"Why Have You Hidden Your Face from Us?"

Hey everyone!

What follows is a rough manuscript of the sermon I preached yesterday at Messiah Lutheran Church in Rotterdam, New York, a Spirit-filled church where I'm incredibly blessed to serve as pastor. It's primarily on the appointed Hebrew Bible passage for this past Sunday, Isaiah 64: 1 - 9. Furthermore, its the first of a four part sermons series I'll be preaching throughout Advent called "God with Us." Here's what I'll be covering in the coming weeks:

- Advent 1: God with Us in the Face of the Stranger

- Advent 2: God with Us in Rotterdam

- Advent 3: God with Us at Work

- Advent 4: God with Us in Family

Thanks so much, stay tuned for future installments, and I hope you find this helpful!

God's peace,

Pastor Dustin

So a couple years back in the very late hours of Christmas Eve or early hours of Christmas Day I found myself sitting on a couch three stories up above Midtown Manhattan, staring out at these stark and lonesome, but also beautifully and atypically still city streets, just sort of taking stock of my life and wrestling with God. You see, I was in the middle of my internship year Saint Peter’s Church, where the final Christmas Eve service gets out quite late and a hot breakfast is served to homeless members of the community early every Tuesday morning, even if that particular Tuesday is Christmas Day. With this in mind, instead of taking the subway back to my tiny apartment in Queens after helping out with the Christmas Eve services, I headed up to the third floor of the church where there was an amazing conference space with massive panel windows on two sides and also an amazingly comfortable couch that I always took naps on Sunday afternoons between services. My plan was to spend the night at Saint Peter’s, wake up early, help with preparing and serving breakfast, assist in a short Christmas morning liturgy and then take off for a few l expected to be melancholy days with folks up in New England. I reasoned that especially on Christmas morning, there wouldn’t be many volunteers to help serve breakfast, or perhaps that our guests would be in need of pastoral care, so staying all night at church seemed like the both logical and upright, Christian thing to do.

The truth I didn’t want to admit to myself or to God however that night was that the reason I was trying to sleep on that couch perched high over Lexington Avenue wasn’t because I was a super good intern or fulfilling my Christian duties at all… Rather, I was burdened with the constantly dull but overpowering ache of depression, sadly anticipating the anniversary of my mother’s death, drowning amidst the chaos of a failed relationship, experiencing incredibly loneliness I what I viewed as a way too big city and feeling like I really had nowhere else to go. I could have easily gotten the holiday itself off, but going back home to Connecticut would only bring up more hard feelings about my mom and doing what I considered to at least be burdening a friend’s family with my presence didn’t seem like a good option either. And worst of all, much like the speaker in today’s first lesson from Isaiah, I felt like God had entirely hidden from me. Trying to sort out where God still was in the middle of all the garbage going on in my life, especially at Christmastime, was completely proving impossible, and as you might imagine, I didn’t sleep a wink that night.

That morning, our God of surprises definitely showed up. A former member of Saint Peter’s and pastor at another nearby congregation that didn’t have an early service on Christmas Day, showed up to lead what turned out to be a huge group a volunteers, one giant extended family with no previous connection to Saint Peter’s who had simply decided to spend Christmas morning helping folks out. I honestly wasn’t need at all… there were more than enough volunteers, and frankly just by hanging out with me, our homeless guests probably did more to provide me with pastoral care than the other way around. We engaged in a bunch of great conversations, especially about our guests’ service in our armed forces. Although this number has improved in recent years, as of 2013 still around 53% of America’s homeless population are veterans (according to HUD's "Annual Homeless Assessment Report" ). I got to hang out and laugh with the family who was volunteering too, and community was fostered on Christmas morning… our God of surprises definitely showed up.

Now don’t get me wrong, God definitely showed up in the face of the stranger that Christmas morning, but it wasn’t necessarily in this big, beautiful, idyllic sort of way… it’s not like Scrooge running around giving folks money and ham dinner in a Christmas Carol! Although this isn’t typical, we had to serve an unused catered fish dinner from a giant law firm a couple stories up that morning for breakfast, which thus made for a really stinky breakfast! We often romanticize poverty in our society, especially around this time of the year, but there were definitely a few guests, although not a lot, who showed up drunk or high on who knows what. I even remember banging my elbow like really, really hard and cursing pretty loud for being in a church building. My depression wasn’t cured overnight, the messy parts of my life weren’t immediately fixed, the rest of my year in New York while incredibly rewarding still turned out pretty darn lonely, sure, but our God of surprises definitely showed up. That sense of not joy, but stubborn, resolute peacefulness, community and most importantly hope that God freely gives us when Christ shows up, especially in the face of the stranger, was definitely present.

So two closing thoughts as we enter into a new liturgical year, into the season of hopefully longing that is Advent here at our Spirit-filled church following Jesus Christ. First, especially in the midst of the holiday season when we’re constantly told again and again in holiday movies, in commercials and even by family and friends that we should be especially joyful, know that in Christ it is absolutely okay to feel whatever it is you’re feeling. Check out verse five of our reading from Isaiah, where the prophet cries out to God, “because you hid yourself we transgressed.” I mean, Isaiah is at least partially blaming God for his people’s sinful behavior!! The prophet’s really discouraged by God seemingly not showing up as in days of old! And I mean, if the guy or woman who wrote that part of Isaiah, one of the most central books of the Christian Scriptures, can take anger and disappointment to God, I think God in Christ certainly gives us permission to do the same. If you are indeed feeling joyful and jolly this holiday season, that is awesome, rock on, but if you’re not, you have absolutely no reason at all to feel guilty about it.

Second, and relatedly, as Jesus cries out to us RIGHT NOW in twenty-first century Schenectady through today’s gospel, KEEP AWAKE! Yes, while God is present in our church, in our families, in all the places we normally experience Jesus, God in Christ is especially present in the face of the stranger! Last night I had a chance to rewatch Jill’s awesome sermon from last week, and the way she proclaimed the good news about serving our neighbors was amazing. Perhaps the best part of serving our neighbors, whether they be people who are homeless, or hungry, or a family where there isn’t enough money to buy the kids Christmas presents, isn’t about what we’re doing, but rather what God is doing to us in Christ. We know in faith that Jesus especially comes to us in the face of the stranger. I took a break from the news while I was on vacation last week, with the exception of course of watching the aftermath on the grand jury ruling in Ferguson, which outside of that city were not entirely but largely peaceful. Whether or not justice was specifically done in Ferguson isn't my specialty, but I couldn’t help but think when looking at the faces of all those peaceful protestors that from one perspective they were simply proclaiming God is present in the face of our African-American sisters and brothers. Yes, Christ is present in their lives and the lives of all who are crying out against a wider societal system where the sin of racial injustice is still certainly weighing down our country.

After everything the prophet Isaiah cries out to God in today’s lesson, there’s a turn near the end, did you catch it? Check out verse eight: “Yet, O LORD, you are our Father; we are the clay, and you are our potter; we are all the work of your hand.” I’ll read it one more time, “Yet, O LORD, you are our Father; we are the clay, and you are our potter; we are all the work of your hand.” Wow, despite things certainly being far from perfect in the prophet’s situation, that stubborn, resolute peacefulness, sense of community and most importantly hope that God freely gives us when Christ shows up is definitely present in Isaiah’s words. It may not always be joyful, it might not even always feel good, but God in Christ is certainly at work in your life and life, your life and your life and indeed all our lives, carefully crafting us, forming us, shaping us, showing up in all sorts of places, especially in the face of the stranger. Indeed, God has promised us in Christ that this is the sort of God who God is, and yes, as always my sisters and brothers our God is a God who keeps promises. Amen.

Dustin serves as pastor at Messiah Lutheran Church, a Spirit-filled church following Jesus Christ in Rotterdam, New York. An evangelist, urban gardener, mountain climber, community organizer, saint and sinner, he spends most of his professional time wrestling with God and proclaiming liberation in Christ. Otherwise, Dustin likes hiking, playing frisbee, hanging out with his fiancée Jessie, his amazing pup Willy Bear and pretending to know how to sing.

Looking Back to Move Forward in the Aftermath of Ferguson

Hey friends,

What follows is a manuscript of the sermon I preached this Sunday at Messiah Lutheran Church in Schenectady, NY. I focused mostly on the first appointed lesson for the day, Isaiah 51: 1 - 6 and related its teachings to race relations in the aftermath of the shooting of Michael Brown in Ferguson, Missouri. Although it does have a lot of things specifically about our own congregation here in Schenectady, I pray that there's some good news in there for everyone. As there were a lot of folks' stories mentioned in today's sermon, I've deleted last names to ensure a level of privacy. Let me express my sincere gratitude to Rev. Andrena Ingram's public witness last night, which I cited about halfway through. Thanks for reading, and I'd love to hear your thoughts.

God's peace,
Pastor Dustin

So as many of you know, I was engaged in a little bit of a research project this past week… in home visits and committee meetings, in phone conversations and on Facebook, I spent a bunch of time asking folks about their favorite memories at here Messiah. Now, my purposes in doing this were multi-fold. First of all, after my first few weeks here, with everything that comes with moving and ordination now behind me, I figured it was about time to start figuring out who this community is on a bit of a deeper level… to get some deeper answers about what you value, how you identify yourselves, why you all bother putting in all the effort to be a faith community at all. Second, in having conversations about your most cherished memories from the past of course, I was hoping to discern a bit more about where we could go, what we could do, how we could serve God together in the extremely uncertain times we find ourselves in. And finally, in asking you about your favorite memories at Messiah, I also wanted you consider the similarities between those extremely uncertain times we’re living through here in modern day Schenectady and the situation the author of Isaiah faced over two-thousand five hundred years ago.

Now to be fair, there are differences between our time and Isaiah’s, to be sure… we have the internet and supersonic jet planes, they had wheels, chariots maybe? The people of Isaiah’s time seemed to dig regular types of sacrifices to various gods, and folks nowadays generally only like going to church on Christmas and maybe Easter. So there are differences, but there’s also incredible similarities… The book of Isaiah is one of the largest and for many most important books of the Hebrew Bible… about two-thirds of the time Saint Paul’s quoting the Hebrew Bible in the New Testament, he’s quoting Isaiah. Despite its length and importance, many of us don’t know a whole lot about it, probably because unlike passages like Noah’s Ark, the Exodus, King David and that sort of thing, there’s not a whole lot of stories in this part of the Bible, at least at on the surface, and hence, its not the type of scripture that lends itself to memorable Sunday School lessons. When you put all the hard to understand prophecies of Isaiah next to the cute little animals going up on Noah’s Ark two by two, well, ya know what wins every time.

But Isaiah is incredibly important, it tells us so much about our Christian understanding that Wikipedia tells me many have called it the “fifth gospel.” Isaiah’s incredible important, and one key to understanding it and digging out the stories that are happening beneath the text is knowing there’s no one “Isaiah” writing the thing… understandings about this have changed a bit in recent years, but pretty much all Biblical scholars will says there’s a bunch of “Isaiahs,” writing at drastically different points in Israel’s history. Today’s passage comes to us from a prophet writing at quite a critical juncture, either right before or right as the people of Israel are returning from exile in Babylon. The Persians conquered Babylon a bit over 2500 years ago, and King Cyrus said whoever wanted to go home could… it’s a time of hope, yes, like wow, after over sixty years of captivity in Babylon, we finally get to go home and rebuild the Temple, but its mostly a time of incredible uncertainty… folks barely remember who they are anymore, with so many traditions lost during captivity, how could we possibly again be the people our God wants us to be?

Isaiah’s time was a time of promise overshadowed by immense uncertainty, just like ours. I mean wow, although I don’t usually bring my phone to worship, on a day to day basis I have the ability in the palm of my hand to with a little bit of effort get in contact with almost two thirds of the over 7 billion people in the world today. Now that’s absolutely amazing, and the possibilities of increased understanding and learning in our time are thus immense. Yet not since at least I was child, a young sophomore in high school probably, have we lived in even somewhat optimistic times… 9/11 happened, most notably, and right as it felt like we were maybe starting to get out of all the subsequent messes we found ourselves after that horrific day, the Great Recession happened. And right as maybe it felt like things were starting to improve in the last year, we hear of new things to be feared in Iraq and Syria, Russia and the Ukraine, Palestine and Israel, the Ebola virus… the list goes on. Despite all our advances, all our promise, we live in a more distrustful, uncertain time than ever, a whole lot like the times Isaiah found himself living through in today’s passage.

So what does Isaiah say, what instruction and good news does Isaiah have to proclaim to his fellow Israelites, as well to us in this time and place, here in modern day Schenectady? He tells us to look back, to remember the past, but in doing so don’t stay there… let the best of the past help you figure out how to move forward.  Look back, remember the past, but don’t stay there… let the best of the past help you figure out how to move forward. Look back, to move forward. “Look to the rock from which you were hewn, to the quarry from which you were dug,” proclaims Isaiah. “Look to Abraham your father, and to Sarah who bore you!” Isaiah keeps pointing us to look back, but only to stay there long enough in order to move forward… “Listen to me, my people… lift up your eyes to the heavens…” And the reason Isaiah keeps pointing us to look back, in order to help us figure out how to move forward? Because even though God is constantly creating and doing new and amazing things, in one sense, God is doing the same old thing God always has… “the earth will wear out like a garment, and those who live on it will die like gnats, but my salvation will be forever, and my deliverance will never be ended.” Things may change, but our salvation will be forever, our deliverance will never be ended.

So, now outside of actually mentioning some of the amazing stories I heard from you all this past week about your favorite memories at Messiah, I probably could have just ended my sermon there and called it a day… gave you all a shorter one for once. Honestly until last night that was the plan, but in an odd sort of way, events over the past couple weeks have granted us an opportunity to in a practical sense talk about how this might work, to look back at what God has done in our past in order to figure out how to move forward. Those of you who saw what I was posting up on Facebook last night probably know what I’m about to get at, the killing of an young, unarmed black man in Ferguson, Missouri and subsequent days of rage, protest, both peaceful and otherwise, police and government officials trying resolve the situation… what a mess, but also what an important reminder that race is still such a major issue in contemporary America.

I was really debating whether to bring this up, talking about controversial topics from the pulpit in your first few weeks in a congregation is usually not advised. But last night as I was reading various articles about everything that happened over the past two weeks, I came upon a letter signed by leaders of nearly all the major African-American church bodies in America, urging all clergy of goodwill, no matter the color of their skin, to talk to their parishioners about what happened in Ferguson. I got to thinking that many of you as you watched all those heartbreaking images going across your TV screens may have wondered, how does this sort of thing relate to my faith, how should I relate to these sort of heartbreaking events as a Christian. I still wasn’t sure if I’d bring up Ferguson and issues of race though until a read a post from a good friend of mine, an African American and ELCA pastor from Philadelphia, Rev. Andrena Ingram. She had by far better words than I could ever come up with on the subject, so I’ll just read some excerpts of them to you now:

I woke up with a headache, and it has "racism" written all over it. Here's the thing: racism exists. I have personally experienced it. My son has personally experienced it. Of course, not to the degree that my parents, grandparents and great-great-great- grandparents - beginning with my ancestor, Tarleton "Slave" Fleming. But -- we have experienced it personally as it continues to reach its icy-hot tentacles out from the abyss of yesterday, into today… what gives me this headache is those who refuse to hear, those who continue to deny, those who try and flip the script and make excuses. Those who continually try to tell us, that what we are experiencing is not what we know it to be. We have lived it. We are living it. It seems to be part of OUR DNA. What gives me this headache is that some folks don't even want to be still and just listen and learn. Just hush! You don't have to have a response every time we try and explain to you how it feels. When I am telling you I have a pain...I am not expecting you to be able to make it go away, pronto. What I do want you to know is that if you just be quiet and LISTEN, maybe you can begin to understand just how deep this issue runs and how afraid people are to even acknowledge it. Serenity Now! Divinity Now! Namaste, Shalom, Peace.

Now, my sisters and brothers, no matter your interpretation of what’s happened over the past couple weeks in Ferguson, we should recognize that Pastor Ingram is right in asking us as Christians to perhaps not entirely agree, but at least to listen. When hundreds of thousands of our black sisters and brothers in Christ are saying that race is still an issue in America, whenever that many people are saying something is a big problem for that matter, we at least need to listen, even if don’t entirely agree.

And the good news, my sisters and brothers, is that listening to each other, that creating space to be together despite sometimes difficult circumstances, is from what I can tell central to who we are as followers of Christ here at Messiah when we’re at our best. So with this particular example, with what’s gone on in Ferguson and the issue of race in America, let’s do exactly what the prophet Isaiah tells us to do in today’s passage: let’s briefly look back in order to figure out how to move forward… All week I was trying to figure out a common thread from the stories I was hearing from all of you, but it wasn’t until Jill sent me a post last night that I figured it out… she sent me this image that said “You might be Lutheran if you carry silverware in your pocket to church, just in case there’s a potluck.” You might be Lutheran if you carry silverware in your pocket to church, just in case there’s a potluck. I’m not sure if this was her intention, but it helped me realize what’s central to our identity here at Messiah… we create space for people, we create space to listen to each other, to share. I kept hearing all these things about sharing food all week from you all, and Bill has kept telling me from day one, we loved to eat. But why do we love to eat? It's not just because we like the taste of the food or whatever, although we certainly do like how food tastes around here. It’s because having a meal together creates space, for listening, for common understanding to take place.

And I heard similar things from other folks… Betty told me about being accepted here years ago despite her Catholic upbringing. Cheryl discussed her fond memories of confirmation class overnights at the church, and it wasn’t just because one of her classmates through a football through the window… she said she felt accepted and listened to her at Messiah, even if she didn’t always in school. Cheryl’s daughter Hannah told me about how she loved building a fort out back behind the church and spending time with her friends during community movie night last weekend. Ed mentioned enjoying some Property Committee work, like installing the second floor in the parsonage, and how good of time that was to share with other folks at Messiah. Lore and Dave told me about sharing time together with family and friends as they celebrated their wedding, the very first one to happen in the old sanctuary building decades ago… Judy mentioned sharing stories and celebrating her mother Dorothy’s life at the memorial held here… so that seems to be what we do as followers of Christ here at Messiah, at least when we’re at our best… we create space for folks, space where folks can share their stories and be listened to. Creating space, listening, that’s who and why we are. Creating space, listening… it lines up perfectly with what Pastor Ingram was asking for in her post last night, and its what we should do in the aftermath of Ferguson. So whether its in relation to what’s happened in Ferguson or to any of the many other difficulties and uncertainties we might face, I encourage you to do just as Isaiah has urged us to this day… look back to the best of the past, but just long enough to figure out how to move forward. Because we know that even though God is always is doing new things, in a way, God has and always will be doing the same old but amazing thing as well… “Things may change, but our salvation will be forever, our deliverance will never be ended.” In Christ, my sisters and brothers, God promises us our salvation will be forever, our deliverance will never be ended. And as always, our God is a God who keeps promises. Amen.

Dustin serves as pastor at Messiah Lutheran Church, a vibrant congregation ministering with the local community in Schenectady, New York. An evangelist, urban gardener, mountain climber, community organizer, saint and sinner, Dustin spends most of his profession time wrestling with God and proclaiming liberation in Christ. Otherwise, Dustin likes hiking, playing frisbee, hanging out with an amazing woman named Jessie and pretending to know how to sing.

A Liturgy of the Oppressed

Friends,

Whew, what a busy couple weeks! After getting to know folks at the annual assembly Upstate New York Synod of the ELCA where I'll hopefully be called as a pastor in a month or so, I've spent some time hiking in northern New England and also preparing to lead a youth mission trip to a Cherokee reservation in Oklahoma, which begins next week.

In the meantime, I'm still trying to post my work from my final semester at seminary. What follows is one of my favorite assignments throughout seminary, a paper and liturgy I created based off of Augusto Boal's Theatre of the Oppressed with inspiration from a faith community called Parables in Brooklyn. This formed the final assignment for an epic "Liturgy and Postcolonialism" course with Professor Cláudio Carvalhaes. The liturgy itself (at the bottom of the post) was written for a short half-hour Service of the Word service at the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia, but otherwise it would certainly include a collection and Eucharist. It's a bit "provocative" perhaps, but I'd love to hear what you think.

God's peace,
Dustin

With only two weeks (and unfortunately around forty pages of writing) between me and graduation, I figure it’s about time to admit something that’s deeply troubled me throughout my seminary education: the majority of church services I’ve participated in throughout my life have been really, really boring! Perhaps it’s due to my overwhelming sense of entitlement as a North American millennial, or maybe it’s because I come from an overly individualistic culture, or maybe it’s just because I’m a good old fashioned heretic… I’m not entirely sure. What I do definitively know however, is that the majority of church services I’ve participated in throughout my life have been really, really boring, and they didn’t mean much. Now such a statement may quickly lead one to ask, “Why be a pastor, or even a Christian at all if you don’t find Christian worship meaningful?” From my perspective, the answer to such a question is quite easy—I’ve developed strong, lifelong relationships through the Church, I’ve experienced a profound sense of community and solidarity through the Church, and I’ve been supported in serving folks and advocating against systems of injustice through the Church. When my mother died from lung cancer at a relatively young age, the Church held me close and told me that life would go on, and it did. In short, I want to be a Christian pastor because I’ve experienced the presence of God in the Church like nowhere else.

Yet, and I say this with some notable exceptions in mind, most church services I’ve participated in throughout my life have been really, really boring. Here’s what my experience of a church service is all too often like (I put this purposefully in a pretty provocative way): I start off by sitting down in an uncomfortable seat, not being allowed to have coffee despite it being way too early in the morning, hearing some announcements and then watching the pastor walk to the back of the sanctuary only to walk forward again in various levels of pomp and circumstance. The folks up front pray some prayers for me and then I spend a whole lot of time trying not to space out while a bunch of long Bible passages are read. After hearing what is often a good sermon (to be fair), I get a brief reprieve by standing up and singing a song, only to have the folks up front once again pray for me, usually from some pretty sounding words they found on an internet resource. The first time I really feel like I get to do anything besides trying to stay awake is the collection, through which I genuinely feel connected to my faith community in mission. The Meal, as long as it is done in a way that is fully inclusive of all individuals, is an extremely profound experience. Shortly after that however, one of the folks up front (sometimes after walking to the back of the sanctuary), reads literally one sentence to say goodbye to me. Couldn’t she or he just look me in the eye and truly say goodbye, lovingly sending me out into the world to serve God and the folks in my community?

Interestingly enough, it is usually only after the official liturgy is completed that the true liturgy, the true λειτουργία, which translates as “work of the people” or even “public service” typically begins… coffee hour! Now that is a good time! I actually get to hear how my sisters and brothers in Christ are doing. I am blessed and honored to support them in their sorrows, laugh with them amidst great joy and simply hear how God is at work in their lives! I welcome in new guests along with the few folks who have good social skills, perhaps share a light meal and finally have a damn coffee! And after that, this is when things really get good… I either learn something about God in fellowship with others, go on some sort of fun outing, engage in meaningful service with my community or go back home and get to take a nap! What could possibly be better? What could possibly be more meaningful? Waking up way too early was kind of a pain, but wow, it was entirely worth it!

I cannot speak for everyone, or even my generation, but I do know I am not alone in these convictions. In my own tiny part of the global Christian community, the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, membership in congregations is steadily declining, yet we can’t sign up folks (and especially young people) fast enough for many of our long-term service programs. Every summer for nearly a decade, I had the privilege of engaging in ministry as a camp counselor at a Lutheran summer camp. For many of the folks I worked with, summers at camp were the most meaningful experiences of their lives, experiences they often interpret as experiencing God’s work while ministering in community. Yet few, and I mean very few, probably ten percent or less, of these same folks go back home and regularly participate in the life of their local congregations. One could make the excuse that these sort of folks are too individualistic, do not have their priorities in order or apply their love of capitalistic choice to their faith life. One could also say (and this option seems quite popular in the Church as of late) that we simply do not educate these folks enough… if only we could teach them how the liturgy is meaningful, they would find the liturgy meaningful!

There is however, another option, one deeply informed by the related concepts of postcolonialism, liberation theology and even community organizing… take the data, take the voice of the people in your context (which includes people outside the church building) seriously! Saul Alinsky, often considered the father of modern community organizing in North America, states the following:

The actual projection of a completely particularized program by a few persons is a highly dictatorial action. It is not a democratic program but a monumental testament to lack of faith in the ability and intelligence of the masses of people to think their way through the successful solution of their problems. It is not a people’s program, and the people will have little to do with it. There should not be too much concern with specifics or details of a people’s program. The program items are not too significant when one considers the enormous importance of getting people interested and participating in a democratic way. After all, the real democratic program is a democratically minded people—a healthy, active, participating, interested, self-confident people who, through their participation and interest, become informed, educated and above all develop faith in themselves, their fellow men, and the future.

Alinsky is of course coming from the predominately secular perspective of community organizing, but applied to liturgy one could easily change his last sentence to the following: “The real λειτουργία is the work of a democratically minded people—a healthy, active, participating, interested, self-confident people who, through their participation and interest, become informed, educated and above all develop faith in themselves, their fellow human beings, and most of all, faith in their God.”

In the name of “unity,” or “equality” as a Church, we often hear that all assemblies should do similar things in their liturgies, and that all people should do similar things in a particular assembly, no matter the context. This idea of “unity in similarity” reaches to all levels of our liturgy, even to the level of what we are to wear on a Sunday:

Washed and bleached clean, this garment became one of the basic symbols of baptism… Leaders of the assembly wear it on behalf of us all, showing another way of festive clothing than either “Sunday best” or casual clothes. Indeed, our leaders can thereby step out of the ways in which our current clothing so inevitably communicates gender, sexual attraction, class and wealth, inviting us to another way of considering the human being.

This appeal to “unity in similarity” almost always has the best of intentions, and needs to be honored as such. Yet at the same time, the people are quite clearly crying out, “I don’t want to be bleached clean! I want to come to God’s table as I am, no matter my shape, size or color!” Such data, the voice of the people, must be taken quite seriously. Furthermore, as postcolonialism teaches us, the modernist appeal to universality almost always ends up looking or acting like the dominant culture:

[Universality is] the assumption that there are irreducible features of human life and experience that exist beyond the constitutive effects of local cultural conditions. Universalism offers a hegemonic view of existence by which the experiences, values and expectations of a dominant culture are held to be true for all humanity. For this reason, it is a crucial feature of imperial hegemony, because its assumption (or assertion) of a common humanity - underlies the promulgation of imperial discourse for the ‘advancement’ or ‘improvement’ of the colonized, goals that thus mask the extensive and multifaceted exploitation of the colony.

Baptism, the wider liturgy, and indeed the gospel itself doesn’t bleach us clean! The good news of God’s act of liberating love in Christ lets us to see the beauty of our own unique shade of “differentness” amidst the muck of our humanity, and thereby frees us to lovingly share in the beautifully unique differentness of our sisters and brothers as well. 

Our chief objective as we cultivate new spaces, communities and liturgies is not to achieve a perfectly objective equality. Although we should do our best to move toward this, such a thing is not humanly possible— there will always be inherent power dynamics involved in any social situation, at least until the Kingdom of God is fully with us. We should however do our prayerful best to acknowledge those inherent power dynamics. In doing so we can foster a spirit of hybridity where all can share of themselves, learn from each other and experience the Divine alongside one another as a communion of fellow pilgrims moving towards their unique destinations. Through celebrating the beautiful tapestry of differentness that is humanity, and the rich variety of means through which humanity experiences God, the λειτουργία, the work of the people, is focused exactly where it should be—on Christ, on the God who promises to show up where we would least expect Her and Him to be: “The presence of God and the Lamb—and the presence of the water of life and the tree of life that come from God—should be at the center of the assembly of the church.”

Now, the next question we must ask of course, is what would such a liturgy look like? We can say a liturgy should truly be the democratic work of the people, all God’s people, in all their beautifully unique differentness, but it has to look like something. One possibility stems from the largely secular work of Augusto Boal, the Brazilian director who developed a “theatre of the oppressed.” Reflecting on Aristotle’s Poetics, Boal discovered that throughout much of Western history the point of theatre was simply to produce a sense of catharsis, and thereby to subjugate the spectator:

… the poetics of Aristotle is the poetics of oppression: the world is known, perfect or about to be perfected, and all its values are imposed on the spectators, who passively delegate power to the characters to act and think in their place. In so doing the spectators purge themselves of their tragic flaw—that is, of something capable of changing society. A catharsis of the revolutionary impetus is produced! Dramatic action substitutes for real action.

Similar to Boal’s understanding of the theatre, the whole point of the gospel, the whole point of the good news of God’s act of liberating love in Christ is to free us from whatever may oppress us, whether it be dominant members of our society, from natural phenomenon like disease or disaster, and especially, from ourselves. We are all oppressed, even in a North American context, although it may look slightly different for us here at the center of the empire. Whether through hate, indifference or most often lack of self agency, many of us, myself included, simply cannot help but oppress our sisters and brother both known and unknown, and in turn, we oppress ourselves.

Amidst so much oppression and the guilt that goes along with it, why would we develop liturgies that are supposed to communicate liberation in Christ yet fail to help us recognize our full sense of self expression and self agency in Christ to change this situation? Augusto Boal, speaking through the secular language of theatre, provides us with another option:

“Spectator” is a bad word! The spectator is less than a man and it is necessary to humanize him, to restore to him his capacity of action in all its fullness. He too must be a subject, an actor on an equal plane with those generally accepted as actors, who must also be spectators. All these experiments of a people’s theater have the same objective—the liberation of the spectator, on whom the theater has imposed finished visions of the world… The poetics of the oppressed is essentially the poetics of liberation: the spectator no longer delegates power to the characters either to think or to act in his place. The spectator frees himself; he thinks and acts for himself! Theater is action!

Theatre is not the same as liturgy, but they both are action, as they both indeed can be the work of the people! The way Augusto Boal blurred the line between spectator and actor was to develop a variety of “movement games” through which anyone could participate, even those with little theatrical training. Furthermore, whether it be a theatre or an assembly engaged in liturgy, communities need a facilitator in some sense. In a theatre of the oppressed, this person is not called the narrator or protagonist but the “joker.” The role of the joker is to float above the action, to allow for the greatest degree of self-expression possible, but also to descend into the action when needed. The role of the pastor in a “liturgy of the oppressed” is quite similar—she or he must prayerfully ensure the gospel is communicated, while allowing for the most democratically minded self expression possible.

A basic “liturgy of the oppressed” is attached as an appendix to this paper, one that hopefully proclaims the gospel while taking seriously the presence of Christ in the beautiful differentness of humanity. As this particularly liturgy was developed for a short weekday “Service of the Word” at the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia, the Meal is unfortunately excluded, although I would consider it central to any Sunday assembly. The traditional Lutheran ordo is followed for the sake of reflecting the liturgical movements of our ancestors but even more for reasons of hospitality, as creating familiar structure hopefully encourages greater self-expression within each individual movement of the liturgy. A “name and gesture” movement game acts as a sort of Kyrie, but a fully participatory “Remembrance of Baptism” rite could greatly strength the Gathering. As a volunteer moves the assembly forward with the “prayer of the day,” it may prove helpful to reflect the prayers of our ancestors through the day’s appointed collects.

The Word portion of the liturgy would look quite different depending on the text(s) used and the folks present in the assembly. If the text for the day is short, reading each phrase and having the assembly repeat seems to work quite well. For longer passages, Bibles should be provided. Although this is of course not a universal observation, I believe a “liturgy of the oppressed” should generally stay away from hymnals, as they often greatly limit self expression. Moving forward, the “columbian hypnosis” movement game then creates an environment for folks in the assembly to have fun, relate to each other and use their bodies in new ways while also exploring social power exchanges. There are a wide variety of more complicated movement games that could also be used, many of which allow for the exploration (and overcoming) of a societal injustice. Discussion then allows the assembly to process the experience, relate it back to the text and most importantly to God’s presence in their lives. The joker should prayerfully shape this discussion to ensure the gospel is communicated. The assembly then responds to the good news in song and prayer. If the liturgy does not include a Meal, the assembly is sent back out into the world with a message of peaceful liberation and community in Christ.

As it has been so aptly stated, “Lutheran worship at its deepest—and this is true of all Western and Eastern Christian worship, as well—is this: a participating and open assembly, served by its ministers, gathered around the bath, the word, the prayers, the table—the very matters which speak and sign Jesus Christ so that the nations may live.” A liturgy of the oppressed takes these central things of worship quite seriously, as they are the gifts Christ gave us to proclaim the gospel. At the same time however, a liturgy of the oppressed also takes seriously the data, the voice of the people, in its context. To say it in a less fancy way, in a liturgy of the oppressed, people matter! The people truly matter! Instead of appealing to the colonialist idea of “unity in similarity,” with everyone engaged in the same action or having “the folks up front” perform the action for them, a more democratic liturgy can develop in which difference is celebrated, not bleached away. Indeed, it is through celebrating the beautiful tapestry of differentness that is our humanity, and especially the innumerable amazing ways God continuously breaks into our lives, that the λειτουργία, the work of the people, is focused exactly where it should be—on Christ, on the God who promises to show up where we would least expect!

A Liturgy of the Oppressed

Gathering

Greeting: The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with you all! And also with you! 

Name and Gesture: The assembly stands in a circle. The joker begins by stating her first name followed by a physical gesture which is indicative of what feelings and/ or experiences she is bringing into the assembly that day. The whole group then repeats the joker’s name and gesture. This process works around the group until everyone has said their name and performed a gesture. The process is then repeated a second time but without names mentioned. Individuals may wish to step forward and briefly explain to the group why they decided upon their gesture as well. 

Prayer of the Day: The joker invites a volunteer to either pray extemporaneously or pray the appointed collects for the day.

Word

Reading: A short Biblical passage, perhaps one appointed for the day by the Revised Common Lectionary, is read phrase by phrase by the joker, who also invites the assembly to repeat each phrase after it is read. 

Columbian Hypnosis and Discussion: The assembly divides into pairs - choosing role A and role B. A will “hypnotize” B with her or his hand - B must keep her face just a few inches from A’s hand at all times - always an equal distance. A should try to manipulate B into all sorts of positions, using forgotten muscles, liberating her to use the body in a different way than she is accustomed. A & B then switch roles.Remaining in pairs the assembly discusses their experience of being in complete power and without power. They may wish to reread the day’s Bible passage. How does power relate to the Biblical passage just read? How is Christ at work in exchanges of power and the everyday life of the assembly? The assembly then gathers back in a circle and those who wish may share their findings. The joker shapes the conversation as needed to ensure the gospel is communicated. One possible addition: The assembly divides into triads. A hypnotizes B & C using two hands, which may do entirely different movements at any time.A second possible addition: One person (A) stands in the center of the assembly. A hypnotizes two people (Bs) using two hands. Everyone else picks one of the B people to be hypnotized by. 

Hymn of the Day: The joker invites the assembly to proclaim liberation in Christ through a commonly known song for which anyone can call out individual verses. Examples include “This Little Light of Mine” and “We Are Marching in the Light of God.” Movement is encouraged as the assembly is able! 

Prayers of the People: The joker invites the assembly into prayer and then individuals go around the circle offering intercessions as they wish. The Lord’s Prayer is then sung or spoken by the assembly in unison.

Sending

Blessing: My sisters and brothers, let us go forth, liberated in Christ to love and serve the world! Thanks be to God! 

Peace: A sign of peace may be shared by all.

Dustin is a recent graduate from the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia and approved candidate for ordination in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. An evangelist, urban gardener, mountain climber, community organizer, saint and sinner, Dustin spends most of his professional time wrestling with God and proclaiming liberation in Christ. Otherwise, Dustin likes hiking, playing frisbee, hanging out with an amazing woman named Jessie and pretending to know how to sing.

"Balance" and the Israeli Occupation of Palestine

I wrote the following as part of my ELCA Peace Not Walls leadership training trip to Jordan and the Holy Land after coming back from occupied Hebron and the South Hebron hills a few days ago. The intention of the trip is to prepare for leading future groups of young adults to the Holy Land while working for a just end to the Israeli occupation of Palestine. You can find the writings of my fellow pilgrims on our trip blog here. I hope you enjoy the post, and please provide feedback if you're able! - Dustin

Whenever I engage folks back home in the states in discussion about the Israeli occupation of Palestine, the word 'balance' always seems to come into the conversation. "The conflict is complicated," folks say, "we're not experts so we should be balanced in our approach." Today as I experienced the abandoned central streets and massive military presence in Hebron that Israeli settlers have termed 'liberation," today as I heard the story of Palestinian villagers in the South Hebron hills having their bread oven, their main source food being destroyed by settlers again and again despite multiple Supreme Court rulings to the contrary, today as I heard a former IDF soldier breaking the silence about how military strategy is regularly break into random homes and detain Palestinians for up to 90 days without giving them access to a lawyer in order to "make their presence felt," I can't but cry out in anguish about what "balance" could possibly look like in such a dire situation.

Can one achieve balance in the collection of information, engaging all sides and narratives in assessing a situation? Yes, absolutely. A balanced assessment is the only way to credibly engage in advocacy. Yet at some point, balance becomes at best a hindrance and at worst an excuse for inaction. In the face of such a starkly clear situation of overwhelming oppression of the Palestinian people, to be "balanced" in one's prophetic proclamation and to neglect radical non-violent action simply proves unethical. I am not Pro-Palestinian. I am not pro-Israeli. But as a person of faith, as a Christian, I am pro-peace, I am pro-justice and I am pro-recognizing the face of Christ in all those crushed by overwhelming oppression. Perhaps there is a type of balance in that. But to be balanced or moderate in proclaiming that God's heart is breaking under this brutal occupation as my heart breaks as well? No, that is not possible.

Dustin is currently in his final year of a Masters of Divinity program at the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia, having recently completed a year as Vicar at the Lutheran Office for World Community and Saint Peter's Church in New York City. While seeking ordination in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, his focus is on the intersection between worship, service and justice in de-centralized faith communities unencumbered by a traditional church building. In his free time, Dustin likes playing frisbee, hiking and pretending to know how to sing.

Reclaiming True Christian Pilgrimage

I wrote the following as part of my ELCA Peace Not Walls leadership training trip to Jordan and the Holy Land while sitting atop the Mount of Beatitudes earlier this morning (with a couple slight modifications taking in experiences from later in the day). The intention of the trip is to prepare for leading future groups of young adults to the Holy Land while working for a just end to the Israeli occupation of Palestine. You can find the writings of my fellow pilgrims on our trip blog here. I hope you enjoy the post, and please provide feedback if you're able! - Dustin

Sitting atop a devotional site called the Mount of the Beatitudes and seeing the sun shining on the Sea of Galilee, I'm a feeling a bit challenged... I've been thinking a lot over the course of my trip about how true Christian pilgrimage should strengthen relationships with God and people rather than necessarily visit specific holy sites, but now I'm beginning to think it's both. I certainly lament that most Christian pilgrims visit the Holy Land without ever learning from Palestinians living under the brutally apartheid-like system of Israeli occupation, don't get me wrong... our Palestinian Christian guide recently mentioned that we were the first group in his 4+ years of giving tours who were interested in hearing the Palestinian side of the story. Yet, walking amongst the gardens of the Mount of Beatitudes and hearing the Scriptures read and discussed in so many languages, it's obvious these "holy sites" are not just dead stones for some people.

The Israeli separation wall in the background.

Rather, people really are living out lives of faith by visiting these sacred places. Perhaps what really matters then is what one does with a faith renewed on pilgrimage, what that faith moves one to do and who that faith moves one to be in relationship with. Christian pilgrimage to the Holy Land can still mean visiting the "holy sites," but it still must also mean accompanying our Palestinian sisters and brothers.

If we're to change minds back home and around the world in the hope of moving toward a just resolution of the Israeli occupation of Palestine, we need to be in relationship with Palestinians... God tends to make liberation happen within an oppressed people themselves, not through outside forces, no matter how altruistic. Our job as American Christian pilgrims is simply to learn the stories of Palestinians, raise those stories up and through those stories let God do the amazing work of liberating hearts and minds. Onto the Tabgha, the devotional site of Christ multiplying the loaves and fishes.
God's peace,
Dustin

Dustin is currently in his final year of a Masters of Divinity program at the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia, having recently completed a year as Vicar at the Lutheran Office for World Community and Saint Peter's Church in New York City. While seeking ordination in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, his focus is on the intersection between worship, service and justice in de-centralized faith communities unencumbered by a traditional church building. In his free time, Dustin likes playing frisbee, hiking and pretending to know how to sing.

Bread for the World Sunday Sermon: The Power of Liberating Love

Hi everyone,

What follows is the draft of a sermon I'll be preaching tomorrow at Saint Michael's Lutheran Church in Germantown on the Gospel according to Saint Luke 18: 1 - 8. The sermon is a part of an ongoing advocacy effort to celebrate Bread for the World Sunday. I'd love to hear what you think!

God's peace,
Dustin

Ya know, today’s message from the Gospel of Saint Luke is one of my absolutely favorite parables. There’s a bunch of good messages here for sure about prayer, persistence, and even gender equality, but the reason I particularly love this parable is because of what it says about justice. A widow, a person frequently near the bottom of the social ladder during the time the gospels were being written, keeps coming back to a cruel judge, begging him for justice over her opponent. And lets just stress here... this is not a Judge Judy sort of situation... the widow does not have any ordinary opponent... the word we translate as “opponent” in the original Greek means someone who keeps coming back to accuse you, to persecute you, again and again. In other words, this widow was in a state of constant oppression, but through her own persistence in prayer and action, she eventually convinces a judge to rule in her favor simply because she wears him down... he doesn’t want to be embarrassed by her any longer. My brothers and sisters, this parable proclaims to us across the millennia that despite human sin, that despite the very real evil that persists in ourselves and our society no matter how we try to change or deny it, that at least some of the time, justice can prevail. Yes, at least in some situations, with God’s help, justice can prevail... problems can be solved.

This parable teaches us something deeper about justice too, especially as it relates to our topic of advocating against hunger, if we take a closer look at the character of the judge. Although our hearts initially go out to the widow (with good reason), the judge is actually in just as bad of shape. He actually says to himself, “I do not care about God and I have no respect for people.” I do not care about God and I have no respect for people... wow. Can you even imagine being in that bad of a situation, where you openly admit to yourself that you don’t care about God AND the folks around you? That’s got to be a deep, dark, lonely place... the sort of place that’s pretty hard to get out of. Perhaps some of us here today can in fact recall such a situation, where either crushed under the weight of addiction, or broken relationships, or disease or loneliness or any other sort of evil that might oppress us, we had to recognize that we had become so entirely disconnected from our God and our fellow human beings that we simply didn’t care.

I myself haven’t been in quite that difficult of a spot, but I’ve been close, and that was especially the case while living in Washington, DC. I moved there right after high school to study political science at the George Washington University because I wanted to change things. I was a pretty progressive teenager, and I wanted to change things... I wanted to make the world a better place, and I thought Washington was just where I could do it! I eventually realized though that change wasn’t so easy. By no means do I think this happens to everyone, there’s still a lot of great folks there, but I eventually realized that I was stuck in a pattern that’s fairly common in Washington. Much like me, a lot of folks move there thinking they want to change the world. Soon though they see that in order to change the world, they have to attain a certain level of power. Whether by climbing social ladders or compromising their values or greatly overworking or building their resume in a cut-throat sort of way, folks in Washington can often lose sight of their original goals. Life for them, as it was for me, no longer is about changing the world... it simply becomes about attaining more power. And on that brutal quest for power, relationships with other people are inevitably lost and one’s connection with God feels broken. In other words, life in Washington easily begins to lack the liberating power of love. I believe God worked pretty darn hard to free me from that sort of life... I recognized I needed to leave Washington, at least for a while, and I’m much happier today for it, but unfortunately, many of our leaders there are still stuck in lives that seem to lack the liberating power of love.

And that my sisters and brothers is what we’ve seen recently in Washington, and what we see in the character of the unjust judge. We see the work of lives lacking love. We see the work of folks whose lives lack the liberating power of love, who have become so disconnected that they can’t see the suffering and injustice all around them. They can’t see the true problems in our nation and our world, nor can they ever dream how it can be better. As we discussed a couple weeks ago, we know that one in six Americans currently face hunger in some form, and that in the city of Philadelphia, the number goes up to one in four. One in six Americans face some form of hunger and one in four folks in this city of brotherly love face some form of hunger. Yet we also know that it doesn’t need to be this way, and that it hasn’t always been this way. Under Richard Nixon, not someone exactly known for being a liberal softy, hunger as an systematic problem was pretty much eliminated for a time in America through the increased use of food stamps, now referred to as the SNAP program. Just listen to what President Nixon said to Congress back in 1969:

More is at stake here than the health and well-being of 16 million American citizens who will be aided by these programs and the current Child Food Assistance programs. Something very like the honor of American democracy is at issue. It was half a century ago that the "fruitful plains" of this bounteous land were first called on to a great work of humanity, that of feeding a Europe exhausted and bleeding from the First World War. Since then on one occasion after another, in a succession of acts of true generosity--let those who doubt that find their counterpart in history--America has come to the aid of one starving people after another. But the moment is at hand to put an end to hunger in America itself. For all time. I ask this of a Congress that has already splendidly demonstrated its own disposition to act. It is a moment to act with vigor; it is a moment to be recalled with pride.

According to President Nixon, the very honor of American democracy was at issue... there could no longer be excuses for allowing hunger to exist in our great nation, and thus, for a time, the systematic problem of chronic hunger was eliminated. Unfortunately, under presidents of both major political parties, under President Reagan and President Clinton, food stamps and other programs were scaled back. And thus we’ve ended up in the dire situation we find ourselves in today.

My sisters and brothers, hunger does not exist in America because of one political party or the other... both parties have worked to eliminate hunger, and both parties have set us back at times. The case is similar on the international level. The Millennium Development Goals were originally signed onto by the Clinton administration, and due to increased foreign aid under the Bush administration, we’ve nearly cut to global hunger rate in half over the last two decades to what is now around 14 percent. Hunger does not exist because of one political party or the other and hunger does not exist because we lack the resources to alleviate it. The main reason the scourge of hunger still exists in our time is because, much like the situation of the judge in today’s parable, the lives of many of our political leaders lack the liberating power of love. Thus, today’s parable teaches us that in order to move towards justice, in order to solve problems that are indeed solvable, much like the widow, we should persistently pray, preach and proclaim the power of liberating love that we know through Christ to those leaders who most desperately need to hear it. So following the close of today’s worship service, I invite you to do just that. As we celebrate Bread for the World Sunday, we got all the materials you need to tell President Obama and the folks in Congress that we can and need to end hunger and to remind them about the liberating power of love that we know through Christ. You can either write a letter, record a short YouTube video, or sign a petition.

Amidst the hardest days of the civil rights movement, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. once preached,

To our most bitter opponents we say: ...One day we shall win freedom, but not only for ourselves. We shall so appeal to your heart and conscience that we shall win you in the process, and our victory will be a double victory. Love is the most durable power in the world. This creative force, so beautifully exemplified in the life of our Christ, is the most potent instrument available in [human]kind’s quest for peace...

Love, my sisters and brothers, is the most potent instrument available in our quest for peace, love is the most potent instrument available in our quest for justice, love is the most potent instrument available in our collective quest for freedom. When our Christ rose from that most gruesome of deaths two millennia ago, He proclaimed to the whole world, including us in this time, in this place, in this city that even the worst of human evil, the actual killing of God, is absolutely nothing next to the power of love. God’s act of love in our Christ empowers us. God’s act of love in our Christ frees us. God’s act of love in our Christ liberates us from whatever or whoever may oppress us. And when we are wrapped up in the arms of God’s liberating love in Christ, we can’t help but share the good news of that love with others. Amen.

Dustin is currently in his final year of a Masters of Divinity program at the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia, having recently completed a year as Vicar at the Lutheran Office for World Community and Saint Peter's Church in New York City. While seeking ordination in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, his focus is on the intersection between worship, service and justice in de-centralized faith communities unencumbered by a traditional church building. In his free time, Dustin likes playing frisbee, hiking and pretending to know how to sing.

Immigration, Oppression and Our God of "Yes"

What follows is video of a sermon I gave at Saint Peter's Church this past Sunday at Jazz Vespers, primarily on 1 Kings 21: 1 - 21 and Saint Luke 7: 36 - 8: 3.  I had something entirely different prepared until that morning, but kept feeling a tug on me all day to tell the story I ended up including.  Thus, this became my first time preaching without at least a mental manuscript.  From my eyes, it only turned out mediocre... it seemed unpolished, had a few missteps, and definitely had a weak conclusion.  The funny thing is that I heard from a few of the folks there that it was some of my best preaching all year.  So, did this last minute change of preaching style on Sunday work?  My initial response is no, but I'd love to hear your thoughts.



God's peace,
Dustin

Dustin currently serves as Vicar at the Lutheran Office for World Community and Saint Peter's Church in Manhattan, having recently completed his second year of a Masters of Divinity program at the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia. While seeking ordination in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, his focus is on the intersection between worship, service and justice in de-centralized faith communities unencumbered by a traditional church building. In his free time, Dustin likes playing frisbee, hiking and pretending to know how to sing.