The RLP Retreat

So I got to visit RLP's church in San Antonio for a Franciscan Retreat. Being around so many bloggers has inspired to blog again! About this event, anyway.

It was a great trip. I drove down with my buddy Xander, which was a lot of fun. It turns out Texas is actually pretty if you go south and east-like. There are hills and trees and stuff. Who knew? It was great to have a friend to go with. If you know me, you probably aren't surprised to know that having someone to go with increased the likelihood of going.

So we went the week that was supposed to be for "clergy", and I'm not really clergy, but I figured I'm in school with a bunch of 'em and I might teach some future clergy-folk someday, so that has to be close enough. I'm really glad that we ended up going on that week because we got to meet some very cool people doing very different kinds of ministry. Emergent folks, Baptist folks, several Disciples of Christ folks (woot for Restoration movement folks!) and others.

We had one session where Gordon asked everybody to share their funniest ministry story or the most important thing they've learned. Well, I don't have any ministry stories, but I can't pass up what seems like an opportunity to tell a joke that honors and old friend, so I told my joke about the Pope and the Rabbi. I think that's close enough to a ministry story. Paulette appreciated it, anyway, which is good enough for me.

I got to meet a fellow "Pirate" blogger who went by the handle revsparker in a certain chatroom not too long ago. Sean is definitely a cool guy and I think his church is lucky to have him. He's the kind of guy I know I could have really cool conversations with if only we happened to live in the same city. It was great to find out that we do, in fact, have cool conversations when we are in the same city. Sean ministers at a Unitarian Universalist church in Salt Lake City of all places.

I also got to play some disc golf with RLP, which was a lot of fun. He has a great way of playing with folks of varying abilities which we used. Essentially it was five of us against the course. Each throw, we just used whomever's shot was the best. I'm proud to say I had the best drive once! (And yes, we did birdy that hole.)

It was structured like a real Franciscan retreat, which means we met for contemplative, liturgical style prayer/worship services at the canonical hours which was really cool. I definitely dig the way they did worship over there.

The theme of the retreat was making a "Rule of Life." As a (sort of) good church of Christ boy, this stuff is all pretty new to me, but I've been blessed by it quite a bit. For awhile I've been sort of drawn and pushed towards the spiritual disciplines tradition through reading folks like Richard Foster and Dallas Willard and by learning from friends here and there. Taking this retreat has given me occasion to blog a bit about this stuff.

Some things take a long time

I'm 25 years old. I think it's fair to say I've been reasonably successful at life so far. Not to toot my own horn, but it's probably fair to say I'm reasonably talented at a few things. I've had to work hard sometimes, but by and large I'm used to things coming quickly at least, if not always easily.

This problem (and it is a problem) has been reinforced by the fact that I've actually been taught to believe that my efforts should have quick results. Theologically speaking, I grew up believing that righteousness/holiness/fruitfulness/whatever-you-want-to-call-it would happen right now if only I would start acting right and trying hard enough.

In high school, I was a wrestler. In wrestling, you're expected to get to the lowest possible weight class so you can wrestle guys of a reasonable size. Now, it is certainly possible, and would have been possible for me, to just live healthy all year-round, but the path of least-resistance is to lose weight during the season and gain weight the rest of the time. You can guess what I (and most of us 14-18 year-old kids) did. I learned to expect that weight-loss can and should happen fast.

In the long run, neither physical health nor spiritual growth have come quickly or easily for me. Anytime I've set out with a spurt of willpower to change and live differently forever and lose weight/get in shape/read my bible everyday/repent of this or that sin/never do this or that bad thing again I have inevitably failed, experienced inordinate guilt, given up, and settled, more or less comfortably, into my original pattern, my expectations subtly adjusted.

As I've read the spiritual disciplines literature, I've felt drawn to the slowness and deliberateness of it. I'm drawn to the recognition that true transformation cannot be brought about by our willpower but neither will it happen against our will. We must "put ourselves in God's way", so to speak, and wait patiently.

I also appreciate the sense that we need a community that supports a different way of living if we want to live differently. We don't simply need people to hold us accountable or give us pep talks, we need a community whose rhythms and patterns intentionally model and encourage a different way of life.

Not only does the spiritual disciplines tradition encourage community with others living today, it draws upon wisdom from the ages. Rather than reinventing the wheel, we learn old ways of living passed down through the ages. We walk down a well-worn path that our fathers and mothers have told us is a good path. We do not have to find our own way; we are free to find the Way that was there before we were born.

So at the retreat, I won't say there was a Life-Changing Moment. Rather, I experienced an entirely different communal rhythm. I got a chance to take a little walk down the path and talk about it with some friends. I learned about making a Rule of Life, and it isn't a 3 Step solution to all my problems. But I do think the idea of taking on disciplines in community which can help me intentionally honor the values I say I have is one I will stick with for a long time.

I am not very good at this. This will take a long time. At this point, it only takes the slightest distraction from my normal rhythms to throw me off from the disciplines I'm trying to take up. But that is ok. Some things take a long time.