I’ve been visiting Camp Cross for over 10 years. We attended a Labor Day Family Camp with our St. James’ (Pullman, WA) parishioners and I enjoyed the glorious natural beauty, but also the fellowship among the participants. Christian community in a non-parish setting is one feature of Camp Cross that has me reminding others to “keep comin’ back! “

While wading at Crescent Beach, my wife Alison relayed her metaphor for her relationship to God.  In the cool water, she floats effortlessly.  As she returns to the rocky shore, her body becomes heavy as she leaves the (holy) water and works to carry herself. It’s harder and harder to gain ones footing.  Yet, a loving arm reaches out to help her gain stability. This arm is God’s love in the form of your loving friend. Together, you can walk the journey on hot, dry land, until you once again return to refreshing water for relief.

Additionally, Camp Cross is a holy place where I have seen miracles happen.  Of course, miracles are in the eyes of the beholder and subject to perspective. This week I have seen the miracle of change. Mid-high campers arrived on Sunday, with anxiety, fears and few friends. In just a few days, I have seen them transformed. They’ve bonded with each other, shared intense experiences, been challenged in their views of faith and even improved their table manners (yes, a great miracle indeed!).  In all seriousness, the joy shared in a small group or gathered around a summer campfire is a holy miracle repeated again and again here.  I’ve noticed another transforming miracle recently.  As I look at this year’s staff members, several have spent many years coming to Camp Cross. They’ve loved being a camper with all the newness that experience brings. Camp Cross can be an intense emotional experience of faith on a young person’s own terms, far from their parish home.  It’s their mountaintop where they gain spiritual insight. Some grow into being a counselor, learning leadership skills shepherding a small group.  This is a critical stage in the faith formation of young people. Of that group, some continue serving as permanent staff members, gaining more leadership skills at the next level, long after coming to Camp Cross for the first time.  This chain of transformative experiences shapes the lifelong faith of many.

Wednesday night, we used a meditation from Taize to focus in the darkness of the cool evening, sitting on a floating dock.  Many relaxed on their backs, pondering the universe, gazing up into the vast expanse of stars. Some reported seeing up to five shooting stars and several orbiting satellites were visible.  Amid the cool breeze, surrounded by both intimate friends and endless cosmos, God is good; Very good; Always.

The Virginia Theological Seminary campus was really beautiful. Image taken from the Virginia Theological Seminary website.

From Friday February 20th to Sunday February 22nd, there was a conference for interns in the Episcopal Church Service Corps at Virginia Theological Seminary, in the DC suburbs.  The conference was an opportunity for interns and their directors to meet together.  As part of my internship, I went to this conference, and so did my director, Bryan.  I do not know what the program for the directors involved, except for when they were with us.  The program for the interns involved chapel Friday night, extensive Bible study on Saturday, with a focus on call stories, a driving tour of DC, and church Sunday morning, which was at Trinity Episcopal Church in Northwest DC, the church with which the DC internship program is associated.

Bryan and I arrived a bit late on Friday, because it took longer to get from the airport to the seminary than anticipated, so we missed chapel on Friday night, but we were there for the rest of the program.  Also, I had the chance to see my mother some, which was nice.  I grew up in the DC area and my parents still live there, though my father was away that weekend.  My mother, in fact, drove Bryan and I to the airport Sunday afternoon, which was very convenient for us.

The conference provided an opportunity to meet other interns in the Episcopal Church, which I thought was pretty exciting because there aren’t any others here in Spokane.  It was good both to meet people in different programs, in order to see how ours here in Spokane is similar to and different from the others, and also just to meet other young people that are excited about serving in an Episcopalian context.

The program we interns experienced provided many subjects for further thought.  Our Bible study of various call stories provided a lot of material for my own thoughts about my sense of call and vocation.  Towards the end of the Bible study we talked some about the challenges of being an intern, particularly those posed by family members and friends who do not understand what interning with the church is about and why it is something in which we are engaged.

It would have been even better if the conference had provided more structured ways to process the issues it brought up, perhaps in small-group discussions or something.  It would have been particularly helpful to have had some sort of structured way to discuss how the call stories we studied related to our own senses of call.  It would also have been helpful to discuss in small groups the challenges of interning, especially if the emphasis were not just on what the challenges are, but also on how to deal with them.

One of the aims of this conference was to build connections between the interns, and having small-group discussions would have helped with that aim, too, because it would have built in program time geared toward interacting with other interns.  As it was, the program relied mostly on large-group time, alternating with completely unstructured time, neither of which provides much structural support for getting to know the interns from other programs that one does not already know.

The first thing I noticed was new traffic circles where stop lights used to be. One is at the intersection where you turn on to Hawthorne Street to get to St. John’s Episcopal Church. I wondered what had prompted Colville’s traffic engineers to adopt this little touch of Europe, but liked the efficient way of getting through the intersection.

I drove through the main business district and noticed that most of the storefronts seemed to be occupied. A few years back there were fears that the arrival of Wal-Mart would spell the death of downtown. But downtown seems to be alive. Some familiar stores are gone, but there are new ones as well as some new restaurants.

As I continued, I noticed a huge Habitat for Humanity thrift store. That, I thought, shows that this community has a heart to work on housing issues.  Habitat forms partnerships in many communities that help families build and purchase simple, affordable homes.

As I swung left toward Kettle Falls, I noticed two things. One was that the large lumber mill was hard at work. I was told later that the smaller mills are struggling. In this town where mills form an important part of the economy, this is a concern.

Across the street, the Wal-Mart parking lot was full as shoppers came and went.

This was a quick tour to be sure.  But you can learn a lot about a community by simply opening your eyes and ears. As we think about strengthening our congregations, we might think about ways to open our eyes and ears in our own communities.

Sometimes churches that are beginning a search for a new priest will spend some time looking carefully at their town as they build their profile. That kind of self-study doesn’t have to wait for a change in leadership, though. It could be helpful for any church that wants to reach into the community for service and evangelism.

Where are the new houses being built? Where do people shop? What languages are spoken in the community? What ethnic groups live in our town? Just wandering around a community is a good way to discover those things.

The Episcopal Church offers another layer of community information that is easy, accessible and free. The information includes an analysis of predominant age, worship style preferences, community concerns, ethnic influence and other information. This is drawn from census data and analyzed and furnished by Percept, an organization that works with demographic information for churches.

There can be some interesting surprises. A few years ago one of our churches discovered that their neighborhood had many single-parent households. It got them thinking about the need for day care or an after-school program. Their eyes were opened in a new way when they had more information.  It helped to focus their conversations about their own mission and ministry,

What’s going on in your community?