{"id":9022,"date":"2014-11-21T11:57:19","date_gmt":"2014-11-21T19:57:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/?p=9022"},"modified":"2014-11-21T12:21:54","modified_gmt":"2014-11-21T20:21:54","slug":"elders-walls-hide-our-real-identities","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/elders-walls-hide-our-real-identities\/","title":{"rendered":"Elders: Walls Hide Our Real Identities"},"content":{"rendered":"

Photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons. Learn more about this image, here<\/a>.<\/center><\/em><\/p>\n

Nurturing Elders:<\/em>
\nWalls Hide Our Real Identities<\/strong>
\nBy the Rev. Paul Graves<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cWe learned that to come to fulfillment of life it takes absolutely nothing at all
\u2013 beyond the development of the best in ourselves.<\/em>\u201d
\n — Joan Chittister, The Gift of Years, p. 71<\/strong> <\/center><\/p>\n

\"INSIGHTS_NuturingElders_paul\"I happen to think that Joan Chittister is on to something. But how do we develop the best in ourselves?<\/p>\n

One way is to take the Incarnation of God (Jesus, folks!) more seriously than as a cuddly baby in a straw manger on an artificially-set birthday in December. Christmas would become my favorite holy-day again if we could really embrace the Incarnation rather than the holiday!<\/p>\n

On my first trip to Israel in early 1992, I visited with the Israeli man across the plane\u2019s aisle as we descended into Tel Aviv. I asked him a pointed question: What will it take for Israelis and Palestinians to seriously work for peace? His answer came in two words: NO WALLS!<\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

I recently thought of that conversation as I was preparing this column about Identity Theft. No, make that \u201cMistaken Identity\u201d. Or, maybe \u201cIdentity Confusion.\u201d Well, whatever you choose to call it, there\u2019s a good chance you experience it as you\u2019re shaped by an imperfect Christian Tradition.<\/p>\n

I grieve over the walls built by the double-messages most of our churches offer to their participants about their true identities as \u201cchildren of God.\u201d I\u2019m sure the effort by most local churches and their participants are not intended to build walls of identity confusion. But too often they do!<\/p>\n

Our message is conflicted. I think it has mostly to do with our deeply conditioned, often contradictory understandings of who God is. That confuses what we think of when proclaiming we are \u201cchildren of God\u201d, made in God\u2019s likeness and image.<\/p>\n

Are we children of a God who we believe acts only in terms of \u201ceither\/or\u201d and \u201cblack-and-white\u201d, and is quick to exclude those not \u201clike us\u201d? <\/p>\n

Or might we be children of a God who we see open up the entire universe to our wondering minds and hearts? Does God rejoice with us at the coo of a baby, and also embraces us as we speak and act for justice for all people, not just those \u201clike us\u201d?<\/p>\n

I don\u2019t pretend to speak for you in this matter. But I do puzzle over the conflicting message when our Christian liturgies and music \u2013 historic and current-day — so persistently emphasize our utter depravity, yet sneak in ways to say God loves us as children of God. I get religious whip-lash!<\/p>\n

It can also cause some Identity Confusion. Am I a child of God, loved unconditionally \u2013 especially when I honestly show my propensity for being an imperfect human?<\/p>\n

Or is my relationship with God really based on following the unhealthier religious rules set down by our historic faith and molded by our religious culture\u2019s fears? Sometimes, we need to be bold enough to question those religious practices we follow in and out of the church building to discover if the God we are following really is the God Jesus proclaimed in the Gospels.<\/p>\n

Jesus is the full Incarnation of God. His entire ministry was devoted to tearing down the walls between God and humanity. He offered himself as the \u201cmodel of humanity\u201d that God intends all persons to be. He came not to make people religious, but more authentically human!<\/p>\n

We can discover the \u201cbest in ourselves\u201d, ala Joan Chittister, when we look more deeply into the courageous humanity that Jesus shows throughout the Gospels. But more than that \u2013 we see that \u201cbest\u201d as we experience a no-walls, unconditionally loving relationship with God.<\/p>\n

\n

The Rev. Paul Graves serves as the chair of the Conference Council on Older Adult Ministries.<\/em><\/center><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons. Learn more about this image, here. Nurturing Elders: Walls Hide Our Real Identities By the Rev. Paul Graves \u201cWe learned that to come to fulfillment of life it takes absolutely nothing at all\u2013 beyond the development of the best in ourselves.\u201d — Joan Chittister, The Gift of Years, p. 71 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":51,"featured_media":9023,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[111,142],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-9022","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-channels","8":"category-older-adult-ministries"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2014\/11\/INSIGHTS_NurturingElders.jpg?fit=700%2C357&ssl=1","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2l75j-2lw","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9022","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/51"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9022"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9022\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9030,"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9022\/revisions\/9030"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9023"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9022"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9022"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.pnwumc.org\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9022"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}