tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-9114389922805354162024-03-04T21:06:48.297-08:00The Hopeful PriestReturn to your stronghold, O prisoners of hope! Zechariah 9:12Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger109125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-911438992280535416.post-43183969705833104102013-11-24T13:15:00.001-08:002013-11-24T13:15:16.148-08:00Christ the ... President? What?<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="color: black; font-family: "Cambria","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 200%; mso-ascii-theme-font: major-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: BodoniSvtyTwoOSITCTT-Book; mso-hansi-theme-font: major-latin;">Welcome to Christ the King Sunday.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Or, as many churches are now calling it, the
Reign of Christ Sunday.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They call it
"Reign of Christ" because they want us to focus not so much on the
Kingship of Christ but on the fact that Christ reigns; Christ is the alpha and
the omega, the be all and end all, the ultimate ruler in our lives. Just
don't call him King.</span>
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="color: black; font-family: "Cambria","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 200%; mso-ascii-theme-font: major-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: BodoniSvtyTwoOSITCTT-Book; mso-hansi-theme-font: major-latin;">The problem, of course, is ... what else
do you call an ultimate ruler?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What's a
better word than King?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Certainly he's
not a dictator; he's not our president or CEO...<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>While I'm the first to admit that
"kingship" is an archaic concept<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>- especially in a country that takes pride in having thrown off kings
and all other non-elected rulers in our lives (except oil companies) - it's
pretty difficult to excise the concept of Kingship from Christ - because he
does rule; he is the ultimate authority for us; he is at the top of the totem
pole.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="color: black; font-family: "Cambria","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 200%; mso-ascii-theme-font: major-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: BodoniSvtyTwoOSITCTT-Book; mso-hansi-theme-font: major-latin;">Well, except it's not really a pole;
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="color: black; font-family: "Cambria","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 200%; mso-ascii-theme-font: major-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: BodoniSvtyTwoOSITCTT-Book; mso-hansi-theme-font: major-latin;">Which is really the point, after
all.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>However he comes to be King,
whatever that means to us, his authority is achieved in humiliation; he is
exalted through degradation; his crown is not a big solid gold thing decorated
with jewels; it's a crude, filthy, bloody crown of thorns.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
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<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="color: black; font-family: "Cambria","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 200%; mso-ascii-theme-font: major-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: BodoniSvtyTwoOSITCTT-Book; mso-hansi-theme-font: major-latin;">And so we come to the great paradox that
lays at the heart of Christ the King - which is actually our way of saying that
the meaning of life itself is paradoxical.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="color: black; font-family: "Cambria","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 200%; mso-ascii-theme-font: major-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: BodoniSvtyTwoOSITCTT-Book; mso-hansi-theme-font: major-latin;">Someone once said the mark of true
intelligence is the capacity to hold two conflicting ideas in your head
simultaneously.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I'm not sure if that's
true or not - but it's true in the case of Christianity, anyway: that our
religion is born in contradiction and paradox.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Our weakness is our strength, as Paul said; the last shall be first; the
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</span>That's paradox: the greatest wisdom is foolishness.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="color: black; font-family: "Cambria","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 200%; mso-ascii-theme-font: major-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: BodoniSvtyTwoOSITCTT-Book; mso-hansi-theme-font: major-latin;">There are some Christians, I admit, who
don't accept this.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When they talk about
Christ the King, there is nothing paradoxical whatsoever.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Christ is KING!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We're talking about Glory here!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We're talking about Christ coming on clouds
of thunder; he's riding a white stallion and he's wearing a suit of armor;
we're talking about power and might; shock and awe.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There is no weakness in their Christ; there
is no humiliation or shame or failure whatsoever.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="color: black; font-family: "Cambria","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 200%; mso-ascii-theme-font: major-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: BodoniSvtyTwoOSITCTT-Book; mso-hansi-theme-font: major-latin;">These are people, I dare say, who are
terrified of weakness; and they are confused by paradox; they jump at the sight
of their own shadow.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For them, power is
to be amassed, not given away. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="color: black; font-family: "Cambria","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 200%; mso-ascii-theme-font: major-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: BodoniSvtyTwoOSITCTT-Book; mso-hansi-theme-font: major-latin;">But Jesus did not have a gun collection.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Jesus did not attack the Roman Empire with
swords and clubs and a mob of angry protesters.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>His assault on the most powerful and ruthless empire on earth was far
more devastating than any armed rebellion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>He defeated the powerful by submitting to power; he attacked the hateful
by loving them; he pronounced judgment in words of forgiveness.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He conquered death by embracing death.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He won for himself the prize of eternal life by
giving away his claim on life.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="color: black; font-family: "Cambria","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 200%; mso-ascii-theme-font: major-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: BodoniSvtyTwoOSITCTT-Book; mso-hansi-theme-font: major-latin;">This is why we call him King.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Because through his life and death, he shows
us the way to eternal life.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Another way
of saying this is that by following in his way of paradox, we discover a life
of ultimate blessing. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="color: black; font-family: "Cambria","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 200%; mso-ascii-theme-font: major-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: BodoniSvtyTwoOSITCTT-Book; mso-hansi-theme-font: major-latin;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="color: black; font-family: "Cambria","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 200%; mso-ascii-theme-font: major-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: BodoniSvtyTwoOSITCTT-Book; mso-hansi-theme-font: major-latin;">Yesterday I met for a couple hours with
our new team of Eucharistic Visitors - and without telling them that this was
my plan, I attempted to demonstrate for them exactly how this paradox of
Christ's kingship actually works.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="color: black; font-family: "Cambria","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 200%; mso-ascii-theme-font: major-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: BodoniSvtyTwoOSITCTT-Book; mso-hansi-theme-font: major-latin;">We sat around a circle, with a candle in
the middle; and while everyone in the circle prayed, we took turns talking
about our experience of being a Eucharistic Visitor. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="color: black; font-family: "Cambria","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 200%; mso-ascii-theme-font: major-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: BodoniSvtyTwoOSITCTT-Book; mso-hansi-theme-font: major-latin;">Just as an example - and while I'm
talking about this, you should know that I'm changing some of the details so to
protect the confidentiality of the group - but just as an example, someone
talked about how he visits this one lady who has more things going wrong with
her body than most of us can imagine. This woman he visits suffers from
several chronic diseases; she lives in constant pain; she is very poor and has
almost no family; and yet, when she opens her mouth, she has almost nothing to
say except Thank you. This woman can barely open her mouth without words
of gratitude and blessing coming out. Our Eucharistic Visitor talked
about how inadequate this made him feel; that here he was, relatively healthy,
relatively young, relatively competent, and yet he was the one who complained
more often than he cared to admit. Here he is, bringing communion to a
woman whose arthritis is so bad that she needs about an hour just to get dressed
in the morning; and yet he's the one filled with rage because the line at Starbucks
is too long.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="color: black; font-family: "Cambria","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 200%; mso-ascii-theme-font: major-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: BodoniSvtyTwoOSITCTT-Book; mso-hansi-theme-font: major-latin;">What was he doing, pretending to be the
minister in that situation? Who did he think he was, to be leading this woman in
prayer? What did he possibly have to offer this woman? </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="color: black; font-family: "Cambria","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 200%; mso-ascii-theme-font: major-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: BodoniSvtyTwoOSITCTT-Book; mso-hansi-theme-font: major-latin;">And of course, as soon as those words
left his mouth, in the context of prayer, he began to see the blessing in it; he began to see that he was exactly the right person to be ministering to
that lady. He had nothing to offer except a stale cracker, and a sip of
some rather mediocre port; and yet by those ordinary means he was witness to
something extraordinary. That all he needs to bring is himself, broken
and flawed; and God takes care of the rest; that it's not about his worthiness,
or his competence, or his expertise, or his intelligence; it's about showing up
in his poverty; it's about letting go of trying to be impressive; it's about
being open to the fact that Christ is found where we least expect it: in the
broken body of a solitary, desperately poor woman living in a trailer park on
the edge of town. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="color: black; font-family: "Cambria","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 200%; mso-ascii-theme-font: major-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: BodoniSvtyTwoOSITCTT-Book; mso-hansi-theme-font: major-latin;">When it came my turn to talk about my
experience of bringing the Eucharist to someone, I confessed to the sense of
inadequacy I felt about the whole thing. About how I never feel like I
can do enough for the people I visit; that I never have enough time; that I can
never take away their pain, or restore them to health, or fix their problems.
And as I confessed that sense of inadequacy, while the others prayed for
me, I didn't feel like I was swirling down a pit of self-loathing; instead, I
felt a blessing; I felt God's mercy and forgiveness; I heard a voice say,
"Of course you feel inadequate. Thank GOD you feel inadequate.
Because you aren't God. But God is here. All this is in God's
hands. And because you have been authentic, you are blessed.
Because you have been honest, you are forgiven. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="color: black; font-family: "Cambria","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 200%; mso-ascii-theme-font: major-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: BodoniSvtyTwoOSITCTT-Book; mso-hansi-theme-font: major-latin;">This is the paradox that we proclaim on
this day. Christ becomes our King in his woundedness. Christ is
exalted... upon a cross.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="color: black; font-family: "Cambria","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 200%; mso-ascii-theme-font: major-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: BodoniSvtyTwoOSITCTT-Book; mso-hansi-theme-font: major-latin;">This is what we proclaim. The very
nature of reality itself - the very structure of the universe - has at its
heart this pattern of paradox. That glory goes to those who serve.
That our healing begins when we accept our woundedness. That love -
not domination, not violence, not control, but love - conquers all.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="color: black; font-family: "Cambria","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 200%; mso-ascii-theme-font: major-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: BodoniSvtyTwoOSITCTT-Book; mso-hansi-theme-font: major-latin;">I pray that Christ may be your King,
this day, and every day; leading you into weakness, which shall be your
strength; leading you into all goodness, bv means of the simple confession of
your sin. In so doing, Christ comes alive in you, and in me; and we
all become members of that blessed community, which is otherwise known as the
Kingdom of God.</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<span style="color: black; font-family: "Cambria","serif"; font-size: 12.0pt; line-height: 200%; mso-ascii-theme-font: major-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: BodoniSvtyTwoOSITCTT-Book; mso-hansi-theme-font: major-latin;">Amen.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; margin-bottom: .0001pt; margin-bottom: 0in; mso-layout-grid-align: none; mso-pagination: none; text-autospace: none;">
<br /></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-911438992280535416.post-2917858491137986142013-08-27T14:24:00.001-07:002013-08-27T14:24:13.884-07:00The Next Big Argument<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<br />
<div class="MsoNoSpacingCxSpFirst" style="margin-left: .5in; mso-add-space: auto;">
Sermon
preached August 18, 2013</div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacingCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: .5in; mso-add-space: auto;">
The
Very Rev. Dr. Matthew Lawrence, Rector</div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacingCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: .5in; mso-add-space: auto;">
Church
of the Incarnation, Santa Rosa, CA</div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacingCxSpMiddle" style="margin-left: .5in; mso-add-space: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacingCxSpLast" style="margin-left: .5in; mso-add-space: auto;">
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Do you think that I have come to bring peace
to the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division! From now on five in one
household will be divided, three against two and two against three…</i></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpFirst">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
The other day I was sitting with some parishioners
and we were talking generally about how things are going around the church
these days, and I was deeply glad to hear each person reflect on how nice it is
not to have any big fights going on in the church these days.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Everyone seems to be pretty happy, knock on
wood.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Not that we all agree with one
another on much of anything – sitting around that table were a healthy
assortment of Republicans and Democrats, gay, straight, male, female, 8
o’clockers and 9:15ers, and 11:15ers – but everyone agreed we didn’t see any
big issue dividing us right now – and we all kind of breathed that in and gave
ourselves permission to enjoy it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
I had the same experience with the bishop a few
months ago.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We were talking about the
state of the diocese and making plans for Diocesan Convention, and I told him
how great it was to go to Convention and not spend the whole time arguing about
sex.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Great… but also kind of disorienting.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I mean, I’ve been a priest since 1990 and
until very recently every single Diocesan Convention was consumed with
arguments about homosexuality.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
I asked the bishop, “What are we going to do, now
that we don’t need to argue about sex?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
And he smiled the smile of a wise and experienced bishop and he said, “Enjoy it while it lasts.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"></span>And that’s
just what I’ve been doing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s been
nice, hasn’t it?</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
But it does make you wonder:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What’s next?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>What’s the next big fight going to be about?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
It’s almost like Jesus gave us this list, 2,000
years ago, of Arguments We Need to Have; and we’ve been going down this list,
checking things off as we go along.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Let’s
see: first we had to fight with our Jewish brothers and sisters because they
didn’t want us preaching in the synagogue; okay, well we gave that our best
shot…<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>and then, let’s see, we had to
fight over whether or not to let Greeks into our company; then we had to settle
the Arian heresy; and then there were the Pelagians; and the Manichees, and all
those other heresies; and then we had our fight over indulgences; and we
finally got the Bible and the prayer book translated into English, that was a
big one and it looks like it’s pretty settled; and then there was slavery; and
Prohibition; and the Vietnam War; and Civil Rights – which is still an issue
but at least Black people aren’t being stopped from registering at universities
by men with guns, so that’s progress; and then there were women wanting to
become priests, and now, gay people!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So:
that’s it, right?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Are we done?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
I’d really like to think that we’re done.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That we’ve settled every big
controversy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I mean, what’s next?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I really have a hard time imagining what the
next big church-splitting argument is going to be over.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Dogs marrying cats?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I have no idea.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
When Jesus said, “Do you think that I have come to
bring peace to the earth? No, I tell you, but rather division!” – boy, was he
right.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I wonder if he had any idea how
long we’d be fighting our very own brothers and sisters in his name.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
And truthfully – which one of those issues do we
wish we <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">hadn’t</i> had a fight over?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I, for one, am glad the Bible’s in English;
I’m grateful we no longer have legalized slavery in the United States; and I’m
proud we are a church that tackled the gay issue so courageously, and, I might
add, so prayerfully.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
So it turns out Jesus was right when he said his message
would bring division.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And when he said,
“You know how to interpret the appearance of earth and sky, but [you don’t
know] how to interpret the present time," he was right about that,
too.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Because we have no idea what the
next big storm is going to be about.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Whatever the issue will be, we know it’s going to
start with some self-aggrandizing, self-appointed spokesperson for justice,
probably some young person going on about sour grapes, like Isaiah in today’s
lesson.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I know this because I have <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">been</i> that self-aggrandizing,
self-appointed spokesperson for justice.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Many of us have.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We have seen the
same cycle take place every generation since the beginning of time: some kid in
his 20’s or 30’s will stand up, just like I used to do 30 years ago, and he
will make some kind of uncomfortable speech that no one wants to hear, and we
will try to shush him up; maybe even drive him from the church.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And our first objection to him is not going
to be that we disagree with him on the merits of his argument; no, we might
even agree with him, secretly, but our biggest objection will be that he’s
divisive; that he’s too blunt; that he’s hurting the feelings of good people
who think differently from him.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And so
we will call the police and we will have him arrested for Disturbing the
Peace.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Because we love this peace so
much; we know how hard-won this peace is; and we who have been through a war or
two already will want to just rest, and enjoy the peace, because we will feel
that we’ve earned it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
About ten years ago – I think it was the first
Clergy Conference that I had been to here in this Diocese – we were engaging
the issue of gay priests, and it was turning into one of those rancorous,
difficult debates; I had just made my speech about my brother, who was gay, and
about how he had attempted suicide as a young man because he had been taught to
hate himself, and I did my usual thing which was to challenge the other clergy
in the room to tell me which side of my brother’s life God was on – was he on
the side of self-hatred and all the forces in our society that were telling him
he was better off dead, or was God on the side of my brother coming out of the
closet, and healing from all the self-hate that he had learned, and finally
embracing himself as God had created him to be.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I had given the same speech a few times before, but this was the first
time in this Diocese.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And then this
older priest, who was about five years from retirement, got up.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He started by reviewing all the battles that
he had fought while he was a priest; about how he had gone into the South to
march with Dr. King; and how he had opposed the Vietnam War and gotten beat up
for it; and how he had been a good soldier over the revisions to the Prayer
Book, even though he lost a third of his congregation over it; and then how he
had come to accept and support and fight for the rights of women to be
ordained.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And now he was being asked to
take up another banner and fight another war and lose more parishioners and he
started weeping and said, “I’m just tired!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I’m tired of all of it!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And I’m
just not going to fight any more!”</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
At the time, I remember I wasn’t very sympathetic
to him.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I mean, I could see the pain he
was in, and I felt sorry for him, but I remember thinking, Jesus doesn’t give
us a pass on these things.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In fact, we
make a promise in our Baptismal Vows, that we will strive for justice and peace
among all people; and we will persevere in resisting evil.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We don’t say that we’ll strive for justice
and peace as long as we feel like it; or as long as we don’t offend somebody;
or as long as we don’t lose members.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
This is the bad news that comes with the good news
of new life in Christ – that we are expected to put justice ahead of peace, and
all of it ahead of our own feelings of comfort, even our own well-deserved
desire for rest.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
But I have to admit that, now that <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">my</i> issue has been settled, more or less;
now that <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">my</i> righteous anger has been
mollified, I understand that older priest completely.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I can honestly say I dread the next conflict;
I want to extend this period of peace and tranquility as long as I can; I’m so
old and self-satisfied right now I can’t even imagine what the next big conflict
is going to be about.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And I’m far more
likely, when the next big conflict comes around, to be on the side of the
conservatives, opposing change simply because I prefer things the way they
are.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
I say this out loud, so that you can hold me
accountable, should you find me digging in my heels against change.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If you see me preferring peace over justice;
if you ever hear me say, “But we just can’t take on any more divisive issues
right now,” please: do me a favor.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Remind
me of my baptismal vows; which today we say out loud for everyone to hear.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
In our Baptism, we don’t say we will persevere in
resisting evil, as long as we feel like it; we don’t say we will strive for
justice and peace among just certain people, as long as they don’t ask too much
of us.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s the bad news of life in
Christ.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We are called to speak the
truth, and work for justice, and step out on faith into new unchartered
territory, every day, whether we like it or not, whether it serves our
interests or not, whether it makes us feel uncomfortable or not.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
But until that next big conflict comes along,
threatening to split our church, I propose that we follow our bishop's advice, and just enjoy the peace that we have
now.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>After all, it’s
almost the end of summer.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Some of us haven’t even
been to a baseball game this year yet.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Let’s be good to ourselves; let’s enjoy this season of peace.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Life doesn’t have to be all conflict, all of
the time.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Even God rested from his
labors once in a while.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And so shall we,
I pray, and give thanks
to God along the way.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span> </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Somebody say…. AMEN.</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-911438992280535416.post-16872041781207454492013-05-22T16:17:00.003-07:002013-05-22T16:17:51.293-07:00"Thirsty Camels" - Pentecost, 2013<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<br />
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpFirst">
Pentecost, 2013</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpFirst">
</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpFirst">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpFirst">
The other day I was at a restaurant and there were
two young people at the table next to me; they were holding hands and leaning
across the table toward one another, so that their foreheads almost met; their
eyes were locked on one another as if no one else on the planet existed; they
would nod in agreement at every observation the other made; and their faces
were beaming.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They were drinking in one
another’s words like thirsty camels at the end of a march across the desert --
they had what I can only describe as an eagerness of understanding; this kind
of Pentecost joy on their faces, as they were connecting with each other.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpFirst">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
You could sense that their love was fresh and there
seemed to me to be a measure of relief about them, as if they had waited a long
time for one another; finally that loneliness - that long aching loneliness - was
over.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
You could almost read it in their faces: here is
someone who understands me; finally, someone who is actually interested in me –
just as much as I am interested in her.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
It’s a beautiful thing to see, this eagerness of
understanding.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
It’s no wonder that when we try to talk about how
God appearred on the earth, we describe him as “the Word.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Before
there ever was any Bible, we say; before there was even words, or writing, or
humans, we say there was the Word; as John’s Gospel says, “In the beginning was
the Word,” </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
and by word he didn’t mean a book; he meant this
sacred potential for understanding; this promise of comprehension.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s this thing that happens between souls, when
they are leaning across a table touching foreheads; or leaning, maybe, across a
universe; this Word with a capital “W”; this promise of perfect understanding
and of being perfectly understood.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We
long for understanding so deeply that when it comes time to talk about God living
among us, we call him the Word.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He does
what words do, except perfectly: He connects us to one another; and when that
happens, we talk about God.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Lately I’ve been aware at how deeply we long for
this Word; for this connection.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’ve
been noticing how often I find myself in a room with someone and we’re both
leaning forward, foreheads almost touching, drinking in understanding. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Right
now we have two beloved parishioners who have come to terms with the fact that
they are dying.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You walk into the room of
someone who has reached this understanding; you sit beside them and they
eagerly take your hand, and your eyes lock, and it’s like entering a cave
filled with treasure, overflowing with gold coins and pearls and jewels: they
want you to have it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Here is my life,
they say; my precious life.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Here are all
of my memories; all of my stories; my loves, my children; my hopes, my regrets,
my achievements – mostly just my stories.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Take it, they say; take this treasure.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Understand it, put it in your pocket and share it with others.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
In their eyes there is in their eyes a universe of
meaning that they are trying to convey. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Whenever I visit someone in the hospital, or the
nursing home, or a homeless person, or someone in prison, there is this longing
for connection.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This level openness that
you don’t see so much in everyday life; and people are saying things they maybe
never would say if they weren’t so opened up by their circumstances; so aware
of the desire to be understood, and to understand.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Which is why I think Jesus said, in Matthew 25, if
you are looking for him, go visit someone in prison; go to the poor and listen
to what they have to say; go to the hospital and hold someone’s hand.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s where you’ll find him: the living Word.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
In the language of the church, this is what we
call pastoral care.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And it’s not just
something priests do.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is something
we are all called to do.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We have trained
pastoral care visitors, and we would like to train more people for this
ministry of presence.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And whether we are
trained for it or not, whether we represent the church in this ministry or just
ourselves, we are all called into that level of relationship.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As our loved ones fall into trouble, and we
run to the hospital bed to be by their side, and see them reach out their hand
from the hospital bed, asking for connection – we take it..<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
And when we are there, foreheads tilting forward, prayers
and words of love being spoken, we know that we didn’t decide to be there; we
were led there – by the Spirit of that Word, we were led to that bedside.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We’re like two magnets, who once they are
within a certain range of one another, an invisible force draws them together.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We call this the work of the Holy Spirit.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
We do that enough times and then we begin to see
every relationship in those terms: we begin to trust that Spirit more and more;
we let the Spirit draw us into deeper connection with everyone in our lives –
our spouse or partner, our neighbor, our children.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Suddenly life seems too short to push those
relationships aside; suddenly the Spirit is drawing us into more truth telling,
more intimacy, more revelation of God’s Word.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
And that’s when we begin to live a Spirit-filled
life.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We begin to have the conversations
that some people only have on their death beds.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>We decide not to wait for disease to open us up to one another – we
choose to live our lives on a more authentic level.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
And that’s when the miracles start to happen –
because then the Spirit takes over; the Spirit draws people of the Spirit
together; the Spirit brings us into new relationships and new connections that
are life-giving to us.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
And that is how we find ourselves here.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
We didn’t decide to come to church; we might have
thought at the time that we were making the decision but in reality we were
drawn together by the Spirit.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And as we
continue to open ourselves to this Spirit and this Word, we find the Spirit
drawing us together in new ways</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
and a new kind of community begins to emerge; </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
a community of care;</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
a community of connection; </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
a community of mutual vulnerability and trust </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
and deep love;</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
a love that has its Source not in ourselves, but
in the Spirit that flows among us; that deep well; that living water.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
We all drink from that well like thirsty camels.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpLast">
This is the water that Jesus was talking about in
John’s gospel, as he encountered that Samaritan woman – that person so
different from him – such a gulf between them, of culture, language, religion,
gender, politics – and yet there they were, leaning toward one another, led by
the Spirit:</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpLast">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacingCxSpFirst">
"...Those who drink of the water that I
will give them will never be thirsty. The water that I will give will become in
them a spring of water gushing up to eternal life." </div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacingCxSpLast">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpFirst">
And that’s how this crazy religion was born, on
this day of Pentecost so many centuries ago, when all of a sudden, just as
Jesus predicted,<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>a disparate group of
people, representing all the different nations and cultures and languages of
the known world, leaned in together, made themselves vulnerable to the presence
of the Holy Spirit; breathed in the Word of God, and became what we call
Christians.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpFirst">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
And in that moment, everything that separated us
was overcome.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The curse from the Tower
of Babel was lifted; finally our universal language was found again; finally
our great long loneliness was lifted; and we became like those young lovers I
saw at the restaurant; fools in love with God and one another; drinking in that
universal language of love.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Pray that we will continue to let the Spirit lead
us into ever deeper relationships; pray that we will continue to listen to
God’s Word, spoken at the depth of our hearts; pray that we continue to seek to
understand, as we are understood, with open hearts and minds.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Amen.</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-911438992280535416.post-69523025626402059082013-05-02T16:58:00.003-07:002013-05-02T16:59:36.757-07:00"What's up with the Holy Spirit?"<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<br />
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpFirst">
Easter 5, Year C</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
April 28, 2013</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="text-indent: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="text-indent: 0in;">
<span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>I’ve been gone for a couple weeks; I was in Minnesota for
a week to see the family, and then I attended a Strategic Planning Conference
in Cincinnati with 3 other of our parishioners, where we learned how to develop
a strategic plan for this congregation.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Very
exciting.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>More about that a little
later. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And it’s good to be back.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="text-indent: 0in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="text-indent: 0in;">
The other day I was sitting in one of my favorite
restaurants - the Chinese place on 4th Street.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>It has windows that face out onto the street and a little courtyard
where there are often a few homeless folks hanging out.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I was sitting there drinking tea and watching
the folks come and go on the street; the waiter had just come by and put a
plate of chicken and prawns in a ginger plum sauce in front of me; and as I
said my prayer and prepared to eat my lunch, I watched as two elderly men -
they must have been 70 years old or so - wandered into the courtyard.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They seemed to be good friends; and they
looked fairly respectable, clean and sober.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I watched as they went<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>to the
trash container and as one guy held up the lid, the other guy reached in and started
rummaging around.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He pulled out a couple
of empty soda cans, which he handed to his friend, who put them into a bag, and
then he pulled out half a sandwich, inspected it, sniffed it, and then broke it
in two and shared it with his friend.
</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
A few days later I was reading in the Press
Democrat about how that big development project for Railroad Square had
died.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It started out as a grand vision
of renewal for RR Square - a $182 million project - in the words of the
article, a "transit-oriented and pedestrian-friendly mixed-use development
that would include a food-and-wine center, a 10,000-square-foot retail center
modeled after the Ferry Building in San Francisco, and low-income and
market-rate housing."<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The article
talked about how, when the recession hit, and then politics entered in, the
project got scaled back more and more, until last week all that was left was a
development for low-income housing for seniors.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>And so the news was that that project had just been scuttled as well.</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
The Press Democrat wrote an editorial about this,
in which they said that it was too bad the project was terminated because
"It would have provided jobs [and] an infusion of government funding in
the local economy..."</div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
I agreed with this, but I also thought it was kind
of odd that nowhere in the editorial or in the news article, which was filled
with quotes from politicians and business people, were any low-income seniors
interviewed, or anyone representing low-income seniors.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I thought about those two elderly gentlemen,
and wondered what they might have said about the lack of decent affordable
housing for seniors in this area.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I
thought about the women who find shelter here at the Living Room, and the folks
who come here for breakfast on Sunday; I tried to do a quick estimate as to how
many of them are seniors, and realized it was probably about a third to a
half.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
And yet it never seemed to occur to anyone to
discuss this issue from <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">their</i> point
of view on this issue.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
It's amazing how your point of view changes
depending on who you talk to.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
This morning we hear this great story about Peter
in the book of Acts which is an illustration of this whole thing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s a story about how he had a vision that
told him it was okay to start eating non-kosher foods; and about how the
disciples in Jerusalem heard about this, and they heard about how Peter had
been seen eating with Gentiles - and so they called him to Jerusalem and had a
little talk with him.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It's like he'd
been called down to the principal's office.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
They want to know: "Why did you go to
uncircumcised men and eat with them?"<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Because of course for “respectable” Jews at that time, even to sit down
at table with Gentiles was strictly forbidden.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>And so this reading is Peter's explanation as to why he did it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
This is a very small section of a much longer
story - in fact, it might be the longest single story in the book of Acts,
stretching from the end of Chapter 9 to the middle of Chapter 11.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It's worth reading the whole story -
especially when we know that when a story is that long, it's probably pretty
important to the author.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Without going into all the details of the story,
it all comes down to this wonderful moment when Peter is told by the Holy Spirit
to follow these guys who come looking for him, who take him to the house of a
Gentile - a centurion in fact.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When
Peter walks into the house, he finds that it's filled with the centurion's
family and friends - a huge assembly of people - who have gathered at the
centurion's request to hear what Peter has to say.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And the second Peter walks into the room he
says, basically, "Wait a minute.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I
can't be here.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I'm not supposed to be
hanging out with you people."</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
But somehow the Holy Spirit keeps him engaged in
the relationship; the centurion begs him to stay and talk to them; Peter says,
well, okay, I'll give them my stump sermon - which is the sermon that he's
given a million times to his Jewish brothers and sisters - and to his amazement
the Holy Spirit comes upon the assembly of Gentiles.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Up until that point, apparently, it never
occurred to Peter that Gentiles could be seized by the same Holy Spirit that he
has been dealing with.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But after that
experience, he realizes that all this time, he has been the problem - he, and
his religious tradition - and that never again would he accept as a given what
his tradition says about clean and unclean.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
It's amazing what happens when people from
different walks of life start listening to and talking to one another.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
It’s good to remember that – unless we come from
100% Jewish families, at some point we were all considered outsiders and
unclean.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In Peter’s time, the thinking
was that Gentiles could be included only if they entered the community entirely
on the terms of Jewish tradition.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Circumcision, kosher dietary laws, dress, grooming, worship, all had to
conform to Jewish custom.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This was
simply assumed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And then this liberating
thought occurred – first to Paul, and then to Peter: hold on!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It seems that, under Jesus, all things are
being made new. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It seems that under
Jesus, there is a new heaven and a new earth.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>No thing and no person in God's creation is unclean - "What God has
made clean, you must not call profane."<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Which is why the next banner that’s gonna hang on
that banner out in front of our church is the one that’s going to say, “ALL are
welcome…. no exceptions!”</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
What I love about this is that Peter doesn't
understand what is happening, but he trusts in the moment; and when they ask him
to speak, he speaks his truth; and when it’s time for him to listen, he listens
carefully and deeply.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And that’s when
the Holy Spirit descends on them; that’s when everything they thought they knew
is turned upside down; that’s when everything that we take for granted: that we
are included in the kingdom of God – that’s when that idea first occurred to
anyone.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The idea that God’s love
extends even to us outsiders; us unclean Gentiles.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That God’s love is so vast that it extends
even to us.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Peter’s like, I don't understand this - I don't even
think I <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">approve</i> of this - but it seems
I've been led to this place and I need to be open to what God is trying to
accomplish.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
I know how Peter felt.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As I was going through this divorce process, I
was like, “I don’t understand this; I don’t even <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">approve</i> of this; I don’t even think this is right.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But I can’t say No to where the Holy Spirit
seems to be leading.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>All I can do is to
listen deeply, and speak my truth, and listen deeply, and speak my truth, and
listen some more… open to wherever it is that the Holy Spirit is leading me and
it’s amazing how the Holy Spirit enters into that dynamic.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
So as I said, 4 of us were there in Cincinnati, in
a beautiful airport hotel at the Strategic Planning Conference.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I think we all thought we’d go there, and
they’d give us a little checklist of things we needed to do so that we could
plan our future.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Of course, you know what they say, if you want to
make God laugh, make some plans.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
But, when we got there we found out that actually what
the whole thing was about was entering into sacred conversation with members of
the congregation and members of the community.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
And there’s no agenda behind this, except for the
idea that we’ve been hearing from a number of people in this congregation that we’ve
reached this point, where either we’re going to continue to grow, in which case
things have got to be done differently, or we’re going to fall back on old
patterns and our membership will decline because we’re unable to incorporate
new growth.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So it raises all sorts of
questions about how we can learn how to do things differently, so that what we’re
experiencing now is not a ceiling on our capacity for growth, but rather the
floor from which we can grow further and further.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>How do we accomplish that?</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
It seems to be all about the same thing Peter
discovered this morning, which is to be listening deeply and speaking our
truth.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And so this is a process that’s
going to be going on for about a year, as we engage the congregation and the
wider community on some of the big questions that need answered in our life
together.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What are the big questions
that are going to drive our life together over the next 10 years?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It will be a beautiful and revelatory
discussion, I’m sure. </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Nothing new.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>We’ve been doing it in this church for 2,000 years; we’ve been doing it
in this congregation forever; and it’s just going to continue.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Because the Holy Spirit works that way; and
that’s how we learn “What’s up” with the Holy Spirit.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
So I ask your prayers on that, and continue to
come to this place with open hearts and minds, and praise God for the
incredible blessings of this community.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Amen.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-911438992280535416.post-46900237184098816702013-04-08T15:32:00.001-07:002013-05-02T17:00:04.122-07:00Doubting Thomas Has His Day<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<![endif]--><span style="font-family: "Georgia","serif";">Second Sunday in Easter</span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
<span style="font-family: "Georgia","serif";">April 7, 2013 </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
<span style="font-family: "Georgia","serif";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>It happens just about every day.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We, or someone we love, goes through a trial
or an affliction almost too terrible to bear.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>A job is lost; <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>a marriage breaks
apart; there’s a car accident; a bad diagnosis; a death…<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We watch loved ones endure weeks and months of
suffering; we read the newspaper and hear about unspeakably more suffering; and
the question is asked: “Where is God in all this?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
<span style="font-family: "Georgia","serif";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>It’s a fair question.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Georgia","serif";">And so we turn to the church and we ask
our priest, “What, exactly, are we supposed to believe?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Who could possibly be led to believe there’s
God in any of this?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What risen
Jesus?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What are you talking about?”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Georgia","serif";">And so the questions emerge.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Doubting Thomas has his day.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Georgia","serif";">We might as well call this the Feast Day
of St. Thomas – because it’s on this day, every year – the Sunday after Easter Sunday
– when we hear the story of this skeptical apostle who needs proof of the
resurrection before he will believe.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Georgia","serif";">St. Thomas has gotten a bum rap through
the centuries but his question is neither petulant nor arrogant; it is a plea
for simple evidence.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Thomas is ahead of
his time – he’s an empiricist.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He
believes in things that can be seen and observed and tested.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He wants proof.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In that respect he’s no different than the
rest of us – except in one very important respect.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Unlike the rest of us, Thomas actually gets
the proof he’s looking for.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The risen
Christ actually does appear to him and answers all his questions.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Georgia","serif";">Lucky for him.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Georgia","serif";">“Blessed are those who believe, and have NOT
seen.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That line was written for us –
the rest of us, still waiting in that upper room, sometimes left there, it
feels, all alone, with our doubts.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Georgia","serif";">And all we want to know is this: what,
dear God, do you want us to believe?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What
set of beliefs will make this cancer go away?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Give me something to believe in that will spare my child.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Just tell me what to believe that will make
this pain go away, and I’ll do it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’ll
believe.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Georgia","serif";">We’re like the father of the epileptic
boy in Mark’s Gospel (Mark 9).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>His son
is having a grand mal seizure as Jesus approaches; he cries out to Jesus, “If
you are able to do anything, help us!”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Jesus is insulted.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What do you
mean, “If?” he says.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“All things can be
done for the one who believes." And the father is desperate and frightened
and cries out, "I believe; help my unbelief!"</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Georgia","serif";"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I
hear it over the phone, and I hear it in hospital rooms and in my office: Just
tell me what to believe that will make this burden easier to bear.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And make it true.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
<span style="font-family: "Georgia","serif";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>The ancient doctrines of the church
say that belief is a gift of the Holy Spirit.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>It’s not something you can reason yourself toward; it’s something that
comes to you through prayer and the leap of faith.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Which, for some of us, might not be good
news.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Some of us would quite naturally
prefer reason, which has proven very reliable over the years and has things like
rules and logic on its side, as opposed to some invisible and mysterious force that’s
widely known to be rather fickle at times, blowing where it will and so-forth.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Georgia","serif";">I know of many good people who have
earnestly prayed for belief and have never received it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The central character in Marilynne Robinson’s
novel,<u> Home</u>, is like that.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Jack
spends his life surrounded by good, happily believing Christians, and the whole
time he feels like an outsider – the only guy at the party who doesn’t work in
the same office.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He would like to
believe – in fact, his life is a huge disaster and he knows that belief would
help him – but he just can’t bring himself to believe all the old stories, and
he can’t figure out what it could possibly mean to say you believe in something
you actually don’t. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Georgia","serif";">And then there are people like my dad,
who, like many Episcopalians, loves church but has always thought belief in
things like the Nicene Creed was more or less optional, and who wasn’t about to
renounce his scientific mind in favor of a 4<sup>th</sup> century universe.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So when it’s time to say the Nicene Creed, he
stands with everyone else, with great respect, but won’t say a thing.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
<span style="font-family: "Georgia","serif";"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Belief is not easy – especially in
our day and age.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is hard to know what
is required and what, if any, form of belief is even possible.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Georgia","serif";">Those among us who are in no mind for
confusion on this score may not be comforted by the hundreds of scholarly books
and theological papers about all this; but still I would encourage anyone with an
interest to explore the book <u>Beyond Belief</u> by Elaine Pagels.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Her book is an examination of the Gnostic
Gospel of Thomas - a gospel which, like the Gospel of Judas, never made it into
the Bible, and which, indeed, was declared heretical in the 2<sup>nd</sup> and
3<sup>rd</sup> centuries, when all copies were rounded up and burned.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is only because a few monks at Nag Hammadi
hid their heretical library in big clay jars and sealed them up and stored them
in a cave, where they were discovered in 1945, that we have these texts at
all.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Georgia","serif";">This is a good thing, I think – to have
access to these important early gospels – but it is also yet another source of
confusion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Now that we’ve got these
Gnostic gospels back, it’s even more difficult to figure out what we’re
supposed to believe.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Georgia","serif";">It’s exactly this spiritual confusion
that the church fathers were hoping to avoid.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I mean, I’m not defending them, necessarily, but when we are howling
with grief and looking for a faith that will get us through the night, the last
thing we want is confusion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But then
again, by trying to protect us from confusion, maybe the church Fathers underestimated
our capacity for faith in the midst of doubt.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Georgia","serif";">The problem that developed with the rise
of Gnosticism in the early church was that all these communities sprang up,
each of them claiming to have this special knowledge of God, but none of them
agreeing with each other; each of these communities completely convinced that
they had the truth unlike anyone else; and that all the other communities were
in error and were children of the devil; and none of them having anything to
point to for their authority except for some gospels that they wrote themselves
in the name of various figures in the original gospel stories… and their own
direct revelations, which were very compelling but also rather idiocyncratic.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Georgia","serif";">And so Christianity reached this breaking
point – either it would splinter into endlessly varied little spiritual
communities that could agree on nothing; or it would come together around a
common set of beliefs and survive as a single religion.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Georgia","serif";">Anyway, all of this is very interesting
but doesn’t necessarily help us get to our main point.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Because the fundamental issue of belief will
never go away with the wave of any theologian’s wand: how can I believe in God,
when I’ve just been diagnosed with Stage 4 cancer?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>How can I believe in God after reading about the
refugees in Syria?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>How can I believe in
God when suicide bombers kill in the name of God?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Georgia","serif";">None of those questions will ever be
resolved by theologians; because the more important question is not <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">what</i> to believe, but <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">whether </i>to believe.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>These questions can only be resolved deeply,
within your heart, in the place within you that only you and God can find; in
that room that only you and God have the key to; in that place of your deepest
and most intimate secrets and longings.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Georgia","serif";">I think you know the room I’m talking
about.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s the place you go to at
night, just before you drop off to sleep; it’s the place you go to when your
feelings are hurt; it’s the place you got to when you’re most lonely; it’s the
place you go to when you’re afraid you will die; or when you’re not sure there’s
a good reason to live.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Georgia","serif";">That’s the place we go to, in
prayer.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s not a place where reason
dominates the discussion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s a place
where the soul has a voice – but the voice of the soul is not always the sound
of a voice; the soul might sound more like a song; or like a magnetic force; or
like a quiet yearning.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And sometimes,
when we go to that place, and we can quiet our own thoughts down to a low hum, it
might sound like the sound of someone listening.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Georgia","serif";">Prayer begins there – in that still,
quiet room, where we realize we are not alone.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The presence we feel there might not be saying anything, but we sense
its presence.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Georgia","serif";">It’s like the upper room where the
disciples were all meeting.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>At first
there’s a lot of commotion and noise; there are opinions flying around, everyone’s
talking; there’s a lot of fear and anxiety in the air.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Georgia","serif";">But then we give it time; the room quiets
down.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The fear dissipates.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The many voices grow quiet.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And we find ourselves asking our one
question; we find ourselves getting down to the truth of it all.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And then we grow quieter still; and we realize:
someone is listening.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There is a
presence in the room.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s as if Jesus has
just walked through the wall.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Georgia","serif";">That’s when all of our questions, which
up to that point seemed perfectly reasonable and very important, go flying out
the room.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Because here he is.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And in the face of his presence, we fall to
our knees, and we have nothing to say but “My God!”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Georgia","serif";">And that’s the place where prayer really
begins.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s the place where “I want I
want I want” gives way to the deeper heart of prayer, which is basically
expressed in the first few words of any prayer in this prayer book: “Oh. My.
God!”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Georgia","serif";">That’s the place where worship really begins.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And that’s the place where belief really
begins.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s the only place where
things like the Nicene Creed make any real sense.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Georgia","serif";">None of us are alone.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Jesus has been with us, all along, in that
room.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Listening.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Waiting.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Silently guiding us in ways we never knew.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Georgia","serif";">He is here, even now, speaking words of
peace and love.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He is holding out his
hands; he is saying, “Touch me and see: I am risen.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 200%; text-indent: .5in;">
<span style="font-family: "Georgia","serif";">Amen.</span></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-911438992280535416.post-77100684210542168182012-12-28T17:55:00.002-08:002012-12-28T17:55:30.894-08:00Christmas Eve Sermon<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<br />
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpFirst">
Sermon preached Christmas Eve, 2012</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpFirst">
Episcopal Church of the Incarnation </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpFirst">
Santa Rosa, CA</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpFirst">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpFirst">
Many of us are familiar, I’m sure, with the
beautiful story of Silent Night – about how, on Christmas Eve, 1914, in the first
winter of World War I, some German soldiers began singing their version of
Silent Night, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Stille Nacht, </i>and about
how the British soldiers, not a hundred yards away, joined in on the singing,
and pretty soon British and German soldiers, who just a few hours earlier had
been shooting at each other, were belting out Christmas carols together. </div>
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"></span><div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
And you have perhaps heard, then, how, as their
courage was made strong by their singing, they began to climb out of their
trenches and calling out to the other side, “Don’t shoot! We won’t shoot
either!” and pretty soon soldiers from both sides were meeting in the middle of
no man’s land, shaking hands, exchanging souvenirs and delicacies like Bavarian
ham and English cigarettes.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Pretty soon
someone brought out a soccer ball, and within moments a hilarious soccer game
was under way</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
One British private, serving in the 2<sup>nd</sup>
Queens Regiment, wrote home about his experience:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“It was a beautiful moonlit night, frost on
the ground, white almost everywhere; and about 7 or 8 in the evening there was
a lot of commotion in the German trenches and there were these lights -I don't
know what they were. And then they sang "Silent Night" - "Stille
Nacht." I shall never forget it, it was one of the highlights of my life.
I thought, what a beautiful tune.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
It’s a beautiful story, made even more beautiful
by the fact that it is true, and well-documented by letters sent home from the
front. </div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What is slightly
less well known is how this was not just a single incident involving just a few
dozen men.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>According to the New York
Times, over 100,000 soldiers participated in these spontaneous outbursts of peace
on that day, stretching all along the front.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>In one case, it was “Silent Night” that inspired the truce; in another,
it was “O Come All Ye Faithful” – the Germans replied with the Latin version –
Adeste Fidelis.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Nor is it commonly appreciated, I think, just how
frightening it was for those first few soldiers as they stepped out of the
protection of their trenches.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>One German
Captain wrote about this in a letter home: <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“I shouted to our enemies that we didn't wish
to shoot and that we make a Christmas truce. I said I would come from my side
and we could speak with each other. First there was silence, then I shouted
once more, invited them, and the British shouted `No shooting!’ Then a man came
out of the trenches and I on my side did the same and so we came together and
we shook hands - a bit cautiously!”</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Nor do we hear much about how enraged the generals
became when they heard about this.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The
commander for the British troops, Gen. Sir Horace Smith-Dorrien, wrote, “I have
issued the strictest orders that on no account is [this fraternizing] to be
allowed between the opposing troops. To finish this war quickly, we must keep
up the fighting spirit and do all we can to discourage friendly [exchange].”</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Apparently it never occurred to the general that
perhaps the war might be finished more quickly, and more honorably, if the
soldiers were allowed to follow their more natural inclination, which was to
exchange gifts rather than bullets.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
The famous Christmas Truce of 1914 has become something
of a real-life endorsement of that famous bumper sticker, “What if they gave a
war and nobody came?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Or, in the words of the prophet Isaiah, “Nation
will not take up sword against nation, nor will they train for war anymore…”</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
By the time Christmas Eve rolled around a year
later, the generals were ready; they made sure no more spontaneous outbreaks of
the Christmas Spirit would be tolerated.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>They threatened the front line officers with courts-martial, rotated
troops to keep them on the move, and ordered artillery barrages to prevent
anyone from raising their heads above the trenches.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Nonetheless,
it is known that a few artillery companies intentionally aimed their cannons
away from the troops, making it possible for a few gift exchanges and
spontaneous soccer games to break out.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
By the time the third Christmas of the war came
around, each side was so exhausted and dispirited by the war, and so thoroughly
convinced of the inhumanity of the other side, that there was little danger of further
Christmas truces.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
But one wonders: what if they had been able to
sing Silent Night every day, and not just on Christmas Eve?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What if all the generals had been unable to stop
the singing of Silent Night?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What if
Silent Night had been ringing in every soldier’s heart, not just that one night,
but every night of the war?</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
The other day a friend of mine prevailed upon me
to sit through a Lord of the Rings Marathon; and I have to say it was time well
spent – a spiritual experience, really.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>One especially striking scene was near the end.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Frodo and Sam are trying, with their very
last ounce of strength, to get through Mordor and to Mount Doom, where Frodo
will try to drop the Ring into the pit where it will be destroyed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But they are absolutely exhausted; Frodo is
fitfully sleeping and whimpering and shivering from the cold and exhaustion;
that’s when Sam sees a break in the clouds – it’s the first sign of light since
they entered the evil country.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A couple
of stars twinkle as the clouds break, and Sam says, “Mr. Frodo!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Look!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>There is light!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Beauty up there –
that no shadow can touch.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
It made me think of the times in my own life when I
felt lost, and at the end of my rope, and beyond saving, only to see a star, or
a sunrise, or the smile of a friend, or a simple gesture of kindness – and that’s
all I’ve needed to find the strength to carry on.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
It makes me think, on this dark and cold light, of
the star that hung over Bethlehem, and of the stars that shined over that
battlefield nearly a hundred years ago, giving those wretched soldiers the
courage to speak words of peace and of love.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
It reminds me to keep an eye out for that star,
each day – for in the midst of darkness and grief, there is light.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A light to enlighten the nations.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Prince of Peace.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
A member of our congregation has a daughter who
teaches school in New Town, Connecticut – thank God, a different school than
the one that was attacked so terribly last week.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A few days ago she wrote to her mother and her
friends about what it’s been like.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>After
describing poignant scenes of grief and unspeakable loss, she says, There is “good
that’s come out of this…, [in] the outpouring of love felt by people
worldwide.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Comfort items like blankets,
quilts, stuffed animals, and books have been pouring in at a rate that has
overwhelmed those coordinating.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>People
are sending and want to send money, not only to help the families directly
affected, but also the people in town.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>There have been accounts of people calling from across the country to
give their credit card numbers to our little General Store, with instructions
to pay for every cup of coffee purchased and other gestures like that.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Flowers, wreaths, candles and even 26
Christmas trees have been sent and placed at memorial gathering places.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The love and grief of the world has been
felt.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I can’t describe the sheer numbers
of people who have come from places near and far to care for our townspeople.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The resources are amazing and they all seem
to know just how to help and what to do – especially as we felt paralyzed the
first few days….”</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Events like this remind us that for every sick
murderous psychopath bent on destruction, there is an army of good soldiers
singing “Silent Night” – the world is full of so many more people willing to
sacrifice and work hard for the good of all, so as to completely overwhelm and
outnumber the few who seek to do harm.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When
we know how to be helpful, we help.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Silent Night is being sung, every day.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The star that gives hope to us all is shining
in the darkness – and the darkness does not overcome it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Many churches, on the one week anniversary of New
Town, tolled their bells 26 times to honor the 26 children and educators who
were killed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But at the National
Cathedral in Washington, DC – which is an Episcopal Church, I’m proud to say –
the bell was tolled 28 times.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Because
the killer and his mother were also human beings who deserve our prayers.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For as Jesus taught us, what good is it if we
pray only for those who deserve our prayers, or only for those whom we like, or
approve of.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That is not God’s way; that
is not the way of the Christ.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Jesus came
to this world to set a new standard for love – that we cross the battle lines
of division and enmity; that we climb out of our trenches; that we love our
enemies and pray for those who persecute us.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
We who are gathered here tonight follow a god whose
purpose was to simple: to love, without exception; and to meet every person who
would do him harm with an open heart and an invitation to love.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
It is this love – this Silent Night kind of love –
to which the world has responded.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We are
here tonight because we know that no one is perfectly good, or perfectly evil,
and no one is beyond the reach of God’s love.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Today as I was scanning through Facebook I found
this post by a member of our congregation:</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
"On Friday, I stopped at a local Santa Rosa
restaurant to have lunch while doing some misc. Christmas shopping. When I
tried to pay for my lunch, I was told that a person at another table had paid
for my lunch. She had already left, but it was apparently a regular customer
for years who picks someone at random each year and buys their meal. So...
feeling like I wanted to extend the Christmas spirit, later in the day, I paid
for a few people behind me at the Starbuck's drive-up. The woman at the window
told me there were many gestures of this type during the Christmas season and
she gave me a coupon for a free beverage. Today, I drove through to use my free
coupon but was told the person in front of me had bought my latte for me. So...
I used the coupon to pay for the person behind me.............”</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Seems like this Silent Night love is breaking out
all over the place.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It seems like you
can’t even buy a cup of coffee in this world without someone buying it for
you!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s a Silent Night kind of
love.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Would that it were being sung
every day.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Maybe, if we choose, it could
be.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Maybe, if we make this our prayer;
maybe, if we hold hands and open our hearts and look for the star that is
beyond all shadow, we will find the strength within ourselves to be messengers
of that love.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Maybe, if
we believe it can be so, we, too, can be bearers of that light and that
love.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s what this church believes
is true.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>May it be true for you, this
Christmas night, and for all the nights that await us.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Because good hearts, open to the light of
Christ, can work miracles.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
May it be so.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Amen.</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-911438992280535416.post-49873135930336596432012-12-03T15:15:00.003-08:002013-05-02T17:01:46.230-07:00On New Sleds and Other Purposes for Prayer<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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The podcast for this sermon can be listened to by going to this link:</div>
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<a href="http://www.incarnation-sr.org/" target="_blank">http://www.incarnation-sr.org</a></div>
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<br /></div>
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"What Are We Waiting For?"</div>
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Sermon preached the First Sunday of Advent</div>
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December 2, 2012</div>
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I have a friend from High School back in Minnesota who
emailed me a few of weeks ago to tell me the doctors had found a mass of some
sort on one of her ovaries.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They poked
at her and took some scans and samples, and then sent her home to wait for the
results.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Those few days of waiting
seemed like weeks.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Finally, they called;
the tests were inconclusive; they asked her to come in for another set of
tests.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That took a few more days of waiting
for the appointment, after which they told her they’d get back to her in a few
days with the results.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>More
waiting.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A few days seemed like a month.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Then they called to say they thought the lump
was a benign cyst but now they were concerned about some abnormal growth of cells
in her uterus.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Could she come in for more tests?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She’s waiting for that appointment now.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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And so it goes.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>She said she’s learning a whole new way of living while waiting.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And of waiting while living.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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Of course, to an outside observer, her life seems
pretty much the same.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She still goes to
work; she still enjoys travel; she continues to feed the cat and water the
plants as per usual.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But on the inside,
everything is different – especially time: how it passes, where it goes, where
it leads. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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Many years ago, Patricia Moore preached an Advent
sermon that I’ll always remember.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She
said when you’re on a road trip, driving down a lonely highway in the middle of
the night, and the low fuel light comes on, you don’t necessarily panic, but
you do find yourself paying more attention to the signs along the highway.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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These are the themes of Advent: sacred waiting.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Waiting, while living, and breathing, and
paying attention.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And I suppose the big question is this: what
are we waiting for?</div>
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So many of us are waiting for something.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Sometimes we live as if our lives haven’t yet
started – as if we can’t really live until we get that diagnosis, or get that
job, or meet that right person, or make it through this busy time.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>My friend, waiting to hear the news from her
doctor, is beginning to ask the question: am I waiting to hear if I’m going to
live?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Or am I waiting to hear that it’s
time to start living?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Or am I waiting to
hear what it is I’m living for?</div>
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Many of you have picked up this book, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Wisdom Distilled from the Daily</i> by Joan
Chittister, and have begun reading it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>This is our first attempt at encouraging the entire congregation to read
a book together, and to have a series of sermons that addressed the topics in
that book.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We’re hoping to do this a few
times a year – to give us all a common vocabulary, and a common experience, to
learn from one another and draw us into deeper connection.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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We chose this book after we did that survey a
while back, in which we asked you to tell us about the challenges you were
living with every day.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We heard about a
huge variety of challenges and concerns, from health and finances to loneliness
and depression to concerns about the kids and the parents and the future – and so
it seemed to us that a good starting place would be not to talk about each of
these challenges, one at a time, but rather to begin by concentrating on the thing
that gets us through any challenge; that aspect of life that strengthens us in
our core; gives us the ability to survive and to thrive when times get tough –
and that, of course, is our spiritual life.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Because when it comes right down to it, when the rubber hits the road
and the chips are down and our backs are against the wall and we’re between a
rock and a hard place and we’ve completely run out of clichés – it’s our spiritual
life that gets us through.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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It’s our spiritual life that answers the questions
“What are we waiting for?” and “What are we living for?” </div>
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One thing I like about this book is that she’s talking
about a spirituality, if you will, for the rest of us.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is not a spirituality that retreats from
the world – rather, it’s a spirituality that engages the world.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s all about living more fully, more
consciously, in the world that we inhabit.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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I doubt anyone would be surprised that when it comes
right down to it, it all turns on the quality of our listening: are we listening
closely to our lives?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Are we listening
for God’s voice?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Are we listening to our
own voice?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Are we listening to anyone?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And, ultimately, that capacity to listen takes
us to the question of our prayer life.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>When we forget to pray, or think we’re too busy to pray, she says, </div>
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"…we have begun the last trip down a very short
road because without prayer, the energy for the rest of life runs down.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The fuel runs out.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We become our own worst enemies: we call
ourselves too tired and too busy to pray when, in reality, we are too tired and
too busy not to pray.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Eventually, the
burdens of the day wear us down and we no longer remember why we decided to do
what we’re doing: work for this project, marry this woman, have these children,
minister in this place.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And if I cannot
remember why I decided to do this, I cannot figure out how I can go on with
it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I am tired and the vision just gets
dimmer and dimmer."</div>
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(p. 31-32)</div>
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Now, here’s the thing: how many of us, I wonder,
get rather uncomfortable with this kind of talk?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I have to confess that I, for one, am always
feeling pretty insecure about the quality of my prayer life.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I always feel that I should be praying more;
I always wrestle with my lack of discipline – actually, that’s not exactly
accurate.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If I were more disciplined, I
would wrestle with my lack of discipline.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>As it is, I just confess that it could be better.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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The truth is I’m kind of sensitive about this
topic.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So whenever someone who is
obviously far more spiritual than I am – a Benedictine nun, for example –
starts talking about the importance of prayer, I immediately start feeling
inadequate.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I have this image in my head
of the devoted contemplative priest – the wise old man who rises before dawn,
sits with his Bible for an hour, and then puts the Bible aside and lifts his
heart in prayer for another hour, and then spends another hour writing
incredibly warm and profound letters to people, so that by the time he hits the
shower and gets dressed he is practically glowing with piety and wisdom.</div>
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I don’t know if I’ll ever have a life like
that.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But something inside me says that’s
the person I should be.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And the sad
thing is that there have been times in my life when I have had a discipline
exactly like that – and the thing is that in the short term, it turned me into
a smug, holier-than-thou priest who just couldn’t resist letting people know exactly
how much prayer and Bible study I had done that morning.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There’s really nothing quite so tiresome as a
person who is proud of his spiritual life.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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Well, the refreshing thing about Chittister’s book
is that she has no use for that kind of spirituality.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She says, “I pray to become a better human
being, not to become better at praying.” (p.37) <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And while she reminds us that it’s important
to set aside a certain time every day to pray, and to stick to it, she also
reminds us about what the point of prayer is.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Prayer is not about bribing God to give us what we want.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Prayer is about opening our own minds and
hearts to be transformed into the mind of Christ.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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For example, my prayer life probably began when I started
to beg God to give me a brand new candy-apple red sled for Christmas.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But then, when I didn’t get my brand new candy-apple
red sled for Christmas, I had the choice of abandoning prayer altogether as an
obvious waste of time, or considering the possibility that maybe there is
something else that prayer is for.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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Maybe through prayer, I could be given the grace
to accept my disappointment and forgive my parents for so obviously failing to
love me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Maybe, with further prayer, I
could be led to experience how grateful I am for the gifts I did receive.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And then, maybe, through prayer, I might become
more aware of how fleeting the pleasure of receiving gifts is, and how much
more satisfying it is to give than to receive.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Perhaps, if I’m praying correctly, I might become more aware of
the fact that most children in the world would be happy with a little bit of
candy, while I was greedily defining the exact shade of candy-apple red of my
new sled.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I might even find myself praying
that their needs get met first, before God grants me my desires.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I might even be given the grace to
rejoice in the gift of life, the gift of being itself, which permeates all of
creation and sings of the glory of God.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I might come to see that, in the end, prayer has nothing to do with getting
what I want, and has everything to do with growing into the man God would have
me be; it has to do with joyfully embracing this gift of the present moment –this
unrelenting, never failing, always fulfilling love of God, pouring out on the
whole of creation, every moment of every day.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Finally, perhaps, my prayer life might lead me to embrace and move into a
renewed sense of purpose for my life, which is to serve that love, sing that
love, let that love fill me and move through me and guide me through each
day.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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That, in the end, is what prayer is about.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And that’s just the beginning of this book by
Joan Chittister.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Next week we’ll explore
the topics raised up through Chapter 7; and we’ll invite the congregation into
a discussion during coffee hour.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If you
haven’t received a copy of the book yet, no worries, there will not be a test or
a grade.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The only test is the life we
are given – which is test enough – and our reward is not a letter grade, but a
renewed sense of joy and purpose in our lives.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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<br /></div>
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May this time of Advent be that for you – a time
of holy waiting, as we rediscover, together, what we are waiting for, and what
we are living for.</div>
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<br /></div>
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Amen.</div>
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<br /></div>
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<br /></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-911438992280535416.post-51943107035277513032012-10-14T19:33:00.000-07:002012-10-14T19:33:47.878-07:00Sermon preached October 14, 2012<br />
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<br />
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Proper 23 Year B</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
We have to begin by taking a moment to savor these
heart-rending words from the book of Job, and from the 22<sup>nd</sup>
Psalm.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I wonder if there are any among
us who can hear these wrenching words of suffering and complaint to God and not
be moved to pity: “My complaint is bitter,” Job says; “God’s hand is heavy
despite my groaning…”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In this reading Job
is giving voice to his deep feeling of abandonment by God: “If I go forward, he
is not there; or backward, I cannot perceive him; on the left he hides… I turn
to the right, but cannot behold him…”</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
I wonder if any of us can relate to that feeling
of being abandoned by God.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
That theme, of course, is repeated in Psalm 22,
the famous psalm quoted by Jesus as he hung on the cross: “My God, my God, why
have you forsaken me?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And are so far
from my cry, and from the words of my distress?”</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Who among us hasn’t felt that sense of abandonment
at some point in our lives?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I know I
have.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
You know, I think there are basically two kinds of
religion in this world.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There are the
religions who almost never let Job get a word in edgewise.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For those religions, our suffering is always only
temporary, and almost always our fault.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>If we only had a little more faith; if we only gave God a little more
credit; if we only gave the church a little more money – then God would swoop
in there and fix our problems and rescue us from our sense of abandonment.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
And then there are the religions – and these are
the more rare religions – that let Job speak his peace.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>These are the religions that acknowledge the
reality of suffering and don’t try to blame the victim for that suffering.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>These are the religions that respect the fact
that sometimes life is very very hard; and that there aren’t always magical
answers to our problems; that sometimes when we get sick, we stay sick, and
then we get sicker, and then after a long and heroic battle, we die; and that
death is not a sign of failure but rather the way in which nature replenishes
itself; these are the religions that understand suffering as an invitation to
come to terms with our mortality and our limits.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We don’t feel a need, as Job’s friends did,
to shut Job up.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Rather, we feel the need
to draw closer to Job; and hold him up when he feels faint; and rub his tired
muscles when he is sore; and wash his feet when he comes in from the road.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We see our suffering as something that draws
us together, rather than splits us apart; and as we care for one another in our
suffering, we discover the healing power of God, holding us close, deepening
our love, expanding our hearts.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
I’d like to think this church is that kind of
religion.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We live in prayer; we pray for
miracles, and we see them every day; but we don’t need miracles to know that
God exists.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Instead, we only need one
another.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
A few weeks ago, during the sermon time, we handed
around sheets of paper and asked each of you to tell us about your suffering:
what is the biggest real-world challenge facing you?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What keeps you up at night?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What do you worry about during the day?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And we asked, how are those challenges a
spiritual challenge to you, and what can we as a community do to support you as
you wrestle with that challenge.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Over the course of those 3 services that Sunday, we
collected 130 slips of paper. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As soon as
I got into the office that week, I read through all of them, in prayer; and it
was a very moving experience.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I want to
thank each of you for the honesty and sincerity of your replies.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
It probably won’t surprise you to learn that a lot
of us are worried about our health.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But
what I noticed was that most of us are more worried about someone else’s health
than we are about our own.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We worry
about our spouse or partner, or a parent, or a child.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Which just goes to show – sometimes our
suffering is harder on the ones we love than it is on us.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
We also found that many of us are burdened by
concerns about our closest relationships: our marriages are under strain, we
have difficulties with our children, we live with broken relationships that cry
out for forgiveness and reconciliation.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And
a number of us struggle with loneliness; the grief of losing a spouse or a partner;
trouble making friends and connections.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
But by far the number one concern – the issue that
came up more than any other issue – was, guess what?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Money.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Financial concerns.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It was truly
an eye opener for me to see just how many of us are worried about money.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This recession has kicked our butts.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Many of us have lost a lot of our retirement
savings; some of us are facing foreclosure or have gone through bankruptcy; and
just about all of us are feeling a major challenge feeling financially secure and
stable in this world.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
The Spiritual Formation committee is going to be
going over these results more systematically but one thing I think is obvious –
many of us could use some support around money.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
I remember once I was leading a Bible Study back
in Boston; we were looking at some of Jesus’ parables about money and I asked
the group if anyone there had a concern about money.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And
this fairly wealthy businessman said, Yeah, I’ve got a problem with money – my problem
is I don’t have enough of it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
A number of other folks nodded their heads at this;
someone even wondered why, while Jesus was out there multiplying the loaves and
fishes, he couldn’t have also multiplied the stocks and the bonds.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
But then we got into it on a deeper level, of
course, and we began to admit that the problem really had to do with our
relationship with money.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Now, this isn’t
to minimize or diminish the fact that many of us are dealing with very serious
financial problems.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Many of us in this
parish are deeply in debt, or genuinely poor.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>But even so, we also have to recognize that just about every person in
this room is better off than most of the people on the planet.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Most of us have seen enough of the rest of
the world to know that, as poor as we feel, we have so much more than most
people on earth.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Many of us have visited
third-world countries; we’ve been absolutely amazed at the generosity of the poor
people we’ve met there.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And yet we’re
the ones worrying about money far more than they are.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
This, of course, is one of the first signs of
wealth: as a general rule, the more money we have, the more we worry about
money.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The more we possess, the more our
possessions possess us. </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Nothing new there.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
So what’s the solution?</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
I used to think that my own anxiety around money
had to do with simply wanting the basics.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>All I want, I used to think, is to know that I’ve got a roof over my
head; if I just didn’t have to worry about losing my house, I’d be fine; and if
I could just be assured that I had 3 meals a day; and decent health insurance;
and, I don’t know, a cell phone that worked; and a wi-fi signal for my
computer; and a car that didn’t break down.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>That was it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Then I’d be happy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Oh, and maybe a pension plan.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And dental insurance.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That would be great.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And a bicycle.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Was that so much to ask, to have a bike to
ride around on?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And maybe, you know, a
little bit at the end of the week to maybe take in a movie and a pizza.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That would be it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Then I’d be happy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
And so it goes, right?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And every time we get a little bit more
money, there’s just one or two more things that seem perfectly reasonable to us
that would make us feel content.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
And so it goes; we’ve stepped onto the treadmill,
chasing after the illusion of security and happiness by means of material
possessions.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And it never ends.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Until one day we’re shelling out for the pool
boy and the gardener and the nanny and the butler and the second vacation home in
Provence and complaining about taxes and the price of caviar and never, ever feeling
secure.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
This is the problem with the rich young man in our
gospel reading.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The young man has come
to Jesus in his best velvet robe.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Pinned
to his cap is a jewel the size of an egg, gleaming in the sun.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But his eyes are troubled.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
"What must I do to inherit eternal
life?" he asks. He’s looking for eternal happiness; for the kind of bliss
and security that never fades away.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Jesus looks into the young man’s soft face.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He sees a good man; he’s not evil or wretched
or greedy – he’s like us – except richer.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>He follows the law, he loves God and his neighbor.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Isn't that enough?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Shouldn't that be enough?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What else could possibly be required?</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
But Jesus sees the deeper problem; and lays down
the ultimate challenge: "Sell everything you have, give the money to the
poor, and come, follow me."</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Jesus uses extreme examples in order to drive home
his point and emphasize his seriousness.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>It’s not that Jesus thinks poverty is such a swell deal everyone should
try it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s not that Jesus wants us all
to experience the joy of sleeping on sidewalks and begging for food – Jesus
doesn’t want that for us any more than he wants us to pluck out our eyes if
they cause us to sin.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
No, Jesus uses extreme teaching examples like that
to get our attention.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But he does want us
to understand this very important point: to the degree that our possessions
possess us, we are hiding from God.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>To
the degree that we continue to think that our happiness and our security
depends on having more stuff, we are lost to God. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
And the cure for that is to move in the opposite
direction.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Practice giving stuff
away.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Practice generosity.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Try being ridiculously generous and see how
it feels.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Get rid of all those things in
your life that you thought at one time you needed, only to find their glitter
fade and their appeal diminish the moment you possess them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Step off the treadmill, Jesus says.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Discover the joy of giving; give, and
experience the freedom that comes from not being owned by your
possessions.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Live simply, and discover
the joy of the earth’s abundance, the true security that comes from living in
balance with God and with nature.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Do
more of that – and the path to salvation will stretch out before you like a gleaming
highway shining in the sun.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
As I said at the beginning of this sermon, we all
wrestle with feelings that God has abandoned us.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But what Jesus is asking us to consider is
how we abandon God – by creating idols of gold; worshiping the golden calf of
our own desires and insecurities.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Practice
generosity – and see if maybe the joy that comes from that doesn’t draw us
closer to the heart of God.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>My prayer is
that we will all open our hearts ever more to this invitation from Jesus – and in
the process we will know eternal life.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Amen.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-911438992280535416.post-15423597150144366772012-07-16T12:27:00.000-07:002012-07-16T12:30:33.537-07:00“Russ Douthat is a Fruit Fly”<br />
My mother, an op-ed columnist, used to say (with a
twinkle in her eye), “Never let the facts get in the way of a perfectly good
opinion.” But at least she, a fierce
liberal, accepted the ultimate authority of reality over ideology. <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/15/opinion/sunday/douthat-can-liberal-christianity-be-saved.html?_r=1">Russ
Douthat’s analysis of liberal Episcopalians</a>, found in the July 14 NY Times,
sails beyond the realm of facts altogether, and comes to illustrate the brave
new world of conservative commentary, where rhetoric creates the impression of
truthiness long enough to reproduce itself into the 24-hour news cycle, facts be
damned.<br />
<br />
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Yes, that’s right, I said it: Russ Douthat is a fruit fly. </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Diana Butler Bass has written a <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/diana-butler-bass/">devastatingly factual
reply</a> to Mr. Douthat, which will enjoy only a fraction of the coverage Mr.
Douthat has received. Thus, once again,
the conservative argument has won the struggle for ideological survival in the
artificial habitat that is our national consciousness. Well played, sir. </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
But the more troubling element of Mr. Douthat’s column
is his bizarre premise: that Christians should base their theology on what is
popular, rather than on what is true. His preoccupation with liberal vs. conservative popularity (the facts of which he misrepresents) implies that if only Episcopalians were more conservative, they would be more popular, and therefore we have erred. He even defends the Vatican’s investigation of the nuns as motivated primarily out of a
concern for institutional self-preservation: “Catholic hospitals across the country are
passing into the hands of more bottom-line-focused administrators, with
inevitable consequences for how they serve the poor.” Wow. This is his breathtakingly cynical reasoning: If
those nuns would only preach a conservative gospel (contrary to their consciences) - a gospel in which women are properly
subordinate to men - then their convents would blossom with devout and properly
respectful sisters, and the hospitals would be saved. </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Funny: all this time I thought the argument was over a
question of truth – whether or not women
are, in fact, equal to men. But no, it seems to be an argument from the most base form of pragmatism.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Thus the conservatives seek to change the
subject. And this laughable argument is made with high-minded seriousness in the most prestigious news outlet in the world. Huh. If only it had integrity.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
This is what happens when conservatives can no
longer defend the substance of their ideology.
The Vatican can no longer plausibly argue that women are not equal to
men; very few American Catholics care what the bishops think about birth
control; the number of Catholics who use condoms and get abortions are about
the same as the national average. The
Catholic Church is beginning to look ever more like the great and terrible Oz, desperately
twirling valves and pulling levers behind the curtain, hoping against hope to
forestall the inevitable day when its people will see past the curtain.<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Rather than do the hard work of changing the
institution in order to conform to the truth of things, conservatives are creating truthy arguments of smoke and mirrors, in
this case appealing to the myth that conservative theology is more
attractive to the American people than liberal theology. Fact one: it is not (see Butler Bass). Fact two: since when do Christians proclaim a
Gospel based on institutional self-interest?
(Answer, only when they are desperate and have lost their way.)</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
So congratulations, Mr. Douthat: you won the 24-hour
news cycle battle. The bad news for you
is that you have exposed the hollow and desperate rhetoric of 21<sup>st</sup> Century
American conservatism for what it is: a mad attempt to change the subject. Speaking on behalf of millions of happy and
spiritually alive Episcopalians, I say to you, and the Vatican, the following:
if we have to choose between a theology that we think is true, and a theology
that your church cynically (and wrongly) believes might be popular, we’ll take
the former, any day. And this is what we think is true: women are equal
to men. Period. Gays are equal to straights. Period. </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Ahead of every other denomination in Christendom, the Episcopal Church has demonstrated its willingness to proclaim this truth and accept the consequences. And the consequences are on our side: it
just so happens that God favors truth. When my congregation proclaimed our truth, loud and
clear, we gained at least four new members for every member we lost. But this is not why we proclaim that
truth. We proclaim it because it happens
to be true. And nothing on God’s green
earth will get us to turn our backs on what we know is true. Period. </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpLast">
Maybe that makes us dinosaurs. But I’d rather be a dinosaur than a fruit
fly, any day of the week.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpLast">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacingCxSpFirst">
The Very Rev. Dr. Matthew Lawrence</div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacingCxSpMiddle">
Rector, the Episcopal Church of the Incarnation
</div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacingCxSpLast">
Santa Rosa, California</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpFirst">
<br /></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-911438992280535416.post-38168198384175311422012-07-09T11:37:00.001-07:002012-07-10T12:25:54.531-07:00Grudge Match: Alpha Male vs. Jesus<br />
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Sermon preached July 8, 2012</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Year B Proper 9</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
I don’t know if it was Saturday morning cartoon,
or a comic strip, or what, but it’s planted firmly in my brain: there’s a man who gets
yelled at by his boss; he comes home and yells at his wife; she yells at the
oldest child, who yells at the youngest child, who kicks the dog, who chases
the cat, who kills the mouse; and as the mouse floats up to heaven he thinks, “What
did <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">I </i>do?” </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
We recognize a kind of truth in that, because it
turns out, of course, that that’s exactly what happens in real life: aggression
begets aggression. Animal behaviorists
have seen the same thing in chimpanzees and other animals, especially where
strict hierarchies are in place: whenever the alpha male gets aggressive, he
starts a chain reaction of aggression that goes right on down the line to the
weakest and smallest member of the group. </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
We have all grown up with some form of this – in our
families, schools, sports teams, playgrounds.
The strong rule the weak and so it has been since before we were
chimps. It is, as they say, the law of
the jungle; and I suppose in nature it’s all perfectly well and good – for animals,
anyway. But if you happen to be the smallest
kid on the playground, it’s not so great - in which case you better learn how
to crack jokes, or run fast, or make friends with the biggest kid in the class.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
I wasn’t the smallest kid on the playground, but I
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">was</i> the smallest person in my
family. (I did have a younger sister, but
throughout my childhood she was bigger than me.) So I got it from all sides - and I lived every day with that law of the
jungle. For me it was a daily experience of being humiliated and belittled. </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
During those years, I used to dream of a different
kind of family; a family where everyone loved and supported each other rather
than competed unfairly and cut each other down. I used to imagine a place where the person
with the best idea won the argument, not the person with the most power. I went to bed at night wishing I would wake
up in a world where people actually listened to one another, no matter if they
were big or small, strong or weak. I
made a solemn promise to God: that when I grew up, I would never treat people the
way I was being treated. This became my
most sacred vow. I would never care how
strong or popular someone was; I would treat everyone the same way that I
wished to be treated.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
By the time I got to high school, I had developed
a deep antipathy toward bullies, and I came to resent any community – whether it
was a family, or a school, or a church, or a nation – that favored the strong
over the weak. I was a popular kid in
school, but not by being athletic and not by hanging out with the other popular
kids. I made friends with everyone, regardless
of status, and especially with the losers and the freaks, the artists and the musicians
and the skinny kids and the fat kids.
Together we formed a kind of family of rejects – open to all,
uninterested in status. I started to
believe that we could create the kind of community I had imagined as a younger
child – a community of respect and love and decency and fairness. You know: a community of <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">nice</i> people!</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
The other
day someone asked me, What do you actually <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">do</i>
around here? I gave her a copy of my letter
of agreement and I talked a little bit about my goals and how I spend my time –
but after we spoke I wished I had said something about what I <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">don’t </i>do – because it’s what I don’t do
that’s maybe just as important. I don’t act
like that alpha male chimp, setting off chain reactions of aggression; I don’t show
preference for the popular and the strong; I don’t ignore the less popular
people and spend all my time with the movers and shakers. I try to model respect and love for everyone
and try to create a community where everyone feels they have a voice and their
concerns are heard. </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
I’ve never believed that the only way to lead is
to be a tough and aggressive alpha male, barking orders, suppressing challenges
to his authority, telling everyone exactly how it is to be done. I believe in a different kind of power – the power
of a just community – the kind of community that is created when people start putting
aside their high school behaviors and actually start to listen to and care for
one another. </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
The solution to aggression is not more
aggression. Schools are learning this:
that when bullies start terrorizing a school, the best thing to do is teach the
nice people how to band together; how they can create alliances with other nice
people; they don’t have to go one-on-one, toe-to-toe with the meanies; instead
they can find strength in numbers, they can pick their battles, and have
confidence in knowing that the nice people outnumber the bullies by about 100
to 1. </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Healthy communities are like healthy immune
systems –antibodies surround and overwhelm viruses and bacteria. Antibodies are not Lone Ranger type heroes –
they work cooperatively, in groups, to keep the organism healthy.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
This, I believe, is exactly the kind of thing
Jesus was trying to teach us. He knew
what it was like to grow up feeling small and humiliated. In today’s Gospel, we read that when Jesus
came to his hometown, he had no power.
He could not perform his miracles to save his life. The people he grew up with gathered around
him and shamed him; they said, “Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary?” </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Now, it’s telling that they didn’t say, “Is not
this the carpenter, the son of Joseph?”
In Jesus’ society, a man was always identified by his father – the only
time you would call him the son of Mary is if his father was unknown or had
abandoned the family; it’s clear by this that Jesus was either the product of a
broken home or born out of wedlock.
Whatever it was, exactly, it was shameful, and when Jesus came home they
threw all that shame right back in his face, so much so that he felt so small
he had no power. </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
So Jesus knew all about shame and humiliation from
a very early age. Like me, he probably
went to bed at night praying to God that he would wake up in a better world.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
He saw the same kind of thing being perpetuated by
the Roman Empire – where domination and brutality were everyday realities. It was in that context that Jesus became a
prophet; for him it was both deeply personal, and the ultimate in a communal
identity. Like the prophets before him,
he imagined a world where people would be respected and loved regardless of their
power and social status. And like every
good prophet, he didn’t just talk about this vision - he went out of his way to
eat with the tax collectors and the sinners.
This is why he delighted in scandalizing the powerful society of Roman
collaborators. There is a different way,
he kept saying; we don’t have to be so powerless; we don’t have to feel so inferior;
we don’t have to bow our heads and kiss the ring of the emperor or his bullies. </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
The emperor can call himself the son of God; he
can even have this idea stamped on his coins and spread throughout the Empire;
he can set up temples in all the cities and demand that people make sacrifices
to him; he can even kill anyone who says different – but that doesn’t make it
so. We Christians need not be afraid of
him; because for us, the son of God is a poor peasant of dubious parentage hailing
from a remote and poorly regarded outpost of the empire. </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
St. Paul, who wrestled with his own alpha-male
tendencies, makes the same case this morning.
“I will not boast,” he says, “except of my weaknesses.” He is tormented by his weakness; he speaks of
having a “thorn in the flesh” – something shameful that humbles him and causes
enormous anxiety. Of course, everyone in
these hyper-sexual times assumes that Paul’s affliction was sexual in nature,
maybe that he was gay – but we have no idea.
Whatever it was, somehow Paul found the courage to stop pretending that
it didn’t exist. Instead of
overcompensating and getting even more alpha-male-like, God gave him the grace
to talk about it – extremely unusual for his time. And God answered his prayer by helping him to
see this deep and true lesson: that “power is made perfect in weakness." </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
The Empire wants us to feel shame for our weakness;
but when by the light of God’s love we get past the shame we learn that it is
our weakness that binds us all together.
The Empire wants us to worship power; but we come here to worship the
one who died in humility. The Empire
wants us to be aggressive and mean to one another; to spread a culture of
competition and cruelty; but we stand together, united against pettiness and
prejudice of all kinds, seeing Christ in all persons, loving our neighbors as
ourselves.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
So, yes, in the words of St. Paul: “I will boast all the more gladly of my
weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may dwell in me.” I pray that we all will meet there, in the
land where there is no pretense or arrogance or rudeness or folly of any kind,
just the simple, unpretentious love of God in Christ Jesus, our humble Lord.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Amen? Let’s
say Amen.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-911438992280535416.post-40074247876189728592012-06-25T11:53:00.000-07:002012-06-25T11:53:03.984-07:00Passage Through the Wild-ness<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<br />
The Very Rev. Dr.
Matthew Lawrence
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="line-height: normal;">
Shepherd-by-the-Sea
Episcopal Church, Gualala, CA</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="line-height: normal;">
June 24, 2012</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="line-height: normal;">
Propers for St. John
the Baptist</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Good morning.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>My name is ML…</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Today we’re celebrating the feast day of St. John
the Baptist, that famous old crank who lived in the desert, living off locusts
and wild honey and wearing an animal skin for clothes.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
I’ve been up here to Gualala only a couple of
times before, and this time, to get here, I took a road I’d never been on
before – the Skaggs Springs Rd over from Geyserville.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>[Huge
groan of recognition from the congregation.]<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Now I know that most of you probably know that road like the back of
your hand, but for me it was something of a revelation: those first ten miles,
heading out of Geyserville?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When you
start out, it really is one of the most beautiful roads on the planet. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s so clean and smooth and well-maintained
it made me proud to be an American all over again; you swing through those
hills with their hairpin curves and those red cliffs and sky breaking out –
there are moments when you feel like you’re in the middle of Handel’s
Messiah.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
I came to that fantastic old bridge over the gulch
– you know, the one with the sheer drop you just don’t want to think about - and
then some time later I was driving along the very top of that ridge, with the
earth falling away on both sides of me, and breathtaking meadows and valleys and
mountains in the distance – and not a single person in sight.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
I turned on my CD player and suddenly George
Harrison was singing “All Things Must Pass” at full volume, and now I’m singing
along with him at full volume; I’m singing Hare Krishna and Hallelujah at the
top of my lungs; and that’s when <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I had
one of those rare thoughts.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I thought, “You
know what: if I were to die right here, tonight; if some drunk driver were to
come along right now and just take me out, I would die a happy man.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
I felt complete, right then; one of those rare
moments when I knew it doesn’t get any better than this, and this is more than
enough .<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If my entire life is nothing
more than a means for getting here, to this place of beauty and harmony and
gratitude, well, you know what, it’s all been worth it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I could die now and be perfectly happy. </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Now listen, I don’t want anyone to get freaked out
or anything: I’m not saying I want to die or that I’m having morbid thoughts,
or anything like that.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In fact it’s
exactly the opposite: It’s the kind of thing that happens only a few times, if
you’re lucky, in your life – this feeling that this moment is so beautiful that
it is entirely sufficient – that you are complete, right here; and that
everything else after this is just gravy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Have you ever been lucky enough to have a moment
like that?</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
I think about how fearless John the Baptist was in
the face of death – how he had such incredible courage that he could look King
Herod in the eye and tell him he was going to hell. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He knew full well that nobody talks to the
king like that without losing his head – and I wonder if that fearlessness in
him came from the same place that this moment of fulfillment came for me – this
sense that your life is so complete that no threat of death can dissuade you –
that you are so fulfilled, so complete, that it just doesn’t matter any more –
you can die now and be happy, so die with words of truth on your lips.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
And then I realize that yes, of course, that’s
exactly how John the Baptist and Jesus themselves described the Kingdom of
God.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s all about this sense of
completeness.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He comes preaching that the
Kingdom of God is here, and the metaphor he uses is this one of completeness: The
grain is ready for the harvest.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
In the Greek world, everyone believed that they
had something like a seed within them, which was their essential self – it was
called their <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">daimon</i> – it was their
essential self in all its potential; and to the Greeks, the point of their
lives was to come into completeness, into ripeness, into wholeness; to be ready
for the harvest.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<span> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
That’s exactly what both John and Jesus understood
the Kingdom of God to be: When Jesus said, “Be ye therefore perfect, as your
Father in heaven is perfect”, what he was talking about was this sense of completeness.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Greek word is <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">teleos</i> – it means perfectly ripe, ready for harvest.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Think of a juicy red tomato, or a stalk of grain
standing golden and ripe in the sun, ready for the sickle.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s what the kingdom of God was like for
John and for Jesus.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Everything in all of
creation was approaching this moment of perfection, when God would come and
reap his harvest.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
To feel that your life is complete – that is a rare
thing.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But maybe that’s what comes from
living in the wilderness, as John the Baptist did; and as you do, out
here.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Because, I’m sorry, after that drive
over Scaggs Springs Road, you might be Shepherd-by-the-Sea but as far as I’m
concerned, you’re Shepherd-in-the-Wilderness.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Not to mention this great wildness that you all live next to [pointing
to the Pacific Ocean, visible through giant plate glass windows] – that great
ocean out there.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>There’s nothing more
wild and treacherous and lonely than bobbing up and down in that ocean out
there.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That is the ultimate wilderness.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
And so maybe there’s something about living in the
wilderness, out here, that makes you particularly compatible with this thing
that Jesus and John the Baptist were talking about.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Because there are some things that wilderness
people know, which the rest of the world is becoming increasingly oblivious to.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
So there I was, feeling complete and ripe and
whole and driving along with a song in my heart and musing on this sense that I
could die right now and be happy…. And then I started getting worried … that maybe
God would take me up on this idea.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I
could imagine him saying, “Ok, clearly you need some kind of challenge.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Maybe I <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">will</i>
send a truck into your front end – clearly you’re just a little too happy for
your own good.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
It was funny because this voice sounded a lot like
the voice of my mom, who, if she ever caught you just lying in a hammock on a
beautiful summer day staring up at the sky, would just have to find something
for you to do.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And in that moment I felt
a sense of dread – as if this great cosmic balance was shifting toward
catastrophe – just because I was clearly too happy in my present
condition.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Have you ever had to contend with a voice like
that inside you?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
And just as I was thinking about that, those
wonderful first ten miles of beautiful two-lane highway changed into something
more like my driveway.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>No shoulder, just a crumbly edge that drops
away into a chasm [heads nod in recognition]; the road in places not much wider
than my car.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
You know what I’m talking about: the sky
disappears, so that you feel like you’re entering an enchanted forest or
something, and you begin to wonder if you didn’t take a wrong turn back there somewhere.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And by now the sun had completely set; and I
realize that taking this road by night, with no lights along the road, no
markers, scant little in the way of assurances that you are not about to drive right
off the edge….<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I glanced at my odometer
and realized I had 20 more miles of this, and I thought, “Oy vey: this little
adventure is turning into one big metaphor for my life – and I’m not sure I
like how it’s turning out!”</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
After another ten miles I realized that I hadn’t
passed a single car since I had gotten on the road.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I realized just how alone you can be out
here; I found myself glancing at the gas gauge, and reminding myself that the
tires were still good and the car just had its check-up, and I remembered the
news article a few months back about how a guy on one of these roads drove off the
edge and they didn’t find him for weeks….</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
A voice said, “You are in the wilderness now.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
And that’s when I started praying.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
I think about Maurice Sendak and his wonderful book,
<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Where the Wild Things Are</i>.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is where the wild things are.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And as if in confirmation of that notion, a
troupe of wild pigs crossed the road in front of me.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>A few minutes later, an enormous owl flew
straight at my car and swooped up over my windshield at the last second.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is not wilderness; this is wild-ness. </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
This is the place where John the Baptist came
from.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
So I’m snaking my way through these mountains, and
to distract myself from a rising sense of dread, I begin to reflect on the values
and virtues that living in the wilderness encourages.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>These are the virtues that John the Baptist would
have known in his bones.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We’re talking
now about things we know in our bones – because Nature herself has taught us
these things.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpLast">
The first thing is humility and respect for the
wildness of Creation.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You spend enough
time out in the wilderness, you learn pretty quickly that this life is not for
sissies.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Nature is a strong and
ferocious beast and it will kill those who are not prepared.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Minnesotans know this too (that’s where I
grew up): out there on the edge of the prairie, when the temperature dips below
zero and stays there for weeks, you learn to rely on your neighbors, because
nature cannot be trusted.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Death is never
far away.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If you see a car broke down by
the side of a snowbank you never drive by – of course you stop to make sure everyone’s
okay and don’t need your help.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Everyone does
that – they still do.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Because in the
wilderness, we aren’t under the illusion that anyone gets through this alone;
and in the wilderness, Nature claims us all, eventually.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpLast">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacingCxSpFirst">
And now George Harrison starts singing <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“The Art of Dying”:<br style="mso-special-character: line-break;" />
<br style="mso-special-character: line-break;" />
</div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacingCxSpMiddle">
There'll come a time when all of us must leave
here</div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacingCxSpMiddle">
Then nothing Sister Mary can do</div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacingCxSpMiddle">
Will keep me here with you</div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacingCxSpMiddle">
As nothing in this life that I've been trying</div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacingCxSpLast">
Could equal or surpass the art of dying</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpFirst">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
And isn’t that what we’re all learning?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> The Art of Dying?</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
We develop a kind of wisdom about how life can
beat you up.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You’re not so special –
this is the Minnesotan’s mantra, actually: don’t think you’re so special.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You’re definitely not the center of the
universe; you are definitely not the Messiah.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>You’re an ordinary man or woman trying to live a good and just and
ordinary life, and you’re thinking if you can get to just one more of those
moments when it all seems complete you’ll be ready for the harvest.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Because you come to see that life is all
about the Art of Dying.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
John the Baptist was like that.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He mastered the art of dying.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He wasn’t under any illusions that he was the
Messiah – he knew his limits, he had given away any thought that he was the
One.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Despite the fact that he was
surrounded by people who wanted to believe that he was the messiah, who were
desperate to believe he was the One to rescue Israel.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>John the Baptist had spent enough time in the
wilderness to know better.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
And so he told everyone, plainly and clearly –
there will be one who comes after me – he I am not worthy to untie the thong of
his sandal.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He will be the one – not me. </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
He took one look at Jesus, and knew it right
away.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He saw it in every gesture and
movement Jesus made: Here is the One who doesn’t just have that sense of
completeness once in a while; he carries it with him, always, at every moment. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>He sees it everywhere he looks.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The Creation is complete, with him in it;
somehow just by walking the earth, he completes it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>John could see it; Jesus lived it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And they both knew they could die knowing it
was all exactly as it should be.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Well, as you can see, I survived the passage; I
have come over the mountain and I stand before you now, a little bit more wisened,
a little bit humbled, and opened way up.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I pray that each one of you will share with me this sense of
completeness that I was blessed with last night; and I pray that you share with
me this sense of awe in the face of our great and mysterious God, Creator of
the Wild-ness and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, our companion along the way,
who brings us into unity with the Creator of all that is, seen and unseen, now
and forever.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Amen.</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-911438992280535416.post-89774132742036159212012-06-12T15:28:00.000-07:002012-06-12T15:28:05.458-07:00Our Separation<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-add-space: auto; tab-stops: .25in; text-indent: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 115%;">Dear Friends in Christ:</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-add-space: auto; tab-stops: .25in; text-indent: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 115%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>With heavy hearts,
we make this statement together so you have news from the source, from us: <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>After 29 years of marriage we will begin
living apart—at least for a time. We are entering into a trial separation.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-add-space: auto; tab-stops: .25in; text-indent: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 115%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>This is a time of
reflection, discernment and private conversation between us. Our love and
affection for one another has always been, and remains, strong. We are friends.
We respect each other, and we are proud of the many accomplishments of our
marriage.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And so we enter this
separation with deep gratitude as well as sorrow. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-add-space: auto; tab-stops: .25in; text-indent: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 115%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>We have been
faithful to each other and are doing our best for one another. Yet we are
humbled by regrets we share. Several times over the course of our years
together we have sought counseling and professional advice, and we have
continued to talk. So our decision now to live apart is the result of a long
and thoughtful process. Our reflections lead us to choose this path at this
time in the same spirit of affection that has held us together as best friends
and partners.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We like one another and enjoy
each other’s company. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-add-space: auto; tab-stops: .25in; text-indent: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 115%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Furthermore, each of
us feels drawn to a renewed awareness of God’s Spirit through this
process—which sometimes expresses itself through the frank confession of our
own truth, and which gives us the faith and courage to confront life’s
challenges in a spirit of adventure and good will.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-add-space: auto; tab-stops: .25in; text-indent: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 115%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>If there is any
hope for our reunion, we believe we can achieve it only by taking this path.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We are profoundly aware that we can never
know anything with certainty, but this feels like the best<a href="" name="_GoBack"></a>
course of action.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For the sake of our
mutual growth and fidelity to God, we need to take this step.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-add-space: auto; tab-stops: .25in; text-indent: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 115%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Finally, our
reasons for taking this action are both substantial and deeply personal.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We ask for your support and your prayers; and,
please, we ask only one thing: that as tempting as it may be to speculate about
the nature of our difficulties, please respect our need for privacy.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-add-space: auto; tab-stops: .25in; text-indent: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 115%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>Remembering to
strive to see Christ in all persons, we ask all our friends to do your part to
challenge gossip, and meet anxiety with words of peace.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-add-space: auto; tab-stops: .25in; text-indent: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 115%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>We thank you for all
the ways in which you walk in compassion, following the way of our Lord Jesus.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="line-height: 115%; margin-bottom: 12.0pt; mso-add-space: auto; tab-stops: .25in; text-indent: 0in;">
<span style="font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 115%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>We remain yours in
Christ,</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: 11.0pt; line-height: 115%;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 2;"> </span>Rose
& Matt </span></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-911438992280535416.post-6765790188792015082012-06-09T22:32:00.003-07:002012-06-09T22:32:13.022-07:00Wedding Advice by Rilke<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<br />
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The point of marriage is not to create a quick
commonality by tearing down all boundaries; on the contrary, a good marriage is
one in which each partner appoints the other to be the guardian of his
solitude, and thus show each other the greatest possible trust. A merging of
two people is an impossibility, and where it seems to exist, it is a
hemming-in, a mutual consent that robs one party or both parties of their
fullest freedom and development. But once the realization is accepted that even
between the closest people infinite distances exist, a marvelous living
side-by-side can grow for them, if they succeed in loving the expanse between
them, which gives them the possibility of always seeing each other as a whole
and before an immense sky. </div>
<div class="MsoPlainText">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoPlainText">
That is why this too must be the criterion for rejection
or choice: whether you are willing to stand guard over someone else's solitude,
and whether you are able to set this same person at the gate of your own
depths, which he learns of only through what steps forth, in holiday clothing,
out of the great darkness. </div>
<div class="MsoPlainText">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoPlainText">
To take love seriously and to undergo it and learn it
like a profession - that is what young people need to do. Like so many other
things, people have also misunderstood the position love has in life; they have
made it into play and pleasure because they thought that play and pleasure are
more blissful than work; but there is nothing happier than work, and love,
precisely because it is the supreme happiness, can be nothing other than work.
So those who love must try to act as if they had a great work to accomplish:
they must be much alone and go into themselves and gather and concentrate
themselves; they must work; they must become something. </div>
<div class="MsoPlainText">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoPlainText">
For the more we are, the richer everything we experience
is. And those who want to have a deep love in their lives must collect and save
for it, and gather honey. </div>
<div class="MsoPlainText">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoPlainText">
Rainer Maria Rilke</div>
<div class="MsoPlainText">
The Very Rev. Dr. Matthew Lawrence, Rector Episcopal
Church of the Incarnation</div>
<div class="MsoPlainText">
636 Cherry St</div>
<div class="MsoPlainText">
Santa Rosa, CA 95404</div>
<div class="MsoPlainText">
707-579-2604 x102</div>
<div class="MsoPlainText">
<a href="http://www.incarnation-sr.org/">http://www.incarnation-sr.org</a></div>
<div class="MsoPlainText">
http:/www.thehopefulpriest.blogspot.com</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-911438992280535416.post-67001812743693543142012-06-05T08:51:00.001-07:002012-06-05T08:53:52.678-07:00What DO we believe?<br />
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpFirst">
Good morning… and Happy Trinity Sunday!</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpFirst">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Yes, here we are, once again, at the beginning of
what we call “Ordinary Time” – which for us begins the week after Pentecost and
stretches like the Sonoma Valley into Spring and Fall and the early days of Winter,
one long green swale of ordinary life, populated by sheep and vineyards and ordinary
people just trying to get by, until we get to Advent, at which point everything
ordinary abruptly ends.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Trinity Sunday usually features long-winded and
abstract sermons about arcane matters of Hellenistic and Neo-Platonic
philosophy. These are sermons that try
to help us make sense of that which makes absolutely no sense. Actually, I suppose that could be said about
every sermon; but in this case, preachers actually go out of their way to
explain the unexplainable. Trinity
Sunday sermons are often filled with strident over-confidence and easy answers –
as strident and easy as the topic is difficult. </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
The image comes to mind of the Great White Hunter from
the days of the British Empire, manfully marching into the dense Amazon jungle,
slashing his way into the heart of darkness, blissfully unaware that his army
of indigenous baggage handlers has long since stopped following him – because they
know better.<br />
</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
So don’t worry, I’m not going to charge too far
into that jungle – for one thing, I know better, and for another thing, I
rather prefer your company.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
You might have heard that, beginning a week from
this Wednesday, I’ll be leading a 4 week class entitled “My Favorite Heresies.” Actually, I’ve just changed the title to “My
Favorite Heretics” because my heretical friend, Chris Bell – the Unitarian
Universalist Buddhist Theist who works across the street – will be joining us
for two of those 4 sessions, to defend the heresies of Arianism and
Pelagianism. For my friend, Chris, that’s
just the beginning of his apostasy – he also claims to follow several other
heresies, including Arminianism and Socianism – thus confirming our worst fears
about Unitarian Universalist Buddhist Theists…. </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Actually, I have no idea what Socianism is… but I’m
sure it must be evil….<br />
</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
And this is kind of the point, I think, about ancient
church doctrines generally speaking, and the Trinity more specifically: we are
so far removed from the worldview that gave rise to these doctrines that they
take on a kind of museum-like status. And
worst of all, they give us the impression that these arcane ideas, no matter
how difficult they are to comprehend, must nonetheless be believed. It’s like what Allen Jones used to say, that
Christianity can sometimes seem like a religion that requires us to believe ten
impossible things before breakfast.
Sometimes it feels to me like the doctrines of the church are the
brussel sprouts at the wedding banquet, which you have to eat if you want to
get any of that cake. And this is a
terrible way to think about your faith. </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
A few years ago, somebody in one of our Inquirer’s
Classes asked whether, instead of being invited to <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">affirm </i>the mysteries of our faith as found in the Nicene Creed, we
could be invited instead to just <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">consider</i>
them. That was such a perfect expression
of our condition that I think I’ll never forget it. Which leads me to the discuss something that
I’ve been meaning to talk about for some time: What <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">are</i> we supposed to believe in this church? What do we make of the Nicene Creed?</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Someone the other day came to my office and asked
me that, point blank: What <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">do</i>
Episcopalians believe, anyway? </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Those of you who know me, or have long experience
with the Episcopal Church, can imagine the vague and evasive answer I may have
given to this question. I often talk
about the Episcopal Church as a kind of giant smorgasbord: we lay out before
you all the resources of Christianity – the creeds, the scriptures, the
traditions, the history of our faith, the music, the rituals – but one thing we
tend to avoid is telling people that in order to be saved, they MUST choose
this creed and this scripture and that tradition. Instead, we say, here it all is. The job of the church is to lay it all out
for you, help you understand it all, and let you choose what is most nourishing
and delicious for you. Now, we might,
like a good parent, encourage you to eat your brussel sprouts, because they
contain iron and folic acid or whatever; we might even cook them in butter and
cheese so you might actually try them; but we will never, ever do what my
grandpa once did to my brother when he was 8, which was to forcefully open his mouth
and shove them in there. I won’t go into
the details of what happened after, but suffice it to say it was memorable, and
the word “projectile” comes to mind – which pretty well sums up the mess that
other churches have on their hands when they think they can force-feed anyone
the truth. </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Now, as you might imagine, this explanation was
not particularly helpful to the young man who showed up in my office – because
for someone who was new to our church, he wanted some indication of what he was
getting himself into. And I can’t blame
him. Which leads me to my second answer
to the question, What must Episcopalians believe? And that is to point to a prayer book, and
say, “We’re more interested in how we pray than in what we believe.” </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
This, as true as it is, did not seem to satisfy my
visitor either. Which led me, finally,
to the third and final answer, which was to turn to the Baptismal Covenant, as
found on page 304 of our prayer books.
Here, we actually find specific things that all persons who are baptized
into our faith are expected to believe.<br />
</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
You’ll notice it is in two major parts. The first part is the Apostle’s Creed – that ancient
statement of belief that is based on what is called the “Old Roman Rule” which dates
back to about the year 180. And the
second part of the Baptismal Covenant is the section of vows that we make as we
embrace this way of life. </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Most of you have probably heard me talk about this
before so I won’t belabor the point, but the important thing to remember is
that, if we were to be true to the ancient understanding of the word “believe,”
we would probably do better to translate it as “trust” than as “belief.” It makes a huge difference to me, and draws
me closer to the original meaning of the creed, if I say the word “trust”
instead of “believe:” </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
“I trust in God the Father…. I trust in Jesus
Christ, the Son of God…. I trust in God,
the Holy Spirit…” When we replace the word “believe” with “trust”,
we skip over the modern hang-up around “what we think is true” and let
ourselves consider instead the trustworthiness of this God we proclaim. </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Last week I was brushing up on my reading about
heresy and came across the excellent point that the problem with a lot of the
heresies is that they make too much sense.
That is, they reduce the paradoxical and mysterious and impossible
nature of God with a version of God that makes more sense: Jesus can’t possibly be both fully human and
fully divine – so let’s say he’s one or the other. And what the early church fathers kept saying
is, no, we refuse to reduce the mystery of God to something that we can fully
comprehend. What makes God worthy of our
devotion is precisely the thing that drove the heretics off the deep end: the
absurd, impossible notion that God becomes flesh and lives among us.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Which leads me to the other thing you’ve probably
heard me talk about, which is that it is helpful to think of God as a Verb
instead of a Noun. That is, the key to
understanding who anyone is is to focus on what that person actually <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">does</i>.
What does God do in this Creed:
God creates heaven and earth; God is born into the world, where he suffered at
the hands of a despot and was killed – etcetera. Focus on what God <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">does</i> in the faith of this church and you’ll be so much better off
than the people who get all hung-up on trying to figure-out the essence of God.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
And then finally we come to the vows – and again,
here we focus on the Verb, this time, on what <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">we</i> will do in response to the actions of God. We will continue in the teaching; we will
persevere in resisting evil; we will proclaim the gospel by word and example;
we will seek and serve Christ in all persons, we will strive for justice and
peace. </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
This, in a nutshell, is what we believe. We believe in a God who is active in the
world; not only throughout the ages, but here, in our own lives, by the choices
we make, and the promises we make to one another. God is found in what we <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">do</i>. </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
One of the worst things that ever happened to our
religion, I think, was this notion that we are saved by virtue of some kind of esoteric
thought process – as if, if we could only manage to swallow those brussel
sprouts of ancient metaphysics, if we could only somehow find a way to twist
our minds into the pretzel logic of some kind of magical formula like “Jesus
died for my sins,” then we’d be fine. </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Wisdom tell us that the truth is much simpler, and
far more difficult. The Christian
journey really begins when we commit ourselves to a godly path, and then
discover that we can’t do this alone. The
spiritual journey is a lot like mountain climbing: if you want to scale a large
hill or even a small mountain, it’s possible to do it alone; but if we want to
take on the truly magnificent mountains, the really transcendent ones, we can
only do it with others. As we get closer to the summit, we rely more
and more on the team of people we came with – including the invisible folks, the
angels and the saints. And then, even
with all of their help, we will inevitably come to the point of failure. And that is when we call upon the name of the
Lord. We can do nothing without God’s
help. </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
This is why we’re in such a good place here at
Incarnation these days. It’s not because
of what we say we believe so much as what we actually do, together, that makes
us a light to others. Because God comes alive for us in what God
accomplishes through us. God comes alive
for us whenever we break bread together; God comes alive for us whenever we
share our food with the hungry, God comes alive for us whenever we see the eyes
of Christ in the eyes of our neighbor, God comes alive for us whenever we
proclaim our deepest truth with respect and reverence, God comes alive for us whenever
we stand for peace and justice in this world. </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
And so that is what we do, with God’s help. Thanks be to God. </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-911438992280535416.post-8970188156118014532012-05-27T13:51:00.001-07:002012-05-27T20:37:16.808-07:00Pentecost: the sermon I don't entirely understand<br />
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpFirst">
I have to begin by telling you that I don’t completely
understand this sermon. This sermon is apparently
being written under the influence of the Holy Spirit and I am quite sincere as
I tell you I have had very little to do with it. </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpFirst">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Last night I went to bed, the sermon still
unformed, and I began to pray for the Spirit to come in, as she always seems to
do, and guide me as I worked on these ideas about Pentecost in my sleep; and
just as I closed my eyes, a very clear little dream came to me: I saw a rope,
coiled, on the ground, ready for use; and a set of keys resting on top of it. It was so clear I woke up and started asking,
like the disciples in our lessons from Acts: What does that mean? And the answer was this: the rope: that’s the
key. Rope? What's with the rope? </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
And then I went downstairs and sat at my desk and
started writing this sermon. And I don’t
really understand it. In fact half way
through I thought, this is going nowhere, I don’t get this, I should just stop
and try a different approach – but I just couldn’t get off it. It just kept writing itself. And eventually I just said, you know
what? It’s Pentecost. If this is what the spirit is saying, this is
what I have to preach, even if I don’t get it myself.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
So I think it’s entirely possible that, of the 250
or so people who hear this sermon by the end of our last service today, there
might be just one person who understands it – and the rest of us will just have
to put up with it. </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
So here it is:</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Sometimes, it seems, no matter what we do to avoid
it, we can’t escape the sensation that we are in freefall.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Maybe you know what I mean.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
It’s like this: our lives are like we’re climbing
a mountain; and when we’re young we are happily dancing up
the foothills and skipping over rocks without much thought of danger; and then
as we get older the air becomes thinner and the slope becomes steeper and we
have to start being more careful; after awhile we find we have to use crampons
and ropes; and before we know it we’re 70 years old and there we are, near the
summit, acutely aware of the void – and we’ve got this whole elaborate system of
ropes that keeps us from falling off the edge. </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
I’m talking about the rope of financial security,
if we’re lucky enough to have any; the rope of a roof over our heads, if we are
blessed with that; the rope of family ties; the rope of friends and church and
clubs and even Facebook friends – all of these ropes tying us to earth, linking
us to safety and connection and comfort – even as we find
ourselves breathing the thin air at 15,000 feet and we can imagine death with
every step.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
And then
finally something gives way – we have a stroke, a heart attack, a complicated
surgery; we lose our house; we go bankrupt; our marriage ends; our spouse dies – and suddenly
we’re in freefall. And that’s when all
our preparations – all our impressive ropes with their fancy knots – that’s
when they’re tested. We find out who our
true friends are; we see who it is who comes to our rescue – who visits us in
the hospital; who cares about the fact that we’re in crisis and who doesn’t –
or at least, who doesn’t seem able to express their care.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
So we find ourselves in crisis. And between the moment when our foot slips on
the ice and the moment the rope grows taught and catches us, there is this
infinity of time; we’re in freefall; we’re clutching at the air; we realize there
is nothing we can do now but trust in the rope.
We wonder, is our health insurance paid up? Does anyone know where we are? Do they know to check on us if they haven’t
heard from us? Would they know where to
look? Have we prepared our children or
our spouse or our neighbors for the possibility that we might need them some
day? Have we invested in those
relationships so that they might be <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">willing</i>
to help us when we need them? Have we
spent enough time helping others that there might be someone out there willing
to return the favor? Is anyone connected
to us? Are they tied down and ready to
take hold of the rope as it flies by?</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
All of these thoughts race through our heads as
we’re in freefall.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
And then we realize: when we’re in freefall,
there’s absolutely nothing we can do about it.
There’s nothing we can do now but trust – in the ropes we have knotted;
in the doctors and nurses; in our children if we have any; in our community,
our church. If we have invested well
during the course of our lives, we might just have a safety net beneath
us. Or we might not. We might be falling too fast for anyone to
catch us. We might be too far out in the
wilderness for anyone to find us. It
really doesn’t matter at this point, because there’s nothing we can do about
any of it anymore. What will be will
be. </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
And that’s when we call upon the name of the Lord.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
A friend of mine sent me this little poem yesterday,
by Denise Levertov – maybe this has something to do with all of this:</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="line-height: normal;">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Suspended </b></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="line-height: normal;">
I had grasped God's
garment in the void</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="line-height: normal;">
But my hand slipped</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="line-height: normal;">
On the rich silk of it.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="line-height: normal;">
The 'everlasting arms'
my sister loved to remember</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="line-height: normal;">
Must have upheld my
leaden weight</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="line-height: normal;">
From falling, even so,</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="line-height: normal;">
For though I claw at
empty air and feel</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="line-height: normal;">
Nothing, no embrace,</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="line-height: normal;">
I have not plummeted.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle" style="line-height: normal;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
If you’ve ever been in freefall, I think you might
know what she’s talking about. </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
We call out to Jesus – only to find out he isn’t
here; he’s ascended to the Father – and we find, instead, the presence of the
Holy Spirit. It seems that the Holy
Spirit comes to us when we’re in freefall.
When the disciples went on the road, carrying no money and no extra
clothes, and threw themselves on the benevolence of the people they were with –
they were in freefall. When, as a young
man, I went hitchhiking through the US and the British Empire and threw myself
on the mercies of those who would stop to pick me up – I was in freefall – and the
Holy Spirit found me there. When the
disciples realized that Jesus was no longer with them, and that they were now
on their own, they were in freefall. And
that’s when the Spirit came to them, giving them meaning, giving them energy,
igniting their passion for this gospel of love.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
So the Spirit is like a rope when we’re in
freefall – we throw ourselves into the ever-loving arms of God. But the Spirit is not like a rope anchored to
the mountain; it’s a rope connecting us to the ones we love, and to God; it’s
not a rope that keeps us from falling, but instead it brings our loved ones to
our bedside as we fall out of this world.
It’s a rope that brings casseroles to our doorstep when we’re too sick
to cook for ourselves; it’s a rope that makes the phone ring when we’re alone –
or perhaps even more helpfully, it’s a rope that inspires us to pick up the
phone ourselves and speak words of love before it’s too late.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
In the end we learn that it’s not about climbing
the mountain and reaching the summit; in the end it’s about the inevitability
of the fall, and learning how to trust the fall. </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
I think this is why we say we are “falling in
love.” </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
It turns out we’re all in freefall, all the
time. After all, what is holding up the
entire universe? Nothing at all. The entire universe is falling through the
infinity of space. The fact that we
don’t realize it is simply because it’s all falling at exactly the same rate –
so that as far as we can see, it’s all standing still. But it’s not – we’re all in freefall. Everything is. And in that weightlessness, the Holy Spirit
finds us.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
So that’s the sermon I was directed to write. Like I said, I don’t exactly know why. But maybe there are some interpreters of the
Spirit here in the congregation. Maybe
you have a story about being in freefall triggered by this sermon. Maybe there’s something here that speaks to
you somehow. If so, let’s have a
conversation. Tell your story. What does this mean to you?</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
[At this point Fr. Matt moved around the
congregation with a microphone and people offered their own interpretations and
stories. Some were very tearful and
profound.]</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Amen.</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-911438992280535416.post-6857188009099267452012-05-10T15:04:00.000-07:002012-05-10T15:04:56.684-07:00Another Marilynne Robinson sermon: on Fear<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<br />
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpFirst">
Somebody said to me last week that she was still
getting used to the idea that Christians can be strong in their faith and yet
not exclusive of other people who might have a different faith.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She found it refreshing that we here at
Incarnation refuse to waste our time worrying about whether or not Jews or
Muslims or Buddhists or Atheists are going to hell – but she admitted that it
was a hard to fully trust it – that we can really be Christians who also respect
and love and learn from other spiritual paths.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpFirst">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
She reminded me that, just because it’s obvious to
those of us who have been Episcopalians for awhile, we can’t assume that it’s
obvious to everyone.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The power and
influence of exclusive forms of Christianity has been so great that we can unconsciously
find ourselves reading the Bible through <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">their</i>
eyes, rather than through the eyes of the people who originally wrote it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpLast">
A good example is this statement in John’s first
letter, which we read this morning: </div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacingCxSpFirst">
God abides in those who confess that Jesus is
the Son of God, and they abide in God. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(1 John 4:15)</div>
<div class="MsoNoSpacingCxSpLast">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpFirst">
When we read this in Scripture, a lot of us can’t
help but interpret it as the evangelical Christians have done, which is this: if
you say, out loud, that Jesus is the Son of God, then you will abide in God and
be saved.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I mean, that’s what it says,
right?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpFirst">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
But I think what he is actually saying is this: “Those
Christians – you know, the ones who confess <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Jesus</i>
as the Son of God?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Those ones?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Man, they really abide in God.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
It’s like saying, “Those folks who live around
Harvard Square? <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Wow, they’re really
smart.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That may be true as a general
statement – but what it doesn’t mean is that moving to Harvard Square will
raise your IQ!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<span></span>Just saying the words
“Jesus Christ is the Son of God” does not necessarily make you a better person.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I grant you, it’s an excellent start – but
God knows the world has seen its share of people confessing Jesus as the Son of
God who are clearly so afraid of the rest of the world that they find it nearly
impossible to love it.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Apparently this was a problem in the earliest days
of the Christian community as well.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Apparently there were members of the early church who not only failed to
love their neighbors – they actually <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">hated</i>
them. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So much so that the disciple John has
to call them out: “Those who say, "I love God," and hate their
brothers or sisters, are liars.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
The problem, John says, is that we are afraid of
one another.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But “perfect love casts out
fear…, and whoever fears has not reached perfection in love.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(1 John 4: 18)</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Last week I talked about one of my favorite
writers, Marilynne Robinson; I talked about how I had gone to a writing
conference in Michigan and she had given a couple of talks that were quite
inspiring.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So I was tickled by the fact
that, this week, our readings include the very phrase that she based her
keynote speech on: “Perfect love casts out fear.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Apparently the Holy Spirit wants me to talk
about her just a little bit more.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Robinson’s point in the talk was to challenge the
culture of fear that she sees all around her.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>She talked about the professional fear-mongers who seem to be cropping
up everywhere these days; people telling us to be afraid of the immigrants; be
afraid of the liberals; be afraid of the President.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The most extreme things are being said
nowadays about our neighbors that if you were to believe all of it, you’d think
America is populated by teeming hordes of brown-skinned homosexual atheists
intent on depriving us of our lives, liberty and happiness.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She said that we can’t seem to get over the
idea that we are under attack:“We’re stuck in psycho-emotional bomb shelters,” she
said, <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>when, in fact, we Westerners are
more free, safe, and stable than most people throughout the world and
throughout history have ever hoped to be. “Why not enjoy it?” she said.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“If there have ever been people on earth who
should have been able to take a deep breath and say, `Thank God,' we are that
people.” </div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
She referred to the folks who feel it necessary to
carry guns around with them, and that people are feeling so “justified in fear”
that they see nothing wrong with shooting a man simply because he felt
threatened.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And so people with no
training in police procedure and no sworn oath to protect and serve,
accountable to no one, are allowed to carry guns and shoot other people simply
because they felt frightened.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
“We’ve begun to rationalize preemptive defense,”
she said.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“People feel justified in fear
that they can take preemptive violence….<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Who do you want to shoot?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Which
image of God has been getting on your nerves lately?”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I mean, let’s face it, “There are a lot of
people who are not good judges of the degree to which others are a threat to
them.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
This is what happens when people start to believe
in fear over faith.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When we’re afraid,
she points out, we are no longer objective observers of reality.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>People who are afraid have a distorted view
of the world.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And so, the more we let
fearful people make our public policies, the more we’re letting the inmates run
the asylum.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
So: what do we, as Christians, need to do to make
a difference in this world?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>She said the
first, we need to “Talk ourselves out of our crouch of fearfulness.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If you’re frightened, you’ve already given
in.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
As Christians, it’s our job to risk respect.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>“What about risking respect of everyone,” she
said.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
“If you’re frightened, you don’t trust God.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>God told us he would protect us.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Trust God and abandon fear.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
This, of course, is much easier said than
done.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Fear is not something that we can
just will ourselves to overcome.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If
we’re afraid, we’re afraid – and sometimes that fear is justified; sometimes
fear really is nature’s way of saying, “Hey, eyes open. Be careful.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
A few days ago, I was in here with the band,
rehearsing for today.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And the front
doors were open and during the rehearsal a guy wandered in; he was obviously
drunk and disoriented.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>At first I
watched him, and thought I’d just keep my eye on him.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And he seemed okay at first.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But then he started interrupting the
rehearsal and saying crazy things so I explained to him that this was actually
a closed rehearsal and he would have to leave.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Then he started getting belligerent and so I started over: I introduced
myself as Fr. Matt, and I said, “What’s going on with you?”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And suddenly he opened up; he gave me a hug;
he poured out all his troubles and concerns.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>I prayed with him and blessed him and sent him on his way.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
It was only later that we realized he had stolen
the saxophone player’s wallet, which had been left on one of the pews!</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
So as Ronald Reagan said, “Trust, but
verify.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We don’t have to be afraid of
the ones we seek to serve – in fact that will make it impossible for us to
serve them.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We are called to have the
deepest respect for every person who comes in these doors.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>But at the same time, well, you know, keep an eye on your wallet...</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Jesus would have us challenge our fear every step
of the way.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>When the food servers at
Open Table decided to come out of the kitchen and interact with the men and
women who come here for food, not only did they send a life-giving, gospel message
of love to the folks they were serving – they also radically decreased the
chances of violence actually breaking out.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>As we demonstrate respect and civility, we find that other people are
grateful to follow our lead.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
And the second thing we can do is just turn off
the TV or the radio.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This Lent Rose and
I cancelled our TV cable service.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We
killed our TV.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And I think it has helped
us to see and appreciate the respectable reality around us, rather than having
it interpreted for us by people who make enormous amounts of money off of our
fear.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is unbelievable to me how often
we mistake reality for the reality represented on the TV.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The TV is not reality.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Nothing in there has much of anything to do
with truth.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>God is truth; God is not
Bill O’Reilly and God is not Stephen Colbert (as difficult as that is for me to admit).</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
God, in other words, is all around us, right
here.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
Jesus says, I am the vine, you are the
branches.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I think of how the branches in
a vineyard go laterally, parallel to the ground, not vertically; they look like an altar rail,
traveling across the field.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That's how we find God - not so much by looking up at the sky, but by looking around us. God travels
along the horizontal plane.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
God is in the miracle of life that turns those
vineyards green; that miraculous combination of water and sun and earth and
photosynthesis and millions of years of evolution. and that spark of life that is God.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>God is in the miracle of life here, turning
oxygen into life-giving red blood cells, giving us strength to serve, and
courage to lead.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-911438992280535416.post-53493094519064108382012-05-09T18:22:00.001-07:002012-05-09T18:23:35.752-07:00Progress with 'CelloMy progress with the 'cello thus far (we've been togther now a week) can be summed up in the words of an old song I made up:<br />
<br />
I'm a long way away from where I used to be<br />
And that wasn't far at all.<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1s_PRBk_JLuA0Xj42nw483clP7vSOMO1gWTd28IZFLXgMCxK70S7O-LSpb4CB9J4X9xz1D3um6YHzK5xTnxmzxcTFCuv6-6hVyGI4IFOAA_0LtR_Rc3IoXnKkst1xVjoW2Cn3ftR2p80/s1600/my+new+woman%27s+backside.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi1s_PRBk_JLuA0Xj42nw483clP7vSOMO1gWTd28IZFLXgMCxK70S7O-LSpb4CB9J4X9xz1D3um6YHzK5xTnxmzxcTFCuv6-6hVyGI4IFOAA_0LtR_Rc3IoXnKkst1xVjoW2Cn3ftR2p80/s320/my+new+woman%27s+backside.jpg" width="240" /></a></div>
<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-911438992280535416.post-48555272424899004252012-05-05T19:04:00.001-07:002012-05-05T19:04:02.997-07:00Can This Deanery Live?<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Cambria","serif";">Well, the
cheerfully obliging Episcopalians of the Wingfield Deanery showed up en masse
today, while the clergy and congregants of the Deanery of the West had a rather
more tepid showing at the first convocation for the two new deaneries.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: "Cambria","serif";">Whether the
difference was due to difficult geography, negligent leadership (mine), or the
possibility that members of the Deanery of the West have better things to do on
a brilliant Saturday morning than wade through the arcana of rules of order and
by-laws, the outcomes of which had been pre-determined by last Diocesan
Convention, our attendance barely moved the meter above zero (5 congregations
were unable to send anyone; only 3 clergy came, including me).
Fortunately, there was no minimum requirement for a quorum, and the impressive
turn-out among the Wingfield Wing-Nuts made up for the absence of Western
Woo-Woos. (No one dares defy Jeanne Forte!)</span></div>
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<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Cambria","serif";">The one thing we
did that made the trip worthwhile, in my opinion, was the wonderful half-hour
we spent at the end of our time, when we broke into groups according to our
interests and connected with other Episcopalians across congregational
lines. We tapped into the expertise in the room as people with experience
in local ministries connected with other people genuinely excited by what they
were doing. Health ministries, small groups, breakfast programs,
youth in worship: these and many other small groups were spontaneously
created. It was exciting to feel energy as we organized around our
competence and lived faith. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Cambria","serif";">Anyway, thanks
to all 15 folks who made the trip, and I promise that in the future, you will
have adequate notice, and maybe even a reason to attend! </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-911438992280535416.post-2445242191043240212012-05-02T17:07:00.002-07:002012-05-02T17:07:08.697-07:00Prayer requests at the homeless shelterAt our day shelter for homeless women and children, we have a box for prayer requests. Every once in a while we collect them and pray over them. Sometimes they are so poignant and truthful you want to weep and laugh at the same time. <br />
<br />
Here are some of them - names have been covered to protect identities. Please pray with me:<br />
<br />
Let someone beautiful come into my life. <br />
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Please help me God to make my life better and find some clarity and a new direction. Take away all fears. Bless me.<br />
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That my craving for the needle subsides... If not, that unto me falls a pressed and sealed brick of hydro-morphone weighing no less than 40 grams.<br />
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Please let me thrive.<br />
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I need prayer for to get off the streets; also for my boyfriend some work at Labor Ready; and maybe for my Ex to let me talk to my kid. Thank[s] for all the prayer.<br />
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<br />Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-911438992280535416.post-31213458224136043442012-04-29T19:18:00.002-07:002012-04-29T19:20:06.867-07:00A Sermon for Marilynne<br />
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Good morning.</div>
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<br /></div>
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This morning we celebrate Good Shepherd Sunday –
in case you didn’t know, which is why we have all these readings about Jesus as
the good shepherd. This is the tradition
across Christendom for the fourth Sunday in Eastertide. </div>
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<br /></div>
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Sermons on Good Shepherd Sunday tend to go on at
length about the peculiarities of sheep and the quality of their relationship
to shepherds, all of which is well and good but to be perfectly honest, I’ve
never much appreciated the metaphor. For
one thing, I’ve never felt inclined to compare members of my congregation to
animals that let’s just say are not known for their intelligence; and for
another thing I’ve always been confused as to whether I should be relating to
the sheep or to the shepherd. If pastors
today are shepherds, we’re more shepherds of cats than of sheep, for starters;
and for another thing, it is obvious to me that Jesus is the shepherd, not me,
so then I’m left wondering “What then, am I?” and that just gets me all
confused.<br />
</div>
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But then I get to thinking about what it must have
been like to be a shepherd lying awake at night under the stars, and a
different sermon emerges.</div>
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<br /></div>
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Last week I was in Michigan, attending a writer’s
conference, where I had the pleasure of listening to one of my favorite
writers, Marilynne Robinson. Robinson
is one of those rare novelists who writes very slowly and very brilliantly; she
has written only three novels, and each one has received some of the greatest
awards in the field, including the Pulitzer, the PEN, the National Book
Critics’ Circle. If you haven’t read <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Gilead</i> yet, you must put it on your
reading list, along with its sequel, entitled <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Home</i>.</div>
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<br /></div>
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While I was there I picked up a copy of her latest
book of essays, entitled <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">When I Was A
Child I Read Books,</i> and I found in her preface a lovely discussion of Walt
Whitman and those other American writers who appreciated, as does Robinson, the
sense of wonder that seizes us as we look up at the stars and realize the fact
that, through us, the universe has found a way to perceive itself. </div>
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<br /></div>
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She quotes Whitman here:</div>
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There is, in sanest hours, a consciousness, a
thought that rises, independent, lifted out from all else, calm, like the
stars, shining eternal. This is the
thought of identity – yours for you, whoever you are, as mine for me. Miracle of miracles, beyond statement, most
spiritual and vaguest of earth’s dreams, yet hardest basic fact, and only
entrance to all facts. In such devout hours,
in the midst of the significant wonders of heaven and earth,… creeds, conventions
fall away and become of no account before this simple idea. </div>
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<br /></div>
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This simple idea: that we are this extremely rare
and special creation, a creature that is able to utter the word, “I” and “you”
and “all of this.” </div>
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<br /></div>
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This is the kind of insight that comes to people
who spend a bit of time staring up at the stars. People like shepherds. When you live in the fields, like a shepherd,
and your primary form of entertainment is to sit under the stars by a campfire
and tell stories of what you see up there, and every night you fall asleep
staring up into the black void of space and the infinite magnificence of it
all, you begin to appreciate just how rare and beautiful a thing it is that we
have any awareness at all. </div>
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<br /></div>
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I think this is the reason why it was the shepherds who
were the first witnesses to the Incarnation – they were the most exquisitely
attuned to the possibility of miracles. I
think it was after a night staring up at the stars that Whitman was able to
write these ecstatic songs of praise:</div>
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<br /></div>
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All parts away for the progress of souls,</div>
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All religion, all solid things, arts,
governments, all that was or is</div>
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apparent upon this globe or any globe,</div>
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falls into niches and corners</div>
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before the procession of souls along</div>
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the grand roads of the universe.</div>
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<br /></div>
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Marilynne Robinson reminds us that this is a common
theme in many 19<sup>th</sup> Century American writers, including Emerson,
Melville, and Dickinson – they all experienced consciousness itself as having
the quality of revelation; they all developed a reverence for this experience
that is born under the stars; those moments when we identify what Robinson
calls the “sacred mystery with every individual experience, every life.” And, she says, this is the experience that
gives birth to democracy as an ideal – because as we experience the miracle of
what it means to be alive and conscious, we find ourselves identifying all
other conscious beings as sacred and worthy of reverence. Because it is impossible to accept the
miracle of our own conscious life without also acknowledging the sacred miracle
of every conscious life. It is this
revelation that leads us to imagine the possibility that everyone is important;
everyone is worthy of God’s love; everyone is equal; everyone gets a vote.</div>
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<br /></div>
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In Jesus’ time, shepherds were among the poorest
and least respected members of society.
And so of course they would become the ones most ready to recognize the
miracle of God taking the form of a homeless child born to an unwed mother.</div>
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<br /></div>
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It was the shepherds, witnesses to fireballs and
meteors, eclipses and solstices, thunder and lightning, who would be most
attuned to possibility that the universe is filled with miracles. These days, modern astronomers and physicists
continue to play that role, as they tell us stories of great mystery, where the
laws of ordinary physics bend and warp at the edges of what is real. What is time, after all? The only explanation physicists can give us
is that time is the thing that clocks measure.
What is gravity? They tell us
gravity has to do with a bending of the timespace continuum – who can
understand that? And yet we all feel the
weight of our bodies on these pews. We
are all participants in this mystery; we are held in place by a warp in
timespace.</div>
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<br /></div>
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And so the shepherds began to imagine time in
reverse – a moment when we would grow younger, not older; the ancients, telling
stories under the stars, began to imagine a time when our inevitable decline
into old age and death was reversed. And
why not? All of reality has this sense
of contingency about it – as if, at any time, another set of rules might
prevail. The constant fact of our
suffering would give way to joy; the shroud of death would be lifted; our
hunger would resolve into feasting on the mountaintop. And then Jesus comes along, and he enacts this
new being: the lame are healed, the blind receive their sight; the dead are
raised; the oppressed are relieved; justice is restored to the shepherds and to
all others whose dignity is denied in the present age. Jesus is seen by the shepherds as the sign
that this great reversal has begun. </div>
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<br /></div>
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In our Scriptures this morning we hear about
Peter’s speech before the rulers of his day.
And what has he done to get him into trouble with the most powerful
people of his time? He has healed a man
who had been lame since his birth.
Peter, walking in the spirit of the resurrection, has begun to spread
this new reality around. The high priest
and the scribes and elders are astonished that as ignorant and unlearned men
should have this power. The King James
Bible has Peter referring to this moment as the “time of refreshing;” it is the
“restitution of all things.” Clearly,
this has to be stopped; this great reversal cannot be allowed to continue. And so they threaten Peter and John – as if
death has any meaning to them anymore.
And their threats do nothing but condemn the ones doing the threatening,
as people who are confused as to the nature of reality, and blinded by their
worldly power.</div>
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<br /></div>
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And so the virus of new life begins to
spread. The seed of a new reality is
being planted. The time of refreshing
has begun. This is the proclamation of
shepherds and fishermen, who have gazed up at the stars long enough to know of
its possibility; and who have seen it become real in the person of Jesus.</div>
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<br /></div>
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And this is why we care about homeless people –
the outcasts of our age, those men and women who go to bed at night with
nothing between them and heaven. They
are every bit as miraculous as any one of us, and we see that in their eyes, where
Christ is alive, and where the great reversal is taking place.</div>
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<br /></div>
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Thanks be to God for this great privilege: to be
alive on this planet; to have the privilege of loving the least among us: the
shepherds and outcasts, the sinners and the heretics and the saints, all of us
brothers and sisters on this tiny planet, singing praises to God in the Spirit
of the one who is bringing about the great reversal, one soul at a time.</div>
<div class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">
AMEN.</div>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-911438992280535416.post-51785848897542359162012-04-08T17:11:00.003-07:002012-04-08T17:36:17.407-07:00<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:worddocument> <w:view>Normal</w:View> <w:zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:trackmoves/> <w:trackformatting/> <w:punctuationkerning/> <w:validateagainstschemas/> <w:saveifxmlinvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:ignoremixedcontent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:alwaysshowplaceholdertext>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:donotpromoteqf/> <w:lidthemeother>EN-US</w:LidThemeOther> <w:lidthemeasian>X-NONE</w:LidThemeAsian> <w:lidthemecomplexscript>X-NONE</w:LidThemeComplexScript> <w:compatibility> <w:breakwrappedtables/> <w:snaptogridincell/> <w:wraptextwithpunct/> <w:useasianbreakrules/> <w:dontgrowautofit/> <w:splitpgbreakandparamark/> <w:dontvertaligncellwithsp/> <w:dontbreakconstrainedforcedtables/> <w:dontvertalignintxbx/> <w:word11kerningpairs/> <w:cachedcolbalance/> </w:Compatibility> <m:mathpr> 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<w:lsdexception locked="false" priority="31" semihidden="false" unhidewhenused="false" qformat="true" name="Subtle Reference"> <w:lsdexception locked="false" priority="32" semihidden="false" unhidewhenused="false" qformat="true" name="Intense Reference"> <w:lsdexception locked="false" priority="33" semihidden="false" unhidewhenused="false" qformat="true" name="Book Title"> <w:lsdexception locked="false" priority="37" name="Bibliography"> <w:lsdexception locked="false" priority="39" qformat="true" name="TOC Heading"> </w:LatentStyles> </xml><![endif]--><!--[if gte mso 10]> <style> /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:"Table Normal"; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-priority:99; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; mso-padding-alt:0in 5.4pt 0in 5.4pt; mso-para-margin-top:0in; mso-para-margin-right:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:10.0pt; mso-para-margin-left:0in; line-height:115%; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;} </style> <![endif]--> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpFirst">Sermon Easter Sunday April 8, 2012<br /></p><p class="MsoNormalCxSpFirst">Good morning!<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">Alleluia!<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Christ is risen!<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style:normal">The Lord is risen indeed!<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Alleluia!</i></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">Good!<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Okay!<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Wonderful!<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>But what does that mean?</p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">We all have that question, I think: Christ is risen – but I’m still the same old dope I’ve always been.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Christ is risen – but my father is still beating up my mother.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Christ is risen – but politicians still lie and cheat and steal.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Christ is risen – but women and children in Syria are still being murdered.</p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">So what good is it?<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>What does it actually <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal">mean</i>?</p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">Do you ever wonder about that?</p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle"> </p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">Well, the first question I think we have to ask is this: Is Christ really risen, or not?<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Because to look at the state of things, sometimes it’s hard to believe that he actually is.</p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">Barbara Ehrenreich, that wonderful writer, wrote a book about the working class in the United States.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>To do her research, she actually went “undercover,” working as a waitress and a hotel maid and a house cleaner for $6 - $7/hour.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Her question was, “How does anyone survive on those kinds of wages?<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>How does anyone get ahead?”<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>And her answer was that most of the time, they don’t.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">Anyway, one day she went to a church revival meeting where a lot of her co-workers were going to church.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>She found herself sitting with these incredibly hard-working and poor people, while the preacher went on and on about believing in Jesus so they could go to heaven.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>She wrote:</p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">It would be nice if someone would read this sad-eyed crowd the Sermon on the Mount, accompanied by a rousing commentary on income inequality and the need for a hike in the minimum wage.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>But Jesus makes his appearance here only as a corpse; the living [Jesus]… is never once mentioned, nor anything he ever had to say.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Christ crucified rules, and it may be that the true business of modern Christianity is to crucify him again and again so that he can never get a word out of his mouth.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>(Quoted by Borg and Crossan in <u>The Last Week</u>.)</p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">She concludes her story by saying, “I get up to leave,… and walk out to search for my car, half expecting to find Jesus out there in the dark, gagged and tethered to a tent pole.”</p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">This has become a very familiar kind of criticism that we hear a lot these days: that the people most responsible for keeping Jesus crucified are Christians themselves, especially preachers.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>And so we see things like the YouTube video entitled “Why I hate religion but love Jesus.” <span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>If you haven’t seen it, just ask your kids, they probably have – at last count had over 20 million hits.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>And so we have this cover story in Newsweek by Andrew Sullivan: “Forget the Church; Follow Jesus.”<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>And so we have countless celebrities, who are happy to talk about Jesus as their “guru” but are quick to say that <i style="mso-bidi-font-style:normal">of course</i> they think organized religion is for the birds.</p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">And of course, the thing is, they’re right: there are all sorts of ways in which modern Christianity is the first offender against Jesus.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>On the one hand, conservative churches are selling their souls to gain favor with right-wing politicians while ignoring everything that Jesus and the Bible actually says about economic justice; and on the other hand liberal churches are so lacking in imagination and stuck in the rhetoric of the 1960’s that they are quickly becoming obsolete.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">All that is true.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>And I just wish all of those people would just come to <i style="mso-bidi-font-style:normal">our</i> church and see how it’s done <i style="mso-bidi-font-style:normal">right</i>!<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>If only all Christians would become Episcopalians!<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Then we’d get it right for a change!<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span><br /></p><p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">But seriously, I think it's fair to say that here, Jesus is not found bound and gagged outside; here, the homeless Jesus is fed a hot meal on Sunday morning; here, the homeless women and children Jesuses are fed and cared for Monday-Friday; here, we don’t violate everything Jesus taught by condemning homosexuals or by coddling millionaires or by pretending that Jesus was a free-market capitalist.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>All that is nonsense.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>We just praise God and feed poor people and that’s at least a pretty good start.</p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">But of course, we have our problems, too – huge surprise – which is exactly the point.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Churches are institutions, like hospitals and schools and sports teams.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>In order to survive, they have to have rules and boundaries and budgets.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>And that always leads to compromise and disappointment because there’s no way an institution can be Jesus.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">But people who say they want to follow Jesus but they don’t want to join a church – that’s like saying I want to play football but I don’t want to join a team; I want to get open heart surgery but I don’t want to go to a hospital; I want to become a scientist but I don’t want to go to a university.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>It’s like saying I want to change the world but I want to do it alone and entirely on my own terms.</p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">In other words, it’s incredibly naïve.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Because like it or not, being a disciple of Jesus is a team sport.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle"> </p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">But now I’ve gotten carried away again – that’s just a little rant that I have to make now and again.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>But let’s get back to the original question, which is: Yes, Christ is risen!<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>But what does that mean?</p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">To answer this question, I rely on two of my favorite scholars, Marcus Borg and John Dominic Crossan.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>During Holy Week I’ve been reading their very good book, <u>The Last Week</u>, which takes us through the final days of Jesus from an historical perspective.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">And what they finally conclude is that, to the people who wrote the Gospels, the resurrection of Jesus means two things.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>The first thing is about us as a society; and the second thing is about us as individuals.</p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">The first thing is this: Jesus was not killed in a car accident.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>He was killed by the politicians of his day.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>The Roman Empire killed Jesus; the chief priests – paid collaborators of the Empire – killed Jesus: because he was presenting himself as the King of the Jews, when everyone knew that Caesar was the King of the Jews.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>He was called the Son of God, when it was Caesar who claimed that title – he even had it written on the coins bearing his likeness.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Jesus called for a Kingdom in which the poor were sitting at the banquet table, not the rich; he called for a world where people who had become slaves and prisoners because of their debts were freed, and restored to the land that was taken from them.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>There is no doubt that this was Jesus’ message; it got him in trouble with the people in power and it got him killed.</p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">I’m sorry to have to say it, but anyone who says Christ was not political simply does not have his facts straight.</p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">So when we say “Christ is risen,” we’re saying that those in power have no power; we’re saying that God is on the side of those who are hungry and powerless; that Caesar can kill the messenger but the message lives on because the universe itself favors justice and compassion.</p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">Christ is alive every place where love and justice stand against contempt and violence.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>It doesn’t matter if the people who know this power of love are Jews or Muslims or Christians: the power of the resurrection is not contained by any mere religion.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal">Every</i> time people stand for life against death – whether it be in Damascus, or Tehran, or Selma, or Stonewall – the resurrection is alive.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">Some people say it’s impossible to prove the existence of God.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>But I say, look no further than the example of those who prove, with their very lives, that God’s love is greater than any power on this earth.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">This is what St. Paul – who despite his flaws was himself a model of this fearless love – this was what he was talking about when he said, </p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">Who will separate us from the love of Christ? Will hardship, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>… No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. For I am convinced that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor rulers, nor things present, nor things to come, nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>(Romans 8:35, 37-39)</p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle"> </p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">No power on this earth can get between us and God.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Because God is alive in each of us.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span><span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span></p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">And that’s where the personal dimension of the resurrection comes in.</p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">Because, no matter what it is that’s oppressing us – whether it’s a dictator like Assad, or just a terrible boss; whether it’s a battering husband, or just a case of low self-esteem – nothing on this earth can separate us from the love and power of God.</p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle"><span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>The other day I found myself staring at a photograph in the newspaper of a protest going on in Damascus, Syria.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>There is no place on earth more similar to Jerusalem 2,000 years ago than Damascus today.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>I found myself staring at the faces in the photograph.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>They had a certain look to them – as if they were lit from within – and I found myself wondering: where have I seen that look before?</p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">And then I realized.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>It’s that same look I see in the faces of people here in this church.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>It’s the same look as I saw on the face of Jose ___ – who even as the pancreatic cancer was literally ripping his abdominal wall, he had no words on his lips but love for his family and friends.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>I saw it on the face of Margaret ___, who for years battled cancer and yet never flagged from her call to serve the community, and who bore her pain and her grief with enormous courage. </p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">I see that look now, on your faces.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>I see it on the face of Barbara ___, one of our most active servant ministers, who I swear is growing younger, not older.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>I see it on the face of the homeless men who come to our breakfast program, who despite the trouble they’ve seen, still live with gratitude and kindness.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>I see it on the faces of every person who comes to this communion rail, as they take in the body and blood of Christ, and in the process give themselves over to lives of service and of love. </p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">Yes, that resurrection power is alive and well here at Church of the Incarnation.<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>How do we find it?<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>We find it in Christ, who counsels us to spend time with those who are worse off than we are – they might have something to teach us; who counsels us to let go of our egos, our aspirations, our striving – that all just gets in the way; who counsels us to be like the seed, which falls to the ground and dies, in order for new life to be born from it.</p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">I pray that this same resurrection power, which knows no bounds, may find its way into all of our hearts, on this Easter morning, and always.</p><p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle"><br /></p>So... Yes! Alleluia! Christ is risen!<br />The Lord is risen indeed! Alleluia!<br /><p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">Amen.</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-911438992280535416.post-75597104485855986552012-04-05T12:20:00.002-07:002012-04-05T12:26:17.559-07:00Andrew Sullivan's bizarre screed<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml> <w:worddocument> <w:view>Normal</w:View> <w:zoom>0</w:Zoom> <w:trackmoves/> <w:trackformatting/> <w:punctuationkerning/> <w:validateagainstschemas/> <w:saveifxmlinvalid>false</w:SaveIfXMLInvalid> <w:ignoremixedcontent>false</w:IgnoreMixedContent> <w:alwaysshowplaceholdertext>false</w:AlwaysShowPlaceholderText> <w:donotpromoteqf/> <w:lidthemeother>EN-US</w:LidThemeOther> <w:lidthemeasian>X-NONE</w:LidThemeAsian> <w:lidthemecomplexscript>X-NONE</w:LidThemeComplexScript> <w:compatibility> <w:breakwrappedtables/> <w:snaptogridincell/> <w:wraptextwithpunct/> <w:useasianbreakrules/> <w:dontgrowautofit/> <w:splitpgbreakandparamark/> <w:dontvertaligncellwithsp/> <w:dontbreakconstrainedforcedtables/> <w:dontvertalignintxbx/> 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mso-para-margin-top:0in; mso-para-margin-right:0in; mso-para-margin-bottom:10.0pt; mso-para-margin-left:0in; line-height:115%; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:11.0pt; font-family:"Calibri","sans-serif"; mso-ascii-font-family:Calibri; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast; mso-hansi-font-family:Calibri; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;} </style> <![endif]--> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpFirst">Andrew Sullivan's cover story in Newsweek, "Forget the Church, Follow Jesus"</p><p class="MsoNormalCxSpFirst"> http://www.thedailybeast.com/newsweek/2012/04/01/andrew-sullivan-christianity-in-crisis.html</p><p class="MsoNormalCxSpFirst">is one of the most bizarre and ridiculous articles I've ever read - by a writer I usually love.</p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">1. If you're going to issue a sweeping broadside against all religion in order to create a sexy cover and sell a ton of magazines to your most important demographic, which is the millions of kids downloading "Why I Hate Religion But Love Jesus", then it is inconvenient to have religions that you actually respect and love on the same table with the bad churches. So you quietly remove them from the table before you sweep the rest of them off with loud and dramatic flourish. </p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">Thus, Sullivan dismisses the "Mainline" churches as being in such "rapid decline" that they apparently don't even count as religions anymore. He's talking about churches like mine, which are actually thriving, thank you very much, and not because we're trying to seize power or gain national media attention but instead because we are happily going about our lives praising God and feeding poor people. </p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">Sullivan thus makes sweeping declamations against Religion without seeming to offend the religions that he actually respects and values. As on-the-mark as his critiques of the Catholics and Evangelicals are, they do not constitute all of religion. This is just lazy writing for dramatic effect. </p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">2. Let us pause to appreciate the sheer hilarity, the incomprehensibility of this idea that Jefferson was devoted to following an "apolitical Jesus". How is it that someone who rose to the very top of the political world claims to follow an apolitical Jesus? What is he talking about?</p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">Sullivan tries to critique institutional religion by asking, "What does it matter how strictly you proclaim your belief in various doctrines if you do not live as these doctrines demand?" You mean, like Jefferson hearing Jesus say we should "give up power over others," as he rises to the highest office in the land? What is he talking about? </p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">Sullivan later describes Jefferson as "renouncing Caesar in favor of Christ". When was that, exactly? After he was the American version of Caesar, or before? After he retired from the most powerful job in the land, sold Monticello and gave the money away to his slaves, whom he freed? Because that would most definitely have been what Jesus taught. </p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">3. Sullivan cites the fact that "Obama invokes his faith in Jesus to defend his plan for universal health care" as evidence that "the ability to be faithful in a religious space and reasonable in a political one has atrophied before our eyes." What is he talking about? Is he saying the President should not reflect on the Golden Rule and how it guides his values? Must a president be silent about the religious ground of his convictions, and is that somehow a violation of what Jesus preached? Are you kidding? How has the President abdicated his responsibility to be "faithful in a religious space and reasonable in a political one?"</p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">4. "I think I grasp what it means to be both God and human..." Really? Seriously?<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>He's got that figured out? Wow. </p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">5. "There are times when great injustices - slavery, imperialism, totalitarianism, segregation - require spiritual mobilization and public witness. But from Gandhi to King, the greatest examples of these movements renounce power as well."<span style="mso-spacerun:yes"> </span>Again, what the is he talking about? Gandhi and King were all ABOUT power! Nonviolent power, the power of love and social justice, "soul force," - but it was power in every sense of the word, thoughtfully and pragmatically applied in order to bring about real political change. To say that Dr. King was not political or was not interested in power is just delusional. </p> <p class="MsoNormalCxSpMiddle">As it was with Dr. King, so it was with Jesus. Jesus grew up 4 miles from a town that was burned to the ground by the Romans. Jesus directly challenged the heart of the political system of his day, riding that colt into the capital city, into the very heart of Roman domination, critiquing the very people in power while he knowingly commits a treasonous act that would get him killed in a particular manner reserved for political criminals. Jesus was political from day one. How could anyone who knows anything about Jesus say he was apolitical? He quoted the prophets directly and modeled himself after them. He explicitly presented himself as an alternative king in the line of David, in direct opposition to the Emperor. Why would Sullivan pretend otherwise? What the hell is he talking about?</p>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-911438992280535416.post-67648529425975535522012-03-23T18:16:00.003-07:002012-03-23T18:25:53.127-07:00Anglican Prayer Beads Part 2<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjKm0e_91GrbgLy-h1e6LDEIk2b1NAgLFgKOGiObYh4qsLDet4YWQeQSK0Gqa0rW40X5dNxBXsFpNciwKVR5LG0NMElTp9Axa-5KPx4IaethlDdeLeUThnJkMS_JO9Wk60D57s7aLeeTps/s1600/IMG-20120323-00033.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjKm0e_91GrbgLy-h1e6LDEIk2b1NAgLFgKOGiObYh4qsLDet4YWQeQSK0Gqa0rW40X5dNxBXsFpNciwKVR5LG0NMElTp9Axa-5KPx4IaethlDdeLeUThnJkMS_JO9Wk60D57s7aLeeTps/s320/IMG-20120323-00033.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5723268093357165298" border="0" /></a><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7uiuRg0FCg1nxm_QFw98r0XXuOP9kHbFVTEX3i_gv30CiwdwuKTeOxUUhGwLD5_ls6t3Ftv8YOxWOdttuRLIstNWxZucv6E3Yse7R6zy-ad69-As9lgiTJKgppEU5Bjc4sFIY5UZpHbE/s1600/my+desk.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg7uiuRg0FCg1nxm_QFw98r0XXuOP9kHbFVTEX3i_gv30CiwdwuKTeOxUUhGwLD5_ls6t3Ftv8YOxWOdttuRLIstNWxZucv6E3Yse7R6zy-ad69-As9lgiTJKgppEU5Bjc4sFIY5UZpHbE/s320/my+desk.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5723268081050592162" border="0" /></a><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhg_TYvJ_Kk-y8Ob9ESj57QFtpVdBPYq7GsDpOCuD_IDTdxO6dRStB22zH7UX-KNXCJUlsRUghjkXWF_6O0SAqI-z_AHkecGsu179xmcMrpMZSpiuWqEmIASDn9t1PbwYcG0IJtbEwrhsE/s1600/prayer+beads+cluster.jpg"><img style="display:block; margin:0px auto 10px; text-align:center;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhg_TYvJ_Kk-y8Ob9ESj57QFtpVdBPYq7GsDpOCuD_IDTdxO6dRStB22zH7UX-KNXCJUlsRUghjkXWF_6O0SAqI-z_AHkecGsu179xmcMrpMZSpiuWqEmIASDn9t1PbwYcG0IJtbEwrhsE/s320/prayer+beads+cluster.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5723268094965376418" border="0" /></a><br />When I'm working at home, this is where I'm working. The prayer beads keep me company as I study and write. I enjoy their company.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-911438992280535416.post-61036126326831211932012-03-23T12:36:00.005-07:002012-03-23T12:49:40.600-07:00Anglican Prayer Beads<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhy6gmgIEfDadDl1wWK77b41COWY6hZonIM1bQxJjvFKzJnAz0H0MJIxZF8y0zYDLO4Rlajcy7hu9C3BJwvBT9jSHS6UQN4W7WTKiWZuZSHFfq0yMQqKVuoIsEAe9PdCCOw1-kWxwdAeVU/s1600/anglican+prayer+beads+w+buddha.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhy6gmgIEfDadDl1wWK77b41COWY6hZonIM1bQxJjvFKzJnAz0H0MJIxZF8y0zYDLO4Rlajcy7hu9C3BJwvBT9jSHS6UQN4W7WTKiWZuZSHFfq0yMQqKVuoIsEAe9PdCCOw1-kWxwdAeVU/s320/anglican+prayer+beads+w+buddha.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5723181198500924402" border="0" /></a><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgx1vBIbtBRQKYB7KFiuXI1pJAgBbQb2QvcP9QxN8LZTDS4D_ECjv48sebI19QX34hKPQbvsqM1DEDdII-BvumlDCUhW7gXGeqgj6XJEHFRqfPaMkRX1_dJyuUV5SkJSy7Ga69ZXpDxtZg/s1600/prayer+beads+closeup+4.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgx1vBIbtBRQKYB7KFiuXI1pJAgBbQb2QvcP9QxN8LZTDS4D_ECjv48sebI19QX34hKPQbvsqM1DEDdII-BvumlDCUhW7gXGeqgj6XJEHFRqfPaMkRX1_dJyuUV5SkJSy7Ga69ZXpDxtZg/s320/prayer+beads+closeup+4.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5723181190473605634" border="0" /></a><br /><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi00rKrCyuLnLA5EFVljbddMtDgkAlGgVqFSJFWfl2bRHv-dgxPzpZH6ScKb_ISjg7Vxxt29wk-aTa11pCHcBSR2SVkHxqoZH5bBnZPL_LHqStj5ZbP14Jd569QEiZKYNioXFpMXDa0_js/s1600/prayer+beads+w+Buddha.jpg"><img style="float:left; margin:0 10px 10px 0;cursor:pointer; cursor:hand;width: 240px; height: 320px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi00rKrCyuLnLA5EFVljbddMtDgkAlGgVqFSJFWfl2bRHv-dgxPzpZH6ScKb_ISjg7Vxxt29wk-aTa11pCHcBSR2SVkHxqoZH5bBnZPL_LHqStj5ZbP14Jd569QEiZKYNioXFpMXDa0_js/s320/prayer+beads+w+Buddha.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5723181204258634594" border="0" /></a><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br />Stayed up way too late last night making Anglican Prayer Beads. Members of my congregation are buying them to support our Sunday morning breakfast program for homeless folks. The stone beads are magnesite - very similar to marble.<br /><br /><br />My personal favorite has the Buddha as the Invitatory bead - when I get to him, I take a deep breath and sit in silence.<br /><br />If you'd like one, we're selling them for $25 - $30 depending on features. All proceeds above cost go to support the breakfast program.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-911438992280535416.post-37828489918317525102012-03-19T02:51:00.005-07:002012-03-19T17:18:05.707-07:00Why We Should Sign the Anglican CovenantI have been fighting on the side of equality for LBGTs since the day my best friend attempted suicide after one-too-many bullies called him a fag. I cheered at Gene Robinson’s election, debated at countless conventions, and married my share of gay couples. So when, at a recent Clergy Conference devoted to the Anglican Covenant, I heard myself arguing for the signing of the thing, I was as surprised as anyone in the room.<br /><br />This is what I heard myself say: <br /><br />1. Every organization has the right to define its membership. If a Mormon declares himself to be a Christian, that’s an interesting debate. But if a Mormon wants to declare himself to also be an Episcopalian, there would be no debate: you can be one or the other, but you can't be both. Our Mormon friends would say the same about us, and they'd be right. Every organization has its boundaries – and needs them.<br /><br />Boundaries that are transparent and open to inquiry are marks of a healthy community. They give the community it's structure and shape – they are like the walls of a house. Sure, they get in the way sometimes; they can even be painful on those nights when we need to find the bathroom in the dark. But generally speaking I’m glad my house - and my church - has walls. They keep the roof from falling down.<br /><br />2. A lot of very smart and presumably prayerful people have worked very hard, producing many drafts of a nearly unreadable document which basically says, “We believe in the importance of relationship so strongly that if you do something we don’t like, we’re never going to talk to you again.” Well, okay, so apparently that’s the best they could do, and now they’ve asked us to sign it. This seems to be our working definition of the word “Anglican.” If it were up to me, I’d write something different, but hey, they never asked me, and I respect that.<br /><br />It’s bizarre logic notwithstanding, there is little in the Anglican Covenant that is, in itself, offensive to the average Episcopalian’s conscience. It deftly avoids any actual commitments beyond a longing for respectful relationships. Who doesn’t want that? Some people think the whole thing is just a cynical attempt by those in power to silence others on the grounds that the Gospel makes them uncomfortable - but I don’t know, that seems a little harsh.<br /><br />3. No demand for conformity would wisely ask any people of faith to disobey their conscience. If, after signing the Covenant, it were decided by a High Deliberative Body that the Episcopal Church had created a controversy which we had been expressly forbidden to create, then the powers that be would have the pleasure of judging between two competing claims on the good: community achieved by means of conformity vs. moral clarity achieved by means of expressed conscience. <br /><br />Some kind of heresy trial would presumably be called, at which we would be free to make our case. We might patiently explain that there is nothing on God’s good earth, and certainly nothing in this vague and overly-nuanced pile of wordsmithy, to make us renounce the truth of the gospel as we understand it. We might make our case that this controversy is, in fact, a settled matter in our church, and that there is no going back – because the Gospel truth of full equality is so self-evident to us that we could no more renounce our gay and lesbian friends as we could sharply kick our 90 year-old grandma in the shins. It’s just not going to happen, no matter whose sensibilities we have offended. <br /><br />If that were to get us kicked out of this Communion, the separating blow would come from those who couldn’t stand to be at table with us - not from us. As long as we have a place at the table; as long as we have the chance to proclaim our Gospel; as long as God’s grace has a chance to infiltrate our relationships, we need to take it. <br /><br />Let them make their case against us, and let us make ours for Christ, and let the chips fall where they may. If the High Deliberative Body decides they can’t endure our presence, let them make that judgment and call Security to have us removed. In the meantime we’ll keep loving them. Because the Gospel does not die; the Gospel is always polite; the Gospel does not give up.<br /><br />4. Jesus submitted to the Sanhedrin. He stood before Pilate and took his licks. He didn’t say, “To hell with you guys, I’m going back to my hammock in the clouds.” No, he made his stand and he took his punishment. Every great movement for social justice has involved people suffering deeply for the sake of their day in court. Let’s have ours. What’s the worst they can do to us? Tell us we can’t wear purple in Lent anymore? What? <br /><br />5. Some say that there is an Anglican priest somewhere in the Sudan who is getting death threats because he’s involuntarily associated with a bunch of homos in the U.S. Well, guess what: that guy’s ten times a better Christian than we ever will be; and if he needs a little distance from us so that he’s physically safe, who the hell are we to argue with that? If we need to suffer a little bit of the Church’s whip so that he can preach the Gospel to some of the poorest and most oppressed people in the world, so be it. If censuring the naughty Episcopalians gives him some cover, let us be censured. Our suffering is nothing compared to his.<br /><br />Meanwhile we’ll keep preaching hope to the gay 15 year-old boy in the back of that priest’s church, who is literally fearing for his life. We’ll keep sending subversive notes of compassion to the 25 year-old African lesbian who’s been raped in an attempt to turn her straight. We’ll continue to speak words of comfort to the desperate Baptist preacher gratifying himself in men’s rooms and scared to death of burning in hell. I mean, the poor guy.<br /><br />In other words, we all have our work to do with the Gospel that we’ve been given. Let’s get on with it; and stay together as long as we can.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com3