Expansive Thinking in a Compression Culture with Charles Bretan of A Jew and A Gentile walk into a Bar . .. . Mitzvah!

Join Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman and Charles Bretan of A Jew and A Gentile walk into a Bar . . . Mitzvah in this live crossover from the Wild Goose Festival 2025. Dive into discussions about the intersection of faith, social justice, inclusion, and intentional living. This episode covers thought-provoking insights on engaging deeply with texts, the impact of compression culture, and personal stories that highlight the importance of curiosity and expansive thinking. Don't miss engaging reflections on A Wrinkle in Time, political and theological commentary, and practical advice for fostering a deeper connection with the divine and with others.

Interested in hearing more from Charles? Listen to episodes of A Jew and A Gentile walk into a Bar . . . Mitzvah here.

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S6 E24 Wild Goose Crossover: A Jew and A Gentile walk into a Bar . . . Mitzvah meets Holy Shenanigans!

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: [00:00:00] Welcome to this live recording of Holy Shenanigans Podcast. I'm your muse, Tara Lamont Eastman, a pastor, a podcaster and practitioner of holy shenanigans. I love to find ways that the sacred shows up in everyday life and to learn from other people's stories, too. This week's conversation partner is Charles Breton.

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: Co-host of the podcast, a Jew and a Gentile Walking two way Bar mitzvah. Charles is also the venue host for the Wild Goose Festival's goose cast stage, and that is where this live audience recording has taken place. So I welcome you to this conversation of the always sacred, never stuffy adventure that is holy shenanigans on the road at Wild Goose Festival [00:01:00] 2025.

Charles Bretan: All right, well, hello Wild Goose

Charles Bretan: and welcome to the podcast where you'll find cigars, theology, and F-Bombs. Although probably not as many as we usually have because the Gentile is not here. We are available wherever you can find your podcasts, and we are part of the Wild Goose Cast Network, a network of faith-based podcasts, discussing issues of inclusion and social justice.

Charles Bretan: To learn more about the Wild Goose Festival, especially those of you who are here, go to wild goose festival.org. As I mentioned the Gentile is not here. The ampersand of reason is not here, but fear not. For, I have a very, very special guest host, the wonderful Pastor Tara Lamont, Eastman host of Holy Shenanigans podcast.

Charles Bretan: Thank you. Has [00:02:00] graciously agreed to sit in and fill both of those seats. 

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: I will do my best, 

Charles Bretan: which is a lot. So now let me tell you, we just finished recording her podcast and it was amazing. So go find that podcast of holy shenanigans when it's up. 

Charles Bretan: As those of you heard us before, know we are very much into shameless plugs but basically just shouting out some of the people who have made this podcast possible. Definitely Four Saints Brewing in Ashboro, North Carolina. Great beer for great people. They also graciously give us space in the tap room on the second Tuesday of every month.

Charles Bretan: To do drinking religiously, which is not a contest to see. You can get drunk, but it's a group of people who gather over some beer in a tap room and discuss philosophy and theology and spirituality and all that fun stuff. So if you find yourself in Ashboro, on the second Tuesday of the month at 7:00 PM come on in, grab a beer and have some great conversation.

Charles Bretan: [00:03:00] And also our good friend Pete Pike at Greensboro Cigar Company, if it wasn't for the wonderful pipe, tobaccos and cigars, I don't know if this podcast would exist. Speaking of which, we normally would have some cigar reviews, but as the Gentile is not here what we decided to do is just what are we fanning over?

Charles Bretan: So I will let our guests go first. So, Tara, what is big in your fandom at the moment? 

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: So it's something that I have been a fan of since I was probably 10, 11 years old, and it is the book A Wrinkle In Time by Madeline L'Engle. I came across this book at a really transformational time. I had lost my older sister mm-hmm.

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: From, some health issues. And in reading that book, I just had this great sense of, comfort and that love does win, right? Mm-hmm. Even in the midst of great grief. But this summer I have had a different ex. Experience with the book. I brought [00:04:00] together a group of folks in the month of July from eight years old to octogenarians on a Tuesday morning.

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: And we would read a couple chapters of the book and we would get together and discuss what stood out to us and what was important about it. I continue to be a fan of this book as well as L'Engle other writings because it became this expansive space for me to, think about life. In some ways I would've never considered it before.

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: earlier at the Goose somebody came up to me and they saw a tattoo that I had, and they're like, oh my gosh, it's sacred geometry. And, and I'm like, by, yes, it's sacred geometry on my arm. It's a tesseract. And, and so like, it's a great way to, continue to grow and learn and find out how love does connect us all. 

Charles Bretan: Oh, and if you have not, you must read that book. It's required reading to be a human being. Yeah. I had an unfortunate experience subbing for a [00:05:00] year in middle school, and made sure that that book was on the bookshelf and.

Charles Bretan: Got into some students' hands. Yeah. Yeah.

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: One of the things I, I learned this summer is that there's a graphic novel also. Ooh. So that was a nice intersection for folks. that had difficulty, you know, imagining the scene mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. All of the dialogue is consistent with the book.

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: But the setting, the scene part. Is done for folks. So it helps them to, , engage with it in a more visual way in this graphic novel format. And at the end of the reading of the two books, we had a screening of the Disney version of A Wrinkle in Time, which everybody said at the end that the books both graphic are print are way better.

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: But, but it was still interesting to watch that film in this intergenerational group of people and see their reactions and be like, wait, where are the twins? You know, and they're not in the movie. Why is that? Yeah. Yeah. So, always a fan will always be a fan. Yep. 

Charles Bretan: Yep. [00:06:00] Well, what I've been recently reading and fanning over is a Commonwealth of Hope, Augustine's Political Thought by Michael Lamb, who's the executive director of the program for leadership and character at Wake Forest University.

Charles Bretan: I was reading it. Because it was an interesting topic, but also Michael Lamb is a former colleague of my wife, which at this point in the podcast, I'm contractually obligated to remind Chris the Gentile, that when I reference my wife, that's Doctor Mrs. Jew to him. But it's a wonderful book. he's writing about Augustine from the political standpoint, not from the theological or liturgical, and he's reclaiming Augustine's position on what his hope and what its function is.

Charles Bretan: 'cause as he points out that not just the religious writers, but much more so the political writers take him totally out of [00:07:00] context. Hmm. And so they paint him either as a hopeless, romantic, ultimate optimist with no action involved, but just as long as you hope everything will turn out fine. Or as the ultimate pessimist that well, all we have is hope, we might as well give up.

Charles Bretan: And he is like, no. He actually gives direction and instructions for how hope leads to faith, leads to love, leads to change. And bringing about what he refers to as or Augustine as an incremental eschaton that it hasn't happened. Whoosh, revelation once and now it's over. Mm-hmm. But it's not some distant thing either.

Speaker 3: Yeah. 

Charles Bretan: It has begun and we have to have hope. And then faith and then the love to make it continue to its ultimate. But he then takes that and puts it in the political arena and [00:08:00] how the same lesson can be said about what's going on today, and we can't hope and wish it away, and we can't just throw up our hands and say it's impossible.

Charles Bretan: Yeah. But if we actually read what Augustine meant. Because he also writes about it in terms of, you know, the politics of the time. Then maybe we can do something. So highly recommend it. it is a bit of an academic slog. It's incredibly researched and detailed and footnoted and referenced, but also there's a crispness to lamb's writing.

Charles Bretan: Mm-hmm. So thank you, Commonwealth of Hope. Highly recommend it. So now we're gonna get to our main topic, and it's kind of a mishmash of things, and it definitely fits in with the podcast that we just recorded for you, for holy shenanigans. Mm-hmm. With engaging with poems or songs or people that the engagement with them has filled you.

Charles Bretan: Yeah. Or [00:09:00] lifted you. So we're at a time that. We have what has been characterized as compression culture, where we want everything compressed, that our response to anything of length is TLDR. Right? Too long, didn't read. Gimme the highlights. What is the bullet points? Yeah. I don't have time to read all six pages of that.

Charles Bretan: I can't read three column inches in a newspaper. 

Charles Bretan: And it's not just Gen Z, it's not just a product of social media, it's also a product of the increase at which change has been happening. Things seem to change so rapidly that there doesn't seem time to try to figure out something because it's gonna be gone in 10 minutes anyway, we're gonna be onto something else.

Charles Bretan: And what's missing for a lot of people in their critique of compression culture is, where's the thought? Where's the contemplation? [00:10:00] Where's that thing that makes us human beings where we take an idea and we hold it for a while and say, what is this? And one of the things that I kind of got to me is one of the articles I was reading, they got, to the podcasters and they had a bit of a bug and upped their butt and said.

Charles Bretan: This person reported that she hates well-edited podcasts because they edit out all the ums. And if Chris were here, he would tell you he spends 90% of editing taking out my ums. But I'm gonna, share this with him though, that we gotta stop doing that. 'cause you're saying no, you want the um, 'cause it is us taking the time to find the right word.

Charles Bretan: And that should be celebrated, not edited out. Mm. Yeah. So where I thought we could take this to begin with and how this fits in and then later roll open for questions [00:11:00] is so contemplation, engagement with spirituality, with the spirit, with the divine, with holy texts. It is essential in both of our faiths.

Charles Bretan: Yes. Right. Yeah. It's foundational. Yeah. So how do we address that in this compression culture? How do we not lose what is so important and makes faith work for so many people, which is deeper contemplation. 

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: Yeah, I think I will, dip back into an experience from this summer. , I hosted an intergenerational Bible study.

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: And so it was a Lectio Divina based study. So we would read the text, two, three times, and each time there would be a different prompt as to, you know, what word or phrase stands out to you. What. [00:12:00] Emotion does this evoke for you now that you've. Looked at the words and you felt what this text says, what does it call you to then go and do or take with you?

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: I had markers on the table for folks that wanted to approach it from a visual perspective. I brought some magazines if people wanted to like smash up or, you know, cut and paste to do some kind of reflection or response. And there was a lot of dialogue too.

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: And all of this is happening all at once from, age seven to Beyond, right? But to your point, we got together, , every week for an hour and a half. And we took time to essentially from your tradition to mid rash over this text and what does it mean for us today? So I think two points that are important are, , gathering groups of people that wanna take a breath and [00:13:00] actually have a conversation and to think and to um, together.

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: Right? And then to. See what it calls us to engage in in the world. One of the folks that at the end of the summer, because , a lot of our younger folks were going back to school. We did, you know, what did we learn this summer at Bible study? Right? That's the like, very much a teacher question.

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: Yes. What did we learn? You know? And there was all sorts of feedback. But one of the parents in the group said. I think this is the first time I have really studied the Bible. 

crowd noise: Hmm. 

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: And I was like, are you really? Wow. I was so impressed. But impressed in the sense that she allowed herself to pause.

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: To be vulnerable. Mm-hmm. And to engage with text and conversation that maybe she was unfamiliar with or was looking at it from a different lens now mm-hmm. Than she might have years before. Mm-hmm. Yeah. So [00:14:00] people time vulnerability 

Charles Bretan: Yes. Don't 

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: have all the answers. Right, 

Charles Bretan: very true. Yeah. Yeah. And that resonates with you.

Charles Bretan: Her response about. This is the first time I've really studied and I think it's, one of the things that we've gotta be careful that the compression culture can take away from us is looking at texts, particularly religious texts. 

crowd noise: Yeah. 

Charles Bretan: Okay. Being exposed to a different reading. 

Charles Bretan: And.

Charles Bretan: Taking the tiny, well, how does that change my relationship with this text? 

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: Yeah. Yeah. And one more thing on that is that I would intentionally pull out different translations of the text. Mm-hmm. Oftentimes every week. Yes. From the message to the new revised standard version to you know, somebody brought their old King James.

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: Right. But my, one of my favorites was being able to read with folks the indigenous new Testament. Mm-hmm. It really [00:15:00] helped to peel away. Oh, I know that story. Right, right, right. And helped us to see it in a whole new way. Yeah. And so I think hearing from those different voices again, also taking time in instructing when we're looking at the text to be like, okay, this isn't just like chopped apart from what happened before it.

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: You know, what is the, the chapter before and after, and let's look into the bottom of our study bible or look into a commentary or several different commentaries and be like, what is this? What is the midrash here? Mm-hmm. Like, what are they all saying about the context that helps us really understand , or try to right what is going on in the text?

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: Mm-hmm. 

Charles Bretan: Yeah. Yeah. Well, we can almost invert one of the commandments and actually put stumbling blocks. Yeah. In, front of people when we're presenting them with the text, instead of, and that's the other thing, we're so used to some authority, someone more learned than us saying, [00:16:00] here's this text and this is what it means.

Charles Bretan: And so you should believe this and go do that. Mm-hmm. 

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: Mm-hmm. 

Charles Bretan: You know, and yeah, take, that away. 

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: But again, and not everybody's reflection was words. Right. , There was one young person that created an artistic reflection that was our bulletin cover for that Sunday. Right. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. So they were also a part of crafting that ongoing discussion and learning.

Charles Bretan: Yeah. Which is good. and again, when I say putting those roadblocks, making them stop and think, alright, how do I need now to engage with this? 

crowd noise: Yeah. 

Charles Bretan: Yeah. , And challenge them. And you also talked about doing things intentionally, which is, a major theme in, in the Jewish tradition and just my philosophical view.

Charles Bretan: It's it's called Kavanah. In Hebrew it means intentionality and it initially is addressed in terms of prayer. And it's aspirational. , In Judaism, we recognize the fact that you're not always [00:17:00] going to be inspired to pray three times a day, every day. 

crowd noise: Yeah. 

Charles Bretan: But if you wait for the inspiration, if you haven't practiced it, then how do you know what to pray?

Charles Bretan: So , that's back from my youth director's days, where why do we have to pray and I don't feel like praying? Well, if we wait for you to feel like praying, we're gonna wait a while. Yeah. And secondly, when you are ready, are you gonna know what to say if you haven't been practicing it? 

Speaker 3: Mm-hmm.

Charles Bretan: And we're like, trust us. God doesn't mind that you're just going through the motions. 

Speaker 3: Okay. 

Charles Bretan: You hope to enter into prayer intentionally, but , that is a habit that is, you know, nurtured. Yeah. As well as encouraged. But it really does make a difference because it, changes it from just the rote

Charles Bretan: I'm gonna have to get through this as quickly as I can to now I'm really focusing on what I'm saying it changes the nature of the prayer Yeah. And [00:18:00] your relation with the divine, but it also then extends to life. Yeah. 

crowd noise: Yeah. 

Charles Bretan: Being intentional in any and all interactions you have with other people.

Charles Bretan: Yeah. And with the world and with creation. Yeah. that's certainly one way because you can't, it's kind of hard to, while I'm intentionally gonna cut this short and really get anything out of it. 

crowd noise: Yeah. 

Charles Bretan: But being intentional to not just stopping at the bullet points, but reading the whole article.

Charles Bretan: Yeah. And not the summary. 

crowd noise: Yeah, yeah, 

Charles Bretan: yeah, yeah. You're not gonna do that with , all 800 things that pop up on your phone, but pick one or two. 

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: Mm-hmm. 

Charles Bretan: And take a little time with it. Yeah. 

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: I had a thought, you know, in regards to compression mm-hmm. Culture or, you know, thinking in fashion and especially in women's clothing, compression wear is a thing that women will wear and undergarments to make themselves smaller.

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: Mm-hmm. [00:19:00] And we could talk about that for days. Oh yeah. 

Charles Bretan: And the Patriarchy and. Literally wanting women to be smaller so that we don't notice that. Yeah. 

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: So not take up space. Yeah. But there's something to be said for that, I think too in compression culture is that there's this smallness, for lack of a better term, like anemic.

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: Kind of quality. Mm-hmm. It doesn't allow for that savoring that richness. This morning we got gluten-free donuts from one of the trucks. Mm-hmm. And so I was delighted to have three little gluten-free donuts with chocolate syrup and whipped cream and strawberries for breakfast.

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: My friends only at the goose. That was not compression. No. That was ex. Expansion, right? Mm-hmm. And in the best sense of the word, what if we talked about pivoting the culture? So that was expansive. Expansive. And there's a beautiful song and I can't think of the musician, [00:20:00] but the hook of the song is to have roots, deep roots so that you can then soar.

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: I think it's Joy Oladokun. To have deep roots so that you can soar. It's this expansive but centered mm-hmm. Experience of life. Yeah. Yeah.

Charles Bretan: And your comment about taking up less space physically? Yeah. And the desire makes me wonder if that, certainly the lack of deeper thought in and of itself is problematic, but. Compression culture leading to an epidemic of us shrinking. 

crowd noise: Yeah. Okay. 

Charles Bretan: That the lesson becomes be less. Okay. Is that a, lesson that we're sending, and especially to populations and groups that have already been getting that lesson?

crowd noise: Yeah. Yeah. 

Charles Bretan: For generations, yeah. How much more [00:21:00] does this, not only do I not want you physically to take up space, but don't even enter this intellectual space with me. Mm. Because you ain't got the chops. 

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: Mm. Yeah. Mm-hmm. I may know a little bit about that. Yes. Which, which is, 

Charles Bretan: which is why I'm saying looking at you now for Yes, yes, yes.

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: Yeah. Yeah. So my, education journey has been one that has had lots of ups and downs and starts and restarts. In my process to become an ordained pastor I have over six years of theological education, but because of the way that the system tallies these things, in some systems, it wasn't recognized as a full.

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: MDiv or Masters. And so when you're in pastor world that can cause a lot of problems when you're seeking a permanent call or a vocation. I just think about so many other folks that have less [00:22:00] education or experience. And it is a free pass based on their gender or their, their 

Charles Bretan: genitalia.

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: Yeah. Yeah.

Charles Bretan: It's a safe space, you can say that. 

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: Yeah, it is. And so, continuing to engage. 

Charles Bretan: Mm-hmm. Yeah. 

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: Since that 

Charles Bretan: is our theme, 

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: to find people that you can link arms with that will help you in that ever expansive journey. Mm-hmm. You know to take breaks when you need to.

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: But I'm excited 'cause I'm gonna be starting a program on Tuesday. Theopoetics through Earlham and Bethany. I'm coming back to areas of interest that I had 20 years ago.

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: But I didn't have the other supportive education to then pursue that in a, DMin or something like that, a doctor of ministry. So I'm doing it this way with wonderful opportunities, thanks to a grant and mm-hmm the support of my, church to be invited, to expand, to grow, to [00:23:00] dig deep, to, to learn more.

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: Yeah. So I'm very excited about that. 

Charles Bretan: And it, it is exciting. Yes. When you, when you grow and. as an educator, for me, it's part of the scary of compression culture because that's our goal for our students is learning and growing. Yeah. You know, as is often said that the day you stop learning is the day you die.

Charles Bretan: Mm-hmm. And some people like, oh, you mean that learning is keeping me alive? No. It means that you're always learning. Yeah. From the moment you're born to the moment you die, you're learning. 

Speaker 3: Yeah. 

Charles Bretan: Now, when you're intentional about it, then that learning becomes even greater growth, you know? And so students getting this message that no life is too fast, you need to.

Charles Bretan: You know, compress it. Let's get this lesson in five minutes instead of an hour. Let's read a 10 page paper essay instead of a 150 page [00:24:00] book. Yeah, yeah. You know, and in fact, I'll just get the, I mean, not even Cliff notes. Cliff notes are too much for all you elderly members of, our audience present and listening.

Charles Bretan: Right. There were some things you read where the Cliff notes were not that much shorter. You might as well have read the whole book, right? Yeah, exactly. Yeah. You know? Yeah. That's even too much for compression culture. They want the spark notes, one laminated piece, three bulleted lists, and they're only gonna read one of the lists and only the first three things now.

Charles Bretan: And it's just The fication of what is vital for a free society, you know, the political part of this. I know recently our vice president was slammed for not knowing that World War II ended with a unconditional surrender and not a negotiated piece. I'm sorry. He knew [00:25:00] that he's smarter than that.

Charles Bretan: He knew what he was saying. He was thinking that you didn't know that World War II ended with an unconditional surrender and not a negotiated peace so that he could frame what Trump is doing in Ukraine with what all great leaders and all great wars have ended with negotiation. 

Charles Bretan: Horace Mann, father of Public Education in America as well as many founders of our country have espoused that sound.

Charles Bretan: Public education is the bulwark of democracy, and you need an educated electorate if you're gonna have a republic and a constitutional democracy. And to me, that's the scary part. So it's not just the threat, this has to, faith, which needs to be deep and profound, but also, you know, the political ramifications of it.

Charles Bretan: Mm-hmm. 

crowd noise: Yeah. Yeah. 

Charles Bretan: So [00:26:00] one thing that I think might be a cure that we've, talked about and this comes from Paulo Freire Teacher and pedagogist from the seventies. Brilliant. One of three main influences on my pedagogy along with John Dewey and I will staunchly stand by the fact that Dewey was correct and Thorndyke was a dick.

Charles Bretan: Look it up. That's really profound. And the third person who was my mentor. Ted Hippel, a blessed memory, but Freire, who is most known for writing the pedagogy of oppression about how colonialized education systems are designed to oppress their students. He was writing mainly in Brazil, 'cause he was teaching in Brazil.

Charles Bretan: Mm-hmm. In very impoverished schools. But he also wrote a book later the fact of the last one he wrote called The Pedagogy of Freedom. Hmm. Where he talks about what is necessary [00:27:00] to free the oppressed, and it is to engage with them to bring them past the naive knowledge. He calls it ingenuous as an ingenue, as an naive and unsophisticated knowledge of things in the world, and teach them the process of epistemological curiosity.

Charles Bretan: Okay. Which is that deeper questioning, leading to that deeper understanding. Okay. So how do we do that? How do we get people to be more curious , I mean, you've already given us some good examples with both the wrinkle in Time. Yeah. Session you did. And with this inter-generational Bible study.

Charles Bretan: Yeah, yeah. But just in everyday kinds of, as we engage with each other, how do we bring some epistemological curiosity and how do we leave the thou in our I, [00:28:00] thou with some epistemological curiosity. As they engage with others. 

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: I'm gonna refer to a favorite TV show. Ted Lasso. Stay Curious, right?

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: Stay curious, stay kind, right? Mm-hmm. Those are some good instructions in how to resist that compression, right? Mm-hmm. Several years ago I created like this little acronym. Mm-hmm. That was really helpful for me to think about what was really essential, important in life.

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: And it's the word live and it represents four words, which are love, intention, verve, and ease. So, love, intention, verve, and ease. It is this, uh. a framework for me that encourages me to live in that messy middle of life, not always seeking mm-hmm. mountaintop or, you know, descending [00:29:00] to the depths and staying there a bit too long in the basement.

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: But to start with love, make those intentions. Mm-hmm. like be vivacious, be willing to try, right? 

crowd noise: Mm-hmm. 

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: But also to like, rest. 

crowd noise: Yes. 

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: Right? I wish these were elements that I would've learned like way long ago or been able to take in, but we learn as we learn, right?

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Um, But I wanted to share those, four little words. Because I found them to be extremely helpful to me and to staying curious. Mm-hmm. Not being judgemental of myself or others and being forgiving of self and others. Mm-hmm. I mean, I think a word that might be helpful for this too is humility in the best sense of that word.

Charles Bretan: Yes. Yes. 

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: Right. Mm-hmm. To know that we are beloved creatures of God. Right. People. But so are you. Mm-hmm. And [00:30:00] so are you and, and everybody here and extending out into all of the world. Mm-hmm. Beloved and also needs to be connected. Yes. And how expansive is that idea, right? 

Charles Bretan: Absolutely. 

crowd noise: Yeah. 

Charles Bretan: And. the humility to recognize that we don't know everything.

crowd noise: No. Mm-hmm. You 

Charles Bretan: know, we're not gonna be able to fix everybody. No. Even ourselves, no. Mm-hmm. Yeah. We, we are social creatures and we need each other. We need each other. Yes. Yeah. We, we are, whether we like it or not, depending on others. Yeah. I, I point that out to my students all the time, you know, because, I teach at a community college and while it's a very diverse group, there's still a lot of young people.

Charles Bretan: Let alone first time college students. And, , they come with that, not arrogance, but that it's all on them. Mm. No one's gonna help them. They've gotta figure this out on their own. And the [00:31:00] reason I wasn't at the, Goose Friday was the term just started and I couldn't leave my students alone with , their first major assignment due this weekend.

Charles Bretan: Okay. 'cause they needed to know that. There, are people here to help? 

crowd noise: Yeah. And 

Charles Bretan: not just me. I said, look around you and everybody's going through this. Yeah. And when you think about it, connecting, engaging, yeah. Physically that makes us larger. 

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: It does, yes. Squished together for those who can't see us.

Charles Bretan: Right. And so if, everybody here leaned hard, we take up a lot more space than any one of us individually. And that's where our strength is. That's what scares me about this idea of compression culture Yeah. It is, is so antithetical to what we know benefits us as individuals, benefits us as a society, as a culture.

Charles Bretan: You know, we need this.

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: Could I say one more thing about Absolutely. Wrinkle in Time? You, 

Charles Bretan: you can say, you can [00:32:00] go on as much as you want on Wrinkle in Time. 

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: Okay. So, are y'all familiar with the tesseract in the Wrinkle in Time? So Sacred Geometry, but I'll, explain it from the, point of the book when they're trying to explain what a tesseract is.

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: It is this Wrinkle in Time that allows travel from one plane to another by essentially, and in the book, it's great. There's this little illustration of two hands holding a string and a little ant on one side of the string, and then the wrinkle that allows this. Connection, right? Mm-hmm. And then it expands out again.

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: And in the story Meg and Calvin and Charles Wallace are trying to find Charles and, Meg's father. And so they go on this adventure. That takes them in this interplanetary mm-hmm. Universal journey motivated by love and seeking out connection. And all of the ways that, you know, as a young girl reading this book, seeing Meg [00:33:00] Grow, expand she started out as this person who was very frustrated and angry with life.

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: She felt like she was very, very small and disconnected. To then, you know, learning, growing. And one of my favorite lines in the book is when Mrs Whatsit says to Meg, I give you your faults. And she's like, what in the world are my faults good for? Right. And she learns through this journey.

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: Mm-hmm. Which I will not give a spoiler. No, no, no. 

Charles Bretan: We are so far above spoilers. Spoiler alert we're not. 

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: That she learns eventually that her faults are the means of expansion and connection and mm-hmm. Being a part of a greater community and really extending love into the entire universe. Yeah. Please read the book if you haven't.

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: Yes. Yeah. 

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: There's a Benedictine phrase Okay. That I would like to at least add in. It is always [00:34:00] we begin again, it's a prayer. But I think across our faith backgrounds or, or our perspectives. There's a beauty in that statement, like always. Mm-hmm. Right? Yeah. That, that love is something that always, always, always is present.

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: And then we, we are in this together. 

crowd noise: Mm-hmm. 

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: Right? Begin, be able to be in that position of a learner. Right. Don't be afraid to try. 

crowd noise: Mm-hmm. And 

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: then again. 

crowd noise: Mm-hmm. 

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: And repeat. And 

crowd noise: repeat. 

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: Right. Yeah. And so I think that, you know, as folks try to move from compression to expansion, that can be a really hard process.

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: It can be painful. Mm-hmm. Because you've been like, kinda like the story Meg, so like compressed and then she has to learn through some really difficult trials, how to expand. Yeah. But don't do it alone. have helpers along the [00:35:00] way. Yes. And then we do always, we begin again and again. Mm-hmm. And again.

Charles Bretan: Yeah. 

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: Yeah. 

Charles Bretan: I like that. Thank you. It's very good. Thank you. Very good. Well, we're coming to the end and as always, we end our podcasts with words of wisdom. My usual disclaimer, these , are chosen at random. I have it. No intent behind why they come up. It may or may not connect to anything we said is just total randomness.

Charles Bretan: Okay. So this episode's words of Wisdom come from Edith Wharton author from the same time period, you know, the twenties if you've watched the Gilded Age. That's what she wrote about. Not, she didn't write any of those episodes. She's, yeah. Yeah. But anyway, wonderful stuff, great, great author.

Charles Bretan: Love her very much. So she once remarked that one can remain alive if one is unafraid of change, [00:36:00] insatiable in intellectual curiosity, interested in big things and happy in small ways.

crowd noise: Thank you. Thank you. That was so fun.

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: I am your holy shenanigans muse, Tara Lamont Eastman. Thank you for joining us for this Wild Goose 2025 episode of Holy Shenanigans. That surprise, encourage, redirect, and turn life upside down all in the name of love. This is an unpredictable spiritual adventure that is always sacred but never stuffy.

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: You can support holy shenanigans by giving at. www.buymeacoffee.com/tara l Eastman. Thanks to the wild goose, [00:37:00] to Charles, to our studio audience and to Ian Eastman for sound production. To join us for more holy shenanigans. Be sure to follow and subscribe wherever you get podcasts. And if you are in the Northwest Pennsylvania region, I invite you to join me for worship at Warren First Presbyterian Church.

Pastor Tara Lamont Eastman: Until next time, as you engage in the next steps of your spiritual journey, may you be well, may you be at peace and may you know that you are always beloved.