Posted by quequel on February 20, 2003 at 23:26:23:
(If anyone wants to skip the stuff to Bill, make sure you scroll to the bottom for the note to everyone!)
I just got done reading about 2 weeks worth of message board. The stuff about Buddhism I saved to read later. But I wanted to say something about Bill's response to Nancy about priesting:
Bill: One night in Ybor City, a man came up and said, HEY FATHER, CAN YOU HEAR MY CONFESSION? I just looked at him amazed and I told him, SIR, I'M NOT A PRIEST. He told me that he saw my black shirt and just assumed, since he said I LOOKED LIKE a priest.
Kristi: I am not surprised at his misjudgment. I have always thought that you looked like a priest. It's not actually the black t-shirt, or any other color. You could borrow Dave Smith's wardrobe and still look like a priest. It's not a visible thing--it's like those optical illusion pictures where you see some bright pattern, or maybe even a completely unrelated picture on the surface, but your eyes don't want to focus because there's something in the glare of the glass that teases them, a picture that is more felt than seen, in the peripheral vision. I think it's in the peace, in the honest, innocent love you show for everyone who comes within your area (or aura, since that seems to be the direction I'm heading with this peripheral image stuff! Eek!)
Bill: Right now I am not ready to spiritually guide others. I am not ready to take a visible leadership stand in any religious context. I am just not. This has to do with very personal issues which to date remain unresolved.
Kristi: Yeah, I can understand that. I'm glad when any of us recognize that personal issues can really show their ugly heads when taking a title. But perhaps the peripheral priest people perceive (sorry--my PC presumes itself a poet) is actually real. Not in the vow of poverty and doctrinal restraint of the vocation, but in a Melchizadek sense. Just by being yourself and letting God communicate to people through you when He wants to. That's what priests do anyway, right?
I may be using a bad example in Melchizadek, since I know that there are several rumors about him. I even found a website about the Nisus Knights, who seem to consider him their founding father. Not sure how I feel about them, but I guess after you die, anyone can use your name...
Bottom line, I wanted to explain a little about why you get the priest thing a lot, since I know you can't see yourself from "out here." And to say that Nancy's pretty cool.
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ONE MORE THING TO ALL AT PU: We are each of us ministers, and we should be undyingly grateful that God wants to do His work in us and through us. Amazed, floored, astounded, humbled, flabbergasted, that One so righteous would delight in using us. There are times that it's easy to compare ourselves to each other and either feel like ascending to our properly, publicly-recognized place or crawling, sniveling, into it. Doesn't matter. HE appreciates us and wants us to just BE his vessel.
I sure do love all of you. Thanks for the fascinating posts.