on my ordination council

As many readers will already know, I was approved for ordination by the Rochester Gennesee Region of the American Baptist Churches USA on January 31. I'm pretty happy about it, and it has been a long time coming, by some measures.

You know, when I sat down beforehand, I thought I might try to think about what kinds of questions I was likely to be asked, and what my answers might be. The story is that they go through your ordination paper, which talks about what you believe about God and the church and your call and your life and stuff, and they can ask you whatever questions they want. ("They" being a mix of pastors and lay folks, basically whoever shows up. There were about 25 or 30 people at mine, I'd say.)

Here's the thing: when I sat down to write about this, to brainstorm possible questions and my own possible answers, here's what I wrote instead. I liked it, so I read it to open the Council, and I'm putting it up here. There's three of these, in good Trinitarian format. (I only read the first one out loud...)

in no particular ordre:


by the harrowing of hell
by the wounds transformed
by the dry bones walking
by the tenacious widow
by the sea that makes way
by the star, by the bush burning:
by the tongues of fire,
and by the empty tomb:

the Risen Jesus demands
my presence in this place.



---

by iorek byrneson
by poncho starboard,
by maniac magee-
by wonky the duck,
by bearface and kleeborg
by charles finney,
by ammon hennacy,
by rick lance, gamma boy:
by the Right Reverend Stuckle Ninehammer,
and by Jeff Jones aka Klanky Pankelsmank:

the Spirit of God demands
my presence in this place.

---

by rachael and by my mother,
by emily jones and digger,
by mary and steve and ted,
by becca and kyle,
by sharon yetter and the wynns,
by mark peoples and mark winters,
by joanne terrell and lee butler,
by arlen vernava and alan newton,
by david gregg and larry greenfield,
by my dad and my sister and randy and kenneth,
by phyllis toback and pastor rosa,
by eliza nad nate metrick,
by nate dannison and tom ryberg
by madeliene, chris, korie and lauren,
by corrigan, brian, will, and ben,
by lisa, bj, megan and grace,
by liang and floyd and sophia,
by becky and mary, by layne and raisa,
by susand and emo,
by dave and tena,
by carolyn and mike
by all of the peacheys
by sylvia and carolina
and by their children:

God
demands my presence in this place.

---

standing on the shoulders of giants,
dw