So in the Presbyterian #PCUSA Hymnal (1990) they changed the line in "Be Thou My Vision" from

"Riches I heed not, nor man's empty praise"

to

"Riches I heed not, nor vain empty praise"

And I wanna know: who was on that committee?

Like, I'm all for gender equality but what woman was on that committee and raised her hand and said,

"Hey look y'all, I feel like the empty praise of women is maybe being overlooked as a thing here.

"As a woman, I am much more tempted by the empty praise of women than of men, and besides that I feel like my empty praise should *also* go unheeded in this song."

"That's a good point, Elizabeth; any ideas how we could change it to make it more egalitarian? Anyone? George?"

"Yeah, what if we just changed "man's" to "vain"? It would be redundant, but it would solve the problem."

"Elizabeth, what do you think?"

"I'm just happy to be included."

Departure: Why I Left the Church
https://www.restorativefaith.org/post/departure-why-i-left-the-church

#pastors #ministry #pcusa

For the past few months, I've had this idea rattling around in my head and today I shared it with like the second person I've ever told it to:

The lived experience of the other as the Word of God.

I'm #PCUSA and in my tradition we talk about the word of God in 3 ways.

1. The word of God incarnate (Jesus Christ)
2. The word of God written (scripture)
3. The word of God preached (what we hear in a sermon).

I'm grounding this interest in adding the lived experience of the other as the word of God in Matthew 25, where Jesus has the king say, whatsoever you did to the least of these my brothers and sisters you did to me.