Eastertide 2020
Eastertide 2020
Dear family and friends,
An Eastertide Reflection
There will always be churches. Those who want them for worship need not fear. Reviving in them a sense of both wonder and purpose might even lead some people from Christmas back to God. Simon Jenkins (Guardian columnist)
In the midst of all the closures and cancellations that intervened this year between Christmas and Easter, I found it a good omen when I read that Kearney Community Theater was announcing the cancellation of Death Trap. They meant, of course, their next play, one we fairly recently saw credibly performed live in Milwaukee. But this particular cancellation among the many also heralded the truth of Easter—the divine cancellation of the “death trap” in which all living things are held.
The Christian spin on this is not the less a revelation for its coincidence with the truth Joseph Campbell drew from his study of all the world’s myths: at the heart of the mythic structures embraced by every known human society lies the paradox of death in life / life in death.
Christian scripture calls the “death trap” the fear of death, a phrase that encompasses not only being afraid in the face of the fact of death but also all the things that fear prompts, the things we should be doing that are left undone and the things we should not be doing that we not only do but rehearse doing and, having done, commit to memory.
From this trap the mystery of Jesus’ death can set us free, just as it freed his first followers in their experiences of the risen Christ. Various theologies have sought to explain or rationalize this, some in the simple language of favorite hymns, some in doctrines, such as the substitutionary atonement, that make God into the opposite of what Christ’s teaching revealed.
These forays into explanation are, it strikes me now, prompted by the continuous ebb and flow of times in which we lean more toward realism and those in which we lean toward romanticism, our mystical immersion into wonder and ecstasy or our rational endeavors to find enlightenment.
Enlightenment, realism, facts—these are wonderful things to seek and the finding of them has brought forth much good. We are sadly in a time in which the fundamentalist suspicion of reason, of science, of knowledge has led us not into mystical revelation but into obscurantist ignorance. Yet the best knowledge available at any given time is not sufficient to the human heart.
The very best of the ancient world—the civilizing enterprise of Rome and the moral seriousness of the Hebrews—put Jesus on the cross, the cross a stumbling block for the one, folly for the other. This alone should give us a sense of how vital transcendence is to our lives. We are made to believe—and we will either believe something profound and true or something shallow and false. We simply don’t get to choose not to believe in anything.
That, ultimately, is the problem of atheism. All well and good and rational not to believe in anything you can’t understand—until you realize that, then, all reality is reduced to the size of your mind. And when my mind becomes the measure of all things, all things undergo a distortion—like seeing the heavens through the wrong end of the telescope.
Attention to fact—sadly lacking in some quarters—will help get us through this latest scare, but attention only to fact will not. Our social distancing and isolating are the safe and sane response to COVID – 19, and the distance is its own kind of grief. But we do not grieve as those without hope.
So comes Easter 2020. Let us take note that we celebrate once again—all-be-it from an acceptable measure of social distancing this year—the cancellation of the Death Trap.
Jesus lives! Thy terrors now can no longer, death, appall us.
Jesus lives! By this we know thou, O grave, can not enthrall us.
Alleluia!
Whatever light and hope you celebrate this time of year—even this year at a distance—may you find freedom from fear and renewed longing for one another.
Love, Nancy and Chuck
Magnificent stone sculpture of a wimpled worshiper before a crucifix, Cloisters, New York
It is time that the stone grew accustomed to blooming
From Paul Celan’s “Corona”
Virus news, family news, church news:
As many of you know, I accepted a call from our Bishop to serve for most of the rest of this year (and now possibly into 2021) as Rector in the Interim at St. Mark’s on the Campus, Lincoln, where Nancy and I met, both of us worked, I was ordained (see photo below) and my dad was the Vicar and Chaplain from 1962-1967. We travel to Lincoln twice a month for 5-6 days a stay, living thanks to their hospitality in the apartment at Holy Trinity across town—well, across the town as we once knew it when we were students there 1960-1971, fairly close in now that Lincoln has enlarged!
Currently, the ELCA chaplain, Adam White, and his Lutheran students have been using St. Mark’s on the Campus while their student house on campus is being rebuilt, and they were the first to tumble to the then future possibilities of shut-downs. Our plans for worshiping jointly in Holy Week were about to be undone, and I quipped that I’d just get some old posters of the trailer for the Natalie Wood movie This Property Condemned and slap them up across the entry doors to St. Marks on the Campus.
“You do know, don’t you,” Adam quipped, “that if you are old enough to remember that movie you are probably at a real high risk where the virus is concerned!”
So, we revised our Holy Week around the absence of our Lutherans. Then revised it again when our own Diocese called for a suspension of public worship, first earlier and now until May 10. I don’t know what significance Mother’s Day has to this timing, but there you have it.
And it turns out, for Fr. Joe Lenow and me, as well as for lots of lay leaders, not having public worship creates a lot more work, work seemingly under constant revision. We’re scrambling to learn and use the means at hand to broadcast worship, devotions, thoughts, and the “news you would have shared at coffee hour” where at least a large number of our members can access it—not always easy for some of our older member, especially those we cannot visit personally due to their assisted living residences being in a prudent lock down.
Luckily, one of our students, Taylor Sullivan, and one of his friends, Chase Crispin, are helping us with the broadcasts, and another, Francine Watkins, is trying to organize a virtual student gathering. We’re setting up a calling tree to ask how people are, if they have any needs or know of people who do, and if they can access our broadcasting. Our offices are open thanks to our intrepid, enterprising, and pastoral Parish Administrator, Bill Huenemann, and we are doing just what Bishop Ingley used to advise: keeping on keeping on!
One of the outdoor chores for springtime is the polishing of Marcus, the winged lion that sits in our courtyard, symbolic of St. Mark and a remembrance of Fr. George Peek who was dubbed “the lion of St. Mark’s.” Somewhere, on or around Easter, the Ptomey family will join Nancy and me as the volunteers to do the polishing. We’ll invite the Peeks in Milwaukee to polish with us virtually!
George’s Law Office is partially open and will probably be designated a vital business, but the courts in the Milwaukee area are no longer allowing “in person” court appearances. Harlan’s Cedar Bluffs School is shut down for now and maybe for the semester. We are doing all our prayer groups and twelve step meetings and church gatherings by Zoom conference calling. So, one way or another, by thoughtful choice or general necessity, we are all keeping a safe social distance and hoping all our collective efforts will get us over the crunch times for our health facilities to operate as they need to.
Those who see things differently than do we are now no longer just a nuisance but a danger—swimming in the Senate pool after being exposed to COVID-19, opening a university while others are wisely closing, delaying in getting the equipment and help needed to fight the virus or even recognize its dangers, first creating fear and causing hoarding, then calling for us to start business as usual by Easter, and putting stock portfolios ahead of the welfare of our elderly and at risk. If you often pray for the conversion of souls, there are apparently plenty to pray for! Dante would have known where they belong. Grace may have something else in store.
In sum, so far as we can tell we are all well, blessed by the means to sustain ourselves, encouraged by visits and calls from friends, and not yet at least a bit bored or antsy. Cottonmill Park was warm, sunny, and full for one of our recent walks, people walking their dogs everywhere you looked. Don’t just wash your hands—watch your step!
My ordination at St. Mark’s on the Campus, with Bishop Rauscher, 1971
Much has been cancelled—my Senior College Class and OLLI class and Nancy’s yoga. The upcoming Cather Spring Conference and our Grace Church Red Cloud service will be digital only; the Wyoming/Montana Hemingway conference has been moved to 2010. All of these, just a few among the many for so many. We will survive and institutions and services will revive. But someone was right in the advice he championed: “don’t stop thinking about tomorrow!” Among our hopes: that May will bring some relief to the prudent measures slowing the spread of the virus, people will still find a way to vote in the final primaries, and my usual Memorial Day blog listing of the friends and public figures who have died since the New Year’s blog will still appear.
Until then, thanks for all of you who keep us in prayers or calls or Facebook posts, especially our old friend from China, Cynthia Caples, and her email blasts with poems and prose that keep us calm and hopeful. And thanks to all our First Responders and all the other priests, pastors, and 12-steppers who are laboring in the labyrinths of Facebook Live, You Tube, and Zoom!
The more I think it over, the more I feel that there is nothing more truly artistic than to love people. (Vincent van Gogh)
Kearney
Nebraska
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- Chuck Peek’s Blog
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- Untitled
Dear family and friends,
An Eastertide Reflection
There will always be churches. Those who want them for worship need not fear. Reviving in them a sense of both wonder and purpose might even lead some people from Christmas back to God. Simon Jenkins (Guardian columnist)
In the midst of all the closures and cancellations that intervened this year between Christmas and Easter, I found it a good omen when I read that Kearney Community Theater was announcing the cancellation of Death Trap. They meant, of course, their next play, one we fairly recently saw credibly performed live in Milwaukee. But this particular cancellation among the many also heralded the truth of Easter—the divine cancellation of the “death trap” in which all living things are held.
The Christian spin on this is not the less a revelation for its coincidence with the truth Joseph Campbell drew from his study of all the world’s myths: at the heart of the mythic structures embraced by every known human society lies the paradox of death in life / life in death.
Christian scripture calls the “death trap” the fear of death, a phrase that encompasses not only being afraid in the face of the fact of death but also all the things that fear prompts, the things we should be doing that are left undone and the things we should not be doing that we not only do but rehearse doing and, having done, commit to memory.
From this trap the mystery of Jesus’ death can set us free, just as it freed his first followers in their experiences of the risen Christ. Various theologies have sought to explain or rationalize this, some in the simple language of favorite hymns, some in doctrines, such as the substitutionary atonement, that make God into the opposite of what Christ’s teaching revealed.
These forays into explanation are, it strikes me now, prompted by the continuous ebb and flow of times in which we lean more toward realism and those in which we lean toward romanticism, our mystical immersion into wonder and ecstasy or our rational endeavors to find enlightenment.
Enlightenment, realism, facts—these are wonderful things to seek and the finding of them has brought forth much good. We are sadly in a time in which the fundamentalist suspicion of reason, of science, of knowledge has led us not into mystical revelation but into obscurantist ignorance. Yet the best knowledge available at any given time is not sufficient to the human heart.
The very best of the ancient world—the civilizing enterprise of Rome and the moral seriousness of the Hebrews—put Jesus on the cross, the cross a stumbling block for the one, folly for the other. This alone should give us a sense of how vital transcendence is to our lives. We are made to believe—and we will either believe something profound and true or something shallow and false. We simply don’t get to choose not to believe in anything.
That, ultimately, is the problem of atheism. All well and good and rational not to believe in anything you can’t understand—until you realize that, then, all reality is reduced to the size of your mind. And when my mind becomes the measure of all things, all things undergo a distortion—like seeing the heavens through the wrong end of the telescope.
Attention to fact—sadly lacking in some quarters—will help get us through this latest scare, but attention only to fact will not. Our social distancing and isolating are the safe and sane response to COVID – 19, and the distance is its own kind of grief. But we do not grieve as those without hope.
So comes Easter 2020. Let us take note that we celebrate once again—all-be-it from an acceptable measure of social distancing this year—the cancellation of the Death Trap.
Jesus lives! Thy terrors now can no longer, death, appall us.
Jesus lives! By this we know thou, O grave, can not enthrall us.
Alleluia!
Whatever light and hope you celebrate this time of year—even this year at a distance—may you find freedom from fear and renewed longing for one another.
Love, Nancy and Chuck
Magnificent stone sculpture of a wimpled worshiper before a crucifix, Cloisters, New York
It is time that the stone grew accustomed to blooming
From Paul Celan’s “Corona”
Virus news, family news, church news:
As many of you know, I accepted a call from our Bishop to serve for most of the rest of this year (and now possibly into 2021) as Rector in the Interim at St. Mark’s on the Campus, Lincoln, where Nancy and I met, both of us worked, I was ordained (see photo below) and my dad was the Vicar and Chaplain from 1962-1967. We travel to Lincoln twice a month for 5-6 days a stay, living thanks to their hospitality in the apartment at Holy Trinity across town—well, across the town as we once knew it when we were students there 1960-1971, fairly close in now that Lincoln has enlarged!
Currently, the ELCA chaplain, Adam White, and his Lutheran students have been using St. Mark’s on the Campus while their student house on campus is being rebuilt, and they were the first to tumble to the then future possibilities of shut-downs. Our plans for worshiping jointly in Holy Week were about to be undone, and I quipped that I’d just get some old posters of the trailer for the Natalie Wood movie This Property Condemned and slap them up across the entry doors to St. Marks on the Campus.
“You do know, don’t you,” Adam quipped, “that if you are old enough to remember that movie you are probably at a real high risk where the virus is concerned!”
So, we revised our Holy Week around the absence of our Lutherans. Then revised it again when our own Diocese called for a suspension of public worship, first earlier and now until May 10. I don’t know what significance Mother’s Day has to this timing, but there you have it.
And it turns out, for Fr. Joe Lenow and me, as well as for lots of lay leaders, not having public worship creates a lot more work, work seemingly under constant revision. We’re scrambling to learn and use the means at hand to broadcast worship, devotions, thoughts, and the “news you would have shared at coffee hour” where at least a large number of our members can access it—not always easy for some of our older member, especially those we cannot visit personally due to their assisted living residences being in a prudent lock down.
Luckily, one of our students, Taylor Sullivan, and one of his friends, Chase Crispin, are helping us with the broadcasts, and another, Francine Watkins, is trying to organize a virtual student gathering. We’re setting up a calling tree to ask how people are, if they have any needs or know of people who do, and if they can access our broadcasting. Our offices are open thanks to our intrepid, enterprising, and pastoral Parish Administrator, Bill Huenemann, and we are doing just what Bishop Ingley used to advise: keeping on keeping on!
One of the outdoor chores for springtime is the polishing of Marcus, the winged lion that sits in our courtyard, symbolic of St. Mark and a remembrance of Fr. George Peek who was dubbed “the lion of St. Mark’s.” Somewhere, on or around Easter, the Ptomey family will join Nancy and me as the volunteers to do the polishing. We’ll invite the Peeks in Milwaukee to polish with us virtually!
George’s Law Office is partially open and will probably be designated a vital business, but the courts in the Milwaukee area are no longer allowing “in person” court appearances. Harlan’s Cedar Bluffs School is shut down for now and maybe for the semester. We are doing all our prayer groups and twelve step meetings and church gatherings by Zoom conference calling. So, one way or another, by thoughtful choice or general necessity, we are all keeping a safe social distance and hoping all our collective efforts will get us over the crunch times for our health facilities to operate as they need to.
Those who see things differently than do we are now no longer just a nuisance but a danger—swimming in the Senate pool after being exposed to COVID-19, opening a university while others are wisely closing, delaying in getting the equipment and help needed to fight the virus or even recognize its dangers, first creating fear and causing hoarding, then calling for us to start business as usual by Easter, and putting stock portfolios ahead of the welfare of our elderly and at risk. If you often pray for the conversion of souls, there are apparently plenty to pray for! Dante would have known where they belong. Grace may have something else in store.
In sum, so far as we can tell we are all well, blessed by the means to sustain ourselves, encouraged by visits and calls from friends, and not yet at least a bit bored or antsy. Cottonmill Park was warm, sunny, and full for one of our recent walks, people walking their dogs everywhere you looked. Don’t just wash your hands—watch your step!
My ordination at St. Mark’s on the Campus, with Bishop Rauscher, 1971
Much has been cancelled—my Senior College Class and OLLI class and Nancy’s yoga. The upcoming Cather Spring Conference and our Grace Church Red Cloud service will be digital only; the Wyoming/Montana Hemingway conference has been moved to 2010. All of these, just a few among the many for so many. We will survive and institutions and services will revive. But someone was right in the advice he championed: “don’t stop thinking about tomorrow!” Among our hopes: that May will bring some relief to the prudent measures slowing the spread of the virus, people will still find a way to vote in the final primaries, and my usual Memorial Day blog listing of the friends and public figures who have died since the New Year’s blog will still appear.
Until then, thanks for all of you who keep us in prayers or calls or Facebook posts, especially our old friend from China, Cynthia Caples, and her email blasts with poems and prose that keep us calm and hopeful. And thanks to all our First Responders and all the other priests, pastors, and 12-steppers who are laboring in the labyrinths of Facebook Live, You Tube, and Zoom!
The more I think it over, the more I feel that there is nothing more truly artistic than to love people. (Vincent van Gogh)
Kearney
Nebraska
April 2020
capeek 