I am bad at the blogging

You know, I thought that, during my internship, I’d have time to blog all the time. But…I…yeah..that’s not happening. Everything is going great. I’m writing Sunday School lessons, visiting folks in hospital, and sending out 200 emails a day. It has been a blast. But, well, when I come home, I see these two, and I just can’t find the time to write about the day.

I’m enjoying be a vicaring dad.

Things they don’t tell you about urban ministry

Today was our first confirmation class of the season. It went well. We had a large class, the kids were in the right spirit, and it went really well. I was happy with the whole thing.

But there is something they don’t tell you about urban ministry that they really should. My internship site tries to keep its doors open as much as possible. It is a rarity in urban ministry to have a church with open doors. So, as the entire class sat in the front of the sanctuary, teaching, learning, and growing, several gentlemen and women from the neighborhood, or who were just passing through, entered the sanctuary. They would sit, pray, spend the time they need with their thoughts and with God, and then go about their way. This is normal at my internship site. A gentlemen came in like every other. He sat in the very back pew, next to a parent of one of the confirmation kids who came early. He sat there for maybe thirty minutes. As we neared the end of confirmation, wrapping up our talk about the first commandment and a nice derail about whether God is a hypocrite for being a jealous God, seven uniformed policemen walk through the door.

My internship supervisor quickly got up and met the officers. The officers approached the gentlemen in the back row and questioned him. It took only a moment. They confirmed what they need to and escort him out of the building to arrest him. The cops told my supervisor that the guy appears to have stole an iPhone and they tracked him through the GPS on the phone to the church. The parent of the confirmation kid tells my supervisor that the gentlemen was sitting and waiting to talk to the pastor (though my supervisor never saw this gentlemen before). The kids, of course, were curious and everyone was watching and going “what’s going on?” It was wild. As the gentlemen was escorted out of the building, one of our students saw the undercover cops who also showed up randomly to help out. She turned to me and said “okay, this is now my high for the week.”

Yes it was kid. Yes it was.

The kid, the kid, the kid is on..wait…he rolled over?


OH YEAH. MY SON ROLLED OVER. BOOYAH!

I’m a proud poppa.

Though, since he is now into the next level of his existence, I wonder if I’m still allowed to look at him and ask him, in all seriousness, in the most serious-baby-type-voice I have, why he doesn’t have a neck. He could use one, that’s all I’m saying.

They grow up so fast.

New Vicar Shadow Bag Blues

I’ll admit that I’m having a hard time blogging as I run through my internship. The combination of working full time, with my wife back to work part time, and Oliver (who is staring and cooing at me as I type this), is exhausting. And I have a great kid! I sleep through the night! But, still, I’m exhausted. When I come home at the end of the day, all I want to do is bounce him on a ball and veg out. The million blog posts that I have swirling in my head are just going to have to stay there for awhile.

However, I would like share this one quote from some of the pastors at my church. Last Sunday (not yesterday) as I robed up in the Sacristy for the second service, I was assigned several liturgical parts to play in the service. Besides my usual singing and dancing (jazz hands), I was told to lead the congregation through the confession.

Pastor One: “I’ve always felt it appropriate that the vicars lead the confession…”
Pastor Two: “…since they have way more sins than we do.”

Lord, let us pray. I ask, if I ever have my own intern to supervise, that the dryness of my humor grows so that it brings joy to all that hear it. I’m definitely thankful for what I’m getting at my internship so far.

Deity, meet Oliver. Oliver, cry at Deity.

At today’s 9/11 Unity Walk in New York City (I’ll hopefully write more about the event latter), Oliver was a champ. He cried and freaked out like the best of them. I picked him up from home, wore him on the subway while wearing my collar (and reading Rad Dad), and we arrived in Washington’s Square park only 15 minutes after the event started! As we caught up with the group, we began our walk through lower Manhattan, arriving in one sacred space after another, listening to speakers from all sorts of faith backgrounds, and moving throughout the city. Oliver slept through most of the walk. That didn’t faze him. But it seemed that sacred spaces were just a little too much today.

One of the venues was in Soho. We found an unmarked door next to a restaurant being renovated. The door was opened and a staircase confronted us. After two long flights up, an opened door and a young woman welcomed me to enter a lovely room full of windows. But there was a catch – my shoes had to come off. I flipped off my red chucks, bent down with Oliver strapped to my chest (cuz I’m a pro), and found a lovely light blue shelf to put them on. I entered the room, looked around, and thought I was in a yoga studio. I mean…it just felt like it. It seemed a tad too…relaxed…to be in the middle of NYC, you know? It was beautiful with a lovely kitchen, lots of shoes, and it looked incredibly open, spacious, peaceful, with a large center piece decoration that was golden but not ornate. Then I noticed it. We weren’t just in a yoga studio – we were in an active hindu temple and before us wasn’t just a decoration, it was an actual deity. And as the group gathered, our speaker began to speak. And Oliver decided to lose his mind.

I know – I know. He was hot, hungry, and he woke up to discover himself face-to-face with the evil that is polyester blend clergy shirts. I would have lost my mind too. So, I stood in the back, and tried to soothe him. I got close. People didn’t mind. After the speaker finished, everyone said they were happy that Oliver was there. Some folks even took my picture (even though Oliver was cranky). But feeding him wasn’t working so I decided to change his diaper. I waited in line for the restroom and he kept melting down. Finally, once we were in the bathroom, and I began to change his diaper on the floor (and I’m still terrible at taking the Ergo off by myself and putting it back on), he howled. I mean, he howled. And it echoed throughout the temple. While I got him changed and rehooked on, I dreaded what I would see when I came out of the restroom. Would they all be staring at me? Would they think I’m a terrible father? Would my internship supervisor disown me? Luckily, everyone left the building, heading to a new place. It was just me, a screaming baby, a temple servant, and the deity. That deity. Staring at me. And Oliver kept howling. We left, and following standard protocal, he was quiet by the time I reached the fourth step down the stairwell. Whether Oliver was voicing a theological concern or just being a baby, I’ll never know. But that deity got to experience the meltdown that is Oliver. Welcome to the club big guy – welcome to the club.