changeling

I have really struggled with my faith over the past year or so.  Actually, when I think about it I really haven’t doubted God so much as I have lost a great deal of faith in church.  I probably too-obviously hint about it and then try to act coy like no one gets it.  But this boy-loving girl just doesn’t understand why the Christian world at large is sometimes so-hateful toward my boy friends that like boys.  I get that this isn’t a big issue for everyone and I probably make it a bigger issue than it needs to be, but I just want to scream when I feel people make God out to be a hate-monger.  But I really do pick fights and need to confess that, both to my Dad and to everyone else.  This probably has something to do with some lacking area in my own life, things I am working through.  I think the frustration with church (not a specific church mind you, but the American church at large) buts up and juxtaposes itself against coming to terms with my own issues (abuse, parents divorce and remarriage, etc…things that are just too painful and not appropriate for a public blog).  I am in counseling and thriving, which is a testament enough!  :)  I am fighting with the idea of institutionalized religion and authority, and I’m sure I’ll work through it and come to terms with it.

And at the end of the day, I know God is still God.  I am thankful that while I fight internally about the concept and realities of church–I know without a shadow of a doubt that there is a God in all this mess.  I don’t know exactly what that always looks like or understand the complexities of how everyone relates to that.

But THE POINT IS I saw “Changeling” last night and it was fabulous.  Fabulous actually isn’t the right word, that is more fitting for something light and bubbly and refreshing in my humble opinion.  Changeling was moving and gut-wrenching and important and earnest.  It was traumatic and enriching and a story too important not to tell.  It was why I want to be in this industry more than anything, to tell stories that need to be told.  I get more spiritual insights from film and tv than anything else really.  Sounds crazy to some but it’s how God works in my life

“Changeling” reminded me big time of something I needed to be reminded of.  There is evil and oppression and injustice and corruption out there and in my own life.  That movie was so piercing to my heart.  All I wanted to do is run home and hold all the babies in my care.  To protect children everywhere.  There was so much evil in the hearts of the villians in the story–the man who brutally kidnapped and murdered those boys, the police chief who tried to bury the story, the policeman who had Collins put into a horrific mental institution and emotionally assaulted her in such corrupt ways, the cruel psychiatrist at the institution).  There is no hope in this world but a God who can redeem, restore and save us.  That movie reminded me of so many things, but one thing stood out–this world is so in need of a savior.  The lyrics that kept pingponging around my mind during the most intense scenes to watch were, “justice and mercy meet on the cross” (from Brenton Brown’s ‘Jesus You Are Worthy’).

So despite my own struggle with institutional church I know there is a God out there and I need God to save me.

one world

and they say you can’t learn essentially spiritual messages from pop-culture?  maybe they haven’t lived in my mind yet! :)  antm cycle 11 (i’m so behind, catching it when posted on youtube because i don’t have cable).

message to myself:
for being two quiet “white girls” one knew how to embrace, include and understand and one sure didn’t.  annaleigh, mad props.  hannah, don’t be so afraid.  jesus loves fiercely, unabashedly, wholly – i want to reflect a winsome faith rather than a prejudicial one.  i hope i can become more like annaleigh.  she sought to understand the heart of the matter.  where there was “i and thou” she pursued “we and us”.

if the sky is heaven

I don’t know if the sky is heaven but I pray anyways.

-Idina Menzel, “I Stand”

While Jesus means something to me, I want to know why people of inter-faith have been so much kinder to me than 90% of Christians.  Maybe their kindness is more genuine and less saccharine, or maybe I just offend a lot of Christians without meaning to.  Again…without meaning to offend, I humbly ask why so many Christians have to be so damn smug?  Sure it’s not just “them” and I fall into that category too, but I’m still thinking that I like the idea of hoping for universalism in the end.  :)

Here’s a few thoughts that I’m currently stewing on:

• Isn’t it more life-giving and Jesus-affirming to hope that universalism is true rather than hoping in hell? 
• Can’t one believe in the person of Jesus Christ and think his personhood could extend to “save all” even without their acknowledgment of him?  If Jesus really is God, isn’t Jesus bigger than the Westernized Christianity we have been brought up with?  I heard this quote recently and I really found it interesting, God has no religion.
• If God is who some say God is, wouldn’t a loving God extend grace even to those who do not profess faith?  I would, and I’m not very loving, so if God is love, isn’t that possible?  For example, say there is a fire at the school I work at.  I’m going to do my best to get every three year old in my care out of the burning building whether or not they think I’m cool or idolize me.  Even if I know for fact they don’t like me very much.  I’m still going to recognize that they are freaking only 3 years old and extend to them every benefit-of-the-doubt and do everything I can to show them I care.  So doesn’t God realize we are pretty much “spiritual babies” and cut us a break too?
• If all truth is God’s truth and all love is God’s love is all faith God’s faith and so on?  I think the whole believing in a God part is easy, it’s the believing in the church stuff that’s hard for me.  So if I’m only 6% loving and God is INFINITY loving, wouldn’t God just give a lot of people a break?  I mean organized religion as man has created it has messed a lot of people up, if I know that I’d think God knows that exponentially more? 
• And again, why have people of multi/interfaith showed me so much more of who Christ is than most people who “believe exclusively in Jesus”?

I should probably crack a Bible open since I have no clue what Christians would say to half these questions, but I’d also like to know what everybody else is saying.  Because hoping for universalism isn’t so bad, right?  For now, God has no religion. :)

…

and if i dont reach in there and grab as many of them as i can carry everyday, then i deserve to get sent right back there.

-”simon” on studio 60 (dl hughley)

salvation.  liberation.  redemption.  transformation.  i don’t just mean these in the born-again bible-believing hook-line-and-sinker way we’ve been taught.  i mean these words, yes, spiritually, but broader than just those who call themselves “christians”.  i’m talking about faith.  about beauty.  about art and truth and love.  i feel like if someone has extended these qualities to you, if they have reached into the muck and carried you out.  if they have delivered you.  if they have opened the doors to your dreams.  you should pay it forward.  if you seek integrity, i think it is necessary.  i don’t see how it is personally avoidable.  if someone ever opens the door to my dreams, a director thinks outside the box and casts me in a truthful, mainstream way…the only way i could live up to it were to extend that to others, wherever possible.  the joy from acting, from being paid to emote like that, would simply bubble over and i couldn’t help myself not to.  the joy would be impossible to contain.  what do you think?

practically flawed in every way

practically perfect in every way.  i’m sure they aren’t really, but i’ve stumbled upon the perfect scene of my former ambitions.  i’m enjoying the air conditioning at peet’s on queen anne when i stumbled upon four very “ann taylor loft” young professionals having bible study.  they really are a pretty picture.  petite, blonde, perky, professional, sweet and soft-spoken.  other than the petite and once in a while the perky, i feel like an alien.  bibles open, they seem really committed to studying.

and it’s kind of funny, because four years ago i would have been so there.  maybe somewhere along the way my faith got weathered, i got jaded, life made me angry or i just got real.  i’m not implying that they aren’t genuine, just realizing that i wasn’t when i tried to be them. 

too tired to think of one.

So I realize I haven’t blogged in awhile and really there hasn’t been anything super newsy in my life these days.  I have been kind of hiding out and thinking a lot.  Wow, way to be super vague and emo, huh?  Anything newsy I can’t really share yet, but I have been enjoying time with friends and time in the sun.

Of course the Grey’s Anatomy Season Finale was ah-mazing and totally renewed my faith in the show.  Gosh.  I could gush on the deep meaning I get from simple television but I won’t bore you since you already know.  But seriously, God usually talks to me most via Grey’s. 

This song played during the show, and it totally sums up my emotional state right now:

…What I’m gonna live for, what I’m gonna die for, who ya gonna fight for, I can’t answer that…

Don’t freak out if the answer seems obvious to you, because I’m really still thinking it through.  Faith has somehow gotten jumbled into the business of church which has kind of jaded me and made me sad.  And confused.  And tired.  And I finally made the decision that freed me to say that officially.  And I now have the freedom to say, Legalize LA, is a really great step for so many friends of mine. 

And I now realize I so relate to Meredith Grey in terms of my boy life.  Every time a nice boy comes into my life I have to resist running the opposite direction as fast as I can.

But I really am enjoying being free as a bird in so many ways right now…

the sacred and the sexual

i actually wrote this last night on the train home from portland after a book i was reading.  when i got home i heard about the miley cyrus vanity fair “scandal” and decided to post this as it is very fitting.  and to comment on the miley situtation, i echo what donny deutsch said on the today show.  the view gals added more interesting talk on the issue, as did rosie.  i think the vanity fair shoot was a calculated career move – they’re media-savvy.  the “apology” was necessary to keep the air clean with disney, nervous parents of teen fans and the shoot was “necessary” to begin propelling her into a credible career once she hits 18 and the hannah montana gig is over.  miley professes that she is a person of faith, many morning commentators reminded us, which make her actions more “dishonorable”.  i don’t think that is necessarily fair either.

whether or not we believe the photos were appropriate, whether or not we chide the cyrus family’s “values” – we do realize this business, show business requires sexuality, at least some element of it.  so really, why are we making miley an example?  are we that surprised? 

so what’s a performer to do?  what do we do to find wholeness in sexuality and spirituality as it pertains to our profession  and our personal lives?  we are often hired, paid and required to be found “sexy” or at least romance-inducing, attractive or desirable?  how do we reattach the sacred in public life?  part of my job as a striving, sometimes-working actress is to be appealing.  and to be genuine in it, through it and despite it.  maybe my industry friends will chime in and say this better than i, but how do i balance the dueling tensions of the sacred and the sexual, the private and the public and the deeply personal? 

what happens to our souls when we must channel a private experience (sexuality) in the public sphere.  are we damaged by pouring ourselves out into the public realm?  does public sensuality, as in what is required to sustain a successful acting career rob me in any way?  how do we seek reconciliation?

all these ruminations have been brought about by well-meaning church ladies asking how i can ”say curses” or “seduce” in an audition.  while i am a more “liberal church lady” who adores her gays and needs a savior, i rarely have an answer that they find suitable, except for:

 a word is just a word and this is acting. 

but still, that answer seems to not calm their reservations.  i get that hollywood and church seem to be fighting, but i truly love them both and want them to be honest, genuine friends.  reserve judgment. :)

am i making any sense?  i’m not sure.  what do you think?

up for air

in process of getting my praise on tonight, i realized that i had rotted out my soul with all my tv watching this weekend.  it’s a good thing i don’t have a dvr.  i still wish i had cable.  i watched probably 20 hours this weekend, more than i normally watch in a month.  i like inhaled mass amounts of soulless, empty reality tv (not the good kind, the vh1 kind) and i needed a dose of something meaningful before taking my newly hollowed out self to work tomorrow.  this was a pop-culture overdose, i feel like i took something good (like a huge jawbreaker) and ate it to the point where my tongue is raw.

i still haven’t gotten my mind around my affirming, live-giving audition that i am still on cloud nine from.  but in the process of this evening, i was able to change my “please god, let it be me” prayers to “thank you for giving me a chance at my dreams”.  in gratitude, i am reminded that it is by grace that i am able to even live the dream.  i feel that it is closer, even if it is not yet here.  that audition was a full-circle moment, one in which i will always remember.

is this really necessary?

so i ran into my friend eric tonight as i was working at the brian mclaren conference we are hosting here in seattle. to summarize what it’s been about so far, it’s basically asking the church to stop fighting about petty issues and focus our attention on global issues. duh. i agree. he says it way better than that with fancy charts and something about equity, but i just finished a 14-hour workday and i’m too tired to go into it tonight. perhaps tomorrow? :) but really, it’s all been really good stuff. and yes, in person even, he’s super warm and good-natured. this is our 2nd time hosting him and he’s a complete non-diva.

so anyways i haven’t been good about watching american idol this season but eric told me that they did “shout to the lord”.  awkwardddd…  he was flabbergasted, as i was at the thought of it alone. thank you youtube for its recap abilities. is it necessary to indoctrinate the rest of our country while they are just trying to watch their entertainment show? yeah this is “idol gives back” but is idol really just hoping to get the right-wing viewer vote? are they trying to expand their empire even further? what’s next, a “devo” by simon cowell? did anyone really enjoy this? what was the point? i’m confused…i wonder if jesus is too.

moderation.

On a Bradley Whitford kick after Studio 60 and West Wing.  Oh and why can’t they ever hire a funny, temperate Christian for these gigs?  The other two school her.