Apr 02 | The Update to end all Updates

Today was long. Looooooooooong. And I kept thinking about finally coming back to my very own blog! I’ve since fixed this to be linked to my Twitter feed! If you’re following me on Twitter then you’ll get automatic updates of new posts.
I also definitely need to include my seminary career in my biography, heh. It doesn’t show up at all and there are definitely going to be God posts, so that would provide some context. I see that it has been fixed so that the text of both bios shows up, but the photographs have disappeared. I’ll find a way to fix it very soon.

So I don’t think I’ve actually posted on this damn thing for about three years. Lots has happened since then! I mention my seminary career because I started an MDiv in September of 2010 and look to be finished in May of 2014, which is coming up far sooner than I’d like. When I started, it was at the end of a very long period of discernment and not a little heartache.

For those of you who don’t know, I started work as a church secretary in February of 2007 to pay the bills as I tried to get my musical career off the ground, and also to discern a possible call to priesthood in the Anglican Church. I hoped to get a feel for what priestly ministry was like in a small parish, as my own parish is quite big and booming and is therefore unusual in the mainline Christian world. My time at this small parish, which was bordering on the suburbs and shrinking all the while, was not what I had expected. It made me sure I was not cut out for priesthood – I began to wonder if the parish model was sustainable, and if smaller parish ministry was about all struggling to help a parish die with dignity. After two years there was a mutual separation, and I decided to devote all of my time to my music career, with thoughts about maybe pursuing a different kind of ministry – perhaps diaconal.

My time as a full-time musician began with rather promising feelings. I had some really fun gigs, wrote and produced two one-woman shows that were hosted by my parish church (at my own expense), got to work on this very website, finished my EP (except for the mastering – that still needs doing but at least I found someone to do it for me), made a couple of music videos, and started work on a novella and a full length album. However, reality quickly set in. I couldn’t get enough gigs and I couldn’t make enough money playing on the street or teaching at Celtic Traditions Music School to support myself or my spending needs. I tried to attach myself to two different people who said they would manage me, and neither was able to help me in the way I needed. One of them, a friend, couldn’t do it for reasons mostly outside their control – they ended up being laid off and not exactly having the time they had expected to have. The other was frankly a bit of a joke – the one thing he did for me was to book me a half-hour set at an open mic night in Burnaby. When I asked him if I could have some help finding gigs, he told me he thought he could get me a couple of weddings that paid $100 a pop. I didn’t bother telling him that I had been charging $250 a wedding for about five years by then.

I became jaded and a little angry. Everyone who came into contact with my music told me I was talented – even people on the street, who would then continue to walk on by without even dropping a nickel in my basket. The worst ones were the ones who would stand and listen to a whole set and then just walk away. Everyone asked me when my album was coming out, but hardly anybody came to either of my one-woman shows. I knew that some people were uncomfortable coming into a church, but there was really nothing I could do about that – it was the only place willing to host me that I could afford or that I had any contacts with. I heard constant affirmation that I was amazing and would be famous and “We’ll say we knew you when,” and yet month after month I was unable to pay rent and I had increasingly little to show for all the work I was putting in. I started staying home during the day instead of going out to busk. I hid inside and hung around on the Internet all day, convinced that I was just useless and lazy and wasn’t working hard enough. While the latter might have been true, I also had a lot of circumstances stacked against me. I didn’t have a car or a manager, and of course I didn’t have enough money to finish my album so there was really no way to promote myself. My website was still being designed and coded, and that cost me around $300 a month, which I could barely afford. I felt completely stuck, and although I was absolutely sure about God’s abiding and loving presence in my life, I felt as though I was ignoring or pushing against the plans She had for me.

Finally, I got one of those calls that seems inconsequential at the time, but later makes all the difference. My old boss – the priest from the church I had worked in – called me to help her with a Taize workshop that was being put on at the Vancouver School of Theology for their summer school. She and I had jammed together on multiple occasions with Taize – it was only one of the beautiful things she introduced me to, including Education for Ministry and Healing Pathways. I accepted, and found myself outside the stunningly beautiful 6000 Iona Drive on a perfect summer day. As I walked up Theology Mall in the sunshine, I thought, “I am going here. One day, this is happening.”

I had a great time at the school on that day, and later sat in my Mum’s garden and talked about it. For the last two years I had had plans to attend VST, but in my mind it had always been something I would do when I was in my 40s or 50s. I hadn’t even started a career yet – I couldn’t afford to go back to school. But as I spoke to Mum about how much I had loved it there, she said to me, “Why are you waiting? Didn’t you tell me your friend said that they offered a work-study program with up to 100% tuition coverage?” Yes he had. “So why are you waiting? Don’t put it off. Do it now. You have nothing to lose – you’re young, you have no career to put on hold, no property, no kids. If you wait it will be much harder. Do it now – at the very least think about it.”

I did think about it.

And I booked an appointment with my Rector, the Rev’d Peter Elliott. A couple of weeks later I sat in his office and laid out my plan for ministry. I wanted to be a “troubadour deacon,” touring dramatic works with music around to different parishes – maybe even across the country – and engaging people through art. Peter thought it was a great idea, and right there in his office he called the assistant to the registrar and booked me an appointment. I found myself shortly after that meeting speaking to her and being given a tour of the school. It was gorgeous and the classes sounded brilliant. I started to get excited, and my amazing mum gave me a very large contribution – she has always been a huge supporter of education and will likely not rest until I’m a PhD. To help me make it through that first year – as I had registered too late to qualify for 100% tuition coverage for 2010/2011 – I got a job at a place I had always wanted to work: Banyen Books and Sound. I was pretty much the only Christian on staff, and I loved the people there.

September of 2010 found me at the beginning of a Masters of Divinity – not a requirement for the diaconate, but highly recommended by my spiritual director, a deacon himself. That first semester was amazing but quite brutal. I was working two part-time jobs and going to school full time. Although I loved Banyen, it exhausted me, particularly since it required me to commit to a weekend day, and since I worked Saturdays at my other job I had to come in on certain Sundays. My boss was very sensitive about this and asked if it was okay for me to come in on my Sabbath. I said it was, and tried to go to the 8am services at my parish. I only did it twice and then stopped going altogether if I had to work that day – I’m not at all a morning person and the style of an 8am service really doesn’t suit me. I miss the music too much. Unfortunately, although I adored working there, I was eventually let go in December because of my hectic schedule. It was just too hard for them to find hours for me, especially since I planned to take an intensive course in January and would be effectively out of circulation for two weeks. I was sad for a little while, but eventually I came to realize that it had been a blessing – my stress levels went way down and I had saved enough to make my second payment for spring 2011.

Once the summertime came around, I began to wonder what to do with myself. I managed to score a job working in the VST library for April and May, which didn’t offer many hours but paid fairly well. It was around May that I was handed a brilliant opportunity. I applied for a job that an old friend recommended: youth pastor (or staff chaplain) at Camp Artaban, the Diocesan camp on Gambier Island. It was a terrifying but amazing prospect for me – not just because of the extraordinary nature of the work, but because I made a big decision: if I got the job, I would ask my boyfriend of eight years to marry me (as the job would give me the money to pay for the space at my parish). I applied, and they actually accepted me! I couldn’t believe it! I began to consider what this job might mean for me. For the first year I had been at school, I had been very open about my plans for the diaconate, but I began to encounter resistance. Many of the folks I spoke to told me they thought my call was to the priesthood, not the diaconate. I didn’t believe them at first, but their words became so persistent that I began to reconsider. This job, I thought, would be a litmus test for me. If I loved it and was good at it, I decided to re-consider a call to the priesthood. At the beginning of July, I packed up my harp, a big blue suitcase and a pile of books, and struck out for Artaban with the rest of the permanent staff.

What followed was one of the most challenging and most rewarding summers of my entire life. My boss was absolutely incredible and the staff I lived with (the “Permies”) were energetic and fun. I took care of chapel worship every day,  Permie chapel once a week, and sometimes took on theme sessions for the campers. I learned how to fight fires on an island, manage a camp canteen, live on generator power that went off at night, what to do with old mouldy Bibles (burn them), and how to care for an outdoor chapel. I even restored balance to the chapel shed, which was filled with detritus and ended up perfectly arranged one long afternoon.

After two weeks on the island, I came home for two weeks in order to complete two summer school courses. During my first night back, I took my boyfriend for a walk on our favourite beach (the one we walked on our first date and the one where I accepted him back into my life after a brief hiatus) and I asked him to marry me. HE SAID YES!

I completed the two courses and went back up to Artaban. I laughed, cried, swatted mosquitoes, composed and led chapel services and played the harp every single day, and lost five pounds hauling luggage and walking everywhere (once I got home I was so relieved to have fresh vegetables that I gorged on good food and lost five more pounds! I’ve unfortunately gained it all back – hopefully I can take some of it off this summer now that I have a bike). At my last performance review, I informed my boss that my time at Artaban had changed my mind, and I thought that I could be a priest after all. The smile she gave me when I said that…I can still see it. On the boat ride home, I cried.

I started my second year with a bang and busted my little buns. It was still hard, but it was good to be back with my friends. In January of 2012, as per my field education requirements, I left my beautiful parish for a time and began attending St. Paul’s in the West End, where I had a couple of contacts from my Education for Ministry days. My mentor was the Rev’d Markus Dünzkofer, a delightful German educated in Scotland and Chicago. He had a cheeky, irreverent sense of humour, paired most beautifully and appropriately with a deep passion for good theology and liturgy. The perfect Anglican, in other words. For the very first time, I preached a sermon, on Ash Wednesday, and got many more chances to do so.

I was also invited to audition for the Diocesan production of Godspell! which was being put on by a couple I had been friends with for a long time – in fact, a couple I had met when I had first started coming back to church, when they were still VST students! I remember thinking at the time that they were irrepressibly cool. I auditioned, and they gave me the role of Jesus (or, as they called me, Shesus). It was the first major role I had ever had in a musical and I was stoked! Although it was a lot of work, it was well worth it. Rehearsals helped me rest my overactive left brain and give my right creative side some lovin’. We had three performances and probably could have had more! I also wrote my Major Exegesis – one of two gigantic papers you write in your MDiv career. A Major Exegesis (or “major ex” in student jargon) is an exhaustive study of a Biblical passage that requires not only standard modes of critical analysis but translation work as well. I chose John 1:1-5 as my passage and explored the topic of gender fluidity. Although it wasn’t required, I even provided my very own translation that highlighted these themes. I received an A+, and the Lloyd Gaston award for New Testament Studies for my work. My professor suggested I continue this work in a Masters of Theology, maybe even a PhD. I do think I will do this, but not until I have steady employment.

In the winter, I brought my Rector up to date on my confusion over my ministry. Saint that he is, he suggested a special group be formed to help me discern what my ministry might be. I called it my “pre-discernment discernment group.” It was headed by a deacon and there were six other people on it – people who loved me and people I didn’t know as well. After meeting monthly for about six months, I broke down and wept when they affirmed that they thought my call was presbyteral. They made a recommendation that a real honest-to-God discernment group be started for me. I had finally started the official steps toward a path I had first begun to consider in 2006.

The summer of that year was mostly taken up with wedding plans and my wedding, although I took some much needed time off in April to do my first self-directed retreat. I went up to the beautiful Rivendell retreat centre on Bowen Island, taking with me the Song of Songs and Rumi as my spiritual guides. I spent most of my time there in silence, and it was wonderful. The wedding was also wonderful – one of the best days of my life. My three beautiful bridesmaids were all incredibly helpful and gorgeous, and everyone was smiling.

I felt extremely rested when I returned to school and began my field education project in earnest. I tried to begin a sort of guild for artists in the parish, but it was difficult to find people to get directly involved. Many of the goals I had hoped to accomplish were slow in getting started, save the preaching. I also found out that my mentor had been called to St. John’s Church in Edinburgh and would be leaving after Christmas. I continued in my work, and finally, after much struggling to create the artists’ guild, took on a project with a good friend at the parish for Lent/Holy Week 2013: a graffiti-style Stations of the Cross, inspired by the artist Banksy. It was a great success, with contributions from many artists around the Diocese. We promoted it with a blog and a Twitter feed, and opened the church during Wednesday evenings after the Wednesday evening Eucharist. I brought my harp and played songs for an hour. Our first night we only had one visitor. Our second night there were twenty. Our last night had thirty people, including Bishop Mark Macdonald! For each Station of the Cross, I had composed a reflection, which we eventually used to create a special liturgy to actually walk the Stations. We celebrated this liturgy only a few days ago, on Good Friday. I printed ten bulletins, expecting five visitors. Twenty-one people came to walk with us. My friend and I concluded our service by reciting St. John Chrysostom’s Easter homily together as a dialogue. Yesterday, the Stations came down.

Um…that was long! That’s been the last few years of my life! You’re all caught up, and so is the blog! Right now, the year is almost over. I’m still meeting with my discernment group, and in fact, I’ll be preaching at my own parish this coming Sunday! It’s funny – the first Sunday I ever preached was liturgically the same Sunday, last year. I preached on Thomas then; I think this year I’ll switch it up and preach on Revelation. I am hoping to do Clinical Pastoral Education at St. Paul’s Hospital this summer. I sent in my application and am still waiting to hear back. Next year will be my last year of VST. I met briefly with my Bishop when he visited school a few weeks ago, and he told me that if all went according to plan and there was a place for me, I could expect to be ordained by June of 2014. I think I had a tiny heart attack when he said that!

So that’s my story. Thanks for sticking with me all this way if you’re still here! I love you all.

-Clarity