Author: Mary Elyn Bahlert

I am a spiritual seeker, a seeker who has "taken a drink from many cups." I love to accompany others on the deeper journey to witness to their True Self. Now a writer, photographer and poet, I have retired from full-time ministry as a pastor in downtown Oakland, CA.
community, reflecting

Lake Merritt UMC

Mary Elyn Bahlert

I was serving part time in a small congregation in South San Francisco, living in Oakland. After several years of my floundering around, trying to make my way into the United Methodist Annual Conference while being married to another member of the clergy, I was grateful for the chance to preach each Sunday, to be present to the people of that community. Aldersgate United Methodist Church had been built in a post-war housing development in South San Francisco – the same development as my Uncle Pete and Aunt Athalie, who had lived there for many years. My being there was a twist of faith, or fate – or something else chosen by powers greater than myself or even greater than the United Methodist Bishop who sent me there. I was finally Pastor of a congregation that I was serving on my own. And I was grateful.

Pastor’s School that year was at Asilomar, a conference and retreat center along the Pacific Coast, south of Monterey, in January. I always looked forward to Pastor’s School, mostly for the time with other clergy, the friendships I formed among my colleagues as we sat in classes and ate meals together. Each conversation felt like a connection. I was standing outside, in conversation with Paul Extrum-Fernandez one day during Pastor’s School that year, 1996. As we stood there, Paul asked me where I’d like to go in the Annual Conference. Hmmmm… I had not considered that one, clear question – ever. And no one had ever asked me before. I stood silent for a few moments, thinking. Finally, I answered: “Lake Merritt,” I said.

Paul’s wife, Renee, was Pastor of Lake Merritt. I knew that. Paul knew that. “Oh, Renee will never leave Lake Merritt,” he said.

Two years later, I was Pastor at Lake Merritt United Methodist Church, a congregation formed by the merger of old First United Methodist Church of Oakland – whose building had burned to the ground – and St. Stephen’s United Methodist Church – where the people of Lake Merritt began to worship after the fire, before the new congregation built an entirely new building on the shore of Lake Merritt. The merged congregation became one: Lake Merritt United Methodist Church. I was excited, happy to be sent to Lake Merritt. And I was happy for 16 years – a long tenure, by any account, for a United Methodist Pastor, whose parishes are appointed by a resident Bishop. And I was grateful. I loved the people, in large part because I understood that they had chosen to continue to do ministry after their merger, and with insurance money to carry them into the future – in downtown Oakland.

I was right there with them, in downtown Oakland – and in my view, in heaven.

Sixteen years is a long tenure for a United Methodist Pastor, whose fate is held in the hands and heart of the resident Bishop, but Jeff and I worked it out as best we could as a clergy couple who chose to live together, to not be separated by an appointment to a church by a Bishop. He received training as an interim pastor, which opened doors for him to serve locally in churches of other denominations as well as United Methodist parishes.

*

Every Sunday during my tenure at Lake Merritt, I opened worship with these words: “Welcome to worship at Lake Merritt United Methodist Church, an open and welcoming Christian congregation serving downtown Oakland”. And I served, together with the wonderful lay people of the congregation, who accepted and understood the diverse community of Oakland, and had chosen to stay and serve among that often unruly and difficult community. I was – I am – proud of them.

*

I’ve been retired for 12 years now. I miss many things about being a parish pastor, but as time has gone on, I’ve taken other, shorter gigs, and even traveled some to be with one or another community of faith, to lead worship, to preach, and to connect with the folks of another faith. To be honest, there are many things I don’t miss! I’ve preached at other United Methodist Churches – filling in for friends and colleagues who are taking a Sunday away, and I’ve gone to Mass at a local Roman Catholic Parish that serves the African American community of the Bay Area. Until this past year, I had not stayed closely connected to the community at Lake Merritt, but the current pastor has invited me to preach, to be present for her and to the people of the parish.

This past weekend, while the Pastor is on Sabbatical, I have been one of the clergy she has invited to preach in her absence. And as fate would have it, I was called upon to offer pastoral care and finally to perform the memorial service for a woman with whom I have a strong connection; I buried both her husband and her son, a police officer (see “The day they died,” thewisdomyears.org, May 18, 2025).

And what I have seen in my visits to Lake Merritt UMC is “an open and welcoming Christian congregation serving downtown Oakland.” The vision that the people and I held in our hearts and minds, in our openness to diversity of all kinds, has created a truly open and welcoming Christian congregation. I think this is rare reality among churches. Congregations are well-known for holding tight to old, old traditions, to be unable and unwilling to make changes, for the unwillingness to step on the toes of folks who’ve been around for a long time and have their own ways. Congregations will not be moved from “the way we’ve always done things.” But Lake Merritt has outgrown and surpassed those ways. I credit their witness and determination to serve the community of Oakland – a community that can be gritty and hard, a community that is colorful and rich in diversity – as a strength that continues to blossom in the people there.

I’m proud of them.

Virginia Turner and me – after worship at Lake Merritt United Methodist Church, Oakland. Virginia Turner is my 102 year old friend.

reflecting, remembering

Watching the Sky

Mary Elyn Bahlert

Fourth of July has passed for another year. On Saturday night, Jeff and I fell asleep to the sound of booming skies, carried to us from around the whole Bay Area. For several years, we’d climbed to the strip of land that attaches itself to our property to the South East of our property – a strip of land that is almost sold to the people whose house behind ours faces a different street – to watch the fireworks from what we had come to call “The Panhandle.” Not this year. We started to go to bed earlier during COVID – waking earlier each morning, too – and so we were in bed at the end of daylight.

The booms from all over the area filled the air as I lay awake, always falling asleep later than Jeff, who falls into sleep soon after his head hits the pillow. I listened for a while before I, too, fell asleep. As I listened, the sounds took me back to a Fourth of July many years ago.

Some memories shine, as if lit by a magic light from within.

I was little, probably four or five. I lay on a hill in Washington Park on the North Side of Milwaukee, next to my Dad. I expect that my mother and the baby, Suzie, and probably my big brother, Ronnie, were with us, but they did not show themselves in the memory. It’s as if Daddy and I were alone on the hill. Of the five of us, Dad – I later took to calling him FRB, a nickname which stuck with the whole family – holds center stage in the memory. He was the one in our house who talked the most, an extravert who lived with four introverts.

Daddy watched the fireworks with his extraversion on full display, along with the fireworks. “OOOOOH,” he said, loudly. “AHHHH,” the sound followed. With each burst of light, a new sound escaped from Daddy. “OHHH…” he claimed, again. I lay close to his side on the side of the hill. While the fireworks flashed overhead, I turned to watch Daddy as enjoyment and wonder flowed from him.

*

Why do some memories stick, and not others? I’d like to know. Every Fourth of July, I think of those moments, moments now over 70 years old, as the fireworks boom overhead. I’m still there on that hill, laying close to my Daddy, his joy spreading along the grass to me.

*

For many years now, the dry days of summer in Northern California surround me. Photo by Mary Elyn Bahlert, Mt. Shasta in the distance, from the Warner Valley, CA, 06/9/2026

beauty

the gift

Mary Elyn Bahlert

Christmas before last, Jeff gifted me a wonderful altar to be hung on the wall of my new office. When my own room in our house was being transformed into a guest room and bath, I had moved to a wonderful, bright room that opened to the dining room. I’m sitting here now, as I write my week’s addition to thewisdomyears.org, enjoying the beautiful, well-lit room. I always sit in a wing back chair, one of two that had been in Jeff’s mother’s living room before she passed. I love my space – “a room of one’s own.”

As I moved from the dark room down the dark hallway from the kitchen, the perfect place to hang the altar I’d received as a gift arrived, along with the larger, bright space. As I write now, I sit in my favorite place, the open window on my right, and the beautiful wooden altar in my view. At the beginning, after the altar had been hung, I took my time finding just the right objects and pictures to sit on its shelves. The ribbons I hung outside to be blessed by St. Brigid hang at the side, a beautiful, colorful origami helmet in a clear box is carefully set on the top shelf. I enjoy the altar, sometimes getting up from my comfortable chair to take something down, to move a small china vase.

*

Last weekend, our nephew Rainier, Lia and Celeste, who is six years old now, in the first grade, visited us on a sunny Sunday afternoon. They have exchanged houses for a few weeks with a couple who has roots in Seattle. We enjoyed a barbecue together, sitting in the early summer yard, lush green this time of year. Lia had brought the last of an apple pie, and Jeff delivered large pieces of pie to each of us, apple pie with a topping of vanilla ice cream. Soon after we’d finished supper, it was time for the family of three to go home; ever since she was an infant, Rainier and Lia have a bedtime ritual, an early bedtime for Celeste. The ritual keeps everyone sane! – and allows for smooth days with busy schedules for the whole family.

And so Lia and Rainier and Jeff and I gathered their belongings and helped them fill their car. Celeste came up to me, her small hand holding two tiny flowers in her fingers. She raised them so that I could see, offering the gift to me. I looked at the gift as I took the flowers into my fingers. “Oh!” I said: “I know exactly where these go!”

Celeste was curious then as we walked into my bright office and stood in front of the beautiful wooden altar. I took a tiny clay vase off a tiny shelf and carefully placed the gift in the vase. “There!” I said: “It’s perfect! Thank you for the gift, Celeste!”

I stood back to admire the addition to my altar. Celeste stood at my side, looking up at the vase that held her gift. Then, she looked at me. She surprised me; she moved to face me and opened her arms and hugged me, her arms fitting around my waist. Then she looked up at me. “Thank you,” I said.

memories, Uncategorized

Driving Through Chester

Mary Elyn Bahlert

Rainier was going with Lia, a young woman who lived in the same apartment that they rented together with several other young women in San Francisco. At just the right time, Rainier and Lia started dating each other – and that was it. They were a couple. It was 2012.

Rainier lived with us in Oakland for the first few years of his studies at San Francisco State University, before he’d moved out to live in the City during his last year of school. He’d come to live with us almost from the day he’d graduated from High School on Oahu, calling to ask us whether the offer of a home with us we’d made some years before was for real. It was for real, and we were glad to have him. He lived in a small porch-like area with windows on two sides in a second story duplex before we moved into the beautiful Craftsman Style home we’ve owned and lived in since. In our home, Rainier’s space was down several steps from the kitchen, a small room with a low ceiling and access through sliding doors to the garden. During the move to our new house, he’d offered a strong helping hand. He’d joined us as we gathered a few friends to our new home for a house blessing.

While he was in college, Rainier had taken up bicycling, first using a second hand bike he’d found in the basement of the duplex on Sunnyslope Avenue, graduating to another bike and into a group of cyclists in San Francisco, competing for Mike’s Bikes by traveling to races. Now he’s got a stash of bicycles and parts in his workshop in the yard of his home in Seattle.

When the time to go out on his own came, Rainier moved to San Francisco, where he shared part of an old house with several young women.

We knew from the start that Lia was Rainier’s true partner, and we have enjoyed their company together ever since. Jeff officiated at their wedding. During COVID, we’d made the trip from our place in Oakland to their home in Seattle several times to spend time with them and their baby girl Celeste, born on the first day of COVID sheltering in place – March 17, 2020. Rainier and Lia and Celeste became the children of our own we did not have.

*

After they became a couple, we invited Rainier and Lia to join us at our friends’ Paul and Lana’s place in the Warner Valley, 5 hours north of the Bay Area, for a few days. The four of us had fun together: we watched the budding romance. When our visit was over, we packed up Jeff’s Forester and headed back to the Bay Area. We stopped in Chester, at the southern end of the Valley, dropped off a few days’ worth of garbage in a big garbage can in a driveway, and started West out of Chester toward Highway 5. We left the town limits of Chester. Jeff noticed first. He didn’t say anything to us, but he watched a police vehicle driving along behind us. Jeff is not one to speed, but he watched the speedometer anyway.

Just as we left the town limits, the red lights of the squad car went on and we pulled over. The four of us sat silent in the car as the officer came to the window and asked to see Jeff’s license. I’m sure the officer could read the faces of anyone he pulled over, because that day, he took his time to explain that we’d been seen dumping garbage in town. “I’ll give you a choice,” he said. “You can go back and get that bag of garbage, or I can take you jail.”

“We’ll go back to pick the garbage up,” Jeff said.

We were silent as Jeff turned the car around and watched as he didn’t go a bit over the speed limit as we returned to Chester. We found the garbage container where we’d deposited our garbage less than an hour before. Jeff stopped the car. Rainier got out to get the bag of garbage. We were silent, but I’ll bet we were watched by the neighbors who’d – apparently – watched us before.

And we were mostly silent on the long ride back to San Francisco.

When we drove into San Francisco, I’d taken the wheel, and we were almost at Rainier and Lia’s place. At the same moment, we all burst into laughter, unable to contain it any longer. We all burst into the laughter that followed our entanglement with the Law in Chester.

And you can bet we’ve told that story to one another many times since that fateful day…

A view of Warner Valley now, Mt. Shasta in the distance. After fires several years ago, damaged trees stand amid trees that had escaped the fire. Paul and Lana’s first cabin was destroyed in the fire; the homes on either side of the cabin that burned still stand. Photo by Mary Elyn Bahlert, 6/9/26.