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.
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