What was it that Mark Twain said, something about his death being
prematurely reported? I would suggest that the same thing could be
said about baseball, and the Episcopal Church, for that matter.
Many said that baseball was doomed in the midst of the controversy
over the use of steroids. Fans would be totally turned off, players
would not know how to train without drugs; that main stay of the
sport, personal best records would be suspect. Without the physical giants like
Sammy Sosa, Mark MacGuire, and Barry Bonds the game just wouldn't be
exciting anymore.
Well guess what. They were wrong. Baseball has come back, maybe
stronger than it's been for a long time. Those lumbering behemoths
gave way to a new breed of ball players. Our new heroes are fast, and
scrappy, like Dustin Pedroia and Nyjer Morgan. They are becoming the
most exciting players to watch. We're realizing it's much more
fun to watch a bold runner score from first on a long out to
right field than it is to watch a slugger trot the bases with his
hands in the air after a home run.
Many said the Episcopal Church was gasping it's last breaths
too, especially after the affirmation of the election of the bishop of
New Hampshire at General Convention in 2003. And the Church has
gotten smaller to, or as I like to think of it, leaner and quicker.
It's not that the Church without the dioceses and congregations who
left is any better, rather it's that since they left those of us still
here have become more focused, more able to spend energy on something
other than sexual politics.
Just as I believe the changes in major league baseball will
reinvigorate the game, I believe the Church's changes will have a
similar outcome. Of course it takes effective training, courageous
play and taking some risks to produce successful baseball, and Church.
It's hopeful, and a lot of fun, to think that we're well on our way,
in both.
Sent from my iPad
Thursday, March 17, 2011
Friday, March 11, 2011
First Pitch
Hurray, baseball season is upon us! Over the next few months I plan to spend some time writing occasional articles about two of my greatest passions, baseball and religion. Here is my first installment
I was really captured by the photo above the fold on the sports page of last Sunday's New York Times. It was taken in a rural village in Zambia, Africa. The photo was of a group of African children and two young, white Americans, comfortably nestled together. Everyone was grinning. Their smiles were of friendship and sharing So here's the catch, and the reason it was in the newspaper. Los Angeles Dodgers ace, 22 year old pitcher Clayton Kershaw, and his wife Ellen were the young Americans in the photo. Karen Crouse of the Times opened her article with:
The Los Angeles left-hander Clayton Kershaw held the audience in his sway from the first pitch. A world removed from the grandeur of Dodger Stadium, the barefoot children stood in awe as they watched Kershaw’s curveball spin and dip.
Kershaw’s pitching, as much as it delighted the children had a serious purpose. He was getting in a few precious minutes of training. Any young pitcher with a great career ahead of him knows that training time is vital. With the season just weeks away Crouse reports that the biggest anxiety the young pitcher had with the trip was that he would miss a week of training. For most people who go on this type of mission trip, money is often the biggest cost. For Kershaw it seems to have been time.
Probably the reason the picture piqued my interest so is that it reminds me of hundreds of similar pictures I have seen, and even been in It's about those countless people, young and old who don't have fabulously fit bodies, fame or fortune, but who can't wait to take that next short term mission trip to Haiti, or Kenya, Colombia, New Orleans, or Appalachia.
In early January I was getting on a plane in Washington DC for my trip to Liberia. I met a young woman, with a great big backpack, traveling alone to do a mission in Tanzania. Her trip, she told me would include, not just the plane ride, but also a rigorous two day bus ride. I think about the young people who I have shared trips with, challenged physically, or emotionally, yet who worked uncomplainingly in hot dusty places to bring the good news of God’s love, and themselves, to help others. I keep hearing from these travelers about how they get much more from those they go to serve then they give. All effective mission trips are about the transformation of the missioner more than about the project.
It's wonderful when a baseball star like Kershaw “gets it” and makes it to the sports page of the New York Times. It's also wonderful that there are so many selfless individuals who put themselves out there for the greater glory of God.
I was really captured by the photo above the fold on the sports page of last Sunday's New York Times. It was taken in a rural village in Zambia, Africa. The photo was of a group of African children and two young, white Americans, comfortably nestled together. Everyone was grinning. Their smiles were of friendship and sharing So here's the catch, and the reason it was in the newspaper. Los Angeles Dodgers ace, 22 year old pitcher Clayton Kershaw, and his wife Ellen were the young Americans in the photo. Karen Crouse of the Times opened her article with:
The Los Angeles left-hander Clayton Kershaw held the audience in his sway from the first pitch. A world removed from the grandeur of Dodger Stadium, the barefoot children stood in awe as they watched Kershaw’s curveball spin and dip.
Kershaw’s pitching, as much as it delighted the children had a serious purpose. He was getting in a few precious minutes of training. Any young pitcher with a great career ahead of him knows that training time is vital. With the season just weeks away Crouse reports that the biggest anxiety the young pitcher had with the trip was that he would miss a week of training. For most people who go on this type of mission trip, money is often the biggest cost. For Kershaw it seems to have been time.
Probably the reason the picture piqued my interest so is that it reminds me of hundreds of similar pictures I have seen, and even been in It's about those countless people, young and old who don't have fabulously fit bodies, fame or fortune, but who can't wait to take that next short term mission trip to Haiti, or Kenya, Colombia, New Orleans, or Appalachia.
In early January I was getting on a plane in Washington DC for my trip to Liberia. I met a young woman, with a great big backpack, traveling alone to do a mission in Tanzania. Her trip, she told me would include, not just the plane ride, but also a rigorous two day bus ride. I think about the young people who I have shared trips with, challenged physically, or emotionally, yet who worked uncomplainingly in hot dusty places to bring the good news of God’s love, and themselves, to help others. I keep hearing from these travelers about how they get much more from those they go to serve then they give. All effective mission trips are about the transformation of the missioner more than about the project.
It's wonderful when a baseball star like Kershaw “gets it” and makes it to the sports page of the New York Times. It's also wonderful that there are so many selfless individuals who put themselves out there for the greater glory of God.
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