Imagine being in a place of profound belonging, of shared vision, of arms-open love, no matter who you are. It’s a serene place on the banks of a wide river, and the music of the river mixes with the sounds of laughter and song all day and into the night. It’s a place that fills you with powerful spiritual energy.
Guess what? It’s real, and you can come visit next summer!
Hope for Justice
I’ve just returned from my third experience of the Wild Goose Festival in Hot Springs, North Carolina. Wild Goose is not just a place, as lovely as it is by the French Broad River, and it’s not just an event, although with several thousand attendees, it certainly is that. Wild Goose is above all a spirit, one with strong wings that will carry me another twelve months until I can be reunited with “my tribe.”
Soul Friends
Everyone I met felt that way, all remarkable God-lovers who would be official saints if I were in charge of the churches that name saints. Souls who devote their lives to racial justice, visiting prisoners on death row, ending human trafficking, promoting peace in Palestine, forging guns into garden tools, fighting coal plants and climate denial, ending the oppression of gay folks, growing food for the hungry, on and on . . . the work of God.
When these tired travelers gather together each year for four days of music, art, justice, and spirituality, something magical happens: loneliness is banished and hope is restored.
For me, this is what the Christian faith is all about: restoration. Restoring our souls, restoring our connection with creation and with our Creator, restoring our relationships with other humans — even restoring a healthy relationship with death. All reasons for hope.
The Fearful Face of Christianity
Sadly, modern Christianity often leads people away from a sense of loving restoration and into a land of judgement, contempt, and fear — fear of God, fear of hell, and fear of people who think or believe differently — which tragically results in many professed Christians working against justice because they fear empowering “the other” and must defend “their” faith from attack, as if God needs to be protected from dangerous outsiders.
These fearful folks don’t come to the Goose — there are too many “others” there. Milling around the festival grounds are Christians who don’t believe in a place called Hell, Christians who don’t believe that Jesus had to be slaughtered by his Father so that we could go to heaven, and Christians who don’t believe that their gay loved ones are headed for eternal damnation. I suspect some may actually be gay themselves — gasp!
Aaron
There’s meditation. And yoga. And Tai Chi.
No doubt about it. The Christian establishment — males who base their faith on rules and theories developed by other males ever since Jesus came to teach us how to live a joy-filled life — do not care for Wild Goosers. Their religious paradigm does not allow for thinking or questioning or evolution (in any sense of the word). “God is unchanging,” they argue, which I believe is true, but this doesn’t mean that our understanding of God and the universe shouldn’t evolve: God did invent the human brain.
The religious establishment rants and rails against progressive “Emergent Christians” and the Wild Goose Festival.
And no wonder. The Wild Goose is the Celtic symbol for the Holy Spirit, an unpredictable, uncontrollable love-power that can topple establishments and result in all kinds of rule-breaking — in the tradition of the historical Jesus, I might add.
This woman is clearly trouble
An Ongoing Story
I’m not good at doing serial blog posts; I tend to peter out after two. “Lessons from the Fall” that broke my arm and observations from my Desert Pilgrimage in April are still awaiting their third installments.
Nevertheless, you’re in for at least a couple of posts. This year’s Goose hosted several surprise guests right out of the headlines, and I have pages of notes from workshops and dialogues. The Wild Goose deserves full attention, both for what it means to me personally in my faith-walk and for what I believe it could mean for the future of Christianity and thus the world.
The Goose is on the wing!
Related links:
https://melanielynngriffin.wordpress.com/2014/07/03/wild-goose-part-one-celebration-sexuality/
https://melanielynngriffin.wordpress.com/2015/06/29/justice-scalia-meet-spirituality/
Writing with Spirit 
Aug 29, 2015 @ 16:38:09
Melanie, thanks for this! I plan to read more of your blog… just discovered it. I’ve been aware of Wild Goose about since its inception and know some people who go. Sure hope I can make it next year. (I’m on the “left coast” so it’s a major trip.) Fortunately we HAVE had TransFORM 2014 here (San Diego), which I got to… wonderful! (Maybe you were there, but I don’t recall your name or face.)
I blog myself, in a semi-academic vein usually – or trying to stimulate thinking and good fact usage. And here is one of MY frustrations and bit of loneliness at times: After a Christian “hiatus” of several years (as to churches), I’ve decided to plug into “mainline”/progressive this time (Evangelical prior), via United Church of Christ. I’m too progressive/open even for many there. I’m particularly fond of Process thought and theology, which hardly anyone knows about, at least in any depth…. So I do my small part to promote it. The frustration: that situation plus the reality (far as I can discover) that south of LA (I’m in N. San Diego Co.), there is precious little of “Emergent” nature, or radically open Christians. That goes for both at-one-time Evangelicals or churches of Mainline affiliation. (This may come as surprise to folks far to our east, but Orange and SD Counties have large pockets of very conservative nature, both theologically and politically, tho we have our liberal element as well.)
The Gathering in S.D. is the one main exception I know of. other than Pilgrim UCC in Carlsbad, which I attended for over a year… but both are a bit too far away for good workability. And I desire a different kind of interaction and opportunity to teach and such than one generally gets in just one congregation. Anyway, I don’t expect any “answers” from you and I know good things are “in process” 🙂 So I will continue to blog, write, maybe do some seminars and rejoice that the wind of the Spirit is blowing so freshly among a growing group of people.
P.S… I love that tatoo featured (whether yours or someone else’s), and I’m not much into tatoos.
Sep 09, 2015 @ 14:46:30
Hi Howard. I am glad that you’ve got a UCC church where you can be (reasonably) happy. Who knows, maybe you’ll be called to start your own house church? I go to a UCC church sometimes when I’m visiting in New Hampshire, but usually go to the Quaker gathering up there. I like the contemplative silence. I’m very fortunate to have stumbled upon Brian McLaren’s church and can’t imagine going anywhere else when I’m at home.
I’m not that familiar with process theology, this is the only thing I’ve read on it: http://www.patheos.com/blogs/rogereolson/2013/12/why-i-am-not-a-process-theologian/
Is it a fair description?
Jul 16, 2015 @ 11:31:13
Just love your clarity and enthusiasm.
Sent from my iPhone
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Jul 16, 2015 @ 10:19:34
What a fascinating event. I hadn’t heard a word about it until just now. Thank you for this post and for the idea that our views can and should evolve over time.
BB
Jul 16, 2015 @ 10:21:59
Sure! Check it out – you should come next year! Usually end of June or beginning of July. Blessings on your journey.