ELCA Three-Month Progress Reports Now Due

The ELCA has asked for additional points of reporting the intern’s progress throughout the internship year. The three-month reports are due now, one from the supervisor and one from the intern. Please access this form and the directions from this web page: http://www.luthersem.edu/contextual_learning/internship/evaluation/evaluation1.asp.

Remember these are required ELCA forms that you need to submit to your candidacy committee and to your seminary’s Contextual Leadership Initiative Office.

Editor's Column: Relax and Enjoy Christmas! 
by Steve McKinley

What I am about to confess might make me persona non grata around the seminary campuses.  In the circles of theological academia it is definitely incorrect politically and maybe theologically.  But confession is good for the soul, so here goes.

On Wednesday, November 16, one of my daughters called me to report that two Twin Cities radio stations had gone to their all-Christmas-music format and I immediately gave those two stations preference on my car radio.  By the time you read these words I will have been listening to Christmas music for two weeks.

Here’s something I wonder about: both of these stations identify them as “the Twin Cities official Christmas music station.”  It’s that “official” word that gets me.  Did the mayors or the city councils of Minneapolis and St. Paul get together and issue a joint resolution on this matter?  Did the suburbs have any voice?  And is it further evidence of incompetent government that the title was given to two different stations?  Anyway…

Just to make things worse.  I do love the sacred music of this season and every year we make it a point to take in at least one concert featuring one of the college choirs or some other outstanding choral group lifting up the great classics and a few new works.  Back in my parish pastor days I was pretty fussy about not scheduling Christmas music until, well, maybe the Sunday before Christmas.  (Of course in the last six or seven years I spent in parish ministry we observed a six-week Advent, but that’s another story.)  Now that I am not a parish pastor, I dare to confess that I am inspired by some Christmas music that is decidedly religious but seldom found in Lutheran churches.  Harry Belafonte and “Mary’s Boy Child”.  Wynonna and Kenny Rogers and “Mary Did You Know?”  Even worse, I also love the “pop” Christmas music.  The Beach Boys singing about “Little Saint Nick.”  Brenda Lee “Rockin’ Around the Christmas Tree.”  Bing Crosby and “White Christmas.”  Gene Autry and “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.”  Alvin and the Chipmunks.  The Bare-Naked Ladies with the “Elf’s Lament.”  Even…dare I admit this?...Vince Vance and the Valiants with “All I Want for Christmas Is You.”  Hearing that music makes the season all the more special for me.

Like my idol Jimmy Buffett I’m working on “growing older but not up.”  I still have a child-like love of Christmas.  This is my favorite time of the year.

It’s popular in pastoral circles to be grinch-like about Christmas, and interns can easily get pulled into that orbit.  We lament about the busy-ness and the commercialism and all that, doing our best to be, well, serious and reverent and “spiritual” (whatever that means) about Christmas.

I fear that we get into taking ourselves too seriously.  (We cannot take the gospel too seriously.  We cannot take the ministry too seriously.  We can take ourselves too seriously.)  Plenty to do?  Sure, there’s plenty to do.  But a lot of what there is to do involves planning worship, developing sermons, sharing communion with the homebound, etc.  I don’t know about you, but that’s what I went into ministry to do.  After December 1, most people are much less eager to have meetings.  I did not go into ministry to go to meetings.  So what we’re busy with is “the good stuff.”

And if folks around us are feeling a little more cheerful because of the garish decorations on their houses, feeling inspired by that light-up scene of Santa kneeling by the Bethlehem manger while Frosty the Snowman looks over his shoulder…is this a bad thing?  It may be a theological travesty, but if somehow people are being moved to be a little kinder to each other, a little more generous…is that something to complain about?  Now it might be sad that the only way many Americans can think of to do that is by buying and giving “stuff”…but is the sentiment something for us to complain about?  I could never get into that.

This is a stressful month. There’s a great article by Deb Ost above on self-care during the Christmas season. Read it. Take care of yourself. And then do the really radical thing: allow yourself to enjoy it!

Looking Back at Internship   
by Barbara Punch, M.Div. Senior, PLTS

“I thank my God every time I remember you, constantly praying with joy in every one of my prayers for all of you, because of your sharing in the gospel from the first day until now….It is right for me to think this way about all of you, because you hold me in your heart, for all of you share in God’s grace with me….For God is my witness, how I long for all of you with the compassion of Christ Jesus”(Phil 3:3-8).

We were sitting in the Chapel at PLTS, the small group that gathers on Monday mornings in that cavernous space for Morning Praise. This was the reading. Tears welled up in my eyes as I thought of my internship congregation. I realized that I knew what Paul meant about missing his people, I missed my congregation. In one short year, it had become truly my congregation. They had welcomed me with open arms, tactfully given me the feedback I requested as if they were making a deposit in their own future. They had patiently smiled when I scrambled the Aaronic blessing during the blessing part of our service, and joyfully sung all the African hymns I chose. They carried me through the time of my father’s death, allowing me the extra time I needed as trustee of his estate. One couple met my brother and me at the airport as we returned from Dad’s memorial service. I will never forget them standing there with flowers and insisting on taking us out to dinner, even though our plane had been seriously delayed.

Through many individual meetings, I had come to know these people very well. I knew about the heartbreak over the incarcerated son, the anxiety over the lawsuit that might restore their job after two years of waiting. I had heard the stories of how couples who had been married over 50 years first met, and the growing-up stories of their kids, the ones I knew as men with college-age sons of their own. They had heard my stories, too, and we were knit together into a communion through these stories and our worship and work together.

As I sat in chapel that Monday morning I realized that I missed them terribly, not only because we had come to know each other so well, but because when I stood before them in my new alb on Sunday mornings, I had come to see God in them. We truly were Christ’s Body for and with each other. I had been humbled and honored to be their pastor, and I suddenly realized how comfortable I had become thinking of myself that way. Not only did I miss them, I missed being their intern pastor.

As a second (or is it third or fourth?)-career candidate, I have always regarded the opportunity to return to school as a treat. Putting life on hold for the four years of study often felt like chance to play, an indulgence in my later years. But now my heart is divided. As much as I love being back on campus to learn and enjoy community life, I miss being the pastor of God’s people. I miss living their joys and sorrows with them, being the one to lift up God’s presence in our midst, to say with the Apostle Paul, “I am confident of this, that the one who began a good work among you will bring it to completion by the day of Jesus Christ” (Phil 1:6).

Barbara Punch, currently a senior at PLTS, served her internship at Redeemer Lutheran Church in Portland, Oregon, where she worked with supervisor Terry Allen Moe.

Report from Internship:  Mexico City   
by Leslie Williamson, International Horizon Intern – Mexico City

Before leaving to begin my internship year, I avidly read A People’s Guide to Mexico so as to prepare myself as well as possible. Inside of it one can find information on vaccinations, possible vacation destinations, Spanish colloquialisms and more. It also contains a section on Mexican culture, and within this part of the book, the author really unleashes his knowledge, showing his deep love for the intricacies and oddities of Mexican life. My favorite was when he described the Mexican penchant for parties or as they are named here “pachangas.”

For example, here at The Lutheran Church of the Good Shepherd the pastoral team spent most of October readying ourselves to celebrate Reformation Sunday. Flyers and announcements were made with gusto. Friends were invited and the Sunday was treated by all as an important opportunity for evangelism. A committee planned for the communal “comida” (something similar to a potluck). We had games for the children, including “Pin the 95 Thesis on Wittenberg Cathedral” (see photo, left) and “Toss the Indulgences in the Trash.” Special voices and instruments were heard in worship. The traditional “A Mighty Fortress is our God” was sung in English and Spanish. And Sofia and Enoc, who work with the children’s ministry, produced a play on the life of Luther complete with PowerPoint slides and a curtained stage that would put any theater to shame.

If you haven’t already discerned, Reformation Day is a big deal for Mexican Lutherans. This is, of course, due in part to the fact that the country remains almost entirely Catholic in religious practice. Many of our members are indeed ex-Catholics, and some share stories of their frustrations with the Catholic Church in Mexico. But I think even more than this, the care with which this day was approached shows off the ability of Mexicans to throw a really great party, focusing sincerely on Luther’s teaching and having a knock-down-drag-out time of it as well. In fact, the festivities didn’t wind down until around 4:00pm, hours after a potluck would have ended in the U.S.

All the energy my Mexican brothers and sisters put into this day helped to remind me of its significance as well. It’s easy in Minnesota, where so many Lutherans abound, to take the reforms Luther made for granted. But here in Mexico, where the Lutheran church is small but strong and the Catholic Church is large and loud, these reforms still retain their original liberating message.

Being the good Lutheran I am, I do believe it to be the most important message for us to hear. As I daily look at the realities of poverty and wealth in this country, I must admit that I get discouraged, even to the point of despair. My anger and sadness overwhelm me, and for the first time I am truly beginning to understand the message of the prophetic books. I am examining my own life in light of these discoveries, and wondering about how to be a Christian and a pastor.

As I struggle to make sense of a world in which some children live in ramshackle shanties and attend schools with pits of sand for playgrounds and classrooms smaller than my bedroom, as I struggle to make sense of the neighborhood in which I live, where the houses are guarded by twelve foot walls with electric wire on the top and there are so many malls I hardly feel that I have left the United States, all I can do is cry and cling to the cross. Remembering Luther’s important message, remembering to look to Christ’s death and sacrifice, I find the flicker of hope that keeps me going. As I preached last Sunday on the Parable of the Ten Bridesmaids, it’s by turning to Christ that we receive the oil sufficient to carry us through all our days on this earth. I feel Christ at work in me each and every day here, filling me with a crazy faith that looks at all the trials and tribulations, all the parties and celebrations and says Praise the name of my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, King of Heaven and King of Earth, King of Joys and King of Sorrows! Praise him now and evermore! Amen.

Be sure to check out Leslie and Mark's Mexico Internship Blog!

Intern Team Cluster Notes    
by Laure Schwartz

Fall cluster events gave us a chance to dialogue with each other about taking risks, share thoughts on pastoral mentoring and supervision, and be present for each other in worship and the informal conversations. The small group time with supervisors was very insightful. We discussed similarities of a potter using a tool called a rib and God using a tool called mentoring to help “shape the vessel.” God, The Potter, is uniquely creating. One wise pastor, also a professional potter, noted how he cannot even begin to use the potter’s rib until he has kneaded the clay or put another way, built a relationship with it. Another wise pastor added that supervisors, as the rib, cannot do anything without the hand of The Potter. The rib does not act on its own. It can’t. Each vessel is unique, not to resemble the rib, but to be truly itself – a vessel for the Gospel. How does each of us get a glimpse at that truest self? Taking risks is part of that journey. May each intern team, risk, dialogue, explore, worship, and pray together.

CLI Staff Meeting at PLTS, November 10-11  

(Standing, from left:) Margy Schmitt-Ager, Alicia Vargas, Kate Sterner, Steve McKinley, Laure Schwartz, Jean Larson, Rod Maeker. Seated, from left: Elba Selby, PLTS president Phyllis Anderson, Randy Nelson, PLTS dean of students and registrar Cheryl Heuer.

It's no easy trick to get the whole CLI staff together! With two campuses and three deployed faculty, it takes some coordination and to get everyone to trek to one place. But we all made it to Berkeley in November--well, all of us except Dan Dornfield. Someone had to stay behind in St. Paul and answer the phones. ("CLI Supreme Chancellor Dan Dornfeld speaking. How may I help you?")

Rod Maeker, Randy Nelson and Laure Schwartz: Experienced travelers taking on the San Francisco airport trams. "Please set luggage cart brake to on."

Contribute to the Newsletter!  

Say, do you have a great story or photo from your wonderful internship that you'd like to share? Send it to Steve McKinley, our newsletter editor, and tell him about it.