Leading Edge of Lent

Lent for me this year is all about re-connection. So far it is working pretty well. I've connected with old friends, made some new ones, re-engaged work to a level that I haven't seen in quite a while and most importantly woken back up to the realities of ministry in the places where I already find myself.

In these early days of Lent I have come across a good reason to stay with my career: I don't entirely believe in its fundamental concern. Or rather I believe that it's fundamental concern is essential but it is also the basis for economic abuses and misperception of value. Private property is a very helpful feature of society but only up to a point. Beyond which we get the increased isolation and huge disparity between have and have-not that we see in the US and between various parts of the globe.

However, having no Land Administration System at all makes it even more difficult for those on the bottom of the socio-economic ladder. Creating land records is the beginning of a path that can create reasonable wealth for the most people. It can be an important part of the technologies which help to underly a society based on enough.

There is a justice concern wrapped up in all the day to day work of maps, deed searches, comparable sales, and poring over county and assessor data. In some of my reading today ("Land Administration for Sustainable Development" from ESRI Press) I found this hopeful and helpful tidbit:

The international land policy literature observes three components within the broad goal of sustainability:

* Efficiency and promotion of economic development
* Equality and social justice
* Environmental preservation and a sustainable pattern of land use (GTZ 1998; Deninger 2003)

You never know what might come of remaining engaged here. An opportunity through the GIScorps or my own company's international efforts might open up a pathway to contribute to a world based on enough rather than just more without end. I can certainly get behind that.

Blessings to you on the Jerusalem road.

The Long Tail of Epiphany

Parts of three liturgical seasons have passed since I was last here: the latter half of Advent, all of Christmas, and most of Epiphany. I can definitely say that Epiphany this year was revelatory but in some pretty rocky ways and distinctly of the less is more variety.

Despite all my excitement regarding the Academy last fall and the hope that came with the feeling that I was finally getting somewhere (whatever that means), I have come to see that not only was I unable to keep up in the new term given my hypo-depressive state, but I also had really good reasons for letting that trajectory go. That was just over two weeks ago.

There are a number of factors behind discerning such a choice. They largely fall into two categories which might appear to be contradictory, though in practice they are not given the nature of my community:

1. My monastic stability was at risk of being permanently impaired. My connections and avenues of service at my church home as well as through work and my personal life were under nearly terminal strain from the striving for the future and the work itself associated with the Academy. I came to realize that where I already found myself was were I wanted to be and I was losing the ability to be present to it.

2. I am very likely too religiously multivalent to fare well in the official discernment process and administration of the church even in a denomination as progressive as this one. However I can be a very happy and hopefully helpful member of this expression of the body of Christ.

So I have been steadily been building that reality back up during this long tail of Epiphany and its collection of small nudges leading to big shifts.

My subjunctive adventure continues...