever taught this poor girl how to construct a coherent argument.

I could have escaped more quickly, but I figured that if she was talking to me, at least she wasn't talking to someone else. She was so enthusiastic, so dressed up, and so utterly lacking in theology and logic. I encouraged her to keep reading her Bible, and said I thought that she would find it wasn't really saying what she thought it said...

Narnia and Israel

We just got back from a wonderful week marrying off my sister. I do mean to post about that, but but tonight I just wanted to link this article on "Why is there no Jewish Narnia?" The short answer: Christianity is inclined toward fantasy, with other worlds and redemption at the end, but Judaism is more sci-fi and here-and-now. The article also talks about a new Jewish fantasy trilogy in the works and discusses some of its peculiarities.

I think he's on to something. Christianity is Judaism fulfilled and transmuted. They have the promise and the shadow very much in earthly things: King David, whose throne will last; the Temple and the sacrifices; the Law, which manages everything. Christians, though, look to somewhere else. Here matters, but it's not ultimate. Our hope is for a Good like you can find on this world, and that has been here, but Jesus said, "My kingdom is not of this world. If it were, I wouldn't have let you arrest me!" We've got villains, heroes, quests, terror, otherworldly landscapes, impending doom, and sudden redemption un-looked-for and beyond hope. So I suppose it's not that big of a stretch to arrive at your standard fantasy plot.

On the subject of fantasy generally, I'm reminded of a point someone made about Spenser, how he is the "poet's poet." His Faerie Queene has the knack of inspiring others to make poetry. I think Tolkien is similarly the fantasy-author's fantasy author. Everyone reads Lord of the Rings and says, "I can do that" -- and writes all the derivative fantasy currently on the market!

Maybe I should go re-read Tolkien and get motivated to work on that story I've got kicking around...

His steadfast love endures forever

It's not looking very hopeful that I'll get to work from home full-time when my leave is up (next week). And if they do approve it, there would be a rather awkward string attached.

Sigh. I came home and read our church children's ministry newsletter. The director had included a meditation on Psalm 136, which is the one that repeats "For His steadfast love endures forever" on every alternating line. He wrote,

And this refrain, in its brevity, announces both what God is like AND what He’s doing: In other words, God is constant, firm, loyal and strong in His love to His people and this will continue into the future. At first glance, we should all look back to times of trouble and see that God was faithful. But the rearview mirror is so small and dirty – it’s hard to be encouraged by the past. Really, what we should be reminded of is that the God we serve is the One that set His love upon His people and promised to be constant, firm, loyal and strong to them NOW and FOREVER.

Believer, God has proven Himself to be a faithful God. But more importantly, your God loves you enough to take the time to prove it to you.

It was very encouraging that God is more faithful than I am.

A new low

I generally try not to think about Presiding Bishop Katharine Jefferts Schori of the Anglican church, but her speech from July 7 came to my attention. I do believe she's hit a new low.

The overarching connection in all of these crises has to do with the great Western heresy – that we can be saved as individuals, that any of us alone can be in right relationship with God. ...That individualist focus is a form of idolatry, for it puts me and my words in the place that only God can occupy, at the center of existence, as the ground of being. That heresy is one reason for the theme of this Convention.

Ubuntu doesn’t have any “I”s in it. The I only emerges as we connect – and that is really what the word means: I am because we are, and I can only become a whole person in relationship with others. There is no “I” without “you,” and in our context, you and I are known only as we reflect the image of the one who created us.

As I read this, the great heresy is that individuals can be saved. She's right that we can only properly be known in relationship to God. She's even right that people properly come in relational clumps. But God pleases Himself to save people from every people-group. We've never been promised that communities will be redeemed in quite the renewed-earth-here-and-now sense she seems to envision.

Some of the ecumenists in here will twitch at this word, but we should be in the business of subsidiarity – the church as a whole should not be doing mission work that can be done better at a more local level. The budget and the resolutions we will debate here should be about those things that affect the whole of this Church, and the vision of a renewed creation for all of God’s handiwork. We should leave smaller things and more local issues to more local parts of this Church.

Apparently, missions work is a smaller issue, not something that affects the entire Anglican church or is worthy of its attention.

We Christians often think the only important part of the Jerusalem story is Calvary, and, yes, suffering and killing in that place still seem to be the loudest news. But Calvary was a waypoint in the larger arc of God’s dream – it’s on the way to Jerusalem, it is not in Jerusalem. Jesus’ passion was and is for God’s dream of a reconciled creation. We’re meant to be partners in building that reality, throughout all of creation.

Hmm... the cross is only a detail on the road to an earthly paradise, that we help make. No wonder missions is irrelevant.

Why is she even claiming to be a Christian, if she despises 1) the cross, 2) salvation of particular people, and 3) missions?