Author Archives: Obie Holmen

Rest in Peace, Char Taylor

For those who noticed the lack of posts on this blog for the last week, I have been out of state for the funeral of my sister-in-law, Char Taylor. Char passed after five difficult months following complications of surgery. Finally at home in Green Valley, Arizona under the care of hospice, she passed quietly with her husband and three adult children with her.

A dozen of us from Minnesota and two more from Iowa (Char’s siblings, their spouses, and Char’s nieces and nephews) gathered in the Tucson area for a long weekend in a bittersweet family reunion centered around Char’s funeral. Author Elaine Pagels wrote the following in her book Beyond Belief, which seems apropos:

—the soaring harmonies of the choir singing with the congregation; and the priest, a woman in bright gold and white vestments, proclaiming the prayers in a clear, resonant voice. As I stood watching, a thought came to me: Here is a family that knows how to face death.

Here was a place to weep … here was a community that had gathered to sing, to celebrate, to acknowledge common needs, and to deal with what we cannot control or imagine. Yet the celebration in progress spoke of hope; perhaps that is what made the presence of death bearable.

Rest in peace, Char. We will miss you.

National Council of Churches (NCC) new leadership team #Episcopal #ELCA

The incoming President and President-elect of the National Council of Churches (NCC) both have Minnesota ties. Episcopal priest, Rev. Peg Chamberlin, will serve a three year term as President beginning Jan 1, 2010. She presently serves as Executive Director of the Minnesota Council of Churches, and she is a frequent contributor to the Minneapolis Star Tribune, the state’s leading daily newspaper. She also serves on President Obama’s faith council.

According to a press release from the ELCA, the incoming President Elect is Kathryn M. Lohre, the daughter of Rev. John and Mary Lohre. John serves as senior pastor at Saint Paul Lutheran Church, Pine Island, Minn.

The governing board of the National Council of Churches USA (NCC) elected Kathryn M. Lohre on Nov. 10 to become the 26th president of the NCC in 2013. Lohre is a member of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) and assistant director of the Pluralism Project at Harvard University, Cambridge, Mass.

Lohre becomes NCC president-elect on Jan. 1, 2010, and president three years later. The current president-elect, the Rev. Peg Chemberlin, will serve those three years as NCC president. They will be installed in their respective new positions tonight, Nov. 12, 2009, at St. Mark’s Episcopal Cathedral in Minneapolis.

Lohre, 32, will be the second youngest president of the NCC since the Rev. M. William Howard, an American Baptist, became president in 1979 at the age of 33.

Veteran’s Day: Thinking of Viet Nam teammates on Romeo 18

On this Veteran’s Day, I’m thinking of my Viet Nam buddies from 1969-70.

The mission of our outfit (K company, Ranger, 75th Infantry) was Long Range Reconnaissance Patrols (LRRP: pronounced lurp). We worked in four man teams that were flown by helicopter into remote areas and dropped off in the jungle for reconnaissance. After four or five days, the choppers would return to pick us up. Because subterfuge was our primary defense, we would be retrieved by the birds ASAP in the event we were exposed. We played hide and seek well.

For 5-6 months, I worked with the same three teammates—Mark Estopare, Billy Powers, and Gary Heald—operating as R-18 (Ranger 18 or Romeo 18 according to the phonetic alphabet). We were stationed in the central Highlands of Viet Nam, in conjunction with the 4th Infantry Division, and lived in base camps near An Khe, Pleiku, and Ban Me Thuot when we weren’t in the field.

Mark was barely 18 and from St. Louis. I haven’t seen him since Viet Nam, but we have spoken by phone a couple of times. I understand he has had a hard time of it with PTSD.

Billy wasn’t much older and spoke with a Texas twang. I saw Billy in Kansas City at a Ranger reunion about three years ago, and the drawl was still there as well as his buoyant humor. He suffered a back injury from a work accident a few years earlier and was receiving worker’s comp. Still in Texas with grown kids.

Gary was the oldest at 23 (I was 21). Gary flew to Minnesota to be one of the groomsmen in my wedding in 1971, I had dinner with him in Los Angeles in 1987, and he was at the same Ranger reunion in KC three years ago. We stay in touch via email. Gary grew up in Oklahoma but settled in California. Remarried with adult kids.

We have animal stories: a rat perched on my shoulder as I pulled midnight guard duty; a tiger silhouetted against the moon as he sauntered along the edge of our night location; and monkeys passing by in the treetops, sounding like the whole God damned North Viet Namese army crashing down on us as we hunkered to the ground, butt muscles tight, and lungs unbreathing. We have drinking stories, and drugs, too. Filipino bands singing rock and roll; movie stars and football players snapping photos of us and we of them; the Beatles partying late on the Panasonic bought at the PX; poker players with military script; and personal AO’s. We have stories of searing sun and monsoon rains. Ponchos. Poncho liners. Prick 25s. Rucksacks. C4. Fragmentary grenades. Smoke grenades. White phosphorous grenades. Later, Bronze stars with V devices. We have flying stories of door gunners and cobra gunships and hot LZs. We have mountain stories, river stories, hooches under triple-canopy jungle stories, and stories of elephant grass much taller than our head. In our stories, there are many faces with names long forgotten. We have shooting stories that come to us in the pale light between wake and sleep, and non-shooting stories, too, of young men from the north passing unknowing in front of our claymores and M16 muzzles, smokin’ and ajokin’ down the mountain, alive still and so were we. We became fathers and grandfathers with stories; I think they did, too.

UPDATE: SINCE PENNING THIS POST, I HAVE CREATED A SEPARATE WEBSITE ENTITLED “LRRPS OF VIETNAM”, AND I HAVE ALSO PUBLISHED FIVE SHORT STORIES BASED ON MY NAM EXPERIENCE. THE SHORT STORIES, ENTITLED PROWL ARE AVAILABLE AS AN EBOOK FOR $6.99 OR PAPERBACK FOR $9.95.

#Lutheran Eva Brunne consecrated as first lesbian bishop #ELCA

Yesterday, Sunday the 8th of November, Eva Brunne was consecrated as the Bishop of Stockholm during an ordination ceremony at the Cathedral of Uppsala. Swedish Archbishop Anders Wejryd conducted the ordination. Not only was the ceremony historic because Brunne is a lesbian in a committed relationship with a female pastor (they are parents of a three year old child), but also because a second female was consecrated as bishop at the same time. Tuulikki Koivunen Bylund was ordained as Bishop of Härnösand in northern Sweden

The photo above is taken from a brief news account in the Local, an English language Swedish newspaper, and the photo below is of Bishop Bylund, copied from a Dutch forum, which quoted my Saturday blog post in its entirety.

For Brunne, her sexual orientation is a non-issue in her role as bishop, except for its symbolism:

Yes, it is important to many people who also live with a same-sex partner that a bishop can also do that. But it’s not a big issue at home in Stockholm. I have yet to be in a workplace where it has been an “issue.”

There have been those who’ve tried to make it difficult for me, but I have always lived openly. Had I chosen to hide parts of my life I probably would have had problems. As a bishop you must be allowed to be a whole person 24 hours a day, otherwise I would never have coped to be who I am and function the way I do.

Radio Netherlands reports that the King and Queen of Sweden attended the ceremony.

Call to Action Progressive #Catholic Conference wraps up

The three day annual Conference of Call to Action (CTA) in Milwaukee is over. I was unable to attend as I had planned, but Thomas C Fox, editor of National Catholic Reporter, offered several sympathetic blog posts over the weekend, and I pass on his insights here.

Call to Action seeks to reclaim the spirit of Vatican II in the face of a church that has tilted strongly toward the right since those heady reform minded days of the early 60’s. Fox’s first post speaks to the need of these progressives to come together to rekindle their energy but especially to be healed:

The folks who come here have been hurt, really hurt, in many ways by their church, a church that has turned on them as they have tried to live out its call faithfully, a clergy who have virtually banished them for their care and compassion. Some CTA types have literally been driven out of parishes, others forced out of ministries and careers. Hurt, really hurt. And they come here, recognizing it or not, in need of healing. And the CTA weekend provides this healing. CTA as healer. I like it. Think of it.

Call to Action has a new executive director, Jim Fitzgerald, and he offered his inaugural address, which Fox reprinted in toto. Here is a portion:

“I don’t think I would be Catholic if it weren’t for Call To Action.” It is a comment I have heard so many times in my 12 years with CTA. While I was a college student at The College of Saint Rose in Albany, NY, I voiced my doubts about remaining Catholic to Sister Nancy Langhart, a Franciscan sister who was my campus minister. I told Nancy that I feel Catholic in my spirit, but I have such difficulty staying in the Church when the Vatican says other religions are deficient, that lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender people are intrinsically disordered, and that the priestly women in my life are not suitable to be ordained or serve in official leadership because of their gender. Regardless of what the Vatican said, I knew in my heart and soul that it is not one’s sexual identity or gender that is disordered; it’s homophobia and sexism in the name of Jesus that’s disordered!

Nancy smiled compassionately as if she knew exactly what I was feeling, leaned over and asked, “Have you ever heard of Call To Action?” In 1997, Nancy drove me to Detroit and introduced me to the Call To Action conference experience and I was home! Tonight, I’m thrilled to say Nancy is here and once again we get to share together this wonderful gathering. Thank you Nancy for bringing me home.

The role of women in the church, including women’s ordination, is of prime importance to Call to Action. Speakers and presenters at the Milwaukee conference included many Catholic feminists. Fox blogged about a couple of them.

Akers (photo by David Hawlic) Sister of Charity Louise Akers filled in for scheduled keynoter Roy Bourgeois Friday evening because Bourgeois’ father took ill. Fox reports that “Akers last August was told by Cincinnati Archbishop Daniel E. Pilarczyk to publicly disassociate herself from the issue of women’s ordination or lose her ability to continue making any presentations or teaching for credit in any archdiocesan-related institution.”

Akers remained defiant, and her address claimed that it was she, not Pilarczyk, who was following church teaching.

Fox also blogged about the Biblical reflections of Sister Dianne Bergant on Saturday. Using the Biblical story of Ruth and Naomi, Bergant suggested we find the the ways God will bless us through the immigrant.

Finally, Fox blogged about Bob and Margaret McClory, founders and mainstays of Call to Action, and their recent visit with reform theologian Fr. Edward Schillebeeckx of Holland who is nearing his 95th birthday.

As the conference came to a close on Sunday, over 2,000 attendees unanimously approved a resolution of support for American nuns who are under pressure from the Vatican. The resolution is reprinted below (from CTA’s press release):

Since January of 2009, the Vatican has investigated and sought to silence Catholic sisters in the United States. They have set a deadline of November 20th for the women religious’ communities to respond to its probing questionnaire. Now more than ever we must speak out against the few bishops who continue to wield the sword of division, rather than extend the hand of unity.

To our fellow Catholics in the United States and around the globe, women religious have taught us how to live the gospel and open our arms until they embraced all of God’s people. It is now our responsibility to put into action the lessons we have learned and ensure that our sisters in faith are not ripped from the church’s embrace,

To our courageous sisters, you who have been the bedrock of our church and country, know that the people you have faithfully served stand beside you as you have stood with us.

To those who are doing the investigation, your actions do not reflect the welcoming and embracing love that Jesus demonstrated in the gospels. We invite you to have a conversion of heart and join us in standing with the women religious.

In every generation God raises up prophets to point the way towards the gospel vision of inclusion. Women religious are these prophets. Today we stand not with those who cling to the gates of exclusion but with the prophets who open the gates and call us to live as one.

Swedish #Lutheran Eva Brunne to be ordained as first lesbian bishop #ELCA

Tomorrow, Sunday the 8th of November, the Lutheran church of Sweden will ordain Eva Brunne as a bishop in ceremonies at the Cathedral in Uppsala. Swedish Archbishop Anders Wejryd will conduct joint ordinations of Brunne, as Bishop of Stockholm, and Tuulikki Koivunen Bylund, as Bishop of Härnösand in northern Sweden.

That two women are being ordained as bishops is noteworthy, but the real news is that Brunne is a lesbian in a long-term, committed relationship with another female pastor. This ordination of an openly lesbian woman as a bishop follows the news a few weeks ago that the Lutheran Church of Sweden will conduct marriage ceremonies of gay couples, which has been permitted by Swedish law since May.

The ordination ceremonies follow the election of Brunne a few months ago. A secular, gay, European blog, Eurout.com, commented at that time, in a post entitled, God Bless Sweden:

With 413 to 365 she won the runoff-election of the Lutheran Church in Stockholm, after she was already the favorite candidate of the majority of pastors during the nomination. “She has this natural authority,” said her fellow church members after the election in several TV interviews. “Her enthusiasm and the ability to see the whole picture, to not get lost in details makes her so precious for this position.”

I want to add, her sense of humor doesn’t hurt either. When Brunne, who was a pastor in Stockholm for 16 years, was asked what she does to relax in her free time, she answered, “I read crime fiction. And I carve. The things you do to conform to Jesus, huh?”

Her partner Gunilla Lindén, who’s also a pastor, gave birth to their now 3 years old son after they entered a registered partnership. International journalists addressed whether this is a problem for the Swedish church, but Eva Brunne only joked, “Um, why? The backyard of the bishop’s house is really big enough.”

There are conflicting reports whether UK Anglican representatives will boycott the ordination. An Anglican cleric who blogs as Madpriest writes, with “embarrassment”:

Five bishops from various levels within the Anglican Church, including Archbishop of Canterbury Rowan Williams, have decided not to attend the November 8th ordination of the openly gay Eva Brunne to be the next Bishop of Stockholm.

“The Anglican Church has a moratorium right now concerning the ordination of bishops who live together with someone of the same sex,” Alan Harper, a bishop from Armagh in Northern Ireland, stated.

Back in July, two UK bishops warned that allowing homosexuals to be married in Swedish churches would lead to “an impairment of the relationship” between the Church of England and the Church of Sweden.

In addition to bishops from the Churches of England and Ireland, the churches of Iceland, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, have also elected to skip the ordination, although without providing any specific reason.

Representatives from the churches of South Africa, the Philippines, Denmark, Norway, Finland, and Germany are among the international representatives who have accepted the Church of Sweden’s invitation to attend Sunday’s ceremony.

But Swedish Archbishop Wejryd denies a boycott, according to the English language Swedish newspaper and website entitled The Local. Wejryd indicated that officials from other countries and other denominations are often invited but seldom attend Swedish ordinations:

“We send invitations to those with the highest rank. That’s why the Archbishop of Canterbury received an invitation, but no one expected him to say yes.”

He added that the Church of England would be represented by the Reverend Karen Schmidt, who serves as the Bishop’s Chaplain for the Portsmouth Diocese, with which the Stockholm Diocese has a twinning relationship whereby church leaders from both diocese conduct reciprocal visits with one another.

“The bishop, David Bingley of Portsmouth, couldn’t make it but will attend Eva Brunne’s reception the following Sunday,” Wejryd told the newspaper.

A blog entitled Thinking Anglicans also reports on the controversy, imagined or real, with many interesting comments such as: “So what’s stopping us (the North Americans) from joining with the Church of Sweden and the ELCA and telling the C of E to go get stuffed?”

Call to Action Progressive #Catholic Conference opens today

Over 2,000 progressive Catholics are expected to gather today in Milwaukee for the opening of the annual Call to Action (CTA) conference. The CTA slogan is “Catholics working together for Justice and Equality,”, and the conference theme is “Everyone at the Table: Rejoicing as People of God!”

The day will be filled with arrivals, registrations, miscellaneous workshops and seminars, a hall full of exhibitors, and an opening liturgy this evening. Today’s keynote address will be offered by Maryknoll priest Roy Bourgeois who has been ordered by the Vatican to recant for his unrelenting support of women’s ordination, but he has refused. His address will be entitled, “A New Model of Being Church”.

The exclusion of women from the priesthood in the Catholic Church is a grave injustice against women and a grave injustice against the God who calls women to be priests. In his keynote address, Bourgeois will explore the roots of sexism in the Church’s history and how an all-male clergy has led to a crisis in our present-day Church. Since justice is an integral part of our faith, Bourgeois will reflect upon what each of us can do to reform our Church and create a new model of being Church.

Here are links to blogs that reference Call to Action:

YoungAdultCatholics – a blog of NextGen at Call To Action

Catholicism in the 21st Century

Local Catholic Reporter (St Louis)

Bridget Mary’s Blog

Criticism of #Lutheran Core #ELCA

Pretty Good Lutherans blog offers several links to blog posts or articles critical of Lutheran Core (one of these was to my own post yesterday). With a hat tip to blogger Susan Hogan for her list, this post will dig into each link a bit.

In a letter to the editor of the Minneapolis Star Tribune entitled “A continuing reformation”, David Weiss suggests the ELCA’s new policy on gays is “a huge change for the better.” Without naming Lutheran Core, Weiss concludes his op-ed piece with these words:

So, to those who say that the ELCA betrayed its own Lutheran heritage last August, I beg to differ. The heart of the Reformation is about grace and welcome offered as a free gift to people otherwise made anxious by social and religious forces. And this year, at long last, from the heart of the Reformation I’m saying to my gay and lesbian brothers and sisters, “Welcome home.”

A second op-ed piece is offered by former bishop of the St Paul area synod, Rev. Lowell Erdahl. Writing on MPR news, Erdahl suggests “Unlearning the things that used to be obvious”. He uses the analogy of the rejection of Copernicus five centuries ago:

Convinced by what was obvious in nature and clearly proclaimed in the Bible, Luther called Copernicus a fool. Calvin asked, “Who will venture to place the authority of Copernicus above that of the Holy Spirit?”

Erdahl then suggests that he “was wrong in my understanding of both homosexual humanity and the Bible.” Erdahl argues that the Biblical texts cited by the opposition “relate to lustful, exploitive same-sex activity, such as temple prostitution, abuse of prisoners and pederasty, but say nothing about homosexuality as we understand it today,” and such texts should not dictate the church’s policy toward the “significant segment of humanity who, through no choice of their own, are attracted to, fall in love with and desire to live in lifelong partnership with persons of the same sex.”

Erdahl concludes: “It will be a great day when homosexual humanity is as clearly understood and as fully affirmed as Copernican astronomy is today.”

The third link is to blogger Joelle Colville-Hanson, an ELCA pastor in Iowa, who confronts Lutheran Core directly, based on comments on Core’s website.

CORE Encouraging Congregations to Oust Pastors who Don’t Agree with them

Lutheran CORE is playing dirty. Got a pastor who agrees with the churchwide assembly decision or simply refuses to make a big old issue out of it? Get rid of them. Yup that’s their suggestion…

This was originally on their resources of “What to do now” You won’t find it on their webpage anymore because they have altered it –but for now it is still here: CORE Suggestions -don’t be surprised if they cover their ass and change that.

In an earlier post on her blog, Pastor Joelle took Core to task for their call for a funding boycott of the ELCA, mocking their stance as “”Well we will stay, call ourselves members of the ELCA, keep our jobs as pastors and other positions in the ELCA, vote in conference and synod assemblies, insist bishops and other leaders in the ELCA listen to us, scold and lecture the ELCA but will not sully our pure wallets by supporting the ELCA with our gold and silver.”

In the next link on Pretty Good Lutherans, Pastor S. Blake Duncan of Illinois also criticizes Core for withholding funds.

When we give as Christians, we are giving of ourselves – our time and our financial resources – out of a sense that everything we have and everything we are is given to us from God. So we give back to God what is already God’s so that the love of Christ can be proclaimed through the ministry of the church. The money I give to my congregation pays for the ministry of the whole church: for the hospital visits, the food pantry, the worship services, the bread and wine of communion, the Sunday school, confirmation. Besides funding our local ministry, a portion is sent to the synod as benevolence. This benevolence pays for Lutheran Social Services’ work of feeding and helping those in need; it pays for synod staff such as the new outreach coordinator who is now working directly with the Wartburg Parish; it provides resources to keep struggling congregations open and serving their communities in places where the need is great but resources are few – such as Trinity Lutheran Church in Kankakee; it pays for the First Call continuing education program for new pastors. A portion is also sent on to the ELCA, where it pays for churchwide youth events, disaster response, new congregational start-ups, campus ministry, Lutheran World Relief, and on and on. The money I give to my congregation each week does all of this! And this is possible only because my congregation is a partner with both the Central/Southern Illinois Synod and the ELCA. To stop giving is to imperil these ministries and risk hurting the most vulnerable programs and people. (Emphasis added)

The final link is to a brief letter to the editor of Star News in Elk River, Minnesota in which an ELCA parishioner notes, “when I heard an emotional plea from the pulpit last Sunday to urge the congregation to vote to leave the ELCA,” that parishioner and others began to work to ensure all views are heard in their congregation.

What’s your point, Lutheran Core? #ELCA #Lutheran #CWA09

At the 2009 ELCA Churchwide Assembly, voting members adopted revised ministry policies and a human sexuality statement. Changed ministry policies will soon allow clergy in a lifelong, monogamous same-gender relationship, and the sexuality social statement recognizes the positive in both gay and straight relationships. Both actions were supported by Goodsoil and opposed by Lutheran Core. That is, Goodsoil was the pro-LGBT advocacy group present during the 2009 Convention while Lutheran Core was there as the opposition advocacy group. Goodsoil was the coalition of several LGBT groups, especially Lutherans Concerned / North America (LCNA), and Core is closely affiliated with the WordAlone Network.

Since the Convention, Lutheran Core has continued to agitate against the ELCA decisions, and their website / blog provides an outlet for their views. Today’s Core blog post reports that a well-heeled private foundation, Arcus, provided significant financial support to LCNA in the past few years.

This is hardly surprising since the website of Arcus states:

The Mission of the Arcus Foundation is to achieve social justice that is inclusive of sexual orientation, gender identity and race …

The following is my response to Core’s post:

And your point is?

Shocking, I say, shocking, that a rich person(s) with a pro-LGBT attitude helped pay the salaries of LCNA staff, Goodsoil Headquarters suite rental at the Mpls Convention Center, printing of literature, etc., etc.

Was the Lutheran Core hospitality room at the convention free? Who paid for the drinks and hors d’oeuvres and handouts and video presentations?

Your post contains a lot of quotes but no premise. Is one implied? Are you whining that Core did not receive equivalent financial support? Are you envious of the Goodsoil efforts? Is this a fundraising post? If so, perhaps you should include your “Donate” button.

Do you imply something sinister? Perhaps now would be a good time to repeat Nestingen’s [Core spokesperson] false claim, quoted on your website, that “the hallways and the back of the assembly fill up with gay advocates bussed in to influence the voters using, commonly enough, intimidation up to and including physical threats.” You know what they say about repeating a lie often enough.

Again, I ask, what’s your point?

Bowed but not broken: the quest for marriage equality continues

I am not a gay person, but I am what is referred to as a “straight ally”. Thus, while I can sympathize with and support LGBT causes, I cannot empathize. I cannot feel the brutalizing affront to my essential human dignity that is all too often the gay experience. Thus, I defer to the voices of others to name the feelings following election night victories and losses. Popular blogger Andrew Sullivan offers his succinct response to the narrow defeat in Maine and the narrow victory in Washington:

But I do want to point out that, from the perspective of just a decade ago, to have an even split on this question in a voter referendum is a huge shift in the culture. In Maine, where the Catholic church did all it could to prevent gays from having civil rights in a very Catholic and rural state, gays do have equality but may now merely be denied the name. The process itself has helped educate and enlighten and deepen the debate about gay people in ways that never happened before the marriage issue came up.

I am heart-broken tonight by Maine, and I’d be lying if I said otherwise.

Somehow losing by this tiny margin is brutalizing. And because this is a vote on my dignity as a human being, it is hard not to take it personally or emotionally. But I also know that the history of civil rights movements has many steps backward as forward, and some of those reversals actually catalyze the convictions that lead to victories. A decade ago, the marriage issue was toxic. Now it divides evenly. Soon, it will win everywhere.

I know for many younger gays and lesbians, this process can seem bewildering and hurtful. But I’m old enough now to be able to look back and see the hill we have climbed in such a short amount of time, and the minds and hearts we have changed. Including our own.

Know hope.

The Johannine account of Jesus’ call to follow me haunts me this morning. Why should we follow? Come and see, Jesus says. Come and see, repeat his followers, one to the next. But I wonder what the world sees when the Mormons in California and the Catholics in Maine work so stridently against human rights.

Vox Clamantis in Deserto. A voice crying in the wilderness. Against the shrillness of the powerful Vatican and much of American evangelicalism, the voice of progressive Christianity sometimes seem so still and so small. Yet, You will see greater things than these, promises Jesus. Forward we go. Forward we must.