I wanted to follow up on this past Sunday’s sermon I preached titled, “Love is mussing up someone’s hair” as a metaphor for how God lovingly and intimately engages us. This is a personal response, but also since our pastoral team discusses our work together, I thought it would be interesting for a community to read a response from three pastors on our team, one Asian-American, one Black, and one White.

We saw in the chats a few of you share your experiences of someone trying to mess your hair as a person who is bald or as a person of color, saying “don’t touch my curly hair.” In that moment I realized, “Oh no! I did not think of that!” and I felt bad for using a metaphor that didn’t relate to all of our varied experiences. And in that moment, I felt grateful that some of you felt comfortable enough to say something, to say ‘well that’s not my experience’ and for others to chime in with the conversation about it. And/or, there might have been some of you who felt uncomfortable, triggered, or unseen and for that I’d like to apologize as your pastor. 

I learned and realized a few things through that, that I wanted to share with you. I remembered how important it is to listen to people’s experiences. And how in our lived experience, especially for BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, People of Color), who are peppered with traumatic or triggering experiences because much of the world is centered on white experiences. I realized as an Asian-American woman, how I am influenced and immersed in a culture that centers white normative experiences, for example a Charlie Brown book that’s originally published in 1965! And also how I have so many blind spots.

It also reminded me how important representation is for such reasons like this. How hearing our own cultures or experiences from the front or the front page can be so powerful. And the work that it takes to bridge that gap is continually needed. That diversifying our sermon illustrations is critical. I was humbled to learn that again this week and grateful to have a community that expects a church that is safe, open, and inclusive. 

It was interesting to get sermon feedback in real time (sweating but smiling emoji here)! But I think it was good. New platform, new engagement, new ways to get things wrong, make mistakes, and learn and grow together! 🙂 

Thanks, Reservoir community, ya’ll keep it real. You keep me real. 

–Lydia

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I had a likely 15 min conversation after Sunday’s service with my husband, a very nonchalant discussion around the metaphor of mussing up my hair.  We joked about the great “No, No” of touching a black woman’s hair, the generational stigma of it all.  As a black woman I’ve had to have very strong boundaries around me to keep me safe and maintain my dignity from those-and-that which have taken many unknowing and unjust liberties.  So I understand how the metaphor of mussying hair can be triggering, the assumed liberty of it all!

I thought of times living abroad where people took liberties with touching my hair which annoyed me and the children too, who were curious, and in whom I had loosened my boundaries a bit more.  But It’s a weight, trying to figure out where you’re truly seen and safe and a chore trying to manage the boundaries.   I wonder if Jesus who knows and sees me would know not to touch my hair in jest and if she did, if I’d be okay with it.  Because in my experience, Jesus has a way of doing things that touches and tears down the boundaries to get to the very heart of who we are and what we need…  To see, be accepted and to know me.   I imagine Jesus mussying up my hair in a room full of people who are otherwise stereotypically unsafe, judgmental, unwoke, a danger to my dark-brown-skinned, 4-C-haired-self –only to experience a love and acceptance that is beyond that plain. Now that is a glorious experience.   

I’m thankful for a team debrief where learning, growth and deep care for others was centered. I’m thankful for our discussions about how we can learn from this, how we can make sure we are doing well to consider diverse experiences so that all are feeling seen and welcome and known, even though we will likely falter along the way.   I’m thankful for the humility of our Pastor of Social Justice.  For I am reminded of the parable of the farmer who sows wheat into the field but there is also poison sowed in the field too, but during the harvest the poison is separated from the wheat.  I pray that the poison that has been planted for generations would be separated from all that is good, that we would continue to learn and grow and sow good things in one another and that the harvest would be abundant.

–Trecia

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Sunday was an opportunity to learn, and also an opportunity for me to continue to unlearn much of what whiteness has taught me. White privilege is not something that I can shake from my feelings and behavior and be done with once and for all, it is a journey of ongoing work. Work that requires developing the willingness, attentiveness and skills continually to align my intent, action, and language in all settings. Sunday was a glaring example of not doing the work, of being misaligned. I am so sorry for my blindsightedness, for my inept use of language, and for the harm it caused. 

Jesus shows us how to make the pathways to him rich, expansive and multiplicative – by listening, knowing and honoring the voices around him. Our commitment and responsibility as pastors is to do the same – to keep open as many pathways to Jesus as possible, so that your story and your imagination can intersect with a loving, life-giving Jesus. I am sorry that Sunday we actively closed many of these pathways. While visible mending is also ongoing work, I hope that we can continue to learn, listen, unlearn, give and receive feedback, and stitch our way forward together.  If you would appreciate more time with any of us to reflect your experience, concerns, or ideas – please reach out: lydia@reservoirchurch.org, trecia@reservoirchurch.org, ivy@reservoirchurch.org. 

–Ivy

Last month, I took a walk on a sunny, early winter’s day. I was with a person new to our church community who had reached out over twitter to say hello. We talked a bit about where we come from – our families and hometowns and professional stories. We talked a little bit about where we are today – why I’m a pastor at Reservoir and what I like about the place, how my new friend likes his life these days and why he’s looking into our church. And we talked a very little bit about where we are going – some hopes we each have for our lives this year and beyond. While our backgrounds are very different, we found we have some similarities to our personalities and some similar hopes for what the Christian faith could more and more become in this country. I can’t speak for the other person, but by the end of our hour walking, I really wanted to know this person more. I hoped I’d be his pastor and we’d have opportunities to know each other better. 

I have conversations like this a lot. Sometimes they are with people visiting or getting to know our church. Sometimes they are with longtime members of our community with whom I don’t have a deep relationship yet. And sometimes they are with fellow clergy or other community members throughout our city. There’s nothing strategic or timely about these conversations. They’re simply one-time opportunities to know and be known a little more. And simple and seemingly insignificant as conversations like this may seem, I think they are incredibly important.

In the interfaith organizing world I am a part of, these conversations are called relational meetings. They are when two people meet – in person, over zoom, over the phone, while walking – it doesn’t matter. Two people meet for between thirty minutes and an hour to simply know part of each other’s stories. That’s it. To matter to one another. 

It’s a one-time thing. There’s no obligation to have a follow-up meeting or conversation unless that happens naturally. There’s no obligation to become good friends. It’s simply a practice of knowing and being known, of forming a wide network of people in your life that you know and care about in some way, and who know and care about you in some way. 

In social justice organizing, we have these relational meetings a lot because they form networks of people who’ll show up for one another when we need each other. 

In a church we do this because it makes us more of a church too, a place where we know and are known, where we all matter.

Reservoir is inviting its participants to have three 1 on 1 relational meetings this winter with another member of the Reservoir community you don’t know well already. You’d say to someone else in this community: hey, the church is inviting us to have three relational meetings. Can we have one? Or someone will ask you that. And then here’s what you do.

1. Anyone is free to say yes or no. Some of us are more introverted. Some of us are busier.  Some of us won’t want to participate in this for whatever reason. All that is fine. 
2. If you ask someone and they say yes, or if someone else asks you and you say yes, set a time and how you’re going to talk – over the phone, over google meet, outdoors on a walk, whatever. Plan on forty minutes to an hour.
3. And then when you have the time, each of you just share a little bit of your story with the other. You can respond and ask questions and all – it’s meant to be a natural conversation. But each of you share. 
4. If you’re not sure what to talk about, here’s the prompt I encourage you to use. Share something about where you come from, something about where you are today, and something about where you think you’re going. These could be very concrete – like talking about the town or city you lived in as a child, and where you live today and what that’s like, and where you hope you’ll be in a few years. Or it could be more abstract – like some significant event in your past, and how you’re feeling about some part of your life today, or a dream or goal you have for your future. Whatever you’d enjoy sharing. However it is you’d like to be known.
5. And just thank each other for your time and for sharing and that’s it. Keep the conversation to yourselves. It’s not meant to be a point of gossip or anything.

If we each have three conversations like this, so together we have hundreds and hundreds of them, Reservoir will end our winter a stronger, more beloved community, and lots of us will experience a few more opportunities to know we matter and to convey that to someone else as well.

This is one more step forward to the kind of experiences of loving community that we read about in the Bible’s New Testament, where city treasurers and children of slaves alike continually learned how much they mattered to God and matter to one another through participation in loving faith community.

This summer, I gave a series of sermons on The Apostles’ Creed, the oldest statement of Christian faith outside of the Bible itself. For a variety of reasons, I didn’t quite finish the series. I owe you all two or three! I did this to demonstrate how my faith in God is very much grounded in a nearly two thousand year-old tradition of following Jesus as Lord and Savior, and loving the God Jesus loved and proclaimed. I also did this to demonstrate that faith and religion evolves and changes over time for many reasons, and a faith at home in our times, with our concerns, needs to sometimes creatively engage the ancient creeds, honoring their truths while updating their blindspots. 

Now and then, different people will do something with the ancient creeds that emphasizes different beautiful aspects of faith in God in Christ. In that spirit, just before Christmas, when we celebrate the birth of Jesus, who lived for a while as an exile, I offer you this beautiful creed as well. It’s a rephrasing of a 5th century Christian creed, called the Nicene creed. It’s written by the now retired Cuban-American poet and pastor Jose Luis Casal. 

The Immigrant’s Creed

By Jose Luis Casal

I believe in Almighty God, 

who guided the people in exile and in exodus, 

the God of Joseph in Egypt and Daniel in Babylon, 

the God of foreigners and immigrants. 

I believe in Jesus Christ, a displaced Galilean, 

who was born away from his people and his home, who fled 

his country with his parents when his life was in danger. 

When he returned to his own country he suffered under the oppression of Pontius Pilate, 

the servant of a foreign power. Jesus was persecuted, beaten, tortured, and unjustly 

condemned to death. 

But on the third day Jesus rose from the dead, 

not as a scorned foreigner but to offer us citizenship in God’s kingdom. 

I believe in the Holy Spirit, 

the eternal immigrant from God’s kingdom among us, 

who speaks all languages, lives in all countries, and reunites all races. 

I believe that the Church is the secure home 

for foreigners and for all believers. 

I believe that the communion of saints begins 

when we embrace all God’s people in all their diversity. 

I believe in forgiveness, which makes us all equal before God, 

and in reconciliation, which heals our brokenness. 

I believe that in the Resurrection 

God will unite us as one people 

in which all are distinct and all are alike at the same time. 

I believe in life eternal, in which no one will be foreigner 

but all will be citizens of the kingdom 

where God reigns forever and ever. Amen.

I gave this talk on Tuesday, November 2nd, at Harvard’s Memorial Chapel morning prayers. It’s a Christian-hosted interfaith environment with a very short message. A few people asked if I would share. You’ll find the talk below and a recording will be available here. 

“What We Can Learn From the Trees”

When I was a child, my favorite tree was the fast growing maple behind our house. It had been planted to celebrate the birth of one of my brothers. By the time I was a teenager, it towered over the center of our yard, where we could sit under its shade and I could climb up high to escape whatever boredom or tensions lay below.

That tree is gone now. It had fallen ill and was removed by the next owners of the property. I have a different favorite tree now, a big old oak tree atop Corey Hill, across the river from here, where Brighton and Brookline meet. Sometimes, when I need to rest or think, I sit under it or climb up into the crook made by its long bottommost branch and lean into its old, rough strength.

This time of year, the trees of New England are not just some of the older living things we can see, they are some of the most beautiful as well. And my hope today is to encourage you to look at and touch and even learn from the trees you see. I share this advice in imitation of my teacher and guide, Jesus of Nazareth, who spoke often of trees and flowers and the rest of the natural world as our teacher. Today’s reading from the gospel of Luke:

Luke 12:22-34, excerpts (New Revised Standard Version)

22 (Jesus) said to his disciples, “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat, or about your body, what you will wear.

23 For life is more than food, and the body more than clothing. …

27 Consider the lilies, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin; yet I tell you, even Solomon in all his glory was not clothed like one of these. …

32 “Do not be afraid, little flock, for it is your Father’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom.

33 Sell your possessions, and give alms. Make purses for yourselves that do not wear out, an unfailing treasure in heaven, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys.

34 For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.

Jesus gives us a teaching of contrasts – two beauties, two ways of living, two kingdoms, two treasures – all wisdom we can receive through looking at the lilies – if it’s springtime in Galilee or, in New England in the fall, through considering the trees.

Trees are more beautiful than most anything we can make from them. Even Solomon in all his glory, which was likely an indirect way of referring to the temple of Jerusalem, its first version built by Solomon. The most extraordinary human-built structure Jesus and his followers had ever seen can not compare to the beauty of the lilies. 

You can not improve on what God has made. This is true of trees, and it’s true of people too. You can not improve upon the beautiful human God has made you. No toiling, no spinning, no surgery or skin care or achievements or fortune can fundamentally improve upon the glory of who God made you. Look at a beautiful tree today, friends, and ask God for the insight to see that extraordinary beauty of all God has made, yourself included.

Two, trees don’t know how to worry. And it’s not because they don’t know things. Trees know how to share resources with one another, to communicate in response to threats, but they don’t know how to worry. It took a lot of evolution to make us fear and worry the way we do. That has a few benefits, but an awful lot of misery that comes with it too. Look at the trees, take a deep breath, and perhaps ask God to let go of the worries you don’t need to carry. 

Three, trees grow and flourish and produce. They make shade and habitats and oxygen and food. But they do not strive. They have no self-improvement projects. They are in a sense satisfied with who and what they are and with their capacity to bless the earth with their gifts. The trees, Jesus says, point us less to a capitalist vision of kingdom and more to a natural one, toward an economy of sharing and abundance, toward a sustainable vision of contentment and generosity. 

Jesus’ vision of the Kingdom of God, what my community of Reservoir Church likes to simply call the Beloved Community, is a vision of life with God and neighbor and earth in which we hope and trust that God is a loving a parent who is kindly with us always; in which we can let go of our lusts and longings to always have more, more, more; and in which the great treasure of our lives can be in the non-competitive giving and receiving of generous love. 

Look at the trees, friends, take a deep breath, and ask God to learn the contentment, the enough-ness, the loving generosity that they embody, and ask for the wisdom to make that ours as well.

Pray with me please.

God of the vision of Beloved Community, 

We ask for the wisdom of the trees,

That we can see and preserve the beauty of what you have made,

That we can be freed from our anxieties.

And that we can embrace more peaceful, contented, generous lives. 

In the name of all this is holy, which for me is both Jesus and the trees,

Amen.

I’m teaching this short class for our church right now in which we unpack different aspects of American Evangelicalism and look for paths forward to a new Christianity. Here’s something I’m thinking about during this class. 

As we let go of some certainties and dogma and open our minds to new ways of thinking, we can gain humility and truth in different ways. But sometimes we can also lose anchors of meaning and purpose. We can feel more adrift and less happy. Growth is good, but it can be hard too.

So let me share just three of the kinds of questions I’ve been led to ask regularly in my life – the kinds of questions that guide me into meaning and purpose without putting my head in the sand or refusing to grow or change.

• How does God love me today, and how am I loving myself? How am I welcoming rest and pleasure and self-compassion and wonder into my life?
• Who and what are most important, and how am I saying yes to that? Who and what are not important, and how am I saying no to that?
• Who and what am I giving myself to this week? How am I taking my big ideas about the good life and making them small – living them out in real relationships and concrete choices?

Questions like these remind me of what’s most important in life.

They nudge me toward love, justice, and mercy while also nudging me toward joy, hope, and gratitude. They bear a curious resemblance to Jesus’ way of love, truth, and meaning, when he taught that the purpose of life – and the point of all God has said – is to love God with our whole selves and to love our neighbor as ourselves. (I’ve rephrased Jesus’ words so that we don’t lose sight of welcoming God’s love into our lives – and to focus the commands to love God and neighbor in some contemporary ways that stir our minds and hearts a bit.)

These are just my versions of the questions this week. I’d encourage you to try them out if they resonate with you, or to pay attention to Jesus’ ethic of love, or your own ways of rephrasing that for yourself. When Jesus says he came to seek and save the lost, I think that one thing he means is that he wants us to know Jesus as a North Star, a guide and mentor and help toward purpose and meaning, hope and joy. If you find these questions help you in some way, let me know!

Act I: My Personal Life

Desolation

• How has this pandemic, dating back to early 2020, changed my life for the worse? 
• What have I lost? How have I suffered?
• In what ways am I less hopeful, less grateful, less engaged in life?

Consolation

• How has this pandemic, dating back to early 2020, changed my life for the better? 
• What (if anything) have I gained? How have I grown?
• In what ways am I more hopeful, more grateful, more engaged in life?
• What new, creative possibilities are in front of me today?

Act II: My Public Life in This Big World

Desolation

• How has our community or our country or our world changed for the worse? 
• What collective injustices or sufferings have been exposed?
• Where do many of us hurt?

Consolation

• How (if at all) has our community or our country or our world changed for the better? 
• What collective possibilities for justice and peace and wholeness are emerging?
• Where do many of us hope?

Act III: My Church, My Life in a Community of Faith

Desolation

• What (if anything) have I missed in my church involvement?
• How have I been less connected to God or others? Are there ways this has made for less flourishing in my life?

Consolation

• What has changed in my faith or my church during the pandemic that I hope will stay true?
• What do I hope to learn or grow in my faith that my church community can help with? What do I hope to receive?
• How do I hope to participate in my community of faith this fall? What do I hope to give?

*Desolation, in the examen tradition, refers to what has in any way drawn us away from God’s love and goodness, what has lessened our energy and well-being and connection. With the desolation, we are invited to pray for guidance, hope, forgiveness, or courage.
*Consolation refers to what has in any way drawn us toward God’s love and goodness, what has increased vitality and well-being and connection in us. With the consolation, we are invited to pray with gratitude.

This week hundreds of Cambridge residents were vaccinated against COVID-19 right inside our church sanctuary. Thanks to a partnership between the Cambridge Fire Department, the Cambridge Health Alliance, City of Cambridge leadership, the Benjamin Banneker School, and our church, we were able to make this happen on very short notice.

This site was mobilized to reach residents in North Cambridge in particular, especially working class residents with less ability and means to travel elsewhere. Big thanks to Executive Pastor Trecia Reavis and Board member and physician Dr. Peter Choo for their time and expertise in supporting this initiative for the health of our city as well!  

This past Monday morning, after successful rollouts over the weekend, we received notice from FDA/CDC of an immediate freeze on administration of the J&J vaccine.  See below or click on the PDF below for more information.  Please join us in prayer for all the health workers who’ve worked so hard putting this distribution opportunity together and for our North Cambridge residents to be served well and quickly through other means, while we await further updates.

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Reservoir Church Vaccine Clinic on Pause Until Further Notice
April 13, 2021

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and other Federal health agencies are recommending an immediate pause in the use of the Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccine following reports of six people who developed a very rare type of blood clot within two weeks of receiving the vaccine.

The Massachusetts Department of Public Health has notified all Massachusetts providers and local boards of health to pause administration of the Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccine, effective immediately.

Cambridge Vaccine Clinic at Reservoir Church at 170 Rindge Avenue on Pause
Following the state and federal recommendation, the City is pausing operation of the vaccine clinic scheduled for this week (April 12-18) at Reservoir Church in North Cambridge, where the Johnson & Johnson vaccine was to be administered.

We will keep Cambridge residents apprised of any new developments as more information becomes available from state and Federal health officials.

For those individuals who have already received the one dose J & J vaccine: These have been very rare events. 7 million people have already safely received the J & J vaccine. You can expect the usual sore arm and achiness that follows a vaccine; please call your health care provider for any serious symptoms such as shortness of breath or chest pain.

Moderna and Pfizer/BIONTech Vaccines Remain Safe for Administration. This announcement by the CDC and the FDA, along with the Commonwealth, does not impact administration of the Moderna or Pfizer/BIONTech vaccine. Anyone who is scheduled to receive either of these vaccines should move forward as planned. Mass vaccination sites do not administer the one dose J & J vaccine.

For more information on this announcement, please visit the CDC’s website:
https://www.cdc.gov/media/releases/2021/s0413-JJ-vaccine.html.
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