Wayne D's Blog

A while ago I wrote about emusic.com an online service that lets you download forty mp3's a month for $9.99. I've been procrastinating about downloading my songs and last month I don't think I downloaded anything. I decided that perhaps I had run out of artists who's music I wanted to download from emusic. This month I decided I was going to do my best to find forty songs I wanted and then I was going to cancel my subscription. I gritted my teeth, determined to find forty songs if it killed me. Before I knew it I had went off on a tangent and found music from artists other than the ones I originally went searching for, downloaded my forty songs and bookmarked three albums for next month. This month's artists and albums were:

• Crooked Still - Shaken by a Low Sound
• Darol Anger - Generation Nation
• Swing Out Sister - Live
• The Wailin' Jennys - Firecraker

On the list for next month:

• Flamenco Caravan - Loves Philosophy
• Darol Anger - Diary of Fiddler
• Pete Seger Sings Woodie Guthrie

A week or so ago we received a few small samples of Nutella spread in the mail. I decided to try it out on my Saturday morning toast. I found it a bit sweet for my taste. When I chekced the label it said hazelnut spread but the first ingredient was sugar and the second ingredient was peanut oil. I guess if they called it sugar spread people might not buy it so readily. When I checked the peanut butter bottle the fourth ingredient was sugar. Of course it isn't that easy, it's not all about sugar. The peanut butter is slightly higher in calories per gram and about double the fat per gram, higher in sodium but about three times lower in carbohydrates per gram. I guess it depends on whether you want to get your calories from sugar or fat. Maybe I'll switch to honey, it's lower in calories than both of them.

Relatively infrequently I lead the service at my church,today was one of those days. Here is the sermon I preached. It will make more sense if you read the lessons that it's based on first. I have helpfully included them here.

How many time has someone said to you, wash your hands before you come to the table? When I was growing up I know my mother would ask us before we sat down to eat, did you wash your hands? I ask my kids, did you wash your hands? I can just see some kid saying to his or her parents after hearing this Bible reading. "See, Jesus says I don't have to wash my hands!" This story illustrates the problem of what happens when someone takes a Bible story at face value, they tend to miss the point Jesus was trying to make.

Current Orthodox and traditional Jewish practice still requires the washing of hands before eating a meal at which bread is served.

How did the practice of ritual hand washing develop? In Exodus 30:17-21 God commands Moses to make a copper basin and to place it at the entrance to the alter area of the temple so that Aaron and his sons could wash their hands and feet before offering sacrifices. Verse 21 concludes with , "... it shall be a perpetual ordinance for them, for him and for his descendants throughout their generations." Aaron and his sons were priests, devoting their lives to the Temple and its system of sacrifices.

By Jesus' time the Pharisees had modified this ritual hand washing by priests into a complicated set of rules. According to William Barclay commentary on The Gospel of Mark some of the rules the Pharisee's would follow when washing their hands were:

1. The hands had to be free of sand, gravel, or any other substance.
2. The water for washing had to be kept in large stone jars.
3. The hands must be washed with the fingertips pointing upwards, and water was poured over them.

4. The fist of one hand had to be rubbed in the palm of the other.

The purpose for this ritual wasn't to prevent the spread of disease but instead to return the performer of the ritual to a state of purity, to set the person apart from the impure. When you live in a desert water is a precious commodity. It has to be carried from the well that is often far away. The rich would have servants or slaves to fetch water for them, the poor would have to carry their own water, filling a large stone jar would take multiple trips. Who would end up fetching the water in the poor households? The women and the children. What we end up with is a ritual that it much more difficult for the poor and disadvantaged to follow than the rich man. Jesus is actually attacking what he sees as meaningless ritual. He tells the Pharisee's that God isn't concerned with human tradition and ritual. It's what's inside that matters most. Salvation doesn't come through the performance of meaningless rituals but through faith. James refers to faith as "the implanted word that has the power to save souls". Who does the implanting? God does!

Jesus wasn't against all ritual though. He and his disciples celebrated Passover. The ritual Passover meal commemorates God freeing the Israelites from Egyptian oppression, something God did for his people. Jesus' Passover meal became our Last Supper. Jesus was unhappy about rituals that divided, rituals that served only to show that the person performing the ritual was better, more important or more Godly than another person.

We need to examine our rituals to ensure that they still retain meaning and haven't become empty gestures. Ritual's need to be symbols that point onto something greater a symbol is "something in our ordinary experience that is used in speaking about God" but what's most important about a symbol is that is connected to whatever it represents. When this connection is broken then the ritual or symbol loses it's meaning. One way I like to think about the meaningfulness of symbols is to compare them to road signs. A sign that says curve ahead is in some way connected to what is to come it describes what is ahead. A stop sign on the other hand isn't connected in anyway to what comes next. It's simply a command, you have to look for yourself to see why you might need to stop.

Rituals may also have meaning to some people and no meaning to others. Passover is an example of this type of ritual, it holds great meaning for the Jewish people but no meaning to someone who doesn't have an understanding of the background behind the meal.

People get very defensive when you question their traditions, not just in churches but everywhere in the world. Often businesses will hire consultants to come in and look at the way they do things, to examine their procedures and practices and make suggestions on how things could be improved. The reason businesses do this is because the people who work there are so used to the way things are done that they can't see them being done any differently. If you talk to consultants they will tell you that in many cases they make their recommendations and either the client decides not to make any changes or does change but slowly slips back into their old familiar practices. Change is hard, everyone agrees that change is a good thing but try to get them to change their rituals or traditions and see what happens. The inertia of tradition is a powerful force. Churches aren't the only place where you hear the plaintive cry, "We've always done it that way!"

At St. Paul's we also have our own fair share of rituals. Our service this morning is a perfect example of one of them. Traditions are another type of ritual. The form the service takes, the words we use to describe the various parts of the service, even the words we use to describe the various parts of the building and pieces of furniture. Pews, lectern, pulpit, platen, kyrie, sermon, hymn, Eucharist. I'm sure you can think of many others. How many of these rituals and traditions have lost their meaning and instead become stop signs whose only purpose is separate us from the people who don't understand the code?

So not only can practices become rituals but so can words. I'm convinced that part of the reason that the mainline churches are losing members is because we have lost the vocabulary to speak to the unchurched. Lets take a look at some of the words that we Christians use so frequently. Salvation, here are a couple of Lutheran favorites, justification and grace. How about redemption, righteousness and even faith? What do these mean? What about sin? For someone who isn't steeped in Christian practices and language we might as well be speaking a foreign language. Now the bad news, I don't have a list of words to use to replace the ones we already have. I've been so immersed in Lutheran practice and tradition that I can't get out of the rut. I have been trying to read Dietrich Bonhoeffer's The Cost of Discipleship for close to a year. Bonhoeffer was a brilliant teacher and thinker whose ideas and commentary about Christianity are just as relevant today, perhaps more so than when he wrote them sixty years ago. Here was a man who believed in what he was saying so much that he was willing to die for them. He was killed by the Nazis just before the end of the war. I really want to finish the book and I keep picking it up with the best of intentions but it's a lot of work to read. The writing is dense, the sentence structures are complex and it must be read carefully. I end up reading a chapter and then put down the book. It almost mocks me as it sits on the table, I can almost hear it saying "Come on chicken, finish me". I will finish it, but don't ask me when.

I can almost imagine someone lying in bed this morning thinking the same thing, they want to go to church but are daunted at the prospect of what they will find there. Rituals that seem alien to them. It's not enough to get them through the door, once they arrive they need to feel comfortable in the place and in the ritual. They need to be touched in their soul, they need to feel that they have found something they are missing. As Kelly Fryer says the church is the only organization on the plant that exists for the sake of the people who aren't members yet. She suggests that when we forget this and make it al about ourselves we have ceased being the church.

What's missing? I think what's missing is the joy of following Christ. Life can be difficult sometimes but we always know that Jesus is there to help us and that no matter how dark things get we have the gift of eternal life and the promise of being one with God. God loves us and cares for us, we no longer need to be filled with fear but with joy.

Our first reading this morning is from the Song of Solomon and of the three readings this morning is the reading most filled with joy. The Song of Solomon is another of the books of the bible that is often shuttled aside. The imagery sometimes makes people uneasy, they don't know what to do with it. From very early after it was written this poetic book hasn't been interpreted literally but instead to help explain God's love for all people. It's not hard to see the joy in our reading from Song Solomon, in fact it's impossible to miss. The female writer hears the voice of her beloved and becomes excited. He is coming to see her and waits outside her house looking up, hoping to catch sight of her through the window. Spring has arrived and he has come to take out to see the flowers, hear the birds singing, eat figs fresh from the tree, not those horrible dried ones we get here in Canada and to smell the blossoms on the vines. Winter has passed, the rains have stopped and he has come to remove her from the gloom of her house and bring her into the sunshine, to appreciate not what man has built but instead the bounty that God has provided.

We need to be sure that we don't through our rituals and actions become the winter and the rain clouds. Spend less time in Lenten frame of mind and more time in an Easter frame of mind.

At the recent Magnetic Church conference a number of people from St. Paul's attended the presenter Andrew Weeks suggested that to get started we go back and paint something. One tradition that many churches have that thankfully our doesn't is to have a big, dark wood door at the entrance. I'm sure you've seen churches like that. His suggestion was to paint the door red. Red is an eye catching, joyful colour. Have you looked at our cross lately? The black paint on the sides has flaked off in many places exposing the rust underneath. I think we should paint the sides of the cross red, not only will it hide the rust but it will also help to show our joy. While we are at it if we aren't going to replace those lights on both sides of the walkway let's paint some bright yellow flowers on them to make them a little less unsightly.

While we are at it why don't we tear out that awful weedy lawn of ours and replace it with a wildflower labyrinth? A labyrinth would not only be of use to our members as a meditative and healing tool but also could be used by others in the community to help them on their spiritual journey.

Music has always formed an integral part of the church service but I know that I have been in churches where any joy and energy was quickly sucked out of the room by the lackadaisical participation of the congregation in their part of the service. A service isn't a performance with the congregation as the audience but instead should involve all, both young and old. When was the last time you were at a party that didn't have music? When people are moved by music they sing along with it. When music really moves them they may even move, perhaps sway back and forth or even dance. I'm not suggesting that everyone has to sway and dance but those who feel so moved should be comfortable doing so.

The introduction of our new song book in the fall is a perfect opportunity for us to examine our rituals and practices which should be kept and which should be lovingly retired.

The point isn't change for changes sake but instead a careful evaluation of how and why we do things to ensure that we haven't become like Pharisee's using ritual and practice as a barrier for those seeking God. Our rituals need to be a symbol that helps lead all to the love of God as expressed through Jesus Christ. When we do this we can help others to be as excited when Jesus comes to their house as the the woman in the Song of Solomon is when she hears the voice of her beloved. Everyone deserves to know about the joy and peace that comes from following Jesus Christ. God wants us so badly to express this joy to others and help them find it as they follow their spiritual path. God loves the whole world and wants us to be more than hearers of the word. God wants us to be doers of the word, God needs us to spread the joy around.

Amen

Please note, all the pictures in this posting are thumbnails, click them to see the full size picture

 
Last weekend we made out annual pilgrimage to Owen Sound to attend the Summerfolk music festival. This three day festival has main stage converts on Friday, Saturday and Sunday evenings with workshops featuring different combinations Saturday and Sunday during the day.  We arrived in Owen Sound Friday afternoon and check into our motel where we were greeted with the artwork you see here. Yes, it's painted on velvet.


The we headed off to line up. Lining up is one of the Summerfolk rituals.  In order to get a good seat in the amphitheatre it's necessary to line up a number of hours in advance. On Saturday and Sunday morning that means anytime between 6 and 7 a.m. for gates that open at 10:30 and 10:00 a.m.  The good news is that sometime between 8 and 8:30 the organizers come down the line and hand out numbers so you can go back to your campsite or motel and come back just before the gates open to go in and place your chairs in the amphitheatre for the night concert. On Friday we arrived at the front gates between 2 and 3 and set up our chairs to wait for the 5 p.m. gate opening time. The two highlights of the Friday night concert were Dala and Ruthie Foster.  Dala are two 20 something women who have the sweetest harmonies.  Though I am generally not a big fan of the blues, Ruthie Foster manages to combine the blues, gospel and folk singing to a style that all her own. Two other notable acts from Friday night were Steve Dickenson and the African Guitar Summit.


Saturday morning Steve and I woke up and 6 a.m. and managed to get ourselves in line by about 6:40 a.m.  We were quite proud of ourselves considering we didn't have an alarm clock in the room and the motel didn't do wake up calls. For this Herculean effort we received numbers 23 and 24.  Back to the motel for a quick nap and then back to the festival site at 10:30 to set up our chairs.  Throughout the workshop schedule on Saturday we managed to catch Dala, hear the Wyrd Sisters sing about how one can have fun in the tub, catch the guitar greats and be introduced to the phenomenon that is the Chucky Danger Band. These four guys from Charlottetown, PEI dress in white shirts and black pants, have their hair cut short and are quite popular with the young ladies.


Our favorite artists from Saturday night were David Sereda, John Wort Hannam and Fig for a Kiss. The skies opened during the Wyrd Sisters set and we dived under our tarps. The rain stopped after about 30 minutes. One memorable moments of the weekend was watching one hardy soul dancing up a storm during the short downpour.  We decided to skip Rita Chiarelli's Italian Sessions and Jane Burnett's Guantanamo Blues set and head down to the beer tent where we caught the end of Dala's set along with the The Undesireables before we headed back to the motel to sleep.


Sunday morning saw Steve and I in line promptly at 6:30 where our efforts netted up numbers 11 and 12.  After a short nap we were back at 10 a.m. for the morning gospel workshop where the mixture of gospel, traditional hymn tunes and other inspirational songs was the perfect way to start off a Sunday morning.


Highlights of Sunday's workshops included the session in the Children's village where a number of the artists explained their instruments and jammed together. Did you know a Celtic harp has 31 strings and at least on Sahra Featherstone's harp the coloured strings help her to navigate? Or that a playing a Cajon doesn't hurt you fingers if you take it easy and don't get too excited? Joe Phillips ukulele playing was also first rate. The fiddle session where Anne Lindsay showed and played the Swedish nyckelharpa and the Finnish jouhikko, two instruments she learned for her Lord of the Rings gig, was also memorable . During this workshop Sahra Featherstone and Duncan Cameron from Fig for a Kiss danced a spontaneous waltz during Anne Lindsay's performance. The dinner show from Flamenco Caravan brought the day to a close that couldn't have been better.


Sunday nights most memorable performances came from the Anne Lindsay Band and Hart Rouge.  Steve Dickinson also impressed when he played three or four covers with audience participation while filling in the time while Prairie Oyster was setting up. I regret that a lack of attentiveness on my part meant that I missed John Somosi's performance.



At 12:30 we hopped in the car with four CD's, Fig for a Kiss, Chucky Danger Band, Dala and Ruthie Foster for the trip back to Richmond Hill. It was a great weekend of music and we will be making the trip again next year. If I have one suggestion for the artistic director next year it's that they program a little less world music on the main stage. Lyrics are an integral part of music and when I can't understand them I feel like I am missing something.

Before I go any further I must inform you that the person holding the guitar in the picture at the top of this posting is not me, it's Jowi Taylor.


Sometime around Canada day I saw a documentary about Jowi Taylor's eleven year quest to build the Six String Nation guitar. The Six String Nation guitar is a guitar which incorporates more than 60 pieces of  wood and materials from places and items that span the breadth of Canadian history and culture. Pieces from a Massey Hall seat, Pierre Trudeau's canoe paddle, the Centre Block of Parliament have all found a new home in the guitar. Cape Breton steel, Fort Smith mammoth ivory, Saskatchewan moose shin bone and silver from Rocket Richards 8th Stanley Cup ring adorn the fingerboard.  Details on all the pieces found in the guitar can be found on the Six String Nation website.


I didn't know the guitar was going to be at Summerfolk, the annual music festival my family and I have attended for the last five years or so. I was spectating at a workshop at the Gazebo stage on Saturday when I saw someone standing behind the stage with a guitar.  I mistakenly assumed it was another player waiting to go on but the man kept standing back there holding his guitar. It wasn't another musician waiting to go on, it was Jowi Taylor. Partway through the workshop he handed the guitar over to one of the players on stage. I'm not sure if it was then or another time during that day that Jowi told us about his booth, where they had pamphlets about the components in the guitar.  He also mentioned that they were taking pictures of people holding the guitar, for free, and emailing them. After the workshop was done Jowi was standing behind the stage again, holding the guitar and chatting with people.  I walked over and took the pictures you see at the top and bottom of this entry.


For some reason I had decided that I didn't want to have my picture taken with the guitar. Perhaps I was worried that if I touched the guitar it would shatter the symbolism. It would be the same as meeting the Queen and realizing she was just another little old lady. The booth for the guitar was close by to the General Store (the merchandise tent) where the CDs, T-shirts and other stuff was being sold, outside that tent was the signing tables for the artists and just past that was the beer tent. This made it almost impossible not to walk past the guitar booth multiples times during the day. I stopped by one time with my family to look over the brochure that detailed all the various pieces of the guitar. Another time on Saturday I went to the merchandise tent to buy some CDs and on the way back found myself standing in the short line that had formed of people waiting to get their picture taken with the guitar. The line wasn't moving and I walked away.


The guitar appeared a few more times that day in the hands of various artists at different venues. As time passed my resolve weakened. Perhaps none of the magic of the guitar would be lost if a hack player like me was allowed to hold it. Sunday afternoon there was a gap in the workshop performances when no one I wanted to see was playing so I told my wife I wanted to check the artists signing schedule for the day and off I went.  I had seen Fig for a Kiss the previous year and wanted them to sign a copy of their new CD.  I'm pretty sure that subconsciously I had already decided what my real purpose for the trip was.  I found out when Fig for a Kiss was signing, almost talked to Ruthie Foster then turned to face the guitar tent. The line wasn't too long and I joined the end.  I filled out the requisite paper work, was handed the souvenir guitar pick and waited my turn.  Just before it was my turn the daughter of the man in front of me in line showed up and started to fill out the form so she could get her picture taken with the guitar too. A quick discussion ensued and she decided to have her picture taken with her father instead. She held the guitar, he stood behind her beaming, perhaps hoping that she would one day appear on the main stage at Summerfolk. Then it was my turn.


The photographer adjusted the strap, made sure that I wasn't going to drop the guitar on the ground and then he disappeared. I was left standing all alone in the tent holding the guitar. I guess the photographer was trying to sort out the paperwork so that everyone got the right pictures, especially with the father and daughter filling out two forms but then deciding to get in the same picture. I had a pick and I had a guitar so I started to play some chords. Not loudly of course, I didn't want anyone to hear me and perhaps ask me to play a song, that's way beyond my guitar capabilities.  I gently strummed for what seemed like forever but was in reality perhaps a minute or maybe two. I didn't hear anything else, no one talked to me, nothing disturbed my moment with the guitar.  Then the photographer asked me to verify the spelling of my email address, he stepped into position and unhurriedly took 4 or 5 shots. He asked me to change poses and when he was done helped me to remove the guitar making sure I didn't bump it into one of the bars supporting the tent.


I picked up my jacket and hat and started to walk away. Jowi Taylor was standing alone a few feet from the tent.  I hesitated to speak to him, I didn't want to disturb him but plucked up my courage and went over and said hello.  We chatted for a few minutes about the guitar project and the documentary I had seen on CBC Newsworld about the guitar.  He told me that the documentary was produced by Newsworld and that they were working on  one of their own.  His passion for the project was obvious.  He told me about some of his plans for what was next, a U.S. nation guitar with two pieces from each state, an Africa guitar, a Middle East instrument that would bring together an Israeli and Palestinian instrument maker and perhaps others which I had forgotten by the time I wrote this.


I'd taken up enough of his time and I'm sure my wife had begun to wonder where I had disappeared to.  I said goodbye and he thanked me.  I don't think I thanked him, I should have both for all his hard work in getting the guitar made and then for touring it around the country.  He reminded me of a proud parent, who had nurtured his child and was now watching it make its way in the world.


It's a beautiful guitar, if you get a chance to see it as it tours around the country you should take the time.  Stories about the guitar's travels and where it can be found on the six string nation guitar website. 


I've decided that it's time for me to pick up my guitar, which has been lying idle for a few months and learn a few songs so if I get the guitar in my hands again I can play it proudly.


Click on the guitar image below to see a detailed picture I took.  When my picture arrives in two or three weeks I'll post it here for you to see.

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While my family was away visiting my wife's parents I had an opportunity to catch up on some movies I wanted to see. You've already heard about Alien vs. Predator and Clerks II, now I'll update you on the rest.


Supersize Me - A very scary movie, it should be required viewing by anyone who has ever eaten at McDonald's. Ber sure to watch the smoking fries outtake on the DVD.


Showgirls - Yes it's bad but not as bad as the classic "Plan 9 from Outer Space. As mindless entertainment goes I've seen worse.


American Splendor - A biographical movie about Harvey Pekar, the comic book author. I thought it was very good but I suspect many may not find it to their tastes. If you are a big action adventure fan this is not the movie for you.


Underworld:Evolution - The first one was better but this one was still quite watchable. Anyone who likes vampire movies and who liked Underworld will find this movie of interest.


Sahara - Lots of shooting and chasing, not academy award material, two thumbs up.