Early Morning Thoughts and Coincidences

I awoke early this morning, a little after 5 a.m. But that's not unusual. I tend to be an early riser. But lately I've been experiencing something unusual, at least for me. I can describe it only by saying I seem to be awakened by my thoughts. That's right, my tired, old brain seems to be kicking in while I'm still asleep and it's those first early morning thoughts that awaken me. For all I know this may be how everyone else in the world wakes up, but for me...well it's a bit weird. And I'm having a little trouble coping with the effects.

Previously, I would awake as if from a coma. I could barely put one foot in front of the other until I'd downed that first cup of morning coffee. The daily routine rarely changed. I'd throw on my bathrobe and try to exit the bedroom without waking Diane, stumble into the kitchen where I'd turn on the coffeemaker, make my way to the front door, walk out to the driveway and pick up the newspaper, then wander back to my big, overstuffed chair in the living room. There I would sit, newspaper in my lap, and await the miracle of fresh Seattle's Best French Roast. This entire process wasn't particularly challenging. It might have called on a percent or two of my few remaining brain cells.

But no longer. For the past year or so I've been waking up...well, awake!When those eyelids click open and I focus on the red digits of the alarm clock, I'm already in the middle of some usually pretty interesting thought.

At 5:14 this morning, for example, I awoke to find my brain already occupied with thoughts of our mainline Protestant friends and the crises plaguing so many of their churches. I assume these pre-conscious thoughts arose out of a conversation I had just a few days ago with a friend who was bemoaning the direction his church was taking. A member of a local ELCA Lutheran church, he was extremely upset over the church's recent decisions that seemed to support and encourage homosexuality. And he's no exception. Over the past year or so, I have had similar conversations with Episcopalians and Methodists on a variety of issues, both moral and theological. One Methodist jokingly said to me, "You guys, at least, seem to be holding your own against the onslaught. If it weren't for the pope, I'd probably become a Catholic." All I could think to say in response was, "It's only because we have a pope that we're able to hold our own." I probably should have stopped there and just let that thought germinate. But instead I launched into a monologue on the Church's teaching authority that caused his eyes to glaze over. I sometimes have a tendency to overkill.

Anyway, the coincidence occurred as a sipped my second cup of coffee, turned on the netbook, and inadvertently clicked on the wrong bookmark. Instead of checking the latest news out of the Middle East, I clicked on a link to "On the Square" a sort-of blog published by First Things. There, staring back at me, was an article by R. R. Reno on "The Agony of Mainline Protestantism". One can always count on Reno, who teaches theology at Creighton University, to write something interesting and thoughtful, and this article is no exception. I recommend it.

Can't wait to discover what I awake to tomorrow.

God's peace...