Category Archives: faith

Teaching “How Come” Not “I Know”

Let’s be honest. The country in which we live is quite…what? Unsettled? Angry? Confused? Thank goodness we all seem to have enough toilet paper! That’s one worry that no longer grips us.

What is going on? A pandemic not everyone believes is a pandemic. A vicious murder not everyone believes was a vicious murder. A president who teargassed peaceful protesters in order to hold up a Bible in front of a church for the camera.

What?

How do I explain to my kids what is going on when I’m not even sure? I am overwhelmed by the hatred, violence and anger, along with the certainty that only by leaning one way or the other, all the way, can someone be right.

And so I offer one response: curiosity.

Perhaps I don’t need to teach my kids in this moment as much as I need them to teach me. No one is better at curiosity than children. In the earliest years, a child’s world can only be understood through “how come” questions. “How come it is bedtime?” “How come birds fly and I don’t?” “How come vegetables don’t taste like cookies?” It is only when we have a few more candles on our birthday cake that we extinguish “how come” and replace it with the dark and lonely words: “I know”.

Nothing stops progress faster than an unequivocal “I know”. When “I know” a thing, curiosity withers away and there is no reason to wonder why poverty settles in every crack of particular neighborhoods. Or why girls who are brown-skinned more often grow up without a father. Or why moms of white boys don’t have to worry when our sons go for a run. “How come?” because “I don’t know.”

How come it is easier to teach our kids “I know” this or that instead of joining them in the land of curiosity. I want to live there forever. Then, maybe my kids will, too.

How Do I Explain #GeorgeFloyd to an 8-Year Old?

Photo Credit: @Joshhild

“What are you watching?” asked my daughter, as I stood in our kitchen staring at my phone.

In a moment, I had to decide how to explain racism and riots to an 8-year old. Or, I could turn off my phone and let the moment go. Isn’t that so much easier? To believe whatever is happening on a screen is far away and someone else has to live with it?

I was watching Pastor Ingrid C. A. Rasumussen on Facebook walk through the neighborhood of Holy Trinity Lutheran Church in South Minneapolis. Touring littered streets, she explained the true identity of the damaged buildings that exposed generations of anger. Like vapor, smoke rose up here and there, like injustice that rises up here and there and here and there.

“I am watching a pastor show us a neighborhood where there was a riot.”

“Did they wreck things?” she demanded to know. “Someone is going to owe a lot of money! Why did they do that?”

“His name,” I slowly began, “was George Floyd. And he was murdered by a police officer, and many people are angry about it.”

With my husband, we tried to explain there are police whose job is to keep people safe, and there are people who are black and there is an ugly history we can’t seem to shake off.

In the end, dear daughter, this world is not yet as it should be. People who happen to be black are not as safe as people who happen to be white. Last week was one of many moments the vapor of injustice rose up in a city we know well and love very much.

There is no perfect dialogue to explain George Floyd’s murder to an 8-year old. It would be perfectly easy to believe his story need not be tied up with our story. But I want my kids to know some hurts in the world are not easy to explain, and those hurts are our hurts, too.

The First Tale of This Mom, Wife, and Pastor

Why in the world are you reading this?

You will not find answers to any questions about how to remove a stain, cook the perfect pork chop, preach a high-level conversion sermon, or prepare your home for your husband. The tales you will find here are not those kind of tales, I assure you. 

In fact, these might be the opposite kinds of tales. The tales you will find here reject stainless homes and perfection of any kind. Through the years, I’ve come to find peace in my own imperfection. Instead of yearning to be a better mom and wife, I am simply the mom and wife I am. 

I am also an imperfect pastor in a Christian denomination called the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA). Like my home, I will not tell you my church is perfect, although I still love it. The church, like me, is a work in progress utterly dependent upon Jesus’ mercy. 

I follow Jesus, bake chocolate chip cookies, and preach hope. 

My husband is a middle school principal and some of the students in that school are also confirmation students at the church I serve. Of course, we never swap stories about these lovely and always cooperative children of God. And by never, I mean only when we cannot help it because the material is just so good. For nearly 20 years, Marcus and I have made a way through the wilderness of marriage and found comfort in our church community and in friends and family who have loved us no matter what. 

We have been parents for nearly 15 years. In other words, I have been humbled privately and also publicly for a decade and a half. The only thing easy about parenting is admitting how freaking hard it is. Every. Single. Day. 

And I love baking (and devouring) chocolate chip cookies like my mama still makes them: crispy on the outside and soft on the inside. Whenever the cookie jar is empty, it’s time to fill it up. Because one thing my kids should be able to depend on is cookies. It is perhaps my only perfect offering. 

I hope these tales inspire you to embrace your own life, let go of perfection and find at least a little joy in each day God gives.