Iconoclast by Gregory Berns - I relate

Just finished the book. I am not typically a library book reader. I like to own books, and keep them on dusty shelves forever, but I did check this out from the library. Good book, and I felt like someone really understood how I thought.

Worth buying. I might have to get a copy even though I've read it now.

Pastor Phil on HEX Education Radio

On Sunday night from 11pm until the Witching hour I was interviewed by my friends, and local Salem Witches Christian Day and Sandra Powers on HEX Education. The interview lasted for about an hour. If you listen to the program, I don't come on until half way through the 2 hour show. You can listen to the program here.

Pine Sunday at The Gathering

This last Sunday we celebrated Pine Sunday instead of Palm Sunday here in Salem. Weird, huh? Well, you can read more about here.

Saint Patrick was a Welshman!

That's right - it's true, and to commemorate this fact I have written a song about it. Evan Hansen helped me with the lyrics.

If you are part of the Boston Welsh gang, hopefully we will see you at McGann's Pub in Boston for the Ireland-Wales match on the 21st.



Saint Patrick was a Welshman

Young Patrick was a Welshman you took him as a slave
His coat was green but his blood ran red as the Draig Goch (Red Dragon) that we wave
He escaped and learned his letters, returned and scared your snakes
now you have a Welshman as your blessed patron saint

Your fathers were our brothers and sons in olden days
Your maidens are our sisters, so keep your hands away!
You'll cry upon your Guinness when it comes Saint Patrick's Day
'cause Patrick was a Welshman, and he still is one today

He's looking down from heaven every time we play
Yr Iaith Nefoedd (Heaven's Language - Welsh) upon his lips at the start of every game
From kickoff at the mid-field the faithful hear him pray
Dressed in red he shouts aloud for the boys who have the Brains

And now good Christian brothers, it's just a game we play
Whether Iechyd Da or Slainte (Welsh and Irish toasts for "good health") we tip our cups today
We share our saints and ales, with heads held high we say
Patrick is an Irish Saint
Patrick is an Irish Saint
Patrick is an Irish Saint
But a Welshman to this day!

You'll cry upon your Guinness when it comes Saint Patrick's Day
'cause Patrick is an Irish Saint, but a Welshman to this day!

The Welsh are Coming! Gymanfa Ganu - Salem, MA

Oh my Gosh!

We held our first Cymanfa Ganu in Salem, MA. Meirwyn Walters was the conductor. I acted as the emcee of the event. The Saengerfest Choir and North Shore Christian Men's Choir joined us for the event. As did Jodi Jenkins-Ainsworth, Rose Wolf, and Stella Price who performed her poetry on "Tin Baths in Wales."

We expected somewhere around 40 to at most 100 people to show up, but we had a front page article in the Salem News. A color photo on the front page had me waving a Welsh Flag in front of the church where the Cymanfa was happening, and it said "The Welsh are Coming!" At 5:30 there were over 40 people there. By 5:45 there were over 100. By 6pm when the event was to begin there were over 240 people in the room.

This was a great first Cymanfa in Salem, and a fantastic beginning to Wales Week Boston!

First Church Salem - thanks.
Meirwyn Walters - thanks.
Choirs - thanks.
Cymrodorion Society of Boston - thanks.

This was one big wow!

ST DAVID: DOING BIG THINGS IN BOSTON? (A press Release Headed to Wales)

The city of Boston in Massachusetts is typically thought of as a center of Irish American life, but next week it will become a focal point for Saint David's Day events in the United States ranging from the saintly to the strange.

The Boston Cymrodorion Society, active in the area since the heydays of Welsh-American cultural life in the late nineteenth century, is at the heart of a cluster of events at which the Boston Welsh will be celebrating Wales’ patron saint.

From the traditional (a Cymanfa Ganu in Salem) to the modern (Tom Jones is performing in Boston) the ascetic (prayers waist-deep in the frigid waters of the Atlantic Ocean), organisations as diverse as The Gathering (a church in Salem, Massachusetts), the Welsh Assembly Government and the UK Consulate General are involved alongside the Cymrodorion in arranging events.

The Ryder Cup is even making an appearance, to draw Americans to Newport for the golfing contest in 2010.

Pastor Phil Wyman of The Gathering (himself a member of the Boston Cymrodorion, and the organiser of Dunkin' Like David) believes that Boston deserves to be better known for its Welsh events: “I hope to see Wales Week Boston grow larger each year,” he said. “There’s no reason why it shouldn’t. This is just the second year St David’s Day has received official support in Boston, and the success of our outreach has been phenomenal. There is a great interest in Wales here in America.”

Aled Llion Jones, who teaches Welsh at Boston’s Harvard University and is active with the local Welsh community, emphasises the historical strength of Welsh America: “Welsh-language culture was once strong across much of the United States, and especially here on the east coast. There were poets, novelists, periodicals, newspapers – you name it – being published in Welsh, and the Welsh were a vital force in many aspects of American cultural history, from the earliest European settlements to the Civil War and the anti-slavery movement. It is a relatively unknown story, but one with strong roots.”

Boston Cymrodorion: www.freewebs.com/cymrodorion; cymrodorion@gmail.com

St David’s Day Week in Boston features the following events:

- Cymanfa Ganu: First Church Salem, MA.
- Dunkin' Like David (Dewch i'r Dŵr fel Dewi) a Saint David's Day “polar bear plunge” at Revere Beach. Charity fundraiser.
- Boston Children's Museum: Merlin and Dragons animation
- Tom Jones sings in Boston on Saint David's Day.
- The Ryder Cup (next contested in Newport in 2010) on show.
- Welsh Whiskey Tasting
- Talks and Welsh-language classes at Harvard
- (with luck) Celebration of Welsh rugby victory over France!

Wondering About the Future, Considering the Discipline of Hospitality

So, here I am listening to The Pogues, Flogging Molly and The Dubliners on Pandora. I am meanwhile getting back to reading "Making Room" by Christine D. Pohl. (Check out the box on the left if you are interested in reading it. I bought it used on Amazon for a few bucks.) I can not help but wonder what place hospitality will need to take in the life of the church, and even our nation should the economy continue to decline.

Currently the leaders of our nation are using the money of our future to survive the problems of our present. Could there be an eventual end to this way of doing things? Will we need to survive by caring for one another in simple non-government designed means? Do you think that this ancient art of hospitality will need to find a new place in contemporary hearts?

Dunkin' Like David - Join us March 1st

This is our trial run for Dunkin' Like David, a Boston polar bear plunge on Saint david's Day - March 1st, 2009. This is part of Boston Welsh (Cymrodorion) Saint David's Day events. Saint David is 6th century Celtic Saint, and the patron saint of Wales. Come and join us on March 1st at 1pm in the afternoon for Dunkin' Like David.

Faith and Ethnicity SynchroBlog List

Tuesday Barrack Obama will be inaugurated as President. Tensions run high in the Middle East. I will be beginning a part time temporary position as "Intern on Wales" (a PR position) for the British Consulate in Boston. Each of the things have something in common. There is an element of ethnicity which comes to play in them. This month's SynchroBlog offering is on the subject of Faith and Ethnicity. Below are the offerings which have been presented thus far.

May you grow in thought and develop in deepening concern as you read. Please leave a response in the comment section for the author of those posts you enjoy. Well, heck leve a comment with the one's that make you mad too. That would be fun!

For my post I am sending you to one of my other blog sites. So, click the first line below to go to The Why Man, and read my offering. You can return here to navigate back to the others. Have fun and be challenged.

Phil Wyman (That's me) on Seeing the Middle East from a Jewish Perspective
Joshua Jinno the Antechurch
Raffi Shahinian on Faith and Ethnicity: A True Story
Susan Barnes on Just a God of the West
K.W. Leslie on Why I went to an all-white church
Adam Gonnerman on Multicultural experience (and inexperience)
Matt Stone on Is the church ready for a multiethnic future?
Beth Patterson on Viva la particularities
Steve Hayes on Christianity and ethnicity"
Matthew Snyder asks What's Your Nation?
Jeff Goins on Gypsies in Spain

Faith and Ethnicity: Wednesday, Jan. 14th SynchroBlog

The next SynchroBlog is coming up. The topic is Faith and Ethnicity. If you want to join the SynchroBlog let us know. Info for signing up can be found here.

Darkness: a Thin Place for My Soul

Today's SynchroBlog covers the subject of Darkness and Light as Motifs of Spirituality.

I like the darkness. I find it comforting. My eyes feel good in darkness.

I like fog at night. It speaks to my heart of shrouded mystery, and things yet to be discovered in the adventure of this life. Darkness is a Thin Place for me. A place where the presence of God seems nearer, and the unseen realm draws closer.

A simple reading of my Bible seems to set in place a specific motif of darkness and light. Light - good. Darkness - bad. This too is the cultural dynamic of these words, when placed in the context of spirituality. Many would call Christianity light, and Satanism dark, and therefore contextualize darkness as a bad thing.

So,what does this say about me that I like physical darkness, and am attracted to it? Am I a human version of a scary creature? a spider, a bat, or some kind of psychic vampire? Or could it be that the motifs of darkness and light in their identification with spirituality are not as simple as we at first surmise?

God separated darkness and light, and it was good. So the story of Creation tells us. The people of Israel saw the presence of the Lord hover over the mountain in thick darkness, and a voice spoke out of the cloud. It was a darkness which stood between the children of Israel and the Egyptians who pursued them across the Red Sea, and saved them from their oppressors.

In these three illustrations we discover that darkness is good, that the presence of the Lord is found in it, and that darkness can even be used to save.

Could it be that the typical motif of darkness as ignorance, and evil somehow blends seamlessly into the idea that darkness can be our salvation?

In darkness I look for mystery: like the God who hides in thick clouds of darkness on the mount, and booms with a voice speaking over my head with things too deep for me. In darkness I look for comfort as though I am hidden from the greedy eye of trouble by the shadow of His wings.

Strangely even difficult darkness has brought me salvation. In my troubles my eyes look up. In my confusion and ignorance I learn not to trust my own sensory perception, or mental acuity.

The darkness carries both the positive elements like the presence of the Lord, and it carries negative elements like confusion and trouble. Who am I to think that they do not somehow simultaneously live in this darkness together, and somehow swirl together in a storm of both violence and salvation? The worlds collide together in darkness, and I find myself in Thin Places where my soul is nourished.

SynchroBlog List for Dec. 10th: Darkness and Light as Motifs of Spirituality

Phil Wyman finds Darkness: a Thin Place for the Soul
Adam Gonnerman on being "In Darkness"
Lainie Petersen at Headspace
Jeff Goins is "Walking in the Light with Jesus"
Ellen Haroutunian finds Holy Darkness
Bethany Stedman thinks Light is Coming
Julie Clawson walks through Darkness and Light
Kathy Escobar will Take a Sliver Anyday
Susan Barnes at ...and here's a photo of one I made earlier
Joe Miller thinks you can Discover Light in Darkness
Beth Patterson talks about Advent: Awaiting the Ancient and the Ever New
Liz Dyer says What the Heck
Sally Coleman muses about Light into Darkness
Steve Hayes with the Lord of the Dark
Josh Jinno with Spiritual Motifs of Darkness and Light
KW Leslie contrasts Darkness versus blackness
Erin Word writes Fire and Sacrifice

Jesus as the Archetype Shaman (Part 1)

Ascent to the heavens, descent to the underworld, an experience of death and resurrection, acting as a psychopomp to the lost souls of dead humans, story-teller, cultural icon and outcast, healer, exorcist...these are the works, and the personal experiences of a Shaman.

These are also the things which set Christ apart as unique in human history. These are things of which He is an exemplary model, and humanity's ideal for spiritual excellence and success. These elements are identified by religious historians as the signs, and activities of a Shaman. It is the contention of this post (and any following posts on the subject) that the Nazarene was the ideal of shamanic power and practice, and therefore The Archetypal Shaman.

This concept is not a new one. Others such as Peiter Craffert, and John Pilch have already done studies along these lines. Their ideas have been considered revolutionary by some, and heretical by others. Both Craffert and Pilch have appeared to have cast Jesus as the Galilean Shaman, at the expense of the orthodox Christian position of Messiah, and resurrected Lord of Heaven and Earth.

In contrast I understand Jesus to be the Savior of all humanity by means of His death and resurrection, and the unique Son of God. My position here in this post, and those that might follow is that Jesus carries many characteristics of the ideal Shaman, and exemplifies the power aspects, and ecstatic experiences of shamanism. In a shamanistic culture Jesus would have been viewed as the greatest of all Shamans, and both previous and subsequent Shamans would be a viewed as a diminishing of shamanic power, but coming from Jewish culture he was obviously held as the greatest of all prophets (and even more than that) to those who would follow Him.

By saying this I am not saying that all Christian ministers should become shamans, nor am I saying that Jesus saw Himself as a Shaman. This is a simple presentation suggesting only that the things Jesus did are things shamans all over the world have attempted to do throughout history, and that Christ is the exemplar of the experiences of the Shaman, and the goals which the Shaman seeks to accomplish. Deeper concepts, and further conclusions, which the reader may come to are their own surmisings, and not those which I am presenting here.

The Shaman is a type of medicine man who works for the community to bring healing, and prosperity. He battles evil spirits seeking to trouble humanity. Usually through ecstatic experiences of trances and soul travel the Shaman will discover healing remedies known only to God, or the gods. The Shaman may also lead the souls of those who have died to paradise through the same ecstatic soul journeys.

Eliade Mircea's landmark book "Shamanism" published in 1951, held this as a central theme: That the diminished powers of shamans were an oft repeated mythos across the continents and islands in which elements of shamanism could be found. Somewhere in the stories of ancient shamans there was an archetypal shaman whose powers far exceeded those of more recent history.

The degradation of power and also of an open and clean communication with the unseen realm of gods, goddesses and spirits is a repeated theme in the mythic stories in shamanistic cultures. This mirrors the story of the Fall in scripture. Once humanity walked in complete confidence before God - without shame, and in open and direct communication with Him. The hunt for a return to paradise underlies the story of our Christian scripture, and underlies the traditional stories of shamanism as well, and so the worlds of shamanism and Christianity meet at a common place.

"More than once we have discerned in the shamanic experience a "nostalgia for paradise" that suggests one of the oldest types of Christian mystical experience." wrote Eliade in the epilogue of the English edition of his book.

I am convinced Jesus answers the "nostalgia for paradise," and by doing so becomes the archetype of the Shaman.

More to come. Follow me as I follow Christ through the world of Shamanism. ;-)

Eventism, Contemporary Christianity, Festival Life as a Means of Evangelism, and My Dilemma

I have been concerned about the state of Evangelical Christianity as an event based establishment for most of the 24 years I have been a pastor. I have written extensively about "Relational Christianity", as I have typically called it for the last 20 years, as a model of church life preferable to event based Christianity.

My thinking is this: As evangelicals we have understood that church is not a building. Most of us were smart enough to figure out that the frailties, banalities, and fallenness of humanity made it impossible for a corporate structure such as a denomination to be a definitive expression of "The Church," but somehow we still seem to describe church as an event.

Rather than something we are, church has become something we go to, and something we do. It is and event on a Sunday morning, or a series of events. It has become Eventism.

I still believe that this is true for much of Evangelical, Charismatic, and Pentecostal Christianity. I still believe that this is less than ideal, and sometimes detrimental to church life.

Despite viewing Eventism as detrimental to a holistic relationship with God, I am beginning to consider a new way of doing things - a way of doing things, which comes dangerously close to the very way of church life I have disliked for so long.

Here is my dilemma: I am looking at the nature of our culture, and the manner in which people gather. I see people running from event to event, and finding their source of fun, recreation, and renewal. This looks reminiscently like the fashion of spiritual gatherings in the Old Testament. There is no mention of church gatherings on Sunday mornings, and even the Sabbath was not set aside for sermons and worship singing, but rather for rest. Instead of church the people gathered in festivals throughout the year, and these festivals became the source of connection to the greater community of the faithful, and the center of Israel's religious life. Now the New Testament has a different spiritual feel. The people gathered daily at the temple in the first few chapters of Acts, and the first day of the week soon became a standard time of gathering for the followers of Christ.

The church I pastor is in the center of Salem, MA. 1 million people pass by our doors each year - most of them come in October during the Halloween based events. We have thousands who pass through our doors. They have a spiritual experience based upon a gracious attempt to relate to them caringly, and creatively, and then they head home to the various corners of the earth from which they came. We have crashed this festival Salem calls Haunted Happenings, and have created one of the best parties within the larger party in the whole city. This has allowed us to briefly pastor tens (if not hundreds) of thousands of people, even if only for a moment, over the last ten years.

I have wondered if we are in a new season lately. We have learned to crash the festival and create life changing experiences people want to be a part of. Could it be that it is time for us to create festivals, which people want to be a part of?

I have been part of a hundreds of Christian festivals over the 30 years of my following Jesus, but typically no one but church goers want to be a part of those festivals. Is it time for me to learn how to develop a festival, which the world wants to be a part of? Is it time to learn how to create the life-changing type of festivals like those of the feasts of Israel?

I think the answer is yes, and our location, and our mission as a church seem to say yes, but I tremble at the thought. Even as I tremble, I am attempting a couple festival type events as a means of pastoring the greater community of Salem (and beyond actually).

How this will contrast with, and perhaps create a struggle with my desire to break the habit of Eventism in the church is yet to be seen, but it is part of the adventure we are on at this time.

May God smile.

Logoing my Crazy New Ideas

I'm not much of a artist, and so anything I do is simple and silly at best, but here are my attempts to put my crazy ideas into logos:

Phil's Latest Crazy Ideas - Mummers and Polar Bear Plunge for Wales

Okay, I'm at it again. I am creating weird ideas, and the ideas seem to have legs. Here's my first crazy idea: A Mummers' Festival in Downtown Salem. Yep that's right you read it correctly - a Mummers' Festival. No, not a Hummers' Festival. This is not about overly adrenalized SUVs or people who sing without opening their mouths. This is about Mummers.

Now to me an idea has legs when it starts running on its own. Well, that is happening right now with the Mummers' Festival. December 14th is the day, and it will happen in downtown Salem - cool thing is that it will take very little work for our church, be lots of fun, and benefit the downtown business community in Salem - which could use the blessing.

The Paper Bag Mummers" led by Lynn Noel will be a big part of making this happen.

My other project is called Dunkin' with David. It is an attempt to get 100 people to go into the frigid New England waters with on Saint David's Day, Sunday March 1st, 2009. This is all about getting some much deserved press for the nation of Wales, and their patron Saint - St. David.

Are you up for the plunge? Are you a celtophile who would like to start your neighborhood David Dunk?

Darkness and Light as Motifs of Spirituality: Next SynchroBlog

On Wednesday, December 10th the next SynchroBlog will be released. The subject is Darkness and Light as Motifs of Spirituality. This is a call to all interested spirituality bloggers. Most of us come from a Christian perspective, many (but certainly not all) from an Emergent perspective, but I want to make the call to any bloggers who write about spirituality to join us in this topic.


This SynchroBlog will officially make the beginning of the third year of SynchroBlogging, which began in December of '06.

Update on Halloween in Salem

I have finally got around to giving an update on our Halloween activities in Salem. Off course you have to remember that our Halloween is a month-long experience called Haunted Happenings. You can find the update here on our church blog.

Glossalalia and The Sacred Language of the Shaman: Christians as Pre-Mortem Psychopomps

Communication with the spirits beyond the curtain of our visible/audible/tangible world is a skill belonging to the most spiritual, and perhaps the most insane among us. Those who hear the voices of gods and goddesses, angels and demons, ancestors and ghosts have been revered, feared, and ridiculed through ages and cultures of human history.

These holy men and women appear to see and hear things the average person does not. Sometimes with the senses, sometimes beyond their senses they experience a tie to a realm invisible to human eyes, and inaudible to human ears.

What distinguished these holy people from the common public was not only having ears and eyes, which perceive things most people do not, but even their speech hearkened the unseen realm. These mystics of the other world spoke the language of the spirits, and their communication traveled in both directions. They heard the secrets of the heaven and hell, and somehow spoke the secrets in languages unknown to the uninitiated.

During the initiation of a Shaman, he/she often must learn a new language. It is a language of the spirits - sometimes a language of the earth's creatures. Especially common among the Northern Asian, and Arctic Shamans this secret language was also found among Shamans of Sumatra, Borneo, South America, North America, and Guiana.

The ability to communicate with spirits and animals set the Shaman apart from others, and gave evidence to the ecstatic, and supernatural component of his or her healing and blessing activities.

The Shaman is a psychopomp. Lost postmortem souls are supposed to be led by the Shaman to their place of rest. The fact that the shamans communicate with the unseen realm is evidence to the uninitiated that they truly walk in the unseen world - the place to which our souls travel after death, and therefore know the paths of death which the uninitiated are forced to someday travel alone.

I am a Pentecostal/Charismatic Christian, and I find that there is a connection to these shamanic languages within my own faith. I speak the languages of angels, and men - languages which I have not learned through education, but which have spontaneously flowed from my tongue in times of worship and prayer.

Could it be that Charismatic Christians have become secret speakers who like the shaman speak the languages of men and angels, and declare divine mysteries hidden in the dark recesses of human history?

The shaman was required to communicate in the secret language of the spirits, and as such it was evidence that he held special communication with the realm of the Spirit.

Could it be that the Pentecostal languages of men and angels are God's way of giving evidence to the mystical, other-worldly travels of the souls of His followers? Could it be that it is evidence to a dying world that there are people who have mapped the way to a place of peace beyond the grave? Is this a portion of what Paul meant when he said that, "tongues are sign to the unbeliever?"

If Moses had been the leader of a Siberian tribe, he might have cried out "Oh, that all the Lord's people were [shamans] and that the Lord would put His Spirit upon them!" (Numbers 11:29) But as a leader among the Hebrews he called for us to be "prophets."

God's heart is the same toward shamanic cultures as it is toward the culture of the prophets, and He as such is developing leaders after His own heart who speak the languages of heaven, and know how to communicate the messages of heaven here on earth

This newly paganized, urban western culture requires people who hear the voice of the Spirit. Although every person will be forced to travel the path of death alone, those who have discovered the mysteries of the unseen world are called to become the pre-mortem psychopomps to those who fear that day of death. We are called to map the way to eternal peace for the uninitiated soul. The ecstatic languages rising from my innermost being declare that I have walked on the winds of the Spirit, and know the paths of life and death.

This gift is not limited to a few initiates of a special class, but to the common follower of Christ, and as such it demands of us that we take on the role of the shaman, and map the way toward eternal peace.

Drum Circles, Witches, Children, Belly Dancers, and Drunks

Last night (Saturday, October 4th) we held a drum circle at church. Mamadou Diop the Senegalese drummer, guitar player, rocker, and band leader from Salem offered to help run the drum circle for us. Every drum circle needs a couple really serious drummers. Mamadou and his team are really serious drummers, so we were going to rock.

We put out flyers. We sent info to our mailing list. On the day of the event Carlos and I sat outside The Vault (the name of our church location), and beat some drums as advertisement for the upcoming drum circle. Little kids stopped with their parents and beat along on the bongos. A few people said they would be back, and a local Witch said she wanted to come and belly dance. We had billed the event as: "Bring your Drum, borrow a drum, learn to drum, come and dance, join the party." So of course, Belly Dancers were welcome too. This was an open event for anyone who wanted to join in.

At 5:45pm Mamadou and his troupe of drummers arrived. There were about eight of them, and then some of the gang from The Gathering arrived. I suggested we move the circle outside. It was a warm Fall evening, and we thought that it would be a good crowd gatherer. The tourist season is officially in full swing in Salem, and the crowds were here indeed. We set a half circle of chairs in the open square just outside the church doors and brought out the drums.

The drumming began, and the crowds started gathering. We had extra drums for people who wanted to join in. Three to six year old children sat down and banged out rhythms to Mamadou's African beats, which I was trying to keep up with.

There were pentagram T-shirt wearing older women, little kids, teenagers, old hippie guys, and then the belly dancer arrived, and the crowds got bigger. The Witch belly dancer has angel wings tattooed on her back from her shoulders to her lower back. Then a drunk guy sat down next to me and had a hard time sitting up straight, but looked like he was having fun. After about 30 minutes the drunk guy said, "I dare you to get naked," through his crooked smile.

I said, "I don't think so."

Then he said, "Can I get you a beer?"

"Um, no thanks, I think I'll pass."

Then he meandered off only to return 15 minutes later with a six pack. Not a good move in downtown Salem, but the police didn't come around, and he seemed to keep in six pack in the canvas bag he carried. I think the drum circle kept his attention, and he forgot about his beer.

So the drums pounded out their rhythms in downtown Salem. The kids and parents joined in. The crowds stood around, and dropped dollar bills in a box Mamadou's people set out. People cheered. The belly dancer came in and out of the church with costume changes.

I live in a weird world. African drummers, little kids and their parents, old hippies, pentagram T-shirt wearing grandmothers, Witches in full garb, a Pagan Belly Dancer, and a drunk. This is who shows up when we throw a party at The Gathering. Acceptance is a messy, and beautiful thing methinks.

This church location we have is an experiment. It is an experiment in acceptance toward the whole community of Salem, and the strange characters who live here, and I guess "I is one." It is an experiment in trying to be an enhancement to the businesses downtown. It is an experiment in living out our Christianity in a post-modern, post-Christian world. I guess this is part of what the experiment looks like.