The theme for our program year is “The Welcome of a Steadfast God: Inviting All the Questions.” With that great theme in mind, we have begun collecting faith statements from congregation members of all walks of life. The pastors have identified specific individuals who have been invited to share. We expect that this project will illustrate the diversity of experience of this church community, reconnect our faith to our shared church life, and tell Central’s story in a new way. From September 2026 to August 2027, you can expect to learn the faith stories of your fellow church community members in the Faith Statements Project.
Tell us about your family and formative years. Growing up, who in your family and/or community influenced your faith?
The most important influence on my faith as a child was singing in church choirs. Ascension Lutheran Church in Towson, Maryland had choirs for all ages, and my younger sister and I grew up singing in church. Buckled into stiff white collars with black bows, grade school kids sang in the Junior Choir at the 8:30 a.m. service. Junior-high and high school age youth graduated into robe and surplice to sing in the Youth Choir, and a lot of our parents sang in the Adult Choir. On festival days, all the choirs merged to perform more complicated works. Given the madness involved in rehearsing and conducting an intergenerational group, these pieces were always short — and featured a lot of soloists. We had some spectacular successes – and failures, but we had fun.
We all learned to read music; we learned to sing in parts; we learned the parts of the liturgy – Kyrie, the Gloria Patri, the Sanctus – and the emotional timbre of each. A large church that served diverse neighborhoods, Ascension practiced a more formal liturgy, whose ancient rhythms were probably equally foreign to everyone. At every service the choirs sang the Introit and Gradual appointed for the day. We chanted these scraps of psalms responsively to medieval psalm tones, minor key for Advent and Lent, major key for the rest of the church year.
This is how I learned the psalms, and I can summon them to this day. Give me the Psalm tone, and I can recite the text; give me the text, I can supply the psalm tone — and always in King James English. “Out of Zion, the perfection of beauty, God hath shined; Our God shall come….” (Ps. 50:2)
Our choir directors also taught us a lot about faith. Each piece of music was a prayer. We learned the range of emotions appropriate to bring before the Mystery: gratitude, anguish, delight and awe, and always, always praise. Decades later, an old Catholic priest told his congregation, “he who sings, prays twice.” He was probably encouraging them to at least try to sing, something Catholics struggle with. My Lutheran congregation taught me early both to sing and to pray.
My father was the one who always drove us to that 8:30 service on Sunday, letting my mother sleep in. Because he was a whistler, we always whistled our favorite hymn on the way home – and in parts. We’d often dissolve into laughter before we could finish, but I’m sure God counted that as prayer too.
Tell us about any faith milestones or touchstones in your life. What significant moments did you feel close to God?
Sometimes the Divine Mystery breaks into the present, and one of those moments in my life centers around music. My husband was deeply sedated and in palliative care at Alta Bates Hospital in Berkeley, California, and my sister-in-law, her husband, their daughter, and I were sitting in his room rehearsing a hymn for the memorial service: “Love divine, all loves excelling….” Catherine and Toby both read music and had fine voices; we wanted to see if the hymn could work for the congregation. We looked up – to find Bill looking at us. He hadn’t opened his eyes in days. And then he died. We sat in that moment for — I don’t know how long. Then, someone started sobbing; then the nurses came in; then, the clock started up again.
That moment of beholding: we were looking at Bill; he was looking at us; we were all beheld by something infinitely greater and utterly loving. There’s a wonderful phrase from Carlos Eire’s book, From Madrid to Purgatory: The Art and Craft of Dying in Sixteenth Spain (1995): “…the curtain raises, if only for a moment….” You can’t find those moments by looking; you simply have to be open to them. They come to you. In familiar places, in unfamiliar places. Don’t explain them; just let them come.
What anchors your faith to Central?
Music drew me to Central, and I suspect the music and rhythm of the liturgy held Central together during some hard transitions. When I first joined, I attended the Sunday services, where music, choir, and organ reminded me of the church of my childhood. Gradually, I saw how Central was itself an anchor in the neighborhood: the Free Store, the Monday meal, the Health Commons, Augsburg’s Advent Vespers, rehearsal space for the orchestra, with Central’s fabled hospitality extending its reach.
Now I’m a regular at the 5 p.m. Saturday service, where the weekday ministry meets weekend worship. I confess that, unless Pastor Peter presides, singing is not our strong suit at that service, but the service has a meditative feel.
What is your favorite part of worship? How do you connect with God on a regular basis?
The silences in the Saturday service quiet me and help me listen. I also need that crowd to help me listen, and often we talk about the music or the texts or the sermons afterwards. We help each other listen to God; we help each other listen for God in the silence.
During the week, I use Magnificat for the daily readings, a Dominican publication. I listen to Kathleen Cahalan’s daily Lectio Divina on the Ritual app, which I follow up with a period of silence. As a class-A multi-tasker, initially I found sitting hard. Now I ease into it, breathing into a mantra I stole from
Greg Boyle SJ, founder of HomeBoys Industries: “Now. Here. This.”
What is something you are looking forward to in your continued faith formation?
I’ve learned a lot from James Finley’s podcast, Turning to the Mystics. Indeed, there are a bunch of fans in my building, and we talk about the podcast. One of my friends does a fine JF imitation! Another friend and I read Teresa of Avila’s Interior Castle together in a kind of Lectio Divina format, sending each other voice memos weekly. In this way, we’ve worked through Julian of Norwich’s Showings, Brother Lawrence’s Practice of the Presence of God, Thomas Merton’s Thoughts in Solitude, even the book of Isaiah – a great practice for the pandemic. Some of these are texts I’ve taught in my seminary classes over the years. Now, I get to learn from them.
I appreciate that Central’s pastors stand firmly in the Great Tradition and have trained as spiritual directors and chaplains. Lutherans can often be a church of “words” and sacraments, and we Lutherans require a high degree of musical literacy – and maybe literacy in general. I am grateful for a pastoral team that listens to the Word that speaks through all the words and to the Word that comes to us in silence.
You can watch the video interview with Marty below!