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Is Church Still Relevant? with Megan McDermott
127 Plays1 year ago
Megan McDermott
Challenge your assumptions. Test Your Faith. Show everyone LOVE.
Megan McDermott is a poet, stand up comedian, and Episcopal priest currently working in Massachusetts.
CONTENT WARNING: Christianity and Christian supremacy
We talk about: shared experiences growing up in small town Central Pennsylvania
Rural, small town values that we embrace and other things that we’ve let go of
Nuances between different Christian subcultures and how they have formed us
The relationship between Christianity and late stage capitalism
Christian pop culture — music, toys, media
Becoming a young clergy person and working with youth during the pandemic
Megan's Brand new book, Jesus Merch: a Catalogue in Poems
Order Megan’s New book, Jesus Merch (affilitate link) https://bookshop.org/a/95818/9781594981029
Order Megan’s Book, Woman as Communion (affiliate link) https://bookshop.org/a/95818/9781735886473
Check out Megan’s website: meganmcdermottpoet.com
Follow Megan on BlueSky: megmcdermott92.bsky.social
Follow Megan on Twitter (X): @megmcdermott92
Subscribe to Megan on Substack: https://meganmcdermott.substack.com/
*****
This program is produced in south west philadelphia, in the unceded neighborhood of the black bottom community and on the ancestral land of the Lenape nation, who remain here in the era of the fourth crow and fight for official recognition by the commonwealth of Pennsylvania to this day. You can find out more about the Lenape Nation of Pennsylvania and how you can support the revitalization of their culture by going to https://lenape-nation.org.
Visit this episode’s sponsor, BVP Coffee, roasting high quality coffee that benefits HBCU students (affiliate link): https://bvp.coffee/uncommongoodpod
Visit this episode's sponsor, Poi Dog, chef Kiki Aranita creating sauces inspired by Hawaiian Cuisine: https://poidogphilly.com
we chat to ordinary people doing uncommon good in service of our common humanity.
we are creating community that builds relationships across difference by inviting dialogue about the squishy and vulnerable bits of life.
(un)common good with pauli reese is an uncommon good media production, where we make wisdom, insight, and spirituality accessible to everyone and put content on the internet to help people stop hating each other.
thanks for joining us on the journey of (un)common good!
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Transcript
Love, Spirituality, and Creation
00:00:00
Speaker
You know, God for me is like this grounding of like love, like that love is really at the center of everything, even though it does not feel like it most of the time. That love is at the center of creation and the fact that we are loved is like at the center of who we are and how we're invited to like be in the world.
Personal Growth and Overcoming Perfectionism
00:00:30
Speaker
And I think that's probably very powerful for me because I was also a tiny perfectionist who got a lot of my self-worth from doing well in school and wanted to be this teen writing prodigy.
Introduction to the Podcast and Guest
00:00:57
Speaker
This is Uncommon Good, the podcast where we chat to ordinary people doing uncommon good in service of our common humanity. My name is Pauli Reese. Fam, I am 100% delighted to bring you today the Reverend Megan McDermott. She's a poet.
00:01:14
Speaker
She is a stand-up comedian. She is an episcopal priest currently working in Massachusetts. Here's your content warning for this episode. We talk a lot about Christianity, Christian supremacy, late-stage capitalism, and diversity, equity, inclusion, and belonging.
00:01:31
Speaker
So as always, viewer and listener discretion advised.
Growing Up in Central Pennsylvania
00:01:35
Speaker
We go on to talk about our shared experience growing up in very midwestern feeling central Pennsylvania. We talk about rural and suburban small towns and communities, specifically the values of those communities that we embrace and some of the ones that we let go of.
00:01:55
Speaker
We talk about the nuances between different Christian subcultures and how they formed us as kids. Looking at you, Christian pop culture toys and music.
Christianity and Capitalism
00:02:06
Speaker
We go on to talk about the relationship between Christianity and late-stage capitalism, more on that Christian pop culture, what it was like for her to become a lay person and work with young people as a clergy person during the pandemic, and her books, Jesus, Merch, and Woman as Communion. This was a privilege to get to talk to my old Yale buddy. Please enjoy my chat to Reverend Megan.
00:02:37
Speaker
So first and foremost, number one, like it's insanely hot. Um, and, and you were going to turn, um, you work in, you work in Episcopal church, um, as a priest. So that means that you're, you're, you're melting under like lots of layers of liturgical fabric.
00:02:56
Speaker
Yes, and I feel like it's a position, probably a lot of clergy and churches are in because our old buildings, which are lovely and beautiful, are not designed with air conditioning. It's challenging and expensive to outfit them with air conditioning, so we just have
00:03:16
Speaker
huge fans, but if a fan is too loud, then you can't hear anything. We have to turn the fans off for the sermon and then turn them back on.
Community and Challenges in Church Life
00:03:28
Speaker
It's a whole process, but it's amazing. People show up and I think
00:03:37
Speaker
I might be looking at the temperature and deciding not to show up, but people still show up. Maybe that's inspiring. Maybe that's how I should be at it. I love the idea of people coming for any number of reasons. I mean, I guess community to whatever patterns that help them feel good and have a good start to their Sunday,
00:04:05
Speaker
And then also they inspire you too. And the other amazing thing about vestments is people don't really know what you're wearing underneath. So you can kind of all think.
00:04:22
Speaker
Is this dress too short for church? And then I'm like, well, they won't see. So I could go all of Sunday without anyone actually seeing my outfit. So at least I have that to fall back on. I can wear something somewhat cool under the vestments because no one's going to know what's under
Symbolism of Clergy Vestments
00:04:44
Speaker
there.
00:04:44
Speaker
For someone who is unfamiliar with the term vestments, can you describe what that would look like and what it feels like to wear something like that? Yes. So vestments are basically uniforms for clergy. And there are also things that people who are serving up at the altar wear. And so at my church, that usually looks like
00:05:12
Speaker
essentially a white robe with it's called a sinker like a white rope kind of around it and then like a low-tech belt yeah what would the non-church equivalent
00:05:27
Speaker
be for stall. It's kind of like a scarf. A little scarf that matches the colors of the different seasons. So it's a little toasty if it's hot. Winter, you get extra layers though. But in the summer, it's a little
00:05:46
Speaker
hot, but it just kind of like set you apart and enter into a different mode for worship by like having a costume change essentially. Yeah, so two reflections. One,
00:06:01
Speaker
I'm thinking of the robe, depending on what church you go to, I'm aware that it might be a robe that sort of crosses the front and has some sort of closure in the front. It might be something that's more like a bleach white mumu that just pulls over the head. I'm imagining a crossover between
00:06:20
Speaker
a liturgical vestments store and like Uniqlo or like some sort of like pregnancy line, like maternity line one. It's not the most flattering thing in the world. Yeah, that's that's accurate. The other thing that comes to mind is that clergy are perennially dressed for pumpkin spice latte season. Oh, that's I could see that. Yeah.
00:06:48
Speaker
Like there's the scarf that's heavy, but not too heavy. There's like the over layer. If it, if it's like really cold, like you might put on another thing depending on like what sort of liturgical tradition, you might have something that goes around your wrists or other ropes or fancy belts that you wear. Yeah. Lots of layering. Yep.
00:07:08
Speaker
The other thing that I, that I immediately wanted to jump to is that you and I have some, some sort of like childhood geography connection.
Childhood and Teen Memories
00:07:17
Speaker
Like we both grew up in like deep central Pennsylvania. And I think you said the town that you grew up in was Lewisbury. Is that, is that correct? Yes. Lewisbury, not Lewisburg or Lewis town, Lewisbury, which is like 15 minutes outside of Harrisburg.
00:07:38
Speaker
Was this suburb, medium town, small town, or outpost in the middle of farmland? I would say where I lived was suburb. I think there is a town that's very tiny of Lewisbury, but where I lived in particular was a suburban development.
00:08:00
Speaker
The thing that as we were talking became increasingly clear that of all of those things we hold most in common and probably have the least traumatic memories of, potentially even great memories of, is Hershey Park.
00:08:17
Speaker
Yes, Hershey Park. It's funny, my parents were just telling me the other week that they're gonna go to Hershey Park on their own and I was shocked. I was like, did you even like going when I was a kid? They've been watching a lot of YouTubers who like...
00:08:34
Speaker
go visit places and just record themselves so they're gonna go to Hershey Park without me so I'm interested to hear what their experience is like but yeah I went with my family dragging them to go and then of course we had a couple of field trips
00:08:54
Speaker
We had our big eighth grade field trip to Hershey Park. We had a physics field trip to Hershey Park that was all about doing physics problems, but not really. And did you ever go to concerts at Hershey? Yes, I did go to concerts. Tell me about your favorite one. I went to, this is revealing my very sophisticated musical taste when I was
00:09:21
Speaker
For my 15th birthday, I went to a concert that was Corbin Blue, Allie and AJ, and Drake Bell. That one was exciting. I went to Demi Lovato with David Archuleta as the opener, but there was a thunderstorm. David Archuleta performed as much as Demi did.
00:09:45
Speaker
I'm still enjoyable. And then the Jonas Brothers featuring the cast of Camp Rock 2. So, seeing a trend. You were a teen Nick kind of girl growing up.
00:09:57
Speaker
Teen Nick, Disney, all about it, all about it. I remember like, so like, I was a teen girl growing up as well, but I think of a slightly earlier era, like thinking in the realm of like the first days of SNCC, right? Are you afraid of the dark? Oh gosh, Roundhouse, the Ren and Stimpy show and like the earliest season of all that.
00:10:25
Speaker
Oh wait, you know what I've re-watched some of since the pandemic? Keenan and Kel. I'm not 100% sure, but I feel like Keenan Thompson is the next Dick Clark, that regardless of how old he gets, he will always look the same. Until someday, out of the blue, tragic passing, and we're all like, nobody knew anything was wrong.
00:10:50
Speaker
And he'll always be working like he's not going to ever be out of a job.
Cultural Influences and Diversity Awareness
00:10:55
Speaker
Yeah. He will always be the elder statesman of sketch comedy like they will make like they'll make like the I don't know like the Masters League of Saturday Night Live and they'll only hire people who are over the age of 55 and Keenan will be there and will look exactly the same as he did when he was first hired for all that like
00:11:16
Speaker
So central Pennsylvania, what was it like having that be sort of like the origin location of your story? What was it like to grow up there? I feel like my area of central PA was very like on that line between suburban and rural. And I think
00:11:37
Speaker
kind of both suburban and rural culture like kind of co-existed in the geographic area I was in and I think it really depended on probably your family, your exact neighborhood, class, etc. Whether you really had a rural experience or like a more
00:12:02
Speaker
suburbia experience, because I remember one of my good friends from college, she came to my parents' house once and she said, they said, you know, they weren't like taking us to the farm show or immersing us in kind of the more rural aspects of things. So like my experience was very suburban. But I think some of my classmates
00:12:30
Speaker
in school growing up, they had much, some of them had much more rural experiences. And I think we might describe the culture there differently. So first and foremost, that sounds like the location for the real life Desperate Housewives, right?
00:12:47
Speaker
That'd be interesting. Yeah. In one geographic location, it's so easy to have so many different experiences. Like your friends have spent so much more time in the more rural sort of, because yes, like outside of Harrisburg, as soon as you get what, like 10, 15 miles outside of Harrisburg, like it's farmland, rolling hills, like very sort of Midwest, maybe even in some places, at least for me, Appalachian.
00:13:15
Speaker
Well, and when I go back, particularly when I was living in New Haven, I would go back to Pennsylvania. It was kind of jarring, the lack of diversity and the realization that I didn't really reflect on that when I was growing up.
Faith Journey and Religious Influences
00:13:34
Speaker
But like I remember, you know, being at a bar, restaurant with my family and like looking around and being like every single person in here as far as I know and can tell visually is white. And then realize that that's like always been
00:13:52
Speaker
the case in almost every space I grew up in. I was not as conscious of that until I was in other environments that were more diverse. And then you go, oh, this is like actually really kind of strange. Yeah.
00:14:11
Speaker
There's something about the world. I'll describe a similar experience of visiting central Pennsylvania. Yes, you don't notice some of those things until you have something else to compare them to. I think racial and country of origin diversity is definitely one of those things.
00:14:30
Speaker
One of the things that you told me about growing up in Central PA is that you were raised in the Catholic worship environment. I wonder if you can describe what that component of growing up was like, how you see elements of that reflected or not reflected in your work today.
00:14:53
Speaker
From a fairly early age, I was kind of attracted or interested in church and in prayer. I remember in elementary school, I did my first communion.
00:15:08
Speaker
which is such an interesting tradition now being in the Episcopal Church where, for the most part, we don't kind of celebrate it in the same way because you have the little girls in these wedding-esque dresses, which is at once very odd. Also, I look back on my pictures. I'm like, oh, it's so cute. It's weird, but
00:15:36
Speaker
You know, so I was, I did that. I did CCD, which is their like Sunday school equivalent, but it happened during the week. I tried to acolyte for a while and I remember they put me on a team and so they didn't rotate through.
00:15:54
Speaker
Like where you were with different kids every week you were always with the same team and my team was me and three siblings who all went to Catholic school and I went to public school and who had been acolyting forever and I just felt like
00:16:14
Speaker
I am not, and I hate fire too, so I think I hated trying to light the candles that stressed me out. I was an acolyte dropout and now I'm a priest. When I was sixth grade or so, I remember researching all the world religions and I was like,
00:16:35
Speaker
seeing if I wanted to switch because I just got it into my head at that like young age like, Oh, I don't want to believe something just because my parents do. And then I remember being like, Oh, I still like Jesus. So I guess I'm going to be Christian, which is
00:16:53
Speaker
felt anti-climactic, 11-year-old. I started going to a Bible study some people at school were doing, which looking back, I would say, leaned evangelical, non-denominational. I don't think I really comprehended that at the time, but it was the first time
00:17:16
Speaker
I was really exposed to the idea that your religion could be a core thing about you, and not just one among many demographic facts about who you are. And that the Bible has something relevant to say to us in our lives. I didn't
00:17:39
Speaker
really get that feeling from my Catholic church growing up and I didn't really necessarily get that from my parents either who like they prioritized having us go to church but and I know that they must have prayed with me because I remember praying as a child but I just remember kind of being introduced to that bible study and feeling like oh there's another level in which I can enter into
00:18:07
Speaker
my faith, if that's what I want. And so I kind of knew even as I was getting confirmed in like eighth grade, I had it in the back of my head.
00:18:16
Speaker
that, like, maybe I'm going to like want to be Protestant when I'm an adult. And, you know, but you go through with it anyway because you're 13. And like, how do you articulate that to your parents or whatever? So I think by the time I was a teenager, I was just I was kind of tackling faith on my own, which I think was not the healthiest.
Perception of God and Self-Worth
00:18:42
Speaker
Like I was still going to church. I was often the one being like, mom and dad, let's go to church. And they were like, okay. One of the things that I'm so curious to explore like in these conversations is what
00:18:57
Speaker
we use the language of prayer and faith very comfortably. But the more time that I spend talking with people about these deep, not just things that we do or places we attend, but things that impact us on that gut core level, the more I realize there are subtle differences that are there that we don't always explore because we haven't
00:19:20
Speaker
We assume that when we use those words, everyone understands what we mean, when they're different. So when you think about this language of faith, can you say more about what that means, at least to you now? Okay, to me now and not- If you can access what it means to little Megan, yeah.
00:19:40
Speaker
I remember one of the most powerful things for me when I was in my early teens was the idea of a god who I could just be my real self with.
00:19:56
Speaker
and be and so I really put on an act I think even to myself sometimes of like I don't care what anyone thinks about me people can make fun of me I don't care like they're just shallow like and I just remember once it was at this like Christian worship
00:20:17
Speaker
festival that I ended up going to was some of the people from my middle school Bible study and having this moment where I was like, it's okay for me to be hurt by things and it's okay for me to be honest with God about that and to not have to all the time be this strong, I don't know, defiant person. I think
00:20:47
Speaker
I think it got me in touch. I don't know. I've always been an emotional person, but I do think it got me in touch with my emotions in a different way than I was letting myself.
00:21:02
Speaker
and drew me into trying to be a little more gracious with other people because I think I felt very judged at that age. I judged other people really harshly. I was a know-it-all. I look back and I'm like, I can understand why I probably ruffled some feathers of people when I was that age because I think
00:21:29
Speaker
I thought I was smart and deep and these other people weren't. I think back then, the idea was huge to me of having God or who's beyond me and who I'm able to open up to in a way that I can't necessarily in the rest of my life.
00:21:52
Speaker
And I mean, I think that's still a part of my faith, too. That's so illuminating. I just hear like a sense of like the capacity, like a place that is safe enough to be, as you said, vulnerable and to be the truest version of Lil' Megan. There's your stage alias for your stand up. But you could be.
00:22:16
Speaker
And at the same time, as I tried to pursue, what does it mean to be a Christian? As I tried to pursue that more seriously, the more toxic
00:22:32
Speaker
ideology that I was coming in contact with in you know these Christian books and magazines aimed at teenage girls or some of the like contemporary Christian music at the time like Barlow girl comic like their lyrics are comically atrocious in some songs when I look back so I think
00:22:55
Speaker
On some levels, I was connecting with this liberating, comforting part of my faith. Then on other levels, I was getting really anxious about what does it mean to be a good Christian? Is it having to be perky all the time and happy and joyful all the time?
00:23:16
Speaker
what does it mean as a woman to like, well, as a young woman at the time, a girl, you know, what is my faith asking me to do? And so I think as I tried to lean in to this faith that was really compelling to me, I also it was also cultivating anxiety about like, I can't live up to this.
00:23:43
Speaker
image I'm getting in my head of like what a Christian is supposed to be. I want to lean into a little bit and try to understand a bit more is what the role of prayer is in the language of faith. Can you say a little bit more about what prayer was for Lil Megan? Yeah, I look back and I'm like I feel like prayer was very anxious. It was like I was afraid of like people I loved going to hell in a way that I
00:24:10
Speaker
am not now because I think I was buying this narrative of like if someone hasn't like very specifically given their life to Jesus in a specific kind of way that they're like
00:24:26
Speaker
in danger. So I feel like I was praying for other people who I felt like were in danger and I was praying for myself because I felt like I remember thinking I don't know if I'm cut out to like
00:24:41
Speaker
be a Christian when I'm an adult. Because I just remember so many periods where I felt, I felt doubt, but then I felt guilt about the doubt. And I think that's the thing that really gets you stuck because like questions and doubts are like a part of life. But when you start having fear-based reactions to like your own thoughts,
00:25:06
Speaker
you know, it's, it's not spiritually, I think, healthy or fulfilling. So I think a lot of my prayers were like, yeah, wanting myself to be different, wanting other people to be different. That's, I feel like that's really far from how I think today. I think I also
00:25:25
Speaker
was very much like, I don't know, concerned I wasn't praying enough. And I think sometimes today I'm still concerned I'm not praying enough, but it comes from a different place, I think. I think now when I'm like, oh, it really would be helpful for me to have a more regular spiritual discipline, I'm usually thinking about it in terms of that's what my soul
00:25:54
Speaker
is craving and could flourish with rather than I think God is mad at me because I'm not praying enough.
Purpose of God and Youth Faith Needs
00:26:05
Speaker
There's a cruel incongruous thing that I think that I hear there because you talk about prayer being this thing where there are specific ways you're supposed to do it. There's a certain quota that you have to reach, although nobody knows what the exact number of that quota is in order for you to have done enough.
00:26:28
Speaker
there and it makes you you talked about little Megan feeling a certain way like feeling a lot of anxiety when in when the relationship with with God with the the beyond the great divine that you describe was all about the piece of feeling the most authentic of self which was decidedly like the work of releasing anxiety and releasing the the school front of little Megan
00:26:57
Speaker
the way that I look at my faith has changed for the better is that I think particularly kind of in my college years, kind of having this realization that like, why would the God who has created like everything like want to shove us into these boring, predictable boxes of behavior, especially around like gendered behavior?
00:27:27
Speaker
the idea that, you know, God once would want me to be like only this very particular kind of woman and every woman who is Christian should be the same type of woman. Like when you think about it, it just like doesn't match. I think the
00:27:49
Speaker
the broader vision of God that I see in the scriptures and that I feel like I've encountered in my life. I think I came to believe that God empowers us to be more boldly who we are and that doesn't mean sometimes we don't do fucked up things. But
00:28:15
Speaker
God is making me more of myself rather than less and making me more my unique self. I think that was an important shift for me to realize.
00:28:34
Speaker
If I didn't, I definitely wouldn't be a priest if I didn't have that shift. Who knows if I would even be involved in church at all if I didn't have that change and what I saw God's purposes being in our lives.
00:28:53
Speaker
I would love to continue on from that point, the purpose of God in our lives. Previous guests have talked about lots of different understandings of the nature of the divine, used lots of different language to describe what that
00:29:09
Speaker
is like and what their experience of the divine is. I wonder if you can tell me what God is to you now, and because of what that is, how that gets you to this work of being a priest in Amherst, Massachusetts.
00:29:31
Speaker
It's a good question. It's a big question. Let's see. For some reason, the thing that's coming to my mind right now is some of the work that I do with youth in my parish and just how important it is to me for them to have a space where they're being told what you achieve, however you want to measure that, is not the most important.
00:29:58
Speaker
thing about you. God for me is like this grounding of like love, like that love is really at the center of everything even though it does not feel like it most of the time. Love is at the center of creation and the fact that we are loved
00:30:21
Speaker
is at the center of who we are and how we're invited to be in the world. I think that's probably very powerful for me because I was also a tiny perfectionist who got a lot of my self-worth from doing well in school and wanted to be this teen writing prodigy.
00:30:49
Speaker
It didn't happen, right? And I applied to Princeton and these schools that I didn't get into. And all of a sudden it was like, oh, I did all this work and put so much of my identity into being this good student. And no matter how hard you work, you still might not get what you want.
00:31:13
Speaker
And then who are you then, I think was, I remember being confronted with that. Going into my freshman year of being a creative writing major and like wanting to be the best. Realizing that that was not always gonna be the case. There are gonna be people who are better than you or by some standard or that you might perceive as being better than you. And so what is the stable ground on which I could build
00:31:42
Speaker
my identity and sense of worth. And for me, that's God. That's beautiful. I'm just sort of reflecting on the sense of stability and how powerful a simple sense of stability is and frankly, how attractive it is in a world that is so full of instability.
00:32:03
Speaker
Yeah. One of the things that you mentioned to me as we were getting started is that the youth have different needs and concerns around faith formation now than what they did in the past. I wonder if you can tell me more about that.
00:32:19
Speaker
Well, yeah, I think some of it, for me, is just comparing, like, one, the religious context that I grew up in, you know, growing up in the Catholic Church, and then also just the cultural context of being in Central PA. And Amherst, Massachusetts is very different from Central PA, and it's
00:32:42
Speaker
You know, the Episcopal Church is very different to grow up in, I think, than the Catholic Church. So like for me to like really come into an ordinate, come into a denomination that had women's ordination and like to realize I could do that was like that was like this wild thing to me. Right. These kids have had women clergy and have seen women clergy, you know, preside and preach.
00:33:12
Speaker
Their whole lives that just is normal to them and I think there are lots of things that are just normal to them like always surprises me like I did a little Lesson I think this was back in
00:33:28
Speaker
There was a year where we were all virtual at church because of COVID and I was doing Zoom Youth Group and we did this video and discussion on faith and science and the idea of the material was to kind of encourage youth to be able to see those as going together and not
00:33:50
Speaker
as automatically being these conflicting things that are butting heads, which at least in my experience of growing up in Central PA, I think is a narrative you hear a lot of, you know, I can't believe in evolution because I'm a Christian, or I don't want you to teach my kids evolution because we're Christian or things like that. I just remember asking them like, if you've ever like,
00:34:17
Speaker
seen these things pitted against each other. And they were like, well, maybe on TV. And I just went, Oh, yeah, because they're, you know, in a pretty progressive part of Massachusetts. Yeah, I'm always striving to hopefully facilitate some like level of personal connection to
00:34:39
Speaker
their faith and to scripture and we're a very academic community in Amherst so we have a lot of faculty and staff from Amherst College or Hampshire or UMass who are part of our community and a lot of kids who have parents who are professors or and so I think sometimes
00:35:00
Speaker
their temptation, if we're talking about the Bible, is to approach it in the way that they would in like a lit class, like where they want to get the right answer. You know, I don't think they always approach it that way, but I think, you know, it's that academic background I think could be a good thing. And it can also sometimes stifle you from like entering into a text that you don't feel qualified
00:35:26
Speaker
to interpret. And I think this is my inner Protestant soul coming out where I'm like, you all can interpret the Bible. You all are capable of it.
00:35:40
Speaker
So yeah, I think there are, and I think their context is also like, it's much rare, it's much more rare to like have a Christian identity and be an active churchgoer at their age than I think it was at my age growing up in Central PA. I think it was still fairly rare to be like pretty serious about your faith or like talk about it a lot.
00:36:07
Speaker
But I feel like the default assumption was that everyone was kind of Christian, and that's not the default assumption here, which is a good thing because not everyone is Christian, right? So you don't want to assume that everyone is. But I imagine it shapes the way that they see church in themselves a little bit to feel like
00:36:31
Speaker
It's not the most common thing in the world maybe for them to be Christian or to be going to church.
Cultural Assumptions and Religious Trends
00:36:42
Speaker
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Speaker
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00:37:19
Speaker
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00:37:38
Speaker
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00:38:03
Speaker
I'd love to hear more about the difference between the world that you see where you use the language of default Christian, where there are assumptions of a certain level of familiarity with
00:38:18
Speaker
sort of with those practices, at least what I think you're getting at of going to church, like the practice of having a life that includes regular attendance at church, some sort of religious observance, versus a culture where that isn't the case. I wonder if you can describe how you feel like the culture is different when there isn't the assumption
00:38:47
Speaker
that everyone is regularly going to church and is at least a little bit familiar with that sort of lifestyle. Talking about it now, I think I often perceive it as
00:39:02
Speaker
a geographic thing, but I also think it's a trajectory in time that is happening throughout the US and many places, right? As people who are connected to the church, we hear these narratives about
00:39:21
Speaker
church all the time. And as younger people, we like know from just our social lives that like, it is somewhat rare, I think. Well, actually, the other day, I was at Amherst Coffee, which is like a bar cafe in Amherst, and I started talking to this couple. And
00:39:46
Speaker
They were like our my age the guy was an episcopalian and we like freaked out we were like Because it just like seems rare right like in that like
00:40:01
Speaker
you don't necessarily expect when you're just going out about in the world and not like at a church related function that you're going to come across a young adult who shares that identity. So I think it's difference happening on two levels, right? Of like, I think
00:40:22
Speaker
The religiosity in this part of Massachusetts is different from where I grew up, but it would also be interesting to like eavesdrop on the conversations about religion from like high schoolers in the where I grew up, because probably
00:40:41
Speaker
fewer and fewer of them have grown up in churches, even there. I mean, that's an assumption. That's like a wild guess. But yeah, I think in terms of how that shapes ministry, I think I'm always thinking about what, particularly with youth, but I think this applies
00:41:04
Speaker
more broadly across all the demographics of like what do we offer that you can't get somewhere else? And so I think I probably lean into a lot more conversation on faith maybe than some models of youth ministry because we like do fun things too like we'll go
00:41:26
Speaker
this past year we went rock climbing, indoor rock climbing and mini golf and you know all those like classic youth group things but it was also important to me this year we had monthly discussions usually over lunch and we did a set of lessons around faith and wellness and like how faith
00:41:50
Speaker
intersects with the way that you care for yourself spiritually and mentally and emotionally and physically and so on. I hope that they'll experience something distinctive that like the Christian tradition can offer them other than just like service projects and fun which are great but like
00:42:12
Speaker
you can easily get those in a lot of context. So I think I think about that a lot of like, am I teaching or guiding conversation or making opportunities for them to make a personal connection with kind of the Christian tradition, you know, they'll all have their own
00:42:36
Speaker
of figuring out, especially as adults, what they believe or not. What do you think it is that is distinctive about the Kurdish tradition that is not offered or at least hard to find elsewhere? I think to be motivated to really stay and put up with all of the
00:43:00
Speaker
interestingness of church, especially as a young person. That's the nicest way I've ever heard that put, incidentally, by the way. As a young person in the mainline, wherever they might end up living, they might be the youngest person in the church by decades if they decide to go. But I think you have to find something compelling about Jesus, I think, to want to keep showing up.
00:43:29
Speaker
in the spaces that I'm involved in. And to me, the most compelling parts, and I'll unpack the theological language, but are the incarnation and the resurrection of the idea that God so wants to be with us and be close to us that
00:43:59
Speaker
God came on earth as one of us and like was present with humanity in that way.
00:44:08
Speaker
To me, that's a compelling vision of God. And then the concept of resurrection and the idea that ultimately life and love and God will triumph over death and grief and injustice and the hope that is represented in that.
00:44:34
Speaker
while I mean while our world is like falling apart and while we're called to like take actions to like you know we're not called to just you know be passive and hope and wait for the resurrection but I think to me that's a fueling idea of like even though it looks like
00:44:56
Speaker
all of the terrible things in the world will always win. I don't think that's true. On some deeper reality, I think that love and life and God are more powerful, even though that doesn't always appear to be the case. And so for me, I think those are the pillars of what is attractive or compelling about the Christian story.
Priesthood, Storytelling, and Creativity
00:45:25
Speaker
I hear so much hope and just a sense of resolute optimism in that. And I suppose not a small commitment to imagination as well in trying to envision a world as you're describing that is so much
00:45:52
Speaker
better than the world that you see in the moment.
00:45:58
Speaker
This is my creative writing background, I think, but I see priesthood as really being about storytelling in a way of how do we proclaim this story of God and God's people that I think we find in scripture. It's a complicated story in scripture. Sure.
00:46:23
Speaker
How do we proclaim that story in a way that connects with people today? And how do people then connect their own stories and their own ways of interpreting their life and their world to that story? Like how do we help people see themselves as a part of that bigger narrative? And I think that was one of my big
00:46:50
Speaker
draws to the priesthood was the idea of working with story in that way and sometimes just reminding people of the story of a god who loves them because it's not always new information when you're preaching. It's not like, oh, I need to come up with the most unique
00:47:14
Speaker
interpretation of this passage ever. But sometimes I think it's just in presence or in preaching, just like reminding people like,
00:47:27
Speaker
This might be a story you already know, but God loves you. I want to turn to this work, this career that you've developed of creative writing. We met at Yale Divinity School, specifically Berkeley Divinity School at Yale, the Anglican Studies.
00:47:44
Speaker
Wing and the Institute of Sacred Music, thank you Martin Jean and Chris Wyman and Maggie Dawn and all of those wonderful people who were there at the time. And then I know you're also a very brilliant poet and hymn text writer. What was the story of that developing and these two ideas of ministry and creative writing sort of merging together
00:48:13
Speaker
into this work of priesthood as storytelling. I think writing, I've been in love with writing forever since I was six, seven, and consistent throughout my childhood. That was my dream of being an author. People knew me as that writer girl, in part because I had this amazing third grade teacher who I showed her a short story.
00:48:42
Speaker
that I wrote and she put it in the library for other kids to check out. I just look back, I'm like, that's so sweet. Then in middle school, the people would bring it up to me and I would cringe. I was like, ah.
00:48:58
Speaker
So I've always loved writing and that was initially only what I planned to study in college. So I went to Susquehanna University, which has a great creative writing program. While I was there, I
00:49:15
Speaker
ended up adding first a religion minor and then getting really into it. So that was kind of going on at the same time, this opening up, I think, of my mind in terms of how I approached reading the Bible, how I approached thinking about my faith. And at the same time, I started getting really into poetry in college. I think it's much harder to
00:49:41
Speaker
tackle ideas in the same way in prose or in fiction. I think you can, but I think you have to be very talented to pull it off in a not didactic way, whereas poetry felt like it was more fit for wrestling with the things that I wanted to wrestle with. I started writing a lot of things about women in the Bible,
00:50:09
Speaker
back in college that have ended up getting published now. That was really, I guess, the start of the focus on poetry. I think going into seminary and being at Yale,
00:50:24
Speaker
I was always still occasionally writing and sending things out to lit mags and getting published here and there and figuring out if I'm going into parish ministry. I feel like once I actually got through seminary and started my
00:50:45
Speaker
life here in Amherst and started my ordained life with some of that more settled. I feel like I've been able to explore again more of the poet's vocation and calling.
00:51:02
Speaker
because I'm not actively in as great a level of discernment as I was about ministry. I think I just was super social in New Haven. I just was always bopping around somewhere. I just have more time to write now that I'm not surrounded by other human beings constantly. In the past few years,
00:51:32
Speaker
have been really happy that like, you know, I've had more poems published and now have had two chat books, which is just a fancy word for tiny collection of poetry and have a full length collection. So like a normal sized book.
00:51:52
Speaker
It's called Jesus Merch, a catalog in poems. It's coming from Fernwood Press, which is a poetry imprint of Barclay Books, which is a small Quaker publisher out in Oregon. Early in the pandemic, I was trying to find things to mail to children from church.
00:52:17
Speaker
I don't think I ever gave these out. I'm holding up a little cheap penguin that says, Jesus warms my heart. We'll put it on the YouTube channel and on Instagram so that people can see it. Oh, wait. These are the things I really love. One of my friends calls this the nerdy Bible. It's a little plastic Bible with arms and legs and glasses on. This actually did get sent out.
00:52:44
Speaker
to kids. And I have, of course, extras on my desk because I love them. I love it too. I was looking through, yeah, this online catalog of like cheap kids, Christian stuff.
00:53:03
Speaker
And there's just so many weird things that they sell. So I think the first poem I wrote, it was this inflatable beach ball that was like construction themed. Oh, it was supposed to be an inflatable wrecking ball. That's like Jesus wrecks my sin or something. And I sent it to a group chat of my friends. And this is why it's
00:53:33
Speaker
It's always good to have writing community because I was joking. I said, I should write a poem about this. And they were like, but you have to actually write a poem. So I wrote a poem about that.
00:53:47
Speaker
And it was really fun to write. And so I decided I am just going to keep looking for weird things on this website, and I'm just going to write until I don't feel like writing them anymore. And so early COVID, everything's locked down. I just wrote, I don't know, 40 poems or something from this website.
00:54:12
Speaker
And so I knew I was writing enough for it to be going towards a book, but I was like, I need I need to bring in some variation in here. And so what I ended up doing pre-COVID, I had been and I had visited the Yale British Art Center, which I love. I love the Yale British Art Center and the Yale Art Gallery.
00:54:36
Speaker
And there was this exhibit on Victorian board games, which I found fascinating. And I bought like the big art book that they sell about the exhibition, which I'd like never bought anything like that before.
00:54:55
Speaker
because they're kind of expensive. It was like a $60 book or something. But I just had that my creative energies were like, I need this. So I bought it. But then I'm pretty sure I had it just in my apartment sitting for
00:55:14
Speaker
a year because I knew in the back of my head I was like I want to write something about these but it took writing these other poems for me to realize oh they these can go together so I wrote some poems based off of the Victorian board games because obviously a lot of them have religious
00:55:33
Speaker
messages in them and a lot of Christian content. And then my third source that I brought in was just looking at Etsy and eBay for 20th century Christian games and Sunday school stuff. So I have things from the 50s and the 20s and the 80s.
00:55:55
Speaker
that people were selling. I think initially it was about exploring the implicit theologies in these commercial items that we sell, have sold, bought, or whatever. A connection between American Christianity and late-stage capitalism. Yeah. Get out of town.
00:56:19
Speaker
But then I think what ended up being really interesting is I think someone could write a book that was just a critique of all these things, but that just wasn't that interesting to me.
00:56:35
Speaker
There are poems that are definitely critical of some of the messages of the merchandise. And then there are poems where in the weird item or like I find some connection to my life in some way and it becomes like a dialogue partner for like something that I'm going through. So to me, I don't know, there's something
00:56:59
Speaker
There was something that captured me in a lot of these weird, cheap, mass-produced items. Leaning into that for the sake of the poems. That's how that came together. It was really different.
00:57:16
Speaker
because I like wrote it all as a project as opposed to like my chapbook that just came out, Woman as Communion, was me like putting together poems I wrote over the course of like seven years and trying to like
00:57:32
Speaker
see how they connected and fit together. Whereas this was like, I kind of wrote feverishly for a couple of months and I knew that I wanted it all to be one project and come together.
00:57:48
Speaker
That's amazing. The phrase that comes to mind when you talk about mass produce, like little toys like that in a religious sort of target audience is made in China, but for Jesus. Well, and the name, I mean, and I always am like, why won't they change the name of this? The company is Oriental Trading. Oh, no. And I'm always like, why?
00:58:15
Speaker
Why wouldn't you update your name? Because I have some history of the company in the author's note. I think it was founded in the early 1900s by a man who's a Japanese immigrant. He named it that, but I'm like, why hasn't anyone since been like, maybe it's time to change the name.
00:58:41
Speaker
Gosh, I remember so many childhood days because we were the family that did all the merchandising for Sunday schools, getting the Oriental Trading Company print catalog. Pack it. Yeah.
00:58:58
Speaker
Exactly. And like all of the glossy pictures of like the the censored like church safe versions of like all of like the the fairground games and like the little toys. Yeah.
00:59:16
Speaker
Yeah, because I think if I'm remembering correctly, I think they started out with carnival materials as what they sold and then they transitioned into Sunday school. That might not be right. I'll have to look up to make sure that's right. I feel like some religious scholar in the PhD in religious studies department at Yale is now going to do a detailed dissertation about the impact of the Oriental trading company.
00:59:45
Speaker
They should because I think I think it says a lot like one what we like give to children right and like what yeah what we sell as representative of different stories of our faith I'm trying to remember like there's one
01:00:04
Speaker
I forget what the actual product was, but I just remember it was about Mary and Martha, and it was like Martha is frowning and angry and Mary's smiling, and it doesn't sell that story to kids.
01:00:25
Speaker
if there's anything that I've learned about what work I've done in children's ministry is that kids are 100, maybe 1000% smarter than what we give them credit for, for sure. I wanna talk about one of the specific expressions of your writing that you told me about and that I saw on your Instagram that you picked up during the pandemic and you turned to standup comedy.
Humor, Poetry, and Personal Voice
01:00:52
Speaker
Yes, so I had been wanting for a while. There's a comedy studio, like 15 minutes from where I live. Nice. And I had been wanting to do their stand-up class pre-COVID. Yeah. And it was always like sold out every time I tried to register. Sure. And then this,
01:01:18
Speaker
past fall, their classes opened up again, masked, everyone required to be double vaccinated. So they were doing it as fairly safely for being in person.
01:01:35
Speaker
So I signed up and I mean, I think my main motivation was just like I wanted to be around other people. And, you know, having moved in the past few years to like a new place, your your attempt to like make a social life gets very interrupted in a global pandemic naturally. Right. So I think that was my main motivation.
01:02:06
Speaker
To me, there's something very there was something very freeing about the class because obviously I like get up and speak in front of other people on a regular basis when I preach. But to me, that's like, you know, there there are stakes to that. Right. Where I'm like, I want to be offering something useful for people. And I'm like also aware in the back of my head, like,
01:02:34
Speaker
I am hired to do this. People are paying me to offer up something worthwhile. Sure.
01:02:45
Speaker
And to be able to just have a venue where, you know, I could get up and talk for five minutes and like it does not really have any consequence for my life. If I bomb or like if if what I have to say is like not very relevant or, you know, it just like does it.
01:03:04
Speaker
And I think, you know, share different parts of myself that I would not necessarily share from a pulpit or in a parish setting. Sure.
01:03:17
Speaker
So yeah, and it was interesting because I a lot of like what I ended up writing about for my standup class was often things I have written poems about, but like just coming at it from a different tone. So I feel like
01:03:37
Speaker
My first chapbook that came out was called Prayer Book for Contemporary Dating. It was a lot of dating and relationship poems that have some elements of humor to them, but I think are relatively sincere. They're not written to be funny. I think some funny comes out.
01:03:58
Speaker
There's a different tone when you're writing for humor or satire. And I imagine also the experience both of writing about and then the actual experience of dating as a clergy person must be fertile ground for poetry and comedy.
01:04:15
Speaker
Yes. Yeah. And I think towards the end, I took three sessions of the standup class where I was like, I have to start talking about something else because it's just like the most obvious
01:04:30
Speaker
material because you just get you just get laughs from like people don't expect at all for someone who is a priest to go up and honestly say anything honest about or like swear like just me swearing which like if someone knew me in my social life would not be like a shocking thing
01:04:55
Speaker
But you just get a lot of easy mileage out of it, I feel like. So towards the end of those classes, I was like, I have to challenge myself to try some other material. Yeah, it's different to approach
01:05:12
Speaker
something with the thought of like, OK, how can I present this in a way that just is funny and that people can enjoy the humor of it? So I did a little hybrid poetry reading slash stand up set a couple of months ago with my new chapbook because it just had been something I wanted to try because I feel like they're in
01:05:41
Speaker
conversation with each other. I think it went okay. I would like to try it again at some point. I sold a couple books to my comedy classmates. I'm interested in how those things could possibly come together in my life.
01:06:06
Speaker
Well, one, I would I would I would pay to see like a a stand up poetry slam. That would be amazing. Two, I I wonder I know we talked about this like a tiny little bit. I wonder if you might be willing to grace us with a reading. Yes. So this is called To Adam. Adam. I now always tack a sigh to your name.
01:06:36
Speaker
a stand-in for more precise feelings. I know I shouldn't be mad still, but I am. It's personal, not principle, that you were the one to betray me, the same one who shared conversations, unlike any I'd known my whole life. Forget that my life was only a day old. Forget that you were my only option.
01:07:02
Speaker
It was still extraordinary, the opening in me meeting the opening in you. To be fair, we didn't know how to be closed yet. Now we have learned to hold words under our tongues, vary the angles of shoulders, narrow and soften eyes. Adam, remember the way you kissed my tears, though we didn't know what they were yet.
01:07:32
Speaker
that my body had guessed at truth. No apple needed to intuit that perfection was temporary. You pressed your lips to each drop, telling me God had said you could drink of any water. All was yours for the tasting. That was the start. You tasted me in the dark, and I tasted you back. And we didn't know shame yet, but it still seems special. Adam.
01:08:02
Speaker
You didn't even call me by name. The woman that you gave me. During those talks we had, the ones we'll never have again, you've said it over and over. Eve, Eve, Eve. Each time like a key finding its proper slot. But now all words are different.
01:08:27
Speaker
And when I hear you repeat my name, it's ownership, irritation, lust if we're lucky. Recognition of us as separate two bound together by guilt and circumstance. Unable to repeat the miracle of that first day. Staying up all night talking. Bright with the hope exclusive to those who don't yet know the need for it.
01:09:01
Speaker
Whoo.
01:09:05
Speaker
That's going to sit with me. The thing that strikes me about that is that at least in my experience of reading that story as very reflecting on the text that I've read, it's a very visceral story. It's a very intimate, very deeply personal story, but that because I suspect probably of the context in which I'm used to reading it. It's not something that you think is very embodied or incarnational.
01:09:33
Speaker
I shared this in my poetry stand-up set, but it's been a while, so it's not going to come off funny, but that's okay. I actually wrote that poem when I was writing a lot of poems about men and people who had broken my heart and just a lot of angry poems about guys.
01:09:59
Speaker
They were not good. I had all of this negative energy about my romantic life, but I was not happy with how the poems were turning out.
01:10:15
Speaker
I was like, how can I do this in a more creative way that will channel that energy but also allow me to step back from the personal details? I was like,
01:10:31
Speaker
I can just pick men from the Bible who I feel are disappointing in similar ways to how men have disappointed me and I will just project my personal disappointment onto the biblical characters. It's also funny because I'm not exactly sure which guy I was really angry at when I wrote that poem.
01:11:00
Speaker
I know that that is there in the background, that I was thinking about a very personal story and situation. I was fusing that with the biblical narrative and where I saw it connect.
01:11:22
Speaker
At one of our classmates, Greg Johnston, who is a priest in Boston, he had me come do a reading for his church, which was so lovely. It's funny because I'm reluctant to read my poems to my own church, but at someone else's church, I'm like, yep, let's go. Someone asked me how much of the voice of
01:11:49
Speaker
the women characters in the poems, how much of it is actually my voice? And how much is actually me? I feel like poets are always reluctant to answer that question. Yeah.
01:12:03
Speaker
But I think it definitely varies by poem. I think I think it's natural that, you know, I I'm interested in these poems and exploring and exploring these women characters who like are not very fleshed out. But I think, yeah, then they probably do get fleshed out with like parts of me and my experiences of, you know, how I would be.
01:12:30
Speaker
feeling if I were in the midst of that biblical narrative. Well, I'm so grateful that you read. The book is called Woman as Communion. I'm assuming anyone can get it anywhere where they get books. Yes, it is easiest to get it probably from my publisher's website, Game Over Books. It's in a few bookstores, but you can always request it at your bookstore or library if they don't have it.
01:12:58
Speaker
Amazing. Well, as we're coming to the end of our time, I just have one more question for you and that is, what do you want the world to look like when you're done with it?
Creating Connection Spaces and Closing Thoughts
01:13:12
Speaker
Oh, it's a good question. I think something I have been thinking a lot about lately is like,
01:13:20
Speaker
How do I phrase this? Making spaces that allow, not allow, making spaces that give people the opportunity to like connect with themselves, to connect with their spirit and with God in like an open and exploratory way. And I've been really kind of fascinated by
01:13:46
Speaker
using the arts and literature more in parish ministry, which is something I feel like I was doing with our youth already, but have been doing more of for adults in our congregation as well. So like right now we're doing a weekly poetry meditation.
01:14:04
Speaker
and I have a different contemporary poem every week, and then I basically pretend I'm Padra Gautuma of Poetry Unbound, if you're familiar with that. I give my little reflection on the poem, except we're on Zoom live, and then I give people reflection prompts, and we have time to meditate and pray, and then we come back together. For me, that's the most interesting part because people open up
01:14:32
Speaker
in a way that I don't think they necessarily would do without having something to respond to, right? Like, you know, people share these personal things or they'll share about their like
01:14:48
Speaker
perspective on God that the poem brought up for them. I don't know. I guess I want to do more of that, of creating opportunities for people to connect with themselves and with God and to share in that with other people. I think the other thing in terms of parish work is I hope people feel that I cared for them.
01:15:16
Speaker
you know, that the congregations I was in, you know, at the end of the day, you know, none of us can do this work perfectly, but the people can feel like, yes, Megan loved us and cared about us. Yeah. Beautiful. Megan McDermott, thank you so much for being on the show and for lingering with me a bit today. Well, thank you for inviting me.
01:15:46
Speaker
My thanks to my guests, the Reverend Megan McDermott. You can buy her books, find out more about her work, and follow her on Twitter and check out her website at the links in the episode description. Thank you so much for tuning in to Uncommon Good with Paulie Rees. This program is produced in Southwest Philadelphia in the unceded neighborhood of the Black Bottom community and on the ancestral land of the Lenape Nation, who remain here in the era of the Fourth Crow and fight for official recognition by the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania to this day.
01:16:14
Speaker
You can find out more about the Lenape Nation of Pennsylvania and how you can support the revitalization of their culture by going to Lenape-Nation.org. Our associate producers are Willa Jaffe and Kia Watkin. If you enjoyed listening to the show, please support us by leaving us a five-star review and a comment and subscribing wherever you listen to podcasts. It really does help people find us.
01:16:36
Speaker
Uncommon Good is also available on YouTube, TikTok, and Instagram at UncommonGoodPod. Follow us there for closed caption video content and more goodies. We love questions and feedback. You can send us a DM on social media or an email at uncommongoodpod at gmail.com. Thank you so much for listening. Until next time, wishing you every Uncommon Good to do your Uncommon Good to be the Uncommon Good.