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When does a pastor have the “period” talk with her parishioners?

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When does a pastor have the “period” talk with her parishioners? Second Timothy 1:7 proclaims, “God has not given us a spirit of fearfulness, but one of power, love, and sound judgment.” But I’ve still been wrestling with this question as a novice pastor serving a small town, rural community along the East Coast. My congregation, which according to their own profile, is “old, white, and conservative,” has never called a woman under the age of 35 to serve as their pastor, let alone one who is ambiguously nestled within the Black, Indigenous, People of Color (BIPOC) community. They chose “unanimously” to become a Reconciling in Christ Community. But many of my parishioners have become disturbed by my sudden erratic mood swings and general snarkiness during certain weeks over others. 

 

You see, I am a pastor, and I bleed. My menstrual cycle has always been unpredictable; however, it became downright fickle when I became an ordained pastor. During the Lockdown of 2020, my period completely stopped: sometimes, bodies cease menstruating to prevent childbearing during crisis. I didn’t actually mind this year-and-a-half reprieve from bleeding, as I had more than enough on my mind during 2020 up until the middle of 2021. However, during the winter of 2021, I was given the opportunity to visit with my family and friends after two years! Something about being with women my own age in addition to being with people I did not need to be pastoral towards triggered something from within. I had life burning in me again, and so I began to preach with fire. My parishioners, most of whom are 60 and older, thought that I had gone crazy making such bold proclamations during worship. Under the guise of caring for my well-being, they contacted my manager, the Bishop and Synod Office, to correct my unwanted behavior as opposed to speaking to me directly about their concerns.

 

During the lockdown, when I wasn’t bleeding, I was able to provide the bright and scintillating persona that they have come to expect in their pastors, all of whom have been white, male, and much older. I have discovered that in addition to my sheer “otherness,” there is a level of terse ennui found among the older folks in my congregation about how to deal with someone old enough to be their granddaughter. 

 

There is a wide array of curiosities among many of my parishioners about my more feminine idiosyncrasies. Many of them demand in the privacy of their homes over tea, “What is to be done about this most irreverent Reverend?” Yes, collar yanking does come with the call to some degree, but we are living in the twenty-first century, are we not? No one has the right to gatekeep anyone else’s body or personhood, not even our parishioners, well-meaning and intended as they may think they are being to us poor little lost lambs who have the audacity to become Shepherdesses in “their churches.” The kingdom of God is open to us all, which includes those of us with the “Red Tide” also known as “Aunt Flo.” It seems that everyone is divided on what should be best practices concerning this internal time marker that our Creator so humorously placed inside of those in possession of a functioning womb. 

 

Regardless of what is a Christ-centered, incarnational call to God, there are corporate realities that make communities of faith very uncomfortable. No one taught me how to handle such conversations in seminary. Naturally feeling disempowered and embarrassed, I took to YCWI for further counsel. As our Scripture writes, “I look to you for help, O Lord God. You are my refuge. Don’t let them slay me” (Psalm 141:8). Naturally, the psalmist didn’t have “Les Anglais ont debarqué” in mind when this wisdom was passed down.

 

Menstruation may forever be a taboo subject, even though it is the most natural thing to happen to those of us currently in possession of it. I am proud to be a Called and Ordained Minister in the Church of Jesus Christ. My “period” comes with my call, and one day, so will menopause, which is a natural process of aging for our sisters who have been blessed with the gift of time. I am not ashamed of being a woman who has been called for such a time as this when I can serve the God who created me in Their Divine Image along with each and every person who was and is and is to be born. 

 

I suppose that a better question to ask right now is a practical one. If our “period” is indeed both a blessing and a curse, then why shouldn’t we as clergywomen be talking about it with the people who claim that “All Are Welcome”?

 

…

Resources to Educate Yourselves and Support:

Days for Girls Challenge: https://www.daysforgirls.org/ 

Endometriosis Support: https://www.endocenter.org/ 

In Search of a Non-White Baby Jesus and Post-Partum Mary: Board Book Edition

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The author’s kiddo approves this message.

My internet search for “Christmas Board Book” was yielding snow, candy canes, Santa, and saccharine messages about “giving” as the true meaning of Christmas. Worse, searches for “Nativity Board Book” and “Baby Jesus Board Book” turned up white Jesus and a skinny post-partum Mary. The closest to a non-white Jesus I could find was the Holy Family as animated vegetables, and even there, Mother Mary was a very skinny veggie with eyeliner and bright red lipstick after just giving birth to a baby pea.

I was searching for a board book that tells the original Christmas story with Mary, Joseph, angels, shepherds, and baby Jesus. I am okay with a little historical inaccuracy (like a nativity mash-up that includes the magi with the shepherds – or even a shepherd made of asparagus), but I am not okay with teaching my blonde-haired, blue-eyed baby boy that Jesus looks exactly like him. I don’t want him to connect holiness with gendered beauty norms. My white son needs to know that God chose to come to earth as a brown-skinned Palestinian Jew, and that God celebrates bodies of all genders and sizes, including body shifts after pregnancy. In short, I don’t want illustrated children’s books to promote white supremacy or patriarchy.

There are children’s nativity stories that fit these parameters (like Who Built the Stable? by Ashley Bryan and the out-of-print The Story of Christmas by Jane Ray), but they aren’t available as board books. My toddler is old enough to insist on turning the pages himself but not old enough to turn the pages without ripping them. This means that we need baby-friendly board books with a non-white Jesus and realistic post-partum Mary. “Does this book exist?” I asked on social media. Fortunately, my crowd-sourcing revealed that four such books do exist. Here they are.

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 I Want to Be a Homemaker

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We found out we were pregnant the day Mary Oliver died, life entering into this world and life leaving. Opening pink box after pink box just to be sure, I began to have the best and worst feelings of my life, wanting to constantly vomit and simultaneously filled with revolutionary hope.  This was our polar vortex baby that taught me about life finding a way in the deep cold and dark of a midwest winter. I sat by bedsides and anointed the dying in my church and held onto our little secret of life and hope. Our little one was of dreams and poetry but never to be more.These days parents-to-be can know so much, and it is a gift as you dream and track your little one. Our little one grew from the size of a chocolate chip but will never be more than my maraschino cherry.  All this knowledge is a gift until it isn’t and saying “I had a miscarriage” seems woefully inadequate, as if I was careless or irresponsible, language here fails me. I was and am heart broken. But life is full of consolation prizes and clubs of which you never want to be a part.

I had been planning on taking parental leave, postponing my first sabbatical for diapers, sleepless nights, and the life changing love of a newborn. My consolation was that now I would get three beautiful months to tend my soul and my broken heart. Becoming a parent, and specifically the parent that carries, I was excited about making my body a home, a safe place that would nourish, tend, and cherish this little human as it grew and developed within. The words of Genesis “bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh” taking on a whole new meaning.  I wanted to make my body a home. I wanted to be a homemaker. I still want to be a homemaker.

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Meeting God in Broken Places: A Review of The Shack

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God the Father

When the novel The Shack was published in 2007, everyone was talking about it, particularly its unusual portrayal of the Trinity. Jesus as a Middle Eastern carpenter was hard to dispute, but the Holy Spirit in the personified form of an Asian woman? God the Father represented as a black woman seemed to raise the most objections. None of these struck me as quite the dangerous heresy they were being declared by more conservative folk, and religious fiction isn’t usually the section I target in Barnes and Noble. But the book was gaining popularity and my congregation was reading it. They wanted to know what their pastor thought of the ideas in the book, many of which were new to them, and so I read the book out of obligation.

With the recent movie release, clergy are in a similar position of being asked what we think about The Shack. Frankly, I didn’t expect to like it much. I found the book alternately pedantic and vague, and too blithe in its treatment of grief and guilt. The latter statement might also be made of the film, which moves at Hollywood pace through tragedy, fallout, and recovery. Still, I was moved by its portrayal of a man trapped in loss and shame who meets God and finds the ability to forgive himself.

The characters of the Trinity are compelling and provocative, if we can set aside the need for absolute theological accuracy at every moment – and after all, who has ever represented the Trinity with absolute theological accuracy in any single statement or metaphor? This version of the triune God is personified separately, in a way that brings out their vitality and relationship. That each person of the Godhead appears as a person of color was to me a relief and delight. And although it’s not explored in detail, “Papa” is played by the same woman, Octavia Spencer, who offers the young Mack pie and empathy in his abused childhood. Plenty of commentators have had difficulty with God being portrayed as a black woman. Some of our people may well have questions about the gender and skin color of God, or about God being visually represented at all. But it seems to me to be downright biblical that God appears to Mack in the one form that he might accept as benevolent. Isn’t the whole story of Scripture rife with examples of God appearing to humankind as we are best able to perceive and receive God? Isn’t this the story of Jesus, God made one of us so that we might see divine love personified? Read more

Not So Silent: Christmas Worship with Children

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Dearest church people,

Get ready. In two days it’ll be Christmas Eve. Your congregation will welcome people in for one of the biggest nights of the year. You may be blessed with an overrun of visitors, and I hope some of those visitors will be children and their parents.

In the spirit of preparation (it is Advent, after all), I write to you with my qualifications as both a minister who has specialized in children and youth and, for the last few years, become a pew-sitter; as a minister without a full time clergy position, I have done more pew sitting than worship leading.

And this season, I suspect, is the hardest of my pew sitting: I currently have three lovely children, and we’re doing all the ages and stages right now. The oldest, at 10, is in that phase where she can follow along in church, but sometimes needs a reminder to do so. Sometimes, this nudge results in a little preteen, mother-daughter drama. The five-year-old wants to move. He has the energy of a Pentecostal, which is perhaps a bit more than your average grown up Lutheran. (We currently attend a Lutheran church.) And the two-year-old has recently learned that she has pipes, so she will deliver quite the yelp if someone takes what she believes to be her crayon. She’s also highly attuned to the Holy Spirit, occasionally making a dash for the aisle because she thinks that music is for dancing. And when it’s time to go forward to receive communion, she has a hard time waiting her turn. Sundays in our pew are sort of like wrestling a squirmy pet monkey, all while juggling hymnals and Bibles. Add candles on Christmas Eve (our church has one service, at 7pm, well past the littlest one’s bedtime), and it’s going to be anything but a meditative experience for me. Read more

People meeting up

Sometimes You Just Need to See the Love

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People meeting upMany of our members have excitedly jumped on board for our very first Meet-Up Week, scheduled for February 16-21, 2014.  (If you’re still looking for one to attend, the link to the map is here.)

But maybe you’re hanging back, waiting to see how it goes first before jumping in.  Or maybe you’re thinking “I am way too busy to add anything else to my schedule,” or “there is nobody anywhere close to me.”  Maybe gathering with other clergy women of any age is considered suspect, or at least odd, in your denomination.  If you’re not currently a member of the project but fit within our audience, maybe you’re still testing the waters of The Young Clergy Women Project.

Meet-Up Week is a way to dip your toes in before deciding whether to take the plunge and get involved in the Project.  But more importantly, it’s a way to carry out the Project’s mission: to remind young clergy women everywhere that they are not the only ones.  What better way to do that than by actually gathering together in person?

Several metropolitan areas have standing YCW gatherings that meet on a regular basis.  They are already reaping the benefits of gathering in person.  And not all of them are in large cities, as you might assume.  (Portland, Oregon?  Oklahoma City?  Albany, New York?  All have their own regularly meeting young clergy women group.)

What happens at these gatherings?  Here’s a sampling:

  • Close friendships, beyond mere acquaintance
  • Colleague relationships that are actually supportive
  • Accountability—but also a safe place to vent and brainstorm how to deal with tough situations
  • Resource and idea sharing (Can you all help me with our wedding policy and fees?  What commentary/curriculum did you use again?  What did you say when you negotiated your maternity leave?  How am I supposed to deal with my senior pastor/council president/deacon/elder/clerk of session/trustees/rector/secretary?  You get the idea.)
  • People who just “get it”–no explanation required
  • Common ground that transcends denominations
  • Shopping buddies for buying clericals and vestments
  • A safe place to discern and ponder transitions and moves (many groups are ecumenical…so don’t worry, these women aren’t from your presbytery/conference/synod/classis/cluster/etc.)
  • Connections made for the sake of young clergy women everywhere, not to mention future young clergy women

Chalk it up to the Incarnation—technology is great, but there’s just nothing like being together in the same room.  As one YCW put it, “Sometimes you just need to see the love and support you have.  Gathering once or twice a month is a life-giving thing for me.  We’ve been meeting for 1.5 years now and I eagerly look forward to it each and every month.”  Another YCW in the same group shared, “It [this group] is one of the few places I can be wholly me—clergy, mother, wife, daughter, sister, friend.  These women know all about my life, all the parts, and we support one another fully.”

Our annual Young Clergy Women conferences are another place to find this support, but even if everyone had access to the time, money, and childcare needed to attend, let’s get real: the conference only happens once a year!  It takes time to develop the trust and safety necessary.  Meet-ups have the ability to provide the deeper support we need, when we need it, where we need it.

So if you’ve been on the side of the pool, wondering if this is the party for you, kick off your flip-flops and dip your toes in.  You never know, you might just find the very thing that will keep you afloat for years to come.