The Holy Spirit descends like a wild goose

LOUISVILLE — According to Celtic spirituality, the Holy Spirit is wild and unpredictable, and 1001 New Worshiping Communities, part of Presbyterian Life & Witness, worked during Wednesday’s online Chapel Service to drive that point home.

Staff and leaders of new worshiping communities affiliated with the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) spent Labor Day weekend at the Wild Goose Festival in aptly-named Harmony, North Carolina. With Fred Rogers as its patron saint, the 1001 NWC tent — with Westminster John Knox Press and Presbyterian Peace Fellowship as partners — was a Tent of Make-Believe, said the Rev. Jeff Eddings of 1001 NWC.

“At our tent and others, folks gave presentations, offered music and art and spoke about ministry and social justice,” he said. “One thing we offered that nobody else did was free peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, which made us a very popular place to come to.”

“This year,” he added, “we’re proud to say we won the Golden Goose Award for best tent at the festival.”

Eddings invited three worshiping community leaders — Reed Conley, the organizing pastor at Artisan Church in Lincolnton, North Carolina, Jaymi Hendrix, co-founder of Spicy Church in Forsyth County, Georgia, and the Rev. Laura Beth Buchleiter formerly of Urban Village in Nicholasville, Kentucky — to share some of their impressions from the Wild Goose Festival.

Under the Tent of Make-Believe, Conley led a discussion on songs for worship, seeking in part “words that are more expansive and inclusive of who God is and where God is calling us today,” Conley said.

In the space of about 15 minutes, about 20 people wrote a song together using Ephesians 2:14, which identifies Christ as our peace and the One who unifies us and breaks down the walls we’ve constructed. Accompanying himself on guitar, Conley performed “Path to Peace,” the song they created:

Peace is the only path to peace (2x)

Stone falling from stone

We make a path together

Walls turn into roads

We walk as kin forever

Peace is the only path to peace (2x).

Hendrix, a second-year apprentice with 1001 NWC, is a chaplain candidate with the Order of St. Hildegard. Hendrix described Spicy Church, a neuro-inclusive community, as “a space for spirituality outside of traditional walls and rooted in nature, creativity and agency.” 

“We meet in nature to explore our interconnectivity to the Divine, with the Earth and one another through art, music, movement, mindful presence and delight,” Hendrix said. “We live and breathe that questions are sacred. Belonging is not something that has to be earned, and spiritual discovery is holy.”

At Spicy Church, “everything is optional. Nothing is prescriptive,” Hendrix said. “Curiosity is the only guide.”

“In a world that often tells us that we got it wrong or that we are different or too much, witnessing individuals — including myself — showing up more authentically, listening to them name their needs without guilt or shame, and healing in community is exactly why we do what we do,” Hendrix said. “True empowerment comes when you begin to trust yourself. Be curious. Ask questions. Love always.”

Buchleiter, who founded the Coalition for Peace and Restoration, said of the Wild Goose Festival that “every time I get to do something like this with my 1001 colleagues, I’m reminded of what a gift we are to each other, and what a gift we are to our communities and to the denomination.”

Buchleiter led a workshop on a community art project about gender. Participants made small paintings and offered sentences to help explain their work. One wrote: “The grief of one can be the grief of many as joy and peace find footholds in shared breath and contemplation.”

Two hours after the workshop, wind and rain disrupted the proceedings. “What had been planned spontaneity became truly chaotic,” Buchleiter said. “But it was also beautiful to support courage and find community in the storm. It gave me courage as I got on the road, knowing we were going to be OK.”

Eddings offered up a final blessing adapted from the Celtic Daily Prayer Book:

“May the peace of the Wild Goose go with you wherever she may send you.

“May she guide you through the wilderness and protect you through the storm.

“May she bring you home rejoicing at the wonders she has shown you.

May she bring you home rejoicing once again into our doors.”