Smuggling Grace

I went to a virtual meeting yesterday. Like all of us, I’ve been to an innumerable amount of virtual meetings over the last two years. This particular meeting had two parts to it, and some participants were scheduled to arrive half way through.

“Okay, I’m going to let in the others,” the host said.

Suddenly, four additional people popped onto the screen, and I don’t know what it was about that extremely small, mundane, has-been-done-so-many-times-in-this-pandemic moment, but when those four additional smiling faces arrived, I felt something deep and meaningful.

Last week, I wrote a piece about what it feels like to know you’re creating together. There is also a particular kind of bond we can feel alongside the people with whom we’ve created. I felt that yesterday.

I recently stepped down from my role as Director of the Interfaith Round Table of Washtenaw County. This was a hard decision for me to make, but with additional responsibilities coming my way, I knew I could not continue to stay in this position. Yesterday, Board members from the Interfaith Round Table met with students at the University of Michigan. They’re taking a class entitled, “Interfaith Organizing and Social Justice.” We talked about what we’ve experienced and what we’ve been able to cultivate together through our relationships, shared dialogue, and interfaith events.

There is truly a special kind of bond between people who have created together. I felt that deeply when they arrived on Zoom. It was such mundane moment, but there was love on the screen.

–Renee Roederer

Each morning, I go to The New York Times website to check the COVID-19 numbers, and each day, the graph moves upward without a flattening curve. I see the number of new cases, the number of hospitalizations, and the number of deaths alongside the percentage increase from two weeks ago.

Average numbers from January 8:
656,478 new cases (14 day change of +226%)
127,225 hospitalized (14 day change of +78%)
1,524 deaths (14 day change of 12%)

These numbers, though informative in their own way, do nothing to tell the stories of upending grief.

My heart hurts because a young pastoral colleague died from COVID-19 over the weekend. He has a name. My heart hurts because people I love are aching. They have names.

The Rev. Matthew J. Warfield is the name of a beloved human being — loved by his family with names, his friends with names, his seminary colleagues with names, and the staff and members of First Presbyterian Church of Ann Arbor, all with names. He came to serve that church in August 2021. He was only 32 years old.

There are beloved people with names who knew him more closely than I did. But I enjoyed his presence and could tell he was very special. He was the first person I met when I arrived for a gathering of campus ministers at the University of Michigan. We sat together and enjoyed bagels. Then, months later, when another resident minister was ordained, I sat next to him, and while sharing a hymnal, we sang in harmony with gusto.

This beloved person with a name created a number of significant moments with beloved people I love, all of them with names, all of them now hurting. And I realize that the numbers cannot capture the stories of precious lives gone. This is devastating.

His memory is not gone. His impact will last as long as all his loves keep living, and likely, beyond that time too. But it hurts.

May his name be said with love. May all the names be said with love.

–Renee Roederer

Why not live this way?

A poem by Hafiz:
“With that Moon Language”

Admit something:
Everyone you see, you say to them, “Love me.”
Of course you do not do this out loud, otherwise
Someone would call the cops.
Still, though, think about this, this great pull in us to connect.
Why not become the one who lives with a
Full moon in each eye that is always saying,
With that sweet moon language, what every other eye in
This world is dying to hear?

This morning, I’m meeting with a community group over Zoom, and we’re going to discuss these questions:

What are 2022’s most pressing needs? — Personally and collectively? How do we want to be a part of addressing those needs this year?

The author Frederick Buechner says that you are called to the place where “your deep gladness and the world’s deep hunger meet.” What is that intersection for each one of us, and how might that be a part of addressing needs together in 2022?

–Renee Roederer

In an era of so much collective upheaval, we are each impacted in particularly difficult ways. In the midst of that, in an effort to bring a cliche (albeit a true one) to life, I really try to focus on one day at a time.

What would make this day a meaningful day?

It helps me to ask that in the morning and then to rehearse in my mind the aspects of the day that are before me. What am I looking forward to doing or experiencing? Or how can I/we make this meaningful?

Sometimes, I sincerely look forward to simple joys: I’m going to have coffee today. (P.S. Coffee is really dang good). But this also helps me bring more intentionality into work, or rest, or conversations, or whatever the day may bring.

But this is my favorite part: Before bed, I rehearse in my mind the day I ended up having. I tell it to myself like a story. I got to do this… This happened… It was so funny when… I loved when… And I feel grateful for a lot. By the end of the day, even if it’s just simple joys, I have more to say about the day and more unexpected gratitude than I named at the beginning.

It feels good.

Now, all of that being said, do not let this post be about toxic positivity (I say this to you all, but also to myself). If there are days where tears need to be shed at the end of the day — or for that matter, at the beginning or the middle — this is valid, and may it be. If anxiety needs to be processed, this is valid, and may it be. If anger rises, this is valid, and may it be. Everything should get space.

But I do name this practice in writing today because it helps me a lot, and I wonder if it might help someone else too. I hope so.

And… Guess what?

Right after pushing ‘publish,’ I’m gonna go into the kitchen for some coffee.

–Renee Roederer

While doing some chores and cleaning the house, I overheard the sounds of James Erb’s choral arrangement of “Shenandoah.” One of my family members has been staying with me for a few weeks, and she started to play it on her laptop. Instantaneously, this brought me back to a lot of wonderful memories.

I’ve sung that piece with several choirs, and I have especially vivid memories from my high school and college choirs. As I heard this last night, I realized that the instant remembrance was less about visual memory or place memory, and it was more of a memory of what it felt like — a feeling between us when we were aware collectively that we were creating a gorgeous sound and a special moment together. As we sang this piece, we would become very present to the moment in the beauty of the melody and the weaving together of harmony.

After hearing this piece in the background, I decided to put on some headphones and listen for myself. The sounds were lovely. And I realized, within music and and also in all the daily living beyond music, this is what I want in 2022: I want moments of feeling like we are creating something glorious together.

Have you ever had those moments? When you were in the midst of creating something together, and you were deeply aware of how special it is?

I want that,
in householding,
in working,
in community care,
in shared laughter (have you ever been aware in the moment that something is going to be a future inside joke for years to come?)
in music,
in community organizing,
in…
in so many things.

I want this.
I want to create together.

–Renee Roederer

I appreciate the perspectives of David LaMotte, songwriter, musician, and author of Worldchanging 101: Challenging the Myth of Powerlessness. He reminds us that we are not always able to fix the many challenges of the world, but we are enabled to change them. Change is the powerful and empowering paradigm.

In my work, I am at times presented with challenges I don’t know how to fix. In those moments, I don’t have the personal knowledge, experiences, or access to necessary resources. In such situations, I have two primary strategies. They sound simplistic, but they are powerful and empowering too:

1) Care and 2) Connect.

Care
We participate in changing situations when we care for the people experiencing them. There are times when people are bolstered by being heard, seen, understood, and loved.

We’ve likely heard about the placebo effect when it comes to medications. But this can be applied to caring presence as well. Studies have revealed that cancer patients do better on their treatment regimen when a doctor walks in to tell them that the treatment is beginning. In such moments, the doctor shares nothing overtly medical. They only offer their presence in connection to the treatment. When patients connect their treatment to a symbol and presence of care, the treatment is more effective.

When we add our presence and care to the people around us, we change difficult situations.

Connect
As I shared above, there are times when we don’t have the personal knowledge, experiences, or access to necessary resources. In these moments, I think, “Get this person to people.” Sometimes, this involves a referral to a trusted source who will have that knowledge, experience, or access to necessary resources. But sometimes, we can’t think of anyone, and this is a general strategy to “get this person to community.”

The community often has the personal knowledge, experience, and access to resources. These are all held in the collective, and while you can’t always anticipate the precise relationships from which they will emerge, so often, they do come specifically from the community. This is something I trust because I watch it happen repeatedly. Every single week, I witness this.

We can change things. When in doubt,
1) Care and 2) Connect.

–Renee Roederer

Rituals can be so helpful.

I joined a group of women over Zoom. They are rooted in the Jewish renewal movement, and they are masters of reflection, spiritual practice, and care for our bodies. We sang and danced last night, each one of us in our own homes, and we discussed our hopes for this new year, all while honoring pains of the pandemic. We know we still carry those into this present moment.

At one point, we each held a rock in our hands, and we imagined that we were placing all our pains and difficulties from 2021 into that rock. Then we put the rock in a bowl of water. We imagined that the water was purifying the rock, and we were invited to take some time after the Zoom gathering to pour out that water with intention, releasing those memories and feelings.

I did not pour out the water gently. After the Zoom, I opened my front door and flung that water out with some force. I imagined throwing toxicity out the door, and it felt really good.

If it would help you to do something similar, I extend the invitation.

Pour it out.

Fling it out!

–Renee Roederer

As we began to close 2021 and came nearer to 2022, I doubt that many of us had a feeling that we may have had in transitions past — a sense that new year might hold promise to be remarkably different than the last one. We’re not at that kind of turning point.

So instead, these questions may be important:

What values and what priorities are you committed to this year, no matter what happens? How will you return to those values and priorities repeatedly, no matter what? How can those sustain you and others?

–Renee Roederer

These days, in the midst of such a tumultuous era, we never know what people have lived or what they’re experiencing in this present moment.

For that reason, I’m saying less, “Happy New Year” to others, and more, “A Loved New Year.”

A Loved New Year to you.

I hope you feel that. All year long. And if you ever have a moment of doubting it, that love is a truth to which you can always return.

–Renee Roederer