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Friday much of the Christian world remembered a horrific execution of a man who taught about peace, about the worth of persons, who lived that life… Theological understandings of who he was and what he did, and what that execution mean vary among the 2 billion or so Christians, and, well that man is a religious figure in other faiths as well, so increase that number by at least a billion, and it’s okay that there are these wide understandings, but for me my journey, my story will come from where I am, who I am, my understandings and experiences, they may not be the same as yours, and if they are I am greatly surprised. What words flow after this, are from that place where I am and/or that of the faith communities I am from… For some the events I relate to of so long ago are “historic” for some they are metaphorical, for some they are somewhere in-between, or outside those two descriptions… I ask, that you interpret and take them as they work for you, your theological understandings, your relationship and journey with the Holy.

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I love to read… I love it when I read and the words come alive, and I find myself transported into the world of what I am reading. It can be fiction or non fiction, I don’t care I love to read. I could read biblical commentaries or a wonderful science fiction novel days on end and it would seem as just minutes passed. I love to read.  (Note this post is a ramble, of jumbled thoughts that sort of flow)

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A few weeks ago I stood with people of faith on the  front steps of the Oregon State Capital. As we listened to the greetings and welcome from two elected officials, I found myself reading the words engraved on the left side (as you look toward it) of the entrance: "A free state is formed and is maintained by the voluntary union of the whole people joined together under the same body of laws for the common welfare and sharing of benefits justly apportioned" and pondering what if our government really embraced these words. What if each person who stepped into that building to legislate, to govern… sought to do so in ways reflective of those words.  I pondered as well, and still do, how if these words were lived out by the nation as a whole what would happen… I think if we were truly a free state as described by those words, this interfaith group would not have been standing on those steps for the reasons we were. We would not have needed to witness and advocate and discuss issues of homelessness, healthcare, hunger…. poverty.

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