June 14-21: A lot can happen in a week

About this time last week, I drove up the Coast to Santa Barbara from our friary at Old Mission San Luis Rey (Oceanside, California) to witness the priestly ordination of our brother, Luis Alberto Guzman, ofm. Since we friars all have different work schedules, I hitched a ride with Mark Beglin and Kay Sempel, two of our volunteer lay Covenant Members who live at the Mission and assist in our work and ministries. We had a great time together and made it to Santa Barbara in just under three hours-- record time-- in Kay's cool yellow Mustang convertible.




Our newly ordained confrere, Father Luis, 44, is a native of Tamaulipas, Mexico, and has been a member of our Province for more than a decade. A year ago, he finished his studies at our Franciscan School of Theology in Berkeley, before being assigned as deacon at the parish of Old Mission Santa Barbara. Luis is a fine man, and a friend, so I was keen to attend his ordination. Not only that, he has been assigned to our parish starting in July, so I had a professional interest in his ordination as well.



The beautiful twilight liturgy on June 15 was attended by hundreds of parishioners, family, friends and friars. Bishop Alexander Salazar, auxiliary bishop of the Archdiocese of Los Angeles, was warm and personable. He spoke directly to Luis and indirectly to the assembly, stressing that priestly ordination rises from our baptism in Christ Jesus. Everything a priest does is an act of service, he emphasized. Service expressed most profoundly through our sacramental life as Catholic Christians: the service of baptizing, the service of presiding at Eucharist, of hearing confessions, of witnessing marriages, of anointing the sick. As I sat in the sanctuary of the Old Mission church, I could not help but reflect upon my own priestly ministry a decade ago. Where has the time gone? But more importantly, how can I reclaim and keep alive in my own heart the tremendous feeling of peace and gratitude I experienced at my own ordination?

I stayed overnight at the Old Mission so I could attend Father Luis' first Mass at the monastery of the Poor Clares the next morning. Here, the setting was more intimate and familial. Flanked by three other Franciscans at the altar, Luis was well supported as he made his way through the liturgy. The chanting of the nuns-- unseen, cloistered behind their grill-- gave a formal and austere feeling to the event. But when the Mass was ended, everyone broke out into warm and enthusiastic applause. Luis just stood there for a moment, taking it all in, beaming.

After the ordination, I drove back to Oceanside with Friar Adrian Peelo, the third member of our team of sacramental ministers. We gave a ride to our new friar-to-be, Sam Nasada, who will enter our novitiate program at the beginning of July. We dropped Sam off in Los Angeles, stopped at Ikea for lunch, and chatted away about our plans and hopes for the parish now that we have a another priest to help out.



When I got home, I met with Brother Vincent Nguyen, who is staying with us for the summer. Brother Vincent has been commissioned to produce a full-scale interpretation of the celebrated Franciscan, or San Damiano Cross for our sanctuary. We hope to have the work completed by the Feast of the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary on August 15. Meanwhile, we placed the blank form in the sanctuary this first weekend so that people would have an idea of the scale of the project. Vincent is making great progress and is generous in explaining the iconography of the Cross to parishioners and others. This is a very concrete way in which we hope to plant the Franciscan identity in our faith community.



I had scarcely unpacked when I learned that our three novices-- Friars Philip Polk, Michael Minton, and Ryan Thornton, along with their assistant novicemaster, Father Tom Frost, had stopped by to spend the night. The novices explained that they had been on the road for 19 straight days, visiting friars and friaries in Arizona and southern California. They were both exhausted and elated; they had learned a great deal during their site visits and were eager to share their insights. At the same time, they were more than ready to return home to Old Mission San Miguel (California) to prepare for their first profession of vows on July 2.



Once the novices left, there was no time to spare in preparing for weekend liturgies (we have 6 Masses-- 2 in Spanish; 4 in English). Everything looked fine until we discovered that we had no water pressure-- there was a break somewhere-- but where?-- in the line. So, we had to close all the bathrooms and shuttle people back and forth via golf cart to the Mission next door so they could use the facilities. Luckily, by noon on Sunday, we were able to plug the leak. Always something!



Today is Monday, June 21. Six of us friars decided to take our day off (yes, we get one whole free day a week) as a Fun Day. So, Friars Larry, Kelly, Andres, Mo, Adrian and myself piled onto the northbound Amtrak train together. We got off at the very next station to spend the afternoon visiting one of our sister missions, San Juan Capistrano. We were given the royal treatment by the staff at both the parish and Mission. San Juan is compact and easily accessible. Even though it welcomes more than 300,000 visitors annually, it has succeeded in retaining its identity and spirit as a place of prayer, reverence, and spiritual refreshment. We friars never seem to have enough time together, so this was a rare treat. We strolled through the Mission and its adjacent basilica , gazing and grazing. Savoring the gorgeous grounds. After an early dinner, we caught the next train back to Oceanside.



It's late. I'm tired and need to rest. It's been a great week; it's been a while since I've been able to spend this much time with the friars. But I have to admit I'm looking forward to some quieter days now to catch up with office work at the parish. Enjoy your week.

True Conversions No. 6: Irene Lape

Leadings: A Catholic’s Journey through Quakerism
Irene Lape
Brazos Press: Grand Rapids, Michigan c.2003
160 pp. ISBN: 1-58743-054-1

It’s tempting to think of a conversion journey as a one-way street. A person moves from one spiritual “home” or tradition to another, either in terms of a natural evolution or as a response to some crisis. And then, presumably, they live happily ever after. End of story. Irene Lape’s excursion, however, is best described as a two-way street, a round-trip experience, even. Brought up by socially involved, but self-proclaimed atheist parents, she first converted to Catholicism (via the Episcopal faith) as a college freshman. Before graduation, though, she had opted out again, only to re-enter the Catholic community some decades later. But not until she had had first become thoroughly steeped in the Quaker tradition.

This short, but intense spiritual memoir also serves as a sympathetic and insightful introduction to Quaker identity, theology, and tradition. Lape clearly treasures her exposure to and involvement in the Religious Society of Friends (of Quakers) as well she should. She does not leave that tradition empty-handed. In fact, if anything, she enriches the Catholic environment through both her search and discoveries. That her search is marked by openness, intellectual rigor, patience, consistency, and integrity is evident in this dense and serious chronicle—one that never lapses into smugness or self-indulgence.

For Lape, Quakerism served as a much-needed antidote and alternative to the “broad way—the popular way—of my generation, the way of ideology and political theorizing, the way of psychology, and scientific ‘positivism’, the way of doubt and skepticism of all traditions.” Like others who came of age in the turbulent Sixties, Lape was attracted to the “simplicity, integrity, and plainness of speech” of the Quakers, to the strength and beauty of their silent worship. She also found the Quaker witness to social justice to be singular and exemplary. The Friends Service Committee, for example, was proactive early on in the struggle for a peaceful resolution to the Vietnam War and consequently exerted an influence far beyond its limited membership.



That said, as much as she admired the Quakers’ stand on social justice, Lape is insistent that her decision to join the Friends was triggered primarily by her spiritual longing and search—most especially by her experience of the presence of Christ within her very self as well as within community: “My outward life was not suddenly different, but inwardly everything was changed. I saw differently.” Elsewhere, she notes that “ (The) Friends said Christ was in me. His Crucifixion was something to be joined with in the depths of my being… and he was inviting me to be joined to him, to trust as he did in the Father to bring forth something good in his own time.”

Lape’s conversion to the Friends led her both to deeper institutional involvement and to a relentless search to plumb the depths of the Quaker theological tradition. In her dogged resourcement, she pondered the writings of founder George Fox himself, as well as those of other Early Friends such as John Woolman,and Isaac Penington. She introduces the reader to the rich vocabulary used by Friends over time—a vocabulary marked by indirect discourse rather than confrontation. Quoting early Quaker sources, she writes of “leadings,” “clearings,” “motions,” “pressings” and openings” not as charming linguistic ornaments, but as apposite descriptions of the nature of the spiritual life and of God’s activity in that life.



As her own search and research into Quaker sources continued, Lape was surprised to find many of her contemporary Friends either indifferent to or ignorant of the early traditions of their own movement: “Missing from the modern way of understanding and articulating Friends’ testimonies is any kind of radical call to holiness, especially in relation to personal, sexual behavior…. or self-abnegation… (or) the sense of sin early Quakers found so important in coming into the sense of God’s new covenant presence.” Increasingly, Lape appears to have found a fundamental disconnect between the theological insights and intentions of those early Quakers and those of present-day practitioners, some of whom evinced only a hazy or remote connection to Christianity itself.

In terms of her own journey, Lape began to question the apparent rejection of both tradition and of a physically incarnate sacramentality within the Friends. This questioning, in time, led her to embrace Catholicism again in her maturity: “It seemed to me… that the Catholic Church understood better than the Friends and most other Christian denominations that Christ had not necessarily come to end outward forms and observances of religion, but to extend them in new ways that represented a real continuity of his physical presence among us.” Added to her sense of the incarnational aspect of Catholicism was Lape’s appreciation for the roots of the faith in apostolic tradition.

Grateful as she is to have found her own spiritual home (again), Lape nevertheless evinces no interest in scoring denominational points, however. On the contrary, she is emphatic that her experience and identity as a Friend were part and parcel of her process and journey: “I had come to Christ among them (the Friends). There was a dimension of the Gospel they knew about ,” she continues, “ that I had not found among Catholics, and (that) God did not want me to lose.” Elsewhere, she concludes, “ I went back (to Catholicism because I believed God wanted me to go back, and as a Friend I would have proved unfaithful had I failed to obey his voice.”

Ultimately, Lape is much more interested in the larger, more transcendent picture: “ I know that the message I responded to is a message anyone can respond to…. The work of redemption God performed through the Jews and brought to us all in Christ is a work we are all invited to be joined to. Open your eyes and see that God is in you… and acknowledge him. Serve him, obey him, let his life grow up in you. If you do, you will experience a delight deeper than any you have ever known, a depth of meaning in your life greater than you have ever imagined.” Blessed by the Quaker tradition, Lape extends and shares that same blessing with us.

Stockholm's Franciscan Heart: Riddarholmen

Over the past several decades, a number of attempts have been made to ‘plant’ the Franciscan order in Sweden, but have met with only limited success. It is unfortunate, because up until the Protestant Reformation, the Franciscans flourished in this country and throughout Scandinavia. In a very special way, the Franciscan ‘footprint’ is still physically present in the form of Stockholm’s oldest building—and one of its’ most distinguished cultural landmarks-- the former friary now known as Riddarholmkyrkan (the Riddarholm Church).

In 1268, just forty years after the death of St. Francis, friars arrived in what is now present-day Sweden. Under the patronage of King Magnus Ladulås (1250-90), they settled on a tiny island in the center of the Stockholm archipelago and immediately adjacent to the Old City (Gamla Stan). Here, on Riddarholmen (the island of the Knights), a large brick sanctuary in the early Gothic style and adjacent friary were constructed, then dedicated in the year 1300. Returning the courtesy of royal patronage, the friars provided for a burial place at the foot of the main altar for King Magnus. He was to be accompanied two centuries later by another Swedish king, Karl Knutsson. Both tombs remain in the sanctuary to this day.



According to historian Henrik Roelvink, himself a Franciscan, the friars flourished on Riddarholmen for more than 200 years. It is believed that the community consisted of up to 20 men who in addition to their other responsibilities, also served as chaplains to the nuns at the nearby monastery of St. Clare. The friars continued to enjoy royal patronage during these centuries, and the convent became famous for its scriptorium. In fact, the very first book ever printed in Sweden was the Dialogus creaturarum moralizatus/ The Moral Dialogue of Creatures, printed at Riddarholm in 1483.

With deep roots in the culture and continuous royal support, one might reasonably assume that the friars would continue to thrive, unmolested and unencumbered in their communal life and ministry. But the arrival of Sweden’s King Gustav Vasa (1523-1560) changed all of that. Under the battle cry (and cover) of the Reformation, Vasa proceeded to break the power and influence of the medieval Church in Sweden. Not unlike Henry VIII of England, he confiscated church property, appropriated altar silver (later melted down and used for the royal treasury), and closed most religious houses and foundations. For the friars, this was a traumatic event; we really don’t know what happened to the friars themselves afterwards. Following the closure of their convents (c.1527), it is assumed that most of them dispersed into the general community, either returning to their families or going into exile abroad. Now banned by law, the Franciscans and other Catholic religious orders were not to return to Scandinavia for more than 300 years.



The departure of the friars, however, did not mean the end of Riddarholm Church. While other religious houses were sacked and destroyed, Riddarholm remained relatively unmolested—physically, that is. For one thing, it contained the remains of one of Sweden’s earliest and most revered kings, Magnus Ladulås, a vital connection to Sweden’s past that it was in the interest of Gustav Vasa to preserve. For another, it had never been a parish church, so its sanctuary could quite easily continue in its role as the burial chapel for Swedish royalty and nobility—a function it has served well into the twentieth century. In time, the early Gothic structure of the church would be modified to accommodate the construction of additional side chapels for burial vaults. A large bell tower was erected, replaced in the nineteenth century by the ornamental metal structure which survives to this day.

The appearance of present-day Riddarholmenskyrka continues to reflect its Franciscan roots. For all the glory and opulence of its royal residents, this (initially simple) brick structure remains a surprisingly spare, even spartan environment. Only a collection of heraldic shields covers the wall; otherwise, the space is barren of superfluous ornament. Fragments of various frescoes can be found throughout the sanctuary, though, hinting at more extensive decoration during the Franciscan era.



It’s remarkable that after 700 years, this important memorial to the Franciscan presence in Sweden should have survived. Of course, it is just a building. One hopes for the day when the Order itself may be return, flourish once more, and leave its distinctive mark on Swedish life in terms of our presence and ministry.//

True Conversions No. 5: Me

June, 1980. I had just turned 30. My father had died suddenly the previous summer, and I was still coming to terms with his death. I felt confused, despondent, and overwhelmed. I was going through a difficult time with work and with some personal relationships. Spiritually, I was drifting. I was a mess.

Then, seemingly out of nowhere, I received a grant from the Swedish government to study and write about traditional handicrafts in Scandinavia. It was an unexpected opportunity; I had already done some freelance writing on the subject and was excited to have the opportunity to spread my wings as a budding freelance journalist. So off to Stockholm I went, with the intention of visiting for just a couple of months. I ended up staying in Sweden, off and on, for almost three full years. I went to Sweden expecting to become a journalist, and I left wanting to become a Catholic priest. No one was more surprised than I was myself.



Although I was a cradle Catholic, educated in parochial schools, and brought up in an especially devout family, I hadn’t been much of a churchgoer since I left home for college. I still believed in God and prayed on a regular basis, but I was ticked off at the church and stayed away from active participation and involvement, as did many people of my generation. But here I was in Stockholm, Sweden, of all places, and, after a few initially euphoric months, I began to feel like my life was coming apart again and that I was sinking. I was stranded-- isolated both physically, spiritually, and emotionally. Cut off from family, friends, work, culture, language, even food-- almost everything and everybody that I thought defined me as a person and supported my identity. I was lost and didn’t know how to get found. As all of these other supports dissolved, I realized that what kept me going was my faith.

I discovered a small Catholic church in the neighborhood where I was staying. Temporarily housed in a converted movie theater, St. Eugenia’s was open during the week, so I started to drop in for an occasional visit. I would just sit in the sanctuary and ask God for help and guidance; anything that would give me some grounding and direction in my life.



I began to feel more and more at home in church-- not just in the physical space, but also in the liturgy and prayer life of the parish. Cautiously, I started to attend Mass again, but I was careful to sit in the very last pew so I could escape out the back door right after the final blessing so I wouldn’t have to speak with anyone.
St. Eugenia’s served a broad international community and was staffed by German Jesuits. These good men made a lasting impression on me: they were intelligent, calm, prayerful men. I liked their style; they were welcoming and approachable, but at the same time discrete and a bit reserved. I screwed up my courage and approached one of the younger priests to ask for an appointment to talk about my life and spiritual search. Over the course of several ensuing months, that initial conversation developed into a more formal process of reconciliation and spiritual direction. I was now coming home in a more conscious and conscientious manner.



My prayer life was flourishing. And at the same time I was getting more clarity about what God was asking of me in terms of a vocational commitment. I was thrilled and scared at the same time. I realized that once I reconciled fully with the Church, I would have to put myself completely at God’s disposal-- to place my self and all of my gifts upon the altar. And I would have to have to come to terms with a growing desire for priesthood—a ‘secret’ I had kept from everyone, including myself for a very long time.

Eventually, all of my deepest fears were realized and I’m glad they were. I did become reconciled to the Church. I did ‘place my gifts on the altar’, and I did finally admit that I was being called to be a priest. But it’s not as if all the pieces fell into to place quickly or easily. The process initiated in Stockholm in 1980, took more than a decade to come to fruition. I moved back to the United States, found a job and apartment in the Bay Area, got connected with a parish community, sought regular spiritual direction, and began to do some volunteer work. Ultimately, in 1993, I was accepted into the postulancy program of the Franciscans in California. A lot happened in between, but my Swedish experience was the initial catalyst for my spiritual conversion, growth and development.



Over the past three decades, I have kept up my Swedish connection and contact with friends and former colleagues. I will always be grateful for the opportunity to spend time in this extraordinary place in the world. In and out of church, I have been nourished on so many levels by the hospitality, friendship, love, and acceptance I have received from people here. As I was leaving for this trip to Stockholm, one of my Franciscan brothers joked with me about returning to my ‘adopted’ country. But, actually, Sweden adopted me. Sweden gave me a home and it helped to bring me home. Amen.

Where do Franciscans go to get away from other Franciscans?

Don’t get me wrong. I love my brothers. But from time to time, I really need to get away from them. And vice versa. So, where does this Franciscan go to get away from other friars? Well, a lot of places, actually. My personal preference is to spend some time at another religious community—most often with Jesuits, Trappists, or the Benedictines. Whether for a ‘sabbath day’ away, or a week-long retreat—the atmosphere of retreat house or monastery can provide a real relief from the stress of ministry and yes, of community living, as well.

Since moving from Sacramento to southern California last July, I have been searching for a place/ places where I can get away from the demands of parish and community life in order to get some rest, time out and spiritual refreshment. It’s ironic. So many people come to us—to our home—looking for those very things. Our Franciscan community at Old Mission San Luis Rey (Oceanside, CA), has an excellent retreat house (and some pretty good cooks!), beautiful grounds, and a wonderful old historic mission church. But it’s also where we friars, eight of us, live. And on weekends, we are often swamped with school groups, Marriage Encounter weekends, and other crowded retreat activities. What looks like an idyllic, restful environment ain’t all that peaceful when you are living there and working behind the scenes.



I try to go for spiritual direction about once a month and, when possible, I make it an overnight visit. It usually involves a three-hour train and bus trip to Los Angeles for me-- to the Cardinal Manning House of Prayer for Priests in the city’s Echo Park neighborhood. As the name suggests, this facility, perched at the edge of the motherhouse of the Sisters of the Immaculate Heart of Mary (IHM), focuses on the spiritual needs of Catholic clergy. Two resident priests, both Jesuits, are available to work with priests from throughout the region and country. For me personally, a visit to the House of Prayer is a savored opportunity to rest deeply in the Lord.



Hospitality is the cornerstone of the Benedictine tradition since the establishment of the Order more than 1,500 years ago. In southern California, we are blessed with two abbeys of Benedictine men. Prince of Peace Abbey in Oceanside, California, is just down the road from our friary at Old Mission San Luis Rey. Poised on a secluded hilltop adjacent to the US Marine facility at Camp Pendelton, it offers a splendid beach and ocean view. The contemporary architecture of Prince of Peace is particularly striking, but what one notices most about the place is the quality of meditative quiet it embodies and imparts. It would be difficult for anyone to leave this spot unaffected by its serenity. Prince of Peace Abbey: princeofpeaceabbey.blogspot.com



Just about 2.5 hours north of Oceanside is another Benedictine monastery, St. Andrew’s Abbey in Valyermo. Unlike Prince of Peace and the Cardinal Manning House of Prayer, St. Andrew’s is, quite literally, a desert community. Cactus, cottonwoods, and Joshua trees dot the sparse and parched landscape of this very basic, very simple monastic settlement. Though physically isolated, it is, ironically, within the bounds of Los Angeles County. Consequently, both individuals and groups from throughout the metropolitan area take advantage of the Abbey’s idyllic environs. In addition to guest/retreat facilities, the Abbey hosts a ceramics center, youth retreat facilities, and its welcome center boasts one of the best Catholic bookstores in the West.



The community at St. Andrew’s consists of some 20 monks, but not everyone is at home 24/7. As one monk quipped: “We Benedictines take a vow of stability, not immobility.” At the moment, a small Byzantine monastery of the Holy Resurrection shares the site while its members search for a more permanent home of their own. They offer, through their presence, an opportunity to experience the richness of the Eastern Christian monastic tradition. St. Andrew’s Abbey: https://www.saintandrewsabbey.com



The Trappists offer hospitality at the New Clairvaux Abbey in Vina, California, about two hours north of Sacramento. The region boasts vast prune and almond orchard, and the abbey has its own winery and pottery. A recently reconstructed 12th century Spanish charterhouse solidifies the stamp of the Cistercian spirit and identity on the site in physical terms. Retreatants are welcome to attend the Liturgy of the Hours, but I, like others, skip the odd hours of prayer and focus on resting as much as possible. Once, I informed one of my spiritual directors of my earnest plans to bring a stack of books and my journal and breviary along with me on a week-long retreat. He just chuckled: “Concentrate on sleep instead. The best thing about retreat time is getting as much rest as you can.” He was so right! New Clairvaux Abbey: www.newclairvaux.org



It is to places like these that I try to make personal pilgrimage whenever I can. In religious life, if you’re too busy to pray, you are way too busy! I work at a large multicultural parish. We’re on call, often 10-12 hours a day, six days a week. The people are wonderful, but the level of stress can really get to you. So when I can, I try to take a day (or two, if I can squeeze it in) to spend a ‘sabbath’ day in a monastic environment.

I really admire our Benedictine, Trappist, and Jesuit confreres, but have no inclination to join either community. Each group has its own particular ‘personality’ or charism, and without going into detail, I still feel most at home with the Franciscan lifestyle. It fits. But I deeply appreciate and respect the quiet, rhythm and balance of monastic life, in particular. Its harmonic, unhurried pace helps me to put my own too busy routine into perspective. It helps one to refocus, “re-center” on one’s prayer and personal encounter with the Lord.

A Sabbath is not the same as a sabbatical, but it certainly is better than nothing. And it’s important. All of us need to put on the breaks periodically and make more time for the Lord. You certainly don’t have to be a member of a religious community to partake of the offerings of such centers of hospitality. Laypeople, whether on an individual, private retreat or as part of a visiting group are often welcome. I’ve included contact information above for the places which would welcome inquirers and guests. Amen.//

True Conversions No. 4: Sara Miles (again)

Jesus Freak: feeding, healing, raising the dead
Sara Miles
Jossey-Bass, San Francisco, c.2010
171 pp. hardbound, US$21.95
ISBN: 978-0-470-48166-0

This is a great book with an unfortunate title. Jesus freak ? Visions of flower children dance in one’s head. That’s definitely not what this book is about. JF is basically the sequel to Miles’s hard-hitting spiritual memoir, Take this bread: A Radical Conversion (c.2007). In a way, this most recent literary effort by Miles—the “feeding’ segment, in particular—takes up where its predecessor left off. The rest of the book is an extended meditation on the meaning of the presence of Christ as healer and reconciler — embodied/ incarnated in the experience of suffering of the poor and those dedicated to accompanying them.

Feeding. The Food Pantry, which Miles founded while a member of St. Gregory of Nyssa Episcopal Church in San Francisco shortly after her initial conversion experience in the mid-Nineties, has now blossomed into a regional network of some 18 pantries for the poor. The Portrero Hill site presently offers free groceries on a weekly basis to upwards of 800 families and individuals. Throughout this surge, Miles has maintained her determination to continue to offer a sense of genuine eucharist (and Eucharist) to all comers. All are fed. In fact, volunteers are especially well fed, with a home-cooked meal prepared for them each Friday before the doors open to the public. The Pantry’s radical sense of inclusion— its stubborn ‘no questions asked’ policy— makes it oddly invincible. Miles reflects: “We had everything we needed because we gave everything away: we were invincible because we offered power and authority, just like food, to everyone.” A teen volunteer concurs: “…it’s cool how people can’t take advantage of you.”

Miles’ focus here is almost exclusively on her own project. It is important, even extraordinary work. But it would be helpful if she had put it in the context of the impressive array of nonprofit projects throughout The City which also serve the poor-- often heroically: e.g., Project Open Hand, Glide Memorial Methodist Church, and our own Franciscan-inspired St. Anthony’s Dining Room, which feeds up to 3,000 free meals daily to the poor.



Healing, raising the dead. If Miles’ entire book were concerned solely with the work of The Food Pantry, it would serve primarily as an informative sequel to her culinary cum spiritual endeavors. Thankfully, it doesn’t stop there. Instead, Miles plunges into a fervent and feverish reprise of the Gospels-- a relentless reflection on its meaning and relevance to her own experience. She’s on a spiritual truffle hunt and doesn’t come home empty handed. In this literal —“hunting for the Gospel in our own stories”—she branches out from The Food Pantry to work with a group of health care professionals based at nearby San Francisco General Hospital. Here she encounters dedicated women and men determined to instill meaning as well as technical/professional efficiency in their work: “Healing’, here, “(is) about creating meaning. What was our suffering, the suffering of others really for?” Miles’ responds with the ‘answer’ of Jesus: “… the answer to all the questions of our lives. Sickness, war, falling in love, going to the grocery store: everything happens so that God’s works might be revealed.”

While Miles the journalist reports on her active participation in projects aimed at feeding the hungry and healing the sick, Miles the convert (but no longer the neophyte) sinks her roots (and teeth) more deeply into the Christian faith: “I realized how my continuing conversion depended on being thrown together in intimate ways with all kinds of strangers I hadn’t chosen.” And, one might add, all kinds of experiences, impressions, and ideas she had not countenanced either. Miles appears to want to take things and shake them up to see what they’re really made of. In this, she is willing to be unorthodox, even “heretical”— while not taking herself too seriously in the process. (In Miles’ argot, Jesus The Beloved becomes The Boyfriend, for example. Cute, but a little annoying after a while)…. With relish, she takes on the issue of authority, especially the authority of The Church. Miles brings communion (and Communion) to the homebound; she anoints the sick; she listens to confessions; she buries the dead. Why, she asks, as do others—why is this sacramental life and power restricted to ordained ministers of The Church? Jesus trusts us (all of us) to do his work, she submits.

Miles goes further in her exploration and theological inquiry, ever willing to push the envelope. She meets Anibal Mejia, a psychologist working with the desperately poor, who is also a priest in the Brazilian Candomble tradition. Her gets her thinking about and questioning The Church’s resistance to and rejection of cultural/ theological syncretism…. At one point, she entertains the notion that religion itself is an enemy of the Gospel. She proposes her own definitions here as “a set of ideas about God, purified and abstracted from ongoing relationship with God. And from religion springs sin: the attempt to separate ourselves from others, the failure to see everyone as an inseparable part of God’s body.” Isn’t Miles painting with a rather broad brush here? Is religion itself, rather than its abuse, the real culprit?

Yet, Miles’ frankness, her willingness to cast a broad net, to address people, experiences, and ideas fearlessly is in part what makes her faith so dynamic, intense, and – well, so downright attractive. In that regard, one is wondering when and how Miles will come up for air, take a giant step back—zoom out and reflect on the whole body and trajectory of this intensely active faith lfe. Some people wear their hearts on their sleeves; Miles has the whole goshdarn four Gospels on hers.

In a reflective moment, she considers the enduring effects of her conversion: “In my new life with The Boyfriend, I wasn’t particularly nicer, but I was freer. I wasn’t more holy, but I felt more blessed. And I knew that to the extent new life was real in any of us, it had sprung, just as Jesus promised, actual feeding, healing, forgiving. It didn’t come from the sky, but from plates of enchiladas, the bruises of strangers, frustration and tears.” Amen.

True Conversions No. 3: Darcey Steinke

Easter Everywhere: A Memoir
Darcey Steinke
Bloomsbury: New York, c. 2007
231 pp. $14.95 (paper)
ISBN: 1-59691-138-7

I once asked a friend of mine in Stockholm why so few Swedes ever bothered to go to church. His answer was both direct and revealing: “We don’t really need to; the influence of Lutheranism is so deep in our culture. In fact, we even have a saying: ‘Luther sitter på axeln,’ which means, “Luther is sitting on our shoulders.” It appears that author Darcey Steinke certainly started out in life with Luther propped up on her shoulders. But in the progress of her faith, as this intimate memoir reveals, she has made the clear decision to carve out her own spiritual space, Luther or no.

Steinke was born in upstate New York, into a clerical family¬-- a preacher’s kid. A Lutheran pastor’s preacher’s kid, in fact. Her earliest memories, she writes, “are of my father in cassock and white surplice preaching from the pulpit.” It’s clear that this and other early experiences have left a deep imprint on her faith journey. Her childhood and adolescence occur during the cultural revolution of the Sixties and early Seventies. Her parents’ spiritual progress during this same period reflects the disruptive influence of the times. Her father moves from the not so genteel poverty of pastor and parent, through a more secular calling as hospital chaplain slash social justice activist, to an ultimate return to church work three decades later-- as shepherd of a struggling inner-city congregation. The waning and waxing faith of her father coincides with the downward spiral of her mother’s ongoing clinical depression, as well as her growing estrangement from, and ultimate renunciation of any formal creed. In and through both of these broadly diverging poles, Steinke seeks to forge her own path.

When she was a child, her father spoke to her of a deity whose existence and presence in the world are both “infused” and infinite. She intuited that somehow God must be something like her dad, in a way: both loving and aloof. Her paternal grandfather, also a pastor, images a deity made of sterner stuff: stolid, humorless, even punitive. Her own search unfolds as a quest for a God who is more passionate, direct, and intimately involved people’s lives, an image that, understandably, she rejects. Later on, in adolescence, she finds her father’s faith struggles perplexing: “Outside of church I’d never seen him pray and he mostly read popular novels…. But his voice quivered as he blessed me (at confirmation), and I knew that his faith hadn’t gone completely, that he still clung to a particle of faith.”



Steinke’s own quest for belief continues through the struggles and growing pains of her teens and twenties: multiple family moves, a study term abroad and her first experience of love, relationship, breakup and heartache. A healing summer sojourn in South Carolina, accompanied by a peak into Penecostal exuberance. A subsequent move to New York, more studies, bouts of clubbing, druggy friends and acquaintances, an abortion, a frustrating relationship, the birth of her child. An emotionally excursive and itinerant life, to be sure, but one in which apparently aimless wandering metamorphoses into a dedicated search for spiritual succor. Lifestyle experimentation gives way to greater inner stability and a disciplined approach to prayer, spiritual reading and direction, friendships with fellow seekers, and the search for a stable worshipping community.

Through her persistent searching and longing, Steinke ultimately experiences something of an epiphany—a direct and intimate experience of the divine which is her own—neither inherited, borrowed, nor vicarious. She is at the University of Mississippi on a fellowship grant: “I paid the sitter and sat outside on my lawn chair. The sky was full of stars, like salt spilled on salt paper. I saw one fall, a quick arc of light disappearing over the horizon… I felt weirdly deracinated, but it was not a creepy feeling. My daughter and I were not, as I had so often feared, doomed characters in the opening sequence of a horror movie. I felt we were living in the eternal moment, residing inside infinity. I raised my hand up and held it before me as a sign.”

Back in New York, she endeavors to settle more firmly into her own life and literary career, She joins a church in her neighborhood—Grace Reformed—and is drawn to the passionate ‘presence’ of evangelical faith. She participates in a study group on Rick Warren’s A Purpose Driven Life. She connects with a spiritual director, an Anglican nun on Manhattan’s upper West Side. And, intermittently, she attends Catholic Mass.

By the books’s end, Steinke has reached her own, but still somewhat tentative conclusions about faith: “I am not able to break with Christianity, no matter how uncomfortable I am with many of its current manifestations. Biblical imagery and Christ’s message of forgiveness continue to haunt me, and I know my own redemption lies in Christian tenets, not in others’ religious beliefs.” She stakes her own ground within the tradition: “The idea of church still has a grip on my imagination, but I realize now that what I thought was held only inside those walls—grace and divinity—is actually located directly and authentically inside myself. Church is not a set of rules or a specific building,” she concludes,” but a way of life.”

There is an ambivalence here yet. Steinke is still not quite fully convinced, committed. She writes more about the Christian church, for example, and less about her direct experience of the Christ from whom the church (traditions, theology, people) has emerged. Still, even if Steinke is not completely at home spiritually (who is?), she is certainly in the neighborhood.