Edgar

That's right - "Edgar." The other night a dear friend of ours at Broadway - Anne Mitchell sent out an e-mail to friends around the country, that included these words: "I have made new connections at the Broadway Church working some with the staff and with the Summer Edgar for Teens (Edgar to remind us we are NOT doing traditional programs but rather are trying to do things through people)."

The term "Edgar" came up when our staff at Broadway was meeting with Anne and we were struggling with how to get away from a programmatic approach to community - that hadn't seemed to serve us well in terms of the results we were achieving - and move to a more person-centered approach. People were struggling as we talked to try and not use the word "program." But when you are used to talking about something in the same way for decades and if that is the word that is in the air in your arena of life - well it's hard to do. So, as someone was struggling and saying..."in our summer...pr..." - "you mean 'edgar'" I responded. People laughed. But over the last several months I've noticed people talking more and more about "the summer edgar." I never meant for that to be used. I just meant to lighten the mood for a very heavy discussion that was going on that seemed to keep tripping us up. But when I saw Anne's e-mail I thought - well, this has gotten out there to a broader audience (while not necessarily having gone "viral").

But the truth is that what is happening around Broadway this summer is something very new. It started last summer - but it has grown exponentially this summer (in terms of the number of people involved and also the quality and the depth of the conversations and connections happening). There are hard things that have happened - and beautiful things have flowed from them. The young people who had conversations with their neighbors last summer - have found the experience this summer to be one that has led to deeper levels of engagement. There have been gatherings - pretty larger gatherings of people who care about the same thing - just meeting one another, building community. What will be the results of this? Who knows?

There were folks who gathered for dinner last Wednesday night - who love sports. And beautiful things happened out of that gathering. I'll write about that in a later posting. Right now I just wanted to say that "edgar" has grown on me. It has reminded me that sometimes language needs to be changed - so that we can be able to stop ourselves and think about things in a little different way. We'll see.

I was telling my father about that this evening and he said "you know that Edgar was your grandfather's middle name." I didn't. Or at least I hadn't remembered it. Connections abound.

What I'm Learning

In July I was the keynote speaker for the Mental Health Empowerment Project (MHEP) for the state of New York - at their annual meeting in Albany, New York. I have often given such talks at churches around the country. In a few instances I have found myself talking with "non-church" groups such as groups like community organizations, United Ways, or groups like ARC that organize communities of people who are labeled as disabled.

MHEP is an organization that is made up of folks who have been labeled with a psychiatric diagnosis, of service providers, and of family members of folks who carry such labels.

During the keynote I shared with the group some principles that we try to orient our life around. The first of these principles is "Never do something for someone that they can do for themselves." I have often repeated and shared these principles with the organizations I talked about earlier. And yet I never got the reaction before that I had gotten at MHEP.

When I said those words - the crowd clapped and cheered enthusiastically. Afterwards I pulled a few people aside and asked what that was about. They said "no one ever lets us do anything."

I thought of all the times that I have said to someone "I'll take care of that, don't worry about that" - because I don't think that someone is up to the task, for whatever reason.

It reminded me once again -- that the heart of true hospitality is not "serving someone" but giving someone the opportunity to serve. At least until these things get back into some sort of balance.

There are so many ways I feel myself caught in this unfortunate way of seeing fellow citizens as only those to be served - not as those from whom to receive. In the larger community there are opportunities to give that are open ended to some parts of the community - while really limited in other parts. Last night there was a neighborhood meeting here -- at the meeting someone (Miss Rose to be exact) got her hackles up because the facilitator said something like "you need to come to the development corporation and tell us what you think." She responded back "No, you need to come talk with and listen to, us." ("us" being the neighbors of this neighborhood -- whom the development corporation are there to "serve")

This same clashing of worlds and world views is present almost everywhere I find myself. I believe that it is truly possible for institutions to organize themselves to listen and act on what they hear -- as it is for them to act on what they think and never listen and never make room for others gifts. But it will take some reordering of our lives and of the ways in which they think. I'm learning something about that this summer.

A week after I had been in Albany I found myself in New York City to talk with some congregations. But I also got a chance to meet Beth Mount. Beth is an amazing person. Among many, many other things she is a tapestry or fabric artist (I don't even know if she would call herself that - I hope that's alright!). Her tapestries tell the stories of the people and communities to which she is connected. She showed me some beautiful, beautiful tapestries - that showed the gifts of people who are labeled as ungifted - but she revealed the real world, their real lives - that are hidden behind those labels. The tapestries she makes sing of a beautiful world. In a strange way they become both windows or lens through which I can see the world around me new - and also a mirror in which I can strive to recognize what I might truly have to offer, as well.

I'm learning a lot this summer.

A Little Different

Last week on Wednesday some of the young people who are our neighbors went out to interview another neighbor named Joe King. Joe is the founder and director of the Dirty Dozen Hunting & Fishing Club. Joe has lived in Indianapolis his whole life. He's worked in insurance. In his retirement he and his friends, all African-American men, have started this club. They spend time with young people and their families. They go on trips together, they fish together, they hunt together and they talk together.

Joe talks about how when he was growing up he used to go out to Fall Creek and watch the men fishing every evening after work. "That was my television," he says. He learned about life standing in the creek, watching his neighbors fish, hearing them swapping stories and jokes. He feels, he says, "an obligation," to the creek. He says, "I talk to the creek and I tell it that I will not forsake it." There is no one I have met who knows more about what has happened to Fall Creek. Back in those years -- over 60 years ago, people got a lot of meals out of Fall Creek. That doesn't happen too often anymore (some worry about the safety of the food coming out of those water).

But Joe wants to simply share with others the gift that he has received. The young people interviewed (on camera) Joe on the porch of his house. One of the young people interviewing him is named Cameron. Cameron lives just a couple of blocks from Joe, but they had never met before. During the interview Joe asked Cameron a question that resulted in Cameron telling Joe that he felt like he is "different" from other kids...that he doesn't feel like he belongs. After the interview, Joe put his arm around Cameron and walked him to the other end of the porch and told him that there was nothing in the world wrong with "being different." Joe told him that he himself is different and that this is a good and holy thing.

I thought later about how Cameron now has a friend, and neighbor, that knows that he feels he is a little different, and that this neighbor not only knows that but thinks that it's great. I hope that in those times when Cameron is feeling a little down that he can walk over to Joe's house and even if Joe isn't there he can remember that conversation and be encouraged. Such gifts are rarely counted and rarely known - but are infinitely valuable.

Our Practices Make Us Who We Are

"How do you get to Carnegie Hall?  Practice, Practice, Practice"—musicians saying

 I am a long time sober alcoholic. When I first stopped drinking, I learned a lot from Roz, who is a very direct fiery lady from L.A. We were in Oklahoma, a place not so direct. Roz said over and over, ”You can act your way into right thinking, but you can’t think your way into right acting.” She said, “ If you care then do something. Love is a verb not a noun. “

 I’ve traveled around a lot working with lots of groups. I have seen many organizations that are like dead zones while talking about community, and seen some organizations that feel completely alive with a beating heart you can hear. One place you feel like if you had a heart attack and died, people would step over you, and wait for someone to clean you up later. In another place you feel like a long lost brother? Why is a place one way and not the other way?  Lucky?

 I was once working with a congregation that was very welcoming to me, and I said to a lady who’d been a member there a longtime, ” You all are so kind to me. Its amazing.” Mary patted me on the shoulder and said, “Mike it has nothing to do with you.”  It stopped me... And after a few moments of silence, then we both laughed.

 Mary started to tell me about the commitments people make as members there. She called them ‘our practices’ that make us who we are.  One thing they do is to meet anyone they don’t know. Another is that any group has room for one more person. They don’t say you can’t play.  Another is that we go towards anyone we don’t like. I asked what that means? Mary said , “We know you can’t hold a negative label or stereotype about someone if you actually get to know them. If I think all teenage boys are dangerous and bad, then I make a special effort to know teenage boys as real people.  

 Whenever I find a group who is living hospitality I have been asking and looking for the practices that make them who they are. I ask; what are the practices you see?, what have you committed to do?, what could you commit to do? I think that groups who are welcoming have intention. People make commitments to practices. Practices are intentional actions we do over and over. They take our ideas into action to be fulfilled.  My meditation teacher said to me about commitments to practices , ”We don’t make decisions, so much as decisions make us.”  

Hospitable groups make commitments to practices to create a container for their experience that can hold water, the meaning and life of their shared experience.

  Hospitality is not helping someone but accompanying someone. The practice of hospitality turns strangers into friends, and transforms our lives in the process.

 

“Greater is an act of hospitality than an encounter of the divine presence”-The Talmud

 

Faux Radical Hospitality

Mike Green sent me a note today and said he was ready for us to get up and posting on this blog -- so I thought that I'd give it a "stream-of-consciousness" go, to help things get kicked off.

The words "Radical Hospitality" get tossed around really loosely these days. Since we began this blog I have heard many, many people in church circles talking about radical hospitality. Seems that the term makes an appearance in a popular book in some church circles (the book shall remain nameless here).

A couple of years ago a friend of mine was driving through a small northern Indiana town on Sunday morning and decided to attend the local United Methodist Church. The sermon that morning was on Radical Hospitality. The example offered that morning was that the church was going to start offering umbrellas to help ferry people back and forth to their cars in their parking lot on Sunday morning. Wow. What radical hospitality. I'm overwhelmed (which has obviously led to a bout of extreme sarcasm). A further irony was that when my friend pulled in the church parking lot that morning he had noticed a man who appeared to have had a very rough night stumbling around the outside of the church building. The folks going by him were ignoring him as they walked into the sanctuary (SANCTUARY!). Sounds like the umbrellas were arriving just in the nick of time.

In late 2007 I attended worship, while on sabbatical, at Broadway Christian Parish in South Bend. The particular Sunday we were there was one of those terrific days I used to call "Broadway Sundays" when I was there, because they were so special. The pastor, Rev. Nancy Nichols, did a great job. The focus on the day was talking about the chapter on Radical Hospitality in the aforementioned (but unnamed) book. The bishop had asked all the congregations in that conference to study the book. The people of Broadway were talking with each other that morning about how they could exemplify radical hospitality more deeply.

Now - like John Wesley -- I agree that we are working to move toward perfection (and that we'll not make it in this lifetime) - but those good people of Broadway Christian Parish have a lot more to teach about Radical Hospitality than most (if not all) of the United Methodist congregations in the whole Indiana area. I heard several people struggling with how they didn't feel like they were doing radical hospitality well enough. And that made me sad.

That morning in worship -- Prince was there. And Prince, like on most of the Sundays that I was there, got up and stomped out right at the beginning of the prayers, his curses ringing the congregation as he left. That congregation makes room for Prince and his family every Sunday - they know a lot about Radical Hospitality. Guy was there -- playing his guitar in the front row. While Guy would be welcome in many United Methodist congregations I guarantee you that he would not be welcome to play his guitar in most of them. Guy is labeled as a person with fragile x syndrome. But that congregation simply knows him as a brother - and makes room for his gifts in worship and in life together. That congregation knows about Radical Hospitality.

A few weeks earlier I had stopped by the church during the week and interrupted some pretty complicated work on the sound system in the sanctuary - that had not worked very well my entire 11 1/2 years there. The fellow working on the system was somebody who doesn't have a place to live, but who stops by Broadway every day for breakfast and company. He knows a lot about sound systems and it was sounding great. That congregation knows something about Radical Hospitality.

That Sunday we were visiting, as always, there was a Sunday Community Dinner after worship. Many neighbors, some who were at worship and some who weren't gathered around tables downstairs and shared a meal and laughter and stories. You couldn't tell, even during the clean up, who were the guests and who were the hosts and hostesses. That congregation knows something about Radical Hospitality.

I could go on and on...but this is the problem we face in the church - we don't recognize Radical Hospitality when it lives in our midst. Instead of reading this book the annual conference should be telling people to go visit Broadway Christian Parish and let them teach you about Radical Hospitality. But no - let's read it from a book and then keep people from getting wet as they go to their cars.

Many of the places who are "studying" Radical Hospitality wouldn't know what to do if a heavily tattooed and pierced young person (or old person) turned up on Sunday morning - much less one who cursed loudly during prayer or who played the guitar frantically and out of key, but joyously none the less. That little congregation of around 90 members provides lunch for nearly 100 plus people every week. I remember that a member of a 600 member church in town said "heck, we couldn't do that four times a year."

Radical Hospitality is not gained from a book....but from the heart and by the practice of making room for the stranger. I hope this blog will become a place where Radical Hospitality, real radical hospitality can be celebrated and perhaps copied and morphed and used as fodder for inspiration. Ride the wave!

Mike and Mike Say Hello

This blog is for all those who are welcoming the stranger and always trying to make the circle a little bigger and a little deeper. This is Mike Green and Mike Mather. Mike Green is an itinerant teacher and community organizer who lives in Denver, but spends much of his time galivanting around the world to strengthen radical hospitality. Mike Mather is an itinerant preacher at Broadway United Methodist Church in Indianapolis, IN where he gets to see the Broadway congregation practice radical hospitality inside and outside the walls of the building.

We decided to call this blog Radical Hospitality in the hopes that it would be a place where stories and organizing strategies will be shared for welcoming the stranger, ripping the labels off of labelled people, and realizing how much we need people who are marginalized.

So...we aren't sure where this will take any of us...but we invite you to share stories and practices of radical hospitality wherever you are or whatever you have seen or experienced.