Lauren Winner is a jumble of contradictions: A Jew who found Christianity in a dream starring Daniel Day Lewis as Jesus, an accomplished historian who rides an oversized tricycle to work, and a memoir writer who wants to keep details of her private life private.
In her latest book, “Still: Notes on a Mid-Faith Crisis,” Winner, 35, writes about what happens when belief falters. Her spiritual crisis, she writes, was precipitated by the death of her mother from cancer and the breakup of her marriage three years ago.
“In my case, as everything else was dying, my faith seemed to die, too,” the recently ordained Episcopal priest writes. “God had been there. God had been alive to me. And then, it seemed, nothing was alive ”” not even God.”
Ugh.
People like this are teaching seminarians. We reap what we sow.
I’ve always had a problem with this lady, she constantly has tried to sell herself as an evangelical but a lot of what she says rings phony. Plus, she’s an expert at “do what I say, not do what I’ve done.” (In other words, living a nonrepentant sinful life while claiming to be a Christian, and then later “repenting” of it when it is to her benefit to change her stripes.) I guess I shouldn’t be surprised this is the latest chapter in her saga.
Yet another reason to give Duke Divinity School a wide berth! Nonetheless, I do feel sorry for her and she deserves our prayers, along with the encouragement to read Job and Psalms as many times as necessary.
I’ve heard her described as orthodox, but not as Evangelical.
And, then we have, “…is fond of making unconventional style statements, like celebrating Communion while wearing cowboy boots with bright red flowers peeking out from under her chasuble.”
So, she got her liturgical training where?
Then, we have, ““In Christianity there’s this script of, you do the right things and you will not come to that place of despair, and something is wrong with you if you do…â€
Heh. If only that were so.
Ralph wrote
in response to a quote from Lauren Winner:
EXACTLY! Where is this in Christianity? I must have missed that portion of scripture. I always thought you could do everything “right” still come to that place of despair and then realize that even in your despair God LOVES you!
If you have read her book, Girl Meets God, you may remember that she calls her conversion “a type of divorce” and even mentions she did not really try to be a Jew but only a certain narrow type of Jew. So not terribly surprised to find that she divorces at a time when her faith is challenged. How unfortunate for her that she did not try to renew her faith and her marriage. I wonder what she will believe next????
#5 Ralph–I only say she played to the evangelicals because that is how she used to portray herself, and managed to get herself featured in Christianity Today, and even, amazingly, as a regular writer on Boundless (the Focus on the Family webzine aimed at teenagers and twenty-somethings).
I know the Rev. Dr. Lauren Winner personally, and regardless of what you may think you know about her, it is an incredible act of hubris to suggest that wearing cowboy boots to preside at the table is in any way a departure from orthodoxy. And I would suggest that her own experience of the life of faith shows just how hard it is to persevere as a follower of Christ. Let those without any struggles to believe cast the first stones.
Further, as a proud graduate of Duke Divinity School and a solidly evangelical Anglican, I would suggest that it is precisely the comments on this particular post that make many people wonder about the future vitality of Anglicanism on this continent. Have you no decency? Have a fantastic Tuesday, I wish it were Lent already.
One of the things that impressed me most about Bishop Bill Frey, who, when he was bishop of Colorado, confirmed me as an Episcopalian, and whose orthodoxy I’ve never doubted, was that he always wore cowboy boots along with his Guatemalan vestments when he celebrated the Eucharist.
As for Lauren Winner, I read her first book, and very much liked it, and have met her once, at a Mere Anglican Conference in Charleston. I have no reason to doubt the authenticity of her faith or her orthodoxy, despite her cowboy boots, her doubts or her divorce. She has my prayers.
Any Christian who claims that he or she would not have his or her faith challenged by experiencing the death of of a mother and a divorce within the span of a year or so, is either lying, is not paying attention, or is a saint.
We worship a Lord who prayed that the cup would pass from him, and it didn’t, who cried out while being crucified “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?”
The Reformation claimed to be about upholding a gospel that says God loves sinners and forgives them. We pray regularly that our trespasses be forgiven as we forgive those who trespass against us. We acknowledge every time we celebrate the Eucharist that we have sinned in thought, word, and deed, by what we have done, and by what we have left undone, that we have not loved God with our whole heart or our neighbors as ourselves.
Yet Christians regularly express shock and surprise and apparently contempt when fellow Christians demonstrate from time to time that they really are sinners, and really do need forgiveness. Especially if they make the fatal mistake of admitting it right out loud.
Friends, in #5 I quoted from the article.
I suppose that there are western-style boots that would be completely appropriate for the Celebrant to wear in a formal liturgical Eucharist in North Carolina, and that there are western boots that (IMHO) would not be appropriate almost anywhere. I think the same might be said for other types of footwear.
The part about “bright red flowers peeking out from under her chasuble”…well, I don’t think I’ve seen that. Maybe it was Rose Sunday, or something…
For me, the altar isn’t the place to be making “unconventional style statements.” At the parish Mardi Gras party, certainly.
As for the faith challenge – the quote, “In Christianity there’s this script of, you do the right things and you will not come to that place of despair, and something is wrong with you if you do…” still stands out to me when I read the article.
Well…I haven’t seen that script, nor have I experienced it.
I defer to those who know her well, and I think she would be a fascinating person to get to know. I won’t comment further.
The Gospel is a call to repentance. In general, when Christians talk about the messiness of sin and forgiveness, I desire to learn something the messy business of repentance too.