No distractions

Detail of the All Souls Window by Ron Ross

A sermon for the Twenty-fourth Sunday after Pentecost, November 7, 2010. The lectionary readings are Job 19:23-27a, Psalm 17:1-9, 2 Thessalonians 2:1-5, 13-17, and Luke 20:27-38.

You may have seen the results of a recent survey taken by people who drive in Fairfax County. Of 1,500 people surveyed, “75 percent said they think using a cell phone while driving is a distraction,. But 54 percent admit to doing it themselves.” 15 percent admitted to texting while driving, and they didn’t even ask how many people fiddle with the radio while driving, deal with children in the back seat, juggle food and hot coffee, or put on makeup. There are a lot of distractions both inside the car, and outside. When you think about it, it’s sort of a wonder that when we drive, we get anywhere at all.

We definitely would not get very far if we stopped along the way for every distraction that presented itself. To read every billboard, to notice every new thing, to pay real attention to the cars around us—we’d be dealing with distractions all of the time.

Even though he’s not driving, it seems Jesus is having to deal with distractions—the kind of distractions that are trying their best to slow him down, to get him off track, or to even to make him veer off course and lose his way.

In the Gospel we just heard a group of religious leaders try their best to distract Jesus and to throw him off his mission.

The Gospel reading takes place as Jesus has already come into Jerusalem. The procession we recall on Palm Sunday has already happened. Jesus has overturned the moneychangers’ tables in the Temple and he has gotten some attention. The Sadducees were a powerful group in Jerusalem, and in today’s reading, Jesus comes up against them. Their beliefs were based on the first five books of scripture only, and they believe that these had been authored by Moses.

If it wasn’t contained in those books, then there was no reason to believe it. But Jesus talks about things not contained in the books of Moses. And Jesus talks about eternal life. But the Sadducees don’t believe in eternal life, not for a minute. So when they ask Jesus a question about it, he suspects that they’re trying to trick him.

Both Jesus and the Sadducees know the longstanding Jewish practice that if a man dies and he has no children to continue his family, his brother should marry the widow to provide for the brother’s family to come. And so, the Sadducees ask Jesus a hypothetical: what if each of the seven brothers dies, but at each point along the way, a remaining brother marries the widow. At the resurrection, whose wife will she be?

Jesus sees the distraction and refuses to be tripped up by it. He tells them that if they were really so concerned about the resurrection and believed in it, then they would be more concerned about getting their own lives in order, not asking questions about marriage. Marriage is for those of “this age,” Jesus says—those who need to provide for a family or provide for the wellbeing of others. The typical marriage in First Century Palestine, like much of the first millennium, was more about property and possessions than it was about love and sharing.

But whenever Jesus talks about marriage, he talks about it as something that always points beyond itself. Marriage doesn’t exists as an end in itself. It doesn’t exist simply for the two partners, or even the nuclear family. Marriage is a preparation for something to come, a training ground for love, a hint of something even more incredible to follow, something that will be even better than the closes of human relationships, at the resurrection.

In talking with the Sadducees, Jesus resists the urge to get distracted by talking about marriage or the treatment of widows or even of the justification of the Sadducees as a religious group. Instead, Jesus keeps his focus. And he keeps moving toward the cross.

Jesus tries to wake up this crowd when he says, “Ours is not a God of the dead, but of the living, for to God all of them are alive.” Anything that is not a part of that life—the life of God—is less than it can be, and anything that tries to turn us away from that life is a distraction.

As we continue to celebrate this week after All Saints Day, we can say with faith that death, itself, is a distraction. This is not to say that we deny death, or that those who face their own death or the death of a loved one are not in real pain. But what it does mean is that at a very deep level, there beneath the distractions of pain and loss and hurt and heartache, our faith gives us what we need to look death in the face and laugh at it. The words of St. Paul put it well when he says, “We shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet. For the trumpet will sound, and the dead will be raised imperishable, and we shall be changed.” (1 Corinthians 15)

The other readings for today, in their own way, also attest to this power of God to dispel the distractions.

In the Old Testament reading we see Job, who even in the very midst of death—the death of his family, the death of his career, his health, even his future (it seems)—he clings to the life of God. Job refuses to be done in by the distractions around him, especially when his friends try to create complicated theological justifications for what he is experiencing. Instead, Job cries out for life: “I know that my Redeemer lives, and at last he will stand upon the earth.”

Likewise, to the people at Thessalonica, Paul says, “the Lord is faithful. He will strengthen you and guard you from the evil one.” These are appropriate words as we approach Veterans Day this Thursday, when our country remembers those who have often strengthened and guarded us.

But distractions do still come. We may not have Sadducees coming up to us and trying to trick us with questions about the resurrection, but we do have plenty of people who will try to trick us with religious arguments, with scripture taken out of context, with confused theology, with simplistic thinking. Whether it is the campaigns political or the campaigns theological that attempt to sidetrack us; whether it is the attack from the right or from the left, from the friend or from the stranger; or just our bodies growing old and rebelling against us—distractions come in many ways.

Prayer helps. Meditation lessens the distractions; contemplation keeps us clear. But today’s Gospel also reminds us simply to focus on Christ and on his focus—the cross that is leads through death to live everlasting. Look for life, in other words, in every situation.

Distractions will continue to dance around us, occasionally needing to be swatted into their place. We might even fall for a few of them; but hopefully we won’t get too far off course. But with our eyes on the cross, like Christ, we can live life fully. We can celebrate life. We can radiate life.

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.

No comparison

The Pharisee and the Tax Collector

A sermon for the Twenty-second Sunday after Pentecost, October 24, 2010. The lectionary readings are Sirach 35:12-17, Psalm 84:1-6, 2 Timothy 4:6-8, 16-18, and Luke 18:9-14.

Most of you know that I’ve just returned from a mission trip in South Africa. Heidi and Marcia return later this week. I’m sure that the others and I will talk and write more about all that we saw and felt, but one aspect of my own experience helps me approach today’s Gospel.

In South Africa, from the moment our plane landed, I was aware of my tendency to make comparisons. My impulse was to see what was different and what was similar. It’s a kind of default for me. I guess I feel that if I can identify how things are in relation to what I’m used to, then whatever new place I’m in will begin to make better sense to me.

And so I notice: I notice they drive on the left side of the road like Europeans; we drive on the right. They speak of “robots” at intersections, whereas we call them “traffic lights.” They have eleven official languages. We (sort of) have one. And then, there are lots of similarities.

Both countries struggle to figure out how a particular group of people who have not always had a fair chance in the past might best be given equal opportunity for the present and future. Both countries struggle with immigrants who arrive from other countries and are willing to take the worst jobs. Both countries deal with diversity and difference. And churches in both places deal with many of the very same issues.

On and on, the comparisons went, until I began to realize that I was wasting a whole lot of energy playing this mental and sometimes verbal game of “notice what’s similar or different in this picture.” I began to realize that I was missing some of what was right in front of me.
Perhaps South Africa, and especially the people I was meeting, might better be enjoyed, might better be understood, by my simply receiving them as they were and not trying to fit them into my view of the world based on where I come from and what I perceive as the norm.

It was the diplomat and economist, Dag Hammarskjöld, who wrote, “To be humble is not to make comparisons.”

He wrote, “Humility is just as much the opposite of self-abasement as it is of self-exaltation. To be humble is not to make comparisons. Secure in its reality, the self is neither better nor worse, bigger nor smaller, than anything else in the universe.” (Markings).

While I certainly don’t claim humility, I do think Hammarskjold’s words speak to my own experience in South Africa, and also speak to the point of today’s Gospel. If we were to take Hammarskjold’s advice, I think we would be very careful in our reading and hearing of the parable in today’s Gospel from Luke. Jesus is not calling us to compare ourselves with either the Pharisee or the tax-collector. Instead, he wants us to try to move beyond comparisons, and begin to depend upon the grace of God.

Perhaps the Pharisee seems familiar from what we’ve heard in church before. Since Sunday school—even in popular culture—the Pharisee is almost always typecast as the “bad guy.” It’s hard to imagine a good Pharisee, one who is kind or generous. It’s perhaps hard to imagine a female Pharisee. But the fact is that the majority of the Pharisees were probably good folks—hardworking, law-abiding, giving, praying, “doing” believers who tried as best they might to follow the ways of the God of Israel.

The Pharisee in today’s Gospel says as much in his prayer. I don’t think his prayer is as boastful as it is factual. He’s simply repeating what he’s done. He’s undertaking a kind of spiritual examen, reviewing his day, reviewing his week. Where did God show up? Where did God not show up? He has fasted twice a week, he has tithed (giving at least a tenth of all he has). He’s an upstanding member of the community.

In our day, the Pharisee would most likely be in church on Sunday morning, serve on community boards, attend PTSA meetings, maybe even coach soccer, and probably volunteer for a local charity or run in a money-raising marathon. If you can picture respectability, then you can picture a Pharisee. And it’s wrong for us to assume that this respectability is just a veneer. The Pharisee feels strongly about his beliefs, takes his commitments seriously, and lives out his values.

The tax collector, on the other hand, is a traitor. Palestine at this point is under Roman occupation. And so, the tax collector is a Jew who is collecting money from his own people to give to the Roman state. Tax collectors in the popular imagination were no good. They were thought to be liars and cheats, greedy and only interested in themselves.

In our Gospel, the Pharisee thanks God for the gifts God has given him. But the tax collector—strange even that we might have wandered into the temple—the tax collector asks for nothing but the mercy of God. There is no indication that the tax collector has quit his dirty-work. He hasn’t suddenly decided to take a new job or follow a different course. And it’s not even clear that the tax collector expects to be heard by God, much less answered by God.

The issue here is not that Pharisees are bad and tax collectors are good. It’s not about comparing the good, honest, upstanding folk who might be in church on Sunday with the folks who partied so hard last night that they’re still in bed this morning. The point of the Gospel come out in the prayers of the two characters.

The prayer offered by the Pharisee was very close to a common prayer offered by any faithful Jew in the temple, with one exception. There’s one little word that pops out, translated in the English as the word, “like.” The Pharisee gives thanks to God that he is not “like” other people, especially the tax collector. For the Pharisee, gratitude has crossed over into a sense of elitism—something that happens easily whenever we get into “we/them language.” The Pharisee’s prayer is false prayer as he compares himself with the tax collector. And had the tax collector in some way compared himself with the Pharisee, whether favorably or unfavorably, it would have been just as false. Neither person is any more deserving of God’s grace and mercy than the other.

Effective prayer reminds us of our complete dependence upon God. Faithful prayer is not a listing of what we’ve done right, or even what we’ve done wrong. The tax collector never loses sight of that. He knows that he really has nothing going for him but the grace of God, and so it’s for this reason that Jesus says the tax collector left the temple “justified,” or “in line with God.”

Those words of Hammarskjöld come back to me: “to be humble is not to make comparisons.” Earlier I spoke of how my making so many comparisons in South Africa obscured what I might really see and what I might really experience.

And I think the same dynamic plays itself out in our relationship with God and with other people. Though we are created in community and God loves us as God’s children, each of us is unique. Each is incomparable. Each lives and dies by the breath of God.

As Paul writes, each of us is “rescued from the lion’s mouth. The Lord will rescue [us] from every evil attack and save [us] for the heavenly kingdom.”

May we resist the temptation of making comparisons. May we rest in the grace, mercy, and love of God that sustains us and keeps us alive.

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Returning Thanks

The Grateful Leper

A sermon for the Twentieth Sunday after Pentecost, October 10, 2010. The lectionary readings are 2 Kings 5:1-3, 7-15c, Psalm 111, 2 Timothy 2:8-15, and Luke 17:11-19.


Tomorrow is Thanksgiving Day in Canada, and in some ways our scripture readings help us to help them celebrate it. Ambrose of Milan said “No duty is so urgent as that of returning thanks.” I’ve always loved that phrase, “returning thanks,” as though thanks comes from somewhere else, moves through us or visits us for just a little while, and so we should be careful with it, hold it gently, and then, when it’s time, let it go back to the its source. But in reality, we sometimes don’t return the thanks. We might misplace it, or forget about it. Or we squander it and pretend it wasn’t a gift, but rather, something we deserved and earned and won. The thanks we get, the thanks for which we are grateful, the thanks we return (or don’t return) is like a blessing—a gift that comes.

In our first reading, it takes Naaman a while to return thanks, to return to give thanks, or to understand where his blessing has come from.

Naaman might be powerful and successful, but he also has leprosy. Lepers were called “unclean,” and the sense was that they were not only physically unclean (and perhaps that’s how they got the skin disease in the first place) but also spiritually unclean, as though they were being punished by God for some reason.

We can understand something of what the culture of fear and suspicion around leprosy might have been like, if we remember the early 1980’s when the outbreak of AIDS meant also an epidemic of fear and ignorance. Others here may remember what it was like in the early 20th century around polio. Philip Roth has written his latest novel, Nemesis about the “nemesis” of polio, and about especially about one man’s fear that he might get it. When two boys from the main character’s neighborhood contract polio, everyone begins to look for someone or something to blame. Imagine that culture of fear in the Bible when we hear about lepers.
Naaman probably tries not to show his fear, being a military man. But he certainly looks for healing. Naaman hears about a great prophet and healer in Israel, Elisha (the heir to the prophet Elijah). The king makes it possible for Naaman to go and visit Elisha, and he makes his way to the cave where Elisha is staying. Naaman gets to the opening of Elisha’s cave, and Elisha sends a servant out to talk to Naaman. The servant says, “Here’s what you need to do: Elisha says for you to go and wash in the River Jordan seven times. That should do the trick. You’ll be fine.”

Well! This great military commander Naaman is insulted. Did he travel all the way to Israel only to be told by a servant go and wash in the river? Does he not even get to see this supposedly great prophet?

Naaman is angry, he criticizes Elisha. He makes fun of Israel and its rivers, and on and on he goes, in an absolute rage. Had he continued to mouth off, had he continued to try to fit things into his own way of seeing, he would have completely missed the opportunity before him. He would have missed the presence of God, and the healing of God. Just before they leave Israel altogether, one of Naaman’s servants pulls him aside and begins to talk a little sense into him. It’s as though this servant understands the nature of grace, the nature of blessing—that when a blessing comes from God (whether it’s in the form of healing or some other blessing), it comes lightly, and so it should be grasped and grabbed, but received and allowed room. Naaman eventually goes down to the water, he bathes seven times, and he is healed. Not only is he healed of the leprosy, but it also sounds like he might have been healed from a little of his arrogance and pride. And then Naaman returns to Elisha and makes a big statement. It’s a statement of faith, but also a returning of thanks: “Now I know that there is no God in all the earth except in Israel. Your God is God.”

There is healing in our Gospel, as well. He is on the way to Jerusalem and is approached by not one, but ten lepers. They greet him with words that will echo on Palm Sunday, recognizing his power and his ability to forgive and cleanse: “Jesus, master, have mercy on us.” Their words are a desperate cry for help, they’re from the heart, and they seem to get his attention.
With these 10 lepers, Jesus does an astounding thing. He responds to them as though they’ve already been healed—he doesn’t send them to bathe in special waters, he doesn’t spit into the dirt and make a potion out of it for their healing—instead, he effects the healing in them even as they ask for it. Next, he follows the Jewish custom of encouraging them to go and show themselves to the Temple priests.

Jesus heals the disease, but he knows that it will take a little more for the fear and suspicion around the disease to heal, as well. It’s a little like when one of us has been healed, has gotten better, has been restored to health, and yet friends and family treat us as though we’re still fragile. Jesus knows that for the lepers to be received back into their families and villages, they needed the official approval of the Temple priest, the sort of cultural equivalent of a “clean bill of health.” And so the ten former lepers follow Jesus’ instructions and they go to the temple. All, except for one.
One comes returns, and returns thanks. The one cured leper happens to be the Samaritan, the foreigner, the half-breed, the one despised by both Jews and the Gentiles. This cured leper had been doubly cured. Not only was he cured of a disease, but he was healed of racial and cultural divides as well. Perhaps because of his living in-between, he understood the nature of blessing, the nature of a grace, the nature of thanks--- as something that visits us, and gains life as it is shared and returned.

In the Collect of the Day we have prayed that God’s grace might always precede and follow us, making us continually given to good works. It’s not our works that produce the grace. It’s not our works that even provide the setting or space for grace. But grace that allows us to do good and faithful work. It is grace that comes before, during, and after. But it is always and everywhere God’s grace, not our own. And so the Spirit helps us to live in this grace, thankfully.

We pray for God’s healing of disease and ailment. We pray for God’s healing of creation, where it is broken or wasted or in trouble. We pray for God’s healing of racial and ethnic and cultural divides. And we can pray for God’s Spirit to help us return thanks and live lightly with grateful hearts.
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

The Marriage of Isaac Borocz and Jeffrey Shaumeyer

Saints Sergius and Bacchus

The scripture readings are Colossians 3:12-17, Psalm 133, and John 15:9-12. A homily preached at a marriage on October 8, 2010 at All Souls Memorial Episcopal Church, in celebration of Saints Sergius and Bacchus.

If anyone has been to my and Erwin’s apartment, they know that the long wall just inside the entrance is filled with pictures. We’ve been careful to keep everything in black-and-white, even it if was originally in color. That means that the whole wall looks like it’s of a piece. There is the amazing photograph of Erwin being baptized. (I still can’t get over the fact that there’s a photograph of his baptism!. The priest is wearing a nice chasuble; the ladies are wearing mantillas … it’s classic.) And then there’s the picture of my mother’s graduation from nursing training. Also a picture of Erwin’s father, my grandfather, a family portrait. As amazing as our wall might be—it’s not complete. For it to include a full family portrait, it would need to extend far and wide, including all sorts of people, some living, some dead.

Today, we celebrate a family—the family based upon Isaac and Jeff. What might their family portrait look like if we were to paint it or photograph it? It would surely include a lot of greyhounds. It would also have scientists and monastics. But who else? It might have a lot of Methodists, a huge number of Episcopalians, and a worthy number of atheists. [My own take on "atheism" can be discussed in another place. Preferably with good coffee or drinks. And it will help things if the "atheist" has done his or her homework. Don't blame me for stupid Christians and I won't blame you for stupid atheists . . . . But I digress.] What is sure, is that there would be all sorts and conditions of people. Every color. Every class. Every persuasion.

This day is special, as we celebrate a family portrait.

It in no way makes any less special the ordinary or extraordinary days of the last 18 years for Isaac and Jeff. But today is special. The family portrait continues. It includes those of us here, those unable to attend, and even those from ancient history.

Today is, incidentally, the feast day for Saints Sergius and Bacchus. We didn’t pick this day intentionally. It was chance, or it was God.

Sergius and Bacchus were third century soldiers who were promoted to a fairly high rank in the Roman army. When the emperor found out they were Christians, he demanded that they make a sacrifice to idols. They refused, and so were persecuted – among which punishments included their military medals being replaced with iron chains as they were paraded through the city, made to wear women’s clothing. [I will make no comment here.] They were sent off to eastern Syria, where the governor had Bacchus beaten, and killed while Sergius was tortured and beheaded.

A cult around the two sprang up almost immediately. Their friendship was admired and imitated. Over time, there sprang up rumors that their friendship had perhaps been MORE than friendship, and the scholar Jon Boswell argued that Sergius and Bacchus had been united in a “brother-making” ceremony by the church, a forerunner of what we might call a same-sex union.

Our family portraits include many people—some saints known, and some saints unknown. And some, saints-in-the-making.

There’s a great story of Nathan Baxter, the former dean of the National Cathedral, who officiated at an interfaith service at the Cathedral some years ago. The procession of various faiths came in, and then the Hare Krishnas came in dancing, playing tambourines, twirling around. The dean thought this might be his last day, that people would get angry with him for including so many different kinds of people and faiths. But just as the dean’s anxiety grew, he heard a whisper in his ear: “Nathan! Get used to this, Nathan. Heaven is going to be full of surprises.”

Heaven is full of surprises and life is also full of surprises.

Who would have thought, Isaac and Jeff, 18 years ago, that your lives would include being in this place, on this day, with these people. But here we are. And we are not only glad. We are made more by knowing you, by learning from you, and by sharing in your love.

Thanks be to God (and Life) for blessings, for laughter, and for family portraits that just keep getting bigger.

Amen.

Ruminating on a bad Gospel

St. Francis of Assisi from the Mary Chapel at All Souls

The lectionary readings are Habakkuk 1:1-4, 2:1-4, Psalm 37:1-10, 2 Timothy 1:1-14, and Luke 17:5-10.

We have just proclaimed the Gospel. Since at least the fourth century, people have stood for the reading, the proclamation of the Gospel. [The Gospel is, of course, the reading from Matthew, Mark, Luke, or John. It is called “gospel,” from the Old English, god spell ; Germanic gut speil , or "good news.”

At least from the seventh century, the deacon (or other priest or bishop) who was to read the Gospel, would move through the building with some ceremony. The person would move to the appointed place (perhaps the pulpit, or ambo) accompanied by acolytes, with the Gospel book, and the singing of alleluias.

From the ninth century onward, there is evidence that people have made the sign of the cross as the Gospel is announced, make the sign three times and saying to themselves the prayer, “Lord, may your word be on my mind ( + sign on your forehead) on my lips (+ sign on your lips) and in my heart (+ sign on your heart). From the eleventh century, incense has been used, the Gospel is sometimes chanted, and responses and acclamations are sung or said, before and afterwards. A recent recording of the Gospel I’ve heard from the Crossing, a community that worships in the Cathedral in Boston, has the gospel being chanted in a contemporary way, with soft drumming going on underneath. The simple proclamation of the Gospel can be a grand, smokey, glorious affair—a little like a parade; a little like a party.

This is appropriate-- the ceremony and celebrations are in order because the reading of the Gospel is a proclaiming that Christ is present. It’s like Easter morning. He is risen. He is in our midst. He is here for us, with us, helping us, encouraging us, taking us by the hand more deeply into the presence of God. Showing us how to love. Showing us how to live.

With all of this going for it, we can expect the Gospel to be filled with words of light and life, words that encourage and uplift, that enlarge us somehow, that make us more. But that doesn’t always happen.

What do we do with a Gospel like the one we just heard? The alleluias seem a little hasty. The incense perhaps better used to cover up some awkward words. Maybe we should have drumming underneath, just so we can celebrate the Good News, but ignore the uncomfortable parts. The first part of the Gospel is easy enough, it’s about having faith, even just a little bit. But perhaps we should have stopped there, before getting into the whole section about slaves and servants, obedience and blind servitude.

Some Christians would and do, stop with the nice words. Some Christians stop with the nice words. They skip over difficult texts, they ignore the violence in the psalms, they look the other way when Old Testament patriarchs abuse women and children. (It’s telling that many of these same Christians look the other way today, when preachers and patriarchs continue to abuse and misuse.)

My friend and former boss, Stephen Gerth, often says that the problem with biblical fundamentalists is not that they read scripture—it’s that they don’t read ENOUGH scripture. Because if one really reads scripture—if one follows the Daily Office at all, or listens to the psalms, or even pays attention the scriptures we read on Sunday—then one will be confronted with contradictions and dilemmas. One will be forced to use one’s mind and heart, to fall on one’s knees in the Spirit of God, asking and praying for truth, for revelation, for wisdom.

And yet…2 Timothy 3:16 suggests “All scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness.” Scripture is inspired by God. It is profitable for teaching, reproof, correction, and for training in righteousness, but it is also given to us for rumination.

Do you know that word, “ruminate?” it comes from the Latin word for “chewing the cud.” Rumination is what ruminants do (ruminants like cows and sheep and goats and giraffes and others). Ruminants have to chew things a second time in order to get them digested. That’s the way the church also comes to understand scripture—especially the parts that are hard to digest, that seem like waste someone has mistakenly gotten mixed up with the good stuff. We ruminate over scripture, if we’re faithful.

That, after all, is what Jesus did.

Jesus ruminated over the scriptures as the Pharisees brought him a woman caught in adultery. He ruminated over the scriptures when he felt moved to heal on the Sabbath. He ruminated (even) over his own calling as he was confronted with a non-Jewish woman.

We are encouraged to ruminate by the Catechism (in the back of the Book of Common Prayer). It reminds us that we call scriptures the Word of God because “God inspired their human authors and because God still speaks to us through the Bible.” The Catechism goes further, saying, “We understand the meaning of the Bible by the help of the Holy Spirit, who guides the Church in the true interpretation of the Scriptures.”

And so, we have proclaimed the Gospel, the God-spell, the Good News, and yet, in today’s reading we come face-to-face with an all-too human side of Jesus, one who appears to be speaking and preaching from within the social context of the first century. It seems unusually brutal, remote, and removed. It’s a story that doesn’t really transcend the ages very well. And in fact, it sort of falls flat. When he uses the issue of slavery as a “given” in a story, in a very matter-of-fact way, it’s difficult for us to hear, maybe even impossible for us to hear, when we live in a church that has understood the Holy Spirit to have moved us to a new place.

Some of this is perhaps Luke’s doing. The Gospel of Luke often underscores the difficulty of following Jesus. Luke points to the cost involved in discipleship—that it won’t come easy, and that grace isn’t cheap. That’s some of what’s going on in today’s reading. Luke is suggesting that the job of a servant is to serve—not to look for honors, or benefits, or rewards. Just to serve.

In the first part of the Gospel, the disciples ask for more faith. “Increase our faith,” they ask.

They want more faith, or stronger faith. Maybe they’re having a hard time following Jesus, or maybe they’re having a hard time understanding what God wants of them. Maybe they’re going through some bad times, or maybe they’re just noticing the places of pain and hurt in their friends and in the world around them.

At first, Jesus seems to suggest that their question is misguided. The quantity of faith is not so important. What matters is that there’s at least a little faith. Any faith will do—just a smidgen, just a tad, faith that would fit on a gnat’s hair. What matters is if it’s faith that is ready to moved, ready to respond, ready to be used by God for whatever God wants to do. Faith even the size of a mustard seed, is enough, Jesus says… it is enough, so that, as Jesus says in another version of this saying, “Nothing will be impossible for you.”

We just need faith for today—each day for itself, one day at a time. This theme rings true throughout the scriptures. When the people of Israel wandered in the desert and were hungry, God sent manna. But it was just enough food for that day, not for the next. It meant that each new day required a little bit of faith. But just a little.

This same daily reliance upon God is what is meant in the Lord’s Prayer, when we ask, “Give us today, our daily bread.” The prayer can also be translated in such a way as to suggest we ask for our bread for tomorrow, and even for the end of ages, but in English, the prayer especially reminds us of our daily need to rely upon God—for food, for wisdom, for faith, itself.

As difficult as today’s Gospel might be, it’s appropriate that we hear it on the eve of the feast of St. Francis of Assisi. Francis, of course, REALLY went by faith. He left family and home and comfort, and moved with the Spirit of God. He served God in such a way that actually resulted in the kind of service mentioned in our Gospel, and yet, Francis did it with joy and excitement and what sounds like an almost infectious faith. He had faith for each day and didn’t worry too much about the next.

We celebrate the Word of God as it comes to us daily, in the proclamation, rumination and living out of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, but also in the daily bread we bless, break, and share. Though we use just a little, just a hint of bread in the Communion Wafer, it is bread that sustains, it is bread-of-faith with power to move mountains, to change lives, and to bring us into the presence of God.

In the name of God, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. Amen.

Building the Kingdom of God (with everyone's help)

The Worship of Mammon by Evelyn de Morgan, 1909

A sermon for the Seventeenth Sunday after Pentecost, September 17, 2010. The lectionary readings are Amos 8:4-7, Psalm 113, 1 Timothy 2:1-7, and Luke 16:1-13.

If you’re downtown and go by the intersection of 10th Street and G Street, in the same block as the Martin Luther King, Jr. Library, you’ll see a new building going up. This new building is being built where in 1868, the First Congregational United Church of Christ began meeting. First Congregational UCC was founded in 1865 by abolitionists as the first racially integrated church in Washington, DC. In 1953, the building was condemned, torn down, and a new building built on the same spot. By 2004, this third building was showing its age and needed some extremely costly repairs. And then a developer knocked on the door.

I imagine that developer must have seemed a little like the devil who approached Jesus in the Gospels and promised Jesus all sorts of superpowers, capping the promise off with “all of this can be yours… all these things, I will give you…” After a couple of years of praying and bargaining, the church reached an agreement with the developer to sell its air rights for $17.4 million. The new building, now going up, will include a new space for the church on the ground floor, meeting spaces and program spaces, with condominiums overhead. The maintains ownership of the land but benefits from the sale of the air rights and profit-sharing from the sale of the condominiums. The church plans to devote a portion of the proceeds to further its social action mission including the Dinner Program for Homeless Women, local and international advocacy for peace and justice and housing for very low income people off site.

I imagine it was a difficult decision for the church to make a deal with the developer, even though, with hindsight, the deal looks pretty sweet. I don’t know what scripture might have guided the discussions, but the readings we have heard today would have given them a lot to think about.

The prophet Amos thunders forth from our first reading. “Hear this,” he says, “you that trample on the needy. You who cheat the poor and push around the defenseless. [God] will turn your feasts into mourning, and … your songs into lamentation.” The point to Amos’s preaching is not to criticize formal or elaborate worship. The point is that with all the resources at Israel’s disposal, with all the wealth in their temple, in their homes and in their hands, they are (at the end of the day) showing themselves to be a stingy, selfish people.

Amos points out the hypocrisy in Israel’s worship, in the ordering of their lives, in their culture. They have forgotten when they were poor. They have forgotten when they were aliens. They have forgotten when they were not the majority. But God never forgets. And God will bring justice. God holds God’s people accountable.

If the Old Testament reading reminds us about some of WHAT we should be doing, the Gospel suggests that our doing—our living out the Gospel, our working with God to bring about his kingdom, may involves some strange relationships. Our being faithful to God may sometimes mean our getting smart, shrewd and resourceful in the here-and-now.

In today’s Gospel, we hear about a rich man who has a dishonest manager. This manager is not only underperforming, but seems to be either skimming off the top or manipulating the funds in some other way. The accounts do not add up, and the rich man gives the manager notice. But the manager sees some of this coming. He knows his days are numbered, so he makes plans, and his plans involve building up “credit” with others. Before he leaves, the manager goes around to all of those who owe the rich man. He cuts his losses. He lowers each person’s total, collects what he can and tries to prepare for the future. He is a pragmatist and his quick thinking seems to get him back into the favor of his boss.
In this parable, Jesus is simply telling a story. He does not mean for his disciples or us to identify specifically with one character or another. He is not encouraging us to be cheats. He is not suggesting that the kingdom of God is achieved by dishonesty or duplicity. But there is the suggestion that the kingdom of God benefits from a shrewd mind and from a willingness to make use of all the resources at one’s disposal. The Christian faith is not helped by feeble-mindedness or by a kind of pious naïveté. Rather, in Jesus’ words, the “children of light” can learn a few things from the “children of this age.” That is to say that those who seek to follow Jesus can learn even from, and perhaps especially from some who are secular and even nonreligious. This idea is echoed in Matthew when Jesus sends out his disciples to be “as sheep in the midst of wolves, to be wise as serpents and innocent as doves.”

Today’s readings suggest that we have a role to play in the ongoing life of God and the unfolding of God’s kingdom. It matters what we do with what we have, whether we have just a tiny bit or whether we have a whole lot. Whatever we have can be used for God’s good will. What we have in terms of our energy, our mind, our faith, our compassion, our talent, our money--- all of this has a role to play in God’s unfolding kingdom.

Using what we have, for God, is the central message of today’s scripture. It is what Jesus is saying to his disciples—that even though the manager in the story is less-than-honest, perhaps he’s even a little shady and maybe even a little underhanded, the manager does everything he can to prepare for the future—he uses all of his resources in the most creative way he can, and it’s that creativity and resourcefulness that Jesus is lifts up for us.

Today in the undercroft we have various ministries represented. They look for volunteers. They look for new ideas. They look for new energy. As you look around you may not see the thing you are interested in doing, or it may be that God is whispering to you an idea that no one else has yet heard. Then, especially, I invite you to speak with someone about a way to use what you have in this little corner of God’s kingdom.

It may not be our calling to sell air rights and build a skyscraper. But who knows what God might call us to do?

Our Collect of the Day prays that even as we are surrounded by earthly things, that we would not be anxious about them, but hold on to what lasts, what endures, what helps others, and what furthers the community and love of our Lord Jesus Christ. May we learn to use all that we have and all that we are for God.

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.

Nothing is Lost

A sermon for the Sixteenth Sunday after Pentecost, September 12, 2010. The lectionary readings are Exodus 32:7-14, Psalm 51:1-11, 1 Timothy 1:12-17, and Luke 15:1-10.

As we all know, yesterday was the ninth anniversary of the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. In one way or another, many in our country have paused to remember those who lost their lives that day in New York, Pennsylvania, and our own area. Each of us probably has our own particular memory of that day. We go on about our lives until something – usually some little thing—surprises us with a memory of that day. We remember where we were and what we felt.

For me, there is one thing in particular that sometimes jolts me and reminds me of September 11, 2001. It’s whenever I see a homemade sign on a post or a wall announcing that something has been lost. Maybe it’s a bicycle, or a dog or a cat. Sometimes the announcements are graver, and appear on milk cartons or on television, announcing the tragedy of a lost child. But wherever I see them, those little posters remind me of coming up out of the subway on 9/11 at the 14th Street Stop, the farthest downtown one could stop. There, near St. Vincent’s Hospital, and on just about every flat surface from there on southward, were quickly made (desperately made), homemade signs announcing that someone was lost. Someone was missing. Someone was unaccounted for.

Over the next few days, there were a few stories about people who were found; people who had simply not been able to communicate with loved ones. Some had been evacuated from downtown and sent over to Staten Island, unable to reach worried loved ones until later. I would imagine there were similar stories from this area, of people temporarily out of touch, temporarily lost, who happily, were later found to be shaken, but very much alive.

People become lost in different ways. Alzheimer’s or dementia takes a person to some far away place. Disease, drugs or addictions contribute to loss. And we lose people through death. But however the loss happens, whenever it feels like someone’s been lost, the question arises (the questions arises in a lot of us, anyway), “Where is God?” Where is God when someone can’t find their way out of addiction? Where is God when someone’s brain allows her no longer to recognize her family? Where is God when people die senseless deaths?

Our scriptures today tell us exactly where God is. God is there. God is here. God is wherever God needs to be, seeking the lost, doing whatever it takes, changing divine plans, changing the course of history if it takes that, just to save and find one lost person.

In the first lesson today, the people of Israel feel lost. They feel afraid and cut off from God. They feel so lost that they begin to substitute other things for God—stuff of silver and gold. They begin to worship pretty things, expensive things. Finally Moses returns and he gradually helps them find their way again. And God actually changes his mind—changes his plans, changes the course of history—just to make a way so that his children can find love again, can find God again.

Our Gospel also shows us a God who will go to desperate means for us. God will do whatever it takes to find someone, and to bring that person home.

Jesus tells the story about a shepherd who has 99 sheep. One wanders off and can’t be found, so the shepherd leaves the 99 and pursues the one.

Jesus also talks about a lost coin. A coin has fallen out of reach, or has gotten behind something, or has seemed to disappear altogether. So, the woman stops what she’s doing and basically turns her whole house upside-down to find the lost coin.

The point in all of these stories is that God goes out of his way to find what is lost, to re-claim what is lost, to recover and restore anything and anyone who is lost. God reaches out for us. God looks for us. God does not stop calling our name.

The past week was unusual in that we had two funerals, one on Monday and another on Friday. At both, we used Psalm 23, “The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.” At each, we invited people to read it in unison. It’s always amazing to me that even when there are people who might not have been in church in a while, the words to Psalm 23 sound familiar.

God leads us into green pastures—not that we’re cows or sheep, but the green pastures become a symbol for whatever is for us a place of rest and refuge, a place of nurture and sustenance. God lead us beside still waters, stilling the rapids of our life, slowing us down, and collecting us in one place. God restores our soul. Even when we walk through the “valley of the shadow of death,” we have nothing to fear, because God is there. Even if we don’t see God, even if we don’t particularly feel God in that moment—God is there. Even when there are those who die all too suddenly, those whose lives are taken, God calls, God loves, and God welcomes by name.

Psalm 23 reminds us that God leads us into a place where there’s an enormous feast, a feast so big that it includes not only everyone we’ve ever loved, but even our enemies, transformed into friends. There in the full presence of God, in the fullness of love, God anoints us and calls us by name.

Throughout scripture, names are important. Sometimes a person’s name is changed when they encounter God in an important way, and that might even be the case for us. We carry many names, after all: names we have been called by our parents, names yelled on playgrounds, nicknames we might try on for a while until we grow out of them. Then there are names we might try to grow into, and find that they don’t quite fit us. We might go for a while under a pseudonym – for safety, or for fear. But throughout it all, if we listen, if our hearts are open, God is calling our true name. We may not even recognize it at first, but if we strain to listen, we’ll hear it.

No one and nothing stays lost from God. God seeks and searches and calls out by our truest name, and calls us into love, into laughter, and into life everlasting. As the church, it’s our job to help one another hear God’s calling. Whether we are the lost who are found, or whether we are among those who fling open the door and welcome those who return—we are, all of us, called to join in the celebration.

We gather in this place at one table, eating from one bread and drinking from one cup. What we do is variously called the Mass, the Holy Communion, the Lord’s Supper. But throughout all, it is the Eucharist, that Greek word meaning “thanksgiving.” We give thanksgiving because we were lost but are found, perhaps because we were kept out or left out, but now are welcomed. We give thanks because through this meal we are invited to be more forgiving, more merciful and more welcoming. Thanks be to God for finding each one of us and for bringing us home.

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.

Memorial Mass for Ellis R. Mottur (1930--2010)

"Come Unto Me," stained glass window at All Souls Memorial Episcopal Church, Washington, DC

A meditation offered at the memorial Mass for Ellis R. Mottur, held at All Souls Memorial Episcopal Church September 10, 2010. Mr. Mottur's book, A Poetic Journey: From Fear-- Through Love-- to Faith and Felicity was published by Dorrance Publishing Co, 2010.

Gerontologists, those who watch the aging process closely, and our own grandparents, all tell us that when it comes to growing older—there is bad news and there is good news.

The bad news is that as we age, we become more our true selves. And you have probably guessed the good news: as we age, we become more our true selves.

So this means that in growing older, those things that irritate us, that get under our skin-- prejudices and places of ignorance all can intensify. Someone who is grouchy at 35 will probably be even grouchier at 95.

But the good news is that we also become more our true selves, the older we get. Where there has been generosity, or wonder, or hope, or love at 35…. with age on our side (and I would add, with grace on our side) into our 60’s and 70’s and 80’s we can become even more generous, even more hopeful, and loving beyond imagination.

Ellis Mottur is proof of this good news. As he aged, he just got smarter. He got sharper. He was able to understand more. He had more friends. He offered more love. He had even more faith.

If you knew Ellis in later life, you might never have known that he had struggled in his younger years. As he has expressed in his poetry, there were times when he felt like he

slashed through swamps of stagnant black;
….rushed from black to black to black;
….kicked [his] feet to the accepted beat;
…. but …dared--- [he] dared not look. (from “Flight Through Fear”)

But he made it. Whether it was the appearance of a sparrow (as he writes), or whether that was a symbol of some person or several persons, Ellis was lifted out of the dark places.

Ellis loved music and he especially loved Beethoven. That’s why we’re using some of the Beethoven sonatas today and why we’ll end our celebration singing (loudly and lustily) “Joyful, joyful, we adore thee.” In that Ellis knew a lot about most things, I would not be surprised if he loved Beethoven in part because of Beethoven’s own struggles and his ability to write and play and pray through those struggles. At the age of 26, Beethoven began suffering from tinnitus and began to lose some of his hearing. Over time, his hearing loss became profound, and it affected the way he interacted with people. It is said that at the end of the premiere of his Ninth Symphony (The Ninth Symphony from which we get the tune, Ode to Joy) Beethoven had to be turned around to see the tumultuous applause of the audience; because he couldn’t hear it. Friends turned Beethoven around literally. Friends (and I think he might add, God, too, helped Ellis turn from doubt and depression, toward light and love.

The Gospel today is a familiar one to many. “In my Father’s house are many rooms.” I always recall the King James version that promises, “in my Father’s house are many mansions.” I can picture heaven as a sort of grand Kennedy-Warren, where each of us has a half-floor, every room has a view, and the ballroom downstairs is filled with music and laughter. It’s an ongoing party where everyone we’ve ever known and loved mingles and munches and dances. They dance on and on and on. I don’t think Ellis would have cared whether we end up with rooms or mansions. But I know one thing now--- he’s in heaven, and I be you that he’s leading the dancing.

Just before Communion, we will sing a hymn often called “Lord of the Dance.” It’s based on the Shaker tune, “Simple Gifts,” which was the basis for Copland’s “Appalachian Spring.” I hope you will try to sing it with us. It’s not easy, but at least notice the words. And if you feel like moving around a little bit, feel free. (It would be fun if word reached the Bishop of Washington that they were dancing in the aisles at All Souls—and that it was Ellis Mottur’s fault!)

The Church believes in life after death. Not that the physical, earthly life isn’t important. Just the opposite, what we do here follows us there. We just become more ourselves, as God has made us. But heaven is a full place—filled not only with famous saints and martyrs (the kind pictured in stained glass windows like these). But heaven is also filled with the ordinary folks, the “household saints.” We use the word “saint” like the scriptures and the Early Church used it—a saint is any person of faith—living or dead. And so, as we go about our lives, we are guided by the saints and we are guarded by them.

I love St. George, and like to think of him reminding me of how to be and how to live, but right a long with him are my grandparents, and friends, people not-so-famous, and people famous. Ellis is with the saints. As Tommy and Caroline and Teddy grow up, I hope they’ll feel their grandfather’s presence. Since Ellis is now in heaven, he’s joined some good company, and so I imagine him there, feasting and dancing, but also talking with the people he loved who went before him. Who knows, if he and the Kennedys begin talking, and planning and plotting, maybe their prayers can put a good jolt back into our economy! Maybe even the OTA will be funded again!

Ellis loved his friends. He was a model of loyalty. He could be fierce when he had an idea or a cause. And yet, he might be the first one to get sentimental, to leave a crowded room so that he could get away to a quiet place and put his thoughts into the form of a poem.

Ellis’s poem entitled “America” works not only as a poem, but as a prayer for our country, and even as a kind of creed.

When everything’s blackest, we must act brightest;
When doubts assail us, we must chart a course in confidence;
When enemies berate us, we must bury our anger;
When friends mistake our motives, we must persist in patience;
When the very foundations of our faith quake beneath our feet,
We must stand firmest upon them;
and when the New World seems farthest away,
we must move farthest toward it. (from “Our America”)

We rejoice in the eternal life of the Communion of Saints. May the wisdom, the tenacity, the love, and the humor of Ellis Mottur continue to inspire us and shape us. Amen.

A consuming fire

Baptism at All Souls, November 30, 2008

A sermon for the Thirteenth Sunday after Pentecost, August 22, 2010. The lectionary readings are Isaiah 58:9b-14, Psalm 103:1-8, Hebrews 12:18-29, and Luke 13:10-17.


Last month when I was on retreat with some other clergy, we realized on the first day that the retreat center had evidently been talking to the fire inspector.

Last year, when we were together, each small group of us, when we got together to pray and talk about things, had a “group candle” we would light. It was a reminder of the Holy Spirit’s presence among us. Of course, the Holy Spirit doesn’t vanish when the candle isn’t lit, but it remained an important symbol of the Spirit. It was light. It was warmth. It was flame. It connected us to those biblical passages in which God’s Spirit is likened to fire. Before Jesus, John the Baptist explains that while he baptizes with water, one will come (the Messiah) who will baptize with the Holy Spirit and with fire. There is fire, too, at that first Pentecost, when the Holy Spirit makes herself known to the disciples by appearing as flames of fire, dancing over their heads, and the fire burns away confusion and difference, ignorance and misunderstanding, so that all understand each other. All of that comes to mind when one lights a candle, especially when one lights a candle among other believers, friends in the faith, with whom one has been praying, for whom one has been praying. But not this year at our retreat. This year, the candles were electric. They had a battery somewhere in them. And they had an “on/off” switch. It was different, this year.

One of my group, Christina, who is an Episcopal priest in Cuba, refused to look at the candle, “that thing,” she called it. At each of our small group’s meetings, I would playfully offer her the candle-thing and ask if she would like to “be our acolyte.” “No,” she said, “get that thing away from me. It’s horrible. It shouldn’t be.” Christina had no time for fake candles, fake-fire, or fake flame. I think she probably associated it with fake faith.

I suppose there might be a faith equivalent for an electric candle. It might look like someone whose practice of faith is artificial—it is “turned on” perhaps for Easter and Christmas, but otherwise the batteries can be removed for safekeeping. Or an electric candle faith might be like the kind of person who keeps his or her faith on a shelf. It is so private, so personal, so individual as never to risk – certainly never risking causing a fire, but also never risking helping another warm to the flame, helping another see by the light, helping another burn with the love of God.

But when we’re open to it, that’s what the Holy Spirit does within us. The flame offers warmth, light, and love.

In Isaiah, we’re told just that, that if we can just stop pointing fingers at each other and speaking in (what Isaiah calls) “evil ways,” then all kinds of things are possible. Our “light shall rise in the darkness, and our (previous) gloom, be like the noonday.” Through our faithfulness, others are blessed—they find food and have their needs addressed. Water comes to the parched, and keeps on coming. Old divisions are healed; separations overcome. When the fire of God burns within us, it spills over onto others.

In Jesus we see the light of God’s love burning brightly, so brightly that it attracts people from all over. When people see him, they want to follow wherever he’s going, because it seems to lead toward increasing light. When people meet him, they want to become different people, more like him, more like God. And when people feel him, they are healed. That’s what happens in today’s gospel reading with the poor woman who is bent over, who’s been crippled for some eighteen years. Jesus looks at her and refuses to see someone who is limited, someone who’s old, someone who is pitied, someone who doesn’t matter. Instead, he sees her as the child of God that she is. With his whole treatment of her, he loves her. The light of God shines on her like the light of the sun on a seedling, and love (and life itself) calls her to grow taller and stretch high so she can come to touch even God.

Whenever God burns within us there is warmth for others, there is light for others, and there is love. And when we’re open to it, there’s no risk of its being artificial, or temporary. There is no on/off switch. Instead, the fire of God that burns within us is a consuming fire.

The Letter to the Hebrews reminds the faithful of the way God’s fire went before the people of Israel, illumining the way, keeping them from stumbling. That same fire burns brightly in the Heavenly Jerusalem, the symbol of our meeting place with God, where the light is thick in its strength, amid innumerable angels feasting and celebrating, with the spirits of all those who have tried to live faithfully finally fulfilled, made holy, and made one with God. This is no flicker of a candle. It’s an eternal flame, so bright that is even gives light to those of us still on earth. We notice its glow. We move in its warmth. We are made holy by its light.

In just a few minutes, we will baptize James Raymond. We offer him a little of that heavenly, eternal, consuming fire as a symbol of the Holy Spirit’s dwelling within him. We baptize with water. We anoint with oil that seals with God’s spirit. And we offer a lighted candle. Some like to bring their candle out on the anniversary of their baptism. Others like to put it away with baptismal keepsakes. Either way, the real message is that God’s light burns within James, and from this day forward, God through him will continue offering light in the world.

A parishioner recently reminded me of a wonderful story that comes from the early years of Christianity, when women and men would go to live in the desert as a means of purifying and strengthening their faith. The desert itself was a bright place, but these people were looking for the light of God. They were looking to increase their own burning to be as much and as pure as possible. These desert fathers and mothers were called abbas and ammas. And so, there’s a story about Abba Lot, who goes to see the older and wiser Abba Joseph.

Abba Lot says, “Abba Joseph, as far as I can I say my little office, I fast a little, I pray and meditate, I live in peace and as far as I can, I purify my thoughts. What else can I do?”

And then, Abba Joseph, the old man, stood up and stretched his hands towards heaven. His fingers became like ten lamps of fire and he said to him, “If you will, you can become all flame.”

May the Holy Spirit quicken the flames that burn within each of us. So that we might be consumed in the fire of God’s love.

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.

Feasting with Mary

Detail of Nativity Window at All Souls

A sermon for the Feast of St. Mary the Virgin, August 15, 2010. The lectionary readings are Isaiah 61:10-11, Psalm 34:1-9, Galatians 4:4-7, and Luke 1:46-55.

Peter Gomes, the great preacher and teacher at Harvard, suggests that many Protestants have trouble with Mary because we assume she’s a Roman Catholic. He imagines what happens to an especially Protestant dean of a Cathedral after he died. This dean had little time for the Virgin Mary, and so when he finds himself in heaven. “Jesus comes down from God’s right hand and says, ‘Ah, Mr. Dean, welcome to heaven; I know you have met my Father, but I don’t believe you know my Mother.” (Sermons, Biblical Wisdom for Daily Living, p.11)

I should “come clean” and admit that in some ways it’s the Virgin Mary’s fault that I am an Episcopal priest. (If not her fault, then at least it happened with a good bit of her influence.)

In my introductory theology class in seminary our primary textbook was called Principles of Christian Theology by John Macquarrie. I studied the textbook, but it my reading the footnotes that got me on a path that would take me out of the Presbyterian Church and into the Episcopal Church.

Somewhere in that textbook, there was a footnote that referred the reader to a document published by a group called the Ecumenical Society of the Blessed Virgin Mary. When I looked up this group in the seminary library, I found that not only were there papers and pamphlets, but also I found out that the group was truly ecumenical: it was made up of Lutherans and Presbyterians, Roman Catholics and Orthodox, Episcopalians and even a few Baptists. The group’s purpose was to try to recover the rightful role of Mary in Christian theology. Carl Braaten, a Lutheran theologian points out that “The vehement attack of the Reformation against the exaggerated cult of Mary in late-medieval Christianity diminished [Mary’s] place in the story of salvation, personal piety, and public worship.”

And yet, Martin Luther maintained a very high view of Mary. Luther wrote, “Mary does not desire to be an idol; she does nothing, God does all. We ought to call upon her, that for her sake God may grant and do what we request. Thus also all other saints are to be invoked, so that the work may be every way God’s alone.” (“Magnificat”, Luther’s Works, vol. 21, pp. 326-29).

The more I learned about Mary, the early church, and sacramental theology, the more I felt cheated at having grown up in such a Protestant background. While some Roman Catholics might have layers of cultural and folk tradition with which to sort through, I felt like I had nothing but ignorance and prejudice.

It is true that some of what has come to be believed about Mary springs from the hearts of faithful believers. Early Christians began wondering about Jesus. If, as the theologians insisted, Jesus was born of a woman, people began to wonder what that woman must have been like. The New Testament scriptures offer minimal information, but other scriptures and writings that circulated in the early Church also seem to point to Mary and her special place in God’s plan of salvation. In other words, Mary (or someone like her) needed to be there for God’s plan to work out. And that plan includes us and our eternal life not only with God, but also with Mary and all the other saints.

The Gospel reading for today is clear enough. In words we know as Magnificat, for the Latin “my souls magnifies,” we hear Mary praise God. The Angel Gabriel reveal to Mary that she is going to give birth to a very special baby, and while Mary’s first instinct might be to run far, far away; instead, she stands still. She remembers words that Hannah used to praise God (way back in 1 Samuel), and Mary quotes what she remembers of Hannah’s song, and then she adds her own twist.
In the Magnificat, we see Mary as faithful to God’s calling, even when it seems scary, even when it brings danger, even when it might turn everything one’s world upside-down.

In the Letter to the Galatians, our second scripture reading today, we hear Paul’s understanding that God is working through Mary, an ordinary woman, in order to create a new family, a family of God into which each one of us is adopted. No one is born with special standing. No one inherits more than another. But each one of us is like a stranger to God, like a slave to the things of the world, until we are baptized, until we claim God and God claims us, and we are adopted into God’s family.

The first scripture reading this morning, from Isaiah is another joyful passage: I will greatly rejoice in the LORD, my soul shall exult in my God;

Isaiah is writing to God’s people who have been help captive, and he’s announcing that it’s soon time to go home. They’ll be restored to their homeland, they’ll be reunited with loved ones, and there will be a time of peace and new life. “For as the earth brings forth its shoots, and as a garden causes what is sown in it to spring up, so the Lord GOD will cause righteousness and praise to spring forth before all the nations.”

Just as humanity encountered a fall in the first garden, the garden of Eden. Mary is understood as the New Eve. The womb of Mary is understood as the new garden, full of possibility and wonder and life.

Ideas and beliefs about the Blessed Virgin Mary have surely grown beyond what we find in scripture. The Protestant theologian Karl Barth had little patience with all of this. He famously said, “In the doctrine and worship of Mary there is disclosed the one heresy of the Roman Church which explains all the rest.” And yet, even as one among the saints—those heroes and heroines of the faith, those known and unknown—even as one of the saints, Mary deserves our attention, and I believe we can learn from her.

There are at least three ways in which Mary can be a model for us and can help us grow in our relationship with Jesus Christ. (From Beverly Gaventa’s books, Mary, Glimpses of the Mother of Jesus and Blessed One.)

First, there is (what Gaventa) calls “the vulnerability of Mary.” She allows God to direct her life. She is obedient in the truest sense of that term—her obedience in no way takes away her strength, her agency, her feistiness, her strong-mindedness (remember when she is at the wedding at Cana, and they’re running out of wine and she looks at Jesus as says, “Do something. Try to be helpful!”) Her obedience in no way diminishes her personality. And yet, she is wholly dedicated to God and God’s purposes.

Second, Mary is able to reflect on the events in her life. That’s no small thing. There have been times in my life when I’ve been regular at journaling. When I look back at those journals, much of my musing is embarrassing and seems immature, but then there are parts where I’m really surprised that I was able to notice something in particular God seemed to be doing in my life. It reminds me that in order to notice, I need to slow down sometimes. I need to pray. I need to open my eyes and look. Or perhaps close my eyes and listen. Mary NOTICED what was going on around her, and slowly, but surely, seems to have realized what God was unfolding in her life and in the world.

And finally, Mary can teach us what it means to be a witness of Jesus. You know the classic posture of the icon that shows the Blessed Virgin Mary with the Baby Jesus on her lap. And Mary is pointing very subtly as if gesture what she said: “Listen to him. Watch him. Do what he says. He is the way.”

A few years ago someone gave me a nightlight of the Blessed Virgin Mary. I like it especially because, in it’s small light-blue way, it symbolizes some of the attitudes one finds around Mary.

On one hand she has been diminished, turned into the stuff of folk-magic and kitsch. Her image appears on toast and on roadside underpasses just as surely as it she appears at the holy sites of Lourdes or Medjugorje. She might as well be blue, light the night light, like Vishnu, or like the Navi in “Avatar.”

And yet, the nightlight Mary is also a good image for those who have known something of her presence, her steadiness, her reliability, and her willingness to be a soft light showing the way. She shows the way to Jesus. She showing the way to eternal life in God.

May God’s Spirit help us to know the Blessed Virgin Mary and especially to know her qualities, so that we too might be brought to heaven, raised high with saints and angels, and behold the risen Christ face to face. In the name of the Father, and the of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost. Amen.

From fear to faith

The Virgin Hodegetria (she who shows the way)

A sermon for the Eleventh Sunday after Pentecost, August 8, 2010. The lectionary readings are Genesis 15:1-6, Psalm 33:12-22, Hebrews 11:1-3, 8-16, and Luke 12:32-40.

This is an unusual Sunday in terms of the scripture readings all lining up around a particular idea. And that idea has to do with our fears: with what we may fear, with God’s desire that we be brought through and beyond fear, and finally, the scriptures offer us a hint of what a fearless world might look like.

We hear in Genesis the words, “Do not be afraid.” The word of God comes to Abram saying “Don’t be afraid, because God will be like a shield for him, protecting him, no matter what. God will be his shield, and what’s even more—especially in a culture where one’s descendants were one’s life—God is going to provide Abram not only with an heir, but with generations as plentiful as the stars. And so, through the mercy of God, Abram is brought beyond any fears he may have had about the future, and he becomes Abraham, the great ancestor of Jews, Christians, and Muslims. And all of that becomes possible because Abram got over his fear.

The Epistle reading, Hebrews, is a beautiful hymn, almost, to faith—faith, in some ways, being the other side of fear. By faith, Abraham obeyed, and looked, and followed. By faith, Sarah laughed, and followed, and conceived. In Hebrews we’re given that famous definition of faith: “Faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things unseen.” Fear often has to do with the power of things unseen.

Fear, of course, can be good and useful sometimes. Especially at this time of the year, it’s just smart to be at least a little afraid of the water, afraid of sharks, afraid of standing in lightening or too much sun.

But fear can also stifle. Fear can keep us stuck.

Some of you may know the (1932) novel by Stella Gibbons, Cold Comfort Farm. It was also made into a wonderful movie, that for many of us, what our first introduction to the story. In the movie, a young woman, Flora Poste, is a smart nineteen-year-old from London, who is orphaned and begins to write various relatives to see where she might live. Eventually, she receives an invitation from the Starkadders, who feel like Flora’s father had been done wrong by their clan at some point, and so they owe it to Flora to take her in.

She arrives at Cold Comfort Farm, the Starkadders’ place that is just about falling apart. And there are dreary characters in every direction. The horse is named Viper, and the poor cows are named Aimless, Graceless, Feckless and Pointless. The whole sad family is ruled by a matriarch who refuses to come out of her room in the attic. Aunt Ada Doom, refuses to come out of her room because, years ago, as a girl, she “saw something nasty in the woodshed.” We never learn what she saw, and it doesn’t seem as though anyone in the family knows. It’s not even clear if she still knows what she saw. But the fear that began in the woodshed has completely infected her. That fear has changed her and made her small, and scared, and sad. And Aunt Ada Doom’s fear casts a spell over the whole farm.

I don’t want to spoil the whole story for you, but I will say that the arrival of Flora Poste, and her commonsense way of interacting with each family member eventually helps Aunt Ada to leave the fear in the woodshed where it belongs, and step into life again. And guess what? As soon as the fear is let go, the whole family finds freedom.

Jesus says, “Do not be afraid.” “Do not be afraid, for it is God’s good pleasure to give you the kingdom.” The kingdom of God may look different for each one of us, but for most of us, at some level, I thing God’s kingdom has a similar effect in our lives as that of the transformation of Cold Comfort Farm. Whatever fears are gnawing at our insides, whatever fears perhaps have been scarred over the years, scarring us so that we even have trouble moving… whatever fears there are that limit us or hold us back or keep us stuck--- God pulls us through those fears, beyond those fears, into a world of faith, into God’s kingdom.

In today’s Gospel Jesus says, “Get ready.” And he uses several images to convey a sense of anticipation—to try to help us see what it’s like to greet the kingdom with faith, and not fear.
He says, “Be like those who are charged with taking care of a house while the owner is away. Be like those caretakers who are in charge while the head of the house is away at a wedding. Blessed are those who are awake at the return.”
He also says, “Get rid of the things that burden you, that weigh you down, that keep you from moving forward. Because where your treasure is, there will your heart be also. Let go of fear.”
In the scriptures, as Jesus meets various people, each one is invited to step into the kingdom of God. And so often the people he meets are stuck in some way. They’re stuck in old habits. They’re stuck by past sins. They’re stuck in a warped perspective or stuck in a world that is so narrow they’re not able to breathe.

There’s a woman who has been caught in adultery. They’re ready to stone her, but even if they let her go, they’ll continue to see her as she used to be. They’ve got her stuck in a bad place. But Jesus forgives her and invites her to leave fear behind, and follow in faith.

Zaccheus the tax collector is stuck in a tree when Jesus walks by. But Jesus calls him out of the tree, and into and among people. Zaccheus doesn’t need to be afraid of being laughed at, made fun of, hated… Jesus says, “stop being afraid” and calls him into the kingdom.

On that first Easter, when Mary Magdalene leaves her fear in the cave, she’s able to see the resurrected Jesus. And she’s able to move forward into the kingdom of God Jesus promises.

The kingdom of God is different from the Magic Kingdom. I have a friend who is about to take his family to Disney World and so we were talking about the Magic Kingdom the other day. The Magic Kingdom comes in other forms, too—not only at Disney World. A kingdom that promises magic can be made of any illusory thing—of the promise of substances, of drugs, of experiences, of all the things that would have us make them rulers of our lives.

But the Kingdom of God is different. God’s kingdom begins here on earth and continues into heaven. Though it can SEEM magical, the kingdom of God is really about our being able to see the world (the world, other people, and ourselves) from God’s perspective. Not magic, but sometimes miraculous.

When Jesus talks about the kingdom of God, he’s not talking about a physical place. It is not a location as much as it is a state, a way of being, a type of consciousness, another awareness. The kingdom of God is where God’s will is actively done. The kingdom of God is that place where human needs are met, sin is forgiven, and lives are changed—by the truth of God’s love and by the fire of God’s forgiveness. The kingdom of God is that place where people live out the depth of God’s love—where we forgive each other and show love in practical, real ways. The Kingdom is that place where the God of heaven and earth, the God of all time and being, the God of all creation, stoops to wash the feet of a disciple, holds out bread and offers a cup. The kingdom of God breaks into our lives whenever we leave fears behind and do something bravely with faith.
Jesus calls us somewhere else. Saint John says, “There is no fear in love, but perfect love casts out all fear.”
May the Holy Spirit enable us to leave fear behind, to claim from the saints our inheritance of faith. May the Spirit enable us to live daring lives of faith and love.

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Living Richly

Narthex window, All Souls Memorial Episcopal Church

A sermon for Sunday, August 1, 2010. The lectionary readings for the Tenth Sunday after Pentecost are Ecclesiastes 1:2, 12-14; 2:18-23, Psalm 49:1-11, Colossians 3:1-11, and Luke 12:13-21.

Not long ago I met someone who was interested in the church I serve. “Where, exactly, are you in Washington?” “We’re in Woodley Park,” I explained, “right near the National Zoo.” “Oh,” this person said, “that’s a nice neighborhood. It must be a wealthy church.”

I have to say, I was a little taken aback by the person’s directness. But thinking about this morning’s Gospel—a Gospel that encourages us to be rich toward God—I looked the person right in the eye and said, “Oh yes, we’re an extremely wealthy church. But I don’t think we’re wealthy in the way you mean.” There are times—in our church life, as in family life—when we don’t have all the money we’d like. There are some things we cannot do, some things we cannot fix right away, some causes we cannot give as much to as we might like. But like some very poor families, we are extravagantly wealthy in other ways. We are rich in our worship. We are rich in our affection for one another. We are rich in our welcome and our invitation for all. We are rich in our care for those who need something—whether that “something” is a material need, a physical need, or a spiritual need. We are rich towards God, even though God calls us to be richer, still.

Whether we have money to throw around in this world is another issue, really. We’re to be rich toward God, and that has little to do with the actual amount of money in our back account. I sometimes think that God might be almost indifferent as to whether we are wealthy (or not). I do think God wants us to have enough, to have plenty, to rejoice in bounty, to have everything we need, and perhaps even to have lots of extra-- so that we can share and help out other people.

I believe God wants us to be full, satiated, complete and lacking nothing. But I don’t think God really cares whether we have one house or five. I don’t think God is bothered by what one drives, or what one wears, or whether one summers in Dupont Circle or the south of France. To get hung up on those questions is to miss the point of the Gospel.

Jesus suggests that we should be “rich toward God.”

Jesus has been talking with a group, probably a group of bystanders and some of the disciples. He’s been warning them about hypocrisy and trying to help them understand what it means to live a life completely dedicated to God. In this context, a man asks Jesus to take his side in a question over an inheritance. We don’t know the exact nature of this man’s question, but biblical scholars would point out that the reality of Jewish inheritance laws at that time held that the eldest son inherited twice the amount that might have gone to a younger sibling. Perhaps the speaker in the Gospel is one of the younger brothers.

I don’t know about you, but the part of me that longs for a world that is fair and just wishes that Jesus would take the man’s side. But that’s not the real issue here. Like he does in so many other situations, Jesus evades the political, cultural, or legal question. Instead, he goes right to the spiritual question.

Jesus uses the moment to point out to the crowd that the real issue real issue is about where one's heart is. It’s not about who has more money, or more stuff, or more power, or more prestige. It’s about how we use it. It’s not about how big the wedding is—it’s about whether you invite God or not.

The Jesus tells the parable about a man who keeps building up storehouses for all of his grain. But the man builds in vain because he is disconnected from God. The real issue has to do with our relationship with what we have. Does it lead us closer to God and God’s people? Or does it drive a wedge between ourselves and all that is holy? Jesus says we need to be “rich toward God.”

Being “rich toward God” has to do with the currency of things.

We speak of the “currency” of things because they move around, they go from one person to the next, they have a life and rhythm to them. Things in currency are not meant to be kept in one’s hands, but get their life out of being passed around and shared. Wealth is like that. It grows only through a certain amount of risk.

It’s that way with the currency of money, the currency of our relationships, and the currency of time. All of these are ways that we can be rich toward God.

Being rich toward God does involve money, at some point, and with the risk involved of letting go. I grew up in a church in which members tried to outdo one another in giving—anonymously. Over and over, again, there would be some major gift to the parish, some program, some extra music, some new mission begun—with a grant from an anonymous donor. That’s living richly toward God.

Being rich toward God also means being rich toward God’s people, how we spend ourselves through the currency of our relationships—both with the people inside the church and those outside. What would it be like if we lived richly toward one another, giving one another the benefit of the doubt, offering first mercy instead of judgment, extending first a welcome rather than wondering if the stranger might fit in or not?

And finally, how do we spend our time? Do we give any of it to God—for God’s use, as well as simply time to be with God, to allow God to draw us closer through prayer, through reading of the Bible, through worship? All of this has to do with being rich toward God.

When I think of richness, of people I have know who were incredibly rich, I always think of the prayer circle of church women who would send me little notes when I was in seminary. This was a group of women at my home church who prayed together and studied the Bible. Every so often I would receive a card from them. In the card would be seven one-dollar bills, sometimes nine one-dollar bills, and one time, a small fortune: thirteen! Each time, the ladies would scribble a message, something to the effect of, “We know this isn’t very much, but we hope you can do something special with it. Spend it on yourself, don’t do anything responsible!” That made it challenging. I would get an expensive ice cream cone and write them about it. Once when they sent money, a new coffee shop had just opened and I got a really expensive, fancy coffee.

What made this such a wonderful gift was not only their random sweetness. But also, I knew these ladies, and I knew that they were not wealthy women. Like many older people, they were counting every single dollar and trying to cover medications, transportation, rent, contributions to church, support of family and friends…. and out of this, they gave also to me. I experienced their generosity not out of their wealth, but out of their richness.

On this day when the reading from Ecclesiastes reminds us to keep a perspective on life; and when the reading from Colossians urges us to worry not about clothes, but about clothing ourselves with such things as “compassion, kindness, lowliness, meekness, and patience; may the Holy Spirit show us what it is to be filthy rich—rich toward God.

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.