Redeemer Review
Church of the
Redeemer
From the Vicar
Notes From the Coach
It’s Back to School Time! So What are we Learning?
Every morning at Camp Hogwarts, Redeemer’s answer to Vacation Bible school, we began in this way:
“Inside each one of you lives a magical being. We’re here to help you find it.”
As I said these words day after day, I realized that nothing could better sum up what the summer of 2005 has
been for me. Between contemplative healing work with Francis Geddes, dream work with both parishioners and
Jeremy Taylor, and a week on an Oregon mountain top in a beautiful room away from telephones, television and
the internet, doing nothing but writing, reading fascinating articles about religion and science, enjoying good
conversation with my husband Jay and walking through the woods with Mystique, I met my own magical being in
a world whose highest reality was love. I am more convinced than ever that God longs for us to discover our
happiness. God exists to show us love, wholeness and healing.
Since there can be no love without relationship, our relationships, the others we meet are, of course, the key.
A Faith Community is a team. As anyone who has ever played a team sport or sung in a choir or played in a band
knows, there’s an amazing synergy that happens when a team clicks, when, after weeks and months of practice,
of learning one another’s moves, suddenly everyone is able to move practically as one, catching a ball seen only
in the corner of an eye, blending voices into a single instrument of haunting beauty, picking up my partner’s riff
and weaving a new variation, at once completely inspired by his notes and completely my own. All these are little
glimpses of true reality. Quantum physics is rediscovering in the language of mathematics and reason what St.
Paul knew by prayer thousands of years ago. We are one body. That body is divine, and it is through love of
others, especially the ones who drive us crazy, that we are saved.
St. Paul also knew that to find that radiant light, that healing, that wholeness, requires no less practice than
getting good at sports or music. Time and again, St. Paul compares the quest for God to an athlete training for
an important match. There’s one important difference between spirituality and sport, however. Unlike a soccer
match in which one team wins and the other loses, there are no losers in God’s kingdom: everyone who comes to
practice with good faith will win!
As fall returns with its schedules and practices, do keep us on your schedule. Every Sunday is game day. At
other times, we offer all kinds of practice: contemplative prayer, Bible study, dream work, after school,
Floating Friday, Wild Young Caribou, Moms in motion, times to check in with each other and God. But Sunday is
game day. Make a pledge to come play in the fields of the Church. I promise you’ll be a winner.
Love,
The Coach
September
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