Oddwalk Ministries

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catholicism, friends, Jesus, JesusJusticeJoy, ministry, NPM, quote, reflection

The Most Important Catholic Word

Robert Feduccia at NPM

I (Orin) just returned from a week in Baltimore attending the National Pastoral Musicians (NPM) 41st annual convention. This gathering is a time for seeing old friends, hearing wonderful speakers and breakout sessions, and encountering new music for the liturgy.

Oddwalk friend Robert Feduccia gave a fantastic keynote Wednesday morning, titled “The Liturgy and the Church’s Mandate to Grow.” There were so many takeaways from the presentation; I want to share just one here.

Robert told the story of a conversation he had once with Bishop Caggiano of Bridgeport. The Bishop had asked Robert what the most important Catholic word was. After a couple failed guesses, the Bishop informed him that, to him, the most important Catholic word was “and.”

And.

So deceptively simple and so important to our faith and world today. Those of you who know me reasonably well know I have been beating the “Both/And” drum for at least a decade now. When our faith paints, I think, far too many things as “black and white,” and when our world seems to create more and more “us vs. them” moments all the time, it is important for us to remember that our faith calls us to both/and, just as our savior Jesus was himself an earthly both/and: both God and human.

Now, of course there are times things truly are black and white, and there are times where some subset of humanity must be distinct from some other subset for valid reasons. We do well, though, to limit those times to only the most necessary and not try to superimpose distinctions where there are none really to be had and especially when they are not helpful.

Our faith is one pf paradox – one where things that seem to be opposites dwell together in mystery and without conflict: death is life, weakness is power, being last is being first. That is, we are called to both death and life, to both weakness and power, to both being last and being first. Just as Jesus himself lived as a both/and, so we too must try to first see the “and” in every situation, every person, and every relationship. Only then are distinctions and discussions of them coming from a place of love and dignity.

And: the most important Catholic word.

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Musical Theater Jesus Camp = YSP


When I (Orin) and some others need to quickly describe Youth Sing Praise (YSP) to those who know nothing about it, we often call it a “Musical Theater Jesus Camp.”

More elaborately, it’s an 8-day period where high schoolers gather to both mount a production of a faith-based musical and take part in a retreat based on that show. This year that show is the 2012 revival of Godspell.

Pictured here are the campers and staff gathered at Mass Saturday night. It’s hard for me to think of any community that more embodies “We are many parts, we are all one body” than does YSP. Christ is present here in community, with varied gifts of music, acting, dancing, and more, and through the evangelization that the show allows the cast to do, Christ is again present in word, song, and actions.

I hope you can all come to the free performance this Saturday night, 7pm, at Our Lady of the Snows. I’ll be the guy playing piano in support of these amazing teens. I will personally guarantee you will not be disappointed you came.

Visit: youthsingpraise.com

catholicism, family, friends, JesusJusticeJoy, Joy, ministry, music, odd, oddwalkia, reflection

Christian Silliness and Joy

Anyone who has heard me (Shannon) talk about my Boy Scout days for any length of time might have noticed a glaring absence from that account: the complete lack of references to any actual scouting topics. There’s typically no talk of merit badges, rank advancement, and leadership roles. It’s not that those things weren’t a part of my experience. They certainly were. I earned many merit badges, advanced to the Life rank, and held several leadership positions in the troop. The reason those things are typically left out is because, in the end, they just don’t matter to me all that much. When I think about my time as a Scout, it’s the time spent with the other boys that matters the most to me. The boys in my troop were my first true friends. Those were the guys who, outside of my family, allowed me to be the bumbling, awkward person I was, without too much pressure to change.

One of the things I discovered through my time in scouting was my love of music performance. I wouldn’t have called it “music performance” back in the day, of course. Had I been forced to come up with a name, I might have called it: “having a blast with my friends, singing and making up songs and drumming on a tortilla chip box in the back of the van, while Mr. Bruss drove us to the campout”. Whether we were on our way to an outing, sitting around the campfire, or just hanging out at a troop meeting, these kinds of experiences helped me discover how much I loved entertaining and engaging audiences and, later, leading congregations in music and prayer. As I grew into adulthood, and my skills developed, I ended up with hundreds of opportunities to share my musical gifts.

Even now, some of the most fun I have planning music are times when it’s just me, a guitar, and a group which is ready to get silly. Sometimes that’s a churchy group, but most times, it isn’t. This is when I can just be dumb, make people laugh, and sing really loudly. Opportunities like these have given me songs like The Dooley Boy Rock, At The Grotto, Mexican Café, Shay Shay Cool Yay, Mr. Crocodile, When The Spirit Says, Dum Dum Deedle, I’m a Little Teapot/We Will Rock You, and many others. These songs are so goofy, but are so fun to do.

Today, along with my friends Chris and Isaiah Korte, I am performing two Week of the Young Child concerts in Kirksville, MO. For the thirteenth consecutive year, preschoolers, daycare kids, and kindergartners from around Kirksville will gather at Rotary Park to spend about forty-five minutes singing a lot of the dumb songs I’ve collected over the years. We’ll scream and encourage the kids to scream as well. We’ll do ridiculous hand motions and laugh a lot. And, while these aren’t Christian events, per se, the expression of joy will leave little doubt that God is in it somehow.

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If you don’t…

There’s a new meme circulating around, like the one here, which I (Orin) have made a version of in a tongue-in-cheek sort of way.  The gist of the meme in general is for a person to point out when they are at their worst and when they are best, and that some significant other in their lives needs to love the meme-making person at their worst, or else that significant other doesn’t deserve the meme-maker at their very best.

(Describing and analyzing memes makes them even more funny, right?)

Anyway, what I’m going for here, by way of amusement, is that 1) I’m at my worst when I pick up the keytar and “try” to be “cool” (which is quite possibly accurate), and 2) that I don’t really have a best – in a way, the joke is possibly even that my worst is all I have.  When seen through eyes of faith, of course, that’s all wrong.  The meme as a whole is asking another to love unconditionally – and so far, so good.  But what rubs me the wrong way a little bit, is that most of these memes try to distinguish human worth and value by something pretty superficial – either physical appearance, or by certain accomplishments, or other external things.  Something Oddwalk often tries to “get at” when present retreats is that our worth, our dignity, is given us by God, that we are created by God in God’s image and likeness, that we are temples of the Holy Spirit as a dwelling for the Divine.  Each of us, regardless of gender, race, any economic or social status, even regardless of our faith (or lack thereof) have this innate dignity.  Nothing can change it, nothing can take it away.

If we were to try to make this meme about God’s love for us, we would quickly find we couldn’t, really.  Sure, we are all sinful, and in those worst of times, God still loves us as much as ever.  And to try to say that God might not as some point deserve us, well, that’s just kooky, to put it colloquially.  And as God loves us, so we must try to love another: to love at all times, and to never place ourselves on a pedestal, that someone feels they must earn (or deserve) our love.  This Christian dignity, once recognized and lived out, will truly change the world, making it an infinitely more just and peaceful place.  We must not only live love, we must be love, at all times.  Are you ready to pick up the challenge?

Pope Francis, in “Gaudete et Exsultate,” tells us that he often likes

“to contemplate the holiness present in the patience of God’s people: in those parents who raise their children with immense love, in those men and women who work hard to support their families, in the sick, in elderly religious who never lose their smile.”

May we too all see holiness in every person we meet!