Montclair Presbyterian Church

We had a (work) party in the garden this weekend!
For those who do not know, this garden (“Susan’s Seeds” after our previous youth director) was built in 2011 following a youth group mission trip to Portland, OR where they learned a lot about community gardening and food justice. Chris Singer reminded us of the story… during some free time they were riding the Aerial Tram in Portland, looking down on vacant lots and lawns and thinking “those could all be gardens!” Then they thought of the little lot sitting vacant at MPC and returned full of excitement to build a garden with raised beds.

Fast forward two years and several harvests, and this weekend we took out our summer crop of tomatoes, beans, peppers, and cukes (mostly tomatoes!) and prepared the garden for a winter planting.

Before picture:

During:

Usually we partner with schools or food banks to get a portion of the produce delivered to people who could really use it. This time, unfortunately, as we were mainly harvesting green tomatoes, there wasn’t much we could do. Some youth took them home to try making fried green tomatoes or other dishes. I already made a half-gallon of pickles and am working on making sauce tonight. Yum!

After:

“I saw a spider!”

Many cultures place a lot of emphasis on honoring your elders. Some do so to an oppressive degree, effectively squashing the dignity of the younger generations. When I was in Uganda I was shocked to see children kneeling before their elders, even before young teachers. When they knelt before me I would promptly commit a cultural faux pas, kneeling down to their level and boosting them up again. I’m not interested in that kind of elder-honoring!

It’s great that our culture values youth and children to the extent we do, allowing them dignity, creating child-size chairs to fit their bodies, and never requiring people to kneel before others. But at the same time, sometimes in our zest for youth, we ignore those to whom honor is due – those who have walked the road of life with grace and dignity for many years… whose wisdom is often hidden because they are not asked to share it.

On Oct. 30th, we will celebrate All Saints Day – in the most inclusive sense of the word, including both spectacular and ordinary saints, past, present, and future. We will particularly take a little time to celebrate the saints of MPC, particularly the group of saints who have been a part of this community for 40 years or more. Note: they’re not necessarily the oldest! These are the people who have spent the longest time with MPC. We have a list from the membership rolls, but let us know if there’s anyone we might be missing, who should be honored that day. We’ll just take a little time to honor them, so my challenge to you is: seek them out, later on, and ask them for their insights about MPC, or church in general, or the world. Take some time to hear things from someone who may see them quite differently. Take time to learn from someone else’s experience!

UPCOMING: Saturday, Oct. 22nd: Work Day for the Youth Group. We will build raised beds for the new garden and hopefully will even start planting new vegetables!

The garden has been readied in a very short time. On Sunday, Oct. 9th the youth group weeded, dug, hoed, raked, and leveled the ground for our new edible, organic garden. A roughly 10’x30′ plot was ready in just about an hour. What energy they had!
The senior high youth group members came back from their mission trip in Portland, Oregon, fired up about food justice. Instead of just donating cans of food to local needs, they wanted to work hands-on to provide fresh fruits and vegetables to people in need.

Surveying the mess

…What is YOUR food?
…What is your native cuisine?
…If I invite you over for lunch… what would you like to eat?

On World Communion Sunday (10/2) we celebrated communion with different kinds of bread from all over the world. When we do this, we are remembering the mystical words of the Apostle Paul: “Because there is one loaf, we, who are many, are one body, for we all share the one loaf” (I Cor 10:17)… remembering that the act of sharing communion with one another binds us with Christians across the world who participate in the same meal.
One way to express this, tangibly, is by using communion wafers. Those are the same everywhere you go (and if they taste like cardboard, at least it’s the same cardboard). The opposite way of expressing it is what we did — using EVERY kind of bread available, and declaring (in spite of your senses telling you otherwise) that these breads, which are many and diverse, are actually one and the same. The logic here can confound you… or it can be a wonderful mystery. (more…)

Just back from vacation… I (Talitha) spent a week with great people on a lake in Massachusetts. There I learned a fantastic new game. The youngest of our company, not yet two years old, went around asking people: “Do you wanna be a pirate?” To this query you would either answer “no” or “Arrrr, matey!” with a pirate hook finger – causing her to giggle with glee.
That was it. That’s the whole game. And it was complicated enough for her, serving to transform an otherwise boring day at the lake into an exciting search for fellow pirates.

This little girl, with her game, was in the business of invitation. (more…)

Last Friday I went to a friend’s wedding. Instead of the bride taking the groom’s name (too patriarchal) or hyphenating both their names (too long and ridiculous) they took their favorite  letters from each name and put them together. Haxton + Medema = Haxtema. In doing so they each said goodbye to their own last name and, in a way, their family lineage… but greeted their new life with a new identity. Some MPC folks have chosen this route as well. It does of course risk sending future genealogists into a whirl… but there are cultures who do not use family names and manage to keep track of their family lineage anyway. (more…)

Caregiving – taking care of one another – is an important part of family life.  We are all born defenseless and in need of care, and many of us will end our lives in a similar “second childhood” dependent on others to care for us. And with very few exceptions, most of us will spend some of our lives as caregivers.

Expectant parents know they have to be ready to , but other types of caregiving can take you by surprise. When you’re young, your parents take care of you – and then suddenly (sometimes too young) a parent starts failing… now you’re parenting your parent?? And unexpected things like accidents, surgeries, or sicknesses take a loved one by surprise, and you end up suddenly thrust into the role of caregiver.

I heard more than one person in that kind of situation say this week – “HOW DO I DO THIS?” How do you lay down the massive amounts of time, energy, and love it takes to care for a person in need – whether young or old – without totally crashing & burning? How do you manage it all, without a superhero cape?

The biggest thing that comes to mind in situations like this is: put your own oxygen mask on first, before assisting others. The caregiver needs to practice self-care first and foremost. I may never have breast-fed, but I can tell you this for sure: if momma isn’t feeding herself first, baby doesn’t get fed enough either.

Self-care might be calling a friend for support, or it might be taking a nice long walk alone. It might be ordering your favorite food for home delivery instead of stuffing down a quick PB&J. These may seem like selfish acts, in the face of such pressing and constant need, but they can be the oxygen we need to keep breathing and keep working.

What do you do to take care of yourself? Even if you’re not a caregiver now, take a moment to focus on caring for yourself – so that you can be strong enough to care for others.

iPhones?  facebook? tech-free life? or toys that beep?

knitting? gardening? skateboarding? or trapeze-ing?

fine lace? ripped jeans? sweater vests? or tube tops?

twittering? texting? sending postcards? or visiting?

I’m imagining a large-scale poll, administered by Gallup or the like, that tracks dozens of statements  in the form  “I love____” across ages 1-100.  “I love facebook” would probably spike at the 25-30 range, “I love David Letterman” a decade or two older, “I love xbox” around 15 or so, “I love canasta” certainly in the later generations of the graph. My point being: different generations like different things. (more…)

In Uganda nearly six years ago, I took a little boy to the hospital. He was a resident of the orphanage where I volunteered, and he had to go to the hospital fairly regularly for checkups; he’d lived with HIV since birth. He loved going to the hospital because he got to ride in a truck, and miss school, and eat special treats like a biscuit or banana… or even candy, if his chaperon was feeling generous. A few days later we were watching a sports event at his school, and he entertained himself by rattling off all the nicknames he could call me. L’s and R’s interchange in Luganda to give him many options: “Talitha, or Terither, or Tally, or Terry, or T, or mummy… can I call you mummy?”

(more…)

This cryptic symbol showed up on the wall at our youth group retreat. No, it wasn’t graffiti… Susan had written it up. She challenged the youth to find a way to explain what it might mean. It’s a good puzzle.

Take a moment to guess….. (more…)