What I have learned from my week in Indiana

Saturday, May 30th

My summer field education began before my arrival in Indianapolis, but not surprisingly, on a plane. If you would like to have an hour and 45 minute conversation on a plane just mention the words "divinity school." After boarding the plane, I squeezed my way past the two people sitting on isle 15 and into an interesting conversation. I sat next to Miller, and his wife Cameron sat next to him. She told me that she had grown up in the church and still was involved in the church. However, Miller informed me he wanted nothing to do with Religion. As I listened I began to understand where his disdain for Religion came from. Miller said, "One day while I was out with my best friend, his dad found us playing together and shooed me away.We came from different Islamic groups the Sunni's and the Shiite's. and both of our fathers told us to earn a heavenly reward we would one day have to kill our best friend from the other group. I was only eight. From that day on I knew I wanted nothing to do with Religion." I began to see that Miller was very forthright in his oppinions. Claire at time gave the appearance of annoyance in response to her husband's candidness, but at the same time seemed to appreciate it. However, she observantly noted that many of the comlaints her husband made against religion, were really complaints about misinterpretations of religions.

I was soon after this that I shared with him what I was going to get to do this summer. I talked to him about how I believed that Religion, my tradition being Christianity, was not about tearing down as he ahd experienced in his childhood, but building up. I explained to him a bit about the edifying and unifying, goals of the UMOJA project, and told him that i felt fortunate to be a part of this summer in Kenya. "The project," I said, "has many differnt purposes. It is a partnership between several churches in Indianapolis, and several churches in Kenya. The churches in Indiana have several different initiatives whose main goal is to support orphans and vunerable children who have lost one or both of their parents to AIDs in the Kisumu area." If only I had known at the time of this conversation that it is not only churches, but it is an interfaith support team which is in partnership with the churches and schools in Kenya.

Michael was right. Throughout history misinterpretation of religions has caused war, strife, and division, but I believe this project represents what religion should produce and this is UMOJA (unity in Kis-Swahili). Many churches send groups on mission trips when they probably could have sent money, and it would have been more efficent and cost effective. Why do they do this? Because it helps the group going to learn from the people they are "serving" and it builds new realtionships and hopefully one day friendships. Our journey to Kenya this summer is modled after Trevor Hudson's idea of going on "Pilgramage" that he talks about in his book A Mile in My Shoes. This is the idea that the people of Indianapolis and Kenya are working to create a relationship which is a partnership, and not a one sided. We are going to Kenya as students in our field education program, in hopes of learning growing, sharing, and experienceing Umoja with the people there.

Sunday, May 31st

Sunday morning the other interns and I arrived at North United Methodist church promptly at 8:15 for 8:30 worship. We retreated back to a small room known as the "bat cave." There we met the rest of the pastoral staff and prayed before filing in to our first morning worship at North UMC.

A Brief History about North United Methodist Church:

North Church was built during the depression, and upon its completion they had several different groups over for a celebration. The first night they invited all the people who helped with the construction of the church to celebrate its completion and opening. The next nights they invited youth, town officials, and the community members in the neighborhood. The last night they had a dinner for all the women who had cooked for all the dinners on the previous nights. So, from the start you could tell it was a Methodist church, five meals in a row. But it also defined the church as one that was willinging to be open and involved in the community.

The church is right in the middle of a couple of dividing lines of the city. It is on 38th and Meridian. The former divides the north and south side of the city and the latter the east and west. This means that North Church is in a very diverse area in terms of socio-economics and race. This creates an unique opportunity for the church to be welcoming of all types of people, and that is just what this church is trying to do.

(Note for the Dothanites: I told the congregation on Sunday morning that I was from Dothan, AL which many people know as the bathroom stop on the way to the beach. This was recieved with laughter not of derision, but endearment and I thought you might enjoy to hear that.)

Monday, June 1st

It was the first day of June, and the second day "on the job." We were shown around the church, met several of the staff members, and went to a couple of meetings with people who are involved with the UMOJA project. These type of meetings happened throught the week. We met with a Presbyterian preacher, another Methodist preacher, a Rabbi, and a Priest. It was an enjoyable way to experience the unity the project had begun to grow here in the states.

However, one of my favorite meetings that Monday was the planning meeting for the Youth carnival. It was great. Two youth, a brother and sister, had just last year decided that they wanted to raise money for the UMOJA project so that they could help support youth their age in Kenya. So, they set out to organize a carnival to raise money. When presented with this idea you might think about a few dink carvinal booths made of cardboard and a couple of water ballons, but these youth had the courage to be creative and think bigger than that. They along with youth from may different churches,s chools, or just from the area pulled off a great Carnival that was lots of fun for the community. They raised somewhere around $8,000 to send for school fees for children and youth in Kenya to go to shcool.

They were very organized in the efforts for planning the carnival, and had different Youth leading each committee (advertising, cause education, fundraising, food, etc) with a bit of guidance from their adult mentors. It was a larger than life story that was true. Once again this idea of Umoja, unity, was present between all the different youth working together in Indianapolis to support the youth in Kenya so that they might be able to go to school.

Tuesday, June 2nd

Although there were more meetings on Tuesday, I found the highlight of this day to be an activity at the church called "Bread and Bowl." The name is fairly indicative of its function. Every Tuesday and Thursday each week people from the church come togetrher to fix a meal of bean soup, bread, and salad and to eat with the people in the community who need lunch or just want to visit. I found out later that another church down the road has meals on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday at there church and there are several buisness and groups that donate food for the meals. All these different groups serving as different instruments for a common goal. Need I say Umoja.