I have come to appreciate Advent so much more without the light/dark binary. Rather, I see darkness as the generative space in which light is conceived and from which it is born. Both holy, both life-giving.
The ongoing tension between the force of the past and the pull of the future can be seen in our time more clearly than ever. Evidence of a positive, forward-moving impulse toward the good, for example, is all around. Technologically, developments in communications are helping to bring the citizens of the planet into a more interdependent unity. Socially, new models of conflict resolution are being devised to help prevent violence, highlighting the importance of conscience in solving emotionally-charged personal disputes. In the field of psychology, therapists are increasingly taking into account the spiritual concerns of their patients – the need for the sacred as a basis of self-esteem, as well as the recognition of an “immaculate child” at the core of the psyche undefiled by the surrounding environment. And in politics, forgiveness and reconciliation have introduced a new note into the fractiousness of rancorous debate, pouring a healing balm once centuries-old wounds and offering the hope of peace.
Yet these advances are shadowed by a corresponding deterioration in moral values, as well as a stunted capacity for wisdom. These shortcomings are reflected in mounting social ills: an unprecedented population explosion amid the dwindling of the earth’s precious natural resources, the frightening specter of vanishing landscapes and plant and animal species, ongoing religious and ethnic strife, and widespread poverty and violence. Thus even as part of humanity strives to dispel the darkness of human suffering through visionary paradigms and healing solutions, it is constantly being pulled back into the past by forces inimical to global spiritual ethics. The task at hand, it seems, is to find a way to bring those perceptions that are mired in petty narrowness and shortsightedness into alignment with the broader, more inclusive vision struggling to be born in our time.
Today I celebrate the winter solstice by sharing Rebekah Myers’ beautifully adapted lyrics to “Silent Night.” Happy Solstice!
Silent night, longest night
Deep the dark; still and quiet
Though in shadow our hearts still a-glow
Star-light glistens on sparkling snow
Sleep and rest through the night
Sleep and rest through the night
Silent night, longest night
Shortest day, gone the light
Will the golden sun ever return?
While in darkness, what lessons to learn?
In the darkness is peace
In the darkness is peace
Silent night, longest night
Mother-God holds the light
Bright, Her love for us, mighty, yet mild
Safe within sleeps her golden child
Morning sun will be born
Morning sun will be born
What exactly do we mean by the concept of the “moment” or “now”? If you are listening to music, the note you have just heard continues to resound in your ears, even as you begin to take in the next note. In this “moment” there are no boundaries between the past or the future. Thus Sufis [and all you walk the path of mysticism] do not see individuals as victims of an inexorably preordained fate, nor as autocratic masters of their individual destiny. Rather, they take into account the existence of a higher intelligence that, through an innovative, trial-and-error, evolutionary process, is embedded within humanity to creatively shape and reshape life in an endless array of new images, patterns, and paradigms.
This transcendent force is what some call God and what I call the “Universe.” Like a cosmic pull that exerts a force of its own over humanity, the Universe is constantly compelling us to break free of the conditioning of the past in order to transform and evolve. Just like the constant changes and adaptations in nature that have been occurring for aeons of time – resulting in emerald rainforests, exotic animals, and complex, intelligent creatures called people – this evolutionary force functions like a spiritual magnet to draw humanity beyond its limitations into further dimensions of consciousness and levels of perception. Indeed, the impetus to span the cleft from the past to the future is part of an on-going, billions-of-years-old process by which the Universe has been fashioning its stardust into human beings. The planning of the Universe is affected by humankind’s free, creative participation; thus the goal for humans is to become conscious of their profound impact upon the unfolding of creation.
Should such a quantum shift in consciousness actually occur, it would represent an heroic victory over determinism – not over nature, but over the limitations of our own minds that prevent us from working in harmony with the Universe. Conscious evolution is humankind’s final frontier, the ultimate freedom sought by humanity since the dawn of time. Thus the challenge seems to be one of overcoming the fear of the unexplored territory that lies ahead, and finding the courage and optimism to illuminate the spiritual dimension hidden within our nature. For it is the intuitive, rader-like quality of this transcendent faculty that will help to guide us through the darkness of the unknown – illuminating our minds and awakening our hearts to the splendor of a new consciousness.
“Participators in the evolution of the Universe”: it is a phrase that resonates with possibility and potential. For this means to realize that the future is not just waiting to happen; instead, it is taking shape right here and now in the attitudes we hold, the choices we make, and the values we cherish. It means to become fully aware of the fact that humanity holds in its hands an extraordinary, precious opportunity to shape the future tomorrows of this planet. One way of doing this is through our Divinely inspired creativity – imagining and envisioning a world that is different from the one that has gone before. This does not mean abandoning all that humanity has attained thus far. Rather, it means carefully sifting through the past – preserving the legacy bequeathed by the great civilizations of antiquity, while at the same time improving our social structures to eschew the sad trail of suffering wreaked by the cruel against the victims of oppression.
I’ll never forget the haunting sound of Buffy Sainte-Marie’s tremolo vocals billowing upwards into the night sky like smoke from a blazing campfire.
After hearing [in 1964] a mesmerizing performance of songs that included “Now That the Buffalo’s Gone” and “Universal Soldier”, her meagre audience coaxed Buffy back for four encores. Then just 23, she was laying the groundwork for a career that would bring her an endless stream of recognition – Junos, a Golden Globe, and the first Native American Oscar for “Up Where We Belong”, fourteen honourary degrees, several lifetime achievement awards, appointment to the Order of Canada, and her image on a Canadian postage stamp.
Her sung and spoken activism for Native American and anti-war campaigns was vocal and visible enough to get her on Richard Nixon’s “enemies list,” and resulted in efforts to have her blacklisted by American television networks.
Buffy Sainte-Marie was more than a singer. She created and donated educational resources like the Cradleboard Teaching Project, which increased awareness of Indigenous peoples and issues for thousands of schoolchildren across North America.
Perhaps her most important gift has been one for which she never received formal public acclaim. Few things are as important to racialized groups like Native Americans than seeing their cultures placed in the spotlight. Her current status as a role model may be in doubt, but it has been real for decades.
Hearing Sac and Fox Olympian Jim Thorpe described as perhaps the greatest athlete in history, or knowing that Wailacki tribe member Nicole Mann commanded the International Space Station are immensely important to Indigenous peoples. Historic government attempts to “kill the Indian in the child” make it even more important for Indigenous youth to have role models, people who demonstrate that success is possible for people like them.
We may never know if Buffy Sainte-Marie was born Cree, Mi’kmaq, or Italian. She may never know the truth about her true heritage, or could have fabricated a false identity for reasons only known to herself, but her life’s work and accomplishments are far too important to be swept under the politically-correct rug of blood quantum. Whether or not Buffy Sainte-Marie is a status-card Indian does not detract from her decades of achievements and contributions that helped put Indigenous peoples and issues in the public eye.
Bad people do bad things, and it should come as no surprise that good people also sometimes do bad things. Ask any parent. In this binary world of black and white, right and wrong, for and against, it sometimes helps to step back and ask: “Would I rather this had or had not happened?”
Archie “Grey Owl” Belaney – the prototypical Pretendian – deliberately used a phony Indigenous persona to become arguably Canada’s most famous environmentalist. There was no question about his authenticity. But there are dozens of others whose claim to Indigeneity are clouded in the doubt created by a vague trail of historic birth and adoption records. Some of these people have made unquestionable contributions to Indigenous advocacy in their roles as authors, academics, artists, and activists.
Whatever their personal flaws or misguided motivations, they have undoubtedly contributed to Indigenous causes. They cannot be accused of taking up the space of “real” Indians if nobody else was doing what they were doing.
On the other hand, there is no shortage of “full-blooded” Indians whose main interest in their heritage seems to be how much PST they can save when they shop at Wal-Mart.
In our cultures, even tricksters can serve a purpose.
To read Maurice Switzer’s op-ed, “Buffy’s Legacy Is the Real Deal,” in its entirety, click here.
. . . Yes, this is my country
Young and growing
Free and flowing, sea to sea
Yes, this is my country
Ripe and bearing miracles
in ever pond and tree
Her spirit walks the high country
Giving free wild samples
And setting an example how to give
Yes, this is my country
Retching and turning
She’s like a baby learning how to live
I can stand upon a hill at dawn
Look all around me
Feel her surround me
Soldier Blue, can’t you see her life has just begun
Beating inside us, telling us she’s here to guide us
Soldier Blue, Soldier Blue
Can’t you see that there’s another way to love her
. . . When the news stories get me down
I take a drink of freedom to think of
North America from toe to crown
And it’s never long before
I know just why I belong here
Soldier Blue, Soldier Blue
Can’t you see that there’s another way to love her
This statement is in response to the Vatican announcement of a new declaration approved by Pope Francis that opens the path for LGBTQ+ people’s relationships to be blessed in the Roman Catholic church.
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Pope Francis gave LGBTQ+ Catholics an early Christmas gift this year by approving blessings for same-gender couples. The Vatican doctrinal office’s previous claim that “God does not bless sin” has been uprooted by the new exhortation, “God never turns away anyone who approaches him!”
It cannot be overstated how significant the Vatican’s new declaration is. Approving blessings for same-gender couples is certainly monumental. But Pope Francis goes further than that by stating that people should not be subjected to “an exhaustive moral analysis” to receive a sign of God’s love and mercy. Such a declaration is one more step Pope Francis has taken to overturn the harsh policing of pastoral care all too common under his predecessors, John Paul II and Benedict XVI.
In contrast, Pope Francis desires pastoral care in which, in the declaration’s words, “every brother and every sister will be able to feel that, in the Church, they are always pilgrims, always beggars, always loved, and, despite everything, always blessed.” By opening blessings to same-gender couples, the institutional church now expands the ways that LGBTQ+ Catholics can know God’s love. And this declaration benefits not only the couples blessed, but every queer person and ally who has had a difficult relationship with the church.
This declaration is proof that church teaching can – and does – change. The Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith has now overturned in full its 2021 statement prohibiting queer blessings because, it claimed, “God does not bless sin.” And how does change happen? Formal approval in teaching often recognizes what people are already doing pastorally and theologically. Practice precedes teaching. So, too, with LGBTQ+ blessings.
For decades, the laity, joined by some religious and clergy, have called for greater inclusion of same-gender couples. In the past few years, this call has become louder in places like Germany, where the Synodal Way process approved such blessings earlier this year. The question of blessings has been a contentious point in Germany, sparking criticism from the Vatican and even Pope Francis. His decision now to approve blessings shows the pope is willing to listen, learn, and respond meaningfully to God’s people, something every church leader should be doing.
When I had the honor of meeting Pope Francis this past October, one of his statements that most impressed me was that a thing he is most upset about in the church is priests who chastise people in the confessional. That time, he said, should be a time of welcome, love, and mercy, not a punishment. This new declaration about blessing same-gender couples is an example of that kind of pastoral attitude.
LGBTQ+ Catholics worldwide welcome this early Christmas gift, which brings them much closer to being full and equal members of the Church they love so dearly.
Well, the autumn equinox has long past and the winter solstice and Christmas are fast approaching. A perfect time, then, to look back on the summer of 2023 and the people, places, and experiences that were the most meaningful to me during those months.
I take this look back via the latest installment of The Wild Reed’s “Out and About” series. Enjoy!
Above: With all but one of my Palliative Care team members (Kari was taking the photo). From left: Kate, Nikki, Jenna, Maddie, Steph, and me – Tuesday, June 27, 2023.
I mentioned how fulfilling I find my work as an interfaith chaplain. Here’s some feedback I’ve recently received that speaks to this experience of meaning and fulfilment.
• Michael is a joy to work with and I wish I got to do so more. He knows so many people at the hospital; not only their names but what is going on in their lives. He cares for others. Michael’s humor, compassion, and worldview helps me every day to be a better medical provider.
• During a recent on-call shift, Michael was called into the ED to support the family of a 7-year-old. Later Michael received feedback from the chaplain who visited the family during a later shift. This chaplain reported that the child’s parents had commented on “the divine way people had come alongside them” and mentioned Michael by name. The chaplain also said, “I could tell that Michael was able to help the parents establish a healthier framework to process the immediate trauma that they were experiencing.” Michael, you truly do amazing work!
For the months of July and August, I switched positions with the Palliative Care chaplain at Abbott-Northwestern (ANW) Hospital in Minneapolis. She went to Mercy and I went to ANW. Both hospitals are in the Allina healthcare system, the largest in Minnesota.
I’m pictured above with members of the ANW Palliative Care team. From left: Courtney, me, Mary, Leslie, Emma, and Katelyn – Thursday, August 10, 2023.
Above: Catching up with my colleagues from Mercy Hospital during a retreat day for the entire Allina Palliative Care department – Thursday, August 17, 2023. From left: me, Maddie, Kate, Steph (with Otis), Kari, and Nikki.
Our retreat was held at Como Park in Minneapolis, right next door to the Como Zoo. So of course I had to go visit the giraffes!
Above: An August 2023 portrait. I’m wearing my “Marianne 2024” t-shirt in support of author and activist Marianne Williamson’s second shot at the U.S. pesidency. She is challenging President Joe Biden for the Democratic party nomination in the 2024 presidential election.
Right: Adnan snapped this picture of me beside my “Marianne 2024” bumper sticker!
Above: With my friend Deandre, to whom I introduced Marianne and her campaign. Go Team Marianne!
Unfamilar with Marianne Williamson’s 2024 presidential campaign?
The following July 18, 2023 interview that Marianne did with the young Canadian journalist Wyatt Sharpe is as good a place as any to learn about her campaign and its progressive platform.
Above: A visit to the Prayer Tree – Saturday, July 1, 2023. For more images and commentary, click here.
Above: Celebrating my dear friend Carol’s birthday – July 30, 2023. From left: Sue Ann, Carol, Carrie, Lucia and Paul.
Above: My buddy Raul – Sunday, July 23, 2023. He’s pictured in the garden of the Walker Arts Center in Minneapolis.
Above: Raul and I with our fun-loving waiter at Cardamom, the restaurant at the Walker – Sunday, July 23, 2023.
Above: On the weekend of August 19-20 I visited my friends Angie and Bryan at their camper in the Pelican Lake RV Resort.
Located just outside of the town of Glenwood in Pope County, Minnesota, Pelican Lake is about a two hour drive northwest from the Twin Cities.
Angie and I first met in 1995, which was my second year in the U.S. after my relocation to Minnesota from Australia. At the time, both of us were students at the College of St. Catherine (now the St. Catherine University) in the Twin Cities. Angie’s hometown is Montevideo, west of the Twin Cities, and back in the late 1990s and early 2000s I spent many happy summer weekends and Thanksgiving holidays in Montevideo with Angie and her family, who welcomed me as one of their own.
Above: With friends Julia and Pete – Sunday, June 25, 2023.
Above: Friends Babs and Kathleen – Sunday, June 25, 2023.
Above: Breakfast with Pete! – Thursday, July 13, 2023.
Above: My friends Joan and Matt’s “Labor Day / Farewell to Summer” party – Monday, September 4, 2023. From left: John, Zach, Handrick, Joan, and Ian.
The following article by Jason Linkins was published today in The New Republic (TNR). It first appeared in Power Mad, a weekly TNR newsletter authored by Linkins, who serves as a deputy editor at TNR.
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Ever since the Supreme Court handed down its decision in Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, the Republican Party has gotten a crash course in what it feels like to be the dog that caught the car. To the surprise of no one who’s spent the past few decades warning what might happen if the abortion rights protections offered by the 1973 ruling in Roe v. Wade perished at the hands of a conservative court, the Dobbs ruling rather swiftlyunleashed dystopiaacross the land and brought a voter backlash with it – so severe that GOP elites, when last we checked in, were contemplating a “rebranding” of the pro-life movement.
That task will become all the more impossible given the persecution this month of a pregnant woman in Texas, which tells you all you need to know about the Republican vision of a post-Roe America.
In late November, Kate Cox [left] learned that her unborn child had a dire genetic disorder called trisomy 18 that typically leads to a stillbirth or, in rare instances, a very short and unhappy life. Making matters worse, Cox had previously delivered two children by C-section, which created potentially life-threatening consequences for her delivery. And so, understandably, she wished to end her pregnancy.
But Cox lives in Texas, where it is illegal to perform an abortion except in some “narrow exceptions” – to save the life of a pregnant patient or prevent a “substantial impairment of major bodily function.” Her doctor, playing by the new rules of the road and having determined that Cox qualified for such an exception, obtained a ruling from a judge that would have permitted her to have an abortion. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton [right] then went to elaborate lengths to thwart her. Beyond merely getting the Texas Supreme Court to intervene, he sent threatening letters to area hospitals warning of the legal consequences of treating Cox. He also made sure to invoke Texas’s infamous abortion bounty law and sic the Lone Star State’s anti-abortion vigilantes on her and anyone else who might help her obtain the procedure. Cox ended up having to flee the state just to get the care she needed.
It’s worth underscoring some basic facts. Cox was no libertine, seeking to use abortion as a form of birth control in the popular caricature of abortion-seekers that the right likes to promulgate. She has two children and very much wanted a third. Doctors were able to offer her doomed child mercy and keep alive the possibility of her adding to her family at some point in the future. Paxton, however, took the position that the only just outcome would be for her to run the risk of leaving her children without a mother and her spouse without a wife, all for the sake of a warped ideology that’s already failed on its own terms.
The pro-life rebranding is thus proceeding exactly as I predicted it would, with the most extreme elements of the anti-abortion movement driving policy forward and grabbing headlines for the fringe ideas they’re birthing and the militancy by which they carry them to term.
Texas Senator Ted Cruz is running scared from this story. Meanwhile, among the Republican presidential candidates, who have the most at stake when it comes to putting lipstick on the party’s anti-abortion pig, mealy mouths are the order of the day. As NBC Newsreported, none of the candidates “were willing to outright say they disagreed with Texas’ decision to deny Kate Cox an abortion, but they also weren’t jumping to defend the Republican politicians in the state.” There never were such sterling examples of courage and conviction. Nikki Haley, who has strained herself trying to locate a middle position on this issue, offered this nonsense: “We have to humanize the situation and deal with it with compassion.”
What Haley doesn’t grasp is that we don’t need to reinvent the wheel. Humanity and compassion are qualities that were ever-present in the pre-Dobbs status quo. How do we know this? We know this because prior to the Supreme Court’s ruling, whenever people like Kate Cox needed humanity and compassion, they got it from their doctors. Humanity and compassion just ran seamlessly in the background, and these women never ended up in the news, fleeing their states, fearing for their lives, or watching their state’s attorney general try to destroy their families. Humanity and compassion didn’t just vanish by accident—the anti-abortion movement is hunting it to extinction.
I don’t personally believe that Republicans have any deeper thoughts to their extreme hostility to reproductive rights beyond a simple but deeply held belief that women are chattel. But you can judge for yourself. Their talk of humane exceptions to abortion bans is bunkum. Their talk of leaving abortion restrictions to the states: hogwash. Their talk of compromiseis a lie. They even lie to themselves about how unpopular their position is. Left to their own devices, they will identify people like Kate Cox – a loving mother who played by the rules – and subject them to stupefying cruelty. And there will always be a next Kate Cox; there already are some next Kate Coxes in the news. The rebranding is well underway.
Image 1:Lalo Alcalaz. Image 2: Kate Cox. (Photo: The Cox family)Image 3: Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton speaks outside the U.S. Supreme Court on November 1, 2021, in Washington, D.C. (Photographer unknown)
I established The Wild Reed in 2006 as a sign of solidarity with all who are dedicated to living lives of integrity – though, in particular, with gay people seeking to be true to both the gift of their sexuality and their Catholic faith. The Wild Reed's original by-line read, “Thoughts and reflections from a progressive, gay, Catholic perspective.” As you can see, it reads differently now. This is because my journey has, in many ways, taken me beyond, or perhaps better still, deeper into the realities that the words “progressive,” “gay,” and “Catholic” seek to describe.
Even though reeds can symbolize frailty, they may also represent the strength found in flexibility. Popular wisdom says that the green reed which bends in the wind is stronger than the mighty oak which breaks in a storm. Tall green reeds are associated with water, fertility, abundance, wealth, and rebirth. The sound of a reed pipe is often considered the voice of a soul pining for God or a lost love.
On September 24, 2012,Michael BaylyofCatholics for Marriage Equality MNwas interviewed by Suzanne Linton of Our World Today about same-sex relationships and why Catholics can vote 'no' on the proposed Minnesota anti-marriage equality amendment.
"I believe your blog to be of utmost importance for all people regardless of their orientation. . . . Thank you for your blog and the care and dedication that you give in bringing the TRUTH to everyone."– William
"Michael, if there is ever a moment in your day or in your life when you feel low and despondent and wonder whether what you are doing is anything worthwhile, think of this: thanks to your writing on the internet, a young man miles away is now willing to embrace life completely and use his talents and passions unashamedly to celebrate God and his creation. Any success I face in the future and any lives I touch would have been made possible thanks to you and your honesty and wisdom."– AB
"Since I discovered your blog I have felt so much more encouraged and inspired knowing that I'm not the only gay guy in the Catholic Church trying to balance my Faith and my sexuality. Continue being a beacon of hope and a guide to the future within our Church!"– Phillip
"Your posts about Catholic issues are always informative and well researched, and I especially appreciate your photography and the personal posts about your own experience. I'm very glad I found your blog and that I've had the chance to get to know you."– Crystal
"Thank you for taking the time to create this fantastic blog. It is so inspiring!"– George
"I cannot claim to be an expert on Catholic blogs, but from what I've seen, The Wild Reed ranks among the very best."– Kevin
"Reading your blog leaves me with the consolation of knowing that the words Catholic, gay and progressive are not mutually exclusive.."– Patrick
"I grieve for the Roman institution’s betrayal of God’s invitation to change. I fear that somewhere in the midst of this denial is a great sin that rests on the shoulders of those who lead and those who passively follow. But knowing that there are voices, voices of the prophets out there gives me hope. Please keep up the good work."– Peter
"I ran across your blog the other day looking for something else. I stopped to look at it and then bookmarked it because you have written some excellent articles that I want to read. I find your writing to be insightful and interesting and I'm looking forward to reading more of it. Keep up the good work. We really, really need sane people with a voice these days."– Jane Gael
"Michael, your site is like water in the desert."– Jayden
