A Month in New York and Many Adventures Later

Dear Friends,

Sorry to be so remiss in posting my online diary. Two extenuating factors have been at work …having too many adventures and some computer malfunction. The latter is resolved and the former is the whole point of taking a sabbatical! Howard Paul told me that when he relayed in worship that I missed you, there was an audible laugh in the congregation…well, it’s true. I worshipped at the Riverside Church my first Sunday away and had devotions on a river the other two Sundays. This past Sunday I worshipped with friends at Christ Episcopal Church in Alexandria, VA, on an excursion to Washington D.C. This is the home parish of George Washington and Robert E. Lee. I did not realize it, but my friends sat us in the pew box where the first President regularly worshipped. It was a wonderful service and after it was over I was listening to the postlude with my eyes closed, when a very exuberant usher startled me by thrusting out his hand and saying, "Good morning, General Washington!" That was quite a day…a bit of an identity crisis…and a hankering to chop down a cherry tree all afternoon!

Most of my weeks since arriving have been spent working with my friend and colleague George Todd on a memoir and history of urban ministry in the Presbyterian Church. George and his wife Kathy have been on the forefront of the church’s justice ministries here in the United States and abroad. I felt their story was important to preserve and have been recording conversations with them for the past several years. The tapes have now been transcribed and we are attempting the translation of an oral history in a manuscript. It is both satisfying and hard work.

The Todds live on the twenty-first floor of a high-rise apartment building on the Upper West Side, just north of Columbia University and south of Harlem. The view out the bedroom window includes the Gothic tower of the famous Riverside Church, the Hudson River, and Grant’s Tomb. It has been an exciting month in New York City. We took an excursion to the Cloisters, a remarkable museum recreating a European monastery, which is full of the religious art of the Rockefeller family. The Todds share a love of Shakespeare and so we enjoyed a production of Anthony and Cleopatra (interestingly set in colonial Africa) and this Wednesday will see a much-acclaimed version of MacBeth starring Patrick Stewart of Star Trek fame. I am also going to see a one-man show on the life of Thurgood Marshall, the first African American Supreme Court Justice, starring Laurence Fishburne. Finally, this is the final season for baseball in Yankee Stadium, so I am hoping to see a game and root for the Detroit Tigers (and maybe wear a Met’s t-shirt to really get some reaction from the Yankee faithful!)

I have also taken some weekend excursions to visit friends in the vicinity. I spent some time with folks who now live in Saugerties, New York, on the edge of the Catskill Mountains, and threw in a little fishing on the famous Beaverkill River (kill is Dutch for river). It was then off to the coast of Maine and touring some of the jagged shoreline with friends living in nearby Portsmouth, Massachusetts.

Another weekend, I traveled with the Todds to visit their son and his family in Northampton, Massachusetts. The family he married into is Jewish and so we celebrated a traditional Passover Seder. It was a moving experience to be in the midst of the Hebrew chants and songs and the re-telling of the story of freedom and faith that marked the beginning of the Jewish people. I then visited a professor friend, Carl Dudley, from seminary days who is gamely battling cancer in Hartford, Connecticut. From there I headed into the Berkshire Mountains of western Connecticut and had wonderful day fishing on the Housatonic River.

This past weekend, I visited friends in Washington, D.C. Besides being mistaken for George Washington, I also visited the Smithsonian (the air and space exhibit in particular), the Library of Congress, the Folger’s Shakespeare Library, the FDR Monument, the Lincoln Memorial, and the National Cathedral. The city is so vibrant with color in the spring and every turn reveals another history lesson. It is also nice having a very tall tower in the center of the mall named for you (did I mention having something of an identity crisis after Sunday worship)!

I have included some photos of these adventures. I leave on Thursday night for three weeks in Ireland. I land in Shannon, rent a car, hope to get used to driving UK style, and will head for Belfast. There I hope to begin my conversations with people involved in innovative church work there, especially around the reconciliation process between Protestants and Catholics. Then it is off to the magical west coast of Ireland – rocks, coastlines, rain, pubs, poetry, and the greenest grass imaginable. I’ll try to do better in communicating…that is if the computer is cooperative and the adventures allow some writing time!

Thanks for your support and much gratitude to Howard, Judy, Patty, the Sabbatical Planning Team, the Session, and everyone working hard while I get this time away. I did miss not being at the Street Festival on Saturday, but trust it went well.

I feel surrounded by the prayers and concern of a great cloud of witnesses.

Blessings to you all in this Pentecost season,

Trey