The View from Bolton Street

Baking Bread Together…. Apart

A Sabbatical Journey

Hello from the Corner of Bolton and Lafayette,

As you are (hopefully) aware, on August 1st I will begin a three-and-a-half-month sabbatical with the support of Memorial’s staff and vestry, and the tremendous generosity of the Lily Endowment.  The current language around sabbaticals is that the congregation and clergy take a sabbatical ‘together’.  While I don’t think Lily is going to support all of us going to Southern India in October, I do recognize that my absence will be a time of rest for many of you.  Thankfully, we have an excellent sabbatical committee that is working to ensure things will go smoothly and that we all are able to refresh, restore and renew ourselves over the next few months. 

The sabbatical is called: “Grains, Trains, and Automobiles”  and it uses the process of Baking Bread - Mixing, Leavening, Stretching, Resting, Baking - to help us understand the hard work of rest, and to explore the role that hospitality plays in our ability to work across difference, repair relationships, and see the face of Christ in the other. 

The last three years have been extremely exciting and challenging for all of us here at Memorial.  From Justice and Reparations to COVID and Renovations we have all had our share of highs and lows, we could all use a rest, even as we are all excited for what is coming next with respect to reparations, the completion of the renovations, and the next five years of Memorial’s life. Deacon Natalie has put together an excellent group of preachers and celebrants to assist with worship, and the vestry and lay leadership are excited to step into some new leadership roles. 

We all agree that this long season of COVID has shifted some of our leadership and worship patterns, and this is an opportunity to rebalance responsibilities between staff and volunteers, and also for some new leaders to rise up within the congregation.  So if that speaks to you, I hope you will reach out to the sabbatical committee to volunteer!  

The Sabbatical will be broken up into parts: 

Mix: When you mix ingredients for baking you are giving them time to get to know each other, connect, and strengthen the bonds and relationships between the parts. It is also a good time to look at what needs to be repaired and restored within ourselves and our community. 

Leaven: The leaven is what agitates the flour and gluten, allows the bread to rise, and creates space to breathe.  During this period, I will be ‘interning’ at a local bakery here in Baltimore, deepening my own understanding and appreciation of the bread baking process, and working out a whole other set of skills and muscles in the process.

Stretch and Fold:  Part of this sabbatical is also making sure Monica, Isabella, and Nicolas also get their own sabbatical experiences - so we will be stretching ourselves on a two-day train ride through the Rockies from Denver to San Francisco.  We will be visiting friends that we have not seen in many years and taking Isabella to Sequoia National Park and Nicolas to the Golden Gate Bridge because that is on both of their bucket lists. 

Bake: Finally, we will finish the sabbatical with an extended trip to Southern India as a family. We will be exploring the way of St. Thomas, and also exploring the concept of hospitality and inter-religious dialogue in one of the few places where so many world religions live together in peace and harmony.  

Through all of this, you will be meeting experts in baking, Christian hospitality, The Church in (and of) South India, and rest and renewal.  Finally, we will all come back together in mid-November to bake bread together.  

My ‘leave-taking Sunday’ will be July 31st. Please plan to join us for a send-off celebration on that day, with food, drinks, music, and community. 

I want to thank again our vestry, our sabbatical committee, Deacon Natalie, and all of you, for making this possible.