The Trinity Blogger

Worry Worry Worry!!

2012-02-01T13:44:00.000-05:00

Today I ran out of time to prepare for Morning Prayer withthe Joyful Ladle (Trinity’s soup kitchen) servers. So I called the Parish Administrator and said… “Dorayne would you pick out a Gospel lessonfrom the Lectionary Page and make enough copies for us to do a Bible study?” Her response was which one? I said – “makes no difference, just pick one.”

When I arrived at the church, five minutes before the Biblestudy, I grabbed the stack of copies and headed down. Much to my delight she had chosen Matthew6:25-33 – the “do not worry about your life” one. We used the African Bible study method and soall shared as the passage moved each of us.

It was one of those Ahha moments for me. This has been a month of dealing with parishbudgets, annual meetings, and upcoming bishop’s visitations, so I was lookingforward to being reminded to “lay back, take it easy – God will provide”. As is often true when I read scripture theHoly Spirit had something else in mind…

What jumped out at me were two lines (beginning and end) “…Jesus said, Is not life more than food, andthe body more than clothing?... …But strive first for the kingdom of God andhis righteousness..” My mother in lawused to say “don’t worry it” – meaning that one was spending way too much timeand energy (perhaps compulsively) trying to fiddle with something – trying tochange it. What this Gospel said to mewas not to lay back and stop considering whether or not something was going tohappen to me (i.e. worrying myself too much), but rather “focus on that whichleads you to the Kingdom of God” – that is “get off your duff and do somethingto make God’s love visible through you in the world.”

Perhaps my epiphanyis not the one you are having. That’s okbecause reading scripture is like that a lot. But I suspect that you will agree that unless you work on something thatyou want very badly it is not likely to happen. Building God’s Kingdom is not likely to happen unless we work to make ithappen. What is the most important thingin your life? Is it your clothing?, yourfood?, your power?, your greed? Or is ityour compassion?, your love for all of creation?, your hospitality?

During Epiphany wehave seen how Jesus’ life and ministry - illuminated by the stories of hishealing and teaching – teaching and healing – sheds light on the nature of God’slove for us and of our path of salvation. Now as we approach the Lenten season I think it is time for us to assesshow our lives illuminate God’s love – and then maybe look for ways to add thosespiritual practices like prayer, tithing, worship, and service to build up God’sKingdom.

Who's in and who's out?

2012-01-02T17:23:00.002-05:00

      Not everyone agrees oneverything about church! Duh!! This is not news to the Episcopal Church for sure. Not everyone appreciates the altar call that I make each Sunday: "This is God's Table and all who seek God or seek to be found by God are welcome here!" Personally, I am not about to set myself in between God and those who seek God's love. But some would say that the church's canon says that only baptized Christians are welcome. And well yes - I think that is what the canons say... Then how is the church to survive and thriveif we cannot agree on what it is we believe or hold sacred?
      “I give you a newcommandment, that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you alsoshould love one another. By this everyone will know that you are my disciples,if you have love for one another.” John13:34
      Who is worthy of mylove?? Is it only the middle class,white, divorced, females from northeastern Louisiana, with three children, andway too much education that are worthy of my love? Maybe that is a little too limiting – it woulddefinitely limit my options for a foursome on the golf course. If Jesus’ command requires that I stepoutside the boundaries of those who look like me, talk like me, act like me,and have the same social networks - then how far do I go? Should I include men and/or children? How about people with limited education orpeople who email inappropriate jokes to me? How about people of color? Non-Christians? Homosexuals and/or heterosexuals both? Then what about trans-gendered? How about Jews?   Arabs? Persians? Mexicans? Extra-terrestials? Where does thisinclusiveness thing end?????

My heart tells me that itdoes not. As hard as it is to love somepeople, to look beyond my own self-centered prejudices, as much as I love beingwith folks who think and act just as I do, as much as I long to be protected bymy comfort zone, as much as I hate to admit that I am not always right – God keepspulling and pushing on me to be open to the goodness of all those around me. Furthermore, I believe with all my heart thatmy very salvation depends on my love for all those other people who are not justlike me. “I give you a new commandment,that you love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love oneanother.” Jesus did not tell me to guardthe church against those who are strange. Jesus told me that it is in the face of the stranger that I will come toknow God. And it is through my love forthat stranger that others will know what it means to be a disciple of Christ.

      This is what I believe tobe the core message of the Gospel. Scripture can be confusing and misleading and contradictory sometimes,but the one message that is sparkling clear is that we are to reflect the abundanceof God’s love for us by loving others.
      I challenge each one ofus to begin this new year by doing an honest and thorough search of the ways inwhich our lives limit love and then praying to God for the strength and courageto change. Let’s take that charge beyondour individual lives to our congregational life. How is the life of our parish/diocese/churchreflective of this commandment? As weenter into a new time of congregational life let’s open up that conversationsee where it takes us.
     PS A good way to start is my coming to the Epiphany Series Study Group on Thursday evenings.... :)

Does Trinity speak with a prophetic voice?

2011-12-01T22:28:00.001-05:00

The week before Thanksgiving I was in New Orleans at a PICO gathering of clergy from all over the country. PICO… People Improving Communities by Organizing. (or something like that - I can never get the exact wording) I learned a lot about economic issues that effect our society - particularly the more vulnerable people. What I heard made me both sad and mad all at the same time. Sad that we, as people of God, have not been able to make a dent in the suffering of the poor, the children, the elderly, the disenfranchised. Why? Is is apathy? Is it ignorance? Is it greed or a desire for power? Is it all of those things and more? Probably….

I made a commitment to myself and my colleagues while I was there. The commitment came in the form of a Clergy Call to Action. The gist of the statement is:

As clergy we witness the pain families face from this financial crisis

　　We stand for and with our people. Even though Americans are working very hard, inequality is growing. Just as ancient prophets spoke out against injustice, we too must speak out.
　 We believe that the public debate about economic recovery is about moral and spiritual values and the faith community has a vital role to play in healing our nation
　　 We pledge to teach, preach and organize to unify people of faith around reducing poverty and increasing economic and racial justice.
　　 We will challenge our elected leaders from both parties to put the needs of working families, the poor and the common good of our nation ahead of short-term political calculus and special interests.
At Trinity we have already begun to talk about the economy in prophetic terms. Tonight in our Advent study group we had a pretty animated discussion about our investments - where we should and where we should not put our money. We talked about the importance of talking about our own complicity in the economic mess within the frame of our Christian ethics. We will talk more.

What do you think? Should a church invest in RJ Reynolds? (Tobacco) Or Walmart? (Unfair labor practices) Or Chikfil-a (Questionable stand on LGBT rights) How about companies who make instruments of war? Maybe this is what we should be talking about at Annual Meeting rather than the flowers in the church or the kind of music we play.

I’m just saying………..

Thanksgiving is what you make of it!

2011-11-23T09:26:00.000-05:00

In Bishop Shaw's Thanksgiving meditation he invites us to "put ourselves in the way of gratitude". Here is the link to the full meditation. He notes that gratitude tends to slip up on him in much the same way as Grace does and that he is overwhelmed by the awareness of God's blessings everywhere.

"I hear ya, Bishop", but too often it seems that it is despair that overwhelms and blessings that seem to be in short supply. Today I received an email from a colleague in New Orleans telling me of an act of desecration in the narthex of the parish he serves. Someone painted swastikas and other aryan symbols on the icons and prayer cards. He said that the damage was not permanent, but that the violent message the vandals left is deeply disturbing.

I believe that such acts are manifestations of deep fear and hatred born out of a loss of connectedness and faithfulness with God and with our neighbors. Dare I say that such fear and hatred are the lingering hanger's on from our history of slavery and colonialism and our refusal as a nation to make justice and equality for all our priority? And yet we stand on the precipice, ready once again to welcome the Son of God into our midst at Christmas. The holiday season offers us an opportunity to renew the ties that bind us to our brothers and sisters in Christ and to God by walking together as children of God - by standing together and refusing to be overcome by the anger, hatred, greed and malice that wants to infect our hearts.

In the season of Thanksgiving our hearts are open to recognize and to name the blessings all around us that are so easily hidden by the news headlines. Let's take Bishop Shaw's invitation to heart and be mindful of these blessings. Let's take the time to be aware of the beauty of a sunlit city and the soft, nestling of the snow in the crooks of the tree branches. Let's let wonder and awe take the place of anger and despair and live fully this Thanksgiving. And then let's come on Sunday and share the Eucharist as we hear Jesus' call to watchfulness and waiting.

Happy Thanksgiving and a Blessed Advent,

Jane+

They sell the needy for a pair of sandals.... (Amos)

2011-11-03T12:55:00.004-04:00

"If this is going to be a Christian nation that doesn't help the poor, either we've got to pretend that Jesus was just as selfish as we are, or we've got to acknowledge that he commanded us to love the poor and serve the needy without condition, and then admit that we just don't want to do it." - Stephen Colbert

For about a month now I have tagged my emails with this quote. I have gotten more comments from this one than any other quote I have ever used. I first saw it on an email from Sojourners, a Christian group whose mission is to “articulate the biblical call to social justice, inspiring hope and building a movement to transform individuals, communities, the church, and the world.” It is a noble group with an even nobler mission.

Most of the comments were supportive and then along the way, I got tangled up in a Facebook debate over whether or not we really do have a responsibility to care for the poor through public programs i.e. do we need to “do justice” as well as charity. Here is the comment from unnamed Christian that ignited the fire…

“The assertion that Jesus was a socialist or liberal is misguided and incorrect because the premise is grounded in the liberal ideology of American politics, not in biblical exegesis. Not one place in the bible did Jesus advocate it was the function of government to do what loving human beings ought to do on their own.”

I beg your pardon….. Mt 25: 31-46, 19:21, 5:3… Luke 4 88-19, 11: 39-42… not to mention the prophets and Torah. Ahhh like Amos warned……

Thus says the Lord: For three transgressions of Israel,
and for four, I will not revoke the punishment;^*
because they sell the righteous for silver,
and the needy for a pair of sandals—
⁷ they who trample the head of the poor into the dust of the earth,
and push the afflicted out of the way;

My personal favorite is… “Let justice roll down like waters and righteousness like and everflowing stream!” Personally, I would rather not be in the way of that torrent! Still I know that there are a lot of faithful people who believe that it is the responsibility of individuals - not governments - to provide for the poor (I use the term loosely and inclusive of a plethora of justice issues). The problem comes when individuals do not step up to the plate and a chasm appears separating the “haves from the have-nots”. When push comes to shove, most human beings hunker down to protect their own nest-egg and leave the "needy other" to swing in the breeze. If there is no organized social justice system to intervene, then the rich just get richer and the poor get you know what. The chasm that separates has grown wider and wider in my lifetime. (Remember old Lazarus?)

This month we will begin to reflect on what it means to be a Christian in the face of the economic crisis in which we find ourselves. No shame or blame – just good faithful exploration of what the scripture really says and how we might faithfully exercise our responsibility to God and our neighbor. I invite you to seriously consider joining us for this discussion. Thursday evenings at 7:15 following the Eucharist. Be there or be square……!!!!! OK too much?????

Onward! (as my friend Joan says….)

What's on your list?

2011-10-01T08:07:00.000-04:00

There is on old worn out joke about a rich person who told the preacher that he was tired of hearing over and over in the sermons about how no one really owned anything… all of creation belonged to God. The rich man invited the preacher to come to with him to see his vast collections of art, his yacht, his many homes and considerable business properties. He said to the preacher, “All of this is mine… now can you really stand there and say I do not own it?” The preacher smiled and said, “Ask me that in 100 years.”

The reality is there is no luggage compartment in a hearse and no pockets in a shroud. You know we can even stretch it a little farther and say even our very lives are on loan from God, because none of us knows the journey or the time our lives will take. But rather than be morbid this is good news. We have the opportunity to work collaboratively with God and to nurture and tend God’s creation with the same love and tenderness that God has nurtured us.

The church is part of God’s creation. Unfortunately we have not always tended it well. But the church is also the vehicle through which we study, serve, and worship God. It is a place of comfort in stress and pain. It is a source of beautiful images that send our thoughts soaring. It is a place of challenge for us when our lives turn toward selfishness. Last week we heard Paul tell us that our very salvation depends on our living our lives as Christ taught us. Imperfect as it is the church is the single best entity for Christians to practice that way of life.

I am grateful for the abundance of comfort in my life. I have worked hard all my life and I, like the Rich Young Man, have many possessions. But when I make a pledge to the church I am acknowledging that nothing in my possession is really mine. All of it belongs to God. God invites me to keep 90% of what I am loaned. The rest helps to nurture and sustain the building of God’s Kingdom.

In Sunday School I invited the kids to write down or list the blessings in their lives. At first they balked. They said that they did not know what to write. When I changed the question to what are you grateful for in your life the list went to the second page. What’s on your list?

A Day in Vermont

2011-09-06T09:27:00.001-04:00

Pictures from our trek to Vermont. It was a full day. We had the opportunity to speak at length with Angie Emerson who is the diocesan stewardship person and is now coordinating the highway relay system to move food and goods to places it is needed. They are a resilient lot. We heard the expected FEMA stories. One woman filed for FEMA assistance on her house that was off the foundation in one section. The inspector told her that he could only do a partial inspection and that she would only get a partial payment as he could not inspect the whole house because part of it was unsafe for him to walk. Meanwhile next door they were told that because the put a temporary shore under the floor the house was now stable and so would get no assistance. These stores sounded all too familiar. Talked to one woman – a priest who noticed lights on in a house across the road and her husband grabbed a flat bottom boat and saved their lives. That night 5 families slept (or not) in their house – animals and children too. She is coordinating relief in Moretown. We went to Randolph, Bethel, West Hartford, Moretown and more. The destruction is in pockets but where the water came the destruction is total. We drove over partial bridges and washed out roads. St Pauls WRJ fed 575 folks today. There was an assembly line of pick-up cooks making lunches. In Northfield they are washing clothes, and all over there is mud. At one point Brattleboro reported that they had run out of peanut butter. An emergency delivery was dispatched to get them some.

Pictures on Trinity FB Page
http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.280273841999780.89849.231444203549411&saved#!/TrinityHaverhill

What follows is a list of needed items.

Current needs include: Please note that the needs will change by next week. No long term collections or drop-offs please

Health is a big issue. All of the mud from the floods is contaminated by sewage, so basic first aid items, and protective latex gloves.

Emergency Clean-up Buckets (such as Church World Services provides) you will need:

One five-gallon bucket with resealable lid

Five scouring pads
Seven sponges, assorted sizes
One scrub brush
Eighteen cleaning towels (reusable, like Easy Wipes®)
One 50-78 oz. box dry laundry detergent
One 12 oz. bottle of liquid concentrated household cleaner (like Lysol®)
One 25 oz. bottle liquid disinfectant dish soap (like Dawn®)
One package of 48-50 clothespins
Clothesline, two 50 ft. or one 100 ft.
Five dust masks
Two pairs latex gloves (like Playtex®)
One pair work gloves
28-bag roll of heavy-duty trash bags (30-45 gallon)
One 6-9 oz. bottle of insect repellent (pump, drops or lotion, not aerosol)

Please provide all liquids in new, unopened plastic bottles. Be sure to send only new materials. Place all items in the plastic bucket, making sure they are packed securely to avoid damage during shipment, and seal lid with packing tape. If you can’t provide the complete kit, any and all of these items are needed.
Gift cards for clothes and school supplies (Walmart, K-Mart, Staples, Walgreens, Kinney’s, etc.)

Gas cards for people in the Proctorsville area (specifically Sunoco and Gulf) for the purchase of gas are needed because there are no longer supermarkets nearby. People have to travel 30 - 45 minutes from Proctorsville to buy food. Local markets were destroyed.
Socks and Underwear for both genders, all age groups, all sizes

Canned and non-perishable food – wholesale-size and household size

Household necessities (diapers, toilet paper, dish and laundry detergents – if you use it in your house, there’s a need somewhere)

Personal necessities (soap, toothpaste, toothbrushes, contact lens solution, etc. – again, if you use it daily, there’s a need somewhere)

Plastic bins for people to protect the belongings they have been able to salvage.

Thank you to all those who have been responding tirelessly to the efforts. All of us need to remember to support each other as we are supporting those in need. Please remember to take a break now and then – we can’t do it all, all at once and there are many who are responding. Please step in to give others a break as you are able.

Disaster in Vermont

2011-09-03T20:47:00.001-04:00

Sometimes the call just seem to fall into your lap. That is what happened as I made a few tentative inquiries into the situation in Vermont. What I got back was a flood of stories of people helping people in a time of great need.

I am working with Bishop Bud and the diocesan disaster response team, other churches, and our friends in Mississippi to provide gift cards and clothing which is the immediate need to Episcopal parishes in Vermont who are working to help those who lost their homes and belongings to Irene. With more rain on the way and the roads in shambles the need is great.

Can you help?

·         Flood Buckets (see below for suggested contents)
·         Gift cards in $20 increments to Walmart, Shaws, Lowes, Aubuchon, or Home Depot
·         Cash if you prefer made out to Trinity Church, Attn: Irene Benevolence Fund
·         Volunteer to help clean out houses – mid-Sept to November
5-gallon bucket with resealable lid
Bleach
5 scouring pads
7 Sponges
1 scrub brush
18 cleaning towels (reusable wipes)
Liquid laundry detergent (two 25 oz. or one 50 oz. bottle)
1 household cleaner, 12-16 oz. bottle
Disinfectant dish soap, 16-28 oz. bottle
50 clothes pins
Clothes line (100 ft)
5 dust masks
2 pair neoprene gloves (Latex allergies!)
1 pair work gloves
24-bag roll of heavy-duty trash bags, 33-45 gallon
1 Air freshener, 8 or 9 oz. non-aerosol can

I am a Christian, but...

2011-08-30T19:21:00.004-04:00

From Trinity Messenger... message continues below after italics...
The lessons last Sunday were pretty darned specific about what it means to be a Christian – to follow in Jesus’ footsteps. Discretion being the better part of valor for most of us we had a small congregation, so I put most of my thoughts on the sermon page on the website. The gist of it is that we hear the lessons about God’s call to us, and we hear Paul’s admonitions to live honorable and peaceable lives, and we hear Jesus' telling us "if any would be my disciple then take up your cross and follow" - but.... We HEAR those teachings and we KNOW that they apply to us, but translating them into how we live our everyday lives is difficult. And so we say with our actions... "I am a Christian, BUT...

What would it take for each one of us to change that statement and instead say: "I am a Christian, AND..." The question is - how do we do that? We do it first and foremost through prayer. We can pray these days as members of the Church, the church which must speak out in simplicity and in honesty about the social ills of our world if it is to remain relevant in the 21st century. Prayer seems particularly important as we approach the tenth anniversary of 9/11. I remember as I walked the perimeter of the Pit the sense of urgency - not for revenge, but for forgiveness. I remember the prayers for those who had died and for their families. I remember how uncertain the future felt. We acknowledge through our prayer that God's action is more powerful than any that we could imagine and we turn to God to intervene with mercy, compassion, and love for all those who are created in God's image. ...

Secondly, we enter into dialogue with those who seem to oppose our understanding. Dialogue is a two way process, so we must listen as much as we must speak. We do not always want to hear from those who speak the words of “non-violence” or "compromise". We might have political views which are so deep that we do not see how they are opposed to the ways of Jesus and the prophets before Him. As a rule, we do not like listening to words and ideas which are new or counter to our traditions. Jesus sent His followers out to do some counter-speaking and to upset the political and religious ways of the times, we are called to do likewise.

Lastly we step up and act. It is that burning in our bones that musters the courage to speak the truth, write the truth, live the truth that we see in the life and ministry of Jesus. We can seek reconciliation in our own lives with those around us. We can order our lives in ways that do not sponsor or support violence or greed that could cause others to be oppressed. We can let our desire to be God's hands in the world govern how we vote, what we buy, how we live our lives.

It is inevitable that somewhere in this process we will walk smack dab into a brick wall. It may be our fear for our personal safety, it may be our friends' opinions or our family's security. We can be silent at the injustices of the world and feel our very bones burn with the fire of God until we are misshapen, or we can risk our personal safety and step out in faith. Jesus doesn't promise to keep our lives comfortable. He promises just the opposite: we will walk into the wall. We cannot know as we begin to act what the outcome will be. We can only know that as we respond to the mercy shown us- by showing mercy, we invite the death of our former selves. And we believe-sometimes barely-that when the dust has settled, we will be acknowledged by Jesus, and will regain our lives.

Be careful what you sow!

2011-07-29T22:14:00.000-04:00

“The one who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and the one who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully.” 2 Corinthians 9:6

I have been thinking about what I sow. This passage is one that is often used in stewardship drives and certainly the entire passage speaks volumes about the importance of sharing the abundance of our possessions with others. In particular this passage refers to a generous gift on the part of the Corinthians for the church in Jerusalem. (It must have been the Good Friday offering.) The passage also speaks about God being the source of our abundance and providing for us as we have need.

“God is able to provide you with every blessing in abundance, so that by always having enough of everything, you may share abundantly in every good work.” 2 Cor 9:8

This is one of the lessons for the Feast Day for Laurence, Deacon of Rome and will be the text from which I will preach next week at Adelynrood. But I am not thinking about money today. I am thinking about other things that I sow. Like this past week… As I slept at a motel someone entered the parking lot, broke the window on my car, and stole Jack the GPS. I was awakened in the middle of the night after a long day and told to come downstairs so that the security person could give me the good news in person. Yea!!! I could not get back to sleep even though I knew I was facing a 9 hour drive the following day. I was grumpy. I felt violated. I was angry. I was unhappy with the whole world. – And I let everyone in my path know about it.

The Boy Scout troop in the breakfast room at the hotel could tell by the way I waited impatiently for them to move from in front of the toaster. The hotel clerk knew it when I commented irritably that the security guard should have been outside watching the cars. The toll booth guy caught the brunt of my frustration when I pulled into the wrong lane and had to pay $2.50 instead of the 50 cents I would have paid had I gone to the FastLane line. (Now what made me think that this young man had been the cause of my not reading the sign properly and getting in the wrong line?) There is no logic for what we do when we let anger and frustration guide our actions.

All of this came back to me as I tried to pray last night. As I prayed I found myself wishing that I had asked the boy scout where they were headed and what about the trip excited him. I wished I had thanked the clerk for the towel that they gave me to keep the glass from cutting me on the way home. I wished my response at the toll booth could have been to laugh at my mistake and to have offered a prayer of thanksgiving for having driven as far as I did safely. If the worst thing that happened was to lose two bucks at the toll booth – I was pretty lucky.

Stewardship is more than money. It is also what we say and do – especially in difficult situations. Having a sense of God’s abundance in our lives means focusing on positive, life giving thoughts and feelings and not letting the hiccups of life rule our responses. Longfellow wrote a poem about an arrow shot into the air versus a song breathed into the air. The bite of the arrow caused irrevocable harm, but the song came back in a friend’s heart.

What did you sow today? The author of 2 Corinthians tells us that the source of our provision and our strength is God. When we sow the seeds of joy, love, and hope they will return to us in spades.

“He who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will supply and multiply your seed for sowing and increase the harvest of your righteousness.” 2 Corinthians 9:10

Stay cool this summer! God bless you and those you love.

Jane+

Sometimes I want to run from scripture!

2011-07-02T18:04:00.002-04:00

     There are some parts of scripture that I would just as soon never hear again. The story of Abraham and Isaac and the sacrifice of the ram in the bushes sends chills up and down my spine. (And makes be disgusted and furious… need I say more?) So I have been beside myself this past week when last Sunday was the tri-annual reading of Genesis 22 and then low and behold it popped up again for the Thursday evening Eucharist.
     This week though I was blessed to hear a Day1 sermon by the Rev’d Canon Charles Robertson and it opened up a whole new perspective for me – and by the way formed that sometimes elusive nugget for a sermon on a very difficult text. Canon Robertson reminded us of God’s provision for our needs and of our part in being watchful for these blessings. Abraham’s willingness to look up from his despair in response to the angel’s call was a response to God’s provision. (http://day1.org/3036-god_will_provide)
     This story is about a man who is about to lose everything he had ever hoped to be. If I step back from my horror a minute then I can identify with the feeling of being in such a desperate situation that I can see no way out and blindly stumbling forward. Life is often not very pretty. If history tells us nothing else it tells us that we are often faced with unfathomable tragedy. We become players - with little ability to change the ultimate outcome, caught up in the tragedy that swirls around us. I saw a movie this weekend called The Adjustment Bureau. The premise was that these men in hats worked for the “Chairman” who had a plan for humanity. They made sure that everyone stayed with the plan no matter what they might want personally. The chairman had tried several times to turn the world over to humanity and allow “free will” but the Dark Ages, World Wars, the Holocaust, and Global warming had all led the Chairman to believe that humanity was hopelessly inept at caring for creation. Scripture tells us differently. Scripture invites us to an awareness of God’s promise of presence with us and to God’s provision of the gifts we need to sustain life. Gifts like hospitality, gratitude, forgiveness, compassion, and hope.
     The true act of faith on the part of Abraham is not the blind faith that tradition has taught us about this story, but rather the ability, the willingness, and the readiness to recognize God in the ordinary ways in which God provides for us, especially in those circumstances when everything appears to be futile - and then to embrace, engage, and empower those gifts.
     Thank you Canon Robertson!

Rising from the fiery ashes!

2011-06-09T17:41:00.001-04:00

Since my arrival I have been captivated by the image carved into the door of the aumbry. It looks for all the world like a ferocious dragon eating baby chicks! Now I do not think that is what is on the aumbry - but still it looks a lot like it. Some say that it is a phoenix. This is what I read about the Phoenix on the internet. (That source is ALWAYS correct. :))

"In ancient Egyptian mythology and in myths derived from it, the Phoenix is a female mythical sacred firebird with beautiful gold and red plumage. Said to live for 500 or 1461 years (depending on the source), at the end of its life-cycle the phoenix builds itself a nest of cinnamon twigs that it then ignites; both nest and bird burn fiercely and are reduced to ashes, from which a new, young phoenix arises. The new phoenix embalms the ashes of the old phoenix in an egg made of myrrh and deposits it in Heliopolis ("the city of the sun" in Greek), located in Egypt. The bird was also said to regenerate when hurt or wounded by a foe, thus being almost immortal and invincible - a symbol of fire and divinity."

I like it! Well perhaps I am a little uncomfortable with a pagan sun god's bird being the symbol guarding the blessed sacrament. But nevertheless the idea of coming to the end of one's life cycle and building a nest for the next generation to thrive, knowing that the next generation will treasure and hold sacred the gifts offered by the parent. Now that's a good thing!

OK here is my standard question... What does that look like here at Trinity?

Feel the Spirit!

2011-06-08T23:51:00.001-04:00

I am thinking about Easter and Pentecost and where the church fits in. Not the “people of God” church, but the “institutional” church. Whoops is there a difference? In an ideal world (the Kingdom of God - of course!) I would hope not, but in reality I am afraid there is.

I often sit with folks who have left the church and speak with some bitterness about being told they were not quite up to snuff for one reason or another. I hear anger over the child abuse for sure, but more often I hear about a sort of disillusionment with clergy and church lay leadership on issues of social justice and money management. I hear that the church preaches one game and acts out another. Take for instance lay staff in parishes and at the diocesan level. It is getting better but the church has a history of full-time work load for part-time paid hours… and insurance or retirement? …forget it.

Things are changing of course. General convention will soon require parishes to include lay staff in the retirement package and priests may (should!) soon have to help pay for their health insurance. But how sad is it that these changes have to come from General Convention rather than the benevolence of parish vestries. Trinity has a relatively good track record in employee benefits. That is to the credit of our past vestries, but as the endowment shrinks and our ability to support full and half time paychecks decreases we will face some hard choices.

There are no easy answers, but this I know… the church’s failure to live up to the Gospel teachings is a result of human frailty and the only solution for human failure is faith in God to do what we are incapable of doing. Through worship, prayer, and service the church can and should – MUST – be God’s body in the world. Where there is hatred, we must sow love; where there is injury, we must offer pardon; where there is discord we must stand in unity; where there is doubt, we must stand by our faith; where there is despair, we must offer hope; where there is darkness, we must be the window to light; where there is sadness, we must bring joy. (My apologies to St Francis)

This summer I hope to explore with you how we at Trinity might live into that gospel imperative. In the lesson for Pentecost, Jesus offers us the promise of Peace for our souls, power to make a difference, insight into God’s Purpose for us, and the Presence of the Holy Spirit empowering us and sending us out. We can and must set the example for this world in all that we do and say.

Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.... Jesus said that - really!

2011-05-07T19:41:00.001-04:00

O God, the Father of all, whose Son commanded us to love our enemies: Lead them and us from prejudice to truth: deliver them and us from hatred, cruelty, and revenge; and in your good time enable us all to stand reconciled before you, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. -from BCP

I am a little late in getting this blog up this week. Clergy Conference entered in to the delay, but honestly I was not sure what I was going to say. Last Monday morning I woke up about 4 AM and turned on my computer to veg out for a while. The first thing I saw was an image of a bunch of kids in front of the White House fence looking like they were drunk and celebrating the Red Sox winning the World Series. Then I read the caption. I was stunned.

I like many others had an instant flashback of children on the West Bank celebrating the deaths at the World Trade Center on 9/11. I could not believe that these young people were Americans. I have heard others say as the week went by that they were not really celebrating the death of a human being (however reprehensible that human being might have been) – they were celebrating the relief from anxiety. I don’t buy that. I think it is an indicator of a much deeper wound in America.

I believe that we are in grave danger of losing our reverence for life and honestly I think that we have brought it on ourselves. We have failed to instill in our children a respect for the dignity of all human life and we have failed to teach them that their actions have consequences. I believe that in our culture today there is a sense that things happen somewhere else. A missile is fired and the news reports that a village was accidentally destroyed. The next day someone walks into a market place and takes his own life and that of 50 more people. My point is that I read it in the paper and then I move on and enjoy my coffee. Don’t get smug – I know you do it too! There is so much pain and suffering in the world that one more act of violence is just the reality of life.

Don’t get me wrong. I am grateful to the Navy SEALS and I am relieved and yes glad that bin Laden is dead. I do not believe in my heart that he would have ever seen the harm he was doing or cared a whit for the lives he took and so I am certain that his death was necessary to prevent more atrocities, but I do not believe that God is rejoicing over his demise.

In this passage from Ezekiel the prophet warns against doing evil, but does not overlook God’s compassion for the worst offender: “Therefore I will judge you, O house of Israel, all of you according to your ways, says the Lord GOD. Repent and turn from all your transgressions; otherwise iniquity will be your ruin. Cast away from you all the transgressions that you have committed against me, and get yourselves a new heart and a new spirit! Why will you die, O house of Israel? For I have no pleasure in the death of anyone, says the Lord GOD. Turn, then, and live.” Ez 18: 30-35

I began with a prayer from the BCP. I can’t always pray that prayer with integrity, but I do think that praying it helps me to overcome the anger and fear that I feel on the inside – and I think that is what God wants from me. You too…..

The chaos of the palms

2011-04-17T17:37:00.001-04:00

Ya gotta love it! I suspect that on that day some 2000 years ago when Jesus and the gang left Bethany and rode into Jerusalem there was absolute chaos. Donkey poop on the ground, people's cloaks getting dragged through the sand, children crying, mother's keening, men shouting back and forth to one another. On the other side of town there was the Roman army riding in from the west. I suspect there was much more order there. Instead of a wall of folks trying to see, I'll bet they were hiding behind the walls hoping not to draw attention and perhaps wrath.

Jesus did just the opposite. He was a man on a mission and nothing would stand in his way. More about that later. Now back to Trinity...

Today at Trinity there were babies crying, a great log jam in front of the altar during the procession, people shuffling in and out, newcomers wandering in off the street (quick - put them on a committee), in a word pure bedlam. Or at least it seemed so to me... But in fact there were smiles, nods, a few tears as we read the Passion with a drum beat in the background, a dedicated youngster leading our procession carrying a huge cross with such dignity, and an absolutely breath-taking anthem from the choir. What a day. What a story. What a week to come.

To my friends who will celebrate Passover this week - you will be in my prayers. Shalom my friends. To those who might be seeking a church home - come try the Episcopal Church - we truly do want to worship with you. To those who are my brothers and sisters at Trinity - thank you for you dedication, your discipleship, and your participation in the chaos of Palm Sunday. It has been a wonderful day.

You just never know where you will find good leadership!

2011-04-04T18:17:00.002-04:00

Samuel was pooped. he had spent years trying to convince God that Israel really did need a king and finally God had caved. So Samuel had anointed Saul as king. Could have been OK but Saul kept messing up and finally God said that he needed to be replaced. So God told Samuel t make his way over to Saul's camp and tell the brute that he was fired. Hmmmmm I don't think so says Sam. But as is typical of God there was just no denying him. And so Sam found himself going to visit Jesse and check out his sons. You know the story if you were in church last week. No one seemed to be the right candidate for king. But Jesse had one more son. A good looking guy who was outworking while everyone else partied. When Samuel saw David he knew he was the one and he anointed him king over Israel. Of course we also know that he was no perfect person. David was arrogant, spoiled, greedy, murderous, and a lot else in his life, but still we know him as one who returned over and over to the Lord. I guess he was a pretty good choice - better than most.

Here in the 21st century, in Haverhill, at Trinity and beyond can be hopeful hearing this story. We are not perfect either, but each Lent we take off our masks, open our hearts to God's admonishment, f9forgiveness, and compassion. and each Lent we turn our hopeful faces toward Easter. Alleluia! Whoops! It just slipped out.

Living Water - John Chapter 4

2011-03-26T13:56:00.002-04:00

You know we talked about this story on Thursday evening at the midweek Eucharist, it is the gospel lesson for this Sunday, and here I am throwing it in again. And to top it all off I am leaving for a retreat where I will be "Called Back to the Well"

In this passage the Samaritan woman is asking Jesus the obvious question. She might have added "You dummy! Where do you think you are going to get water without a bucket?" Clearly Jesus was in a different place spiritually at that moment.

What Jesus is telling us is that God is the source of life itself and in Jesus - in his ministry, his teaching, his leading, and his death and resurrection we can KNOW God in a way that we have never known God before. God is revealed to us in the Word that we hear on Sunday morning and in the relationships we nurture each day.

Sex and stuff

2011-03-21T11:36:00.003-04:00

Today the SSJE reflection was about the discomfort of talking about sex in their newer permutation of The Rule. Brother David said that it seems more natural now to talk about this and other worldly matters than it did several years ago.
For me this brings up the difficulty of talking about hard issues with the congregation. From the simple stuff like pledging and church attendance to the harder stuff – naming the hurtful and in fact sinful acts that go on in human lives.

Recently I spoke with someone who told me about being addicted to pornography and that it had almost broken up the marriage. This was not the first person to come to me with this issue. Talk about awkward! Instantly I go over where my buttons are on this topic so that I can be present and not be judgmental, preachy, or condescending. This is hard stuff for both of us. Can you imagine how much courage it takes to come and talk with a priest about such weaknesses? Fear, shame, guilt, anger - all of these come up.

I think for me the grounding in these conversations is to recognize that I too am pitifully inadequate at perfection! When it gets down to basics we all miss the mark and need to be forgiven, encouraged, and loved. Turning my head away and playing like sin does not exist does no one any good. I hope that my parishioners will always feel that they can come to me with whatever is weighing heavily and know that I will listen, recognize that they are children of God just as I am, grieve with them over their short-comings, celebrate with them new ways of living fully, and reassure them of God’s forgiveness and love.

Sometimes you just have to look at hard things in the eye and name them.

Family time

2011-03-18T10:08:00.000-04:00

What is your spiritual practice? Today a member of the Fellowship of SSJE wrote about the importance of not letting rigid attention to a particular practice (in her case reading Morning Prayer) get in the way of her important family time obligations. She makes the point that the relationships we nurture by spending time with family and friends are a spiritual practice in themselves.

I could not agree more. In fact, I find that my faith is all tied up in all that I do. Sometimes as a young mother and wife making eggs and biscuits on a Sunday morning and sharing a long, laughter filled breakfast with my family was as much a prayer as any I could have offered in church. Now that is not to say that community worship is not important to me. If you asked my family they would tell you that I took us to church every time the doors opened. But perspective and balance is critical to healthy spiritual practice I think. Framing family time with hope and joy in God’s Kingdom is I think exactly what God has in mind for us when he set us in families. It is a beautiful… and spiritual thing….

Embarrassed by money?

2011-03-17T14:38:00.002-04:00

Brother Curtis’ comments today about the hesitancy of the brothers to talk about money struck a chord with me. He says that the subject of money causes embarrassment because they are so dependent on their benefactors to support them.

Church folks also have a lot of trouble talking about money – me included. And I think embarrassment plays a part. We are embarrassed as a church community because we can’t have all of the programs that we want or because we cannot give to all the causes that we want or because we can’t repair the building like we want. Individually, we are embarrassed because we don’t feel like our small contribution is going to be valued or because we feel pressured to give more, or because we want to give more but we feel that we cannot. Maybe embarrassed is not the only operative feeling here but I don’t think that is as important as the context through which all of these feelings come.

What I do think is operative is whether we come from a theology of scarcity or a theology of abundance. Do we see God’s love as being parceled out only to those who deserve it or do we see God’s love lavished out to all comers in a never-ending stream? Likewise do I view my pledge as my having shared my wealth with God or do I see it as God’s abundant gift to me of which I use what I need and share the rest? Aye there’s the rub!

Committee Meetings!

2011-03-14T19:02:00.000-04:00

Today Brother Jonathan said that rewriting the Rule with his brothers seemed sometimes to be pedestrian and pedantic. My mind immediately went to committee meetings at church! Vestry can be exhausting and exasperating for all. Worship committee believe it or not can become contentious. Who’d a thought! But then the time comes when we gather as a faith community, as a family, and worship and work and play – and it feels really good. I think that is because when we give the time and energy to do that tough work the Holy Spirit takes over and brings in the fresh air of joy.

Not sure what the title of this might be

2011-03-12T11:18:00.002-05:00

Today Brother Curtis commented that as they considered their tradition as it is expressed in the Rule, they allowed themselves to hear all observations regardless of how expansive they might be. Surprisingly they found that some of the most important observations were of the more traditional nature.

Hmmm I wonder what emotions or feelings will surface for us as we begin using Rite I liturgy tomorrow? I suppose some will be totally lost, some will feel frustrated with the length and detail of the liturgy, some will be bored by the redundancy of the prayers of the people. I hope that some will be caught by the music of the verse, by the wisdom of Eucharistic Prayer – “we present unto thee, ourselves, our souls, and our bodies to be a reasonable holy and living sacrifice unto thee.” Now there is a Memorial Acclimation if I ever heard one! In the Rite II prayer the acclimation is “We proclaim the mystery of faith Christ has died, Christ is risen, Christ will come again” That is a statement of belief. Rite I is a statement of faithful service.

What do you think?

Passing on the baton

2011-03-11T13:02:00.000-05:00

Today the brothers wrote of the responsibility to “pass the baton” to the next generation. The passing on of the baton is the former’s way of participating in the new ministry. Brother Kevin went on to say that the SSJE rule, and by implication – tradition is a framework for growth and has possibilities within it.
I think he is onto something but I do not agree that by passing on the baton we participate in the next generation’s ministry. That to me is a cop out. If all we do is pass on the baton then what we are saying is that we have done our part and now it is time for you to do your part. I believe that ministry happens when we all participate in all of the parts. Our heritage is more than a framework it is the substance through which the new is made. Transformation does not cull any of the substance. Transformation takes the whole thing and creates something new. If we do not know our roots intimately then we will not be able to imagine the possibilities for the new shoots.

Here is the link to the SSJE blog

http://ssje.org/lent/?p=47

Tradition

2011-03-10T09:35:00.003-05:00

Handing on the tradition is the topic for the brothers today. Brother Kevin valued tradition, but acknowledged that some of it would not stand the test of time. Interesting, as last night was our first service in which we used the Rite I liturgy. In our commitment to experiencing the vast wealth of our liturgical tradition as Episcopalians we vary our prayers from season to season. Last summer we were over the top with contemporary liturgy and this Lent we are returning to our roots with Rite I. Perhaps this is a way for the next generation to make informed choice about what tradition to keep and what to leave behind.

To access the SSJE Lenten reflection on the Rule go to:
https://mail.google.com/mail/#inbox/12ea017de89f1c14

Ash Wednesday and the Brother's blog

2011-03-09T08:48:00.001-05:00

http://ssje.org/word/?p=1116&utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+ssje%2Flent+%28Lent+with+SSJE%29

I was surprised to read this in the early morning hours as I madly got ready for the first service for Ash Wednesday. I was thinking about Psalm 51 and a midrash on the Ark of the Covenant comparing the gold on the inside and out as a metaphor for our need for spiritual disciplines that we should be clean on inside and outside as this was to form the crux of my sermon. And then I read that we are to "gaze on the world and see it full of possibility". I think that is harder than "knowing all my transgressions" in a season in which I will call the congregation to a season of penitence. BUT the SSJE brothers are right on.... I say YES the world is full of possibility as our reason for all this reflection is to identify that possibility both in the world and in ourselves. So fling open the doors and let's ride the possibility!

Time to take off the mask

2011-03-08T19:04:00.000-05:00

Lent is not about being careful not to sin for 40 days or adding some sort of special discipline in order to make us more acceptable to God. Lent is not even just about journeying with Jesus through study and prayer. Lent is about a very personal openness. It is about opening our own hearts and souls up so much that we invite and allow God's very heart to pierce us through and through. The spiritual disciplines invite us to remove from our lives the impediments and distractions that might prevent us from entering into intimacy with God.

Yesterday was Mardi Gras, Fat Tuesday. Mardi Gras is a wild party time with foods and drink aplenty and lots of horn blowing and bead throwing. During Mardi Gras we wear masks on our faces and we dress in wildly colored outfits. And wherever Mardi Gras is celebrated the revelers do things that are not part of their everyday experiences. The masks and the costumes whether simple or extravagant, provide a level of anonymity that is key to the attraction of Mardi Gras. It is a time that we are not really ourselves, but rather live behind a cloud of disguise and mystery. We can be the life of the party without risking failure because no one knows who we really are.

But when Mardi Gras ends and Lent begins the revelers remove their masks and reveal themselves as the very human beings that they were all along. The removal of the mask is a symbolic opening of self to being known – a move from anonymity to recognition. If we choose to delve deeply into ourselves and to seek the heart of God then we will remove our masks of pretense and pomposity because, you see, for God to love us, we do not need a mask. For God to love us we do not have to pretend to be someone or something else. We do not have to pretend that we do not make mistakes, or hurt other people, or hurt ourselves, or turn away from God. For God to love us we need only to ask for forgiveness and to continue to be open and receptive to God's possibilities and we will find Jesus there, loving us the whole time. For God to love us – we do not need a mask.

Get out of the boat!

2011-02-21T12:52:00.007-05:00

Funny how you can read a passage over and over and then all of a sudden someone says something about it and you see it in a whole new light.... I am working with some great folks putting together a class at EDS for helping parishes create "Diaconal Congregations" For my part I hope to share some of my experience on the Gulf Coast working with Redeemer and Main Street Baptist. I am clearly out of my league with the academic expertise of the group! Humility is a good thing with Lent approaching. Anyway we were selecting scripture references to use and one person suggested that the "story of Jesus commanding Peter to get out of the boat might be good. I responded "I don't think Jesus commanded him - I think he did it on his own. Well suck it up Jane... Here is the passage... It picks up just after Jesus says that "Do not be afraid" thing...

28 Peter answered him, "Lord, if it is you, command me to come to you on the water." 29 He said, "Come." So Peter got out of the boat, started walking on the water, and came toward Jesus. 30 But when he noticed the strong wind, he became frightened, and beginning to sink, he cried out, "Lord, save me!" 31 Jesus immediately reached out his hand and caught him, saying to him, "You of little faith, why did you doubt?" 32 When they got into the boat, the wind ceased. 33 And those in the boat worshiped him, saying, "Truly you are the Son of God." Mt 14: 28-33

I had preached on this passage several times - talked about leaning on Jesus for faith, having God present through all sorts of turmoil, witnessing to the reality of the Incarnation, but never had I reflected on what seems so obvious now: Jesus commanding Peter to move away from his comfort zone and get out into the water. Wading out into the tumultuous sea can be as simple as believing that Haverhill can be a better place to live and punctuating that belief with a blog called Haverhill Fever or a volunteer group called Team Haverhill. It can be as simple as deciding to break the pattern of violence in our cities by participating in a Neighborhood Watch or attending town meetings and finding ways to provide safe recreation for young people.

Stepping outside one's comfort zone requires that one learn about the issues involved, listen to all of the voices who speak, but not be swayed by the voices of fear or greed. It requires that one be committed to the long haul - few of society's ills have been solved overnight. It requires seeking out others to work with you and being open to ideas that are not your own. But most of all it requires that one believe that they can make a difference. I love the starfish story where the guy is throwing the beached starfish back into the sea. There are way more than he can throw and someone chastises him saying that he is wasting time he will not make a difference to the starfish. He responds as he throws one back. "I made a difference to that one"!

Stepping outside the boat risks sinking in the overwhelming turmoil that is our world today. Which brings me back to the lesson in Matthew. Peter, realizing that he is sinking fast calls out to Jesus, "Lord save me". I wish I had a nickel for every time I have cried out "Lord Help Me" (or as we say in the South - "Hep me!") The one constant that we have and can count on when we choose to do God's work in the world is that when we cry out, Jesus will reach out and give us a hand up - no questions asked. So I say - take the chance, look around, you can make a difference. Get out of the boat and throw some starfish.

Ruminating on violence

2011-01-22T15:10:00.002-05:00

This has been an odd month for me. It began in a relatively warm New Orleans with a wedding and a plethora of activities surrounding it. And then I was back in New England battling the cold and snow with everyone else. The world and all that was going on in it slipped to the back burner. A friend called and invited me to come over for supper. I readily accepted. And then as we were sitting down to eat, I heard that there had been a shooting in Arizona. I listened, unbelieving, but realizing that tragedy have come yet again to this country.
Driving home I knew we needed to do something to allow folks to name their feelings – anger, fear, confusion… whatever or wherever they were. And so I did what any savvy web surfer would do – I combed the internet for some prayers. Found some too and then adapted them to our parish and to the tragedy at hand. On Sunday morning I located the music director and said.. “No opening hymn. We are going to enter in silence and read a litany together to mark the deaths of the people in Tuscon. In less than 5 minutes she had a suitable music program to use. It was a powerful beginning to the Eucharist.
I mention this because I think it speaks to the importance of who we are as a church. It speaks to our mission in the world. Community service is important, building fellowship is important too. But without a doubt I believe that the single most important thing that we do in church is to provide a space for a hurting world to encounter the Divine. Yes, I can pray at home, yes, I can worship God when I am walking outdoors, no I don’t need a priest to mediate my conversation with God. But when the community is violated, when there seems to be no rhyme nor reason to the violence – the church provides the words and the space to lay it before God. The mission of the church is to bring all people back to God. Sacramental worship is one good avenue for that.

A note on Advent

2010-12-06T21:57:00.002-05:00

Happy New Year! Break out the noise makers and champagne!

Well maybe not. But still Advent marks the beginning of the church’s liturgical year. The word “liturgy”, my handy dandy on-line dictionary tells me, is derived from a Greek word meaning “people” and refers to public worship or loosely “the people’s work”. The liturgical year then is the work that the people of God do to acknowledge the action of God in our lives in various ways and at various times. As the church year evolves we recapitulate salvation history. Remember a few months ago when I preached about lex orandi – lex credendi (praying shapes believing)? As the liturgical year changes, our gestures and our words change to reflect the season. In that way our praying shapes and informs our understanding and our experience of God. Our movements are a tangible reflection of our relationship with God. The seasons vary from preparatory to penitential to celebratory. The colors, the music, the prayers, and (when use incense) the smells move the liturgy with the seasons and inform us about God’s presence in our lives.

During Advent we will use a more penitential liturgy because it is a season of preparation. We begin with the lighting of the Advent Wreath – the breaking-in of God’s Light into the darkness of chaos. Our hymns move into a minor key and we drop the song of praise. We spend Advent in a sort of suspended animation, waiting and hoping for God to come among us in flesh. This “Incarnation”, God taking on our very humanness, is at the core of our understanding of our relationship with God, and yet it is one of the most preposterous tenets of Christianity – a totally unreasonable hope. But God did - and that has made all the difference.

After Annunciation

This is the irrational season
When love blooms bright and wild.
Had Mary been filled with reason
There’d have been no room for the child.
Madeleine L’Engle

Time to pay attention

2010-11-26T12:53:00.001-05:00

41 As he came near and saw the city, he wept over it, 42saying, ‘If you, even you, had only recognized on this day the things that make for peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes. 43Indeed, the days will come upon you, when your enemies will set up ramparts around you and surround you, and hem you in on every side. 44They will crush you to the ground, you and your children within you, and they will not leave within you one stone upon another; because you did not recognize the time of your visitation from God.’* Luke 19:41-44

This was the lesson for one of the Thursday evening Eucharists during November. I had never really paid much attention to this passage. It is surrounded by much more familiar verses. Preceding it is the triumphant entrance into Jerusalem on a donkey and immediately following is the story of turning over the stalls of the money changers. They are much more familiar stories.

What struck me was the line “If you – even you had only recognized on this say the things that make for peace”. What a tragedy for us that we do not stop long enough in our hectic lives to see the things that make for peace. A few years ago I helped put together a Quiet Day for Advent that was called Welcoming the Prince of Peace. We used several readings from the prophetic texts. I never like to read into those texts a prediction of the coming of Jesus, but for sure the Christmas cards calling for peace on earth are grounded in them.

That is harder than we might think. So many things get in the way – the need to succeed in business, the desire for more and more wealth, the struggle for power and sway, our egos, our selfishness… The list could probably fill a book. But Jesus tells us that our very salvation hangs on our willingness to put ourselves to the side and to pay attention for the opportunities in our lives to recognize the things that make for peace. This lesson is a wake-up call for each of us and for the church to look and listen to the cries for help on the street, to work for solutions to the problems of poverty, homelessness, hunger, violence. Who is calling to me that I am not hearing? How can Trinity be more relevant in facing the needs of our city?

I think it starts by stopping the hectic pace and waiting for God. Truth is often revealed when we least expect it and form the least likely sources. Advent is a good time to do wait and watch. We are waiting for the visitation of God in the Incarnation. Don’t miss it!

Let's talk about bullying

2010-11-08T23:41:00.003-05:00

I ran across this link tonight. It is an engaging video by Kermit the Frog titled "It Gets Better"

http://www.dailyoffice.org/

Providing a safe place for children is more than doing mandatory safe church training and CORI checks. It is setting an example for children to follow. It is not choosing violence (physical or verbal) as a first option when faced with conflict. It is not turning our backs on our brothers and sisters who are in pain or want. It is not building ourselves up on the backs of others. And it is teaching these things to our children.

Providing a safe place for children is also living in a place of joy and hope. It is strengthening the faith community by working within it to further God's Kingdom. It is turning back to God when we stray and do those things which we ought not to have done and forgotten those which we ought. It is loving God and neighbor and acting like it when we drive a car. It is not turning to the "F" word every time we are disgruntled. For heaven's sake if we do then what is left to say when things really get bad?

I think these things have everything to do with bullying. What do you think?

The Feast of All Saints

2010-11-01T18:28:00.002-04:00

All Saints Day carries a special significance for me. It is not just another feast day on the Anglican calendar. It is special because I am a Saint. I have been one since 1963. What’s more I have lots of sisters and some brothers who are Saints too. We are Saints because we all attended a school that was founded in 1903 as All Saints’ Episcopal School of Vicksburg Mississippi. We lived in Green Hall (of the bishop kind) and we studied, competed, laughed, and grew to be adults together. We also wore scratchy grey suits on All Saints Day.

Now thanks to those Harvard boys who invented Facebook and the tenacity of one of our classmates, we routinely share pictures of our grandchildren, our vacations, and our aging faces that for the most part still have a twinkle in the eye. The community of Saints is strong. I believe that the tie that binds us is strong because it was formed in the rhythm of worship and prayer and thanksgiving to God for all our blessings. Not always in ways that we as teens might have wanted, but for sure in ways that taught us the meaning of such words as respect, honesty, compassion, humility, honor, gratitude, and love. We did not become Saints’ because of our scholastic achievements or because we were members of the Canterbury Choir or the Letter Club. We became Saints because of the sense of community and mutual hope that was infused into our study, our play, and our worship.

So here is my point: The Saints of God, those who we remember and honor on this Feast of All Saints, are not saints because of their tenacity or their sacrifice, or even their martyrdom. They are you and me and Grandmother and Grandfather and Aunt Ethel – they are everyone who has been made perfect through the birth, life, death, resurrection, and ascension of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Saints do not become saints because of their good works – they are saints through the Grace and Love of God - the good works are our loving response. That is good news for those of us still slogging it out here on Earth. We are all saints of God, through faith and in community. Happy All Saints’ Day!

Open my eyes that I may see

2010-10-22T18:44:00.005-04:00

I get a lot of emails. I suspect you do too. I delete most of them without a second glance – especially “forwards”. One though caught my eye. It was from a friend in MS. The story went something like this. A young man who had lost his eyesight was sitting on the corner panhandling. He held up a sign that said “I am blind, Please Help” Very few people dropped money into his cup. Then another person walked by, picked up his sign, and changed the message. From that point on “his cup runneth over? (with apologies to Psalm 23). The man had changed the sign to read: “today is a beautiful day, but I am not able to see it” I was saddened by the story. The “moral” was of course about resourcefulness and ingenuity, but for me this story was about the great sadness of how so many of us go day by day in places of anger or regret or resentfulness – negative approaches to the richness of God’s creation. People who can only see theirs and other’s limitations are blind to the potential of God’s work in us.

It reminded me of the lesson from Ephesians at our Thursday night Eucharist. Ephesians is one of the epistles and was written as a sermon of sorts for the churches of Asia Minor. Ephesians, Philippians, and 1 Thessalonians are my favorite epistles. Ephesians carries the reader from the cosmic ramifications of God’s action in Jesus Christ to the movement of God’s Spirit in creation. The images of church and Christian life are of family and sustenance through Grace. Ephesians leaves no doubt that life eternal is not the result of individual actions, but is accomplished through God’s action and we are called to faith in God. The church as God’s family is to be the herald of God’s wisdom, love, and grace to the hurting world. But the greatest thing about it is this heartfelt prayer that the author offers for those in the church who are charged to be God’s hands and feet in the world and who must endure in an uncertain and often hostile world. He says: “I bow my knees before the Father,* from whom every family* in heaven and on earth takes its name. I pray that, according to the riches of his glory, he may grant that you may be strengthened in your inner being with power through his Spirit, and that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith, as you are being rooted and grounded in love. I pray that you may have the power to comprehend, with all the saints, what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, so that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.” Eph 3:14-19

Blindness to God’s work in us comes from placing our trust – our faith – in human resources rather than looking to God for strength and power to live as faithful servants. This epistle is good news indeed to us. It is magnificent because it reminds us that the power at work in us can accomplish far more then all that we can ask or imagine.
Wow – what a great gift!

"Open my eyes, that I may see
glimpses of truth thou hast for me;
place in my hands the wonderful key
that shall unclasp and set me free.
Silently now I wait for thee,
ready, my God, thy will to see.
Open my eyes, illumine me, Spirit divine!"
-a portion of a hymn written by Clara H Scott 1841-1897

Christian Education or not?

2010-09-28T17:40:00.002-04:00

There is a BCP collect that we read in November that prays:
"Blessed Lord, who caused all holy Scriptures to be written for our learning: Grant us so to hear them, read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest them, that we may embrace and ever hold fast the blessed hope of everlasting life, which you have given us in our Savior Jesus Christ; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen."

A friend emailed an article to me (see link below) about the inability of most Christians to articulate the basic tenets of their faith. A couple of problems here I think. First if we have not read, marked, learned and inwardly digested the teachings of the prophets and of Jesus and even the learnings of a fledgling church then how will we manifest those teachings in our daily lives. Secondly when confronted with someone who spouts inaccurate interpretations of our own faith texts then how will be discern the truth and stand the moral ground. Christian education is important because without it we only follow blindly the customs of our childhood. Which reminds me of the Pauline live about "when I was a child I..., but when I became an adult I put away..." Furthermore without the study and prayer that are central to Christian life, the passion for ministry soon dies and the world fills the gap.

Another problem that I see is the fear that comes when something different or strange presents and we have no knowledge base to reconcile it to our own faith. Take a look at the article and let me know what you think...

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/39397251/ns/us_news-life/

Herod did what?

2010-09-23T22:44:00.003-04:00

Interesting Gospel tonight at the mid-week Eucharist.

7 Now Herod the ruler* heard about all that had taken place, and he was perplexed, because it was said by some that John had been raised from the dead, 8by some that Elijah had appeared, and by others that one of the ancient prophets had arisen. 9Herod said, ‘John I beheaded; but who is this about whom I hear such things?’ And he tried to see him. Luke 9:7-9

I found it to be a bit abrupt so I went digging to see what came before and after. The beginning of Luke 9 has Jesus sending the disciples out to cure, heal, and proclaim. And there were amazing things accomplished. Luke tells us that they did these miracles everywhere. That was what herod had heard about and he was "perplexed". Curious perhaps? Wondering? What caught my eye was that Herod tried to "see him". Did I read that correctly? Harod considered seeking out Jesus to see what was up with this guy? Well yes, at least according to Luke.

I think the take away here is that each and every day we have opportunities to startle or perplex someone to wonder what it is that gives us hope or strength or joy. Our actions tell others that we want to share the love God gives to us with them so that they will know this joy also. I don't even think that you or I realize when we catch someone's interest and perhaps create some awareness of God's action in the world. Halloween concerts, Easter parties, music lessons, a willingness to listen, a stern look when danger is near - how about a hug when the day is not going well, or a kind wish for a better day tomorrow. These are the ways we connect with God and with each other. These are the ways we get the Herod's of our world to wonder at the miracle of God acting in the world and perhaps to try to see Him. (or Her)

Jane+

The Crazy Woman with the Alabaster Jar

2010-09-16T23:48:00.003-04:00

Tonight at our mid-week Eucharist the lesson was from Luke. Jesus goes to eat with Simon who was a Pharisee. A woman comes in quite unannounced and proceeds to bathe and anoint Jesus' feet using some ointment and her hair. It is all a very sensuous scene. I can just imagine those dark piercing eyes gazing up at Jesus from the floor. Simon is horrified, but Jesus points out that Yes, she is a sinner of the most flagrant kind but that just means that when God's forgiveness becomes part of her life she will be even the more grateful.

So this is what I am thinking... I wonder if her gratitude will include her willingness to offer the same to others and to take to heart the Gospel imperative to serve. I wonder if my gratitude at having been forgiven for my repetitive sins (I think sometimes that I should just carry a laminated sheet to my confessor) - I wonder if that compels me to try to be more compassionate, loving, caring, a better listener, a more willing servant. I think so... I hope so.... I try

I love this story because it cuts to the chase. It is not the person who puffs up with all the right answers who rings Jesus' bell. It is the sex worker who is grateful for Jesus' having seen her as a person and forgiving her for her sins to whom Jesus reaches out. I'll bet she did take that forgiveness to heart and pass it forward.

Reflection on Ground Zero

2010-09-11T17:17:00.001-04:00

I wrote this shortly after Daphne and I returned from NYC having served as ARC chaplains in the temporary morgue. I am very conscience of the loss of compassion in these days of political wrangling over the Mosque near GZ. Tomorrow I preach on the search for the lost sheep and the lost coin. (Luke 15:1-10) The controversy makes we wonder if perhaps it is we who have lost our bearings.

November 2001 a reflection

On Monday Nov. 19, 2001, I boarded a bus in South Station for Manhattan. I traveled with fellow deacon, Daphne Noyes. We were responding to a call for help from deacons in New York, to serve as chaplain at the World Trade Center site. A site known as the HellHole, the Pit, the Pile, Ground Zero. We arrived early, met our contact person, Keith, and headed down Fulton Street to the temporary morgue that was set up just a few yards from what was left of the twin towers.

Once in the morgue we met those chaplains whom we were relieving. One was a Rabbi and one a Catholic Priest. We discussed the importance of offering prayers over the remains that would be appropriately ecumenical for civilian casualties. We chose to pray with the Psalms, the 121st and the 23rd. Then we were briefed on our duties. We were to wait until we got a call that one of the spotters had found remains. Then we were to go with the EMTs into the hole to pray with the laborers and fireman who were there. We would accompany the remains to the morgue where a medical examiner would determine, if in fact, there were human remains present and whether or not the remains were that of a person of service, a fireman or policeman. If so, the body bag would be draped with an American flag. We were to offer prayers for the deceased and for the men and women working there and an honor guard would stand watch while the flag draped litter was carried to an ambulance to be transported to the main morgue at Bellevue Hospital. - I have never prayed so hard in my life. I prayed for those who lost their lives. I prayed for the men and women who had survived. I prayed for those of us who felt distant and helpless in the face of such an evil act. And I prayed for myself - that I would not shrink from the horrific sight of burned mortality, that I would have the right words to offer when we cried, that I would not get sick from the smell.

After a short time, Keith took us out of the morgue to walk the perimeter and to meet and talk with some of the people working on the site. As we approached the Hole the smell of acrid, moist air grew strong. I reached for my respirator, but hesitated wanting somehow to feel with all of my senses in order to try to grasp what had happened here. There were piles and piles of colorless soot, twisted steel, junk. Everywhere I looked there were huge digging machines, taking bite after bite out of the junk and placing it on the side of the hole. Then the jaws would sift and sift to allow the spotters time to look for buried equipment, clothing, or burned flesh and bones. There was a constant trail of smoke rising from various spots. The pile was still burning deep within its bowels. Each time the jaws would pull up a hot steel girder the smoke would increase, the smell would become stronger, and the water cannon would send long streams of water high into the air and flood the burning hole. Clouds of steam would rise up like a mushroom cloud. As we walked we saw and heard, off in the distance, a wrecking ball as it demolished piece after piece of the Customs House in one loud crash after another. Steel and ash got loaded onto great dump trucks and flat beds that made there way out of Manhattan to Fresh Kill, the dump site that has become the resting place for the once great buildings. Each truck was washed under overhead sprinklers before it left the site. Everything gets washed before it leaves Ground Zero, trucks, trash, boots, and hands.

As we walked around the site we were greeted by smiles and waves. Men and women who were grateful for a listening ear. Before I left Boston, I wondered what our place would be here. I know now. As men and women we have no place, but God does and we are privileged to be offered an opportunity to remind the phenomenal men and women working there that God is there with them. We offer some order and control over the process of removing the remains and for that ritual the laborers and the men of service seem to be very grateful. I rode around the site one night on a buggy with a contractor who had been in Tower 1. He escaped but a laborer that he had laid off two weeks before had gotten a job on the 110 floor. We talked for a while about being a survivor and how much that can hurt and how hard you work in the aftermath. We reminded each other of God's peace and parted. He had a really nice smile.

Thanksgiving Day the Red Cross had neglected to schedule anyone to relieve us so we worked on – 37 hours. I slept for a while at St. Paul’s Church. St. Paul’s is a church that is located on the corner of Broadway and Fulton, just two blocks from the heart of what was the World Trade Center. St. Paul’s was covered by ash and debris in the tragedy there but the structure itself was not heavily damaged. Almost immediately after the disaster the people of St. Paul’s converted the church to a shelter for the workers at the Pile. They have provided clothing, food, beds, medical help, and a spiritual refuge for literally thousands of men and women who entered there exhausted - physically, mentally, and spiritually. Every inch of open space is covered with notes of thanks and encouragement from people all over the world.

Early on the morning of Thanksgiving the digging stopped as spotters had seen the bodies of two firemen and the partial remains of several civilians. Daphne went into the Pit while I waited and prayed as each bag was brought into the morgue. I have never felt so helpless in my life. But I have also never felt so privileged. Privileged to have served. Privileged to have offered reassurance of God’s presence and love. Privileged to have walked along the last few feet to the vehicle that would carry those heroes away.

The great plumes of gas, steam, and debris that rise up out of the pit each time the digger hits a pocket of hot metal - set beside the sacredness of the effort that is going on there are a constant reminder of God’s presence. Man cannot bring life back from the pit. Only God can do that. But what I saw there was the human expression of God’s work through the work of those men and women. God and man are about the business of cleaning up evil's mess. Ground Zero is holy ground and the hands of the men and women who struggle there are holy hands. The evil that visited there wanted to create darkness, but the darkness is giving way to the light of compassion, the light of self-sacrifice, the light of love.

The Cost of Discipleship

2010-09-06T14:44:00.002-04:00

"So therefore, none of you can become my disciple if you do not give up all your possessions." Luke 14:33

Jesus asks us to give up all of our possessions and follow. There is a Jewish tradition, a play I think, about two young men who were the best of friends. They wanted to cement their friendship forever and so they made a pack that if one should have a girl and the other a boy they would agree to give them in marriage as a way of expressing their commitment and love for each other. As fate would have it one friend became a scholar of modest means and the other wealthy merchant. The scholar had a son who grew us to follow in his Dad's footsteps and the merchant friend had a daughter. The children grew up and met and fell in love. When the merchant friend found out, he refused his blessing on the marriage as he wanted his daughter to marry someone of higher social standing. In typical Greek tragedy fashion the young man was heart broken and died from loneliness. When he died his spirit sought out and entered the heart of the girl he loved who was now betrothed to someone else. But before that marriage could take place her lover’s spirit had to be exorcised from her - so the merchant father called the rabbi to come and do the deed. When the Rabbi arrived the merchant asked him why God would do such a thing to him as this. The Rabbi asked him to look out the window and to tell him what he saw there. The man answered "I see people going by". Then the rabbi held up a mirror and asked him what he saw. The man answered "I see myself". "Yes" said the Rabbi, "there is only a coating of silver that separated one piece of glass from the other, but it is when that silver blocks our view of the people going by and only lets us see ourselves that we lose sight of God's desire for us. ….. A single opaque covering of silver. That silver might be made of money, or power, or greed or hate or maybe something else. But whatever it is it blocks our view of others and that in turn blocks our view of God. This is the cost of discipleship.

In calling for our undivided attention and devotion Jesus is not talking about self-sacrifice that saps our strength and our will. Rather, He offers complete and spontaneous love that builds, sustains, and comforts us and those we serve. Choosing the life of a disciple is not necessarily about what feels good or makes us happy. It is not really about self-fulfillment or satisfaction in a job well done. Faithful discipleship, according to Jesus, involves "hating" everything that gives us self -sufficiency - in exchange for sharing the burdens of others in the same way that Christ shares our burdens.

The challenges to choose life, discipleship, and the way of the cross are ultimately about where we place our allegiance. It is a matter of where our focus lies. We choose discipleship when we love, obey and hold fast to God.

Living water and leaking cisterns

2010-08-28T19:30:00.000-04:00

The lesson from the Hebrew scripture this week caught my attention. Well actually it caught the attention of one of my parishioners who had highlighted the passage from Jeremiah: “for my people have committed two evils: they have forsaken me, the fountain of living water, and dug out cisterns for themselves, cracked cisterns that can hold no water”. My first thought was “only two?”. But the two do go to the heart of the matter. Living Water here reminds me of Jesus at the well with the Samaritan woman. He tells her that he will give her living water and she will never be thirsty again. You know if we could actually find it in ourselves to let go of the myriad of wants and desires that we work so hard to get and just be open to God as the life giving element that we really need - how much easier and more satisfying that would be. Sometimes the most readily available resources are the last ones we reach out to grasp. The second evil was the creation of the leaking cistern – putting our faith in false idols that we create rather than in God. They just do not hold water! My leaking cisterns are my stubborn efforts to be in control and to work, work, work. It is a pretty empty bucket that I am left holding. Thank goodness for family and friends who remind that that God desires for me to rest, to be at peace, and to depend on God’s guidance and love to get me through the tough times. The cistern that holds water is faith in God who is also the Living Water of Love that fills it.

The Banquet Robe

2010-08-19T17:47:00.003-04:00

Our lesson on Thursday at the evening Mass was Mat 22: 1-14. It is the story of the wedding banquet where the king gives a wedding banquet for his son, but all of the invitees turn down the invitation. One has work to do on the farm, one to his business and the rest mistreated the messengers. The king (God of course) tells the messengers to go back into the street and find everyone they can vagrants, theives etc and invite them to the wedding. They all come and then there is a twist. One person does not have on a wedding robe and the king throws him out into the darkness where there will be gnashing of teeth. The Gospel ends, “many of called, but few are chosen”.
I read somewhere once God said “seek ye first” and we responded “let me first”. As we approach the new church program year we have some choices to make. Do we make God our priority or do we choose to worship something else? Do we set aside time to be with our brothers and sisters in Christ to share bread and wine, to sing, to study, and to serve or do we allow other obligations to get in the way of a commitment to Trinity.
Being faithful in our worship attendance and in our pledges to the work of the church is not about feeling guilty for not doing something. It is about saying “yes” to the invitation out of a sense of gratitude and responsible stewardship. You can be a wonderful, compassionate, contributing person without going to church, but you cannot build a relationship with God unless you spend time with God. God’s invitation is there for the taking – just as you are, but it also involves change. Being a disciple is not a Sunday Brunch where you can graze on one faith practice and not another. Yoga is great but it is not the only robe that we wear at the wedding banquet. The robes that God gives us are worship, study, and service. When we do these three we will be ready for the feast.

Sunshine and scripture

2009-07-03T15:25:00.002-04:00

The sun is finally out. Yea! I am excited that we have a comment on the first ever Trinity Blogger page. Is there a way to say definitely that one life event or another is all bad or all good? Or is it somewhere in betwee?

This week's lesson from 2nd Sammuel adds an interesting twist.

2 Samuel 5:1-5, 9-10
All the tribes of Israel came to David at Hebron, and said, "Look, we are your bone and flesh. For some time, while Saul was king over us, it was you who led out Israel and brought it in. The LORD said to you: It is you who shall be shepherd of my people Israel, you who shall be ruler over Israel." So all the elders of Israel came to the king at Hebron; and King David made a covenant with them at Hebron before the LORD, and they anointed David king over Israel. David was thirty years old when he began to reign, and he reigned forty years. At Hebron he reigned over Judah seven years and six months; and at Jerusalem he reigned over all Israel and Judah thirty-three years.

David occupied the stronghold, and named it the city of David. David built the city all around from the Millo inward. And David became greater and greater, for the LORD, the God of hosts, was with him.

David's achievements are credited to God's presence with him. I take this to mean that God blessed him in some way. Does this speak to good and bad? to the existence of evil? The study of the problem of evil, or perhaps a better description is a study of how the existence of evil is justified alongside the existence of God, is called theodicy. Maybe someone out there - perhaps a philosopher :) - might help me out here...

Year B Proper 7

2009-06-20T14:12:00.000-04:00

Why do bad things happen to good people? Job knew that he was a good person who had obeyed God all his life. Yet all that he had was taken and so Job challenged God to meet him and to explain why God had stripped him of the blessings of life. God's asnwer addresses more of mystery than legality and so we are left wondering.

The disciples are terified of the chaos that rages around them, but Jesus' response to their pleas for help does not seem to assuage their fear, but rather leaves them wondering "who on earth is this man anyway?".

Job 38:1-11
Mark 4:35-41

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