My Dance with Grace

In recent days I have come to realize my relationship with Grace has been in disrepair. What’s Grace? I see it as a force not an it, so I choose to see Grace much like I would see a person who always adds a certain elegance to what is before her. Grace can only build on something, she cannot fathom something upon nothing. Grace is that desirable illustrious creature that offers herself completely and unselfishly to anyone who seeks her wholeheartedly – the catch - you have to continually seek her and fight to stay with her.

I have been examining the nature of my relationship with Grace and I could best quantify it as merely accidental brushes here and there. I can imagine grace as a noun or verb - something I desire to exude; when it comes to receiving or living with her, I have been lacking more times than I care to admit. She often invites me to come dance with her and when I do it is always wonderful and free, but it is so specific and ornate at the same time. When I am willing our movements start to intertwine, I become strangely unnerved and unraveled. Things begin to fall away and appear in ways I do not understand when you are moving with Grace. It feels so off-kilter - I can either move away or I can fall into Grace. If try to grab something to steady myself Grace disappears as quickly as she arrived. If I try to hold onto Grace, my grip is useless I just crash into Grace. When embraced the peace and disruption seem to explode at the same time. It is hard to be cool or feel in control when you are leaning into Grace. You follow and try to press into something that cannot be held or contain. You never feel more alive and ridiculously useless at the same time.

As we lumber along I start to I think this cannot be what it is suppose to be. I was expecting something else… I cannot tell you how many times I have gotten to this place with Grace only to find myself pushing away. But once I am on my own again, I eventually come to my senses and realize what I left. Sometimes I am bold enough to I think I can recreate it on my own without her but somehow I just end up further from where I wanted t be. Just when I think there is nothing more I can do and I lay everything down, I turn the corner and there she is again. She approaches with her arms open inviting me in.

I Love A Parade!

Last weekend went to the Gay Pride Parade in Amsterdam with some fellow yanks (sorry Texans and Southerners you will have to cope) to take in the festivities. Now being a California girl, I have been to epicenter of Pride parades in San Francisco and Hollywood; Amsterdam is a much tamer version of reality but the sister cities could learn from their Dutch ally.

Of course the house music was going full steam and the boys and girls were getting’ their twirls on much like anywhere else but there were a few twists on the parade boats that might stop the Americana parade. Firstly, any parade day in Holland is a family affair for all generations, cultures and creeds. I mean you saw just about everyone there and not to just gawk, they were fully invested in having a good time. Grandmothers, grandkids and every age in between lined the canals to cheer and celebrate. The parade may be dramatic but it is not vulgar (well the US boats were the sad exceptions). There was just an air of fun, community and joy.

Another difference, there were no protesters. Churches passed invitations throughout the crowd to join their fellowships offering a message of love. A group of churches even had a boat in the parade with a banner boasting of God’s love for EVERYONE.

Lastly, every high-ranking government office and officer (city, education, police, hospitals, etc) was represented in the parade. It did not seem like an obligation or public relations gig; they seemed to embrace it more as an opportunity to show their support. Many of these official boats created dance routines and skits, which they performed all along the parade route. We sat next to a gentleman who he took the time to point out all the dignitaries in the parade and translated for us. Our private narrator of the parade was there with his two daughters and he was really a wonderful host. Before he left I asked if he been before and he said yes, he comes every year with his kids. I asked him why and he said, “Because it is a parade and it is always fun; it is always a celebration.”

All these elements made me wonder how a country that prides itself on a no nonsense nonreligious lifestyle could foster such a compassionate environment. You may not agree with the practice or lifestyle of homosexuality, but it is something is woven the fabric of our global human existence much the same way as relationships, lying, theft and aging. It is here no matter if you choose to embrace, ignore, criticize or rejoice. I believe a follower of Jesus cannot take the easy out of indignation or self-righteousness to dismiss or by take a perceived moral high ground. After all it says judge not lest you be judged by the same measure (not for the same sin - your sins will be weighed with the same magnitude with which you dole out condemnation on others – ouch!).

Many people wear he WWJD bracelets, but I wonder if they really asks themselves what would Jesus do if he showed up on Gay Pride Day. My bet is that he would approach people much the same way he did when the crowd threw a prostitute at his feet for stoning, or the way he did when he walked among the untouchables – the leapers, the sick and the poor. I would be willing to bet that he would be moved to compassion and from that place act in love, wisdom and restoration. I am not saying that compassion was the aim of the day in Amsterdam, but I sensed a strong undercurrent of it in the crowd. Could that be why the Gay community here does not feel the need to be so militant or defensive in living out their lives because people have made room in their hearts to meet them as people first and homosexuals somewhere else down the line of priorities? Makes me think and wonder. I hope it does the same for you as well.

South Africa to Amsterdam

If you did not get a chance to see this or you were wondering what I have been up to here you go!

My Next Move

It is official! I am moving to Amsterdam. If you would like to on my mailing list, please send me a message with your direct email address with subscribe in the subject.

Blessings, Alycia

Airplane Spirituality

My friend Wes White wrote this and posted it on Open Source Theology. I just love the way he thinks.


I only just recently returned home to Glasgow, Scotland after a long three week trip to the USA that included four multiple-leg airline flights. On Monday coming, I fly once again to Amsterdam, The Netherlands only to turn around on Wednesday and fly back. So I'm learning a lot about what I now refer to as "airplane spirituality." Here's just a couple thoughts on it for your consideration. (There might even be a bit of application hidden within.)

1) Traveling on airplanes reminds us that healthy Christian spirituality is as earthy as it gets. On long overseas flights, human beings have the audacity to develop bad breath, for example. Some actually bring along brush and paste and hazard the experience of minuscule airplane toilets in order to retain some semblance of hygiene. But most simply resort to popping mints, spraying sprays, or freely engaging various other forms of cover-up. Suddenly liberality with chewing gum finds itself in vogue. But it is all an attempt to mask something that we really need not hide. Being human is earthy, and in that is glory. St. Augustine ( City of God, bk.9, ch.1) referred to it as the blessed recognition that we are "intermediate beings," finding ourselves most truly when we happily locate ourselves somewhere between the beasts and the angels. Humans who affirm their "intermediateness" are able to appreciate the baser as well as the more sublime aspects of life, and to find God in the mix of both. My friend, Rodney Clapp, puts it this way: "Christian spirituality comprehends not only the sparkle in our eyes but the grime under our fingernails." (Rodney Clapp, Tortured Wonders, 177.)

2) I am regularly amazed at the contorted bodily positions people can assume in order to seek a bit of sleep on a long flight, especially when the plane is full to capacity. Sleeping is otherwise a rather private affair where drools and snores and involuntary escapes of bodily gases are preferably protected from public attention. Not so in the cramped spaces that usually define the intimate communion of long-distance flight. Some who would generally never be seen with a hair out of place soon give in to unbelievable displays of tangles and tousles out of sheer desperation to resemble an horizontal posture. It is intimate communion indeed! After all, at the end of a long and crowded flight we have all slept together. But it reminds us that spirituality, Christian spirituality particularly, cannot be healthy if it is only a private matter. In fact, Christian spirituality proves its muster by its sociality, for we claim that all humanity derives its essence from the Trinitarian God who is socially defined. Miroslav Volf and others ( see, for example, God's Life in Trinity ) have been reminding us of late about the perichoretic nature of God's own sociality. I am more and more convinced that one of the best ways to both demonstrate and test the genuineness of the give and take of perichoresis is by attempting to sleep on airplanes, where community is voluntary to be sure, yet anything but arbitrary.

True spirituality is earthy. True spirituality is social. God, I think, is discovered and experienced in both. So don't be afraid to fly.