Have you ever tried to create something out of nothing?
I usually avoid anything of the sort.
Even with my family, which is perhaps the greatest creation of my life, I cannot say I created them out of nothing. The entire time, I referenced the love and nurture that went into making me.
I remember being a 22-year-old new hire for a campus ministry organization. I resented being placed on a campus where I would have to (re)create something from near nothing. While I met some beautiful people who have enriched my life, the process of it was nearly soul-crushing for me.
Similarly, creating a life in California without any roots here has been a constant struggle. I find myself constantly comparing it to where I was from and the circle that surrounded my life until I left.
Last year, I took a pilgrimage. More than two years into leaving the old, I needed a break from the work of creating from nothing, to rest and make space in my lungs for deep breaths.
On the other side of that pilgrimage I have become something new and I have made something new. Both were processes already unfolding, but the trip was something of a marker.
The last pieces of the old were tearing away and needed to release in order for me to take flight.
When I finished climbing Croagh Patrick, a 4.3-mile ascent and the most challenging part of our journey, I was met with the news that my husband had planned a surprise for me. He gave me the chance to choose a piece of art in a studio near our accommodations in Westport.
This was an especially sweet surprise because he was not on the trip. He had worked from home with multiple accomplices to determine the best time and place on the journey around the Emerald Isle to give me a special souvenir.
On his end, the details were flawless. On our end, as pilgrims, our legs were jello, my sweat was stinky, and I had less than an hour to get to the art studio and choose a piece of art. Still jet-lagged and constantly on the move, I had not yet had the opportunity to really take in Ireland and consider how I wanted to remember it. The limitations forced me to make a quick decision in the moments before the studio closed.
I thought of what Tracey, my leadership coach, had said about other decisions.”Go with your first instinct.” She was reminding me to trust my gut.
It seemed silly, but my instinct was drawn to a woodcut hot-air balloon with the words “Up, up, and away in my beautiful balloon.” Apparently, it is a lyric from The 5th Dimension, a band I had never heard of. It was the colors, the fun and whimsy, and perhaps, subconsciously, this idea of taking flight that caught my eye.
I was ready to take flight, to leave behind the things that we were weighing me down. To launch ahead with my new endeavors unencumbered, embracing the process of creating from nothing.
And thankfully, by God’s grace, it’s not nothing anymore.
You are at the time in your life where you are exploring what you believe, piecing your world together as it expands and grows.
My precious daughter, ever since you were born, we aspired to teach you many things so you could grow into your full, beautiful self as a child of God. In some areas we succeeded and, in others, we missed the mark. I am sorry. I seek your forgiveness and I am trusting God to cover my failures.
I just want you to know while you launch into adulthood at this unstable time in the history of our country, and, by extension, the world, that the choices are not what you think they are. It may look like there are two paths in front of you: one involves sticking with Christianity and buying into things that seem wrong, and the other involves taking the values of Christianity and turning away to do what is right. Even so, there is a somewhat hidden path if you choose to seek it. It is going to be increasingly hard for young women like you to see it and hear it because of the forces obscuring it, but it is the truth that we have most wanted you to know. It is the path of Christ. I understand why you do not want anything to do with what you see around you, but what you see is not who he is.
Since humankind was created, God’s disposition toward his children was not to force them into loving him. We have always had a choice. This tells us something about how God uses his power. He wants relationship and not dictatorship. So when he sent his son Jesus into the world as God in the flesh, it is no wonder that Jesus abided by the same standards. The Bible tells us that Jesus had all the powers of God available to him, but he did not use them to coerce people to follow him, glorify himself through show, or overturn oppressive empire.
Of all the ways that God could choose to come to earth, he sent Jesus as a simple boy born to a no-name family, who grew up to be an offbeat Jewish rabbi with great compassion, supernatural authority, and divine insight. Instead of instigating a bloody revolution or demanding allegiance to himself, he taught the secret of the kingdom, which required people to draw near with openness and curiosity in order to behold that which is hard to see. He preached that happiness came through meekness, peace, righteousness, and suffering for God. He drew from a deep well of truth that was other worldly, but he walked in the nitty gritty of the world, touching untouchable lepers, the bleeding, dead, and demonized people.
Christ’s most powerful action was his unjust death at the cross, which he willingly submitted himself to without a fight. Because of his sacrifice and his resurrection, death in this world is life in the next. None of his followers had to fear death when they were martyred by earthly powers. After Christ, no king could terrify Christ-followers because they lived unto a heavenly kingdom rather than waiting for an earthly one.
You told us the other day you passed someone on campus who was yelling about salvation with big giant signs and you argued with them. You may not be following Jesus yet with your life yet, but you know him. You know the kind of person he is. You can identify fruitless things done in his name and the kinds of things that represent his character.
What concerns me is that culture is splitting things in a way that makes you think you have to choose. You do not need to choose between forceful governmental Christianity and a Christ-less path. You can cling to the true Christ and his ways in the midst of this broken world.
Your dad and I have watched generations of students deconstruct the parts of cultural Christianity that are off track, but it has broken our hearts when they lose their desire to connect with Christ altogether. My prayer for you and all our students and friends is that Christ will not be lost in the midst of this culture war. At least my confidence is in this–even if you lose him, he will not lose you.
What I am trying to say is that the forces making choices today in our world in the name of Christ are not necessarily representing Christ. Christianity means to follow Christ and Christ did not assume a position of controlling the government for greater influence or usurping government powers. Christ led the way for us to follow, despite these systems. His very being goes against all systems of earthly power and control. The greatest resistance to all forms of evil was laying down his life.
So, please, don’t think you have to reject Christ because of the mislabeling happening in society right now. Christian Nationalism is a co-opting of the symbols of Christ for national power and domination, two things Christ had no interest in. Christ is still the most powerful antidote to all the powers of darkness in this world. He disarms them through his refusal to wield power the way institutions and leaders are tempted to.
So Christ is for you, not only because you are a young woman and the gospels show us so many cultural and religious-upset moments where he crossed barriers to give women dignity and honor, but because history will show that the powerful cannot advance Christ’s cause in the way that the meek can. Your instincts are correct. The trick is to resist using earthly powers to counter the ones you face in your generation.
In seminary, I learned some things of particular importance now.
Weak Vessels Can Display Christ’s Power
The way Jesus came into and left the earth is just as important as who he was and what he did. It’s not an accident that he came and left humbly and vulnerably. As a gospel minister I will resist all forms of power that invoke the name of Jesus while acting contrary to his very essence. The Bible is clear that we are made strong in our weakness. Weak or meek vessels are the only vessels that can cooperate with and be filled by the supernatural power of God. There’s a lot of pressure to be a strong woman, but there was nothing wrong with our innate vulnerabilities in the first place. God can use those over and above the strength of men.
Earthly Dominions Contradict Christ’s Power
Every time Christianity is combined with government power it is a disaster for Christianity. When Constantine did this it was called Christendom. It probably looked like a great idea to make an empire Christian, but government power and Christianity are like oil and water. They cannot go together. They do not make sense together. If you put them together, you lose the essence of Christ and his kingdom entirely. You have grown something in the name of Jesus, but you have not allowed the Spirit to grow the Church, which happens through conditions of desperation, persecution, and clinging to Christ in our broken world.
A lot of Christians are afraid of what students like you will learn in university to undo the Christianity we have tried to put inside of you. I know God is bigger than that. I just want to make sure that when you learn these truths about Christianity getting mixed in with power, you do not miss Christ. Christ is there on campus. He loves you and the students there. He invites you to something life-giving, freeing, and true.
He will find you.
*A letter to my daughter coming of age in our culture wars. Written in early 2025 during her freshman year.
Summer ended in the blink of an eye, and my 10-day trip to Ireland feels like a mirage. Before I forget the details, I believe it is time I introduce you to my new friend from the journey, Brigid.
Brigid has fiery red hair and a personality to match. Rejecting her culture’s customs, she refused to be married, costing her important father a slew of cattle, weapons, and land. Instead, she took up vows to God. I wonder if her father saw it coming. After all, as a child she did give his sword to a beggar. No wonder she developed the controversial habit of taking from the wealthy for the poor.
Her cloaks, in sapphire and emerald tones, are alluring. Mysterious and majestic, they convey warrior meets wizard, while her pursuits are all peaceful and scholarly. A leader for all, she established monasteries in Kildare for both men and women, known not only for prayer and learning, but also for hospitality to any person in need. As if the mystique of channeling Robin Hood, Mother Teresa, and Disney’s Merida, were not enough, she is also known for her discerning ability to settle disputes, like King Solomon.
Brigid is a new friend of mine, but she’s not my contemporary. She lived in the mid-400s to early 500s. Some might say she colored outside the lines. I would say she lived beyond the confines of family, culture, and the religious establishment in her time. Her story shows that God was with her “out there.” For example, she boldly asked the King of Leinster for property for her monastery, of which he offered her “whatever her cloak would cover.” It sounds like he expected to give her a piece of land the size of my local community garden plot, but he was about to learn the mystery of abundance. Brigid and her companions unrolled her cloak over the acres that would become the borders for her new monasteries. Like David, she could say her boundary lines fell in pleasant places (Ps. 16:6).
Greater yet is the mystery of her ordination. As a woman, Brigid was restricted to particular vows for religious life, but during her ceremony, the priest “accidentally” read her the vows for a bishop. Some called it a mistake that stuck, while others said it was the work of the Holy Spirit. Either way, it was another example of abundance. The containers created by humanity put the world in categories that keep things orderly and clear for us, but the Spirit of God operates freely (Jn 3:8). Bishop Brigid was given a wide open space (Ps. 18:19) both physically with land and spiritually with her unconventional title as a woman. Out of this, she lived a faithfully expansive mission, reflecting God’s expansive world, without knowing it would earn her a seat as a patron saint of Ireland.
Beyond Domination
Initially, I perceived Brigid was something of a maternal guide for men and women alike. But, there was something about her leadership that begged for a wider lens. Hers is not only a story about female leadership in patriarchal times. These categories alone shrink the picture of Brigid among the sweeping green fields of Kildare. The way she carried her Holy Spirit-entrusted authority into her expressions of peace, hospitality, and care for the poor and creation invited us all to do the same. She is more of a model than a reformer, a be-er instead of a fixer. For no other goal, she existed from her God-given authority, extending God’s goodness and love in her space.
Like Christ, Brigid brings a non-dominating leadership and spiritual authority in a world stuck on tools of domination. Perhaps what draws us to Brigid is as simple as that–Christ in her essence and ways. She was born under the protection of the sword, but sold that sword to a beggar. She should have been wed in exchange for land, but instead received her land at the hand of God. Her womb was to be a future king-maker, but she was made a bishop and given children of all kinds. She did not use tools of domination, nor worry about their forces. She walked differently, in the opposite direction of systems of domination, and the Lord provided.
While our impulse is often to reject the vulnerability encompassed in following Christ’s non-dominating example, when I meet a friend like Brigid, I become reacquainted with our soul’s deep desire to live in a space like hers. Containers of identity try to lay claim on me, but in the endless expanse, I am free to delight in God’s creation from a posture of sharing and flourishing. There is nothing to hoard in this space. This was humanity’s first relationship with creation in the Garden of Eden.
Domination, on the other hand, is a human tool for wielding power and control. It is a product of the fall, giving rise to all sorts of evil. While it’s true that God gave humanity a part in God’s shared authority over the garden, sometimes referred to as shared dominion, our human capacity for keeping this sort of stewardship pure is quite limited. This is seen in the trajectory of dominion theology (or dominionism) whereby the ends justify the means and human domination over earth, animals, and people is permitted. Deep down, while our flesh wants to control someone else, our spirit wants to live in a space where we are neither dominated nor dominating others. Our innate programming from our Creator points to this desire.
Bishop Brigid invited all of us weary journeyers in Kildare to a world more real than the one her clan members shed blood over. She invited us into “earth as it is in heaven.” She did not need the title of bishop, saint, or chieftain’s daughter to do it. Rather, she lived according to God’s ways, without striving for those other systems to give her approval.
Confidence in my Own Calling
Brigid reminds me that God is not only with us in contained spaces where we can see and define everything. Our calling is not ultimately informed by the titles and accolades bestowed upon us by institutions. God is present there, but God is equally present in the expansive outside world–spaces too vast for us to hold in our minds, let alone our hands.
How else should we understand the hidden places of God’s creation? In the Kildare oak grove, we learned that below the surface, root systems communicate with one another, reflecting God’s artistry and order. Why do we try to dominate something so beyond us? Lord, have mercy on us for our pride that causes us to believe you have called us to lead things so that we can build something great. Our never-ending vocation is to worship you, not ourselves and our creations.
In contrast, I like the way Brigid followed her desire to live a life for God and let God take care of the rest. After all, we now know the Holy Spirit unfolds cloaks to cover acres, illuminates words to bless and commission. Those who would otherwise be overlooked, passed over, or forbidden are welcome and provided for at both God’s table and Saint Brigid’s monastery.
And, wouldn’t you know it? On the day we arrived in Kildare to learn about Brigid, there had been a miscommunication. Twelve of us arrived just in time for lunch to two sisters who had no idea what time we were coming and no lunch. In keeping with the tradition of their patron saint, they did not bat one eyelash of condemnation or inconvenience and kindly left to purchase lunch, bringing it back to feed us.
And so, in the spirit of my new friend, I say, “Weary travelers, have a seat.”
