Fridays with Froehlichs #2

Welcome to the second edition of Fridays with Froehlichs... not to be confused with Ruth Naomi Floyd's Fridays with Frederick, although we enthusiastically encourage you to get acquainted with her music, art, and thought.

Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving marked a significant transition for us as a family. Our life this Fall has been dominated by care for Sheryl's 88-yr old mom, Naomi, who is now settled into life in assisted living. We've made 5 trips from Ithaca to OH (9 hrs each way) as her needs have progressed. Sheryl has spent… and continues to spend countless hours filling out forms, managing her finances, and talking on the phone with doctors, nurses, administrators, and providers. (That’s why this post is mostly my, Steve’s, voice)  Some of you have been down this road with loved ones.

If you know mom, she'd love to get a card from you:
Naomi Cummings
1035 Hager Street
St. Marys, OH 45885

We gathered as a family to be with mom over the Turkey holiday with Sheryl's sister, Lynne, along with her husband, Ken, and their 4 girls and 2 grandkids. Our son, Jonathan, and 3 of our grandkids were able to join us as well. Everyone pitched in to get mom moved – it was nostalgic work but fun doing it together. Also, Sheryl's cousin, Rod and his wife, Barb, drove down from Ann Arbor to be with us while the Univ of MI vs OH State football game ran in the background without any voices being raised or objects hurled across the room. We are grateful that we could gather while mom still can recognize and enjoy everyone. We are aware that those days are numbered.

As mom steps into the early stages of dementia, we are reminded that mental health care has been a part of our lives for generations in many forms: depression, bi- and mono-polar disorders, trauma, schizophrenia, and the many ways those conditions complicate and trouble our lives. We have seen God's sustaining and healing grace come to us in many ways - through medicine, counseling, knowledge, and wisdom - even as the conditions persist. Just before the pandemic, we offered a Sunday School class on the Church and mental health to communicate that our church family was a safe place to have these conversations about living with our brokenness. Over 20 years ago we brought my mom into our home for a few years as she began her journey with Alzhiemers. We've been here before, although now with greater awareness, support, understanding, and resources in the Church and in communities. For each manifestation of God's grace we are grateful.

The Porter's Gate, the musical mission founded by Isaac Wardell, has just released an album, "Sanctuary," about faith and mental health. The project was birthed out of a partnership with Sanctuary Mental Health Ministries.  There is also a Sanctuary course: How can a church become a sanctuary? The music is available via Apple and YouTube.

Perhaps you've seen the new internet commercial produced by Chevrolet. It captures the sadness of dementia alongside the joy of remembering. The Lord knows how forgetful we can be, so it should not surprise us that he repeats again and again, "Remember" and "Do Not Forget."

It's a Small World

Amid the weariness of caring for mom in this transition, we've been grateful for the benefits of small town life. Navigating the often impersonal maze of "for billing press 3" is exhausting. Sheryl grew up in a farming community in western OH where her dad ran a country grain elevator. Everybody knew everybody else, and often everybody else's business. But, today when Sheryl was trying to sort out the details of an upcoming medical appointment for her mom, the doctor's assistant paused, "May I ask you a personal question? Is your mom related to Cummings Grain Company?" Sheryl said, Yes. "Oh," said the assistant, "I remember your family. I was your neighbor. I lived in the red house down the street. I'll make sure we take good care of your mom." After over 55 years, they are still neighbors, and Sheryl put the phone down with a heart lightened by this gift of grace.

Serving in South Africa

We've been extended an invitation to travel to South Africa in 2024 to serve students at the Univ of Stellenbosh and the community of Christ Church in Stellenbosch. Click here to get details.

When You Have Been Hurt by the Church

Many people have left the Church and may even have thought about giving up on God as a result of how they have been treated by the Church. Too many people in the Church have been wounded by abusive leadership, and many pastors have been beaten up by their congregations. I was asked recently to preach on "church hurts." Click here to listen to my sermon "Healing Church Hurts."

What does it mean to "pray for the peace of Jerusalem"? (Ps 122:6).  Click here to read further.

Abbot Meno Walks with Jesus

A print of this 8th century Coptic icon hangs on the wall beside my desk… Click to continue reading.

Advent Book Notes

Hello, it's Sheryl here to wrap up this 2nd installment of Fridays with Froehlichs.

Advent begins this Sunday, marking a new year, a new beginning in the life of the Church.  Since Advent is about time, I revisited James KA Smith's How to Inhabit Time for help and perspective as I wrestle to recalibrate to enter yet again.

There is a grace needed to glimpse the God who graces history.

Christian liturgy enacts the sacred folds of [time]. The liturgical calendar rehearses the way time curves and bends around the incarnate Christ like a temporal center of gravity. Year after year, during Advent, the church relives the messianic hope of Israel, awaiting the promise—and it has been doing so for two thousand years.... The liturgical calendar is... an invitation into the event: repetition forward [followed by] a return [spiral] that generates new possibilities. The rhythm of the church’s worship — which is the very cadence of the church’s life, the heartbeat of the body of Christ — spirals forward by living back into humanity’s encounter with the incarnate God in time. In the timekeeping of the people of God, it is Christmas again, Easter again, Pentecost again and again.

I'm also planning to absorb 2 books this season: Tish Harrison Warren's Advent, and Setting the Spiritual Clock by Paul Metzger from which here is an excerpt:

In our secular age, we readily displace eternity and unintentionally make an eternity out of time. While it is vital that we guard against sectarianism and learn how to engage our secular context meaningfully, we in the Christian community must "focus our imaginations on the glorious Christ, around whom the liturgical calendar rotates, as he breaks through the secular eclipse."

"Now the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing so that by the power of the Holy Spirit you may overflow in hope. Amen."
(from Grace Be with You, benedictions from Dale Ralph Davis)

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