(a letter to my friends at
St. Augustine by-the-Sea)
Just two weeks ago, we were celebrating together the Feast of our parish patron Saint Augustine of Hippo while also bidding me farewell. This is a little note to highlight how my vocational journey continues in Manhattan, Kansas, and to, again, offer my heart-felt thanks to our St. A’s family.
First, a little context on the seemingly seminal nature of Septembers in my life. After our Sunday services, and after a nice send-off lunch with Fr. Mark, I loaded the last few things into my car, spent a few more moments privately in our sanctuary offering tearful farewells to a place that has meant so much to me, and began my four-day drive to my new home. The drive through Nevada, Utah, and Colorado provided for plenty of nourishing, contemplative silence as I passed through awe-inspiring landscapes in these states. There were many conversations with God about transitions in my life, with musing about the significance of September in this regard.
We’ll skip a full recounting of the many transitions that Septembers have represented in my life, including the major life changes immediately following September 11, 2001 when I found myself unemployed, shell-shocked, and grieving in New York City (memories still as fresh this past Saturday as they were nine years ago). But, let’s look back just four years ago. Four years ago this month, I was beginning a new job in Santa Monica, having just relocated from the Big Apple (Manhattan / New York City), where I had lived and worked for nearly ten years and where I had begun my initial vocation discernment with the Episcopal Church. Three years ago this month, I had just returned from a month-long intensive Spanish-language immersion program in central Mexico (something I chose to do the month after I ended employment with Pfizer) and was heading to Nevada for several months to care for an ill relative. Two years ago this month, having returned from the Lambeth Conference in England, I was relocating to the Burbank area, beginning what would be a short-term job with Kaiser Permanente, and initiating my course of study at the Episcopal Theological School at Claremont. And, this month last year, having completed my Clinical Pastoral Education experience downtown at Good Samaritan Hospital, I was wrapping-up a project management job for our General Convention and beginning a new short-term job as parish administrator at St. John’s Pro-Cathedral downtown. Whew – hard to believe all that has happened in these past four years.
Now, September 2010 finds me beginning a new job in the Little Apple (Manhattan, Kansas) after having been recently ordained to the [transitional] Diaconate and returning from an amazing pilgrimage to Israel and Palestine. Indeed, for me, turning the soil and planting seeds in September makes perfect sense, as this process has consistently yielded interesting new fruits in life.
Last week, I began feathering my new nest in Kansas (yes, I’m now a home owner, for the first time in my life) and preparing to commence my new job this week as Campus Missioner here in the Episcopal Diocese of Kansas. As one of two such missioners on Bishop Wolfe’s staff, my/our mission is to cultivate ministerial leadership in Episcopal communities around every college and university campus in the diocese in order to facilitate welcome and nourishment of those who seek a loving relationship with God and compassionate fellowship with others (be they Episcopalians who work or study at the schools, or seekers in the college/university communities who are curious about our way of Christian discipleship).
Although based in Manhattan, the home of Kansas State University (who beat UCLA during the opening game of the football season last week, to the pleasure of over fifty thousand cheering, purple-clad fans in the stadium), I’ll be traveling a lot, preaching and celebrating the Eucharist different places most every Sunday, and meeting and planning with laity and clergy all over the diocese. The diocese has equipped me with a car, laptop, cell phone, and a broad network of earnest evangelists, many of whom have been in engaged in good work with the colleges and university communities for the past four years since this new model for campus ministries was introduced in this diocese. Our collective work for this next phase will be to evaluate how things have evolved and set course for the next four years.
To prepare for this field-work, I’ve been re-reading Acts and some of the letters of Paul to the early Christian communities, filling my heart and mind with missionary spirit. As many of you noted when you learned about the particulars of this job, this work will well leverage my prior experiences in business consulting and higher-education student affairs as well as afford me rich continuing education and additional formation as I venture into my new vocation as an ordained minister of our church. I’m so grateful to be gainfully employed in a full-time position within our church and even more thrilled that the job is such an amazingly good fit for who I am, where I am in my journey, and what the community desires. Thanks be to God! The words from Frederick Buechner’s book Wishful Thinking: A Theological ABC are salient, “The kind of work God usually calls you to is the kind of work (a) that you need most to do and (b) that the world most needs to have done....The place God calls you to is the place where your deep gladness and the world's deep hunger meet.”
And, thanks be to you, too. Over these past three years of my active involvement with you at St. A’s, so many of you have helped form me and my sense of ministry in ways that will benefit the wider church. I’ve learned to let go of a lot of things, both literally and figuratively in my time at St. A’s, and I’m better for it. In surrendering many of the things associated with “I”, I’ve traded up, so to speak, to a greater strength and peace found in the “we” with Christ. You’ve helped me till much September soil, healing and reconciling a few wounds, cultivating seeds of new faith, hope, and joy in the love that emanates from a church alive with people committed to spiritual health through enduring fellowship, compassionate inquiry and study, and meaningful worship. Your prayers have buoyed me through the crucible of discernment and preparation that has been these past three years. Your very generous expressions of affection, affirmation, and support for my ordination, for my pilgrimage, and upon my departure two weeks ago were nothing short of profoundly humbling and moving at the core of my soul.
As I write this, my fingers have paused over the keyboard as I remember conversations I’ve had with many of you – on the Altar Guild, through the Healing Prayer Team, on parish retreats, during the Men’s Dinners, in discernment committee meetings, in and around special services, in the church office, and casually over meals. These moments of authentic connection were rich and remain vivid and informative. As I attempted to say on my last Sunday (I’m not sure how articulate I was on that very emotional day), rather that hastily trying to thank each of you individually, I chose to leave with you two symbolic gifts at the altar to better communicate my love for St. A’s – a new Gospel Book for use during worship services and a chalice and paten made for you while I was in Canterbury in 2008. May the book containing the written Gospel of our Lord serve as a symbol of our desire to come to know and love God with all our heart, mind, and spirit. May the chalice and paten serve to remind us to continually feed and nourish each other out of the abundance of what God provides to us. Perhaps I’ll have occasion to be back at St. A’s in the coming years and will have the opportunity to again read from this Gospel Book and/or celebrate with this chalice and paten. Regardless, I leave them with you as tokens of my gratitude… and as anchors in the St. A’s soil that has nourished me as I’ve grown.
Speaking of celebrating with a chalice and paten, I’m still awaiting word from Bishop Bruno and Bishop Wolfe about whether my ordination to the priesthood will be in Los Angeles or Topeka on January 8. I’ll let you know as soon as I know. Until then, know that you are with me in my heart as I begin new life and ministry here in the ‘heartland’ of America. Peace of our Lord be always with you!
With Love, --michael
