internal exile

This is what I'm reading tonight and I feel like I will be reading it many more times.

https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2019/06/to-save-the-church-dismantle-the-priesthood/588073/

The title is sort of misleading; the meat of the thing, I think, is here:

     Joyce was a self-described exile, and exile can characterize the position of many former Catholics, people who have sought refuge in another faith, or in no faith. But exile of this kind is not what I suggest. Rather, I propose a kind of internal exile. One imagines the inmates of internal exile as figures in the back of a church, where, in fact, some dissenting priests and many free-spirited nuns can be found as well. Think of us as the Church’s conscientious objectors. We are not deserters.
     Replacing the diseased model of the Church with something healthy may involve, for a time, intentional absence from services or life on the margins—less in the pews than in the rearmost shadows. But it will always involve deliberate performance of the works of mercy: feeding the hungry, caring for the poor, visiting the sick, striving for justice. These can be today’s chosen forms of the faith. It will involve, for many, unauthorized expressions of prayer and worship—egalitarian, authentic, ecumenical; having nothing to do with diocesan borders, parish boundaries, or the sacrament of holy orders. That may be especially true in so-called intentional communities that lift up the leadership of women. These already exist, everywhere. No matter who presides at whatever form the altar takes, such adaptations of Eucharistic observance return to the theological essence of the sacrament. Christ is experienced not through the officiant but through the faith of the whole community. “For where two or three are gathered in my name,” Jesus said, “there am I in the midst of them.”

I, for one, look forward to some "unauthorized expressions of prayer and worship." Which reminds me, it's time again for the prayer on Thursday.

In other news, today in Zurich I spotted this:

Ok, I know you can't tell what it is, because I wasn't brave enough to walk right up to these guys and take a picture of them working, and sort of snuck around the back instead. But it's a special city truck equipped with a pressure washer and manned by a team of two, and they have a special sign that says "Kaugummi Entfernung" - chewing gum removal. I did not know this was a thing. Of course it is.