Memorial Day 2011

Remembering with gratitude those who made the ultimate sacrifice and praying that we will study war no more.

Gonna lay down my sword and shield
Down by the riverside
Down by the riverside
Down by the riverside
Gonna lay down my sword and shield
Down by the riverside
Ain't gonna study war no more.

refrain

I ain't gonna study war no more,
I ain't gonna study war no more,
Study war no more.
I ain't gonna study war no more,
I ain't gonna study war no more,
Study war no more.

Gonna stick my sword in the golden sand;
Down By the riverside
Down by the riverside
Down by the riverside
Gonna stick my sword in the golden sand
Down by the riverside
Gonna study war no more.

refrain

Gonna put on my long white robe;
Down By the riverside
Down by the riverside
Down by the riverside
Gonna put on my long white robe; Down by the riverside
Gonna study war no more.

refrain

Gonna put on my starry crown; Down By the riverside
Down by the riverside
Down by the riverside
Gonna put on my starry crown;
Down by the riverside
Gonna study war no more.

refrain

Gonna put on my golden shoes;
(ETC)
Gonna talk with the Prince of Peace;
(ETC)
Gonna shake hands around the world;
(ETC)

Maundy Thursday 2011

John 13: 1-17, 31b-35

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

Peter said to Jesus, “You will never wash my feet. Jesus answered, “Unless I wash you, you have no part in me.”

Peter isn’t the only one who has reservations about footwashing. Just last week I had lunch with a friend who happens to be a Presbyterian laywoman. She asked me about our Maundy Thursday service, and I explained to her that we would wash feet of any wished, celebrate the eucharist, and strip the altar in preparation for Good Friday. My friend is polite to her very core, but she still wrinkled her nose as she said, “Really? I don’t think we ever do a footwashing service on Maundy Thursday.”

I suspect that a great many of us Episcopalians might share my friend’s feeling about liturgical footwashing. I’d be surprised if anyone among us ever had a hard time finding a seat at such a service. For a people who worship God incarnate in Jesus, we are strangely uncomfortable with contact with the actual flesh of other people. I can remember a time when some folks would remain on their knees just to avoid exchanging the peace. And we’re twenty-first century Americans with on-demand hot running water; we can’t understand why we’d want to go anywhere, much less church, to have our feet washed or to wash the feet of others. We take pride in doing things by ourselves and for ourselves.

In Jesus’ time, though, footwashing was understood as an act of hospitality. Still, the disciples are puzzled by Jesus’ act of washing their feet. Peter especially has a problem with having Jesus wash his feet. To Peter, having Jesus wash the feet of a disciple seems like a violation of the proper relationship between them. As with many other things Jesus has done in his time with the Twelve, Peter just doesn’t get what Jesus is trying to do. At first he refuses Jesus’ offer to wash his feet. When Jesus tells Peter he must wash his feet, Peter wants his head and hands washed as well. Peter is so like the rest of us. When he realizes he’s said the wrong thing, he proceeds to put his foot even further into his mouth.

But I suppose we shouldn’t be too hard on Peter. Even in a cultural context where foot-washing was a common practice of hospitality, it would have been downright weird for one’s host to start washing feet in the middle of dinner. We can be pretty sure that it isn’t concern for hygiene or even comfort that’s motivating Jesus. I think we can also be sure it’s not ritual cleanliness that’s on Jesus’ mind. Jesus presents a model of servanthood, to be sure. But the lesson that Jesus teaches by washing the feet of his disciples reaches beyond even servanthood.

By washing the feet of his disciples, Jesus teaches them what it’s like to be in loving relationship with one another. By washing his disciples’ feet, Jesus teaches them about mutuality in love. Jesus turns the whole notion of the master-servant hierarchy upside down. He offers service to the very people who think it’s their job to serve him instead. By performing the service of foot-washing for his disciples, Jesus teaches them how to receive service. By this point in Jesus’ ministry, the disciples know what doing service looks like. They’ve seen Jesus touch lepers and minister to outcasts. They’ve seen him eat with people whom others consider beyond the pale. Now, as their own feet are washed by Jesus, they learn what it’s like to be the ones who are served, to be the ones who receive service.

The lesson that Jesus teaches in the foot-washing is one that we too would do well to learn. Most of us have internalized the idea that it’s more blessed to give than to receive. I’d venture to guess that most Christians believe that it’s better to serve than be served. Most of us like to think of ourselves as givers and helpers. It certainly is good to give and it’s certainly good to help. But if we are givers and helpers only, and are never receivers, we perpetuate a hierarchy in which some people are defined as being better than others. If we refuse what others offer, if we refuse the service of others, we may—without meaning to—deprive someone else of the chance to give and serve.

We may want to keep Jesus’ lesson in mind as we think about our relationships with the poor and homeless in our community. We may want to keep Jesus’ lesson in mind as we think about our relationships with those who are ill or disabled in any way. It is a very good thing indeed that we are eager to serve people who may appear to be more in need of assistance than we ourselves are. But in our enthusiasm for serving others, it may be easy for us to forget what gifts that they have to offer us. Yes, we want to emulate Jesus and be washers of feet. But Jesus, too, had his feet washed with ointment by Mary, who dried Jesus’ feet with her hair. Sometimes it is as blessed to receive as to give. Sometimes it is as blessed to be served as to serve. Mutuality is essential to truly loving relationships, like the one Jesus has with the disciples. Mutuality is essential to truly loving relationships, like the one Jesus has with his Father. “Unless I wash you,” says Jesus, “you have no part in me.” Amen.

Presentation of Our Lord Jesus Christ in the Temple

February 2, 2011

Luke 2:22-40

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

The burning question for today, for some of us, is whether or not the groundhog saw his shadow. Tradition has it that if the day is sunny and the groundhog sees his shadow, there will be six more weeks of winter. If it’s a cloudy day and the groundhog doesn’t see his shadow, spring is just around the corner. As a child growing up in the New York City suburbs, I found Groundhog Day kind of annoying. No matter what the groundhog saw, you could be pretty sure there would be six more weeks of winter and then some.

It may or may not surprise you to know that there is a similar tradition around Candlemas, which is another name for the holy day that we are observing here now. The name Candlemas comes from an ancient rite for the blessing of candles to be used in the church in the coming year. There’s an old English song that says, If Candlemas be fair and bright,/ Come winter, have another flight; / If Candlemas bring clouds and rain, / Go winter, and come not again.

For the moment let’s leave aside the connection between groundhogs, church candles, and predictions for future weather. Let’s turn instead to our Gospel reading for today. This reading from Luke provides an account of the baby Jesus being brought to the temple for the traditional Jewish dedication. Because we know who Jesus is, it’s hard for us to imagine this event without a great deal of pageantry and fanfare. If we’ve seen the medieval paintings of the presentation, complete with the halo over the head of the baby Jesus, it’s doubly hard to imagine this scene as ordinary. But ordinary it was.

Mary and Joseph almost certainly weren’t the only couple bringing a baby son to the temple that day. Jewish law required that firstborn sons be brought to the temple and dedicated to the Lord. The mothers of sons were required to present themselves thirty-three days after the birth of a son that they might undergo ritual purification. So likely there would have been many sets of observant Jewish parents at the temple on that same day.

What’s striking about our Gospel reading is the things it doesn’t say. There is nothing in Luke’s account that mentions that many people in the temple took note of Mary, Joseph, and the baby Jesus, who we know was a very special baby indeed. There is nothing in Luke’s account that mentions that the chief priests or anyone in the temple hierarchy took any notice at all. What most people there saw was a very ordinary couple with a baby fulfilling their obligation under Jewish law. If anyone remarked about anything even slightly out of the ordinary, it might have been to remark that the mother was very young but the father much older, and that they didn’t look like prosperous people.

Apparently hardly anyone noticed the baby Jesus, with two notable exceptions. One of them was an old woman named Anna. Anna was a widow of unusual devotion. According to Luke, “she did not depart from the temple, worshiping with fasting and prayer night and day.” Anna knew that when she saw the baby Jesus she had seen something close to God.

The second person, Simeon, was a “righteous and devout man,” Luke tells us. Simeon was led by the Holy Spirit to come into the temple on that particular day. He had been also told by the Holy Spirit that “he should not see death before he had seen the Lord’s Christ.” When Simeon saw the baby Jesus come into the temple with his parents, he took Jesus in his arms and said the words that we have come to know as the Nunc Dimittis: “Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in peace, according to thy word; for mine eyes have seen thy salvation which thou hast prepared in the presence of all peoples, a light for revelation to the Gentiles, and for glory to thy people Israel.”

It wasn’t the rich or powerful who recognized the light of Christ when they saw it; it was those whose piety made their eyes and hearts and minds open to revelation. Many of us spend considerable time looking for signs. We read our horoscopes in the newspaper, we study stock market trends to look for the next hot investment, and we look at the sports pages to try to figure out if UNC will beat Duke, or vice versa. We tend to look out for the extra-ordinary things, the things that for some reason or another stand out.

But all the looking we might do is to no avail unless our eyes are open to see what is right before our eyes in the ordinary things of life. Anna and Simeon didn’t recognize Jesus for who he was because they were brilliant or because they had any kind of psychic gifts. Anna and Simeon knew Jesus as the Lord’s Christ, the Lord’s Messiah, because they were both in the holy habit of keeping their hearts and minds turned to God. I pray that you and I might learn to do the same, that our own hearts might be open to the light of Christ when it is in our midst. Amen.

THE DIGITAL STORY OF NATIVITY - ( or Christmas 2.0 )

Reasons (why people don't come to church)

First Sermon at the New Parish

Downtown Deacon has moved to a large parish in a college town. Here is her first sermon preached today at that church.

October 31, 2010

Pentecost 23C, Proper 26

Isaiah 1:10-18

Psalm 32:1-8

2 Thessalonians 1:1-4, 11-12

Luke 19:1-10

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

Most mornings I wake up to music from WXXX. If the music playing at 6:30 is a Bach cantata or something by Vivaldi, chances are I’ll wake up pretty happily. But if the music playing at 6:30 happens to be a Sousa march or something with clanging cymbals, I’ll feel like I was rudely awakened. Maybe YOU weren’t quite awake when you arrived here this morning. Maybe you were hoping for some soothing words from the readings. No such luck. I imagine the opening words of the Old Testament lesson struck you like a trumpet blast or crashing cymbals: “Hear the word of the LORD, you rulers of Sodom! Give ear to the teaching of our God, you people of Gomor'rah!”

What a way to start the day! Isaiah certainly knows how to get our attention! He doesn’t try to sugar-coat his message. Isaiah’s words would have been pretty striking in his own day. His contemporaries expected to hear sharp words from a prophet. They knew well what happened to Sodom and Gomorrah when they incurred God’s wrath. Today, we’re not used to being addressed with such force and vehemence. We’re not used to being hit between the eyes. We like to be approached just a bit more gently.

So why is Isaiah talking to us that way? We’re good people. We’re in church on this Sunday morning after all. We could be at the gym, we could be in a coffee shop, or we could be simply getting our well-earned rest. But we’re not. All of us got up this morning and came to church to hear the word of God proclaimed and preached. We came to exchange the sign of peace with each other and to eat at the Lord’s table. Like the Pharisee from last week’s Gospel, we might well be feeling mighty pleased with ourselves. If we’re honest, we might be feeling just a little superior to that neighbor of ours who says he communes with God on the golf course.

But Isaiah isn’t going to let us get away with feeling smug. He takes away any shred of self-satisfaction we might feel about our diligence in worship. After all, he’s a prophet, and shaking us up is his job. He aims to let us know just what the consequences are for ignoring God’s will for us.

The simple fact of our attendance at church doesn’t impress God one bit. Our scrupulous observation of the ritual doesn’t impress God either. Through Isaiah the Lord says, “Your new moons and your appointed feasts my soul hates; they have become a burden to me, I am weary of bearing them. When you spread forth your hands, I will hide my eyes from you; even though you make many prayers, I will not listen.”

This last bit sounds quite discouraging. If God won’t listen to our prayers, what’s the point of praying then? Why are we even here, making the effort to worship according to the forms of the Prayer Book, with everything done decently and in good order?

It’s not that there’s anything BAD about our worship. Not at all. It’s just that worship isn’t enough all by itself. There’s more to our relationship with God. One of the reasons this passage has been appointed for us is to remind us that there is a danger in seeing worship as an end in itself. There’s a risk that we too, like the people of Judah, might become so focused on the details of our worship that we neglect how God has commanded us to live.

God’s concern for us extends beyond how we relate to God to how we relate to each other. Ritual without relationship is empty. So God asks that we extend our circle of concern beyond our individual soul’s relationship to God. God asks we extend our circle of concern to embrace and uplift those whom Jesus calls the least among us. Through Isaiah God commands us, “learn to do good; seek justice, correct oppression; defend the fatherless, plead for the widow.” This idea has lasted through the ages. About seventy or so years ago Dietrich Bonhoeffer observed that “The church is the church only when it exists for others.”

Now I realize that many if not most of us here are already on the path to reaching outside the church doors. XXXXXXX parish is well-known in [College Town] and throughout the diocese for its generosity to organizations that feed the hungry and shelter the homeless. We’re further known for volunteering in these organizations, for gathering canned goods for food pantries, for supporting Habitat for Humanity, and for preparing food for the soup kitchen, just to name a few of our many local outreach activities. These kinds of participation provide much benefit to our neighbors in need, and our neighbors are much better off for our concern.

But we could do more, and I believe that as people who’ve been richly blessed by God, we’re called to do more. I’d like to challenge us all to do two things.

First, let’s get to know our homeless neighbors right here in downtown [College Town]. Let’s give ourselves an opportunity to find out who they are and to listen to their stories. During the time I’ve served at the [College Town Agency] and [Downtown Agency], I’ve heard stories of adversity and grace that both saddened and inspired me. I’ve met people like Bill. Bill taught at a northeastern prep school until a psychotic break turned his life into a shuttle between mental hospitals and homeless shelters. I met Marty. Marty was a New York City travel executive until his alcoholism and Vietnam era demons caught up with him. Most recently, I met Lilian, a mother of seven and former [Downtown Agency] donor—yes, a donor. Lillian’s health issues and need to leave an abusive marriage sent her and her children to the shelter for refuge. I’ve changed the names but not the stories. These are real people.

I encourage anyone who is able to sit down and chat with some of the folks who eat in the soup kitchen, or who use [College Town Agency’s] other services. But there are some of us whose time and health constraints don’t permit meeting homeless people face-to-face. Fortunately, there are also online and print sources of stories by homeless people. Once we hear or read these stories by people who are more like us than not, we will never look at homeless people in quite the same way again.

The second thing I’m asking us all to do is, as a once popular bumper sticker used to say, is to question the dominant paradigm. We can ask ourselves what structures of our economy and society keep some of our sisters and brothers without adequate food, shelter, and healthcare, while others have far more than they could ever need. We can ask ourselves how we might become agents of change, however small. Jesus certainly questioned the dominant paradigm of his time. In order to follow him, we need to do so as well.

By doing these things, in addition to our already generous gifts of our time and treasure, we’ll be taking our faith through the church doors and out into the world beyond. This kind of faith in action is what I believe that Isaiah is telling us is pleasing to God. God is quite willing to work with us in the process of helping us to align ourselves with God’s will. Today’s Isaiah lesson ends infinitely more gently than it begins, with the words, “"Come now, let us reason together,

says the LORD: though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though they are red like crimson, they shall become like wool.” With God’s help and through God’s grace, we and our world can be transformed and redeemed.

Our Gospel today gives us a clear example of the grace of God at work through a seemingly very unlikely person. The tax collector Zaccheus climbs a tree in order to see Jesus in the crowd. Jesus asks Zaccheus to come down from the tree so that Jesus may stay at his house. The crowd around Jesus is scandalized that Jesus would accept the hospitality of a presumed sinner. Zaccheus’s next words reveal his true character. Zaccheus says, “Behold, Lord, the half of my goods I give to the poor; and if I have defrauded any one of anything, I restore it fourfold.” More than the self-righteous crowd, Zaccheus understands what it means to follow Jesus.

My prayer for us all today is that we too may fully understand and fully embody what it means to follow Jesus, that we may serve God as the General Thanksgiving says, “not only with our lips but with our lives.” May we come down from our trees, or whatever it is that hinders our discipleship and follow Jesus, who came to seek and to save the lost. Amen.

The Fourteenth Sunday after Pentecost

Proper 17, Year C
Luke 14: 1, 7-14



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

Sometimes I think we Episcopalians have to put up with a lot. Some people say the Episcopal church is obsessed by sex. Others describe Episcopalians as bon vivants who are heavy on form and light on theology. We’ve been called “whiskeypalians.” We’ve been described as “Catholic lite.” We’ve even been called “The Church of the Correct Salad Fork,” as if table manners were more important for us than how we think about God. But table manners aren’t an entirely frivolous concern. Those of us who’ve heard the Gospel read and preached on week after week may have noticed that Jesus pays a great deal of attention to the dinner table. What we eat, how we eat it, and who we eat it with are not trivial matters. How we carry out this basic and essential human activity says much about our relationship with one another and with God.
In the Gospel today, Jesus begins by telling us that when we are invited by someone to a wedding banquet that we shouldn’t sit at the place of honor. It’s preferable instead to sit at the lowest place and be asked to move up rather than take the highest place and risk the disgrace of being asked to move down. At first reading, Jesus’ advice sounds to us like a clever bit of social strategy. Pretend humility for the purpose of getting the status we think we really deserve.
But this isn’t what Jesus is really telling us. Jesus isn’t in the business of teaching us to be successful in any conventional understanding of being successful. Also, there is something in what Jesus says that for us is quite literally lost in translation. Jesus’ original audience would have picked right up on his choice of one important word. The word that is translated here as “honor” is the Greek word doxa. The more usual translation of doxa is “glory,” and for Jesus’ disciples, and for us today, the word “glory” is usually associated with God. Think “doxology.” “Praise God from whom all blessings flow” is one example of a doxology that most of us are familiar with. Glory is given to God and glory must be given by God; glory can’t be given by one human being to another. Unlike honor, it’s glory that really counts in God’s kingdom, and glory is awarded by God to the humble rather than to those who try to lift themselves up.
Although most of us wouldn’t have noticed the Greek usage, Jesus has another way of letting us know his advice extends far beyond the dinner table, important though the dinner table is. Jesus’ advice concerns our salvation. He tells us “all who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted.” Far more is at stake for us than our human power games. Jesus gives our social relationships cosmic signficance.
Just as Jesus gives advice to guests, he has some instructions for hosts as well. He tells us that when hosting a meal, we shouldn’t invite our friends, relatives, or wealthy neighbors because these people would reciprocate and we would be making an exchange rather than a gift. Jesus’ instructions require that we invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind. Choosing our guests this way involves more than an act of charity, though it certainly is that too. These four groups of people—poor, crippled, lame, and blind—are specifically excluded from temple priesthood in the book of Leviticus and were also excluded from some religious communities in Jesus’ time. Here too Jesus lets us know that more than simple kindness is involved in having us follow his instructions. Just as the guest who takes the lowest seat at the table will be honored, or receive glory, the host who invites the untouchables of society will be “blessed.” Who usually blesses? God. And here too more reward is involved, for Jesus says “you will be repaid at the resurrection of the righteous.” Again, salvation is at stake.
At this point you may be getting a bit restless in the pew, thinking that however important it is, the resurrection of the righteous is a long way off. So what does today’s Gospel mean for you and me now, today, the last Sunday of August in 2010? While we don’t want to take away anything from the resurrection of the righteous, we really aren’t looking forward to that anytime soon. We have more immediate things on our minds, like how we’re going to pay our bills, make childcare arrangements, look after an ill family member, or how we’re going to cram all we have to do into that one day off and have a little relaxation besides.
Fortunately for us, there is good news in what Jesus tells us, and the good news is here and now. The good news is that living by Jesus’ words will help us enjoy abundant life right now as well as in the hereafter. Jesus gives us permission to let go of being number one all of the time. I imagine most of us like to be number one in some way or another. It starts early in life. Just watch what happens when a teacher asks a group of preschool children to form a line. There’s a mad dash for the front of that line, and probably even a bit of pushing and nudging is involved. First in line is the coveted spot. Later in life it’s the same story. We want to be on the winning team, be on the “A” honor roll, and eventually occupy the corner office. We take great delight in telling our friends how we got upgraded to first class on our last flight or how we got the best table on the busiest night of the week in the most popular restaurant in town. These are not bad things in themselves, and I have to admit that the occasional times I’ve been upgraded on an airplane I’ve enjoyed it immensely.
So then what’s bad about wanting to be number one? A couple of things. When it’s really important for us to be number one, it takes a lot of our time and energy to get there and to stay there. It’s hard work being number one, and it’s constant work, because someone else wants to be number one too and take our place. And, being number one is a mixed blessing. Yes, it feels good, but we might think that unless we’re number one we’re not worth much. What Jesus tells us to do in today’s gospel is to get out of this rat race.
Not only does Jesus say we should stop striving to be top dog, he tells us to get out of the business of bookkeeping, too. We don’t have to keep mental accounts of whom we did things for and who did things for us and make sure the two columns always balance. If we invite the poor, the crippled, the lame, and the blind to our tables, we don’t have to worry about being asked in return. When we’re planning a dinner party we can stop saying things like, “We don’t have to ask the Joneses. After all, we’ve had them over for dinner three times and we haven’t even been asked for a glass of wine at their house.” We may even be able to stop obsessing over who paid the check last time. When we stop expecting comparable returns for what we give it’s actually quite liberating. We really don’t need to worry about it, because eventually all will be settled in God’s own good time.
And what will our lives look like if we get out of the rat race and we stop our social bookkeeping? What will life be like if we value ourselves not by our position but because of the simple fact that we are children of God? What will life be like if we forget about the things other people can do for us and simply enjoy their company? I think that our priorities will change. For one thing, if we’re not worrying about being number one we will be able to love ourselves. If we can love ourselves we will be more able to love our neighbors. When all are welcome, the dinner table will become a joyful feast for all and not an anxious occasion for social one-upmanship. We will create space in our lives for joyful possibilities that we couldn’t have imagined previously.

If I and not the lectionary had been in charge of selecting the gospel reading for today, my last Sunday with you at St. Joseph’s, I could not have chosen better than our reading today. I didn’t really know what to expect when I came to St. Joseph’s two years ago. What I found was a church that knows all about table fellowship, a church made up of folks who regularly sit down and break bread with those who are seldom invited elsewhere. I feel singularly blessed to have had the chance to serve as the deacon of a church that lives out Christ’s ministry every single day of the week.
“Let mutual love continue,” says today’s Epistle. “Do not neglect to show hospitality to strangers, for by doing that some have entertained angels without knowing it.” If we can open our hearts and our dinner tables, who knows who will come to share the feast? Amen.