What Would Thoreau Say?

As strange as it seems, I just finished a three-year stint as ‘interim pastor’ for an Episcopal Church.  As a layperson, that shouldn’t have been allowed, and nobody was more surprised than me when the Bishop approved the experiment.   The church, being in between priests, had been somewhat lay-led for years anyway since they had a series of very poor priests who provided little in the way of spiritual direction or strategy for a small, aging church to survive let alone thrive.  I had been a member and occasional worship leader there until one of those priests drove me away several years ago with his 16th century theology.  When he finally left, the church asked me if I would take his place. I remember saying to the church leaders, 'I couldn’t be less qualified for this job. But that never stopped me before.' Without going into great detail, after three years we increased membership dramatically, stabilized Sunday service attendance and when I left the church, we had almost

THOREAUSAY.BLOGSPOT.COM HAS BEEN ON HIATUS FOR THREE YEARS (OR SO) WHILE I PASTORED A CHURCH ON AN INTERIM BASIS.  I DID NOT FEEL IT WAS RIGHT DURING THAT TIME TO EXPRESS MY OPINIONS DIRECTLY ON THIS BLOG. NOW THAT I AM NO LONGER LEADING THE CHURCH ' WHAT WOULD THOREAU SAY ?' IS BACK AND WILL BE UPDATED REGULARLY. PLEASE SPREAD THE WORD IF YOU FEEL I HAVE SOMETHING WORTH 'LISTENING TO.' THANKS.

  Many of my friends have said the Trump view of the world ‘isn’t who we are as Americans.’   I beg to differ. This election has proven that this is who we are.   If not, he would have been soundly repudiated.   We seem to have become exactly what he stands for, speaks to and represents. But he didn’t invent it.   America First (besides being a semi-fascist slogan from the WWII era) wasn’t invented by Donald Trump.   It was invented by the way we, as a people, approach the world.   And in fact, it is the way the world approaches the world.   It is characterized by, what David Brooks calls, hyper-individualism.   Me, mine, more…to me this is ultra-individualism. We can blame Trump for four years of lies and division.   Only he is responsible for that.   But we can’t blame him for the fact that our culture and our economy only seem to succeed when we are divided and when the rich get richer and the poor get poorer.   And, when the common ethic is individual rights are more importan