Theme Conversation this Sunday (October 26, 2014): Nothing Can Trouble

THEME CONVERSATION this Sunday:

This Sunday, I am hoping to introduce a Taize chant (Nothing Can Trouble, in VU 290) to our children and youth using the time for Conversation.
I think it is very timely at such time as this, and it is beautiful and comforting.

What I am thinking is
I’ll sing it for children and youth (and the congregation) as I introduce this chant for them,
and explain why I chose this one for chanting together,
then, tell my story of what I experienced in Taize community in February, 2005.

When we pray, we just need to bring ourselves, sit and talk to the heart of ourselves and to God.
‘What’s happening around me and around the world? What I am afraid of? What I am hoping for?
How is God related to me and to the world now?’

I’ll introduce a prayer to our children and youth:

“Jesus our peace,
by the Holy Spirit you always come to us.
And in the deepest part of our soul,
there is the wonder of a presence.
Our prayer may be quite poor,
But you pray within us.”

We need to wage love and peace. Peace is active, something we make. (Inspiration from my friend Lauren Aldred)

At the end, we will chant together Nothing Can Trouble (VU 290) a few times.

On Intercultural Ministry # 2 (October 21, 2014)

On Intercultural Ministry # 2

It is from my email I sent to my friends re: the expression, 'becoming more clearly intercultural." 

How do you think?

-------------

Two thoughts for now:

First, I feel unsure about whether intercultural is what needs a sort of ‘approval’. The expression that ‘becoming more clearly intercultural’ does not seem to sound right, to me. (However, I thank our friend for presenting that description because it is very useful for me to build up my thoughts and argumentation, here.) From my point of view, being intercultural is how we, or some of us, feel about what we need to do, how we think about ourselves, how we can relate to one another better and in a deeper way, and how we listen, how we learn and we grow.

It’s not what we engage with in the way and as if we put it among the competing agendas for securing a visioning priority of our church and as if only by doing so and therefore having the council's approval, we can start doing anything about it, clearly and ‘boldly!!'. Becoming intercultural is what we live out, at anytime when there is one or two voices coming up and being united because they feel a sense of urgency and goodness about it.

If ‘becoming more clearly intercultural' is about increasing the numbers of people with diverse ethnics and diversifying the shades and colours - so changing the face of the congregation - , well, I would still wonder whether it really needs the Council’s approval for that direction, but even if it does so, … that is not in my mind as my primary concern and enthusiasm. Because I believe, 'becoming more clearly intercultural’ is, most of all, about how we claim and enjoy the transforming process in which we are changed, challenged, comforted and inspired by one another. Put it differently, It is an emboldened action in faith to let others change us, challenge us, comfort us, and inspire us! It simply falls on the category that is general and for all, we believers - - how we live out faith in love and in action. When we think in this way, becoming intercultural is not what we need to wait for the Council’s approval, but we must start at any time when there is energy, growing interest, enthusiasm, and momentum.

What we need from the Council is their support, and their willingness to learn, grow, and participate. However, the Council’s approval is not the preliminary condition or foundation in which our effort grows and bears fruit.

Second, having the above in mind, 'that ‘becoming clearly intercultural’ does not wait for Council’s approval' also means that we don’t necessarily need to invest our energy in convincing the Council, as our effort's primary target. They are not our primary target. As our friend affirms, “we can grow this priority” from the grass roots up. We can act as the vessels in the plant’s stem at this point. We help the liquids (resources) flow through and reach to each cell (people), and together we are part of the plant and grow as an organic body. The primary targets are each and every person we meet in the church.

Please let me know, if anything above is not clear, or should you have any question or concerns, let me know.

I originally posted to my Facebook page on October 21: https://www.facebook.com/hana.park.357284

On Intercultural Ministry # 1 (October 20, 2014)

On Intercultural Ministry # 1

Intercultural Ministry?

If you are one of those who are interested in intercultural ministry, please read my earlier posting on Immigration and neo-liberalism/Immigration is a big bang.

I firmly believe if we don't consider the facts I pointed out in the posting, intercultural ministry loses its <liberating> potential.

We would like to see the congregation that consists of diverse people with different ethnic, cultural backgrounds and heritages. However, if not we hear the sound of the big bang they have gone through and if not we give the message that liberates, heals, affirms, encourages, challenges people and that speak to their experiences,

why would we endeavor to engage with intercultural ministry?

A very important question would be; so why do we engage and will do intercultural ministry?

To GIVE the message to LIBERATE and heal
Not RECRUIT them for the possibly hidden agendas such as
growing numbers
or the ideals for diverse ethnics getting to know each other
and welcoming one another
like in the kin-dom of God.

I originally posted this to my Facebook page on October 20: https://www.facebook.com/hana.park.357284

Immigration and Neo-Liberalism (October 20, 2014)

Immigration and Neo-Liberalism

Immigration. How do you think about immigration? 

How I think about immigration may be quite different from how other immigrants would think about it and their experiences. However here is my reflection that I can't contain in myself any more - , and now I don't want to.

Immigration is, first of all, celebration, because all immigrants get that permanent resident status through a very very hard process mainly to prove that they satisfy all the qualifications and standards of education, wealth, skills, age - which gives an idea of their human power (labour) - and family/children. They bring their whole self, dreaming that they will find a 'culture' that will give them a nurture, but the real expectation is what they can bring to the 'economy' of the host country. So there's a gap; culture vs. economy

Second, and this is important to be noted:

Immigration is an expulsion
It is a big bang
people experience
they are expulsioned - expelled from their home country

Neo-liberalism that snares and swallows and
oppresses all corners of the world
to make them put money and the economy and the transnational companies and capitals's self-increase and expansion on everything else

The neo-liberalism
that drives ordinary people to the very end of the corner
so that they are left with only desperate few choices for survival
has made the roads, the paths, the paved roads people walk on
like a LAVA
that people can't really walk on
if not they risk their lives and safety for money,
for agendas for survival and competition

People don't breathe for the fresh air - the gift of the nature and life
they breathe just because they have to

They can't save their community, but they know that
they can save their three or four member household, at least, and that's all

So people choose to expulsion
they choose to be big banged

After all, immigration is disaspora
phenomenally, tragic diaspora
after the expulsion
they've become a scattered seed
uprooted, scattered, and flown away

they have no where to land, really,
so they gather to live as a ghetto among themselves
known to each other as the same ethnic
In the middle of the cold air
they live as a ghetto

They meet others - the host people, culture, system,
but most often those places are
at the markets or in the medical clinics
and they are greeted there
with welcome.
I have wondered why, for a long time,
maybe because money bridges them all, there?

There are many hopes, the places for hope, we can find,
but we also need to be bold to say
what is perceived as it is
we don't shed lights only on success
we hear the stories of struggles, too.

I originally posted this to my Facebook page on October 20: https://www.facebook.com/hana.park.357284

Where Waters Meet (October 19, 2014)

Where Waters Meet

The following inspiration on Water has come from my new friend, Melanie Kampen. The inaccuracies are due to my capacity in noting things in English.

"When I think about water I am drawn into the healing capacity of water, the basic sustenance for our lives (physical/spiritual sustenance), and also to the chaotic aspect of water.

I hold two things together - water as unsettling and also water as healing

These reflections offer the invitation to ….muddy waters of Winnipeg - muddy waters. The violence... what is happening to this muddy waters…the missing and murdered indigenous woman ….

Idle no more movement which is both the indigenous and settler movement …. invite us to the muddy water…unsettling our own waters..our life that is messy… And the spirit that troubles and heals at the same time."

I originally posted this to my Facebook page on October 19: https://www.facebook.com/hana.park.357284

The Name for God (October 19, 2014)

The Name for God

I've sent the following message to someone I've recently got to know a little bit deeper.

--------

The following does not fully reflect how I perceive, theologically think upon, and experience God. However, after our conversation, and after I attended “Where Waters Meet” gathering, I thought of this.

Later on, I hoped to share this reflection with you as our ongoing dialogue on God and our relationship with it (the presence, the dynamic entity or non-entity, the evolving process that is pregnant of possibilities) I posted it to my Facebook. FB is my personal journal.

It is a very valuable and hard question – it has been in my mind for a long time – ; how to pray when our understanding has reached to a post-theistic God (which means we don’t think God as a God like a person who intervenes in our lives like a watchmaker fixes its clock.)

The Name for God

First peoples, Korean storytellers 

call the moon
grandmother, older sister,
loving the energy of the moon

First peoples, their ancestors
call the water our sister
our brother, our father, our mother
loving the healing and unsettling power of the water

Isn't it beautiful
that we call these things
with the names for our relations, our relatives, our family members, our parents

No wonder that we call God - the 'it' -
with the names for our relations, our relatives, our family members, our parents
with the names that we have saved dearly for our beloved ones
my lover...

I originally posted this to my Facebook page, on October 19. https://www.facebook.com/hana.park.357284

Questions (October 17, 2014)

Questions

I am not quite religious 

I am not a spiritualist either
I would say I am rather a truth-seeker
but not always a truth-teller.

In the midnight, I ask to myself,
"Have I ever shared with others
real questions of mine
that have occupied my mind, heart, intelligence
for a long time
and matter to me so much, personally,
disturbingly or liberationally
in the church
in the pulpit, in the study?"

I wonder what would happen and what it would be like
if everyone comes to church
to share their real questions
that they ask everytime,
when they are alone, or when they hear somebody's message...
the real questions that matter to them so much, personally,
and disturbingly

I wonder what would happen and what it would be like
if I speak what I truly wonder and want to explore theologically,
spiritually or scientifically,
about emotions or evolutions,
about what is potentially 'biased' politically,
- not only safe topics,
whenever I converse with people who are also truth seekers
trusting that we would accompany one another.

Would that change the church
to be a deeper community to engage
a safer community to be
or a random community
that can't maintain and develop stronger identity any longer?

No one has forced me but,
being tongue tied &
confining myself with a self-assuming role

I admit I've never shared real questions that matter personally to me

However, in this midnight moment,
rather than regretting,
I feel grateful,
because I think I feel awake more than ever
as I wonder and reflect
honestly, faithfully, truthfully

Well, even now, I don't take risks
I don't show my wings
but am aware of grace.
Grace.

We can be
a fear-full place
or
a fear-free place
or
a fearless place
or
all three
and that's the beauty

With grace,
I give permission to myself

to relax
to wonder
to feel good about this moment

yearning and believing in

the deeper community
that is called
church
the body of the human beings -
the incarnated place where God shows
Him/herself
or hides it,
or both, always.

I originally posted this to my Facebook on October 17. https://www.facebook.com/hana.park.357284

A Few Important Things to Remember (October 8, 2014)

A few important things I must remind myself of in ministry in my context

1) Don't care that I may look less smart than I wish I would for speaking with accent and with some errors in the uses of prepositions, etc, etc. 

2) Make sure to let that feeling go and let your spirit flow even more so when you talk with youth/teens. Remember that you meet them with your integrity facing forward. You are not there to impress them, but to engage with them.

3) Don't give in or let others' agendas replace your own agenda. 

4) Fight with your own fear or anxiety re: time pressure. I mean, even if it is the last minute when everyone in the group wants to wrap up the meeting as soon as possible, if you feel that you need to speak, speak and don't worry that others may make a frown face to you, because they will not. It is not the same that YOU speak to that those who always speak first and always speak again.

And these four things are the hardest to keep, personally. They are almost spiritual practices which require the stronger sense of inner authority and peace about myself.

If you want to check out people's replied and join in the conversations, please send me friend request to https://www.facebook.com/hana.park.357284.

For Whom Sexuality Is Still A Trouble (October 5, 2014)

On Sexuality, Culture, and Christian Church worship
Copying it from my Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/hana.park.357284) If you want to check out people's replies and join in the conversation, send me friend request to my FB account.

As I reflect on my life, except for a few courses I took at University or other rare learning opportunities, I have learned to repress one's sexuality. When I grew up in Korea, the schools never allowed their students from letting their hairs grow long once they enter the junior high school. All the students had to wear school uniforms to be seen all same. My friends and I often saw the teens who were in dating outside the school rules ended up with big troubles. My church was the place that made me regret that I was born as a girl, not a boy. After some years in University, a short, special time period when all the students are suddenly given a permission from the society to explore youth and sexuality, they get married and build a family. Your sex becomes equated with your gender roles. That's my story on sexuality experienced as a Korean female, before I moved to Canada.

Now I am very grateful for my recent discovery and new appreciation on sexuality: sexuality rather than to be used, exploited, abused or controlled, but to be expressed, appreciated and affirmed so that it can perform its creative power that can heal a person. It can help one cast out the burdens of oppression and shame.

I wondered:

what if the church is the place where not only sexuality is 'discussed', but celebrated, where the broken part of a human soul is recognized and the healing is ritualized, and where not only love as agape but love as eros is praised.

It would be a very interesting question for me, personally, studying Jesus teaching on human sexuality. Did he ever?

Sexuality is un-finite. De-finite. There may be In-finite between homosexuality and heterosexuality.

And it seems also interesting to me: so now, theatres celebrate love as eros, arts do so, musics do so, novels do so, and offers their answers in a variety of forms to respond to the question how our new appreciation on human sexuality and love can be employed as a tool to bring equity, freedom, healing, and change.

I wonder, why Christian worship, as an art form, wouldn't do so, to be the feast to celebrate the God's gift given to us to use it with ethics and conscience, discernment, and love. I wonder whether we can be a community that intends to help others for whom sexuality is still a trouble.