Some backstory: Adam Walker Cleaveland, recent PTS grad and proprietor of pomomusings, is a candidate for ordination in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.). As part of his final steps towards ordination, he must be examined by his Presbytery of Call, and part of that examination includes the presentation of a statement of faith.

These statements of faith are typically a page or so (single spaced), and cover things like who God is, humanity’s relationship to God, who Jesus is, what the Bible and Sacraments are all about, and so on. Its not easy to condence the basics of one’s religious beliefs to a single page, but those of us who’ve been examined by a presbytery for ordination are asked to do it, and he’s working on it.

Also, you should know about what twitter is: a social-networking tool that enables people to “micro-blog,” similar to status updates on facebook, using 140 characters or less. For those who love status updates on facebook, this is right up your alley, and you can access it through the web, through a number of apps, through SMS Text Messages, etc. (Adam also wrote about why one should use twitter at pomomusings.)

So Adam has been twittering about his writing of this statement of faith, and Shawn Coons of igeekrev suggested that those who know him try to use twitter to make a statement of faith, that is, to write one using 140 characters only.

The thing has taken off today, and is now called Twitter of Faith. Adam posted the particulars on his website, but you can also look at the facebook page.

The original challenge was:

Twitter of Faith: What do you believe? You have 140 characters – give us your statement of faith in 140 characters. #TOF

And here was my offering:

God is love, and lovingly empowers, forgives, redeems me. Thus I am God’s, and live to do the same for others, so that love might win. #TOF

You can keep up with the various postings about it here. Its pretty cool!

Update (11/23/08): I slept on the above, and really like it, but see that my first TOF leaves out Jesus Christ. I’m ok with that, but it is incomplete. So I offer this modification, which adds Christ but which makes it slightly different:

God is love, and in Xp lovingly calls, forgives, redeems me. Thus I am God’s, and live to do the same for you, so that love might win. #TOF

Take your pick. I like to place them together, but that’s against the rules.

There is now a post about this up on presbymergent, and the following blogs as well: wendy, mark, mycontemplations. Its taking off..

I’m a fountain pen snob. Snob might be too strong a word: I write with other, more pedestrian instruments much of the time without breaking out into a sweat. But I love my fountain pens. I have too many of them. I use the ink from the bottle (this ink, typically). It gets on my hands sometimes. I love it.

Anyway, I also actually write letters, by hand (even with my poor handwriting). Sure, I do a lot of email, but I still default to (fountain)pen and paper for many things. I enjoy it.

Maggi Dawn has a delightful Garrison Keillor quote up today on her blog:

The first step in writing letters is to get over the guilt of not writing. You don’t “owe” anybody a letter. Letters are a gift.

Sure, we don’t owe anyone a letter. You can call, email, text, whatever. Or not communicate. But writing a letter is a special thing. Part of that gift is the time and thought put into writing it, thinking about it, engaging it. Email is fast-food communication; the letter, more ideally an elegant meal.  Something for me to ponder…

…As I thought about it on the drive home, I can think of a few people I know and love whom I’ve not seen or spoken to in a while. A letter to them might be a nice Christmas gift.