Commentary

One congregation’s sweaty spiritual practice

by Ken Sehested

Just this past week one of my congregation’s mission groups, MercyMovers, completed its forty-third moving job, helping members (and a few other special cases) lug their stuff to a truck or other vehicles, then travel to their new home for unloading. (A few times only loading, as a tangible blessing for those moving elsewhere.)

We—Circle of Mercy Congregation in Asheville, NC—have been at this for most of our 21-year history. So we average about two per year. Sometimes it was a small group of us—four-to-five, using a pickup and several cars. One involved 16 volunteers and took most of the day loading and unloading a 26-foot rental truck and ten or so cars carrying fragile things and miscellaneous other items too odd-shaped to box up.

by Ken Sehested

This tale is the unlikely story of a single, five-word sentence, a fragment of a much longer prose poem.

It was first uttered during what many would consider a parochial backwater event: the April 1971 annual meeting of the Florida Baptist Convention Woman’s Missionary Union (WMU).

by Ken Sehested

July 2022

“Every piece of this is man’s bullshit. They call this war a cloud over the land. They made the weather, then they stand in the rain and say, ‘Shit, it’s raining.’” —lines by Ruby Thewes (Renee Zellweger) in the Civil War-era movie “Cold Mountain”

by Ken Sehested

Recently I forwarded the social media link to an article detailing the ways religious piety was intertwined with the violent uprising at our nation’s capitol on 6 January 2021. My ever-thoughtful friend Susan responded with this question: “Scary. How is the best way to counter this descent into the same horrors as German Christians did following Hitler?”

I composed a couple sentences of response. But then a new door opened in my mind; then another, then another. And I ended up writing, over a few days time, the following:

by Ken Sehested

Under the sway of Easter bunnies, chocolate binges, and spring fashion sales, Holy Week and Resurrection Morning observances have shed almost all connections to the volatile political events in Jerusalem leading up to Jesus’ “triumphal entry” into the city.

The season of Jesus’ final visit to Jerusalem was the fevered occasion of Passover. Passover was the story of the Hebrews’ miraculous escape from Egyptian bondage. Passover’s observance in first century Palestine was like President’s Day, Armed Forces Day, Memorial Day, Flag Day, and Independence Day all rolled up into one. Judea was again in bondage, this time subjugated by Roman occupation. Jews from around the countryside streamed into Jerusalem for reasons of piety mixed with nationalist fervor. Rome ramped up its troop level every year at this time.

by Ken Sehested

"Cuba seems to have the same effect on U.S. administrations as the full moon once had on werewolves." —Dr. Wayne Smith, former director of the US Interest Section in Havana, Cuba

Medieval European maps traced the outline of the entirety of its exploration. Just outside the bounds of what was known they inscribed the words “Here Be Dragons.”

by Ken Sehested

“Concealment makes the soul a swamp.
Confession is how you drain it.”
—Charles M. Blow

They have treated the wound of my people carelessly.
They acted shamefully, they committed abomination,
yet they did not know how to blush.
—Jeremiah 6:14-15

by Ken Sehested

I can almost smell the acrid, thick smoke of diesel engines powering Russian tanks, personnel carriers, and trucks hauling heavy artillery into two eastern provinces of Ukraine’s border with Russia. This afternoon Russian President Vladimir Putin declared the two provinces as “independent states,” and that he was sending in “peacekeeper” troops to protect ethnic Russians in the region.

It’s likely the halls of the White House, the State Department, and the Pentagon will stay on all night with a company of aides following up-to-the-minute news and crafting President Biden’s response. The same goes for European and Russian leaders. Dawn is already breaking for many of them.

by Ken Sehested

The Solemnity of Our Lord Jesus Christ, King of the Universe, commonly referred to as Christ the King Sunday (aka Reign of Christ Sunday) is among the newer observances in the church’s lectionary calendar. It was promulgated by Roman Catholic Pope Pius XI in 1925, as a reaction to the perceived growth of secularism, escalating nationalism, and surging anti-clericalism. As it now stands, it is the final Sunday in the lectionary calendar, ushering in a new “year” beginning with Advent.

Numerous other denominations, which follow the Revised Common Lectionary, also observe the day as the culmination of the annual narrative of Jesus’ birth, life, death, and resurrection.

by Ken Sehested

At sunset tonight, Muslims around the world begin their observance of Ramadan, the ninth month in the Islamic calendar, which entails fasting (during daylight hours), a renewed focus on prayer and meditation on the Qur’an, and communal generosity. These behavioral admonitions broadly resemble the Christian emphases of prayer, fasting, and almsgiving during Lent.

Such ascetic practices are sometimes understood as a condemnation of all human desiring, as if “spiritual” life and “fleshly” are polar opposites.