So, I finished it. A movie of the book is coming out next year. Two sections:

What do you want to do?
Just help him, Papa. Just help him.
The man looked back up the road.
He was just hungry, Papa. He’s going to die.
He’s going to die anyway.
He’s so scared, Papa.
The man squatted and looked at him. I’m scared, he said. Do you understand? I”m scared.
The boy didn’t answer. He just sat there with his head bowed, sobbing.
You’re not the one who has to worry about everything.
The boy said something but he couldnt understand him. What? he said.
He looked up, his wet and grimy face. Yes I am, he said. I am the one.

and

He [the boy] walked back into the woods and knelt beside his father. He was wrapped in a blanket as the man has promised and the boy didn’t uncover him but he sat beside him and he was crying and he couldn’t stop. He cried for a long time. I’ll talk to you every day, he whispered. And I wont forget. No matter what. Then he rose and turned and walked back out to the road.
The woman when she saw him put her arms around him and held him. Oh, she said, I am so glad to see you. She would talk to him sometimes about God. He tried to talk to God but the best thing was to talk to his father and he did talk to him and he didnt forget. The woman said that was all right. She said that the breath of God was his breath yet through it pass from man to man through all of time.
Once there were brook trout in the streams in the mountains. You could see them standing in the amber current where the white edges of their fins wimpled softly in the flow. They smelled of moss in your hand. Polished and muscular and torsional. On their backs were vermiculate patterns that were maps of the world in its becoming. Maps and mazes. Of a thing which could not be put back. Not be made right again. In the deep glens where they lived all things were older than man and they hummed of mystery.

Pgs. 259 and 286-287, respectively. The Road, by Cormac McCarthy

I’ve gone from “The Summer of Harry Potter” to “The Road,” by Cormac McCarthy. What a book!
From the back cover: “The Road is the profoundly moving story of a journey. It boldly imagines a future in which no hope remains, but in which the father and his son, ‘each the other’s world entire,’ are sustained by love… The Road is an unflinching meditation on the worst and the best that we are capable of: ultimate destructiveness, desperate tenacity, and the tenderness that keeps two people alive in the face of total devastation.”
“total devastation” is an understatement.

I’ve been offered a new position. In so many aspects, it is perfect – an ideal means and place of ministry and in so many ways what I’ve been hoping for. Unexpectantly, and to a great degree sadly, I don’t want to go! It would mean upturning my entire life and for what will probably not be a permanent place.
So many good things about it. Great people. Good vision. Financially secure. Open. I will have (could have if accepted) a great deal of freedom and will be able to impact a good many lives for the sake of the Gospel.
I want to stay where I am (ministry) even though it will mean keeping my “day job” which sucks up my best time, even though it may well mean giving up on ever getting another opportunity to have my “dream job.”
It is nice to be “in demand” – there and here. I’m truly torn.
In 5 years, no matter what decision I make, in hindsight I will know whether it was good and wise and right. Now, God may now but He isn’t telling, and I’m caught in the same position I’ve been in so many times.
I’ve learned to trust that “still small voice.” Yet, I know that many, many things can impede the right “hearing” of the voice. My gut tells me I want to stay where I am, yet my mind tells me that this is an opportunity that is too good to turn down.
If you want to say a prayer for me, for wisdom and good discernment, I would appreciate it.
This may sound sappy, but I believe it, I want what is best for those people in that ministry and while I feel I can do a good job I am under no illusions that I am God’s gift to anyone. If at the moment I have no sense of leading to go, despite the ideal conditions, and if at the moment I desire to stay where I am, despite the less than ideal circumstances, what does that say? I really hate being in these situations!
It does them no good and it does me no good to judge these kinds of things as the “world” does. If I did, then I should jump at the opportunity, but I desire God’s will (if there is a specific “will” in this case).

You know, I’m just tired. I’m tired of 20 plus years of the Culture Wars. I’m tired of the disunity and the false accusation against the neighbor and the manipulation of Truth that comes along with war. I’m tired of having explain that being a follow of Jesus Christ is not the same as being a follower of the Religious Right. I’m tired of identity-politics and political-correctness that deceive us into not being honest and that produces no real solutions. I’m tired of moral busybodies who can’t face up to their own dysfunction and so insist on imposing themselves into the lives of everyone else.
I’m tired of being embarrassed by the foreign policy of this present administration. I’m tired to our hubris and the hegemonic insistence of Neo-Con’s who want empire. I’m tired that the moral force for the welfare of humanity (despite our international screw-ups) that this country held in the imaginations of people all over the world has been squandered.
I’m tired of being embarrassed by my government and my culture.
I’m tired of modern day Pharacies Pharisees that would rather destroy than compromise. I’m tired of ecclesiastical battles where I find not a lot in common with either of the antagonists. I’m tired of trying to champion this wonderful thing I found called Anglicanism and all I see is leadership tearing apart this jewel for their own end. Where is sacrifice of self? Where is humility? Where is consideration for your brother or sister more than your consideration for yourself? Where is a hunger for the Gospel of Jesus Christ that goes beyond the next political or social theory or trendy dysfunction that rampages through the culture?
It is so easy to become overwhelmed by negativity and angst and frustration while trying to discover and trying to call people to something more, something stronger, something lasting far longer than the last 30 years – a whisper in time. I’m just tired, and I well understand why some people simply want to get out and be apart of something that is positive, forward looking and understanding without having to jettison all that came before. For a change. I’m tired of wondering whether there will come a point when I will need to “jump ship” or will be pushed out. I’m tired of wondering why nothing works out the way it is supposed to work, at least that is my life experience.
I certain understand when people say, “I just want to get on with things and end all this distraction.”
There has always been a part of me that loves the politics, loves the battle, and would be very good in all that. There is part of me that knows that if I had gone into politics or the foreign service or stayed within American-Evangelicalism that I could have gone far, could have had a huge church if I wanted to be a pastor – I’m gifted in those ways. I also know myself well enough to realize that pride and arrogance are just under the surface. I’m tired to wondering, “When is my life going to begin?” My life, most everything has been “temporary,” not knowing from year-to-year what I will be doing next. There is a bit of excitement in that, but I’m tired of it.
I’m tired of waking up at 3:30 in the morning and having all this stuff running through my head. I’m tired of my compulsion to try to find solutions. I’m physically just exhausted, too. I’m tired of my own erratic thoughts, lack of discipline, and lack of time to focus on the things I want to. I’m tired of having to function in a left-brained job when I’m a right-brained person. I’m tired of being bi-vocational.
I’m tired of not knowing where I fit. I’m too independent and rebellious to give myself over to a “party.” I’m bored too easily. But, I’m tired of not fitting and trying to force myself into the shape that others expect. I’m tired of not being too forceful or leaderly because I’m trying to be sensitive and respectful. I’m tired of the rejection because I don’t play “correctly.” How easy it would be to be just like an American-Evangelical entrepreneur and go off and do my own thing. I would succeed. But, I took vows!
I’m tired of defeatists. I’m tired of egomaniacs.
I’m tired of watching my seminary being run into financial ruin and being brought from the only Anglican seminary in the Northern Hemisphere offering a ThD. program (Oxford on the Hudson) to becoming some sort of “community college” for people interested in religiousy stuff because of an ill conceived “vision” of the present administrator.
You know, the seminary Dean and the U.S. President have one thing in common – they both cannot recognize or admit that the policies they purse have failed and are continuing to fail.
I’m tired of the greed, the hypocrisy, and what is developing into a real Social Darwinism.
I want to be a part of making things better. How far do I go? At want point is it legitimate to just throw up your hands and say, “I give up?” Sometimes, situations and institutions are beyond saving.
As Betty Butterfield says, “I just want to sit in a pew and do it the normal way!”

So, the weekend of all 5 movies is over – the official end of my “Summer of Harry Potter.” We all had a good time, and some who never read or saw anything pertaining to HP were sucked in.
For them:

Well, I finished it! On the subway to work this morning, I finished book 7, the last book, of the Harry Potter series. My “Summer of Harry Potter” has ended… well, almost.
I’ve been saving for the last couple of years and finally bought a large screen TV this past July (Sony Bravia, 52″ LCD-TV). I said that one reason I wanted to buy the TV was for the community aspect it could offer. Now, on a purely selfish level, the Olympics were fantastic in high definition – “just look at those water drops on the swimmers! Unbelievable!”
While reading through the last four books beginning last spring, when I knew that I was actually going to buy the TV, I said that when I finished the 5th book I would have a “Harry Potter Fest” and show all the current movies – all 5 of them – during one weekend. I put together the flyers, scheduled the movies, let the parish know, and this weekend is “Harry Potter Fest!” Three movies on Saturday, 2 movies on Sunday. (I bought the Blu-ray high definition DVD’s for the first 5 movies.) After hours and hours of Harry Potter movies, I suspect that I will be done with it!
Then, really, my “Summer of Harry Potter” will be completely over! Its been a fun ride.
At lunch today, I felt this loss. I was a bit confounded about what to do. No more sitting in Bryant Park, eating lunch, and reading Harry Potter. Funny… I suspect I need to re-engage with the real world.

Well, I stumbled upon this today. A bit of background. Back in the mid-80’s when I was working as a campus pastor at Bowling Green State University in Ohio (my alma mater), we sponsored a “concert” on campus with Christian comedian Mike Warnke. Warnke was very funny and made all kinds of claims about being a former Satanist, etc. He was well known within American-Evangelicalism.
We had the concert in the University’s basketball arena, and despite a bad snowstorm on show-night, we still attacked 5,000 or so people coming from as far away as Chicago. The University administration thought it was going to be a bust. After all, who in the world comes to see a “Christian” comedian.
Anyway, in the planning stages we were looking for an opening act. The pastor of the Assembly of God church that we worked through at the time had a very good friend from Indiana who was a struggling contemporary Christian musician that was just about ready to hang-it-up. Reluctantly, we agreed to invite him to be the opening act. His style of music didn’t quite fit-in with our idea of what college students might want to hear. He performed before perhaps the biggest crowd in his life at the time, and he did well. There just so happened to be a Christian music record label person in the crowd. He introduced himself, and this musician’s career took off. We had a little part in his terrific success.
So, on the Web today I came across an link to a story in the Washington Blade about this singer/songwriter who has sold more than 4.2 million albums. If you know about the Washington Blade, you will know that it is a newspaper focused on the GLBT community.
Well, Ray Boltz is gay. I’m flabbergasted. Here is his interview with the Blade.
The pastor of the A/G church in B.G. was one of the first people I admitted to that I struggled with this particular issue. Of course, at the time I still believed that there was no way that a Christian could reconcile his/her orientation with his/her faith. Through the incredible struggle, I simply believed that at some point I would be healed, married, all happy like in the image of the American dream. I just never married, had a family, or waited as long as Ray did to admit to myself that no matter how much counseling, prayer, struggle, faith, Bible reading, more therapy, and anguished nights that I wasn’t changing.
I don’t know whether the pastor of the A/G church continued his friendship with Ray or not. Ray became a big star, so who knows. But, if they did I wonder how the pastor is taking this news. They were very good friends at one point. If they still are, it is certainly a challenge to the tradition line on homosexuality that most A/G (most of Evangelicalism) take.

Considering the post before this one and my general attitude while trying to figure all this stuff out, my former seminary roommate commented, part of which is below. I’ve been thinking about this.

“…I think, and I say this with love, sometimes you are so focused on those extremes that you leave little space in your writing for those closer to your position that still are not in total agreement. (I write this knowing and confessing to my own blind spots as well, many of which over the years you have highlighted for me.) I think some attention to the blessings and grace that still do occur in our church would strengthen your writing even more.”
God’s Peace,
Jason+

He is right.
The other thing I’ve been realizing is that as I continue to obsess over trying to find a way forward in salvaging this jewel of Anglicanism that I am still discovering (and I know I have almost no influence) from the forces that whether intentionally or by consequence seek to make this Church into their own image even if they destroy it (fundamentalism), I descend into a negativism that really does no one any good. But, that’s what I do. I try to figure things out. If I were smart, I suspect it would be a lost easier.
“The joy of the Lord is my strength…” How easy it is to allow the affairs of the world, even within the Church, to rob us of joy – and the strength that comes through the freedom we have in Christ.