The Ven. Richard I. Cluett
July 30, 2006
Proper 12 ~ 2Kings 4:42-44 John 6:1-21
When our children were young, it was our family practice to help serve Thanksgiving dinner to others before we went home to serve ourselves.
In those days I was the archdeacon and so had no parochial responsibilities. Also in those days, long, long ago, we had a diocesan mission to the Hispanic community in Allentown. The vicar was a former archdeacon of the Diocese of Puerto Rico. His name was Father Rueben Rodriguez; the name of the mission was Capilla Santo Nombre de Jesus.
It was one of the things I was most happiest about in my ministry as archdeacon. The fact of its existence gave me great joy. It was true, authentic, important, serving a vital need for a community that in those days was voiceless, powerless, of no account in the great scheme of things. It was very much like our work in Kajo Keji, in Southern Sudan today, but then in our own neighborhood. And the church, our church, our diocese, was there, ministering, because God called it to be and we made it happen.
Santo Nombre was at the corner of Ridge and Gordon Streets in Allentown; a ghetto of poverty, joblessness, drugs, the homeless, and families desperate to make a living and a life for themselves. The people in that neighborhood, mainly Hispanic, in time came to look to that mission as their voice, as their power, as the sign of their identity, their worth, as the Source of their succour, their help when there was no other.
And they were hungry, so hungry for so many things. And being associated with Capilla Santo Nombre de Jesus, and with Father Ruben, they knew would give them a chance to be fed – in whatever way they needed. Santo Nombre was a place of hospitality, caring, help, reconciliation – even salvation.
And like many such ministries, an important sign of all that was the annual community Thanksgiving dinner which in this case was provided by the people of the Santo Nombre themselves; open to all and to any who were hungry – hungry for food, hungry for community, hungry for a sense of being cared about, hungry for a party, a celebration, hungry for an opportunity to be the one who serves others in need.
And they came. Dressed in their best clothes they came. Bringing a dish to share, they came. From small, crowded airless apartments or rooms shared with too many members of families near and extended, they came. From no jobs, from low-paying jobs, from too many jobs they came. From the ordeal of hard-scrabbling life, they came… to give thanks.
It was the people of Santo Nombre de Jesus, the people who had so little in the terms of our culture, our society, and our economy, it was the members of that chapel who provided all that was necessary for Thanksgiving dinner, from roast turkey with filling to fried plantains. Who would have thought that these people could produce such a beautifully decorated dining hall, could provide such a wonderful feast, could make their neighbors, including the homeless, and themselves into such a loud, joyous community celebration of God’s goodness – in the midst of such need, want and hunger. Who would have thought they could do that?
It was a miracle.
And it was a miracle that Puddy and I wanted our family to be a part of – for all the reasons you might imagine. We were hungry too; with a hunger to be of use, a hunger to share, a hunger to be part of life at its most basic, most essential core, a hunger to be fed by the courage, and faith and resourcefulness of the people of Santo Nombre.
So each year our family would come down from our mountainside home, go down into the valley, into the center of the city to be a part of this miracle: to help set-up, cook-up, serve-up and clean-up – and thereby each one of us (and I don’t mean just the Cluett’s), each one, each person there was lifted-up; lifted-up into the presence of the one, holy God, in the community of saints, and given an experience of how God intends it to be for all people in all times, including right there at that time on the corner of Ridge and Gordon Streets in Allentown, PA.
It was a miracle. It was God’s kingdom present, glimpsed and experienced in that moment.
We read about it in the Revelation to John (7:14-17):
“… These are they who have come out of the great ordeal; they have washed their robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. For this reason they are before the throne of God, and worship him day and night within his temple, and the one who is seated on the throne will shelter them. They will hunger no more, and thirst no more; the sun will not strike them, nor any scorching heat; for the Lamb at the centre of the throne will be their shepherd, and he will guide them to springs of the water of life, and God will wipe away every tear from their eyes.”
We hear those words at funerals, during requiems. But God doesn’t intend that vision to be realized when we die. God intends it for NOW.
So... Today we are reminded through these readings that God wants hungry people fed. There is no hunger, no need that is of little concern to God. The desire of God’s heart is that the hungry be filled with good things. And that we help provide the bread that is needed – in whatever form.
Do you believe that you are truly called by God to feed the hungry? I do.
Do you believe this cathedral congregation is truly called by God to feed the hungry, to be a sign of God’s presence, to be an instrument of Hope for those who have so little reason to hope? I do.
Do you believe God wants us to take care of these things, to be the provider of these miracles, to stand by, to work with and to lift up those who are bowed down? byu the ordeal of their lives? I do.
Do you believe that God will provide what we need to do the ministry God wants done?
I do.
I deeply and completely believe God calls each of us and this cathedral to this ministry of miracle-making – filling the hungry with good things. And I believe in the very depth of my being and that in the heart of God all things necessary will be provided; as they were in the time of Elisha, in the ministry of Jesus, and through the people of the Capilla Santo Nombre de Jesus.
As we do that, we will find that God fills our deepest hungers, our greatest needs, as well. That, too, is part of the miracle.
Gracias, El Senor.
