We’ve Come a Long Way, Baby
That’s an acolyte. With her hair in a bun. HER hair.
Do you remember a time when that was totally unheard of? To have a woman at the alter? Holy Moly!
But isn’t she beautiful? How did we ever think that keeping such a beautiful child from participating in such a beautiful way in such a beautiful service to God was ever wrong?
We’ve come a long way, baby. A long way to a new understanding of who we are, of who God is, and who we are to become.
And we have a long, long way to go.
What reason weaves, by passion is undone. -Alexander Pope
Are there ways that you used to believe were true and right that now you see as narrow and unforgiving? I’m still working on my many prejudices (aka fears). Love, laughter and forgiveness — especially for yourself — are the best weapons to take into battle.
What say you?
prayers for the oft traveled road 
Oh, now you & Anne are making me think lately – & that darn book! I grow up in a fairly conservative area (my folks were pretty open, although we didn’t really talk about homosexuality, the definitely believed that women could minister as well as men – & they were pretty adamant about not being racist). I went to a Baptist college. I participated in a mission program where I had to sign an oath that the Bible was the inerrant Word of God.
What do you think – have I come a long way? I think so. But there are still those niggling little prejudices that trip me up sometimes (every day).
You caught right on to where I was when I started this post. 🙂 I was sparked by a post from the iMonk this morning (I subscribe to their blog, it’s a good one!) AND by the novel I’m reading, Chasing Francis.
I’m pretty sure our God hasn’t gotten bigger as we’ve grown, but that we’ve gotten smaller. The world (my world) has so much more COLOR and flavor than it did before, things just aren’t so black and white. I’m less sure and MORE sure, both at the same time.
LOL! Can you tell I’m just bursting full of jumbled, as yet unformed into coherent thoughts? Life is good.
Oh, so good!
Amen!
There are too many to list! I’m thinking about a conversation I had this morning with a person at work. She was telling me about her pastor’s advice which I think is crazy. I’m going to blog about it once I figure out a response that is more coherent than “He wants you to do WHAT?”
A lovely post! I concur that God wants ALL of us to participate in the beauty and the holiness of this world and of the church in that world. I look forward to visiting your site again soon.
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