Run, Nori, Run! Lessons learned from my four half marathons this summer

This past Saturday, I ran 2.1 miles—it was my first attempt at running since my last half marathon on September 6. I had mysteriously injured my lower back the week before that race and, probably against my better judgment, I went ahead with the race, even though my back was spasming and getting out of bed was a chore.

It was at Disneyland, I had paid $200 to register—not to mention the cost of flying out and staying in a hotel; dammit, I would finish the race if it was the last thing I did!! So I awoke at 4 AM on Sunday, September 6, took 800 mg of ibuprofen and walked (hobbled) in the pre-dawn darkness from my hotel to Downtown Disney where my last half marathon of the summer was to commence.

I remember when I first decided to run four half marathons over the summer. It was last December and I was a part of a Facebook running group called CJ’sHoliday Challenge. I am not sure how I stumbled upon it, but I was glad I found it. It was focused on the two months between Thanksgiving and January 25^th, and led by Coach Jenny Hadfield, a well known running coach in the “real world.” The group was geared to folks of all ages and running abilities and was simply there to encourage people not to lose track of their fitness and running goals during the busy (and fattening) holiday seasons.

Before I joined this group I was an uninspired runner; I tried to get in three runs a week, but they weren’t very long (no more than three miles), nor were they consistent. I did try to sign up for a 5K “race” each month, to keep me motivated. I put “race” in quote marks because I surely wasn’t trying to win, but I did get a racing bib,as well as a t-shirt (generally) and it was timed. But being a part of this group opened my eyes to bigger possibilities. Suddenly, I was seeing posts from people who ran at my pace (a 13 minute mile) who were doing 10Ks and half marathons and even FULL marathons! If they could do it, why couldn’t I? I was going on sabbatical from June 1-September 10. Why not do a half marathon a month during that time, among other sabbatical plans?

I shared my idea with the group and asked, “Am I crazy?” The answer was an unreserved, “Yes!!” But, the other members added, in a good way. Why not go for it? A few even pointed out that I could become of a member of the Half Fanatics if I accomplished this feat.

So I cemented my plan by putting it boldly in my Winter holiday letter and even proclaiming it from the pulpit in a New Year’s sermon. By mid-February I had picked out and paid for all four of my races. I was firmly committed.

When friends would ask me why I chose to undertake such a daunting mission during my sabbatical, I found it hard to explain. I truly felt called to do this. I wasn’t doing it for fame or glory; it certainly wasn't to get more attention (as an introvert, I spend my time finding ways to NOT be the center of attention!) All I could say was that I was going to learn things I needed to learn during the training leading up to the races, and in the races themselves. Honestly, I was feeling a little tredipatious, myself, about the undertaking but as March came around, I begin training in earnest.

Now, on the other side of this endeavor, I can see clearly the lessons learned in the training, the races, and the conversations in between.

Lesson #1

It doesn’t matter if anyone else believes in you; it only matters if you believe in yourself.

I first began to realize during my training that there were some people—caring people involved in my life—that didn’t really expect me to make it to my first half marathon, let alone getting through all four. People who met my stated training goals with disbelief,

and my accomplishment of them with sheer amazement. I remember saying to one friend, after I had completed my first double digit mile training run, “You didn’t really expect me to do that, did you?” She admitted she had been surprised that I had done so.

Now, to be fair, I was a little surprised by my own tenacity. It would have been much easier to keep putting off those long runs; they took up so much time! I’m slow on a good day and my average pace, as the miles increased, got slower and slower. Do you know how long it takes for me to run 10 miles? 2:15 hours!! That takes a lot of planning in order to make sure I had time in the day to run it! It was daunting to me but I kept faith in myself and steadily increased my miles until, four weeks before my first race, I ran 12.4 miles on a long Saturday morning. I came home from that run and, as I was gulping down an electrolyte enhanced drink, suddenly burst into tears. The reality hit home then, I was doing it! I was actually training consistently for a half marathon! All those years of being non-athletic, all the friends who didn’t think I would actually follow through, all the times I doubted myself, were washed away in those tears. At the moment, my own belief in myself took a secure hold. It would carry me through a summer of injuries, illness, and travel that interfered with my on-going training and it would ultimately carry me through that last, rough half marathon in Disneyland.

Lesson #2

The race isn’t about the starting line or the finish line; it’s about those lonely miles in between.

There’s a certain sense of excitement when the gun goes off and the race commences. For a while, I’m in the thick of a pack of runners, with many runners passing me and me passing some as well as we all jockey for position and find our paces. Knowing that I’m a slow runner, I always start somewhere near the back of the pack. If there was a pacer holding a three hour sign, I’d position myself behind that person, since my goal was to break three hours.

And then the race would begin! And we would run through a crowd of cheering friends and family members onto the course! Soon—within a mile or two—we would all be in our respective places that we would hold for virtually the rest of the race. I would find myself playing “leap-frog” with one or two of the other runners at my pace. I might steadily overtake them (think of that annoying moment on the freeway when an 18 wheeler pulls slowly into the left lane to pass another 18 wheeler, going about .5 miles faster an hour than the truck being passed; it takes a long time for that pass to actually get completed) and then when my watch beeps to tell me to take my one minute walk break, they would slowly overtake me.

It’s not crowded where I am, in the middle miles. Far ahead of me are the faster runners; if it’s an “out and back” course the fastest racers will be passing me at about the half way mark. Behind me are runners even slower than me, including those who walk the races. This leaves me in a solitary place with only my leap frog buddies to keep me company.

And it is in those miles, where I’m alone, where there is no one to cheer me on, where the only sound is that of my somewhat labored breathing, that the true race is run. Ultimately I will reach that glorious 13 mile marker and put what little I have left of any reserves into play and run across the finish line where still a crowd waits to cheer me in! And then I will dazedly lower my head to accept my finisher’s medal and head for the cups of water waiting, but I know the only reason I got there is because I slogged along in those lonely middle miles, persistently putting one foot in front of the other, even when there was no one to witness my efforts.

Lesson 3

Sometimes you can’t quite reach your goal. You can choose to focus on how much you missed it by or how close you came.

My first half marathon was June 6 in Moab, UT. It was the Thelma and Louise half—so named because the course ran along the Colorado River in the location where the final scene was shot in that iconic movie. I was nervous b

"Flat Nori" ready for Thelma and Louise

ecause shortly after I had done my 12.4 training run, I had seriously injured my right knee.  I had taken it easy for a few weeks but when I ran six miles the week before the race, the pain was so great that I had to call a friend to pick up, a couple of miles from home.

I had gone to a physical therapist twice in the week before that first race, and my knee was taped up using the kinesio tape, which is all the rage now, to help prevent injuries. Right before the race I downed 400 mg of ibuprofen; I was as prepared as I could be. The course was beautiful and the taping and the drugs evidently helped because I didn’t really feel any pain until about mile 9. Then it came on with a vengeance. I stayed with my pace of run 3 minutes, walk one minute, the entire time and was pretty impressed with my final time of 3:05:41.

Unfortunately, my knee was incredibly injured and I spent the next four weeks before my second race focusing on doing physical therapy for strength and recuperation and did very little actual running prior to the Fourth of July race in the Colorado Springs. Subsequently, my time was worse—I finish

July 4th "Flat Nori"

ed at 3:11:46. I was discouraged but it couldn’t be helped. At mile 11, my legs simply quit working on me. At that point, I switched the tempo to running 1 minute and walking 3. That was the most miserable race ever! 

Then came my third half—the Georgetown to Idaho Springs race. Billed as a fast race because it ultimately is a downhill race, there were several steep uphill portions, too. On a positive note, although I was much slower in my second race than my first, my knee didn’t hurt at all! The on-going PT was really working! On a negative note,  I had gotten a miserable, intractable cold that had kept me in bed for the better part of two weeks in between race two and three. Once again, my training runs suffered. One well-meaning friend (and a “real” runner) tried to convince me to forgo this race and just focus on getting faster for the grand finale in September. I thanked her for the advice but told her I was planning on running that third race, even if I had to crawl over the finish line.

Proudly displaying medal for Georgetown

Instead, I had the best run of the summer! I felt like I was flying down the mountain. I abandoned the run/walk ration of 3:1 and just ran until I felt the need to walk. Once again, however, mile 11 proved to be my nemesis. This time, I started to experience cramps in my left calf that caused the toes on my left foot to spasm. When that would happen, I would slow to a walk until it stopped, then start running again.

I crossed the finish line triumphantly with a final time of 3:00:47. Yes, that means I was just 48 seconds shy of my goal of a sub-3 hour half! At first I was disappointed. I kept replaying those final 2.1 miles, knowing if my calf hadn’t started to cramp, I would have taken less walk breaks. Then I realized that 3:00:47 is a GREAT time for me! And, if I didn’t make my goal, at least I finished with my knee intact and with the best effort I could give. I posted the results on the CJ Challengers page and was met with enthusiastic congratulations. More importantly, I had a good race; a race that was actually fun to run!'

Lesson #4

Run fast, but don’t miss the magic.

This brings me back to where I started this post: a pre-dawn start in Downtown Disney with an 
injured back. I had hoped, following my triumphant third race, that the Disneyland Half marathon would be my crowning glory: a half marathon at sea level, with much better pre-race training runs. Instead, I entered this last race more nervous than I had been before any of the other three.

There were over 15,000 runners and we were set loose in corrals of hundreds of people eight minutes apart. The race began at 530 AM but it was just past 6 when my corral was finally released. At first, I tried my best to get ahead of the crowd, even though veterans of the race had told me the night before that this was not a race to try for a PR due to so many runners on the course. Still, I dodged around slower people, jumped up onto the sidewalk when it got too congested and was generally not having a very good time, although I was very determined. I did my best running, initially, not even taking any walk breaks until after I had run steadily for more than 30 minutes; still I was getting nowhere fast.
That’s when I noticed what many of the other runners were doing. The first few miles of the race took us through the streets of Disney California Adventure and then onto the streets of the Magic Kingdom itself. Even at that early hour, hundreds of workers lined the course to cheer us on and many characters were also there—Mickey, Minnie, and their gang;  Beauty and The Beast, and their gang;  Buzz Lightyear! Woody! All of the big names were out to cheer us on! And runners were pausing from their race to line up 20 deep in order to have their picture taken with these luminaries.

In this first video, you can see me as I run out of the castle at about the :10 mark, on the far right of the crowd. It's clear by my gait that there is something wrong with me!  

That’s when I got it. I realized how for the past three races, essentially all summer, I had been focused on the stress, the injuries, the doubts. I had worried about, rather than rejoiced in, the races. I had spent a lot of time trying to justify to some people why I was running this series, rather than just soaking in the congratulations of others.

For me, doing these four half marathons had never been about getting progressively faster; it’s always been about just doing them, not letting any excuse stop me. That’s why I registered early and why I broadcast my intent. After all, it would have been easy for me to opt out of any or all of these races at the last minute; that I didn’t do that was the victory.

In this second video, you can see me at about the :20 mark, on the side closest to the announcer. I have given up trying to run and am just soaking in the magic.

It was at that moment of realization in that final race, that I stopped jockeying for a better position and just took in the magic that is Disney. I snapped a couple of photos of my own as I “raced” along. I took in the cheering Disney workers and characters and the beauty of running through the streets of the Happiest Place on Earth. As we left the park and headed down the streets of Anaheim, I applauded the bands and dance teams and car clubs that lined the streets to cheer us on. When we made it to Angel Stadium and headed down onto the field, it felt as if we were taking a victory lap; hundreds of people in the stands were cheering us on as the official game announcer welcomed us in. Unfortunately, that was at the 15K mark; we still had 3.7 miles to go.

Towards the end there were several places where cheerleaders were doing chants for us, and I felt as if they were directed specifically to me. “We are proud of you! We are proud of you!” and “We are the champions, my friend!” 

It occurred to me that I really had done it: I had completed four half marathons in four months. I had trained consistently until injuries and illnesses sidelined me, but even then, I never gave up. The victory was mine.  I wasn't the fastest in my age group, I never broke the three hour time, and I was beset by complications that slowed me down, but never held me back. And at the end of that final race, as I hobbled back to my hotel room, I could be proud. Proud that I had, ultimately, crossed the finish line I had set before me, all those months ago.

This commercial captures exactly how I felt at the end!

EPILOGUE

On Monday, September 7, I was back at home. Although my back was worse than before, I had gotten out of bed early to cheer on my friend, Cate, who was running the American Discovery Trail half marathon here in Colorado Springs. This race was an out and back, beginning in America the Beautiful park and going north for 6.55 before the turn around back to the where it began. Cate is a seasoned runner and had been training hard all summer for this race. She suggested that, if I wanted to cheer her on (and I did; she had been my faithful cheerleader at all but my final race the day before) to be waiting at the 4 mile mark (which was also about mile 9 on the way back.) So I made my way to that mile marker, at Goose Gossage park.

Once the first  and fastest runners came through, I tried to guess about when she’d be by, based on the pace estimates she’d given me. Sooner than I expected she came zipping along, going fast and looking great. After she left, I cheered on the other runners, while I waited for her to return. I looked at my watch, at one point and figured out that the next batch of runners would be about where I would be, if I had been running that race, and sure enough here they came. Some were doing the sort of disciplined run/walk ratio that I did, others were running and then walking intermittently. All of them looked exhausted but determined. I cheered especially loud for them, knowing what it felt to be at mile four, with the bulk of the race ahead. Soon after “my” group passed along, Cate came winging back. I stayed long enough to encourage her then got in my car and sped to the finish line so that I could greet her there.

It was hard to walk, my back was spasming and I was giving out little Tourette shrieks of pain every time it did. But as I waited for Cate, I reflected on my own journey that summer, the lessons I learned, the experiences I had. If you had told me just four years earlier when I first laced up a pair of running shoes and started a couch to 5K program, that I’d be running four half marathons in a single summer, I would have laughed out loud. Yet, here I was. I thought of those in my pace group still struggling on the course that morning and mentally cheered them on some more.

 Soon Cate crossed the finish line. At age 56, she had not only placed first in her age group, she had set a new PR for herself, with a time of 1:52:14- a 8:34 mile.  She writes about that experience eloquently in her own blog, Meditatio Ephemera So that’s another lesson I learned vicariously: you’re never too old to set a new PR.

Over this past month, as I’ve gone multiple times to the chiropractor, and have focused on recuperating, I have to say, I was so glad to not have a race in October. I doubt I’ll ever do so many distance races in such a short time again! But I might do the Georgetown to Idaho Springs race next year; there’s still those 48 seconds I need to lose. And I would definitely do another Disney half-- only next time I will make sure to focus on the magic from the start.

A slide show representation of my summer running!

Unintended Blessings of the Long Journey to Justice

A few weeks ago I traveled to Kansas to celebrate my 35^th (!) high school reunion. The festivities were held on Friday and Saturday night in Topeka, where I grew up, but Sunday I was to go to my sister Lori’s in Lawrence, KS. We had a full day planned: a first birthday party for my grand-niece, Averie, and a birthday dinner for my 26 year old niece, Rachael.

But Lori wanted the day to start with church. Her daughter, Rachael, had discovered a new church and had told her mom about it. I first heard of this church a few months ago when Lori and I were on the phone. “It’s contemporary and really simple,” Lori had said, “There’s just a few songs, the sermon, a prayer and a closing song. Then you’re done.”

She went on to rave about the rock band and the casual appearance of the ministers, their fun use of videos and their small group ministries. I was pleased she and Rachael had found a church where they could  feel comfortable, though I was not sure I wanted to attend; I worried about the theology. In my experience, “contemporary” non-denominational churches with praise bands and coffee bars have a conservative, evangelical bent that focus on “loving the sinner and hating the sin.”

Still I was curious about this church and so I headed to Lawrence after getting in an early morning run. Lori was especially excited to tell me about what the topic of the sermon just happened to be for my visit: Gay marriage.

Great.

Still, I gamely smiled and marched like a good little soldier into the Lawrence theatre where Eastlake Church rents space each Sunday morning. My niece, Rachael met us there.

“Did Mom tell you what the service is on today,” she asked with a big smile. When I said yes, she responded, “I’m 90% sure we won’t have to worry about what they’ll say.”

This made me feel a little better, but as the lights dimmed and the young members of the band walked on stage, I felt my gut tighten. Listening closely to the lyrics of the praise songs (like any good Unitarian Universalist would do) I felt my sense of unease growing. One song mentioned over and over again, how the singer would call to Jesus from a miry pit, “rescue me! Deliver me!” This sounded a lot like something ex-gay ministries would tout—Jesus can save us from the pit of homosexuality.

Finally the lead minister, Matt, came out and began his 40 minute talk. This was the last of a four part sermon series called “Survey Says” and each week, one of the ministers would address questions people wanted answered. This talk actually addressed four questions: would there be an increase in persecution of Christians in America, Is there a heaven and hell, If I’m afraid to die does that threaten my salvation and the Big One: What Do You Believe About Gay Marriage?

As Matt spoke, even though I really appreciated his perspective (for the first question he said people voting differently than you is not persecution, it’s democracy, and atheists are not anti-Christian, they’re anti-asshole, they’re anti-douche bag) I still kept waiting for the other shoe to drop.

Finally he got to the marriage issue and when he said he believed in marriage equality and all three ministers would be available to officiate at any legally sanctioned marriage, I thought I was going to burst into tears. I mean seriously.

You have to understand that for most of my ministry I was with MCC-- a predominantly queer Christian denomination-- and I can't recall how many times someone walked through the doors of that church, broken and beaten down by their former church's interpretation of homosexuality. I couldn't tell you how many times they had to recover from being told they had to be ex-gay, in ordered to be loved by their god. So maybe my trepidation that Sunday morning at Eastlake Church was understandable.  Even though by then what Matt would say shouldn’t have been a surprise, I still didn’t trust where the message was going. I thought he’d say, gays and lesbians are welcome but marriage is between one man and one woman. 

Instead he fully affirmed the human dignity and worth of queer folk, and unequivocally welcomed all into their church. Instead of delving deep into scriptures and the translations, he offered two links for those who wondered how he had reached this decision –this one from 2005, written by John Thomas, then General President of the UCC, and this one by Justin Lee, author of the book Torn: Rescuing the Gospels from the Gays vs. Christian Debate. In summary, Matt simply stated that homosexual relationships mean something different than what was depicted in biblical times and that of all the things Christians were called to, loving one another was chief among them. Then, just as promised, a prayer, a closing song, and we were out the door.

As the lights came up, I looked at the other folks gathering up their belongings and exiting; I thought about how many of them might be struggling with their sexuality or know someone who was. I thought about how this simple validation in a contemporary Christian church- complete with a rock band with a thumping bass line might have saved lives that day.

In June I wrote about the historic decision on marriage equality given by the US Supreme Court and I focused on its relevance, on the struggle to win that fight but I failed to mention the unintended blessings it would also give: a reason to live. As many of you know, I belong to a facebook page called Sibling Survivors of Suicide. In the wake of the Supreme Court ruling, I was amazed to see how many of my fellow siblings posted their joy at the decision and said that they only wished their brother or sister could have been alive to witness this day, adding their siblings killed themselves because they had been gay or lesbian, because they didn’t think their god could love them, because someone told them they were going to hell, because they had been bullied in high school- or middle school- because of their sexual orientation, because they were raised in a culture that said they were second class citizens, at best.

I thought about how long the journey, how arduous the struggle, how Sisyphean a task justice-seeking is; and yet, with each small victory attained, with each nudge that topples the dominoe

s of injustice, somewhere in some small town, a life is saved, a love is lifted up, and liberty and justice for all seems, at least in this moment, ours.

That’s what I experienced at Eastlake Church that morning, as I blinked back tears of joy. And that was at the center of the bittersweet celebration of the Supreme Court’s decision on my sibling survivor page.

In 2004, long before I could see the unexpected turn this journey would take, I wrote a paper on Marriage and the Patriarchy, in which I questioned if that issue should be the building we put our ladder on, but in the end I believe that this struggle for equality will have ramifications beyond two people’s decision to say “I do.” Perhaps, by legitimizing love we can finally begin the process of detaching qualifiers such as gay or straight marriage and just say marriage. Perhaps, we can begin to dismantle the hierarchies of love that have held sway for so long. Perhaps then we can join together, all of us members of the human race, to care for our planet, in all its diversity, and one another, in all of ours. 

Cry Me a River

Recently, I’ve been very emotional. I suspect hormones might be in play here, but I can’t talk about Cecil the lion, recount a moving passage from a book I read nearly a year ago, or watch certain commercials without getting verklempt. Well, more than verklempt, really; almost on the verge of ugly crying. I’m serious here.

I’ve always been a touch sentimental but it is getting worse (better? You be the judge.) There are two things, however, that I have never been able to talk about for long before the tears well up in my eyes and my throat constricts with a mass of grief struggling to get out or go deeper in; I’m never quite sure which: my brother’s suicide and the US AIDS years. Both of these have created deep canyons in my soul, brimming over with grief. For these two things, no matter how many tears I cry, I will never be able to empty out these canyons; there are vast untapped reservoirs waiting, still.

I tapped into one of these canyons last night, while my son, Sam, and I were watching the movie “RENT.” It’s one of our favorites; we know all of the songs and sing along, assigning ourselves different parts (you be Mark on this duet, and I’ll be Roger, and so on.)

Midway through, a song entitled Without You comes on. It focuses primarily on a broken relationship between two of the main characters—Mimi and Roger—but interspersed with their montage of heartache is a montage that brings me to tears just writing about it (see what I mean???) in which an AIDS support group is shown; nothing much-- just a small circle of people in folding chairs, only as the song goes on, the people disappear and you understand that they have died.

When the song came on last night, Sam said, very solemnly, “This is such a sad song.” I, of course, was making that strangled sound you make when you’re trying not to cry, while tears poured down my face. Sam looked at me with compassionate concern. I struggled to say, “It’s really sad to me, because I lived through those years. I lost 33 friends to AIDS and knew many more who died. And did memorial services for untold numbers.”

“Think of it,” I said. “It would be like you losing 33 Brandons or Sams (friends of his.)”

Suddenly I was struck by the realization that there are many of us survivors—mainly queer folks, but straight allies, too— for whom those first 15 years, 1980—1995, (the year Sam was born) when the protease inhibitors came on the scene and stopped the floodgates of death-- cut deep canyons of grief, with untapped reservoirs of tears, and now we have children who know nothing at all about how those years impacted us, impact us still. It’s like escaping from the pogroms or ethnic cleansing and then going on to have a family that knows nothing about it.

In some ways, though, it is like the entire country wants us to keep silent, to move on, and to let it go. Not just now, but then, too, during those dark days. As one ACT UP activist said, it was like fighting a war that only the combatants knew about. No one wanted us to talk about it then and no one wants us to remember—at least not so viscerally—now. Unfortunately, that is impossible. It is always with us. It moves through the rivers of blood in our veins, always very close to the surface. I realized that anew last night.

And it got me wondering: how has this history impacted my parenting? How has the grief shown through the cracks? How can I explain this to my son in a way that will make sense to him and not just be a dry history lesson? (Note: intentional pun; no way my eyes will be dry through that conversation.)

I don’t have any answers here, just a clear understanding that our children, our collective children, need to know about this era in a deeper way, they need to understand how it changed us, how we are marked, how we wrestled with the angel of death through that long, long night and now forever walk with a limp. They need to know, Sam needs to know, the source of these tears. These tears aren’t related to hormones at all.

And Grace Will Lead Me Home

We are living in historic times, my friends. Times of great victories—such as the June 26^th SCOTUS ruling for marriage equality, and times of great pain and terror- such as the murders of nine people of faith in Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, SC.

And on the razor’s edge of sorrow and joy, President Barack Obama’s eulogy of Rev. Clementa Pinckney, the minister shot down along with eight congregants at a prayer meeting at Emanuel AME, will also go down in history as one of the most eloquent and powerful speeches of our day.

I’ve been thinking a lot about grace this week, he states early on.  I, too, had been thinking about grace, wanting to put some words around the aftermath of the terrorist attack on the beloved church.  I thought about how the family members of the victims walked in grace that empowered them to tell Dylann Roof, the shooter, that they forgave him. 

Forgiveness is a tricky thing.  I’ve been thinking about forgiveness, too,  this week. It’s a much better focus, than the sense of helplessness or despair that can so easily find its way to the forefront of my being. 

It’s good to turn away from such bleak feelings to feelings of power. And forgiveness is just that. Forgiveness is refusing to allow injustices done to us have complete power over our lives, Forgiveness is acknowledging that we will never have a different past. Forgiveness is grace is action. 

I watched the footage of the families of the victims “facing” Dylann Roof via video feed and expressing their pain and anguish at the lives he took from them but also, curiously, telling him they forgave him, and I was filled with so many questions.

What does it mean to forgive in this type of circumstance? Can it even be real, so close to the rawness of their loss, the blood stains still not yet faded, despite the crime scene clean up?

What was the scene like at Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, SC , that following Sunday morning? In black churches across the nation?  

And what does it mean for members of the African American community to forgive their white destroyer of lives and dreams? Should that be something to wait before giving, as black scholar and author, LaToya Baldwin Clark, suggests?

How is forgiveness borne in the heart? When is it real and when is it just words? And is it a linear path that once traveled, cannot be revisited? Or is forgiveness like the tide, ebbing and flowing on any given day, depending on our own strength and grace in the moment?

It seems to me forgiveness and grace are intertwined; they are woven into the same fabric of humanity; each one requires the other to fully thrive. Grace calls us to forgiveness, forgiveness calls us to grace. 

In his speech, President Obama alluded to the well-known hymn “Amazing Grace” in saying that grace calls us to open our eyes to see what we have refused to see; I would add that grace calls us to see the road that leads to wholeness, which is what the word salvation means, to stop insisting we can't find our way. 

The President spoke movingly about how we, as a nation, have in the past refused to open our eyes to the reality of the racism embedded in the flying of the Confederate flag, how we have refused to look upon the carnage of gun violence as something we can prevent with better gun control regulation, how we have turned away from the racist attacks on the African American community. But grace calls us to see.  Grace calls us to see the path that leads to justice and start walking. Ironically, "Amazing Grace" was written by John Newton, who experienced that turning point of having his eyes opened to the evils of the slave trade, in which he was an active participant. And Dylann Roof, himself, would talk about how close he came to having his eyes opened, due to the love and grace extended him by those nine people of faith, who welcomed him into their prayer meeting. Grace is not something thrust upon us; it is an invitation to have our eyes opened to a different, more inclusive way. Dylann heard that invitation, but in the end Dylann chose to continue with his blinders on, leaving a swath of destruction in his wake. 

Grace may also call us to forgive those who have wronged us. I would like to think I could have as much grace as the family members did in forgiving Roof, but I don’t know that I am that evolved. Frankly, though, I would probably find it much easier to forgive Dylann Roof than I would to forgive our politicians who keep pandering to the powerful gun lobbyists out of fear that they might not get re-elected.  Our laws—particularly those that would provide a safer world—should be based on what is right and just, not what is politically expedient.  In  my opinion, that is where the real evil lies: in the hands of politicians too afraid to fall out of step with the NRA and other groups who insist their right to bear semi-automatic weapons is ironclad, and to put the craven desires of those groups above the safety of our nation. That is evil. That is reprehensible.

People talk about being in a state of grace as if it were something to shield them from pain, but that’s not the way the President spoke of it. He spoke of it as a catalyst for change, for having our eyes opened to the injustices and pain that is all around us and making a different choice.

In his eulogy for Rev. Pinckney, our President gave voice to the grace that we need as a nation, as families impacted by violence, as a grieving community. He stood fully in his power as the President and in his identity as a Black man and spoke prophetically about grace in such a way that we can no longer say we don’t see it. We can no longer say we don’t see the damage done by racism, subtle and overt, by gun violence. The President called upon us to open our eyes, and to walk in the state of grace that leads us to a place of justice, compassion, and forgiveness. If we can take at least one step, it will be a start.

The families of the fallen were able to do that, even if I don’t understand how they could. Now it’s our turn.  Let’s get moving.

No union is more profound than marriage, for it embodies the highest ideals of love, fidelity, devotion, sacrifice, and family. In forming a marital union, two people become something greater than once they were. As some of the petitioners in these cases demonstrate, marriage embodies a love that may endure even past death. It would misunderstand these men and women to say they disrespect the idea of marriage. Their plea is that they do respect it, respect it so deeply that they seek to find its fulfillment for themselves. Their hope is not to be condemned to live in loneliness, excluded from one of civilization’s oldest institutions. They ask for equal dignity in the eyes of the law. The Constitution grants them that right. –Justice Anthony Kennedy in the majority opinion granting marriage equality.

My heart is full this morning as I celebrate the Supreme Court’s decision on marriage equality. I confess: it has struck me more profoundly than I thought it would; I can’t seem to stop the tears of joy from spilling over. HISTORY IS MADE!! I posted on my facebook wall, and indeed it has been. Two years ago, on this same date, when the Supreme Court ruled in favor of equality, overturning California’s discriminatory Proposition 8 and recognizing the validity of the marriage between Edith Windsor and Thea Spyer in The United States vs Windsor, I said these words at a rally held in Colorado Springs:

We are here today to celebrate a victory that has been decades in the making.
When Harry Hay founded the Mattachine Society in 1950 as an international fraternal order of gay men to protect and improve the rights of homosexuals, we began planning this party. When the Daughters of Bilitis formed in 1955 in San Francisco as the first lesbian civial and political organization, we started choosing the invitations. When the first commitment ceremony performed by a Unitarian Universalist minister for a same gender couple was reportedly done in the late 1950s, we began to get an idea that this party was going to be big.
In 1963 , when Bayard Rustin, organized the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, as an openly gay man with full support from Dr. King, we started thinking about who would get those invitations.
In 1968 when Troy Perry– whose name is on the Prop 8 case, as one of the plaintiffs, along with his husband Philip De Bliek--when Troy Perry founded Metropolitan Community Church, as a queer Christian church, we started thinking about the entertainment.

In 1969, during the Stonewall Uprising, on June 28 , drag queens and butch lesbians and transgender folk got started on the party a little early when somebody called the cops.
In 1970 when the Unitarian Universalist Association passed a resolution urging support for the glbtq community and in 1972 when the United Church of Christ ordained their first openly gay minister, Bill Johnson, we got a few more details for this party.

And so it has been, through the years, that we have been preparing for this moment. If not us, personally, than our forebears who went before, who courageously paved the way, who dared to speak love’s name loud and proud, who would not sit down and shut up, no matter who told them to.

And so we stand here today, celebrating a great victory: The recognition by the Supreme Court that marriage cannot be separate but equal; that all marriages should be treated equally under the law.
Of course, the struggle continues, but the dominoes of injustice and inequity are falling, my friends, their precarious rigid black and white pattern is being replaced by the beautiful, powerful, rainbow-hued colors of freedom and equality.

So we’re throwing this party tonight. In fact, let's just call it a wedding reception. And we are celebrating but we are not stopping our march toward full freedom and equity under the law. And we won’t stop until it is achieved.

Theodore Parker, 19th c Unitarian minister, wrote this:
"Look at the facts of the world. You see a continual and progressive triumph of the right. I do not pretend to understand the moral universe, the arc is a long one, my eye reaches but little ways. I cannot calculate the curve and complete the figure by the experience of sight; I can divine it by conscience. But from what I see I am sure it bends towards justice."
Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. used this phrase to give him hope in the Civil Rights movement. May these words give us hope today as we rejoice in the victories we have won and look to the long arc still ahead, confident it bends always towards justice.” 
On that same day, Minnesota outgoing Congresswoman Michele Bachmann had this to say on SCOTUS overturning DOMA: “Marriage was created by the hand of God. No man, not even a Supreme Court, can undo what a holy God has instituted.”
I couldn’t help but think how similar her words sounded to the words spoken in 1958 by Trial judge Leon Bazile in the original trial of Richard and Mildred Loving, arrested for violating the Virginia Racial Integrity Act of 1924:
“Almighty God created the races white, black, yellow, malay and red, and he placed them on separate continents. And but for the interference with his arrangement there would be no cause for such marriages. The fact that he separated the races shows that he did not intend for the races to mix.” 
I thought then of what a long, Sisyphean task it must have appeared to be, to seek the right for people of different races to be able to marry with all the love and dignity afforded same race couples. Yet love persevered, hope kept going, and justice was won. Now, as Justice Kennedy said—using this word nine times in his opinion—gay and lesbian couples are finally afforded the dignity of legal marriage should they so desire. History is made! Even as recently as 10 years ago, I said with full optimism, “Marriage equality will happen—probably not in my lifetime—but it will happen.” There is no way in the world I could have foreseen how swiftly the tide of justice would roll over the land; there is no way in the world I could have foreseen this momentous day happening just 46 years after the Stonewall riot which heralded the beginning of the Queer rights movement, and exactly 12 years following the SCOTUS decision on Lawrence v. Texas. That decision, on June 26, 2003, which declared that sodomy laws in the U.S. are unconstitutional." Overturning the Texas "Homosexual Conduct" law which made it illegal for two people of the same gender to have oral or anal sex (which was already legal if with someone of another gender) was instrumental in making this day a reality. June 26 is a good day, indeed! I can't help but look back over my 21 years here in Colorado Springs and how hard we, as a community, have fought for this right. I can’t even count how many times we had a demonstration at the downtown office of the County Clerk; all these gay and lesbian couples lining up to apply for a marriage license, $20 (then $30) and driver's license in hand, only to be turned down by the (apologetic) workers who had to inform them, that, according to Colorado  law, marriage was only between one man and one woman. And then, how Ryan Acker (then the Executive Director of the Pride Center) and I would step forward, a lesbian and a gay man, who had never even gone out on a single date together, with cash in hand, and our driver's license at the ready to prove our identification; the two of us, who weren't even a couple (though I told everyone he was registered at Bed, Bath, and Beyond, and I was registered at Home Depot); the two of us, achingly single in reality, yet we could step up and by virtue of the gender listed on our drivers license, we could get a marriage license. We could step right past those gay and lesbian couples, some of them together for decades, and get what was denied them, on the basis of whether or not we peed standing up. How many marriage licenses did we get? Five, ten? And all of them unsigned, a dusty testament to the abuses of a legal system that did not require evidence of love, commitment, trust, only an F and M in the appropriate boxes. 
Today, our fake relationship is trumped by true love, today the law of the land honors the love of all couples. 
Today, I cry tears of joy for the journey it has taken to get us, for the future queer children who will see their love fully represented legally and in society, for those whom we lost before this victory was granted, to despair and shame. 
Today, even though I am perennially always the officiant, never the bride, I understand what it feels like to be fully recognized as a citizen of this country, with all the rights accorded therein. 
Today I have been seen, because, to paraphrase Justice Kennedy’s words, we have asked for equal dignity in the eyes of the law. The Constitution grants us that right. In my lifetime. In yours. Let the party begin!

Bottom of Form

I Need You; You Need Me

Last night I attended a prayer vigil for the victims and families of the Charleston church shooting. It was held at their sister church, Payne Chapel AME Church in Colorado Springs. The house was packed; every seat was taken, with some folks standing along the back walls. It was a simple service, beginning with a Prayer of Forgiveness, followed by the choir singing of God’s mercy and grace, then a Prayer for Healing, then two sections titled, simply, Expressions, interspersed with Gospel music, and finally, ending with a Prayer for Hope.

During these two parts of Expressions, the leaders of the service spoke and then invited other ministers, church leaders, community leaders to come forward and speak as well.

I hadn’t planned on speaking, I was casually dressed, but I felt like I was answering an altar call to go up and testify; so I did. I introduced myself as the minister at All Souls Unitarian Universalist Church and then said something along these lines (it was extemporaneous, so I’m sure I’m not getting it 100% right :)

“I’m on sabbatical this summer. Unfortunately, violence doesn’t take sabbaticals; racism doesn’t take sabbaticals; hatred never takes a break. There is never a day when they shutter their windows and put a closed sign on their front door.

But here’s the other thing: Forgiveness never takes a sabbatical, either. Love never takes a sabbatical. Grace is always hanging around.

That is why I’m so honored to be here with all of you tonight. That is what we’re experiencing here tonight. And it is what the congregation of Emanuel AME Church in Charleston is experiencing tonight, even in the midst of their pain and anguish. Emanuel AME has a rich tradition of speaking and acting out for justice and being attacked and destroyed for it; they have always risen from the ashes of despair and they will do so this time, as well

And I want to pledge to you tonight that All Souls Unitarian Universalist Church will never take a sabbatical when it comes to standing with you in the struggle; we will stand shoulder to shoulder with you; we will be your allies in the face of hate and violence; we will not grow weary in the work of love.”

I sat down then, and others spoke. As I looked at the crowd of people gathered, as I listened to the choir sing, “God is good all the time; all the time, God is good,” I felt such a profound sense of solidarity, of community. There we were, people of all races, ages, faith traditions trying to make some sense of another senseless tragedy, and yet, it was not despair or defeat or the pervasive sadness I wrote about yesterday, that filled the chapel last night; it was, indeed, the never-resting spirit of forgiveness and grace and love.  We joined together, hundreds of people, to say, we are not broken down, we are lifted up in our faith—whether in God, or Love, or the Power of Humanity to one day rise above, and we will not let the hatred of this world ever overshadow the Love that sets us free, that calls us into wholeness, that gives birth to grace and forgiveness and hope.

At the end of the service, the choir sang one last song, before Rev. Arthur B. Carter, Jr., the minister of Payne Chapel AME sent us off with words of hope. The praise and worship song, written by Hezekiah Walker, summed up perfectly, the simple truth of our lives, the interdependent nature of this web of existence, of which we are a part, and the solid truth that we need each other.

Maybe tomorrow I’ll reflect on forgiveness, grace, love. For now, I’ll leave you with this:

\

(The audio for this was recorded live from the Prayer Vigil in Colorado Springs. For a clean version of the song, check out this link)

"I'VE HAD TO MAKE STATEMENTS LIKE THIS TOO MANY TIMES. COMMUNITIES HAVE HAD TO ENDURE TRAGEDIES LIKE THIS TOO MANY TIMES."-- President Barack Obama

I want to say I’m outraged, shocked, appalled. I want to say I don’t understand how something so tragic, so—if you’ll pardon the expression—evil could happen in 2015, in the United States, in one of the most developed countries in the world. I want to shake my fists at this young man who took the lives of nine people and forever altered the lives of those who knew and loved them and cry out, why?

But unfortunately, that’s not true. That’s not what I’m feeling; I feel deep sadness rather than molten outrage, the Novocain-like numbness that comes only from repeated witnessing of innocent people gunned down, of racially motivated terrorism white-washed—at least when the killer is white and the victims are black—and a sense of despair of us ever getting it right as a nation.

Why? Hell, I know why. At least in part. I don’t know all of the sad story of 21 year old Dylann Roof, who has confessed to the murder of the nine church-goers, shot down in cold blood as they met in a prayer meeting and Bible study but I do know that he has fit himself neatly into a template of violence that has become so familiar, we can just save the stories and change the name and location of the incident.

Why? Because we, as a nation, refuse to enter into any serious conversation about racial violence done in this country.  We allow white police officers and white vigilantes and even white guys driving a truck to say they felt threatened by black men as their single defense for their use of deadly force.  We want to say that we are post-racism, since we have a president who is half black while glazing over the incredibly offensive overt racist remarks and responses to President Obama from our own citizens.  There has never been a US president as openly ridiculed and reviled as him, even though his performance in office has been stellar in terms of the work he’s managed to get done while dealing with these attitudes.

Racism is so pervasive, so embedded in American culture that, as Jon Stewart so brilliantly and somberly pointed out in his opening monologue  on The Daily Show  last night, black citizens of Charleston drive down streets that are named for confederate generals that fought for the ability to deny black citizens the freedom to drive down those streets.

This is nothing less than an act of domestic terrorism. When Dylann Roof opened fire on a group of black people who were in no way threatening him, he did so out of a self-admitted desire of provoking some new, racially motivated, civil war. As Jon Stewart also asserted in his monologue, we seem to have no problem doing whatever it takes to protect our country from acts of terrorist aggression from foreign elements—we attacked two countries, spent trillions of dollars and thousands of lives to do so—but when it comes to an American committing an act of terrorism, we shrug our shoulders and say, “what can you do? Crazy guy.”

Why?  Because we, as a nation, have turned our backs and shut our pocket book to the mentally ill in our country. According to a  USA Today article from 2014, States cut $5 billion in mental health services from 2009 to 2012. In the same period, the country eliminated at least 4,500 public psychiatric hospital beds — nearly 10% of the total supply. As a result, nearly 40% of adults with

severe mental illness received no treatment at all in the previous year. Compare that to the money earmarked for military spending in this fiscal year which is a whopping $598 billion—over half of the money budgeted for discretionary spending. And while that number is huge, it neglects to show the cuts for Veterans benefits that our congress has voted in, even in the face of increasing mental illness among veterans returning from war zones; 22 veterans kill themselves every day, with many of them having fallen through the cracks of a system that glorifies the war and will pay a high cost for it, while neglecting the emotional toll it takes on those who serve. 

Dylann Roof is not a veteran but it would come as no surprise to me to learn that he suffers from mental illness, as do James Holmesof the Aurora shootings and Adam Lanza, the Sandyhook shooter.

Why? Because we, as a nation, refuse to deal with the rampant pandemic of gun violence in our country.  Once again, a gun, so easily obtained, was the weapon of choice. This is another conversation folks don’t want to have.  Today, as I write this, the prosecution rested its case in the trial of James Holmes, the young white man who shot up a movie theater in Aurora, CO, killing 12 and injuring 70. Their final witness was Ashely Moser, who was 25 at the time of the attack. She described how she took her seven year old daughter, Veronica, to see the movie “The Dark Knight Rises” to celebrate the news she had received earlier in the day: she was expecting another child. She lost her daughter, her unborn baby, and her own mobility that day; she was paralyzed by the bullet that ripped through her body as James Holmes unleashed a barrage of ammunition from the four guns—semiautomatic and pump action—that he was able to purchase legally from four different stores.

And, already NRA leaders and nervous politicians are spewing forth the well-worn trope that guns don’t kill people and that now is not the time to be political, but to focus on grieving the victims and supporting their loved ones.

South Carolina governor, Nikki Haley, a long time gun advocate, said as much in this statement, 

One NRA board member, Charles Cotton, even blamed one of the victims, church minister and state legislator Clementa Pinckney, referring to his stance on control, saying, “And he voted against concealed-carry. Eight of his church members who might be alive if he had expressly allowed members to carry handguns in church are dead. Innocent people died because of his position on a political issue.”

The NRA has issued similar statements following the tragic killings at Sandyhook and in Aurora, even though an FBI report released last year shows that unarmed private citizens were three times more likely to subdue an active shooter than a citizen who is armed.

I said, in the wake of the Sandy hook shootings, that now is exactly the time we need to be having a conversation about gun violence and gun control; that there is no greater way to honor the horrific losses to gun violence than to enact laws that protect the 2^nd amendment but not at the expense of innocent lives lost. The authors of the 2^nd amendment had no concept of semi-automatic and automatic weapons; they had no idea of the violence that could be wrought in a 10 second burst of gunfire. They were addressing the right of people to bear arms, not stockpile enough military grade weapons for their own private war. When people declare their second amendment right to own an uzi they pervert the meaning of it.  

Why? Maybe because we as a nation have become so anesthetized to gun violence that we prefer to get our dander up over which Kardashian is dating who, and the prime time premier of Caitlyn Jenner, and an activist who has been discovered to be living a racial lie. We get worked up over, and pass great judgment on the details of those living in public life while every day, people are killing other people in manners which could have been avoided.

 And so now we gather, we grieve, we hold one another close; we will light candles, and hold vigils and say prayers; but here’s what remains the same: the Confederate flag still flies proudly, at full mast, over the state capitol of South Carolina, this shooting will get its 15 minutes of infamy and then be buried under an avalanche of celebrity mischief, sports hi-jinks, and the next deadly shooting.

It’s enough to take the wind out of anyone’s sails. It’s why I feel more sadness than outrage. It’s why this will happen again. And again.

And yet here is where the light shines through, here is what also remains the same: the good people of Emanual AME will rise again, they have already faced their killer via video feed and shared what they lost, even while forgiving him. Emanuel has a long history of social justice and activism leading to its racially motivated violence and destruction, and yet rising again and again out of the ashes of history to remain a shining light of justice and equity, good people of conscience will gather and disperse, blow out our candles and place them in the basket as we leave the vigils, but the embers of justice in our hearts will have been fanned into the flames of commitment and activism to make this a better world. There is a tipping point that we are approaching, my friends, a tipping point of sadness that will be alchemically transformed into the passionate outrage that can fuel a revolution; a revolution that can topple politicians who are more concerned about the money they get from the gun lobby than protecting the lives of their constituency, a revolution that will see a true dismantling of the racist attitudes and permissiveness  that allows a flag to wave over a state capitol that represents the worst of our history. Here is what also remains the same: in my sadness, in my despair at the exhausting sameness of these tragedies, I will not give up, I will not give in, I will not grow weary in the work of love.

There is more I could say but I’m off now, to attend a vigil here in Colorado Springs, at an AME church, where we will gather, we will grieve, we will hold one another close. And then we’ll leave with the light of conviction blazing in our hearts. Maybe I will see you there.