Lenten Spiritual Discipline and Vocation

Lent has begun and I am taking up blogging as a spiritual discipline, and am looking at blogging each day during Lent. Part of what I hope to do in taking up blogging is to unpack and explore why I have taken this up as a Lenten discipline. Part of this is that, as the subtitle of this blog indicates, at least a purpose of this blog is to explore my sense of vocation. As the Title of this blog indicates this vocation engages church and world in ways that are somewhat peculiar, or in the least not what is generally expected, the coincidence of pastor and goth, continue to surprise people and cause at least at first some discomfort. That I engage both the church and the goth scene and subculture simultaneously (along with other urban subcultures and scenes), creates a number of tensions, as well as fairly consistent puzzlement, admittedly even from myself on occasion.

I think I have found myself of late resisting aspects of the peculiarity of my vocation. I am perhaps seeking to avoid a certain public nature of my calling. As the Community of the Holy Trinity and Church of Jesus Christ, Reconciler have taken more form, the pressure of my pastoral ministry in both places has caused for a greater and greater desire for withdrawal. As I enter Lent oddly enough, I am suspecting that this desire for withdrawal is avoidance of the complex nature of my vocation and its public nature. Thus it seems that an appropriate Lenten discipline is not to withdraw (though I have planned a spiritual retreat in Lent) but to engage my vocation and to do so in this public space. this is at least in part seeking not only to explore my vocation but also to confront the temptations of this peculiar call.

I hope that this may be of some interest and perhaps even help to others, who perhaps find themselves in a matrix of communities and tensions between worlds in their call to serve Christ and the Church. And I ask for your prayers for me a sinner as I undertake this discipline of engagement. I also invite dialogue and conversation.