Meta Centricities

I’m taking a little break from filling boxes and taking down pictures and wrapping delicate things in newspaper to watch the DNC convention via streaming video (since I don’t have a TV.) In three days, a truck is going to come, and take all of my stuff away, to go to California. The next day, I drop Ruth off at the airport, and embark on my solo journey across country.

I’m really looking forward to the trip. I’m thinking of it as part retreat, part vision quest, part liminal experience. It’s a good thing I love to drive (Ruth doesn’t). I love the idea that I’ll get to really see and experience the country between where I live now, and where I’ll be living. Flying always makes the place I arrive in surreal - I never really quite feel like I’ve arrived. But traveling by surface - car, train, etc., makes me really know I have arrived.

I’m going the northern route - from New York, Ohio, Indiana, through Chicago, up through Wisconsin and a corner of Minnesota. I’ll be going to South Dakota, and go through the Badlands. I’m going to drive through Wyoming, and visit Yellowstone. Then through Idaho. It’s not clear whether I’ll head straight down from Idaho to Nevada, then CA, or go through Oregon to Portland, then down the coast. The latter sounds much more fun, but I don’t know how tired I’ll be, and what I’ll want to do. But in any event, I expect the trip to take me close to a week.

I’ll be blogging and tweeting along the way, of course (I’m going to put my tweets in the sidebar here.) And I hope to take pictures, and take in the full experience.

Real Live Preacher is a blog by a real Baptist minister. I’ve been reading it pretty consistently since I discovered it quite a number of years ago (pre-seminary).  He even used to have a chat room I would visit on occasion. That’s where I met Rev. Sean, a UU Minister (and on the board of Starr King) whose blog, Ministrare, I also read pretty consistently.

Anyway, so RLP (or Gordon Atkinson, his real name) is very brave, and quite interesting, too. He has taken on issues of gay marriage, his battle with depression, and a broad range of issues. He has now decided to take on the question of whether or not the Bible really says that non-Christians are going to hell.

THE CHALLENGE:

Okay, so here’s the deal: if you believe in hell, I want you to help us understand why. I invite anyone who believes that non-Christians are going to an eternal hell to make your case. We’re going to play by your rules too. Bible arguments only. Don’t explain why you think there should be a hell. Don’t tell us that your preacher told you there is a hell. Show us in the scriptures you say you love so dearly.

Because if you’re talking about hell, you better damn well be able to open your holy book and show us why. And if you can’t…well, maybe you shouldn’t be talking so much.

You really should go read the whole post. It’s great.

What I think is great about this is unlike the general progressive/liberal Christian strategy, which basically (for good reason) questions the whole premise of the Bible being the literal truth, thus allowing us to basically throw out things we don’t like, RLP is asking people who believe in hell to play by their own rules - that is, prove it using scripture. I can’t wait to hear the results.

On August 28th, a truck will come and take all of my stuff away, to go to California. It seems unreal, somehow, that it will happen quite so soon. But the date is approaching at a rapid pace.

I’m in my standard “moving is chaos” challenging place. I get restless, have insomnia, and indigestion, among other things. It’s stressful to move, and it’s hard for me to feel grounded and at peace with all of it going on, even though it’s all really under control.

For me, this emotional state is familiar, having moved so much in the last few years. This time, I’m just trying to be present with it, and accept it, instead of wishing it would go away (because, of course, it won’t.) It will be likely more than a month before I have a place to live, and can begin to unpack, so I will have this internally (as well as externally) chaotic place to live with for a while yet.

All of that said, I’m excited about the move. I’m starting to already make plans to do things when I arrive, and I’m excited about all of the possibilities. So, just to live through the chaos…