Alternative Skill Sets

My wife, Lynne, and I recently attended the Grassroots Festival in Trumansburg, NY, as we have done for many years.

It’s a festival that was started in 1990 in response to the AIDS crisis. The original organizers were noticing their friends dying of the disease and were simultaneously witnessing widespread inaction related to research and the development of a cure. So they decided to rally together in support of their friends and loved ones to try to create “joy in the midst of crisis” by using music, dance and art as the vehicle. 

At the same time, however, they also wanted to create a space where everyone felt cared for, respected and visible for who they were, and the organizers sought to embody what it means to “be community” to each other. 

Over time, the festival has evolved in both its scope and mission and has now become this 4 day alternative live-in celebration of love, justice and community with art, culture, dance and music as the medium and the message.

One thing I love about Grassroots is that it reminds me a lot of what I envision the kin-dom of God to be all about.

People who find a home at Grassroots are, generally speaking, not the “Fortune 500” folks of society. It’s a lot of people who find themselves on the fringes somehow. Furthermore, as I have mentioned in other posts, the “skill sets” that become valuable at Grassroots are not the ones that might usually matter in the world.

For example, as I watched the group Old Crow Medicine Show, one of the band members came out doing a baton twirling routine that left the crowd stunned.

Welcome to a world where the skill of baton twirling matters! As do the skills of hula-hooping, stilt walking, puppet making and face painting!

Grassroots – not unlike the vision of Jesus – tries to create an environment where the alternative skill sets of storytelling, composting, community building, sharing, inclusion, artistic creativity, healing arts, etc. come together for the common good. And it does my heart good each year to witness a context that holds these up and shows us (albeit for 4 days) what might be possible in a world constructed around other skill sets.

In today’s gospel from Luke 10, Jesus is challenging “what skills matter.”  Martha, who is preoccupied doing all of the activities of serving and hospitality, says to Jesus, “Do you not care that my sister has left me to do all the serving?” Martha is upset that her sister, Mary, is in the other room with Jesus – leaving her with all the work. 

Naturally there is much we could unpack in this scripture passage, and maybe there are other storylines that you’d focus on.

But for the purpose of this reflection on skill sets, I want to focus on the “skill set” that Mary is practicing. In my estimation, she has had a lot of practice at serving and hospitality – especially as a woman in that society. And while that skill set is needed, she probably also knows where it leads.

And so she practices a different skill set – that of presence – which then leads her to a very different space.

Of course, Jesus responds to Martha with his famous words, “Martha, Martha, you are anxious and worried about many things. There is need of only one thing. Mary has chosen the better part…”

Jesus isn’t being mean to Martha. He’s just suggesting that the skill sets of God’s kin-dom may not be the ones that “tradition” or the status quo finds valuable. It doesn’t mean that the other skills of being busy and focused on the world aren’t important, he’s just saying that they are not the most important.

When I step back and try to get a little perspective, I start to wonder, “What skills are most important in the world today given the historical moment we are in? What skills does my lifestyle encourage, make room for or prioritize? What might Jesus call ‘the better part’ these days?” 

How would you respond to that?

I have long been drawn to Deepa Iyer’s Social Change Map which I have referenced on multiple occasions. Iyer names various roles that people might play in social change movements, and each has specific skill sets that will be needed. Many of these are not the skill sets valued by the dominant ideologies, but, I would submit, these are the skill sets that Jesus would identify with as necessary for the continued emergence of God’s kin-dom.

We have seen what the ‘skill sets’ of consumption, greed, domination and power-over have brought about. They have created a good deal of the messes that we are now trying to get out from under – and are running out of time to address.

Now more than ever, we are in critical need of alternative skill sets.

Jeb Puryear, one of the founders of the Grassroots festival and lead guitarist for the band Donna the Buffalo, writes a reflective piece every year for the festival. I close today’s blog with an excerpt from this year’s reflection which, I think, closes us well.

Everything we need, is here.

Everything that needs to be done, We can do

Spirit draw the mind.

And brave to fear…

A vibration of cosmos

Immense and near

A story as old as the beginning

And as new as the future moment,

About to be played.

Where your movement,

Joins the movement of others.

Beyond the self

While fully, feeling within…

The wave,

of it…

Yes, humans, we are up against it once again, war, greed, poverty. Misunderstanding, misinformation, misconduct. And ninety nine percent of the problem? Is us.  

 But I still believe there is a way! It’s us!

So yes, yes we can, do it…The us that will eventually, find the way, to peace on earth.