It took me three years to complete my Master’s degree in Divinity. Of those three years in seminary, I attended a Sunday morning church service perhaps five times. It wasn’t a lack of interest, and I certainly wasn’t trying to abandon organized religion. Despite a commitment to my faith community at seminary, and a deep regard for faith-based justice work, something was lacking to compel me to attend a local community church every week.
Today, I usually grumble to myself while getting up on Sunday mornings for church. The community is great, and I adore the ministers. But at the risk of sounding wholly un-pious, I sometimes skip the service for no other reason than that I’d like to sip my coffee in peace, listen to Speaking of Faith on NPR, and do a crossword puzzle.
A Lutheran church in Brazil
In “the Church” (that is, the often mainstream and Protestant church) these days, there seems to be a lot of panic around the topic of young people: Where are they? How can we get them to come here? Why aren’t they interested in Sunday morning worship? Don’t they care about faith; values; community?
I certainly consider myself as a person who cares about community, faith, ethics, social justice, and even The Church. But sometimes—and I say this as someone with a degree specializing in parish ministry—the Sunday morning worship experience seems too creedal, too suffocating; trying to claim me too much as its own. In the midst of the grand pillars, the soft candlelight, the hymnody, my ancestral tradition, the question remains: what if I want to change my mind?
Rather than courting me as one more young-person’s-body in the pews on Sunday morning (as the Church sometimes does), I’d like to be appreciated as an individual whose identity sometimes transgresses traditional religious boundaries. I’m Christian, but I’m definitely not all that concerned with other people’s spiritual salvation. And although I belong to a congregation, my faith life doesn’t abide in a church alone.
One of the most spiritual experiences I had in seminary was outside the seminary walls, on the floor of a yoga studio in New York City. It was in savasana, after a particularly compelling practice, that I realized my seminary education was changing my religious life in an entirely irreversible way. Never again would I approach the Bible with the same sense of awe, assuming that hidden beneath the Hebrew and Greek was a Truth yet to be revealed. The Church became the church. The Bible became the bible. God even took on god’s own flaws – overtly masculine, strangely hierarchical, at times wrathful. As I, a Christian seminarian, opened my heart to a Buddhist practice, I found a space to mourn and accept the changes in my faith.
Instead of believing in something explicit, I now just have faith that there is something to believe in. My faith is that Good exists, and that good is what I call God. It is not that I am not reflective, or that I don’t care, or that I am not committed to what I believe. It is that there are very few religious institutions that are flexible enough to allow me to be constantly changing my own definitions of belief, ethics, social justice, and truth.
It is my experience that many fellow young people I meet also have conflicting feelings about the creedal necessities of religion. Despite caring deeply about theological concepts and ideas, it is sometimes asking too much to identify too closely with hard and fast beliefs. In a world of crossing boundaries, flexible identities, and intermingling concepts, mainstream Protestant churches have unfortunately become institutional fundamentalists. Too afraid to lose their own identities, they have begun to claw and grasp at the last hope for tomorrow: young bodies in the pews. Too busy gnashing their teeth at the absence of young people in their midst, they are not listening to our voices as we say we’re here. We care. We matter.
Change the infrastructure. Give us a voice. Let the institutions fall.
there are a lot of things i miss about seminary. mandatory bible-reading, believe it or not, IS one of them (ancient concepts and words, history encapsulated and translated to today’s world, beautiful and terrifying expressions of the nature of humanity); so is the exploration of ethics (the subtlety and relativity of right-ness, the consideration of diversities, the concern for people and the world, the earnestness).
last week i got a call from my alma mater (does that term apply for seminaries?) and the man who called me was SO CLASSICALLY UNION. it was like he spoke my language or something. he recommended this vegan ice cream called oats cream and told me about how he’s interested in psych and religion, but ulanov was on sabbatical first semester (they always are, it seems sometimes). it was simultaneously a punch in the gut and a big bear hug, remembering how much i love that place, and how far away it seems now. 
but getting back to the point. another thing i miss about seminary: PROM. as you can tell, we took it quite seriously.
i thought when i attended prom last spring that it would be my last. union kind of goes all out. the theme was “temptation in the garden of eden” – so biblical – although it seems i was the only person who took the theme semi-literally (look for the cream (nude-colored, for me) tee-dress and the strawberry necklace). we even had prom “royalty”–although union avoids anything too hierarchical, so i think we just drew names out of a hat. again: classic union. it makes me want to cry that i miss it so much, and yet, i’m so happy that it exists at all.
i have to report, however, that i was wrong about grown-up proms: union’s was not my last! that’s right. i have the good fortune of possibly four years of the only prom even dorkier than seminary prom: MED SCHOOL prom.
now. don’t be fooled by the professional DJ, the huge dance floor, or the fancy downtown hotel locale, the more-traditional prom-garb. these things SEEM cool. but in all reality, in order to partake in these things, you have to listen to a lot of talk about cadavers and exams and body functions and parts of the brain.
since B started med school, i’ve learned a lot of new things. for example: i now know what ‘histology’ is (hint: it is NOT the study of history). i also know what B is like as a student (incredibly diligent), and how proud i am of the work he’s doing in the classroom and out.
oh, and one more thing. med students are nice. they’re dorks, yes. but dorks are my favorite kind of people!!
so. one med school prom down — three to go.
and the best part of prom as a grown up? open bar.
i love sundays, but morning brunches are always tough if i haven’t planned them into our meal plan for the week.
today, i woke up to a largely empty kitchen. our produce consisted of spinach and rosemary–if you consider rosemary produce. and we had no milk, no cream, no dairy. it was time to be creative.
We had four eggs left, and i scrambled them as best i could without milk. I dug into what little was left in the fridge: spinach, rosemary, garlic, butter, and parmesan cheese.
I made a foray in our pantry and decided oatmeal would be a hearty, healthy pairing on this cold wintry morning. I toasted some sliced almonds (left over from alien babies), tossed in golden raisins, along with honey, a cinnamon stick, nutmeg, and ground cloves.
Things I liked:
1) It’s always surprising to me, the things I can come up with when I think there is no food left in the house. Lately, I’ve been challenging myself to plan one less meal per week because we usually end up a) with tons of leftovers, b) it’s cheaper and less wasteful, and c) with enough extra odds and ends to throw something tasty together, like this meal. Also helpful is a deep pantry. If I hadn’t had oatmeal, raisins, almonds, and spices just hanging around, we would have missed out on this tasty morning treat.
2) The rosemary in the eggs was delectable. I would do it again in a second.
Things I would change for next time:
1) MILK. The eggs weren’t all that malleable, and the oatmeal had a tinny, harsh quality to it. It was still a tasty meal, but milk would have made it much more pleasant (and I could have actually enjoyed my coffee).
2) SEASONING. The eggs were way too salty. I wasn’t tasting as I went–I rarely do with eggs–but the parmesan cheese provided enough saltiness without having to add any. I didn’t finish mine–but B finished his AND mine. He’s less picky than I am (lucky for me!).
3) SPICES. I would totally add cayenne and orange rind to the oatmeal next time (along, of course, with milk or cream). It needed a good kick.
reason #53,760,982,348,762,358,601 not to like the Super Bowl:
sexist advertisements make me feel like puking.
but i’m still going to mom and dad’s tomorrow to watch it, mostly because they also promised laundry, soup, and a bubble bath.
wonderful friends came to visit me and B for new years eve. we went to my parents’ cabin in northern wisconsin. it was cold, beautiful, and just what i needed to kick the year off right.
note: not my pictures.
Photo: Jennie
-
- photo by Jennie
-
- Photo by Jennie
-
- Photo by Kim
-
- Photo by Kim
-
- Photo by Kim?
-
- Photo – Kim
-
- Kim
-
- Photo by Kim
-
- Photo: Kim
-
- Photo: Kim
-
- Photo: Jennie
-
- Photo: Jennie
-
- Photo: Jennie
-
- Photo: Kim
-
- Photo: Kim
my cold today would have been so much better if only i had not taken nyquil last night. i woke up so groggy i could hardly function until 2:00 pm. i wanted to be sure to get a good night’s sleep, which i did… but i could have slept all day, too. so. i am an official nyquil hater now.
ok. whine, whine. moving on.
i think it’s about time that i fess up to something i’ve been keeping from everybody. i’ve been holding back because it is utterly ridiculous, and when i told my friend lissa about it last week she looked at me with new eyes. those eyes said: “this woman is much more of a cat-lady than i ever expected, and i reeeally don’t know what to think about it.”
so. here it is.
ahem.
*wince*
i’m toilet training our cat.
that’s right, i have this tray thing called CitiKitty and i have biodegradable, wheat-based litter that you flush down the toilet, and i even position my cat’s paws to try to teach her the right toilet position. (did i also mention that i have a very patient boyfriend?)
and. (yes, there IS another and).
i have been doing this since august.
i know.
it’s crazy.
that’s why i haven’t told you yet. i’m ALMOST ASHAMED to tell people. but i’m kinda too stubborn to stop. i want to know that our little cat is definitely NOT TRAINABLE before i stop. and so far, she’s been making some pretty rad strides, once she realized that if she… “goes”, food/treats will be her reward.
i’m not going to bore you with methodology, mostly because it’s gross and i don’t really want to talk about it unless asked. but, if you’re curious, here’s a video that explains much of the process:
what do you think? am i crazy? or would you go through this mess just to have to not clean the litterbox?
this is me and bff sophie.
we may not be looking our best, but we look happy. this is ALWAYS how we look when we are together, except for those times that her mom makes chex mix for christmas and then we eat too much and get sick.
sophie got into a ph.d. program in american history today at the University of Minnesota. i can only imagine that more schools will follow in the race to win her to their program.
but I will always be the lucky person to have the smartest person in the whole world as MY BEST FRIEND.
… wow. that sounded possessive. i meant it in a more affirming way.
…
…
ps. Soph. now that i’ve posted this, does it mean you’ll move back here?!
Well, despite all the formality of yesterday’s post — in which I professed to keep to the many goals I laid out for myself — today I am sick.
So. I was going to run, and brag effusively about how wonderful I am to have already begun my exceedingly difficult regimen of thrice-weekly exercise.
But. Twas not to be.
So, instead I took pictures of my simple little pasta dinner. Which, by the way, I cooked the entire time with toilet paper stuffed up my nose. I have one of those ridiculous colds where you don’t actually FEEL sick–that, except for the sore throat and runny nose, I feel quite normal.
Anyway. Tonight’s dinner was really fun to make (despite the elephantine-like tusks protruding from my nostrils) because it reminded me of friends. You know those meals that just have a little love packed in them? This was like that, except it was a surprise because I’ve never made it before.
It was a Fried Tofu, Olive, and Red Pepper Pasta. The tofu reminded me of Tallu, the first person to ever serve me tofu AND have me successfully finish my meal. This is mostly because I wanted her to like me and we were just becoming friends. She steamed the tofu and made this delicious gingery, vinegar-y sauce to drizzle atop it. Tallu is one of the most accomplished cooks I know, and only her skills could have convinced me that — whoa, there — I actually like tofu.
This recipe itself is from a cookbook that Kate gave me, and has been dogeared in our household now for a few years. It still has the note she tucked in the front cover, with the pages of her favorite recipes indicated (whole wheat pancakes, portobello mushroom sandwiches…). This is one of the few recipes left to try, and I’m sorry I waited this long!
The few things I would change? To save a few bucks, I bought cheap parmesan cheese and canned olives. The cheese was mildly passable (though I much prefer fresh), but the olives were awful, tinny, tasteless creatures. Never again.
Also, the basil at Cub last weekend was moldy and I didn’t buy any. So, I didn’t have any, which the recipe called for. Still, in spite all these failings, it was mighty tasty.
Now: more tea and bedtime for me. Tomorrow if I’m not sick, I will report back on my awesome run!
for months, my colleague/friend rachel has been telling me about how fabulous the moosewood cookbook is. last night, i finally got around to cooking something from it.
i made stuffed cabbage. sounds a little weird, but we’ve had an extra head of cabbage rolling around our fridge for longer than i’m willing to divulge here, so i figured it was worth a shot. the recipe is actually in the link to the googlebook above, so i’m not going to mess with spelling it out here… you just get the pictures and my sparse commentary.
Cooking with cabbage was a very unique experience. My not-so-extensive cabbage background includes slaws and soups, so to core it, boil it, peel it apart, and use the leaves to hold all the stuffing ingredients was completely alien to me. Funny enough, the cabbage itself actually took on something of an incandescent, ghostly, and alien quality of itself, as well.
Here, I thought the cabbage leaves looked lacy, skin-like, and very eerie. I don’t know what to make of this picture… totally not appetizing. But how could I not include it here?! You must be prepared what you’re up against. Alien Skin, that’s what.
Once the cabbage is cored and boiling, you begin to sautee the onion, celery, garlic, and carrots in butter. Later, I added salt, pepper, and sunflower seeds.
Once all that jazz is sauteed up, you add a chopped tart apple, a pound of ricotta cheese, lemon, tamari, and some other stuff… I forget what it was now…
Then you take the ricotta-based stuffing and roll it up into the cabbage. Here, I thought the cabbage-rolls looked like little baby aliens–see, the stems are like spines! Again–NOT appetizing to look at, but I promise, it is delicious (plus later, it gets prettier). Spread some cashew-ginger sauce (in my case, almond-ginger) on top and stick it in the oven for a half an hour.
And viola! This dish was by far one of the most surprising, delightful meal I’ve made in a long time. It is tart, creamy, and sweet all at once. Next time I’d pare down on the ricotta–I don’t think the stuffing needs to be *that* creamy–but if you make this, DON’T LEAVE OUT THE SAUCE. It’s too good to leave out.