Blessing the Market

The farmer's market opened in the church parking lot last evening, cutting the ribbon on its eleventh season. An idea that sounded silly to me when it was first suggested, the market has grown and matured over the years to such an extent that the only thing silly about it has proved to be me. Because of devoted and diligent leadership, the market has become something of a model in the state, used to pilot various county and state programs eventually implemented in markets throughout Iowa. Our manager even spoke at a national conference last year. The market isn't large. While the Downtown market has hundreds of vendors and tens of thousands of visitors each week, twenty or so faithful vendors pull into our parking lot every Wednesday afternoon throughout the season to serve a rebirthing neighborhood.

So why would a church sponsor a farmer's market? That was the question I couldn't initially get my mind around. Part of the answer has to do with access to quality food, which in our neighborhood hasn't always been easy. But the larger part of the answer has to do with community -- creating the space in which people from a dizzying array of nationalities, a cacophonous mixture of languages, the full life-cycle of ages, and a wide spectrum of economic means can come together, shop, eat, sit and enjoy the music, or simply walk around and "window shop" on a lovely summer evening in safety. Again, that last part -- safety -- hasn't always been easy to find in our neighborhood through the years. Which is finally to say that what gets sold is secondary. What gets experienced is sacred.

And so we began yesterday with a blessing. It is, after all, a part of a church. Just before the opening whistle, vendors poised and customers pacing, I took up the DJ's microphone, called for attention, and began...

"The opening words of scriptures sacred to many speak of God’s creative authorship and ingenuity; of God’s Spirit sweeping through great nothingness and calling into being this great, wonderful “is-ness.” All that is – the soil and all that grows from it and rains down on it; the seas and all that swim in it; the bugs and birds and finally us. And God looked over it all and declared it very, very good.

And turning to us, God said, “here is beauty and nourishment, enterprise, community and joy; and you are responsible for it.”

I like to think of this market as one way that we are carrying out that assignment – honoring the fruitfulness of the earth and the creativity of our hands that must, I’m convinced, have something to do with what it means to be made in God’s image; and celebrating the community of one another by creating the space and the occasion for it to flourish.

As we cut the ribbon on this 11^th season of the Drake Neighborhood Farmer’s Market, let us offer a word of blessing:

God of Sower and Seed, of artisans and cooks, of vendors and buyers, we give you thanks for the soil and all that grows from it. We thank you for those who cultivate it and tend it and beckon from it the staff of life. We give you thanks for those by whose hands it is harvested and boxed and brought to market; those by whose hands it is turned into meals and snacks and served; and those who, so nourished and fed, turn their energies to creation in varied forms – basket and bread, soap and health, honey and song and art in varied forms.

We give you thanks for this market, and those on both sides of the stalls. We give you thanks for the community experienced, the intersection of colors and countries and appetites and hopes. May we see in each other the gift of your face, and so finding, and so receiving, know and indulge in the real of harvest of life.

Bless, then, this market and all who gather here, all who direct traffic here, all who manage and set up and tear down, all who shop and all who sell, all who come for supper and all who simply sit and enjoy the sun, the music, the company and the wonder of your manifold goodness. Prosper this effort, and through it, all those whose life it touches. Amen.

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The Painfully Good News of April 15

There is even a word for it -- in Greek, of course; the language of almost all things significant: allelon, or "one another", "each other". Greek simpleton that I am, I encountered the word during a sabbatical experience a couple of years ago while reading a book titled Christ in Community by Gerhard Lohfink. In the course of the book, he calls attention to all the "one anothering" passages in the Christian scriptures --

Love one another with mutual affection;outdo one another in showing honor (Rom. 12:10)
Live in harmony with one another (Rom. 12:16)
Welcome one another (Rom. 15:7)
Have the same care for one another (1 Cor. 12:25)
Bear with one another in love (Eph. 4:2)
Build one another up (1 Thess. 5:11)
Encourage one another (1 Thess. 4:18)
Confess your sins to one another (James 5:16)
Admonish one another (Rom. 15:14)
Be hospitable to one another (1 Peter 4:9)

-- just to start the list. Allelon: the fine and holy art of "one-anothering." The Kingdom of God, not as "within you" as our individualistic leanings would prefer to translate the affirmation in Luke 17, but "among you" -- in the spaces between us. The obligation of having to do with one another.

I've been trying to keep that noble notion in mind this week as I look over the tax return I picked up from the accountant. To say that we are getting no refund is a wounding understatement. To say that we "owe" hardly captures the numbing reality of it. Yes, in a word, we owe. Which is why I am working prayerfully to keep in mind the purpose of those taxes: the greater and common good -- the roads on which we travel, the trails on which we bike; the parks and monuments and landmarks we maintain; the firefighters and police and military and meat inspectors and those few precious dollars to the Corporation for Public Broadcasting and the National Endowment for the Arts; food stamps and medicaid and medicare and courts and college grants. And...and...and.... I may not always agree with the particular allocation, but that's the way it goes. I like to think of that ongoing debate as welfare for politicians. If we were always in agreement, we wouldn't need Senators and Representatives.

I think, then, of all these and countless other "one anothering" investments that my taxes represent as I sign the bottom of the 1040 form and take a deep breath. It ought to feel better than it does. There is about it the pungent odor of obligation -- which puts it in good company.

Which of the spiritual disciplines isn't?

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The Better Angels of our Nature

A fat book loaned to me by a friend has immersed me in Lincoln of late. Though my reading schedule has allowed steady but only slow progress, every page has brought an education; and here and there, an awakening. For example, how did my education – or my retention – overlook the closing lines of Lincoln's inaugural address? Spoken at a time when at least one state had already seceded from the Union – spurred on by Lincoln’s own election – and rumors of assassination forced his covert arrival into the capital city, Lincoln strove to address the concerns of both North and South. And then this conclusion:

We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained it must not break our bonds of affection. The mystic chords of memory, stretching from every battlefield and patriot grave to every living heart and hearthstone all over this broad land, will yet swell the chorus of the Union, when again touched, as surely they will be, by the better angels of our nature.

“We are not enemies, but friends. …the better angels of our nature.” The recent years of electoral combat, the polarization of progressive and conservative Christians, the strident arguments over bullying and civil rights for those of varying sexual orientations – to say nothing of warfare in the global community - make Lincoln sound like a contemporary. According to playwright John PatrickShanley (Doubt), Americans have shifted into a "courtroom culture." "It's evident in political talk shows, in entertainment coverage, in artistic criticism of every kind, in religious discussion," he writes. "Discussion has given way to debate. Communication has become a contest of wills."

The Des Moines Register (12/12/06) recently cited Deborah Tannen's best-seller The Argument Culture: Stopping America's War of Words, "When you're having an argument with someone, your goal is not to listen and understand. Instead, you use every tactic you can think of — including distorting what your opponent just said — in order to win."

His against hers. Hers against theirs. Theirs against ours. Us against them. We are not enemies, but friends, Lincoln wrote, and I pray we find a way to remember. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained it must not break our bonds of affection.

Imagine what we might hear if we were to take his words to heart, allowing the “mystic chords” of humankind to be strummed by “the better angels of our nature.”