FOURTH SUNDAY OF ADVENT
Year A
December 19, 2010
Ss. Peter & Paul, 10:00 a.m. Mass
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God with us,
borne by Mary’s flesh
beyond all convention:
give us the faith of Joseph
to see the Spirit’s work
where the world sees only shame;
to listen to the promise
and waken to the cry
of life renewed and love reborn;
through Jesus Christ, the one who is to come
Amen.
(Steven Shakespeare: Prayers for an Inclusive Church)
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I have always loved this Sunday, the Fourth of Advent. It speaks of announcement; in another year on this day, we hear the story of the announcement by the angel Gabriel to Mary that she will conceive and bear a Son. In yet another year, we have the story of Mary’s visit to her cousin Elizabeth and the two pregnant mothers compare notes. And, it’s always a joy on March 25 each year to celebrate the Annunciation to Mary again, often providing us with a joyful respite in the austerity of Lent.
But on this Sunday, in Liturgical Year “A”, the “Year of Matthew” (so called because the gospel that bears his name is used throughout much of the year), the prominent character in the narrative is Joseph. Poor old - we think; probably he was in his thirties and considerably older than Mary, who could well have been about 14 or so – poor old Joseph! Here he is, engaged to Mary, and finds she’s pregnant . . . and not by him. In the “old dispensation,” we heard that he “would divorce her quietly,” and move on with his life. But he doesn’t. He “took her as his wife . . .That child is from the Holy Spirit . . . you are to name him Jesus, for he will save his people from their sins.”
Sam Portaro has written:
Joseph was not a sophisticated man, else he would not have put up with [what he had to put up with]. He was humble and maybe even a little simple, the kind of man who has a soft heart, the kind described as “the salt of the earth.” He was probably a carpenter of sufficient competency to make a living at it, but there is no evidence that he was in any way exceptional—except that he was the kind of man who could take a pregnant, teenaged wife and a troublesome, temperamental boy and make a life with them. He was that remarkable person who could shrug off the gossip and the complaints, [and] take them in stride….
2
And think, too, about Joseph and the role that dreams play in the narrative: in a dream, Joseph has announced to him: go ahead and take Mary as your wife, despite the sure shame that would come your way; in a dream, he is told to take his wife and his son and flee to Egypt because jealous and cruel Herod wants to destroy the child; in a dream, Joseph is told that it is safe to go home to Nazareth, now that Herod’s dead. We could say, “Joseph, the Dreamer,” as though he was somewhat wifty and ungrounded. Ah, but he’s not – I would beg to differ with that sort of assessment of Joseph.
Yesterday, I went up to the Grotto. Maybe you’ve been there to visit, pray, hear good music at Christmas time, walk their new labyrinth, or walk the Stations of the Cross. Well, in 1997, as a tourist in Portland, I was given a free token for the elevator to get me up to the second level. I remember being aghast at that – to me – dreadful, “embalmed Mary and Child” and was ready to descend on the elevator immediately! But I continued my tour of the area and ran across the most remarkable thing: “Stations of Joseph.”[“Garden of Joseph”?] There are about six of them, and I saw them again yesterday; they are carved in marble, and are set up to be a Rosary devotion. Each station has a “sorrowful” part and a “joyful” part. E.g., the “sorrowful” part at one station is “Joseph is confused about the birth,” and its opposite, or “joyful” part, is “Joseph is joyful at the Birth of Jesus.”
I spent some time pondering these carvings, and thinking about Joseph and asking God to help me just “be” with Joseph for awhile, and not just to get through a homily that still was unwritten, but to find something that might enlighten and delight my hearers – and me.
I remembered a hymn by Brian Wren, “You were a child of mine.” It’s called “Joseph’s Carol”:
You were a child of mine.
I watched you born, and wept
with joy to see your sticky head.
I held you in my arms.
I watched you, awe-struck, as you slept.
I love you, Son of God:
you were a child of mine.
You were a boy of mine.
You wallowed in the sand.
You copied me at work, and played
with hammer, wood and nails.
You talked to me, and held my hand.
I love you, Son of God:
you were a boy of mine.
You were a youth of mine.
Quite suddenly you grew.
You sought and questioned wiser men.
I felt you breaking free.
I raged, admired – and feared for you.
I love you, Son of God:
3 you were a youth of mine.
Last Thursday, the 16th of December, was the 40th anniversary of my ordination as a Priest in the Church. So much has changed since then. I was a young, cocky cleric and an anti-war member of Episcopal Peace Fellowship. There I was, stuck in a small town in southeastern Kansas, where I really didn’t want to be. But that night I felt the weight of Apostolic hands that were pressed upon my head by the Bishop and all the priests present to make me a priest.
I indulged overly much in “priestcraft”. That’s a buzz- word meaning all the details about how to conduct yourself as a priest, right down to how to hold your hands at Mass, how to hear a confession, how to anoint the sick and dying, what to wear, etc. It’s a much healthier scene today. More broadly speaking, it’s tougher to be a priest in today’s world; then, there were still some discounts for clergy. I could buy gasoline for 35 cents a gallon, rather than the full price of 38 cents! Things are more honest now.
Spiritually speaking, I’m better grounded now than I was then. And now we affirm our Baptismal Covenant in a big way, and understand our ordinations to be a part of the Ministry of All the Baptized. We renew that Covenant every time we celebrate a Baptism here. The “Priest-as-Entrepreneur” is now the order of the day.
I feel the time has come to “re-invent” myself! I’m still going to be very much a priest, but I’m going to “re-retire” and “go on sabbatical” for a season. This is done with the advice of my spiritual director and Bishop Michael, and the consent of our rector Kurt, along with encouragement from Bishop Ladehoff, my wife, and family and friends. I’m going to go to church with LaVera and not take on any supply work or service with diocesan groups for about six months. Surely, I have some “churchly” commitments to honor during that space of time, but the emphasis will be upon finding anew in the Mystical Body of Christ what it is to be a priest in his seventieth year.
Bishop Michael said to me recently, “Do things in your retirement that bring you joy.” Dear friends, being at the altar and in a pulpit in this place brings me much joy, but, like Joseph, who had to contend with the culture in which he lived, and to be “just Joseph,” I am going to take a big risk and be “just Phillip.” I want to do it without the trappings, accoutrements and subculture of “priestcraft.” In the words of the opening prayer I used today, I desire, with Joseph, to “see the Spirit’s work where the world sees only shame; to listen to the promise and waken to the cry of life renewed and love reborn.” You will understand, I hope and pray, that I’m not leaving or “checking-out.” You may not see me often, but know I pray for you all and love you very much. I hope you’ll pray for me and for LaVera, who has shared this often rough journey for over 45 years.
These past four and half years have been wonderful for us at Ss. Peter & Paul: the worship style, music, and community life all suit us to a “tee.” We love helping with Brigid’s Breakfast on Saturdays and being in a congregation that takes God seriously, and laughs and weeps together through thick and thin. We are blessed with Fr. Kurt’s wisdom, pastoral sensitivity, and vision. And…is there another parish in the Episcopal Church that has a “parish defibrillator”? I only wish I could easily put our history into words, in the form of a book! I can’t promise a parish history, but please know that it’s still on a “back burner,” if only in my “Joseph-dreams”!
I’d better close this before I get maudlin and sound like I’m preaching at my own funeral! Here’s the conclusion of Brian Wren’s hymn about Joseph:
4
You were a son of mine,
full-grown, my hope and pride.
You went your puzzling way, a man
so ready, fine and young:
life broke in me the day you died.
I love you, Son of God:
you were a son of mine.
You are the Lord of all—
My child, my man, my son.
You loved and gave yourself for me.
Now I belong to you—
New worlds are born, new life begun.
I love you, Son of God:
You are the Lord of all.
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[Excerpt from Sam Portaro’s Brightest and Best: A Companion to Lesser Feasts and Fasts, Cowley Press, 1995; Brian Wren hymn from Faith Looking Forward, Hope Publishing Co., 1972]
Homily by Phil Ayers+
archived musings and preachments
Thursday, December 23, 2010
Thursday, December 16, 2010
Matthew's Tale: the strange birth of the Messiah
When we think of the Biblical account of Christmas, we love the stories so much that we collapse them together. Of the four Gospels, only two, Matthew and Luke, make any mention at all of the birth of the Messiah. Luke’s tale has much of the imagery that forms innumerable manger scenes and Church School pageants: animals including the patient donkey that carried Mary on her tiring journey, shepherds from the fields, and angels who announce the holy birth and sing “Gloria” in the winter night. Mary figures strongly in the story, and has voice, especially in the wondrous song called by tradition “Magnificat.”
Matthew tells a different tale.
If Luke is Mary’s story, Matthew is Joseph’s. Joseph, named for Joseph the dreamer of dreams, the loved younger son of the Biblical patriarch Jacob, also dreams that he is to do amazing things that challenge him to the depths of his soul. An angel comes to him, not to sing “Gloria”, but to tell Joseph to accept and marry his fiancé Mary who is already “with child by the Holy Spirit.” The angel names the child Jesus, actually in Hebrew “Ye’Shua”, “Joshua”, the same name as the Biblical hero who led Israel from the desert into the Promised Land. But just as Joshua himself had many battles to fight in the new land, Joseph must contend with a cruel and powerful king. Herod is known today as a deeply clever and politically successful ruler, builder of some of the most magnificent structures that archaeologists are still uncovering. He was also a notably cruel and, later in life, paranoid king who dealt ruthlessly and violently with threats to his power, even from members of his own family.
The angel sends the new Joseph into exile in Egypt with the new Joshua, the new liberator of the people. He may have been honored by Gentile scholars and magicians, the “Magi” of Christmas tales, but the Magi took a detour out of fear of savage Herod and the new Joshua must flee also.
Gospels are not told as “biographies of Jesus” according to how we understand such works. Gospels are how living churches, living communities, told the story of Jesus in a way that gave them faith and strength and hope for their own journeys. In this tale of Matthew, then, we are asked many questions and given much strength. When have we been asked to do something outrageous in response to God? How have we been asked to revise or even reverse our sense of the “way things are” as was Joseph? What are the threats to our living a life of faith and of hope? When have we “gone into exile”? And how and when are we called to return? If these questions speak to us on any level, know that the Christ, the anointed one, came into the world and walked in these ways. He knows our path, even when it lies hidden from us.
Matthew tells a different tale.
If Luke is Mary’s story, Matthew is Joseph’s. Joseph, named for Joseph the dreamer of dreams, the loved younger son of the Biblical patriarch Jacob, also dreams that he is to do amazing things that challenge him to the depths of his soul. An angel comes to him, not to sing “Gloria”, but to tell Joseph to accept and marry his fiancé Mary who is already “with child by the Holy Spirit.” The angel names the child Jesus, actually in Hebrew “Ye’Shua”, “Joshua”, the same name as the Biblical hero who led Israel from the desert into the Promised Land. But just as Joshua himself had many battles to fight in the new land, Joseph must contend with a cruel and powerful king. Herod is known today as a deeply clever and politically successful ruler, builder of some of the most magnificent structures that archaeologists are still uncovering. He was also a notably cruel and, later in life, paranoid king who dealt ruthlessly and violently with threats to his power, even from members of his own family.
The angel sends the new Joseph into exile in Egypt with the new Joshua, the new liberator of the people. He may have been honored by Gentile scholars and magicians, the “Magi” of Christmas tales, but the Magi took a detour out of fear of savage Herod and the new Joshua must flee also.
Gospels are not told as “biographies of Jesus” according to how we understand such works. Gospels are how living churches, living communities, told the story of Jesus in a way that gave them faith and strength and hope for their own journeys. In this tale of Matthew, then, we are asked many questions and given much strength. When have we been asked to do something outrageous in response to God? How have we been asked to revise or even reverse our sense of the “way things are” as was Joseph? What are the threats to our living a life of faith and of hope? When have we “gone into exile”? And how and when are we called to return? If these questions speak to us on any level, know that the Christ, the anointed one, came into the world and walked in these ways. He knows our path, even when it lies hidden from us.
Tuesday, December 14, 2010
physical therapy
3 Advent A 2010
(Isaiah 35: 1-10; Canticle 15; James 5: 7-10; Matthew 11: 2-11)
“Welcome to my torture chamber!”
My second violent rear-ending totaling yet another car left me with lower back pain and a feeling of vulnerability. I had received my black belt just a month before and felt better about my health and strength than I had since I was a kid. Now I felt weakened and frail, and I wanted that feeling of strength and independence back.
Bill the physical therapist was a man about my age, but spare and fit and energetic and utterly honest. He smiled as I scanned the large room, filled with equipment. Some of the gear looked like fitness-center type stuff, weight machines and all. Some looked more complex and just scary, like post-modern Spanish Inquisition machinery designed to tear a confession out of people’s lips.
Still smiling, Bill said, “Whatta ya think? People come to physical therapy thinking that they are going to get deep-tissue massage and lots of hugs. Most of the time they are with me they complain and swear at me. But they leave with their lives back. If you want to be healed, you will work and push yourself. Because to heal damaged tissue, you have to strengthen the muscles and tissue around the damaged place. In order to get better, you have to get stronger.”
Today, I did not hang a sign on the church that says, “Welcome to Fr. Kurt’s torture chamber”, although some Sundays people may think that to themselves. But I take a lesson from my old therapist and say that today, Rose Sunday, “Be joyful!” Sunday, is a day when we come for healing and learn that, if we wish to be healed, we must take on strength. We must enter the physical therapy-chamber of God.
Isaiah’s glad song is all about taking on strength. He is very specific: “Strengthen the weak hands, make firm the feeble knees!” The promise of God is near, so now is not the time to collapse and sit by the side of the road! Even if we are beaten down, by life or by pain or by discouragement or by doubt, now is the time to take on strength. Our God is strong, so ask for his strength. Our God is strong, so ask and ask to be the person of strength that God made us to be. There is good news today—if we feel at the end of our strength, we can call on God for divine strength. In fact, we can be demanding about it! Did you notice that we told God to get stirred up when we began the Mass today? Get moving, God, get up and get busy! We are empowered by God to ask that boldly. But if we do, know that we ask God to get stirred up so we can get stirred up. In the world of the Gospel, No beggar is left by the side of the road.
And that is what Jesus tells John. John asks that heartbreaking question right before his execution that is on the lips of every honest seeker: Are you the one we are waiting for, or do we wait for someone else? Jesus’ answer is not a theological statement, but an invitation for John to look at how God’s power has been stirred up. “The blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them.” God is on the move, things are changing, and you John? Even from your prison cell, are you on the move too?
We talk of the two comings of Jesus—once long ago, humble and born in a stable; once again, in power and glory. The monk Bernard in the Middle Ages said that there is a third coming—Jesus comes every day. And he comes to give us strength for the journey. “Keep God’s word…let it enter into your very being… Feed on goodness, and your soul will delight in its richness. Remember to eat your bread, or your heart will wither away. Fill your soul with richness and strength…The Son with the Father will come to you.”
So, welcome to the Advent physical therapy gym. It’s not a bedroom and it is not a couch. If we wish to be healed, if we still believe in the promises of God and the divine goodness, then be ready to work out. Be ready to seek strength. I always felt wide awake after those therapy sessions, as if every fibre of my body were tingling and alert. That’s what a good workout will do for you. That is also a good description of an Advent state of soul.
(Isaiah 35: 1-10; Canticle 15; James 5: 7-10; Matthew 11: 2-11)
“Welcome to my torture chamber!”
My second violent rear-ending totaling yet another car left me with lower back pain and a feeling of vulnerability. I had received my black belt just a month before and felt better about my health and strength than I had since I was a kid. Now I felt weakened and frail, and I wanted that feeling of strength and independence back.
Bill the physical therapist was a man about my age, but spare and fit and energetic and utterly honest. He smiled as I scanned the large room, filled with equipment. Some of the gear looked like fitness-center type stuff, weight machines and all. Some looked more complex and just scary, like post-modern Spanish Inquisition machinery designed to tear a confession out of people’s lips.
Still smiling, Bill said, “Whatta ya think? People come to physical therapy thinking that they are going to get deep-tissue massage and lots of hugs. Most of the time they are with me they complain and swear at me. But they leave with their lives back. If you want to be healed, you will work and push yourself. Because to heal damaged tissue, you have to strengthen the muscles and tissue around the damaged place. In order to get better, you have to get stronger.”
Today, I did not hang a sign on the church that says, “Welcome to Fr. Kurt’s torture chamber”, although some Sundays people may think that to themselves. But I take a lesson from my old therapist and say that today, Rose Sunday, “Be joyful!” Sunday, is a day when we come for healing and learn that, if we wish to be healed, we must take on strength. We must enter the physical therapy-chamber of God.
Isaiah’s glad song is all about taking on strength. He is very specific: “Strengthen the weak hands, make firm the feeble knees!” The promise of God is near, so now is not the time to collapse and sit by the side of the road! Even if we are beaten down, by life or by pain or by discouragement or by doubt, now is the time to take on strength. Our God is strong, so ask for his strength. Our God is strong, so ask and ask to be the person of strength that God made us to be. There is good news today—if we feel at the end of our strength, we can call on God for divine strength. In fact, we can be demanding about it! Did you notice that we told God to get stirred up when we began the Mass today? Get moving, God, get up and get busy! We are empowered by God to ask that boldly. But if we do, know that we ask God to get stirred up so we can get stirred up. In the world of the Gospel, No beggar is left by the side of the road.
And that is what Jesus tells John. John asks that heartbreaking question right before his execution that is on the lips of every honest seeker: Are you the one we are waiting for, or do we wait for someone else? Jesus’ answer is not a theological statement, but an invitation for John to look at how God’s power has been stirred up. “The blind receive their sight, the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, and the poor have good news brought to them.” God is on the move, things are changing, and you John? Even from your prison cell, are you on the move too?
We talk of the two comings of Jesus—once long ago, humble and born in a stable; once again, in power and glory. The monk Bernard in the Middle Ages said that there is a third coming—Jesus comes every day. And he comes to give us strength for the journey. “Keep God’s word…let it enter into your very being… Feed on goodness, and your soul will delight in its richness. Remember to eat your bread, or your heart will wither away. Fill your soul with richness and strength…The Son with the Father will come to you.”
So, welcome to the Advent physical therapy gym. It’s not a bedroom and it is not a couch. If we wish to be healed, if we still believe in the promises of God and the divine goodness, then be ready to work out. Be ready to seek strength. I always felt wide awake after those therapy sessions, as if every fibre of my body were tingling and alert. That’s what a good workout will do for you. That is also a good description of an Advent state of soul.
Wednesday, December 8, 2010
called out...
"In those days John the Baptist appeared in the wilderness of Judea, proclaiming, 'Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.' This is the one of whom the prophet Isaiah spoke when he said,
"The voice of one crying out in the wilderness:
`Prepare the way of the Lord,
make his paths straight.'"
"Now John wore clothing of camel's hair with a leather belt around his waist, and his food was locusts and wild honey. Then the people of Jerusalem and all Judea were going out to him, and all the region along the Jordan, and they were baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins.
"But when he saw many Pharisees and Sadducees coming for baptism, he said to them, 'You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bear fruit worthy of repentance. Do not presume to say to yourselves, `We have Abraham as our ancestor'; for I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children to Abraham. Even now the ax is lying at the root of the trees; every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.
"'I baptize you with water for repentance, but one who is more powerful than I is coming after me; I am not worthy to carry his sandals. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor and will gather his wheat into the granary; but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.'" (Matthew 3: 1-12)
Matthew's community of Antioch, notes Alexander Shaia, were a disparate Jewish collective traumatized by the sacking of Jerusalem and the razing of the Temple, God's holy dwelling-place. As people in crisis, they vacillated between despair and seeking for hope and meaning in these events, for a reason to go on, for a way to understand the incomprehensible. Some elements of the community advocated a renewed and vigorous Torah-centered faith not dependent on the Temple and its sacrifices, rigorous in its observance and very clear about who was in the community and who was out. This is a very human response to crisis and disaster and we see this reflected in many strict literalist or "fundamentalist" movements today.
Others, whom Shaia dubs "Messianists", were Jewish followers of the charismatic lay teacher from Galilee, believing him to be God's anointed. They not only struggled to make sense of the loss of the Temple, which they also held sacred, but were still making sense of their Master's horrible execution by the Romans.
To all these people Matthew tells his story of the powerful, enigmatic figure of John the Baptizer, embodying in his person the charisma and shock of the old prophets of Judah and Israel with something utterly new, a new proclamation. He calls all to leave Jerusalem, to leave the well-known holy city with its Temple, to an unnamed place "in the wilderness." The unnamed and the unknown place becomes the place of change and encounter. All are called to this change--to what end? No one knows! But as one preacher said, perhaps the people hearing John looked back towards Jerusalem and, in a moment of sacred disorientation, wondered if the familiar holy city really was "the wilderness", and whether this nameless piece of wild country was the sacred dwelling of God!
It is the officially "holy people", the Pharisees and Sadducees, who hear John's harshest words.
What is disrupted for us in our lives, in our church, in our world? What has us disoriented, reeling? From what familiar and even "sacred" place are we being called forth? What "familiar holiness" is being spoken to harshly by the prophet's words? And, in the question placed in the mouths of John's hearers, what are we to do?
"The voice of one crying out in the wilderness:
`Prepare the way of the Lord,
make his paths straight.'"
"Now John wore clothing of camel's hair with a leather belt around his waist, and his food was locusts and wild honey. Then the people of Jerusalem and all Judea were going out to him, and all the region along the Jordan, and they were baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins.
"But when he saw many Pharisees and Sadducees coming for baptism, he said to them, 'You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bear fruit worthy of repentance. Do not presume to say to yourselves, `We have Abraham as our ancestor'; for I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children to Abraham. Even now the ax is lying at the root of the trees; every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.
"'I baptize you with water for repentance, but one who is more powerful than I is coming after me; I am not worthy to carry his sandals. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor and will gather his wheat into the granary; but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.'" (Matthew 3: 1-12)
Matthew's community of Antioch, notes Alexander Shaia, were a disparate Jewish collective traumatized by the sacking of Jerusalem and the razing of the Temple, God's holy dwelling-place. As people in crisis, they vacillated between despair and seeking for hope and meaning in these events, for a reason to go on, for a way to understand the incomprehensible. Some elements of the community advocated a renewed and vigorous Torah-centered faith not dependent on the Temple and its sacrifices, rigorous in its observance and very clear about who was in the community and who was out. This is a very human response to crisis and disaster and we see this reflected in many strict literalist or "fundamentalist" movements today.
Others, whom Shaia dubs "Messianists", were Jewish followers of the charismatic lay teacher from Galilee, believing him to be God's anointed. They not only struggled to make sense of the loss of the Temple, which they also held sacred, but were still making sense of their Master's horrible execution by the Romans.
To all these people Matthew tells his story of the powerful, enigmatic figure of John the Baptizer, embodying in his person the charisma and shock of the old prophets of Judah and Israel with something utterly new, a new proclamation. He calls all to leave Jerusalem, to leave the well-known holy city with its Temple, to an unnamed place "in the wilderness." The unnamed and the unknown place becomes the place of change and encounter. All are called to this change--to what end? No one knows! But as one preacher said, perhaps the people hearing John looked back towards Jerusalem and, in a moment of sacred disorientation, wondered if the familiar holy city really was "the wilderness", and whether this nameless piece of wild country was the sacred dwelling of God!
It is the officially "holy people", the Pharisees and Sadducees, who hear John's harshest words.
What is disrupted for us in our lives, in our church, in our world? What has us disoriented, reeling? From what familiar and even "sacred" place are we being called forth? What "familiar holiness" is being spoken to harshly by the prophet's words? And, in the question placed in the mouths of John's hearers, what are we to do?
Wednesday, December 1, 2010
Pioneer Square
The attempted Pioneer Square bombing
For me, the recent bombing attempt at Pioneer Square brushed closely by, like the brush of the feathers of a dark bird. My son and his girlfriend were there. Last year the whole family and I were there. I know some of you were too, or had family and friends who were at Pioneer Square, “Portland’s living room.”
I ask myself as I write how my reflections might be different had the attempt been successful, and if my son and his friend had been killed or injured. I do not know the answer to that question. Perhaps none of us do until we are tragically in that position. Nevertheless, as a follower of Jesus and a priest as well as a father and husband and citizen, I write as I feel the compelling need.
I am not immune to fear, and I am not immune to anger arising from fear. I have been proximate to enough violence and death to know how life can change or be erased in the blink of an eye. I have sat and sought for words with those who grieve, and more often have sat with them in silence.
And yet I say, with all of the conviction of my soul, that we are called and empowered not to allow our lives and our responses to be ruled by that anger and that fear. The teaching of the Christ whom I follow is clear—forgive, as you would be forgiven; love your enemies, do good to those who offend you, pray for those who persecute you. We make a grave mistake if we imagine that these clear teachings of Jesus were somehow easier and less complex in the 1st Century when he spoke them, or are only meant to apply to peaceful and simple times. They were never simple or easy, and they are meant to apply always.
We clergy often commit the sin of acting as if the teachings of our Lord are easy and palatable and intended for our comfort alone. In the name of maintaining numbers and contributors in our congregations we often gloss over the hard sayings of Jesus. We are not called to comfort and to a false “inner peace” that ignores the enormity of what is done in our world, done often in our name and on our behalf.
In the face of a potential act of mass violence, we cannot lapse uncritically into language like “the war on terror”, coined not by the Gospel but by a past political administration, in reflecting on how to respond with our faith and our integrity intact. Any easy alliance between the Gospel and militant zealous patriotism needs to be strongly examined in the light of our best values. Sadly, voices proclaiming their faith in the Prince of Peace have in the same breath advocated violence, religious intolerance, and revenge.
I am grateful beyond words that that bomb did not go off, that it was a contrived fake. My eyes sting with a father’s relieved tears as I write these words.
I am deeply grateful that there are those who pay the price to search out and to act on dangers to my family, my neighbors, and my people. I admit that, paraphrasing an English writer, that I sleep safely knowing that rough men and women are willing to deal out violence to those who would deal out violence to me. But I believe we must never excuse ourselves from the moral complexity and ambiguity of that fact. The price that is paid for our sense of security, borne by those whose lives and souls are endangered by that work as well as those who are the recipients of violence on our behalf, should trouble us and place before us the question of how to do we actually change such a brutal world.
I grieve for that 19 year old young man, Mohamed Osman Mohamud, whose life as he knew it is over. It is true that a confused, alienated young man is fully capable of making conscious choices and of harming a lot of people. But a 19 year old is a very young person, very impressionable, as I remember I was at 19. Fortunately I chose and embraced value-systems that were more humane and more responsible than did Mohamed. The spectacle of his arrest and trial is to me mostly about the problem of alienated immigrant youth, desperate and angry at being adrift in a culture not their own. People I know and respect work with Somali children and youth in Portland and can speak to the legacy of political violence, the memory of refugee camps, and the cultural alienation suffered by those children. In spite of any fear and anxiety we feel, we cannot begin to understand what those children carry within their minds and souls. As a nation of immigrants, save for those of Native blood who have been made to feel like aliens in their own land, we need to recall our own family stories and know some empathy.
I am glad that Mohamed will have his “day in court.” And I am glad the defense will call into question the procedure used in the development of the case against him. The best strength of our nation, that which makes us distinct in the world, is that we are concerned with the individual rights of all, that our law enforcement is not immune to scrutiny and accountability, and that all are presumed innocent until proven otherwise. These basic civil safeguards are often threatened in times of fear and anger. Sometimes officials and law enforcement have found the practice of accountability, public scrutiny, and legal defense awkward and frustrating in the pursuit of their goals. But this is the price of a participative democracy in which individual rights are protected. It is messy, complicated, and slow. But we compromise these rights and practices at risk of losing what is most worth defending about this nation. To paraphrase Winston Churchill, democracy is the second-worse system in the world—the only one worse is all the rest.
I grieve for the fact that, in the words of one frustrated Muslim citizen, one incident like this takes the five steps towards understanding laboriously taken forward and flings us ten steps back. We all should feel outrage and a sense of common threat by the arson committed in the Corvallis mosque. It is directed against any who publically witness to their faith. I am deeply moved by the response of the people of Corvallis and of faith-communities there to rally around the people of the mosque. I do think that leadership of the various Islamic communities (for there are many, distinguished by history and teachings and ethnic roots as are Christians) have an obligation to speak out clearly against violence and the distortion of their teachings represented by terrorism. But I also believe that we Christian folk have the same obligation, to speak out against the violence and coercion done in the name of our own faith, and we usually avoid it. Too often we turn a blind eye to language sprinkled with the name of Jesus and imagery from the Bible used to justify military action overseas as well as prejudice and violence against vulnerable people and groups and communities among us. There are too many planks in our own eyes for us to feel self-righteous about the splinter in the eye of another.
There is nothing easy about living in these times, even amidst the relative serenity and illusion of isolation that some of us enjoy here in Portland, Oregon. There is nothing easy about how our best and most fundamental values, both as citizens and, for those of us who profess faith, live side by side with the potential violence of our times. It is vital that we do not leap to any easy conclusion that makes it easy. Even had that bomb been real, these hard questions remain. How costly is the achievement of a sense of security if we lose what is most vital, most precious about our core values? Or in the words of one far more eloquent, “What does it profit you to gain the whole world, and yet lose yourself in the process?”
For me, the recent bombing attempt at Pioneer Square brushed closely by, like the brush of the feathers of a dark bird. My son and his girlfriend were there. Last year the whole family and I were there. I know some of you were too, or had family and friends who were at Pioneer Square, “Portland’s living room.”
I ask myself as I write how my reflections might be different had the attempt been successful, and if my son and his friend had been killed or injured. I do not know the answer to that question. Perhaps none of us do until we are tragically in that position. Nevertheless, as a follower of Jesus and a priest as well as a father and husband and citizen, I write as I feel the compelling need.
I am not immune to fear, and I am not immune to anger arising from fear. I have been proximate to enough violence and death to know how life can change or be erased in the blink of an eye. I have sat and sought for words with those who grieve, and more often have sat with them in silence.
And yet I say, with all of the conviction of my soul, that we are called and empowered not to allow our lives and our responses to be ruled by that anger and that fear. The teaching of the Christ whom I follow is clear—forgive, as you would be forgiven; love your enemies, do good to those who offend you, pray for those who persecute you. We make a grave mistake if we imagine that these clear teachings of Jesus were somehow easier and less complex in the 1st Century when he spoke them, or are only meant to apply to peaceful and simple times. They were never simple or easy, and they are meant to apply always.
We clergy often commit the sin of acting as if the teachings of our Lord are easy and palatable and intended for our comfort alone. In the name of maintaining numbers and contributors in our congregations we often gloss over the hard sayings of Jesus. We are not called to comfort and to a false “inner peace” that ignores the enormity of what is done in our world, done often in our name and on our behalf.
In the face of a potential act of mass violence, we cannot lapse uncritically into language like “the war on terror”, coined not by the Gospel but by a past political administration, in reflecting on how to respond with our faith and our integrity intact. Any easy alliance between the Gospel and militant zealous patriotism needs to be strongly examined in the light of our best values. Sadly, voices proclaiming their faith in the Prince of Peace have in the same breath advocated violence, religious intolerance, and revenge.
I am grateful beyond words that that bomb did not go off, that it was a contrived fake. My eyes sting with a father’s relieved tears as I write these words.
I am deeply grateful that there are those who pay the price to search out and to act on dangers to my family, my neighbors, and my people. I admit that, paraphrasing an English writer, that I sleep safely knowing that rough men and women are willing to deal out violence to those who would deal out violence to me. But I believe we must never excuse ourselves from the moral complexity and ambiguity of that fact. The price that is paid for our sense of security, borne by those whose lives and souls are endangered by that work as well as those who are the recipients of violence on our behalf, should trouble us and place before us the question of how to do we actually change such a brutal world.
I grieve for that 19 year old young man, Mohamed Osman Mohamud, whose life as he knew it is over. It is true that a confused, alienated young man is fully capable of making conscious choices and of harming a lot of people. But a 19 year old is a very young person, very impressionable, as I remember I was at 19. Fortunately I chose and embraced value-systems that were more humane and more responsible than did Mohamed. The spectacle of his arrest and trial is to me mostly about the problem of alienated immigrant youth, desperate and angry at being adrift in a culture not their own. People I know and respect work with Somali children and youth in Portland and can speak to the legacy of political violence, the memory of refugee camps, and the cultural alienation suffered by those children. In spite of any fear and anxiety we feel, we cannot begin to understand what those children carry within their minds and souls. As a nation of immigrants, save for those of Native blood who have been made to feel like aliens in their own land, we need to recall our own family stories and know some empathy.
I am glad that Mohamed will have his “day in court.” And I am glad the defense will call into question the procedure used in the development of the case against him. The best strength of our nation, that which makes us distinct in the world, is that we are concerned with the individual rights of all, that our law enforcement is not immune to scrutiny and accountability, and that all are presumed innocent until proven otherwise. These basic civil safeguards are often threatened in times of fear and anger. Sometimes officials and law enforcement have found the practice of accountability, public scrutiny, and legal defense awkward and frustrating in the pursuit of their goals. But this is the price of a participative democracy in which individual rights are protected. It is messy, complicated, and slow. But we compromise these rights and practices at risk of losing what is most worth defending about this nation. To paraphrase Winston Churchill, democracy is the second-worse system in the world—the only one worse is all the rest.
I grieve for the fact that, in the words of one frustrated Muslim citizen, one incident like this takes the five steps towards understanding laboriously taken forward and flings us ten steps back. We all should feel outrage and a sense of common threat by the arson committed in the Corvallis mosque. It is directed against any who publically witness to their faith. I am deeply moved by the response of the people of Corvallis and of faith-communities there to rally around the people of the mosque. I do think that leadership of the various Islamic communities (for there are many, distinguished by history and teachings and ethnic roots as are Christians) have an obligation to speak out clearly against violence and the distortion of their teachings represented by terrorism. But I also believe that we Christian folk have the same obligation, to speak out against the violence and coercion done in the name of our own faith, and we usually avoid it. Too often we turn a blind eye to language sprinkled with the name of Jesus and imagery from the Bible used to justify military action overseas as well as prejudice and violence against vulnerable people and groups and communities among us. There are too many planks in our own eyes for us to feel self-righteous about the splinter in the eye of another.
There is nothing easy about living in these times, even amidst the relative serenity and illusion of isolation that some of us enjoy here in Portland, Oregon. There is nothing easy about how our best and most fundamental values, both as citizens and, for those of us who profess faith, live side by side with the potential violence of our times. It is vital that we do not leap to any easy conclusion that makes it easy. Even had that bomb been real, these hard questions remain. How costly is the achievement of a sense of security if we lose what is most vital, most precious about our core values? Or in the words of one far more eloquent, “What does it profit you to gain the whole world, and yet lose yourself in the process?”
Your jacket
1 Advent A 2010
(Isaiah 2: 1-5; Ps 122; Romans 13: 11-14; Matthew 24: 36-44)
Walking out of my martial arts class this past summer, sweaty from a hard workout, I turned as a young man shouted at me from a passing car. “What’s that?” I shouted back. He rolled the window down all the way and shouted again, “Wax on, wax off!”
In terms of what can be shouted from a car on 82nd Avenue, I appreciated this and walked away doing “wax on…” I liked the old Karate Kid movie with everyone’s favorite resident Asian sage, Mr. Miyagi. Not long ago I rented the re-make with Jackie Chan and Will Smith’s son. I liked it because it was different, placing the kid in China as a guest rather than in L.A. There was no “wax on, wax off.” Instead Jackie Chan taught basic martial arts in a different way.
“Put on your jacket! Take it off. Pick it up. Put it on. Now take it off. Pick it up.” And on and on and on, the kid endlessly taking that same jacket off, putting it on, stooping over and over until I felt my own back creak with the stoop and I thought the jacket would be worn to shreds.
Finally the endless gesture, seemingly so meaningless, makes the kid rebel. Jackie Chan then demonstrates how the seemingly meaningless ordinary gesture is actually the foundation for a powerful kung fu practice, the basis for defense and balance on which all else will be built. And, says Jackie, “everything is kung fu.”
The year has turned, and we are again in Advent. Have you been tempted to ask what is this purpose of endless repetition of readings, prayers, colors, and moods? Think of this: Put on your jacket, take it off, pick it up. This will teach us everything. And, I tell you, “Everything is Advent.”
“Cast away the works of darkness…”
The light wanes and grows short, this time of year. The fading light is a reminder that there is darkness in this world. I myself have become very aware of the heaviness of darkness, the weight of it, clinging to my body like an old, stained jacket. We each have such a jacket. Some of its stains have been imposed—the discouragement from struggle, from the cruelty and the seemingly random nature of the world and its pain. Some stains we have put on ourselves, from the anger and impatience and frustration and self-absorbedness of our lives. Paul does us the favor of listing some pretty general jacket-stains: “reveling and drunkenness”, “debauchery and licentiousness”, “quarreling and jealousy.” My personal jacket has stains like resentment, disgust, and apathy, the temptations of middle age. When we allow our lives to be shaped by these stains, that is sin. “Take off your jacket.” Because the good news is, we can. We are not our discouragement, our heaviness, our despair. In each of us there is a soul that stands with open arms awaiting our God.
“Put on the armor of light…”
We can live in a new and renewed way. We can place on ourselves a new jacket, a new way of being and seeing and feeling and praying and loving. The time is now. “Put your jacket on.” “Put on the Lord Jesus Christ.” Jackie says that “everything is kung fu,” but I say that everything is Advent. We live now in hope because he has come among us in humility, taking flesh and teaching and healing and dying and rising and filling all things. So what we do is full of meaning: our turning, our casting aside our personal and corporate works of darkness, our putting on the light of Christ. The vision of Isaiah, that all nations will come as pilgrims to Jerusalem, that swords will become plows, spears become pruning shears, tanks become farm tractors, warships become hospitals—that is the promise and the gift to those who follow Jesus.
This is how we are to live, this is what we shall do. Take off your jacket, pick it up, put it on. We shall be changed, we shall be transformed, in the casting aside of darkness and putting on Christ. The Light is promised to us, the Light is dawning in our midst. The time is now. Casting aside and putting on teaches us the deep lesson of this time.
That lesson is simple: Everything is Advent.
(Isaiah 2: 1-5; Ps 122; Romans 13: 11-14; Matthew 24: 36-44)
Walking out of my martial arts class this past summer, sweaty from a hard workout, I turned as a young man shouted at me from a passing car. “What’s that?” I shouted back. He rolled the window down all the way and shouted again, “Wax on, wax off!”
In terms of what can be shouted from a car on 82nd Avenue, I appreciated this and walked away doing “wax on…” I liked the old Karate Kid movie with everyone’s favorite resident Asian sage, Mr. Miyagi. Not long ago I rented the re-make with Jackie Chan and Will Smith’s son. I liked it because it was different, placing the kid in China as a guest rather than in L.A. There was no “wax on, wax off.” Instead Jackie Chan taught basic martial arts in a different way.
“Put on your jacket! Take it off. Pick it up. Put it on. Now take it off. Pick it up.” And on and on and on, the kid endlessly taking that same jacket off, putting it on, stooping over and over until I felt my own back creak with the stoop and I thought the jacket would be worn to shreds.
Finally the endless gesture, seemingly so meaningless, makes the kid rebel. Jackie Chan then demonstrates how the seemingly meaningless ordinary gesture is actually the foundation for a powerful kung fu practice, the basis for defense and balance on which all else will be built. And, says Jackie, “everything is kung fu.”
The year has turned, and we are again in Advent. Have you been tempted to ask what is this purpose of endless repetition of readings, prayers, colors, and moods? Think of this: Put on your jacket, take it off, pick it up. This will teach us everything. And, I tell you, “Everything is Advent.”
“Cast away the works of darkness…”
The light wanes and grows short, this time of year. The fading light is a reminder that there is darkness in this world. I myself have become very aware of the heaviness of darkness, the weight of it, clinging to my body like an old, stained jacket. We each have such a jacket. Some of its stains have been imposed—the discouragement from struggle, from the cruelty and the seemingly random nature of the world and its pain. Some stains we have put on ourselves, from the anger and impatience and frustration and self-absorbedness of our lives. Paul does us the favor of listing some pretty general jacket-stains: “reveling and drunkenness”, “debauchery and licentiousness”, “quarreling and jealousy.” My personal jacket has stains like resentment, disgust, and apathy, the temptations of middle age. When we allow our lives to be shaped by these stains, that is sin. “Take off your jacket.” Because the good news is, we can. We are not our discouragement, our heaviness, our despair. In each of us there is a soul that stands with open arms awaiting our God.
“Put on the armor of light…”
We can live in a new and renewed way. We can place on ourselves a new jacket, a new way of being and seeing and feeling and praying and loving. The time is now. “Put your jacket on.” “Put on the Lord Jesus Christ.” Jackie says that “everything is kung fu,” but I say that everything is Advent. We live now in hope because he has come among us in humility, taking flesh and teaching and healing and dying and rising and filling all things. So what we do is full of meaning: our turning, our casting aside our personal and corporate works of darkness, our putting on the light of Christ. The vision of Isaiah, that all nations will come as pilgrims to Jerusalem, that swords will become plows, spears become pruning shears, tanks become farm tractors, warships become hospitals—that is the promise and the gift to those who follow Jesus.
This is how we are to live, this is what we shall do. Take off your jacket, pick it up, put it on. We shall be changed, we shall be transformed, in the casting aside of darkness and putting on Christ. The Light is promised to us, the Light is dawning in our midst. The time is now. Casting aside and putting on teaches us the deep lesson of this time.
That lesson is simple: Everything is Advent.
Saturday, November 27, 2010
Matthew's mountain--climbing and changing
Matthew 24:36-44
Jesus said to the disciples, "But about that day and hour no one knows, neither the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. For as the days of Noah were, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. For as in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day Noah entered the ark, and they knew nothing until the flood came and swept them all away, so too will be the coming of the Son of Man. Then two will be in the field; one will be taken and one will be left. Two women will be grinding meal together; one will be taken and one will be left. Keep awake therefore, for you do not know on what day your Lord is coming. But understand this: if the owner of the house had known in what part of the night the thief was coming, he would have stayed awake and would not have let his house be broken into. Therefore you also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an unexpected hour."
Alexander Shaia in his work The Hidden Power Of The Gospels speaks of a central task, a question that each Gospel asks. This question was forged by the lived experience of each actual community whose struggles gave birth to a Gospel text. Shaia identifies the Jewish Christian community of Antioch, reeling from the destruction of the Temple and struggling to understand the newness brought by their puzzling Messiah, as the progenitors of the Gospel of Matthew, and identifies the burning question of Matthew as: How do we move through change?
This opening text of Year A of the Revised Common Lectionary brings us face to face with the image of change as presented by Matthew's Jesus immediately before his Passion. Sadly, this imagery has been cherry-picked and cobbled together into a lurid brand of selectively-literalistic apocalyptic literature and rhetoric that I say runs contrary to the Gospel's use of it. Popular contemporary Christian apocalyptic is used to hammer home the veracity of certain presentations of the Gospel, for the most part culturally and politically conservative presentations. The imagery of apocalyptic can be employed, as has many "fire and brimstone" teachings through the ages, to literally "scare the hell" out of people, to authenticate the voice of various forms of religious authority and assure obedience to it. An even less savory use is to give a sense of entitlement and assurance to those who have decided they are "the faithful", coupled with an edge of unpleasant satisfaction at the comeuppance given to the unbeliever. After all, what does one do if one is "Left Behind"?
But I do not think this text provides any of these doctrinal assurances or affirmation of entitlement. Jesus says something simpler: the ordinary is deceptive, for nothing is ordinary. The purposes of God are deeper than we can understand. There is unpredictability hard-wired into our ordinary-seeming lives. This is a deeply subversive message, both to our own understanding as well as to the voice of static religious or political authority. Jesus does not say that the good, the pious, the doctrinally or politically correct will be "taken"; only that there will be deep and unpredictable disruption of our lives and our relationships and of our understanding of "the ordinary." What to do, how to be in such a reality? Like a householder on guard--live as a Watcher. Watch! Wake up! Traditional angelology spoke of an order of angels called "Grigori", the "Watchers." Do like a Watcher, and watch! Wake up, look, learn!
Jesus said to the disciples, "But about that day and hour no one knows, neither the angels of heaven, nor the Son, but only the Father. For as the days of Noah were, so will be the coming of the Son of Man. For as in those days before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day Noah entered the ark, and they knew nothing until the flood came and swept them all away, so too will be the coming of the Son of Man. Then two will be in the field; one will be taken and one will be left. Two women will be grinding meal together; one will be taken and one will be left. Keep awake therefore, for you do not know on what day your Lord is coming. But understand this: if the owner of the house had known in what part of the night the thief was coming, he would have stayed awake and would not have let his house be broken into. Therefore you also must be ready, for the Son of Man is coming at an unexpected hour."
Alexander Shaia in his work The Hidden Power Of The Gospels speaks of a central task, a question that each Gospel asks. This question was forged by the lived experience of each actual community whose struggles gave birth to a Gospel text. Shaia identifies the Jewish Christian community of Antioch, reeling from the destruction of the Temple and struggling to understand the newness brought by their puzzling Messiah, as the progenitors of the Gospel of Matthew, and identifies the burning question of Matthew as: How do we move through change?
This opening text of Year A of the Revised Common Lectionary brings us face to face with the image of change as presented by Matthew's Jesus immediately before his Passion. Sadly, this imagery has been cherry-picked and cobbled together into a lurid brand of selectively-literalistic apocalyptic literature and rhetoric that I say runs contrary to the Gospel's use of it. Popular contemporary Christian apocalyptic is used to hammer home the veracity of certain presentations of the Gospel, for the most part culturally and politically conservative presentations. The imagery of apocalyptic can be employed, as has many "fire and brimstone" teachings through the ages, to literally "scare the hell" out of people, to authenticate the voice of various forms of religious authority and assure obedience to it. An even less savory use is to give a sense of entitlement and assurance to those who have decided they are "the faithful", coupled with an edge of unpleasant satisfaction at the comeuppance given to the unbeliever. After all, what does one do if one is "Left Behind"?
But I do not think this text provides any of these doctrinal assurances or affirmation of entitlement. Jesus says something simpler: the ordinary is deceptive, for nothing is ordinary. The purposes of God are deeper than we can understand. There is unpredictability hard-wired into our ordinary-seeming lives. This is a deeply subversive message, both to our own understanding as well as to the voice of static religious or political authority. Jesus does not say that the good, the pious, the doctrinally or politically correct will be "taken"; only that there will be deep and unpredictable disruption of our lives and our relationships and of our understanding of "the ordinary." What to do, how to be in such a reality? Like a householder on guard--live as a Watcher. Watch! Wake up! Traditional angelology spoke of an order of angels called "Grigori", the "Watchers." Do like a Watcher, and watch! Wake up, look, learn!
Friday, November 19, 2010
A joy and a delight
(sermon delivered by Cat Healy on 25 Pentecost, Year C, Nov 14 2010)
25 Pentecost 2010
Isaiah 65:17-25 – Psalm 98 – 2 Thessalonians 3:6-13 – Luke 21:5-19
It strikes me that this week’s readings summarize every campaign ad we’ve seen on TV in the last several months. It’s the same in each election year: Half the candidates promise us new heavens and a new earth, and the other half tell us that anyone unwilling to work should not eat. A few brave ones do both. Beneath all the flag backdrops and political rhetoric, there are kernels of truth in there somewhere. That’s why campaign ads work; we’re all looking for something to believe in.
But Isaiah’s vision of the new earth is much more than a campaign ad. Here, we see God’s promise that the people of Israel, who have suffered so long, will not be destroyed. And more than that, they will be blessed beyond their imagining: “I will rejoice in Israel,” says the Lord; “I will delight in my people.” In every part of the new Jerusalem, God promises transformation. Infant mortality will disappear; no one will be homeless or hungry; even animals will have no need to harm each other.
However, there is another piece of this transformed creation. The ancient Israelites may have used different language for what we now call “social justice,” but they surely understood the concept. Isaiah’s new Jerusalem is about more than long lives and vegetarian lions. When the world is re-created, the workers who build will be able to inhabit their houses, and those who plant will enjoy the fruits of their labors. “They shall not build and another inhabit; they shall not plant and another eat.” This is not a faraway utopian vision, like the wolf lying down with the lamb. For this reason, it is much more challenging to us. Think about the world we live in now. The people who haul the lumber and lay the bricks of mansions will never inhabit them; workers spend hour after hour in the hot sun, picking produce they could never afford to buy. We know from the Hebrew prophets that this is not the world God wants. But these kinds of changes are not magic tricks that will be worked by God alone, with no effort from us, the people of the new earth. If we want to live in such a world, we have to do the work ourselves.
If you fast-forward to Thessalonians, you can watch a community of people trying to live out this mandate. The Christians of Thessalonica were mostly Gentiles; the Scriptures were brand-new to them, so they approached the Hebrew prophets as starry-eyed converts, seeing this vision of the world for the very first time. Though it’s hard to know for sure, you can imagine how carefully they made their chore charts, ensuring that everyone had an equal share of the labor and enjoyed an equal share of the fruits. They wanted to be just like their heroes, Paul and Timothy; just like Jesus and the Apostles; they wanted to make the new Jerusalem. In today’s reading, you can see how that went for them.
They are tired. They are cranky. They are in a bad mood.
Equal sharing of labor is hard. Equal sharing of the rewards is even harder. You don’t need to be an early Christian to know this; you only need to share a kitchen with someone. The Christians Paul is addressing here have a lot working against them. They’re getting picked on left and right by all the other people in Thessalonica, who view them as a cult; they converted as adults, they have no roots in Jewish tradition, and a lot of them are new even to monotheism; and in the midst of all this, they’re trying to revolutionize the labor economy as we know it. No wonder they’re burned out. And so they complain to Paul that their fellow Christians are “living in idleness, mere busybodies, not doing any work.”
And so Paul writes back: Shut up and do your work! Anyone unwilling to work should not eat.
Not because he wants the Thessalonians to starve each other. Not because he is heartless.
But because everyone has to buy into the new Jerusalem, or it doesn’t stand a chance.
Had Paul gone into more detail here, he might have said: If even one of you sits back and hoards your wealth while another goes hungry, the vision falls apart. If even one of you takes a break from your labor in the fields and lets your brother or sister do their share of the work and yours too, allows them to suffer and struggle while you rest in the shade, the new heaven and the new earth are shot.
And this is where campaign ads always fail. They ignore the obvious: We can’t do it alone. If we treat our own good intentions as our only fuel, our only source of energy, we develop compassion fatigue and begin to come apart at the seams. If we try to build the new Jerusalem without God as its rock, we crumble.
In the same way, if we lose our sense of community – if we find ourselves unable to look past “Anyone unwilling to work should not eat” – we fall apart.
Isaiah resonates with us, though, because he tells us that we don’t have to do this hard work alone. As we work on building the Kingdom, as we make our chore charts, as we try to ensure that no one goes hungry and everyone gets a chance to reap what they sow – we are lifted up by one whose strength and patience are infinitely greater than ours. Whose powers of forgiveness are infinite, who, no matter how many times we turn away, is able to remake us as a joy and a delight.
25 Pentecost 2010
Isaiah 65:17-25 – Psalm 98 – 2 Thessalonians 3:6-13 – Luke 21:5-19
It strikes me that this week’s readings summarize every campaign ad we’ve seen on TV in the last several months. It’s the same in each election year: Half the candidates promise us new heavens and a new earth, and the other half tell us that anyone unwilling to work should not eat. A few brave ones do both. Beneath all the flag backdrops and political rhetoric, there are kernels of truth in there somewhere. That’s why campaign ads work; we’re all looking for something to believe in.
But Isaiah’s vision of the new earth is much more than a campaign ad. Here, we see God’s promise that the people of Israel, who have suffered so long, will not be destroyed. And more than that, they will be blessed beyond their imagining: “I will rejoice in Israel,” says the Lord; “I will delight in my people.” In every part of the new Jerusalem, God promises transformation. Infant mortality will disappear; no one will be homeless or hungry; even animals will have no need to harm each other.
However, there is another piece of this transformed creation. The ancient Israelites may have used different language for what we now call “social justice,” but they surely understood the concept. Isaiah’s new Jerusalem is about more than long lives and vegetarian lions. When the world is re-created, the workers who build will be able to inhabit their houses, and those who plant will enjoy the fruits of their labors. “They shall not build and another inhabit; they shall not plant and another eat.” This is not a faraway utopian vision, like the wolf lying down with the lamb. For this reason, it is much more challenging to us. Think about the world we live in now. The people who haul the lumber and lay the bricks of mansions will never inhabit them; workers spend hour after hour in the hot sun, picking produce they could never afford to buy. We know from the Hebrew prophets that this is not the world God wants. But these kinds of changes are not magic tricks that will be worked by God alone, with no effort from us, the people of the new earth. If we want to live in such a world, we have to do the work ourselves.
If you fast-forward to Thessalonians, you can watch a community of people trying to live out this mandate. The Christians of Thessalonica were mostly Gentiles; the Scriptures were brand-new to them, so they approached the Hebrew prophets as starry-eyed converts, seeing this vision of the world for the very first time. Though it’s hard to know for sure, you can imagine how carefully they made their chore charts, ensuring that everyone had an equal share of the labor and enjoyed an equal share of the fruits. They wanted to be just like their heroes, Paul and Timothy; just like Jesus and the Apostles; they wanted to make the new Jerusalem. In today’s reading, you can see how that went for them.
They are tired. They are cranky. They are in a bad mood.
Equal sharing of labor is hard. Equal sharing of the rewards is even harder. You don’t need to be an early Christian to know this; you only need to share a kitchen with someone. The Christians Paul is addressing here have a lot working against them. They’re getting picked on left and right by all the other people in Thessalonica, who view them as a cult; they converted as adults, they have no roots in Jewish tradition, and a lot of them are new even to monotheism; and in the midst of all this, they’re trying to revolutionize the labor economy as we know it. No wonder they’re burned out. And so they complain to Paul that their fellow Christians are “living in idleness, mere busybodies, not doing any work.”
And so Paul writes back: Shut up and do your work! Anyone unwilling to work should not eat.
Not because he wants the Thessalonians to starve each other. Not because he is heartless.
But because everyone has to buy into the new Jerusalem, or it doesn’t stand a chance.
Had Paul gone into more detail here, he might have said: If even one of you sits back and hoards your wealth while another goes hungry, the vision falls apart. If even one of you takes a break from your labor in the fields and lets your brother or sister do their share of the work and yours too, allows them to suffer and struggle while you rest in the shade, the new heaven and the new earth are shot.
And this is where campaign ads always fail. They ignore the obvious: We can’t do it alone. If we treat our own good intentions as our only fuel, our only source of energy, we develop compassion fatigue and begin to come apart at the seams. If we try to build the new Jerusalem without God as its rock, we crumble.
In the same way, if we lose our sense of community – if we find ourselves unable to look past “Anyone unwilling to work should not eat” – we fall apart.
Isaiah resonates with us, though, because he tells us that we don’t have to do this hard work alone. As we work on building the Kingdom, as we make our chore charts, as we try to ensure that no one goes hungry and everyone gets a chance to reap what they sow – we are lifted up by one whose strength and patience are infinitely greater than ours. Whose powers of forgiveness are infinite, who, no matter how many times we turn away, is able to remake us as a joy and a delight.
Thursday, November 4, 2010
Sycamore and the Trees of Life
Today’s Sermon
Posted on October 31, 2010 by Carl McColman
Sermon for October 31, 2010, Sts. Peter & Paul Episcopal Church, Portland, OR
Text: So he ran ahead and climbed a sycamore tree to see him, because he was going to pass that way. (Luke 19:4)
When I was a boy I loved to climb trees. We had two pine trees in our back yard, and one of them I could only climb up maybe five feet or so, but in the other, larger one I could get at least ten or twelve feet off the ground, which was pretty high for a ten year old kid! How fondly I remember my clothes and limbs covered with dust when I would finally descend from the branches. Even having to pull out the occasional splinter was worth the joy of bonding with that tree.
Climbing a tree always gave me a new perspective; I would climb it for fun, or I would do it to get away from it all, or even just to think through my homework. I suppose I was also trying to avoid doing my homework, but I never really thought about it in those terms!
In today’s Gospel, Zacchaeus the tax collector does precisely this: he climbs the Sycamore tree to get a new perspective on Christ. He’s not satisfied with the rumors and hearsay about Jesus. He wants to see for himself. But he’s not a very big guy, either physically or socially. No one is going to do any favors for Zach. So he takes matters in his own hands, and up the tree he goes. And once he does, — guess what? Not only does he see Jesus, but Jesus sees him. Jesus calls to him. And out of this encounter, Jesus comes to visit Zacchaeus’s home, and Zacchaeus is forever transformed. I think the Sycamore Tree is the unsung hero of the Zacchaeus tale. It has been relegated to the status of whimsy in a children’s song. But without that tree, the encounter between Jesus and the tax collector might never have happened.
Indeed, if we take a step back and look at the entire history of our faith, we will notice that trees appear again and again, always at some sort of pivotal moment in the story of our ongoing relationship with God.
We remember, of course, the two great trees in the Garden of Eden: the Tree of Life and the Tree of Knowledge. Keep in mind also that the Tree of Life reappears at the other end of the Bible, when Zion is transformed into the Heavenly or New Jerusalem, with none other than that great tree at its very center. And let us not forget the tree that was felled so that its wood could be used to build the cross — the “tree” on which Our Lord hung, as he suffered and died. For that matter remember that Jesus and Joseph were carpenters, which means that trees provided the raw material by which they earned their daily bread.
In fact, that’s true for many of us, even today. Trees give us the material by which we live and work. As an author, I am reminded of Thich Nhat Hanh, who in his books asks his readers to give thanks for the trees that died to make the paper on which his words are printed. Perhaps in our day of Kindles and other ebook readers, this is changing, but at least for the moment, so many of the words we read come to us on paper made from the wood of a tree.
When I think about the spirituality of trees, I also cannot help but think about the great wisdomkeepers of Ireland, Scotland and Wales: the Celts. Today, of course, is October 31, or Hallowe’en — but it is also Samhain, the ancient Celtic festival marking the end of summer and indeed the end of the year. Samhain was a day for honoring the ancestors, and if we honor our Celtic ancestors, we remember that they had a particular devotion to trees. This is true not only of the pagan Celts, but even of the earliest Celtic Christians. For example, St. Brigit made her home in Kildare, a name that means “The Church of the Oak.” In Kildare archaeologists have discovered the foundation of a temple where nineteen sisters of Brigit tended an eternal flame. Just a short walk from this site are two holy wells which remain, to this day, sites of sacred pilgrimage for Christians and Pagans alike.
For the ancient Celts, what the sacred flame, the holy well, and the great tree all had in common was their function as portals, or doorways, between the worlds. Fire transforms, water flows, and trees reach high. Each of these, in their own way, signify the alchemy of the human spirit as it is transformed, flows into, and reaches for the very heart of God.
I would be remiss if I did not also tip my metaphorical hat to our Jewish brothers and sisters, and their great mystical tree: The Tree of Life within the Kabbalah. The Kabbalistic Tree of Life is a symbol which represents the various stages of reality, or consciousness, that form a sort of creational continuum between the unspeakable splendor of God and the ordinary reality of human awareness. “Climbing the Kabbalistic Tree” is therefore a metaphor or a symbol for the transformations of human consciousness that take place as we seek to “put on the mind of Christ,” which is how Saint Paul describes the journey of inner transformation.
I would like to suggest a metaphor for us to explore this morning. I invite you to join with me in thinking about the great trees of the spiritual world — whether we are talking about the Jewish Tree of Life, the Celtic Oak Tree of Brigit, the World Tree, Yggdrasil of Norse Mythology, the Cross of Christ, or even the humble Sycamore Tree that Zacchaeus climbed: all these trees function as symbols of the human body itself. We stand, our feet planted on the ground and our hands and eyes reaching for the stars. We are creatures of clay animated with the Breath of God. So like these great trees, we stand between the worlds, the worlds of ordinary reality and the always-transforming splendor of our Triune God.
The philosopher Rudolf Eucken said that humanity “is the meeting point of various stages of reality.” In other words, we are, like the great trees of Celtic mythology, the link between the physical and the spiritual dimensions of the cosmos.
This, then, is why I commend to you the practice of Christian spirituality: of lectio divina, or meditative reading of the Bible; of meditation itself, thoughtful reflection on the great mysteries of our faith, and the summit of our spirituality, contemplation, the practice of allowing all thoughts and distractions to gently rise and fall within the greater silence that is our most natural ground of being. When we enter into meditation or contemplation, we are symbolically “climbing the tree” of our own minds and hearts, and in doing so, we reach a new perspective, a new vantage point, a new place where it is possible to encounter the Risen Lord — but, even more important, where Christ encounters us. And in this encounter, he asks to come into our lives, our homes, and leaves us forever transformed.
The great German mystic Meister Eckhart said: “The eye with which I see God is the same with which God sees me. My eye and God’s eye is one eye, and one sight, and one knowledge, and one love.” This, then, is the heart of contemplation: I gaze at God, and God gazes at me. This is brought about because we climb the tree of contemplation, where, from a new and higher vantage point, this encounter with the Holy is made possible. And when we return from the height of our inner tree, we find that our lives have been changed forever. And out of this change, we are empowered to truly and lovingly serve others.
So on this Hallowe’en Day, I hope that each of us will take time to reflect on Zacchaeus and his sycamore tree. Give thanks for the trees in your life, whether living are dead. From paper to furniture to floors to cabinets, our lives are filled with the gift of trees. So consider this, and give thanks. But give particular thanks for the trees that are alive, the living, sentient beings that bless us with their fruit, and their shade, their roots that stabilize our soil, and most important of all, their oxygen. And finally, consider the sacred tree that you can find within the theater of your spiritual imagination, where you are invited to climb to a new vantage point where, like Zacchaeus, you may see, and encounter, and be encountered by, the One who can change your life with love with truth and goodness and beauty. For after all, it is in his name that we gather today, for the great feast in which he is both priest and victim. Amen.
(see Carl McColman's blog at www.anamchara.com )
Posted on October 31, 2010 by Carl McColman
Sermon for October 31, 2010, Sts. Peter & Paul Episcopal Church, Portland, OR
Text: So he ran ahead and climbed a sycamore tree to see him, because he was going to pass that way. (Luke 19:4)
When I was a boy I loved to climb trees. We had two pine trees in our back yard, and one of them I could only climb up maybe five feet or so, but in the other, larger one I could get at least ten or twelve feet off the ground, which was pretty high for a ten year old kid! How fondly I remember my clothes and limbs covered with dust when I would finally descend from the branches. Even having to pull out the occasional splinter was worth the joy of bonding with that tree.
Climbing a tree always gave me a new perspective; I would climb it for fun, or I would do it to get away from it all, or even just to think through my homework. I suppose I was also trying to avoid doing my homework, but I never really thought about it in those terms!
In today’s Gospel, Zacchaeus the tax collector does precisely this: he climbs the Sycamore tree to get a new perspective on Christ. He’s not satisfied with the rumors and hearsay about Jesus. He wants to see for himself. But he’s not a very big guy, either physically or socially. No one is going to do any favors for Zach. So he takes matters in his own hands, and up the tree he goes. And once he does, — guess what? Not only does he see Jesus, but Jesus sees him. Jesus calls to him. And out of this encounter, Jesus comes to visit Zacchaeus’s home, and Zacchaeus is forever transformed. I think the Sycamore Tree is the unsung hero of the Zacchaeus tale. It has been relegated to the status of whimsy in a children’s song. But without that tree, the encounter between Jesus and the tax collector might never have happened.
Indeed, if we take a step back and look at the entire history of our faith, we will notice that trees appear again and again, always at some sort of pivotal moment in the story of our ongoing relationship with God.
We remember, of course, the two great trees in the Garden of Eden: the Tree of Life and the Tree of Knowledge. Keep in mind also that the Tree of Life reappears at the other end of the Bible, when Zion is transformed into the Heavenly or New Jerusalem, with none other than that great tree at its very center. And let us not forget the tree that was felled so that its wood could be used to build the cross — the “tree” on which Our Lord hung, as he suffered and died. For that matter remember that Jesus and Joseph were carpenters, which means that trees provided the raw material by which they earned their daily bread.
In fact, that’s true for many of us, even today. Trees give us the material by which we live and work. As an author, I am reminded of Thich Nhat Hanh, who in his books asks his readers to give thanks for the trees that died to make the paper on which his words are printed. Perhaps in our day of Kindles and other ebook readers, this is changing, but at least for the moment, so many of the words we read come to us on paper made from the wood of a tree.
When I think about the spirituality of trees, I also cannot help but think about the great wisdomkeepers of Ireland, Scotland and Wales: the Celts. Today, of course, is October 31, or Hallowe’en — but it is also Samhain, the ancient Celtic festival marking the end of summer and indeed the end of the year. Samhain was a day for honoring the ancestors, and if we honor our Celtic ancestors, we remember that they had a particular devotion to trees. This is true not only of the pagan Celts, but even of the earliest Celtic Christians. For example, St. Brigit made her home in Kildare, a name that means “The Church of the Oak.” In Kildare archaeologists have discovered the foundation of a temple where nineteen sisters of Brigit tended an eternal flame. Just a short walk from this site are two holy wells which remain, to this day, sites of sacred pilgrimage for Christians and Pagans alike.
For the ancient Celts, what the sacred flame, the holy well, and the great tree all had in common was their function as portals, or doorways, between the worlds. Fire transforms, water flows, and trees reach high. Each of these, in their own way, signify the alchemy of the human spirit as it is transformed, flows into, and reaches for the very heart of God.
I would be remiss if I did not also tip my metaphorical hat to our Jewish brothers and sisters, and their great mystical tree: The Tree of Life within the Kabbalah. The Kabbalistic Tree of Life is a symbol which represents the various stages of reality, or consciousness, that form a sort of creational continuum between the unspeakable splendor of God and the ordinary reality of human awareness. “Climbing the Kabbalistic Tree” is therefore a metaphor or a symbol for the transformations of human consciousness that take place as we seek to “put on the mind of Christ,” which is how Saint Paul describes the journey of inner transformation.
I would like to suggest a metaphor for us to explore this morning. I invite you to join with me in thinking about the great trees of the spiritual world — whether we are talking about the Jewish Tree of Life, the Celtic Oak Tree of Brigit, the World Tree, Yggdrasil of Norse Mythology, the Cross of Christ, or even the humble Sycamore Tree that Zacchaeus climbed: all these trees function as symbols of the human body itself. We stand, our feet planted on the ground and our hands and eyes reaching for the stars. We are creatures of clay animated with the Breath of God. So like these great trees, we stand between the worlds, the worlds of ordinary reality and the always-transforming splendor of our Triune God.
The philosopher Rudolf Eucken said that humanity “is the meeting point of various stages of reality.” In other words, we are, like the great trees of Celtic mythology, the link between the physical and the spiritual dimensions of the cosmos.
This, then, is why I commend to you the practice of Christian spirituality: of lectio divina, or meditative reading of the Bible; of meditation itself, thoughtful reflection on the great mysteries of our faith, and the summit of our spirituality, contemplation, the practice of allowing all thoughts and distractions to gently rise and fall within the greater silence that is our most natural ground of being. When we enter into meditation or contemplation, we are symbolically “climbing the tree” of our own minds and hearts, and in doing so, we reach a new perspective, a new vantage point, a new place where it is possible to encounter the Risen Lord — but, even more important, where Christ encounters us. And in this encounter, he asks to come into our lives, our homes, and leaves us forever transformed.
The great German mystic Meister Eckhart said: “The eye with which I see God is the same with which God sees me. My eye and God’s eye is one eye, and one sight, and one knowledge, and one love.” This, then, is the heart of contemplation: I gaze at God, and God gazes at me. This is brought about because we climb the tree of contemplation, where, from a new and higher vantage point, this encounter with the Holy is made possible. And when we return from the height of our inner tree, we find that our lives have been changed forever. And out of this change, we are empowered to truly and lovingly serve others.
So on this Hallowe’en Day, I hope that each of us will take time to reflect on Zacchaeus and his sycamore tree. Give thanks for the trees in your life, whether living are dead. From paper to furniture to floors to cabinets, our lives are filled with the gift of trees. So consider this, and give thanks. But give particular thanks for the trees that are alive, the living, sentient beings that bless us with their fruit, and their shade, their roots that stabilize our soil, and most important of all, their oxygen. And finally, consider the sacred tree that you can find within the theater of your spiritual imagination, where you are invited to climb to a new vantage point where, like Zacchaeus, you may see, and encounter, and be encountered by, the One who can change your life with love with truth and goodness and beauty. For after all, it is in his name that we gather today, for the great feast in which he is both priest and victim. Amen.
(see Carl McColman's blog at www.anamchara.com )
Sunday, October 17, 2010
The cry and the crier
21ST SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST
(Proper 24C, 28th Sunday in Ordinary Time)
October 17, 2010
Ss. Peter & Paul – 10:00 a.m.
by Fr. Phil Ayers
God of the dispossessed,
you teach us to hunger for justice
even when the weak are shut out
and the powerful turn over in their beds:
in the heat of our anger
and the bitterness of our complaints,
give us the courage to protest,
the persistence to pray,
and the heart to love;
through Jesus Christ, the true judge.
(Steven Shakespeare, Prayers for an Inclusive Church)
+++++
A parable, such as we have before us in today’s Gospel – sometimes called “The Importunate Widow and the Unjust Judge” – is a pearl of wisdom set in a particular context by the evangelists, the gospel-writers, for pastoral purposes. That is, as I try to understand it, for purposes of strengthening the community of Christ. Thomas Keating says we have to remove the jewel from the context in order to get to the heart of the reality proposed by the parable, which shocks us into an experience of who we are and what motivates our conduct. The parables give insight that is not just knowledge, but the knowledge infused by love that Paul keeps referring to in his epistles.
2
Leaving out the context in which Luke places this precious gem, which makes of it an exhortation to pray always and not lose heart, the original meaning of the parable emerges stark and clear.
The outraged widow is not presented as virtuous or having just cause. She was, after all, a product of her time, in which widows got a bum deal: if any money was left by her husband, it went to her sons or to her brothers-in-law. She was, in effect, a charity case. The judge is obviously not impartial or objective. How can the kingdom of God be similar to anything in this rather scandalous situation? If the judge was a professional crook, it would not be so bad. But he is supposed to be a decent man who does justice to people. The fact is he is a wretched man!
We might remember that there were no juries in the time of Jesus so the role of a judge was doubly important. Judging meant adjudicating disputes, hearing complaints fairly, and maintaining harmonious relationships between people. A judge established and guarded shalom – peace, if you will – in the community.
In particular, the Law of Israel instructed the people – and certainly the judges in their midst – to show mercy to widows, orphans, and foreigners. After all, God had been merciful to the Hebrew people while they were in bondage; so they should especially reciprocate this graciousness to the powerless among them. The judge, of all people, would be charged with this responsibility of championing the rights of the dispossessed and the alienated.
3
By these standards, the judge in the parable comes across as completely unfit. He is a backslider - a slacker in keeping the Law. He has lost whatever compunction he had once to champion the poor.
But the widow keeps knocking!!!
We might translate this story into a contemporary scenario. Let us say that there is a judge who is supposed to decide a difficult insurance case. The plaintiff, a widow, who is destitute, sends him two or three letters a day, plus a couple of telegrams, makes innumerable phone calls, endless faxes, and has her friends calling in daily to recommend her cause and demand justice.
When he tries to leave his house or workplace, she accosts him. Regularly she sends him a bouquet of roses with the message, “I’m waiting.”
Finally the judge cannot stand her constant, annoying begging anymore and without considering the merits of the case, decides to give her all that she wants. (One commentator I consulted remarks that what is translated “wearing me out by her continually coming” could well be “so that she won’t give me a black eye”!)
Having concluded the parable, Jesus walks off down the street with his disciples.
With whom can the hearers identify in this parable? Nobody wants to see himself or herself as an unjust judge. Nobody wants to be the destitute widow. Whom can they identify with? That is the crux of the challenge.
4
Parables are mirrors in which we are invited to look at ourselves. We are the unjust judge. The widow represents the kingdom of God – grace that is constantly banging on our door, morning, noon, and night, pleading, “Do me justice.” Or more specifically, “How about spending some time in prayer? How about forgiving your enemy? How about seeking reconciliation with the members of your family? How about helping someone in need?”
So we can take note of the feelings that hinder our relationships, our efforts to forgive and not to judge. Where are they coming from? These are the things that the widow whom Fr. Keating calls “The divine widow” has in mind when she pleads, “Do me justice!” In other words, “Be compassionate as your heavenly Father is compassionate.”
The divine widow keeps pounding on the door of our hearts day after day as, like the unjust judge, we try to put her off. If modern forms of communication can be overwhelming, wait until you encounter how many ways of communicating God can come up with! God approaches us all day long, coming to meet us morning, noon, and night through people, events, and our own thoughts, feelings, memories, and reactions. We accept the kingdom finally, not because we are just or deserve it, but because at some point, like the unjust judge, we cannot stand the pestering of grace anymore and are forced to give in, saying, “Okay, take my life. I am in your hands.”
5
Here at Ss. Peter & Paul, we are invited to live into the thrust of that parable, responding to the persistence of many “divine widows” who won’t go away and constantly remind us of what we are to be about as Christians. They convey the holy and urgent grace of God by their persistence, and even annoyance, at times. We can totally ignore them or we can respond to their invitation in terms of sharing our abundance. (And I think we do have some here in our midst, but they are NOT pests!)
Our parish is a context in which we are put into many relationships with one another. Some we would rather not enter into, but we really must for our soul’s health and the health of the Body of Christ in this place and time. I’m not speaking mysteriously here: more concretely, Ss. Peter & Paul is a place in which I have witnessed an inkling of the Kingdom of God. And it has come about through the people who comprise this community: we spend a lot of our time in prayer, especially in the community’s prayer – the liturgy, the work of the people of God – richly celebrated week by week. We are invited and beckoned to cultivate our spiritual lives, not so that we will climb the ladder of perfection necessarily, but so that we will be equipped to reach out in love and concern for the poor, the needy (of all kinds!), the destitute, the lonely, the bereft, the seekers, the hurting and abused. We are called to forgive one another, called to reconcile divergence.
6 Now the parish invites us to consider how we will, with the gifts God has so richly bestowed upon us, support this community and its life and work and ministry. Last evening many of us were present for “Loaves and Fishes,” a terrific idea that the Vestry came up with; and we got a true taste of what it must have been like on that hillside long ago when loaves and fishes were miraculously multiplied and the fragments left over from the meal were filling many baskets. We all ate, and were satisfied! This isn’t your “normal” or “regular” fall stewardship “pitch.” I take this to mean something far deeper than the annual “Beg-a-Thon” we so often indulge in. (I certainly did that when I was an active parish rector.) Rather, it is an invitation, a call to live holier and deeper lives in Christ, to be truer than we’ve ever been before to the solemn Baptismal Covenant, part of which proclaims to love and serve Christ in every human being, loving our neighbor as ourselves.
Strength and abundance is ours, dear people of God at Ss. Peter & Paul. May we share it, giving gladly and willingly, not just to “keep doors open,” not just “to pay the bills,” not just to “stay afloat” – but to witness clearly to the love of God in Christ as we receive him into our bodies today and at every Mass we celebrate together.
[Ideas from Paula Franck, Thomas Keating and H. K. Oehmig in Synthesis 10/17/10]
(Proper 24C, 28th Sunday in Ordinary Time)
October 17, 2010
Ss. Peter & Paul – 10:00 a.m.
by Fr. Phil Ayers
God of the dispossessed,
you teach us to hunger for justice
even when the weak are shut out
and the powerful turn over in their beds:
in the heat of our anger
and the bitterness of our complaints,
give us the courage to protest,
the persistence to pray,
and the heart to love;
through Jesus Christ, the true judge.
(Steven Shakespeare, Prayers for an Inclusive Church)
+++++
A parable, such as we have before us in today’s Gospel – sometimes called “The Importunate Widow and the Unjust Judge” – is a pearl of wisdom set in a particular context by the evangelists, the gospel-writers, for pastoral purposes. That is, as I try to understand it, for purposes of strengthening the community of Christ. Thomas Keating says we have to remove the jewel from the context in order to get to the heart of the reality proposed by the parable, which shocks us into an experience of who we are and what motivates our conduct. The parables give insight that is not just knowledge, but the knowledge infused by love that Paul keeps referring to in his epistles.
2
Leaving out the context in which Luke places this precious gem, which makes of it an exhortation to pray always and not lose heart, the original meaning of the parable emerges stark and clear.
The outraged widow is not presented as virtuous or having just cause. She was, after all, a product of her time, in which widows got a bum deal: if any money was left by her husband, it went to her sons or to her brothers-in-law. She was, in effect, a charity case. The judge is obviously not impartial or objective. How can the kingdom of God be similar to anything in this rather scandalous situation? If the judge was a professional crook, it would not be so bad. But he is supposed to be a decent man who does justice to people. The fact is he is a wretched man!
We might remember that there were no juries in the time of Jesus so the role of a judge was doubly important. Judging meant adjudicating disputes, hearing complaints fairly, and maintaining harmonious relationships between people. A judge established and guarded shalom – peace, if you will – in the community.
In particular, the Law of Israel instructed the people – and certainly the judges in their midst – to show mercy to widows, orphans, and foreigners. After all, God had been merciful to the Hebrew people while they were in bondage; so they should especially reciprocate this graciousness to the powerless among them. The judge, of all people, would be charged with this responsibility of championing the rights of the dispossessed and the alienated.
3
By these standards, the judge in the parable comes across as completely unfit. He is a backslider - a slacker in keeping the Law. He has lost whatever compunction he had once to champion the poor.
But the widow keeps knocking!!!
We might translate this story into a contemporary scenario. Let us say that there is a judge who is supposed to decide a difficult insurance case. The plaintiff, a widow, who is destitute, sends him two or three letters a day, plus a couple of telegrams, makes innumerable phone calls, endless faxes, and has her friends calling in daily to recommend her cause and demand justice.
When he tries to leave his house or workplace, she accosts him. Regularly she sends him a bouquet of roses with the message, “I’m waiting.”
Finally the judge cannot stand her constant, annoying begging anymore and without considering the merits of the case, decides to give her all that she wants. (One commentator I consulted remarks that what is translated “wearing me out by her continually coming” could well be “so that she won’t give me a black eye”!)
Having concluded the parable, Jesus walks off down the street with his disciples.
With whom can the hearers identify in this parable? Nobody wants to see himself or herself as an unjust judge. Nobody wants to be the destitute widow. Whom can they identify with? That is the crux of the challenge.
4
Parables are mirrors in which we are invited to look at ourselves. We are the unjust judge. The widow represents the kingdom of God – grace that is constantly banging on our door, morning, noon, and night, pleading, “Do me justice.” Or more specifically, “How about spending some time in prayer? How about forgiving your enemy? How about seeking reconciliation with the members of your family? How about helping someone in need?”
So we can take note of the feelings that hinder our relationships, our efforts to forgive and not to judge. Where are they coming from? These are the things that the widow whom Fr. Keating calls “The divine widow” has in mind when she pleads, “Do me justice!” In other words, “Be compassionate as your heavenly Father is compassionate.”
The divine widow keeps pounding on the door of our hearts day after day as, like the unjust judge, we try to put her off. If modern forms of communication can be overwhelming, wait until you encounter how many ways of communicating God can come up with! God approaches us all day long, coming to meet us morning, noon, and night through people, events, and our own thoughts, feelings, memories, and reactions. We accept the kingdom finally, not because we are just or deserve it, but because at some point, like the unjust judge, we cannot stand the pestering of grace anymore and are forced to give in, saying, “Okay, take my life. I am in your hands.”
5
Here at Ss. Peter & Paul, we are invited to live into the thrust of that parable, responding to the persistence of many “divine widows” who won’t go away and constantly remind us of what we are to be about as Christians. They convey the holy and urgent grace of God by their persistence, and even annoyance, at times. We can totally ignore them or we can respond to their invitation in terms of sharing our abundance. (And I think we do have some here in our midst, but they are NOT pests!)
Our parish is a context in which we are put into many relationships with one another. Some we would rather not enter into, but we really must for our soul’s health and the health of the Body of Christ in this place and time. I’m not speaking mysteriously here: more concretely, Ss. Peter & Paul is a place in which I have witnessed an inkling of the Kingdom of God. And it has come about through the people who comprise this community: we spend a lot of our time in prayer, especially in the community’s prayer – the liturgy, the work of the people of God – richly celebrated week by week. We are invited and beckoned to cultivate our spiritual lives, not so that we will climb the ladder of perfection necessarily, but so that we will be equipped to reach out in love and concern for the poor, the needy (of all kinds!), the destitute, the lonely, the bereft, the seekers, the hurting and abused. We are called to forgive one another, called to reconcile divergence.
6 Now the parish invites us to consider how we will, with the gifts God has so richly bestowed upon us, support this community and its life and work and ministry. Last evening many of us were present for “Loaves and Fishes,” a terrific idea that the Vestry came up with; and we got a true taste of what it must have been like on that hillside long ago when loaves and fishes were miraculously multiplied and the fragments left over from the meal were filling many baskets. We all ate, and were satisfied! This isn’t your “normal” or “regular” fall stewardship “pitch.” I take this to mean something far deeper than the annual “Beg-a-Thon” we so often indulge in. (I certainly did that when I was an active parish rector.) Rather, it is an invitation, a call to live holier and deeper lives in Christ, to be truer than we’ve ever been before to the solemn Baptismal Covenant, part of which proclaims to love and serve Christ in every human being, loving our neighbor as ourselves.
Strength and abundance is ours, dear people of God at Ss. Peter & Paul. May we share it, giving gladly and willingly, not just to “keep doors open,” not just “to pay the bills,” not just to “stay afloat” – but to witness clearly to the love of God in Christ as we receive him into our bodies today and at every Mass we celebrate together.
[Ideas from Paula Franck, Thomas Keating and H. K. Oehmig in Synthesis 10/17/10]
Tuesday, October 12, 2010
The Nine and the One
Proper 23 C 2010
Jer 29: 1, 4-7; Ps 66: 1-11; 2 Tim 2: 8-15; Luke 17: 11-19
“The other nine—where are they?”
The table is set and the food is laid out. The invitations have been sent, some have RSVP’d, others have not. The hour for dinner arrives, and the host glances nervously out the front window. She thinks she hears a soft tap at the door, then realizes it was her hopeful imagination. What shall I do with all this food?
“The other nine—where are they?”
Anyone who has planned a party can recognize the wonder and the frustration in Jesus’ voice. Anyone who has planned church events can identify with Jesus’ question. The work party, the special liturgy, the stewardship event—yes, our lives are complicated, and even getting to Sunday Mass seems to take special effort even for the most committed. Chances are we can all identify with Jesus who wonders aloud at the small response to a healing received. Chances are we have also sometimes been among the absent “nine.”
It is not my intention to preach a “make you feel guilty if you don’t show up for things” sermon. But today’s Gospel does invite us into reflecting deeply about our response to Jesus’ voice and action in our lives. Like that day on the road, Jesus does amazing things for us—he heals, he calls, he sends, he gives new meaning and purpose, he even brings us back to life. Today we are among that mystical band of ten lepers who needed so much and asked for so much. At first there were ten. Then there was one, and nine. One was different in response. That one received much more.
Let’s not forget that all ten lepers did things the right way. They respectfully obeyed the taboos for lepers and kept some distance between themselves and Jesus. They acknowledged that Jesus could do something wondrous for them—“Jesus, Master, have mercy!” And Jesus responds and gives them what they ask. He sends the ten on a journey of obedience both to himself and to the Law of Moses—“Go and show yourselves to the priests.” They obey, they set out, and they are made clean.
There is nothing wrong with any of this. We never learn if the now-clean lepers complete their journey and show themselves obediently to the priests. According to the Law, only the priests can pronounce a leper clean so they can re-join the community. I imagine that most if not all of them fulfilled that journey, and ended up at the Temple, obeying Jesus and obeying the ancient Law.
But there was one who did things differently, one who actually disobeys the letter of the Law and even the letter of what Jesus said. He returns to the place where he was a leper and Jesus was his only hope for healing. He lays down in a lovely Middle Eastern bow—not at the Temple, not before the priest, but before the Jesus who is himself healing and hope.
And he was a Samaritan, a foreigner. Nine were made “clean”, nine obeyed the Word and customs—but only one soke his thanks aloud, only one was pronounced “well.”
Today our own church community is a mix of the long-time faithful, the new seekers, the casual fringe, and the involved well-wishers from “outside.” Sometimes it is these outsiders who make our events and our ministries work. When this happens, I sometimes think of this story of the ten lepers.
It is a wonderful thing to be a church which knows Jesus and which prays to him for healing and life. It is a wonderful thing to obey the word of Jesus and of our wise tradition. It really is good to be one of the “nine.”
But what would it be like to make the extra journey, to take a new leap, to be one with that grateful Samaritan? What would it be like to be a community which was also “made well”?
Jer 29: 1, 4-7; Ps 66: 1-11; 2 Tim 2: 8-15; Luke 17: 11-19
“The other nine—where are they?”
The table is set and the food is laid out. The invitations have been sent, some have RSVP’d, others have not. The hour for dinner arrives, and the host glances nervously out the front window. She thinks she hears a soft tap at the door, then realizes it was her hopeful imagination. What shall I do with all this food?
“The other nine—where are they?”
Anyone who has planned a party can recognize the wonder and the frustration in Jesus’ voice. Anyone who has planned church events can identify with Jesus’ question. The work party, the special liturgy, the stewardship event—yes, our lives are complicated, and even getting to Sunday Mass seems to take special effort even for the most committed. Chances are we can all identify with Jesus who wonders aloud at the small response to a healing received. Chances are we have also sometimes been among the absent “nine.”
It is not my intention to preach a “make you feel guilty if you don’t show up for things” sermon. But today’s Gospel does invite us into reflecting deeply about our response to Jesus’ voice and action in our lives. Like that day on the road, Jesus does amazing things for us—he heals, he calls, he sends, he gives new meaning and purpose, he even brings us back to life. Today we are among that mystical band of ten lepers who needed so much and asked for so much. At first there were ten. Then there was one, and nine. One was different in response. That one received much more.
Let’s not forget that all ten lepers did things the right way. They respectfully obeyed the taboos for lepers and kept some distance between themselves and Jesus. They acknowledged that Jesus could do something wondrous for them—“Jesus, Master, have mercy!” And Jesus responds and gives them what they ask. He sends the ten on a journey of obedience both to himself and to the Law of Moses—“Go and show yourselves to the priests.” They obey, they set out, and they are made clean.
There is nothing wrong with any of this. We never learn if the now-clean lepers complete their journey and show themselves obediently to the priests. According to the Law, only the priests can pronounce a leper clean so they can re-join the community. I imagine that most if not all of them fulfilled that journey, and ended up at the Temple, obeying Jesus and obeying the ancient Law.
But there was one who did things differently, one who actually disobeys the letter of the Law and even the letter of what Jesus said. He returns to the place where he was a leper and Jesus was his only hope for healing. He lays down in a lovely Middle Eastern bow—not at the Temple, not before the priest, but before the Jesus who is himself healing and hope.
And he was a Samaritan, a foreigner. Nine were made “clean”, nine obeyed the Word and customs—but only one soke his thanks aloud, only one was pronounced “well.”
Today our own church community is a mix of the long-time faithful, the new seekers, the casual fringe, and the involved well-wishers from “outside.” Sometimes it is these outsiders who make our events and our ministries work. When this happens, I sometimes think of this story of the ten lepers.
It is a wonderful thing to be a church which knows Jesus and which prays to him for healing and life. It is a wonderful thing to obey the word of Jesus and of our wise tradition. It really is good to be one of the “nine.”
But what would it be like to make the extra journey, to take a new leap, to be one with that grateful Samaritan? What would it be like to be a community which was also “made well”?
Monday, October 4, 2010
The Wolf of Gubbio
(note-the tale I told as a homily on St. Francis Sunday was my rendering of "the Wolf of Gubbio", one of the oldest and richest of the legends of Saint Francis. Rather than re-do it myself as a text, here the Franciscans tell the tale themselves from FranciscanWiki, translated from the "Little Flowers of Saint Francis", an ancient collection of Francis tales--kn+)
From the Fioretti ("The Little Flowers of St. Francis")
Chapter 21.
How St. Francis Tamed the Very Fierce Wolf of Gubbio
At a time when St. Francis was staying in the town of Gubbio, something wonderful and worthy of lasting fame happened.
For there appeared in the territory of that city a fearfully large and fierce wolf which was so rabid with hunger that it devoured not only animals but even human beings. All the people in the town considered it such a great scourge and terror -- because it often came near the town -- that they took weapons with them when they went into the country, as if they were going to war. But even with their weapons, they were not able to escape the sharp teeth and raging hunger of the wolf when they were so unfortunate as to meet it. Consequently, everyone in the town was so terrified that hardly anyone dared go outside the city gate.
But God wished to bring the holiness of St. Francis to the attention of those people.
For while the Saint was there at that time, he had pity on the people and decided to go out and meet the wolf. But on hearing this the citizens said to him: "Look out, Brother Francis. Don't go outside the gate, because the wolf which has already devoured many people will certainly attack you and kill you!"
But St. Francis placed his hope in the Lord Jesus Christ who is master of all creatures. Protected not by a shield or a helmet, but arming himself with the Sign of the Cross, he bravely went out of the town with his companion, putting all his faith in the Lord who makes those who believe in Him walk without any injury on an asp and a basilisk and trample not merely on a wolf but even on a lion and a dragon. So with his very great faith St. Francis bravely went out to meet the wolf.
Some peasants accompanied him a little way, but soon they said to him: "We don't want to go any farther because that wolf is very fierce and we might get hurt."
When he heard them say this, St. Francis answered: "Just stay here. But I am going on to where the wolf lives."
Then, in the sight of many people who bad come out and climbed onto places to see this wonderful event, the fierce wolf came running with its mouth open toward St. Francis and his companion.
The Saint made the Sign of the Cross toward it. And the power of God, proceeding is much from himself as from his companion, checked the wolf and made it slow down and close its cruel mouth.
Then, calling to it, St. Francis said: "Come to me, Brother Wolf. In the name of Christ, I order you not to hurt me or anyone."
It is marvelous to relate that as soon as he had made the Sign of the Cross, the wolf closed its terrible jaws and stopped running, and as soon as he gave it that order, it lowered its head and lay down at the Saint's feet, as though it had become a lamb.
And St. Francis said to it as it lay in front of him: "Brother Wolf, you have done great harm in this region, and you have committed horrible crimes by destroying God's creatures without any mercy. You have been destroying not only irrational animals, but you even have the more detestable brazenness to kill and devour human beings made in the image of God. You therefore deserve to be put to death just like the worst robber and murderer. Consequently everyone is right in crying out against you and complaining, and this whole town is your enemy. But, Brother Wolf, I want to make peace between you and them, so that they will not be harmed by you any more, and after they have forgiven you all your past crimes, neither men nor dogs will pursue you any more."
The wolf showed by moving its body and tail and ears and by nodding its head that it willingly accepted what the Saint had said and would observe it.
So St. Francis spoke again: "Brother Wolf, since you are willing to make and keep this peace pact, I promise you that I will have the people of this town give you food every day as long as you live, so that you will never again suffer from hunger, for I know that whatever evil you have been doing was done because of the urge of hunger. But, my Brother Wolf, since I am obtaining such a favor for you, I want you to promise me that you will never hurt any animal or man. Will you promise me that?"
The wolf gave a clear sign, by nodding its head, that it promised to do what the Saint asked.
And St. Francis said: "Brother Wolf, I want you to give me a pledge so that I can confidently believe what you promise."
And as St. Francis held out his hand to receive the pledge, the wolf also raised its front paw and meekly and gently put it in St. Francis' hand as a sign that it was giving its pledge.
Then St. Francis said: "Brother Wolf, I order you, in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, to come with me now, without fear, into the town to make this peace pact in the name of the Lord."
And the wolf immediately began to walk along beside St. Francis, just like a very gentle lamb. When the people saw this, they were greatly amazed, and the news spread quickly throughout the whole town, so that all of them, men as well as women, great and small, assembled on the market place, because St. Francis was there with the wolf.
So when a very large crowd had gathered, St. Francis gave them a wonderful sermon, saying among other things that such calamities were permitted by God because of their sins, and how the consuming fire of hell by which the damned have to be devoured for all eternity is much more dangerous than the raging of a wolf which can kill nothing but the body, and how much more they should fear to be plunged into hell, since one little animal could keep so great a crowd in such a state of terror and trembling.
"So, dear people," he said, "come back to the Lord, and do fitting penance, and God will free you from the wolf in this world and from the devouring fire of hell in the next world."
And having said that, he added: "Listen, dear people. Brother Wolf, who is standing here before you, has promised me and has given me a pledge that he will make peace with you and will never hurt you if you promise also to feed him every day. And I pledge myself as bondsman for Brother Wolf that he will faithfully keep this peace pact."
Then all the people who were assembled there promised in a loud voice to feed the wolf regularly.
And St. Francis said to the wolf before them all: "And you, Brother Wolf, do you promise to keep this pact, that is, not to hurt any animal or human being?"
The wolf knelt down and bowed its head, and by twisting its body and wagging its tail and ears it clearly showed to everyone that it would keep the pact as it had promised.
And St. Francis said: "Brother Wolf, just as you gave me a pledge of this when we were outside the city gate, I want you to give me a pledge here before all these people that you will keep the pact and will never betray me for having pledged myself as your bondsman."
Then in the presence of all the people the wolf raised its right paw and put it in St. Francis' hand as a pledge.
And the crowd was so filled with amazement and joy, out of devotion for the Saint as well as over the novelty of the miracle and over the peace pact between the wolf and the people, that they all shouted to the sky, praising and blessing the Lord Jesus Christ who had sent St. Francis to them, by whose merits they had been freed from such a fierce wolf and saved from such a terrible scourge and had recovered peace and quiet.
From that day, the wolf and the people kept the pact which St. Francis made. The wolf lived two years more, and it went from door to door for food. It hurt no one, and no one hurt it. The people fed it courteously. And it is a striking fact that not a single dog ever barked at it.
Then the wolf grew old and died. And the people were sorry, because whenever it went through the town, its peaceful kindness and patience reminded them of the virtues and the holiness of St. Francis.
Praised be Our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.
From the Fioretti ("The Little Flowers of St. Francis")
Chapter 21.
How St. Francis Tamed the Very Fierce Wolf of Gubbio
At a time when St. Francis was staying in the town of Gubbio, something wonderful and worthy of lasting fame happened.
For there appeared in the territory of that city a fearfully large and fierce wolf which was so rabid with hunger that it devoured not only animals but even human beings. All the people in the town considered it such a great scourge and terror -- because it often came near the town -- that they took weapons with them when they went into the country, as if they were going to war. But even with their weapons, they were not able to escape the sharp teeth and raging hunger of the wolf when they were so unfortunate as to meet it. Consequently, everyone in the town was so terrified that hardly anyone dared go outside the city gate.
But God wished to bring the holiness of St. Francis to the attention of those people.
For while the Saint was there at that time, he had pity on the people and decided to go out and meet the wolf. But on hearing this the citizens said to him: "Look out, Brother Francis. Don't go outside the gate, because the wolf which has already devoured many people will certainly attack you and kill you!"
But St. Francis placed his hope in the Lord Jesus Christ who is master of all creatures. Protected not by a shield or a helmet, but arming himself with the Sign of the Cross, he bravely went out of the town with his companion, putting all his faith in the Lord who makes those who believe in Him walk without any injury on an asp and a basilisk and trample not merely on a wolf but even on a lion and a dragon. So with his very great faith St. Francis bravely went out to meet the wolf.
Some peasants accompanied him a little way, but soon they said to him: "We don't want to go any farther because that wolf is very fierce and we might get hurt."
When he heard them say this, St. Francis answered: "Just stay here. But I am going on to where the wolf lives."
Then, in the sight of many people who bad come out and climbed onto places to see this wonderful event, the fierce wolf came running with its mouth open toward St. Francis and his companion.
The Saint made the Sign of the Cross toward it. And the power of God, proceeding is much from himself as from his companion, checked the wolf and made it slow down and close its cruel mouth.
Then, calling to it, St. Francis said: "Come to me, Brother Wolf. In the name of Christ, I order you not to hurt me or anyone."
It is marvelous to relate that as soon as he had made the Sign of the Cross, the wolf closed its terrible jaws and stopped running, and as soon as he gave it that order, it lowered its head and lay down at the Saint's feet, as though it had become a lamb.
And St. Francis said to it as it lay in front of him: "Brother Wolf, you have done great harm in this region, and you have committed horrible crimes by destroying God's creatures without any mercy. You have been destroying not only irrational animals, but you even have the more detestable brazenness to kill and devour human beings made in the image of God. You therefore deserve to be put to death just like the worst robber and murderer. Consequently everyone is right in crying out against you and complaining, and this whole town is your enemy. But, Brother Wolf, I want to make peace between you and them, so that they will not be harmed by you any more, and after they have forgiven you all your past crimes, neither men nor dogs will pursue you any more."
The wolf showed by moving its body and tail and ears and by nodding its head that it willingly accepted what the Saint had said and would observe it.
So St. Francis spoke again: "Brother Wolf, since you are willing to make and keep this peace pact, I promise you that I will have the people of this town give you food every day as long as you live, so that you will never again suffer from hunger, for I know that whatever evil you have been doing was done because of the urge of hunger. But, my Brother Wolf, since I am obtaining such a favor for you, I want you to promise me that you will never hurt any animal or man. Will you promise me that?"
The wolf gave a clear sign, by nodding its head, that it promised to do what the Saint asked.
And St. Francis said: "Brother Wolf, I want you to give me a pledge so that I can confidently believe what you promise."
And as St. Francis held out his hand to receive the pledge, the wolf also raised its front paw and meekly and gently put it in St. Francis' hand as a sign that it was giving its pledge.
Then St. Francis said: "Brother Wolf, I order you, in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, to come with me now, without fear, into the town to make this peace pact in the name of the Lord."
And the wolf immediately began to walk along beside St. Francis, just like a very gentle lamb. When the people saw this, they were greatly amazed, and the news spread quickly throughout the whole town, so that all of them, men as well as women, great and small, assembled on the market place, because St. Francis was there with the wolf.
So when a very large crowd had gathered, St. Francis gave them a wonderful sermon, saying among other things that such calamities were permitted by God because of their sins, and how the consuming fire of hell by which the damned have to be devoured for all eternity is much more dangerous than the raging of a wolf which can kill nothing but the body, and how much more they should fear to be plunged into hell, since one little animal could keep so great a crowd in such a state of terror and trembling.
"So, dear people," he said, "come back to the Lord, and do fitting penance, and God will free you from the wolf in this world and from the devouring fire of hell in the next world."
And having said that, he added: "Listen, dear people. Brother Wolf, who is standing here before you, has promised me and has given me a pledge that he will make peace with you and will never hurt you if you promise also to feed him every day. And I pledge myself as bondsman for Brother Wolf that he will faithfully keep this peace pact."
Then all the people who were assembled there promised in a loud voice to feed the wolf regularly.
And St. Francis said to the wolf before them all: "And you, Brother Wolf, do you promise to keep this pact, that is, not to hurt any animal or human being?"
The wolf knelt down and bowed its head, and by twisting its body and wagging its tail and ears it clearly showed to everyone that it would keep the pact as it had promised.
And St. Francis said: "Brother Wolf, just as you gave me a pledge of this when we were outside the city gate, I want you to give me a pledge here before all these people that you will keep the pact and will never betray me for having pledged myself as your bondsman."
Then in the presence of all the people the wolf raised its right paw and put it in St. Francis' hand as a pledge.
And the crowd was so filled with amazement and joy, out of devotion for the Saint as well as over the novelty of the miracle and over the peace pact between the wolf and the people, that they all shouted to the sky, praising and blessing the Lord Jesus Christ who had sent St. Francis to them, by whose merits they had been freed from such a fierce wolf and saved from such a terrible scourge and had recovered peace and quiet.
From that day, the wolf and the people kept the pact which St. Francis made. The wolf lived two years more, and it went from door to door for food. It hurt no one, and no one hurt it. The people fed it courteously. And it is a striking fact that not a single dog ever barked at it.
Then the wolf grew old and died. And the people were sorry, because whenever it went through the town, its peaceful kindness and patience reminded them of the virtues and the holiness of St. Francis.
Praised be Our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.
Sunday, September 26, 2010
The ditch
Proper 21 C 2010
(Jeremiah 32:1-3a, 6-15; Psalm 91:1-6, 14-16; 1 Timothy 6:6-19; Luke 16:19-31)
A young preacher told of a conversation she overheard outside of a Narcotics Anonymous meeting. One man told another, “Man, I’m just starting out in recovery, and each day is hard.” The second man he spoke to laughed and said, “Dude, I’ve been in recovery for years, and every day that same ditch is right there in front of me.”
That’s a 12-Step version of the ancient desert saying, “This is our life: we fall down, and we get back up again.”
That ditch and that harsh, no-nonsense wisdom is right in front of us today, and it is good that we are here to face it together. Jesus tells a haunting and rather dark parable. “Be nice to poor people” is the simplest meaning if we are looking for a moral. By all means, be nice to poor people. But the parables are never just morality tales—they are stories of the strange reality that is the Kingdom of God and how the Kingdom calls us over and over to change and transformation. And that is never easy.
A few years ago Phil Collins sang a haunting song, “It’s just another day for you and me in paradise...” as we walk by while the poor call out for help. It was just another day in paradise for the rich man in Jesus’ story, with the poor man waiting at his gates for a hand-out. The rich man is not a bad man. He’s just living his life as it is, where there are rich and poor and isn’t that too bad, but there’s a lot of poor and I am only one man, and what can I do?
The rich man has no name. The poor man has a name—Lazarus, which means roughly “God has helped.” This story is about to flip our world upside-down, since in our world the rich and famous have names and the poor have none.
The rich man dies and enters a harsh reality—it is no longer just another day in paradise for him. He who doled out scraps to Lazarus begs for Lazarus’ finger to moisten his mouth. Have you ever looked at the fingers of a poor homeless man? Those are the fingers that the rich man begs to be put between his lips.
The father of his nation says, “No my son, between you and us a great chasm has been fixed…” Who can cross over that?
That ditch is right there in front of us, and that chasm has been fixed. What can we do? How can we deal with the ditch, how can we cross the chasm opened by our blindness to the truth of God’s kingdom?
We can make a bid on a wild hope. Jeremiah was in jail while the Babylonians were beating down the gates, and what does he do? He swings a real estate deal with his cousin, right when property values were bottoming out and the Babylonians were just dying to depreciate values even more. Despair and flee? No, buy the land and seal the deal. Live and act in hope, and the God of hope will fulfill the promise—land, freedom, and new life. Ask people recovering from the hopeless hell of addiction about the wildness, the pure improbable faith of hope when they are locked in despair.
And we can fight the good fight.
One thing we learn in martial arts is to never give up, to never, ever stop fighting. Only the teacher calls the end of the match. Says Paul, Paul who no doubt saw wrestling and boxing matches in Tarsus and Corinth: “Fight the good fight of the faith...make the good confession...just as Christ Jesus made the good confession before Pontius Pilate.” Ours is a fighting life—never stop fighting, even if we are knocked down or see defeat before us.
Jesus ends his parable on a dark note. I believe he asks us these questions:
No matter how long we’ve been on a Gospel path, do we see that ditch before us, the chasm that is fixed if we take for granted the way things are, the way we ourselves are, the way we are living today?
Do we wish to bridge that chasm, to deal with that ditch?
Do we wish to live into a wild hope, the hope that we might live a different and transformed life, and that we might transform life for the poor of this world?
Do we believe that the fight is worth fighting, that it is worthwhile to get back up when we fall?
If we answer yes, if we even want the courage to be able to answer “yes”, then we’ve made Jeremiah’s crazy land deal, we’ve made Paul’s good confession. All that remains is to fight the fight—to live the upside-down values of the kingdom, where the poor have names and where we are to live and to be the abundant mercy of God.
And so we will fall down, and get up, together with one another and with the Spirit. Never stop fighting. Only the teacher calls the end of the match.
And only the Teacher gives us the promised glory when the match is finally over.
(Jeremiah 32:1-3a, 6-15; Psalm 91:1-6, 14-16; 1 Timothy 6:6-19; Luke 16:19-31)
A young preacher told of a conversation she overheard outside of a Narcotics Anonymous meeting. One man told another, “Man, I’m just starting out in recovery, and each day is hard.” The second man he spoke to laughed and said, “Dude, I’ve been in recovery for years, and every day that same ditch is right there in front of me.”
That’s a 12-Step version of the ancient desert saying, “This is our life: we fall down, and we get back up again.”
That ditch and that harsh, no-nonsense wisdom is right in front of us today, and it is good that we are here to face it together. Jesus tells a haunting and rather dark parable. “Be nice to poor people” is the simplest meaning if we are looking for a moral. By all means, be nice to poor people. But the parables are never just morality tales—they are stories of the strange reality that is the Kingdom of God and how the Kingdom calls us over and over to change and transformation. And that is never easy.
A few years ago Phil Collins sang a haunting song, “It’s just another day for you and me in paradise...” as we walk by while the poor call out for help. It was just another day in paradise for the rich man in Jesus’ story, with the poor man waiting at his gates for a hand-out. The rich man is not a bad man. He’s just living his life as it is, where there are rich and poor and isn’t that too bad, but there’s a lot of poor and I am only one man, and what can I do?
The rich man has no name. The poor man has a name—Lazarus, which means roughly “God has helped.” This story is about to flip our world upside-down, since in our world the rich and famous have names and the poor have none.
The rich man dies and enters a harsh reality—it is no longer just another day in paradise for him. He who doled out scraps to Lazarus begs for Lazarus’ finger to moisten his mouth. Have you ever looked at the fingers of a poor homeless man? Those are the fingers that the rich man begs to be put between his lips.
The father of his nation says, “No my son, between you and us a great chasm has been fixed…” Who can cross over that?
That ditch is right there in front of us, and that chasm has been fixed. What can we do? How can we deal with the ditch, how can we cross the chasm opened by our blindness to the truth of God’s kingdom?
We can make a bid on a wild hope. Jeremiah was in jail while the Babylonians were beating down the gates, and what does he do? He swings a real estate deal with his cousin, right when property values were bottoming out and the Babylonians were just dying to depreciate values even more. Despair and flee? No, buy the land and seal the deal. Live and act in hope, and the God of hope will fulfill the promise—land, freedom, and new life. Ask people recovering from the hopeless hell of addiction about the wildness, the pure improbable faith of hope when they are locked in despair.
And we can fight the good fight.
One thing we learn in martial arts is to never give up, to never, ever stop fighting. Only the teacher calls the end of the match. Says Paul, Paul who no doubt saw wrestling and boxing matches in Tarsus and Corinth: “Fight the good fight of the faith...make the good confession...just as Christ Jesus made the good confession before Pontius Pilate.” Ours is a fighting life—never stop fighting, even if we are knocked down or see defeat before us.
Jesus ends his parable on a dark note. I believe he asks us these questions:
No matter how long we’ve been on a Gospel path, do we see that ditch before us, the chasm that is fixed if we take for granted the way things are, the way we ourselves are, the way we are living today?
Do we wish to bridge that chasm, to deal with that ditch?
Do we wish to live into a wild hope, the hope that we might live a different and transformed life, and that we might transform life for the poor of this world?
Do we believe that the fight is worth fighting, that it is worthwhile to get back up when we fall?
If we answer yes, if we even want the courage to be able to answer “yes”, then we’ve made Jeremiah’s crazy land deal, we’ve made Paul’s good confession. All that remains is to fight the fight—to live the upside-down values of the kingdom, where the poor have names and where we are to live and to be the abundant mercy of God.
And so we will fall down, and get up, together with one another and with the Spirit. Never stop fighting. Only the teacher calls the end of the match.
And only the Teacher gives us the promised glory when the match is finally over.
Sunday, September 19, 2010
enough, and more than enough
“Fill The Church” Sunday 2010
Isaiah 45: 21-25; Ps 98: 1-4; Phil 2: 5-11; Luke 9: 10-17
What drew us to this man?
Was it his beauty? It’s strange, but we cannot remember the details of his face. We could not take our eyes off of him some days. John was more handsome, Peter was louder and his presence filled a room. Magdalene was beautiful and the men perspired slightly when she was near. But our eyes were drawn to him, the rabbi, the master, only to him. Why?
Why did we listen to this man? He was not a professional teacher, he did not set out to found a school. He had not studied with great teachers or even with the Gentile philosophers. But his words—he spoke them with his whole body, with his life and actions, with his whole being—no difference between what he said and what he did and who he was. To hear him was like listening to a waterfall while bathing in the pool beneath it.
Why did we follow this man? If we knew where the road would lead when we first met him, we would have shuddered and run away. But when he called, we stood up and took first one step after him, then another. It was all those steps, on the dust and on the paving-stones, on the sand of beaches and through the growing grain, that strengthened us so today we can bend and lift our cross as he lifted his on that terrible day, all alone, while we hid and shivered and secretly thought how lucky we were that we did not share his pain. And we have been changed—now we think we are blessed because by the mercy of God we are allowed to walk his way, from pain to glory.
That day in the wilderness was just such a day of change.
The teacher was tired, and so were we. So many thronged around, holding up their empty hands, opening their famished mouths, baring their famished souls. He spoke and touched, healed and blessed, but he was just one man and all we could do was stand and try to help in small ways—bring him water for his dry throat, support a drooping man for him to heal.
We were drained and exhausted. And of course we were broke—always broke. Thomas was practical—“Tell people to go now, tell them to scatter so they can hit the villages for food before the merchants close their booths for the day.”
The teacher surprised us. “You give them something to eat.”
It was impossible, and we told him so. A couple of us had brought a loaf or two of bread, not very fresh, and a couple of dried fish, workingman’s lunch. That was all the food in sight.
The teacher held that food, that working-stiff food, so tenderly. He raised his eyes in that way he had which was not sticky-sweet but natural. In simple words, he thanked his Father, broke the bread, carefully handed the pieces to us.
Numb, we obeyed. Piece by piece, we handed fragments to the open hungry hands. Break, hand, break, hand. Often we were sure we held the next-to-last piece. Each time there was more, there was more. The people watched us, and even in their hunger they themselves began to break pieces from their own pieces, and passed them on.
At first there were murmurs, then a strange hush, as if everyone were holding their breath, waiting for the very last piece to be passed, waiting to see who would be fed, who would be hungry. And then the buzz—faint at first, then the more hopeful began to say that something strange, something wonderful was happening right here, right out here in the middle of nowhere. The buzz became a deep, resonant, satisfied roar. Even the people on the fringe of the crowd, those who were just curious and not very interested in the teacher’s words, even they were handed their share.
There is nothing as content as a group of people filled with good food.
Andrew started picking up the pieces. He always worried about things like that. He had to find twelve baskets to hold them all. Enough for today, and for tomorrow. Our ancestors in the desert, fed with the manna, did not eat any better.
And we were changed.
Never again would we worry that a gathering of the faithful was broke or poor. The master said that if even two gathered remembering just his name, he would be there. If he is there, if he is here, then there is always more than enough. All we need do is remember the story, give thanks, share what we have. All shall eat, and be satisfied. And we shall be changed.
This is out story, Saints Peter and Paul. This is our teacher who is here with us today. Here is the bread—the bread of the altar, and the bread which is our lives. Have you ever felt broke? Have you ever felt stretched thin? Have you ever felt that there is just not enough, that our lives and energy are just not enough, that we can’t keep our lives, our families, or our church going another day?
Well, we have followed the teacher. He is with us today. He takes the bread of the altar and the bread of our lives and the story happens again—give thanks, break, and give. When we do that, there is enough and more than enough. We need him, we need each other, and we need to tell this tale. Know this—when we tell this tale together, when we live this tale today, there is enough. There is more than enough. And we shall be changed.
Isaiah 45: 21-25; Ps 98: 1-4; Phil 2: 5-11; Luke 9: 10-17
What drew us to this man?
Was it his beauty? It’s strange, but we cannot remember the details of his face. We could not take our eyes off of him some days. John was more handsome, Peter was louder and his presence filled a room. Magdalene was beautiful and the men perspired slightly when she was near. But our eyes were drawn to him, the rabbi, the master, only to him. Why?
Why did we listen to this man? He was not a professional teacher, he did not set out to found a school. He had not studied with great teachers or even with the Gentile philosophers. But his words—he spoke them with his whole body, with his life and actions, with his whole being—no difference between what he said and what he did and who he was. To hear him was like listening to a waterfall while bathing in the pool beneath it.
Why did we follow this man? If we knew where the road would lead when we first met him, we would have shuddered and run away. But when he called, we stood up and took first one step after him, then another. It was all those steps, on the dust and on the paving-stones, on the sand of beaches and through the growing grain, that strengthened us so today we can bend and lift our cross as he lifted his on that terrible day, all alone, while we hid and shivered and secretly thought how lucky we were that we did not share his pain. And we have been changed—now we think we are blessed because by the mercy of God we are allowed to walk his way, from pain to glory.
That day in the wilderness was just such a day of change.
The teacher was tired, and so were we. So many thronged around, holding up their empty hands, opening their famished mouths, baring their famished souls. He spoke and touched, healed and blessed, but he was just one man and all we could do was stand and try to help in small ways—bring him water for his dry throat, support a drooping man for him to heal.
We were drained and exhausted. And of course we were broke—always broke. Thomas was practical—“Tell people to go now, tell them to scatter so they can hit the villages for food before the merchants close their booths for the day.”
The teacher surprised us. “You give them something to eat.”
It was impossible, and we told him so. A couple of us had brought a loaf or two of bread, not very fresh, and a couple of dried fish, workingman’s lunch. That was all the food in sight.
The teacher held that food, that working-stiff food, so tenderly. He raised his eyes in that way he had which was not sticky-sweet but natural. In simple words, he thanked his Father, broke the bread, carefully handed the pieces to us.
Numb, we obeyed. Piece by piece, we handed fragments to the open hungry hands. Break, hand, break, hand. Often we were sure we held the next-to-last piece. Each time there was more, there was more. The people watched us, and even in their hunger they themselves began to break pieces from their own pieces, and passed them on.
At first there were murmurs, then a strange hush, as if everyone were holding their breath, waiting for the very last piece to be passed, waiting to see who would be fed, who would be hungry. And then the buzz—faint at first, then the more hopeful began to say that something strange, something wonderful was happening right here, right out here in the middle of nowhere. The buzz became a deep, resonant, satisfied roar. Even the people on the fringe of the crowd, those who were just curious and not very interested in the teacher’s words, even they were handed their share.
There is nothing as content as a group of people filled with good food.
Andrew started picking up the pieces. He always worried about things like that. He had to find twelve baskets to hold them all. Enough for today, and for tomorrow. Our ancestors in the desert, fed with the manna, did not eat any better.
And we were changed.
Never again would we worry that a gathering of the faithful was broke or poor. The master said that if even two gathered remembering just his name, he would be there. If he is there, if he is here, then there is always more than enough. All we need do is remember the story, give thanks, share what we have. All shall eat, and be satisfied. And we shall be changed.
This is out story, Saints Peter and Paul. This is our teacher who is here with us today. Here is the bread—the bread of the altar, and the bread which is our lives. Have you ever felt broke? Have you ever felt stretched thin? Have you ever felt that there is just not enough, that our lives and energy are just not enough, that we can’t keep our lives, our families, or our church going another day?
Well, we have followed the teacher. He is with us today. He takes the bread of the altar and the bread of our lives and the story happens again—give thanks, break, and give. When we do that, there is enough and more than enough. We need him, we need each other, and we need to tell this tale. Know this—when we tell this tale together, when we live this tale today, there is enough. There is more than enough. And we shall be changed.
Sunday, September 12, 2010
following the heart
Proper 19 C 2010
Jeremiah 4:11-12, 22-28; Ps 14; 1 Timothy 1:12-17; Luke 15:1-10
There was a man in the Middle East who thought he knew his own heart as well as the heart of God.
The young man grew up in privilege. He received a good liberal education. Perhaps it was his loneliness and sense of alienation among sophisticated fellow-students which set his feet on a dark path. See, the young man was raised in a stern faith which believes in one God, in the purity of God’s faithful people, and in observing clear laws that God has set down. As the world grew more complex, as their young people were exposed to more and more temptations of the flesh and of ideas, the teachers and leaders of this faith grew more stern in their demands and more angry in their preaching. The nations of the West, they said, brought nothing but greed and conquest to their lands and pollution to their young people and to their faith. A few teachers even advocated violence, violence against the Western forces who occupied their land, violence against their own people who co-operated in any way with those Western forces and who did not live up to the stern demands of those teachers. Any who died in this holy war, said the teachers, were God’s martyrs, guaranteed a hero’s reward in the life to come.
The bright and idealistic young man drank in this harsh teaching like cold water on a hot day. His heart thrilled to the white-hot, single-minded commitment required of a warrior for God. He was finally drawn into violence. He helped his new friends kill a man, a man whose beliefs ran against the approved teaching of the young man’s group.
Inspired, and secretly thrilled at violence for religion’s sake, the young man set out with the blessing of his leadership to harass and arrest his own people whose faith fell short of his standards and haul them before religious courts.
And the young man would have lived and probably died for this harsh, utterly committed faith, sure of his own heart and of the heart of God. But the strangest thing happened. The One God in whom the young man believed with all his heart showed up. God knocked the young man down and told him he was wrong, wrong about his own heart and about the heart of God.
This story sounds strangely like the tale of a member of the Taliban, or Al-Qaeda. In a sense it is. The young man was not Muslim, he was Jewish. His given name was Saul. Today we call him Saint Paul.
Saul thought he knew his heart and the heart of God. Do not underestimate the depth of his fanaticism. Only the lack of technology limited its power. I myself need little effort to imagine unchanged Saul sitting in a cave on the Afghani border, watching the Twin Towers fall on CNN and nodding in approval.
One Desert Father said, “Of all evil suggestions, the most terrible is the prompting to follow your own heart.” Now that’s really dark, and really counter-cultural—over and over again we are urged to “follow our hearts.” If you do not follow your heart, says popular wisdom, then you are allowing external authority to force you to be untrue to yourself.
Today the Scriptures suggest that we may not really know our own hearts. Our impulses and our most deeply cherished, unexamined beliefs are not necessarily our deepest truth. That poor fellow in Florida who was about to burn the Koran—he was following his heart and his most cherished beliefs. So are many misguided people, small or great. I am still on a journey to listen to my own true heart. Since our true heart is made to rest in God, it takes at least a lifetime to know ourselves even somewhat as God knows us. In the meanwhile, I face the fact that as often as I felt certitude, even a deep sense of passion about my ideals, all too often I have strayed into self-deception. “My people are foolish; they do not know me”, says God in Jeremiah. “I was formerly a blasphemer, a persecutor, and a man of violence” says Paul. “But I received mercy…”
“But I received mercy…” This weekend, we remember the death and destruction worked by young men who were absolutely sure they were right, that God was guiding them, that they were willing to die for their faith and their truth. As we remember, let us humbly ask for the grace to make a better world, not by rushing to assert that our enemies are wrong and we are right. That path leads all too easily to our willingness to make others suffer and die for our rightness. The violence, the single-mindedness, the self-deception is in us, and it awaits us always if we think we always know our own hearts and the heart of God. Our hope is not in our own sense of rightness. Our hope is in the God who is willing to search for us even in our times of anger, fear, and violence. Like a shepherd so single-minded he will leave the other sheep to search, like the woman who quits even cooking food to search her house for one coin, the God who truly knows us will search us out from every crack and crevice we have rolled into chosen for ourselves. Just ask Saul—God searched hard for him and finally had to knock him down to get his attention. Our single-mindedness does not save. The God who searches our minds and looks beneath our illusions and fears—it is this God who saves.
Jeremiah 4:11-12, 22-28; Ps 14; 1 Timothy 1:12-17; Luke 15:1-10
There was a man in the Middle East who thought he knew his own heart as well as the heart of God.
The young man grew up in privilege. He received a good liberal education. Perhaps it was his loneliness and sense of alienation among sophisticated fellow-students which set his feet on a dark path. See, the young man was raised in a stern faith which believes in one God, in the purity of God’s faithful people, and in observing clear laws that God has set down. As the world grew more complex, as their young people were exposed to more and more temptations of the flesh and of ideas, the teachers and leaders of this faith grew more stern in their demands and more angry in their preaching. The nations of the West, they said, brought nothing but greed and conquest to their lands and pollution to their young people and to their faith. A few teachers even advocated violence, violence against the Western forces who occupied their land, violence against their own people who co-operated in any way with those Western forces and who did not live up to the stern demands of those teachers. Any who died in this holy war, said the teachers, were God’s martyrs, guaranteed a hero’s reward in the life to come.
The bright and idealistic young man drank in this harsh teaching like cold water on a hot day. His heart thrilled to the white-hot, single-minded commitment required of a warrior for God. He was finally drawn into violence. He helped his new friends kill a man, a man whose beliefs ran against the approved teaching of the young man’s group.
Inspired, and secretly thrilled at violence for religion’s sake, the young man set out with the blessing of his leadership to harass and arrest his own people whose faith fell short of his standards and haul them before religious courts.
And the young man would have lived and probably died for this harsh, utterly committed faith, sure of his own heart and of the heart of God. But the strangest thing happened. The One God in whom the young man believed with all his heart showed up. God knocked the young man down and told him he was wrong, wrong about his own heart and about the heart of God.
This story sounds strangely like the tale of a member of the Taliban, or Al-Qaeda. In a sense it is. The young man was not Muslim, he was Jewish. His given name was Saul. Today we call him Saint Paul.
Saul thought he knew his heart and the heart of God. Do not underestimate the depth of his fanaticism. Only the lack of technology limited its power. I myself need little effort to imagine unchanged Saul sitting in a cave on the Afghani border, watching the Twin Towers fall on CNN and nodding in approval.
One Desert Father said, “Of all evil suggestions, the most terrible is the prompting to follow your own heart.” Now that’s really dark, and really counter-cultural—over and over again we are urged to “follow our hearts.” If you do not follow your heart, says popular wisdom, then you are allowing external authority to force you to be untrue to yourself.
Today the Scriptures suggest that we may not really know our own hearts. Our impulses and our most deeply cherished, unexamined beliefs are not necessarily our deepest truth. That poor fellow in Florida who was about to burn the Koran—he was following his heart and his most cherished beliefs. So are many misguided people, small or great. I am still on a journey to listen to my own true heart. Since our true heart is made to rest in God, it takes at least a lifetime to know ourselves even somewhat as God knows us. In the meanwhile, I face the fact that as often as I felt certitude, even a deep sense of passion about my ideals, all too often I have strayed into self-deception. “My people are foolish; they do not know me”, says God in Jeremiah. “I was formerly a blasphemer, a persecutor, and a man of violence” says Paul. “But I received mercy…”
“But I received mercy…” This weekend, we remember the death and destruction worked by young men who were absolutely sure they were right, that God was guiding them, that they were willing to die for their faith and their truth. As we remember, let us humbly ask for the grace to make a better world, not by rushing to assert that our enemies are wrong and we are right. That path leads all too easily to our willingness to make others suffer and die for our rightness. The violence, the single-mindedness, the self-deception is in us, and it awaits us always if we think we always know our own hearts and the heart of God. Our hope is not in our own sense of rightness. Our hope is in the God who is willing to search for us even in our times of anger, fear, and violence. Like a shepherd so single-minded he will leave the other sheep to search, like the woman who quits even cooking food to search her house for one coin, the God who truly knows us will search us out from every crack and crevice we have rolled into chosen for ourselves. Just ask Saul—God searched hard for him and finally had to knock him down to get his attention. Our single-mindedness does not save. The God who searches our minds and looks beneath our illusions and fears—it is this God who saves.
Tuesday, September 7, 2010
trust and cost
Proper 18 C 2010
Jeremiah 18:1-11; Psalm 139:1-5, 13-17; Philemon 1-21; Luke 14:25-33
Trust in God is hard for me.
That may sound like a surprising admission from a priest. But trust in God has been a lifelong, ongoing, and unfinished project for me.
I envy my youngest daughter’s trust who, when she was three, jumped down the basement steps into her mother’s arms. But then I remember that when I was three I fell down our basement steps while my own mother watched helplessly. I still have dreams that end with my tumbling down a set of stairs.
Today’s Collect asks God to give us the gift of trusting with all our hearts. For me, and I suspect for many of us, that trust is not a simple religious sentiment, but something that we wish we had but must admit that we often do not. That we struggle with trust is understandable—life gives many of us good reasons to struggle with trust.
But we want that sense of trust, we want our lives to be transformed by that trust. And we want that transformation in the face of what God calls us and empowers us to do.
Today it is Jesus himself who presents us with a sharp challenge to trust in God. Jesus turns to us and speaks challenging words, words that I even hesitate to explore in a pulpit for fear that they will drive some people away. Hating father and mother, hating children, carrying crosses, giving up all possessions—Jesus says clearly that admiring him is easy, but following him is hard. One contemporary writer says that Jesus has many fans, but few real followers. So Jesus gives some practical examples of “counting the cost”—make sure you know what you are getting into if you wish to be my follower.
After serving here as rector for 15 years, I have seen us move from being a church who defined ourselves in terms of how we do our liturgy to being a church who tries to live what our liturgy means. Instead of talking about “the right way to do things”, we began to speak of “what does the Gospel call us to do?” “Who is our neighbor and how do we welcome and serve them?” “How does Christ call us to renew our lives?” These questions are hard but they are open questions and they are the right questions, they are Gospel-based questions. Some of the results of engaging these questions are in our midst—renewed outreach to the poor, outreach to women in the sex trade, dental services to the poor, a growing Hispanic presence, an urge to deepen our lives of prayer and discipline, new members with new vision and new hopes. This journey has not been easy. My life was in some ways much easier in those years when I first arrived. Our life together was not as challenging. Sometimes I have wondered if I have asked too much of Saints Peter and Paul, and perhaps even of myself.
But then I hear Gospel texts like this one, and I feel again that strange urge—to learn again how to trust God and to live a Gospel that is not so much soothing as it is challenging. Even as the seasons of our lives change, and as one old rock ‘n roller sang we “find ourselves seeking shelter against the wind”, I find I still love the wind and I hope that we may always be a church that can ask and act on hard questions. I think that is our only hope as a congregation for the future: to fearlessly allow the Master’s words to move us, kindle us, and sometimes disturb us. Count the cost—yes indeed. Many people try out a Gospel path, but now as in the beginning of the Gospel adventure people do fall away when they count the cost. May we be among those who trust and stay.
It is the Old Testament that gives us a note of gentle hope.
Jeremiah goes down to the local potter’s workshop and watches the potter at the wheel. Have you ever seen a potter work? I am always amazed at how many times the pot seems to grow and take shape, only to be touched and collapsed by the potter and spin again from a shapeless lump of clay. I always wonder why one shape is suddenly acceptable to the potter, why she chooses that moment and that shape over all the others. But the potter knows. And the potter makes all the past shapes, curves, flaws, and false starts into part of the pattern. Nothing is wasted.
We can trust the divine Potter to have an artist’s way with us, to make all our stumbling attempts to be a follower of the Master part of the final lovely product. At least, we can long for that trust, and ask for it as a gift. And the gift of trust will be given.
It takes humility to admit that we have a long way to go, that our trust and our faith is small or weak. But that’s a good place to start. God isn’t very interested in finished products. The potter cannot work with a lump of stone or steel. When we pray each day, “Today I begin again to be a follower of you—what would you have me learn and do?”, we allow the divine Artist to make of each of us, and our life as a church, a lovely and surprising work of art.
And we learn to trust that even if we fail and fall, the Potter can make us new.
Jeremiah 18:1-11; Psalm 139:1-5, 13-17; Philemon 1-21; Luke 14:25-33
Trust in God is hard for me.
That may sound like a surprising admission from a priest. But trust in God has been a lifelong, ongoing, and unfinished project for me.
I envy my youngest daughter’s trust who, when she was three, jumped down the basement steps into her mother’s arms. But then I remember that when I was three I fell down our basement steps while my own mother watched helplessly. I still have dreams that end with my tumbling down a set of stairs.
Today’s Collect asks God to give us the gift of trusting with all our hearts. For me, and I suspect for many of us, that trust is not a simple religious sentiment, but something that we wish we had but must admit that we often do not. That we struggle with trust is understandable—life gives many of us good reasons to struggle with trust.
But we want that sense of trust, we want our lives to be transformed by that trust. And we want that transformation in the face of what God calls us and empowers us to do.
Today it is Jesus himself who presents us with a sharp challenge to trust in God. Jesus turns to us and speaks challenging words, words that I even hesitate to explore in a pulpit for fear that they will drive some people away. Hating father and mother, hating children, carrying crosses, giving up all possessions—Jesus says clearly that admiring him is easy, but following him is hard. One contemporary writer says that Jesus has many fans, but few real followers. So Jesus gives some practical examples of “counting the cost”—make sure you know what you are getting into if you wish to be my follower.
After serving here as rector for 15 years, I have seen us move from being a church who defined ourselves in terms of how we do our liturgy to being a church who tries to live what our liturgy means. Instead of talking about “the right way to do things”, we began to speak of “what does the Gospel call us to do?” “Who is our neighbor and how do we welcome and serve them?” “How does Christ call us to renew our lives?” These questions are hard but they are open questions and they are the right questions, they are Gospel-based questions. Some of the results of engaging these questions are in our midst—renewed outreach to the poor, outreach to women in the sex trade, dental services to the poor, a growing Hispanic presence, an urge to deepen our lives of prayer and discipline, new members with new vision and new hopes. This journey has not been easy. My life was in some ways much easier in those years when I first arrived. Our life together was not as challenging. Sometimes I have wondered if I have asked too much of Saints Peter and Paul, and perhaps even of myself.
But then I hear Gospel texts like this one, and I feel again that strange urge—to learn again how to trust God and to live a Gospel that is not so much soothing as it is challenging. Even as the seasons of our lives change, and as one old rock ‘n roller sang we “find ourselves seeking shelter against the wind”, I find I still love the wind and I hope that we may always be a church that can ask and act on hard questions. I think that is our only hope as a congregation for the future: to fearlessly allow the Master’s words to move us, kindle us, and sometimes disturb us. Count the cost—yes indeed. Many people try out a Gospel path, but now as in the beginning of the Gospel adventure people do fall away when they count the cost. May we be among those who trust and stay.
It is the Old Testament that gives us a note of gentle hope.
Jeremiah goes down to the local potter’s workshop and watches the potter at the wheel. Have you ever seen a potter work? I am always amazed at how many times the pot seems to grow and take shape, only to be touched and collapsed by the potter and spin again from a shapeless lump of clay. I always wonder why one shape is suddenly acceptable to the potter, why she chooses that moment and that shape over all the others. But the potter knows. And the potter makes all the past shapes, curves, flaws, and false starts into part of the pattern. Nothing is wasted.
We can trust the divine Potter to have an artist’s way with us, to make all our stumbling attempts to be a follower of the Master part of the final lovely product. At least, we can long for that trust, and ask for it as a gift. And the gift of trust will be given.
It takes humility to admit that we have a long way to go, that our trust and our faith is small or weak. But that’s a good place to start. God isn’t very interested in finished products. The potter cannot work with a lump of stone or steel. When we pray each day, “Today I begin again to be a follower of you—what would you have me learn and do?”, we allow the divine Artist to make of each of us, and our life as a church, a lovely and surprising work of art.
And we learn to trust that even if we fail and fall, the Potter can make us new.
Saturday, September 4, 2010
true religion
Proper 17 C 2010
Sirach 10: 12-18; Ps 112 ; Hebrews 13:1-8, 15-16;
Luke 14:1, 7-14
“…be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and to try to love the questions themselves like locked rooms and like books that are written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them.”
I remembered this quote from Rilke this week. Today we prayed my favorite Collect, one that is filled with questions. “Graft in our hearts the love of your Name”—how does God do that and what does it mean? “Increase in us true religion”—in an age full of voices claiming to know what “true religion” is, how can we ourselves know? After “nourish us with all goodness”, the prayer ends almost strangely with “bring forth in us the fruit of good works.”
We Episcopalians are more comfortable with questions than some other folks, and we take Rilke’s advice to “love the questions” more easily than some. We come each Sunday with our questions, questions about God, questions about meaning and sanity in an often-crazy world, and questions about ourselves—how am I to live? How do I deal with the changes in my life? What does this talk about God mean for me really?
“Loving the questions” can be an honest stance, but it can also be cheap grace. We can say “I love the questions”, and simply walk home unchanged and unchallenged, secure in not allowing a single question to move us. I fear that at this juncture of my own life. I want those questions—Who is God? Who am I? How am I to live?—to burn in me and take me somewhere new, where I can see God and the world and others and myself with fresh eyes.
The readings present us with this burning need.
Sirach says, “The beginning of pride is sin; the heart has withdrawn from its Maker.” I don’t think that Sirach is saying that those who do not cling to approved-of ideas about God will be punished. I think that Sirach urges us to look beyond our own assumptions and know, once again, that we are all beginners in the way of the Spirit. We are created, made in wisdom, but we need the Creator’s ongoing presence and dynamic re-creation in order to fulfill our deepest nature. Daily we are tempted to feel and think and act as if we define ourselves, are self-sufficient. Sirach urges us to a larger life, a more creative imagination of who we are and who God is, and how we are to be.
The writer of Hebrews speaks of how we are to live if our hearts are rooted in our Maker. God the creator and re-creator is the fountain of life and all goodness, each moment overflowing with generosity and abundance. There are moments when our lives seem far from this divine generosity, but the wise heart returns to the deep wellspring of God’s own goodness. And when we do, we shall be changed, we shall live out this abundance in the way that Hebrews counsels us. Hospitality to the stranger, mutual love, honoring our partners, freedom from the love of money—all this flows from walking a dynamic path rooted in the divine wisdom, drinking from the cup of divine abundance.
And that path we walk is the path of freedom.
Once again Jesus finds himself a guest of the Pharisees. Jesus was sharp-eyed to see that the gathering was shaped by privilege and status. What Jesus proposes might seem like doormat spirituality—take the lowest seat. But Jesus’ advice is the path of wisdom. Be free of scrabbling for puny scraps of self-assurance and importance. Be free of that smallness of soul, do not play that game. God’s abundance will lift you if you trust and let your life be shaped by that trust, that overflowing goodness. If you play that fighting-for-status game, eventually the music will stop and someone will push you off the chair.
Welcome each day as the amazing gift of an abundant God. Express that abundance with open hands and hearts and minds. Choose freedom from the status-standards of the world.
That sounds like at least one of those questions. That sounds like “true religion” to me.
Sirach 10: 12-18; Ps 112 ; Hebrews 13:1-8, 15-16;
Luke 14:1, 7-14
“…be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and to try to love the questions themselves like locked rooms and like books that are written in a very foreign tongue. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them.”
I remembered this quote from Rilke this week. Today we prayed my favorite Collect, one that is filled with questions. “Graft in our hearts the love of your Name”—how does God do that and what does it mean? “Increase in us true religion”—in an age full of voices claiming to know what “true religion” is, how can we ourselves know? After “nourish us with all goodness”, the prayer ends almost strangely with “bring forth in us the fruit of good works.”
We Episcopalians are more comfortable with questions than some other folks, and we take Rilke’s advice to “love the questions” more easily than some. We come each Sunday with our questions, questions about God, questions about meaning and sanity in an often-crazy world, and questions about ourselves—how am I to live? How do I deal with the changes in my life? What does this talk about God mean for me really?
“Loving the questions” can be an honest stance, but it can also be cheap grace. We can say “I love the questions”, and simply walk home unchanged and unchallenged, secure in not allowing a single question to move us. I fear that at this juncture of my own life. I want those questions—Who is God? Who am I? How am I to live?—to burn in me and take me somewhere new, where I can see God and the world and others and myself with fresh eyes.
The readings present us with this burning need.
Sirach says, “The beginning of pride is sin; the heart has withdrawn from its Maker.” I don’t think that Sirach is saying that those who do not cling to approved-of ideas about God will be punished. I think that Sirach urges us to look beyond our own assumptions and know, once again, that we are all beginners in the way of the Spirit. We are created, made in wisdom, but we need the Creator’s ongoing presence and dynamic re-creation in order to fulfill our deepest nature. Daily we are tempted to feel and think and act as if we define ourselves, are self-sufficient. Sirach urges us to a larger life, a more creative imagination of who we are and who God is, and how we are to be.
The writer of Hebrews speaks of how we are to live if our hearts are rooted in our Maker. God the creator and re-creator is the fountain of life and all goodness, each moment overflowing with generosity and abundance. There are moments when our lives seem far from this divine generosity, but the wise heart returns to the deep wellspring of God’s own goodness. And when we do, we shall be changed, we shall live out this abundance in the way that Hebrews counsels us. Hospitality to the stranger, mutual love, honoring our partners, freedom from the love of money—all this flows from walking a dynamic path rooted in the divine wisdom, drinking from the cup of divine abundance.
And that path we walk is the path of freedom.
Once again Jesus finds himself a guest of the Pharisees. Jesus was sharp-eyed to see that the gathering was shaped by privilege and status. What Jesus proposes might seem like doormat spirituality—take the lowest seat. But Jesus’ advice is the path of wisdom. Be free of scrabbling for puny scraps of self-assurance and importance. Be free of that smallness of soul, do not play that game. God’s abundance will lift you if you trust and let your life be shaped by that trust, that overflowing goodness. If you play that fighting-for-status game, eventually the music will stop and someone will push you off the chair.
Welcome each day as the amazing gift of an abundant God. Express that abundance with open hands and hearts and minds. Choose freedom from the status-standards of the world.
That sounds like at least one of those questions. That sounds like “true religion” to me.
Wednesday, August 25, 2010
Fire
Proper 16 C 2010
Jeremiah 1:4-10; Psalm 71:1-6; Hebrews 12:18-29; Luke 13:10-17
My favorite Desert Fathers story, the tales of those hermit monks who would go to one another for advice, speaks of Abba Joseph going to visit Abba Lot. Abba Joseph asks Abba Lot, “Tell me what to do? I keep my daily rule of prayer, I work with my hands. I keep my fast, I keep silence and only speak when necessary. Is that all there is? Is there anything else I can do?” Abba Lot stands, and extends his hands with fingers outspread. Abba Joseph sees Abba Lot’s fingers each turn into a flame. Abba Lot asks, “Why not be totally turned into fire?”
I have told this tale often because it is very important to me. Like Abbot Joseph, through the years I have kept my own modest way of life, even if imperfectly. I am no desert hermit, but I live a fairly structured life of church duties and of family. This church is my chapel, my home is my monastery, my own body is my cell of solitude. I have found joy. But as the years spin out, I confront weariness and even boredom in the midst of worship and prayer. Is that all there is? Am I just going through the motions?
I feel Abba Lot asks me, “Why not be totally turned into fire?” God asks all of that in the Word today. As I wrote these words, I realized that my eyeglasses are out of date, that it is literally time to get my sight adjusted. If we find that boredom is corroding our souls, perhaps it is time to get our own sight adjusted.
In our culture, boredom is regarded as a symptom of an external problem. If we’re bored, we are not being given the right kind of entertainment, we are not being given the right sort of stimulation by our partner or our friends, we are not buying the right kind of entertainment. Sometimes people can give up relationships or jobs or churches out of boredom. Kathleen Norris in her book Acedia And Me speaks of boredom as a disease of the soul, a problem inside rather than outside. We despair of the richness of the divine life, of the meaning trembling beneath the surface of reality, and we flee from our fear that there might actually be no meaning and no divine Presence filling our lives. There’s nothing wrong with some entertainment, with some fun—every full life needs balance. But that restlessness of soul—isn’t the source of that within ourselves?
Because our God, says Hebrews, is a consuming fire. Because, says Jeremiah, we have been made and known in intimacy and wonder from the beginning of time, and have been given the very words of God. Because, says today’s Gospel, the mercy and love of God strains to be released in our midst, in spite of all the ways that we try to minimize God and make God small and controllable. Jesus healed in spite of narrow restrictions of religion and custom, overwhelming the woman who lived in pain and overwhelming those who were present with the wonder of God’s love.
For our God is a consuming fire. So, why not be totally changed into fire?
Years ago, an older couple attended here until one of the partners told the other, “But it’s the same thing every week!” Sunday Mass does follow a predictable pattern. Our worship is not designed to fix boredom by entertaining. Our worship confronts head-on the basic questions of our lives—who is God, who are we, and what does that mean? We place ourselves week by week in the presence of Christ because of who Jesus Christ is and because, as Hebrews says, we do not refuse his invitation. We keep this most basic rule of New Testament life—to gather together for worship—in order to keep our eyes properly focused. When our eyes see clearly, we see God’s overwhelming fiery love, our nature as beloved and in need. And we are asked Abba Lot’s most basic question:
“Why not be totally changed into fire?”
Jeremiah 1:4-10; Psalm 71:1-6; Hebrews 12:18-29; Luke 13:10-17
My favorite Desert Fathers story, the tales of those hermit monks who would go to one another for advice, speaks of Abba Joseph going to visit Abba Lot. Abba Joseph asks Abba Lot, “Tell me what to do? I keep my daily rule of prayer, I work with my hands. I keep my fast, I keep silence and only speak when necessary. Is that all there is? Is there anything else I can do?” Abba Lot stands, and extends his hands with fingers outspread. Abba Joseph sees Abba Lot’s fingers each turn into a flame. Abba Lot asks, “Why not be totally turned into fire?”
I have told this tale often because it is very important to me. Like Abbot Joseph, through the years I have kept my own modest way of life, even if imperfectly. I am no desert hermit, but I live a fairly structured life of church duties and of family. This church is my chapel, my home is my monastery, my own body is my cell of solitude. I have found joy. But as the years spin out, I confront weariness and even boredom in the midst of worship and prayer. Is that all there is? Am I just going through the motions?
I feel Abba Lot asks me, “Why not be totally turned into fire?” God asks all of that in the Word today. As I wrote these words, I realized that my eyeglasses are out of date, that it is literally time to get my sight adjusted. If we find that boredom is corroding our souls, perhaps it is time to get our own sight adjusted.
In our culture, boredom is regarded as a symptom of an external problem. If we’re bored, we are not being given the right kind of entertainment, we are not being given the right sort of stimulation by our partner or our friends, we are not buying the right kind of entertainment. Sometimes people can give up relationships or jobs or churches out of boredom. Kathleen Norris in her book Acedia And Me speaks of boredom as a disease of the soul, a problem inside rather than outside. We despair of the richness of the divine life, of the meaning trembling beneath the surface of reality, and we flee from our fear that there might actually be no meaning and no divine Presence filling our lives. There’s nothing wrong with some entertainment, with some fun—every full life needs balance. But that restlessness of soul—isn’t the source of that within ourselves?
Because our God, says Hebrews, is a consuming fire. Because, says Jeremiah, we have been made and known in intimacy and wonder from the beginning of time, and have been given the very words of God. Because, says today’s Gospel, the mercy and love of God strains to be released in our midst, in spite of all the ways that we try to minimize God and make God small and controllable. Jesus healed in spite of narrow restrictions of religion and custom, overwhelming the woman who lived in pain and overwhelming those who were present with the wonder of God’s love.
For our God is a consuming fire. So, why not be totally changed into fire?
Years ago, an older couple attended here until one of the partners told the other, “But it’s the same thing every week!” Sunday Mass does follow a predictable pattern. Our worship is not designed to fix boredom by entertaining. Our worship confronts head-on the basic questions of our lives—who is God, who are we, and what does that mean? We place ourselves week by week in the presence of Christ because of who Jesus Christ is and because, as Hebrews says, we do not refuse his invitation. We keep this most basic rule of New Testament life—to gather together for worship—in order to keep our eyes properly focused. When our eyes see clearly, we see God’s overwhelming fiery love, our nature as beloved and in need. And we are asked Abba Lot’s most basic question:
“Why not be totally changed into fire?”
Tuesday, August 17, 2010
Gaga
Mary the God-Bearer 2010
Isaiah 61:10-11 Galatians 4:4-7 Luke 1:46-55 Psalm 34:1-9
Lady Gaga is in town. The feature article in the newspaper had a picture of her in one of her trademark outlandish costumes. The caption read, “The Fame Monster.”
I actually have respect for that young woman whose real name very few people know, even people who consider themselves her fans. Lady Gaga has chosen to become rich and, above all, famous, and she has achieved those goals. To be fair, that news article title “The Fame Monster” was taken from a body of her own work in which she reflects on the reality of fame. Lady Gaga can sing, she can dance, she works very hard to give her fans what they want. Some of her songs touch people deeply. She puts a lot of effort into being Lady Gaga, and it shows.
But growing up Catholic on Long Island, there was another famous Lady whose image I saw everywhere.
That Lady we called by her given name, Mary. Pictures, statues, even those bathtub shrines that many homes sported in the front yards—she was everywhere. Miriam Bat Joachim as she was probably called was probably much darker and more Semitic-looking than the Caucasian faces gazing from walls or lawn shrines. But people tend to make Mary look like one of them, as much or more than they do Jesus.
No music videos, no MP3s, no concert tours, no paparazzi—why does Mary’s fame endure, far longer than Lady Gaga’s will?
Lady Gaga for the most part points to herself. Mary points to a deep and personal reality who speaks through her.
God does not speak from on high, commanding that we gaze up straining to see the divine presence. God speaks from among us, from within us, from the very ground beneath our feet and the very voices that we hear each day. In the Gospel, Mary is that ground.
Isaiah speaks of gardens and plants and new shoots—God lies beneath our feet and brings new life to birth right beneath us. A Catholic poet whom I knew in the Midwest wrote once of a “warm, moist, salty God.” That image jars us, until we gaze at Mary and remember that the eternal, creative, vibrant Word of God grew in a woman’s body and swam in amniotic fluid and tasted her milk as his first food. “Taste and see that the LORD is good” sang the Psalm. That taste was milky on the tiny divine lips and little trembling divine chin, just like on Rose or the newly-baptized twins or any other baby among us.
The one who bore God in her body through her openness, her “yes” to God, held him while he and she gazed on a wounded world.
Brutal occupation by Rome and violent insurgency tore the bodies of the people, while rigid religion and purity codes tore their souls and their community. Imagine what Mary and young Jesus saw walking by their own doorstep—Roman soldiers, pilgrims, beggars, rich merchants, revolutionary Zealots in disguise, Pharisees, lepers maybe, and just plain folk. Mary’s eyes guided her Son’s first steps amidst a world as violent and uncertain as our own. Every poor woman who gazes in pain and anguish from Pakistani floodwaters or Haitian rubble, from midnight emergency rooms and crime-ridden streets, gaze with Mary’s eyes. She is one with them, and so her ancient song-which-is-always-new, “my soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord”, is the song of hope for Israel and for all the world’s poor.
For God chooses the cause of the poor, and God came as one of the poor. So long as Mary sings “Magnificat, with tune surpassing sweet”, the powerful will know fear in their hearts, and the poor will lift up their eyes and know hope.
When we honor Mary, we honor the hope of the poor and know, with relief and joy, that we are God’s poor.
When we long for God, when we pray, when we look with love and wonder and grief on a beautiful, wounded world, we find Mary. She does not point to herself. She points to her Son, the life and hope of the world. Funny how real fame comes from not trying to be famous.
Isaiah 61:10-11 Galatians 4:4-7 Luke 1:46-55 Psalm 34:1-9
Lady Gaga is in town. The feature article in the newspaper had a picture of her in one of her trademark outlandish costumes. The caption read, “The Fame Monster.”
I actually have respect for that young woman whose real name very few people know, even people who consider themselves her fans. Lady Gaga has chosen to become rich and, above all, famous, and she has achieved those goals. To be fair, that news article title “The Fame Monster” was taken from a body of her own work in which she reflects on the reality of fame. Lady Gaga can sing, she can dance, she works very hard to give her fans what they want. Some of her songs touch people deeply. She puts a lot of effort into being Lady Gaga, and it shows.
But growing up Catholic on Long Island, there was another famous Lady whose image I saw everywhere.
That Lady we called by her given name, Mary. Pictures, statues, even those bathtub shrines that many homes sported in the front yards—she was everywhere. Miriam Bat Joachim as she was probably called was probably much darker and more Semitic-looking than the Caucasian faces gazing from walls or lawn shrines. But people tend to make Mary look like one of them, as much or more than they do Jesus.
No music videos, no MP3s, no concert tours, no paparazzi—why does Mary’s fame endure, far longer than Lady Gaga’s will?
Lady Gaga for the most part points to herself. Mary points to a deep and personal reality who speaks through her.
God does not speak from on high, commanding that we gaze up straining to see the divine presence. God speaks from among us, from within us, from the very ground beneath our feet and the very voices that we hear each day. In the Gospel, Mary is that ground.
Isaiah speaks of gardens and plants and new shoots—God lies beneath our feet and brings new life to birth right beneath us. A Catholic poet whom I knew in the Midwest wrote once of a “warm, moist, salty God.” That image jars us, until we gaze at Mary and remember that the eternal, creative, vibrant Word of God grew in a woman’s body and swam in amniotic fluid and tasted her milk as his first food. “Taste and see that the LORD is good” sang the Psalm. That taste was milky on the tiny divine lips and little trembling divine chin, just like on Rose or the newly-baptized twins or any other baby among us.
The one who bore God in her body through her openness, her “yes” to God, held him while he and she gazed on a wounded world.
Brutal occupation by Rome and violent insurgency tore the bodies of the people, while rigid religion and purity codes tore their souls and their community. Imagine what Mary and young Jesus saw walking by their own doorstep—Roman soldiers, pilgrims, beggars, rich merchants, revolutionary Zealots in disguise, Pharisees, lepers maybe, and just plain folk. Mary’s eyes guided her Son’s first steps amidst a world as violent and uncertain as our own. Every poor woman who gazes in pain and anguish from Pakistani floodwaters or Haitian rubble, from midnight emergency rooms and crime-ridden streets, gaze with Mary’s eyes. She is one with them, and so her ancient song-which-is-always-new, “my soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord”, is the song of hope for Israel and for all the world’s poor.
For God chooses the cause of the poor, and God came as one of the poor. So long as Mary sings “Magnificat, with tune surpassing sweet”, the powerful will know fear in their hearts, and the poor will lift up their eyes and know hope.
When we honor Mary, we honor the hope of the poor and know, with relief and joy, that we are God’s poor.
When we long for God, when we pray, when we look with love and wonder and grief on a beautiful, wounded world, we find Mary. She does not point to herself. She points to her Son, the life and hope of the world. Funny how real fame comes from not trying to be famous.
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