Attempting to Be More Insightful

So I was reading through my previous few blogs, and I've realized that compared to the majority of blogs I read, mine is incredibly un-insightful. Unless of course you find that insightful in and of itself. So I'm thinking maybe I'll try to be more insightful (yeah...right...). Or maybe this will be along the lines of Peter Griffin's "You Know What Really Grinds My Gears?" Ha. We'll see.

I had a really great meeting with Mike yesterday. We started off by talking about the state of the Episcopal Church in today's world, which is pretty much how we start every conversation. We had an interesting talk about the Prayer Book and Rite One. He likes Rite One, and I'm not a big fan. I think my issues with it come from being a cradle Episcopalian, because he says most young converts he knows really like it. I just remember growing up and being interminably bored during Rite One. And I've really tried to get over that; I swear I have. But there's something inside of me that just clenches when I have to say "vouchsafe" in a service. I agree with Mike, though, that the movement of the Rite One service is beautiful. It's musical in a way, much more so than Rite Two I would think. And as he said, the prayer of humble access is something that we should perhaps incorporate more into our daily lives. And I totally agree on all of that. I think my hang up with Rite One has to do with the language. We're supposed to have services in the language of our times, and paternalistic toudated language is not my language, nor has it ever been. So why can't we rework Rite One, keeping the qualities of the service while changing the language? I think a lot more young people (especially cradles like myself, who admittedly are not very great in number) would respond to the service better if the language were more familiar. Just a thought.

I went to church with my roomate last night. We went to Hope Church in JP. I had told her beforehand that UCC/DOC is no where near liturgical enough for me, but I agreed to go with her anyway. And my opinion still stands (there was no reading from the Gospel at all during the service, and they had communion as well...maybe I'm just uber Episcopalian but you gotta have the Gospels...), but the community and the energy at the church was really really great. I was very thankful to have had that experience with her. Really great group of people, and the preaching was pretty good too. I'm glad Sarah has found a church community that she can feel a part of...I wish everyone could.

OK well, I have to run and meet Sarah and some others for lunch. I'll write more in the next couple of days about mission (I came to a realization yesterday that made sense out of many conundrums I'd been stuck in with regards to mission). But in the meantime, y'all keeo your noses clean.