I find these words by Stephen Porges to be very wise and real:
“Trauma compromises our ability to engage with others by replacing patterns of connection with patterns of protection.”
When a person or community has experienced trauma, recent or long ago, the instincts for protection are valid.
-And-
This is one of the reasons that human connections are important in the healing of trauma. They restore something diminished. And they protect too.
–Renee Roederer
I had the best soup for dinner last night. Like. Wow.
It was a tortellini soup, made by one of my favorite people. First of all, I don’t think I’ve ever had tortellini soup, so that was fun, but also, this was one of the best meals I’ve had in a good while.
And on top of that, something simple meant a lot to me too. As soon as I walked in the door, she said, “I know you like your food really hot, so I’ve kept it hot on the stove.” She would have kept it on the burner until I arrived anyway, but she had also been intentional about this little detail, just because she knows me. It feels good to be known.
One of the greatest gifts we can give each other — in large things and in small things — is particularity of care. Care that knows each other. Care that notices each other. Care that loves each other specifically.
–Renee Roederer
I was recently listening to a Mumford & Sons’ song when one of their lyrics really caught my attention:
“… before I tumble homeward, homeward.”
I thought that was intriguing phrasing. It made me reflect on the times when I suddenly found myself in a homeward direction, perhaps when I wasn’t even expecting it. There are also times when I found myself feeling a sense of home, even though its process and arrival of getting there was messy.
Thank goodness these moments can happen.
I have had moments of return — to place, to family, to communities, to memory, to states of mind — that were sudden. I have had estrangements suddenly end. I have had reconnections with community open wide after this was previously closed. I have had moments when I realized I could reconnect with the feeling of a loved one’s presence after they died.
I have also had moments of tumbling home to uncharted places. I have moved across the country three times to live in four different states. I have weathered a pandemic from inside my house. I have been accompanied by friends and loved ones through daily living. I have come to feel at home in my body.
“… before I tumble homeward, homeward.”
How about you?
–Renee Roederer
Easter is a season — 50 days of new life.
Some of my readers likely celebrate Easter, while others do not. In any particular way resonates with you, may a season of new life find you. And here’s the theme that is sitting with me at the moment:
I want to live a larger narrative. I have some very specific things on my mind when I say that. These are large visions that resonate with my life and send me into particular callings in community.
I hope that you can also live into a larger narrative that marks your life, however it may take form.
This is what I mean:
What is the larger narrative for you? —
a vision more expansive
than your fears,
than your pain,
than your abandonment,
than your guilt,
than your anger,
than your regret,
than your addictions,
than your cynicism,
than your anxiety,
than your unease?
These feelings and experiences are valid and can be felt and processed, rather than pushed to the side.
But what larger narrative and vision energizes you and lights you up with sacred possibility?
Could we perhaps spend 50 days cultivating that? Dreaming that? Practicing that? Acting on that?
–Renee Roederer
A poem for Holy Saturday by Lucy Shaw:
Judas, Peter
because we are all
betrayers, taking
silver and eating
body and blood and asking
(guilty) is it I and hearing
him say yes
it would be simple for us all
to rush out
and hang ourselves
but if we find grace
to cry and wait
after the voice of morning
has crowed in our ears
clearly enough
to break our hearts
he will be there
to ask us each again
do you love me
-Lucy Shaw
This reflection was offered on April 14, 2022 at First Presbyterian Church in Saline, Michigan.
Having loved his own who were in the world,
Jesus loved them to the end.
Jesus knows that the end of his life is coming. In a matter of hours, he will be unjustly arrested and condemned to die a painful death. As the end of his life draws closer, with each minute of heartbreak, Jesus also knows he will soon experience betrayal and abandonment by his most beloved disciples. It is a terrible burden to bear.
Having loved his own who were in the world,
Jesus loved them to the end.
In his final moments, Jesus chooses to demonstrate love and righteousness, for he embodies the very love and righteousness that the disciples cannot fulfill. The King of Kings clothes himself in rags of servanthood and lowers himself to the ground. With love and righteousness, he washes the feet of the very ones who will walk toward his betrayal and then run away in fear.
Why does he choose to serve the ones who serve him betrayal?
Because love and righteousness are the end —
the goal, the purpose, and the aim of his life.
Jesus loved his disciples to the end – that is, to his very last breath.
Jesus loved his disciples to the end – that is, to the goal and purpose of who he was.
Jesus demonstrated love continually in the last hours of his life as he took bread, blessed it, and broke it with his disciples. He shared his last meal with them. He prayed for these disciples — each one — and he prayed for future disciples like you and me who would come to believe in him based on the words and witness of these disciples around the table with him.
Jesus loved these disciples.
Jesus loved us.
Jesus loved the world.
He loved us all in these last moments,
as he had loved us his entire life long.
Love so deep, enduring, and inclusive can come with challenges. Jesus loved so fully and radically that he threatened those in power, and the Roman state executed him. Love can be costly. . . Jesus chose to love anyway, and in doing so, he demonstrated the stronger power.
Jesus loved those he counted as friends, and he loved friends who would treat him like an enemy. Jesus Christ, God among us, loved humanity to the end – to his very last breath and the goal and purpose of his life.
We have all failed to live this kind of love fully. We struggle to love our friends and fellow disciples. We certainly fail to love our enemies and those who are scapegoated as the so-called “enemies.”
But Jesus gives us a commandment to love one another: “Love one another,” he says. “Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”
Even if we do so imperfectly,
can we dare to love one another to the end,
to and through our very last breath?
Even if we do so imperfectly,
can we dare to love one another to the end,
to and through the very purpose and goal of Jesus’ life?
May God strengthen us as we sit at table with those we love.
May God strengthen us as we sit at table with those who disagree with us.
May God strengthen us as we ponder those who are vulnerable.
May God strengthen us as we ponder those who betray the vulnerable.
And may we know that Jesus Christ loves us to the end.
I walked in the rain, but I didn’t care much about that. I enjoyed finding these flowers along the way.
Photos by Renee Roederer
I grabbed a carafe of coffee and mindlessly poured it into a cup in a way that one would during communion, lifting the carafe higher to increase the distance the between the coffee coming out of the pot and the cup, as if to make it visible to a congregation.
And that is the precise moment when I knew I needed coffee.
–Renee Roederer
Once, a 4 year old I know said this with total sincerity:
“Jesus was very sad… But then! He got happy! And he changed his name to Paul. And that is why we have Paul Sunday, and sometimes, we call it Paulmmmmm Sunday.”
One of the things I love during this time of year is the occasion to watch perennial wildflowers emerge in their typical order throughout the spring and summer. And the first ones are always the crocuses.
“Welcome to spring!” I think. “We’re here!”
Right now, I have little bouquets of crocuses sprouting in my yard (pictured above). They’re gorgeous, and they give me delight. We’re really here!
–Renee Roederer
Smuggling Grace 