Yes

"I believe we can seize this future together because we are not as divided as our politics suggests. We’re not as cynical as the pundits believe. We are greater than the sum of our individual ambitions, and we remain more than a collection of red states and blue states. We are and forever will be the United States of America." - President Obama

That is all. Thank you America.

Photog Update

A little glimpse of life here over the past two weeks...

A and her buddy Max at daycare. These two have been pals since they were born and they love each other. We pray for Max every. single. night. usually three times minimum. So sweet.

My banana bread making helper, pre bob haircut (look how long that hair was!)

Checking out the bunny rabbit and Schuster's Playfarm just this morning. As is typical of A with animals, she was totally mesmerized but did not want to touch it!

Riding the little animal train at Schuster's! Too fun!

Climbing and sliding, a big favorite around here.

Miss J slept in the ergo (aka sleep whisperer) the entire visit at the Playfarm, so of course as soon as we got into the car for the drive home she was ready to play. That smile just melts me.

Beloved, beautiful girls (another shot from daycare - thanks Jen!)

Election Season

Oh, election season. How I love and loathe thee. At its best, this season is a vibrant time of people becoming impassioned and further exploring their own beliefs and stances. But at its worst, it is a monopoly of money and tactics and choruses of "he said, she said" where it becomes difficult to pin down the truth.

And it seems that each election cycle only becomes more complicated by the increasing prevalence of the internet and social networking. Granted, the advancements in technology have been amazing on many accounts - i.e. my ability to livestream in all three debates thus far, with not a tv to be seen in our house. But then there is the darker side to it, the parts I don't like to admit - the parts that leave me obsessing over fact checker and emails and online articles and status updates/comments/responses for far many more hours than in reality I have the time/energy for. A mixed bag.

During the DNC, a writer whose books and blog I very much enjoy posted something referencing how awesome Michelle Obama is. (And seriously, I couldn't agree more - what a brilliant hottie, for real.) This writer also happens to be known as a Christian author. You should have seen the firestorm that imploded on her Facebook wall as a result! Some people agreeing with her excitedly, others denouncing her, stating that there is no way the Obamas are Christians and that they were disappointed in her for saying something affirmative in regards to Michelle. The whole thing was making me a bit sick, but I couldn't pull myself away from reading each new comment and thought.

Hence, an issue that is bound to come up for me during election season - defending my beliefs as a liberal Christian. Talk about one of my hot buttons. It is clearly a complicated conversation, as are all things political, but at the end of the day, Jesus wasn't a Republican or a Democrat. And the belief that a vote for one party or the other determines the authenticity of your faith, well, that's ludicrous. People on both sides of the spectrum have really real (and grounded) faith that guides their decision making, and if you want to see me get in a tizzy, challenge me otherwise.

In light of all of this, I loved this recent blog post, titled Why I am a Christian Democrat. Ellen Painter Dollar clearly articulates many of my own leanings and reasonings without being vengeful or defensive. I especially appreciated this section on "Biblical Values" (which, like Dollar, I agree reach far beyond one or two hot button issues):

 I am a Democrat because “Biblical” values are far from clear cut, so I focus on what Jesus chose to focus on in his earthly ministry. Jesus understood, I think, that our holy scriptures are not always consistent when it comes to details, even such important details as the character of God (Did the same God who called the little children to him really mastermind the murder of the innocents?). So Jesus made it simple for us. Jesus said there are two things we must do: Love God. Love our neighbors as ourselves. To figure out in practical terms what it means to love God and others, we look to what Jesus did and said, searching for common threads. The most obvious common thread is that Jesus continually reached out and offered hospitality, healing, hope, and help to those who were poor, sick, powerless, or reviled.

Jesus’s continual emphasis on our duty toward the poor and marginalized is most beautifully and memorably expressed in the Parable of the Sheep and the Goats (Matthew 24:31–46). Jesus says, quite simply, that any time we offer concrete help to someone suffering from hunger or cold or imprisonment or sickness or lack of welcome, we are loving God. And Jesus doesn’t instruct us to first decide if those in need of a cloak or a drink of water deserve our help. Jesus doesn’t say we can first figure out whether it’s fair to ask me to give away my only cloak or offer a stranger a drink from the well I built with my own two hands, with my wealth, to nurture me and my family.

Time and time and time again, Jesus put caring for “the least of these” at the center of his ministry and his message. These days, neither party is doing a particularly good job of making the poor central to their message, preferring to focus instead on the middle class, who are more likely than the poor to vote. But when it comes time for me to color in a circle on my voting card, I’m going to choose the candidate whose party has shown, most recently via the adoption of universal health care, that it takes seriously our societal obligation to care for those who cannot, for whatever reason, care adequately for themselves.

There are many reasons why I'll be casting my vote for Obama in a few weeks, and I won't lay them all out here, but if you are curious to know why or to discuss other topics, I would be more than happy to. My hope is that we, as the collective of Christ followers voting, will make an informed decision, grounded in research and careful consideration and most of all, in faith. At the end of the day, there isn't a right or wrong, but there is a right or left (my version of political humor...).

And, if you are still an undecided voter (or if you are decided but just curious - I loved taking this), I highly recommend checking out the quiz on this website: http://www.isidewith.com. The survey is very thorough and you can get a pretty detailed score by being sure to utilize the "choose another stance" option to highlight your more specified beliefs. Seriously. Check it out. And vote.

All in a Name

Way back when our now "big girl" Adah was still a wee babe, my friend posted about this ebook on her FB page. I read then about Scot McKnight's essay, Junia is Not Alone, and showed the link to Paul as well. There and then (and after checking on this opinion to said husband), I pretty much made up in my mind that if we had another girl we'd be naming her Junia. Not only do I love the name, but the legacy that comes with it. I hope that our girls grow up knowing that nothing, especially their gender, can stop them from being and doing what they are meant to do in this world. I dream that they will be women of vision and substance. And I can't wait to watch their stories unfold.

(Cheese over. But it's true.)

this body

this body

30 years and then some

today, they felt each one

lined up next to freshman college coeds...all of us there to dance

for them, a class, one of many each day, each week

for me, an hour and a half of precious

a gift

to remind myself that i am more than...

a nurturer

wife

sister

daughter

mother. mother of two very small people.

two very small brilliant people who very much depend on this body

this body

that i am, can be, was, want to be. long to be.

a dancer.

this body that is indeed my own, but that does not feel like my own

that feels stretched and widened and imbalanced and pulled at and

well, sucked on

this body

this body connected to this mind that still thinks it can do all of the same things that it did as a college coed

pre 20, 25, 30

pre two little tiny humans

a body that is meant to fly but that at the moment is mostly thudding to the ground

this body

fighting off frustration, this

that is still mine, but that is also theirs

that must learn to reconfigure, rediscover, reshape

ground

to dance again

the same but immeasurably different

change.

this body that still needs patience

a little bit softer and easier approach to itself and to the world and to the marley floor

this body that i know so well and in this very moment of especially today that i don't feel like i know at all

this body that is not going anywhere, that i must learn to love

no matter how many hours, classes, days, months, years it takes

so that we can find a way to dance together again

body

this.

Baptism

Paul and I started dating in November of 2003 - he had already finished college, and I was in my senior year at the University of Minnesota. That following April, my Dad's cancer, which had been in remission, returned - this time in his lymph nodes. I deferred my grad school acceptance in a last minute decision to move back to Lincoln following graduation. During the next year, Paul and my relationship got more and more serious, as I simultaneously watched my father get sicker and sicker and slip through all of our clinging fingers. We lost him in April 2005.

I will always and forever be grateful for the time I got with my Dad during that last year, and also for the time he and Paul got to spend together. Paul and I took his Lutheran Doctrine class at the Lutheran Student Center, and my dad would always remind Paul that he would make a very good pastor - an ELCA pastor, of course. My Dad grew to love Paul, in spite of the fact that he did not in fact grow up in or belong to the ELCA denomination (my father's vantage point for understanding the world). He would, however, frequently remind him that the Covenant Church (which Paul did grow up in), was really just an offshoot of the Lutheran Church. My Dad was like the father in My Big Fat Greek Wedding - everything somehow traced back to the ELCA and the teachings of Martin Luther.

In February 2005, months before we got engaged officially and without me knowing it, Paul asked my father for permission to ask me to marry him. This gift that he gave to him, to me, is still beyond my comprehension. At the time, my Dad was pretty filled up on morphine, but no amount of painkiller could make him neglect his allegiance to his beloved ELCA and the theology of the Lutheran Church. So, he told Paul yes - on one condition - that he would promise to someday infant baptize our children.

We have kept that promise, in the best way we know how. The church we belong to in Madison, also where Paul works, practices infant dedication, and we don't have any strong connections to ELCA pastors or churches nearby. So for both of the girls, we chose to do a baptism in our home, inviting our families and our community to be a part. Our friend Tim baptized both girls (traveling from Portland for Miss J's, bless his heart), and beforehand Paul and my sister coached him through just how my Dad would have done the baptism himself, had he been able. Oh, and had he been, he would have been bursting with pride. He liked nothing better than weddings and baptisms, one of the many reasons he so adored campus ministry.

So we baptized our girls to fulfill this promise to my Dad, but also to make so many promises to them - to love them as best as we can, to remind them constantly of the grace that is God's gift to them, to place others in their lives who will also love them, to raise them in the church in spite of all of its shortcomings and the inherent brokenness of humankind. Because at the end of the day, "the church" is our people - the people who speak truth into your life even when you don't want to hear it, the people who bring you chili and banana bread when the cancer is taking over and they don't know what else to do, the people who stand in your backyard and watch with love as you baptize your sweet tiny babe.

Two Saturday evenings ago, when we baptized J, it was a perfect fall evening in Madison. There was nothing I could do to contain my overwhelm as I looked around to see our families, our dearest of friends and our Madison community all present to support us and our promises to our girl. I have spent the greater part of my adult life attempting to come to terms with my own faith, and how it is not that of my father's, as heavily influenced by him as it might be. So part of me struggled, knowing it wasn't the typical Lutheran baptism that he likely had in mind that February 2005 evening. But another part of me knew, knows, that the pieces were all in place, and that our promises to teach and raise and love were the perfect combination of our promise to my father and our own faith story as a couple (and now a family).

Some photos from the weekend...

Pre-weekend festivities with our beloved friends and Portlandians.

The Meyer crew.

The Meyers and the LeFebers, atop the Wisconsin Capitol and unabashedly sporting Husker gear on the Husker/Badger game day. Classic.

Sisters.

Backyard Baptism.

All I'm saying is...

Watch this video.