Rev Gals Friday Five: Civic Duties

http://revgalblogpals.blogspot.com/
Friday Five: Civic Duties

It's that season of the year when lawn signs are sprouting as surely as flowers in the spring; elections are just around the corner. And so today we bring you a Civic Duty Friday Five.

1) How old were you when you voted for the first time?
I think that I was 19, but I'm really getting old because that just doesn't make sense. I thought it was in a Presidential Election that I voted, but it must not have been......because it was Nov. 1983? (oops--it was 1982!) I sat in my boyfriend's dorm room and let him tell me who to vote for on my absentee ballot! ugh! (and that ballot had the little styrofoam punches that leaves hanging chads!)

2) What was the contest at the top of the ballot?
I can't remember (see above!) . It must have been a Senate race or a Governor's Race.... My mind is befuddled because I thought it was the 1984 presidential election. Which actually took place during my sophomore year and our college had a mock convention for the party out of power--which would have been the democratics. I got to be a part of the Idaho delegation and we initially nominated "Mr. Potato Head"--ok, maybe we just thought about that one....but the mock convention ultimately nominated Gary Hart!

3) Can you walk to your polling place?
yes...it's actually in our church and the parsonage is right next door! It's quite unnerving because several of our church members work the polls and I have to walk in and declare my party to get the right primary ballot. It's unnerving because I really feel like the "brite blue dot in a really red state" that I am!

4) Have you ever run for public office?
nope and don't plan on it (even in local politics anymore, it's just too nasty!)

5) Have you run for office in a club or school or on a board?
yes...I always seemed to get elected secretary of every group I belonged to in high school!

what I needed on my birthday

My brothers and sisters, whenever you face trials of any kind, consider it nothing but joy, because you know that the testing of your faith produces endurance; and let endurance have its full effect, so that you may be mature and complete, lacking in nothing.

- James 1:2-4

That's when I want you - you knower of my emptiness, you unspeaking partner to my sorrow. That's when I need you, God, like food.
- Rainer Maria Rilke

from Sojouners Daily Verse and Voice

On the Eve of my Birthday

So, tomorrow is my 43rd birthday...what's scary is that that means I am beginning my 44th(!) year on earth. My sister is turning 40 tomorrow as well. (i know, it's strange, I'm not sure how my parents worked that one out!)

I'm not getting my birthday gift until the end of the month, though. RevHub's best friend is getting married in San Francisco, so we are headed there for 6 days! Both of us have been there before, but not together. RH has been to visit his friend several times as well as a "family" trip that he took a few years ago with his father and two sisters (the year before his dad died). My one trip there was as a chaperone for our Youth Choir Tour. It was an amazing and awful trip one and the same time....it was wonderful in every way except for the fact that we were what I would call "transportationally challenged." here are a few of the highlights:

• before we ever got on the plane in Raleigh, they had to fly a completely new plane from Atlanta to RDU for us. Needless to say, we missed our connection in Atlanta and only half of the 65 of us got on another flight that night and made it to Oakland
• Half of us made it there, but for some of us the luggage made it and for some of us (including me) it didn't
• the tour bus that was supposed to pick us up could not be found upon arrival at Oakland--evidentially it did
• one of the children got left on the bus sleeping when we arrived the hostel. When she woke up 20 minutes after he'd dropped us off, she about gave the driver a heart attack when she walked to the front of the bus.
• the next night, the second half arrived --having to take the subway with their luggage from the Oakland airport to the Giants stadium to the baseball game
• we were the last ones to leave the game because once again, the bus could not be found. In talking with a woman who seemed to be using more Chinese than English (and none of us spoke Chinese), we figured out, it had a flat tire.
• One day the driver showed up with a significantly smaller bus and we had seven people who sat on the floor in the aisle
• Finally, to top the week off, the bus failed to show up to take us to the airport. That was after the choir director and most of the choir had decided to stay awake all night since the bus was coming at 5 a.m. anyway and they could sleep on the plane. We got about 15 folks to the airport via alternate means and they made the original flight. when the rest of us finally got to the airport about 10 a.m. on Sunday, we were told that the next flight that we could get on was at 4 p.m. Monday! However, they would good enough to divide us up with a few youth and at least one adult in a group and put us on other flights...the only problem was that we were in Oakland and all the other flights were out of San Fran or San Jose and we had to hire transportation between airports. I was in the last group that flew out at 11 p.m. on Sunday, but we were the first to arrive in Raleigh at 1 p.m. on Monday (we were supposed to be home on Sunday by 5 p.m.)

SO....I only hope that this trip is better transportationally speaking than my last!!!

Well...I forgot to mention, part of my gift is that we are renting a convertible mustang! Surely that will be better!

Forgiveness? only by God's grace

There have been reports that members of the Amish community have forgiven the man who killed their little girls. When I first heard this in a report, I was astounded and thought, how could anyone "process" their grief so quickly and reach forgiveness already.

Later, I heard another report that said that the community had begun to think about how they could respond to the family of the shooter. They had talked about taking food to his widow. That's when I began to think...what a witness to God's grace.

The power to forgive is not through our own strength or goodness or will. Rather, we are able to forgive, only by the power of God's grace.

Although the report that I have linked talks also about some members of the community believing this was God's plan, I strongly disagree with that theology. But, I do believe whatever happens to us, we have a choice in how we respond and in that response we can witness to God's Grace.